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The Los Angeles city council on Tuesday unanimously passed a “sanctuary city” ordinance to protect immigrants living in the city, a policy that would prohibit the use of city resources and personnel to carry out federal immigration enforcement, Reuters reports.
The move by the Southern California city, the second most populated city in the US after New York City, follows President-elect Donald Trump’s vow to carry out mass deportations of immigrants.
The ordinance codifies the protection of migrants in municipal law. Council member Paul Krekorian said the measure addresses “the need to ensure that our immigrant community here in Los Angeles understands that we understand their fear.”
Who is Linda McMahon, Trump's choice for education secretary?
Linda McMahon has been a constant presence in Donald Trump’s tumultuous orbit, serving in his first administration and supporting his presidential campaigns. Now he’s chosen her to serve as Education secretary.
McMahon chaired America First Action, a super PAC that backed Trump’s reelection campaign in 2020. He lost to Democrat Joe Biden, and McMahon helped start the America First Policy Institute to continue advocating for Trump’s agenda and prepare for a potential return to the White House.
McMahon is married to Vince McMahon, whose father was a prominent professional wrestling promoter. They followed him into the business, founding their own company that’s now known as World Wrestling Entertainment, or WWE. It became a juggernaut in the industry and American culture.
When Trump was the star of the reality show “The Apprentice,” he made an appearance at Wrestlemania in 2007. The billionaire entertainment mogul participated in an elaborately scripted feud that ended with Trump shaving off Vince McMahon’s hair in the middle of the ring.
Linda McMahon stepped down from her position as WWE’s chief executive to enter politics. She ran twice for a US Senate seat in Connecticut, but lost in 2010 to Richard Blumenthal and in 2012 to Chris Murphy.
McMahon provided $6m to help Trump’s candidacy after he secured the Republican presidential nomination in 2016. McMahon served on the Connecticut Board of Education for a year starting in 2009. She told lawmakers at the time that she had a lifelong interest in education and once planned to become a teacher, a goal that fell aside after her marriage.
She also spent years on the board of trustees for Sacred Heart University in Connecticut.
McMahon is seen as a relative unknown in education circles, though she has expressed support for charter schools and school choice.
In October, McMahon was named in a new lawsuit involving the WWE. The suit alleges that she and other leaders of the company allowed the sexual abuse of young boys at the hands of a ringside announcer, former WWE ring crew chief Melvin Phillips Jr. The complaint specifically alleges that the McMahons knew about the abuse and failed to stop it.
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Bloomberg reports that Trump plans to interview former federal reserve governor Kevin Warsh and billionaire Apollo Global Management CEO Marc Rowan for the role of treasury secretary on Wednesday.
CNN reported earlier that Trump could name his pick for secretary on Wednesday.
Since 2021, McMahon has served as Washington DC-based thinktank America First Policy Institute’s board chairperson and chair of its Center for the American Worker.
A former Senate candidate in Connecticut, McMahon is also the chair and chief executive of Cantor Fitzgerald and a former executive of the World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), which she co-founded with her husband, Vince McMahon.
In October, McMahon was named in a new lawsuit involving the WWE. The suit alleges that she and other leaders of the company allowed the sexual abuse of young boys at the hands of a ringside announcer, former WWE ring crew chief Melvin Phillips Jr. The complaint specifically alleges that the McMahons knew about the abuse and failed to stop it.
An attorney for the McMahons told USA TODAY Sports that the allegations are “false claims” stemming from reporting that the couple deems “absurd, defamatory and utterly meritless”.
Trump confirms former WWE CEO as his choice for education secretary
Trump has just confirmed that his nomination for education secretary is Linda McMahon.
McMahon, who had been in the running for commerce secretary, headed up the Small Business Administration in Trump’s first administration and was a major donor and early supporter of the Republican president-elect when he first ran for the White House almost a decade ago.
The co-founder and former CEO of the WWE professional wrestling franchise, she resigned from the SBA in 2019 to lead the pro-Trump spending group America First Action. She also chairs the America First Policy Institute, a Trump-friendly think tank.
In his statement, Trump said:
It is my great honor to announce that Linda McMahon, former Administrator of the Small Business Administration, will be the United States Secretary of Education.
For the past four years, as the Chair of the Board at the America First Policy Institute (AFPI), Linda has been a fierce advocate for Parents’ Rights, working hard at both AFPI and America First Works (AFW) to achieve Universal School Choice in 12 States, giving children the opportunity to receive an excellent Education, regardless of zip code or income. As Secretary of Education, Linda will fight tirelessly to expand “Choice” to every State in America, and empower parents to make the best Education decisions for their families.
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Mexico’s top economy officials on Tuesday downplayed concerns about trade talks with Donald Trump’s administration, saying the potential impact on American companies could give the incoming US president second thoughts about levying massive tariffs.
Trump campaigned on a pledge to roll out a slew of tariffs, including for firms that had moved operations to Mexico, in a bid to restore jobs in the US Economists have warned that such tariffs would amount to a serious blow to Mexico’s export-dependent economy and have warned of a lesser hit to the US economy.
“Mexico’s negotiation power is relevant,” Mexico’s economy minister, Marcelo Ebrard, said at a press conference on Tuesday, pointing to the number of multinational firms that have set up shop in his country.
“Any action that you take to put at risk (the US-Mexico trade relationship) means thousands of companies” will be impacted, Ebrard said.
“There’s hardly an important US company that doesn’t have money here.”
Trump is expected to name Linda McMahon as education secretary, CNN reports, citing four sources familiar with the matter, putting the former pro-wrestling mogul at the helm of a department Trump has proposed abolishing.
McMahon, who had been in the running for commerce secretary, headed up the Small Business Administration in Trump’s first administration and was a major donor and early supporter of the Republican president-elect when he first ran for the White House almost a decade ago.
The co-founder and former CEO of the WWE professional wrestling franchise, she resigned from the SBA in 2019 to lead the pro-Trump spending group America First Action. She also chairs the America First Policy Institute, a Trump-friendly think tank.
Trump tapped her to co-lead a transition team formed to help vet personnel and draft policy ahead of the 5 November election.
