The latest on Trump’s presidential transition

Sen. John Thune, the incoming Senate majority leader, didn’t take issue with the pay increases congressional leaders included in the must-pass spending bill that was unveiled last night.

Thune said that the lack of cost-of-living adjustments since 2009 can make it difficult to recruit members to run for the Senate.

Asked if he supports the stop-gap bill that has come under fire from the right, Thune said he was still reviewing it.

“I don’t want a shutdown. We are going through the CR (continuing resolution) and figuring out what all is in it,” Thune said, noting that there would be provisions Republicans won’t like since they had to cut a deal with Democrats in the Senate and White House.

Thune added: “At the end of the day, we got to get some of this stuff wrapped this year so we are not dealing with it all again next year.”

Vice President-elect JD Vance did not say whether he advises Republicans to vote on the continuing resolution to keep the government funded until March as he walked out of his office on Capitol Hill and headed toward the Senate floor.

Vance did not answer when asked about whether he agreed with Elon Musk that members should be voted out in two years if they support the proposed spending bill or if he is going to meet with House Speaker Mike Johnson.

After Vance voted, he did not answer when asked again if he would support the continuing resolution.

The Federal Reserve is banking on higher-than-anticipated inflation after President-elect Donald Trump takes office.

Federal Reserve officials had thought their preferred inflation gauge, the Personal Consumption Expenditures price index, would be 2.1% by the end of 2025 at September’s monetary policy meeting, according to the median forecast included in the quarterly Summary of Economic Projections.

But at this month’s meeting, officials raised their forecast and are now predicting 2.5% inflation by year’s end next year, according to new projections released Wednesday.

What changed from September to December that would cause officials to foresee higher inflation? Trump won a second term.

Trump’s victory carries significant implications for the trajectory of inflation and the overall economy. For example, many economists have warned that some policies Trump promised to put in place, including broad-based tariffs and mass deportations of illegal migrants, could push prices Americans pay for goods and services up significantly.

Fed officials may have taken that into account when they made new projections on inflation’s path next year, though it’s impossible to say for certain whether that alone drove them to believe inflation would be higher.

In recent months, inflation has heated up, moving further away from the Fed’s target. Many officials have also expressed concerns recently that inflation may prove to be stickier than previously thought to be.

House Republicans acknowledge that Elon Musk, who is using his powerful mantle to pressure GOP lawmakers to vote against the government spending bill, has sway on the conference, but not everyone is bending to the pressure – for now.

As multiple GOP lawmakers field calls after Musk unleashed his millions of followers on their offices, the most important voice in the conversation, President-elect Donald Trump, has stayed silent.

House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole said “people put a lot of stock” in what Musk has to say but downplayed the impact it has on his colleagues.

The incoming vice chair of the House GOP caucus, Rep. Lisa McClain, told CNN, “He’s not a member of Congress, but I do think he, you know, he’s a successful business owner, and he’s on the DOGE caucus. So, you know it go. It cuts both ways.”

One moderate GOP Rep. Don Bacon, who supports the package, told CNN that Musk was “premature” for coming out against it so quickly when there are a lot of Republican “wins” tucked in.

“He should have gotten the facts,” Bacon added.

But retiring GOP Rep. Debbie Lesko, who is voting against the package said she “absolutely” hopes Musk’s public play will sway more of her colleagues to grow.

Elon Musk at Capitol Hill on the day of a meeting with Senate Republican Leader-elect John Thune, in Washington, DC, on December 5.

Elon Musk is using his X platform to threaten Congressional Republicans who vote for the stop-gap spending bill negotiated by House Speaker Mike Johnson.

“Any member of the House or Senate who votes for this outrageous spending bill deserves to be voted out in 2 years,” Musk posted on X.

“Please call your elected representatives right away to tell them how you feel! They are trying to get this passed today while no one is paying attention,” Musk continued.

Republican Rep. Ralph Norman of South Carolina said that any member who supports the Trump-formed Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) efforts — which is led by Musk — should be opposed to this stopgap bill.

“Any Member who claims to support the @DOGE should not support this ‘CR of Inefficiency’ that does not have offsets!!” Norman said in his own post on X. “Don’t get weak in the knees before we even get started!”

In order to pass under suspension, Johnson will need roughly ninety members of his own conference to support it.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Sen. Marco Rubio — President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to be the top US diplomat’s successor — for a “constructive and substantive conversation” on Wednesday, State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel said.

It was Blinken’s first time meeting in person with the Florida Republican since his selection. The two previously spoke by phone.

Patel did not go into further details about the meeting, but he did say it was one-on-one. He reiterated the State Department’s commitment “to help support a seamless transition.”

