The big news of the week is our withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement. At an Asian security forum in Singapore, James Mattis gave a speech reiterating our support for national alliances and institutions in an effort to reassure our allies. When asked whether moves like leaving the Paris accord meant the U.S. is abandoning these alliances and institutions, here was his response (referring to a Winston Churchill quote on democracy):

“To quote a British observer of us from some years back, bear with us. Once we have exhausted all possible alternatives, the Americans will do the right thing…. So, we will still be there, and we will be there with you.”

In other words, once we’re done fucking around, we’ll start doing the right thing again.

Russia:

1. The Russia investigation expands to include Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, who is refusing to cooperate with investigations, former adviser and White House aide Boris Epshteyn, and campaign aide Michael Caputo.
2. The Kushner investigation includes looking into why Kushner met with Sergey Gorkov, a Russian banker and associate of Putin’s. This is part of finding out why he was setting up a confidential line of communication.
3. Trump makes moves to reopen two Russian compounds in the U.S. that Obama had closed when he expelled 50 Russian spies last fall. Trump wants to return the compounds to Russia.
4. Putin changes his tune somewhat and says it’s possible that “patriotically minded” Russians might have been involved in last year’s email and DNC server hack, as well as in meddling in the elections. He still denies that the Russian government was involved, and adds that it could’ve been some kid sitting in their living room.
5. The house intelligence committee issues seven new subpoenas in the Russia investigation, indicating they are ramping things up. Three of these are about the unmasking, however…
6. …In an apparent misunderstanding of the word “recuse,” Devon Nunes, the Republican chair of the House Intelligence Committee who “recused” himself from the Russia investigation two months ago, issues subpoenas looking for info not about Russian ties or meddling, but about the unmasking of Trump associates caught up in foreign surveillance.
7. Almost immediately after taking office, Trump officials asked the State Department to work on lifting sanctions with Russia and returning diplomatic compounds in the U.S. to them. State Department officials were so concerned by this they began lobbying Congress to pass legislation to block it.
8. Special Counsel Mueller’s Russia probe is expanding to include the investigation into Michael Flynn and a criminal investigation into Paul Manafort, and it could be expanded to include the DoJ’s involvement in the Comey firing.
9. According to Mark Warner, Democrat ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, there are reports that the Kremlin paid over a thousand internet trolls to create fake anti-Clinton news stories and to use botnets to target the stories to key states. He reconfirms the hacking and selective leaks.
10. The Russia investigations hamper Trump’s ability to fill government jobs. There are hundreds of open positions, but candidates are nervous about coming on to this administration and the people who are doing the hiring are distracted by the probe. They’ve only nominated 117 out of 559 major Senate-confirmed positions.
11. NBC and CNN report that, according to several U.S. officials, the Russia investigations include a meeting in April of last year at the Mayflower Hotel between Trump, Sessions, Kushner and Kislyak.

Courts/Justice:

1. A federal judge in D.C. throws out a lawsuit against Hillary Clinton brought by the parents of one of the people who lost their lives in Benghazi. The lawsuit alleges that Clinton’s use of a private email server directly resulted in the deaths, and that Clinton had called the parents liars. The judge ruled against both of these, and said about the latter, “To the contrary, the statements [made by Clinton] portray plaintiffs as normal parents, grieving over the tragic loss of their loved ones.” The parents are expected to appeal.

Healthcare:

1. Senator John Thune says that their caucus is done with preliminary meetings and is now drafting the base language for their replacement plan for the ACA.
2. John Cornyn promises there will be a bill by the end of July at the latest.
3. Governors from both sides are relieved that the House healthcare bill is stalled, and voice concerns about the Senate version, specifically around block grants. Senate Republicans want to solicit governor input for their version of the bill.
4. Senator Richard Burr (R-N.C.) says it’s not likely that they’ll get a healthcare deal at all, and Senator Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) says he doubts they can pass a healthcare bill before the August recess.
5. The California Senate passes a statewide single-payer healthcare bill, which now moves on to the Assembly for approval. Funding is only partially worked out, so it’ll be up to the Assembly to plan that before approving.
6. Trump says we should spend more on healthcare to make our system the best, but his budget cuts anywhere from $800 billion to $1.4 trillion from Medicaid and doesn’t request any additional healthcare spending.

