In our latest edition, we have interviews with the chair and co-chair of the RNC, Rep. Mike Collins and Derrick Anderson, a bizarre saga about an ad run by House Democrats, op-eds from Reps. Mike Bost, Burgess Owens, Mike Rogers, and much more!
By: Matthew Foldi
Michael Whatley, the head of the Republican Party is “cautiously optimistic” heading into Election Day, he told the Washington Reporter. “When you look at where we are with voter registration, where we are with early voting, the absentee voting, and layer on the polling, along with all of the other metrics that we care about, the number of volunteers, the number of doors that are being knocked, the number of phone calls that are being made, how many people we’ve got who are requesting absentee ballots, all of those factors,” Whatley said.
Whatley’s co-chair at the Republican National Committee (RNC), Lara Trump, added that “we’ve seen a lot of great early vote totals, especially for Republicans, right now. And it’s really historic. We’ve never seen something quite like this. And so I think assuming we continue this trajectory, and then we know that typically, the Republican voters come out big on Election Day, I think that that’s what we’re hoping to see happen.”
Less than two weeks out from Election Day, the pair described the stakes of the presidential election, the importance of Donald Trump going on the Joe Rogan Experience, how they’ve seen their home state of North Carolina rally after a devastating hurricane, and much more, in a joint interview with the Washington Reporter.
Click HERE to hear more from RNC Chair and Co-Chair, Michael Whatley and Lara Trump, including their thoughts on whether they want to run for office themselves.
We’re under two weeks out. What are the most realistic paths that you are looking at to 270 electoral votes?
Matthew Foldi
Editor-in-Chief of the Washington Reporter
There are seven battleground states that are really essentially going to decide the election. The traditional math holds that you got to get four of those seven. We’re talking Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan. But if you win Georgia, North Carolina and Pennsylvania, then that’s where you need to be. That’s probably the most direct path that we’ve got through it right now. And when you look at where we are with voter registration, where we are with early voting, the absentee voting, and layer on the polling, along with all of the other metrics that we care about, the number of volunteers, the number of doors that are being knocked, the number of phone calls that are being made, how many people we’ve got who are requesting absentee ballots, all of those factors. We’re cautiously optimistic. We feel great in terms of all seven, frankly, of those battleground states right now.
Michael Whatley
RNC Chair
There have been three attempted assassination attempts on your father-in-law over the past four months. What was it like just talking with your kids about this?
Matthew Foldi
Editor-in-Chief of the Washington Reporter
This was the hardest thing for me and for Eric. Our kids are young. Our kids, at the time, were four and six at the time. And so I don’t want to burden them with all of the heavy nature of this, but I did need them to know before the convention that something had happened to grandpa’s ear, because I knew they were going to see him. When my four year old daughter said to me, ‘why would someone try to hurt grandpa?’ it just went straight to my heart. It’s devastating. It’s completely unacceptable and just kind of crazy that we found ourselves in this space. This is a man who I think just defies all logic for so many people. There are so many others who one of the things that have happened, one impeachment, one indictment, one assassination attempt would have been enough, but the fact that he’s still in this and still going strong and has let nothing deter him, it really shows you his character, and I think he also knows that he truly was made for such a time as this. He understands the gravity of what’s going on, not just for our country, but for the world. And he knows he can do the job. He’s done it once before. And I think he really knows that God spared his life on July 13, and it’s because God is not finished with him, and Donald Trump is not finished with this country. He still has plenty of work to do, and I think that will be apparent in his second term.
Lara Trump
RNC Co-Chair
FREDERICKSBURG, Va. — Rep. Mike Collins (R., Ga.) is spending the final days of the 2024 campaign meeting voters where they are: online, at home, at community barbecues, and more. The first-term lawmaker is no stranger to grassroots campaigning; Collins gave his first political speech in 4th grade, when he asked his classmates to tell their parents to elect his father, a former Congressman, to local office.
The Washington Reporter caught up with Collins in Fredericksburg, Virginia, where he was campaigning for Republican Derrick Anderson in one of the cycle’s most competitive House races. After liberal podcaster Rachel Vindman mocked a failed assassination attempt against Donald Trump, Collins tweeted that he would soon “be in #VA07 knocking doors for @DerrickforVA to ensure this lady’s brother-in-law does not make it to Congress.”
