CNN Lawyers Gagged in Fight With Justice Dept. Over Reporter’s Email Data

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The disclosure of the aggressive leak investigation tactic followed a similar revelation involving The New York Times.

WASHINGTON — CNN secretly fought an attempt by the Justice Department to seize tens of thousands of email logs of one of its reporters, the network disclosed on Wednesday, adding that the government imposed a gag order on CNN’s lawyers and its president, Jeff Zucker, as part of the legal battle.

The disclosure — including that CNN ultimately agreed to turn over “a limited set of email logs” involving the reporter, Barbara Starr — was the latest to recently come to light in a series of aggressive steps that federal prosecutors secretly took in leak investigations late in the Trump administration.

It is also the second such episode known to have spilled over into the early Biden administration. CNN struck a deal with prosecutors to settle the matter on Jan. 26, it said, and the government only recently lifted the gag order. Continue reading.

DFL Party Statement On Minnesota’s $1.8 Billion Surge In Unanticipated Revenue

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SAINT PAUL, MINNESOTA – On Thursday, DFL Party Chairman Ken Martin released the following statement in response to Governor Walz’s announcement that general fund revenues totaled $3.306 billion in May, nearly $1.8 billion or 119% more than projected. This report also increased the fiscal year 2021 projection by $2.170 billion or 10.4% bringing the total to $23.113 billion for the year.

“Thanks to the hard work of Governor Walz, Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan, and their team, our economy is booming and Minnesota is in the best position to recover from this pandemic. These unanticipated funds will allow us to continue to invest in our state’s future, fully fund our schools, and ensure our small businesses have the support they need to thrive. Due to the Governor’s thoughtful response to COVID-19 and the strategic reopening of the economy, we are bouncing back and better than we were before this crisis.”

JBS paid $11 million to hackers to resolve ransomware attack

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Major meat producer JBS USA said it paid the equivalent of $11 million to hackers to resolve a ransomware attack that forced the company to shut down its beef plants. 

The company said in a statement on Thursday that it made the decision to “mitigate any unforeseen issues related to the attack and ensure no data was exfiltrated.” 

Andre Nogueira, CEO of JBS USA, told The Wall Street Journal that the company paid the ransom in bitcoin. Continue reading.

McGahn Affirmed That Trump Tried to Oust Mueller, Transcript Shows

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The former White House counsel testified behind closed doors last week about the former president’s attempts to interfere with the Russia investigation.

WASHINGTON — Donald F. McGahn II, who served as White House counsel to former President Donald J. Trump, has told lawmakers that episodes involving him in the Russia report by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, were accurate — including one Mr. Trump has denied in which the president pressed him to get the Justice Department to remove Mr. Mueller.

A 241-page transcript of Mr. McGahn’s closed-door testimony from last week, released on Wednesday by the House Judiciary Committee, contained no major revelations. But it opened a window on Mr. McGahn’s struggles to serve as the top lawyer in a chaotic White House, under a president who often pushed the limits of appropriate behavior.

“They don’t teach you this in law school,” Mr. McGahn said of one episode he witnessed in which Mr. Trump was trying to get his attorney general at the time, Jeff Sessions, to resign because he had recused himself from the Russia investigation. Continue reading.

House Judiciary releases McGahn testimony on Trump

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Former White House counsel Don McGahn confirmed to congressional investigators a key account in ex-special counsel Robert Mueller’s report that former President Trump directed him to try to get Mueller removed, according to a transcript of his closed-door testimony released Wednesday. 

The 241-page transcript follows a long fought-for interview the House Judiciary Committee finally secured with McGahn on Friday after the Trump White House challenged a subpoena seeking his testimony during Trump’s first impeachment investigation. The transcript shows that the interview yielded little new information but confirmed some of the details of Mueller’s lengthy report on his 22-month investigation that concluded in March 2018 and with which McGahn cooperated.

