;)
The Commentariat -- May 2, 2018
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
Matt Apuzzo & Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "President Trump plans to hire Emmet T. Flood, the veteran Washington lawyer who represented Bill Clinton during his impeachment, to replace Ty Cobb, the White House lawyer who has taken the lead in dealing with the special counsel investigation, who is retiring, according to two people briefed on the matter. In a phone interview, Mr. Cobb said he informed the president weeks ago that he wanted to retire. He said he planned to stay at the White House, likely through the end of the month, to help Mr. Flood transition into the new job.... Following a New York Times report in March that Mr. Trump was in discussions to hire Mr. Flood, the president attacked the article and one of the reporters who wrote it."
Eileen Sullivan & Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: "President Trump plunged on Wednesday into the simmering dispute between conservative House Republicans and the deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein, siding with the lawmakers and attacking his own Justice Department. Mr. Trump called the legal system 'rigged' in a tweet and gave voice to the complaints of a small group of congressmen who have assailed the Justice Department as slow or unresponsive to their demands to produce sensitive documents that the lawmakers say they need to conduct oversight.... 'A Rigged System - They don't want to turn over Documents to Congress. What are they afraid of? Why so much redacting? Why such unequal "justice?" At some point I will have no choice but to use the powers granted to the Presidency and get involved!'... Representative Jerrold Nadler of New York, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, said the latest Republican efforts were 'clearly trying to sabotage' the Mueller investigation and court a confrontation with Mr. Rosenstein." ...
... Josh Gerstein & Kyle Cheney of Politico: "Trump did not say precisely which records he believed were being slow-walked by the Justice Department, but Republicans have been pressing officials there to turn over memos on a variety of topics, including an August 2017 directive in which Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein laid out the scope of Mueller's investigation. On Monday, Justice rejected lawmakers' request for that memo, saying that disclosing it would jeopardize the ongoing probe." ...
... We're having another Trumpertantrum this morning, culminating in, "At some point I will have no choice but to use the powers granted to the Presidency and get involved!" And by "involved," he means stepping on the DOJ.
Our Conspiracy Theories about Trump Are Not Conspiratorial Enough. Jonathan Chait: "... the leak [of the Mueller team's questons] came from Trump's side, so that Trump could blame the leak on Mueller. 'The president and several advisers now plan to point to the list as evidence that Mueller has strayed beyond his mandate and is overreaching,' two advisers tell the Post. The 'disgraceful' leak [Trump tweeted about] was planted by Trump's own staff -- probably at the direction of Trump himself -- in order to concoct evidence of wrongdoing by Mueller, in order to advance Trump's claim that Mueller is supposedly setting him up.... Bear this lesson in mind when you process the following. In December, the administration allowed the sale of anti-tank missiles to Ukraine. Supporters of the administration held up the sale as evidence that Trump could not have colluded with Russia -- here he was, arming Russia's enemy.... [Now we learn that] in response to the missile sale, Ukrainian officials have frozen out the Mueller investigation.... When the missile sale came up in December, almost nobody even considered the possibility that it might be used as a bribe to shut down Ukrainian cooperation with Mueller.... The number one rule in understanding Trump is that the lies are usually covering even worse lies."
Melanie Schmitz of ThinkProgress: "A group of Republican lawmakers has sent a formal letter to the Norwegian Nobel Committee, officially nominating ... Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize, for his 'work to end the Korean War.' The letter was signed by 18 members of Congress...."
Haley Britzky of Axios: "Three Americans being held in North Korean labor camps have been released ahead of a planned summit between President Trump and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un, the Financial Times reports.... Kim Dong-cheol, Kim Sang-deok, and Kim Hak-seong were reportedly released in early April. Choi Sung-ryong, a campaigner for South Korean abductees, told the FT that they can either come home with Trump the day of the summit, or with an envoy prior to the talks. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is 'believed to have discussed the issue' when he traveled to North Korea on Easter weekend."
