The House will return from a holiday break to face sagas that have vexed the chamber for months.
Debates on health care and attempts to revive expired ObamaCare subsidies will stretch into January and the first quarter of the year. An end-of-month funding deadline poses a threat of a partial government shutdown. And the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) slow release of files about the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, as well as the House’s own investigation into the matter, could again roil the chamber.
Here are five things the House faces in January:
Scrutiny of DOJ’s Epstein compliance
The DOJ’s rolling release of the Epstein files and the level of redactions in the documents have infuriated Democrats and some Republicans, and the issue is likely to remain at the forefront when the House returns.
Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who led the effort to force a vote on the bill directing the Department of Justice to release files about Epstein, said they are drafting a resolution to hold Attorney General Pam Bondi in inherent contempt of Congress. The DOJ has been releasing files in batches and said that it missed the law’s Dec. 19 deadline because it is ensuring it protects information about victims.
Massie said on CBS News’s “Face the Nation” that inherent contempt would be the “quickest way” to get justice for the victims, with Khanna saying such a move could fine Bondi “for every day that she’s not releasing the documents.”
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche responded to the inherent contempt threat on NBC’s “Meet the Press” by saying: “Bring it on.” He added that the measure favors redacting information in compliance with the law over meeting a statutory deadline.
Top Democrats on key House committees have expressed sharp criticism of the DOJ’s handling of the document releases. Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), the ranking member on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, has accused the department of making “illegal redactions” that appear to be “protecting powerful men who raped and abused women and girls,” and he said the delay amounts to “a criminal White House cover-up.”
Garcia and Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee, said in another joint statement that they are “examining all legal options” to respond to what they see as a violation of the law.
Republicans threaten Clinton contempt
Meanwhile, the House Oversight Committee’s separate investigation into matters related to Epstein could give Republicans a way to shift heat onto prominent Democrats.
Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), the chair of the Oversight panel, has threatened to hold former President Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in contempt of Congress if they do not appear for in-person depositions with the committee about their personal relationships with Epstein.
In a Dec. 15 letter, Comer said after much negotiating and back-and-forth the committee had scheduled deposition dates of Jan. 13 and Jan. 14 for the former president and former State secretary.
“If your clients do not comply with these new dates, the Committee will move immediately to contempt proceedings,” Comer said in the letter.
A spokesperson for the Clintons has called on the DOJ to release the full Epstein material, after the initial release included a number of photos of former President Clinton with Epstein, suggesting the DOJ is “using selective releases to imply wrongdoing about individuals who have been repeatedly cleared by the very same Department of Justice, over many years, under Presidents and Attorney Generals of both parties.”
Vote on extending ObamaCare subsidies
Enhanced ObamaCare subsidies officially expired at the end of 2025, but the battle in Congress to revive the credits and prevent increased premiums for 22 million people on Affordable Care Act marketplace plans will continue in the new year.
The House is set to vote on a bill to extend the subsidies as-is for three years after four Republicans rebelled against GOP leaders and joined a Democratic effort to force the measure to the floor. Moderate Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), Rob Bresnahan (R-Pa.), Ryan Mackenzie (R-Pa.), and Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) signed the discharge petition after negotiations with GOP leadership on allowing an amendment vote to extend the subsidies with reforms broke down.
The rebels and Democratic leaders can force a vote on the matter in mid-January.
It’s unlikely a three-year extension without reforms will be passed. The same three-year proposal was blocked in the Senate after Democrats tried to bring it up in December.
But moderate House Republicans are plotting potential compromise measures with moderates in the Senate. Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) and Angus King (I-Maine) joined moderate House Republicans in a meeting after the discharge petition got the signatures it needed.
“It’s too late to avoid the shock factor, but it’s not too late to do something about it,” Murkowski told reporters after that meeting.
Republicans pledge to work more on health care
House Republicans hoping to counter Democratic messaging on the ObamaCare subsidies passed a bill of health care reforms in December, but GOP leaders have promised that they are not finished and will craft more health care reforms in early 2026.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said on CNBC in December that Republicans were “looking at another reconciliation package” in “the first quarter of next year” that would include more reforms to the health care system. The reconciliation process allows Republicans to push budget and tax-related measures through a special process that bypasses the need to obtain Democratic support to advance in the Senate and pass a bill on party lines.
“All of it is geared again, for reducing premiums, increasing access to care and quality of care,” Johnson said. “There’s a lot of different issues that must be addressed in a very complex system. … You don’t just go flip switches and change it. It takes some time.”
The GOP health care bill that passed in December, dubbed the Lower Health Care Premiums for All Americans Act, included funds to pay for “cost-sharing reductions,” reforms to the pharmacy benefit manager industry, and an expansion of association health plans.
That bill did not include other reforms popular among Republicans, such as expanding access to health savings accounts (HSAs) or similar programs. Some Republicans have pitched HSAs as an alternative to the ObamaCare subsidies, though details vary in different proposals.
Government funding deadline
Lawmakers will race to complete spending negotiations before the bulk of the federal government’s funding runs out on Jan. 30, the date set by a continuing resolution that ended the longest-ever government shutdown in November.
Congress has passed three of the 12 annual appropriations bills, funding military construction and veterans affairs; the legislative branch; and agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration. That accounts for a small fraction of total discretionary government spending.
Just before the holiday break, the Senate was nearing a deal on a “minibus” of appropriations bills to fund about two-thirds of discretionary spending, for the departments of Defense, Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, Commerce, Justice, Interior, Transportation, and Housing and Urban Development.
But the minibus did not advance before the holiday break in part because of concerns from Democrats about President Trump’s threat to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo. One Republican senator worried that a lack of movement on the bills in December could make lawmakers “walk into a potential government shutdown.”
Bipartisan House negotiators will be part of any deal to fund the government, and any Senate plan will have to clear the House before the 30th.
