Welcome to the NewsHour.

The U.S. Senate returns to Washington tonight, now facing more tough decisions about controversial

nominations by Donald Trump.

That says the president-elect is also pushing to bypass the Senate entirely in confirming

his key appointments.

Congressional correspondent Lisa Desjardin is here to bring us up to date and take a bigger

look at the Senate as a check on presidential power. It's always great to see you, Lisa. So let's start with this.

What's the latest on President-elect Trump's most controversial cabinet selections? Let's talk about two

in particular for the Department of Defense and Attorney General. Let's start there with Matt

Gates, the controversial nominee for Attorney General. We know a little bit more about him.

A Florida attorney says he is representing two young women who saw Gates having a sexual encounter

with a woman who was 17.

Gates himself has denied any wrongdoing.

He's saying he has been politically persecuted and targeted in all of this.

But there is an update on the House ethics report for that long investigations of the House

had on this exact incident. That committee meets this week. And the chair of that committee,

a Republican, has said that Speaker Johnson, who has said he didn't, doesn't want them to release the report,

he said that that word shouldn't affect the committee's decision.

Will it or won't it? We don't know. But the ranking Democrat on that committee, Susan Wilde,

has said it should be released. They are going to decide this week whether it will be publicly released.

Now, let's talk about the Department of Defense nominee, Paul Heggseth.

There separately, a lawyer for him has said that he did pay a woman a settlement after they

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