President-elect Donald Trump has wasted little time in naming top White House and Cabinet officials to serve in his administration as he prepares to be sworn in for a second term in January.

It remains to be seen, however, who Trump will pick to head up his Justice Department, perhaps one of the most important vacancies to be filled in the next administration. 

Early contenders for the post include sitting U.S. senators, former Justice Department personnel and at least one top White House adviser from Trump’s first term.

Though each would bring widely different backgrounds and perspectives to the position, they all share one common trait: loyalty to the president-elect and a willingness to back his agenda and policies over the next four years. 

As the U.S. awaits a formal announcement from the president-elect, here are some of the top names being floated for the role of U.S. attorney general.

Sen. Mike Lee, R- Utah, is considered to be a more conventional pick to head up the Justice Department. Lee is a high-ranking Republican in the chamber and would face a somewhat easy path to Senate confirmation, at least compared to some of the more controversial names that have surfaced.

But he may not be gunning for the role.

The Utah Republican told reporters last week that while he has been in frequent conversations with Trump’s transition team, he plans to focus his sway in the Republican-majority Senate on helping gin up support for Trump’s Cabinet nominees and helping select the Senate majority leader, a leadership election in which Lee, as current chair of the Senate Steering Committee, is poised to a play a major role.

‘I have the job I want,’ Lee told the Deseret News in an interview. ‘And I look forward to working in the next Congress and with President Trump and his team to implement his agenda and the reform agenda that Republicans have offered and campaigned on, and it’s going to be an exciting time. We’ve got a lot of work to do.’

Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe is among the top names being considered to head up the Justice Department. 

Ratcliffe, a former federal prosecutor and a former U.S. representative from Texas, earned the spotlight during Trump’s first term for his outspoken criticism of the FBI and of the special counsel investigation overseen by Robert Mueller.

Trump tapped Ratcliffe in 2019 to replace Dan Coates as the Director of National Intelligence. The following year, he was tapped by the outgoing president to be a member of his impeachment team.

Former White House attorney Mark Paoletta served during Trump’s first term as counsel to then-Vice President Mike Pence and to the Office of Management and Budget.

Paoletta is also already working on the Trump transition team, including helping steer Justice Department policy in the next Trump administration, making him a potentially natural fit for the role.

Paoletta also made clear Monday that if tapped to head up the Justice Department, he would not tolerate any resistance to Trump’s agenda by career prosecutors and other nonpolitical officials.

In a lengthy post on the social media site, X, Paoletta said career employees are ‘required to implement the President’s plan’ after an election, even ones they may consider unethical or illegal. 

‘If these career DOJ employees won’t implement President Trump’s program in good faith, they should leave,’ Paoletta said, noting that employees who engage in so-called ‘resistance’ to Trump’s agenda would be guilty of ‘subverting American democracy’ and subject to ‘disciplinary measures, including termination.’

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey is also among the names floated to lead the Department of Justice. Bailey was tapped by Missouri Gov. Mike Parson in 2022 to be the state’s top prosecutor after then-state Attorney General Eric Schmitt was elected to the U.S. Senate.

Since taking over the state AG’s office, Bailey has led dozens of lawsuits against the Biden administration and sought to defend the state on a number of conservative issues as well. 

Those familiar with Bailey’s ascent say his lower-profile career could be an asset as a possible U.S. attorney general, especially since the role requires Senate confirmation. He could be aided here by Sens. Josh Hawley and Eric Schmitt, two Missouri Republicans who also served as state attorney general before their Senate service.

Since neither appear to be seeking the role of the top U.S. prosector, they could play a key role in stumping for Bailey in the Senate if his name does come up for consideration.

Former Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker temporarily led the Justice Department after Trump fired former Attorney General Jeff Sessions during his first term.

Asked last week in a Fox News interview whether he wants the role, Whitaker declined to answer, saying that the decision is Trump’s to make. 

‘He’s going to want someone who he knows, likes and trusts,’ Whitaker said. ‘He’s going to want someone who was there from the beginning,’ he added, and who can help defend against what Whitaker described as ‘all this lawfare nonsense.’ 

The Trump transition team did not immediately respond to Fox News’s request for comment as to who remains on its list of candidates to lead the Justice Department.

Every winning presidential campaign features a lot of GOATS (greatest of all time), while those on the losing side are ridiculed as old goats, grumpy goats, and scapegoats. The macro narrative gets set, with the victors hailed as geniuses who played a clever long game and came together with brilliant tactics and strategies to make it happen, while the vanquished get painted with a broad brush of incompetence, infighting, and failure.

