Politics

(NEW YORK) — How much more U.S. aid should be sent to Ukraine is emerging as dividing point among Republican presidential hopefuls, posing a new test of the GOP grassroots’ appetite for overseas involvement and whether foreign policy is potent enough to move the needle in the race.

The debate is part of an early mêlée for support under a tent that includes a base transformed by Trump’s isolationist-tinged “America First” ideology and a swath of voters still aligned with conservative orthodoxy on projecting strength abroad. But whether the fission makes an electoral difference remains an open question given history of foreign policy failing to move enough votes to change a national election outside of wartime.

“Well, we’re gonna find out,” veteran GOP pollster Whit Ayres said when asked about the impact the Ukraine debate will have on the primary. “It is a major story, but how that is going to shake out compared to domestic concerns remains to be seen.”

Former President Donald Trump first upended the bedrock of GOP foreign policy during his 2016 presidential bid, railing against “forever wars” amid mounting frustration over U.S. involvement in Afghanistan and other battlefields. With his rise within the party, many ultimately came on board with his worldview, shedding advocacy for an omnipresent military and instead focusing on fixing domestic issues plaguing blue collar Americans.

On one side of the debate are current and would-be contenders like Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis who voice skepticism over a supposed “blank check” to Ukraine and the broader danger posed by Moscow. On the other side are more traditional foreign policy conservatives like former Vice President Mike Pence and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley who have advocated for muscular support for Ukraine and warn that Russia’s military goals extend beyond Ukraine’s borders.

Trump has lambasted Biden’s policy of aiding Ukraine, warning that U.S. assistance could escalate to a broader conflict and maintaining that his method would help bring peace between Kyiv and Moscow — without actually detailing what that method is.

“If you watch and understand the moves being made by Biden on Ukraine, he is systematically, but perhaps unknowingly, pushing us into what could soon be WORLD WAR III,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

DeSantis, for his part, hasn’t called for cutting off aid as some hard-liners in Congress have, but he too has Bashed Biden’s “blank-check policy.”

“These things can escalate. And I don’t think it’s in our interest to be getting into a proxy war,” he said on Fox News last month, warning Biden should instead focus on Chinese aggression.

Still, others haven’t shed their traditional foreign policy bona fides.

“We are involved in a proxy war against the Soviet Union, the Ukrainians are fighting it,” Pence said on Fox News last month. “[L]et’s get them what they need, the tanks, let’s get them the F-16s and support them as they finish this fight.”

Others, like Haley and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have also advocated for keeping up the aid deliveries, suggesting that a defeat for Kyiv — rather than the assistance — risks letting violence spill over Ukraine’s borders.

“If we win this fight for freedom, it will send a signal to every enemy we have. If we lose this fight for freedom, Russia has said Poland and the Baltics are next, and then we’ve got a world war,” she said in February.

Some Republican operatives warn against reading too deeply into the rhetoric, noting that even hawks would favor some limits and are not that far apart from those warning of “blank checks.”

“It’s, ‘sure, we don’t want the Russians to encroach. We think what they did was wrong. This aggression was wrong. But we have to have limits on what we do, what we can do, and we sure don’t want to send American troops to Eastern Europe.’ I think that’s kind of the plurality position,” said GOP strategist Brendan Steinhauser.

However, with several candidates struggling to come up with domestic policy differences with Trump, even tonal disagreements on Ukraine could be one of very few chances for differentiation among the candidates.

“I think it’s smart for Trump to also focus on issues like foreign policy and trade where he creates the most contrast with the rest of the field,” said one longtime Trump aide close to his 2024 team.

“You’re not going to differentiate yourself from the field by opposing critical race theory or sex changes or hormones for minors,” the person said.

Those conflicting stances could pose an even greater contrast should one side of the war gain the upper hand or even win outright.

“If the Ukrainians have some success, it will tamper down some of the worries and concerns and criticisms. People will want to be on the side of the winner. I think if it goes really poorly, and … the Russians make gains, I think you’ll see Republicans pick up their critique and say, ‘we need to get to a negotiated settlement,'” Steinhauser said.

Whether those differentiations ultimately will matter electorally remains an open question.

