Kingfisher Cove

Day In, Day Out

Man, the time is flying, and that’s with life currently in lazy, mellow mode. I’ve been buried in books, the end of the Olympics, British TV murder series, and a little bit of glass work. I made another wind chime and although I’m not overly thrilled with it, it was fun to see how that special crazy-color gaudy dichroic glass would look in a larger project (it’s usually used in jewelry because it’s pricey stuff). I have yet to hang it outside (no free hooks yet, plus lots of rain, wind, and even snow), but here’s an indoor pic:

It’s hard to capture a photo of dichroic because it’s so glow-y and metallic. It’s not transparent, but I think sunshine would still make it pop. I have one more wind chime frame and I think it’ll be more in line with the original one I made. I’m also motivated to see if I can somewhat replicate this bowl someone posted on the fused glass Facebook page I follow:

Isn’t that gorgeous? I don’t think it would be too difficult (albeit tedious), except for nipping all those thousands pieces of glass! (My wrist hurts just thinking about that effort!) I also have a mold that I think would work really well for it.

Speaking of motivation: I need to muster some up! The house really needs cleaning and I keep putting it off (I’m almost done with this book! I’m really into this OTHER book! Shiny things! SQUIRREL!!) I also need to drastically tidy up de-clutter my glass studio. Argh.

AND…full disclosure: I can’t turn away from this train wreck that is this White House and the Russian investigation. Every. Single. Day. there is breaking news and astounding revelations. Never has there been such craven corruption, such blatant disregard for ethics, such absolute INSANITY. Five felons so far, four with guilty pleas! Unprecedented firings and resignations. Incessant and pathological lying from every corner of the administration regime.  Special Prosecutor Mueller is very obviously tightening the noose and closing in on the White House, and as a result, trump has spent this week throwing his feces against the walls of the Oval Office. STAY TUNED. POP SOME POPCORN.

And then there’s Quinn!! He was 5 months old on Feb. 18th:

 

Yes, I want to kiss him all over!

He’s a big boy! Weighs about 18 lbs. (he has a checkup coming up and we’ll soon know for sure). He’s loving his solid food. He giggles a LOT. I’m going to insert a couple of short videos:

 

 

Week Sixty-Seven

Compiled by Amy Siskind

On a holiday week with Congress out of session, gun control and the Mueller probe dominated the headlines and the country’s attention. The youth-led activism on gun control sparked by Parkland students has been compared to the successful youth movement against the Vietnam War. The Trump regime was caught flat-footed on the issue, left to parrot NRA talking points; while one White House described the mass shooting as a “reprieve” from a series of negative news and scandals starting in Week 65.

The Mueller probe made news this week with new indictments, and the probe’s fourth and fifth guilty pleas. A comparison of public knowledge on where the probe was headed was made to the “tip of the iceberg,” as charges against a previously unknown Dutch man whose father-in-law is a Russian oligarch came Tuesday. Trump's White House continues its high-drama chaos with continuing threats of firings and actual resignations, and amid controversy over access to highly classified materials.

