The three funding dynamics to understand

IN THIS EDITION

Three funding moments to watch

Kansas Republicans prepare to move on redistricting

The Vault: No quarterly SEC reports? Congress shrugs

AAN ad tries to bring conversation back to reconciliation

THE TOP

Three funding moments to watch

Happy Tuesday morning. And happy Rosh Hashanah to those celebrating.

The government-funding deadline is now one week away. We’re going to delve into three key dynamics to watch during the coming days – and possibly weeks – as this crisis unfolds.

Trump vs. Democrats: We scooped that President Donald Trump would meet with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries on Thursday. It’s not clear yet if Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune will attend. Because why would the speaker and Senate majority leader attend a meeting on FY2026 spending just days before the shutdown deadline?

Schumer and Jeffries have been demanding this meeting with Trump, and now they’ve got it. Will it be a repeat of Trump’s disastrous December 2018 sitdown with Schumer and then Speaker Nancy Pelosi? Or will 2025 Trump be different? Will the president invite in cameras like the last time? How will Jeffries respond in his first-ever sitdown with Trump? There’s lots to ponder.

Johnson and Thune should want to be in this meeting to make sure that their negotiating position is represented. Trump likes nothing more than chasing a deal. Of course, the two sides are far apart. But with Trump in a room with two Democrats, you can’t be too sure of something unpredictable happening.

What’s at stake? It’s a high-pressure situation, to say the least. Federal agencies shut down on Oct. 1 if the two sides don’t reach a deal. Republicans are offering a “clean” continuing resolution to Nov. 21, a proposal that allows GOP and Democratic appropriators to continue negotiating on a broad FY2026 spending accord.

Schumer and Jeffries have countered with a dramatically different offer of their own: an Oct. 31 CR that includes a permanent extension of Obamacare premium tax credits; reversal of the GOP’s One Big Beautiful Bill’s massive Medicaid cuts; an end to billions of dollars in unilateral spending rescissions by the White House, and restoration of public-broadcasting funds that Republicans have eliminated. The cost of this Democratic package is $1 trillion-plus.

There’s no way that Trump or GOP congressional leaders will accept the Democrats’ offer, although a number of moderate House and Senate Republicans would go along with an Obamacare subsidies extension.

The House has already passed the Republicans’ Nov. 21 CR. Senate Democrats blocked it, only to have Senate Republicans in turn block the Democrats’ plan.

Thune can force another vote on the GOP proposal before a shutdown starts, and we expect him to do that. Schumer will have to keep rallying Democrats to vote it down. The pressure will thus build on Schumer as the crisis plays out.

Democrats believe an unprecedented shutdown under full Republican control of Washington will backfire on Trump and GOP leaders. Republicans are convinced they have a far stronger hand than in any previous shutdown showdown. Most Republicans don’t even think Schumer and Jeffries deserve a meeting and should simply accept the House GOP’s CR.

Trump and OMB Director Russ Vought have wide discretion over how painful a shutdown will be. Trump can keep hundreds of thousands of federal workers on the job even if they’re not getting paid. Or he can close down huge swathes of the government in order to maximize the pain on the American public — and by extension, Democrats. He can mix and match at will.

The politics of the House coming back. We scooped on Monday that Jeffries has told his members to be prepared to come back to D.C. on Sept. 29, even though the House is out of session.

Why would this be the case? Because Johnson and House GOP leaders have announced they won’t bring the House back until at least Oct. 1. In other words, after a shutdown has started.

We expressed our skepticism of this strategy in Monday’s AM edition, only to hear complaints from Republicans. Yet as we noted, Jeffries and dozens of House Democrats will be in town starting Wednesday for the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s annual legislative meeting. Now Jeffries is upping the stakes by potentially having all his members in town on Sept 29, too. The Senate will be here, as will Trump. But House Republicans say they’re all set and don’t need to come back as the government closes. Got it.

One quick note: We looked back at the 2013 shutdown, the last full government shutdown. The GOP-run House was in session and voting 15 of the 16 days the shutdown covered, including the day it began. It was different during the 2018-19 partial shutdown, but that was post-election. Democrats had already won a big House margin and a huge chunk of the shutdown took place during the Christmas holiday season. We’ll see how Johnson plays this.

