Abbreviated Pundit Roundup is a long-running series published every morning that collects essential political discussion and analysis around the internet.

Edward Luce/Financial Times:

America is staring into the abyss

After the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, an already existential election is now even more fraught

It is not just Donald Trump who dodged a bullet. Half an inch to the left and the cartridge that grazed Trump’s ear would have turned him into a martyr. There is no telling what his death would have unleashed.

As it is, the reprehensible attempted assassination of Trump will have profound reverberations for US democracy. Within seconds of being blanketed by secret service agents, Trump was yelling “fight, fight, fight” to the crowd. The instantly ubiquitous photo of him pumping his fist against the backdrop of the stars and stripes will become the emblem of his campaign.

A high-trust society would have awaited the facts of the shooting before leaping to conclusions. By that yardstick, America is close to the edge. Two of the Republicans auditioning to be Trump’s vice-presidential running mate blamed Democrats for inciting hatred of Trump. The favourite, Ohio senator JD Vance, said the Biden campaign’s rhetoric “led directly to President Trump’s attempted assassination”. Tim Scott, the South Carolina senator, said Democrats’ “inflammatory rhetoric puts lives at risk”. Elon Musk, owner of the site, X, on which these statements were posted, was quick to weigh in on a conspiracy about how the shooter could have got so close: “Either extreme incompetence or it was deliberate,” Musk wrote.

The Republican convention starts Monday. That will put an end to the “politics on hold” feeling throughout the country as we assess where we are at and where we are going.

David Frum/The Atlantic:

The Gunman and the Would-Be Dictator

Violence stalks the president who has rejoiced in violence to others.

Fascism feasts on violence. In the years since his own supporters attacked the Capitol to overturn the 2020 election—many of them threatening harm to Speaker Pelosi and Vice President Mike Pence—Trump has championed the invaders, would-be kidnappers, and would-be murderers as martyrs and hostages. He has vowed to pardon them if returned to office. His own staffers have testified to the glee with which Trump watched the mayhem on television.

Now the bloodshed that Trump has done so much to incite against others has touched him as well. The attempted murder of Trump—and the killing of a person nearby—is a horror and an outrage. More will be learned about the man who committed this appalling act, and who was killed by the Secret Service. Whatever his mania or motive, the only important thing about him is the law-enforcement mistake that allowed him to bring a deadly weapon so close to a campaign event and gain a sight line of the presidential candidate. His name should otherwise be erased and forgotten.

Washington Post:

Misinformation spreads swiftly in hours after Trump rally shooting

Conspiracy theories swell around false flags, Deep State, Biden and the Secret Service, filling the information vacuum as consumers choose their own reality.

Even after investigators identified the shooter and confirmed some details of the attack, conspiracies that were born Saturday evening hardened into narratives that further politicized the violence.

Some accounts from the left of the political spectrum immediately claimed that the shooting was a “false flag” operation perpetrated by Trump’s own supporters. Some on the far right accused President Biden of ordering a hit on a political rival.

“Incidents of political violence spawn conspiracy theories and false narratives when people try to spin the event to suit their various agendas,” Megan Squire, deputy director for data analytics at the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Intelligence Project, told The Washington Post. “This incident is no different, with people concocting ‘false flag’ conspiracies and even blaming innocent people for either committing this crime or inspiring it.”

New York Times:

Some Political Figures Who Condemned Saturday’s Violence Spoke From Experience

Judges, members of Congress and local elections officials have all been besieged with threats of political violence in recent years.

In a striking sign of how deep violence has become embedded in American politics, several of the political figures who condemned the shooting at Saturday night’s rally for former President Donald J. Trump had experienced political violence themselves.

“Political violence is terrifying. I know,” Gabrielle Giffords said in a statement. Ms. Giffords, a former Democratic representative from Arizona, was shot in the head at a political event in 2011, where six people were killed. “I’m holding former President Trump, and all those affected by today’s indefensible act of violence in my heart.”

Phillips P O’Brien/”Phillips’s Newsletter” on Substack:

An Even Worse Letter About Ukraine

Which Did Not Seem Possible After the Realists Stepped In.

Its open season for terrible open letters by academics and retired civil servants and other assorted Russian apologists telling Ukraine what Ukraine must do, and other countries who want to support Ukraine what they must do (or more accurately what they must not do). There was the open letter by the “Realists” last week, which I talked about in Sunday’s weekend update. This letter was covered with unsupported (and unsupportable) statements and had some weird logical inconsistencies. What is interesting is that on Twitter one of the authors came to say I was wrong—but when I asked him about one of those inconsistencies (why should the Baltic states be treated any differently on this than Ukraine), there was no response.

Phillips P O’Brien/The Atlantic:

The Final Six Months of U.S. Aid for Ukraine

If Trump wins, Kyiv’s cause is in danger. Biden must prepare for that possibility.

The Ukrainian people may be six months away from losing military aid from the United States—again. President Joe Biden, however, seems not to recognize any urgency. When ABC’s George Stephanopoulos asked him how he’d feel if Donald Trump defeated him in November, Biden responded, “I’ll feel as long as I gave it my all and I did the good as job as I know I can do, that’s what this is about.” Biden’s personal feelings will be small consolation to the Ukrainian people, for whom Trump’s return could prove deadly.

Last year, the former president helped engineer what turned out to be an approximately four-month interruption in U.S. assistance to Ukraine, which Russia invaded in 2022. Trump has vowed to end the war quickly, which would likely mean letting Russia keep territory it seized in 2022 and giving Russian President Vladimir Putin an advantageous position for future invasions. Trump is leading in the polls. Biden’s administration—which has supported Ukraine steadfastly, albeit overcautiously in many respects—should be taking aggressive steps now to bolster that beleaguered country’s self-defense while it still can.

Matt McNeill and Cliff Schecter discuss Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the impeachment articles against Justices Thomas and Alito:

Jill Lawrence/The Bulwark:

Donald Trump Should Not Have Been on That Stage

Plus: What would you have done if confronted with Trump’s galloping lies?

DONALD TRUMP WON the first presidential debate the minute he walked onstage. His win was cemented a few minutes later, when the moderators addressed him as Mr. President. He had no business being there and his presence was stark evidence that our system is not only dysfunctional, it is impotent when we need it most.

