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Supreme Court takes up another clash over Biden’s student debt relief plan

The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear a second legal clash over President Biden’s ambitious student debt relief plan that is currently blocked by lower courts.

The two cases involve an effort by the Biden administration to reinstate a loan forgiveness program that would give federal borrowers making less than $125,000 a year up to $10,000 debt relief.

Arguments in the cases could be heard as early as February. It was not immediately clear if the disputes would be consolidated or handled separately.

The case added Monday stems from a legal challenge brought by individual borrowers who argued the debt-relief program’s enactment was procedurally improper. A Texas-based federal judge last month invalidated the program and a New Orleans-based federal appeals court let that ruling stand, prompting the administration’s appeal to the Supreme Court.

Separately, a St. Louis-based appeals court halted the loan relief program in response to a challenge by six conservative-led states — Nebraska, Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas and South Carolina. Earlier this month the justices agreed to hear the administration’s appeal of that ruling, in which a unanimous three-judge panel found the debt-relief plan usurped Congress’ authority.

The White House, for its part, maintains that its policy is authorized by a 2003 federal law known as the Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students Act, which both the Trump and Biden administrations have drawn upon to alleviate student borrowers’ financial strain during the global pandemic.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates Biden’s plan will cost about $400 billion over 30 years. Its aim is to forgive up to $10,000 in federal student loan debt for those making under $125,000 annually and up to $20,000 for recipients of Pell Grants, which assist students from lower-income families.

The program has drawn numerous legal challenges including two cases that sought emergency relief in the Supreme Court earlier this year that were unilaterally rejected by Justice Amy Coney Barrett.

Source: TEST FEED1

White House lashes out at Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Jan. 6 remarks

The White House lashed out at Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) on Monday for saying the Jan. 6 attack at the U.S. Capitol would have been armed and successful if she planned it, arguing her rhetoric is violent.

Greene on Saturday appeared to hit back at claims that she and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon were involved in planning the Jan. 6 riots.

“And I will tell you something, if Steve Bannon and I had organized that, we would have won. Not to mention, it would’ve been armed,” she said at a gala for the New York Young Republicans Club on Saturday.

White House spokesman Andrew Bates released a statement saying that all leaders have a responsibility to condemn her remarks, calling them dangerous and abhorrent.

“It goes against our fundamental values as a country for a Member of Congress to wish that the carnage of January 6th had been even worse, and to boast that she would have succeeded in an armed insurrection against the United States government,” Bates said.

“This violent rhetoric is a slap in the face to the Capitol Police, the DC Metropolitan Police, the National Guard, and the families who lost loved ones as a result of the attack on the Capitol,” he added.

Greene is an outspoken ally of former President Trump and has long espoused his false claims of fraud during the 2020 presidential election. She was questioned earlier this year by the House select committee investigating Jan. 6 over her role in efforts to stop the certification of President Biden’s win.

Many of the rioters on Jan. 6 brought weapons, and leaders of the Oath Keepers militia group were found guilty last month for seditious conspiracy.

According to former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony in June, Trump complained that some of his armed supporters were unable to join the crowd at his Ellipse speech on Jan. 6.

The New York Young Republicans Club last month pushed back at the White House for saying that bigotry, hate, and antisemitism have no place in the U.S. following Trump’s dinner in Florida with White nationalist Nick Fuentes and the rapper Ye.

“Biden’s handlers aim to ban wrongthink; it has ‘no place in America,’ they say. The American government is obliged to defend individuals’ right to freedom of expression even when their views are contrarian & widely condemned,” the group said on Twitter.

Source: TEST FEED1

Juan Williams: Who's laughing at Biden now?

President Biden is slated to announce his 2024 campaign after the holidays.

He is going to need a winning slogan. 

I’ve got it.

“Slow and Steady.”

Boring, you say.

You are thinking like Donald Trump. 

Remember, the former president thought “Sleepy Joe” was a killer put-down when he faced Biden in the 2020 campaign. Trump lost by millions of votes.

Meanwhile, Biden keeps winning.

Arnon Mishkin, the Fox polling analyst, mentioned “Slow and Steady” as a slogan last summer after Biden’s success in passing nearly all his legislative agenda. 

“Slow and Steady” isn’t catchy, I complained.

With polls dancing in his head, Mishkin said the numbers showed voters wanted the opposite of the chaos, midnight tweets, and juvenile name calling common throughout the Trump presidency. 

Americans still want a “Slow and Steady” president — someone who gets things done and offers a reassuring presence. As the midterms approached, Mishkin listed Biden’s negatives and positives with voters and said Democrats were missing the obvious in not playing to Biden’s strengths.

I foolishly dismissed the conversation as the knotty product of a numbers guy’s mind. At the time, Biden’s poll numbers remained low and a red wave in the midterms was widely predicted.

Last week, I apologized.

Yes, Arnon, “Slow and Steady” now looks very good.

With Biden as their leader, Democrats gained a seat in the Senate. They also picked up control of two governors’ mansions and four state legislative houses — two in Michigan.

They did lose their majority in the House. But, with one race yet to be called, the GOP will gain 10 seats at most. Those Democratic defeats are far below the 25-seat average loss for the party in the White House since 1994. There was no red wave.

Biden looks so good at year’s end that conservative Republican champion Newt Gingrich wrote on his website that the GOP “must learn to quit underestimating Biden.” 

Gingrich’s column also drew parallels between Biden and two iconic GOP Presidents, Eisenhower and Reagan — leaders who were put down by their political opponents but proved to be consistent winners. The former Speaker described Biden as the Democrats’ “almost inevitable” nominee for president in 2024.

