"My son had a drug problem but he's overcome it and I'm proud of him" -- Biden says of Hunter, a powerful message for many Americans hit hard by the opioid crisis Trump pledged to end in 2016.
[Also, Hunter was not dishonorably discharged.]
Welcome to 2020, time travelers, where white grandads fighting for racial equity mid pandemic are equipped with n95s and super charged leaf blowers to “blow the tear gas away.”
“Rosalynn Carter’s family said she specifically wanted Melania Trump to know she was invited to the service. In a time of division, she hoped all the first ladies would join in a show of solidarity as her farewell tribute,” per
@marycjordan
:
Marie Yovanovitch in WaPo: "I have seen dictatorships around the world, where blind obedience is the norm & truth-tellers are threatened w punishment or death. We must not allow the US to become a country where standing up to our gov is a dangerous act."
.
@lizzo
has James Madison’s crystal flute onstage right now - a gift from a French crystal flute designer. She claims to be the first person to ever play it !! There are body guards onstage surrounding the flute. “History is freaking cool you guys.” Cc
@librarycongress
Scoop: the Jan. 6 committee has obtained emails between John Eastman & Ginni Thomas & is now discussing whether they should spend time during hearings exploring Thomas's role. With
@jdawsey1
&
@emmersbrown
>
Scoop: National Archives last month had to retrieve boxes of Trump WH records from Mar-a-Lago that were improperly removed from the WH. The items included correspondence w Kim Jong Un. With
@jdawsey1
@thamburger
&
@AshleyRParker
>
Text from former 2016 Trump campaign staffer: “I was told by multiple people when I came aboard to never cough or sneeze while in the presence of Trump. He thinks it’s a sign of weakness and lack of control. Nobody ever recovers.”
Interesting: Marjorie Taylor Greene paid for $10,000 worth of legal services from Constitutional Counsel Group this quarter, per FEC filings -- that's John Eastman's law firm.
.
@AOC
asks why McCarthy is "unable to condemn the incitement of violence against a member of this body... what is so hard about saying this is wrong? This is not about me, this is not about Rep. Gosar but this is about what we are willing to accept."
I have agreed with the historically cooperative, disciplined approach that we have engaged in with Robert Mueller (Unlike the Clintons!). I have full confidence in Ty Cobb, my Special Counsel, and have been fully advised throughout each phase of this process.
An HHS official tells
@weijia
that there will NOT be special efforts made to reunite children who have already been separated from their families bc of the Zero Tolerance Policy, despite Trumps EO. Process will proceed for minors currently in the unaccompanied children program.
Scalise has finally gotten vaccinated, Fox News is urging viewers to get vaccinated & now McConnell issues stern warning: “These shots need to get in everybody’s arm as rapidly as possible or we're going to be back in a situation in the fall... that we were in last year.”
.
@RepMTG
just asked to enter unverified evidence into the record during the Hunter Biden Oversight contempt hearing.
@RepRaskin
replied that she can't show pornography.
“It’s not pornography,” said MTG.
"You're the expert," Raskin responded.
This is a startlingly human and heartbreaking response. Trump's attacks are oftentimes glossed over as shocking or funny or simply a part of partisan warfare - and it can get lost on people that these types of comments from the president of the United States can really hurt.
Mr. President, let’s set politics aside. My husband earned all his accolades after a lifetime of service. I’m preparing for the first holiday season without the man I love. You brought me down in a way you can never imagine and your hurtful words just made my healing much harder.
Just spoke with former
@CBP
Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske, who handled 68,000 unaccompanied children in the summer of '14. He says Trump's actions today, just before midterms, is "a misuse of active duty military...To say this isn't a political stunt is misleading the public."
Scoop: Over 500 Biden campaign & Democratic Party staffers and organizers have signed a letter issued on Monday calling on Biden to do more to protect Palestinian human rights & demanding that the Israeli government be held more accountable by the admin >
"They've taken the black vote and the poor vote for granted for a long time. It's time for democrats to get off their asses... this is a wake up call for democrats to do better for black people & poor white people," Charles Barkley tells
@jaketapper
of Doug Jones' W
.
@AndrewYang
: "Right now we have to do more for Kyle, and special needs children are going to become special needs adults.... we have to stop confusing economic value and human value... We have to say Kyle, you have intrinsic value because you are a human being."
.