McMahon had been in the mix to head the Commerce Department, but Trump on Tuesday instead chose her transition team co-leader – Cantor Fitzgerald Chief Executive Howard Lutnick – for that post. Now she will lead an agency Trump said on the campaign trail that he would abolish, although he likely lacks authority to do it without congressional approval.
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Businesses are bracing for the economic impact of a second Trump presidency, which, if his campaign promises are to be believed, will mean tariffs across nearly all imports to the US, especially those from China.
But amid the gloom over the spectre of a renewed global trade war, some manufacturers may be looking to those who already have a playbook on dealing with aggressive US levies, such as China’s solar companies.
China all but owns the global solar market. Its share in every stage of the solar panel manufacturing chain exceeds 80%, according to the International Energy Agency. Last year it exported a record high of 227 gigawatts (GW) of solar panels – more than the entire installed solar capacity of the United States.
The Guardian’s Amy Hawkins and Helen Davidson report:
California voters have rejected a ballot measure that would have raised state’s minimum wage to a national high of US$18 per hour, the Associated Press reports.
San Francisco Mayor London Breed loses re-election bid
San Francisco Mayor London Breed lost her re-election race to Levi Strauss heir Daniel Lurie.
The Associated Press called the race Tuesday.
In conceding the race to Lurie, Breed, 50, pledged a smooth transition for the incoming mayor.
“Being Mayor of San Francisco has been the greatest honor of my lifetime. I’m beyond grateful to our residents for the opportunity to serve the City that raised me,” she said in a statement last week.
Breed’s victory six years ago as the city’s first Black female mayor — who grew up poor and in public housing — showed that no dream was impossible in the progressive, compassionate and equitable city.
She won election as mayor in June 2018 to serve out the remainder of Ed Lee’s term, who died suddenly while in office.
The authorization would be a reversal of an Obama-era policy revived by Biden in 2022 that banned the transfer and use of US antipersonnel landmines outside the Korean Peninsula, the Washington Post reports.
An official, cited in the story, said Ukraine had committed to not using the mines in densely populated areas.
Biden to approve use of anti-personnel landmines in Ukraine - report
The Washington Post reports that US President Joe Biden, “has authorized the provision of antipersonnel land mines to Ukraine”.
It cites two unnamed US officials.
Trump expected to name Treasury pick Wednesday
US president-elect Donald Trump will name who he has picked to be Treasury secretary as soon as Wednesday, CNN reported, citing two sources familiar with the matter.
No one has been has been chosen yet for the role, CNN also reported.
The narrowly trailing Republican candidate in the race for a North Carolina Supreme Court seat formally requested a recount on Tuesday, with barely 600 votes separating him from the Democratic incumbent.
Jefferson Griffin, a Court of Appeals judge, sent the request before a noon deadline, marking the lone statewide race where a recount is poised to occur. Recounts for several single- or multi-county races also have been requested, including five General Assembly races. Ballots will be run again through tabulator machines.
Associate Justice Allison Riggs led Tuesday by 625 votes over Griffin, as election officials in all but two small counties from the state’s 100 counties have finalized their work from last Friday’s count meetings.
Griffin led after election night by roughly 10,000 votes, but the margin dwindled last week as county election boards reviewed tens of thousands of provisional and absentee ballots and added voting choices of those that qualified for counting to the totals. More than 5.5m ballots have been cast in the Riggs-Griffin race.
The State Board of Elections said in a news release that most of the 100 counties will begin their recounts on Wednesday and should be completed by 27 November. The board is slated to meet 26 November to consider final counts and certify results, but a Supreme Court race certification could be considered at a later date, spokesperson Pat Gannon said.
Vance deletes posts saying Trump is interviewing FBI director candidates
Trump is interviewing candidates for the role of FBI director, incoming vice-president JD Vance said Tuesday in the clearest indication yet that the new administration is looking to replace current director Christopher Wray.
In a social media post that was later deleted, according to the Associated Press, Vance defended himself from criticism over his absence from a Senate vote at which a judicial nominee of President Joe Biden was confirmed by saying that at the time of the vote, “I was meeting with President Trump to interview multiple positions for our government, including for FBI Director.”
“I tend to think it’s more important to get an FBI director who will dismantle the deep state than it is for Republicans to lose a vote 49-46 rather than 49-45,” he added on X. “But that’s just me.”
Vance was referring to the Senate vote Monday to confirm Embry J. Kidd, a Biden nominee to the US court of appeals for the 11th Circuit, a vote that he and several other Republican senators missed.
An FBI spokesperson declined to comment.
Who is 'Dr Oz', Trump's choice to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services?
Trump announced a short while ago that he has chosen television personality and surgeon Dr. Mehmet Oz to serve as administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, a wide-reaching agency with annual spending of $2.6tn.
Trump, who endorsed Oz in his unsuccessful run in Pennsylvania for the US Senate in 2022, said he would work closely with Robert F Kennedy Jr., who was nominated to lead the Department of Health and Human Services.
Trump said the pair would take on “the illness industrial complex, and all the horrible chronic diseases left in its wake” as well as cutting what he called waste and fraud.
“Our broken healthcare System harms everyday Americans, and crushes our Country’s budget,” Trump said in a statement.
The agency runs Medicare, the federal health insurance program for people aged 65 or older and disabled people. The office also oversees Medicaid, the state-based health insurance program for low-income people, which is jointly funded by states and the federal government. The two programs provide health insurance for over 140 million Americans.
It also handles much of the enrolment in income-based government-subsidized health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. Trump and other Republicans have previously tried to repeal the law but now say they only seek to overhaul it.
Oz was a regular Fox News commentator during the Covid-19 pandemic and a proponent of unproven treatments for Covid-19 including hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malaria drug whose use against the disease was also backed by Trump.
Oz challenged the Biden administration’s Covid-19 pandemic policies on social media, including mask policies, saying they ignored the science and were based on missing data.
In 2020, he was a proponent of expanding Medicare Advantage plans in which insurers manage healthcare benefits paid for by the government to all Americans who were not enrolled in Medicaid in a column published in Forbes magazine.
News of the appointment pushed shares of insurer Humana up 1.8% at $282.75. Humana is a provider of private Medicare Advantage plans.
Trump promised during his campaign not to cut Medicare but is expected to let federal subsidies for Medicaid expire at the end of 2025.
