Supreme court rejects Trump ally’s bid to move Georgia election case; judge to decide fate of Trump’s criminal conviction – live | Donald Trump

Conservative justice Samuel Alito intends to continue serving on the supreme court, the Wall Street Journal reports, despite fears from liberals that the 74-year-old will soon step down and allow Donald Trump and the newly Republican-controlled Senate to confirm a younger replacement.

Such a decision by Alito could prolong the conservative dominance of the supreme court, where they have a six-justice supermajority and the liberals a three-justice minority. But the Journal says that Alito plans to stick around:

“Despite what some people may think, this is a man who has never thought about this job from a political perspective,” said one person close to Alito. “The idea that he’s going to retire for political considerations is not consistent with who he is.”

Trump’s election last week set off renewed discussions over the future of the Supreme Court, where the three eldest justices are in their 70s.

With Republicans set to take both the White House and Senate come January, there will be at least a two-year span when the GOP can fill vacancies without need of compromise with Democrats. Some Republicans have suggested that would be a good time for Alito, appointed in 2006 by President George W. Bush, and Justice Clarence Thomas, 76, a 1991 appointee of President George H.W. Bush, to step aside for younger nominees who could perpetuate the court’s conservative direction for decades to come.

A majority of Americans view the Supreme Court as politically motivated, public opinion surveys have shown. But across the ideological spectrum, the justices prefer to see themselves as standing apart from partisan politics, and Washington’s postelection chatter is proving irksome within the court, people familiar with the matter said.

The supreme court has turned down an effort by Donald Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows to move the Georgia election meddling case to federal court.

Meadows first made the petition earlier this year, after the supreme court ruled that presidents are immune from prosecution for official acts. The case brought by Atlanta-area district attorney Fani Willis against Meadows, Trump and more than a dozen others for allegedly plotting to overturn the results of the election in Georgia has since stalled, and it is unclear if it will continue now that Trump is headed back to the White House.

Here’s more about Meadows’s petition:

The GOP is on track to maintain its majority in the House of Representatives, even as Democrats managed to claim a hotly contested seat in the Los Angeles suburbs.

Yesterday, Republican congressman Mike Garcia conceded to his challenger George Whitesides in California’s 27th congressional district, flipping a district that Democrats have wanted to conquer for the past two elections. But it may not be enough to return the party to the majority in Congress’s lower chamber, and give them the ability to block Donald Trump’s legislative agenda.

The Associated Press reports that the GOP had won 214 seats in the House, four shy of the majority, while the Democrats have 205. Counting in 16 races is ongoing, many of which are swing seats where every vote will matter, but Republicans are generally seen as having the edge in several crucial races.

We’ll let you know if the AP calls any outstanding House races over the course of today.

Joe Biden is meeting with two foreign leaders at the White House today.

At 11.15am, he will speak with Israel’s president Isaac Herzog, then with Indonesia’s president Prabowo Subianto at 2pm.

Biden is also scheduled to have a private lunch with Kamala Harris around noon. The vice-president has no other meetings publicly scheduled.

Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, the Democratic former Florida congresswoman who mounted an unsuccessful bid to unseat Republican senator Rick Scott in last week’s election, had a few words for Marco Rubio as he heads to the state department.

“Congrats @marcorubio on your appointment as US Secretary of State. I’m sure in a few weeks, after January 20, you’ll finally take down Maduro’s narco-regime and free the Cuban people from Díaz-Canel’s communist dictatorship. It’s been all talk so far—let’s see if you’re actually ready to do something about it,” she wrote on X.

Those are references to Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro and Cuba’s president Miguel Díaz-Canel, both of whom leads governments Rubio is opposed to.

Mucarsel-Powell lost badly to Scott last week, picking up just under 43% of the vote to the Republican’s 55%, further confirming the strength of the Republican party in Florida.

Should Florida senator Marco Rubio become Donald Trump’s next secretary of state, Arkansas’s Tom Cotton is set to become the chair of the Senate intelligence committee, Punchbowl News reports.

Cotton, who is known for his hardline views on the US relationship with China, was seen as a potential contender for a cabinet post in a second Trump administration, but reportedly withdrew his name following the ex-president’s election victory.

Donald Trump is reportedly considering making North Dakota’s governor Doug Burgum his new “energy tsar”. The Financial Times were the first to report this on Friday. The outlet said that Burgum, who last year ran a short-lived campaign for the Republican nomination for president, is the president-elect’s preferred candidate for the role, though former energy secretary Dan Brouillette is also said to be a strong contender. The role and its powers have yet to be finalised but the FT reports that role would likely replace the “climate tsar” — or National Climate Advisor — established by the Biden administration. You can read more on Trump’s (potential) cabinet picks here.

As my colleagues Dharna Noor and Oliver Milman note in this story, Trump has pledged to deregulate the energy sector, allow the oil and gas industry to “drill, baby, drill”, and pull the US from the Paris climate agreement, which committed countries to taking steps to avoid the worst impacts of the crisis.

Vietnam’s Communist Party head To Lam has congratulated Donald Trump on his US presidential election victory in a phone call and the two discussed ways their countries could boost economic ties, according to the communist party.

The US is Vietnam’s largest export market, and the two countries upgraded their relationship to a comprehensive strategic partnership last September, the highest level in Vietnam’s ranking.

“Vietnam is ready to promote stable and long-term development of bilateral relations for the benefit of the people of the two countries,” Lam said during the call, which took place on Monday, according to a statement posted on the communist party’s website.

Lam stated that Vietnam is ready to promote the stable and long-term development of the bilateral ties for the sake of the two peoples, as well as for regional and global peace, cooperation, and sustainable development…

Trump expressed his satisfaction with the positive development in the bilateral relations, and affirmed the importance he attaches to the relationship with Vietnam, particularly economic cooperation. He highlighted specific areas of economic and trade collaboration that the US seeks to advance.

Last week, officials and supply chain experts told Reuters Vietnam could face trade volatility with a new Trump presidency, as it could become “collateral damage” of protectionist measures.

Both leaders invited the other to visit their country, according to the party statement.
Trump travelled to Vietnam twice in his first term as president, first to attend an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit and then for a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

My colleague Rachel Leingang has done a profile on Tom Homan, the former law enforcement official who has been selected to be in charge of the country’s borders following Trump’s inauguration in January. Here is an extract from her piece:

Homan has been describing mass deportation in stark terms for the past year, angling for a role in helping Trump with his signature campaign promise. Asked about the high price tag of a mass deportation, he turned the question back on 60 Minutes: “What price do you put on our national security? Is it worth it?” When the outlet followed up to ask if there was a way for mass deportations not to separate families with mixed immigration statuses, Homan responded: “Families can be deported together.”

It is a likely next step for a man who served as acting director of Ice for 16 months under Trump in what was seen as a period of intense controversy for the agency. The Atlantic documented how Homan was the “father” of the Trump administration’s family separation policy, tracing its roots to a 2014 meeting where Homan pushed the idea. He defended the policy to the outlet by saying: “The goal wasn’t to traumatize. The goal was to stop the madness, stop the death, stop the rape, stop the children dying, stop the cartels doing what they’re doing.”

This year, his speech to the Republican national convention started with a folksy “how you doin’” and a shoutout to New York, his home state. He then launched into an impassioned speech defending Trump and lambasting the Biden administration on immigration, saying Joe Biden’s policies were essentially “national suicide”.

“As a guy who spent 34 years deporting illegal aliens, I got a message to the millions of illegal aliens that Joe Biden’s released in our country in violation of federal law: you better start packing now – you’re damn right – because you’re going home,” he said, to raucous applause.

To the cartels in Mexico trafficking fentanyl, he said: “When President Trump gets back in office, he’s going to designate you a terrorist organization. He’s going to wipe you off the face of the earth. You’re done.”

The Republicans already have a majority in the Senate and need to win just a few seats to take control of the 435-member House (a party needs 218 seats to win a House majority). According to our latest tally, Republicans have 214 seats, while the Democrats have 205.

Keeping hold of the House would give Republicans sweeping powers to potentially enact a broad agenda of tax and spending cuts, energy deregulation and border security controls. As well as giving the party the power to initiate spending legislation, control of the House would allow Republicans to launch impeachment proceedings against officials.

Steve Bannon is due in court today ahead of his trial on criminal fraud charges over a push to fund Trump’s border wall, weeks after he was released from prison on a separate conviction. Bannon, the 70-year-old former Trump adviser, is scheduled to stand trial starting on 9 December in New York state court in Manhattan.

