Attorney General William Barr is pushing back against criticism that he is using his position to protect President Trump.

During an interview with The Wall Street Journal on Monday, Barr said that before becoming Trump's attorney general, he saw the president was the focus of several investigations, and felt "the rules were being changed to hurt Trump, and I thought it was damaging for the presidency over the long haul."

Barr wrote a 19-page memo to the Department of Justice last year, saying Special Counsel Robert Mueller's obstruction inquiry hurt the presidency; after the report was released, Barr decided that several incidents of potential obstruction described in Mueller's report were not criminal. "At every grave juncture the presidency has done what it is supposed to do, which is to provide leadership and direction," Barr said. "If you destroy the presidency and make it an errand boy for Congress, we're going to be a much weaker and more divided nation."

Barr's critics have called him out for refusing to turn over an unredacted copy of Mueller's report to the House Judiciary Committee, which led to the panel voting to hold him in contempt; ordering a review into the origins of the Russia investigation; and telling lawmakers that Trump campaign associates were the victims of "spying." All of this is "an affront to everyone who worked on that case and who supported it, and to everyone who works counterintelligence in general," former top FBI counterintelligence agent Frank Montoya told the Journal. Catherine Garcia

Police officers in Phoenix must now fill out a form every time they point a gun at a person, with a supervisor then reviewing the incident, a policy the city has been considering for several years.

City officials announced the new rule on Monday, with Police Chief Jeri Williams saying, "When a gun is pointed at someone, that's a traumatic event. I think this is a first step in being ... that accountable, transparent organization that is willing to share what we do and how we do it."

This was first recommended in 2015 by a community panel, and again in April by the National Police Foundation, which studied a spike in officer-involved shootings last year; there were 44 incidents in 2018, up from an average of 21 from 2009 to 2017, CNN reports. Other major cities also document when officers point their guns, including Dallas, New Orleans, and Chicago.

The city did not say if this new policy is in response to a video released two months ago, which showed an officer pointing a gun at a family during a shoplifting investigation. Police say the woman did not listen when officers told her to lift her hands, and they were concerned she might be hiding a weapon. Catherine Garcia

By the end of 2022, Hasbro products will be mostly free of plastic packaging, the toymaker announced Tuesday.

The company now uses plastic bags, elastic bands, and shrink wrap for its board games, including Monopoly, and some other toys. This move does not affect toys made out of plastic, like Mr. Potato Head, but Hasbro said it is trying to find an alternative material that is safe for kids and still looks like plastic. Hasbro does offer a recycling program, with customers able to send in their old plastic toys.

Because of its harmful environmental impact, more companies are trying to stop using plastic, and many cities are banning plastic bags and eliminating plastic straws. The company said it will start phasing out plastic in 2020. Catherine Garcia

Mr. Stark, I don't feel so good...

Just after being crowned the next Iron Man in this summer's Spider-Man: Far From Home, Spider-Man's involvement in the Marvel Cinematic Universe may be over. Deadline reported on Tuesday that Disney and Sony were unable to reach an agreement that would keep Marvel Studios and its president, Kevin Feige, involved in future Spider-Man movies.

To recap, Marvel Studios did not have access to Spider-Man when it began the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2008 with Iron Man, as Sony had exclusive rights to the character and was releasing movies in its own universe. But after the financial disappointment of The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Sony and Marvel Studios reached a deal whereby Sony and Disney would essentially share the character, with Sony continuing to make Spider-Man movies that crossed over with the Marvel universe. After appearing in both Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame, this summer's Spider-Man: Far From Home sets up Spider-Man as a crucial character for the rest of the series, and he's established as effectively being the successor to Tony Stark.

