House Republicans are pushing for more information on an FBI informant now who was recently indicted for alleged fabrication of Biden family bribery allegations — claims that GOP investigators once saw as a boost to their impeachment probe.

Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) sent a letter on Friday to FBI Director Christopher Wray, asking for a sweep of information related to Alexander Smirnov. He is the FBI informant facing charges from DOJ special counsel David Weiss, who is running the yearslong federal investigation into Hunter Biden, the president’s son.

“Pursuant to the House’s impeachment inquiry into President Biden, as well as the Committees’ Constitutional oversight authority over the Department of Justice and the FBI, the Committees require documents and information related to the FBI’s handling of Mr. Smirnov and the information he provided to the FBI for over a decade,” the Republicans wrote in a letter to Wray.

Jordan and Comer added that they had relied on the FBI’s description of Smirnov as “highly credible.”

The two Republicans are giving the FBI until March 15 to hand over details on any criminal cases that included information from Smirnov; how much Smirnov was paid for his cooperation and how he was validated as a confidential source; and any records related to concerns within the FBI of wrongdoing or inaccurate reporting related to him.

The two Republicans, who are leading the impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, also want any records related to an investigation of the Biden bribery allegations.

In a 2020 FBI document, released publicly by Republicans last year, Smirnov recounted to a bureau interviewer what he characterized as a conversation with Mykola Zlochevsky, the owner of the Ukraine energy company Burisma. Smirnov claimed that Zlochevsky said he paid Hunter Biden and Joe Biden a bribe — an allegation that was fabricated, per a recent DOJ court filing.

Comer and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) first hinted at the existence of the allegations in May, when the Kentucky Republican issued a subpoena citing a whistleblower complaint. That sparked a weekslong standoff with the FBI, which ultimately allowed members of the House Oversight Committee to see, but not retain, the document. Grassley also publicly released a redacted version of the form, which he said that he was able to do because of disclosures from whistleblowers.

Both Republicans and Democrats on the Oversight Committee said at the time that the FBI described their source — who turned out to be Smirnov — as credible. But the bureau also directly warned lawmakers that information being included in the FBI record, known as an FD-1023, did not mean it was verified.

Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso could throw his cowboy hat in the ring with the other Two Johns — Cornyn and Thune — for the Senate GOP’s top job. There’s a much easier path to promotion, though, as he wrestles with his decision.

The current No. 3 Senate Republican could eschew a run to succeed Mitch McConnell and instead pursue the party’s whip job this fall, elevating him to the No. 2 role, a leadership suite, security detail and being at the heart of Senate floor action every day.

Both Thune, the current whip, and Cornyn, a former whip, are term-limited out of the job. Currently, there are no announced candidates, making the whip position open for next Congress.

Barrasso has not made a public decision on his plans and seems truly undecided, according to people familiar with party dynamics. In contrast to Cornyn and Thune’s launches this week, Barrasso will decide on his own timeline, according to a person familiar with his thinking.

In doing so, he effectively freezes the field for the rest of the down-ballot races. Under party rules, each senator can pursue only one job in the leadership contests set to take place after the general election.

There are several senators who could get a promotion either way. And with Minority Leader McConnell retiring and Barrasso term-limited from his current job as conference chair, some shake-up is guaranteed.

Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa, the current No. 4 Republican serving as policy chair, could run for the conference chair position, stay where she is or even potentially seek the whip job depending on what Barrasso does.

“Ernst is keeping every option on the table as she discusses with her colleagues the best way she can continue being a voice for Iowans, serving and bringing together the Senate GOP conference, and furthering the conservative agenda,” an Ernst spokesperson said.

Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas is also taking a strong look at a run for conference chair, the leader of GOP messaging. Both senators are undecided, Republicans say.

National Republican Senatorial Committee Chair Steve Daines (R-Mont.) is being encouraged to run to succeed McConnell by former President Donald Trump, but has demurred because he first has to win back the majority. A strong performance in the Senate races and a Trump presidency could increase Daines’ sway within the conference, but Cornyn, Thune and other potential candidates will have a monthslong head start to make their case.

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) is the current vice chair of the conference, joining elected leadership fewer than two years ago. She too could be in the mix for any shake-up, though she said this week there’s plenty of time to figure out the leadership situation and it isn’t top of mind for her.

One more thing: The party will almost certainly have to find a new NRSC chair — Daines is up for reelection in 2026, and senators rarely serve in that job while in cycle.

