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As the manhunt for the suspect in a mass shooting in Maine on Wednesday drags on, much of American public is wondering how he could have eluded authorities this long. But for right-wing commenters and influencers, his baffling disappearance is only further proof that the country’s top law enforcement agency is to blame for acts of domestic terror.

Contempt for the FBI among extremists dates back at least to the bureau’s 1990s-era deadly sieges on Ruby Ridge and Waco, which in turn motivated attacks including the Oklahoma City bombing.

Mike Johnson is the new Speaker of the House. The Louisiana Republican won the gavel on Wednesday, three chaos-filled weeks after the party ousted Kevin McCarthy from the position earlier this month. Republicans voted unanimously to make him second in line to the presidency.

Johnson, who was elected to the House in 2016, is serving just his fourth term in Congress and is the least experienced Speaker elected to the position since the 1870s. Three other candidates, Reps. Steve Scalise (R-La.), Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), and Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) failed to convert...

Update: Rep. Mike Johnson (R-la) won the vote for speaker, ending three-weeks of Republican intra-party divisions and bitter argument that paralyzed the House.

Johnson won 220 votes while Hakeem Jeffries drew 209 votes. The manual roll call was a contrast to previous ones, as Republicans were unified in their support of the Louisiana Republican, who is little known on the national stage. Yet late on Tuesday, he managed to win a GOP closed-door vote to win the nomination, with members quickly predicting that they would finally coalesce around a speaker candidate.

“The challenge is great, but the time for action is now, and I will not let you down,” Johnson told members after taking the gavel. He said that the first bill he will bring to the floor will be a resolution in support of Israel. He also said that he planned to create a bipartisan commission on the national debt, and...

Late Tuesday night, Louisiana’s Mike Johnson became the fourth Republican representative nominated for House Speaker since Republicans ousted Kevin McCarthy from the position earlier this month. The decision to nominate Johnson, a key architect of congressional efforts to challenge the 2020 election results, drew glowing praise from former President Donald Trump.

“Congratulations to Congressional Republicans! Yesterday was a big and very important day,” Trump wrote on Truth Social early Wednesday morning. “It gave us a quick and easy way forward with 5 candidates who are beyond reproach, and represent the absolute...

Update: Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) is the latest GOP nominee for speaker, but he may face the same types of divisions that sank three previous party designees for the top House post.

Johnson, the vice chair of the House Republican Conference and deputy whip, drew 128 votes in the third ballot this evening, per CNN, but coming in second, with 44 votes, was “other.” GOP members cast 43 of those “other” votes for Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-ca), the former speaker, even though he was not in the race. Rep. Byron Donalds (R-fl), the other declared candidate, garnered 29 votes.

“Democracy is messy sometimes, but it is our system,” Johnson said to reporters after the vote. “This conference, this House Republican majority is united.” He said the “intention” is go to the House floor for a vote on Wednesday.

Johnson has been in Congress since 2017. He is a defender of Donald Trump as he...

“The Daily Show” correspondent Desi Lydic roasted Republicans’ inability to choose a new Republican Speaker of the House, saying the party should just “settle” on an option just like women often have to do when it comes to picking a suitor.

This week’s guest host was TV personality Desus Nice (“Desus & Mero”) who served up show’s weekly “Headlines” of the week. Some of the topics included Taylor Swift’s celebratory handshake with Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes’ wife, Brittany, the nation’s tough health care system and Sheila Jackson Lee’s explosive phone call with her staff.

The last bit of the segment was delivered by Lydic, who was live from a fictional Capitol Hill, where she reported on Republicans’ search for a new speaker.

“Well, in political science terms, Republicans are all kinds f–ked up right now,” Lydic said, before suggesting that the party should...

Tom Emmer has withdrawn his name contention to become the next House Speaker hours after Republicans nominated him for the position and Donald Trump trashed him on Truth Social.

Republicans nominated Tom Emmer to become the next House Speaker in a closed-door vote Tuesday morning. The nod toward the Minnesota congressman came amid weeks of turmoil as the party struggles to coalesce around a leader to replace Kevin McCarty, whom it ousted from the position earlier this month.

Emmer emerged from a handful of candidates who put their names forward for the position,...

Jimmy Fallon thinks he may have found a solution for the Republican Speaker of the House problem: the Amazon Alexa House Speaker. “The Tonight Show” host cut to a fake commercial for the product on Monday night.

