Former Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-Tex.) dropped out of the 2020 race for the Democratic presidential nomination on Friday.
The big picture: O'Rourke had once been the subject of buzz, with multiple polls showing him as a viable prospect for the Democrats in 2020. But as his campaign came to fruition, he failed to gain traction, and attempted to rebrand himself multiple times.
Sen. Kamala Harris' campaign is left with only a few staffers in New Hampshire after the majority of them were laid off, Jewish Insider first reported on Friday.
The big picture: Harris and other 2020 candidates facing cash crunches ultimately have two choices: Drop out or fire staff to reallocate money and keep their campaigns afloat.
President Trump on Friday nominated the chief medical officer of Houston's MD Anderson Cancer Center, Stephen Hahn, to be the FDA's next commissioner.
Catch up quick: HHS Secretary Alex Azar's top deputy, Brett Giroir, will oversee the FDA on an acting basis until Hahn is confirmed. Hahn has never worked in government before, per STAT News. The FDA is finalizing plans to ban most flavored e-cigarette cartridges from the market, Azar said in September, in an attempt to discourage youth vaping amid reports of vaping-related deaths and illnesses.
South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg made gains in Iowa, as former Vice President Joe Biden slipped in a New York Times/Siena College poll of voters likely to attend the state's caucuses. Sen. Elizabeth Warren leads the deadlocked pack, with Sen. Bernie Sanders coming in next.
Why it matters: "Buttigieg is aiming to peel away support from Mr. Biden by offering himself as the viable moderate alternative" to Warren and Sanders, the New York Times wrote last week. That effort appears to be working.
Julian Castro's campaign said Friday it reached a self-imposed $800,000 fundraising goal that will keep his bid for the 2020 Democratic nomination alive, NBC News reports.
Why it matters: "Castro did not have a stocked campaign chest to help boost his campaign when he launched," according to NBC News.
During the House's historic vote to set the ground rules for the impeachment of Donald J. Trump, members shouted and booed as the votes popped up in lights on the wall above them.
Why it matters: The Legislative Branch embarks on its ultimate weapon against the Executive Branch with the two parties locked in corners.
Andrew Yang will unveil a "New Way Forward" message when he joins other candidates onstage in Des Moines Friday night at the Iowa Democratic Party's Liberty & Justice dinner (formerly the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner).
Why it matters: Yang wants to set himself apart by discussing the root causes that led to President Trump, as a way to promote Yang's signature universal basic income for all American adults, which he calls the Freedom Dividend.
The leading white candidates in the Democratic presidential primary combined have nearly four times as much cash on hand as all five non-white candidates.
Why it matters: Some argue the country's racial wealth gap is underlying what we're seeing in the race for the White House — where a diverse field of Democratic candidates is trailing three white front-runners, and where Kamala Harris was forced to lay off dozens of her campaign staffers this week.
Televangelist Paula White, President Trump's personal pastor, will join the White House as a member of the Office of Public Liaison, a White House official told the New York Times.
The big picture: In 2020, Trump needs to secure the white evangelical voters that boosted his 2016 campaign. That demographic remains the only faith-based group with a majority that favors Trump, although evangelical leaders recently broke with the president over his decision to withdraw U.S. forces from northern Syria.
LONDON — Thursday was supposed to be Brexit Day — deal or no deal, "do or die" — but instead it’s the dawn of an election campaign that could determine whether Brexit happens at all, not to mention who’ll be leading the U.K. for the next five years.
The big picture: Still just three months in as prime minister, Boris Johnson is gambling everything for a parliamentary majority that will allow him to, per his constant refrain, “get Brexit done.” As he studies the electoral map, Johnson might see a path to victory that President Trump would recognize.
President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump changed their primary residence in September to Palm Beach, Fla., the New York Times reports.
Why it matters, per the NYT: "White House officials declined to say why Mr. Trump changed his primary residence, but a person close to the president said the reasons were primarily for tax purposes." That same person also reportedly told the Times that Trump was "infuriated" by a Manhattan lawsuit that sought the president’s tax returns. Since taking the oath of office, Trump has spent 99 days at Mar-a-Lago, as opposed to just 20 days at Trump Tower, per NBC News.
