Michael Flynn is out of legal limbo and back in the Trump administration's good graces, a dramatic change from the 2017 days of getting fired for lying to Mike Pence and twice pleading guilty to charges from the Mueller investigation.
Why it matters: Trump's allies view Attorney General Bill Barr's move to withdraw charges against Flynn as the first major step in exposing the Russia investigation as a political hit job. Democrats, most notably Barack Obama, fear Barr is weaponizing the Justice Department ahead of an election.
Aimee Stephens, a plaintiff in one of the first Supreme Court cases to address the civil rights of transgender people, died of health complications Tuesday in Detroit at age 59, the ACLU said in a statement.
The big picture: Stephens' case against her former employer, a Detroit funeral home owner who testified that she was fired for dressing as a woman, comes in the wake of a larger fight in the U.S. over employment protections for LGBTQ people.
The federal government reached a record monthly deficit of $737.9 billion in April, the Treasury Department said Tuesday.
The big picture: April is traditionally a month of budget surpluses, with tax filings rolling in, but the coronavirus pandemic instead widened the gap last month. The previous record monthly deficit was $235 billion.
Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) criticized the Trump administration's coronavirus testing coordinator Adm. Brett Giroir at a Senate hearing Tuesday, accusing him of framing U.S. testing data in a politically positive light: "I find our testing record nothing to celebrate whatsoever."
The big picture: At a press briefing Monday, President Trump and Giroir touted the fact that the U.S. has now conducted more tests per capita than South Korea. But Romney argued those claims are misleading because South Korea conducted tests much earlier on and no longer needs to test as many people as their case numbers fall.
After more than three hours of oral arguments Tuesday morning, the Supreme Court seems unlikely to grant President Trump the sweeping total immunity he has asked for while fighting subpoenas for his taxes and other financial records.
Why it matters: The Supreme Court seems likely to raise the bar that both Congress and local prosecutors would have to meet before they can obtain Trump’s financial records — as the justices worried about exposing future presidents to fishing expeditions — and Congress may ultimately have a harder time meeting that standard.
House Democrats released Tuesday their phase 4 $3 trillion coronavirus relief proposal that would provide billions of additional aid to state and local governments, hospitals and other Democratic priorities.
The state of play: The 1,815-page HEROES Act, which the House is expected to consider on Friday, hasn't been negotiated with congressional Republicans and the Trump administration — and is expected to die in the Senate.
Senate Republicans are moving to swiftly confirm a conservative filmmaker to lead the independent agency in charge of Voice of America (VOA), the state-sponsored international news agency, per The New York Times.
Why it matters: The Trump administration has twice-nominated Michael Pack, but it's been held up in the Senate confirmation processes. Pack has received pushback from some Democrats for his ties to Steve Bannon.
Vice President Mike Pence, in an interview last week with "Axios on HBO," didn't embrace the routine wearing of face masks in the White House — even after two West Wing regulars tested positive for the coronavirus.
Why it matters: President Trump makes a point of not wearing a mask, and Pence, with the exception of an Indiana trip, has mostly followed suit — even as the White House recommends them for other Americans.
More than 2,100 incidents of assault, vandalism and harassment against members of the American Jewish community took place in 2019, the highest level recorded since tracking began in 1979, according an Anti-Defamation League report released Tuesday.
The state of play: There were recorded incidents in every state in the continental U.S. —and more than half of the assaults nationwide occurred in the five boroughs of New York City.
The Federal Reserve's unprecedented response to the coronavirus pandemic has not helped it win the battle for public opinion as a little more than half of Americans indicate they don't trust the central bank, per the latest Axios-Ipsos Coronavirus Index.
Why it matters: As an unelected institution that has been granted the power to independently oversee monetary policy by Congress, the Fed's power "is contingent on securing as well as maintaining broad political and public support," Mark Spindel and Sarah Binder wrote in their 2017 book "The Myth of Independence: How Congress Governs the Federal Reserve."
Dr. Anthony Fauci's goal for his testimony on the Hill today — to warn the country of the dangers of reopening too quickly — precisely undercuts what President Trump and the White House are trying to achieve this week.
The state of play: Trump and his team built its messaging this week around convincing Americans that they had enough testing and personal protective equipment to begin to safely return to work — and Trump has been publicly chiding blue-state governors for keeping their states closed longer than he'd like.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said during an online Trump campaign event Monday former President Obama should have "kept his mouth shut" on President Trump's response to the coronavirus outbreak.
Why it matters: Obama has rarely commented on Trump since leaving office, but he has begun to speak out on the president and his administration's policies. McConnell noted former Presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush "kept their mouths shut" on successors because they deemed it inappropriate to comment on other presidents.
