DeSantis, former Trump aide condemn corruption, lobbyist influence after GOP midterm losses

Concerns about lobbyist influence and corruption in Washington, D.C., are resurfacing after the 2026 midterm elections, with policymakers at the state and federal levels attributing Democrats’ strong performance to a backlash against the status quo that has entrenched the federal executive and legislative branches.

In the days since the 2026 midterm elections, top Republicans inside and outside the administration have weighed in on what led Democrats to gain control of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate.

During remarks at the Notre Dame Center for Citizenship and Constitutional Government on Saturday, Florida’s Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis noted that Democratic candidates were “running ads on corruption in Washington.” He called “Congressmen making a windfall in the stock market” a major problem.

“You show up to Congress, you’ve never displayed any investment acumen in your life, all of a sudden, you’re beating Warren Buffett with … a suspiciously timed trade," he said. "Oh, a company that is actually under one of your committee’s jurisdictions. That is just something.”

DeSantis recalled selling all of his stocks after he was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2012.

“I’ve never traded a stock in elected office,” he said. “Why? Because I don’t want to be in a situation where I do something and then, ‘Oh well, you did this’ and ‘you voted this way.’”

“The idea that public service is a way to leverage power and enrich yourself is anathema to what our founders believed,” he said. “What you’re seeing in Washington is clearly not consistent with what our founders believed was necessary to kind of create a foundation for a successful republic.”

DeSantis called for a ban on congressional stock trading and for action to ensure that lawmakers cannot make money on prediction markets. He also expressed concern about the influence of “lobbyists” in Washington, maintaining that “Republicans should be leading this.”

“Weren’t we the ones saying 'drain the swamp' … a few years ago?” he asked. “And yet, the Democrats now are able to take that, and they’re making hay out of it.”

During an appearance on “The Joe Rogan Experience” on Friday, former Trump administration official Calley Means told host Joe Rogan why he recently resigned as a senior adviser to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

While Means praised the 2024 presidential election as one of the greatest “political miracles in history,” he lamented that “there is a very concentrated group of people in the Trump administration” who are “antagonistic to what people voted for” and are instead working to “enrich their families.”

Means, who worked closely with Kennedy on the “Make America Healthy Again” initiative, said outgoing White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles “is the most powerful chief of staff in American history," saying she was previously “one of the top lobbyists in the country.” He named some of the individuals and causes she lobbied for, including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, “the pharmaceutical industry” and “the pesticide industry.”

Throughout his conversation with Rogan, Means highlighted the resistance his efforts to take on the pesticide industry encountered.

“It is absolutely true that his administration has been infiltrated by the very people that he energized voters to say he would get out of DC,” he said. He named Kennedy as one of “a lot of good people in the administration” who are “exasperated” by the “absolutely centralized control and paralysis that Susie’s driven.”

Means shared statistics showing that the U.S. has 4% of the world’s population but uses 20% of the world’s “glyphosate” as well as “herbicides” and “pesticides.” He said the inclusion of the word “glyphosate” in the Make America Healthy Again report resulted in “violent reaction against that from [the] industry” in the form of “calls to Susie.” The discussion touched on concerns that glyphosate causes cancer and that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had not reviewed it in 30 years.

Means said the influence of lobbyists and special interests is not unique to the Trump administration. He acknowledged that the EPA studied glyphosate five years ago but alleged that “it came out in court that Bayer, the maker of glyphosate, ghostwrote research for the EPA report and bribed EPA officials” to declare that it does not cause cancer.

The interview ended with Means telling Rogan he had “a huge issue that the administration had agreed to release an ultraprocessed food definition” but the plan did not materialize because of opposition from major food and beverage companies, including Coca-Cola and Oreo.

While Means said he assured the lobbyists, “We have a mandate behind us” and “We’re going to get it done,” he said the lobbyists reached out to Wiles and successfully had the effort killed.

Means said this prompted him to resign from the Trump administration.