The Week MHI dailybriefing ;

10 things you need to know today !

1. Second woman accuses Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax of sexual assault A second woman, Meredith Watson, came forward Friday to say Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax (D) sexually assaulted her. Through her legal team, Watson alleged she “was raped by Justin Fairfax in 2000, while they were both students at Duke University” in a “premeditated and aggressive” assault. She says former classmates have corroborated her account. Fairfax was previously accused of sexual assault by Vanessa Tyson, who says he forced her to perform oral sex at the Democratic National Convention in 2004. Fairfax denied both allegations, denouncing Watson’s claims as evidence of a “vicious and coordinated smear campaign.” He has refused to resign. Statement from VA Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax denying second sexual assault allegation, ends with “I will not resign.” [The Guardian, NPR] 2. Trump announces details of next Kim summit “My representatives have just left North Korea after a very productive meeting,” President Trump tweeted Friday evening, “and an agreed upon time and date for the second Summit with Kim Jong Un. It will take place in Hanoi, Vietnam, on February 27 & 28. I look forward to seeing Chairman Kim & advancing the cause of peace!” At the State of the Union address Tuesday, Trump mentioned Vietnam as the location of the meeting but did not offer further details. In a second tweet Friday, Trump said Kim’s leadership would make North Korea “a different kind of Rocket – an Economic one!” Two Vietnamese cities — Hanoi and Da Nang — emerged as top contenders for the summit’s location, according to a source familiar with the summit’s planning. The choice of venue could be seen as a small concession by the US — CNN reported that North Korea favored Hanoi because it has an embassy there, while the US preferred Da Nang because an Asian-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit was held there recently, which means the US has already conducted a full check, per a source familiar with the negotiations. CNN reported last week the choice would likely be Da Nang, but the plan was still being finalized. The announcement of the location for second summit comes just days after a confidential UN report found that the North Korean nuclear and missile program remains intact. And last week, intelligence officials warned that they believed North Korea was “unlikely to completely give up its nuclear weapons and production capability.” But Trump has continued to paint a rosy picture of his relationship with the North Korean leader and the “tremendous progress” being made in negotiations. He previewed the upcoming summit during his State of the Union address earlier this week, emphasizing the “historic push for peace” on the Korean Peninsula. “Our hostages have come home, nuclear testing has stopped and there has not been a missile launch in more than 15 months. If I had not been elected President of the United States, we would right now, in my opinion, be in a major war with North Korea,” Trump said Tuesday on Capitol Hill. Trump previously met with Kim in Singapore last summer, where the North Korean leader agreed to “work toward complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.” The State Department’s top negotiator with North Korea, Stephen Biegun, released a statement Friday following a meeting in Pyongyang with North Korean officials, but did not mention a location for the summit. [Politico, CNN] 3. Acting AG Whitaker testifies he has ‘not interfered’ with Mueller probe Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker testified before the House Judiciary Committee on Friday, where he insisted he has “not interfered in any way” with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into the Trump campaign’s involvement with Russian election interference. Whitaker did not directly answer Committee Chair Jerry Nadler’s question about whether he has “ever been asked to approve any action or request to be taken by the special counsel,” but said he has “not talked to the president about the special counsel’s investigation.” Whitaker has faced criticism for not recusing himself from Mueller’s probe after publicly questioning its validity. Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal grilled Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker on the family separations at the southern border, describing the traumatized children she witnessed. Whitaker repeated that “there was no family separation policy, despite a leaked memo among senior government officials revealing that the administration planned to separate families to deter migrants from coming to the US-Mexico border. The administration’s controversial “zero tolerance” policy required that all adults apprehended at the border be subject to criminal prosecution, resulting in families being separated. But Whitaker later conceded that the administration was not tracking the children who were separated by a parent or legal guardian after they were apprehended at the southern border. “Before or after the zero tolerance policy was put into place and I call it the zero humanity policy, did the US attorneys track when they were prosecuting a parent or legal guardian who had been separated from their child? There’s only one answer