On the left, Biden’s past year is described in New York Magazine with the headline “Joe Biden’s Actually Not-At-All-Bad Year.”

That grudging assessment is now accepted wisdom among top Democrats.

With California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) declaration that he is backing Biden for the 2024 Democratic presidential nomination, there is no serious challenge to Biden’s run for a second term.

Add in the Democratic National Committee’s proposed shuffle of the 2024 primary calendar at Biden’s direction — moving South Carolina to the front of the process and giving new prominence to Michigan and Georgia — and Biden wins again.

Primary voters in those states, especially Black voters, saved Biden’s campaign in 2020 and put him on a path to the nomination. Now, they are a wall of protection to ensure he stays the nominee in 2024. 

But what about the general election? 

Well, the only major declared Republican candidate is Trump.

Biden already beat Trump by over 7 million votes — and by a 306-232 margin in the electoral college. 

A Marquette University Law School poll conducted last month found Biden leading Trump by ten points and tied with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) among registered voters. 

“Slow and Steady” Biden already has a strong record to show to voters in the 2024 general election.

Biden passed major bipartisan legislation to fix our nation’s decrepit infrastructure. Another bill helps U.S. manufacturers compete with China. With the narrowest of Democratic majorities in the Senate, he won legislation lowering the cost of prescription drugs. And let’s not forget he put the COVID-19 pandemic largely in the rearview mirror.

For female voters and Black voters, he can say he put the first Black woman on the Supreme Court, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. More than half the members of his cabinet — 13 of 25 — are women. A similar number identify as members of a minority group.

Mr. “Slow and Steady” has more wins coming.

As Congress wraps up a lame duck session this month, he is poised to sign a bill protecting same-sex marriage and interracial marriage.

He is also likely to get additional congressional funding to help Ukraine fight the war against Russia. 

With a steady hand, he has kept U.S. troops out of war while holding NATO allies together against Russian aggression.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is another loser to the “Slow and Steady” Biden. 

Not bad for a man derided by critics as a mentally challenged 80-year-old who sometimes stutters. Some still dismiss him as “Sleepy Joe.”

I can’t wait to see the old guy, Mr. “Slow and Steady,” defy more low expectations in his next two years as president. 

Who knows, we might be talking about six more years?

Juan Williams is an author, and a political analyst for Fox News Channel.

Source: TEST FEED1

Musk fires back after criticism of gender pronouns tweet about Fauci

Twitter CEO Elon Musk fired back on Sunday night after facing backlash for tweeting that his pronouns are “Prosecute/Fauci” earlier in the day, a reference to chief White House adviser Anthony Fauci.

“Elon, please don’t mock and promote hate toward already marginalized and at-risk-of-violence members of the #LGBTQ+ community,” astronaut Scott Kelly, the twin brother of Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), responded to Musk’s tweet. “They are real people with real feelings. Furthermore, Dr Fauci is a dedicated public servant whose sole motivation was saving lives.”

“I strongly disagree,” Musk replied. “Forcing your pronouns upon others when they didn’t ask, and implicitly ostracizing those who don’t, is neither good nor kind to anyone. As for Fauci, he lied to Congress and funded gain-of-function research that killed millions of people. Not awesome imo.”

Multiple Republicans, including Sen. Rand Paul (Ky.) and Rep. Jim Jordan (Ohio), have pressed Fauci on whether the National Institutes of Health has ever funded gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a claim Fauci has said is “entirely and completely incorrect,” as part of the Republicans’ claims that the COVID-19 virus escaped from a lab in Wuhan, China.

House Republicans have repeatedly floated plans to investigate Fauci upon taking the House majority in January, a scenario Fauci has acknowledged. He has also indicated he will cooperate with any investigations.

Musk’s Sunday evening tweet is the latest attack against the nation’s top infectious diseases doctor, who plans to step down from his government roles later this month.

The newly minted Twitter CEO also previewed plans to release files from the company’s internal systems showing how the social media platform grappled with pandemic-related decisions, dubbed the “Twitter Files.”

Musk at times has sparred with Fauci and other infectious diseases experts, calling concern over the coronavirus “dumb” in the early days of the pandemic and ending Twitter’s policies about COVID-19 misinformation once he took over the company.

He later shared a meme on Sunday showing Fauci telling President Biden, “Just one more lockdown, my king.” 

“The woke mind virus is either defeated or nothing else matters,” Musk tweeted on Monday morning.

Source: TEST FEED1

The Hill's Morning Report — Congress is running out of time for big fiscal deal

The clock is running out for Congress to fund the government and avoid a shutdown by Friday at midnight. With the holidays fast approaching, lawmakers are facing a familiar time crunch on two must-pass bills — an omnibus government funding bill and the annual National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

Of the two bills, the NDAA is one step closer to passage. Its record $858 billion in spending priorities cleared the House on Thursday. The omnibus spending bill, however, is a different story (Vox). 

As congressional leaders and the White House struggle to reach a deal on a massive government funding package, they’re warning that Congress will almost certainly need to pass a short-term measure to avert a shutdown. While lawmakers had hoped to wrap up their work in the lame-duck session by Friday, they are now making plans to stay around right up until the Christmas weekend.

The two parties have yet to settle on top-line spending numbers for the omnibus bill set to fund the federal government through the fiscal year that ends in September 2023; without the numbers, appropriators cannot finalize the details. Currently, a $26 billion difference in domestic spending divides the two parties, Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) the vice chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, told NBC News. It’s a small piece of the $1.5 trillion package, but while Democrats want parity between domestic and defense spending, the GOP is seeking to reduce that number because of billions in new spending Democrats passed this Congress for inflation reduction and COVID-19 relief.

