U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to reporters in the Oval Office of the White House on Feb. 3, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Top Democrats in Congress are asking the Government Accountability Office to open an investigation into whether the Trump administration violated federal law by freezing funding for several programs.

Pennsylvania Rep. Brendan Boyle and Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley, ranking members on the House and Senate Budget committees, wrote in a two-page letter sent Monday to the government watchdog organization that certain actions appear to have violated the Impoundment Control Act.

“Unilaterally impounding funds is illegal, and Donald Trump and Russ Vought are trying to gut the federal government piece by piece,” Merkley wrote in a statement accompanying the letter. “GAO must get to the bottom of this and reiterate to the administration that Congress has the power of the purse, not Trump and Vought.”

The Senate voted along party lines earlier this year to confirm Vought as director of the Office of Management and Budget, which has wide-reaching authority over decisions within the executive branch

A Government Accountability Office spokesperson told States Newsroom the agency is working through its process to determine whether it will launch an investigation based on the letter.

GAO, the spokesperson said, also has ongoing work related to the ICA.

OMB authority

Boyle wrote in a statement that the Constitution gives Congress the authority to determine when and where the federal government spends money.

“The administration’s withholding of critical investments harms American communities that rely on these funds for jobs, economic stability, and essential infrastructure,” Boyle wrote. “Robust congressional oversight, alongside litigation, is vital to protecting the interests of the American people.”

The Impoundment Control Act, enacted in the 1970s, bars presidents from not spending the money that Congress has appropriated. Vought has said repeatedly he believes the law is unconstitutional and that presidents have this authority.

Several lawsuits have been filed over the Trump administration opting not to spend federal money, some of which have blocked the actions from taking effect while the cases proceed through the federal courts. 

The Boyle-Merkley letter alleges the Trump administration has run afoul of the law on several occasions, including on his first day in office when he ordered a pause on foreign development assistance as well as funding in the Inflation Reduction Act and the bipartisan infrastructure law.

The two ask GAO to also look into the Trump administration’s decision to halt military aid to Ukraine for about a week in March, writing they are “concerned this pause may have been an illegal impoundment with negative foreign policy and national security implications.”

“The Constitution grants the President no unilateral authority to withhold funds from obligation,” Boyle and Merkley wrote in the letter. “Instead, Congress has vested the President with strictly circumscribed authority to impound or withhold budget authority only in limited circumstances as expressly provided in the Impoundment Control Act.

“The executive branch may withhold amounts from obligation only if the President transmits a special message to Congress that includes the amount of budget authority proposed for withholding and the reason for the proposal (2 U.S.C. §§ 683–684).”

What can GAO do?

During the first Trump administration, the GAO found the Office of Management and Budget violated the Impoundment Control Act  when it halted assistance to Ukraine.

“Faithful execution of the law does not permit the President to substitute his own policy priorities for those that Congress has enacted into law,” GAO wrote in the report. “OMB withheld funds for a policy reason, which is not permitted under the Impoundment Control Act (ICA). The withholding was not a programmatic delay. Therefore, we conclude that OMB violated the ICA.”

The GAO writes on its website that the ICA “authorizes the head of GAO, known as the Comptroller General, to file a lawsuit if the President illegally impounds funds.”

Comptroller General Gene Dodaro testified before Congress earlier this year that he plans to do just that if the independent agency finds violations of the ICA.

“We’re going to make these decisions as fast as possible,” Dodaro said, according to a news report. “I fully intend to carry out our responsibilities under the Impoundment Control Act expeditiously and thoroughly . . . I’ll do it as quickly as I can, but we need to be careful and thorough, because the next step for us is to go to court ourselves. If we say there’s been impoundment and money isn’t released in a certain period of time, we have to go to court.”

U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., speaks to reporters during a press conference inside the U.S. Capitol on Thursday, March 27, 2025. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — The top Republican and top Democrat on the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee sent the Trump administration a joint letter on Thursday, telling the Office of Management and Budget it’s on thin ice with the panel.

The dispute has to do with how the White House is implementing the stopgap spending law that Congress approved earlier this month, which funds the federal government through the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30.

Chairwoman Susan Collins, R-Maine, and ranking member Patty Murray, D-Wash, wrote in the two-page letter that the way OMB is approaching a section on emergency designations is in sharp contrast to how other administrations have implemented it.

“This (or substantially similar) language has been used in appropriations legislation for decades, and it has always been interpreted to give the President a binary choice: He must concur with all or none of Congress’s emergency designations,” Collins and Murray wrote. “Just as the President does not have a line-item veto, he does not have the ability to pick and choose which emergency spending to designate.

“This interpretation is consistent with congressional intent and is the most logical and consistent reading of the law.”

The two wrote the Trump administration’s new “piecemeal approach” raises questions about whether emergency funding, including $8 billion in housing assistance, will be available as Congress intended.

Collins and Murray appeared to imply that OMB not correcting course on the emergency designation would strain the working relationship between the Appropriations Committee and the Trump administration.

The two will need to work together in the months ahead to draft the dozen appropriations bills for fiscal year 2026, which is slated to begin Oct. 1.

“We are concerned that sudden changes to OMB’s interpretation of long-standing statutory provisions could be disruptive to the appropriations process and make it more difficult for the Appropriations Committee to work in a collaborative fashion with the Administration to advance priorities on behalf of the American people,” they wrote. “Collaboration will become even more challenging when the Committee is first informed of such developments through the press, rather than notified through official channels, as was the case here.”

An aerial view of the Pentagon on May 12, 2021. (Photo by Air Force Tech. Sgt. Brittany A. Chase/Department of Defense)

WASHINGTON — The chairman and ranking member on the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee sent a letter to the Defense Department inspector general on Thursday asking the independent watchdog to open an investigation into top officials’ use of the Signal chat app to discuss plans for bombing Yemen.

Mississippi Republican Sen. Roger Wicker and Rhode Island Democratic Sen. Jack Reed wrote that the group chat, which somehow inadvertently included Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, warranted further inquiry.

“This chat was alleged to have included classified information pertaining to sensitive military actions in Yemen,” the two wrote in the one-page letter. “If true, this reporting raises questions as to the use of unclassified networks to discuss sensitive and classified information, as well as the sharing of such information with those who do not have proper clearance and need to know.”

They asked the inspector general to include an “assessment of DOD classification and declassification policies and processes and whether these policies and processes were adhered to” as well as a determination of whether anyone “transferred classified information, including operational details, from classified systems to unclassified systems, and if so, how.”

The senators called on the inspector general to figure out if “the policies of the White House, Department of Defense, the intelligence community, and other Departments and agencies represented on the National Security Council on this subject differ.”

The letter requests the inspector general make recommendations to address any issues that might be identified by an investigation.

Signalgate, as it’s become known, began Monday when The Atlantic published excerpts of the group chat that included Vice President J.D. Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, National Security Advisor Michael Waltz and others.

President Donald Trump and numerous White House officials have repeatedly tried to downplay the use of a commercial communications app to discuss plans to bomb Houthi rebels inside Yemen.

Hegseth has said publicly that no classified information was shared in the group chat, but Wicker told reporters on Wednesday that the “information as published recently appears to me to be of such a sensitive nature that, based on my knowledge, I would have wanted to classify it.”

A spokesperson for the Defense Department Inspector General said the office “received the request yesterday and we are reviewing the letter. We have no further comment at this time.”