1. On Saturday, at the Munich Security Conference, US lawmakers from both parties and top national security officials told Europe’s foreign policy elite to ignore Trump's tweets, Trump's main mode of communication.
2. On Saturday, in the opening of her show, Fox News’ Jeanine Pirro slammed the FBI again, this time over the Parkland shooting, saying “The FBI needs a complete overhaul, a complete cleansing.”
3. On Sunday, Rep. Trey Gowdy defended Mueller on “Face the Nation” after the indictments, saying “Russia is not our friend,” adding about Mueller, “This is exactly what we wanted him to do.” Other Republicans have been silent.
4. WAPO reported Trump spent the weekend at Mar-a-Lago stewing, watching cable news and calling friends to vent. On Saturday and Sunday Trump skipped golf, reportedly to honor the Parkland victims.
5. Starting after 11 p.m. Saturday night and continuing through midday Sunday, Trump sent a series of 10 tweets lashing out at the Russia probe. The tweets were laden with false statements, profanity, and misspellings.
6. Trump seized on Mueller’s Russian indictments and Rod Rosenstein’s statement that there is “no allegation in the indictment that any American had any knowledge” of Russian election interference in this indictment to yet again claim he was exonerated.
7. Trump tweeted he “never said Russia did not meddle in the election.” This is false. Trump has called Russian meddling a “hoax” and a “witch hunt” ginned up by Democrats numerous times before and after taking office.
8. Trump also criticized H.R. McMaster’s incontrovertible statement tweeting McMaster forgot to add the 2016 results were not impacted, and “the only Collusion was between Russia and Crooked H, the DNC and the Dems.”
9. Trump tweeted that he had “never gotten over the fact” that Obama “was able to send $1.7 Billion Dollars in CASH to Iran,” which Trump complained no one in Congress, the DOJ, or FBI is investigating.
10. Trump lashed out at Rep. Schiff, tweeting “Liddle’ Adam Schiff, the leakin’ monster of no control” is now blaming Obama for Russian meddling as an excuse for why “Crooked Hillary Clinton, lost the 2016 election.”
11. Trump tweeted that the FBI missed “signals” sent out about the school shooting because the agency was too focused on Russian collusion, drawing widespread condemnation, including from survivors on Twitter.
12. Asked about Trump, Emma Gonzalez, a Parkland student who is helping organize gun-control marches in DC and other cities on March 24 said, “the best thing for us to do is ignore him,” calling his words “disgraceful.”
13. On Sunday night, Trump was again tweeting, this time mocking a “very insecure” Oprah for her performance on “60 Minutes,” adding “Hope Oprah runs so she can be exposed and defeated just like all of the others!”
14. On Monday, which was President’s Day, after golfing, Trump took to Twitter to again criticize Obama, saying Obama was president during the election, asking “So why didn’t he do something about Russian meddling?”
15. On Monday, WAPO reported according to a White House official, after the flurry of negative news to hit the regime in the last week, the school shooting which killed 17 was viewed as a “a distraction or a reprieve.”
16. Baltimore Sun reported Republican Aaron Penman, who is running for state delegate, hosted a “gun bingo” campaign fundraiser that included raffling off an AR-15 gun, three days after the Parkland shooting.
17. The Chicago Blackhawks banned four fans from their home games for directing racist taunts at Black American hockey player Devante Smith-Pelly of the Washington Capitals while he was in the penalty box.
18. Politico reported the Trump regime is trimming language on women’s reproductive rights and discrimination from the soon-to-be-released State Department annual report on global human rights.
19. By order of the regime, passages which deal with women’s access to contraceptives and abortion will be removed, and a broader section which chronicles racial, ethnic and sexual discrimination will be pared down.
20. The State Department report is relied on by a range of people, from U.S. lawmakers to political activists. Officials say these late, unusual revisions reflect Trump regime orders while many key roles remain unstaffed.
21. On Thursday, Reuters reported Speaker Paul Ryan and the White House are replacing Matthew Masterson, chair of the Election Assistance Commission who has helped states protect election systems from cyber-attacks by Russia.
22. Masterson is a popular figure among state election officials, who praised his expertise. He was picked by GOP speaker John Boehner and nominated by Obama to a four-year term. Ryan and Trump will pick his replacement.
23. Politico reported Trump's Department of Health and Human Services is taking steps to dismantle LGBTQ health initiatives: regulations to protect LGBTQ worker and patients have halted or rolled back, LGBTQ-friendly language removed from documents.
24. Senior advisers dedicated to LGBTQ health have been reassigned. Officials are also concerned that many Trump appointees at the agency have records of anti-LGBTQ beliefs or actions.
25. NY Republican Rep. Lee Zeldin proposed sweeping reforms to federal Immigration and Nationality Law that would allow the government to revoke citizenship within 10 years for a broad range of alleged offenses.
26. On Thursday, Intercept reported an email sent to US Citizenship and Immigration Services staff members by director L. Francis Cissna announced a new agency mission statement which omits the words “nation of immigrants.”
27. In its annual audit of the world’s human rights, Amnesty International accused Trump of taking “actions that violate human rights at home and abroad,” grouping Trump with other authoritarian leaders from Egypt, Russia, China, the Philippines, and Venezuela.
28. Amnesty International said Trump's policies created a year of “hate-filled rhetoric,” citing his Muslim Bans, anti-immigration policies, and his attacks on the rights of women and girls, the LGBTQ community, and more.
29. AP reported the Trump regime is calling for the elimination of LIHEAP — Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program — which provides heating assistance for low-income families, as part of his 2019 budget.
30. Also as part the 2019 budget, Ryan Zinke’s Interior Department plans to use money raised from drilling on public lands to fund $18 billion of backlogged infrastructure plans at his department’s choosing.
31. On Wednesday, WAPO reported two senior US Geological Survey officials resigned after Zinke asked them to provide confidential data on the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska before it was released to the public, an action which would violated the USGS’s scientific integrity policy.
32. On Monday, Scott Pruitt postponed canceled a trip scheduled to Israel amid scrutiny over his travel costs. According to Week 66, Pruitt reportedly has been flying in first class and on military jets.
33. On Wednesday, Rep. Gowdy, chair the House Oversight Committee, demanded Pruitt turn over documents related to his first-class travel, and raised concerns about conflicting statements from Pruitt’s press office.
34. Trump's nominee to become ambassador to the Bahamas, billionaire Doug Manchester, headed a newspaper where former employees said the “‘Mad Men’-style,” was uncomfortable and often disrespectful toward women.
35. WAPO reported that two weeks after Trump nominated Florida businessman Leandro Rizzuto Jr. to become ambassador to Barbados, Rizzuto pledged thousands to underwrite a gala at Mar-a-Lago.
36. Since Trump has yet to nominate a head of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the position is held by Michael Kratsios, a 31 year-old former chief of staff to Peter Thiel who has a political science degree.
37. CNN reported The Department of Housing and Urban Development’s inspector general is looking in the role secretary Ben Carson’s family has played at the agency. In Week 64, Carson was warned by agency lawyers about his sending his son on a listening tour.
38. WSJ reported watchdog group Common Cause filed complaints with the FEC and DOJ asking the agencies to investigate the $150k payment to Karen McDougal who sold her Trump story to the National Enquirer (AMI).
39. Common Cause said the “catch and kill” payment made by AMI was intended to influence the election. Michael Cohen was in touch with AMI’s CEO and chief content officer during the investigation.
40. CNBC reported Trump's former bodyguard, Keith Schiller, worked for Trump for nearly 20 years, is being paid $15,000 a month from a GOP slush fund. Schiller has been questioned as part of the Mueller probe.
41. CNBC reported the RNC has been quietly paying more than $37,000 a month in rent to Trump's companies and thousands more in salary to Pence’s nephew for expenses previously covered by the Trump campaign.
42. These payments started shortly after the RNC came under pressure for paying legal bills for Trump and Donald Jr. in the Mueller probe, and stopped doing so.
43. Forbes reported based on identifying 164 tenants of Trump properties, at least 36 have meaningful relationships with the federal government, from contractors to lobbying firms to regulatory targets.
44. Forbes noted China’s largest bank, the Industrial & Commercial Bank of China is a tenant on the 20th floor of Trump Tower, six floors below Trump's desk. The Chinese government is majority owner of the bank.
45. Donald Jr. made an “unofficial” business trip to India to promote Trump Organization real estate transactions. While there, he delivered a foreign policy speech on Indo-Pacific relations at an event with Indian PM Narendra Modi.
46. Indian newspapers have been running full-page advertisements about the Trump Tower project under the headline: “Trump is Here — Are You Invited?” inviting people to spend a $38k booking fee and meet Donald Jr.
47. During his trip, Donald Jr. praised the “spirit” of people in poverty-stricken areas of India, adding that he likes that they “smile.” Trump Tower apartments in a New Delhi suburb run from $775,000 to $1.5 million.
48. Donald Jr. called accusations that his family is profiting from Trump's position “nonsense,” adding “It’s sort of a shame. Because we put on all these impositions on ourselves and essentially got no credit.”
49. On Tuesday, a review board overseeing Puerto Rico’s housing contracts suspended a $133 million contract awarded to Adjusters International, whose senior vice presidents is Trump's failed FEMA nominee Daniel Craig.
50. Craig helped his firm with the bid for the contract which should have been disqualified for failing to comply with FEMA requirements. Craig is under federal investigation for ethics issues involving FEMA contracts for Hurricane Katrina.
51. AP reported six-months after Hurricane Harvey in Texas, recovery has lagged well behind earlier post-disaster efforts. Relief efforts have been slow to unfold and tangled with bureaucracy.
52. Federal records show it took four times as long to house people in trailers after Harvey than Katrina, and housing repairs are running months behind Sandy. Local communities have been left to their own devices.
53. On Tuesday, the regime held its first daily press briefing in over a week, and first since the Parkland shooting, with unanswered questions on the Rob Porter scandal, Russian indictments, and hush money for Trump's affairs.
54. The briefing started 88 minutes late, the longest delay to date, and lasted only 20 minutes long. Sanders left many questions unanswered, cutting off at 3:30 p.m. for Trump's Public Safety Medal of Valor Awards Ceremony.
55. Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Trump has repeatedly acknowledged Russian interference, and that Trump “has been tougher on Russia in the first year than Obama was in eight years combined.” Both statements are false.
56. Sanders also said VA chief David Shulkin’s job is safe, despite alleged misuse of taxpayer money during a 10-day trip to Europe and attempts to conceal it in Week 66, unless “other stuff comes up.”
57. Politico reported it has been a year since Trump held a news conference. In their first years in office, Obama held 11 formal news conferences, George W. Bush held four, Clinton held 14, and George H.W. Bush held 26.
58. On Tuesday, a front page story at WAPO was “Is anyone listening?” the story of Rachel Crooks, who claims Trump kissed her for two minutes when she worked as a secretary at Trump Tower in 2006.
59. On Tuesday, Trump sent two tweets denying Crooks’ claim, calling it “Another False Accusation,” saying of Crooks, “to the best of my knowledge, never met,” and “Never happened!”
60. Trump also lashed out at WAPO in his tweets, calling the paper “Fake News Washington Post,” and asking why WAPO doesn’t “report the story of the women taking money to make up stories about me?”
61. Crooks is one of 16 women who have come forward with allegations of sexual misconduct against Trump. Crooks is also running in November 2018 for a seat in Ohio’s state Legislature.
62. On Tuesday in a Kentucky rural district, Democrat Linda Belcher won a state House of Representative seat by 36 points. Trump won the district by 49 points in 2016, an 85 point swing.
63. On Tuesday, NYT reported Jared Kushner is resisting giving up his access to highly classified information, sparking an internal struggle with chief of staff John Kelly, who announced an overhaul of the security process in a memo in Week 66.
64. Kelly’s public statements, in which he said policy change would not harm Kushner’s ability to do his job, have ratcheted up tensions. Kushner and Ivanka reportedly were critical of Kelly when speaking to Trump.
65. On Wednesday, Trump again attacked his beleaguered Attorney General, tweeting the Obama administration did nothing about Russian meddling so “why aren’t they the subject of the investigation?” adding “Ask Jeff Sessions!”
66. On Sunday, the LA Times reported Rick Gates will change his plea to guilty of fraud-related charges, and testify against Paul Manafort. Gates will become the fourth person in the Mueller probe to plead guilty and cooperate.
67. On Monday, CNN reported Mueller’s interest in Kushner has expanded to include Kushner’s efforts to secure financing for his company from foreign investors during the presidential transition.
68. Mueller is interested in Kushner’s discussions with Chinese investors, including Anbang’s chairman, Wu Xiaohui, a week after the election, as well as negotiations with a Qatari investor, relating to 666 Fifth Avenue.
69. In Week 35, Intercept reported Kushner not getting a deal with a Qatar sovereign wealth fund on 666 Fifth Avenue may have influenced US policy towards Qatar.
70. Mueller is also reportedly investigating Kushner’s involvement in the Trump campaign’s 2016 data analytics operation, his relationship with Flynn, and Kushner’s contacts with Russians.
71. On Monday, Politico reported conservatives are urging Trump to grant pardons to limit the impact of the Mueller probe. Supporters said Trump should consider pardoning Michael Flynn, Manafort, Gates, and George Papadopoulos.
72. On Wednesday, conservative media floated a false narrative that based on a new filing in his case, Flynn should withdraw his guilty plea because the special counsel “withheld” evidence which could exonerate him.
73. Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats defended hosting the controversial secret visit by Russian spy chiefs in Week 64, telling Sen. Chuck Schumer in a letter that the meetings focused on counterterrorism cooperation.
74. One of the visitors was GRU chief, Igor Korobov, who was sanctioned for interfering in the US election. When MSNBC asked the State Department about his travel waiver, they were directed by State to the Russian government.
75. BuzzFeed reported Mueller’s team has now identified more than $40 million in “suspicious” financial transactions to and from companies controlled by Manafort. Mueller’s October indicted listed just $18 million.
76. On Tuesday, Alex van der Zwaan, son-in-law of Russian oligarch German Khan, pleaded guilty to making false statements in a November 3 interview by Mueller’s team, days after Manafort and Gates were indicted.
77. False statements were related to a 2016 recorded phone call about a 2012 report prepared by van der Zwaan’s law firm, Skadden, Arps, about the jailing of former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko.
78. Van der Zwaan was hired by Manafort and Gates to prepare the report while working for Skadden. Last year, Skadden fired van der Zwaan and has been cooperating in the Mueller probe.
79. German Khan is an owner of Alfa Group, Russia’s largest financial and industrial group. In Week 21, Alfa Bank was being investigated by the FBI over frequently pings of Trump Organization servers during the campaign.
80. Alfa Bank is also mentioned in the dossier. Khan and other Alfa Bank owners sued Fusion GPS and Glenn Simpson in Week 47, and BuzzFeed in Week 28, saying their reputations had been tattered by the dossier.
81. On Thursday, Mueller filed a new indictment against Manafort and Gates which included 32 additional counts, including tax and bank fraud charges. The initial indictment last October had 12 counts.
82. Manafort and Gates received large amounts of money for their work in Ukraine from 2006–2015 which they laundered by bringing it into the US as corporate loans, also avoiding reporting the money as income.
83. When the money dried up, Manafort and Gates lied to lenders about their finances, and set up a real estate scheme under which they were able to obtain millions in financing in 2015 and 2016.
84. Lawfare reported while there are no allegations about the Trump campaign directly, the indictment alleges bank fraud between 2015 and 2017 during which Manafort and Gates were both involved with Trump.
85. In previous weekly lists, at the time Manafort took the position as Trump's campaign chair, although he was cash poor, he offered to do the job for free, potentially to relieve pressure to repay Russian oligarch Deripaska.
86. WSJ reported Mueller’s team and federal prosecutors in NY are also examining a $16 million loan made to Manafort by Federal Savings Bank, a small bank in Chicago run by Steve Calk.
87. In Week 26, the loan represented 24% of the bank’s reported capital. Mueller’s team wants to know if the loan was part of a possible quid pro quo for Calk to secure the position of Army secretary in the Trump regime.
88. Early Thursday, WAPO reported Gates’ legal defense is in question. His three lawyers asked to leave the case, citing “highly sensitive matters” that would “potentially be prejudicial as well as embarrassing.”
89. Late Thursday, shortly after Mueller filed the new charges, the judge granted the three lawyers’ request, and Gates’ new lawyer Thomas C. Green, filed notice with the court that he is now representing Gates.
90. On Thursday, The Daily Beast reported that Gates fired Tom Green, and is replacing him with lawyer Barry Pollack of Miller Chevalier. Reportedly Gates is, at this point, not cooperating in the Mueller probe.
91. On Thursday afternoon, Green denied the report that he been fired, and the next day The Daily Beast completely rewrote their story leaving out any mention of Green and printed a correction.
92. On Friday morning, NYT reported Gates will plead guilty in the Mueller probe and will cooperate. The deal reportedly came after Mueller filed additional charges. Gates became the fifth to plead guilty in the probe.
93. Gates pleaded guilty in court to participating in a financial conspiracy with Manafort. He also admitted that he lied to investigators on February 1, while negotiating with prosecutors.
94. Gates lied about a conversation he had with Manafort in March 2013, after Manafort had met with Rep. Dana Rohrabacher to discuss the situation in Ukraine. Gates falsely claimed Manafort said Ukraine did not come up.
95. Gates’ three attorneys had asked to step off the case on February 1 after Gates’ lie, saying “Irreconcilable differences have developed with the client which make our effective representation of the client impossible.”
96. Court documents revealed Gates has been discussing a deal with Mueller’s team since January. If Gates fully cooperates he could ask for probation, or he could face up to 71 months in prison on the two felony counts.
97. Gates was deputy campaign manager as Trump was developing policy positions and engaging with voters on social media. Gates stayed on after Manafort resigned in August and was a consultant on the transition team.
98. On Friday, less than two hours after Gates agreed to cooperate, new charges were filed against Manafort in the Mueller probe, alleging Manafort paid European politicians to push positions favorable to Ukraine.
99. Charges say Manafort, with assistance from Gates, orchestrated a group of former European politicians, called the “Hapsburg group,” to appear independent, while being secretly paid 2 million euros by Manafort.
100. Manafort funded the payments from an offshore account, similar to $4 million payments he made to Alex van der Zwaan to produce the report on jailing Tymoshenko. Manafort maintained his innocence on Friday.
101. On Friday, Susan Rice’s attorney responded to Sens. Chuck Grassley and Lindsey Graham’s request in Week 66, saying she documented the January 2017 meeting before Obama left the White House because they were “justifiably concerned” about ties between Russia and the incoming Trump regime.
102. Rice’s attorney added Rice memorialized the meeting based on advice she received from the White House counsel, and that Rice was not aware of the existence of the FBI’s investigation at the time.
103. On Wednesday, Trump met with grieving parents and students impacted by school gun violence at the White House. Several attendees showed raw emotion and tears, which reportedly overshadowed a policy discussion.
104. During the meeting, Trump held a card captured in photographs with items including, “What would you most want me to know about your experience?” and a reminder to express empathy: “I hear you.”
105. After listening, Trump suggested arming teachers to increase school safety. On Thursday morning, Trump lashed out at news organizations for reporting this, tweeting that he “never said ‘give teachers guns.’”
106. On Thursday, Trump hosted a second White House meeting on gun violence. Trump floated the idea of paying teachers “a little bit of a bonus” for carrying guns in class, and promised federal funds to train them.
107. Trump fired back at Education secretary Betsy DeVos for suggesting active shooter drills, saying “active shooter drills is a very negative thing,” adding “I think it’s crazy, I think it’s very bad for children.”
108. Trump blamed video games and movies for youth violence, suggesting “maybe they have to put a rating system for that.” Ratings systems for movies and video games have existed for decades.
109. Trump repeated the terms “hardening” numerous times, meaning adding armed guards and arming teachers. He also spoke against banning guns, saying that a school “is frankly no different” than a military base.
110. Trump added, “we have to let the bad guy know that they are hardened,” harkening back to National Rifle Association chief Wayne LaPierre’s talking points after Sandy Hook that the only way to stop bad guys with guns is having good guys with guns.
111. NPR reported many of Trump's words seem to come from a NRA script. Trump said of the NRA, “I don’t think I’ll be going up against them,” adding “I’m very close to them; they’re very, very great people.”
112. On Thursday evening, the night after a widely-watched CNN Town Hall on gun control, Trump tweeted, “School shooting survivor says he quit @CNN Town Hall after refusing scripted question.” CNN denied the charge.
113. On Friday, Trump called deputy Scot Peterson, the Parkland security guard who failed to stop the shooting, a “coward.” Critics pointed to the armed guard who froze to show the fallacy of Trump's proposal to arm teachers.
114. In speeches at CPAC, both Trump and LaPierre delivered dystopian speeches, harkening the culture wars.LaPierre attacked the FBI, saying it was “not free of its own corruption and its own unethical agents.”
115. At the Ronald Reagan dinner Friday, CPAC’s communication director Ian Walters stirred controversy by saying, “We elected Mike Steele as chairman because he was a black guy, that was the wrong thing to do.”
116. Curtis Rhodes, the superintendent of Needville Independent School District in Texas said in a letter to families and on social media that students who take part in protests on gun violence will be suspended.
117. On Thursday, amid customer feedback and complaints, the First National Bank of Omaha ended its relationship with the NRA. Car rental companies Enterprise, National, and Alamo also cut ties.
118. By Saturday, Delta and United became the latest companies to cut ties with the NRA, bringing the total to 13 including hotels, insurance companies and more.
119. On Tuesday, 22 Democratic state attorneys general filed a lawsuit to preserve net neutrality. The suit cites the Administrative Procedure Act, which prevents the FCC from “arbitrary and capricious” redactions.
120. On Thursday, the FCC’s repeal of net neutrality became official, and was published in the Federal Register, the government’s official record of all administrative actions.
121. On Friday, the NRA awarded FCC chair Ajit Pai its “Charlton Heston Courage Under Fire Award” for withstanding months of criticism and repealing net neutrality.
122. On Thursday, Trump said he is considering pulling ICE out of California, blaming the state for doing a “lousy management job” in patrolling illegal immigration. He added if he pulls ICE, “you would have a crime nest.”
123. The regime has stepped up enforcement of immigration laws in California as part of their efforts to pressure sanctuary cities. ICE director Tom Homan told Fox News, “There’s no sanctuary from federal law enforcement.”
124. California Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Trump's “obsession with our state is growing more outrageous by the day,” and Sen. Kamala Harris added the regime has “continually put a target on California’s back and we won’t be bullied.”
125. On Thursday, CNN reported Trump is considering firing McMaster as National Security Adviser. In Week 66, McMaster said evidence of Russian interference was “incontrovertible.”
126. Reportedly some in the Pentagon believe McMaster has become too politicized to return to the military.Amid tension between the two, Trump could also go as far as not to offer him a fourth star and force him to retire.
127. On Thursday, Reuters reported both McMaster and Kelly may resign from the White House over tensions with Trump, especially as it relates to clearance for Kushner. WH officials have been working on a compromise.
128. Ivanka led a delegation to South Korea for the Olympic closing ceremony and to brief President Moon Jae-in on new North Korea sanctions Trump imposed on Friday. Ivanka still lacks permanent security clearance.
129. On Friday, WAPO reported Rosenstein alerted Don McGahn on February 9 that significant information requiring additional investigation would further delay Kushner’s security process.
130. Two sources said new important information came light. Security experts say it is rare to have a high level of interim clearance for such a long period of time. Typically, this interim clearance would last for only three months.
131. Kelly’s memo in Week 66 could mean Kushner and Ivanka could lose their high-level security clearance as early as Friday, February 23. On Friday, Trump told the press he would leave the decision to Kelly.
132. On Friday, Elaine Duke, deputy secretary at the Department of Homeland Security resigned after serving less than a year on the job. Duke worked as a high-ranking DHS official under George W. Bush and was recruited back by then-Secretary Kelly.
133. The Trump regime soured on Duke after she refused as acting secretary in Week 52 to expel 57,000 Hondurans who have lived in the US for nearly two decades under temporary protected status.
134. Over a week has passed since Mueller unsealed criminal indictments against Russians for interfering in our 2016 election. Trump has taken no actions nor did he issue any statement or tweet on the subject this week.

