memeorandum: White House Signals Retreat on Shutdown Threat (Emily Cochrane/New York Times)

11:50 AM ET, December 18, 2018

Top Items:

White House signals it will back down on President Trump's demand for border wall funding and avert a partial government shutdown — The Trump administration wants to avoid a partial government shutdown and has found other ways to get the border wall money it wants, spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said Tuesday.

Discussion: Political Wire

Washington Post:

White House says it wants to avoid government shutdown, will find other ways to fund border wall — The White House wants to avoid a partial government shutdown and has found other ways to get the border wall President Trump is demanding, spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said Tuesday.

Discussion: The Gateway Pundit, Washington Examiner and HuffPost

Emily Cochrane / New York Times: White House Signals Retreat on Shutdown Threat

HuffPost:
White House Nightmare: Trump Golfs While His Secret Service Agents Work Without Pay

Discussion: Shareblue Media

CNN:
Senate Republicans in the dark on Trump's plan to avert a partial government shutdown

Discussion: Outside the Beltway, The Week and Splinter

Arizona Republic:

Martha McSally will be appointed to John McCain's Senate seat — Republican U.S. Rep. Martha McSally will replace retiring U.S. Sen. Jon Kyl to fill for the next two years the Senate seat long held by the late U.S. Sen. John McCain. — Gov. Doug Ducey's decision to appoint McSally …

Discussion: Shareblue Media, ThinkProgress, Vox, Axios, Political Wire, Washington Free Beacon, twitchy.com and The Daily Caller

Sean Sullivan / Washington Post:

Arizona governor taps Martha McSally to fill Senate seat once held by McCain — Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey has appointed fellow Republican Rep. Martha McSally to the Senate, he announced Tuesday, picking a favorite of GOP leaders to fill the seat John McCain held for decades.

James Arkin / Politico:

Arizona governor to appoint Martha McSally to Senate — Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey has appointed GOP Rep. Martha McSally to the Senate seat being vacated by GOP Sen. Jon Kyl — tapping McSally as the Republican contender in a 2020 special election that will be among the most competitive Senate races in the country that year.

Discussion: ABC News and Breitbart

Associated Press: Arizona governor names Martha McSally to McCain Senate seat

Fox News:
Rep. Martha McSally appointed by Arizona governor to Senate seat held by John McCain

Discussion: The Gateway Pundit

Washington Post:

On Twitter, Trump comes out swinging in many directions — President Trump lashed out Tuesday morning at threats from many directions, taking aim at the special counsel's Russia inquiry, the Federal Reserve, social media companies and undocumented immigrants in tweets that spanned more than two hours.

Discussion: ABC News, New York Times, Mother Jones and Political Wire

Eli Lake / Bloomberg:

Michael Flynn Is Owed an Apology — One year after he pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI, there is still no evidence that he is a traitor. — Remember when Michael Flynn was a traitor? It was early 2017. Democrats were still stinging from their defeat at the hands of Donald Trump.

emptywheel:

Mike Flynn Steps in It: In a Bid to Feed the Frothy Right, He Leads to Release of Damning New Details Showing He Lied to Protect Trump — Last week, I suggested that Mike Flynn's cute trick of publicly releasing information from Andy McCabe's memo and Peter Strzok's 302 might backfire.

Discussion: Raw Story, Hullabaloo and Salon

Katelyn Polantz / CNN:
Mueller releases memo summarizing FBI's interview with Michael Flynn

Discussion: KXLF-TV

NY State Attorney General:

A.G. Underwood Announces Stipulation Dissolving Trump Foundation Under Judicial Supervision, With AG Review Of Recipient Charities — News from the New York Attorney General's Office — Attorney General's Office Press Office / 212-416-8060 — nyag.pressoffice@ag.ny.gov

Discussion: POLITICUSUSA, Raw Story and Law & Crime

Washington Post:

Trump agrees to shut down his charity amid allegations he used it for personal and political benefit — New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood announced Tuesday that the foundation is dissolving and distributing its remaining funds as her office pursues a lawsuit against the charity …

Discussion: Political Wire

David A. Fahrenthold / Washington Post:

Trump agrees to shut down his charity amid allegations he used it for personal and political benefit — President Trump has agreed to shut down his embattled personal charity and give away its remaining funds amid allegations that he used it for his personal and political benefit, the New York attorney general announced Tuesday.

Discussion: Politico, Mediaite and Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion

Shane Goldmacher / New York Times:

Trump Foundation to Close After Lawsuit by New York Attorney General — The Donald J. Trump Foundation has agreed to close following a court decision that allowed a lawsuit against the foundation to move forward, the New York attorney general's office announced Tuesday.

