A Georgia judge on Monday denied Gov. Brian Kemp’s bid to avoid testifying before the grand jury hearing evidence in an investigation of possible 2020 election interference by then-President Donald Trump and others but said he doesn’t have to testify until after the November election.

“The governor is in the midst of a re-election campaign and this criminal grand jury investigation should not be used by the District Attorney, the Governor’s opponent, or the Governor himself to influence the outcome of that election,” Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney wrote in his six-page ruling. “Once the election is over, the Court expects the Governor’s legal team promptly to make arrangements for his appearance.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

President Joe Biden will deliver a prime-time address “on the continued battle for the soul of the nation” Thursday outside Independence Hall in Philadelphia, the White House announced Monday.

Billed as a major address just over two months before the midterm elections, Biden, the White House said, will discuss how the nation’s standing in the world and its democracy are at stake.

“He will talk about the progress we have made as a nation to protect our democracy, but how our rights and freedoms are still under attack,” the White House said. “And he will make clear who is fighting for those rights, fighting for those freedoms, and fighting for our democracy.”

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

Last fall, Republicans held high hopes of a “red wave” in the 2022 elections after they stormed to power in blue-leaning Virginia and nearly won the governor’s race in New Jersey. While Democrats were demotivated, the GOP base was on fire.

But in recent weeks, numerous data points have indicated Republican prospects of a smashing victory are dimming. While the president’s party tends to perform poorly in midterm elections, there are signs it is shaping up to be an unusual year, potentially enabling Democrats to hold one or both chambers of Congress.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Any public bluster from former President Donald Trump and his team in the wake of the FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago is just posturing, says one top correspondent.

Appearing on ABC’s This Week Sunday, Jonathan Karl reported that Trump’s inner circle is freaking out over the former president’s inability to retain adequate legal counsel.

“Publicly, what they’re saying is this is rallying Republicans to Trump’s defense,” Karl said. “This makes it more likely that he will run for president, more likely that he will win the Republican nomination. Campaigning against this political action by the FBI and the DOJ.

Read the rest of the story at Mediaite

Intelligence officials are assessing the potential risk to national security after classified documents were found at former President Donald Trump’s Florida residence.

Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines sent a letter Friday to top lawmakers in Congress confirming the assessment is underway, a spokesperson for the agency told ABC News.

The letter, addressed to the House Oversight Committee Chair Carolyn Maloney and House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff, was first reported by Politico.

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

President Joe Biden hit the campaign trail on Thursday to highlight a series of policy wins as Democrats look to keep their narrow majorities in Congress during this fall’s elections.

“I just want to be crystal clear on what’s on the ballot this year,” he said at a Democratic National Committee rally in front of a friendly Rockville, Maryland, crowd as he underscored what he felt should be on voters’ minds in November: abortion rights, Social Security, climate change and more.

“Your right to choose is on the ballot this year. The Social Security you paid for from the time you had a job is on the ballot,” he said. “The safety of your kids from gun violence is on the ballot. And it’s not hyperbole — the very survival of our planet is on the ballot. Your right to vote is on the ballot.”

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

The White House hit back at Republicans in an uncharacteristic manner Thursday by using its Twitter account to go after GOP lawmakers who are bashing President Joe Biden’s move to cancel some student debt after they personally benefited from having Paycheck Protection Program loans forgiven during the Covid pandemic.

In a series of tweets, the White House highlighted several congressional Republicans — Reps. Vern Buchanan of Florida, Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania, and Markwayne Mullin and Kevin Hern of Oklahoma — who it said had tens of thousands of dollars in PPP loans forgiven as part of a federal program intended to help those harmed by the coronavirus.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The Justice Department on Wednesday released the unredacted version of a 2019 memo that made the case to then-Attorney General William Barr that President Donald Trump should not be charged with obstruction of justice in the Russia investigation.

The nine-page memo, from March 24, 2019, was written by Steven Engel, then the assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel, and Ed O’Callaghan, who was the Justice Department’s principal associate deputy attorney general. Barr, a critic of then-special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe, announced that the Justice Department would not prosecute the case the same day the memo was sent to him.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Uvalde schools police chief Pete Arredondo was fired Wednesday by the Texas city’s school board.

The board voted unanimously to oust the embattled chief after a recommendation from the school district superintendent.

Arredondo’s removal caps three months of outrage over the botched law enforcement response to the shooting at Robb Elementary School, which killed 19 children and two teachers.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The Pennsylvania Senate race took a heated — and personal — turn on Tuesday as an aide to Dr. Mehmet Oz, the Republican nominee and former cardiothoracic surgeon who for years offered medical advice as a popular TV host, was quoted derisively blaming Democratic opponent John Fetterman for his own stroke.

“If John Fetterman had ever eaten a vegetable in his life, then maybe he wouldn’t have had a major stroke and wouldn’t be in the position of having to lie about it constantly,” Oz communications adviser Rachel Tripp said in a statement, first reported by Insider, responding to Fetterman’s attacks on Oz as elitist and out of touch.

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson said Monday that the U.S. attorney general’s office and the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division will investigate a viral video that shows law enforcement officers holding down and beating a man Sunday morning outside a convenience store in Mulberry, Arkansas.

The three officers were suspended Sunday following widespread outrage over the video, in which one of the officers repeatedly punches a shoeless man’s head and smashes it into the pavement, while another knees him and a third holds him down.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Former President Donald Trump asked a judge Monday to order the appointment of a special master to oversee the handling of the documents seized in the search of his Mar-a-Lago estate two weeks ago.

The court filing also asks the judge to require the Justice Department to return materials not covered by the scope of the search warrant, which Trump’s team refers to as “overbroad.” The filing also calls the Justice Department’s decision to search the estate in Palm Beach, Florida, on Aug. 8 a “shockingly aggressive move.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

A clear majority of American voters believe that the various investigations into alleged wrongdoing by former President Donald Trump should continue, according to a national NBC News poll conducted after the FBI searched Trump’s Florida home and recovered  documents marked as “top secret” earlier this month. 

The poll also shows a dissatisfied public, with three-quarters of voters saying the county is headed in the wrong direction, a record 58% who say that America’s best years are behind it and 61% who say they’re willing to carry a protest sign for a day because they’re so upset.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The committee tasked with electing more Democrats to the Senate is reporting a $10 million haul in July, outpacing its Republican counterpart for the fourth month in a row, according to numbers first released to NBC News. 

With less than three months until the November elections, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee appears to be in a more formidable financial position, with $54.1 million cash on hand, well more than double the $23 million left in the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s account. 

The NRSC reported about $8 million in fundraising in July. 

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Thursday downplayed expectations of Republicans capturing control of the Senate in the fall elections, describing “candidate quality” as an important factor.

