Defense Secretary Austin tells Congress 6-month funding stopgap would be ‘devastating to our readiness’
US Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin speaks at the end of a Ukraine Defence Contact Group meeting on September 6, 2024 at the US air base in Ramstein, southwestern Germany. (Photo by DANIEL ROLAND/AFP via Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin sent a weekend letter to Congressional appropriators urging them to pass government funding bills after the election in the “vulnerable time around transitions” to “uphold the bipartisan tradition of funding our nation’s defense prior to the inauguration of a new president,” a source in the department told ABC News.
In his letter to bipartisan committee chairs on government funding, Austin urged lawmakers to avoid a six-month stopgap funding measure, calling a regular funding bill for the Pentagon “the single most important thing that Congress can do to ensure U.S. national security.”
Speaker Mike Johnson has proposed the six-month continuing resolution to fund the government beyond the inauguration of a new president. The government funding deadline is September 30.
Austin’s letter does not signal opposition to a one-month stopgap – but he urges “action immediately after the election.”
“The repercussions of Congress failing to pass regular appropriations legislation for the first half of FY 2025 would be devastating to our readiness and ability to execute the National Defense Strategy,” Austin writes.
The defense secretary points out to Congressional leaders that a six-month continuing resolution “would represent the second year in a row, and the seventh time in the past 15 years” the Pentagon has been stalled until midyear in receiving its funding orders from the legislative branch.
“I am fully aware of the political pressures that will challenge the Congress from fulfilling its duty before our national elections conclude,” he writes. “No matter who wins this election, there will be a Presidential transition. I urge you and your colleagues to take up action immediately after the election to limit damage to our national security during this vulnerable period around transitions and uphold the bipartisan tradition of funding our nation’s defense prior to the inauguration of a new President.”
(WASHINGTON) — The Democratic National Committee on Saturday is launching a new ad campaign targeted at rural voters to boost turnout in two southern battlegrounds in the final days of the presidential election.
The effort, backed by a six-figure media buy, comes as Democrats are especially concerned that early vote turnout is low among Black voters in rural areas. The effort will span 15 counties that are part of the “Black Belt” in Georgia and North Carolina.
The ads, which will run on multi-media billboards and on radio stations in the area, will feature DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison, a Black South Carolinian who has spoken extensively of his upbringing in rural Orangeburg. The effort will promote policies that Democrats say will help rural voters, including expanding rural infrastructure, making health care more affordable and ensuring rural hospitals can remain open.
“In the final days of this election, Democrats are not taking our foot off the gas as we communicate our plan for rural America. From affordable and accessible health care, to lower costs, and economic opportunities, the Democratic Party will fight for the policies that make a tangible difference for rural Americans,” Harrison said in a statement provided first to ABC News.
“Growing up in a rural town, I know how important it is to show up and truly meet rural voters where they are. The DNC’s latest rural ‘I Will Vote’ initiative does exactly that, ensuring that the final message rural voters in the critical battlegrounds of Georgia and North Carolina receive in this election is Democrats’ commitment to fight for them.”
The ad buy comes as Democrats grow concerned that Black rural voters are not participating in early voting at the rate that the party needs.
Democrats hope to be competitive in Georgia and North Carolina, where Black rural voters are key. Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to clean up in urban areas, but she’ll have to keep former President Donald Trump’s rural margins down enough to stop him from offsetting her advantage in cities like Atlanta and Raleigh.
In Georgia, 41% of early voters are Republican, and 42% are Democrats, according to 538 analysis of voter data from L2, a non-partisan political data company. In 2020, early voting was 41% Republican – 46% Democrat.
It’s the same story in North Carolina, where 34% of early vote ballots have been cast by Republicans, and 33% by Democrats. In 2020, early voting was 32% Republican – 35% Democrat.
Of voters who voted early in 2020, only 66% of Black voters have cast an early ballot this time around so far. That number drops to 63% of Black voters in rural areas.
The drop is likely explainable in part by this year’s election not taking place in the middle of a pandemic, whereas in 2020, many voters leaned on early and absentee voting to avoid long lines and possible COVID-19 exposures.
Still, both states remain highly competitive. Polling averages from 538 show Trump up 1.6 points in Georgia and 1.3 points in North Carolina.
Early voting has also had some promising signs for Democrats, including high female turnout, particularly as polls show a widening gender gap, with women leaning toward Harris and men toward Trump.
And while operatives said Democrats were not hitting their marks with Black rural voters early on, that trend has begun to be mitigated, with veteran North Carolina Democratic strategist Morgan Jackson conceding that while “they had started early vote a little low,” the turnout has “picked up pretty substantially.”
“My suspicion is by Saturday’s close, they’ll be at parity with where they were four years ago,” added Michael Bitzer, a political science professor at Catawba College in North Carolina who is tracking the early vote numbers.
