update - Fed'l judge blocks Trump's depolyment of Nat'l Gd to Wash DC

[mandrill]

Judge demands to know what DOJ prosecutor was 'instructed not to say' in Comey case


U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan appeared in court on Wednesday as former FBI Director James Comey challenged his indictment in an Alexandria, Virginia, courtroom. Among the challenges for the Justice Department was a judge demanding answers as prosecutors insisted they weren't trying to be evasive.

Comey is citing years of evidence from Trump's own social media to challenge the "vindictive" or "selective" prosecution.

“The President’s hate or animosity or dislike of Mr. Comey may be enough to fire" him, Comey defense lawyer Michael Dreeben told U.S. District Judge Michael Nachmanoff. But the lawyer argued it can't be used to throw the “full weight" of the criminal justice system against him.

Dreeben pointed to Trump's Truth Social post from late September in which Trump appeared to send a message to Attorney General Pam Bondi and championed the appointment of Halligan in former U.S. Attorney Erik Siebert's place.

“The President is underscoring what he wants here, Siebert was not doing his job here," Dreeben said.

“If that’s not a direction to prosecute, I’m not really sure what is,” he added.

Prosecutor Tyler Lemons later argued Comey wasn't "indicted at the direction of the president of the United States."



Lemons said the grand jury's work on the indictment was entirely proper.

“We’ll have some questions about that,” Judge Michael Nachmanoff said.

As CNN captured, the judge began demanding answers about a rumored memo that says they didn't have the evidence to indict Comey.

“What did someone in the Deputy Attorney General’s office instruct you not to say?” Judge Nachmanoff asked.

Lemons confessed that he has “reviewed” draft memorandums.

He then promised, “I hope you understand that I am trying to answer your questions."

U.S. Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick in the Eastern District of Virginia on Monday chastised Halligan after reviewing the grand jury transcripts. He wrote that he found a "disturbing pattern of profound investigative missteps" by the Department of Justice, and warned it imperils her case against Comey.

One CNN reporter said Tuesday that there are so many flaws cited by Fitzpatrick that the case may not even make it to trial.

 

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Trump reportedly plotting new wave of revenge


Donald Trump’s fury at watching Congress vote almost unanimously to open the Jeffrey Epstein files to the public within 30 days by the DOJ — presuming he doesn’t veto the bill — has set the stage for a new wave of White House retribution.

According to a report from Politico’s Dasha Burns and Diana Nerozzi, Trump is already making plans to vent his wrath on Democrats and attempt to tie them more closely to the sexual abuser who died in jail under mysterious circumstances.


The report notes the White House is “on its back foot” at the moment after the vote but is promising an onslaught of attacks.

One White House official admitted, “The Democrats are going to come to regret this“ before adding, “Let’s start with Stacey Plaskett. You think we’re not going to make a scene of this?”


Plaskettis already under siege from Republicans for texting with Epstein, among others, during a hearing featuring former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen on Trump's alleged payments to mistresses.

A second Trump insider stated, “President Trump has nothing to hide, but the Democrats should be very scared because they have secrets to hide.”

According to the Politico report, whether Trump can make a dent with his attacks on Democrats is unknown now that he is also facing a rebellion within his own party.

“The plan to attack – a well-worn tactic for the president – will test whether Trump still has the political muscle to cow people into submission and make those who challenge him pay a political price. It comes as questions swirl over whether the president has lost his iron grip on the GOP and is entering his lame duck period," Politico is reporting.

In response to Trump’s new threat, a DNC official quipped, “Does Trump’s newest strategy finally include sharing what ‘wonderful secret’ he kept with Jeffrey Epstein,” referring to a mysterious reference the president made in a letter to the now-deceased sex trafficker.

You can read more here

 

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Judge pushes for resolution in lawsuit over legal access at 'Alligator Alcatraz'


ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — A federal judge in Florida is pushing for a resolution in a lawsuit over whether detainees at an immigration center in the Florida Everglades known as “Alligator Alcatraz” are getting adequate access to attorneys.

U.S. District Judge Sheri Polster Chappell last Friday ordered a two-day conference to be held next month in her Fort Myers courtroom, with attorneys present who have the authority to settle. The judge asked for an update at a hearing next Monday.