Week Sixty-Six

Compiled by Amy Siskind

For the first time in quite a while, this week Trump had no control over the narrative. What was supposed to be his Infrastructure Week, was quickly supplanted by the Rob Porter scandal, which carried over from Week 65 and escalated, highlighting the Trump White House dysfunction. Another mass shooting shook the country and left Trump and his regime flat-footed ahead of bombshell indictments unsealed by Mueller against Russians on Friday.

The indictments highlight what heads of US intelligence unanimously agreed to in Senate hearings, and what H.R. McMaster called “incontrovertible” — that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election. Trump's continued denial of Russian meddling leaves him in an isolated and untenable position, as the country awaits his response to Russia.

Of note, this week there was push-back from inspector generals, watchdog groups, and the judicial branch against the regime’s kleptocracy and corruption — some of the first signs of accountability.

1. NBC News reported Associate Attorney General Rachel Brand resigned due to her frustration that key positions in her jurisdiction were unfilled, and her concern that Rod Rosenstein’s job was in danger and she would assume oversight of the Russia probe.
2. On Sunday, Kellyanne Conway, Mick Mulvaney, and Marc Short appeared on Sunday shows to defend the White House’s handling of the Rob Porter abuse allegations. Mulvaney’s timeline on “Face the Nation” was different than John Kelly’s version.
3. When asked if Hope Hicks was in danger dating Porter, Conway said “I’ve rarely met somebody so strong with such excellent instincts and loyalty and smarts.” Porter’s first ex-wife, Colbie Holderness, responded in an op-ed about domestic abuse.
4. On Tuesday, Politico reported in the hours after Daily Mail broke the story about Porter’s abuse, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders hastily arranged an off-the-record meeting between Porter and four reporters to tell his side of the story.
5. On Sunday, WAPO reported under Trump ICE arrests have surged by 40%. The biggest jump has been arrests of immigrants with no criminal convictions: 37,734 arrests in fiscal 2017, more than doubling 2016’s arrests.
6. Street-level ICE officers and field directors have greater latitude to determine whom they arrest and under what conditions. Trump officials call it taking “the shackles off,” and happily report morale is up at ICE.
7. Houston Chronicle reported Carlos Gudiel Andres, husband and father of five, was arrested early morning while packing his tools for work, the latest case of ICE targeting predominantly Hispanic apartment complexes.
8. Community members held a rally in CT for Zhe Long Huang and Xiang Jin Li, known as “Kris and Tony,”who face deportation to China. The couple, who own a local nail salon, fear being separated from their two sons.
9. In Kansas, ICE handcuffed a chemistry professor, Syed A. Jamal, who has been in the US for 30 years, as he was leaving to drive his daughter to school. Jamal, who coached kids in science and sports, awaits deportation.
10. In Phoenix, ICE was set to deport Jesus Armando Berrones-Balderas, a father of five who has lived in the US since he was one and has a son battling cancer. After media coverage, ICE granted him a one-year stay.
11. Toronto Star reported US Border Patrol is boarding buses and trains within 100 miles of Canada and asking passengers if they are citizens. A 1953 law gives the patrol the right to do this within 100 miles of our borders.
12. On Tuesday, BuzzFeed reported Raphael Sanchez, while chief counsel for ICE in Seattle, stole the identities of multiple immigrants while their immigration cases were under review.
13. Sanchez pleaded guilty to using the immigrants’ information to open up credit cards and loans in their names, taking payments of more than $190,000 from the false accounts. He resigned from the agency.
14. Reuters reported the Trump regime is considering closing more than 20 US resettlement offices, and cutting back operations at more than 40 others as part of the State Department’s plan to reduce the number of refugees allowed in.
15. On Tuesday, a second judge, US District Judge Nicholas Garaufis in Brooklyn, ruled DACA could not end in March, saying the regime could eventually rescind DACA, but the reasons given in September were too arbitrary to stand.
16. Vox analyzed the hiring records for three Trump properties in New York and Florida and found only one out of 144 jobs went to a US worker from 2016 to the end of 2017. The rest were foreign workers under H-2B visas.
17. Jocelyn Morfii, an elementary school teacher at Saints Peter and Paul Catholic School in Miami for seven years, was fired after marrying a woman. The principal said it was “difficult and necessary decision.”
18. USA Today reported that 92% of Trump's federal judge nominees are white. Of the 87 picks so far, just one is African American, one is Hispanic, and five are Asian American.
19. Boston Globe reported Charles Johnson, a 29 year-old who questions if six million Jews died in the Holocaust, argues black people are “dumber” than white people, and is part of white supremacist circles, has found mainstream acceptance working for a pro-Trump super PAC in DC.
20. On Sunday, Rick Blood, the GOP deputy mayor of Mendham, ex-Gov. Chris Christie’s hometown, published a Facebook post comparing immigrants to raccoons in the basement, and lauded Trump as the exterminator.
21. Blood deleted the post, which was a version of a post circulating on conservative blogs since early 2016. On Monday he faced Mendham residents, and then, after a township committee meeting, resigned.
22. On Monday, Brandon Defrain, GOP chair in Bay County, Michigan resigned his post and from the party. In a Facebook post he said “I can no longer remain silent” about Trump, citing racism, hatred, and violation of civil rights.
23. Lissa Luca, a Democratic candidate in West Virginia’s House of Delegates, was forcibly escorted out after using a public hearing on the House floor to list the donations GOP lawmakers had received from the oil and gas industry.
24. On Monday, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, led by acting director Mulvaney, dropped its lawsuit against Golden Valley Lending, a payday lender that allegedly charged people interest rates of up to 950 percent.
25. On Monday, is a speech to the National Sheriffs Association, Sessions broke from his prepared written remarks—“The sheriff is a critical part of our legal heritage” — to instead invoke the “Anglo-American heritage.”
26. On Thursday, the US appeals court in Virginia said Trump's Muslim Ban was probably unconstitutional, putting it on hold pending Supreme Court review. Trump's comments and tweets were reviewed in the case.
27. On Thursday, the House voted to amend the Americans with Disabilities Act, to require written notice of violations, and giving businesses 60 days to come up with a plan and an additional 60 days to take action.
28. On Thursday, Planned Parenthood and eight other groups sued Trump's Department of Health and Human Services, saying the agency unlawfully canceled their five-year grants for teen pregnancy prevention midstream and with no explanation
29. Heath Hall, the Federal Railroad Administration’s acting chief since June, resigned following another deadly Amtrak crash. Politico reported Hall was simultaneously working as a public relations consultant in Mississippi.
30. Trump's pick to run the Census Bureau, Thomas Brunell, a deeply partisan professor with no government experience who had defended racial gerrymandering and voter suppression, withdrew from consideration.
31. According to data obtained by McClatchy, the State Department is promoting 50% fewer people into the first levels of senior Foreign Service positions, creating a crisis for the future diplomatic corps and a leadership vacuum.
32. The Trump regime has also proposed another steep cut in the diplomatic budget of more than 25%, raising concerns the regime is intentionally undercutting the department’s work and US influence in the world.
33. According to WAPO in partnership with Partnership for Public Service, after 13 months in office, Trump has yet to put forth a nominee for 1 in 3 key roles in the executive branch: 225 of 636 positions have no nominee.
34. On Sunday, Politico reported Rep. Devin Nunes created his own alternative news site. The website, “The California Republican,” is paid for by Nunes’ campaign committee, and is classified on Facebook as a “media/news company.”
35. On Sunday, WAPO reported based on information obtained under the FOIA, unlike his predecessors,Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt travels first-class and on military jets, and stays at very high-end hotels, costing taxpayers tens of thousands.
36. Pruitt also tends to bring a larger entourage of political advisers on his trips than past administrators, and rarely discloses his schedule in advance citing “security concerns” and that it could be a “distraction.”
37. NYT reported that a $225,000 donation resulted in special treatment for Fitzgerald trucks, as Pruitt helped the company secure a pollution loophole that Obama tried to close, and the Trump regime is championing.
38. A federal court ruled Trump's Department of Energy must implement four Obama-era energy efficiency regulations, which have been delayed for more than a year, saying failure is “a violation of the department’s duties.”
39. The Veterans Affairs inspector general found Secretary David Shulkin’s chief of staff doctored an email and made false statements to justify having taxpayers cover expenses for his wife on a 10-day trip to Europe.
40. The inspector general also found Shulkin improperly accepted tickets to Wimbledon worth thousands of dollars and other gifts, and directed an aide to act as a “personal travel concierge” to him and his wife.
41. On Thursday, Shulkin refused to resign, instead saying his chief of staff’s email account had been hacked: “We’ve seen that somebody is impersonating her, and we have to fully investigate that.”
42. NYT reported the FCC inspector general opened an investigation by the end of 2017 into whether commissioner Ajit Pai and his aides improperly pushed for rule changes which benefitted Sinclair Broadcasting.
43. AT&T will seek testimony from the Department of Justice’s antitrust chief, in exploring whether Trump influenced the department’s decision to block the company’s proposed acquisition of Time Warner to retaliate at CNN.
44. WAPO tabulated that in Trump's first 13 months in office, more than 40% (9 out of 22) of the people he originally picked for Cabinet-level jobs have faced ethical or other controversies.
45. On Thursday, the Trump regime agreed to settle a pending lawsuit by nonprofit group Public Citizen filed last August, and will post visitor logs for some White House offices, including Office of Management and Budget and the drug czar’s office.
46. On Sunday, the day before the White House released its 2019 budget, Mulvaney told “Fox News Sunday” that the US will post a larger budget deficit this year and could see a “spike” in interest rates as a result.
47. On Monday, Trump unveiled his $1.5 trillion infrastructure plan which his aides told Axios is not expected to pass, and his $4 trillion budget which his aides said reads like “science fiction.”
48. The aides told Axios Trump's real focus in 2018 is “looking for opportunities to stir up the base” — “unexpected cultural flashpoints” like the NFL and kneeling that Trump can latch onto in person and on Twitter.
49. As part of the infrastructure plan, Trump would give Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke the unilateral power to approve construction of pipelines through national parks. Currently, construction requires an act of Congress.
50. Also as part of the infrastructure plan, the Trump regime wants to sell off or privatize a broad array of government assets, including the Reagan National Airport and the George Washington Memorial Parkway.
51. As part of the budget, the Trump regime wants to shake-up the SNAP program (food stamps). Under the regime’s proposal, recipients would get half their benefits in a “USDA Foods package” determined by the regime.
52. The package includes “shelf-stable milk, ready to eat cereals, pasta, peanut butter, beans and canned fruit and vegetables,” but not fresh produce. The regime says it will save $129 million over 10 years with these limitations.
53. Trump's budget also proposed ending federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which provides some funds to PBS and NPR. PBS CEO Paula Kerger said this would result in closing some local PBS stations.
54. On Wednesday, Mulvaney told a congressional panel Trump's military parade could cost up to $30 million, but it is not included in the budget because it came up late.
55. On Tuesday, in Senate testimony, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said the nation’s debt, likely to escalate with the Republican’s $1.5 trillion tax cut and other fiscal measures, “represents a dire threat to our economic and national security.”
56. AP reported the amount of money spent lobbying by corporations, trade associations, and special interest groups spiked in the final months of 2017, in the battle for tax breaks in the Republican tax bill.
57. The GOP tax bill was mostly written in private. Watchdog group Public Citizens reported more than 4,600 lobbyists were engaged specifically on the tax rewrite, an average of 13 lobbyists for every member of Congress.
58. On Monday, Trump tweeted, “4.2 million hard working Americans have already received a large Bonus and/or Pay Increase.” This is false. A survey found less than 2% of America benefited from the GOP tax law.
59. Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf of Pennsylvania announced a directive for counties replacing electronic voting systems to buy machines with a paper backup, citing hackers scanned voter registration databases in the 2016 election.
60. Foreign Policy reported BuzzFeed has hired Anthony Ferrante, who works for FTI Consulting and is a former FBI and National Security Council cybersecurity expert, to lead a team in verifying the Steele dossier.
61. BuzzFeed is being sued for libel by Russian technology executive Aleksej Gubarev who claims the website was reckless in publishing the dossier. A source said of BuzzFeed’s strategy: “If it’s fact, it’s not libel, that’s the idea.”
62. On Monday, Russia news agency Tass was again the first to report a telephone conversation between Trump and Putin. According to Tass, the content discussed had to do with diplomacy in the Middle East.
63. On Monday, Putin hosted Palestinian President Abbas in Moscow and reportedly told him Trump coveys“his best wishes.” Reuters reported Abbas told Putin he wants the US peace role diluted.
64. On Monday, CNN reported Sens. Chuck Grassley and Lindsey Graham sent a letter to former National Security Adviser Susan Rice asking why she sent an email to herself the day of Trump's inauguration about an Oval Office meeting on Russian interference.
65. The email details a January 5 meeting attended by Rice, Obama, James Comey, Sally Yates, and Joe Biden. Obama stressed he wanted every aspect handled by the Intelligence and law enforcement communities “by the book.”
66. In January, Comey, James Clapper, John Brennan, and Mike Rogers released a public report saying Russia meddled in the election to help Trump win. Obama was also briefed on conversations between Michael Flynn and Sergey Kislyak.
67. The email states: “Obama said he wants to be sure that, as we engage with the incoming team, we are mindful to ascertain if there is any reason that we cannot share information fully as it relates to Russia.” The email was sent at 12:15 p.m., just minutes before Obama left office.
