Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Even by the standards of Donald Trump's presidency, this week has been extraordinarily chaotic and, more importantly, disastrous for the President's agenda. Just hours before Senate Republicans failed to choke the life out of the health care program known as Obamacare - a top domestic priority for the administration - the entire Senate, Democrats and Republicans, voted on imposing new Russia sanctions, effectively tying the President's hands on dealing with that country.
President Donald Trump's decision to replace Reince Priebus as chief of staff deepened the concerns of some Republican state party officials over the direction of the White House. "Reince gave his heart and soul to the administration," he said.
House Republicans are intensifying their effort to have the Justice Department investigate Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign, as they're seeking the same sort of special counsel probe President Donald Trump's campaign is now enduring. House Judiciary Committee Republicans detailed in a seven page letter to Justice a request for a special counsel to investigate "actions taken" by Clinton, former FBI Director James Comey and former Attorney General Loretta Lynch.
The House overwhelmingly approved a $3.9 billion emergency spending package to address a budget shortfall at the Department of Veterans Affairs that threatens medical care for thousands of veterans. The bill provides $2.1 billion to continue funding the Veterans Choice program, which allows veterans to receive private medical care at government expense.
Sen. John McCain sent shockwaves through the Senate early Friday morning when he cast the deciding vote rejecting the GOP's heath care effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. While his dramatic thumbs-down rejection drew gasps and cheers in Washington, D.C., leaders in Arizona have responded with a mixture of disappointment and frustration - but little in the way of direct criticism in this Republican-heavy state.
Sen. John McCain, recently diagnosed with an aggressive form of brain cancer, is returning to Arizona to begin radiation and chemotherapy. In a statement Friday, his office said he will undergo further treatment at the Mayo Clinic in Phoenix while maintaining his work schedule.
There's a reason why Sen. John McCain was eager to pivot to the annual defense spending bill in the early hours of the morning right after he had killed the Senate's Obamacare repeal effort: The Arizona Republican's office announced McCain is planning to return to his home state to start cancer treatment Monday. That may also help explain why Majority Leader Mitch McConnell appeared willing to let McCain try to proceed to the the National Defense Authorization Act, even after he thwarted the GOP's plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act in the early hours of Friday morning.
Shortly before Sen. John McCain entered the Senate chamber in the wee hours of Friday morning, reporters wanted to know how he'd vote. McCain killed his party's narrowly-crafted Obamacare repeal bill Friday not because he was opposed to dismantling the Affordable Care Act, but because he fundamentally believed the process -- the lack of hearings, the one-party, closed-door negotiations, the fact that in the end all that Republican senators could agree upon was a shell of the plan they'd promised -- was flawed.
The top homeland security Republican in the House unveiled a border security bill Friday that would codify President Donald Trump's border wall, boost resources for Border Patrol and authorize the National Guard and Defense Department to provide support to those efforts. The Border Security for America Act by Texas Rep. Mike McCaul is a scaled back version of a bill that McCaul had been working on with fellow Texan Republican Sen. John Cornyn, as CNN first reported.
The 54-year-old three-term congressman revealed his plans in a Washington Post op-ed. He won't run for re-election and is bypassing a run for Maryland governor in 2018.
The Russian Foreign Ministry demanded Friday that the United States cut its diplomatic staff in Russia and said it would seize two US diplomatic properties in a sharp response to a new sanctions bill the US Congress passed a day earlier. The order -- which affects the US Embassy in Moscow and consulates in St Petersburg, Yekaterinburg and Vladivostok -- would reduce US diplomatic and technical staff to 455, the same number Russia has in the United States, by September 1. Russia also is suspending the use of a US storage facility in Moscow and a country house, or dacha, outside Moscow by Tuesday.
The first question any viewer is going to ask about the cable network USA's new crime drama The Sinner is, "How are they possibly going to string this thing out for eight episodes?" A murder is committed, its perpetrator captured, and her voluntary and unambiguous confession obtained, all in the first five minutes.
Sen. John McCain, recently diagnosed with an aggressive form of brain cancer, is returning to Arizona to begin radiation and chemotherapy. In a statement Friday, his office said he will undergo further treatment at the Mayo Clinic in Phoenix while maintaining his work schedule.
Gov. Jay Inslee wants to change to the school-funding plan the Legislature approved this year. This clip is an excerpt from an episode of a political video series, Capitol Happy Hour, that will go online next week.
U.S. Rep. Alan Lowenthal, D-Long Beach, has vowed to fight a federal lawsuit attempting to force him and three other congressional colleagues to remove "Pride Flags" from their Washington, D.C., offices. The lawsuit was filed July 18 in Washington by Chris Sevier, who describes himself in the lawsuit as a "former judge advocate general, combat veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, D.C. lobbyist, overseas missionary, whistleblower and recording artist."
A Twitter feud broke out July 24 between President Donald Trump and Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Burbank, with the president calling Schiff sleazy and Schiff responding that "your comments and actions are beneath the dignity of the office." "Sleazy Adam Schiff, the totally biased congressman looking into 'Russia,' spends all of his time on television pushing the Dem loss excuse!" the president tweeted in the morning.
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, when asked Thursday about the friction playing out in the public eye between White House chief of staff Reince Priebus and new White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci, said conflict between White House staff is the result of "healthy competition." Sanders' comment came hours before the New Yorker magazine published a vulgarity-laced interview with Scaramucci.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions says he hopes his efforts to fight gang violence will help mend fences with President Donald Trump after a series of public rebukes by Trump. Sessions says the anti-gang effort is one of many issues on which he and the president share a commitment.
The House has passed a $788 billion spending bill that combines a $1.6 billion down payment for President Trump's controversial border wall with Mexico with a whopping budget increase for the Pentagon. The 235 to 192 vote both eases a large backlog of unfinished spending bills and gives Mr. Trump and his House GOP allies political wins heading into the August recess.