While it is the candidates who matter most in determining who wins our quadrennial contests for the Oval Office, the advisers, staffers, and supporters are in fact an invaluable part of the strange organism that is a presidential effort.

Team Trump, led by campaign captains Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita, and championed by such prominent backers such as Elon Musk, Tulsi Gabbard, and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., is currently on an earned victory lap, lauded for the crafting and execution of a plan that led to a smashing success.

Outside that spotlighted inner circle are scores of others who contributed mightily, from surrogates, to donors, to staffers, to state directors.

One could fill a book with fascinating profiles of these often unsung stars who played significant roles in the Trump-Vance triumph.

Based on conversations with a range of sources in and around Team Trump, here’s a starting look at four folks among the many women and men who, below the radar, helped drive Trump’s GOAT historic comeback:

1. James Blair, Trump campaign political director

Blair took charge of a budget that, while sizable, was smaller than that of the Harris campaign, and transformed it into a formidable turn-out-the-vote grassroots operation in the battleground states.  He also took on two complex tasks: building a system to reach and turn out low-propensity voters and using a new legal ruling that allowed the campaign to closely coordinate with well-funded but inexperienced outside groups for voter mobilization.  

Blair remained calm, cool, and analytical in the face of doubts from the media, the Democrats, and even his own party that he would succeed. 

Although there was some secret sauce in the political director’s jambalaya, he was, in fact, remarkably open about his strategy, notable during several pre-election long-form interviews in which he displayed the classic assured operative’s mix of humility and confidence.

2. Lee Zeldin, former New York congressman

After running a strong race for governor of the Empire State in 2022 and coming up just short, Zeldin took his newfound expertise in turning out those infrequent voters that Trump was counting on by heading the turnout operation of America First Works. It was a low-profile voter program (compared to those of Musk and Charlie Kirk) but one that nonetheless proved to be an effective get-out-the-vote operation based on rigorous metrics and grassroots focus. The group’s own data suggests that its efforts were remarkably efficient, turning out a very high percentage of the voters its workers targeted. 

Zeldin is that rare person who has both served in elective office and has the soul and vision of a top political operative. His determination and loyalty to Trump has landed him a position in the new administration as EPA administrator. 

3. Walt Nauta, assistant to Donald Trump

After being caught up in Jack Smith’s investigation of the Mar-a-Lago documents case, Nauta stayed physically close and personally loyal to Trump, continuing to serve as a super valet, anticipating the former president’s needs, fulfilling requests, and providing nonstop practical and material comfort to the on-the-go candidate.  

The former chief petty officer from Guam has a demeanor similar to that of Trump sidekick Dan Scavino: a calming voice and subtle influence, always in the background but forever at hand, serving as a source of Pacific calm for a man who otherwise often leads a life of swirling chaos.

4. Hogan Gidley, campaign strategist

The supreme Trump loyalist and Southern gentleman, with a quick, sharp mind and gracious style, Gidley has been described as ‘assassin but not a viper’ – and that is by his fans.  

For years, he has ventured into hostile on-air territory such as MSNBC, CNN, and CBS News and emerged unrattled and typically victorious.  

During the last three months of the campaign, Gidley fluidly managed the assignment of working with Congressman Mike Johnson to engage the Speaker’s office in some significant legislative and PR fights and beef up defense of the president’s agenda and the president himself, all with a more pugnacious style than the usual mode of the soft-spoken Louisianan.  

Thanks in part to Gidley, Johnson ended the campaign smoothly integrated into the Trump machine, praised publicly by the POTUS-elect, invited to Mar-a-Lago, and prepped for coordinated teamwork when the new administration moves into the White House. 

Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., will reportedly meet with Israeli President Isaac Herzog when he visits the nation’s capital on Tuesday after President-elect Donald Trump named the House Republican Conference chair to be his next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. 

Herzog is expected to meet with multiple high-profile lawmakers in D.C. Tuesday, including President Biden, Sen. Lindsey Graham and Stefanik, his office told The Times of Israel. The meeting with Stefanik comes shortly after Trump said she would be his next ambassador to the United Nations.

On Monday, Trump confirmed reports that he would be nominating the GOP conference chairwoman to be his next U.N. ambassador, noting how she ‘is an incredibly strong, tough, and smart America First fighter.’

Stefanik, the top Republican in the House of Representatives, is also a firm supporter of Israel and has been a leading voice challenging the rising tide of antisemitism on college campuses following the tragic Hamas massacre of innocent Israelis on Oct. 7, 2023. 