“The court will not entertain excuses regarding leaving early for flights or other meetings,” the judge wrote about next month's conference.

The lawsuit filed by detainees against the federal and state governments over legal access is one of three federal cases challenging practices at the immigration detention center that was built this summer at a remote airstrip in the Florida Everglades by the administration of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis.

In a separate environmental lawsuit, a federal appellate court panel in September allowed the center to continue operating by putting on hold a lower court’s preliminary injunction ordering the facility to wind down by the end of October. The appeal was put on hold during the government shutdown but resumed last week.

A third lawsuit claims immigration is a federal issue and Florida agencies and private contractors hired by the state have no authority to operate the facility.

President Donald Trump toured the facility in July and suggested it could be a model for future lockups nationwide as his administration pushes to expand the infrastructure needed to increase deportations. While the facility was built and operated by the state and its private contractors, federal officials have approved reimbursing Florida for $608 million.

In the legal access case, attorneys representing detainees at the Everglades facility are seeking a preliminary injunction that will make it easier for their clients to meet and communicate with their individual attorneys.

They claim that detainees' attorneys must make an appointment to visit three days in advance, unlike at other detention facilities where the lawyers can just show up during visiting hours; that detainees often are transferred to other facilities after their attorneys have made an appointment to see them; and that scheduling delays have been so lengthy that detainees are unable to meet with attorneys before key deadlines.

Florida officials said in a motion to dismiss that the case is now moot since the concerns initially raised by the detainees and their attorneys have been addressed. Any delays were due to trying to construct a facility for thousands of detainees in a remote area with little infrastructure, they said.

“In other words, there is no longer a live controversy,” Florida officials said in their court filing.

___

Follow Mike Schneider on the social platform Bluesky: @mikeysid.bsky.social.

Mike Schneider, The Associated Press

 

[mandrill]

Trump admin hit with court block in bid to end temporary protections for refugees


A federal judge handed President Donald Trump's administration another loss in the administration's bid to revoke temporary protected status for thousands of refugees, according to a new report.

U.S. District Judge Katherine Polk Failla in Manhattan said in a ruling on Wednesday that Trump's plan to strip nearly 6,100 Syrian refugees of their temporary protected status was "likely unlawful," according to a report by Newsweek. The ruling comes at a time when the administration is seeking to remove as many refugees and immigrants from the country as possible.


The administration can appeal the ruling, although no paperwork has been filed yet.

In September, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced that protected status for Syrian refugees would end on Sept. 30. That move was swiftly challenged by rights groups who said ending their protected status was "arbitrary."

TPS allows people who are fleeing wars, natural disasters, and other catastrophes to live in the United States without fear of deportation.

Democrats and advocates have argued that TPS is necessary to prevent people from being forcibly returned to dangerous or life-threatening conditions.

 

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Contempt proceedings set to be revived for Trump officials accused of defying orders


Federal judge James Boasberg of the District of Washington, D.C. plans to revive contempt proceedings against Trump administration officials who possibly defied his orders, according to a new report.

The Hill reported on Wednesday that Boasberg is reviving the proceedings after an appeals court "cleared the way." The proceedings had initially been paused as the appeals court mulled the charges against administration officials who attempted to deport people to El Salvador's infamous CECOT prison earlier this year.



At the time, administration officials admitted that a plane carrying immigrants to El Salvador had taken off minutes before Boasberg had the opportunity to stop them. Boasberg ordered the plane to be returned.

“I believe that justice requires me to move promptly on this,” Boasberg said during a hearing on Wednesday.



Whistleblowers have said that Emil Bove, who is now a federal appeals court judge, was responsible for telling Department of Justice lawyers to ignore court orders. Bove served as the number-3 at DOJ until earlier this year, when he was confirmed to the bench for the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.

Read the entire report by clicking here.

 

[mandrill]

Contempt proceedings set to be revived for Trump officials accused of defying orders


Federal judge James Boasberg of the District of Washington, D.C. plans to revive contempt proceedings against Trump administration officials who possibly defied his orders, according to a new report.

The Hill reported on Wednesday that Boasberg is reviving the proceedings after an appeals court "cleared the way." The proceedings had initially been paused as the appeals court mulled the charges against administration officials who attempted to deport people to El Salvador's infamous CECOT prison earlier this year.



