Politics

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Sen. Rick Scott of Florida has amended his plan to overhaul how the federal government works after Democrats, including President Joe Biden, repeatedly invoked it to accuse Republicans of looking to cut Medicare and Social Security.

Scott unveiled his original plan last year when serving as chair of the campaign committee for Senate Republicans. It called for all federal legislation to sunset in five years, and if a law is worth keeping, Congress can pass it again.

His revised plan specifies exceptions for Social Security, Medicare, national security, veterans benefits, and other essential services. The change comes as Democrats work to drive a wedge between GOP lawmakers and their base of older voters who rely on government programs for income and health insurance.

Biden held up a pamphlet of Scott’s original plan when he visited the senator’s home state of Florida last week, saying “I know that a lot of Republicans — their dream is to cut Social Security and Medicare. If that’s your dream, I’m your nightmare.”

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has also been highlighting Scott’s proposals to criticize the GOP’s budgetary demands. And Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has consistently sought to distance Senate Republicans from Scott, telling reporters this week: “Let me say one more time, there is no agenda on the part of Senate Republicans to revisit Medicare or Social Security, period.”

Scott’s new plan takes a shot at his critics, saying in bold typeface: “Note to President Biden, Sen. Schumer, and Sen. McConnell – As you know, this was never intended to apply to Social Security, Medicare, or the US Navy.”

Scott explained the changes he made in a Washington Examiner op-ed that lashed out at Biden as well as McConnell.

“I have never supported cutting Social Security or Medicare, ever. To say otherwise is a disingenuous Democrat lie from a very confused president. And Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is also well aware of that. It’s shallow gotcha politics, which is what Washington does,” Scott wrote.

The White House wasn’t buying Scott’s explanation, though. White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said cutting Medicare and Social Security was a “longstanding passion” for Scott.

“Make no mistake, his true colors are undeniable and on the record,” Jean-Pierre said.

McConnell and Scott have been at odds for some time now. Scott challenged McConnell in November to become the chamber’s minority leader, but McConnell easily prevailed in the first attempt to oust him. The vote was 37-10, senators said, with one other senator voting present.

House Republicans have been calling for reducing government spending as part of any agreement to increase the nation’s borrowing authority in the coming months. Democrats have been calling for a clean debt ceiling with no strings attached and are challenging Republicans to spell out any cuts they propose to make. Scott’s overhaul Friday signals the difficulty Republicans will have in answering that challenge.

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Associated Press staff writer Christopher Megerian contributed to this report.

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NEW YORK (AP) — Republican presidential candidates will be blocked from the debate stage this summer if they do not sign a pledge to support the GOP’s ultimate presidential nominee, according to draft language set to be adopted when the Republican National Committee meets next week.

The proposal sets up a potential clash with former President Donald Trump, who has raised the possibility of leaving the Republican Party and launching an independent candidacy if he does not win the GOP nomination outright. While RNC officials and Trump aides downplay that possibility, such a move could destroy the GOP’s White House aspirations in 2024 and raise existential questions about the party’s future.

“After the primary, it is imperative to the health and growth of our Republican Party, as well as the country, that we all come together and unite behind our nominee to defeat Joe Biden and the Democrats,” RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel said in a statement to The Associated Press when asked about the loyalty pledge.

As many as a dozen Republicans are expected to enter the 2024 presidential contest as the GOP braces for an all-out civil war in the months ahead.

Much of the party is eager to move past Trump and his divisive politics, but in reality, Republican leaders have few, if any, tools to control the former president given his popularity with the GOP’s most passionate voters. RNC leaders are hopeful that a loyalty pledge, while ultimately unenforceable, would generate some shared commitment to unity, albeit a fragile one, as the presidential primary season takes off.

A senior Trump aide could not say whether the former president would sign the pledge to support the eventual nominee but suggested privately that he plans to participate in the debates. Campaign spokesman Steven Cheung declined to answer the question directly as well.

“President Trump is the undisputed leader of the Republican Party and will be the nominee,” Cheung said. “There is nobody who can outmatch President Trump’s energy or the enthusiasm he receives from Americans of all backgrounds.”

Facing similar concerns in 2016, Trump signed a similar loyalty pledge that was not tied to debates, but he later reneged as the primary campaign became more contentious. At the very first Republican primary debate that year, Trump was the only candidate on stage who refused to commit to supporting the party’s eventual nominee unless it was him.

And just last December, Trump shared an article on social media encouraging him to seek a third-party bid to punish the GOP should Republican primary voters select another presidential nominee in 2024.

Meanwhile, there is no such threat on the Democratic side.

Virtually every Democrat thought to have presidential aspirations has already promised to unite behind President Joe Biden, assuming the 78-year-old Democrat follows through on his plan to seek a second term. Biden may face token resistance from a lower-profile intra-party rival — activist and author Marianne Williamson is exploring another White House bid, for example — but the Democratic president would face little pressure to appear on the debate stage before the fall of 2024 for the general election debates, should they occur.

