CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) - U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin has fired back at President Donald Trump’s criticism of the West Virginia Democrat for voting guilty on two articles of impeachment. Manchin says he - not Trump - has fought tirelessly for his constituents.

Manchin issued the response Saturday night on Twitter, ...

U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin has fired back at President Donald Trump’s criticism of the West Virginia Democrat for voting guilty on two articles of impeachment. Manchin says he — not Trump — has fought tirelessly for his constituents. Manchin issued the response Saturday night on Twitter, a day after Trump tweeted that he was “very surprised & disappointed” with Manchin’s votes and claimed no president has done more for the state.

President Trump attacked Sen. Joe Manchin for denying him a Democratic vote for acquittal during his recent impeachment trial, firing off a tweet Sunday that appeared to question the West Virginian's reading comprehension.

Mr. Trump was reportedly hoping Mr. Manchin, who's cozied up to the White House at times, would ...

CONCORD, N.H. -- Through an impeachment trial, a Russia investigation, an Iran crisis and other daily turmoil, President Donald Trump has repeatedly been able to point to one consistent success that has united Republicans: moving conservative justices onto all levels of the federal judiciary.The count now stands at more than 180 judges -- many of whom are endorsed by the conservative legal group The Federalist Society. About 50 of the judges sit on the nation's appeals courts. (By comparison, President Barack Obama appointed about that many circuit court judges during his entire eight-year term.)Trump's ability to push through judges has been possible in large part because of the success that Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, has had in holding open seats during the Obama administration and pushing nominees through after Trump took office.On Saturday, eight of the presidential candidates still in the Democratic primary race took turns outlining their views on the federal judiciary; they argued about how and whether they would work with Republicans, if elected, and how they would protect reproductive rights and other Democratic priorities.But for all of the focus on the critical importance of the courts, the candidates recognized the limits of what even a Democratic president could do if Republicans and McConnell remained in control of the Senate."The best solution to the Senate is to make sure that in 2021, Mitch McConnell is no longer in the majority or preferably not in the Senate at all," former Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Indiana, told the gathering Saturday. He added, "This is our chance. This is our only chance."Why the Stakes Are High"We are going to be, I think, just about No. 1 by the time we finish -- No. 1 of any president, any administration," Trump bragged in November, releasing a fact sheet about his success in confirming judicial nominees.As a result, Democrats fear reversals on a wide array of labor law, civil rights and environmental cases as the courts move steadily to the right. Perhaps no issue has garnered more attention than reproductive rights, in which Democrats fear a conservative-leaning Supreme Court can significantly restrict or even remove the constitutional right to abortion."We have courts that are completely out of balance that have been taken over by activist judges who certainly, absolutely want to end Roe and criminalize abortion," said Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, which co-sponsored the forum Saturday. "But abortion is always the tip of the spear on human rights."Counterbalancing Trump's WorkAt the event Saturday, Democratic candidates largely were unified in their pledge to try to balance Trump's judicial appointments with ones of their own. Several candidates, including Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, said they would be in favor of creating their own lists of qualified justices whom they would be ready to push forward on the first day of their administrations."Let's give Trump and Mitch McConnell some credit," Sanders said. "They were well organized; they knew what they were doing. As a member of the Senate, I can tell you, you know what we do every day? We vote for right-wing, extremist judges."As Tom Steyer, the former hedge fund executive, put it, "Someone's got a steamroller. And they're going right over us."Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts attacked the qualifications of the judges appointed by Trump, calling them "beyond unqualified" and arguing that they would not have been acceptable in previous presidential administrations.Asked by a moderator whether she would seek to appoint young progressive justices to the court to balance conservative appointments by Trump, she said she would."I want judges who believe in democracy, who believe in justice, who believe in the rights of individuals," she said, "because that is the job of a justice."How to Work (or Avoid Working With) RepublicansThe Democratic candidates were repeatedly pressed by moderators to explain how they planned to make any changes to the courts or to enshrine threatened civil rights legislation into law if the Senate remained controlled by Republicans.The most common answer involved winning elections. "If we don't change Congress, we're screwed," Buttigieg said."Power is the only language the Senate GOP responds to right now," he said. "Our party's sense of fair play has come back to bite us."Klobuchar argued that her experience in the Senate had given her insight into how to work the levers of Congress and, if necessary, to conduct a pressure campaign to get judicial openings filled with candidates of her choosing."It's a game that's been going on," Klobuchar said. "You've got to be creative."Pledging to Protect Reproductive RightsAll of the candidates staunchly backed a woman's right to choose, and most pledged to do whatever they could to codify Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court case that established the constitutional right to abortion.Warren said that over the years, the rights afforded by the case had become narrower and narrower, "like we're standing on a ledge, and every couple of months, another rock sort of breaks loose and falls off." And she argued that simply seeking to protect reproductive rights through the courts was no longer sufficient."When you've got a tilted Supreme Court and a tilted court system, we've got to start putting a lot more emphasis on what we can do through Congress," she said. "In a democracy, when 3 out of 4 people want to see something be the law, then it's time for us to mobilize and make it the law."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company

