What to make of Johnson and Jeffries

IN THIS EDITION

Johnson and Jeffries: The July Leader Look

Thune tees up key test vote for shutdown fight

House GOP looks to immigration agenda

The Vault: Senators push to overhaul small business database

Cocktails & Conversation

THE TOP

Johnson and Jeffries: The July Leader Look

Happy Friday morning.

The House passed President Donald Trump’s $9 billion rescissions package just after midnight. The vote was 216-213. Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) and Mike Turner (R-Ohio) voted no along with all the Democrats.

House GOP leaders also passed their version of the FY2026 Defense funding bill, 221-209. Five Democrats crossed the aisle to vote with Republicans.

This morning, we have our Leader Look for Speaker Mike Johnson and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. Let’s get into it.

Johnson. Speaker Mike Johnson had the biggest legislative success of his career by helping deliver the One Big Beautiful Bill Act to President Donald Trump’s desk by July 4. Yes, everyone doubted he’d be able to do it. And he did it.

Johnson also set fundraising records in the second quarter, keeping vulnerable House Republicans flush with cash.

But in Congress, you’re judged on what you’ve done lately. And since OBBB was signed into law, things have gotten awfully choppy for House Republicans. Consider what’s happened during the last week.

House Republicans voted down a procedural motion to allow consideration of three cryptocurrency bills. Trump cut a ham-handed deal with the House Freedom Caucus to change the structure of these bills. Then the rule came back up and Johnson kept the floor open for hours while he was getting the HFC to fold again.

That was followed by a political headache that may linger for a while: Jeffrey Epstein.

Republicans on the House Rules Committee grew frustrated over the last few days of having to vote against Democratic amendments related to the late disgraced financier.

Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) voted for a Democratic amendment Tuesday to force the Justice Department to release its Epstein files. All other Rules Republicans voted no, sparking a backlash among GOP members of the committee. Rules Republicans wanted political cover.

So Johnson huddled with these members all day, and ended up greenlighting a non-binding resolution, which the House didn’t even vote on.

The Epstein issue isn’t going to go away.

Rep. Thomas Massie’s (R-Ky.) discharge petition – which mandates the release of the documents – has nine GOP co-sponsors. If all Democrats sign the petition when it ripens after the August recess, it will come up for a vote.

Johnson is stuck between a Republican Party that wants to see the release of the Epstein files and an all-powerful president who badly wants the issue to go away. Trump said Thursday night he wanted to unseal “pertinent” grand jury testimony in the Epstein case.

Attorney General Pam Bondi said she’s willing to do that. But that won’t stop the pressure on Johnson – or Trump. There’s plenty in the so-called files that goes beyond the scope of grand jury testimony.

Johnson never asked to be a referee in a decades-old sex trafficking case. But that’s part of the job of being the speaker.

There is some frustration with the speaker. One GOP member reached out to us to say that they have the votes to depose Johnson after the August recess.

And, of course, Johnson’s job is only going to get harder. He has 74 days until the government-funding deadline.

Jeffries. The Democratic rank-and-file have been clamoring for their leaders to get more aggressive in taking on Trump. Jeffries is starting to deliver.

Consider the past few weeks. Confined to the House minority, Jeffries was powerless to stop the passage of the OBBB. But Jeffries did have the ability to force Republicans to cast their vote in broad daylight.

So he did, breaking the record for the longest House floor speech in the process. Speaking for over eight hours, Jeffries read into the Congressional Record the stories of average Americans who would suffer from the massive cuts to Medicaid and SNAP in the OBBB.

Democrats are winning the messaging wars so far on the bill too, thanks to publicity from members of the caucus and TV ad spending. (On that note, Unrig Our Economy is out with new TV and digital ads slamming GOP Reps. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (Iowa) and Juan Ciscomani (Ariz.) for their OBBB votes.)

Next, Jeffries fought back as Trump has embarked on a brazen effort to force Texas Republicans to redraw their congressional map to doom Democrats. Huddling with California Democrats, Jeffries endorsed a plan to muscle through a new map in the Golden State.

As we reported, this idea — if successful — could add a half-dozen blue seats. More importantly, Democrats don’t look like they are hopelessly standing by as Trump and Johnson scheme their way to keeping the majority in 2026.

