Today’s edition of quick hits.
* The expected plea: “James Comey pleaded not guilty Wednesday to criminal charges that were demanded by President Donald Trump and secured by one of his former personal lawyers, who has never prosecuted a case before.”
* Challenging diplomacy: “President Trump said negotiations over a cease-fire in Gaza and the release of hostages being held there is ‘going very well.’ … ‘I may go there,’ he said, first suggesting a trip on Sunday and later adding perhaps it could be on Saturday evening.”
* We knew this was coming, but that doesn’t make the news any better: “Some 500 National Guard members have arrived in the Chicago area and are mobilized for an initial period of 60 days, despite an ongoing lawsuit challenging their deployment there, according to a statement Wednesday morning from U.S. Northern Command, a part of the Defense Department.”
* Hmm: “The Pentagon has to provide The New York Times information about Elon Musk’s security clearances, a federal judge ruled Wednesday — and the billionaire’s own posting habits helped decide the case.”
* It’s quite a team: “The Justice Department on Tuesday appointed as the new head of its immigration court system a retired Marine Corps colonel who was fired from a command position as head of security at Marine Base Quantico for negligently firing a gun into the floor of his office.” * Herschel Walker and Sergio Gor were part of this group: “Senate Republicans confirmed more than 100 nominees Tuesday evening, largely clearing the backlog of President Donald Trump’s picks who have been awaiting a floor vote. The party-line vote comes after Senate Republicans changed the rules last month to allow most executive branch nominees to be confirmed as a group, whereas lawmakers previously had to hold a vote on each one. The change does not include Cabinet picks or judges.” * A gut-wrenching report: Mohammed Taher clutched the lifeless body of his 2-year-old son and wept. Ever since his family’s food rations stopped arriving at their internment camp in Myanmar in April, the father had watched helplessly as his once-vibrant baby boy weakened, suffering from diarrhea and begging for food. On May 21, exactly two weeks after Taher’s little boy died, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio sat before Congress and declared: ‘No one has died’ because of his government’s decision to gut its foreign aid program. … That, Taher says, ‘is a lie.’” See you tomorrow.
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."
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