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  • Kentucky Christmas parade canceled amid threats to protestors calling for Emmett Till accuser’s arrest | CNN

    Kentucky Christmas parade canceled amid threats to protestors calling for Emmett Till accuser’s arrest | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Bowling Green, Kentucky, has canceled its annual Christmas parade scheduled for Saturday due to threats against protests related to the notorious lynching of 14-year-old Emmett Till in 1955.

    The city announced the cancellation in tweet. In a video posted on Facebook, Police Chief Michael Delaney said at least three groups planned to protest at noon on Saturday at two locations.

    Warren County Sheriff Brett Hightower said his office learned of threats late Friday evening “to shoot anyone who is protesting” or assisting protesters, Hightower said.

    “At this moment, we have not been able to determine the validity of the threat; however, we believe it’s important to alert our citizens,” the sheriff said.

    The protesters want a Mississippi court to order the arrest of Carolyn Bryant Donham, the White woman now in her late 80s who accused Till of whistling at her in 1955 in Mississippi, according to CNN affiliate WBKO. He was abducted, tortured, and lynched, in a case that drew national attention and helped galvanize attention on the civil rights movement.

    According to WKBO, Donham’s last known address is believed to be an apartment in Bowling Green.

    Donham was never arrested in connection with Till’s death, but a warrant for her arrest was found earlier this year in a Mississippi courthouse basement. A grand jury in Mississippi declined to indict Donham in August.

    The Bowling Green-Warren County NACCP said it is not slated to protest Saturday.

    “This is due in part to safety concerns for the event, as well as focusing our energies on those who are currently being discriminated against and need immediate assistance,” the organization said in a statement last week.

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  • Former Trump White House counsel and his deputy testify to Jan. 6 criminal grand jury | CNN Politics

    Former Trump White House counsel and his deputy testify to Jan. 6 criminal grand jury | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Former Trump White House counsel Pat Cipollone and deputy counsel Patrick Philbin testified to a federal grand jury for several hours in Washington, DC, on Friday, indicating the Justice Department had compelled the men to answer more questions in the January 6, 2021, criminal investigation despite challenges from Donald Trump’s legal team.

    The January 6 grand jury activity is the latest indication the investigation – now led by special counsel Jack Smith – has pushed in recent months to unearth new details about direct conversations with the former president and advice given to him after the election.

    Cipollone was first seen entering the grand jury area with his attorney, Michael Purpura, before 9 a.m., and he was there for more than five hours. Purpura has not responded to requests for comment. The grand jury proceedings themselves are confidential.

    Philbin, whom Purpura also represents, headed into the grand jury area just before the lunch hour on Friday, staying until about 4 p.m.

    Thomas Windom and Mary Dohrmann, prosecutors in the January 6 investigation who are now to be led by Smith, were also seen walking in with Cipollone.

    The investigators are looking at efforts to obstruct the transfer of power at the end of Trump’s presidency and have obtained testimony from several administration advisers closest to the former president after the election and as the Capitol was attacked by his supporters.

    CNN previously reported that Chief Judge Beryl Howell of the DC District Court, who oversees the federal grand juries in Washington, ordered Cipollone and Philbin to provide additional grand jury testimony this month, following up on their testimony in the fall. The judge has repeatedly rejected Trump’s privilege claims in the Justice Department’s criminal investigation of efforts to overturn the 2020 election, according to people briefed on the matter.

    Philbin and Cipollone were both key witnesses to Trump’s actions in the last days of his presidency. Cipollone repeatedly pushed back on efforts to overturn the 2020 election, and according to a Senate Judiciary Committee report, he and Philbin opposed a proposal to replace the attorney general with someone willing to look into false claims of election fraud.

    Previously, the Justice Department compelled top advisers from Vice President Mike Pence’s office to testify to the grand jury. They had sought to protect Pence in January 2021 from Trump’s pressure campaign to overturn the election.

    Earlier this week, Trump White House official Stephen Miller, who worked with Trump on his speech at the Ellipse, had his own day before the grand jury.

    On Thursday, another leg of Smith’s special counsel investigation – into the handling of documents at Mar-a-Lago after the presidency – was active in the courthouse. At least one Mar-a-Lago prosecutor was working in the secret grand jury proceedings, as three aides to Trump, Dan Scavino, William Russell and Beau Harrison, each appeared, according to sources familiar with them. Their attorney declined to comment.

    This story has been updated with additional details.

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  • IRS inspector general says intensive audits of former FBI Director Comey and deputy were random | CNN Politics

    IRS inspector general says intensive audits of former FBI Director Comey and deputy were random | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    An inspector general for the Internal Revenue Service said this week that significant tax audits conducted for 2017 and 2019 – years where former FBI Director James Comey and then-deputy Andrew McCabe have said they were audited – were randomly selected and did not show misconduct by the IRS.

    The report does not mention Comey or McCabe by name but says the assessment was conducted after a July New York Times article.

    “Maybe it’s a coincidence or maybe somebody misused the IRS to get at a political enemy,” Comey said in a statement in July.

    McCabe told CNN’s Laura Coates at the time that, “people need to be able to trust the institutions of government and so that’s why there should be some – we should dig through this and find out what happened.”

    In July, The New York Times reported that Comey had received a highly intensive tax audit for 2017 and McCabe had received the same for 2019, questioning whether it was “sheer coincidence” that the two were selected.

    The Times was first to report the inspector general’s findings.

    An attorney for Comey declined to comment on the inspector general’s report and McCabe did not respond to CNN’s request for comment.

    Democratic Rep. Richard Neal, the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said in a statement that he had “requested a deeper probe into the former president’s use of the IRS against his political enemies” last month, noting that “this report alleviates some concerns” but hopes to receive more information from the inspector general.

    The inspector general said in its report that the office will continue to examine certain IRS practices related to the intensive tax audits.

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  • Venezuela and Chevron sign oil contract in Caracas | CNN

    Venezuela and Chevron sign oil contract in Caracas | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    The Venezuelan government and American oil company Chevron have signed a contract in Caracas on Friday to resume operations in Venezuela, according to the country’s state broadcaster VTV.

    “This contract aims to continue with the productive and development activities in this energy sector, framed within our Constitution and the Venezuelan laws that govern oil activity in the country,” said Venezuelan oil minister Tareck El Aissami, who was slapped with United States sanctions in 2017.

    He attended the signing ceremony along with representatives from Venezuelan state-owned oil and natural gas company PDVSA and Chevron.

    April 2023 will mark Chevron’s 100th anniversary in Venezuela, El Aissami said at the event.

    The move comes after the United States granted Chevron limited authorization to resume pumping oil from Venezuela last week, following an announcement that the Venezuelan government and the opposition group had reached an agreement on humanitarian relief and will continue to negotiate for a solution to the country’s chronic economic and political crisis.

    The US has been looking for ways to allow Venezuela to begin producing more oil and selling it on the international market, thereby reducing the world’s energy dependence on Russia, US officials told CNN in May.

    A 6-month license was granted to Venezuela by the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) last week, and the US can revoke it at any time. Additionally, any profits earned will go to repaying debt to Chevron and not to the Maduro regime, according to a senior official.

    In 2017, OFAC said El Aissami had played a “significant role in international narcotics trafficking,” according to a news release.

    The Treasury Department said he “facilitated shipments of narcotics from Venezuela to include control over planes that leave from a Venezuelan air base, (and) narcotics shipments of over 1,000 kilograms from Venezuela on multiple occasions, including those with the final destinations of Mexico and the United States.”

    In addition, the department said El Aissami is linked to coordinating drug shipments to Los Zetas, a violent Mexican drug cartel, and provided protection to a Colombian drug lord.

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  • Suspect in 2017 killing of two Indiana teen girls ‘has nothing to hide,’ attorneys say | CNN

    Suspect in 2017 killing of two Indiana teen girls ‘has nothing to hide,’ attorneys say | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Attorneys for the suspect in the 2017 killing of two teenage girls in Delphi, Indiana, said in a statement Friday that their client “has nothing to hide. ”

    Richard Allen, who was arrested last month in connection with the killings, will make “a vigorous legal and factual challenge” to the prosecution claim that a .40 caliber unspent round found near the bodies of the two teens tied him to the crime, attorneys Brad Rozzi and Andrew Baldwin said in the statement.

    The statement comes days after the unsealing of a probable cause affidavit on Tuesday that shed light on how investigators narrowed in on Allen and arrested him more than five years since the slayings of Abigail Williams, 13, and Liberty German, 14.

    Allen is charged with two counts of murder and has pleaded not guilty.

    The two girls went for a hike along Delphi Historic Trails but never showed up at a previously arranged time to meet Libby’s dad, according to police. Their bodies were found the next day in a wooded area near the trail, about a half mile from the Monon High Bridge where they’d been dropped off, according to authorities.

    A grainy video of a man walking and a garbled voice recording were among the scant clues authorities publicized over the years.

