"Judge Judy" Sheindlin of TV courtroom fame threw her support behind Haley for president.

“I’m proud to endorse Nikki Haley because she is whip smart, has executive credentials and was a superb governor,” Sheindlin said in a statement. “She has international gravitas as Ambassador to the United Nations. She is principled, measured and has that illusive quality of real common sense. I truly think she can restore America and believe she is the future of this great nation.”

Sheindlin endorsed former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg during his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020.

Rep. Greg Pence, R-Ind., the brother of former Vice President Mike Pence, announced that he won't run for re-election this fall.

Greg Pence was first elected in 2018 to the seat his brother previously held representing Indiana’s 6th Congressional District. The district is heavily Republican, favoring Trump over Biden by an almost 32-point margin in 2020.

Greg Pence's political career is inextricably linked to his brother's. Hours after a mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, chanting "Hang Mike Pence," Greg Pence was one of 147 Republicans who voted to object to the results of the 2020 election. He later voted against establishing the Jan. 6 Committee, as well.

Pence is the second Indiana Republican to announce his retirement in as many days: Rep. Larry Bucshon said yesterday he won’t run for re-election.

In a new ad out today, former GOP Rep. Steve King of Iowa offers a full-throated endorsement of Ramaswamy’s presidential bid.

“I’ve been looking for the strongest voice we have that will defend our Constitution and restore the pillars of American exceptionalism. That’s Vivek Ramaswamy,” King says in the ad, which is the Ramaswamy campaign’s first paid TV ad since December, when it went dark on the airwaves.

King lost his seat in Congress in 2020 after he made racist comments and was condemned for questioning whether humanity would exist without rape and incest. 

Ramaswamy began campaigning with King in Iowa in December and flatly denied any racism allegations against King, telling one voter, “I don’t think Steve King is a white supremacist … I don’t think he’s any close to that.”

After spending Monday berating Haley for canceling a campaign event because of a harsh winter storm that’s blanketing Iowa, Ramaswamy is doing the same thing today.

Originally slated to hold seven events in Iowa today, Ramaswamy's schedule is now down to four.

But when Haley cancelled an Iowa event yesterday because of the snow, Ramaswamy said “if you can’t handle the snow, you can’t handle Xi Jinping” and you can’t be a “wilting flower when some basic things don’t go your way.” He also posted on X: “We’re not gonna let a little snow stop us. I’m no snowflake.”

This morning, he posted again about his car getting stuck in a ditch due to the snow. Ramaswamy vowed “Our next 7 events will continue as planned, starting at 9am in Coralville” before cancelling three of those seven events just a few hours later.

On "The Hugh Hewitt Show" this morning, Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst called on Trump to announce whom he'll select as his vice presidential nominee early in the year if he is gliding to the nomination.

Hewitt asked Ernst, "If [Trump] is the nominee and it’s certain that he’s the nominee after Super Tuesday, should he name his vice president early, because he’s going to be in trial after trial, and we need someone to go out there and raise money, raise awareness, raise issues. What do you think?"

Ernst answered, "I do think it’s important to announce someone early." She added that Trump will "need a surrogate out there, that’s able to raise the money and to speak to a number of the issues that we will be facing in these next number of years."

Ernst has not endorsed the former president, citing a "long-standing tradition" for Iowa's senators to stay neutral ahead of the Jan. 15 caucuses. But many, including Hewitt, have named Ernst as a potential vice presidential pick for Trump.

Two new polls of the Republican presidential race in New Hampshire paint very different pictures about the state of the contest there.

A CNN/University of New Hampshire poll finds Trump ahead of Haley by 7 points among likely Republican primary voters — just outside of the poll’s margin of error — down from the former president’s 22-point lead over the former U.N. ambassador in November.

The numbers: Trump 39%; Haley 32%; Christie 12%; Ramaswamy 8%; DeSantis 5%. The survey was conducted Jan. 4-8 among 919 likely primary voters and has a margin of error of +/- 3.2%

On the flip side, a Boston Globe/USA Today/Suffolk University poll shows Trump ahead of Haley by 20 points among likely New Hampshire GOP primary voters.

Mother Nature is once again forcing Republican presidential candidates to alter their campaign plans in Iowa.

Ramaswamy postponed his first scheduled stop in the Hawkeye State today because of snow. This comes after he criticized Haley yesterday for canceling an event in Iowa because of the weather. Ramaswamy still plans to hold six events in Iowa today.

While Trump is attending court in Washington, his former acting attorney general, Matt Whitaker, is set to hold an event for the former president’s campaign in Iowa. Actor Roseanne Barr was slated to join, but the Trump campaign said she would no longer be able to make it because of the inclement weather.

Haley and Hutchinson are scheduled to hold events in Iowa this morning.

DeSantis will participate in a Fox News town hall in Des Moines this evening after delivering his annual State of the State address in Tallahassee, Florida, in the morning.

In New Hampshire, Christie will hold a town hall in Rochester this evening. And on the Democratic side, long-shot candidate Dean Phillips has four Granite State stops on his schedule.

AMES, Iowa — In the basement of the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity house here at Iowa State University, Ramaswamy made his pitch to a crowd of about 50 young men — and one young woman — on a Friday evening last month, as a campaign that often attracts more men than women took on a literal frat house atmosphere for a night.

The fraternity brothers peppered him with questions about cryptocurrency, “woke” indoctrination on campus, and crime on the streets of Chicago before honorary brother Ramaswamy threw a question at them himself.

“Do you guys have suggestions to us and our team here for how we can get large numbers of college students, say here at Iowa State, to come out on Martin Luther King Day evening?” Ramaswamy asked, fishing for ideas on getting young voters to caucus Jan. 15. “I saw some party buses on the way in here,” he added. “I’m open to any idea.”

Read the full story here.

CLINTON, Iowa — The Iowa campaign trail has long been littered with mainstays, like Pizza Ranch and the Machine Shed BBQ restaurant, but Trump aims to add a new stop today nearly 900 miles from Des Moines: A courtroom in Washington.

His campaign and allies see this detour from the Hawkeye State days before the caucuses as a boost, not a detriment, to his bid to return to the White House.

“I think the Democrats intended to hurt him by tying him down in a courtroom, but it’s backfiring on them spectacularly,” said Mike Davis, an outside legal and political adviser who is in frequent contact with Trump and his campaign. “They’re turning Donald Trump into Nelson Mandela.”

Read the full story here.