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Year: 2024

Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen recovering from multiple injuries after being bucked from horse: ‘Good prognosis’

Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen recovering from multiple injuries after being bucked from horse: ‘Good prognosis’

Nebraska’s Republican Gov. Jim Pillen was in intensive care at a hospital on Monday to be treated for injuries after he was thrown off a horse while riding with his family the day before. Pillen, 68, was treated at the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, Nebraska, where he underwent a medical procedure for an injured spleen he suffered when he was bucked off a new horse. Doctors said Pillen’s prognosis was positive despite seven rib fractures, a partially collapsed lung, a minor fracture in one of his vertebrae and a minor kidney injury that is expected to heal on its own. He is expected to remain in the hospital for at least another day, but is in stable condition. The governor underwent a minimally invasive procedure called a prophylactic embolization for the spleen injury. Doctors passed a wire into his arteries near the spleen and inserted coils to stop the bleeding, according to Nebraska Medicine trauma surgeon Hillman Terzian. NEBRASKA GOV. JIM PILLEN HOSPITALIZED AFTER HE WAS BUCKED OFF A HORSE Terzian said Pillen did well during the procedure, which he was sedated for. The operation lasted less than an hour and GOP Lt. Gov. Joe Kelly acted as governor for the time being in a routine transfer of power. The governor did not suffer any damage to his nervous system and there were no signs of an injury to his head, neck or spinal canal, according to Terzian. Pillen has been motivated to get out of bed and has already been walking laps, Terzian said, noting that this is “very impressive.” The doctor said being in intensive care is normal for people with a spleen injury similar to Pillen’s and with rib fractures at his age. Terzian said the governor had “a very good prognosis.” ILLEGAL MIGRANTS IN NEBRASKA TOWN BRINGING ‘STRESS’ TO SCHOOLS, PUBLIC SAFETY “We don’t expect anyone with his injuries to be up and running a marathon the next day, but we like them to be out of bed, to show us that they can pick up small objects, that sort of thing,” Terzian said. The biggest priority for Pillen’s doctor right now is controlling his pain. No other operations are planned, although physicians have options for treating his ribs, Terzian said. Pillen has made arrangements to work from his hospital room. The governor’s office said his injuries were serious, but not life-threatening, and could have been much worse. Pillen was elected as governor in 2022, running in the gubernatorial election that year because former Gov. Pete Ricketts, also a Republican, was term-limited. The governor worked as a veterinarian and owned a livestock operation before he was elected to the state’s highest office. The Associated Press contributed to this report.

‘Independent-minded’: DCCC chair reveals blueprint for winning back majority during 2026 midterms

‘Independent-minded’: DCCC chair reveals blueprint for winning back majority during 2026 midterms

The House Democrat who chairs the party’s campaign committee says she wants to “build on” the “things we did right” in the 2024 elections as she works to win back the chamber’s majority in the 2026 midterms. While the party lost control of the White House and Republicans flipped the Senate majority while holding on to their fragile control of the House, Democrats were able to take a small bite out of the GOP congressional majority.  Republicans will hold a razor-thin 220-215 majority in the next Congress, which means the Democrats only need a three-seat gain in the 2026 midterms to win back the chamber for the first time in four years. HOUSE GOP CAMPAIGN CHAIR TOUTS HOMEFIELD ADVANTAGE “We won in tough districts, outperformed across the country,” Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chair Rep. Suzan DelBene of Washington state emphasized in a recent Fox News Digital interview. DelBene, who is sticking around for a second straight tour of duty steering the party’s campaign committee, said the 2024 successes are “a good example of what we need to continue to follow heading into 2026.” VANCE TO LIKELY BE 2028 GOP PRESIDENTIAL FRONT-RUNNER, BUT RNC CHAIR ALSO LIKES PARTY’S ‘BENCH’ “Number one, have great candidates who are independent minded, focused on the needs of their communities,” DelBene said. “Those candidates and their voices were critically important in this election.” DelBene said “making sure that they [the candidates] have the resources they need to get information out to voters and to continue to address head on the issues that are most important to their communities, lowering costs, making sure there’s economic opportunity” are also top priorities. SENATE REPUBLICAN CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE CHAIR SPELLS OUT HIS 2026 MISSION With President-elect Trump returning to the White House next month, and the GOP in control of both chambers of Congress, DelBene said Republicans are “going to be accountable for what they do in this country and the impact that has on working families” “We’re going to hold them accountable for their votes and the actions they take, especially if they aren’t supporting working families,” she emphasized. “I think people want to see governance work. So, if Republicans aren’t willing to work in a bipartisan way to get things done, that’s going to be a key part of the 2026 election as well.” The party in power traditionally takes a gut punch in the ensuing congressional election, which means the Democrats will have historical winds at their backs.  Looking to the 2026 map, DelBene touted that Democrats will have “opportunities across the country.” And she said it’s the DCCC’s job to “reach voters where they are and make sure they’re getting accurate information about where our candidates stand.” Fox News’ Emma Woodhead contributed to this report

