A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo.
And Another Domino Falls
The woman who came forward with receipts and a signed “get well” card revealing that Georgia GOP Senate nominee Herschel Walker had paid for her abortion in 2009 is the mother of one of his children, despite Walker claiming she doesn’t exist, the Daily Beast reports.
- The woman is reportedly the mother of one of the four kids whom Walker has publicly acknowledged is his. There’s 23-year-old Christian Walker (who’s been calling out his father as a domestic abuser and a liar over the past week), then three others that Walker didn’t disclose to the public until the Daily Beast reported on them in June.
- Christian Walker’s thoughts:
- The woman said she was “stunned” by Walker’s denials, but then again “maybe there are just so many of us that he truly doesn’t remember.”
- Walker’s campaign stuck to the denial route on Wednesday in response to this latest bombshell report with a one-line statement: “There is no truth to this or any other Daily Beast report.”
- We did a live blog on the burgeoning abortion scandal and the GOP’s desperate efforts to paper over it yesterday, which you can read here.
Secret Service Misreported Harris’ Motorcade Accident
On Monday, the Secret Service agent who was driving Vice President Kamala Harris downtown hit the curb of a tunnel and busted one of the SUV’s tires, requiring Harris (who was unharmed) to switch cars–but that’s not how the Secret Service initially reported it to the agency’s senior leadership, according to the Washington Post.
- Instead, agents who were part of Harris’ motorcade reportedly claimed that the vice president had transferred cars due to “a mechanical failure.” The Secret Service director wasn’t told the real reason until later on Monday.
The Gun-Election Denialism Overlap
Most of the National Rifle Association’s most highly rated Republicans are election truthers, according to this unsettling analysis by the Washington Post, which also notes:
“Many of the most fervent defenders of freely accessible firearms center their views on the idea that weapons are necessary to combat an oppressive federal government. If that government is perceived as also illegitimate, the risk of violence would seem necessarily to increase.”
Bolduc Struggles With Pretending Not To Be Election Denier
For those of us trying to keep track, New Hampshire GOP Senate nominee Don Bolduc is now at the ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ phase of his dizzying election denialism journey.
- “I can’t say that it was stolen or not,” Bolduc said when asked about the 2020 election during a town hall on Monday, claiming that he doesn’t “have enough information.”
- Flashback to less than three weeks ago, when Bolduc declared on Fox News that the election “was not stolen,” a conclusion he supposedly came to after doing “a lot of research” (the best part of that declaration was when he said he was being “definitive” on the issue).
- The problem is that Bolduc’s having trouble sticking to his own messaging strategy. Several days after the Fox interview, the Senate hopeful told a QAnon podcaster (yup) that he knows the MAGA stolen election narrative that he peddled during his entire primary campaign “doesn’t fly” with regular New Hampshire voters. Yet here he is at the town hall, inching back to the election denialism he claimed to have abandoned. Pick a lane, bro.
OPEC+ To Slash Oil Production By 2 Million Barrels A Day
The OPEC+ alliance announced on Wednesday that it will cut oil production by two million barrels per day, which could cause gas prices to surge.
- The production decrease will be a boon to Russia (which happens to be a member of the alliance), as the Washington Post points out. Higher oil prices mean more money for Russia’s invasion and illegal land-grabbing in Ukraine.
- OPEC+ said its decision was prompted by “uncertainty that surrounds the global economic and oil market outlook.”
Looking At Russia’s Nuclear Arsenal
With his war on Ukraine becoming an increasingly embarrassing disaster, Russian leader Vladimir Putin has been hinting recently at escalating the invasion with nuclear weapons. Here’s an overview of what we know about the nuclear weapons he has at his disposal.
Gunman Kills More Than 30 At Thailand Day Care Center
34 people, including 22 children, were killed on Thursday when a former cop allegedly shot up a day care in northeast Thailand, according to local authorities.
Must Read
“He escaped North Korea, then risked everything to go back for his mom” – The Washington Post
Intrepid Journalism From The New York Post
BREAKING: Velma IS Gay And Conservatives Are Being Really Normal About It
The new Scooby-Doo movie depicts Velma as a lesbian, and conservatives’ heads are exploding over this absurd development in a show about a cartoon dog who solves mysteries:
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