Hillary Clinton said on David Plouffe's podcast "Campaign HQ" this week that Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) is Russia's "favorite" 2020 candidate and said the country could be "grooming" her to become a third-party candidate.
"I'm not making any predictions, but I think they've got their eye on somebody who is currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate. She's the favorite of the Russians."
President Trump's 2020 campaign says it's releasing a line of merchandise featuring a new slogan: "Get over it."
Context: The line comes from Trump Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, who declared in a press conference yesterday that Michael McKinley, a longtime diplomat who resigned over political interference in foreign policy, should "get over it."
Former Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) told CNN Friday that President Trump should be impeached after acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney said the Trump administration had frozen military aid as leverage to get Ukraine to investigate a conspiracy theory about a DNC server.
Rep. Francis Rooney (R-Fla.) said he doesn't believe acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney's attempt to backpedal his statement on Thursday that the White House withheld security aid to pressure Ukraine into investigating Democrats, Bloomberg reports.
The big picture: Rooney told Bloomberg the admission of quid-pro-quo "shocked" him and that he wants to "get to the facts and do the right thing." But Rooney was ambiguous on his stance on the impeachment investigation, according to Bloomberg, saying there's "a lot of water to flow down under the bridge."
The chairs of the legislative foreign affairs committees from the U.S. House of Representatives, the U.K., France, Germany and the European Parliament released a rare statement Friday condemning Turkey's invasion of Syria and the U.S. withdrawal that made it possible, per Sky News' Deborah Haynes.
What they're saying: The authors denounce Turkey's invasion as "a military aggression and a violation of international law" and say they "deeply regret the decision of the president of the United States to withdraw American troops." That move, they write, "marks another landmark in the change of American foreign policy in the Near and Middle East," adding that the ensuing Turkish offensive "may contribute to a resurgence of Islamic terrorism and undermines years of effort."
Mayor Pete Buttigieg is refunding a $5,600 donation from a former Chicago attorney who tried to block the release of a video showing a police officer fatally shooting 17-year-old Laquan McDonald.
Why it matters: The former city attorney, Steve Patton, was co-hosting a Buttigieg event, the Associated Press reported earlier today. After Axios reached out for comment, his campaign said Patton is no longer attending or co-hosting that event, which was scheduled for tonight, and he's refunding all donations previously received from Patton.
Former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis jokingly roasted President Trump on Thursday during a keynote address at New York's annual Alfred E. Smith dinner, saying he was "honored" to be called "the world's most overrated general" by the president earlier this week, the Washington Post reports.
"I'm honored to be considered that by Donald Trump because he also called Meryl Streep an overrated actress. So I guess I'm the Meryl Streep of generals, and frankly that sounds pretty good to me."
A top U.S. diplomat told the House committees investigating President Trump's dealings with Ukraine Tuesday that he raised concerns about Hunter Biden's board position at a Ukrainian gas company in 2015, but was brushed off by an aide to former Vice President Joe Biden, reports the Washington Post.
Why it matters: George Kent's testimony is "the first known example of a career diplomat who raised concerns internally in the Obama administration" about Hunter Biden's work, writes the Post.
While national support for an impeachment inquiry is growing, it's not a clear winner for Democrats in the most competitive House districts just yet.
That's according to an internal impeachment polling memo, obtained by Axios, that was sent to House Democrats Thursday night.
Why it matters: Their vulnerable members this cycle are the ones who helped the party win the House in 2018 because they were in districts that flipped from Republican or that Trump won in 2016. They're not in the clear yet, as an impeachment inquiry is only "slightly favorable 49-48," per Democrats' memo.