“I think there’s probably a greater likelihood the House flips than the Senate. Senate races are just different — they’re statewide, candidate quality has a lot to do with the outcome,” he said in Florence, Kentucky, at a Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce luncheon when asked about his projection for the 2022 election.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Former Vice President Mike Pence said Wednesday that he would consider testifying before the House Jan. 6 committee if invited to appear, but he suggested he would need to sort out thorny constitutional questions before committing.

“If ever any formal invitation were rendered to us, we’d give it due consideration,” he said, in reply to a question posed to him at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics’ “Politics & Eggs” series.

Afterward, a spokeswoman for the House committee declined to comment on whether it plans to ask Pence to appear. In a recent interview with NBC News, the committee’s chairman, Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., said both Pence and former President Donald Trump “are on our agenda to be talked about as we meet.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The head of the nation’s top public health agency on Wednesday announced a shake-up of the organization, saying it fell short responding to COVID-19 and needs to become more nimble.

The planned changes at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — CDC leaders call it a “reset”— come amid criticism of the agency’s response to COVID-19, monkeypox and other public health threats. The changes include internal staffing moves and steps to speed up data releases.

The CDC’s director, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, told the agency’s staff about the changes on Wednesday. It’s a CDC initiative, and was not directed by the White House or other administration officials, she said.

Read the rest of the story at CBS News

Former Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg is expected to plead guilty Thursday to 15 counts of fraud and tax evasion, acknowledging that he was part of a scheme to receive more than $1.7 million in off-the-books perks and compensation.

Weisselberg was charged alongside two Trump Organization companies that prosecutors claim took part in the scheme, which allegedly benefited other company executives. The company has entered a not guilty plea and jury selection for its trial is scheduled for Oct. 24.

Prosecutors will ask a New York judge Friday to impose a sentence of five months incarceration for Weisselberg, according to sources familiar with the negotiations. 

Read the rest of the story at CBS News

Newly updated COVID-19 boosters tailored to target a dominant strain of the virus will be available in the next three weeks or so, assuming the Food and Drug Administration and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention work through their processes for authorization as expected.

That was White House COVID coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha’s prediction Tuesday at an event hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation.

In late June, the FDA directed Moderna and Pfizer to make vaccines for the upcoming winter that targeted the more contagious BA.5 omicron subvariant, along with the original COVID strain. That work has been underway and the next step is for the FDA and CDC to review data from the companies, once they’ve received it.

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has clinched one of four spots in November’s ranked-choice general election for the state’s at-large congressional seat, NBC News projects, keeping alive her hopes for a political comeback. 

She will be joined on the fall ballot by Republican Nick Begich, the namesake grandson of a former Democratic representative who held the seat, and Democrat Mary Sattler Peltola, a former state lawmaker. It was too early after polls closed to call the fourth and final contender.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

President Joe Biden signed into law Tuesday a major Democratic spending bill that seeks to fight climate change, raise taxes on corporations and expand health care coverage.

The bill, dubbed the Inflation Reduction Act, is a major legislative achievement for Democrats ahead of the midterm elections. It passed the House and the Senate last week with the support of every Democrat and no Republicans.

“With this law, the American people won, and the special interests lost,” Biden said in remarks from the White House. “We didn’t tear down; we built up. We didn’t look back; we looked forward. And today offers further proof that the soul of America is vibrant.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

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Rudy Giuliani is a “target” of the criminal investigation into possible 2020 election interference in Georgia by former President Donald Trump and others, his attorney told NBC News.

The lawyer, Robert Costello, said that as part of their efforts to compel Giuliani’s testimony, Georgia prosecutors initially told New York courts that Giuliani was a material witness. Then, Costello said, Giuliani’s lawyers were informed Monday that he is a “target” of the probe.

Giuliani, Trump’s former personal attorney and the former mayor of New York City, was ordered last week to testify in person Wednesday before a grand jury handling the case.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Former Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg is expected to plead guilty to criminal charges tied to his indictment by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office in an investigation of former President Donald Trump’s businesses, according to two people familiar with the matter and a public court filing.

Weisselberg’s plea could come as soon as 9 a.m. Thursday. Terms of the expected deal were not immediately disclosed.

Weisselberg and the Trump Organization were charged as part of what prosecutors described as an “off the books” scheme over 15 years to help top officials in the Trump Organization avoid paying taxes. Weisselberg, 74, was accused of avoiding paying taxes on $1.7 million of his income.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Six days after the raid at Mar-a-Lago, former President Donald Trump is continuing to rage on his platform Truth Social, adding to the increasing criticism of the FBI and Justice Department since Monday.

The search warrant and inventory list from the former president’s estate were revealed to the public on Friday, showing that Trump could find himself in serious trouble, being investigated for multiple federal charges, including the Espionage Act. On Saturday, it was unearthed that a Trump lawyer signed a statement for the DOJ assuring that all classified material had been returned, two months before those documents were seized from Mar-a-Lago.

Read the rest of the story at Mediaite

A man identified by two law enforcement sources as Ricky Shiffer, who died in a confrontation with police after he fired a nail gun at a Cincinnati FBI building, appeared to post online in recent days about his desire to kill FBI agents shortly after former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence was searched.

Two law enforcement officials confirmed Shiffer’s name. Shiffer was at the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021, according to three people aiding law enforcement who saw him in photos taken from the day of the attack; however, it’s unclear whether he went inside the building. Shiffer frequently posted about his attendance at the Capitol on social media.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The House is expected to pass a sweeping Democratic bill to combat climate change and extend health care coverage Friday, sending it to President Joe Biden for his signature.

Passing the Inflation Reduction Act would deliver a major victory for the Democratic Party less than three months before the November midterm elections and cap nearly a year of on-again, off-again internal negotiations, defying numerous near-death experiences for the bill.

“This life-changing legislation increases the leverage of the people’s interest over the special interest,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., told Democratic colleagues in a letter. “This bill makes a tremendous difference at the kitchen table of America’s families.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Actor Anne Heche suffered an “anoxic” brain injury and is not expected to survive, her spokesperson said Thursday, nearly a week after she crashed her car into a home in Los Angeles.

“It has long been her choice to donate her organs and she is being kept on life support to determine if any are viable,” the spokesperson said in a statement on behalf of her friends and family.

On Monday, Heche, 53, was in a coma and in “extreme” condition, her representative said. The spokesperson said Heche was “unconscious, slipping into a coma” following the crash.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

President Joe Biden signed legislation on Wednesday expanding health care benefits for veterans exposed to toxic burn pits.

The bipartisan bill, known as the PACT Act, is the most significant expansion of veterans’ health care and benefits in more than 30 years, a White House official said.