    “Rick has nothing to hide,” the statement from the attorneys said. “We feel it appropriate, necessary, and within the bounds of our rules of professional conduct to make a few comments concerning the probable cause affidavit and Rick’s innocence.”

    Investigators believe the evidence they gathered shows that Allen is the man seen on a video from Liberty’s phone who forced the girls down a hill and that he led them to the location where they were killed, according to the affidavit.

    That evidence includes interviews with witnesses who were in the area the teens were hiking on a day off from school on February 13, 2017, as well as the video from Libby’s phone. The video shows a man in a dark jacket and jeans walking behind the girls and then telling them, “Guys, down the hill,” according to the affidavit.

    Allen’s lawyers said their client “contacted the police and voluntarily discussed being on the trail that day,” according to the statement. “Like many people in Delphi, Rick wanted to help any way he could.”

    The two girls were dropped off in the area just before 1:50 p.m. that day, the affidavit said. The video showed they encountered the man at the Monon High Bridge at 2:13 p.m.

    A witness told investigators she had seen a man heading away from that bridge later “wearing a blue colored jacket and blue jeans and was muddy and bloody,” and appeared to have gotten in a fight, the affidavit said. The man was traveling on a road adjacent to the crime scene, and investigators were able to determine that took place shortly before 4 p.m.

    Allen remembers “seeing three younger girls on the trail that day” but “his contact with the girls was brief and of little significance,” his attorneys said.

    “The probable cause affidavit seems to suggest that a single magic bullet is proof of Rick’s guilt,” Rozzi and Baldwin said. “We anticipate a vigorous legal and factual challenge to any claims by the prosecution as to the reliability of its conclusions concerning the single magic bullet.”

    Another witness told investigators she noticed an oddly parked vehicle at an old Child Protective Services building. A tip to investigators had also referenced a vehicle parked at the building that “appeared as though it was backed in as to conceal the license plate.” Investigators believe the description of the vehicle matched one of two vehicles that Allen owned in 2017, the affidavit said.

    When Allen spoke with an officer in 2017, he admitted he was on the trail for roughly two hours, the affidavit said. In a subsequent interview in October 2022, Allen told authorities he had gone out there to “watch fish,” that he was wearing jeans and a black or blue jacket and also said he owns firearms which were at his home, according to the affidavit.

    “On October 13th, 2022, Investigators executed a search warrant of Richard Allen’s residence,” the affidavit said. “Among other items, officers located jackets, boots, knives and firearms, including a Sig Sauer, Model P226, .40 caliber pistol with serial number U 625 627.”

    According to the document, investigators found a .40 caliber unspent round less than two feet away from one of the bodies, and between the two victims.

    Lab results confirmed the unspent round had been cycled through Allen’s Sig Sauer, the affidavit said. When Allen was questioned about that result, he denied knowing their victims or having any involvement in their killings, according to the affidavit.

    The affidavit does not make any reference to any other participants in the girls’ killings, despite Carroll County Prosecutor Nick McLeland recently saying in court that he had “good reason to believe that Richard Allen is not the only actor in this heinous crime.”

    Allen’s lawyers said they pushed to have the affidavit unsealed.

    “We were hoping that we would receive tips that would assist us in proving up his innocence,” the statement said. “Although it is the burden of the prosecutor to prove Rick’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, the defense team looks forward to conducting its own investigation concerning Rick’s innocence.”

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  • Shanquella Robinson’s death is being investigated as a femicide. Here is what it means | CNN

    Shanquella Robinson’s death is being investigated as a femicide. Here is what it means | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    The killing of Shanquella Robinson is being investigated as a femicide, an unfamiliar term for many in the United States as this gender-motivated crime has not been defined by US legislation despite being a global issue.

    Robinson, a 25-year-old student at Winston-Salem State University in North Carolina died in October while staying in a luxury rental property in the Mexican state of Baja California Sur.

    Prosecutors in Mexico are seeking to extradite one of Robinson’s friends as a suspect in the case. Daniel de la Rosa, the attorney general for Baja California Sur told local media last week that an arrest warrant was issued for the crime of femicide, or the killing of a woman because of her gender, in connection with Robinson’s case.

    No one has been charged in the case, and authorities have not released the names of Robinson’s friends.

    Unlike Mexico and other Latin American countries, the US does not have a law recognizing femicide as a different crime than homicide, which several experts say does not mean that killings targeting women are not happening in the US at alarming rates.

    “Femicides happen all the time in the US, and many famous murder cases that we all have in our consciousness are actually femicide, but we don’t put that label on them,” said Dabney P. Evans, director of Emory University’s Center for Humanitarian Emergencies, who studies violence against women.

    As the investigation into Robinson’s death continues, here’s what you need to know about what is considered femicide in Mexico, why gender-based violence is a big problem globally, and why scholars say that writing femicide into US law could help women.

    Femicide is the most extreme form of gender-based violence (GBV) and is defined as the “intentional murder of women because they are women.” 

    Femicides fall into two categories: intimate and non-intimate femicide. The former refers to the killing of women by current or ex-partners, while the latter is the killing of women by people with whom they had no intimate relationship.

    In most countries, femicide is not different from homicide in criminal law, but Mexico is among at least 16 countries that have included femicide as a specific crime.

    Under federal law in Mexico, people can face up to 60 years in prison if convicted. The difference between homicide, or unlawful killing, and femicide, varies from state to state in Mexico.

    There could be a history of violence – sexual or not – and threats, or “if the victim was in community, for example, and if she was killed and her body was in public,” said Beatriz García Nice, who leads the Wilson Center’s initiative on gender-based violence.

    A video circulating online in recent weeks appears to show a physical altercation inside a room between Robinson and another person. Her father, Bernard Robinson, told CNN his daughter is seen in that video being thrown to the floor and beaten on the head.

    It’s not clear when the video was taken or if it depicts the moment Robinson suffered the injury that led to her death.

    While there is legislation against femicide in Mexico, “the main problem is the execution,” García Nice said. The number of gender-based violence cases are underreported in national statistics and the law is “under executed” in the judicial system, she said.

    García Nice says nearly 95% of femicide cases in Mexico go unpunished. “If you commit a crime of femicide, there’s really not that much of a chance for you to get convicted for it. And that’s one of the reasons why we see that rates are still very, very high.”

    Alejandra Marquez, an assistant professor of Spanish with a focus on gender and sexuality in Latin America and the Caribbean at Michigan State University, said the “feminicidos” crisis in Mexico started several decades ago and first gained national attention in the 1990s when hundreds of women were killed in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez.

    “There used to be this idea, especially in central Mexico, where it was like ‘women are getting killed over there at the border,’ but because it’s expanded all over the country, it’s sort of become this phenomenon that can no longer be ignored,” Marquez told CNN.

    “When you’re in Mexico, it’s part of day-to-day conversation,” Marquez added.

    The disproportionate killings of Black women, the crisis of missing or murdered Indigenous people and the 2021 deadly shootings of women at Atlanta-area spas are some examples of cases that could potentially be labeled as femicides, experts say.

    “As a society, we need to recognize that these are not one-off deaths. These are in fact, connected to patterns of masculine violence, and we need to think more closely about preventing that kind of violence,” said Evans, the scholar at Emory University.

    An analysis of homicide data by the Violence Policy Center shows 2,059 women in the US were killed by men in 2020 and 89% knew their offenders.

    For Evans, having femicide legislation in the US would not solve the issues of toxic masculinity, patriarchy, and misogyny that lead to gender-based violence but the terminology could “allows us to talk about this phenomenon” and prevent it from happening.

    There are existing laws that address gender-based violence in the US and mechanisms to track domestic violence but they are flawed.

    The federal hate crime law covers violent or property crimes at least partially motivated by bias against race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender or gender identity. At the state level, the definition of a hate crime varies and several states do not cover bias based on gender.

    Earlier this year, federal lawmakers reauthorized the Violence Against Women Act. The legislation is aimed at protecting and supporting survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking – all documented precursors in femicide cases.

    During a March ceremony celebrating the act’s passage, President Joe Biden said more needs to be done to address the issue.

    “No one, regardless of gender or sexual orientation, should experience abuse. Period. And if they do, they should have the services and support they need to get through it. And we’re not going to rest.”

    An estimated 81,100 women and girls around the world were killed intentionally last year with about 56% of them by intimate partners or family members, a UN report published last week shows.

    It’s hard to describe the full scope of gender-based violence, the report says, because roughly 4 in 10 killings reported by authorities have “no contextual information to allow them to be identified and counted as gender-related killings.”

    “These rates are alarmingly high, as we can see; however, that’s the tip of the iceberg,” Kalliopi Mingeirou, the chief of Ending Violence against Women Section at UN Women, one of the entities that compiled the report.