The Republican loyalty pledge is among several provisions likely to be adopted as the RNC’s Temporary Standing Committee on Presidential Debates meets next week to determine the rules governing which candidates may participate in the GOP’s upcoming debate season — and which media networks will host the events.

The committee is considering between 10 and 12 debates to begin in late July at the Reagan Library in California or at the RNC’s summer meeting in Milwaukee, the host of the GOP’s next national convention.

Committee officials are sorting through proposals from as many as 18 media companies eager to host a debate. They include major television networks like CNN, MSNBC and Fox and lower-profile conservative favorites like Newsmax, according to people directly involved in the process who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share internal discussions.

While the likes of CNN and NBC hosted Republican primary debates in 2016, Republican officials suggest it would be a mistake to assume they will be selected this time around given widespread disdain for the networks among the party’s base. Representatives from each network will pitch the RNC in person next Wednesday and Thursday.

Meanwhile, the criteria for debate participants will almost certainly include a new donor threshold to demonstrate broad support among the party’s grassroots in addition to a polling threshold of either 1% or 2%. Participants will also be asked to sign a pledge to avoid any general election debates hosted by the Commission for President Debates; the commission has hosted every general election presidential debate since 1988, but Republicans increasingly believe the non-partisan group is biased against them.

While there are many moving pieces, GOP leaders are most concerned about the party’s ability to come together after what promises to be a divisive primary election season.

Dave Bossie, a former Trump aide and current RNC member leading the debate committee, noted that the committee is modeling its 2024 loyalty pledge after the 2016 pledge that every Republican candidate signed.

“All Republicans can agree that Joe Biden has been a disaster for America,” Bossie said. “Therefore, it should be easy for every candidate to pledge unity toward defeating the radical Biden administration.”

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MADISON, Wis. (AP) — One of the two conservative candidates for an open Wisconsin Supreme Court seat was paid by state and national Republicans to advise on election issues, including the plan to have fake GOP electors cast ballots for Donald Trump even though he lost the state.

Dan Kelly is a former state Supreme Court Justice who is one of four candidates in Tuesday’s primary. The top two vote-getters will advance to the April 4 general election, with the winner determining whether the court remains 4-3 majority conservative or flips to liberal control.

Kelly was a justice on the court from 2016 to 2020. He was endorsed by Trump during his unsuccessful run for the court in 2020.

After Kelly left the court in August 2020, he went on to be paid nearly $120,000 by the Wisconsin Republican Party and the Republican National Committee to work on election issues, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel first reported Friday.

Kelly’s work for the state GOP was revealed in testimony that former party Chairman Andrew Hitt gave the U.S. House committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, attacks on the U.S. Capitol.

Hitt, according to his testimony that was released by the committee last month, said that Kelly was working as a “special counsel” and had “pretty extensive conservations” about the fake Republican electors. Hitt testified that he brought in Kelly to “kind of advise on election law matters.”

The Republican fake electors met in the Wisconsin Capitol building on the same day that Democrats cast the state’s 10 electoral votes for Biden. Hitt and others who cast ballots for Trump said they were doing so in case courts overturned Biden’s win and gave the state to Trump.

Biden won the state by nearly 21,000 votes, and every attempt by Trump and his allies to overturn the results failed.

Kelly’s campaign spokesperson, Jim Dick, said Kelly “took a call from RPW Chairman Hitt on the subject of Republican electors and was asked if he was in the loop about this issue and Justice Kelly stated he was not.”

Dick said that after Kelly left the state Supreme Court in August 2020, he “provided legal counsel to several clients, amongst which were the RNC and RPW. It is a maxim in the legal profession that the views of clients are not attributable to their attorneys.”

Kelly faces conservative Waukesha County Circuit Judge Jennifer Dorow and two liberal candidates, Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Janet Protasiewicz and Dane County Circuit Judge Everett Mitchell.

“There’s no doubt Dan Kelly is a partisan extremist, as much as he’d like to dishonestly pretend otherwise,” Sam Roecker, a spokesperson for Protasiewicz, said in a statement to the AP. “His continued efforts to overturn Wisconsin’s 2020 presidential election results are disqualifying.”

Mitchell said in a statement to the AP that “I believe that just as we have a separation of church and state, we need a separation between partisanship and justice. Because when partisanship invades our court system, it leads to pre-determined outcomes, the diminishing of justice, and the destruction of equity.”

Dorow did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.

Kelly has been critical of Protasiewicz for publicly stating her support for abortion rights and saying that Republican-drawn legislative maps were “rigged.” Mitchell has also voiced support for abortion rights and been critical of the GOP-drawn maps.

In addition to advising the state party on the fake elector scheme in 2020, federal elections records show that the Republican National Committee paid Kelly and his firm, Daniel Kelly Consulting, $110,000 from March to December 2022 for “legal and compliance services,” the Journal Sentinel first reported. That included a $40,000 payment he received after he announced his run for the state Supreme Court in September.

