• Donald Trump and Dana White have enjoyed a decadeslong friendship predating presidential politics.
• In each of Trump's three presidential campaigns, White lined up behind the president-elect.
• During the 2024 race, the mixed martial arts leader also appeared on Trump's first TikTok video.

Donald Trump might be the only person who can attend an Ultimate Fighting Championship fight and outshine the headliners — even UFC CEO Dana White doesn't draw the same type of reaction.

In November, Trump set the crowd off by walking into UFC 309 at Madison Square Garden to join his entourage, which included Elon Musk, House Speaker Mike Johnson, and Trump's cabinet nominees.

White stands at the center of it all. In just under three decades, White has turned his sport, once on the fringe of pop culture, into a spectacle that even a president-elect couldn't resist.

Trump and White's decades-long friendship has been mutually beneficial. White has repeatedly said he will never forget how Trump offered a grand stage to his sport when few others would. Trump successfully deployed White's cohort of podcasters and influencers, led by Joe Rogan, in his 2024 election win.

"Nobody deserves this more than him, and nobody deserves this more than his family does," White told the energetic crowd at Mar-a-Lago as it was apparent that Trump had been elected to a second term. "This is what happens when the machine comes after you."

Here's a look at the decadeslong relationship between Trump and White over the years:

Donald Trump gave a big early boost to UFC

In 1990, Trump opened Trump Taj Mahal, a billion-dollar prized jewel in Atlantic City, that businessman billed as the 8th Wonder of the World. At its peak, it was the biggest casino in town.

Trump needed big acts to fill the casino's arena, which Elton John had christened. In 2001, Trump took a chance on the UFC, which was still trying to escape its brutalist stigma. The sport that then-Sen. John McCain, famously called "human cockfighting" in the 1990s, couldn't even put on an event in Las Vegas.

Trump's UFC event came at a pivotal moment

Shut out of Nevada, UFC staged its fights in a series of smaller venues around the country and the world. White considered the invitation to the Taj Mahal a sign of legitimacy.

"Nobody took us seriously," White has repeatedly said. "Except Donald Trump."

Trump's backing came during a crucial time in the company's history. In January 2001, a month before the Trump-hosted fight, casino moguls Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta purchased UFC. They picked White, Lorenzo's friend and a manager for two of mixed martial arts' biggest fighters, as the president.

Under White's leadership, UFC's popularity skyrocketed

By September 2001, UFC was in Vegas. Four years later, White led UFC onto the airwaves on SpikeTV, cashing in the popularity of reality TV competitions with "The Ultimate Fighter."

It helped that in 2004, Trump welcomed Tito Ortiz, one of the sport's biggest stars, onto the first season of NBC's "Celebrity Apprentice," the glitzier spin-off to Trump's smash reality TV hit.

The Ultimate Fighter was a big success, increasing the company's popularity.

White locked in UFC's voice

If White is the face of UFC, Rogan is undoubtedly its voice. His association with the company even predates White's time as president. After the Fertitta brothers purchased UFC in 2001, White offered Rogan a full-time gig as a color commentator. Rogan has said it's in his contract that he'll leave the UFC if White ever exits, too.

Rogan's profile grew alongside the UFC, considering his association with mixed martial arts was part of why he became the host of NBC's "Fear Factor."

The comedian cashed in on his bigger profile in 2009, starting what was then a weekly commentary show. By the time Trump first ran for president in 2016, "The Joe Rogan Experience" was one of the most popular podcasts in the world.

Business didn't get in the way of Trump and White's friendship.

While he's known for real-estate, Trump has sought out many other partnerships and business ventures to varying degrees of success. In 2008, Trump partnered with Affliction, a clothing brand, to launch a competitor in the mixed-martial arts space. Their promotion even landed Russian fighter Fedor Emelianenko, whom White and the UFC had previously sought to sign.

The venture lasted only two fights. According to The New York Times, White sometimes criticized his friend, pointing out his inexperience in operating such a company, "Donald Trump owns casinos."

White and Trump remained close. The UFC head even vowed that he would never fully go after Trump, a nod to the real estate mogul's early support.

White was once far from a conservative firebrand

In 2010, White campaigned with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada as he sought to hang onto his seat amid a difficult year for Democrats. Reid won, and Democrats held onto a slimmer US Senate majority.

According to The Times, White's politics mirrored Trump's in that both businessmen viewed the enterprise through a transactional lens. Trump faced criticism in the 2016 GOP primaries for previously supporting leading Democrats like Hillary Clinton.

White spoke as if he was a stranger at the 2016 Republican National Convention.

Few major establishment Republicans spoke at Trump's 2016 convention. Enter White, one of a handful of longtime Trump friends who extolled the virtues of the man who would soon become the Republican Party's presidential nominee.

White even alluded to the fact that his attendance might appear odd.

"My name is Dana White. I am the president of the Ultimate Fighting Championship. I'm sure most you are wondering, 'What are you doing here?'" White told the crowd in Cleveland. "I am not a politician. I am a fight promoter, but I was blown away and honored to be invited here tonight, and I wanted to show up and tell you about my friend, Donald Trump — the Donald Trump that I know."

White returned to the trail again in 2020.

Ahead of Trump's reelection bid, White said Trump's time in the White House only deepened their relationship.

"We've actually become even closer since he's become the President of the United States," White said during a 2020 campaign rally. "When somebody becomes the President of the United States, you don't ever expect to hear from them again. And I understand it. It absolutely makes sense. This guy is so loyal and such a good friend."

The COVID-19 pandemic made White a conservative star

The COVID-19 pandemic devastated the live event business. Sports, including the UFC, were no exception. White saw an opening as the four major professional leagues struggled through discussions on how to return.

White tried to get the UFC to return with an event on tribal land in California, but that effort was postponed amid Disney and ESPN's uneasiness. In turning to Gov. Ron DeSantis' Florida, White found a much more receptive audience — even if the first fight didn't allow any fans. UFC 249 in May was the first major sporting event since the pandemic's beginning.

Trump delivered a video message congratulating White on the event.

"Get the sports leagues back, let's play," Trump said in a video recorded outside of the Oval Office. "Do the social distancing, and whatever you have to do, but we need sports. We want our sports back."

Out of power, Trump found refuge at the UFC

After leaving the White House, Donald Trump wasn't welcomed in many places. Following the January 6 Capitol riot, the two biggest professional golf governing bodies rebuked him. The Professional Golf Association even stripped one Trump-owned course of the right to host one of the PGA's major four tournaments.

In July 2021, the Manhattan District Attorney indicted the Trump Organization, setting off an array of legal headaches that didn't abate until after the 2024 election. A week later, Trump entered to mostly cheers in Las Vegas as he prepared to take in UFC 264.

Trump made the UFC central to his 2024 bid

Trump officially launched on TikTok at UFC 302 in June 2024. The fighting promotion's audience was also the perfect place for the former president's campaign, given his advisors' emphasis on attracting young men.

White's broader orbit suddenly intertwined with the former president's comeback campaign. Trump, and later his running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, made a point of appearing on podcasts geared toward this demographic. The Nelk Boys, Theo Von, Adin Ross, and "Bussin' with the Boys" all shared close ties to White. Trump appeared on each of their respective shows.

@realdonaldtrump

Launching my TikTok at @UFC 302.

♬ original sound - President Donald J Trump

White spoke at Trump's pre-election rally at Madison Square Garden.

White energized the crowd at Trump's Madison Square Garden rally just days before the election, where he said that Vice President Kamala Harris wouldn't bring "change" to the country.