This Didn't Take Long. Quint Forgey of Politico: "Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is walking back some of the criticism he leveled against the new Republican tax law earlier this week, now claiming the measure 'has been good for Americans' overall.... That assessment marks a stark departure from Rubio's awkward rebuke of the law in an interview with The Economist published Monday, in which the Florida Republican questioned how much the legislation is really helping the working class." Mrs. McC: Marco is already famous for wearing high heels; now he's getting so good at walking backwards, I wonder if he's auditioning for second billing in a Fred Astaire movie.
Stef Kight of Axios: "Several thousand ancient artifacts -- including cuneiform tablets, cylinder seals and clay bullae -- that were illegally smuggled into the United States by Hobby Lobby last year under the guise of 'tile samples' are on their way back to Iraq, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Nichloas Confessore & Matthew Rosenberg of the New York Times: "... Cambridge Analytica announced on Wednesday that it would cease most operations and file for bankruptcy amid growing legal and political scrutiny of its business practices and work for President Trump. The decision came less than two months after the firm and Facebook became embroiled in a data-harvesting scandal that compromised the information of up to 87 million people. The revelations about the misuse of data, by The New York Times, along with The Observer of London, plunged the social media giant into crisis and prompted regulators and lawmakers to begin investigations into Cambridge Analytica. In a statement posted to its website, Cambridge Analytica said it was filing for bankruptcy in both the United States and Britain.'" ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: My congratulations to the New York Times & Guardian for taking down these reprobates.
Jason Hancock of the Kansas City Star: Missouri "Gov. Eric Greitens' former campaign manager told the Missouri attorney general's office that the governor knowingly lied to the state ethics commission about how he came to possess a donor list belonging to a veterans charity. He also says he was tricked by the governor's political advisers into taking the blame. The allegations were included in a 23-page report released Wednesday afternoon by a Missouri House committee investigating allegations of wrongdoing by the governor."
*****
Government by Absurdity
Glenn Kessler, et al., of the Washington Post: "In the 466 days since he took the oath of office, President Trump is now averaging nearly 6.5 false or misleading claims a day -- a number that keeps creeping up. He also has a proclivity to repeat, over and over, many of his statements, according to a Post analysis.... [He] has made 3,001 false or misleading claims as president." (Also linked yesterday.)
Jack Ewing of the New York Times: "American allies did not bother to conceal their annoyance Tuesday with the Trump administration's last-minute decision to delay punitive aluminum and steel tariffs by a month, in their view leaving a sword of Damocles hanging over the global economy. In Europe, the reprieve was seen not as an act of conciliation or generosity but instead as another 30 days of precarious limbo that will disrupt supply networks and undermine what has been an unusually strong period of growth. European leaders, normally circumspect, are openly irritated that President Trump's protectionist assault is aimed at them despite decades of military alliance and shared values.... They find it absurd that Mr. Trump is risking a trade war with Europe, the United States' biggest trading partner, rather than joining forces to rein in Chinese trade practices they both oppose. And the European Union's cautious, often ponderous approach to policymaking is now clashing directly with Mr. Trump's unpredictability and aggressiveness."
When Is a Typo Not Just a Typo? Daniel Drezner of the Washington Post has a great column on the Trump White House's unpresidented sloppiness. Drezner cites Suzanne Maloney of the Brookings Institution: "The correction to today's White House statement on Iran is not a typo; it's an error of unimaginable incompetence. It reflects lack of capacity a the highest levels of this administration to vet information, accurately identify real-time challenges, and devise serious responses." (Also linked yesterday.)
Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post: "The Trump administration has chosen to ignore an executive order that requires the White House to issue an annual report on the number of civilians and enemy fighters killed by American counterterrorism strikes. The mandate for the report, which was due May 1, was established by former president Barack Obama in 2016 as part of a broader effort to lift the veil of secrecy surrounding drone operations in places such as Yemen, Somalia and Libya. The White House has not formally rescinded the Obama-era executive order but has chosen not to comply with some aspects of it.... A separate requirement, imposed as part of last year's defense budget, requires the Pentagon to submit to Congress by May 1 a list of all U.S. military operations that caused civilian deaths. The Pentagon plans to deliver the report to Congress by June 1.... Former U.S. counterterrorism officials expressed surprise at the Trump administration's failure to deliver either report on time."
