A Lot of Decimal Places
Senate leaders will sort through almost 700 amendments—ranging from border issues to Taiwan security and counter-drone technologies—when they take up the $925.8 billion defense authorization bill next week.
Roxana Tiron walks through what to expect at the marathon markup and explains the points of friction between the Senate (
Among them: about $32 billion more than the Trump administration requested would be authorized by the Senate version. The Senate also proposes defying the Pentagon’s plans to curtail the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program.
The House plans to consider its version of the legislation the second week of September. Lawmakers have a Thursday deadline to file proposed floor amendments. Read More
Fed Upheaval
President Donald Trump said he’s got grounds to fire the first black woman to serve as a Federal Reserve governor.
The move against Lisa Cook came after a member of Trump’s team, Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte, asked the Justice Department to look at whether Cook’s handling of a mortgage amounted to fraud. DOJ said it would investigate, and Trump said he doesn’t have to wait for due process to play out.
He posted a letter to Cook on Truth Social saying she needed to go because of “deceitful and possibly criminal conduct in a financial matter.” Cook was defiant and refused to quit.
The Fed is set up to be a body of independent decision-makers; presidents can only remove governors for cause. Laws generally define that as inefficiency; neglect of duty; and malfeasance, meaning wrongdoing, in office. Forcing Cook out would give Trump an opportunity to secure a four-person majority on the Fed’s seven-member Board of Governors. Those governors, in turn, approve the regional Fed presidents, all of which have terms ending next year. Read More
See Also:
- Lisa Cook’s Journey From Fed Governor to Target of Trump’s Ire
- What Is the Mortgage Fraud Lisa Cook Is Accused Of?: QuickTake
More Redistricting
The legislatures in Texas and California vote to shuffle their states’ congressional district lines for bare-knuckled political reasons. Now Utah is being ordered to redo its lines because the current ones are too partisan.
The Associated Press reports that a judge ruled last night that the Republican-controlled legislature went too far in 2021 with a four-way split of Salt Lake County — the state’s population center and a Democratic stronghold.
District Court Judge Dianna Gibson declared the map unlawful because lawmakers weakened and ignored an independent commission established by voters to prevent partisan gerrymandering.
Republican lawmakers may be able to run out the clock by appealing the ruling since a new map would have to be in place well before candidates start filing to run in early January.
The new Texas map hasn’t yet been signed into law and there’s already a court challenge arguing that the lines were drawn illegally based on the racial makeup of voters.
“Every aspect of this mid-decade redraw of the congressional map has been infused with impermissible racial motives,” violating the 14th and 15th Amendments, the plaintiffs’ US District Court complaint says. The plaintiffs are 20 Black or Latino voters alleging their votes are diluted under the new map, Ryan Autullo reports. Read More
California Republicans are also suing to stop a special election the Legislature called to approve a new map, Maia Spoto and Isaiah Poritz report. The emergency petition filed Monday before the California Supreme Court said Democrats’ push for a new map runs counter to the California Constitution’s requirement that maps be made by an independent redistricting committee.
An earlier lawsuit from Republican legislators wasn’t enough to block lawmakers from approving the plan. Read More
Senate 2026
Democrats had a good August, locking down their most-wanted recruits when former Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown and North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper said they’d run for Senate seats currently held by Republicans. Now what?
Lillianna Byington and Greg Giroux report on the state of next year’s midterm Senate lineup, which has Republicans defending 22 seats to the Democrats’ 13. The GOP has a 53-47 majority, and all but two of the seats the party will be defending are in states Trump won by at least 10 percentage points last year. Read More
See Also: Senate Democrats Use Recess to Raise Profile, Test 2026 Message
Saying the Quiet Part Out Loud
It wasn’t a pundit or an analyst or an academic connecting dots. Trump himself pointed out that the states he has chosen for possible — and in one case, past — National Guard patrols are led by possible 2028 White House hopefuls.
“All of their potential candidates are doing a bad job,” Trump told reporters.
The comment came during Q&A about Trump expressing interest in sending the National Guard to Baltimore and Chicago. Troops previously were deployed to Los Angeles.
At a downtown Chicago press conference, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) said Trump “wants to use the military to occupy a US city, punish his dissidents and score political points. If this were happening in any other country, we would have no trouble calling it what it is, a dangerous power grab.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) posted on X quotes from Trump’s news conference, calling it “super normal stuff.” Read More
Eye on Tariffs
The cabinet minister leading trade talks for Canada is flying to Washington today with the intention of meeting with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.
The move follows Canada’s pledge to remove most of its retaliatory tariffs on US goods.
“We are looking, I hope, for an agreement that will put us in a better position than we are right now,” Dominic LeBlanc said Monday in a French-language radio interview on Canada’s public broadcaster. Read More
A draft notice published yesterday outlines plans to push tariffs on India to 50% starting tomorrow, the latest sign the White House plans to push ahead with the heightened levies initially announced as a wa to push Russia toward peace with Ukraine.
Trump announced plans earlier this month to double tariffs on Indian goods from 25% to 50% over its purchases of Russian oil. The Indian government has decried the so-called secondary tariffs as unfair. India’s external affairs minister said Saturday that trade negotiations between New Delhi and Washington continue. Read More
See also:
- Modi Is Seizing on Trump’s Tariffs to Cut India Taxes, Red Tape
- Trump Threatens Export Curbs, Tariffs in Digital Tax Retaliation
- Hyundai to Lift US Investment to $26 Billion After Lee Visit
Different Environment
Three new presidential flexes are demonstrating this administration’s determination to have environmental regulations that are as far as possible from those of the past.
One fresh demonstration of muscle is hitting renewable energy suppliers, another is brushing aside regulations that threatened to slow down southern border wall-building, and a third is intended to help big rig operators:
- A court filing shows the Interior Department intends to remand and vacate a permit granted to the $6 billion Maryland Offshore Wind Project, which was approved in 2024 and was set to begin construction next year. Read More
- Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is expediting construction of border barriers within a national wildlife refuge in Texas, Ellen M. Gilmer reports. The waivers of environmental reviews, historic preservation requirements, and other laws are part of a broader effort bolstered by the $46.5 billion Congress appropriated this year to fund construction. Read More
- And as you probably know, because of California’s topography — with mountains and valleys that create pollution-trapping bowls — the federal government for decades has let the state enact extra-strict air emission regulations. The Trump administration, which has been chipping away at those Clean Air Act exceptions, is now moving toward making the state go easier on heavy-duty vehicles, Jennifer Hijazi reports. Read More
Before You Go
Blue Slips: Trump is threatening to go to court over a Senate Judiciary Committee tradition. Giving deference to homestate senators over certain nominations makes it “impossible for me as president to appoint a judge or a US attorney,” the president said. Read More
Epstein Probe: A congressional committee is expanding its investigation into the sex-trafficking operation run by the late financier Jeffrey Epstein. House Oversight Chairman James Comer said a Sept. 19 interview has been scheduled with the former prosecutor who approved a plea deal that allowed Epstein to avoid serious charges. Read More
Escalation: Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro used his weekly television show to confirm he deployed 15,000 “well armed and trained” troops to the border with Colombia as US warships head to the southern Caribbean. “Unfortunately this gentleman, with his madness and extremism, could lead Trump to the worst possible scenario in Latin America and the Caribbean,” Maduro said, referring to Secretary of State Marco Rubio. “We will emerge victorious from this situation.” Read More
Clarification
An item in yesterday’s edition referred to visas that are popular with seasonal workers and the tech industry. The type that the tech sector relies on are H-1B visas.
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