Rep. Victoria Spartz is facing a misdemeanor charge over allegedly carrying a weapon in a terminal at Dulles International Airport in late June and will face arraignment on Sept. 20.

On June 28, Spartz (R-Ind.) allegedly brought a .380 caliber firearm in her carry-on that was found by TSA personnel. Last month, her office said the handgun was “accidentally” in her bag, she was “issued a citation” and then allowed to board her international flight.

The Indiana Republican could face up to a year in jail and a $2,500 fine. She’ll be arraigned at the Loudoun General District Court in Virginia.

Spartz was first elected to the House in 2020 and won the GOP nomination for reelection in May, fending off a primary challenger. Last February, she announced that she’d retire at the end of her current term, but later reversed course. She has been in the spotlight amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as the first-ever Ukrainian-born member of Congress.

Kyle Cheney contributed to this report.

House Republicans failed to pass their $7 billion funding bill for parts of the legislative branch on Thursday, a surprise misstep in what should have been an easy victory for GOP leaders.

The failure is an ominous sign for Republicans’ push to pass the rest of their fiscal 2025 spending bills on the floor before August recess, with seven bills — most of which are far more politically divisive — tentatively slated for floor action during the last two weeks of July.

The measure collapsed on the House floor in a 205-213 vote, with 10 Republicans joining Democrats to tank the legislation as well as several GOP absences. A longstanding and contentious freeze on a cost-of-living pay raise for members of Congress, in addition to concerns about higher spending, contributed to the GOP dissension.

Before the vote, Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.), a GOP appropriator who voted against the bill, raised concerns on the floor about increased funding levels and the constitutionality of maintaining the pay freeze through appropriations bills. While House Republicans are broadly seeking cuts throughout their annual spending bills for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1, the Legislative Branch measure is one of a few that seeks a funding hike, proposing an overall 6 percent bump for the House, Capitol Police, Congressional Budget Office and more.

Senior Republican appropriators were shocked by the failed vote, with House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) calling it “inexplicable,” adding that he had not heard significant concerns from members.

“Well, I assumed it was going to pass,” said Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.), another senior appropriator.

Rep. David Valadao (R-Calif.), who oversees the Legislative Branch funding measure, said the bill was facing “a few different issues.”

“And so we went in — the last couple of days — we knew that it was going to be close,” he said. “There were some members that were expressing concerns. And there were a lot of members who weren’t here, as well.”

Republican Reps. Andy Biggs of Arizona, Tim Burchett of Tennessee, Eli Crane of Arizona, Matt Gaetz of Florida, Bob Good of Virginia, Debbie Lesko of Arizona, Ralph Norman of South Carolina, Matt Rosendale of Montana, Keith Self of Texas and Clyde all voted against the bill.

GOP leaders will now face their most ambitious fiscal 2025 task yet: attempting to pass seven appropriations bills during the last two weeks of July, several of which never made it across the floor last summer thanks to politically tough goals for funding cuts and policy provisions that fueled House Republican infighting.

House Republicans have so far managed to pass four of their spending bills on the floor for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1, including measures that would fund the departments of Veterans Affairs, Defense, Homeland Security, State and foreign aid programs.

Katherine Tully-McManus contributed to this report.

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this report incorrectly identified Rep. Robert Aderholt’s state. He represents a district in Alabama.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said Thursday that he plans to eventually convene his leadership team and then they’ll “figure out the next step” on the crisis surrounding President Joe Biden.

Jeffries added he has no scheduled meetings with the president, though he had told Democrats in talks this week that he planned to relay their concerns to Biden directly. He also said it’s his goal to hear from every House Democrat — before leadership makes any decision on what to do next — but that it is “a process.”

The House Democratic leader has been under intense pressure to take a stand on Biden’s future at the top of the ticket as he’s met with multiple factions of his caucus. And more members have been publicly calling for Biden to step aside, with purple-district Rep. Hillary Scholten (D-Mich.) becoming the latest Democrat to say Biden needs to drop out of the race Thursday morning.

Biden campaign and White House officials are set to meet with Democratic senators on Thursday afternoon to hear their concerns.

There is no scheduled meeting with House Democrats yet, with lawmakers set to leave for a weeklong recess Thursday afternoon.

The House on Thursday rejected a rare effort to hold Attorney General Merrick Garland in “inherent contempt” after a handful of Republicans helped squash the resolution.

Democrats and a handful of Republicans defeated the measure on a 204-210 vote. It was forced by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) and would have required the top Justice Department official to pay fines of $10,000 per day until he handed over audio of former special counsel Robert Hur’s interview with President Joe Biden.

Four Republicans voted against the resolution, and unexpected GOP absences drove the vote count down further. Democrats were united in opposition.

Democrats had failed twice on Wednesday to pigeonhole the effort. Four Republicans voted with them on Wednesday, but the House minority party was ultimately foiled by absences.

