President Donald Trump met with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Thursday — a rare one-on-one meeting between the two native New Yorkers.

The two have shadow-boxed repeatedly over the past year, including on a failed nominations deal and a historic government shutdown, but have had virtually no personal interaction.

Trump, according to a statement from Schumer’s office, called the meeting to talk about the Gateway tunnel project, which the administration said late last year would not be funded because of the shutdown.

But the Senate leader also used the sit-down to raise two unrelated issues — health care and the administration’s decision to deploy ICE around the country to carry out mass deportations.

“Schumer also told President Trump that their actions are dangerous and putting more people at risk and he must pull back ICE from U.S. cities,” the statement said.

Schumer’s decision to raise recently expired Affordable Care Act subsidies comes as the bipartisan health care negotiations in the Senate struggle. The group is discussing a two-year extension of the enhanced subsidies with new restrictions paired with broader health care changes in the second year.

But Schumer told Trump to “push Senate Republicans to support the 3-year extension of the ACA tax credit bill that has already passed the House.” Democrats forced a Senate vote on a three-year extension last year, but it failed to advance.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the meeting.

The Senate’s effort to pass sweeping new cryptocurrency regulations has been replete with tension from the start. Now, the process is at a low point after Senate Banking Chair Tim Scott (R-S.C.) bailed on a Thursday markup amid surprise industry opposition and whip count uncertainty.

Lawmakers, staff and lobbyists around the process say they’re exhausted, and the path forward is murky. But senators involved in the effort are vowing to forge on.

“I think there is a way forward,” said Sen. Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat who sits on Senate Banking and has been involved in negotiations.

The process around the crypto bill hit its biggest stumbling block yet late Wednesday after Coinbase, the largest U.S. digital asset exchange, came out against the latest text that Republicans unveiled this week. Scott and pro-crypto Republicans now need to make changes to appease the crypto sector — which the bill is aimed at boosting — while also wooing some Democrats, whose votes are needed to pass a law, and keeping on board some more skeptical GOP members.

It’s unclear when Scott will move to hold a markup again, but negotiations are almost certain to stretch into February as aides prepare to restart talks.

“It’s going to take a while to develop a plan on how to make another run at it,” said Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), who chairs a Senate Banking subcommittee on crypto. “I’m not going to reach out to do it immediately. People need a chance to soak in what happened.”

The thorniest outstanding issue is a clash over whether to allow crypto exchanges to offer stablecoin rewards programs that pay an annual percentage yield, which has pitted the crypto world against banks. The crypto lobby risked losing the battle if a markup were held this week because Democrats and several GOP Wall Street allies were prepared to attach amendments aimed at addressing banks’ concerns.

The yield fight was “was really significant in derailing” the bill, Lummis told reporters Thursday.

In order to secure the votes to advance the measure, lawmakers need to go back to the drawing board to find a compromise that both banks and crypto exchanges can live with. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong told reporters on Capitol Hill Thursday that “there’s actually more consensus on this than people think.”

One factor that could help is that both sides are incentivized to cut a deal. Banks need a bill to pass in order to curb existing stablecoin rewards programs, which are being offered by top crypto firms, including Coinbase. And crypto firms say they need the long-term “regulatory clarity” that a market structure bill would provide by outlining what tokens are securities and what are commodities.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), a Banking member who is concerned about the yield issue, told reporters that he is “optimistic we’ll have a successful markup this quarter.”

Jordain Carney contributed to this report.

The Senate’s bipartisan health care talks are on shaky ground.

Senators are leaving town until Jan. 26 sounding as uncertain as ever about the prospects of a bipartisan deal to revive the lapsed enhanced Obamacare subsidies after blowing through their informal deadline to release text before the chamber’s one-week break.

Although a small bipartisan group of lawmakers has been working furiously the past two weeks to reach a compromise to lower health costs, several Republicans expressed skepticism Thursday that the group could ultimately overcome some of the thorniest issues involved in extending the Affordable Care Act insurance subsidies that expired Dec. 31.