“We haven’t reached an agreement, we’re not near an agreement, but the circumstances are there … that we could reach one,” Shelby told NBC News. “Now, will it be before the 23rd? I don’t know that. The time compresses the schedule.”

While Senate Democrats are set to unveil their own funding bill through the fiscal year today in hopes of ending the stalemate, Congress is likely to pass a stopgap spending measure for one week to buy lawmakers more time to strike a deal — and extend their funding deadline to Dec. 23 (NBC News and Roll Call).

▪ The New York Times: Leaders back away from raising the debt ceiling, punting the clash to the new Congress.

▪ CNN: Democratic lawmakers make last-ditch effort to enhance child tax credit.

The House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol is increasingly turning to the Department of Justice (DOJ) as a potential partner for carrying out its mission once the panel dissolves. While the two investigative teams have at times been at odds over the last year and a half, The Hill’s Rebecca Beitsch reports the committee’s tune is changing. 

“If they would want to talk to some of our investigators or members of the committee, I think part of our duties and our oath of office is that we have to cooperate. And I see that cooperation being ongoing,” Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) told reporters Thursday. “If they have a particular interest in a subject or a subject matter, then we will be as cooperative as we can with respect to sharing it.”

The turf battle over transcripts is about to end with the release of the committee’s report on Dec. 21, when the panel plans to make public much of the evidence it has collected, including interviews and depositions with more than 1,000 witnesses. It will be the final official act of the committee, as its mandate ends with the release, but members hope to see their work live on through the Justice Department, a point made clear by the panel’s plans to make criminal referrals.

▪ The Hill: GOP members who rebuffed Jan. 6 panel may face referral to ethics panel.

▪ The Hill: Former US attorney predicts DOJ “on a path” to charge former President Trump.

Meanwhile, searches for an alternative to House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s (Calif.) Speakership bid are slowly building momentum. As The Hill’s Emily Brooks reports, McCarthy faces possible hurdles on both sides: from his fiercest detractors who are teasing that there are viable GOP consensus substitutes and from a bipartisan contingency candidate if McCarthy cannot win the gavel after multiple ballots in the new GOP-majority House next month.

“If somebody were to come out now and we didn’t deliver enough votes to stop Mr. McCarthy, that there would be a real potential for blowback,” said Rep. Andy Biggs (Ariz.), a former chairman of the House Freedom Caucus who has mounted a protest challenge to McCarthy for the House GOP nomination. “They want to be very careful. So I think I think people are interested. They’ve expressed it to some of us … I think people are being wary.”

McCarthy needs a majority of those voting for a Speaker candidate to win the gavel on Jan. 3, but with just a slim majority of 222 Republicans to 212 Democrats and one vacancy in the new Congress, five or more members voting against him could keep him from the gavel or force multiple ballots for Speaker — a situation that hasn’t happened in 100 years.

Politico: Wanted by McCarthy critics: 1 qualified alternative speaker. His conservative opponents are making a lot of noise, but whether they can stay organized ahead of Jan. 3 is another matter.

Related Articles

▪ NBC News: Republicans struggle in the Southwest as Latino voters stick with Democrats. “The GOP could potentially lose the Southwest for decades to come” if it doesn’t take a different tack with Latinos, one independent pollster in the region said.

▪ The Washington Post analysis: The big Republican Latino realignment didn’t happen in 2022. What now?

▪ The New York Times: After the midterm elections, abortion rights advocates hope to harness public support for the long term, while opponents look to advance new laws in sympathetic courts and legislatures.

LEADING THE DAY

➤ MORE POLITICS

It’s a tale of two men vying for the 2024 presidential election, writes The Hill’s Amie Parnes. President Biden hasn’t officially announced another White House bid, but his informal reelection rollout is in motion — and things have generally been going his way since the midterms gave Democrats a lift. Trump, meanwhile, announced he was running for the White House again days after the midterms but has spent the ensuing weeks mired in negative headlines. 

Recent polls show Biden ahead of Trump in a potential match-up. A Marquette Law School poll out earlier this month showed Biden leading Trump, 44 percent to 34 percent. But Biden’s lack of official announcement and potential indictments facing Trump is sure to throw more curveballs into an already-tense rematch between the two politicians. 

And as The Hill’s Brett Samuels reports, four weeks after declaring his 2024 White House bid, Trump appears so far to be a candidate in name only. He has not held any formal campaign events. He has not traveled to early voting states, made any major staffing announcements or done much of anything to scare off would-be rivals.

“His announcement and post-announcement period went terribly,” one former Trump campaign adviser told The Hill.

▪ The Hill: Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) rejects Trump as leader of the party.

▪ Politico: Why the Republican Party just can’t quit Trump. Former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele talks about why the former president and RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel are unlikely to pay the price for the party’s recent losses.

▪ The Washington Post: Congressional Republicans divided on attacking Trump investigations.

Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.) stole Democrats’ thunder after winning the Georgia runoff and expanding their majority by announcing Thursday that she will leave the Democratic Party to become an Independent, writes The Hill’s Alexander Bolton, in a power play that may increase her leverage in the Senate but almost certainly complicates her path to reelection and further strains relations with the Democratic base. 

John LaBombard, a former senior adviser to Sinema, said her exit could “reset” expectations of how she will vote, which could ease some of the tensions that built up between her and Democrats when she broke with them on tax policy and Senate rules reform. 