And he emphatically praised Trump in advance of an election that was seemingly tied in most of the swing states.

"He is the most resilient, hardest-working human being that I've ever met in my entire life," White said during his remarks.

Celebrating his win, Trump turned the mic over to White

Dana White just thanked

Adin Ross, Theo Von, Nelkboys and Joe Rogan for the Trump victory #Election2024 pic.twitter.com/GYye6c9onc

— FADE (@FadeAwayMedia) November 6, 2024

As Trump spoke to an adoring crowd at Mar-a-Lago and to the nation, he invited White to make remarks, and the UFC president wasted no time singing the praises of the president-elect.

"He keeps going forward — he doesn't quit," White bluntly said. "He deserves this. They deserve it as a family."

White also name-checked podcast hosts that had welcomed Trump into the so-called "Manosphere."

A former UFC spokesperson will have a key role in Trump's White House

One of Trump's key White House aides also has ties to UFC. Steven Cheung, who will be the White House communications director, was a spokesperson for UFC before he left to join Trump's 2016 campaign.

Cheung's brash statements, particularly those bashing DeSantis during the 2024 primary season, received considerable attention and drew comparisons to how closely they mirrored Trump's own rhetoric.

Just before Trump took office, Meta tapped White for a new role.

Trump may have helped out White again. In January 2024, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that the UFC executive would join the technology company's board. Zuckerberg's move was widely seen as a play to curry favor with Trump and his orbit.

White might be done in the political arena

White wasn't very political before he campaigned for Trump. He has said that his outspokenness may be an exception only reserved for his friend.

"I'm never fucking doing this again," White recently told The New Yorker. "I want nothing to do with this shit. It's gross. It's disgusting. I want nothing to do with politics."

President-elect Donald Trump's transition will be funded entirely by private donors. His unprecedented move to reject federal funds typically allocated to presidential transitions allows him to shield the identity of donors. We explore why this matters in a video collaboration between Politico and Business Insider.

• Biden says he thinks he would've defeated Trump in 2024, "based on the polling."
• Polling consistently showed Biden losing handily to Trump before he dropped out in July.
• The president also says he's unsure if he would've been able to complete a second term.

President Joe Biden said in an interview this week that he believes he could have defeated President-elect Donald Trump if he had remained the Democratic nominee, rather than stepping aside for Vice President Kamala Harris.

"It's presumptuous to say that, but I think yes," Biden told USA Today.

The president was less sure, however, that he would've been able to serve out the entirety of a second term, noting that he would have been 86 years old at the end of it.

"When Trump was running again for reelection, I really thought I had the best chance of beating him. But I also wasn't looking to be president when I was 85 years old, 86 years old," Biden said. "Who the hell knows? So far, so good. But who knows what I'm going to be when I'm 86 years old?"

Though Harris came up short in the 2024 election, many prominent Democratic lawmakers have argued that she helped the party stave off an electoral disaster by replacing Biden, who lost the confidence of Democrats after a disastrous debate performance against Trump in June.

"President Trump beat Joe Biden after delivering the greatest debate performance in history, and he beat Kamala Harris in a landslide on Election Day," Trump-Vance Transition Spokesperson Anna Kelly told BI in a statement.

Rep. Angie Craig, a Democratic who represents a swing district in Minnesota, recently told NBC that Trump "would have taken, I believe, if Biden had stayed on the top of the ticket, 30 to 40 House seats with him."

Instead, Democrats actually gained one seat in the House.

Biden said that his belief that he could've done what Harris couldn't is "based on the polling." Polling at the time showed the president losing handily to Trump.

• Trump has raised millions from CEOs and businesses for his inauguration and presidential library.
• Apple CEO Tim Cook was the latest to contribute, Axios reported.
• The Times reported that Trump has raised over $200 million since winning a second term.

President-elect Donald Trump will take office in less than three weeks.

In the meantime, he continues to craft his policy agenda and make key appointments for his second administration.

He is also raking in substantial amounts of money.

From Meta and Coinbase to Ford and GM, businesses and CEOs are contributing large sums to Trump's inauguration and future presidential library as the president-elect prepares to enter the Oval Office for a second term.

Apple CEO Tim Cook is the latest to contribute $1 million of his own money to Trump's inaugural committee, according to Axios.

Trump has so far collected a total of at least $200 million, according to The New York Times, which spoke to sources involved in the fundraising. At least $150 million of that will go toward his inaugural, far more than the $107 million he raised for the event in 2017.

The super PAC Make America Great Again Inc. is also set to benefit from the cash infusion, giving Trump's allies a powerful vehicle to boost his conservative plans on everything from tax policy to the environment, as well as the GOP lawmakers who'll back his agenda.

David Tamasi, a Washington lobbyist, waved off the notion that donors were contributing to Trump to stay on his good side. However, he told the Times that some leaders may seek to build rapport after being detached from the president-elect's orbit.

"It is a time-honored DC tradition that corporations are enthusiastically embracing this cycle in all manners, largely because they were on the sidelines during previous Trump cycles," Tamasi said. "They no longer have to hedge their political bets."

There are virtually no limits to contributions for inaugural committees, and corporations have traditionally funded inaugurations regardless of the political party of the incoming commander in chief.

President Joe Biden's inaugural committee raised $63.8 million for his 2021 inauguration, according to FEC filings.

Trump's relationships with many top business leaders became rocky during his first term, namely in the aftermath of the August 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, where white nationalist groups sparked violent clashes. The January 6, 2021 attack at the US Capitol, days before Trump left office, led several companies to pause financial contributions to GOP politicians who had voted to overturn the 2020 presidential results.

Even during the 2024 presidential campaign, some business leaders stayed out of the political fray, while others, like LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman and Netflix cofounder Reed Hastings, supported Vice President Kamala Harris' presidential campaign.

TikTok is now subject to not one, but two Digital Services Act (DSA) investigations. The European Union announced on Tuesday that it has opened a formal proceeding focused on election risks, specifically in the context of recent elections in Romania. The probe will focus on TikTok’s recommender systems, principally “risks linked to the coordinated inauthentic manipulation […]

© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.

• Reid Hoffman said there's a "greater than 50% chance" he'll receive retaliation for backing Kamala Harris.
• The LinkedIn cofounder made the remarks on an episode of "The Diary of a CEO" podcast.
• Hoffman was one of the vice president's most prominent Silicon Valley business supporters.

Reid Hoffman, the billionaire LinkedIn co-founder and outspoken Democrat, said he thinks it's likely that he will face retaliation from President-elect Donald Trump for supporting Vice President Kamala Harris' presidential campaign.

"I think that there's a greater than 50% chance that there will be repercussions from a misdirection and corruption of the institutions of state to respond to my having tried to help Harris get elected," Hoffman said on an episode of "The Diary of a CEO" podcast that aired on Monday.

Hoffman said that he hopes any retaliation from Trump would be fairly tame, naming possibilities like IRS audits or phone calls from the incoming president trying to hurt his business prospects.

"It could get much worse, but I don't really want to speculate on it because I don't want to give anybody any ideas," he said.

Any repercussions would, he added, be "undemocratic and un-American."

Regardless, Hoffman said that he has no plans to leave the United States.

Nearly 90 top business executives — including Hoffman — signed a letter endorsing Harris' candidacy ahead of the general election, touting her plan to expand tax deductions for small businesses. The letter said that Harris' White House bid was "the best way to support the continued strength, security, and reliability of our democracy and economy."