to this. It’s gone through the courts,” Jayapal said. “Did we track it?” Whitaker responded. Jayapal followed up, “Did you track when you were prosecuting a parent of legal guardian who had been separated from a child?” “I don’t believe we were tracking that,” Whitaker said. A report from the Government Accountability Office and a Health and Human Services inspector general report have since revealed the chaos and confusion among federal agencies as the policy was rolled out. The HHS IG report, specifically, found that thousands of children had been separated prior to the policy being publicly announced. Asked if the Justice Department provided advanced notice to other agencies, Whitaker repeatedly referred to a news conference by then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions in May 2018. “The responsibility for the arrest, the detention and together with the custody of the children was handled by DHS and HHS before those people were ever transferred to DOJ custody through the US Marshals,” Whitaker added. Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker said he has not received special counsel Robert Mueller’s report. The revelation came after Congressman Eric Swalwell, a Democrat from California, pressed Whitaker on the Mueller report. Whitaker went on to say that Mueller is going to “finish his investigation when he wants to finish his investigation.” Asked if he thought Mueller was honest, Whitaker said, “I have no reason to believe he’s not honest, so yes I do believe he’s honest.” Here’s a portion of their exchange: Swalwell: “Has there been discussion at the Department of Justice about keeping the Mueller report from going to Congress?” Whitaker: “No. We in fact were continuing to follow the special counsel regulations as it relates to the report. We haven’t received the report.” Swalwell: “Has there been a draft opinion about keeping it from going to Congress?” Whitaker: “You know congressman I’m not going to talk about the kind of ongoing investigation that is the special counsel.”[CNN, The Week] 4. Roger Stone objects to possible gag order Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office said Friday it would support a “narrowly-tailored” gag order for Roger Stone, President Trump’s longtime adviser and friend who last month was indicted by Mueller’s team on seven counts, including obstruction of an official proceeding, witness tampering, and making false statements. “The order would be supported by a finding that there is a substantial likelihood that extrajudicial comments by trial participants will undermine a fair trial,” Mueller’s team said. Stone objected to the proposal via his attorneys, arguing his social media presence is smaller than Kim Kardashian’s and that public comment is his job. Stone’s attorneys’ argument contrasts with what Stone has claimed about his case so far — that it’s “impossible” for him to have a fair trial in Washington, he wrote on Instagram. He also attacked Jackson because she was appointed to the bench by President Barack Obama. Jackson said last week that if she imposes a gag order, it won’t limit all of Stone’s speech. He would still be able to opine on “foreign relations, immigration and Tom Brady,” she said, for example, but shouldn’t treat his in-court proceedings “like a book tour.” Stone’s attorneys also note that they disagree with the legality of a gag order Jackson put in place more than a year ago that has kept Stone’s former lobbying partner and fellow Trump adviser Paul Manafort and his legal team from speaking publicly. While they don’t attack Jackson directly in their filings, Stone’s attorneys took a second swing at her approach Friday. They requested that his criminal matter be randomly reassigned to another judge, because they say it was unfairly lumped together with a case that special counsel Robert Mueller brought against 12 Russian military intelligence agents for allegedly hacking the Democratic Party and Hillary Clinton presidential campaign during the 2016 election. Stone accuses the prosecutors of “shopping for a preferred district judge.” Jackson so far hasn’t had much face time in court with Stone or his legal team to reveal her approach to the case. And she’s had no proceedings to handle yet in the Russian hacking case, since the Russian defendants have not been arrested. But in Manafort’s case, another special counsel proceeding she oversees, Jackson has repeatedly clashed with the defense team, even sternly warning defense attorney Kevin Downing on multiple occasions. Stone’s attorneys seek more information about why the hacking case and Stone’s were deemed to be related. The DC District Court has special rules that govern related cases so that those with similar facts can be assigned to the same judge. Stone faces no charges in connection with the hack — though he was mentioned anonymously in their indictment as communicating with the Russians. He is charged with lying about his attempts to reach WikiLeaks as it planned to publish documents stolen by the Russians in 2016. “At first blush and without the benefit of discovery, there is nothing about these cases that suggests they are suitably related, other than they are both brought by the Office of Special Counsel,” Stone’s attorneys wrote in the filing. Prosecutors will respond to him about this next week.