The returning head of the House Republican campaign committee says President-elect Trump's convincing 2024 White House victory gives the GOP plenty of home field advantage as the party aims to defend its razor-thin majority in the 2026 midterm elections.
"The battlefield is really laying out to our advantage. There are 14 Democrats who won seats also carried by Donald Trump. There are only three Republicans in seats that were carried by Kamala Harris. So that tells me we're going to be on offense," National Republican Congressional Committee chair Rep. Richard Hudson emphasized in a recent Fox News Digital interview.
Trump carried all seven crucial battleground states and, for the first time in three presidential elections, won the national popular vote as he defeated Vice President Harris last month.
The Republicans also flipped control of the Senate from the Democrats, and even though they had a net loss of two seats in the 435-member House, they'll hold a fragile 220-215 majority when the new Congress convenes next month.
Eight years ago, when Trump first won the White House and the GOP held onto their House majority, Democrats targeted roughly two-dozen Republicans in the 2018 midterms in districts Trump lost in the 2016 election.
The Democrats, in a blue-wave election, were successful in flipping the House majority.
Fast-forward eight years, and it's a different story, as this time Republicans will be defending seats on friendly turf in districts that the president-elect carried.
"There's a whole lot more opportunity for us to go on offense," Hudson, who's represented a congressional district in central North Carolina for a dozen years, touted.
Hudson also made the case that House Republicans who will once again be targeted by the Democrats in the upcoming election cycle are "really battle tested. I mean, they're folks who've been through the fire before. They've gone through several cycles now with millions of dollars spent against them."
"They've been able to succeed because they work very hard in their districts. They've established very strong brands, as you know, people who know how to get things done and how to deliver for their community," he emphasized. "The Republicans who are in tough seats are our best candidates."
The three House Republicans who are in districts that Harris carried last month are Reps. Don Bacon of Nebraska, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, and Mike Lawler of New York.
But there will be a big difference in 2026: Trump, who helped drive low propensity voters to the polls this year, won't be on the ballot in the 2026 midterms.
"I certainly would rather have him on the ballot because he turns out voters that don't come out for other candidates," Hudson acknowledged.
But he argued, "If you look at the way this race is shaping up, we campaigned on a key set of issues of things that we promised we would deliver. If we deliver those things and have Donald Trump there with us campaigning with our candidates, I believe we can drive out a higher percentage of those voters than we have in midterms in the past."
Hudson said Trump "was a great partner" with House Republicans this year and will be again in the upcoming election cycle.
"[Trump] cares deeply about having a House majority because he understands that a Democrat House majority means his agenda comes to a grinding halt. And so he's been very engaged, was a very good partner for us this last election, and I anticipate that continuing."
Hudson, who is returning for a second straight cycle chairing the NRCC, said that at the top of his committee to-do list are candidate recruitment and fundraising.
"I mean, first thing, we've got to go out and recruit candidates. You know, candidate quality matters. And then we've got to go raise the money. And so I'll be on the road and be out there helping our incumbents. But I'm looking forward to it," he emphasized.
Fox News' Emma Woodhead contributed to this report
Editors note: Fox News Digital also interviewed Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chair Rep. Suzan DelBene of Washington. That report will be posted on Friday.
With former president and now President-elect Donald Trump unable to run again for the White House in 2028, Vice President-elect JD Vance appears to be the heir apparent to the America First movement and the Republican Party's powerful MAGA base.
But even though the 40-year-old Vance will be considered the front-runner in the next GOP presidential nomination race, the chair of the Republican National Committee says the party will hold to its traditional role of staying neutral in an open and contested presidential primary.
"We will," RNC chair Michael Whatley said in a Fox News Digital interview.
Vance, with Trump's support in a party firmly in the president-elect's grip, will be very hard to knock off in the 2028 Republican presidential primaries.
David Kochel, another longtime GOP strategist with plenty of presidential campaign experience, said that Vance is the front-runner due to "the size and the scope" of Trump's Electoral College and popular vote victories last month, "and the implied passing of the torch from Donald Trump."
"There will be no shortage of people looking at it. But most people looking at it are seeing the relative strength of the Trump victory and the movement," Kochel said.
However, Kochel noted that "nobody will completely defer to JD Vance. There will be a contest. There always is."
Whatley, who was interviewed a week after Trump asked him to continue as RNC chair moving forward, said he's "very excited about the bench that we have in the Republican Party right now."
"You think about all the Republican governors, you think about all the Republican senators, the members of the House that we have, the leaders across the country that have been engaged in this campaign are going to be part of the president's cabinet," he added.
Whatley argued that the president-elect's "America First movement is bigger than Donald Trump. He is the tip of the spear. He is the vanguard of this movement. But. It is a very big movement right now."
The chairman on Thursday also emphasized that "Donald Trump has completely remade the Republican Party. We're now the working-class party. We're now a party that is communicating and working with every single voter, speaking to every single voter about the issues that they care about. So, as we go into 2028, we are in a great position to be able to continue the momentum of this agenda and this movement."
Unlike the rival Democratic National Committee, which in the 2024 cycle upended the traditional presidential nominating calendar, the RNC made no major changes to their primary lineup, and kept the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary as their first two contests.
Asked about the 2028 calendar, Whatley said "I've not had any conversations with anybody who wants to change the calendar on our side. I know the Democrats did during the course of this election cycle, not sure that it really helped them all that much."
"We're very comfortable with the calendar as it is. But as we move towards 2028, we'll have those conversations," he added.
An adviser to President-elect Trump's campaign, Alex Bruesewitz, passed out and collapsed as he was speaking onstage during a New York Young Republican Club gala Sunday night.
Bruesewitz, 27, was introducing incoming White House senior aide Dan Scavino inside a venue in Manhattan when he began stumbling over his words and fainted, video on social media shows.
Several people quickly rushed to his aid after his collapse. It was not immediately clear what caused him to faint.
Master of ceremonies Raheem Kassam, also a former aide of British conservative politician Nigel Farage, later assured the audience that Bruesewitz was doing fine backstage and that he even asked if he "look[ed] cool" when he fainted.
"I talked to our friend Alex Bruesewitz and you know what he said to me? He goes 'Did I at least look cool?' I said Alex, you used gravity like I've seen nobody use gravity before in their lives," Kassam said. "But he's recuperating back there, so give him a big cheer so he'll hear you."
Trump also said following the collapse that he believes Bruesewitz will be fine, according to the New York Post.
"I know that Alex is going to be fine because he’s a tough son of a gun," Trump said. "There’s no doubt about that. So I want to say hello to Alex, because he’s a very special guy."
Bruesewitz is the CEO of consultancy firm X Strategies LLC, which states its mission to help elect "America First" candidates. Its website says he is "a prominent political consultant and strategist known for his unwavering support of President Donald Trump and the America First agenda."
The website adds that Bruesewitz "has been the driving force behind the efforts to defeat Republicans who fight against Trump and the MAGA movement and works to replace them with Republicans who fight for the values we hold dear."
Before his collapse, Bruewitz appeared to be OK while commending the New York Republican Club for backing Trump's campaign. He also gave shout-outs to several supporters of the incoming president who were at the event, including former Florida congressman Matt Gaetz, who recently resigned from his U.S. House seat.
Other notable speakers at the event included former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon and senior adviser to President-elect Trump, Corey Lewandowski.
Republican Brad Knott, who flipped North Carolina’s 13th District red in November, explained to Fox News Digital why he resigned as a federal prosecutor to run for Congress – and what his priorities will be once he’s sworn into the House next month.
A lifelong North Carolinian and former longtime Assistant U.S. Attorney, Knott said that he considered it a "high honor" to spend most of his career working alongside law enforcement, including through organized crime investigations spanning across the country. It was the effects of President Biden and Vice President Harris taking office on local law enforcement in particular that drove Knott to run for Congress.
