Sahil Kapur

WASHINGTON — Centrist Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia announced Thursday he won’t run for re-election next year, a much anticipated decision that will reshape the battle for Senate control in 2024. “After months of deliberation and long conversations with my family, I believe in my heart of hearts that I have accomplished what I set out to do for West Virginia. I have made one of the toughest decisions of my life and decided that I will not be running for re-election to the United S…

WASHINGTON — A weak performance for Republicans in Tuesday’s elections has sparked new waves of anxiety in the party, and strategists are now urging their candidates to change course on how they discuss the issue in order to win competitive races next year. Three GOP sources told NBC News that party operatives fighting to win control of Congress are making a concerted push Wednesday to encourage Republicans to make clear to voters, in speeches and TV ads, that they don’t favor a national ban on…

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans released a proposal for tougher immigration laws Monday while issuing a warning to President Joe Biden that there will be no further Ukraine aid without stricter rules for being granted asylum in the U.S. The one-page plan — written by GOP Sens. James Lankford of Oklahoma, Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina — calls for a wide variety of changes, including raising the “credible fear” standard for asylum-seekers, curtailing officials’ abilit…

Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., is launching the first TV ad of his 2024 re-election campaign, as he vies for his fourth term in a red state seen by both parties as crucial to Senate control. The spot, called “Big Sandy,” uses upbeat music and Tester’s voice to highlight his roots as a third-generation Montanan. It casts him as a Washington outsider seeking to combat Montana’s rising costs, to “expand veterans’ clinics, and save our rural hospitals and schools.” “I know the Montana that’s worth protec…

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden has hit a milestone as the Democratic-led Senate confirmed his 150th federal judge. Back-to-back votes Tuesday made Kenly Kiya Kato and Julia Kobick district court judges in California and Massachusetts, respectively, totaling 113 district court judges chosen by Biden. He has also secured lifetime appointments for 36 appeals court judges — who have the final word on most matters of federal law — and one Supreme Court justice: Ketanji Brown Jackson. Senate Majorit…

At a closed-door meeting Tuesday, National Republican Senatorial Committee Chair Steve Daines showed fellow GOP senators an internal poll of a three-way Arizona Senate race that found Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego leading with 41%, followed by Republican Kari Lake with 37% and independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema with 17%, said a source familiar with the meeting. Notably, Daines told Republicans that Sinema is currently pulling more votes from Lake than she is from Gallego, despite her longtime affil…

WASHINGTON — The House and the Senate are at odds over how to proceed with President Joe Biden’s sweeping funding request for foreign aid and national security goals. On Tuesday, Senate Democrats will seek to bolster their position at a hearing titled “A Review of the National Security Supplemental Request,” where Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin are expected to make their case for fully funding the new spending package. Their testimony before the Senate Appro…

WASHINGTON — In his first major move, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., is using the bipartisan goal of providing aid to Israel to pick a fight with President Joe Biden over his signature achievement. A new bill House Republicans released Monday includes $14.3 billion in emergency funding for Israel while rescinding the same amount of IRS funding from the Inflation Reduction Act, a major climate, health care and tax law Biden signed last year. The new GOP bill is slated for consideration by the…

WASHINGTON — There’s a renewed hope for approving additional aid to Ukraine after House Republicans resolved their speaker paralysis, and as some hard-right lawmakers critical of new funding hint at a viable path to vote on it. One month ago, Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., voted with 93 Republicans to cut off Ukraine aid. Now, as speaker, Johnson said he’s asked White House staff to “bifurcate” aid to Israel and Ukraine. But he emphasized that the U.S. must stop Russia’s advances. “We can’t allow Vla…

WASHINGTON — Newly minted Speaker Mike Johnson has pitched House Republicans on a short-term funding bill to prevent a government shutdown next month while they hammer out a longer-term solution. Even ultraconservative lawmakers who firmly oppose stopgap bills said after he won the speakership that they’re willing to give him the space to pursue his plan, explaining that they trust him and that he inherited a tough situation. It’s a sign that Johnson, R-La., will have a honeymoon period with the…