After RFK Jr. was named to the job last week, Oz told Fox News that he knew the HHS secretary nominee personally. The position is subject to Senate confirmation.
In case you missed this news earlier: The Associated Press reports that, according to a lawyer, an unauthorized person gained access to a file containing confidential testimony from women who have made allegations about former Rep. Matt Gaetz, Donald Trump’s pick to become the next attorney general:
The Associated Press reports that attorneys involved in a civil case brought by a Gaetz associate were notified this week that an unauthorized person accessed a file shared between lawyers that included unredacted depositions from a woman who has said Gaetz had sex with her when she was 17, and a second woman who says she saw the encounter, according to attorney Joel Leppard.
Gaetz has denied all the allegations, and the Justice Department ended its sex trafficking investigation without any criminal charges against him. A lawyer who has represented Gaetz said he would not answer any questions when reached Tuesday by The Associated Press.
The apparent breach comes as Gaetz is facing intense scrutiny over the allegations threatening to complicate his path to be confirmed as the nation’s top federal law enforcement officer. Several Republicans in the Senate have expressed concern about his nomination or refused to say publicly yet whether they will support him.
The files the person was able to access are part of a defamation case filed by a Gaetz associate against Gaetz’s onetime political ally Joel Greenberg, who pleaded guilty in 2021 to sex trafficking of a minor, and admitted that he had paid at least one underage girl to have sex with him and other men.
The email notifying the lawyers about the apparent hack says a person named “Altam Beezley” downloaded the files, and when an attorney emailed the person to ask them to identify themselves, the email was returned because the email address was not found. The apparent breach was first reported Tuesday by The New York Times.
Trump says he is not reconsidering Gaetz nomination for attorney general
Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he was not reconsidering the nomination of former congressman Matt Gaetz as attorney general, Reuters reports.
Gaetz, 42, who was investigated by the justice department for nearly three years over sex trafficking allegations involving a 17-year-old girl, was tapped by Trump on Wednesday to run the agency when he returns to the White House in January.
Trump, asked if he was reconsidering the nomination, replied: “No.”
Trump did not respond when asked how far he was willing to go to get Gaetz confirmed.
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Summary
Donald Trump has continued to choose loyalists for his upcoming administration, tapping TV personality and purveyor of health misinformation Dr Mehmet Oz to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Here’s where things stand:
Howard Lutnick will be Trump’s pick for commerce secretary for his second administration, according to a report. Lutnick is the president-elect’s transition co-chair and is the CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, the New York investment bank, and a longtime friend of Trump.
Sean Duffy has been nominated to be Trump’s transportation secretary in his next administration. The former congressman is co-host of The Bottom Line show on Fox Business. Duffy served in Congress from 2011 until 2019. Before being elected to national public office, he was district attorney for Ashland county, Wisconsin, from 2002 to 2008 and previously had a reality TV show role.
Trump is “calling senators” to pressure them to confirm Matt Gaetz as his attorney general for the incoming administration, according to a report. This is occurring as the US House ethics committee is expected to discuss next steps in its investigation into Gaetz, the now former Florida congressman, tomorrow.
Nearly 100 House Democrats have signed a letter urging the House ethics committee to release its report into Matt Gaetz. “The United States Senate has a constitutional duty to provide advice and consent on presidential nominees, and it is critical that senators have all the information necessary to consider Mr Gaetz’s nomination,” the letter reads.
New York prosecutors in Trump’s criminal case said they oppose dismissing the president-elect’s election hush-money case as his sentencing looms – but they expressed some openness to delaying the conclusion of the case until after his impending second term.
The prosecutors said in a letter today that they plan on fighting Trump’s push for the dismissal of the criminal case, following his presidential election win over Kamala Harris. They said the Manhattan court should set a timeline for Trump’s expected motion to dismiss, which they “intend to oppose”. The scheduled 26 November sentencing appears poised for adjournment.
An unidentified hacker has reportedly accessed a file shared among lawyers representing clients who have provided damaging testimony regarding Matt Gaetz, the New York Times is reporting, citing a person with knowledge of the activity. Apparently, the computer file consisted of 24 exhibits, including testimony by a woman in which she says she had sex with Gaetz in 2017 when she was 17, as well as corroborating testimony by a second woman who said that she witnessed the encounter.
Trump has joined his new BFF, billionaire Elon Musk, for a planned rocket launch by the entrepreneur’s SpaceX company at the aerospace base in south-east Texas later today. Weather conditions permitting, this will be the sixth test flight into space for SpaceX’s Starship rocket. The test launch is planned for 5pm ET, with a half-hour window for launch.
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Soon-to-be senate leader John Thune has led Republicans in the Senate in their effort to block confirmations of qualified judicial nominees proposed by the Biden administration.
On Monday, Republicans dragged out the floor process in an effort to delay the confirmation process, after Donald Trump directed his Republican senators to “show up and hold the line” against confirmations.
The White House noted that this is a reversal in stance for Thune.
“During the equivalent time under the Trump Administration – after President-elect Biden had won the most votes of any candidate in American history – Senator John Thune forcefully argued that continuing to confirm President Trump’s judicial nominees should be a ‘top priority,’ stressing that ‘confirming good judges is one of our most important responsibilities as senators’ and that ‘it’s a responsibility I take very seriously,’” said White House spokesperson Andrew Bates. “Senator Thune was correct in 2020 when he said senators have every urgent reason to continue working together in good faith to staff the federal bench. There is no excuse for choosing partisanship over enforcing the rule of law.”
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Colorado governor Jared Polis on why he’s willing to work with incoming president
Despite launching a governors’ group focused on safeguarding democracy during Donald Trump’s second term, Governor Jared Polis of Colorado said the coalition wasn’t about Trump, a president he’s willing to work with on several key issues.
In recent days, Polis, a Democrat, also praised Trump’s pick of Robert F Kennedy Jr for secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, an unexpected endorsement from a governor of a blue state that bucked the national trend and largely moved to the left in the election.
Polis has some ideas as to why the state didn’t shift to the right like most of the country. The state’s Democratic-controlled government has passed policies that have improved lives, he said, and Colorado voters have a higher than average education level, tilting them toward Democrats.
Polis and the Illinois governor, JB Pritzker, last week announced Governors Safeguarding Democracy, seeking to defend democratic institutions. The group has been described as an effort to oppose Trump administration policies, but Polis said it was not specifically in response to a Trump presidency.