“Progress on that is sort of uneven,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Thursday when asked about the status of the negotiations. “It doesn’t look like they’re close.”

Republicans involved in the talks disagree on what policy issue has left them in limbo, and some of them have started blaming Democrats for failing to come to the table on a compromise — an ominous sign for a deal that must have buy-in from both sides of the aisle.

Meanwhile, the White House threw its own curveball in the debate Thursday by unexpectedly releasing its own framework for lowering health care costs that would not include an extension of the subsidies.

“There’s been kind of a pause right now,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) told reporters of the Capitol Hill health care talks. “We’ve all known that, in order to be able to advance something, we’re going to have to have buy-in from the White House. “

Murkowski added that the negotiations “got hung up on what everybody knew Republicans would get hung up on,” a reference to the so-called Hyde amendment that prevents the credits from funding abortion services.

But Sen. Bernie Moreno, one of the lead negotiators, denied that a fight over abortion coverage was the issue.

‘We’re waiting to get a signal from the Democratic leader because it seems like he’s just going to tell his conference not to agree on anything,” the Ohio Republican said in an interview Thursday, alluding to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

Democratic negotiators, however, insisted Thursday they believe a deal is still possible and that Schumer isn’t even being looped in on their efforts at this point.

“We have not talked to leader Schumer about what we’re doing,” said Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.). “There are still discussions, we are waiting for text. We will continue to work on this.”

Asked about the talks, Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), who caucuses with Democrats, said they were “good” and that he was “optimistic.”

Schumer, however, tried this week to pass a three-year extension of lapsed credits, warning Republicans that the “political price they pay will be severe” if they didn’t agree. The effort to advance the bill through a unanimous consent agreement was blocked by Republicans.

He raised the issue again during a meeting with Trump, urging the president to “push Senate Republicans to support the three-year extension of the ACA tax credit bill that has already passed the House,” according to his office.

Time is running out. While the deal under discussion by the bipartisan group would include an extension of the open enrollment period to extend select insurance plans, the subsidies under discussion have already expired at the end of last year and most plans have already set their 2026 rates.

Key lawmakers have also indicated the January negotiations represent a last-ditch effort at addressing the issue that has dominated policy debates in Congress since September.

“I think we’re entering the final phase of the effort,” said one Senate GOP aide briefed on the negotiations, granted anonymity to speak candidly. “Coming to a dead end.”

Former Rep. Billy Long has reportedly apologized after privately joking to House lawmakers that Iceland would be the “52nd state” and he would be its governor.

Long was recently nominated to be ambassador to the island nation by President Donald Trump, who has said he wanted to make Canada the 51st state and is now seeking to take over another Arctic realm, Greenland.

“There was nothing serious about that, I was with some people, who I hadn’t met for three years, and they were kidding about Jeff Landry being governor of Greenland and they started joking about me and if anyone took offense to it, then I apologize,” Long told Arctic Today, an Alaska-based nonprofit news site.

Long did not respond to multiple requests for comment from POLITICO. Trump recently named Landry, the elected governor of Louisiana, as a special envoy to Greenland.

Long, who represented a southwest Missouri House district for six terms and served a brief stint as IRS commissioner last year, was visiting former colleagues on the House floor earlier this week. His private quip first reported in POLITICO kicked off a minor diplomatic row, with Iceland’s Ministry for Foreign Affairs demanding answers from the U.S. Embassy in Reykjavík over Long’s comments.

Long’s comment appears to have struck a nerve as NATO countries, including Iceland, cringe at Trump’s repeated threats to commandeer Greenland, a Danish territory. Some Icelanders launched a petition drive urging their government to reject Long as ambassador.

Asked about the “52nd state” remark, Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Long was “probably having some fun” and “I wouldn’t read too much into that.”

Jordain Carney contributed to this report.

The Senate is ready to vote Thursday afternoon to clear legislation that would fund a slew of federal agencies through September, taking care of one bucket of spending measures ahead of the Jan. 30 deadline to avert a government shutdown.