Unless TikTok wins its appeal to the US Supreme Court or is sold, the app could be banned in America on January 19 due to national security concerns because of a law signed in April.

But, President-elect Donald Trump — who wanted to ban TikTok back in 2020 — could be an unlikely savior.

Here’s how Trump might be able to do so:

Incoming Senate Finance Committee Chairman Mike Crapo wouldn’t comment on Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s vaccine skepticism, but said Wednesday he supports President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Health and Human Services Department.

Asked by CNN if he has any concerns about Kennedy’s views on vaccines, Crapo — who met with Kennedy on Tuesday and whose committee will have primary jurisdiction over the nomination, responded — “I don’t discuss private conversations.”

Pressed further on Kennedy’s false claims that vaccines could be linked to childhood autism, Crapo again dodged, saying he wouldn’t “respond to quotes that other people have said” until he can verify them.

Crapo, who will lead the panel central to confirming Kennedy, said he supports him for the position and thinks “he’s going to be a very good leader to help us move to developing healthy lifestyles and helping the American people get control over an out-of-control bureaucracy.”

He wouldn’t weigh in on when the panel will schedule a hearing on Kennedy, saying “that depends on all kinds of factors that I don’t know the answer to yet.”

GOP Sen. Roger Wicker, the incoming chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told CNN that his panel will hold its confirmation hearing for President-elect Donald Trump’s defense secretary pick Pete Hegseth on January 14.

A group of Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee has argued in a new letter that claims against Hegseth disqualify him as defense secretary.

“We write to express deep concerns about whether Pete Hegseth’s attitudes toward women, including allegations of sexual assault and harassment, disqualify him to be the next Secretary of Defense,” the Democrats, led by Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, wrote Tuesday in a letter to Susie Wiles, Trump’s incoming chief of staff.

CNN’s Rashard Rose and Morgan Rimmer contributed to this report.

In this photo illustration, the TikTok app is seen in the app store on a phone on March 13 in New York City.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to decide whether a controversial ban on the social media app TikTok violates the First Amendment, adding a major case to its docket this term just before President-elect Donald Trump takes office.

The high court agreed to expedite the case and hear arguments on January 10.

TikTok’s appeal to the Supreme Court will thrust the justices into a high-profile fight between Congress, which has cited national security concerns over China’s control of the app, and the platform’s users and executives, who argue that the ban violates the First Amendment.

What makes this decision different: Underscoring the significance of the case over TikTok’s fate, the court’s handling of the social media company’s appeal was unusual — and unusually fast.

In most cases — even emergency cases — the court reviews written briefings from both sides before deciding whether to hear arguments on its regular docket. In this case, it dispensed with that procedure and agreed to hear the appeal immediately.

In announcing it will hear arguments over the constitutionality of the law banning TikTok unless it divests from Chinese ownership, the court also said it was deferring its consideration of whether to temporarily block the ban until the day of oral arguments, suggesting the justices could issue a ruling in the case mere days before the law is set to take effect on January 19.

Remember: Congress passed the ban with bipartisan support earlier this year, and President Joe Biden signed it into law in April. It came in response to years of concern in Washington that TikTok’s Chinese parent-company poses a national security risk.

Trump met with the head of TikTok at his Mar-a-Lago club Monday afternoon, a person familiar with the meeting told CNN. Earlier in the day, he said he had a “warm spot” for the app.

First lady Jill Biden deliver remarks in the East Room of the White House on October 16 in Washington, DC.

First lady Jill Biden announced this week that she taught her final class at the Virginia college where she has worked teaching English and writing for 15 years.

During a virtual holiday thank-you event for teachers on Monday, Biden announced she finished her last class at Northern Virginia Community College the previous week.

Biden started teaching at the community college in 2009, when she was second lady. She continued teaching through her husband’s administration, making her the only first lady to hold a professional career separate from the White House.

Biden has been a teacher for about 40 years.

Former Rep. Matt Gaetz conceded that his previous behavior that is at the center of a House Ethics Committee report was “embarrassing, though not criminal.”

In a post on X in response to CNN’s reporting on Wednesday that the committee has voted to release the report, Gaetz emphasized that he was “FULLY EXONERATED” by a separate Department of Justice probe.

And he said he “NEVER had sexual contact with someone under 18” — a claim that is addressed in the House Ethics report, CNN has previously reported.

Gaetz has previously vigorously denied all the allegations and has characterized the investigation as a witch hunt.

He was President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for attorney general before withdrawing his name from consideration.

