Brandon Livesay
Reporting from New York

It took Matt Gaetz eight days to withdraw after Donald Trump nominated him to be attorney general. It then took Trump six hours to name his new pick, Pam Bondi.

It’s been a frenetic day (and week) of US politics after swirling controversy over Gaetz’s nomination finally proved too much for him to continue.

Trump will hope Bondi can rescue him from the drama of this nomination process.

And her resume, when compared to Gaetz’s legal background, will seem to many to be more suited to the job of being America’s chief law enforcement officer.

But Bondi will now face a wave of her own scrutiny. The former Florida attorney general will need to be confirmed by the Senate to get the job.

We're wrapping up today's live coverage. If you're looking for some further reading, I recommend checking out these articles:

• What to know about the Matt Gaetz allegations
• Trump picks former WWE CEO and TV's Dr Oz for top roles
• Who has joined team Trump so far?

• After days of debate on Capitol Hill, and leaked details related to allegations involving drugs, bribes and sex, Matt Gaetz withdrew as Trump's pick for attorney general
• Gaetz has long denied the allegations, but said on social media that his nomination had become a "distraction"
• President-elect Trump said "I greatly appreciate the recent efforts of Matt Gaetz"
• Six hours after Gaetz's exit, Trump announced the name of his replacement - former Florida attorney general Pam Bondi
• Bondi and Trump have a years-long history which includes her serving under Trump's first administration and working as his defence lawyer during his first Senate impeachment in 2020
• Gaetz called Bondi a "stellar selection", echoing the excitement of many other Republicans in Congress

This is not Pam Bondi's first time being considered for attorney general.

In 2018, Bondi was mentioned as a contender to replace then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions, according to the BBC's US partner CBS News, external.

In CBS's reporting, Bondi said she had been friends with Trump "for many years".

Bondi was also a defence lawyer for Trump during his first Senate impeachment trial in 2020.

The first woman to be confirmed by the Senate for US attorney general was Janet Reno, a Clinton nominee, who served from 1993-2001.

She went on to become the longest serving attorney general in the 20th century.

The second woman to fill the role was Loretta Lynch, an Obama nominee, who served from 2015-2017.

A third woman, Sally Yates, also served as US attorney general.

Yates served as acting attorney general for 10 days, following the inauguration of Donald Trump and the resignation of Lynch.

Could Bondi rescue Trump from nomination headache?published at 01:12 Greenwich Mean Time 22 November

01:12 GMT 22 November

Peter Bowes
North America correspondent

Image source, Getty Images

After the whirlwind of controversy surrounding Matt Gaetz's nomination, the Trump transition team will be hoping for a less distracting confirmation process for Pam Bondi.

The veteran prosecutor comes with a long track record in law enforcement - a qualification Gaetz did not have - and is cited by the President-elect as having done an "incredible job" as Florida's first female Attorney General.

Bondi is a loyal Trump ally, which likely played into his decision to appoint the 59-year-old as the nation's top law enforcement officer.

She served as one of the then-president's defence attorneys during his first impeachment trial, over his alleged abuse of power linked to military aid for Ukraine and pressure to investigate the former Vice President Joe Biden.

Bondi also publicly supported Trump during his hush money trial in New York, showing up at the court where he was eventually convicted.

Let's take a moment away from the attorney general news to quickly look at a Senate race that has finally been called, some 16 days after the US election.

Democratic Party Senator Bob Casey from Pennsylvania has conceded to Republican David McCormick.

Weeks after the election, it brings a finite end to a close race that was dragged through re-counts and court battles.

Casey, the incumbent running for re-election, congratulated McCormick over the phone.

In a statement, Casey said: "As the first count of ballots is completed, Pennsylvanians can move forward with the knowledge that their voices were heard, whether their vote was the first to be counted or the last." Casey said.

Republicans will have a 53-47 majority next year in the US Senate.

Reactions are coming in from Republican senators, who say they are "thrilled" by Trump's decision.

"She’ll be an incredible Attorney General. Great choice," Missouri Senator Eric Schmidt posted on X.

Florida Senator Rick Scott posted that he was "thrilled for our great friend and our next Attorney General".

"For 8 years I worked alongside Pam to keep Florida safe, and I’m looking forward to working with her to keep our nation safe!” Scott added.

Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville called her a "brilliant attorney with a long career of fighting for the Constitution".

"She will do a great job restoring JUSTICE at the DOJ. I look forward to the Senate QUICKLY confirming her to be our next Attorney General. No time to waste — our future is at stake.”

Pam Bondi has been vocally pushing for Trump's daughter-in-law to be appointed Florida senator, a role that will be up for grabs if current Senator Marco Rubio is confirmed as US secretary of state. Trump has nominated Rubio for that role.

“I don’t know who the front-runner is, but I know who’s extremely qualified, and that’s Lara Trump,” Bondi told FloridaPolitics.com, external earlier this month.

Lara Trump has been the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee since March 2024. She is married to Eric Trump, the president-elect's third child.