Foreign policy’s traditional failure to impact elections has become almost a cliché in politics. And even as the war in Ukraine emerges as a potentially history-altering struggle and one of the lone differentiators in the mushrooming primary field, strategists are forecasting that the fighting won’t be top of mind when voters decide who to send to the general election next year.

That’s already playing out in early endorsements, with both Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a hawk, and Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, a skeptic of Biden’s broad support for Kyiv, both endorsing Trump.

“I’m as engaged as I think just anybody is, but I can tell you this, the decision I make on who to support for president or senator or whatever is in no way going to be affected by their position on Ukraine,” said Allegheny Country, Pa., GOP Chair and Marine veteran Sam DeMarco.

“I think it will be a differentiator. Whether it is used as the differentiator, I don’t know. To me, the more important differentiators in some ways are just the strategic questions about who can actually win the election,” Republican strategist Scott Jennings added.

Conversations with several attendees of this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) back up those assessments.

Conference goers, who in recent years have largely fallen in line behind Trump, almost unanimously insisted on limits on aid to Ukraine in interviews with ABC News.

“I think we’ve given them quite enough, I really do,” said Sandy Bellucci, a surgical coordinator from northern New Jersey supporting Trump.

Still, “I think there’s other issues higher on the list,” she said when asked how a candidate’s Ukraine policy could impact votes. “I think what we have to worry about here is more important to people than what’s going on somewhere else.”

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(NEW YORK) — Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., was interviewed by U.S. Secret Service agents in 2017 as part of an ATM fraud investigation that targeted a friend of his, sources familiar with the case told ABC News.

According to the sources, the case began when police in Seattle spotted an individual removing a device from a bank ATM known as a card skimmer, which is used to secretly steal users’ ATM card information.

That individual, Gustavo Ribeiro Trelha, had been living in a Seattle hotel where authorities subsequently found multiple card-skimming devices, sources said.

The shipping address on the packaging for some of those items was the same address where Santos lived in Florida, the sources said.

It’s not known whether Santos was ever pursued as a target of the investigation, but Secret Service agents based in Orlando, Florida ended up interviewing him as part of the case, the sources said, confirming a development first reported by CBS News.

Trelha was ultimately convicted and sentenced on charges related to ATM-skimming and turned over to immigration authorities for deportation to Brazil — but not before Santos appeared in a Seattle courtroom on his friend’s behalf.

According to Politico, which first obtained audio of the hearing, Santos told the judge that he worked for Goldman Sachs in New York.

“I am an aspiring politician and I work for Goldman Sachs,” Santos said, according to the audio recording.

“You work for Goldman Sachs in New York?” the judge asked.

“Yup,” Santos responded.

As ABC News has previously reported, Santos did not work for the firm, as he later conceded in an interview with the New York Post. Instead, he claimed that a firm where he did work had partnerships with Goldman Sachs.

On Friday, Santos that he will comply “100%” with a House Ethics Committee investigation into numerous allegations against the freshman Republican. He did not address the ATM probe.

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(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden on Friday awarded the Medal of Honor to a Black Army Special Forces hero from the Vietnam War who has waited close to 60 years to receive the nation’s top award for valor after the Army said the paperwork couldn’t be found.

Then a 26-year-old captain, Paris Davis, now 83, led a company tearing through a larger enemy force, pushing the attack despite being shot, absorbing shrapnel and another bullet to get wounded comrades to safety, refusing to join them on the evacuation helicopter, choosing rather to stay and continue destroying the remaining adversaries.

At a White House ceremony, Biden called Davis “an incredible man.”

Picking up the story, Biden continued, “And although the men who were with him on that June day immediately nominated Captain Davis to receive the Medal of Honor, somehow the paper — the paperwork was never processed, not just once, but twice. But, you know what Captain Davis said after learning that he would finally receive the Medal of Honor? Quote, ‘America was behind me.'”

A colonel by the time he retired from the Army, Davis’ first name “Paris” is inspired by the mythological figure featured in Homer’s epic war poem “The Iliad.”

In 1965, already having served in Korea and Vietnam, Davis was told by his company commander he was destined for the treacherous Binh Dinh province.

“He said that it was overrun by the Viet Cong. He thought through my training and the way that I handled myself that I could handle being in a situation where there were more enemies than there were friends,” Davis told ABC News during an interview Thursday.

