WTF Just Happened Today

Tuesday, May 21, 2019

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1/ Former White House counsel Don McGahn failed to appear at hearing in front of the House Judiciary Committee, following Trump's instructions to ignore the congressional subpoena. "Our subpoenas are not optional," Committee chair Jerry Nadler said after McGahn failed to show up. Nadler also warned that "one way or another," the panel will hear from McGahn, even if that means holding McGahn in contempt of Congress for failing to appear. "This committee," he said, "will have no choice but to enforce the subpoena against him." (Associated Press)

2/ A federal judge ruled that Trump's accounting firm must turn over his financial records to Congress. Judge Amit Mehta ruled that the accounting firm, Mazars, must comply with the subpoena issued by the House Oversight Committee. Trump had sued to quash the subpoena, arguing that Congress had no legitimate legislative reason to request the documents, but Judge Mehta said that they do. "It is simply not fathomable," Mehta wrote, "that a Constitution that grants Congress the power to remove a President for reasons including criminal behavior would deny Congress the power to investigate him for unlawful conduct — past or present — even without formally opening an impeachment inquiry." Trump has vowed to appeal Mehta's ruling. (NPR / Washington Post / The Guardian / New York Times / CNN)

3/ Michael Cohen told lawmakers earlier this year that one of Trump's personal attorneys told him to lie to Congress about the Trump Tower Moscow deal and suggested he might be pardoned if he helped "shut down" the Russia investigation. Cohen claimed that Jay Sekulow asked him to tell Congress that the Trump Tower Moscow negotiations ended on Jan. 31, 2016 — nearly six months before they actually ended — according to transcripts from Cohen's two private interviews with lawmakers, which were released yesterday. Cohen also said Sekulow told him that Trump was considering pardons for Cohen and others who "shut down, you know, this investigation." (Politico / Washington Post)

4/ 'Fox & Friends' host Pete Hegseth has been privately lobbying Trump for months to convince him to pardon convicted and accused war criminals. Hegseth has repeatedly lobbied Trump since as early as January and pressed him in multiple private conversations to support pardons for, among others, accused war criminal and former Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher. Gallagher will stand trial on May 28 for allegedly shooting civilians, including a school-aged girl, and knifing a captured ISIS fighter to death while the fighter was receiving medical treatment in 2007 at a facility in Iraq. (Daily Beast...

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