Good Wednesday evening. In this edition: Blanche seeks to reassure senators of independence; Clayton dodges 2020 election questions; and Schwartz vows to follow the science.
Plus, reconciliation 3.0, Israel aid and Trump coins.
Attorney General
Todd Blanche sought to win over skeptical senators at his confirmation hearing to be attorney general, defending his record at the Justice Department and seeking to assure lawmakers he could remain an independent voice.
"Seventeen months ago, I sat at this table as the nominee to be the deputy attorney general, and I told you that serving in the Department of Justice was my American dream," he told the Senate Judiciary Committee. "Since then, I have helped lead it first as deputy and now as acting attorney general, and I'm here today to earn your trust once more."
Mr. Blanche highlighted the Trump administration's federal enforcement surges in major cities, prosecutions of alleged gang members and crackdown on fraud, while arguing the Justice Department was restoring public trust after what he described as weaponization under the Biden administration.
"Above all, we are restoring American trust," he said. "In recent years, we watched the Justice Department turned against many of you and a former president, and it damaged the public's faith in justice. We are fixing that."
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), the committee's chair, opened the hearing by defending the department's direction under President Trump and preemptively pushing back on expected Democratic criticism.
"I urge them to remember the boy who cried wolf and take a long look in the mirror before lecturing anyone about partisanship at the Justice Department," he said, referring to former Special Counsel Jack Smith's investigations during the Biden administration.
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), the ranking member, questioned whether Mr. Blanche could serve independently after previously representing President Trump as his personal attorney.
"In less than 18 months at the Department of Justice, you have shown you're still President Trump's personal attorney," Sen. Durbin said.
"This nation deserves an attorney general who loves the Constitution more than any single president, an attorney general focused on keeping America safe and combating corruption — not satisfying the president's personal grievances."
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), a lame-duck senator whose vote will be crucial to Mr. Blanche's confirmation, sharply questioned him on the DOJ's "anti-weaponization" settlement fund that was widely panned on Capitol Hill, forcing the administration to reverse course.
"The settlement fund is just not moving forward," Mr. Blanche said. "It never started. No money went from the Treasury to any other account. There's no commissioners. It's not moving forward."
The Texas Republican continued to press him on the fund, questioning whether President Trump, a party to the settlement, had agreed in writing to kill it and whether he or his sons could file a lawsuit to revive it.
"I supposed they could bring a lawsuit and then we would litigate it, but even if we were litigating it, there's no fund," Mr. Blanche said. "So the results of such litigation, whatever it would be, wouldn't be a revival of the fund."
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), another critical vote who lost his reelection bid to a Trump-backed challenger, pressed Mr. Blanche on the president's decision to issue a blanket pardon for the Jan. 6 rioters.
"Can you tell me definitively that you think that any Capitol Police officer who was harmed on January the 6th was a victim of a heinous crime at the hands of the person who did it?" he asked.
Earlier in the hearing, Mr. Blanche said he does not "question" President Trump's decision to issue the blanket pardon, saying it was the president's right.
"The Constitution gives the president the full power to pardon anybody for any reason he wants, and so, I don't question President Trump's authority or his decision to do so," he said.
Mr. Blanche also acknowledged "mistakes" in the Justice Department's handling of the Epstein files, but said the Trump administration "has been more transparent than any past administration."
"The reviewers were qualified, experienced attorneys within the department and the FBI. They took pains to apply appropriate redactions," he said. "There were mistakes that were made, and so approximately 1% of the redactions had to be fixed after we released the Epstein files."
Losing a single Republican vote in the Judiciary Committee could bottle up his confirmation, and Sens. Cornyn and Tillis both told reporters after the hearing that they remained undecided, though Sen. Tillis said he was now leaning toward "yes."
If he makes it out of committee, Mr. Blanche would then be able to lose up to three GOP votes, though absences might mean he could afford fewer.
Jay Clayton, a former SEC chair and U.S. attorney, faced sharp questioning from Democrats over election security and his ability to keep the intelligence community free of political interference as he testified at his confirmation hearing to be director of national intelligence.
The hearing had been postponed by President Trump for three weeks to allow Bill Pulte, a loyalist with no intelligence background, to shake up the intelligence community and investigate his claims of election fraud.
In what became a theme of the hearing, Mr. Clayton repeatedly declined to answer who won the 2020 presidential election.
"Like I said, I'm not going to get into that with you," Mr. Clayton told Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA), whose own election that year is expected to be a focus of President Trump's primetime address Thursday.
"Isn't it humiliating to be unable to answer this question — to have to indulge the president's delusions?" Sen. Ossoff continued. "We know, you know, everybody in this room knows the truthful answer to that question — why can you not give it?"
Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) later questioned whether Mr. Clayton would be willing to deliver hard truths if he was unwilling to acknowledge Joe Biden won the election.