68. On Tuesday, leaders of the US intelligence agencies testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee. DNI Coats warned, “There should be no doubt that Russia perceives its past efforts as successful and views the 2018 US midterm elections as a potential target for Russian influence operations.”
69. Leaders laid out the challenges which include the flow of Russian misinformation and shoring up defenses of electoral systems. Almost every state is taking steps to protect voter databases and election equipment.
70. Coats said, “We need to inform the American public that this is real,” adding, “there needs to be a national cry for that.” Trump continues to deny that Russia interfered in the 2016 election, calling it “a hoax.”
71. Sen. Jack Reed asked the leaders if Trump has directed them to take “specific actions to confront and to blunt” Russian interference activities. All are taking some actions, but none have been specifically directed by Trump.
72. On Wednesday, WAPO reported at the behest of Trump in April, Don McGahn called Dana Boente at DOJ and tried to get him to persuade Comey to publicly state Trump was not personally under investigation in the Russia probe.
73. McGahn’s office has also reportedly prepared a detailed reconstruction of the 18 days between the time of Yates’s warning and Flynn’s firing, and turned the document over to Mueller for his review.
74. On Thursday, CNN reported Rick Gates is finalizing a plea deal with Mueller, indicating he will become the third regime member to cooperate in the investigation. The plea negotiations had been ongoing for about a month.
75. Gates has already had a “Queen for a Day” interview, in which he can answer any questions about his own case and other potential criminal activity he witnessed, and not have it used against him if he cooperates.
76. On Friday, as part of the wrangling over Paul Manafort’s bail, Mueller’s team told a federal judge they have found evidence of “additional criminal conduct” by Manafort not addressed in their indictment last October.
77. Mueller’s filing shows Manafort obtained a mortgage using “doctored profit and loss statements” which overstated his consulting company’s income “by millions of dollars.” There are also references to “conspiracies,” suggesting that someone beyond Manafort was involved in the fraud.
78. NBC News released, in a public database, more than 200,000 malicious activity tweets created by Russian-linked accounts during the 2016 presidential race, which were deleted by Twitter.
79. Russia threatened to block YouTube and Instagram if they did not remove content posted by opposition leader Aleksei Navalny of Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska and deputy prime minister Sergei Prikhodko on Deripaska’s yacht.
80. On Thursday, Steve Bannon told the House Intelligence Committee he has been instructed by the White House to invoke executive privilege on behalf of Trump, saying he could only answer 25 pre-approved questions on the Russia investigation.
81. Rep. Adam Schiff said Bannon’s claim of executive privilege is “breathtaking and insupportable.” He added Democrats will push for initiating contempt charges against Bannon, but it is unclear if Republicans will go along.
82. On Thursday, NBC News reported Bannon spent 20 hours with Mueller’s team at multiple meetings over the past week as part of the investigation of Russian interference and other issues that have arisen in the probe.
83. Daily Beast reported Mark Corallo, former legal spokesperson for Trump, was interviewed this week by Mueller. In Week 64, Corallo was said to be planning to share information relating to obstruction of justice.
84. FBI director Christopher Wray contradicted the White House timeline on Porter. Wray said the FBI submitted a partial report to the White House in March, completed it in late July, and followed up in November with additional information requested by the White House, before closing the file in January.
85. Later Tuesday, the White House again changed its story on Porter: Sanders said the White House Office of Personnel Security didn’t consider the investigation complete until November, and it had not made a final determination thereafter.
86. On Tuesday, at the Senate hearings, Coats said officials with an interim clearance should have limited access to sensitive information. He called the security clearance process in Trump's White House “broken.”
87. On Tuesday, Rep. Trey Gowdy announced the House Oversight Committee has opened an investigation into Trump's employment of Porter, and what White House officials knew about domestic abuse accusations against him.
88. On Tuesday, WAPO reported many White House staffers feel misled and blame chief of staff John Kelly. One White House official called Kelly “a big fat liar,” and added, “his handling of the Porter scandal amounts to dereliction of duty.”
89. There is also infighting as press secretary Sanders and her deputy Raj Shah echoed Vice President Pence saying the White House could have been handled this better, while Kelly disagrees, telling the WSJ Monday, “It was all done right.”
90. WAPO’s Philip Rucker, a reporter on the story, told MSNBC they tried to get a subordinate of Kelly to go on the record and say something positive about him for balance, but were unable to find one.
91. On Wednesday, Politico reported nine days into the Porter scandal, press secretary Sanders is pushing for senior officials who made the decisions around Porter’s security clearance to speak to the press directly.
92. On Wednesday, NBC News reported more than 130 appointees working in Trump's Executive Office did not have permanent security clearances as of November 2017, including Ivanka, Kushner, Dan Scavino, and McGahn.
93. On Trump's National Security Council, 10 of 24 officials had only interim security clearances as of November, including Dina Powell (who has resigned), Fiona Hill, Kevin Harrington, John Rader, and Joshua Steinman.
94. On Wednesday, National Economic Council official George David Banks who served since February 2017became the third White House official to resign after being told he would not receive permanent security clearance.
95. NBC News reported that in addition to the basic questionnaire to gain security clearance, some members of the Trump regime were required to answer supplemental questions asking if they are vulnerable to blackmail.
96. On Friday, WAPO reported, amid fallout from the Porter scandal, Kelly announced an overhaul of the White House security clearance process which places the onus on the FBI and DOJ to hand-deliver updates and information.
97. The five-page document begins, “We should — and in the future, must — do better,” is addressed to McGahn and McMaster, with Sessions and Wray copied, and gives 48 hours to report derogatory information to the White House.
98. Also Friday, Kelly announced starting next week, the White House will no longer allow some employees with interim security clearances access to top-secret information, which could impact Kushner in his role as senior adviser.
99. Kushner may not be able to maintain his extensive portfolio, which necessitate classified briefings. Kushner has also attended meetings where classified info was discussed, and had access to the President’s Daily Brief.
100. Bloomberg reported the IRS and DOJ have issued subpoenas for documents from lenders and investors in real estate projects managed by Kushner’s family in New York and New Jersey within the past year.
101. Talking Points Memo reported that Kushner quietly filed an addendum to his personal financial disclosure on January 3, 2018, adding a number of additional business interests which were previously undisclosed.
102. According to a recent update by Ivanka, Kushner has taken out millions more in loans, signaling liquidity issues. The couple is battling a lawsuit accusing them of illegally omitting information on 32 other companies.
103. TPM asked Kushner’s lawyer about public documents of other undisclosed business interests. The lawyer said Kushner “has provided complete information” on his financial disclosure, but there may be further updates.
104. On Friday, Reed Cordish, a senior Trump adviser on government-to-government and technology initiatives, and close friend of Kushner and Ivanka, resigned.
105. On Tuesday, Michael Cohen told the NYT he paid $130,000 of hush money to Stephanie Clifford out of his own pocket, saying neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction.
106. On Wednesday, NYT reported Cohen’s payment has raised potential legal questions ranging from breach of contract to ethics violations. Cohen has also been vague on whether he was reimbursed for his payment.
107. On Thursday, tax documents released by Trump's Inaugural Committee show the committee spent nearly all of the $107 million it raised. The majority of the funds, $57 million, went to four event-planning companies.
108. The largest payment of $25.8 million went to WIS Media Partners, an event-production company formed 45 days before the inauguration, led by Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, a friend and now unpaid adviser to Melania.
109. On Friday, Ronan Farrow reported on Trump's nine month affair with Playboy model Karen McDougal starting in 2006, which she memorialized in an eight-page handwritten document provided to The New Yorker.
110. McDougal was paid $150,000 by American Media, Inc. (AMI), publisher of the National Enquirer, on November 4, 2016 for exclusive rights to her story. David Pecker who owns AMI is a friend of Trump, and never ran her story.
111. Six former employees of AMI said Pecker routinely made arrangements with women called “catch-and-kill” — paying for stories that would never run. One employee said Pecker used the unpublished stories as leverage.
112. On Friday, First Lady Melania Trump broke with the tradition of walking as a couple across the South Lawn to Marine One amid the new allegations of Trump's marital affairs.
113. On Wednesday, 17 people were killed in a mass shooting at a high school in Parkland, Florida. This marks the third mass shooting in the last five months: at a school, church, and concert, done with a AR-15 semi-automatic rifle.
114. On Thursday, Trump tweeted blaming the shooting on mental illness and later called for mental health action. In February 2017, Trump signed a GOP bill revoking Obama-era gun checks for people with mental illness.
115. Trump's budget proposed a $25 million reduction in funds designated for national school safety activities, and the elimination of a $400 million grant program used to prevent bullying and for mental health assistance.
116. Wired reported that in the aftermath of the shooting, pro-gun Russian bots flooded Twitter. The top hashtags the bots were active in within 24 hours of the shooting included #Parkland, #gun control, and #guncontrolnow.
117. On Thursday, Politico reported the White House is feeling rudderless as this week Trump hung back behind staff rather than take decisive action in the face of the Porter scandal and then the Parkland school shooting.
118. On Friday, Mueller’s office unveiled criminal indictments against 13 Russian nationals and three foreign entities, which revealed a sophisticated network of interference in the 2016 presidential election.
119. The 37-page indictment includes conspiracy to defraud the US and aggravated identity theft, and reveals how the campaign also relied on extensive intelligence work by Russian operatives on US soil.
120. Two operatives, Aleksandra Krylova and Anna Bogacheva, traveled as tourists through at least nine states in June 2014 to gather intelligence used to evaluate political targets on social media before the campaigns got into full swing.
121. Russians stole the identities of American citizens and posed as political activists. They also set up US bank accounts and used computer servers located in the US.
122. Charges say the operation was primarily meant to communicate derogatory information about Clinton, to denigrate Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, and to support Bernie Sanders and Trump. There was also a push to back Jill Stein.
123. Political ads sought to chip away Black Americans’ support for Hillary and to lower Muslim American turnout. Operatives also pushed social media hashtags like #Hillary4Prison and #TrumpTrain.
124. One of the three entities indicted was Internet Research Agency, whose operations targeted US social media and which employed hundreds of people, and at one point had a monthly budget of over $1.25 million.
125. Starting in June 2016 when Trump had clinched the GOP nomination, the operatives began to organize and coordinate pro-Trump political rallies. In August, the operatives focused on Florida which Trump narrowly won.
126. NYT reported the Federal Election Commission had also launched its own investigation into Internet Research Agency last year, on whether it may have violated the FEC Act of 1971 with the purchase of Facebook ads.
127. In September 2017, as social media companies started disclosing Russia’s presence, one defendant,Viktorovna Kaverzina, emailed her family: “We had a slight crisis here at work: the FBI busted our activity (not a joke).
128. Mueller’s team also unsealed an indictment against 28-year-old Richard Pinedo, a California computer science major whose company opened bank accounts and sold them to shadowy purchasers for cash.
129. Pinedo pleaded guilty to identity fraud, and has been cooperating with Mueller’s team. He also wrote a plea supporting the indictment of Russian nationals. His lawyer said Pinedo sold accounts to Russians unwittingly.
130. After the indictments were released, Rosenstein held a press conference. Of note, he stood alone without Mueller or anyone from Mueller’s team. He said the defendants conducted information warfare against the US.
131. Rosenstein said he and Wray had briefed Trump on the indictments Friday morning. Experts noted the time frame between informing Trump and the public was unusually short.
132. Rosenstein noted the defendants “communicated with unwitting individuals associated with the Trump campaign,” and added, “there’s no allegation in this indictment” (emphasis added) of knowing collusion.
133. The DOJ said Mueller’s work is not complete. The charges did not address the hacking of Democratic email systems or whether Trump tried to obstruct the FBI investigation into Russian interference.
134. None of the defendants were arrested, and it is highly unlikely Russia will extradite its citizens to the US. Experts speculated the level of detail given this may indicate Mueller is perhaps deterring Russia from further action, and it may also elicit relevant documents from businesses and banks.
135. On Friday, the White House issued a statement saying the indictments show “there was NO COLLUSION between the Trump campaign and Russia and that the outcome of the election was not changed or affected.”
136. On Friday, Trump suggested he was vindicated, tweeting Russia started their operation in 2014, “long before I announced that I would run,” adding “the Trump campaign did nothing wrong — no collusion!”
137. Trump made no mention of a foreign power disrupting our election or acknowledging it occurred, nor did he announce any steps to address it. He was conspicuously silent on all these points again on Saturday.
138. On Saturday, at the 2018 Munich Security Conference, Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov called the indictments “just blabber.” Lavrov also noted that Vice President Pence had raised questions about the investigation.
139. Shortly after Lavrov spoke, McMaster told the audience that evidence of Russia interference in the 2016 presidential election is “now really incontrovertible.”
140. Former US ambassador Kislyak told the audience the indictments were “some kind of hunting spree throughout the world on Russian computer wizards,” adding they have “spoiled the trust” between the two countries.

