December 16, 2024 - Presidential transition news

Our live coverage of the Trump administration’s transition has ended for the day. Follow the latest updates or read through the posts below.

David Hogg speaks during the Texas Democratic Party Convention in El Paso, Texas, on Friday, June 7.

David Hogg, an activist and a 2018 Parkland school shooting survivor who is running for vice chair of the Democratic National Committee, said Monday night the Democratic Party is comprised of “consultants and sycophants.”

Asked what he would tell people that say he lacks experience, Hogg said, “Well, look at the results that we’ve had so far with the purported people that are experienced.”

Hogg’s candidacy comes as Democrats seek to chart a new path forward after devastating losses in the 2024 election. DNC members will vote on a new party chair and several other executive positions at their Winter Meeting on February 1 – the first competitive contest to lead the party since 2017.

The 24-year-old said he has been working for the past seven years “on building a 30 year plan for the Democratic Party of young, of investment in young people so that we build the future of this party and the future of this country with talented and effective leaders that got the experience that they needed young to become the leaders that we’ve always deserved but have never had enough of.”

He was one of several Parkland students who rose to prominence in the wake of the devastating 2018 school shooting, issuing calls for gun safety legislation, and he has since helped to form several liberal advocacy groups, including the gun safety group March For Our Lives, and another organization, called Leaders We Deserve, aimed at boosting young candidates for office.

CNN’s David Wright contributed to this report.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. leaves a meeting in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on Monday, December 16, in Washington, DC.

Several GOP senators on Monday said they would press Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to fully explain his views and intentions about vaccines before deciding whether to support him — highlighting the work that lies ahead for President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to lead the Department of Health and Human Services.

Kennedy is trying to tamp down concerns about his history of vaccine skepticism as he meets with Republican senators who will vote on whether to confirm him as HHS secretary, telling reporters on Capitol Hill on Monday that he is “all for the polio vaccine.”

The comment follows reports that a lawyer affiliated with Kennedy has petitioned the US Food and Drug Administration to revoke approval of the polio vaccine used in the United States.

Asked about Kennedy saying he supports the polio vaccine, Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a key centrist Republican who will meet Kennedy this week, said, “I haven’t heard that. But then I guess it begs the question: is it just that one vaccine or kind of where is it coming from more broadly?”

She continued: “So, those are the conversations that I think are important for me to have with him, because I do think that vaccines save lives.”

Sen. Thom Tillis, who sits on the health committee, said he wants to give Kennedy the opportunity to explain his views on vaccines.

“If they are as reported, of course,” the North Carolina Republican said when asked if he was concerned by what he’s heard.

“I think it’s hard to dispute that vaccines are probably one of the key factors behind our life expectancies and eliminating scourges that killed millions of people before vaccine,” he added.

Earlier Monday, Trump said he’s a “big believer in polio vaccines” amid questions about Kennedy’s view on the crucial inoculation that has existed in the US for nearly seven decades.

Read more about Kennedy’s history with vaccines and senators’ reactions here.

Rep. Victoria Spartz speaks during a news conference on May 01, in Washington, DC.

GOP Rep. Victoria Spartz said Monday that she will not sit on committees or participate in the House Republican caucus as a result of what she described as the “circuses” of House GOP leadership.

The move, announced on social media, signals the challenges ahead for House Speaker Mike Johnson who has to navigate a very slim majority in the chamber next term.

The Indiana lawmaker, who is known to waffle on key votes and positions, made the announcement after she did not get appointed to serve on the House Ways and Means Committee, two sources told CNN.

Spartz said she will stay registered as a Republican.

Judge Juan Merchan wrote Monday that Donald Trump’s hush money conviction should not be dismissed because of the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity decision, ruling that the evidence presented by the Manhattan district attorney’s office was not related to Trump’s official actions as president.

The judge did not, however, rule Monday on a motion from Trump’s attorneys to dismiss the conviction because Trump has now been elected president. Instead, his 41-page decision focused on the question of presidential immunity.