In the summer, Davis led three other Green Berets and what the Army calls “an inexperienced company of the 883rd South Vietnamese Regional Force” on an audacious raid against a North Vietnamese base.

Davis personally captured two enemy combatants.

“We caught the guards that were sleeping,” Davis said. “They gave us some information — exactly where the preponderance of the troops were.”

According to the Army, “he learned [from the captives] that a vastly larger enemy force was operating in the area.”

Not that Davis was surprised, he said.

“We knew that we were going to run into a hornet’s nest,” he recalled.

Davis took this not as a warning to withdraw, but as an opportunity to attack. On the night of June 17, he readied his men for a surprise raid, and at dawn led them through what would stretch into a grinding 19-hour battle.

“Davis was wounded leading the initial assault, but continued moving forward, personally engaging the enemy in hand-to-hand combat and killing several enemy soldiers,” the Army said in a release.

When the noncompliant enemy rallied with a counteroffensive, a bleeding Davis led a small team onward, destroying gun emplacements and earning more captives, the Army said.

He then consolidated his men to pull back and, while calling for artillery and aircraft attacks against the defenders, was hit by automatic weapons fire.

Davis was wounded again when an enemy soldier “engaged him at close range with his rifle,” the Army said. Davis tackled the enemy and “defeated” him — as the Army euphemistically puts it — with his bare hands.

Now injured several times over, Davis saw two American comrades seriously hurt, but across enemy lanes of fire.

“Davis made it to the first soldier under a hail of enemy fire and was shot once again. Despite his grievous wounds and with no regard for his own safety, Davis saved the soldier and returned him to the company’s perimeter. Davis again broke cover, braving enemy fire, to retrieve the second soldier. Crawling nearly 150 yards and wounded by enemy grenade fragments, he rescued the soldier and returned him to the company perimeter,” according to the Army.

At one point during the battle, Davis said he recalled a general observing the fight from a helicopter ordering him to leave before one of the wounded soldiers was flown out. He refused.

“He said, ‘You know you’re disobeying an order?’ And I said, ‘Yes, sir, I understand that. But I’m not leaving,'” Davis told ABC News.

Davis described a war of words with the senior officer.

“The general said … ‘If I was down there, I’d probably kick your ass.’ And I said, ‘You know what, general, there’s a lot of room down here.’ And that was the end of the conversation. He never landed, and never kicked his ass,” Davis said.

ABC News asked Davis what would have happened had he obeyed.

“If we had obeyed that order, there would have been soldiers that would have been just mutilated, because there [were] no other free forces available,” he said.

The Army credits Davis for having saved three men from enemy capture: Robert Brown, John Reinberg and Billy Waugh.

For his actions, he was awarded the nation’s third-highest military decoration, the Silver Star. But according to Davis, requests for his award to be upgraded to a Medal of Honor were inexplicably lost by the Army twice over the years.

Davis has speculated that his race could have played a factor.

“I wish I could say that this story of Paris’ sacrifice on that day in 1965, was fully recognized and rewarded immediately,” Biden said. “But sadly, we know they weren’t. At the time Captain Davis returned from war, the country is still battling segregation. He returned from Vietnam to experience some of his fellow soldiers crossing to the other side of the street when they saw him in America.”

Army officials said they cannot determine whether any records were lost, or under what circumstances.

“Due to lack of records, we cannot say for sure, but we are pleased that the president will soon bestow this overdue honor to Col. Paris Davis and his family,” Army spokeswoman Madison Bonzo told ABC News on Wednesday.

Davis credits a group of friends and comrades for refusing to let the Army forget his case.

Davis, his first name inspired by the ancients, alluded to Greek tragedy when explaining the resolution to his decadeslong trial.

“The soldiers that you served with, the soldiers you were in the war with, become that Greek chorus. They pick up the voice of saying ‘We aren’t gonna let this rest, we are going to keep after it until we get it done.’ And that’s the saving grace I’m so thankful for,” he said.

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(WASHINGTON) — Embattled New York Rep. George Santos said Friday that he will comply “100%” with the House Ethics Committee, which is probing numerous allegations against the freshman Republican.

The committee voted unanimously Thursday to establish an “Investigative Subcommittee” to look into the claims made against Santos, which is the panel’s first move toward formally investigating him.

