What Wasn’t Addressed

Today’s notice: Trump tries to change the narrative. Scott Bessent tries to have dinner in peace. Pot policy changes expected today. Republicans on Capitol Hill are really quite mad at each other. Plus: Trump’s retribution against Colorado.

THE LATEST

President doing great job, says president. It seems Tucker Carlson was ill-informed — last night Donald Trump did not announce a war with Venezuela. Instead, he turned his attention to a more existential threat: his declining approval ratings and fracturing coalition.

For just under 20 minutes, Trump yelled into a microphone surrounded by White House Christmas decorations, listing his version of his accomplishments. A tariff policy that has worked perfectly, prices that are low, a world at peace and a political program that is an unabashed success.

The one new thing was a $1,776 bonus check Trump said he was sending to every service member. Beyond that, the address sounded much like a Trump campaign rally.

It was an attempt at a Trump reset. The president ended the year reiterating the promises he made at the start, asking voters to give him more time to deal with the mess he said Democrats had left him, but also asking them to appreciate that he’s cleaned up a lot of that mess already.

“We are making America great again, very simple. We are making America great again,” Trump said.

Polls have found that Americans don’t agree. A Fox News survey released just hours before the address reflected most recent public polling, finding 39% of Americans approving of the job Trump is doing handling the economy, while 58% say he’s focused on the wrong things. “That’s about the same response voters gave former President Joe Biden four years ago, when 54% said he was prioritizing the wrong issues,” Fox noted.

Other things Trump is apparently focused on include a series of plaques affixed to the new White House “Presidential Walk of Fame” mocking Biden as well as Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. “The plaques are eloquently written descriptions of each president and the legacy they left behind. As a student of history, many were written directly by the president himself,” Karoline Leavitt told reporters.

Open tabs: Trump Told by Alan Dershowitz Constitutionality of Third Term Is Unclear (WSJ); Bongino Confirms He’s Quitting as FBI Deputy Director (NOTUS); Trump admin asking US oil industry to return to Venezuela — but getting no takers (Politico); Warner Rejects Paramount’s Hostile Bid (WSJ)

From the Hill

We asked, they answered (kind of): NOTUS’ Hill team inquired with more than 120 House Republicans whether they planned to retire — and a surprising amount aren’t quite ready to commit one way or the other. The total number of retirement announcements this cycle is widely expected to outpace the 45 before the 2024 election, with members of the GOP conference leading the way. Twenty-four Republicans have announced their intentions to step away already. Nineteen Democrats have done the same.

“We haven’t made that decision yet,” Rep. Troy Balderson said, adding that he was “probably” going to run again.

“Yes, I plan on running,” Rep. Mark Amodei, a Republican from Nevada, told the NOTUS Hill team. But then he added a caveat: “Ask me in 60 days.”

Why would they possibly want to leave the place? “If you asked members for their honest review of [Mike] Johnson, he’d be at a 20% approval rating,” one Republican member who asked to remain nameless told NOTUS.

The year is not ending well for the House Republican Conference. Yesterday, four moderates incensed over Johnson’s refusal to allow a vote on extending Affordable Care Act subsidies before they expire at the end of the month signed on to a Democratic-led discharge petition to force that vote, likely in January after the holiday break (and after the subsidies have expired, but that’s another story).

This resulted in a new low point for conference infighting. “The message I’m going to send to them is: Don’t even think about asking me for help politically, period,” Freedom Caucus member Eric Burlison told NOTUS of his moderate colleagues who signed the petition. “Because why would I? You basically just stabbed us in the back.”

Republicans were, however, in lockstep on one thing: stopping a pair of Democratic-led measures to rein in Trump’s expanding military campaign in the Western Hemisphere. The president is, for now, able to continue escalating operations in Venezuela and against alleged “narco-terrorist” networks without approval from Congress.

From the White House

An executive order rescheduling marijuana is coming today, a source familiar told Jasmine. She also heard the executive action will attempt to fix the mess made in the CBD industry due to a provision in the bill that reopened the government. On Monday, we told you about the complicated MAGA rift opening up over cannabis.

Colorado retribution? “Maybe if Colorado had a governor who actually wanted to work with President Trump, his constituents would be better served,” a senior White House official told NOTUS’ Anna Kramer when she asked about Tuesday’s announcement that the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder — which handles many national security projects — would be broken up.

“Premier research stronghold for left-wing climate lunacy” is how the White House described the center. But even conservative climate skeptics strongly disagree with dismantling it, Anna reports.

From the campaign trail

An NRSC strategist warns Republicans not to get Wiles’d: “Washington keeps dancing with the same partner and acting surprised when it ends badly,” Nathan Brand, a senior adviser to the NRSC’s chair, Sen. Tim Scott, wrote in a recent Substack where he takes a not-so-subtle shot at the White House over the Vanity Fair profile of chief of staff Susie Wiles.

“There is a collective refrain: ‘We warned you,’” Brand wrote. “The episode is yet another reminder of why conservative media matters.”

From Reveler’s Hour

Spotted by NOTUS: While dining with a guest at the Adams Morgan restaurant, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was heckled in front of dozens of diners by a woman who bashed the administration’s sanctions.

Restaurant patron Olivia DiNucci repeatedly struck her glass to garner attention and mockingly toast Bessent, who called her ignorant and asked staff why they weren’t stopping the scene.

He exited the restaurant soon after, with bystanders observing he was upset.

“He’s eating in this nice restaurant in Washington, D.C., when sanctions cause starvation across the world,” DiNucci told NOTUS’ Daniella Diaz, who was also eating at Reveler’s Hour, in a brief interview. “We should be confronting them with our voice as much as we can because people across the world are affected by this.”

A person familiar with the secretary told Daniella that Bessent departed the restaurant “precisely because the restaurant owner refused to respect other diners and remove the heckler in question. Also, the food sucked.”

NEW ON NOTUS

Republican revolt over AI regulation? “States are closest to the ground, closest to the schools, the businesses, the public sector systems that are already grappling with AI every single day. So the responsibility naturally shifts to us,” Dana Trabulsy, a Republican state representative from Florida, told NOTUS’ Samuel Larreal after Trump sought through an executive order to bar states from passing AI regulations. Trabulsy and other state and local Republicans are dismayed at the federal efforts to slow them down.

Voters may be dismayed, too. A strategy memo by Republican consultant Chapin Fay obtained by Sam warns 2026 candidates: “Republican lawmakers and candidates should signal to voters in this case, particularly young voters, that we share their values and do not side with Big Tech.”

More: Democrats Give Adam Schiff a Financial Boost in His Defense Against Trump, by Dave Levinthal

Senate Confirms New NASA Head After Trump Nominated Him for a Second Time, by Amelia Benavides-Colón

Federal Judge Temporarily Bars ICE From Restricting Congressional Oversight Visits, by Jackie Llanos

Congress Just Granted the Lumbee Tribe Federal Recognition, by Em Luetkemeyer

NOT US

• The Most Powerful Politics Influencers Barely Post About Politics, by David Gilbert for Wired
  
• His Vanity Fair photos of Trumpworld blew up online. We called to talk. By Shane O’Neill for The Washington Post
  
• What’s really behind your soaring utility bills, by Nick Bowlin for Harper’s

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