Top Items:
The White House:
FACT SHEET: President Biden Announces Clemency for Nearly 1,500 Americans — Today's announcement will commute the sentences of close to 1,500 individuals who were placed on home confinement and will pardon 39 individuals convicted of non-violent crimes — Today, President Biden announced …
Discussion:
Rolling Stone, The Hill, New York Times, Washington Examiner, Daily Caller News Foundation, Forbes, NPR, ABC News, Hollywood Life, UPI, Townhall, Lawyers, Guns & Money and IJR
RELATED:
Colleen Long / Associated Press:
Biden commutes roughly 1,500 sentences and pardons 39 people in biggest single-day act of clemency — President Joe Biden is commuting the sentences of roughly 1,500 people who were released from prison and placed on home confinement during the coronavirus pandemic and is pardoning 39 Americans convicted of nonviolent crimes.
Discussion:
CNN, Wall Street Journal, Washington Examiner, Bloomberg, Reuters, Al Jazeera, Politico, Scripps News, The Hill, Breitbart, Fox News, Mediaite, WTTG-TV, New York Daily News, New York Times, The Independent and TheGrio
Patrick Smith / NBC News:
Biden to commute sentences of 1,500 ‘non-violent’ offenders, in the biggest single-day act of clemency to date — “America was built on the promise of possibility and second chances,” the president said in a statement Thursday. — President Joe Biden will commute the sentences …
Discussion:
USA Today
The White House:
Statement from President Joe Biden on Providing Clemency for Nearly 1,500 Individuals on Home Confinement and Pardons for 39 Individuals Convicted of Non-Violent Crimes — America was built on the promise of possibility and second chances. As President, I have the great privilege …
Discussion:
Washington Post, RedState and USA Today
Wall Street Journal:
Mark Zuckerberg's Meta Donates $1 Million to Trump's Inaugural Fund — President-elect had blasted the tech tycoon during the presidential campaign, but ties have been improving — Meta Platforms has donated $1 million to president-elect Donald Trump's inaugural fund …
Discussion:
CNN, The Hill, New York Times, Axios, Reuters, New York Post, UPI, RedState, American Greatness, Fortune, CBS News, Mediaite, IJR, HuffPost, Forbes, Fox Business, Daily Mail and The Independent, more at Techmeme »
RELATED:
Leo Sands / Washington Post:
Mark Zuckerberg's Meta donates $1M to Trump inauguration fund — Meta's donation comes weeks after Mark Zuckerberg met President-elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago, as the Facebook founder seeks to mend ties with the right. — Meta donated $1 million to the inauguration committee …
Oriana Pawlyk / Politico:
FAA administrator will resign on Trump's inauguration day — He told his staff about his departure plans at a meeting Thursday morning. — FAA administrator Mike Whitaker announced he will resign and not serve as the head of the agency in the second Trump administration …
Noah Berlatsky / Public Notice:
Chris Wray folds like cheap suit. Don't be Chris Wray. — The FBI director obeys in advance. … 🚔 — FBI Director Christopher Wray became the latest public official to remove his own spine and dissolve into a puddle of genuflecting goo for the greater glory of MAGA …
Discussion:
Fox News, Deseret News and The Hill
RELATED:
Jonathan Chait / The Atlantic:
A Scandalous Resignation — When Donald Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, in 2017, I was about to drive my daughter and some of her friends to a soccer tryout. I remember that the news came moments before we left; once we arrived, I sat on a bench next to the soccer field …
Perry Stein / Washington Post:
FBI Director Christopher Wray to resign before Trump takes office
FBI Director Christopher Wray to resign before Trump takes office
Discussion:
CNN, The Bulwark, NBC News, New York Times, Reuters, Washington Times, New York Daily News, CBS News, Associated Press, Daily Caller News Foundation, Raw Story, Twitchy, UPI, The Guardian, CNBC, Scripps News, Axios, ABC News, Breitbart, HotAir, The Post Millennial, The Daily Signal and Townhall
Benjamin Wittes / Default:
The Situation: Chris Wray Rolls Out the Red Carpet for Kash Patel
The Situation: Chris Wray Rolls Out the Red Carpet for Kash Patel
Discussion:
RedState, Reuters, emptywheel, The Independent, Fox News, Al Jazeera, Alternet.org, Newsbusters, CBS News, Mediaite, New Republic, Forbes, Townhall, The Hill, New York Daily News, Bloomberg, Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion, ABC News, Deadline, HuffPost, Associated Press, The National Pulse and Washington Examiner
Minho Kim / New York Times:
Trump Chooses Kari Lake to Lead Voice of America — Ms. Lake, a former TV news anchor turned right-wing firebrand who has called journalists “monsters,” would be in charge of a federally funded news outlet with a huge global audience. — President-elect Donald J. Trump on Wednesday night chose Kari Lake …
Discussion:
CNN, Politico, USA Today, Deadline, Washington Post, Roll Call, Raw Story, The Hill, Arizona Mirror, UPI, The Independent, Al Jazeera, Fox News, Mediaite, Breitbart, Associated Press, New York Post, NBC News, Twitchy, Daily Mail, CBS News, The Gateway Pundit, Axios, Washington Examiner and ABC News
RELATED:
Costas Pitas / Reuters:
Trump picks hardline Republican Kari Lake to lead Voice of America — U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday said he was picking Kari Lake, a former news anchor and a hardline Republican who failed to win an Arizona Senate seat last month, to be the director of U.S. government-funded media outlet Voice of America.
Discussion:
Townhall, Washington Post, Raw Story, Daily Mail, HuffPost, Fox News and Washington Times, more at Mediagazer »
Jennifer Jacobs / CBS News:
Trump invites China's Xi Jinping to inauguration — President-elect Donald Trump has invited Chinese President Xi Jinping to attend his inauguration next month, multiple sources told CBS News, and inauguration officials are making plans for additional foreign dignitaries to attend the swearing-in ceremony.
Clarissa Ward / CNN:
‘My God there is light’: CNN witnesses moment Syrian prisoner is freed from Assad's forced detention — While searching a secretive prison in the belly of the Assad regime's legacy of torture for American journalist Austin Tice, CNN's Clarissa Ward made a startling discovery …
Discussion:
New York Post, The Sun and Mediaite
CNN:
Pete Hegseth, Trump's Defense pick, says allowing gay troops to serve openly reflects a Marxist agenda — Pete Hegseth, President-elect Donald Trump's pick for secretary of defense, has repeatedly criticized policies allowing gay people to serve openly in the US military, calling them part of a …
Time:
Read the Full Transcript of Donald Trump's 2024 Person of the Year Interview With TIME — President-elect Donald Trump, TIME's 2024 Person of the Year, sat down for a wide-ranging interview at his Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Fla., on Nov. 25. — Over the course of the interview …
Discussion:
New York Times, Axios, ABC News, CNBC and Mediaite
Bloomberg:
No Winners Seen in Trump's ‘Hugely Destructive’ Energy Tariffs — Analysts expect levies to hurt refiners, raise US gas prices — Canada, Mexico also stand to lose in oil, gas trade war — When President-elect Donald Trump announced his plan to impose tariffs on goods coming …
Discussion:
Reuters, Canadian Press and Daily Mail
RELATED:
Judd Legum / Popular Information:
Ohio teacher suspended for including four books with LGBTQ characters in her classroom library — Karen Cahall has been a teacher in the New Richmond School District in Ohio for 34 years. During that time, according to a lawsuit Cahall filed earlier this month, she “consistently received …
Discussion:
Washington Post and Los Angeles Times
Matt Brown / Associated Press:
Manchin, Sinema prevent Democrats from locking in majority on labor board through 2026 — Senate Democrats failed Wednesday to confirm a Democratic member of the National Labor Relations Board after independent Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema opposed the nomination …
Discussion:
New York Times, New Republic, The Hill, RedState, Axios, Rolling Stone, Mediaite, Washington Times, Raw Story, The Daily Caller and Fox News
RELATED:
New York Times:
Power, Intimidation and the Resurrection of Trump's Support for Hegseth — The president-elect became convinced that letting Pete Hegseth fail would set off a feeding frenzy among senators. What followed was a MAGA swarm that helped salvage his bid, at least for now.