Among the accusations the subcommittee will look at are whether Santos “engaged in unlawful activity with respect to his 2022 congressional campaign; failed to properly disclose required information on statements filed with the House; violated federal conflict of interest laws in connection with his role in a firm providing fiduciary services; and/or engaged in sexual misconduct towards an individual seeking employment in his congressional office,” according to a news release from the House Ethics Committee.

“I’m going to comply 100% with them,” Santos told ABC’s Gabe Ferris on Capitol Hill Friday, though he declined to answer a question about any information he may have already supplied to the committee.

Rep. David Joyce, R-Ohio, will serve as chair of the subcommittee, and Rep. Susan Wild, D-Pa., will serve as the ranking member.

In a brief statement on Twitter, Santos wrote that he was cooperating and that “there will be no further comment made at this time.”

Santos has previously acknowledged lying about some parts of his background, specifically about graduating from college — which he did not — but he has insisted his behavior was similar to routine resume embellishment.

He has denied any criminal wrongdoing, and he vowed before he took office that he would be “effective” for his constituents.

“If for some way when we go through Ethics [Committee] that he has broken the law, then we will remove him, but it’s not my role,” House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said in January. “I believe in the rule of law. A person’s innocent until proven guilty.”

If a majority of the Ethics Committee determines Santos has done something wrong, they can then file a recommendation to the full House for one or more punishments, including: expulsion, censure, reprimand, fine, denial of various responsibilities or any other sanction determined to be appropriate.

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(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden on Friday will host a Medal of Honor ceremony for an Army Special Forces veteran who has waited close to six decades to receive the nation’s top award for military valor since his heroic actions in Vietnam.

Then a young captain, Paris Davis, now 83 years old, led a company tearing through a larger enemy force, pushing the attack despite being shot, absorbing shrapnel and another bullet to get wounded comrades to safety, refusing to join them on the evacuation helicopter, choosing rather to stay and continue destroying the remaining adversaries.

Davis, a colonel by the time he retired from the Army, has battle in his name, his first inspired by the mythological figure featured in Homer’s epic war poem “The Iliad.”

In 1965, already having served in Korea and Vietnam, Davis was told by his company commander he was destined for the treacherous Binh Dinh province.

“He said that it was overrun by the Viet Cong. He thought through my training and the way that I handled myself that I could handle being in a situation where there were more enemies than there were friends,” Davis told ABC News during an interview Thursday.

In the summer, Davis led three other Green Berets and what the Army calls “an inexperienced company of the 883rd South Vietnamese Regional Force” on an audacious raid against a North Vietnamese base.

Davis personally captured two enemy combatants.

“We caught the guards that were sleeping,” Davis said. “They gave us some information — exactly where the preponderance of the troops were.”

According to the Army, “he learned [from the captives] that a vastly larger enemy force was operating in the area.”

Not that Davis was surprised, he said.

“We knew that we were going to run into a hornet’s nest,” he recalled.

Davis took this not as a warning to withdraw, but as an opportunity to attack. On the night of June 17, he readied his men for a surprise raid, and at dawn led them through what would stretch into a grinding 19-hour battle.

“Davis was wounded leading the initial assault, but continued moving forward, personally engaging the enemy in hand-to-hand combat and killing several enemy soldiers,” the Army said in a release.

When the noncompliant enemy rallied with a counteroffensive, a bleeding Davis led a small team onward, destroying gun emplacements and earning more captives, the Army said.

He then consolidated his men to pull back and, while calling for artillery and aircraft attacks against the defenders, was hit by automatic weapons fire.

Davis was wounded again when an enemy soldier “engaged him at close range with his rifle,” the Army said. Davis tackled the enemy and “defeated” him — as the Army euphemistically puts it — with his bare hands.

Now injured several times over, Davis saw two American comrades seriously hurt, but across enemy lanes of fire.

“Davis made it to the first soldier under a hail of enemy fire and was shot once again. Despite his grievous wounds and with no regard for his own safety, Davis saved the soldier and returned him to the company’s perimeter. Davis again broke cover, braving enemy fire, to retrieve the second soldier. Crawling nearly 150 yards and wounded by enemy grenade fragments, he rescued the soldier and returned him to the company perimeter,” according to the Army.

