📝 The Readback: A House in chaos

IN THIS EDITION

How the House’s week went off the rails

That’s Not Gonna Fly

How the shutdown ate my laundry

Tech chat over wine

THE TOP

How the House’s week went off the rails

Welcome to The Readback, our weekend digest featuring the best of Punchbowl News this week – a quick roundup of all our scoops, analysis and Capitol Hill insight you won’t find anywhere else. We’ve also included a few of our favorite outside reads from the week.

Chaotic House: The lower chamber returned Monday for its first full week of work since mid-September. And what a week it was.

First on the agenda was the Epstein files, an issue that had vexed Speaker Mike Johnson for months. But there was another late twist in the saga.

President Donald Trump changed his tune and backed the bill. The House then voted 427-1 to release the Justice Department’s documents on Jeffrey Epstein, and it glided into law.

Then things took another unexpected turn. The House’s week ended up dominated by a series of resolutions aimed at rebuking members for various reasons. There were five different efforts from lawmakers aimed at their colleagues’ conduct.

Essentially, House members turned on their own ranks.

It all kicked off with Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez’s (D-Wash.) resolution disapproving of Rep. Chuy García’s (D-Ill.) attempt to pass along his congressional seat to an aide. Then there were votes to censure Del. Stacey Plaskett (D-Virgin Islands) over texts she exchanged with Epstein during a congressional hearing. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) attempted to censure Rep. Cory Mills (R-Fla.). Mace stood on the House floor staring in Mills’ direction when her resolution was being read out.

Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.) also announced he may try to expel Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick after the Florida Democrat was indicted on charges of embezzling disaster funds.

This was not the week some members were hoping for after weeks away from Washington, waiting to get back to real policy work.

Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) aired his frustrations while talking to reporters Friday about efforts for an extension of enhanced Obamacare subsidies. (We scooped the House members’ new bipartisan ACA bill here.)

Gottheimer said Americans want solutions to the affordability issues they’re facing.

“They’re sick and tired of the BS,” Gottheimer said. “They do not want censure resolutions… They just want answers about how we’re going to make their lives more affordable.”

What I’m watching: “Secret Lives of Mormon Wives” season 3. I’m only midway through, but the new season is wild already.

— Laura Weiss

You can find The Readback in your inbox every Saturday at 8 a.m. And don’t hesitate to reach out to [email protected] with feedback. Enjoy The Readback.

That’s Not Gonna Fly

Just when you think things couldn’t get crazier in Congress, something more insane happens. We saw plenty of chaos this week in the hallways and on the House floor, and I love capturing the absurdity of it all in a segment called That’s Not Gonna Fly.

Each week, we take a few minutes to highlight ideas that just aren’t gonna take off, strategies that backfired, excuses that make no sense or members who misbehaved. There is always plenty of content.

This week on Fly Out Day, we had Louisiana Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy in the townhouse for a lively discussion mostly focused on health care. Our own Andrew Desiderio and NBC News’ Ryan Nobles watched the interview live from our Pink Room and then broke it down with founders Anna Palmer and Jake Sherman in our studio across the hall immediately after. They certainly came prepared for my favorite segment with classic examples of Capitol Hill nonsense.

Jake’s take for the segment featured his reporting on Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas) getting banned from traveling internationally for three months after an alcohol-related episode during a foreign congressional delegation.

Ryan pointed out Speaker Mike Johnson “twisting himself into knots” trying to defend why he stood in the way of the resolution to compel the DOJ to release the Epstein files is not gonna fly. Anna spoke about the House devolving into a censure frenzy this week.

No-fly faves: Some of my favorite moments from previous segments include when Ally Mutnick brought up the fact that, at the time, both New York Democratic leaders in Congress had not endorsed Zohran Mamdani for mayor. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries later endorsed at the last minute, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer never did.

When Phil Mattingly of CNN joined the show, he spoke about that time the White House had to pull E.J. Antoni’s nomination to be the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which Phil called a “smoldering ash heap.”

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving break, and we’ll see you back in December!

What I’m reading: I am currently reading Clarissa Ward’s inspiring book, “On All Fronts.” She is an extraordinary journalist and storyteller. I highly recommend the read!

– Haley Talbot

How the shutdown ate my laundry

Over the course of the 43-day shutdown, I made a lot of jokes about my laundry.

At least, until Bloomberg News’ Caitlin Reilly told me I should probably stop, because the story I was telling did not make me look like a particularly savvy Hill reporter. Fair point.

