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WASHINGTON — TMZ built its brand tracking celebrities. Now it’s turning its attention to Congress, chasing down paparazzi-style shots of lawmakers on break from Washington during a record-long partial government shutdown.

Videos and photos posted by the tabloid website showing lawmakers in airports, Las Vegas and even Disney World have racked up millions of views and fueled a growing backlash. With travel disruptions persisting and some federal workers going without pay, pressure is mounting on Congress to cut short its regularly scheduled recess.

Beyond TMZ, President Trump also wants lawmakers to come back, even hinting he might invoke rarely used powers to call Congress into session.

Still, it’s not clear what a return would accomplish, with the 45-day partial government shutdown at a deeper impasse than ever. The Senate reached a bipartisan funding deal last week, but House Speaker Mike Johnson rejected it, and House Republicans passed their own version before heading for the exits.

“I’m not sure that we’d come,” Democratic Sen. Chris Coons said Monday when asked about members being called back. “And I’m not sure that there would be any difference from what’s happened so far.”

On recess — and on camera

As lawmakers headed out of Washington last week, the celebrity-gossip outlet TMZ put out a call.

“TMZ is on the hunt for photos of politicians on vacay as TSA officers suffer!” the outlet said in a social media post.

The focus from TMZ — an outlet known more for capturing unflattering footage of celebrities than digging into the nuances of federal policy — was the latest example of how politics is being fueled by viral images and populist sentiment.

Videos quickly followed, showing senators moving through airports — often attempting to shield themselves from cameras — with provocative headlines layered on top. The clips racked up millions of views.

The outlet didn’t stop there. Photos of lawmakers on vacation soon followed, including viral images of Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham at Disney World with captions such as: “Lindsey Graham lives it up at Disney World during the partial government shutdown!”

Graham said that he had been in Florida for a meeting with Trump administration officials and had made a stop at Disney World with a friend. He also blamed Democrats for the shutdown.

Another widely shared post showed Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia in Las Vegas.

“Actually I don’t mind what TMZ is doing here,” Garcia posted in response, adding that he was visiting his father. “Like I said a few days ago, Speaker Mike Johnson should have never sent us all home.”

The effort grew out of frustration, said TMZ executive producer Harvey Levin, after the outlet interviewed a TSA worker struggling due to missed paychecks during the shutdown.

“It outraged us so much we wanted to use our platforms to show how Congress — Dems AND Republicans — have betrayed us,” Levin said in a statement.

He added that lawmakers shouldn’t expect the coverage to end anytime soon.

“Several months ago we decided to amp up our presence and our voice,” Levin said. “We now have a producer and a photog circulating in the Capitol, showing the intersection between politics and pop culture.”

Pressure mounts on Congress to return

The backlash playing out online is fueling other pressure as well. Trump has called on Congress to return. He spoke with Senate Majority Leader John Thune on Sunday and Monday, and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said he has urged leadership to cancel recess “repeatedly.”

“He’ll host a big Easter dinner here at the White House if Congress will come back,” she added.

So far, Republican leadership has not blinked, raising questions about how much pressure Trump will ultimately apply — and whether he would be willing to concede ground to Democrats to end the shutdown.

Unions are adding to that pressure.

“To leave Washington while tens of thousands of workers are going without pay shows a clear lack of respect for the essential employees tasked with keeping our nation safe,” said Hydrick Thomas, president of the American Federation of Government Employees TSA Council 100.

Although vacation snapshots have stirred outrage, recess is also an opportunity for lawmakers to reconnect with constituents back home. Some hold town hall events. Others go on trips abroad, such as joining a delegation to Taiwan.

Why the funding impasse won’t be easy to solve

Even if lawmakers return to Washington, there isn’t an easy way out of the funding impasse.

Senators already labored for weeks to try to find agreement on Democrats’ demand that any funding for the Department of Homeland Security come with restrictions on how federal immigration agents conduct enforcement. In vote after failed vote, Democrats showed they wouldn’t budge.

As the partial government shutdown extended to the longest in U.S. history, the Senate settled on a last-ditch effort to fund most of DHS while leaving out money for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Border Patrol.

But that deal was rejected by Johnson in the House, who instead pushed through a bill to extend DHS funding on a party-line vote. The collapse of the bipartisan agreement has soured the mood for negotiations and left lawmakers pointing fingers.

“There’s no point in calling us back because that was the result of a conscious choice by the Republican majority,” said Coons, a Delaware Democrat.

Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, told Fox News on Tuesday that the House can come back “on a moment’s notice,” but “the Senate has to do their job and help us on this heavy lift.”

But Thune, a South Dakota Republican, has been clear that he sees no way to get a DHS funding bill through the Senate with its 60-vote threshold for advancing legislation, known as the filibuster.

Still, Thune is coming under renewed pressure to find a way past the funding impasse — with calls from Trump and some conservatives to get rid of the filibuster.

