December 3, 2024 - Presidential transition news

Our live coverage of the Trump administration’s transition has ended for the day. Follow the latest updates or read through the posts below.

Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina on Tuesday said he supports President Joe Biden’s pardon for his son, Hunter Biden, and that Biden should preemptively pardon others to protect them from President-elect Donald Trump.

Clyburn, a key Biden ally who endorsed him early in the 2020 Democratic primaries, told CNN he is “absolutely OK” with Biden’s pardon for his son, who faced sentencing this month for federal tax and gun convictions, saying Hunter “was targeted” because of his father. Clyburn said he spoke with Biden two weeks ago and said the president seemed reticent to pardon his son, but that he urged Biden to go through with it. Clyburn said he told the president “that we as fathers have obligations to our children.”

Biden’s decision left some other Democrats fuming as the president repeatedly promised to not pardon Hunter before and after dropping out of the 2024 presidential race.

Clyburn also listed others he thinks Biden should preemptively pardon.

Asked whether he agreed with retiring Sen. Joe Manchin’s call on Monday for Biden to pardon Trump, Clyburn said, “I’m in that category as well.”

Clyburn pointed out, however, that Trump’s only conviction is on the state level, where he was found guilty of 34 charges of falsifying business records by a Manhattan jury. Since it is a state case, the president does not have the power to pardon the conviction, though the district attorney’s office that brought the case acknowledged in court last month that Trump is not likely to be sentenced until after his presidency is over.

Smith last month dropped both the 2020 election subversion prosecution against Trump and the charges accusing Trump of mishandling classified documents pointing at the Justice Department’s long-held belief that the Constitution prohibits prosecutions against sitting presidents.

“I’m talking about things that could impede our federal government. And so I believe (Manchin) may be onto something there,” Clyburn told CNN.

Embattled defense secretary pick Pete Hegseth is set to meet with four key senators tomorrow: incoming Majority Leader John Thune and incoming chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee Roger Wicker, along with committee members Joni Ernst and Kevin Cramer, according to a source.

Times and locations of the meetings have yet to be announced.

President-elect Donald Trump at a SpaceX Starship rocket launch in Brownsville, Texas on November 19, 2024.

President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday said he will receive the “Fox Patriot of the Year Award” with a ceremony hosted by Fox News’ Sean Hannity set to take place in New York on Thursday.

Trump’s cabinet has plucked two Fox News stars from their airwaves to serve in his cabinet — Sean Duffy for Transportation secretary and Pete Hegseth to lead the Pentagon — and a number of Fox News contributors to serve elsewhere in his administration.

Donald Trump’s allies involved in the transition process have been compiling a list of alternative candidates for Secretary of Defense in recent days in the event Pete Hegseth’s road to confirmation appears destined to implode, according to multiple sources familiar with the discussions.

Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa is among the names under consideration to replace Hegseth, should that come to pass. Ernst is widely viewed as willing to accept the role and, most importantly, confirmable, the sources said. Ernst recently spent several days at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, where she discussed Trump’s Cabinet nominees as well as plans related to DOGE, according to her social media posts.

Two other sources said that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ name had been raised.

DeSantis, who served in the US Navy as a JAG officer, was on the initial list of candidates for Secretary of Defense that Trump was shown, according to a person familiar.

Other Trump allies are floating Sen. Bill Hagerty of Tennessee for the role, according to a fourth source familiar with the matter. People close to Trump have long been hoping to find a big administration role for the senator.

CNN has reached out to representatives for Ernst, DeSantis and Hagerty.

People involved in Trump transition planning for the Pentagon started floating other options after the first allegations about Hegseth surfaced, driven in large part by concerns that he could face a similar “math problem” as Former Rep. Matt Gaetz, who withdrew his name as Trump’s pick for attorney general after facing headwinds in the Senate.

President-elect Donald Trump's nominee to be Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on Capitol Hill on December 2..

The nomination of decorated Army veteran and former Fox & Friends weekend co-host Pete Hegseth to be Secretary of Defense is in trouble, a senior Trump transition source told CNN Tuesday evening.

“His mom is going to be on Fox & Friends,” the senior Trump Transition source said. Two days ago, The New York Times reported on an email Hegseth’s mom wrote her son sin 2018 saying in part: “On behalf of all the women (and I know it’s many) you have abused in some way, I say … get some help and take an honest look at yourself.” “There are significant concerns more accusations are going to come out from his time at Fox News, about his behavior there, where he had an affair with his now-wife who was his executive producer,” the source said.