Potential offramps. We noted that there’s no way that Trump or Hill Republicans accept the Democratic CR proposal. But is there any chance for Republicans to do a deal, especially on Obamacare subsidies?

We’ve told you before that some vulnerable House GOP moderates want a one-year extension. Some Senate Republicans are pushing this too. Neither effort is Republican-leadership sanctioned.

So can a deal happen? Not on a seven-week CR, according to Hill Republicans. But Trump could push GOP leaders to accept a two-year extension as part of an FY2026 funding deal. And as we’ve seen time and time again, Republicans will do whatever Trump says.

For now, Republicans remain convinced that Democrats – especially Schumer – will fold, if not before a shutdown starts, then shortly afterward.

– Jake Sherman and John Bresnahan

Join us next Tuesday, Sept. 30 at 9 a.m. ET for a conversation with Rep. Beth Van Duyne (R-Texas) to discuss news of the day and the economic impact of creators across the country and in Washington. Afterward, we’ll be joined by YouTube’s Head of Public Policy Alexandra Veitch and Co-Creator and Executive Producer of Gracie’s Corner Dr. Javoris Hollingsworth. RSVP!

REDISTRICTING WARS

Kansas Republicans prepare to move on redistricting

News: Republicans in the Kansas legislature are planning to petition to call themselves into a special session on redistricting, circumventing Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly.

An announcement could happen soon, per sources with knowledge of the plans.

This special session would be the beginning of a lengthy process to try and draw Democratic Rep. Sharice Davids out of her Kansas City-based district. This push, which comes amid White House pressure, is the newest front in the nationwide redistricting wars.

Republicans can force the governor to call a special session if a supermajority of lawmakers sign a petition. The Kansas legislature has a GOP supermajority in both chambers.

That’s a tough task. But if Republican leaders in the Kansas House and Senate are ready to gather signatures, they likely believe they have the necessary buy-in from their caucuses. State Senate President Ty Masterson, a Republican who is currently running for governor, has been publicly supportive of redistricting.

The Kansas legislature has successfully forced a special session only once, in 2021.

Republicans can pass a new congressional map, but they will again need a supermajority to override Kelly’s likely veto.

The map. Davids currently holds a purple seat that former Vice President Kamala Harris won by four points. A new map would likely need to split Kansas City among three districts.

In addition to Davids, Rep. Derek Schmidt (R-Kan.) already has part of Kansas City. Rep. Tracey Mann’s (R-Kan.) sprawling rural 1st District would need to stretch east to snag a piece in a new map. That could cause tension because it lumps together rural areas with urban and suburban communities that have little in common.

The roadblocks. The state legislature wasn’t willing to draw out Davids ahead of 2022, although it didn’t have White House pressure then. The margin for error is small. Republicans can lose only a handful of votes in each chamber.

And there are moderate Republicans in the Kansas legislature, especially those representing the suburbs in Johnson and Wyandotte counties. Those lawmakers may blanch at a request to blow up their state’s congressional map for partisan gain.

Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), who formerly represented the state’s 1st District, told reporters Monday that he knew state lawmakers were looking at redistricting. But Marshall sounded skeptical about the prospects for success.

And then there’s the Kansas court system. A new map is certain to attract a legal challenge and the state courts may not rule in favor of the GOP. Five of the seven justices on the Kansas Supreme Court were appointed by Democratic governors.

But Democrats will have to find a way to challenge the map in court. The Kansas Supreme Court ruled in 2022 that partisan gerrymandering is constitutional in the state.

One last thing to keep in mind: Marshall is up for reelection in 2026. If Davids’ House seat turns deep red, she could choose to challenge him.

– Ally Mutnick, Max Cohen and Laura Weiss

The Vault: No quarterly SEC reports? Congress shrugs

End quarterly reports from public companies? The Trump administration wants it to happen, but lawmakers are all over the map.

President Donald Trump declared on social media last week it was time to kibosh quarterly reporting requirements, a view he’s espoused in the past. Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Paul Atkins has already said the agency will propose a rulemaking along these lines.

This is one of those ideas that’s been out there for a while. Now that it’s on the verge of reality, we surveyed some members of the House Financial Services Committee.

The reaction was mixed – not strictly surprising, given where the business community is on the issue.