From a Friend

I’ll keep her identity private, but I couldn't say it any better:

"Would you like to do something about gun violence? Don't vote for Republicans. For any office. Not even dog catcher. Not even if that Republican is your friend and would make a great dog catcher."

WE Must Do Something

“My kids’ right to survive a day at school outweighs your right to own any kind of gun you want. It just does.” -Ben Wexler

If your elected officials do not concur, vote them out. If your candidates do not concur, do not vote for them. It’s up to us to stop the madness.

Heartsick

And here we are, with yet another mass school shooting, this time in Florida. At least 17 dead, 15 injured. Another mentally disturbed white guy. (And no, not a Muslim, not a Dreamer, not on the streets of Chicago). Another disturbed white guy with access to an AR-15.

Again.

And you can shove your thoughts and prayers up your ass.

---

Now, some good news (I think!) On Monday, I saw  my original doctor in Tacoma who did my eye surgery four years ago, and to make a long(ish) story shorter, that stent is now el-gone-o. Yep, he got it out! Yay! (No biggie). Now I’m taking some uber-expensive/powerful antibiotic eye drops for a few days. (The eye was badly infected, and has been for months). I can say that it already feels much better, but I’m worried because it’s still weepy (which was why I’d had the surgery in the first place; the tear duct was obstructed and the surgery was supposed to fix that). I DO NOT WANT TO HAVE TO WEAR ONION GOGGLES WHEN I TAKE A WALK ON THE BEACH. He *thinks* the tearing will eventually improve once the eye recovers from the infection, but just in case, I have an appointment to go back in April if it doesn’t improve. (And then what??!)

---

Tonight, for Valentine’s Dinner (whoopee, right?) I am cooking up some lobster tails! We bought four 6-oz. tails, so we’ll each have two (which means a pretty decent amount) and they were very affordable! AND. . . I’m going to sous vide them! Instructions across the interwebs are all over the map, but I’ve settled on 140° for 1 hour. I’m just about to stick them in the water bath.

Mmmm. Buttah.

I’m a wee bit nervous about this, but I’m hoping it turns out delicious! Yikes.

Ladies & Gentlemen, The POTUS

Racist birther who brags about sexual assault and mocks the disabled and cheats on his post-partum wife with a porn star, takes the side of a multiple wife beater while refusing to protect us from enemies foreign (Russia) and domestic (white nationalists). Thanks, GOP. -Bradley Whitford (Josh from “The West Wing”)

Week Sixty-Five

Compiled by Amy Siskind

This week the chaos in our country infected Trump's beloved stock market, which suffered its most volatile week since the financial crisis of 2008, as the Republican Party of Trump abandoned yet another of its guiding principles, fiscal responsibility. The regime suffered multiple resignations from its thinly staffed White House, as well as resignation of the third-ranking official at the Department of Justice amid escalating attacks on our institutions by Trump and his allies.

Troubling signs that Russia never left, and plans to meddle in our midterms emerged, although an increasingly autocratic Trump has conveniently yet to acknowledge Russian interference in our 2016 election. The whitewashing of America continues with statements and actions by Trump and his regime which are antithetical to American values. Trump also continues his pattern of siding with men facing allegations of abuse, ignoring victims’ suffering and accusing them of telling lies, despite Steve Bannon’s warnings that the “anti-patriarchy movement” is changing the US power structure.