At the time, administration officials admitted that a plane carrying immigrants to El Salvador had taken off minutes before Boasberg had the opportunity to stop them. Boasberg ordered the plane to be returned.

“I believe that justice requires me to move promptly on this,” Boasberg said during a hearing on Wednesday.



Whistleblowers have said that Emil Bove, who is now a federal appeals court judge, was responsible for telling Department of Justice lawyers to ignore court orders. Bove served as the number-3 at DOJ until earlier this year, when he was confirmed to the bench for the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.

Read the entire report by clicking here.

 

[mandrill]

Trump considering executive order to preempt state AI laws


(Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump is considering an executive order that would seek to preempt state laws on artificial intelligence through lawsuits and by withholding federal funding, according to a draft of the order seen by Reuters on Wednesday.

The move, which is likely to face pushback from states, shows how far Trump is willing to go to help AI companies overcome a patchwork of laws they say stifle innovation.

A White House official told Reuters that until officially announced, discussion of potential executive orders was speculation.

The order would task Attorney General Pam Bondi with establishing an "AI Litigation Task Force whose sole responsibility shall be to challenge state AI laws, including on grounds that such laws unconstitutionally regulate interstate commerce, are preempted by existing federal regulations, or are otherwise unlawful," according to the document.

It would also direct the Department of Commerce to review state laws and issue guidelines that would withhold broadband funding in some cases.

An effort to block state AI laws was defeated in the Senate 99-1 earlier this year. The issue took on new life after Trump on Tuesday threw his weight behind a proposal by Republicans in Congress to add a similar provision to the National Defense Authorization Act.

(Reporting by Jody Godoy in New York; Editing by Chris Reese and Jamie Freed)

 

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Judge orders Trump administration to end National Guard deployment in DC


WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge on Thursday ordered the Trump administration to end its monthslong deployment of National Guard troops to help police the nation’s capital.

U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb concluded that President Donald Trump’s military takeover in Washington, D.C., illegally intrudes on local officials’ authority to direct law enforcement in the district. She put her order on hold for 21 days to allow for an appeal, however.

District of Columbia Attorney General Brian Schwalb sued to challenge the Guard deployments. He asked the judge to bar the White House from deploying Guard troops without the mayor’s consent while the lawsuit plays out.

Dozens of states took sides in Schwalb’s lawsuit, with their support falling along party lines.

Cobb found that while the president does have authority to protect federal functioning and property, he can't unilaterally deploy the D.C. National Guard to help with crime control as he sees fit or call in troops from other states.

After her ruling, Schwalb called for troops to be sent home. “Normalizing the use of military troops for domestic law enforcement sets a dangerous precedent, where the President can disregard states’ independence and deploy troops wherever and whenever he wants — with no check on his military power,” Schwalb said.



FILE - People talk with National Guard soldiers on the Ellipse, with the White House in the background, Oct. 17, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul, File)© The Associated Press
The White House, though, stood by the deployment.

“President Trump is well within his lawful authority to deploy the National Guard in Washington, D.C., to protect federal assets and assist law enforcement with specific tasks," said spokeswoman Abigail Jackson. "This lawsuit is nothing more than another attempt — at the detriment of DC residents — to undermine the President’s highly successful operations to stop violent crime in DC.”

In August, President Donald Trump issued an executive order declaring a crime emergency in Washington. Within a month, more than 2,300 National Guard troops from eight states and the district were patrolling the city under the command of the Secretary of the Army. Trump also deployed hundreds of federal agents to assist in patrols


The administration has also deployed Guard troops to Los Angeles and tried to send troops into Chicago and Portland, Oregon, prompting other court challenges. A federal appeals court allowed the Los Angeles deployment, and the administration is appealing a judge’s decision in Portland that found the president did not have the authority to call up or deploy National Guard troops there.

The Supreme Court is weighing the administration’s emergency appeal to be allowed to deploy National Guard troops in the Chicago area in support of an immigration crackdown. A lower court has indefinitely prevented the deployment.

In Washington, It’s unclear how long the deployments will last, but attorneys from Schwalb’s office said Guard troops are likely to remain in the city through at least next summer.

“Our constitutional democracy will never be the same if these occupations are permitted to stand,” they wrote.

