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Top Democrat on House homeland security calls for Noem to resign
Mississippi congressman Bennie Thompson, the top Democrat on the House homeland security committee, chastised DHS secretary Kristi Noem in his opening remarks today and called for her resignation.
“Rather than sitting here and wasting your time and ours more with more corruption, lies and lawlessness, I call on you to resign. Do a real service to the country and just resign,” the lawmaker said. “That is if president Trump doesn’t fire you first.”
Earlier, Thompson said that under Noem’s direction the DHS has “illegally tased, maced, punched and even shot Americans, black and brown. Americans in particular have been racially profiled, detained and locked up and sometimes with tragic consequences”.
Key events
Thompson and Noem are going back and forth on the asylum application of Rahmanullah Lakanwal, the 29-year-old Afghan national who has been charged with shooting two national guard members in DC, killing one of them.
Lakanwal came to the US in September 2021 under an Operation Allies Welcome program that gave some Afghans who had worked for the US government entry visas to the US.
Thompson said today that the suspect’s asylum application was approved by the Department of Homeland Security under Donald Trump. Noem, however, pushed back.
“The asylum application moved forward under all of the information and vetting processes that were put in place under the Biden administration, which is when vetting happened, and that’s what President Trump has changed,” she said.
Federal judge orders release of Kilmar Ábrego García from immigration detention
Marina Dunbar
A federal court in Maryland has ordered the release of Kilmar Ábrego García from ICE custody on Thursday, and he will be advised on his release conditions in his separate Tennessee criminal case.
The case of Ábrego, a Salvadorian national who was a construction worker in Maryland, has become a proxy for the partisan struggle over Donald Trump’s sweeping immigration policy and mass deportation agenda.
Trump administration officials have waged a relentless public relations campaign against Ábrego, repeatedly referring to him as a member of the MS-13 gang, among other things, despite the fact he has not been convicted of any crimes. His attorneys have denounced the criminal charges.
As Noem began speaking today, a heckler interrupted her, screaming “end the deportations”.
The homeland security committee chair, representative Andrew Garbarino, called on the Capitol police to remove the disruptor.
Top Democrat on House homeland security calls for Noem to resign
Mississippi congressman Bennie Thompson, the top Democrat on the House homeland security committee, chastised DHS secretary Kristi Noem in his opening remarks today and called for her resignation.
“Rather than sitting here and wasting your time and ours more with more corruption, lies and lawlessness, I call on you to resign. Do a real service to the country and just resign,” the lawmaker said. “That is if president Trump doesn’t fire you first.”
Earlier, Thompson said that under Noem’s direction the DHS has “illegally tased, maced, punched and even shot Americans, black and brown. Americans in particular have been racially profiled, detained and locked up and sometimes with tragic consequences”.
Homeland security secretary to appear before House committee
In a short while Kristi Noem, the Department of Homeland Security secretary, will face questions from representatives on the House homeland security committee.
This comes amid reports that Donald Trump and his administration is frustrated with Noem’s performance.
We’ll bring you the latest lines as the hearing gets underway.
‘Our heroes did not sign up for this’: Duckworth slams National guard deployments at Senate hearing
Democratic senator Tammy Duckworth slammed the Trump administration’s deployment of national guard troops at a Senate armed services committee hearing today.
The Illinois lawmaker, a veteran and former Army helicopter pilot, said that “thousands of troops are deployed across the country under false pretenses”.
“Here in DC, the national guard has been performing missions that don’t help with their military training—like spreading mulch and picking up trash—but that, as we’ve sadly seen, nonetheless carry risk for our service members,” she added.
The hearing comes after two members of the West Virginia national guard were shot in downtown DC just before Thanksgiving. One soldier, Sarah Beckstrom, was killed in the attack, while another, Andrew Wolfe, was severely injured and is recovering in hospital.
“Enabling the president to send military troops into American cities under transparently flimsy pretext to meet his whims will have a dangerous and profoundly damaging impact on our military,” Duckworth said today. “Our heroes did not sign up for this.”
Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, questioned how the US was able to seize an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela on Wednesday but “not a drug boat” – referring to the suspected drug-trafficking vessel that was the target of the 2 September double-tap strike.
Warner has been part of the chorus of lawmakers who have called for the full, unedited video of the strike to be released.