The commercial advertised some of benefits of the robotic speaker, including its ability to vote on bills and heckle the President during the State of the Union by saying “Let’s go Brandon,” a nod to the Republican outburst that occurred in February. Much like Kevin McCarthy, the speaker also has the ability to lose its jobs after just a few weeks.

“It’s time to listen to the speaker that’s been listening to you since 2014,” the commercial’s announcer cheerily says. Watch the segment above.

On Monday, the Republican-led House of Representatives hit its 20th day of being locked as it continues to search for the new Speaker of the House.

Stephen Colbert was back with a vengeance Monday on “The Late Show” after missing most of last week with Covid.

What Colbert missed he seemed to make up for right off the bat, going in on Rep. Jim Jordan’s failed bid for the U.S. House speakership.

“I’m feeling good partly because I’m back on my feet but mostly because Jim Jordan will not be speaker of the House,” Colbert cracked in his monologue, setting up a fresh round of gags at the Republican congressman’s expense.

“At this point, Jordan might have to go back to his previous job at the Museum of Natural History,” Colbert said, before “The Late Show” cut to an image perhaps photoshopped but perhaps not.

In it, Jordan is seen standing in what appears to be a museum display case between a Cro-Magnon man and woman, who stood tall and featured distinct chins,...

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez joined The Daily Show guest host Desus Nice on Monday to shed some light on the GOP infighting following their ouster of Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

“Republicans kicked out their speaker, and now they can’t find a new guy to run their group project,” the New York congresswoman quipped. “And they’re all fighting with each other about it.”

In terms of how it affects the U.S. on a wider scale, Ocasio-Cortez said, “We’ve got a clock ticking on a government shutdown,” adding, “That’s...

A coalition of Democrats serving in the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party has requested to receive a classified intelligence briefing on “how the Ccp and our foreign adversaries are leveraging current political dysfunction in the U.S. House of Representatives to discredit democracy globally.”

In a Monday letter addressed to Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines and CIA Director William Burns, Democrats expressed their concern that House Republicans’ inability to elect a House Speaker to replace Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) presents a national security threat.

Democrats want a...

Rep. Liz Cheney shared her fears that another Trump presidency could be the death knell for democracy.

“He cannot be the next president because if he is, all of the things he attempted to do but was stopped from doing by responsible people around him — at the Department of Justice, at the White House counsel’s office — all of those things he will do. There will be no guardrails,” the former congresswoman and member of the Jan. 6 committee said Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union.

.@Liz_Cheney on...

Saturday Night Live castmembers kicked off season 49’s second episode with a satirical take on Republicans’ current chaos in the U.S. House of Representatives.

The cold open saw Mikey Day’s Rep. Jim Jordan distraught after his bid for House Speaker failed for a third time. After Kevin McCarthy was ousted as House Speaker last month, Republicans have been sinking deeper into turmoil amid their division on who should claim the spot. On Friday, Republicans abruptly decided to drop Jordan, an ally of Donald Trump, as their nominee.

“How did I lose? This is chaos,” Day’s Jordan says. “Some of us are here to actually serve the American people. All I want to do is get Congress back to work so I can shut it down again.”

Bowen Yang’s Rep. George Santos, who has been at the center of controversy amid criminal charges and allegations that he...

Before we were treated to the hosting debut of musician and actor Bad Bunny, Saturday Night Live kicked things off with a cold open on the House of Representatives’ third vote for Speaker — where the deeply unlikable Republican Representative Jim Jordan, who has some serious things to answer for during his time as an assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State University, emerged as the GOP’s nominee.

“I didn’t win, honey. Not this time, either. I’m feeling good. I’ll see you at home, sweetie. Bye-bye,” Jordan (played by Mikey Day) mutters,...

“Saturday Night Live” took aim at Jim Jordan’s (Mike Day) failed bid for Speaker of the House, with the Republican being consoled by George Santos (Bowen Yang), Lauren Boebert (Chloe Fineman) and Donald Trump (James Austin Johnson).

“How did I lose? This is chaos,” Day’s Jordan says. “Some of us are here to actually serve the American people. All I want to do is get Congress back to work so I can shut it down again.”

Moments later, he’s visited by Santos, who has come to cheer him up with a baby in hand.

“I just wanted to say how sorry I am. But I want you to know I voted for you and get this, so did Shawna Loggins,” Yang said.

“Who’s that?,” Day replies, to which Yang responds: “Also me.”

Day’s Jordan says he’s not ready to give up and asks Yang...

