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Senate GOP readies to consider budget plan with House out

Introducing the first speakers at The Conference

DOGE on the rampage but cracks start to emerge

What we’re watching

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Senate GOP readies to consider budget plan with House out

Happy Monday morning. And happy Presidents’ Day. We are only publishing AM editions this week.

The Senate is the only show in town as the House is in recess. And senators have got a lot on their plate.

The chamber comes into session on Tuesday evening. Senators will take a procedural vote on Kash Patel’s nomination as FBI director that will allow Senate Majority Leader John Thune to file cloture on the highly controversial pick. After that vote, the Senate will move to confirm Howard Lutnick as commerce secretary.

What’s next is the big question, especially what will happen to the Senate GOP’s budget resolution. As we reported Sunday, Senate Republican leaders are considering bringing their “skinny” resolution — championed by Thune and Senate Budget Committee Chair Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) — to the floor this week. No final decision has been made by GOP leaders yet, but it’s likely to happen.

If the resolution were to be brought up as expected, it would be a major statement from Senate Republicans that they’re moving ahead with their two-bill process versus the House GOP’s one-bill approach. The House Budget Committee voted its own budget resolution out of committee late Thursday night following a marathon markup.

Now we’ve said it before and we’ll say it again here: The one-bill vs. two-bill debate feels very insider-y, very Capitol Hill-centric. But it’s truly important when it comes to how much of President Donald Trump’s legislative agenda gets enacted and when.

Under Graham’s approach, Senate committees will quickly come up with $300 billion-plus in new defense and border security spending, including funding to complete the border wall between the United States and Mexico. Senate Republicans will also include energy policy changes. This approach would allow for quick legislative wins for Trump and Hill Republicans.

But it doesn’t address extending the 2017 Trump tax cuts — the president’s big goal – which would come in the second bill. That’s the main reason that Speaker Mike Johnson and House Ways and Means Committee Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.) are pushing for the one-bill approach. House GOP leaders also aren’t sure they can pass two reconciliation bills given their razor-thin margin of control. Smith, by the way, was with Trump on Air Force One on Sunday going to Daytona Beach, Fla.

Remember — the Senate can’t actually consider more money for the Pentagon or the border until there’s a deal with the House. This resolution only directs the committees to do so. That’s an important dynamic if you’re watching a vote-a-rama on the Senate floor later this week.

More Senate business: The Senate agenda this week also includes confirming former Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.) as small business administrator. Loeffler and Patel’s nominations both only require two hours of post-cloture time.

And former Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.), Trump’s pick for labor secretary, has her confirmation hearing on Wednesday before the Senate HELP Committee. Several Democrats have praised Chavez-DeRemer, a former mayor and one-term House member, over her union-friendly stances, but it’s unclear whether that will translate into votes for her confirmation. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) has said he’ll vote “no.” Other conservative Republicans have also raised concerns.

Ukraine: The speed with which negotiations to end the war in Ukraine are progressing is stunning. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and national security adviser Mike Waltz are heading to Saudi Arabia this week for meetings with Russian officials as they look to make good on Trump’s promise for a peace deal.

But there are signs of uneasiness about the new U.S. approach, including from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. (We’d recommend carefully watching and reading NBC’s Kristen Welker’s interview with Zelensky on “Meet the Press.”) Many of these concerns were expressed over the weekend at the Munich Security Conference. Several senators attended the annual gathering, where Ukraine’s rare earth minerals were a major focus.

This is very clearly a way for the Ukraine backers in Trump’s orbit to try to convince the president that Ukraine is worth defending. By giving the United States a financial stake in Ukraine’s critical minerals, the thinking goes, the cost of abandoning Kyiv will be that much higher.

Here’s how Graham described it during a panel discussion in Munich over the weekend with Zelensky sitting right next to him:

There are major fears among Democrats and NATO allies that the U.S.-led negotiations will mirror Trump’s deferential posture toward Russia and will leave Ukraine and the rest of Europe on the sidelines.

To that end, European leaders are holding an emergency meeting in Paris today focused on Ukraine. Ahead of the meeting, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he’d deploy British troops in Ukraine in order to enforce any peace deal negotiated by the United States. This is yet another sign of European leaders’ skeptical outlook of the Trump-led talks.

— John Bresnahan, Andrew Desiderio and Max Cohen

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PUNCHBOWL NEWS EVENTS

Introducing the first speakers at The Conference

We’re very, very excited to introduce The Conference, a daylong event focused on power, people and politics inside and outside D.C.

On March 11, we’ll have some of the most influential people in America gathered in Washington to talk about pressing policy and political issues of the day. This is an invite-only event featuring CEOs, congressional leaders and Trump administration officials to discuss the power dynamics and biggest challenges facing Washington.

We’ll have mainstage conversations and networking opportunities with leading policy influencers, activations and a live taping of The Daily Punch.

Our first wave of speakers include:

– Speaker Mike Johnson

– Nasdaq CEO Adena Friedman

– AMD CEO Lisa Su

– United CEO Scott Kirby

– Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins

– McKinsey & Co. Global Managing Partner Bob Sternfels

– Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.)

– Sen. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-Del.)

– Sen. Jim Banks (R-Ind.)

– Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart (R-Fla.)