A federal appeals court on March 27, 2025, denied a request from the Trump administration to overturn a lower court’s preliminary injunction, which has so far blocked the White House budget office from implementing a freeze on grants and loans.  Shown is Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought during a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill on Jan. 15, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — A federal appeals court on Wednesday denied a request from the Trump administration to overturn a lower court’s preliminary injunction, which has so far blocked the White House budget office from implementing a freeze on trillions in grants and loans.

The 48-page opinion from the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals’ three-judge panel said the Department of Justice failed to show that the federal government would “be irreparably injured absent a stay,” or that a stay of the lower court’s ruling pending appeal would serve the “public interest.”

The ruling came from Chief Judge David Barron, Judge Lara Montecalvo and Judge Julie Rikelman. President Barack Obama nominated Barron, while President Joe Biden appointed Montecalvo and Rikelman.

The case began in late January when the Office of Management and Budget issued a two-page memo that led to widespread confusion about the proposed freeze on grants and loans from numerous federal departments and agencies.

The announcement quickly led to two lawsuits, National Council of Nonprofits v. Office of Management and Budget and State of New York v. Trump.

This latter case, filed by Democratic attorneys general from 22 states and the District of Columbia, is the one that worked its way to the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals.

The attorneys general who brought that case represent Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New York, North Carolina, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin.

The Department of Justice’s appeal in the attorneys general case followed Chief Judge John J. McConnell Jr. of the U.S. District Court in Rhode Island issuing a preliminary injunction in early March.

There is also a preliminary injunction in the other case, issued by District Judge Loren L. AliKhan of the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia in late February. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., secretary of Health and Human Services, testifies during his Senate Finance Committee confirmation hearing at the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Jan. 29, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration announced a sweeping plan Thursday to restructure the Department of Health and Human Services by cutting an additional 10,000 workers and closing down half of its 10 regional offices.

The overhaul will affect many of the agencies that make up HHS, including the Food and Drug Administration, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. HHS overall will be downsized from a full-time workforce of 82,000 to 62,000, including those who took early retirement or a buyout offer.

HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. released a written statement along with the announcement, saying the changes would benefit Americans.

“We aren’t just reducing bureaucratic sprawl. We are realigning the organization with its core mission and our new priorities in reversing the chronic disease epidemic,” Kennedy said. “This Department will do more — a lot more — at a lower cost to the taxpayer.”  

The U.S. Senate voted to confirm Kennedy as the nation’s top public health official in mid-February.

Democrats immediately reacted with deep concern.

Senate Appropriations Committee ranking member Patty Murray, D-Wash., said that she was “stunned at the lack of thought about what they are doing to the American public and their health.”

Murray said the committee, which controls about one-third of all federal spending, “absolutely” has an oversight role to play in tracking HHS actions.

Wisconsin Sen. Tammy Baldwin, the top Democrat on the Appropriations subcommittee that funds HHS, said she believes HHS has overstepped its authority and expects the panel will look into its actions.

“These individuals who are going to be terminated under this plan play vital roles in the health of Wisconsinites and people nationally,” Baldwin said. “And I believe that they do not have the authority, the Trump administration does not have the authority to do this wholesale reorganization without working with Congress.”

Maryland Democratic Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, whose constituents in suburban Washington likely hold many of the jobs in question, wrote in a statement the HHS’ restructuring plans are “dangerous and deadly.”

“I warned America that confirming RFK Jr. would be a mistake,” Alsobrooks wrote. “His blatant distrust of science and disregard for research and advancement makes him completely unqualified.”

Cuts across department

The announcement says reorganizing HHS will cut its $1.7 trillion annual budget by about $1.8 billion, in part, by lowering overall staff levels.

Staffing cuts will be spread out over HHS and several of the agencies it oversees. The restructuring plans to eliminate 3,500 full-time workers at the FDA, 2,400 employees at the CDC, 1,200 staff at the NIH and 300 workers at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

“The consolidation and cuts are designed not only to save money, but to make the organization more efficient and more responsive to Americans’ needs, and to implement the Make America Healthy Again goal of ending the chronic disease epidemic,” according to a fact sheet.

Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, or HELP, Committee Chairman Bill Cassidy, R-La., wrote in a statement that he looks “forward to hearing how this reorganization furthers these goals.”

“I am interested in HHS working better, such as lifesaving drug approval more rapidly, and Medicare service improved,” Cassidy wrote.

Regional offices, divisions affected

HHS did not immediately respond to a request from States Newsroom about which five of its 10 regional offices would shutter or when those closures would take effect.

Its website shows the offices are located in Boston; New York City; Philadelphia; Atlanta; Chicago; Dallas; Kansas City, Missouri; Denver; San Francisco; and Seattle.

HHS plans to reduce its divisions from 28 to 15 while also establishing the Administration for a Healthy America, or AHA.

That new entity will combine the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health, Health Resources and Services Administration, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry and National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.

That change will “improve coordination of health resources for low-income Americans and will focus on areas including, Primary Care, Maternal and Child Health, Mental Health, Environmental Health, HIV/AIDS, and Workforce development. Transferring SAMHSA to AHA will increase operational efficiency and assure programs are carried out because it will break down artificial divisions between similar programs,” according to the announcement.

HHS will roll the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response into the CDC.

The department plans to create a new assistant secretary for enforcement, who will be responsible for work within the Departmental Appeals Board, Office of Medicare Hearings and Appeals and Office for Civil Rights.

House speaker says HHS is ‘bloated’

U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., posted on social media that he fully backed the changes in store for HHS.

​​”HHS is one of the most bureaucratic and bloated government agencies,” Johnson wrote. “@SecKennedy is bringing new, much-needed ideas to the department by returning HHS to its core mission while maintaining the critical programs it provides Americans.”

Advocates shared Democrats’ concern about the staff cutbacks.

Stella Dantas, president of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, released a statement saying the organization was “alarmed by the sudden termination of thousands of dedicated HHS employees, whose absence compounds the loss of thousands of fellow employees who have already been forced to leave U.S. health agencies.”

“Thanks to collaboration with HHS, ACOG has been able to contribute to advances in the provision of maternal health care, broadened coverage of critical preventive care, increased adoption of vaccines, raised awareness of fetal alcohol syndrome, strengthened STI prevention efforts, and more,” Dantas wrote. “This attack on public health—and HHS’ ability to advance it—will hurt people across the United States every single day.”

U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., points to text messages by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth during an annual worldwide threats assessment hearing at the Longworth House Office Building on March 26, 2025, in Washington, D.C. The hearing held by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence addressed top aides inadvertently including Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief for The Atlantic magazine, on a high level Trump administration Signal group chat discussing plans to bomb Houthi targets in Yemen. (Photo by Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The now-famous group chat made up of high-ranking Trump administration national security officials and a journalist included a precise timeline of U.S. bombing of Houthi targets in Yemen, and revealed one of the targets of the attack was under surveillance, according to a release of the entire text chain The Atlantic published Wednesday.

Despite the newly revealed details of the leaked chat, administration officials, including President Donald Trump himself, continued to downplay the seriousness of the breach, and Republicans in Congress refused to join Democrats in calls for Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to step down.

Administration officials argued the texts lacked key information and that the “attack plans” revealed in the chat were less damaging than “war plans,” the term Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg used to refer to information he’d decided to withhold for national security reasons. Trump aides also implied the magazine – which has endorsed Trump’s opponent in each of his elections – was spinning the entire episode to discredit the administration.

