From The Hill
Former Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) has a lead over Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed and is falling behind Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) in the race for Sen. Gary Peters’s (D-Mich.) seat, per a new poll. In the EPIC-MRA poll, 44 percent of respondents said they would cast their ballot for Stevens or would consider doing…
When Republican Sens. John Cornyn and Thom Tillis first withheld their support from attorney general nominee Todd Blanche, they had two major demands: formally kill the president’s proposed “anti-weaponization” fund and at least narrow the scope of the president and his family’s immunity from IRS audits.
Ultimately, Cornyn and Tillis may have accepted a deal that falls well short of those goals. But the agreement appears to give them enough to claim victory — even as questions remain about how durable or real the changes actually are.
Late Sunday night — after days of drama and closed-door negotiations — Blanche posted two documents on X seeming to address concerns with the settlement between the IRS and the Trump Justice Department.
One document, bearing Blanche’s signature, formally rescinds the order that created the nearly $1.8 billion “ anti-weaponization” fund.
“This Order establishes, beyond any doubt, that there is no fund,” Blanche wrote.
The second document, which does not have Blanche’s signature, clarifies that the IRS audit immunity is only retroactive and applies only to the named parties in the lawsuit in January — President Donald Trump, his two oldest sons and the Trump organization.
On its face, the documents appear to meet the demands made by Cornyn and Tillis. And by Monday morning, both said they would vote to dispatch the nomination out of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
But a closer inspection of the agreement — and the president’s own comments about the deal — suggests there are plenty of holes.
In the signed order, Blanche officially kills the so-called anti-weaponization fund in a single sentence, writing the nearly $1.8 billion taxpayer fund is “rescinded and shall have no force or effect.” He does not, however, specify that the order is withdrawn permanently, meaning there is a possibility the DOJ could try to revive the fund.
That possibility is compounded by the fact that the settlement agreement, which yielded the fund, remains in effect.
Blanche didn’t publish any document signaling that agreement has been voided. In fact, the text of the agreement specifies that it “may be modified only with the written agreement of the Parties.”
The parties to President Donald Trump’s original $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS are Trump himself, his two eldest sons, the Trump Organization and the IRS.
The second document raises a different issue.
The unsigned memo addressing the audit immunity is not an official order. Instead, it only offers Blanche’s interpretation of the agreement’s terms.
He writes that the immunity deal only extends to the “named parties in the lawsuit.” That is a narrower scope than the original agreement, but the memo does not formally change the terms of the deal. It is not, after all, an official order signed by Blanche.
Trump himself downplayed the significance of the concessions that Cornyn and Tillis got Monday afternoon. When MS NOW asked the president during an executive order signing in the Oval Office whether he had signed off on Blanche’s deal, Trump said he had not. But he added that it was his understanding that Blanche only “agreed to reconfirm things that he’s already said.”
“And what he’s said is OK,” Trump said.
Democrats, for their part, were quick to poke holes in the already porous agreement.
“This supposed ‘deal’ doesn’t prevent payouts to violent insurrectionists in the future. It doesn’t prevent the admin from bringing the slush fund back from the dead next week or using DOJ’s Judgment Fund for the same illicit purpose,” Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., a member of the Judiciary Committee, wrote on X. “It leaves in place a tax-immunity deal that could help Trump skip taxes on the $2.3 billion he made last year, and still leaves it vague who and what is covered.”
“The Judiciary Committee and its members should not settle for less than the Acting Attorney General following through on his promise of helping to write this into statute,” Schiff continued.
While the agreement may be enough for Cornyn and Tillis — and enough to move Blanche through the Judiciary Committee — it remains unclear whether the orders will sway other GOP holdouts when his nomination hits the Senate floor.
Last week, Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, told MS NOW she was reserving judgment until she saw how questions involving the “anti-weaponization” fund and IRS audit immunity were resolved.
“I have been waiting to see the outcome of the hearing on the anti-weaponization fund and the IRS issues,” Collins said. “I’ve been following closely.”
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, who has also spoken out about the fund and Trump’s IRS audit immunity, declined to comment when asked about Blanche’s nomination by MS NOW last week.
And Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., who lost his primary to a Trump-backed challenger in May and has since become a top critic of the president, has been careful not to throw his weight behind Blanche’s nomination.
Beyond the fund and audit immunity, Cassidy has said he’s worried Blanche will continue acting as Trump’s personal attorney while leading the DOJ.
“I’m very concerned about the weaponization of the Justice Department,” Cassidy said, according to KPLC 7 News last week. Asked if he would support Blanche if the vote happened that day, Cassidy responded, “I’m not going to answer that, because I’m still in the information gathering stage.”
If just two of those Republicans vote against Blanche on the floor, his nomination could fail. With Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., still in rehab following a lengthy hospitalization, the breakdown in the Senate is 52 Republicans to 47 Democrats. Two GOP defections could derail Blanche’s chances at the permanent attorney general job.
