It’s Wednesday. It’s been a busy day at the inaugural Hill Nation Summit. Oh, and the Congressional Softball Game is happening tonight!
In today’s issue:
- The Hill Nation Summit is underway
- Trump denies he’s planning to fire Powell
- Noem teases relaxed TSA policies
- President calls Epstein outrage “bulls—“
- Senate set to start next vote-a-rama
🎤️ LIVE FROM THE HILL NATION SUMMIT
Washington leaders are spilling the tea:
The Hill and NewsNation are hosting the inaugural Hill Nation Summit to convene Washington’s leaders.
It’s been a newsy morning. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem teased potential changes to the Transportation Security Administration’s (TSA) liquid policy. She also defended the federal government’s response to the fatal Texas floods amid criticism over FEMA deployment delays, as well as recent ICE raids.
💻 Watch it live— it goes until 5 p.m.
🗨️ Follow the live blog of news
🚨 News from the Summit:
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has had a lot to say:
- The Texas flood response: Noem, who oversees the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), defended the federal government’s response to the deadly floods, arguing it should be a state-led response. “The federal government was never supposed to come in and run an emergency response,” she said. “What has happened over the years is the bureaucracy of the federal government has taken over.”
- The marijuana facility raid in California: “We will go places where we know there are known criminals, where we’ve built a case to go get those individuals,” Noem said. Scores of people were arrested during the immigration raid last week, and one person died from injuries after falling off a roof.
- Her goals for airport security: Noem, who also oversees the Transportation Security Administration (TSA),wants a streamlined version of airport security. “You walk into the doors with your carry-on suitcase, you walk through a scanner and go right to your flight,” she told The Hill and NewsNation. She also teased the idea of increasing liquid sizes allowed on airplanes, saying, “But I will tell you — I mean the liquids — I’m questioning. So that may be the next big announcement is what size your liquids need to be. … We’re looking at, you know, our scanners.”
^ Readers, what do you think about this? Let me know your thoughts!
Sen. Klobuchar on Trump’s trade war with Canada: Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) noted that border crossings are down while Trump continues his aggressive trade maneuvers with Canada: “This is about tourism and a longtime friend and we can’t continue like this,” she said.
Navarro had some sharp words for Jerome Powell: “Historically, he’s the worst Fed chair … in history,” White House senior trade adviser Peter Navarro said about Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. He wouldn’t comment on whether Powell should be fired but slammed the Fed as becoming “too politicized” with a “lot of folks on the board [who] are Democrats who hate Trump. Keep in mind that Powell was first nominated by Trump during his first term.
The FDA is phasing out animal testing: FDA Commissioner Marty Makary mentioned his agency’s push to phase out animal testing, arguing that “testing new drugs on animals is not very predictive.”
The House Republican Policy Committee chair weighed in on the rescissions package working its way through Congress: The U.S. is tens of trillions of dollars in debt but “we’re having cardiac arrest over $9 billion,” Rep. Kevin Hern (R-Okla.) said.
➤ SIGHTS & SOUNDS
Mychael Schnell, throwing some shade!: My colleague interviewed Rep. John James (R-Mich.) on stage this morning. Schnell began by stressing that she’s an Ohio State University fan, a major rival of the University of Michigan. “Go blue!” James responded.
Spotted at the summit: Former Rep. Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.); Axios’s Mike Allen; Fire House Strategies’s Alex Conant; L’Oréal’s Christopher Semenas; Seven Letter’s Michael Ricci.
Lol: Klobuchar referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee as the “always friendly, lovey-dovey Judiciary Committee on which I serve.” That got a little chuckle from the audience.
➤ WHO IS SPEAKING THIS AFTERNOON?:
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) is set to address the Hill Nation Summit this afternoon. Other speakers:
12:45 p.m.: Former DNC Vice Chair David Hogg
1 p.m.: House Judiciary Committee Chair Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio)
1:15 p.m.: Mark Warner (D-Va.)
1:30 p.m.: Lisa McClain (R-Mich.)
1:45 p.m.: Former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.)
3 p.m.: Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.)
📝 IN THE WHITE HOUSE
Do you think he’ll use his classic ‘Apprentice’ catchphrase?:
President Trump told Republican lawmakers that he plans to fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell “soon”before quickly denying any such plan after reports emerged about his remarks Wednesday afternoon.
