A U.S. federal judge has ruled that the Affordable Care Act, widely known as Obamacare, is unconstitutional.

U.S. District Court Judge Reed O’Connor in Texas ruled Friday that a change in the U.S. tax law last year eliminating a penalty for not having health insurance invalidates the entire ACA.

Last year’s $1.5 trillion tax bill included a provision eliminating the individual mandate.

The decision is expected to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The ACA will remain the law during the appeal process.

About 11.8 million consumers nationwide enrolled in 2018 Obamacare exchange plans, according to the U.S. government’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

U.S. President Donald Trump promised during his presidential campaign to dismantle the ACA, a program that made affordable health insurance available to millions of Americans.

The president took to Twitter Saturday night:

“The ruling seems to be based on faulty legal reasoning and hopefully it will be overturned,” U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer said in a statement. “Americans who care about working families must do all they can to prevent this district court ruling from becoming law.

“If this awful ruling is upheld in the higher courts,” he added, “it will be a disaster for tens of millions of American families, especially for people with pre-existing conditions.”

Americans with pre-existing conditions, before ACA, faced either high premiums or an inability to access health insurance at all.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said the judge’s decision “vindicates President Trump’s position that Obamacare is unconstitutional. Once again, the president calls on Congress to replace Obamacare and act to protect people with pre-existing conditions and provide Americans with quality affordable health care.”

“Today’s misguided ruling will not deter us,” California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, the leader of an alliance of states opposing the lawsuit, said in a statement. “Our coalition will continue to fight in court for the health and well-being for all Americans.”
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Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker signed a sweeping package of Republican legislation Friday that restricts early voting and weakens the incoming Democratic governor and attorney general, brushing aside complaints that he is enabling a brazen power grab and ignoring the will of voters.

Signing the bills just 24 days before he leaves office, the Republican governor and one-time presidential candidate downplayed bipartisan criticism that they amount to a power grab that will stain his legacy.

Just two hours later, a group run by former Democratic U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced it planned legal action to block the limitation on early voting.

Walker’s action Friday came as Michigan’s Rick Snyder, another Midwestern GOP governor soon to be replaced by a Democrat, signed legislation in a lame-duck session that significantly scales back minimum wage and paid sick leave laws that began as citizen initiatives. Michigan’s Republican legislators also are weighing legislation resembling Wisconsin’s that would strip or dilute the authority of incoming elected Democrats.

The push in both states mirrors tactics employed by North Carolina Republicans in 2016.

Walker: No power shift

Speaking for 20 minutes and using charts to make his points, Walker detailed all of the governor’s powers, including a strong veto authority, that will not change while defending the measures he signed as improving transparency, stability and accountability.

“There’s a lot of hype and hysteria, particularly in the national media, implying this is a power shift. It’s not,” Walker said before signing the measures during an event at a state office building in Green Bay, about 130 miles (209 kilometers) from his Capitol office that has frequently been a target for protesters.

Walker was urged by Democrats and Republicans, including Democratic Gov.-elect Tony Evers and former Republican Gov. Scott McCallum, to reject the legislation. Walker, who was defeated by Evers for a third term, had earlier said he was considering partial vetoes, but he ultimately did not strike anything.

Governor-elect reviewing options

Evers accused Walker of ignoring and overriding the will of the people by signing the bills into law. He held a five-minute news conference in Madison shortly after the signing to accuse Walker of ignoring the will of the voters.

“People will remember he took a stand that was not reflective of this last election,” Evers said. “I will be reviewing our options and do everything we can to make sure the people of this state are not ignored or overlooked.”

Evers didn’t elaborate and left without taking questions.

Walker, speaking after he signed the bills, brushed aside what he called “high-pitched hysteria” from critics of the legislation. He said his legacy will be the record he left behind that includes all-but eliminating collective bargaining for public workers, not the lame-duck measures.

“We’ve put in deep roots that have helped the state grow,” Walker said. “You want to talk about legacy, to me, that’s the legacy.”

Lawsuit promised on voting change

Holder’s group, the National Redistricting Foundation, along with the liberal One Wisconsin Now, promised a swift legal challenge to one provision Walker signed limiting early voting.

Holder, in a statement, called it a “shameful attack on our democracy.”

Holder’s group and One Wisconsin Now successfully sued in federal court in 2016 to overturn similar early voting and other restrictions enacted by Walker.

The Wisconsin bills focus on numerous Republican priorities, including restricting early in-person voting to two weeks before an election, down from as much as nearly seven weeks in the overwhelmingly Democratic cities of Milwaukee and Madison.

The legislation also shields the state’s job-creation agency from Evers’ control until September and limits his ability to enact administrative rules. The measures also would block Evers from withdrawing Wisconsin from a multistate lawsuit challenging the Affordable Care Act, one of his central campaign promises.

The legislation imposes a work requirement for BadgerCare health insurance recipients, which Walker won federal approval to do earlier this year, and prevents Evers from seeking to undo it.

Attorney general restricted

It eliminates the state Department of Justice’s solicitor general’s office, which outgoing Republican Attorney General Brad Schimel used to launch contentious partisan litigation. Doing away with it ensures Democratic-Attorney General-elect Josh Kaul can’t use the office to challenge Republican-authored laws.

The bills also allow lawmakers to intervene in lawsuits, ensuring Republicans will be able to defend their policies and laws in court if Kaul refuses to do it. Kaul also would need approval from the Legislature’s budget-writing committee before he can reach any settlements, further increasing the power of that GOP-controlled panel.

The Republican-controlled Legislature introduced and passed the bills less than five days after unveiling them late on a Friday afternoon two weeks ago. Outraged Democrats accused the GOP of a power grab that undermined the results of the November election. Evers and others have argued Walker will tarnish his legacy by signing the bills, and Kaul has predicted multiple lawsuits challenging the legislation.

Republican legislative leaders countered that they were merely trying to balance the power of the executive and legislative branches. They said they wanted to ensure Evers must negotiate with them rather than issue executive orders to undo their policy achievements.

Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said by signing the bills, Walker was “acknowledging the importance of the Legislature as a co-equal branch of government.”

Walker uses power new bills take away

Walker’s signing of the bills comes a day after he announced a $28 million incentive package to keep open a Kimberly-Clark Corp. plant in northeast Wisconsin. One of the lame-duck bills would prevent Evers from making such a deal, instead requiring the Legislature’s budget committee to sign off.
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Ending a sustained period of speculation, U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday named the head of the largest entity within his executive office to become his acting chief of staff, replacing retired Marine Gen. John Kelly. 

Mulvaney, a former Republican congressman from South Carolina and known as a fiscal hawk, besides running OMB has also been the head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which he scaled back.

Mulvaney tweeted about his new job: “This is a tremendous honor. I look forward to working with the President and the entire team. It’s going to be a great 2019!”

The position of White House chief of staff has traditionally been very important and powerful, akin to the chief operating officer of the country and gatekeeper to the Oval Office.

But the two men who have held the position in the Trump administration, Reince Priebus and Kelly, have found it frustrating. Their authority has been repeatedly undercut by the president, as well as other top administration officials, especially presidential daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, both of whom hold senior positions in the West Wing.

