News

House GOP Passes DHS Patch as Shutdown Drags Toward a Record

Washington has reached that familiar point where procedure starts to look like punishment. Late Friday, House Republicans approved a short-term funding extension for the Department of Homeland Security, a move meant to break a standoff that has already stretched into a 42-day partial shutdown. The...

The Turbulent History of U.S.-Cuban Relations

The United States and Cuba sit less than 100 miles apart, but their political relationship has often felt like an ocean wide. Across two centuries, the story repeats in different forms: American leaders see Cuba as strategically essential, Cuban leaders resist outside control, and everyday people...

Medicare Drug Price Suits Move Through Lower Courts

The Biden administration is defending the Medicare drug price negotiation program created by the Inflation Reduction Act, but the fight is playing out where many major federal programs are tested first: in the lower courts. Drugmakers and industry groups have filed multiple lawsuits in federal...

House GOP Rejects Senate Deal, Shutdown Drags On

House Republicans turned down a Senate continuing resolution, prolonging a partial shutdown. A plain-English guide to CRs, the Antideficiency Act, and what stops first.

DHS Funding Standoff

Washington loves to talk about “national security” in the abstract. But the Department of Homeland Security shutdown has a way of stripping the abstraction off. When the White House has to reach for existing funds to keep about 50,000 TSA agents from missing yet another paycheck, you are not...

Cruz’s Warning to the GOP

Ted Cruz is making a familiar midterm argument, but with a distinctly constitutional edge: control of Congress is not just about policy. It is about the machinery of oversight, confirmations, and impeachment. In his telling, if Democrats retake the House, President Donald Trump will be “impeached...

How is Trump trying to lower gas costs - and will it work?

Gas prices do not rise because the president wakes up and chooses chaos. They rise because oil is a globally priced commodity, refined into gasoline, then pushed through a supply chain that is allergic to uncertainty. Right now, uncertainty has a name: a shooting war with Iran and a chokepoint that...

Pima County Deputy Accused of Kidnapping Woman in Custody

A former Pima County Sheriff’s deputy in Arizona is facing a felony kidnapping charge after authorities say he abused his position while transporting a woman who was already in custody. The deputy, identified by police as 22-year-old Travis Reynolds, has been arrested, booked, and fired from the...

‘No Kings’ Protests: What to Know

“No Kings” is not subtle branding. It reads as a constitutional argument in three syllables: America rejected monarchy in 1776, and it did not swap it for an elected version of royal power in 2026. Today, that argument is spilling into streets and town squares at a scale that is hard to miss....

CPAC Texas and the Fight Over America’s Next Chapter

CPAC has always been part pep rally, part power audit. But in Texas this week, the mood felt less like a routine gathering of conservative celebrities and more like a political war room with stadium lighting. The message from the stage and the crowd was consistent: this is not just another election...

Biden-Era Social Media ‘Jawboning’ Curbed in 10-Year Settlement

A decade-long consent decree is reshaping how several federal agencies may interact with social media companies, and it is being celebrated by two Republican-led states as a major First Amendment win. The agreement resolves a lawsuit brought by Missouri and Louisiana, alongside individual...

The Supreme Court, a Wristlock, and Qualified Immunity

Here is the uncomfortable question hovering over Zorn v. Linton : When a protester refuses to move, what kind of force can an officer lawfully use to make her move, and when can she sue afterward? On Monday, the Supreme Court did not set a new line for how much force is too much. Instead, it...

A Republican Plan to Make Colleges Pay for Student Debt Relief

Student loan politics usually arrives in one of two costumes. Either it is a moral crusade for “forgiveness,” or it is a scolding lecture about personal responsibility. Both scripts are familiar. Neither one starts where serious policy should start: who is being asked to pay, and what...

SAVE America Act Hits the Senate Wall

The Senate can talk about election rules for days and still not be any closer to changing them. That is the reality check now facing Republicans and the SAVE America Act, a bill that would require proof of citizenship to vote. It has become a kind of legislative security blanket, a campaign-ready...

Democrats Say They Support Voter ID, Then Block a Vote to Require It

Voter ID is one of those election issues that sounds simple until you look closely at what lawmakers are actually voting on. This week in the Senate, that gap between the slogan and the substance became the story: several prominent Democrats reiterated that they are not opposed to photo...

Senate Republicans Press Trump to Restore the Title X ‘Protect Life Rule’

Every few years, Washington rediscovers a familiar trick: fight the abortion battle by fighting over the plumbing. Not the moral argument. Not even the constitutional argument. The funding pipes. On Thursday, a group of Republican senators led by Sen. Todd Young of Indiana sent a letter to the...

HUD Opens Probe Into Washington’s Race-Linked Mortgage Aid Program

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has opened a federal civil rights investigation into a Washington state homeownership initiative that the agency believes may sort applicants by race and ancestry. The question at the center of the probe is a constitutional one with everyday...

Treasury Plans Trump Signature on U.S. Paper Currency for 250th Anniversary

The Treasury Department says it plans to place President Donald Trump’s signature on U.S. paper currency as part of the country’s upcoming 250th anniversary of independence. If implemented as described, it would be a major break from modern practice, since U.S. banknotes typically carry the...

Trump Administration Waives Summer Gasoline Rules as Fuel Prices Spike

When gas prices jump fast, the federal government has a familiar temptation: loosen the rules that shape what can be sold at the pump. That is exactly what the Trump administration is doing now, temporarily waiving seasonal gasoline regulations in response to sharply higher fuel costs tied to the...

New $6,000 Tax Break for Seniors: Do You Qualify?

Every time Congress announces a “new tax break,” I hear the same question from retirees and their adult kids: Is this real relief, or is it just a new label on the same old rules? The answer with the new senior deduction is: it is real, it can lower your taxable income, and it is also easy to...