News & Politics

A House Congressional Ethics panel is recommending further investigation of U.S. Rep. Andy Ogles after finding he likely violated federal campaign finance laws, mainly by reporting an inflated personal loan to make his bid for office look stronger.

In his first run for Congress representing the newly-drawn 5th Congressional District in 2022, Ogles reported receiving a $320,000 personal loan for his campaign. The Culleoka Republican said in an April 2022 press release that he raised $450,000, including the six-figure infusion to his campaign. His first report with the Federal Election Commission showed he raised only $250,0000.

In May 2024, he amended campaign finance reports for the previous two years, acknowledging he made only a $20,000 loan to his campaign and saying the additional $300,000 was in a joint account he shared with his wife. Still, Ogles and his campaign manager were unable to “definitively” confirm the source of the $20,000 to ethics board investigators.

The ethics board voted 6-0 to call for a closer look at Ogles’ finances because “there is substantial reason to believe that Rep. Ogles omitted or misrepresented required information in his finance disclosure statements or FEC candidate committee reports,” the board’s report says. It also says more review is necessary because of the likelihood that Ogles’ campaign committee accepted excessive contributions reported as personal loans and contributions from him.

The Office of Congressional Ethics started its review in February 2024 following media reports about Ogles’ finances and whether he had enough income to lend his campaign $320,000. Ogles refused to cooperate, declining to produce documents and participate in an interview.

On the last day of the panel’s review, Ogles’ attorney provided a letter stating that while he had identified $320,000 in personal funds available for the campaign, only $20,000 was transferred.

Addressing his amended report, Ogles said the $320,000 was a “pledge” to his campaign from assets such as bank and retirement accounts.

The ethics board, though, said Ogles’ refusal to cooperate “hindered” its ability to assess his “intent” in overreporting the loan and cash on hand in his account. But it says he was responsible for the inaccurate reporting.

Nashville car dealership magnate Lee Beaman served as Ogles’ treasurer early in his campaign before being replaced by Thomas Datwyler.

Tennessee 5th District Congressman confirms FBI fraud investigation

The report also says Ogles “apparently exercised control over his campaign finances, “to the exclusion of his campaign treasurer and manager,” and provided improper documentation to his treasurer. He also failed to take advantage of several opportunities to correct them on the real amount of the loan.

Ogles’ campaign manager, who is not identified in the report, “speculated” to the ethics board that Ogles might have overreported the loan amount to make his campaign look stronger and “buy the primary.” He defeated former Tennessee House Speaker Beth Harwell and former Brigadier Gen. Kurt Winstead.

“This $300,000 difference was not inconsequential – or overlooked,” the ethics board found.

Ogles’ campaign manager told the board the campaign didn’t seem to be operating in a “cash crunch” at the time but that in hindsight it was “tighter” than they thought.

The report says Ogles had “significant control” over the campaign’s finances and that neither his treasurer nor manager had access to the bank account and depended on him for information. A treasurer told the ethics board that Ogles provided “misleading documentation” about the $320,000 loan.

Ogles’ campaign manager told investigators that press releases dealing with campaign finances were “merely regurgitated information” from Ogles.

A 2023 U.S. House finance disclosure form filed in September 2024 lists a loan worth between $500,001 and $1 million from FirstBank in September 2022. He failed to disclose it previously.

It came up after the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan watchdog organization, filed a complaint claiming Ogles had nearly $1 million in finance discrepancies between his House disclosure form and campaign finance reports.

Ogles’ attorney confirmed he had a $700,000 line of credit opened in September 2022 that wasn’t included in his candidate or member financial disclosures. He didn’t indicate whether it was used to finance the $20,000 loan.

After Ogles’ Republican primary victory last August, FBI agents searched his property and seized his cell phone as part of a fraud investigation.

OCE-Report-and-Findings

Tennessee Lookout is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Tennessee Lookout maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Holly McCall for questions: [email protected].

We speak with The Nation's Chris Lehmann about President-elect Donald Trump's escalating attacks on the press and how major media figures and institutions are “capitulating preemptively” to the pressure. ABC News recently settled a defamation suit brought by Trump by making a $15 million donation to his future presidential library, despite experts saying the case was easily winnable. Trump is also suing The Des Moines Register for publishing a poll before the election that showed him losing to Vice President Kamala Harris. “What’s happening is a very clear pattern in Trump’s public life,” says Lehmann. “This is a show of power.”

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González.

We end today’s show looking at Donald Trump’s renewed war on the press, which he’s often called “the enemy of the people.” Trump recently sued The Des Moines Register, its parent company Gannett and the pollster Ann Selzer for publishing a poll before the election that showed him trailing Kamala Harris in Iowa. While Trump ended up easily winning Iowa, he’s now accusing the paper of committing, quote, “brazen election interference,” unquote. Trump laid out his plans to target The Des Moines Register and other news outlets during a news conference at Mar-a-Lago.

PRESIDENT-ELECT DONALD TRUMP: And I feel I have to do this. I shouldn’t really be the one to do it. It should have been the Justice Department or somebody else. But I have to do it. It costs a lot of money to do it, but we have to straighten out the press. Our press is very corrupt, almost as corrupt as our elections.