Discussion:
Talking Points Memo
Adrienne LaFrance / The Atlantic:
Decivilization May Already Be Under Way — The line between a normal, functioning society and catastrophic decivilization can be crossed with a single act of mayhem. This is why, for those who have studied violence closely, the brazen murder of a CEO in Midtown Manhattan—and, more important …
Discussion:
Raw Story
Tyler Austin Harper / The Atlantic:
Is This How Democrats Win Back the Working Class? — A week after Donald Trump won the presidency again, I sat across from Chris Murphy in his minimalist but well-appointed D.C. office. The Connecticut senator sounded like a man who had done a speedrun through all five stages of grief …
Ryan Cooper / American Prospect:
Democrats Lost the Propaganda War — The party used up about $5 billion on political ads in 2024. There's a better way. — A Fox News ad is displayed outside the Fiserv Forum on the eve of the Republican National Convention, July 14, 2024, in Milwaukee.
Jake Zuckerman / Plain Dealer:
Bill forcing hospitals to administer ivermectin, other requested treatments nears finish line — COLUMBUS, Ohio - Senate Republicans on Wednesday passed legislation that would enable patients to force hospitals into administering drugs for off-label use if the hospital's own physicians refuse.
CNN:
South Korea's ruling party backs impeachment as president refuses to step down over martial law — South Korea's ruling party has thrown its support behind attempts to impeach embattled President Yoon Suk Yeol over his ill-fated decision to declare martial law that sparked a political crisis and widespread public anger in the country.
Discussion:
Reuters, Agence France-Presse, UPI and Fox News
New York Times:
Blue States are Unaffordable. The Price Will be Political. — Every year, millions of Americans bounce around the country like electrons, moving from one state to another. But there are patterns in this chaos, and one of the clearest in recent decades is that Americans are moving from blue states to red states.
Sanjana Karanth / HuffPost:
Mitch McConnell Says Trump Win Puts Americans In A ‘Very Dangerous World’ — The GOP's outgoing Senate leader said he plans to spend his final two years in office pushing back against the Trump-fueled isolationism within his party. — LOADING — Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) …
Discussion:
The Independent, Raw Story, Mediaite, Balloon Juice, Financial Times and Daily Kos
Matthew Yglesias / Slow Boring:
End the Medicare For All wars — It's time to talk about other health care policy ideas — I'm a little uncomfortable with the fact that health care policy is back on the American political agenda because of the murder of UnitedHealth Care's CEO. But, given that it is, I do want to write about it.
FIRE:
Silence in the Classroom: The 2024 FIRE Faculty Survey Report — Research & Learn — FIRE's new report finds that faculty members are four times more likely to self-censor than they were in the 1950s, at the height of the Cold War and McCarthyism. — Executive Summary
Discussion:
The Daily Caller, The Texas Tribune and Knight First Amendment …
Victoria Balara / Fox News:
Fox News Poll: Voters feel hopeful post-election, want Trump to focus on inflation — A month after Donald Trump's presidential victory, more voters feel positive than negative about the election results. — A month after Donald Trump's presidential victory, more voters feel positive than negative about the election results.
Charles Sykes / The Atlantic:
The Crisis Neither Party Is Equipped to Handle — America's education system is in trouble, but neither Republicans nor Democrats are up for the challenge of enforcing change. — In 1957, the Soviet Union shocked the world with the launch of its Earth-orbiting Sputnik satellite.
Discussion:
American Greatness
Raphael Boyd / The Guardian:
From X to Bluesky: why are people fleeing Elon Musk's ‘digital town square’? — Musk's platform has lost 2.7 million active US users in two months, while its rival has gained 2.5 million — A mass departure from Elon Musk's X has led to the site losing about 2.7 million active Apple …
David French / New York Times:
Biden Has a Pair of Gifts for Trump — Donald Trump is a lucky man. — The combination of allied courage and American support has inflicted serious losses on America's enemies and created a series of strategic openings for the United States. The Iranian “axis of resistance” is in a state of collapse.
Discussion:
Raw Story