Collins added Anderson’s race to a group of districts where he planned to deploy his retail politicking skills to help expand the GOP’s slim majority. Anderson, a homegrown candidate running against Eugene Vindman, an MSNBC staple who carpetbagged to the district, is what Collins looks for in a potential colleague: “I wanted to somebody I could work with, somebody who’s very conservative, who has Judeo-Christian values…[and somebody who] is America First, period.”
FREDERICKSBURG, Va. — Derrick Anderson, the Republican nominee for Congress in one of the most expensive elections in America, grew up “about 15 minutes, depending on traffic,” from his campaign headquarters. His opponent, Democrat Eugene Vindman, grew up “many thousands of miles” away, Anderson told the Washington Reporter.
Both men are military veterans, but their similarities end there. Vindman is an MSNBC regular who is misspelling counties in Virginia’s 7th District with days until the election; and “he lied about his military record. He said that he was a colonel when he’s not,” Anderson said. Anderson, a combat veteran, is a former Green Beret who helped pass legislation “just by beating down the doors of members of Congress” following a catastrophic friendly fire incident that killed five soldiers in Afghanistan in 2014.
What we’re hearing from people we trust on and around the Hill – please send us more tips!
Democrats have canceled ad buys worth more than seven figures in Wisconsin, Montana, and Pennsylvania, as polls show the party’s dwindling shot at winning House races in those states. Reps. Bryan Steil (R., Wis.), Ryan Zinke (R., Mont.), and Brian Fitzpatrick (R., Penn.) are all leading in polls, causing Democratic groups like House Majority PAC (HMP) and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) to pull previously-commissioned ad buys.
Some of those funds were redirected to an ad buy worth up to $4 million in New Jersey, where polling consistently shows Rep. Tom Kean (R., N.J.) leading his opponent, former defund the police activist Sue Altman. “Two big wins for Democratic Election Twitter today in their prolonged effort to try to bully Chuck Schumer’s WinSenate to start spending in the #TXSen race and House Majority PAC to start spending in #NJ07,” election analyst Rob Pyers wrote of the buy.
For generations, North Carolina farmers have farmed tobacco. But a little-known candidate running for a statewide office in the Tar Heel State could devastate North Carolina’s tobacco and corn, industry experts caution.
Sarah Taber, who is running to be North Carolina’s Commissioner of Agriculture, “wants to push her state away from tobacco production,” according to Investigate Midwest. “We have a state where tobacco doesn’t make money anymore and no one’s thought of anything else because that’s been the focus of our leadership,” Taber said.
The state’s farming community cautions that if Taber wins, America will quickly suffer the consequences. Peter Daniel, the NC Ag Partnership Chairman, told the Washington Reporter that “Dr. Sarah Taber’s views are far outside the mainstream and out of touch with North Carolina farms.” Daniel’s organization is a non-profit that focuses on strengthening the economic viability of farmers, businesses, and their communities.
Daniel, who has worked in agriculture policy for almost half a century, added that “Taber’s schemes to replace traditional crops like tobacco and corn in favor of products that often cannot receive crop insurance is a disaster for North Carolina’s family farms. If Taber is elected, the entire country would suffer a shortage of North Carolina’s agriculture production due to her incompetence.”
Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) defended Elon Musk and the billionaire’s America PAC against the Department of Justice (DOJ) this week, in a letter obtained exclusively by the Washington Reporter. Cotton asked the DOJ to retract the “ill-considered handiwork of partisan killjoys.”
“I write regarding reports that the Department of Justice has warned Elon Musk’s America PAC that its sweepstakes may violate federal law,” Cotton wrote to Attorney General Merrick Garland. “I’m not convinced that America PAC has run afoul of the law, but I’m very concerned that the Biden-Harris administration has once again singled out center-right Americans like Mr. Musk for political retribution while turning a blind eye to liberal-leaning groups engaged in similar behavior.”
Click HERE to read Tom Cotton’s letter to Merrick Garland.
Rebecca Cooke, a Democratic candidate for Congress, “pocketed almost 200 grand electing Democrat extremists,” a new ad from the Congressional Leadership Fund (CLF) super PAC says, criticizing the candidate’s history of raising millions of dollars for far-left Democrats across the country.
Cooke’s company, Cooke Strategy, was paid for work on Democratic campaigns for years — and Republicans are now attacking her previous support for radical Democrats, even though her current bid for Congress is backed by more moderate party members.
“Liberal Rebecca Cooke [has] cooked up quite a story about herself,” the CLF ad says. “The truth: Cooke is a slick political operative who pocketed almost 200 grand electing Democrat extremists. Cooke supported radicals pushing open borders, defunding police, and ending cash bail. No wonder New York radical AOC is spending big money electing radicals like Cooke.”
