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Sign up for the Evening Report newsletter Subscribe {beacon} Evening Report ©  Rod Lamkey, Jr. and Alex Brandon, Associated PressWashington braces for Cabinet confirmation fights THE CONFIRMATION HEARINGS for President-elect Trump’s Cabinet will get underway Tuesday, with several nominees expected to face tough questions or outright hostility from the senators who will decide their fates. Republicans are increasingly confident they’ll stick together to give Trump the team that he wants, although the intense scrutiny and public nature of the hearings will inject some volatility into the process. With a 53-47 majority in the Senate, Trump’s nominees can only afford to lose three Republicans to get confirmed. Among those who face an uncertain path forward:  • Pete Hegseth to lead the Department of Defense.• Tulsi Gabbard to serve as director of National Intelligence.• Kash Patel to lead the FBI.  Senators will probe the nominees about their personal lives, experience, heterodox views and promises to up-end the status quo at the departments they’ve been picked to lead.  • Hegseth will be the first to go through the ringer, facing 14 Republicans and 13 Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday morning.  The former Fox News anchor is expected to face uncomfortable questions about allegations of sexual misconduct and drinking, as well as financial mismanagement at a previous job.  Most of those allegations have been passed along anonymously through the press, so the big question hanging over his confirmation battle is whether any witnesses come forward to go on the record.  One member to watch: Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), a veteran and survivor of sexual assault who met twice with Hegseth last year.  Meanwhile, well-funded conservative organizations are urging Republican senators to confirm Hegseth, and Trump's other nominees, or face the consequences. • Gabbard has also been met with skepticism from some quarters in Washington.  Gabbard faces conners over her connection to the now-toppled Bashar Assad regime in Syria, as well as previous comments seen as sympathetic toward Russia.  Democrats are pumping the brakes on her confirmation, saying the proper background checks and ethics disclosures haven’t come through.   Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) has acknowledged that a “paperwork problem” with the Office of Government Ethics is holding up Gabbard’s hearing. Last week, Gabbard reversed her stance on FISA Section 702, which gives the U.S. the authority to conduct warrantless surveillance of non-U.S. citizens abroad.  Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.), who had previously held out his support for Gabbard over questions about her position on that issue, says now that he'll support her nomination.  SOME NOMINEES EXPECTED TO SAIL THROUGH The vast majority of Trump’s nominees who will get hearings this week are expected to get only a light touch in the Senate.  Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) faces a relatively simple path to confirmation for secretary of State, with lawmakers on both sides of the aisle signaling their support.  Pam Bondi, Trump’s pick to be Attorney General, has been warmly welcomed by Republicans.  Other nominees facing committee hearings this week:  • Doug Collins, Veterans Affairs • Doug Burgum, Interior• Kristi Noem, Homeland Security • John Ratcliffe, CIA• Sean Duffy, Transportation• Russell Vought, Office of Management and Budget • Lee Zeldin, Environmental Protection Agency• Scott Bessent, Treasury Burgum's confirmation hearing has been delayed by a couple of days over missing paperwork but is still expected to take place this week. Find the full calendar of hearings here.  BIDEN'S FAREWELL TOUR President Biden is mapping out his exit as Trump prepares for a second term.  Biden will address the State Department this afternoon, as he seeks to burnish his foreign policy legacy.  The administration is newly optimistic it could reach a Gaza ceasefire deal before Biden leaves, although they've talked about being close to a deal for months.  The jury is out over how history will judge the Biden administration’s handling of the war between Israel and Hamas. And the calamitous U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan ranks high among the darkest days of the Biden administration.  Biden will give his official farewell address from the Oval Office on Wednesday. 💡Perspectives: • The Hill: The promises Trump will never be able to keep. • The Hill: What’s realistic for foreign policy under Trump 2.0 • Foreign Affairs: The rise of the non-aligned.  Read more:  • Senate to kick off hearings for key Trump nominees. • DeSantis calls special session to implement Trump immigration crackdown. • Republicans urge Trump nominees: Don’t take the bait from Democrats. Welcome to Evening Report! I'm Jonathan Easley, catching you up from the afternoon and what's coming tomorrow. Not on the list? Subscribe here.CATCH UP QUICK U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon will allow the release of special counsel Jack Smith's report on President-elect Trump's efforts to block the peaceful transfer of power. Separately, Cannon ordered a hearing to determine whether to release Smith's report on the classified documents case against Trump. Smith resigned over the weekend, bringing an end to both investigations.   