As Republicans circle the wagons around Matt Gaetz and his nomination to be attorney general, Donald Trump and his surrogates have started calling GOP senators to feel them out on the confirmation battle.
The calls are not going well.
According to three sources familiar with the conversations, Trump and his team are receiving an overwhelmingly negative reaction with regard to Gaetz. One of the sources told NOTUS that multiple senators have even told Trump and his team they won’t be voting to confirm.
There has been a healthy amount of skepticism about Gaetz becoming attorney general since the moment Trump announced his nomination. But the recent controversy over an Ethics Committee report that Gaetz dodged by resigning from Congress has only compounded the problems.
“This fake news will age poorly when Matt Gaetz is sworn in as the Attorney General,” said Alex Pfeiffer, a Trump transition spokesperson.
Given the conversations, there’s growing doubt that Gaetz can actually be confirmed — either by the Senate or through a recess appointment.
“Matt Gaetz is toxic among House Republicans. Among Senate Republicans, he is radioactive,” one of the sources told NOTUS.
GOP senators themselves have intimated that Gaetz will have to go through the normal confirmation process and they have expressed that to Trump.
“He’s made it very clear he wants Gaetz confirmed,” Sen. John Cornyn said of Trump on Tuesday. “And I told him that we need to do our vetting process, and that’s what we’re doing.”
Soon-to-be Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee Chuck Grassley — who has jurisdiction over the attorney general confirmation process — told NOTUS that he “had a conversation” with Trump and that Gaetz’s “name came up.” Grassley declined to get into specifics, however.
(After publication Grassely’s office reached out to clarify his comments, saying the Iowa senator meant to say he had spoken with Gaetz about the confirmation process, not Trump.)
Sen. Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming said she had not heard from Trump about Gaetz’s nomination but that she has an “open mind” about him and wants to meet with Gaetz ahead of voting on his confirmation.
“There’s a lot of rumors and innuendo about him living a wild life,” Lummis told NOTUS. “He’s very outspoken. I want to meet with him. I want to ask him a lot of tough questions about some of the things that people just say about him and just take his temperature.”
Despite the increasingly long odds, Trump seems to be plowing forward with the nomination.
Helping him out this week will be Vice President-elect JD Vance, who will be on Capitol Hill with Gaetz to help arrange meetings with key GOP senators ahead of the confirmation battle, according to a source familiar with the matter.
“President Trump’s incoming administration is moving at an accelerated schedule in order to make good on getting key nominees confirmed in order to start delivering for the American people. Rep. Collins (VA), Rep. Gaetz (DOJ), Pete Hegseth (DOD), and Rep. Stefanik (UN) will all begin their meetings this week with additional Hill visits to continue after the Thanksgiving recess,” Brian Hughes, a Trump-Vance transition spokesperson, said in a statement about the meetings on the Hill.
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Reese Gorman is a reporter at NOTUS.