INSIDE D.C. WITH JOHN GIZZI NEWSMAX WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT
HOUSE SPEAKER ANGERS OHIO REP. • In a surprise move, Rep. Mike Turner was ousted in January as chairman of the House Intelligence Committee by Speaker Mike Johnson. Still fuming, the Ohio Republican is now telling friends he will never support Johnson as speaker again — a serious threat, given that the House GOP majority is at a historical low (217 Republicans, 215 Democrats, and three vacancies) and Johnson could easily lose a new challenge to his speakership. Turner, 65, a onetime mayor of Dayton, is likely to retire next year, after 12 years in the House. In such a scenario, his successor would almost certainly be friend and fellow conservative Niraj Antani, a former state senator. Antani, the first Indian American in the Ohio Senate, currently is running for secretary of state.
WAR ON ‘WOKE GENERALS’ • No sooner had he been sworn in as secretary of defense than Pete Hegseth began working immediately on his goal of replacing “woke generals” with younger brass who are more attuned with his vision of restoring the “combat ethos.” Hegseth is already eyeing possibilities to replace Gen. C.Q. Brown Jr., chairman of the Joint
44 NEWSMAX | MARCH 2025
Chiefs of Staff, and Army Chief of Staff Randy George — both of whom are Biden appointees and whose terms run out in the fall of 2027.
VANCE BACKS OHIO GOV. HOPEFUL • Finished with the fledgling Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in Washington, D.C., Vivek Ramaswamy is likely to run for governor of Ohio next year. Speculation is rife Vice President JD Vance will likely endorse him over GOP front-runner and state Attorney General Dave Yost. Ramaswamy, a wealthy biotech entrepreneur and failed 2024 presidential hopeful, has assembled a team that includes veterans of Vance’s winning 2022 Senate race. Among them are Jai Chabria, a close adviser to Vance and former GOP Gov. John Kasich; and Michael Biundo, who worked on Ramaswamy’s 2024 presidential campaign and managed former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum’s 2012 presidential bid.
BOTH PARTIES EYE CHALLENGE TO N.Y. GOVERNOR • Strong evidence continues to mount that, at age 38 and after two terms in the House, Republican Mike Lawler will run for governor of New York next year. Lawler already
is taking shots on social media at Democrat Gov. Kathy Hochul, blasting her for her recent budget- busting $252 billion spending plan. Lawler clearly would like to run against the Democrat he calls “the most inept, feckless governor in New York history,” but there are increasing questions about whether Hochul, who won in ’22 by an unusually close 53%-47%, will run again. Already Rep. Ritchie Torres is strongly
considering a gubernatorial bid, positioning himself as a pro-Israel, moderate Democrat. Torres represents the South Bronx, one of the poorest and smallest congressional districts in the country. He recently attacked Hochul for financial mismanagement of a state program for children with autism and other disabilities in an open letter, charging that she has “broken the broken system to an extent not seen before.”
Trump-Putin Summit
• Expect President Donald Trump to sit down with Vladimir Putin sometime within the next six months for a wide-ranging summit. With candidate Trump promising he would end the Russia-Ukraine War “on my first day” as president, Trump has more recently said it may take longer to get Putin and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to agree to a ceasefire. Although Trump’s generally kind words about Putin worry some kremlinologists, the president is sure to have at his side hardline National Security Advisor Mike Waltz. As a Florida congressman, Waltz was an outspoken critic of the Biden administration’s handling of the Ukraine conflict and frequently warned of Putin’s threats to use weapons of mass destruction to win the war. One city increasingly discussed as a site for the summit is Vienna. Trump is reportedly intrigued by the fact the city was the site of the first summit of President John Kennedy and Soviet strongman Nikita Khrushchev in 1961. In addition, Austria’s populist Chancellor-designate Herbert Kickl is an admirer of both Trump and Putin and would no doubt love to host both of them in Vienna.
JIM WATSON, EMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
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