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The End Is Near For George Santos As He Steps Down From Committees

George Santos marks Holocaust Remembrance Day on the House floor.

Rep. George Santos (R-NY) stepping down from committees is a sign that his legal problems are growing, and his time in Congress could end soon.

The AP reported:

Republican Rep. George Santos of New York told GOP colleagues Tuesday he is temporarily stepping down from his two congressional committees, a move that comes amid a host of ethics issues and a day after he met with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. read more

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Rachel Maddow Cuts Trump To The Bone With Stormy Daniels Hush Money Analysis

Rachel Maddow on the Stormy Daniels investigation into Trump.

Rachel Maddow showed how Trump committed a crime then had everyone bend over backward to protect him from prosecution, and the damage he has done to the DOJ and the rule of law.

Video:

Maddow said:

So this is a crime that was committed in 2016. The last time it was in court was in 2018. The last time someone went to jail for this crime was in 2019. Federal prosecutors bobbled it and they simultaneously blocked state prosecutors from pursuing it themselves for a long time. There was also a weird interlude where one Manhattan D.A., one New York state prosecutor started an investigation into this matter, and then a new prosecutor came into office and stopped that investigation and then the new prosecutor restarted it a few months later after some of the lawyers who had been working on Trump-related investigations quit in protest and did so loudly. read more

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McCarthy Caves To Biden On Social Security And Medicare Cuts

President Biden speaks about Trump's return to DC from the White House

Speaker McCarthy said on Sunday that he wants to take Social Security and Medicare cuts off the table as an option for spending cuts.

Transcript via CBS News’s Face The Nation:

MARGARET BRENNAN: I want to dig into what you are willing to put on the table because Republicans campaigned on fiscal responsibility. You promised you won’t spend more next year than you did last year. Are you willing to consider any reductions to Social Security and Medicare? read more

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The Durham Investigation Tried To Use Russian Disinformation To Clear Trump

John Durham has one of his counts dismissed for failing to bring evidence

Special Counsel John Durham tried to use Russian intelligence memos that were suspected of containing disinformation in his investigation of Russiagate.

The New York Times reported:

In Mr. Durham’s case, the dubious sources were memos, whose credibility the intelligence community doubted, written by Russian intelligence analysts and discussing purported conversations involving American victims of Russian hacking, according to people familiar with the matter. read more

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Trump’s 2024 Campaign Is Bombing And Struggling To Raise Money

The money isn’t coming into Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign, as his decision to announce an early bid has bombed.

Gabriel Sherman at Vanity Fair reported:

There are several theories about why Trump’s campaign has been so underwhelming out of the gate. “Money is a real issue,” the former administration official said. Already, prominent GOP mega-donors, including billionaires Ken Griffin and Stephen Schwarzman, have said they aren’t supporting Trump’s 2024 run.

As a presidential candidate, Trump isn’t allowed to tap into the $100 million war chest his various super PACs have amassed since he left the White House, meaning he either has to raise the money himself or spend his own. “A rally is expensive. They cost a half million dollars easily,” a veteran of Trump’s 2016 campaign told me. Trump’s 2024 campaign has yet to file a fundraising report with the Federal Election Commission, but two sources close to Trump told me the money spigot isn’t flowing like it used to.

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The important point is that Trump can’t use his super PAC money for his presidential campaign. There has already been chatter in Republican circles about how Trump wore out his donor with constant fundraising appeals for his super PAC. Donor fatigue is a very thing, and Trump simply asked his followers for money too much and too often.

The reason why there have been no rallies since he announced is that Trump can’t use his super PAC money to pay for the events. Now that he is an official candidate, any event that Trump holds will be considered a campaign event.

Trump appears to have been so worried about being indicted that he cut off his own money supply. Donald Trump no longer gets the free media coverage that he once did and without the cash to hold rallies, the failed former president is left with nothing to do but putter around his private club, and air his grievances on his small social media platform.

Donald Trump thought that he was outsmarting the DOJ, but all he really did was sabotage himself.

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House Democrats Are Going To Cause Chaos By Trying To Get McCarthy Removed As Speaker

Kevin McCarthy meets with reporters before Speaker vote.

House Democrats and progressives are getting set to give Kevin McCarthy constant headaches by filing motions to remove him as speaker.

Politico reported:

“Why not? You know, that sounds like a good idea. I mean, you’re still going to need what, 218 for passage, right? But listen, man, he has a very slim majority,” mused Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.). “Whenever we want to cause complete chaos, we’ll do that.”

The gambit, known as the motion to vacate, would almost certainly fail this early in the new Congress, as Republicans can use a procedural move to toss the motion before it actually gets a vote and Democrats would need GOP support to reach the required majority. But progressives’ zeal confirms a fear from McCarthy’s allies — that a rule he greenlighted to assuage conservatives could easily cause frequent headaches.

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The motion would be a way to cause chaos and troll McCarthy with his own rules. Plus, if something totally bonkers happens, it just may work. Mostly though, this is just something that the House minority can do to give the Speaker of the House a headache when he has a really small majority and no room for error.

If the vote got to the House floor, it would be complete madness and a massive problem for Kevin McCarthy. A handful of Republicans who decide that they have had enough of McCarthy could end his speakership, and make last week’s drama look like a walk in the park.

Speaker McCarthy made the concession, and now he has to sleep with one eye open because his speakership could end at any time.