Then on Thursday, Polis praised RFK’s nomination.
“I’m excited by the news that the President-Elect will appoint @RobertKennedyJr to @HHSGov,” Polis wrote on X after the staffing announcement. “He helped us defeat vaccine mandates in Colorado in 2019 and will help make America healthy again by shaking up HHS and FDA. I hope he leans into personal choice on vaccines rather than bans (which I think are terrible, just like mandates) but what I’m most optimistic about is taking on big pharma and the corporate ag oligopoly to improve our health.”
Polis’s office didn’t respond to questions about what Polis and Kennedy had worked on together in 2019 in Colorado.
The Guardian spoke with Polis before the RFK Jr tweets, about Colorado and what Democrats nationally could learn from a state that didn’t move toward Trump.
Read more:
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Donald Trump has joined Elon Musk for the sixth test of SpaceX’s giant Starship rocket from Texas.
Trump’s attendance underscores his increasingly close friendship with Musk, whom he has tapped to co-lead a new Department of Government Efficiency with the former Republican presidential candidate, Vivek Ramaswamy.
Follow the Guardian’s SpaceX launch liveblog here:
Dr Oz has built a long career promoting health misinformation.
During his unsuccessful campaign for senator of Pennsylvania, doctors and researchers called for him to be stripped of his medical credentials over his promotion of unproven treatments, including touting the use of hydroxychloroquine, a malaria drug, to treat Covid-19 without scientific evidence.
Timothy Caulfield, the Canada Research Chair in Health Law and Policy at the University of Alberta, wrote in the Scientific American:
Despite facing mounting criticism for his embrace of harmful pseudoscience and the provision of evidence-free health advice, Oz remains connected to Columbia University’s medical school and is a licensed physician. In 2014, he was called in front of the Senate Subcommittee on Consumer Protection over misleading statements he made on his popular television show, the Dr. Oz Show. During the hearing one senator went so far as to tell “America’s Doctor” (anointed thus by Oprah) that “the scientific community is almost monolithic against you.”
And while Oz has not been officially sanctioned by a regulatory body—the Federal Trade Commission, for example, has gone after fraudsters who have appeared on his show, but the agency hasn’t taken direct action against him—that doesn’t mean he shouldn’t be disciplined.
His affiliation with Columbia and the fact he still has a license seems especially baffling at a time when the spread of health misinformation has been recognized as one of this era’s most challenging health policy issues. Given all that he has done to promote science-free medicine, how has Oz’s licence not been revoked?
In his announcement naming Dr Mehmet Oz as his nominee to lead the Centers of Medicare and Medicaid Services, Donald Trump has also suggested that these massive health programs that serve more than 140m people could see steep cuts.
Oz “will also cut waste and fraud within our Country’s most expensive Government Agency, which is a third of our Nation’s Healthcare spend, and a quarter of our entire National Budget,” Trump said in his announcement.
Republicans have been pushing to further privatize Medicare, a program for elderly people and some people with disabilities, despite complaints from patients and providers that the existing privatized Medicare Advantage program costs taxpayers more, and provides worse care.
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Trump nominates Dr Mehmet Oz to serve as Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator
President-elect Donald Trump announced on Tuesday that he has nominated Dr Mehmet Oz to serve as the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Administrator.
“America is facing a healthcare Crisis, and there may be no Physician more qualified and capable than Dr. Oz to Make America Healthy Again” Trump said in a statement.
Trump added: “He is an eminent Physician, Heart Surgeon, Inventor, and World-Class Communicator, who has been at the forefront of healthy living for decades. Dr. Oz will work closely with Robert F Kennedy Jr. to take on the illness industrial complex, and all the horrible chronic diseases left in its wake.”
Oz ran an unsuccessful campaign for senator in Pennsylvania in 2022.
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Trump urges Republican senators to stop confirming federal judges before he takes office
President-elect Donald Trump is urging Republican senators to stop the confirmation of judges before he takes office in January.
“The Democrats are trying to stack the Courts with Radical Left Judges on their way out the door” Trump wrote in a social media post on Tuesday. “Republican Senators need to Show Up and Hold the Line – No more Judges confirmed before Inauguration Day!”.
This comes as Senate Democrats held a late-night vote on Monday to confirm Joe Biden’s nominees to the federal judiciary.
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Meanwhile, Joe Biden is at the G20 leaders summit in Rio de Janeiro and finally appeared in the leaders’ photo after missing the first one.
US officials previously stated that “logistical issues” were to blame for why the president missed out on the first group shot on Monday. Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau and Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni also missed the first group photo.
But today, they had a reshoot, and this time Biden was given a spot near the middle of the front row of the assembled world leaders.
Here are some of the photos:
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Donald Trump has confirmed that he is on his way to Texas for a SpaceX rocket launch, scheduled for later today.
“I’m heading to the Great State of Texas to watch the launch of the largest object ever to be elevated, not only to Space, but simply by lifting off the ground” Trump said in a social media post.
He added: “Good luck to Elon Musk and the Great Patriots involved in this incredible project!”
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Vice president-elect JD Vance said that he and Donald Trump were interviewing candidates for the FBI director position on Monday evening.
In a post on social media, Vance said that he was meeting with Trump to interview multiple positions for their government on Monday evening, including the role of FBI director.
The post came in response to criticism regarding his absence from a Senate vote on Monday night to confirm nominees for the federal judiciary.
“When this 11th Circuit vote happened, I was meeting with President Trump to interview multiple positions for our government, including for FBI Director” Vance said. “I tend to think it’s more important to get an FBI director who will dismantle the deep state than it is for Republicans to lose a vote 49-46 rather than 49-45. But that’s just me.”
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Trump announces appointment of Howard Lutnick as commerce secretary
Donald Trump has officially chosen Howard Lutnick, the president-elect’s transition co-chair, to serve as commerce secretary for his second administration.
Lutnick, who has been a longtime friend of Trump, is the CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald.
In a post on Truth Social, the former president wrote that he was “thrilled” to announce Lutnick as his commerce secretary. He stated that Lutnick will “lead our Tariff and Trade agenda” and will also have direct responsibility for the office of the US trade representative.