    Mingeirou said when a femicide isn’t classified legally for what it is, police cannot investigate properly. Other challenges in stopping and preventing femicides include the lack of resources and training for authorities expected to implement laws.

    “What women and girls deserve around the world is to have a world that respects their choices, that respects their rights,” Mingeirou said. “We need to have equal rights. We have a primary right to be free from violence because if we are free from violence and harassment, we can achieve, and we can thrive in this world.”

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  • The fine print of the Respect for Marriage Act | CNN Politics

    The fine print of the Respect for Marriage Act | CNN Politics

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    A version of this story first ran in July. It also appears in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.



    CNN
     — 

    Let’s start with the positive: Republicans and Democrats are coming together to protect same-sex marriage from the Supreme Court. The Respect for Marriage Act, which safeguards the right to same-sex marriage nationwide, passed the House with bipartisan support earlier this week and now awaits a Senate vote.

    The Respect for Marriage Act codifies marriages and came about amid worries among Democrats that the same conservative majority on the Supreme Court that took away the right to abortion will target same-sex marriage in the future.

    The version that overcame a filibuster in the Senate passed the Senate Tuesday. A dozen Republican senators from across the country voted with Democrats before Thanksgiving to limit debate and move toward a final vote.

    RELATED: Meet the 12 Republicans who voted to consider the Respect for Marriage Act

    It next goes to the House for approval before President Joe Biden can sign it into law.

    But there is a fair amount of fine print.

    First, the bill does not require all states to allow same-sex marriage, even though that is the current reality under the 2015 Obergefell v. Hodges decision. Rather, if the Supreme Court overturned Obergefell and previous state prohibitions on same-sex marriage came back into effect, the Respect for Marriage Act would require states and the federal government to respect marriages conducted in places where it is legal.

    There are religious exceptions. Republican supporters have emphasized the elements in this Senate version that protect nonprofit and religious organizations from having to provide support for same-sex marriages.

    “I will be supporting the substitute amendment because it will ensure our religious freedoms are upheld and protected, one of the bedrocks of our democracy,” said West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito in a statement after helping break the filibuster.

    It took months of behind-the-scenes effort to bring 10-plus Republicans on board.

    This is all academic right now. The bill is only being passed in case the now-solidly conservative Supreme Court, which has taken delight in upending precedent, were to revisit the Obergefell v. Hodges decision that created a national right to marriage for same-sex couples.

    Two of the justices who voted in favor of that ruling have been replaced by Republican-appointed conservatives, which means that if the case were heard today, there’s a real likelihood it would be decided differently.

    While Justice Samuel Alito seemed to want to wall off the abortion rights precedent upended by the Supreme Court earlier this year, CNN’s Ariane de Vogue has written about how the decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization could affect issues like marriage. Read her story.

    Here’s a brief history of marriage equality playing a role in prior election years:

    Today, it’s Republicans and Democrats, along with a Democratic president, working together to protect same-sex marriage from a government institution.

    During that time, public support for same-sex marriage grew from about a quarter of the public in the year the Defense of Marriage Act was enacted to 71% in Gallup polling this year.

    The issue has played a role in multiple US elections, including, arguably, the one that just took place.

    Here’s a brief history of marriage equality playing a role in prior election years:

    In 1996, Republican majorities in the House and Senate sensed a political opening after then-President Bill Clinton failed to allow gay people to openly serve in the military.

    They were also trying to get ahead of a Hawaii court decision that could have legalized same-sex marriage in that state. Fearing every state might have to recognize same-sex unions, Republicans pushed the Defense of Marriage Act, known as DOMA.

    It declared marriage as between one man and one woman and allowed states to refuse to recognize marriages. It also withheld federal benefits from married same-sex couples. In 2013, a part of DOMA was found to be unconstitutional.

    DOMA had broad approval. Democrats like then-Sen. Joe Biden voted for the bill. Current Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, and many other Democrats whose names you’d recognize, were among the 342 who voted for the bill in the House.

    Current House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was among the 67 members to vote “no,” along with Rep. Steve Gunderson, who at the time was the House’s only openly gay Republican.

    In 2004, placing anti-gay-marriage amendments on ballots in key states like Ohio was smart politics. It helped George W. Bush win reelection to the White House and the GOP gain seats in the US Senate.

    Bush endorsed a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage. The Democratic candidate, John Kerry, also opposed same-sex marriage at the time.

    In 2008, even as more in his party began to publicly support marriage equality, Obama continued his opposition.

    He has more recently said and written that he always personally supported same-sex marriage rights. His campaign aide David Axelrod has written that Obama made a calculated decision to oppose gay marriage.

    “He grudgingly accepted the counsel of more pragmatic folks like me, and modified his position to support civil unions rather than marriage, which he would term a ‘sacred union,’” Axelrod wrote in a memoir.

    In 2012, following the lead of then-Vice President Biden, Obama officially evolved on the issue and said he now supported marriage equality. It was a big moment.

    A few years later, in 2015, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of same-sex marriage nationwide.

    “I’m fine with it,” Trump said in 2016 during an interview with “60 Minutes.”

    He’d go on to brag about being a champion for gay rights, although many LGBTQ activists would disagree.

    The politicians of the ’90s have largely evolved with the country.

    But one of the Supreme Court’s relics from the ’90s, Justice Clarence Thomas, recently questioned the 2015 marriage decision he opposed. As a result, Republicans and Democrats are coming together again, in less than a generation, to undo what they did in 1996, and try to guarantee marriage as a right for all Americans.

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  • Trump is losing his capacity to control his fate with legal threats swirling | CNN Politics

    Trump is losing his capacity to control his fate with legal threats swirling | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    An ex-president who’s always on the attack will no longer be the sole orchestrator of his fate.

    When Donald Trump officially becomes a criminal defendant on Tuesday, he’ll be subject to a legal system he can’t control.

    Trump has long conjured political storms, alternative realities, legal imbroglios and media spectacles to blur the truth or discredit institutions that have constrained his rule-busting behavior. He’ll lose that ability when he steps before the court at his arraignment in a case related to a hush money payment to an adult film actress.

    Trump posts video from his motorcade while en route to New York for his arraignment

    And there are increasing signs that this new reality – which will come with hefty financial commitments in legal fees and locks on Trump’s calendar – could be multiplied at a time when he’s already facing the intense demands of another White House bid.

    That’s because the ex-president – the first to face criminal charges – also appears to face serious problems in a potentially more perilous case involving his alleged mishandling of secret documents being investigated by special counsel Jack Smith. Charges look like an increasing possibility as the Justice Department secures evidence about Trump’s handling of classified documents after leaving the White House.

    Smith’s prosecutors have secured daily notes, texts, emails and photographs and are focused on cataloguing how Trump handled classified records around Mar-a-Lago and those who may have witnessed the former president with them, CNN’s Katelyn Polantz and Evan Perez reported Monday. The new details coincide with signs the Justice Department is taking steps consistent with the end of an investigation.

    Trump’s former lawyer, Ty Cobb, told CNN’s Erin Burnett that the developments represent a serious turn in the case for the ex-president. “We’ve known the investigatory steps were under way, we just haven’t known alleged results until today,” Cobb said. “I think these are highly consequential.”

    The documents case may not be the end of it. Smith is also investigating Trump’s conduct in the run-up to the US Capitol insurrection. Then there’s also a possible prosecution in Georgia led by a district attorney probing the ex-president’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election result in the swing state.

    Trump denies any wrongdoing in all of these investigations. He has described his behavior in Georgia as “perfect.” And he has lambasted the sealed indictment in New York, where he faces more than 30 counts related to business fraud, as an example of politicized justice.

    But at a grave moment for the country, given that an ex-president and current presidential candidate is about to appear in court, there’s also growing sense of inexorably building pressure on Trump that will compromise his capacity to evade accountability.

    Trump made a big show on Monday of his return to New York ahead of his arraignment. The snaking motorcade of black Secret Service SUVs to and from his private Boeing 757 in its sparkling new livery carried overtones of a presidential movement in a power play meant to send a message of strength.

    Dean Trump split vpx

    Watergate whistleblower says this Trump move would be a ‘terrible idea’

    Trump is itching to speak publicly. After court Tuesday, he will return to his Mar-a-Lago resort and reclaim the media spotlight with a primetime speech he will likely use to proclaim his innocence, attack the New York case as political persecution and try to distract from the fact he will be a criminal defendant.

    Multiple people familiar with Trump’s thinking tell CNN’s Kaitlan Collins and Kristen Holmes, however, that he has weighed speaking even earlier, in Manhattan, even as advisers caution the former president that any unplanned remarks put him at high risk of hurting his case. His speech Tuesday night is expected to have legal eyes on it before he delivers it.

