The latest in politics and policy.
Direct to your inbox.
Sign up for the Evening Report newsletter
96
<!–
Presented by Jewish Federations of North America
{beacon}
Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough dealt a blow to President Trump’s agenda bill Thursday, rejecting a key Medicaid provision that was central to GOP efforts to cut federal spending.
Republicans had planned to cap states’ use of health care provider taxes to collect more federal Medicaid funding as a means of offsetting the costs of making Trump’s tax cuts permanent.
“The cap on health care provider taxes in both states that expanded Medicaid and did not expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act was projected to save hundreds of billions of dollars over the next 10 years, but it would have forced states to shoulder substantially more of the cost for Medicaid coverage.”
MacDonough does not decide what goes into legislation, but determines whether the text adheres to Senate rules around the filibuster.
The GOP hopes to pass the reconciliation bill with a 51-vote majority, but MacDonough’s ruling means that if the Medicaid provision is included, the bill would need 60 votes to overcome a Democratic filibuster. At the moment, Republicans are having a hard enough time scrounging up a simple majority.
The Medicaid provision was divisive and had received strong pushback from a handful of Senate Republicans, who warned it would lead to rural hospital closures.
The ruling sent Republicans scrambling for additional federal spending cuts, with fiscal hawks in both chambers vowing to oppose the bill over debt levels.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said he would not overrule the parliamentarian.
“No, that would not be a good outcome for getting a bill done,” Thune told reporters, saying he believes they’ll be able to suss out additional savings elsewhere.
“These are … short-term setbacks,” he added. “Speed bumps, if you will. We’re focused on the goal.”
REPUBLICANS FUME
Not all Republicans reacted with Thune’s level of restraint.
“The WOKE Senate Parliamentarian, who was appointed by Harry Reid and advised Al Gore, just STRUCK DOWN a provision BANNING illegals from stealing Medicaid from American citizens,” Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) posted on X. “This is a perfect example of why Americans hate THE SWAMP.”
“Unelected bureaucrats think they know better than U.S. Congressmen who are elected BY THE PEOPLE,” he added. “Her job is not to push a woke agenda. THE SENATE PARLIAMENTARIAN SHOULD BE FIRED ASAP.”
Hardline conservatives in the House joined in the criticism, urging the Senate to overrule the parliamentarian, which would be a major departure from protocol.
“It is time for our elected leaders to take back control,” Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.) posted on X. “@JDVance should overrule the Parliamentarian and let the will of the people, not some staffer hiding behind Senate procedure, determine the future of this country.”
The White House declined to address the parliamentarian’s ruling, although Trump is expected to address it this evening at an event meant to pressure lawmakers to back the “big, beautiful bill.”
Trump will host “everyday Americans” at the White House to highlight how the bill will help working class people and law enforcement, including tipped workers and border patrol agents.
The White House said the setback shouldn’t alter the timeline for passage.
“We expect that bill to be on the president’s desk for signature by July 4,” press secretary Karoline Leavitt said.
“This is part of the process, part of the inner working of the United States Senate, but the president is adamant about seeing this bill on his desk here at the White House by Independence Day.”
💡Perspectives:
•HuffPost: Republicans rush to pass a bill they don’t like.
• Ro Khanna: Congress must take back its war powers.
• CommonPlace: Three things that weren’t supposed to happen, but did.
The Supreme Court will release decisions on all six remaining cases tomorrow, including on birthright citizenship and opt-outs for classroom discussions of LGBTQ issues. The high court ruled Thursday that states can cut off Medicaid money to Planned Parenthood.
House Republicans investigating former President Biden’s mental fitness while in office subpoenaed testimony from Anthony Bernal, who was a top aide to former first lady Jill Biden.
The Defense Department is establishing two additional military zones along the U.S.-Mexico border in an effort to further crack down on unlawful migrant crossings.
Dan “Razin’” Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, briefed reporters Thursday on the U.S. strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities, as the Trump administration continues to push back on media characterizations of a preliminary intelligence assessment that suggested the strike may not have been a total success.
Caine said 15 years of planning by PhD-level military officials acting as the “biggest users of supercomputer hours” designed the strikes and that that the bunker-buster bombs dropped on Iran’s Fordow nuclear site “functioned as designed.”
“The weapons all guided to their intended targets,” Caine said.
Asked if he had been pressured or would bow to pressure from the White House to paint a rosier assessment of the strikes, Caine responded: “No, I have not. And I would not.”
The White House embarked on a third day of battling with the media, after several news outlets reported on a preliminary assessment that said the strikes may have only set Iran’s nuclear program back by months.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Thursday said information from that preliminary report was leaked to the media with “gaps of information.” He said the “low-confidence” report was not coordinated with the Intelligence Community, which will needs weeks to make a final assessment. He said the media did not report that the assessment also said “severe damage” was a possible outcome from the strikes.