It was unclear why Trump named Mulvaney as only acting chief of staff.

“There’s no time limit. He’s the acting chief of staff, which means he’s the chief of staff. He got picked because the president liked him — they get along,” a senior White House official said. 

‘That’s what the president wants’ 

Asked why Trump was implying Mulvaney’s time in the job might be only temporary, the official replied, “Because that’s what the president wants.”

Another senior administration official confirmed that “it’s what the president wants right now.” 

White House officials also said Trump chose Mulvaney because of his experience on Capitol Hill and his reputation for being fiscally responsible.

Later on Twitter, the president responded to media reports that there were few if any qualified candidates eager to take the high-stress position, especially a long-term commitment:

A senior official said that Kelly, who Trump earlier had announced would be leaving by the end of the year, was pleased with the choice of Mulvaney. 

“The current chief is happy. The current chief is fine. The current chief will stay till the end of the year,” the official said.

At first, White House officials said Russ Vought, currently the No. 2 official at OMB, would succeed Mulvaney as director there.

But later, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said, “Mick Mulvaney will not resign from the Office of Management and Budget, but will spend all of his time devoted to his role as the acting chief of staff for the president. Russ Vought will handle day-to-day operations and run OMB.”

For weeks, there had been consistent and inaccurate media speculation as to who was likely to succeed Kelly, including Kushner; the vice president’s outgoing chief of staff, Nick Ayers; Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin; U.S. Rep. Mark Meadows of North Carolina; and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.

Eventually, Ayers, Meadows and Christie all publicly said they were not interested in the job.

Although the Trump administration has a reputation for a higher rate of staff turnover than its predecessors, Kelly’s total time of 16 months in the job will not be unusually short in a high-stress position where two years is considered a decent run. Priebus lasted just six months.

With Mulvaney poised to take the job on an interim basis, Trump could have four chiefs of staff within a little more than two years.

In January 2012, then-businessman Trump harshly criticized then-President Barack Obama for having three chiefs of staff in less than three years, saying that was a reason the Democrat was not having success with his legislative agenda.
…

The Trump administration has unveiled a new strategy for Africa that’s focused on countering Chinese and Russian influence on the resource-rich continent. And the administration is demanding more accountability for American aid. Patsy Widakuswara has more from the White House.
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A lawsuit accusing the Trump administration of denying nearly all visa applicants from countries under President Donald Trump’s travel ban will move forward, a U.S. judge said Thursday.

Judge James Donato heard arguments on the administration’s request that he dismiss the lawsuit. The case was “not going away at this stage,” he said at the close of the hearing.

The plaintiffs say the administration is not honoring a waiver provision in the president’s ban on travelers from five mostly Muslim countries — Iran, Lybia, Somalia, Syria and Yemen.

The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the ban in a 5-4 ruling in June.

The waiver provision allows a case-by-case exemption for people who can show entry to the U.S. is in the national interest, is needed to prevent undue hardship, and would not pose a security risk.

The 36 plaintiffs named in the lawsuit include people who have had waiver applications denied or stalled despite chronic medical conditions, prolonged family separations, or significant business interests, according to their attorneys.

They estimate tens of thousands of people have been affected by what they say are blanket denials of visa applications.

At Thursday’s hearing, Sirine Shebaya, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said officials considering the waiver requests are not following guidelines and are routinely denying people the opportunity to show they qualify for a visa.

Justice Department attorney August Flentje said consular officials are working “tirelessly” on visa applications using guidelines from the State Department. He said decisions on visas are beyond judicial review, and he accused plaintiffs’ attorneys of a “kind of micromanagement” of those decisions.

Donato said he did not have to consider any specific waiver decision, but more broadly whether officials were considering applications in “good faith” and not stonewalling.

Roughly two dozen opponents of the travel ban — some wearing stickers that read, “No ban, no wall,” — came to the courthouse for the hearing.
…

Federal prosecutors are investigating whether U.S. President Donald Trump’s inaugural committee misspent some of the funds it raised, the Wall Street Journal reported Thursday, citing people it said were familiar with the matter.

The investigation opened by the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office is examining whether some of the committee’s donors gave money in exchange for policy concessions, influencing administration positions or access to the incoming administration, the Journal said.

The probe could present another legal threat for Trump and his White House, which already faces a web of lawsuits and probes into subjects such as the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russia, hush-money payments to women made by the president’s former lawyer, and spending by Trump’s foundation.

The investigation into the inaugural committee partly stemmed from materials seized in a probe into the dealings of former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, the Journal reported. Cohen was sentenced Wednesday to three years in prison for crimes including orchestrating the hush payments in violation of campaign laws.

A spokesman for the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office declined to comment. Spokespeople for the White House and Trump’s campaign did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
…

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy says a looming government shutdown would be “stupid” but might be unavoidable if Democrats refuse to support President Donald Trump’s proposed border wall with Mexico.

The California Republican said Thursday that even if House Republicans cobble together enough votes to approve the wall, the plan is likely to fail in the Senate. Democrats in that chamber have vowed to block it from receiving the necessary 60 votes.

McCarthy said he thinks “going into a shutdown is stupid,” but he offered no immediate plan ahead of a December 21 deadline. The House adjourned for six days after his remarks.

McCarthy’s comments put him at odds with Trump, who said this week he’d be “proud to shut down the government” in the name of border security.
…

Rep. Nancy Pelosi shrugged off suggestions Thursday that she weakened herself by agreeing to limit her tenure as next House speaker to a four-year maximum, a deal that clears the way for her to be elected to the post for the new Congress.

“That’s a long time,” she said at a news conference a day after she and seven insurgents who’d been pushing for younger leadership announced their pact.

For weeks, the 78-year-old California Democrat had resisted opponents’ demands that she step aside or restrict how long she’d serve, saying limits would make her a lame duck and sap her bargaining clout. But on Wednesday she relented and struck a deal that all but guarantees she’ll be elected when the House votes on its new speaker on January 3.

“What, four years? No, I don’t think that’s a lame duck,” she told a group of reporters afterward.

Democrats widely agreed that the pledge meant Pelosi had clinched a comeback to the post she held from 2007 until January 2011, the last time her party ran the House and the first time the speaker was a woman.

Wednesday’s accord gives Pelosi a clear path to becoming the most powerful Democrat in government and a leading role in confronting President Donald Trump during the upcoming 2020 presidential and congressional campaigns.

It moves a 78-year-old white woman to the cusp of steering next year’s diverse crop of House Democrats, with its large number of female, minority and younger members.

The agreement also ends what’s been a distracting, harsh leadership fight among Democrats that has been waged since Election Day, when they gained at least 39 seats and grabbed House control for the next Congress. It was their biggest gain of House seats since the 1974 post-Watergate election.

Democrats have been hoping to train public attention on their 2019 agenda focusing on health care, jobs and wages, and building infrastructure projects. They also envision investigations of Trump, his 2016 presidential campaign and his administration.

