After President Trump announced Wednesday night that he will give his State of the Union address once the government shutdown is over, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) quickly responded, urging him to support efforts to end it as soon as Thursday.
Last week, Pelosi suggested Trump hold off on giving the State of the Union speech until after the shutdown was over. On Wednesday, the two went back and forth, with Trump saying he planned on delivering the speech in the House chamber on Jan. 29 and Pelosi writing back, saying not until the government re-opened. Trump finally tweeted that this was "her prerogative," and he'll wait until the shutdown is over. "I look forward to giving a 'great' State of the Union Address in the near future!" he added.
Pelosi pounced, tweeting: "Mr. President, I hope by saying 'near future' you mean you will support the House-passed package to #EndTheShutdown that the Senate will vote on tomorrow. Please accept this proposal so we can re-open government, repay our federal workers, and then negotiate our differences." On Thursday, the Senate is scheduled to vote on two opposing bills to end the government shutdown. One proposal would extend 2018 funding levels through Feb. 8, and the other would re-open the government in exchange for Trump receiving his requested $5.7 billion for a border wall and a three-year extension of DACA. Catherine Garcia
Four days out from the 2019 Oscars, pundits are generally in agreement about what is likely to win in the top categories. But could some stunning upsets be in store?
A few scenarios are plausible, if still unlikely. Here are five potential outcomes to brace yourself for this Sunday:
1. Black Panther wins Best Picture: Roma is the clear frontrunner, but a foreign film has never won Best Picture, and there are some who believe its status as a Netflix movie may hold it back. If so, in years when no film runs away with the top prize, the Oscars' preferential balloting system can favor one with broad appeal. Green Book is controversial, though, and may not have the broad appeal of the $1.3 billion phenomenon Black Panther, which already picked up a win at the SAG Awards.
2. Spike Lee wins Best Director: The frontrunner here, Alfonso Cuarón, won five years ago, while the Academy has repeatedly whiffed on even nominating Lee. This year, voters could decide his time has finally come.
3. Bradley Cooper wins Best Actor: This would be the wildest upset of the night, since Rami Malek likely has this category locked up. But Cooper was shut out throughout awards season and snubbed for Best Director, which could actually work in his favor, earning him enough sympathy votes for a shocking victory, Argo style.
4. Olivia Colman wins Best Actress: This is Glenn Close's to lose, but don't fully count out Colman. There's plenty of affection in the Academy for The Favourite, which tied with Roma for the most nominations, and Colman already won an acting award at the Golden Globes and the BAFTAs.
5. Rachel Weisz wins Best Supporting Actress: A potential red flag for this category's frontrunner, Regina King, is that she wasn't even nominated at the SAG Awards. If this sets her back, perhaps the Favourite love will continue and Weisz, who won the BAFTA, really is in contention. Brendan Morrow
Brexit isn't the only political crisis tearing the U.K.'s Parliament apart.
Three Conservative and eight Labour members of Parliament have left their parties in the past few days, and they have a surprisingly unified reason, BBC reports. All the defectors are fed up with Brexit proceedings and how their parties are being run, so they're coming together under a newly formed Independent Party.
Britain voted in June 2016 to leave the European Union, but just how that's happening has been a total mystery ever since. Parliament hasn't confirmed a Brexit deal with the EU, it doesn't really want a Brexit with no deal, and it hasn't opted for a referendum on the entire thing. Prime Minister Theresa May has just barely retained her seat through it all.
The leadership crisis has spanned both major parties, with seven Labour MPs first announcing their resignation from the party on Monday, CNN says. One defector, Luciana Berger, cited anti-Semitism within the party and said it had been "hijacked by the machine politics of the hard left." Joan Ryan, an eighth Labour defector, joined the new Independent Group on Tuesday. And on Wednesday, three Conservatives joined the Independents on account of "this government's disastrous handling of Brexit," they said in a letter to May.
The 11-member, centrist party is already united under the premise of fixing a "broken" political system, per its Twitter. The Labour Party is now seemingly worried about losing more MPs, as staffers lost access to voter rolls Wednesday, per The Guardian. Kathryn Krawczyk
The Department of Justice is ready for Special Counsel Robert Mueller to drop his report, CNN reports.
