Rep. Victoria Spartz announced Monday that she is opting out from serving on committees next year and will boycott the House GOP conference meetings, a rare move given she also stated her intention to remain a Republican.

“I will stay as a registered Republican but will not sit on committees or participate in the caucus until I see that Republican leadership in Congress is governing. I do not need to be involved in circuses,” Spartz wrote on X.

The decision to step down confused some Republicans, but others suspected the move had something to do with the House GOP Steering Committee not giving her a coveted post on the House Ways and Means Committee, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter.

Spartz, who has had problems with retaining staff, said she’d prefer to “spend more of my time helping” the mission of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, which is meant to help cut government spending.

Some Republicans are happy about her decision to boycott the conference meetings, according to two people familiar with the situation, as some had privately complained about her speaking too much during the internal GOP meetings.

House Agriculture ranking member David Scott has dropped out of the race to maintain his post next year, according to four people with knowledge of the matter granted anonymity to discuss the decision.

Scott (D-Ga.) lost a key Steering panel vote Monday on the first ballot. The ranking member has long faced questions about his ability to lead the panel amid health concerns.

Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) is in a strong position to take the top Democratic spot on the committee after receiving 34 votes from the steering panel. Rep. Jim Costa (D-Calif.), who was also in the running for the ranking member post, came in second with 22 votes. Scott received five votes.

The House Democratic caucus will meet in full on Tuesday to hold a vote finalizing who will lead Democrats on the House Agriculture Committee and other contested ranking member races.

President-elect Donald Trump has chosen a former investment bank president to be the next U.S. ambassador to Japan.

George Glass, who served as ambassador to Portugal in the first Trump administration, would replace Rahm Emanuel in Japan.

“As a former President of an Investment Bank, George will bring his business acumen to the Ambassador’s position,” Trump said in a Truth Social post Monday.

The president-elect also announced who he has chosen to nominate to serve as ambassadors to the Dominican Republic, Austria, Luxembourg and Uruguay.

For the Dominican Republic, Trump chose Leah Francis Campos, who was a CIA case officer before becoming senior adviser for the Western Hemisphere on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. She’s also the sister of “Fox and Friends Weekend” anchor Rachel Campos-Duffy — the spouse of Sean Duffy, Trump’s pick to serve as secretary of transportation.

Trump said he would nominate Arthur Graham Fisher, president of Fisher Realty, as ambassador to Austria and Stacey Feinberg, president of investment firm 33 Capital, as ambassador to Luxembourg.

He said he had chosen Lou Rinaldi, a friend and businessperson, to be ambassador to Uruguay.

The president-elect noted that Rinaldi grew up in Uruguay and has “expertise and background” to advance U.S. interests and strengthen relations between the U.S. and Uruguay.

“Lou is a great golfer, and will be in a Country with some terrific courses,” he said.

House Democrats have solidified the generational shake-up at the top of their committees, after significant behind-the-scenes influence from both current and former leaders of the caucus.

The caucus faced tough races for the Agriculture, Oversight and Natural Resources Committees. Rep. Angie Craig (Minn.) won the nod for the top party spot on Agriculture, beating incumbent Rep. David Scott (Ga.), who’d faced long-standing questions about his health, and Rep. Jim Costa (Calif.). Rep. Gerry Connolly (Va.) won the Oversight recommendation over Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.). And Rep. Jared Huffman (Calif.) earned the nod for the Natural Resources Committee against Rep. Melanie Stansbury (N.M.) after Rep. Raúl Grijalva (Ariz.) stepped down.

Rep. Jamie Raskin (Md.) is also poised to take the top Democratic spot on the Judiciary Committee, though Steering will now take votes on uncontested panel spots on Tuesday.

It’s a huge amount of turnover for a caucus that typically favors seniority to pick its panel chiefs. But House Democratic leaders such as Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries had largely stood aside as lawmakers challenged powerful sitting committee heads, a sign many members took as a tacit endorsement of the effort to replace the old guard.

And former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, despite stepping down from leadership two years ago, put her thumb on the scale even more pointedly. She publicly backed fellow Californians Huffman and Costa, as well as Connolly on Oversight. Pelosi also made calls to lobby support for all three men, according to three people familiar with the conversations.

The full Democratic Caucus will vote on the recommendations Tuesday morning. Most of the votes are expected to be perfunctory approvals of the steering panel’s choices, though the caucus has the option to vote against the selections.

House Democrats are poised to oust another senior panel leader after ailing Rep. David Scott (D-Ga.), 79, lost a vote in the influential Steering panel Monday.

Scott lost the steering committee vote in the first round of voting Monday, according to three people familiar with the matter who were not authorized to speak publicly. Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) won the vote outright on the first ballot. The result all but ensures Scott will lose his bid to stay on as the top Democrat on the Agriculture panel next year.

Craig, 52, is in a strong position to take the top Democratic spot on on the Agriculture Committee after receiving 34 votes from the steering panel. Rep. Jim Costa (D-Calif.), 72, who was also in the running for the ranking member position, came in second with 22 votes. Scott received 5 votes.

The full Democratic House caucus will vote Tuesday. Scott failed to garner the support of every Black Caucus member on the steering committee, according to two other people.

The formal move against Scott comes after years of pressure from rank-and-file Democrats, who complain he has not been an effective committee leader. It also reflects the larger effort among House Democrats to force out senior panel leaders ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s return to power with a GOP trifecta next year.

Since 2021, Scott has defied private calls from fellow Democrats to step down from his committee role amid concerns about his health, lack of leadership and struggle to negotiate the $1.5 trillion farm bill. Those calls have built since the election, especially after Costa and Craig launched their own bids for the ranking member job.

Scott, who became the first Black chair of the Agriculture Committee in 2021, has long been protected by Democratic leaders and the powerful Congressional Black Caucus. But those alliances have crumbled, especially in the last few weeks.

As recently as last Wednesday, Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries declined to support Scott when asked in a brief hallway interview about the Georgia Democrats’ health and whether he should be reelected to the role for the next Congress.

Scott has also been hemorrhaging support among the Black Caucus. Younger CBC members have long been more open to replacing Scott. But in a stunning shift, even some senior CBC members have recently and openly mulled the potential of backing one of Scott’s challengers.

Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), the top Democrat on the Homeland Security panel, said in a recent interview that he hadn’t made up his mind whether to stick behind Scott.

“But I do want someone who … can carry the Democratic message far and wide,” Thompson said. “We need the strongest voice.”

A bipartisan group of lawmakers failed to reach a compromise deal to reform permitting rules that would speed the development of new energy infrastructure, people involved in the effort said on Monday.

The push to overcome partisan differences ahead of a crucial government funding deadline saw a significant push by key lawmakers — led by retiring Senate Energy Chair Joe Manchin (I-W.Va.) and House Natural Resources Chair Bruce Westerman (R-Ark.) — but the long-shot challenge of making progress on a major policy issue before Republicans take control of both chambers of Congress and the White House proved too difficult.

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