I’m so not ready for this… the 2020 campaign season is already starting, with a bunch of Democrats declaring a presidential run. And that means that the disinformation campaigns are already out in force. So please remember to check your facts and don’t believe everything you hear. Here’s some advice for trolls that’s circulating on 4Chan to make Democrats sound conflicted or negative about Elizabeth Warren:

“Pose as a concerned Democrat and criticize her for being white,” one wrote. “Criticize her for being a woman. Do whatever it takes to further divide the left and prevent them from unifying behind a candidate for 2020. If we can manufacture another Bernie/Hillary split, they’ll get crushed in the general election.”

Here’s what really happened last week…

Missed from Last Week:

1. In late December, Trump signed an executive order that expands logging on public lands. The EO also orders the clearing of underbrush on 4 million acres and treating pests on another 1.5 million acres. Trump says this will help prevent forest fires, but experts say this is only useful when done near homes. The EO could mean a 30% increase for the logging industry.

Border Wall/Shutdown:

1. Here’s some fallout from the shutdown this week:

• • The Federal Aviation Administration calls back furloughed safety inspectors to work without pay. The IRS does the same with its employees, and the FDA brings back food safety inspectors (without pay). U.S. Fish and Wildlife bring back some workers so people can hunt on wildlife refuges.
  • The Coast Guard becomes the first branch of the armed services to not get paid.
  • FBI agents are now working without pay.
  • The SEC stops processing initial public offerings.
  • The NTSB suspends investigations of fatal accidents.
  • The State Department is calling furloughed diplomats to come back to work without pay.
  • Trump’s economists double their estimation of how much economic growth is being lost each week of the shutdown.
  • Some states begin allowing federal workers who are working but not being paid to receive unemployment benefits. The Trump administration has said these workers don’t qualify for benefits.
  • Over 40,000 immigration hearings have been cancelled due to the shutdown. Immigrants who miss their hearings are being given new dates years from now.
  • Businesses are doing their part to help furloughed workers by helping them to delay payments and reorganize loans, and by providing free services and free food.
  • The NY Met gives free tickets to furloughed workers to see their performances.

2. A federal judge denies requests from federal employees and unions 1) to require that air traffic controllers be paid, and 2) that employees who are essential shouldn’t be forced to work without pay.
3. The House passes a package to reopen the government, and, for the third time this year, Mitch McConnell block bills to reopen the government in the Senate.
4. Sarah Huckabee Sanders says it’s Democrats fault that Trump had to feed the Clemson Tigers champion football team fast food.
5. Nancy Pelosi sends Trump a letter saying they need to postpone the State of the Union address until after the shutdown ends due to security concerns. The White House asks Mitch McConnell if he can invite them to do it in the Senate instead.
6. In apparent retaliation, Trump postpones Pelosi’s congressional delegation (codel) trip where Pelosi planned to visit NATO officials in Brussels and then troops in Afghanistan. The codel was already on a bus on the way to the plane and Capitol Police already had their people on the ground in Europe awaiting their arrival.
7. Trump orders that government officials can’t use military planes until the shutdown is over. Then he sends Melania to Mar-a-Lago on a military plane.
8. Trump says Pelosi and her group can take a commercial flight if she wants. Recent history note: Trump took an official plane to Iraq during the shutdown.
9. Pelosi says she’s now postponing even their commercial flight abroad because Trump took divulged the codel’s travel plans to the public.
10. Nearly 400 immigrants tunneled under a border wall in Arizona and present themselves to border patrol agents for asylum.
11. While border crossings are down, family units now makes up 80% of apprehensions. And they’re mostly seeking asylum.
12. Trump starts telling stories about women trafficked over the border who’s mouths are taped with electrical tape. He morphs the story to include multiple kinds of tape and body parts. People who work with anti-trafficking NGOs at the border say it’s possible, but they haven’t seen it.
13. Trump offers Democrats a three-year reprieve for people currently protected by DACA and TPS, saying he won’t try to deport them during that time if they fund his wall. Soooo he tried to take away DACA and TPS, and now he says he’ll give them back if Democrats give him the wall. Again, the courts have struck down his actions on DACA and TPS, so they’re currently protected by the courts.

• • Conservative pundits call this amnesty. To be clear, this is not what amnesty looks like.

14. Here’s where Pelosi says Democrats want border funding to go toward:

• • Increased infrastructure investments at our ports of entry including additional ports and roads;
  • Advanced technology to scan for drugs, weapons and contraband and to detect unauthorized crossings;
  • More customs personnel including filling the more than 3,000 customs and border patrol vacancies; and
  • More immigration judges.

15. The House cancels January recess in order to deal with the shutdown.
16. The DOJ hires two lawyers likely to deal with issues of eminent domain at the border.

