HOUSE REPUBLICANS WILL REGROUP over the weekend, as they search of a way forward on President Trump’s agenda bill after suffering a stunning setback Friday.

 

Conservative fiscal hawks, insisting the bill doesn’t do enough to address the federal deficit or Medicaid work requirements, prevented the bill from advancing out of the House Budget Committee.

 

Five Republicans on the committee voted not to advance the “One Big Beautiful Bill” (OBBB) — Reps. Chip Roy (Texas), Ralph Norman (S.C.), Josh Brecheen (Okla.) and Andrew Clyde (Ga.). Rep. Lloyd Smucker (Pa.) at first voted yes, but changed his vote to no in a procedural move.

 

“To be clear—I fully support the One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB),” Smucker posted on X. “My vote today in the Budget Committee is a procedural requirement to preserve the committee’s opportunity to reconsider the motion to advance OBBB.”

 

It’s an embarrassing defeat for GOP leadership, who insisted the legislation would make it out of committee despite repeated warnings from fiscal hawks that they’d kill it if changes weren’t made.

 

House GOP leaders will spend the weekend strategizing and huddling with the dissenters. The Budget Committee will reconvene on Sunday evening.

 

House Budget Committee Chair Jodey Arrington (R-Texas) hopes the next vote will happen on Monday.

 

“We’re working through some remaining issues here,” Smucker added. “There are just a few outstanding issues I think everyone will get to yes, and we’re going to l resolve this as quick as we can and hopefully have a vote, ideally on Monday, and we can advance this bill.”

 

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has little room for error, with a self-imposed deadline of passing the full bill by Memorial Day.

 

“This bill falls profoundly short,” Roy said. “It does not do what we say it does with respect to deficits.”

 

Fiscal conservatives also want an earlier deadline to enforce Medicaid work requirements, which are currently scheduled to take affect in 2029.

 

“Sadly, I’m a hard no until we get this ironed out,” said Norman.

 

The House Freedom Caucus posted on X:

 

“Reps. Roy, Norman, Brecheen, Clyde and others continue to work in good faith to enact the President’s ‘Big Beautiful Bill’— we were making progress before the vote in the Budget Committee and will continue negotiations to further improve the reconciliation package. We are not going anywhere and we will continue to work through the weekend.”

 

There’s also the matter of the state and local tax (SALT) deduction. Republicans from blue states say they’ll withhold their support from the final bill unless the SALT cap is raised dramatically, which many conservative Republicans oppose.

 

Trump is not happy about the discord, posting on Truth Social before the vote:

 

“Republicans MUST UNITE behind, ‘THE ONE, BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL!’ … We don’t need ‘GRANDSTANDERS’ in the Republican Party. STOP TALKING, AND GET IT DONE!”

 

If Republicans are able to unite and pass the final bill, it will still face a tough pass through the Senate.

 

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) told Fox News’s Ainsley Earhardt that the bill is a “slap in the face” to fiscal conservatives because it raises the debt ceiling by $5 trillion.

 

“We’ll make changes,” Sen. John Hoeven (R-S.D.) told NBC News.

💡Perspectives:

• Whole Hog Politics: Reality bites Republicans’ budget happy talk.

• The Hill: DOGE isn’t meeting its goals thanks to the political establishment.

• The Hill: The actual cost of a US ‘Golden Dome’ could be staggering.

• The Hill: Congress must defund Planned Parenthood.

• Commentary: The real first 100 days.

Read more: 

• Trump’s honeymoon is over; his political resilience isn’t.

• These Republicans voted against advancing Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’.

• GOP bill makes heavy cuts to green energy credits in its fine print.

• Opponents raise alarm over school vouchers in GOP budget bill.

• Boeing won’t face criminal charges in a fraud case stemming from two fatal 737 MAX plane crashes that killed 346 people after it reached a tentative non-prosecution agreement with the Justice Department.

   

• The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to lift a judge’s order blocking mass layoffs at 21 federal agencies. 

   

• More than 400 New Jersey Transit train engineers went on strike Friday in a dispute over pay, affecting more than 350,000 New Jersey and New York City commuters. 

• Eleven inmates escaped from a New Orleans jail Friday. The public is advised to stay alert and aware.

©  AP Photo/Alex Brandon

President Trump returns to Washington tonight after his trip to the Middle East and he’s ready to tussle with critics.

 

Trump was active on Truth Social during the flight from the United Arab Emirates back to the U.S, attacking Taylor Swift, Bruce Springsteen and former FBI director James Comey.

 

“Has anyone noticed that, since I said ‘I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT,’ she’s no longer ‘HOT?’,” Trump posted, reigniting his feud with the pop star, who endorsed former Vice President Harris for president in 2024.

 

Trump also took aim at The Boss, who has been savaging Trump in remarks at his concerts.

 

“Never liked [Springsteen], never liked his music, or his Radical Left Politics and, importantly, he’s not a talented guy — Just a pushy, obnoxious JERK, who fervently supported Crooked Joe Biden, a mentally incompetent FOOL, and our WORST EVER President, who came close to destroying our Country,” Trump said.

