The new Congress, seated Jan. 3, 2027, will hold a Democratic majority. Until then, the outgoing administration controls the levers. Trump, RaiNews reported, intends to use every one of them.
Trump races the clock before Democrats take the gavel
The phrase for it is already circulating on Capitol Hill: the “lame-duck sprint,” the stretch in which an outgoing majority stops as much legislation as it can before the new Congress arrives. There is a historical benchmark on the record. In 1974, after Richard Nixon’s resignation and that year’s midterms, the outgoing Congress managed to pass 138 substantial measures in a single month, according to the historical precedent cited in RaiNews’s report. That is the pace the current White House is measured against.
The agenda breaks into three fronts. On defense funding — the most urgent, given international conflict and the looming legislative deadlines — the White House has asked for $1.5 trillion. The request has run into resistance not only on the Democratic benches but inside the Republican Party itself, RaiNews reported. Facing that friction, the administration is weighing a fallback plan of $1.1 trillion — a flat $400 billion cut — though the outcome that looks most realistic is an emergency bipartisan deal worth roughly $100 billion. The gap between what was asked and what will likely pass is, on those numbers, about $1.4 trillion.
Ayer, la sociedad estadounidense votó contra las políticas que solo empobrecen. Contra el odio. Contra el machismo. Contra el negacionismo climático y contra los privilegios de las élites. Ocurrió en Brasil. Acaba de ocurrir en EEUU. Y ocurrirá pronto en España. La ola ultra a…
On immigration, the core of Trump’s political platform, the strategy is to bypass legislation altogether. Presidential advisers are preparing a battery of decrees and executive orders to harden the border, drawing on the special powers of the commander in chief — powers that do not require a vote in a House the president is about to lose.
The same executive-branch approach is planned for tariffs and federal appointments: move now, before Capitol Hill changes color.
Alito closes the last window on the Supreme Court
The dossier with the longest shelf life is the Supreme Court. Once the Senate flips to Democratic control in January, Trump loses any ability to confirm federal judges or justices to the high court.Republicans had floated a way around that: persuade one of the two aging conservative justices — Samuel Alito or Clarence Thomas — to retire early, and confirm a replacement in the transition weeks, locking in the 6-3 majority.
That option is effectively dead, RaiNews reported. Alito made it known he has no intention of stepping aside. With one justice unwilling to move, the arithmetic of the transition leaves the conservative court majority — and every future vacancy — out of Trump’s hands until at least the next election cycle.
What happens between now and Jan. 3, then, is a contest of clocks. Trump’s runs on executive orders and an emergency spending deal; the Democrats’ runs on the calendar itself.