@KaciSokoloff
just spoke w Dr. Harold Bornstein, who refused an interview but said that NBC's piece was "a pretty good story." Bornstein also said that he spoke to the NBC reporter “in the bathroom” of his office. He signed off with: "Sweetheart, this is watergate, goodbye!"
Breaking: Kash Patel, Steve Bannon, Mark Meadows, and Dan Scavino issued subpoenas by the 1/6 Select Committee to produce records and appear for depositions. Story TK
Two gifts to Trump family from foreign nations are missing -- golf clubs from Shinzo Abe & a life-sized portrait of Trump. Over 100 gifts worth ~ $300,000 were not properly reported to the gov, as required by fed'l law, per new report. W
@jdawsey1
:
In light of Grassley's disclosure, this is notable: the FBI sent a letter to GOP Chairman Comer last month after lawmakers were briefed in a SCIF on the FD-1023 document & proceeded to disregard "security restrictions" around the briefing & document:
Read til the very end: “Trump was very secretive about the packing of boxes that were retrieved from Mar-a-Lago last month, and did not let other aides — including some of his most senior advisers — look at them, according to people close to him.”
Scoop from our crew: Some Trump records that were taken to Mar-a-Lago were clearly marked as classified, including documents at the ‘top secret’ level, with
@DevlinBarrett
@mattzap
@jdawsey1
:
Scoop: the Biden admin has approved the sale of $735 million in precision-guided weapons to Israel, raising red flags for some House Dems more open to questioning DC’s support of Netanyahu, suggesting the sale be used as leverage. W/
@karoun
:
So thrilled to join the
@MSNBC
&
@NBCNews
team I’ve long admired; it’s a privilege to share the hard work we do every day at
@washingtonpost
. Feeling very lucky to do this job.
NEW: WashPost Congressional Correspondent & Author of The Early 202
@JaxAlemany
joins
@NBCNews
&
@MSNBC
as a contributor.
She will appear across the network, sharing her reporting on the nation's power centers, from the White House to Cap Hill, & more.
Watch via
@Morning_Joe
.
Rep. Adam Kinzinger, one of two Republicans serving on the Jan. 6 committee, said he recently got an alarming message threatening to execute him, his wife and their 5-month-old baby, via
@PostRoz
.
@IlhanMN
just played a voicemail she received a few hours after she got off the phone w
@RepBoebert
:
“There’s plenty that would love the opp to take you off the face of the earth… you’re a fucking traitor, you will not live much longer bitch. I can almost guarantee that.”
We got Bertha because she failed her birddog test (she’s gun shy). She’s still an absolute terrorist but there’s no such thing as untrainable dogs. Just terrible owners.
Okay so I’m finally up to speed on Noem killing her dog. I was open to the idea there was more to the story, farm life is hard, etc. But this seems indefensible to me. If I had that attitude about my Carolina Dog, I would have shot Zoë a dozen times over when she was young.
1/
“I can’t underscore how much the hesitancy of the Biden admin to pursue student loan cancelation has demoralized a very critical voting bloc that the President, House & Senate need in order to have any chance of preserving any of our majorities,”
@AOC
.
Scoop: the FBI agent overseeing the investigation into Hunter Biden disputed whistleblower claims that David Weiss was stymied by the Biden admin -- a critical detail McCarthy cited when announcing plans to pursue an impeachment inquiry on Tuesday...
Buck elaborated on his news w reporters just now: "We've taken impeachment and we've made it a social media issue as opposed to a constitutional concept -- this place keeps going downhill and I don't need to spend more time here."
.
@TheAmandaGorman
: "How could we possibly prevail over catastrophe? Now we assert: how could catastrophe possibly prevail over us?... One thing is certain: if we merge mercy with might and might with right, then love becomes our legacy and changes our children's birthright."
This footage was shot by Alexandra Pelosi, the Speaker's documentary filmmaker daughter, who was present to capture her mother during the historic day, per person familiar w the footage...
This is unseen footage of Congressional leadership, including Senators Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell, Speaker Pelosi and Rep. Steve Scalise, in a secure location as the riot was unfolding on Capitol Hill on January 6th.
Biden says he's picked up the phone and called former presidents. "With the exception of one of them, they've all picked up the phone and called me as well," he adds.
U.S. soybean exports to China dropped 98% in 2018. They were our top agricultural export to China last year. Now China’s buying them from Brazil due to trade tensions w Trump.