WASHINGTON -- A handful of Republican senators tried to stop President Donald Trump from firing Gordon Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union who testified in the House impeachment hearings, but the president relieved the diplomat of his post anyway, according to people briefed on the discussions.The senators were concerned that it would look bad for Trump to dismiss Sondland and argued that it was unnecessary, since the ambassador was already talking with senior officials about leaving after the Senate trial, the people said. The senators told White House officials that Sondland should be allowed to depart on his own terms, which would have reduced any political backlash.But Trump evidently was not interested in a quiet departure, choosing instead to make a point by forcing Sondland out before the ambassador was ready to go. When State Department officials called Sondland on Friday to tell him that he had to resign that day, he resisted, saying that he did not want to be included in what seemed like a larger purge of impeachment witnesses, according to the people informed about the matter.Sondland conveyed to the State Department officials that if they wanted him gone that day, they would have to fire him. And so the president did, ordering the ambassador recalled from his post effective immediately. Sondland's dismissal was announced just hours after another impeachment witness, Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, and his twin brother, Lt. Col. Yevgeny Vindman, were marched out of the White House by security officers and told their services were no longer needed.The ousters came two days after the Republican-led Senate acquitted Trump on two articles of impeachment stemming from his effort to pressure Ukraine to incriminate Democratic rivals. Outraged Democrats called the firings a "Friday night massacre" aimed at taking revenge against government officials who had no choice but to testify under subpoena about what they knew.Among the Republicans who warned the White House was Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, who after voting to acquit Trump said she thought he had learned a lesson. Others included Sens. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Martha McSally of Arizona and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin. The White House did not respond to requests for comment Saturday but a senior administration official confirmed the senators' outreach.Collins said Saturday that her lesson comment had been misinterpreted. "The lesson that I hoped the president had learned was that he should not enlist the help of a foreign government in investigating a political rival," she said in a statement to The New York Times. "It had absolutely nothing to do with whether or not he should fire people who testified in a way that he perceived as harmful to him."The senators did not express the same concern about Vindman, who is viewed less sympathetically by the president's allies. Republicans considered some of Vindman's comments during his testimony overtly political and, in any case, believed it was untenable for him to remain on the staff of a president with whom he broke so publicly.Other witnesses who testified have quietly left government in recent days. Jennifer Williams, a career official working for Vice President Mike Pence, returned to the Defense Department. Marie Yovanovitch, the ambassador to Ukraine removed from her post last spring because she was seen as an obstacle to the president and his associates, retired from the foreign service. And her acting successor, William B. Taylor Jr., returned home as well.Some of these witnesses may begin to speak out. Taylor has given a series of news media interviews in recent days. And Yovanovitch has enlisted the Javelin literary agency, picking the same agents who represent John Bolton, the former national security adviser, among others.Trump on Saturday defended his decision to fire Vindman, calling the