memeorandum: ‘Hello, Bob’: President Trump called my cellphone to say that the health-care bill was dead (Robert Costa/Washington Post)

8:35 PM ET, March 24, 2017

Top Items:

In Spectacular Defeat for Trump, Push to Repeal Health Law Fails — WASHINGTON — House Republican leaders, facing a revolt among conservatives and moderates in their ranks, pulled legislation to repeal the Affordable Care Act from consideration on the House floor Friday afternoon …

Robert Costa / Washington Post:

‘Hello, Bob’: President Trump called my cellphone to say that the health-care bill was dead — President Trump called me on my cellphone Friday afternoon at 3:31 p.m. At first I thought it was a reader with a complaint since it was a blocked number. — Instead, it was the president calling from the Oval Office.

Discussion: Business Insider, AOL, Hot Air, Lawyers, Guns & Money, TheBlaze, ACASignups.net, The Atlantic, TVNewser and Politico

Kate Bennett / CNN:

Trump unhappy Jared Kushner took a powder on the ski slopes as health care bill floundered — Aides in Washington toiled all week trying to get the health care reform bill over the finish line — Washington (CNN)While the rest of his senior staff scrambled to squeeze votes …

Discussion: Politico and RedState

Matthew Boyle / Breitbart:

Exclusive — Discussion About GOP Replacement to Paul Ryan as Speaker of the House Intensifies in White House, Congress — Republican officials in Congress and the White House are now openly discussing finding a GOP replacement to Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) as Speaker of the House …

Discussion: ABC News, Politico, The Huffington Post, The Gateway Pundit, Vox, ThinkProgress, IJR, Raw Story, RT, CNBC, The Daily Caller, Mediaite, Politicus USA and Axios

Jonathan Chait / New York Magazine:

Why Obamacare Defeated Trumpcare — With the collapse of the House health-care bill, the cause of repealing Obamacare, a right-wing obsession for seven years and a day, has died. The flame will never be fully extinguished in the hearts of the true believers — after all …

Discussion: Vox, The Moderate Voice, ABC News, Politico, New York Times, The American Conservative and TheBlaze

Gabriel Sherman / New York Magazine:

Why Steve Bannon Might Be the Winner of the GOP's Health-Care Civil War — With hours to go before the House is set to (finally) vote on Paul Ryan's health-care bill, the Trump administration is putting a full-court press on recalcitrant Republicans to rally votes.

Discussion: Business Insider, The Rush Limbaugh Show, No More Mister Nice Blog, The Atlantic, Talking Points Memo and Axios

Asawin Suebsaeng / The Daily Beast:

Bannon Tells Trump: ‘Keep a S**t List’ of Republicans Who Opposed You — If TrumpCare dies, the White House won't forget who killed it — and plans on keeping a “s**t list” of Republicans who stood in their way. — According to multiple Trump administration officials speaking to The Daily Beast …

Discussion: Raw Story and Politico

Joe Concha / The Hill:

Fox's Stuart Varney: ‘The Republican Party is a disgrace’ — Fox Business Network host Stuart Varney scolded the GOP on Friday for struggling to repeal and replace ObamaCare despite controlling the House, Senate and White House. — “I personally believe at this moment in time the Republican Party …

Discussion: RedState and Viking Pundit

Bloomberg:

White House Preparing to Blame Ryan If Health Bill Fails, Official Says — But Trump says ‘yes’ when asked if Ryan should remain speaker — Legislation advances toward crucial House vote on Friday — In public, President Donald Trump is standing by House Speaker Paul Ryan over the Obamacare replacement bill.

Discussion: ABC News, Politico, The Atlantic, New York Times, TheBlaze, Investor's Business Daily, Townhall.com, Daily Kos, Axios and Hot Air

Nolan D. McCaskill / Politico:
Trump: I never said repeal and replace would come in 64 days

Discussion: ABC News and Mother Jones

Mike DeBonis / Washington Post:
GOP health-care bill: House Republican leaders abruptly pull their rewrite of the nation's health-care law

Discussion: Power Line, Talking Points Memo, Politicus USA, Washington Examiner, Political Wire, Occupy Democrats, Outside the Beltway, The Daily Caller, Washington Times, Washington Free Beacon, Booman Tribune, Mediaite and New York Times

Ezra Klein / Vox:
How Paul Ryan played Donald Trump

Discussion: NPR, Politicus USA, Hit & Run, bradford-delong.com, BillMoyers.com, The Resurgent, Daily Kos, Salon, No More Mister Nice Blog, Occupy Democrats, New York Magazine, Talking Points Memo, Lawyers, Guns & Money, Hot Air, rubber hose and Business Insider, more at Mediagazer »

Washington Post:
‘The closer’? The inside story of how Trump tried — and failed — to make a deal on health care

Discussion: Politico and Hullabaloo

Jordan Fabian / The Hill:
FBI Director Comey visits White House

Discussion: Mediaite and The Gateway Pundit

Joel B. Pollak / Breitbart:
Health Care Bill's Failure: Just Part of the ‘Art of the Deal’

Discussion: The Gateway Pundit

Maggie Haberman / New York Times:
In a Call to The Times, Trump Blames Democrats for the Failure of the Health Bill

Discussion: Politico

Axios:
Health care bill might get yanked from House floor

Discussion: Mother Jones

Ema O'Connor / BuzzFeed:
Planned Parenthood's President: “It's Time For Ivanka To Stand For Women”

Discussion: CNBC, Political Insider blog, Raw Story, The Gateway Pundit, Daily Wire, ABC News, New York Magazine, The Guardian, Business Insider, AOL and TheBlaze

Justin Fishel / ABC News:
Ryan pulls ‘fundamentally flawed’ GOP health care bill following call from Trump

Discussion: Politico and Washington Post

CNN:
Ryan visiting Trump, not delivering good news on health care

Discussion: MichelleMalkin.com, The Atlantic, Hot Air, IJR, Mediaite and Joe.My.God.