Senate leaders plan to tee up a vote on final passage of the three-bill package that covers the EPA, NASA and the departments of Energy, Justice, Interior and Commerce. Independent trade agencies would also be funded, along with federal science and water programs.

Assuming it’s passed, the measure will then be sent for President Donald Trump’s signature, since the House approved the package last week.

Democrats had tried to secure an amendment vote to repeal a policy enacted in November allowing senators to sue for $500,000 if their electronic records were obtained by federal law enforcement without prior notification. But leaders blocked the effort spearheaded by Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) to overturn this provision included in the stopgap funding patch that ended the six-week government shutdown.

Key Republicans are working to put together a $15 billion tranche of aid for farmers in this month’s appropriations bills.

Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.), who chairs the Senate Appropriations Ag-FDA subcommittee, met Wednesday with House Agriculture Chair G.T. Thompson (R-Pa.) and Senate Agriculture Chair John Boozman (R-Ark.) to discuss a path forward for the package, the three men told POLITICO.

A final number is still up in the air, but they’re eyeing about $15 billion, according to a person with knowledge of the discussions who was granted anonymity to discuss the planning. The talks come after the Trump administration’s December announcement of $11 billion in aid for row crop farmers and $1 billion for specialty crop farmers.

Boozman said in a brief interview that the group is hoping to finalize the plan “fairly shortly,” which will be crucial given the Jan. 30 deadline for passing the broader federal funding package. The three negotiators still need to get buy-in from GOP leadership in both chambers, according to the person close to the talks.

Thompson originally estimated that the second round of aid would need to be about $10 billion. He said lawmakers are now hoping to pass something “a little north” of that.

“We’re looking at exactly what the need is and how it would be dispersed,” Thompson said.

Hoeven and Thompson told POLITICO that the second round of farm aid would include money designated for specialty crop producers, who asked for more assistance after the Trump administration’s initial farm aid launch. USDA has not announced details about a timeline for sending out the $1 billion for specialty crop producers. Thompson said he’d also like to include producers of forestry and lumber products.

The Republicans’ plan comes as House Agriculture ranking member Angie Craig (D-Minn.) has introduced her own farmer aid plan that includes $17 billion in additional funds, with carveouts for specialty crops, foresters and sugar beet farmers included.

The Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle the Education Department have emerged as an obstacle in congressional spending talks.

Democrats are trying to stop the department from offloading some of its duties to other agencies by pushing for language blocking such moves to be included in spending legislation to fund the departments of Education, Labor and Health and Human Services.

The language is one of a handful of outstanding issues in the negotiations, according to lawmakers overseeing the spending bill.

Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.), chair of the subcommittee overseeing the bill, who characterized himself as “not a big fan” of the Education Department, said adding that language would be a “heavy lift” to getting the spending bill through the House.

“As long as the money’s there, I don’t care what department that it goes through,” he said. “So just convincing my Democrat counterparts of that … is what we gotta do.”

The Trump administration has struck at least seven interagency agreements to transfer the administration of programs like Title I, which supports high-poverty schools, and career and technical education, to the Labor Department and other agencies. The Education Department is weighing more transfers, such as the administration of special education programs and civil rights enforcement.

The stalemate comes as Congress has roughly two weeks to clear spending legislation to avoid a partial government shutdown. The language, if included in the final bill, would curtail a key part of Education Secretary Linda McMahon’s efforts to make good on President Donald Trump’s directive to close the Education Department. McMahon has said the department’s agreements serve as proofs of concept for Congress to make the changes permanent.

Aderholt previously told POLITICO that making the transfer of education programs permanent would need an act of Congress.

The bipartisan Senate bill advanced by the Appropriations Committee last July included language essentially blocking the Education Department from transferring the administration of funding supporting high-poverty schools and special education programs. Top Senate Democrats have also pitched going further, with language that blocks future transfers of any program and prevents the agreements that have already been struck from being carried out.