How this came up: Trump hosted a group of 11 hardline House Republicans in the Oval Office on Tuesday evening. “The President asked lawmakers how they felt about firing the Fed Chair. They expressed approval for firing him. The President indicated he likely will soon,” a senior White House official told The Hill. CBS News first reported the Oval Office discussion.
A reporter just asked Trump about this reporting: “I don’t rule out anything, but I think it’s highly unlikely,” Trump said about whether he would fire Powell. “Unless he has to leave, fraud.”
This is an important caveat — it’s unclear whether Trump *can* fire Powell: “Any effort to remove Powell may face legal challenges. It’s not clear the president has the authority to fire the Fed chair without cause, and Powell has repeatedly indicated he will not step down before his term ends.”
Cue the 2005 hit — 🎵‘Move along, move along’🎵:
President Trump, who once amplified Jeffrey Epstein conspiracy theories, wants nothing to do with the story anymore.
He fired off a lengthy Truth Social post this morning, calling the controversy a “hoax” orchestrated by Democrats.
“Their new SCAM is what we will forever call the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax, and my PAST supporters have been brought into this ‘bulls—,” Trump wrote. 🔎 Read Trump’s fiery post
Trump has been in a very public falling out with some of his high-profile supporters over the so-called Epstein files.
His Department of Justice (DOJ) and FBI ignited a firestorm last week when they dismissed theories about a potential cover-up in the scandal. This memo walked back conspiracies that were once welcomed in Trump World, raising eyebrows and angering several right-wing figures who strongly disagree with that assessment.
“I don’t want their support anymore!” Trump continued in his post today.
🕰️ Throwback to this 2019 reporting from The New York Times: ‘In Epstein Tweets, Trump Revisits a Favored Conspiracy Genre: Murder’(h/t The Washington Post’s Benjy Sarlin)
But behind the scenes, the Trump team may be considering releasing more. The New York Times’s Maggie Haberman reports that administration officials are considering the release of “some sort of additional material” connected to Epstein.
^ Yes, but it may be too late: Haberman argues the Epstein controversy is a “problem [the Trump administration has] created for themselves.” She told CNN’s “AC360” that “whatever partial information they release, it will never be seen as enough. It will never be believed.”
➤ RELATED READS
AP: How Trump spent years stoking dark theories
The New York Times: For Hard-Right Lawmakers, Trump’s Shift on Epstein Is Just the Latest Breach
Politico: 3 Scenarios That Explain the Epstein Debacle
📝 IN THE WHITE HOUSE
The phrase ‘vote-a-rama’ will always sound so unserious to me:
^ And based on lots of emails from you, I’m not alone.
The Senate is heading into a vote-a-rama this afternoon to pass $9 billion in spending cuts. This is its second (!) marathon voting session in just the past month.
Senate Republicans say they have the votes after haggling with their caucus over the specifics.
Last-minute dealmaking: Leaders removed cuts to the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). There was also a deal to redirect money to help approximately 28 radio stations across 14 states that broadcast onto tribal lands. These changes shrunk the spending cuts from $9.4 billion to $9 billion.
How tight are the votes?: Republicans can lose three GOP votes and still pass it with Vice President Vance’s tiebreaking vote Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), a senior member of the Appropriations Committee, have their concerns.
➤ TIDBIT — WHO IS MAKING THE D.C. ROUNDS TODAY?:
New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani is visiting Washington today. He’s attending a breakfast with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.).
COMING SOON
The House and Senate are in. President Trump is in Washington. Vice President Vance is in Pennsylvania. (All times EST)
12:20 p.m.: First House votes of the day. 📆 Today’s agenda
2 p.m.: State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce briefs reporters. 💻 Livestream
3 p.m.: Trump participates in a bill signing ceremony. 💻 Livestream
7 p.m.: Trump has dinner with the prime minister of Qatar.
7:30 p.m.: The annual Congressional Softball Game at Audi Field in Washington. It will be televised for the first time! 💻 Livestream
🐝 INTERNET BUZZ
🌭 Celebrate: Today is National Hot Dog Day.
🦈 It wouldn’t be summer without ‘Shark Week’!: “Shark Week” begins on Saturday on Discovery. 📺 Programming schedule
🏆 ‘And the Emmy goes to …’: Nominations for the 77th Primetime Emmys were announced yesterday. Apple TV+’s “Severance” had 27 (!) nominations, followed closely by HBO Max’s “The Penguin,” which had 24. See the full list here.
👋 AND FINALLY…
To leave you with a wild discovery, have you ever spotted the mystical, illustrious golden alligator?