1. Late Saturday, WAPO reported Trump is hopeful that the release of the Devin Nunes memo release will pave the way for further shake-ups, including the firing of Rod Rosenstein, as he continues to take steps to derail the Mueller probe.
2. Late Saturday, TIME reported that in an August 2013 letter to an academic press, Carter Page bragged about his tie to the Kremlin: “I have had the privilege to serve as an informal advisor to the staff of the Kremlin.”
3. On Sunday, Republicans lawmakers including Rep. Trey Gowdy tried to distance themselves from the Nunes memo. Four members of the House Intelligence Committee said the memo should not impact the Mueller probe.
4. Asked about the Nunes memo release in an interview with CBS News, former CIA director Leon Panetta said, “I’ve been in public life for over 50 years. I have never in my lifetime seen anything like this happen.”
5. On Monday, Nunes admitted a central part of his memo’s case against the FBI is untrue: the FBI did disclose a law firm working for Hillary’s campaign and the Democratic Party paid for the dossier in a footnote.
6. Also on Monday, Nunes told Fox & Friends that George Papadopoulos who is mentioned in his memo, “never even knew who Trump — never even had met with” him. This is a lie. There a picture of the two together.
7. Amid the onslaught of attacks, Republican voters have soured on the FBI. Gallup found 49% of GOP voters think the FBI is doing an “excellent” or “good” job in December 2017, down from 62% in 2014.
8. On Monday, the House Intelligence Committee voted unanimously to release the Democratic rebuttal to the Nunes memo. Trump now has five days to review it and decide on redactions, if any, and if it should be released.
9. On Tuesday, Trump met with Rosenstein to discuss the Democratic rebuttal memo. Chief of staff John Kelly told reporters he asked key lawyers and national security officials to complete a final evaluation of the memo by Thursday.
10. On Monday, at a speech in Ohio, Trump called the Democrats who didn’t applaud his State of the Union speech “un-American” and “treasonous,” adding “I mean they certainly didn’t seem to love our country that much.”
11. On Tuesday, Sen. Jeff Flake took to the Senate floor to rebuke Trump's “not normal” comments, adding “Democratic colleagues love this country as much as we do. To suggest otherwise is simply unconscionable.”
12. On Tuesday, Democratic Rep. Hakeem Jeffries took the House floor saying, “how dare you lecture us,” asking if it is treason for a “campaign to meet with a hostile foreign power to sell out our democracy and rig the election?”
13. On Tuesday, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Trump was “clearly joking” when he made the comment about Democrats. Deputy press secretary Hogan Gidley added that the remark was “tongue-in-cheek.”
14. On Tuesday, White House officials say they have begun planning for a grand military parade later this year showcasing the might of America’s armed forces. Trump reportedly said, “I want a parade like the one in France.”
15. Trump's idea for a military parade was met with widespread bipartisan condemnation calling it a waste of money, and saying it would break from democratic traditions. Conservative Joe Walsh tweeted, “Trump isn’t a King.”
16. Robert J. O’Neill, a Fox News contributor and former Navy SEAL who killed Osama bin Laden, tweeted that Trump's parade idea is “third world bullshit,” saying a “First World” country doesn’t do such things.
17. On Thursday, Democrats introduced the PARADE (Preventing the Allocation of Resources for Absurd Defense Expenditures) Act, which would block Trump from spending taxpayers funds for his parade.
18. Chicago Sun Times reported Arthur Jones, an outspoken Holocaust denier, activist anti-Semite, and white supremacist, is set to become the GOP nominee for an Illinois congressional seat, representing parts of Chicago.
19. The Southern Poverty Law Center reported released a report, “The Alt-Right is Killing People.” Of 12 incidents which led to death or injuries, nine of those incidents occurred during 2017.
20. The Guardian reported that court documents reveal California police worked with, and expressed sympathy for, neo-Nazis while working to identify anti-fascist activists and Trump protesters after violent clashes at rallies.
21. Dallas Morning News reported the Trump regime capped the number of refugees it would admit at 45,000 for the fiscal year 2018, down from 85,000 allowed in Obama’s final year in office.
22. In the first four months of fiscal year 2018, just 6,700 refugees have been admitted, putting the US on pace to take 20,000 refugees, the lowest since the 1980 Refugee Act gave US leaders the power to set caps.
23. On Wednesday, the FBI released information that Border Patrol agent Rogelio Martinez, whose death in November 2017 was used by Trump to push for his border wall, was the result of an accident, not a homicide.
24. Reuters reported the Trump regime plans to revamp a US government program called “Countering Violent Extremism,” from countering all violent ideologies to solely focusing on Islamist extremism.
25. On Thursday, Trump tweeted “Time to end the visa lottery. Congress must secure the immigration system and protect Americans,” and linked to the 2010 case of Mubarak Ahmed Hamed, who illegally transferred money.
26. WAPO reported an employee of the Montana Department of Labor resigned after learning ICE planned to subpoena the state for labor data which would be used to “hunt down & deport undocumented workers.”
27. CNN reported Amer Adi, who has lived in the US for almost 40 years, has a wife and four daughters who are US citizens, and who Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan described as a “pillar” of his community, was deported to Jordan by ICE.
28. Since Trump took office, ICE arrests have increased by 42%. Tens of thousands of undocumented immigrants have been arrested, including many like Adi who are deeply rooted and have no criminal convictions.
29. Reuters reported Trump's Department of Homeland Security has drafted rules that would allow ICE to scrutinize immigrants’ use of certain taxpayer-funded public benefits, for them or their children, to determine if they could become a public burden.
30. Under the draft, a person would be considered a “public charge” if they depend on “any government assistance,” the result of which is effectively barring lower- and middle-income people from immigrating.
31. On Tuesday, at a meeting with Leader Mitch McConnell, Kelly said undocumented immigrants who hadn’t signed up for the DACA program were either “too afraid” or “too lazy to get off their asses.”
32. When asked later that day by the media to clarify his comments, Kelly doubled-down saying, “I gotta say that some of them just should have probably gotten off the couch and signed up.”
33. Kelly’s words were met with harsh condemnation from Democrats and advocates, calling his words “ignorant,” “discriminatory,” and “cruel.” Advocates cite fear, cost, and misinformation as the main barriers.
34. On Tuesday, when asked by the media about the pending government shutdown, Trump said he would “love to see a shutdown” if it helped get a tough immigration deal, including his border wall, passed in Congress.
35. On Wednesday, Rep. Nancy Pelosi held the House floor for over eight hours, the longest continuous speech in the chamber since 1909, to advocate for Dreamers, and for a vote on a bill to address DACA.
36. On Monday, Reuters reported acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Mick Mulvaney planned to pull-back from a full-scale probe of how hackers stole personal date of 143 million Americans from Equifax.
37. Intercept reported coal lobbyist Andrew Wheeler hosted fundraisers for Sens. John Barrasso and Jim Inhofe, Republicans on the Committee on Environment and Public Works, ahead of his nomination for a top EPA position.
38. Association of Health Care Journalists reported The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services threatened to ban a reporter from press calls after he refused to delete parts of a published story at the request of CMS administrator Seema Verma.
39. The agency followed through with its threat last week when Virgil Dickson of Modern Healthcare said his phone went mute during a CMS press call and a woman’s voice told him he was not allowed to participate.
40. EPA administrator Scott Pruitt said in an interview with KSNV News 3 Las Vegas, that the warming climate is not “necessarily is a bad thing,” suggesting instead that a warm climate could be beneficial.
41. The state legislature in Idaho voted to strip all mentions of human-caused climate change from statewide science guidelines, the first state to do so. Parents, teachers, and students are pushing back for revised standards.
42. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos told Politico she found it “hurtful” being criticized for not upholding civil rights. She responded to lawsuits against her and her department for repealing Obama-era rules on campus sexual assault, saying she hoped “nobody who has been involved” would now not come forward.
43. On Thursday, the two largest teachers union were blocked from entering the Education Department building to deliver complaints in the form of 80,000 report cards to DeVos, because they did not have an appointment.
44. A three-month study conducted by Oxford, as part of the school’s Computational Propaganda Research Project, found Trump supporters consume and share the most fake news on Twitter and Facebook.
45. Congressional Republicans took another step in quietly dismantling Obamacare, disbanding the Independent Payment Advisory Board, a board designed to tame runaway Medicare costs, should they ever arise.
46. Judge Gonzalo Curiel, whom Trump described in 2016 as a “hater” and a “Mexican” who disliked Trump because of his strong border stance, will hear a key environmental case on Trump's border wall with Mexico.
47. On Monday, the Supreme Court denied a request from Pennsylvania Republicans to delay redrawing congressional lines. The deadline to redraw districts, which will benefit Democrat, was Friday.
48. Pennsylvania State Rep. Cris Dush sent a letter to fellow House Republicans calling for the impeachment of the five justices who ruled that the legislature must redraw the state’s gerrymandered maps.
49. On Friday, Dallas Morning News reported that county Republicans filed a lawsuit alleging the Democratic Party chair did not sign petitions of 128 candidates, so they should be kicked off the March 6 primary ballot.
50. Sen. Chuck Grassley sent a letter of rebuke to Jeff Sessions, saying a memo which instructs Department of Justice employees not to communicate with Congress without pre-approval discourages whistleblowers and does not comply with the law.
51. Spain extradited Russian citizen Pyotr Levashov, aka Peter Severa, a spam kingpin, to the US to face charges of links to a series of powerful botnets that were capable of pumping out billions of spam emails.
52. A counter-extradition request from Russia was rejected. Levashov was apprehended while vacationing with his family in Barcelona in April. In Week 22, his wife said he was arrested for being “linked to Trump's win.”
53. On Monday, NYT reported Trump's lawyers have advised him against being interviewed by Mueller’s team over concern Trump would make false statements and contradict himself, and could be charged with lying.
54. If Trump refuses to be interviewed, Mueller could subpoena him to testify before a grand jury, a court fight that could be determined by the Supreme Court. It could also prompt accusations that Trump has something to hide.
55. On Tuesday, Steve Bannon did not show up to testify before the House Intelligence Committee, despite a subpoena. Bannon’s attorney said the White House would not let him testify beyond 14 pre-approved yes-or-no questions.
56. On Tuesday, Rep. Adam Schiff said if Bannon maintains his refusal, the committee should commence contempt proceedings to compel his testimony. The House has given Bannon one week to comply with their subpoena.
57. On Wednesday, Schiff said in a statement that neither Bannon and Corey Lewandowski have “articulated legitimate grounds for refusing to appear and answer questions.” Schiff plans to subpoena Lewandowski too.
58. NBC News reported Bannon is likely to meet with Mueller’s team next week. Bannon has reportedly struck a deal with Mueller’s team to avoid having to testify before a grand jury.
59. Politico reported that the FBI was monitoring Carter Page when he spoke to Bannon in January 2017, and may have picked up the call. In Page’s November testimony to the House Intelligence Committee, he mentioned the call.
60. According to Page, Bannon called to ask him to cancel a planned television appearance shortly before Trump's January 21 inauguration. The two then discussed the dossier which was made public on January 11 by BuzzFeed.
61. Research findings by BuzzFeed and Jonathan Albright of Columbia University reveal Russian trolls were active on Tumblr during the 2016 election, although the company has yet to face Congressional scrutiny.
62. Russian-run Tumblr accounts used the same or similar usernames as the list of confirmed Russian troll farm Internet Research Agency accounts on other social media. Accounts generated hundreds of thousands of interactions which were anti-Hillary Clinton.
63. On Tuesday, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said that Russia is already gearing up to meddle in the 2018 midterms, following the playbook it used in 2016. Tillerson warned the US is not “better prepared” and that Russia will adapt as well.
64. In an interview with NBC News the head of cybersecurity at the Department of Homeland Security, Jeanette Manfra said, “We saw a targeting of 21 states and an exceptionally small number of them were actually successfully penetrated.”
65. NBC News reported many of the states complained the federal government did not provide specific threat details. Manfra said clearances are being processed to make more sharing possible.
66. On Thursday, George W. Bush said during his talk at an economic summit in Abu Dhabi that there is “pretty clear evidence that the Russians meddled” in the 2016 US election.
67. A poll by NBC News/SurveyMonkey found 79% of Americans are concerned our voting systems might be vulnerable to computer hackers, while just 55% say our federal government is doing enough about it.
68. On Wednesday, the WSJ reported the Senate Intelligence Committee is drafting is a report on vulnerabilities in the US election system based on the committee’s Russia probe which is expected to be released in March.
69. On Thursday, Fox News reported Sen. Mark Warner, ranking Democrat of the Senate Intelligence Committee, had extensive contact via texting with a lobbyist for a Russian oligarch who was offering him access to Christopher Steele.
70. Of note: last week in Week 64, Assange messaged a Twitter account he thought belonged to Fox News’ Sean Hannity offering, “Have some news about [Sen. Mark] Warner.” Fox News broke the story on Warner.
