President Trump's weekend was spent "largely alone at the White House, irked by a pair of startling Russia headlines, and baffled that he's not getting more credit for staying put during the partial government shutdown," The Associated Press reports. Along with prolific tweeting, Trump called in to Fox News host Jeanine Pirro's Saturday night show. The decision to call into Fox News, with just a few hours' notice, "surprised his aides," AP said, and they had some regrets about his conversation.
Trump pushed back against a Washington Post report that he'd gone to great lengths to keep his conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin secret, even from top aides, but "White House aides expressed regret that the president did not more clearly and forcefully deny being a Russian agent when asked by the usually friendly Fox News host, according to three White House aides and Republicans close to the White House," AP reports.
Pirro asked Trump if he is or has ever worked for Russia, pointing to a New York Times report that the FBI had opened a counterintelligence operation soon after his inauguration because they became concerned he was a Russian asset, witting or unwitting. "I think it's the most insulting thing I've ever been asked," Trump told Pirro. "I think it's the most insulting article I've ever had written, and if you read the article you'll see that they found absolutely nothing." He did not directly address her question.
In Sunday's Washington Post, columnist Max Boot took a stab, listing 18 bits of evidence Trump could be a Russian asset and concluding, "If Trump isn't actually a Russian agent, he is doing a pretty good imitation of one." At Politico, Strobe Talbott, a deputy secretary of state under Bill Clinton and a Russia expert, lays out his case that "Trump has been colluding with a hostile Russia throughout his presidency. We'll see if it started before that." Peter Weber
President Trump now has three chances to keep his financial records a secret.
The Supreme Court agreed Friday to hear Trump's appeal of three cases that involve subpoenas for his financial records, giving no explanation for the decision. Oral arguments for the separate cases are likely slated for March, with a decision expected at the end of June.
In three separate cases, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance, the House Oversight Committee, and the House Financial Services and Intelligence Committees requested Trump's financial records from his banks and other businesses he worked with. Trump's lawyers sued to block those subpoenas, but in each case, courts ruled against them. So they appealed the decisions to the Supreme Court, first getting stays on the rulings to block the records' immediate release to the oversight committee, and then getting the whole case accepted Friday.
Previous judges have noted that past presidents released their tax returns to the public, and Trump's lawyers subsequently argued that the subpoenas are not a legitimate legislative inquiry. Kathryn Krawczyk
President Trump has at least three Jewish friends. He just asks them all the same questions.
On at least four occasions over the past few months, Trump has pulled out a story where he's purportedly asking a friend which of his administration's moves have been bigger for the Jewish people. The friend always gives the same answer — but Trump changes the name of who he's talking to each time, The Washington Post reports.
"Charlie, let me ask you what’s bigger for the Jewish people," Trump recalled asking Charles Kushner, the disgraced real estate developer and father of Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, at a Hanukkah event on Wednesday. "Giving the embassy to Jerusalem" and recognizing it as Israel's capital or supporting Israel's sovereignty in the disputed Golan Heights. "Neither," Kushner apparently replied. "The biggest thing of all is what you did by ending the Iran nuclear catastrophe."
Yet just a few hours earlier, Trump told nearly the same story, this time involving the even shiftier New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft. A few days earlier, it was Republican megadonor Sheldon Adelson who Trump asked about Israeli accomplishments. And back in September, it was a nondescript "people" who told him they loved his withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal.
Read the full accounts or watch them mashed up side-by-side at The Washington Post. Kathryn Krawczyk
Mitch McConnell has declared himself judge, jury, and White House coordinator in the upcoming Senate impeachment trial.
As the House Judiciary Committee continued to debate its articles of impeachment against President Trump on Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) made a shocking statement: He'll be working "in total coordination" with the White House counsel's office on impeachment. That doesn't mesh well with senators' roles as impartial jurors in an impeachment trial, and it unsurprisingly caught Democrats' attention.
"Everything I do during this, I'm coordinating with the White House counsel," McConnell said of impeachment in his Thursday segment with Fox News' Sean Hannity. "There will be no difference between the president's position and our position in how to handle this." Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) quickly brought up McConnell's comments as Thursday's impeachment debate continued, translating them to mean "the jury — Senate Republicans — are going to coordinate with the defendant — Donald Trump — on how exactly the kangaroo court is going to be run."
The next morning, other Judiciary Democrats took a stab at McConnell's comments. "I think it is outrageous for the chief juror who is organizing the trial to be coordinating with the defendant," Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) told CNN. Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.) went further, saying because McConnell is "working hand in hand with the White House, with the president's attorney," he should "recuse himself" from the trial. Kathryn Krawczyk