Our last example: With Jeffries support, Democrats’ have aggressively exploited MAGA divisions over Epstein to troll the GOP.

Jeffries made this point succinctly in his weekly presser when he laid out Republicans’ Catch 22. Either there’s nothing in the Epstein files and Trump fanned a false conspiracy theory, or there’s something nefarious and Trump is hiding it (Thursday’s WSJ story is going to help with that too.)

“Now they are reaping what they have sown,” Jeffries declared.

We’ve long called Jeffries “ever-cautious” — and it’s true. The minority leader is still navigating how to address the controversy around Zohran Mamdani, the Democrats’ New York City mayoral nominee. Jeffries has work to do on this issue, and it’s a difficult one, especially for someone so careful. Mamdani is widely popular with the left but he makes others in the House Democratic Caucus nervous, especially regarding his stances on Israel.

History is on Democrats’ side this cycle, yet Jeffries has a lot riding on the midterms. His members are counting on him to lead them back to the majority. It won’t be easy. GOP incumbents raised globs of money last quarter, outperforming many Democratic incumbents. The NRCC raised an impressive $18 million last month.

At the end of the day, Jeffries leads the minority party and there are serious limits to what he can do. But he has had a string of successes recently for a leader out of power.

Speaking of the House. DNC Chair Ken Martin will be in Houston to meet with Texas House Minority Leader Gene Wu and other leaders of the state’s Democratic caucus. This comes as GOP Gov. Greg Abbott has the legislature redrawing the Texas congressional map to add new Republican seats. Texas Democrats are considering fleeing the state to deny a quorum. In a statement, Martin said that he is supportive of California Gov. Gavin Newsom being ready to “punch back.”

– Jake Sherman, Ally Mutnick and John Bresnahan

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THE SENATE

Thune tees up key test vote for shutdown fight

The Senate is slated to take a key vote next week that could tell us a lot about the likelihood of a government shutdown.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and top Democrats have warned that Republicans’ approval of a $9 billion rescissions package, paired with the White House’s ongoing hostility toward Congress’ power of the purse, could doom chances of a bipartisan government funding deal this fall.

By teeing up a vote on a funding bill that cleared the Appropriations Committee by a big bipartisan margin — the FY2026 MilCon-VA bill — Senate Majority Leader John Thune is forcing an early test of Democrats’ willingness to have that fight.

“We’ll see if the Democrats want to play ball. I hope they do,” Thune told us. “All of these threats to the contrary — at the end of the day, I think it’s in everybody’s interest to figure out how to keep the government funded.”

The Senate Appropriations Committee has cleared four funding bills to date, three of them unanimously or nearly so. The Senate will hold a procedural vote next on the MilCon-VA bill, which the panel adopted on a 26-3 vote — meaning it should, in theory, pass overwhelmingly on the floor. Of course, that’s far from likely. Funding the government past Sept. 30 will require at least seven Democratic votes.

All eyes on Dems. For now, Schumer is staying mum about Senate Democrats’ strategy. He deflected multiple times Thursday when asked how Democrats would handle upcoming funding votes. Yet Democrats sure seem like they’re gearing up for a shutdown fight, especially after the debacle in March.

Schumer was more focused Thursday on criticizing OMB Director Russell Vought, who caused a stir on the Hill after saying the appropriations process should be “less bipartisan” and that he expects additional rescissions requests.

Vought’s comments certainly didn’t help Thune’s case. The South Dakota Republican distanced himself from Vought’s remarks by noting that funding the government must, by definition, be bipartisan because of the Senate’s 60-vote threshold.

Many Senate Democrats are insisting that they should use that leverage absent commitments from Republicans to reject future rescissions requests. And even that might not be enough.

Here’s Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), a senior Appropriations Committee member:

Murphy also warned that if Republicans make this “the new normal,” Democrats will do “the exact same thing” if they win back power.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), another top appropriator, said Democrats will need to have internal discussions to hash out a strategy.

“As of now, it’s hard to see a path there,” Van Hollen told us. “We need to put in place some kind of assurances that the bills we just voted on… will not be undone with a rescissions process.”

Some Republicans are lending credence to Democrats’ concerns about a lack of trust between the two parties wrecking the Senate’s appropriations process, like Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.).

