The Leader’s Floor Lookout: Week of April 27, 2026

For years, schools across the country have been assuming the role of caretaker and decision-maker for our children, while deliberately keeping parents out of the loop on their kids’ classroom activity.

Under the Biden Administration, school boards tried to silence parents while the Department of Justice and the FBI investigated parents who voiced concerns about what is happening in their children’s schools. Meanwhile, these schools were using taxpayer dollars to promote woke agendas in classrooms.

Many schools around America have begun teaching about gender ideology in their classrooms, including the ideas that gender is a spectrum and a personal choice. Schools have gone so far as encouraging students to transition to the opposite gender without talking to the child’s parents. 

Demonstrating just how often schools leave parents in the dark, a report by Parents Defending Education found that 1,200 school districts—covering 21,000+ schools and 12 million students—have policies requiring or encouraging staff to withhold information about a child's gender transition from parents. 

This is absurd and unacceptable: Parents have the right to transparency when it comes to their child’s education and life at school. House Republicans are bringing a package of two bills, Chairman Walberg’s PROTECT Kids Act and Rep. Burgess Owens’ Say No to Indoctrination Act, to prevent children from being indoctrinated with gender ideology at school or socially transitioned without parental consent. 

Chairman Tim Walberg’s legislation, H.R. 2616, the Stopping Indoctrination and Protecting Kids Act, ensures parents remain central in their children’s lives by prohibiting federally funded elementary or middle schools from socially transitioning a child – such as by changing their name, pronouns, or bathroom access – without parental consent, and blocking federal funding from supporting gender ideology teachings in classrooms.

It’s past time we stop taxpayer-funded indoctrination and the sidelining of parents in America’s schools. House Republicans are fighting to keep parents in the know when it comes to their children and make sure parental rights are protected and respected in schools. 

The United States is an agricultural powerhouse, producing the safest and most affordable food supply in the world thanks to America’s hardworking farmers and producers. In fact, American farmers produce around 85 percent of food consumed in the U.S., and the average U.S. farm feeds around 169 people annually. American agriculture is a way of life, with about 97 percent of the 1.9 million farms across the country being family-owned. These are the families that feed our nation.

As our farmers and ranchers face new challenges and opportunities, it is vital that we make sure policy is keeping up – that’s why this week, we’re bringing forward a farm bill that provides American producers with the resources they need and builds on historic measures in the Working Families Tax Cuts. 

Our legislation includes critical programs to help our agricultural producers manage risk and maintain operations through economic changes and provide them with assistance to address natural resource concerns like soil health and water quality. The policies in this farm bill bolster working lands conservation programs, mitigate food insecurity by reducing bureaucracy, expand the reach of critical feeding programs, improve nutrition, and keep America’s agriculture leading the world in innovation and productivity.

The bill also contains provisions to support rural communities by strengthening broadband connectivity, encouraging private capital investments in rural communities, protecting access to healthcare, and promoting active forest management. With this legislation, we make critical investments that enhance specialty crop competitiveness and plant health, as well as enact regulatory reforms to remove burdensome red tape.

H.R. 7567, the Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2026, sponsored by Chairman Glenn Thompson, reauthorizes and reforms Department of Agriculture programs through FY2031 to build on pro-farmer provisions in the Working Families Tax Cuts, deliver certainty and regulatory clarity to farmers, and expand on investments in rural and agricultural communities, prioritizing responsible spending on agriculture without adding to the deficit.

Thanks to the incredible hard work of our farmers, growers, and ranchers, Americans are able to put food on the table for their families. It’s time we passed legislation to support them and make sure they have the resources they need to continue feeding America.

Congress passed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978 to create a process allowing the government to collect foreign intelligence on U.S. soil with court approval and congressional oversight. 

In 2008, Congress added Section 702 to FISA to enable the targeting of foreigners outside the U.S. who use U.S.-based services to communicate. This helps us surveil foreign spies and ensure we don’t relive the pre-9/11 failures to ‘connect the dots’ between terrorists plotting overseas and threats here at home.
 
FISA Section 702 is vital to our national security amid the rising threats we’re seeing from foreign adversaries like Iran, China, and drug cartels – however, due to previous abuses of FISA, the entire program required significant reforms before reauthorization. 

In 2024, Congress enacted legislation to reform Section 702 querying procedures at the FBI, limit the use of information obtained under Section 702, require greater oversight of Section 702 targeting decisions, reform the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), impose stronger criminal penalties for FISA violations, and hold leaders accountable for FISA abuses on their watch. In total, 56 reforms were called for in our legislation, and have already begun making a difference.

Now, with FISA Section 702 authority set to expire at a time when threat levels are elevated, House Republicans are bringing forward a 3-year extension of Section 702 to keep our country safe while upholding the vital reforms made in our last reauthorization and adding more to strengthen privacy protections for Americans, increase accountability and safeguards, and providing for a first-ever external review for the FBI. These additional reforms include expanding criminal penalties for abuses of FISA Section 702 and conducting an audit of Section 702 targeting procedures and implementation. 

H. Amdt. to S. 1318, the Foreign Intelligence Accountability Act, sponsored by Chairman Rick Crawford, amends the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 to extend the authorities of title VII of FISA through April 30, 2029, maintaining our national security while adding to previous reforms that protect Americans' privacy and address Intelligence Community abuses.

House Republicans are working to ensure that our Intelligence Community has the tools they need to protect our nation from foreign threats while ensuring FISA is not abused against American citizens.