Still, the agreement could lend some vulnerable Republicans political cover to support Blanche’s nomination.
While plenty of GOP lawmakers have expressed concerns with the fund and the president’s audit immunity, the documents from Blanche bolster the argument that GOP lawmakers successfully blocked the fund.
Cornyn and Tillis made that argument on Monday.
“From the outset, we were clear that we needed a written document addressing our concerns on the IRS audit agreement and the anti-weaponization fund that included constraining the scope of audit protection by limiting it to the parties of the Settlement Agreement and legally ending the anti-weaponization fund,” the pair wrote in a joint statement.
“We are pleased that the Department of Justice has issued a formal order terminating the anti-weaponization fund,” they said. “Additionally, the Department has acknowledged in a binding written order that the audit settlement is limited to the plaintiffs and the scope does not extend beyond the defendants in the lawsuit, the IRS and the Treasury, addressing concerns that multiple of our Republican colleagues share.”
Of course, Trump remains a wild card over the nomination — particularly after his comments on Monday.
The president has repeatedly undermined the importance of the concessions that Blanche has offered, and he has gone after Cornyn and Tillis throughout the negotiations.
Over the weekend, Trump warned on Truth Social that he would push to resurrect the “anti-weaponization” fund if senators didn’t confirm Blanche.
Another wild card is Trump himself. The president warned on Truth Social over the weekend that if Cornyn and Tillis continued to withhold support from Blanche, he would push to resurrect the “anti-weaponization” fund and keep Blanche in his acting attorney general role indefinitely.
“Thank you for your attention to this matter!” Trump wrote.
The post How Cornyn and Tillis’ deal on Blanche falls short of their demands appeared first on MS NOW.
From MS Now.
From The Hill
Democratic-led states sued the Trump administration on Monday over concerns it will soon hand immigration authorities access to Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) recipients’ personal data. It’s the latest legal challenge that accuses the Trump administration of violating federal privacy laws to collect data on welfare recipients. The Trump administration defends the data sharing…
For years, many Cubans hoping to leave the island looked to the United States. Now, with legal pathways largely closed, a growing number are heading to Brazil instead.
(Image credit: Ramon Espinosa)
Source: NPR.
Nolan Wells’ friends want to lawyer up after they say they’ve been “wrongly blamed” for his death … and have raised close to their fundraising goal to do just that. Benjamin Hudson — dad of Nolan’s so-called best friend Warren — launched a…
From TMZ.
Jay Clayton was sworn in Monday as the U.S. director of national intelligence, cementing the senior federal prosecutor’s control over the nation’s sprawling intelligence apparatus as the Iran war intensifies and the country hurdles toward November’s midterm elections.
Clayton, who was narrowly confirmed by the Senate last week after a combative confirmation hearing, previously served as U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York and chair of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
He was nominated in June by President Donald Trump to head the intelligence community after his predecessor, Tulsi Gabbard, resigned from the Cabinet-level position in May, ending her turbulent tenure.
Gabbard cited health concerns about her husband, who had been diagnosed with a rare form of bone cancer, at the time of her resignation. Trump then appointed Bill Pulte as acting DNI, a move that was met with swift bipartisan backlash due to Pulte’s lack of intelligence experience. Republican Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who initially pushed back against Todd Blanche’s nomination to attorney general, also appeared concerned about Pulte and indicated they would not vote to confirm him.
Trump ultimately opted to not nominate Pulte to the role permanently, saying that his appointment was always meant to be temporary. Clayton’s nomination was initially met with broad bipartisan support, with Democratic lawmakers eager to replace Pulte, who ordered multiple rounds of layoffs across the Office of the Director of National Intelligence during his brief time directing the agency.
But that support swiftly eroded after Clayton refused under oath to directly state that Trump lost the 2020 presidential election to former President Joe Biden during his July 16 confirmation hearing. That stoked fear among Democratic lawmakers, who have voiced concern that Trump will unlawfully ask Clayton to help him improperly sway, discredit or steal this fall’s midterm elections.
Clayton also stumbled during a series of questions about whether he knew Gabbard attended the FBI raid of the election office in Fulton County, Georgia, earlier this year. Local officials, including Republicans, have said that raid was an illegal attempt by Trump to prove long-debunked conspiracy theories that he won in Georgia in 2020.
Clayton refused to answer when pressed by lawmakers over why he signed off on the subpoenas that were delivered to the homes of New York Times reporters who wrote a story about the safety issues surrounding Trump’s new Qatari-funded Air Force One. Those subpoenas, which critics argued were a severe violation of press freedom, have since been withdrawn.
Clayton also declined to criticize Trump’s pardon of the former president of Honduras, whom his office had convicted of smuggling thousands of pounds of cocaine into the U.S.