“I can tell you what I am hearing but I honestly have no idea if it’s right,” said one senior administration official close to the president. “A lot of people aren’t even telling other people in the building the truth.”
Can confirm that it delights no one to report on a lot of people — family members, friends, friends of friends, colleagues, strangers, etc. — dying. But thanks for checking in. Please stay at home everyone.
Some in our media can’t contain their glee & delight in reporting that the U.S. has more
#CoronaVirus
cases than
#China
Beyond being grotesque,its bad journalism
We have NO IDEA how many cases China really has but without any doubt its significantly more than why they admit to
New detail: post
@NatashaBertrand
&
@kyledcheney
’s story of a top ranking FEMA official who attended the Jan 6 rally, he remained part of “leadership team that received & gave guidance during the classified inaugural threat & prep meeting.”
For those already claiming "Witch hunt"/ Dem overreach, some necessary perspective: Republicans issued 1,285 subpoenas throughout the Senate's Whitewater and campaign finance investigations into the Clinton White House. See here for the reference doc:
From a source close to the WH: “The legal operation is designed for Trump to save face and ultimately give him the ability to say he didn’t lose the election fair and square. So we’re going to roll with it.”
“How much Trump stink is on my resume right now?” Preparing for the worst, GOPers ponder life after Trump. My latest on the uptick in resumes circulating on Gmail, disqualifiers for corporate clients, & where all the Trump staff might go post Trumpworld.
The contrasts between Stacey Abrams and Beto O’Rourke - from the way the media covers them, their decision making process, the way they talk about themselves, to the way other pols treat them - says so much about our society.
Senior GOP aide weighs in on Comer's hearing so far:
- Comer has lost control, allowing Dems to land attacks
- witnesses Comer selected have disputed House GOP arguments on the impeachment inquiry
- has failed to attract mainstream media attention RE more damning evidence.
Trump falsely claims that Democrats have not wanted to "do anything protecting people from eviction" -- not only have they consistently supported extending the moratorium but they've also urged emergency rental assistance.
“Carter is the only president in the modern era to return full-time to the house he lived in before he entered politics — a two-bedroom rancher assessed at $167,000, less than the value of the armored Secret Service vehicles parked outside.”
If you’ve never read this
@washingtonpost
piece by
@sullivank
&
@marycjordan
, it so perfectly captures Carter and the way he has lived up to model of the citizen servant. It’s also just a great story that has stuck with me for years.
NEW details: The unclassified inventory of unclassified items in boxes already recovered from MAL is ~100 pages long. If unclassified version of the classified inventory was organized in same way as inventory of non-classified items, it’d be ~3 pages >
.
@DaveedDiggs
aptly quoting Baldwin on this July 4th: "I love America more than any other country in the world, and exactly for this reason I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually."
Trump is indeed furious this morning, particularly about Mehmet Oz, and is blaming everyone who advised him to back Oz -- including his wife, describing it as not her best decision, according to people close to him.
BREAKING: 1/6 Select Committee issues second round of subpoenas targeting those involved with planning of Jan. 6 rally that led to the insurrection on the Capitol. Among those named: Katrina Pierson, Amy & Kylie Kremer, Cindy Chafian, Maggie Mulvaney, & more. Story link TK -
“Eight said they had clear recollections of team members protesting Strauss’s conduct either directly to Jordan or within Jordan’s range of hearing. All considered it inconceivable that Jordan did not know about Strauss’s disturbing behaviors.”
In a private meeting with moderates this week, the new Speaker appeared to agree with members who argued that since Biden’s polling numbers have been weaker, there is less of a political imperative to impeach him >
Elise Stefanik, the No. 3 House Republican, has echoed the racist “great replacement” theory allegedly espoused by the Buffalo shooter, via
@MariannaReports
"Trump was very secretive about the packing of boxes that were retrieved from Mar-a-Lago last month, and did not let other aides — including some of his most senior advisers — look at them, according to people close to him."
Cheney has entered the Capitol. Asked by
@jmartNYT
what today says about the GOP, she responds: “The party is going to come back stronger and I’m going to lead the effort to do it.”
Scoop from our crew: Some Trump records that were taken to Mar-a-Lago were clearly marked as classified, including documents at the ‘top secret’ level, with
@DevlinBarrett
@mattzap
@jdawsey1
:
New from
@harvardiop
: Biden has hit the highest favorability rating — 63 percent — among college students who are registered voters of any president in the youth poll's 21-year history >>
.