Appropriations leaders overseeing the Education Department met last week to discuss the bill, and talks at the staff level continue. Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), the top Democrat on the subcommittee overseeing the Labor-H bill, said she proposed letting the Education Department continue its interagency agreement with the Labor Department to operate career and technical education programs, but halting agreements on K-12 and higher education programs that have taken place.

“There’s some level of appropriateness for Labor and Education to work closely together on career and technical education programs, but I don’t think Labor should be operating preschool and kindergarten,” she said.

Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, said Wednesday that lawmakers are “still talking” through the language. DeLauro, who also leads Democrats on the subcommittee overseeing the Education spending bill, said she has concerns about how education programs will be administered at other agencies.

“We need to really make sure that the people who know the most about dealing with the education programs are administering the education programs,” she said. “This is part of the president’s agenda to dismantle the Department of Education, which we should not be doing, and we should prevent the president from trying to dismantle the Department of Education.”

The House voted 213-205 on Thursday to pass legislation that would limit retirement fund managers’ ability to consider environmental, social and governance factors in investment decisions.

The Protecting Prudent Investment of Retirement Savings Act, sponsored by Rep. Rick Allen (R-Ga.), seeks to limit the use of ESG considerations, particularly in fiduciaries’ management of retirement savings governed by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.

The legislation targets a Labor Department rule finalized during the Biden administration that clarified support for fund managers’ authority to consider ESG factors when they are financially relevant and to use them as a tiebreaker when competing investments are otherwise economically equivalent.

The bill was one of several measures advanced by the House Education and Workforce Committee that were slated for floor votes this week. The Thursday vote came after six Republicans joined Democrats earlier this week to block a separate GOP-backed bill easing overtime rules.

Republicans then shelved a bill that would tighten joint-employer standards after members informed leadership that the legislation would fail.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers will introduce a resolution Thursday that repudiates President Donald Trump’s threats to seize Greenland and warns that any U.S. military action involving the Danish territory would require Congress’s approval.

State of play: The nonbinding measure is led by Sens. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Reps. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) and Don Bacon (R-Neb.). It affirms U.S. respect for the sovereignty of Denmark and Greenland and contradicts recent statements by senior administration officials suggesting the United States could seek control of Greenland, including by force.

What they’re saying: “This is actually making us less secure,” Gallego said Wednesday of the administration’s stance. “By us attacking or claiming to attack a NATO ally, we are essentially destroying one of the most secure partnerships and alliances that we need to counteract Russia and to counteract China.”

War powers: The move comes as Democrats separately press a privileged war powers resolution from Gallego that would require congressional authorization before any U.S. military action tied to Greenland. That measure, still under review by Democratic leaders, would force lawmakers to go on the record as Trump expands his use of military power and unnerves U.S. allies.

Diplomatic blitz: Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen said a “fundamental disagreement” over Greenland remains after meeting with Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. The two sides, however, agreed to create a working group to discuss ways to work through differences as Trump continues to call for a U.S. takeover of Denmark’s Arctic territory of Greenland.

Rasmussen and Greenland’s foreign minister, Vivian Motzfeldt, met Wednesday with Gallego, Murkowski and other lawmakers who rebuked Trump’s pressure campaign.

“I hope it’s ultimately not necessary,” Murkowski said of a potential war powers resolution. “But we are operating in times where we’re having conversations about things that we never thought even possible. To use the name Greenland in the context of a war powers resolution, to me, is absolutely stunning.”

Messaging bill: While the sense of Congress resolution is nonbinding, its sponsors hope it will keep the spotlight on the split between Congress and the White House. The effort follows the administration’s recent military operation in Venezuela, which intensified concerns among allies about the Trump administration’s willingness to act unilaterally.

The resolution states that any change to Greenland’s status or any use of U.S. military force there must comply with U.S. treaty obligations and be approved by Congress.

