eNewspaper | Crosswords | Horoscopes

On Politics

Wed Jul 1 2026

Zachary Schermele | Congressional Correspondent

@zachschermele

Hello readers and welcome back to On Politics. Zach Schermele here, USA TODAY's congressional correspondent. It's Wednesday. Yesterday, I spotted several Republican lawmakers leaving the Capitol with red Solo cups in hand as they departed early for the July Fourth recess. They could've been celebrating or commiserating. More on that later.

Democrats' welcome news in Alaska

Senate Democrats are rejoicing after the nonpartisan Cook Political Report officially shifted its outlook today for the Alaska Senate race from leaning Republican to a toss-up. Cook editor Jessica Taylor wrote that this week’s bad news for Republicans about the makeup of the ballot was enough to move the contest – a must-win for Democrats that will be key to determining Senate control in November – into the forecasting group's most competitive category.

Alaska's state supreme court ruled Monday that Dan J. Sullivan, a retired teacher, could still challenge Republican Sen. Dan S. Sullivan. GOP senators have spent weeks fuming about the double-Dan drama, arguing that the new Republican challenger with the same first and last name as the incumbent is just trying to trick voters and isn't a "good faith candidate."

Sen. Dan S. Sullivan called the Alaska Supreme Court's ruling disappointing, accusing the other Dan Sullivan of being a "sham candidate" and saying "the only reason he is running is to deceive voters and manipulate Alaska's election system."

Anna Moneymaker, Getty Images

The Democrat in the race is Mary Peltola, a former congresswoman, who's denied any involvement in the same-name controversy.

Get USA TODAY at the top of your search results: Add us as a preferred source on Google.

A politics rundown

•	Colorado primary takeaways: split decision on Democratic establishment
•	Trump reported more than $1.4B in income from crypto ventures: filings
•	Trump takes first flight on new Air Force One gifted by Qatar

Enjoying On Politics? Subscribe here and stay ahead of the midterms with our daily politics newsletter.

Congress' SAVE Act standstill

I was interviewing a Democratic congresswoman in her office yesterday when one of her staffers informed us that votes for the remainder of the week, on everything, had been abruptly canceled, sending lawmakers home early for the July Fourth recess. The congresswoman, her staffer and I grumbled about how unpredictable the House schedule has been lately.

It's the second week in a row that the legislative schedule in the House of Representatives has essentially been frozen amid a Republican rebellion aimed at tightening voting restrictions.

"In broad terms, there are things that we need to be moving forward, that we've all talked about, that aren't happening, that are starting to bottleneck," Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, told me yesterday. "We need to figure out how to free things up again."

Read how Speaker Mike Johnson explained the situation here.

GOP eyes birthright citizenship post-SCOTUS ruling

Speaking of Johnson, he's not ignoring President Trump's demands that Congress intervene after the Supreme Court upheld birthright citizenship. As I reported this morning, the speaker sounded a call to action in the wake of the decision.

"If it requires a constitutional amendment, maybe we work towards that," Johnson told a group of reporters I was huddled with outside his office. "If there's something to do statutorily, maybe we do that as well."

Read more here about how Justice Brett Kavanaugh factors into it all.

Zachary Schermele is the congressional correspondent for USA TODAY. You can reach him by email at zschermele@usatoday.com. Follow him on X at @ZachSchermele and Bluesky at @zachschermele.bsky.social.