decorated Iraq War veteran "very insubordinate.""Fake News @CNN & MSDNC keep talking about 'Lt. Col.' Vindman as though I should think only how wonderful he was," Trump wrote on Twitter, without explaining why he put the colonel's rank in quote marks."Actually, I don't know him, never spoke to him, or met him (I don't believe!)," he continued, "but, he was very insubordinate, reported contents of my 'perfect' calls incorrectly, & was given a horrendous report by his superior, the man he reported to, who publicly stated that Vindman had problems with judgement, adhering to the chain of command and leaking information. In other words, 'OUT'."Trump offered no explanation for why Vindman's twin brother, Yevgeny Vindman, who is also an Army lieutenant colonel and who worked as a lawyer on the National Security Council staff, was fired and escorted out of the White House complex at the same time even though he did not participate in the House hearings. Nor did the president mention his decision to recall Sondland, a hotel magnate who donated $1 million to Trump's inaugural festivities before receiving his ambassadorial appointment.Sondland and Vindman were key witnesses in the House hearings. Sondland, who was deeply involved in the effort to pressure Ukraine, testified that "we followed the president's orders" and that "everyone was in the loop." Vindman, who was on Trump's July 25 phone call with Ukraine's president, testified that it was "improper for the president" to coerce a foreign country to investigate political opponents.Vindman, a Ukraine expert on the NSC staff, and his brother were scheduled to remain at the White House until July but will now be sent back to the Defense Department. Sondland, a political appointee, will return to the U.S. and presumably leave government service.A lawyer for Vindman said Trump's Twitter messages contained "obviously false statements" about his client."They conflict with the clear personnel record and the entirety of the impeachment record of which the president is well aware," said the lawyer, David Pressman. "While the most powerful man in the world continues his campaign of intimidation, while too many entrusted with political office continue to remain silent, Lt. Col. Vindman continues his service to our country as a decorated, active duty member of our military."Trump's tweets misstated or overstated testimony about Vindman. Tim Morrison, who supervised him at the NSC for just three months, told the House that he had concerns about Vindman's judgment and believed he did not always adhere to the chain of command. But when Morrison said he had originally heard such concerns from his predecessor, Fiona Hill, she disputed his account.Hill, who supervised Vindman for two years, testified that she had a much narrower concern that he did not have "the political antenna" to deal with matters related to domestic politics. "That does not mean in any way that I was questioning his overall judgment, nor was I questioning in any way his substantive expertise," she said. "He is excellent on issues related to Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova, on Russian defense issues."In fact, Vindman read from Hill's personnel evaluation at his own hearing: "Alex is a top 1% military officer and the best Army officer I have worked with in my 15 years of government service. He is brilliant, unflappable, and exercises excellent judgment."Democrats on Saturday denounced Trump's actions. "By firing Lt. Col. Vindman and Ambassador Sondland like this, the Trump administration signaled it won't tolerate people who tell the truth," said Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island. "The fact that Lt. Col. Vindman's brother was also removed from the NSC, as well as the transfer of Ms. Williams from Vice President Pence's staff, are signals that the president places blind loyalty above all else, including testimony under oath."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company