Observing the impact of the border crisis on communities, Knott said that he couldn't sit by and watch the sheer "availability of drugs, the presence of violence, the inability to combat it effectively because of just the deluge of people and contraband and criminality that was coming across the border and really the refusal of Washington to do what it could do."
"I had a very, very extensive career in law enforcement, saw a lot in that role and was very much troubled by what I saw on a policy level once Joe Biden and Kamala Harris took the reins in January of 2021," Knott said. "And the deliberate policies and the actions that they took upon taking the oath had a trickle-down effect that was just undeniable. And it was undeniably harmful not only for us as prosecutors, but federal law enforcement, local law enforcement, and then obviously the communities that we are all tasked to protect."
Noting executive policies alone, Knott said "there was an absolute refusal to tackle this problem," which he found "baffling" given the numbers of drug overdoses, attrition rates of law enforcement agencies and crime.
"There was just not an appetite at all to tackle this issue. And after a number of years of that, I ultimately followed my heart. We had prayed about this and given the unique posture I had before I decided to run," Knott said. "Seeing crimes all over the country and the effects of it, I thought that it'd be worth trying to run for office in an effort ultimately to fix those issues that I had a firsthand account of seeing and seeing how to combat it effectively."
Knott’s endorsement by President-elect Trump in April resulted in his overwhelming May run-off primary win, staving off the prior GOP front-runner Kelly Daughtry. He went on to defeat Democrat Frank Pierce on Election Day last month, winning the redrawn district now covering all or parts of the eight counties in or near the state capital of Raleigh.
The highlight of campaigning for office, Knott said, was door knocking and hosting town halls for the opportunities to speak and interact with voters firsthand.
"It's essential to do that because it gives you a window, a front row seat and to what people are actually focused on," Knott said. "It cuts through the noise. It cuts through the media. And in my old job, it's like getting to talk to the jury. It just goes right to the relevant party."
Through those conversations, Knott said the people of the 13th district expressed "a fairly consistent basket of issues" involving the border crisis' strain of resources on local police and first responders, and in schools and hospitals.
"But beyond that, there was an overwhelming sense that the country was just headed in the wrong direction," Knott told Fox News Digital. "And from a priority standpoint, I think many people realize that the last administration, the current administration, but soon to be the last administration, were prioritizing things that most Americans just did not agree with. There's real suffering in the United States right now, and there's a very real misconception that the economy is doing well, that the economy is robust. It is not robust. And most people in the 13th District had a real understanding of just how limited the economy is."
Knott stressed that the United States is $36 trillion in debt – and regardless of their background, he said voters overwhelmingly felt their taxpayer dollars were funneled to illegal immigrants and conflicts abroad, rather than Americans at home.
"Most people are struggling and struggling mightily. And whether it's sending tens, if not hundreds of billions of dollars abroad, tens if not hundreds of billions of dollars to illegal immigrants, the promulgation of thousands of regulations that strangle small businesses, essentially enabling only the connected and the big businesses to thrive," Knott said. "And again, the overall sentiment was the country is just headed in the wrong direction. And the path we're on, it needs to change. And so getting out into the community, our belief about getting into the race was certainly affirmed that the people, regardless of race, regardless of class, regardless of of politics, really, they wanted they wanted meaningful changes to obvious problems."
"We are $36 trillion in debt. What have you received for all of that spending?" Knott asked, stating that "we are going to have to pay that back for no services rendered."
As for the border crisis, Knott condemned how the U.S. government "literally borrowed money from other countries, from the taxpayers, their future earnings to subsidize the illegal immigration invasion," as "we were spending tens, if not hundreds of billions of dollars a year over the last couple of years paying for illegal immigrants to be here, to be educated here, to eat here, to sleep here. And incentivizing more of it."
"That's just one example of the gross incompetence, but the unbelievable power of Washington," Knott said.
The Biden administration is rushing to dispense billions more in U.S. aid to Ukraine before Trump takes office. Additional assistance amid what is nearly a three-year-long conflict will be deliberated by the new Congress, controlled by the GOP in both chambers, as Trump is expected to pressure Ukraine and Russia to come to a cease-fire agreement.
Knott decried how those in the political class and media simplify the Ukraine debate, arguing that objectives can be "more complicated than just one line." Yet, he says, his focus remains on the American people.
"Obviously, I think what Vladimir Putin is doing in Ukraine is, it's horrible. It should not be happening. I believe that Ukraine is certainly entitled to its border, to its sovereignty," Knott said. "And as I agree with President Trump, it needs to stop before tens of thousands of more people are killed. And, at the same time, recklessly dispensing of American dollars to a foreign country with what seems to be very little oversight when we have tremendous problems at home to deal with, that's a very legitimate concern. And there comes a point where we have to question whether or not our involvement is worth it to the American people."
"And we have suffering at home to the degree that we are currently seeing. I prefer to send those dollars and to keep those dollars here. And flatly speaking, we have a $36 trillion debt," Knott added. "And the idea that the United States can just dump tens, if not hundreds of billions of dollars into what seem to be very righteous endeavors around the world, we simply can't do that with no end in sight. And so my main focus is guarding the dollar, guarding the hard earnings of Americans, and really focusing as a government on the American citizenry that seems to be so downtrodden and taken advantage of and rebuilding that first."
Knott said that Trump has "made it very clear to the Republican Congress that he expects us to deliver solutions, and he also expects us to work with the other side," recognizing the GOP holds control by just a slim margin in the House.
"I mean, the open border, overregulation, overtaxation, overspending, inflation, the debt, these are not Republican problems to tackle. These are American problems that we must all tackle," Knott said. "And if we don't fix these things quickly, whether it is, you know, tens of millions of people coming across our border and requiring an increased percentage of support from the American taxpayers, whether it's the $36 trillion debt, these issues will ultimately gravely weaken the country. And so without saying my expectations, my hope is that the 119th Congress will find a way to meaningfully address these very serious problems, not for Republican benefit, but for the country's benefit."
Knott will replace Democrat Rep. Wiley Nickel, who did not seek re-election after citing the congressional remapping by Republican state legislators that reconfigured the district to strongly lean red. Nickel, who has signaled interest in running for Senate in 2026, will serve just one term in the House after flipping the seat blue by a razor-thin margin in 2022. Republican Ted Budd, another Trump-backed candidate, represented the district for three terms and that year successfully ran for the U.S. Senate.
Across his district's "robust and diverse" set of industries, ranging from agriculture, heavy equipment and infrastructure projects, Knott said he observed a "common thread" of business owners expressing frustration with D.C. bureaucracy.
From a conversation with a large scale sweet potato farmer in the district, as North Carolina is one of the largest producers of the crop in the country, Knott said he was told, "I can deal with the weather, I can deal with storms, I can deal with droughts, but I cannot deal with the regulations that are coming out of Washington, D.C." And the incoming congressman heard a similar story from infrastructure companies, which he says relayed how "the cost of regulatory overreach is becoming so great that they're having to just reallocate resources from building bridges to hiring basically paperwork pushers to deal with the regulations and the bureaucracy maze that is levied upon them."
"In terms of taking that power back, Washington has no business in telling our farmers how to farm, our builders how to build, our teachers how to teach," Knott said. "Kind of reestablishing the priorities in Washington and cutting the reach, sort of removing the tentacles as it is, I think will enable a much greater degree of flourishing for big businesses, small businesses, and really everyone in the 13th District."
Trump’s TRUTH Social post endorsing Knott called him a "Strong Patriot" who would support law enforcement and the military, secure the border and protect the Second Amendment. As for Daughtry, the daughter of a former longtime Republican legislative leader, Trump described her as a "RINO" – Republican in Name Only – "who has given money to Far Left Democrats, pledged to vote for Obama, and is no friend to MAGA."