What’s been dubbed “Signalgate” began when The Atlantic on Monday published a stunning account by  Goldberg of his apparently accidental inclusion in a group chat on the messaging app Signal, titled “The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans.”

The others in the chat were senior administration officials discussing the upcoming war operation.

Administration leaders on Tuesday denied, including in testimony before Congress, that the chat contained classified information. The magazine then published a report Wednesday by Goldberg and staff writer Shane Harris that purported to include virtually the entire transcript of the chat until Goldberg’s voluntary exit.

The administration position was inconsistent with the screenshots published in The Atlantic of detailed and explicit messages in the chat. At the Capitol, concerns were raised even among the administration’s usually obsequious GOP allies in Congress, with U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker saying the information in the chat should have been classified.

“The information as published recently appears to me to be of such a sensitive nature that, based on my knowledge, I would have wanted to classify it,” Wicker, a Mississippi Republican, told reporters on the Hill Wednesday.

Attack details revealed

In the initial story, Goldberg reported National Security Advisor Michael Waltz on March 11 added the journalist to a group chat on Signal that included Vice President J.D. Vance, Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Waltz and others.

Goldberg in the first story withheld details of the chat that he said could have compromised intelligence-gathering and military operations.

But after a day of administration figures claiming the Signal chat did not reveal classified material, while smearing Goldberg, the magazine published the entire thread with one redaction: the name of Ratcliffe’s chief of staff, at the request of a CIA spokesperson.

The unredacted messages show Hegseth shared plans of the bombing campaign about 30 minutes before the first planes took off on March 15 and two hours before the start of the window of opportunity for hitting a target.

“TEAM UPDATE,” Hegseth wrote in the chat on the day of the strike, according to the Atlantic’s Wednesday story. “TIME NOW (1144et): Weather is FAVORABLE. Just CONFIRMED w/CENTCOM we are a GO for mission launch.”

In the same message, Hegseth laid out a timeline of the attack, including confirmation that a target was at his expected location.

“Target Terrorist is @ his Known Location so SHOULD BE ON TIME,” Hegseth wrote.

He also noted that the mission’s operational security was “clean.”

Two hours and 15 minutes later, Waltz told the group that bombs had destroyed a building where the Houthi “top missile guy” was thought to be present.

“The first target – their top missile guy – we had positive ID of him walking into his girlfriend’s building and it’s now collapsed,” Waltz wrote.

Tuesday denials led to publishing

At a previously scheduled U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee hearing Tuesday, Gabbard said that no classified information was discussed in the chat.

Trump echoed that message and Hegseth said, “Nobody was texting war plans and that’s all I have to say about that.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt wrote on social media:

“Here are the facts about his latest story: 1. No ‘war plans’ were discussed. 2. No classified material was sent to the thread. 3. The White House Counsel’s Office has provided guidance on a number of different platforms for President Trump’s top officials to communicate as safely and efficiently as possible.”

Gabbard and Ratcliffe told the Senate Intelligence Committee they did not recall specific weapons systems or the timing of the operation being discussed in the chat.

But the transcript published by The Atlantic showed Hegseth’s down-to-the-minute timeline of the launch of F-18 aircraft.

The denials led to the magazine’s decision to publish the full transcript Wednesday, Goldberg and Harris wrote.

“The statements by Hegseth, Gabbard, Ratcliffe, and Trump — combined with the assertions made by numerous administration officials that we are lying about the content of the Signal texts — have led us to believe that people should see the texts in order to reach their own conclusions,” they wrote.

“There is a clear public interest in disclosing the sort of information that Trump advisers included in nonsecure communications channels, especially because senior administration figures are attempting to downplay the significance of the messages that were shared.”

‘No names. No targets.’

But Hegseth and other administration officials continued to deny the growing controversy was serious Wednesday.

“So, let’s (sic) me get this straight,” Hegseth wrote on X Wednesday. “The Atlantic released the so-called ‘war plans’ and those ‘plans’ include: No names. No targets. No locations. No units. No routes. No sources. No methods. And no classified information.

“Those are some really shitty war plans.”

Waltz posted a similar message.

“No locations,” he wrote. “No sources & methods. NO WAR PLANS. Foreign partners had already been notified that strikes were imminent. BOTTOM LINE:  President Trump is protecting America and our interests.”

White House Counselor Alina Habba told reporters shortly after the second Atlantic story posted on Wednesday morning the issue had been overblown.

“We stand by Mike Waltz; he’s doing a tremendous job,” she said, according to a White House pool report. “I think this is a distraction.”

Bipartisan call for investigation

Leading members of Congress, though, were treating the matter with more seriousness.

Wicker said he and Armed Services ranking Democrat Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island had agreed on next steps, which included a letter to the administration asking for an expedited inspector general report on the matter.

He also said they were requesting “a senior person” come to a secure facility on Capitol Hill to provide a classified briefing to the committee to confirm the reporting was accurate.

Asked what the consequence should be for Hegseth if the transcript of the chat was accurate, Wicker took a forgiving tone.

“I make a lot of mistakes in my life,” he said. “And I’ve found that it’s best when I just own up to it and say ‘I’m human, I made a mistake.’ And I’m glad in this case no real damage was done. I think that’s probably the approach of the administration right up to the president.”

He also said that no targets or specific timing were mentioned.

Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a moderate who has voiced criticism of Trump more often than most GOP colleagues, wrote in an X post Wednesday that the incident should be a “wake-up call” to prioritize operational security.

“I am appalled by the egregious security breach from top administration officials,” she wrote. “Their disregard for stringent safeguards and secure channels could have compromised a high-stakes operation and put our servicemembers at risk. I hope this serves as a wake-up call that operational security must be a top priority for everyone—especially our leaders.”

Dems urge Hegseth’s resignation

Many Democrats went further, calling for Hegseth to resign over the use of an unclassified messaging platform to discuss impending military action.

Gabbard and others noted the Defense secretary can decide what information is classified to argue that the chat did not include classified information.

But critics said whether or not the information was technically classified, its disclosure would put service members at greater risk.

“Advance strike times are sensitive and classified because they put American military directly at risk,” Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat, wrote on social media Wednesday. “The Secretary of Defense was blasting them out to unknown numbers over unclassified channels. It’s sloppy, careless, and dangerous. He should resign.”

Warner spokeswoman Rachel Cohen added that, despite the administration’s denials, the information revealed in The Atlantic would compromise intelligence sources and methods.

“They can keep repeating this but it’s not true,” she wrote, responding to Hegseth’s post. “Those messages, as released by the Atlantic, are source revealing, and include targeting and weapons information that would have, at the very least, been considered at the ‘secret’ classification level.”

The top Democrats in the U.S. House and U.S. Senate, Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer, both of New York, also called for Hegseth to lose his job.

“The secretary of Defense should be fired immediately if he’s not man enough to own up to his mistakes and resign in disgrace,” Jeffries said on MSNBC Wednesday.

“I agree he should be fired,” Schumer told reporters at the Capitol.

Jayanta Bhattacharya, President Donald Trump's nominee to be director of the National Institutes of Health, speaks at his confirmation hearing before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions on Capitol Hill on March 5, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

This report was updated at 7:59 p.m. EDT.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate confirmed President Donald Trump’s nominees to lead the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health.

Senators voted 53-47 along party lines Tuesday evening to confirm Jayanta Bhattacharya as director of the NIH before voting 56-44 to approve Martin Makary as FDA commissioner.

Democratic Sens. Dick Durbin of Illinois as well as Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire were the only three members of their party to vote for Makary.

