Time: “Much as the Paula Jones’ harassment case against Bill Clinton helped drive his impeachment and the seizure of Anthony Weiner’s laptop led the FBI to reopen its probe of Hillary Clinton, Trump’s personal history now may threaten his presidency.”
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GOP Has Lost All Credibility on Fiscal Responsibility
John Harwood: “The business model of the modern Republican Party does not produce real-world budget discipline. So today, GOP lawmakers turn to make-believe.”
“Within the last four months, the Republican president and party leaders in Congress took two actions that dramatically expand federal deficits. On a party-line vote, they cut taxes by $150 billion a year, then increased spending by $150 billion a year in cooperation with Democrats.”
“Now, as the Congressional Budget Office projects the return of $1 trillion annual deficits, congressional Republicans plan a gesture for constituents alarmed by rising debt. The House will vote on Thursday on a constitutional amendment requiring lawmakers to balance the federal budget.”
National Enquirer Bought Trump Love Child Story
New Yorker: “Late in 2015, a former Trump Tower doorman named Dino Sajudin met with a reporter from American Media, Inc., the publisher of the National Enquirer, at a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania. A few weeks earlier, Sajudin had signed a contract with A.M.I., agreeing to become a source and to accept thirty thousand dollars for exclusive rights to information he had been told: that Donald Trump, who had launched his Presidential campaign five months earlier, may have fathered a child with a former employee in the late nineteen-eighties.”
“Sajudin declined to comment for this story. However, six current and former A.M.I. employees, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared legal retaliation by the company, said that Sajudin had told A.M.I. the names of the alleged mistress and child. Reporters at A.M.I. had spent weeks investigating the allegations, and Sajudin had passed a lie-detector test, during which he testified that high-level Trump employees, including Trump’s head of security, Matthew Calamari, had told him the story.”
Inside the GOP Plan to Discredit Comey
President Trump’s allies “are preparing an extensive campaign to fight back against James Comey’s publicity tour, trying to undermine the credibility of the former FBI director by reviving the blistering Democratic criticism of him before he was fired nearly a year ago,” CNN reports.
“The battle plan against Comey, obtained by CNN, calls for branding the nation’s former top law enforcement official as ‘Lyin’ Comey’ through a website, digital advertising and talking points to be sent to Republicans across the country before his memoir is released next week. The White House signed off on the plan, which is being overseen by the Republican National Committee.”
Comey’s much-anticipated book, A Higher Loyalty, is out next week.
Ryan May Be Forced Out as Speaker This Summer
One source close to House GOP leadership tells Axios: “Scuttlebutt is that Paul will have to step down from speakership soon. Members won’t follow a lame duck, he’ll have no leverage to cut deals, and the last thing they need in this environment is 6 months of palace intrigue and everyone stabbing everyone else in the back.”
Said another senior GOP House member: “He will be gone by the end of July.”
Trump Discussed Firing Rosenstein with Aides
President Trump discussed firing Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein with White House aides on Wednesday, Bloomberg reports, “as a chorus of Trump’s advisers and allies urged him to thwart the investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election.”
“Egged on by some of his strongest supporters, Trump has taken an increasingly combative posture toward special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation after FBI agents descended on the office and home of his lawyer Michael Cohen on Monday.”
The Week: Trump’s favorite Fox News analysts are urging him to fire Rosenstein.
Trump Push to Redo Spending Bill Causes GOP Revolt
“A regretful President Trump wants to roll back spending in a massive omnibus bill he signed into law, but Republicans who helped craft the legislation are in open revolt,” Politico reports.
Said House Appropriations Chairman Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-NJ): “My attitude is, your word is your bond.”
“Frelinghuysen is among more than a half-dozen appropriators who have voiced skepticism about the Trump administration’s proposal to cancel billions in spending. Nearly all said they feared that it could erode the GOP’s bargaining power in future budget talks. Their objections represented another low point in an often-tense relationship between the cost-cutting White House and GOP members of Congress who write spending bills.”
Trump Says He Would Have Fired Mueller If He Wanted
President Trump tweeted that a New York Times report that he wanted to fire special counsel Bob Mueller in December is “fake news from a biased newspaper!”
Said Trump: “If I wanted to fire Robert Mueller in December, as reported by the Failing New York Times, I would have fired him.”
Trump Takes Out Paul Ryan
Rick Wilson: “Ryan and his caucus hoped to run on the tax cut, the economy, and infrastructure. All of these messages now will be swept aside. Ryan owns his share of the blame; too often, he behaved as if he was some deferential junior VP at a Trump resort and not the leader of the House of Representatives in a co-equal branch of government. The idea, popular among the House leadership, that a diet of ass-kissing and deference would make Trump into a normal President who didn’t need the political equivalent of Depends was always a strategic mistake.”
