House Rep. Have 3-Seat Majority!

Good news being reported as the House Republicans will have 220 seats in the House of Representatives in the 119th Congress, completing their majority caucus, after the last election to the House with outstanding results was called on Dec. 5. The House Republican Conference declared victory in its quest to retain the majority in 2024’s general elections on Nov. 12, and the Associated Press called the majority-making 218th House seat for the GOP in Arizona’s 6th Congressional district, where Rep. Juan Ciscomani won re-election on Nov. 13. while, in a few races, the differences between candidates were just hundreds of votes and thus were too close to call until recounts and legal proceedings were completed. That process concluded on Dec. 4, nearly one month after Election Day on Nov. 5. 

The 13th district near the San Francisco Bay Area, Rep. John Duarte (R-Calif.) lost re-election to Democratic nominee Adam Gray by just 187 votes out of over 205,000 votes cast. The contest was the last federal race of the 2024 general election, with results to be called. There isn't all just good news though one bad thing is a Democrat did flip a GOP-held seat in California’s 45th district, which is located in the Los Angeles Metropolitan Area. The contest’s Democratic nominee, labor lawyer Derek Tran, defeated two-term Rep. Michelle Steel (R-Calif.) by a narrow margin of 613 votes, with the race being called on Nov. 27. The district was also regarded as a toss-up by the Cook Political Report. The race was divided along county lines the Los Angeles County half of the district voted heavily for Tran, while the Orange County portion voted narrowly for Steel. But it's LA California does this shock anyone really? 

Also in Iowa’s 1st Congressional District, two-term Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks defeated Democratic nominee Christina Bohannan by just 798 votes, with that race also called on Nov. 27. The race was expected to be highly competitive, and the Cook Political Report had rated it as a “toss up.” These results conclude the counting of votes in 2024’s federal elections, which entail Republican control of both houses of the 119th Congress from 2025 to 2027. The House majority will be narrow, at just three seats, a decline from five seats after 2022’s midterm election. President-elect Donald Trump’s victory in the 2024 presidential election also means that conservatives will control all three branches of government, as six of the U.S. Supreme Court’s nine current justices were appointed by Republican presidents and are widely regarded as being conservative.

So here are the final results going forward. Steel and Duarte will be among the several Republican incumbents who lost re-election in 2024. The list includes Rep. Mike Garcia of California as well as Reps. Marc Molinaro, Anthony D’Esposito, and Brandon Williams of New York. Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.) also lost re-election, though she will be nominated by Trump to be the Secretary of Labor once he takes office on Jan. 20, 2025. However, the Democrats wins were offset by Republican wins in five other seats. In Alaska’s at-large district, Republican nominee Nick Begich defeated Rep. Mary Peltola (D-Alaska) by a two-percentage-point margin. The party also won two House seats in Northeastern Pennsylvania: in the 7th District, Republican state legislator Ryan Mackenzie defeated Rep. Susan Wild (D-Pa.); in the 8th District, Republican businessman Robert Bresnahan defeated Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-Pa.). 

Other Republican wins included State Rep. Gabe Evans (R)’s victory in the race for Colorado’s 8th Congressional district, in which he defeated Rep. Yadira Caraveo (D). In Michigan’s 7th district, former state Sen. Tom Barrett (R) beat Democrat Curtis Hertel Jr., also a former state senator, in the open election to replace Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D), who herself was elected to the U.S. Senate from Michigan, replacing the retiring Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.). So despite their victories, Republicans will not begin the 119th Congress with a full majority. Several members of the conference have been selected by Trump for executive branch positions and, thus, will have to resign their seats in the House to assume them. Also the departing members include Rep. Michael Waltz (R-Fla.), who was appointed National Security Adviser with cabinet rank. 

Waltz will take his seat in the 119th Congress on Jan. 3, only to resign 17 days later on Jan. 20 to assume his new office, which does not require Senate confirmation. Similarly, Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) will also resign from office should her nomination to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations be confirmed by the Senate confirmation.