“Yo-hoo, is this the loser’s room?” asked James Austin Johnson’s Donald Trump on Saturday Night Live’s cold open tonight. “Don’t we love our country, what an awful place it is,” he said later in the skit, nailing the ex-real estate mogul and one of the better political cold opens SNL has had in a long time.

Crashing a one-man pity party by Mikey Day’s phone-breaking Rep. Jim Jordan (R-oh), Johnson’s ever better Trump mocked the never-was Speaker of the House for being rejected by his fellow Republicans. Stressing he “prefers the Jordans who win,” SNL’s Trump blew his own horn on what a great Speaker he would be, as some of the GOP wingnuts have suggested.

“Sadly, I’ll be too busy campaigning,” Johnson mimicked as the much indicted former and perhaps future Potus. “Traveling from city to city, visiting their beautiful courtrooms.

Live from somewhere near New York, it’s yet another recap of an original broadcast of “Saturday Night Live.”

The venerable late-night NBC series, now just two episodes into its 49th season, kicked off the show with a satirical look at the Republican Party. “SNL” skewered Rep. Jim Jordan’s efforts to win the battle for U.S. Speaker of the House, Rep. George Santos’ ongoing legal imbroglio, Rep. Lauren Boebert’s recent scandal and, of course, former President Donald Trump.

The opening sketch featured Mikey Day as Rep. Jim Jordan, Chloe Fineman as Rep. Lauren Boebert, Bowen Yang as Rep. George Santos carrying a mystery baby and James Austin Johnson as former President Donald Trump.

The show also featured surprise cameos by Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger, who took part in two different sketches, as well as Lady Gaga, who introduced the first musical segment featuring Bad Bunny. Notable...

Former House speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-California) scolded Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Florida) in a closed-door GOP conference meeting.

When Gaetz tried to interrupt McCarthy, the ex speaker told him to sit down.

McCarthy reported that in the meeting, there was a moment when he mentioned Gaetz.

Gaetz stood up to interrupt him and say something. McCarthy then fired back at him, “Sit … down,” which prompted Gaetz to respond back.

Gaetz said that he thought McCarthy was “yielding to me since he had mentioned me.”

On Thursday, the House Republicans gathered for nearly four hours to discuss their next steps as they worked to choose a speaker candidate. This follows Gaetz’s decision to join forces with Democrats to remove McCarthy from his position. Gaetz led eight Republicans and all Democrats in the vote.

The conference nominated right-wing Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) for the role, but he was unsuccessful in securing...

Jim Jordan shed even more support from his caucus in a third failed vote to secure the Speakership, and on Friday the Republican caucus deemed that he is no longer their Speaker Designate.

Twenty-five Republicans voted against Jordan’s nomination during a Friday floor vote, an increase in defections from the 22 who voted against him on Wednesday, and 20 on Tuesday. Hours later, Jordan lost a secret ballot during a closed door conference vote, effectively ending his run for the gavel.

On Thursday, it seemed as if Jordan had, at least temporarily,...

Update: Back to square one: Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Oh) is out as the Republican nominee for Speaker of the House.

Jordan fell short in roll call votes this week, and lost even more ground in a third ballot Friday.

“We need to come together and figure out who are speaker is going to be,” Jordan told reporters today.

Members are leaving for the weekend. Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-Nc), who is serving as speaker pro tem, said there will be a candidate forum Monday night and conference elections to select a nominee on Tuesday morning.

“We’ll have to go back to the drawing board,” said Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-ca), who was ousted as speaker earlier this month. “What history will look at, the crazy eights, led by [Matt] Gaetz, the amount of damage they have done to this party and this country, is insurmountable. … We are in a very bad position as a party.

Jim Jordan lost a floor vote to become House Speaker on Tuesday. He lost by an even wider margin on Wednesday. He decided against a third vote on Thursday — which many predicted would have gone even worse for the Ohio Republican — instead opting to back a resolution to appoint Rep. Patrick McHenry as a temporary Speaker until the caucus could rally around a permanent leader.

It didn’t go so well.

Tempers reportedly flared behind closed doors, with Republicans directing their ire at a familiar target: Matt Gaetz, whose successful...

Update, 11:57 a.m. Pt: The Republican leadership chaos continues, as a plan to designate a temporary speaker has been sidelined and Rep. Jim Jordan (R-oh) made plans for another floor vote.