In his role as co-chair of the Trump-Vance transition team, Trump said that Lutnick “created the most sophisticated process and system to assist us in creating the greatest Administration America has ever seen”.
The statement also describes Lutnick as having been a “dynamic force on Wall Street for more than 30 years”.
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Vice president-elect JD Vance is said to be arranging meetings this week on Capitol Hill between some of Donald Trump’s Cabinet nominees and Republican senators who will be involved with the confirmation process.
According to CNN, Vance is expected attend some of the meetings too, including those with former representative Matt Gaetz, who Trump has selected as his nominee for attorney general, and former Fox News host Pete Hegseth, whom Trump has selected as the head of the Department of Defense.
Louisiana Republican Senator John Kennedy also told CNN that he plans to meet with Gaetz and Vance on Wednesday.
A spokesperson for the Trump-Vance Transition said in a statement to the network that Gaetz and Hegseth, as well as Representatives Doug Collins and Elise Stefanik, will “begin their meetings this week with additional Hill visits to continue after the Thanksgiving recess”.
Collins has been chosen by Trump to lead the Department of Veterans Affairs while Stefanik has been selected to be the US ambassador to the United Nations.
The House Democrats’ press conference wrapped up a little earlier with the minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, trying to instill confidence that they can provide effective resistance to Republican extremism.
“House Democrats are going to protect our institutions, our values and the norms that have made America the greatest country in the history of the world and the greatest democracy in the history of the world,” he said, as he signed off at the end of the event.
Moments before, congressman Ted Lieu, re-elected today as vice chair of the House Democratic caucus, warned the public not to pay attention to Donald Trump’s campaign trail attempts to distance himself from Project 2025, a rightwing thinktank blueprint for the incoming administration.
“You are watching Project 2025 being implemented,” Lieu said, vowing that Democrats are “going to continue telling the truth” about Trump policy and plans.
And congressman Joe Neguse of Colorado said it would be unconstitutional for the incoming Trump administration to set about “deleting agencies” as it tries to shrink the federal government.
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Today so far
Hello, US politics live blog readers, it’s another action-packed news day and we are in the midst of it all so stick with us for all the developments as they happen.
Here’s where things stand:
New York prosecutors in Donald Trump’s criminal case said moments ago that they oppose dismissing the president-elect’s election hush-money case as his sentencing looms – but they expressed some openness to delaying the conclusion of the case until after his impending second term. In the latest court filing today, the Manhattan district attorney’s office said Trump’s forthcoming presidency is not grounds for dropping a case that has already been tried, adding that “consideration must be given” to potentially freezing the case until after Trump is out of office.
The prosecutors said in a letter today that they plan on fighting Trump’s push for the dismissal of the criminal case, following his presidential election win over Kamala Harris. They said the Manhattan court should set a timeline for Trump’s expected motion to dismiss, which they “intend to oppose”. The scheduled 26 November sentencing appears poised for adjournment.
Nearly 100 House Democrats have signed a letter urging the House ethics committee to release its report into Matt Gaetz. “The United States Senate has a constitutional duty to provide advice and consent on presidential nominees, and it is critical that senators have all the information necessary to consider Mr Gaetz’s nomination,” the letter reads.
Howard Lutnick will be Donald Trump’s pick for commerce secretary for his second administration, according to a report. Lutnick is the president-elect’s transition co-chair and is the CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, the New York investment bank, and a longtime friend of Trump.
An unidentified hacker has reportedly accessed a file shared among lawyers representing clients who have provided damaging testimony regarding Matt Gaetz, the New York Times is reporting, citing a person with knowledge of the activity. Apparently, the computer file consisted of 24 exhibits, including testimony by a woman in which she says she had sex with Gaetz in 2017 when she was 17, as well as corroborating testimony by a second woman who said that she witnessed the encounter.
Trump will join his new BFF, billionaire Elon Musk, for a planned rocket launch by the entrepreneur’s SpaceX company at the aerospace base in south-east Texas later today. Weather conditions permitting, this will be the sixth test flight into space for SpaceX’s Starship rocket. The test launch is planned for 5pm ET, with a half-hour window for launch.
Trump is “calling senators” to pressure them to confirm Matt Gaetz as his attorney general for the incoming administration, according to a report. This is occurring as the US House ethics committee is expected to discuss next steps in its investigation into Gaetz, the now former Florida congressman, tomorrow.
Sean Duffy has been nominated to be Trump’s transportation secretary in his next administration. The former congressman is co-host of The Bottom Line show on Fox Business. Duffy served in Congress from 2011 until 2019. Before being elected to national public office, he was district attorney for Ashland county, Wisconsin, from 2002 to 2008 and previously had a reality TV show role.
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Prosecutors oppose dismissing Trump hush-money case, open to delay
New York prosecutors said moments ago that they oppose dismissing president-elect Donald Trump’s hush-money case as his sentencing looms – but they expressed some openness to delaying it until after his impending second term.
In the latest court filing today, the Manhattan district attorney’s office said Trump’s forthcoming presidency is not grounds for dropping a case that has already been tried, AP reports.
But prosectors added: “Given the need to balance competing constitutional interests, consideration must be given” to potentially freezing the case until after Trump is out of office.
Trump was convicted in May of falsifying business records to cover up a scheme to influence the 2016 election by paying hush money to a porn actor who said they’d had sex. Trump denies the allegations.
Judge Juan Merchan had given prosecutors until today to share their thoughts on how to proceed with the case, which had been scheduled for sentencing on 26 November.
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Trump's hush-money case should be paused, prosecutors say
Prosecutors in Donald Trump’s Manhattan criminal hush-money case said in a letter on Tuesday that they plan on fighting the president-elect’s push for its dismissal following his win over Kamala Harris.
They said the court should set a timeline for Trump’s expected motion to dismiss, which they “intend to oppose”. Prosecutors also believe that other proceedings should be put on hold until the dismissal issue is decided.
Trump’s scheduled 26 November sentencing in his Manhattan criminal hush-money case appears poised for adjournment, given prosecutors’ request and a court calendar entry on Tuesday.
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Donald Trump is on his way to Texas, where he will be joining billionaire Elon Musk for a SpaceX launch later today.