"No one works as hard as Lara Trump,” Bondi, said, adding that she “can’t be objective because she’s also my friend.”

Florida's Republican Governor Ron DeSantis would be tasked with choosing a new senator to complete Rubio's term.

Trump, who changed his residency from New York to Florida in 2019, has chosen several Floridians to serve in high profile roles in his administration.

In addition to Rubio, Florida Congressman Michael Waltz has also been picked to be the next national security adviser. And Matt Gaetz, who withdrew from the attorney general nomination earlier today, is also from Florida.

About eight hours ago, Matt Gaetz was Donald Trump's nominee for the role of attorney general.

But things (sometimes) happen fast on Capitol Hill.

Minutes ago, Gaetz tweeted a congratulations to Trump's new nominee for the role - Pam Bondi.

"Pam Bondi is a stellar selection by President Trump for Attorney General. Pam and I worked closely together when she was Florida’s Attorney General and I chaired Criminal Justice in the state house," he said.

"She’s a proven litigator, an inspiring leader and a champion for all Americans. She will bring the needed reforms to DOJ."

Pam Bondi, a longtime Trump ally, joined the White House in 2019 to focus on "proactive impeachment messaging".

The move came as Trump was being impeached for the first time.

She served him during the impeachment as both a legal advisor and defence attorney.

Trump was impeached by the US House of Representatives on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

Democrats accused him of withholding military aid to Ukraine to pressure the country into investigating his political rival, former US Vice-President Joe Biden.

The Senate, run by Trump's fellow Republicans, voted to acquit him 52-48 on charges of abuse of power and 53-47 on obstruction of Congress.

Image source, Getty Images

Pam Bondi has just been named as Trump's nominee for attorney general.

She's a name that's long been associated with the president-elect.

That's her on the left of the photo above, standing next to Donald Jr. The fuzzy person at the centre of the image with a gold tie - that's Trump.

The photo was taken when Trump was speaking to media at the Manhattan criminal court in New York earlier this year.

Bondi also worked in the previous Trump administration.

And she was on his defence team during his impeachment trial.

Image source, Reuters

About six hours after Matt Gaetz withdrew from consideration for attorney general, Donald Trump has already named a successor - Pam Bondi, a former Florida attorney general.

"Pam was a prosecutor for nearly 20 years, where she was very tough on Violent Criminals, and made the streets safe for Florida Families," Trump wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social.

Bondi served during Trump's first administration as a member of the Opioid and Drug Abuse Commission.

Brandon Livesay
Reporting from New York

Image source, Getty Images

Matt Gaetz lasted eight days as Donald Trump's pick to be attorney general.

Trump's controversial nomination shocked many on Capitol Hill, on both the Democrat and Republican sides.

Then details started emerging in US media from a House Ethics Committee report into allegations of Gaetz having sex with a minor, illicit drug use, and other claims.

The former congressman has denied all of the allegations, and the report has not been released.

But the pressure on Gaetz intensified steadily until today, when he said he was withdrawing his nomination because it had become a "distraction" for Trump's transition.

Gaetz resigned from the House after he was nominated, so it's very much up in the air what could happen for him next. And Trump now needs a new candidate to be attorney general - America's chief law enforcement officer.

Perhaps the only certainty is that there will be more drama to come in the world of US politics.

We're wrapping up today's live coverage from Capitol Hill. If you're looking for some further reading, I recommend checking out these articles:

• What to know about the Matt Gaetz allegations
• Trump picks former WWE CEO and TV's Dr Oz for top roles
• Who has joined team Trump so far?

Kayla Epstein
Reporting from New York

Gaetz was not the only Trump cabinet nomination under scrutiny. Now that he's bowed out, the political spotlight is likely to shift to Trump's defence secretary nominee, Pete Hegseth.

Hegseth faces a sexual assault allegation from 2017. Hegseth, a former National Guard officer, has denied any wrongdoing and claims the encounter was consensual.

His lawyer, Tommy Parlatore, previously told BBC's US partner CBS News that Hegseth entered into a confidential financial agreement with the woman to stave off allegations that could have cost him his job at Fox News.

Hegseth told reporters today that: "The matter was fully investigated, and I was completely cleared."

Hegseth's resume has also raised eyebrows among lawmakers. He's well-known as a weekend morning television co-host on the conservative Fox News channel.

Hegseth did serve in the Army National Guard and was deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, but not at the high rank usually seen with nominees for the defence role.

Typically, defence secretaries are either high-ranking military officials or seasoned lawmakers.

The requirement for the president’s cabinet nominees to be approved by the Senate comes directly from the US Constitution – it’s a key part of the system of checks and balances that divide power between the branches of government.

But rarely have cabinet nominees been rejected by the Senate – or, like in the case of Gaetz, withdrawn before even getting to a vote.

Senate records list just 28 rejected or withdrawn nominees in US history, external.