Republican businessman Bernie Moreno has amassed a double-digit lead in the GOP primary for Ohio’s Senate seat, according to the candidate’s own internal polling.

Moreno took 31 percent of the vote in the survey of 500 likely voters, conducted in late February. Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose and state Sen. Matt Dolan followed with 21 percent and 19 percent, respectively. The winner of the March 19 primary will face Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, one of the most endangered 2024 incumbents.

But the race is still up for grabs: 27 percent of voters surveyed are undecided. The margin of error is +/- 4.4 percentage points.

The Moreno’s campaign polled previously in December, finding Moreno with a smaller lead, 23 percent to LaRose’s 19 percent and Dolan’s 18 percent.

Moreno has already secured an endorsement from former President Donald Trump. The survey found that Moreno leads by 31 points among those aware he has Trump’s backing.

The poll, conducted by Fabrizio, Lee & Associates, also found Trump soundly beating Nikki Haley in the GOP presidential primary, 76 percent to 19 percent.

Instead of a shutdown this weekend, we may see text of the first six-bill spending package. For lawmakers, its part of the effort to try and meet the new March 8 and March 22 spending deadlines.

Speaker Mike Johnson and top Appropriations Democrat Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) both told reporters Thursday that they expect text for the first tranche of spending bills to be posted this weekend, although it wouldn’t be surprising if it slipped to Monday.

Multiple appropriators said Thursday they still don’t know what policy riders may hitch a ride on the first bundle of bills — decisions hashed out at the leadership level. But DeLauro said there will not be controversial policy riders in the bills aimed for release this weekend. Their inclusion could easily doom the package.

Conservatives like Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) said they aren’t aware of any significant Republican policy victories across the first set of bills. (Johnson admitted during a closed-door conference meeting Thursday morning that House Republicans didn’t get many of the wins they wanted.) And they’re lamenting more of the status quo when it comes to negotiating the annual bills.

“Whoever’s in charge of the Senate and whoever’s in charge of the House, they put their staff in a room and they come up with something and tell you to take it or leave it,” Massie said earlier this week. “This is exactly what we said we would not do at the beginning of this Congress. This is the exact way it’s been done for the 12 years that I’ve been here and it’s wrong.”

“I remain optimistic, we’re going to get them done before the 22nd, six months into the fiscal year,” DeLauro said. On blocking GOP policy riders, DeLauro said, “We’ve done very, very well,” noting that the battle is far from over.

Refresher on what’s in this first package: Agriculture-FDA, Energy-Water, Military Construction-VA, Transportation-HUD, Interior-Environment and Commerce-Justice-Science measures.

Like the stopgap bill that passed Thursday, Johnson will need significant support from Democrats to move the six-bill package. His razor-thin GOP majority, paired with divisions within his conference — especially on spending — means he’ll move the bill under a process that requires a two-thirds vote threshold.

When asked how close appropriators are to the second six-bill package of the more challenging spending bills, she joked: “Jesus Christ, give me a break!”

The Senate approved a stopgap funding bill Thursday night for President Joe Biden’s signature, thwarting a partial government shutdown on Saturday and buying more time to finalize half a dozen spending bills that congressional leaders aim to pass next week.

Congress now officially has until March 8 to clear that initial six-bill bundle, which leaders struck a deal on earlier this week. But they’re still working on an agreement to fund the rest of the government, including the military and some of the biggest domestic programs, before a second deadline on March 22. The upper chamber cleared the measure in a 77-13 vote, following votes on four Republican amendments that were defeated on the floor.

Senate Appropriations Chair Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said on the floor Thursday night that leaders plan to release bill text of the six finalized bills “in the coming days” to give lawmakers time to review them before a vote next week. “We are genuinely close. And if bipartisan cooperation prevails, I am very confident we can, at long last — at long last — wrap up our FY24 bills,” she said. “It is full speed ahead.”

Appropriators are optimistic that this latest stopgap — the fourth enacted by Congress this fiscal year alone — will finally deliver enough time to wrap up funding negotiations after a particularly chaotic cycle largely derailed by House Republican infighting. If congressional leaders can successfully pass the six bills next week to fund the departments of Agriculture, Energy, Veterans’ Affairs and Transportation, they’ll face an even bigger test in trying to strike a compromise on the remaining six bills that fund the rest of the federal government.