AMY GOODMAN: Trump’s lawsuit against The Des Moines Register came just days after ABC News, which is owned by Disney, settled a defamation lawsuit filed by the president-elect. The network agreed to donate $15 million to Trump’s presidential library and pay $1 million in legal fees to Trump’s lawyer. Trump sued ABC after its anchor George Stephanopoulos said Trump was found “liable for rape” in a 2023 civil case in Manhattan brought by writer E. Jean Carroll. ABC has been widely criticized for agreeing to settle instead of going to court to fight what many believed to be a winnable case. The prominent attorney Marc Elias responded to the settlement by writing, “Knee bent. Ring kissed. Another legacy news outlet chooses obedience,” unquote.

Juan González and I recently spoke to Chris Lehmann, D.C. bureau chief for The Nation, who wrote an article headlined “Trump’s Attack on the Free Press Is Just Getting Started.” I started out by asking Chris to lay out what’s happening.

CHRIS LEHMANN: Well, what’s happening is a very clear pattern in Trump’s public life. It actually well antedates his rise to political power. He made a practice of frequently going after journalists for defamation. He famously sued one of his biographers, who wrote in this biography that Trump did not qualify as a billionaire. And in his subsequent deposition, Trump basically said he was a billionaire because he felt like a billionaire. This is a long-standing pattern of just intimidation of the press. And Trump was very open as a private businessperson that that was his aim. He wanted to exert a chilling effect on people doing critical reporting from him.

Now, of course, he has the awesome power of the federal government behind him, or prospectively behind him, and ABC disgracefully capitulated right away. And The Des Moines Register suit is a clear augur of what’s lying ahead. At the Mar-a-Lago conference you mentioned, Trump also threatened to sue Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward, the Pulitzer Prize — Pulitzer Peace Prize committee for these, you know, alleged offenses against, basically, Trump’s bottomless vanity. So, by capitulating, you know, sort of preemptively the way ABC has, this news organization has set the stage for a torrent of similar suits like this. You know, Trump will, and his henchmen, like Kash Patel — also, Pete Hegseth has threatened a defamation suit against the person alleging sexual assault against him. You know, this will be a prime MO of the second Trump administration. And it’s very worrisome that even before Trump takes office, ABC is, without cause, giving in. It sends a very distressing signal.

In point of fact, what George Stephanopoulos said on the air was just a paraphrase of what the judge in Trump’s — in the E. Jean Carroll case said. He said that even though Trump’s conduct on the case did not rise to the strict definition of rape under New York law, any commonsense understanding of rape suggests that Trump did, in fact, commit that act. So —

AMY GOODMAN: The judge said that.

CHRIS LEHMANN: The judge in the case. So, there is not — this was not George Stephanopoulos just randomly popping off on the air. It was a documented claim.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Chris, I wanted to ask you — in The Des Moines Register lawsuit, Trump is alleging consumer fraud by The Des Moines Register as a weapon? Could you talk about that, particularly, and also the impact on these media companies, many of which tend to want to settle just to get rid of a lawsuit?

CHRIS LEHMANN: Right, right. Yeah, the fraud charge is — you know, as far as I know, has no legal basis. You can’t just say, because a pollster got something wrong, there is some deliberate intent to mislead. It’s a plainly frivolous suit. But that is the point. This is a show of power on the part of an administration that, we know from his prior turn in office, takes every opportunity to demonize, harass and intimidate the free press. So, you know, this, The Des Moines Register suit, is very much like the Trump biography suit I mentioned earlier. It’s just his vanity was affronted by poll findings that, you know, turned out to be wrong. You know, I don’t know what he can assert the damage has been, if he won Iowa by 15 points after this poll was released. It is just a plain effort to harass and intimidate.

To its credit, the _Register_’s parent company, unlike Disney, which owns ABC, indicates it will be putting up a robust defense. And, you know, in a sane court system, they will prevail. But, you know, all of this takes resources and money. And as you mentioned, Juan, you know, big companies don’t want to be bothered with the hassle of going to court, even though these companies also have libel insurance precisely for cases like this, and they don’t actually tend to suffer in terms of the bottom line.

AMY GOODMAN: I mean, this is extremely serious, when you look at the amount that ABC settled for. They were —

CHRIS LEHMANN: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: — just about to go to depositions — right? — of George Stephanopoulos —

CHRIS LEHMANN: Right, to discovery, yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: — and Trump, to discovery.

CHRIS LEHMANN: Right.

AMY GOODMAN: And so, ABC called that off. Fifteen million dollars plus another million for lawyers’ fees, any smaller news organization couldn’t possibly deal with something like this. And then —

CHRIS LEHMANN: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: So, you have these news divisions that are not, you know, profitable. They only profit democracy, but —

CHRIS LEHMANN: Right.

AMY GOODMAN: — so-called, you know, financially profitable. From these multinational or these very large corporations that own lots of other things, like Bezos with The Washington Post —

CHRIS LEHMANN: Right.

AMY GOODMAN: — and they care more about that other stuff, they don’t want to be seen unfavorably by Trump, so they settle on the news issue. This is so extremely disturbing.

CHRIS LEHMANN: Yeah, and this is what happens when you have large corporations who are not — they don’t have journalistic values. They don’t have journalistic priorities. You know, as you said, the news operations are loss leaders for these figures, and Jeff Bezos has billions of dollars in government contracts. The publisher of the L.A. Times, it’s the same story. He has extensive pharmaceutical holdings that come under federal regulation, so he, too, is preemptively knuckling under to the Trump administration. He’s killed editorials critical of Trump. He’s installed this absurd new feature for readers of the paper to track bias. And he’s insisted that anything critical of Trump run alongside, in the op-ed section, something that’s the opposite point of view. This is more than just callow bothsidesism. This is just craven corporate misconduct. And it is —

AMY GOODMAN: That’s Patrick Soon-Shiong who owns the Los Angeles Times.