Hoffman was also part of a cohort of business leaders who put together an initiative to get right-leaning swing voters onboard with Harris' candidacy by stressing her pro-business stances.

On the podcast, Hoffman said he'd spoken to fellow billionaires during the campaign who applauded his political actions but declined to partake themselves for fear of getting "penalized" if Trump won.

"Part of the reason why I think less people were public about it this cycle was because President Trump was threatening personal and political retaliation, and so you had to have a certain degree of courage to stand up — and courage in the public area," he said.

Since winning a second term, Trump has put several Silicon Valley business leaders in prominent roles, from Department of Government Efficiency co-head Elon Musk to newly minted AI and crypto czar David Sacks.

Despite his dislike for Trump and many of his policies, Hoffman said that some of the president-elect's deregulation efforts could broadly benefit entrepreneurs.

"I think they're going to reduce regulation across the board for all entrepreneurs, so I think that's helpful for entrepreneurship," he said.

Representatives for Hoffman and Trump did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment.

• Reid Hoffman said he'd faced threats after Elon Musk fueled a baseless conspiracy theory about him.
• Musk has amplified claims that the LinkedIn cofounder was a client of Jeffrey Epstein.
• Hoffman said he regretted his past association with Epstein and had hired security after threats.

Reid Hoffman, a cofounder of LinkedIn, said he had received threats of violence — and had to hire security — since Elon Musk fueled a baseless conspiracy theory about him.

Musk, the Tesla CEO who worked with Hoffman at PayPal, replied earlier this month to an X post in which a user implied Hoffman had visited the sex offender Jeffrey Epstein's private island.

He replied with the "100" emoji to a post saying: "This guy is TERRIFIED about Trump releasing the Epstein Client list after all his visits to Epstein Island."

Musk also made the claim during an October interview with the former Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson, in which he said Hoffman was among the "billionaires behind Kamala" who were "terrified" by the prospect of Epstein's client list being made public.

Speaking with the British newspaper The Sunday Times, Hoffman said Musk had developed a "conviction with no evidence" that he had a close relationship with Epstein.

"Elon's defamation makes me angry and sad," he said. "Angry because it is an ugly assault. Sad because it comes from someone whose entrepreneurial achievements I continue to admire."

He added that he didn't want to "dignify" the threats he had received by sharing any details but said, "I've hired security staff as a result."

After Epstein's suicide in jail in 2019, Hoffman apologized for inviting him to a dinner party in 2015 with other tech tycoons — including Musk, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and Palantir's cofounder Peter Thiel — while fundraising for MIT's renowned Media Lab.

Hoffman said he was told Epstein's involvement in raising donations had been vetted and approved by MIT. But he later wrote in an email to Axios that he regretted not conducting his own research into Epstein, who died while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges.

"My last interaction with Epstein was in 2015," Hoffman said in the email. "Still, by agreeing to participate in any fundraising activity where Epstein was present, I helped to repair his reputation and perpetuate injustice. For this, I am deeply regretful."

He told The Sunday Times that he "went to no Epstein parties" and that he "didn't even know who he was."

Hoffman is a major Democratic donor who used X to voice his support for Vice President Kamala Harris in the presidential election. "My message for American voters and Russian bots: don't vote for the guy too busy selling you a scamcoin," he wrote in a post on X on Election Day. Donald Trump, then the Republican presidential nominee, launched his own crypto coin, World Liberty Financial's wlfi, in October.

Musk has become a close ally of Trump, having been tasked with leading a new advisory committee, the Department of Government Efficiency, alongside the pharmaceutical entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy.

Musk did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

• Matthew Hiller sells stickers on Etsy for Tesla owners embarrassed by Elon Musk's politics.
• Musk's vocal support for Donald Trump has boosted sales, he told The New York Times.
• MadPufferStickers is a side hustle for the Waikiki Aquarium worker.

Some Tesla owners are embarrassed by Elon Musk's very public support for Donald Trump — and one Etsy seller has found a way to cash in.

Matthew Hiller works in the gift shop of Waikiki Aquarium in Honolulu but also has a side hustle in the form of Mad Puffer Stickers that calls itself "Etsy's #1 Shop For Tesla Drivers!"

Some of the stickers and magnets available on his Etsy store have slogans such as "I Bought This Before We Knew Elon Was Crazy" in all-capital letters, and another that reads: "Anti Elon Tesla Club."

The latter item measures four inches by five inches, costs $339.80 and was bought by 13 people in the past 24 hours as of Thursday. It's suitable for the Tesla Model X, Y, 3 and Cybertruck.

Hiller told The New York Times he used to sell between five and 10 a day, but interest jumped significantly after Musk ramped up his support for Trump ahead of the election. He said he's now sold about 18,000 stickers to buyers in 30 countries.

Hiller had once considered buying a Tesla. Following Musk's takeover of Twitter, now X, he told the Times of his concern about what he called misinformation on the social media platform.

"So I'm like, there's no way I'm buying a Tesla: I don't want to give this guy a penny," he said.

That led Hiller to think some Telsa owners would not "want to endorse anything this guy stands for," and inspired him to add the "I Bought This Before We Knew Elon Was Crazy" sticker. One buyer of that item commented: "Love the car ... can't deal with Musk."

It sits alongside more lighthearted items on Mad Puffer Stickers such as "Don't Talk To Me, I'm a Fishtrovert," and "Eighters Gonna Eight" with an image of an octopus.

Business Insider reported in November that seven current and would-be Tesla owners said they were actively planning or considering selling their vehicles or Tesla shares, or that they were done buying the brand after years of believing in Musk and his EV maker.

Hiller did not immediately respond to a request for comment from BI.

Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour confirmed on a podcast interview that his employees asked social media influencers to promote memes about the FBI’s raid on the home of his archrival, the CEO of Polymarket.  Both companies offer competing events-betting markets, a new kind of betting industry where people wager about the outcomes of events ranging from […]

© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.

• Trump has promised to do a variety of different things on "Day One" of his second term.
• Much of his agenda will take time to implement, but there are things he could start immediately.
• Among the first items could be pardons for January 6-related offenses.

President-elect Donald Trump has outlined clear plans on how he plans to spend his first day back in the White House.

He plans to spend his first few hours signing executive orders rolling back some of President Biden's policies, considering pardons for a number of people convicted of January 6-related offenses, and launch his mass deportation program.

Some of the early items on Trump's list are already crossed off. Trump no longer has to fire special counsel Jack Smith, who has moved to dismiss his criminal cases against Trump. Speculation that the president-elect might fire FBI Director Christopher Wray is also moot. Wray announced he would resign before Trump is sworn in.

Other aspects of Trump's agenda, particularly his promises to eliminate taxes on tips, overtime, and Social Security benefits, will require Congress to act.

Trump has also conceded that some of his pledges, like "ending inflation," may be difficult to fulfill. Fellow Republicans are also pressuring the president-elect to expand his agenda to include items like nixing the IRS' free direct tax-filing tool.

Tariffs: Trade wars are likely to return

The president-elect made clear just before Thanksgiving that he intends to use tariffs much like he did during his first term.

In a series of posts, Trump pledged to levy a 25% tariff on all products coming into the US from Mexico and Canada. Chinese imports would get an additional 10%.

He said the tariffs would be among his first actions after being sworn in — meaning he'll likely return to his reliance on a law that allows a president wide discretion to impose tariffs in the event of a national emergency.

Trump said the tariffs are needed to take migration and fentanyl more seriously. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum quickly retorted that her nation may be forced to impose its own retaliatory tariffs.

