July 22, 2017

Washington Post: “Scaramucci has coined a particularly crude nickname for Priebus and, in private conversations with associates in recent weeks, repeatedly savaged both the chief of staff and the entire White House press operation.”

Anthony Scaramucci gave his first interview as White House communications director to Matt Boyle of Breitbart.

SCARAMUCCI: “Did you send your job application form in yet, Matt? Do you need my email so I can get your resume over here?”

BOYLE: “Anthony, I’m honored, maybe we can talk about that later.”

New York Times: “A newfound memo from Kenneth W. Starr’s independent counsel investigation into President Bill Clinton sheds fresh light on a constitutional puzzle that is taking on mounting significance amid the Trump-Russia inquiry: Can a sitting president be indicted?”

“The 56-page memo, locked in the National Archives for nearly two decades… amounts to the most thorough government-commissioned analysis rejecting a generally held view that presidents are immune from prosecution while in office.”

From the memo: “It is proper, constitutional, and legal for a federal grand jury to indict a sitting president for serious criminal acts that are not part of, and are contrary to, the president’s official duties.”

Jared Kushner “failed to disclose dozens of financial holdings that he was required to declare when he joined the White House as an adviser to President Trump, his father-in-law,” the Washington Post reports.

“A separate document released Friday also showed that Kushner’s wife, presidential daughter Ivanka Trump, had been paid as much as $5 million from her outside businesses over an 84-day span this spring around the time she entered the White House as a senior adviser and pledged to distance herself from her private holdings.”

“Kushner’s new disclosure, released by the White House, detailed more than 70 assets that his attorneys said he had inadvertently left out of earlier filings.”

CNN: “The leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee have cut a deal with President Donald Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., and former campaign chairman Paul Manafort to avoid being subpoenaed for a high-profile public hearing next week, with the two men agreeing to provide records to the panel and to be privately interviewed ahead of any public session.”

Mike Allen: “The President is building a wartime Cabinet, for political and legal war. One longtime ally who’s likely to have a more visible, frequent role: Newt Gingrich, husband of Callista Gingrich, Trump’s choice for ambassador to the Vatican.”

“Trump relishes fights, and creates plenty of them. But now he’s in a real one, with special counsel Bob Mueller signaling that he plans an expansive, exhaustive investigation aimed at Trump, his relatives, and current and former political lieutenants.”

“One West Wing confidant says Trump really might dismiss Mueller. So POTUS needs ‘a group that can fight through what could end up being something quite amazing.'”

President Trump asserted his “complete power to pardon” in a tweet after reports emerged this week that he was discussing his ability to pardon people in the ongoing investigation into ties between his campaign and Russia, The Hill reports.

“Sean Spicer came to the White House on Thursday completely unaware President Donald Trump was planning to meet with Anthony Scaramucci, a longtime Wall Street friend, and offer him the job of communications director. Other top aides, including Reince Priebus and Steve Bannon, also had no clue,” Politico reports.

“The wham-bam events of the past 24 hours were exceptional even by Trump’s standards: the dismissal of his top lawyer and the lawyer’s spokesman, West Wing blowups between the president and his top aides, a press secretary fending off rumors about his possible demise without knowing the entire truth, all while new reports landed about Trump going on the attack against the special counsel investigating his White House.”

“What struck one adviser who speaks to Trump frequently is that the president seemed calm — like he had a plan in mind all along — but just hadn’t shared it with many others.”