To line up support, Pelosi initially resorted to full-court lobbying by congressional allies, outside Democratic luminaries, and liberal and labor organizations. She cut deals with individual lawmakers for committee assignments and roles leading legislative efforts.

But in the end, she had to make concessions about her tenure to make sure she’ll win a majority — likely 218 votes — when the new House votes. Democrats are likely to have 235 seats, meaning she could spare only 17 defections and still prevail if, as expected, Republicans all oppose her.

Pelosi had described herself as a transitional leader over the last several weeks. But she’d resisted defining how long she would serve as speaker, saying it would lessen her negotiating leverage to declare herself a lame duck.

On Wednesday, she gave in to her opponents’ demands that she limit her service. Under the deal, House Democrats will vote by February 15 to change party rules to limit their top three leaders to no more than four two-year terms, including time they’ve already spent in those jobs.

“I am comfortable with the proposal and it is my intention to abide by it whether it passes or not,” Pelosi said in her statement.

Pelosi’s opponents have argued it was time for younger leaders to command the party. They also said her demonization as an out-of-touch radical in tens of millions of dollars’ worth of Republican television ads was costing Democrats seats.

While some Democrats are still certain to vote against Pelosi — especially incoming freshmen who promised to do so during their campaigns — most Democrats have remained solidly behind her. She’s been a strong fundraiser and unrelenting liberal who doesn’t shy from political combat, and her backers complained that her opponents were mostly white men who were largely more moderate than most House Democrats.

Pressure to back Pelosi seemed to grow after she calmly went toe-to-toe with Trump at a nationally televised verbal brawl in the Oval Office on Tuesday over his demands for congressional approval of $5 billion for his proposed border wall with Mexico.

“We are proud that our agreement will make lasting institutional change that will strengthen our caucus and will help develop the next generation of Democratic leaders,” the rebellious lawmakers said in a written statement.

To be nominated to a fourth term under the agreement, Pelosi would need to garner a two-thirds majority of House Democrats. Several aides said they believed restlessness by younger members to move up in leadership would make that difficult for her to achieve.

The limits would also apply to Pelosi’s top lieutenants, No. 2 leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland and No. 3 leader James Clyburn of South Carolina. Both are also in their late 70s.

Rep. Ed Perlmutter, D-Colo., was among 16 Democrats who had signed a letter demanding new leadership but who ultimately helped negotiate the deal with Pelosi.

Joining Perlmutter in saying they would now back her were Democratic Reps. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts; Tim Ryan of Ohio; Bill Foster of Illinois; Linda Sanchez and Rep.-elect Gil Cisernos, both of California; and Filemon Vela of Texas.
…

President Donald Trump is welcoming governors-elect from both parties to the White House.

Among those attending Thursday are Florida Republican Ron DeSantis, Georgia Republican Brian Kemp, Illinois Democrat J.B. Pritzker, Wisconsin Democrat Tony Evers and newly-inaugurated Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy, a Republican.

White House Director of Intergovernmental Affairs Doug Hoelscher says they’ll be discussing “shared priorities,” including workforce investment, prison reform and combatting the opioid epidemic.

The visitors will also be meeting with Cabinet members as part of a broader White House outreach effort to local officials.

The White House says that, after the midterm elections, it has reached out to a long list of newly-elected state and local officials of both parties “to open lines of communication and begin a dialogue.”
…

Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill says she won’t run for another office after her term expires next month, but that she will remain active in Democratic politics.

The veteran senator sought re-election to a third term last month but lost to Republican state Attorney General Josh Hawley. On Thursday, she will give her final Senate floor speech before she leaves office in January.

In an interview with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch from her Senate office, McCaskill squashed any speculation that she’d run for Missouri governor by saying she’s done running for office. Instead, she said she’s planning a yet-to-be-announced initiative and that she sees potential in the non-elected public role that former Missouri Sen. John Danforth, a Republican, has taken since he left office 24 years ago.

“I am not going to disappear,” McCaskill said. “I am going to help and I think I can help in terms of the party recruiting good candidates, being prepared. I envision trying to help teach candidates some of the basics.”

One thing she won’t miss?

“I will never make another phone call asking for money,” said McCaskill, who raised nearly $40 million for her re-election bid, almost four times more than Hawley. “It’s terrible, terrible. It is a horrible part of the job and I have done it for a long time.”

McCaskill, 65, told the newspaper that she considered not running this year but did so partly out of duty. She also said she had made up her mind before she announced she was running that it would be her last campaign.

After Donald Trump’s strong showing in Missouri in 2016 en route to winning the presidency, McCaskill said she felt obliged “to stand and fight and not just walk off the field. And so we gave it our best. But I am really at peace about being done.”

Danforth, who has served as United Nations ambassador and in a variety of governmental roles since retiring from the Senate, was among those who called her the day after the election, McCaskill said.

“She has got a lot of life ahead of her,” Danforth said of McCaskill. “There are a lot of opportunities for people who want to continue to be engaged.”

McCaskill leaves a Congress torn over Trump’s agenda. Lawmakers also face a potential constitutional showdown over special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian influence on the 2016 election and the Trump campaign.

McCaskill said she has no idea what Mueller will ultimately conclude, but warned: “If it continues down the path it appears to be going, my colleagues here — if more of them don’t speak up — I think they will have a crisis.”

She said Trump’s Republican allies in Congress “are all conflicted right now. They don’t know what to do. All you have to do is look at the state of Missouri, where Trump’s blessing was all a Republican needed. So you want to risk that if he is not going down? It will be interesting to see.”

Information from: St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
…

Intelligence experts say Russian outreach to the Trump campaign fits the pattern of an intelligence operation.

Former officials have reviewed the attempts by Russians to establish contact as laid out in recent court filings by special counsel Robert Mueller. They conclude they were apparently targeted and more frequent than would be expected during a typical presidential campaign.

Mueller has been investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election for more than a year and has not revealed clear evidence of coordination between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.

Much of the investigation is still under wraps.

Court filings from Mueller show Russian contacts with the Trump campaign began within months of Trump announcing his candidacy in June 2015.
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Michael Cohen, the longtime personal attorney for U.S. President Donald Trump, was sentenced Wednesday to three years in prison, after telling a New York judge that his “blind loyalty” to the U.S. leader led him to “cover up his dirty deeds.”

U.S. Judge William Pauley imposed the sentence on Cohen for an array of crimes, including his role in arranging $280,000 in hush money payments to two women who alleged they had affairs with Trump, and for lying to Congress about Trump’s efforts to build a skyscraper in Moscow.

The judge told the 52-year-old Cohen that somewhere along the way, he had “lost his moral compass.”

Cohen, who worked for Trump for 12 years, once bragged that he would “take a bullet” to support Trump. More recently, however, Cohen had turned against Trump and said at his sentencing that working for Trump was a “personal and mental incarceration.”

“My weakness could be characterized as a blind loyalty to Donald Trump,” Cohen said.

Now, Cohen also holds the distinction of being the closest figure to Trump sentenced to prison in the wide-ranging criminal investigations of Trump’s 2016 campaign, its links to Russia and whether, as president, Trump obstructed justice by trying to thwart the probes being conducted by federal prosecutors in New York and special counsel Robert Mueller in Washington.