“You, the press, you cheer against Trump so hard, it’s in your DNA and in your blood to cheer against Trump, because you want him not to be successful so bad, you have to cheer against the efficacy of these strikes,” Hegseth said. “You have to hope maybe they weren’t effective.”
Hegseth on Thursday cited new assessments from the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the Israeli Atomic Energy Commission, Central Intelligence Agency Director John Ratcliffe and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, all of whom reported that Iran’s nuclear facilities suffered major damage.
Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), a close ally to Israel, posted on X:
“To those who were ‘unimpressed’ or borderline gloating on a leak: Operation Midnight Hammer worked. I’ve been calling for and fully supported those strikes, and it made the world safer. It should transcend partisan politics.”
MEANWHILE…
The Trump administration, furious over the leak, will limit the amount of classified information it shares with Congress going forward.
“This administration wants to be sure that classified information is not ending up in irresponsible hands and that people who have the privilege of viewing this top secret classified information are being responsible with it,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Thursday.
Rep. Jim Himes (Conn.), the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, blasted both the leak and the clampdown on intelligence sharing.
“The leak of classified information is unacceptable and should be fully investigated and those responsible held accountable,” Himes said. “It’s also unacceptable for the Administration to use unsubstantiated speculation about the source of a leak to justify cutting off Congress from classified intelligence reporting, particularly when over a million people within the Executive Branch have clearance to access classified top-secret reporting.”
The FBI is investigating the leak, which Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff called “treasonous.”
💡Perspectives:
•The Hill: Trump is a disruptor — but for good or for ill?
• BBC: Iran’s supreme leader finds a very different nation.
Democrats are wrestling with the meaning of Zoharan Mamdani’s shocking upset victory in the Democratic primary to be mayor of New York City, with progressives holding it up as evidence of how a populist left-wing message can resonate with voters during President Trump’s second term.
Mamdani, a 33-year old democratic socialist, took down former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) in the primary, a sea change moment in New York politics.
Progressives are suddenly feeling triumphant after a brutal 2024 cycle that saw them lose several members of Congress.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said former Vice President Harris would’ve defeated Trump in the 2024 presidential election if she’d used Mamdani’s playbook of focusing on the economic needs of the middle class.
“Instead of taking money from billionaires and putting stupid ads on television… you mobilize thousands and thousands of people around the progressive agenda that speaks to the needs of working-class people and you go out and you knock on doors,” Sanders said. “And if somebody like a Kamala Harris had not listened to her consultants and done that, she would be president of the United States today.”
Mamdani also benefitted from being a charismatic and social media-savvy candidate who resonated with young people agitating for generational and ideological change within the Democratic Party.
However, centrist Democrats have expressed alarm, certain that Mamdani’s leftist agenda is a national loser for the party in the long-term.
“The baggage and the danger of some of the ideas that he espouses and does so proudly, even in the final stretch of his campaign, is something that Democrats have to recognize is going to be deeply problematic in the places that we are going to need to win to take back the House,” Kate deGruyter, the senior director of communications for the center-left think tank Third Way, told The Hill.
There’s also the matter of Mamdani’s anti-Israel activism — and his defense of the term “globalize the intifada” — which some Jewish Democrats see as antisemitic.
Republicans see Mamdani as a gift and plan to highlight his progressive agenda, which includes city-run grocery stores and rent freezes.
“It’s finally happened, the Democrats have crossed the line. Zohran Mamdani, a 100% Communist Lunatic, has just won the Dem Primary, and is on his way to becoming Mayor,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “We’ve had Radical Lefties before, but this is getting a little ridiculous.”
Mamdani responded to Trump:
“I encourage him — just like I encourage every New Yorker — to learn about my actual policies to make the city affordable,” Mamdani told ABC News’s Rachel Scott in an interview.
Mamdani could face a crowded field in the general election, with Cuomo “assessing” a potential independent run, current New York City Mayor Eric Adamslaunching his independent reelection bid on Thursday, and Republican Curtis Sliwa all potentially in the race.
Also on Thursday, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D), a potential 2028 Democratic presidential contender, launched his reelection bid for a third term.
The University of Virginia’s Center for Politicswrites:
“The biggest shifts to Donald Trump came among nonwhite voters and that men moved more toward Trump than women… One striking finding came among the roughly 10% of the electorate made up of naturalized citizens: They voted only narrowly for Kamala Harris after backing Joe Biden by about 20 points…The Democratic presidential coalition is still much more racially diverse than the Republican coalition, but the difference between the two has lessened over the course of Trump’s three elections.”
💡Perspectives:
•The Hill: The limits of culturally radical populism.
