Trump Adviser Met With Russian Officials in 2016
Carter Page told the House Intelligence Committee that he met Russian government officials during a July 2016 trip he took to Moscow, the New York Times reports.
“Shortly after the trip, Mr. Page sent an email to at least one Trump campaign aide describing insights he had after conversations with government officials, legislators and business executives during his time in Moscow.”
“The new details of the trip present a different picture than the account Mr. Page has given during numerous appearances in the news media in recent months and are yet another example of a Trump adviser meeting with Russians officials during the 2016 campaign.”
Trump Bodyguard Faces Questions About Moscow Trip
“One of President Trump’s most trusted confidants, a security chief who served as his sounding board for nearly two decades, will face questions from congressional investigators next week about Trump’s 2013 trip to Moscow,” the Washington Post reports.
“The excursion is at the center of some of the most salacious allegations contained in a now-famous dossier, which contains unverified charges that Trump has vehemently disputed.”
Corker Blasts Trump’s ‘Inappropriate’ Remarks
Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) is firing back at President Trump over his push for the Justice Department to investigate Democrats and Hillary Clinton, The Hill reports.
Said Corker: “President Trump’s pressuring of the Justice Department and FBI to pursue cases against his adversaries and calling for punishment before trials take place are totally inappropriate.”
He added that the president’s remarks “not only undermine our justice system but erode the American people’s confidence in our institutions.”
Deadlocked In Virginia
A new Roanoke College poll in Virginia finds Ralph Northam (D) and Ed Gillespie (R) are tied in the race for governor, 47% to 47%.
Said pollster Harry Wilson: “As we noted in the last poll, Republicans closed well in the 2013 and 2014 elections. This one may be following the same script.”
How Russians Hacked the Democrats’ Emails
“An Associated Press investigation into the digital break-ins that disrupted the U.S. presidential contest has sketched out an anatomy of the hack that led to months of damaging disclosures about the Democratic Party’s nominee. It wasn’t just a few aides that the hackers went after; it was an all-out blitz across the Democratic Party. They tried to compromise Clinton’s inner circle and more than 130 party employees, supporters and contractors.”
“The AP’s reconstruction— based on a database of 19,000 malicious links recently shared by cybersecurity firm Secureworks — shows how the hackers worked their way around the Clinton campaign’s top-of-the-line digital security to steal chairman John Podesta’s emails in March 2016.”
Republicans Would Be Happier Not Trying to Pass Laws
Matthew Yglesias: “There’s no need to pass a giant tax reform package, and there’s also no need to run around Washington with a hangdog look or vague sense of shame about it. With the federal government under GOP control, the judiciary is filling up with GOP appointees. Regulatory agencies are in the hands of people who share the party’s mostly pro-business orientation. Appropriations bills are pouring money into the military and domestic security forces. Partisan control of the government is a big deal with or without major legislation.”
“But Republicans are mostly a party of cultural grievance-mongers, not ambitious legislators. That’s why Donald Trump is their president. That’s why they don’t seem to notice or care that Paul Ryan is a total fraud. They’d be a lot happier if they just owned it.”
Mainstream Media Amplified Russian Propaganda
Recode: “U.S. lawmakers are probing the extent of the Kremlin’s campaign to disrupt last year’s presidential election and have focused their latest efforts on tech platforms like Twitter.”
“But new data show that many news publications — from established outfits like the Post, the Miami Herald (owned by McClatchy), Buzzfeed, CBS and even Vox, to controversial alt-right hubs like InfoWars — were duped into citing some of these nefarious tweets in their coverage, perhaps unwittingly amplifying the reach of Russian propaganda.”
Republicans Already Divided Over Tax Plan
“After a display of unity for the unveiling of an ambitious plan to slash individual and corporate taxes, some House Republicans began late Thursday to pick out the parts of the tax legislation they don’t like,” Bloomberg reports.
“The ink was barely dry on the first draft when at least four Republicans declared they would vote against the bill in its current form. While the early opponents represent high-tax states that would get slammed by the plan’s elimination of state and local income-tax deductions, several other areas began to emerge as points of contention as Republicans sifted through the 429-page bill.”
Will It End Like This?
A Lot Rides on Virginia
Andrew Sullivan: “If Gillespie wins, or the result is close, it means the Trump-transformed GOP is electorally viable in every swing district in 2018. That it could win in the state where actual white supremacists marched this past summer and when the president is 20 points underwater is a sobering reminder of the actual state of play in our politics. I can only hope it’s a wake-up call to the Dems. In 2017, they are either useless or actively counterproductive in the struggle to resist right-authoritarianism.”
“They have learned nothing from 2016. Their intelligentsia seems determined to ensure that no midwestern whites ever vote for the party again. Their public faces are still Hillary Clinton, Chuck Schumer, and Nancy Pelosi. They still believe that something other than electoral politics — the courts, the press, the special counsel — will propel them back to power. They can’t seem to grasp the nettle of left-populism. And they remain obsessed with a Russia scandal that most swing voters don’t give a damn about.”
Bonus Quote of the Day
“Sam Clovis was almost a comically bad nominee, even for this administration.”
— Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), in a statement.
Sean Spicer’s Secret Harvard Fellowship
Harvard Crimson: “Sean Spicer was publicly offered a Visiting Fellowship here at the Harvard Kennedy School—and then allowed to speak entirely off the record.”
“During his time on campus, Spicer had closed-door forums with select faculty and fellows, spoke in a few chosen classes, and attended invite-only meals with selected groups of students. In total, 11 events over three days, all off the record, none open to the general student body or public. Not a single word Sean Spicer spoke during his Visiting Fellowship at Harvard was on the record, nor could a single word could be heard without an explicit invite.”
Kid Rock Sold Merchandise for Fake Senate Run
BuzzFeed: “Kid Rock sold merchandise for a fake Senate campaign in Michigan for months, all the while encouraging rumors that he would run and teasing announcements. Now that the ‘campaign’ is officially over… the artist won’t say how much money he made from the ‘Kid Rock For Senate’ stunt or where it went.”
Bannon Pledges No War with House Republicans
“Top House GOP campaign strategists met with former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon on Friday morning — an indication party leaders are attempting to avert the divisive primaries that Bannon is organizing against Senate Republicans,” Politico reports.
Sarah Huckabee Sanders Makes the Heart Grow Fonder
Frank Bruni: “It hit me this week, around the time when Sarah Huckabee Sanders was blithely seconding Chief of Staff John Kelly’s Civil War revisionism, that I missed Sean Spicer.”
“I missed the panic in his eyes, which signaled a scintilla of awareness that he was peddling hooey. I missed the squeak in his voice, which suggested perhaps the tiniest smidgen of shame.”
“He never seemed to me entirely at home in his domicile of deception; she dwells without evident compunction in a gaudier fairyland of grander fictions. There’s no panic. No squeak. Just that repulsed expression, as if a foul odor had wafted in and she knew — just knew — that the culprit was CNN.”
Quote of the Day
“Lemme tell you, the one that matters is me. I’m the only one that matters, because when it comes to it, that’s what the policy is going to be.”
— President Trump, in an interview on Fox News, about unfilled State Department positions.
Perry Says Fossil Fuels Can Prevent Sexual Assault
Energy Secretary Rick Perry claimed that fossil fuels can help prevent sexual assault, NBC News reports.
Said Perry: “But also from the standpoint of sexual assault, when the lights are on, when you have light that shines, the righteousness, if you will, on those types of acts. So from the standpoint of how you really affect people’s lives, fossil fuels is going to play a role in that. I happen to think it’s going to play a positive role.”
