All in all, things went well in court today for the Jan. 6 committee as it tries to enforce a subpoena for Trump presidential records. But there was one moment when the judge missed the significance of scope of the document requests, and the House lawyer didn’t bail her out. Josh Kovensky explains why the committee’s inquiry needs to start with what Trump was doing back in April 2020. Super important.
BREAKING: Justice Department Sues Texas Over New Voting Restrictions
The Department of Justice on Thursday sued the state of Texas over some of its new voting restrictions, alleging they violate the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act.
Continue reading “BREAKING: Justice Department Sues Texas Over New Voting Restrictions”In Trump’s Fight Over A Jan. 6 Subpoena, The Judge Missed A Crucial Point
Midway through Thursday’s hearing on whether former President Trump can block a subpoena issued by the House Jan. 6 Committee for records from his administration, U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan had a question: Why was the panel asking for records going all the way back to April 2020?
Continue reading “In Trump’s Fight Over A Jan. 6 Subpoena, The Judge Missed A Crucial Point”DeSantis Wants Special Cops Hunting For Bogus Election Fraud
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) wants a new, specialty election crimes office to allow police to chase imaginary election fraud cases around the Sunshine State, the latest in months of crackdowns on voting rights in the wake of Donald Trump’s lies about election theft.
Continue reading “DeSantis Wants Special Cops Hunting For Bogus Election Fraud”Listen To This: Election Fallout
A new episode of The Josh Marshall Podcast is live! This week, Josh and Kate work through Democrats’ loss in the Virginia gubernatorial race and what it means for reconciliation.
You can listen to the new episode of The Josh Marshall Podcast here.
How These Ultrawealthy Politicians Avoided Paying Taxes
This article was originally published in ProPublica, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom.
As a member of Congress, Jared Polis was one of the loudest Democrats demanding President Donald Trump release his tax returns.
At a rally in Denver in 2017, he warned the crowd that Trump “might have something to hide.” That same year, on the floor of the House, he introduced a resolution to force the president to release the records, calling them an “important baseline disclosure.”
But during Polis’ successful run for governor of Colorado in 2018, his calls for transparency faded. The dot-com tycoon turned investor broke with recent precedent and refused to disclose his returns, blaming his Republican opponent, who wasn’t disclosing his.
Polis may have had other reasons for denying requests to release the records.
Continue reading “How These Ultrawealthy Politicians Avoided Paying Taxes”Dems Finally Making Real Progress On Reconciliation Impasse
In a flurry of statements following Senate Democrats’ lunch this afternoon, we finally saw some substantial movement on reconciliation negotiations — more tangible movement toward an actual deal than we’ve seen in months at this point.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) announced that members had reached an agreement on the drug pricing provision in the bill, a puzzle piece that has been a sticking point for not just the typical holdouts, Sens. Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), but also a few other members of Schumer’s caucus.
Within minutes of that announcement, Sinema released a rather snarky statement confirming she did in fact support the plan. As Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) put it, just minutes before Sinema released her statement of support, all eyes on are now on Manchin.
“Is this the last piece of the puzzle? Ask Manchin,” he said.
Follow our live coverage below.
Being a Whiny Little B Isn’t Good For Your Soul
Yesterday CNN headlined that President Biden returned to a Democratic “nightmare”. The Times Peter Baker said Biden was returning to a “different country”. There’s no doubt Democrats had a rough night. They lost a close governor’s race in Virginia, a state they have come to see increasingly as home turf. They also narrowly lost control of the state House of Delegates which they first took control of in 2019. And while Democrat Phil Murphy won in New Jersey, Republicans made a very close race of it, in large part by a big drop off in Democrats showing up to vote.
As I wrote Tuesday night, this isn’t a surprising result. The President’s popularity is underwater. Polls say the public sees the country going in the wrong direction – a reality regardless of whether you or I think it is an accurate perception. But let’s also get real: the incumbent President’s party has consistently lost these two governorships every cycle for more than 30 years. The one exception was Terry McAuliffe in 2013. Murphy’s victory in New Jersey sees the first Democrat reelected governor in that state in 44 years.
Continue reading “Being a Whiny Little B Isn’t Good For Your Soul”Russian Analyst Who Contributed To Steele Dossier Indicted For Lying To FBI In Durham Probe
Igor Danchenko, a Russian analyst who contributed to the so-called Steele dossier, has been arrested as part of the probe by special counsel John Durham. According to the indictment released on Thursday, Danchenko was charged with five counts of making false statements to the FBI.
Former British intelligence agent Christopher Steele had hired Danchenko as his primary researcher in compiling his famed dossier. Steele’s dossier broadly alleged that the Trump campaign had conspired with Russia in the 2016 election, but many of the specifics were unconfirmed and some were later debunked.
Danchenko’s arrest comes several months after Durham, who was appointed by Attorney General Bill Barr to investigate the origins of the FBI’s 2016 Russia probe, secured an indictment of cybersecurity attorney Michael Sussmann, whose firm has represented the Democratic National Committee. Sussman was indicted for allegedly lying to the FBI about not working for anyone when he told the feds about allegations of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.
The new indictment alleges that Danchenko made false statements to the FBI in five separate interviews in 2017.
In Count 1, the indictment alleged that Danchenko was not truthful in an interview with the FBI on or about June 15, 2017 when he denied speaking to a person identified as “PR Executive-1” about the material in the dossier. PR Executive-1, who is not named in the indictment, had a long and ongoing involvement in Democratic politics which made their involvement in the dossier highly relevant and material, the indictment alleged.
Counts 2-5 allege that Danchenko lied to the FBI in four separate interviews – on March 16, May 18, Oct. 24 and Nov 16, 2017 – when he claimed to have had communications from ”Chamber President-1.” The indictment doesn’t name ”Chamber President-1,” but the Washington Post identified him as Sergei Millian, who was then the president of the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce.
Durham’s probe has long been controversial, seen as Barr’s politically motivated response to the repeated claims by President Donald Trump and his allies that the FBI’s Russia investigation was a politically motivated hit job to sabotage his campaign and his presidency.
Read the indictment below:
Once-Wary Dem Now Supports Nuking Filibuster For Voting Rights Legislation
Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE), who previously withheld support for gutting the notorious filibuster, signaled a significant shift on his stance in the face of persistent GOP obstruction, particularly with voting rights legislation.
Continue reading “Once-Wary Dem Now Supports Nuking Filibuster For Voting Rights Legislation”