House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, will not seek re-election in 2026.

The senior Republican lawmaker will have finished serving a decade in Congress when he leaves at the end of next year.

‘I have a firm conviction, much like our founders did, that public service is a lifetime commitment, but public office is and should be a temporary stint in stewardship, not a career,’ Arrington said.

And the conservative Texan told Fox News Digital he felt he was leaving on a high note, having played a key role in crafting President Donald Trump’s big, beautiful bill.

‘It was a very unique, generational impact opportunity, to be almost ten years into this and to have the budget chairmanship, and to lead the charge to successfully pass that and to help this president fulfill his mandate from the people,’ Arrington said. ‘It just seems like a good and right place to leave it.’

He cited multiple legislative items across his tenure as Budget Committee chair when asked what he took pride in, but added, ‘It’s more of changing the narrative and the culture in Congress and in my party that I’m most proud of.’

‘I’m from a rural district and I can tell you, raising the profile among urban and suburban members as to the unique challenges of rural America and the unique contributions of rural America — like food security and energy independence and how much the nation depends on these plow boys and cowboys in rural areas — that’s another thing I’m proud of,’ he said.

Arrington said he had faith Republicans in Washington would pick up his mantle of fiscal hawkishness, or as he’s often called it, ‘reversing the curse’ of public debt.

‘The president’s committed to it, he talks about it all the time. He’s actually doing something about it with very difficult decisions, not politically popular decisions. This is all about political will,’ Arrington said. ‘Trump’s doing it. Mike Johnson is committed to it… And we have a growing number of fiscal hawks who are absolutely dogged on this issue.’

But he said he would continue to push for further fiscal reforms for his remaining year on Capitol Hill, including another budget reconciliation bill to follow up on the big, beautiful bill.

‘I don’t know where the Senate Republicans are. I don’t know where the president is and can’t speak for the White House. But the House is at the ready,’ Arrington said. ‘It’s been our most consequential tool to support the president and the strength of the country, and I don’t see any reason we wouldn’t utilize it to its fullest extent.’

The West Texas Republican said he had not given much thought to what he would do next but said he wanted to ‘remain in the fight,’ adding he would seek a ‘new leadership challenge’ that ‘allows me to make the biggest difference on as many people as I can.’

‘And then I would say…I am looking forward to quality time with my wife and kids and focusing on my leadership and service, not in the people’s house, but in my own house,’ Arrington said.

He said he hoped to ‘make a difference’ in the lives of his two young sons and daughter.

Arrington’s Lubbock-anchored district leans heavily Republican, meaning it’s unlikely to flip to blue in the 2026 midterms.

And come the end of his time next year, the conservative lawmaker said he would leave with no regrets.

‘I’m thankful that God called me and gave me the grace to succeed and to achieve the things that we’ve achieved,’ Arrington said.

‘His grace looks like the members of Congress that I’ve been doing battle with, my budget hawks who I’ve been in the trenches with, my constituents who I run into in the grocery store, who want to pray with me right there in the aisle while I’m checking out. The grace of God looks like my wife being both mom and dad about two-thirds of the time, because I’m in Washington doing battle for the country.’

He finished, ‘Did I make my share of mistakes? You bet. Did I learn along the way? You bet I did. But we left [the country] better than we found it, and it gives me great satisfaction.’

Critics once called it isolationist. But national security experts now say Donald Trump’s ‘America First’ strategy is proving to be something else entirely — a hard-nosed policy of deterrence built on strong alliances, especially with Israel.

Fred Fleitz, vice chair of the America First Policy Institute’s Center for American Security and former chief of staff at the National Security Council, told Fox News Digital that ‘The America First approach to U.S. national security means a strong national security policy, a decisive president, keeping our nation out of unnecessary wars, having members of alliances carry their own weight, but it also means standing strongly with Israel and fighting antisemitism.’

