“Tulsi Gabbard and Andrew Yang could get more airtime than ever to introduce themselves to America with just one more poll — or they could spend the December debate sitting at home,” Politico reports.

“Right now, six candidates — four white men and two white women — are set to take the stage for the Democratic primary debate on December 19: Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar, Bernie Sanders, Tom Steyer and Elizabeth Warren. Gabbard and Yang are not among them, with only one week left before qualification closes.”

Associated Press: “The news of Kamala Harris’ sudden departure from the presidential race came during an all-staff conference call led from Cory Booker’s campaign headquarters in Newark, the New Jersey city that he led for seven years and that propelled him to national fame. Within hours, Booker dictated a message calling Harris ‘my friend and my sister,’ and a directive was issued to show her team respect at a difficult moment.”

“The campaign also scheduled a high-profile speech in Iowa. Booker’s aides have been careful to emphasize that the New Jersey senator isn’t looking to capitalize on the collapse of his Senate colleague’s White House bid. But they’re also aware that for a campaign languishing in the polls, this may be one of their last opportunities to turn things around.”

“The prosecutor handpicked by Attorney General William Barr to scrutinize how U.S. agencies investigated President Trump’s 2016 campaign said he could not offer evidence to the Justice Department’s inspector general to support the suspicions of some conservatives that the case was a setup by American intelligence,” the Washington Post reports.

“Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s office contacted U.S. Attorney John Durham, the prosecutor Barr personally tapped to lead a separate review of the 2016 probe into possible coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia… The inspector general also contacted several U.S. intelligence agencies.”

“Challenging a fellow Republican incumbent looks like Rep. George Holding’s (R-NC) most plausible path to re-election — and he’s done it before,” the Raleigh News & Observer reports.

“But Holding, whose Republican-leaning U.S. House district was redrawn into a Democratic-leaning one, will not challenge a sitting GOP colleague in 2020.”