“There’s some part of this I think could really serve as a helpful reset in expectations in the Democratic Party and Congress as a whole, and a good reminder that diversity of thought and opinion is okay,” he told The Hill. “Both parties for long-term success should really think hard about the kind of expectations they put on their more independent-minded members.”

Sinema’s decision is already having a significant impact on Arizona’s Senate race in 2024, writes The Hill’s Julia Manchester. While it remains unclear whether the senator will even run for reelection in two years, her announcement means Republicans and Democrats in the Grand Canyon State are already having to recalibrate ahead of what is expected to be a bitterly fought contest.

“It’s a new game of chess for Democrats and Republicans about how do you actually play the game to be successful statewide,” said Lorna Romero, an Arizona-based Republican strategist, who worked on the late Sen. John McCain’s (R-Ariz.) 2016 reelection bid.

▪ Roll Call: What Sinema’s party switch means for the next Congress and 2024.

▪ Politico: “She was likely going to lose her next primary, and that’s why she’s doing this. It’s not a principle change,” Rep. Colin Allred (D-Texas) said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union,” noting that Sinema has voted with Senate Democrats in the vast majority of instances.

Rep. Tony Cárdenas (D-Calif.) wants to lead the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) to try to help his party regain control of the House in 2024. The Hill’s Rafael Bernal recently profiled the lawmaker, speaking to colleagues and fellow Democrats about his career and DCCC prospects.

​​“I’ve been fortunate to have a front row seat to Tony’s career in public service, from managing his first campaign for California State Assembly in 1996 to now serving together in Congress,” Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) told The Hill. “In his decades in office, he has never forgotten Pacoima and the working class community we come from in serving as their voice at all levels of government.”

➤ ADMINISTRATION

The U.S.’s increased efforts to assist Ukraine and other Eastern European countries in shoring up their cyber defenses amidst the war appear to have been successful in countering destructive Russian cyberattacks and mitigating their impact, writes The Hill’s Ines Kagubare. Beyond Ukraine, the recent cyber investments seem to have helped countries such as Estonia and Ukraine, which have both reported that they’ve successfully thwarted cyberattacks launched by hackers tied to Russia. 

“My sense is that the U.S. and the U.K. have both been pretty helpful when it comes to hardening Ukraine’s cyber defenses during the war and have been reasonably successful at their counter maneuvers as well, including things like removing Russian malware from machines and helping thwart attacks on Ukraine’s electric grid,” Josephine Wolff, an associate professor of cybersecurity policy at the Tufts University Fletcher School, told The Hill.

The front lines in the war between the West and Islamic extremists have shifted to Africa, from Somalia on its eastern tip to the West African Sahel, a semidesert strip south of the Sahara. It’s in the Sahel where the U.S. and its allies are betting that Niger offers the best hope of stopping the seemingly relentless spread of al Qaeda and Islamic State.

Hundreds of American troops are joining Western allies in Niger to block the terrorist groups from advancing violence and influence in West Africa (The Wall Street Journal).

▪ Axios: Biden’s overseas mining funding.

▪ The New York Times: Vice President Harris swears in Karen Bass as Los Angeles’ mayor.

IN FOCUS/SHARP TAKES

➤ INTERNATIONAL

While more Russian drone strikes continued to destroy Ukraine’s electricity grid, Kyiv’s military demolished a hotel complex hosting dozens of Russian military personnel between Saturday and Sunday, using U.S.-supplied long-range artillery.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said 1.5 million people in his country’s southern region were left without power after strikes late Saturday. Only critical infrastructure remained connected to the power grid, he said, adding that restoring service could take longer than after previous attacks (The Wall Street Journal).

Zelensky spoke with the leaders of the United States, France and Turkey ahead of planned Group of Seven (G7) and EU meetings today that could set further sanctions against Russia. Biden told Zelensky during a call on Sunday that the administration was prioritizing efforts to boost the country’s air defenses, the White House said. Zelensky said he thanked Biden for the “unprecedented defense and financial” aid from the United States has provided (Reuters).

▪ CNBC: China expands hospitals and ICUs as it faces COVID-19 surge.

▪ CNN: A Libyan man accused of being involved in making the bomb that destroyed Pan Am Flight 103 over the town of Lockerbie, Scotland, in December 1988 is now in U.S. custody.

▪ Reuters: EU chiefs shocked by European Parliament corruption probe.

Last week, security forces raided more than 150 targets in one of postwar Germany’s biggest counterterrorist operations. By Friday, 23 members of the cell had been detained across 11 German states, while 31 others were placed under investigation. The police discovered stashes of arms and military equipment as well as a list of 18 politicians and journalists they deemed enemies.

Among them was Prince Heinrich XIII, the 71-year-old descendant of a 700-year-old noble family, who was arrested last week as the suspected ringleader of the plan. The New York Times reports that, nostalgic for an imperial past, he embraced far-right conspiracy theories.

OPINION

■ The great delusion behind Twitter, by Ezra Klein, columnist, The New York Times. https://nyti.ms/3Fkq0zZ 

■ A question to conservative Christians on gay marriage: Why draw the line here? by E.J. Dionne, columnist, The Washington Post. https://wapo.st/3VQJhjk

WHERE AND WHEN

🎄 A note to readers: Morning Report will be helmed through Dec. 22 by The Hill’s Kristina Karisch; co-writer Alexis Simendinger will wrap up a newsy 2022 by taking a holiday break. 

👉 The Hill: Share a news query tied to an expert journalist’s insights: The Hill launched something new and (we hope) engaging via text with Editor-in-Chief Bob Cusack. Learn more and sign up HERE.