Merchan wrote that the evidence contested by Trump’s lawyers related “entirely to unofficial conduct” and should receive no immunity protections.

Trump’s transition team responded to the ruling on Monday, claiming in a statement that it violates the Supreme Court’s ruling on immunity and that Trump must be allowed to execute the duties of the presidency “unobstructed by the remains of this, or any other, Witch Hunt.”

Read more about Merchan’s ruling.

President-elect Donald Trump announced a slate of new ambassador picks Monday night.

He named Leah Campos as his pick for US ambassador to the Dominican Republic, Arthur Fisher for Austria, Stacey Feinberg for Luxembourg, George Glass for Japan and Lou Rinaldi for Uruguay.

Campos, Trump highlighted, is a former CIA case officer and senior adviser for the House Foreign Affairs Committee. She is also the sister of “Fox & Friends Weekend” co-host Rachel Campos-Duffy, whose husband, former Republican Rep. Sean Duffy, is Trump’s choice for Transportation secretary.

Fisher is the president of a real estate firm in North Carolina, while Feinberg, an investor and broadway producer, has donated to Republicans and various Trump-associated PACs, according to the Federal Election Commission.

Glass, a businessman from Oregon, served as ambassador to Portugal during Trump’s first term. Rinaldi, who Trump called a “longtime friend,” grew up in a Uruguay, according to the president-elect’s announcement.

This 2017 handout photo released by the South Korean Defense Ministry shows a US Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) firing a missile into the East Sea during a South Korea-US joint missile drill.

White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby pushed back against comments from President-elect Donald Trump earlier Monday that he thought the Biden administration shouldn’t have been allowed to authorize Ukraine’s use of US-supplied long-range missiles inside Russia, telling reporters during a virtual gaggle the decision to do so was made before Trump was elected in November.

Earlier Monday, during a Mar-a-Lago news conference with reporters, Trump lamented the administration’s decision, telling reporters, “I don’t think they should have allowed missiles to be shot 200 miles into Russia – I think that was a bad thing.”

“I don’t think that should have been allowed, not when there’s a possibility, and certainly not just weeks before I take over,” Trump added. “Why would they do that without asking me what I thought?”

During Monday’s gaggle, Kirby insisted that, in the weeks since November’s election, the Biden administration has “had the appropriate level of conversations with the incoming team about various national security issues, including the war in Ukraine -– to explain what we’re doing, what we’re seeing, why we’re doing it, so that… there should be no decision we are taking or that we have taken in recent weeks that should come as a surprise to them.”

Rep. Gerry Connolly prepares to give a television interview on Capitol Hill on December 12.

Virginia Rep. Gerry Connolly narrowly won a recommendation from his colleagues to lead Democrats on the House Oversight panel over New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, but she is expected to appeal the decision before the full House Democratic caucus on Tuesday, three sources told CNN.

Connolly had 34 votes and AOC had 27 votes, two of the sources said.

Even though the steering committee chose Connolly for the coveted spot, that position could be overruled on Tuesday in a rare reversal by the full caucus.

“I feel good. I’m locked in, I just got to work to land the plane,” Ocasio-Cortez said ahead of tomorrow’s vote.

Democrats also voted on other contested committee ranking member races in their closed-door meeting.

California Rep. Jared Huffman beat New Mexico Rep. Melanie Stansbury to lead Democrats on the Natural Resources Committee and Rep. Angie Craig of Minnesota unseated two more senior House Democrats to lead her party on the Agriculture Committee, multiple sources told CNN.

CNN’s Haley Talbot contributed to this report.

In this November 2023 photo, Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos attends The Netflix Cup at Wynn Las Vegas Golf on November 14, 2023 in Las Vegas.

President-elect Donald Trump is scheduled to meet with Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos on Tuesday at Mar-a-Lago, a source familiar with the meeting told CNN.