CHRIS LEHMANN: Yes. Thank you. Yes. So, yeah, this is what happens —

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Chris, I wanted to —

CHRIS LEHMANN: Oh, go ahead.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Chris, I wanted to ask you — we only have about a minute left. I wanted to ask you about the potential — what Trump could do with the FCC, especially in terms of broadcasters. Are there any concerns in that area?

CHRIS LEHMANN: Oh, absolutely. Cameron Barr, his nominee to head the FCC, is a very vocal critic of, you know, what in MAGA-land is considered mainstream media censorship. He has gone on and on about how Big Tech, in particular, you know, during COVID and at other times, have allegedly suppressed MAGA causes and talking points. So, yeah, there’s a very real and immediate danger. You know, the call will be coming from inside the White House soon, when Trump’s FCC starts implementing policy.

And it is all of a piece. It’s really important to underline that. You know, what we’re going to see, I think, is what happened in Hungary under Orbán’s rise to power. Trump and JD Vance are both ardent admirers of Viktor Orbán. And Orbán basically used his version of Elon Musk to buy out the national press and turn it into a party propaganda arm.

And, you know, that is a very real and present danger with Trump coming back into power and feeling this kind of impunity and this drive to avenge the people he sees as his enemies. It’s crucial that the press hold the line and follow the example of The Des Moines Register and not the example of ABC News.

AMY GOODMAN: Chris Lehmann, D.C. bureau chief for The Nation. We’ll link to his piece, “Trump’s Attack on the Free Press Is Just Getting Started.”

During his 20 years as chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, John Roberts has been releasing annual year-end reports. And on December 31, the George W. Bush appointee issued his "2024 Year-End Report on the Federal Judiciary."

Roberts has writing his reports for SCOTUS under four different presidents: Republicans Bush and Donald Trump and Democrats Barack Obama and Joe Biden. And Trump's effect on the chief justice's 2024 report is the thing that political science professor Austin Sarat finds "unsettling" in an op-ed published by MSNBC on January 2.

"Trump is what literary critics call an 'absent presence' in Roberts' 15-page document," Sarat explains in his article. "He is like a ghost, whose presence is felt if not seen."

READ MORE: 'Nice work, John Roberts': Trump's latest move said to be 'middle finger' to Supreme Court

Sarat (who teaches at Amherst College in Massachusetts) argues that Roberts' 2024 report "rightly highlighted" the "very real dangers to this country's long tradition of judicial independence that we now face" but "failed to name" President-elect Trump as "their source."

"Aside from the usual statistics on the courts' workload," Sarat notes, "the report made news because of what he writes on Page 5: 'I feel compelled to address four areas of illegitimate activity that, in my view, do threaten the independence of judges on which the rule of law depends: (1) violence, (2) intimidation, (3) disinformation, and (4) threats to defy lawfully entered judgments.' Some of what Roberts named might have been best described as a self-inflicted wound or perhaps been best addressed to the radical conservatives on the Supreme Court who seem to value loyalty to Trump and the MAGA cause more than their duty to decide cases without fear or favor."

The Amherst professor continues, "Beyond that, the threats that the chief justice mentioned all seem to have their roots in the authoritarian playbook that has guided Trump and his MAGA acolytes. He leaves it to his readers to connect the dots."

Sarat agrees with Roberts on the need for "judicial independence" but complains that he "lets judges off the hook" — including the "partisan" far-right Republican appointees on the U.S. Supreme Court.

READ MORE: 'False!' CNN's Jim Acosta confronts GOP operative on latest Trump claim

"The absence of outside influence does not guarantee that judges will be independent and impartial rather than partisan warriors," Sarat writes. "Judges as partisan warriors seems a fit description for some of the current crop of Supreme Court Justices…. The chief justice would have served the country better if he had ended 2024 with four simple words: 'Stop it, Donald Trump.'"

READ MORE: 'Emergency break glass option' on the table for Republicans to rush Trump certification

Austin Sarat's full op-ed for MSNBC is available at this link.

The bipartisan House Ethics Committee announced earlier this week that it unanimously opted to close several investigations involving alleged campaign finance violations by three Republicans and one Democrat, a move that one expert characterized as a "New Year's Eve Ethics Massacre."

The decision to close the investigations into Reps. Sanford Bishop (D-Ga.), Wesley Hunt (R-Texas), Ronny Jackson (R-Texas), and Alex Mooney (R-W.Va.) was made public in a vaguely worded press release published the day before New Year's Eve.

The panel, composed of five Republicans and five Democrats, said while "there was evidence" that lawmakers who were under investigation "did not fully comply with the applicable standards relating to personal use of campaign funds," the committee determined there wasn't proof that "any member intentionally misused campaign funds for their personal benefit."

The committee also criticized Federal Election Commission (FEC) rules pertaining to personal use of campaign funds as "often ambiguous" and issued its own updated guidance for House members.

Additionally, the committee said it dropped "other confidential matters that have been under review," without offering specifics.

The committee said its only action in response to its findings was contacting the lawmakers to provide them with the updated campaign finance guidance "as well as specific findings and recommendations with respect to that member's campaign activity."

"The New Year's Eve Ethics Massacre is a repudiation of the Ethics Committee's job to hold members of Congress to account for their wrongdoing."