⭐ INVITATION: Join a newsmaker event hosted by The Hill and the Bipartisan Policy Center on Tuesday, Dec. 13, 10 a.m. ET (hybrid), “Risk to Resilience: Cyber & Climate Solutions to Bolster America’s Power Grid,” with. Jim Himes (D-Conn.), Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.), Energy Department Cybersecurity, Energy Security and Emergency Response Director Puesh Kumar and more. Information for in-person and online participation is HERE.

The House will convene at noon. 

The Senate will convene at 3 p.m. and resume consideration of the nomination of Tamika Montgomery-Reeves to be a U.S. circuit judge for the 3rd Circuit.

The president will receive the President’s Daily Brief at 8:45 a.m. At 12:40 p.m., he and First Lady Jill Biden will participate in a United States Marine Corps Reserve Toys for Tots event in Arlington, Va.

The vice president will be in Washington and has no public schedule.

The first lady will participate in the Toys for Tots sorting event with the president. At 6 p.m., she will host a virtual appreciation event for educators with the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken will meet with Uzbekistan’s Foreign Minister Vladimir Norov at 1:30 p.m. At 2:30 p.m., Blinken will participate in a memorandum of understanding signing ceremony with the Tent Partnership for Refugees at the State Department. At 6:30 p.m., he will speak at a State Department reception for African innovators as part of the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit.

The White House daily press briefing is scheduled at 3 p.m. 

ELSEWHERE

➤ TECH

Twitter announced it will relaunch its subscription service today, although prices will be higher for Apple users in an apparent jab at the tech giant’s fees on in-app purchases. The social media company said users can subscribe to Twitter Blue, which includes a blue checkmark, editing abilities and 1,080-pixel video uploads, for $8 per month if purchased through the web and $11 per month if purchased on an Apple device.

CEO Elon Musk has taken aim at Apple’s 30 percent commission on in-app purchases, calling it a “secret 30% tax” in a tweet late last month (The Hill).

“Literally 10 times higher than it should be,” Musk said of the fee in May.

▪ Fortune: Musk demands Twitter employees pledge they won’t leak information to the press — and is threatening to sue them if they do.

▪ CNN: Musk says Twitter is rolling out a new feature that will flag “shadowbanning.” It’s complicated.

▪ Business Insider: Musk says his politics are in the center but extremism experts say he’s using Twitter to increasingly empower right-wing viewpoints.

Hiring in tech, information and media is at its lowest level since July 2020, according to a Thursday report from LinkedIn, which points to “a painful recalibration of a sector that saw massive hiring gains throughout the pandemic.” And an NBC News tally of layoffs at companies that cut 100 people or more shows that about 91,000 people have lost their jobs in the tech industry this year.

Some would-be tech workers told NBC News that given the turmoil, they’re shifting plans at least slightly by entering adjacent fields, and they’re preparing themselves for a potentially exhaustive job search.

▪ The Wall Street Journal: Survival lessons from past tech downturns.

▪ The New York Times: Tech layoffs in the U.S. send foreign workers scrambling to find new jobs.

➤ PANDEMIC & HEALTH 

As COVID-19 cases surge nationwide alongside unseasonably severe waves of flu and respiratory syncytial virus, state health officials are warning people that time is running out to get vaccinated before gathering with family over the holidays. While experts say this winter’s COVID-19 surge may be more mild, they worry whether hospitals — already dealing with staffing shortages — can handle the increased caseload from the “tripledemic” of viruses.

Nearly 30,000 people currently in the hospital have tested positive for COVID-19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, up 30 percent since Thanksgiving. A little more than 13 percent of Americans over the age of 5 have gotten their updated booster vaccine since it was released in September, according to the CDC (Politico).

“The situation in the hospitals is grim,” David Scrase, secretary of the New Mexico Health and Human Services Department, told Politico. “The death toll from this very serious virus continues to go up and really, hopefully, will create a sense of urgency in individuals and families to think about getting access to vaccines and also to treatments, should you test positive for coronavirus.”

▪ The Hill: COVID-19, RSV or flu? How to tell the symptoms apart.

▪ CNN: Face masks come back to forefront amid triple threat of COVID-19, flu, RSV.

▪ Los Angeles Times: How to avoid COVID-19 and the flu this holiday season.

Information about COVID-19 vaccine and booster shot availability can be found at Vaccines.gov.

Total U.S. coronavirus deaths reported as of this morning, according to Johns Hopkins University (trackers all vary slightly): 1,084,440. Current U.S. COVID-19 deaths are 2,981 for the week, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (The CDC shifted its tally of available data from daily to weekly, now reported on Fridays.)

THE CLOSER

And finally … 🚀 It’s back! NASA’s Orion spacecraft is back on Earth after its journey around the moon. The crewless rocket — which NASA launched into orbit on Nov. 16 after multiple technical and weather delays  — landed in the Pacific around noon on Sunday, just off the coast of San Diego. 

The 322-foot Artemis I rocket bolted skyward in November at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., lifting the uncrewed Orion capsule on a 1.3 million-mile trek that looped twice around the moon. At the conclusion of its 25 ½-day mission, the capsule slowed from a dizzying 25,000 mph to just 300 mph after it entered the Earth’s atmosphere.

The capsule’s successful reentry brings to a close the space agency’s first Artemis mission, which was designed to test some of the technology needed to one day send people to the surface of the moon (Axios and Florida Today).

