Welcome back to The Best & The Brightest. I’m Tara Palmeri, trying to navigate all of the Christmas parties and events in D.C. this week.

On Tuesday, Puck and Arnold Ventures hosted a fabulous event to celebrate the fifth anniversary of the First Step Act on the rooftop of the Riggs Hotel. I had a great time onstage talking with Van Jones and Matthew Charles. Thanks also to former Rep. Doug Collins and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries for their moving remarks. (More details on the event here.) It was also nice to see, among so many others, Rep. Kelly Armstrong, Holly Harris, Alice Marie Johnson, Jonathan Capehart, Jon Reinish, Jonathan Martin, Shanti Stanton, Rickie Niceta, Josh Dawsey, Grover Norquist, Ja’Ron Smith, Heather Rice-Minus, and Jessica Jackson. Special thanks to Arnold Ventures C.E.O. Kelli Rhee, who introduced the night’s conversation, and to Kevin Ring and James Williams for their support and partnership.

Tonight, a scoop from the upper chamber, where N.R.S.C. chairman Steve Daines is urging fellow senators to endorse Trump now, before Iowa, if they want to be on the loyalist list. The rest of town is already feeling the reverberations: There’s no more holding out, you’re either team Trump or you’re not.

But first, here’s Abby Livingston with today’s highlights from the Capitol Hill reality show…

• Michigan: When it comes to the House/Senate/White House trifecta, Michigan is the most consequential state in 2024. Democrats are almost entirely on defense here, protecting Joe Biden’s 2020 Electoral College votes, retiring Debbie Stabenow’s Senate seat, and the open-seat House races to replace Elissa Slotkin (who’s running for Senate) and the retiring Dan Kildee. (To be fair, Republican John James’ seat is also in play…) But the stakes could not be higher here, amid profound turmoil in both parties.

  Reports emerged on Thursday that the Michigan Republican Party is on the brink of bankruptcy, a fresh development in the tumultuous reign of Republican chairwoman Kristina Karamo. But it is nearly impossible to find a national Democrat who feels reassured about Michigan. The defiance of Rashida Tlaib’s criticism of Israel has made Democrats even more anxious. What makes them even more insecure, however, is whether she will lift a finger to help Biden and Slotkin. The margins here have become razor-thin, and there is a great deal of fear that Michigan’s robust Arab American community will stay home. It is anyone’s guess which party has the upper hand in the state.

• California: The crumbling of the California G.O.P. over the last 15 years is well-documented. But amid that collapse, Kevin McCarthy has served as a bulwark for California Republicans—in fundraising, political sophistication, and prioritization in N.R.C.C. spending. Alas, no more, as Politico noted this week. Save for Katie Porter’s open Orange County seat, California Republicans are on complete defense. No longer will House members John Duarte, David Valadao, Mike Garcia, and Michelle Steele have their Golden State guardian angel in leadership.

• New York: While it’s often a sleepy general election state, New York is now Democrats’ top priority to recapture the House—beginning with the election to replace George Santos in February. That race is producing insight into New York’s senior Democratic leadership, and it’s reasonable to expect Brooklyn’s Hakeem Jeffries to be heavily involved in this race, especially as the “Santos special” becomes nationalized. If Democrats can snatch this seat from Republicans, it will permanently reduce Speaker Johnson’s vote margin.

  But also keep an eye on Gov. Kathy Hochul, who has shouldered the blame for New York Democrats’ underperformance in ’22, fairly or not. Hochul knows a bit about winning competitive House special elections, and she recently demonstrated her old-school bona fides as a former Moynihan staffer and product of the Buffalo political machine: After a rough 2022 gubernatorial primary against then-Rep. Tom Suozzi, Hochul put the screws to her former rival ahead of Thursday, when he secured the party’s nomination for the special.

  Democrats say they’re delighted with Republicans’ intent to move forward on a Biden impeachment, and the New York special election may well be a testing ground for impeachment messaging. And they’re particularly focused on the six New York seats held by Republicans in districts Biden carried in 2020 (currently represented by Anthony D’Esposito, Nick LaLota, Mike Lawler, Marc Molinaro, Brandon Williams, and, until last week, George Santos).

  And then there is once again the Israel issue, which is playing out painfully among Democrats in and around New York City. That division manifested for real this week when Jamaal Bowman, an Israel critic, picked up a pro-Israel primary challenger (and a House censure vote). This is a safe Democratic seat, but it’s also a safe bet that Republicans will look for every opportunity in New York to exploit this cleavage.

According to multiple sources in the Senate and on the Trump team, National Republican Senatorial Committee chair Steve Daines has been “aggressively lobbying” fellow senators to make their Trump endorsement now, before it’s too late and doesn’t matter. For the Trump team, the demand for a loyalty oath is not just about racking up enough support to finally vanquish his flagging competitors; it’s also about sending a message to the donor class currently infatuated with Haley as the Never Trumper du jour. “Chairman Daines is a strong supporter of President Trump and firmly believes he will be the nominee,” said N.R.S.C. communications director Mike Berg, who declined to comment further on the record.