This Russia Thing, Ctd.
White House: "President Donald J. Trump Proclaims May 1, 2018, as Law Day, U.S.A." (Not satire.)
** Carol Leonnig & Robert Costa of the Washington Post: "In a tense meeting in early March with the special counsel, President Trump's lawyers insisted he had no obligation to talk with federal investigators probing Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential campaign. But special counsel Robert S. Mueller III responded that he had another option if Trump declined: He could issue a subpoena for the president to appear before a grand jury, according to four people familiar with the encounter. Mueller's warning -- the first time he is known to have mentioned a possible subpoena to Trump's legal team -- spurred a sharp retort from John Dowd, then the president's lead lawyer. 'This isn't some game,' Dowd said, according to two people with knowledge of his comments. 'You are screwing with the work of the president of the United States.' The flare-up set in motion weeks of turmoil among Trump's attorneys as they debated how to deal with the special counsel's request for an interview, a dispute that ultimately led to Dowd's resignation." ...
... Leonnig & Costa also give us a much better idea of the provenance of the New York Times' list of "Mueller's questions":
In the wake of the testy March 5 meeting, Mueller's team agreed to provide the president's lawyers with more specific information about the subjects that prosecutors wished to discuss with the president. With those details in hand, Trump lawyer Jay Sekulow compiled a list of 49 questions that the team believed the president would be asked, according to three of the four people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk publicly.
... John Dowd Confirms the Story on the Record. Chad Day & Darlene Superville of the AP: "Special counsel Robert Mueller's team raised the prospect of issuing a grand jury subpoena to compel ... Donald Trump to testify as part of the Russia probe, the president's former attorney said Tuesday. Attorney John Dowd told The Associated Press that Mueller's team broached the subject in March during a meeting with Trump's legal team while they were negotiating the terms of a possible interview with the president." ...
... Evan Perez, et al., of CNN: "Trump's legal team is bracing for the dramatic possibility that Mueller would subpoena the President, setting up a collision that could force a lengthy court fight and test the legal limits of the President's power all the way up to the Supreme Court.... Many legal observers believe that if Mueller issues a grand jury subpoena for Trump's testimony, the courts will order the President to comply, because the Supreme Court has repeatedly ordered presidents to comply with subpoenas.... The Trump team's legal argument, according to multiple sources, is that they believe the special counsel does not have the authority to force a President to appear before a grand jury."
Adam Serwer of the Atlantic: "Former prosecutors and investigators say that the Mueller questions likely only skim the surface of what Mueller knows or wants to ask -- and that given the length of the inquiry, the special counsel has a clear picture of what he thinks happened from other witnesses, and wants to see if those accounts mesh with what the president says."
Shannon Pettypiece & Chris Strohm of Bloomberg: "Donald Trump's current team of lawyers lacks the security clearances needed to discuss sensitive issues related to a possible presidential interview with Special Counsel Robert Mueller, according to two people familiar with the matter. Trump's former lead lawyer John Dowd had been the only member of the president's personal legal team with a security clearance, the people said. When Dowd quit in March over disagreements with Trump on legal strategy, Jay Sekulow became the lead lawyer on the investigation and is still waiting for his clearance."
