White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announces she’s pregnant
The White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt speaks at the White House press briefing room in Washington DC, United States, on December 11, 2025. (Photo by Celal Gunes/Anadolu via Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced on Friday that she is pregnant with her second child.
“The greatest Christmas gift we could ever ask for – a baby girl coming in May 2026,” Leavitt wrote in a post to Instagram.
“My husband and I are thrilled to grow our family and can’t wait to watch our son become a big brother. My heart is overflowing with gratitude to God for the blessing of motherhood, which I truly believe is the closest thing to Heaven on Earth,” she wrote.
“I am also extremely grateful to President Trump and our Chief of Staff Susie Wiles for their support, and for fostering a pro-family environment in the White House. 2026 is going to be a great year and I am so excited to be a girl mom!” Leavitt added in the social media post.
Leavitt is 28 years old and is the youngest person to serve as White House press secretary. She previously worked in the press office during President Donald Trump’s first term and also served as the press secretary for his 2024 campaign.
Leavitt ran a failed bid for Congress in New Hampshire, her home state, in 2022.
She and her husband, Nicholas Riccio, welcomed their first child, Nicholas “Niko” Robert Riccio, in 2024.
In this July 23, 2025, file photo, Rep. Robert Garcia gestures as the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on Federal Law Enforcement meets in the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, D.C. Members of the subcommittee passed a motion to subpoena the so-called “Epstein files.” Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images, FILE
(WASHINGTON) — Reactions are pouring in from Capitol Hill after House Democrats released correspondence from sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in which he wrote that President Donald Trump “spent hours at my house” with an alleged victim.
The emails, written in 2011 to Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell but made public on Wednesday by Democrats on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, have added to a renewed push by some lawmakers to compel the administration to release all files related to Epstein.
“We won’t stop until we end this White House cover-up. Release the files, NOW,” Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia, the ranking member on the Oversight panel, wrote on X.
Many Democrats issued similar calls.
“It’s clear as day: Trump is in the Epstein files,” New York Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler wrote on X. “The American people deserve the full truth.”
“The public deserves to know who enabled Epstein, who looked the other way, and who’s still being protected. Survivors have waited long enough. Release the Epstein files NOW,” wrote Minnesota Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar.
Republicans on the House Oversight Committee accused Democrats of “trying to create a fake narrative to slander President Trump.”
In a social media post, Republicans on the panel claimed in the 2011 email between Epstein and Maxwell, Democrats redacted the name “Virginia” — a likely reference to prominent Epstein accuser Virginia Giuffre, who had made extensive public comments about her exploitation by Epstein, but had never accused Trump of any wrongdoing.
“Democrats continue to carelessly cherry-pick documents to generate click-bait that is not grounded in the facts,” a House Oversight Majority spokesperson said in a statement. “The Epstein Estate has produced over 20,000 pages of documents on Thursday, yet Democrats are once again intentionally withholding records that name Democrat officials.”
After the release by House Democrats, House Republicans on the Oversight panel released an additional 20,000 pages of documents they received from the Epstein estate.
Republican Rep. Nancy Mace, one of a handful of Republican women backing the effort to compel the release of all Epstein files, defended Trump and said focus should be on the victims.
“How pathetic that Democrats are using Epstein’s victims to bury headlines on their vote against reopening the government,” Mace wrote on X.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt also accused Democrats of “selectively leaked emails to the liberal media to create a fake narrative.”
“The ‘unnamed victim’ referenced in these emails is the late Virginia Giuffre, who repeatedly said President Trump was not involved in any wrongdoing whatsoever and ‘couldn’t have been friendlier’ to her in their limited interactions. The fact remains that President Trump kicked Jeffrey Epstein out of his club decades ago for being a creep to his female employees, including Giuffre,” Leavitt said in a statement to ABC News.
“These stories are nothing more than bad-faith efforts to distract from President Trump’s historic accomplishments, and any American with common sense sees right through this hoax and clear distraction from the government opening back up again,” Leavitt added.
In other messages released by House Democrats, Epstein appeared to touch on his relationship with Trump and whether he’d been banned from membership at Mar-a-Lago years earlier.
“Trump said he asked me to resign, never a member ever,” Epstein wrote in a message to author Michael Wolff, “Of course he knew about the girls as he asked ghislaine to stop.”
Trump, who hasn’t yet directly weighed in on the latest development, previously blamed Democrats for creating a “hoax” surrounding the Epstein files.
After Epstein was arrested in 2019, Trump said he hadn’t spoken with him since 2015 because of a falling out. This summer, as momentum picked up in Congress to release all the Epstein files, Trump said Epstein “stole” young women (including Guiffre) from his Mar-a-Lago club, but that he didn’t know why.
Republican Rep. Thomas Massie and Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna are leading a discharge petition to force a vote on compelling the Justice Department to release all the Epstein files.
Democratic Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva, set to be sworn in on Wednesday, is expected to become the decisive 218th signature needed for the petition.
“Why did Justice or the FBI not get & release these?” Khanna wrote on X about the Epstein emails made public by House Democrats. “Today, [Massie] & my petition gets 218!”
U.S. President Donald Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney speak as they pose for a photo, at a world leaders’ summit on ending the Gaza war on October 13, 2025 in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt. (Photo by Suzanne Plunkett – Pool / Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — A top Ontario official vowed to take down a negative TV advertisement about tariffs on Friday, just hours after President Donald Trump halted trade negotiation with Canada citing the ad.
