 | By Calder McHugh | Presented by |  |
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| | A maintenance worker uses cleaning product to remove graffiti after Donald Trump's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame was defaced in 2020. | Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images
| STAYING IN THEIR LANE — As Donald Trump ascends to the presidency once again, there are arguments in Washington and among the pundit class about what the contours and the energy of the Trump resistance movement looks like now — and what it should look like. What’s become clear though, in the weeks following his election, is that the cultural nodes of resistance — the segments of society that are not in the direct business of politics — are showing little interest in a repeat of their 2016 post-election activism. That is obvious in Hollywood, Silicon Valley and the wide world of American sports, as culture leaders and titans of industry are self-imposing an old attitude that was a favorite of Fox News’ during the first Trump administration : Shut up and dribble, sing or sell. In 2016, after Trump was first elected, much of Hollywood publicly grieved and insisted that it was their mission to stop Trump. At the time, an outpouring of celebrities took to Twitter and Instagram to express, in large part, their concerns and their grief. In December 2016, a group of celebrities got together to cut an ad that, in a last ditch, obviously doomed effort, pleaded with state electors not to cast their votes for Trump. This year, Hollywood stars don’t want to touch the subject. The film “The Apprentice,” the origin story of Trump that traced his relationship with lawyer Roy Cohn, opened in mid-October to sluggish box office returns after having trouble finding a distributor. But even critical reviews of the movie largely praised actor Sebastian Stan for his pitch perfect performance as Trump, one that went well beyond simple caricature. Still, when Stan was selected by Hollywood trade publication Variety to participate in their “Actors on Actors” series — in which often Oscar-contending actors interview one another about their performances on the year — he ran into a problem: No one wanted to participate alongside him. Stan’s fellow actors (and their agents) had no interest in participating in a discussion that was sure to turn political, even if it could help explain Trump’s psyche to a larger audience. Hollywood remains overwhelmingly liberal, with many celebrities continuing to share their concerns about Trump, though they’re doing it a little bit more quietly now. But up in Silicon Valley and the broader tech world, the sea change among cultural and business leaders has been drastic. Venture capitalists like Marc Andreessen and David Sacks have fully joined the Trump train after being skeptical in 2016. Ditto, of course, for Elon Musk. And even tech leaders who remain liberal, like OpenAI founder Sam Altman, have taken a different tack when discussing the new president. “Tonight we cry, we despair, and we fear,” Altman tweeted in 2016 after the election was called early that Wednesday morning. This year, he posted on X, “congrats to President Trump. I wish for his huge success in the job.” Google parent company Alphabet, whose employees donated the most out of any company to the Harris campaign, banned any personal political speech on an internal message board in the days leading up to the election and after. Outpourings of public grief are no longer allowed or in vogue. On the playing field, the first era of Trump was the high water mark for off the court activism. In the NBA in particular, athletes and coaches such as Doc Rivers, Carmelo Anthony, Steve Kerr and Gregg Popovich were direct about their criticisms of Trump and talked openly about how to explain the 2016 result to their children. After LeBron James called out Trump directly in 2018 — and Fox host Laura Ingraham told him to “Keep the political comments to yourself … shut up and dribble” — James responded by saying “We will definitely not shut up and dribble. ... I mean too much to society, too much to the youth, too much to so many kids who feel like they don’t have a way out.” It was also an era in which the Democratic Party directly courted the help of athletes , crescendoing with a summer of strikes across sports in the wake of the police shooting of Jacob Blake. The same energy didn’t persist into 2024. After Trump’s win, James posted only obliquely about it on social media, with a picture of him and his daughter, writing, “PROMISE TO PROTECT YOU WITH EVERYTHING I HAVE AND MORE!! WE DONT NEED THEIR HELP!” A few days later, he went on a self-proclaimed social media hiatus. Ironically, it remains an open question whether endorsements from celebrities help or hurt Democratic campaigns. Republicans have long complained of a dominant American popular culture that they feel is much more reflective of liberal values than their own, and use that idea to paint the Democratic Party as out of touch elitists. Call it fatigue or capitulation, but those same celebrities are not making nearly the same level of stink about Trump’s victory this time around. Whether that will continue into the next Trump term is unclear, but for now, they’re largely listening to their critics and staying in their lane. Welcome to POLITICO Nightly. Reach out with news, tips and ideas at nightly@politico.com . Or contact tonight’s author at cmchugh@politico.com or on X (formerly known as Twitter) at @calder_mchugh . PROGRAMMING NOTE: Nightly will be off on Thursday (11/28) and Friday (11/29) for Thanksgiving. We will return to our regular schedule on Monday (12/2).
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| | A message from Instagram: Instagram Teen Accounts: automatic protections for teens
Parents want safer online experiences for their teens. That's why Instagram is introducing Teen Accounts, with automatic protections for who can contact teens and the content they can see.
A key factor: Only parents can approve safety setting changes for teens under 16.