But Republicans had been privately fuming over the effort behind the scenes for days. Some questioned why they were giving it political oxygen in a week dominated by Democrats’ ongoing existential political crisis over whether Biden should stay at the top of their ticket.

One GOP member, who had expected Speaker Mike Johnson to help kill Luna’s resolution, argued that Republicans should just “keep quiet” and leave Democrats to their “circular firing squad.”

Another GOP member, granted anonymity to discuss private conversations, recounted complaining to Johnson recently that the speaker wasn’t doing enough to push back on the right flank of his conference. Others lamented that Luna’s resolution would just end up in court anyway, and still others argued that they didn’t support the effort but the likely ensuing backlash wasn’t worth opposing it.

To that last point, the political dynamic got more complicated for Republicans after former President Donald Trump publicly endorsed her effort. That put more pressure on GOP lawmakers to back it, rather than risk a high-profile break with their party’s nominee.

Johnson and other Republicans tried to talk Luna out of forcing a vote, but in the end, she stuck by her vow to bring it to the floor. In a bid to assuage her colleagues, Luna softened the measure’s language — no longer calling for the House sergeant at arms to take Garland into custody and instead levying fines.

Johnson told reporters this week that the resolution gave him “pause” from a constitutional perspective, but that he would support it if it came up.

Congress hasn’t used its inherent contempt powers since 1935. Republicans separately voted last month to hold Garland in contempt for refusing to hand over the audio, which Biden asserted executive privilege over. DOJ officials subsequently announced they would not pursue charges against Garland.

The Justice Department did hand over the transcript of the interview, but Republicans have argued that they need the audio so they can listen to details like Biden’s tone or pauses in his answers.

House Republicans have also sued to try to get the courts to force Garland to hand over the audio.

Rep. Hillary Scholten (D-Mich.), a frontline Democrat from a critical swing state, became the 11th Democratic member of Congress and 10th from the House to call for President Joe Biden to stand down from his reelection bid on Thursday.

In a Thursday statement and social media post, Scholten said, “President Biden has served his country well, but for the sake of our democracy, he must pass the torch to a new candidate for the 2024 election.” In an interview with The Detroit News, she said she would respect Biden’s decision and vote for him if he ultimately continues in the race.

Scholten won her Grand Rapids-based seat in 2022 and joins frontline Reps. Pat Ryan (D-N.Y.) and Angie Craig (D-Minn.) in calling for Biden to abandon his bid for a second term.

All eyes on Capitol Hill — let’s face it, throughout world capitals, too — will be trained on President Joe Biden on Thursday afternoon.

His press conference, landing amid the close of the NATO summit, also comes as Biden’s team tries to reassure wavering Hill Democrats he’s up for another term.

The hits kept coming Wednesday night. Sen. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) became the first Democrat from the upper chamber to call on Biden to stand aside, arguing “the latest data makes it clear that the political peril to Democrats is escalating.”

“You’re focusing on a single event because that’s the one that’s coming up,” Welch said Wednesday of the press conference before his Washington Post op-ed published. “There’ll be another event next week. You’ll focus on that. And what it suggests is that the question of aging capacity simply won’t go away.”

Then, Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine), one of the most moderate Democrats in Congress, went a step further and said he was unsure he could even vote for Biden. “I will not vote for someone if I don’t think they are physically or mentally equipped to lead this nation. And I do not know the answer to that question at this time,” Golden told Maine Public Radio. (Golden had already predicted his party would lose the White House this fall but added at the time “I’m OK with that.”)

And Majority Leader Chuck Schumer issued a statement late Wednesday after a report he might be open to swapping Biden atop the Democratic ticket. “As I have made clear repeatedly publicly and privately, I support President Biden and remain committed to ensuring Donald Trump is defeated in November,” the Senate leader said.

Speaker Mike Johnson, echoing the feelings of many in the GOP conference, was happy to highlight Democratic in-fighting as it enters its second week. “The Democrats are in total disarray,” he said Wednesday night on Fox News. “They don’t have a plan B but they know they have a serious problem.”

Maybe the only saving grace for Hill Democrats? They’ll be out of Washington by the time Biden’s press conference wraps — however it goes.

For your radar: Senate Democrats will gather for a special lunch with senior Biden advisers Mike Donilon and Steve Ricchetti — as well as Biden campaign Chair Jen O’Malley Dillon — on Thursday afternoon at their campaign headquarters off the Hill.

Rep. Bob Good says he informed his House Freedom Caucus members that he will step aside as the group’s chair if the Virginia conservative ultimately does not emerge victorious in the state recount for his GOP primary race.