“Ontario will pause its U.S. advertising campaign effective Monday so that trade talks can resume,” Ontario Premier Doug Ford said, noting the advertisement would air over the weekend during the Major League Baseball World Series.
“The people elected our government to protect Ontario—our workers, businesses, families and communities. That’s exactly what I’m doing,” Ford said.
On Friday morning, Trump claimed, without evidence, that the ad aimed to sway the outcome of a U.S. Supreme Court case over the policy set to come before justices next month.
“TARIFFS ARE VERY IMPORTANT TO THE NATIONAL SECURITY, AND ECONOMY, OF THE U.S.A. Based on their egregious behavior, ALL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH CANADA ARE HEREBY TERMINATED,” Trump posted on his social media platform.
“Canada is trying to illegally influence the United States Supreme Court in one of the most important rulings in the history of our Country,” Trump said on Friday morning.
Trump did not specify which law Canada had allegedly broken.
The ad campaign in question was rolled out earlier this month by the Canadian province of Ontario. The ad features audio with excerpts of a 1987 address by then-President Ronald Reagan that came as he imposed some duties on Japanese products but cautioned about the long-term economic risks of high tariffs and the threat of a trade war.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford called for a spirit of partnership between the two countries in a post on X early Friday.
“Canada and the United States are friends, neighbours and allies. President Ronald Reagan knew that we are stronger together. God bless Canada and God bless the United States,” Ford said.
The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation & Institute said in a statement on social media Thursday evening that the Canadian ad campaign used “selective audio and video” of Reagan and “misrepresents” what he said in the address.
Referring to the Canadian ad campaign, Trump said, “They only did this to interfere with the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court, and other courts.”
The Supreme Court is set to decide this term whether Trump’s sweeping global reciprocal tariffs are an illegal use of emergency authority granted by Congress — and whether tens of billions of dollars collected so far must be refunded.
Earlier this month, in a White House meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, Trump signaled optimism about a potential U.S.-Canada trade deal, saying the two sides had “come a long way” in negotiations.
In July, Trump issued a 35% tariff on most goods and raw materials from Canada.
ABC News’ Brian Hartman contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — Following an unprecedented surge in election-related litigation, the Supreme Court on Wednesday was. considering reviving a lawsuit challenging an Illinois law that allows officials to count mail-in ballots received within two weeks of Election Day.
The Supreme Court heard arguments about the broader question of who has the right to file a federal lawsuit challenging election law, the outcome of which could not only revive the mail-in ballot case but also open the door to a wave of new legal challenges to election laws.
Republican Rep. Michael Bost and two presidential electors filed a lawsuit in 2022 to challenge the Illinois law, arguing that counting mail-in ballots beyond Election Day constitutes an illegal extension of voting beyond the timeframe set in federal law.
Two lower courts threw out the lawsuit after concluding that the congressman lacked standing — or the legal right to bring a lawsuit — because the plaintiffs could not prove the policy harmed them. The Supreme Court agreed to hear the case in June, adding to one of the high court’s most consequential terms in recent history.
President Donald Trump and his allies have long criticized the practice of mail-in voting, using it as ammunition to cast doubt on the outcome of the 2020 election. In August, Trump vowed to “lead a movement to get rid of” mail-in voting, though his campaign had encouraged voters to use mail ballots.
“It’s time that the Republicans get tough and stop it, because the Democrats want it. It’s the only way they can get elected,” Trump said then.
When a federal district judge threw out Bost’s lawsuit in 2022, the decision stemmed from the question of whether the congressman and the electors had the grounds to sue, not the merits of his legal argument about mail-in ballots. The court ruled that Bost’s claims about being harmed by the policy — including having to use campaign resources during the post-election ballot counting period — were a “generalized grievance” that did not provide him standing to sue.
To bring a lawsuit in federal court, a plaintiff generally needs to establish that a particular action injures them, that the action stemmed from the person he or she is suing, and that the court’s solution would resolve the harm.
Together with electors Laura Pollatrini and Susan Sweeney, Bost argues that the mail-in ballot policy not only harms his election prospects but also causes a “pocketbook injury,” because candidates need to continue staffing their campaigns through the ballot-counting period.
“When it comes to elections, candidates running for office plainly have the most at stake. They put their lives on hold and spend countless hours and millions of dollars organizing and running campaigns,” their lawyers wrote. “When the dust settles, the candidates either win or lose, with months of effort and untold expenditures either vindicated or forever lost.”
The Illinois State Board of Elections has pushed back by arguing that the potential impact on Bost’s “electoral prospects” is too speculative and that political candidates are under no requirement to continue staffing their campaigns after the election, effectively making the injury that Bost claims he suffers voluntary.
Illinois has also argued that allowing Bost to bring the lawsuit would open the floodgates of frivolous lawsuits “to challenge any election rule on the books for purely ideological reasons” and cause local governments to spend more time fighting lawsuits and less time administering elections.
The Trump administration has supported part of Bost’s argument about having the right to sue over the ballot policy, though Solicitor General D. John Sauer pushed back on the claim that candidates have broad claims to bring election-related lawsuits.
“This Court can …. establish a clear rule for standing to litigate disputes over election laws: candidates have standing to seek prospective relief challenging a rule governing the validity of ballots so long as there is a risk that the ballots at issue could affect the outcome of their election,” Sauer wrote in an amicus brief.
