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In today's issue:

▪ Trump vows to steam through agenda

▪ Will Epstein grand jury files appease MAGA?

▪ GOP eyes Texas midterm safety valve

▪ President pressures Washington Commanders

President Trump applauded his sixth-month mark Sunday, hailing his second term as an early success even as he tallies unfinished business, middling poll results and Republican anxiety that next year’s midterm contests might end on a sour note.

“Wow, time flies!” he wrote on social media. “Importantly, it’s being hailed as one of the most consequential periods of any President.”

Polls show mixed reviews. Trump’s six-month approval rating remains underwater, with nearly 53 percent of surveyed U.S. adults disapproving of the job he’s doing, according to Decision Desk HQ polling averages.

That disapproval is near its highest level since he returned to office in January. And Americans say they want Trump to focus on consumer prices instead of raising tariffs, according to a new CBS News survey.

The president says Republicans have brought the United States back from what he calls “the dead,” but polling suggests majorities of Americans are wary of Trump’s roller-coaster trade war, treatment of immigrants and key elements of his agenda woven into the newly enacted One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

There’s pushback from the right aimed at the president over the Justice Department’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files. From the left, Democrats vow to battle Republicans to protect Medicaid, voting rights and what they call a restoration of democratic norms. Wall Street would like the president to stop threatening to fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, whom he appointed in 2017 and whose central bank leadership ends in less than a year.

The president on Sunday refuted a Wall Street Journal report that Treasury Department Secretary Scott Bessent advised him financial markets would react negatively to Powell’s ouster.

“Nobody had to explain that to me. I know better than anybody what's good for the Market, and what's good for the U.S.A.," Trump wrote on Truth Social.

The president, eager to capitalize on a string of legislative victories this month, advised Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) to keep senators in Washington and cancel the August recess to allow time to confirm more of his appointees.

Senate committees and the full Senate this week are taking steps toward confirmation votes for nominees to the Drug Enforcement Administration, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, Pentagon, Labor Department, federal judiciary and more.

Thune also has a bigger battle on his horizon. Republicans fear Washington could be headed for a government shutdown after bruising partisan battles over spending and legislation that last week clawed back $9 billion in previously approved appropriations for foreign aid and public broadcasting.

White House budget director Russell Vought told lawmakers the administration plans to propose additional spending cancellations favored by Trump. GOP leaders are waving the caution flag, The Hill’s Alexander Bolton reports. They have fewer than 20 legislative days left before funding expires at the end of the year and are uneasy about forfeiting their power of the purse.

At risk is the annual defense appropriations bill, a top Republican priority that Democrats view as a valuable bargaining chip while in the minority.

Thune, interviewed on Fox News’s “Sunday Morning Futures,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) “probably thinks” a partial government shutdown this fall “is beneficial to their political base, the far left of the Democrat Party, and you can kind of see what’s happening up there in New York politics.”

This week, Thune has a test vote in mind to challenge Democrats who think a shutdown fight might be politically useful, despite their previous opposition to such brinksmanship. At issue is a customarily bipartisan funding measure for the Pentagon, which would set a budget beginning Oct. 1, at the onset of the new fiscal year.

“We’ll see if the Democrats want to play ball. I hope they do,” Thune told Punchbowl News. “All of these threats to the contrary — at the end of the day, I think it’s in everybody’s interest to figure out how to keep the government funded.”

Editor's note: Blake Burman's Smart Take will return on Tuesday.

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