Senate

Jan. 8 (UPI) — Seventeen House Republicans joined their Democratic colleagues Thursday evening to pass legislation that extends Affordable Care Act premium tax credits for three years.

The House lawmakers voted 230-196 in favor of House Bill 1834, known as Breaking the Gridlock Act, sending it to the Senate where passage is anything but assured. The Senate already shot down the proposal last month. President Donald Trump would also have to sign it.

“We did it!” Rep. Lauren Underwood, D-Ill., said in a recorded statement following the bill’s passing.

“And, honestly, I’m just a little bit hopeful that we might be able to get this across the finish line and save our healthcare.”

Affordable Care Act premium tax credits have greatly reduced the costs of healthcare coverage for more than 20 million people annually. The tax credits expired at the turn of the new year, setting the stage for premiums to double for millions of people.

Debate over how to address the expiration of premium tax credits was a key point of contention during the record 43-day government shutdown that ensued in October.

Nine Republicans broke from party leadership on Wednesday to join Democrats in forcing a vote on the House floor with a rarely used discharge petition after House Republicans prevented it from moving forward. Only four Republicans pushed for a floor vote last month when lawmakers tried to pass an extension before the end-of-year deadline.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., who had expected the extension to pass, applauded his party for standing strong on their months-long commitment to “fix our broken healthcare system and address the Republican healthcare crisis, beginning with the extension of the Affordable Care Act tax credits.”

To reporters after the vote, Jeffries called on Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., to “immediately” bring the bill up for a vote and “stop playing procedural games that are jeopardizing the health, the safety and the well-being of the American people.”

Rep. Rob Bresnahan Jr. of Pennsylvania was one of the 14 Republicans to vote “yes” to H.B. 1834. In a statement, the junior House member criticized the Affordable Care Act, which is frequently called Obamacare, for allegedly failing to deliver on its promise to lower insurance costs.

“But the only thing worse than a three-year extension of these credits is to let them expire with no solution or off-ramp,” he said.

“I voted for this because, as of right now, it is the only path forward that keeps discussion alive to protect the 28,000 people in my district from immediate premium spikes.”

Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., is among the Republicans who supported voting on an extension last month. He said ahead of the vote that House members have been working with members of the Senate on a proposal that could pass through with reforms.

“We’ve been working with senators for weeks,” Lawler said. “I think that’s ultimately where we can get.”

WASHINGTON — In a remarkable rebuke of Republican leadership, the House passed legislation Thursday, in a 230-196 vote, that would extend expired healthcare subsidies for those who get coverage through the Affordable Care Act as renegade GOP lawmakers joined essentially all Democrats in voting for the measure.

Forcing the issue to a vote came about after a handful of Republicans signed on to a so-called “discharge petition” to unlock debate, bypassing objections from House Speaker Mike Johnson. The bill now goes to the Senate, where pressure is building for a similar bipartisan compromise.

Together, the rare political coalitions are rushing to resolve the standoff over the enhanced tax credits that were put in place during the COVID-19 crisis but expired late last year after no agreement was reached during the government shutdown.

“The affordability crisis is not a ‘hoax,’ it is very real — despite what Donald Trump has had to say,” said House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, invoking the president’s remarks.

“Democrats made clear before the government was shut down that we were in this affordability fight until we win this affordability fight,” he said. “Today we have an opportunity to take a meaningful step forward.”

Ahead of voting, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that the bill, which would provide a three-year extension of the subsidy, would increase the nation’s deficit by about $80.6 billion over the decade. It would increase the number of people with health insurance by 100,000 this year, 3 million in 2027, 4 million in 2028 and 1.1 million in 2029, the CBO said.

Growing support for extending ACA subsidies

Johnson (R-La.) worked for months to prevent this situation. His office argued Thursday that federal healthcare funding from the COVID-19 era is ripe with fraud, pointing to an investigation in Minnesota, and urged a no vote.

On the floor, Republicans argued that the subsidies as structured have contributed to fraud and that the chamber should be focused on lowering health insurance costs for the broader population.

“Only 7% of the population relies on Obamacare marketplace plans. This chamber should be about helping 100% of Americans,” said Rep. Jason Smith (R-Mo.), chair of the House Ways and Means Committee.

While the momentum from the vote shows the growing support for the tax breaks that have helped some 22 million Americans have access to health insurance, the Senate would be under no requirement to take up the House bill.

Instead, a small group of senators from both parties has been working on an alternative plan that could find support in both chambers and become law. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said that for any plan to find support in his chamber, it will need to have income limits to ensure that the financial aid is focused on those who most need the help. He and other Republicans also want to ensure that beneficiaries would have to at least pay a nominal amount for their coverage.

Finally, Thune said there would need to be some expansion of health savings accounts, which allow people to save money and withdraw it tax-free as long as the money is spent on qualified medical expenses.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), who is part of the negotiations on reforms and subsidies for the Affordable Care Act, said there is agreement on addressing fraud in healthcare.

“We recognize that we have millions of people in this country who are going to lose — are losing, have lost — their health insurance because they can’t afford the premiums,” Shaheen said. “And so we’re trying to see if we can’t get to some agreement that’s going to help, and the sooner we can do that, the better.”

Trump has pushed Republicans to send money directly to Americans for health savings accounts so they can bypass the federal government and handle insurance on their own. Democrats largely reject this idea as insufficient for covering the high costs of healthcare.

Republicans bypass their leaders

The action by Republicans to force a vote has been an affront to Johnson and his leadership team, who essentially lost control of what comes to the House floor as the Republican lawmakers joined Democrats for the workaround.

After last year’s government shutdown failed to resolve the issue, Johnson had discussed allowing more politically vulnerable GOP lawmakers a chance to vote on another healthcare bill that would temporarily extend the subsidies while also adding changes.

But after days of discussions, Johnson and the GOP leadership sided with the more conservative wing, which has assailed the subsidies as propping up ACA, which they consider a failed government program. He offered a modest proposal of healthcare reforms that was approved, but has stalled.

It was then that rank-and-file lawmakers took matters into their own hands, as many of their constituents faced soaring health insurance premiums beginning this month.

Republican Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick, Robert Bresnahan and Ryan Mackenzie, all from Pennsylvania, and Mike Lawler of New York, signed the Democrats’ petition, pushing it to the magic number of 218 needed to force a House vote. All four represent key swing districts whose races will help determine which party takes charge of the House next year.

Trump encourages GOP to take on healthcare issue

What started as a long shot effort by Democrats to offer a discharge petition has become a political vindication of the Democrats’ government shutdown strategy as they fought to preserve the healthcare funds.

Democrats are making clear that the higher health insurance costs many Americans are facing will be a political centerpiece of their efforts to retake the majority in the House and Senate in the fall elections.

Trump, during a lengthy speech this week to House GOP lawmakers, encouraged his party to take control of the healthcare debate — an issue that has stymied Republicans since he tried, and failed, to repeal Obamacare during his first term.

Mascaro and Freking write for the Associated Press. AP writer Matt Brown contributed to this report.

A resolution that would block US President Donald Trump from taking further military action against Venezuela without congressional authorisation has passed in the Senate by a vote of 52-47.

With the measure receiving a simple majority in Thursday’s vote, it will move ahead to the House.

Days after US forces abducted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in a dramatic military raid in Caracas, senators voted on the latest in a series of war powers measures introduced since the administration ramped up military pressure on the country with attacks on boats off its coast in September.

Republicans have blocked all of the measures, but the last vote was just 49-51, as two senators from Trump’s party joined Democrats in backing a resolution in November. Administration officials had told lawmakers at that time that they did not plan to change the government or conduct strikes on Venezuelan territory.

More to come…

Jan. 6 (UPI) — The 2026 midterm elections are coming later this year with 33 seats in the U.S. Senate and all 435 House seats on ballots across the country.

