General
Door is ‘wide open’ to negotiation if Trump lifts his sanctions on Iran, Zarif says
Dan De Luce, NBC News
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said Monday his country does not want a war with the U.S. but said President Donald Trump must lift harsh economic sanctions on Tehran to clear the way for negotiations. In an interview with NBC Nightly News’ Lester Holt, Zarif said the door is “wide open” to diplomacy if Trump removes the array of sanctions he has imposed since 2017 that have slashed the country’s oil exports and damaged its economy.
‘Nobody Opened the Door’: Neighbors Rally During an ICE Raid in Houston
Manny Fernandez and Kerry Lester, The New York Times
The immigration raid early Monday morning at the El Paraiso Apartments in Houston was not exactly a major victory for immigration enforcement. It was foiled, in part, by 19-year-old Kaylin Garcia.
Security reports reveal how Assange turned an embassy into a command post for election meddling
Marshall Cohen et al., CNN
New documents obtained exclusively by CNN reveal that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange received in-person deliveries, potentially of hacked materials related to the 2016 US election, during a series of suspicious meetings at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. The documents build on the possibility, raised by special counsel Robert Mueller in his report on Russian meddling, that couriers brought hacked files to Assange at the embassy.
Trump’s Favorite Meme-Maker Adopted A Fake Name To Go On Trump’s Favorite TV Network
Criag Silverman and Jeremy Massler, BuzzFeed News
On Friday, the pro-Trump cable news channel One America News Network aired an interview with a man it identified as Dennis F. Charles, “a conservative social media analyst.” But that wasn’t his real name. In the segment, he said social media companies were censoring conservatives, echoing a core message of the White House social media summit held the day before, on July 11.
White House & Administration
How Trump aides rushed to repackage the ‘go back’ tweets
Gabby Orr, Politico
Within hours of President Donald Trump’s radioactive tweets on Sunday urging several Democratic congresswomen to “go back” to other countries, his campaign was scrambling to repackage the attack on the four women of color into a broader patriotic message. By Sunday night, the campaign was portraying Trump as a defender of American pride. “President Trump loves this country [and] doesn’t like it when elected officials constantly disparage it,” said Tim Murtaugh, communications director for Trump’s reelection operation.
Border officials are investigated for role in Facebook group with violent and sexist posts
Molly O’Toole, Los Angeles Times
Seventy current and former Customs and Border Protection personnel are under investigation as part of an administrative probe into a secret Facebook group in which members used dehumanizing and derogatory language toward Latina members of Congress and deceased migrants. On Monday, officials for the first time provided details of the recently launched federal investigation into the 9,500-member group, known as “I’m 10-15,” the code used by Border Patrol for migrants in custody.
Interior to move most of Bureau of Land Management’s D.C. staff out west as part of larger reorganization push
Juliet Eilperin and Lisa Rein, The Washington Post
The Trump administration plans to relocate most of the Bureau of Land Management’s D.C. workforce to west of the Rockies, part of its broader push to shift power away from Washington and shrink the size of the federal government. The proposal to move roughly 300 employees from a key Interior Department agency — among them the majority of top managers — comes as Trump officials are forcibly reassigning career officials and upending operations across the federal government. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue finalized plans this summer to move about 550 jobs at two of his department’s scientific agencies from the nation’s capital to greater Kansas City.
After 2016 Bible Slip, Trump Lashed Out at ‘So-Called Christians,’ Book Says
Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Martin, The New York Times
Furious after he was criticized by evangelicals for stumbling in his reference to a book of the Bible during the 2016 campaign, Donald J. Trump lashed out at “so-called Christians” and used an epithet in describing them to a party official, according to a new book. Mr. Trump’s anger was aroused after he stumbled in an appearance at Liberty University by referring to Second Corinthians as “Two Corinthians” as he was competing for the votes of evangelicals — traditionally critical to a Republican’s success in the Iowa caucuses — with Senator Ted Cruz of Texas.
Musical chairs at the Pentagon: Eight days, two top jobs, four people
Courtney Kube, NBC News
Think there is turmoil in Pentagon leadership now? Just watch what happens during the next two weeks. Over the next eight days, there will likely be four people occupying the top two positions at the Pentagon, some for just 48 hours.
Does Melania Trump ‘Really Care’? In Her Birthplace Women Really Want To Know.