WASHINGTON — Republicans elected a new speaker of the House on Wednesday in Rep. Mike Johnson, ending 22 days of a paralyzed chamber after a group of rebels overthrew Rep. Kevin McCarthy. Johnson, R-La., was nominated Tuesday after three previous nominees flamed out. He unified the fractious Republican Conference, winning votes from right-wing detractors of McCarthy, R-Calif., as well as centrist Republicans who opposed Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio. Follow along for live updates The little-known cong…

WASHINGTON — Tackling big issues was always going to be difficult in a divided government. But without a speaker, it’s impossible. Congress has three-and-a-half weeks to fund the government or cause another damaging shutdown. But without a speaker, the House is frozen, unable to conduct business as their to-do list piles up and other key deadlines approach. And 21 days after House Republicans threw out their last speaker, they’re no closer to replacing him. On Tuesday, their third nominee to rep…

AUSTIN, Texas — Red Bull driver Max Verstappen won the Formula One race at the Circuit of the Americas here Sunday, holding off the charging Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton in the final laps. “You could see it was very close to the end!” Verstappen said after the race. “I was struggling a lot on the braking.” It was the 15th Grand Prix win this year for Verstappen, tying his own record from last year, as he chased Formula One history after he clinched his third straight world championship this month.…

The Arizona Democratic Party sent $10,000 to Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego for his Senate campaign last quarter as he stockpiles cash to seek the seat held by independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema — a former Democrat who left the party late last year and hasn’t said whether she’s running for re-election. The contribution, detailed in a recent filing with the Federal Election Commission by Gallego’s campaign, shows the party sent him $5,000 for the primary and $5,000 for the general election on Sept. 3…

WASHINGTON — Republican House speaker nominee Jim Jordan has pitched his colleagues on an unorthodox plan to prevent a government shutdown on Nov. 17. And his conference members have mixed feelings about it. In recent meetings with House Republicans, Jordan, the right-wing firebrand from Ohio, has called for passing a stopgap bill to keep money flowing under existing law beyond April, according to a half-dozen lawmakers who heard his comments. The reason is that an across-the-board 1% cut, as tu…

WASHINGTON — Democrats are already crafting a strategy to use Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, as a political weapon against Republicans in the next election if he becomes the next House speaker. In a memo to House Democrats, first shared with NBC News, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee urged party members and candidates to portray the entire GOP as beholden to radicals should Republicans hand him the speaker’s gavel. There are “no more moderates left in the Republican conference,” the DCC…

WASHINGTON — Centrist and politically vulnerable Republicans face a moment of reckoning as the House is expected to vote on whether to elect Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio as the next speaker. Jordan is a right-wing firebrand and fierce Donald Trump ally, a Freedom Caucus co-founder who worked his way up to be Judiciary Committee chairman and became the party’s nominee for speaker last week after it ousted Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and forced Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., to withdraw due to a lack of…

WASHINGTON — Democrats are standing firm in their refusal to bail out the House Republican majority as it struggles to elect a new speaker 10 days after after booting Rep. Kevin McCarthy. They’re also dialing up the rhetoric against the GOP’s new nominee for speaker, prominent Donald Trump ally Jim Jordan of Ohio, blasting him as an insurrectionist, election denier and extremist. “House Republicans have selected as their nominee to be the speaker of the people’s House the chairman of the chaos c…

WASHINGTON — More than 24 hours after Republicans nominated Rep. Steve Scalise to be the next House speaker, they remained mired in divisions and no closer to electing him as deep angst persisted after an hours-long meeting. Exiting the meeting before it ended, Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Ala., openly fretted that his party’s narrow majority may never find the 217 votes necessary to elect a speaker. He blasted eight Republican “traitors” — a word he used four times in a hallway interview — who voted wit…

WASHINGTON — A bipartisan group of senators sent a letter asking Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to send Israel two Iron Dome batteries — the systems that launch interceptors to block incoming rockets — as soon as possible. The letter, first reported by NBC News, was led by Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., and sent Tuesday evening in the aftermath of a vicious attack on Israel by Hamas that has shocked the world. It is co-signed by Sens. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., and Rick Scott,…