Tuesday, December 31 | By Kristina Karisch |
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| ▪ Trump backs Johnson's Speakership bid ▪ Biden and Carter's overlapping legacies ▪ The year of AI in schools ▪ Russia accused of cutting undersea cables |
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©️ The Associated Press | Jose Luis Magana |
Can Johnson keep his gavel? |
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It's Speaker Mike Johnson's (R-La.) moment of truth. Will he be able to hold on to his gavel? The Speakership election is the first order of business for the House on the opening day of the 119th Congress, which will take place Jan. 3 at noon, as dictated by the Constitution. Even with President-elect Trump's endorsement of Johnson on Monday, the Speaker remains in a precarious position ahead of the vote on Friday. "Speaker Mike Johnson is a good, hard working, religious man," Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social. "He will do the right thing, and we will continue to WIN. Mike has my Complete & Total Endorsement. MAGA!" Tech billionaire Elon Musk also backed Johnson on Monday, a sign of his persistent influence on Republican politics since the campaign. Musk's support comes after he torpedoed Johnson's initial end-of-year funding package through a daylong crusade against the deal on the social platform X. Will it be enough? Johnson, who's seeking to lead a razor-thin one-seat GOP majority, cannot afford to lose more than one Republican vote on the House floor to maintain his delicate grasp on the gavel. As he aims to shore up support, Johnson has been making calls and reaching out to those who have expressed skepticism about his Speakership, write The Hill's Emily Brooks and Brett Samuels. While Johnson had successfully integrated into Trump's inner MAGA circle and spent months campaigning on a legislative agenda for a second term, their relationship has faced ups and downs after tripping on end-of-year legislative hurdles — one of which was set up by the president-elect. Anger from GOP members about how Johnson has handled various issues, including the end-of-year funding package, has already left his Speakership hanging by a thread. While Trump's endorsement is expected to empower prominent conservatives to rally to Johnson's side, it might not be enough. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) reiterated Monday that he will not support Johnson, and his "no" vote could sink his prospects. Others, such as Rep. Rich McCormick (R-Ga.), are likely to back Johnson — but not firm yeses. ▪ The New York Times: Since Election Day, Musk has largely been staying at a $2,000-a-night cottage at Mar-a-Lago, giving him easy access to Trump. ▪ The Atlantic: The MAGA honeymoon is over. A simmering debate over work visas has exploded over the last days of the year, exposing a rift on immigration among Trump's closest supporters. The H-1B visa — a temporary, non-immigrant work permit — is at the center of the MAGA-on-MAGA strife, with one faction claiming it's a necessary tool to attract professional talent to the United States, and the other deriding the visa program as a burden on American workers. Trump allies, including Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, have argued that the visa program benefits the country. Musk said in a post this week that "the number of people who are super talented engineers AND super motivated in the USA is far too low." Other Republicans have criticized H-1B visas. Former United Nations Ambassador — and the president-elect's former GOP primary rival — Nikki Haley (R) called it "lazy" for the "tech industry to automatically go to foreign workers for their needs." Trump, meanwhile, told the New York Post that he has "always liked the visas." But during his first term, the Trump administration implemented rules that would have cut the number of H-1B visas issued each year. Ultimately, those rules were struck down in court. The Hill's Rafael Bernal breaks down what you need to know about the visa fight. |
- U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Matthew Graves announced he will step down from the post on Jan. 16, four days before Trump is set to return to the White House. Graves spearheaded the Justice Department's investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack.
- A state-sponsored actor in China hacked the Treasury Department earlier this month, the White House said Monday. The hackers gained access to the workstations of government employees and unclassified documents.
- A federal appeals court upheld writer E. Jean Carroll's $5 million civil judgment against Trump. A jury awarded Carroll the sum after finding Trump liable for sexually abusing her in the 1990s and defaming her after she went public with the allegations.
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©️ The Associated Press | Paul Sancya |
President Biden paid tribute to the late former President Carter on Sunday evening after his death at 100 — but the parallels between the two men are uncomfortable for the current commander in chief, The Hill's Niall Stanage notes in The Memo. As with Carter, Biden's most loyal supporters insist his record will be viewed more positively over time. But Biden leaves office much as Carter did — beset by low approval numbers, wounded by the memory of high inflation, and with a troubled record on the world stage. Perhaps just as damagingly, both are viewed even by some supporters as fundamentally decent people but ineffective presidents, ill-equipped for the challenges of their moment. One area where Carter's legacy is clear is the environment, and the former president leaves behind a history of pioneering energy and environmental policy. In his single term in the Oval Office, Carter took a range of actions on issues that remained influential long after his presidency ended, from imposing new wilderness protections to creating the federal Department of Energy during the recurring energy crises of the 1970s. ▪ NPR: Carter's environmental legacy set the foundation for today's climate action. ▪ BBC: Global problems that plagued Carter have also troubled Biden. ▪ CNN: The U.S. has repatriated a detainee from Guantanamo Bay to Tunisia, the Pentagon announced Monday, the fourth detainee to be transferred this month. In Alaska, opponents of the state's ranked-choice ballot system are renewing their efforts to overhaul the voting method ahead of 2026 after an effort to undo the system narrowly failed last month. Alaska made history in 2020 when it became the second state after Maine to vote to enact ranked-choice voting for federal and state elections. A petition gathered signatures to place an initiative to repeal it on the ballot this year, but the effort fell short by one of the tightest margins in the country, despite Rep. Mary Peltola's (D) loss to Rep.-elect Nick Begich (R) and the fact the groups associated with the effort were bogged down by campaign finance violations. "What it tells us is a lot of Alaska split their ticket and voted each race individually, not as much pure party ticket," said strategist Robert Dillon, noting Peltola and the effort to stop the repeal performed considerably better in the state than Vice President Harris. ▪ NBC News: Battlegrounds, primaries and potential retirements mark the key Senate races to watch in 2026. ▪ Politico: The Democrats and Republicans best positioned — right now — for 2028. |
- Programming note: Morning Report's Alexis Simendinger will return in the new year. The quiz will return next week.