WAUKESHA, Wis. -- The moment President Donald Trump was acquitted in the Senate on Wednesday, Judy Ryan was licking a blueberry ice cream cone in the Brookfield Square shopping mall and feeling happy.Ryan, 74, a retired factory worker, had followed the impeachment trial almost every day. The more Democrats attacked Trump, the more protective she felt, and the more hopeful she was that he would be reelected."They just pushed him right back into the presidency," she said, wiping the corner of her mouth with a napkin. "He should say thank you to all of them for the help."The third impeachment trial in American history ended Wednesday not with a bang but with a whimper. But here in Waukesha County, a patchwork of suburbs, small cities and rural areas west of Milwaukee that holds more Republican votes than any other county in this crucial swing state, there was a nervous excitement.Yard signs have been flying off the shelves in the county Republican Party's headquarters in a strip mall near a vegan food supply store. More than 150 people showed up for a State of the Union watch party Tuesday night, applauding and cheering in a giant hall. And volunteers like Diane Schlosser, a 63-year-old homemaker, have been walking in off the street to sign up."We got tired of yelling at the TV," she said, cleaning up plates of pretzels and bags of popcorn after Tuesday's party.The path to the presidency runs through Wisconsin, one of the three key industrial states, along with Pennsylvania and Michigan, that flipped by narrow margins and gave Trump the presidency in 2016. Trump won the state by fewer than 23,000 votes, setting up a battle of inches in this year's presidential race.Suburban places like Waukesha will be key this year in Wisconsin and nationwide. But though many are trending toward the Democrats, that is hardly universal. These suburbs west of Milwaukee are less white and more educated than they used to be, but overall they have changed much more slowly than suburbs in states like Virginia, Georgia and Arizona.Demographically, Wisconsin is more like Ohio and Missouri -- whiter, older and less educated than the national average, and that has tended to tilt the advantage to Republicans, said David Wasserman, an editor at the Cook Political Report.Still the Democratic counties of Milwaukee and Dane, which contains Madison, are the most densely populated in the state. Limp turnout for Trump in Republican counties could tip the balance for the Democrats. In the 2018 midterms, an energized Democratic base turned out in large numbers to lift Tammy Baldwin to victory over her pro-Trump Republican rival for a U.S. Senate seat, and elect a Democrat, Tony Evers, as governor."You can't have a meeting with a group of Democrats in Wisconsin without someone at some point nervously joking, 'no pressure,'" said Ben Wikler, chair of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin. Door knocking was expected to happen in 100 places this weekend, he said, including 15 in the Milwaukee suburbs. He said impeachment never comes up.Republicans in Wisconsin did not immediately warm to Trump. He came in a distant second behind Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas in the 2016 primary. He has particularly struggled in Waukesha County: Trump did worse in the general election here than Mitt Romney in 2012, and than Ron Johnson, Wisconsin's senior senator, in 2016.But in about two dozen interviews over three days, many Republicans said that while they voted for Trump reluctantly in 2016, they no longer felt hesitant. They pointed to the booming economy, Trump's judicial appointments and the conservative stances he has adopted on cultural issues. They also brought up the actions of Democrats."He's from New York, and I thought nothing good could come out of New York," said Marge Ingold, a retired business owner who voted for Cruz in the primary. She is now a firm Trump supporter. "He believes what we believe," she said. "He is standing up for the people."Impeachment, Ingold said, was simply the most recent installment of a long effort to take down Trump."The pressure he's been under has just been horrendous," she said. "It just made the people move cohesively behind him."Robert Dohnal, a longtime conservative activist in Wisconsin, compared impeachment to sports: "It's like if your team in football is getting bad calls from the referees and you are just getting madder and madder. It puts more fight in the belly."Impeachment has a special meaning in Wisconsin, one of three states that have had recall elections for governor, and the only one in which the governor was not defeated. The governor at the time, Scott Walker, won the largest share of votes of any of his elections during the 2012 effort to remove him. Political analysts saw parallels with the 2020 vote."In an odd way, this helps the president, at least in Wisconsin," said James Wigderson, editor of RightWisconsin, a conservative website based in Waukesha. "Talking to people, listening to talk radio, judging from our readers, this is reenergizing them."Impeachment also seemed to help nudge moderate Republicans, who were never fans of Trump, in his direction."This really pulled a lot of Republicans off the fence," Wigderson said of moderates. "Now it's, 'You've gone too far and we are going to defend this guy to the end.'"Matthew Sama, 27, a mortgage loan officer who grew up in the Milwaukee suburbs, said he disliked Trump so much that he voted for a third-party candidate in 2016."The more he started to talk, the