Russia:

1. Mueller’s team subpoenas three new Jerome Corsi associates to testify before the grand jury. The Senate Intelligence Committee subpoenas Corsi himself.
2. Both Mueller and Manhattan prosecutors are investigating a breakfast event held at the Trump International Hotel in DC two days before Trump’s inauguration. In attendance were Michael Flynn, Devin Nunes, and several foreign diplomats.
3. The House votes to overturn the Treasury Department’s decision to lift sanctions on a company that Oleg Deripaska has a stake in. 57 Senators, including 11 Republicans, also vote to keep sanctions, but it falls short of the 60 votes required to overturn the decision.

• • Under the Treasury decision, Deripaska must reduce his stake in two companies and the other sanctions against him remain. But a binding and signed document shows that it allows Deripaska to get rid of $100s of millions in debt and for him and his associates to retain a large share of ownership.
  • The primary company involved is a major aluminum producer, and the sanctions are hurting American companies.
  • With an overwhelming majority, the House passes a resolution of disapproval for rolling back the sanctions.

4. Last year, I refrained from reporting on Anastasia Vashukevich, who says she was Deripaska’s mistress and that she has tapes of him bragging about how Russia stole our 2016 elections. She was subsequently arrested in Thailand on charges of prostitution. So I was waiting to see what would come of this, if anything. This week, Thailand releases her and deports her to Belarus… with a layover in Moscow where officials there arrest her at the airport in dramatic fashion.
5. BuzzFeed releases a report that starts out with a bang but quickly fizzles. (Note that I don’t typically use BuzzFeed as a source, but the story generated a lot of buzz, so I figured it was newsworthy.)

• • BuzzFeed reports that Trump personally directed Michael Cohen to lie to Congress about the duration of the Trump Tower Moscow negotiations to hide Trump’s involvement.
  • Trump’s legal team reaches out to Mueller’s office about this.
  • Mueller’s office disputes parts of the reporting, but not the substance. This is important because his office rarely jumps in with statements on news stories. They issue this statement:
    “BuzzFeed’s description of specific statements to the Special Counsel’s Office, and characterization of documents and testimony obtained by this office, regarding Michael Cohen’s Congressional testimony are not accurate.”
  • BuzzFeed stands by their story, but they’re also working to learn what specific parts Mueller’s team is disputing.
  • If the reporting turns out to be right, it would mean Donald Jr. perjured himself during his testimony to Congress.

6. Rudy Giuliani says Trump and Cohen were discussing building a Trump Tower in Moscow throughout 2016, possibly into November.
7. Giuliani also admits that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia, but he maintains that Trump did not. He later says he doesn’t know if there was any collusion.
8. Cohen’s testimony before Congress next month will be limited so as not to interfere with Mueller’s investigation. So if you were expecting the full scoop, you’re not going to get it.

Legal Fallout:

1. A new report from the Inspector General for the General Services Administration says that GSA officials chose to ignore the constitution’s anti-corruption clauses when they continued leasing the Old Post Office Building to the Trump International Hotel after Trump took office.

• • An example of why this is an issue: Last year when T-Mobile needed approval from the Trump administration for a merger, nine T-Mobile executives booked rooms at the hotel with one of them staying there at least 10 times.

2. Michael Cohen confirms that he paid a tech firm to rig online polls in Trump’s favor during the 2016 elections. He also says this was “at the direction of and the sole benefit of” Trump. I don’t think this is illegal, but it is ironic given that Trump kept complaining about how rigged the polls are.

• • Fun fact: Cohen also used this company to promote himself as a sex symbol on Twitter.

3. Court filings show that Paul Manafort attempted to fill Trump’s administration with his allies, but it’s not clear how successful he was.

Courts/Justice:

1. William Barr, who’s currently being evaluated for confirmation as Attorney General, once said that the DOJ might need some “political supervision.” He thinks that we went too far in pushing the DOJ to be independent following Watergate.

• • Barr doesn’t say he wouldn’t jail journalists if they report on things that “might hurt the country.”
  • Barr says it’s vitally important that Mueller be able to complete his investigation, but he refuses to recuse himself even though he has expressed opinions on the case previously without full knowledge of the evidence obtained so far.
  • It takes Trump by surprise to learn during Barr’s testimony that Barr has been friends and colleagues with Mueller for 30 years. I would’ve thought that would come out in the vetting process. Was there a vetting process?
  • Unlike Jeff Sessions, Barr says he won’t go after marijuana sales in states where it’s legal.

2. A district judge says Susan Rice and Ben Rhodes must answer questions for a court case in writing, but denies a request to make them sit for depositions. The conservative group Judicial Watch filed a FOIA lawsuit against the State Department last year over the handling of missing emails. Rice and Rhodes will answer questions about the talking points used after the Benghazi attacks. Because that hasn’t been investigated enough yet.

