December 5, 2024

In this edition

1. Interview: Chuck Grassley: “The Senate majority is is very eager to process these Trump nominees very quickly”

2. Heard on the Hill

3. Exclusive: “Without Dan Conston’s leadership of CLF, Republicans would not be in the Majority and I would not be in Congress”: GOP praises outgoing super PAC leader

4. Exclusive: Rep. Stephanie Bice rolls out plan to gut the administrative state

5. Scoop: Democrats at risk of controlling the National Labor Relations Board until 2026

6. COVID-19 likely emerged from lab and “the ‘science’ never justified the prolonged closing of schools,” bombshell report claims

7. Exclusive: Democrats turned down $250,000 in free X advertising during DNC

8. Op-eds from Rep. Mike Bost on Republicans’ agenda for 2025, James Erwin on how to defund NPR, and former Member of European Parliament David Lega on the scourge of anti-Semitism

9. What we’re reading

A message from our sponsor.

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We spoke with Sen. Chuck Grassley about President Donald Trump's cabinet picks, have the exclusive on Rep. Stephanie Bice's plans to slash regulations, a story on Dan Conston's CLF legacy, and more!

Interview: Chuck Grassley: “The Senate majority is is very eager to process these Trump nominees very quickly”

by Matthew Foldi

Sen. Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa), 91, usually shows up to work at 6 a.m. — so, he has little patience for the “absenteeism” of some of his Republican colleagues, who he said are allowing President Joe Biden’s radical nominees to get confirmed during the lame duck Congress.

“Trump's taken the right position, and I'm taking the same position, not just because of Trump, but I'm voting against these nominees,” Grassley told the Washington Reporter in an interview. “And if we had every Republican who’s a member of the Senate present, we would be defeating some of these but because of the absenteeism of some Republicans, these judges are getting confirmed by less than a 50 vote margin because of absenteeism.”

Next year, Grassley will chair the powerful Senate Judiciary Committee, and he plans to start confirmation hearings for Trump’s nominees as soon as possible.

“I think that the Senate majority is very eager to process these Trump nominees very quickly, and I'm hoping to hold a hearing on them, like Pam Bondi and even on the FBI director sometime after that, before Inauguration Day,” Grassley said. “I don't have any fault with any of them that have been proposed…obviously there's some questions among some of my colleagues and probably by all of the Democrats on two or three of them, and I'm going to let that play out.”

FINISH reading here

Heard on the Hill

• Jobs win in North Carolina: In another jobs win for President Trump, Amgen announced a $1 billion investment in North Carolina with hundreds of new high-paying jobs. Sen. Thom Tillis (R., N.C.), who has the reputation on the Hill of being a relentless salesman for investment in North Carolina, praised the move as a “welcome opportunity” for his state.

• Partner problems: Eric Holder, one of the Democrats’ go-to figures for political and racial gerrymandering, may be complicating things for his colleagues at his day job. Holder, who served as Barack Obama’s controversial and disgraced attorney general, is a senior counsel at the Covington & Burling law firm, which did not respond to the Washington Reporter’s request for comment about whether Holder’s increasingly partisan and strident defenses of President Joe Biden’s pardon of his son Hunter represent the firm’s views.

• D’Esposito to DEA? Rep. Anthony D’Esposito, who narrowly lost a heavily Democratic district, is getting some home town backing to run the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), which is one of the few top agencies without a nominee. “@realDonaldTrump should nominate @RepDesposito a highly decorated @NYPDDetectives & proven crime fighter as @DEAHQ Administrator,” the Nassau County Detectives Association tweeted. “As a respected member of Congress, D’Esposito has demonstrated leadership & commitment needed to help DJT in his goal of Making America Safe Again 🇺🇸.” D’Esposito is also picking up support from his colleagues, including Rep. August Pfluger (R., Texas), the newly elected chair of the powerful Republican Study Committee, who said that D’Esposito, a former longtime NYPD cop, said that D’Esposito “would be an excellent pick to head the [DEA].”

• Geography 101: Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) just introduced legislation to eliminate the federal usage of the term “West Bank.” The term “West Bank” is an invention of the left to refer to territory that has never been a “Palestinian” state. For more about how the territory, which should correctly be referred to as “Israel” or as “Judea and Samaria,” we recommend watching this quick video about Jordan’s illegal occupation of the land from 1948 to 1967.

• RFK backup plans? Former Gov. Bobby Jindal made his way to Mar A Lago this week. Our sources speculate that he could be making his case that he could be a solid pick to run the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) if Robert F. Kennedy Jr. can’t get confirmed. Jindal served in high-ranking HHS roles during President George W. Bush’s administration.

• Senate swagger: The National Republican Senatorial Committee’s (NRSC) Christmas party featured ornately designed cookies, but more importantly, several of the incoming Senate Republicans, stopped by. Several of the NRSC’s top staff are making their way to the official side, we’re told. Mike Berg will be chief of staff to Tim Sheehy and Phil Letsou will be Bernie Moreno’s chief.

