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An off-color joke by media executive Tom Rogers on MSNBC’s “The 11^th Hour” jolted other guests on set and caused the show’s host to shriek with laughter.

The moment came Friday night during a discussion about the controversy swirling around former Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz’s selection as President-elect Donald Trump’s next attorney general.

A Republican strategist’s defense of President-elect Donald Trump’s next rumored pick of MAGA enthusiast Kash Patel to join his administration left a Washington Post columnist flabbergasted as she refused to move on without airing her concerns.

“The Constitution still matters! I’m sorry I can't get past the locking up of all of the enemies, whether they're journalists or otherwise, that matters,” columnist Catherine Rampell said during an appearance on CNN’s “NewsNight” with host Abby Phillip. “I don't think the voters get a say on whether the First Amendment still exists.”

Comedian Bill Maher used his opening monologue Friday night to mock President-elect Donald Trump's most controversial Cabinet nominations, including one whom he joked was only chosen because the rapper Diddy "was not available."

Beginning his show, "Real Time" on Friday night, Maher led off by noting that women are now pledging to deny sex as a rebuke to the nation electing Donald Trump.

A former federal prosecutor said the most recent revelations coming out about former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) following his selection by President-election Donald Trump as attorney general is an indication of more complications to come.

The assessment by CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig came Friday after reports emerged that the House Ethics Committee heard testimony from a witness who claimed to have seen Gaetz engage in sexual misconduct with a minor. But whether or not the ethics committee’s investigative report ultimately becomes public, the claims against Gaetz “are open game," according to Honig.

A former assistant homeland security secretary said Friday night that she expects more "chaos" to return to the United States' national defense agency after President-Elect Donald Trump nominated Gov. Kristi Noem (R-SD) to be its next head.

Elizabeth Neumann, a prominent national security expert and homeland security official who has served across three presidential administrations, told CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins that the chaos will be "definitely the same" as it was during Donald Trump's first term.

Right-wing conspiracy theories about the election being stolen largely dried up after Trump emerged the victor in the 2024 election — but some liberal ones have arisen in response, even if not with the same planned and calculated violence that arose on Jan. 6.

According to Molly Olmstead in Slate, one of those theories concerns tech billionaire Elon Musk, who poured tens of millions of dollars into the election to help Trump through his America PAC — but the thinking goes, without any basis, that he might have directly altered votes.

The fall of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani took new heights on Friday after reports surfaced that his new attorneys launched a legal battle over a refrigerator caught up in his $148 million judgment for defamation.

And the reality that Giuliani, a one-time federal prosecutor who rose to fame as “America’s mayor” after 9/11, is fighting over an appliance seemed to fascinate and concern CNN anchor Anderson Cooper.

Former Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) on Friday night sharply criticized Donald Trump's selection of Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) to serve as attorney general — and gave his fellow commentators on Fox News a piece of his mind.

Gowdy, who ran the House's controversial investigation into the 2012 Benghazi consulate attack, has a history of enmity with Gaetz, who has himself lashed out at Gowdy on Fox News.

A CNN anchor and the former Democratic lawmaker she was interviewing suggested Friday that the release of what was expected to be a damning ethics report into former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) might be made public in a less than formal way.

The moment happened during an appearance on CNN by former Rep. Mondaire Jones (D-NY) when anchor Brianna Keiler asked if he believes the report will come out “either by the committee releasing it or someone leaking it?”

The House Ethics Committee received testimony from someone who claimed to have witnessed former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) engage in sexual misconduct with a high school girl, ABC News reported Friday.

This follows a development earlier in the week when the attorney for a woman who claims she and Gaetz had sexual contact when she was 17 — beneath the age of consent in Florida — called on the House Ethics Committee to release its report on the matter, which is expected to contain further damning information.

Vice President-elect J.D. Vance lashed out at The Associated Press after the news organization reported that a fellow service member reported Donald Trump's pick for Pentagon chief as a possible ‘Insider Threat."

Pete Hegseth, an Army National Guard veteran and Fox News host, was nominated this week to lead the Department of Defense. Trump's nominee was met with fierce criticism over concerns Hegseth was not qualified for the role.

President-elect Donald Trump continued to roll out his next administration's main players after announcing Friday that campaign spokesperson Karoline Leavitt will be his next White House press secretary.

Leavitt is no stranger to the media. The campaign veteran previously served as assistant press secretary during Trump’s last term and has earned a reputation as a fierce defender of the incoming president that conservatives appear to welcome to the new role.

Former Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard has a consistent habit of trusting "foreign propaganda" over the very people she would lead as America's spymaster, making her wholly unqualified to be director of national intelligence, foreign policy columnist Josh Rogin wrote for The Washington Post.

This comes as Gabbard's nomination — one of several divisive picks, including Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) for attorney general, Fox News host Pete Hegseth for the Pentagon, and anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for the Department of Health and Human Services — causes outrage among intelligence experts.