Government lawyers have said Congress empowered the president to control the D.C. National Guard’s operation. “There is no sensible reason for an injunction unwinding this arrangement now, particularly since the District’s claims have no merit,” Justice Department attorneys wrote.

The Trump administration has deputized the Guard troops in Washington to serve as special U.S. Marshal Service deputies. Schwalb’s office said out-of-state troops are impermissibly operating as a federal military police force in D.C., inflaming tensions with residents and diverting local police resources.

“Every day that this lawless incursion continues, the District suffers harm to its sovereign authority to conduct local law enforcement as it chooses,” his office’s attorneys wrote.

Gary Fields And Lindsay Whitehurst, The Associated Press

 

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DOJ officials accused of using 'cut and paste' job to salvage rejected indictment


During a discussion of the James Comey indictment that it threatened with dismissal for multiple errors, missteps and misrepresentations, MS NOW legal analyst Lisa Rubin battered Department of Justice officials for making matters for embattled prosecutor Lindsey Halligan even worse.

Describing the turn of events on Wednesday, when Halligan was forced to admit to U.S. District Judge Michael Nachmanoff that a second indictment filed against James Comey was never shown to the entire grand jury after a first one was rejected, Rubin singled out DOJ officials for partial blame.


As CBS News reported, “Halligan's presentation before the grand jury and her handling of the indictments have puzzled not only Nachmanoff, but two other judges who have presided over different aspects of Comey's criminal case, which remains in its early stages.”

Appearing on “Morning Joe,” Rubin suggested that, in their haste to get an indictment after he first one was shut down, DOJ officials cut corners — which has now put the prosecution of the former FBI director in peril.


“According to lots of case law, you're supposed to start over and make sure that every member of the grand jury has an opportunity to see the charges before them and vote on what that charging instrument should look like,” Rubin said. “And instead, according to a footnote in a brief that they returned last night, they had a deputy criminal chief consult with a grand jury coordinator and basically do a cut-and-paste job where they produced a new charging document with just the two counts the grand jury liked.”

“And then, instead of presenting it to the full grand jury, they just sort of rushed in to a magistrate judge, presented it with the foreperson and the deputy foreperson and Lindsey Halligan there,” she elaborated.

“But Lindsey Halligan herself was so confused about what had happened that if you read the transcript of that exchange that night, the night that Jim Comey was indicted, the magistrate judge says to her, Miss Halligan, ‘I have two charging documents before me. One has three counts, one has two counts. And your signatures on both. Can you explain to me what happened?’”

“And she can't even represent with a straight face that her signature's on both," she reported. “Oh, did I sign them both? Oh, my signature's on both?’”

 

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House Republicans join Dems in moving to yank controversial GOP senate provision snuck into bill


House Republicans joined Democrats on Wednesday in moving to rip out a controversial measure that Senate Republicans snuck into the government funding package that allows them to sue the Justice Department for up to $500,000 over their phone records being seized.

The provision was quietly added to the government funding bill that ended the record-long shutdown and gave senators the ability to sue the Justice Department for each instance their office's data was subpoenaed without the required notification.



On Wednesday, House lawmakers moved to yank out the provision, voting 426-0 to have it nullified. CNN noted the provision's future remains murky, as Senate Majority Leader John Thune added it to the legislation at the request of several senators.

 

[mandrill]

Federal judge orders release of 16 migrants detained in Idaho raid, citing due process violations


BOISE, Idaho (AP) — A federal judge has ordered the release of 16 people detained by immigration officials during an FBI-led raid at a rural Idaho racetrack last month.

U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill ruled Wednesday that keeping the migrants jailed without bond violated their due process rights, and he ordered that they be released while they wait for their immigration cases to be resolved. Many of them have lived in the U.S. for decades and lacked any criminal history, Winmill noted. Some are married to U.S. citizens or have children who are U.S. citizens, according to court documents.

In an e-mailed statement to The Associated Press, the Department of Homeland Security said Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents lawfully arrested the detainees during the raid, and added that “an activist judge is ordering lawbreakers to roam free.”

"The Trump administration is committed to restoring the rule of law and common sense to our immigration system, and will continue to fight for the arrest, detention, and removal of aliens who have no right to be in this country,” the department said.

