A federal judge dismissed the criminal case against James Comey after determining that U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan was not lawfully appointed.
“All actions flowing from Ms. Halligan’s defective appointment, including securing and signing Mr. Comey’s indictment, were unlawful exercises of executive power and are hereby set aside.”
The New York Times reports charges were also dismissed against New York Attorney General Letitia James.
The Pentagon says it is investigating Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) for possible breaches of military law after Kelly joined a handful of other lawmakers in a video that called for U.S. troops to refuse unlawful orders, the AP reports.
Just in time for the holidays, the Blue Wave T-Shirt is back.
President Trump claimed on social media that Ukraine’s leadership has expressed “zero gratitude” for the U.S. efforts to help them in their war, CNN reports.
“Trump’s claim is not even close to accurate.”
“Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has expressed gratitude to the United States on dozens of occasions – 78 examples are listed below – since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of his country in early 2022. And Zelensky has repeatedly expressed gratitude to Trump personally since Trump was elected again last fall.”
A senior House Republican to Punchbowl News:
“This entire White House team has treated ALL members like garbage. ALL. And Mike Johnson has let it happen because he wanted it to happen. That is the sentiment of nearly all — appropriators, authorizers, hawks, doves, rank and file. The arrogance of this White House team is off putting to members who are run roughshod and threatened. They don’t even allow little wins like announcing small grants or even responding from agencies. Not even the high profile, the regular rank and file random members are more upset than ever. Members know they are going into the minority after the midterms.”
They add: “More explosive early resignations are coming. It’s a tinder box. Morale has never been lower. Mike Johnson will be stripped of his gavel and they will lose the majority before this term is out.”
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins was interviewed on CNBC by Andrew Ross Sorkin:
SORKIN: My understanding is the White House said that China was gonna buy 12 million tons of soybeans from the US by January. That’s approaching and they’ve only purchased 332,000. China has not confirmed that pledge.
ROLLINS: Your point is salient. We’ve got a significant way to go.
“In a recent conversation, Vice President JD Vance asked Roger Stone, President Donald Trump’s longtime confidant, for his biggest concern facing the country. Stone later recalled on his radio show that his answer was a technology company Vance now hears about with increasing frequency: Palantir,” CNN reports.
“For years, Democrats have zeroed in on Vance’s relationship with Palantir’s co-founder Peter Thiel, the iconoclastic tech titan who gave Vance one of his first jobs and later put $15 million behind his successful 2022 Ohio Senate bid.”
“But the pressure on Vance is now coming from inside Trump’s coalition. As the administration steers billions of dollars of new work to Palantir, prominent voices have expressed fears that the firm’s powerful data analytics tools could give the government sweeping, almost futuristic surveillance capabilities.”
New York Times: “Mr. Cuomo has managed to keep most details about his podcasting career under wraps. But a review of previously unreported court records and interviews with a dozen people involved show the lengths he was willing to go to restore his name.”
“It began with Quake Media. But when the start-up began unraveling, Mr. Cuomo tried others in the Republican spectrum. He courted a conservative talk radio powerhouse and had a portentous run-in with a Republican rival in a familiar red beret. And, in a bizarre twist, the podcasts he made may soon be owned by a well-known Fox News host.”
“U.S. airlines are predicting another record Thanksgiving holiday travel period and are upbeat now that the travel-snarling government shutdown has ended,” CNBC reports.
“Over the course of decades, House lawmakers had succeeded only a few times in triggering votes on bills the chamber’s leaders refused to call up,” Politico reports.
“Then Mike Johnson became speaker.”
“On the Louisiana Republican’s watch, the “discharge petition” has caught fire. Rank-and-file lawmakers have managed five times since he won his gavel two years ago to circumvent Johnson’s wishes by getting the 218 signatures needed to force votes on legislation he had blocked — more than in the prior 30 years combined.”
Sarah Stillman: “The Trump Administration is deporting people to countries they have no ties to, where many are being detained indefinitely or forcibly returned to the places they fled.”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) “did not give Speaker Mike Johnson a heads up about her shocking resignation,” NBC News reports.
“Her abrupt departure from Congress in January will make Johnson’s job even more difficult, given the GOP’s already slim margins.”
President Trump warned the Supreme Court in a social media rant that striking down his sweeping tariffs would mean “serving hostile foreign interests.”
Just published: The Age of Extraction: How Tech Platforms Conquered the Economy and Threaten Our Future Prosperity by Tim Wu.
Tech platforms manipulate attention, extract wealth, and deepen inequality.
Wall Street Journal: “The spending points to a solid holiday shopping season, which many retailers count on for a significant portion of their annual sales and profits.”
Bloomberg: “For Europeans, the alarm went off when a new player was introduced to the scene: US Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, a close friend of JD Vance going back to their days at Yale Law School. It was he who told their ambassadors and Ukraine officials in an urgent tone that US President Donald Trump had run out of patience, that Ukraine was in a bad position and that Kyiv had to agree to concede territory.”
“The fact that it was a figure close to the vice president tasked to push the plan during a trip to Kyiv this past week was telling. It was a weighty assignment typically undertaken by high-level diplomats, like Secretary of State Marco Rubio or other foreign diplomats. Vance and Rubio have had different takes on how the war should end, with Vance taking a more isolationist bent and Rubio much warier of being manipulated by Russia.”
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.