At one point during the battle, Davis said he recalled a general observing the fight from a helicopter ordering him to leave before one of the wounded soldiers was flown out. He refused.

“He said, ‘You know you’re disobeying an order?’ And I said, ‘Yes, sir, I understand that. But I’m not leaving,'” Davis told ABC News.

Davis described a war of words with the senior officer.

“The general said … ‘If I was down there, I’d probably kick your ass.’ And I said, ‘You know what, general, there’s a lot of room down here.’ And that was the end of the conversation. He never landed, and never kicked his ass,” Davis said.

ABC News asked Davis what would have happened had he obeyed.

“If we had obeyed that order, there would have been soldiers that would have been just mutilated, because there [were] no other free forces available,” he said.

The Army credits Davis for having saved three men from enemy capture: Robert Brown, John Reinberg and Billy Waugh.

For his actions, he was awarded the nation’s third-highest military decoration, the Silver Star. But according to Davis, requests for his award to be upgraded to a Medal of Honor were inexplicably lost by the Army twice over the years.

“The first time is on me, the second time is on the Army,” he said. Davis has speculated that his race could have played a factor.

Army officials said they cannot determine whether any records were lost, or under what circumstances.

“Due to lack of records, we cannot say for sure, but we are pleased that the president will soon bestow this overdue honor to Col. Paris Davis and his family,” Army spokeswoman Madison Bonzo told ABC News on Wednesday.

Davis credits a group of friends and comrades for refusing to let the Army forget his case.

Davis, his first name inspired by the ancients, alluded to Greek tragedy when explaining the resolution to his decadeslong trial.

“The soldiers that you served with, the soldiers you were in the war with, become that Greek chorus. They pick up the voice of saying ‘We aren’t gonna let this rest, we are going to keep after it until we get it done.’ And that’s the saving grace I’m so thankful for,” he said.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — Though President Joe Biden has yet to announce his anticipated reelection bid, he will now have at least one long shot challenger from within his own party, with self-help author and former political candidate Marianne Williamson formally launching her 2024 campaign on Saturday.

But leading Democrats tell ABC News they don’t anticipate a traditional primary playing out between now and the nominating convention next year — with many aligned behind Biden’s expected campaign for a second term, which is thought to be launching in the coming months.

The Democratic National Committee, the campaign arm of the party, has been committed for years to keeping Biden on Pennsylvania Avenue. When asked by Politico in August 2022 about how they might deal with a primary challenge, DNC executive director Sam Cornale put it bluntly: “We’re with Biden. Period.”

The group also unanimously passed a resolution during their February winter meeting expressing their “full and complete support” for a second term for Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.

That view hasn’t changed in light of Williamson, who during the 2020 race qualified for only two presidential debate stages and suspended her campaign before the Iowa caucuses.

Democrats don’t plan on holding primary debates, either.

On Friday, another potential long shot Democratic hopeful, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., will speak at the New Hampshire National Politics Institute for their “Politics and Eggs” speaker series, an event that historically draws notable political figures, including potential presidential hopefuls.

“This platform is the premier stop for prospective presidential candidates,” said Neil Levesque, the executive director of the New Hampshire Institute of Politics and Political Library at Saint Anselm College, when he announced Kennedy’s speech.

Kennedy, an activist, attorney and self-described “lifelong Democrat” and son of one of America’s most famous families, has in recent years stirred controversy for his support of conspiracies about the COVID-19 vaccines, garnering support from some unlikely bedfellows on the right.

“RFK Jr. could jump into the Republican primary for president, and only DeSantis and Trump, I think, would do better,” former Trump adviser Steve Bannon recently said on MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell’s streaming program, Lindell TV.

Without institutional support, a track record of support with voters or a real appetite among party officials for a contested primary, neither Williamson nor Kennedy have a realistic shot at replacing Biden, despite polling showing Democratic voters are apathetic at the idea of the president being renominated.

But both Kennedy and Williamson have taken advantage of a pocket of opportunity in New Hampshire, which is unlikely to see Biden campaigning on the ground before the so-called “Super Tuesday” primary date due to changes in the DNC’s calendar. New Hampshire Democrats have said such changes pave the way for local insurgency — and now that may be bearing fruit, with Kennedy appearing there and Williamson spending time in the state prior to her launch.