One of Trump’s aides posted a video on X on Tuesday, showing Trump boarding a plane with the caption “President @realDonaldTrump en route to @SpaceX!!!”
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Hakeem Jeffries also said at the news conference that Democrats are prepared to push back against any effort at extremism that they see from the House Republican conference or from the incoming Trump administration.
“We are prepared to work hard to find bipartisan common ground with our Republican colleagues and the incoming administration on any issue whenever and wherever possible, but at the same time, we will push back against far-right extremism whenever necessary,” he said.
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At the news conference, the House minority leader, Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, said that the House Democratic caucus convened to “begin the process of organising in preparation for the 119th Congress”.
“We have made clear repeatedly, as House Democrats, we are prepared to work with the incoming administration to find bipartisan common ground on any issue whenever and wherever possible in order to make life better for hard-working American families and taxpayers and to solve problems on behalf of the American people” Jeffries said. “That’s our job.”
“We look forward to working hard on the issues that the American people have made clear coming out of this election matter to them,” he added.
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House Democratic leaders are holding a press conference right now.
Among those standing on stage are the House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries; the Democratic whip, Katherine Clark; the Democratic caucus chair, Pete Aguilar; and others.
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New polling from Data for Progress found that a majority of voters disapprove of recess appointments and believe that president-elect Donald Trump should not be able to appoint his cabinet without confirmation from the Senate.
The survey found that 54% of voters said that they disapprove of recess appointments while 38% say they approve of recess appointments.
Notably, 60% of independents disapprove of Trump making recess appointments.
According to the US constitution, the president can make recess appointments to fill vacant positions when the Senate is not in session.
Want to read more about recess appointments and what they are?
Read our explainer here:
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Nearly 100 House Democrats sign letter urging the House ethics committee to release Matt Gaetz report
Nearly 100 House Democrats have signed a letter urging the House ethics committee to release its report into Matt Gaetz.
“The United States Senate has a constitutional duty to provide advice and consent on presidential nominees, and it is critical that senators have all the information necessary to consider Mr Gaetz’s nomination” the letter reads.
The letter was addressed to the Representative Michael Guest, the chair of the House ethics committee, as well as Representative Susan Wild, the top Democrat on the committee.
“Withholding the findings of your investigation may jeopardize the Senate’s ability to provide fully informed, constitutionally required advice and consent regarding this nomination. Representative Gaetz’s abrupt resignation from Congress should not circumvent the Senate’s ability to fulfill its constitutional responsibilities,” the letter adds.
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Voter turnout among people who live on tribal lands was 11 percentage points lower than others in the same state who do not live on tribal lands, according to a new study released on Tuesday by the Brennan Center for Justice.
The study, which examined voter turnout from 2012 to 2022 across 21 states, sheds light on the significant barriers that Native American voters face. If the 900,000 voters on tribal lands in the study had turned out at the same rate as those who don’t live on tribal lands in 2020, the study’s authors concluded, 160,000 more votes would have been cast.
Tribal lands with the highest concentrations of Native American adults also had lower turnout.
“Participation rates between tribal lands with the smallest Native populations (less than 20 percent) and those with the largest Native populations (more than 80 percent) differed by 33 percentage points in presidential elections and 25 percentage points in midterm elections,” the study found. “These findings demonstrate that Native Americans living on tribal lands are uniquely disenfranchised and demobilized from participating in federal elections.”
Native American voters on tribal lands often face unique obstacles to voting. Election offices and voting sites can be far away (the study noted that on the Pyramid Lake Reservation in Nevada the election office is more than 100 miles away).
Several tribal lands also do not use standard addresses, making mail delivery more difficult. The post office can also be far away with limited hours. Voters on tribal lands were seven percentage points less likely to vote by mail than those not on tribal lands, the study found.
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Donald Trump’s scheduled 26 November sentencing in his Manhattan criminal hush-money case has been adjourned, according to a court calendar entry on Tuesday.
The postponement followed prosecution and defense filings requesting a delay in proceedings after Trump’s victory.
The prosecutors in the case are expected to submit paperwork sometime today indicating how they believe the case should proceed.
Read more about it here.
The House minority leader, Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, stated that he is “honored” to have been re-elected as House Democratic leader on Tuesday morning.
“We will never give up the fight for the people” Jeffries added.
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Though Donald Trump has announced his nominations for several cabinet roles in his second administration, some roles have yet to be announced.
Some key roles that still need to be filled include:
Treasury secretary
Agriculture secretary
Labor secretary
Housing and urban development secretary
Education secretary
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Who is Howard Lutnuick, Trump’s reported choice for commerce secretary?
Howard Lutnick is a longtime friend of Trump, co-chair of Trump’s transition team, CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald and one of the few high-profile figures in corporate America to vocally endorse Trump’s presidential campaign, my colleague Callum Jones reported over the weekend.
Last month, Lutnick said in an interview that Trump “picked unfortunately” when it came to hiring in his first term, describing the hires in the first administration as “freshman” mistakes.
Read more about Lutnick here.
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Trump expected to name Howard Lutnick as commerce secretary – report
Punchbowl News is reporting that Donald Trump will name Howard Lutnick, the president-elect’s transition co-chair, as his commerce secretary for his second administration.
Lutnick is the CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald and a longtime friend of Trump.
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Hacker accesses Gaetz testimony file, the New York Times reports
An unidentified hacker has reportedly accessed a file shared among lawyers representing clients who have provided damaging testimony regarding Matt Gaetz, the New York Times is reporting, citing a person with knowledge of the activity.
According to the New York Times, the computer file consisted of 24 exhibits, including testimony by a woman in which she says she had sex with Gaetz in 2017 when she was 17, as well as corroborating testimony by a second woman who said that she witnessed the encounter.
The files were reportedly downloaded by a person using the name Altam Beezley at 1.23pm on Monday. But when a lawyer connected to the case sent an email to the address associated with Beezley, they received an automated reply that the recipient does not exist.
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South Carolina Republican representative Nancy Mace has introduced a bill to ban transgender women from facilities on Capitol Hill that correspond with their gender identity.
This comes as Delaware elected Sarah McBride to the House earlier this month, who will become the first ever openly transgender member of Congress.
Read more about it here.
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Hakeem Jeffries was re-elected as House Democratic leader this morning, according to Politico.