Daniel Schuman, executive director of the American Governance Institute, argued that the panel's decision "effectively legalized the conversion of campaign funds for personal use by members of the House of Representatives" by establishing "a new weak standard" and ignoring evidence of wrongdoing provided by the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE).

"They can now take dollars from donors and put them in their pocket," Schuman wrote in his newsletter. "It's not what they said they did, but under the cover of the New Year's holiday, Ethics Committee Democrats and Republicans pulled a fast one, legalizing a money laundry so blatantly corrupt it would embarrass Walter White. They also made many other allegations of wrongdoing disappear."

Schuman noted that the committee's probes into Bishop, Mooney, Hunt, and Jackson stemmed from OCE reports on each of the lawmakers dating back to 2020. Republicans have repeatedly targeted the OCE and are currently trying to drop "ethics" from its name.

In the case of Mooney, Schuman wrote, the OCE found in October 2021 that he "used campaign funds to purchase more than $17,000 in gift cards in violation of FEC rules and had the effect of concealing the ultimate recipient of those funds (which may have been Rep. Mooney's pocket)."

The West Virginia Republican said in a statement that he was "grateful" for the House Ethics Committee's decision and dismissed allegations of misconduct as "driven by politically motivated actors on the extreme left."

As for Bishop—the lone Democrat among the four lawmakers who faced House Ethics Committee probes—the OCE found on February 10, 2020 that he "may have improperly disbursed campaign funds for personal use and improperly spent his official member funds for annual holiday parties in the district," Schuman noted.

"Among the inappropriate costs incurred were golf club memberships, the purchase of golf clubs, brunch for family members, groceries, and so on," Schuman added.

"The ethics process is broken," he concluded. "There must be an independent ethics process where investigations and their recommendations are divorced from internal party politics and not designed to shield members from accountability for apparent wrongdoing. The New Year's Eve Ethics Massacre is a repudiation of the Ethics Committee's job to hold members of Congress to account for their wrongdoing and to be honest and forthright to the public about their behavior."

Craig Holman, government affairs lobbyist for the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, echoed Schuman's assessment, arguing in a statement that by "summarily dismissing all charges of potential violations of ethics rules, the House Ethics Committee is shirking its responsibilities to both the House of Representatives and the American public."

"The press release from the Ethics Committee hinted that violations may have indeed occurred with personal use of campaign funds ('a gray area' and 'did not fully comply' with the rules, stated the release) and avoided any discussion of the other allegations, but dismissed the charges nonetheless," said Holman.

Lisa Gilbert, Public Citizen's co-president, added that the decision "is further evidence that the House Ethics Committee, on its own, is too embedded with members of Congress to adequately enforce ethics rules."

"A fair and impartial congressional ethics process needs the public awareness and oversight provided by the outside Office of Congressional Ethics," Gilbert said.

Confronted by the possibility of a revolt by far-right House members against re-electing House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), the GOP leadership is considering taking emergency measures to assure the certification of the votes for Donald Trump as president next week.

According to a report from CNN, there is a consideration of an "emergency break glass option" on the table designed to go around the lack of a speaker if one is not voted in on Friday.

As it stands now, there is one definite no vote on Johnson from Rep. Tom Massie (R-KY), with as many as 14 more House Republicans who are on the fence about handing the gavel back to the Louisiana conservative.

ALSO READ: Merrick Garland's last task and the explosive evidence that could save America

With that in mind, there is consideration being given to calling an emergency session –– the "break the glass" scenario –– that would allow the Trump presidential certification to proceed four years after it was disrupted by supporters of the losing Trump who stormed the Capitol and forced lawmakers to flee for their lives.

However, as CNN is reporting, that "special" session may not come to pass because it "would be a tough sell for many institutionalist Republicans."

RELATED: Former law review editors lay out roadmap for not certifying Trump's win

Should it not come to pass, the slim Republication majority may just wait up the speaker leadership squabble knowing they have until Jan. 20 when the inauguration ceremony is scheduled.

You can read more here.

A frustrated Jim Acosta unleashed on a Republican operative for defending Donald Trump after the president-elect continued to tie the issue of illegal immigration to the New Year's Eve terror attack in New Orleans.

Neil Chatterjee, who served under Trump as commissioner and chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, spoke with Acosta on CNN Thursday.

Acosta referred to Trump's TruthSocial post from Wednesday where he wrote, "When I said that the criminals coming in are far worse than the criminals we have in our country, that statement was constantly refuted by Democrats and the Fake News Media, but it turned out to be true. The crime rate in our country is at a level that nobody has ever seen before. Our hearts are with all of the innocent victims and their loved ones, including the brave officers of the New Orleans Police Department.”

"I mean this this is a problem!" Acosta said. "And, you know, you were saying a few moments ago, you can't take him literally. The president — why — shouldn't you take the president of the United States literally? Isn't that isn't that sort of a baseline expectation that he should stick to the facts?"

ALSO READ: Trump is already walking back on his promises

Chatterjee answered, "I don't think he was saying that this individual crossed illegally, or if he was, it was based on initial reporting that was incorrect, that somebody had crossed at Eagle Pass —"

"We can show it up on screen again, I mean he's talking about, he's blaming Biden's 'open borders policy', and he's talking about that on Truth Social."

Acosta continued, "What he is saying in that Truth Social post is false! That is false!"

Chatterjee pushed back: "He's not saying that this individual crossed the border illegally, but there were 400 people on the terrorist watch list —"

"Of course, but when there's an act of terrorism in this country, the incoming president should tell the truth to the American people. I mean, that is just — isn't that what the president should do at all times?" Acosta asked.