“The latest chapter in NASA’s journey back to the surface of the Moon comes to a close,” NASA spokesman Rob Navias said during the webcast of the splashdown. “Orion is back on Earth.”

Stay Engaged

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Jan. 6 panels eyes new beginning with DOJ as partner in Trump probe

The House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol is increasingly turning to the Department of Justice as a potential partner for carrying out its mission once the panel sunsets. 

The two investigative teams have at times been at odds over the last year and a half, with the panel rebuffing a request from the Department of Justice (DOJ) to share transcripts of its interviews in May.  

But as it stares down an end-of-the-year deadline, the committee’s tune is changing toward something reminiscent of a high school yearbook: Let’s keep in touch. 

“If they would want to talk to some of our investigators or members of the committee, I think part of our duties and our oath of office is that we have to cooperate. And I see that cooperation being ongoing,” Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) told reporters on Thursday. 

“If they have a particular interest in a subject or a subject matter, then we will be as cooperative as we can with respect to sharing it.” 

In the past, the committee has been more reticent to share its information with the department. 

An initial agreement was reached after the DOJ complained in court that the panel’s failure to furnish the transcripts would “complicate” their investigation. 

But it turns out the panel never made good on the arrangement, with Thompson telling reporters earlier this month the committee changed its mind. 

“We never shared it,” he said, adding later, “The committee just made a decision not to.” 

Attorney General Merrick Garland flagged the disagreement in a recent press conference. 

“We would like to have all the transcripts and all the other evidence collected by the committee so that we can use it in the ordinary course of our investigations,” he said. “We are asking for access to all of the transcripts. And that’s really all I can say right now.” 

Any turf battle over transcripts is about to end with the Dec. 21 release of the committee’s report.  

The panel plans to make public much of the evidence it has collected, including interviews and depositions with more than 1,000 witnesses. 

It will be the final official act of the committee, as its mandate ends with the release of its report. 

But the panel hopes to see its work live on through the Department of Justice, a point made clear by its plans to make criminal referrals for those it contends broke the law in the effort to stop the peaceful transfer of power. “As you know, DOJ has been actively pursuing our work product. So we think now’s a good time to share it with them,” Thompson said. 

He noted that it’s ultimately up to the department to determine how to move forward on the panel’s recommendations. “It’s strictly a DOJ product at that point,” Thompson said. 

The committee in recent weeks formed a subcommittee to evaluate the extent that behavior from former President Trump and those in his orbit justified making criminal referrals and to determine whom to include on the list.  

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the chairman of that subcommittee, said the panel has yet to completely winnow the list, which will be revealed in the committee’s final report on Dec. 21. 

“We want to make sure no one slips through the cracks. We want to make sure that the key organizers and movers of this attack don’t escape the scrutiny of the justice system,” he said. 

The criminal referrals won’t just be a list of names, but will instead likely include a list of statutes violated, along with legal analysis and evidence. 

“The committee is engaged in very painstaking due diligence about all of the statutory events…and reviewing the record and the video and the testimony. Even though what we’re doing is just making a referral of our views, we want to take it very seriously,” Raskin said. 

For its part, the DOJ appears to be ramping up its own investigation into Jan. 6 following the appointment of Special Counsel Jack Smith, who is likewise overseeing the investigation into the mishandling of records at Mar-a-Lago after Trump announced he would again seek the presidency in 2024. 

A slew of former Trump White House staff have appeared before a grand jury in recent weeks, while the DOJ also sent out fresh subpoenas relating to Jan. 6, asking local government officials in three states for any communication with some 19 different Trump campaign staffers or associates. 

For his part, Thompson does not intend to reach out to the DOJ. But he would not be surprised if he hears from them. 

“I don’t plan to, but I wouldn’t doubt if the special counsel wouldn’t reach out to us at some point to get the information,” he said. 

The DOJ will be left to grapple with what charges — if any — to bring, and whether it is willing to take on the high stakes, first-ever prosecution of a former president or others in his orbit. 

And it has a mixed record when it comes to taking prosecutorial advice from the panel, filing charges against just two of the four contempt of Congress recommendations forwarded by the full House for former White House aides that failed to comply with subpoenas. 

Thompson acknowledged that it’s unusual for a House committee to make such weighty recommendations on individuals’ criminal behavior. 

“I think the more we looked at the body of evidence that we had collected,” he said, “we just felt that while we’re not in the business of investigating people for criminal activities, we just couldn’t overlook some of it.” 

Source: TEST FEED1

Behind-the-scenes hunt builds for McCarthy Speaker alternative

Searches for a Speaker alternative to House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) are slowly building momentum as he faces opposition that threatens to sink his bid.

On one side, McCarthy’s fiercest detractors are teasing that there are people interested in being a viable GOP consensus substitute for the current minority leader. On the other, members say preliminary conversations are happening among Republicans and Democrats about a possible contingency candidate if McCarthy cannot win the gavel after multiple ballots in the new GOP-majority House next month.

Neither side will name names, fearing that anyone mentioned as a candidate would get intense blowback.

“If somebody were to come out now and we didn’t deliver enough votes to stop Mr. McCarthy, that there would be a real potential for blowback,” said Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), a former chair of the House Freedom Caucus who has mounted a protest challenge to McCarthy for the House GOP nomination, a bid he is continuing as he searches for an alternative. “They want to be very careful. So I think I think people are interested. They’ve expressed it to some of us … I think people are being wary.”

Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.) told Fox News there are a number of candidates who have come to McCarthy’s conservative opponents privately to say they’d like to be considered for Speaker once it is clear he cannot win the votes. Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) has publicly called for other House Republicans to step up as an alternative.