The first, Lucius Horatio Stockton, was nominated to be Secretary of War by President John Adams in 1801. Stockton was nominated in the last few months of the Adams administration but was seen as too radical by incoming president, Thomas Jefferson.

Before Gaetz, the last nominee to be withdrawn was Chad Wolf. He was picked by Donald Trump to head the Homeland Security department in the last few weeks of Trump’s first administration.

Wolf was Acting Secretary of Homeland Security at the time. But when Wolf called on Trump to condemn the riot at the US Capitol on 6 January 2021, the president withdrew his nomination.

Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from Washington

I've been exchanging messages with Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond, about Trump's potential picks to succeed Matt Gaetz as nominee for attorney general.

The "obvious choice", he tells me would be Todd Blanche, who represented Trump in his New York criminal trial and has already been nominated to serve as deputy attorney general.

Other possibilities include Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares or senior Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, including Ted Cruz, Tom Cotton or Josh Hawley, according to Tobias. The latter two have suggested that they would prefer to stay in the Senate.

"Perhaps when Gaetz met with senators he realised that the nomination process was going to be difficult, and so he may have concluded that it was better to withdraw," Tobias added.

"Indeed, he deserves some credit for saying that the nomination might be a distraction and so decided to withdraw and spare himself, the Senate, President-Elect Trump and the nation a time-consuming and protracted battle so soon after the election," he added.

Jonathan Josephs
BBC business reporter

The head of the US financial regulator the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Gary Gensler has said he will resign from the role on the day of Donald Trump’s inauguration.

It will save the new president the trouble of following through on his campaign promise to fire Gensler on his first day in office.

The two have vastly different opinions on the crypto currency industry.

At a Bitcoin conference in July, Trump said he would make the US the cryptocurrency capital of the world.

In contrast, Gensler, in September, told the BBC that it was an industry “rife with fraud and hucksters and grifters” as he explained why the Biden administration had led a crackdown on the industry which led to a record high 46 enforcement actions last year.

Those cases led to the founders of two of the world’s biggest crypto platforms, FTX’s Sam Bankman-Fried and Binance’s Changpeng Zhao, sentenced to jail.

Under President Trump, it's likely the SEC will put far fewer resources into trying to police an industry its critics argue isn’t even its responsibility.

Mike Wendling
US digital reporter

Matt Gaetz is currently unemployed - having resigned from his seat in the House of Representatives shortly after being nominated for attorney general.

But he could return to the House in short order - when the new Congress is sworn in on 3 January.

That is possible because before he was nominated by Donald Trump, Gaetz handily won re-election to his seat, carrying two-thirds of the vote in the election earlier this month.

Although he's resigned from the current congressional session, there is nothing preventing him from re-taking his seat in the next Congress, says Pamella Seay, a law professor at Florida Gulf Coast University.

There's one sticking point - Gaetz would then face a reopening of the House ethics investigation against him.

But Seay says the Republican-majority House could also consider the matter settled and vote against relaunching the case.

Some pundits have suggested that Gaetz could also be picked by Florida governor Ron DeSantis to replace Senator Marco Rubio, Trump's nominee for Secretary of State. Seay says that's less likely, as Gaetz and DeSantis are not close allies.

"My best guess is that he is going to go back to his seat in the House," Seay told the BBC. "It's a platform for him."

Image source, Getty Images

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson has come out in support of fellow Republican Matt Gaetz, saying he "has a bright future ahead of him", echoing the remarks made earlier by President-elect Donald Trump.

In a post on X, the Republican lawmaker writes: "I’ve worked closely with Matt for eight years. He is an America First fighter—dedicated to ending the weaponization of the Department of Justice which, after the abuses of the Biden-Harris Administration, needs serious reform."

Johnson last week came out in opposition to the potential release of the House Ethics Committee report into Gaetz, saying it would set a "terrible precedent" and it's "not the way we do things in the House".

The Venmo payment leak that seemed to end Gaetz's bid for attorney generalpublished at 22:22 Greenwich Mean Time 21 November

22:22 GMT 21 November

Mike Wendling
US digital reporter

The investigation into allegations that, among other things, Matt Gaetz paid for sex, is fairly old news – dating back to 2020.

And ever since those allegations were brought forward, he has denied all wrongdoing.

But his nomination to the post of America’s top law enforcement official put new attention on the issue.

And in recent days, US news outlets have been reporting on leaks from the investigation – one that did not lead to any criminal charges.

Some of the most significant material concerns payments that Gaetz made using Venmo – a popular online payment app.

The leaks show payments from Gaetz to several people, including two women - allegedly the money was sent to these women in exchange for sex with the former congressman.

Venmo users can attach short messages to payments – usually to indicate what the payment is for – and some of the transfers that Gaetz made apparently included messages such as “love you”, “being awesome” and “being my friend”, according to records obtained by ABC News.

Gaetz and Trump have not given a specific reason for the withdrawal of his nomination, but reporting on the payments has been one of the biggest stories in the US media over the last day or so.

And the level of detail could indicate that investigators have collected a much larger amount of information about Gaetz’s activities.