Finally the week we’ve been waiting for. Mueller completes his investigation and turns in his final report to Attorney General William Barr. Barr takes two days to review it and send a summary to Congress. It sounds like good news for Trump (no collusion!), but we won’t know for sure until we can see it ourselves. If we can see it ourselves, that is. Mueller declined to make a determination on obstruction, and Barr’s letter barely skims the surface of the content. At any rate, it’s been a little anti-climactic.

Here’s what else happened this week…

Russia:

1. A court releases documents pertaining to the raid on Michael Cohen’s properties. It turns out that when federal prosecutors were investigating Michael Cohen last year, they were easily able to obtain digital data stored in the U.S., but Google wasn’t turning over information stored abroad. That is, until Trump signed the CLOUD Act, which made it easier for the FBI to obtain offshore information.
2. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein had planned to leave the DOJ in mid-March, but now it appears he’ll stay on longer to help the new Attorney General and to help his replacement transition in.
3. The most intriguing thing I read this week is about a Russian journalist who went undercover at the Russian troll factory Internet Research, LLC, in 2014. Unfortunately, her report is in Russian and doesn’t translate well, but here are some highlights:

• • The factory runs 24/7, including holidays, with a few hundred people on every shift.
  • Those who have the best English skills pose as Americans and develop online personas.
  • Her job at the factory was to spark anti-American sentiment among Russians.
  • The factory also employs bloggers to get their message out.
  • The messages they send out are nearly identical to the messages put out by state-run media.
  • Take a look at some of the rallies they held to pit us against each other.

4. And thus it ends…or does it? Robert Mueller files his final report to Attorney General William Barr, and now it’s up to Barr what to do with the information. Mueller hasn’t recommended any more indictments, though there are several ongoing investigations in district attorneys’ offices, state offices, and the House. Here’s a recap of the entire investigation (as is known to the public) so far. It’s interesting how much we forget.
5. Remaining open investigations include:

• • Southern District of New York: the hush money payments, Trump’s inaugural fund, campaign finance violations, and the activities of a pro-Trump Super PAC.
  • NY state: Trump Organization real estate deals and possible insurance fraud, Trump Foundation, undocumented workers at Trump’s golf course, and Trump’s taxes.
  • Maryland and D.C. Districts: emoluments clause violations.
  • DOJ: Still investigating at least 12 Russian intelligence agents believed to play a part in the hacking attacks against the DNC.
  • House committees: Russia meddling, obstruction, security clearances, Deutsche Bank’s loans to Trump Organization, tax returns, Saudi Arabian ties, the Trump Tower meeting, and emoluments clause violations.
  • There’s also the Summer Zervos defamation lawsuit, the lawsuit over his legal fees, and Roger Stone’s court case.

6. By the end of the weekend, just two days after receiving Mueller’s report, Barr delivers a summary of Mueller’s main findings to Congress. Main points, according to Barr:

• • Mueller didn’t find coordination or conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia to influence the elections.
  • Russian individuals offered several times to assist the Trump campaign.
  • Mueller declined to decide on obstruction of justice charges against Trump (similar to what happened during both the Nixon and Clinton investigations). Mueller did lay out the evidence for both sides of that argument, though.
  • Mueller said his report doesn’t exonerate Trump of obstruction allegations.
  • Barr and Rosenstein won’t charge Trump, but Congress can still look into the charges.
  • Barr promises to release additional information. It’s notable that Ken Starr released his entire report on Clinton to the public.

7. Trump claims that Barr’s letter proves Mueller’s report exonerates him. At the beginning of the week, though, he said that Mueller’s report is illegitimate because Mueller was never elected.

• • Then Trump says House Republicans should vote to make the Mueller report public, but he later says that there should be no Mueller report. Make up your mind, man!