The guardrails—the impeachment process, the Twenty-fifth Amendment, the courts—did not hold. They have proved to be a fairytale we spin to make ourselves feel better. They will remain just that: a fantasy destined to implode, over and over.

Maybe as soon as in the next few days, if the Supreme Court tells us whether Trump has immunity from prosecution for laws broken during his presidency. Maybe a few months from now, at the polls. Maybe next year, when his federal criminal trials will amount to something, or nothing, but too late to matter.

Grace Panetta/The 19th:

‘A missed opportunity’: Groups critical to Biden’s success say they’re shaking off bad debate

Reproductive rights groups were disappointed by Biden’s answers on abortion in Thursday night’s debate, but neither they nor voters at his Friday rally said they wanted to abandon him.

On calls with reporters Friday, leading reproductive rights advocates acknowledged that President Joe Biden’s showing in Thursday’s debate versus former President Donald Trump fell short. So too, to varying degrees, did women voters who came to the North Carolina state fairgrounds to see the president at a post-debate rally.

But all of them — key to Biden’s reelection chances — vowed to continue supporting him, seeing it as the way to avoid another Trump term.

Biden’s speech here was considerably more energetic than his performance in Thursday night’s debate, which spurred a fresh round of panic over his age, mental acuity and ability to serve another term. Top advocates also expressed disappointment with Biden’s remarks on abortion, which they viewed as a missed opportunity to make a strong argument and attack Trump on a top issue for Democrats. But the day after, Democratic voters and volunteers in North Carolina said Biden’s showing didn’t change their strong support for the president and opposition to another term for Trump.

Will Saletan/The Bulwark:

Correcting Trump’s Unanswered Debate Lies

Biden couldn’t fact-check his opponent in real time. But Trump’s torrent of bullshit needs to be shown for what it was.

“I would have much rather accepted” the 2020 election results, “but the fraud and everything else was ridiculous.”

This, again? Among Trump’s many lies, this is the most incendiary and the most thoroughly debunked. The fact that he keeps repeating it, still enjoys the full support of his party, and continues to lead in the polls is a major warning sign to our country.

“I heard him [Biden] say before, ‘insulin.’ I’m the one that got the insulin down for the seniors.”

LOL. The $35 monthly cap on out-of-pocket Insulin costs under Medicare wasn’t passed until the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. (Trump did a mini-version of this, but it was sharply limited and voluntary: Drug plans could choose to opt out of the program.)

Biden “allowed millions of people to come in here from prisons, jails, and mental institutions.”

Bullshit. Trump’s allegation isn’t even statistically plausible.

Just Security:

The Limited Effects of Fischer: DOJ Data Reveals Supreme Court’s Narrowing of Jan. 6th Obstruction Charges Will Have Minimal Impact

But even if the result of the Court’s ruling is to invalidate Section(c)(2) charges against those who attacked the Capitol, as the data below reveal, the government has many tools in its tool kit to hold accountable those individuals criminally responsible, and the decision will have minimal impact on its cases against the great majority of those already convicted or charged.

Rick Hasen/Election Law Blog:

Supreme Court Hands January 6 Rioters a Win in Fischer Case, But It Likely Won’t Help Trump Beat Similar Charges Against Him (Should He Ever Go To Trial on Election Interference)

The key holding in Fischer v. United States is to read the obstruction statute so that “the Government must establish that the defendant impaired the availability or integrity for use in an official proceeding of records, documents, objects, or as we earlier explained, other things used in the proceeding, or attempted to do so.” Rioters were not interfering with evidence, so even though they were trying to stop the counting of electoral college votes, they could not be charged with obstruction under this particular statute.

But Trump allegedly did try to obstruct the proceeding with evidence: the fake electors scheme. So those charges could potentially go forward. (We are still waiting on the immunity ruling which impacts those charges, and Trump likely has run out the clock on the trial before the election.)

Inside Climate News:

Supreme Court Overturns Chevron Doctrine: What it Means for Climate Change Policy

The high court sweeps away a ‘Goliath’ of modern law, weakening agencies’ legal authority as courts weigh Biden’s policies to cut greenhouse gases.

The decision to overturn Chevron fulfills a long-held wish of conservative groups that seek a smaller role for the federal government. They are led by a network funded by the Koch family, which made its billions in the petrochemical industry. Although small fishing operations brought the case against federal regulators, they were represented by a titan of conservative law, former U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement, and lawyers for the Cause of Action Institute, which shares an address and personnel with the Koch-funded organization Americans for Prosperity.

Ironically, the 1984 case articulating the deference principle, Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council, was an anti-regulatory decision. In that case, a unanimous court upheld a Reagan administration air pollution regulation that environmentalists challenged as too weak.

That rule was issued by an Environmental Protection Agency then led by the late Anne Gorsuch, a fierce opponent of regulation. Her son, Supreme Court Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch, today wrote a lengthy concurring opinion affirming the wisdom of sweeping away the Chevron precedent, finding the reason in the roots of common law, from ancient Roman law to the efforts of King George to control the American colonies.

“Today, the Court places a tombstone on Chevron no one can miss,” Gorsuch wrote. “In doing so, the Court returns judges to interpretive rules that have guided federal courts since the Nation’s founding.”

Noah Rosenbloom/The Atlantic:

The Supreme Court Won’t Stop Dismantling the Government’s Power

The decision in Jarkesy v. SEC puts much of the basic work of the executive branch at risk.

The case started as garden-variety securities fraud. According to SEC findings, the radio host George Jarkesy stole from his investors by lying to them about his investment strategy, lying about his auditor and prime broker, and lying about his take. To protect the integrity of the financial markets, the SEC forced Jarkesy to disgorge his ill-gotten gains and banned him from the securities industry. It also fined him $300,000 for good measure.

This is where the story should have ended. Instead, two Republican-appointed judges on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit made Jarkesy into a cause célèbre. In recent years, that court has repeatedly endorsed fringe right-wing legal efforts, such as when it struck down access to mifepristone nationwide (a decision later overturned by the Supreme Court). This has made it into a preferred forum for conservative activists seeking to use the judiciary to advance right-wing projects, among which attacking the federal government’s ability to regulate industry is a top priority.