Donald Trump is in Washington today. At 4:45pm ET he’ll take part in a signing ceremony in the Oval Office. That’s closed to the press, but we’ll let you know if that opens up.
Then, he’ll deliver remarks at the Congressional ball this evening.
Also today, we’ll hear from press secretary Karoline Leavitt. At 1pm ET, she’ll hold a White House briefing, and we’ll bring you the key lines.
Chris Stein
Ahead of today’s vote on extending Obamacare premium tax credits, Senate Republican leaders have endorsed an alternative bill that would instead give enrollees of high-deductible plans, purchased through the ACA marketplace, payments of up to $1,500 into their health savings accounts.
In the House, Republican speaker Mike Johnson has said he does not support extending the tax credits, but that his party plans to soon introduce their own proposals to make healthcare cheaper.
Johnson’s opposition means that even if the Democratic gambit succeeds in the Senate, it is unlikely to be voted on in the House.
Trump lashes out against Indiana lawmakers ahead of redistricting vote
The Indiana state senate is set to vote on Thursday on efforts to redraw the state’s congressional map ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, the latest state under pressure from the Trump administration to do so with the goal of gaining Republicans more seats in the US House of Representatives.
While efforts in Texas led to the state drawing five additional red districts – which then led to California advancing a now-approved ballot measure to create five more Democrat-friendly districts – the White House pressure campaign hasn’t found willing participants in all GOP-held statehouses. Voters in Missouri are trying to stop their state’s gerrymander with a referendum and some Republican representatives in Kansas have been speaking against the efforts.
Last month, Rodric Bray, the Indiana senate president pro tem, said that he and many others in his caucus did not believe that redistricting was the to gain control of the House.
Donald Trump lashed out at Bray on Truth Social on Wednesday, accusing Bray of enjoying being “the only person in the United States of America who is against Republicans picking up extra seats”. The president said Bray was “either a bad guy, or a very stupid one”.
“Anybody that votes against Redistricting, and the SUCCESS of the Republican Party in D.C., will be, I am sure, met with a MAGA Primary in the Spring,” Trump said. “If Republicans will not do what is necessary to save our Country, they will eventually lose everything to the Democrats.”
He continiued: “Rod Bray and his friends won’t be in Politics for long, and I will do everything within my power to make sure that they will not hurt the Republican Party, and our Country, again.”
DNC launches ads in Republicans’ hometowns ahead of vote on Obamacare subsidies
Chris Stein
As the Senate votes today on a pair of bills to address the looming expiration of premium tax credits for Affordable Care Act health plans, the Democratic National Committee took out ads on the home town newspapers’ websites of Republicans senators who could be crucial to determining the vote.
The subsidies were created under Joe Biden, and premiums for the more than 21.8m enrollees are expected to spike to potentially unaffordable levels if they are not renewed beyond their end-of-the-month expiration.
Democrats have proposed a bill that would extend them through 2028, but will need to receive at least some Republican votes for it to succeed in the Senate. To pressure Maine senator Susan Collins, Ohio senators Jon Husted and Bernie Moreno, Texas senators Ted Cruz and John Cornyn and Alaska senators Dan Sullivan and Lisa Murkowski, the DNC has taken out ads in their local newspapers reading: “Republicans are doubling healthcare costs”, and encouraging readers to call their offices.
DNC chair Ken Martin called the Senate vote, “the difference between life and death for many Americans.”
“Working families are already struggling to afford the basics, and if they have to shell out hundreds of dollars more for their health care every month, they could be forced to choose between putting food on the table, paying their rent, or going uninsured,” he said.
Senate to vote on dual bills on looming expiration of Obamacare tax credits
Chris Stein
The US Senate will vote Thursday on competing bills to address the imminent expiration of subsidies for Affordable Care Act health insurance plans, but neither measure is expected to pass, greatly increasing the chances that healthcare costs will soon rise to unaffordable levels for many Americans.
The votes, part of a deal brokered between Republican majority leader John Thune and the Democratic senators who agreed to reopen the government after a historically long shutdown last month, come as premium tax credits for an estimated 21.8 million enrollees of the plans are set to expire at the end of the month. Health policy research group KFF estimates that annual premiums will more than double if the subsidies are allowed to expire.
While Democrats have proposed extending them for three years, Republicans are poised to oppose their bill, claiming that the 2010 law, commonly known as Obamacare, has failed at its promise of lowering healthcare costs, and that further tax credits would be untenable.
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