memeorandum: Ocasio-Cortez backs campaign to primary fellow Democrats (Alex Thompson/Politico)

11:35 PM ET, November 17, 2018

Top Items:

Christine Mai-Duc / Los Angeles Times:

Democrat Gil Cisneros defeats Republican Young Kim, flipping last GOP House seat in Orange County — Gil Cisneros has defeated Republican Young Kim in the 39th Congressional District, putting the seat held by retiring GOP Rep. Ed Royce into the Democrats' column.

Adam Nagourney / New York Times:

A Democratic Rout in Orange County: Cisneros's Win Makes It Four — California Democrats completed their sweep of the congressional delegation in Orange County on Saturday as Gil Cisneros defeated Young Kim, a Republican, to capture a fourth seat in what had once been one of the most conservative Republican bastions in the nation.

Discussion: Raw Story

Michael R. Blood / Associated Press:

Democrat Cisneros nabs GOP House seat in Southern California — LOS ANGELES (AP) — Democrat Gil Cisneros captured a Republican-held U.S. House seat in Southern California on Saturday, capping a Democratic rout in which the party picked up six congressional seats in the state.

Discussion: Axios

Carla Marinucci / Politico:
RIP, California GOP: Republicans lash out after midterm election debacle

Discussion: Mother Jones, Hullabaloo, CALmatters, Washington Free Beacon and Political Wire

Los Angeles Times: Going, going ... with midterm wipeout, California Republican Party drifts closer to irrelevance

Jane Mayer / New Yorker:

New Evidence Emerges of Steve Bannon and Cambridge Analytica's Role in Brexit — For two years, observers have speculated that the June, 2016, Brexit campaign in the U.K. served as a petri dish for Donald Trump's Presidential campaign in the United States. Now there is new evidence that it did.

Discussion: Raw Story

The Guardian:

Emails reveal Arron Banks' links to Steve Bannon in quest for campaign cash — Businessman sought Trump strategist's help to raise funds for Leave.EU in the US — The controversial businessman Arron Banks was keen to involve Donald Trump's former chief strategist Steve Bannon in a scheme …

Peter Geoghegan / openDemocracy:
Brexit bankroller Arron Banks, Cambridge Analytica and Steve Bannon - explosive emails reveal fresh links

Discussion: Political Wire

New York Times:

Top White House Official Involved in Saudi Sanctions Resigns — WASHINGTON — A top White House official responsible for American policy toward Saudi Arabia resigned on Friday evening, a move that may suggest fractures inside the Trump administration over the response to the brutal killing of the dissident Jamal Khashoggi.

Discussion: Power Line, WTVR-TV, Political Wire, KAJ-TV, Raw Story, France 24, fox5sandiego.com, Mediaite, Talking Points Memo, Hullabaloo, The American Conservative, Vox, The Daily Beast, Politico and NPR

Washington Post:
Trump says he'll speak with CIA about Khashoggi killing

Discussion: Lawfare, Splinter, One America News Network, Daily Kos, The Week, KAJ-TV, Outside the Beltway, POLITICUSUSA and New York Times, more at Mediagazer »

Alex Thompson / Politico:

Ocasio-Cortez backs campaign to primary fellow Democrats — Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Saturday threw her weight behind a new national campaign to mount primaries against incumbent Democrats deemed to be ideologically and demographically out of step with their districts.

Discussion: Political Wire and The Daily Caller

Anand Giridharadas / New Yorker: The New York Hustle of Amazon's Second Headquarters

Frances Robles / New York Times:

Nearly 3,000 Votes Disappeared From Florida's Recount. That's Not Supposed to Happen. — Nearly 3,000 votes effectively disappeared during the machine recount of Florida's midterm races, according to election records, calling into question whether officials relied on a flawed process to settle the outcome of three statewide contests.

