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19%
A new AP-NORC poll finds just 19% of Americans approve of Pete Hegseth being nominated as the secretary of defense.
$83 billion
“Senate Democrats are warning that the Laken Riley Act is unworkable in its current form, requiring tens of billions in new spending and enforcement resources that are ‘not feasible’ to detain undocumented immigrants accused of theft,” Semafor reports.
~40%
A recent poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that about 4 in 10 Democrats said it’s “not very likely” or “not at all likely” that a woman will be elected to the nation’s highest office in their lifetime. That’s compared with about one-quarter of Republicans who feel the same.
46,000+
“Illegal crossings along the U.S.-Mexico border have slowed significantly as President Biden prepares to leave office and as President-elect Donald Trump, who promised to crack down on immigration, is days away from retaking power,” the New York Times reports. “More than 46,000 people crossed the border illegally in November, the lowest number during the Biden administration.”
256,000
“Job growth was much stronger than expected in December, possibly providing the Federal Reserve less incentive to cut interest rates this year,” CNBC reports. “Nonfarm payrolls surged by 256,000 for the month, up from 212,000 in November and above the 155,000 forecast from the Dow Jones consensus.”
$2 $1 trillion
Tech billionaire Elon Musk said Wednesday that his budget-cutting effort on behalf of President-elect Donald Trump would most likely not find $2 trillion in savings, backtracking on a goal he set earlier as co-head of a new advisory body, the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, NBC News reported. Musk told political strategist Mark Penn in an interview broadcast on X that the $2 trillion figure was a “best-case outcome” and that he thought there was only a “good shot” at cutting half that.
100
“President-elect Donald Trump is preparing nearly 100 executive orders for when he returns to the White House on Jan. 20,” the Washington Post reports. “Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Oklahoma), appearing on Fox News, said Trump relayed plans to take action on immigration and energy, among other issues, during a meeting with Republican senators in Washington on Wednesday night.”
$1 million
Google donated $1 million to President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration fund, CNBC reports. Google will also live-stream the swearing-in ceremony on YouTube and include a direct link on its homepage.
$170 million
“President-elect Donald Trump’s inaugural committee is no longer selling tickets for major donors to attend his swearing-in and accompanying private events in Washington,“ the New York Times reports. “The committee has raised over $170 million… The haul is so big that some seven-figure donors have been placed on wait lists or have been told they probably will not receive V.I.P. tickets at all because the events are at capacity.”
$40 million
Amazon is paying “a whopping $40 million to license the Brett Ratner-directed Melania Trump documentary plus another, previously undisclosed project from the First Lady,” Puck reports.