Healthcare:

1. A federal judge issues a nationwide injunction against Trump’s attempted rollback of the ACA’s birth-control mandate. Just previous to that, a different judge blocked the rule for several states just hours before it was to take effect.

• • If successful, Trump’s rollback would let employers avoid providing contraceptive coverage as part of the insurance policies they offer to their employees. Under the ACA, they must provide this at no cost.

2. WHO issues a list of the top 10 most significant health issues facing us today (in no particular order):

• • Air pollution and climate change
  • Noncommunicable diseases (like heart disease, cancer, diabetes)
  • A global flu pandemic
  • Fragile and vulnerable settings (caused by things like drought, famine, and war)
  • Antimicrobial resistance to existing treatments
  • Weak primary healthcare
  • Anti-vaccination movements
  • High-threat pathogens (like Zika, Ebola, and SARS)
  • Dengue fever
  • HIV

3. An appeals court vacates a previous ruling that stopped Texas from defunding Planned Parenthood. In the original case, Texas tried to oust Planned Parenthood from their Medicaid program based on the videos that purported to show Planned Parenthood workers discussing illegal sales of fetal material. This doesn’t reverse the ruling, but instead throws the ball back into the original judge’s court and forces him to use a different standard to review the case.
4. The Senate fails to get the 60 votes needed to pass a bill that would permanently ban federal funding for abortions and place new restrictions on abortions.

International:

1. Trump has privately and repeatedly pushed withdrawing from NATO. At the NATO summit last summer, he told his national security officials that he didn’t see the point of the coalition. Both Jim Mattis and John Bolton spent the summit scrambling to make sure there was no mention of a withdrawal.
2. Turkish President Erdogan says Trump called him up and said that he’s still going to withdraw troops from Syria.
3. The UK Parliament fails to pass Theresa May’s Brexit deal with a vote of 432 to 202, a huge defeat for her government.

• • As a result, May faces a vote of no confidence, which she wins.
  • The official Brexit due date is March 29. May can try to ask the EU for more concessions, but they’ve drawn a firm line.
  • It’s possible this will lead to another vote on Brexit, but it’s not clear that if voters decide to NOT Brexit that it wouldn’t happen anyway.
  • Parliament could amend the EU Withdrawal Act to force May to request an Article 50 extension on the Brexit deadline if there is no agreement on an exit plan.

4. An explosion in Syria kills two U.S. troops and two civilians, with the Islamic State claiming responsibility. Just a few weeks ago, Trump said ISIS was defeated and we’re pulling troops out of Syria.

• • On the day of the explosion, Mike Pence states that “the caliphate has crumbled and ISIS has been defeated.”
  • Brett McGurk, former special envoy to the Global Coalition to Counter ISIS, says that Trump’s choice to withdraw troops is giving IS fighters new life.

5. Trump plans another North Korea summit with Kim Jong Un in February. A new report claims there are at least 20 previously undisclosed ballistic missile sites in North Korea.
6. The Trump administration rejects a deal with Russia to keep the Nuclear Forces Treaty, which is intended to contain nuclear arms proliferation. They say there’s no way to verify Russia is keeping their end of the deal. This sets the stage for a six-month withdrawal from the treaty starting next month.

Legislation/Congress:

1. Three GOP Members of Congress have either had their committee assignments stripped or won’t get any assignments due to misconduct:

• • Steve King: Stripped of assignments due to racist comments.
  • Duncan Hunter: Indicted (when elected)
  • Chris Collins: Indicted (when elected)

Family Separation:

1. An audit finds that the Trump administration has separated thousands more children than was publicly known. They started separating families over six months before they announced it, and they didn’t track those families. So we don’t know exactly how many, where the parents or children are, or whether they’ve been reunited.

• • The first separations started no later than October of 2017; Jeff Sessions didn’t announce the policy until May of 2018.
  • The separations continued after Trump ended the policy in June of 2018 (largely due to a court order).
  • Amnesty International estimates 8,000 “family units” were separated. I’m not sure what they mean by family unit.

2. Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR) asks the FBI to open an investigation into whether Kirstjen Nielsen lied under oath to Congress when she said that the administration never had a policy for family separation.
3. Merkley gave NBC News a draft of a 2017 memo from the DHS and DOJ that describes plans to separate families, to deport minors and deny them asylum hearings, and to force asylum seekers to wait for their hearings in Mexico instead of the U.S.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

1. A judge blocks the Commerce Department from adding a citizenship question to the 2020 Census, and rakes Secretary Wilbur Ross over the coals in his ruling. He says Ross and his aides broke a “smorgasbord” of federal rules, cherry-picked facts, twisted evidence, hid their deliberations, and lied under oath.
2. The Pentagon extends the mission of the troops assisting DHS along the border through September. There are about 2,300 troops still at the border, down from 5,900.
3. The Virginia Senate ratifies the ERA (yes, this is still a thing). If the GOP-led House of Delegates follows suit, we’ll have enough state ratifications to finally ratify it. Interesting history note: The original draft of the amendment was created almost 100 years ago, in 1921. Can we get this done already? We shouldn’t need to!
4. The House passes a resolution nearly unanimously condemning white supremacy and white nationalism. Even Steve King, at whom the resolution is directed, voted for it. The lone nay vote, Democrat Bobby Rush, doesn’t think the wording is strong enough.
5. While Representative Tony Cárdenas was speaking on the House floor, a Republican representative yelled “Go back to Puerto Rico!” The congressman later called Cárdenas to apologize and said he wasn’t addressing him, he was referring to the Democratic contingent that had a retreat in Puerto Rico earlier this year. At the time, the House was trying to pass a continuing resolution to reopen nine departments.
6. Hundreds of thousands show up across the country for the third annual Women’s March. The marches have gotten smaller each year, and this year the National March in DC was marred by accusations of anti-Semitism.
7. New York bans gay conversation therapy, and adds gender identity and gender expression to their anti-discrimination laws.
8. The new Democratic governor of Kansas reinstates protections for LGBTQ state employees.
9. The Trump Organization received at least 192 visas for foreign workers last year. That’s the highest number since 2008.

Climate/EPA:

1. On top of learning earlier this month that the oceans are warming waaaay faster than we thought, now we learn that the Antarctic is now losing six times as much ice each year as it was in the 80s. It’s gone from 40 billion tons a year to 252 billion tons.
2. The U.S. is increasing oil and gas drilling faster than any other nation, even though scientists say we have just 11 years to sort out this whole climate change thing.

Budget/Economy:

1. Representative Maxine Waters (D-CA) becomes the first woman and the first African American to chart the Financial Services Committee in the House.
2. Los Angeles County teachers strike for higher wages and an increase in staffing levels. They’re trying to bring attention to the needs of public schools.
3. Our six biggest banks (JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, and Goldman Sachs) made $100 billion in profit last year. That’s a first, it’s expected to grow when 4^th quarter numbers come in, and it’s due to the tax cuts.
4. The Trump administration refuses to extend emergency food assistance to Puerto Rico, calling it “excessive and unnecessary.”
5. Economists worry that the extended shutdown could push us into a contraction. A contraction starts when there are two consecutive quarters of GDP decline.
6. Economic growth was already slowing in the last quarter of 2018, with downward pressures including the trade war with China, the fading effects of the $1.5 trillion tax cut, and slower global growth in general. The government shutdown is expected to slow it further.

Elections:

1. A federal judge blocks parts of the lame duck bills passed in Wisconsin aimed at disenfranchising typically Democratic voters. The judge blocks attempts to curb early voting, to limit the use of student IDs, and to limit the use of receipts for people with exceptional barriers to getting IDs.
2. McConnell accuses Democrats of encouraging voter fraud and trying to swing elections toward one party with their sweeping election reform bill. His exact words are “power grab” and “naked attempt to change the rules of American politics to benefit one party.”

• • There’s a general summary of the bill here (under Legislation): http://cjrules.com/week-102-in-trump/
  • The point of the bill is to make sure every citizen can vote and none are disenfranchised from their right to vote. So I guess if more people voting swings elections toward one party…

3. New York passes election reform bills to allow early voting, preregistration of minors (so they’re able to vote upon turning 18), and voting by mail.

Miscellaneous:

1. Trump officials reverse an Obama-era safety rule (this is so commonplace that it isn’t even news). This rule required trains that carry flammable material (like oil) to install special brakes to reduce the risk of derailment and explosion. The move was proposed just over a year ago, right around the time the Amtrak train derailed in Washington.
2. A federal judge finds four women guilty after they enter a national park and leave food and water for immigrants crossing the border. The charges include entering a national refuge without a permit, driving a vehicle in a national refuge, and leaving things behind in a national refuge.
3. Ouch. Betsy DeVos breaks her pelvis and hip socket in a biking accident.

Polls:

1. 57% of American voters say they’ll definitely vote against Trump in 2020.

• • 30% say they’ll vote for Trump in 2020.
  • 13% say they have no idea who they’ll vote for.

2. 72% of federal workers oppose the shutdown, with 64% strongly opposed.

• • 21% support the shutdown, with 14% strongly supporting.

3. 56% of federal workers oppose building the wall, with 45% strongly opposed.

• • 34% support building the wall, with 25% strongly supporting.