“President-elect Donald Trump’s plans to end business-as-usual at the Justice Department apparently include replacing FBI Director Christopher Wray, Vice President-elect JD Vance indicated in a social media post on Tuesday,” Politico reports.
“Vance revealed he and the president-elect were conducting interviews for the crucial FBI post in a since-deleted post on X.”
“Fresh from a devastating loss to Donald Trump, Vice President Kamala Harris may now head to Capitol Hill to defy him in what could be her last major act in office,” NBC News reports.
“As President Joe Biden attempts to advance a crush of judicial confirmations before he leaves the White House, Democrats are bracing for the possibility of close calls in the process as they ambitiously seek to top the 234 judges Trump secured during his first term.”
“That’s where Harris would come in. As the president of the Senate, Harris wields the constitutional power to provide a tie-breaking vote.”
Vince Fong (R) was on the ballot this fall for an Assembly race, “but he didn’t want to win it. After all, he left that job for Congress earlier this year, and he planned to stay in the nation’s capital,” the AP reports.
“He even went so far as to endorse the Bakersfield city councilmember who was listed as running against him on the November ballot.”
“But voters chose Fong anyway for the Assembly. They chose him again for Congress, too, since he was listed on the same ballot twice. And they did so overwhelmingly. By last count, Fong had more than 33,000 votes over fellow Republican Ken Weir for the Assembly seat.”
“President-elect Donald Trump is considering giving Russell Vought, his previous Office of Management and Budget director, his old job back,” Politico reports.
“Vought, a prominent contributor to the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 initiative to draft proposals for a second Trump administration, is among the people being seriously considered for the post.”
Vice President-elect J.D. Vance will be on Capitol Hill this week arranging meetings between some of President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks and key Republican senators who could determine their confirmations, Politico reports.
Former President Bill Clinton says in his new book that he wishes he “had never met” Jeffrey Epstein, the late convicted sexual offender, the Washington Examiner reports.
President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday called for a halt in confirming President Joe Biden’s nominees to the federal judiciary until he takes office, accusing Democrats of “trying to stack the courts,” ABC News reports.
Said Trump: “The Democrats are trying to stack the Courts with Radical Left Judges on their way out the door… No more Judges confirmed before Inauguration Day!”
“The conflicting goals of President-elect Donald Trump’s economic agenda have been playing out as he debates who to choose as his Treasury secretary, a job that will entail steering tax cuts through Congress, leading trade talks with China and overseeing the $30 trillion U.S. bond market,” the New York Times reports.
“Budget experts have warned that his plans could add as much as $15 trillion to the national debt while increasing inflation and slowing growth. But Mr. Trump is not in the market for a naysayer. After a first term in which some of his top economic aides tried to tame his protectionist impulses, Mr. Trump is seeking a Treasury secretary who will carry out his unconventional plans while still having the credibility to keep markets buoyant.”
“That mix of qualities is not easy to find.”
“Texas education officials approved in an initial vote on Tuesday a new elementary school curriculum that infuses material drawn from the Bible into reading and language arts lessons, a contentious move that would test the limits of religion’s presence in public education,” the New York Times reports.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) said she would fight a transgender woman — such as Rep.-elect Sarah McBride (D-DE) — if she comes across her in the bathroom, Politico reports.
Said Greene: “It’s pretty aggressive for biological men to be invading our spaces.”
According to Punchbowl News, Greene also called McBride “mentally ill” and refused to identify McBride by her preferred pronoun.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) told lawmakers that transgender women won’t be allowed to use the women’s bathrooms in the Capitol, but added later: “We’ll provide appropriate accommodation for every member of Congress.”
Jonathan Last: “Yesterday the Financial Times reported that the Trump Media and Technology Group… was in talks to buy a cryptocurrency exchange. This may not seem like much, but it’s a layer cake of corruption and it’s taking place in broad daylight…”
“Let me bottom-line it all for you: Trump is looking to buy a moribund crypto exchange owned by the husband of one of his Republican sycophants/allies/donors. He’s going to pay for the acquisition with stock, the price of which is inflated to ludicrous levels by a combination of cultists, speculators, and people seeking to influence him.”
“The value proposition for this merger is that, as president, Trump can make sure the SEC doesn’t touch this exchange, while also giving actors who hope to influence him another way to shove money in his direction.”
“And all of this is so commonplace and unremarkable that no one is going to even pause for a moment to question it.”
Linda McMahon had been widely seen as a leading contender for commerce secretary, before President-elect Donald Trump gave the job to her transition co-chair, Howard Lutnick, the Wall Street Journal reports.
McMahon is now under consideration for other jobs, including education secretary and U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom.
“I think there is sort of a faction in the Republican Party that has a strange kind of… sort of homoerotic fascination for Putin, which I personally don’t share.”
— Former British prime minister Boris Johnson, speaking at an event.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) said her Republican colleagues in Congress have covered up “sexual harassment and assault claims” by paying off victims with taxpayer money, the Daily Beast reports.
Greene said that if Republicans are “going to release ethics reports and rip apart our own that Trump has appointed,” they should disclose all ethics report and claims, including one she said she filed but did not detail.
Said Greene: “If we’re going to dance, let’s all dance in the sunlight. I’ll make sure we do.”
“The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office told a judge Tuesday that it supported pausing the planned sentencing of President-elect Donald Trump in his criminal hush money case to give Trump’s lawyers time to argue that the case should be dismissed altogether,” CNBC reports.
I’ll be posting more regularly on Bluesky, so follow me there.
“Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) said Tuesday that her effort to ban transgender women from using female bathrooms at the U.S. Capitol is a direct response to the election of Sarah McBride, who is set to be the first openly transgender person in Congress,” NBC News reports.
Said Mace: “Yes and absolutely, and then some. I’m absolutely 100% gonna stand in the way of any man who wants to be in a women’s restroom, in our locker rooms, in our changing rooms. I will be there fighting you every step of the way.”
Wall Street Journal: House Republicans aim to bar transgender lawmaker from women’s bathrooms.
“Despite coming up short in their fight for the majority, House Democrats aren’t tossing their leaders aside,” Politico reports.
“The caucus opted to keep their top slate of leaders in Tuesday’s party elections, with every single top Democratic leader reelected without opposition.”
“It’s a mark of confidence, even as the party girds for another Congress in the minority. Even with public and private venting over the future of their party, alongside debate over the Democratic message, most in the party were satisfied with their performance in congressional elections.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.