Speaking at a White House ceremony, Biden said that “veterans of the wars of Iraq and Afghanistan not only faced dangers in battle — they were breathing toxic smoke from burn pits.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Four states went the polls Tuesday night in matchups that included a race to take on a swing-state governor, a member of the progressive “Squad” with several primary challengers and an opportunity to elect a woman for the first time in Vermont’s at-large congressional district.

Tuesday’s primaries take place a day after the FBI searched former President Donald Trump’s primary residence in Florida, at Mar-a-Lago, as part of a probe into documents that may not have been preserved as required by the Presidential Records Act. 

Since the search, Trump has launched fundraising efforts off “Biden’s FBI RAIDS.” Republicans blasted the search, and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy vowed to retaliate if the GOP takes back the House in November. 

Read the rest of the story at CBS News

Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., said Tuesday night that the FBI seized his cellphone earlier in the day, less than 24 hours after federal agents searched former President Donald Trump‘s home in Florida.

“This morning, while traveling with my family, 3 FBI agents visited me and seized my cell phone,” Perry said in a statement.

Perry, a top Trump ally, said the FBI “made no attempt to contact my lawyer, who would have made arrangements for them to have my phone if that was their wish. I’m outraged — though not surprised — that the FBI under the direction of Merrick Garland’s DOJ, would seize the phone of a sitting Member of Congress.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

A federal appeals panel unanimously ruled Tuesday that a House committee can access former President Donald Trump’s tax records after a yearslong legal battle.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for Washington, D.C., agreed that the House Ways and Means Committee has the authority to obtain Trump’s tax records from the Treasury Department, upholding a district court ruling from late last year.

Trump’s lawyers are all but certain to appeal the ruling.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Top Republicans and prominent conservatives reacted with outrage on Monday night to the news that the F.B.I. had searched the private residence of former President Donald J. Trump, with some suggesting that federal agents should be arrested and others hinting that the court-approved law-enforcement action against Mr. Trump was pushing the country toward political chaos.

“I’ve seen enough,” Representative Kevin McCarthy, the House minority leader, wrote in a statement that he posted online. “The Department of Justice has reached an intolerable state of weaponized politicization.”

Read the rest of the story at The New York Times

In the wake of the F.B.I. search of former President Donald J. Trump’s property in Florida, the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol is gearing up to meet with two potentially key witnesses in its separate inquiry on Tuesday.

The committee is expected to meet with Mike Pompeo, the former secretary of state under Mr. Trump, and Douglas V. Mastriano, the Republican nominee for governor of Pennsylvania who served as a point person in the state for a plan to keep Mr. Trump in power by using slates of “alternative” or “fake” electors.

Read the rest of the story at The New York Times

Olivia Newton-John, a British Australian pop star who dominated the pop culture of an era, has died after repeated treatments for cancer, her family announced Monday. She was 73.

“Dame Olivia Newton-John … passed away peacefully at her Ranch in Southern California this morning, surrounded by family and friends,” John Easterling, her husband, said in a statement on her official Facebook page. “We ask that everyone please respect the family’s privacy during this very difficult time.”

“Olivia has been a symbol of triumphs and hope for over 30 years sharing her journey with breast cancer. Her healing inspiration and pioneering experience with plant medicine continues with the Olivia Newton-John Foundation Fund, dedicated to researching plant medicine and cancer.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Rep. Liz Cheney’s (R-WY) criticisms of former President Donald Trump are no secret, with her impeachment vote and involvement in the House Select Committeeinvestigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, and she holds similar concerns about Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), telling The New York Times she “would find it very difficult” to support the Florida governor for president because of how he had “lined himself up almost entirely” with Trump.

Cheney, currently the underdog in the primary battle to retain her own congressional seat against Trump-endorsed challenger Harriet Hageman, is described by Times reporter Jonathan Martin as believing that “ridding American politics of former President Donald J. Trump and his influence” is “more important than her House seat,” skipping time on the campaign trail to work with committee members and staff on their ongoing investigations and series of hearings.

Read the rest of the story at Mediaite

President Joe Biden traveled to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, on Sunday after he ended isolation in the White House following two negative tests for Covid.

“This morning, the president’s SARS-CoV-2 antigen testing was negative for a second consecutive day,” Dr. Kevin O’Connor, the White House physician, wrote in a letter Sunday. “He will safely return to public engagement and presidential travel.”

Biden told reporters he was feeling great as he walked out of the White House to board Marine One on his way to his home state, where first lady Jill Biden has been staying during his Covid infection.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Sen. Kyrsten Sinema signed off on sweeping Democratic legislationThursday that would provide new spending to mitigate climate change and extend health care access while taxing corporations.

The Arizona Democrat’s announcement likely unlocks the votes needed to pass the bill in the Senate.

Sinema said her support came after Democratic leaders agreed to remove a provision on closing the so-called carried interest tax loophole that enables wealthy hedge fund and investment managers to pay lower taxes.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The Biden administration declared monkeypox a public health emergency on Thursday as cases topped 6,600 nationwide.

The declaration could facilitate access to emergency funds, allow health agencies to collect more data about cases and vaccinations, accelerate vaccine distribution and make it easier for doctors to prescribe treatment.

“We’re prepared to take our response to the next level in addressing this virus and we urge every American to take monkeypox seriously and to take responsibility to help us tackle this virus,” Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said in a Thursday briefing about the emergency declaration.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The Justice Department filed suit Wednesday against Peter Navarro, claiming the former adviser to Donald Trump used an unofficial email account while working in the White House and wrongfully retained presidential records.

The lawsuit in federal court in Washington claims Navarro used at least one “non-official” email account — a ProtonMail account — to send and receive emails. The legal action comes just weeks after Navarro was indicted on criminal charges after refusing to cooperate with a congressional investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

Rep. Jackie Walorski, R-Ind., and two of her staffers were killed in a car crash on Wednesday, authorities said. Walorski was 58.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy first confirmed Walorski’s death in a tweet earlier Wednesday.

McCarthy said he spoke to Walorski’s husband, Dean Swihart, who was informed of her death by the Elkhart County Sheriff’s office on Wednesday afternoon.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Kansas voters handed abortion-rights advocates a massive victory Tuesday, surging to the polls to defeat a measure that would have allowed the GOP-led legislature to impose new restrictions.

The vote in Kansas was one of the first tests of the potency of abortion rights at the ballot box since the Supreme Court’s decision to reverse Roe v. Wade and end the federal protection of abortion access.

Meanwhile, in Arizona, local elections officials were still counting votes to determine whether a slate of statewide candidates who were endorsed by former President Donald Trump and promoted his lies about election fraud won their Republican primaries.

Read the rest of the story at CNN

The Senate on Tuesday passed legislation expanding lifesaving health care benefits for Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans exposed to toxic burn pits.