The Nov. 3 midterms are an opportunity for voters to respond to President Donald Trump‘s second term. Midterm elections are often viewed as a measure of voters’ response to the sitting president’s policies.

After a year of aggressive deportation practices, a withdrawal from the international arena and economic upheaval, 2026 has begun with the Trump administration abducting a foreign leader and launching offensives on foreign nations.

Republicans will seek to maintain a 219-213 majority in the House and three-seat majority in the Senate while Democrats hope to make gains and offer a check on Trump’s power. The results will signal approval or disapproval of how the country is being run and will set the landscape for the final two years of Trump’s presidency.

Retirements to bring changes to Senate

Nine senators have announced they are retiring from the chamber in 2026, including one of the most senior lawmakers.

Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., the longest-serving Senate party leader in history, will end his 40-year career at the end of the current term. He is one of four Republicans retiring from the Senate.

Six Republicans launched campaigns to succeed McConnell last year, along with eight Democrats. Kentucky has been a firmly Republican-leaning state, voting more than 65% for Trump in 2024.

Alabama voted similarly in 2024, with about 64% of votes going to Trump. Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., is ending his time in the Senate to run for state governor.

Like Tuberville, Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., will leave the Senate to run for governor of their respective states. Bennet has been a senator since 2009 while Blackburn entered the chamber in 2019.

Of the senators not running for re-election, Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, is leaving open a seat that is considered to be the most competitive. Ernst has been a senator since 2015.

Republicans are backing Rep. Ashley Hinson to take Ernst’s seat. Hinson was elected to the U.S. House in 2020.

Three candidates are in the Democratic primary seeking to challenge Hinson in November: state Sen. Zach Wahls, state Rep. Josh Turek and Nathan Sage, a military veteran.

Wahls was the youngest Iowa Senate Democratic Leader, serving in that role from 2020 to 2023.

The race for an open seat in North Carolina features former Gov. Roy Cooper on the ticket for the Democratic Party. Cooper served two terms as governor.

On the Republican side, former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley has earned the endorsement of Trump but he is being challenged in the primary by Michele Morrow. She ran an unsuccessful campaign for North Carolina’s superintendent of public instruction in 2024 and has never held public office.

North Carolina has historically been a tightly contested state. Trump earned about 50% of the vote there in 2024. Prior to that, the last time a presidential candidate received 50% of votes was 2012 when Mitt Romney received 50.4%.

North Carolina’s Senate seats have been held by Republicans since 2014. Kay Hagan was a state senator from 2009 to 2015 before being succeeded by Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C. Tillis is retiring at the end of the term.

The Democratic Party has tapped former Sen. Sherrod Brown to attempt a return to the chamber in 2026 after he lost a bid for re-election in 2024 to Republican Bernie Moreno.

Brown has launched a campaign to challenge Sen. Jon Husted, the Republican who was appointed to fill Vice President JD Vance’s seat that he vacated when Trump was elected president.

Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., is running for re-election in a state won by Trump in 2024. Three Republicans have entered their party’s primary to challenge Ossoff: Rep. Buddy Carter, Rep. Mike Collins and former college and pro football coach Derek Dooley.

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has given Dooley his endorsement.

Georgia’s 6th Congressional District re-elected Democrat Lucy McBath to the House in 2024 by nearly 50 points over her Republican challenger. Democrats hold both of the state’s Senate seats.

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, will be challenged in 2026 but who will be on the other side of the ticket will not be known until the Democratic primary in June. Collins represents a state that former Vice President Kamala Harris carried by about seven points in 2024.

Maine Gov. Janet Mills and military veteran Graham Platner are campaigning in the Democratic primary.

Texas Sen. John Cornyn is running for re-election but will first have to win a contested Republican primary. Attorney General Ken Paxton, who has been a key figure in Texas’ redistricting battle and often opponent to Biden administration policies, will challenge Cornyn, along with Rep. Wesley Hunt.

In another battleground state, the retirement of Democratic Sen. Gary Peters will leave the race for a Michigan Senate seat open.

Former congressman Mike Rogers is expected to be on the ticket for Republicans after receiving an endorsement from Trump. Three candidates have entered the Democratic primary: Rep. Haley Stevens, state Sen. Mallory McMorrow and physician Abdul El-Sayed.

Congresspeople seeking new offices

Several members of Congress are running for different offices outside of the House chambers, including 11 running for governor. Meanwhile 18 members of the House are retiring, including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Republicans running for governor in their respective states include Iowa Rep. Randy Feenstra, South Dakota Rep. Dusty Johnson, Florida Rep. Byron Donalds and South Carolina Rep. Nancy Mace.

Rep Chip Roy, R-Texas, will not run for re-election as he will try to succeed Paxton as his state’s attorney general.

New Mexico’s 2nd Congressional District is held by Democrat Gabriel Vasquez but was won by Trump in 2024. New Mexico has voted for Democrats in every presidential election since 2008.

Vasquez faces a challenge from Republicans Greg Cunningham, a veteran of the U.S. Marines and former Albuquerque police officer. Cunningham ran for a seat in the state legislature in 2024 and lost.

Arizona’s 6th Congressional District seat, held by Republican Rep. Juan Ciscomani, had several Democrats looking to challenge Ciscomani in November.

Some candidates have begun dropping out of the Democratic primary as 2026 has arrived. JoAnna Mendoza, a military veteran, and engineer Chris Donat remain in the race. Mendoza has vastly outraised Donat, tallying $1.9 million in receipts compared to Donat’s $21,061, according to Federal Elections Commission data.

Trump won Arizona in 2024 with about 52% of the vote.

Colorado’s newest seat, District 8, is held by Republican Rep. Gabe Evans. He represents the district located in the northern Denver area after flipping the seat for Republicans in 2024.

Evans has a new challenger in the Republican primary as of November with former Air Force cadet and current Colorado Army Reserve Capt. Adam DeRito filing to run against him.

DeRito has been in a long legal battle with the U.S. Air Force which expelled him hours before he was set to graduate in 2010. He was denied a diploma for allegedly violating academy rules by fraternizing with a subordinate. DeRito claims these allegations were retaliation for him reporting sexual assaults at the academy.

The Democratic primary is set to feature five candidates, former state legislator Shannon Bird, state lawmaker Manny Rutinel, Marine veteran Evan Munsing, Denis Abrate and self-proclaimed former Republican John Francis Szemler.

Michigan is one of the biggest battleground states in 2026 with three seats expected to feature close races, along with an open Senate seat.

District 7, held by Republican Tom Barrett, has flipped in consecutive elections. Barrett, a U.S. Army veteran, will seek re-election with seven Democrats declared for their primary. He assumed the seat after Democrat Elissa Slotkin ran for and was elected to the Senate.

Among the Democrats vying to challenge Barrett is former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink, Michigan State professor Josh Cowen and William Lawrence, the founder of nonprofit environmental advocacy organization the Sunrise Movement.

District 10 will feature an open election as Rep. John James, a Republican, enters the state gubernatorial race.

FEC campaign data shows a field of six Democrats seeking their party’s nomination. Eric Chung, a former U.S. Department of Commerce official under the Biden administration, has raised the most out of any candidate, followed by Republican Robert Lulgjuraj, a former county prosecutor.

After some delay, District 4 Rep. Bill Huizenga, a Republican, announced last month that he will seek re-election. Four Democrats have filed to appear in the primary, including state Sen. Sean McCann.

Reporting from Lincoln, Calif. — Republican Assemblyman Chuck DeVore was riding high from his party’s recent Senate election victory in Massachusetts when he bounded into the town library here. The meeting of the Lincoln Tea Party Patriots was already buzzing over Scott Brown’s win in one of the bluest of blue states, and DeVore tried to convince them that with his consistent conservative credentials, he could take incumbent Sen. Barbara Boxer.