Several other prominent figures in Trump’s orbit, including his former campaign chairman and his first national security advisor, have yet to be sentenced for various offenses.

Cohen attorney Lanny Davis said that after Mueller completes his investigation, Cohen would cooperate with congressional committees as they consider possible wrongdoing by Trump and his aides. Some Democrats in the House of Representatives have called for Trump’s impeachment when they assume control of the chamber next month.

“Mr. Trump’s repeated lies cannot contradict stubborn facts,” Davis said.

Cohen’s lawyers asked that he serve no prison time, but Cohen took “full responsibility” for his crimes, “including those implicating the president of the United States. He said that his allegiance to Trump led him “to take a path of darkness instead of light.”

Pauley rejected leniency for Cohen, saying, “This court firmly believes that a significant term of imprisonment is fully justified in this highly publicized case to send a message.”

The judge ordered him to surrender March 6 for his prison term and also pay nearly $1.9 million in financial penalties.

Prosecutors said that Cohen, at Trump’s direction, facilitated the payments — in violation of campaign finance laws — to porn star Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal shortly before the 2016 election to buy their silence about alleged liaisons with the real estate mogul a decade before he ran for the presidency.

After Cohen was sentenced, the New York prosecutors announced they had reached a “non-prosecution agreement” with American Media Inc., which publishes the grocery store tabloid National Enquirer, to acknowledge that it paid McDougal $150,000 shortly before the 2016 election for her story about her claims that she had a months-long affair with Trump in 2006 and 2007 with the “principal purpose” of killing the information so it would not damage Trump’s chances of winning the election.

Cohen’s lawyers said he was in “close and regular contact with White House-based staff and legal counsel” when he prepared for congressional testimony last year falsely claiming that Trump had ended his efforts to build a Trump Tower in Moscow by early 2016, before Republican presidential nominating contests started.

Cohen more recently said that actually Trump had pursued the Moscow project through June 2016, the entirety of the Republican primary election calendar two years ago. Cohen said he briefed the then-candidate about his efforts to win approval for the Moscow project, although eventually it was abandoned.

Federal prosecutors in New York had called for a “substantial term of imprisonment,” perhaps 3 1/2 years or more, because they say Cohen never fully cooperated with investigators about his crimes, which also include tax fraud and making false statements to a bank.

Trump and his lawyers have sought to downplay the payments to Daniels and McDougal, saying that at most, it was a civil, not criminal, violation of U.S. election laws.

On Twitter, Trump contended that Cohen was “just trying to get his sentence reduced” by making claims against him.

The U.S. leader, angered by Cohen’s allegations, has said that the lawyer deserves a “full and complete” sentence.

There was no immediate White House comment about Cohen’s sentence.

But Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani said, “This is the real criminal sentence. I have no idea if it’s the right one or not, but I do know he’s proven to be a consummate liar who has lied at all stages of his situation.”

 
…

Lawyers for Trump’s former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, asked a judge Tuesday to spare him prison time, saying he had devoted his career to his country and taken responsibility for an “uncharacteristic error in judgment.” 

The arguments to the judge echoed those of special counsel Robert Mueller’s office, which last week said that Flynn’s cooperation — including 19 meetings with investigators — was so extensive that he was entitled to avoid prison when he is sentenced next week. 

Flynn, who pleaded guilty of lying to the FBI about conversations during the presidential transition period with the then-Russian ambassador to the United States, will become the first White House official punished in the special counsel’s probe into whether the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia during the 2016 presidential election. 

In court papers Tuesday, he requested probation and community service for his false statements.  

The filing came as lawyers for former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort said they were still deciding whether to dispute allegations that he lied to investigators and breached his plea agreement. A judge gave Manafort until Jan. 7 to respond to prosecutors’ claims that he misled them about his interactions with an associate who they say has ties to Russian intelligence and with Trump administration officials. 

The defendants, their fortunes sliding in opposite directions, represent starkly different paths in Mueller’s investigation — a model cooperator on one end and, prosecutors say, a dishonest and resistant witness on the other. Even as prosecutors recommend no prison time for Flynn, they’ve left open the possibility they may seek additional charges against Manafort, who is already facing years in prison. 

Threats to Trump

Given both men’s extensive conversations with prosecutors, and their involvement in key episodes under scrutiny, the pair could pose a threat to Trump, who in addition to Mueller’s investigation is entangled in a separate probe by prosecutors in New York into hush-money payments paid during the campaign to two women who say they had affairs with the president. 

Since his guilty plea a year ago, Flynn has stayed largely out of the public eye and refrained from discussing the Russia investigation despite encouragement from his supporters to take an aggressive stance. 

Flynn, a retired Army lieutenant general, spent three decades in the military, including five years in combat. In a public statement after his plea, Flynn has said he cooperated with prosecutors because it was in “the best interests of my family and our country.” 

In Manafort’s case, prosecutors have accused him of repeatedly lying to them even after he agreed to cooperate. They say Manafort lied about his interactions with a longtime associate they say has ties to Russian intelligence, his contacts with Trump administration officials and other matters under investigation by the Justice Department. 

Manafort pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges in Washington in September and faces sentencing in a separate case in Virginia, where he was convicted of eight felony counts related to his efforts to hide from the Internal Revenue Service millions of dollars he received for Ukrainian political consulting.
…

President Donald Trump said on Tuesday he was not concerned that he could be impeached and that hush payments made ahead of the 2016 election by his former personal attorney Michael Cohen to two women did not violate campaign finance laws.

“It’s hard to impeach somebody who hasn’t done anything wrong and who’s created the greatest economy in the history of our country,” Trump told Reuters in an Oval Office interview.

“I’m not concerned, no. I think that the people would revolt if that happened,” he said.

Federal prosecutors in New York said last week that Trump directed Cohen to make six-figure payments to two women so they would not discuss their alleged affairs with the candidate ahead of the 2016 presidential election.

They said the payments violated laws that stipulate that campaign contributions, defined as things of value given to a campaign to influence an election, must be disclosed, and limited to $2,700 per person.

Democrats said such a campaign law violation would be an impeachable offense, although senior party leaders in Congress have questioned whether it is a serious enough crime to warrant politically charged impeachment proceedings.

Impeachment requires a simple majority to pass the House of Representatives, where Democrats will take control in January. But removal of the president from office further requires a two-thirds majority in the Senate, where Trump’s fellow Republicans hold sway.

Cohen is scheduled to be sentenced on Wednesday in New York for his role in the payments to the two women — adult film actress Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal.

Trump has denied having affairs with them.

Earlier this year, Trump acknowledged repaying Cohen for $130,000 paid to Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford.

He  previously disputed knowing anything about the payments.

Trump has slammed Cohen for cooperating with prosecutors, alleging that the lawyer is telling lies about him in a bid to get a lighter prison term. He has called for Cohen to get a long sentence and said on Tuesday his ex-lawyer should have known the campaign finance laws.

“Michael Cohen is a lawyer. I assume he would know what he’s doing,” Trump said when asked if he had discussed campaign finance laws with Cohen.