Anna Nemtsova, The Daily Beast
What were first faint rumors turned into palpable buzz: Melania Trump, the most famous daughter of Slovenia, might finally visit her homeland. Her father, Viktor Knavs, was seen here driving a white Maybach with Florida plates between the capital and Melania’s hometown of Sevnica preparing the way, it was said, for a spectacular homecoming.
WH projects $1 trillion deficit for 2019
Niv Elis, The Hill
The White House projects that the federal deficit will surpass $1 trillion this year, the only time in the nation’s history the deficit has exceeded that level, excluding the four-year period following the Great Recession. “The 2019 deficit has been revised to a projected $1.0 trillion,” the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) wrote in its midyear review.
Senate
Member of Senate GOP leadership says Trump tweets are racist
Alexander Bolton, The Hill
Senate Republican Conference Vice Chairwoman Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) said Monday that she thinks President Trump’s tweets suggesting that minority Democratic lawmakers “go back” to the countries they came from was racist. Ernst was pressed by reporters about Trump’s tweets from the weekend when she walked into a weekly leadership meeting in Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-Ky.) office.
The Long, Bipartisan History of Alabama’s Senators
Zach C. Cohen, National Journal
The waiting area of Sen. Doug Jones’s Washington office features a glass case of 100 signed baseballs, one from each U.S. senator. The balls are grouped alphabetically by state, with each senior senator showcased directly to the left of their junior colleague.
Bipartisan bill would handcuff Trump on China concessions
Burgess Everett, Politico
Senators are introducing a bipartisan bill that would clamp down on U.S. companies from doing business with Chinese tech giant Huawei, the latest effort to ensure President Donald Trump takes a hard line in his trade talks with China. Sens. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) are leading the effort to stop the Trump administration from unilaterally allowing business with Huawei.
Hawley targets higher ed monopolies with new legislation
The Hill
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) plans to introduce two new pieces of legislation Tuesday that target higher education monopolies, Hill.TV has exclusively learned. The first provides federal student aid dollars to students pursuing vocational training or education by targeting the Pell Grant system.
House
Rep. Al Green to force impeachment vote against Trump
Kyle Cheney, Politico
A Democratic lawmaker says he will force a vote on articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump by next week, a dramatic step that could force the Democrat-led House to consider the measure for the first time, even over the objection of Speaker Nancy Pelosi. “The President of the United States is a racist, a bigot, a misogynist, as well as an invidious prevaricator. To say that Donald John Trump is unfit for the Office of the President of the United States is an understatement,” said Rep. Al Green (D-Texas), who cited Trump’s racist tweets over the weekend about Democratic congresswomen as the impetus for his third effort to push through an impeachment vote.
DeVos’ use of personal email as secretary probed by House Democrats
Kimberly Hefling, Politico
House Oversight Chairman Elijah Cummings said Monday that he is expanding an investigation into the use of personal email by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. Cummings told DeVos in a letter that his move came after “disturbing new revelations” released by the Education Department’s inspector general in May about how DeVos had used personal email while on the job.
House orders Pentagon to say if it weaponized ticks and released them
John M. Donnelly, Roll Call
The House quietly voted last week to require the Pentagon inspector general to tell Congress whether the department experimented with weaponizing disease-carrying insects and whether they were released into the public realm — either accidentally or on purpose. The unusual proposal took the form of an amendment that was adopted by voice vote July 11 during House debate on the fiscal 2020 defense authorization bill, which lawmakers passed the following day.
2020
Biden Echoes Obama’s Broken Vow to Keep Existing Health Plans
Jennifer Epstein, Bloomberg
Democratic presidential front-runner Joe Biden repeated one of former President Barack Obama’s broken promises, vowing that Americans who like their current insurance plans could keep them. As the former vice president rolled out his proposal to add a public insurance option to the Affordable Care Act, he promised that it would let people keep their existing plans.
Elizabeth Warren’s Campaign Turned To A Big Donor To Pay For The DNC Voter Database, Despite Her Fundraising Pledge
Ruby Cramer, BuzzFeed News
Elizabeth Warren relied on a multimillion-dollar Democratic donor to cover the cost of an expensive voter database — a move that risks putting her campaign at odds with the spirit, if not the letter, of the pledge she made to abstain from “big money” fundraising. In February, two months into her presidential campaign, Warren set herself apart from the rest of the Democratic field by swearing off the kind of pay-for-play fundraising that typically gives wealthy donors outsize access and influence: front-row seats at closed-door fundraisers, one-on-one-time with candidates, and private phone calls, known on campaigns as hourslong blocks of “call time” for soliciting big checks.