Donald Trump is stoking political mayhem in Canada by intensifying a crisis that threatens to oust Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

The president-elect’s bullying of an embattled political foe, whom he mocks as the governor of the 51st state in an insult to America’s loyal northern neighbor, is a preview of a belligerent strategy as he scours the globe for big second-term wins before even taking office.

And his willingness to plunge into an ally’s domestic politics ought to be a warning to other strife-torn governments in places like France, Germany and South Korea, where political chaos and internal divides could make it hard to fight back.

Trump’s threat to impose 25% tariffs on Canadian goods to coerce action from Ottawa on border issues saddled Trudeau with fears of a profound recession ahead of an election year which will dawn with him in deep trouble.

It also represents an extraordinarily hardline approach to a nation that has deep diplomatic, cultural and familial ties to the United States, is one half of one of the world’s most lucrative trading relationships and that sent its troops to die in defense of its ally after the September 11 terror attacks in 2001.

Read Collinson’s full analysis here.

US representative Matt Gaetz (R-FL) attends the second day of the 2024 Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on July 16, 2024. Days after he survived an assassination attempt Donald Trump won formal nomination as the Republican presidential candidate and picked right-wing loyalist J.D. Vance for running mate, kicking off a triumphalist party convention in the wake of last weekend's failed assassination attempt.

The House Ethics Committee secretly voted earlier this month to release its report into the conduct of former Rep. Matt Gaetz before the end of this Congress, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the matter.

The report is now expected to be made public after the House’s final day of votes this year as lawmakers leave Washington for the holidays, those sources said.

The vote, which has not previously been reported, amounts to a stark reversal for the panel after it had voted along party lines in late November not to release the results of the investigation. The decision to release the report suggests that some Republicans ultimately decided to side with Democrats on the matter, and it is unclear if the committee will once again change course now that it has voted.

Remember: When the committee voted last month to shelve the report, Gaetz was President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to be attorney general. Since then, Gaetz withdrew himself from consideration for the Senate-confirmed post, though he maintains frosty relations with many in his party and is still active in GOP politics.

The Ethics Committee’s report concludes a years-long probe into numerous allegations against Gaetz, including whether he engaged in sexual misconduct, used illicit drugs, “shared inappropriate images or videos on the House floor, misused state identification records, converted campaign funds to personal use, and/or accepted a bribe, improper gratuity, or impermissible gifts,” according to an announcement by the panel last summer.

Gaetz did not immediately respond to a request for comment on this story. He has vigorously denied all the allegations.

Read more about the vote and allegations against Gaetz.

President-elect Donald Trump promised mass deportation on the campaign trail, and while the scale of it remains vague, the elements of the plan are an unlikely call back to former President Barack Obama who was billed the “deporter-in-chief” by Democrats and immigrant advocates.

While Trump’s allies have floated draconian measures to detain and deport people residing in the US illegally, the plans are, in many ways, consistent with the way Immigration and Customs Enforcement has often carried out operations. And the person at the helm is Tom Homan, a veteran of immigration law enforcement who served under the Obama administration and has been tapped by Trump to serve as border czar.

“He’s going to have to do more draconian things to do a million deportations in a year,” Sandweg said.

Trump has previously cited the Eisenhower administration’s wide-scale deportation program, an aggressive and unprecedented sweep that resulted in the mass deportation of undocumented immigrants. A program like that would mark a dramatic shift in interior enforcement compared to recent years.

But publicly, Trump aides have described a plan that emulates previous administrations.

Read more here on how Trump’s deportation plan shares several similarities with tactics used by Obama.

As Wednesday gets underway on Capitol Hill, here’s a recap of what you might have missed on Tuesday.

• RFK Jr. questions continue: Senators and congressmen continue to question Trump’s choice for Health and Human Services secretary, Robert Kennedy Jr. On Tuesday, Louisiana GOP Sen. John Kennedy said his mind is “open” to the prospect, but he still has a lot of questions. Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand also said she was open to supporting RFK Jr.

• Gabbard returns to Hill: Trump’s choice for director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, told CNN she’s “having great conversations” as she entered the office of GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who has expressed skepticism about some of Trump’s choices. Earlier Tuesday, Gabbard met with Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff, the first Senate Democrat to meet with Trump’s DNI pick. She is also expected to meet with Democratic Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman this week as well.

• 2025 Senate calendar: The new administration will get quickly to work next year, with incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune saying he has prepared an “aggressive” Senate calendar — with Friday votes, weekend work and few recesses at the beginning of the new Congress.

• Trump rails against Merchan: Donald Trump on Tuesday railed against Judge Juan Merchan after he ruled on Monday that president-elect’s hush money conviction should not be dismissed because of the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity decision.

