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Trump won less than 50 percent. Why is everyone calling it a landslide?

Trump won less than 50 percent. Why is everyone calling it a landslide?

Michael Schaffer writes: Is it newsworthy that Donald Trump’s share of the 2024 presidential vote has fallen below 50 percent? You wouldn’t think it’s a big deal based on the relatively few headlines triggered by the milestone, which passed quietly last weekend as California and other states continued their glacially slow vote counts. And maybe that’s as it should be. After all, Trump’s 49.9 percent (for now) is still more than Kamala Harris’ 48.3 percent. When the counting is done,…

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Republicans put Marjorie Taylor Greene in charge of new ‘DOGE’ subcommittee

Republicans put Marjorie Taylor Greene in charge of new ‘DOGE’ subcommittee

HuffPost reports: House Oversight Committee chair James Comer (R-Ky.) announced Thursday that Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) will chair a new subcommittee named after an internet meme from the early 2010s. President-elect Donald Trump tapped entrepreneurs Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to head an advisory panel called the “Department of Government Efficiency,” or DOGE, that’s tasked with identifying trillions in government waste. Not wanting to be left out, Republicans on Capitol Hill this week created a caucus (an informal group…

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Gallant: IDF ‘securing aid distribution’ is a ‘euphemism’ for military rule in Gaza

Gallant: IDF ‘securing aid distribution’ is a ‘euphemism’ for military rule in Gaza

The Times of Israel reports: Ousted defense minister Yoav Gallant said Wednesday that Israel’s taking security responsibility for the distribution of humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip would set it down the path of military governance in the enclave at an unacceptable cost to the lives of soldiers. “The discussion about ‘distributing food to residents of Gaza by private companies with IDF security’ is a euphemism for the start of a military government,” Gallant wrote on X. “The price will…

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Accused war criminal status will be hard stigma for Netanyahu to shrug off

Accused war criminal status will be hard stigma for Netanyahu to shrug off

Julian Borger writes: The arrest warrants issued by the international criminal court (ICC) represent an earthquake on the world’s legal landscape: the first time a western ally from a modern democracy has been charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity by a global judicial body. Inside Israel, the warrants against Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defence minister, Yoav Gallant, will not have an immediate impact. In the short term they are likely to rally support around the prime minister…

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Several of Trump’s Cabinet picks — and Trump himself — have been accused of sexual misconduct

Several of Trump’s Cabinet picks — and Trump himself — have been accused of sexual misconduct

The Associated Press reports: While Matt Gaetz has withdrawn from the nomination process for attorney general, President-elect Donald Trump has picked several other people for his Cabinet and key staff positions who have been accused of some form of sexual misconduct. Trump himself has long been accused of abusing or mistreating women and once was caught bragging about grabbing women by the genitals. He was found liable by a New York City jury for sexual abuse and defamation and eventually…

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Linda McMahon, Trump’s Education pick, was sued for allegedly enabling sexual abuse of children

Linda McMahon, Trump’s Education pick, was sued for allegedly enabling sexual abuse of children

CNN reports: A recent lawsuit alleges Linda McMahon, who President-elect Donald Trump tapped to lead the Department of Education, knowingly enabled the sexual exploitation of children by a World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) employee as early as the 1980s — allegations she denies. McMahon is the former CEO of the WWE, which she co-founded with her husband, Vince. As head of the WWE, Linda McMahon oversaw its transformation from a wrestling entertainment company into a publicly traded media empire. She stepped…

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Trump picks Pam Bondi for AG, having previously been accused of bribing her when she was Florida AG

Trump picks Pam Bondi for AG, having previously been accused of bribing her when she was Florida AG

NBC News reports: President-elect Donald Trump announced Thursday evening that his new pick for attorney general is Pam Bondi. Bondi previously served as Florida’s attorney general. The announcement came just hours after former Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., withdrew from consideration. “For too long, the partisan Department of Justice has been weaponized against me and other Republicans — Not anymore,” Trump said in a post to Truth Social. “Pam will refocus the DOJ to its intended purpose of fighting Crime, and…

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Why Trump dumped Gaetz

Why Trump dumped Gaetz

Marc A. Caputo reports: Donald Trump giveth. And he taketh away. Eight days after making the snap decision to nominate Matt Gaetz to be the nation’s next attorney general, Trump phoned him Thursday morning to tell him he wouldn’t get confirmed, according to a source briefed on the conversation. The president-elect explained that Republican senators were too troubled by the sex scandals and investigations surrounding Gaetz and that the constant and salacious distractions had doomed him. “You don’t have the…