Matt McNeill and Matt Robison talk about changing the way Democrats campaign:

New York Times:

‘Antihero’ or ‘Felon’: 11 Undecided Voters Struggle With How to See Trump Post-Verdict

Ben, you’re up. Can you explain why undecided?

Ben, 42, Texas, white, college adviser

A couple people have mentioned a massive judicial conspiracy of everybody going after him. OK, let’s talk conspiracy math here. The sheer number of people who would have to be working together to get something like this working just boggles the mind. And have you ever tried to get four people to agree on what to order for pizza? I just don’t see this working out. And at the end of the day, OK, fine. OK, I’m going to side with Jonathan on this one, saying, what’s the big deal about bribing Stormy Daniels? But I want a president who’s going to be able to cover up a $130,000 bribe to Daniels. If he can’t pull that off, I’m not going to trust him with the nuclear football. This seems like such an easy thing for him to screw up. I’m kind of leaning toward Biden now.

Well, okay then. So long as it’s about policy.

From that story, five of the eleven are leaning Biden, 3 Trump, the other 3 RFK, Jr or won’t vote.

NBC News:

Biden calls Trump a 'convicted felon' who 'snapped' after the 2020 election

The president also called Trump, who was found guilty last week in his New York criminal trial, "unhinged."

“It’s reckless, it’s dangerous, it’s irresponsible for anyone to say this was rigged just because they don’t like the verdict,” Biden told reporters at the White House last week.

Biden made similar remarks Monday, saying, "It's reckless and dangerous for anyone to say that’s rigged just because they don’t like” the outcome.

"Something snapped in this guy for real" after the 2020 election, Biden said. "It’s literally driving him crazy."

Biden also called Trump "unhinged."

Jill Lawrence/The Bulwark:

The MAGA Education of Larry Hogan The Senate candidate learns the hard way that his party no longer supports the rule of law.

The MAGA hardliners, who don’t represent most of us but are determined nevertheless to be the boss of all of us, are lying in wait. The Senate is particularly easy to muck up and bog down, and they are ready. Ready to block Democratic nominees, legislative priorities, and funds for “partisan lawfare,” which is how they describe bringing charges against Trump. They claim the Biden administration is making “a mockery of the rule of law” and they want revenge: “We are unwilling to aid and abet this White House in its project to tear this country apart.”

As Trump would say, unbelievable. Projection like we’ve never seen.

Hogan’s crash course in MAGA-style politics has gotten a lot more intense in the last few days. He may have a feeling he’s not in Maryland anymore, and he’d be right. Planet MAGA is home for the GOP these days—and Larry Hogan is an alien.

Stephen Collinson/CNN:

Why Biden’s escalation on Trump guilty verdict is so significant

Other Democratic officials have used such rhetoric. But the phrase took on greater force coming from the mouth of the president himself. While Republicans have rallied around Trump since his conviction, it remains unclear how the verdict will go down in swing states where the shift in a few thousand votes could decide November’s election.

Biden’s remark was yet another stunning turn in an election entangled in Trump’s multiple legal threats. It came on a day when the first family was embroiled in its own extraordinary courtroom drama as Biden’s son Hunter became the first child of a sitting president to go on trial. The younger Biden has pleaded not guilty to charges of buying and possessing a gun illegally while addicted to or abusing drugs. He also faces a tax trial in September.

Last week, Biden noted that Trump had been convicted on 34 felony counts and said it was “reckless … dangerous … and irresponsible” for his opponent to say the verdict was rigged. Presidential remarks in off-camera fundraisers can often serve as a test bed for rhetoric that later emerges in public events. But Biden’s sharpened tone will certainly lead to accusations by the Trump campaign that the former president’s conviction came after a process of political weaponization of the justice system.

John Stoehr/The Editorial Board:

Will a felony conviction hurt Trump? Yes! Just listen to him!

The man's practically howling in pain, but some people still wonder

For the most part, all this wondering comes from very clever people who are paid very handsome salaries to wonder aloud about things, even in the face of plain reality that should end all the wondering.

I’m talking, of course, about members of the Washington press and pundit corps, even some liberals, who want more than anything else to get your attention. They can’t do that as well as they would like if the contours of the election align with normal common sense. It’s normally very bad for a convicted felon to run for president, but it’s more fun, and perhaps more lucrative, to pretend the opposite could be normal.

Political reporters are probably more bored than cynical. Trump never changes and he’s been campaigning nonstop since 2015. The main difference is while he was fascist-lite then, he’s full-on fascist now. That’s not enough, though, and when political reporters get bored, they assume everyone else is bored, too. That assumption, however, should be seen as a choice of convenience. Assumed boredom is a credible rationale for believing spin about a felony conviction working in Trump’s favor, instead of what it really is, which is a painful wound.

Alon Pinkas:

Israel Is in Flames, Israelis Are Dying, While Netanyahu Polishes a Speech for Sycophants in Congress

Analysts of Benjamin Netanyahu keep attributing grand plans to the Israeli prime minister. But there is no plan – just a desperate, incompetent leader, manipulating a once-thriving country, who couldn't care less about the hostages or their families

Northern Israel is burning, four hostages taken alive by Hamas on October 7 have been confirmed dead by the Israel Defense Forces, he is clueless as to what happens next and refuses to engage in any deliberations on postwar frameworks. But don't worry, while his country is in flames, Nero Claudius Caesar Netanyahu is busy picking out a tie for his sanctimonious, recklessly unnecessary, patently divisive showcase speech in the U.S. Congress later this month.

Matt Robison on the effect of the Trump felony conviction:

Reed Galen/The Home Front:

Donald Trump's 'Unified Reich'

Bullhorns, Not Dog Whistles

Donald Trump is in dire electoral straits, regardless of what national and state polling says. His coalition, such as it is, is smaller, older, whiter, more male, and more extreme than it was four years ago. You can read my deeper analysis here.

The noteworthy part of this episode for the Trump campaign isn’t that they posted a video talking about a ‘reich.’ What’s most interesting is that after the firestorm that erupted, his organization chose to take it down

CBS News:

Rudy Giuliani pleads not guilty as Trump allies are arraigned in Arizona 2020 election case

Allies of former President Donald Trump were arraigned Tuesday in Phoenix on charges that include conspiracy, fraud and forgery that are related to an alleged scheme to put forward phony electors in the 2020 election who backed Trump despite President Biden winning the state.

