Stormy Daniels says in a new lawsuit that her former attorney betrayed her and became a “puppet” for President Trump and his personal lawyer while still representing her, NBC News reports.
The filing alleges that lawyer Keith Davidson “hatched a plan” and “colluded” with Trump attorney Michael Cohen to get the adult film actress to go on Fox News a few months ago and falsely deny she had an affair with Trump a decade ago.
President Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau “had a testy phone call on May 25 over new tariffs imposed by the Trump administration targeting steel and aluminum imports coming from Canada, including one moment during the conversation in which Trump made an erroneous historical reference,” CNN reports.
“Trudeau pressed Trump on how he could justify the tariffs as a ‘national security’ issue. In response, Trump quipped to Trudeau, ‘Didn’t you guys burn down the White House?’ referring to the War of 1812.”
“The problem with Trump’s comments to Trudeau is that British troops burned down the White House during the War of 1812. Historians note the British attack on Washington was in retaliation for the American attack on York, Ontario, in territory that eventually became Canada, which was then a British colony.”
“Amid intense scrutiny of contacts between Donald Trump’s inner circle and representatives of Vladimir Putin, Ivanka Trump’s name has barely come up. But during the campaign, she connected her father’s personal lawyer with a Russian athlete who offered to introduce Donald Trump to Putin to facilitate a 100-story Trump tower in Moscow,” according to emails reviewed by BuzzFeed News.
“There is no evidence that Ivanka Trump’s contact with the athlete — the former Olympic weightlifter Dmitry Klokov — was illegal or that it had anything to do with the election. Nor is it clear that Klokov could even have introduced Trump to the Russian president. But congressional investigators have reviewed emails and questioned witnesses about the interaction… and so has special counsel Robert Mueller’s team.”
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“A Cambridge Analytica director apparently visited Julian Assange in February last year and told friends it was to discuss what happened during the U.S. election,” the Guardian reports.
“Brittany Kaiser, a director at the firm until earlier this year, also claimed to have channeled cryptocurrency payments and donations to WikiLeaks. This information has been passed to congressional and parliamentary inquiries in the UK and US.”
President Trump commuted the life sentence for Alice Marie Johnson, a drug offender championed by Kim Kardashian, the AP reports.
Washington Post: “President Trump’s acts of clemency so far have been scattershot, driven by television segments, celebrities, friends and White House advisers who have pressed their cases for pardons that include controversial Sheriff Joe Arpaio, conservative commentator Dinesh D’Souza and Lewis ‘Scooter’ Libby, former chief of staff to Vice President Richard B. Cheney.”
Dan Conley: “When Democratic strategists look ahead to the 2020 Presidential Election, one thought scares them more than any other — if the party attracts as many or even more candidates for President than the Republicans did in 2016, a deadlocked convention is inevitable.”
“While I tend to agree that this is a very likely outcome of a large Democratic field, I believe it’s a scenario to embrace, not fear. But more on that later. First, let me explain why a big field is likely and why it will almost certainly lead to at least a second ballot at the 2020 Democratic Convention.”
Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) sided with Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) who had said that the FBI did nothing wrong by using a confidential informant to contact members of President Trump’s campaign as it investigated its ties to Russia, the New York Times reports.
And he warned that Mr. Trump should not try to pardon himself: “I think obviously the answer is he shouldn’t. And no one is above the law.”
“The White House has assembled the paperwork to pardon dozens of people, two sources with knowledge of the developments tell CNN, signaling that President Trump is poised to exert his constitutional power and intervene, in some instances, where he believes the Justice Department has overstepped.”
“The administration has prepared the pardoning paperwork for at least 30 people.”
“The Justice Department’s internal watchdog has concluded that James Comey defied authority at times during his tenure as FBI director,” ABC News reports.
One source says the draft report explicitly uses the word “insubordinate” to describe Comey’s behavior.
“The draft… specifically called out Comey for ignoring objections from the Justice Department when he disclosed in a letter to Congress just days before the 2016 presidential election that FBI agents had reopened the Clinton probe… Clinton has said that letter doomed her campaign.”
Rudy Giuliani said North Korean leader Kim Jong Un got down “on his hands and knees and begged” for their summit to be held after Mr. Trump canceled it last month, the Wall Street Journal reports.
“Mr. Giuliani counseled a similar approach to Trump administration negotiations with Palestinian officials in a future Middle East peace process.”
Former Vice President Joe Biden “and a trusted inner circle have quietly been engaging a wider network of political allies to sketch the outlines of what a Biden 2020 candidacy might look like should he decide to run,” NBC News reports.
“Biden himself has only gone so far as to say he’s not ruled out what would be a third run for the White House. He’s also been adamant that while a decision won’t come until after the 2018 midterms, it shouldn’t linger much beyond year’s end — a timetable that would help to bring some order to what could be the largest Democratic presidential field in generations.”
“President Trump is preparing to sign a sweeping new law Wednesday aimed at expanding veterans’ access to private-sector health care. But behind the scenes his administration is fighting a bipartisan Senate effort to fund the legislation,” the Washington Post reports.
“The VA Mission Act authorizes new health care programs for veterans, but the bill does not reserve federal money to pay for those programs. A group of powerful Senate committee chairmen aims to remedy that by amending a separate measure to pay for the new $50 billion law… But the White House has engaged in a quiet effort to thwart the senators’ plan, encouraging lawmakers to vote it down and instead asking Congress to pay for the veterans programs by cutting spending elsewhere.”
Sam Baker: “Last night’s primaries set up a major role for health care in November’s midterms, both in individual races and as a part of Democrats’ search for a nationwide wave.”
“The results firmed up the emerging national dynamic. Health care motivates Democrats more than Republicans, and Democrats are moving left on the issue. Advocates for single-payer or ‘Medicare for All’ (whatever that ends up meaning) aren’t running the table, but they continue to win important primaries.”
A new UtahPolicy.com poll finds Rep. Mia Love (R-UT) leads challenger Ben McAdams (D) by just 4 percentage points, 47% to 43% with another 10% still undecided.
“President Trump’s instinct for exploiting America’s deep cultural divisions could help Republicans nullify the Democratic resistance in the midterm elections, saving the party’s vulnerable congressional majorities,” the Washington Examiner reports.
“Trump’s habit of ignoring the economic message preferred by House and Senate Republicans in favor of the culture war tropes that propelled him to the White House is increasingly seen as an asset. Though provocative, the president’s rhetoric resonates with the base, offering Republicans a vehicle for matching the Democrats’ critical voter enthusiasm edge.”
Mike Allen: “Mark Zuckerberg survived questions about Russia’s election-meddling largely unscathed. But the New York Times‘ that Facebook knowingly granted four Chinese electronics companies (including Huawei, which U.S. intelligence officials see as a potential national security threat) access to Americans’ data — and didn’t bother to tell Congress about it — has Washington fuming again.”
“The president has made it pretty clear he’s going to try to divide all of us in this country for political gain.”
— Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr, quoted by the Washington Post.
BuzzFeed News: “How do Republicans who don’t seem to care much for Donald Trump gently rebuke him without provoking his wrath or alienating his supporters?”
“They register a complaint about the tweets — or his attacks on the press and the FBI, or his mollifying of white supremacists — before pivoting to how, by and large, they’re delighted with his policies.”
“Those words are emerging as an operative phrase for many conservatives trying to reconcile themselves with Trumpism. Nearly 18 months into the Trump presidency, it’s both a verbal crutch toward fragile Republican Party harmony and a rueful but not exactly complete explanation of why most won’t abandon Trump.”
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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