In January, Kennedy sent an open letter to the DNC, imploring the committee to retain New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary status.

“Like many people, I have spent the past few years thinking deeply about the issues facing America. Our nation is at a crossroads. Next year’s election will be the most important of our lifetimes. For more than a century, New Hampshire has been fertile ground for the strongest Democratic candidates. Now, more than ever, it is important that the Democratic Party have a primary campaign that produces our party’s most competitive candidate,” he wrote.

New Hampshire Democratic Party Chair Ray Buckley told ABC News that the calendar shuffle, which means the state won’t be an early focus of the party in the primary, does create “an opportunity for any number of [other] individuals to make a national name for themselves.”

“It just gives Republicans a great tool to play mischief by declaring that [Democrat] a front-runner and all sorts of other stuff that Fox News, etc., would love to do,” Buckley said.

ABC News’ Isabella Murray contributed to this report.

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(NATIONAL HARBOR, Md.) — The famed Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) touts itself as “the largest and most influential gathering of conservatives in the world,” but its attendance list this year — and the presidential hopefuls staying away — reflects instead a broader reckoning over the Republican Party’s future.

The gathering, a longtime window into the grassroots of the GOP, in recent years has morphed into a prominent stage for allies of former President Donald Trump and is anticipated to heavily promote his platform this week, including offering him a prime time speaking slot Saturday.

Yet, as other current and potential 2024 presidential candidates flock to Maryland’s National Harbor to address activists at the conference, which began Wednesday, over a half-dozen prospective contenders are instead choosing to keep their distance.

Trump, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, all of whom are either running or have said they are mulling a 2024 bid, are slated to speak at CPAC. Current lawmakers on the schedule include firebrand Reps. Matt Gaetz, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert. Former lawmakers include some of those outside the U.S., like former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.

Kari Lake, the 2022 Republican Arizona gubernatorial nominee and election conspiracy theorist, is also slated to speak.

But Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, who are seen as possible 2024 hopefuls, are among those staying away — with some opting instead to attend a donor retreat hosted by the anti-tax Club for Growth.

“Ten years ago, [CPAC] was an opportunity to test your messages to conservative leaders and influencers all over the country and to have a big audience get to know you from the podium. And I don’t think that’s where it is today,” said one aide to a possible 2024 candidate. “Last time I was there, it almost felt more like a college crowd than it did a serious thinker crowd.”

CPACs of yesteryear featured notable moments, including Ronald Reagan’s “city upon a hill” speech, and strategists who spoke with ABC News, who asked not to be quoted by name, reminisced about past conferences they said offered a more representative cross-section of Republican voters.

Defenders of the conference counter that CPAC still offers a marketplace of ideas.

“Traditionally you’ve always had your libertarian conservatives, your free market, laissez fair-type of conservatives, you had your hawks and foreign affair guys, you’d have your Rand Paul-libertarian types. Now you have your MAGA types, and then you have your ultra MAGA types. I think CPAC is a classic example of growing pains,” said former Michigan GOP Chair Saul Anuzis, who first attended CPAC in 1978 and has been to almost every conference since.

But given that, the benefits of attending, even for those eyeing a presidential campaign and activist support, could be diminished, the strategists said.

“Now it’s kind of turned into a one-trick pony,” said a source familiar with Pence’s thinking. “It’s not like where it was 20 years ago, where it was conservatives from all over the country who were influencers from all the different states.”

When reached by ABC News to explain DeSantis’ absence from CPAC, an aide said he was instead attending GOP dinners elsewhere.

The person declined to comment further when asked why the Florida governor chose to attend those events, including the Club for Growth retreat, over CPAC.

Candidates who travel to CPAC also have to contend with the prospect of being tied to an event helmed by Matt Schlapp, the conference’s chairman, who is currently mired in controversy.

A former staffer to Herschel Walker’s 2022 Senate bid has alleged that Schlapp “groped” and “fondled” his crotch while he was driving Schlapp back from a bar in Atlanta, according to a report from The Daily Beast. The staffer also filed a lawsuit against Schlapp and his wife, Mercedes, seeking $9.4 million for sexual battery and defamation, according to a report.