Washington Post:

Russian disinformation teams targeted Robert S. Mueller III, says report prepared for Senate — Months after President Trump took office, Russia's disinformation teams trained their sites on a new target: special counsel Robert S. Mueller III. Having worked to help get Trump into the White House …

Washington Post:
Russia's support for Trump's election is no longer disputable

Discussion: HuffPost

Sohrab Ahmari / New York Post: Why Western elites now can't resist conspiracy theories

Erin Banco / The Daily Beast:

Mueller Ready to Pounce on Trumpworld Concessions to Moscow — New court filings by Mueller's office could answer a central question of the Russia investigation: What did the Kremlin hope to get from its political machinations? — For more than a year, Special Counsel Robert Mueller's office …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Law & Crime, Just Security, Raw Story and Hill Reporter

Steve Denning / Forbes: Mueller Exposes Putin's Hold Over Trump

Wall Street Journal:

Roger Stone Admits Spreading Lies on InfoWars — Trump adviser made the admission in settling a defamation suit brought against him by an exiled Chinese businessman — As questions swirl about his credibility, former Trump campaign adviser Roger Stone settled a defamation suit seeking $100 million …

Discussion: CNN, Politico, Talking Points Memo, WSVN-TV, The Gateway Pundit, Washington Times, The Week, HuffPost, Mediaite and Splinter, more at Mediagazer »

Tim Elfrink / Washington Post:
Roger Stone admits he pushed false statements on Infowars

Discussion: Wonkette

Olivia Nuzzi / New York Magazine:

Donald Trump Hates Christmas Parties — On Monday and Wednesday this week, Donald Trump will leave the Oval Office in the West Wing in the late afternoon and walk eastward to the White House residence, where he will meet Melania Trump. Together, they will head downstairs at 5:15 to the Grand Foyer …

Discussion: Raw Story

Laura Barrón-López / Politico:

Ocasio-Cortez weighs a new primary target: Hakeem Jeffries — Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is eyeing a new member of House Democratic leadership as a 2020 primary target: Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.). — Ocasio-Cortez, who ousted House Democratic Caucus Chairman Joe Crowley earlier …

Discussion: Washington Free Beacon and Washington Times

Karl Evers-Hillstrom / OpenSecrets.org: Ocasio-Cortez enters the House with highest portion of small contributions

David Dayen / The Intercept:

Elizabeth Warren Plan Would Allow the Government to Manufacture Its Own Generic Drugs — If I told you that there are two major efforts on the left to reform the pharmaceutical industry, and one relies on market competition while the other establishes a publicly run office to manufacture prescription drugs …

Elizabeth Warren / Washington Post:
It's time to let the government manufacture generic drugs

Discussion: Bloomberg, Politico and Boing Boing

Kimberly Hefling / Politico:

Trump school safety group backs off his call to arm trained teachers — A Trump administration school safety panel hardly touched on the role of guns in deadly school shootings in its wrap-up Tuesday. — Instead, the panel took a far less confrontational approach by sidestepping President …

Discussion: ABC News, Associated Press and Joanne Jacobs

Michelle Hackman / Wall Street Journal: Trump School-Safety Panel Targets Obama Policy on Race and Discipline

Chris Buskirk / American Greatness:

Death of The Weekly Standard Signals Rebirth of the Right — Neoconservatism is dead, long live American conservatism. That's what I thought when I learned The Weekly Standard would be shuttered by longtime owner Clarity Media. The Standard was a creature of a particular time and place …

Alex Isenstadt / Politico:

Trump launches unprecedented reelection machine — President Donald Trump is planning to roll out an unprecedented structure for his 2020 reelection, a streamlined organization that incorporates the Republican National Committee and the president's campaign into a single entity.

Charlie Cooper / Politico:

Troops to be on standby in event of no-deal Brexit — LONDON — The U.K. government will move to a full no-deal Brexit footing after Theresa May's Cabinet agreed to trigger all remaining contingency plans for such a scenario. — Some government officials will be required to work …

Discussion: One America News Network

Lawrence Lessig / USA Today:

Democratic House will address most important civil rights issue in half century — A bill of impeachment against the old ways: America has come to expect that its politicians will promise change, yet change nothing. We need a radically comprehensive and practical fix. — CONNECT

Jonah Goldberg / National Review:

Emerald Robinson's Stupid Lies — She peddles conclusions and innuendo pretending that they're facts, and she's doing that about NR. — One of the problems with the political moment we're in is that there are powerful incentives for people to be stupid and dishonest.

Benjamin Hardy / Arkansas Blog, Arkansas Times:

Work requirement ends Medicaid coverage for 4,600 more Arkansans in December — Almost 17,000 Arkansans have now lost their health insurance due to the state's experimental work requirement for certain low-income adult Medicaid beneficiaries, according to a monthly report released by the state Department of Human Services on Monday.

Discussion: Vox

Isaac Stanley-Becker / Washington Post:

New York Times assailed for Alice Walker interview endorsing ‘anti-Semitic’ conspiracy theorist — Critics call it anti-Semitic, saying it places Holocaust revisionism at the center of an odious and addled worldview. Its title has been borrowed by followers of QAnon, a conspiracy movement …

Discussion: National Review, Althouse, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, The Daily Caller, Bookworm Room and Daily Wire

Mark Rober / YouTube:

Package Thief vs. Glitter Bomb Trap … This might be my Magnum Opus. Go to https://NordVPN.com/MarkRober and use code MARKROBER to get 75% off a 3 year plan and an extra month for free. — My buddy Sean posted a video with more details of the build: https://youtu.be/IpMxOmUcfOI

Discussion: The Verge and Engadget

Paul Kane / Washington Post:

Different kind of Blue Dog Coalition intent on being a force in House — Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) is living proof that the Blue Dog Coalition has morphed into something its founders would struggle to recognize. — “This is not your father's Blue Dog caucus anymore,” Murphy, 40, said in a recent interview.