Brian Beutler of Crooked: "... in the face of this long-standing evidence that Trump officials 'colluded' with Russia, and of this new, strong indication that Mueller has substantiated the collusion, the Trump administration has decided to simply lie about it. Trump himself has claimed falsely that none of Mueller's proposed questions touch upon collusion.... The purpose of the lie is twofold: first, to continue misleading the public -- as Trump does every time he tweets or screams 'No collusion!' -- about the credibility of the investigation, and, second, to create a pretext for refusing to cooperate with Mueller, or even for shutting down his investigation.... On a near-weekly basis, Sanders, like Trump, insists both that there was 'no collusion' between the Trump campaign and Russia, and that 'no evidence' has emerged to suggest otherwise.... The two of them are able to endlessly repeat the 'no evidence' refrain because the press has been deferential to them about it -- because it's uncomfortable to say the claim is false. That deference leaves an opening for Trump to discredit and undermine Mueller's investigation on a false basis."
Matt Naham of Law & Crime: "A joint status report filed Tuesday by Special Counsel Robert Mueller and fired Donald Trump national security advisor Michael Flynn's legal team reveals that both parties, 'due to the status of the Special Counsel's investigation,' are asking for a a sentencing date to be moved past June.... The way investigations like this one work makes such a delay standard operating procedure for cooperating witnesses. Flynn won't be sentenced until he is no longer needed -- that is, until his cooperation with Mueller's investigation ends or the last person Flynn would be testifying against is sentenced. Former federal prosecutor Bill Thomas told Law&Crime that this news most likely means Flynn is 'still cooperating' with Mueller's investigation."
Eric Tucker of the AP: "Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is defending himself following a report that some House Republicans have drafted articles of impeachment against him. At a Newseum event Tuesday, Rosenstein took aim at allies of ... Donald Trump who drafted the document." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Mrs. McCrabbbie BTW: This is, in case you didn't notice, an indictment not just of "Trump allies" but of Trump himself, our extortionist-in-chief. Also: former prosecutor Joyce Vance pointed out on the teevee that the Mueller team would not have threatened Trump with a subpoena to testify had Rosenstein not given the special prosecutor authority to issue Trump a subpoena.
Accommodating Trump. Andrew Kramer of the New York Times: "In the United States, Paul J. Manafort is facing prosecution on charges of money laundering and financial fraud stemming from his decade of work for a pro-Russian political party in Ukraine. But in Ukraine, where officials are wary of offending President Trump, not so much. There, four meandering cases that involve Mr. Manafort, Mr. Trump's former campaign chairman, have been effectively frozen by Ukraine's chief prosecutor. The cases are just too sensitive for a government deeply reliant on United States financial and military aid, and keenly aware of Mr. Trump's distaste for the investigation by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III.... The decision to halt the investigations by an anticorruption prosecutor was handed down at a delicate moment for Ukraine, as the Trump administration was finalizing plans to sell the country sophisticated anti-tank missiles, called Javelins."
"Better Call Cohen." Seth Hettena in Rolling Stone: "A few years before he started working for Donald Trump..., Michael D. Cohen ... roamed the courthouses of New York City, filing lawsuits on behalf of people with ittle means who were seeking compensation for the injuries they suffered in car collisions. Many personal-injury lawyers make their living this way, but there was something striking about Cohen's cases: Some of the crashes at issue didn't appear to be accidents at all. A Rolling Stone investigation found that Cohen represented numerous clients who were involved in deliberate, planned car crashes as part of an attempt to cheat insurance companies. Furthermore, investigations by insurers showed that several of Cohen's clients were affiliated with insurance fraud rings that repeatedly staged 'accidents.'... Taken together, a picture emerges that the personal attorney to the president of the United States was connected to a shadowy underworld of New York insurance fraud, a pervasive problem dominated by Russian organized crime that was costing the state's drivers an estimated $1 billion a year."
