Welcome to meet the press now.

I'm Kristen Welker in Washington, where a historically long 75-day partial government shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security is about to be over,

with the House finally voting to send a bill to fund most of the agency to the president's

desk for his signature. We will have much more on that breaking news and the political fallout

in just a moment. But we do begin with the war against Iran, with gas prices moving higher

yet again, and the president's

allies trying to buy him more time to end the conflict and avoid a messy showdown with Congress.

It comes as Defense Secretary Pete Hegeseth and Joint Chiefs Chairman General Dan Kane defended

the scope, mission, and price tag of the war as they were grilled by lawmakers on Capitol

Hill for a second straight day. Hegseth also telling senators the ongoing ceasefire has paused

the clock on the constitutional requirement that the president come to Congress at the 60-day mark

of this war, which would be tomorrow.

Is the president intending to either seek congressional authorization for the war in Iran or send us the legally required certification that he needs an additional 30 days to remove U.S. forces from the war?

Ultimately, I would defer to the White House and White House

House counsel on that. However, we are in a ceasefire right now, which our understanding means

the 60-day clock pauses or stops in a ceasefire. So you're not in. That's, it's our understanding,

just so you know. Okay. Well, I do not believe the statute would support that. I think the 60 days

runs maybe tomorrow, and that's going to pose a really important legal question for the administration.

House Speaker Mike Johnson telling my colleague Ryan Nobles, there is no clock because this isn't a war.

It's time for Congress to weigh in on the war in Iran,

especially now that we're past the 60-day threshold.

I don't think we have any active kinetic,

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