A statement from Schlapp’s attorney at the time said the complaint is “false” and the “Schlapps and their legal team are assessing counter lawsuit options.”

The source familiar with Pence’s thinking told ABC News for this story that the decision to not attend was made before the allegations about Schlapp emerged, but Anuzis, the longtime CPAC attendee, said the scandal could be a factor in deciding whether to appear.

“There’ll be some people who I think are taken aback by that and will want to be cautious about participating in one way or the other, and that’s just the way politics works,” he said. “He’s a potential liability at this stage of the game and so it’s safer for some folks who are really worried about that to stay away.”

GOP strategist Doug Heye put it this way: “The most valuable asset any candidate or potential candidate has is their time. And so they’re making very real decisions, whether it’s on this or certainly moving forward on other things, on where they’re spending their time.”

“Obviously, the Club [for Growth, holding its own event] has become a bigger and bigger funder on the Republican side, and if you’re running for president or if you’re running for Senate, that’s an important audience for you to address,” Heye said.

CPAC organizers, meanwhile, brushed off any perceived snubs.

“It’s a missed opportunity for any potential Presidential Candidate to not address the thousands of grassroots activists at CPAC this year. Luckily, CPAC attendees will get to hear from every announced Presidential candidate and over 100 premiere speakers, including over 30 elected officials,” CPAC spokesperson Megan Powers Small told ABC News on Saturday.

And for its part, Trump’s campaign is seizing on the way the former president has shaped CPAC, casting it as a sign of his continued hold on the GOP as he ramps up his third presidential campaign.

“CPAC is the embodiment of the conservative movement as well as the Republican Party. … The conference has always represented the ‘springboard’ for the presidential primary season, and President Trump’s outsized influence at this year’s conference combined with recent polling success shows just how dominant his candidacy is as we approach 2024,” said Trump senior adviser Jason Miller.

Yet should would-be candidates continue to avoid CPAC, operatives said that could change the media perception of the event which could result in fewer headlines.

“One of the things that we’re going to have to see after the fact is, how much coverage does all of this get?” Heye said. “If you’re not getting that, it makes it easier to potentially turn down.”

“It has certainly morphed into more of an event that is just giving rally speeches to a crowd, and that had proven to be popular. But at a certain point, there are diminishing returns,” he added. “There are obviously greater concerns about how effective of a tool this has been and whether or not it’s a political version of the Star Trek convention.”

ABC News’ Olivia Rubin contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — California Sen. Dianne Feinstein has been hospitalized in her home state with shingles.

A spokesperson for her office on Thursday confirmed her hospitalization, which was first reported by The San Francisco Chronicle.

“I was diagnosed over the February recess with a case of shingles. I have been hospitalized and am receiving treatment in San Francisco and expect to make a full recovery,” Feinstein said in a statement. “I hope to return to the Senate later this month.”

Shingles is caused by the same virus, varicella-zoster virus, that causes chickenpox and is characterized by a painful rash that develops on the face or body. A person sickened by chickenpox and who recovers can later get shingles when the virus reactivates.

While about one in every three people in the U.S. develops shingles, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, only about 1-4% need to be hospitalized.

At 89, Feinstein is the oldest serving member of the Senate. She has not been on Capitol Hill this week.

Her absence is a further blow to the narrow Democratic majority, with Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman out for an indefinite amount of time being treated for depression.

If all Republicans are present and voting next week when the chamber returns, they’ll have a one-vote majority, though Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer controls the floor.

Last month, Feinstein announced that she would not run for reelection after her term is up in early 2025 but will continue serving until then and “intend[s] to accomplish as much for California as I can.”

She said then that she remains focused on passing legislation important to Democrats through the end of her term, including curbing gun violence in the face of a string of mass shootings and ameliorating homelessness and wildfires.

After announcing her retirement to her colleagues during a closed-door lunch, Feinstein spoke briefly to reporters, saying, “The time has come.”

California Reps. Barbara Lee, Katie Porter and Adam Schiff have all announced bids to succeed her.

ABC News’ Tal Axelrod, Trish Turner and Nicole Wetsman contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — The White House on Thursday said the Biden administration does not know what is causing the apparent poisoning of schoolgirls in Iran and called for the Iranian government to conduct a thorough and transparent investigation.