"You're going to be in a room with him many times, and at times you should have a difference of opinion, and if you can't disagree with him when he's not in the room, are you going to be able to disagree with him when you're sitting across from him in the Oval Office or the Situation Room?" Sen. Kelly asked.
"I have every confidence that I will deliver on my job, candidly, independently and with my best judgement," Mr. Clayton responded.
Sen. Angus King (I-ME) also questioned Mr. Clayton about comments he made during a June appearance on CNBC questioning the integrity of U.S. elections.
"We had a problem, a deep problem with voting in America," Mr. Clayton said during the interview. "On the integrity side, we're doing an absolutely terrible job, and the American people are right to question it."
Sen. King, noting that Mr. Clayton had earlier said he was not an "election denier," asked him to explain the remarks.
"That meant that the audit trail we have available for our elections in a number of places is not the kind of audit trail that you would expect in something that is this important," Mr. Clayton replied.
Asked whether he believed voter fraud was a problem in America, Mr. Clayton responded: "I don't think we can say definitively whether there is, or is not, until we have better processes."
Following the hearing, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) sharply criticized Mr. Clayton's performance.
"The performance of Jay Clayton in committee today was abysmal, and it makes it much less likely that he would get Democratic votes," he said at a news conference.
Nevertheless, Mr. Clayton is likely to receive some Democratic votes from senators eager to replace Mr. Pulte as acting director.
Dr. Erica Schwartz also faced pointed questions from senators over whether she would be willing to stand up to political interference and follow the science if confirmed to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The nation's top public health agency has been without a permanent leader since Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fired Susan Monarez in August 2025 after less than a month on the job for what she said was her refusal to rubber-stamp his vaccine agenda.
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA), the chair of the Health Committee and a physician, repeatedly pressed Dr. Schwartz on whether she would be willing to reject political pressure.
"I will continue to live and lead by my integrity. I will never compromise on the science," said Dr. Schwartz, who holds a medical degree from Brown University and served in the U.S. Navy until 2005.
Sen. Cassidy cut her off, saying that wasn't the "direct answer" he was hoping for and that he wanted someone to "actually stand up to crazy, stupid things being said that undermine faith in immunization."
"Will you have the ability to say no to junk science, and to say yes to that which has been firmly established, and to stick up for what is actually right and true, as opposed to that which is superstition and prejudice?" he asked.
"Chairman, I have always stood up for what is right and what is true, and I believe that I will continue to do that," Dr. Schwartz replied. "You have my assurances that I will do that."
Dr. Schwartz, who served as deputy surgeon general during the first Trump administration, repeatedly sought to assure senators that she believes in the safety and efficacy of vaccines and said she would never accept vaccine panel recommendations without first doing a "deep dive" with career scientists.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) announced House Republicans will move forward with a third reconciliation package that includes defense funding, farm aid and elements of the SAVE America Act. "It's our best shot at enacting our party's top priority legislation, the SAVE America Act, which is important to the American people and it's important to the future," he said. The budget resolution, which must pass both chambers before Republicans can craft a filibuster-proof bill, provides up to $73 billion for defense, $12 billion for farm aid and $10 billion for election security measures. The House Budget Committee is set to mark up the resolution Thursday, with Republican leaders hoping to bring it to the House floor next week. The resolution does not offset the new spending with budget cuts, a sticking point that is likely to draw opposition from fiscal conservatives. It's also unclear whether the measure has enough support to pass the Senate as Republicans seek to hold their majorities in the November midterm elections.
The Housesoundly defeated an amendment to cut off military aid to Israel, 104–314, but the vote underscored growing divisions among Democrats over support for the U.S. ally, with more than half of the caucus backing the measure. The split reached the top of the caucus, with Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) joining 97 other Democrats and 215 Republicans in opposition, and Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-MA) joining 102 other Democrats and Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), who introduced the amendment, in favor. Many of the Democrats who rejected the amendment took issue with it also cutting off diplomatic aid to the country.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessentannounced that the U.S. Mint will begin striking a new $1 coin bearing President Trump's likeness to commemorate the nation's 250th anniversary. It's the latest move by the Treasury to place the sitting president on U.S. currency after adding his signature to new paper money and spearheading an effort to create a $250 bill bearing his portrait. The moves appear to conflict with a federal law prohibiting living people from appearing on U.S. currency, but Secretary Bessent argued the new coin complies with a separate 2020 law authorizing the Treasury to mint $1 coins during 2026 to mark the nation's 250th anniversary "with designs emblematic of the U.S. semiquincentennial."
For your radar…
Keith Sonderling testifies at his confirmation hearing Thursday to become Labor secretary before the Senate HELP Committee. Watch LIVE on C-SPAN3 at 10am ET.
President Trump delivers an address to the nation on Thursday night that he indicated will focus on "election integrity." Watch LIVE on C-SPAN at 9pm ET.
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