Today's Liberal News

Profiting from Pardons: Giuliani Aide Told CIA Whistleblower a Trump Pardon Would Cost $2 Million

With less than 12 hours before the end of his presidency, Donald Trump issued 143 pardons and commutations, including a pardon for Steve Bannon, his former chief strategist and campaign manager. Trump, who has pardoned other associates and allies during his single term, has so far rejected calls to pardon prominent whistleblowers including WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and NSA whistleblowers Edward Snowden and Reality Winner.

30 Things Donald Trump Did as President You Might Have Missed

Trump’s presidency may be best remembered for its cataclysmic end. But his four years as president also changed real American policy in lasting ways, just more quietly. We asked POLITICO’s best-in-class policy reporters to recap some of the ways Trump changed the country while in office, for better or worse.

Following remembrance for Martin Luther King Jr., Secretary of State Pompeo goes full dog whistle

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is well known to Kansans. In his six years in the U.S. House, Pompeo was ranked as one of the most conservative by GovTrack, and the policies he promoted were, well, the kinds of things most of America simply would roll their eyes at even considering. As a secretary of state, Pompeo has served failure after failure and has been rewarded for it, repeatedly, as one of Trump’s members who followed his marching orders.

Trump plan to politicize key civil service jobs has run out of time

It looks like one of Team Trump’s last-minute efforts to destroy the civil service has fizzled. With less than a day to go, the plan to strip protections from tens of thousands of career federal employees hasn’t been put into effect at any federal agency. 

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the Office of Personnel Management had rushed to list many of their jobs in the new Schedule F, a new classification for jobs involving policymaking.

Feds arrest woman accused of stealing Pelosi laptop in violent Capitol riot

Joining the increasing number of Trump supporters arrested after storming the Capitol on Jan. 6, a Pennsylvania woman who allegedly took a laptop belonging to Speaker Nancy Pelosi was arrested Monday. The woman, identified as 22-year-old Riley June Williams, is charged with intentionally entering into a restricted building without lawful authority in addition to disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.

A Tragic Beginning to a Presidency

Tomorrow, America inaugurates a new president. With the transfer of power comes the transfer of responsibility for the COVID-19 pandemic. On the eve of Joe Biden’s inauguration, the toll of the pandemic stands at 23.9 million cases and 392,428 deaths, according to the COVID Tracking Project at The Atlantic. There are 123,820 people hospitalized. Today alone, states reported 144,047 cases and 2,141 deaths.

The Weekly Planet: How to Think About President Biden’s Big Climate Plans

Every Tuesday, our lead climate reporter brings you the big ideas, expert analysis, and vital guidance that will help you flourish on a changing planet. Sign up to get The Weekly Planet, our guide to living through climate change, in your inbox.Tomorrow, pending calamity or misfortune, Joe Biden will take the oath of office and become president of the United States. In that moment, the United States’ approach to climate change will invert.

They Should Have Taken Them at Their Word

They never saw it coming.Ben Goldey resigned as Representative Lauren Boebert’s communications director after the January 6 attempted coup. Lauren Blair Bianchi quit the same job in Senator Ted Cruz’s office. George Erwin Jr. had rallied local law-enforcement backers for Representative Madison Cawthorn and was preparing to take a job working for him, but has now disavowed him.