Trump will be ‘very active on the campaign trail’ in 2026 midterms, Republican Party chair predicts

Trump will be ‘very active on the campaign trail’ in 2026 midterms, Republican Party chair predicts

As President-elect Trump begins his second term in the White House, his days as a candidate are numbered. But even though he’s term limited and his name will no longer be on the ballot, Republican National Committee chair Michael Whatley says Trump will play a “significant” role in supporting GOP candidates in the 2026 midterm elections. “President Trump is going to be a very significant part of this because at the end of the day, what we need to do is hold on to the House, hold on to the Senate so that we can finish his term and his agenda,” Whatley emphasized in a recent interview with Fox News Digital at the RNC headquarters in the nation’s capital. Republicans enjoyed major victories in last month’s elections, with Trump defeating Vice President Kamala Harris to win back the White House, the GOP flipping control of the Senate from the Democrats, and Republicans holding on to their razor-thin majority in the House. VANCE TO LIKELY BE 2028 GOP PRESIDENTIAL FRONT-RUNNER, BUT RNC CHAIR ALSO LIKES PARTY’S ‘BENCH’ Whatley argued that “as we go forward into this next election cycle, the fundamentals are going to remain the same.” “We need to make sure that we are building our state parties, that we’re building our ground game, we’re building our election integrity apparatus to be in place to make sure that when we get those candidates through those primaries in ‘26, that we’re going to be in a position to take them all the way to the finish line,” he emphasized. HOUSE GOP CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE CHAIR MAKES 2026 PREDICTION But the party in power traditionally suffers setbacks in the ensuing midterm elections. And Trump, who was a magnet for voter turnout in this year’s elections, won’t be on the ballot in 2026. Whatley predicted, “Donald Trump will be very active on the campaign trail for Republicans. And his agenda is the agenda that we’re going to be running on.” The Harris campaign and the Democratic National Committee outraised the Trump campaign and the RNC this past cycle, but Whatley is confident that with the party soon to control the White House, Republicans will be even more competitive in the campaign cash race in the midterms. “We’re pretty excited about where we are in terms of the fundraising that we did throughout the course of this cycle and what we’re going to do going forward,” he said. SENATE REPUBLICAN CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE CHAIR SPELLS OUT HIS 2026 MISSION Whatley said his message to donors will be, “We were successful in putting Donald Trump into the White House, and we need to carry forward with his agenda by keeping these House majorities and Senate majorities.” He also pushed back on the persistent questioning of the RNC and Trump campaign’s ground game efforts during the general election. “We focused very hard on low propensity voters. This was an entirely new system that we put in place over the course of this election cycle. It worked very, very well,” he touted.  And looking ahead, he said, “In a midterm election cycle, low propensity voters are going to, again, be very, very important for us. So, we’re going to continue to focus on building that type of a program.” Whatley spotlighted that “we also focused on outreach to communities that the Republican Party has traditionally not reached out to – Black voters, Hispanic voters, Asian American voters. That’s why we were able to see such seismic shifts toward Donald Trump versus where those blocs had been in 2016 and 2020. We also saw seismic shifts among young voters and women voters because we were talking to every single American voter. Our ground game was very significant.” Whatley was interviewed earlier this month, a week after Trump asked him to continue as RNC chair. In March, as he clinched the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, Trump named Whatley to succeed Ronna McDaniel as RNC chair. Whatley, a longtime ally of the former president and a major supporter of Trump’s election integrity efforts, had served as RNC general counsel and chair of the North Carolina Republican Party. 

Donald Trump’s tough talk—Buy Greenland! Take back Panama Canal!—sparks defiance from many Republican rebels

Donald Trump’s tough talk—Buy Greenland! Take back Panama Canal!—sparks defiance from many Republican rebels

