Axios

Steve Mnunchin ran OneWest Bank from 2009 through 2015 and presided over tens of thousands of foreclosures in California. According to documents uncovered by David Dayne at the Intercept, California's then-Attorney General, and now U.S. Senator, Kamala Harris, didn't bring civil action against the bank despite evidence of misconduct found by her deputies.

The Intercept doesn't say why Harris didn't bring a case against the bank; maybe she thought it would be too hard, or it wasn't a priority. "Or maybe it was something else."

This "something else" is what the Intercept is really getting at. It insinuates that Harris and her deputies were swayed by powerful interests. It points out that Supervising Deputy Attorney General Benjamin Diehl left Harris' office in November 2013 "to join Stroock Stroock & Lavan, a corporate law firm that represents Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, and Citigroup in cases against consumers, regulatory agencies and state attorneys general."

What it means: The Intercept—which is a platform for far-left critics of the Democratic Party—continues to suggest that top Dems are corrupt puppets of moneyed interests. About Harris, it mentions she was a "prodigious" fundraiser who took money from George Soros (who invested in OneWest Bank). Democrats should not assume the election of Donald Trump will cause these kinds of pressures to ease.

But will be smarter about it next time.

What we're hearing: A top House Republican aide says haste was the cause of the "ridiculous, tone-deaf unforced error" when the GOP attempted in trying to cripple the Office of Congressional Ethics. Democrats in the Congressional Black Caucus also hate the OCE, seen by members as a "black hole."

That same Republican aide says:

We needed to build bridges to the other side.

The GOP will now quietly do precisely that — and revisit the issue later, with Trump and Democrats onboard.

Why it matters: Trump's tweet lambasting the original vote made it clear to members that they had handed the president-elect a club he could use any time they tried to buck him. But members recognize that folding in the face of the tweet makes them look weaker and him stronger as they begin their messy marriage.