Axios

President Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden, the presumptive contenders for the 2020 presidential election, responded Thursday to a cellphone video that appears to show Ahmaud Arbery being shot and killed on February 23.

What's happening: The death of Arbery, a 25-year-old black man fatally shot by a white father and son, is under investigation by Georgia officials. The men who pursued Arbery were arrested on murder charges Thursday evening, several months after the event took place. They told police they suspected Arbery committed a burglary before pursuing him.

Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, is among 27 federal employees nominated for recognition of their work through Samuel J. Heyman Service to America medals.

Why it matters: "If this pandemic has taught us anything, and I hope it's taught us a lot, but if it's taught us anything, it's that government matters. The federal government matters. Expertise matters. Service matters. Experience matters," CNN's Anderson Cooper said in a live Axios Event on Thursday, before introducing the finalists.

Author Michael Lewis knocked libertarians for their silence in the face of the coronavirus pandemic on Thursday, in an interview with CNN's Anderson Cooper at an Axios virtual event.

What he's saying: "This isn't gonna last two weeks. We're going to be living with this for a long time ... You're not hearing a lot from libertarians. Where's the Heritage Foundation, you know? They're all under a rock right now. Big corporations asking for the government to save them. All that noise has gone away."

Sen. Susan Collins took issue Thursday with Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's decision not to accept the White House's speedy coronavirus tests, worrying in a private lunch with GOP colleagues that untested senators could become "super-spreaders" when they return to their home states.

Driving the news: The pushback was part of a broader airing of concerns in today's Republican Senate lunch, in which McConnell defended the political necessity of his move, according to several people familiar with the discussions.

House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) said he plans to schedule a hearing with Attorney General Bill Barr "as soon as possible" in light of the Justice Department's move on Thursday to drop its prosecution of former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

Driving the news: The DOJ's motion to dismiss charges against Flynn, who pleaded guilty in the Mueller investigation in 2017 to lying to FBI agents, was signed by U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Timothy Shea, described by Fox News as Barr's "right-hand man."

Tara Reade, a former Senate staffer who has accused Joe Biden of sexually assaulting her in 1993, called on the presumptive Democratic nominee to "step forward and be held accountable" in an excerpt of an interview with Megyn Kelly.

Why it matters: This is Reade's first on-camera interview since Biden unequivocally denied the allegations on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" last week. Top Democrats have since said they stand behind Biden.

Former acting FBI director Andrew McCabe released a blistering statement on Thursday criticizing the Justice Department's decision to drop charges against former national security adviser Michael Flynn as "pure politics designed to please the president."

The big picture: The Justice Department claimed that the interview in which Flynn lied to the FBI "was untethered to, and unjustified by, the FBI’s counterintelligence investigation into Mr. Flynn." McCabe rebukes this assessment as "patently false," arguing that Flynn's high-level Russian contacts posed a "considerable national security risk."

The Justice Department moved Thursday to drop its prosecution of former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who pleaded guilty in the Mueller investigation in 2017 to lying to FBI agents about his conversations with the former Russian ambassador.

Why it matters: The politically explosive decision follows accusations by Flynn's attorneys and conservative media that prosecutors entrapped the former top Trump aide into lying. The case had become part of a broader campaign by the president and his allies to discredit the Russia investigation, which consumed the first two years of the Trump presidency.

California projects it will face a $54.3 billion deficit as a result of the economic damage caused by the coronavirus, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration announced Thursday.

Why it matters: It's a sign of the massive economic devastation caused by the coronavirus and the stay-at-home orders that have followed, especially when compared to the $21 billion surplus that California ran a year ago, per CNBC.

The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court Thursday to temporarily block an appellate ruling that would force the Justice Department to give Congress some secret grand jury material from the Mueller investigation, the Washington Post reports.

Why it matters: Even though President Trump was acquitted by the Senate in February for allegedly trying to pressure Ukraine to investigate his political rivals, House Democrats have said that grand jury material could help them determine if Trump obstructed the Mueller investigation, possibly requiring new articles of impeachment.

Editor's note: After this story was published, the Justice Department revealed it was dropping its prosecution of Michael Flynn. Read the full story here.

Brandon Van Grack, a former member of special counsel Robert Mueller's team, moved to withdraw from the Justice Department's prosecution of former national security adviser Michael Flynn on Thursday. He did not provide a reason for his withdrawal.

