Good afternoon. This is the Final NOTUS newsletter for May 15, 2026. You can get it in your inbox every day by signing up here — it’s free!

THE LATEST

Donald Trump isn’t taking his foot off the ballroom gas pedal. The White House’s pressure campaign is accelerating before the Senate presents its budget reconciliation bill as early as next week — even as Republicans work to patch the other provisions that got “Byrd bathed” last night.

Senate aides will meet with the chamber parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, today about the ballroom’s proposed funding as part of her budget review. As it stands, Trump’s ballroom money may not reach the necessary 50 votes with several senators on the fence. Meanwhile, Secret Service Director Sean Curran again briefed a group of House Republicans, including Homeland Security Chair Andrew Garbarino, last night on the project’s funding details.

In a new DOJ court filing that sounds like it could have come from Trump’s Truth Social, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche says the D.C. nonprofit suing over the ballroom “never once denies” its case is “motivated by an irrational desire to stop anything associated with [Trump], which even Democrat elected officials have labeled as ‘Trump Derangement Syndrome.’”

THE ADMINISTRATION

Trump is still noncommittal on sending a $14 billion arms package to Taiwan following his China summit. He also declined to say whether he would defend Taiwan, and said he told Chinese President Xi Jinping “‘I don’t talk about those things.’”

• “The last thing we need right now is a war that’s 9,500 miles away,” he told reporters on Air Force One.

Cuban officials are bracing for a potential conflict with the U.S. — including running drills in case of an invasion. The DOJ is taking steps to indict the country’s former leader Raúl Castro, a move which would require approval from a grand jury first.

• “We are preparing to defend ourselves,” Lianys Torres Rivera, Cuba’s top diplomat in the U.S., told The Hill.

Scoop: The Pentagon plans to downgrade the Army’s top command overseeing Europe and Africa by midsummer, replacing Christopher Donahue, a four-star general, with a three-star or lieutenant general. Donahue is best known publicly as the last American service member photographed leaving Afghanistan.

The DOJ is pursuing the death penalty against a man accused of fatally shooting two Israeli Embassy employees last May.

THE HILL

The fragile coalition behind House Republicans’ housing bill is collapsing ahead of next week’s floor vote, even with strong support from Mike Johnson and Steve Scalise.

• Some Republicans feel as though the new version is too favorable to Democrats or senators, or both. “We passed our bill, and they threw it in the garbage,” one House Republican told NOTUS.
• House Financial Services Chair French Hill argues everyone knew the changes were coming: “I’ve been telling people this for months, and so we tried to make as narrow and craft a set of changes to the Senate bill as passed as we could.”

Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen is retiring after Tennessee Republicans passed a new congressional map carving up the Memphis portion of his district, which has a majority-Black population.

• “I don’t want to quit, I’m not a quitter,” he told reporters. “But these districts were drawn to defeat me.”

THE STATES

The Texas Supreme Court rejected Gov. Greg Abbott’s effort to remove House Democratic Leader Gene Wu from office over dozens of members leaving the state last year to delay redistricting.

THEY HAVE ONE, TOO

Thank you for reading! Today’s newsletter was produced by Kelly Poe and Andrew Burton. If you liked it, please forward it to a friend. If someone shared it with you, please subscribe — it’s free! Got a tip or comments to share? Email us at finalnotus@notus.com.