71. On Thursday, shortly after the Fox News story, Trump tweeted “Senator Mark Warner got caught having extensive contact with a lobbyist for a Russian oligarch.” Russian bots were also active in attacking Warner.
72. Republican Sen. Marco Rubio, also on the Senate Intelligence Committee, tweeted in response to the Fox News story, “Sen.Warner fully disclosed this to the committee four months ago. Has had zero impact on our work.”
73. On Wednesday, Sen. Ron Johnson released a new report which included additional texts between FBI agent Peter Strzok and Page. A September 2, 2016 text from Page says, “potus wants to know everything we’re doing.”
74. Shortly after the next texts were released, Trump tweeted, “NEW FBI TEXTS ARE BOMBSHELLS!” Press secretary Sanders added the report, “further shows that there is reason for us to have great cause for concern.”
75. Sen. Johnson asserted the text was Obama wanting to know about the Clinton email investigation, however the investigation was closed at that time. September 2 was three days before Obama confronted Putin for meddling in our election on the sidelines of the G20 meeting in Hangzhou, China.
76. On Thursday, FBI informant Douglas Campbell resurrected Uranium One, saying in a statement to three congressional committees that Russia routed $3 million through an American lobbying firm to influence Hillary and Obama.
77. On Thursday, CBS News reported that House Intelligence Republicans will literally wall off their aides from Democratic staffers. Republicans on the committee claim to not be part of this, instead suggesting the move is by Nunes.
78. A Marist College poll found Americans who strongly disapprove of Trump is up to 44% from 39% last month, while just 24% strongly approve.
79. The poll also found 71% do not think the FBI is out to get Trump. Also, 55% said they would believe Mueller over Trump, compared to 30% who said the reverse.
80. WAPO reported Christopher Steele, according to colleagues, was so concerned about what he learned from his Russia network on the Kremlin’s plans, he said “it was like “sitting on a nuclear weapon.”
81. Steele was summoned to Rome to meet with the US intelligence. He shared that Russia had damaging information on Trump, and they planned to carry out an operation to tilt the US election, ordered by Putin.
82. The FBI treated Steele as a peer. On Russian expertise, Steele had been sought out by the DOJ on past cases, as well as providing briefing material for British prime ministers and at least one US president.
83. Speaker Paul Ryan tweeted then deleted a tweet celebrating a high school secretary’s $1.50/week pay increase under the GOP tax law. Ryan collected $500,000 from the Koch Brothers days after the law passed.
84. Ryan, in turn, donated $5,000 to 143 Republican members of Congress.
85. CNN reported under the Republican tax law, Exxon will lower its tax bill by $6 billion, as the company’s tax rate is lowered from 35% to 21%. Tillerson recused himself for one year only from matters relating to Exxon.
86. WAPO reported according to a document released by the Treasury Department, the US government expects to borrow $955 billion in 2018 up from $519 billion last year, and the highest borrowing amount in six years.
87. The jump in borrowing is the biggest since a spike under Reagan. The Congressional Budget Office said in a report the steep increase in borrowing is from lower tax receipts resulting from the GOP tax law.
88. On Tuesday, the Commerce Department announced the trade gap in goods and services rose to $566 billion in 2017, the highest level since 2008.
89. Following the sell-off Friday on the release of the Nunes memo, the global sell-off continued Monday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) plunging 1,175 points, the largest single-day drop in history.
90. CNBC reported the DJIA traveled more than 20,000 points this week, the most volatility since October 2008, during the financial crisis.
91. On Tuesday, Democrats picked up a seat in the Missouri state House of Representatives. Mike Revis, a 27-year-old, won the race by four points, in a deep-red district that Trump had won by 28 points.
92. So far in nine 2018 special election races, Democratic candidates are running 27 points ahead of Clinton and 12 ahead of Obama. In 70 races in 2017, Democrats ran 10 points ahead of Clinton and 7 ahead of Obama.
93. Lawfare reported, based on 103 FBI emails obtained under a FOIA request, that despite statements by Trump and Sanders, bureau employees were shocked by Comey’s firing, and were supportive of him as their leader.
94. NYT reported FEMA awarded Tiffany Brown, an Atlanta entrepreneur and sole owner of her company with no experience in large-scale disaster relief, a $156 million contract to deliver meals for Puerto Ricans.
95. Brown’s contract called for delivering 30 million meals. By the time 18.5 million meals were due, only 50,000 had been delivered. House Democrats have asked Rep. Gowdy to subpoena documents from FEMA.
96. Reps. Elijah Cummings and Gerald Connolly, the Democratic leaders on the House Oversight Committee send a letter to committee chair Gowdy complaining that 13 of the 19 subpoenas put forth by Democrats have been rejected.
97. On Friday, Sen. Tim Kaine demanded the release of a secret memo outlining Trump's interpretation of his legal authority to wage war. Sessions was briefed on the memo last April, but Trump has yet to brief Congress.
98. On Tuesday, the National Weather Service sent out an errant tsunami warning on Twitter to several East Coast locations. The warnings were supposed to be a test, but due to a glitch came out as an actual warning.
99. In an op-ed, former Office of Government Ethics director Walter Shaub criticized the Russia probe legal defense fund set up by the Trump regime in Week 64 as “unethical” citing Trump's ability to allocate funds and lack of visibility on donors.
100. WAPO reported that, breaking with tradition, Trump does not read his daily intelligence reports, instead relying on oral briefings. Experts say by not reading the detailed classified info, Trump could miss detail and nuance.
101. In the quickly shifting US media landscape, Time Inc. takeover by Meredith with funding by the Koch Brother was completed, Newsweek was in disarray after being raided by the Manhattan DA, and biotech billionaire Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong took over the LA Times.
102. Daily Beast reported that a media startup Redfish, a Berlin-based media collective marketed as “grassroots,” is actually supported by the Kremlin and most of its in-house staff last worked for Russian government media.
103. On Friday, at the opening ceremony for the Winter Olympics in South Korea, Vice President Pence and the second lady sat stone faced while South Korean president Moon, North Korea officials and others stood together to applaud their athletes.
104. As Pence led the US delegation, openly gay figure skater Adam Rippon told a reporter, “You mean Mike Pence, the same Mike Pence that funded gay conversion therapy?” Rippon turned down a meeting request from Pence.
105. On Tuesday, UK’s Daily Mail reported the two ex-wives of Trump aide Rob Porter say he was physically and emotionally abusive, and his second wife had an order of protection against him. Porter is currently dating Hope Hicks.
106. Porter had a central role in the Trump regime, working for Kelly and as Staff Secretary, controlling the information that reached Trump, including highly classified information. On Wednesday, Kelly said “Porter is a man of true integrity and honor, and I can’t say enough good things about him.
107. Porter denied the allegations, but resigned on Wednesday. CNN reported senior aides to Trump had known about the abuse allegations for months. Trump reportedly learned of the allegations this week.
108. Hicks did not recuse herself from the White House media strategy. A statement from Sen. Orrin Hatch was being released by the White House without his office’s knowledge as new facts came out and the senator’s office was issuing an updated statement. Porter formerly served as chief of staff to Hatch.
109. A year into serving, Porter was unable to get permanent security clearance. Kelly and others had been aware since early fall that this was due to the FBI speaking to Porter’s ex-wives as part of routine background.
110. Late Wednesday, reportedly after seeing photos of Porter’s first wife with a black eye, Kelly said in a statement he was “shocked” by the allegations against Porter, and “there is no place for domestic violence in our society.”
111. On Thursday, Porter’s second ex-wife Jennifer Willoughby said she told the FBI about the abuse and protective order. She said when FBI agents asked if Porter could potentially be blackmailed, she answered, “maybe.”
112. Intercept reported a friend of Porter tried to silence Porter’s first ex-wife Colbie Holderness by contacting her husband ahead of her FBI interview in January 2017. Holderness described her abuse in detail to the FBI, and told them she believed Porter’s history would make him easy to blackmail.
113. On Thursday, WAPO reported that White House counsel Donald McGahn knew Porter’s ex-wives accused him of domestic violence in January 2017, but allowed him to continue as an influential aide and gatekeeper of information to Trump.
114. McGahn’s views didn’t change in June when the FBI flagged some of its findings to the White House, or in September when he learned the domestic violence claims were delaying Porter’s security clearance, or in November when Porter’s former girlfriend contacted him about the allegations.
115. Rep. Cummings slammed House Oversight Committee chair Gowdy in a letter for stonewalling efforts to get information on the security clearance process at the White House. Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney called for an investigation of Porter.
116. CNN reported 30 to 40 White House officials and political appointees are still operating without full security clearances, including Jared Kushner. Experts describe the backlog as unusual after more than a year in office.
117. WAPO reported McGahn and others are hesitant to act on others not getting security clearance, because they have not taken steps on Kushner, who has access to highly classified materials including the daily briefings.
118. On Friday, CNN reported Trump is frustrated with Hicks over her role in what has become the Porter scandal. Trump thinks Hicks let her romantic relationship cloud her judgment, and put her priorities ahead of his.
119. WAPO reported Kelly told White House staff in a Friday morning meeting to communicate a new version of events, and to say he took action to remove Porter within 40 minutes of learning abuse allegations were credible.
120. This version contradicts reporting and accounts of numerous White House officials who say Kelly knew about the allegations for months. Kelly also told his staff to convey to other White House aides that he cares about domestic violence.
121. On Friday, Trump told reporters he was “very sad” about Porter’s departure and “we wish him well.”Trump did not express any sympathy for Porter’s victims, instead adding Porter “says he’s innocent.”
122. WAPO’s Jennifer Rubin noted Trump has yet to put forth a nominee for the DOJ’s director for the office of violence against women, nor has he named a White House adviser for violence against women, a position created by Obama.
123. The House voted to change decades-old procedures handling reports of sexual harassment and assault accusations. The bill still has to pass through the Senate and Trump. Eight lawmakers have resigned or said they will not seek re-election since the start of #MeToo.
124. Changes include a rule that lawmakers cannot have sexual relations with their staff, a new office will help guide victims, taxpayers will no longer pay lawmakers’ legal bills, and non-disclosure statements will no longer be required.
125. In an interview with Bloomberg, Bannon warned Trump the “anti-patriarchy movement” is going to dramatically alter the power structure in the US, adding “I think it’s going to unfold like the tea party, only bigger.”
126. On Friday, Rachel Brand, the third-highest-ranking official at the DOJ, a department under constant attack by Trump, resigned to take a position at Walmart. Brand was confirmed for the position just nine months ago.
127. Brand would have been next in line to oversee the Mueller investigation if Trump fires Rosenstein, renewing concerns Trump will move to end the Mueller probe. Trump appointee Noel Francisco is now next in line.
128. On Friday, Kelly’s deputy chief of staff, Jim Carroll, announced he will leave the White House to lead the Office of National Drug Control Policy. Reportedly, the resignation was planned prior to the Porter scandal.
129. Carroll is the third deputy chief of staff to resign in the first 13 months since Trump took office. Late Friday, the NYT reported Kelly has offered to resign over the Porter scandal.
130. On Friday WAPO reported that a second White House staffer, David Sorensen, a speechwriter for Stephen Miller, resigned amid allegations by his ex-wife, Jessica Corbett, that he was physically and emotionally abusive.
131. Corbett first contacted the Post after Porter’s case became public. Corbett said she detailed her domestic abuse allegations to an FBI agent in October 2017, as part of Sorensen’s background check process.
132. NYT reported US spies paid a $100,000 down-payment in Berlin in September 2017 to a Russian who promised to deliver stolen NSA cyberweapons as well as compromising information on Trump.
133. Reportedly the Russian handed over data in October and December, but all was related to the 2016 election and alleged ties between Trump and Russia, not the NSA or CIA hacking tools. The CIA then cut ties.
134. Intercept further reported Trump appointee CIA director Mike Pompeo was at times reluctant to stay involved in the operation, fearing the information obtained from the Russians would be Trump-related material.
135. Some sources claim that the CIA has become so politicized under Pompeo, agents fear taking in materials that could be damaging to Trump, and also fear Trump's blowback on their agencies and firing senior officials.
136. Late Friday, Trump announced he will not allow the Democrats’ rebuttal memo to be declassified and released. McGahn said in a letter the memo contains “numerous properly classified and especially sensitive passages.”
137. On Saturday, Trump tweeted he did not release the memo because it is “very political and long.” Sen. Dianne Feinstein called it “hypocrisy at its worst” adding she has read the classified materials and the Nunes memo is “misleading.”
138. On Saturday, again following his pattern of supporting men accused of assault, Trump tweeted “lives are being shattered and destroyed by a mere allegation,” adding, “some are true and some are false.”

