House Ways and Means Committee chairman Richard Neal on Friday issued subpoenas to Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Internal Revenue Service commissioner Charles Rettig for President Trump's personal and business tax returns from 2013 to 2018.
Details: Neal has given Mnuchin and Rettig until next Friday at 5 pm to turn over Trump's tax returns, per the Washington Post. In a statement on Friday, Neal wrote: "On April 3, I requested six years of the President's personal and business tax returns... Unfortunately, the Treasury Department and the IRS have denied my reasonable request. Despite the agency's denial, we on the Ways and Means Committee are still moving forward with our inquiry."
Climate change is warming the ocean and, in turn, transforming wave conditions. Surfers are on the front lines of these changes, and they're "pretty conflicted about what lies ahead," writes the Washington Post.
The bad news: Oceanographers warn that dying reefs will change how waves break, and that "rising sea levels could mean other swells roll right over reliable breaking points without ever 'tripping,' leaving the swells flat and surfers without waves."
Joe Biden, the early 2020 Democratic frontrunner, is seeking a middle ground on climate policy and has brought on one of former President Obama's high-level aides as an informal adviser, Reuters reports.
Why it matters: The story sheds new light on how Biden will approach a topic that he has not yet emphasized in his nascent White House run. While Biden's campaign has not yet unveiled a policy platform, the report confirms that he is not seeking to join rivals who are running to the left on the issue.
House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) told Axios' Mike Allen Friday that the House is considering reviving its "inherent contempt" power, which would allow Congress to enforce subpoenas through coercive measures like fines.
"Much as I like the visual of [throwing people in jail], I think it's far more practical to consider levying individual fines on the person — not the office — until they comply. You could fine someone $25,000 a day until they comply. You can do that. We're looking through the history and studying the law to make sure we're on solid ground."
A single senator criticizing a fellow senator of the same party, especially a committee chair, is rare enough, but six Republican senators criticized the decision by Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.) to subpoena Donald Trump Jr. about the Russia investigation.
What's next: We're told Don Jr. won't show up. Options include daring the committee to hold him in contempt, taking the Fifth in writing, or (most likely) a compromise like answering written questions.
House Democrats' heightened hunger for impeachment is being fueled by President Trump's scorched-earth strategy of rebuffing every congressional demand for information related to the special counsel's Russia probe.
Why it matters: Multiple fights between the two branches of government will wind through the courts, with some likely to end up at the Supreme Court.
Chevron said Thursday that it would not increase its bid to buy Anadarko, leaving the prize to Occidental while walking away with a $1 billion breakup fee.
The latest: Anadarko announcing on Thursday evening that it has entered into a “definitive merger agreement” with Occidental, expected to close in the second half of 2019.
Earth's rivers are increasingly dammed, disrupted by development and fragmented — all of which are threatening food and clean water sources that hundreds of millions of people depend on, a new study finds.
What's new: A first-of-its-kind study published Wednesday in Nature provides a global census of the world's rivers, and seeks to answer the question of how many are still free-flowing.
President Trump told reporters Thursday that he was "very surprised" that his son, Donald Trump Jr., was subpoenaed by the Senate Intelligence Committee, as first reported by Axios.
UNs Secretary-General António Guterres is trying to rev up global efforts to achieve climate goals that are slipping out of reach.
Driving the news: In a new interview with AP, he warns of a "catastrophic situation for the whole world" as he prepares to tour Pacific islands facing existential threats from rising seas.
GM's plan to sell its shuttered Lordstown, Ohio, plant to the Workhorse Group, an electric truck company, would remove a political headache for GM and is already bringing new prominence to the little-known buyer.
Driving the news:GM is in talks with Workhorse and an affiliated party to "bring significant production and electric vehicle assembly jobs to the plant."
Lawmakers offer lots of bills every day that just vanish into the ether, but yesterday my inbox filled up with responses to a new energy proposal, and the rollout says a lot about the state of play heading into the 2020 elections.
Driving the news: 2 Democrats — Sen. Tina Smith and Rep. Ben Ray Luján — unveiled plans for a "clean energy standard" that would require utilities to supply escalating amounts of carbon-free power annually over coming decades.
A Republican backlash has followed the decision by the Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee to subpoena Donald Trump Jr. in relation to the Russia investigation.
Be smart: Senate Intel Chair Richard Burr (R-N.C.) may be more resilient to this kind of pressure than most Republicans would be.
Unprecedented flooding is devastating the Midwest with the Mississippi River rising to some of its highest levels since 1993.
What's new: Heavy rain prompted more flash flooding concerns over Wednesday night, as Kansas residents were evacuated from their homes and dozens of Texas children were left stranded at school, AP reports.