 

And the entire Trump administration has rallied against Comey, who posted an image of sea shells on a beach in the shape of the number “86-47,” which they cast as a call to violence against Trump, the 47th president.

 

Comey, who Trump fired during his first term, deleted the post and said he wasn’t aware of its meaning.

 

“He knew exactly what that meant,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News’s Bret Baier. “A child knows what that meant. If you’re the FBI director and you don’t know what that meant, that meant assassination. And it says it loud and clear.”

 

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem says she’s investigating Comey after he “called for the assassination of Trump.”

 

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard accused Comey of “issuing a hit” on Trump and said he should be “put behind bars.”

 

Comey has been promoting his new political thriller book on social media.

 

The Hill’s Alex Gangitano reports:

 

“Making the case could be difficult, given protections for free speech and the broad meanings behind the ’86ing’ of someone.”

 

Trump also said Friday he’d be open to releasing the audio of former President Biden’s interview with special counsel Ben Hur, which ignited debate about Biden’s mental acuity.

 

Trump said he’d leave it up to Attorney General Pam Bondi to make the call.

 

Hur recommended that Biden not be prosecuted for mishandling classified documents, saying he couldn’t recall key facts about his life and that a jury would likely find him to be a “sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”

 

The Biden Justice Department blocked efforts to release the audio, although a transcript of the interview was released last year.

💡Perspectives:

• Washington Times: Trump torches neocon elite in the Middle

• USA Today: Qatar tries to rewrite history with gift to Trump.

• Los Angeles Times: How much power should federal judges have?

• The Hill: Democrats are failing against Trump.

• CNN: Trump might be a strongman but still can’t do everything he wants.

Read more: 

• Trump touts investments as he departs Middle East.

• Trump military parade costs could hit $45M.

• Boeing accelerates its momentum with win from Trump, Qatar.

• Trump administration fires almost 600 Voice of America employees.

• Trump’s firing of FEMA director unsettles GOP senators.

Officials from Russia and Ukraine met Friday in Turkey for about two hours, the first direct peace talks to take place since Russia invaded Ukraine more than three years ago.

 

There was hope that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin would meet in person, but Putin sent an aide instead.

 

The Trump administration says it’s unlikely a peace deal can be reached without Trump directly engaging Putin.

 

President Trump, who considered a last-minute stop in Turkey if Putin had gone, said he’d like to meet with the Russian leader “as soon as we can set it up.”

ELSEWHERE…

After extending an “olive branch” to Iran, Trump says the nation must move quickly to to strike a nuclear deal with the U.S.

 

There are reports that the U.S. would be willing to lift sanctions on Iran if it abandons its efforts to build a nuclear weapon, draws back its uranium enrichment and allows for independent inspections.

 

Iran’s foreign minister on Friday disputed claims that a deal had been proposed:

 

“Iran has not received any written proposal from the United States, whether directly or indirectly,” Seyed Abbas Araghchi posted on X.

 

“Iran nonetheless remains determined and straightforward: Respect our rights and terminate your sanctions, and we have a deal. Mark my words: there is no scenario in which Iran abandons its hard-earned right to enrichment for peaceful purposes: a right afforded to all other NPT signatories, too.”

©  AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey

Consumer confidence is down, but stocks notched another day of gains, boosted by better-than-expected inflation data and the pause in the trade war with China.

 

The latest University of Michigan survey released Friday recorded the second-lowest ever reading of consumer sentiment.

 

However, stocks posted another strong week, with inflation data coming in lower than expected.

 

The S&P 500 rose about 5 percent this week after posting its fifth straight day of gains.

 

• The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) requested 20,000 National Guard troops to assist with immigration enforcement.

 

DHS made the request to the Pentagon “to help carry out the President’s mandate from the American people to arrest and deport criminal illegal aliens,” DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement.

 

Meanwhile, DHS says it is in the early stages of vetting a potential reality show that would have immigrants competing for a fast-track to citizenship.

 

Producer Rob Worsoff, who created the hit show “Duck Dynasty,” pitched DHS on the idea.

 

McLaughlin said the show “is in the very beginning stages” of a vetting process.

💡Perspectives:

• New York Times: How did so many elected Dems miss Biden’s infirmity?

• The Atlantic: America is having a showboater moment.

• The Hill: Vance and Rubio are auditioning daily for a 2028 audience of one.

• The Liberal Patriot: What Democrats can learn from Morena.

Read more: 

• Trump signals US will inform countries of new tariff rates in coming weeks.

• Newark mayor seeks dismissal of charges from ICE facility encounter.

• Judge rescinds order requiring administration to admit 12K refugees.

• 5 takeaways from birthright citizenship argument at Supreme Court.

Here’s who’s talking Sunday…

 

NewsNation’s “The Hill Sunday”: Reps. Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.) and Marc Veasey (D-Texas).

 

NBC’s “Meet the Press”: Former Vice President Mike Pence; Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent; Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.).

 

CNN’s “State of the Union”: Bessent; Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.).

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