International:

1. A car bomb went off during rush hour in Kabul, killing an estimated 90 people and injuring over 400. This happened in what should be a highly secure area near the embassies.
2. Concerns about security arise on news that Trump hands out his cell phone number to world leaders and tells them they can call him directly. On an unsecured line. Without the meeting preparation needed to hold an informed discussion.
3. French President Macron took some hard lines with Putin in their meeting this week, and called him out on Russian interference in the French election (if you remember, there was a last minute document leak after the media blackout). While Macron took a firm stance with Putin, Trump has been taking a softer stance with Putin.
4. A gunman attempts to rob a Manila resort and casino, leaving 37 dead. This was not a terrorist attack, but a lone gunman, though Trump calls it a terrorist attack in his Paris agreement speech.
5. Trump announces that the U.S. Embassy in Israel will remain in Tel Aviv for now instead of relocating to Jerusalem.
6. A group of three assailants drive a van into pedestrians on London Bridge, and then jump out and begin stabbing people, leaving at least seven dead and 48 injured. Police kill all three assailants and neutralize the threat within eight minutes. Later police arrest 12 in connection with the terrorist attacks. This attack comes a week before the elections and is the third recent attack (though the attacks are said to be not connected).
7. Trump and other world leaders express condolences and support to England, but then Trump criticizes London’s mayor in a tweet, taking his words out of context. He also tries to use this as support for his travel ban.
8. Putin says that if Sweden becomes a part of NATO, Russia will consider it a threat and will think about how to eliminate that threat.
9. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt and Bahrain cut diplomatic ties with Qatar for sponsoring terrorist groups, specifically the Muslim Brotherhood. This could make things a little harder for the U.S. in the war against ISIS since our military operations are spread throughout the region.
10. H.R. McMaster and Gary Cohn pen an op-ed where they claim Trump expressed support for NATO’s article 5, though he never said that in his speech.

Legislation:

1. Trump calls for changes to senatorial proceedings to allow things like healthcare and tax reform to pass with a simple majority instead of the currently required 60 votes. Senate Republicans are using reconciliation to pass these through, which doesn’t require 60 votes.
2. The California Senate passes a bill that would require presidential candidates to release their tax returns in order to be allowed on the primary ballot. The bill moves to the Assembly.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

1. The tourism industry estimates that international tourism will drop by an additional 800,000 in Southern California over the next three years. International tourism in Southern California dropped 16% from the first quarter of 2016.
2. The Trump administration asks the Supreme Court to allow the travel ban to go ahead, filing a petition to overturn the appeals courts rulings blocking the ban.
3. The administration calls for tougher visa vetting, including social media checks.
4. A federal court rules that a 17-year-old transgender student can use the men’s bathroom. Earlier in the year, the administration overturned the bathroom rule that allowed students to use the bathroom corresponding to the gender they identify with. This ruling is consistent with the previous administration’s stance that Title IX’s prohibition on sex discrimination allows students to use the bathroom consistent with their self-identity.

Climate/EPA:

1. Trump indicates he’s planning to pull out of the Paris agreement, but tries to keep us all in suspense like on a reality TV show. When he does announce the withdrawal, his speech is peppered with much misinformation. Critics say it weakens efforts to combat climate change and weakens our global standing. Proponents say it will save us money and now the world can’t tell us what to do… except this whole thing was our idea.
2. Trump opts for the withdrawal process laid out in the agreement, which could take nearly four years.
3. In his statement on the withdrawal, Trump issues a few untruths:
   • He called the attack at the Manila casino a terrorist attack, though it turned out to be a robbery gone very bad.
   • He said the tax bill is progressing through Congress, though there is no tax bill.
   • He uses incorrect statistics about slowing the increase in global temperature with numbers from a draft done before the deal was even signed. The actual reduction was expected to be between 0.6 and 1.1 °C.
   • He says that India could double their coal production, which is technically true. However that also means we could do what we want to since the accord is nonbinding. Also, both India and China are on track to exceed their promises to the agreement.
   • He says we’ll ″begin negotiations to reenter either the Paris Accord or a really entirely new transaction on terms that are fair to the United States, its businesses, its workers, its people, its taxpayers.″ Uh, Europe says no thanks– not renegotiable. According to Christiana Figueres, a former UN official who worked on the deal, “You cannot renegotiate individually. It’s a multilateral agreement. No one country can unilaterally change the conditions.”
   • Figueres also says Trump shows a lack of understanding of how international agreements work. Apparently we can’t even submit our intention to exit the accord until November 2019, and then the process would take a year.
   • Trump says the agreement puts draconian burdens on the U.S. and that we’ll have massive legal liability if we stay in. But an agreement can’t really be both nonbinding and impose draconian burdens, and a nonbinding agreement can’t have legal implications. The point of the agreement is to use public accountability.
   • He says China and India are the two largest emitters. Actually, China and the U.S. are, but no one tops the U.S. in per capita emissions; China’s are about half ours per capita.
   • There are more misstatements–I can’t get into them all here. Here are a few links: factcheck.org, politifact, WaPo.
4. Days before Trump announces his decision on the Paris agreement, Russia expresses support for the agreement.
5. Kimberly Guilfoyle, a Fox News correspondent, says Trump called her the morning of the decision for advice.
6. Tesla’s Elon Musk and Disney’s Bob Iger leave Trump’s advisory council due to the exit from the climate deal. The CEOs of 25 leading tech companies signed a letter against the withdrawal. Even Exxon Mobile thinks we should keep our seat at that table.
7. Major companies say the accord would’ve helped create jobs in clean energy fields.
8. Three states, 80 universities, more than 200 mayors, and more than 100 businesses vow to remain in the Paris agreement and to adopt and uphold the commitments to our original goals by working together to create a clean energy economy.
9. More Americans say the U.S. should stay in the Paris agreement by a ratio of more than 5 to 1.
10. Michael Bloomberg says he’ll cover the cost of the U.S. portion of the UN’s Framework Convention on Climate Change to the tune of about $15 million.
11. In response to our withdrawal from the agreement, Macron expresses his says his country still supports the American people and our efforts against climate change. He invites scientists to his country if their research is cut here, inviting brain drain from the U.S.
12. The 2017 hurricane season starts with no one at the helms of FEMA and NOAA. Trump nominated someone to head FEMA a month ago, but is waiting on confirmation. He hasn’t appointed anyone to head NOAA.
13. A California court rules against Monsanto and says California can label RoundUp weed killer with cancer warnings.
14. The California state Senate passes a bill guiding the state to get its energy from 100% renewable sources by 2045. The bill moves on to the Assembly.
15. Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke starts a review process on opening the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil drilling. The review should take a month and will include input from locals. The results of opening ANWR are unpredictable, with the high cost of exploration and drilling in the difficult terrain and the low cost of oil with the current glut.
16. The Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) goes live.

