Congress’ leaders aren’t budging on government shutdown

WASHINGTON - Congressional leaders in both parties refused to budge publicly from their political corners Saturday on the first day of the government shutdown, avoiding direct negotiations and bitterly blaming each other for the impasse in speeches. But private glimmers of a breakthrough were evident by late Saturday, as moderate Democrats and Republicans began to rally behind a new short-term funding proposal to reopen the government through early February.

US Senate panel moves Keystone bill forward, despite White House veto threat

Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., left, GOP sponsor of the long-stalled Keystone XL pipeline bill, is joined by Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., right, as he makes his case at the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee during a markup to advance a bill to the floor, Thursday, Jan. 8, 2015, on Capitol Hill in Washington. WASHINGTON - A bill to approve the Canada-U.S. Keystone XL oil pipeline cleared a key Senate committee Thursday, setting up a fight next week pitting newly empowered Republicans against President Barack Obama and Senate Democrats.

President Trump Goes to Davos

The World Economic Forum Annual Meeting, getting under way this week in the Alpine town of Davos, Switzerland, has long been known as much for its socializing and its parties as for its serious discussions of policy. But the organizers do their homework, and last Wednesday the W.E.F. released its Global Risks Report 2018, detailing how factors such as interstate conflicts, earthquakes, market bubbles, and a severe energy-price shock could affect the well-being of populations and businesses around the world.

After a Wild Week for Trump, ‘S.N.L.’ Asks, ‘What Even Matters Anymore?’

The game show parody has been a fundamental building block of "Saturday Night Live" since time immemorial, from one-off bits like "Jackie Rogers Jr.'s $100,000 Jackpot Wad" to long-running sendups of "Celebrity Jeopardy!" and "Family Feud." The format achieved a kind of Platonic ideal on this weekend's episode of "S.N.L.," which featured a satirical game show that seemed perfectly calibrated for the current moment.

Florida eye doctor gets 17 years for Medicare fraud

A prominent Florida eye doctor once accused of bribing Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey received a 17-year sentence Thursday for stealing $73 million from Medicare by persuading elderly patients to undergo excruciating tests and treatments they didn't need for diseases they didn't have. Dr. Salomon Melgen was convicted of 67 crimes including health care fraud, submitting false claims and falsifying records in patients' files.

Sheriff: School officer never went inside to confront gunman

The armed officer on duty at the Florida school where a shooter killed 17 people never went inside to engage the gunman and has been placed under investigation, officials announced Thursday. The Valentine's Day shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School by a gunman armed with an AR-15 style assault rifle has reignited national debate over gun laws and school safety, including proposals by President Donald Trump and others to designate more people - including trained teachers - to carry arms on school grounds.

Today In History, Jan. 21: Women’s March

One year ago: A day after Donald Trump's inauguration, more than 1 million people rallied at women's marches in the nation's capital and cities around the world to send the new president an emphatic message that they wouldn't let his agenda go unchallenged. In 1937, Count Basie and his band recorded "One O'Clock Jump" for Decca Records .

Mulvaney finds himself in middle of another shutdown

Mick Mulvaney stormed Washington as a tea party lawmaker elected in 2010, and he hasn't mellowed much as director of the Office of Management of Budget at the White House. As a congressman in 2013, Mulvaney was among a faction on the hard right that bullied GOP leaders into a shutdown confrontation by insisting on lacing a must-pass spending bill with provisions designed to cripple President Barack Obama's signature health care law.

Democrats, GOP exchange charges of blame for shutdown

Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan says the partial government shutdown is "inflicting needless uncertainty on our country" and he is blaming it all on Senate Democrats. WASHINGTON - Feuding Democrats and Republicans in Congress are trying to dodge blame for a paralyzing standoff over immigration and showing few signs of progress on negotiations needed to end a government shutdown.

How shutdown affects key parts of federal government

Thousands of federal employees began their weekends gripped with doubt, uncertain of when they'll be able to return to work and how long they'll have to go without being paid after a bitter political dispute in Washington triggered a government shutdown. Many government operations will continue - U.S. troops will stay at their posts and mail will get delivered.

Verbatim

Hoeven: Sen. John Hoeven released the following statement after voting for a continuing resolution to keep the government operating and make sure the military gets paid. The legislation provides a long-term, six-year reauthorization of the Children's Health Insurance Program to ensure that states, including those running out of funding in January, can continue to provide children with health care.

Congress back at work on Sunday, still searching for deal to end shutdown Source: Cox Media Group

With no signs of any deal to restore funding for the federal government, lawmakers on Capitol Hill will be back for a rare Sunday session, with no real signs of an agreement to end the first government shutdown since 2013, as both parties continued to point the finger of blame at each other. The main stumbling block continues to be immigration, and what to do about hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrant Dreamers in the United States, who were protected under the Obama Administration's DACA program, which was ended by the Trump Administration in October.

Democrats, GOP exchange charges of blame for shutdown Source: AP

Feuding Democrats and Republicans in Congress are trying to dodge blame for a paralyzing standoff over immigration and showing few signs of progress on negotiations needed to end a government shutdown. The finger-pointing Saturday played out in rare weekend proceedings in both the House and Senate, where lawmakers were eager to show voters they were actively working for a solution - or at least actively making their case why the other party was at fault.

Trump the dealmaker comes up short ahead of shutdown

He wrote a book on the art of negotiation and was elected to office claiming he alone could end Washington gridlock, but President Donald Trump's latest attempt to broker a big, bipartisan deal has turned into a big mess. The failure to find consensus on immigration and spending is a blow to Trump's presidency on the one-year anniversary of his inauguration - and perhaps more painfully, a blow to his brand as a wheeler-and-dealer.

WashPost: Elite Russians in Mueller Probe Attended Trump’s Inauguration

Many Russian elites attended President Donald Trump's inauguration last year, anticipating improved relations with the U.S. after the Republican praised President Vladimir Putin during the campaign, The Washington Post reported Saturday. "It was a great, amazing experience," Alexey Repik, a wealthy Russian pharmaceutical executive, told the Post of last year's festivities.