Snowed In + Shut Down

Today’s notice: A man was killed while trying to enter Mar-a-Lago, authorities said. We check in on the DHS shutdown stalemate. White House trade hawks remain unbothered by Friday’s Supreme Court ruling. Democrats name their House flip targets. An election year with no FEC. And: what a day of trans lobbying on Capitol Hill was like.

THE LATEST

Another storm of the century. Both the House and Senate canceled today’s votes yesterday when it became clear the Blizzard of 2026 was set to snarl the Northeast — at least until Tauntauns can be distributed to lawmakers.

Human-made travel delays? Yesterday morning, Kristi Noem announced TSA PreCheck and Global Entry would be suspended as her department’s partial shutdown drags on. A few hours later, DHS reversed course, NOTUS’ Amelia Benavides-Colón reports.

What happened in between? The White House reportedly intervened. Also, President and CEO of Airlines for America Chris Sununu decried the announcement as travelers are “once again, [being] used as a political football amid another government shutdown.”

One thing DHS didn’t back off on: FEMA halting all non-disaster efforts. The agency “cannot continue normal recovery operations under these conditions and must prioritize only its most critical, life-saving responsibilities,” Noem said in her statement.

Any sign this is coming to an end? Short answer: No. Slightly longer version: NOTUS’ Avani Kalra writes negotiations between the White House and Democrats over reforms to federal immigration enforcement tactics are effectively stalled after both sides accused the other of being unreasonable.

The tariff refund shrug. “We will follow the court’s direction,” Scott Bessent told CNN yesterday, as the fallout from the Supreme Court’s ruling on Donald Trump’s tariff power scrambled a core focus of Trump’s second term. Some read the decision as requiring hundreds of billions in tariff refunds. Bessent said that’s for a lower court to decide, and not to expect anything to happen soon. “That could be weeks or months away, that decision,” he said.

Nothing to see here was the general take from administration officials yesterday. “It’s not as big of a change as people might think it is,” U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer told ABC News.

Open Tabs Trump Considers Targeted Strike Against Iran, Followed by Larger Attack (NYT); Kash Patel Spotted Celebrating in U.S. Olympic Hockey Team’s Locker Room (NOTUS); Violence erupts in Mexico after cartel leader “El Mencho” killed in military operation (CBS); US ambassador causes uproar by claiming Israel has a right to much of the Middle East (Politico)

From the White House

“In the middle of the night while most Americans were asleep, the United States Secret Service acted quickly and decisively to neutralize a crazy person,” That’s how Karoline Leavitt described an incident early Sunday morning in which an armed man was shot and killed by Secret Service agents and local police after he entered the secured perimeter of Mar-a-Lago.

Leavitt also used the moment to slam Democrats over the ongoing DHS shutdown: “Federal law enforcement are working 24/7 to keep our country safe and protect all Americans. It’s shameful and reckless that Democrats have chosen to shut down their Department.”

From the Hill

Trans people press Democrats to pick a side: “I want them to know that they’re visibly and immediately affecting my life and hundreds of other kids’ lives with what could easily be described as a wave of their hand,” Marigold, a 17-year-old transgender girl from Ohio who traveled to Capitol Hill as part of a trans rights lobbying day earlier this month, told NOTUS’ Oriana González.

Trepidation remains common. Democrats have largely pulled back from their Biden-era push for trans acceptance, viewing it as too divisive for purple districts.

Trust is still an issue, too. “We’ve had a problem with leakers,” said Rep. Becca Balint, cochair of the Congressional Equality Caucus, which seeks to educate lawmakers about trans issues. “You have a situation where there are members who generally want to get information and they want to be able to ask their question in a safe place, and unfortunately, right now, there are so many members who are leaking not just general concepts of what we talk about but tying it to specific people.”

But the first trans member of Congress said things have gotten easier. “I’m experiencing it,” Rep. Sarah McBride, Democrat of Delaware, told the trans families as they set out to lobby the Hill. She said there has been a shift from the months right after the 2024 election. “I see it in the conversations, individual conversations I have with my colleagues — some Democrats who were getting a little nervous and Republicans who thought that the days of bipartisan support for trans rights were over.”

