Trump lands first major legislative win after Congress passes his massive domestic policy bill
CNN
Republican lawmakers have handed President Donald Trump the first major legislative achievement of his second term, following a fierce arm-twisting campaign by GOP leaders to unite a deeply divided party behind his sweeping domestic agenda.
Republican lawmakers have handed President Donald Trump the first major legislative achievement of his second term, following a fierce arm-twisting campaign by GOP leaders to unite a deeply divided party behind his sweeping domestic agenda. House Republicans voted Thursday afternoon to approve Trump’s massive package of tax and federal spending cuts and funding boosts for the Pentagon and border security, clearing the bill to be sent to the White House for his signature. The Senate passed the bill earlier in the week. The landmark victory for Republicans comes just six months into Trump’s second administration – a rapid timeline that appeared in question up until the final vote. The president and his Capitol Hill allies ratcheted up pressure on party holdouts in recent days, arguing the package will help cement Trump’s legacy on issues like immigration and tax policy – including making key campaign promises reality – while attempting to rein in spending with historic cuts to federal support for the social safety net. “Only one man that can seal the deal,” Rep. Anna Paulina Luna said of Trump’s involvement in the final hours of the House’s push to pass the bill. It’s also a significant win for House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Congress’ top two Republicans, who are both relatively new to the leadership suites. What members have doubted for weeks will now happen: Trump will be able to sign his “one big, beautiful bill” by the Fourth of July. With almost no room for error, the two Hill GOP leaders convinced nearly every member of their party to march in line behind Trump. They succeeded despite months of griping by fiscal hawks about exploding the deficit with a $3.3 trillion bill, and separately, concerns from more moderate members about cutting $1 trillion from Medicaid.
Speaker Mike Johnson is a political survivor, weathering crisis after crisis since his unlikely ascent two years ago.
Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Elena Kagan are well matched, rhetorically forceful opposites. And they have been clashing for more than a decade over an increasingly relevant question of presidential power: How easy should it be for the president to fire the heads of independent agencies?
The Army gynecologist described in a recent lawsuit as a “predator in uniform” is now being held in the Bell County Jail in Texas, “after apparently violating conditions of liberty imposed by his commander,” according to an Army spokesperson.
Brian Walshe on Thursday came face-to-face for the first time with the man who had been having an affair with his wife before her death, as he took the stand to testify in Walshe’s murder trial.
The Supreme Court on Thursday allowed Texas to use a congressional map that will boost President Donald Trump’s effort to keep Republicans in control of Congress, blocking a lower court decision that found the new boundaries were likely unconstitutional because they were drawn based on race.
The US military carried out a strike Thursday on a suspected drug boat in the Eastern Pacific, killing four people on board, according to a social media post from US Southern Command.
A grand jury voted against indicting New York Attorney General Letitia James after being asked to look at the mortgage fraud case against her a second time, according to multiple people familiar with the development Thursday.
National Guard troops deployed to Washington, DC, can remain there for now, after a federal appeals court on Thursday temporarily froze a judge’s ruling that would have soon required them to leave the city’s streets.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s bad week just got worse. That’s after the long-awaited release Thursday of an inspector general’s report on his sharing of highly sensitive military attack plans on the unclassified app Signal earlier this year.
President Donald Trump has hired a new architect for the White House ballroom amid disputes between the president and his architect originally contracted to complete the project, several sources have told CNN.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth risked compromising sensitive military information that could have endangered US troops through his use of Signal to discuss attack plans, a Pentagon watchdog said in an unclassified report released Thursday. It also details how Hegseth declined to cooperate with the probe.
If nothing else, the controversy over the Trump administration’s second strike on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean has surfaced a long-overdue debate about its already legally dubious first strikes.
Two top House lawmakers emerged divided along party lines after a private briefing with the military official who oversaw September’s attack on an alleged drug vessel that included a so-called double-tap strike that killed surviving crew members, with a top Democrat calling video of the incident that was shared as part of the briefing “one of the most troubling things” he has seen as a lawmaker.