Recording Shows Trump Pressed Michigan Republicans To Not Certify Election Results: Report

Former President Donald Trump was recorded pressing two Wayne County, Michigan, election canvassers to not certify the results of the 2020 presidential election, the Detroit News reported Thursday.

According to four recordings listened to by the Detroit News, which were reportedly made by a person present during the conversation, the then-president and Ronna McDaniel, the Republican National Committee chair, spoke with Monica Palmer and William Hartmann — Republican members of the county’s Board of Canvassers — on Nov. 17, 2020. At the time, Trump was falsely claiming the election had been stolen from him, filing dozens of unsuccessful lawsuits based on unfounded claims of voter fraud.

Republicans Will Try For Third Time To Pin Ukraine Corruption On Joe Biden

WASHINGTON — The House will vote Wednesday on whether to formally authorize Republicans’ impeachment inquiry against President Joe Biden.

The vote is mostly symbolic, signaling impeachment will remain a top priority for House Republicans in the new year — but Biden’s alleged misdeeds are not new, nor are GOP efforts to litigate them.

Putin loyalist Valery Gergiev installed as director of Bolshoi theatre

Valery Gergiev, the star Russian conductor and prominent supporter of Vladimir Putin, has been installed as general director of Moscow’s Bolshoi theatre, in the latest appointment of a Kremlin loyalist to a leading cultural institution.

The appointment means that Gergiev, who also heads the rival Mariinsky theatre in St Petersburg, will have artistic control over the two crown jewels of the Russian ballet and opera.

Clarence Thomas May Have Had A Quarter-Million Dollar RV Loan Forgiven: Senate Inquiry

Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas never paid back the full amount of a quarter-million-plus loan that financed his high-end RV, according to an investigation by Senate Democrats.

A report that Democratic members of the Senate Finance Committee released on Wednesday found that the Supreme Court justice, who has been the subject of multiple ethics questions this year relating to gifts from wealthy friends and associates, “never repaid” a friend’s $267,230 loan in full after using the money to purchase a high-end Prevost Marathon Le Mirage XL RV in 1999. 

Clarence Thomas failed to fully repay $267,000 loan for luxury RV, inquiry finds

The US supreme court justice Clarence Thomas failed to repay much – or possibly all – of a “sweetheart deal” to borrow more than $267,000 to buy a luxury motor home, a Senate committee found.

The existence of the $267,230 loan, made by the businessman Anthony Welters in 1999 and forgiven in 2008, was first reported by the New York Times. On Wednesday, the Times quoted Michael Hamersley, a tax lawyer and congressional expert witness, as saying “‘this was, in short, a sweetheart deal’ that made no logical sense from a business perspective”.

Senate Democrats Want To Subpoena Harlan Crow Over Ties To Clarence Thomas

Republican Texas billionaire Harlan Crow could soon receive a subpoena to produce information about his relationship with conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas as the Judiciary Committee steps up its ethics probe into the high court.

Democratic Sens. Dick Durbin (Ill.), who chairs the panel, and Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.), who heads a subcommittee on federal courts, oversight, agency action, and federal rights, on Monday announced they would hold a vote to authorize subpoenas for Crow, conservative legal activist Leonard Leo and GOP donor Robin Arkley II.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders In Political Firestorm Over $19,000 Lectern

Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R) is facing new questions over a custom $19,000 lectern her office purchased earlier this year.

The lectern in question is a custom blue wood-paneled stand purchased with a government credit card in June. Matt Campbell, a lawyer and blogger, first posted the invoice for it on X, formerly known as Twitter, last month, prompting a political firestorm over its sky-high price. Similar lecterns sell for much less, but the governor’s office paid the invoice to an events company called Beckett Events LLC, whose founder was once a lobbyist in the Washington, D.C., area.

Canada: police open criminal inquiry into billion-dollar green belt scandal

Canada’s federal police have opened a criminal investigation into a controversial plan to allow construction on greenbelt lands in Ontario, escalating a political scandal that has gripped the province and already forced a number of high-profile government resignations.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police announced on Tuesday that its sensitive and international investigations unit would investigate the C$8.3bn ($6.10bn) deal.

It’s Not Personal: Why Clarence Thomas’ Trip to the Koch Summit Undermines His Ethics Defense

For months, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and his allies have defended Thomas’ practice of not disclosing free luxury travel by saying the trips fell under a carve-out to the federal disclosure law for government officials.

But by not publicly reporting his trips to the Bohemian Grove and to a 2018 Koch network event, Thomas appears to have violated the disclosure law, even by his own permissive interpretation of it, ethics law experts said. The details of the trips, which ProPublica first reported last month, could prove important evidence in any formal investigation of Thomas’ conduct.

Greenbelt 2.0? Why Doug Ford's boundary changes in Ottawa and Hamilton could make developers rich

On the same Friday afternoon last November that Premier Doug Ford's government announced its plan to take certain developers' land out of the Greenbelt, it also made moves that benefited developers who own rural land on the outskirts of Ottawa and Hamilton. 

It did so by expanding each city's boundaries, instantly turning certain parcels of agricultural land from rural to urban, opening them up to future housing development and sharply increasing their potential value. 