“A sleeping giant has been awakened,” he said. “Some of you are scared. Some of you are mad as hell. . . . Times are different and we can win!”

If any major candidate should be able to marshal that sentiment in California it is DeVore, a lifetime conservative rumbler whose policy positions dovetail perfectly with the mojo of the nation’s guerrilla movement of the moment. Almost a third of Californians, according to a recent poll, identify with Tea Partiers like those at this gathering about 30 miles northeast of Sacramento; Republicans here and across the nation are salivating over the possibility of defeating their long-time Democratic nemesis, Boxer.

But serious questions remain about whether DeVore, 45, can survive the GOP primary. He has the fiscal and social credentials desired by the conservative party voters most likely to turn out in June. But, despite campaigning for more than a year, his candidacy is something of an apparition. Outside party circles and his home base of Orange County voters generally have no idea who he is, and he ended 2009 with a net $140,000 in the bank.

In a state as big as California, recognition does not come cheap. Primary opponent Carly Fiorina, a multimillionaire, has already lent her campaign $2.5 million, and former U.S. Rep. Tom Campbell, who jumped into the race last month, is much better known to voters because he has been in the public eye for two decades.

DeVore is counting on hard work and persistence to make up for money and name identification. Since announcing his candidacy in November 2008 he has logged more than 50,000 miles by car and air to meet with nearly 40,000 Republican voters at 239 stops up and down the state. (The candidate, an admitted wonk, logs every visit, mile and voter on a spreadsheet when he gets home to Irvine).

“Whatever the polls say four months before the primary, the strength of the volunteers backing us, the lack of any skeletal remains in my closet are going to allow me to prevail in this primary and to ultimately vanquish Barbara Boxer,” DeVore said at the January meeting of the West Valley Republican Women Federated at a diner in San Jose.

He tells voters that politicians in both parties have forgotten their duty, which he believes should be limited to securing citizens’ rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness — “not making up new rights.”

“They make it up as they go along because they don’t have a core philosophy that guides their decisions,” DeVore said. “I have a core. It’s the Constitution, it’s the preamble of the Declaration of Independence. I don’t vary from that.”

The retired National Guardsman, Reagan White House appointee to the Pentagon and longtime legislator relishes political combat. Referring to the Senate hearing in which Boxer rebuked a brigadier general for addressing her as “ma’am” rather than “Senator” — she told him she worked hard to win her seat — DeVore pledged to call her “ma’am” every chance he could during debates.

If she objects, he told the women’s club, he will reply, “Well, then, Senator, you can call me Colonel because I worked a hell of a lot harder for that title!”

While mocking Boxer, he also criticizes his GOP primary opponents. At gatherings across the state, he paints Fiorina as a dilettante whose spotty voting record alone undermines her candidacy, and who has shifted her positions to the right on policies such as the federal economic stimulus package. He faults Campbell, who is campaigning as a fiscal conservative, for supporting temporary tax increases in recent years.

“I would argue it’s important to have some consistency in the people we trust with our vote,” DeVore said in Lincoln.

At each event, DeVore takes question after question, and he doesn’t always tell the voters what they want to hear. In Lincoln, one man said he was tired of congressional Republicans arguing they could accomplish nothing because they are in the minority. He asked DeVore how he would achieve more.

“I’m going to challenge you a bit on this, sir,” DeVore replied, before booming: “The first order of a senator is not to do something. It’s to follow the Constitution!”

DeVore’s supporters believe he is the lone candidate who would stop what they see as a growing threat to the nation’s future: ever-expanding government, deficit spending, debt to China. Their frustration that their leaders have stopped listening to them, and acting in their best interest, is palpable.

“I trusted my government,” said Ruth Crone, a Fair Oaks mother of four who attended the Lincoln Tea Party. The registered Republican said she has grown increasingly disillusioned with both her elected representatives and her party, and she supports DeVore because he understands what’s at stake. “Our individual liberties are imperiled by the financial irresponsibility” of the federal government, she said.

Zeal, however, is no guarantee of momentum.

DeVore sees a path to victory. Once primary voters tune in to the race later this year, he said, they will be turned off by the other candidates’ pasts: Campbell’s support for tax increases and Fiorina’s controversial tenure as chief of Hewlett-Packard. When he wins the primary, DeVore said, he believes the national conservative movement will financially back him much as it did Scott Brown in Massachusetts.

“Once you get past the June primary, the notoriety we’ll generate by defeating the better-known and presumably better-financed Republican — one perceived rightly as the pick of the establishment, the other a moderate who has been in favor of tax increases — I think that’s going to put us on the map,” DeVore said. “Frankly, I need that.”

While analysts predict, and polls thus far confirm, that the other candidates match up better against Boxer in the general election, he argues that Republicans would coalesce behind him because of their interest in defeating her. “That’s going to motivate a lot of people,” he said.

In every step DeVore takes, however, lies confirmation that his situation is dire.

He urges followers to attach bumper stickers to their car, noting that each one is worth $200 in paid ads. Campaign signs and T-shirts are stored in his Sacramento apartment. DeVore knows which car rental firm near the state Capitol offers the cheapest rates should he drop the car off in another city.

DeVore’s campaign staff is tiny and volunteer-driven, a shadow of Fiorina’s assembly of pollsters, media advisors and political consultants. The silver lining: The lack of bureaucracy allows DeVore’s circle to be nimble. As Brown gained steam in Massachusetts, DeVore directed his volunteers to call voters there the weekend before the election on Brown’s behalf; Campbell and Fiorina merely put out statements on election day. On Thursday, DeVore jumped on an opportunity to ambush Fiorina on a popular Southern California radio show, where he accused her of flip-flopping on the issues and tried to goad her into committing to a debate.

DeVore used to drive himself to campaign events, until his staff decided his time would be better spent in other ways, such as phone calls, interviews, Facebooking and chatting with voters on Twitter.

“I don’t know if this is going to be a waste of time at the end of the day in a state of 37 million people, or whether, relative to the large numbers of voters that we’re dealing with, whether this is a good investment of time. But what other choice do I have?” he asked. “I’m not a millionaire, and I’m not a celebrity.”

seema.mehta@latimes.com

PHOENIX — Republican former U.S. Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona on Tuesday announced his withdrawal from public life after a dementia diagnosis.

Kyl, 83, represented Arizona in both chambers of Congress for nearly three decades. Most of those years were in the Senate, including a term as minority whip.

“My family and I now head down a path filled with moments of joy and increasing difficulties,” Kyl said in a statement. “I am grateful beyond expression for their love and support, in these coming days as in all the days of my life. Despite this diagnosis, I remain a very fortunate man.”

Kyl left the Senate in 2013 and joined the lobbying firm Covington and Burling. In 2018 he was appointed by then-Gov. Doug Ducey, a fellow Republican, to fill the vacancy after the death of Sen. John McCain. Kyl served several months before rejoining the lobbying firm.

Kyl leveraged his expertise on water policy in Congress to gain approval of tribal water rights settlements, said Sarah Porter of Arizona State University. He was an “important participant” in negotiations that created the state’s water rules, said Porter, director of the university’s Kyl Center for Water Policy that is named after the former senator.

As a lobbyist, Kyl helped guide the confirmation of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh.

Govindarao writes for the Associated Press.

Terrorism and the Middle East are continuing to roil the Republican Senate contest after a letter written by former congressman Tom Campbell emerged that appeared to contradict statements Campbell and his aides had made about his dealings with a radical Muslim professor.

The professor, Sami Al-Arian, contributed to Campbell’s unsuccessful campaign in 2000 for the U.S. Senate. On Sept. 26, 2001, when he was teaching at the University of South Florida, Al-Arian gave an interview to Fox TV host Bill O’Reilly in which he conceded that he had said, “Jihad is our path. Victory to Islam. Death to Israel. Revolution. Revolution until victory. Rolling to Jerusalem.”

