By REBECCA SANTANA, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who heads the agency central to President Donald Trump’s mass deportations agenda, is expected to face fierce questioning from Democrats on Thursday as the public face of the Republican administration’s hard-line approach to immigration.

It has been months since Noem last appeared in Congress in May. Since then, immigration enforcement operations, especially in Los Angeles and Chicago, have become increasingly contentious, with federal agents and activists frequently clashing over her department’s tactics.

As prisoners stand looking out from a cell, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem speaks during a tour of the Terrorist Confinement Center in Tecoluca, El Salvador, March 26, 2025. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

Noem is testifying in front of the House Committee on Homeland Security to discuss “Worldwide Threats to the Homeland,” which in years past have focused on issues such as cybersecurity, terrorism, China and border security. With Noem having made only a few appearances before Congress when she is leading Trump’s signature policy area, Thursday’s appearance is likely to focus heavily on immigration.

Trump returned to power in January with what he says is a mandate to reshape immigration in the U.S., claiming the country is under an invasion.

In the months since, the number of people in immigration detention has skyrocketed; the administration has continued to remove migrants to countries they are not from; and, in the wake of an Afghan national being accused of shooting two National Guard troops, Noem’s department has dramatically stepped up checks and screening of immigrants in the U.S.

The worldwide threats hearing, usually held annually, is an opportunity for members of Congress to ask the leaders of the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI and the National Counterterrorism Center about threats facing the U.S. and what their agencies are doing to address them.

Noem’s department is under particular scrutiny because Congress in July passed legislation giving it roughly $165 billion to carry out its mass deportations agenda and secure the border. The department is getting more money to hire 10,000 more deportation officers, complete the wall between the U.S. and Mexico and increase detention and removal of foreigners from the country.

The secretary’s appearance also comes as a federal judge is investigating whether she should face a contempt charge over flights carrying migrants to El Salvador.

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Noem will also likely have to answer to criticism from Democrats who accuse immigration enforcement agents of erroneously detaining and arresting American citizens in their rush to deport as many people in the country illegally as possible. Homeland Security says agents carrying out immigration enforcement operations do not target or arrest American citizens for immigration reasons although they say they have arrested Americans for allegedly interfering in enforcement operations.

And a number of the Democratic members of the committee are part of a lawsuit accusing Noem and the department of limiting their access to Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities.

Also attending Thursday’s hearing are Joseph Kent, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, and Michael Glasheen, operations director of the national security branch of the FBI.

Previous hearings have included questions on cybersecurity, China, chemical security and drones. Under President Joe Biden, at times of heavy migration at the southern border, Republicans often focused their questioning on his Democratic administration’s handling of border security.

When the hearing was announced in September, the Republican committee chair said that besides Noem and Kent, FBI Director Kash Patel would also be attending. But instead the FBI is being represented by Glasheen.

By MARY CLARE JALONICK, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate is poised on Thursday to reject legislation to extend Affordable Care Act tax credits for millions of Americans, a potentially unceremonious end to a monthslong Democratic effort to prevent the COVID-era subsidies from expiring on Jan. 1.

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Despite a bipartisan desire to continue the credits, Republicans and Democrats have never engaged in meaningful or high-level negotiations on a solution. Instead, the Senate is expected to vote on two partisan bills and defeat them both — essentially guaranteeing that many who buy their health insurance on the ACA marketplaces see a steep rise in costs at the beginning of the year.

“It’s too complicated and too difficult to get done in the limited time that we have left,” said Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who has unsuccessfully pushed his Republican colleagues to extend the tax credits for a short time so they can find agreement on the issue next year.

Neither side has seemed interested in compromise.

Democrats who forced a government shutdown for 43 days on the issue have so far not wavered from their proposal to extend the subsidies for three years with none of the new limits that Republicans have suggested. Republicans are offering their own bill that would let the subsidies expire, even as some in the GOP conference, like Tillis, have said they would support an extension. The GOP proposal would create new health savings accounts to replace the tax credits, an idea that Democrats called “dead on arrival.”

The dueling Senate votes are the latest political messaging exercise in a Congress that has operated almost entirely on partisan terms, as Republicans pushed through a massive tax and spending cuts bill this summer using budget maneuvers that eliminated the need for Democratic votes. They also tweaked Senate rules to push past a Democratic blockade of all of President Donald Trump’s nominees.

A small group of moderate Democratic senators crossed the aisle and made a deal with Republicans to end the shutdown last month, raising some hopes for a health care compromise that quickly faded with a lack of real bipartisan talks.

An intractable issue

The votes were also the latest salvo in the debate over the Affordable Care Act, former President Barack Obama’s signature law that Democrats passed along party lines in 2010 to expand access to insurance coverage.

Republicans have tried unsuccessfully since then to repeal or overhaul the law, arguing that health care is still too expensive. But they have struggled to find an alternative. In the meantime Democrats have made the policy a central political issue in several elections, betting that the millions of people who buy health care on the government marketplaces want to keep their coverage.

“When people’s monthly payments spike next year, they’ll know it was Republicans that made it happen,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said in November.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, of N.Y., right, speaks as Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Ct., left, listens during a news conference on health insurance premiums on Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Dec. 10, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib)

Schumer has also been clear that Democrats will not seek compromise.

Thursday’s vote is “the last train out of the station,” he said. “What we need to do is prevent premiums from skyrocketing, and only our bill does it,” he said.

The health care shutdown

Even if they view it as a political win, the failed votes would be a loss for Democrats who demanded an extension of the benefits as they forced a government shutdown for six weeks in October and November — and for the millions of people facing premium increases on Jan. 1.

While most Democratic senators pushed to keep the shutdown going as Republicans refused to negotiate, a small group of centrist Democrats struck a deal with Majority Leader John Thune for a future health care vote, with no guarantee of success, in exchange for their votes to reopen the government.

Maine Sen. Angus King, an Independent who caucuses with Democrats, said the group tried to negotiate with Republicans after the shutdown ended. But he said the talks became unproductive when Republicans demanded language adding new limits for abortion coverage that were a “red line” for Democrats.

“They’re going to own these increases,” King said of Republicans.

A plethora of plans, but little agreement

Republicans have used the looming expiration of the subsidies to renew their longstanding criticisms of Obamacare and to try, once more, to agree on what should be done. The GOP plan that the Senate will vote on Thursday would replace the tax credits with health savings accounts, an overhaul of the law that they say would put the money in the hands of consumers, not insurance companies that currently receive the current subsidies directly.

Thune announced Tuesday that the GOP conference had decided to vote on the bill led by Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, the chairman of the Senate Health, Labor, Education and Pensions Committee, and Idaho Sen. Mike Crapo, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, even as several Republican senators proposed alternate ideas.

In the House, Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., has promised a vote next week. Republicans weighed different options in a conference meeting on Wednesday, with no apparent consensus.

Moderates in the party who could have competitive reelection bids next year are pushing Johnson to find a way to extend the subsidies. But more conservative members want to see the law overhauled.

Rep. Kevin Kiley, R-Calif., has pushed for a temporary extension, which he said could be an opening to take further steps on health care.

If they fail to act and health care costs go up, the approval rating for Congress “will get even lower,” Kiley said.

Associated Press writers Kevin Freking and Joey Cappelletti contributed to this report.