“Number one, it wasn’t a campaign contribution. If it were, it’s only civil, and even if it’s only civil, there was no violation based on what we did. OK?”

Asked about prosecutors’ assertions that a number of people who had worked for him met or had business dealings with Russians before and during his 2016 presidential campaign, Trump said: “The stuff you’re talking about is peanut stuff.”

He then sought to turn the subject to his 2016 Democratic opponent.

“I haven’t heard this, but I can only tell you this: Hillary Clinton — her husband got money, she got money, she paid money, why doesn’t somebody talk about that?” Trump said.
…

The moment of reckoning has nearly arrived for Michael Cohen, who finds out Wednesday whether his decision to walk away from President Donald Trump after years of unwavering loyalty will spare him from a harsh prison sentence. 

A federal judge in New York is set to decide whether Cohen gets leniency or years in prison for crimes including tax evasion, making illegal hush-money payments to protect Trump during the campaign and lying to Congress about the president’s past business dealings in Russia. 

Few observers expect the hearing to go well for the 52-year-old attorney. 

For weeks, his legal strategy appeared to revolve around convincing the court that he is a reformed man who abandoned longtime friendships and gave up his livelihood when he decided to break with the president and speak with federal investigators.

That narrative collapsed last week. New York prosecutors urged a judge to sentence Cohen to a substantial prison term, saying he’d failed to fully cooperate and overstated his helpfulness. They’ve asked for only a slight reduction in the 4- to 5-year term he would face under federal sentencing guidelines. 

Revisiting of sentence

A sentence of hard time would leave Cohen with little to show for his decision to plead guilty, though experts said Wednesday’s hearing might not be the last word on his punishment. 

Cohen could have his sentence revisited if he strikes a deal with prosecutors in which he provides additional cooperation within a year of his sentence, said Michael J. Stern, a former federal prosecutor in Detroit and Los Angeles. 

“Few things spark a defendant’s renewed interest in cooperating faster than trading in a pair of custom Italian trousers for an off-the-rack orange jumpsuit,” he said.    

Annemarie McAvoy, a former federal prosecutor in Brooklyn, said prosecutors appear to be angry at Cohen for limiting his cooperation. 

“It could be a tactic to try to break him like they’ve tried to do with [Paul] Manafort,” McAvoy said, referring to Trump’s former campaign chairman. “It kind of shows they’re putting the screws to him. If they’re not mad at him, he didn’t give them what they wanted.” 

Cohen’s transition from Trump’s fixer-in-chief to felon has been head-spinning.  

During the campaign, he coordinated payments to buy the silence of two women — former Playboy model Karen McDougal and adult film actress Stormy Daniels — who were thinking of speaking with reporters about alleged sexual encounters with Trump. Cohen once told an interviewer he would “take a bullet” for Trump. 

But months after investigators began gathering evidence that he’d dodged $1.4 million in taxes, Cohen pleaded guilty in August, pledged to cooperate with special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and changed his party registration from Republican to Democrat.  

Prosecutors said Cohen orchestrated payments to McDougal and Daniels at Trump’s direction.  

Trump, who insists the affairs never happened, said Monday in a tweet mocked for its spelling errors that the campaign finance allegations are being made up by Democrats disappointed not to have found a “smocking gun” proving collusion between his campaign and Russia. 

“So now the Dems go to a simple private transaction, wrongly call it a campaign contribution … which it was not (but even if it was, it is only a CIVIL CASE, like Obama’s – but it was done correctly by a lawyer and there would not even be a fine. Lawyer’s liability if he made a mistake, not me). Cohen just trying to get his sentence reduced. WITCH HUNT!” Trump wrote. 

‘Bring his toothbrush’

U.S. District Judge William Pauley III, who was appointed to the federal bench by former President Bill Clinton, may allow Cohen to begin serving any prison term he receives at a later date. But legal experts said Cohen could also be taken into custody immediately.  

“If I were advising him, I’d encourage him to bring his toothbrush to court,” said Stern. 

Cohen’s lawyers have asked for no prison time, saying he has suffered enough already. 

“The greatest punishment Michael has endured in the criminal process has been the shame and anxiety he feels daily from having subjected his family to the fallout from his case,” his attorneys wrote in a court filing last month. “The media glare and intrusions on all of them, including his children, the regular hate correspondence and written and oral threats, the fact that he will lose his law license, the termination of business relationships by banks and insurers and the loss of friendships, are but some of this fallout.” 

Federal prosecutors said the request of a probation-only sentence is unbefitting of “a man who knowingly sought to undermine core institutions of our democracy.” 

Mueller’s office took a far kinder view of Cohen’s cooperation in a separate court filing, crediting him for useful insights about attempts by Russian intermediaries to influence Trump, among other matters.  

Cohen’s latest plea agreement, reached last month, requires he “provide truthful information regarding any and all matters” Mueller deems relevant. The same document bars Cohen from appealing his sentence unless his prison term exceeds federal guidelines, or he claims to have received ineffective assistance of counsel in his proceedings.  

David S. Weinstein, a former federal prosecutor in Miami, said Cohen’s lawyers miscalculated by seeking an “unreasonably lenient” sentence.   

“They got a little greedy,” Weinstein said. “Judges take a dim view of lawyers who have played the system. Cohen knew where the line was, and he chose to step over the line.” 
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U.S. President Donald Trump has insisted on numerous occasions that his 2016 presidential campaign had nothing to do with Russia.

“Time for the Witch Hunt to END!” Trump said in a message on Twitter last Saturday. “After two years and millions of pages of documents (and a cost of over $30 million) no collusion!” Trump tweeted earlier. 

But the special counsel investigating Russian meddling in Trump’s victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton has unearthed plenty of evidence connecting Trump associates with Russia. In the year and a half since Robert Mueller took over the investigation into possible collusion, charging documents have alleged that more than a dozen Trump associates – from former campaign manager Paul Manafort to son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner – communicated with Russians, in one form or another, during and after the election. 

While the Mueller investigation operates under grand jury secrecy, the evidence the special prosecutor has referenced in court documents points to deeper and broader than previously thought contacts between people in Trump’s orbit and Russian operatives who sought to gain influence with the Republican president.

The latest revelation on the nexus between Trump and Russia appeared in a sentencing memo for former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen who pleaded guilty last week to lying to Congress about Trump’s efforts, during the campaign, to build a Trump tower in Moscow.

Last year, Cohen told lawmakers that his efforts on behalf of Trump to win Russian approval and build a new high rise in Moscow ended in January 2016, just as the campaign was heating up, whereas in fact they continued through June 2016, shortly before Trump secured the Republican presidential nomination. In the memo, Mueller’s prosecutors wrote that Cohen, who once said he would “take a bullet” for Trump but subsequently turned on his former boss, has provided “information about his own contacts with Russian interests during the campaign and discussions with others in the course of making those contacts.”

Cohen, who broached the possibility of a meeting in New York between Putin and Trump during the U.N. General Assembly in September 2016, has told prosecutors that he had “conferred” with Trump about the idea before “reaching out to gauge Russia’s interest in such a meeting,” according to the memo. 