Those statements quickly generated a furor and the university moved to discipline Al-Arian. Campbell, by then a law professor at Stanford University, wrote a letter to Judy Genshaft, the president of the University of South Florida, protesting any punishment.

Campbell had previously conceded that he wrote a letter on Al-Arian’s behalf, but had said during a candidates’ debate Friday that he did so before Al-Arian’s interview with O’Reilly. His campaign’s website also said the letter was written before the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

The text of the letter showed otherwise. Dated Jan. 21, 2002, it said, “ . . . I respectfully wish to convey my sincere alarm that Professor Al-Arian may be treated harshly because of the substance of his views.”

Campbell went on to write that “I have formed this fear because of the paucity of evidence supporting the purported reasons for this discipline against him. I read a transcript of the ‘O’Reilly Factor’ interview last autumn, and I did not see anything whereby Professor Al-Arian attempted to claim he was representing the views of the University of South Florida.”

Carly Fiorina, one of Campbell’s opponents in the primary race, called on him to release the letter last week. The text of the letter was first disclosed by the website of the Investigative Project on Terrorism. Campbell’s aides, who had said the candidate no longer had a copy of the original letter, then posted a link to it on the campaign website.

On Monday, Campbell said in an interview that despite the language of his letter, he had never read the full transcript of the O’Reilly interview, specifically the “Death to Israel” language. If he had seen it, he said, he never would have written the letter.

“That’s too zealous,” he said. “Unacceptable. Calling for death to a country or individual is unacceptable.”

Campbell has previously said that Al-Arian never contributed to his 2000 Senate campaign; Campbell later admitted that he had.

In 2006, Al-Arian pleaded guilty to providing aid to a terrorist group.

Campbell spokesman James Fisfis said the candidate’s memory of his dealings with Al-Arian is foggy because he did not have an original copy of the letter and because the events occurred nearly a decade ago.

“It was a long time ago,” Fisfis said. “We’re trying to piece together everything about that time period.”

A spokesman for one of Campbell’s rivals, Assemblyman Chuck DeVore (R-Irvine), said the letter is the latest in a troubling pattern.

“Whether it’s absent-mindedness or deception — the only person who knows that for sure is Tom Campbell — there’s a pattern of inaccuracy whenever Tom Campbell ventures into these subjects,” Joshua Trevino said.

“We have to double-check everything he says about his past associations with these radicals because we can’t trust him to give us the whole truth.”

The disclosures came as Campbell and Fiorina filed the paperwork Monday to make their candidacies official. DeVore planned to file his paperwork Wednesday. The winner of the primary will face three-term Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.).

seema.mehta@latimes.com

DES MOINES, Iowa — Democrat Renee Hardman was elected to the Iowa state Senate on Tuesday in a year-end special election, denying Republicans from reclaiming two-thirds control of the chamber.

Hardman bested Republican Lucas Loftin by an overwhelming margin to win a seat representing parts of the Des Moines suburbs. The seat became vacant after the Oct. 6 death of state Sen. Claire Celsi, a Democrat.

Hardman, the CEO of nonprofit Lutheran Services of Iowa and a member of the West Des Moines City Council, becomes the first Black woman elected to the 50-member Senate.

“I want to recognize that while my name was the one on the ballot, this race was never just about me,” Hardman told a room of supporters in West Des Moines after declaring victory.

With 99% of votes counted, Hardman led by about 43 percentage points.

Her win is latest in a string of special election victories for Iowa Democrats, who flipped two Senate seats this year to break up a supermajority that had allowed Republicans to easily confirm GOP Gov. Kim Reynolds’ appointments to state agencies and commissions.

Democrat Mike Zimmer first flipped a seat in January, winning a district that had strongly favored Republican President Trump in the 2024 election. In August, Democrat Catelin Drey handily defeated her GOP opponent in the Republican stronghold of northwestern Iowa, giving Democrats 17 seats to Republicans’ 33. Celsi’s death brought that down to 16.

Republicans would have regained two-thirds control with a Loftin victory Tuesday. Without a supermajority, the party will need to get support from at least one Democrat to approve Reynolds’ nominees. The GOP still has significant majorities in both legislative chambers.

Ken Martin, chair of the Democratic National Committee, called Hardman’s victory “a major check on Republican power.”

“With the last special election of the year now decided, one thing is clear: 2025 was the year of Democratic victories and overperformance, and Democrats are on track for big midterm elections,” Martin said.

In November the party dominated the first major Election Day since Trump returned to the White House, notably winning governor’s races in Virginia and New Jersey. Democrats held onto a Kentucky state Senate seat this month in a special election. And while Republican Matt Van Epps won a Tennessee special election for a U.S. House seat, the relatively slim margin of victory gave Democrats hope for next year’s midterms. The party must net three House seats in 2026 to reclaim the majority and impede Trump’s agenda.

Loftin, a tree trimmer turned data manager, congratulated Hardman and told the Associated Press he’s praying for her as she embarks on this important chapter.

Iowa GOP Chairman Jeff Kaufmann applauded Loftin and his supporters for putting up a fight in what he described as “a very tough district.” Democrats outnumber Republicans by about 3,300 voters, or 37% to 30%.

“Although we fell short this time, the Republican Party of Iowa remains laser-focused on expanding our majorities in the Iowa Legislature and keeping Iowa ruby-red,” Kaufmann said.

The Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee pledged Tuesday to help defend the party’s gains in Iowa and prevent the return of a GOP supermajority next year.

Schoenbaum and Fingerhut write for the Associated Press. Schoenbaum reported from Salt Lake City.

Dec. 27 (UPI) — President Donald Trump and Treasury Sec. Scott Bessent urged an end to the Senate filibuster rule ahead of an anticipated budget battle in January.

Bessent submitted an op-ed that The Washington Post published on Saturday and blames Senate Democrats and the filibuster for blocking passage of a resolution to keep the federal government open while negotiating the 2026 fiscal year budget and causing a record 43-day shutdown of the federal government.

“The American people are just now emerging from the longest and most devastating government shutdown in U.S. history,” Bessent said.

“While the blame lies squarely with Senate Democrats, we cannot ignore the weapon they used to hold the country hostage: the legislative filibuster,” Bessent wrote.

With the continuing resolution expiring on Jan. 30, Bessent said there is a strong likelihood that Senate Democrats again will use the filibuster to block passage of a budget and force the government to close again.

“Democrats inflicted tremendous harm on the nation, including $11 billion in permanent economic damage” as the federal government was “held for ransom by the left’s demands,” Bessent said.

He said the shutdown caused the nation to lose 1.5 percentage points in gross domestic product growth during the fourth quarter, triggered 9,500 canceled flights and caused 1.4 million federal workers to miss their paychecks.

He called the filibuster a “historical accident that has evolved into a standing veto for the [Senate] minority and a license for paralysis.”

The Constitution does not mention a filibuster, and its “framers envisioned debate, but they expect majority rule,” Bessent said.

He said the filibuster has its roots in an 1806 Senate rules decision that deleted a “previous question” motion, which unintentionally removed the Senate’s mechanism for ending debate with a majority vote.

Senators later realized they could “delay or block” legislative action with unending debate, and just the threat of a filibuster is enough to trigger the filibuster rule requiring a supermajority of 60 votes to end it, Bessent explained.

He said it is likely that Senate Democrats again will force the federal government to shut down at the end of January by blocking the 2026 fiscal year budget vote.

President Barack Obama called the filibuster a “‘Jim Crow relic,'” but Bessent said Senate Democrats always use it to their advantage whenever possible, and the president agrees.

“It’s time to end the filibuster,” Trump said while agreeing with Bessent in a social media post that includes Bessent’s op-ed.