• Paging Jeff Bezos: The Washington Post picked an odd hill to die on this week. In its partisan bid to derail Pete Hegseth’s nomination to be Secretary of Defense, the liberal outlet insisted to Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s (R., Ala.) office that Hegseth’s nearly two dozen military accolades do not make him “highly decorated.”

• Party like an X star: X’s staff hosted a happy hour this week where they spiked the football on their platform’s success in bringing back advertisers following an overt pressure campaign by progressive activists to shut it down following Elon Musk’s historic purchase of Twitter.

• POOLHOUSE in the house: POOLHOUSE’s Christmas party filled an entire D.C. speakeasy where patrons danced to, you guessed it, the Trump version of Y.M.C.A.

• Spirited away: The Distilled Spirits Council of the United States hosted its Christmas party this year, where they cautioned about controversial Canadian scientists who are advocating that any alcohol consumption at all is unhealthy. We’d note that all of human history suggests otherwise…

• Sazerac soiree: The Sazerac House hosted its Christmas party this week, featuring a rare bottle of Weller Millennium, a blend of bourbon and wheat whiskeys from 2000, 2003, 2005, and 2006. One drinker of it told the Reporter that it “was immaculate. It truly the nectar of the gods.”

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Exclusive: “Without Dan Conston’s leadership of CLF, Republicans would not be in the majority and I would not be in Congress”: GOP praises outgoing super PAC leader

by Matthew Foldi

Although for the past three cycles the odds have been stacked against the House Republicans, Dan Conston, the outgoing president of the Congressional Leadership Fund (CLF), has helped the GOP navigate an internal coup, historically bad midterm elections, and an unprecedented amount of Democratic fundraising.

Conston has raised $871 million between CLF and its aligned organization, the American Action Fund (AAF), in the past six years. In the final full quarter of the 2024 elections, Conston raised a record $81.4 million. Chris Winkelman, the current executive director of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), will replace Conston, who will still serve as a senior advisor — which comes as welcome news to Republicans, who showered Conston with praise in remarks to the Washington Reporter.

“Dan Conston is one of the smartest political strategists in the country with immense political skill and a keen understanding of the House map, who uniquely built trust among Republican donors over three successive cycles to build the most successful political operation in the country,” Rep. Mike Lawler (R., N.Y.) said. “Simply put, without Dan Conston’s leadership of CLF, Republicans would not be in the majority and I would not be in Congress.” In 2022, Lawler scored one of the upsets of the cycle, ousting the then-chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D., N.Y.).

FINISH reading here

Exclusive: Rep. Stephanie Bice rolls out plan to gut the administrative state

by Matthew Foldi

Rep. Stephanie Bice (R., Okla.) is rolling out her plan to slash burdensome and unnecessary regulations this week, in anticipation of the incoming administration’s plans to create a Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

Bice’s bill, first obtained by the Washington Reporter, is called the Chevron Re-Review Act; it aims to build on the Supreme Court’s Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo decision, which significantly hindered unelected bureaucrats’ abilities to regulate industries.

“According to the National Association of Manufacturers, in 2022, regulations and government inefficiency cost our economy over $3 trillion,” Bice told the Reporter. This is not sustainable. In the wake of Chevron, it is imperative that Congress reassert its Article 1 authority. As we begin this new era, we must ensure we are reviewing and overturning the many rules and regulations which have arisen from the bureaucratic state.”

FINISH reading here

A message from our sponsor.

Both sides agree: NOW is the time to pass real PBM reform.

Rein in the middlemen pharmacy benefit managers and require them to increase transparency, share discounts with seniors, and delink PBM profits from the cost of medicines in Medicare.

Pass S. 2973 and S. 3430 today. Help America's seniors.

Scoop: Democrats at risk of controlling the National Labor Relations Board until 2026

By Matthew Foldi

The current Democratic chair of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), Lauren McFerran, could be reconfirmed during the lame duck Congress, which would allow her to remain at her post until 2026.

“Hunter Biden’s pardon should be the death rattle of Joe Biden’s presidency,” Tom Hebert, Americans for Tax Reform’s (ATR) Director of Competition and Regulatory Policy, told the Washington Reporter. “Biden doesn’t get any more chances to shape his legacy, and that includes putting Donald Trump’s NLRB in Democrat control until August 2026. Senate Republicans need to show up and block Biden and Chuck Schumer from hijacking the NLRB.”

Donald Trump, Jr. recently told the Reporter that Senate Republicans need to hold the line against Biden’s radical nominees such as McFerran, who has waged war on Elon Musk for years, during the lame duck Congress.

Under McFerran’s tenure at the NLRB, the organization has ruled time after time against companies like Musk’s Tesla, with critics alleging that this reeks of persecution. In one instance, the NLRB under McFerran even ordered Musk to delete a tweet.

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COVID-19 likely emerged from lab and “the ‘science’ never justified the prolonged closing of schools,” bombshell report claims

by Matthew Foldi

The House’s Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic released its long-awaited final report on Monday, almost five years after a man in Wuhan, China contracted the first confirmed case of COVID-19.

In a 525-page report, the committee’s Republicans, led by Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R., Ohio), found that “a lab-related incident involving dangerous gain-of-function research in China is the most likely origin of the COVID-19 pandemic,” “the ‘science’ never justified the prolonged closing of schools,” and “the Biden administration repeatedly obstructed [Congress’s] investigations.”