It also invokes the North Atlantic Treaty, noting that NATO members are required to resolve disputes peacefully and refrain from threats or the use of force against one another. It highlights America’s long defense presence in Greenland as part of security cooperation with Denmark and Greenland, particularly in the Arctic and North Atlantic.

“It’s time for Congress to wake up and do its job,” Khanna said in a statement. “This is a moral test for America and we have a responsibility to keep Americans out of dumb foreign wars and honor our relationships with our NATO allies.”

A bipartisan group of senators met privately Tuesday to start building support for overhauling the Federal Emergency Management Agency, in a move meant to exert congressional influence over the office as it’s being targeted by the Trump administration.

The meeting, organized by Sen. Peter Welch (D-Vt.), indicates heightened Senate concern about FEMA as it experiences deep cuts to its disaster workforce and faces structural changes under President Donald Trump, who has lashed out at the agency for delivering aid too slowly.

The legislative push comes as Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth are steering efforts to reduce the amount of federal aid for states in the wake of disasters.

It also comes after Trump has sought to politicize FEMA aid by requiring states to assist federal immigration agents as a condition of receiving the money. That policy was derided by a federal judge who called it a “ham-handed attempt to bully” the states.

Roughly a dozen senators met in Welch’s Capitol Hill office with former FEMA chiefs Craig Fugate and Peter Gaynor, in what two participants described as an unusually constructive meeting in interviews. Patrick Sheehan, who runs the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency, was also in attendance.

“There is strong, bipartisan interest in improving FEMA,” Welch said in a statement. The meeting was closed to the public and not announced.

Fugate, who ran FEMA under former President Barack Obama, said the meeting was “an impressive bipartisan discussion about how to work for solutions.”

“At most hearings, people talk past each other. This event, people were talking to each other and engaging in conversations in a very collegial approach,” Fugate added. “I was just very impressed by the caliber of the conversation.”

An unusually large number of bills to revise FEMA are pending in Congress, including a sweeping agency overhaul, that the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee approved in September on a 57-3 vote.

The Senate has no companion bill or comparable legislation. Welch, whose state sustained major flood damage in 2023 and 2024, introduced a measure in July that would create new programs for hazard mitigation and simplify some post-disaster procedures.

Sen. Andy Kim (D-N.J.), who led the meeting Tuesday with Welch, said he left the session confident that Congress could revise FEMA “in a bipartisan way.”

“This was just an opportunity for us to have a conversation, to hear from some experts and really try to discuss it without the cameras, without the posturing. And I was really encouraged by it,” Kim said in an interview Wednesday. “A lot of my colleagues showed up, and a lot really talked about their interest in continuing to work on this.”

Welch’s office declined to name the senators who attended. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), whose state was devastated by Hurricane Helene in 2024, confirmed that he was at the meeting. Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) also confirmed her attendance.

Welch invited senators who he knew were interested in FEMA-related legislation. He expects to have ongoing bipartisan talks similar to the House transportation committee process last year.

“There’s a lot of concern about the potential for [Homeland Security Secretary Kristi] Noem and Trump to disband FEMA or dismantle it slowly,” said a Senate aide who was not authorized to talk publicly. Senators want to “better shape the agency and support reforms before it is destroyed completely by the administration.”

Sen. Bill Cassidy raised $1.65 million in the latest fundraising quarter and has $11 million in cash on hand, his team told POLITICO, as he seeks to ward off a right-wing primary challenge.

The Louisiana Republican is facing several primary challengers on the right fueled by his past criticism of President Donald Trump. Cassidy voted to impeach Trump following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack against the Capitol, a stance that angered the GOP base in Louisiana.

Cassidy has consistently posted slightly higher fundraising numbers than his opponents, John Fleming, the state treasurer and a former congressman, and state Sen. Blake Miguez, but has a significantly larger war chest. Cassidy has raised more than $17 million this cycle to date. Fleming and Miguez haven’t released their latest numbers; they had just over $2 million and $2.5 million in the bank respectively as of the end of September. Rep. Julia Letlow (R-La.) has also flirted with a bid, though sources told POLITICO she is not expected to run; she had $2.3 million in the bank as of the end of September.