The meeting did not take place for reasons that prosecutors did not reveal. 

Russian attempts to set up such a meeting persisted, however. In November 2016, Cohen spoke with a Russian who offered “political synergy” with the campaign and “repeatedly proposed a meeting between Putin and Trump. 

“The person told Cohen that such a meeting could have a ‘phenomenal’ impact ‘not only in political but in a business dimension’… because there is ‘no bigger warranty in any project than consent of [the President of Russia,]’” according to the memo. 

Cohen did not follow up on the invitation, according to the court filing, explaining to prosecutors that “he was working on the Moscow Project with a different individual who Cohen understood to have his own connections to the Russian government.” 

The unidentified individual is believed to be Felix Sater, a Russian-born real estate developer who worked as an adviser for the Trump Organization.

Trump’s interest in doing business with Russia goes back decades. In 2013, he brought the Miss Universe beauty pageant to Moscow. Throughout the 2016 campaign Trump repeatedly praised Putin and reveled in the Russian president’s compliments before the relationship soured after the election. 

The latest filings came at the end of a whirlwind week in the Russia investigation that saw similar documents filed in criminal cases involving Manafort and former Trump National Security Advisor Michael Flynn.Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI in denying he had conversations with the Russian ambassador to the U.S. shortly after the election and before Trump took office, at a time Russia was trying to get out from under U.S. sanctions. 

The Cohen sentencing memo represents the first time the special counsel has alleged a discussion between Trump and his lawyer about a meeting with Putin during the 2016 election.It suggests that Trump remained focused on his business interests even as he was running for the White House. 

“If the project was completed, the Company could have received hundreds of millions of dollars from Russian sources in licensing fees and other revenues,” the Cohen sentencing memo says. 

Other Trump associates accused of interacting with Russia during and after the 2016 campaign include former attorney general Jeff Sessions who met with former Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the campaign and former campaign foreign policy advisor George Papadopoulos who tried to set up a meeting between Trump and Putin during the campaign.
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A group of former U.S. Senate members from both the Democratic and Republican parties is urging current members to be “guardians of our democracy” and not let party affiliation get in the way of the interests of the country as it faces a “critical juncture.”

The 44 former lawmakers wrote in an op-ed published Monday by the Washington Post that the United States is “entering a dangerous period” and they felt they needed to “speak up about serious challenges to the rule of law, the Constitution, our governing institutions and our national security.”

They cited the eventual conclusion of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible collusion with President Donald Trump’s campaign, as well as the planned investigations of the Trump administration by the Democrat-led House of Representatives that will be in place next month as challenges that are coming amid regional and global conflicts.

“We are at an inflection point in which the foundational principles of our democracy and our national security interests are at stake, and the rule of law and the ability of our institutions to function freely and independently must be upheld,” they wrote.

The group includes Democrats John Kerry, Tom Daschle and Chris Dodd, as well as Republicans John Warner, Richard Lugar and Chuck Hagel.
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U.S. President Donald Trump will meet with Democratic leaders Tuesday in a final effort to secure border wall funding as part of a larger government spending package that must be passed by Dec. 21. The funding marks the final legislative action of the Republican-controlled Congress and a must-pass bill to avert a partial government shutdown ahead of the holidays.

Both parties face a delicate balancing act tackling the latest fight over immigration with just weeks until control of the House of Representatives shifts to Democrats.

Trump will meet with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi to see if there is room for compromise on his request for up to $5 billion in funding for the wall in fiscal year 2019. The meeting will be the first test of Trump’s ability to negotiate bipartisan deals following significant Democratic gains in November’s congressional midterm elections.

Trump and Pelosi initially expressed interest in working with each other on bills addressing infrastructure and prescription drug prices. But Pelosi — who is expected to become Speaker of the House when the new Congress is sworn in next month — rejected the possibility of compromise on border wall funding.

Democrats consider a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border “immoral, ineffective and expensive,” Pelosi told reporters Thursday. She also made clear Democrats would not link a compromise on the border wall with a legislative solution addressing the legal status of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival (DACA) recipients, the more than 800,000 undocumented young people brought to the United States as children.

Compromise on a solution for DACA recipients stalled in Congress throughout 2018. The House failed to pass a bill after a group of Republicans organized an effort to defy House Speaker Paul Ryan and force the issue.

Pelosi proposed lawmakers pass the six funding bills that have already cleared key committee votes while funding the Department of Homeland Security, the agency that would oversee the border wall funding, on another temporary spending measure.

“I can’t imagine the president is willing to accept that,” Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn told reporters Thursday.

Trump says the border wall with Mexico will stop an invasion of migrants from Central America into the United States.

“Could somebody please explain to the Democrats (we need their votes) that our Country loses 250 Billion Dollars a year on illegal immigration, not including the terrible drug flow. Top Border Security, including a Wall, is $25 Billion. Pays for itself in two months. Get it done!” Trump tweeted on Dec. 4.

The administration received $1.375 billion in funding for border security in the fiscal year budget that ended on Sept. 30. It did not include money for building a wall.

“The idea that they haven’t spent last year’s money and they’re demanding such a huge amount this year makes no sense at all,” Schumer said.

Trump and Republicans in a lame-duck Congress face a tough choice. Forcing the issue of the border wall will trigger a partial government shutdown just four days before Christmas.

Lawmakers will not relish the prospect of being trapped in Washington figuring out a solution. But some Republicans see the shutdown as an opportunity to slow Democratic momentum coming into the new year with a new legislative agenda. Democrats will not want to be blamed for a shutdown before they have even taken control of the House.

Ahead of Tuesday’s meeting, Pelosi and Schumer issued a joint statement saying Trump’s border wall proposal does not have sufficient support and he should not make it “an obstacle to bipartisan government.”

“Republicans still control the House, the Senate, and the White House, and they have the power to keep the government open,” the statement said.
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Editorial cartoons — also known as political cartoons — have been around as long as there’s been political discourse and dissent. In the U.S. they’re a vibrant part of American culture and history, and no matter how controversial, are protected as free speech under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. VOA’s Julie Taboh spoke with a Pulitzer-Prize-winning cartoonist about the current state of cartooning in the U.S. — and overseas.
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Editorial cartoons — also known as political cartoons — have been around as long as there’s been political discourse and dissent. 

In the U.S., they’re a vibrant part of American culture and history, and no matter how controversial, are protected as free speech under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. In fact, the late Pulitzer-Prize winning cartoonist Doug Marlette described them as “the acid test of the First Amendment.” 

An unusual calling

Matt Wuerker is a staff cartoonist for Politico, an American political journalism company based just outside the nation’s capital. 

He says it’s an unusual job.

“We’re a strange mix of things in that we are making serious commentary on serious topics, but we’re doing it not so seriously,” he says. “We like to see ourselves as opinion columnists that you’d see in a newspaper or somebody on TV who’s offering their opinion… and we get to draw our opinions with silly pictures!”

The Pulitzer-Prize winning cartoonist says the main advantage of a political cartoon is being able to communicate an opinion very quickly. 