Breitbart:
Report: Steve Bannon Says American Health Care Act ‘Written by the Insurance Industry’

Discussion: Vox, ABC News and Talking Points Memo

Bloomberg:
GOP Leaders Not Confident They Have Votes to Pass Health Bill

Discussion: The Daily Caller, Fox News, Axios, CNBC, Mediaite, ABC News, Deadline and Talking Points Memo

Jordan Fabian / The Hill:
White House: Vote at 3:30; Trump left ‘everything on field’

Discussion: Hot Air, New York Times and Joe.My.God.

Wall Street Journal:

Ex-CIA Director: Mike Flynn and Turkish Officials Discussed Removal of Erdogan Foe From U.S. — James Woolsey says he attended a September meeting where other participants, including then-Trump adviser Mike Flynn, talked of moving Fethullah Gulen back to Turkey without going through U.S. extradition process

Discussion: Business Insider, Balloon Juice, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Daily Wire, Raw Story and Mediaite

Dan Alexander / Forbes:

After Promising Not To Talk Business With Father, Eric Trump Says He'll Give Him Financial Reports — Eric Trump sits behind a desk on the 25th floor of Trump Tower in New York City, dressed in a slightly less formal version of his father's go-to power uniform—blue suit, white buttoned-down shirt, no tie.

Discussion: New York Times, The Guardian, TheBlaze, Hullabaloo, Political Wire, Occupy Democrats, CNBC, Business Insider, Talking Points Memo, Politico and Axios

David Corn / Mother Jones:

Nunes (Kind of) Confesses He Went Off Half-Cocked — Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the now-famous (for the wrong reasons) chair of the House intelligence committee, held another weird press conference Friday morning. It wasn't as much of a doozy as his double feature on Wednesday …

Discussion: Hullabaloo, Common Dreams, CNN and Washington Post

CNN:
Rick Gates out at America First Policies over Manafort ties to Russia

Discussion: Politico

Katie Bo Williams / The Hill:
Nunes: Manafort volunteered to interview with Intel panel

Discussion: CNN, Occupy Democrats, Politico, Infowars, CANNONFIRE, ABC News, Fox News Insider, Towleroad, The Gateway Pundit, Mediaite, TalkLeft and TheBlaze

Axios:

Mnuchin: Losing human jobs to AI “not even on our radar screen” — Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin joined Axios' Mike Allen this morning at the debut of his News Shapers event series to talk about his new role in the Trump Administration. — On AI supplanting human jobs …

Discussion: The Daily Beast, GeekWire, Heat Street, KFOR-TV, Washington Post, The Atlantic, TheStreet, Business Insider, Shakesville and Mashable, more at Techmeme »

Media Matters for America:

Alex Jones Apologizes For Pizzagate Coverage, Blames Other Media Outlets — Conspiracy theorist and radio host Alex Jones was pressured to air an apology for his role in spreading the false “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory, which led to a Jones listener firing a gun inside a Washington, D.C. pizzeria.

Discussion: Washington Post, The Slot, The Daily Caller, grubstreet, Joe.My.God. and Mashable

David Frum / The Atlantic:

The Republican Waterloo — Seven years and three days ago, the House of Representatives grumblingly voted to approve the Senate's version of the Affordable Care Act. Democrats in the House were displeased by many of the changes introduced by Senate Democrats.

Discussion: bradford-delong.com

Glenn Garvin / miamiherald:

Hardball political operative Roger Stone finds himself on the receiving end — Roger Stone, the legendarily hardball Republican operative who for years has lustily embraced such media epithets as the dapper don of dirty deeds and the undisputed master of the black arts of electioneering …

Discussion: emptywheel, The Daily Caller and CANNONFIRE

Katherine Timpf / National Review:

College ‘Diversity Council’ Admits to Posting Fake Racist Flyers On Campus — The idea was to encourage ‘dialogue.’ — The Diversity Leadership Council at Gustavus Adolphus College admits that it — with the help of other social-justice groups — planted fake racist flyers on campus “to educate” people about racism.

Discussion: Hit & Run, IJR, Campus Reform, John Hawkins' Right Wing News and The Federalist

David Lazarus / Los Angeles Times:

Column Whatever you do, don't say yes when this chatbot asks, ‘Can you hear me?’ — CSA Images/Archive / Getty Images — It's the most cunning robocall scam I've encountered — and the fact that I've fallen for it more than once tells you how successful it can be. — The phone rings.

Discussion: Mashable

Jennifer Palmieri / Washington Post:

The Clinton campaign warned you about Russia. But nobody listened to us. — Democrats can still fight back now. Here's how. — At the Democratic convention in Philadelphia last summer, Jake Sullivan and I took to our golf carts one afternoon to make the rounds of the television networks' tents …

Matthew Guariglia / MuckRock:

The same billionaire that funded Trump's campaign bankrolled Milo's college speaking tour — University of Washington records confirm Yiannopoulos' speaking fee as zero dollars, and entirely self-financed — Over the last year, Breitbart's former ethno-nationalist troll-provocateur got …

Discussion: Latest from Crooks and Liars and Heat Street

Nicholas Bagley / The Incidental Economist:

Confusion over essential health benefits — The post has been revised to take into account feedback on how best to understand the manager's amendment. — Last night, House Republicans released the text of the final manager's amendment to the American Health Care Act …