"He's talking about securing the border, and he's been talking for years about securing the border. And I think the data bears out that he won the election, partially because —"

Acosta interjected, "I mean, i just have to say, here he goes again! He talks about everybody else being fake news, and he's the one peddling fake news."

Watch the CNN clip below or click here.

- YouTubeyoutu.be

Donald Trump was slammed over one of his latest social media rants claiming that the "world" is "laughing" at the United States after the New Orleans truck attack that occurred on New Year's Day, leaving at least 14 people dead.

"Our Country is a disaster, a laughing stock all over the World!" Trump proclaimed. "This is what happens when you have OPEN BORDERS, with weak, ineffective, and virtually nonexistent leadership. The DOJ, FBI, and Democrat state and local prosecutors have not done their job. They are incompetent and corrupt, having spent all of their waking hours unlawfully attacking their political opponent, ME, rather than focusing on protecting Americans from the outside and inside violent SCUM that has infiltrated all aspects of our government, and our Nation itself."

The president-elect added, "Democrats should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this to happen to our Country. The CIA must get involved, NOW, before it is too late. The USA is breaking down - A violent erosion of Safety, National Security, and Democracy is taking place all across our Nation. Only strength and powerful leadership will stop it. See you on January 20th. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!"

READ MORE: Fox News forced to fact-check Trump after reading his statement on New Orleans attacker

Gizmodo reporter Matt Novak replied: "This kind of talk doesn’t historically work out well for vulnerable people. '…violent SCUM that has infiltrated all aspects of our government, and our Nation itself.'"

HuffPost reporter Jonathan Nicholson said: "And for those libertarians thinking 'well, at least he'll be better on FISA/Sec 702/PATRIOT Act then Harris,' Trump just called for breaking down the firewall that's kept the CIA from spying within the US on US citizens."

READ MORE: 'Here’s the deal': Legal experts debunk MAGA’s 'nutbar fantasy'

As Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) faces the possibility of an ouster from the speakership Friday if he doesn't receive enough votes, some Republican lawmakers tell Axios the Louisiana lawmaker should avoid one thing.

"Don't do what [former speaker Kevin] McCarthy did," one GOP member told the news outlet, noting that several Republican colleagues agree with the advice.

"Don't give promises upon which you can't deliver," the lawmaker added. "Don't give promises that require us to do things that we don't want to do, that are beyond reasonable."

READ MORE: Experts predict 'most extreme' outcome of speakership vote: report

Axios notes ahead of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy's (R-CA) ouster in January 2023, the former GOP congressman "cut a deal with his right-wing rebels — including rules changes, plum committee assignments and votes on certain bills — that came back to haunt him."

One Republican told Axios, "You cannot trust these guys who undermine us at every point. They ask for first base, the speaker gives it to them, and they ask for second base. ... Don't cater to [them]."

The first GOP lawmaker emphasized to the news outlet, "We all trust Johnson won't go that far."

He added that Johnson is a "good conservative man whose ideology used to be like Freedom Caucus ... adjacent — now he understands he's got a house to run."

READ MORE: 'No Fs to give': GOP rep remains committed to oust Mike Johnson despite Trump endorsement

Axios' full report is available here.

Vice President-elect JD Vance, the Republican Senator from Ohio, is facing criticism both domestically and internationally for endorsing and seemingly defending an op-ed by Elon Musk that is supportive of a far-right German political party reportedly linked to neo-Nazis.

The New York Times late last month described the Alternative for Germany, or AfD, as “a group with ties to neo-Nazis whose youth wing has been classified as ‘confirmed extremist’ by German domestic intelligence.” The paper of record also noted that AfD has been “called a threat to German democracy” by Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz and others.

“News that members of the AfD attended a secret meeting with the Austrian extreme-right provocateur Martin Sellner, who has admitted to once being a member of a neo-Nazi group and has called for deporting migrants en masse, led to large protests early this year,” The Times also reported. “Then, starting in May, a leading light of the party was twice given a hefty fine for using Nazi-era slogans during campaign stops.”

On Thursday, Vance reposted a thread containing what is allegedly Musk’s op-ed translated into English, titled, “Only the AfD Can Save Germany.”

READ MORE: Republicans Use New Year’s Attacks to Push Border Narrative and Fast-Track Trump Nominees

The Vice President-elect then wrote: “I’m not endorsing a party in the German elections, as it’s not my country and we hope to have good relations with all Germans. But this is an interesting piece. Also interesting; American media slanders AfD as Nazi-lite, But AfD is most popular in the same areas of Germany that were most resistant to the Nazis.”

Vance’s remarks were quickly criticized, with some discussing post-World War II German reunification in 1990, following the fall of the Berlin Wall, to explain how geography has little to do with opposing Nazism. Others suggested Vance’s geographic claim was actually wrong.

And despite Vance’s claim, The Economist as some noted, in 2019 reported: “Post-war population transfers changed politics across Germany,” and added that “a new paper finds an uncomfortable overlap between the parts of Germany that support the afd and those that voted for the Nazis in 1933. At first glance, the link is invisible. The Nazis fared well in northern states like Schleswig-Holstein; the afd did best in the former East Germany.”

Germany’s Ambassador to the U.S., Andreas Michaelis, politely schooled the right-wing American Senator slated to be sworn in as Vice President in just weeks.

