Contempt for Clinton

Good afternoon. Here’s what you need to know.

The Latest

The Clintons are refusing to testify in House Republicans’ Epstein probe. Bill and Hillary Clinton wrapped themselves in the resistance — citing everything from the Jan. 6 pardons to last week’s ICE shooting — but also acknowledged that the stakes are personal: The process, they said, is “literally designed to result in our imprisonment.”

• The House Oversight Committee’s chair, Rep. James Comer, said he’ll start work next week on a contempt of Congress charge. Then, in an X exchange with Bill Clinton, he posted photos of the former president from the Epstein files.
• Reps. Ro Khanna and Thomas Massie asked a federal judge to appoint a “special master” to oversee the Justice Department’s slow rollout of the Epstein files, NOTUS’ Jose Pagliery reports. “Put simply,” they wrote, “the DOJ cannot be trusted with making mandatory disclosures” required by law.

Inflation held steady at 2.7% in December. That’s lower than it was when Donald Trump took office but higher than the Fed wants to see. Speaking at the Detroit Economic Club, Trump declared “inflation is defeated.”

• The president also said he’s cancelling federal funding for sanctuary cities, knocked Jimmy Carter for selling the Panama Canal, riffed on malaria and mosquitos, imitated Joe Biden’s cough and called Jerome Powell “a jerk” who will be “gone soon.”

Abortion is still holding up a compromise on ACA subsidies. Last week, Sen. Bernie Moreno said he hoped senators working the deal would have language to share this week. New timeline: Maybe the last week of January.

The Hill

Republican leaders are throwing shade on Trump’s credit card cap. Mike Johnson has mastered “not seeing” controversial statements from the president. This time, both he and John Thune are saying Trump’s proposal to limit interest rates to 10% would deprive a lot of people of credit.

• “The president is the ideas guy,” Johnson told reporters. “I wouldn’t get too spun up about ideas that are out of the box, that are proposed or suggested.”

The Senate passed a bill allowing victims of deepfake porn to sue. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — herself a victim of deepfake porn — is pushing for passage in the House.

Republican Rep. Neal Dunn is retiring from Congress. Per the House Periodical Gallery’s “Casualty List,” 27 Republicans and 22 Democrats have now resigned, retired or are seeking other office.

Republican Rep. Randy Fine wants to give Trump the power to annex Greenland. Fine envisions Greenland becoming the 51st state, which would give the residents of Nuuk two more senators than the District of Columbia has.

Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin wants to know how many J6ers are working for ICE. It’s not clear if there are any.

The Administration

The Trump administration is ending Temporary Protected Status for Somalis. Approximately 700 people will be at risk of deportation in March.Ten DOJ lawyers quit over Minnesota. MS NOW says four leaders of the criminal section of the Civil Rights Division resigned to protest the department’s decision not to investigate the ICE shooting of Renee Nicole Good. The New York Times says six more federal prosecutors in Minnesota quit, in part because the department wanted to investigate Good’s wife.

• Trump told a group of federal prosecutors that they aren’t moving fast enough to bring charges against Sen. Adam Schiff and other political foes, The Wall Street Journal reports.

ICE is expanding so fast that it offered a job to an anti-ICE journalist. Laura Jedeed declined.

It’s Been a Big Month for F-bombs

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