All Senate Democrats voted against confirming Clayton to the position in the chamber-wide vote last week.
“The safety and security of the American people will be our North Star, and we will work to make sure the American people have complete confidence in the IC through proper oversight, transparency, and accountability,” Clayton said after taking the oath of office. “This includes ensuring the vital work of our IC is never weaponized for political motives.”
Clayton also added that he is “deeply grateful” to Trump.
The post Jay Clayton sworn in as national intelligence director appeared first on MS NOW.
From MS Now.
It’s only been a few months since two members of Congress — Democrat Eric Swalwell of California and Republican Tony Gonzales of Texas — resigned in disgrace, though the scope of the broader problem about members and alleged sexual misconduct on Capitol Hill continues to come into focus. In fact, in May, Politico reported that the federal government has paid out more than $338,000 to settle allegations of sexual harassment on behalf of House members since 2004.
This came on the heels of the House Ethics Committee for the first time publicly requesting information from people who know about sexual misconduct from members of Congress.
It’s against this backdrop that yet another lawmaker is embroiled in a related scandal.
The House Ethics Committee announced Monday that it has completed its investigation into Republican Rep. Chuck Edwards of North Carolina. The panel’s press release on its findings explained, “At the completion of its investigation, the Committee concluded there was substantial reason to believe Representative Edwards violated House Rules related to sexual harassment and hostile workplaces.”
An accompanying 25-page report went into far more detail. From the document:
Taken individually, many of Representative Edwards’ actions were at minimum inappropriate; a Member of Congress should not single out a staffer and isolate them from other staff, make frequent comments regarding that person’s appearance and weight, send messages in the middle of the night, text staff deeply personal and seemingly romantic thoughts, intrude on personal occasions without invitation, pay for personal vacations, and spend thousands of dollars on gifts for staffers. That Representative Edwards did all these things to two young staffers, repeatedly over a sustained period, was beyond inappropriate.
In his interview with the Committee, the Congressman repeatedly asserted that he knows well what constitutes “sexual harassment,” and seemed to believe that by avoiding inappropriate physical touch, explicitly sexual comments, and occasionally telling the staffers that they were free to put up boundaries with him, he had immunized himself from such a charge. That is not the case. Despite the absence of an explicit proposition, a reasonable person could interpret Representative Edwards’ intimate and effusive attentions, where he prioritized the personal over the professional, as thinly veiled advances.
There is also contemporaneous evidence and testimony that Staffer 1 and Staffer 2 perceived the conduct as abusive. Even under the exacting standards of federal employment law, Representative Edwards’ conduct at minimum exposed his office to the litigation risk of a viable sexual harassment lawsuit.
A spokesperson for the congressman has long dismissed the claims as “baseless allegations.” The House Ethics Committee disagreed.
Indeed, the Republican congressman was quite generous with the two young women in question. Edwards, the ethics panel added, “went beyond norms of professional behavior by giving both women lavish gifts. Both women received numerous gifts from Representative Edwards, including jewelry totaling over $1,000, designer purses, guns, shoes, flowers, a laptop and cell phone, KitchenAid mixer, robotic vacuum, vacations, tickets to performances, and one-on-one dinners.”
At one of the female staffers’ going-away party, the GOP lawmaker, according to the House Ethics Committee, cried while reading her a poem he wrote about her, making other staffers feel “uncomfortable.”
Edwards, who is married, also gave a handwritten letter to one of the staffers as she was set to leave his office, telling her that she had “written a complex chapter in my heart,” the committee said.
As for what happens now, the committee recommended that the House approve a formal censure resolution against Edwards, who was already facing a competitive re-election campaign. Watch this space.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.
The post Ethics panel: ‘Substantial reason’ to believe GOP’s Edwards violated sexual harassment rules appeared first on MS NOW.
From MS Now.
Acielle Tanbetova is on the ground in Copenhagen photographing the best dressed guests at the spring 2027 shows.
Source: Vogue
ABC News’ Katherine Faulders discusses President Donald Trump’s remarks on the latest attempt for a potential peace deal with Iran.
Source: ABC News
The In-N-Out employee who died when a gunman shot up her workplace over the weekend in Idaho has been identified … and her friends and family are reeling. Ashley Garibay, a 23-year-old from Stockton, California, was among the 3 killed and 7…
From TMZ.
Wildfires in Spokane have destroyed hundreds of homes and led to evacuation orders for 60,000 people.
(Image credit: Young Kwak/AP)
Source: NPR.
From The Hill
President Trump praised Rep. Max Miller (R-Ohio) as “a good person” on Monday amid domestic abuse allegations against the congressman. “It’s a very sad thing. I know Max. He’s a good person. I mean, I always thought he was a very good person, and I’m going to let the families figure that out,” Trump told…