This Is the Way the Mob Does It. Anna R. Schecter of NBC News: "In February 2017, a top White House aide who was Trump's longtime personal bodyguard, along with the top lawyer at the Trump Organization and a third man, showed up at the office of Trump's New York doctor without notice and took all the president's medical records. The incident, which Dr. Harold Bornstein described as a 'raid,' took place two days after Bornstein told a newspaper that he had prescribed a hair growth medicine for the president for years. In an exclusive interview in his Park Avenue office, Bornstein told NBC News that he felt 'raped, frightened and sad' when Keith Schiller and another 'large man' came to his office to collect the president's records on the morning of Feb. 3, 2017. At the time, Schiller, who had long worked as Trump's bodyguard, was serving as director of Oval Office operations at the White House." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Alex Marquardt & Lawrence Crook of CNN: "When Dr. Harold Bornstein described in hyperbolic prose then-candidate Donald Trump's health in 2015, the language he used was eerily similar to the style preferred by his patient. It turns out the patient himself wrote it, according to Bornstein. 'He dictated that whole letter. I didn't write that letter,' Bornstein told CNN on Tuesday.... The admission is an about face from his answer more than two years when the letter was released and answers one of the lingering questions about the last presidential election.... He said Trump read out the language as Bornstein and his wife were driving across Central Park. '(Trump) dictated the letter and I would tell him what he couldn't put in there,' he said. 'They came to pick up their letter at 4 o'clock or something.'" ...
... The Doc Borstein Character Makes a Comeback in Season 2. Jonathan Chait: "... it is perhaps understandable that the president would discontinue his relationship with a doctor who gave out embarrassing information about his hair-growth drug. Bornstein has come forward because of the saga of Dr. Ronny Jackson.... Having lost both his promised post as head of the Veterans Administration and even as Trump's personal physician, Jackson has suffered even greater humiliation than Bornstein himself. Bornstein is, naturally, thrilled. He tells NBC he is speaking out now because of Jackson's predicament.... It is certainly true that, now, when somebody mentions 'that crazy story with the Trump doctor,' people now have to ask 'Which one?' Advantage: Bornstein." ...
... Ronn Blitzer of Law & Crime: "If the allegations are true..., they would appear to make out a case for burglary.... Even though they are Trump's medical records, Trump does not own them, so he can't just send people to fetch them.... Then there's the issue of Trump himself. If he instructed people to carry out a raid like this (the NBC report did not indicate that he did), he could potentially be charged with conspiracy. The situation is even more complicated given the nature of what was allegedly stolen: private medical records. Such documents are covered by HIPAA, which strictly prohibits the unauthorized release of medical information. Bornstein claims that the men who raided his office did not provide any such release." ...
... Jeremy Faust in Slate looks at possible legal ramifications of the so-called raid. But "In sum: There are a lot of questions and not much clarity. On that note at least, we can conclude that we're in well-trodden Trump territory." Mrs. McC: It does seem there should be some official investigating done. Whether or not Bornstein has ever told the truth about anything that ends up in the press, you can't help but see him as a hypertypical Trump retainer: incompetent, truth-averse, unethical & weird. ...
... digby: "When they asked the White House snowflake Sarah Huckabee Sanders about this, this is what she said: 'As is standard operating procedure for a new president, the White House medical unit took possession of the president's medical records.' Right. Every four or eight years the new president sends in his private thugs to break the law and seize his medical records from his private doctor.... Is it just me or is this president's essential thuggishness becoming more obvious every day? And, by the way, as it becomes more obvious that the country has a criminal mobster in the White House, conservatives in the media and the congress are circling the wagons ever tighter." ...
... Steve M. makes a suggestion about something else that might be hiding in Trump's medical files that he really does not want the public to see: a years-long period during which Trump was allegedly using "amphetamine derivatives."