From Texas

A Republican Senate primary turns nasty. NOTUS’ Daniella Diaz delivers a dispatch from the Lone Star State, painting a picture of the three-way race that has become a proxy for the future of the state’s Republican Party.

The stakes are high. Incumbent John Cornyn is in the fight of his political life to win a fifth term against the state’s attorney general, Ken Paxton, and Rep. Wesley Hunt.

There’s no love lost between the candidates. “If you stay around long enough, you hang around long enough, you end up in a position like John Cornyn is in right now,” Hunt told Daniella. “The party has left him. Clearly.”

Just don’t expect Trump to tip the scales. “I like all three of them, actually,” the president said last week.

From the campaign trail

Democratic House targets: The DCCC announced its first round of “Red to Blue” candidates this morning, who will receive support from national Democrats as they try to flip seats currently held by Republicans. The group of a dozen candidates includes districts in Arizona, Iowa, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia and Wisconsin.

F.E.Zzzzzz. The Federal Election Commission remains effectively offline nearly two months into the 2026 midterm elections. There are supposed to be six commissioners. There are currently two. The legal requirement to even hold a meeting of the FEC is four commissioners. This is not really going to change this cycle, NOTUS’ Taylor Giorno reports.

Trump nominated two commissioners this month – Republicans Ashley Stow and Andrew Woodson – but even if they have a smooth confirmation, the FEC will not truly be up and running. Four commissioners would make a quorum, which means the FEC can actively consider cases, but it’s also the number of votes required to take major action. So, every ruling would have to be unanimous. Good luck!

From your favorite podcast app

Rep. Sarah McBride, a Democrat from Delaware and the first openly transgender member of Congress, has introduced more bipartisan legislation than any other freshman. This week, she joined the On NOTUS podcast and spoke with Oriana González about getting Republicans to cosponsor bills with her and how she works to “not take the bait” when certain members of the GOP attack her identity.

“I’m there to be substantive, and I can work with people who disagree with me. And I think as a byproduct of that, I’ve been able to introduce 100% of my legislation as bipartisan legislation,” she told Oriana. Listen to the episode here.

NEW ON NOTUS

Another Palantir stockholder. Rep. Tom Suozzi, a Democrat, said in January that he regretted his vote with other moderate Democrats to fund DHS after the shooting of Alex Pretti. NOTUS’ Sam Larreal reports that Suozzi holds between $15,000 and $50,000 worth of Palantir stock, which shot up in value thanks in part to federal contracts with DHS. Suozzi’s office did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

More: Greenland Responds to Trump’s Hospital Boat Offer: Thanks But No Thanks, by Amelia Benavides-Colón

NOT US

• Donald Trump’s Pantomime United Nations, by Ishaan Tharoor for The New Yorker
  
• First AIPAC, Now AI PACs, by Emma Janssen for The American Prospect
  
• What Trump’s UFO Deep Dive Might Reveal to Americans, by Joel Schectman for The Wall Street Journal

WEEK AHEAD

Today: California Gov. Gavin Newsom makes a book tour stop in Rock Hill, S.C.

Tuesday: Trump is set to deliver his State of the Union address. Some Democratic lawmakers are also scheduled to appear in a counter-SOTU programming livestream hosted by progressive groups.

Wednesday: Surgeon General nominee Casey Means is scheduled to appear before the Senate HELP committee.

Thursday: Depositions of Bill and Hillary Clinton in the Epstein investigation by the House Oversight Committee are set to begin in Chappaqua, N.Y., and last two days.

Saturday: Secretary of State Marco Rubio will reportedly travel to Israel.

Thank you for reading! If you like this edition of the NOTUS newsletter, please forward it to a friend. If this newsletter was shared with you, please subscribe — it’s free! Have a Tip? Email us at tips@notus.org. And as always, we’d love to hear your thoughts on our newsletter at newsletters@notus.org.