KAY GRANGER

House Republicans are pushing new restrictions on abortion access and trying to build on the work of activists whose strategy successfully elevated the abortion fight to the Supreme Court.

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s bid to appease hardliners in his caucus and get the House moving again has some Democratic worried about the road ahead when it comes time to passing legislation to keep the government running.

It’s the first time the four leaders of the two congressional spending committees are women.

House Republicans are promising aggressive oversight of the Biden administration once they assume the majority next year.

Home-district projects for members of Congress are back, sprinkled across the government-wide $1.5 trillion bill that President Joe Biden signed recently.

The House has approved legislation financing federal agencies for another month.

The House has overwhelming passed legislation to provide funding for Israel’s missile defense system.

The House has approved legislation to fund the government, suspend its borrowing limit and provide federal disaster and refugee aid.

(Bonnie Cash/Pool via AP)WASHINGTON The chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee said Saturday he tested positive for the coronavirus days after he sat close to another member of the panel, Texas Rep. Louie Gohmert, who also tested positive. Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., said in a statement that he has the virus but, like Gohmert, has no symptoms. He is at least the 11th member of Congress known to have tested positive for the coronavirus. Grijalva went into isolation after Gohmert tested positive on Wednesday, since the two had sat close to each other at a Natural Resources hearing the day before. The White House tests anyone who will be in close proximity to the president, which is how Gohmert found out he had the virus.

On Friday, the House passed a $259 billion funding bill for foreign aid and the Interior, Agriculture, and Veterans Affairs departments along party lines. The measure is the first annual spending measure to pass either the House or Senate this year, but it has scant chance of becoming law, serving instead as a springboard for negotiations down the line. And if Trump loses the election, Democrats are likely to wait until the Biden administration is in place before wrapping up the annual bills, which fund the annual operations of federal Cabinet agencies. The Senate Appropriations panel canceled plans for drafting its 12 annual bills after Democrats served notice they would offer amendments on COVID relief and policing reform that Chairman Richard Shelby, R-Ala., deemed too politically troublesome. As a result, Congress is likely to return to Washington in September to handle a stopgap funding bill that would last until December to prevent a campaign season government shutdown.