☕️ Good Tuesday morning. Midterms are a week from today.
🇺🇸 Nov. 11 — two Sundays from now — marks 100 years since World War I ended, the N.Y. Times Magazine reminds us. More than 4 million Americans served.
☕️ Good Tuesday morning. Midterms are a week from today.
🇺🇸 Nov. 11 — two Sundays from now — marks 100 years since World War I ended, the N.Y. Times Magazine reminds us. More than 4 million Americans served.
Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios
President Trump plans to sign an executive order that would remove the right to citizenship for babies of non-citizens born on U.S. soil, he said yesterday in an exclusive interview for "Axios on HBO," a new four-part documentary news series debuting on HBO this Sunday at 6:30 p.m. ET/PT.
See the video in the Axios stream. Media must credit "Axios on HBO."
Trump told Swan and Axios CEO Jim VandeHei that he has run the idea of ending birthright citizenship by his counsel and plans to proceed with the highly controversial move, which certainly will face legal challenges.
When Swan says that's very much in dispute, Trump replied: "You can definitely do it with an act of Congress. But now they're saying I can do it just with an executive order."
The president expressed surprise that Swan knew about his secret plan: "I didn't think anybody knew that but me. I thought I was the only one."
The legal challenges would force the courts to decide on a constitutional debate over the 14th Amendment, which says:
Be smart: Few immigration and constitutional scholars believe it is within the president's power to change birthright citizenship, former U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services chief counsel Lynden Melmed tells Axios.
Michael Anton, a former national security official in the Trump administration, recently took up this argument in the Washington Post.
Between the lines: Until the 1960s, the 14th Amendment was never applied to undocumented or temporary immigrants, Eastman said.
The bottom line: If Trump follows through on the executive order, "the courts would have to weigh in in a way they haven't," Eastman said.
During an interview with Bob Woodward and Bob Costa in April 2016, candidate Donald Trump said when asked if he needed to tame the rage in the Republican Party:
"Yes, yes, but I bring that out in people. I do. I’m not saying that’s an asset or a liability, but I do bring that out. ...
I bring rage out. I do bring rage out. I always have."
CNN's Jake Tapper surfaced that quote yesterday during an interview with Woodward, who said:
"We know presidents have extraordinary power," Woodward continued. "He has probably more power than any president I've reported on, going back to Nixon. And he has seized it with the communication channel — with the tweeting, and the rallies and the press conferences."
"Until recent years, many Jews in America believed that the worst of anti-Semitism was over there, in Europe, a vestige of the old country," the N.Y. Times Laurie Goodstein writes in the paper's lead story:
"[I]t did not come out of nowhere, said experts in anti-Semitism":
"The Pentagon said it's sending 5,200 troops to the Southwest border in an extraordinary military operation ordered up just a week before midterm elections," per AP.
"The Radio Television Digital News Association is spreading safety and self-defense tips to journalists, most notably advising limits on the use of one-person news crews," AP's David Bauder reports:
"Caitlin Penna, a freelance photographer from Durham, North Carolina, said she constantly has her guard up on assignments. Even her conservative family is suspicious of her. 'I'm pretty sure my grandmother thinks I'm this far-left liberal because of the things I cover.'"
"A group of more than 200 engineers at Google are organizing a companywide 'women’s walk' walkout for [Thursday] to protest recent revelations about the search giant’s protection of employees that had allegedly engaged in sexual misconduct," BuzzFeed News' Caroline O'Donovan and Ryan Mac report:
Why it matters: "The walkout is the latest in a series of employee-led actions at Google, where frustration with management has been mounting in recent months."
The Athletic, a subscription-based digital sports media company, is raising $40 million in a series C funding round. With this investment, the company has raised a total of $70 million since its launch in 2016, and is valued at roughly $200 million, reports Axios' Sara Fischer.
Between the lines: Because The Athletic has journalists covering sports in 47 markets (up from 12 in January), it also competes for the attention of local sports fans.
Go deeper: Sara will have more details in her Media Trends newsletter today. Sign up here.
"Even a 10-Minute Walk May Be Good for the Brain," per the N.Y. Times' Gretchen Reynolds:
"The Simplest Way to Drastically Improve Your Life: More Sleep," per the N.Y. Times' Tim Herrera:
Starting today, Spotify users will receive a message in the app reminding them to vote next Tuesday — plus a link to a polling place locator (via Get to the Polls), and a custom playlist for each state or territory that highlights the music that’s uniquely popular there.
Here's a sneak peek at several of the playlists: