Politics Election category, Page 73
Police report reveals assault allegations against Pete Hegseth, Trump’s pick for defense secretary
SANTA CRUZ, Calif. — A woman told police that she was sexually assaulted in 2017 by Pete Hegseth after he took her phone, blocked the door to a California hotel room and refused to let her leave, according to a detailed investigative report made public late Wednesday. Hegseth, a former...
Trump chooses Pam Bondi for attorney general pick after Gaetz withdraws
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump on Thursday named Pam Bondi, the former attorney general of Florida, to be U.S. attorney general just hours after his other choice, Matt Gaetz, withdrew his name from consideration. Bondi is a longtime Trump ally and was one of his lawyers during his first impeachment...
Bob Casey concedes to Dave McCormick in Pa. Senate race
Democratic incumbent U.S. Sen. Bob Casey has conceded to Republican rival Dave McCormick. The three-term senator announced his concession in a statement shortly after 6 p.m. Thursday. McCormick defeated Casey by more than 16,000 votes in the tightest margin of Casey’s career and one of the most competitive Pennsylvania Senate...
Republicans rally around Pete Hegseth, Trump’s Pentagon pick, as Gaetz withdraws for attorney generalVideo
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump’s allies on Capitol Hill rallied around Pete Hegseth, Trump’s Pentagon pick, on Thursday even as new details surfaced about allegations that he had sexually assaulted a woman in 2017. The GOP embrace of Hegseth came as another controversial Trump nominee, Matt Gaetz, withdrew from consideration...
Elon Musk’s budget crusade could cause a constitutional clash in Trump’s 2nd term
WASHINGTON — When Elon Musk first suggested a new effort to cut the size of government, Donald Trump didn’t seem to take it seriously. His eventual name for the idea sounded like a joke too. It would be called the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, a reference to an...
Rep. Greene to helm new ‘DOGE’ subcommittee in House
WASHINGTON — Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene announced Thursday she will chair a new House Oversight subcommittee to work with President-elect Donald Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency to cut spending and streamline government. The new subcommittee, created by House Oversight and Accountability Chairman James R. Comer, R-Ky., would hunt for...
Georgia AG Chris Carr launches Republican bid in 2026 governor’s race
ATLANTA — Georgia’s Republican attorney general, Chris Carr, said Thursday that he’s running for governor in 2026, becoming the first major candidate from either party to announce a bid. Prominent Republicans and Democrats are eyeing the seat, which will be open in two years after term-limited Republican Gov. Brian Kemp...
Gaetz withdraws as Trump’s pick for attorney general
WASHINGTON — Matt Gaetz withdrew Thursday as President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for attorney general following continued scrutiny over a federal sex trafficking investigation that cast doubt on his ability to be confirmed as the nation’s chief federal law enforcement officer. The abrupt withdrawal is a setback to Trump’s push to...
Republicans on the House Ethics Committee reject releasing report on Matt Gaetz
WASHINGTON — Republicans on the House Ethics Committee voted Wednesday against releasing a report on the panel’s long-running investigation into President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for attorney general, former Rep. Matt Gaetz, the top Democrat on the panel said. Rep. Susan Wild of Pennsylvania said the ethics panel, which is evenly...
Ex-federal prosecutors in Pittsburgh weigh in on attorney general nominee Matt Gaetz
Robert Cindrich served as the federal government’s top prosecutor in Pittsburgh during the Jimmy Carter administration. He took over the U.S. Attorney’s Office a few years after Dick Thornburgh, who later went on to be a Republican governor of Pennsylvania and attorney general of the United States. To Cindrich, who...
Recount begins in McCormick-Casey Senate race
Election workers in Allegheny County on Wednesday joined their counterparts across the state as they launched a legally mandated recount in Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate race. About 100 workers began processing hundreds of thousands of ballots on scanning machines at a warehouse on Pittsburgh’s North Side. Abigail Gardner, spokeswoman for Allegheny...
Trump chooses former acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker as NATO ambassador
WASHINGTON — Donald Trump says he has chosen former acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker to serve as U.S. ambassador to NATO, the bedrock Western alliance that the president-elect has expressed skepticism about for years. Trump, in a statement, said Whitaker was “a strong warrior and loyal Patriot” who “will ensure...