Stefanik, for example, made headlines last year after pressing the presidents of three of the nation’s most prestigious colleges to share whether they thought ‘calling for the genocide of Jews’ was against their codes of conduct. Eventually, pressure from Stefanik and other GOP leaders resulted in the presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania resigning.

‘The work ahead is immense as we see antisemitism skyrocketing coupled with four years of catastrophically weak US leadership that significantly weakened our national security and diminished our standing in the eyes of both allies and adversaries,’ Stefanik said in a statement Monday to Fox News Digital after it reached out to confirm her meeting with Herzog, which Stefanik’s spokespeople did not acknowledge. 

‘I stand ready to advance President Donald J. Trump’s restoration of America First peace through strength leadership on the world stage on Day One at the United Nations,’ the future UN ambassador added.

Stefanik will be the first major policymaker to meet with Herzog on Tuesday, with their meeting scheduled at 9 a.m. EST, The Times of Israel reported.

Herzog will then reportedly meet with Graham and Biden afterward.

A spokesperson for Graham told Fox News Digital that their meeting was ‘not yet confirmed’ but that they were working out scheduling.

Herzog’s visit to the U.S. comes amid the Jewish Federations of North America’s General Assembly, held Sunday through Tuesday in the nation’s capital, during which Herzog will be a keynote speaker.    

Fox News Digital reached out to representatives for Stefanik and Herzog but did not hear back prior to publication time.

Two blue state Democrats in Congress issued blistering assessments of where their party stands after Tuesday night’s overwhelming election defeat and offered suggestions about changes that Democrats need to make.

‘That was a cataclysm,’ Connecticut Sen. Chis Murphy posted on X. ‘Electoral map wipeout. Senate D practical ceiling is now 52 seats. R’s is 62.’

‘Time to rebuild the left,’ Murphy wrote. ‘We are out of touch with the crisis of meaning/purpose fueling MAGA. We refuse to pick big fights. Our tent is too small.’

In a lengthy X thread that had more than 7 million views on Monday morning, Murphy said Democrats ‘don’t listen enough; we tell people what’s good for them’ and skip ‘past the way people are feeling (alone, impotent, overwhelmed) and straight to uninspiring solutions (more roads! bulk drug purchasing!) that do little to actually upset the status quo of who has power and who doesn’t.’

Murphy acknowledged a disconnect between everyday working class voters and the ‘elites’ and suggested the party needs to more openly embrace candidates who reject the status quo. 

‘And when progressives like Bernie aggressively go after the elites that hold people down, they are shunned as dangerous populists,’ Murphy wrote. ‘Why? Maybe because true economic populism is bad for our high-income base.’

‘We cannot be afraid of fights – especially with the economic elites who have profited off neoliberalism. The right regularly picks fights with elites – Hollywood, higher ed, etc. Democrats (e.g. the Harris campaign) are tepid in our fights with billionaires and corporations.’

Murphy told his followers that ‘real economic populism should be our tentpole.’

‘Those are hard things for the left,’ Murphy wrote in the final post of the thread. ‘A firm break with neoliberalism. Listen to poor and rural people, men in crisis. Don’t decide for them. Pick fights. Embrace populism. Build a big tent. Be less judgmental. But we are beyond small fixes.’

New York Democrat Rep. Pat Ryan, who won re-election in New York’s 18th Congressional District despite the red wave that swept across most of the country, also put forward a post-mortem on social media that was seen by millions of users.

‘First and foremost, if you’re using the words ‘moderate’ or ‘progressive’ you’re missing the whole f***ing point,’ Ryan wrote on X. ‘It’s not ideological. It’s about who fights for the people vs. who further empowers and enables the elites.’

Ryan explained his take on why he was able to win as a Democrat in a pro-Republican climate and said he ‘put affordability front and center every day.’

‘Most importantly, I told folks exactly who it was that was ripping them off, and I grounded it locally. It’s the billionaires and big corporations making record-breaking profits while the rest of us struggle.’

Ryan wrote, ‘It’s not enough to throw these seemingly disparate policies at people. We must articulate a unifying principle, and clearly tell folks who’s at fault.  For me, it was Freedom. and Patriotism. And the fault lies with the same elites, in both parties, who’ve run this country for far too long.’

Various camps within the Democratic Party have been pointing fingers at each other Democrat presidential candidate Vice President Harris’ loss to President-elect Donald Trump last week.

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders pinned blame for the loss on the Democratic Party for ‘abandoning’ the working class, sparking a rebuke from former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.