The Oct. 19 raid at the privately operated outdoor track in Wilder was led by the FBI as part of an investigation into suspected illegal gambling. More than 200 officers from at least 14 agencies, including U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol, participated in the raid, detaining around 400 people for hours, including many U.S. citizens.

Witnesses described aggressive tactics, including zip-tying children or separating young kids from their parents for an hour or more. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, whose agency oversees Border Patrol and ICE, denied that children were zip-tied. FBI spokesperson Sandra Barker initially said no restraints or rubber bullets were used on children but later amended that statement, replacing “children” with “young children.”

The raid resulted in only a handful of gambling-related arrests, while 105 people were arrested on suspicion of immigration violations. Many of them signed voluntary agreements to leave the country before they were able to talk to immigration lawyers, said Nikki Ramirez-Smith, an immigration attorney whose firm is representing 15 of the people released this week.

Just 18 people detained in the raid have sought their release in the federal courts in Idaho, according to online court records. One of them had that request initially dismissed after a judge found that they did not include enough detail in their court filing, but the judge also gave them 30 days to try again. Another person is now pursuing release through a different federal court after they were transferred to a detention facility in a different state.

The federal judge in Idaho said that nearly all of his colleagues who have faced similar requests from immigration detainees have come to the same conclusion: That non-citizens who are detained while already present in the United States are entitled to due process rights.

“Treating the detention of noncitizens stopped at or near the border differently from noncitizens who reside within the country is not an anomaly. Instead, it reflects the long-recognized distinction in our immigration laws and the Constitution that due process protections apply to noncitizens residing within the country but not those stopped at or near the border,” Winmill wrote.

Ramirez-Smith said Winmill's release orders do “a great job of putting into perspective what the issues are."

“They’ll just stay home with their families, and we’ll file the applications for relief in immigration court, and they’ll get a court hearing. Those trial dates will probably be years out,” she said, because of a hefty backlog of more than 3 million cases in immigration courts.


Still, President Donald Trump has taken steps to reduce the backlog, instructing judges during his first term to deny entire categories of asylum claims such as for victims of gang or domestic violence.

During his current term, the Trump administration has fired dozens of immigration judges, and authorized about 600 military lawyers to work as temporary immigration judges. The administration has also frequently turned what would normally be routine immigration hearings into deportation traps, with government lawyers quickly dismissing asylum cases so the migrants who sought asylum can be immediately arrested in the courthouse halls.

Rebecca Boone, The Associated Press

 

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Trump and Republicans once more face a tough political fight over Obama-era health law


WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is once more targeting former President Barack Obama's signature health care law, picking a political fight before next year's elections that is reminiscent of one he lost in his first term.

Back then, Trump and fellow Republicans tried but failed to dismantle the Affordable Care Act, a stinging defeat viewed as contributing to the party's losses in 2018.

This time, Trump seems to be scaling back his ambition to repeal and replace the law. But he is struggling to ease voters' concerns over the high cost of living — combined with a looming deadline to extend expiring subsidies that help people pay for their “Obamacare” premiums — and it is not clear how he plans to prevent history from repeating itself.



FILE - House Democrats prepare to speak on the steps of the Capitol to insist that Republicans include an extension of expiring health care benefits as part of a government funding compromise, in Washington, Sept. 30, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)© The Associated Press
“You can’t address an affordability crisis by making health care less affordable,” said Jonathan Oberlander, a professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill whose work has focused on health care policy and the politics of the Obama-era health overhaul.

Consumers insured through the law's marketplaces have received notices of hefty premium increases for next year if the subsidies are not extended by Jan. 1 — a reprieve that Trump said Tuesday he would not support. Unless he changes his mind, that leaves it to Congress to find a solution or let the tax credits expire, raising the rates of 24 million people covered through ACA exchanges.



Former President Barack Obama, gestures during a rally for Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger Saturday, Nov. 1, 2025, in Norfolk, Va. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)© The Associated Press
‘Concepts of a plan’

During his White House campaign last year, Trump was calling to repeal the law, but said he only had the “concepts of a plan” to do so. He has yet to elaborate.

The president has since focused on overhauling the COVID-era subsidies that have helped keep down premiums. Democrats forced the recent government shutdown by demanding an extension and have linked that to broader concerns about affordability that were front and center during elections this month as Democrats had big victories.