The 86-11 vote came after Republicans agreed to lift their blockade of the popular bill, caving to pressure from more than 60 veterans groups — and comedian Jon Stewart — who had railed against Republicans for days outside the Capitol.

Many of the veterans who had camped on the Senate steps, braving heat, humidity and thunderstorms, watched the vote from the gallery in the Senate chamber. The bill has already cleared the House and now heads to President Joe Biden’s desk for his signature.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Amid an ongoing legal battle over the 2020 election probe in Georgia, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) has added former President Donald Trump’s first White House counsel, Donald McGahn, to his legal team.

Graham continues to fight a subpoena ordering him to appear before a grand jury in Fulton County’s criminal investigation into efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election in the state.

McGhan’s name appeared on a recent legal filing alerting the Fulton County Superior Court that Graham would be moving his challenge to the Northern District of Georgia, as he continues his fight against the subpoena, which he first began last month.

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

Jen Burch, 35, a retired staff sergeant in the Air Force, looks strong and healthy from the outside. She says that inside, however, she’s suffering from ailments that she believes are related to her service during the Afghanistan war more than a decade ago.

While they were in Kandahar, Burch and her fellow service members were exposed to “burn pits, incinerators and poo ponds,” she said. When she left, she battled pneumonia and bronchitis. And in the years since then, she has been “in and out of ERs” and has struggled with intense migraine headaches and shortness of breath whenever she climbs a flight of stairs.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The Department of Homeland Security’s watchdog agency, which in February 2021 requested all Secret Service text messages sent around Jan. 6, 2021, the day of the Capitol riot, withdrew the request five months later, according to an email obtained by the top Democrats on two House committees. 

On July 27, 2021, DHS Deputy Inspector General Thomas Kait sent an email telling Jim Crumpacker, a senior official at DHS, “Jim, please use this email as a reference to our conversation where I said we no longer request phone records and text messages from the USSS relating to the events of January 6th,” referring to the U.S. Secret Service.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The House of Representatives on Friday passed a bill to ban assault-style weapons.

The last-minute vote was announced by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., on Friday morning just hours before the chamber was set to break for a month-long recess.

The legislation passed 217 to 213. Two Republican lawmakers — Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania and Chris Jacobs of New York — voted in support of the bill.

Pelosi said the ban is “a crucial step in our ongoing fight against the deadly epidemic of gun violence.”

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

President Joe Biden has tested positive again for COVID-19, according to a letter from White House physician Dr. Kevin O’Connor, who said on Sunday that Biden “continues to feel well” and that “unsurprisingly” his test results are still positive.

O’Connor wrote in a memo released by the White House that Biden’s antigen test came back positive late Saturday morning after he tested negative Tuesday evening, Wednesday morning, Thursday morning and Friday morning.

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

A key measure of economic output fell for the second straight quarter, raising fears that the United States could be entering a recession — or perhaps that one had already begun.

Gross domestic product, adjusted for inflation, fell 0.2 percent in the second quarter, the Commerce Department said Thursday. That drop followed a decline of 0.4 percent in the first quarter. The estimates for both periods will be revised in coming months as government statisticians get more complete data.

News of the back-to-back contractions heightened a debate in Washington over whether a recession had begun and, if so, whether President Biden was to blame. Economists largely say that conditions do not meet the formal definition of a recession but that the risks of one are rising.

Read the rest of the story at The New York Times

Blindsided veterans erupted in anger and indignation Thursday after Senate Republicans suddenly tanked a widely supported bipartisan measure that would have expanded medical coverage for millions of combatants exposed to toxic burn pits during their service. 

Supporters of the Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson Honoring Our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act — or PACT Act — overwhelmingly expected the House-passed bill to sail through to the president’s desk for signature.

But in a move that shocked and confused veteran groups Wednesday night, 41 Senate Republicans blocked the bill’s passage, including 25 who had supported it a month ago.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Federal prosecutors have been interviewing witnesses pertaining to former President Donald Trump’s actions on Jan. 6, 2021 as part of a larger investigation into efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, a person familiar with the matter said.

Prosecutors will also review attempts by Trump and his team to alter the election outcome by substituting fake electors in key states Trump lost and by pressuring former Vice President Mike Pence to block certification of the results.

Read the rest of the story at USA TODAY

The U.S. government has proposed to Russia that it release detained Americans Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan in exchange for imprisoned Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, two sources familiar with the matter confirmed to NBC News.

Griner, a WNBA star and Olympic gold medalist, has been held in Russia since February, and Whelan, a corporate executive, has been detained in the country since 2018.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that the Biden administration had made a “substantial” offer to Russia to facilitate the release of Griner and Whelan, but he did not disclose further details about the proposal.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

In an unexpected breakthrough, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., reversed his opposition to quickly moving a broad filibuster-proof bill Wednesday and announced he will support a package that includes major investments in drug pricing, as well as provisions to address climate change and taxes on the wealthy.

Manchin announced the agreement in a joint statement with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., after months of negotiations between the two appeared to break down recently. The deal represents a major breakthrough for elements of President Joe Biden’s agenda that appeared to be all but dead.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

America first, irony last. Donald Trump, the former US president accused of a coup attempt in which police were speared and sprayed, returned to Washington on Tuesday with a plea for law and order to give police “the respect that they deserve”.

Trump spoke at a luxury hotel less than two miles from the US Capitol where, 18 months ago, his supporters furiously attacked law enforcement in a bid to overturn the 2020 presidential election result. It was his first visit to the nation’s capital since he snubbed Joe Biden’s inauguration and took flight to Florida.

There were chants of “four more years!” as Trump gave a 90-minute address to a summit hosted by the America First Policy Institute (AFPI), a rightwing thinktank conceived by alumni of his White House. Less than a week after the congressional January 6 committee detailed 187 minutes in which he chose not to stop the deadly insurrection, Trump sought to blame Democrats for what he described as rampant crime.

Read the rest of the story at The Guardian

The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol shot down a right-wing talking point on Tuesday by releasing a video deposition of former acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller saying there was no order to have military personal ready ahead of Jan. 6.

“I was never given any direction or order or knew of any plans of that nature,” Miller said in the clip shared by the committee on Twitter.

“To remove any doubt: Not only did Donald Trump fail to contact his Secretary of Defense on January 6th (as shown in our hearing), Trump also failed to give any order prior to January 6 to deploy the military to protect the Capitol,” the committee wrote, adding, “Here is Secretary Miller’s testimony.”

Read the rest of the story at Mediaite

A Republican lawmaker attended his gay son’s wedding just three days after joining the majority of his GOP colleagues in voting against a House bill that would codify federal protections for same-sex marriage.

The gay son of Rep. Glenn Thompson, R-Pa., confirmed to NBC News on Monday that he “married the love of [his] life” on Friday and that his “father was there.” NBC News is not publishing the names of the grooms, neither of whom is a public figure. 