Rudy Giuliani pleaded not guilty to nine federal charges in the case in a virtual appearance. The former New York City mayor and Trump attorney was served Friday night while leaving his 80th birthday party.

Other defendants include former Arizona Republican Party chair Kelli Ward, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, attorneys Jenna Ellis and Christina Bobb, former Turning Point USA youth director Tyler Bowyer and Arizona Republican state election officials.

Trump adjacent characters are in court for the Arizona FAFO phase of election denial.

Matt Robison/Washington Monthly:

The Low Information Trap: Why Don’t Voters “Get It?” Because They Don’t Know About It

Many voters aren’t reacting to Donald Trump’s many outrages because they don’t consume much news. At least, not yet.

If you had to boil down the biggest question rattling through the minds of tortured Democrats these days, it’s “Why don’t voters get it?”

How in the name of all that is holy can Donald Trump—a man indicted on 91 felony counts—still be leading in polls? Why are people so down on a president who has passed more popular bills than anyone since Lyndon Johnson? How could it be that while jobs and economic growth are soaring, many voters believe the economy is doing worse than during the Great Recession?

In other words, when things seem so obvious, how can voters be so oblivious?

There are plenty of theories. Stephen Colbert thinks voters have become “numb”: a political callous formed by years of rubbing against Trump’s outrages. Paul Krugman argues that a lot of voter sourness is driven by extreme hatred of Democrats by addled Republicans—a phenomenon dubbed “negative partisanship” by political scientists. Scads of commentators think Biden has been weighed down by lousy salesmanship, exemplified by the now-jettisoned slogan “Bidenomics.”

But there’s something even simpler going on, something the analyst world tends to undervalue: Almost no one is paying attention.

Rick Hasen/Election Law Blog:

With Both Sides Resting in Trump Hush Money Trial, Whether Donald Trump Committed Felonies is Uncertain, Likely Depending on the Jury Instructions and How Appeals Courts Will Interpret the Law

As I explained in my LA Times piece, to make this into a felony, Trump had to be falsifying the records to further or conceal another crime. From the beginning, the NY district attorney was not that forthcoming about what those other crimes are. Eventually, the DA settled on three: violations of federal campaign finance law; a state election law, and a state tax law. The prosecutors’ emphasis has been on violation of federal campaign finance law.

There’s been much less attention paid to the state election law claim. As I’ve written, no one seems to be prosecuted under this New York law. This raises issues of potential selective prosecution. And more importantly, no one knows how appeals courts will say this New York law could be violated and whether what Trump did qualifies. Can violation of a federal campaign finance law constitute a state election law violation? Another serious issue on appeal.

I cannot speak to the state tax law violations, but we’ve heard very little about them in the prosecution’s case. Will those claims even go to the jury? What will the jury instructions there look like?

Still, there’s a good chance the District Attorney will cite New York State election law as the predicate.

POLITICO:

‘Are you staring me down right now?’: Key Trump defense witness draws judge’s wrath

The judge briefly cleared the courtroom while he admonished the witness and threatened to kick him off the stand.

Shortly after the prosecution rested its case Monday in the Manhattan hush money trial, the defense called to the stand a belligerent witness who sparred with prosecutors, muttered under his breath and drew the ire of the judge.

That witness was not Donald Trump.

Instead, it was an old-school New York lawyer named Robert Costello, whose demeanor on the stand seemed to embody defendant Trump’s surly attitude throughout the trial, which is in its sixth week and now appears to be heading for closing arguments next week.

From Katie Phang on X:

Here is a paraphrase of Costello's email:

"We can get Cohen on the right page without giving the appearance that we are following instructions from Giuliani or the President. In my opinion, this is the clear & correct strategy…..Signed, BOB .”

Cross examination: did you send Michael Cohen a retainer? That he didn’t sign?

Costello: yes

Cross: why was it inserted into a newspaper wrapped around a fish? Was that a message?

Costello: yeah, I like fish.

The above is only a slight exaggeration.

In regard to a different court, Jill Lawrence/The Bulwark:

Enough Already: It’s Time to Reform the Supreme Court

Ethics outrages and partisan hardball are not what the Founders had

HOW MANY LAST STRAWS can there be? When it comes to the Supreme Court, the supply appears to be infinite.

The Court needs an extreme makeover ASAP, and that is far from an extreme idea. It’s the only path back to a high court that is trustworthy, balanced, logical, and durable.

The latest shock is the photo of an upside-down American flag—a symbol adopted by Donald Trump supporters, including the “Stop the Steal” movement to keep him in office after he lost—on display outside Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s house in January 2021, just days after an insurrectionist mob waving some upside-down flags attacked the U.S. Capitol.

And no matter how or how soon the justices rule on Trump’s argument that he deserves absolute immunity from criminal prosecution, apparently on the theory that presidents should be free to do whatever, including try to overturn elections they’ve lost, the oral argument in that case last month was so disturbing—with justices and Trump’s lawyers entertaining hypotheticals about a president ordering the murder of a political rival—that it can never be unheard. Not even if Trump loses the 2024 election, not even if he’s convicted in any or all of his criminal trials.

David Rothkopf/Daily Beast:

All Signs Point to a Trump Debate Meltdown

Biden is eager for the chance to stand toe-to-toe with his predecessor because it will be incredibly hard to look worse in comparison.

Of course, Biden actually isn’t behind Trump in the polls, with most showing the race essentially tied—and several including the most recent NYT Ipsos poll showing Biden up by 3. Further, the idea that “age” is an issue for two guys who are essentially the same age, is one that does not stand up to the slightest scrutiny. But never mind all that.

No, after talking to a number of Biden administration officials, it is clear that the primary reason Joe Biden chose to debate Donald Trump is… because he can win.

Bill Scher/Washington Monthly:

The Biden Campaign Is Worried  

The decision to propose two debates with Donald Trump is a clear sign the president’s reelection team knows it’s behind.  

It might be true that no course corrections are necessary. Simply staying on message for the next six months might be all the 81-year-old president and his campaign need to reach minimal news-consuming swing voters in time for Election Day.