Shaheen said during an interview Wednesday that while she has reservations about how the Trump administration might try to change access to medication abortion, she felt Makary was qualified to lead the FDA.

“Well, I’m very concerned about what this administration might do about mifepristone,” Shaheen said. “But, I thought it was important to have someone in that role who has the scientific background and ability to run the agency.”

Hassan declined to answer questions about her vote when asked about it Wednesday afternoon by States Newsroom. Her office declined to send a written statement from the senator, offering only a response from a spokesperson. 

“The opioid epidemic has devasted communities across New Hampshire, and the FDA has made mistakes over the years that fueled this epidemic,” the spokesperson wrote in an email. “Senator Hassan voted for Dr. Makary as Commissioner of the FDA following his clear commitment to ensuring that the agency learns from its past mistakes and acts aggressively to tackle this crisis.”

Senate confirmation came just weeks after the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, or HELP, Committee voted to advance Makary and Bhattacharya.

Sen. John Hickenlooper, D-Colo., voted in committee to send Makary’s nomination to the floor, but switched to opposing his confirmation on Tuesday.

Hickenlooper said during a brief interview with States Newsroom on Wednesday that he ultimately couldn’t support Makary over his comments about medication abortion. But he said nothing significant happened between his yes vote in committee and his no vote on the floor.

“I agonized over it. I could have easily gone back and voted yes,” Hickenlooper said. “You know, at some point when I see him, I’ll apologize and say, ‘You know, that was a hard vote for me. But I really wish you would have been more demonstrative about specifically mifepristone, because I think that’s a big issue that the FDA is going to take on.’”

Hickenlooper said he spoke with his staff and his wife over Makary’s comments about access to medication abortion before he cast his no vote on the Senate floor.

“I realized that he serves at the pleasure of the president, so what the president says he’s probably going to have to do,” Hickenlooper said. “But for me, I just became more and more uncomfortable that he wouldn’t make a few statements to say that, you know, this is not something that is a medical reinterpretation for political purposes. He should have said something.”

Abortion pill

Makary will have considerable authority at the FDA to determine if access to medication abortion remains as it is now, if the agency changes prescribing guidelines, or even pulls its approval.

During his confirmation hearing in early March, Makary testified he hadn’t yet decided how he would approach that aspect of the job.

“I have no preconceived plans on mifepristone policy except to take a solid, hard look at the data and to meet with the professional career scientists who have reviewed the data at the FDA,” Makary said at the time.

Medication abortion is a two-drug regimen consisting of mifepristone and misoprostol that accounts for about 63% of all pregnancy terminations within the United States, according to research from the Guttmacher Institute.

The FDA originally approved mifepristone in 2000 and changed its prescribing guidelines in 2016 and 2021. It is currently approved for use up to 10 weeks gestation and can be prescribed via telehealth and shipped to patients.

Sixteen major medical organizations — including the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the American Medical Association and the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine — affirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court last year that mifepristone is safe and effective.

“The scientific evidence is overwhelming: major adverse events occur in less than 0.32% of patients,” the medical organizations wrote in a 45-page brief. “The risk of death is almost non-existent.”

Goals for NIH

Bhattacharya testified during his confirmation hearing that he has five goals for the NIH, including focusing the agency’s research on chronic diseases and funding the “most innovative biomedical research agenda possible.”

“The NIH is the crown jewel of American biomedical sciences, with a long and illustrious history of supporting breakthroughs in biology and medicine,” Bhattacharya said at the time. “I have the utmost respect for the NIH scientists and staff over the decades who have contributed to this success.”

But, he said, “American biomedical sciences are at a crossroads” following the coronavirus pandemic.

Bhattacharya said during his hearing he would ensure NIH’s scientific research is replicable, that it has a culture that respects “free speech in science and scientific dissent” and that it regulates “risky research that has the possibility of causing a pandemic.”

“While the vast majority of biomedical research poses no risk of harm to research subjects or the public, the NIH must ensure that it never supports work that might cause harm.”

President Donald Trump and Congress have until August or September to reach agreement and act on the debt limit, the Congressional Budget Office forecast Wednesday.  (Stock photo/Getty Images Plus)

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump and Congress have until August or September to reach agreement and act on the debt limit, the Congressional Budget Office forecast Wednesday.

Otherwise the United States would default for the first time in history, likely leading to a global financial crisis.

The nonpartisan CBO projection is similar to an estimate published earlier this week by the Bipartisan Policy Center think tank, which expects the X-date will occur between mid-July and early October.

The previous debt limit suspension expired in January, but the Treasury Department has been able to keep paying all the government’s bills through accounting maneuvers called extraordinary measures. When those run out, the country would hit the X-date and a default would begin.

The four-page CBO report says the default range “is uncertain” because how much money the federal government brings in as well as how much it spends at a given time is difficult to track. 

“If the government’s borrowing needs are significantly greater than CBO projects, the Treasury’s resources could be exhausted in late May or sometime in June, before tax payments due in mid-June are received or before additional extraordinary measures become available on June 30,” the report states. “Conversely, if borrowing needs fall short of the amounts in CBO’s projections, the extraordinary measures will permit the Treasury to continue financing government activities longer than expected.”

GOP bill on tap

Republicans in Congress are hoping to approve a massive bill in the months ahead that would extend the 2017 tax law, creating $4.5 trillion in new deficits. The package is also supposed to appropriate hundreds of billions of dollars to the Department of Defense and border security initiatives.

GOP lawmakers hope to pay for some of those increases in the deficit through spending cuts, but are far from agreement on how best to do that.

The debt limit allows the Treasury Department to borrow money to pay all of the country’s bills in full and on time. The federal government must borrow money to pay for spending that Congress has approved that isn’t funded by taxes or other fees.

During the last full fiscal year, that imbalance between revenue and spending, also called the deficit, totalled $1.8 trillion. Over decades, annual deficits have added up to a $36.2 trillion national debt.

Congress failing to raise or suspend the debt limit before the default date would limit the Treasury Department to spending only the cash it had on hand, a scenario with much broader implications than a partial government shutdown.

A default could lead the federal government to delay or simply never make payments on thousands of federal accounts, including Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, troop pay, federal employee salaries and much more.

The Treasury Department writes on its website that not raising the debt limit by a specific dollar amount or suspending the debt limit through a future date “would have catastrophic economic consequences.”

A Government Accountability Office report lists off several negative repercussions of a default, including that it could trigger runs on banks and money market funds, that it would likely reduce lending to households and businesses, that it would lead to a substantial downgrade to the country’s sovereign credit rating and that it would likely lead to a significant and potentially long-lasting recession.

Treasury projection in May

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent plans to send his department’s default date projection to Congress in May, though he wrote in a March letter that lawmakers should get to work sooner rather than later.

“The period of time that cash and extraordinary measures may last is subject to considerable uncertainty due to a variety of factors, including the unpredictability of tax receipts and the normal changes of forecasting the payments and receipts of the U.S. government months into the future,” Bessent wrote. “We expect to provide an update during the first half of May, after the majority of receipts from the April income tax filing season have been received.”

Bessent then urged lawmakers “to act promptly to protect the full faith and credit of the United States.”

Republican leaders in Congress and the Trump administration have just a few more months to decide how they want to handle this year’s debt limit debate.

House Republicans included a proposal in their budget resolution to raise the debt limit by $4 trillion later this year, when GOP lawmakers draft the bill to extend the 2017 tax cuts. But the Senate has yet to agree to that blueprint.