Thompson’s press secretary, Maddison Stone, also confirmed the congressman was in attendance. 

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Two top aides to former Vice President Mike Pence testified last week to a federal grand jury in Washington investigating the events surrounding the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, the highest-ranking officials of the Trump administration so far known to have cooperated with the Justice Department’s widening inquiry into the events leading up to the assault.

The appearances before the grand jury of the men — Marc Short, who was Mr. Pence’s chief of staff, and Greg Jacob, who was his counsel — were the latest indication that the Justice Department’s criminal investigation into the events surrounding and preceding the riot is intensifying after weeks of growing questions about the urgency the department has put on examining former President Donald J. Trump’s potential criminal liability.

Read the rest of the story at The New York Times

President Joe Biden slammed former President Donald Trump on Monday for lacking “the courage to act” as police defending the U.S. Capitol suffered through “medieval hell” on Jan. 6, 2021 — a rare and direct attack pre-empting Trump’s plan to deliver a law-and-order-themed speech Tuesday in the nation’s capital.

The two men may be on a collision course for a rematch of their hard-fought 2020 election.

Biden has said he will seek re-election, and Trump advisers say it is likely he will announce his own bid before November’s midterm elections.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

President Joe Biden’s Covid symptoms “continue to improve significantly,” his doctor said in a letter Sunday.

Dr. Kevin O’Connor, the White House physician, said that the president completed his third full day of treatment with the antiviral drug Paxlovid on Saturday and that his “predominant symptom” is only a sore throat. Biden, who tested positive for Covid on Thursday, had been fully vaccinated and twice boosted, the White House said.

“This is most likely a result of lymphoid activation as his body clears the virus, and is thus encouraging,” O’Connor said of Biden’s sore throat. “His rhinorrhea, cough and body aches have diminished considerably. His voice remains a bit deep. His pulse, blood pressure, respiratory rate and temperature all remain normal. His oxygen saturation continues to be excellent on room air. His lungs remain clear.” (Rhinorrhea is a runny nose.)

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

A jury on Friday found former Donald Trumpadviser Steve Bannon guilty on two counts of contempt of Congress for blowing off the House Jan. 6 committee.

The jury returned the verdict after deliberating for less than three hours in what prosecutors presented as a straightforward case.

“This case is not complicated, but it is important,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Molly Gaston told jurors during closing arguments on Friday. She argued that Bannon “did not want to recognize Congress’ authority” or play by the government’s rules.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Federal prosecutors on Wednesday rested what they argue is a pretty straightforward contempt of Congress case against former Trump adviser Steve Bannon after calling just two witnesses.

Justice Department prosecutors told jurors in their opening statement Tuesday that Bannon thought he was “above the law.” Wednesday’s testimony from a senior staffer on the House Jan. 6 committee and an FBI special agent, who testified — among other things — about Bannon’s posts on the right-leaning social media website GETTR.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

A New York judge has ordered Rudy Giuliani to testify before the Georgia special grand jury hearing evidence in an investigation into possible 2020 election interference by former President Donald Trump and others, court filings show.

The order came after Giuliani, who was Trump’s personal attorney, failed to appear at a July 13 hearing before the judge to challenge a subpoena for his testimony in the investigation.

Giuliani was subpoenaed earlier this month as a “material witness” by the grand jury called by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis to investigate any “coordinated attempts to unlawfully alter the outcome of the 2020 elections.” The subpoena said Giuliani made statements at legislative hearings in Georgia falsely claiming that there had been “widespread voter fraud” in the state.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

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The Secret Service said it may not be able to recover a batch of erased text messages from phones used by its agents around the time of the attack on the Capitol last year, a development that comes amid intensified scrutiny over lapses in the agency’s accounting of its actions during the riots.

The Secret Service informed the House Jan. 6 committee that it was still attempting a forensic search for the phone records on Tuesday morning, when it delivered not the missing text messages the panel was seeking but “thousands of pages of documents” and other records related to decisions made on Jan. 6, according to the agency’s spokesman, Anthony Guglielmi. Later, in an interview, Mr. Guglielmi said the phone records were probably not recoverable.

Read the rest of the story at The New York Times

Former Donald Trump chief strategist Steve Bannon “decided he was above the law” when he blew off the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack, a federal prosecutor told jurors Tuesday in opening statements of Bannon’s contempt of Congress trial.

Bannon “chose to show his contempt for Congress’ authority and its processes” by refusing to comply with a subpoena, Assistant U.S. Attorney Amanda Rose Vaughn told jurors.

“It wasn’t optional, it wasn’t a request and it wasn’t an invitation. It was mandatory,” Vaughn said.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The House passed the Respect For Marriage Act Tuesday to codify legal same-sex marriage nationwide, fearing that the conservative majority on the Supreme Court will rescind the right after it overturned Roe v. Wade last month.

The vote was 267-157, with 47 Republicans joining a unanimous Democratic caucus in supporting the legislation.

Among the GOP lawmakers who voted for the measure were Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, the No. 3 Republican in the House, and Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming. House Freedom Caucus Chair Scott Perry of Pennsylvania and Rep. Tom Emmer of Minnesota, head of the House Republicans’ campaign arm, also backed the bill.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

One by one, dozens of angry parents and residents lambasted the Uvalde school board, repeatedly calling for the superintendent to be fired and trustees to step down after more law enforcement failures were revealed in the response to the shooting that killed 19 childrenand two teachers at Robb Elementary School.

“Shame on you!” a chorus erupted as the meeting got underway Monday evening.

Hundreds of community members crammed into an auditorium at Uvalde High School, questioning school officials’ handling of safety and demanding accountability from the people paid to protect children and school staff.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Jury selection is set to begin Monday in the trial of former President Donald Trump’s ally Steve Bannon over his defiance of a subpoena from the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Bannon, who previously served as Trump’s White House chief strategist but departed in August of 2017, was first subpoenaed by the Jan. 6 committee for records and testimony in September of last year. The committee told Bannon at the time it had “reason to believe that you have information relevant to understanding activities that led to and informed the events at the Capitol on January 6, 2021.”

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

The House select committee investigating the Capitol riot expects to receive erased Secret Service text messages from Jan. 5 and Jan. 6, 2021, by Tuesday, and will present testimony from new witnesses during Thursday’s public hearing, its members said Sunday.

Fanning out on Sunday programs, multiple members of the committee discussed the latest developments in their investigation and plans surrounding the prime-time hearing this week, which will focus on what the panel has called the crucial “187 minutes” — the length of time it took for former President Donald Trump to urge his supporters to leave the Capitol after the attack began.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Four people were dead, including the suspected shooter, after a man with a long gun entered a mall south of Indianapolis and opened fire, police said.

