“President-elect Trump floated taking ownership of Greenland as he named PayPal co-founder Ken Howery as his pick for U.S. ambassador to Denmark on Sunday,” Axios reports.
“Trump said during his first administration that he was looking into the U.S. buying Greenland and canceled a state trip to Denmark after Danish officials said the autonomous territory that’s part of its kingdom was not for sale.”
President-elect Donald Trump said on Sunday that he intended to nominate Callista Gingrich, who served as his ambassador to the Vatican during his first term, as ambassador to Switzerland, the New York Times reports.
President-elect Donald Trump delivered a sprawling address on Sunday that he called a “small preview of the common-sense revolution” his administration will bring, pledging to slam shut the nation’s borders, end federal regulations, lower taxes, prosecute his rivals, “stop woke” and “end the transgender lunacy,” the New York Times reports.
Said Trump: “We will end the occupation, and Jan. 20 will truly be liberation day in America.”
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Republican members of Congress took to the Sunday shows to praise Trump lieutenant Elon Musk’s involvement in last week’s government funding saga, with one likening him to “our prime minister,” Axios reports.
“The Federal Reserve is starting to contend with how President-elect Donald Trump and his ambitious policies could reignite inflation in 2025,” the Washington Post reports.
“The central bank’s leaders strive to protect their independence from the White House and avoid commenting on politics or policy proposals. Fed Chair Jerome H. Powell had said for weeks that it was premature to discuss the degree to which the president-elect’s proposals — including higher tariffs, lower taxes and deportation of immigrants — would factor into its decisions on interest rates.”
President-elect Donald Trump said the notion that he has “ceded the presidency” to Elon Musk is a fiction and that even if Musk wanted the job, he couldn’t get it because of the Constitution’s requirement that the U.S. president be a natural-born citizen, NBC News reports.
Said Trump: “No, he’s not going to be president, that I can tell you. And I’m safe. You know why he can’t be? He wasn’t born in this country.”
A source told CBS News the House Ethics Committee is expected to release its report on former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) on Monday.
Meanwhile, Gaetz floated the prospect of running for senator or governor of Florida — or landing a special counsel spot to go after his former colleagues in Congress.
Playbook: “From floor speeches to hallway chats to post-vote statements, Democrats have spent the past few days portraying Musk as a shadow president — a man perhaps more influential than Trump himself. Musk, you may recall, used his social media platform to start whipping Republicans into tanking the initial, bipartisan funding deal before Trump publicly nuked it.”
“Yes, it’s a transparent play to prey on the incoming president’s insecurities — Trump despises when people outshine him, and one of the most notable elements of his second-term team so far is that it’s filled with people who are unlikely to steal his spotlight. MAGA world is warning not to take the bait, but, nevertheless, Dems are persisting.”
“President-elect Donald Trump said Saturday that the Panama Canal is charging ‘exorbitant prices and rates of passage’ on US naval and merchant ships, and he demanded that fees be lowered or else Panama should return the canal to the U.S.,” Bloomberg reports.
“Private prisons and other companies that provide detention services are getting ready to cash in on what President-elect Donald Trump has billed as “the largest domestic deportation operation in American history.” That includes scouring for as many detention beds as possible in their networks of facilities, and scouting sites for new buildings to house migrants,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“Some executives are considering whether to take up the controversial work of detaining families or unaccompanied children. Others are preparing to hire new staff and snapping up well-connected lobbyists.”
New York Times: “As rebels advanced toward the Syrian capital of Damascus on Dec. 7, the staff in the hilltop Presidential Palace prepared for a speech they hoped would lead to a peaceful end to the 13-year civil war.”
“Aides to President Bashar al-Assad were brainstorming messaging ideas. A film crew had set up cameras and lights nearby. Syria’s state-run television station was ready to broadcast the finished product: an address by Mr. al-Assad announcing a plan to share power with members of the political opposition…”
“They had all been deceived.”
“After dusk, the president slipped out of the capital, flying covertly to a Russian military base in northern Syria and then on a Russian jet to Moscow.”
“For many years, Donald Trump repeatedly threatened to sue the press but often didn’t follow through. When he did, he almost always lost,” the Washington Post reports.
“But Trump’s recent settlement with ABC News and a cascade of lawsuits and other complaints against media entities from him and his allies signal a ramped-up campaign from the president-elect. Together, the action has spurred concerns that his efforts could drastically undermine the institutions tasked with reporting on his coming administration, which Trump has promised will take revenge on those he perceives as having wronged him.”
Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX) has been missing votes in Washington because she’s been living in a nursing home for dementia patients for the past six months, the Daily Mail reports.
The current longest-serving GOP representative had not been on record voting for or against anything since July.
Dallas Express: Where is Kay Granger?
“Lara Trump, President-elect Trump’s daughter-in-law, said Saturday she is removing herself from consideration for Florida Republican Marco Rubio’s seat in the U.S. Senate,” Fox News reports.
Said Trump: “After an incredible amount of thought, contemplation, and encouragement from so many, I have decided to remove my name from consideration for the United States Senate.”
Donald Trump has appointed television producer Mark Burnett as his special envoy to the United Kingdom, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
“After days of threats and demands, Donald Trump had little to show for it once lawmakers passed a budget deal in the early hours of Saturday, narrowly averting a pre-Christmas government shutdown,” the AP reports.
“The president-elect successfully pushed House Republicans to jettison some spending, but he failed to achieve his central goal of raising the debt limit. It demonstrated that despite his decisive election victory and frequent promises of retribution, many members of his party are still willing to openly defy him.”
“Trump’s decision to inject himself into the budget debate a month before his inauguration also showed that he remains more adept at blowing up deals than making them, and it foreshadowed that his second term will likely be marked by the same infighting, chaos and brinksmanship that characterized his first.”
A Republican strategist is lashing out at Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) months after he says he fired her as a client, dubbing the far-right lawmaker a “pitiful embarrassment,” the Daily Beast reports.
Said Wesley Donehue: “I fired Nancy Mace as client a few months back because I’m a political consultant and not a babysitter, a sex therapist or a doctor who can prescribe fixes for chemical imbalances. I don’t have time for her constant egotistical bullshit and drama in my life.”
He added: “I’ve been worried about Nancy Mace for a while now. Mental health is a serious issue. I want her to get better and seek treatment.”
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.
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