more I became repulsed by what he was turning the Republican Party into," Sama said.Since then, he has shifted. He likes the deregulation, the tax cut and the fact that Trump has not started a war. He is still apprehensive about Trump, but he has decided to vote for him for these policies -- and as a way to stop the Democratic Party."I was like, 'Come on, this is ridiculous, he's not smart enough to be able to collude with another country!'" he said. "The Democrats have gone so far from reality, and they are coming across as so unreasonable, that it makes it look like they are out to get him."Wisconsin's suburbs have grown less white and more educated, but the change has been slow and, at least so far, less important for its politics than a stark and relatively sudden political shift among white men without a college degree, said Charles Franklin, director of the Marquette Law School Poll. In 2012, when he started polling, those men were about 5 points more likely to identify as Republican than Democrat. Now they are 18 points more likely to call themselves Republican, while other more educated groups have not changed much. That has erased the slight advantage Democrats used to enjoy in the state, Franklin said, making it a dead heat.Charlie Sykes, a former editor of RightWisconsin who broke with the Republican Party over Trump, said the question was not whether Trump would win in Waukesha County, but by how much. Margins are incredibly close, and if Republican moderates fail to support Trump here or in Milwaukee County, where he received his second highest vote tally among Wisconsin counties in 2016, he might not have enough to counter Democrats in urban areas.The Democratic nominee is important, too. If it is Bernie Sanders, "they'd be saying, 'Yes, Donald Trump is toxic, but I'm sorry, we are out of this if you are going full socialism,'" Sykes said.In a sign the parties are fighting over every vote, the Milwaukee County Republican Party announced Thursday it was opening a field office in downtown Milwaukee, deep in Democratic territory.Dissident Republican voices are getting harder to find."Every once in a while, I get an email from someone who says, 'Thank goodness you are still criticizing Trump for his behavior,'" said Wigderson, who airs views critical of Trump on his website. "But those emails are coming in less and less."Opinions in Wisconsin on impeachment have been dug in and virtually unchanged since the investigation began last fall, Franklin said. The one difference is that Republicans have been more unified in their opposition than Democrats have been in their support -- by more than 10 percentage points in November and December.Jeremy Carpenter, 31, who works for a Republican state lawmaker, said he was so turned off by Trump at first that he voted for Evan McMullin, an independent, in 2016.He said he was still "not a fan" of Trump's style, but he has gradually decided that many of his policies -- his nomination of conservative judges, his support of the anti-abortion movement, his stance on trade and foreign policy -- outweigh the negatives."Those things were wrong -- they do not match up to what I believe about my Christian faith," Carpenter said of Trump's divorces and language about women. "But on the other hand, he has done some very good things as president. If you can balance those, then you can accept who Donald Trump is without selling your soul down the river."And in a side-by-side comparison with a Democrat, Trump looks even better."Yes, Trump has glaring weaknesses," Carpenter said, "but Bernie is a self-admitted socialist, and that's a huge problem in my book."On balance, he said: "Donald Trump checks the most boxes for me. It makes sense to give him another four years."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company

Republican senators tried to offer some advice, but President Trump reportedly didn't think much of it.Multiple GOP lawmakers tried to prevent Trump from dismissing U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, sources confirmed to The New York Times and CNN.Sondland was told to resign by State Department officials Friday, but refused and was ultimately fired. A group of Republicans in Congress' upper chamber, including Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.), and Martha McSally (R-Ariz.), had advised against it to no avail, believing the decision would look bad for the White House and create political backlash. Sondland provided damaging testimony during the House's impeachment inquiry, so his removal has been viewed by many as a Trump revenge tactic.The senators also reportedly thought the firing was unnecessary because Sondland had already communicated with senior officials about leaving his post after the Senate impeachment trial concluded.Trump on Saturday also defended his decision to remove another impeachment witness, Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, from the National Security Council. Vindman is reportedly seen less sympathetically by Republicans, so he didn't receive the same kind of effort form senators to preserve his post. Collins, though, did say she was opposed to the White House going forward with any kind of retribution against witnesses. Read more at The New York Times and CNN.More stories from theweek.com America's pig problem Vanguard is an anomaly in the investment world. Can it stay that way? American democracy is dying

Army Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman was removed from his post at the White House a day earlier.