Two others were injured in the early evening attack at Greenwood Park Mall, Jim Ison, the police chief of Greenwood, Indiana, said at a Sunday night news conference. One remained hospitalized, he said. A 12-year-old girl with abrasions was treated and released.

Four of six people who were injured or killed were female, Ison said.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin has dealt a huge blow to President Joe Biden’s economic agenda, telling Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer that he will only support a reconciliation bill that lowers prescription drug prices and extends subsidies for the nation’s health care law, the Affordable Care Act, according to a Democrat briefed on the conversations. 

Manchin told Schumer that he cannot support a bill this August containing the climate or energy provisions the president seeks. 

Read the rest of the story at CBS News

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on Thursday filed the first legal challenge to President Joe Biden’s executive order on abortion — accusing the administration of turning emergency health care providers into “walk-in abortion clinics” and kicking off what is expected to be a protracted legal battle between the White House and red states.

At issue is Biden’s interpretation of a federal law that requires doctors to treat patients in medical emergencies, even if they do not have insurance, and provide the necessary “stabilizing treatment.”

Under guidance issued Monday, the Health and Human Services Department said the law would require doctors to perform abortions in medical emergencies if their clinical judgement finds such a procedure would help stabilize a pregnant patient.

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

Ivana Trump, Donald Trump‘s first wife and the mother of his three oldest children, has died, the former president said Thursday.

“I am very saddened to inform all of those that loved her, of which there are many, that Ivana Trump has passed away at her home in New York City,” the former president said in a post on his social media platform, Truth Social. “She was a wonderful, beautiful, and amazing woman, who led a great and inspirational life. Her pride and joy were her three children, Donald Jr., Ivanka, and Eric. She was so proud of them, as we were all so proud of her. Rest In Peace, Ivana!”

Ivana Trump was 73. Her cause of death is unknown.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol has been having conversations with the Justice Department about the phony elector scheme put forward by former President Donald Trump’s allies, committee chair Rep. Bennie Thompson said Wednesday. 

Thompson confirmed a day earlier the committee had been having discussions with the Justice Department. He clarified on Wednesday that those conversations are about a scheme allegedly cooked up by Trump’s allies to put forward alternate electors supporting him in seven battleground states that President Joe Biden won.

Read the rest of the story at CBS News

The Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday granted emergency use authorization to Novavax’s Covid-19 vaccine, opening up another option for adults who have not received immunization against the virus.

The vaccine, a two-dose series administered three weeks apart, is manufactured using a lab-made spike protein produced in insect cells and an adjuvant obtained from the bark of a tree native to Chile, offering a different and older vaccine technology than is used in the messenger RNA vaccines and Johnson & Johnson shot. It is authorized for people ages 18 and older as a primary series, meaning the shot is intended for the roughly 10 percent of adults who have not yet received a Covid-19 vaccine.

Read the rest of the story at Politico

President Joe Biden sought to reaffirm U.S. support for Israel and present a united front between the two nations on a range of issues from Iran to Russia’s war in Ukraine as he kicked off a day of meeting with Israeli leaders here on Thursday.

Biden met Thursday with Israeli caretaker prime minister Yair Lapid, who said the two leaders spoke about ways to improve relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia and their commitment to never allow a nuclear Iran.

Biden said he discussed with Lapid the importance of integrating Israel into the region and support for Israel from the “the vast majority” of Americans.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

President Joe Biden will arrive in Israel Wednesday for his first trip to the Middle East as president looking to show support for that nation amid low expectations that his visit will lead to any fundamental shift in the growing tensions between Israelis and Palestinians.

While most presidents have centered their visits to Israel around trying to help resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, there are no indications from Biden administration officials that there are plans to do anything more than reaffirm Biden’s support for a two-state solution. 

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., revealed Tuesday during the Jan. 6 committee’s seventh hearing that former President Donald Trump called a witness in the probe after the previous hearing on June 28.

“After our last hearing, President Trump tried to call a witness in our investigation — a witness you have not yet seen in these hearings,” Cheney said in her closing statement. “That person declined to answer or respond to President Trump’s call, and instead alerted their lawyer to the call. Their lawyer alerted us.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Security video published Tuesday by two Texas news outlets shows police officers retreating from the classroom where a gunman killed 19 students and two teachers at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas.

The video, which was recorded in a hallway and obtained and edited by the Austin American-Statesman and KVUE-TV of Austin, shows the officers arriving at Robb Elementary School at 11:36 a.m. May 24, three minutes after the gunman was seen entering the school and walking down an empty hallway. 

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

When President Joe Biden touches down in Israel on Wednesday for a series of meetings there and in the West Bank before heading to Saudi Arabia, he will find himself treading carefully around political land mines both foreign and domestic, where any missteps could have wide-ranging consequences.  

For much of Biden’s time in office, the Middle East has taken a back seat as an area of concern to China and Russia, and the president hasn’t made progress on his campaign pledge to improve human rights in the region. But the region remains key to Biden’s wider domestic and foreign policy goals, including the revival of a nuclear deal with Iran, maintenance of stability in the region, and the lowering of record high gas prices.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

A judge said Monday that he would not delay Steve Bannon’s contempt of Congress trial, just one week before it is set to begin.

Bannon was indicted last year for refusing to answer questions from the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Bannon, who had stonewalled the committee since October, had a last-minute change of heart over the weekend, a decision his lawyer attributed to a letter from former President Donald Trump that waived a purported claim of executive privilege. The Justice Department maintains that Bannon’s offer to testify was nothing more than a “last-ditch attempt to avoid accountability.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

A judge ordered U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham to testify in front of a special grand jury in Georgia investigating former President Donald Trump’s alleged attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney ordered that Graham will be required to testify on Aug. 2. The judge’s certification filed on Monday described Graham as a “necessary and material witness” to the grand jury probe. The development was reported earlier by WSB-TV.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Steve Bannon, a former top adviser in Donald Trump’s White House, recently told the House panel investigating the Capitol riot that he would be willing to testify since Trump now says he won’t cite executive privilege.

In a letter on Saturday to the committee, obtained by ABC News, Bannon said he would prefer testifying in a live, public hearing after the former president had sent him a separate letter on Saturday — also obtained by ABC — waiving objections.

Both the House committee and federal prosecutors who sought to speak with Bannon have said the executive privilege claims never covered him, since the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection took place long after Bannon left his post as chief White House strategist in 2017.

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

A former spokesperson for the Oath Keepers, a far-right “militia” organization, will appear as a witness at the House Jan. 6 committee’s next public hearing Tuesday, a source familiar with the plans said.