‘It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them. While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change,’ Sanders posted to X last week, accompanied by a press release on the election results. ‘And they’re right.’

Pelosi responded that the party has not left the working class behind in favor of kowtowing to ‘big-money interests and well-paid consultants who control the Democratic Party,’ as Sanders had argued in his press release. 

‘With all due respect, and I have a great deal of respect for him [Sanders], for what he stands for, but I don’t respect him saying that the Democratic Party has abandoned the working-class families. That’s where we are,’ Pelosi told the New York Times’ ‘The Interview’ podcast on Saturday.

Fox News Digital’s Emma Colton contributed to this report.

The ‘moral clarity’ that Rep. Elise Stefanik is bringing into her new role as the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations will help fight the organization’s ‘hate and lies,’ Israel’s ambassador to the U.N. said Monday.

The appointment of the New York Republican by President-elect Donald Trump is one of the first personnel moves announced in the early days of his transition period.

‘Congratulations Rep. Elise Stefanik on your nomination as the next U.S. Ambassador to the U.N.,’ Israeli Ambassador Danny Danon wrote on X. ‘At a time when hate and lies fill the halls of the U.N., your unwavering moral clarity is needed more than ever.’ 

Danon is looking forward to ‘working closely with Elise Stefanik on tackling malicious lies at the U.N. advanced by hostile nations while staying unswervingly committed to truth and justice,’ Jonathan Harounoff, Israel’s U.N. spokesperson, told Fox News Digital. 

Trump said in an earlier statement to the New York Post — which was the first to report on Stefanik’s nomination — that ‘Elise is an incredibly strong, tough, and smart America First fighter.’

Stefanik is currently the chairwoman of the House Republican Conference and is the fourth-highest ranking House Republican.  

She was elected to her sixth term in the House last week and previously has made national headlines for grilling the presidents of Ivy League universities about the rising antisemitism on college campuses in the wake of the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks on Israel.  

‘I am truly honored to earn President Trump’s nomination to serve in his Cabinet as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations,’ Stefanik told the New York Post. ‘During my conversation with President Trump, I shared how deeply humbled I am to accept his nomination and that I look forward to earning the support of my colleagues in the United States Senate. President Trump’s historic landslide election has given hope to the American people and is a reminder that brighter days are ahead – both at home and abroad.’  

President-elect Donald Trump’s historic victory was made possible by the broadest coalition of voters the Republican Party has seen in the modern era. On Election Day, our big tent expanded coast to coast and brought in patriotic Americans of all stripes. Many were initially turned away from a Democrat Party that increasingly ignores the concerns of hard-working Americans. But Trump’s leadership, and his agenda for American success, closed the deal.

As Congress returns to Washington, we must prepare the Senate to advance that agenda legislatively and ensure that the president-elect can hit the ground running with his appointees confirmed as soon as possible. The Senate Republican majority will work with President Trump to ensure the Senate calendar allows us to confirm his nominees and pass our shared agenda as quickly and as efficiently as possible.

We have a mandate to govern. With President Trump leading the ticket, Republicans did better than in 2020 in 48 states. We improved our margins in three out of every four counties in the United States and grew support with nearly every demographic group. President Trump won more Hispanic support than any Republican president ever before, and younger voters who have many elections ahead in their lifetimes were crucial to victory. As my colleague Flordia Sen. Marco Rubio describes it, the party is now a ‘multi-ethnic, multi-racial coalition of hard-working Americans who love their country.’ It’s a new day for the GOP – and that’s a very good thing.

We cannot afford to take this coalition for granted. If we fail to deliver on President Trump’s priorities, we will lose their support. They have trusted us with their votes. Now we have to roll up our sleeves and get to work.

At the top of the list is cleaning up the mess left by the Biden-Harris-Schumer agenda, which was clearly repudiated by the American people. The Republican Congress must ensure President Trump has the necessary tools and support to enforce border security laws and to remove the violent criminals wreaking havoc in every state. The Biden-Harris administration caused the border crisis. We will end it.

Next, to make America prosperous again, we must take a hatchet to the regulatory apparatus choking our economy, starting with the 1,000 Biden-Harris regulations that have already cost Americans nearly $2 trillion. Streamlining the bureaucratic machine is long overdue.

Just undoing the damage done by the Biden-Harris-Schumer Democrats is not enough. Americans have endured devastating price increases over the last four years. They have charged us to increase growth and improve take-home pay, which starts by preventing looming tax hikes. They have directed us to restore order to a volatile world through strength, with a military so powerful and mission-focused our adversaries won’t dare to challenge us. And they have given us the green light to restore American energy dominance.