    But despite his bravura and talk by pundits that he will alchemize his legal problems into political gold, Monday was a dark day for Trump. He was returning to his old stomping ground in Manhattan under duress, to turn himself in on Tuesday over the first-ever criminal charges ever laid against an ex-president. Trump has long been a force of nature who rebels against constraints and has always been impossible for his staff to control. But now he will be subject to the dictates of a judge and the rules and conventions of the legal system, which will be far harder for him to disrupt and divert than the institutions of political accountability he has subverted.

    At times, he may be compelled to appear in court. The grueling pre-trial process, with its numerous legal argument deadlines and heaps of evidence the defense must sift through, will impose severe demands on a legal team that has often struggled to act coherently. Ahead of his appearance Tuesday, for instance, Trump made a late shuffle of his legal team, bringing in another attorney, Todd Blanche, to serve as his lead counsel – a move some saw as sidelining another attorney, Joe Tacopina. The ex-president’s camp pushed back on this interpretation, however.

    Trump legal team drama magic wall vpx

    ‘You can’t make this up’: The dramatic history within Trump’s legal team

    One criminal prosecution is onerous enough. Trump hasn’t been charged in any of the other cases, but a multi-front defense in multiple cases would represent an extraordinary storm. And it would further disrupt the ex-president’s capacity to dictate his political schedule and control his destiny. When he was under scrutiny in the Russia investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller, or during his two impeachments, Trump exploited his huge popularity with Republican voters to discredit accusations against him. He pressured most GOP senators, who knew they would pay with their careers if they voted to convict him in an impeachment trial.

    While public opinion will be critical in shaping the political impact of the New York case, the prosecution itself will be insulated. Acting New York Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan, who will preside over Trump’s arraignment, is immune to his political pressure. In fact, Trump’s attacks on prosecutors or the judge could backfire in a legal arena. And even a former president can’t disregard the choreography of a court case and rules of criminal procedure.

    The situation is somewhat similar to the 2020 election, when the will of voters prevailed because Trump’s attempts to have votes thrown out and results changed foundered in multiple courts because of the fact-based standards of evidence and the law.

    Trump’s lawyers attempted to wrest some control of the court proceedings on Monday, arguing against a request by news organizations, including CNN, to allow television cameras into Tuesday’s arraignment. The media outlets argued that the case was of such public interest that it should be broadcast. But Trump’s lawyers told the judge that “it will create a circus-like atmosphere at the arraignment, raise unique security concerns, and is inconsistent with President Trump’s presumption of innocence.”

    In a late-night ruling, Merchan turned down the request for broadcast cameras. Five still photographers will be allowed to take pictures of Trump and the courtroom before the hearing begins, however.

    But the irony of the ex-president complaining about being the subject of a media circus was rich indeed. Without his salesman’s talent for whipping up media circuses, he’d have never have been president. Trump built his “The Art of the Deal” mythology in New York by constantly providing fodder for the city’s ravenous tabloids with his famed celebrity feuds, colorful personal life and business hits and failures. His entire 2016 campaign and his single-term presidency were pageants of outrage, scandal and lawlessness stoked by his often unchained Twitter posts.

    If anyone knows how to thrive in a media circus, it is Trump. The difference, perhaps, in this case is that he fears being part of a media circus that he can no longer control.

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  • Blinken says US is ‘engaged with Syria’ in efforts to free missing journalist Austin Tice | CNN Politics

    Blinken says US is ‘engaged with Syria’ in efforts to free missing journalist Austin Tice | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The United States is “engaged with Syria, engaged with third countries” to try to bring detained journalist Austin Tice home, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday.

    “We are extensively engaged with regard to Austin, engaged with Syria, engaged with third countries, seeking to find a way to get him home. And we’re not going to relent until we do,” Blinken said in remarks at a Washington Post event on World Press Freedom Day.

    Tice was taken hostage in Syria in 2012. President Joe Biden declared last year that the US government knows “with certainty that he has been held by the Syrian regime” and called on Damascus to cooperate on efforts to release him.

    The government of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad has not publicly acknowledged they are detaining Tice. The US does not have diplomatic relations with the Syrian regime and has voiced opposition to rapprochement with Assad.

    Blinken did not provide details about the engagements to bring Tice home. White House and State Department officials would not confirm a report from the Wall Street Journal that US officials had held talks with Syrian officials in Oman.

    “We cannot confirm any specific meetings past or present. As you know in general meetings and negotiations to secure the release of wrongfully detained Americans, that is incredibly sensitive,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at a White House briefing. “We want to be really, really careful and mindful and don’t want to confirm any specific conversation from the past or in the present.”

    CNN reported last August that the Biden administration had direct engagements with the Syrian government in an effort to secure Tice’s release. In 2020 under the Trump administration, Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs Roger Carstens secretly traveled to Damascus and met with Assad regime officials.

    Austin Tice’s mother Debra Tice told CNN Monday that she thinks that the administration is committed to bringing her son home but “they stumble over what needs to be done.” She said she had no doubt that her son would walk free.

    Biden paid tribute to Austin Tice and other wrongfully detained Americans, including Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan in Russia, in remarks at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday.

    A number of family members of wrongfully detained Americans – many of whom have joined forces in an organization called the “Bring Our Families Home” campaign – as well as those who had been freed from detention gathered in Washington, DC, this week to seek a meeting with the president and call on the US government to do more to secure the release of their loved ones.

    “Although our loved ones are wrongfully detained and held hostage abroad, including China, including Russia, including Iran, Syria, the United Arab Emirates and Venezuela, our voices are stronger together,” said Harrison Li, the son of Kai Li, who is detained in China.

    “Although each case has its own idiosyncrasies, we all need the same things: for President Biden to meet with us, and to use all tools to bring them home,” he said.

    “We have asked for a meeting with the president for so long now that I frankly don’t know how else to ask or what else to say,” Hannah Sharghi, whose father Emad Shargi is detained in Iran, said at a news conference Wednesday.

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  • Dutch watchdog looking into alleged Tesla data breach | CNN Business

    Dutch watchdog looking into alleged Tesla data breach | CNN Business

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    Reuters
     — 

    The data protection watchdog for the Netherlands said on Friday it was aware of possible Tesla data protection breaches, but it was too early for further comment.

    Germany’s Handelsblatt reported on Thursday that Elon Musk’s Tesla had allegedly failed to adequately protect data from customers, employees and business partners, citing 100 gigabytes of confidential data leaked by a whistleblower.

    “We are aware of the Handelsblatt story and we are looking into it,” said a spokesperson for the AP data watchdog in the Netherlands, where Tesla’s European headquarters is located.

    They declined all comment on whether the agency might launch or have launched an investigation, citing policy. The Dutch agency was informed by its counterpart in the German state of Brandenberg.

    Handelsblatt said Tesla notified the Dutch authorities about the breach, but the AP spokesperson said they were not aware if the company had made any representations to the agency.

    Tesla was not immediately available for comment on Friday on the Handelsblatt report, which said customer data could be found “in abundance” in a data set labelled “Tesla Files”.

    The data protection office in Brandenburg, which is home to Tesla’s European gigafactory, described the data leak as “massive”.

    “I can’t remember such a scale,” Brandenburg data protection officer Dagmar Hartge said, adding that the case had been handed to the Dutch authorities who would be responsible if the allegations led to an enforcement action.

    The Dutch authorities has several weeks to decide whether to deal with the case as part of a European procedure, she added.

    The files include tables containing more than 100,000 names of former and current employees, including the social security number of Tesla CEO Musk, along with private email addresses, phone numbers, salaries of employees, bank details of customers and secret details from production, Handelsblatt reported.

    The breach would violate the GDPR, it said.

    If such a violation was proved, Tesla could be fined up to 4% of its annual sales, which could be 3.26 billion euros.

    German union IG Metall said the revelations were “disturbing” and called on Tesla to inform employees about all data protection violations and promote a culture in which staff could raise problems and grievances openly and without fear.

    “These revelations … fit with the picture that we have gained in just under two years,” said Dirk Schulze, IG Metall incoming district manager for Berlin, Brandenburg and Saxony.

    Handelsblatt quoted a lawyer for Tesla as saying a “disgruntled former employee” had abused their access as a service technician, adding that the company would take legal action against the individual it suspected of the leak.

    Citing the leaked files, the newspaper reported about thousands of customer complaints regarding the carmaker’s driver assistance systems with around 4,000 complaints on sudden acceleration or phantom braking.

    Last month, a Reuters report showed that groups of Tesla employees privately shared via an internal messaging system sometimes highly invasive videos and images recorded by customers’ car cameras between 2019 and 2022.

    This week, Facebook parent Meta was hit with a record 1.2 billion euro ($1.3 billion) fine by its lead European Union privacy regulator over its handling of user information and given five months to stop transferring user data to the U.S.

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  • Timeline: The special counsel inquiry into Trump’s handling of classified documents | CNN Politics

    Timeline: The special counsel inquiry into Trump’s handling of classified documents | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    The federal criminal investigation into former President Donald Trump’s potential mishandling of classified documents escalated in stunning fashion this week with Trump’s indictment.

