Trump expected to announce Stephen Miller as deputy chief of staff in new administration
(WASHINGTON) — President-elect Donald Trump is expected to announce that Stephen Miller, an immigration hard-liner and one of his senior advisers, will become his deputy chief of staff for policy, multiple sources familiar with the matter told ABC News.
It’s not clear when Trump plans to formally announce the job, the sources said.
Miller worked in the first Trump administration and played a key role in crafting immigration policies — including separating thousands of families at the border.
ABC News reported earlier this week that Miller is expected to drive immigration policy and has already been laying the groundwork on this for months.
Vice President-elect JD Vance posted on X saying “this is another fantastic pick by the president.”
News of Miller’s selection comes as Trump’s new administration begins to take shape. Last week, he announced his campaign manager, Susie Wiles, would be his White House chief of staff; on Sunday evening, Trump shared that former Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Tom Homan is going to be the “border czar” in his administration.
Trump also selected Rep. Elise Stefanik to be his U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, sources told ABC News.
The position is not a Cabinet position, so it does not need Senate confirmation.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., a prominent ally of Donald Trump, downplayed the prospects of the military having a major role in what the president-elect has previewed as a massive deportation effort once he takes office.
Speaking with “This Week” co-anchor Martha Raddatz, Donalds said that local and federal law enforcement like U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will take the lead on deportations, which he said would focus on immigrants convicted of crimes and those who have already been given legal deportation orders but remain in the country.
“When you’re talking about military assets being used, that’s only in an extreme last resort. There are more than 6,000 officers who have who have dedicated their lives to having to remove illegal aliens from our country, people who already have a legal deportation order, but it hasn’t been effectuated by Joe Biden,” Donalds said.
“I think if you’re going to use military assets, that’s in the last resorts, but that’s only for logistical purposes, Martha. And so, I think that what we have to be very careful of is not to try to throw out this idea that you’re going to have troops in the United States going door to door. That is not going to happen.”
Trump made immigration a cornerstone of his campaign, panning President Joe Biden for the record numbers of unauthorized border crossings that occurred in the earlier years of his term.
The president-elect has vowed to deport immigrants who are in the country illegally but also to scrap certain programs that offer legal status, including Temporary Protected Status for Haitians and other groups of immigrants.
Trump deported about 1.5 million immigrants during his first term, according to a Migrant Policy Institute analysis, but Donalds predicted that number will be topped during Trump’s second term.
“Just speaking with you anecdotally, it’s at a minimum going to be 2 million, but it’s going to be more, because the amount of people who already have a deportation order, people who are in our country who have committed crimes, people who have already been convicted of murder, they need to go and go immediately,” Donalds told Raddatz.
Donalds also predicted that stricter border enforcement and ramped-up deportation efforts will lead some undocumented immigrants to leave the country on their own, rather than get kicked out by law enforcement, which prohibits them from coming back to the country for 10 years.
“When you have an active deportation process, we do know that there are aliens who are going to want to go back to their home country. They’re not going to want to be caught up in the process of dealing with ICE, because if you’re deported through that process, then you will actually be barred from returning to the United States for a period of 10 years,” Donalds said.
“When you turn off the spigots of opening our borders, when you turn off the spigots of all this aid going to illegal aliens in the United States, and then you have a president of the United States and a government who is serious about repatriating people back to their home country, you will see that the enticement of coming to America is not going to be what it was under Joe Biden,” Donalds added.
(WASHINGTON) — House Speaker Mike Johnson said on Friday that he does not think the House Ethics Committee should release the findings of its investigation into Matt Gaetz, now that the Florida Republican is no longer a member of Congress.
“I believe it is very important to maintain the House’s tradition of not issuing ethics reports on people who are no longer members of Congress,” Johnson said. “I think it would open a Pandora’s box.”
Johnson weighing into the issue is extremely rare as House speakers traditionally stay out of the committee’s investigations and business.
Just two days ago, Johnson said the following about the report: “As far as the timing of the release of a report, or something, I don’t know. The speaker of the House is not involved in that, can’t be involved in that.”
It’s unclear what the bipartisan panel will do now with its report. There are growing calls from senators on both sides of the aisle for the report to be released.
The House Ethics Committee, which sources said was preparing to meet this week to deliberate over whether to release a final report, was now not expected to meet on Friday, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
Gaetz stepped down from the House shortly after being tapped by President-elect Donald Trump to be attorney general — a choice that shocked some Republican lawmakers and many Justice Department officials. Gaetz will need to be confirmed by the Senate to serve in the role.
Asked on Friday if he spoke to Trump about the ethics investigation, Johnson sidestepped.
“I’m not talking to anybody about what I have said to Trump,” he said.
Johnson also claimed he was responding to public reports about the panel’s findings and had not been briefed on the investigation.
“The speaker has no involvement or understanding of what’s going on with the Ethics Committee or what they’re investigating or when,” Johnson added.
