Betty White Dead at 99  —  EXCLUSIVE  — 1.41M … 3:32 PM PT — Betty's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is drawing a crowd ... and folks are leaving candles, flowers, stuffed animals and other tokens.  —  12:32 PM PT — The beginnings of a makeshift memorial outside Betty's house are underway.

Ron DeSantis accompanied wife to cancer treatment while critics claimed he was ‘missing’  —  DeSantis announced his wife's breast cancer diagnosis in October  —  Florida Democrats blame DeSantis for COVID surge  —  Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis accompanied his wife to her cancer treatment …

Chief Justice John Roberts Pledges to Bolster Judicial Ethics  —  Year-end report addresses Wall Street Journal findings that federal judges with financial conflicts improperly ruled in hundreds of cases  —  WASHINGTON—Chief Justice John Roberts pledged Friday to improve ethics training …

China harvests masses of data on Western targets, documents show  —  China is turning a major part of its internal Internet data surveillance network outward, mining Western social media, including Facebook and Twitter, to equip its government agencies, military and police with information on foreign targets …

Efforts to Trump-proof presidential certification crash into congressional realities  —  The violent attack on the Capitol cost lives, threatened the transition of presidential power and forever changed the way Congress does its work.  One year later, we at POLITICO are looking back at those changes …

Bernard Kerik provides batch of documents to Jan. 6 select committee  —  A key adviser to Donald Trump's legal team in their post-election quest to unearth evidence of fraud has delivered a trove of documents to Jan. 6 investigators describing those efforts.

Omicron Doesn't Infect the Lungs Very Well, Animal Studies Find  —  Compared with earlier variants, Omicron may cause less damage to the lungs, new animal research suggests.  —  A spate of new studies on lab animals and human tissues are providing a possible explanation …

One Year Since the Jan. 6 Attack on the Capitol  —  Thursday, Jan. 6 2022, marks one year since the attack on the U.S. Capitol that disrupted a joint session of the U.S. Congress in the process of affirming the presidential election results.  The government continues to investigate losses …

FDIC's GOP chair to resign after partisan brawl  —  Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chairman Jelena McWilliams on Friday unexpectedly submitted her resignation after the Trump appointee faced partisan strife at the bank regulator, in a move that will give Democrats control of the agency in the coming weeks.

Why 2022 Rhymes With the Previous Four Midterms  —  It feels safer to bet on unpredictability than stability in this era of tremendous political and social churn and upheaval.  While we know that the midterm elections favor the ‘out’ party (i.e. the party that doesn't control the White House) …

Who Won in Afghanistan?  Private Contractors  —  The U.S. military spent $14 trillion during two decades of war; those who benefited range from major manufacturers to entrepreneurs  —  The U.S. lost its 20-year campaign to transform Afghanistan.  Many contractors won big.

Top-Down Letdown  —  How elites failed us in 2021.  —  Dear Reader (and all the strange voices in my head),  —  I finally got COVID.  I assume it was Omicron, but who knows?  Whatever variant it was, it wasn't fun.  Since odds are good everybody everywhere is going to get it, I'll spare you the detailed reporting from my sickbed.

Eric Adams takes office as New York City's 110th mayor at a perilous moment.  —  Eric Adams, the city's second Black mayor, faces difficult decisions over how to lead New York City through the next wave of the pandemic.  —  Eric Leroy Adams was sworn in as the 110th mayor of New York City early Saturday …

First part of Texas' 2020 election audit reveals few issues, echoes findings from review processes already in place  —  An initial review of four counties' election results — launched after pressure from former President Donald Trump and touted by GOP leaders — showed few discrepancies between electronic …

Biden to speak with Ukraine President Zelenskyy, says he ‘made it clear’ to Putin that Russia cannot invade  — President Joe Biden plans to speak with Ukraine President Zelenskyy on Sunday to express support amid Russia's military buildup on the border, a White House official said.