(WILMINGTON, N.C.) — Former President Donald Trump is returning to the key battleground state of North Carolina on Saturday amid a major controversy revolving around North Carolina’s Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson, who the former president had previously supported and called “Martin Luther King on steroids.”
Robinson, the sitting Republican lieutenant governor of North Carolina, allegedly posted inflammatory comments on a message board of a pornography website more than a decade ago, according to a report out Thursday from CNN.
Robinson is not expected to attend Saturday’s rally, though sources caution plans could always change. Trump has not given any indication that he intends to pull his endorsement of Robinson.
The controversy has become a new headache for Trump in the final stretch of the 2024 election cycle.
Trump has campaigned for Robinson multiple times this election cycle, including inviting him to speak at his rallies in North Carolina this year and hosting him at his Mar-a-Lago estate for a fundraiser last year. Also, Trump’s advisers are keenly aware just how important battleground North Carolina is for the former president’s victory in November.
People close to the former president told ABC News that they were bracing for the Robinson story on Thursday. Sources said the campaign was planning to put more distance between Trump and Robinson, but initially did not have plans to call on him to drop out.
“President Trump’s campaign is focused on winning the White House and saving this country. North Carolina is a vital part of that plan,” Trump campaign’s National Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt wrote in a statement to ABC News in response to allegations about Robinson.
When it comes to winning North Carolina, the Trump campaign “will not take our eye off the ball,” Leavitt said.
Trump has yet to make any direct comment on the Robinson controversy. His running mate Sen. JD Vance dodged reporters’ questions about it on Thursday, later, in a post on X, he repeated attacks on Harris as his “comment on Mark Robinson.”
Among the controversial comments Robinson allegedly made online many years ago, according to CNN’s reporting, is one comment where he allegedly referred to himself as a “black NAZI!” CNN reports the comments were made by Robinson between 2008-2012 under the username “minisoldr” on “Nude Africa,” a pornographic website that includes a message board.
ABC News has not confirmed this reporting or the online username alleged to be linked to him.
Robinson has denied he made the comments and claimed the allegations were “salacious tabloid lies.” Defending his character, Robinson vowed to stay in the race as the deadline to drop out as a candidate in North Carolina approached on Thursday.
While Robinson’s alleged past comments online have received a lot of attention, so too have Trump’s past comments in support of Robinson.
“This is Martin Luther King on steroids,” Trump said at a rally in March 2024 while campaigning in Greensboro, North Carolina.
Taking the stage after Robinson’s speech, Trump said, “I told that to Mark. I said, ‘I think you’re better than Martin Luther King. I think you are Martin Luther King times two.'”
Trump later said he was “outstanding” and set to “be the next governor” of North Carolina.
In December 2023, at a private Mar-a-Lago fundraiser supporting Robinson, Trump said people should “cherish” Robinson like a “fine wine.”
“We have to cherish Mark. We have to cherish him. It’s like a fine wine, because that’s what you have, you have a fine wine,” Trump said in a social media video posted by North Carolina politician Robert Ward, who attended the fundraiser.
Trump further called Robinson an “outstanding person” that he “got to know fairly quickly,” asking donors gathered at his property to donate to Robinson and to get out and vote because he has a “tough opponent.”
“You got to help him financially, because you all people that have a lot of money — I know, rich as hell. So anything you were going to do, quadruple it,” Trump said.
Trump campaigned with Robinson twice at his North Carolina rallies in August. In Asheville, on Aug. 14, Robinson was the final speaker of the pre-programming prior to Trump’s arrival, and Trump called him a “good man” and a “fighter” in a relatively short shout out.
“I want to thank a very good man, and he’s in there fighting,” Trump said about Robinson. “… We know he’s a fighter. The next governor of North Carolina, Mark Robinson. Thanks, Mark. This is Mrs. Robinson. Thank you. They’re a great, great couple. Thank you both.”
In Asheboro, on Aug. 21, Robinson did not speak on stage, but Trump gave him a shout out during his speech and briefly brought him on stage.
The Harris campaign has been capitalizing on Trump and Robinson’s relationship on social media, firing off a series of posts featuring Trump’s praising past comments on Robinson and calling them “best friends.”
On Friday, the Harris campaign released a new ad that seeks to tie Trump to Robinson, saying “they’re both wrong for North Carolina.”
The ad, which will air in North Carolina, features past clips of Trump praising Robinson. The 30-second spot also highlights Robinson’s hard-line comments on abortion.
The ad does not include the alleged comments and conduct outlined in CNN’s article.
ABC News’ Fritz Farrow, Gabriella Abdul-Hakim and Will McDuffie contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — For the first time in four years, Democrats are leaderless. But chaos is a ladder, as the saying goes, and the party is packed with climbers.
