Axios

Check the photos above: The one with the pink sign was taken less than a month ago. The one with the black sign was taken last Thursday and given to us by the anti-abortion activist who met privately with West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin. Together, these pictures reflect the tightrope Manchin is walking as a Democratic Senator in a deep red state, who says he's personally anti-abortion but has voted both for and against defunding Planned Parenthood.

The Canadian National Post cites multiple government sources in saying White House staff reached out to the Canadian Prime Minister's office to get Justin Trudeau to call Trump and lobby for NAFTA in what the paper calls with some understatement an "unconventional diplomatic manoeuvre."

Why it matters: Trump decided against scrapping NAFTA after talking to the leaders of Mexico and Canada. That Trump officials put together the Canadian call, as the Post puts it, "highlights the difficulties faced by governments all over the world when it comes to dealing with a president as volatile as Trump."

Former deputy attorney general Sally Yates and former DNI James Clapper are testifying before a Senate subcommittee about Russian interference in last fall's presidential election.

The big thing: Yates confirmed that she had warned the White House counsel in January that Michael Flynn misled officials about his discussions with the Russian ambassador to the United States, in part out of fear that Flynn would be blackmailed by Russia.

• On Flynn: Yates said Flynn's conduct was "problematic," as was the fact that Mike Pence was unwittingly misleading the American people. She said she wanted to give the White House the opportunity to "take action."
• On leaking: Yates and Clapper both stated that they had never been an anonymous source to a reporter — and that they had not been questioned by the FBI regarding leaks.
• On not defending Trump's travel ban: "All arguments have to be based on truth. We're the Department of Justice, not a law firm...it was unlawful." She says despite being acting A.G. she learned of the order through media reports.

Yates' reasoning for telling the White House about Flynn:

"The underlying conduct that Gen. Flynn had engaged in was problematic in and of itself.""We felt that the Vice President and others were entitled to know that the information they were conveying to the American people was untrue.""We were concerned that the American people had been misled about the underlying conduct and what Gen. Flynn had done.""The Russians also knew what Gen. Flynn had done and that Gen. Flynn had misled the Vice President and others…that created a compromise situation — a situation where the national security advisor essentially could be blackmailed by the Russians."More live updates:

• Compartmentalized investigation: Clapper said in his opening statement that he was not aware of the FBI's investigation into Trump campaign associates' possible links to Russia until James Comey confirmed its existence to the House Intel Committee in March.
• A question from WH for Yates: "What does it matter if one White House official lies to another?"
• Yates sums it up: "Logic would tell you that you don't want the national security advisor to be in a situation where the Russians have leverage over him."
• Yates says she was not aware of any efforts by the White House to restrict Flynn's access to classified information.
• Changing the topic: Ted Cruz focused his questioning on everything from Hillary Clinton's emails to Yates' refusal to defend Trump's travel ban.

For new readers: Check out our newsletters, including Axios AM.

Spicer said the warning Barack Obama gave President Trump about Michael Flynn did not give Trump any pause, and said any blame for flawed vetting should fall on the Obama administration.

• On Obama and Flynn: "It's true that President Obama made it known that he wasn't exactly a fan of General Flynn's, which shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone...if they were concerned why didn't they take any steps" to take away his security clearance?
• Was Trump suggesting that Sally Yates leaked classified info? "I think the tweet speaks for itself."
• Trump-Macron phone call: Spicer announced Trump spoke with incoming French President Emmanuel Macron over the phone.
• On the American citizen detained in North Korea: "We're going to work through Sweden that has an Embassy in North Korea."

With Dems fired up by the messy process and result of the House health care fight, everything on President Trump's agenda is likely to take longer than strategists had planned.

On the eve of Sally Yates' testimony before the Senate on her warnings about Mike Flynn, the President wants any of his staff who've been feeding negative lines about Flynn to the media to stop immediately.

White House officials have been eager to throw the former national security advisor under the bus, but a source familiar with the President's thinking says he still thinks highly of Flynn and has never authorized any of his staff to undermine the retired general. Trump still defends his former national security advisor and wasn't happy to see an Axios story Sunday afternoon saying administration officials have been attacking Flynn to reporters.

Thanks to a leaky administration, everyone gets an inside look at how the Trump White House operates. Aides often leak stories about the difficulty of managing Trump — as if they were his babysitters. Here are some of the clearest examples, sourced from Axios, the New York Times, the Washington Post and Politico.