    The indictment hasn’t been unsealed yet, so details of the charges aren’t publicly available. But the investigation – led by Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith – revolves around sensitive government papers that Trump held onto after his White House term ended in January 2021. The special counsel has also examined whether Trump or his aides obstructed the investigation.

    Federal authorities have recovered more than 325 classified documents from Trump. He has voluntarily given back some materials, his lawyers turned over additional files after a subpoena, and the FBI found dozens of classified records during a court-approved search of his Mar-a-Lago home last summer.

    Trump has denied all wrongdoing and claims the investigation is a politically motivated sham, intended to derail his ongoing campaign to win the Republican 2024 nomination and return to the White House.

    Here’s a timeline of the important developments in the blockbuster investigation.

    An official from the National Archives and Records Administration contacts Trump’s team after realizing that several important documents weren’t handed over before Trump left the White House. In hopes of locating the missing items, NARA lawyer Gary Stern reaches out to someone who served in the White House counsel’s office under Trump, who was the point of contact for recordkeeping matters. The missing documents include some of Trump’s correspondence with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, as well as the map of Hurricane Dorian that Trump infamously altered with a sharpie pen.

    In a taped conversation, Trump acknowledges that he still has a classified Pentagon document about a possible attack against Iran, according to CNN reporting. The recording, which was made at Trump’s golf club in New Jersey, indicates that Trump understood that he retained classified material after leaving the White House. The special counsel later obtained this audiotape, a key piece of evidence in his inquiry.

    NARA grows frustrated with the slow pace of document turnover after several months of conversations with the Trump team. Stern reaches out to another Trump attorney to intervene. The archivist asks about several boxes of records that were apparently taken to Mar-a-Lago during Trump’s relocation to Florida. NARA still doesn’t receive the White House documents they are searching for.

    After months of discussions with Trump’s team, NARA retrieves 15 boxes of Trump White House records from Mar-a-Lago. The boxes contained some materials that were part of “special access programs,” known as SAP, which is a classification that includes protocols to significantly limit who would have access to the information. NARA says in a statement that some of the records it received at the end of Trump’s administration were “torn up by former President Trump,” and that White House officials had to tape them back together. Not all the torn-up documents were reconstructed, NARA says.

    NARA asks the Justice Department to investigate Trump’s handling of White House records and whether he violated the Presidential Records Act and other laws related to classified information. The Presidential Records Act requires all records created by a sitting president to be turned over to the National Archives at the end of their administration.

    NARA informs the Justice Department that some of the documents retrieved from Mar-a-Lago included classified material. NARA also tells the department that, despite being warned it was illegal, Trump occasionally tore up government documents while he was president.

    On April 7, NARA publicly acknowledges for the first time that the Justice Department is involved, and news outlets report that prosecutors have launched a criminal probe into Trump’s mishandling of classified documents. Around this time, FBI agents quietly interview Trump aides at Mar-a-Lago about the handling of presidential records as part of their widening investigation.

    The FBI asks NARA for access to the 15 boxes it retrieved from Mar-a-Lago in January. The request was formally transmitted to NARA by President Joe Biden’s White House Counsel’s office, because the incumbent president controls presidential documents in NARA custody.

    The Justice Department sends a letter to Trump’s lawyers as part of its effort to access the 15 boxes, notifying them that more than 100 classified documents, totaling more than 700 pages, were found in the boxes. The letter says the FBI and US intelligence agencies need “immediate access” to these materials because of “important national security interests.” Also on this day, Trump lawyers ask NARA to delay its plans to give the FBI access to these materials. Trump’s lawyers say they want time to examine the materials to see if anything is privileged, and that they are making a “protective assertion of executive privilege” over all the documents.

    Trump’s lawyers write again to NARA, and ask again that NARA postpone its plans to give the FBI access to the materials retrieved from Mar-a-Lago.

    Debra Steidel Wall, the acting archivist of the United States, who runs NARA, informs Trump’s lawyers that she is rejecting their claims of “protective” executive privilege over all the materials taken from Mar-a-Lago and will therefore turn over the materials to the FBI and US intelligence agencies, in a four-page letter.

    The Justice Department subpoenas Trump, demanding all documents with classification markings that are still at Mar-a-Lago. At some point after receiving the subpoena, Trump asks his lawyer Evan Corcoran if there was any way to fight the subpoena, but Corcoran tells him he has to comply, according to notes Cochran took and later gave to investigators. Also after getting the subpoena, Trump aides are captured on surveillance footage moving document boxes into and out of a basement storage room – which has become a major element of the obstruction investigation.

    News outlets report that investigators subpoenaed NARA for access to the classified documents they retrieved from Mar-a-Lago. The subpoena is the first public indication of the Justice Department using a grand jury in its investigation.

    As part of the effort to comply with the subpoena, Corcoran searches a Mar-a-Lago storage room and finds 38 classified documents. According to a lawsuit that the former president later filed, Trump invites FBI officials to come to Mar-a-Lago to retrieve the subpoenaed materials.

    Federal investigators, including a top Justice Department counterintelligence official, visit Mar-a-Lago to deal with the subpoena for remaining classified documents. The investigators meet with Trump’s attorneys, including Corcoran, and look around the basement storage room where the documents were stored. Trump briefly stops by the meeting to say hello to the officials, but he does not answer any questions. Corcoran hands over the 38 classified documents that he found. Trump lawyer Christina Bobb signs a sworn affidavit inaccurately asserting that there aren’t any more classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.

    Trump’s attorneys receive a letter from federal investigators, asking them to further secure the room where documents are being stored. In response, Trump aides add a padlock to the room in the basement of Mar-a-Lago.

    Federal investigators serve a subpoena to the Trump Organization, demanding surveillance video from Mar-a-Lago. Trump’s company complies with the subpoena and turns over the footage. CNN has reported that this was part of an effort to gather information about who had access to areas at the club where government documents were stored.

    The FBI executes a court-approved search warrant at Mar-a-Lago – a major escalation of the investigation. The search focused on the area of the club where Trump’s offices and personal quarters are located. Federal agents found more than 100 additional classified documents at the property. The search was the first time in American history that a former president’s home was searched as part of a criminal investigation.

    Trump sends a message through one his lawyers to Attorney General Merrick Garland, saying he has “been hearing from people all over the country about the raid” who are “angry,” and that “whatever I can do to take the heat down, to bring the pressure down, just let us know,” according to a lawsuit he later filed. Hours later, after three days of silence, Garland makes a brief public statement about the investigation. He reveals that he personally approved the decision to seek a search warrant, and that the Justice Department will continue to apply the law “without fear or favor.” Garland also pushes back against what he called “unfounded attacks on the professionalism of the FBI and Justice Department.”

    Federal Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart approves the unsealing of the Mar-a-Lago search warrant and its property receipt, at the Justice Department’s request and after Trump’s lawyers agree to the release. The warrant reveals the Justice Department is looking into possible violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction of justice and criminal handling of government records, as part of its investigation.

    Trump files a federal lawsuit seeking the appointment of a third-party attorney known as a “special master” to independently review the materials that the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago. In the lawsuit, Trump’s lawyers argue that the Justice Department can’t be trusted to do its own review for potentially privileged materials that should be siloed off from the criminal probe.

    In a major ruling in Trump’s favor, Federal District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, grants Trump’s request for a special master to review the seized materials from Mar-a-Lago. She says the special master will have the power to look for documents covered under attorney-client privilege and executive privilege.

    The Justice Department appeals Cannon’s decision in the special master case.

    Cannon appoints senior Judge Raymond Dearie to serve as the special master and sets a November 30 deadline for the Brooklyn-based federal judge to finish his review of the seized materials.

    A maintenance worker drains the swimming pool at Mar-a-Lago, which ends up flooding a room where there are computer severs that contain surveillance video logs, according to CNN reporting. It’s unclear if the flood was accidental or on purpose, and it’s possible that the IT equipment wasn’t damaged, but federal prosecutors found the incident to be suspicious.

    Former Trump administration official Kash Patel testifies before the federal grand jury in the classified documents investigation. A Trump loyalist, Patel had publicly claimed that Trump declassified all the materials that ended up at Mar-a-Lago, even though there is no evidence to back up those assertions.

    Garland announces that he is appointing special counsel Jack Smith to take over the investigation.

    A federal appeals court shuts down the special master review of the documents that the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago. The appeals panel rebuked Cannon’s earlier decisions, writing that she essentially tried to “interfere” with the criminal probe and had created a “special exception” in the law to help Trump.

    Trump attorney Timothy Parlatore testifies before the special counsel’s grand jury, where he described how Trump’s lawyers scoured his properties for classified materials. He later left Trump’s legal team.