8. Trump wants Attorney General Barr to open investigations into Hillary, Comey, James Clapper, and John Brennan.
9. Devin Nunes tells Fox News the Mueller Report should be burned (I wonder why). In other Nunes news, he’s suing two parody Twitter accounts, @DevinNunesMom and @DevinCow, because they were mean to him. And hilariously so.
10. Leaked bits of a deposition from Christopher Steele show he used web searches and crowdsourced reporting to verify some of the information about Webzilla in his dossier. He wasn’t aware the CNN iReport is not associated with CNN journalists. But that’s only part of the story—he was unable to disclose other methods of investigation.

Legal Fallout:

1. Judicial Watch releases an additional trove of Clinton emails received from the FBI as a result of a FOIA request.

• • Judicial Watch and Fox News claim the emails show that Clinton did the same thing as Michael Flynn by talking to Tony Blair in the days before Obama’s inauguration, that she shared classified information on her private emails, and that she had offers to establish a back channel of communication with Netanyahu.
  • I’m about halfway through reading them, and I don’t see the sharing of classified information, and it’s hard to tell if she overstepped by talking to Blair. It looks like she put off the serious talks until after the inauguration.

Courts/Justice:

1. Senate Republicans prepare to propose a resolution that would make it easier to confirm Trump’s judicial nominations at the district level by reducing the amount of debate time required.
2. A county judge in Wisconsin temporarily blocks a bunch of laws passed by last year’s GOP legislature and governor that would have curbed the power of their new governor. The judge says that the legislature convened under an “extraordinary session” which isn’t covered in their state constitution.

• • The ruling cancels 82 appointments made by former governor Scott Walker.
  • Immediately following the decision, Governor Tony Evers takes advantage of the reprieve to pull Wisconsin out of a lawsuit whose aim is to overturn the ACA.
  • Evers could move quickly to enact his own agenda, but he says they’re taking their time to make changes thoughtfully, not impulsively (probably to avoid the same pitfall the GOP fell into here).

3. The Supreme Court appears split so far in hearings about gerrymandering in Virginia. A lower court already ruled that the gerrymandering there disenfranchises minorities and gives the GOP a boost. House Republicans appealed the case, but it’s not clear they have legal standing to do so.

• • The Court has two similar cases pending for North Carolina and Maryland.

Healthcare:

1. A report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) finds that 14 states plus the District of Columbia aren’t in compliance with federal Medicaid laws covering abortion. They don’t cover the abortion pill in cases of rape, incest, or endangerment.

International:

1. Mike Pompeo briefs the State Department on International religious freedoms. They deny access to all media except “faith-based” media, and refuse to release transcripts. They also refuse to release the list of faith-based media on the guest list and the criteria for being invited.
2. Within six days of the mosque shootings that left nearly 50 people dead, New Zealand passes gun laws banning “military-style” assault rifles and high-capacity magazines. That’s how you get it done, folks.
3. Trump declares that the U.S. should officially recognized Israel’s occupation of Golan Heights.
4. Theresa May requests a delay on the Brexit deadline from the EU, and they grant her a short stay. Unless the Parliament can agree on a deal, they have until April 12 to exit.
5. The ISIS caliphate is destroyed, marking the end of a four-year campaign to wrest control of the land back from the group. This means that they don’t hold any land in Iraq or Syria, but the threat isn’t gone. They’ve already moved to a more traditional terrorist group—a clandestine network running guerrilla attacks.
6. Trump announces he’s withdrawing the sanctions against North Korea that he said were announced earlier that day. Except no sanctions were announced that day, leading some to believe that he’s referring to sanctions announced the previous day. However, the administration says he’s talking about sanctions that hadn’t even been announced yet and that were super secret. Whoopsies!

• • Fast forward a few days: According to five sources, it turns out that the “secret sanction” story was a cover. Trump was referring to the sanctions announced the previous day but was talked out of withdrawing them. There were no unannounced sanctions.

7. The U.S. increases the number of troops that will stay in Syria to 1,000.
8. The U.S. announces new Iran sanctions, this time against 14 people and 17 entities associated with Iran’s defense and research organization, SPND.