Kevin Sullivan, et al., of the Washington Post: "A controversial trip to Morocco by Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt last December was partly arranged by a longtime friend and lobbyist, who accompanied Pruitt and his entourage at multiple stops and served as an informal liaison at both official and social events during the visit. Richard Smotkin, a former Comcast lobbyist who has known the EPA administrator for years, worked for months with Pruitt's aides to hammer out logistics, according to four individuals familiar with those preparations. In April, Smotkin won a $40,000-a-month contract, retroactive to Jan. 1, with the Moroccan government to promote the kingdom's cultural and economic interests. He recently registered as a foreign agent representing that government.... The visit's cost exceeded $100,000, more than twice what has been previously reported -- including $16,217 for Pruitt’s Delta airfare and $494 for him to spend one night at a luxury hotel in Paris. He was accompanied by eight staffers and his round-the-clock security detail." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... Carol Davenport of the New York Times: "Two top aides to Scott Pruitt, the chief of the Environmental Protection Agency who is facing an array of questions related to his spending and management of the agency, have resigned under increased scrutiny over their roles at the E.P.A. The departures include Albert Kelly, who ran the agency's Superfund program..., and Pasquale Perrotta, who served as the chief of security for Mr. Pruitt and helped build an unusual and costly protective apparatus around him. Mr. Kelly, widely known as Kell, was a longtime business associate of Mr. Pruitt's in his home state of Oklahoma who previously had a banking career before being barred from working in the finance industry. Before joining the E.P.A. Mr. Kelly led an Oklahoma bank that issued a mortgage for a home purchased by Mr. Pruitt through a shell company registered to another business partner of Mr. Pruitt's, Kenneth Wagner. Mr. Wagner now holds a senior position at the E.P.A.... Officially, Mr. Perrotta..., known as Nino..., led Mr. Pruitt's protective detail, but he played a larger role at the E.P.A. by arguing that the security needs of the agency justified some management, personnel and spending decisions at the agency. Mr. Perrotta's influence placed him at the center of inquiries by the E.P.A. inspector general's office...." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... AND This: Also on Tuesday, new details emerged about the lobbying of the E.P.A. by J. Steven Hart, the lobbyist whose wife had last year rented a $50-a-night condo to Mr. Pruitt. Congressional investigators on Tuesday provided The New York Times with an email in which Mr. Hart asked Mr. Pruitt for help in getting three people appointed to the E.P.A.'s prestigious Science Advisory Board. They had been recommended by Smithfield Foods, a company that was a client of Mr. Hart's lobbying firm, and its Smithfield Foundation, a charitable subsidiary. The email was sent in August 2017, a few weeks after Mr. Pruitt had moved out of the apartment, but at a time when he still owed money to Mr. Hart's wife. Mrs. McC: Both Pruitt & Hart have previously claimed that Hart did not lobby the EPA while Pruitt was administrator. ...
... Benjamin Siegel, et al., of ABC News: "The House Oversight Committee is expected to interview ... Scott Pruitt's former head of security Wednesday, the latest indication that Pruitt still faces scrutiny from Congress after back-to-back hearings last week. Pasquale 'Nino' Perrotta ... led Pruitt's 24-hour security detail, putting him at the center of several of the ethics and spending episodes under review by the EPA inspector general and congressional investigators. In a phone interview Tuesday morning, Perrotta, who said he left his job at the EPA Monday, said he plans to 'fully cooperate and answer any and all questions' from Congress, starting with the transcribed interview with the House Oversight Committee Wednesday.... An EPA spokesman ... did not respond to repeated requests for comment on Perrotta's departure." ...
... Emily Atkin of the New Republic: "Last year, Scott Pruitt ... embarked on a media tour to convince the public that President Barack Obama was bad for the environment.... Today, however, the person who appears most excited about Obama's environmental accomplishments is Pruitt, as he keeps mistaking Obama's victories for his own. The latest instance occurred during Pruitt's double-header of congressional hearings last week. In his opening remarks to the House Energy and Commerce Committee's subcommittee on environment, Pruitt touted his agency's efforts to clean up Superfund sites.... [But] Pruitt's EPA didn't have to do any actual decontamination work to 'remove' these contaminated sites. Obama's EPA had already done that work.... Pruitt's hypocrisy is apparent in other successes he's claimed, like cleaning up lead in drinking water." Mrs. McC: Funny, too, because Pruitt's Superfund guy, Albert Kelly, just left the EPA in disgrace, as noted above.
