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THE FIGHT OVER PRESIDENT TRUMP’S immigration policies is growing in intensity, with emotions running hot on both sides of the aisle.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem accused three Democratic lawmakers of committing “felonies” during a scuffle with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials at a detention facility in New Jersey last week. Newark Mayor Ras Baraka (D) was arrested for trespassing during the encounter.
“It was a political stunt that put the safety of our law enforcement officers, our agents, our staff and our detainees at risk,” Noem said Wednesday at a hearing about the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) budget.
“There are proper protocols and there are procedures that must be abided by,” she added. “These congressional members and staff visit our facilities all of the time, and these members could follow the policies that have been in place.”
The New Jersey Democrats — Reps. Bonnie Watson Coleman, Robert Menendez and LaMonica McIver — say they were there on official business and insist the ICE agents instigated the physical contact.
“Instead of launching an investigation into the incident, your Department lied to the press about the situation and threatened to arrest Members of Congress for doing their jobs,” said Rep. Bennie Thompson (Miss.), the top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee.
DHS says it’s reviewing video of the encounter and that the lawmakers could still be arrested.
Democrats, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), have warned that arresting the lawmakers would be an untenable escalation.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said House Republicans are weighing what actions to take.
“We’re having conversations — we had them this morning in the House Republican conference meeting this morning — about appropriate action that we need to take here to address that inappropriate behavior, the wildly inappropriate behavior,” Johnson said.
Rep. Earl “Buddy” Carter (R-Ga.) introduced a resolution seeking to remove the three New Jersey Democrats from their committee posts.
NERVES FRAYED
It was a chaotic day on Capitol Hill, with nerves frayed after two House committees worked all night to mark up the GOP’s Trump agenda bill. A couple of lawmakers were spotted dozing in their seats during the markups in the early hours of the morning.
• Capitol Police on Wednesday removed protesters who disrupted the start of a Senate hearing with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., which followed arrests on Tuesday of activists protesting cuts to Medicaid.
•At one point, several Republican members of the House Agriculture Committee were spotted running through the tunnel connecting the Capitol to House to defeat a Democratic motion to end a markup.
MORE ON IMMIGRATION
•A federal grand jury indicted Wisconsin judgeHannah Dugan over allegations she helped an immigrant living in the country illegally to escape from immigration officers who were looking to arrest him.
•In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) proposed to stop enrolling low-income immigrants in the country illegally in the state-funded health care program beginning next year, citing budget issues. He also said California would need to begin charging those already in the program.
💡Perspectives:
•The Hill: The Supreme Court can settle nationwide injunctions.
• Newsweek: Democrats must show they can do change, too.
A brutal and record-early heat wave is baking Texas this week, bringing triple-digit temperatures typical of July to the middle of May.
California’s top insurance regulator ruled that State Farm can raise premiums by 17 percent for all of its home insurance customers as Los Angeles looks to rebuild after the devastating wildfires.
President Trump signed an economic and defense partnership with Qatar on the second leg of his trip to the Middle East, although the controversy over his acceptance of a luxury jet threatens to drown out his investment achievements.
The White House says the agreement with Qatar is worth $1.2 trillion, underscored by an agreement by Qatar Airways to purchase 160 Boeing airplanes. The deal also includes new Qatari investments in U.S. tech and defense, including the purchase of billions worth of U.S. military equipment.
“We’ve liked each other and worked with each other,” Trump said. “And now we can work in the highest capacity.”
Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg was on hand for the signing, along with Qatari emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani and Qatar Airways CEO Badr Mohammed Al Meer.
But a different controversy involving Boeing dominated headlines in the U.S., with Trump agreeing to accept a $400 million luxury jet from Qatar to serve as Air Force One for the remainder off his term before being decommissioned and donated to his presidential library.
Trump says the jet is needed because Boeing has fallen years behind in its effort to deliver a new presidential aircraft, and the current one is 40 years old.
Republicans are alarmed by the possibility of espionage and other national security issues surrounding the gift, as well as the ethics of accepting a gift from a country with a record of human rights abuses.
“I trust Qatar like I trust a rest stop bathroom,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said on Fox News. “If they want to be friendly, I want to be friendly back. But with those guys, you know, trust in God but tie up your camel.”
Democrats are leaning into the controversy, casting the gift as a bribe and believing allegations of corruption will stick to Trump.
“It is gross, it is reckless, it is corrupt, and the outrage and the condemnation, especially on the Republican side, should be universal,” Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) said on the Senate floor. “There is no excuse or justification for this. It is wrong, and that is the end of the story.”
Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) pressed Attorney General Pam Bondi on Wednesday over her decision to deem the jet as a “legally permissible” gift, citing Bondi’s past work as a lobbyist for Qatar.
“[T]here are serious questions about whether you should have recused yourself from this matter,” Durbin wrote to Bondi.
Democrats flew a plane carrying a banner that reads “Qatar-a-lago” over Trump’s Florida estate on Wednesday.
Trump defended the gift in late night social media posts and in questions from the press.
“The Boeing 747 is being given to the United States Air Force/Department of Defense, NOT TO ME!” Trump posted on TruthSocial. “Why should our military, and therefore our taxpayers, be forced to pay hundreds of millions of Dollars when they can get it for FREE … Only a FOOL would not accept this gift on behalf of our Country.”
Trump travels to the United Arab Emirates for the final leg of his trip Thursday.
Earlier this week, Trump signed a $600 billion investment deal with Saudi Arabia. The president also met with the new Syrian leaderAhmed al-Sharaa after announcing the U.S. would drop sanctions on the country following the fall of the Assad regime.
The president dismissed criticism that he’s slighting Israel by not traveling there on his tour of the Middle East.
“This is good for Israel, having a relationship like I have with these countries — Middle Eastern countries, essentially all of them,” Trump said.
MEANWHILE…
The proposed peace talks between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky may not happen as planned in Turkey on Thursday.
Zelensky says he’ll only attend if Putin attends, but the Russian leader has not committed.
Trump said he’d consider attending if it would help Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is currently slated to attend.
“I don’t know if [Putin’s] showing up,” Trump said. “I know he would like me to be there. And that’s a possibility…I’ve been thinking about that. Now tomorrow, we’re all booked out, you understand that…Now that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t do it to save a lot of lives and come back.”
House Republican efforts to pass President Trump’s agenda bill by Memorial Day are in peril, as the GOP continues to face intra-party disagreements over Medicaid cuts and taxes.
The House Ways and Means Committeeadvanced the tax portion of the bill on a party-line vote after a 17-hour mark-up dragged into the early hours of the morning, sending it the House Budget Committee, which must cobble it together into “one big, beautiful bill.”
But conservatives in the caucus say the bill doesn’t sufficiently cut spending or do enough to beef-up work requirements for Medicaid. They’re threatening to sink the bill unless changes are made that could potentially scare off moderate Republicans.
“In my opinion they don’t go far enough,” said Rep. Eric Burleson (R-Mo.), a member of the House Freedom Caucus who does not support the package.
“At the end of the day, we have a $2 trillion deficit and the fact that we’re — we’re shuffling the chairs on the top of the Titanic here,” he added. “So we’ve got to do more.”
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the GOP Medicaid plan would leave 7.6 million people uninsured, opening Republicans up to political attacks from Democrats ahead of next year’s midterm elections.
Meanwhile, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) met with Republicans from blue states that say they won’t vote for the bill unless it contains a higher deduction cap on state and local taxes (SALT).
Johnson left the meeting optimistic and saying he expected to have a deal in place with the SALT Republicans on Wednesday, but nothing has been announced.
If House Republicans are able to unite and pass the reconciliation bill, it would go to the Senate, where Republicans are already saying it’s a nonstarter, with the same divisions over spending cuts and Medicaid.
“We need to return to a reasonable pre-pandemic-level spending,” Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) told NewsNation’s Blake Burman. “At a minimum, we shouldn’t be increasing the deficit, and I don’t see any scenario that they’re discussing right now where we don’t actually increase the deficit over 10 years with this big, beautiful bill.”
Johnson said he hopes Senate Republicans don’t completely overhaul the bill, pushing the upper chamber for “the most minimal modifications” possible in order to keep his fractured caucus happy.
“I understand the Senate has its role to play and its job to do, but we have 170 more personalities and opinions to contend with here, and the product that we send over I think will be a very good one, and I hope they make the most minimal modifications possible,” he said.
Democrats have their own divisions, with party leaders poised to shoot down an effort by Rep. Shri Thanedar (D-Mich.) to impeach Trump.
“This is not the right approach we should be taking,” said Rep. Pete Aguilar (Calif.), the chair of the Democratic Caucus. “We’ll join the members of the leadership team in voting to table that motion.”
House Democrats pressed Thanedar to drop the effort, but he’s dug in.
Democrats are feeling beaten down during Trump’s second term, with a new Associated Press-NORC poll finding that only about one-third of Democrats are optimistic about the party’s future.
💡Perspectives:
•Spiked: Trump has scrambled the old class allegiances.