That’s unlikely to work either because of a handful of Republican senators who have made it clear they won’t vote to change the Senate’s rules. Still, Trump told reporters Sunday night that, “They should terminate the filibuster and they should vote.”

Sen. Mike Lee, a Utah Republican, agreed. He said on social media that he thinks one of the only options for the Senate is to “nuke the filibuster and pass everything.”

“Inaction is unacceptable,” he added.

Cappelletti and Groves write for the Associated Press. AP writer Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report.

KTLA-owner Nexstar Media Group said it has closed its deal to acquire rival Tegna’s TV stations, despite opposition from eight state attorneys general who filed a lawsuit to block the merger.

The acquisition was approved by the Federal Communications Commission’s Media Bureau and the Justice Department, Irving, Texas-based Nexstar said Thursday.

“This transaction is essential to sustaining strong local journalism in the communities we serve,” Nexstar founder and Chief Executive Perry Sook said in a statement. “By bringing these two outstanding companies together, Nexstar will be a stronger, more dynamic enterprise — better positioned to deliver exceptional journalism and local programming with enhanced assets, capabilities and talent.”

Sook also mentioned President Trump and FCC Chairman Brendan Carr by name in the statement, saying the company was “grateful” they recognized the “dynamic forces shaping the media landscape” and allowed the transaction to move forward. Trump had supported the deal.

The surprise announcement came only a day after eight state attorneys general, including California’s Rob Bonta, sued to stop the deal, arguing it would give Nexstar too much control of local TV stations. At the time, Bonta said the combination would cause “irreparable harm to local news and consumers who rely on their reporting as a critical source of information.”

Nexstar is the largest TV station owner in the U.S., with 164 outlets including KTLA in Los Angeles. If the merger with Tegna succeeds, Nexstar would have 265 TV stations reaching 80% of the U.S. and multiple outlets in a number of markets.

The suit also claimed it would give the combined company too much leverage in negotiating fees from pay-TV providers that carry their stations, which could raise costs for consumers.

The plaintiffs in the suit also include state attorneys general in Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, New York, North Carolina, Oregon and Virginia.

FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez said the merger violates the existing national ownership cap of 39% under federal law and said the acquisition did not receive a vote before the entire commission. The FCC approved this deal with waivers, meaning the company can operate in violation of that ownership cap.

“A transaction of this magnitude, which includes new and novel issues before the FCC, demands open deliberation before the full Commission, not a quiet sign-off meant to avoid public scrutiny,” Gomez said in a statement. “Given the increasingly alarming pace of reckless media consolidation, the American public deserves to know how and why this decision was made.”

The FCC did not respond to an immediate request for comment.

Times staff writers Stephen Battaglio and Meg James contributed to this report.

A group of attorneys general are taking legal action to block Nexstar Media Group’s proposed $6.2-billion acquisition of Tegna’s TV stations, calling the deal bad for consumer cable bills and local journalism.

A lawsuit filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Sacramento says the proposed deal by eight state law enforcers, including California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta, claims the proposed deal will give Nexstar too much control of local TV stations, ultimately hurting consumers by diminishing the diversity of news sources in their markets.

Bonta said in a statement that the deal will cause “irreparable harm to local news and consumers who rely on their reporting as a critical source of information.” The plaintiffs also include state attorneys general in Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, New York, North Carolina, Oregon and Virginia.

The Irving, Texas-based Nexstar is currently the largest station owner in the U.S., with 164 outlets including KTLA in Los Angeles. If the merger with Tegna succeeds, Nexstar would have 265 TV stations reaching 80% of the U.S. and multiple outlets in a number of markets.

The suit also claims that the merger would give Nexstar too much leverage in negotiating fees from pay-TV providers that carry their stations. Higher fees paid to Nexstar would be passed along to consumers in their cable and satellite bills, the lawsuit asserts.

Most of Nexstar’s stations are affiliates of ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox, all of which carry NFL football, the highest-rated programming on TV by a wide margin. Disputes over carriage fees between station owners and pay-TV providers often result in blackouts and service interruptions to consumers.

DirecTV, which serves around 11 million pay-TV subscribers in the U.S., filed a similar lawsuit in the same court on Thursday, claiming the Nexstar deal will “irreparably drive up consumer costs, reduce local competition, shutter local newsrooms, and increase both the frequency and duration of blackouts of key local teams and network programming.”

A Nexstar representative did not respond to a request to comment.

President Trump has said he favors Nexstar’s proposed deal. But every major TV station owner believes consolidation in the TV station business is necessary to thrive going forward as they battle to compete with streaming video platforms that have eaten away at their audience share.

The companies say they are at a disadvantage in competing with tech companies by being limited to owning stations in 39% of the U.S., a cap that was set in 2003.

Nexstar recently cut veteran anchors and on-air reporters from its stations in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York. Further reductions in local TV newsrooms would occur if Nexstar succeeds in acquiring Tegna, which would likely mean consolidation of local newsrooms in which it owns more than one station.