Paul Begala: “I am old enough to remember when it was right-wing Republicans who were hellbent on tearing down Democratic presidents like Barack Obama and Clinton; now the progressives are practically doing the GOP’s job for them.”
“I have a radical proposal for my progressive friends: Stop attacking Biden and start attacking Republicans. If you think Biden is too weak, don’t weaken him further for goodness sakes. Strengthen him, so he can lead the way forward.”
“The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot said its next hearing will focus on how former President Donald Trump’s failure to quell the violent mob for several hours showed a ‘supreme dereliction of duty,'” CNBC reports.
“The committee’s eighth public hearing, expected to air in prime time on July 21, marks its last scheduled presentation of evidence implicating Trump in a multi-pronged conspiracy to overturn his 2020 election loss that culminated in the deadly invasion.”
“The final hearing will highlight the more-than-three-hour gap between Trump’s departure from a rally that preceded the Jan. 6, 2021, riot, and his eventual call for the mob to go home.”
“The Justice Department has asked the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol for evidence it has accumulated about the scheme by former President Donald Trump and his allies to put forward false slates of pro-Trump electors in battleground states won by Joe Biden in 2020,” the New York Times reports.
Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS), the chairman of the committee, “disclosed the request to reporters on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, and a person familiar with the panel’s work said discussions with the Justice Department about the false elector scheme were ongoing. Those talks suggest that the department is sharpening its focus on that aspect of Mr. Trump’s efforts to overturn the election, one with a direct line to the former president.”
“Despite running as a staunchly anti-transgender and anti-abortion candidate, far-right Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake once posted in support of transgender youth and asked her followers about aborting fetuses who would be born with disabilities in social media posts from 2015 and 2016,” CNN reports.
“President Biden defended his decision to meet with the Saudi crown prince who orchestrated the killing and dismemberment of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, saying the Saudis must be involved in any effort to stabilize a volatile region,” the Washington Post reports.
Said Biden: “My views on Khashoggi have been absolutely, positively clear and I have never been quiet about talking about human rights. The reason I’m going to Saudi Arabia is to promote U.S. interests in a way that I think we have an opportunity to reassert our influence in the Middle East.”
President Biden said the United States is “not going to wait forever” for Iran to rejoin a nuclear deal as he held a joint news conference in Jerusalem with Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid, in which both leaders vowed not to let Iran develop nuclear weapons, the Washington Post reports.
“The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack scrambled to add new testimony from White House counsel Pat Cipollone to its latest hearing on Tuesday, and in the process bumped aside evidence about former President Trump’s ties to violent extremist groups,” The Hill reports.
Update: Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS) emails with a clarification: “It was in the original script, but we pulled some back just because of the timing. The Cipollone deposition was important. And obviously, it’s just a choice we had to make.”
A new Gallup poll finds that the world is feeling more stressed and unhappy than ever before.
Donald Ayer, Stuart Gerson, and Dennis Aftergut writing in The Atlantic:
“After seven hearings held by the January 6 committee thus far this summer, doubts as to who is responsible have been resolved. The evidence is now overwhelming that Donald Trump was the driving force behind a massive criminal conspiracy to interfere with the official January 6 congressional proceeding and to defraud the United States of a fair election outcome.”
“The evidence is clearer and more robust than we as former federal prosecutors—two of us as Department of Justice officials in Republican administrations—thought possible before the hearings began. Trump was not just a willing beneficiary of a complex plot in which others played most of the primary roles. While in office, he himself was the principal actor in nearly all of its phases, personally executing key parts of most of its elements and aware of or involved in its worst features, including the use of violence on Capitol Hill. Most remarkably, he did so over vehement objections raised at every turn, even by his sycophantic and loyal handpicked team. This was Trump’s project all along.”
“In recent months, the members of Congress who have publicly reported coronavirus cases overwhelmingly have been Democrats — including the party’s two top leaders on Capitol Hill — posing a big and ironic problem for the majority party,” the Washington Post reports.
“By testing more frequently than their Republican colleagues, Democrats are facing the possibility that their strict adherence to public health protocols could backfire as they pursue the passage of major domestic policy legislation through the 50-50 Senate in the coming weeks.”
Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita (R) told Fox News his office would investigate a doctor who provided an abortion to a 10-year-old girl who was raped and became pregnant.
Said Rokita: “We’re gathering the evidence as we speak, and we’re going to fight this to the end, including looking at her licensure if she failed to report. And in Indiana it’s a crime… to intentionally not report.”
Judd Legum: The right-wing smear campaign against a doctor who helped a 10-year old rape victim.
Charlie Sykes: “With Trump in the race, Biden would no longer be running against the ghost of FDR, or a generic Republican. He wouldn’t be constantly compared with a mythical progressive pol who could magically enact sweeping spending plans in an evenly divided Congress.”
“The alternative would be Trump.”
“That fact alone would go a long way toward fixing some of Biden’s problems. Democrats, who are now wallowing in their season of acedia and self-loathing, would come home.”
“If anything, the defeated, disgraced, twice impeached president, in pouting exile, has become more vicious, unhinged, narcissistic, dishonest, reckless, and demagogic than he was as Mad King.”
FiveThirtyEight: What’s behind Biden’s record-low approval rating?
New York Times: “Interviews with these young voters reveal generational tensions driving their frustration. As they have come of age facing racial strife, political conflict, high inflation and a pandemic, they have looked for help from politicians who are more than three times their age.”
“Those older leaders often talk about upholding institutions and restoring norms, while young voters say they are more interested in results. Many expressed a desire for more sweeping changes like a viable third party and a new crop of younger leaders. They’re eager for innovative action on the problems they stand to inherit, they said, rather than returning to what worked in the past.”
“For nearly a year, a kitchen cabinet of Donald Trump confidants have told the former president not to announce his 2024 comeback candidacy before the midterms, arguing that he could be a drag on 2022 candidates and would be blamed if Republicans underperformed,” the Washington Post reports.
“But Trump has continued to regularly push for an early announcement in private meetings, as potential 2024 rivals become more aggressive amid signs of weakening support among his base. Now an increasing number of allies are urging him to follow his instincts as a way to shore up his standing in the party and drive turnout to help the GOP take over the House and Senate next year.”
“The former president is now eyeing a September announcement… One confidant put the odds at ‘70-30 he announces before the midterms.’ And others said he may still decide to announce sooner than September.”
“Donald Trump is returning to Washington later this month for the first time since the end of his presidency,” Axios reports.
“Trump’s planned July 26 visit — to headline an event for the America First Policy Institute — comes as the Jan. 6 committee’s blockbuster hearings contribute to speculation his grip on the Republican Party may be weakening.”
“Shifts in the demographics of the two parties’ supporters — taking place before our eyes — are arguably the biggest political story of our time,” Axios reports.
“Republicans are becoming more working class and a little more multiracial. Democrats are becoming more elite and a little more white.”
“Democrats’ hopes for retaining power rest on nonwhite voters remaining a reliable part of the party’s coalition. Democrats’ theory of the case collapses if Republicans make even incremental gains with those voters. Even small inroads with Hispanic voters could tip a number of Democratic-held swing seats to the GOP.”
Politico: “As Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) labor toward a possible summertime agreement on a filibuster-proof tax, energy and prescription drugs bill, the Democratic Party is reckoning with its long-term political position on taxes. For more than a decade, Democrats campaigned on raising rates on high earners and large corporations, arguing the GOP is the party of tax cuts for the top 1 percent.”
“Yet as Democrats near the climax of their monthslong push to unilaterally raise those taxes, there’s real division in the party over both how to talk about tax increases and whether to pursue them at all. Already some House moderates are balking at any tax increases in the bill, and Republicans are revving up a campaign that will hit Democrats for raising any taxes.”
“White House officials are actively debating whether to formally declare abortion access a public health emergency, pitting the belief of many Biden advisers that such a move would be counterproductive against the overwhelming political pressure to show they are fighting hard for abortion rights,” the Washington Post reports.
“Several top Biden aides have expressed internal reservations about declaring an emergency, saying it would give the administration little money and few new powers… And outside legal experts advising the administration have warned that an emergency declaration would face inevitable legal challenges, potentially giving conservative judges an opportunity to cut back on the administration’s emergency authority.”
The Economist: Why are Democrats dithering on abortion rights?
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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