[Politico, CNN] 5. Warren to formally launch 2020 campaign Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) is expected to formally launch her 2020 presidential campaign Saturday at an event in Lawrence, Massachusetts, north of Boston. She will likely focus on her populist economic platform, highlighting issues of income inequality and workers’ rights. Lawrence boasts a “history of working people coming together to make change, where the fight was hard, the battle was uphill, and where a group of women led the charge for all of us,” Warren said in a video announcement. After her launch event, she will spend the rest of the weekend in early primary states New Hampshire and Iowa. From Lawrence, Warren went north to New Hampshire, where she held a town hall meeting in the town of Dover and repeated her call for Democrats to eschew corporate political money. “We gotta walk the walk; if we actually believe that money has too much damn influence in Washington, then change starts right here in the Democratic presidential primary,” she said. Warren’s announcement will be followed on Sunday by U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar, 58, who has said she will reveal her presidential plans in her home state of Minnesota. Warren picked up the endorsement of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee simultaneously with her launch. The group could pump millions of dollars behind her candidacy and provide an outside attack dog against her Democratic opponents. “We believe that Elizabeth Warren is the most electable Democrat and the best person to be president,” said Adam Green, the committee’s co-founder. Warren’s heritage claims have dogged her since her first Senate campaign in 2012, and Trump mockingly refers to her as “Pocahontas.” “Will she run as our first Native American presidential candidate, or has she decided that after 32 years, this is not playing so well anymore?” the president tweeted on Saturday. “See you on the campaign TRAIL, Liz!” Warren’s ancestry drew fresh scrutiny earlier this week with the discovery that she described her race as American Indian on a form to join the Texas legal bar in the 1980s. Warren has repeatedly apologized, saying the claim was based on “family lore,” and she now understands tribal sovereignty dictates membership. In a statement, Trump’s campaign described her as a “fraud” and said the American people will reject her “dishonest campaign.” Warren is one of four women so far seeking the Democratic nomination – an unprecedented number of female candidates vying to lead a country that has never elected a woman as president. Warren and the other women running so far, including Senators Kamala Harris of California and Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, are hoping to build on the success of women candidates who played a significant role in Democrats regaining control of the U.S. House of Representatives in November’s congressional elections. Lesley Thompson, 43, of Grantham, New Hampshire, had her support for Warren cemented after seeing her hold a town hall meeting, but knows many of her neighbors are still on the fence. “She’s a fighter and I’m a fighter,” Thompson said. [Reuters, The Associated Press] 6. Feds investigating Bezos’ accusation of blackmail by National Enquirer Federal prosecutors are examining whether the National Enquirer’s publisher, American Media Inc., violated a cooperation deal with its alleged attempt to blackmail Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos. AMI had previously signed a non-prosecution deal with the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office under which the company agreed to “commit no crimes whatsoever” for three years. Bezos claims AMI threatened to publish private photos of him and his mistress, Lauren Sanchez, if he didn’t stop an investigation into how the publication obtained text messages between the two. Authorities are reviewing whether AMI’s handling of the matter constitutes extortion. The authorities are now reviewing the matter for potential criminal activity. If they find any, they must also weigh whether the conduct breached AMI’s previous deal to assist prosecutors. AMI agreed not to commit crimes as part of that deal to avoid prosecution over hush-money payments to women who claimed relationships with President Donald Trump. Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer, played a pivotal role in some of the payments and has pleaded guilty to related charges. The Bezos tabloid matter could prove embarrassing not only for AMI, but for others in Trump’s inner circle who have engaged with David Pecker, AMI’s overseer. Bezos’s post pointedly referenced Pecker’s connections with the Saudis and suggested more would come to light. Bezos, who also owns the Washington Post, appeared to be making references to that paper’s aggressive investigation of the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, who wrote for the paper, and the seeming reluctance of the Trump administration to hold Saudis responsible despite that assessment by the intelligence community. Nicholas Biase, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan, declined to comment, as did Jon Hammond, a spokesman for AMI. Bezos Blackmail Charge Intensifies Proxy War With Trump It’s unclear whether the letters involving AMI’s and Bezos’s lawyers will lead to any criminal finding, given that the communications were presented in the form of