“What I am saying is someone who is no longer a member of Congress. You’re not in the business of investigating and publishing a report,” he concluded. “I would encourage the House Ethics Committee to follow that tradition. I think it’s important.”
(WASHINGTON) — Lawmakers running for reelection loathe tough votes. And for senators up in purple states in two years, those tough votes are coming early.
President-elect Donald Trump is moving at a lightning pace to stock up his administration, mixing in conventional picks like Florida Sen. Marco Rubio for secretary of state with controversial moves like putting up Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz as attorney general and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. for health and human services secretary. For frontline senators who hold the key to the next Senate majority, navigating their confirmations will be a minefield.
Republicans will be defending the seats of North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis and Maine Sen. Susan Collins, while Democrats will be working to protect Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff and Michigan Sen. Gary Peters. Their confirmation votes for Trump’s Cabinet picks offer a chance to prove bipartisan bona fides, but backing a nominee who is too controversial risks opening them up to attack in races that could be decided by razor-thin margins.
“If they’re smart, then it’s a major factor. The midterms are still a ways off. Generally, voters have short attention spans, and so it’s debatable how much of this stuff they’re going to remember. But I think it’s uniquely important for people who may take heat from the right,” said one GOP strategist.
Some of Trump’s nominees are not anticipated to run into significant roadblocks.
Rubio has already received praise from some Democratic senators, and members of the chamber are often given some degree of deference when facing confirmation to Cabinet positions. Waltz and Ratcliffe may face tighter margins than Rubio but are also considered to be among Trump’s more conventional picks.
But Gaetz and Kennedy, along with Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s pick to be director of national intelligence, and Fox News host Pete Hegseth, named to run the Pentagon, will likely enjoy no Democratic support at all. With Republicans winning a maximum of 53 Senate seats this month, that leaves their margin for error small if they hope to be confirmed.
Already, Collins and Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski have sounded skeptical notes about some of Trump’s choices, and other Republicans, including Tillis, have remained noncommittal.
The pressure will be on for Republicans, though.
Trump won a comprehensive victory, and before he announced his more controversial cabinet picks, Republicans on Capitol Hill were touting the need for unity as they prepared to take over a unified government in January.
Collins is considered to be in a league of her own, sources said. A senior Republican who’s likely one of the few candidates, if not the only one, who can win her state, she’s expected to have especially wide latitude to oppose a candidate she deems unfit.
And with a base in such lockstep with Trump, any defiance from other GOP lawmakers could trigger outrage from the famously mercurial president-elect — fury that could in turn result in a primary challenge, and not just for swing-staters like Tillis.
At the same time, supporting a controversial nominee who pushes the envelope too far once confirmed risks becoming a general election issue.
“There will be Trump voters who remember how Republican senators handle these nominations. And so, I do think that for senators who are up this cycle, the base is watching how they handle Trump’s nominees,” the Republican strategist said.
“Any of these other safe-state Republicans who are in cycle, it’s within Trump’s power to cause problems for them on the right, if he chooses to,” the person added.
Still, underscoring the catch-22, any votes for nominees deemed too controversial could end up in ads from their ultimate Democratic opponents labeling them a “rubber stamp” for Trump, the source warned.
The pressure is on for House members, too.
House members will not have a vote in the confirmation process, but they will inevitably field a slate of questions about nominees like Gaetz. Those running in purple districts could opt to punt, noting their lack of a vote, or they could knock the more controversial contenders, also risking blowback from Trump.
“I would try and push it to the Senate first and see if you get away with that. And if you don’t get away with that, then I would strongly advise to stand by your principles and not to end up going down a path for someone else that you didn’t choose for yourself,” said William O’Reilly, a GOP strategist in New York, home to many endangered House Republicans. “Loyalty goes so far, the public is looking for legislators that have a little bit of backbone and common sense.”
Democrats are also in a pickle of their own.
Ossoff and Peters are Senate Democrats’ top frontline members up in 2026. Offering support to some of Trump’s picks like Rubio, Rep. Mike Waltz, R-Fla., for national security adviser and former Rep. John Ratcliffe, R-Texas, for CIA director, could bolster their bipartisan bona fides. But going too far risks turning off Democrats, a major risk when they’ll need every single supporter energized in states Trump won this month.
“Waltz, Ratcliffe and Rubio, if you’re Ossoff and you vote for them, independent voters see you’re a straight shooter, and he can claim he’s bipartisan, because he was,” said one Georgia Democratic strategist. “And then he says, ‘look, I voted for everybody except Gabbard on his national security team.'”
To be certain, there are several other factors at play across the key midterm races. Incumbents’ opponents are far from finalized, the midterms will take place almost two years after confirmation votes start in January, and some nominees might not even make it to a vote.
But already, the knives are out.
“President Trump and JD Vance are going to be running the Senate,” Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville, a Trump ally, said on Fox Business this week. “If you want to get in the way, fine. But we’re gonna try to get you out of the Senate, too, if you try to do that.”