“I can draw a picture and put in a little word bubble and you can read it in about four seconds and you get it,” he says. “So it’s a very interesting vehicle for expressing an opinion if you do it right.”

“It has to hit you in the face kind of hard and fast and you know it when you’ve been hit.”

A good example of that is his popular Thanksgiving cartoon where he shows a family gathered around the dinner table about to partake in the much-revered Thanksgiving meal. While Mother brings the turkey to the table, family members are shown immersed in their mobile phones instead of paying attention to this time-honored ritual.

He was inspired by a popular painting by American artist Norman Rockwell who painted idyllic scenes reflecting American culture. 

While Wuerker created the cartoon for an American audience, its message is universal; a striking example of how technology is disrupting such simple rituals as meal time.

A variety of styles

Wuerker’s cartoons are very ornate and detailed and painted in a variety of colors. But he’s a bit envious of other cartoonists he says, who can express themselves with a simple line drawing. They can “make the statement with very little drawing and it can be just as effective, if not maybe more effective,” he says.

The format of cartoons has evolved, he says.

“When I started 40 years ago doing cartoons, an editorial cartoon was a black-and-white single-panel cartoon in a newspaper. And now cartoons can be color, they can be animated, they can be graphic novels that are political.”

Like the 2018 Pulitzer Prize-winning work by journalist Jake Halpern and illustrator Michael Sloan currently on display at the Newseum in Washington. 

“They did something quite extraordinary,” says Patty Rhule, Vice President of Exhibits at the Newseum. “They did a 20-part series in the New York Times following the story of two Syrian immigrants who fled the war in Syria to come to this country and start a new life with their families.”

It marked the newspaper’s first Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning.

Rhule says editorial cartoons “bring faces and art to current events and tell stories in a way that journalists who are reporting strict facts can’t always do,” adding that the graphic novel format the two journalists used “takes cartooning to a whole new level; they add a note of commentary on what is happening in the world.”

Editorial cartoons have always been an important part of American culture, she adds.

“Since the beginning of this country, editorial cartoons have been framing issues and framing debate — from Ben Franklin’s Live Free or Die [Join, or Die], the segmented snake that rallied the 13 colonies together. So it’s always been a part of this country and the world’s way of freely expressing ideas and debate, and so I hope they never go away.”

Cartoon backlash 

But free expression sometimes comes at a heavy price. 

In 2015, Islamic terrorists attacked the offices of Charlie Hebdo, a French satirical magazine, after it published unflattering cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed. Twelve people were killed in the attack, including several prominent cartoonists.

“And within their [Islamic] culture they are certainly entitled to be offended, but they’re not entitled to decide that they’re going to go to Paris and kill the people who created that cartoon that was really intended for a French audience,” Wuerker says.

He has great respect, he says, for cartoonists who keep working despite the dangers.

“In the course of my career I’ve gotten to know a lot of cartoonists from different parts of the world, and the ones that really impress me are the ones that keep drawing despite having to live with constant threats all the time.” 

“Many cartoonists have had to flee their country because they were brave enough to take on regimes or political figures that don’t understand that a free press is a salutary thing,” he adds.

He hopes that in these troubled times, people will appreciate cartoons for what they are.

“The times have become so vitriolic and people are so quick to anger. I think the good kind of political cartooning is something that slips in a really good political point with a certain amount of good humor and wit that people will process and hopefully won’t make them angry but will make them think.”
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U.S. President Donald Trump sought Monday to diminish allegations he directed his lawyer to criminally violate campaign finance laws by making $280,000 in payments to two women to remain silent before the 2016 election about alleged affairs with him.

Trump said on Twitter the payments made by his former attorney, Michael Cohen, were “a simple private transaction,” and that opposition Democrats and federal prosecutors “wrongly call it a campaign contribution, which it was not.”

The U.S. leader said that “…even if it was, it is only a CIVIL CASE,” comparing it to campaign finance violations committed in 2008 by his predecessor, Democrat Barack Obama. But Trump said the payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal were “done correctly by a lawyer and there would not even be a fine. Lawyer’s liability if he made a mistake, not me.”

He said, “Cohen just trying to get his sentence reduced. WITCH HUNT!”   

Trump’s comments on Cohen came after federal prosecutors said Friday the Trump attorney, “in coordination with and at the direction” of then-candidate Trump, made the hush money payments shortly before the 2016 presidential election. Cohen is being sentenced Wednesday for making the payments, along with several other criminal offenses, and faces several years in prison.

Trump, as he often does, derided special counsel Robert Mueller’s ongoing 19-month investigation into whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia to help him win the election and whether, as president, Trump obstructed justice by trying to thwart the probe.

Quoting a Fox News report, Trump said, “Democrats can’t find a Smocking (sic) Gun tying the Trump campaign to Russia… No Smocking Gun…No Collusion. That’s because there was NO COLLUSION.”

‘Impeachable offenses’

A key U.S. lawmaker said Sunday Democrats in the House of Representatives could pursue impeachment hearings against Trump, saying that he had “surrounded himself with crooks” and was part of a broad “conspiracy against the American people” to win the 2016 election.

Congressman Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat set to become chairman of the House Judiciary Committee when Democrats take control of the chamber next month, told CNN that lawmakers have to decide “how important” allegations are against Trump, but should pursue impeachment charges “only for serious offenses.”

Nadler said that if proven, the payments to the two women were “certainly impeachable offenses.” That could lead to his removal from office, if the Senate were to convict him by at least a two-thirds vote, a doubtful proposition with Republican control of the Senate continuing in the Congress that takes office in January.

Nadler said lawmakers will have “to look at all this,” along with weighing what Mueller eventually concludes about Trump campaign links with Russia and whether Trump obstructed justice.

The U.S. Justice Department has a standing guideline against indicting sitting presidents, although they can be charged after leaving office. Nadler said, however, “There’s nothing in the Constitution that prohibits the president from being indicted. Nobody should be above the law.”

Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff, set to assume control of the House Intelligence Committee next month, told CBS News on Sunday, “My takeaway is there’s a very real prospect that on the day Donald Trump leaves office the Justice Department may indict him, that he may be the first president in quite some time to face the real prospect of jail time.”

Trump has called for the end to the Mueller probe, but a Republican lawmaker, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, told ABC News, “I’ve always supported the Mueller investigation and continue to do so because I think it’s in the best interest of everyone involved, including, by the way, the president.”

Aside from Cohen, Mueller so far has secured guilty pleas or won convictions of Trump’s first national security adviser, his former campaign manager, his former deputy campaign manager, a foreign policy adviser and other lesser figures.

Blaming Comey

On Sunday, Trump assailed former Federal Bureau of Investigation director James Comey, whom Trump fired while he was heading the Russia investigation before Mueller was named to lead the probe. Comey testified to a House panel on Friday about his role in 2016 election-related investigations of Trump’s campaign and that of his challenger, Democrat Hillary Clinton, a former U.S. secretary of state.

“On 245 occasions, former FBI Director James Comey told House investigators he didn’t know, didn’t recall, or couldn’t remember things when asked,” Trump said on Twitter.