Border Wall/Shutdown/National Emergency:

1. Crime is rising in Tijuana, so some people who live there are stealing Trump’s new concertina wire off the fence at the border to put around and protect their own homes.
2. The commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps says Trump poses a risk to combat readiness by sending troops to the border and by using military funding for the border wall. Already they’ve had to cancel several trainings and delay much-needed repairs to their bases.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

1. Brazil’s president Jair Bolsonaro visits the White House, and says this (to which Trump vigorously nods in agreement): The U.S. and Brazil are together ”in their efforts to ensure liberties and respect to traditional family lifestyles, respect to God, our Creator, against the gender ideology or the politically correct attitudes, and against fake news.” No wonder they call him the Trump of the Tropics.

• • Bolsonaro has previously said he’d rather his son die than be gay and that parents should beat the gay out of their children. Nice guy.

2. The Supreme Court rules that people with past criminal records can be detained indefinitely throughout the course of their deportation proceedings even if they’ve never committed another crime. This will likely cause more overcrowding in detention centers.
3. In yet another desecration of a Jewish cemetery, vandals knock over 59 gravestones and mark them with antisemitic slurs, swastikas, and Hitler references.
4. House Democrats reintroduce a bill that would add “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” to the list of groups protected in the Civil Rights Act. Why? Because most states don’t provide protections, and you can be kicked out of your apartment or fired from your job for being part of the LGBTQ community.
5. The U.S. has denied travel visas to several women trying to participate in the UN’s annual Commission on the Status of Women. Some of these women fell under the Muslim Ban, but the U.S. government technically isn’t allowed to prevent individuals from going to the UN headquarters in New York. The same thing happened last year.
6. A flight attendant for Mesa Airlines out of Arizona put Mexico and Canada on her “no fly” list because she’s a DACA recipient and Trump’s new rules prevent her from flying outside the country. They put her on a flight to Mexico anyway, and not surprisingly she was detained. And even though she’s from Peru, they sent her back to Mexico. She was held for over a month before finally being released.
7. A comparison of hate-crime incidents and Trump rallies shows that counties where Trump rallies were held had a 226% increase in hate crimes vs. counties that didn’t host Trump rallies. The study controlled for crime rates and active hate groups, among other things, and counties that held rallies were compared to similar counties that did not.
8. Despite the Trump administration’s announcement last week that they’re moving forward on the ban on transgender troops, a judge blocks them from doing so. Apparently the administration says that a previous court order blocking the ban was lifted, but it wasn’t.
9. As part of a court settlement, the state of Michigan says they’ll no longer fund adoption agencies that discriminate against LGBTQ couples.
10. Indiana and New Mexico add non-binary gender options to official documents, and United Airlines adds the option for booking flights.
11. Someone vandalizes a mosque in southern California with fire and graffiti referencing the New Zealand killing of nearly 50 Muslims in two mosques. What kind of person glorifies a mass killing? Geez.

Climate/EPA:

1. The Midwest is hit with record flooding, and it’s not done yet. There’s still snowmelt coming along with spring rains. Floating ice in the floodwaters has only increased the damage.

• • Nebraska is largely under emergency declarations. Flooding also hit parts of Iowa, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Ohio, Missouri, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Wyoming (and earlier this year, Michigan, Illinois, and California).

• • The flooding has killed livestock, destroyed grain bins, and closed businesses. A number of farmers aren’t expected to recover from this.

2. A cyclone hits Mozambique, killing at least 750 people.
3. A federal judge rules that the Department of the Interior (specifically the BLM) broke the law by ignoring climate impact studies in their decisions to open Wyoming lands to gas and oil drilling under Obama.

• • This could become a stumbling block to the Trump administration’s efforts to further expand gas and oil drilling.
  • The judge doesn’t block the drilling outright, but directs the BLM to perform climate impact evaluations again.

4. Newly released audio recordings of a meeting of the Independent Petroleum Association of America show that shortly after David Bernhardt was appointed to the second highest position in the Interior Department, members laughed about their unprecedented access to the president and administration.

• • Bernhardt is currently nominated to become Secretary of the Interior, replacing Ryan Zinke.
  • So far, the Interior has granted the Independent Petroleum Association of America nearly all of their deregulation requests.