"President Trump was undeniably effective as he weathered perhaps more resistance that was thrown at him than any candidate, certainly in my lifetime, and maybe the history of the country," Knott said. "And all of that resistance was designed and promulgated from Washington, D.C. And it's a very interesting metaphor that Washington, D.C. was fighting so hard against President Trump, both in his first term as president and when he was running again in the last couple of years. And my entire hope as a soon-to-be congressman is to equal out the balance of power again, to really leverage whatever ability we have as the 119th Congress, to dispense resources and power back to the people of this great country."
Trump is expected to bring a major shake-up to federal law enforcement, and while Knott said he does not know Trump's pick for FBI director, Kash Patel, or Attorney General pick Pam Bondi personally, he appreciates how Patel has supported "this decentralizing thrust of putting officers back into communities for safer collaboration, more in-depth collaboration with local law enforcement, and hopefully communities will be made safer."
"There does need to be a rigorous review of how the FBI is being managed and how it's being used and what percentage of the tax dollars that we allocate for the FBI are being used for Washington, D.C., bureaucracy versus putting police on the streets to make American communities safer," Knott said, adding that he's confident Patel and Bondi will face "rigorous review," will stand for questioning in the Senate and "then the right decision will hopefully be made following that review."
Recognizing that most first-term members do not get their first committee assignment picks, Knott said his background would make him a good candidate for the Judiciary.
"That's one of my passions, is to retool the criminal code in such a way that when President Trump leaves office, law enforcement still has the tools to protect the American people rather than relying solely on executive policy and executive power which can be undone with the stroke of a pen like we saw with Joe Biden and Kamala Harris," he said. "I think we need to rebuild the criminal code in some respects to be a more durable solution for the American people."
The incoming House class already has seen controversy with the election of transgender Rep.-elect Sarah McBride, D-Del. In response, Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., pushed for a resolution banning members and House staffers from using "single-sex facilities other than those corresponding to their biological sex." Mace, a rape survivor, said she’s received death threats for publicly calling to preserve private spaces for women and girls, and she said she was "physically accosted" on the Capitol grounds on Tuesday.
Knott, who was on the Hill for orientation while the controversy unfolded, praised the response of House Speaker Mike Johnson, who enacted a policy preserving single-sex facilities on Capitol grounds. While Johnson said everyone should be treated with dignity and respect, the speaker stressed, "A man cannot become a woman."
"It was one of the unfortunate instances of our orientation insofar as we talked about very serious issues that affect all Americans, not just a very small percentage of society. And I think the speaker hit the nail on the head," Knott said. "He said all people are worthy of respect and dignity and being treated with respect and dignity and kindness. But that does not mean that anybody who claims to be a woman should be able to go into a bathroom where women are, where little girls are."
"As the father of two little girls, I stand behind the speaker's sentiment that men should stay in men's locker rooms, women should be and women's locker rooms. And you're born a man. You're born a woman. And we should adhere to that," Knott added. "It's not uniform across the board. There are some people who would abuse that liberty to satisfy their own perversions. And of course, there are some who would not. And the speaker's policy, I think, is the one that's most respectful, it’s most clear, and it's the easiest for us to follow."
EXCLUSIVE: President-elect Trump won't be on the ballot in the 2026 midterms, but Republican National Committee chair Michael Whatley says that Trump will play a "significant" role in supporting GOP candidates.
Republicans enjoyed major victories in last month's elections, with Trump defeating Vice President Kamala Harris to win the White House, the GOP flipping control of the Senate from the Democrats, and holding on to their razor-thin majority in the House.
Whatley argued that "as we go forward into this next election cycle, the fundamentals are going to remain the same" during an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital.
"We need to make sure that we are building our state parties, that we're building our ground game, we're building our election integrity apparatus to be in place to make sure that when we get those candidates through those primaries in ‘26, that we're going to be in a position to take them all the way to the finish line," he emphasized.
But the party in power traditionally suffers setbacks in the following midterm elections. And Trump, who was a magnate for voter turnout, won't be on the ballot in 2026.
Whatley said that even though he won't be a candidate, "President Trump is going to be a very significant part of this because at the end of the day, what we need to do is hold on to the House, hold on to the Senate so that we can finish his term and his agenda."
And Whatley predicted that "Donald Trump will be very active on the campaign trail for Republicans. And his agenda is the agenda that we're going to be running on."
The Harris campaign and the Democratic National Committee outraised the Trump campaign and the RNC this past cycle, but Whatley is confident that with the party soon to control the White House, Republicans will be even more competitive in the campaign cash race in the midterms.
"We're pretty excited about where we are in terms of the fundraising that we did throughout the course of this cycle and what we're going to do going forward," he said.
Whatley said that his message to donors will be "we were successful in putting Donald Trump into the White House, and we need to carry forward with his agenda by keeping these House majorities and Senate majorities."
He also pushed back on the persistent questioning of the RNC and Trump campaign's ground game efforts during the general election.
"We focused very hard on low propensity voters. This was an entirely new system that we put in place over the course of this election cycle. It worked very, very well," he touted.
And looking ahead, he said "in a midterm election cycle, low propensity voters are going to, again, be very, very important for us. So, we're going to continue to focus on building that type of a program."
Whatley spotlighted that 'we also focused on outreach to communities that the Republican Party has traditionally not reached out to - Black voters, Hispanic voters, Asian American voters. That's why we were able to see such seismic shifts towards Donald Trump versus where those blocks had been in 2016 and 2020. We also saw seismic shifts among young voters and women voters because we were talking to every single American voter. Our ground game was very significant."
Whatley was interviewed a week after Trump asked him to continue as RNC chair moving forward.
In March, as he clinched the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, Trump named Whatley to succeed Ronna McDaniel as RNC chair. Whatley, a longtime ally of the former president and a major supporter of Trump's election integrity efforts, had served as RNC general counsel and chair of the North Carolina Republican Party.
Trump is term-limited and won't be able to seek election again in 2028. Vice President-elect Sen. JD Vance will likely be considered the front-runner for the 2028 GOP nomination.
But asked if the RNC will hold to its traditional role of staying neutral in an open and contested presidential primary, Whatley said "we will."
And he added that "I'm very excited about the bench that we have in the Republican Party right now. You think about all the Republican governors, you think about all the Republican senators, the members of the House that we have, the leaders across the country that have been engaged in this campaign are going to be part of the president's cabinet."
Whatley argued that the president-elect's "America First movement is bigger than Donald Trump. He is the tip of the spear. He is the vanguard of this movement. But. It is a very big movement right now."
The chairman also emphasized that "Donald Trump has completely remade the Republican Party. We're now the working-class party. We're now a party that is communicating and working with every single voter, speaking to every single voter about the issues that they care about. So, as we go into 2028, we are in a great position to be able to continue the momentum of this agenda and this movement."
Unlike the DNC, which in the 2024 cycle upended the traditional presidential nominating calendar, the RNC made no major changes to their primary lineup, and kept the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary as their first two contests.
Asked about the 2028 calendar, Whatley said "I've not had any conversations with anybody who wants to change the calendar on our side. I know the Democrats did during the course of this election cycle, not sure that it really helped them all that much."
"We're very comfortable with the calendar as it is. But as we move towards 2028, we'll have those conversations," he added.
President Biden slammed Republicans for not understanding how advancing women's health not only improves the lives of women but also the prosperity of the entire nation. He made the remark during a first-of-its-kind conference on women's health research at the White House Wednesday afternoon.
"The fact is, the health of our moms, and grandmothers, sisters and daughters, friends and colleagues, affects not just women's well-being but the prosperity of the entire nation," Biden said at the conference. "That's a fact – we haven't gotten that through to the other team yet. I mean it – across the board."
Republicans, meanwhile, questioned whether Democrats understand the need to protect women, citing, in particular, Biden administration policies that sought to allow transgender women to use biological women's spaces and play on women's sports teams.