The visit comes as Trump has met with the CEOs of major companies in recent weeks, including Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Alphabet Inc.’s co-founder Sergey Brin.

On Monday, Trump met with TikTok CEO Shou Chew at his Florida home, just hours after the president-elect suggested he might reverse course on the impending ban on the social media app TikTok in the United States.

Trump is also scheduled to meet with Amazon founder Jeff Bezos at Mar-a-Lago on Wednesday.

Shou Zi Chew, CEO of TikTok, departs from the Russell Senate Office Building on March 14, in Washington, DC.

President-elect Donald Trump is meeting with TikTok CEO Shou Chew at his Mar-a-Lago Club this afternoon, a person familiar with the meeting told CNN.

The pre-scheduled meeting comes hours after Trump suggested he might reverse course on the impending ban on the social media app TikTok in the United States.

“You know, I have a warm spot in my heart for TikTok because I won youth by 34 points and there are those that say that TikTok has something to do with it,” Trump said at a news conference earlier Monday. (Trump lost 18-29-year-old voters to Vice President Kamala Harris by 11 points, according to exit polls.)

The platform is one step closer to facing a ban on January 19 unless it can convince Chinese parent-company ByteDance to sell and find a buyer. On Monday, TikTok asked the Supreme Court to temporarily block the ban.

The TikTok CEO has been trying to meet with Trump since he got elected. He was seen at Mar-a-Lago in early December, but this is believed to be the first time they have met since Trump won in November, another person told CNN.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. arrives to meet with US Senators on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on December 16.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, said he supports the polio vaccine as he arrived on Capitol Hill to begin meeting with senators Monday.

“I’m all for the polio vaccine,” he told reporters.

He ignored other questions about school vaccine mandates, his past false statements linking vaccines to autism and his views on abortion.

Some background: CNN previously reported a lawyer affiliated with Kennedy, a vaccine skeptic, has petitioned the US Food and Drug Administration to revoke approval of the polio vaccine used in the United States.

Earlier Monday, Trump said he’s a “big believer in polio vaccines” amid questions about Kennedy’s view on the crucial inoculation that has existed in the US for nearly seven decades.

President-elect Donald Trump made numerous false claims in a Monday news conference at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida.

Trump also offered a noncommittal reply when he was asked whether he believes there is a connection between vaccines and autism, saying that “right now, you have some very brilliant people looking at it” and that “we’re looking to find out.” Vaccines do not cause autism; the notion of a link between the two has been thoroughly disproven.

Here are some of the false claims Trump made at the Monday event.

Migrants, prisoners and “the Congo”: Trump repeated his false claim that foreign leaders are “releasing prisoners from jails all over the world” to let criminals come to the US as migrants, specifically saying “the Congo” is “a very big sender of people.”

Experts say there is no evidence for these claims, which Trump’s own presidential campaign was unable to corroborate, and both the Democratic Republic of Congo and the neighboring Republic of Congo have told CNN that it is false.

Tariffs on China: Trump repeated two of his regular false claims about tariffs on imported Chinese products. He falsely claimed the US took in hundreds of billions of dollars in tariffs “from China” during his presidency, then falsely claimed that before his presidency, “no other president took in 10 cents, not 10 cents.”

The US was generating billions per year in revenue from tariffs on China before Trump took office; in fact, the US has had tariffs on Chinese imports since the 1700s. Second, US importers pay these tariffs, not China, and they often pass on some or all of the cost to consumers. Study after study has found that Americans bore the overwhelming majority of the cost of Trump’s tariffs.

Read more of our fact check here.

Rep. Jared Moskowitz speaks during a press conference on December 13, 2023 in Washington, DC.

Rep. Jared Moskowitz, a Florida Democrat, is a top contender to lead the Federal Emergency Management Agency in Donald Trump’s incoming administration, two people with knowledge of the president-elect’s consideration told CNN.

Another person close to the Trump transition team confirmed Moskowitz is in the mix.

