In The News
Jared Kushner should be very nervous. Rather than take heat for protecting his son-in-law, President Trump left the disposition of Kushner’s security clearance up to White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly. On Tuesday, Kelly dealt Kushner a humiliating setback. The Post reports:
Three House Democrats will introduce legislation on Wednesday to significantly expand congressional oversight of the White House’s security clearance process, as controversy swirls over a former senior White House aide who maintained an interim clearance despite accusations of domestic violence.
Late last September, I moderated a discussion about North Korea with retired Navy Adm. James Stavridis, whose 37-year military career included a stint running NATO, and Michèle Flournoy, the No. 3 official at the Pentagon during the Obama administration, who has helped shape US policy toward North Korea since 1993.
The racist insult against Dreamers by President Donald Trump’s chief of staff was so toxic Tuesday that Fox News Channel ignored it in prime time while CNN and MSNBC played it up in heavy rotation.
White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly on Tuesday suggested that some young immigrants eligible for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program failed to apply for the legal protections because they were too afraid — or “too lazy to get off their asses.”
Congressmen Ted Lieu, D-Torrance, and Justin Amash, R-Mich., have reintroduced legislation to block the use of civil asset forfeiture funds to support the Drug Enforcement Agency’s marijuana eradication program.
Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) of the House Judiciary Committee said the classified memo Republicans say indicates anti-Trump bias at the Department of Justice is "worse than a nothing burger.”
Funerals in Yemen are traditionally large affairs. When prominent figures die, hundreds or even thousands of people come to pay their respects and to pray for them. Abdulqader Hilal Al-Dabab, the mayor of Sana’a, Yemen’s capital, could expect such treatment. But Hilal used to ask for a simple burial. “If I get killed when I’m in office, I don’t want a state funeral,” he told his sons.
After a contentious debate, the House of Representatives has voted to extend a controversial government surveillance program that powers American spying operations, as it voted down a proposal to include new privacy measures.
More indictments are coming this year in special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia in the presidential election, a Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee predicted.