📢First TV ad in #WI03: Here’s the truth about @RebeccaforWI.
Cooke is a slick political operative who:
– Pocketed nearly $200K electing Dem extremists
– Backed open-borders & defund-the-police radicals pic.twitter.com/P8L4Kdz98c— Congressional Leadership Fund (@CLFSuperPAC) October 18, 2024
Polling suggests that the Republicans’ attacks on Cooke are working. CLF’s latest polling shows her Republican opponent leading 49 percent to 44 percent.
West Virginia Treasurer Riley Moore has donated almost $400,000 to Republican candidates up and down the ballot.
Moore, who is poised to claim an open House seat in West Virginia, first shared his fundraising outlays with the Washington Reporter. They include $125,000 in donations directly to the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), $166,800 in direct contributions across 72 candidates and committees, $53,400 bundled specifically for Reps. Tom Cole (R., Okla.) and Tom Emmer (R., Minn.), and $41,740.50 in WinRed conduit fundraising to 27 candidates and committees.
Moore has also sent money to incumbents Reps. Don Bacon (R., Neb.), Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R., Ore.), and Derrick Van Orden (R., Wis.), and to challengers George Logan in Connecticut and Neil Parrott in Maryland.
“Maintaining the House majority isn’t enough,” Moore told the Reporter. “We need to expand our majority in the House, win back the Senate, and put President Trump back in the White House so we can actually get things done for the American people. That’s why I’m working hard to help Republicans all across the nation win.”
In this election, Vice President Kamala Harris is pulling out all the stops to win over Black Americans. But let’s be clear: her Opportunity Agenda for Black Men is not just patronizing; it’s also an insult to our intelligence.
This last-minute sales pitch is the same worn-out script the Democratic Party has used on the Black community for decades. It offers promises like reparations, knowing that these empty and demeaning policies have no connection to reality.
Here’s the reality: Over the last four years, the Biden-Harris administration has repeatedly failed to deliver on its promises to the Black community, instead turning to misery as a political strategy. Look no further than their inflationary spending policies, open borders, and defund the police agenda.
When Benjamin Franklin was asked what kind of government the Constitutional Convention had created, his response became legend: “A republic, if you can keep it.” His words, spoken over two centuries ago, still ring true today. The survival of our system of government rests on the trust in, and integrity of, our elections.
Throughout our nation’s history, there have been fateful moments when the security and integrity of our elections were called into question — defining moments that shifted the course of America. In 1876, our country was thrown into chaos due to a dispute over electoral votes in one of our closest presidential races ever. It took a special electoral commission and a compromise on post-Civil War era Reconstruction to resolve the crisis, but public confidence in the election process was deeply shaken.
More recently, in the election of 2000, an incredibly tight race in Florida between George W. Bush and Al Gore — along with disputes over the ever-remembered “hanging chads” — delayed election results for weeks.
Now, in the age of social media and 24-hour news, we are potentially facing an election result that’s closer than ever. With that comes significant challenges, especially at a time when many Americans already distrust the process. I believe it’s mission critical to do absolutely everything possible to earn back the trust of the American people before the polls close on November 5.
Since I started my campaign to serve Michigan in the United States Senate, I’ve talked to thousands and thousands of Michiganders from every corner of our state. The messages I’ve received are heartbreaking.
I met a mother in West Michigan who told me that even though she works part time and her husband works full time, she has been forced to go to a food bank for the last few days of the month to feed her family, due to rising grocery prices caused by wasteful spending by Kamala Harris and Elissa Slotkin.
I talked to a deputy sheriff whose daughter died when she was exposed to fentanyl after smoking marijuana, all because of the wide open southern border. Harris and Slotkin have been in power, yet have done little to make our streets secure or to keep our children safe.
General John Pershing famously said that “infantry wins battles, logistics wins wars.” Our superior logistics — the ability to plan, produce, and deliver military supplies — helped us win the Civil War, both World Wars, and ultimately established America as the leading world power.
However, decades of neglect have transformed defense logistics into a glaring weakness, putting our national security at risk. The current state of our defense industrial base and supply chains projects vulnerabilities to both our allies and adversaries.
As the CEO of a company that delivers wartime and emergency products to our allies who need them the most, I have seen these challenges firsthand. Here is what went wrong — and how we can get back on track.