“It’s deeply concerning news coming out of Iran. These — what, what could be the poisoning of young girls that are just going to school,” National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said. “Truth is, we don’t know right now what caused those ailments. We see reports that the Iranian government are investigating it, that’s the right course of action.

“We want those investigations to be thorough and complete, and we want them to be transparent. Little girls going to school should only have to worry about learning. They shouldn’t have to worry about their own physical safety, but we just don’t know enough right now,” he added.

Kirby wouldn’t say if the U.S. would consider sanctions in reaction to any intentional poisoning. He also wouldn’t say if the U.S. would take the Iranian investigation at face value.

“Let’s see what the results are here first, before we make some kind of snap-judgment,” he said. “We need to know, the world needs to know, certainly the families of those little girls need to know.”

Over the past three months, hundreds of young girls attending different schools in Iran appeared to have been overpowered by what are believed to be noxious fumes wafting into their classrooms, with some ending up weakened on hospital beds, state media and the Associated Press reported.

Officials in Iran’s theocracy initially dismissed these incidents but now describe them as intentional attacks involving some 30 schools identified in local media reports, with some speculating they could be aimed at trying to close schools for girls in this country of over 80 million people, according to sate media.

On Sunday, Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency filed multiple stories that included officials acknowledging the scope of the crisis.

“After several poisonings of students in Qom schools, it was found that some people wanted all schools, especially girls’ schools, to be closed,” IRNA quoted Younes Panahi, a deputy health minister, as saying.

A health ministry spokesman, Pedram Pakaieen, said the poisoning didn’t come from a virus or a microbe, but neither elaborated.

Ali Reza Monadi, a national parliament member who sits on its education committee, described the poisonings as “intentional.”

The “existence of the devil’s will to prevent girls from education is a serious danger and it is considered a very bad news,” he said, according to IRNA. “We have to try to find roots” of this.

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(WASHINGTON) — One of the biggest Supreme Court cases of the year — with major stakes for U.S. elections and who decides when, where and how people vote — could be thrown out.

In an unusual twist, the justices on Thursday issued an order asking both sides in Moore v. Harper to submit written explanations on why they should continue to decide it, indicating that they may find the matter moot in light of new state-level developments.

The dispute between the North Carolina GOP and a group of voting rights advocates, backed by the Biden administration, centers on the role of state courts in resolving election disputes.

The Republican lawmakers have advanced a fringe legal concept, known as the “independent state legislature theory,” that only legislators can set election policy and can do so largely free from any oversight by state courts or even governors.

Democracy advocates say that if the theory is adopted, it could upend state election laws nationwide.

The North Carolina Supreme Court initially ruled against the conservative lawmakers, who in turn appealed to the nation’s highest court. The justices heard oral arguments in the case late last year and have been poised to issue a ruling this spring.

But last month, the state Supreme Court, newly controlled by Republican justices, agreed to grant a rehearing in the case, on March 14. That rekindled the litigation at a state level and may serve to keep the U.S. Supreme Court on the sidelines while it plays out.

The justices’ order on Thursday asks the parties to explain why they still have jurisdiction in light of this development.

“It raises the question whether the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Moore v. Harper could become moot,” Rick Hasen, a University of California, Irvine, law professor and election law expert, wrote in February.

Looking back at the arguments

In an extraordinary and tense debate stretching three hours during a hearing in December, the North Carolina Republicans asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate a gerrymandered election map drawn by the GOP-controlled state legislature after it was thrown out by the state Supreme Court for violating the state constitution.

A court-appointed panel drew a new map which was used during the 2022 midterm election.

The plaintiffs argued before the justices that the U.S. Constitution’s elections clause expressly empowers the state legislature, and legislature alone, to dictate the “time, places and manner” of federal elections.

“States lack the authority to restrict the legislatures’ substantive discretion when performing this federal function,” argued attorney David Thompson, representing the Republicans.

A group of North Carolina voters and pro-democracy advocates opposed the move as contrary to the nation’s history and tradition and warned that it would invalidate hundreds of election laws in every state.

“The blast radius from their theory would sow elections chaos,” said attorney Neal Katyal, the former Obama administration solicitor general representing the voters.

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