Battle over mail ballots in Pennsylvania is latest example of messy disputes over election rules
HARRISBURG — The recount underway in Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate race marks the end of a chaotic post-election period that has become the latest example of how disputed election rules can expose weak points in a core function of American democracy. The ballot-counting process in the race between incumbent Democratic Sen....
Trump has called for dismantling the Education Department. Here’s what that would mean
WASHINGTON — Throughout his campaign, President-elect Donald Trump heaped scorn on the federal Department of Education, describing it as being infiltrated by ”radicals, zealots and Marxists.” He has picked Linda McMahon, a former wrestling executive, to lead the department. But like many conservative politicians before him, Trump has called for...
Trump’s casting call as he builds out his administration: TV experience preferred
WASHINGTON — There’s a common trait that President-elect Donald Trump is clearly prizing as he selects those to serve in his new administration: experience on television. Trump loves that “central casting” look, as he likes to call it. Some, like his choices for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, and transportation secretary,...
Trump to nominate professional wrestling mogul Linda McMahon to be education secretary
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump is nominating the billionaire professional wrestling mogul Linda McMahon to be secretary of the Education Department, tasked with overseeing an agency Trump has promised to dismantle. McMahon led the Small Business Administration during Trump’s initial term from 2017 to 2019 and twice ran unsuccessfully as...
House Republicans signal support for proposal to ban bathroom access for 1st transgender member
WASHINGTON — House Speaker Mike Johnson signaled support Tuesday for a Republican effort to ban Democrat Sarah McBride — the first transgender person to be elected to Congress — from using women’s restrooms in the Capitol once she’s sworn into office next year. “We’re not going to have men in...
Trump chooses TV doctor Mehmet Oz to lead Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday tapped Dr. Mehmet Oz, a former television talk show host and heart surgeon, to head the agency that oversees health insurance programs for millions of older, poor and disabled Americans and selected Wall Street executive Howard Lutnick to lead the Commerce Department. “Dr....
Elon Musk, senior Trump adviser have ‘massive blowup’ over Cabinet picks
Elon Musk had a ” massive blowup ” with a top aide for President-elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago because the pair reportedly disagreed on Cabinet appointments. Musk, believed to have spent around $120 million to get Trump elected, engaged the incoming president’s longtime adviser Boris Epshteyn in a “huge explosion”...
Trump says he is naming former Wisconsin Rep. Sean Duffy to be transportation secretary
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — President-elect Donald Trump said Monday he is naming former Wisconsin Rep. Sean Duffy as his nominee to be transportation secretary, as he continues to roll out picks for his Cabinet. Duffy is a former reality TV star who was one of Trump’s most visible defenders...
Kissing the ring? MSNBC ‘Morning Joe’ hosts say they met with Trump to reopen lines of communicationVideo
MSNBC hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski, fierce critics of President-elect Donald Trump, say they traveled to Mar-a-Lago for a meeting with him to reopen lines of communication that would better serve their morning show viewers. With feelings still raw two weeks after the election, their journey to Trump’s Florida...
Pa. Supreme Court forbids counties from counting mail-in ballots with date errors
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled Monday that mail-in ballots in the Nov. 5 election that lacked handwritten dates or were improperly dated on their outer envelopes as required under state law cannot be counted. The ruling comes as several counties have been tallying those votes. In a four-page order, the...
Ron DeSantis aims to appoint Marco Rubio’s Senate replacement by early January
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Floridians will likely know who their next U.S. senator will be by the beginning of January, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis announced on Monday. With Florida’s senior Sen. Marco Rubio tapped to be President-elect Donald Trump’s secretary of state, it’s up to the governor to appoint his replacement,...
Allegheny County elections board finalizes provisional ballots
Allegheny County will finish this week counting its ballots from the Nov. 5 election, completing a weekslong process that has taken place amid legal challenges and on the heels of an automatic recount in Pennsylvania’s race for a U.S. Senate seat. About 725,000 total ballots were cast in Allegheny County....
NYC politicians call on Whoopi Goldberg to apologize for saying bakery denied order over politics
NEW YORK — New York City politicians are calling on Whoopi Goldberg to apologize for suggesting on air that a local bakery had declined to make “The View” co-host a batch of desserts for her birthday because of her political beliefs. Staten Island Borough President Vito Fossella was among the...
