Today’s notice: D.C. getting more scrutiny. Redistricting lawsuits are starting to roll. A researcher tells us he doesn’t agree with how the USDA is using his numbers. Massie vs. everyone. And: Life at the CDC after the shooting.
THE LATEST
District of escalation: The latest on the takeover of D.C. law enforcement by Donald Trump’s White House can be summed up in one word: more.
More troops: Tennessee this week joined the list of red states sending National Guard troops to the District. Before those troops were added, the number of incoming National Guard members was already more than 1,000.
More time: At Tuesday’s press briefing, Karoline Leavitt declined to put a timeline on the National Guard deployment or the surged federal law enforcement presence. The law says Trump can only federalize D.C.’s police department for 30 days, but the president has signaled he wants more time than that.
More attacks on city government: U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro’s office announced an investigation into the city government’s crime statistics, which Trump has repeatedly claimed are “fake.” District officials are already conducting their own investigation into a member of MPD brass accused of manipulating crime statistics, but Pirro’s probe is reportedly much broader.
More politics: Trump’s D.C. takeover has always been mixed with a healthy dose of attacks on Democrats. Both the investigation and the suggestion the White House will push the legal limits of this takeover can be seen as a weaponization of that rhetoric, or the next step in pressuring failed leaders, depending on your point of view. Either way, Congress may be asked very soon to get involved.
Open Tabs: Kremlin plays down Zelensky talks (BBC); Trump Yanks Security Clearances for Dozens of Biden, Obama Admin Alums (NOTUS); Trump weaponization czar urged Letitia James to resign (AP); White House aims to fast-track key Fed pick (Politico)
From the Hill
GOP lawmakers on Trump’s Ukraine moves: On the record, they have been generally effusive, NOTUS’ Reese Gorman and Ursula Perano report.
But when speaking frankly (and anonymously): “He’s been all over the place,” one Republican lawmaker told them.
What’s next: Congress has halted progress on a Russian sanctions bill for months, and more traditional policy splits still govern that debate. Old-school hawks like Sen. Lindsey Graham want the sanctions (and more aid to Ukraine), while America Firsters like Sen. Tommy Tuberville sound like this: “I know President Trump’s trying to do the right thing, but people in Europe have to take responsibility for this. We’re so far away from Ukraine.”
From the states
California redistricting already in trouble? There are going to be lots of lawsuits all over the place now that redistricting is on the national agenda. But this one could be a doozy: Republican legislators in California allege that a bill kicking off Gavin Newsom’s redistricting plan violates the state’s constitution.
Whether they’re right or not could be irrelevant if a court decides to slow this process down to consider the suit. The state Assembly has to pass the bill by the end of the week for the next step in Newsom’s plan, a statewide ballot measure, to move ahead.
NOTUS EXCLUSIVE
Shattered windows: A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention employee sent NOTUS’ Margaret Manto photos of the agency’s headquarters in Atlanta on Monday afternoon. More than a week after a gunman fired hundreds of bullets at the building, the windows were still pockmarked with bullet holes. Broken glass remained on the carpet.
“I was thinking they would have at least enhanced security going into campus and/or in buildings, but it seems oddly the same as usual,” the employee told Margaret.
Morale is low. “As if we have just been beat down so much that we’ve lost motivation to go above and beyond for our work and for our country,” the employee said. The gunman, who killed a police officer before dying by suicide after the attack, expressed discontent with the COVID-19 vaccine.
Trump has not mentioned the shooting publicly. CDC staff got an email from Health Secretary RFK Jr. and a site visit with the CDC’s new director, Susan Monarez. She later told staff “misinformation can be dangerous” and that rebuilding public trust would require “rational, evidence-based discourse.”
A CDC spox said the agency was “working closely with [the Georgia Bureau of Investigation] on a security assessment of the facilities to ensure the safety, security and wellbeing of staff for when they return to campus.”
Public-health workers are watching closely. “I think CDC was seeing themselves as more remote from these threats and were surprised because CDC is really a wonky agency,” an FDA employee told Margaret. That employee and one from NIH say they’ve seen no increase in security, either.
NEW ON NOTUS
Massie of his domain: “I think I’ll just do it without painkillers,” Rep. Thomas Massie told NOTUS’ Haley Byrd Wilt of an upcoming procedure to remove a metal rod from his thumb. It’s an apt metaphor for Massie’s life as MAGA’s punching bag.
Grinning and bearing it: “If I lose, they’re going to be even more scared than they are now,” Massie said of his GOP House colleagues. “When I do win, there’ll be more Republicans who are emboldened to not be rubber stamps and to vote their conscience.”
Number cruncher’s lament: “Our stats are our stats, how people use those numbers, and however they want to talk about what is happening, is up to them,” agriculture researcher Charles Martinez, who led an effort to catalog the loss of U.S. farmland to development, told NOTUS’ Anna Kramer on the day his findings were used in a USDA press release announcing the end to subsidies for solar energy production in the agency’s Rural Energy for America Program.
USDA says the program is a big contributor to the conversion of farmland to other purposes, citing Martinez’s numbers. Martinez doesn’t agree with the finding. “The majority of the land conversion is going to be residential, that’s the lion’s share,” he said. “What has happened over time and where it is headed, solar farms being a reason is just not on the top of the list.”
Trust issues: “I’m sorry, this idea that we could just forget about what they just did. No, what they did is awful,” Rep. Jim McGovern says of the prospects of a bipartisan farm bill when Congress comes back to town, NOTUS’ Nuha Dolby reports.
“People can do whatever they want. I’m just speaking for myself. But I don’t want to deal with them until they fix the damage they did in reconciliation,” McGovern said of SNAP cuts in Republicans’ budget law.
More: HUD Cancels Non-English Language Services, by Amelia Benavides-Colón
Adam Schiff Forms Legal Defense Fund to Prepare for Trump Attacks, by Samuel Larreal
Texas Dem Sleeps at Capitol After Refusing Police Escort, by Amelia Benavides-Colón
NOT US
- ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ will cost Wyoming $50 million. State lawmakers are worried, by Caitlin Tan for Wyoming Public Media
- Cuomo’s seeking a Trump bump, by Jeff Coltin, Nick Reisman and Emily Ngo for Politico New York Playbook
- Mayoral endorsement drama evokes old debates within Minneapolis DFL, by Kyle Stokes for Axios
- Bondi Aides Corrupted Antitrust Enforcement, Ousted DOJ Official Says, by Dave Michaels for The Wall Street Journal
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