More context: No Republicans have said they will not support Hegseth, but even some of the GOP senators closest to Trump, including Sen. Lindsey Graham, are now wondering whether Hegseth can survive the tightrope walk to confirmation, sending an ominous signal for the incoming White House. Hegseth will need to limit defections to three GOP senators, assuming all Democrats vote against him, and there are already more than three senators who are uncertain if they’ll back him.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis attends a hearing on the Georgia election interference case, in Atlanta, on March 1.

A Georgia judge is ordering Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ office to provide a conservative watchdog group with any documents from its 2020 election interference investigation that it shared with special counsel Jack Smith and the House select committee that investigated the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney ruled on Monday that the documents must be submitted to Judicial Watch, a conservative nonprofit organization based in Washington, DC, after finding that Willis violated open records law.

McBurney’s order told Willis to “conduct a diligent search of her records for responsive materials within five business days.”

Judicial Watch, which has several Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits related to what it calls “prosecutorial abuse targeting Trump,” filed a lawsuit in March after Willis denied having responsive records from their Georgia Open Records Act request filed last year.

Willis’ office did not immediately reply to a request for comment on McBurney’s order.

Judicial Watch submitted its initial open records request after President-elect Donald Trump and multiple co-defendants were indicted in Fulton County in August 2023 in connection with their attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

Trump and multiple co-defendants were indicted in Georgia in August 2023 in connection with their attempts to overturn the 2020 election, though the case would almost certainly be imperiled now that he has been reelected.

Pete Hegseth’s mother is expected to be interviewed on Fox and Friends tomorrow, according to two people.

It comes after she was inserted into his confirmation drama when The New York Times published an email she sent him amid his divorce in 2018.

In it, she said he abused and mistreated women and needed to seek help. She later told the Times she sent an “immediate follow-up email at the time apologizing for what she had written.”

Kash Patel speaks at a campaign event for Republican candidates in Tucson, Arizona, in 2022.

Kash Patel, President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to run the FBI, was recently informed by the bureau that he had been targeted as part of an Iranian hack, two sources familiar with the matter tell CNN.

Hackers are believed to have accessed at least some of Patel’s communications, according to one of the sources.

Trump Transition spokesman Alex Pfeiffer declined to comment specifically on the hack in a statement to CNN.

Some background: Members of Trump’s inner circle have been targeted by foreign hackers in recent months. Last month, the FBI informed Todd Blanche, one of Trump’s lead attorneys and now his pick to be deputy attorney general, that his cellphone was tapped by Chinese hackers, three sources familiar with the matter previously told CNN. The Chinese government has denied US allegations that it is behind that hack.

Donald Trump Jr. also has said he was notified by the FBI that he was “one of the top targets” of Iran.

Blanche was the second of two Trump attorneys believed to be targeted by foreign hackers. CNN reported in August that attorney Lindsey Halligan was targeted as part of a separate Iranian hacking effort.

Iran has for several years targeted members of Trump’s first administration and more recently sent information they stole from his presidential campaign to people who were affiliated with President Joe Biden’s campaign this summer.

In June, Iranian hackers breached the email account of longtime Trump ally Roger Stone and used the account to try to break into a senior Trump campaign official’s email, investigators have said.

The Iranian government has denied US allegations that it was trying to meddle in the November election.

Some of President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks spent Tuesday meeting with senators who will soon decide their fate during the confirmation process.

Among those who attended meetings was Department of Defense pick, Pete Hegseth, who faces a tough road to win confirmation due to past allegations of misconduct and questions about whether he can do the job.

Senators who have met with Hegseth, Trump’s pick for defense secretary, said his confirmation will be difficult and that frank discussions are necessary amid a New Yorker report that he was pushed out as the head of two veterans’ advocacy organizations over misconduct allegations.

In a sign of how seriously the transition team is taking their concerns, Hegseth is expected to sit for an interview with Fox News tomorrow, two people familiar confirmed to CNN. It’s unclear if the interview is scheduled to air tomorrow as well.

Elsewhere, Hillsborough Florida County Sheriff Chad Chronister withdrew his name from consideration to lead the Drug Enforcement Administration.

Here’s what you should know:

Republican reactions to Hegseth allegations and reports:

GOP conference meeting:

More developments in DC: