Kansas and South Carolina's Republican parties shuttered their 2020 presidential primaries on Friday and Saturday, respectively, the AP reports.
The big picture, via Axios' White House editor Margaret Talev: Early on, President Trump's campaign team studied the patterns of past presidents who lost re-election and sought to avoid their mistakes. Trump is using the tools he has now to minimize primary challenges so that he can save his money and energy to focus on the general election.
She has yet to endorse a 2020 presidential contender, but Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) has offered her take on a handful of candidacies and worked with several White House hopefuls on legislation.
Why it matters: Since her improbable 2018 win over Rep. Joe Crowley, at the time the No. 4 House Democrat, Ocasio-Cortez has become a household name. The freshman lawmaker has 5.5 million Twitter followers, giving her commentary influence. Her district is 49% Hispanic and heavily Democratic. However, many consider her, as a democratic socialist, the face of the far-left. Just how desirable her favor would be to more moderate candidates is unclear.
House Judiciary Chair Jerry Nadler is expected to schedule a vote on Wednesday to authorize ground rules for launching impeachment proceedings against President Trump, 2 committee aides tell Axios' Alayna Treene.
Why it matters: The vote, details of which CNN first reported on Saturday, will be on a resolution to determine guidelines for how House Democrats can move forward with formalizing its ongoing impeachment inquiry. Notably, the resolution will allow witnesses to be questioned by committee staff counsels, CNN reports.
Several federal efforts to combat human trafficking in the U.S. have slowed under the Trump administration, according to government data and human trafficking advocates.
Why it matters: There are thousands of trafficking victims in the U.S. — including children trafficked into prostitution as well as agricultural and domestic workers who are paid little or nothing. But the Trump administration has cut back on prosecutions of these crimes and assistance to victims.
President Trump is pulling out all the stops to shut down an effort by California to enlist automakers on a plan that would undermine his administration’s effort to roll back strict Obama-era carbon emissions and mileage mandates.
Where it stands: The Justice Department is seeking to determine if Ford, VW, Honda and BMW "violated federal competition law by agreeing with each other to follow tailpipe-emissions standards beyond those proposed by the Trump administration," WSJ reports.
The Trump administration is planning to allow immigration officials to take as long as needed to approve work permits for asylum seekers by throwing out the current 30-day processing deadline, according to the proposed regulation released on Friday.
Why it matters: The rule could prevent some asylum seekers, awaiting a decision on their asylum claims in the U.S., from legally working for a long period of time. They are already forced to wait 180 days before they are eligible for a work permit. Asylum cases often take years due to immigration court backlogs.
Former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz, who put his independent presidential exploration on hold in June, will tell supporters later this morning that he's abandoning his campaign but still plans to spend big "to fix our broken system."
Why it matters: Schultz — a billionaire who planned to spend north of $100 million on 2020 — now will direct that same amount, over a longer time, toward innovative efforts to reduce inequality and promote political reform.