During his first term, Trump repeatedly threatened to use tariffs as a cudgel, though he did not always follow through.

Executive orders: Immigration and likely legal challenges

Some of Trump's most readily achievable promises are related to immigration, an area where the White House and Executive Branch have a significant say. In the closing days of the campaign, Trump underlined his commitment to getting to work right away on building "the largest deportation force" in the nation's history. The American Civil Liberties Union and other organizations have said they would challenge Trump's actions in court, meaning that anything begun on Day One will only be the beginning of a potentially long legal fight.

Trump also repeatedly promised to curtail parole, which allows immigrants to temporarily live in the US, often for humanitarian reasons. He also pushed debunked claims about secret "migrant flights," which he also promised to ban on day one.

Trump has promised to issue several executive orders when he takes office, though some of them are likely to be challenged in court.

For example, Trump has pledged to sign an executive order revoking birthright citizenship, which is enshrined in the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution.

During the Republican primary, he pledged to take executive action "banning schools from promoting critical race theory or transgender insanity."

It's likely that such an action could mirror an executive order President Joe Biden revoked after taking office, which at the time prohibited the federal government and federal contractors from conducting workplace trainings on "divisive concepts." A federal judge later blocked prohibitions on certain trainings.

Pardons and personnel decisions: January 6 rioters could get immediate pardons

Trump said he could take action on January 6-related pardons "within the first nine minutes."

He has long maintained that some people arrested or convicted of offenses related to the Capitol riot were overcharged. Trump is likely to avoid any personal legal consequences at the federal level for his efforts to overturn the election. Smith's 2020-charges against Trump were dismissed in a way that would allow them to be refiled once the president-elect leaves office in 2029.

In an interview with Time Magazine, Trump said his focus is on non-violent offenders and that he will weigh potential pardons on a "case-by-case" basis.

"We're going to look at each individual case, and we're going to do it very quickly, and it's going to start in the first hour that I get into office," Trump said to the publication during a wide ranging interview. "And a vast majority of them should not be in jail. A vast majority should not be in jail, and they've suffered gravely."

Some of Trump's promises are more simple and involve firing government officials he does not like.

At a Bitcoin conference in July, Trump also pledged to fire Gary Gensler, the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, on "day one" and appoint a replacement. Gensler has angered many in the cryptocurrency community, which Trump and his campaigned courted ahead of the 2024 election. Gensler, too, has headed off a potential showdown by announcing he will resign before Trump's inauguration

Trump has also pledged to pardon January 6 rioters "if they're innocent," which he would be able to do as soon as his first day in office.

"Day One" promises that Trump may not be able to fulfill

Some "day one" commitments are simply not possible.

At times during the campaign, Trump pledged to "end inflation" just hours after taking office. No one, including the president, can single-handedly lower broad price levels set across the entire US economy.

Prices reached record highs earlier in the Biden administration, but since then inflation has continued to cool. Many economists are concerned that Trump's protectionist trade policies could exacerbate inflation. He has repeatedly rejected this view, but conceded lowering grocery prices will be difficult.

"Look, they got them up," Trump said to Time. "I'd like to bring them down. It's hard to bring things down once they're up. You know, it's very hard. But I think that they will. I think that energy is going to bring them down. I think a better supply chain is going to bring them down."

• President Biden touted his economic record during a Tuesday speech at the Brookings Institute.
• Biden suggested that he should've had his name printed on the 2021 stimulus checks, similar to Trump in 2020.
• Trump won a second presidential term in November with a heavy economic message for voters.

President Joe Biden during a Tuesday speech said that it was "stupid" of him to have not signed COVID-19 stimulus checks that went out as part of the American Rescue Plan, contrasting himself with President-elect Donald Trump.

While speaking at the Brookings Institute, Biden touted the effects of the $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill, which Congress passed in 2021, as a major economic accomplishment of his administration. But the president also reflected on the actions of Trump, his predecessor and soon-to-be successor.

"I also learned something from Donald Trump — he signed checks for people … and I didn't," he said. "Stupid."

In March 2020, Congress passed the CARES Act, a $2.2 trillion bill signed into law by Trump at the outset of the coronavirus pandemic that provided $1,200 relief checks to millions of Americans. Trump's name, controversially, was added to the relief checks by his administration.

This year, many Americans, who yearned for the pre-Covid economic conditions earlier in Trump's first term, chose Trump at the ballot box over Vice President Kamala Harris.

Biden from the earliest days of his administration sought to tackle some of the biggest pandemic-era economic issues.

The American Rescue Plan provided $1,400 checks to most Americans.

But inflation dogged the Biden administration's economic message, and the president was unable to articulate a convincing defense of his policies ahead of the 2024 election. His standing, coupled with concerns over his advanced age, led him to step aside as the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee in July.

Harris assumed the mantle as the Democratic standard-bearer, but she had to run a 107-day campaign and was unable to overcome Trump's advantage on the economy among a broad swath of voters.

• Donald Trump successfully used podcasts to expand his reach during the 2024 presidential campaign.
• On Election day, Trump ended up boosting his support among men overall compared to 2020.
• A variety of podcast hosts are set to have a substantial level of influence in Trump's second term.

President-elect Donald Trump's love for the media is well-known — just look at how much Trump's early picks resemble a Fox News greenroom.

The president-elect made significant efforts during his campaign to get his message in front of podcasters and influencers. Now that he's set to return to power, these commentators will play a major role in setting and pushing his agenda. Or they'll just stream from the White House.

If Donald Trump Jr., who hosts his own podcast, gets his wish they might even be seated somewhere in the White House briefing room.

'The Joe Rogan Experience'

The UFC commentator and comedian Joe Rogan has become one of the biggest names in the podcast world. Rogan's persona and massive following (14.5 million followers on Spotify and nearly 19 million subscribers on YouTube) have given him the sort of platform that continues to attract a range of high-profile guests.

Trump's appearance on Rogan's podcast in October allowed him to reach a critical audience — which heavily skews male — ahead of an election where the president-elect boosted his performance with men compared to 2020. Rogan's reach is so substantial that Trump took a few hours off the campaign trail to travel to Austin, Texas, to sit in the studio with the podcast host.

Rogan, shortly before the election, endorsed Trump's candidacy, calling him "the biggest there is."

Many Democrats pushed for Vice President Kamala Harris to appear on the program before the election, but scheduling during the frenetic last weeks of the race precluded her from traveling to Austin to do so, according to a campaign statement at the time.

"My sincere wish is to just have a nice conversation and get to know her as a human being," Rogan said in October.

'Bannon's War Room'

One of the more seasoned podcasters in Trump's orbit, former White House strategist Steve Bannon, started his program during Trump's first impeachment. Trump has said he listens to "Bannon's War Room."

Bannon used the program to foment backlash to then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy of California. And Kash Patel, Trump's pick to lead the FBI, has made countless appearances on the show.

Former White House Trade Council director Peter Navarro, set to return to Trump's second administration, was among a handful of commentators who kept Bannon's show going while he was in prison. Like Navarro, Bannon was sentenced for his defiance of a subpoena from the House January 6 committee.

'Triggered with Don Jr.'

Donald Trump Jr., the president-elect's eldest son, has confirmed he won't be in the incoming administration. But he remains a key voice in his father's ear.

Trump Jr. pushes his message in multiple forms, including on his podcast, "Triggered With Don Jr.," which he has hosted for almost a year. He's frequently hosted some of Trump's congressional allies, along with top aides like Stephen Miller, who will return to the White House.