“Leakin’ James Comey must have set a record for who lied the most to Congress in one day. His Friday testimony was so untruthful!  This whole deal is a Rigged Fraud headed up by dishonest people who would do anything so that I could not become President. They are now exposed!”

Late Sunday, Comey said Americans “should use every breath we have to make sure” Trump is defeated in 2020 when he is running for re-election to a second term.

 
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Washington is absorbing new revelations concerning the Russia probe revealed in court documents regarding U.S. President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign manager as well as his former personal attorney, both of whom have pleaded guilty to a variety of federal crimes and provided information to prosecutors. VOA’s Michael Bowman reports, Trump himself continues to deny wrongdoing.
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A key U.S. lawmaker said Sunday that Democrats in the House of Representatives could pursue impeachment hearings against President Donald Trump, saying that the U.S. leader had “surrounded himself with crooks” and was part of a broad “conspiracy against the American people” to win the 2016 election.

Congressman Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat set to become chairman of the House Judiciary Committee when Democrats take control of the chamber next month, told CNN that lawmakers have to decide “how important” allegations are against Trump, but should pursue impeachment charges “only for serious offenses.”

Nadler offered his thoughts two days after federal prosecutors accused former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, “in coordination with and at the direction” of Trump, of orchestrating $280,000 in hush money payments shortly before the 2016 election to two women who alleged they had affairs with Trump so they would stay silent before Election Day.

Nadler said that if proven, the allegations against Trump were “certainly impeachable offenses.” That could lead to his removal from office, if the Senate were to convict him by at least a two-thirds vote, a doubtful proposition with Republican control of the Senate continuing in the Congress that takes office in January.

Nadler said lawmakers will have “to look at all this,” along with weighing what special counsel Robert Mueller concludes about allegations that Trump and his campaign colluded with Russia to help him win and that, as president, Trump obstructed justice by trying to thwart the ongoing 19-month probe.

The U.S. Justice Department has a standing guideline against indicting sitting presidents, although they can be charged after leaving office. Nadler said, however, “There’s nothing in the Constitution that prohibits the president from being indicted. Nobody should be above the law.”

Trump has dismissed the latest allegations against him in connection with the payments to porn star Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal and allegations of Trump campaign contacts with Russia to help him win the election.

“We’re very happy with what we’re reading,” Trump said Saturday, following a Twitter comment Friday night, “Totally clears the President. Thank you!”

Trump has called for the end to the Mueller probe, but a Republican lawmaker, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, told ABC News, “I’ve always supported the Mueller investigation and continue to do so because I think it’s in the best interest of everyone involved, including, by the way, the president.”

Aside from Cohen, who is set to be sentenced Wednesday and faces several years of imprisonment, Mueller so far has secured guilty pleas or won convictions of Trump’s first national security adviser, his former campaign manager, his former deputy campaign manager, a foreign policy adviser and other lesser figures.

On Sunday, Trump assailed former Federal Bureau of Investigation director James Comey, whom Trump fired while he was heading the Russia investigation before Mueller was named to lead the probe.

Comey testified to a House panel on Friday about his role in 2016 election-related investigations of Trump’s campaign and that of his challenger, Democrat Hillary Clinton, a former U.S. secretary of state.

“On 245 occasions, former FBI Director James Comey told House investigators he didn’t know, didn’t recall, or couldn’t remember things when asked,” Trump claimed on Twitter.

“Leakin’ James Comey must have set a record for who lied the most to Congress in one day. His Friday testimony was so untruthful! This whole deal is a Rigged Fraud headed up by dishonest people who would do anything so that I could not become President. They are now exposed!”

 
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The latest impending White House high-profile departure is the top official who traditionally controls access to the Oval Office.

Chief of Staff John Kelly is exiting by the end of this month, President Donald Trump told reporters on Saturday.

“John Kelly will be leaving — I don’t know if I can say ‘retiring.’ But, he’s a great guy,” Trump told reporters on the White House South Lawn. 

Kelly’s successor is widely expected to be Nick Ayers, the young, politically savvy chief of staff for Vice President Mike Pence.

New staff

Trump, before boarding Marine One, said he would announce his next chief of staff “over the next day or two.”

Kelly’s imminent departure comes as no surprise. There had been speculation for months — which had grown more intense in recent days — that the former Marine general would soon exit amid a further chill between him and the president, a deterioration in a relationship that had never been described as overly warm.

“It would have been a bad fit for anybody. He was essentially tasked with mission impossible,” said professor David Cohen, a presidential historian at the University of Akron in Ohio. “Trump never gave him the tools to succeed in the job,” in which the chief of staff is supposed to be empowered to speak for the president and to have unfettered authority in organizing the White House and instilling stability and order.

“The cause of the chaos is Donald Trump himself, who is never willing to be reined in by anybody,” and considered Kelly and his predecessor, Reince Priebus, to be more “staff than chief,” said Cohen, who is writing a book about White House chiefs of staff.

Although the Trump administration has a reputation for a higher rate of staff turnover than its predecessors, Kelly’s total time of 16 months in the job will not be unusually short in a high-stress position where two years is considered a decent run. Priebus lasted just six months.

“There’s a lot of burnout in the position,” Cohen told VOA. “More often than not the individual that’s serving in that position can’t wait to find a new position, in the president’s Cabinet or maybe simply retiring from the rigors of the White House and a presidential administration.”

The departing chief of staff, during his time inside the White House was “a force for order, clarity and good sense,” said outgoing House Speaker Paul Ryan, a Wisconsin Republican. “He is departing what is often a thankless job, but John Kelly has my eternal gratitude.”

Kelly’s service

Kelly’s tenure has been “the definition of selfless service and he served President Trump well from day one,” Heritage Foundation Vice President James Jay Carafano told VOA, noting the administration’s foreign policy that “has been tough, focused, realistic and successful.”

A former high-ranking official from the administration of Barack Obama, Trump’s predecessor, saw it differently.

Kelly “failed to contain or restrain the president, and supported and encouraged the abhorrent family separation policy as a deterrent to asylum seekers,” said Jon Wolfsthal, a former senior director for arms control on the National Security Council.

Kelly previously was Trump’s secretary of homeland security, where his hard-line stance on immigration earned praise from the president.

Trump in recent days has been negotiating with Ayers to succeed Kelly — who lacked experience in partisan politics — but the vice president’s 36-year-old chief of staff is reluctant to make a two-year commitment to the job, according to White House sources.

Ayers has the support of the president’s daughter, Ivanka Trump, and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, but some key West Wing officials will not be welcoming to the hard-charging operative, according to administration insiders.

Ayers likely would be a chief of staff who “is politically savvy and willing to help with the president’s campaign operation,” but his age is likely to prompt senior staff to question: “Who does this kid think he is?” Cohen said.

Asked to assess Ayers’ chances of success, Wolfsthal replied, “Zero. Trump listens to Trump because he cares about his self-interest, not that of the country.”

The bottom line is that Trump will soon have his third chief of staff in two years, a turnover rate for which he harshly criticized Obama in January 2012.
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