Kelly also lists the RNC as a client on his ethics statement, calling himself a spokesman for the national party.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden built his 2020 White House run around promises to beat Donald Trump “like a drum.” As Biden gears up for an expected reelection campaign, he insists he can do it again.

But what if Trump isn’t next year’s Republican nominee?

Though the GOP primary race is only just beginning, a general election pitting Biden against any other Republican could look very different from one against Trump, with Democrats perhaps seeing enthusiasm to stop Trump at all cost evaporate.

Biden’s continually low approval ratings and polling showing that many Americans — even a majority of Democrats — don’t want him to seek a term that won’t end until he’s age 86 may also begin taking a bigger toll.

“I believe that, both for Biden and for Trump, going up against a new nominee would be more challenging than facing each other,” said Julián Castro, a former Obama administration housing chief who ran against Biden in the 2020 Democratic primary.

For now, Trump remains a leading figure within the GOP and exercises tremendous influence among primary voters. Still, the field of Republican presidential candidates is beginning to expand with his former U.N. ambassador, Nikki Haley, announcing her candidacy. Polling suggests that GOP voters are open to backing someone other than Trump.

Beyond Haley, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis could be a leading Trump alternative. More moderate challengers, such as former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, may soon emerge. Trump’s vice president, Mike Pence, and secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, might run. South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott is planning to visit Iowa, fueling speculation about his political future.

All offer younger alternatives to both Biden and the 76-year-old Trump, and can promise fresher approaches to Washington, a point Haley made explicitly in her campaign kickoff. But so many choices could split the anti-Trump vote, perhaps allowing the former president to prevail in a fractured primary field.

Celina Vasquez, founder of the progressive group Texas Latinas List, said Biden’s reelection appeal is built on his experience, not simply defeating Trump again.

“My generation, and the generation behind me, we’ve seen the dangers and the disaster of the MAGA Republicans,” said Vasquez, whose organization promotes engagement by Texas Hispanic women at all levels of political office. MAGA is the acronym for the 2016 Trump campaign’s slogan, “Make America Great Again,” and has since become a general synonym for a descriptor of Trump policies and supporters.

Biden’s political standing within his own party is perhaps stronger than it has ever been. After Democrats showed surprising resilience during last fall’s elections, no major challenger has emerged to compete against the president in the party’s upcoming primary.

Democrats also just replaced Iowa with South Carolina to lead off their 2024 primary at Biden’s behest. And, despite still-high inflation, unemployment has fallen to its lowest level since 1969.

Top Democrats say another factor in Biden’s favor is that, unlike former President Barack Obama, who was seen as a political phenomenon, Biden only got to the White House after two previous failed runs and was never viewed as a potentially transformational Washington force. That has kept the party and voters alike from falling into the complacency that contributed to Democratic losses in the 2010 and 2014 midterm elections under Obama.

For Biden, “the political nature of his presidency is one where Democrats around the country realize we all have a role to play in making sure he succeeds,” said Ben Wikler, chair of the Wisconsin Democratic Party. “It’s everybody’s job.”

Some voters in competitive states such as Georgia, however, say Democrats would be foolish not to think that a younger Republican nominee could capitalize on Biden’s age.

“It really matters also who his actual opponent will be,” Latabia Woodward, founder of Who’s Got Next Music, a music tech platform in Atlanta, said after listening to Vice President Kamala Harris speak recently at Georgia Tech University. “But, as a strategy, I do believe that it is a concern and I think we need to prepare for it, not just react to it.”

Doing so may not be easy. Polling from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows that only 37% of Democrats say they want Biden to seek a second term — down from the 52% who backed the president running for reelection in the weeks before he led the party to a stronger-than-expected showing in November.

Among Republicans, 49% say they want Trump to run next year, while 50% do not. That’s a modest shift from October, when 57% of Republicans reported wanting Trump to run.

Overall, just 22% of U.S. adults want Biden to run again compared to 27% who want Trump to run again.

Former House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., has said he thinks “anybody not named Trump” can beat Biden. Gov. Chris Sununu, R-N.H., himself mentioned as a possible White House 2024 contender, said Trump “can’t get it done” against Biden.

Biden has shrugged off those findings, noting that he’s been counted out before — for example, the recent midterms and when his 2020 campaign lost the first three Democratic primary contests in Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada, only to be revived by a resounding South Carolina win.

Castro said beating Trump is a central argument for Biden’s reelection, though equally important will be his legislative accomplishments, including a sweeping public works package, new gun safety rules and steep federal spending increases on green energy,high-tech manufacturing and health care. But Castro said polls nonetheless show an electorate not supportive of a second Biden term and that Democrats must “patch that up by the time he gets to the general election.”

“Somebody can make the case out there – and right now there’s nobody on the horizon – but there certainly seems to be an opening” for a Democratic primary challenger to Biden, Castro said, adding that it won’t be him.