Politico reported on Tuesday that Jeffries, who was unopposed in his bid for another term, will lead the Democrats as minority leader.
Additionally, Representative Pete Aguilar of California was also reportedly re-elected to another term as Democratic caucus chair.
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Ken Martin, the chair of Minnesota’s Democratic party, has announced his candidacy to lead the Democratic National Committee (DNC).
“When I took over Minnesota’s Democratic party, we were in debt and disarray, reeling from major losses” Martin said in a video posted online this morning. “But we brought people together, we built a winning coalition and delivered results.”
“Since then, we’ve won every single statewide election” he said. “And we are the last of the blue wall states still standing.”
“If you’re looking for a creature of DC, that’s not me” Martin continued. “But I do know how the DNC works and how it isn’t working … We need to reconnect our ideas – which we know are popular in red, blue and purple states across this country – back to our party and to our candidates.”
Martin O’Malley, the former governor of Maryland, has also entered the race to lead the DNC, announcing his candidacy on Monday.
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Donald Trump to join Elon Musk at SpaceX launch
President-elect Donald Trump will join billionaire Elon Musk for a SpaceX launch in Texas later today, as reported by Reuters.
This will be the sixth test flight to space for SpaceX’s Starship rocket. The test launch is planned for 5pm ET.
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Attorney general Merrick Garland made his first public remarks following president-elect Donald Trump’s selection of former Representative Matt Gaetz to head the justice department.
On Monday, Garland spoke with career prosecutors at the southern district of New York, reportedly telling them that they are the “backbone” of the justice department and urged them to continue to “uphold the rule of law” according to CNN.
“I may be coming to the end of my tenure at the justice department, but I know that all of you will continue in the department’s mission – what has always been its mission – to uphold the rule of law, keep our country safe and to protect civil rights,” Garland reportedly said.
He added: “The career lawyers of the justice department as a whole, you are the institutional backbone of this department. You are the historical memory of this department. You are the heart and soul of the department. You are the justice department.”
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Russia has claimed debris from US-made missile has landed in the country’s Bryansk region.
Russia’s Ministry of Defence told Russian state-owned media that it had shot down five of the missiles over the Bryansk region. The attack resulted in no casualties or damage, it said.
The claims have not been independently verified. Ukrainian officials have also not commented on the Russian reports, and there has been no confirmation from US or other allied powers.
This news comes as fears rise over major escalation, as just hours earlier Russian President Vladimir Putin approved an updated nuclear doctrine and expanded the list of criteria that require a nuclear response.
Read more over at our Ukraine war live blog.
Elon Musk says Gaetz is 'Judge Dredd America needs'
Billionaire Elon Musk, a close ally of Donald Trump, defended former representative Matt Gaetz this morning.
In a statement posted on X, Musk said that Gaetz has three “critical assets” that he believes are needed for the role of Attorney General.
“A big brain, a spine of steel and an axe to grind” Musk, who has been deeply involved in the Trump administration’s transition plans, wrote.
Gaetz “is the Judge Dredd America needs to clean up a corrupt system and put powerful bad actors in prison” Musk continued. “Gaetz will be our Hammer of Justice.”
In a second post, Musk addressed the allegations against Gaetz
“I consider them worth less than nothing” Musk said. “Under our laws, a man is considered innocent until proven guilty.”
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Trump pick for attorney general Matt Gaetz under further scrutiny amid fresh allegations
As we have been reporting, Matt Gaetz, Trump’s controversial pick to be the new attorney general, is at the centre of a number of allegations which could prevent him from passing Senate confirmation for the high-profile role.
As my colleague Anna Betts reports in this story, an attorney representing two women who he says testified before the House ethics committee has claimed that Gaetz paid both women for sex and that one of the women alleged she witnessed Gaetz having sex with a minor.
The new allegations were revealed by the attorney Joel Leppard during an interview with ABC News on Monday – less than a week after Gaetz resigned from Congress following his nomination by Donald Trump to serve as attorney general in his second administration.
In the interview, Leppard said his clients were paid by Gaetz using Venmo and said that one of the women testified to the committee that she saw Gaetz at a house party in 2017 having sex with a 17-year-old girl.
“She testified that in July of 2017 at his house party, she was walking out to the pool area, and she looked to her right, and she saw Rep Gaetz having sex with her friend, who was 17,” Leppard said.
Joel Leppard is the attorney for two women who testified before the House Ethics Committee about former Rep. Matt Gaetz's conduct. Leppard said his clients told the committee that they were paid to have sex with Gaetz. One woman testified she witnessed Gaetz having sex with a… pic.twitter.com/t9tPUSS8Yo
— CBS News (@CBSNews) November 18, 2024
Gaetz was investigated by the justice department on suspicion of child sex trafficking, but the department decided not to bring charges. The House ethics committee then launched its own inquiry into allegations that Gaetz engaged in sexual misconduct, illicit drug use and other ethical breaches. Gaetz has repeatedly denied the allegations against him.
Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson has said he believes the report should not be made public, as Gaetz , a former Florida congressman, is no longer a House member.
Lauren Gambino is political correspondent for Guardian US, based in Washington DC
Donald Trump said on Monday that his administration would declare a national emergency and use the US military to carry out mass deportations of undocumented immigrants.
In an early morning social media post, Trump responded “TRUE!!!” to a post by Tom Fitton, the president of the conservative group Judicial Watch, who wrote on 8 November that the next administration “will use military assets to reverse the Biden invasion through a mass deportation program”.
Since his decisive victory, Trump has said he intends to make good on his campaign promise to execute mass deportations, beginning on the first day of his presidency. But many aspects of what he has described as the “largest deportation program in American history” remain unclear.
Trump has previously suggested he would rely on wartime powers, military troops and sympathetic state and local leaders. Such a sprawling campaign – and the use of military personnel to carry it out – is almost certain to draw legal challenges and pushback from Democratic leaders, some of whom have already said they would refuse to cooperate with Trump’s deportation agenda.
Through personnel announcements, the president-elect has put together a team of loyalists and hardliners to implement a second-term immigration crackdown.
Tom Homan, the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement in his first administration, was named “border czar” with a wide-ranging remit. In a short social media post announcing the position, Trump said Homan would be “in charge of all Deportation of Illegal Aliens back to their Country of Origin”.