“I think people are optimistic right now. This has been a slog. It has kind of worn people down a little bit,” said Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.), a senior appropriator. “The first six are, I mean, they’re not easy by any means, but they’re easier than what we’re going to deal with by the 22nd.”

Under the deal to fast-track passage of the stopgap, Senate leaders agreed to a vote by the end of next week on a bill sponsored by Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) that would compensate people diagnosed with cancer after being exposed to nuclear waste stored as a byproduct of the top-secret program to make an atomic bomb during World War II.

Before passage, the chamber rejected three different proposals from Republican Sens. Roger Marshall of Kansas, Mike Lee of Utah and Ted Cruz of Texas that would fund federal agencies at current levels through the end of the fiscal year, triggering an estimated $73 billion in cuts to non-defense programs and forgoing billions of dollars in agreed-upon funding for the Pentagon. Marshall’s plan also included emergency aid to Israel, and Cruz’s proposal included H.R. 2, the House-passed border security bill.

The Senate’s top Republican appropriator, Maine Sen. Susan Collins, argued against the yearlong stopgaps her GOP colleagues proposed, saying that they would “lock in dangerously inadequate funding levels” for the Pentagon, while cutting other “vital” programs and resulting in budgets that are “misaligned” with current military needs.

The chamber also voted 37-53 to defeat an amendment from Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) that would prevent the Federal Reserve from buying the debt of states.

Earlier Thursday, the House passed the stopgap in a 320-99 vote. Speaker Mike Johnson secured support from a majority of his conference, despite simmering conservative discontent.

While congressional leaders plan to release text for the first tranche of bills this weekend, the second tranche of those fiscal 2024 spending measures are in various states of completion, according to Collins, the top Republican appropriator in the Senate. The funding bill for the military, for example, is in pretty good shape, Collins said. Measures that would fund the Department of Homeland Security, or the departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and Education, still have a ways to go, according to appropriators.

Republicans and Democrats are still sparring over how to split up a limited pot of money across a variety of tricky issues in the DHS budget, including salaries, detention beds, processing and asylum policies, technology and other border security efforts.

Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.), who oversees the massive Labor-HHS-Education measure, said appropriators are still working toward an agreement on the funding details of his bill. Policy riders are sure to snag endgame negotiations as lawmakers inch closer to their new deadline of March 22, he said.

The first slate of bills set to lapse at the end of next week cover funding for the EPA and the Department of Energy, as well as federal transportation, housing and science programs, plus military construction and water projects. Those measures also fund the departments of Justice, Veterans Affairs, Agriculture, Commerce and Interior, along with the FDA and urban development projects.

Hunter Biden repeatedly told House investigators behind closed doors that his father was not involved in his business deals as part of an hours-long and, at times, contentious interview.

Republicans on the House Judiciary and Oversight committees released the nearly 230-page transcript on Thursday, about 24 hours after they concluded their private deposition that is part of a sweeping impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden. Much of the GOP investigation has focused on the business deals of Joe Biden’s family members, as lawmakers have struggled to find a smoking gun linking official actions he took as president or vice president to those financial agreements.

Hunter Biden — in a theme he previewed in a defiant opening statement on Wednesday morning — told lawmakers and congressional aides that his father had no involvement in his business arrangements as he fielded questions on years-old financial deals and his own well-publicized struggle with addiction. Republicans have said they now want to have a public hearing with Hunter Biden — something neither he nor his legal team has committed to this week, after pushing for one last year before they agreed to the private deposition.

“All I know is this: My father was never involved in any of my business, ever. Never received a cent from anybody or never benefited in any way. Never took any actions on behalf in any way. And I can absolutely, 100 percent state, that is not just in my case but in every family member’s case,” Hunter Biden told lawmakers, according to the transcript.

Republicans largely used the closed-door interview to press Hunter Biden on his business deals with companies in China and Ukraine, as well as testimony from previous business associates that he would put his father on speakerphone or that Joe Biden dropped by dinners or lunches. Those same associates have testified that business was not discussed.

Hunter Biden didn’t deny that he put his father on speakerphone when at dinner with business associates, saying that he always answers when his dad calls, and quipping to investigators: “Over the course of the last 30 years when speakerphone was invented on a cell phone? I’m certain my dad has called me.”

He also confirmed that he would invite his father to stop by for lunch or dinners, and didn’t contest testimony from former business associate Rob Walker that Joe Biden had stopped by a lunch in 2017, but tried to draw a bright line between his father briefly meeting someone and having a meeting with them. Walker previously told investigators that Joe Biden wasn’t involved in their business deals and characterized his appearance at the lunch as exchanging pleasantries.