Good briefed the entire MAGA-aligned group of his plans in a closed-door meeting earlier this week, though he said the leadership board of the Freedom Caucus was aware beforehand. His remarks come as Good moves forward with requesting an official recount this week after the Commonwealth certified that his challenger John McGuire led him by more than 300 votes.

And while he hopes to make up the deficit of votes and emerge victorious, Good is nonetheless signaling that he is working with the group to make contingency plans.

“I told the membership that if I didn’t do well in my recount that I would step down as chair,” Good confirmed for the first time publicly in an interview with POLITICO on Wednesday. “I think that would probably be in the best interest of the organization. … Just so that’s not the story all the time.”

His remarks come after Punchbowl News first reported his privately shared plans Wednesday morning.

Good also dismissed recent media reports that he lacks the proper funds to move forward with a recount while acknowledging he told supporters his campaign is predicting a price tag ranging from $75,000 to $100,000. But that, he says, all depends on how much the state ultimately charges him to process more than 60,000 ballots in addition to legal costs.

“I believe that I filed today. We contemplated waiting right up to the deadline. … You had to file it by Friday, 10 days after certification. We couldn’t file it until it was certified,” Good said.

As for his potential successor, he declined to name names but noted that he is “confident” that the Freedom Caucus board has “very strong, capable individuals” who can rise to the occasion.

“They don’t need me as chair, they just need a good board chair,” he said, no pun intended.

Good also argued that despite attacks from his critics, the changes he’s made under his leadership were already set in motion by his predecessors — a ball he kept rolling and one he predicts will continue rolling in the same direction, no matter who is leading the group.

“I would challenge anyone to substantiate any claims that I have taken HFC in a direction that’s different than Perry or Biggs,” he said, pointing to former HFC Chairs Scott Perry (R-Pa.) and Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.). “These high-profile conflicts and fights we have predated me.”

“The board is pretty united and the majority of HFC is united,” Good added.

Still, one fight does center around Good. Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio) was ejected from the Freedom Caucus over his decision to back Good’s opponent, as first reported by POLITICO. The effort was led by one of his allies and proved to further anger those who were close to Davidson, including Freedom Caucus co-founder Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio). Davidson was kicked out after being found as a member not in good standing, which lowered the threshold to needing only a simple majority to remove him.

But if it does ultimately come down to a new chair search, Good is still deciding whether he will privately make his preference known.

“Probably, but I don’t know,” he said, noting that they respect each other’s opinions but do not control one another.

Some names cropping up include Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), Andy Harris (R-Md.), Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), as well as Rep. Andy Ogles (R-Tenn.).

Rep. Earl Blumenauer became the ninth House Democrat to call for President Joe Biden to drop his bid for reelection.

“While this is a decision for the president and the first lady, I hope they will come to the conclusion that I and others have: President Biden should not be the Democratic presidential nominee,” he said in a statement.

The veteran Oregon lawmaker is retiring from Congress this year.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries has told lawmakers in private meetings that he’ll relay concerns regarding the president’s electability to Joe Biden, according to two people familiar with the situation, as more Democrats call for him to step aside.

Jeffries has convened listening sessions in recent days with rattled members of the caucus, including a Wednesday meeting with members of the centrist New Democrat Coalition to discuss how having Biden at the top of the ticket could impact incumbents in battleground districts. Meanwhile, Speaker emerita Nancy Pelosi, whom rank-and-file Democrats have sought out for advice, has been having her own private conversations with Democrats to listen to their concerns, according to two people familiar with those discussions.

It’s still not clear when Jeffries will speak with the president. Asked Wednesday about his plans to talk with Biden, Jeffries sidestepped and said the “comprehensive conversations with the House Democratic Caucus” will be “the focus of our activity today, tomorrow and we’ll see where we go from there.”

CNN first reported Jeffries’ conversations.

Some key Democrats who have won tough races have started to urge Biden to get out of the race. Rep. Pat Ryan (D-N.Y.), who represents a purple district, became the eighth House Democrat to publicly call for Biden to step aside on Wednesday, writing in an op-ed: “for the good of our country, for the future of our kids and grandkids, I am asking Joe Biden to step aside in the upcoming election and deliver on his promise to be a ‘bridge’ to a new generation of leaders.”

Pelosi earlier Wednesday had raised eyebrows in the caucus by saying on Morning Joe that Biden ultimately had to make the decision on whether he would continue his reelection bid, despite the president repeatedly saying he would stay in the race. Many in the caucus have looked to direction from her, Jeffries and other leaders on how to proceed as lawmakers panic over Biden’s electoral prospects.

The news of Jeffries’ outreach comes after Biden’s high-profile interview last Friday with ABC, where he declined to answer a hypothetical about staying in the race if top Democrats told him they’re concerned about losing the House and the Senate with him at the top of the ticket.

“I’m not gonna answer that question. It’s not gonna happen,” Biden responded at the time.

Mia McCarthy contributed to this report.