Today’s notice: Shutdown dance steps. Heavy sighs after the White House signed on to TikTok. Where are we on the Epstein files? And: Thanks to media outlets like NOTUS, we know a lot more about that John Bolton search warrant.
THE LATEST
The delicate shutdown dance: Rep. Tom Cole and Sen. Susan Collins — the chief appropriators in their respective chambers — have a plan to avert a government shutdown: a bipartisan, extremely short-term continuing resolution through November, NOTUS’ Helen Huiskes and Em Luetkemeyer report.
Some Senate Democrats on Thursday told NOTUS they’d be willing to vote for it.
Problem solved? No! “Right now, to me, there’s no sign that the Republicans are taking seriously the need to pass a bipartisan bill,” Sen. Chris Murphy said. “There has not been any meeting of the leaders. The White House hasn’t reached out to Democratic leadership, so there’s been no serious effort.”
This is more of a vibes negotiation at this point. Collins and Cole really want to sell Democrats on the idea they can trust institutional norms. We’re doing this regular is the vibe on offer from those two.
That pitch might run up against another fraught negotiation — over nominations. Republicans say they may change Senate rules as soon as next week to pass Trump’s nominees en masse, NOTUS’ Ursula Perano reports.
“Amy did this in 2023,” Sen. Markwayne Mullin told NOTUS on Thursday, referencing Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s proposal to push 10 nominees through at once. “I mean, it’s dang near the exact same language, except we may not put a limit of 10. We may put unlimited on there.”
Open tabs: Trump to Rename the Department of Defense (NOTUS); Chinese Cyberattackers May Have Stolen Data From Almost Every American (NYT); DOJ is looking at ways to ban transgender Americans from owning guns (CNN); Northwestern President Steps Down Amid Trump Pressure (WSJ)
From the Hill
Republican senators have grown more skeptical of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
At a hearing yesterday, Sens. Thom Tillis, John Barrasso and Bill Cassidy peppered Kennedy with questions about Donald Trump’s Operation Warp Speed in light of HHS’s mRNA funding cuts.
“I can’t conclude from the discussion today where you are on Warp Speed. So I would like a definitive statement on exactly where you are,” Tillis said. “I, for one, think it was a signature accomplishment of President Trump.”
An emboldened RFK Jr: “Is this a question, Sen. Cassidy, or is this a speech?” Kennedy said when Cassidy asked about the canceled mRNA vaccine research funds. Kennedy didn’t directly address the canceled contracts.
The secretary was remarkably candid about his anti-vaccine views, a shift from his more cautious approach in past hearings, NOTUS’ Margaret Manto reports.
From D.C.
A new domestic deployment legal test: One federal judge already swatted the White House’s justification for using federal troops in domestic law enforcement roles in a scathing ruling on the Los Angeles deployment.
Now, D.C. leaders are betting on a different federal judge to rule that same way on Trump’s deployment of federal troops into the District. “The forced military occupation of the District of Columbia violates our local autonomy and basic freedoms. It must end,” D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb posted Thursday on X after filing a suit against the Trump administration.
From the White House
The clock is no longer Tok-ing: “TikTok should be banned. It was banned, actually. So no, I’m not really happy about it,” Rep. Carlos Gimenez said of the new White House TikTok account. Once it was a pressing issue — with a deadline attached and everything — but now, NOTUS’ Haley Byrd Wilt and Samuel Larreal report, Republicans who supported the TikTok ban are resigned to Trump doing as he pleases.
“My hope is that it happens sooner rather than later,” Rep. John Moolenaar, chair of the House select committee on competition with China, said of the TikTok sale long ago required by law.
From John Bolton’s house
What federal agents seized: Two iPhones, four boxes “containing printed daily activities” and several computers and hard drives. Also a “white binder labeled ‘statements and reflections to allied strikes’” and “typed documents in folders labeled ‘Trump I-IV,’” according to documents released by a federal judge at the request of NOTUS and other media orgs.
What does this mean? Newly released federal law enforcement records say Bolton is being investigated for the same criminal charge Trump faced for hoarding classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, a case that was ultimately dismissed.
THE BIG ONE
How many Republicans will cross Trump and sign on to Rep. Thomas Massie’s discharge petition to release DOJ documents on Jeffrey Epstein? Massie said he’s still confident he’ll get the numbers he needs, NOTUS’ Daniella Diaz reports, but “it’ll take a week or two.”
As of yesterday, he still needed three more Republican signatures.
The White House is fighting him, and it’s working. “I told the White House liaison — who’s working against me — I said, ‘I may have made a tactical error here by actually getting co-sponsors on my bill, because now you know which 12 to target,’ and he kind of smiled,” Massie told the NYT.
“Anytime they’re not talking about the victories of this administration means they’re not talking about things that help us,” a White House official told Jasmine this week as Trump redrew his political line on this topic.
Momentum is fading as the White House courts the very influencers that thrust Epstein onto center stage this summer. That said, the DOJ was forced to respond Thursday to a James O’Keefe sting video purporting to capture a department official suggesting the administration would “redact every Republican” from the Epstein files.
Where does this saga go? The Democratic dream was always that Epstein would deeply fracture Trump’s GOP. But if Massie can’t get the signatures, it will be up to Democrats to try to keep Epstein going.
NEW ON NOTUS
Who the NRSC likes in Iowa: In a memo to donors, the committee said state Rep. Ashley Hinson would be a “formidable contender” in the general. NOTUS’ Reese Gorman reports that the memo stopped short of formally endorsing Hinson’s candidacy to replace Sen. Joni Ernst as Republican nominee, but came pretty darn close.
More: Major Wind Project Sues the Trump Administration, by Shifra Dayak
Trump Admin Plans to Make Citizenship Test More Challenging, by Amelia Benavides-Colón
Rep. Tim Burchett Shoves Protester on Capitol Hill, by Amelia Benavides-Colón
NOT US
- Trump Is Accusing Foes With Multiple Mortgages of Fraud. Records Show 3 of His Cabinet Members Have Them. By Robert Faturechi, Justin Elliott and Alex Mierjeski for ProPublica
- RFK Jr. and the White House buried a major study on alcohol and cancer. Here’s what it shows. By Dylan Scott for Vox
- Federal judges criticize Supreme Court’s handling of Trump cases, by Lawrence Hurley for NBC News
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