He also told Politico that the GOP must end the filibuster when interviewed on Friday night.

Doing so will help his administration to undo damage that he said was caused by the Biden administration and led to very high inflation that he is trying to fix to make life more affordable in the United States, Trump said.

The president has urged Senate Republicans to end the filibuster as soon as possible and said Senate Democrats will do it the first chance that they get when they eventually win a majority in the Senate.

Senate Democrats in September and afterward overwhelmingly opposed a clean continuing resolution to keep the federal government open and instead submitted a resolution that would add $1.5 trillion in spending over the next 10 years to extend Affordable Care Act subsidies that expire at the end of December.

Senate Democrats control 47 seats, including two occupied by independents who caucus with Senate Democrats, while the GOP controls 53 seats, so neither party can overcome the filibuster rule without help from the other.

The Senate GOP could not muster the 60 votes needed to overcome the filibuster rule until eight Senate Democrats joined with most Senate Republicans to support the continuing resolution to end the 43-day government shutdown that began when the 2026 fiscal year started on Oct. 1.

Senate Democrats in 2022 tried to end the filibuster rule but could not obtain a simple majority due to opposition from Sens. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona and Joe Manchin of West Virginia, both of whom were Democrats but have retired from politics.

Former Nebraska U.S. Sen. Ben Sasse, a conservative who rebuked political tribalism and stood out as a longtime critic of President Trump, announced Tuesday he was diagnosed with advanced pancreatic cancer.

Sasse, 53, made the announcement on social media, saying he learned of the disease last week and is “now marching to the beat of a faster drummer.”

“This is a tough note to write, but since a bunch of you have started to suspect something, I’ll cut to the chase,” Sasse wrote. “Last week I was diagnosed with metastasized, stage-four pancreatic cancer, and am gonna die.”

Sasse was first elected to the Senate in 2014. He comfortably won reelection in 2020 after fending off a pro-Trump primary challenger. Sasse drew the ire of GOP activists for his vocal criticism of Trump’s character and policies, including questioning his moral values and saying he cozied up to adversarial foreign leaders.

Sasse was one of seven Republican senators to vote to convict the former president of “ incitement of insurrection ” after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. After threats of a public censure back home, he extended his critique to party loyalists who blindly worship one man and rejected him for his refusal to bend the knee.

He resigned from the Senate in 2023 to serve as the 13th president of the University of Florida after a contentious approval process. He left that post the following year after his wife was diagnosed with epilepsy.

Sasse, who has degrees from Harvard, St. John’s College and Yale, worked as an assistant secretary of Health and Human Services under President George W. Bush. He served as president of Midland University, a small Christian university in eastern Nebraska, before he ran for the Senate.

Sasse and his wife have three children.

“I’m not going down without a fight. One sub-part of God’s grace is found in the jawdropping advances science has made the past few years in immunotherapy and more,” Sasse wrote. “Death and dying aren’t the same — the process of dying is still something to be lived.”

NEW YORK — The Senate’s top Democrat urged his colleagues Monday to take legal action over the Justice Department’s incremental and heavily redacted release of records pertaining to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Minority Leader Chuck Schumer introduced a resolution that, if passed, would direct the Senate to file or join lawsuits aimed at forcing the Justice Department to comply with the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the law enacted last month that required disclosure of records by last Friday.

“Instead of transparency, the Trump administration released a tiny fraction of the files and blacked out massive portions of what little they provided,” Schumer (D-N.Y.) said in a statement. “This is a blatant cover-up.”

In lieu of Republican support, Schumer’s resolution is largely symbolic. The Senate is off until Jan. 5, more than two weeks after the deadline. Even then, the resolution will likely face an uphill battle for passage. But it allows Democrats to continue a pressure campaign for disclosure that Republicans had hoped to put behind them.

The Justice Department said it plans to release records on a rolling basis by the end of the year. It blamed the delay on the time-consuming process of obscuring victims’ names and other identifying information. So far, the department hasn’t given any notice when new records arrive.

That approach angered some accusers and members of Congress who fought to pass the transparency act. Records that were released, including photographs, interview transcripts, call logs, court records and other documents, were either already public or heavily blacked out, and many lacked necessary context.

There were few revelations in the tens of thousands of pages of records that have been released so far. Some of the most eagerly awaited records, such as FBI victim interviews and internal memos shedding light on charging decisions, weren’t there.

Nor were there any mentions of some powerful figures who’ve been in Epstein’s orbit, like Britain’s former Prince Andrew.

Deputy Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche on Sunday defended the Justice Department’s decision to release just a fraction of the files by the deadline as necessary to protect survivors of sexual abuse by the disgraced financier.

Blanche pledged that the Trump administration would meet its obligation required by law. But he stressed that the department was obligated to act with caution as it goes about making public thousands of documents that can include sensitive information.

Blanche, the Justice Department’s second-in-command, also defended its decision to remove several files related to the case from its public webpage, including a photograph showing Donald Trump, less than a day after they were posted.

The missing files, which were available Friday but no longer accessible by Saturday, included images of paintings depicting nude women, and one of a series of photographs along a credenza and in drawers. In that image, inside a drawer among other photos, was a photograph of Trump, alongside Epstein, Melania Trump and Epstein’s longtime associate, Ghislaine Maxwell.

Blanche said the documents were removed because they also showed victims of Epstein. Blanche said the Trump photo and the other documents will be reposted once redactions are made to protect survivors.

“We are not redacting information around President Trump, around any other individual involved with Mr. Epstein, and that narrative, which is not based on fact at all, is completely false,” Blanche told NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Blanche said Trump, a Republican, has labeled the Epstein matter “a hoax” because “there’s this narrative out there that the Department of Justice is hiding and protecting information about him, which is completely false.”

“The Epstein files existed for years and years and years and you did not hear a peep out of a single Democrat for the past four years and yet … lo and behold, all of a sudden, out of the blue, Senator Schumer suddenly cares about the Epstein files,” Blanche said. “That’s the hoax.”

Sisak and Neumeister write for the Associated Press. AP reporter Kevin Freking in Washington contributed to this report.

Dec. 21 (UPI) — House Minority Leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, R-N.Y., said Sunday that he expects lawmakers to pass a bipartisan compromise on extending Affordable Care Act tax credits.

Jeffries said on ABC News’ “This Week” that lawmakers will pass a bi-partisan compromise to extend ACA tax credits extension in the House, potentially forcing Senate Republicans hand on health insurance subsidies for at least 22 million Americans who will face higher premiums in the new year.

Congress adjourned for Christmas without reaching a deal on extending on the tax credits, which Jeffries promised that House lawmakers will address in early January.

“That will put pressure on John Thune and Senate Republicans to actually do the right thing by the American people, pass a straightforward extension of the Affordable Care Act tax credits, so we can keep health care affordable for tens of millions of Americans who deserve to be able to go see a doctor when they need one,” Jeffries said.

Democrats have said if the two sides are unable to reach a deal on an extension, they will wield it against Republicans in next year’s midterm elections.

Rep. Pat Ryan, D-N.Y., has said access to affordable health care remains among the most pressing issues among voters.

“It’s just pathetic,” Ryan said. “The last time there was a major national Republican effort to repeal the ACA, we had an overwhelming wave where they got absolutely wiped out, and I think that’s likely what will happen here again.”

A handful of centrist Republicans in vulnerable congressional districts bypassed the authority of House Speaker Mike Johnson to team up with key Democrats to authorize a vote on a three-year tax credit extension when the House returns to Washington the week of Jan. 5.

Some Republican leaders have said they favor allowing Covid-era tax credits that made health care more affordable for millions of Americans to expire or be phased out over several years. Other members of the GOP, however, have said they favor extending the credits for longer.