Those concerns are expected to linger into 2026 when the elections could shift control of Congress.

Some Republican lawmakers are open to extending the subsidies, but Trump said he would only support a plan that sends money to individuals rather than insurance companies, which he complains are “making a fortune.”

“Congress, do not waste your time and energy on anything else,” he wrote on social media.

‘Call it Trumpcare. Call it whatever you want to call it’

Republicans in Congress are working behind the scenes with the White House to devise an answer. There is no guarantee they will succeed.

Sens. Rick Scott, R-Fla., and Bill Cassidy, R-La., have floated separate proposals that would create savings accounts along the lines of what Trump says he would support.

House Republicans are working on a series of bills “that would actually lower costs for families,” said Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La. “We’re going to keep bringing those bills over the next few months.”

House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York panned Trump’s idea of giving money directly to those buying insurance. He said people can already access the tax break on a monthly basis to defray the costs of the policies.

“Donald Trump has zero idea what he’s talking about,” Jeffries said. “It’s all fantasy.”

Vice President JD Vance, without offering details, said Thursday that the administration has a “great health care plan coming together” and predicted it would draw bipartisan support.

“This system is broken. The Democrats broke it, but who cares? We’re going to work together if they’re willing to fix it,” he said.

He also Trump does not care about the politics of the issue and dismisses concerns from those who think health care is a “graveyard for Republicans.”

Vince Haley, who runs the White House Domestic Policy Council, and Heidi Overton, a deputy assistant on the council, have had conversations with industry leaders and members of Congress on the issue, according to a senior White House official who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe internal discussions.


Trump has his own ideas of what he would like to see in a proposal, according to the official, and recognizes the political need for Republicans to have a plan.

The president also said he is talking directly with some Democratic lawmakers, though he declined to name them.

One thing is clear: Trump wants to leave his stamp on the health law that he long has called “a disaster.”

“Call it Trumpcare. Call it whatever you want to call it,” Trump said of his proposed overhaul during an interview last week on Fox News Channel. “But anything but Obamacare.”

The debate underscores how hard it is to unwind Obamacare

Democrats may have unintentionally put a spotlight on the problems in the law in their shutdown fight by drawing attention to the need for subsidies to make the coverage affordable, said Tevi Troy of the Ronald Reagan Institute.

“Republicans have been scared about talking about the issue,” said Troy, who was a deputy health secretary in Republican President George W. Bush’s administration. “And this fight raised the issue again in a way that is favorable for Republicans because eight years later the prices have not gone down" since Trump's first-term repeal effort.


Troy said more Republicans are starting to realize they need to do something about the high costs of coverage, but will need to find some sort of bipartisan compromise to get it passed.

Oberlander, the North Carolina professor, said the “never-ending war over Obamacare” since it was signed into law 15 years ago has been fueled partly by problems with it, but largely by the hyperpartisan era of modern politics.

“This is one front in a broader partisan war in American politics,” Oberlander said of the ACA. “Partisan polarization makes it hard to come to bipartisan compromise.”

He contrasted the law with Medicare, the program providing health coverage for older adults. Medicare faced a tough fight when it was passed in 1965, but the controversy died down, and Republicans and Democrats in the 1980s worked together with Republican President Ronald Reagan to expand it.


If Trump and Republicans attempt to repeal Obamacare again, they will have a much harder political fight than in 2017, when then-Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., doomed the effort with a decisive thumbs-down, Oberlander said. There are now more than twice as many people getting insurance through the ACA as there were then, and some of the law's provisions are popular, such as the ban on denying coverage or raising rates for people with preexisting health conditions.

“You cannot go all the way back to 2009,” Oberlander said. “And whatever Republicans do, they have to work with that reality.”

___

Associated Press writers Lisa Mascaro and Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report.