Think back to 2012, when Democrats were panicking about President Barack Obama’s prospects and questioning his ability to communicate economic improvement coming out of the Great Recession. In the CBS/New York Times poll, from 2010 through much of 2012, Obama’s handling of the economy was significantly underwater. To make matters worse for the Obama-Biden ticket, Mitt Romney and his running mate, Representative Paul Ryan, had a solid bounce in late August following the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Florida, and caught Obama in the poll average.  

Washington Post:

Pentagon says Gaza pier anchored, but U.N. casts doubt on distribution

U.S. officials said aid deliveries could start “within days,” but it was unclear whether there was a firm deal with the U.N. to distribute the food once it arrives on land.

About 90 trucks per day are expected to come over the pier via an attached floating causeway before ramping up to 150 trucks daily, officials have said. After the operation was announced by President Biden in early March, the Pentagon said up to 2 million meals per day could eventually be moved into Gaza via this “maritime corridor.”

Yet even as the U.S. military has said delays in getting the deliveries underway were largely due to poor weather and sea swells, the United Nations continued to hedge Thursday on whether it has fully agreed to deliver the aid brought from the pier.

In a news briefing later in the day, Farhan Haq, a spokesman for U.N. Secretary General António Guterres, characterized the negotiations as “still going on.

There’s still a tremendous amount of uncertainty about these arrangements, in no small part due to the ambivalence of the Israeli government.

Anshel Pfeffer/Haaretz:

Why Israel's Defense Minister Just Broke His Silence About Netanyahu's Gaza War Paralysis

Israeli Defense Minister Gallant's press conference calling for a 'day after' plan in Gaza was his third time publicly putting Netanyahu on blast. While it won't take Netanyahu down, it portends more turmoil

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has made little secret of his contempt for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu throughout this war. Long before his bombshell of a press conference on Wednesday night, in one of the very rare occasions over the past seven months in which the two were seen together in public (at a press conference on October 28), a reporter asked Gallant, "You've expressed confidence in the [Israel Defense Forces] chief of staff and in the directors of the Shin Bet and Mossad. Do you have confidence in the prime minister as well?"

Gallant hesitated for a second and answered, "I spoke about what I'm responsible for – the security establishment." Israel was at war and its defense minister was refusing to say that he had confidence in the prime minister. Not that it came as much of a surprise to anyone. Seven months earlier, Netanyahu tried to fire Gallant over his open objections to the judicial overhaul and backed down only in the wake of a night of massive protests that rocked his government and forced him to suspend the legislation. Netanyahu may have rescinded the dismissal, but that hardly restored confidence.

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup is a long-running series published every morning that collects essential political discussion and analysis around the internet

Politco Magazine:

Why Stormy Daniels Isn’t Getting the Monica Lewinsky Treatment

So far, none of the familiar sexist insults have seemed to stick.

Sex scandals have come a long way since the Bill Clinton days.

That’s a major takeaway from this week’s courtroom spectacle, when Daniels calmly testified about hotel room dalliances and sexual positions and the clumsy come-ons from a future U.S. president — and the media took copious notes. In some ways, the excitement around the trial was a throwback to the political and legal scandals of the 1990s, when Clinton’s alleged sexual harassment and illicit affairs led to lawsuits, investigations and impeachment. Then, as now, there was breathless interest from the press, aw-shucks reporting of salacious details, palpable glee from late-night comedians.

But there’s also a crucial difference. The women at the center of the 1990s scandals, Paula Jones, who sued Clinton for sexual harassment in the mid-1990s, and Monica Lewinsky, the intern at the center of Clinton’s impeachment, were mocked and belittled, frequently dismissed, dragged unwittingly into the arena and left to suffer there alone. At one memorable point in the saga, Jones broke down crying at a press conference; the spotlight was too harsh, the pressure was too much.

Michael Tomasky/The New Republic;

Tim Scott’s Stated Willingness to Crush Democracy Is an Ominous Moment

We crossed another Rubicon this week with these veep wannabees parroting Donald Trump’s line about not accepting election results.

As you’ve probably read, Scott was on Meet the Press Sunday and, under questioning from host Kristen Welker, refused six times to say he’d accept the election results. The things he did say were ludicrous: “This is an issue that is not an issue so I’m not going to make it an issue.” “I’m not going to answer your hypothetical question when, in fact, I believe the American people are speaking today on the results of the election.” “This is why so many Americans believe that NBC is an extension of the Democrat Party.”

The same day, North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum ran for the hills when CNN’s Jake Tapper asked him about potential political violence after the election. He spat out some evasive nonsense about how the important thing about the election is that “both sides feel good about how it was counted.” We all know what that means: If one party (gee, which one?) doesn’t “feel good” about the vote count, then violence might be justified.

These are, in one way, dismissible men. But these are not dismissible comments. This is new. And it’s worth thinking about.

Walter Shapiro/The New Republic:

No, the 2024 Election Won’t Be Anything Like 1968

The election will be a challenge for Joe Biden. But looking to the past won’t help him—or us—understand what lies ahead.

But the closer you look at the turbulent history of 1968, the more it reflects the 2024 presidential race with the accuracy of a funhouse mirror.

For all the horrors in Gaza, that war is a distant echo for most Americans—unlike Vietnam where nearly 17,000 U.S. soldiers died in 1968. Moreover, young men, unless they had the resources to obtain a deferment by going to college, were subject to the military draft.

Few presidential candidates have been as hapless as Vice President Hubert Humphrey, the Democratic nominee after Lyndon Johnson abandoned his reelection campaign in late March of 1968. Historian Luke Nichter’s recent book on the 1968 election, The Year That Broke Politics, reveals that LBJ preferred Nixon over his own vice president—and undermined Humphrey at every turn. It wasn’t until late September that Humphrey, who kept begging for Johnson’s approval, had the temerity to call for a bombing halt in Vietnam without preconditions, which was a minor dissent from the administration’s position.

Andrew Sanders/MSN:

CNN: Trump Has Succeeded In Being ‘Casual About Violence’

CNN national security analyst Juliette Kayyem expressed concerns about former President Donald Trump using the threat of violence to rally support for the 2024 election.

She highlighted the normalization of violence as an extension of democratic differences and emphasized the potential impact on the election.