Why it matters: Van Grack leads a team that has been accused by Flynn's attorneys of prosecutorial misconduct. New FBI documents stemming from Flynn's move to withdraw his 2017 guilty plea have amplified conservative claims that prosecutors sought to entrap the former top Trump aide into lying about his conversations with the former Russian ambassador.

The Republican National Convention announced on Thursday that Dr. Jeffrey Runge will be joining its planning team as a senior adviser for health and safety planning.

Why it matters: Democratic and Republican party leaders have insisted that they plan to move forward with their in-person conventions in August, despite the threat of the coronavirus. The RNC expects to draw around 50,000 people to its convention in Charlotte, N.C., making it a potential petri dish for the spread of the virus.

Police departments throughout the U.S. have seen crime rates fall since the coronavirus pandemic, but shootings in some cities have surged despite stay-at-home orders.

Why it matters: Before the pandemic, mass shootings — when four or more people are injured — drove the national conversation on gun violence. But while shootings at schools or crowded places snagged the headlines, victims were in their homes 61% of the time when gunfire erupted.

The White House confirmed on Thursday that a member of the U.S. Navy who serves as one of President Trump's personal valets has tested positive for coronavirus, CNN reports.

Why it matters: Trump and Vice President Mike Pence both tested negative after being told about their potential exposure, but the episode illustrates how close the virus can get to the president even with precautions in place.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) announced a new "China Task Force" on Thursday that will work to develop legislative policies to curtail Chinese influence.

Why it matters: The global coronavirus pandemic has made it more apparent "for the need for a national strategy to deal with China, McCarthy said. The committee of 15 Republicans was originally supposed to include Democrats, but the party reportedly withdrew without explanation in February.

The White House coronavirus task force asked the CDC to revise a 17-page report that detailed specific guidelines for how local leaders should begin reopening cities and businesses, but never received a revised copy, sources familiar with the documents tell Axios.

The state of play: The guidelines — which a task force official says were never cleared by CDC leadership — are now being tabled for the foreseeable future.

The Supreme Court on Thursday overturned a pair of public corruption convictions in connection with the 2013 New Jersey "Bridgegate" scandal.

The big picture: In a unanimous ruling, the court found that former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie allies Bridget Anne Kelly and Bill Baroni did not commit federal fraud by closing off two lanes to the George Washington Bridge for three days in September 2013 to punish the mayor of Fort Lee, N.J. for refusing to back Christie’s 2013 reelection effort.

Lis Smith, Pete Buttigieg's former campaign spokesperson, argued in a New York Times op-ed published Thursday that Joe Biden's move to virtual campaigning amid the coronavirus crisis could lead to "the death of the traditional presidential campaign."

What she's saying: Smith argues that Biden, at age 77, "can become the hottest bad boy and disrupter in the media game" by becoming "digitally omnipresent." That move, "at a small fraction of the cost and physical toll" of a normal campaign, could "create a new paradigm for how presidential campaigns communicate in the press for years to come."

Democrats smell blood and have momentum in this year's Senate and House races, Doug Sosnik, a former White House political director for President Clinton, writes in the latest of his popular "big thinks" political decks.

The big picture: Since President Trump's election, Republicans have lost 42 House seats (and control of the House), 10 governorships, and well over 450 state legislative seats. Democrats have taken full control of government in 10 states.

In Georgia, the parents of a black man slain by two white men armed with guns called for immediate arrests yesterday as they faced the prospect of waiting a month or longer before a grand jury considers charges, the AP reports.

The state of play: The mother of 25-year-old Ahmaud Arbery, Wanda Cooper Jones, told reporters her son "was just out for his daily jog."

The whistleblower complaint filed by former Health and Human Services official Rick Bright includes email chains that illuminate the administration's push to use chloroquine — an unproven drug that President Trump has repeatedly touted.

The state of play: In a March 17 email, HHS official Joe Hamel described chloroquine as "not a blockbuster drug for this fight, but a good drug."

New York state's Democratic presidential primary will again be held on June 23, after a federal district judge reinstated the contest on Tuesday.

The latest: New York Attorney General Letita James requested that Manhattan's federal appeals court review the judge's order on Wednesday, Bloomberg reports.

Louis DeJoy, a fundraiser for the Republican National Committee and President Trump, will begin serving as the new postmaster general on June 15, the Postal Services' Board of Governors confirmed to the Washington Post on Wednesday.

The big picture: Some Trump administration officials see USPS' struggle for survival amid the coronavirus as an opportunity for reform or even privatization, Axios' Alayna Treene and Kia Kokalitcheva reported last month.