Week ahead: Congress to grapple with highway funding

Lawmakers will grapple with an infrastructure spending bill next week as they seek to meet a July 30 deadline for approving new highway spending.

President Obama is pressing for a long-term extension of highway funding, but that is a long-shot given fights over how to pay for it.

The debate is further complicated by the fact that a reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank is expected to be added to the Senate infrastructure funding bill. That will set up a battle in the House, where conservative Republicans hope to prevent the bank’s charter, which expired last month, from being relaunched.

{mosads}Happy birthday, Dodd-Frank. The 2010 Dodd-Frank Financial Reform Law turns five years old this month.

Republicans are already using the anniversary to tout their argument that it has slowed economic growth.

Democrats, for their part, argue GOP objections prevented the reform from going farther to regulate markets.

Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen testifies before the House Financial Services Committee on Wednesday.

She will face a tough crowd of Republicans critical of the Fed’s transparency and regulatory steps.

It’s a big week for Yellen, who also testifies before the Senate Banking Committee on Thursday. The panel also will hear testimony from Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Richard Corday on Wednesday.

Also on Wednesday, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is hosting a cybersecurity summit in Atlanta. The technical problems that shut off trading for hours on the New York Stock Exchange this week is likely to be a hot topic.

On Friday, the Chamber will host a forum with Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer, who will speak at the group’s headquarters in Washington.

Hill headlines:

— Yellen: Fed still on track for rate hike later in 2015, by Pete Schroeder: http://bit.ly/1D61VUV

— Senators may seek briefing on NYSE outage, by Cory Bennett: http://bit.ly/1fuTNs9

— House GOP halts spending bills after Confederate flag fight, by Cristina Marcos and Rebecca Shabad: http://bit.ly/1Cu7Poj

— McConnell, Ryan at odds over highway fix, by Bernie Becker: http://bit.ly/1Tqztqt