Biggs thinks there are still around 20 House Republicans members who will be “hard no’s” on McCarthy, which would be enough to deny him a majority of total lawmakers.

Right now, Biggs, Good and Gaetz are part of a group of five GOP members — along with Reps. Matt Rosendale (Mont.) and Ralph Norman (S.C.) — who have said or indicated they will not vote for McCarthy or “present” on the House floor in the next Congress.

Several others have withheld support for McCarthy without revealing how they would vote. On Thursday, seven more hardline conservatives signed a letter laying out demands for what they want from a GOP Speaker in terms of House rules and priorities, without naming McCarthy. The California Republican has held several meetings with members of that group on potential rules changes. 

“We’re talking about who the other candidates are, who can get into it. Again, we’re not going to get it publicly throw those names out there because then the disinformation campaign is directed towards them, then the retaliatory efforts go towards them,” Good told conservative radio host John Fredricks on Wednesday.

McCarthy needs a majority of those voting for a Speaker candidate to win the gavel on Jan. 3. With a slim majority of 222 Republicans to 212 Democrats and one vacancy, the five or more members voting against him could potentially keep him from the gavel or force multiple ballots for Speaker — a scenario that hasn’t happened in 100 years.

The situation is leading to bipartisan talks about contingency plans if it becomes clear that McCarthy cannot win the gavel — and more moderate House Republicans indicate their preferred alternative would not necessarily be someone the hardliners would want.

“We’ve had preliminary talks with the Democrats,” Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) told reporters. “If we have multiple, multiple votes, and they’re not willing to support what the far majority of the conference wants to do, we’re not going to be held hostage by them.”

Bacon later added on C-SPAN that he does think McCarthy will be elected Speaker and that he will support the GOP leader as long as he “stays in the fight.” But he does have “a few names” of possible alternatives, he said, without revealing any.

At least one House Democrat is publicly saying there is some “openness” among Democrats to working with Republicans to pick an alternative to McCarthy.

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) said he’d consider supporting a unity candidate if McCarthy stumbles and can’t win the gavel. Republicans have already reached out to him directly to gauge his interest, Khanna said, and “a few” other Democrats have received similar entreaties.

Their message is: “’You’ve always been for reform, what can we do to get some of these reforms? This may be a historic opportunity.'”

He, too, did not name names. But it is not clear Republicans would make any kinds of structural concessions to get Democratic support.

“It requires some shared subpoena power, some commitment to legislating. And it would have to be the right candidate,” Khanna said.  

He declined to offer any potential names, saying that if he floated one, “it’ll probably become toxic.” But he emphasized that a Speaker does “not necessarily” have to be a sitting member.

On Friday, Khanna told CNN that he has not talked to Bacon about a possible alternative.

Such a situation would be unprecedented in modern history. The House has chosen the majority party nominee in every Speakership election since at least 1913, according to a Congressional Research Service report.

And it is also a scenario feared by some hardline House Republicans who have broken with their Freedom Caucus colleagues to strongly support McCarthy.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) has repeatedly warned that the slim majority could cause moderate Republicans to work with Democrats to elect a Speaker who is less conservative than McCarthy. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), who is set to chair the House Judiciary Committee in a GOP majority, told Breitbart last weekend that he worries some Republicans could work with Democrats to elect a Speaker who will not allow the types of investigations into the Biden administration that he wants to conduct. 

With just three weeks until the new Congress and the Speakership election, some of McCarthy’s closest allies are brushing off the prospect of someone other than McCarthy becoming Speaker, noting the lack of any other viable GOP candidate.

“I think Kevin will get there. It might go a couple rounds, we’ll see. But at the end of the day, you can’t beat somebody with nobody,” said Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.). “There is no other member of the Republican conference that is currently here that can get 218 votes.”

Frustration is bubbling up in the House GOP Conference over the opposition to McCarthy. Two House GOP caucuses – the Republican Governance Group, an organization of more center-leaning members formerly known as the Tuesday Group, and the Main Street Caucus, a group of pragmatic governance-minded Republicans – have released letters in recent days urging their House Republican colleagues to support McCarthy. The former group urged Republicans to “put posturing aside.”

“He’s brought the conference from the minority to the majority. He’s been to every single congressional district. He’s broken all fundraising records. He’s raised close to half a billion dollars,” Fitzpatrick said. “If you can put all that work and dedicate your life and sacrifice your time, yourself, your family, only in the 11th hour to have a knife in your back, nobody’s ever going to do that work again. It would set the worst precedent I can imagine politically.”

—Mike Lillis contributed.

Source: TEST FEED1

Trump says he turned down deal to release Paul Whelan  

Former President Trump on Sunday said he turned down a deal to release former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, who’s been detained by Moscow since 2018, in exchange for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout during his time in the White House.

“I turned down a deal with Russia for a one on one swap of the so-called Merchant of Death for Paul Whelan. I wouldn’t have made the deal for a hundred people in exchange for someone that has killed untold numbers of people with his arms deals,” Trump said on Truth Social. 

Bout was released last week in exchange for WNBA star Brittney Griner, who spent about 10 months in Russian custody.  

Trump criticized the deal soon after news broke of Griner’s release, saying Whelan should have been freed instead.

The Biden administration has said Russia was unwilling to include Whelan in a swap for Bout.

Trump said Sunday that, although he turned down the deal with Moscow, he “would have gotten Paul out,” though didn’t explain why he wasn’t able to do so.

“The deal for Griner is crazy and bad. The taking wouldn’t have even happened during my Administration, but if it did, I would have gotten her out , fast!” Trump said.  