- The House will meet at 10 a.m. for a pro forma session. The Senate will meet on Thursday at noon for a pro forma session.
- The president and first lady Jill Biden will travel from St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, to Wilmington, Del.
- Vice President Harris is in Los Angeles and has no public schedule.
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©️ The Associated Press | Rebecca Blackwell |
Experts predict that 2025 will be the year artificial intelligence (AI) truly gets off the ground in K-12 schools, The Hill's Lexi Lonas Cochran reports. 2024 laid the groundwork for AI to reach a level of "maturity" in education, with the federal government releasing guidance on the issue and growing numbers of teachers getting professional training on the technology, as well as classes on data science available to students. Now, a development that once baffled educators and administrators is ready to go mainstream. "I think we're better equipped to use it in ways that promote safety and privacy and that mitigate some of the big security risks, and we have a long way to go," said Pati Ruiz, senior director of education technology and emerging tech at Digital Promise. "I see it as an opportunity for helping folks develop more AI literacy … because, yes, harm can be spread at scale with these systems and tools, and we need to make sure that we are helping folks both understand that and mitigate that." The Hill: Will California sell gas cars after 2035? Nobody knows for sure. Norovirus cases are surging across the country this winter, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data. There were 91 outbreaks reported by state health departments during the week of Dec. 5, up from 69 in the last week of November, according to the CDC. Norovirus is extremely contagious and can cause diarrhea, vomiting, nausea and stomach pain within 12 to 47 hours after being exposed, the agency said. The Hill: Trump's plan to enact heavy tariffs on certain imports could affect the prices and availability of pharmaceutical drugs in the U.S. |
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©️ The Associated Press | Rajavartiosto |
UKRAINE WAR: Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov rejected proposals Monday floated by Trump's allies to end the war in Ukraine, dealing a major setback for the president-elect's hopes to freeze the conflict. In an interview with Russian state-run media outlet TASS, Lavrov said Moscow has "not received any official signals regarding a settlement in Ukraine," but the Kremlin was resistant to those unofficial ideas. Trump has not officially released any proposals to end the war, and earlier this month he admitted it would be more difficult to solve than the Middle East conflict. Still, the president-elect campaigned on ending the war by the time he takes office. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has made NATO membership a key part of his victory plan, and Ukrainian officials have pushed for legitimate security guarantees, which is unlikely to happen outside of NATO. Lavrov said Russia "would refuse to accept Ukraine's NATO membership regardless of the territorial factor." Meanwhile, Moscow's connection to the rupture of an undersea cable between Finland and Estonia is raising a new bevy of fears over sabotage of critical power lines in the water, especially as the recent incident bears similarities to two other cuts linked to China. The Christmas cutting of the Estlink-2 power cable connecting energy between Finland and Estonia was allegedly from a Cook Island-flagged ship called Eagle S that Western officials claimed is part of a vast Russian shadow fleet working to circumvent Western sanctions. The Hill's Brad Dress reports that the incident adds to a larger problem related to the security of undersea infrastructure, as China has also been accused of three incidents over the past two years that have disrupted power lines in European waters. "Recent Baltic Sea sabotage attempts are not isolated incidents; they form a deliberate pattern aimed at damaging our digital and energy infrastructure," said European Union foreign policy head Kaja Kallas in an interview with German newspaper Welt. ▪ Business Insider: The West found a miles-long piece of evidence backing its claim Russia is purposely cutting undersea cables. ▪ The Guardian: Russia and Ukraine swapped at least 300 prisoners in an exchange deal. ▪ The New York Times: From murder suspects to immigrants to a former Olympic gold medalist, Russia pressures those it thinks should fight in Ukraine. SYRIA'S NEW RULERS elevated a woman to run the country's central bank, as the U.S. and other Western governments watch how the Islamist rebels who toppled Bashar al-Assad's regime treat women as well as Syria's many religious and ethnic minorities. Maysaa Sabrine, who served as first deputy governor at the central bank under the fallen regime, will take the top job at the institution. ▪ Axios: U.S. raises concerns about attacks on minorities with new Syrian government. ▪ NBC News: Concerns grow after Israeli forces detain the director of besieged Gaza hospital. ▪ BBC: Why was there a wall near the runway at the South Korea plane crash airport? |
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- Americans love to hate the state. But do they really want this? by Stephen E. Hanson and Jeffrey S. Kopstein, guest essayists, The New York Times.
- Yes, policies advancing justice can prevail again in Trump 2.0, by Marc Levin, opinion contributor, The Hill.
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©️ The Associated Press | Julia Demaree Nikhinson |
And finally … 🪩 That's a wrap! 2024 is officially one for the books. Marked by one whirlwind news cycle after another, a presidential election and upheaval across the globe, a lot happened in the last 366 days (don't worry, we also briefly forgot it was a leap year). To help make some sense of it all, here are roundups of some of the defining moments of 2024. From The Washington Post, 24 good things that happened in 2024. These are CBS News's five most uplifting 2024 stories. From The Hill, five wins for the climate in 2024. From The New York Times, the year in 10 charts. From Time magazine, the year in 100 pictures. From Variety, the 50 best songs of the year. Happy New Year from us at Morning Report! |
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