Budget/Economy/Trade:

1. The unemployment rate continues its steady decline to 4.3% last month even though job growth continues to slow, likely because we’re near full employment.
2. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross says he’s open to completing a trade agreement with the EU, called the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP).
3. It appears that the relationship between corporate American and Trump is cooling off, with fewer CEOs and other executives meeting in the White House and future meetings falling apart. Many business titans criticize the decision to leave the Paris accord saying it will hurt us economically and take us out of a leadership role.

Miscellaneous:

1. I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention this: Trump tweets ″Despite the negative press covfefe…″ Social media hilarity ensues.
2. The directors of the CIA and National Intelligence worry that because of the casual nature of security briefings, Trump doesn’t retain all the intelligence he gets. Briefings are very visually driven (charts, graphs, pictures) as opposed to data-driven.
3. Continuing to make violence more acceptable, a Texas legislator threatens to ″put a bullet″ in the head of a colleague after a disagreement over an illegal immigrant rally.
4. For the first time, a U.S. test of the ground-based system for intercepting ballistic missiles completes successfully.
5. The White House finally makes public the ethics waivers granted so far to staffers, some of whom were lobbyists and some whose current position overlaps with work they did in the private sector. The waivers exempt them from certain ethics rules. Waivers were granted to Kellyanne Conway, Reince Priebus, and Steve Bannon. The number of waivers granted by the administration so far is equal to the total number granted by Obama’s administration over 8 years.
6. Bannon’s waiver allows him to maintain his relationship with Breitbart.
7. The White House is complying with Senator Burr’s request for all copies of the 2014 report on torture. This report is the result of a years-long investigation and it details CIA methods for detention and interrogation, including water boarding and sleep deprivation. Burr’s request has lead some to believe that Congress wants this information to disappear.
8. The Secret Service is short agents, and in an effort to bulk up their ranks, they’re relaxing their drug policies for new hires. Agents have been working double-duty to keep up with the president’s far-flung, jet-set family.
9. This is news to me, but not new this week: Richard and Rebekah Mercer pushed for these positions in the Trump campaign: Steve Bannon as CEO, Kellyanne Conway as Manager, and David Bossie as Deputy Manager. This led even William Kristol to dub it the ″merger of the Trump campaign with the kooky right.” Among other things, Mercer is the multi-million dollar investor in Cambridge Analytica, a firm used by both the Trump and Brexit campaigns to pinpoint and target demographics using ″secret psychological methods.″
10. Jared Kushner gets in own intelligence briefing every morning before Trump gets his.
11. The White House has been ignoring oversight requests from Democratic legislators, but this week they make it official by telling federal agencies to ignore the requests.
12. This isn’t newsworthy for any reason other than the hypocrisy of Trump’s (and the right’s) criticism of Obama. Trump goes golfing for the 23^rd times in his 19 weeks in office.
13. Mike Dubke, Trump’s communication director, resigns after just under three months in the job.
14. Kellyanne Conway’s husband, George T. Conway III, withdraws from consideration to lead the Civil Division of the DoJ.
15. Tom MacArthur resigns as chair of the Tuesday Group caucus, a group of moderate Republicans in the House, amid his work on the healthcare bill (the waiver amendment).
16. Polls show that 43% of Americans want Congress to start impeachment proceedings… even though they don’t think Trump is guilty of an impeachable offense? Weird.