Washington, DC

1. Warsh’s uncertain path
2. House’s next move
3. DHS deal’s challenges
4. Trump’s Africa strategy
5. Trump weighs Iran options
6. Moreno’s ACA proposal
7. Minnesota tensions high
8. View: X is back

PDB: Abu Dhabi royal bought stake in Trump crypto venture

Trump to close ‘broken’ Kennedy Center for two years … Palantir reports earnings … Gaza-Egypt border crossing reopens

Trump’s Thom Tillis problem

President Donald Trump’s nominee for Federal Reserve chair, Kevin Warsh, lacks a clear path to confirmation as Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., doubles down on his commitment to block Trump’s Fed nominees until the administration drops its investigation into Chair Jerome Powell. “I actually sent a note to the president saying, ‘It’s a great pick,’” Tillis told Semafor. “But I’m not changing.” His stance means Senate Republican leaders will need 60 votes to advance Warsh’s nomination. Trump, who said Friday he was prepared to wait for Tillis’ term to end, later said he hoped Democrats would help advance his pick before then. That could be a heavier lift after he joked at the Alfalfa Club’s annual dinner that night that he would sue Warsh if he didn’t lower interest rates, per The Wall Street Journal. “I’m pretty sure that they wouldn’t get 51,” Tillis predicted.

— Eleanor Mueller

Divided House stretches shutdown

The House Rules Committee meets this afternoon to ready the Senate’s government spending package for a floor vote after funding for several key agencies lapsed Friday at midnight. Though Speaker Mike Johnson had initially hoped to pass the legislation with the help of Democrats, Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told Johnson on Saturday that minority-party leaders would not lend their support due to concerns about greenlighting funding for immigration enforcement before enacting new restrictions. “We’ve got to pass a rule and probably do this mostly on our own,” Johnson told NBC. That raises the stakes for GOP leaders’ ongoing efforts to appease conservative hardliners, whose demands include attaching legislation requiring voters to provide proof of citizenship. Johnson will have some bipartisan support: Some Democrats indicated on a caucus call Sunday that they planned to vote “yes” (and urged colleagues to do the same).

— Eleanor Mueller

Senate battles over DHS morass

Senate Democrats are betting they can make substantial headway in immigration enforcement negotiations in just a few days. Practically speaking, they’ll need a deal well before Feb. 13 — the Department of Homeland Security shutdown deadline they’re working with — to get it on the floor. “It’ll be hard, but we will know quickly whether it’s going to happen or not,” Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., told Semafor. Democrats have their demands, and some Republicans are willing to consider them. Others are bearish. “Their proposals are insane, so I’m not optimistic,” said Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., who devised a list of GOP counterproposals with Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. “Are we going to pass a law around here that kneecaps ICE? No.” Don’t be surprised if more short-term DHS funding bills are needed — just the slightest hiccup will throw off the goal of a deal by mid-February.

— Burgess Everett

White House refines Africa strategy

The Trump administration is overhauling how it handles aid to Africa with an aim towards dislodging China from “priority” sectors in the region, Semafor’s Shelby Talcott and Yinka Adegoke report. Nick Checker, the State Department’s head of the Bureau of African Affairs, told Semafor they don’t need to compete “dollar to dollar” with China: “If it’s a priority sector, or in the mineral space … that’s an area where we’d actually want to be actively competing,” he said. The State Department is also defending its efforts in Africa: Checker said that he is heading to Mali soon to discuss counter-terrorism cooperation, and that current “focus areas” for Africa include “commercial diplomacy” and making efforts to resolve and prevent conflicts in the continent. “The president’s met with 11 African leaders, so we are very much engaged — it just looks a little bit different,” Checker said.

Trump says in talks with Iran

The Trump administration is in talks with Iran as the US president continues to weigh military strikes against the country. On Saturday, Trump confirmed that Iran is “talking to us” and said he hopes they “negotiate something that’s acceptable;” separately, Iran’s Fars news agency reported Monday that Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian had ordered the start of nuclear talks with the US. Still, rhetoric between the two countries is heightening: On Sunday, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned that a US attack would result in a “regional war” and said Tehran would “put an end to the United States’ mischief and harassment.” Trump told reporters: “Of course he would say that,” adding that the US has “the biggest, most powerful ships in the world over there.” The US president continues to surge military assets to the region (just like he did before targeting former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro).

— Shelby Talcott

Bipartisan ACA deal not dead yet

Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, believes his proposal to extend expired Affordable Care Act subsidies is still alive, because he says Democrats haven’t ruled it out. “Not the Democrats I’m talking to. I think [Senate Minority Leader Chuck] Schumer has ruled it out,” Moreno told Semafor. “The people I’m talking to want to actually solve it.” His proposal would extend the enhanced subsidies for a year with income caps, impose new $5 minimum payments on plans, and ratchet down the subsidies over the next two years with an option to convert them to health savings accounts. Ever the salesman, Moreno has a chart demonstrating how the deal would play out over three years. Democrats aren’t sold yet. Kaine said discussions went well but “we’re trying to see if we can align the [bill] text to what we discussed.”

— Burgess Everett

Homan’s challenge in Minnesota

As the uproar over the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota bleeds into February, the central question is whether border czar Tom Homan can de-escalate the situation, writes The New York Times. He has support from unusual corners: Obama-era Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano told the Times that Homan is a “career professional” who possesses the “demeanor that will be required,” but questioned “whether he will have the latitude from the White House to do what needs to be done.” As Homan works toward a possible drawdown, a federal judge in Minnesota denied the state’s bid to end the federal immigration deployment. The Justice Department is pursuing a civil rights investigation into Alex Pretti’s killing; ProPublica identified the two agents who shot Pretti on Sunday. Meanwhile, protests against ICE and Customs and Border Protection continued across the country.

View / X is back

There’s really no disputing it at this point: After a dip in its cultural relevance at the end of the COVID-19 lockdowns, the site formerly known as Twitter is back. The platform, which dominated US and much of global politics a decade ago, seemed to be receding into a kind of time-capsule-like, Pretoria-inflected insane asylum. But Elon Musk’s social media-and-AI platform is now undoubtedly at the beating heart of news again, helped by a series of product improvements under new chief Nikita Bier. It’s where MAGA-dominated US politics organizes, where sophisticated conversation about artificial intelligence takes place, and where big news still breaks. Over the weekend, as I wrote, X offered a contrast between curious and cooperative AI agents speculating about their own consciousness on Moltbook; and obsessive, hyperpartisan humans chasing Jeffrey Epstein obsessions down dark rabbit holes.

— Ben Smith

Blindspot: Arizona and warrantless arrests

Stories that are being largely ignored by either left-leaning or right-leaning outlets, curated with help from our partners at Ground News.

What the Left isn’t reading: Arizona’s Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes faces growing blowback for remarks she made suggesting Arizona citizens under threat from ICE agents should be able to “defend” themselves “with lethal force.”

What the Right isn’t reading: ICE gave agents more leeway to conduct warrantless arrests of suspected undocumented immigrants, according to a new memo reported by The New York Times. 

Beltway Newsletters

Punchbowl News: Bill and Hillary Clinton have been advised to cut a deal with Republicans to avoid being held in criminal contempt of Congress, after they defied a congressional subpoena to testify in a bipartisan probe into Jeffrey Epstein.

Axios: DHS’ scouting of commercial warehouses to retrofit into ICE detention centers that can hold up to 9,500 detainees has been met with fierce local protests.

Playbook: “Once again, Donald Trump has acted with a total disregard for Congress,” said Rep. Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio, a member of the Kennedy Center’s board, of the president’s decision to go ahead with renovations without consulting Congress.

White House