Donald Trump says it is “an absolute necessity” for our country to own Greenland. He says the U.S. should take back the Panama Canal unless the “ridiculous” shipping fees are lowered. He threatened that any Republican who opposed him on the bill to avoid a government shutdown can and should be primaried. The president-elect is earning his reputation as a disruptor, with enough influence over what is now his party to blow up carefully negotiated bipartisan compromises. Let’s look at each of these. HOW PRESIDENT-ELECT TRUMP COULD PULL OFF ‘THE DEAL OF THE CENTURY’ AS HE ENTERS OFFICE Trump tried in his first term to buy Greenland, which is controlled by Denmark but under home rule. That went nowhere, though it created a diplomatic crisis with Danish officials. While the U.S. built the Panama Canal in the early 20th century, it was turned over to Panama under a treaty approved by both countries. Panamanian President Jose Raul Mulino says “every square meter of the Panama Canal and its adjacent zone is Panama’s and will continue to be so. The sovereignty and independence of our country are not negotiable.” That didn’t stop Trump from posting an AI image of an American flag flying over a waterway presumed to be the canal. The incoming president has certainly demonstrated the ability to engineer primary challenges to those who cross him. But three dozen conservative Republicans voted against him on the government shutdown bill, including on final passage, which dropped his demand to eliminate the debt ceiling during his term. Would he really gin up primaries against all of them? So the overwhelming likelihood is that the status of Greenland, the Panama Canal and rebellious Republicans won’t change in the second term. The reason Trump does this is that it reinforces his role as a disruptor, someone taking on the decrepit Washington establishment, even though a president, by definition, is the new establishment.  Beyond that, whether he’s making outrageous demands or not, Trump shapes, and often dominates, the news agenda. As the 47th president has acknowledged to me, he sometimes crosses the line because he knows it will provoke a strong media reaction. As Trump sees it, even negative coverage is good coverage because the press is playing on his turf. And sometimes these are just negotiating positions to win concessions, as with the threatened 25 percent tariffs against Canada and Mexico.  Remember, most people outside the media-political complex aren’t breathlessly following these developments. Since the government didn’t actually close down, they don’t see it as a setback for Trump that he didn’t get most of what he wanted. They probably don’t recall that he tried to buy Greenland before. What Trump clearly has the power to do is to blow up carefully crafted bipartisan agreements. He did it after Speaker Mike Johnson–whose own future is in doubt because, like Kevin McCarthy before him, he didn’t have the votes–let the bill grow into a Christmas tree monstrosity.  And he did it during the campaign when both parties agreed on a tough border enforcement deal, which was then trashed by Trump’s objections. But there are clearly limits to Trump’s ability to shape events, especially with the country. For three dozen Republicans to defy him on as fundamental a matter as the debt ceiling shows that he can only push his party so far. TRUMP’S FAMOUS CHRISTMAS CAMEO IS FAR FROM HIS ONLY ACTING CREDIT: SEE THE FULL LIST Rep. Nancy Mace, a Trump supporter who voted against him on final passage–told me on Sunday’s Media Buzz that was because she wants to keep the debt ceiling. But with the GOP clinging to a 1-vote House margin, for now, the cauldron of campaign rhetoric is running up against the cold, hard math of getting to the number 218.  Democrats have to wonder if it’s worth negotiating with the other party if they’re just creating a target for Trump’s demolition derby. It was Elon Musk who first tweeted about how bad the original bill was–at Trump’s suggestion–and after 70-plus tweets (including some falsehoods), the new president was drawn into the fight.  Over the weekend, Trump denied that he had surrendered his presidential powers to his billionaire buddy, and half-mockingly said Musk could never be president:  “You know why? He wasn’t born in this country. Hahaha.” A favorite media parlor game is whether the two strong-willed men will eventually have a falling out. For now, though, Trump’s tough talk about Greenland and the Panama Canal shows that he’s most comfortable playing offense, even if nothing much comes of it. In other news: –The House Ethics report says Matt Gaetz “regularly” paid women for sex, including with an underage girl, and used illegal drugs. In 2017, the former attorney general nominee “engaged in sexual activity with a 17-year-old girl,” who was also paid. Gaetz used or had possession of such illegal drugs as cocaine and Ecstasy “on multiple occasions,” and also accepted lucrative gifts, such as transportation and lodging in the Bahamas. “Many of the women interviewed by the committee were clear that there was a general expectation of sex,” with one woman telling the committee Gaetz paid her more than $5,000 and that sex was involved “99 percent of the time.” The panel said Gaetz was “uncooperative” and that he “knowingly and willfully sought to impede and obstruct the committee’s investigation of his conduct.” The Justice Department investigated but brought no charges. TRUMP COULD FACE RENEWED ISIS THREAT IN SYRIA AS TURKEY GOES AFTER US ALLY Gaetz also misused House resources when he had his chief of staff “assist a woman with whom he engaged in sexual activity in obtaining a passport, falsely indicating to the U.S. Department of State that she was a constituent… “There was substantial evidence that Representative Gaetz violated House Rules, state and federal laws, and other standards of conduct prohibiting prostitution, statutory rape, illicit drug use, acceptance of impermissible gifts, the provision of special favors and privileges, and obstruction of Congress.” If