Wanted to flag for your attention Allegra Kirkland’s second installment on the implosion of the National Socialist Movement (NSM), a decades old descendent of the American Nazi Party that has imploded to the degree that its leader says he got bamboozled into signing over leadership of the party to a black activist. Also be sure to read Tierney Sneed’s backgrounder on why Judge Ellis (P) gave Paul Manafort less than four years and finally signs Dems are looking for new connections (P) between Russia and the Trump entourage.

I don’t know if anyone anticipated Paul Manafort receiving such a vast downward revision from the sentencing guidelines – just under four years when federal sentencing guidelines leaned toward more than twenty (19-24 years). But if there was a judge who was going to wrench the scales in Manafort’s favor it was going to be Judge Ellis. During the trial Ellis made no effort to hide his sympathy for Manafort and hostility toward the government’s case. He attacked the government’s lawyering. He attacked the government’s case. He questioned the existence of the Special Counsel’s office itself. It came up again and again. Ellis was even compelled on to rule against his own manifest partiality in at least one instance. Read More

I’m working on a piece with some more thoughts about the Rep. Omar (D-MN) controversy. For now, on the vote: I thought jumping to passing a resolution was always a mistake, an overreaction, too reactive. In the event, it was unobjectionable enough that every Democrat and almost every Republican voted for it. Even though I thought doing any kind of resolution was a mistake, I also thought the whole “Dems in disarray” narrative was overblown. Certainly it’s a distraction from what they want to be focused on. But these things happens. Then they’re done. Then three days later it’s like it never happened. Read More

Paul Manafort’s sentencing hearing in Virginia should be getting underway. TPM’s Tierney Sneed and Caitlin MacNeal are present. No electronic devices allowed in the courthouse, so we’ll be doing our best with analog coverage. They have quarters for the payphone. More soon.

I agree with David that this lawsuit must irk Trump. But I had a somewhat different reaction. Just under $2 million dollars seems almost quaint for the Trump Era. It has like a vaguely Austin Powers feel to it. Trumpers seem to sue for at least $100 million, just on principle, just following Trump’s lead.

Cohen seems like a man out of time. Maybe he has really turned a corner.

We’re now learning that the Trump Organization/Trump campaign paid $1.7 million in legal bills for Michael Cohen before he flipped, at least according to Cohen.

[When I first wrote this post I thought the law literally barred Trump from issuing these pardons. It doesn’t actually do that. It requires the DOJ to give Congress evidence against the pardoned individual and at least implicitly on how a particular pardon would affect or insulate the President and associates from legal jeopardy. That’s significantly different and not as clear cut. But I still think the law is likely unconstitutional because it forces the executive to take actions which at least complicate and in practice put obstacles in the way of this power. Post follows as I wrote it in the first instance.]

Adam Schiff wants to pass a law that would prevent the President from issuing pardons that protect him, his family or associates from legal jeopardy. Read More

I’ve seen a lot of journalists complaining that the DNC is somehow showing fear, or unwillingness to take tough questions or even some hostility to press freedom by rejecting a 2020 primary debate with Fox News. This is silly. Some non-journalists seem to be confused about the difference between access and debate sponsorship. But journalists know this difference. So they’re being silly. Read More

Neo-Nazis say they’re going to wrest control over their neo-Nazi organization back from the African-American activist who recently took over the organization. Really.

Here is a remarkable and yet entirely unremarkable story. The Commerce Department announced this morning that the country’s trade deficit last year was the biggest in US history. It’s $891 billion for merchandise, $621 billion when the service sector is added in, and $419 billion with China alone. Each is a record. The Post reports that the overall number tops the previous record of $838 billion in 2006, but it doesn’t seem like those numbers are adjusted for inflation or judged relative to the overall size of the economy. So possibly there should be an asterisk after biggest ever. (This Reuters article says biggest since 2008 when adjusted for inflation.) Still however you slice it, for all President Trump’s yakking and fairly disruptive trade wars, the problem has actually gotten worse. Read More