Jordan, who has failed in two votes to become speaker, earlier today embraced a plan in which a resolution would be offered so that the current speaker pro tem, Patrick McHenry, would get additional powers through January. Jordan would have still been in the speaker race, but it would have given him more time to win over holdouts, which numbered 22 on Wednesday.

But in the closed door Republican conference meeting, there was a revolt among some members, particularly those on the far right, who viewed it as a coalition plan that would give additional power to Democrats.

After the temporary speaker plan was presented, “We decided that wasn’t where we were going to go,” Jordan told reporters.

Two strikes, he’s out. Jim Jordan will not attempt a third floor vote to confirm his nomination for the speakership.

Following two failed votes on Tuesday and Wednesday, the Ohio congressman has determined not to bring his nomination to the floor on Thursday. He will instead back the interim appointment of Speaker Pro Tem Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) as House speaker through January, according to multiple reports.

Jordan insisted on Wednesday that he did not support the push to appoint McHenry, and was reportedly planning as late as Thursday...

Jimmy Fallon isn’t exactly impressed by Jim Jordan’s second loss for Speaker of the House. During the second round of voting, the Ohio representative lost by even more votes than in the first round.

“That’s like retaking the Sat and finding out you got dumber somehow,” the NBC late night host joked Wednesday night.

On Wednesday, Jordan lost his second bid for the role after several GOP holdouts blocked the vote. Their concern rests in how ultraconservative the Ohio representative is. During the first round of voting, Jordan lost 20 votes. Then on Wednesday’s vote that number jumped to 22.

The House will reconvene at noon on Thursday for a third vote and to find a way forward, according to the New York Times. Jordan failing to secure the vote continues two weeks of infighting within the Republican party.

Following the quip, Fallon presented a series of fake...

Bret Baier’s recent Fox News interview with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman took up less than 36 minutes on the cable outlet’s “Special Report.” Behind the scenes, preparations took months.

Baier spent time in the U.S. with Princess Reema, Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the United States, and made a special trip overseas to meet with various ministers and the head of state himself to test their rapport. “I went over on a flier,” says Baier during an interview in Fox News Channel’s New York offices. “I said there was not going to be any laying out of what the questions are, that it was going to be tough but fair. And we came to the end, and he said, ‘I think I’m going to do it.’ It took a few months after that to get it locked down.”

What Baier got was something of a surprise.

Fox News host Brian Kilmeade was caught on a hot mic calling a congressman a “dumbass” for voting for Kevin McCarthy during Tuesday’s Speaker vote, and Seth Meyers got a pretty big kick out of that on Wednesday night, pointing out some irony.

As part of his “Closer Look” segment, Meyers once again roasted Republicans for not being able to decide on a House Speaker, calling up footage of GOP politicians publicly shaming their own party. But then, he pulled up a clip of Kilmeade — or rather, Kilmeade’s voice — shaming Rep. Don Bacon specifically.

The footage is of the live vote in the House but, as Bacon is called on to give his vote, Kilmeade is clearly heard saying “dumbass” after the congressman doesn’t say Jim Jordan’s name.

“Do you know how bad things are for you when Brian Kilmeade is calling you a dumbass?” Meyers mocked with a laugh.

Iowa Congresswoman Mariannette Miller-Meeks reported receiving death threats after voting against Rep. Jim Jordan in his second failed ballot to secure the House Speakership on Wednesday.

“I have received credible death threats and a barrage of threatening calls.” Miller-Meeks (R-Iowa) wrote in a statement. “The proper authorities have been notified and my office is cooperating fully. One thing I cannot stomach, or support is a bully.”

“Someone who threatens another with bodily harm or tries to suppress differing opinions

undermines opportunity for unity and regard for freedom of speech,” she added.

Update: Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Oh) lost ground in his bid to become House speaker, as he again fell short of a majority in a roll call vote.

Twenty-two Republicans voted against him, two more than did so in Tuesday’s vote.

The latest tally was 199 votes for Jordan and 212 for House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries.

Jordan won over some members who voted against him on Tuesday, but he lost others. It’s unclear whether he will move to a third vote. The House went into recess after the final tally was announced. Jordon told reporters afterward that he hasn’t decided if he will pursue a third vote.

In nominating Jordan, Rep. Tom Cole (R-ok) urged Republicans to end the “chaos” of the past two weeks, calling the Ohio congressman an “honorable man.”

That was a contrast to Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-ca), who blasted Jordan’s role in January...