Socializing and Stuff

The Winter Olympics have begun in PyeongChang, South Korea and we completely missed the Opening Ceremony. Bummer. We were visiting our neighbors and neither of us thought ahead to record it. Oh well. I’m currently watching the ice dancing, which I enjoy but it does get a little tiresome after a while. (I have yet to see anything that comes anywhere close to Torvill & Dean dancing to Bolero at the 1984 Olympics). This time around I’m honestly not familiar with ANY of the athletes (I don’t think; well, there’s Lindsey Vonn, the often-injured Alpine skier who has been to several of these), so I will need to get to “know” some of the folks in order to feel the excitement and emotions I typically have during the Olympics. I always have become immersed in the drama. I did see video of the asshat vice president who refused to stand and honor any of the athletes except the Americans during the Opening Ceremony. His radically pious self must be miserable surrounded by so many non-English speaking people of various skin colors (from “shithole countries”) besides white. And I’m sure he won’t be interested in the ice skating events because there might be gays.

[Oooh! Watching the snowboarders now and cute lil’ Red Gerard of the U.S. just won the gold!]

We had a great time over at the Mees last night for dinner. I had my first Moscow Mule! Yum! I’m thinking about getting me some copper mugs and some ginger beer! They have a duplex in the Dominican Republic that they rent out, and then go down to spend a few weeks now and then. They’ll be heading down again on Valentine’s Day for 5 weeks for some sun and beach fun. Yeah, I’m a bit envious!

[Oooh! Now watching the Women’s short skate program. I LOVE listening to Tara Lipinski and Johnny Weir! They’re snarky…but professional. But snarky!]

Fun Book Club Thursday, and I was surprised that I was the only one who enjoyed the Katharine Graham autobiography. I mean, yes, Katharine came from an extremely privileged background, but I thought it was interesting! So many historical and dramatic elements to her life. And, I sensed that even with all her privilege, she was a very insecure person, which gave her humility (even though she had no clue about how to launder her clothes when she was in college because servants had always taken care of that for her). At any rate, on to the next book, which is “The Lying Game” by Ruth Ware. It sounds quite mysterious!

[I keep expecting Tara L. to rag on some of these skaters’ outfits].

Mundane, But Nice

Today was actually a day that made me think of spring. I could feel a hint of it, kind of like I can sometimes feel a hint of fall in August. For the first time in what feels like forever, it did not rain, and the temps were in the mid 50s. Also? No breeze, so no wind chill. Not especially sunny, but peeks of it through the clouds now and then.

John and I (and the dog) drove into to Shelton for lunch (where I had my go-to chicken salad croissant sandwich and nummy balsamic vinaigrette side salad), and then we hit the grocery store. I skipped this week’s Blue Apron so I needed a few things to add to the stores of meat I’ve had in the freezer and need to use. (We have tons of pork ribs. I do not know why). It was nice to be out and about for a while, even if the reason was mundane. (I honestly don’t mind mundane).

Yesterday, while John was at the Hydroplane Museum, I taught myself to “bead.” I’ve bought my niece beading supplies as gifts over the years, but I’ve never had any interest in it myself. Beaded jewelry at farmer’s markets or gift shops have never jazzed me, and I got sick and tired of the ad jingle on the radio over and over and over again for “SHIPWRECK BEADS!” Blech. (I haven’t heard it for a while after years on blast; maybe they went out of business). Anyway, I’d made the fused glass components for a wind chime, and I knew that I didn’t want the wire holding the chiming parts to be plain. I wanted intermittent beads to break up the span of the wire. So I scored some really cool “sea glass” beads from Ebay, then sat down to watch YouTube videos on stringing beads. I realized I needed a few more supplies, like crimping beads and special pliers, so I ordered those and yesterday was the day to try it. (I was kind of dreading it because I always have 10 thumbs when I’m trying something for the first time).

And sure enough, I struggled for a while. Ultimately, I blame my bad eye that never stopped tearing up and driving me over the edge, BUT I PERSISTED.

It was dark when I finally finished it, so it wasn’t until today that I could get an idea how it looked in daylight. I don’t have a hook handy yet, so I held it up to a window and contorted myself to take a photo. Here it is:

Hopefully I’ll get a better picture tomorrow when John hangs it on the hook I want it on (that I can’t reach).

At any rate, it was pretty fun to make, and it was a good use of some scrap glass I had laying around.

Book club tomorrow! (I desperately want — right now! — to be reading the final book on the final chapter of trump). (And what a book that will be!)