10 things you need to know today: January 1, 2019

(Image credit: ERIC BARADAT/AFP/Getty Images)

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1. Democrats propose bills to end shutdown but deny Trump wall money
2. New Year's car attack injures 9 in Tokyo
3. Elizabeth Warren launches 2020 exploratory committee
4. Mattis leaves urging Defense Department employees to 'hold fast'
5. Video footage reportedly shows Khashoggi's body moved in suitcases
6. Vatican spokesman and his deputy resign
7. Stocks gain on last day of their worst year in a decade
8. Trump insists he hasn't abandoned push for concrete wall
9. Federal workers' union sues over shutdown
10. NASA probe flies by farthest object ever explored in solar system

published 1 January 2019

1. Democrats propose bills to end shutdown but deny Trump wall money

House Democrats on Monday unveiled a proposal to end the partial government shutdown without the $5 billion President Trump wants to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Democrats take control of the House when the new Congress convenes on Thursday, and their package of spending bills will mark their first showdown with Trump and his Republican allies who still control the Senate. Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), the House Democratic leader, said it would be "the height of irresponsibility and political cynicism" for Senate Republicans to reject the legislation, because it is essentially the same plan they once supported. But a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said the Senate "is not going to send something to the president that he won't sign."

A man rammed a car into a crowd of New Year's revelers in Tokyo near the city's iconic Meiji shrine early Tuesday, injuring nine people, one seriously. The man fled and assaulted a passerby, but was captured minutes later. About five gallons of kerosene reportedly were found in his car. Police said the suspect, identified as 21-year-old Kazuhiro Kusakabe, said immediately after his arrest on suspicion of murder that the attack was an "act of terror," but later described it as "retaliation for the execution of Aum cult members." The cult was held responsible for a 1995 sarin gas attack in the city's subway, and its remaining members were executed last year.

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Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), a vocal liberal critic of Wall Street and President Trump, announced Monday that she had formed an exploratory committee to consider a possible presidential run in 2020. The move will allow her to raise money to compete in what is expected to be a crowded field of candidates vying for the Democratic nomination to challenge Trump. Warren, 69, said via Twitter that she would decide whether to run early in 2019. Warren vowed in a video message to be a fierce advocate for the middle class, saying the federal government has become "a tool for the wealthy and well-connected." Asked whether she could win, Trump, who has repeatedly called Warren "Pocahontas" because of her claim to be part Native American, told Fox News to "ask her psychiatrist."

Defense Secretary James Mattis released a farewell message on his last day of the job on Monday, urging department employees to "keep the faith in our country and hold fast, alongside our allies, aligned against our foes." "I am confident that each of you remains undistracted from our sworn mission to support and defend the Constitution while protecting our way of life," Mattis wrote. The short note mirrored the message in his resignation letter, which he wrote shortly after President Trump announced he was ordering the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria and cutting U.S. troop strength in Afghanistan by half. Mattis' resignation letter was widely interpreted as a stinging rebuke of Trump's foreign policy, and it prompted Trump to say Mattis would leave at the end of 2018, rather than in late February as originally planned.

A Turkish television station, A-Haber, has broadcast footage of men carrying five suitcases and two other bags to the home of Saudi Arabia's consul general in Istanbul. Citing unnamed Turkish sources, A-Haber reports the luggage contained the dismembered body of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered in the Saudi consulate in October. The residence is close to the diplomatic facility and was among the locations searched by Turkish authorities soon after Khashoggi's death. His body has not been found, and some reports suggest it was dissolved in acid after dismemberment. The CIA reportedly concluded with "medium-to-high confidence" that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman "personally targeted" Khashoggi, likely ordering his death.

Vatican spokesman Greg Burke and his deputy, Paloma Garcia, resigned Monday as part of a shakeup of Vatican communications operations ahead of a crucial summit in February to discuss sexual abuse within the Catholic Church. Burke's sudden, unexpected departure came after a previous shake-up of the Vatican communications staff, when Pope Francis named a new editor of the Vatican newspaper and a new editorial director for Vatican media. "At this time of transition in Vatican communications, we think it’s best the Holy Father is completely free to assemble a new team," Burke said via Twitter. Francis named a longtime member of the Vatican's communications operations, Alessandro Gisotti, as an interim replacement.

Stocks gained on the last day of 2018 on Monday, but still ended the year with their worst losses since 2008, at the height of the financial crisis. The market volatility has raised fears of a bear market or even a recession in 2019. The Dow Jones Industrial Average started the year with a 5 percent surge in January, which President Trump attributed to his tax cuts and other policies. But the Dow ended down 5.6 percent on the year. The S&P 500 fell by 6.2 percent, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite lost 3.9 percent. The sell-off started in October as investor fear mounted that Trump's trade war with China and the Federal Reserve's interest rate hikes would drag down the economy.

President Trump pushed back Monday against comments by his outgoing chief of staff, John Kelly, who told the Los Angeles Times that the administration had abandoned plans for an actual concrete wall running the length of the Mexican border. Kelly said Trump now sometimes refers to a "barrier," or "fencing," and now tends "toward steel slats. But we left a solid concrete wall early on in the administration." Trump blamed the media for suggesting he had changed plans. "An all concrete Wall was NEVER ABANDONED, as has been reported by the media," he tweeted. "Some areas will be all concrete but the experts at Border Patrol prefer a Wall that is see through (thereby making it possible to see what is happening on both sides). Makes sense to me!"

One of the largest unions representing federal workers announced Monday that it is suing the Trump administration over the government shutdown. The American Federation of Government Employees lawsuit, filed in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, argues that the administration is violating the law by making some employees continue working without pay, although they will receive back pay once the shutdown ends. "Our members put their lives on the line to keep our country safe," J. David Cox Sr., president of AFGE, said. "Requiring them to work without pay is nothing short of inhumane." About 420,000 federal employees deemed "essential" are continuing to work through the shutdown, which started Dec. 22 due to an impasse over President Trump's demand for $5 billion toward a border wall.

Just after midnight on New Year's Eve, NASA's New Horizons probe sailed into the outer edges of the solar system, flying by Ultima Thule, 4.1 billion miles from Earth. The mysterious object is home to frozen relics from the birth of the solar system. New Horizons has spent years soaring through space, flying past Pluto in late 2015. New Horizons got within 2,200 miles of Ultima Thule, whizzing by at 32,000 miles per hour. "We set a record! Never before has a spacecraft explored something so far away," New Horizons principal investigator Alan Stern, of the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado, said after the flyby. "I mean, think of it. We're a billion miles farther than Pluto."

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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.