While he was not part of the Oath Keepers, whose members have pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy in connection with the riot or with events during or leading up to Jan. 6, 2021, the source said, Jason Van Tatenhove is expected to speak about the group’s propaganda efforts and radicalization over the years, including how founder Stewart Rhodes capitalized on conspiracy theories to build membership and funding.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Highland Park shooting suspect Robert E. Crimo III’s father “may have responsibility in certain circumstances” for his son’s deadly actions, police said Wednesday while stopping short of tying the dad to any criminal culpability.

The 21-year-old suspect was too young to get a gun permit in 2019 from the state of Illinois, but his father, Bob Crimo Jr., sponsored one for him despite previous threats by his son to harm himself and loved ones, authorities have previously said.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Former Japanese leader Shinzo Abe died on Friday after being shot at a campaign event, in an attack that shocked a country where gun violence is virtually nonexistent.

Abe, 67, was a towering political presence even after he stepped down as Japan’s longest-serving prime minister, and he was campaigning ahead of elections scheduled for Sunday. He had just begun a speech in the western city of Nara, near Kyoto, when gunfire was heard around 11:30 a.m. local time (10:30 p.m. Thursday ET).

Officials said that one person had been apprehended in relation to the shooting.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Lawyers for Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Wednesday they’ll challenge a subpoena demanding that he testify before a special grand jury in Georgia hearing evidence in a probe of possible 2020 election interference by former President Donald Trump and others.

In a statement, Graham’s attorneys Bart Daniel and Matt Austin said the subpoena, in which the grand jury hearing evidence in the Fulton County district attorney’s investigation seeks his testimony, is “all politics.”

“Senator Graham plans to go to court, challenge the subpoena, and expects to prevail,” the statement said.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Pat Cipollone, who served as Donald Trump’s White House counsel, is expected to testify behind closed doors on Friday with the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, a person familiar with the situation said Wednesday.

The interview with Cipollone will be transcribed and videotaped, according to a person familiar with the matter. His appearance before the panel comes as a result of a subpoena issued to him last week.

The committee didn’t return a request for comment.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

A portrait of Robert “Bobby” E. Crimo III as a mysterious and music-obsessed loner began emerging Tuesday, a day after he was arrested in the wake of a mass shooting at a July Fourth parade that left seven dead and traumatized an affluent Chicago suburb.

Crimo, 21, who attempted to disguise himself by wearing women’s clothing during the deadly rampage, aspired to be a rapper and his music got darker and more delusional as he got older and relationships with his parents and a girlfriend frayed, former friends said.

“He was in his own world,” said 22-year-old Nick Pacileo.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The Georgia special grand jury hearing evidence in an investigation into possible 2020 election interference by former President Donald Trump and others has issued subpoenas to Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and key members of Trump’s legal team, including Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman, NBC News has confirmed.

The Fulton County special grand jury also subpoenaed lawyers Jenna Ellis, Cleta Mitchell and Kenneth Chesebro, all of whom worked with Trump as he contested the election results.

The subpoenas were first reported by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and obtained by NBC News.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Robert E. Crimo III, identified by police as the person suspected of shooting and killing six people and wounding dozens of others Monday morning at a Fourth of July parade in Highland Park, Illinois, has been arrested, authorities said Monday evening.

Police believe the suspected gunman opened fire shortly after 10 a.m. CT from the rooftop of a business near the parade route. The gun was a “high-powered rifle” and the attack appeared to be “random” and “intentional,” said Christopher Covelli, spokesperson for the Lake County Major Crime Task Force.

Read the rest of the story at CNN

House Jan. 6 committee members said Sunday that they may make criminal referrals to federal prosecutors involving former President Donald Trump and his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results. 

Fanning out on Sunday programs to discuss the congressional investigation and its public hearings, committee members said that while no formal decision has been made, they can envision multiple referrals to the Justice Department based on evidence they’ve uncovered investigating the events surrounding the attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Federal law enforcement was at the Virginia home of Jeffrey Clark, a former Justice Department official who is at the center of Thursday’s Jan. 6 committee hearing.

A U.S. Attorney’s office spokesman confirmed that the activity took place on Wednesday, but the spokesman had no comment regarding the reason for the activity.

In a Thursday night interview with Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, Clark said it was just before 7 a.m. on Wednesday when he answered his front door to discover federal agents.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The Senate on Thursday night passed the most sweeping gun bill designed to prevent gun violence in decades, a major victory for advocates and a rare defeat for the National Rifle Association.

The vote was 65 to 33, with all 50 Democratic-voting members and 15 Republicans, including Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, voting to send the bill to the House for a vote expected Friday.

“The United States Senate is doing something many believed was impossible even a few weeks ago. We are passing the first significant gun safety bill in nearly 30 years,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said immediately before the vote. “The gun safety bill we are passing tonight can be described with three adjectives: bipartisan, commonsense, lifesaving.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the Constitution provides a right to carry a gun outside the home, issuing a major decision on the meaning of the Second Amendment.

The 6-3 ruling was the court’s second important decision on the right to “keep and bear arms.” In a landmark 2008 decision, the court had said for the first time that the amendment safeguards a person’s right to possess firearms, although the decision was limited to keeping guns at home for self-defense.

The court has now taken that ruling to the next step after years of ducking the issue and applied the Second Amendment beyond the limits of homeowners’ property in a decision that could affect the ability of state and local governments to impose a wide variety of firearms regulations.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

After four years in power, Donald Trump never grasped that government isn’t supposed to be a tool for promoting personal interests, the Jan. 6 committee argued as it presented evidence Thursday about his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.  

Witnesses described Trump’s desperate efforts to rope the Justice Department into a plot to overturn the election — trying at every turn to persuade government attorneys to act as an extension of his campaign. 

Senior officials whom Trump had appointed testified that they tried to explain the department’s unique role to him: They worked for the American people and represented the federal government. The message never stuck. 

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

President Biden on Wednesday called on Congress to suspend the federal gas tax for three months and asked states to suspend their own gas taxes or provide commensurate relief to consumers.

The federal government charges an 18.4-cent tax per gallon of gasoline and a 24.4-cent tax per gallon of diesel. Suspending the tax for three months — through the end of September, will cost about $10 billion, the White House said.

“I fully understand that the gas tax holiday alone is not going to fix the problem,” Biden said in remarks delivered from the South Court Auditorium. “But it will provide families some immediate relief, just a little bit of breathing room, as we continue working to bring down prices for the long haul.”

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

Republicans in Washington are betting that the televised Jan. 6 hearings aren’t breaking through, that voters are more worried about gas prices and inflation and that — basically — no one cares.

But one man is paying attention: Donald Trump. And he’s not happy no one is defending him.

The former president has reserved special criticism for House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., who made the call last year to yank all five Trump allies from the special panel after Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., rejected two of his picks. 