@SpeakerPelosi
: "There is no requirement there be a quid pro quo in the convo. If POTUS brings up that he wants to investigate something about his political opponent, that is self evident -- it is not right. We don't ask foreign govs to help in our election."
#TheAtlanticFest
Trump & his allies raised $250 million post election off of false claims of election fraud. But the majority of that $ went to the Save America PAC — & not to the election defense fund, as promised to donors. Below are some of entities and vendors that received $ from the PAC:
.
@RepKinzinger
: "This isn’t a waste of time. It’s a matter of accountability... The future of our party & our country depends on confronting what happened so it doesn’t happen again."
New: House Dems seek to censure Marjorie Taylor Greene over antisemitic comments -- again. The move comes after Greene tweeted “Joe Biden is Hitler” & tweeted a doctored video of a mustachioed POTUS standing at a lectern w swastikas, dubbed w Hitler audio:
One of those nuggets: Jon Sale, a prominent Florida defense attorney who had been part of the Watergate prosecutorial team, said he was asked this week to represent Trump — & declined.
.
@RepLizCheney
teases next week's hearing: Trump "never picked up the phone that day to order his admin to help, he did not call the military, his Sec of Defense received no order, he did not talk to his AG...[nor] DHS Sec -- Mike Pence did all of those things. Trump did not."
Buried at the bottom of this great scoop: USDA meat inspectors also have begun calling in sick — in numbers large enough to trigger an agency crackdown that prompted doctor’s notes as a requirement for those calling out sick
NEWS: NARA has received a request from House Oversight for a review of whether Trump has surrendered all presidential records he took with him from the White House, per person familiar w the request. Story TK.
Trump on ISIS: “These people are very smart ... very technically brilliant. They use the internet better than anyone else in the world .. perhaps except Donald Trump.”
Inventing Anna…. Paulina Luna. Our dive on the GOP darling who some old friends & family say has cherry picked & embellished parts of her past to craft her political persona. With
@alice_crites
:
NEW: Letters released today authorize the National Archives to hand over a new tranche of Trump White House documents to the House committee investigating the Jan. 6. Story TK.
Liz Cheney tells America why Jan. 6 should terrify them -- and she's willing to bet her political career on it.
@pkcapitol
,
@jdawsey1
& I profile Cheney & the last gasp of the Republican party -- at least as the Cheney political dynasty know it:
Newsy update from me &
@thamburger
on NARA’s inventory of the classified docs found within the 15 boxes recovered from Trump last month. Some of the documents are so sensitive that they may not be able to describe them in an unclassified way >
“He continued to cry when we got home and would hold on to my leg and would not let me go. When I took off his clothes he was full of dirt and lice. It seemed like they had not bathed him the 85 days he was away from us.”
Former long time
@FoxNews
corespondent to
@isaacstanbecker
: influential right wing figures “are creating a dystopia wherein lying and physical violence has become part of our politics.”
This background quote from a Cheney family friend didn't make the cut but sharing anyways: “When the book is written, we already know what it will say: Liz Cheney gave up her life and political career in order to try to tell the American people what Donald Trump had done."
Liz Cheney tells America why Jan. 6 should terrify them -- and she's willing to bet her political career on it.
@pkcapitol
,
@jdawsey1
& I profile Cheney & the last gasp of the Republican party -- at least as the Cheney political dynasty know it:
News: The Justice Department has begun taking steps to launch an investigation into Trump’s improper removal of presidential records to Mar-a-Lago — some of which were labeled “top secret,” per ppl familiar w the matter. W/
@mattzap
:
“While neurological experts said they couldn’t offer a specific diagnosis abt Fetterman’s health, they noted that closed captions are a common tool for ppl w auditory processing/ hearing issues, conditions which have nothing to do w overall intelligence.”
New:
@USNatArchives
says they've yet to recover all records from Trump admin officials that should've been transferred to NARA under the PRA. (Eg. Peter Navarro). In letter to
@OversightDems
, they defer to DOJ on question of whether Trump has handed every record over. Story TK >
“Trump is the president,”
@AlanIAbramowitz
said. “So it’s a little bit strange for the incumbent president to be running on a platform of: `We’ve got these terrible problems. Elect me and I’ll solve them.’”