Kayyem warned about the permissive atmosphere created by the lack of condemnation from Trump’s party and the potential consequences if he were to win the presidency. (Trending: Joe Biden Emailed Hunter’s Business Associates 54 Times)

“It’s about to be 2024. We are running into an election period in which violence and the threat of violence are sort of viewed as an extension of our normal democratic differences,” Kayyem said.

“This is one of the successes of what Donald Trump has been able to do, is to sort of be kind of casual about violence.”

Chris Brennan/USA Today:

Noncitizens can't vote in federal elections. Trump and the GOP hope you don't know that.

Republicans are again pushing unsubstantiated claims about noncitizens voting in federal elections

[Speaker Mike] Johnson and his election-denying schemers were pushing the new Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, which would require proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote in federal elections.

Sounds harmless, right? That's true if you don't know much about voting rights issues.

But like laws that some states have enacted requiring voters to show identification at polling places, this act completely ignores the fact that not everyone who is eligible to vote has access to the documents needed to establish their identity.

Daily Mail:

Nancy Mace says staff 'sabotaged' her: Republican accuses ex-aides of mismanaging $1million, hacking her phone, spying on medical records and dumping office devices in water in extraordinary interview

• Mace says her new staff are still repairing the damage left behind by her 'sabotaging' former aides
• 'This seems to be stemming from paranoia and trust issues,' one former staffer said. 'She's clearly unwell and I hope she gets help'

Reps. Mace (South Carolina) and Victoria Spartz (Indiana) are the two House Republicans that can be counted on to switch positions hourly. For some reason, Mace gets labeled as a moderate, when there not only aren’t any in the GOP, but she clearly isn’t one. For that reason, she’s worth the extra attention.

Steerpike/The Spectator:

Listen: Houchen turns on Sunak

When it rains for the Tories, it pours. Now Tees Valley’s Conservative mayor Ben Houchen has hit out at his party’s leadership – just 24 hours after yet another Tory MP defected to Labour. The re-elected Conservative mayor this morning admitted the path to Tory electoral victory is ‘getting narrower by the day’ before adding, in more bad news for poor Rishi Sunak, that ‘ultimately it all rests on the shoulders of the leader.’ Talk about trouble in paradise…

In a series of damning remarks made during an interview on BBC Radio Tees today, Houchen seemed rather downcast on the topic of his party’s prospects. ‘Things don’t look great for the Conservative party at the moment,’ he told the station. But while admitting that ‘all responsibility goes back to the top’, the Tees Valley mayor had some home truths for his parliamentary colleagues:

Oh, and by the way, speaking of the UK …

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup is a long-running series published every morning that collects essential political discussion and analysis around the internet.

Jennifer Rubin/Washington Post:

A rotten week for MAGA Republicans’ feeble stunts

In dismissing the articles of impeachment with a party-line vote, Senate Democrats ignored crocodile tears from the likes of Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) — who voted against the most meritorious impeachment in history following the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot — that dismissing an impeachment before trial would create a bad precedent (unlike letting an insurrectionist off the hook?). Schumer deserves credit for nipping in the bud the GOP-controlled House’s abuse of power.

When Republicans blatantly lie, disregard their oaths and — to borrow a phrase — weaponize government, Democrats have an obligation to call them out. That entails refusing to take Republican antics seriously. When hearings and investigations obviously lack good faith, the Democrats can uphold the stature of Congress by simply walking away and refusing to play these games.

David Frum/The Atlantic:

Trump Deflates

It wasn’t just Putin who lost in the House vote on Ukraine aid.

Ukraine won. Trump lost.

The House vote to aid Ukraine renews hope that Ukraine can still win its war. It also showed how and why Donald Trump should lose the 2024 election.

For nine years, Trump has dominated the Republican Party. Senators might have loathed him, governors might have despised him, donors might have ridiculed him, college-educated Republican voters might have turned against him—but LOL, nothing mattered. Enough of the Republican base supported him. Everybody else either fell in line, retired from politics, or quit the party…

At the beginning of this year, Trump was able even to blow up the toughest immigration bill seen in decades—simply to deny President Joe Biden a bipartisan win. Individual Senate Republicans might grumble, but with Trump opposed, the border-security deal disintegrated.

Three months later, Trump’s party in Congress has rebelled against him—and not on a personal payoff to some oddball Trump loyalist, but on one of Trump’s most cherished issues, his siding with Russia against Ukraine.

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup is a long-running series published every morning that collects essential political discussion and analysis around the internet.

The Washington Post:

The U.S. just changed how it manages a tenth of its land

The Interior Department rule puts conservation and clean energy development on par with drilling, mining and resource extraction on federal lands for the first time

The final rule released Thursday represents a seismic shift in the management of roughly 245 million acres of public property — about one-tenth of the nation’s land mass. It is expected to draw praise from conservationists and legal challenges from fossil fuel industry groups and Republican officials, some of whom have lambasted the move as a “land grab.”

Interior’s Bureau of Land Management, known as the nation’s largest landlord, has long offered leases to oil and gas companies, mining firms and ranchers. Now, for the first time, the nearly 80-year-old agency will auction off “restoration leases” and “mitigation leases” to entities with plans to restore or conserve public lands.

The New York Times:

After Reports About Trump Jurors, Judge Demands Restraint From the Press

Some news reports have included details about jurors that had been aired in open court. One was excused after she developed concerns about being identified.

The judge in former President Donald J. Trump’s criminal trial ordered reporters to not disclose employment information about potential jurors after he excused a woman who said she was worried about her identity becoming known.

The woman, who had been seated on the jury on Tuesday, told the judge that her friends and colleagues had warned her that she had been identified as a juror in the high-profile case. Although the judge has kept prospective jurors’ names private, some have disclosed their employers and other identifying information in court.

She also said that she did not believe she could be impartial.

The judge, Juan M. Merchan, promptly dismissed her.

Moments later, Justice Merchan ordered the press to not report the answer to two queries on a lengthy questionnaire for prospective jurors: “Who is your current employer?” and “Who was your prior employer?”

They have 12 jurors as of Thursday afternoon and an alternate, and are now selecting the other five alternates.