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RFK Jr. compared Trump to Hitler and praised descriptions of his supporters as ‘Nazis’

RFK Jr. compared Trump to Hitler and praised descriptions of his supporters as ‘Nazis’

CNN reports: Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for secretary of Health and Human Services, has a long history of scathing critiques against Trump, labeling him a “threat to democracy,” a “bully,” and, as recently as July, a “terrible president.” But Kennedy’s harshest attacks date back to Trump’s rise in 2016, when on his radio show “Ring of Fire,” Kennedy applauded descriptions of Trump’s base as “belligerent idiots” and suggestions that some were “outright Nazis” and “spineless fellow…

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The technology the Trump administration might use to hack your phone

The technology the Trump administration might use to hack your phone

Ronan Farrow writes: In September, the Department of Homeland Security (D.H.S.) signed a two-million-dollar contract with Paragon, an Israeli firm whose spyware product Graphite focusses on breaching encrypted-messaging applications such as Telegram and Signal. Wired first reported that the technology was acquired by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)—an agency within D.H.S. that will soon be involved in executing the Trump Administration’s promises of mass deportations and crackdowns on border crossings. A source at Paragon told me that the deal followed…

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Can he do that? How Trump could try to break the federal government

Can he do that? How Trump could try to break the federal government

ABC News reports: President Donald Trump’s picks to lead the next administration are talking about abolishing entire agencies and firing tens of thousands of federal workers at a time. But can his administration actually do all that? Experts believe Trump can get much further on upending the government system this go-around compared to his first term — in part because the typical checks and balances are expected to lean in his favor. Next year, the House and Senate are on…

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U.S. federal workers hope Republicans will curb Trump, Musk firings

U.S. federal workers hope Republicans will curb Trump, Musk firings

Reuters reports: Members of the over 2 million-strong U.S. civilian federal workforce are looking to an unlikely source to protect it from Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s promise to slash government employees and cut costs: the incoming Republican-controlled Congress. Federal employee unions are lining up lawyers and preparing public campaigns to try to stave off any mass firings, but they’re hoping Republican Congress members will join Democrats in defending their importance to local economies, health and safety, union members and…

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Trump’s corruption of the DOJ goes much deeper than Gaetz

Trump’s corruption of the DOJ goes much deeper than Gaetz

Liz Dye writes: Donald Trump’s nomination of Matt Gaetz as attorney general is a giant middle finger to anyone who believes in the rule of law. But his nominees for other key Justice Department positions may be both more consequential and potentially more dangerous for democracy. That’s partly because Gaetz is a lazy fool who never tried a federal criminal case and is functionally a “liberal tears” meme made flesh. It’s not that he’s too stupid to be dangerous —…

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Silicon Valley eyes a windfall from Trump’s plans to gut regulation

Silicon Valley eyes a windfall from Trump’s plans to gut regulation

The Washington Post reports: Prominent venture capitalists and start-up founders see Donald Trump’s victory as heralding a golden age for innovation — anticipating a major boost to tech businesses from lucrative government contracts and the rollback of regulations they consider onerous. The tech industry’s potentially unbridled future under the second Trump administration energized some Republican donors at a Las Vegas conference this week hosted by the Rockbridge Network, a conservative political advocacy group co-founded by Trump’s incoming vice president, former…

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This election’s surprising bright spot for progressives is a very big deal

This election’s surprising bright spot for progressives is a very big deal

Mark Joseph Stern writes: The 2024 election marked a painful setback for Democratic hopes of rebalancing the federal judiciary: When Donald Trump reenters the White House in January, he will have a pliant Republican Senate majority eager to confirm his hard-right judges. But federal courts don’t tell the whole story: Across the country, voters also elected liberal justices to their state Supreme Courts, which function as a key backstop for civil rights and democracy as federal courts lurch rightward. Progressives…

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Key intelligence watchdogs resign in wake of Trump’s win

Key intelligence watchdogs resign in wake of Trump’s win

The Project On Government Oversight reports: The top watchdogs for the Central Intelligence Agency and Office of the Director of National Intelligence are leaving their roles in the wake of former President Donald Trump’s re-election, sources tell the Project On Government Oversight (POGO) and their agencies confirm. These departures come as unease has swept across the federal inspector general community, which anticipates the possibility of a purge of senior watchdog officials by the incoming Trump administration. Appointed by the president…

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