Today’s edition of quick hits:
* Minnesota: “A jury has acquitted a Minnesota police officer in the shooting death of a black man outside St. Paul last year, putting to end a tragic saga that began with a routine traffic stop.”
* Another step backwards: “The United States will tighten travel restrictions and block business with the [Cuba’s] military regime, President Donald Trump announced Friday.”
* Immigration: “The Trump administration has announced it will allow eligible young undocumented immigrants to remain in the U.S. and work, but did away with a program that would have let undocumented parents of U.S. citizens and legal resident children stay.”
* Afghanistan: “The Pentagon will send nearly 4,000 additional troops to Afghanistan in an effort to turn around a war that commanders have described as a stalemate, the Associated Press reported Thursday.”
* Trump World: “Members of President Trump’s transition team were ordered on Thursday to preserve documents and other materials related to the investigation of Russian interference in the presidential election, according to a memo obtained by The New York Times.”
* On a related note: “House Russia investigators are planning to call on Brad Parscale, the digital director of President Donald Trump’s campaign, as the congressional and federal probes dig into any possible connections between the Trump digital operation and Russian operatives, congressional sources said this week.” * Trump assumed he could get China’s Xi Jinping to do more on North Korea. Trump assumed wrong: “China has not significantly tightened the pressure on North Korea since Mr. Trump met with Mr. Xi in Palm Beach, Fla., in April. Its failure to do more has frustrated White House officials, who plan to raise the issue with their Chinese counterparts at a high-level meeting here on June 21.” * There’s a reason this topic is generating so much chatter: “Deputy White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Thursday said President Donald Trump has ‘no intention’ of firing former FBI head Robert Mueller as special counsel overseeing the federal probe into Russian election meddling. Speaking to reporters during an off-camera, unrecorded briefing, Sanders said Trump ‘has the right to’ fire Mueller as special counsel but ‘has no intention to do so.’” Anything to add? Consider this an open thread.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past." Recommended