The good: Most Republicans appear fine with the shift. Rep. Roger Williams (R-Texas), who also heads the House Committee on Small Business, hailed the potential boost to productivity. Williams also dismissed worries that investors could lose valuable or timely corporate data.

“I think what you do is, you take a lot of productivity away from a lot of companies when they have to meet deadlines,” the Texas Republican said.

Here’s a good place to point out that ending this SEC requirement wouldn’t immediately translate to the end of all quarterly reports. Plenty of companies could continue to publish that data if they wanted.

The meh: Other pro-business lawmakers were more ambivalent. That includes Rep. Ann Wagner (R-Mo.), who chairs the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets.

“We’re still taking a look,” Wagner told us last week. “We’re just going to get some input about some of the repercussions and maybe the effects on the market and such.”

Wagner is sympathetic to the red-tape-cutting argument, but she stressed wanting to understand the broader implications.

“Instead of focusing on earnings and their customers and performance, they’re always staring down the neck of another reporting period,” Wagner said. “It’s a good idea. We just have to see what all the knock-on effects would be.”

Likewise, some Democrats are cautiously optimistic.

“If we’re going to dispense of quarterly reporting, we need to ensure there is some measure of transparency that would supplant it that is sufficient to provide our markets with the confidence that they have enjoyed for decades,” Rep. Sam Liccardo (D-Calif.) said.

The ugly: Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.), a former investment banker with Goldman Sachs, said the move away from quarterly reporting was “a terrible idea.”

“Less data means more risk. More risk means a risk premium, and that means less valuable assets,” Himes said.

– Brendan Pedersen

THE CAMPAIGN

AAN ad tries to bring conversation back to reconciliation

News: American Action Network, the Congressional Leadership Fund-aligned group, is launching a $3.2 million digital ad buy boosting vulnerable House Republicans for backing the GOP reconciliation package. The ad buy also slams Democratic Frontliners for opposing the One Big Beautiful Bill, now rebranded in GOP parlance as the Working Families Tax Cut.

The pro-GOP argument: The spots running in Republican districts, like this ad supporting Rep. Ryan Mackenzie (R-Pa.), focus on the tax policies of the GOP package. A homicide detective thanks Mackenzie for voting to cut taxes on overtime pay and “kick criminal illegals off Medicaid.”

“He knows I earned my overtime check and criminal illegals should be in jail or deported, not getting handouts,” the detective says of MacKenzie in the ad.

It’s interesting to see GOP ads leaning into Medicaid reform as Democrats spent months slamming Republicans for health care cuts.

The anti-Democrat argument: In one spot targeting Rep. Susie Lee (D-Nev.), a waitress lambasts Lee for voting no on the reconciliation package.

“Susie Lee could’ve stopped taxing tips. But she voted no,” the waitress says. “She’d rather use that money to keep illegals on Medicaid.”

Here’s the full list of the 25 districts targeted in the AAN ad buy.

— Max Cohen

THE CAMPAIGN

The Money Game. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso, NRSC Chair Tim Scott, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) are appearing at an Oct. 22 fundraiser for Rep. Ashley Hinson’s (R-Iowa) Senate campaign.

The invite includes a whole host of Senate Republicans and top-level Republicans, including S-3’s Matt Bravo, Miller Strategies’ Jeff Miller and former Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

Arizona special. The special election for Arizona’s deep blue 7th District is today. Adelita Grijalva, the Democratic nominee, is almost certainly coming to Congress to replace her late father, Rep. Raúl Grijalva. The elder Grijalva passed away in March after a long struggle with cancer.

Once Adelita Grijalva is sworn in, the House will have only two vacancies. Speaker Mike Johnson’s majority number remains at 217. He can lose only two members on a party-line vote.

Georgia Senate news. Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) is airing an ad focusing on “gender ideology” as part of his campaign’s $1 million-plus buy in the Georgia GOP Senate primary.

The ad starts by showing the mugshot of Charlie Kirk’s alleged killer and declaring that “the radical left’s twisted ideology has led to violence.”

“While Jon Ossoff placates the gender extremists, Buddy Carter will stand up for us,” the ad’s narrator says.

Carter is running against Rep. Mike Collins (R-Ga.) and Derek Dooley for a chance to unseat Ossoff.

— Max Cohen

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