“Ryan is now paying the price. The rest of his caucus will pay in the fall.”
Bannon Pushing Plan to Cripple Mueller Probe
“Stephen Bannon, who was ousted as White House chief strategist last summer but has remained in touch with some members of President Trump’s circle, is pitching a plan to West Wing aides and congressional allies to cripple the federal probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election,” the Washington Post reports.
“The first step, these people say, would be for Trump to fire Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein… Bannon is also recommending the White House cease its cooperation with Mueller, reversing the policy of Trump’s legal team to provide information to the special counsel’s team and to allow staff members to sit for interviews.”
“And he is telling associates inside and outside the administration that the president should create a new legal battleground to protect himself from the investigation by asserting executive privilege — and arguing that Mueller’s interviews with White House officials over the past year should now be null and void.”
Christie Doesn’t Think Trump Will Fire Mueller
Former Gov. Chris Christie (R) told ABC News that he firmly believes that President Trump won’t fire special counsel Robert Mueller, but he admitted that the president is unpredictable.
Said Christie: “I just don’t think he will fire Bob Mueller. I don’t, but you never know because this is a president who follows his gut and he makes decisions that at times that others think are contrary to his best interests.”
Woman Says Greitens Groped and Hit Her
“During several sexual encounters with his hair stylist the year before he was elected Missouri’s governor, Eric Greitens (R) struck her in the face, touched her crotch without her consent and called her a ‘whore,’ the woman told a Missouri House committee,” the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports.
“The claims add disturbing new layers to the single criminal allegation Greitens faces — a felony invasion-of-privacy charge, for allegedly taking and transmitting a semi-nude photo of her without her consent.”
Kansas City Star: “The explosive allegations were among the findings of the bipartisan investigative committee of the Missouri House that has been looking into allegations of wrongdoing against the Republican governor.”
“The committee – five Republicans and two Democrats – concluded that the woman’s testimony is credible.”
It’s All Trump’s Party Now
Washington Post: “Ryan’s decision to abruptly throw in the towel, just six months before the midterms, is likely to only further Trump’s control of the party. Republicans strategists worry that it will also make it harder for the GOP to hold onto the House, a prospect that seems less likely after a recent Democratic victory in a special election outside of Pittsburgh.”
“Not only are donors making clear they are more skeptical of the effort to retain the House, but the sudden departure of Ryan suggests the Republican ideological tent will continue to shrink.”
Extra Bonus Quote of the Day
“I don’t know what he was thinking. I think this was a huge miscalculation. I think this is the captain abandoning the sinking ship.”
— Former Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA), quoted by the Daily Beast, adding that GOP lawmakers “are pissed” about Speaker Paul Ryan’s retirement announcement.
Ryan Upends GOP Hopes for the Midterm Elections
New York Times: “For House Republicans, and for a White House bracing for a potential Democratic impeachment inquiry, the more immediate and ominous impact of Mr. Ryan’s retirement was unmistakable: He has made it more difficult for his party to keep control of the House, where Republicans currently hold a 23-seat majority. With one decision, Mr. Ryan has turned an already difficult midterm election into a precarious task for his remaining colleagues.”
Said former Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA): “This is the nightmare scenario. Everybody figured he’d just hang in there till after the election.”
“Mr. Ryan’s exit is a destabilizing blow to Republicans’ 2018 plans on nearly every front.”
Raid Sought Records on ‘Access Hollywood’ Tape
“The FBI agents who raided the office and hotel of President Trump’s lawyer on Monday were seeking all records related to the Access Hollywood tape in which Mr. Trump was heard making vulgar comments about women,” the New York Times reports.
“The search warrant also sought evidence of whether the lawyer, Michael Cohen, tried to suppress damaging information about Mr. Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign.”
“It is not clear what role, if any, Mr. Cohen played regarding the tape, which was made public a month before the election. But the fact that the agents were seeking documents related to the tape reveals a new front in the investigation into Mr. Cohen that is being led by the United States attorney’s office in Manhattan.”
NRA Admits to 23 Russian-Linked Contributions
“The National Rifle Association has accepted contributions from about 23 Russians, or Americans living in Russia, since 2015, the gun rights group acknowledged to Congress,” NPR reports.
“The NRA said in a letter to Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) that the sum it received from those people was just over $2,500 and most of that was ‘routine payments’ for membership dues or magazine subscriptions.”
Senate Committee Moves Bill Protecting Mueller
“The Senate Judiciary Committee is moving forward with legislation to limit President Trump’s ability to fire special counsel Robert Mueller,” The Hill reports.
Judiciary Chairman Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) wants to add the bill to the panel’s business meeting agenda scheduled for Thursday.