"Is any Democrat willing to stand up and defend girls and protect girls in private, in their private spaces, and protect girls in sports – not to force girls to participate in sports against men?" asked Tiffany Justice, the co-founder of the conservative nonprofit Moms for Liberty. "The idea that Democrats protect women or respect women is just absolutely nonsense."
Justice pointed to Biden's appointment of Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, "who was unwilling to define what a woman was" when pressed on the matter during her confirmation hearings.
The Heritage Foundation's Sarah Perry, a civil rights attorney who has extensive experience litigating Title IX issues, noted that Biden's remarks had an underlying tone of "abortion is health care," which was a hot-button issue for Republicans during this year's election.
"This is an administration that has made a name for itself in advancing the most radical ideologue policies," Perry said. "I mean, he's got a man in a dress at HHS telling us what health care is. That is the specious nature of those kinds of representations."
Colin Reed, a GOP strategist, added that the electoral success seen last month by Republicans was an indication that the American people reject these sorts of arguments from Democrats.
"The Democratic Party has become a one-trick pony trying to speak to voters facing across-the-board challenges," he said. "Until Democrats start meeting voters where they are at, they will continue losing elections."
In a statement to Fox News Digital, Karoline Leavitt, Trump-Vance Transition spokeswoman, noted that Trump campaigned on "making ALL Americans" healthy again, including women, adding that Trump "will deliver on that promise."
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for comment but did not receive a response.
FIRST ON FOX: Republican governors from across the United States are expressing their support for President-elect Trump’s plans for a historic mass deportation campaign next year, and promising to work with him to get it done.
"As Republican governors, we stand united in support of President Donald Trump’s unwavering commitment to make America safe again by addressing the illegal immigration crisis and deporting illegal immigrants who pose a threat to our communities and national security," 26 Republican governors said in a joint statement.
The statement was led by Republican Governors Association (RGA) Policy Chair Henry McMaster. McMaster, the governor of South Carolina, became policy chair in November and this marks his first action in this role.
In the statement, the governors said they had taken action during what they say is inaction by the Biden administration in the border crisis that began in 2021.
"We mobilized state resources, including law enforcement and National Guard units, to protect Americans from disastrous open border policies and prevent illegal immigration from overwhelming our country," they say.
Trump has promised to launch the deportation campaign when sworn into office next year. He has appointed Tom Homan, former acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) director, as border czar, and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem as his nominee to lead the Department of Homeland Security. Noem also signed the statement.
Homan has said the primary target of the deportation operation will be public safety threats, but he has also stressed that no-one in the country illegally is off the table.
A number of Democratic governors, including Massachusetts' Maura Healey and Arizona's Katie Hobbs, have said they won’t cooperate with the administration on deportations. But the Republican governors say they are "proud to welcome President Trump back to the White House, a leader who has consistently put America first.
"His leadership is exactly what our nation needs to restore law and order at the border, and we are eager to work alongside his Administration to tackle the critical challenges facing our nation," they say.
"Republican governors remain fully committed to supporting the Trump Administration’s efforts to deport dangerous criminals, gang members, and terrorists who are in this country illegally. We understand the direct threat these criminal illegal immigrants pose to public safety and our national security, and we will do everything in our power to assist in removing them from our communities."
They say they are prepared to use every tool at their disposal "whether through state law enforcement or the National Guard – to support President Trump in this vital mission."
"The time for action is now. Together, we will make America safe again," they say.
In addition to South Carolina, governors from Alabama, Arkansas, Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Ohio, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia and Wyoming are represented in the statement.
Already, the state of Texas has offered more than 1,400 acres of land to the incoming administration with which to stage mass deportations. Homan said this week he is already making plans for how that land can be used.
A federal judge in North Dakota blocked a Biden administration rule that allowed Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients to apply for ObamaCare coverage through the Affordable Care Act.
Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach, who led the lawsuit against the Biden administration, called the judge's ruling on Monday "not surprising," in an interview with Fox News Digital.
"In this case, it was argued before the election, and we definitely got the impression at the hearing that the judge was going to rule the way he did," Kobach told Fox News Digital. "And similarly, there are a bunch of other cases where Republican states brought challenges to Biden administration policies, where again, the Biden administration was just torturing the English language and changing the meaning of statutes."
"And so what the Biden administration attempted to do was to say, 'Well, we will just define these categories of illegal aliens as lawfully present, even though they're not,'" Kobach said. "It's Alice in Wonderland stuff."
In the preliminary injunction issued Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Dan Traynor – appointed by President Trump during his first term – sided with 19 state attorneys general who filed a lawsuit against Biden's rule in August. The state attorneys general argued it violates a law that bars ObamaCare benefits to illegal immigrants. Biden's regulation will now not be enforced in those states.
"The Court concludes, through a common-sense inference, that the powerful incentive of health care will encourage aliens who may otherwise vacate the Plaintiff States to remain," Traynor wrote.
The Biden administration's executive action aimed to redefine illegal aliens as lawfully present. The states opposing the ruling were Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia.
If Biden's ruling remained in place, it would have resulted in over 100,000 uninsured illegal immigrants accessing health insurance. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) rule would have also allowed DACA recipients to apply for coverage through HealthCare.gov and state-based marketplaces. The rule would have done so by making what HHS calls "technical modifications" to the definition of "lawfully present" used to determine eligibility.
President Obama announced the DACA program on June 15, 2012, as an executive action to address the situation of young illegal immigrants brought to the U.S. as children. The program was not passed through Congress but was implemented via a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) memorandum.
Trump's first-term administration tried to end DACA, but the Supreme Court blocked it in 2020.
"The impact on federal taxpayers, if this Biden regulation had gone through, would have been immense, because the benefit of getting the ObamaCare subsidy in any given year might be $4,000 or so," Kobach said. "But if you multiply that times the hundreds of dreamers who would have gotten this benefit, and they would have gotten year after year… that would have included basically any illegal alien who's got work authorization, and they number in the thousands. So the total impact, the total financial impact on taxpayers would certainly have been in the millions, possibly in the hundreds of millions."
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid services (CMS) said in statement to media it is reviewing a lawsuit but does not comment on ongoing litigation.
Fox News Digital's Adam Shaw contributed to this report.
Florida state Rep. Susan Valdés, who was just re-elected as a Democrat last month, announced that she's switching her party affiliation to Republican.
"I will not waste my final two years in the Florida Legislature being ignored in a caucus whose leadership expects me to ignore the needs of my community," the newly-minted Republican said in a statement.
"Effective immediately, I will change my registration from a Democrat to Republican and will join the Republican Conference in the Florida House of Representatives," she noted. "I know that I won't agree with my fellow Republican House members on every issue, but I know that in their caucus, I will be welcomed and treated with respect."
Her switch comes on the heels of a bid for the role of Hillsborough County Democratic Executive Committee chair.
"While it remains disturbingly unclear whether she was entertaining the switch to become a Republican even as she was running to lead the local Party, ultimately it is her constituents in District 64 who have the most reason to be upset and betrayed," Hillsborough County Democratic Party chair Vanessa Lester said in a statement shared on the Hillsborough County Democratic Party's Facebook page. "They voted for a Democrat to fight for them and ended up with a political opportunist who abandoned them."
Sunshine State Gov. Ron DeSantis welcomed the congresswoman to the Republican Party, declaring in a post on X, "Welcome to the GOP, Rep. Valdes! Congrats to Speaker @Daniel_PerezFL on the biggest Republican majority in the history of the Florida House!" the governor added.
Valdés hailed former President Jimmy Carter as "My hero!" in a post on X earlier this year while wishing the 100-year-old Democrat a happy birthday.
"I’m only trying to make it to vote for Kamala Harris," the former president told his son Chip, according to grandson Jason Carter, The Atlanta-Journal Constitution reported earlier this year.