He said supporting Israel is not about sentiment. ‘Standing with Israel is in our strategic interest,’ he said. ‘Israel is dealing with enemies in the region that the U.S. would have to deal with if it were not there. So it’s in our strategic interest.’

Israel as America’s forward defense

Mike Makovsky, CEO of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA), said Israel effectively absorbs threats that would otherwise demand U.S. military action. ‘Historically, there are about three reasons why we have interests in the region,’ he said. ‘One is Israel. Two is oil. And three is Islamic extremism — terrorism, Shia and Sunni.’

Makovsky said it is ironic that the America First debate has resurfaced ‘only a few months after Israel smoked America’s Mideast enemies.’ He pointed to Iran’s nuclear advances and the role of its proxies. ‘They’re building ballistic missiles… They could reach the eastern seaboard of the United States,’ he said. ‘You marry missiles with nukes that could hit the U.S. — you’ve got the North Koreans on the West Coast; do you really want Iran that could hit the East Coast?’

According to Makovsky, Israel’s campaign against those threats shows the alliance’s strategic value. ‘What did the Israelis just do? They took care of it. The United States came in with the B-2 at the very end… but it was Israel that did all that work,’ he said.

He added that Israel ‘pretty much finished off Hamas,’ weakened Hezbollah — ‘which has hundreds of American soldiers’ blood on their hands’ — and continues to confront the Houthis to ‘ensure freedom of navigation.’ That, he argued, is deterrence in action: ‘As long as we support Israel, we give them some help, we give them the weapons they need, they’re really doing our work.’

Countering Iran and its allies

Fleitz called Iran ‘the biggest threat,’ encompassing ‘Iran and Iran’s proxies in the region. This includes Hamas, Hezbollah in Syria, Iran-backed militias in Iraq, and then Iran itself, with its nuclear weapons program and its sponsorship of terror.’

He said Israel’s actions have ‘destroyed Hamas proxies and significantly weakened Iran,’ adding that ‘we joined Israel in June in taking on Iran’s nuclear program, which was a threat to global security.’

Both analysts framed Iran as part of a wider axis of power alongside Russia and China, each exploiting Middle East instability to undermine U.S. influence — by fueling proxy wars, spiking energy prices, and threatening trade routes through the Gulf and the Red Sea. Fleitz said Trump’s willingness to act decisively ‘to attack Iran’s nuclear program’ exemplified using strength to prevent costlier wars later.

Energy and economic security

Both agree that energy policy is where America First becomes measurable. Fleitz said that ‘energy independence is a very important part of President Trump’s America First policy to free Americans from high energy bills.’ At the same time, he noted, energy diplomacy abroad reinforces economic security at home. ‘By pushing the Saudis — and the Saudis, I think, are happy to help us with this — to produce more oil, it may actually help us end the war in Ukraine,’ he said.

Makovsky made a similar case for regional stability: ‘The biggest threat to the Gulf Arab oil exporters … is Iran,’ he said. Without Israel’s containment of Tehran, ‘Iran would have taken over the Middle East, most likely. And if you care about oil prices, that’s not too good.’

Both experts said that when Israel shoulders the burden of defending energy corridors and trade routes, Americans save in both dollars and deployments.

Avoiding unnecessary wars

Fleitz said Trump’s doctrine is about selective force, not retreat. ‘He wants to keep our country out of new and unnecessary wars, but he will use military force prudently to defend our national security,’ he said. ‘He is going to avoid sending American troops into certain situations and using military force. But that doesn’t mean he won’t do these things when it is in U.S. strategic interests.’

He pointed out U.S. personnel who are currently stationed in Israel but ‘they’re not going to Gaza’ and ‘will not be engaging in combat operations against Hamas.’ Their mission, he said, fits the model of minimal footprint, maximum leverage.

Credibility and global deterrence

Makovsky warned that abandoning Israel would erode America’s credibility worldwide. He recalled what a senior Arab leader once told him: ‘If America doesn’t help Israel attack the nuclear facilities of Iran, it will be one of the great catastrophes.’