Sen. Josh Hawley Received Campaign Donations From General Motors and Ford

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., appeared at a General Motors plant in Wentzville, Missouri, earlier this week to join members of the United Auto Workers on the picket line against the Big Three automakers. There, he called himself “pro-worker,” challenged the companies to give workers a pay raise and more time off, and said he’s with the workers “100 percent.”

While he is rallying against the Big Three now, he has previously received campaign contributions from the automakers. During his first run for Senate in 2018 and through 2020, Hawley’s PAC received $8,500 from GM’s PAC, according to records filed with the Federal Election Commission. His Senate campaign received $3,500 from Ford’s PAC and another $1,000 from a GM executive during that same time period. His PAC and campaign received an additional $13,000 from PACs associated with Toyota, a Japanese company notorious for running non-union shops in the United States.

The Swift and Stunning Downfall of New Jersey Teflon Don

Micah Rasmussen knows what it’s like to be on the wrong side of Bob Menendez. Back in 2003 as press secretary for Democratic Gov. Jim McGreevey, he pushed back against Menendez’s favored candidate for the state Supreme Court, fellow Cuban Zulima Farber. Menendez, then a U.S. representative, deridingly called the governor’s office “amateur hour” in the press because McGreevey did not put her on the bench, and he wanted to know why. So Rasmussen explained: Farber had a poor driving record that included unpaid parking tickets.

Menendez Vows to Stay in Office as AOC, Fetterman Call for His Resignation

Sen. Bob Menendez is remaining defiant and has doubled down on his vow to remain in Congress as a growing number of fellow Democrats in Congress, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) of New York and other influential figures, are calling on him to resign.

The Democrat from New Jersey faces federal charges alleging that he and his wife, Nadine Arslanian Menendez, accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of bribes from the Egyption government in exchange for political favors. In his first press conference since federal prosecutors announced the charges with an indictment on Friday, Menendez said he believes he will be exonerated and reiterated his vow not to resign.

GOP Senator Mocked For Saying Bob Menendez Should NOT Resign

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) this week mounted an unexpected defense of Sen. Bob Menendez, the New Jersey Democrat recently indicted on extensive bribery charges.

Menendez faces allegations that he accepted various bribes, including $480,000 in cash and $100,000 in gold bars, in return for improperly using his influence to benefit and enrich several New Jersey businessmen.

Although many of Menendez’s Democratic colleagues have suggested he resign, no Republican senators have called on him to step down, according to Business Insider.

Sen. Cory Booker Calls On Sen. Robert Menendez To Resign

Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) said Tuesday that Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) should resign as he faces federal corruption charges.

“Stepping down is not an admission of guilt but an acknowledgment that holding public office often demands tremendous sacrifices at great personal cost,” Booker said in a statement. “Senator Menendez has made these sacrifices in the past to serve. And in this case he must do so again. I believe stepping down is best for those Senator Menendez has spent his life serving.”

Clarence Thomas Secretly Participated in Koch Network Donor Events

On Jan. 25, 2018, dozens of private jets descended on Palm Springs International Airport. Some of the richest people in the country were arriving for the annual winter donor summit of the Koch network, the political organization founded by libertarian billionaires Charles and David Koch. A long weekend of strategizing, relaxation in the California sun and high-dollar fundraising lay ahead.

Just after 6 p.m., a Gulfstream G200 jet touched down on the tarmac. One of the Koch network’s most powerful allies was on board: Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

Revelations of Clarence Thomas’s Koch links stoke supreme court reform calls

A report detailing how Clarence Thomas secretly participated in donor events staged by the hard-right Koch network drew more fierce protests and outrage over the conservative supreme court justice’s proliferating ethics scandals.

Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat on the Senate judiciary committee who has advanced ethics reform amid reports about Thomas and other justices, said: “Oh, my.

Trump Wants Republicans to Shut Down the Government to Block DOJ Charge

In a Truth Social post on Wednesday night, former President Donald Trump demanded that Republican lawmakers in Congress shut down the federal government in order to aid him in thwarting the charges against him in the federal grand jury investigations into his actions.

With a funding crisis looming, and no indications that a deal between Democrats and Republicans (much less between Republicans and Republicans) is in motion, the federal government is set to run out of funding by the end of September.

Trump Demands House GOP 'Defund' Criminal Cases Against Him Amid Shutdown Threat

WASHINGTON ― Coup-attempting former President Donald Trump demanded that House Republicans use the looming threat of a government shutdown to “defund” the federal criminal prosecutions against him.

“Republicans in Congress can and must defund all aspects of Crooked Joe Biden’s weaponized Government that refuses to close the Border, and treats half the Country as Enemies of the State,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social media platform late Wednesday. “This is also the last chance to defund these political prosecutions against me and other Patriots.”

Jamie Raskin Says Republicans Have 'Conclusively Disproven' Their Own Biden Corruption Allegations

In his quest to uncover evidence of corruption by President Joe Biden, House Oversight Committee chair James Comer (R-Ky.) has only managed to undermine his key allegations against the president, according to the committee’s top Democrat.

“Chairman Comer’s investigation has conclusively disproven the Republican allegations against President Biden,” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) said Monday in a statement accompanying a report summarizing the committee’s work so far this year.