In an October post on Facebook, Valdés wrote, "I pray you can see her inauguration, President Jimmy Carter."
President-elect Donald Trump's nominee to head the Department of Defense, Pete Hegseth, spent another day courting support from Republican senators on Capitol Hill and taking a few questions from reporters while he was at it.
The military vet turned "Fox & Friends" co-host met with senators Rick Scott, R-Fla.; Cindy Hyde-Smith, R-Miss; Mike Rounds, R-S.D.; Ron Johnson, R-Wis.; Tom Cotton, R-Ark.; and Sen.-elect Jim Banks, R-Ind., Thursday.
The meetings followed others Hegseth held earlier in the week with GOP senators, including Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., who will be the next chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D.
Hegseth has been facing a mountain of criticism with accusations against him ranging from fiscal mismanagement to alcoholism to sexual misconduct. Nevertheless, Hegseth said Thursday while walking between meetings on Capitol Hill that Trump supports him "fully."
"I'll tell you why I support him," Scott told reporters after his meeting Thursday with Hegseth. "I admire people who are willing to put on the uniform and lead troops into battle. ... When he goes in the Department of Defense, he will walk in with the mentality that he's going to take care of our warfighters."
Scott added that he will do "everything" he can to ensure Hegseth is confirmed.
"Pete Hegseth won’t back down from the media or the Pentagon bureaucracy," Banks added after his own one-on-one meeting with the defense nominee. "And he won’t back down from China, Russia or Iran. He will help President Trump make America strong again."
Between meetings on Capitol Hill Thursday, Hegseth was pressed about his meeting a day earlier with Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa. Ernst said earlier Thursday morning she was not yet willing to throw her support behind him.
"Productive meeting. Excellent," Hegseth said of his meeting with Ernst as he was peppered with questions during his meeting with Rounds.
"Constructive, candid. It was great," Hegseth told a different reporter.
When asked if the allegations about him were a topic of his conversation with Ernst, Hegseth declined to comment further, citing the private nature of their conversation.
"It's been a wonderful process," Hegseth told reporters Thursday. "There's an incredible amount of knowledge in the U.S. Senate — in the Senate Armed Services Committee — men and women who have studied these issues, have invested their lives in it. And as someone who is hoping to earn their support as the nominee for secretary of defense, I welcome that knowledge, I welcome that advice. And that's why we're here in all these meetings."
Hegseth's meetings Thursday coincided with visits to Capitol Hill by Tesla CEO Elon Musk and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy. The pair convened on Capitol Hill to discuss their new role running President-elect Trump's Department of Government Efficiency with Thune.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Lawmakers told Fox News Digital they are "very impressed" with President-elect Trump's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) framework amid meetings on Capitol Hill with agency appointees Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy.
In November, Trump tapped Tesla CEO Musk and former presidential candidate Ramaswamy to co-lead DOGE under his administration — a new federal department that will aim to reduce government waste and slash costs.
Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa., chair of the Senate's DOGE Caucus, led a meeting with senators Thursday to unveil a 60-page cost-cutting proposal. Ramawasy was present at the meeting, while Musk simultaneously sat down with incoming Senate Majority Leader Sen. John Thune of South Dakota.
"I'm very impressed with what Elon and Vivek want to accomplish," Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., told Fox News Digital after leaving the DOGE Caucus meeting. "I can't talk about what they are going to be proposing, but I've known them for a long time, and I think they're going to do a great job."
While senators who attended the meeting would not reveal specifically where DOGE intends to cut costs, they all agreed that the conversation was productive.
"It showed a lot of us are on the same page," Sen. Ted Budd, R-N.C., said of Thursday's chat. "We need to make government serve people again."
Budd added that he believes Musk and Ramaswamy are "the right people for the moment" to cut government costs.
Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., told Fox News Digital that DOGE is rolling out "hundreds of ideas" aimed towards achieving a "balanced budget."
"It was just a great conversation," Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., said after leaving the meeting.
Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said, "We talked about a lot of things. This is the very beginning of a process that, if we do it right, will be ongoing. So right now, we are just talking about the art of the possible."
Tillis added that he believes Democrats will come on board with DOGE.
Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan of Alaska said his top priority in addressing costs is fixing "the regulatory burden and litigation abuse to do anything in America."
Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine also told reporters that it was a "good meeting."
During Thursday's DOGE caucus meeting, Ernst proposed the federal government relocate Washington’s workforce across the country, and for Congress to set a goal for all federal government agencies to achieve a 60% daily occupancy at their headquarters.
Ernst's report found that only 6% of workers currently report in-person on a full-time basis, with nearly one-third working remotely, according to a copy shared with Fox News Digital.
Fox News' Brooke Singman contributed to this report.
President-elect Trump on Wednesday invited Republican National Committee chair Michael Whatley to continue steering the GOP's national party committee.
And Whatley quickly accepted, saying he is "honored for the opportunity to continue as Chairman of the RNC and work nonstop to help President Trump Make America Great Again!"
The former and future Republican president, pointing to his convincing White House victory in last month's elections, as well the GOP's flipping of the Senate and holding onto its fragile House majority, said Whatley had done "an OUTSTANDING and HISTORIC JOB in running" the RNC.
And Trump announced that "I have asked Michael to return as Chairman of the RNC to continue to build our Party, and be a trusted partner as we Make America Great Again, and ensure Free and Fair Election."
In March, as he clinched the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, Trump named Whatley to succeed Ronna McDaniel as RNC chair. Whatley, a longtime ally of the former president and a major supporter of the former president's election integrity efforts, had served as RNC general counsel and chair of the North Carolina Republican Party. Trump also named his daughter-in-law Lara Trump as RNC co-chair.
After first winning the White House in 2016, Trump picked McDaniel to steer the national party committee, and she became the longest serving chair in modern times. But earlier this year, Trump essentially pushed McDaniel out the door by repeatedly urging changes at the committee – after lackluster party fundraising and his opposition to the RNC's presidential primary debates.
Trump, in his social media post, said Whatley "is a smart, tough lawyer who put together a completely unprecedented ELECTION INTEGRITY OPERATION that protected the Vote all across America, and a GET OUT THE VOTE CAMPAIGN that delivered the Votes we needed in every Battleground State."
And he argued that "Michael and Lara transformed the RNC into a lean, focused, and powerful machine that will empower the America First Agenda for many years to come."
Trump, whose immense grip over the GOP is stronger than ever, urged that "Republicans everywhere should support him [Whatley] as he continues his mission at the RNC."
Whatley, responding minutes later in a social media post, thanked Trump "for the trust he has placed in me to continue our important work at the @GOP."
"As long as I am Chairman, the RNC’s priorities will remain the same: get out the vote, protect the ballot, and raise the money we need to elect Republicans up and down the ticket," he pledged.
Whatley pointed to the "crucial fights ahead," which he said included "supporting President Trump’s cabinet nominees and preparing for the 2026 midterms, to our ongoing fight for election integrity across America."
But Trump, in last month's elections, outperformed many down-ballot Republicans in key Senate and House races. And the RNC, going forward, will need to work to ensure that Trump voters continue to support the party's candidates even though the term-limited Trump won't appear on the ballot ever again.
Incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., is laying out a legislative road map for 2025 with plans to pass a colossal bill within the first month under the new administration.
Thune revealed his legislative priorities during a Republican meeting on Tuesday, telling his colleagues that he intends to swiftly move forward a budget reconciliation bill on border security, defense and energy within the first 30 days of the new Congress.
Reconciliation is a legislative maneuver used to fast-track bills on issues such as taxes, the debt limit and federal spending by bypassing the Senate’s 60-vote threshold for passage, instead lowering it to a simple 51-vote majority.
The senator told lawmakers that his next order of business would be legislation focusing on taxes and other top priorities of President-elect Donald Trump's administration.