In a recent episode, Trump Jr. teased how the president-elect's transition team is eyeing ways to bring conservative podcasters into the White House briefing room.

'This Past Weekend with Theo Von'

In August, the comedian Theo Von hosted Trump on his podcast, "This Past Weekend with Theo Von." On the program, Von spoke openly with Trump about his recovery from drug addiction. It may not have been seen as a typical stop for a presidential candidate, but the conversation was heard by many Americans, providing Trump with another connection to a bloc of male voters who don't consume much mainstream media.

Von received a shout out from UFC president Dana White during Trump's election night victory speech in Florida.

'The Charlie Kirk Show'

Charlie Kirk, a cofounder of the conservative nonprofit Turning Point USA, has spent over a decade advocating for limited government and free markets among students on high school and college campuses.

Ahead of the 2024 general election, Kirk used Turning Point Action, the political advocacy arm of Turning Point USA, to boost Trump's bid for a second term and amplify his conservative message. Kirk appeared alongside Trump at campaign events in key swing states like Georgia and Nevada, which the president-elect went on to flip in November.

Kirk hosts "The Charlie Kirk Show" podcast, which serves as an influential vehicle for reaching the sort of young voters who were a key part of Trump's electoral gains.

'Full Send Podcast'

Few shows personify "the manosphere" that Trump spent the summer tapping into more than "Full Send," a podcast started by a group of influencers called the Nelk Boys. Trump has made multiple appearances on Full Send, even stumping with one of its members in Las Vegas. Unlike Bannon and some others on this list, the Nelk Boys are not explicitly political, which made their audience ripe for Trump's 2024 appeals but also means they're unlikely to engage in the day-to-day news cycle.

Adin Ross

Adin Ross, an internet personality and popular streamer, sat down with Trump this past August and in a departure from many interviews — gifted the Republican a gold Rolex watch and a customized Tesla Cybertruck.

Ross became a big name through his livestreams of video games, and Trump's interview with the streamer was one more way that he was able to connect with a male-skewing audience.

'The Dan Bongino Show'

Dan Bongino, a former Secret Service agent, is so firmly entrenched in the conservative space that he was selected to replace the late Rush Limbaugh in his coveted time slot. Republican Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio and other influential leaders on the right have pushed Trump to name Bongino to run the agency tasked with protecting the president. In the meantime, Bongino has been a vocal proponent of Trump's other nominees and helped lead a pressure campaign to push Sen. Joni Ernst, an Iowa Republican, to back Trump's pick to lead the Pentagon.

'Verdict with Ted Cruz'

Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas has repeatedly offered his full-throated support to Trump, a stark contrast to the bitter end to his 2016 GOP primary run. Like Bannon, Cruz launched his podcast amid Trump's first impeachment battle. He has since used his platform to shed light on Congress and to discuss the news of the day.

With a 53-47 Republican Senate majority beginning in January, Trump can't afford many defections if he wants to get his agenda through the upper chamber. Cruz is well-positioned to serve as a narrator for a far more supportive group than the one that repeatedly vexed Trump in his first term.

'The Megyn Kelly Show'

Many in Trump's orbit once detested former Fox News journalist Megyn Kelly after she asked him during a 2015 GOP presidential debate about past inflammatory comments directed toward women.

"You've called women you don't like fat pigs, dogs, slobs, and disgusting animals," she asked at the time. "Does that sound to you like the temperament of a man we should elect as president?"

Trump repeatedly blasted Kelly after the interview.

But in the intervening years, Kelly left Fox and was hired by NBC News before a tumultuous departure. She's since become a major conservative voice in the podcast world and interviewed Trump on her show in September 2023.

Ahead of the 2024 election, she appeared alongside Trump at a Pennsylvania rally, voicing her support for his campaign and calling him a "protector of women."

'All-In Podcast'

Key venture capitalists embraced Trump ahead of the 2024 election, including former PayPal executive David Sacks. Sacks and fellow venture capitalists, Chamath Palihapitiya, Jason Calacanis, and David Friedberg, hold court on their podcast, "All-In," which was launched during the pandemic.

It remains to be seen how involved Sacks will be going forward on the podcast now that Trump has named him his AI and crypto czar. Trump made an appearance during a June episode.

• Jeff Bezos and Donald Trump have been at odds over the years.
• However, Bezos says Trump has "probably grown in the last 8 years" and he'd like to help him in "reducing regulation."
• The two men recently had dinner at Mar-a-Lago.

A dinner between Donald Trump and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is the latest development in their history, which has seen both men criticize each other publicly.

Bezos has spoken out against Donald Trump in the past — and vice versa. However, Bezos has changed his tune on the president-elect, saying he is feeling optimistic now about Trump's return to the Oval Office.

Speaking at The New York Times' DealBook Summit earlier this month, Bezos said he's "actually very optimistic" about another Trump term.

"What I've seen so far is he is calmer than he was the first time and more settled," he said. "You've probably grown in the last eight years. He has too."

Bezos said he's also encouraged by Trump's deregulation aims, which include his newly created Department of Government Efficiency, headed by Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk, a Trump ally and major donor to his campaign.

"He seems to have a lot of energy around reducing regulation. If I can help do that, I'm going to help him," Bezos said.

Bezos, alongside fiancée Lauren Sánchez, recently met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago for dinner, joined by Musk.

The billionaire Amazon founder and Trump have been contentious at times. In 2016, Bezos said Trump's wish to lock up Hillary Clinton or refuse to accept a loss in that election "erodes our democracy around the edges."

"One of the things that makes this country as amazing as it is, we are allowed to criticize and scrutinize our elected leaders," Bezos said at the time.

"An appropriate thing for a presidential candidate to do is say, 'I am running for the highest office in the world, please scrutinize me,'" he continued. "That's not what we've seen. To try and chill the media and threaten retribution and retaliation, which is what he's done in a number of cases, it just isn't appropriate."

Following Trump's election that year, Bezos was one of several tech leaders who met with the president-elect in a summit Bezos later described as "very productive." Introducing himself in the meeting, Bezos added that he was "super excited about the possibilities this could be the innovation administration."

Trump and Amazon

While campaigning for the 2016 presidential election, Trump said Amazon would have "such problems" if he became president.

In 2017, he tweeted that the company was "doing great damage to tax paying retailers" and that "towns, cities and states throughout the U.S. are being hurt."

He repeated similar sentiments the following year, saying that Amazon was pushing smaller retailers out of business.

Trump has also said on multiple occasions that Amazon should be paying more for USPS deliveries.

"Why is the United States Post Office, which is losing many billions of dollars a year, while charging Amazon and others so little to deliver their packages, making Amazon richer and the Post Office dumber and poorer?" he tweeted in 2017. "Should be charging MUCH MORE!"

In 2019, Amazon filed a federal complaint challenging the Department of Defense's decision to award Microsoft a $10 billion contract to move sensitive data to a cloud server rather than Amazon Web Services.

The company said in the complaint that Trump swayed the decision to "pursue his own personal and political ends" and to harm Bezos, "his perceived political enemy." Amazon said Trump made "repeated public and behind-the-scenes attacks" about the company and Bezos, who was still CEO at the time.

In 2021, the DoD canceled the contract with Microsoft and announced a multi-vendor contract to seek proposals from Microsoft and AWS as "the only Cloud Service Providers (CSPs) capable of meeting the Department's requirements."

Trump and The Washington Post

Trump has repeatedly criticized The Washington Post, which Bezos owns.

In 2019, Trump bashed Bezos and the Post as he appeared to talk about Bezos' divorce from MacKenzie Scott.