Sure, there are political risks around getting behind a former president facing 91 indictments, especially when he’s the kind of guy who will likely run a desperate, chaotic campaign and then enter the White House hellbent on retribution. As multiple news organizations have reported in recent weeks, Trump and his allies are assembling a shortlist of far-right enforcers—Stephen Miller, Steve Bannon, Kash Patel—with a shock-and-awe mandate to target, and even jail, critics. (My Puck partner Tina Nguyen has also reported on the outpouring of assistance Trump is getting to stock the government with true believers on Day 1.)

Naturally, they are making their case along purely Trumpian lines: Loyalists will get more credit for pledging their fealty now, before Iowa, which is now just six weeks away. Of course, the unspoken element of this negotiation is that the disloyal will get Romney-ed— i.e., neutered or potentially strung along and then humiliated. As a Trump campaign official reminded me: “We always know when people came along in the process.”

This is all of a piece with classic Trumpian transactionalism. When he first arrived in town, Trump brought with him a mantra from his decades as a shifty New York real estate heir: Everyone, he assumed, had a price. His only surprise, perhaps, was that people’s prices in this town were often lower than he expected. After all the grandstanding during the primaries, even the most august members of the party, including Romney (as well as high-minded folks like Rex Tillerson and Gary Cohn) acquiesced when they saw an opportunity for themselves.

So, in the coming weeks, as our news cycles become ever more littered with alarming revelations about the authoritarian potential of a second Trump presidency, we may see a cavalcade of rolling endorsements from high-ranking elected officials. “Members like to have their heads in the sand and act like it’s not happening. Daines raising it means they have to think it through, and they’re struggling with what to do,” said a source close to one of the many senators who has been contacted. “The jig is up. If we want a constructive relationship with him to get things done; you have to think about what best enables you to be in that position.”

Daines believes that having Trump at the top of the ticket will actually help the G.O.P. win back the Senate. Among other things, according to his data, it will help the party’s odds in the states that matter—West Virginia, Montana, and Ohio. That said, Daines would desperately want Trump to endorse Tim Sheehy over the more MAGA-friendly Matt Rosendale in Montana against Democrat Jon Tester, the state’s popular incumbent. He would also need to ensure that Trump doesn’t tank David McCormick’s bid in Pennsylvania, as he did in the last election, and to work with him on choosing the right candidate to challenge Sen. Sherrod Brown in Ohio, which is probably the strongest “hold” opportunity for the Democrats.

Trump has already repaid Daines by endorsing popular West Virginia governor Jim Justice over Alex Mooney, a Freedom Caucus hardliner who pushed to reject the 2020 election result. In doing so, he essentially forced the Democrats’ strongest candidate, Sen. Joe Manchin, out of the race. (As for the House, it’s not a given that Trump will be any help, considering the seats that delivered them the majority in 2022 were concentrated in the suburbs of New York and California.)

But Daines needs to continue delivering for Trump. In just the last week, Senators Kevin Cramer, Katie Britt, and John Hoeven endorsed Trump, joining J.D. Vance, Roger Marshall, Markwayne Mullin, Marsha Blackburn, Bill Hagerty, Tommy Tuberville, Ted Budd, Eric Schmitt, Cindy Hyde-Smith, Lindsey Graham, and Rick Scott. (None of Trump’s primary rivals has even one Senate endorsement.) “The strategic decision is, ‘Am I going to endorse him now?’ and you get credit for having done it. You’re viewed as more proactive in facilitating the rise of it all,” said the Senate source.

At the same time, this person noted, this short-term decision-making is the purest form of cynical political myopia. “Now, what’s coming from the rise of Trump 2.0.? Everyone knows what’s coming; it’s going to be a disaster.”

Indeed, there is a new clause increasingly being inserted in the Trump loyalty oath that relates to which operatives someone can and can’t work with. On Saturday, Trump called Roe out by name on Truth Social, saying he’s “known for spending Top Dollars on failing campaigns,” which many interpreted as an obvious message around town: You’re either with us, or you’re with them.

There is also personal beef between Roe and Chris LaCivita, the senior advisor to the Trump campaign, as has been widely documented. They even once fought on Twitter/X over one of my pieces, and then challenged each other to a cage match. (Please, no, guys…) When I asked LaCivita if working with Axiom would hurt a member’s standing with Trump, he said “no comment.”

Of course, Axiom still has at least 100 Republican members on retainer, and plenty of them say they’re happy with their service and too far into the cycle to change political strategists. (And yes, Trump did endorse an Axiom client, Brandon Gill, the other day, showing that his team isn’t really fine-tooth combing through the Roe client list.) But others in G.O.P. circles are raising the alarm that even their choice of professional services could become a litmus test. “If I’m a candidate, I have to think about using Jeff Roe since the leader of the party is personally opposed to it,” said one operative.

A moment of reckoning is arriving for professional bundlers, fundraisers, and the lobbyist class, too. “It’s time to get in line, or it’s going to be a lot more later,” one Trump adviser told me. These sorts of threats aren’t atypical, especially in local politics. But Trump is unique in his appetite for retribution, his influence in the party, and his capacity to hold a grudge. “You have to bend the knee, and you don’t want to be the last guy to do it,” said a consultant who worked on the last Trump campaign. “We’re having a come to Jesus for the Republicans operatives.” Said another operative working on a rival campaign: “It’s time. I don’t know what else you do. If you want to do it, you do what Harold Hamm did a few weeks ago: Go to Mar-a-Lago and write a $200,000 check.”