5. California’s population grew by 11.7% since 2005, but gas consumption is down and the state runs on 33% renewable energy (two years ahead of schedule).
6. Carbon dioxide emissions in the United Kingdom decrease for the sixth year in a row.
7. Nevada joins the bipartisan U.S. Climate Alliance, making it the 23rd state to join.

Budget/Economy:

1. February’s job report was dismal, with just 20,000 jobs added. Of those, nearly 3/4 were created in one state—California.
2. The U.S. also had its largest monthly deficit ever in February, coming to $234 billion. The previous high was $231.7 billion in February of 2012.
3. General Motors plans to idle five of their U.S. plants and lay off 14,000 workers. Trump pressures them to stay open or sell to another company that can use the factories.
4. The Trump administration wants to cap federal student loan borrowing, saying that will cause schools to lower tuition fees. School administrators say that isn’t how it works.
5. Betsy DeVos wants to stop subsidizing low-income students and wants to end loan forgiveness for public service workers.
6. The Trump administration says that the tax cuts won’t create 3% growth after all. We also need to rollback labor regulations (I think businesses have already gotten a pretty decent break here), a $1 trillion infrastructure plan (yes!), and additional tax cuts (how’re we supposed to pay for the infrastructure then?).

Elections:

1. Arizona pulls out of the controversial Interstate Voter Registration Crosscheck program. Crosscheck was founded to compare voter records across states to make sure people aren’t registered to vote in more than one state, and to purge voter rolls if they are. After Kris Kobach took over the program, false matches started coming to light and multiple lawsuits ensued (one claiming that the system falsely matches records in 99% of all matches).

• • Nine states have dropped from the Crosscheck program so far.
  • 26 states belong to a different program, the Electronic Registration Information Center, founded by Pew Charitable Trusts.

2. Ever since voters in Florida passed Amendment 4 last year, restoring voting rights to ex-felons who’ve completed their sentence, the state government has been working on ways to stymie that effort. Their House just passed a bill that would make ex-felons pay fees and fines before getting their voting rights back.

• • There’s a question of whether this is constitutional (imposing fees or taxes on voting).
  • And why did so many voters vote for this issue and then go on to vote for officials that they knew would oppose it?

3. A federal court orders legislators in Mississippi to redraw a State Senate district that they previously drew to dilute minority voting power. The judge says the district violates the Voting Rights Act.
4. Trump says it’s Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s fault that the economy didn’t exceed 4% growth last year.

Miscellaneous:

1. Paul Ryan will join the board of Fox Corp’s new organization after the sale of their film and TV assets to Disney.
2. Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump both use WhatsApp and personal email accounts for official government business. But her emails…
3. Trump lays into John McCain and then blames the media for his outburst when he doesn’t get the audience response he was expecting. He did this during a speech in Ohio and on Twitter with no prodding from any members of the media.
4. Within days of each other, two Parkland school shooter survivors commit suicide. We passed the year anniversary 5 weeks ago. In the same week, one of the parents who lost his child in the Sandy Hook shooting also commits suicide. He and his wife started a foundation to combat violence.
5. Trump signs an executive order forcing colleges to comply with his standards of free speech in order to receive certain federal grants.
6. The Trump supporter who sent pipe bombs to targets of Trump’s ire pleads guilty. He says he didn’t design them to blow up, though he knew they could’ve. He sounds pretty remorseful.
7. The DoD Inspector General opens an investigation into whether Acting Secretary Patrick Shanahan showed favoritism to Boeing over other manufacturers.
8. Teachers from an elementary school in Indiana sue the local sheriff’s office after the office conducted an active shooter drill where they took staff into a room in small groups at a time, lined them up on their knees, and shot at them from behind using plastic pellets.
 What could go wrong?

Polls:

1. The U.S. drops to number 19 in the World Happiness Report, which is still pretty good when you consider they look at 156 countries. Finland is still the happiest country on earth.
2. 78% of the Republican Fox News audience thinks Trump is the most successful president in history. 79% say U.S. intelligence agencies are trying to sabotage him. Only 49% of Republicans who don’t watch Fox News believe either of those things. Read into that what you want…