    Trump’s legal team searches four of his properties in Florida, New York and New Jersey for additional classified material. They find two more classified files in a Florida storage unit, and give them to the FBI. Around this time, Trump’s team also finds additional papers with classification markings at Mar-a-Lago, and they give those materials to the Justice Department. They also turn over a laptop belonging to a Trump aide who had copied those documents onto the computer, not realizing they were classified.

    A string of key witnesses testify before the special counsel’s grand jury in Washington, DC. This includes Trump administration officials Robert O’Brien and Ric Grenell, who handled national security and intelligence matters; Margo Martin, a communications aide who continued working for Trump after he left the White House; and Matthew Calamari Sr. and his son, Matthew Calamari Jr., longtime Trump employees who oversee security for the Trump Organization.

    In response to a new subpoena from the special counsel, Trump’s lawyers turn over some material related to a classified Pentagon document that he discussed at a recorded meeting in 2021. However, Trump’s team wasn’t able to find the specific document – about a potential US attack on Iran – that prosecutors were looking for.

    Corcoran, the lead Trump attorney, testifies before the grand jury in Washington, DC. This occurred after a federal judge ordered him to answer prosecutors’ questions, ruling that attorney-client privilege did not shield his discussion with Trump because Trump might been trying to commit a crime through his attorneys. Corcoran later recused himself from handling the Mar-a-Lago matter.

    The first public indications emerge that the special counsel is using a second grand jury in Miami to gather evidence. Multiple witnesses testify in front of the Miami-based panel, CNN reported.

    Trump lawyers meet with senior Justice Department officials – including special counsel Smith – to discuss the Mar-a-Lago investigation. The sitdown lasted about 90 minutes, and Trump’s team raised concerns about the probe, which they have called an “unlawful” and “outrageous” abuse of the legal system.

    News outlets report that the Justice Department recently sent a “target letter” to Trump, formally notifying him that he’s a target of the investigation into potential mishandling of classified documents.

    News outlets report that Trump has been indicted in connection with the classified documents investigation. Trump also says in a social media post that the Justice Department informed his attorneys that he was indicted – and called the case a “hoax.”

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

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  • Conservative House floor blockade ends but GOP tensions persist | CNN Politics

    Conservative House floor blockade ends but GOP tensions persist | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The House advanced a slate of bills Tuesday afternoon, bringing a floor blockade to an end after a tentative agreement was reached between Speaker Kevin McCarthy and hardline conservatives who had brought the chamber floor to a halt in retaliation over how GOP leadership handled the debt ceiling deal.

    The stalemate is at an end for now, but tensions continue to erupt in the House Republican conference, including from moderates frustrated and angry at conservatives for halting floor action.

    The floor blockade also showed how a relatively small faction of conservatives can derail or hold hostage McCarthy’s agenda – and the hardliners have made clear they reserve the right to use every tool available to them to potentially make life harder for GOP leadership in the future.

    With the stalemate over at least for now, the House held votes Tuesday evening, including passing a measure to block a pistol brace regulation and failing to override a presidential veto on a measure to overturn a DC policing bill aimed at accountability and reform.

    Multiple members leaving the speaker’s office on Monday said the hardline conservatives agreed to end the blockade while they continue discussions with McCarthy about future spending decisions and a new “power-sharing agreement,” though they said the exact details are still being worked out and did not say whether they would ever be made public or put into a written statement.

    But even with the news that House action will proceed, frustration among moderates over the blockade was on full display Tuesday morning during a closed-door GOP conference meeting.

    GOP Rep. Derrick Van Orden of Minnesota slammed the House Freedom Caucus blockade of the House floor in a heated, expletive-laden speech during the closed-door meeting, according to multiple sources in the room.

    Orden got up at the mics and said his daughter is dying of cancer, and yet he still “shows up to work every f—ing day,” and complained that he has been trying to introduce bills to save lives, specifically a train bill, but “it’s not shit that gets on Fox News.”

    Republican Rep. Chip Roy of Texas then responded and said he also has constituents he represents and that he came to Washington to shrink government. Roy declined to comment on the interaction after the meeting, but did defend his efforts to hold up the floor in exchange for more concessions from McCarthy.

    Some members were happy Van Orden spoke up during the meeting, as they have been frustrated that a small band of hardliners have been able to hold things up.

    Reps. Mike Lawler of New York and Tom McClintock of California also stood up to blast the hardliners for holding the floor hostage and warned that the House GOP cannot be controlled by a small faction.

    House GOP leadership has attempted to downplay the issues within the conference.

    McCarthy was asked by CNN about the drama inside the meeting and he called it “a little bit of fun.”

    When CNN pressed House GOP Whip Tom Emmer on internal conference dynamics given the House has not voted in a week following the action by House Freedom Caucus, he said that “communication and respect” are key to moving forward with a unified conference.

    The hardline conservatives who have held up legislative action have done so in protest of the deal McCarthy struck with President Joe Biden to raise the nation’s borrowing limit last month. Conservatives wanted the debt ceiling deal to cut more federal spending than it did, and several far-right members of McCarthy’s conference accused him of reneging on commitments he made to them in private in order to win the speakership in January.

    After the meeting, Roy wouldn’t comment on the specific comments Van Orden made, but when asked by CNN to respond to frustrations from his colleagues over the floor standstill said, “Well, my experience in life is that the more Congress is open more than American people should be nervous. But the first five months this year we were united doing good things, and it’s my aim to get us back into that row boat.”

    Nebraska Rep. Don Bacon said, “there was a little bit of slugging going on,” as he exited the meeting, but noted that 95% of the conference is on McCarthy’s side.

    House Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar and Vice Chair Ted Lieu blasted House Republicans for shepherding through what they called a week of “chaos” in the lower chamber.

    “We haven’t voted for about a week because the Republicans lost control of the House floor,” Lieu said. “So we had all this chaos, the forced shut down.”

    This story and headline have been updated with additional developments.

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  • Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe testifies to grand jury in January 6 probe | CNN Politics

    Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe testifies to grand jury in January 6 probe | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe testified before a federal grand jury Thursday in Washington, DC, as part of the special counsel’s criminal probe into the aftermath of the 2020 election.

    Former President Donald Trump had sought to block testimony from Ratcliffe and other top officials from his administration, but courts have rejected his executive privilege claims.

    The investigation led by special counsel Jack Smith has focused on January 6, 2021, and other efforts to overturn the presidential election.

    Ratcliffe is likely of interest to investigators because he personally told Trump and his allies that there was no evidence of foreign election interference or widespread fraud.

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  • Accused January 6 rioter fired shots at police during standoff ahead of arrest, court documents say | CNN Politics

    Accused January 6 rioter fired shots at police during standoff ahead of arrest, court documents say | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    A Texas man facing charges in connection to the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol opened fire on law enforcement officers last week when they arrived at his house in the Dallas area for a welfare check, according to an affidavit.

    Nathan Donald Pelham, who is charged with misdemeanors for entering the restricted Capitol building and disorderly conduct, now faces a charge of being a felon in possession of a firearm after opening fire on authorities from Hunt County Sheriff’s Office, according to court documents.

    Politico first reported the standoff with Pelham. CNN has reached out to Pelham’s attorney for comment.

    Pelham’s father called law enforcement on April 12, warning that his son had a gun and was threatening suicide, the affidavit said. That same day, an FBI agent had called Pelham to notify him of a warrant for his arrest related to charges from the insurrection and Pelham had agreed to turn himself in the following week.

    After arriving at Pelham’s home and speaking to a neighbor, officers saw a young girl, Pelham’s daughter, walk out of the house and she was put in a patrol car for safety, according to the affidavit.

    Then authorities from the sheriff’s department heard gunshots coming from inside the house, the affidavit said.

    “Deputy J.W. reported that the gunshots were spread out in time and that they were not towards the HCSO personnel,” the agent wrote. “At approximately 9:38 p.m., Pelham’s father arrived on scene. Deputy J.W. heard another gunshot and reported that ‘the bullet from this gunshot came in so close proximity to myself that I could hear the distinct whistling sound as the bullet traveled by me and then strike a metal object to my right side.’”

    The standoff lasted until shortly after midnight when law enforcement left without arresting Pelham, according to the affidavit. Pelham was arrested on Tuesday, according to online court records.

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  • Trump shakes up legal team in wake of classified documents indictment | CNN Politics

    Trump shakes up legal team in wake of classified documents indictment | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Former President Donald Trump’s legal team is undergoing a significant shakeup in the wake of his indictment in the special counsel’s classified documents probe.

    In a sudden move, Trump announced Friday morning that he was removing two of his top attorneys, Jim Trusty and John Rowley, from the case and said Todd Blanche, a defense lawyer he hired in April after being indicted in Manhattan, would take the lead. Soon after, Trusty and Rowley issued a joint statement in which they said they were resigning from the legal team entirely.

    Trump is considering adding Miami-based attorney Benedict Kuehne to his legal team, a source familiar with the matter told CNN. He has not been formally added to the team yet but could join soon given Trump’s expected court appearance on Tuesday. CNN has reached out to Kuehne for comment.

