Three House members could soon make their exits—and more will join them

Politico relays that Georgia Rep. David Scott's colleagues in the Democratic caucus "widely expect him not to run" again in his dark blue seat; Scott, who has a history of siding with Republicans, has not commented publicly, though. Two House Republicans who identify with the declining institutionalist wing of the GOP, Arkansas' Steve Womack and Idaho's Mike Simpson, tell the Washington Post in a separate report that they're considering retiring from their safely red seats.

Campaign Action

We’ll start with Scott, whose performance as the top Democrat on the Agriculture Committee has been the subject of much intra-party frustration. His lack of a response to Republican efforts to cut food assistance programs—in a new report, Politico says that he hasn't held a single press conference on the topic this year—apparently prompted Democrats to form a special task force, led by Mississippi Rep. Bennie Thompson, to take point on the issue.

The unusual move seems to have been prompted by concerns about Scott's health. Last year, Politico reported that people close to Scott "acknowledged he’s noticeably slowed in the last few years, citing his increasingly halting speech and trouble at times focusing on a topic."

Politico's article this week says that Scott "no longer speaks with reporters in the halls of the Capitol"; in June, when one reporter was actually able to ask the congressman how a hearing had gone, the congressman replied, "I don't know." "There are real questions about whether he’s with it," an unnamed House colleague told Politico of the 78-year-old Georgian.

Scott, who was first elected in 2002 with support from his late brother-in-law, the legendary Atlanta Braves Hall of Famer Hank Aaron, has long been one of the more conservative members of his caucus. The Democrat crossed party lines in 2016 to back Republican Sen. Johnny Isakson’s bid for reelection, declaring, "He's my friend. He's my partner. And I always look out for my partners." Scott, who donated to Utah GOP Rep. Mia Love's campaign that year, has also sided with Republicans to undermine regulations aimed at reining in predatory payday lenders and preventing auto dealers from charging higher interest rates to people of color.

If the congressman does surprise his colleagues and run again, though, his renomination in this safely blue suburban Atlanta seat is hardly assured. Scott unexpectedly earned just 53% of the vote in a crowded 2020 primary against several underfunded foes—just a few points more than the majority he needed to avert a runoff against former state Rep. Keisha Waites. (Waites, who is now a member of the Atlanta City Council, took 25%.) The incumbent did better last cycle when he turned back South Fulton City Councilor Mark Baker 66-13, though that performance wasn't emphatic for a longtime incumbent.

Meanwhile there’s Womack, a self-described "institution guy" who told the Post's Paul Kane that the far-right's antics have made serving in D.C. "so unpleasant" that he's weighing retirement and would decide whether he's had enough around Labor Day. After the article was published, though, the seven-term congressman backtracked somewhat.

"To be clear, I am frustrated with the state of play in Congress," he tweeted. "[H]owever I have every intention of running for reelection and using my work to fix the institution I love." He still left the door open to leaving, though. "I have always used Labor Day as the time frame for these decisions," he continued. "I take nothing for granted and I’m honored every day to serve my constituents in Arkansas’ Third District."

But while Womack, in Kane's words, is tired of seeing "his party’s leadership kowtowing to a small band of hard-right lawmakers," the story notes that his friends fear one of those hardliners would simply replace him in this northeast Arkansas seat. Womack himself has never had trouble winning renomination, though that hardly means he'd be in for another easy campaign if he ran again: Last year, Rep. French Hill, another member of the GOP minority that recognized Biden's victory, only won his primary for the neighboring 2nd District by a relatively soft 59-41 margin against a foe who was happy to spread the Big Lie.

Simpson, finally, made it clear he shares Womack's grievances. "I think there’s a lot of people like that, to tell you the truth," he told Kane." It’s just people considering: Is this really worth it?" And the answer for the Idaho Republican may be no: "Right now, I’m running again," he said before, as Kane puts it, "pausing for effect" and finishing, "Right now." Unlike Womack, though, Simpson did not provide a timeline for when he expects to make up his mind.

The 72-year-old Simpson is only six years older than his likeminded colleague from the South, but unlike Womack, Simpson just had to fend off an organized attempt to beat him in last year's primary. In that matchup, the incumbent fended off attorney Bryan Smith 55-33 after an expensive fight for an eastern Idaho constituency Simpson first won in 1998. The congressman, who had also turned back Smith 62-38 in 2014, didn't come close to losing, but his declining vote share could foreshadow more tough races to come―if he tries to stick around, that is.

