memeorandum: These 5 states are the most likely to see legislative chambers flip in November (Liz Crampton/Politico)

10:00 AM ET, June 20, 2024

Top Items:

Dana Blanton / Fox News:

Fox News Poll: Three-point shift in Biden-Trump matchup since May — 32% give the economy positive marks, a record-high during Biden's presidency — Join Fox News for access to this content — President Biden is the frontrunner in a hypothetical matchup against former President Trump …

Discussion: HuffPost, Reuters, The Guardian, Off Message, WKBN-TV, Breitbart, New York Post, Mediaite and Hopium Chronicles

CNN:

How Biden and Trump are preparing for their first presidential debate — One is secluding himself at a mountainside retreat with a tight circle of advisers, poring over briefing binders, honing attack lines and bracing for personal smears. The other is workshopping responses and retorts …

Discussion: HotAir, Washington Examiner, The Gateway Pundit, The Daily Caller, PJ Media, PoliticusUSA, RedState, Axios and New Republic

CNN:

CNN debate stage set with Trump and Biden going head-to-head — President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are set for a historic showdown, with the stage now set for CNN's June 27 presidential debate. — The showdown will make history as the first debate between a sitting president and a former president.

Discussion: New York Times, The Economist and Boston Herald

Shawn McCreesh / New York Times:
Trump Tries to Set Expectations, and Floats Excuses, for His Debate With Biden

Discussion: Boston Herald, Raw Story, Tennessee Star and Boing Boing

Stephanie Kelly / Reuters:
RFK Jr faces midnight deadline to qualify for CNN presidential debate

Discussion: New York Times, NOTUS, Washington Examiner, Kennedy24, HuffPost, UPI, Balloon Juice, Breitbart, CNN, RedState, Washington Times, Vanity Fair, American Greatness, Reuters and Washington Post

Eric Levitz / Vox:
Biden's ads haven't been working. Now, he's trying something new.

Discussion: IJR, Washington Examiner and The Western Journal

MSNBC:

Fox News is helping Trump plan another Jan. 6-style assault on democracy — Five months before the election, claims that only fraud could explain a future Trump defeat are already common in the right-wing media ecosystem. — The cycle of lies that drove the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection is again underway.

David E. Sanger / New York Times:

Putin Once Tried to Curb North Korea's Nuclear Program. That's Now Over. — Vladimir Putin promised unspecified technological help to North Korea, which could allow it to advance its nuclear weapons program. — 阅读.体中文.閱讀.體中文.

Discussion: Wall Street Journal, PBS NewsHour, The Japan Times, Associated Press, Washington Examiner, One America News Network, The Daily Beast, NPR, RedState, Sputnik News, Breitbart, Semafor, Reuters, Human Events, AllSides Balanced and KUSA-TV

Soo-Hyang Choi / Bloomberg:
Putin, Kim Agree to Immediately Offer Military Aid If Attacked

Discussion: USA Today, ABC News, The Kyiv Independent, NK News, WHDH-TV, NBC News, Kyodo News+, El País, AllSides Balanced, The Guardian, Associated Press, Fox News, UPI, The Japan Times and IJR

Noah Berlatsky / Public Notice:

Democrats need to push back harder on Trump's immigrant hate — PN is a reader-supported publication made possible by paid subscribers. Appreciate our independent journalism? Then please sign up to support us. — 🛂 Subscribe to Public Notice 🛂

Discussion: New York Times, The Guardian, Immigration Impact, Hartford Courant, NPR, New Republic, Politico, PBS NewsHour and CBS News

William Kristol / The Bulwark:

Why Dictators Want Trump … We're big fans both of decarbonization and of reliable electricity, so two thumbs up on this one from us! (One assumes the Democrats don't mind the job creation, either?) Happy Thursday. — The Real World — Things are hopping in American politics.

Discussion: Associated Press and CNN

ProPublica:

The Delusion of “Advanced” Plastic Recycling — LAST YEAR, I became obsessed with a plastic cup. — It was a small container that held diced fruit, the type thrown into lunch boxes. And it was the first product I'd seen born of what's being touted as a cure for a crisis.

Sara Cline / Associated Press:

The Ten Commandments must be displayed in Louisiana classrooms under requirement signed into law — BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Louisiana has become the first state to require that the Ten Commandments be displayed in every public school classroom under a bill signed into law by Republican Gov. Jeff Landry on Wednesday.

USA Today:
Louisiana law signed, first in US to require Ten Commandments in the classroom

Discussion: Washington Examiner, New York Times, Washington Post, Breitbart, The Daily Caller, Rolling Stone, AllSides Balanced, IJR, Fox News and Alternet.org

David Goldman / CNN:

Wikipedia now labels the top Jewish civil rights group as an unreliable source — Wikipedia's editors declared that the Anti-Defamation League cannot be trusted to give reliable information on the Israel-Palestine conflict, and they overwhelmingly said the ADL is an unreliable source on antisemitism.

Discussion: Breitbart and Middle East Monitor

Claire Heddles / NOTUS:

The Supreme Court Is Raising the Stakes of Congressional Dysfunction — One Democrat called the push from the right to rein in government agencies “part of a deeper, darker corporate strategy than this euphemism about putting power back in Congress.” — Copy

Discussion: Reason

Sam Baker / Axios:

Supreme Court gets ready to drop its bombshells … - The court has 23 cases left to decide, and will likely hand down all of those opinions by the end of the month, give or take a few days — meaning the next week or so may redefine the limits of presidential power for generations to come.

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Lawyers, Guns & Money and New York Times

Judd Legum / Popular Information:

These 25 rainbow-flag waving companies donated $18 million to anti-gay politicians since the last election — At the pride parade in Washington, D.C., earlier this month, accounting giant Deloitte promoted its support of the LGBTQ community: — In June 2023, Deloitte produced a report on “LGBT+ Inclusion @ Work.”

Jose Pagliery / The Daily Beast:

Trump's Favorite Judge Puts Mar-a-Lago Prosecutor on Trial — ADVANTAGE: TRUMP — Judge Aileen Cannon stalled the ex-president's trial for hoarding classified documents. Now she's making Special Counsel Jack Smith prove the case should be brought at all. — The tables have turned.

Discussion: Law & Crime, Raw Story, Alternet.org and Washington Examiner

The Guardian:

Washington Post publisher alleged to have advised Boris Johnson to ‘clean up’ phone during Partygate Covid scandal — Sources' claim suggests advice by Will Lewis, an informal adviser to then prime minister, contradicted instructions to staff — Will Lewis, the Washington Post publisher …

Discussion: Poynter, more at Mediagazer »

Michael Podhorzer / Weekend Reading:

Tipping the Scales: The MAGA Justices Have Already Interfered with the 2024 Elections — By shielding Donald Trump from standing trial before a jury in two of his felony cases, Trump's three appointments to the Supreme Court, along with the even more MAGA Justices Alito and Thomas and Judge Aileen Cannon …

Discussion: New Republic

Politico:

Scorched-earth summer: Biden, Sunak and Macron go negative — Struggling leaders in America, Britain and France are bombarding their political opponents, some of whom are testing the bounds of the mainstream. — Even at a glittering Hollywood fundraiser, President Joe Biden's message was dark.

Discussion: Politico and Washington Examiner

Liz Crampton / Politico:

These 5 states are the most likely to see legislative chambers flip in November — Arizona, Michigan and Pennsylvania are among the country's biggest battlegrounds. — Democrats and Republicans are busting campaign spending records in state legislative races this year as they aim to shape policy debates far from Washington.

Discussion: The Daily Caller and Washington Examiner