"So sorry to hear the news about Jeff Bozo being taken down by a competitor whose reporting, I understand, is far more accurate than the reporting in his lobbyist newspaper, the Amazon Washington Post," Trump wrote on X. "Hopefully the paper will soon be placed in better & more responsible hands!"

For the first time in decades, the newspaper didn't publish an endorsement of a presidential candidate in 2024. Bezos reportedly intervened to block an endorsement of Kamala Harris that had already been drafted.

Bezos later wrote an op-ed defending the newspaper's decision to decline to endorse, saying endorsements "create a perception of bias" and "do nothing to tip the scales of an election."

Trump and Bezos

After the assassination attempt on Trump at a Pennsylvania rally in July 2024, Bezos broke a hiatus of nearly nine months on X, formerly known as Twitter, to write, "Our former President showed tremendous grace and courage under literal fire tonight. So thankful for his safety and so sad for the victims and their families."

Following Trump's second election win, Jeff Bezos congratulated him on "an extraordinary political comeback and decisive victory," wishing the president-elect "all success in leading and uniting the America we all love."

CEOs and business leaders quickly began making the journey to Mar-a-Lago in Florida to meet with the president-elect, and Trump mentioned that a dinner with Bezos was planned.

″Mark Zuckerberg's been over to see me, and I can tell you, Elon is another and Jeff Bezos is coming up next week, and I want to get ideas from them," Trump told CNBC's Jim Cramer in December.

After Meta confirmed plans to donate $1 million to Trump's inauguration fund, Amazon followed suit with its own $1 million donation.

Bezos and Trump ended up dining together, and were joined by Musk, who said it was a "great conversation."

• Trump has proposed 25% tariffs on imports from Canada, China, and Mexico.
• Trump said he doesn't "believe" the tariffs would cause price increases at home.
• But, he told Kristen Welker on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday, "I can't guarantee anything."

President-elect Donald Trump, in an NBC News interview that aired on Sunday, said he doesn't "believe" his tariff proposal will raise consumer prices for American families but stopped short of making a promise.

"I can't guarantee anything," Trump told "Meet the Press" moderator Kristen Welker in his first major network television interview since the November general election. "I can't guarantee tomorrow."

Trump then said that before the COVID-19 pandemic, he placed tariffs "on a lot of different countries."

"We took in hundreds of billions of dollars and we had no inflation," the president-elect told Welker. "In fact, when I handed it over, they didn't have inflation for a year and a half."

Trump in November floated 25% tariffs on imports from Canada, China, and Mexico, the top three trading partners of the United States. The president-elect has criticized what he says is the free flow of drugs and illegal migrants into the United States from the three countries.

Late last month, Trump also threatened economic sanctions against the BRICS group, a bloc of nine emerging market countries. He said he would institute "100% tariffs" if they sought to "move away" from the US dollar.

Trump, while on NBC, reiterated that he's a "big believer in tariffs" — calling them "beautiful" — and said the United States is subsidizing Canada and Mexico.

"If we're going to subsidize them, let them become a state," the president-elect said. "We're subsidizing Mexico, and we're subsidizing Canada, and we're subsidizing many countries all over the world. And all I want to do is have a level, fast, but fair playing field."

Late last month, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada traveled to Mar-a-Lago to dine with Trump after his tariff threats. Trudeau later said he had an "excellent conversation" with the president-elect.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum also described her recent conversation with Trump as "excellent," stating that the two discussed her country's plans for migration.

The economy was a top issue for voters in the November election, with Trump defeating Vice President Kamala Harris largely due to dissatisfaction with President Joe Biden's handling of inflation. Harris sought to define her economic plan — zeroing in on price gouging and tackling housing affordability — but she could not reverse Trump's advantage on the issue.

Across the United States, Trump cut into traditional Democratic advantages with working-class voters and minority groups, with many siding with him at the ballot box over his focus on inflation.

• The Harris campaign has $1.8 million cash after spending over $1 billion in the 2024 race.
• Harris continually raked in money during her 107-day presidential campaign against Donald Trump.
• But Harris could not overcome the headwinds against her party, coming up short in the swing states.

After President Joe Biden stepped aside as the Democratic nominee last summer, the party felt an enormous jolt of energy as Vice President Kamala Harris embarked on a 107-day presidential campaign against Donald Trump.

Throughout her campaign, Harris raised more than $1 billion, a stunning figure that mirrored the quick rise of her campaign.

But Trump, now the president-elect, defeated Harris in the general election, with the vice president coming up short in the swing states.

New federal filings show that the Harris campaign had $1.8 million remaining in the bank after spending over $1 billion against Trump in the presidential race.

In the filings, the Harris campaign also reported that it had no debts.

The filings reveal the pace of spending for the Harris campaign, which began with heightened enthusiasm from Democrats and major donors who had grown despondent over Biden's chances after a disastrous debate against Trump raised questions about his ability to mount a robust reelection campaign.

From October 17 through November 25, which included some of the most frenzied stretches of the campaign through the postelection period, Harris raised $160 million and spent over $270 million. The Trump campaign raked in nearly $87 million during that same period and spent $113 million, the president-elect's campaign filings indicated.

Harris held large rallies in swing states like Georgia and Pennsylvania throughout her campaign, especially in the immediate weeks leading up to the election. And despite the vice president's financial advantage over Trump, she had to boost her profile to an electorate that had long expected Biden to be the nominee and was uncertain about her positions on various issues — from tackling inflation to her approach to foreign policy.

The new FEC report also seemingly puts to rest any talk that the Harris campaign is heavily in debt, a notion that the campaign rejected last month when it told The New York Times that "there will be no debt" on the filings.

But in the weeks since the general election, Democrats have still received fundraising appeals from the Harris operation. The "Harris Fight Fund" is the postelection operation of the general election "Harris Victory Fund" and is touted as a way to help provide accountability for the Trump administration.

The Democratic National Committee's newest filings revealed that it had over $47 million in cash on hand, while its rival, the Republican National Committee, had nearly $43 million in the bank.

Business Insider reached out to the Harris campaign for comment.

• Elon Musk spent at least $277 million on Trump and the GOP, according to new documents.
• Most of it went toward America PAC, where Musk spent just shy of $239 million.
• But he also gave over $20 million to a group that compared Trump to RBG.

Elon Musk spent at least $277 million in political contributions to support President-elect Donald Trump and other Republican candidates, according to documents filed late Thursday.

That sum, totaling more than a quarter of a billion dollars, likely makes Musk the single largest donor of the 2024 election. Other top donors this cycle included Timothy Mellon, Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein, and Miriam Adelson, all of whom spent more than $100 million supporting Trump and the GOP.

Musk, the owner of X and the CEO of both Tesla and SpaceX, is now set to co-lead a new "Department of Government Efficiency" initiative under the incoming Trump administration.

Here's a look at where Musk's millions went this election cycle.

Musk poured roughly $239 million into America PAC — and spent $58 million of that on voter giveaways

As of November 25, documents filed with the Federal Election Commission showed that Musk had contributed just shy of $239 million to his personal super PAC, America PAC.

That super PAC, almost entirely funded by Musk alone, would go on to spend $154.5 million directly on canvassing efforts and digital ads to support Trump and oppose Vice President Kamala Harris.

More than $19 million went toward supporting GOP House candidates in 18 battleground districts, 10 of whom ultimately won their races.

The most intriguing revelation from Thursday night's report, however, was the amount of money that went towards America PAC's controversial voter giveaways, in which registered voters received $47 or $100 for signing a petition along with the chance to win $1 million.

