Dear Friends, While the upcoming presidential debate might be grabbing headlines this week, there’s also a flurry of activity on the House side of the Capitol as members seek progress on spending bills before heading home for a 4th of July recess. If all goes according to plan (never a

Dear Friends, With FY2024 funding bills finally off the to-do list, the House and Senate have a bit more bandwidth to focus on other priorities. But even as I write this, events are overtaking the chambers’ planned schedules. Following Iran’s weekend attack on Israel in retaliation for a recent strike,

Dear Friends, “It’s a huge month for appropriations” isn’t always something we say about March, but nothing is normal on the Hill these days. Now that six FY24 funding bills have finally reached the President’s desk, we look to the next (partial) shutdown deadline ten days away. With huge, complicated

Dear Friends, The biggest news on Capitol Hill this week will be the bipartisan immigration deal reached by Senate negotiators. Surprising no one, it has already produced turmoil in both chambers. Many Senate Republicans, as well as a few Democrats, have signaled their opposition, and House Republicans have promised the

Dear Friends, Well! After one of the craziest weekends any of us can remember witnessing on the Hill, I’m certainly relieved to be writing a very different note this week than I had expected. As everyone knows, a last-minute about-face by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy on Saturday afternoon teed up

Dear Friends, It has become commonplace for us to greet September with a long congressional to-do list and some degree of concern over whether the federal government will be funded come October 1. The main difference this year, unfortunately, is the intensity with which the shutdown speculation is ramping up.

Dear Friends, As the House and Senate settle into August recess, let’s take a quick look at where things stand on the Hill and what looms ahead in September. Despite a lot of promises from both sides of the Capitol, the appropriations process is barely inching along, raising fears of

Dear Friends, Washington may be starting June with wildfire haze and sonic booms, but thankfully at least not a debt default. I hope you’ll read on for Senior Fellow Laura Blessing’s fascinating look at the many similarities between the debt limit negotiations of 2011 and 2023, and some important cautions

Dear Friends, The biggest story on Capitol Hill- and the theme of this month’s newsletter – is the debt limit. Now that House Republicans have passed what amounts to an initial offer (and promptly left town for a week-long recess), the focus will shift to whatever move President Biden and