Republicans raising the debt limit through the complicated budget reconciliation process would require support from nearly every GOP lawmaker in Congress, since the party holds a paper-thin majority in the House and just 53 seats in the Senate.

Nearly two years ago, when Congress sent the last debt limit bill to the White House, 71 House Republicans and 31 GOP senators voted against approval.

The other option is for Republicans and Democrats to negotiate a bipartisan agreement on the debt limit that can get the support of at least 60 senators to move past the legislative filibuster.  

Abortion advocates and Democratic U.S. House members march in front of the U.S. Capitol on July 19, 2022. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — A group that focuses on electing Democratic women who support abortion rights announced Wednesday it would target 46 U.S. House seats held by Republicans in the midterm elections as it seeks to turn the chamber from red to blue.

“In 2026, we must take back the majority in the U.S. House to create a federal check on Donald Trump and beat back GOP attacks on our rights and our livelihoods,” EMILYs List President Jessica Mackler wrote in a statement. “Democratic pro-choice women will be at the heart of the fight for the majority by flipping competitive seats across the country. House Republicans beware; we are coming for your seats.”

Democrats, who have been publicly fighting each other lately about how best to oppose Trump’s agenda, barely lost the House during the 2024 elections. Republicans secured 220 seats, compared to Democrats’ 215.

EMILYs List cites several reasons it doesn’t believe the 46 Republicans should stay in office, though all of the issues highlighted have to do with abortion access and reproductive rights.

For example, it notes which of the GOP lawmakers signed a 62-page amicus curiae brief filed to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2021 that urged the justices to overturn Roe v. Wade, eliminating the constitutional right to an abortion.

The brief description of each Republican also cites which members have sponsored bills that would implement nationwide abortion bans and which GOP lawmakers voted against approving a bill that would have guaranteed people the right to use contraception without government interference.

The GOP House members that EMILYs List hopes to unseat represent congressional districts considered toss-ups, by the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter, as well as districts that lean more favorably toward one party or the other.

EMILYs List is one of several left-leaning organizations that will focus their efforts during the next 19 months on securing Democratic wins come November 2026. 

History will likely be on Democrats’ side during the midterm elections, since the political party that doesn’t control the White House typically wins control of the House. That, however, is far from a guarantee.

Polling from NBC News, released in mid-March, shows that just 7% of voters have a “very positive” view of the Democratic Party with another 27% responding they have a positive opinion.

Here are the House GOP members on the list, organized by state.

Alaska: Nick Begich

Arizona: David Schweikert and Juan Ciscomani

California: Kevin Kiley, David Valadao, Young Kim and Ken Calvert

Colorado: Jeff Hurd, Jeff Crank and Gabe Evans

Florida: Aaron Bean, Cory Mills, Anna Paulina Luna and Laurel Lee

Iowa: Mariannette Miller-Meeks, Ashley Hinson and Zach Nunn

Kentucky: Andy Barr

Michigan: Bill Huizenga, Tom Barrett and John James

Minnesota: Brad Finstad

Missouri: Ann Wagner

Montana: Ryan Zinke

Nebraska: Mike Flood and Don Bacon

New Jersey: Jeff Van Drew and Tom Kean

New York: Nick LaLota and Mike Lawler

North Carolina: Chuck Edwards

Ohio: Max Miller, Michael Turner and Mike Carey

Pennsylvania: Brian Fitzpatrick, Ryan Mackenzie, Robert Bresnahan and Scott Perry

South Carolina: Nancy Mace and Joe Wilson

Virginia: Rob Wittman, Jen Kiggans and John McGuire

Washington: Michael Baumgartner

Wisconsin: Bryan Steil and Derrick Van Orden

Frank Bisignano, the nominee for Social Security commissioner in the Trump administration, testifies before the Senate Finance Committee at his confirmation hearing on March 25, 2025. (Screenshot from Senate webcast)

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Social Security Administration pledged Tuesday that if confirmed he’d ensure Americans can access customer service however they choose, though Democrats questioned how that would be possible if thousands of employees are fired and offices throughout the country are closed.

Social Security Commissioner nominee Frank Bisignano testified during a nearly three-hour hearing in the Senate Finance Committee that he wants to ensure beneficiaries have the option to visit an office, use the website, or speak to a real person after calling the 1-800 number.

“On the phone, I’m committed to reducing wait times and providing beneficiaries with a better experience; waiting 20 minutes-plus to get an answer will be of yesteryear,” Bisignano said. “I also believe we can significantly improve the length of the disability claim process.”

Bisignano promised lawmakers he would reduce the 1% error rate in payments, which he said was “five decimal places too high.” And he said repeatedly that personally identifiable information will be “protected.”

Elevator music

Democrats and Republicans on the panel repeatedly raised concerns about how long constituents already wait for their phone calls to be answered when they need to make changes or have an issue with their Social Security benefits.

Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., said that on Monday to prepare for the hearing, his staff called the Social Security Administration’s customer service number, but were disconnected twice and then had to wait an hour while listening to “D-grade elevator music.”

“It could have at least had Olivia Newton-John or some mediocre 70s music,” Daines said while playing a recording of the hold music.

Louisiana Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy asked Bisignano how he’d ensure potential changes at the Social Security Administration wouldn’t exclude seniors who are unable to attend in-person meetings at a field office.

Bisignano said he views the phone as a “mandatory way for people to communicate,” especially since the Social Security Administration received more than 80 million calls last year. 

“If you look at the Social Security website, and you look at the statistics, taking 20-plus minutes to answer the phone is not really acceptable,” Bisignano said. “And that’s the reason why only 46% of the phone calls get answered, because people get discouraged and hang up.”

Bisignano said he believes he can get wait times on the phone line down to under one minute.

“I think we can also help the people within the organization answer questions better by bringing artificial intelligence to them, to prompt them with the information they need,” Bisignano said.

Bisignano, of New Jersey, works as chairman of the board and chief executive officer at Fiserv, Inc., which “enables money movement for thousands of financial institutions and millions of people and businesses,” according to its website. The company is based in Wisconsin.

He previously worked as co-chief operating officer and chief executive officer of Mortgage Banking at JPMorgan Chase & Co.

DOGE pursues office closures

Democrats appeared unconvinced that proposed changes from the U.S. DOGE Service and Elon Musk would have a positive impact on the Social Security Administration.

“Earlier this month, at the direction of Elon Musk and DOGE, the administration announced plans to close 47 Social Security offices, including the one in Littleton, New Hampshire,” Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan said. “Shortly thereafter, the Social Security Administration announced plans that would force more applicants and beneficiaries to go in-person to offices, while at the same time laying off staff who work in those remaining offices. If the Littleton office is closed, North Country seniors would be forced to travel nearly 100 miles to the next closest New Hampshire field office.”

Colorado Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet criticized the Trump administration for announcing plans earlier this month to eliminate “access to a number of service options over the phone.”

“Instead, they’ll need to either use an online verification process or call to make an in-person appointment,” Bennet said. “The agency itself estimates that this will add 75,000 to 85,000 in-person visitors a week to field offices.

“As my colleagues have already said, wait times for appointments can already take a month. And that in-person appointment is only going to get harder to make if the agency cuts 7,000 employees and ends up with the lowest head count in decades.”

Minnesota Democratic Tina Smith said the Trump administration choosing to “drastically reduce phone service and force people to apply for benefits in person” while shuttering offices was unacceptable.