It was not immediately clear whether Moskowitz and Trump had met to discuss the role, but several people described the Florida congressman as a strong candidate. If appointed, he would be the highest-ranking Democrat in the Trump administration.

Moskowitz did not immediately respond to a voicemail request for comment.

Since Trump won election, Moskowitz has taken a notably friendlier approach to the incoming administration than some of his Democratic colleagues. He was quick to offer praise on social media when Trump tapped another Florida native, Susie Wiles, as chief of staff. Moskowitz has a close relationship with Wiles from their time working in Florida politics, a source familiar with the dynamic told CNN.

He is also the first Democrat to join the recently created Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, caucus in Congress, a group formed around billionaire Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy’s mandate from Trump to cut government spending and regulations.

Moskowitz was recently elected to serve a second term in the US House, where he represents South Florida’s Broward County. Last year, Moskowitz introduced legislation to make FEMA a Cabinet-level post that reports directly to the president.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. takes the stage during a campaign rally in Warren, Michigan, on November 1.

A group boosting Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, is touting the support of hundreds of doctors ahead of crucial meetings with Senators on Capitol Hill this week.

Some of the noteworthy signatories include Dr. Mehmet Oz, Trump’s pick to serve as administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services; Dr. Casey Means, a bestselling author focused on nutrition and chronic disease prevention; and Dr. Jeff Vacirca, a cancer doctor and the CEO and chairman of the board of New York Cancer & Blood Specialists.

The letter, addressed to the Senate, notably does not mention the word “vaccine” but instead lists Kennedy’s policy priorities as “removing harmful substances from our food, water, and medicines.”

Some background: Kennedy, a former independent presidential candidate, is seeking to woo senators as he begins meetings in Washington this week.

While Democrats have voiced persistent concern about his long history of spreading false information about the safety of vaccines, some have shown openness to his other arguments as it relates to challenging Big Pharma and taking on the corporate agriculture industry.

CNN has previously reported about worries among many in the medical profession over Trump’s selection of Kennedy.

The State Department will have “initial conversations … about the path forward” with the incoming Trump administration’s agency review team at the department Monday, according to a spokesperson.

“We will reiterate to them, as we have been reiterating publicly for some time, that we stand ready to do everything that we can to support a successful transition,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said at a news briefing.

Miller said the initial meeting will focus more on logistics, “because people come in and they want to know what resources are available to them.”

“Oftentimes, they have requests for information that they put to the incoming administration, and they will prioritize what is most important, so this is an initial meeting about how the process should unfold over the coming weeks,” he said.

Miller said Secretary of State Antony Blinken and President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the department, Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, have planned to meet in person, but he did not have a date for that meeting.

Tulsi Gabbard arrives for a meeting at the Hart Senate Office Building on December 10, in Washington, DC.

President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the US intelligence community, Tulsi Gabbard, is expected to meet this week with her first Democrat on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Sen. Jon Ossoff of Georgia, a source familiar with the matter said.

Gabbard is also planning to meet with Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania this week.

Gabbard has drawn scrutiny over her public adoption of positions on Syria and the war in Ukraine that many national security officials see as Russian propaganda. The source said she has been asked about her controversial 2017 trip to Syria and meeting with then-President al-Bashar Assad, which Gabbard has defended as an effort to bring peace to the country.

As she seeks to shore up support among lawmakers, Gabbard has discussed with some how to potentially readjust briefings so there is more raw intelligence provided to Capitol Hill, rather than just finished products and assessments by analysts.

Gabbard, a former Democratic congresswoman, has also discussed her goal of reducing what she sees as bloat by bringing the Office of the Director of National Intelligence back to its original role of a coordinator between the intelligence agencies, the source said.

The current director of national intelligence, Avril Haines, and Gabbard have spoken but have not met in person, the source said.

Ossoff will also meet with Rep. Doug Collins, Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Veterans Affairs, and John Ratcliffe, Trump’s pick for CIA director, a source familiar with the meetings said.

