与...的关系里克·克莱因
民主党完全控制华盛顿的最后几天异乎寻常地富有成效，而且按照最近的标准来看，是有序的——关闭的威胁被假日旅游的担忧所淹没。
即使按照不太新的标准，它们也很大程度上与前总统唐纳德·特朗普(Donald Trump)有关。对于在一场并不糟糕的选举后找到团结的民主党人，以及在接管众议院之前分裂再次明显的共和党人来说，情况都是如此。
想想特朗普在最近一届国会任期的最后几天被指责和拒绝的方式。他的税收被揭露出误导性陈述，甚至可能更糟;他在1月6日左右的行为受到了周围人的谴责，加上刑事起诉和选举法的重大变化;乌克兰总统在国会被视为英雄，尽管特朗普的儿子称他为“忘恩负义的国际福利女王”。
特朗普对参议院周四在两党支持下通过的大规模支出法案感到愤怒，预计该法案将于周五在众议院获得最终批准。特朗普对参议院少数党领袖米奇·麦康奈尔(Mitch McConnell)进行了最后一系列侮辱，称他是“绝对的灾难”，他“更像是民主党人，而不是共和党人”。
尽管如此，更多以特朗普为中心的戏剧准备在新的一年上演。众议院共和党领袖凯文·麦卡锡和共和党全国委员会主席罗娜·麦克丹尼尔都需要在下个月击退挑战者，同时两人都因对川普的忠诚过度或不足而受到攻击。
随着2023年即将开始，如果从目标和试金石的角度来看，MAGA运动仍然是令人生畏的。虽然特朗普仍然是2024年唯一的主要共和党总统候选人，但这几乎肯定不会持续下去——这意味着未来几个月的竞选和执政。
四面楚歌的纽约当选众议员乔治·桑托斯周四打破沉默，此前有新闻报道称他捏造了许多背景。
“我有我的故事要讲，下周会讲，”桑托斯在推特上发布。“我想向所有人保证，我将回答你们的问题，我将继续致力于实现我竞选时的目标;公共安全、通货膨胀、教育&更多。"
除了他在花旗集团和高盛任职以及在巴鲁克学院和纽约大学上学的未经证实的说法之外，新的披露使人们对他的遗产和个人生活产生了进一步的疑问。
在竞选活动中，桑托斯声称他的祖父母在大屠杀中幸存下来。但犹太新闻媒体The Forward查阅了家谱信息，发现桑托斯的祖父母出生在巴西。
桑托斯也创造了历史，成为第一个以非现任身份赢得众议院席位的公开同性恋共和党人，但法庭文件显示，他在2019年与一名女子离婚。桑托斯没有公开谈论结婚或离婚，但十月份告诉《今日美国》:“我是公开的同性恋，在过去的十年里，我的性别认同从未有过问题。”
纽约司法部长莱蒂夏·詹姆斯的办公室说，她现在也在调查桑托斯。
国会共和党领导层保持沉默，但地方共和党领导层的声音更大了。
“虽然我已经表示，当选议员应该有合理的时间来回应媒体，但选民应该从桑托斯先生那里得到一个真诚的交代，”拿骚县共和党主席约瑟夫·开罗(Joseph Cairo)说，拿骚县是桑托斯所在选区的一部分。“我会认真倾听，我希望听到乔治·桑托斯有意义的言论。”
亚利桑那州共和党州长候选人卡莉·莱克(Kari Lake)的选举挑战诉讼周四结束，此前他对2022年选举进行了为期两天的重新审查，莱克输掉了这场选举。
与此同时，进行出口民调的大数据民调(Big Data Poll)主任理查德·巴里斯(Richard Nixon)和威斯康星大学(University of Wisconsin)政治学教授肯尼斯·迈耶(Kenneth Mayer)博士提供的证词强调了民调和方法的使用，这是选举的一个关键特征，肯定会在未来几个周期继续受到审查。
巴里斯作证说，根据他的分析，马里科帕县的总体投票率因他所说的选举日超过正常差额而受到抑制，他认为选举因此受到影响。
在交叉询问中，代表亚利桑那州国务卿凯蒂·霍布斯(Katie Hobbs)的律师证实，巴里斯从未在学术场合研究过民调，也没有发表过任何与他的研究领域相关的同行评议研究。迈尔在证词中驳斥了巴里斯的说法，并呼吁关注支持这一说法的细节的缺乏。
“巴里斯先生没有提供任何数据[……]没有利润，没有回应或可能没有回应的人的统计数据，”梅耶尔作证说。
由于对准确性的担忧，大数据民意调查是被FiveThirtyEight的民意调查聚合和分析禁止的11个民意调查团体之一。如同由五月三十八日报道在11月大选之前，缺乏可信的投票是一个令人担忧的政治趋势。
FiveThirtyEight的杰弗里·斯凯利写道:“根据对2010年、2014年、2018年和2022年中期选举周期中从5月初至10月底进行的民意调查的分析，这个较小的馅饼中有很大一部分是由党派民意调查者和/或党派组织进行的。”
Democrats close legislative year with final swipes at Trump: The Note
The TAKE with Rick Klein
The final days of full Democratic control of Washington have been uncommonly productive and, by recent standards, orderly -- with shutdown threats subsumed by holiday-travel worries.