It’s highly likely that special elections to these seats will yield Republican winners, given their partisan rating and electoral history. One former House Republican, Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), was nominated for the role of attorney general by Trump but withdrew shortly afterward amid heavy opposition to his nomination. Gaetz resigned from the 118th Congress immediately after he was nominated and, despite his withdrawal, has announced he will not take his seat in the 119th Congress. 

Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) has already announced plans to hold special elections for the seats held by Gaetz and Waltz. The immediate departures of Waltz and Gaetz and the expected departure of Stefanik will mean the conference has a zero-seat majority of 217 members in a 432-member House. During this time, Republicans will need every single member of the conference to vote with the party in order to pass legislation, and a sudden vacancy may unexpectedly give House Democrats the majority.

Biden's DOJ Rejects Hunter's Pardon!

Well I'm not shocked Joe did what he did here which is again lie to the public when he said he wouldn't Pardon his son for his crimes as he's now trying to do but In a surprising legal move, special counsel David Weiss filed a motion in the California federal court where Hunter Biden’s tax case is being conducted, calling on the judge not to dismiss the charges following President Joe Biden’s pardon that was announced Sunday. 

The Hunter Biden pardon covers the period from Jan. 1, 2014 to Dec. 1, 2024. That time frame includes Hunter’s jury-trial convictions in June for lying on a federal form about his drug use when he purchased a handgun. It also covers his September conviction on nine charges related to his failure to pay at least $1.4 million in taxes from 2016 through 2019. 

Hunter faced a maximum of 17 years in prison for his tax offenses. “The charges in his cases came about only after several of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack me and oppose my election,” Biden claimed in a statement accompanying his pardon announcement. Well isn't this hilarious! Coming from the guy who has spent how many years doing that to Donald Trump! And so yes Joe once more lied to the American people when he stated he would NOT Pardon his son as we well know Joe is a known liar. But yes folks this ones a big one because any one of us who did these crimes would be in prison unless our names were Hunter Biden.

But Monday in the court filing in a federal district court in California, Weiss wrote, “There was none and never has been any evidence of vindictive or selective prosecution in this case.” and added “The defendant [Hunter Biden] made similar baseless accusations in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware. Those claims were also rejected,” he added. “In total, eleven different [federal] judges appointed by six different presidents, including his father, considered and rejected the defendant’s claims, including his claims for selective and vindictive prosecution.”

The special counsel’s office urged the judge not to dismiss the tax charges, but instead just close the docket indicating a pardon had been issued. This would allow the record to continue to exist. “[I]t has been the practice of this court that once an Executive Grant of Clemency has been filed on the docket, the docket is marked closed, the disposition entry is updated to reflect the executive grant of clemency, and no further action is taken by the Court,” Weiss wrote. He also pointed out that Hunter Biden has not docketed the pardon yet with the court, nor has his office seen it.

“If media reports are accurate, the Government does not challenge that the defendant has been the recipient of an act of mercy.  But that does not mean the grand jury’s decision to charge him, based on a finding of probable cause, should be wiped away as if it never occurred. It also does not mean that his charges should be wiped away because the defendant falsely claimed that the charges were the result of some improper motive,” Weiss wrote. 

He concluded, “No court has agreed with the defendant on these baseless claims, and his request to dismiss the indictment finds no support in the law or the practice of this district.” Mark Osler, an expert in presidential pardons at the University of St. Thomas, told ABC News that Weiss’s filing raises “a technical issue either way, the case goes away but an important one.” 

 “[Prosecutors] want the indictment to remain on the record,” he said. The Hill reported, “U.S. District Judge Mark Scarsi, who is overseeing Hunter Biden’s tax case in California, has not yet ruled on dismissal.” The news outlet pointed out, “U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika, the federal judge in Delaware overseeing Hunter Biden’s gun case, said she intends to terminate the proceedings against him once the pardon is docketed but asked Weiss to inform her whether his office objects to dismissal in that case, too.”