Last night there was a limited attack on Iran. But:

Here is the full tweet above:

It appears that the attack in Iran was executed through glide bombs. That is important, because those were likely launched not from Israel but elsewhere. In addition, they can’t be traced through radar. This goes with the radio silence from Israel. Meanwhile, an IDF source told FOX News the operation was “limited.” What the attack was going for is plausible deniability. That will allow Iran to pretend this isn’t a big deal and react without major escalation. Iran seems to be playing along so far. That would also go with approval from the United States, which seems to have been obtained a day in advance.

Joe Perticone/The Bulwark:

Mike Johnson Finds a Way, Despite the Odds Plus: The shortest and silliest impeachment trial in history.

For some background on the unique process by which Johnson is going about this, see Tuesday’s edition of Press Pass. Today, I want to catch you up on the events that have unfolded since Johnson unveiled the four-bills-one-rule plan. Given the way the 118th Congress has functioned so far—it has been among the least effective Congresses in modern history—we may be on the verge of seeing a clever maneuver to circumvent the members who have been holding the chamber hostage.

Since Johnson laid his cards on the table on Monday, the individual bill texts have been released. The toplines are as follows:

• Ukraine: $60.84 billion

• Israel: $26.38 billion

• Indo-Pacific: $8.12 billion

Johnson created a plan that insulates him from potential scheming and alterations by the Senate, while structuring a package that essentially includes what has already passed the upper chamber.

POLITICO:

Party leaders try to break standoff over Johnson's foreign aid package

The Rules Committee hasn't yet returned from a break, as Democrats and Republicans negotiate how to move the four bills to the floor.

In exchange for helping circumvent the conservatives, Democrats are hoping they’ll be able to extract concessions from the other side of the aisle and are actively talking with Republicans, according to those people. But it’s not clear what, if anything, Johnson would give them for helping bring the bills to the floor. Democrats have called on him to bring Ukraine aid, in particular, to the floor for months.

“I think Democrats will act in a manner that's incredibly united once we see the rule and see what it says,” Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez (D-N.M.), who sits on the Rules committee, told POLITICO Thursday when the meeting recessed.

She wouldn’t comment directly on whether Democrats have heard from Johnson, but added, “I hear that [Johnson] has put a lot of time and thinking into this.”

Simon Rosenberg/”The Hopium Chronicles” on Substack looks at the newest Harvard IOP Youth Poll:

Winning Arizona, Making Calls For Ukraine, A Good Youth Poll, A Bluer 2024 Election

Note that the poll breaks out “likely voters” from “registered voters,” which is important as so many young people don’t end up voting. Some initial takeaways from me:

• 18-29 year old vote intention is about the same as it was in the spring of 2020, a very high youth turnout year.

• Biden leads 56-39 (+19) among voters 18-29 year olds likely to vote. He won 18-29 year old voters by 60-36 in 2020, so off a bit but with work we can match our 2020 results. As I say here every day, some of our coalition is wandering now, and we need to go get them back. To repeat - this result is neither suprising, or worrisome.

• The data on Israel-Gaza is consistent with what I’ve been writing here - while an important issue, it is unlikely to be a voting issue for a large number of young people this fall: “When young Americans are asked whether or not they believe Israel's response so far to the October 7 attack by Hamas has been justified, a plurality indicates that they don't know (45%). About a fifth (21%) report that Israel's response was justified with 32% believing it was not justified.”

I also found this section to be particularly interesting: “Among the 1,051 "likely voters" in our sample, we found significant differences in support levels based on gender, age, race/ethnicity, and education levels, among other subgroups.

Will Bunch/The Philadelphia Inquirer:

Fear and loathing on America’s college campuses as free speech is disappearing

Student activists say fear and paranoia has descended on college campus around free speech as college administrators cave into a new brand of McCarthyism.

Student activists told me they feel constantly watched, either by university officials they think are monitoring their Wi-Fi or watching from omnipresent cameras — or by pro-Israel outside groups that have “doxxed” the personal information of pro-Palestinian protesters.

This week’s jarring news out of the University of Southern California that its Muslim valedictorian, Asna Tabassum, would not be allowed to give her upcoming commencement speech because of what the school called “safety concerns” — after some critics had singled out some of her X/Twitter posts over Palestine — gave the rest of America a window into what students and some of their professors have been saying for months: Free speech and political expression at U.S. universities is facing its greatest threat since the 1950s “Red Scare” and the heyday of McCarthyism.

Two Carleton College professors who write frequently and host a podcast around questions of academic freedom actually argue the current crisis is even worse than that dark era.

Hannah Metzger/Westword:

Abortion Ban Fails to Qualify for Ballot: "Colorado Is Not a Place Where You Can Mess With Our Reproductive Freedom"

On the same day, an abortion rights initiative submitted nearly double the signatures needed for the November election.

An initiative seeking to ban abortion will not appear on Colorado's ballot in November after the campaign failed to collect enough legitimate signatures to qualify. The campaign behind Initiative 81: Protections for a Living Child says it collected "tens of thousands of signatures" but fell short of the 124,238 it needed to turn in by April 18. If approved by voters, the ballot measure would have banned abortion at any point after conception, classifying it as homicide. "God gave us a choice between life and death for our state," Faye Barnhart, who co-led the campaign, said in a statement. "Many didn’t have the faith or vision to see this amazing window of opportunity to lead our state to choose life. We mourn the loss of these children’s lives because we didn’t do everything we could to save them." The anti-abortion measure's failure comes on the same day that a pro-abortion-rights campaign says it turned in nearly 240,000 signatures in support of another proposed ballot measure, Initiative 89: Right to Abortion. That proposal asks voters to enshrine the right to abortion in the state constitution, and also allow state funds — including Medicaid and state employee health insurance — to be used to pay for abortions.

It takes 55% to pass, since it’s a constitutional amendment.

The last time this happened was nearly thirty years ago.

Cliff Schecter on the media’s OJ trial coverage and its relevance today:

New York Times:

Abortion Jumps to the Center of Arizona’s Key 2024 Races

Democrats quickly aimed to capitalize on a ruling by the state’s highest court upholding an 1864 law that bans nearly all abortions.

Democrats seized on a ruling on Tuesday by Arizona’s highest court upholding an 1864 law that bans nearly all abortions, setting up a fierce political fight over the issue that is likely to dominate the presidential election and a pivotal Senate race in a crucial battleground state.