Lawmakers in the House chamber have already signaled their intention to also pass a border security and energy-focused reconciliation bill.
"We’re going to push the outer limits to include as much pro-growth strategy as we can. One of those would be regulatory reform," Rep. Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, the House Budget Committee Chair, told Fox News Digital. "Another one will be border security and immigration reform."
However, reconciliation plans were not welcomed by all congressional Republicans.
Rep. Jason Smith, R-Mo., chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, strongly criticized the proposal, labeling the concept of reconciliation as "reckless."
"If they do that process, I think that they are creating an opportunity to increase taxes for all Americans," Smith told Punchbowl News.
During Tuesday's meeting, Thune also revealed his plans to make some changes to the workflow in the chamber.
The Republican senator said that votes would no longer be held indefinitely to shorten voting time and prepared lawmakers to expect longer work weeks during the first few months of the 119th Congress.
Trump reportedly called into Tuesday's meeting to speak with the senators as they discussed legislative priorities, as he will have to work closely with the chamber to move forward his own agenda.
"He was thrilled with his victory," Sen. John Barrasso, R–Wyo., said of Trump’s call, the Hill reported. "We have a mandate and an opportunity to do the sorts of things that we campaigned upon in terms of lowering prices, in terms of the border, in terms of getting America back on track."
Fox News' Elizabeth Elkind contributed to this report.
The candidate considered the frontrunner in the race to chair the Democratic National Committee is proposing a "massive narrative and branding project" to boost the party's image in the wake of last month's election losses.
Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party chair Ken Martin, a DNC vice chair who has led the association of state Democratic Party chairs, on Tuesday unveiled a 10-point memo titled "A New DNC Framework."
Martin's memo calls on Democrats to "show up in nontraditional and uncomfortable media spaces on a regular basis, increase outreach to local messengers and trusted validators, and create our own platforms for authentic engagement."
Democrats suffered major setbacks up and down the ballot in the 2024 elections, as former President Trump recaptured the White House, and the GOP flipped the Senate and held onto their fragile majority in the House.
The Trump campaign and Republicans' aggressive strategy of appearances on podcasts and other non-traditional media is credited, in part, for the gains they made in winning the support of working class, minority, younger and low-propensity voters.
Martin, who is courting state Democratic Party officials this week as they huddle in Phoenix, Arizona, is also calling for themes others in the party have pushed, including competing in all 57 states and territories.
"If we’re going to be a national party, we need to compete everywhere," Martin emphasizes.
He also calls for year-round organizing in every county in the country, contesting races all the way down the ballot, and energizing youth mobilization.
Martin lamented that "the majority of Americans now believe the Republican Party best represents the interests of the working class and the poor, and the Democratic Party is the party of the wealthy and the elites. It’s a damning indictment on our party brand."
And he urged that "we must be willing to dig deep and recenter the Democratic agenda to unite families across race, age, background, and class."
Martin unveiled his plan on the same day that DNC chair Jaime Harrison released a memo highlighting that the party's down-ballot victories last month offer a road map to greater electoral success in the future.
Harrison is not seeking a second straight four-year term steering the national party committee. The next chair will be chosen by the roughly 450 voting members of the national party committee when they meet at the beginning of February at National Harbor in Maryland for the DNC's winter meeting.
Martin appears to be the early frontrunner in the race, and his campaign says he has the backing of at least 100 DNC voting members, which is nearly half of what a candidate needs to secure the chair.
Also running and considered competitive is Ben Wikler, who's chaired the state Democratic Party in battleground Wisconsin for five years and is well known by the voting members.
"Today, the country we love needs the Democratic Party to be stronger. To unite. To fight. And to win," Wikler emphasized on Sunday in a video as he launched his bid.
A party insider who asked to remain anonymous to speak more freely told Fox News that "the DNC insiders/establishment have significant influence over this membership, so the race will be very close."
Martin O'Malley, the former two-term Maryland governor and 2016 Democratic presidential candidate who served as commissioner of the Social Security Administration the past year, jumped into the race last week, a day before Martin.
Also running are New York state Sen. James Skoufis and former U.S. Senate candidate from Maryland Robert Houton.
The field of five DNC chair candidates is expected to grow.
As Fox News and other news organizations reported last month, Rahm Emanuel, the ambassador to Japan, has been quietly reaching out to DNC committee members as he contemplates a bid. Emanuel is a former two-term Chicago mayor who earlier served as White House chief of staff in President Obama's administration and as a member of Congress.
Also eyeing the chair are former New York State assembly member Michael Blake, Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, and Chuck Rocha, a Democratic strategist who describes himself as "non-college-educated Mexican redneck."
A DNC voting member granted anonymity to speak more freely told Fox News, "I'm open to talking to whomever is interested in this, to listen to their vision and plan, and listen to people's different takes on what we need to do."
"I think the race is wide open," the member added.
The field of contenders bidding to steer the Democratic National Committee in the wake of the party's very disappointing results in last month's elections keeps growing.
Three more candidates over the weekend announced their intentions to run in a wide-open DNC chair race that appears to have a frontrunner.
Ben Wikler, who's chaired the state Democratic Party in battleground Wisconsin for five years, launched his campaign Sunday in a video.
"Today, the country we love needs the Democratic Party to be stronger. To unite. To fight. And to win," Wikler emphasized.
Also Sunday, former Senate candidate from Maryland Robert Houton announced his bid, saying in a letter to DNC members that he aimed to "lead and grow our Democratic party to champion electoral and transformative, legacy victories in 2025, 2026, 2027, 2028, and beyond."
A day earlier, New York state Sen. James Skoufis took to social media to announce his long-shot, outsider bid for DNC chair, in the race to succeed Jaime Harrison, who is not seeking a second four-year term early next year in the wake of major setbacks for the Democrats up and down the 2024 ballot.
"Voters have spoken, and we need to listen, not lecture. We need to be strong fighters again," he said. "I may be an outsider, but I know how to win."
And Skoufis vowed to "throw out the DNC's stale, Beltway-centered playbook so that we rebuild, stop ceding ground to Republicans and start winning again – everywhere."
Martin O'Malley, the former two-term Maryland governor and 2016 Democratic presidential candidate who served as commissioner of the Social Security Administration the past year, and Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party chair Ken Martin, a DNC vice chair who also leads the association of state Democratic Party chairs, jumped into the race last week.
"When I took over @MinnesotaDFL, we were in debt and disarray. But we brought people together, built a winning coalition, and delivered results. I’m ready to get to work to rebuild our party," Martin said in a social media post announcing his run.
In an accompanying video, Martin emphasized, "If you're looking for a creature of D.C., that's not me. But I do know how the DNC works and how it isn't working."
O'Malley, in launching his bid, highlighted that "we must connect our Party with the most important place in America – the kitchen table of every family’s home. Jobs, Opportunity, and Economic Security for all. Getting things done. Hope. A 50 state strategy. Now."
The field of five DNC chair candidates is expected to grow, as the Democrats try to rebound after losing the White House and Senate in the 2024 elections and failing to recapture the House of Representatives.
As Fox News and other news organizations reported last month, Rahm Emanuel, the ambassador to Japan, has been quietly reaching out to DNC committee members as he contemplates a bid. Emanuel is a former two-term Chicago mayor who earlier served as White House chief of staff in President Obama's administration and as a member of Congress,
Also eyeing the chair are former New York State assembly member Michael Blake, Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, and Chuck Rocha, a Democratic strategist who describes himself as "non-college-educated Mexican redneck."
The next chair will be chosen by the roughly 450 voting members of the national party committee when they meet at the beginning of February at National Harbor in Maryland for the DNC's winter meeting.
Martin appears to be the early frontrunner. A DNC insider who asked to remain anonymous to speak more freely said Martin has over 150 endorsements from voting members.
But Wikler, who is also well-known by the DNC membership, is also considered a frontrunner. "The DNC insiders/establishment have significant influence over this membership, so the race will be very close," the party insider argued.
"I'm open to talking to whomever is interested in this, to listen to their vision and plan, and listen to people's different takes on what we need to do," said a DNC voting member granted anonymity to speak more freely.
The member said, "I think the race is wide open."
"We have to go back to 50-state strategy," the member said. "We definitely have to figure out how to speak to a broader swath of working-class voters, and when I say working-class voters, I don't just mean White working-class, I mean Latino, African American, voters of colors… we have to figure out how to talk to all of those."
And the member added that in order to compete with the Republicans, the DNC also has "to drastically expand and not just go a mile wide but a mile deep on the different platforms of communication."
FIRST ON FOX — Gov. Brian Kemp, the new chair of the Republican Governors Association, is aiming to build on the GOP momentum coming out of the 2024 elections as he looks ahead to the next gubernatorial showdowns.
"We've had great successes," the popular GOP governor of Georgia told Fox News Digital as he pointed to President-elect Trump's 2024 victory as well as Republican gubernatorial, congressional and down-ballot triumphs this month.
Republicans held onto their 27-23 gubernatorial advantage in the 2024 elections, thanks in part to the efforts of the RGA.
Looking ahead, New Jersey and Virginia are the only two states to hold gubernatorial elections next year, giving them outsized national attention and making them key barometers for the mood of Americans during the start of a new presidential term.
A competitive GOP primary is underway in blue-state New Jersey, where Republicans hope to win a gubernatorial election for the first time in a dozen years.
And in Virginia, the GOP is rallying around Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears as she aims to succeed term-limited Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin [Virginia governors can only serve one consecutive four-year term] and make history as the state's first woman governor and the nation's first Black female governor.
"We're ready to keep working as we move into what will be a tough cycle for us in Virginia, in New Jersey, and then having 36 races in 2026," Kemp said last week in his first interview after being elected RGA chair at the group's annual winter meeting, which was held this year at a waterfront resort in Marco Island, Florida.
Kemp emphasized that "my goal is for us to continue to raise enough money to be competitive. The Democrats are outspending us because they have big check writers, but we have a lot of really dedicated donors. We'll try to continue to build the tent, make sure that we have good candidates and win because our policies are better."
Kemp said his own comfortable re-election in 2022 and Trump's victory in battleground Georgia this month in the presidential election "gives us a lot of confidence, a lot of hope, but we also know that the '26 midterm is going to be tough."
Kemp is term-limited and can't seek another term in office in 2026. The contest to succeed him will be a top gubernatorial election in two years.
"I'm going to be very engaged, you can rest assured, to making sure that my [successors] are Republican. I have a vested interest in doing that," Kemp said. "We'll be working with the Trump administration and a lot of other people to make sure that that's happening not only in Georgia but in other states around the country, in places like Kansas, where we have a Democratic governor right now, in places like Arizona, where we have a really good shot at winning the governor's races. So we're going to be on offense."
Georgia will also have a high-profile Senate showdown as Republicans aim to defeat Democrat Sen. Jon Ossoff in 2026.
Asked if he'll be courted by national Republicans to take on Ossoff, Kemp responded, "Well, I may."
But he quickly pivoted, stressing that "my focus right now, being just elected the chairman of the Republican Governors Association, is on raising money for us to be competitive in 2025 and 2026. I've made the commitment to do that, and I'm going to fulfill that commitment. We'll see what happens down the road with anything else."
Asked if he's not ruling out a possible 2026 Senate bid or even a 2028 White House run, the governor said, "I try to keep all doors open in politics."
The White House turkey pardoning ceremony, a long-held Thanksgiving tradition formalized 77 years ago, traces its origins back decades further.
Since the 1800s, it has been customary for the sitting president to be gifted a turkey as a festive gesture, with several presidents hinting that the bird would be featured on their holiday menu.
However, in recent decades, sitting presidents launched a new tradition of "pardoning" the bird, essentially sparing its life and ensuring it will spend the remainder of its time on a farm.
The turkey is brought to Washington, D.C., during the week of Thanksgiving, gets a room at the five-star Willard Hotel and is eventually "pardoned" by the president. However, the history of exactly when the pardon began "gets tricky," as described by the Obama White House archives.
According to the George Bush national archives, former President Lincoln spared the life of the Thanksgiving turkey upon request from his son, Tad Lincoln.
The White House turkey was again spared in 1947, when former President Truman began an annual tradition of the animal being gifted by the National Turkey Federation.
However, the Truman Library and Museum said they have "found no documents, speeches, newspaper clippings, photographs, or other contemporary records in our holdings which refer to Truman pardoning a turkey that he received as a gift in 1947, or at any other time during his presidency."
In 1963, former President Kennedy also decided to spare the life of that year's Thanksgiving turkey, saying "we'll just let this one grow."
Former President Reagan did it informally during the ceremony in 1987. Reagan was asked by reporters about potentially pardoning individuals from the Iran-Contra affair, but he pointed at the turkey and said he would "pardon him" instead.
However, it wasn't until 1989 when former President George H. W. Bush officially presented the turkey with a presidential "pardon," an annual tradition that has been honored in the decades since.
"Let me assure you and this fine Tom Turkey that he will not end up on anyone's dinner table, not this guy. He's granted a presidential pardon as of right now and allow him to live out his days on a children's farm not far from here," Bush said in 1989.
Since Bush, every president has participated in the turkey pardoning ceremony as part of the White House Thanksgiving week celebration.
President Biden has been pardoning two turkeys for the last three years. He participated in the 77th annual turkey pardon on Monday, the last one of his presidency, sparing "Peach" and "Blossom" in the Rose Garden on the South Lawn of the White House.
"This event marks the official start of the holiday season here in Washington. It's also my last time to speak here as your president during the season," Biden said during the ceremony. "It's been the honor of my life. I'm forever grateful that today my wife, Jill, and I will travel to Staten Island, New York, for a ‘friendsgiving’ with members of the Coast Guard and their families to demonstrate our gratitude for their service and sacrifice, like my son."
Some critics, such as animal rights group Farm Sanctuary, have called the tradition "little more than a photo op."
However, presidents and spectators have enjoyed the ceremony as a fun event for the holidays.
NEWFIELDS, N.H. – After eight years in office, Republican Gov. Chris Sununu of New Hampshire is in his final weeks steering New England's only swing state.
Sununu announced last year that he wouldn’t seek an unprecedented fifth two-year term as governor. New Hampshire and Vermont are the only two states in the nation to hold gubernatorial elections every two years.
And he's leaving office on a high note, with his approval ratings remaining firmly in positive territory.
So what's next for the 50-year-old Sununu, who eight years ago, when first elected, was the nation's youngest governor?
"I'm excited to get back to the private sector. I like businesses, I like deal sourcing," the governor said in a Fox News Digital interview. "I'm not sure exactly what the private sector is going to bring, but I think it's going to be pretty exciting."
New Hampshire, a perennial swing state, will likely have a competitive Senate contest in 2026 when longtime Democrat Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a former governor, is up for re-election. And Sununu is likely to be courted by national Republicans to run for the Senate.
But Sununu reiterated what he told Fox News Digital in July.
"Definitely ruling out running for the Senate in 2026. Yeah, definitely not on my dance card," he said.
But the governor predicted that Republicans will "have a good candidate. There's no question about it. A couple of different folks that might be interested in running. I think that'd be fantastic. We've had an all-Democrat [congressional] delegation for a long time. I think the people in the state… would love a different voice, would love just some sort of change."
Sununu, one of the more recognizable governors nationwide thanks to his regular appearances the past few years on the Sunday talk shows and cable news networks, mulled a Republican presidential nomination run before announcing a year and a half ago that he wouldn't seek the White House in 2024.