Democrats are still sifting through the rubble of last week’s election results, and many said that a period of grieving and soul-searching is due after Vice President Kamala Harris’ loss. But over a dozen operatives said that the leadership vacuum fueled by her defeat will attract members of the party’s deep bench who likely won’t wait long to cast themselves as the messenger Democrats need to bounce back ahead of the 2028 election.
“I have not seen any outreach from the national party to folks for 2028. I think they’re too busy playing the blame game, they’re too busy knifing each other,” said one person who has spoken to multiple potential 2028 candidates. “In terms of donors reaching out to their candidate of choice, that has been never ending over the course of the last four or five days. And then there’s a lot of local outreach to people.”
Democrats boast several governors, senators, House members and more rumored to have national ambitions.
Among them are California Gov. Gavin Newsom; Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker; Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear; Maryland Gov. Wes Moore; Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer; North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper; Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro; Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock; New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker; Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman; California Rep. Ro Khanna; and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, her running mate, could also play some role in guiding the party, though it’s unclear how much of an appetite there is in the party to allow the bench to take on a supporting role to members of the losing ticket.
Already, the jockeying is underway, albeit not yet in full force.
Shapiro has received calls from Democrats in his state, a source familiar with the matter confirmed, as has Beshear, who also wrote a New York Times op-ed examining his party’s woes. Newsom held a call with his grassroots donor network and is set to be a top Trump antagonist, and Khanna is mulling a media blitz and listening tour to areas that have borne the brunt of deindustrialization, sources familiar with their thinking said.
Buttigieg has traversed the country touting the administration’s infrastructure achievements, often goes behind enemy lines to appear on Fox News and moved his residency to Michigan, which has an open gubernatorial race in two years. Fetterman has been vocal about what he calls his party’s disconnect from working-class voters.
All have some kind of argument, whether it’s a blue-collar appeal the party has been missing, proven electoral experience in red or purple areas, or something else, and most hit the campaign trail for Harris this year. More maneuvering is expected to come, especially once Trump takes office and his policies go into effect, likely galvanizing Democrats’ base.
“I think that what you’ll probably see beginning in January, is people who are at least considering being candidates come out with really detailed, expansive programs. Some may be about jobs, some may be about education, some may be about who knows what else. But it will probably be policy-based,” said Dan Fee, a Democratic strategist and donor adviser based in Pennsylvania.
“I think you’re going to see a lot of a lot of governors and a lot of other folks do the speaking circuit thing, be going to events, certainly heading into ’26, you’re going to see a lot of people endorsing folks,” added one senior Democratic strategist, referencing the 2026 midterms.
There is no clear frontrunner in the beefy field, but some did see their personal stock rise during the Biden administration or as the result of the election.
Newsom, in particular, could benefit, given that his California roots and political base overlapped significantly with Harris’. But Buttigieg also boasts a beefier resume after four years in President Joe Biden’s Cabinet, Shapiro and Beshear were vetted as part of Harris’ veepstakes, and many hit the trail — especially to the early primary state of New Hampshire — throughout the year, helping them building relationships with local groups and voters.
Still, anything can happen in four years.
Republicans, not too long ago, were walking in the political wilderness themselves after President Barack Obama won reelection in 2012, sparking a famed autopsy. Four years later, now-President-elect Donald Trump won his first term, ushering in two years of unified Republican control but a series of fits ever since over the identity of the party and how much it should hew to his brand.
Democrats too were on a high after Biden’s win in 2020, a euphoria reinforced after the party defied the odds in the 2022 midterms to expand its Senate majority and limit its House losses. Now, they’re conducting a postmortem of their own.
What’s more, positioning oneself for higher office is more art than science. Appearing too eager risks turning off voters, while not stepping on the gas hard enough risks ceding ground to other aspirants.
But promoting oneself isn’t the only way to improve one’s standing amid the jockeying, and operatives predicted that the knives will be out.
“I think the [opposition research] books are probably already being built,” said the operative who has spoken to multiple potential 2028 candidates.
For all the preparation, though, would-be party leaders can’t make themselves so just by themselves. And party donors may not quite be ready to indulge a 2028 free-for-all as it analyzes its 2024 loss, especially after Harris’ team boasted of smashing several fundraising records only to get swept in all seven swing states.
“People were being told this is a toss-up, and so, their biggest problem is going to be getting fundraising,” said John Morgan, a prominent donor to Democratic candidates and causes. Donors “do not trust people with the money. Nobody does.”
That’s not expected to make a bench full of ambitious politicos collectively pump the brakes, though.
Several of the operatives who spoke to ABC News predicted a gargantuan 2028 primary field, even eclipsing that of 2020, which boasted over two dozen candidates.
“It’s gonna make the 2020 presidential primary look like it was a small gathering. This is going to be frenzied, it’s going to be competitive. There will be no punches pulled. And I think that’s a good thing,” a former Fetterman staffer said. “I hope we let it all out this time and the strongest person emerges.”
