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Congress rocked by consequential battles that will shape Biden's presidency
CNN
The future of the Biden presidency, the terrain of the midterm elections and the fate of the Republican Party will all be shaped by a series of early battles unfolding on Capitol Hill.
After four years of politics by tweeted decree, normal service is resuming inside the Beltway in all its brutal, hypocritical, and high-stakes glory as everyone with power tries to wield it to set the tone for the coming years. The White House is standing firm behind Neera Tanden, its pick for budget director, though her nomination seems doomed. Aides to Joe Biden know this first big fight will help set the terms of the new President's relationship with Congress. Other bitter confirmation hearings are turning into early de-facto fights on the great issues of the Biden era, like climate change and expanding access to health care. Republicans are meanwhile beginning to mobilize against Biden's $1.9 trillion Covid rescue package in the hope of billing it as an example of massive liberal overreach and winning a political payoff. Yet they are making a significant gamble. If Biden pulls the country out of the pandemic with the help of the bill -- that is currently popular -- the GOP will look mean and irresponsible.![](/newspic/picid-6252001-20250215102651.jpg)
In less than a month in office the Trump administration has simultaneously dismantled foreign aid programs that support fragile democracies abroad and put on leave federal workers who protect US elections at home in a move that current and former officials say abandons decades of American commitments to democracy.
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Sen. Mitch McConnell was a generational force for the Republican Party — using procedural tactics and political will to stymie much of former President Barack Obama’s agenda, hand President Donald Trump key first-term political victories and deliver a 6-3 conservative Supreme Court majority. Now he’s the odd man out.
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The Trump administration is forcing out senior leadership at the National Archives and Records Administration in a major shakeup, according to a source familiar. President Donald Trump has been highly critical of the archives since the agency asked the Department of Justice to investigate Trump’s mishandling of classified documents after he left office.
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The morning after the mass resignation of prosecutors sparked a crisis inside the Trump Justice Department, acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove led a meeting with the Justice Department’s public integrity section. His message: they had to choose one career lawyer to file a dismissal of the corruption charges against New York City Mayor Eric Adams, according to three people briefed on the meeting.
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Seventh prosecutor in Eric Adams case resigns and calls out Trump’s former lawyer in scathing letter
A federal prosecutor assigned to the corruption case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams resigned Friday in a blistering letter that accused top leaders at the Justice Department of looking for a “fool” to dismiss the criminal charges.