Jim Jordan is on track to lose a second ballot to secure the House speakership, with 22 Republicans voting against him on Wednesday — two more than the 20 who voted against him on Tuesday. Jordan can only afford to lose four caucus members if he wants to win the gavel.

House Republicans appear wholly incapable of bringing forth a resolution to the leadership crisis that has brought Congress to a standstill since the ouster of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy earlier this month. The House only has 30 days left to resolve the budgetary...

Update, 2:20 p.m.: Jim Jordan’s effort to become speaker of the House will be put off for another day.

The next vote is now scheduled for 11 a.m. on Wednesday. It’s an indication that Jordan and his allies are still struggling to win over holdouts.

“We’re going to keep going. We’ve had great conversations, especially with our colleagues,” Jordan told CNN’s Manu Raju. He said “we have to get a speaker and it can’t be some deal with the Democrats. The American people don’t want that. They elected Republicans in a majority — a small majority, I get it.”

Previously: The House may be in for a bit of deja vu, as Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Oh) fell short of winning the speakership on the first ballot.

Jordan received 200 votes, while the House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, drew 212. Some 217 votes were needed to become speaker,...

The hosts of “The View” were pretty pleased with President Biden on Wednesday morning, after he unequivocally condemned the terrorist attacks by Hamas in Israel. The women were decidedly less impressed with Rep. Matt Gaetz, with Alyssa Farah Griffin calling him out for “holding congress hostage.”

Discussing Biden’s statement on the attacks, in which he noted that Hamas “brings to mind the worst the worst rampages of Isis,” Farah Griffin applauded the president, saying she had “no notes.” But, she remained frustrated by the fact that the US can only provide limited aid to Israel at the moment, because the House Speaker position is currently vacant.

“This underscores the unseriousness of the Gaetz Eight,” Farah Griffin said, referring to Gaetz and the seven conservatives who led the ouster of Kevin McCarthy, and have a list of demands for the next speaker.

“The fact that right now, our greatest ally...

Rep. Jim Jordan has apparently appeared on Fox News a lot over the last six years or so — almost 600 times, to be exact. In fact, Seth Meyers is pretty sure he hasn’t even appeared on his own NBC late night show that many times in the same timeframe.

Jordan was at the core of Meyers’s “A Closer Look” segment on Monday night, after receiving an endorsement to become House Speaker from Donald Trump. Meyers wasn’t surprised by this, reminding viewers that Jordan is “the guy who would routinely show up to hearings in the House that were supposed to be investigating the Trump administration, but would instead talk really fast and say incoherent bulls—.”

Meyers likened Jordan to “an auctioneer with a head injury, just repeating all the unhinged buzzwords you hear on Fox News, without any of the content.” Of course, Meyers noted that it “makes...

The first day of public impeachment hearings reinforced what the previous month of closed-door depositions all but confirmed: that President Trump attempted to extort Ukraine into interfering in the 2020 election. Witnesses George Kent, the deputy assistant secretary of state, and Bill Taylor, the top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, laid out the case in exacting detail, while also revealing additional damning information, including that Trump was more concerned with Ukraine investigating Biden than the 2016 election.

Nevertheless, Republicans have claimed victory.

Rep. John Ratcliffe (R-Texas) called the hearing “boring.” Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.

Late-night hosts from Stephen Colbert and Seth Meyers to Trevor Noah and Samantha Bee gleefully dissected the first day of public hearings in the impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump on their respective shows Wednesday night.

On The Late Show, Colbert called the hearings “the biggest ratings hit for C-span 3 since Drunk History starring Brett Kavanaugh,” and focused on the bombshell testimony from U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Bill Taylor. Taylor said that one of his colleagues overheard Trump asking E.U. ambassador Gordon Sondland about Ukraine’s investigations into Joe Biden,...

It’s red meat time for the late night political comedy shows, as the impeachment hearings are finally underway in Washington.

Seth Myers focused on committee chair Adam Schiff, who started the hearing by mentioning one crucial point: that the raw facts are not in dispute.

So far, the Republicans haven’t contested that assertion, Meyers claimed, and poked fun at presidential adviser Rudy Giuliani, who kept flashing phones and other information during his Ukraine interviews: “You know you’re a bad criminal when you keep the evidence against you on multiple devices. Like a bank robber with a FitBit who says, “Look at this. I took 1,000 steps from the bank to my car.”

