Manchin proposed $1.5T top-line number to Schumer this summer  —  Joe Manchin proposed a deal to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer this summer to limit the total cost of Democrats' sweeping spending bill to $1.5 trillion, according to a copy of the agreement obtained by POLITICO.

Durham issues fresh round of subpoenas in his continuing probe of FBI investigation into Trump, Russia  —  Washington (CNN)Special Counsel John Durham has issued a new set of subpoenas, including to a law firm with close ties to Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign, an indication that Durham …

Ozy Built a TV Show on a False Claim, Says Its Former Producer  —  Producers say they were led to believe they were making a talk show for A&E, which said no to the program.  “You are playing a dangerous game with the truth,” the top producer wrote in his resignation email.  — Read in app

Alex Jones Just Lost 2 Sandy Hook Cases  —  A judge issued default judgments — a rarity in the legal world — against Jones and Infowars after the conspiracy theorist failed to produce discovery records.  —  Infowars host Alex Jones has lost two of several lawsuits filed against him by relatives …

Harriet Hageman once rebuked Trump and endorsed Liz Cheney.  She's now challenging her with his support  —  (CNN)Harriet Hageman, who earned the endorsement of former President Donald Trump in her 2022 bid to challenge Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, once called her current opponent a “proven, courageous, constitutional conservative.”

Pelosi Plans Infrastructure Vote Tonight; Democrats Prepare for Showdown  —  The Senate and House passed a short-term spending bill, which would fund the government until early December.  Senator Joe Manchin III, a key holdout on the president's social policy and climate bill …

Alito speaks out on Texas abortion case and ‘shadow docket’  —  Justice Samuel Alito leapt into a political fray over the Supreme Court on Thursday, lashing back at critics who have accused the justices of increasingly issuing momentous decisions on its emergency docket without the benefit of a full briefing or oral arguments.

Harris' office does damage control over student's Israel ‘ethnic genocide’ comment  —  Vice President Kamala Harris' office is working behind the scenes to mend relationships with pro-Israel Democrats after not pushing back on a student who, in asking her a question, accused Israel of “ethnic genocide.”

Why I Am Suing UCLA  —  I refused to discriminate against my students.  Then the problems began.  —  Recently, I was suspended from my job for refusing to treat my black students as lesser than their non-black peers.  —  Let me back up: I teach at UCLA's Anderson School of Management, and I've been doing this for 40 years.

Leader of Prestigious Yale Program Resigns, Citing Donor Pressure  —  The historian Beverly Gage, who has run the Grand Strategy course since 2017, says the university failed to stand up for academic freedom amid inappropriate efforts to influence the curriculum.

Fox News Poll: Tight race for Virginia governor  —  The survey, released Thursday, was conducted September 26 through September 29 among Virginia registered voters  —  McAuliffe says parents shouldn't choose their children's curriculum  —  Virginia voters give Democrat Terry McAuliffe …

Covid is killing rural Americans at twice the rate of people in urban areas  —  Unvaccinated Covid patients still overwhelming health care workers  —  Rural Americans are dying of Covid at more than twice the rate of their urban counterparts — a divide that health experts say is likely …

IG Horowitz discovers more FBI abuses of FISA process  —  A bad day for FBI Director Wray  —  Today, DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz issued a damning new report on the FBI's “Execution of its Woods Procedures for Applications Filed with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court Relating to US Persons.”

Houston, epicenter of Harvey damage, still would get $0 under Texas' latest disaster aid plan  —  Harris County and the city of Houston this week blasted the Texas General Land Office's revised plan for distributing billions in federal Hurricane Harvey aid, saying that while it is an improvement …

I just rode the bus with Biden's education chief.  You should hear what he said about Trump supporters, critical race theory, and mask mandates.  — Education Secretary Miguel Cardona toured the Midwest last week.  — He's touting a safe return to school amid the pandemic.

Kristi Noem cuts ties with adviser Corey Lewandowski after donor alleged unwanted sexual advances  —  South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem has severed ties with political strategist Corey Lewandowski, following allegations reported by POLITICO that Lewandowski made unwanted sexual advances toward a woman at a recent fundraising event.

Senior al Qaeda leader killed in drone strike in Syria, US defense officials say  —  The figure was responsible for planning, funding, and approving trans-regional al Qaeda attacks

How a Secret Google Geofence Warrant Helped Catch the Capitol Riot Mob  —  A WIRED investigation has found 45 federal criminal cases that cite Google geolocation data to place suspects inside the US Capitol during the January 6 riot.  —  COURT DOCUMENTS SUGGEST the FBI has been using …

The Trailer: So long, swing seats: Gerrymandering is already shrinking the midterm map  —  In this edition: The slow death of the swing seat, debate echoes in New Jersey and Virginia, and a boom market in anti-Kyrsten Sinema PACs.  —  Please don't make me write about an August 2024 primary until at least next month.

Democracy Cannot Survive the Fracturing of the Democratic Coalition  —  When anti-authoritarian coalitions splinter, the authoritarians take over.  —  (PHOTOS: GETTYIMAGES / SHUTTERSTOCK)  —  In the early days of the first Trump presidency, our organization cohosted a “Summit for Democracy” …

Hack Of Oath Keepers Militia Group Includes Names Of Active NYPD Officers, De Blasio Launches Investigation  —  New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio's office said it will scrutinize NYPD ranks following a WNYC/Gothamist investigation of online records that appears to tie several …

More Than Half of Police Killings Are Undercounted, New Study Says  —  Researchers comparing information from death certificates with data from organizations that track police killings in the United States identified a startling discrepancy.  — Read in app

Inside the CIA's desperate effort to rescue its Afghan allies  —  Often the spy business is about betrayal.  But for the CIA in Afghanistan, even amid the catastrophic U.S. withdrawal in August, the story in recent months has largely been about keeping faith with its local partners.

New Initiative Explores Deep, Persistent Divides Between Biden and Trump Voters  —  The University of Virginia Center for Politics has partnered with Project Home Fire, a new initiative dedicated to finding common ground in American politics, on an innovative new data analytics and polling project …

The trainwreck of Sen. Kyrsten Sinema is the cost of not getting money out of politics  —  It sounds bizarre, but a $1,117.40 summer internship at a vineyard in the heart of California wine country may prove the ultimate saga in how Big Money has permanently broken American politics.

Business gets personal: Leftists push boundaries in protests targeting public figures  —  Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas became the latest victim of liberal activism targeting political figures personally when protesters shrouded his Washington, D.C., home in a giant foil blanket this week.

Bice: Multimillionaire U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson paid a mere $2,105 in state income taxes in 2017, despite making big bucks  —  U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson has pushed back on any suggestion that wealthy individuals, such as himself, should be paying more in income taxes.

A Border Town's Democratic Mayor Has Had Enough  —  The Democratic mayor of Laredo, Texas, slammed President Joe Biden's immigration policy, alleging that his party has no plan to fix the southern border and has abandoned local communities in favor of massive spending proposals for other interest groups.

Half support vaccine mandates amidst Delta surge  —  Half of Americans approve of the Biden administration's plan to require most U.S. workers to get vaccinated or regularly tested for COVID-19, and a third disapprove. … As businesses across the country navigate return to office plans …

Psaki snipes at claims Biden has been acting Trump-like  —  White House press secretary Jen Psaki pushed back against claims that President Joe Biden is acting Trump-like.  —  “There have been a number of issues in the last several weeks in which advocates, allies of the president …