Trump builds cabinet as his White House transition takes shape; Judge Merchan delays hush money case: Live updates – UK Times

We covered the question of the new Trump administration potentially abolishing the DOE a little earlier and here’s Florida Senator Rick Scott, who could be elected as Mitch McConnell’s replacement tomorrow, questioning its very existence.

Education should be left up to the states, Scott argues, just as Trump did about reproductive rights.

Bloomberg is currently reporting that members of the president-elect’s inner circle are backing Scott Bessent, who runs macro hedge fund Key Square Group, to be his new treasury secretary, which would see him taking a role occupied by Steve Mnuchin last time around.

Here are a couple of post-election media appearances in which Bessent outlines his fiscal philosophy, first with CNBC’s Squawk Box and then on Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast.

Here he is attacking Kamala Harris as an “economic illiterate” on Laura Ingraham’s Fox News show during the campaign for good measure.

House speaker Mike Johnson has just been giving a press conference on the steps of the Capitol at which he said he plans to spend his upcoming weekend at Mar-a-Lago hammering out strategy with Trump and that there was no election fraud this time around.

You can’t help but suspect he might have declared the exact opposite had Kamala Harris won in a landslide but here we are.

He also claimed to have no favorite in the Senate contest to replace Mitch McConnell, declining to back any of John Coryn, John Thune or Rick Scott.

Johnson further revealed that there are “preliminary plans” developing for Trump to visit Republicans on Capitol Hill tomorrow before he is received by Joe Biden at the White House at 11am ET.

“Not true – I was paid nothing, ever,” said the TV star when buttonholed by a TMZ reporter on Monday and asked about the alleged fee.

Throughout the election, Kamala Harris wildly outraised and outspent her opponent, picking up numerous celebrity endorsements, including Winfrey’s – all in vain.

According to The Washington Examiner, her campaign spent more than $15m on production fees for events, as well as more than $654m on advertising between July 22 and November 5.

The US Supreme Court has refused to let former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows move the election interference case against him in Georgia to federal court.

Meadows was one of 19 people indicted in Georgia and accused of participating in an illegal scheme to keep then-president Donald Trump in power after he lost the 2020 election.

Trump was also charged, though after he won re-election to a second term last week any trial appears unlikely, at least while he holds office. Both men have denied wrongdoing.

It’s unclear what affect the election results could have on others charged in the case, which is largely on hold after an appeals court agreed to review whether to remove Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis over her romantic relationship with the special prosecutor she had hired to lead the case.

Meadows had gone to the Supreme Court in an effort to move the charges out of Georgia courts. He argues the case belongs in federal court because it relates to his duties as a federal official and he pointed to the Supreme Court ruling giving Trump broad immunity from criminal prosecution to support his argument.

“A White House chief of staff facing criminal charges based on actions relating to his work for the president of the United States should not be a close call – especially now that this court has recognized that federal immunity impacts what evidence can be considered, not just what conduct can form the basis for liability,” his attorneys wrote.

But prosecutors said that Meadows failed to show he was carrying out official duties during the alleged scheme, including participating in a phone call where Trump suggested Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger could help “find” votes he needed to win the state.

Judge Juan Merchan is postponing a decision on whether to undo President-elect Donald Trump’s conviction in his hush money case because of a US Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity.

Judge Merchan had been set to rule Tuesday.

Instead, he told Trump’s lawyers this morning he’d delay the ruling until November 19.

According to emails filed in court, Trump’s lawyers asked for the delay over the weekend, arguing there are “strong reasons for the requested stay, and eventually dismissal of the case in the interests of justice.”

Here’s the very latest from Alex Woodward.

A federal judge has struck down a Louisiana law that required every public school and university classroom to display the Ten Commandments, drawing legal challenges from civil rights groups anticipating a Supreme Court battle with the state’s Republican governor.

The law clearly violates the First Amendment’s provisions against the government from establishing or favoring one religion over another, and from interfering with a right to practice a religion without government interference, according to the ruling.

There is a “real and substantial likelihood of coercion” if Louisiana students are forced to be a “captive audience” for “a specific version of the Ten Commandments, one posted in every single classroom,” District Judge John Wheadon deGravelles wrote on Tuesday.

The law signed by Governor Jeff Landry earlier this year — the first of its kind in the US — appears to be designed to invite a federal court battle that will work its way to the Supreme Court.

Conservative Christian legal groups have been angling for another shot at reversing Supreme Court rulings protecting the separation of church and state for decades.

House Democrats are hoping to blunt Trump’s sweeping legislative agenda by putting pressure on President Biden before the Republican president-elect returns to the White House.

Trump is expected to enter office with GOP control of the House and Senate and plans to gut Biden’s achievements by reversing executive orders, swiftly passing an extension of his 2017 tax law and implementing anti-immigration measures aimed at the US-Mexico border.

The president-elect’s “day one” agenda includes an executive order that would end the legal right to citizenship for children born in the US if their parents are “illegal aliens.” His administration is also expected to revive a “denaturalization” plan that could strip Americans of their citizenship – a project that was abandoned in his first term.

Trump also has announced plans to mobilize federal, state and local law enforcement for a massive “deportation operation” that could see millions of people forcibly removed from the country.

But Democratic members of Congress are reportedly planning to push the Biden White House on bolstering immigration policy, including fast-tracking citizenship and legal residency paperwork for immigrants living in the US.

The Republican Party is likely to retain control of the House of Representatives in the coming days, but with the makeup of the chamber virtually unchanged despite decisive victories in the presidential race and Senate contests.

GOP members are projected at this point to win a single-digit majority. Seventeen seats around the country remained up for grabs as of Monday evening, with Democrats currently leading in nine and Republicans in eight – in two cases, by just a few hundred votes.

Of the races already called, Republicans have secured 214 – four short of a majority. Democrats currently sit at 204 in the chamber.

Notable incumbents on both sides lost seats, including Anthony D’Esposito in the New York GOP and Pennsylvania’s Susan Wild on the Democratic side.

Here’s the latest from John Bowden.

The anchor and staunch Trump supporter, who regularly shares details about clashes with his Democrat-voting mom, revealed on his show on Monday night: “People are taking some space in the Watters household.

“I’ll have you know that I wasn’t invited to my mother’s house for Thanksgiving.

“Apparently, there wasn’t enough room.

“She said it was a scheduling situation and then at the last second invited me to come over on Black Friday.

“I told her, ‘No thanks, I’ll be at Best Buy.’”

Rhian Lubin has more on this heart-breaking rift.