No matter what Womack, Simpson, or Scott do in 2024, however, there's almost certainly plenty of other House members from both parties who are thinking about whether they want to remain in office. Currently just two representatives―California Democrat Grace Napolitano and Indiana Republican Victoria Spartz—have announced they're leaving the chamber and not campaigning for another office. And while just two outright retirements might seem like very few so far, that's in keeping with patterns over the last two decades.

According to data compiled by Daily Kos Elections since the 2005-06 election cycle, an average of about three House incumbents have decided to say goodbye to elective politics altogether before Aug. 1 of each odd-numbered year. That means we can expect many more to call it a career ahead of the 2024 elections, though we'll likely be waiting well into the new year for some decisions.

5 key takeaways from explosive witness account of Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings, Joe’s role

Hunter Biden’s former business partner Devon Archer appeared Monday on Capitol Hill, detailing what members of Congress familiar with the closed-door interview described as proof President Biden "lied" about having no knowledge of his son's business dealings.

Here are five key takeaways from Archer's hours-long interview with members of the House Oversight Committee investigating the Biden family finances:

1. Archer said Biden repeatedly spoke to Hunter's business partners to sell "the brand"

Speaking with Fox News Digital following the hearing, Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., said Archer detailed how Hunter put his father, then-Vice President Biden, on speakerphone while meeting with business partners at least 20 times. He said Archer described how Biden was put on the phone to sell "the brand."

DEVON ARCHER CONFIRMS JOE BIDEN ‘LIED’ ABOUT KNOWLEDGE OF HUNTER'S BUSINESS DEALINGS, COMER SAYS

"Joe Biden was ‘the brand’ that his son sold around the world to enrich the Biden family," Comer said. "When Joe Biden was Vice President of the United States, he joined Hunter Biden’s dinners with his foreign business associates in person or by speakerphone over 20 times."

Another source also told Fox that Biden was put on the phone to sell "the brand." These phone calls included a dinner in Paris with a French energy company and in China with Jonathan Li of BHR, a Chinese investment firm.

Archer said that the value of adding Hunter to Ukrainian energy company Burisma’s board was "the brand," the source said. He also stated that Burisma would have gone under if not for "the brand."

2. Archer's account appears to contradict Biden's claim to have had no knowledge of Hunter's business dealings

Biden has consistently claimed that he had no knowledge of Hunter's business dealings, saying as early as 2019 that he had "never discussed with my son or my brother or anyone else anything having to do with their business, period."

"There wasn't any hint of scandal at all when we were there. It was the same kind of strict, strict rules. That's why I never talk with my son or my brother or anyone else, even distant family about their business interest, period," he added at the time.

But Archer's testimony concerning the numerous phone calls Hunter placed to Biden connecting him with his business associates suggests otherwise.

"Why did Joe Biden lie to the American people about his family’s business dealings and his involvement?" Comer posed while speaking with Fox. "It begs the question what else he is hiding from the American people."

DEVON ARCHER: HUNTER BIDEN, BURISMA EXECS ‘CALLED DC’ TO GET UKRAINIAN PROSECUTOR FIRED

3. Hunter Biden, Burisma execs ‘called DC’ to get Ukrainian prosecutor fired

Archer said that Hunter and top executives of Burisma Holdings, CEO Mykola Zlochevsky and Vadym Pozharski, "called D.C." in December 2015 to ask the Obama administration to help fire the Ukrainian prosecutor investigating the firm, a source familiar with his testimony told Fox.

Archer said Zlochevsky and Pozharski "placed constant pressure on Hunter Biden to get help from D.C." in getting Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin ousted. Shokin was investigating Burisma for corruption.

According to the source, Archer revealed that in December 2015, Hunter Biden, Zlochevsky and Pozharski "called D.C." to discuss the matter. Archer recounted how Biden, Zlochevsky and Pozharski stepped away to take make the call.

It is unclear if Hunter and the Burisma executives spoke directly to Joe Biden on the matter, who, at the time, was in charge of the administration's U.S.-Ukraine policy.

WITNESS SAYS JOE BIDEN TALKED TO HUNTER'S BUSINESS ASSOCIATES; GOP SEES SMOKING GUN, DEMS DOWNPLAY

4. Archer's appearance will add fuel to Republicans' impeachment push

Speaking with Fox News Digital following the hearing, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., said Archer's testimony proving Biden "lied" meant House Speaker Kevin McCarthy's openness to a potential impeachment inquiry against the president was "the right thing to do."

Greene was not in the hearing herself, but said she was getting frequent updates from her staff.

Appearing on Fox News' "Hannity" last week, McCarthy escalated his talk about potentially impeaching Biden by saying "this is rising to the level of impeachment inquiry." The speaker said evidence uncovered by the House's investigations into the president may necessitate a full inquiry to gather more evidence of alleged corruption by the Biden family.