Also returning for a second term is Stephen Miller, a chief defender of the last administration’s most controversial immigration policies, including the use of family separation as a means of deterrence. Miller was named White House deputy chief of staff for policy and a homeland security adviser, giving him far-reaching influence over immigration policy.
You can read the full story here:
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Trump 'calling senators' to get Matt Gaetz confirmed as his attorney general - report
The US House ethics committee is expected to discuss next steps in its investigation into Donald Trump’s attorney general pick Matt Gaetz, the former Florida congressman, tomorrow, according to Reuters.
A growing number of Republicans in the Senate, which has a constitutional duty to confirm or reject high-level presidential appointments, have called on the House panel to turn over its findings on allegations of sexual misconduct involving a teenager and drug use by Gaetz.
It is uncertain whether the probe will continue because Gaetz, 42, resigned his seat in the Republican-controlled House last week, hours after Trump unveiled announced him as his choice for AG and as the probe was nearing completion. Gaetz denies any wrongdoing.
Amid growing cross-party concern, Axios is now reporting that Trump is personally calling senators to press them to confirm Gaetz to be his attorney general. Here is an extract from the outlet’s report:
Trump is digging in on his embattled and controversial nominee and is sending an unmistakable message to Senate Republicans that he expects him to be confirmed.
“He clearly wants Matt Gaetz,” said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), who received a call from Trump. “He believes Matt Gaetz is the one person who will have the fearlessness and ferociousness, really, to do what needs doing at the department of justice.”
“One thing about Donald Trump, people should never confuse his support for one of his nominees as a tactical or strategic tool for somebody else,” Cramer said. “And at least to this point, he’s putting his own political capital behind it.” “And he’s a pretty persuasive guy,” Cramer said.
Another senator also confirmed to Axios that Trump reached out, calling on them to rally behind him.
Trump selects Fox News contributor Sean Duffy as transport secretary
Donald Trump has nominated former congressman and co-host of “The Bottom Line” on Fox Business Sean Duffy to be his transport secretary in his next administration.
Duffy served in Congress from 2011 until 2019. Before being elected to public office, he was district attorney for Ashland county, Wisconsin, from 2002 to 2008 and previously had a reality TV show role. Duffy was a cast member on The Real World: Boston in 1997 where he would meet his wife, Fox news contributor Rachel Campos-Duffy (you can read more about Duffy’s time in Congress here).
In a post on Truth social, Trump said Duffy would use his experience in Congress “to maintain and rebuild our nation’s Infrastructure, and fulfil our mission of ushering in the golden age of travel, focusing on safety, efficiency and innovation”.
“The husband of a wonderful woman, Rachel Campos-Duffy, a STAR on Fox News, and the father of nine incredible children, Sean knows how important it is for families to be able to travel safely, and with peace of mind,” the president-elect added.
If confirmed, Duffy will oversee aviation, automotive, rail, transit and other transportation policies at the department with about a $110bn (£86bn) budget.
A spokesperson for Fox News Media wished Duffy “the best of luck in his return to Washington” and said he left the company on Monday.
Duffy is so far the second Fox-affiliated television host that Trump has named to his Cabinet. Trump last week announced his choice of Fox News host Pete Hegseth to serve as his defence secretary.
Hegseth was a major in the Minnesota national guard who served as a prison guard at Guantánamo Bay detention camp and served in Iraq and Afghanistan before becoming an outspoken rightwing critic of the military. He has no experience in government and is untested on the global stage.
Here is some background, courtesy of my colleague, Victoria Bekiempis, on why the judge in Donald Trump’s Manhattan criminal hush-money case has postponed deciding on whether to throw out the president-elect’s conviction on presidential immunity grounds:
Judge Juan Merchan’s office told Trump’s lawyers and prosecutors that he would delay the ruling until 19 November after defense and prosecutors submitted letters asking for a postponement. Merchan’s decision was not made public until Tuesday – the day he was set to issue his ruling on the immunity issue…
Trump was originally scheduled to be sentenced on 10 July. Then came the 1 July US supreme court ruling that granted sitting presidents broad immunity for official acts taken during their time in office.
Trump urged Merchan to delay his sentencing in light of this ruling. His legal team pushed to challenge Trump’s conviction, citing the supreme court decision.
Merchan agreed to mull over the legalities and pushed back the proceeding until 18 September “if such is still necessary” given the supreme court decision. Trump’s attorneys in August asked for still more time, saying that they would need it to possibly appeal Merchan’s decision.
Merchan on 6 September delayed Trump’s sentencing yet again until 26 November – after the election – saying the situation was “fraught with complexities”. He said this decision was meant “to avoid any appearance – however unwarranted – that the proceeding has been affected by or seeks to affect the approaching presidential election in which the defendant is a candidate”.
Prosecutors on 10 November sent an email to Merchan indicating that Trump’s team had asked them to agree to a stay so there would be time to review “a number of arguments based on the impact on this proceeding from the results of the presidential election; defendant’s forthcoming certification as president-elect on January 6, 2025; and his inauguration on January 20, 2025”…
They asked Merchan for time to “assess recent developments” and to give them until 19 November to advise him what they believe are “appropriate steps going forward”. Prosecutors indicated that they had spoken to Trump’s team about this and that they agreed to this request.
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Update expected in Trump hush-money case
Good morning, and welcome to our US politics blog.
Donald Trump, 78, was convicted in May of falsifying business records to cover up a $130,000 (£102,809) hush money payment his former lawyer Michael Cohen made to porn star Stormy Daniels for her silence before the 2016 election about a sexual encounter she says she had with Trump, who denies it.
The president-elect had been scheduled to be sentenced on 26 November, but justice Juan Merchan last week put all proceedings in the case on pause at the request of Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg’s office.
The prosecutors had asked for more time to consider next steps in the case, citing the need to balance the “competing interests” between having the criminal case go forward as normal and protecting the office of the president.
They are due to propose their next steps later today.
Trump’s win in the 2024 presidential election has thwarted his other criminal cases, including the federal election interference and classified documents cases.
The state-level election case in Georgia is on pause pending appeal in the wake of news that the Fulton county district attorney, Fani Willis, had hired a man with whom she had an affair as prosecutor.
You can read more on the legal battles Trump faces in this story.
