Republican Kevin McCarthy wrapped his first full week as House speaker in the most outwardly orderly way. There was hardly a hint of the chaotic, rebellious fight it took for the Republicans to arrive here, having barely installed him as the leader with the gavel. The House Republicans marched through the early days of the session passing bills, choosing committee chairman, even requesting its first documents for investigations of President Joe Biden and his family. But the semblance of House GOP unity is all but certain to be temporary as Congress faces more difficult questions ahead around spending cuts and the federal debt limit.

Virtually everything was going right for President Joe Biden to open the year. Biden's approval ratings were ticking up. Inflation was slowing. And Republicans were at war with themselves after a disappointing midterm season. But Biden's rosy political outlook veered into uncertainty Thursday after the Justice Department appointed a special counsel to investigate the Democratic president's handling of classified documents. Democrats concede the stunning development is at best an unwelcome distraction at an inopportune time that muddies the case against Donald Trump. The Republican former president faces a special counsel of his own and is under federal criminal investigation for his handling of classified documents and other potential transgressions.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has notified Congress that the U.S. is projected to reach its debt limit on Thursday and will then resort to "extraordinary measures" to avoid default. Those measures include delaying some payments in order to provide some headroom to make other payments that are deemed essential, like those for Social Security and debt instruments. Yellen said Friday that while her department can't estimate how long extraordinary measures will allow the U.S. to continue to pay the government's obligations, "it is unlikely that cash and extraordinary measures will be exhausted before early June."

The House Ethics Committee has been asked to investigate Rep. George Santos. The newly-elected Republican from New York has admitted to lying about his job experience, college education and even family heritage. Two Democrats on Tuesday requested the probe saying Santos has "failed to uphold the integrity expected" of lawmakers. In a letter to the Ethics Committee, Democratic Representatives Ritchie Torres and Dan Goldman said Santos also failed to file accurate financial disclosure reports as required by law. Some Democratic leaders said Santos should be expelled from the House. Republican leaders have said they will handle the situation internally. Santos' election helped give Republicans the House majority.

Electing the House speaker may have been the easy part. Now House Republicans will try to govern. Speaker Kevin McCarthy faces his first test late Monday as the Republicans try to approve their rules package governing House operations. It's typically a routine step on Day One that is now stretching into the second week of the new majority. After that, the Republicans will try to pass their first bill — legislation to cut funding that was intended to bolster the Internal Revenue Service. But it has ran into a snag because the budget office says it would add $114 billion to the federal deficit.

Washington has one specialty that has long endured — memorializing and coming together over a national trauma. On Sept. 11, 2001, Democrats and Republicans stood together on the Capitol steps after the terrorist attacks and sang "God Bless America." But that unifying impulse has faded. On Friday's second anniversary of the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol, a moment of silence drew mostly Democrats. The same is expected at a ceremony where President Joe Biden will honor election officials and police officers who upheld democracy that day. The Jan. 6 anniversary comes as the House is at a standstill because of a Republican fight over who'll be the speaker.

The religious makeup of the incoming 118th Congress looks more like what America used to be than what it is today. Congress is more Christian and religious overall than the general population. Nearly 88% of members of Congress identify as Christian, according to Pew Research Center. That's compared with only 63% of U.S. adults overall. And only two members of Congress publicly say they have no religious affiliation. That's a fraction of a percent of Congress. Yet nearly three in 10 Americans claim no religious affiliation. U.S. Rep. Jared Huffman, D-Calif., identifies as humanist and predicts more lawmakers will eventually do so.

President Joe Biden is holding out the promised makeover of a dilapidated bridge over the Ohio River as a symbol of what can happen when Republicans and Democrats work together. His visit Wednesday to the Brent Spence Bridge connecting Kentucky and Ohio came even as the president condemned what he labeled an "embarrassing" scene of GOP disarray back in Washington, where Republicans have been unable to unify on electing a new House speaker. The infrastructure law will offer more than $1.63 billion in federal grants to Ohio and Kentucky to build a companion bridge that will help unclog traffic on the Brent Spence.