    Lindsay Halligan, who is barred in the state where Trump was indicted, also remains on the team.

    In their statement, Trusty and Rowley said they were confident Trump will be “vindicated in his battle against the Biden Administration’s partisan weaponization of the American justice system” and said now was a “logical” time for them to step aside with the case having been filed in Miami.

    They added that they do not plan to make media appearances or to reveal conversations they’ve had with Trump. Trusty appeared on CNN just hours after Trump announced that he had been indicted to defend his client but also left open the door to potential changes in the legal team.

    Asked which members of the team would accompany Trump to court Tuesday, Trusty said, “We’ll see. It’ll make some excitement to see who shows up to the table on Tuesday, I guess.”

    Shortly before Friday’s statement was issued by Trusty and Rowley, Trump disclosed on Truth Social that neither would be representing him. He thanked them for their work, saying they “were up against a very dishonest, corrupt, evil, and ‘sick’ group of people,” but did not explain why they were departing.

    Trump’s legal team has seen significant turnover as the investigation into the mishandling of classified documents has unfolded. Last month, Timothy Parlatore, an attorney who played a key role in the investigation and once testified before the grand jury, left Trump’s legal team due to infighting, he told CNN’s Paula Reid.

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  • Who is David Weiss, the US attorney overseeing Hunter Biden criminal probe? | CNN Politics

    Who is David Weiss, the US attorney overseeing Hunter Biden criminal probe? | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    The Donald Trump-appointed US attorney leading the investigation into President Joe Biden’s son Hunter has decades of experience as a federal prosecutor.

    David Weiss, the Delaware US attorney, met in April with Hunter Biden’s attorneys, who had requested a routine status update on the investigation. The long-running probe, which began as early as 2018, at one time concerned multiple financial and business activities in foreign countries dating to when Joe Biden was vice president.

    On Tuesday, the Justice Department said in court filings that Biden will plead guilty to two tax misdemeanors and struck a deal with federal prosecutors regarding a felony gun charge.

    In 2018, the Senate confirmed Weiss to serve as US attorney for the District of Delaware. At the time of his nomination, he was serving as the acting US attorney for the district and was one of nine candidates whom Trump said shared his “vision for ‘Making America Safe Again.’”

    The Philadelphia native is a member of the Delaware and Pennsylvania bars.

    A Washington University in St. Louis and Widener University School of Law graduate, Weiss began his career in law in 1984 as a clerk to Justice Andrew D. Christie of the Delaware Supreme Court, according to his Justice Department biography.

    Following his clerkship, Weiss prosecuted violent crimes and white-collar offenses as an assistant US attorney before joining firm Duane Morris, where he was a commercial litigation associate and eventually became a partner. He later served as chief operating officer and senior vice president at The Siegfried Group, a financial services firm, according to his biography.

    He served as the first assistant US attorney starting in 2007.

    Weiss’ investigation into Hunter Biden continued into the Biden administration, prompting Attorney General Merrick Garland to stress during a March Senate committee hearing that he would not interfere with the investigation. Weiss, he reiterated at the time, had “full authority” to carry out the investigation and to bring in another jurisdiction if necessary.

    Garland said Weiss was “not to be denied anything that he needs.”

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  • China-based hackers breached US government email accounts, Microsoft and White House say | CNN Politics

    China-based hackers breached US government email accounts, Microsoft and White House say | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    China-based hackers have breached email accounts at two-dozen organizations, including some United States government agencies, in an apparent spying campaign aimed at acquiring sensitive information, according to statements from Microsoft and the White House late Tuesday.

    The full scope of the hack is being investigated, but US officials and Microsoft have been quietly scrambling in recent weeks to assess the impact of the hack, which targeted unclassified email systems, and contain the fallout.

    The federal agency where the Chinese hackers were first detected was the State Department, a person familiar with the matter told CNN. The State Department then reported the suspicious activity to Microsoft, the person said.

    The Department of Commerce, which has sanctioned Chinese telecom firms, was also breached. The hackers accessed Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo’s email account, one source familiar with the investigation told CNN. The Washington Post first reported on the access of the secretary’s account.

    The Chinese hackers were detected targeting a small number of federal agencies and just a handful of officials’ email accounts at each agency in a hack aimed at specific officials, multiple sources familiar with the investigation told CNN.

    “Microsoft notified the (Commerce) Department of a compromise to Microsoft’s Office 365 system, and the Department took immediate action to respond,” a department spokesperson said in a statement on Wednesday.

    The spokesperson did not immediately reply to a request for comment on the targeting of Raimondo’s email account.

    The hackers targeted email accounts at the House of Representatives, but it was unclear who was targeted and if the breach attempts were successful, two sources familiar with the matter told CNN.

    The breaches add to what is already one of the steepest cybersecurity challenges facing the Biden administration: limiting the ability of Beijing’s formidable hacking teams to access US government and corporate secrets.

    “Last month, US government safeguards identified an intrusion in Microsoft’s cloud security, which affected unclassified systems,” National Security Council spokesperson Adam Hodge said in a statement to CNN.

    “Officials immediately contacted Microsoft to find the source and vulnerability in their cloud service,” Hodge said. “We continue to hold the procurement providers of the US Government to a high security threshold.”

    The State Department “detected anomalous activity, took immediate steps to secure our systems, and will continue to closely monitor and quickly respond to any further activity,” a department spokesperson said on Wednesday.

    US Capitol Police declined to comment, referring CNN to the FBI.

    Hodge did not identify who was behind the hack, but Microsoft executives said in a blog post that the hackers were based in China and focused on espionage.

    In response to the Microsoft and White House statements, the Chinese foreign ministry on Wednesday accused Washington of conducting its own hacking operations.

    US officials have consistently labeled China as the most advanced of US adversaries in cyberspace, a domain that has repeatedly been a source of bilateral tension in recent years. The FBI has said Beijing has a larger hacking program than all other governments combined.

    China has routinely denied the allegations.

    The hacking began in mid-May, when the China-based hackers used a stolen sign-in key to burrow their way into email accounts, according to Microsoft. The tech giant has since blocked the hackers from accessing customer emails using that technique, Microsoft said late Tuesday.

    Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited China in mid-June, but it was not immediately clear if the cyber-espionage campaign was connected to that high-stakes visit.

    Some US officials credited the State Department with investing in more cyber-defense capabilities, allowing the agency to detect the suspicious activity earlier than in past advanced hacks.

    The number of US organizations, public or private, impacted by the hacking campaign is in the “single digits,” a senior US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency official told reporters on Wednesday.

    “This appears to have been a very targeted, surgical campaign,” the official said.

    This story has been updated with additional information.

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  • Judge denies Trump bid to move hush money case to federal court | CNN Politics

    Judge denies Trump bid to move hush money case to federal court | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    A federal judge on Wednesday denied Donald Trump’s effort to move the New York indictment charging him with falsifying business records into federal court, finding that Trump failed to show that any of the allegedly illegal conduct related to his role as president.

    Judge Alvin Hellerstein previewed at a court hearing several weeks ago that he would not accept the case and would return it to state court.

    Trump, who has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records in connection to hush money payments made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels, is set to go to trial in Manhattan for this case in March 2024.

    The judge stated in his ruling that the payments to Daniels, an adult film actress and director, were not related to presidential duties.

    “The evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the matter was a purely a personal item of the President – a cover-up of an embarrassing event. Hush money paid to an adult film star is not related to a President’s official acts,” the judge wrote. “Whatever the standard, and whether it is high or low, Trump fails to satisfy it.”

    The judge also rejected Trump’s argument that he should have immunity given his position as president at the time he signed reimbursement checks to Michael Cohen, his then-personal attorney who facilitated the hush money payment to Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford.

    “Reimbursing Cohen for advancing hush money to Stephanie Clifford cannot be considered the performance of a constitutional duty. Falsifying business records to hide such reimbursement, and to transform the reimbursement into a business expense for Trump and income to Cohen, likewise does not relate to a presidential duty. Trump is not immune from the People’s prosecution in New York Supreme Court,” the judge found.

    A spokesperson for Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg told CNN that the district attorney’s office is “very pleased with the federal court’s decision and look forward to proceeding in New York State Supreme Court.”

    A Trump campaign spokesman, meanwhile, said Wednesday that “this case belongs in a federal court and we will continue to pursue all legal avenues to move it there.”

    In another blow to Trump, the judge said that federal election law, the Federal Election Campaign Act, doesn’t pre-empt the state charges, falsifying a business record with the intent to commit or conceal another crime. Trump has signaled he will make the argument that the federal statute should preempt the state claim before the judge presiding over the case in state court.

    “FECA does not preempt the application of a general state law to conduct related to a federal election except if the law, or its application, constitutes a specific regulation of conduct covered by FECA,” the judge wrote.