Trump has persistently denied any effort to fire Mueller amid the long inquiry, which probed allegations that members of Trump’s team had colluded with Russian figures during his 2016 presidential campaign. Yet in Friday’s interview, McGahn directly disputed Trump’s claims, repeatedly laying out Trump’s consideration of firing Mueller.  Continue reading.

The Keystone XL pipeline is officially dead

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The developer of the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline abandoned the project Wednesday after a decade-plus effort.

Why it matters: TC Energy’s decision ends one of the century’s highest profile battles over climate change and energy. But the move is unsurprising. 

  • President Biden canceled a cross-border permit in January, prompting TC Energy to suspend construction on the project that would bring hundreds of thousands of barrels per day from Alberta, Canada, to U.S. markets. Continue reading.

The right wing’s ‘culture war’ is built on a mountain of lies

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“The culture war” is so familiar I don’t need to explainwhat it is. It has been part of the Republican Party’s rhetorical repertoire since at least Robert Taft’s time. What most people do not understand, however, is nearly every moment in which “the culture war” flares up—over abortion, guns, sexuality, etc.—is rooted in a lie. If more people understood the centrality of lying to “the culture war,” more might understand the goal of the GOP’s “cultural war” repertoire is making some Americans seem illegitimate.

Consider the case of Mara Gay, a member of the Times‘ editorial board.1 She was on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” Tuesday. The subject of table discussion was Max Boot’s new op-ed in the Post on how too many people in this country are still underestimating the dire threat posed by the Republican Party to democracy and the American union.

Joe Scarborough, the co-host, said there’s a need to stop being surprised by the GOP’s anti-democratic posturing. Gay agreed. “We need to start taking it seriously,” she said. When it comes to creating an independent bipartisan body to investigate the sacking and looting of the United States Capitol on January 6, she said the Democrats in the United States Congress should stop asking for the GOP’s permission and act alone. Continue reading.

New report reignites push for wealth tax

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A blockbuster ProPublica report on the taxes paid by the richest Americans is reigniting a push from progressives for a wealth tax.

The report, based on tax-return data ProPublica received from an anonymous source, details how prominent billionaires like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk have paid little to no taxes in some recent years, particularly when compared to their wealth gains.

The article comes as President Biden has proposed raising taxes on the wealthy and corporations to pay for his major spending proposals. Democrats have increasingly made raising taxes on the rich a top priority in recent years, and some progressives have called for going even further than Biden’s proposals by establishing a wealth tax that would impose taxes on net worth rather than income. Continue reading.

U.S. to buy 500 million Pfizer doses to share with the world

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The Biden administration will buy 500 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine to share with countries around the world, with the option to buy an additional 200 million, two sources familiar with the deal tell Axios.

Why it matters: That’s a big step toward making the U.S. a major global vaccine supplier and comes as Biden departs for his first foreign trip as president.

Details: The doses were purchased at a not-for-profit price rather than the $19.50 per dose the U.S. paid in its initial Pfizer contract, according to the sources. Most or all of the doses will be distributed through the global COVAX mechanism. Continue reading.

Biden pushes protection for more streams and wetlands, targeting a major Trump rollback

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The change could have broad implications for farming, real estate development and other activities, the latest salvo in a decades-long battle

The Biden administration is set to toss out President Donald Trump’s efforts to scale back the number of streams, marshes and other wetlands that fall under federal protection, kicking off a legal and regulatory scuffle over the fate of wetlands and waterways around the country, from the arid West to the swampy South.

Michael Regan, head of the Environmental Protection Agency, said his team determined that the Trump administration’s rollback is “leading to significant environmental degradation.” The EPA and Army Corps of Engineers will craft a new set of protections for waterways that provide habitats for wildlife and safe drinking water for millions of Americans, according to a joint statement.

With the announcement, the Biden administration is wading into a decades-long battle over how far federal officials can go to stop contaminants from entering small streams and other wetlands. Continue reading.