We will have many more speakers announced leading up to the event March 11.

As the Trump administration and Congress begin negotiating tax reform and reconciliation in earnest, there’s never been a better time to gather the Punchbowl News community for insightful conversations and connections. Beyond tax reform, speakers and attendees will discuss bipartisanship in a divided Washington, artificial intelligence and the future of financial services policy.

To stay updated on The Conference plus other events and networking opportunities with Punchbowl News, please fill out this form.

SPENDING WARS

DOGE on the rampage but cracks start to emerge

It’s safe to say that DOGE and Elon Musk are dominating much of the discussion in official Washington right now.

The sheer scale of the effort, combined with the fact that neither the White House nor DOGE is signaling to anyone what its goals or its next targets are, is keeping Democrats off balance and everyone else in D.C. on edge.

And there’s the harsh ideological component to the DOGE effort with the Trump administration. Musk and DOGE are ending DEI programs across the federal government but also employee civil rights initiatives while claiming big budget savings for having done so.

Over the weekend, the U.S. DOGE Service was seeking access to personal taxpayer data at the IRS, a hugely controversial move. This comes after legal challenges were filed to challenge efforts by Musk and DOGE officials to gain access to sensitive Treasury Department payment systems. DOGE is also at the Pentagon now, which will be closely watched by the Hill and the defense industry as a whole.

The scale of DOGE-related layoffs and firings at federal agencies is stunning, running into the tens of thousands of government employees. There are more than 200,000 probationary workers across federal agencies, many if not all of whom will be laid off. This includes 15,000 probationary employees at the IRS, 1,000 more at the VA, 3,400 at the Forest Service and 5,000-plus at the NIH and CDC, among others. Hundreds of FAA employees are being terminated, despite multiple deadly airplane crashes recently.

But the Trump administration had to stop the firing of up to 350 employees at the National Nuclear Security Administration, which helps oversee the nation’s nuclear stockpile.

The haphazard, sometimes chaotic process has stunned lawmakers. A number of GOP senators in particular have complained about the scale or depth of some of the DOGE-related cuts, including Sens. Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), John Curtis (Utah), Katie Britt (Ala.) and Bill Cassidy (La.).

These Republicans have been careful to make clear that they’re not defending wasteful government spending or criticizing President Donald Trump or Musk. They are warning, though, that some of this may have gone too far, too fast, possibly even hurting their home states in the process.

The DOGE initiative is claiming huge cost savings or funds “recovered” or clawed back.

For instance, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, a former House member and GOP gubernatorial candidate in New York, has vowed to claw back $20 billion in “gold bars” — grants awarded to clean energy and environmental projects by EPA in the closing months of the Biden administration. The program was part of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, which Democrats pushed through on a party-line vote.

DOGE also reported that “$1.9 billion of HUD money was just recovered after being misplaced during the Biden administration due to a broken process.” New HUD Secretary Scott Turner has set up a DOGE task force at his agency that has identified more than $260 million in cost savings.

But there’s widespread confusion on Capitol Hill and among government contractors over Musk and DOGE’s ultimate goals or how reshaped agencies or departments will function after downsizing. These changes have left many lawmakers baffled about how to oversee and fund the newly revamped departments, as well as who or what programs are left.

USAID — long criticized by Trump and other Republicans — has essentially been folded into the State Department, with thousands of employees laid off and hundreds of programs canceled.

Pete Marocco, a Trump ally appointed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio to oversee this process, held a call last week with congressional aides and NGOs to brief them on the future of the State Dept.-run aid programs. Sources familiar with the briefing said Marocco didn’t provide them with much information or give a timetable for when it would be available.

For his part, Rubio already has numerous crises on his hands to deal with, including trying to help negotiate a Russia-Ukraine peace deal, Israel and Gaza, and the future of U.S. immigration policy.

– John Bresnahan

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What we’re watching

Wednesday: The Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee will meet to consider Paul Lawrence to be deputy secretary of the VA.

The Senate HELP Committee will meet to consider former Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer’s (R-Ore.) nomination to be labor secretary.

The Senate EPW Committee will hold a hearing on improving the environmental review and permitting processes.

The Senate Commerce Committee will hold a hearing to examine spectrum auction delays.

The Senate Armed Services Committee will hold a closed briefing on the F-15E.

Thursday: The Senate Commerce Committee will hold a hearing on Steven Bradbury’s nomination to be deputy secretary of transportation.

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee will hold a hearing on nominations for top DHS and OMB jobs.

– Jake Sherman

… AND THERE’S MORE

Downtown Download. Alcoa, the aluminum giant, has hired Akin Gump and Brian Pomper, the former trade counsel for the Senate Finance Committee, to lobby on trade and tariffs.

Rio Tinto, the mining company, has hired Lot Sixteen to lobby on “mining and natural resources; critical minerals; and trade-related issues.”

Carlisle, the Arizona-based building material company, has hired former Rep. Ben Quayle (R-Ariz.) to lobby on “energy solutions related to efficient building materials and tax issues.” Meijer, the supermarket company, has also hired Quayle.

The Money Game. Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) will fundraise for Rep. Shomari Figures (D-Ala.) in Atlanta today. Tickets run from $500 to $6,600.

– Jake Sherman

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