By a vote of 51-48 Thursday, the Senate rejected a three year ACA extension with four Democrats joining the GOP to vote it down.

WASHINGTON — Treasury Secretary James A. Baker III faced open hostility to the Reagan Administration’s tax revision proposal Tuesday as the Senate Finance Committee began what is expected to be at least three months of testimony on overhauling the current tax code.

“The best simplification this committee could do for the country would be just to adjourn,” Sen. Steven D. Symms (R-Ida.) complained.

Senate Republican leader Bob Dole of Kansas, a committee member, conceded that progress on tax revision could be slow. “Once the initial glow has faded,” Dole said, “there are a lot of questions this committee has to deal with.”

Warning of ‘Fiscal Disaster’

Meanwhile, Martin S. Feldstein, former chairman of President Reagan’s Council of Economic Advisers, warned that the Administration’s tax proposal could be a “fiscal disaster if tax reform became a deficit-enlarging tax cut.”

Feldstein, who left the White House last year after several disputes over Administration policy toward budget deficits, told the House Ways and Means Committee that the tax proposal “is at best revenue neutral and has a substantial risk of losing revenue.”

Other economists testifying before the House panel, which originates tax legislation, also expressed skepticism over the Administration’s contention that the tax plan would raise as much revenue as the current tax system. They contended that the package could exacerbate deficits that are now expected to remain larger than $170 billion annually well into the next decade, even if the package of spending cuts now working its way through Congress becomes law.

“I suspect that the President’s proposal is a revenue loser, particularly after 1990,” said John H. Makin, director of fiscal studies at the American Enterprise Institute.

But Baker, in defending the tax proposal to the Senate panel, insisted that Reagan’s plan would lose only $11.5 billion during the next five years, substantially less than 1% of the $4.7 trillion that the government estimates it will collect in total revenues during that period.

Contradictory Attacks

In grilling Baker, senators on the tax panel attacked the White House proposal on a wide variety of sometimes contradictory points.

Sen. William V. Roth Jr. (R-Del.) complained that the proposal “tends to soak the middle class,” but he worried also that the plan would be too generous to consumers at the expense of those who save.

Some senators argued that the plan would do little to help businesses facing the threat of foreign competition, but others suggested that individuals should receive a more generous tax break even if it means increasing taxes for corporations.

Most members of the Republican-controlled committee warned that they would attempt to restore certain tax breaks that would be eliminated by the White House package.

In particular, they criticized Reagan’s proposals to abolish the deductions for state and local taxes and for two-earner couples, to eliminate the investment tax credit and alternative energy tax credits and to tax growth in the cash value of insurance policies. But Sen. Bill Bradley (D-N. J.), author of a separate tax revision proposal, argued that the White House tax plan does not go far enough in eliminating special tax preferences. He told Baker that he would try to eliminate some tax breaks for the oil industry and wealthy investors.

Exemption Hike Opposed

Sen. George J. Mitchell (D-Me.) challenged Baker’s contention that the best way to help families living below the poverty line to escape income taxes is to increase the personal exemption from the current $1,040 to $2,000 next year.

Mitchell said that he would introduce a proposal to limit the increase in the personal exemption and grant a larger increase than Reagan recommended in the standard deduction, or zero-bracket amount, a proposal that would help only taxpayers who do not itemize their deductions. Mitchell said that his approach would concentrate tax relief more directly on middle-income and lower-income families than would the Administration’s plan.

Baker vigorously defended the Administration’s plan against the attacks. “We think our plan is very fair,” he said, pointing out that the majority of taxpayers at every income level would receive tax reductions and that the average tax cut would be 7%.

When he was plucked by fate and his friend Pete Wilson from the political minor leagues to be a U.S. senator in January, 1991, John Seymour vowed to go back to Washington, shake up the congressional Establishment, make his mark for California and win election on his own.

After 22 months, the 54-year-old former Anaheim mayor is still struggling to forge a senatorial image of himself and his vision for California in the minds of voters.

His 59-year-old Democratic opponent, Dianne Feinstein, has coasted into the final week of the campaign with a commanding 54%-to-40% lead among likely voters surveyed by the Los Angeles Times Poll. Political experts credit her with building on her strong image from the 1990 contest for governor and conducting an error-free campaign that more often resembled that of a secure incumbent than the challenger.

The race for the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Wilson had shaped up as a classic California contest featuring a scrappy appointed incumbent and a strong challenger known to many voters as the tough officeholder “forged from tragedy” when she was thrust into the leadership of San Francisco by the shooting death of Mayor George Moscone in 1978.

Some experts thought it would be a close rerun of Feinstein’s 1990 battle with Wilson, which she lost by only 3.5%.

But so far the race hasn’t gotten that close.

Feinstein has demonstrated the immense benefits of having run an earlier campaign for major statewide office: Building an image among voters in a state of 30 million residents and the financial base needed to field such a campaign.

In analyzing the contest Tuesday, political experts credited Feinstein with running a consummate professional effort, if not a spectacular one. But even more emphatically, they characterized the Republican campaign as a missed opportunity that failed to follow a basic rule of politics: A candidate must define himself or herself to the voters before waging a negative campaign on the opponent.

Going into the last week of the campaign, one-fourth of California’s voters still did not know who John Seymour was, according to statewide opinion polls. Even more didn’t know much about him or why they should vote for him.

What’s more, Feinstein has demonstrated a Teflon resistance to attack. When Seymour attacked her, he often appeared strident or petty as Feinstein reacted indignantly and emerged all the stronger.

For 22 months, Seymour has been dogged and tireless, commuting regularly to Washington and campaigning throughout California with the tough can-do talk of a former Marine and a successful Orange County Realtor–the sort of man who’s not worried about the threat of Mexican competition under a free trade agreement because “we’ll kick their butts.”

He hounded Feinstein to hold more debates and pounded her with tough, largely negative television commercials.

His ads attacked her on all the perceived weaknesses of the tough 1990 campaign for governor: Her 1990 campaign’s legal problems, the potential conflict of interest of her banker-husband’s investments and her former position against the death penalty, which changed nearly 20 years ago.

Seymour added the hidden bomb of his opposition research: the fact that the five-member state women’s parole board on which Feinstein served from 1960 to 1966 paroled 21 convicted murderers out of more than 5,000 cases considered. By last week, Seymour even tried to link those 30-year-old decisions to the prospect that a convicted murderer like Robert Alton Harris, who was executed at San Quentin in April, might be set loose.

Essentially, Seymour duplicated the 1990 Wilson campaign playbook, Feinstein media adviser Bill Carrick said.

“But it’s 1992 not 1990,” Carrick said. “And in 1990, we never saw that crime as an issue made much difference. It’s less important in a Senate race.”

While Seymour tried to portray himself as an outsider, Feinstein attacked him as just another incumbent and, going to the heart of his failure to define himself to voters, asked: “How much do you know about Sen. John Seymour?”

Seymour, the ad said, was “a Washington big spender” who also had voted to raise his own pay four times. In fact, he had voted to raise his pay as a state senator, but not in the U.S. Senate, where he denounced the congressional pay raise and refused to accept it.

While Feinstein seemed relatively impervious to his ads, hers seemed to be finding the mark. The Times Poll found that in the last month, the number of respondents who had an unfavorable impression of Seymour had soared to 39%, an increase of 18 points.

“One has to infer they haven’t run a very good campaign,” Times Poll Director John Brennan said.

Veteran California pollster and analyst Mervin Field said: “He was unknown. He got appointed. He is unelected. He hasn’t distinguished himself in the Senate.”

UC Berkeley political science professor Bruce Cain said Seymour has been “invisible” as a senator and suffers “grayness” as a candidate.

Seymour insists he’s closing the gap. And on Tuesday, campaign manager Richard McBride said: “We’re fine, right where we are. Our tracking shows a lot of volatility among voters out there.”