CNN has reached out to the offices of Ossoff and Fetterman.

This post has been updated with additional reporting.

CNN’s Morgan Rimmer contributed to this post.

A United States Postal Service person delivers mail on September 12 in Miami Beach, Florida.

President-elect Donald Trump said Monday that privatizing the US Postal Service is “not the worst idea I’ve ever heard” as the agency grapples with multibillion-dollar losses.

“It’s an idea that a lot of people have liked for a long time,” Trump said at a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. “We’re looking at it.”

The remarks come after Trump met with US Postmaster Louis DeJoy at Mar-a-Lago earlier this month to discuss the Postal Service’s dire finances, a person familiar with the meeting told CNN.

In the meeting, DeJoy discussed with Trump and his advisers financial reforms the Postal Service has made to try to balance its books, the source said.

The Postal Service’s financial struggles make it a prime target for Trump allies trying to slash government spending. Elon Musk, the tech billionaire who has Trump’s ear, has endorsed privatizing USPS.

But there is concern within the Postal Service about the effect that any privatization effort would have on the agency’s ability to deliver mail to rural areas and that it could undermine the trust Americans place in the agency, sources familiar with the matter told CNN.

Asked about DeJoy’s Mar-a-Lago meeting, a USPS spokesperson told CNN: “We are part of the executive branch and it’s appropriate for us to meet with the incoming administration during the transition.”

This 2004 photo shows then-North Carolina Court of Appeals Judge James Wynn in Raleigh, North Carolina. Wynn, now a federal appeals court judge appointed by President Barack Obama, has withdrawn his intention to retire from the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.

A federal appeals court judge has withdrawn his intention to retire, depriving President-elect Donald Trump of the ability to make an influential circuit court nomination and enraging Senate Republicans.

James Wynn of the 4th Circuit marks the third federal judge appointed by Democratic presidents to decide against retirement after Trump’s reelection.

Wynn, an appointee of President Barack Obama, told the White House late last week that he was reversing his plans to take senior status, the semiretired status that allows a president to confirm a replacement, according to a letter posted Saturday by Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican.

After Wynn said early this year that he intended to leave active service, President Joe Biden had put forward North Carolina Solicitor General Ryan Park as a replacement.

As a part of a deal with the Senate GOP last month, Democrats agreed not to try to confirm Park and three other circuit court nominees, and in exchange, Republicans would clear the way for several Biden nominees for lower district courts to be voted on.

Tillis, in a statement Saturday, pointed to that agreement while calling Wynn’s reversal a “slap in the face.”

Read more here.

President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team for the Defense Department is expected to arrive at the Pentagon on Monday for their first in-person visit, a defense official said.

The official said earlier on Monday that the Defense Agency Review Team is expected to arrive “later this morning or early afternoon,” though that timing is subject to change. At this point, the official said, the Trump transition team has not signed a memorandum of understanding with the General Services Administration, which means they will not be provided government-issues equipment, like computers or laptops, and they will not have official government email addresses.

“The Trump transition team will still be allowed to enter the Pentagon and utilize the spaces that have been set aside for their use,” the official said.

The Pentagon and Trump transition team started talks on Friday, CNN previously reported, when the DoD transition team lead spoke with Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks.

President-elect Donald Trump is scheduled to meet with Amazon founder Jeff Bezos sometime this week, he said during a news conference at Mar-a-Lago Monday.

“We do have Jeff Bezos — Amazon — coming in sometime during the week,” Trump said. “I’m looking forward to that.” His remarks came as he was discussing how several prominent tech figures, including Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Apple’s Tim Cook, have met with him since his election.

CNN previously reported that Amazon plans to donate $1 million toward Trump’s inauguration. Zuckerberg’s Meta is making a similar contribution.

Bezos also owns The Washington Post. The publication’s decision not to endorse a presidential candidate this election cycle sent that newsroom into turmoil and caused staffers to accuse their billionaire owner of trying to curry favor with Trump.