The Biden administration says it will forgive student loans for an additional 150,000 borrowers, bringing the total number of those eligible to more than 5 million. The Supreme Court let Maryland's handgun licensing regime stand, turning away a long-running Second Amendment challenge.NEWS THIS AFTERNOON©  Scott J. Applewhite and Alex Brandon, Associated Press GOP faces divisions ahead of tough fiscal battles Republicans, who have fashioned themselves as the party of fiscal responsibility, face deep divisions ahead of several key budgetary and fiscal fights that could make it difficult to pass President-elect Trump’s second term agenda. The Hill’s Mike Lillis and Mychael Schnell capture the quandary here:  “House Republicans have a problem. They want to pass a massive agenda for President-elect Trump, preferably in his first 100 days of office. And they don’t want to add to the federal deficit. That looks impossible.”  Trump has pushed to get the GOP on the same page, holding court at Mar-a-Lago with the various factions that will determine the way forward in the early days of his administration.  Even Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), a fiscal conservative that Trump has threatened to run out of office, joined his House Freedom Caucus colleagues for a meeting with Trump in Palm Beach, Fla., over the weekend. But the signs of strain are evident on a number of fronts.  Trump is venting frustration to Republican leaders about the debt limit.  Via The Hill’s Alexander Bolton:  “Trump told Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) at a recent meeting that it’s now up to him to find a way around the debt limit impasse…Republicans say Trump’s unhappy that Congress failed to raise the debt limit before he takes office Jan. 20 and wants congressional leaders to take care of the looming problem, largely washing his own hands of the matter — at least for now.”  House Republicans raised several alternative options for raising the debt limit with Trump over the weekend, although no consensus was reached.  Several Republicans are pledging to withhold support for Trump’s agenda if the state and local tax (SALT) deduction cap is not raised. However, GOP fiscal hawks are worried about the budgetary impact of those expensive tax deductions, which are popular among wealthy taxpayers in several high-tax states.  💡Perspectives: • Understanding Congress: Unserious politics on the federal budget. • Washington Monthly: What Dems need from the next party chair. • The Hill: Goodbye cancel culture, hello capitulation culture.  Read more:  • Koch-backed group unveils $20M campaign highlighting Trump tax cuts. • Greenland prime minister ‘ready’ to talk with Trump. • Trump’s talk of expansion puts world leaders on alert.  ON TAPTrump will be inaugurated one week from today.  IN OTHER NEWS ©  Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty ImagesLos Angeles faces humanitarian, political crises There is no relief yet for desperate Angelenos as wildfires rage across the city.  The National Weather Service issued a new warning that the wind is expected to pick up this week, creating a “particularly dangerous situation.”  This comes as the death toll from the blazes has reached 24. Some 60 square miles of Los Angeles have burned, destroying thousands of homes and displacing tens of thousands of residents, many of whom are camped out at crowded shelters.  State and local officials, including Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) Sen. Adam Schiff (D), are calling for independent investigations into how a Pacific Palisades reservoir was offline and empty as firefighters sought to battle the biggest blaze in the city. Los Angeles fire chief Kristin Crowley has criticized the city’s leadership, saying fire hydrants running dry at a time of crisis is unacceptable. “When a firefighter comes up to a hydrant, we expect there’s going to be water. We don’t control the water supply,” she said.  Asked if city leadership had failed firefighters, Crowley responded: “Yes.”  Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass (D), who was in Africa when the fires broke out, is on the defensive over the city’s firefighting budget. Newsom, who has been in a feud with Trump over the city’s preparedness to deal with the crisis, is concerned the federal government will withhold aid from the state when Trump is sworn in next week. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said Monday that conditions should be placed on disaster relief for California, as he blamed the state's leaders for the crisis.  "There has been water resource mismanagement, forest management mistakes, all sorts of problems," Johnson added. "And it does come down to leadership, and it appears to us that state and local leaders were derelict in their duty in many respects. So that’s something that has to be factored in.” The Los Angeles fires are expected to be the most expensive in U.S. history, with damages in the hundreds of billions of dollars.  California Democrats on Monday authorized $50 million in state funding to “Trump-proof” the state from the president-elect’s forthcoming administration, which they said would result in “inhumane” treatment of their constituents. 💡Perspectives: • Chicago Tribune: Chicago once used fire as a catalyst for reinvention. • The Hill: California’s fires are a scorching indictment of misguided governance.  Read more:  • L.A.’s wildfires have leaders fighting on two fronts: Nature and politics. • Anger and resentment rise in Los Angeles over fire response. • Narrow roads, deep canyons: L.A. firefighters confront the perfect firetrap. • Congress braces for California wildfire fallout. • For Los Angeles, Fires Ramp Up Difficulty of Hosting 2028 Summer Games. • Who pays to rebuild California when insurance falls short? Everyone else. • ‘Half the Country’s Thinking Magically’: California Fire Victims Grapple with the Political Paralysis Over Climate Change   Stay Engaged  Did I miss a story? Drop me a line. Follow TheHill.com for the latest and recommend us to others: TheHill.com/Evening. See you next time.