Newly-confirmed Attorney General William Barr will announce "as early as next week" that Mueller has completed his probe into potential ties between the Trump campaign and Russian election interference, sources tell CNN. He'll reportedly only give Congress a summary of the confidential report and not the whole thing — a contrast to what many Democrats demanded of Barr during his confirmation proceedings.
Mueller has been investigating President Trump's 2016 campaign staff for nearly two years and has levied indictments against or negotiated plea deals with 37 people. Per CNN's reporting, this is the strongest sign that Mueller is finishing the probe. Still, "the precise timing of the announcement is subject to change," CNN says. If it comes next week, Trump will likely be in Vietnam meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
It's unclear what Barr will include in the summary to Congress, or how long it will take for him to prepare that summary after announcing the probe has wrapped. Both the Justice Department and the special counsel's office declined to comment, CNN reports. Kathryn Krawczyk
Michael Cohen will have two more months of freedom than expected.
President Trump's former lawyer has been granted a request to delay the beginning of his prison sentence. He was originally ordered to report to jail on March 6, but U.S. District Judge William Pauley has delayed this to May 6, reports BuzzFeed News. Cohen had been sentenced to three years in prison after pleading guilty to campaign finance violations related to his role in paying off two women who claim they had affairs with Trump. He also pleaded guilty to lying to Congress.
CNN reports Cohen's lawyers when making this request had pointed to Cohen's shoulder surgery, as well as his planned congressional testimony. Cohen plans to testify before three different congressional committees before his prison sentence begins, according to CNBC, and now, he'll have plenty of time to do so. Brendan Morrow
Before health insurance brokers pitch a plan to employers, the brokers are pitched by the insurance companies themselves — and the pitches come with promises of luxury vacations, $100,000 bonuses and in one instance, the chance to play baseball with former New York Yankee Mariano Rivera.
The lucrative health insurance business doles out commissions and bonuses to independent brokers who are working with employers, reports ProPublica. But these additional incentives are ultimately paid for by the employers and the employees who purchase the plans. One major insurer, Health Care Service Corporation, spent $816 million on broker bonuses and commissions in 2017.
When insurance brokers sign up more employers, they receive commission based on the price of the premium, often upwards of $50,000 per client. Commissions increase for costlier plans, therefore creating a lack of incentive to promote more cost-effective options, per ProPublica. The average cost of employer-sponsored health insurance premiums has reportedly tripled since the 1990s.
Insurers foot the bill for commissions, but these payments are ultimately factored in to the price of the premiums that employers pay. Some insurers offer additional non-financial incentives to brokers, and these are often not revealed by brokers to the employers they are advising unless specifically asked for. Read more about the lucrative brokering business at ProPublica. Marianne Dodson
Southern California has been emerging from its most recent drought cycle thanks to one of the wettest winters the long-parched southern half of the Golden State has experienced in years — 18 trillion gallons of rain have fallen in February alone.
The rest of the state is doing pretty well, too. No area "is considered to be in extreme or exceptional drought," the Los Angeles Times reported on Wednesday.
But don't expect these storms to come to the rescue when — not if — more intense droughts return to the region. All that rain water? Climatologist Bill Patzert estimates that 80 percent of it winds up in the Pacific Ocean.
"When you look at the Los Angeles River being between 50% and 70% full during a storm, you realize that more water is running down the river into the ocean than what Los Angeles would use in close to a year," said Mark Gold, associate vice chancellor for environment and sustainability at University of California, Los Angeles.
There are other reasons run-off evades capture in the region — for example, it's been so arid the last few years that the rainwater falls victim to exceptionally thirsty roots and soil before it can even get to any basins. That means less water for household use even as storms bring record rainfall. "What a waste of water supply," said Gold.
There have been increased efforts to retain more rainwater, which have proved to be more successful this year, and a new property tax passed last year will create funding necessary for better capturing practices. Read more at the Los Angeles Times. Tim O'Donnell