Prosecutors allege that he deceived donors who contributed more than $15 million in 2019 to a private fundraising drive to build a barrier along the US-Mexico border. Bannon has pleaded not guilty. He is set to appear for a final pretrial conference before acting justice April Newbauer at 2:15 pm EST (1915 GMT).

Last month, Bannon was released from prison, following a four-month sentence for defying a congressional subpoena in an investigation of the 6 January 2021 US Capitol attack.

Trump demands Senate allow him to circumvent hearings to appoint cabinet

Robert Tait

Robert Tait is a journalist based in Washington DC

Donald Trump has demanded that the three frontrunners to lead the Senate allow him to appoint officials to his new administration without confirmation hearings on Capitol Hill, as a future Republican government began to take shape the week after his election victory.

In a demonstration of his political muscle, the US president-elect urged support for “recess appointments”, which allow the president to make appointments while the Senate is temporarily paused, and can be used to circumvent the confirmation process, which can result in appointments being delayed or blocked.

The demand amounted to a full-frontal intervention in this week’s GOP’s election for a new Senate leader to replace Mitch McConnell, the party’s longtime leader who is retiring. The three men tipped to lead the Senate – Rick Scott, John Thune and John Cornyn – all quickly agreed to Trump’s request.

It also signalled Trump’s determination to press ahead with his agenda without being encumbered by congressional oversight, which is mandated by the US constitution.

You can read the full story here:

Good morning, and welcome to our US politics blog.

US President-elect Donald Trump announced several new members of his incoming administration on Monday, and is reportedly expected to name Marco Rubio – a one time challenger in the 2016 Republican presidential primaries – as secretary of state.

It comes as justice Juan Merchan, a New York judge, is set to decide later today whether Trump’s criminal conviction on charges involving hush money paid to a porn star should be overturned in light of the US Supreme Court’s July ruling on presidential immunity.

Meanwhile, officials at the US justice department are assessing how to wind down the two federal criminal cases brought against Trump by special counsel Jack Smith due to its longstanding policy against prosecuting a sitting president.

A separate case in Georgia involving state criminal charges concerning Trump’s efforts to overturn his 2020 presidential election loss remains in limbo.

We will give you more on the developments in the legal cases Trump faces when news breaks throughout the day.

Here are the main political appointments Trump has already made or is expected to announce shortly:

• The New York Times reports that Trump is expected to name Florida senator Marco Rubio his secretary of state. The paper cites three unnamed sources “familiar with [Trump’s] thinking”. Rubio has said that Ukraine needs to seek a negotiated settlement with Moscow rather than focus on regaining all territory that Russia has taken in the last decade. He was also one of 15 Republican senators to vote against a $95 billion military aid package for Ukraine, passed in April. Rubio serves as the vice-chairman of the Senate intelligence committee and sits on the foreign relations committee.

• The US president-elect has reportedly asked US Representative Michael Waltz, a retired Army National Guard officer and war veteran, to be his national security adviser. Waltz, regarded by many in Washington as hawkish on China and Iran, has also been a member of the intelligence and foreign affairs committees.

• Trump picked South Dakota governor Kristi Noem to serve as the next secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, CNN reported on Tuesday, citing two sources. The Department of Homeland Security is responsible for a range of issues, including border protection, immigration, disaster response and the US secret service. Noem, once seen as a possible running mate for Trump, made headlines after refusing to impose a statewide mask mandate during the pandemic.

• Trump announced that the former New York congressman Lee Zeldin will be selected to lead the Environmental Protection Agency. Trump, who oversaw the rollback of more than 100 environmental rules when he last was US president, said Zeldin was a “true fighter for America First policies” and that “he will ensure fair and swift deregulatory decisions”.

• Stephen Miller, the author of Trump’s so-called “Muslim ban” immigration policy during his first term, is set to be his deputy chief of staff with a broad portfolio.

• Trump said on Sunday that Tom Homan, the former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice), will be in charge of the country’s borders in his new administration. Homan told Fox News: “If sanctuary cities don’t want to help us, then get the hell out of the way, because we’re coming.”

• New York Congresswoman Elise Stefanik, 40, has been made ambassador to the United Nations. Stefanik, a Trump-skeptic turned Trump-ally, is the House Republican Conference chair, making her the fourth-ranking House Republican.

• On Thursday, Trump made his first appointment, naming Susie Wiles, who has worked on Republican campaigns since the days of Ronald Reagan, White House chief of staff. She was previously the campaign manager for his victorious bid for re-election.