Learn more. | | | | | — U.S. exchanges Chinese detainees for three imprisoned Americans : The Biden administration has brokered the release of three Americans by trading them for unidentified Chinese citizens in U.S. custody , according to a senior administration official familiar with the deal. The release of Mark Swidan, Kai Li and John Leung is the result of years of intensive talks between White House and State Department officials and their Chinese counterparts, said the senior administration official, granted anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic negotiations before they’re announced. — Democrats flip House seat in California: Derek Tran, a first-time Democratic candidate, has flipped a toss-up California House seat , narrowly defeating GOP Rep. Michelle Steel, who conceded today after a protracted vote count. Tran had declared victory early this week, and currently leads by roughly 600 votes. Steel, a two-term congressmember, had been an elusive target for Democrats, occupying an Orange County district that had backed President Joe Biden in the 2020 election. The race ended up being the most expensive House battle in the country, with at least $46 million spent by the campaigns and an array of outside groups. — Ohio governor signs bill limiting bathroom use by transgender students : Transgender students from kindergarten through college at Ohio public and private schools will be banned from using multiperson bathrooms that fit their gender identities under a measure that Republican Gov. Mike DeWine said today that he has signed. DeWine signed the law out of public view Tuesday over the objections of Democrats, teachers’ unions and civil rights groups, which had hoped that his objections to a ban on gender-affirming care for minors last year would carry through and prompt another veto. It takes effect in 90 days. The governor issued no statement regarding the signing.
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| | Want to know what's really happening with Congress's make-or-break spending fights? Get daily insider analysis of Hill negotiations, funding deadlines, and breaking developments —free in your inbox with Inside Congress. Subscribe now . | | | | | | | WARTIME CONSIGLIERE — President-elect Donald Trump today named former national security aide and retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg as a special envoy to Russia and Ukraine , commissioning him to lead negotiations to end the war. The move is not likely to allay anxieties among European allies that Trump will attempt to pursue peace between Russia and Ukraine. Western leaders are concerned that Trump’s terms could come at Ukraine’s long-term expense, including by pressuring Kyiv to give up territory or not providing Ukraine with adequate security guarantees to deter Russian aggression in the future. Kellogg, 80, has held a senior foreign policy role at the Trump-aligned America First Policy Institute and in that role has voiced skepticism of U.S. support for Ukraine. TOP CONTENDER — Paul Atkins, a veteran regulator and influential voice on financial policy, is emerging as a leading candidate to chair the Securities and Exchange Commission under President-elect Donald Trump, according to four people familiar with the transition. No final decision has been made, said the people, who were granted anonymity to discuss the private conversations. But Atkins was recently invited to interview with Trump, one of the people said. Trump is expected to announce his pick for Wall Street’s top regulator soon. Atkins, if picked and confirmed, would rejoin the SEC after a 16-year hiatus from the agency. He served as a commissioner from 2002 to 2008, a tenure that began shortly after the Enron and WorldCom accounting scandals and ended just before Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy. JD VANCE’S CINEMATIC UNIVERSE — Politicians have always been defined, at least in part, by their favorite movies. Woodrow Wilson had “Birth of a Nation.” Richard Nixon had “Patton.” Donald Trump has “Sunset Boulevard” and “Citizen Kane.” The films that define the worldview of incoming Vice President JD Vance? It may be a toss-up between an indie cult classic and a sappy 2000s rom-com. Read about JD Vance’s professed movie interests — and what they say about him — here .
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| | | | | | French Prime Minister Michel Barnier leaves after the weekly cabinet meeting at the presidential Élysée Palace today. | Julien de Rosa/AFP via Getty Images
| ON THE BRINK — French Prime Minister Michel Barnier is running out of options . The French Socialist Party confirmed today that it plans to vote to topple the government following an hour-long meeting with Barnier. Patrick Kanner, leader of the Socialist group in the French Senate, told French broadcaster BFM that the meeting had been cordial but that Barnier had not put forward “any concrete proposals” to convince them to back his minority government, which is made up of centrists and conservatives. French MPs have spent weeks debating the Barnier government’s hastily prepared budget, which includes €40 billion in spending cuts and €20 billion in tax hikes. The bill aims to reduce the French budget deficit, which is projected to hit 6.1 percent of gross domestic product in 2024. Without a majority in parliament, the government will need to use a constitutional mechanism to bypass a vote, but the feint will also allow lawmakers to put forward a motion of no confidence. If the motion passes, it would trigger the government’s collapse and the budget would be rejected.
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$13 million The amount of money that Massachusetts resident Michael Sullivan was awarded after a jury ruled he was wrongfully convicted of murder in 1986, which resulted in Sullivan spending over three decades behind bars. Sullivan, though, will only receive $1 million because state regulations cap rewards at $1 million for wrongful conviction. |
| | | AI CONNECTION — When users open social networking site LinkedIn now, it gives a prompt where the button to write a status used to be: “Start a post, try writing with AI.” Unlike other corners of the internet or society that have shunned using AI to generate “original” writing, LinkedIn is welcoming it. And a new analysis shows that over half of the English language posts on the platform are AI-generated . Not many users have noticed a huge difference, but that’s largely because of what LinkedIn looked like in the pre-AI days: A number of posts preaching the same advice or asking for the same sorts of things, all written in an extremely similar cadence to one another. Kate Knibbs reports on the LinkedIn AI boom for WIRED.
| | | On this date in 1976: A peace rally takes place in Trafalgar Square, London, in a reaction to the Northern Ireland Troubles. | AP
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| | A message from Instagram: Introducing Instagram Teen Accounts: limits for teens, peace of mind for parents
Parents want their teens to grow and thrive - and to make sure they’re staying safe.
That’s why Instagram is launching Teen Accounts, with automatic protections limiting who can contact teens and the content they can see. Putting built-in limits in place for teens, so parents can have more peace of mind.
Learn more. | | | | |
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