memeorandum: The NRA donated $10,000 to help train the Parkland shooting suspect to use a rifle (Judd Legum/ThinkProgress)

5:00 PM ET, February 17, 2018

Top Items:

Trump's Conspicuous Silence Leaves a Struggle Against Russia Without a Leader — WASHINGTON — After more than a dozen Russians and three companies were indicted on Friday for interfering in the 2016 elections, President Trump's first reaction was to claim personal vindication …

Discussion: RT, Hullabaloo, The Mahablog, Talking Points Memo, KTLA, RedState, The Week, Politico, CNBC, FiveThirtyEight, NBC News, Al Jazeera English, CNN, IJR, Washington Post, The Gateway Pundit, France 24 and Business Insider, more at Mediagazer »

Sophie Tatum / CNN:

McMaster: Evidence of Russian meddling is ‘now really incontrovertible’ — McMaster responds to Russian indictments — Washington (CNN)Evidence of Russian meddling in the 2016 election is “now really incontrovertible,” White House National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster said Saturday.

Discussion: RT, CNNMoney, 89.3 KPCC, Business Insider, Mediaite, Law & Crime, Outside the Beltway, Daily Kos, LGBTQ Nation, NBC News, Fox News Insider, The Daily Caller, Towleroad, The Week, Political Wire, IJR, AOL and BuzzFeed, more at Mediagazer »

emptywheel:

What Did Mueller Achieve with the Internet Research Agency Indictment? — Back during Nunes Week, Trey Gowdy described the importance of Robert Mueller's investigation by stating that we were only seeing half of what he was doing. The other half of his work, Gowdy said, was the counterintelligence side …

Discussion: Law & Crime, The Atlantic, The Daily Signal, Vox, U.S. Embassy & Consulates …, The Last Refuge and Woke Sloth

Bob Bauer / Just Security:

The Charging Mystery in the Russia Indictments—And Its Indication of What Comes Next in the Mueller Investigation — The special counsel's indictment of Russian individuals and organizations brought campaign finance law for the first time into formal charges in the case. But this development came with a mystery.

Associated Press:

The Latest: Ex-Russian diplomat calls US charges ‘fantasies’ — MOSCOW (AP) — The Latest on the Russian response to U.S. indictments (all times local): — Russia's former ambassador to the United States is dismissing detailed allegations of attempted Russian interference …

Discussion: ThinkProgress, IJR, ABC News and Bloomberg

Mike Allen / Axios:

We know nothing; Mueller knows all — Robert Mueller's meaty indictment, accusing 13 Russians (including an oligarch known as “Putin's cook") of “information warfare against the United States of America,” shows the special counsel has been doing deep, serious investigative work — totally under the radar, and with zero leaks.

Discussion: Politico, The Daily Caller, Washington Monthly and New York Times

New York Times:
To Stir Discord in 2016, Russians Turned Most Often to Facebook

Discussion: Joe.My.God., NPR and CNN, more at Techmeme »

Politico:
‘Something was weird’: Inside the Russian effort to bamboozle Florida

Discussion: Political Wire, No More Mister Nice Blog and WBBH-TV

Lawfare:
Russian Influence Campaign: What's in the Latest Mueller Indictment

Discussion: Reuters, CNBC, FOX40, Washington Monthly, IJR, The Last Refuge, Washington Press, The Gateway Pundit, Mother Jones, Politico and TheBlaze

Fiona Maxwell / Politico:
McMaster: ‘Incontrovertible’ evidence of Russian interference in election

Discussion: New York Magazine

Dan Balz / Washington Post:
Mueller's new indictments put the pressure on Trump to act

Discussion: Breitbart, The Stranger …, Little Green Footballs and Politico

David Remnick / New Yorker:
Mueller's Indictment Ends Trump's Myth of the Russia “Hoax”

Discussion: Hullabaloo, Slate and Washington Post

Marwa Eltagouri / Washington Post:
The rise of 'Putin's chef,' the Russian oligarch accused of manipulating the U.S. election

Discussion: New York Times, Business Insider, The Guardian, Power Line, VICE News, The Atlantic, DFRLab, Vox, Washington Press, Politico, Patterico's Pontifications, NBC News and Breitbart

Washington Post:
What Trump still doesn't get about Russian interference in the election

Discussion: RedState, Des Moines Register and Business Insider

Alexander Burns / New York Times:

Prominent Republican Donor Issues Ultimatum on Assault Weapons — A prominent Republican political donor demanded on Saturday that the party pass legislation to restrict access to guns, and vowed not to contribute to any candidates or electioneering groups that did not support a ban on the sale of military-style firearms to civilians.