But that may be quickly retconned, as now, Deadline reports that Feige won't produce the next two Spider-Man movies that are planned with Tom Holland, meaning they are unlikely to have any connections to the Marvel Cinematic Universe at all, and Spider-Man probably wouldn't appear in any Avengers movies, either. According to the report, Disney was looking for a 50-50 co-financing arrangement for future Spider-Man movies, but Sony turned it down. "Sony so far has decided that as valuable as Feige is, Disney is asking too high a price," Deadline writes. The Hollywood Reporter confirmed the news, adding that as a result, "Tom Holland's Spider-Man is likely to disappear entirely from the Marvel Cinematic Universe." Far from home, indeed. Brendan Morrow

President Trump's Scottish golf courses are raising some eyebrows, but not because of the beauty of their design.

HuffPost reports that Trump filed financial disclosure statements that appear to misstate the value and profitability of his Turnberry and Aberdeen resorts. For example, in 2018, Trump claimed in his U.S. filing that the resorts were each worth more than $50 million. Meanwhile, he filed balance sheets with the British government covering the same time period that showed the resorts' combined debt exceeded their assets by 47.9 million British pounds, which was equivalent to $64.8 million at the time.

In the U.S., his public disclosure pegged the income he earned from the resorts at $23.8 million, while his filings with the U.K. Companies House office in Edinburgh, Scotland, showed Turnberry and Aberdeen lost 4.6 million pounds, or $6.3 million in that timeframe. Finally, HuffPost notes that Trump's U.S. disclosure statement did not mention the $199.5 million in loans the president made to the resorts.

HuffPost reports that knowingly providing false or incomplete information on the form is a violation of the Ethics in Government Act and is punishable by up to a year in jail, while signing the form — and subsequently making a false statement — could result in a maximum of five years' imprisonment.

However, Virginia Carter, an ethics law expert with Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, told HuffPost that the Office of Government Ethics does give filers quite a bit of leeway in determining asset value, though she added Trump's numbers raise "legitimate questions," as it's unclear as to how the $50 million mark was reached. "The numbers don't appear to add up," she said. Read more at HuffPost. Tim O'Donnell

President Trump continued his feud with Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) on Tuesday, ultimately leading him to accuse Jewish Democratic voters of disloyalty.

This iteration of the battle between Trump and the congresswomen follows a turbulent week which saw Israel bar and unbar Tlaib from visiting her grandmother in Palestine, only to have Tlaib ultimately reject the country's approval of her appeal. Meanwhile, Trump suggested Israel would look "weak" if it allowed Tlaib and Omar to enter Israel considering their support for the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions, or BDS, movement. It's unclear if Trump's words swayed Israel toward Tlaib's initial rejection, but, regardless, the sides have gone back and forth ever since.

On Tuesday, Trump was asked about the situation, to which he replied that "any Jewish people that vote for a Democrat" show either "a total lack of knowledge or great disloyalty." About 79 percent of American Jews voted Democratic in 2018, reports NBC News' Benjy Sarlin.

The president also called Omar a "disaster for Jewish people" and, earlier in the day, mocked Tlaib for crying as she explained why she decided against visiting her grandmother. Tim O'Donnell

President Trump on Tuesday confirmed reporting that he's considering a payroll tax cut after the White House spent the past day denying that he is.

On Monday, reports from The Washington Post and The New York Times emerged that the White House was weighing a temporary payroll tax cut as economists fear a looming recession, but White House officials denied it, with a statement released to the Post saying that "cutting payroll taxes is not something under consideration at this time." White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary Hogan Gidley in a Fox News interview on Tuesday morning similarly offered a denial, saying that "it's not being considered at this time."

So of course Trump would go on to say the exact opposite mere hours later, confirming the original reporting by saying in the White House, "Payroll taxes is something that we think about, and a lot of people would like to see that."

Add this onto the increasingly large list of examples of Trump contradicting White House officials, as when, earlier this year, the White House denied that Trump was considering a plan to release migrants into "sanctuary cities" and target his Democratic opponents, only for Trump to immediately tweet that he is "indeed, as reported," considering said plan. The New York Times' Maggie Haberman reports that administration officials were told to go out and deny that Trump is considering a payroll tax cut, a plan Trump himself would apparently thwart in short order. Brendan Morrow