“Interesting observation, Senator JD Vance,” Ambassador Michaelis wrote. “Historical context can be tricky – while some areas you are referring to resisted the Nazi party early on, others did not, or later became strongholds of the regime. Germany’s history reminds us how important it is to challenge extremism in all its forms.”

READ MORE: Trump Calls for CIA to Act Inside US, Raising Legal Concerns, During Midnight Tirade

The Bulwark’s Cathy Young blasted the Vice President-elect.

“Vance is now literally channeling old-time Soviet propaganda by portraying the communist-controlled areas of Germany as the most genuinely anti-Nazi,” she observed. “Yes, AfD is most popular in former East Germany, partly b/c people there never got an education that stressed the evil of racism.”

Berlin-based journalist and award-winning documentary filmmaker James Jackson responded to Vance by offering a cartographic refutation.

Last month, U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) wrote that the “AfD‘s mission is to rehabilitate the image of the Nazi movement. One leader’s license plate is an open tribute to Hitler. A top AfD official said about migrants, ‘We can always shoot them later…or gas them.’ Another described Judaism as the ‘inner enemy’ in Germany.”

READ MORE: US Sanctions Russian and Iranian Entities for 2024 Election Interference Attempts

Ahead of the House speakership vote on Friday, constitutional and congressional experts are weighing the various outcomes if Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) doesn't win the vote, according to Politico.

One of the potential outcomes includes a roadblock to Donald Trump's ability to officially begin his second presidency on January 20. Despite the president-elect's endorsement of Johnson last month, several GOP members want the speaker out.

“I don’t think Trump has any interest in messing with the [certification]. And so there’s going to be a lot of pressure to coordinate on someone without a protracted fight," ex-Hill staffer Matthew Glassman told Politico.

READ MORE: Ex-House lawmaker stuns MSNBC hosts with surprise candidate to replace Mike Johnson

Politico reports, "If it becomes clear that Johnson can’t win the gavel, congressional experts say the least chaotic path for the House would be to elect a temporary or 'caretaker' speaker."

Whoever becomes the "temporary" speaker, according to the news outlet, "would be tasked with swearing in all incoming House members, adopting procedures to govern the certification of the 2024 election and convening the House on Jan. 6 so lawmakers can meet to count the votes of the Electoral College, finalizing Trump’s victory."

Once Trump becomes president, "the caretaker speakership would end, facilitating the election of a permanent speaker," but according to Politico, "The biggest question about this path is whether Johnson himself would support it. His allies have been making the case that he must be elected speaker to ensure that Trump’s certification as president is not delayed. If he endorses a caretaker speakership, he instantly loses that leverage."

Aside from this, "The most extreme, maximally chaotic outcome of this battle is a protracted speakership fight without a caretaker, one that stretches so deep into January it threatens the inauguration," the news outlet notes, but many "experts expect the House to get its act together by then, if only to avoid this precise scenario, but given the chamber’s chaos, it’s hard to count anything out."

READ MORE: 'Can’t certify the election': GOP reps say 'protracted' speakership battle could delay Trump

Politico's full report is available at this link.

The Office of Congressional Ethics on Thursday announced that it has “substantial reason to believe” two Republican House members potentially violated campaign finance regulations, Politico reports.

Per the report, the committee found that Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) "may have 'omitted or misrepresented required information in his financial disclosure statements or FEC candidate committee reports' and that his campaign committee 'may have accepted excessive contributions that were reported as personal loans and contributions from the candidate.'"

Additionally, the committee "released findings from a watchdog report into allegations against" Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D-FL)."

READ MORE: 'Unconscionably sloppy': Swing district GOP rep spent donor money on lavish meals and liquor

Politico reports, "Some of the allegations were already known after the ethics panel released the summary of the watchdog report last fall, but Thursday’s release expanded on the allegations."

According to a press release published Thursday, the committee "is reviewing the matter."

READ MORE: GOP proposes repealing Biden’s student debt relief to fund new tax cuts for the rich

Politico's full report is available here.

While several top lawmakers — such as Vice President Kamala Harris, Attorney Merrick Garland, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, and more — were threatened with impeachment "without cause" by House Republicans last year, according to MSNBC's Steve Benen, one person the GOP leaders targeted flew under the radar.

Matthew Graves, who has served as United States attorney for the District of Columbia since 2021, was an "odd" target, Benen submits, "not just because he hadn’t done anything wrong, but also because his name was unknown to most Americans."

As US attorney for the District of Columbia, the Rachel Maddow Show producer notes, Graves is responsible for "prosecuting criminal cases against accused Jan. 6 defendants," which is "why Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia — and four other GOP lawmakers— introduced an impeachment resolution going after the federal prosecutor."

READ MORE: Republicans use New Year’s attacks to push border narrative and fast-track Trump nominees

"[Graves resigned], but this is not the end for him. Because we are about to take over and we’re going to be in charge, and he should pay for what he’s done to [Jan. 6 criminal defendants.] the Georgia lawmaker said during an appearance on Real America’s Voice earlier this week.

"He doesn’t get to resign and run away," Greene added. "He should be held accountable for the absolute misery and lives that have been destroyed from these Jan. 6 defendants and their families. We’re talking about marriages have been destroyed, families have been destroyed, careers have been destroyed, and these people have spent time — years now — in prison."

The Justice Department responded to attacks from Greene this week.

"In a news release issued earlier this week, the DOJ wrote in a press releases, according to Benen. "Because politically motivated violence and destruction rip at the fabric of our society, Mr. Graves made federally prosecuting such crimes a priority."