Discussion: Political Wire, Raw Story, Mediaite and CNN

CNN:

CNN announces town hall with students, parents affected by Florida school shooting — Parkland student makes demand to lawmakers — “Stand Up: The Students of Stoneman Douglas Demand Action” will air live on Wednesday, February 21 at 9 p.m., ET. — (CNN)The school shooting in Florida …

Judd Legum / ThinkProgress:

The NRA donated $10,000 to help train the Parkland shooting suspect to use a rifle — Nikolas Cruz, the 19-year-old who charged with murdering 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High, honed his marksmanship skills in a school program supported by the NRA.

Discussion: RedState, Task & Purpose, Associated Press, The Daily Caller, Law & Crime, Vox and Mother Jones

Ross Douthat / New York Times:

No Country for Young Men With AR-15s — Four years ago the essayist Helen Andrews wrote a critique, for the religious journal First Things, of what she described as “bloodless moralism” — meaning the decay of public moral arguments into a kind of a vulgar empiricism, a mode of debate …

Los Angeles Times: Horrified Florida students beg the adults: Please, do something about guns

Margaret Sullivan / Washington Post:
The students at Florida's Douglas High are amazing communicators. That could save lives.

Discussion: Politico, New Yorker, ThinkProgress and CNN

ABC News: Florida teen who survived shooting massacre rallies passionate crowd, 'It's time for victims' to change gun laws

Bret Stephens / New York Times: To Repeat: Repeal the Second Amendment

Mary Ellen Klas / miamiherald:
Lawmakers agree to destroy site of school carnage: ‘This building has to come down’

Discussion: Florida Politics, IJR and Daily Wire

New York Daily News:
Florida high school shooter was on school rifle team funded by the NRA: ‘He was a very good shot’

Discussion: RedState, TheBlaze and twitchy.com

Brandon Carter / The Hill:

Kushner requests more intel info than almost all White House staff: report — 's son-in-law and senior White House adviser Jared Kushner — has reportedly requested more intelligence information than almost every other White House official. — The Washington Post reports that Kushner …

Discussion: ThinkProgress

Shane Harris / Washington Post:
New White House security clearance policy could put 'bull's eye' on Kushner

Discussion: Axios, Vox, Hullabaloo, New York Magazine, Joe.My.God., Eschaton, New York Times, VICE News, CNN and KTLA

Paul P. Murphy / CNN:

Exclusive: Group chat messages show school shooter obsessed with race, violence and guns — (CNN)In a private Instagram group chat, confessed school shooter Nikolas Cruz repeatedly espoused racist, homophobic and anti-Semitic views and displayed an obsession with violence and guns.

Discussion: FOX6Now.com, theGrio, WHNT-TV, Washington Press, Dispatches From the …, IJR, Joe.My.God. and RedState

Paula McMahon / Sun-Sentinel:
Nikolas Cruz was investigated after cutting himself on Snapchat, state report shows

Discussion: New York Times, WREG-TV and Business Insider

Erika Pesantes / Sun-Sentinel:
As Nikolas Cruz fired, JROTC students hid behind bulletproof sheets

Discussion: NBC News

Joe Trinacria / Pushback:

Larry Krasner Sues Big Pharma, Drops All Marijuana Possession Charges — With a little over a month in office, Philly's new DA is already further reforming the city's drug policy. — On the same day a Philly.com op-ed was published in which Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner …

Discussion: Balloon Juice

Alex Harris / miamiherald:

‘No more guns’: Protesters escorted out of Paul Ryan fundraiser in Key Biscayne — Two protesters chanting “no more guns” were removed from a Republican fundraiser in Key Biscayne Friday night after confronting Speaker of the House Paul Ryan about the mass shooting that happened days earlier and miles up the road.

Discussion: Raw Story, Shareblue Media, Politico, Florida Politics and Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Robert Barnes / Law & Crime:

Does Mueller Indictment Mean Clinton Campaign Can Be Indicted for Chris Steele? — Special Counsel Robert Mueller indicted foreign citizens for trying to influence the American public about an election because those citizens did not register as a foreign agent nor record their financial expenditures to the Federal Elections Commission.

Discussion: Power Line

Josh Gerstein / Politico:

Mueller levels new claim of bank fraud against Manafort — Prosecutors say they've found ‘additional criminal conduct’ by the former Trump campaign chairman. — Special counsel Robert Mueller's office has told a federal judge it has found evidence that Paul Manafort, the former Trump campaign chairman …