They were also, even by not-so-recent standards, quite a bit about former President Donald Trump. That was the case both for Democrats who have found unity in the wake of an election that wasn't disastrous, and for Republicans whose fissures were again evident right before they take over the House.
Consider the ways in which Trump was rebuked and rebuffed in the last days of the latest congressional term. His taxes were exposed to reveal misleading statements and possibly worse; his actions around Jan. 6 were called out in damning testimony from those around him, plus criminal referrals and a key change in electoral law; Ukraine's president was greeted as a hero in Congress, even as Trump's son labeled him an "ungrateful international welfare queen."
Trump was left raging against the massive spending bill that passed the Senate on Thursday with bipartisan support and is expected to get final approval in the House on Friday. Trump squeezed in a final series of insults against Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, calling him an "absolute disaster" who is "more of a Democrat than a Republican."
For all that, more Trump-centric dramas are ready to play out in the new year. Both House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy and Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel need to fend off challengers for their jobs next month while both get simultaneously attacked for either excessive or insufficient loyalties to Trump.
As 2023 is set to begin, the MAGA movement remains formidable if splintered in terms of its goals and its litmus tests. And while Trump remains the only major Republican candidate for president in 2024, that almost certainly won't last either -- with all that means for campaigning and governing in the months ahead.
Embattled New York Rep.-elect George Santos on Thursday broke his silence after news reports suggested he fabricated many parts of his background.
"I have my story to tell and it will be told next week," Santos posted on Twitter. "I want to assure everyone that I will address your questions and that I remain committed to deliver the results I campaigned on; Public safety, Inflation, Education & more."
In addition to his unverified claims of employment at Citigroup and Goldman Sachs and attendance at Baruch College and New York University, new revelations have raised further questions about his heritage and personal life.
On the campaign trail, Santos claimed his grandparents survived the Holocaust. But Jewish news outlet The Forward reviewed genealogical information and found that Santos' grandparents were born in Brazil.
Santos also made history as the first openly gay Republican to win a House seat as a non-incumbent, but court documents show he was divorced from a woman in 2019. Santos has not publicly spoken about the marriage or divorce but told USA Today in October: "I am openly gay, have never had an issue with my sexual identity in the past decade."
New York Attorney General Letitia James is now also looking into Santos, her office said.
Congressional Republican leadership has remained silent, but local Republican leadership has been more vocal.
"While I have indicated that the Congressman-Elect deserves a reasonable amount of time to respond to the media, voters deserve a sincere accounting from Mr. Santos," said Joseph Cairo, chairman of the Nassau County GOP, which is part of Santos' district. "I will be listening attentively, and I want to hear meaningful remarks from George Santos."
Arizona Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake's election-challenging lawsuit concluded on Thursday after a testy two days of reexamination of the 2022 election, which Lake lost.
Along the way, testimony provided by Richard Baris, the director of Big Data Poll, a group that conducts exit polling, and Dr. Kenneth Mayer, a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin, highlighted the use of polls and methodology, a key feature of elections that are sure to continue to be put under scrutiny in future cycles.
Baris testified that according to his analysis, overall turnout in Maricopa County was depressed by what he said were larger than normal margins on Election Day, and he expressed his belief that the election was impacted as a result.
In the cross-examination, an attorney representing Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs -- who is also the Democratic governor-elect -— established that Baris never studied polling in an academic setting nor had he published any peer-reviewed studies related to his field of study. Mayer refuted Baris' claims in his testimony and called attention to the lack of details to back that claim.
"Mr. Baris has presented no data […] no margins, no demographics of people who responded or may not have responded," Mayer testified.
Big Data Poll is one of 11 polling groups banned from FiveThirtyEight's polling aggregates and analysis due to concerns over accuracy. As reported by FiveThirtyEight ahead of the November election, a lack of credible polling is a concerning trend in politics.
FiveThirtyEight's Geoffrey Skelley wrote: "A larger share of that smaller pie has been conducted by partisan pollsters and/or sponsored by partisan organizations, based on an analysis of polls conducted from early May to late October in the 2010, 2014, 2018 and 2022 midterm election cycles."