Seth takes #ACloserLook at the first day of impeachment hearings. https://t.co/u165vO91tW

— Late Night with Seth Meyers (@LateNightSeth) November 14, 2019

On The Daily Show, Trevor Noah had a long take on what went on in the hearings,...

Whether today is the beginning of the end of Donald Trump’s presidency or the end of its beginning, one’s thing for sure: partisan political warfare got real fast Wednesday as the House impeachment hearings went live on TV.

Besides a hairspray-defying strong wind, Trumps worst nightmare started promptly at 10 Am Et/7 Am Pt as the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence kicked off its first public hearing, and within minutes the Republican minority aimed to knock the Democrats off their game.

Starting with a very real reality-tv moment of an interrupting question from Rep. John Ratcliffe (R-tx) as chair Rep. Adam Schiff (D-ca) tried to methodically lay out how the heavily televised day would go, the Gop looked to defang the proceeds citing a thousand parliamentary procedures. Clearly well-scripted for his big turn in the media glare, Sunday show regular and Hollywood congressman Schiff appeared ruffled by the...

The day after damaging testimony from a former top U.S. diplomat undermined President Trump’s claim that there was no quid pro quo in the administration’s decision to withhold military aid from Ukraine while demanding an investigation into Trump’s political opponents, a mob of House Republicans stormed a secure congressional chamber where a new impeachment deposition was to take place on Wednesday.

Ostensibly there to protest a lack of transparency and due process for the president, the crowd of more than 40 Gop Congress members recklessly upended House protocol,...

The House’s impeachment inquiry has given new importance to what is a part of the culture at the Capitol — the media stakeout.

As lawmakers meet behind closed doors in a House Intelligence Committee hearing room, a handful of reporters are waiting just outside the restricted space, anxious for any information on what is being said. C-span has started a regular feed on its website of this stakeout spot, located two floors down a spiral staircase in the underground Capitol Visitor Center.

Many of the images on cable news channels lately have been of reporters catching lawmakers in fleeting moments for comment, or even just a glimpse of an entering or exiting witness. But the relentless pace of the news cycle, with its ever-expanding scope of bombshells related to President Donald Trump, has placed new competitive pressure on journalists to break new details and gather reaction.

“I would say that...

President Donald Trump has a busy Saturday planned. He’ll be speaking later at the Values Voter Summit in Washington, DC, and is en route to his Sterling, Va golf course for a few rounds.

But before hitting the links, the Commander-in-Tweet had a few choice words for his friends and enemies. Particularly his enemies, which included usual suspect Rep. Adam Schiff, whom he termed “a lying mess” for his impeachment probing.

On the other hand, Rudy Giuliani, although “a little rough around the edges,” is also “a great guy and a wonderful lawyer.” There was also praise for the people of Louisiana, where Trump spoke last night, and for China, which has reached agreement on a new trade deal that appears to be a home run for farmers and Boeing.

We’ll update as more communications arrive. The tweetstorm so far:

The Endless Wars Must End!

— Donald J. Trump...

Reporters on Capitol Hill were staked out on Tuesday to capture a key witness arriving to provide behind-closed-doors testimony to Congress. Instead, about an hour before Gordon Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union, was to start, his lawyer announced that he would not show.

News networks quickly focused on the increasing possibility that this could trigger an additional article of impeachment against President Donald Trump, this time for obstruction.

Appearing at the Capitol before cameras on Tuesday morning, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-ca) didn’t go as far, but confirmed that it may only add to their case.

“The failure to produce this witness, the failure to produce these documents, we consider yet additional strong evidence of obstruction of the Constitutional functions of Congress,” he said. He revealed that also being withheld were some of Sondland’s text messages on one of his personal devices.

Sondland, a...

“This is a deep state operative, pure and simple,” White House senior policy adviser Stephen Miller told Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace in an attempt to characterize as partisan the whistleblower who came forward following President Donald Trump’s phone call with Ukraine’s president asking him to dig up dirt on his political rival.

“I think it’s unfortunate that the media continues to describe this individual as a whistleblower, an honorific that this individual most certainly does not deserve. A partisan hit job does not make you...

While discussing President Donald Trump’s most recent controversy, Ukraine, staunch ally of the president, Republican congressman Jim Jordan, was challenged by CNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday. Tapper used both facts and Jordan’s own issues while confronting him about “throwing out wild allegations against people,” which the congressman continues to do to deflect attention away from Trump’s troubles.