negotiations between lawyers. If a prosecutor believes a cooperation deal has been violated, “you have to look at it,” said Kan Nawaday, formerly of the public corruption unit in the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office, which prosecuted the Cohen case. “You’re compelled to.” The deal between federal prosecutors in Manhattan and AMI was struck in September. It stipulated that AMI “shall commit no crimes whatsoever” for three years. AMI was required to produce “any document, record or other tangible evidence relating to matters about which this office or any designated law enforcement agency inquires of it.” Bezos said last month that he and his wife, MacKenzie, were divorcing, in an announcement that came just hours before the Enquirer reported that Bezos had been having a relationship with another woman. Bezos hired a private investigator, Gavin de Becker, to learn how the texts were obtained and “to determine the motives for the many unusual actions taken by the Enquirer.” [The New York Times, Bloomberg] 7. Trump inaugural committee may have overpaid for space at Trump hotel   Federal investigators scrutinizing President Trump’s inaugural committee have discovered it paid the Trump International Hotel a rate of $175,000 per day for event space, a WYNC/ProPublica report revealed Friday. Tax laws prohibit nonprofits from paying above-market rates to private entities, and Trump’s control over both organizations could be problematic. Committee members reportedly complained the $175,000 rate was far too high, suggesting a reasonable price would be $85,000 per day or less. Prosecutors in New York in December launched a criminal probe into whether Trump’s inaugural committee misspent its record $107 million haul. Ari Krupkin, an event planner at the Markham Group in Washington, said event space rentals typically come as part of a package that includes catering and audio-visual. Without those services included in the price, he said, “$175,000 a day seems more than egregious.” “It could be a tax law violation,” said Brett Kappel, an attorney at Akerman LLP who advises nonprofits. “Those emails would be of great interest to the Internal Revenue Service if they were to conduct an audit. They probably will be of great interest to the U.S. Attorney’s office in the Southern District of New York, which is investigating the inaugural committee.” Tax law bars nonprofits such as the inaugural committee from insider deals that would unduly benefit people — in this case the Trump family — that have influence over the nonprofit, Kappel said. In legal parlance, these are known as excess benefit transactions. A key question would be whether the Trump hotel charged the inaugural committee above-market rates, which could violate tax rules, Kappel said. If an IRS audit found such a civil violation, the inaugural committee would have to pay taxes on the amount of money it overpaid. It could become a criminal violation, Kappel said, if investigators uncover evidence that people knew that charging above-market rates to enrich the Trump Organization was illegal and did it anyway. A question on the mandatory nonprofit tax return, Form 990, asks whether the organization engaged in any excess benefit transactions. The inaugural committee checked the “No” box. The inaugural committee’s tax return states that it had a written conflict-of-interest policy, but the spokesman declined to provide the policy to reporters. Atchley & Associates, the Texas firm that prepared the tax form, did not respond to requests for comment. The inaugural committee has said that overall, for the event spaces and other expenses, it paid more than $1.5 million to the Trump hotel, as first reported by ABC and The New York Times. Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter and an executive at the Trump Organization at the time, was on the email chain about the Trump hotel event. She connected Rick Gates, the inaugural committee’s deputy chairman, with a hotel executive when Gates was seeking a price quote for the ballroom. Ivanka Trump’s spokesman in December said she only passed on the note and said that the inaugural should pay a “market rate.” Her spokesman did not respond to inquiries for this story. In her email, Wolkoff, who was a friend of Melania Trump’s, pointed out that since other venues were donating their spaces, the Trump hotel’s rate was particularly troubling. The company that runs events at Union Station, the site for the inaugural’s candlelight dinner, donated the iconic space, according to a contract obtained by WNYC and ProPublica. Barrack’s own wine was also on the menu at the Chairman’s Global Dinner, an exclusive inauguration week event hosted by Barrack. “It was my honor to have donated wine from my personal vineyard, completely free of charge,” Barrack told Vinepair. The Union Station donation and the wine do not appear to be included on the inaugural committee’s tax return, which is supposed to report non-cash contributions. The committee spokesman declined to answer detailed questions about the omission and other issues. In addition, the inaugural spent money at a hotel then partly owned by the investment firm of Barrack, the businessman and friend of Donald Trump’s who chaired the inaugural committee. The committee has said it spent at least $1.5 million at the Fairmont, a Washington hotel owned by the conglomerate