‘Doomsday scenario’: Cash shortage squeezes huge Dem field
David Siders et al., Politico
Months of bleak polling couldn’t stop the parade of lower-level Democrats crowding into the presidential primary. But bankruptcy might.
Biden cancer nonprofit suspends operations indefinitely
Stephen Bruan, The Associated Press
A nonprofit foundation set up by Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden that relied on health care world partnerships to speed a cure for cancer has suspended its operations, it announced Monday. The Biden Cancer Initiative’s sudden move to cease its activities comes two years after it was founded in 2017 by the former vice president and his wife, Jill, as a philanthropic extension of Biden’s stewardship of the White House Cancer Moonshot program.
States
Going Quiet: More States Are Hiding 911 Recordings From Families, Lawyers and the General Public
Lynn Arditi, ProPublica and The Public’s Radio
Troy Phillips was repairing a propane filling station on Cape Cod one afternoon last October when his mother called, her voice frantic. “Something happened to Scott!”
Former Gov. Scott Walker to take the helm of conservative group, says he won’t run for office in 2022
Craig Gilbert, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Former Gov. Scott Walker has accepted a full-time position running a national conservative youth organization based in northern Virginia. Walker said the move rules out a run for his old job or any other political office in the next few years.
Police Fire Tear Gas to Quell Protests Over Puerto Rico’s Governor
Patricia Mazzei, The New York Times
An afternoon of extraordinary protests demanding the immediate resignation of Gov. Ricardo A. Rosselló of Puerto Rico turned chaotic late on Monday when police in riot gear launched tear gas and pepper spray into a crowd of thousands of demonstrators. The volleys of gas just after 8:30 p.m. dispersed much of the gathering that had swelled outside of the governor’s mansion, La Fortaleza.
Advocacy
Apple preaches privacy. Lawmakers want the talk to turn to action.
Reed Albergotti and Tony Romm, The Washington Post
When Apple CEO Tim Cook privately hosted six Democratic lawmakers at the company’s space-age headquarters this spring, he opened the conversation with a plea — for Congress to finally draft privacy legislation after years of federal inaction. “It was the first issue he brought up,” said Rep. Suzan DelBene (Wash.), one of the lawmakers who made the trip to Cupertino, Calif.
Snap hires Laura Nichols to lead comms for policy and content
Sara Fischer, Axios
Snap Inc. has hired Laura Nichols, formerly head of communications of National Geographic Partners, as vice president of communications, Axios has learned. Nichols will be based in Washington D.C. and will lead communications around Snap’s global policy, social impact, and its content arm, Discover.
A Message from the National Association of Chain Drug Stores:
According to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), the use of pharmacy DIR fees has exploded by 45,000 percent between 2010 and 2017. CMS also estimates that reforming DIR fees would save patients $7.1 to $9.2 billion in reduced costs over 10 years. Drug-pricing legislation needs to include DIR fee relief, to help address this dire situation for Medicare patients, for pharmacies, and for the Medicare program. AccessAgenda.NACDS.org
Opinions, Editorials and Perspectives
Trump is a racist president
George Conway, The Washington Post
To this day, I can remember almost the precise spot where it happened: a supermarket parking lot in eastern Massachusetts. It was the mid-1970s; I was not yet a teenager, or barely one.
A New Tactic in Trump’s War on the Fed
Alan S. Blinder, The Wall Street Journal
You might have noticed that President Trump is waging war on the Federal Reserve. That in itself is nothing new. In 1966, Lyndon Johnson invited Fed Chairman William McChesney Martin down to his Texas ranch to barbecue him.
Research Reports and Polling
July Poll Shows Biden, Harris, Warren Leading New Hampshire
Alexis Soucy, Saint Anselm College
The July poll by the Saint Anselm College Survey Center at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics (NHIOP) includes the Survey Center’s second ballot test of the 2020 presidential primary, as well as name recognition and favorability of the candidates. The poll of 351 randomly-selected registered New Hampshire voters expressing an intention to vote in the upcoming Democratic Presidential Primary was conducted between July 10 and July 12, 2019.
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