Sen. John Fetterman plans to meet with Pete Hegseth on Thursday, making him the first Senate Democrat to sit down with Donald Trump’s embattled pick for Pentagon chief.

The Pennsylvania senator, known for his blunt and pragmatic approach, confirmed the meeting on Wednesday and said he’s not ruling out supporting Hegseth. His decision comes amid allegations against the former Fox News anchor of sexual misconduct, excessive drinking and financial mismanagement.

“He could theoretically become the head of the Defense Department,” he said. “I’ve discovered in my time in D.C. that that’s important. And, ‘Are you having a conversation with someone?’ I don’t know why that’s shocking.”

Fetterman, a populist outsider, said he wanted to hear out Trump’s pick.“I mean I’m waiting,” he said. “And I’m looking forward to having an opportunity to have a conversation.”

Hegseth’s team is voicing new optimism about his chances of confirmation after MAGA allies waged a pressure campaign against Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), who was seen as wavering until Monday when she struck a warmer tone.

As part of a weeklong blitz of Capitol Hill, Hegseth has meetings planned Wednesday with Sens. Todd Young (R-Ind.), Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Bill Cassidy (R-La.) — as well as Montana Republican Senator-elect Tim Sheehy.

Hegseth on Wednesday met with Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), the incoming chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and widely viewed as a swing vote, for nearly an hour and half.

Collins said she won’t make up her mind until a FBI background check is completed and he testifies at an Armed Services confirmation hearing. The two spoke about a variety of topics, Collins said, including women in the military, sexual assault, NATO, and Ukraine. She said she also pressed Hegseth on the allegations against him, although did not say how Hegseth responded.

“I asked virtually every question under the sun,” Collins told reporters. “I obviously always wait until we have an FBI background check and one is underway in the case of Mr. Hegseth. And I wait to see the committee hearing before reaching a final decision.”

Rep. Chip Roy is making a bid to lead the House Rules Committee next year, which would give him and the chamber’s right flank an influential perch for shaping legislation.

The Texas Republican, during an interview on Steve Bannon’s “War Room,” said he would “defer” to Speaker Mike Johnson on who ultimately gets the top spot but “obviously I have put my name out there.”

“A number of my colleagues, I’m proud to have their support. … I think I would add some value to that position because of my expertise on the rules and because I think I can figure out how to bring the conference together,” Roy added.

Roy is currently a member of the Rules Committee. Unlike most House panels, Johnson decides who chairs the committee as well as its members. Roy and Reps. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) were added to the Rules Committee at the start of this Congress as part of a deal with Kevin McCarthy meant to boost conservative representation on what is typically a leadership-aligned committee.

Norman and Roy are members of the House Freedom Caucus, while Massie is not but has served as an occasional gadfly for leadership. Combined, the three of them currently have the ability to block any bill in the Rules Committee, as long as Democrats also oppose it, something that has sparked headaches for McCarthy and Johnson.

Their votes against rules on the floor have also sparked perennial calls from some of their GOP colleagues to strip them of their Rules seats. If Johnson taps Roy to be chair of the committee, it would be a significant boost not only for the Texas Republican but also the Freedom Caucus, which has at times struggled to find its footing.

Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) is also viewed as a contender for the Rules gavel, particularly as Johnson comes under scrutiny for the lack of women atop House committees. Rep. Ann Wagner (R-Mo.) ran for the Foreign Affairs gavel but was defeated by Rep. Brian Mast (R-Fla.) in an upset.

Johnson, asked about the lack of women leading House GOP committees during a press conference this week, told reporters, “We haven’t decided on the committee chairs yet, so we’ll see how this shakes out. … Stay tuned on the final composition of conference chairs.”

President-elect Donald Trump said Tuesday that he is selecting former U.S. Ambassador to El Salvador Ronald Johnson to be the next U.S. ambassador to Mexico.

Johnson, a Green Beret who spent more than 20 years at the Central Intelligence Agency before a diplomatic posting in San Salvador, would bring significant foreign policy expertise to one of the most important bilateral diplomatic portfolios in the U.S. government.

Mexico is the United States’ largest trading partner, and thorny discussions around bilateral trade, drug trafficking, migration and border security are expected to dominate the agenda between Washington and Mexico City under the Trump administration.

In a post on Truth Social announcing Johnson as his pick, Trump said: “Together, we will put an end to migrant crime, stop the illegal flow of Fentanyl and other dangerous drugs into our Country and, MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!”

Johnson will face a Senate confirmation process but is unlikely to encounter resistance from senators as a former diplomat with extensive foreign policy credentials.

U.S. envoys to Mexico City have had mixed success in the past. Some, like current U.S. Ambassador Ken Salazar, have been faulted for deferring too much to the Mexican government, while others like the Reagan administration’s envoy, John Gavin, have ruffled feathers by pressing too hard on issues of crime and drug trafficking.

Still, Johnson’s selection sends a signal to Latin America, in the wake of the selection of Marco Rubio to be secretary of State and former Ambassador to Mexico Christopher Landau as deputy secretary of State, that the Trump administration will pay attention to the Western Hemisphere and potentially turn the page on decades of perceived neglect towards the region on the part of successive U.S. administrations.

The pick is likely to prompt relief in Mexico City, after rumors circulated for weeks in Mexico that Trump would nominate former news anchor and Arizona Senate candidate Kari Lake to the post.

President-elect Donald Trump has tapped Jacob Helberg to be the State Department’s top economic policy and trade official, selecting a China hawk for an integral role in U.S. efforts to secure supply chains.

In a Truth Social post on Tuesday, Trump said Helberg, one of the leaders in the push to ban Chinese-owned social media platform TikTok, will be “a champion of our America First Foreign Policy.” He added that Helberg “has the knowledge, expertise, and pragmatism to defend America’s Economic interests abroad.”

Helberg will face a Senate confirmation process, and his current work for defense contractor Palantir — he is a senior adviser to the company’s chief executive officer — may attract scrutiny from lawmakers concerned about potential conflicts of interest. But it is not expected that he will face sharp resistance from Senate Republicans, as he is not seen as a particularly polarizing figure in policy circles.

Helberg, a tech executive who serves as a member of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, has been an advocate for a more muscular policy toward Beijing. In 2023, he founded the Hill and Valley Forum, which brings together venture capitalists and lawmakers concerned about the rise of China and its impact on the U.S. tech sector.

That group was critical in his efforts to rally support for a 2024 law that will ban TikTok in the United States unless its Chinese parent company — ByteDance — sells the platform by January 2025.

Helberg was a major donor to Trump’s 2024 campaign. But he was previously donated to then-South Bend, Indiana, mayor Pete Buttigieg’s 2020 presidential campaign.

President-elect Donald Trump is continuing to fill out key posts at the Office of Management and Budget with two staff picks on Tuesday.

Trump picked Rep. Dan Bishop of North Carolina as deputy director of the OMB. Bishop lost his election in the North Carolina attorney general race in November.

“Dan will implement my cost-cutting and deregulatory agenda across all Agencies, and root out the Weaponized Deep State,” Trump said in a Truth Social post.

Bishop, a member of the Freedom Caucus, gave up his House seat to unsuccessfully run for attorney general after serving in Congress since 2019. He was previously a state legislator and lawyer.

Trump also announced that he has chosen conservative activist Ed Martin as chief of staff at the OMB. Martin is the former chief of staff for Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt and ran for attorney general of Missouri in 2012. He was also a proponent of Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

Momentum is building among Democrats to oust their ailing leader on the House Agriculture Committee, part of the party’s generational shake-up on Capitol Hill in the wake of their demoralizing losses in November.

Rep. David Scott (D-Ga.) — the committee’s current ranking member — faces a challenge from fellow Democrats Reps. Jim Costa of California and Angie Craig of Minnesota for the post in the next Congress. And, according to more than two dozen House Democratic lawmakers and aides granted anonymity to discuss the matter, Scott is poised to lose the vote if he doesn’t step aside before then.

“The race is against Costa and Craig at this point,” said one House Democratic lawmaker. “Scott is done.”

If he loses, Scott would be the third septuagenarian House Democrat push out of a committee leadership role in the new Congress — along with Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) and Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), who ended bids to continue as ranking members on the House Natural Resources and House Judiciary Committees following challenges from younger Democrats. And it would be a sign of just how strongly the party wants to turn the page on an older generation of leaders, particularly after losing an election many blame on 82-year President Joe Biden’s initial decision to run for a second term.

“It’s in the air. People want heads to roll on our side,” a House Democratic aide said.

At this point, Scott can only survive if the powerful Steering Committee recommends him for the post again when the panel meets next Monday. Such a move would essentially block Costa and Craig from consideration. But House Democrats, including several on the Steering panel, don’t expect that to happen.

Costa has strong ties to a bloc of senior Democrats on the Steering panel who have been pushing for him. Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has also been telling members she is supporting Costa in the race and trying to advocate for him, according to three people familiar with the conversations. Craig meanwhile is a frontline Democrat who has a strong relationship with Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and his leadership team. Jeffries, according to Democratic lawmakers, hasn’t discouraged her or any other Democrat from challenging Scott and additional senior panel leaders.

Spokespeople for Jeffries and Pelosi declined to comment.

Costa, a Congressional Hispanic Caucus member, also secured the endorsement of the influential caucus Tuesday, according to two people familiar with the closed-door meeting.

Separate discussions are also underway among some members who are searching for a way for the Steering Committee to refrain from making any recommendation on the Agriculture panel race — which would effectively greenlight Scott’s ouster without the panel having to overtly move against him.

Scott, 79, has faced a number of behind-the-scenes attempts to remove him as the Agriculture Committee’s leading Democrat in recent years, as POLITICO has reported. He became the first Black chair of the Agriculture Committee in 2021, and then stayed on as ranking member in 2023. But a growing group of fellow Democrats have complained to party leaders that he is no longer able to effectively lead the committee, which faces critical negotiations on a $1.5 trillion farm bill in the next Congress.

Spokespeople for Scott did not respond to an inquiry. But Rep. Sanford Bishop (D-Ga.), who still supports Scott, said his fellow Georgia Democrat indicated in a recent conversation that he was staying in the Agriculture panel race.

Scott missed two weeks of votes last month to receive treatment for back problems, and currently relies on a wheelchair to get around the Capitol. And he has shed so much personal staff in recent years that his 26-year-old chief of staff, who was recently promoted from legislative assistant, is one of the few people left in his office to navigate the fallout as members dig in to oust remove Scott from his leadership role.

Scott won his post with the support of then-Speaker Pelosi and the powerful Congressional Black Caucus, but those alliances are now crumbling.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who himself represents a new generation of Democratic leadership, has notpublicly backed Scott as strongly in recent monthas Pelosi once did. Jeffries and his leadership team also made the rare move last year to start personally attending several meetings with Scott and his agriculture panel Democrats after members continued to raise alarms about Scott.

In private conversations with rank-and-file members, Jeffries and his team have taken concerns about Scott seriously, according to three Democratic lawmakers familiar with the conversations.

The CBC is navigating its own generational divide on the matter and has so far stayed silent on the challenges to Scott’s leadership in the next Congress, despite strongly pushing back on an effort to replace him in 2022.

“I don’t think he has the capacity,” said one younger House Democrat who is a CBC member, who was granted anonymity to candidly discuss the matter. “I’m leaning towards Angie.”

Asked if younger members within the Black Caucus are more willing to oust Scott compared to the older guard who’ve long backed the Georgia Democrat, the young CBC member responded: “Absolutely.”

But in an incredibly striking move, even some older Black Caucus members say they’re still weighing their options.

“I haven’t made up my mind,” said Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), the top Democrat on the Homeland Security panel. “But I do want someone who … can carry the Democratic message far and wide. … We need the strongest voice.”

Thompson headed the farm bill task force that Jeffries created in 2023, effectively removing a major piece of Scott’s workload as ranking member. Democrats pleaded with Thompson and senior Democrats for him to take over the Agriculture panel from Scott, but Thompson resisted their efforts.

Scott has raised eyebrows by not showing up to several candidate forums to make his case members. Thompson said it was his understanding that Scott isn’t attending the Black Caucus member forum Wednesday.

“I think that’s a mistake,” Thompson said. “I think anyone running has to make their case as to why they’re there. It’s part of the process.”

“The first inclination of course is to support him,” said Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), the top Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee. “However, I’m also talking to members of the committee, etc. to see where they are.”

“Any member that’s not feeling well, I have concerns about their health, and obviously he would be one of them,” Meeks added, when asked about other members’ concerns regarding Scott.

On Monday, Scott’s team scheduled a meeting with him and House Agriculture Democrats for Wednesday (right before the CBC candidate forum Scott is expected to skip) to provide an update on the ongoing farm bill extension talks as negotiators are close to a deal, according to two Democrats familiar with the plans. Scott’s panel staff have dug into hammering out a complex farm bill extension agreement in a way that’s made fellow lawmakers believe the Georgia Democrat will try to hang onto the role until the very end. He also hasn’t made any indication to panel Democrats that he plans to step aside and told POLITICO just off the House floor last week that he was in fact not dropping out of the ranking member race.

Scott also skipped making his case before the Congressional Progressive Caucus, which is chaired by House Agriculture member Greg Casar (D-Texas), and a separate closed-door candidate forum on Tuesday for the New Democrat Coalition, a center-left caucus of about 100 Democrats, of which he’s a member.

President-elect Donald Trump announced private equity executive Tom Barrack, a longtime ally who faced legal scrutiny for his work on behalf of the United Arab Emirates, as his pick to be the next U.S. ambassador to Turkey.

In a Truth Social post on Tuesday, Trump said Barrack, a California billionaire, is “a well respected and experienced voice of reason to a wide range of thought leaders in both political and business circles.”

Barrack’s relationship with Trump goes back to the 1980s and he has fundraised and supported Trump throughout his political career. Barrack, who served as a deputy undersecretary at the Department of the Interior during the Reagan administration, was a senior adviser to the Trump campaign in 2016 and chaired the 2017 inaugural committee.

But Barrack may face a rocky road to confirmation. He has faced legal issues related to his Middle East business dealings and his ties to Trump.

An Arabic speaker born to Lebanese parents, Barrack built relationships with Saudi government officials and businesses in the 1970s. He also helped open diplomatic relations between Saudi Arabia and Haiti, and has ties to other Gulf monarchies.

He was indicted by the Department of Justice in 2021 on charges that he was lobbying the Trump campaign on behalf of the United Arab Emirates, all the while pursuing business deals valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Barrack was acquitted in November 2022.

During the Trump administration, Barrack was heavily scrutinized for his connections to undemocratic regimes in the Middle East and foreign donations to the 2017 inaugural committee.

Barrack was also a friend of disgraced investor and sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein.

Kimberly Guilfoyle, the former Court TV anchor and Fox News host who became a staunch advocate for Donald Trump, has been chosen by him to be the next U.S. ambassador to Greece.

Trump announced the decision Tuesday in a social media post, calling her a a “close friend and ally” who “is perfectly suited to foster strong bilateral relations with Greece.”

Guilfoyle was engaged to Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest child, but newspapers have recently published photos suggesting that he is now romantically involved with socialite Bettina Anderson.

Neither Trump Jr. nor Guilfoyle has publicly announced a split, and their relationship status is unclear.

Guilfoyle, before her TV career, was a prosecutor in San Francisco who was married to the city’s then mayor, Gavin Newsom — who, as California’s Democratic governor, has become one of the most high-profile critics of President-elect Trump.

CBS was the first to report that Guilfoyle was being considered for the diplomatic posting in Athens.

Guilfoyle isn’t the first person with ties to the Trump family tapped for a foreign policy role. The president-elect has announced that Charles Kushner — whose son Jared is married to Ivanka Trump — would be ambassador to France.

He also named Massad Boulos — the father of daughter Tiffany’s husband — to be his senior adviser on Arab and Middle Eastern affairs.

Guilfoyle’s nomination will require Senate confirmation and she may face scrutiny for allegations of abusive behavior against her former assistant at Fox News.

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise said that Republicans were negotiating on Tuesday over how to accommodate concerns about the state and local tax deduction that could be an obstacle to a sweeping tax package next year.

“We need to address this problem,” said Scalise (R-La.) of the contingent of House Republicans from California, New Jersey and New York who have been adamant about lifting the $10,000 cap on the deduction for state income and property taxes, known as SALT in tax parlance. “They’re coming back.”

A spokesperson for Scalise did not immediately respond to a request about which lawmakers were participating in the meetings.

The early negotiations signal just how challenging House Republican leadership expects it to be to muster the votes for an anticipated reconciliation bill next year, which could be passed without Democratic support. Republicans want to use the legislation to extend trillions of dollars in expiring tax cuts that President-elect Donald Trump and his allies in Congress pushed through in 2017, during Trump’s first term.

And the most difficult part for leadership promises to be those pro-SALT Republicans, who held up a tax package earlier this spring over demands that it include some form of relief from the cap. The limit was imposed to offset some of the cost of the 2017 cuts – and ding blue states that have high taxes.

Tuesday morning, Rep. Michael Lawler (R-N.Y.) reaffirmed those demands, telling POLITICO that he’s made it “abundantly clear” that any future tax packages will need to address SALT.

In remarks made at a panel hosted by the Business Roundtable and the American Petroleum Institute, Scalise said that he reminded incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) that such demands from Republicans in high-tax states could be a significant challenge in the House.

“I reminded him, because he wasn’t part of it last time around in the top leadership, that our challenge in the House is much different,” Scalise said. The Senate GOP “doesn’t have a single SALT state member. There’s five states that are really affected by SALT, and New York and New Jersey were the most vocal,”

“We had over 30 members from those states,” Scalise said of 2017. “By the way we still have close to that today.”

For now, negotiations over taxes are mired in an ongoing strategic debate over whether to do two reconciliation bills, addressing border and energy policies first and taxes later, or enact all of the Republicans’ policy priorities together.

Still, there are plenty of Republicans who detest the idea of raising the SALT cap because they believe it unfairly benefits wealthy taxpayers in high-tax states.

“We’ve got people on both ends, Republicans and Democrats who don’t like it,” said House Ways and Means committee member Kevin Hern (R-Okla.).