DEVON ARCHER INTERVIEW ‘VERY PRODUCTIVE’ IN BIDEN FAMILY PROBE, JORDAN SAYS

5. Democrats attempted to spin - but didn't deny - Archer's account of events

On the other side of the aisle, freshman Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., told reporters that Archer said Biden was on the phone when he was working with Hunter. But Goldman said they discussed "casual niceties" and "the weather" rather than topics of business.

"Like many people, Hunter spoke with his father every day, and would often put his father, occasionally would put his father on to say hello to whomever he happened to be caught at dinner with, and Mr. Archer clarified that was sometimes people that they were having, you know, they were trying to do business with, and it was sometimes friends or other social engagements," he said.

"As he described it, it was all casual niceties, the weather, what's going on," Goldman added. "There wasn't a single conversation about any of the business dealings that Hunter had."

Fox News' Brooke Singman, Elizabeth Elkind, Houston Keene and Jessica Chasmar contributed to this report.

Cornel West bid prompts worries from progressives: ‘I just wish he wasn’t doing it’

Progressive lawmakers are voicing concerns over Cornel West’s third-party bid, worried that a figure they respect could cripple President Biden’s prospects in 2024.

West launched a Green Party campaign earlier this year to inject more leftism into the election cycle. He’s challenging both the Democratic and Republican establishments, raging against them in equal measure and raising the stakes of being a spoiler in the fall. 

Now, with the Republican nomination of former President Trump seeming more and more plausible, progressives are becoming more outspoken about their worries.

“I think he has a very long record of service and academic thought leadership,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) told The Hill last week. “I think just right now, given the Electoral College, it's very difficult to square the very real threat of a Republican presidency … [with] the risk of giving up the very small margin of electoral votes needed to ensure that President Biden wins.”

Until recently, lawmakers on the left didn’t feel much need to voice any reservations they had about West. When he first announced he was running for president in early June, he did so under the grassroots People’s Party, without much fanfare. Democrats weren’t really applauding him but weren’t criticizing his bid, either; there seemed little cause for concern on Capitol Hill.

The shift happened after West changed his affiliation to the Green Party just a few weeks later. The move promoted bad recollections for Democrats of 2016, when third-party nominee Jill Stein captured enough votes that election analysts said helped contribute to Trump’s edge in certain states. 

The difference now is that West, unlike Stein, is a revered part of the progressive movement who has garnered goodwill from sitting members of Congress for his activism on behalf of working-class people. 

“I care about the quality of your life. I care about whether you have access to a job with a living wage, decent housing, women having control over their bodies, health care for all, de-escalating the destruction of the planet,” West said in his launch video this summer.

Some liberal lawmakers also personally know and like him, having crossed paths with him over the years. He worked as one of Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-Vt.) top surrogates in 2020. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who served as a campaign co-chairman for Sanders, has expressed kind sentiments about him despite publicly supporting Biden this cycle.

Biden has earned overwhelming support from the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC), and no elected progressive has primaried him. Even Ocasio-Cortez, who has at times been critical of the president’s policy decisions, officially endorsed his reelection bid. And Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), the chairwoman of the left-leaning CPC, threw her support behind a Biden reelection effort even before he formally announced, despite initially backing Sanders in the Democratic primary last election.

The progressives coalescing around Biden are starting to share their concerns about the damage West’s bid may cause to the president’s reelection effort.

Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass), a prominent member of the CPC, credited West as a “thoughtful guy.” McGovern has had close proximity to West over the years in Massachusetts, where the philosopher and historian taught at Harvard University. 

But McGovern didn’t mince words about his third-party bid. 

“The stakes are too high this year, especially if Trump is the nominee,” he said. “I think everybody, including the most progressive elements of our country, need to protect our democracy by stopping Donald Trump and supporting Joe Biden.”

McGovern said he was worried about a scenario in which West gained enough traction to help the GOP nominee win again. 

“I worry about those things because Cornel West is a very effective speaker and can be very persuasive,” he said. “I am not here to question his motives or bash him, because I've followed him for many, many years, but I just wish he wasn't doing it.”

Moderate Democrats have been quick to paint West as a potential spoiler running a glorified vanity campaign. They’ve been the most publicly against possible challengers to Biden and third-party bids, including from their own centrist flank No Labels, a group that wants to recruit a credible third-party rival. 

Progressives, on the flip side, are often critical of the country’s two-party system and have been hesitant to outwardly dissuade West or other progressives from competing for the White House. Their wing proudly embraces intraparty primaries and outside bids when necessary to push a progressive agenda. Many believe that’s often better than the status quo, and it’s how several prominent progressive lawmakers rose to power themselves. 

One Squad member, Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), is personally familiar with the power of insurgent campaigns. She was elected to the House in 2018 after ousting longtime Democratic Rep. Michael Capuano (Mass.) by running on a more liberal platform. 

While Pressley is still a staunch progressive, she’s more measured in her approach to the presidential election. Asked about West’s bid, she tiptoed around the issue but noted the popularity of his ideas.

“The CPC is the largest ideological caucus in Congress, which I think proves that, as the caucus continues to grow, their progressive ideas are popular,” Pressley said. 

“As much as they try to fringe and marginalize them, people want transformational change like universal basic income, like unionization, like reparations,” she said, careful not to criticize the platform that liberal candidates have run on each cycle. 

The anxiety around West is also illustrative of the broader concerns Democrats have about Biden. They understand that his approval rating isn’t where they’d like it to be, and that Trump still has a firm grip on the Republican Party. They also see poll after poll indicating that at least some percentage of voters want someone else as the Democratic nominee. In another sign of the frustrations surrounding Biden, moderate Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.) has been eyeing a possible primary challenge against him.

Defenders of West’s candidacy, however, feel strongly that it’s important to let voters decide whom they prefer in an open election.

“To progressive lawmakers who prefer to name-call and to label him as a spoiler candidate, please take a moment to remember that votes are always earned and never given,” said Cullen Tiernan, a progressive activist based in New Hampshire who has been critical of the party’s establishment class. “Too many of these lawmakers have changed from, ‘We will push Biden left,’ to now, ‘We will endorse anything he does.’”

“As Dr. West says, ‘You can’t save the people if you don’t serve the people,’ and I ask: Who are you serving by trying to eliminate voices from a democratic process?”

Cheyanne M. Daniels contributed.

Ted Cruz grows his brand with popular tool — a podcast

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) has been a familiar face and voice on Fox News, right-wing talk radio and elsewhere in the conservative media ecosystem since first being elected to the Senate more than a decade ago. 

But these days, Cruz is getting a boost in raising his profile through a media product of his own making.  

The Republican lawmaker hosts a now thrice-weekly podcast that has grown in popularity since its first episode published during former President Trump’s first impeachment trial.  

Over the last three years, “Verdict” has helped Cruz amass a following of millions of listeners each month, all while promoting frequent GOP talking points, blasting his political enemies and keeping the senator's name in the headlines.  

“I’m not interested in being a pundit,” the Republican senator told The Hill during an interview this week. “But part of fighting successfully is communicating and explaining what the issues are that matter. So, I view the podcast as fulfilling one of the really important responsibilities of representing Texans.”  

“Verdict” became a quick success in terms of listenership during Trump’s first impeachment drama, quickly climbing podcasting leaderboards, with Politico noting at the time it beat out “The Daily” from The New York Times and Joe Rogan’s popular talk show on iTunes.  

Today, it ranks among the top podcasts in the “politics” category and among the top 25 among all “news” podcasts, according to podcast tracking website PodBay. This month alone, “Verdict” has raked in 2 million downloads, including more than a million unique listeners, Cruz said.  

The Republican argues that his show, which often features lengthy discussions on constitutional law and politics, has seen success because of what he described as the failings of the mainstream media in acknowledging topics important to conservatives.  

“Much of the corporate media does not provide in-depth coverage of what is going on,” Cruz contends. “The reason why people faithfully listen three times a week is because when they’re done they’ve learned something … far better than what they’re able to get from the vast majority of media sources.”  

Started initially as an explanatory program laying out and poking holes in the impeachment charges against Trump, Cruz now uses each episode of “Verdict” to pontificate about everything from President Biden’s family to foreign policy issues and other news of the day.  

During one recent episode, Cruz explained for his audience the legalese around Hunter Biden’s plea deal, which fell apart in a Delaware courtroom last week after the president’s son was expected to plead guilty to two misdemeanor counts of willful failure to pay income taxes as part of a deal announced last month with the Department of Justice (DOJ).

“It’s a plea deal that is designed to be a slap on the wrist, so Hunter serves no jail time whatsoever, and that it’s real purpose as we’ve discussed is to protect Joe Biden from any exposure to Hunter’s influence-selling and corruptions,” the GOP senator said during the episode. 

Cruz, a second-term senator who mounted an unsuccessful campaign for president against Trump in 2016, fashions himself as a media-savvy national political operative — one who is mindful of audience demographics on each platform he appears on.  

“If I’m walking through an airport and a woman in her 70s comes up and says, ‘Hey I loved you on TV,’ you know many of the demographic that are watching TV interviews are of an older generation,” the senator said.  

“On the other hand, if I’ve got another guy with a ponytail and tattoos comes up and says, ‘Hey, I love what you’re doing,’ I know what the next words he’s going to say. He’s going to mention the podcast.”  

Other high-profile lawmakers have also dipped their toes in the podcasting arena. Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) are regulars on former Trump adviser Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast. 

Other up-and-coming lawmakers have used social media to boost their brand, such as freshman Rep. Jeff Jackson (D-N.C.), who has mobilized an aggressive campaign on TikTok to reach voters, and progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), who has made news with opinions given while speaking on Instagram Live. 

Cruz, likewise, makes it clear his goal with his podcast is to drive the news cycle as much as he can.  

“It’s a way of raising issues and advancing issues that matter to Texans,” he told The Hill.  

Cruz’s podcasting venture has been met with some criticism, including over the ethics of a sitting U.S. senator operating a talk show.  

The Campaign Legal Center filed a complaint with the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Ethics after he reached a syndication agreement with iHeartMedia, one of the largest providers of audio content in the country, contending the deal violated Senate rules on accepting gifts from lobbyists. 

iHeartMedia is a registered lobbyist, according to OpenSecrets. 

Cruz has said he receives “no financial benefit” from his podcast.  

“It’s no surprise Democrats and their allies in the corrupt corporate media take issue with Sen. Cruz’s chart-topping podcast — it allows him to circumvent the media gatekeepers and speak directly to the American people about what is really happening in Washington,” a Cruz spokesman told the Austin American-Statesman at the time.  

“Sen. Cruz receives no financial benefit from 'Verdict.' There is no difference between Sen. Cruz appearing on a network television show, a cable news show, or a podcast airing on iHeartMedia.” 

While Cruz, who is up for reelection in 2024, still sees some value in traditional cable news hits and radio appearances, he says the show he puts on himself allows for extra flexibility in pushing his agenda.  

“Let’s say you’re doing a TV interview and it’s six or eight minutes. That can be valuable if you reach a lot of people,” he said. “But in six or eight minutes, you can’t engage in a whole lot of substance. You can have a few talking points, you can have kind of a clever one-liner, but it’s difficult to have really detailed analysis in a short TV or radio interview. The podcast format, I’ve really grown to like.” 

Trump steps up war with Senate GOP

Former President Trump is stepping up his war with Senate Republicans by calling for primary challenges next year against GOP incumbents who do not support investigating President Biden's family finances.  

Many Senate Republicans have made clear they don’t want Trump to win their party’s nomination for president, and they’re leery about rallying to his defense given the former president’s polarizing effect on moderate Republican and swing voters. 

Senate GOP aides and strategists argue they can’t do much regarding the Biden family's business dealings because they don’t have the power to issue subpoenas as the Senate’s minority party.  

But GOP senators aren’t giving Trump much rhetorical support either — in sharp contrast from prominent House Republicans such as Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio). 

Ron Bonjean, a GOP strategist and former Senate leadership aide, said the Trump call will appear to a number of Senate Republicans like a way for Trump to distract people from the investigations into his own activities.

But he suggested it isn’t likely to work.

“A good number of Senate Republicans take a more measured approach usually. They don’t knee-jerk to pressure,” Bonjean said.

Trump appears to be losing patience with Republican lawmakers on the fence about impeaching Biden and Attorney General Merrick Garland, as the federal and state felony charges pile up against him along with his mounting legal bills.   

Trump mocked GOP senators and House members who say they have “other priorities” and would prefer to leave the investigations of Hunter Biden and the Biden family's business dealings to the House committees.  

“They sit back and they say, ‘We have other priorities, we have to look at other things.’ Any Republican that doesn’t act on Democrat fraud should be immediately primaried. Get out. Out,” he declared at a Saturday rally in Erie, Pa.  

The comments came a few days after Trump hit Senate Republicans for not taking a more aggressive approach to Biden’s personal finances.  

“With all of these horrible revelations and facts, why hasn’t Republican ‘leadership’ in the Senate spoken up and rebuked Crooked Joe Biden and the Radical Left Democrats, Fascists, and Marxists for their criminal acts against our Country, some of them against me,” he demanded in a post on Truth Social. 

Cool to launching impeachment proceedings

Republican senators are cool to the idea of launching impeachment proceedings against Biden in the House and generally have kept their distance from House GOP threats to cut funding to the Department of Justice and FBI in response to more than 30 felony counts prosecutors have brought against Trump.  

Asked last week whether he saw any merit to an impeachment inquiry into Biden, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said impeachment “ought to be rare rather than common.” 

“I’m not surprised that having been treated the way they were, House Republicans last Congress, [they] begin open up the possibility of doing it again,” he said, referring to the two impeachments of then-President Trump by a Democratic-controlled House.  

“And I think this is not good for the country to have repeated impeachment problems,” McConnell warned.  

It was hardly a ringing endorsement of the House Republican-led investigations into the Biden family and the Department of Justice’s handling of criminal allegations against Hunter Biden.  

Bonjean said “in any impeachment, there would be a trial in the Senate,” which is another reason why Republican senators want to preserve an appearance of impartiality and not rush to judgement about allegations of corruption against the sitting president.  

Republicans up for reelection next year include Sen. Mitt Romney (Utah), an outspoken Trump critic, as well as Republicans who have largely stayed quiet about the president, including Sens. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), Pete Ricketts (R-Neb.) and Deb Fischer (R-Neb.).

None of these incumbents appear vulnerable, but GOP strategists warn that Trump’s support could result in several of them facing credible primary challenges.  

“They could. Some Senate Republicans could face primary pressure over the next year, but they have a lot of time to position themselves on the matter and see how things unfold,” Bonjean said.  

Trump tried to drum up opposition in the last election cycle to Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) and Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska).  

He was more successful in stirring up support for Murkowski's Republican challenger, Kelly Tshibaka, but his efforts to recruit a primary challenge to Thune in South Dakota quickly fizzled. 

Senate Republicans believe they have a good chance to win back the Senate majority in 2024 because Democrats will have to defend 23 seats, while they only have to protect 11 GOP-held seats.  

A tough spot

Ross Baker, a professor of political science at Rutgers University who served several fellowships in the Senate, said Trump’s calls for Republicans to embrace the partisan investigations of Biden’s family puts Republicans facing competitive general-election races next year in a tough spot.  

“These are people who given the political physics of their congressional districts have to play a very exquisite balancing act. The idea that they move to impeach Biden does not play well in those districts,” he said of Republican lawmakers in competitive House districts.  

Baker warned that some Senate Republicans could be in “jeopardy” in primaries next year if Trump decides to launch a full-scale assault against incumbents he views as reluctant allies.  

“Think of people like Roger Wicker, who is someone who is seen as a pretty solid guy who votes the right way but is not an extremist,” Baker said, identifying a senator who might have to watch his right flank. “There are constituencies that will respond to any demand that Trump puts out who will say, ‘I can’t support [a senator] unless he gets on the impeachment bandwagon.’ 

“But I don’t think any Republican who is up for reelection wants to have to do that,” he said.  

Baker said that Senate Republicans up for reelection don’t want to alienate the sizable share of the Republican electorate — which he estimates at about 25 percent of Republican voters — who don’t support Trump and don’t like the idea of GOP candidates embracing his scorched-earth tactics. 

One Senate Republican aide defended the Senate GOP leadership from Trump’s broadsides by pointing out that Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), a member of McConnell’s leadership team, played a key role in publicizing an FBI 1023 form that makes reference to unsubstantiated allegations that Biden was involved in a foreign bribery scheme.  

“We’re not in the majority, and we don’t have subpoena power. You see Chuck Grassley and [Sen. Ron] Johnson [R-Wis.] pulling the levers on oversight and whistleblowers,” the aide said.  

The form, which FBI investigators use to catalogue raw, unverified claims by informants, received little attention from other Republican senators.  

A second Senate Republican strategist who requested anonymity argued that Grassley has made important contributions to the House investigations of Biden’s, even if Senate Republican leaders have generally kept their distance.  

“I can’t imagine any House Republican would say that the stuff that Grassley has uncovered in his ongoing efforts is less important than what they’re doing. But I think it’s really a matter of, House Republicans are in the majority and have subpoena power and can do a lot more that Republicans in the Senate can,” the aide said.  

Updated at 7:23 a.m. ET.

Did the government confirm aliens exist?

(NewsNation) — As in decades past, the question of whether aliens exist continues to captivate Americans. Following Wednesday's widely-watched Congressional hearing on UAPs and UFOs, people flocked to social media — many proclaiming the government confirmed aliens exist.

But that's not actually what happened at the hearing. While witnesses and lawmakers discussed the issue of UFOs, the government has not issued any official confirmation of alien life and what was said at the hearing, by witnesses and even a lawmaker, remains unverified.

As lawmakers continue to probe the issue, join NewsNation's Brian Entin at 9 p.m. ET Sunday night for a two-hour special report on the hearing, including analysis from UFO experts. Find out how to tune in to NewsNation on your local channel lineup.

Here's what we do (and don't) know after the hearing:

  • Whistleblower David Grusch largely recounted second-hand testimony and provided no evidence to support his claims. Grusch is a former member of the UAP Task Force.
  • Former Navy Commander and pilot David Fravor recounted a first-hand experience with the so-called Tic Tac UFO but said he was never briefed on the object or its potential origins.
  • Former Navy pilot Ryan Graves, who founded the Americans for Safe Aerospace, also recounted an encounter he had with an object he described as a black sphere floating inside a clear cube. Graves indicated such encounters were extremely common among pilots. There was no evidence presented to support this claim.
  • While lawmakers seemed largely accepting of the witness testimony, only Rep. Matt Gaetz, R.-Fla., said he had seen any evidence of alien life firsthand.
  • Grusch was unable to answer a number of inquiries regarding specific evidence or proof in an open setting, though he indicated he would be willing to say more in a secure, classified briefing.
  • All three witnesses agreed these unidentified objects constituted a potential national security threat.
  • Official government bodies, including the White House, Pentagon, and NASA have all stated they have no reason to believe unexplained objects are extraterrestrial in nature.
  • National Security Council Spokesman John Kirby said after the hearing there are "no hard and fast" answers to the question but that the administration is taking it seriously.

This wasn't the first time the U.S. government undertook investigations to address the question of UFOs, nor is it the first time the official response was that there was nothing "alien" going on.

However, at the heart of Grusch's whistleblower complaint is his claim that the government, specifically the Department of Defense, is operating programs to retrieve material from crashes that are extraterrestrial in nature and are keeping those programs secret from the public while also operating without appropriate Congressional oversight.

Grusch spoke exclusively to NewsNation regarding his experiences, which he said include the U.S. government recovering the "non-human" pilots of downed craft.

In light of his claims, lawmakers on the House Oversight Committee have vowed to continue to hold more hearings, including classified briefings where Grusch could speak more freely. Members have also vowed to seek the power to subpoena documents and images that Grusch says back up his claims.

Lawmakers have also called for a centralized reporting system for both military and civilian reports of UFOs, to better analyze and understand the possible threat.

There is also the possibility of the creation of a new committee to specifically investigate UAPs/UFOs. It's not entirely clear how Congress could compel the DoD or military to release information on any secret programs, should they exist, though, in the past, lawmakers have attempted to work UFO reporting into funding requirements for the Pentagon.

Democrats not ready to ditch Biden over Hunter scandal fallout, strategists say

They aren’t thrilled with 80-year-old President Biden as their party’s standard-bearer in the 2024 election, but Democrats appear far from ready to cut bait with the president due to his connections to his son Hunter Biden’s expanding legal scandals.

Former Hunter Biden business partner Devon Archer on Monday told members of the House Oversight Committee in a closed-door interview that the younger Biden included his father on speakerphone while meeting with business associates at least 20 times. The Republican controlled panel is investigating Hunter Biden’s business dealings with foreign companies and what, if any, role his father played in those interactions.

The closed-door interview revelations will likely fuel Republican attempts to link the president to Hunter Biden’s business transactions, which could politically wound the elder Biden as he runs for re-election in 2024 to a second term in the White House.

But a Democratic lawmaker on the committee argued that Archer’s testimony does not show that then-Vice President Biden was involved in son Hunter’s business dealings.

A TOP HOUSE REPUBLICAN SAYS DEVIN ARCHER INTERVIEW ‘VERY PRODUCTIVE’ IN BIDEN FAMILY PROBE

"The witness indicated that Hunter spoke to his father every day, and approximately 20 times over the course of 10 year relationship, Hunter may have put his father on the phone with any number of different people, and they never once spoke about any business dealings," Rep. Dan Goldman of New York told reporters on Capitol Hill.

"As he described it, it was all casual conversation, niceties, the weather, ‘What’s going on?’" Goldman added. And he emphasized that "there wasn’t a single conversation about any of the business dealings that Hunter had."

WHAT FORMER HUNTER BIDEN BUSINESS ASSOCIATE SAID ON CAPITOL HILL

Devon Archer’s interview comes in the wake of a whistleblower’s allegations that the FBI and the Justice Department are in possession of an unverified document that claims a criminal scheme involving then-Vice President Biden and a foreign national relating to the exchange of money for policy decisions. And House Speaker Kevin McCarthy recently floated that the Republican majority in the chamber could consider an impeachment inquiry into the president over the unproven claims of financial misconduct.

The president’s approval ratings have been underwater for nearly two years and polls suggest Democrats are anything but enthused with Biden seeking a second four-year term in the White House. But regardless, Democrats don't appear buying – at least right now – what the Republicans appear to be selling.

Veteran Democratic consultant and pollster Doug Schoen argued in an opinion piece this past weekend that Hunter Biden’s multiplying legal controversies "are now Joe Biden’s problems." 

But Schoen, a top political adviser to then-President Bill Clinton and on Michael Bloomberg’s unsuccessful 2020 presidential campaign, told Fox News Digital on Monday that "from what I have seen, there still has been no direct evidence, or even testimony today from Devon Archer, Hunter Biden’s former partner, that President Biden was involved in their business dealings."

"At this point there is nothing to lead me to say anything about the president's likely candidacy being impacted by any developments in the Hunter Biden case," Schoen emphasized.

WHAT THE COLLAPSE OF THE HUNTER BIDEN PLEA DEAL MEANS FOR PRESIDENT BIDEN IN 2024

Asked if Democrats would look to jettison Biden as their party’s nominee if the president becomes increasing entangled in his son’s legal predicaments, Democratic strategist and communicator Chris Moyer told Fox News "no way."

Moyer, a presidential campaign veteran, scoffed at suggestions that party leaders would consider asking Biden to step aside in 2024, adding that "Republicans are always going to try to find something to drum up."

"There’s good news about the economy almost every day. That’s what’s going to matter most not just to Democrats but also to key swing voters in the general election," he argued.

Longtime political scientist Dante Scala of the University of New Hampshire emphasized that "until Democrats are confronted with incredibly solid evidence that the father himself has some wrongdoing in all this, their default is to confine the sins of Hunter Biden to Hunter Biden."

Hunter Biden’s legal saga and the mounting inquiries come as the battle for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination is heating up, and as Biden faces long-shot Democratic presidential primary challenges from Robert F. Kennedy Jr. - the environmental lawyer and high-profile vaccine critic, and scion of arguably the nation’s most famous family political dynasty – and best-selling author and spiritual adviser Marianne Williamson, who’s making her second straight White House run. And progressive activist and professor Cornel West has launched a third-party bid for president that has some in the party nervous he might siphon votes from Biden in November 2024.

"The Hunter Biden circus is a concern for Democrats if President Biden’s opponents in the primary begin to bang the same drum as Republicans," warned longtime progressive strategist and communications consultant Michael Ceraso.

CLICK TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

Ceraso, a veteran of Sen. Bernie Sanders 2016 presidential campaign and now-Transportation Secy. Pete Buttigieg’s 2020 White House bid, noted that "we have a short-term memory in politics, but Bernie benefited from the allegations stacked against Secretary Hillary Clinton. Her past propelled him to be competitive. Whether West or RFK lean in and step in line with Republicans to propel themselves in the primary is anyone’s guess. But six months of weathering Hunter-related attacks from primary challenges before advancing to the general election is not ideal for the president - especially when he needs to drum up support from voters around the policies the Democrats and his White House passed."

"Many Americans - those who are likely to elect to stay home on Election Day, or flip parties based on the candidate and their personality, and not the issues - need convincing that the president deserves a second term," Ceraso argued.

Katie Britt recovering at home after ‘sudden onset of numbness’ in face, condition not life-threatening

Sen. Katie Britt (R-Ala.) announced Monday night that she is receiving outpatient care after experiencing a "sudden onset of numbness" in her face and is expected to need "several weeks" of recovery. 

Doctors believe that the numbness was likely the result of swelling of a facial nerve that was caused by a post-viral infection, Britt said in a statement. She was admitted to Baptist Medical Center South in Montgomery, Ala., and was released, saying that her condition is not considered life-threatening. 

“A specialist from [the University of Alabama at Birmingham] has subsequently evaluated me on an outpatient basis and concurred with the prognosis and course of treatment," Britt said in the statement. "My condition is not life-threatening, and recovery could take several weeks. 

"I am grateful for the medical professionals providing excellent care, and my family and I are deeply grateful for your prayers," she added. 

The news came only days after the Senate broke for its monthlong August recess, with lawmakers not slated to return to Washington until after Labor Day. 

Britt, 41, won her first term in office last year and has largely kept a low profile during her first seven months in the upper chamber. However, she was recently added to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's (R-Ky.) leadership team.

The junior Alabama senator also sits on the Senate Appropriations Committee, which is set for a busy September as it looks to help avoid a government shutdown and fund the government for fiscal 2024.