Trump adviser stays silent on whether incoming president will pardon himself: Live

Donald Trump’s attorneys are calling on the judge overseeing his hush money case to toss it altogether, pointing to President Joe Biden’s pardon of his son Hunter, and raising the idea that presidential “immunity” should apply to the president-elect.

The “disruptions to the institution of the Presidency violate the Presidential immunity doctrine because they threaten the functioning of the federal government,” attorneys wrote in a 72-page filing made public on Tuesday.

Alex Woodward has the details.

With their party hollowed out on the national stage, the eyes of many Democrats are now turning to state leaders as they search for a new bench of candidates for 2028 as well as signs of life for the resistance to the GOP White House.

John Bowden has the details.

Donald Trump’s lawyers have called on Judge Juan Merchan to dismiss the hush money case in which the president-elect was found guilty of all 34 counts back in May. They cite President Joe Biden’s pardon of his son Hunter, and quote the president’s “enough is enough” statement.

Todd Blanche and Emil Bove accuse District Attorney Alvin Bragg of engaging in “‘precisely the type of political theater’ that President Biden has condemned.”

Here’s the latest on the case when sentencing was delayed indefinitely:

Gustaf Kilander has the story about what he also suggested.

Leaders in the construction business, including Republicans, are worried that Donald Trump’s plans to carry out a mass deportation of undocumented immigrants will crater their industry, given its reliance on migrant workers.

“We will absolutely have a labor shortage,” developer George Fuller, mayor of McKinney Texas, a Dallas suburb that’s undergone a construction boom in recent years, toldThe Wall Street Journal. “Whether you want to acknowledge it or not, these industries depend on immigrant labor.”

Josh Marcus reports from San Francisco.

The Trump-Vance transition team has entering into a Memorandum of Understanding with the U.S. Department of Justice, and released the following statement:

Today, the Trump-Vance Transition has entered into a Memorandum Of Understanding (MOU) with the U.S. Department of Justice. This is the next step in the ongoing preparation of senior administration officials for the purpose of serving in President Trump’s Administration. This allows the transition team to submit names for background checks and security clearances. Ultimately, this will afford the transition process additional insights, and it facilitates our agency landing teams gaining access to the information they need to prepare for leadership of the federal agencies and departments.

“This agreement with the Department of Justice will ensure President Trump and his team are ready on Day 1 to begin enacting the America First Agenda that an overwhelming majority of our nation supported on Election Day.” – Susie Wiles, President-elect Trump’s Chief of Staff

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Whatsapp, and Instagram, has said it “overdid it a bit” when moderating pandemic-related content on its platforms and that chief executive Mark Zuckerberg is now seeking an “active role” in shaping tech policy debates with Donald Trump’s incoming administration.

The company’s president of global affairs, Sir Nick Clegg made the remarks in a briefing with journalists, as reported by The Financial Times.

He said Zuckerberg was keen to play “an active role in the debates that any administration needs to have about maintaining America’s leadership in the technological sphere.”

Clegg added that leadership “is tremendously important given all the geostrategic uncertainties around the world, and particularly the pivotal role that AI will play.”

Zuckerberg recently dined with the president-elect at Mar-a-Lago.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom and state lawmakers headed back to the state Capitol Monday to begin steeling themselves for another Donald Trump presidency and to kick off a special session aimed at protecting the state’s progressive policies from his administration.

The Democratic governor, long a Trump foe, is maneuvering to position his huge, powerful state to once again be the center of a resistance effort against Trump’s extremely conservative agenda.

Former New York mayor and Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani never ended up filing his response to a motion for contempt in his defamation case that was due yesterday, after he was accused of repeatedly defaming election workers despite a court order that blocks him from doing so.

Now the election workers’ attorneys are reminding the judge that she said his failure to reply will “be treated as conceding that motion.”

The judge should “grant the Motion for Civil Contempt as conceded, should enter an order that Mr. Giuliani is in civil contempt, and the December 12, 2024 hearing should be narrowed to focus on the appropriate civil contempt sanction for Mr. Giuliani’s violation of the consent injunction,” they wrote.

Here’s our latest reporting on the case:

With former Fox News host Pete Hegseth’s appointment as defense secretary suddenly in doubt amid a bevy of startling stories detailing his alleged sexual misconduct, boorish behavior and financial malfeasance, the right-wing network he called home for nearly a decade is doing what it typically does in these instances.

That is, it’s hushing up.

Meanwhile, another conservative cable channel that has long sought to court favor with MAGA by running to the right of Fox News is openly calling on President-elect Donald Trump to ditch Hegseth’s nomination because the ex-Fox star simply “can’t” lead the Pentagon amid the growing scandals.