Political Wire Members get the complete experience: exclusive analysis, a 24/7 trending news, no advertising, the weekly news quiz and more.
Join today for instant access.
“The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob issued a request on Thursday for an interview with Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA), citing evidence the panel has obtained regarding a tour he led through parts of the Capitol complex the day before the attack,” the Washington Post reports.
The Guardian: January 6 panel evidence suggests Congress members led “reconnaissance tours” of the Capitol before attack.
“President Trump’s attorney general Bill Barr is in active discussions with the Jan. 6th investigative committee to appear for a formal transcribed interview,“ Axios reports.
“Barr is likely to cooperate with the committee, according to a source familiar with his thinking.”
“The Oklahoma Legislature gave final approval on Thursday to a bill that prohibits nearly all abortions starting at fertilization, which would make it the nation’s strictest abortion law,” the New York Times reports.
“The bill is modeled on one that took effect in Texas in September, which has relied on civilian instead of criminal enforcement to work around court challenges. But it goes further than the Texas law, which bans abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy.”
Washington Post: “Under the Oklahoma bill, those who could be punished include anyone who ‘performs or induces’ an abortion; anyone who ‘knowingly engages in conduct that aids or abets the performance or inducement of an abortion,’ including paying for one; and anyone who even ‘intends to engage’ in either of the two actions above.”
“House GOP leaders were among the 192 Republicans who voted against providing $28 million in aid to the Food and Drug Administration to address the shortage of baby formula — within days of criticizing President Biden for not doing enough on the issue,” the Washington Post reports.
“Facebook has not yet released a new public policy strategy for the November midterms to refresh and update its rules and tools to protect the elections, something it traditionally touts,” the Washington Post reports.
“And former employees, some of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said they worry that the social media company is already lagging far behind where it needs to be to prevent the spread of misinformation from hurting voters’ understanding and behavior in the primaries and general election.”
Despite his pledge to vote Republican in the next election, Elon Musk told CNBC that he “has no current plans to fund a Republican super PAC in the upcoming U.S. elections, including any that oppose President Joe Biden in the 2024 presidential race.”
North Korea is “preparing to conduct a nuclear test or a long-range ballistic missile test around the time of President Biden’s trip to the region this week, according to intelligence from Washington and Seoul,” the Washington Post reports.
“From 2013 through 2018, Hunter Biden and his company brought in about $11 million via his roles as an attorney and a board member with a Ukrainian firm accused of bribery and his work with a Chinese businessman now accused of fraud,” according to an NBC News analysis of a copy of Biden’s hard drive and iCloud account and documents released by Republicans on two Senate committees.
“The documents and the analysis, which don’t show what he did to earn millions from his Chinese partners, raise questions about national security, business ethics and potential legal exposure.”
President Biden’s approval rating among Hispanic Americans has plummeted to 26%, according to a new Quinnipiac poll.
Seth Masket: “A few months ago, I did a simple forecast model for the 2022 midterms, suggesting Democrats were in for a rough year. We have some newer economic data since then, and the model looks considerably worse for the Democrats.”
“The Senate prepared to vote Thursday to deliver more than $40 billion in new military and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine, a move which would send the measure to President Biden after a week-long delay sparked by a lone senator’s objection,” the Washington Post reports.
“Republican candidates in upcoming primaries may have a tougher time scoring a coveted endorsement from Donald Trump, according to the former President’s allies, who say he is feeling more risk-averse amid the deadlocked Senate GOP contest in Pennsylvania,” CNN reports.
“A bipartisan group of senators led by Utah Republican Mike Lee introduced legislation Thursday that would take aim at conflicts of interest in the advertising technology industry and force Google to break up its dominant online-ad business,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
Jonathan Chait: “The Democratic Party has a lot of problems right now. Many of these problems lie outside its control: A global wave of inflation and continuing waves of coronavirus infection have prevented the recovery Joe Biden imagined when he took office last year, and the party’s slender majority gives it very narrow room to maneuver legislation through Congress.”
“That said, Democrats still have some room to improve their situation. They retain their congressional majority until January, and Joe Manchin has expressed his willingness to negotiate a bill to raise taxes on the rich and fund at least some new programs, including support for green energy. And yet their main response to a looming political and policy catastrophe appears to be fatalistic acceptance.”
“For the 2020 census, all states were not counted equally well for population numbers used to allocate political representation and federal funding over the next decade, according to a U.S. Census Bureau report released Thursday,” NPR reports.
“A follow-up survey the bureau conducted to measure the national tally’s accuracy found significant net undercount rates in six states: Arkansas (5.04%), Florida (3.48%), Illinois (1.97%), Mississippi (4.11%), Tennessee (4.78%) and Texas (1.92%).”
“It also uncovered significant net overcount rates in eight states — Delaware (5.45%), Hawaii (6.79%), Massachusetts (2.24%), Minnesota (3.84%), New York (3.44%), Ohio (1.49%), Rhode Island (5.05%) and Utah (2.59%).”
“Consumers with low credit scores are falling behind on payments for car loans, personal loans and credit cards, a sign that the healthiest consumer lending environment on record in the U.S. is coming to an end,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“The number of sailors who deserted the Navy more than doubled from 2019 to 2021, while desertions in other military branches dropped or stayed flat, pointing to a potential Navy-wide mental health crisis amid a spate of recent suicides,” NBC News reports.
“Coloradans have elected just one Republican governor in the last 50 years. A current GOP candidate for governor has an idea that could change that: stop counting each vote equally,” KUSA reports.
“Former Parker Mayor Greg Lopez, who holds the top line on the 2022 Republican primary ballot, says Colorado should create an electoral college system for electing candidates to statewide office.”
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.
“There are a lot of blogs and news sites claiming to understand politics, but only a few actually do. Political Wire is one of them.”
— Chuck Todd, host of “Meet the Press”
“Concise. Relevant. To the point. Political Wire is the first site I check when I’m looking for the latest political nugget. That pretty much says it all.”
— Stuart Rothenberg, editor of the Rothenberg Political Report
“Political Wire is one of only four or five sites that I check every day and sometimes several times a day, for the latest political news and developments.”
— Charlie Cook, editor of the Cook Political Report
“The big news, delicious tidbits, pearls of wisdom — nicely packaged, constantly updated… What political junkie could ask for more?”
— Larry Sabato, Center for Politics, University of Virginia
“Political Wire is a great, great site.”
— Joe Scarborough, host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe”
“Taegan Goddard has a knack for digging out political gems that too often get passed over by the mainstream press, and for delivering the latest electoral developments in a sharp, no frills style that makes his Political Wire an addictive blog habit you don’t want to kick.”
— Arianna Huffington, founder of The Huffington Post
“Political Wire is one of the absolute must-read sites in the blogosphere.”
— Glenn Reynolds, founder of Instapundit
“I rely on Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire for straight, fair political news, he gets right to the point. It’s an eagerly anticipated part of my news reading.”
— Craig Newmark, founder of Craigslist.