A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo.
Don’t Most People Just Steal Office Supplies?
A new jaw-dropping Washington Post report reveals that FBI agents who executed a raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort on Monday were digging for, among other things, classified documents related to nuclear weapons.
- We don’t know if the agents actually found those documents, however.
- It’s also unclear if the documents were about the U.S.’s nuclear weapons arsenal or another country’s.
- Trump lawyer Christina Bobb flailed on national TV under questioning on Thursday night from that tough interlocutor Laura Ingraham:
DOJ Moves To Have Mar-A-Lago Search Warrant Unsealed
Attorney General Merrick Garland on Thursday publicly addressed the FBI’s blockbuster raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, and announced that the Justice Department was asking the courts to unseal the search warrant.
- DOJ asked the court to unseal a copy of the search warrant, the property receipt Trump got for the White House records that he kept at Mar-a-Lago, and two unspecified attachments to the warrant.
- Trump announced shortly after midnight that he won’t oppose unsealing documents related to the warrant and is in fact “ENCOURAGING” their release.
- Several news organizations have joined together to support the DOJ motion to unseal the search warrant. The New York Times had already filed a motion to unseal it the day before:
- Garland also said on Thursday that he had “personally approved the decision to seek a search warrant.”
Man Who Tried To Break Into FBI Field Office Dead After Standoff
Ricky Shiffer, the man identified as the person who allegedly tried to break into the FBI’s field office in Cincinnati, Ohio, was fatally shot by law enforcement during a standoff yesterday after the alleged break-in attempt.
- Shiffer was allegedly at the Capitol on Jan. 6 last year, according to NBC News.
- Investigators are probing Schiffer’s apparent ties to far-right extremist groups, according to the New York Times.
- An account on Trump’s Twitter knockoff, TRUTH Social, under Shiffer’s name posted about killing FBI agents in response to the Mar-a-Lago raid.
House Slated To Pass Sweeping Climate And Tax Bill Today
The House is back in session today to vote on Democrats’ historic reconciliation bill on climate investment, taxes and drug pricing, aka the Inflation Reduction Act, per House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) “Dear Colleague” letter.
Ex-Trump National Security Adviser To Meet With Jan. 6 Panel
Robert O’Brien, Trump’s former national security adviser, is scheduled to have an interview with the House Jan. 6 Committee today, NBC News reports.
Jan. 6 Panel Interviews Trump’s Ex-Transportation Secretary
The House Jan. 6 Committee has recently had an interview with Elaine Chao, Trump’s former Transportation secretary and the wife of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), according to CNN, yet more testimony from an ex-Trump Cabinet official.
- The panel’s been digging into alleged discussions the then-Cabinet members had about invoking the 25th Amendment to oust Trump after the Capitol attack.
- The committee has already spoken to six other former Cabinet members who were still part of the Trump administration on Jan. 6:
- Ex-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
- Ex-Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin
- Ex-acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf
- Ex-Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia
- Ex-acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller
- Ex-acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen
The Right-Wing Swamp
Fox News host Brian Kilmeade wants to know: If Merrick Garland is oh-so-transparent about the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago raid, then why didn’t he publicly announce in advance that the raid was going to happen, huh?
Alabama Governor’s Office Went Radio Silent For A Week
AL.com columnist Kyle Whitmire reported yesterday that sources had told him last week that Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey (R), who had struggled with lung cancer three years ago, was ill. But when Whitmire reached out to Ivey’s office last Thursday–and then for an entire week–to confirm whether or not the governor was sick, he didn’t get any response.
- Whitmire reported that Ivey’s spokesperson only got back to him yesterday after his column on the governor’s disappearance went up earlier in the day. Before then, he and a colleague repeatedly tried to get in contact with Ivey’s office to no avail.
- After a week of radio silence, Ivey’s spokesperson put out a statement saying the governor was “doing great” and staying “healthy and cancer-free.”
- Whitmire noted that this isn’t the first time Ivey’s office has clammed up over her health status: Three years ago, her reps had initially claimed she was fine, then admitted weeks later that she had been diagnosed with cancer, according to the columnist.
Twitter Unveils Pre-Midterms Misinfo Safeguards
Twitter announced its new “approach” to the upcoming U.S. midterms yesterday aiming to combat “harmful misleading information” about the elections, voting process, candidates, etc. on its platform.
Twitter also promised to implement special measures “to get ahead of misleading narratives” and “proactively address topics that may be the subject of misinformation,” so maybe they should start with this guy:
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Shocking!!! But predictable
Oh F***! Now he has to reveal something even worse.
Oh, and what if they don’t find some of the nuclear documents they know should be there!
That would get interesting.
An acquaintance who is a retired national security employee with a legal background suggested, among the other obvious reasons that Trump would retain nuclear weapons-related secrets (like selling them to our enemies), this: Trump, being a psychopath, is like a serial killer – even though it might incriminate them, they have to retain “trophies” of their exploits.
In any dealing with Donnie, one must start with a known stipulation, i.e. that “he’s an unrepentant and self-serving liar.”