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With Donald Trump headed to Capitol Hill on Thursday to meet with GOP lawmakers including House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), CNN's John King reported that some GOP lawmakers would just prefer not having to deal with him at all.

Speaking with host John Berman, King stated that ever since the former president first came on the political scene there have been Republicans who privately have taken shots at him but have held their tongues publicly because they fear his wrath.

"That Donald Trump is back on Capitol Hill of all places as Republican kingmaker is a wow," King told Berman who replied, "You know, it's interesting because there's the issue of what it says about him and, as I think, you know, he's got this skill, whether you liked him or not, this political resilience that is in many ways unprecedented, but what does it say about them?"

"What does it say about these Republican members who absolutely were saying other things on January 6, 7, 8, and 9th?" he asked.

"Many of them, some will never say this publicly, but in private conversations, many of them from the beginning had been trying to figure out how do we make him go away? How does he go away?" King replied. "When will the trap door open and he will go away because, never mind 5:00 A.M. tweets when he was president, even never mind the insurrection. I know the people out there throw things at the TV."

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"But he's not a conservative, he's not one of us, he doesn't stand up against Vladimir Putin. You know, he's just not a traditional Reagan Republican or a Bush Cheney Republican," he said of the GOP lawmakers.

"They've wanted him gone a long time, but they haven't even figured out how," he elaborated, "and I think that the fact that the Marco Rubios and Ted Cruzes and the people who Trump just eviscerated in 2016 and still to this day doesn't really respect and thinks he dominates will just follow him. Follow him because they are afraid of his people they're afraid of the phone calls, the protests, the people back home."

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CNN legal analyst Elliot Williams found himself appalled on Thursday after seeing former President Donald Trump's latest fundraising pitch.

During a roundtable discussion, host Kasie Hunt displayed a message Trump sent out to his supporters this week that began with the subject header, "HAUL OUT THE GUILLOTINE!"

Paul Ryan rebuked Donald Trump in a Fox News interview, but MSNBC's Joe Scarborough called out his opposition as insufficient.

The former House speaker and current Fox Corporation board member questioned Trump's character and fitness for office, calling him an authoritarian and a drag on other Republican candidates, but the "Morning Joe" host lambasted Ryan for stopping short of saying he would vote for President Joe Biden and saying he would instead cast a write-in vote.

With the first 2024 presidential debate between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump two weeks away, one GOP campaign consultant said both candidates have "trigger points" that they both need to rise above if they hope to come out on top.

Appearing on MSNBC's "Way Too Early," with host Jonathan Lemire, Susan Del Percio said she expects Biden to get under Trump's skin, which could be disastrous for his bid to return to the Oval Office.

"I think what both men have to do is realize what their trigger points are and know to keep them in check. That's much easier for President Biden who has shown an ability to control himself, unlike the former president," she told the host before laughing.

"But they each have points where they really know how to — they get prickly, if you will," she continued before elaborating, "It will be Donald Trump going after President Biden's son, most likely, and the president has to have that response there. Donald Trump, I do believe that President Biden will go after Donald Trump as a convicted felon, as well he should. But I think this is definitely working to Biden's benefit because he knows how to hold his tongue a lot better."

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Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) says there's a get-out-of-jail-free-card for Trump ally and convicted criminal Steve Bannon.

Appearing on “The Tim Pool Daily Show”, the Florida pol mapped out a way for the conservative host of the “War Room” podcast to avoid surrendering on July 1 to serving out his four month sentence for being in contempt of Congress.

House Republicans are knuckling down in their effort to pry away audio recordings of President Joe Biden's interview in his classified documents investigation, and MSNBC's Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski ridiculed them for "embarrassing" themselves to appease Donald Trump.

Only one GOP lawmaker, Rep. Dave Joyce (R-OH), voted against holding Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt for refusing to hand over the tapes, saying he could not support a resolution that "would further politicize our judicial system to score political points," but panelists on "Morning Joe" agreed the rest of the Republican conference was more than happy to do that.

Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) said House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has the legal authority to prosecute Attorney General Merrick Garland without the Justice Department's help or a vote from Congress.

After House Republicans voted to hold Garland in contempt on Wednesday, Biggs appeared to be in a celebratory mood but worried that the Justice Department might not act on the contempt vote.

A spokesperson for Donald Trump compared the former president to "a pair of glasses for the American people."

During a Wednesday appearance on Real America's Voice, Trump Deputy Communications Director Caroline Sunshine was asked about the House holding Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt of Congress.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell spurred outrage Wednesday when he announced he'd meet with former President Donald Trump in Washington D.C. — despite having condemned him when MAGA supporters attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

McConnell (R-KY) told reporters in Washington D.C. that he was throwing support behind Trump's campaign and intended to meet with him in person on Thursday.

Rep. Tom Tiffany (R-WI) was shut down on live television Wednesday by a CNN anchor who repeatedly interrupted his "Biden crime family" monologue with fact checks and rebuttals.

Tiffany faced off against Boris Sanchez, who took Tiffany to task over his public statement on the criminal conviction of President Joe Biden's son Hunter, was found guilty on gun charges in Delaware federal court this week.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson on Wednesday celebrated Donald Trump's upcoming visit to Washington, D.C. to meet with House and Senate Republicans, barely blocks away from where the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol and on democracy itself took place. Many hold the-then president and his "Big Lie" responsible for the insurrection, and he has been indicted on charges related to it.

Johnson was asked if the ex-president is committed to and respects the peaceful transfer of power.

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) defended snubbing a House committee after he was subpoenaed to testify about the effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election on Jan. 6, 2021.

During a Wednesday House floor debate on holding Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) argued that claims of Department of Justice "weaponization" against Republicans "melted away" after President Joe Biden's son Hunter was convicted of three felonies.

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg says he hopes Americans can see the difference between an LGBTQ Pride flag representing love, like the one Martha-Ann Alito lamented she has to look at daily, and flags that symbolize the January 6, 2021 insurrection, two of which she flew at the homes she and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito live in.

"I'm often reminded that the most important thing in my life, which is my marriage, and my family and the two beautiful children that my husband Chasten and I are raising that that marriage only exists by the grace of the single vote on the United States Supreme Court," said Secretary Buttigieg, responding to a question during a CNN interview Wednesday morning about secretly-recorded remarks Mrs. Alito made. "That expanded our rights and freedoms back in 2015 and made it possible for somebody like me to get married."