Asked if there's another run for office in his future, the governor said he's "not thinking about that at all, excited for the private sector. And that's all… that's in my windshield."
But he didn't entirely shut the door, adding, "We'll see what political chapters write themselves down the road."
Sununu will be succeeded as New Hampshire governor by Gov.-elect Kelly Ayotte, a fellow Republican and former state attorney general and former U.S. senator.
The governor was a top surrogate on the campaign trail and on the airwaves for Ayotte, who pledged to continue the Sununu agenda.
Asked if Ayotte's nearly nine and half point win over former Manchester Mayor Joyce Craig, the Democratic Party gubernatorial nominee, was also a victory for him, Sununu said, "It was a victory for New Hampshire."
"Kelly's going to be phenomenal. She has that experience as an attorney general, as U.S. senator. She understands how the systems work," Sununu emphasized. "Our transition is already going incredibly smoothly; discussions virtually every single day about all aspects of government, where it's going, how to build good teams and, most importantly… the opportunities to listen to what's happening in the communities."
Asked if he'd be offering advice to his successor, Sununu said "she'll have my cell number. I don't know if she'll need it, because I think she's going to be fantastic on her own, but she'll always have my cell number."
Sununu pointed to John Lynch and now-Sen. Maggie Hassan, his Democratic predecessors as governor, who Sununu said shared their cellphone numbers with him. He noted, "We want New Hampshire to be successful. So, it's not just me helping Kelly out. It is always a team effort. She's going to have a host of people that she can lean on for any advice when she needs it."
MARCO ISLAND, Fla. — With his convincing White House victory this month, President-elect Donald Trump's grip over the Republican Party is firmer than ever.
But a popular Republican governor who has long been a vocal critic of the former and future president says that there's still room in the GOP for those outside of the MAGA and America First base.
"The party is a big-tent party. There's no question about it," Sununu said in a Fox News Digital interview this week along the sidelines of the Republican Governors Association winter meeting, which was held at a waterfront resort in southwest Florida.
Sununu, who was a top surrogate and supporter of former U.N. ambassador and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, Trump's final challenger in the 2024 GOP presidential primaries, backed the Republican nominee in the general election.
"It was a huge victory across the country, and the people of this country have spoken very loudly and unequivocally," Sununu said of Trump's electoral college and popular vote victory.
And the governor acknowledged that Trump is "the standard-bearer of the party" and "the voice of the party."
"But this is a very large party. If it wasn't, he (Trump) wouldn't have won. If it wasn't, we wouldn't have had convincing wins all across this country in a variety of different states," Sununu said.
Asked about the president-elect's flurry of announcements on Cabinet nominations this month, Sununu said that "he definitely has a couple of controversial Cabinet picks that … I don't mind saying I'm not the biggest fan of, but the vast majority of them are terrific." (Sununu was interviewed before former Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., withdrew his name from consideration as attorney general amid a growing scandal.)
"He's bringing folks from the private sector, he's bringing in governors, he's bringing in folks that have real experience in all of these issues and that understand the mission, which is fiscal responsibility," Sununu said, "getting regulations out of the way, which effectively lowers costs on business, lowers costs on consumers, lowers costs for everyday citizens."
Sununu didn't stump on Trump's behalf in swing state New Hampshire, but he crisscrossed the campaign trail on behalf of down-ballot Republicans. The governor was a top surrogate for former Sen. Kelly Ayotte, the GOP gubernatorial nominee who emerged victorious on Election Day and has pledged to continue the Sununu agenda.
Asked if Ayotte's nearly nine and half point win was also a victory for him, Sununu said, "It was a victory for New Hampshire."
"Kelly's going to be phenomenal. She has that experience as an attorney general, as U.S. senator. She understands how the systems work," Sununu said. "Our transition is already going incredibly smoothly; discussions virtually every single day about all aspects of government, where it's going, how to build good teams and, most importantly … the opportunities to listen to what's happening in the communities."
"She'll have my cell number. I don't know if she'll need it, because I think she's going to be fantastic on her own, but she'll always have my cell number," Sununu said when asked if he'd be offering advice to his successor.
And pointing to his two Democrat predecessors as governor, who Sununu said shared their cellphone numbers with him: "We want New Hampshire to be successful. So it's not just me helping Kelly out. It is always a team effort. She's going to have a host of people that she can lean on for any advice when she needs it."
After mulling a 2024 White House run, Sununu announced in the summer of 2023 that he would launch a presidential campaign, and weeks later he also said he wouldn't seek an unprecedented fifth two-year term steering the Granite State. (New Hampshire and neighboring Vermont are the only two states in the nation to hold gubernatorial elections every two years.)
"I'm excited to get back to the private sector. I like businesses, I like deal sourcing," he said. "I'm not sure exactly what the private sector is going to bring, but I think it's going to be pretty exciting."
New Hampshire will likely have a competitive Senate contest in 2026 when longtime Democrat Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a former governor, is up for re-election.
But Sununu reiterated what he told Fox News Digital in July.
"Definitely ruling out running for the Senate in 2026. Yeah, definitely not on my dance card," he said.
But the governor predicted that Republicans will "have a good candidate. There's no question about it. A couple of different folks that might be interested in running. I think that'd be fantastic. We've had an all-Democrat [congressional] delegation for a long time. I think the people in the state, especially with Kelly's convincing win, would love a different voice, would love just some sort of change."
Asked if there's another run for office in his future, the 50-year-old governor said he's "not thinking about that at all, excited for the private sector. And that's all … that's in my windshield."
But he didn't entirely shut the door, adding, "We'll see what political chapters write themselves down the road."
A new poll finds that Democrats are feeling glum about their party's prospects after Republican President-elect Trump won the 2024 presidential election.
Democratic pessimism about the party's future is at its highest point in eight years, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. Republicans, on the other hand, are riding high and have the most optimistic outlook about their party recorded since the 2016 election, Trump's last presidential victory.
For the first time since 2016, more Americans say the GOP, not the Democratic Party, represents the interests of "people like them" very or somewhat well, 50% to 43%.
Trump defeated Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 election, winning 312 Electoral College votes to her 226 votes and sweeping all the battleground states. Republicans also flipped control of the Senate and managed to cling to their majority in the House of Representatives, as well — guaranteeing full control of the federal government with a favorable 6-3 conservative majority on the Supreme Court.
Short of a filibuster-proof supermajority in the Senate, there is not much more Republicans could ask for in terms of power to enact their agenda at the federal level. So Democrats, understandably, are not thrilled about their party.
A majority of Democrats and Democrat-leaning independents, 51%, still say they are optimistic about the party's future. However, 49% are pessimistic — an increase of 20 percentage points from how Democrats felt after the 2022 midterm election's mixed results, according to the Pew Research Center. The number of pessimistic Democrats is also about 10 percentage points higher than when Hillary Clinton lost to Trump in 2016.
Those who are under age 50 and those further to the left than conservative and moderate Democrats tended to be more pessimistic.
Republicans, however, are far more optimistic about their party today (86%) than they were after the 2022 midterms (65%) and Trump's 2016 victory (79%).
The Pew Research Center noted the partisan gap in Republican and Democratic views of their respective party's futures is at 35 percentage points, the largest of any recent election.
Additionally, more Americans now say the GOP best represents their interests than those who say it is the Democratic Party who does so. About half of Americans say Republicans best represent "people like them" compared to 43% who say so about Democrats — a shift from recent years when the Democratic Party was believed to be more representative of "people like them."
That swing of opinion is almost entirely among Republicans and Republican-leaning independents, 85% of whom now say the GOP represents them well or somewhat well. That is a 14-point gain from a previous Pew Research Center survey in June 2023.
Most Democrats, 72%, still say their party represents them at least somewhat well. A small minority on both sides say their respective parties do not represent their interests well.