But other polls point to a Feinstein victory Tuesday that would gain her some measure of revenge for her narrow loss of the governorship to Republican Wilson two years ago.

It was that loss that provided Feinstein her Senate opportunity. Before Wilson could take office as governor in January, 1991, he had to resign the Senate seat to which he was reelected for a six-year term in 1988. As governor, Wilson appointed a successor until the next general election. The winner Tuesday will serve the final two years of Wilson’s term and the seat will come up again in 1994 for a regular six-year stint.

Wilson angered GOP conservatives and puzzled nearly everyone else when he turned to Seymour, who had served eight years as a state senator but was not well known statewide. He had lost the Republican nomination for lieutenant governor in 1990 to a fellow Orange County senator.

Seymour bounded off to Washington, saying that to win the 1992 election, “John Seymour has got to perform and he’s got to make his mark very quickly.”

Seymour’s best opportunity to make a name for himself was to resolve two major California issues that had long simmered in Congress: the California desert wilderness bill and legislation to reform the federal Central Valley water project.

But Seymour presided over the death of the desert bill in 1991 because, Democratic critics contend, of his loyalty to ranching and mining interests.

In 1992, Seymour seized on Central Valley Project reform as his key issue. He bragged about muscling a water bill favorable to California agribusiness through the Senate over the objections of Senate giants like Bill Bradley (D-N.J.) and Bennett Johnston (D-La.). But Seymour’s measure was ignored in the House and Seymour was shut out of Senate-House conference sessions where the final version of the bill was drafted by others.

Seymour denounced the deal as being unfair to California farmers while he repeatedly misstated the dire effect it would have on California water supplies. With Wilson’s backing, Seymour implored President Bush to veto the measure. A final ignominy for Seymour would be Bush’s signature on the bill just a few days before the election.

Feinstein used her primary to reinforce the positive image and message of change she carried over from the 1990 race. She went after Seymour in the fall as an insider incumbent and capitalized on the “year of the woman,” but also was careful to avoid damaging mistakes.

Cain summed it up: “Dianne Feinstein has a formula which is well suited to California, which is a moderate to conservative Democrat who is pro-choice and pro-environment but also pro-business, for fiscal responsibility and the death penalty.”

“That formula has served her well,” Cain added. “She consolidated that image in 1990 and carried it into this campaign.”

Legislation reflects Democrats’ efforts to seek tighter oversight of Trump administration’s military action.

The United States Senate has passed a $901bn bill setting defence policy and spending for the 2026 fiscal year, combining priorities backed by President Donald Trump’s administration with provisions designed to preserve congressional oversight of US military power.

The National Defense Authorisation Act (NDAA) was approved in a 77-20 vote on Wednesday with senators adopting legislation passed by the House of Representatives last month. It now goes to Trump for his signature.

Several provisions in the bill reflect efforts by Democratic lawmakers, supported by some Republicans, to constrain how quickly the Trump administration may scale back US military commitments in Europe.

The bill requires the Pentagon to maintain at least 76,000 US soldiers in Europe unless NATO allies are consulted and the administration determines that a reduction would be in the US national interest. The US typically stations 80,000 to 100,000 soldiers across the continent. A similar measure prevents reductions in US troop levels in South Korea below 28,500 soldiers.

Congress also reinforced its backing for Ukraine, authorising $800m under the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative with $400m allocated for each of the next two years. A further $400m per year was approved to manufacture weapons for Ukraine, signalling continued congressional support for Kyiv and cementing Washington’s commitment to Europe’s defence.

Asia Pacific focus, congressional oversight

The bill also reflects priorities aligned with the Trump administration’s national security strategy, which places the Asia Pacific at the centre of US foreign policy and describes the region as a key economic and geopolitical battleground.

In line with that approach, the NDAA provides $1bn for the Taiwan Security Cooperation Initiative, aimed at strengthening defence cooperation as the US seeks to counter China’s growing military influence.

The legislation authorises $600m in security assistance for Israel, including funding for joint missile defence programmes, such as the Iron Dome, a measure that has long drawn broad bipartisan support in Congress.

The NDAA increases reporting requirements on US military activity, an area in which Democrats in particular have sought greater oversight.

It directs the Department of Defense to provide Congress with additional information on strikes targeting suspected smuggling and trafficking operations in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific, adding pressure on Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to provide lawmakers with video footage of US strikes on alleged drug-smuggling boats operating in international waters near Venezuela.

Lawmakers moved to strengthen oversight after a September strike killed two people who had survived an earlier attack on their boat.

Some Democratic lawmakers said they were not briefed in advance on elements of the campaign, prompting calls for clearer reporting requirements.

Sanctions and America First

The legislation repeals the 2003 authorisation for the US invasion of Iraq and the 1991 authorisation for the Gulf War. Supporters from both parties said the repeals reduce the risk of future military action being undertaken without explicit congressional approval.

The bill also permanently lifts US sanctions on Syria imposed during the regime of President Bashar al-Assad after the Trump administration’s earlier decision to temporarily ease restrictions. Supporters argue the move will support Syria’s reconstruction after al-Assad’s removal from power a year ago.

Other provisions align more closely with priorities advanced by Trump and Republican lawmakers under the administration’s America First agenda.

The NDAA eliminates diversity, equity and inclusion offices and training programmes within the Department of Defense, including the role of chief diversity officer. The House Armed Services Committee claims the changes would save about $40m.

The bill also cuts $1.6bn from Pentagon programmes related to climate change. While the US military has previously identified climate-related risks as a factor affecting bases and operations, the Trump administration and Republican leaders have said defence spending should prioritise immediate military capabilities.

WASHINGTON — The Senate gave final passage Wednesday to an annual military policy bill that will authorize $901 billion in defense programs while pressuring Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to provide lawmakers with video of strikes on alleged drug boats in international waters near Venezuela.

The annual National Defense Authorization Act, which raises troop pay by 3.8%, gained bipartisan backing as it moved through Congress. It passed the Senate on a 77-20 vote before lawmakers planned to leave Washington for a holiday break. Two Republicans — Sens. Rand Paul and Mike Lee — and 18 Democrats voted against the bill.

The White House has indicated that it is in line with President Trump’s national security priorities. However, the legislation, which ran more than 3,000 pages, revealed some points of friction between Congress and the Pentagon as the Trump administration reorients its focus away from security in Europe and toward Central and South America.

The bill pushes back on recent moves by the Pentagon. It demands more information on boat strikes in the Caribbean, requires that the U.S. maintain its troop levels in Europe and sends some military aid to Ukraine.

But overall, the bill represents a compromise between the parties. It implements many of Trump’s executive orders and proposals on eliminating diversity and inclusion efforts in the military and grants emergency military powers at the U.S. border with Mexico. It also enhances congressional oversight of the Department of Defense, repeals several years-old war authorizations and seeks to overhaul how the Pentagon purchases weapons as the U.S. tries to outpace China in developing the next generation of military technology.

“We’re about to pass, and the president will enthusiastically sign, the most sweeping upgrades to DOD’s business practices in 60 years,” said Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), the chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Still, the sprawling bill faced objections from both Democratic and Republican leadership on the Senate Commerce Committee. That’s because the legislation allows military aircraft to obtain a waiver to operate without broadcasting their precise location, as an Army helicopter had done before a midair collision with an airliner in Washington, D.C., in January that killed 67 people.

“The special carve-out was exactly what caused the January 29 crash that claimed 67 lives,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), the chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, said at a news conference this week.

Cruz said he was seeking a vote on bipartisan legislation in the next month that would require military aircraft to use a precise location sharing tool and improve coordination between commercial and military aircraft in busy areas.

Boat strike videos

Republicans and Democrats agreed to language in the defense bill that threatened to withhold a quarter of Hegseth’s travel budget until he provided unedited video of the strikes, as well as the orders authorizing them, to the House and Senate Committees on Armed Services.