Biden’s close aides acknowledge that, in 2020, he was laser-focused on having come out of retirement to deny Trump a second term. If Trump’s not on next year’s presidential general election ballot, they say, the president will broaden the contrasts he presents, seeking to make the race a referendum on broader Trumpism.

That’s a strategy Biden effectively employed during the 2022 elections, when he constantly denounced “ultra-MAGA Republicans.” He hinted there will be more where that came from, recently telling Univision that he didn’t fear facing DeSantis more than Trump next year “because I think that they have a similar modus operandi, a similar way in which they work.”

Biden allies say that the appeal of thwarting Trump can be expanded to Republicans as a whole because many in the party have either continued to embrace Trump’s White House tenure or larger MAGA movement, or at least have struggled to condemn things such as spurious questioning of the 2020 election results and defending the mob that overran the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Many top Republicans also have, at one time or another, suggested they would support cuts to Medicare or Social Security, Biden aides note, a criticism the president has already begun lobbing.

The Democrats’ midterm performance shows Biden was able to win last year without Trump on the ballot, and could do so again next year, those close to the president argue. Either way, they predict Biden will be buoyed in 2024 by two years of promoting trillions of dollars of reinvestment domestically.

That all resonates with Brandon Mayberry, an Emory University senior who also came to hear Harris in Atlanta. He said he plans to vote for Biden in 2024 regardless of who the president’s opponent is, but admits that what happens next gives him pause.

“I like his passion as an 80-year-old man,” Mayberry said. “But five, six more years –- that’s kind of concerning.”

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Associated Press writers Bill Barrow in Atlanta and Zeke Miller contributed to this report.

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PHOENIX (AP) — An Arizona appeals court has rejected Republican Kari Lake’s challenge of her defeat in the Arizona governor’s race to Democrat Katie Hobbs, denying her request to throw out election results in the state’s most populous county and hold the election again.

In a ruling on Thursday, the Arizona Court of Appeals wrote Lake, who claimed problems with ballot printers at some polling places on Election Day were the result of intentional misconduct, presented no evidence that voters whose ballots were unreadable by tabulators at polling places were not able to vote. The court said that even a witness called by Lake to testify had confirmed that ballots that couldn’t initially be read at polling places could still ultimately have their vote counted.

And while a pollster who testified on behalf of Lake claimed the polling place problems had disenfranchised enough voters to change the outcome in Lake’s favor, the court said his conclusion were baseless.

The appeals court wrote Lake’s appeal failed because the evidence supports the conclusion that “voters were able to cast their ballots, that votes were counted correctly, and that no other basis justifies setting aside the election results.”

Shortly after the ruling, Lake tweeted: “I told you we would take this case all the way to the Arizona Supreme Court, and that’s exactly what we are going to do. Buckle up, America!”

Lake, who lost to Hobbs by just over 17,000 votes, was among the most vocal 2022 Republicans promoting former President Donald Trump’s election lies, which she made the centerpiece of her campaign. While most of the other election deniers around the country conceded after losing their races in November, Lake did not.

Lawyers for Lake focused on problems with ballot printers at some polling places in Maricopa County, home to more than 60% of the state’s voters. The defective printers produced ballots that were too light to be read by the on-site tabulators at polling places. Lines backed up in some areas amid the confusion.

County officials say everyone had a chance to vote and all ballots were counted since ballots affected by the printers were taken to more sophisticated counters at the elections department headquarters.

Lake’s attorneys also claim the chain of custody for ballots was broken at an off-site facility, where a contractor scans mail ballots to prepare them for processing. They claim workers at the facility put their own mail ballots into the pile, rather than returning them through normal channels, and also that paperwork documenting the transfer of ballots was missing. The county disputes the claim.

Hobbs’ attorneys said Lake was trying to sow distrust in Arizona’s election results and offered no proof to back up her allegations of election misconduct.

Lake faced extremely long odds in her challenge, needing to prove not only that misconduct occurred, but also that it was intended to deny her victory and did in fact result in the wrong woman being declared the winner. In her appeal, her lawyers argued a trial court judge applied the wrong standard of proof in deciding the case.

Hobbs took office as governor on Jan. 2.

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The findings were contained in a memo by Biden’s doctor, summarizing the exams conducted during a three-hour stay at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland.

O’Connor concluded in a five-page memo that Biden “remains a healthy, vigorous 80-year-old male, who is fit to successfully execute the duties of the Presidency.” But the doctor did not speculate about where Biden’s health might be at age 86, when a second term might end.

The president had a lesion removed from his chest that is undergoing a traditional biopsy. But Thursday’s results largely matched the findings after the president’s last exam in November 2021, which said his coughing was due to acid reflux and his stiffened gait was the result of spinal arthritis, a previously broken foot and neuropathy in his feet.

The memo generally labeled Biden’s health as “stable” compared to his last exam, though it noted that his calves and hamstrings had possibly tightened.