‘That’s because everybody in the Mideast, everyone in Asia, knows that the U.S.–Israel relationship is one of the closest in the world,’ Makovsky said. ‘If we don’t help Israel, it undercuts our credibility. The Chinese and the Russians and the North Koreans know that if we’re not going to support Israel, we’re not going to help other allies … and it would make us more vulnerable to the Chinese without a doubt.’

Peace through strength

Fleitz said Trump’s ’20-point peace plan’ for Gaza exemplifies the America First balance between toughness and diplomacy. ‘It achieved its two primary objectives, getting all the living hostages out of Israel and enacting a ceasefire,’ he said, acknowledging that ‘the ceasefire is fairly shaky.’ The next step, he added, is ‘an international stabilization force’ — a complex process still under negotiation.

For both experts, the takeaway is the same: America First doesn’t mean isolation. It means strategic partnerships that keep U.S. troops out of long wars while preserving American dominance.

The shutdown stalemate that has dragged on in the Senate officially ended late Monday night, and it places Congress on a path to reopen the government later this week.

Senators advanced a bipartisan funding package to end the government shutdown after a group of Senate Democrats broke from their colleagues and joined Republicans in their bid to reopen the government.

Those same eight Senate Democratic caucus members stuck with Republicans and provided the crucial votes needed to send the package to the House.

The votes went deep into Monday night on the shutdown’s 41st day and resulted in an updated continuing resolution (CR) being combined with a trio of spending bills in a minibus package that is now headed to the House.

Whether the Senate would get to this point was in the air for much of last week and even earlier in the day. On Monday, lawmakers were riding high after smashing through the package’s first procedural test, but concerns of objections and other procedural maneuvers threatened to derail the process.

‘I think everybody’s pretty united [behind] this bill,’ Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, said. ‘We want to reopen the government.’

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and his caucus demanded throughout the entirety of the shutdown that they would only vote to reopen the government if they received an ironclad deal on expiring Obamacare subsidies.

But that deal, or at least the one that Democrats wanted, never materialized. Instead, eight Senate Democrats took the offer that Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has made since the beginning: A guarantee to vote on legislation that would deal with the subsidies.

Thune reiterated his promise and noted that a vote would come, ‘No later than the second week of December.’ The subsidies are set to expire by the end of the year.

‘We have senators, both Democrat and Republican, who are eager to get to work to address that crisis in a bipartisan way,’ he said. ‘These senators are not interested in political games, they’re interested in finding real ways to address healthcare costs for American families. We also have a president who is willing to sit down and get to work on this issue.’

Senate Democrats did not leave completely empty-handed, however.

Included in the revamped CR, which would reopen the government until Jan. 30, was a reversal of the Trump administration’s firing of furloughed federal workers, a deal to ensure that furloughed workers would get back pay and future protections for federal workers during shutdowns.

‘This was the only deal on the table,’ Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., one of the eight that crossed the aisle to support the package, said. ‘It was our best chance to reopen the government and immediately begin negotiations to extend the [Obamacare] tax credits that tens of millions of Americans rely on to keep costs down.’

Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., another of the eight Senate Democrats to break with Schumer, said that it was clear that Republicans weren’t going to budge on their position that healthcare would be dealt with after the government reopened. 

But it wasn’t the guarantee of a vote on the expiring subsidies that got him to splinter, it was promises that there would be protections for federal employees. 

‘If you wait another week, they’re going to get hurt more, another month or even more,’ Kaine said. ‘So what got me over the line was the pledge that they were able to give the federal employees.’ 

On the House side, it appears GOP leaders are eager to move quickly on ending the prolonged shutdown.

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., earlier Monday told Fox News Digital that he would bring the House back into session ‘immediately’ upon Senate passage of the legislation.

He later told House Republicans on a lawmaker-only call that he anticipated a vote in their chamber midweek at the earliest, Fox News Digital was told.