Hegseth was on Capitol Hill on Tuesday ahead of the bill’s passage to brief lawmakers on the U.S. military campaign in international waters near Venezuela. The briefing elicited contrasting responses from many lawmakers, with Republicans largely backing the campaign and Democrats expressing concern about it and saying they had not received enough information.

The committees are investigating a Sept. 2 strike — the first of the campaign — that killed two people who had survived an initial attack on their boat. The Navy admiral who ordered the “double-tap” strike, Adm. Frank “Mitch” Bradley, also appeared before the committees shortly before the vote Wednesday in a classified briefing that also included video of the strike in question.

Several Republican senators emerged from the meeting backing Hegseth and his decision not to release the video publicly, but other GOP lawmakers stayed silent on their opinion of the strike.

Democrats are calling for part of the video to be released publicly and for every member of Congress to have access to the full footage.

“The American people absolutely need to see this video,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.). “I think they would be shocked.”

Congressional oversight

Lawmakers have been caught by surprise by the Trump administration several times in the last year, including by a move to pause intelligence sharing with Ukraine and a decision to reduce U.S. troop presence in NATO countries in eastern Europe. The defense legislation requires that Congress be kept in the loop on decisions like those going forward, as well as when top military brass are removed.

The Pentagon is also required, under the legislation, to keep at least 76,000 troops and major equipment stationed in Europe unless NATO allies are consulted and there is a determination that such a withdrawal is in U.S. interests. Roughly 80,000 to 100,000 U.S. troops are usually present on European soil. A similar requirement keeps the number of U.S. troops stationed in South Korea at 28,500.

Lawmakers are also pushing back on some Pentagon decisions by authorizing $400 million for each of the next two years to manufacture weapons to be sent to Ukraine.

Cuts to diversity and climate initiatives

Trump and Hegseth have made it a priority to purge the military of material and programs that address diversity, anti-racism or gender issues, and the defense bill codifies many of those changes. It would repeal diversity, equity and inclusion offices and trainings, including the position of chief diversity officer. Those cuts would save the Pentagon about $40 million, according to the Republican-controlled House Armed Services Committee.

The U.S. military has long found that climate change is a threat to how it provides national security because weather-related disasters can destroy military bases and equipment. But the bill makes $1.6 billion in cuts by eliminating climate change-related programs at the Pentagon.

Repeal of war authorizations and Syria sanctions

Congress is writing a closing chapter to the war in Iraq by repealing the authorization for the 2003 invasion. Now that Iraq is a strategic partner of the U.S., lawmakers in support of the provision say the repeal is crucial to prevent future abuses. The bill also repeals the 1991 authorization that sanctioned the U.S.-led Gulf War.

The rare, bipartisan moves to repeal the legal justifications for the conflicts signal a potential appetite among lawmakers to reclaim some of Congress’ war powers.

Groves writes for the Associated Press.

Dec. 17 (UPI) — Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is facing a Georgia state Senate committee over her attempts to prosecute President Donald Trump in a 2020 election interference case as well as her hiring of Nathan Wade, with whom she had a romantic relationship.

Willis has fought the subpoena requiring her to appear before the committee since the summer of 2024. Her attorney is former Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes, who said she maintains that the committee’s actions are politically motivated.

Barnes argued before the Georgia Supreme Court on Dec. 9 that the subpoena to testify issued by the committee is invalid because it was issued after the legislature adjourned.

The committee plans to ask about her decisions regarding the case against Trump and his supporters, some of whom pleaded guilty to charges. Sidney Powell, Jenna Ellis, Kenneth Chesebro and Scott Hall took plea deals after agreeing to testify. Trump later gave them all federal pardons.

Wade and Willis were removed from the case, and Willis fought to stay on the case, but lost her appeal. The case against Trump was dropped after a new prosecutor took over the case.

WASHINGTON — A Minneapolis jury’s conviction of former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin in the murder of George Floyd has reignited debate about what policing should look like in the United States.

In the weeks following Floyd’s death and the ensuing outrage that caused millions of Americans to pour into the streets to protest in the midst of a pandemic, Congress promised fundamental change to policing.

There was legislation to standardize training across the country, to keep problem officers from moving between departments without their records following them, to ban the use of chokeholds and no-knock warrants.

But Congress failed to reach an agreement that could pass both the House and Senate and attention moved to other things.

Negotiations for a bipartisan deal on police reform continue informally on Capitol Hill, and the lead House sponsor, Rep. Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles), said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that she is hopeful because those involved are “very sincere, and it’s a bipartisan group.”

Bass is working with Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Tim Scott (R-S.C.). She told reporters on Capitol Hill on Tuesday that she is optimistic they will reach an agreement and get a bill to President Biden’s desk in the coming months.

“I believe that we want to make something happen,” Bass said.

Last month the House passed Bass’ George Floyd Justice in Policing Act by a 220-212 vote, with no Republican support and two Democrats voting no.

The legislation, which would ban chokeholds, end “qualified immunity” for law enforcement officers and create national standards for policing in a bid to bolster accountability, passed the House last summer but was not considered by the Republican-controlled Senate.

Democrats in turn blocked consideration of a Republican policing reform bill proposed by Scott last summer, saying though it was similar to their proposal in some ways, it did not go far enough because it did not modify so-called qualified immunity for police officers, which has made it harder for victims of brutality to file civil lawsuits over excessive force, or make it easier to prosecute police officers for criminal behavior.

Even now that Democrats control the Senate, hurdles remain for passing policing reform out of the Senate, where most legislation faces a 60-vote threshold, Bass said.

“It’s one thing to pass legislation in the House; it’s a super hurdle to get it passed in the Senate,” Bass said in the CNN interview. “But we are working.”

Marian La Follette, who spent 10 years as a Republican Assemblywoman from Northridge before retiring in 1990, plans to enter the state Senate race in the new district that stretches from Oxnard to the San Fernando Valley, Republican sources said Tuesday.

“I just spoke to her a little while ago, and she has made up her mind that she will be running,” said Charles H. Jelloian, a Republican from Northridge. Jelloian said he has decided to withdraw from the state Senate race, partly to make way for La Follette’s return to politics.

“Marian’s jumping into the race is a very big factor,” said Jelloian, who became acquainted with La Follette when he was an aide to state Sen. Newton R. Russell (R-Glendale). “I worked very, very well with her for a long time,” he said. “I have a lot of respect for her.”

La Follette has lived in Orange County since her retirement. She could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

If she enters the race, she could pose a formidable challenge to Assemblywoman Cathie Wright (R-Simi Valley) in the new 19th state Senate District. So far, Wright is the leading candidate in the district that encompasses Oxnard, Camarillo, Thousand Oaks, Moorpark, Fillmore, Simi Valley and Northridge.

“Both are new to this district,” said one Republican source. “I think they would start out about equal.”

Roger Campbell, a Republican city councilman in Fillmore, also has declared his candidacy in the heavily Republican district. No Democratic candidate has come forward in the district that has roughly 28,000 more registered Republican voters than Democrats.

La Follette, a conservative legislator, was best known for her persistent efforts to divide the massive Los Angeles Unified School District into smaller districts.

She decided to retire two years ago when her late husband, Jack, a Los Angeles lawyer, fell seriously ill with cancer.

When she was in the Legislature, she aligned herself with Sen. Ed Davis (R-Santa Clarita), who is vacating the Senate seat. Republican sources said they anticipate that Davis will support her candidacy against Wright, a longtime political foe.

La Follette’s candidacy is another indication that Assemblyman Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks) will run for Congress. She and McClintock are strong political allies.

McClintock has toyed with the notion of running for state Senate, GOP sources said. The long-anticipated announcement of his plans has been postponed until later this week.