Biden tested positive in July for COVID-19 and experienced “very mild symptoms,” according to the White House. He also had a rebound infection and ultimately tested negative on Aug. 6 of last year. The president continued to work even as he isolated himself in the White House.

“Well, everything really went well,” Biden told NBC News on Thursday about the exam ahead of the memo’s release.

Follow-up interviews with people in the survey indicated that Biden’s age was a major concern. They took note of his coughing, a greater sense of fragility in his walking and moments when he misspoke.

Biden had a colonoscopy in 2021, in which a 3-millimeter “benign-appearing polyp” was identified and removed. He did not undergo a colonoscopy during Thursday’s checkup.

Asked in a recent PBS interview about his age and ability to be president, Biden responded with what has become his stock line: “Watch me. It’s all I can say.”

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WASHINGTON (AP) — As former CIA Director David Petraeus recently told the House Intelligence Committee about the needs of the agency’s workforce, one of the committee’s youngest members flashed a knowing smile and began to nod.

Abigail Spanberger spent almost a decade as a CIA operations officer. Now, she’s a third-term Democratic congresswoman from Virginia who was just named to one of two committees that oversees the work of America’s spy agencies.

The relationship between Congress and the U.S. intelligence services can be uneasy and is often adversarial. That’s especially true now as lawmakers demand answers about classified documents found in the private possession of two presidents and the Biden administration’s response to a suspected Chinese spy balloon.

Years of high-profile fights over intelligence matters have taken a toll, with some Republicans accusing the agencies of being part of a “deep state” controlling U.S. politics.

Spanberger, 43, is part of a small group of former intelligence officers to have been elected to Congress. Like others with access to America’s top secrets, she will be called on to review intelligence matters in private and explain what she can to fellow lawmakers and the public.

“I know the lingo. I know the language. I know the culture,” Spanberger told The Associated Press in a recent interview in her office. “I hope that helps me do my job better. But I’m sure there will be points of frustration probably for me and for them, frankly speaking.”

She rejects talk of a “deep state” and called on other lawmakers not to promote conspiracy theories about intelligence or the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021.

“The reality is other countries perceive that and they perceive that in a way that can’t be good,” she said. “As a former intelligence officer, I know that countries are watching us. I know because I wrote up those reports — you know, ‘there’s fighting with these two factions and this is what it means.’”

At least two other former CIA officers became members of the committee — Republicans Will Hurd of Texas and Porter Goss of Florida, who was chairman before being named CIA director in 2004 under President George W. Bush.

In an interview, Goss described his experience with overseeing intelligence while in Congress as “frustrating.”

“The tensions are greater than when I was there,” he said, blaming polarization both in Congress and within the spy agencies. “Most of the intelligence community doesn’t understand Congress and most of Congress doesn’t understand the intelligence community.”

Spanberger’s background in intelligence and her moderate politics representing a swing district south and west of Washington will be assets on the committee, Goss and Hurd said.

“She’s trustworthy,” said Hurd, who left Congress after the 2020 election. “Even when you don’t agree on something, you’re able to build trust with her, which is something I always appreciated. She’s someone that works hard and is focused on the mission. She doesn’t get overwhelmed by stuff.”

The daughter of a nurse and a federal law enforcement officer who also served in the Army, she says she was drawn to national service and the idea of learning new languages and cultures. Spanberger was a postal inspector before joining the CIA in 2006.

As an operations officer, Spanberger worked on cases ranging from counterterrorism to nuclear proliferation. The specifics of her cases remain classified.

Charlotte McWilliams met Spanberger when they were trainee officers before going to the CIA’s academy in rural Virginia known as “The Farm.” They were both sent on to overseas postings — Spanberger in Europe, McWilliams in Africa — and bonded over their shared experiences doing clandestine work while becoming new mothers at the same time.

“It was wonderful to have this dear friend who was working hard to kick butt as much as she could, professionally and personally at the same time,” McWilliams said in an interview.

After eight years, Spanberger had several choices for her next posting, from Kenya to Costa Rica. She says it was her daughter, then in kindergarten, who asked them if they could move back to Virginia. She decided ultimately to leave the CIA.

A few years later, during the 2016 presidential election, she started to discuss with her friends the possibility of running for office.

She ultimately targeted the congressional seat held by then-Rep. Dave Brat, who had stunned House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in the GOP primary four years earlier. Part of what informed her decision, she said, was her experience of “always being the one who believed that somebody somewhere was using the information I was collecting in really a productive way.”

“I said I want to be the one who’s making good, informed decisions for the district,” she said.

But not everyone felt she should run for Congress. When Spanberger went to a Democratic Party event to recruit and train future women candidates, McWilliams says, she was told by officials in Washington and Richmond, Virginia, that she should consider running a smaller race, perhaps for school board.

“She did have to listen to her gut,” McWilliams said. “Even in that place where the whole point is they’re experts and they’re going to guide you, she had to advocate for herself.”

Spanberger defeated Brat in 2018, winning a hotly contested race in which Republicans questioned her national security credentials and a stint as a substitute teacher at a school funded by the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Washington. A previous application she submitted for a security clearance was obtained by a conservative political group and shared with the press.

She’s since won two more close races and been raised as a possible candidate for Virginia governor. She has cut a centrist profile and criticized more liberal Democrats who have identified themselves as “socialist.”

In the weeks since she was named to the intelligence committee, Spanberger says she’s already recognizing some of the names and programs in the classified materials she’s receiving. As a case officer, one of her responsibilities was to help inform the briefers who went before Congress.

She intends to push for more support for current and former officers who have reported illnesses consistent with a possible directed energy attack, in what’s broadly become known as “Havana syndrome.” The CIA last year deemed it unlikely that Russia or another adversary mounted a campaign to attack American officials with microwaves or other energy. Investigations are ongoing, as are stepped-up efforts to identify and compensate people who have reported cases.

Marc Polymeropoulos is a fellow former operations officer who retired after suffering symptoms consistent with Havana syndrome. He says Spanberger brings an insider’s knowledge of the challenges faced by the CIA and other agencies, from recruitment and retention to whether U.S. intelligence agencies are developing enough Chinese speakers and evolving how they does business in a world of advanced technologies and the ubiquitous surveillance of cellphones.

He says Spanberger shouldn’t be assumed to reflexively defend the agencies because she worked for one.

“If you want to be a plumber, you’ve got to know about plumbing,” he said. “She’ll know how to fix things.”

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WASHINGTON (AP) — He twice voted in favor of convicting former President Donald Trump in impeachment trials. He excoriated his fellow senators who objected to certifying the results of the 2020 presidential election. He even scolded New York Rep. George Santos for his audacity in grabbing a prominent seat at the State of the Union address after admitting to fabricating much of his biography.

After four years in Washington, Republican Mitt Romney has established himself as a rare senator willing to publicly rebuke members of his own party.

But the Utah senator’s outspoken stances, along with his willingness to work with Democrats, have angered some Republicans in the deep-red state he represents and led them to cast about for someone to try to dethrone him a primary race next year.

The 75-year-old said that he hasn’t made a decision on whether to run for reelection in 2024 and doesn’t expect to until the start of summer.

“I’m sort of keeping my mind open,” Romney said in an interview. “There’s no particular hurry. I’m doing what I would do if I’m running with staffing and resources, so it’s not like I have to make a formal announcement.”

His decision about whether to run again comes as Trump is making his third campaign for the White House, presenting Romney an opportunity to continue to serve as a chief foil to the former president.

But that could also sustain the backlash Romney has faced for serving as a check on Trump, including being heckled at the airport, narrowly avoiding censure by the state GOP and becoming an insult that other Republicans use to slam their rivals as suspect: “A Mitt Romney Republican.”

Romney said he didn’t know if the prospect of Trump becoming the Republican presidential nominee was something that would spur him to run for reelection run or stay out. But he said it was among the the things he would be weighing, along with personal considerations regarding his wife, Ann Romney, and family, and his goals for what he wants to accomplish in the Senate.

“We’ll look and see what happens in the rest of the Republican landscape and the national landscape, the presidential race and the other Senate races,” he said. “There is just a lot of elements that I will ultimately take into account. But I haven’t begun that process yet.”

Romney has earned a reputation for bipartisanship, from his role helping broker a sweeping 2021 infrastructure law with Democrats to his being one of only three Republicans to vote to confirm President Joe Biden’s nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson as a Supreme Court justice. He helped negotiate legislation to protect same-sex marriages in December by demanding language ensuring that the rights of religious institutions would not be affected. And he joined 14 other Republican senators in supporting a sweeping gun control measure last summer in the wake of mass shootings.

“I didn’t come to the Senate to just fight and lose,” Romney said. “I came to actually fight and win. And I fell in with a group of Republicans and some Democrats who felt the same way and wanted to work together on issues of significance for the country and for our respective states.”

But what garnered Romney heavy booing two years ago and a near censure from the Utah GOP was his vote in 2020 that made him the first senator in U.S. history to vote to convict a president of his own party in an impeachment trial. Romney voted to convict Trump on House charges that he had abused his power by urging the president of Ukraine to investigate then-candidate Biden. He voted to acquit on a separate charge that Trump had obstructed the impeachment investigation.

Romney did it again in the weeks after the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, becoming one of seven Republicans to vote to convict Trump of incitement of insurrection.

Stan Lockhart, a former chair of the Utah Republican Party, said that while Romney’s votes in the impeachment trials drew a “huge negative outpouring,” he thinks that, nearly two years later, some of the support for Trump has softened and the hostility has “mellowed.”

“I think there are people today that were not big fans of Mitt Romney after that impeachment vote who like him better today,” Lockhart said.

Romney said he doesn’t have a measure of whether the backlash has eased, but said he was following an oath he took “to apply impartial justice.”

“People elect you and then you follow your conscience,” he said. “It would be sad if people who got elected to office tried to calculate their decisions based upon how popular it was at home. They have to do what they feel is absolutely right and then live with the consequences of that.”

No GOP challenger has stepped forward to run against Romney, but several prominent Utah Republicans are seen as potential candidates and at least one major conservative group is looking at spending in the race.

The anti-tax group Club For Growth, which used the phrase “Mitt Romney Republican” in attack ads in 2022, said the Utah Senate race is one where its political super PAC could likely get involved, throwing heft behind a conservative challenger.

“Even if he stays, I think there’s a desire among conservatives to have a real choice in Utah,” said Club For Growth President David McIntosh. “If somebody steps forward and is a credible candidate, we would definitely take a look at that.”

Former U.S. Rep. Jason Chaffetz, who gained the national spotlight leading the House Oversight committee through aggressive investigations of Hillary Clinton, said he is considering a campaign.

“I do think about it. It’s not something I’m working on,” Chaffetz said in an interview. “It’s something I don’t think I need to decide right now and consequently I haven’t.”

He declined to say whether he thinks Romney is vulnerable but said, “I don’t think anybody should ever assume that they will continue to be there in perpetuity.”

Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes, a Republican and staunch Trump ally, is among those seen as a potential challenger. Reyes’ longtime political consultant Alan Crooks told the AP last year that Reyes was getting pressure to run and was well-positioned but wouldn’t say if he would launch a campaign.

The Western state allows candidates to secure a spot on the primary election ballot by collecting voter signatures — something a well-funded or popular candidate can generally do with ease — or by winning the support of 4,000 conservative-leaning delegates at the state GOP party convention.

Romney is unlikely to win the support of delegates — he didn’t in 2018 — and the impeachment votes made it worse.

“Trump is still very popular among the base,” Utah GOP Chair Carson Jorgensen said. “Many Republicans felt it was a waste of time and taxpayer dollars to vote for impeachment.”

In a primary election, where a larger pool of more moderate and independent Republicans cast ballots, the race is seen as Romney’s to lose.

Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, had long been among the most popular figures in Utah by the time he moved to the state after his unsuccessful 2012 presidential campaign.

A Brigham Young University graduate, Romney was brought on to help the 2002 Winter Olympics in Utah, turning the games that had been overshadowed by a bribery scandal into a successful showcase for the small Western state. As the Republican presidential nominee a decade later, he became the most visible member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a faith to which more than half of Utah residents belong.

The church’s culture of decorum made the state a place where Trump, with his brazen personality and comments about women and people of color, initially received a chilly reception, losing the state’s 2016 caucuses.

Romney that year delivered a scathing speech against Trump, deeming him a “fraud” who was unfit to be president, but later warmed to him and accepted his endorsement during his Senate campaign.

Kirk Jowers, the former chairman and general counsel of Romney’s leadership PACs who remains in touch with Romney, said he has positioned himself at the center of much of what goes on in Washington and probably feels “that he has an incredibly important role to play in our state’s and our country’s and his party’s affairs.”

“I think it would be incredibly difficult for him to walk away from that role as things stand right now,” Jowers said.

Romney said he found it “fun” to get things passed in Washington but said he doesn’t “understand someone who just wants to stay in the Senate.”

“I had a life before I came here, and I’ll have a life after I go,” Romney said. “And I came to actually do things and I’ve been part of a group that allowed me to do that.”

___

Price reported from New York. Associated Press writer Sam Metz in Salt Lake City contributed to this report.

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Today in History

Today is Friday, Feb. 17, the 48th day of 2023. There are 317 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On Feb. 17, 1801, the U.S. House of Representatives broke an electoral tie between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr, electing Jefferson president; Burr became vice president.

On this date:

In 1815, the United States and Britain exchanged the instruments of ratification for the Treaty of Ghent, ending the War of 1812.

In 1863, the International Red Cross was founded in Geneva.

In 1864, during the Civil War, the Union ship USS Housatonic was rammed and sunk in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina, by the Confederate hand-cranked submarine HL Hunley in the first naval attack of its kind; the Hunley also sank.

In 1897, the forerunner of the National PTA, the National Congress of Mothers, convened its first meeting in Washington.

In 1944, during World War II, U.S. forces invaded Eniwetok Atoll, encountering little initial resistance from Imperial Japanese troops. (The Americans secured the atoll less than a week later.)

In 1959, the United States launched Vanguard 2, a satellite that carried meteorological equipment.

In 1964, the Supreme Court, in Wesberry v. Sanders, ruled that congressional districts within each state had to be roughly equal in population.

In 1972, President Richard M. Nixon departed the White House with his wife, Pat, on a historic trip to China.

In 1988, Lt. Col. William Higgins, a Marine Corps officer serving with a United Nations truce monitoring group, was kidnapped in southern Lebanon by Iranian-backed terrorists (he was later slain by his captors).

In 1995, Colin Ferguson was convicted of six counts of murder in the December 1993 Long Island Rail Road shootings (he was later sentenced to a minimum of 200 years in prison).

In 2014, Jimmy Fallon made his debut as host of NBC’s “Tonight Show.”

In 2015, Vice President Joe Biden opened a White House summit on countering extremism and radicalization, saying the United States needed to ensure that immigrants were fully included in the fabric of American society to prevent violent ideologies from taking root at home.

Ten years ago: Danica Patrick won the Daytona 500 pole, becoming the first woman to secure the top spot for any Sprint Cup race. (Patrick covered the 2½-mile Superspeedway in 45.817 seconds, averaging 196.434 mph. A week later, Jimmie Johnson won the race, while Patrick finished eighth.) The Western Conference beat the East 143-138 in the NBA All-Star game played in Houston. Mindy McCready, 37, who’d hit the top of U.S. country music charts before personal problems sidetracked her career, died by her own hand in Heber Springs, Arkansas.

Five years ago: President Donald Trump’s national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, told a conference in Germany that there was now “incontrovertible” evidence of a Russian plot to disrupt the 2016 U.S. election; the statement stood in stark contrast to Trump’s claim that Russian interference in his election victory was a hoax. Japan’s Yuzuru Hanyu made Olympic figure skating history in the men’s free skate event in South Korea, becoming the first man to repeat as Olympic champion since Dick Button in 1952.

One year ago: U.S. President Joe Biden warned that Russia could still invade Ukraine within days and Russia expelled the No. 2 diplomat at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, as tensions flared anew in the worst East-West standoff in decades. (Russia would invade Ukraine three days later.) Anna Shcherbakova won a stunning gold medal in women’s figure skating at the Beijing Games, while Russian teammate Kamila Valieva tumbled all the way out of the medals after a mistake-filled end to her controversial Olympics.

Today’s Birthdays: Actor-comedian Barry Humphries (aka “Dame Edna”) is 89. Actor Christina Pickles is 88. Football Hall of Famer Jim Brown is 87. Actor Brenda Fricker is 78. Actor Becky Ann Baker is 70. Actor Rene Russo is 69. Actor Richard Karn is 67. Actor Lou Diamond Phillips is 61. Basketball Hall of Famer Michael Jordan is 60. Actor-comedian Larry, the Cable Guy is 60. TV personality Rene Syler is 60. Movie director Michael Bay is 59. Singer Chante Moore is 56. Rock musician Timothy J. Mahoney (311) is 53. Actor Dominic Purcell is 53. Olympic gold and silver medal skier Tommy Moe is 53. Actor Denise Richards is 52. Rock singer-musician Billie Joe Armstrong (Green Day) is 51. Actor Jerry O’Connell is 49. Country singer Bryan White is 49. Actor Kelly Carlson is 47. Actor Ashton Holmes is 45. Actor Conrad Ricamora is 44. Actor Jason Ritter is 43. TV personality Paris Hilton is 42. Actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt is 42. TV host Daphne Oz is 37. Actor Chord Overstreet is 34.

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The panel recommended that the district attorney “seek appropriate indictments for such crimes where the evidence is compelling.” In addition to the section on perjury, the report’s introduction and conclusion were released Thursday. But any recommendations on potential criminal charges for specific people will remain under wraps for now.

Despite Trump’s persistent contentions, the grand jurors found “by a unanimous vote that no widespread fraud took place in the Georgia 2020 presidential election that could result in overturning the election.”

McBurney wrote in his order that it’s not appropriate to release the full report now because it’s important to protect the due process rights of people for whom the grand jury recommended charges.

The special grand jury, which was requested by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis to aid her investigation, did not have the power to issue indictments. Instead, its report contains recommendations for Willis, who will ultimately decide whether to seek one or more indictments from a regular grand jury.

The grand jurors were seated in May, began receiving evidence in June and submitted their report to McBurney on Dec. 15. The report’s introduction says an “overwhelming majority” of the information that the grand jury received “was delivered in person under oath.”

Trump and his allies have made unproven claims of widespread voter fraud and have repeatedly berated Raffensperger and Kemp for not acting to overturn his loss. State and federal officials, including Trump’s attorney general, have consistently said the election was secure and there was no evidence of significant fraud.

“All I want to do is this: I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have,” Trump said during that call. “Because we won the state.”

Trump has said repeatedly that his call with Raffensperger was “perfect,” and he told the AP last month that he felt “very confident” that he would not be indicted.

Based on witnesses called to testify before the special grand jury, it is clear that Willis is focusing on several areas. Those include:

— False allegations of election fraud made during meetings of state legislators at the Georgia Capitol in December 2020.

Willis last summer sent letters informing some people, including Giuliani and the state’s 16 fake electors, that they could face criminal charges.

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