READ MORE: 'No Fs to give': GOP rep remains committed to oust Mike Johnson despite Trump endorsement

Benen's full blog post is available here.

In less than three weeks, President-elect Donald Trump will be serving his nonconsecutive second term. And he will be joined in Washington by small GOP majorities in both chambers of Congress.

Trump, during his first term, often clashed with the more traditional conservatives in his administration — from former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to ex-White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly. But this time, he is hoping to avoid that by nominating a lot of far-right MAGA loyalists, including Kash Patel for FBI director, former Fox News host Pete Hegseth for defense secretary, and former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi for U.S. attorney general.

In a sobering op-ed published by The Hill on January 2, Democratic strategist Max Burns argues that members of his party are woefully unprepared for Trump's second term and the assault on U.S. democracy it will bring.

READ MORE:How US citizens can combat 'malicious, unjust prosecutions' during Trump's second presidency

"In his second term," Burns warns, "expect Trump to push his personality cult as far as it can go — and for Democrats to once again underestimate their adversary. Trump will lead a nation very different from the one that booted him from office four years ago. Since then, millions of Americans have told campaign pollsters that they place a personal allegiance to Trump above their belief in the Constitution. The number of people willing to consider alternatives to democracy is at a level last seen during the crises of the 1930s."

Burns continues, "Trump knows he speaks for these people, and he's awarded his base voters' loyalty with a series of increasingly outlandish and aggressive statements, from a promise to seize Panama and Greenland to his more serious intention to pardon nearly 1000 federal criminals behind bars for their roles in the violent January 6 attack on the Capitol."

The Democratic strategist stresses that Trump's promise to "prosecute his political opponents," including former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyoming) and outgoing U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, must not be taken lightly.

"Soon, Trump will find himself in the Oval Office with few practical limits on his capacity to seek revenge," Burns explains. "It doesn't take a political science expert to realize that the America Trump has in mind can't coexist with democracy — and that Trump's most committed voters don't actually want to coexist in a constitutional democracy. Now, it seems even more Republicans are getting in line with Trump's authoritarian ideas. Just one year ago, three in 10 Republican voters told Fox News that they wanted a president 'willing to break rules and laws.' Now, that number is nearing half of all Republicans."

READ MORE: There's only one real firewall against the Trump regime

Burns adds, "A Monmouth University poll conducted last month found largely similar results. When asked if they had any concerns about Trump's repeated pledges to suspend the law in order to jail his political opponents, most Republicans said it didn't bother them at all."

According to Burns, polls indicate that "even Trump-leaning independent voters" are "getting more comfortable with a lawless presidency."

"The frightening reality of 2025 isn't that Trump might attempt some end-run around the democratic process," Burns argues. "It's that he may not need to. Both the MAGA faithful and Trump-leaning independents are still racing rightward in terms of what they'll excuse from a Trump Administration."

The Democratic strategist adds, "If Democrats think they can rely on the same anti-Trump messaging that carried them in 2020, they are catastrophically wrong. That audience is gone, and it isn't coming back. Democrats are quoting laws to people carrying swords."

READ MORE: House GOP proposes new rules for next Congress — including a 'crucial alteration': report

Max Burns' full op-ed for The Hill is available at this link.

President-elect Donald Trump, in an angry midnight rant, criticized the United States on multiple fronts and called for the Central Intelligence Agency, a U.S. civilian foreign intelligence entity, to conduct investigations within the United States—a move potentially unlawful and contrary to its charter, and a possible threat to Americans’ civil rights. Hours later, he appeared to directly blame President Joe Biden for the New Year’s Day attack in New Orleans, currently under FBI investigation as an act of terrorism.

Declaring America a “disaster,” and a “laughing stock all over the World,” Trump, early Thursday morning, alleged the U.S. has “open borders,” and “weak, ineffective, and virtually nonexistent leadership.”

He also claimed the “DOJ, FBI, and Democrat state and local prosecutors” are “incompetent and corrupt” and “have not done their job,” but rather, “spent all of their waking hours unlawfully attacking their political opponent, ME, rather than focusing on protecting Americans from the outside and inside violent SCUM that has infiltrated all aspects of our government, and our Nation itself.”

“Democrats should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this to happen to our Country,” Trump declared, never specifying what he was railing against, before calling for the Central Intelligence Agency to investigate.

READ MORE: US Sanctions Russian and Iranian Entities for 2024 Election Interference Attempts

“The CIA must get involved, NOW, before it is too late. The USA is breaking down – A violent erosion of Safety, National Security, and Democracy is taking place all across our Nation. Only strength and powerful leadership will stop it. See you on January 20th,” Trump announced, referring to his upcoming inauguration, before closing with his slogan.

The Washington Post’s Aaron Blake, pointing to Trump’s Truth Social post, reported that the President-elect “again seems to connect the attack in New Orleans to the border.”

The suspect in that attack is a 42-year-old American from Texas, a U.S. military veteran, who is believed to have plowed a pickup truck into people celebrating on historic Bourbon Street in New Orleans early on New Years’ Day, killing 14 or 15 people, and injuring many others. The attack is being investigated by the FBI as an act of terrorism, according to multiple reports.

“The FBI said the suspect, who was killed in a firefight with officers, had an ISIS flag in the vehicle at the time of the attack,” CNN reported Thursday.

Despite the suspect being an American and a veteran, Trump had implied the attack had been carried out by an undocumented immigrant.

