“How much of this shit do we have to listen to?” Trump said he asked. “How much are we going to listen to?”

The speech was not open to reporters but CNN obtained a recording of Trump’s remarks at Mar-a-Lago, which it said undermined official explanations for the decision to kill Suleimani at Baghdad airport on 3 January.

The White House has claimed Iran posed an “imminent” threat to US interests and lives. Trump’s own statements, including the claim that four embassies were threatened, have muddied the water considerably.

He has also claimed “it doesn’t really matter” whether the attack was imminent or not or whether his advisers were in agreement, because of “the terrorist” Suleimani’s “horrible past”.

Congress was not informed of the strike in advance, its eventual notification was heavily classified and a congressional briefing prompted bipartisan protest. Democrats have proposed legislation to rein the president in.

The death of Suleimani prompted Tehran to launch retaliatory rocket strikes on US targets in Iraq. Having said no one was hurt, the Trump administration said on Friday 11 US service members in fact suffered blast-related concussions.

According to numerous people in the room, Milley was the most vocal defender of the intelligence. Multiple Hill Democrats said Milley came across as trying to match the bombast of the President in defending the strike.

One Democratic lawmaker told CNN they were turned off by Milley’s pitch on behalf of the administration, particularly when he insisted that the intelligence was “exquisite.” The lawmaker argued Milley’s rhetoric was divorced from how intelligence is actually assessed.

“General Milley went out of his way to defend the intel behind the QS strike as so utterly compelling,” a Democratic aide in the room told CNN. “It was embarrassing.”

Not everyone reacted that way. Many Republicans and some Democrats came away impressed by Milley and defended him as an “honest broker” in the words of Virginia Democrat Sen. Tim Kaine.

Still, the briefing — and indeed the strike on Soleimani itself— marks a critical moment for the 61-year-old four-star general. At the peak of an illustrious military career, Milley’s non-partisan reputation is being put to the test as he defends the most controversial foreign policy decision of Donald Trump’s presidency.

In doing so, Milley has come dangerously close to wading into political realms that are usually out of bounds for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, who is typically there to provide non-partisan military advice.

Democrats — fuming at Trump’s decision to kill one of Iran’s top generals without notifying Congress — will vote this week on a resolution to restrain Trump’s military actions in one of the House’s first acts after returning from the lengthy Christmas recess.

“We have the actual power to stop these wars and it’s important to make that point so people don’t think that Congress is somehow powerless,” said Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who has been a leading voice on efforts to limit Trump’s authority to bypass Congress on foreign conflicts.

“We would be powerless if we didn’t get the majority, but the country gave us the majority in the House of Representatives,” he added.

The resolution is expected to easily pass the House as early as Wednesday, with nearly every Democrat likely to support it. Adoption will force a vote on the Senate floor in the coming days, because it is privileged. Democrats hope it will pose a tough loyalty test for Republicans, who were also mostly blindsided by Trump’s strike.

But the House and Senate GOP are likely to remain largely united on the floor, with many across the party rallying around Trump’s slaying of a man linked to the deaths of hundreds of Americans.

Senate Democrats will need at least four Republicans to join them if all 47 caucus members vote for the resolution. Such a break would mark a repudiation of Trump as he gears up for his reelection campaign and an impeachment trial in the Senate.

But now McCarthy looks to agree with AOC that members of Congress deserve a pay raise. Without a salary increament, McCarthy says, only millionaires will be able to serve.

The top Republican in the House made the comments this week as lawmakers scrapped the bill over the possible backlash from increasing salaries for themselves and their staffs.

“When you talk this subject about COLA, a cost-of-living increase, it does invoke an emotion, kind of an impulsive emotion,” McCarthy told reporters, according to the Washington Examiner.

“I think it’s one that we should pause and look at. It’s been more than 10 years in the process. The current study says that pay has decreased by 15 percent. I do not want Congress at the end of the day to only be a place that millionaires serve. This should be a body of the people.”

Members of Congress generally make $174,000 per year, with senior leaders earning more, and no cost-of-living adjustments have been made in the past nine years.

Last month, some vulnerable swing-state Democrats, concerned how the proposed $4,500 pay hike would look if it didn’t also have Republican support, had signed onto amendments rejecting a similar measure to increase their pay.

Republicans must create a strong and relevant message to fight this new development if they truly want to emerge victors in future elections, Luntz claimed Friday on “The Ingraham Angle.”

“My concern is that the Democrats are using — sometimes — language of the right as a way to push policies of the left,” he said.

“And conservatives have to be careful about that. You use softer, gentler, kinder words to push things that are about either government control or government giveaways, and the conservatives need to have a message — they need to have an answer to that.”

Luntz was responding to a montage of 2020 Democratic candidates claiming health care is a “human right.”

To that extent, Ingraham added a conservative analyst once explained, if something “is a human right, you don’t have to debate it anymore.”

“So, if it’s a ‘human right,’ there’s no debate, you have to give it to them,” she added, characterizing the idea.

Luntz expressed agreement, adding that if a person is against certain policy proposals in that regard they can be painted as, “cruel and inhumane.”

In regard to the idea of Medicare-for-all, Fox News medical contributor Dr. Marc Siegel claimed recently on “Fox & Friends” the platform will not resonate with voters in the end.

Voters will turn away from candidates pushing the idea in the end and claims the plan will improve access to quality health care are unfounded, Siegel said last month.

“I think it’s a campaign slogan. I don’t think it’s ever going to happen. They will self-destruct by getting behind it,” he claimed.

“I can’t believe they are making it a campaign issue. It’s so unpopular.”