“So you can call this rank incompetence, or you can call it the don’t-know-don’t-care game plan that DOGE has taken across the board,” Smith said. “But to me, it honestly looks like sabotage.”

Bisignano testified that he, and no one else, would make the final decision about whether to close field offices.

“What I will commit to is that there will be no decision made without you knowing about it,” he said. “I have no intent to close field offices, but I’ve studied nothing on the topic. So, it’s a little hard to commit to something.”

North Carolina Republican Sen. Thom Tillis urged Bisignano not to “pull any punches” on decisions about closing field offices.

“What you’re going to find out is, after you do the analytics, every member of Congress, except for me probably, will like your analytics, except to the extent that it affects one of their offices and their district or state,” Tillis said.

‘Fraudsters,’ newborns and layoffs

Bisignano distanced himself from some of the comments Trump administration officials have made about Social Security, though he appeared reluctant to do so.

He didn’t agree with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who said on a podcast that his mother-in-law wouldn’t complain if she missed a Social Security payment and that “the easiest way to find the fraudster is to stop payments and listen because whoever screams is the one stealing.”

“It would be hard to get to that conclusion,” Bisignano said.

He said he didn’t agree with trying to use Social Security as a political weapon, after Nevada Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto asked about news reports the acting Social Security commissioner tried to make changes to how Social Security numbers are issued to newborns in Maine.

“The current Social Security administrator briefly ended a contract that had allowed parents of newborn babies in Maine to sign their children up for a Social Security number at the hospital,” Cortez Masto said. “Instead, he required them to do so in-person at an office.”

“The current administrator, according to a New York Times article, said he had ordered the move after watching Gov. Janet Mills clash with Mr. Trump at the White House,” she added. “He then quickly reversed that decision, but said he did it because he felt that the governor of Maine was not being real cordial to the president.”

Bisignano appeared to reject the possibility of mass layoffs at the Social Security administration when asked about the issue by Vermont independent Sen. Bernie Sanders.

“Do I think it’s a great idea to lay off half of the employees when a system doesn’t work? I think the answer is probably no,” Bisignano said.

Vermont Democratic Sen. Peter Welch asked whether Bisignano would have taken the same approach to firing some federal workers that DOGE has, which Welch described as a “shoot first, aim later” system.

“No,” Bisignano said.

During another part of the hearing, Bisignano said that he believes his job as commissioner would be to “ensure that every beneficiary receives their payments on time, that disability claims are processed in the manner they should be.”

“So my first actions are going to be to get organized around delivering the services,” he said. “And I’ve only been given one order, which is to run the agency in the right fashion.”

Bisignano also rejected the possibility of privatizing Social Security.

“I’ve never thought about privatizing. It’s not a word that anybody’s ever talked to me about,” Bisignano said. “And I don’t see this institution as anything other than a government agency that gets run to the benefit of the American public.”

A sign at the entrance for Mahaska Health, a hospital in Oskaloosa, Iowa, that has received funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. (Photo by Cecilia Lynch/USDA). 

WASHINGTON — Americans living in rural communities throughout the country could see their access to health care diminish if Congress changes eligibility for Medicaid or significantly reduces its federal funding.

While rural residents who depend on the state-federal program for lower income people would experience the most substantial impacts, those who have private health insurance or have other coverage, like Medicare, would likely encounter changes as well.

Rural hospitals and primary care physicians’ incomes would likely go down if Medicaid patients are no longer able to afford the same level of health care, potentially leading to reductions in services offered for everyone or even closures, according to experts.

Whitney Zahnd, assistant professor in the Department of Health Management and Policy at the University of Iowa, said that cuts to Medicaid “will disproportionately hit rural communities,” where 24% of people are covered by the program, including 47% of all births and a majority of nursing home patients.

“This is something that’s going to impact them more than those in urban areas and that’s on top of the already lower access to care, higher need for care, older populations,” Zahnd said. “It’s just going to make things that are already a challenge even more challenging for rural communities.”

The Federal Office of Rural Health Policy categorizes about 20.3% of Americans, or 62.8 million people, as living in rural areas, based on 2020 Census data.

Hospital closings in rural America

Rural areas have seen hospitals close their doors at higher rates than facilities in non-rural areas and that trend doesn’t appear likely to reverse any time soon.

The Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has an interactive map showing where 87 rural hospitals have closed completely since 2010, while an additional 65 “no longer provide in-patient services, but continue to provide some health care services.”

And a report from the Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform released in February shows that more “than 700 rural hospitals — one-third of all rural hospitals in the country — are at risk of closing because of the serious financial problems they are experiencing.”

Losing income from Medicaid patients could lead to a “domino effect,” Zahnd said, exacerbating budget challenges for rural health care providers and potentially communities overall.

“Economically in a lot of rural communities, the hospital is the largest employer,” Zahnd said. “So if you have a hospital close, it’s not just that people are losing access to health care, they might be losing their job or their family member may be losing their job.”

Rural health care providers that are able to stay open might have to cut the services they offer to keep their accounts from going too far into the red. Such a decision wouldn’t just harm Medicaid patients, but anyone living in a rural community who goes to that doctor or hospital.  

“So those are some risks we would anticipate if there are these big cuts to Medicaid,” Zahnd said.

Winners and losers

Timothy McBride, co-director of the Center for Health Economics and Policy at the Institute for Public Health at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, said during a briefing on Medicaid in mid-March that financial margins for rural hospitals are “razor-thin.”

“Even in the urban hospitals, they’re probably just a few percentage points, but in rural hospitals, they can be just a percentage point or 2 or negative,” McBride said. “So if you take away the Medicaid dollars, they’re certainly going to go negative. And if you wonder why rural hospitals close, that’s why.”

McBride also made the point during a March 13 briefing hosted by SciLine, a service for journalists and scientists based at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, that Medicaid provides funding for a lot of rural health care providers.

“In an economic system, if we cut the spending, we can go, ‘Oh, that’s great. We cut $880 billion.’ But whose income is that? It’s income to hospitals, it’s income to doctors,” McBride said. “And that’s going to, you know, be really hard on rural systems and on rural hospitals and urban systems.

“Yeah, it’s going to help the taxpayers, but, you know, just be mindful of who is going to be hurt. There’s winners and losers here.”

Budget process

Republicans in Congress are planning to use the complicated budget reconciliation process to extend the 2017 tax cuts they enacted during President Donald Trump’s first term to the tune of about $4.5 trillion in new deficits. They also want to boost spending on defense and border security by hundreds of billions of dollars and rewrite energy policy.

In order to pay for some of the package, the House’s budget resolution instructs the committee that oversees Medicaid to cut $880 billion in spending during the next decade — the figure cited by McBride.

Republicans in the Senate haven’t yet agreed to that outline, with several expressing concerns about how steep cuts to federal funding would affect their constituents.

Census data shows that more than 85% of the United States remains rural, meaning every one of the 53 Republican senators represents a state with at least some rural areas.

The Senate in the weeks ahead is expected to debate the budget resolution the House voted along party lines to approve in February. Senators are likely to make changes and send it back across the Capitol for the House to give final approval.

Once the two chambers vote to adopt the same budget resolution with identical reconciliation instructions, Congress can formally begin advancing legislation that could restructure Medicaid. But the GOP will need to stay united throughout the process.

Republicans hold a paper-thin majority in the House of Representatives, requiring that any proposed changes to Medicaid garner the support of centrist and far-right GOP lawmakers.

Even a few defections over Medicaid changes, or other elements in the bill, would stop the package from becoming law.