    “The only elements are the falsification of business records, an intent to defraud, and an intent to commit or conceal another crime,” the judge said, adding, “Trump can be convicted of a felony even if he did not commit any crime beyond the falsification, so long as he intended to do so or to conceal such a crime.”

    The judge also rejected Trump’s claim that the case should be moved to federal court because of hostility at the state level.

    “There is no reason to believe that the New York judicial system would not be fair and give Trump equal justice under the law,” the judge wrote.

    This story has been updated with additional details.

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  • READ: Trump indictment and statement of facts related to hush money payment | CNN Politics

    READ: Trump indictment and statement of facts related to hush money payment | CNN Politics

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    Former President Donald Trump has been charged with 34 criminal counts in an indictment unsealed Tuesday.
    Read the indictment here.

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  • E. Jean Carroll battery and defamation trial against Donald Trump begins: What to know | CNN Politics

    E. Jean Carroll battery and defamation trial against Donald Trump begins: What to know | CNN Politics

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    New York
    CNN
     — 

    The civil battery and defamation trial for columnist E. Jean Carroll against former President Donald Trump is set to begin Tuesday.

    Carroll alleges Trump forcibly raped and groped her in a Manhattan luxury department store dressing room in the mid 1990’s. Trump denies the charges and has said Carroll is “not my type.”

    Unlike his dramatic courtroom appearance in New York state court earlier this month, Trump is unlikely to appear in the Manhattan federal courtroom, his lawyers have said, unless he is called to testify in Carroll’s case or opts to take the stand in his own defense. Because it is a civil case, he is not required to appear.

    Jury selection begins Tuesday and the trial is expected to last up to two weeks.

    Trump is not being criminally prosecuted on Carroll’s rape allegations. Carroll did not specify an amount in her civil lawsuit filed in Manhattan federal court but is seeking monetary damages and a retraction of an October 2022 social media statement Trump made about Carroll.

    Here’s what to know:

    Nearly four years after Carroll first went public with the allegations in 2019, a jury is expected to be empaneled. Federal District Judge Lewis Kaplan is expected to winnow down a pool of about 100 prospective jurors.

    The attorneys have asked the judge to quiz the jury pool on issues like their potential biases and their knowledge of Carroll, Trump and the pending legal matters Trump is facing in unrelated cases like his recent indictment in New York County criminal court.

    The jury will remain anonymous to the public and the attorneys, the judge ruled. The decision was in part influenced by Trump’s threats to the state Supreme Court judge overseeing his criminal case in New York.

    Attorneys for Carroll and Trump could give opening statements late in the day Tuesday.

    Carroll filed the suit last November under New York’s 2022 Adult Survivors Act that opened a look-back window for sexual assault allegations like Carroll’s with long-expired statutes of limitations.

    The former Elle columnist first came forward with her story in June of 2019 publishing an excerpt from her book “What Do We Need Men For” in New York Magazine ahead of the book release.

    “And, while I am not supposed to say it, I will. This woman is not my type,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

    “In the meantime, and for the record, E. Jean Carroll is not telling the truth, is a woman who I had nothing to do with, didn’t know, and would have no interest in knowing her if I ever had the chance. Now all I have to do is go through years more of legal nonsense in order to clear my name of her and her lawyer’s phony attacks on me. This can only happen to ‘Trump’!”

    The lawsuit argues the denial of Carroll’s allegations is defamatory and caused her emotional, reputational and professional harm.

    Trump’s lawyer corrects him after error during deposition

    Carroll’s account of the alleged rape after encountering Trump at Bergdorf Goodman in the fall of 1995 or spring of 1996 is detailed in the lawsuit.

    She recalled telling Trump she was 52 at time. Both are now in their 70’s.

    She helped Trump shop for “a girl” when he recognized her leaving the store, Carroll says.

    “Hey, you’re that advice lady!” he said to her, according to the lawsuit. “Hey, you’re that real estate tycoon!” she replied.

    Trump steered what started out as light-hearted shopping to the lingerie department where he suggested Carroll try on a bodysuit, the suit alleges. Carroll says Trump then guided her toward a dressing room, where she jokingly suggested he try on the lingerie.

    Once in the dressing room Trump “lunged at Carroll, pushing her against the wall, bumping her head quite badly, and putting his mouth on her lips,” according to the lawsuit. With Carroll fighting back, Trump pushed her against the wall again, “jammed his hand under her coatdress and pulled down her tights,” the lawsuit says.

    “Trump opened his overcoat and unzipped his pants. Trump then pushed his fingers around Carroll’s genitals and forced his penis inside of her,” the suit alleges.

    Carroll eventually pushed him off with her knee and ran out of the dressing room to exit the store, according to the lawsuit.

    The former president categorically denies that the interaction and assault ever happened.

    After Carroll went public, Trump said he “never met this person.”

    Trump’s counsel has made several legal attempts to dismiss the litigation with Carroll and once tried to countersue her, alleging Carroll violated New York’s anti-SLAPP law prohibiting frivolous defamation lawsuits – a claim rejected by Judge Kaplan.

    Carroll first sued Trump for defamation in 2019 for statements he made denying the allegations at the time. That case has been paused pending further litigation about how to handle the case because Trump was president when he made the statements at issue in the lawsuit.

    Attorneys for the career advice columnist have indicated that Carroll will likely take the stand to tell her account to the jury.

    Trump, however, is unlikely to appear in the Manhattan federal courtroom, his lawyers have said, unless he is called to testify in Carroll’s case or opts to take the stand in his own defense.

    Trump’s attorney told the court that Trump wanted to attend the trial but claimed it would be a burden on the city and court staff to accommodate him given the security protection he receives.

    Judge Kaplan has not decided whether he’ll instruct the jury about Trump’s absence from the defense table.

    Jurors are expected to see at least some parts of Trump’s video deposition taken last October for this case. Excerpts of the deposition were previously unsealed in court filings ahead of the trial.

    Carroll’s lead attorney, Roberta Kaplan, a civil attorney who’s represented women in high-profile sexual assault litigation like victims of Jeffrey Epstein, indicated that her team can put on Carroll’s case without Trump making an appearance. (Carroll’s attorney and the judge are not related.)

    Two longtime friends of Carroll, who’ve confirmed that she confided in them soon after the alleged incident more than two decades ago, can testify to corroborate Carroll’s story, Judge Kaplan ruled over objections from Trump’s legal team.

    Carroll has said when she confided in journalist Lisa Birnbach, her friend told her she’d been raped and should report the incident to the police at the time.

    When she told former local TV anchor Carol Martin a day or so later, Martin warned Carroll that she was no match for Trump’s army of lawyers and said it was best to keep it to herself – which is ultimately what Carroll did until 2019, she says.

    Two other women who allege Trump physically forced himself on them can also testify about their allegations, the judge ruled.

    Jessica Leeds has alleged that Trump, seated next to her on a plane, groped her on a flight from Texas to New York in 1979. Leeds, who first came forward during the 2016 presidential election, said in a deposition for this case that Trump acknowledged remembering her from the plane when she saw him at an event sometime after the alleged incident.

    People Magazine writer Natasha Stoynoff similarly alleges that Trump groped her and tried to forcibly kiss her in 2005 when Stoynoff was at Mar-a-Lago to interview Trump and a then-pregnant Melania Trump on their first wedding anniversary.

    Trump denies both incidents ever happened.

    Attorneys for Carroll are expected to show the jury a black and white photo of Trump where he is interacting with several people, including with his then-wife Ivana, Carroll and her then-husband.

    A transcript of his October 2022 deposition revealed that Trump mistook Carroll for his ex-wife Marla Maples when he reviewed the photo during the deposition.

    “I don’t know who – it’s Marla,” Trump said when shown the photo. “That’s Marla, yeah. That’s my wife,” he says when asked to clarify.

    e. jean carroll new day 071619

    E. Jean Carroll: ‘I’m not sorry’ (2019)

    Trump’s lawyer, Alina Habba, then interjected and said “no, that’s Carroll,” according to the transcript.

    Carroll’s lawyers have said the photo proves Trump had in fact met Carroll and she could be his “type.”

    Trump’s comments on the 2016 campaign trail denying allegations from Leeds and Stoynoff can also be admitted as evidence, the judge ruled.

    Like Carroll, Trump has asserted that the allegations are false and implausible in part because the women aren’t attractive or his ‘type.’

    Jurors may also hear the controversial “Access Hollywood” tape on which Trump can be heard telling show host Billy Bush how he would use his stardom to aggressively come on to women.

    Trump has chalked up his graphic language on the tape, which first surfaced during his 2016 Presidential election campaign, as “locker room talk” that wasn’t actually true.

    Judge Kaplan ruled that a jury could reasonably find that Trump admitted in the Access Hollywood Tape “that he in fact has had contact with women’s genitalia in the past without their consent, or that he has attempted to do so,” and the jury may view accounts from Leeds and Stoynoff as support for that argument.

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