“He was not involved with any business activity. Would you call it involvement if my dad was in New York City at the same time I was in New York City and I was having lunch with some of my business associates, and I said, ‘Hey, dad, come by for lunch?’” Hunter Biden asked congressional investigators.

Hunter Biden also addressed a 2017 WhatsApp message where he claimed to be with his father. He told lawmakers that that his father was not sitting next to him, that he had sent the message to the wrong person and that the IRS agents who had handed over the message had conflated it and a separate message from a person with the same last name.

“Addiction is not an excuse, but I can tell you this: I am more embarrassed of this text message, if it actually did come from me, than any text message I’ve ever sent. The fact of the matter is, is that there’s no other text message that you have in which I say anything remotely to this. And I was out of my mind,” he said.

The hours-long interview at times turned contentious, as Republicans pressed Hunter Biden on details, including dates, of his struggle with addiction.

When Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), as part of a lengthy back-and-forth over addiction, asked him if he was on drugs while serving on the board of Burisma, Biden shot back: “Mr. Gaetz, look me in the eye. You really think that’s appropriate to ask me?”

The House passed a stopgap bill on Thursday afternoon that kicks Congress’ two government shutdown deadlines further into March, as top lawmakers work to pass final versions of half of the dozen annual funding measures next week.

Now the spending patch awaits action in the Senate, where leaders are hoping to lock in unanimous agreement to fast-track final passage as early as Thursday evening. Senate approval will head off a partial government shutdown that would begin after midnight Saturday if Congress doesn’t act, pegging the next funding deadlines as March 8 and March 22.

There are still potential hurdles, to that end. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) is asking for a vote on an amendment that would prevent the Federal Reserve from buying the debt of states, and more last-minute demands could crop up. Leaders in the upper chamber will need agreement from all 100 senators in order to pass a stopgap before the shutdown deadline.

In the House, the final passage tally was 320-99, with the support of 207 Democrats and 113 Republicans. House leaders needed to clear a two-thirds vote threshold to advance the continuing resolution, since Speaker Mike Johnson brought it up under a process meant to circumvent conservative hardliners who have blocked bills that are brought up under a simple majority threshold as a form of protest against leadership.

The fact that Johnson has had to rely on overwhelming Democratic support to pass the funding bills “becomes an opportunity for negotiations,” said Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the House’s top Democratic appropriator. The speaker also acknowledged privately to his conference last week that the new tendency of House conservatives to block a simple majority vote has undermined Republican leverage during funding talks.

Under the stopgap, government funding would run out on March 8 for half of the dozen funding bills and on March 22 for the six others. While top lawmakers announced this week that they have struck an agreement on six measures, including four that would expire this Saturday, they have yet to divulge funding totals or policy stipulations, which could be released along with bill text over the coming days.

The new two-date funding patch still saves the most challenging bills for last, punting to late March on funding for the Pentagon, Department of Homeland Security, federal health programs and many other agencies that typically spur partisan feuding over both spending levels and policy.

House Appropriations Chair Kay Granger (R-Texas) said “it’s always good” to be on track to pass half of the dozen annual funding measures. As to how the second batch compares, she said bluntly: “Harder.”

The stopgap will be the fourth funding punt Congress has cleared since the fiscal year kicked off in October. It’s the second since Johnson told House Republicans in writing in December, “I do not intend to have the House consider any further short-term extensions,” after passing a patch in November. Going back on that commitment and striking a bipartisan spending agreement with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer last month has predictably riled House conservatives.

Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) said Thursday that continuing to clear funding patches and negotiate spending bills that don’t cut federal budgets are going to cause voters to “lose faith in a Republican Party that is no different than what they are campaigning against.”

But Roy declined to comment on whether there will be consequences for Johnson, such as a vote to oust him like the one that resulted in the termination of Kevin McCarthy’s speakership. “I’m not going to talk about that,” Roy told reporters.

Jordain Carney contributed to this report.

Former President Donald Trump is encouraging Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) to run for GOP leader — a move that would significantly shake up the race to succeed Mitch McConnell later this year.

Daines currently helms Senate Republicans’ campaign arm. Daines indicated to Trump that he appreciates Trump’s encouragement but is focused on winning back the Senate majority this fall, according to a person familiar with the conversation who was granted anonymity to speak candidly.