“I think that you came here and leveled a bunch of accusations and allegations about Hunter Biden,” Tapper said of the widely debunked story that supposedly connects the former...

Washington — Not so long ago, a powerful Republican congressman gave a revealing, behind-the-curtain glimpse at how the modern-day Republican Party had drifted away from reality. The Republican said the biggest change he’d witnessed in his time in Congress was the growth of pseudo-media outlets and hyper-partisan outside groups that polluted the political discourse with misleading, if not false, information. The effect of this, he said, was alarming:

“I used to spend ninety percent of my constituent response time on people who call, email, or send a letter, such as,...

Robert Mueller hadn’t testified before a Congressional committee in a while, and it showed. The last time was when he was FBI Director under President Obama, more than six years ago. I won’t ascribe his rustiness or halting speech to his 74 years, because I’m neither a doctor nor an asshole. I don’t know whether he was old, tired, a bit unprepared, is usually boring, or whether he might have simply tried to not to be used as a partisan tool by either the Democrats or Republicans in a made-for-television event.

On Wednesday night, ABC released a clip of President Trump telling George Stephanopolous that he doesn’t feel he needs to contact the FBI if a foreign government offered him dirt on his 2020 opponent, and that he would be willing to court to any such offers. “If somebody called from a country [and said] we have information on your opponent. Oh. I think I’d want to hear it,” the president said.

As Federal Election Commission Chair Ellen Weintraub pointed out on Twitter, this is illegal. It’s pretty simple. There is no gray area.

After a two-week hiatus, “SNL” is back. And it brought back Alec Baldwin as Donald Trump for the first time in a while, along with Robert De Niro as Robert Mueller.

The topic of the cold open sketch was the Mueller Report, which was released just over a week ago to new attorney general William Barr, who in turn dropped a four-page summation for Congress. The sketch consisted of De Niro’s Mueller explaining his findings, Barr (played by “SNL” cast member Aidy Bryant) interpreting the report in a way that is friendly to Trump, and Baldwin’s Trump tweeting nonsense about the whole thing after having not read any of it.

The sketch cut between the three of them in succession, like so.

Also Read: 'SNL': R Kelly Is Upset That Gayle King Asked Him Real Questions in Interview Parody (Video)

De Niro’s Mueller: “I am submitting these 380 pages.

Congressman Jim Jordan (R-oh) hit the morning news shows on Sunday to make it clear that President Donald Trump can do no wrong because some people like him. Every time Jordan was asked about the morality or just simply the right or wrong of anything Trump has been accused of doing or being involved in, like a programmed robot, Jordan spoke about the president’s popularity among his base or folks who have come out to his rallies.

Jordan visited CBS News’ Face the Nation and host Margaret Brennan tried...

At a rally in Ohio this week, President Donald Trump went after a familiar target: the late Senator John McCain. “I have to be honest, I never liked him much,” the president told his crowd at the General Dynamics plant in Lima. “Probably never will.” (Trump seemed particularly galled that he never got a “thank you” for giving McCain “the kind of funeral that he wanted.”)

Baffling as the attack might seem to someone who wasn’t conditioned to years of Trump’s rambling, extemporaneous grievance-airings, the attack barely registered in Washington.

This week’s “SNL” cold open skipped the political landscape, instead parodying R. Kelly’s wild interview with Gayle King in which Kelly tried to salvage his image and really, uh, did not. Kelly was played by “SNL” regular Kenan Thompson, and Leslie Jones played King.

“I guess my first question for you, Robert is, why exactly are you doing this interview?,” Jones’ King said to open the interview after refusing Kelly’s request to be called “victim.”

“Because people think I’m some kind of a monster. I’m here to remove all of that,” Kenan’s Kelly said before referencing his own own song lyrics. “My lawyer was telling me no. But my ego, my ego was telling me yes.”

Also Read: 'SNL': Ben Stiller's Michael Cohen Faces Off Against Bill Hader's Jim Jordan (Video)

Several times during the sketch he slipped into song, as he...

This wasn’t supposed to be hard.

On Thursday, the House of Representatives voted on a resolution denouncing hatred. The bill was introduced as Democrats grappled with how to respond to what pro-Israel lawmakers have considered anti-Semitic sentiments expressed by Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-mn), but its language encompassed pretty much every form of bigotry prevalent in the United States. All 234 House Democrats voted in favor of the resolution. The same can’t be said for their colleagues across the aisle, 23 of whom voted against the measure condemning white supremacy.

Here...