Even though the court put its ruling on hold for now, President Biden and his campaign moved quickly to blame former President Donald J. Trump for the loss of abortion rights, noting that he has taken credit for appointing the Supreme Court justices who overturned a constitutional right to abortion. Just a day earlier, Mr. Trump had sought to defang what has become a toxic issue for Republicans by saying that abortion restrictions should be decided by the states and their voters.

Remember, abortion is fading in saliency as an issue, say umpteen anonymous male Republican consultants.

Dan Balz/Washington Post:

The Arizona Supreme Court just upended Trump’s gambit on abortion

On Monday, Trump declined to support a national abortion ban, seeking to neutralize the political issue. A day later, Arizona’s ban gave it new life.

On Monday, the former president declined to support any new national law setting limits on abortions. Going against the views of many abortion opponents in his Republican Party, Trump was looking for a way to neutralize or at least muddy a galvanizing issue that has fueled Democratic victories for nearly two years. He hoped to keep it mostly out of the conversation ahead of the November elections.

On Tuesday, the Arizona Supreme Court showed just how difficult it will be to do that. The court resurrected an 1864 law that bans nearly all abortions, except to save the life of the mother. The law also imposes penalties on abortion providers.

Trump had said let the states handle the issue. The Arizona court showed the full implications of that states’ rights strategy.

Or, if you will, Arizona Supreme Court destroys news organization plans to declare the abortion issue neutralized (it wasn’t).

Marc A Caputo/ The Bulwark:

MAGA Takes Aim at RFK Jr.: ‘Radical F—ing Kennedy’

They turned on him overnight once they realized he’d be a threat to Trump and not only to Biden.

TRUMP ADVISERS QUIETLY acknowledge they and the right helped build up RFK Jr., especially after the pandemic when Kennedy’s anti-vaccine activism gained broader attention and support among conservatives.

“For more than two years, Kennedy was on more conservative media than any of the Republicans who ran for president, so he’s partly a monster of our own making,” said one adviser in Trump’s orbit. “But the same conservative media apparatus that built him up is starting to tear him down. It’s easy. He’s a liberal.”

That cocksure sentiment pervades Trump’s campaign, where they view Kennedy more as an opportunity than a danger.

…

Matt Bennett, executive vice president of Third Way, said Kennedy has benefited from his famous last name, his savvy social media use, and his lack of a political record. Bennett doesn’t think the candidate will be able to withstand the scrutiny that’s coming now that the threat he represents has become clearer.

“Kennedy is in for a rough ride. We need to make sure lower-information voters don’t somehow think, ‘Oh, it’s his dad.’ Or that he’s a safe pair of hands,” Bennett said. “He’s a lunatic. He lies. He’s a bad person.”

Will Bunch/Philadelphia Inquirer:

Is Team Trump meddling in the Middle East?

This weekend, the endless gusher of petrodollars from Riyadh left their oily mark on the dim jewel of Trump’s fast-fading empire, the Trump National Doral course outside of Miami. There, the Saudi-funded LIV Golf tour brought yet another televised and star-studded tournament to a resort owned by the 45th president’s business arm.

We don’t how much the LIV tour — largely a creation of the massive sovereign wealth fund controlled by the Saudi dictator Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) — paid the Trump Organization for the three-day event. The LIV people insist the money is nominal, but no one would argue that the widely seen tournaments are propping up Trump’s coffers at a time when his hotel brand is in the loo, and the established PGA golf tour is avoiding the ex-POTUS and his 88 felony charges.

David Gilbert/Wired:

Inside the Election Denial Groups Planning to Disrupt November

Groups like True the Vote and Michael Flynn’s America Project want to mobilize thousands of Trump supporters by pushing baseless claims about election fraud—and are rolling out new technology to fast-track their efforts.

As the most consequential presidential election in a generation looms in the United States, get-out-the-vote efforts across the country are more important than ever. But multiple far-right activist groups with ties to former president Donald Trump and the Republican National Committee are mobilizing their supporters in earnest, drawing on one baseline belief: Elections in the US are rigged, and citizens need to do something about it.

All the evidence states otherwise. But in recent weeks, these groups have held training sessions about how to organize on a hyperlocal level to monitor polling places and drop boxes, challenge voter registrations en masse, and intimidate and harass voters and election officials. And some are preparing to roll out new technology to fast-track all of these efforts: One of the groups claims they’re launching a new platform for checking voter rolls that contains billions of “data elements” on every single US citizen.

Jennifer Rubin/Washington Post:

Don’t overlook these five aspects of Trump’s N.Y. trial

Trump’s first impeachment seems like ancient history. But House impeachment investigators interviewed Hope Hicks and Michael Cohen, and delved into the facts concerning payment to women to silence them before the 2016 election. The hush money scheme was grist for impeachment because procuring office by corrupt means can be a sufficient basis for impeachment.

Philip Bump/Washington Post:

How much time and money will the GOP waste chasing imaginary election fraud?

Fox host Maria Bartiromo has proved to be one of the most credulous members of the right-wing media universe. This was understood by her own employers in 2020 when one executive warned another that she had “GOP conspiracy theorists in her ear and they use her for their message sometimes.” In the wake of the 2020 election, she flirted with the most ridiculous fraud theories then circulating; more recently, she was a constant promoter of the discredited idea that Joe Biden had been bribed by a Ukrainian businessman.

Yet she also remains one of the most prominent voices on Fox News and Fox Business. One need not engage in conspiracy-theorizing to guess some reasons for that.

And finally, the exclamation point on this amazing college hoops season.

Candace Buckner/Washington Post:

Connecticut unlocked the overwhelming beauty of a team game

More than other team sports, basketball thrives on individual talent. Singular stars fuel intrigue. They make us sit up and pay attention. And the superstars make us believe that one vs. five maintains pretty good odds. Then a night such as Monday comes along and wrecks the belief that you need a superstar to win.

Somewhere in the Purdue locker room sat [Perdue’s center Zach] Edey, his season having ended in disappointment, with a lonely shower awaiting. Meanwhile, the Connecticut Huskies were busy changing clothes on the court. Their new shirts read: “2024 Men’s Basketball National CHAMPS” — that word more prominent than the others.

Cliff Schecter covers General Mark Milley’s opinion of Donald Trump: