BOWSER HEADS TO HILL: Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) will appear before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Thursday, as National Guard troops patrol the city she's led for a decade.
Her testimony comes amid a federal crackdown in the District over the past month. Trump declared in August that the administration would take temporary control of the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department, and he would send the National Guard in to address what he argued was out-of-control crime in the city.
While the federal government's control of the police ended after 30 days, National Guard members could remain for months. Many Democrats have slammed Trump's actions as political theater and unnecessary as the District's crime levels had been dropping before the deployment.
Among those critics is D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb (D), who will also be testifying on Thursday and sued the Trump administration to try to stop the National Guard's deployment.
But Bowser has taken at times a more conciliatory approach, avoiding a direct confrontation with Trump and acknowledging that crime has dropped further since the Guard was first deployed. She also signed an executive order earlier this month authorizing coordination between the police and federal troops to the extent possible.
But Trump went after Bowser earlier this week after the mayor said she expects police to stop cooperating with Immigration and Customs Enforcement with the 30-day limit on police control reached, as outlined by the D.C. Home Rule Act.
Trump threatened to call a national emergency and federalize the city if necessary. That is what sets up Bowser's testimony Thursday, when Republicans could press her on the state of the city.
The Hill's Brett Samuels reported on the tightrope that Bowser is trying to walk, with her power more limited than other Democrats who lead states.
"What I care about is protecting this city, our home rule and preserving our autonomy at every step," Bowser told The Washington Post in an interview last week.
KIMMEL PULLED: ABC is taking its late-night show "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" off the air "indefinitely" after comments that Jimmy Kimmel made about the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was killed last week.
The suspension came after Nexstar Media Group, which owns a wide range of local television stations across the country, said its affiliate stations would preempt the show starting Wednesday evening.
During Kimmel's show on Monday, he accused conservatives of trying to "score political points" from Kirk's death and went after Trump, comparing his mourning for Kirk to "the way a 4-year-old mourns a goldfish."
Nexstar, which also owns The Hill, said in a statement that it "strongly objects" to comments that Kimmel made and would replace his show with other programming on its ABC-affiliated networks.
Kimmel faced conservative backlash for his comments, and Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr called Kimmel's remarks "some of the sickest conduct possible."
Trump celebrated ABC's decision to pull Kimmel's show, calling it "Great News for America."
KEY MEETING: Public health experts are bracing for potentially drastic changes to the childhood vaccine schedule following a two-day meeting from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) vaccine panel, reports The Hill's Joseph Choi.
The agenda for the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) is unclear, but some have speculated the panel could back an overhaul of the childhood vaccine schedule, including guidance on immunizing newborns against hepatitis B.
The meeting starting Thursday comes after Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. removed all 17 members of the ACIP earlier this year and replaced them with his own picks, including several who are known to be vaccine critics.
Former CDC Director Susan Monarez, who was ousted after just a month in the role, testified on Wednesday that the ACIP meeting was key to her sudden firing, as she claimed Kennedy asked her to pre-approve the committee's recommendations and she refused.
"We got into an exchange where I had suggested that I would be open to changing childhood vaccine schedules if the evidence or science were supportive, and he responded that there was no science or evidence associated with a childhood vaccine schedule," she said.
DEMOCRATS STRATEGIZE: Senate Democratic leadership is taking a different approach to the pending government shutdown from the last time that government funding needed to be extended in March.
Despite some members of his caucus wanting Democrats to put up more of a fight, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) and nine other Democrats voted in favor of a House-approved funding bill despite their concerns. Now, as The Hill's Alex Bolton reports, Schumer plans to stand by his caucus, significantly increasing the chances of a shutdown happening when government funding runs out on Sept. 30.
Sen. John Fetterman (Pa.), one of the upper chamber's more moderate Democrats, indicated he would vote in favor of the "clean" continuing resolution (CR) that Republicans have unveiled, which would keep government funding at current levels through Nov. 21.
But Democratic leaders quickly rejected the proposal as it was crafted largely without their input and doesn't extend health care subsidies through ObamaCare.
So far, neither Schumer nor Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) appears likely to back down with two weeks left before a shutdown.
Passing the CR will be easier in the House, which advanced the stopgap on Wednesdsay evening, teeing up a final vote later this week. But 60 votes are needed to overcome a filibuster in the Senate, meaning Democratic votes will be needed.
Senate Democrats proposed their own version of the stopgap, which would extend ObamaCare subsidies, restore Medicaid funding that the One Big, Beautiful Bill Act cut and prevent the Trump administration from clawing back previously appropriated funds.
Republicans view the proposal as unacceptable. Meanwhile, GOP senators don't seem too bothered by the idea of Schumer publicly discussing the possibility of a shutdown, reports The Hill's Al Weaver.
Senate Republican sources told Weaver that Schumer mentioning a shutdown could mean the GOP comes out as the political winner.
"People don't want dysfunction. They don't want a government shutdown. They don't want people taking a stand on stuff that doesn't impact them or they don't understand," Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) said.
"Let Schumer be Schumer," a Senate GOP aide said.
▪ Fox News: 'Senate Republicans brand looming crisis a 'Schumer Shutdown' as Democrats dig in.'
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