“Documents marked “HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL PROCEEDING” for the first time tie President Trump’s flagship holding company to the continuing effort to silence a former adult-film actress who says she had an affair with Mr. Trump,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“A Trump Organization lawyer, Jill Martin, is listed as counsel in an arbitration demand for Essential Consultants LLC, a Delaware company formed by Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer and used to pay $130,000 to Stephanie Clifford (a.k.a. Stormy Daniels) in exchange for her silence.”

CNN: “In addition to showing a second attorney connected with the Trump Organization having direct involvement in legal matters related to Daniels, the new documents raise questions about Cohen’s previous insistence that ‘neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford,’ though it is not known whether Martin had any involvement in the case prior to the arbitration filing.”

The Wall Street Journal has this great detail when President Trump called Larry Kudlow to offer him a job as his top economic adviser:

At one point during their call Tuesday, Mr. Kudlow said the president seemed to revel in the fact that his staff didn’t know they were discussing the job. The president told him, “‘No one else knows that you and I are having this conversation.’ I loved it,” said Mr. Kudlow. “He is who he is.”

In 14 months covering this White House, Jonathan Swan says he’s “never registered such a mood of acute anxiety from within the West Wing.”

“Nobody knows what exactly is happening, who’s about to be fired, or which staffer will next be frogmarched out the door by security for some shadowy clearance issue.”

Said one official: “This is the most toxic working environment on the planet. Usually tough times bring people together. But right now this atmosphere is ripping people apart. There’s no leadership, no trust, no direction and this point there’s very little hope. Would you want to go to work every day not knowing whether your future career was going to be destroyed without explanation?”

James Hohmann: “There are not many — if any — real opportunities for Republican incumbents to score meaningful legislative achievements between now and November.”

“The GOP’s struggles are remarkable because the economy is so strong. A solid jobs report came out last Friday, and the stock market is still up big since Trump took office, even after the recent correction.”

“But it’s not puzzling what’s going on: Trump’s approval rating is hovering below 40 percent, and he sucks up all the oxygen. He did it again yesterday, when he fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson over Twitter.”

“Attorney General Jeff Sessions is reviewing a recommendation to fire the former F.B.I. deputy director, Andrew McCabe, just days before he is scheduled to retire on Sunday,” the New York Times reports.

“Mr. McCabe was a frequent target of attack from President Trump, who taunted him both publicly and privately.”

“Though no decision has been made, people inside the Justice Department expect him to be fired before Friday, a decision that would jeopardize his pension as a 21-year F.B.I. veteran.”