Avoiding high medical costs, bankruptcy

Joan Alker, executive director of the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families, said that in addition to being “a critical backbone to our healthcare system,” Medicaid helps prevent lower-income Americans from going into medical debt and reduces the number of people landing in emergency departments for conditions that can be managed by primary care providers.

“We spend a lot of time, of course, rightly, thinking about Medicaid and the question of access. But fundamentally, Medicaid is an economic support — a critical piece of the puzzle for families who are struggling to pay bills with the high cost of housing and food,” Alker said. “And so that’s the number one most important thing: If you are uninsured in this country, unless you are a billionaire, you are going to be exposed to high medical costs, and those can lead to debt, and even bankruptcy.”

When people lose access to health insurance or programs like Medicaid, they tend to delay or avoid going to primary care providers, who can diagnose issues early and help patients manage chronic conditions.

“That’s not the way we want our health system to work,” Alker said. “Their condition will have worsened. They won’t have had access to prescription drugs that they needed to address chronic conditions, like asthma or diabetes or hypertension. And so they get worse and show up in the emergency room.”

Medicaid also covers health care for about half of the children in the United States and more than 40% of the births, making the program a significant source of income for both pediatricians and OBGYNs. They would see their budgets decreased if patients lose access to the program.

“There are already challenges, and these kinds of cuts will really exacerbate those for families living in these communities, whether they’re enrolled in Medicaid or not,” Alker said.

Entire community affected

Megan Cole, associate professor in the Department of Health Law, Policy and Management at Boston University School of Public Health, said during the SciLine briefing that if Congress cuts Medicaid, it would have wide-ranging effects on rural health care. 

“I think these cuts will have impacts not just on Medicaid recipients but on whole economies and health systems; so particularly safety net health systems, community health centers, rural hospitals,” Cole said. “As those institutions have less patient revenue. They may face reductions in services. They may close certain sites depending on finances. They may eliminate staff. So that affects not just the Medicaid enrollees, but also affects anyone who is otherwise served by those providers.”

Chief Justice of the Supreme Court John Roberts and Justice Elena Kagan attend U.S. President Donald Trump's address to a joint session of Congress at the U.S. Capitol on March 4, 2025, in Washington, D.C.  (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts on Tuesday rejected calls to impeach federal judges who issue rulings that block Trump administration policies, a rare public statement from the nation’s highest sitting judge.

“For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision,” Roberts said. “The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose.”

The comments, provided to States Newsroom by a spokesperson for the court, came just hours after President Donald Trump vented his frustration with a federal judge on social media.

“I’m just doing what the VOTERS wanted me to do,” Trump wrote. “This judge, like many of the Crooked Judges’ I am forced to appear before, should be IMPEACHED!!! WE DON’T WANT VICIOUS, VIOLENT, AND DEMENTED CRIMINALS, MANY OF THEM DERANGED MURDERERS, IN OUR COUNTRY. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!”

The post appeared to be directed at U.S. Judge James Emanuel Boasberg in the District of Columbia, who over the weekend blocked the Trump administration from deporting certain immigrants under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798.

The American Civil Liberties Union is arguing the Trump administration violated the judge’s order by not bringing back flights traveling to Honduras and El Salvador on Saturday.

Boasberg on Monday called on attorneys from the Justice Department to provide detailed information on the deportation flights over the weekend.

The U.S. House of Representatives must vote to impeach federal officials. Trump was impeached twice by the House during his first term in office.

The Senate then holds a trial, after which at least two-thirds of the lawmakers in that chamber must vote to remove the federal official from office. The upper chamber didn’t take that step during Trump’s first term and he was acquitted twice.

“The House has initiated impeachment proceedings more than 60 times; roughly a third of all proceedings have led to full impeachments,” according to a post by the Office of the Historian. “Just eight individuals—all federal judges—have been convicted and removed from office by the Senate.”

Ariana Figueroa contributed to this report. 

U.S. Capitol at sunset on March 8, 2024. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate cleared a stopgap spending bill Friday that will fund the government through the end of September, sending the legislation to President Donald Trump.

The White House said on Saturday afternoon that Trump had signed the measure, avoiding a partial government shutdown. 

Trump’s signature, a day after the 54-46 Senate vote, will keep the federal government mostly running on autopilot under spending levels and policy similar to what Congress approved about a year ago when lawmakers passed the full-year appropriations bills for the last fiscal year. But the stopgap bill does slightly boost defense spending while reducing domestic funding authority.

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul was the only Republican to vote against passage. Maine independent Sen. Angus King and New Hampshire Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen voted to approve the bill, the only ones backing it besides Republicans. 

Senate approval followed days of debate among Democrats over whether to support moving forward with the GOP-authored bill or see a shutdown begin that Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said would allow Trump to take even more power over the government.

Debate on the House-passed stopgap spending bill was more complex than usual. A majority of Senate Democrats believe the continuing resolution shortchanges important federal programs and doesn’t do enough to reinforce Congress’ constitutional authority over spending in light of Trump’s efforts to remake the size and scope of the federal government.

Many of those actions are on hold as dozens of lawsuits move through the federal court system. But Democrats who opposed the bill felt that lawmakers must make their voices heard as well.

Other Democrats argued a partial government shutdown would give Trump more leeway to make funding decisions and further harm federal workers.

Republicans largely supported the stopgap spending bill. However, many lamented that the House and Senate didn’t do more to reach agreement on the dozen full-year government funding bills.

‘Inherently a failure

Senate Appropriations Chairwoman Susan Collins, R-Maine, said the stopgap spending bill wasn’t her first choice for funding the government, but that it was the only option on the table to prevent a funding lapse.

“Government shutdowns are inherently a failure to govern effectively and have negative consequences all across government,” Collins said. “They inevitably require certain government employees — such as Border Patrol agents, members of our military and Coast Guard, TSA screeners and air traffic controllers — to report to work with no certainty at all on when they will receive their next paycheck.”

Washington state Democratic Sen. Patty Murray, ranking member on the Appropriations panel, rebuked House Republican leaders for drafting the stopgap spending bill on their own and then expecting Democratic votes.

“Let me be clear, in my time in Congress, never, ever has one party written partisan full-year appropriations bills for all of government and expected the other party to go along without any input,” Murray said.

The stopgap spending bill, she said, cuts overall spending on domestic programs, a choice Democrats never would have agreed to had GOP leaders tried to negotiate with them.

“We are talking about a nearly 50% cut to life-saving medical research into conditions affecting our service members,” Murray said. “It is a giant shortfall in funding for NIH. It is a massive cut in funding for Army Corps projects and $15 billion less for our domestic priorities.”

“This bill will force Social Security to cut staff and close offices and make it harder for our seniors to get the benefits they spent their careers paying into the system to earn,” Murray added. “It creates a devastating shortfall that risks tens of thousands of Americans losing their housing. So this bill causes real pain for communities across the country.”

Murray also criticized House Republicans for releasing their stopgap spending bill just days before the deadline and then leaving for a recess right after voting to send the measure to the Senate. The move prevented the Senate from amending the CR in any way if Congress wanted to avoid a shutdown.

The Senate voted to reject amendments from Oregon Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley, Illinois Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth, Maryland Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen and Paul before approving the bill.

Schumer’s decision

Schumer said he voted to limit debate to avoid giving Trump, Elon Musk and U.S. DOGE Service the authority to determine which federal employees would have been exempt from the effects of a shutdown and which would have essentially been furloughed. Under federal law, both categories of federal workers receive back pay once the shutdown ends.