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Pete Arredondo was put on administrative leave Wednesday as the police chief of the Uvalde, Texas, school district after a month of sharp criticism for his decision to delay confronting the gunman in the shooting that killed 19 children and two teachers, the district superintendent said.

Hal Harrell, the superintendent of the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District, noted in a written statement Wednesday that he has said the district would wait until the investigation into the May 24 massacre at Robb Elementary School was complete before it made personnel decisions.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Automatic locking doors and law enforcement radios — things that were supposed to protect children from mass shootings — failed in the Uvalde school massacre, a top Texas official testified Tuesday. 

In testimony before the state legislature, Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw outlined several school security failures that may have contributed to the tragic outcome at Robb Elementary last month, when a gunman opened fire and killed two teachers and 19 students. 

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Katie Britt, a former top aide to Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., has defeated Rep. Mo Brooks in Alabama’s Republican Senate primary runoff, NBC News projects.

The race to succeed Shelby, who is retiring, had flummoxed former President Donald Trump, whose early endorsement of Brooks was consistent with what had been a close political alliance.

But Trump soured on Brooks, who had expressed a desire to move on from the 2020 election that Trump continues to falsely claim he won. Brooks, once an early favorite in the race, saw his poll numbers decline, and Trump withdrew his endorsement. Brooks ultimately rallied to earn a spot in the runoff against Britt, but she had long since become the GOP front-runner. Trump eventually endorsed herless than two weeks ago.h

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Eric Greitens, the embattled former Missouri governor-turned-GOP Senate candidate, released a campaign ad Monday in which he and a group of armed men in tactical gear are on the hunt for “RINOs” — Republicans in name only.

“We’re going RINO hunting,” a shotgun-toting Greitens, with a handgun holstered at his side, says before he bursts into a house with the men in tactical gear, one of whom throws what appears to be a flash-bang grenade.

“Get a RINO hunting permit. There’s no bagging limit, no tagging limit, and it doesn’t expire until we save our country,” he says at the end of the video, which encourages donors to pay $25 for a “RINO hunting” sticker.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

President Joe Biden said Monday that he is seriously considering temporarily halting the federal gas tax as the White House looks to take steps to lower the cost at the pump ahead of the July 4 holiday. 

White House officials say the July 4 weekend, when tens of millions of people are expected to hit the road, is a target for announcing new measures to help lower record-high gas prices. 

Biden said Monday that he could make a decision on pausing the federal gas tax by the end of this week. “I hope I have a decision based on data,” he told reporters traveling with him in Rehoboth, Delaware. 

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

Police officers with rifles and at least one ballistic shield were in a hallway at Robb Elementary School around 19 minutes after a gunman entered classrooms there, according to reports from Texas news organizations Monday.

The Austin American-Statesman said the timeline was based on documents it reviewed following the May 24 attack in Uvalde that killed 19 children and two teachers.

The Texas Tribune on Monday night also reported the new details, citing records and surveillance video it had reviewed.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitolwill present evidence in a public hearing this week about then-President Donald Trump’s involvement in a failed scheme to push slates of bogus electors to overturn the 2020 election results, Rep. Adam Schiff, a member of the panel, said Sunday.

“We’ll show evidence of the president’s involvement in this scheme,” Schiff, D-Calif., said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “We’ll also again show evidence about what his own lawyers came to think about this scheme. And we’ll show courageous state officials who stood up and said they wouldn’t go along with this plan to either call legislators back into session or decertify the results for Joe Biden.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

The four U.S. senators leading negotiations on a gun deal met for hours in a Senate basement Thursday in pursuit of a final agreement, but emerged with one major unresolved issue.

The meeting among Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., and Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., did not yield a resolution on how to close the “boyfriend loophole” involving gun rights for abusive partners.

As they craft the federal language, the group is looking at “state statutes” that currently prohibit dating partners convicted of abuse from possessing guns, said Tillis, without elaborating on which states. More than 33 states have already taken steps to close or address the boyfriend loophole. 

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

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Top negotiators on a bipartisan gun safety framework huddled behind closed doors for several hours Wednesday evening to try to solve remaining differences on the package, but the group’s effort to expedite passage of an agreement is stalled, at least for the moment.

Since a group of 10 Democrats and 10 Republicans announced an agreement on a framework of proposals aimed at curbing gun violence in the wake of mass shootings in Uvalde, Texas, and Buffalo, New York, on Sunday, a bipartisan group of senators has been working to speedily turn the list of ideas into a bill ready for consideration on the Senate floor next week. But two provisions, one focused on incentivizing states to implement violence prevention programs, and another dealing with closing the so-called “boyfriend loophole,” are now plaguing negotiations, chief Republican negotiator John Cornyn, R-Texas, said Wednesday.

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Dr. Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden, has tested positive for Covid-19, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases said in a statement Wednesday.

Fauci, 81, has directed the institute since 1984. He is fully vaccinated and has received two booster shots. His positive result came from a rapid test.

“He is currently experiencing mild symptoms,” the institute said. “Dr. Fauci will isolate and continue to work from his home. He has not recently been in close contact with President Biden or other senior government officials.”

Read the rest of the story at NBC News

As former President Donald Trump’s presidential legacy is tested in Washington this week, with the Jan. 6 hearings dominating Capitol Hill, his political power — and the sway of his election denying — saw a renewed test in the midterm primaries in a handful of states. Voters took the polls in South Carolina, Nevada, Maine, North Dakota and Texas’ 34 Congressional District Tuesday night, delivering historic turnout numbers and allowing voters to give Republicans who defied the former president a second chance at keeping their jobs, and some Democrats to lose theirs.

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

Former President Donald Trump on Monday responded in a lengthy statement to the House’s ongoing Jan. 6 committee hearings, assailing the panel as illegitimate and their presentation as one-sided — but rather than refute their evidence, he reiterated the same baseless claims about the 2020 presidential election that are at the center of the proceedings and the group’s case that he had attempted a “coup.”

Trump’s 12-page statement, sent to reporters on Monday night, comes after the second public hearing held by the House select committee investigating last year’s deadly Capitol attack. His statement, marked by characteristic exclamations and insults, called the hearings “a smoke and mirrors show” that failed to include “all exculpatory witnesses, and anyone who so easily points out the flaws in their story.”

Read the rest of the story at ABC News

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Stocks sold off Monday, pushing the S&P 500 to a fresh 2022 low and back into bear market territory, as recession fears grew ahead of a key Federal Reserve meeting this week.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 810 points, or about 2.6 percent, the S&P 500 fell 3.5 percent and the Nasdaq Composite tumbled 4.35 percent.

The moves came as investor continued to digest a hotter-than-expected inflation report on Friday and braced for the Fed to raise rates later in the week as the 10-year Treasury yield saw its largest jump since March 2020.

Read the rest of the story at NBC News