President Trump surprised allies, adversaries, and even some advisers last Thursday when he said the U.S. would be pulling out of Syria “very soon.” The clearest indications of what happens next came in statements today from Press Secretary Sarah Sanders and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats.
The bottom line: Sanders confirmed that the Trump administration is taking the idea of pulling out of Syria seriously — but said the anti-ISIS fight isn't finished yet, and there are no immediate plans to withdraw. That shows "the president’s top military advisers ... have succeeded — at least for now — in persuading an impatient commander in chief not to order a quick withdrawal," per the NY Times.
Seoul-born Wendy Hui Kyong Chun, a professor at Brown University known for her work on fake news, is moving to Canada. So is Alan Aspuru-Guzik, a Harvard chemistry professor working on quantum computing and artificial intelligence.
What's going on: They are among 24 top academic minds around the world wooed to Canada by an aggressive recruitment effort offering ultra-attractive sinecures, seven-year funding arrangements — and, Chun and Aspuru-Guzik said in separate interviews with Axios, a different political environment from the U.S.
White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said Wednesday the "military mission to eradicate ISIS in Syria is coming to a rapid end, with ISIS being almost completely destroyed." An announcement on America's future military involvement in Syria will be made “relatively soon,” Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said, per the AP.
The big picture: If the U.S. pulls out, it would likely be a gift to Iran, Syria, and Russia, which have been backing Syria’s Bashar al-Assad. It would also raise security concerns for Israel, which has called for stronger action to counter Iran’s presence and influence in Syria.
H-1B high skilled visas — the most popular U.S. temporary work visa — are often associated with high level jobs in Silicon Valley tech companies. But College Station, Texas has the highest number of H-1B visa approvals per 100 workers over the past few years, according to a new study by the Pew Research Center of data obtained through the Freedom of Information Act.
Between the lines: Companies located on the East Coast of the U.S. and in Texas actually use the H-1B visas far more than Silicon Valley companies. The large IT company Cognizant is located in College Station, and it files the ninth largest number of Labor Condition Applications (LCA), which are required when hiring workers on an H-1B visa.
The Congressional Leadership Fund, a conservative super PAC linked to House Speaker Paul Ryan, announced Wednesday that they raised $15 million in the the first quarter of 2018 — a record for the PAC and up from the $1.3 million raised in Q1 of 2016, the previous election year.
State of play: Courtney Alexander, communications director of CLF and American Action Network, another conservative group tied to Ryan, told Axios that the group plans to place a high priority on raising money early on rather than waiting to raise and spend toward the end of the cycle. The aggressive approach so early on in the election cycle shows how competitive conservative groups expect the midterm elections to be and offers an inside look at how they plan to defend the Republican majority.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller said he's preparing a report regarding the president’s actions while in office and potential obstruction of justice, the Washington Post reports, citing two people with knowledge of the conversations.
That’s not all: The Post reports that the Special Counsel told Donald Trump’s attorneys in March the president is not a criminal target in his investigstion, but that the ongoing probe in to Russian interference in the 2016 election will continue.
During a joint press conference with leaders of the Baltic States, President Trump said the U.S. military coalition has "almost completed" the task of getting rid of ISIS in Syria, and that the administration will soon be making a decision on when to pull U.S. troops out of the region.
Quick take: This is along the same line of thinking the president expressed last week when he said "let other people take care of [the ISIS situation in Syria] now."
President Donald Trump said that he wants to send military troops to defend the southern border with Mexico until a wall is built. His comments came during a meeting with the leaders of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania at the White House on Tuesday.
We are going to be guarding our border with our military. That's a big step ... We cannot have people flowing into our country illegally, disappearing and, by the way, never showing up for court.
A group of 17 blue states and 6 cities filed a lawsuit against the Department of Commerce today, alleging that the inclusion of a citizenship question in the 2020 Census will "significantly [deter] participation in immigrant communities, because of concerns about how the federal government will use citizenship information."
Who they are: Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, and Washington — along with the District of Columbia; the cities of Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, Providence, Seattle and San Francisco; and the United States Conference of Mayors. California has already filed a similar lawsuit against the administration.
Aftab Pureval, the Democrat challenging Rep. Steve Chabot for his U.S. House seat in Ohio's 1st congressional district, has raised $660,000 in the eight weeks since announcing his candidacy. Pureval, a first-generation American and lawyer-turned-politician, was elected in 2016 as the Clerk of Courts in Ohio's Hamilton County — the first Democrat elected to that position in 100 years in the district.
Why it matters: Pureval's team said that these fundraising totals are more than any Democratic challenger has raised in a single quarter against Chabot, who has held the seat since it was redistricted in 2010. Most importantly, the numbers show nearly 80% of the money is coming from voters in and around the district, suggesting enthusiasm from Pureval's constituents. Well-funded Democrats, like Paul Ryan challenger Randy Bryce and Georgia's Jon Ossoff, often see the bulk of their cash come from big blue states like New York and California.
President Trump created a new nickname for his predecessor in a Tuesday morning tweet: "Cheatin' Obama."
Flashback: Trump was part of the "birther" movement against Obama, which claimed that the former president was actually born in Kenya and his birth certificate was forged. The New York Times reported that Trump was still raising that conspiracy theory as recently as November.
President Trump and his personal attorney Michael Cohen filed papers in a federal court in Los Angeles Monday asking a federal judge to order that Stormy Daniels' lawsuit, which claims a non-disclosure agreement is invalid, be heard by a private arbitrator instead of in front of a jury.
What they're saying: In the court filing, Cohen argues that Daniels had never brought up any issues with the NDA or settlement agreement before filing her suit last month. But her lawyer, Michael Avenatti wrote on Twitter that they will "vigorously oppose" the motion, which he suggested is an effort to keep the case "hidden from the American public."
Jill McCabe, an emergency room pediatrician and the wife of fired FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe, opened up about how the president's "attacks" on both her and her husband created a nightmare for her family, in a new Washington Post op-ed.
"[My previous decision to enter politics] — plus some twisted reporting and presidential tweets — ended up costing my husband, Andrew, his job and our family a significant portion of his pension my husband had worked hard for over 21 years of federal service ... For the past year and a half of this nightmare, I have not been free to speak out about what happened. Now that Andrew has been fired, I am."