Records show that $40.5 million went toward paying voters for signing the petition, while an additional $18 million — $1 million apiece — went to 18 lottery winners, each of whom were paid for being a "spokesperson consultant."

Musk poured $20 million into a mysterious PAC that compared Trump to Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Separately from America PAC, Musk was revealed to be the sole funder of a super PAC that ran ads comparing Trump's position on abortion to that of the late liberal Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Musk contributed $20,500,000 via a trust to "RBG PAC," which ran ads highlighting his pledge that there would be no federal abortion ban under his watch.

Clara Spera, an abortion rights lawyer who's also Ginsburg's granddaughter, told the New York Times in October that the PAC was "an affront to my late grandmother's legacy."

"The use of her name and image to support Donald Trump's re-election campaign, and specifically to suggest that she would approve of his position on abortion, is nothing short of appalling," Spera said.

Musk did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Musk's contributions to other GOP groups

While America PAC and RBG PAC represented the bulk of Musk's spending, there's a handful of other groups that have also received money from him this election cycle.

He gave $10 million in October to the Senate Leadership Fund, a super PAC linked to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, along with more than $2.3 million to Sentinel Action Fund. Both groups spent heavily on Senate elections.

Musk contributed $1 million to Early Vote Action PAC, which is led by the pro-Trump activist Scott Presler, along with $924,600 directly to Trump's campaign and hundreds of thousands to House Republican's central campaign committee.

It's likely that Musk spent even more than what's publicly accounted for, including to "dark money" nonprofit groups that aren't required to disclose their donors.

He reportedly contributed to a dark money group that gave $3 million to a super PAC that ran ads portraying Harris as simultaneously supportive and hostile toward Israel.

Correction: December 6, 2024 — An earlier version of this story misstated Sentinel Action Fund's affiliation with the Heritage Foundation. The group was legally separated from Heritage's political infrastructure in 2023.

The European Commission has responded to widespread concerns swirling around the impact of TikTok on elections in Romania by announcing it’s stepping up monitoring of the platform’s compliance with the bloc’s online governance framework, the Digital Services Act (DSA). This follows the shock emergence of Călin Georgescu, an independent, far-right, pro-Russian nationalist, as the lead […]

© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.

• TikTok is facing scrutiny in Romania for election interference.
• Romania's defense council says TikTok's algorithm fueled the rise of a far-right candidate.
• TikTok denied the claim that it treated any political candidate's content differently from others.

TikTok is facing accustions from regulators in Romania that content on the platform improperly influenced the country's presidential election.

Romania's Supreme Council of National Defense said in a statement on Thursday that one candidate "benefited from massive exposure due to preferential treatment" from TikTok.

Călin Georgescu, a far-right populist and ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, defeated leftist Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu, the heavy favorite, in the first round of presidential voting on November 24. Georgescu, who was virtually unknown before the election, catapulted from obscurity thanks in part to his viral TikTok videos.

The win secured Georgescu a place in a runoff vote scheduled for December 8. The Romanian Constitutional Court ordered a re-verification of the result following his surprise victory.

Georgescu has courted controversy with his pro-Russian and anti-NATO rhetoric, calling Ukraine an "invented country," according to the Associated Press. Romania borders Ukraine and is a NATO member.

In its statement, the Romanian defense council said there is growing interest inside Russia to "influence the public agenda in Romanian society" and disrupt social cohesion.

Georgescu's sudden popularity on TikTok appears to have helped fuel his election victory. One Romanian think tank told the AP that his TikTok following and engagement — his posts garnered over 100 million views in the weeks before the election — appeared "sudden and artificial."

The Supreme Council of National Defense said TikTok, owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, failed to label the videos of one candidate — presumed to be Georgescu — as campaign content. The defense council said that not labeling the content as campaign-related drastically increased its visibility on TikTok.

"Thus, the visibility of that candidate increased significantly in relation to the other candidates who were recognized by the TikTok algorithms as candidates for the presidential elections, and the content promoted by them was massively filtered, exponentially decreasing their visibility among platform users," the statement said.

The accusation against TikTok in Romania mirrors similar claims against Facebook during the 2016 US presidential election when Russia used the social media platform to sow discord that favored Republicans and Donald Trump.

TikTok has also faced scrutiny in the United States for allowing political ads that included disinformation in the lead-up to the 2024 presidential election.

TikTok did not immediately return a request for comment from Business Insider. A spokesperson for the company told Politico that it denies that Georgescu was treated differently by the platform than other candidates.

"It is categorically false to claim his account was treated differently to any other candidate," spokesperson Paolo Ganino told the outlet. Ganino added that Georgescu was treated "in the same way as every other candidate on TikTok, and subject to exactly the same rules and restrictions."

• In the 2024 election, Donald Trump won 312 electoral votes to Kamala Harris' 226 electoral votes.
• Each candidate sought to present themselves as the better steward of the economy.
• But President-elect Trump emerged victorious, sweeping the seven major battleground states.

Headed into Election Day, the presidential race between Vice President Kamala Harris and Donald Trump appeared deadlocked, with polls showing a close race across the seven swing states.

But Trump came out on top, with the president-elect sweeping the battleground states and making critical gains among a broad slice of the electorate, from young voters and Latino men to suburban voters and rural voters.

The president-elect's victory came as he retained his long-standing advantage on economic issues through Election Day.

Here's a look at why the 2020 race between President Joe Biden and Trump was such a departure from this year's contest between Harris and Trump.

Trump made significant inroads in the suburbs, where the economy was a key issue

In 2020, Biden emerged victorious in the suburbs, winning over voters in this key group 50% to 48%, according to CNN exit polling.

Harris was hoping that strong support from suburban voters, especially among college-educated women, would aid her, with her campaign banking that her prosecutorial background would match up well against that of Trump — who has been embroiled in an array of legal issues over his push to overturn the 2020 election results.

While Harris performed well in many of the suburbs that paved the way for Biden's 2020 election, she simply did not win by the margins she needed to overcome Trump's burst in support from white voters without college degrees, as well as the drop-off in support from Latino and Asian voters compared to the president's performance.

This year, Trump won suburban voters 51% to 47%, per CNN exit polling, a four-point edge that allowed him to hold the line in areas where Democrats were hoping to run up the score. And the shift allowed him to flip Maricopa County, and thus, win back Arizona, which had been one of Biden's most impressive victories in 2020.

Similar to other groups, the economy was critical for suburban voters, with inflation and housing costs being paramount. In Arizona, a state dominated by Phoenix and its vast Maricopa-anchored suburbs, the economy was the second-most important issue for voters, only trailing the issue of democracy.

According to CNN exit polling, 42% of the Arizona electorate said the economy was in "poor" condition, and 89% of those voters backed Trump, compared to 10% for Harris. By comparison, only 6% of respondents considered the economy to be "excellent," and 99% of those voters supported Harris, with only 1% backing Trump.

Trump hammered home an economic message centered on lowering costs, forging ahead with new housing construction on federal land, and cutting government relations that he said hampered growth. In western states like Arizona and Nevada, where housing affordability has been a major issue, the issue took on added resonance. Harris had high-profile economic proposals of her own, including a $25,000 tax credit for first-time home buyers, but it wasn't enough to swing the race.

Turnout declined in key Democratic areas

After Biden exited the race in July and Harris stepped into her role as the Democratic Party's standard bearer, she was faced with running a 107-day campaign. While Harris had been Biden's No. 2 for over three years at that point, she was still unfamiliar to a considerable slice of the electorate.

Despite Biden's decline in support with groups that had fueled his 2020 victory — which included Black, Latino, and young voters — he was a known commodity. And Harris, in many ways, had to reintroduce herself to millions of Americans who were open to backing her but had reservations about the Biden administration on issues like inflation and border security.

From Harris' first major rally as a 2024 presidential candidate in Wisconsin to her Election eve turnout push in vote-rich Philadelphia, she crisscrossed the swing states, aiming to hold on to the blue wall battleground states while also eyeing gains in the Sun Belt.

But compared to 2020, turnout declined on the Democratic side.

Four years ago, the Biden-Harris ticket won over 81 million votes, compared to 74 million votes for Trump and then-Vice President Mike Pence. So far, Harris has earned just under 75 million votes, compared to a little over 77 million votes for Trump.

Democratic strength in New Jersey and New York fell sharply, with Harris faring worse than Biden in those solidly blue states.

Voters did boost their numbers in several key battlegrounds, though.

Georgia hit a turnout record of almost 5.3 million voters this year, and despite Harris losing the state by 2.2 points (50.7% to 48.5%), she earned more votes in the Peach State than Biden did when he won the state by 0.23 percent (49.47% to 49.24%) in 2020.

Harris won 2,548,017 votes in Georgia this year, compared to Biden's 2,473,633 votes four years ago. But Trump won 2,663,117 votes this year, giving him a 115,100-vote advantage over Harris.

In Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, more votes were tallied between the two major-party candidates this year compared to 2020, but this didn't benefit Harris as Democratic strength declined in cities like Detroit and Philadelphia.

For example, Harris won Philadelphia, the most populous city in Pennsylvania, by a hefty 79% to 20% margin. But in 2020, Biden won Philadelphia 81% to 18%. And while Biden earned 604,175 votes in the city, Harris currently has 568,571 votes there, according to NBC News.

Turnout fell across Philadelphia this year, allowing Trump to post gains in what has long been known as one of the most Democratic cities in the country.

• Since law school, JD Vance's wife has been tight-lipped about her political beliefs.
• Usha Vance was a registered Democrat until 2014 and worked at what some consider a progressive law firm.
• Vance has said she has "not given a ton of thought" to the issues she'd focus on as second lady.

Usha Vance's classmates at Yale Law School didn't know much about her politics. Weeks before she becomes second lady, the nation doesn't know much, either.

"She was more tight-lipped, at least in my experience, with her political views," said Marvin Lim, a Democrat in the Georgia House of Representatives who also graduated in 2013. He wasn't close with either of the Vances, but said that they "certainly communicated a great deal."

"I don't remember ever having a political conversation with Usha," Elliot Forhan, a Democrat representative in Ohio who took a small class with Usha but wasn't close friends with her, said. "She just didn't really show her cards with respect to the political stuff."

Vance, 38, will make history as the nation's first Indian American and first Hindu second lady. She'll also be the second-youngest person to fill the role, after Jane Hadley Barkley, wife of former Vice President Alben Barkley in 1949.

Usha Chilukuri met JD Vance while at Yale Law School. The two were in the same small group of approximately 15 students who take all of their classes together, the New York Times reported. They got married in 2014, one year after graduating, and Lim said that their affection for each other was obvious. Less obvious, however, is Usha Vance's political orientation and relationship to the newfound national spotlight.

Vance grew up in a suburb of San Diego, raised by a mechanical engineer and a biologist. One of her family friends, Vikram Rao, told The Times that she was a natural and kind leader, selecting what games they played and setting the rules by age five.

After getting her undergraduate degree from Yale, she studied copyright law at Cambridge. In February of 2006, a campus tabloid magazine at Yale described her "as "of the leftish political persuasion," but noted that she opted for romantic partners who are "tall, handsome, and conservative." One of her friends at Cambridge, Gabriel Winant, said that her social circle was left of center and even dotted with the occasional leftist, the Times reported.

While her political views weren't recognizable to casual peers at Yale Law School, her leadership was evident. Both Forhan and Lim said that she wasn't particularly loud in class, but didn't fade into the background, either. Her drive didn't seem to extend to politics.

"She didn't express political ambitions, but she did have ambition," Lim told Business Insider, noting that she went on to have prestigious judicial clerkships after graduation. "We knew those were things she wanted to do, but not political ambitions."

A representative for Usha Vance declined to comment for this story.

From a 'woke' law firm to conservative clerkships, Vance's political orientations remained murky after law school.

After graduating from law school, Vance clerked for a pre-SCOTUS Brett Kavanaugh from 2014-2015 and Chief Justice John Roberts from 2017-2018. In addition, she worked at the law firm Munger, Tolles & Olson, but resigned on Monday when her husband became the GOP nominee for vice president. The law firm has since removed her biography, and with it all of her past cases, though the website used to describe her as "a skilled litigator specializing in higher education, local government, and technology sectors."

The magazine The American Lawyer described Munger, Tolles & Olson as "cool, woke" in 2019, with a "radically progressive" policy on gender and racial diversity in hiring, Vanity Fair reported. Despite his wife's workplace environment, JD Vance championed the "Dismantle DEI Act" in June, 2024, calling the DEI agenda "destructive." In 2022, two colleagues at the firm described Usha Vance as liberal or moderate to The Times.

To make her political affiliations even murkier, Vance was a registered Democrat until 2014, The Times reported. Yet she shifted to the right alongside her husband — in 2021, Federal Election Commission records reveal that she donated to Blake Masters, a conservative Senate candidate in Arizona backed by tech billionaire Peter Thiel. And Thiel has known JD Vance since at least 2011, when the tech magnate spoke at Yale. In 2024, Thiel was instrumental in cementing Vance's spot on the Trump ticket.

Vance hasn't always seemed eager to be center stage.

When JD Vance was himself running for Senate, Usha Vance appeared in his very first campaign ad, sitting in front of a bookshelf and talking about their three children. In an interview with Newsmax during the campaign, she said that her husband has not changed in the many years of their relationship.

After her initial appearance, Vance largely faded out of her husband's campaign, but became more active as voting day neared. The same was true of this year's presidential election: Vance introduced her husband at the Republican National Convention, but didn't speak at other public campaign events, ABC reported. She helped behind the scenes, assisting with debate prep and offering feedback on rallies, according to NBC News.

In an interview on Fox & Friends in June, Usha Vance seemed ambivalent about taking on a public political role. During the conversation, she didn't wholly embrace the possibility of becoming the second lady.

"I don't know that anyone is ever ready for that kind of scrutiny," she said. "I'm not raring to change anything about our lives are right now, but I believe in JD and I really love him, so we'll just sort of see what happens."

She declined to specify what issues she would tackle in the White House, saying that "we might be getting a little ahead of ourselves."

Vance has consistently defended her husband in the face of controversy, like when she called his infamous childless cat ladies comment a "quip."

As the election inched closer, Vance remained vague about her personal political plans.

"This is such an intense and busy experience that I have not given a ton of thought to my own roles and responsibility," she told NBC News in late October when asked what she'd focus on as second lady. "It's just something that I've never really — it's not something I'm terribly familiar with."

Vance went on to say that she'd "collect some information" and circle back to the question after November 5, depending on the election results. With the results in, she has yet share any specific plans.

While Usha Vance's political orientations and interest in life as a national figure remain foggy, her devotion to her husband has seemed strong since her days at Yale Law School.

"In terms of political beliefs, she held that close to her chest, but in terms of being supportive of JD, that does not surprise me," Lim said.