“If someone in the administration goes and cuts something that was clearly a part of a deal that got funding done in the past, then they’re destroying our chances of getting trust for the next appropriations bill,” Tillis said.

— Andrew Desiderio

BORDER AND IMMIGRATION

House GOP looks to immigration agenda

House Republicans are considering reviving their signature hardline border and immigration bill from the last Congress following the August recess.

Both the House Judiciary and the Homeland Security committees are having internal discussions about rewriting and reintroducing the border security bill, best known as H.R. 2. The bill proposes new restrictions on asylum, limits on parole authority and tougher enforcement on illegal border crossings.

House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) said his committee is having staff level discussions at the White House on what to prioritize in the bill.

“We’re rewriting some of the law to make sure if we ever get another Biden-type president he can’t just do what he did for four years,” Jordan said. “We’re working with the White House to see when it makes sense [to take up.]”

President Donald Trump has issued numerous executive orders related to restricting both illegal and legal immigration and tightening border security, leading to controversial crackdowns across the country.

But House Republicans are itching to codify the Trump administration’s hardline policies to prevent a future Democratic administration from simply reversing his executive orders.

Rep. Michael Guest (R-Miss.), a contender to become the next Homeland Security Committee Chair, said he believes there will be an effort “between now and the end of the year” to move forward with a new version of H.R. 2.

The One Big Beautiful Bill, signed into law by Trump on July 4, provided more than $70 billion in supplemental funding for border security across four years, including construction of new border wall and Customs and Border Protection facilities and capabilities.

Trump back up. House Republicans are poised to take up a series of other immigration bills in coming weeks.

The Rules Committee is scheduled to consider Rep. Stephanie Bice’s (R-Okla.) “Stop Illegal Reentry Act” on Monday. That bill would increase penalties for undocumented immigrants who illegally reenter the country after being removed.

Rep. Brad Knott (R-N.C.) has another bill that’s garnering significant interest among House Republicans and the Trump administration. Knott’s bill, dubbed “Punishing Illegal Immigrant Felons Act” of 2025, would heighten punishments for undocumented immigrants convicted of crimes.

Rep. Tom McClintock (R-Calif.) also told us he’s working on legislation related to cracking down on sanctuary cities and is socializing ideas with colleagues.

The California Republican said Congress must “absolutely” aid Trump’s border agenda by codifying his policies.

“The doctrine of nullification died with the Confederacy,” McClintock said.

Alternative avenues. Some House Republicans, especially those in centrist districts, could be hesitant to support these hardline immigration bills.

Illegal border crossings are at the lowest levels in decades but Trump’s approval ratings on the issue has sharply declined.

“It’s a different age. We should probably review it,” Rep. David Joyce (R-Ohio) said of the legislation.

Ten House Republicans, including several in blue districts, signed on to Reps. Maria Salazar (R-Fla.) and Veronica Escobar’s (D-Texas) bipartisan “Dignity Act,” which would offer pathways to legal status for longtime immigrants living in the country.

Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.), who is co-sponsoring the bill but not running for reelection, said he wants to be remembered as being “on the right side of history.”

– Mica Soellner

PUNCHBOWL NEWS EVENTS

Cocktails & Conversation

On Thursday night, we hosted Cocktails & Conversation to celebrate the end of an incredibly busy summer session in Washington. Punchbowl News Founder & CEO Anna Palmer gave brief remarks and a toast to the Punchbowl News community while attendees connected over light bites and drinks. Thank you to Duke Energy for partnering with us on this event.

Raising a glass: Charles Dahan of Rep. Lisa McClain’s (R-Mich.) office; Ryan Walker of Rep. Jimmy Patronis’ (R-Fla.) office; Georgia McLean of Rep. Rob Menendez’s (D-N.J.) office; Eric Fejer of the Senate Finance Committee; Dahvi Cohen of Sen. Adam Schiff’s (D-Calif.) office; Heather Smith of Rep. William Timmons’ (R-S.C.) office; Maite McPherson of Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove’s office (D-Calif.); Deniz Houston of the EU Delegation; Kunmi Ageh of the Small Business Administration; Jermaca Brown of Rep. Julie Johnson’s (D-Texas) office; Max Stahlberg of the United States Space Force; and Louis Renjel, Baker Elmore and Annelise Rickert of Duke Energy.

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