“Republican lawmakers’ muted reaction to a federal judge’s ruling to suspend access to the abortion pill is the latest sign that the GOP’s legal success in limiting access to abortions is causing the party political headaches,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
Playbook: “Republicans are already on the defense on abortion rights. The political blowback against the GOP since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year has been ferocious. We saw this in the midterms, when Republicans drastically underperformed expectations, and we saw it again as recently as last week’s Wisconsin’s high court election, which saw the more liberal candidate win handily.”
“The GOP doesn’t entirely know how to handle this political reality.”
Axios: Ruling echoes anti-abortion rhetoric.
New York Times: “Call it an escape valve, an off-ramp or a break-glass-in-case-of-emergency option.”
“From Pennsylvania Avenue to Wall Street to Main Street, those anxious about the political impasse over raising the federal debt limit are eying an arcane, seldom successful congressional process known as a discharge petition as a possible solution to ward off a disastrous default.”
“The petition is just what its name implies: a signed demand, in this case bearing the signatures of a majority of the House, that can force consideration on the floor of a certain piece of legislation. The demand would be an increase in the federal debt limit — a way of staving off disaster if House Republicans refuse to agree to raise it before the Treasury Department exhausts its legal authority to borrow to pay its creditors this summer.”
“But the process is exceedingly difficult, time-consuming and easily derailed. It has been successful only rarely in recent decades, most notably with passage of a campaign finance overhaul in 2002.”
Wall Street Journal: “The intelligence leak is shaping up to be one of the most damaging in decades, officials said. The disclosure complicates Ukraine’s spring offensive. It will likely inhibit the readiness of foreign allies to share sensitive information with the U.S. government. And it potentially exposes America’s intelligence sources within Russia and other hostile nations.”
New York Times: “Some of the most sensitive material — maps of Ukrainian air defenses and a deep dive into South Korea’s secret plans to deliver 330,000 rounds of much-needed ammunition in time for Ukraine’s spring counteroffensive — is revealed in documents that appear to be barely 40 days old.”
“It is the freshness of the ‘secret’ and ‘top secret’ documents, and the hints they hold for operations to come, that make these disclosures particularly damaging, administration officials say.”
Playbook: “Wealthy Republicans will convene in Nashville on Friday for the RNC donor retreat — a long-planned event that comes just days after Tennessee Republicans booted two Black Democratic lawmakers from the statehouse for protesting gun laws on the chamber floor (while allowing a third participant who was white to keep her job).”
“It’s unlucky timing for a party already exhausted by controversy and hobbling as it tries to win over critical swing voters ahead of the 2024 election.”
“Privately, Republicans acknowledged to Playbook the inconvenience of visiting a state where local party leaders are mired in ugly headlines and accusations of racism. Their presence, they know, will likely invite questions about whether national Republicans condone the decisions of their Volunteer State brethren — and reporters are likely to hear wildly different answers depending on which GOP officials they ask.”
“Elon Musk took over Twitter last fall with a pledge of transparency for the social media giant — but so far political advertising on the platform has been anything but forthcoming,” Politico reports.
“Twitter has failed to disclose some political ads running on its site since early March… At least three promoted fundraising tweets were not included in Twitter’s own data, seemingly contradicting the company’s policies and raising doubts about the integrity of the platform’s data and how many other political ads could go unreported.”
Olivia Nuzzi profiles the Adult film actress and “the long afterlife of a forgettable fling with a reality-television personality.”
“Donald Trump’s attorney Jim Trusty said Sunday he expects the legal team representing the former president in New York City to seek to dismiss his recent indictment over hush money payments,” ABC News reports.
Said Trusty: “I think there’s going to be some very well-placed motions to dismiss based on the legal frailties of this kind of, you know, mental gymnastics indictment that Alvin Bragg is trying to piece together.”
“Recently expelled former Tennessee Reps. Justin Jones and Justin Pearson, who were ousted last week from the Republican-led Tennessee House for joining a protest on the House floor demanding stricter gun control, are seeking reinstatement,” CBS News reports.
“Nashville’s metro council has been called to a special meeting on Monday, during which it will likely vote to install Jones as his own interim successor, effectively giving him his seat back for the time being. A vote to reappoint Pearson to his seat will take place Wednesday.”
Just days after the GOP-led Tennessee State House expelled State Rep. Justin Jones over his gun control protest on the chamber floor, the Nashville Metro Council voted unanimously to reinstate him as the interim district representative in the General Assembly.
Justin Pearson is also expected to rejoin the General Assembly despite his expulsion. On Wednesday, the Shelby County Board of Commissioners in Memphis will hold a special meeting to determine if the 28-year-old Democrat will be reinstated as a temporary representative in the interim before a special election.
Former Attorney General Bill Barr spoke candidly on Sunday about Trump’s 2024 run, his verbal attacks on the Manhattan judge, and his legal cases, saying the former president should be “most concerned about the documents case at Mar-a-Lago,” Vanity Fair reports.
Said Barr: “He had no claim to those documents–especially the classified documents. They belong to the government. I think he was jerking the government around.”
He added: “Trump unfortunately has a penchant for engaging in reckless and self-destructive behavior that brings these kinds of things on him. In many respects, he’s his own worst enemy. He’s dug himself a hole on the documents [case]…It doesn’t surprise me that he has all these legal problems. He was warned about them before he left office.”
“Police have uncovered a New IRA bomb plot aimed at eclipsing US President Joe Biden’s visit to Belfast to mark the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement,” the Belfast Telegraph reports.
Politico: “The Republican presidential primary was always expected to revolve around Trump. But post-indictment, as Republicans rally to his defense — including, crucially, conservative talkers on Fox News — Trump’s opponents are confronting an even more damaging dynamic in race: Their inability to break through at all.”
Said one GOP operative who backs Gov. Ron DeSantis: “It feels like fucking 2016. Is there anything that can suck up as much political oxygen in the American political landscape as Trump? I don’t think so.”
Josh Kraushaar: “This week marked a low point for Republicans as they prepare for the 2024 elections: Former President Trump is once again the dominant force in the party, which is showing little indication of trying to appeal to swing voters.”
“Key Democrats hoping to keep abortion access a central part of the 2024 campaign are looking to the 2004 playbook of an old Republican nemesis: Karl Rove,” CNN reports.
“Rove was the architect of ballot initiatives to ban gay marriage placed in swing states to boost turnout for George W. Bush. Now Democrats are pushing ballot measures and an array of other moves to try to capitalize on a backlash to last year’s Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade, which they say was instrumental in many of their wins in last year’s midterms.”
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