Michelle L. Price, The Associated Press

 

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Trump’s pardons rewrite failed coup


President Donald Trump is facing renewed scrutiny after issuing a sweeping set of pardons to dozens of allies implicated in efforts to overturn the 2020 election — an extraordinary move critics say is aimed at reshaping the public narrative of one of the most turbulent moments in modern U.S. democracy.
Trump’s pardons


The proclamation claims the pardons “end a grave national injustice.” By: MEGA© Knewz (CA)
The pardons, disclosed by Department of Justice Pardon Attorney Ed Martin and dated November 7, offer a “full, complete, and unconditional pardon” to numerous figures who spent the last three years under federal investigation. The accompanying proclamation declares it”ends a grave national injustice perpetrated upon the American people following the 2020 Presidential Election and continues the process of national reconciliation.” The document notes that the pardon does not apply to Trump himself.

Pardon clemency

The pardons explicitly exclude Trump himself. By: MEGA© Knewz (CA)
While presidents often grant clemency toward the end of their terms, these pardons stand apart in scope and political significance. Far from routine acts of mercy, they effectively absolve central figures in Trump’s effort to overturn Joe Biden’s victory — an operation that culminated in the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Among the most prominent recipients are Sidney Powell, Rudy Giuliani and Mark Meadows. The trio allegedly played pivotal roles in spreading false claims of widespread fraud, pressuring state officials and coordinating slates of fake electors. Special Counsel Jack Smith’s filing details how they “peddled fabricated claims, leaned hard on state officials to toss out results, and helped organize fake electors like it was an amateur off-Broadway production of Seven Days in May.”

Fraud

The pardons aim to “wipe the slate clean” and minimize the actions of co-conspirators. By: MEGA© Knewz (CA)
Key administration officials had already attempted to debunk the fraud theories. Trump’s Attorney General Bill Barr called the allegations “bulls***,” while cybersecurity director Chris Krebs affirmed that 2020 was the most secure election in U.S. history.

Erasing accountability

Critics warn that the pardons create an injustice by rewarding individuals who tried to subvert the election. By: MEGA© Knewz (CA)
The pardons, critics warn, risk “erasing accountability” for what critics describe as “a bats*** conspiracy theory” that fueled the insurrection. By wiping legal consequences from those involved, the move could “turn co-conspirators into footnotes” and signal that attempting to subvert an election carries no lasting penalty. Compounding concerns is the muted media reaction. Cable networks offered brief early coverage, and the story appeared poised to fade amid routine political headlines.

 

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How much is Barron Trump worth — and where did his fortune come from?

 

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Billionaire Trump pal eyeing 'axing' CNN hosts the president 'is said to loathe': report


Senior White House officials say that they are in favor of Paramount Skydance acquiring Warner Bros Discovery, and one official has discussed potential programming changes and firings at CNN with Paramount's largest shareholder, Larry Ellison, The Guardian reports.

Paramount Skydance is currently engaged in a potential bidding war to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, expected to submit a formal bid by the Thursday deadline, is in a competition between other parties including Comcast and Neftlix.

According to The Guardian, Paramount is poised "as the best bid" thus far.

Billionaire Ellison and President Donald Trump have a close relationship, marked by Ellison hosting fundraisers for Trump, meeting with him regularly, and potentially benefiting from Trump's administration on business deals like Oracle's role in the "Stargate" AI partnership and the proposed TikTok acquisition.

Ellison's son David is also a significant figure in the media landscape following his company Skydance's merger with Paramount.

Larry "Ellison often speaks to connections at the White House but, in at least one of the calls, engaged in a dialogue about possibly axing some of the CNN hosts whom Donald Trump is said to loathe, including Erin Burnett and Brianna Keilar, the people said," reports The Guardian.

"The conversation also touched on floating names to replace Burnett and the possibility of running CBS assets like its flagship 60 minutes program on CNN air – proposals that have animated the White House, the people said," they write.

Paramount already has an in with Trump after they paid a $16 million settlement to him after an edited interview of former Vice President Kamala Harria by 60 Minutes last year.

"Additional backing from White House officials would smooth over any other hurdles for the Paramount bid," The Guardian notes.

And while "the only regulatory scrutiny" of Paramount acquiring Warner Bros "would be an antitrust review by the justice department," a former White House official doesn't see it being a problem.

"This won’t pose serious antitrust issues,” they told The Guardian. “That’s just how the government relations game is played."

Trump loyalist Brendan Carr, Federal Communications Commission chair, agrees, telling The Guardian that a Paramount acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery would be very unlikely to require any review by his commission.

“I’d be very surprised if there was an FCC role at all in that type of transaction,” Carr said.