“Steve Bannon’s training academy for nationalists is set to lose its spiritual home,” Politico reports.
“Italy’s Culture Ministry announced it will revoke the lease on a state-owned monastery given to Dignitatis Humanae Institute, a right-wing Roman Catholic institute affiliated with Bannon, the former Breitbart executive and ex-chief strategist to Donald Trump.”
New York Times: “Democratic presidential contenders have already combined to visit more than 30 states and territories for public events, far more than in any past nominating contest when candidates would spend the vast majority of their time in Iowa and New Hampshire.”
“The explosive growth of social media, the increasing diversity of the Democratic electorate and changes to the party’s electoral calendar and debate format have created more of a national primary than ever before.”
“The shift reflects the new imperatives driving campaign strategy. With voters increasingly consuming news online, candidates are eager to go viral, which helps build their grass-roots and small-donor networks. This has made the feedback loop between the internet and television news the most powerful tidal force in politics, prompting campaigns to approach states as would-be soundstages for specific messages they are trying to deliver and constituencies they are hoping to reach.”
Jonathan Parker — a lobbyist and former Idaho Republican Party chairman — was arrested and booked on a felony first-degree stalking charge, the Idaho Statesman reports.
According to the criminal complaint, Parker “did knowingly and maliciously engage” in conduct that “seriously alarmed, annoyed or harassed (his wife) Kelly Parker.”
The complaint states that Parker’s conduct included “repeatedly hiding in bushes, masturbating, disguising himself with a wig” at or near her apartment complex.
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Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) was hit with a drink outside a town hall event in Pensacola, Florida as he left the venue, The Hill reports.
“Video of the incident posted on Twitter shows the Florida congressman leaving the event while flanked on both sides by a crowd of protesters when a drink flies out of the crowd, appearing to strike Gaetz on the right arm.”
New York Times: “Just before his state visit to Britain was to begin, President Trump subverted diplomatic norms by rattling an already precarious political situation there: He suggested that the next prime minister of Britain ‘walk away’ from trying to reach a deal to withdraw from the European Union and that the far-right populist Nigel Farage be sent in to negotiate.”
“In an interview with The Sunday Times, of London, Mr. Trump also said he had told the current prime minister, Theresa May, who announced last month that she would step down after repeatedly failing to get her Brexit plan through Parliament, to sue the bloc for greater leverage in talks. Mrs. May left her government in a weaker position, he said, for not threatening to walk away ‘in the form of litigation or in the form of a request.'”
“Former Colorado governor John Hickenlooper found a way to stand out at a crowded gathering of California Democrats: He denounced socialism, and got booed,” the Washington Post reports.
Said Hickenlooper: “If we want to beat Donald Trump and achieve big progressive goals, socialism is not the answer.”
As the jeering grew louder, Hickenlooper added: “You know, if we’re not careful, we’re going to end up reelecting the worst president in American history.”
Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) pushed back at the emerging narrative that she’s been too timid while campaigning for president, Politico reports.
Asked about strategist David Axelrod expressing these concerns, Harris paused for a few seconds before saying, “I don’t know what to tell you.”
She added: “Axelrod was on the road with Barack a decade ago. I’ve invited him to come on the road with me … and he’d see contrary to what he thinks is happening.”
Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA) said he probably killed “hundreds of civilians” while serving as an artillery officer in Fallujah, KPBS reports.
Said Hunter: “I was an artillery officer, and we fired hundreds of rounds into Fallujah, killed probably hundreds of civilians. Probably killed women and children if there were any left in the city when we invaded. So, do I get judged too?”
Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R), “who was considering an insurgent White House bid that would have championed traditional GOP values, will not challenge President Trump for the Republican Party’s 2020 nomination,” the Washington Post reports.
Said Hogan: “I’m not going to be a candidate for president in 2020.”
“Hogan’s choice dashes the political hopes of Trump’s leading GOP critics, who have wooed the popular Maryland governor for months and connected him with key players in early voting states — and comes as other top Republicans are shying away from jumping into the presidential fray.”
A new analysis finds Justice Brett Kavanaugh is the second most conservative justice on the Supreme Court next to Justice Clarence Thomas, on a measure that places judges on a liberal-conservative spectrum.
The most liberal are Justice Sonia Sotomayor and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Bloomberg: “The economic damage of U.S. tariffs on Mexican goods would tear through battleground states that President Trump needs to win re-election, hurting the auto industry in Michigan and Ohio, dairy farmers in Wisconsin and grain and hog farmers in Iowa and North Carolina.”
“Agricultural and industrial regions played an important role in Trump’s electoral map in 2016. He won an Electoral College majority and the presidency based on a combined margin of fewer than 80,000 votes in three states: Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.”
“House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler said that there ‘certainly is’ justification for launching impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump, but cautioned that the public first must agree that it’s warranted,” Politico reports.
Said Nadler: “Impeachment is a political act, and you cannot impeach a president if the American people will not support it.”
He added: “The American people right now do not support it because they do not know the story. They don’t know the facts. We have to get the facts out. We have to hold a series of hearings, we have to hold the investigations.”
Reuters: “The United States began collecting higher, 25% tariffs on many Chinese goods arriving in U.S. seaports on Saturday morning in an intensification of the trade war between the world’s two largest economies and drawing retaliation from Beijing.”
The Atlantic: “Over the past two and a half years, the president has interfered in the U.K.’s domestic politics. He has repeatedly undermined its national security with his comments and actions after terrorist attacks in Britain. He has bullied and humiliated the prime minister, Theresa May. He has accused British intelligence agencies of spying on him, even after he promised not to do so. Trump has taken a predatory approach in trade talks, seeking to squeeze controversial concessions out of London at a moment of weakness, even at the risk of sabotaging the prime minister’s Brexit deal. He refused to listen to the British government on vital issues of shared concern, such as Iran and climate change.”
“The special relationship is arguably at its lowest point since the Suez crisis of 1956, when President Dwight Eisenhower pulled the rug out from underneath Britain and France’s attempt to retake the Suez Canal. If this sounds like an exaggeration, just consider the track record.”
A new Gallup poll shows that just 20% of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing. The vast majority, 75%, disapprove of the job Congress is doing.
Harry Enten: “From 1974, when the Gallup data starts, to September 2009, the average approval rating for Congress in Gallup’s polling was 37%. That’s not good. President Donald Trump, who has been historically unpopular for a president, has had an average approval rating in the low 40s over the last year.”
“But that 37% is more than double the 17% average approval rating Americans have given Congress since September 2009. It’s not just that the average has been low, though — it’s how consistent the low ratings have been.”
“President Trump is inching closer to hiring his third legislative affairs director, a job that is becoming increasingly challenging as Trump makes sweeping policy decisions that are alienating lawmakers,” Politico reports.
“Trump and acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney are interviewing at least two internal candidates for the position in the Oval Office on Friday afternoon, according to two people familiar with the deliberations. The candidates being interviewed Friday are Eric Ueland, a top official at the White House Domestic Policy Council, and Amy Swonger, the White House deputy director of legislative affairs.”
Wall Street Journal: “The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee slammed a Justice Department review of the origins of the Russia investigation as a politically charged effort to cast doubt on special counsel Robert Mueller’s findings, demanding the nation’s intelligence chiefs share with the panel any materials they turn over to Attorney General William Barr.”
CBS News: “As many of the 2020 Democratic candidates descended on San Francisco for the state’s party convention, former Vice President Joe Biden — who skipped the convention — picked up a new endorsement, former Labor secretary and current Los Angeles County Supervisor Hilda Solis.”
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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