“In a shutdown, Donald Trump and DOGE will have the power to determine what is considered essential and what is not — and their views on what is not essential would be mean and vicious and would decimate vital services and cause unimaginable harm to the American people,” Schumer said.

The Democrats who voted to advance the stopgap spending bill, Schumer said, wanted to keep attention on Trump’s actions as president and not divert focus to the wide-reaching repercussions of shutting down the government.

“A shutdown will be a costly distraction from this all important fight,” Schumer said.

The stopgap spending bill, he noted, doesn’t change the Constitution or the laws that say Congress controls spending and that the president must implement those laws.

“The CR does not change the underlying law, making the Trump administration’s impoundments and mass firings illegal,” Schumer said. “Nothing in the CR changes the Impoundment Control Act, the foundation of Congress’ appropriations authority. And the authorization laws that require USAID and other agencies to exist and to operate the programs Congress has assigned to them. Nothing changes Title 5, governing the civil service, the Administrative Procedures Act and so on.”

Senate rules require at least 60 lawmakers vote to cut off debate on a bill. The GOP holds 53 seats at the moment and needed Democratic buy-in to proceed with regular bills. That procedural vote was 62-38.

Democratic Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, Dick Durbin of Illinois, John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire, Gary Peters of Michigan, Brian Schatz of Hawaii, King, Schumer and Shaheen voted to limit debate.

Delays on spending bills

Congress was supposed to draft, debate and approve the dozen annual appropriations bills by the start of this fiscal year on Oct. 1, nearly six months ago.

The bills fund the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Justice, Labor, State, Transportation, Treasury and Veterans’ Affairs.

They also provide funding for Congress, the Supreme Court and numerous smaller agencies, like NASA and the National Science Foundation.

The House Appropriations Committee approved all 12 of its bills on party-line votes and the House was able to pass five of those across the floor last summer without broad Democratic support.

The Senate panel approved 11 of the bills in July and August with broadly bipartisan votes, but none of the measures came up on the floor for debate.

The House and Senate have regularly negotiated final versions of the spending bills, even if they didn’t receive floor approval, and could have begun that conference process in September, or even during their August recess.

But congressional leaders opted to focus their attention on the November elections and used a stopgap spending bill to keep the government running through mid-December, an expected and rather predictable move.

After Republicans won unified control of government, Congress used a second continuing resolution to keep the government funded through March 14. GOP leaders and Trump wanted to hold over negotiations on the full-year bills until they were in office.

The leaders of the Appropriations committees spent the last couple months trying to get bipartisan, bicameral agreement on the total spending level for the current fiscal year. But that ended this weekend when House Republicans released a stopgap spending bill to fund the government through September.

The House voted 217-213 on Tuesday to send the continuing resolution to the Senate. Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie was the only GOP lawmaker to vote against it and Maine Rep. Jared Golden was the only Democratic member to support the bill in that chamber.

‘Congratulations to Chuck Schumer’

Trump had said he would sign the stopgap spending bill, according to a Statement of Administration Policy issued Tuesday.

“H.R. 1968 includes a focused set of critical funding anomalies to ensure the Administration can carry out important programs and fulfill its obligations, including veterans’ healthcare and benefits, pay raises for junior enlisted servicemembers, operations of our air traffic control system, along with nutrition and housing programs,” the SAP states. 

“The bill also provides the Department of Defense with the resources and flexibility necessary to align funding to current priorities in consultation with the Congress and responds to emerging threats by allowing for ‘new starts,’ including other key provisions.”

Trump took to social media ahead of the procedural vote to thank Schumer for announcing he’d vote to limit debate.

“Congratulations to Chuck Schumer for doing the right thing — Took ‘guts’ and courage! The big Tax Cuts, L.A. fire fix, Debt Ceiling Bill, and so much more, is coming. We should all work together on that very dangerous situation,” Trump wrote. “A non pass would be a Country destroyer, approval will lead us to new heights. Again, really good and smart move by Senator Schumer. This could lead to something big for the USA, a whole new direction and beginning! DJT”

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer talks to reporters at the U.S. Capitol on Feb. 7, 2024. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer announced during a floor speech Thursday evening that he will vote to advance the stopgap spending bill that must become law before Friday at midnight to avoid a partial government shutdown.

“While the CR bill is very bad, the potential for a shutdown has consequences for America that are much, much worse,” Schumer said, referring to the stopgap bill, formally known as a continuing resolution.

“For sure, the Republican bill is a terrible option. It is not a clean CR. It is deeply partisan. It doesn’t address far too many of this country’s needs,” he added. “But I believe allowing Donald Trump to take even much more power via a government shutdown is a far worse option.”

The Senate is scheduled to take its first procedural vote on the bill Friday, but both parties will need to reach a time agreement to hold a final passage vote before the deadline.

Schumer’s comments came just one day after he declared that Republicans didn’t have the 60 votes needed to move beyond procedural votes and onto final passage, setting the stage for a funding lapse that would affect nearly every corner of the federal government.

The reversal by the party’s leader indicates that enough Democrats likely will vote with Republicans to cut off debate on the House-passed bill and send it to President Donald Trump, despite intense objections from some in the Democratic Party who want to protest Trump’s actions and obtain commitments that Trump will spend the money Congress appropriates.

No pay during shutdown

During a partial government shutdown, federal departments and agencies have broad authority to determine which federal employees keep working and which are sent home. Neither group would get paid until after Congress and Trump reach agreement on a way to fund the government.

Schumer argued that entering a partial government shutdown would give Trump and members of his administration even more authority than they have now to limit federal operations.

“The decision on what is essential would be solely left to the executive branch, with nobody left at the agencies to check them,” Schumer said. “In short, a shutdown would give Donald Trump, Elon Musk and DOGE and (Office of Management and Budget Director Russ) Vought the keys to the city, state and country.”

Democrats, he said, also want to ensure that any negative repercussions from firing federal workers en masse are solely the responsibility of the Trump administration.

“Right now, Donald Trump owns the chaos in the government. He owns the chaos in the stock market. He owns the damage happening to our economy from one end of the country to the other,” Schumer said. “Donald Trump is hoping for a shutdown, because it will distract from his true agenda — delivering massive cuts to the rich, paid for on the backs of American families.”

Democratic votes needed

Republicans hold 53 seats in the Senate, but Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul has said he’ll vote against advancing the continuing resolution, meaning at least eight Democrats must vote with the GOP for the resolution to move forward.

Schumer and Pennsylvania Democratic Sen. John Fetterman, who previously announced support for the stopgap spending bill, will need at least six of their colleagues to vote with them on Friday.

It wasn’t immediately clear Thursday which Democratic senators would cast those votes.

The House voted mostly along party lines Tuesday to send the stopgap spending bill to the Senate.

Congress was supposed to complete work on the dozen annual government funding bills before Oct. 1, but has instead used continuing resolutions to fund the government through Friday.

Appropriators from both political parties and both chambers had spent weeks trying to reach agreement on how much to spend on the bills during the current fiscal year, but were unable to in time.

To avoid a funding lapse, Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., released a continuing resolution over the weekend that would fund the government through September, essentially cutting off efforts to get agreement on the full-year bills nearly six months into the fiscal year. 

The continuing resolution will free up time and energy for Republicans, who won unified control of government during the November elections, to negotiate a deal among themselves on extending the 2017 tax law, and finding ways to pay for the deficit increase that is expected to cause.