Discussion: Sun-Sentinel and Breitbart

Barnini Chakraborty / Fox News:
Broward counts the wrong ballots as Florida races to finish manual recount ahead of Sunday deadline

Discussion: New York Times, The Gateway Pundit, The Last Refuge and The Guardian

Matt Viser / Washington Post:

In Mississippi, Republican concern rises over a U.S. Senate runoff that should have been a romp — JACKSON, Miss. — A U.S. Senate runoff that was supposed to provide an easy Republican win has turned into an unexpectedly competitive contest, driving Republicans and Democrats to pour …

Discussion: Politico and Raw Story

Kendall Karson / ABC News:
Controversies hamper candidates in Mississippi Senate race

Discussion: Talking Points Memo and Washington Post

Jim Carlton / Wall Street Journal:

Facing Deadlier Fires, California Tries Something New: More Logging — Environmentalists and the timber industry, after long butting heads, increasingly agree that cutting trees to thin forests is vital to reducing fire danger — FRENCH MEADOWS RESERVOIR, Calif.—Obscured amid the chaos …

Sacramento Bee:
Trump cites ‘total devastation’ in Paradise, pushes plan to thin forests; death toll rises to 76

Discussion: USA Today, Townhall and Vox

Sacramento Bee:
Camp Fire refugees create new town of ‘Wallywood’ as officials struggle with housing crisis

Discussion: McClatchy Washington Bureau and Vox

Alex Stamos / Washington Post:

Yes, Facebook made mistakes in 2016. But we weren't the only ones. — Alex Stamos is a Hoover fellow and adjunct professor at Stanford University. He previously served as the chief security officer at Facebook until August. — Yup, Sheryl Sandberg yelled at me.

Discussion: New York Times, Raw Story and The Verge, more at Techmeme »

Mike Isaac / New York Times:
Zuckerberg Defends Company in Friday Meeting With Employees

Discussion: The Verge, more at Mediagazer »

Martin Cizmar / Raw Story:

‘God will not bless America’: Texas pastor curses nation after ‘Godless’ Democrats win midterms — A Texas pastor is reacting with rage to the result of the midterm elections, in which Republicans lost control of the House of Representatives. — Following the election …

Discussion: Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Tia Mitchell / Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

Abrams plans suit to seek cure to problems in Georgia's voting process — Her campaign for governor may be over, but Stacey Abrams is not going away. — She told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution she's not ruling out a run for another public office, perhaps as early as 2020.

Discussion: Daily Kos and Balloon Juice

New York Times:

Are Jared and Ivanka Good for the Jews? — Jewish communities stand more divided than ever on whether to embrace or denounce Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump. — On election night in Beverly Hills, Jason Blum, the hot shot horror-movie producer, was accepting an award at the Israel Film Festival.

Discussion: twitchy.com, Instapundit and TalkLeft

Andrew Gillum:

#TeamGillum, our fight continues.

Discussion: ThinkProgress, NPR, CNBC, Breitbart, The Last Refuge, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, The Capitolist, The Gateway Pundit, Joe.My.God., twitchy.com, HuffPost, The Root, The Week and Bloomberg

Marc Caputo / Politico:
DeSantis wins Florida gubernatorial race as Gillum concedes

Discussion: RedState, twitchy.com and Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion

Paul Kane / Washington Post:

House GOP women confront a political crisis — their party is mostly men — About a half dozen House Republican women gathered this week for a somber, post-election dinner. — Exchanging thoughts about the brutal results for GOP candidates, they realized something depressing, according to one attendee.

Discussion: FiveThirtyEight

Washington Post:

Fight for House speaker explodes into national political campaign — Music legend Barbra Streisand retweeted a list of Rep. Nancy Pelosi's biggest legislative achievements. Film director Rob Reiner called her “the smartest, toughest strategic thinker in our party.”

Dan Balz / Washington Post:

What has President Trump learned from defeat? — All presidents suffer defeats and setbacks, whether through elections, legislative battles, international events or scandals. Most learn from them and adapt. Will President Trump be an exception? — That's the question ahead for the president …

David Knowles / Yahoo News: Trump explains his no-show at Arlington: ‘I was extremely busy on calls’

David J. Lynch / Washington Post:

‘This would be a very good time to do a shutdown,’ Trump says — President Trump suggested Saturday he was prepared to shut down the federal government next month if Congress fails to give him the money he wants to build a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico.

Discussion: Booman Tribune, Political Wire and Breitbart