The senator will have some help. A pair of super PACs supporting Cassidy’s reelection will show they had $5 million in cash on hand at the end of 2025 and received an additional $2 million in the first two weeks of January, according to a person close to those efforts. The PACs expect to spend between $13 million and $15 million on his behalf.

Cassidy is one of a trio of GOP senators facing tough reelection fights where Trump is declining to endorse a candidate, along with Texas Sen. John Cornyn and Maine Sen. Susan Collins.

Cassidy’s Senate GOP colleagues are backing his reelection. On Thursday, Majority Leader John Thune will host a fundraiser for Cassidy in Baton Rouge that’s expected to bring in $600,000.

Tim Scott is facing a crypto calamity.

Landmark digital asset legislation that the Senate Banking chair hoped to advance out of committee Thursday is in extreme jeopardy after one of the industry’s most influential executives announced his opposition Wednesday, setting off a scramble in the Senate and the White House to rescue the bill.

Scott has now postponed the markup, and it’s unclear where he goes from here.

The last-minute backlash is crypto’s biggest flex yet on Capitol Hill, after the industry’s largest players doled out more than $100 million on races across the country to ensure their allies controlled the 119th Congress.

Scott is facing opposition from Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, founder of the largest U.S.-based crypto exchange. Coinbase has one of the most aggressive lobbying and legal operations in the realm of crypto policy, and it has pumped tens of millions of dollars into a pro-crypto super PAC network.

The bill at issue is on its face the kind of thing crypto companies have been working toward for years — a sweeping rewrite of Wall Street regulations to accommodate the trading of crypto tokens. It’s also a top financial policy priority for the Trump administration.

But the legislation isn’t accommodating enough for Coinbase, which had been generally supportive of Scott’s approach until he revealed a new version of the bill this week.

“Evidently, the industry writes the bill and if anybody in Congress has the nerve to slightly amend it, the industry says that the whole thing is off and they have canceled the law,” Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the top Democrat on Senate Banking and an opponent of the bill, told POLITICO. “These are folks who think that when they’ve bought themselves a Congress, then they expect it to behave the way they say.”

Armstrong is balking at what he calls the bill’s “erosion” of authority at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission — a regulator the industry has long preferred over the Securities and Exchange Commission. He’s also concerned about the potential for amendments that would crack down on “rewards” from stablecoins — a flashpoint between crypto firms and traditional banks, which see them as threats to old-school savings accounts.

“We’d rather have no bill than a bad bill,” Armstrong wrote on X — a statement that was also at odds with other big players in the crypto world, who say the bill is flawed but still worth advancing.

Before Armstrong’s surprise rebellion, Scott told POLITICO that he was fully committed to holding the markup, despite looming opposition from key crypto-friendly Democrats and further complications from Republican allies of the banking industry.

“I am hopeful that it will be a bipartisan victory,” Scott said Wednesday around noon. “But at the end of the day, it’s time for us to come and say where we are on the underlying issues.”

But for some Republicans, the outcome was obvious after Armstrong’s power play.

“I think there’s a deal to be had,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said. “But [Armstrong’s] probably made the right assessment in terms of us being ready for the markup.”

What else we’re watching:

— Approps progress: Senators expect to pass the three-bill appropriations minibus Thursday, and some are confident that another funding package could be released this weekend covering Defense, Transportation-HUD and Labor-HHS-Education. Senate Majority Leader John Thune told POLITICO that senators are keeping their options open for how to process the six remaining funding bills once they return from next week’s recess.

— What’s next on war powers: Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) says Democrats plan to force votes on military action in Greenland, Iran, Colombia, Mexico, Nicaragua and Cuba, after Republicans derailed the Venezuela war powers measure Wednesday. “You make them have to work their ass off to keep their people in the corral,” Kaine told reporters.

Meredith Lee Hill, Jordain Carney and Calen Razor contributed to this report.