FINISH reading here

Exclusive: Democrats turned down $250,000 in free X advertising during DNC

by Matthew Foldi

When Elon Musk’s X offered both the Republican National Convention (RNC) and the Democratic National Convention (DNC) $250,000 in free advertising to promote their conventions on X, only Democrats declined, the Washington Reporter has learned.

The DNC streamed its content on X but turned down the offer for free ad space, seemingly based on the party’s ideological differences from Musk.

“The Democrats’ X strategy was to rely on @KamalaHQ and on Harry Sisson,” a social media strategist told the Reporter. Republicans, on the other hand, utilized X, and took advantage of Musk’s offer. Democrats’ ad spending on X for the presidential race was negligible; Democrats’ ad spends, however, dwarfed those of Republicans’ on Snapchat, Google, and Meta.

FINISH reading here

Op-Ed: Rep. Mike Bost: The status quo isn’t working for working families

The 2024 election delivered a powerful message to the D.C. swamp: the voters were fed up with leaders who ignored their struggles. They handed President Donald Trump and Republican majorities in both houses of Congress a mandate for change.

From factory floors and family farms to Main Streets and mom-and-pop shops, working Americans rejected the status quo that had long ago left them behind. Even traditionally Democrat-leaning states like New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and California saw significant shifts toward President Trump, highlighting the growing disconnect between D.C. Democrats and the rest of the country.

We should be focusing on illegal immigration and kitchen table issues, like jobs, rising grocery prices, the cost of energy, and fixing supply chain disruptions that lead to empty store shelves. These are the things that matter to working families in Southern Illinois and across America.

Now that the contentious November election is over, it’s time to roll up our sleeves and get to work on the issues that hit home the hardest.

FINISH reading here

Op-Ed: James Erwin: How Republicans can defund NPR

Taxpayers should not be required to fund a news outlet. As I testified to the House Energy and Commerce’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations in May, state-funded media outlets have no place in a free society.

Yet Americans have been stuck subsidizing National Public Radio (NPR) since 1970. A grand total of $28 billion has been shoveled at the radio network, even as it has run stories as deranged as how the names of bird species are racist and a justification of looting.

The fact that consumers have an endless supply of high-quality podcasts not subsidized by the taxpayer renders NPR unnecessary. The fact that NPR is a taxpayer-funded propaganda machine for the Democratic Party, staffed with left-wing ideologues, makes any Republican voting to fund it downright masochistic.

Republicans could completely defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in a reconciliation package next year. CPB is requesting $565 million for the next fiscal year — over a decade, that’s $5 billion dollars in tax cuts you’ve paid for.

FINISH reading here

Op-Ed: David Lega: The face of modern anti-Semitism, from Kristallnacht to today’s Europe

On November 9, 1938, Europe experienced one of its darkest nights. Kristallnacht — the name refers to the shattered glass from thousands of Jewish shops, homes, and synagogues — was not just a night of destruction but one that filled Jewish Europe with collective terror. Synagogues were burned to the ground while firefighters and police stood by and watched. People were dragged from their homes, beaten, and humiliated in public.

Jewish families who had contributed to Europe’s cultural, intellectual, and economic life for generations saw their world collapse. The fear, the foreboding of what was to come, left deep scars. This marked the beginning of an assault on the very existence of Jewish life in Europe.

Understanding this aspect of the Holocaust is crucial. Concentration camps were one tool in Hitler’s plan, but the goal was far greater — to erase Jewish presence, history, and culture from European cities. Today, as we see Jews in Malmö and other places in Sweden feeling unsafe and choosing to move away, it echoes this strategy. It is a modern form of the historical erasure that leaders annually vow never to let happen again.

Today, 86 years later, we live in a time when anti-Semitism is once again taking hold in our societies. In Malmö, a city long seen as a symbol of diversity and openness, Jews today experience an anxiety that cannot be ignored. After October 7, 2023, when Hamas launched its brutal attack on Israel, we witnessed a rapid surge in anti-Semitic expressions, not only globally but also on our streets.

FINISH reading here

What we’re reading

• The Spectator: Will Trump stop America’s funding of the Taliban? by Lynne O’Donnell.

• Washington Free Beacon: Biden Admin's Revolving Door With Left-Wing Green Groups Continues as Environmental Official Lands Cushy Gig With Anti-Fossil Fuel Radicals, by Thomas Catenacci.

• National Review: UNRWA Created Its Own Reputation Crisis, by Haley Strack.

• Free Press: How to ‘Make Your Campus Palestinian,’ by Olivia Reingold.

• Fox News: American students face declines in math, science scores compared to international peers: report, by Jeffrey Clark.

• Washington Free Beacon: San Francisco’s $30,000 ‘Equity-Centered’ School Closure Plan—Put on Hold After Parent Uproar—Used DEI Formulas To 'Target' High-Performing, Majority-Asian School, by Jessica Costescu.

• National Review: Most Americans Like Their Health Insurance, by Dominic Pino.