White House Staff Secretary Rob Porter resigned Wednesday, hours after Britain's Daily Mail and The Intercept reported that Porter physically and verbally abused both of his ex-wives. But other than that established point, the White House has given significantly different versions of who knew what, when.
Notably, White House Chief of Staff John Kelly's version of Porter's departure is markedly different than the version from other White House officials, so "either the White House spokespeople or the president's chief of staff is lying," says Jonathan Swan at Axios. "It's a stunning display of incompetence that five days after the initial story broke, they still can't get their stories straight."
In Kelly's version, he demanded and got Porter's resignation within 40 minutes of fully understanding the severity of the allegations from the Daily Mail story, then went in and told President Trump what had happened. Porter had misled him Tuesday about the nature of the imminent negative stories about his marriages, Kelly told people to say.
But "multiple administration officials" told Politico and other news organizations that Kelly had known about the main points of the allegations against Porter for months, as had White House Counsel Don McGahn. In the main alternate timeline from the White House, the communications team had met with Porter on Tuesday, warned Kelly about the coming domestic violence accusations, then worked up a statement defending Porter in Kelly's name. On Wednesday, Swan says, "the White House press team told reporters that nobody asked for Porter's resignation. They added that several senior officials encouraged Porter to 'stay and fight,'" possibly including Kelly.
On Sunday's Face the Nation, White House budget chief Mick Mulvaney added another wrinkle, saying that Porter had proclaimed his innocence to Trump himself, telling him: "I've been falsely accused of this. Please don't believe it. It's not true." Porter was given "the benefit of the doubt" until the photos of Porter's ex-wife's black eye were published, Mulvaney said. That would be at 1:53 a.m. on Twitter — so Trump was plausibly asleep. Peter Weber
A federal judge in California issued a preliminary injunction on Friday temporarily blocking the government from constructing a wall in two sectors along the U.S.-Mexico border using funds diverted from the Defense Department, throwing a wrinkle into President Trump's national emergency declaration.
Construction was set to begin on Saturday, but the order — which applies specifically to two areas along the border near Yuma, Arizona, and El Paso, Texas, where a total of 51 miles of fencing was set to be built — will put that on hold. The construction of additional segments, announced too late for Friday's decision, will reportedly be taken up in June.
The judge, Haywood S. Gilliam, wrote that Congress's 'absolute' control over federal funding is an 'essential' feature of the United States government and that Trump's emergency declaration would "pose serious problems under the Constitution's separation of powers principles." The American Civil Liberties Union called the decision a "win for our system of checks and balances." Gilliam's ruling was in response to a lawsuit brought by the Sierra Club and the Southern Border Communities Coalition. Tim O'Donnell
The Supreme Court has blocked lower court rulings that required Ohio and Michigan's electoral maps to be immediately redrawn, NBC News reported Friday.
Previous court rulings had determined Ohio's map of congressional districts, and Michigan's map of congressional and state legislative districts, needed to be redrawn ahead of the 2020 election due to unconstitutional gerrymandering, in both cases favoring Republicans. But the Supreme Court on Friday put these orders on hold.
The justices are currently reviewing two gerrymandering cases, one concerning North Carolina and one concerning Maryland, during which they will decide whether the court has a role in such a matter. Verdicts are expected to be reached in these cases by the end of next month. Read more at The Washington Post. Brendan Morrow
There are now 9 states with laws that would outlaw nearly all abortions if Roe v. Wade is overturned
Missouri's governor signed into law a strict abortion ban on Friday, adding it to the list of states that would have a dramatically different abortion landscape if Roe v. Wade were overturned.
The law, which bans abortions at eight weeks of pregnancy, follows in the footsteps of four other states that have passed fetal "heartbeat" laws, as well as two states that have limited abortions to the middle of the second trimester, reports Axios.
At least six other states are currently considering restrictive abortion bills, as a nationwide momentum has led more bills to state legislatures. Six states have included "trigger laws," which are currently inactive but would go into effect banning all abortion the moment Roe is hypothetically overturned, reports CBS News.
But while Roe v. Wade remains a hot-button topic, experts say it's unlikely to be overturned — especially any time soon.
"The court just doesn't operate that way … This idea that you're going to force them to reconsider Roe v. Wade is just absurd," Pro-life lawyer James Bopp Jr. told Politico. "There's a lot of ill-informed hype on both sides about these measures … They'll never go into effect."
Caroline Fredrickson, with liberal legal group the American Constitution Society, told Politico that Chief Justice John Roberts would "probably prefer" the issue not be brought to the Supreme Court in the middle of an election. Marianne Dodson
The University of Oklahoma has been supplying false information to U.S. News & World Report for the last 20 years, reports CNN.
U.S. News & World Report, which creates the annual Best Colleges rankings, says the university has given "inflated" numbers on its alumni giving rates, of all things. Oklahoma will now be unranked in the 2019 rankings.
The university inflated its alumni giving rate by more than 4 percent, incorrectly claiming it was 14 percent instead of 9.7 percent. The alumni giving rate makes up 5 percent of the rankings formula, as it "measures student satisfaction and post-graduate engagement," reports CNN.
The school said it noticed the error in reporting in 2018 and immediately gave the accurate information to U.S. News. OU was ranked 97th in 2018 among both public and private institutions.
The revelation marks the second time in two years that a college has provided false information to U.S. News for several years, following Temple University's admission it had inflated information about its online M.B.A. program, per Inside Higher Ed. Marianne Dodson
Adam Levine has turned his chair for the final time.
The Maroon 5 frontman announced season 16 of The Voice would be his last as a coach, revealing the decision in an Instagram post Friday morning.
Levine has been with the talent competition show since its premiere in 2011 and is one of two judges, along with Blake Shelton, to remain as a coach during the show's 16 seasons. Levine and Shelton struck up a friendship and rivalry during the show's tenure, which has been credited as bolstering the show's success, reports People.
"Our friendship is and always will be one for the books," Levine wrote about Shelton on Instagram. "Whatever this whole surreal experience was, [I'm] just happy I got to experience it with you."
Levine ends his run on The Voice with three wins to his name, half of Shelton's six.
The Voice host Carson Daly told The Today Show that Levine's replacement would be former coach Gwen Stefani, who is dating Shelton. Marianne Dodson