• Funding deal reached: Lawmakers unveiled a stopgap spending bill on Tuesday night to prevent a shutdown that funds the government through March 14. The deal would avert a lame duck showdown, instead punting major spending decisions to the incoming Trump administration.

• Connolly defeats AOC: Democratic Rep. Gerry Connolly deflected a challenge from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and will be the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee next Congress, according to multiple sources in the room.

• New administration pick: Trump has named former NFL star Herschel Walker as his pick to be the US ambassador to the Bahamas.

• Trump lawsuit: The president-elect is escalating his legal campaign against media outlets by suing renowned pollster J. Ann Selzer, her polling firm, The Des Moines Register newspaper and its parent company Gannett.

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY), Vice Chairwoman of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, participates in the last public meeting in the Canon House Office Building on Capitol Hill on December 19, 2022 in Washington, DC.

Wrapping up their own investigation on the January 6, 2021 US Capitol attack, House Republicans have concluded GOP former Rep. Liz Cheney should be prosecuted for probing what happened when then-President Donald Trump sent his mob of supporters as Congress was certifying the 2020 election.

The findings issued Tuesday show the Republican Party working to reinforce Trump’s desire to punish his perceived enemies, including Cheney and members of the January 6 committee that the president-elect has said should be in jail.

Trump suggested in a 3 a.m. ET social media post that Cheney could face legal consequences based on evidence gathered by the GOP subcommittee.

House Administration Committee Chairman Barry Loudermilk, a Republican from Georgia, wrote, “Until we hold accountable those responsible, and reform our institutions, we will not fully regain trust.”

The panel Republicans’ 128-page interim report arrives as Trump is preparing his return to the White House and working to staff his administration with officials at the highest levels, including Kash Patel as FBI director, who appear like-minded in his efforts at retribution. Trump has also vowed to pardon people who were convicted for roles in the riot at the Capitol.

Keep reading.

Pete Hegseth walks with his wife after a meeting in the Russell Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on December 17.

A group of Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee has argued in a new letter that allegations against Pete Hegseth should disqualify him from serving as the next defense secretary.

Hegseth, who President-elect Donald Trump chose last month as his pick to run the Pentagon, has been on Capitol Hill in recent days in a bid to garner enough support from senators to earn confirmation to the role.

Hegseth, a veteran and former Fox News anchor, has faced a tough confirmation process as allegations emerged related to his workplace behavior and treatment of women, including a surfaced sexual assault accusation from 2017. Hegseth has denied wrongdoing, and no charges were brought over the 2017 allegation.

The group of Democrats also warned in the letter of the consequences of Hegseth’s previous comments that women should not serve in combat roles, which he has since attempted to clarify.

“Mr. Hegseth’s ill-informed views ignore the significant role women have played in combat roles for the United States of America. His dismissal of women as warfighters drives away both potential recruits and women who are already serving in the armed forces. At a time when DOD is struggling to build up military enlistments, Mr. Hegseth’s comments disqualify him to serve as the Secretary of Defense,” wrote the senators.

Herschel Walker during a rally on September 25, 2021 in Perry, Georgia.

President-elect Donald Trump has named Herschel Walker as his pick to be the US ambassador to the Bahamas.

Walker, who lost a bid for Senate in Georgia in 2022, has been a longtime Trump supporter.

Trump also announced Nicole McGraw has his choice to be ambassador to Croatia in a Truth Social post.

Lawmakers unveiled a massive spending bill that includes government funding through March 14 at current levels as well as a series of other legislative priorities from health care provisions to a bill that would allow NFL team, the Washington Commanders, to return to RFK stadium.

The bill also includes nearly $100 billion in disaster relief and another $10 billion in economic assistance for farmers, an issue that became a massive last-minute negotiation in the package.

The breakdown will include $29 billion for FEMA’s disaster relief fund, another $2.2 billion for the Small Business Administration’s disaster loan program, $21 billion in disaster relief for farmers including the $10 billion in economic assistance for farmers and $3.5 billion for state and tribal assistance grants to go toward water systems damaged in disasters.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) program for disaster relief will get $12 billion and the federal highway and roads disaster relief will total $8 billion.

The funding bill also has a huge win for the city of Washington as it seeks to become the future home of the Washington Commanders. After years of infighting, hill leaders allowed the team to negotiate with Washington, D.C., leaders to return to the site of RFK stadium. The provision came after hill leaders satisfied other demands from Maryland leaders including for the federal government to cover the full cost of the replacement of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore.

The legislation will also allow the US Treasury department to eventually recoup funds from any settlements related to the Key Bridge collapse to pay for the rebuilding.

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore has been in close contact with Democratic leaders as they landed the deal.