Former Trump White House national security official Fiona Hill said Sunday that the deal to swap Bout for Whelan was a possibility while Trump was in office.

“At the particular time, I also have to say here that President Trump wasn’t especially interested in engaging in that swap for also Paul Whelan. He was not particularly interested in Paul’s case in the way that one would have thought he would be,” Hill said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” with Margaret Brennan. 

David Whelan, Paul Whelan’s brother, has also accused the Trump administration of not appearing “interested in” the case.  

“I think the first two years, partly I think the Trump administration was not prepared to or not interested in working on wrongful detention cases,” David Whelan said Saturday on MSNBC.

“The Biden administration is much more engaged in wrongful detentions,” he added.  

Source: TEST FEED1

Trump, Biden fortunes shift dramatically post-midterms 

It’s a tale of two men vying for the 2024 presidential election.  

President Biden hasn’t officially announced another White House bid, but his informal reelection rollout is in motion — and things have generally been going his way since the midterms gave Democrats a lift.  

Biden managed to have the best first-term performance in the midterms of any president since Republican President George W. Bush, who saw his party gain seats in the House and Senate that cycle in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.  

Biden didn’t quite do that well, but the expected red GOP wave did not materialize. Democrats did lose the House majority to the GOP, but they lost fewer seats than expected and ended up holding the Senate majority.  

On Tuesday, Biden saw his party actually add to its Senate lead when Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock defeated Republican Herschel Walker in Georgia.  

There was a stumble of sorts on Friday morning when centrist Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.) announced she was leaving the Democratic Party to become an Independent. But Sinema did not announce she would not stop caucusing with Democrats, and the party will retain its majority.  

Biden separately took a post-midterm victory lap during an extensive foreign trip where he was seen as a more emboldened leader.  On Thursday, as his poll numbers continued to inch up, the president completed a controversial exchange with Russia that brough WNBA star Brittney Griner home after 10 months of detention in Russia.  

The deal was heavily criticized by the GOP but won applause from Democrats and supporters of Griner who had pressured the president to get her home.  

Meanwhile, former President Trump has had a much more difficult few weeks.  

Trump announced he was running for the White House again days after the midterms, but has spent the ensuing weeks mired in negative headlines.  

Politically, Trump watched the candidates he supported lose big in the midterms, even as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a potential adversary in 2024, won reelection and gained favor as a potential rival in a 2024 GOP presidential primary.  

The Trump Organization this week was found guilty of tax fraud, and then there was Trump’s self-inflicted controversies: a dinner with the white nationalist Nick Fuentes and Ye, the artist formerly known as Kanye West, who has spewed antisemitic messages in public and on social media.  

Trump a week ago suggested the U.S. Constitution be suspended to overturn the 2020 presidential election, remarks that triggered widespread criticism from Republicans.  

While it’s still early in the cycle — and Biden isn’t expected to make an announcement about a reelection bid until spring — both Democrats and Republicans say the potential Trump-Biden match-up is already taking shape.  

“Obviously Biden is in a stronger position today for the nomination than he was a month ago — not something you’d typically say about a sitting president,” said Republican strategist Doug Heye.  

Heye said the good midterm results limit the chances of a real primary challenge against the president.  

Trump, in contrast, is likely to see a fight for the GOP nomination.  

“Trump’s popularity in the party has dropped,” Heye remarked.  

Democrats, even those weary of writing off Trump, also feel Republicans are beginning to drift away from the former president.  

“It feels like the migraine named Donald we’ve all had for the last six years is finally abating,” said Democratic strategist Christy Setzer. “He just doesn’t hold the same power anymore.” 

Recent polls show Biden ahead of Trump in a potential match-up. A Marquette Law school poll out earlier this month showed Biden leading Trump, 44 percent to 34 percent. (Twenty-two percent said they would prefer someone else or would not vote.)  

Separately, a poll from USA Today and Ipsos out late last month showed that Democratic support for Biden has significantly improved, while Trump’s backing among Republicans has taken a hit.  

The poll showed that Democrats who said Biden could win reelection jumped to 71 percent from 60 percent in August. The same survey indicated that 75 percent of Republicans said Trump could prevail in 2024 — but that is 7 percentage points lower than the previous poll.  

“Pre-midterms, Trump had an advantage with his base headed toward 2024,” Clifford Young, president of U.S. Public Affairs at Ipsos, told USA Today. “Now, post midterms, Trump has been winged and Democrats are more confident in Biden, setting this up to be a close fight. The race is on.” 

Still, even with Biden’s bout of momentum, some Democrats are taking a more sober view of another potential Trump-Biden race.  

In a closely divided country, Democratic strategist Eddie Vale said it makes sense for the Biden team to prepare for a tough fight, adding that “anyone who now thinks Trump can’t win should take a quick look back at what almost everyone said was going to happen in the midterms.”  

Democrats say they are also preparing for the possibility that DeSantis knocks out Trump in a Republican primary and emerges as the nominee. That could be a possibility, some Republicans predicted this week, after Walker’s defeat in the Georgia runoff.  

“DeSantis is the one with the momentum in the party right now, one GOP strategist said. “It’s not Trump. Lately Trump feels dead in the water. If the election were held today, he would lose big.”  

Heye said Trump remains “the most popular person in the party as far as a plurality go and the constant media attention keep him in the center of energy.”  

But Heye added that if Trump is indicted, “the race becomes immediately scrambled, if it’s not already.” 

“It’s a mess,” he said.  

Source: TEST FEED1