Nonetheless, here’s the story. On Sept. 29 at 12:51 p.m., 36 hours before the federal government ran out of money, I stopped by the Longworth House Office Building’s on-site dry cleaners. I had a few suit jackets that needed some love, plus dress pants. Oh, and I was way behind on returning some ceremonial Indian attire I’d borrowed for a wedding a few months earlier. (Thanks, Rohan! And congrats!)

The dry cleaner printed a ticket with a bar code and a pickup date of Thursday, Oct. 2. Before I got the receipt, the employee manning the desk had a warning: If the government shuts down, the dry cleaner would also shutter.

“If” was generous. The look on her face said we both knew the shutdown was coming. The first line of our AM edition that morning reported there was “no resolution to the crisis anywhere in sight.”

I nodded sagely and took the ticket. I’d already brought the laundry to the Hill. I bike to work, and bringing this stuff back home would be a pain. How long could a shutdown go, anyway?

And so it was that as federal workers went unpaid, air travel snarled and economic data faded into the void, my clothes (and also Rohan’s clothes) sat in a darkened room in the Longworth basement for 40-plus days and 40-plus nights.

The shutdown ended on Nov. 13. The next day, I stopped by the cleaners. The shop was still closed, with a paper sign reporting the store was shuttered until “further notice.” At some point during the shutdown, a vandal wrote “THAT’S DUMB. THIS IS A PRIVATE ENTERPRISE” in tiny scrawl under the message. I left.

I came back the next day. They were open! But my stuff wouldn’t be ready for another hour. I left.

I came back on Monday. I paid $43. I asked the employee if a lot of people had their stuff stuck during the shutdown. “Not a lot,” she said. Great!

I carried the bright blue laundry bag back through the basement tunnels to the Capitol. I pushed the button for an elevator. The doors opened, and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, aides and a full security detail were waiting inside.

The elevator wasn’t full enough for me to wave them on and catch the next one without it being weird, so I stepped in. An aide remarked they needed to pick up their own laundry.

I told them a 15-second version of my shutdown story. Jeffries gave a polite smirk and said something I don’t remember – but I think it was along the lines of, “What a funny and relatable story that could have happened to anyone, and one that doesn’t make you look like an idiot!” Thank you, Mr. Leader.

What I’m reading: I really enjoyed “James” by Percival Everett. It’s a short but gripping retelling of Mark Twain’s “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” from the perspective of Jim, an enslaved person who escaped captivity before he could be sold and separated from his family. The less you know about the plot going in, the better.

– Brendan Pedersen

Tech chat over wine

Who doesn’t like some good red wine and a nice charcuterie spread as the weather gets colder?

On Wednesday, we held an event with Google and YouTube at District Winery about online learning for youth.

It was my first time at District Winery. I’m no sommelier, but I enjoy wine, particularly in colder weather, and I had been wanting to go there for a bit.

But news got in the way, and I almost couldn’t make it on Wednesday. Punchbowl News readers may well know that Washington’s tech world has been upside down this week as Republicans in Congress and the White House seek to preempt states’ artificial intelligence laws.

And Wednesday was when we, and much of the rest of the media, reported that the White House was considering an executive order to preempt state AI rules.

So when I got to District Winery, surprisingly less than five minutes late, I was hungry and in need of a drink.

I was happy to find a beautiful table full with an assortment of cheeses, dates and prosciutto. Crackers, grapes, honey and jams completed the spread.

Not only that. As I delighted in the charcuterie accoutrements, servers passed around a variety of finger foods.

That included satay, the Southeast Asian skewer dipped in a wonderful peanut sauce. As someone who has just come back from a week in Singapore and Thailand, it was a welcome sight.

I had two glasses of red wine, the house’s Zinfandel and Cuvée Noir, and great conversations with folks from Capitol Hill and the tech industry.

It was another example of what makes Punchbowl News’ social events so attractive. A rich conversation of policy issues with a side of great drinks and tasty food. A diverse group of people from industry and Capitol Hill makes it all a great opportunity to meet people interested in the same things you are.

What I’m watching: As I mentioned, I recently traveled to Asia and the flights were not short. So I took the opportunity to watch “The Diplomat,” as my wife has been begging me to. I’m on season three and as much as my Washington brain says “no, that’s not how it works,” sometimes, I’m really enjoying it.

– Diego Areas Munhoz