Chris Mooney of the Washington Post: "Eighteen states on Tuesday sued President Trump's administration over its push to 'reconsider' greenhouse gas emission rules for the nation's auto fleet, launching a legal battle over one of President Barack Obama's most significant efforts to address climate change. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt in April said he would revisit the Obama-era rules, which aim to raise efficiency requirements to about 50 miles per gallon by 2025. Pruitt's agency said that the standards are 'based on outdated information' and that new data suggests 'the current standards may be too stringent.' But in the lawsuit, the states contend that the EPA acted 'arbitrarily and capriciously' in changing course on the greenhouse gas regulations." (Also linked yesterday.)
Maria Sacchetti of the Washington Post: "Texas and six other states are suing the Trump administration over its failure to terminate an Obama-era program that provides work permits to hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children. The lawsuit signals growing GOP frustration with President Trump's struggles to advance his immigration policies and could lead to conflicting federal court decisions that would put the fates of 690,000 immigrants known as 'dreamers' in the hands of a deeply divided Supreme Court. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Brownsville on Tuesday. It asks the court to rule on whether President Obama's 2012 decision to grant deportation protections and two-year work authorizations to young undocumented immigrants -- without congressional approval -- was lawful."
Kirk Semple of the New York Times: "Several members of the Latin American migrant caravan that has enraged President Trump were allowed to step onto United States territory to apply for asylum late Monday, ending a border standoff that had lasted more than a day and marking the beginning of the final chapter of the group's monthlong odyssey. Shortly after 7 p.m. local time, eight migrants who, like most of the caravan's participants, said they were fleeing violence in their homeland, passed through the metal gate separating Tijuana from San Diego, entered the immigration checkpoint and began the process to petition for sanctuary, caravan organizers said." (Also linked yesterday.)
Another Republicans Tells the Truth. Jeff Stein of the Washington Post: "President Trump's former top health official on Tuesday said the Republican tax law would raise the cost of health insurance for some Americans because it repealed a core provision of the Affordable Care Act. Tom Price, Trump's first secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, said people buying insurance on government-run marketplaces will face higher prices because the tax law repealed the ACA's individual mandate. The mandate had forced most Americans to have health coverage or face a financial penalty.... Price's comments are in line with predictions from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, which in November projected 13 million fewer Americans would have health insurance by 2027 as a result of the elimination of the individual mandate." ...
... Eric Levitz of New York elaborates on the amazing flip-flops by Price & Marco Rubio re: the tax heist.
GOP Politicians in the Age of Trump. Michael Scherer of the Washington Post: "Criminal convictions, once seen as career-enders [for politicians], are no longer disqualifying [Republican candidates]. In the era of President Trump, even time spent in prison can be turned into a positive talking point, demonstrating a candidate's battle scars in a broader fight against what he perceives as liberal corruption. In a startling shift from 'law-and-order Republicans,' Trump has attacked some branches of law enforcement, especially those pursuing white-collar malfeasance, as his allies and former campaign officials are ensnared in various investigations. Following his lead, Republican Senate candidates with criminal convictions in West Virginia and Arizona have cast themselves as victims of the Obama administration's legal overreach. Another former Trump adviser who has pleaded guilty to a felony has also become an in-demand surrogate, as Republicans jump at the chance to show their opposition to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III's investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential campaign.... Former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who is awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty to a felony count of lying to the FBI, has become an unexpected star on the Republican campaign trail...." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: See? This is where Democrats are screwing up. Instead of recruiting all these goody-two-shoes reformist ladies, Democratic recruiters should be standing at the prison gates beckoning the newly-released. I mean, think how good a guy who had kited a lot of checks or actually robbed a bank at gunpoint would be at fundraising?
Climate Change Can Kill You. Donald McNeil of the New York Times: "The number of people getting diseases transmitted by mosquito, tick and flea bites has more than tripled in the United States in recent years, federal health officials reported on Tuesday. Since 2004, at least nine such diseases have been discovered or newly introduced here. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention did not suggest that Americans drop plans for softball games or hammock snoozes. But officials emphasized that it's increasingly important for everyone -- especially children -- to be protected from outdoor pests with bug repellent. Warmer weather is an important cause of the surge, according to the lead author of a study published in the C.D.C.'s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report."
Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Emily Smith of the New York Post: "Female staffers at NBC News are complaining they felt under huge pressure to sign the 'women's letter' defending Tom Brokaw against sexual harassment allegations.... One NBC News staffer said, 'We felt forced to sign the letter supporting Brokaw. We had no choice, particularly the lower level staffers. The letter was being handed around the office and the unspoken threat was that if your name was not on it, there would be some repercussion down the road. Execs are watching to see who signed and who didn't. This was all about coming out in force to protect NBC's golden boy; the network's reputation is tied to Brokaw ... If more women come forward, that's a big problem.' Another insider said the powerful names on the letter could intimidate other victims. 'When you have over 100 women like Andrea Mitchell signing a letter of support without knowing the facts, it's pretty scary ... The letter will have a chilling effect on other women coming forward.'" ...
... Elizabeth Wagmeister & Ramin Setoodeh of Variety: "On Monday, NBC News staffers received a memo with guidance from the network's standards and practices on how to handle reporting a sensitive story about sexual harassment allegations against Tom Brokaw.... The network went on to enumerate, in great detail, exactly how on-air reporters should frame Brokaw's side of the story. 'Include relevant portions of Brokaw's denial, his email and the email in support of him, signed by more than 60 colleagues,' read the instructions, which appeared in a company-wide system that producers and talent can access." ...
... As Rebekah Entralgo writes in the postlinked above above, "Brokaw's letter ... goes to great lengths to deny the accusations, all while victim-blaming and taking credit for his accuser's career." ...
... Rebekah Entralgo of ThinkProgress: "A third woman has come forward with accusations of sexual misconduct against longtime NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw.... Mary Reinholz, a veteran reporter, claims that Brokaw, who was married at the time, attempted to kiss her 50 years ago after assisting her with a story. 'We talked and then, abruptly, he was embracing me and giving me a French kiss,"' Reinholz wrote in The Villager.... 'I wouldn't be writing this account if it wasn't for the #MeToo movement and Brokaw’s disparaging remarks about Linda Vester[...],' she wrote. '... Why would [these] women lie?'"
Beyond the Beltway
Marc Caputo of Politico: "In the fourth and final Florida bellwether election since 2016, the Democratic candidate beat the Republican in a contested race, providing the best evidence yet that the GOP is in retreat heading into the midterm elections under an unpopular president. On Tuesday, in Florida’s 114th House District in Miami, Javier Fernandez beat Republican Andrew Vargas by about 4.1 percentage points, despite being outspent by at least 2-1 in a swing seat where voters split their tickets between both parties in the 2016 elections."
Ian Shapira of the Washington Post: "One of the white supremacists who viciously beat a black man inside a parking garage during last year's 'Unite the Right' rally [in Charlottesville, Va.,] was found guilty Tuesday night of malicious wounding. Jacob Scott Goodwin, 23, who wore a military tactical helmet and brandished a large shield during the Aug. 12 attack against DeAndre Harris, was convicted by a jury of nine women and three men. The jury recommended a sentence of ten years, with the option of suspending some of the time and a $20,000 fine. The presiding judge, Richard E. Moore, will set the sentence on Aug. 23."
Way Beyond
Adam Baidawi of the New York Times: "Cardinal George Pell, the Vatican's third-highest-ranking official, must stand trial on several charges of sexual abuse, an Australian court ruled on Tuesday, promising to prolong a case that has already dragged on for months, and which many see as a moment of reckoning for a church racked by scandal. Belinda Wallington, a Melbourne magistrate, found there was sufficient evidence for prosecutors to bring the cardinal's case to trial, ending a two-month pretrial hearing, in which witnesses described abuse they said took place decades ago." (Also linked yesterday.)
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