What Democrats Should Do With Congress in January

When the new Congress is sworn in on January 3, Democrats will run both the House and the Senate. A Republican is still in the White House, and most big bills still need 60 votes in the Senate. That’s a recipe for two years of shouting, unless the new majority uses its power well.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune warned before the election that a Democratic Congress would mean “two years of paralysis.” Democrats should spend the next two years proving him wrong. Here’s how I’d do it.

1. Go to work on the Medicaid cuts

The 2025 budget law cut close to a trillion dollars from Medicaid over ten years. Enrollment has already dropped by about 5 million people since the law was signed, and the biggest changes, including new paperwork rules for work requirements, start in 2027. Here in Utah, tens of thousands of people could lose coverage, many of them people who are working but get tripped up by forms.

Democrats should be honest about the math. With the president able to veto, undoing all of it at once won’t happen. So start with the pieces that can draw Republican votes:

• Delay the paperwork rules until states can check work automatically, using records they already have. Nobody who’s working should lose coverage over a form.
• Protect hospital funding, especially for rural hospitals. Some Republicans have shown openness to changing these cuts even while they defend the work requirements.
• Pay for it honestly. Every dollar restored should come with a real way to pay for it, so no one can call it a spending spree.

That’s the approach in my Medicaid plan: keep the work expectation, end the paperwork trap.

2. Do the oversight the Constitution expects

The Founders didn’t build Congress to be a cheering section for the president, of either party. Madison put it simply in Federalist 51: “Ambition must be made to counteract ambition.” The Constitution gives Congress the power of the purse, the power to declare war, and the duty to watch how the laws are carried out.

Lately, Congress hasn’t done much of it. Congress’s own watchdog, the GAO, has found the administration broke the Impoundment Control Act 12 times since January 2025 by refusing to spend money Congress approved. The president fired about 17 inspectors general, the independent watchdogs inside federal agencies, without the 30-day notice the law requires. Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley objected at the time, and a federal judge later found the firings violated the Inspector General Act.

Real oversight means:

• Follow the money. When Congress passes a budget, that money should be spent the way the law says. Hold hearings on every impoundment GAO has found, and fix the law so it has teeth.
• Rebuild the watchdogs. Protect inspectors general from being fired without cause, and fund their offices.
• Vote on war. Under the Constitution, Congress decides whether the country goes to war. It should debate and vote, not watch from the sidelines.

And just as important, here’s what oversight isn’t. It isn’t revenge or a fishing expedition. Every investigation should start with a specific question about money or the law, invite both parties in, and happen in public. The test is simple: would Democrats accept the same scrutiny of a president from their own side? If not, don’t do it.

3. Pass things that can actually become law

A bill that passes the House and dies in the Senate changes nothing for a family in Ogden. The new majority should spend its early months on bills that already have Republican support, so they can reach the president’s desk:

• Ban stock trading by members of Congress. Both parties campaign on it. There’s already a bipartisan Senate bill from a Democrat and a Republican, and the House passed a weaker version this summer loaded with an unrelated add-on. Pass a clean, full ban. It’s in my money in politics plan.
• Restore the help with marketplace premiums. Families buying their own insurance saw their costs jump this year, and Senate Democrats believe some Republicans will vote to restore the tax credits.
• Keep gambling apps out of states that don’t want them. Utah’s own Rep. Blake Moore and Sen. John Curtis have teamed up with Democrats on bills to rein in prediction markets. That’s a ready-made bipartisan win. See my gambling plan.
• Stop fentanyl at the ports. Scanning every vehicle and truck at the southern ports has support in both parties, and most fentanyl comes through those ports. See my border security plan.
• Give Congress its say on tariffs. Republicans and Democrats alike have voted to rein in tariffs set without Congress. A rule that any tariff lasting more than 60 days needs a vote would restore the Constitution’s design.

What Democrats shouldn’t do

Majorities get into trouble when they mistake a win for a blank check. Voters in a lot of places, Utah included, didn’t vote for every item on a party wish list. They voted for lower costs, honest government, and a Congress that does its job.

The biggest temptation will be impeachment. Democrats shouldn’t go there. Removing a president takes 67 votes in the Senate, and that isn’t going to happen. An impeachment fight would swallow the calendar, freeze every bipartisan bill on this list, and give the president exactly the fight he’d like to have. It would also tell voters the new majority cares more about the last election than about their grocery bills and health insurance. Do the oversight, put the facts in public, and let voters judge in 2028.

So skip the bills written only to make a point. Skip the investigations that exist only to make the other side look bad. Work with any Republican willing to work back, and give them credit when they do.

If Democrats spend the next two years making things cheaper, cleaner, and more honest, voters will notice. If they spend it on revenge and messaging bills, voters will notice that too.