The 2024 elections finally ended on Tuesday night as Democrat Adam Gray officially defeated Rep. John Duarte (R-Calif.) in California’s 13th District. The margin of victory was 187 votes out of nearly 211,000 votes cast, or 0.08%.
The final House results are 220-215 in favor of Republicans. The GOP controlled 222 seats after Election Day 2022. This means Democrats netted a two-seat gain but still couldn’t claim the majority. Democrats flipped three seats each in California and New York, although it wasn’t enough to offset GOP gains in Pennsylvania and North Carolina.
You won, so now welcome to your nightmare, Speaker Mike Johnson. For the first several months of 2025, Johnson will have a 217-215 seat majority when factoring in the resignation of Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and the expected departure of Reps. Michael Waltz (R-Fla.) and Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) for Trump administration posts. Johnson, quite literally, has no margin for error.
Nominations: In public, Senate Republicans are giving President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet nominees the benefit of the doubt, signaling a level of deference to the leader of their party while emphasizing the Senate’s advise-and-consent process.
Yet beneath the surface, several undercurrents paint a less rosy picture for some of Trump’s more controversial nominees.
Top Senate Republicans want to avoid offending Trump, who never forgets any slight. But there are GOP senators who don’t want to be forced to vote for unacceptable nominees just to mollify Trump, believing this will lead to more problems for him and them in the long run. These senators want their leadership to convince Trump to pull nominees rather than seek floor showdowns. This has happened already with Gaetz and DEA nominee Sheriff Chad Chronister — and it may again with Pentagon pick Pete Hegseth.
At the center of it all is incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune. Senate Republicans will have 53 seats come January and likely won’t get any Democratic help on the more controversial nominees. That means limiting GOP defections to no more than three.
Thune has spoken repeatedly with Trump about the challenges facing some of the president-elect’s nominees. And there have been staff-level conversations with incoming White House legislative affairs chief James Braid and Stephen Miller, deputy chief of staff for policy, among others. Vice President-elect JD Vance has also been directly involved and is in constant communication with his soon-to-be former colleagues.
At the same time, some moderate Republicans are talking informally about their approach to certain nominees, including Hegseth and former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (Hawaii), Trump’s pick for director of national intelligence. These senators are keeping Thune in the loop on their discussions and have no interest in blindsiding him — or Trump.
Republican leaders are also monitoring senators whose pet issues may put them on a collision course with any of the nominees, as well as a few others who don’t fit neatly into any camp.
By Tuesday night, Hegseth’s nomination was so endangered that the Wall Street Journal reported Trump is considering pulling Hegseth in favor of Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis. Our friend Marc Caputo at the Bulwark reported that Trump and DeSantis also discussed having DeSantis appoint Lara Trump, the president-elect’s daughter-in-law, to the Senate to replace departing Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who has been nominated for secretary of state.
Hegseth and his mother, Penelope Hegseth — who wrote a 2018 email accusing her son of having “abused” women, although she later apologized — were set to be interviewed on Fox News today in a bid to save his nomination.
Zooming in: GOP senators to watch here include Sens. Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Bill Cassidy (La.). Sen.-elect John Curtis (R-Utah) is seen as another potential swing vote.
And don’t forget about Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), the outgoing Senate GOP leader. We wrote last month about McConnell’s post-leadership posture and the possibility that he’d cause problems for Trump, especially on foreign policy-centric nominees and policy questions.
There’s also Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who’s up for reelection in 2026 but could draw a primary challenger from the right. Tillis has yet to indicate that he’ll oppose any of Trump’s nominees and hasn’t raised public doubts about any.
Tillis said Tuesday he doesn’t worry about potential backlash from the right or left.
“I will run on my record and show that I’m generally going to be supportive unless when I think things don’t make sense, and then I’ve got to go back home and explain that to people in North Carolina,” Tillis said. “So far my track record’s been pretty good on that.”
Hegseth back in the Senate: Hegseth has several critical meetings lined up for today. He’ll meet with Thune, as well as with Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), the incoming Senate Armed Services Committee chair, and Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.). Hegseth is meeting with the Republican Study Committee on the House side too.
Hegseth is also scheduled to sit down with Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa). Ernst has been generally supportive of Hegseth but has said she wants to ask him tough questions about the various allegations.
