Politics

The Washington Post reports: Brett Kavanaugh wrote in a strikingly explicit 1998 memo that he was “strongly opposed” to giving then-President Bill Clinton any “break” in the independent counsel’s questioning about his sexual relationship with intern Monica Lewinsky, according to a document released Monday. In the memo, Kavanaugh, who worked as an associate counsel for independent counsel Ken Starr and …

Newsweek reports: Arizona Senate candidate Dr. Kelli Ward says she is hoping to capitalize on the audience of far-right conspiracy theorist Mike Cernovich, who is best known for spreading the “Pizzagate” fake news panic and the firing of Hollywood director James Gunn. Ward, a Republican candidate hoping to replace retiring Sen. Jeff Flake in November, made the admission to MSNBC …

The New York Times reports: Federal authorities investigating whether President Trump’s former personal lawyer and fixer, Michael D. Cohen, committed bank and tax fraud have zeroed in on well over $20 million in loans obtained by taxi businesses that he and his family own, according to people familiar with the matter. Investigators are also examining whether Mr. Cohen violated campaign …

Former CIA director John Brennan appeared on Meet The Press this morning and Chuck Todd asked if he stands by his claim that Trump has committed treason. “Well I called his behavior treasonous, which is to betray one’s trust, and to aid and abet the enemy, and I stand very much by that claim,” Brennan answered. “You are the former …

The Hill reports: Former White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman on Sunday said President Trump is “disingenuous” in his efforts to help the African-American community, and accused the president of wanting to start a race war. “We have a lot to lose right now,” Manigault Newman said on MSNBC’s “Politics Nation,” referencing Trump’s appeal to African-American voters during the 2016 …

The Washington Post has published a lengthy look at the modest life Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter continue to have in the same rural Georgia house they lived in before the 1976 election. The piece is largely a folksy comparison of the lives led by the Carters and other former presidents. But buried near the end, we get this: Carter has …

Reuters reports: Special Counsel Robert Mueller recommended in a court filing late on Friday that a judge sentence former Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos to up to six months in prison for lying to federal agents investigating whether Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Papadopoulos pleaded guilty in October to lying to FBI agents and is scheduled to …

Politico reports: Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has died aged 80 after a short illness, it was announced Saturday. The Ghanaian led the U.N. from 1997 to 2006 and was chair of the Elders, a group of former heads of state and human rights advocates set up by Nelson Mandela. As U.N. head, Annan was a staunch opponent of the …

The New York Times last night published a lengthy profile of Melania’s relatively solitary life in the East Wing. Most notable, perhaps, is the revelation that her husband tried to quash her #BeBest campaign: The president suggested that Mrs. Trump choose a different topic to avoid questions about how the wife of a notorious Twitter bully could lead a campaign …

Politico reports: The White House budget office believes it has found a way to cancel about $3 billion in foreign aid even if it is never approved by Congress, according to a Republican aide familiar with the plan. Using an obscure budget rule, administration officials are planning to freeze billions of dollars in the State Department’s international assistance budget — …

The Hill reports: The judge in the tax and bank fraud trial against one-time Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort said Friday he’s been threatened over the case, denying a request from media outlets to release the names and addresses of the jurors. Judge T.S. Ellis III said he’s not going to reveal the specifics of the threats he received. “I …

The Washington Examiner reports: Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., said Thursday evening he would ask President Trump to lift sanctions against the chairmen of both houses of the Russian legislature so they can visit the U.S. in the fall. Paul just returned to the U.S. from Russia after a trip intended to promote diplomacy between the two countries. Paul told Fox …

Mediaite reports: GOP Senate Candidate Chris McDaniel has had a rough 48 hours of attempted Civil War revisionism. The state senator, running to represent Mississippi in Congress, first took to social media to wheel out some wild claims about Confederate general Robert E. Lee. He was promptly fact checked, by everyone from CNN anchor Jake Tapper to historian Kevin Kruse. …

The Miami Herald reports: As one of his first acts in office in 2011, Gov. Rick Scott canceled a $2.4 billion federally funded and shovel-ready bullet train from Orlando to Tampa because it carried “an extremely high risk of overspending taxpayer dollars with no guarantee of economic growth.’’ It was a political slap to then-President Barack Obama, who considered the …

The Hill reports: First lady Melania Trump is planning to attend a summit in Maryland early next week focused on combatting cyberbullying. The White House announced that the first lady will be “addressing the positive and negative effects of social media on youth” during brief remarks at the summit in Rockville, Md., on Monday. The first lady is set to …

Politico reports: There’s a new way of demonstrating loyalty to Donald Trump and his Republican Party: Claiming that the president could not only survive an impeachment effort, but that it would guarantee his victory in 2020. The idea gaining currency on the right is that Trump can be Bill Clinton, not Richard Nixon. It depends on a delicate political calculation …

The Hill reports: Democrats have about a 75 percent chance of retaking the House of Representatives in the midterm elections, according to the data crunchers at FiveThirtyEight. The website launched their new House forecast on Thursday, predicting an 80 percent chance that Democrats gain between 14 and 58 seats. The party needs to flip 23 seats to retake the House …

Click On Detroit reports: President Donald Trump tweeted about the passing of Aretha Franklin on Thursday. Trump, joining the chorus of reaction and tributes around social media, said, “She was a great woman, with a wonderful gift from God.” The legendary soul singer met with, performed for and was honored by many of the presidents during her long career. In …

“Any allegation provided by a woman is supposed to be enough, isn’t it? Isn’t that how everyone wanted this Me Too moment to work? You believe all women. You believe all women whether or not the evidence exists. They’re asking for evidence so I guess, what, they’re calling her a liar? Are they shaming the woman and calling her a …

CBS News reports: New York City unveiled an ambitious plan on Wednesday to replace the notorious Rikers Island jail complex with four smaller lockups located in densely populated neighborhoods, including turning an Art Deco government building that went up in lower Manhattan in 1930 into a tower for up to 1,500 inmates. Mayor Bill de Blasio and other city officials …