‘We’re going to plan on voting, on being here, at least by Wednesday,’ Johnson said. ‘It is possible that things could shift a little bit later in the week, but right now we think we’re on track for a vote on Wednesday. So we need you here.’

Johnson signaled the House would not move to fast-track the legislation via suspension of the rules however, which would bypass procedural hurdles in exchange for raising the passage threshold to two-thirds of the chamber.

It’s not a surprising move given House Democratic leaders’ opposition to the bill.

He said, however, that the House Rules Committee should be ready to move by Tuesday at the earliest.

Lawyers for roughly two dozen states will head to court Monday to block the Trump administration’s attempt to penalize them for making full payments to Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients. 

The filing is the latest in a chaotic, fast-moving legal saga centered on the status of the nation’s largest anti-hunger program, which supports 42 million low-income Americans and remains stalled as a result of the ongoing government shutdown.  

‘Food assistance is not a political issue,’ New York Attorney General Letitia James told reporters Monday. ‘It is a moral imperative, and no one should go hungry because their own government is refusing to feed them.‘

The request for emergency intervention comes after the Trump administration on Saturday threatened to slap states who paid out the full SNAP benefits with steep economic penalties, despite an order from U.S. District Judge John McConnell, who ordered the administration to make the full SNAP payments fully available compared to just 65%, as had been previously outlined.

Trump officials further urged the Supreme Court in a supplemental brief Monday afternoon to keep in place an emergency stay handed down by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson last week. 

They cited the progress Congress has made towards resolving the ongoing shutdown, and added that, in their view, ‘the answer to this crisis is not for federal courts to reallocate resources without lawful authority.’ 

‘The only way to end this crisis — which the Executive is adamant to end — is for Congress to reopen the government,’ they added.

States have until tomorrow morning to file their response to the Supreme Court.

The judge had scolded the Trump administration for agreeing to fund just 65% of the SNAP benefits. ‘It’s likely that SNAP recipients are hungry as we sit here,’ McConnell said Thursday shortly before issuing the new order, which gave the USDA less than 24 hours to comply. 

In appealing the case, Trump’s legal team had argued that the judge’s order ‘makes a mockery of the separation of powers,’ and accused McConnell of overstepping his powers as a federal judge.

‘There is no lawful basis for an order that directs USDA to somehow find $4 billion in the metaphorical couch cushions,’ DOJ lawyers argued, describing his order as an ‘unprecedented injunction.’ 

The U.S. Department of Agriculture told states in a directive on Saturday that states that failed to comply with the administration’s plans and pay only the reduced SNAP benefits could see a cancellation of federal cost-sharing benefits for SNAP, and would be otherwise fully financially ‘responsible for the consequences’ of their actions.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta, New York Attorney General Letitia James, and New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin spoke out about the actions before heading to court today to seek emergency intervention. 

‘We’re asking the courts to block Saturday night’s guidance and immediately make full SNAP benefits available,’ Bonta said of the lawsuit. 

The group accused the Trump administration of playing politics with SNAP benefits, or the food aid that provides benefits to roughly one in eight Americans.

The New Jersey attorney general, Matt Platkin, described the effort by USDA to halt full SNAP payments and shift the costs to states as the ‘most heinous thing’ he had seen while in office. 

‘There are more children in New Jersey on SNAP than consists of the entire population of our state’s largest city,’ he said, in an effort to contextualize the number of people in the Garden State alone who are served by the food aid program. 

‘The new guidance from USDA ‘claimed that the steps we’ve taken to follow its earlier guidance and a court order were ‘unauthorized,’ and that we must immediately undo the actions, or we would face steep penalties,’ Bonta said. 

Trump officials separately told the Supreme Court on Monday that they will continue to seek their emergency stay of another federal judge’s order requiring them to keep SNAP benefits fully funded during the ongoing government shutdown.

The administration ‘still intends to pursue a stay’ of that order, U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer told the Supreme Court in a filing, barring any eleventh-hour action from Congress to reach consensus and reopen the government after the more than 40-day government shutdown.