We have an ambitious agenda, and it will take all of us – each and every Republican – working together with President Trump’s leadership to achieve it. If we don’t successfully execute on our mandate, we risk losing the coalition that swept Republicans into office up and down the ballot.

We will have disagreements along the way. When they arise, we must listen to each other and keep working toward serving the people who gave us this mandate. The Democrat Party will shun or cancel anyone who challenges liberal orthodoxy. This Republican Party listens to our voters and celebrates the marketplace of ideas.

If we listen to the voters who made it possible, last week’s red wave can lift our country to new heights.

Taiwan is considering a massive $15 billion military package in a show to the incoming Trump administration that it is serious about defending itself against the threat posed by China. 

Officials from Taipei are already engaged in ‘informal’ talks with the incoming Trump team, according to a report by the Financial Times on Monday; although, as President-elect Donald Trump has yet to fill his cabinet, it is unclear who is engaging in these alleged discussions.

According to the report, Taiwan is considering the purchase of an Aegis-class destroyer – a system described by defense contractor Lockheed Martin as ‘the most capable multi-mission combat system deployed in the world today’ as it integrates air and missile defense.

Taipei is also eyeing other sophisticated equipment when it comes to beefing up its war capabilities, including Northrop Grumman’s E-2D Advanced Hawkeye aircraft, which has been deemed a ‘game changer in how the Navy conducts battle management command and control.’

Fox News Digital could not immediately reach the Trump transition team for comment on the ‘informal’ talks reportedly taking place. 

However, unnamed sources close to the Trump team reportedly said that up to 60 F-35 fighter jets, 10 retired warships and 400 Patriot missiles could make up the substantial package requested by Taiwan.

‘Taiwan is thinking about a package to show that they are serious,’ one former Trump administration official apparently told the Financial Times. ‘Assuming they follow through, they will go to the U.S. national security advisor when they are named and present a very aggressive package of American hardware.’

Fox News Digital could not immediately reach the Taiwanese government for comment, but according to a report by Reuters, Taipei denied that there were ongoing talks with the U.S. about an arms package. 

‘There has been a period of consolidation and discussion between Taiwan and the United States on military needs, but there is no new stage of discussion at this time,’ an official told the outlet.

From the campaign trail, Trump threatened to expand the trade war with China, but it is unclear where he stands when it comes to U.S. defense priorities, particularly in the waters off of mainland China.

Beijing has made it clear it intends to ‘reunify’ Taiwan with mainland China, and U.S. security experts have been sounding the alarm that this could happen as soon as 2027.

President-elect Trump is expected to pick Stephen Miller as deputy chief of staff for policy in his administration. 

Vice President-elect JD Vance posted a message of congratulations to Miller on X Monday morning.

‘This is another fantastic pick by the president,’ Vance wrote, following a CNN report about Trump’s pick. 

Miller was a senior adviser in Trump’s first term. He helped craft many of Trump’s hard-line speeches and plans on immigration. 

Since Trump left office, Miller has served as the president of America First Legal, an organization of former Trump advisers fashioned as a conservative version of the American Civil Liberties Union, challenging the Biden administration, media companies, universities and others over issues such as freedom of speech and religion and national security.

Miller has advocated for mass deportations during a second Trump term. He spoke at Trump’s massive rally at Madison Square Garden in New York City. 

‘I want you to think for a minute about the decades of abuse that has been heaped upon the good people of this nation, their jobs looted and stolen from them and shipped to Mexico, Asia and foreign countries, the lives of their loved ones ripped away from them by illegal aliens, criminal gangs and thugs who don’t belong in this country,’ Miller told the packed Manhattan venue. ‘A political system that punishes working citizens, oppresses them at every turn, takes away the rights of free speech, the right to political expression, the right to fundamental safety in their own country. One man dared to step forward nine years ago and say enough, no more. America gets its future back.’ 

Miller spoke of the indictments and lawsuits Trump has faced, adding that the former president ‘took a bullet for democracy’ – a reference to the assassination attempt against Trump in Butler, Pa. 

He also spoke of high profile cases of illegal immigrant suspects being charged with the rape and murder of women and girls. 

‘He was fighting for your children, for your wives, your husbands, everyone that you love and know in the world the right to live in a country where criminal gangs cannot just cross our border and rape and murder with impunity,’ Miller said of Trump. ‘Think about how corrupt and hateful and evil a system is that allows gangs to come into this country and rape and murder little girls.’ 

The Associated Press contributed to this report. This is a developing story. Check back for updates.