“When I said that the criminals coming in are far worse than the criminals we have in our country, that statement was constantly refuted by Democrats and the Fake News Media, but it turned out to be true,” Trump had claimed Wednesday. “The crime rate in our country is at a level that nobody has ever seen before. Our hearts are with all of the innocent victims and their loved ones, including the brave officers of the New Orleans Police Department. The Trump Administration will fully support the City of New Orleans as they investigate and recover from this act of pure evil!”

Reporting that Trump had “shared anti-immigrant misinformation moments after an inaccurate report from Fox News,” HuffPost notes that “Fox News had reported minutes prior to Trump’s Truth Social post that the vehicle used by the suspect had crossed into Eagle Pass, Texas, from Mexico two days before the attack. Just over an hour later, the conservative network retracted that reporting, saying its sources had advised that the truck crossed the border on Nov. 16 apparently driven by someone else. Later in the afternoon, it reported that the truck never crossed over from Mexico.”

As Raw Story reported Wednesday afternoon, Fox News delivered an on-air fact check of Trump’s remarks.

“Now the former president said ‘criminals coming in’ in a statement, meaning into our country, but to be clear,” Fox News justice correspondent David Spunt told viewers (video below), “the suspect was born in the United States, he served in the United States Army, he was a veteran, the FBI is the lead agency in this investigation going through the social media and any other accounts associated with the suspect.”

READ MORE: Trump Medicare Pick Dr. Oz Says Uninsured ‘Don’t Have Right to Health’ in Resurfaced Clip

Later Thursday morning, Trump doubled down, this time directly attacking President Joe Biden.

“With the Biden ‘Open Border’s Policy’ I said, many times during Rallies, and elsewhere, that Radical Islamic Terrorism, and other forms of violent crime, will become so bad in America that it will become hard to even imagine or believe. That time has come, only worse than ever imagined. Joe Biden is the WORST PRESIDENT IN THE HISTORY OF AMERICA, A COMPLETE AND TOTAL DISASTER. What he and his group of Election Interfering ‘thugs’ have done to our Country will not soon be forgotten! MAGA,” Trump posted to his Truth Social account.

In 1974, The New York Times reported that the CIA, “directly violating its charter, conducted a massive, illegal domestic intelligence operation during the Nixon Administration.”

“Under the 1947 act setting up the C.I.A., the agency was forbidden to have ‘police, subpoena, law enforcement powers or internal security functions’ inside the United States. Those responsibilities fall to the F.B.I., which maintains a special internal security unit to deal with foreign intelligence threats,” The Times had reported.

Watch the video below or at this link.

On the last day of 2024, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts issued his "2024 Year-End Report on the Federal Judiciary."

This was the 20th annual year-end report that Roberts has issued since being appointed chief justice by then-President George W. Bush in 2005. The High Court has changed a lot since that appointment 20 years ago, when it leaned conservative but didn't have the 6-3 GOP supermajority that it has now. And Roberts, in his report for 2024, was highly critical of "public officials" who have accused judges of showing a "political bias."

"Public officials certainly have a right to criticize the work of the judiciary," Roberts wrote, "but they should be mindful that intemperance in their statements when it comes to judges may prompt dangerous reactions by others."

READ MORE: There's only one real firewall against the Trump regime

In a biting article published on New Year's Day 2025, Rolling Stone's Andrew Perez argues that Roberts' comments sounded a lot like President-elect Donald Trump's rhetoric.

" Trump is so proud of the conservatives on the Court that he frequently praised the justices, individually by name, at 2024 campaign events — thanking them for their 'courage' in deciding to overturn Roe v. Wade, so states could ban abortion," Perez writes. "At a September rally, Trump called the conservative justices 'very brave' and argued that 'people should be put in jail' for criticizing them. The Supreme Court's chief justice, John Roberts, is now echoing Trump's demand that people stop criticizing him, his colleagues, and other federal jurists — while continuing to pretend that judges are not political."

Perez continues, "In his annual end-of-year report, issued on Tuesday, Roberts wrote that public officials (read: Democrats) 'regrettably have engaged in recent attempts to intimidate judges — for example, suggesting political bias in the judge's adverse rulings without a credible basis for such allegations.'"

The Rolling Stone journalist argues that it's "ridiculous" to deny that Supreme Court justices are "political appointees."

READ MORE: How US citizens can combat 'malicious, unjust prosecutions' during Trump’s second presidency

"In his first term as president," Perez observes, "Donald Trump built a conservative 6-3 supermajority on the Supreme Court. Ever since, the nation's highest court has repeatedly issued increasingly extreme, far-right decisions on topics of abortion, race, the environment, corruption, and much more."

Perez continues, "The Supreme Court has eliminated federal protections for abortion rights; limited the federal government's ability to regulate carbon emissions, protect Americans' drinking water, and limit ozone pollution; gutted federal agencies' ability to implement regulations generally; opened up long-standing regulations to new challenges; made it easier for states to enact racial gerrymanders; eliminated college affirmative action policies; found businesses can discriminate against LGBTQ+ customers; permitted public school employees to lead students in prayer; decided that companies can pay public officials gratuities, or thank-you payments, for corrupt contracting decisions; and broadly shielded Trump from criminal prosecution for any so-called official acts he committed as president…. Roberts and his colleagues were appointed to the Supreme Court to carry out a conservative political agenda — and that's exactly what they have done. No one should pretend otherwise."

READ MORE: Supreme Court signals it will uphold 'state-sanctioned discrimination' in new case

Read the full Rolling Stone article at this link (subscription required).