AccorHotels. Barrack’s investment firm Colony Capital owned a roughly 5 percent stake in AccorHotels at the time of the inaugural, which it sold soon after. AccorHotels is run by a longtime former Colony executive. The inaugural spent as much or more at the Fairmont as it did at at the Trump International, the Times reported. The White House and the Trump Organization did not respond to requests for comment. White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said this week that the subpoena to the inaugural committee “has nothing to do with the White House.” This week, ProPublica and WNYC reported that Barrack’s firm developed a plan after the inaugural to profit from its close ties with Trump and the incoming administration. [ProPublica, WNYC] 8. Trump declared in ‘very good health’ after annual physical exam White House physician Dr. Sean Conley on Friday reported preliminary results of President Trump’s annual physical exam, which was completed earlier that day. “While the reports and recommendations are being finalized, I am happy to announce the president of the United States is in very good health,” Conley said, “and I anticipate he will remain so for the duration of his presidency, and beyond.” Trump was given recommendations to change his diet and exercise regime after last year’s physical found he was close to obesity. The president “admits he has not followed [those recommendations] religiously,” the White House said. Conley’s statement does not elaborate on any of the President’s medical conditions or procedures performed during the examination. Last year’s examination revealed that Trump has a common form of heart disease, as well as high cholesterol. Trump also received a perfect score on a cognitive exam, which Jackson said he performed at the President’s request. “I’ve got to know him pretty well. And I had absolutely no concerns about his cognitive ability or his, you know, his neurological function,” Jackson told reporters at the time. [CNN, NBC News] 9. Thai king opposes his sister’s campaign for prime minister Thailand’s King Maha Vajiralongkorn on Friday said a bid by his sister, Princess Ubolratana Mahidol, to serve as the country’s prime minister would be “inappropriate” and unconstitutional. The Thai royal family traditionally stays out of electoral politics, and “though she has relinquished her royal titles in writing,” the king said, his sister “maintained her status and carried herself as a member of the Chakri dynasty.” Who is Princess Ubolratana Mahidol? Born in 1951, Princess Ubolratana Rajakanya Sirivadhana Barnavadi is the oldest child of Thailand’s beloved late King Bhumibol Adulyadej. He died in 2016. She attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and after marrying an American in 1972 she gave up her royal title. After her divorce she returned to Thailand in 2001 and once again started participating in royal life. The princess engages actively in social media and has also starred in several Thai movies. She has three children, one of whom died in the 2004 Asian tsunami. The other two now also live in Thailand. The princess has registered for the Thai Raksa Chart party, which is closely linked to Mr Thaksin. Why is the election important? It will be the first vote since current Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha took power in 2014, overthrowing the democratic government and ousting ex-PM Yingluck Shinawatra, the younger sister of Mr Thaksin. Ubolratana was nominated by the Thai Raksa Chart Party, which opposes the military junta that took power via coup in 2014, including current Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha. Who is Prayuth Chan-ocha? Both Mr Thaksin and his sister live in self-imposed exile but remain a powerful force in Thai politics, with many in the country remaining loyal to them. In 2016, Thais voted to approve a new constitution created by the country’s military leaders, which was designed to perpetuate military influence and block Mr Thaksin’s allies from winning another election. But the princess aligning herself with a party allied with Mr Thaksin threatens those plans, correspondents say. A former general, Mr Prayuth also announced on Friday that he would be running for prime minister in the forthcoming election as a candidate for the pro-military Palang Pracharat party. Thailand has some of the world’s toughest royal defamation “lese-majeste” laws but technically the princess is not covered by them. However, the royal family is revered in Thailand and rarely criticised, so there are questions around whether any other candidate would want to challenge a member of the royal family. [BBC News, The Associated Press] 10. Actor Albert Finney dies at age 82 Actor Albert Finney, known for films like Skyfall, Tom Jones, Erin Brockovich, and Murder on the Orient Express, “passed away peacefully after a short illness,” his family confirmed Friday. He was 82. The Oscar-nominated actor debuted in 1960’s The Entertainer, and his career continued through The Bourne Ultimatum in 2007. He won several BAFTA and SAG awards, along with multiple Golden Globes. “We are deeply saddened to hear of the passing of Albert Finney,” the British Academy wrote on Twitter. “Finney will be warmly remembered for his powerful performances.” [Deadline, BAFTA] The Week MHI

Fareed’s MHI Global Briefing ;

Fareed: The American Left’s Isolationism

Venezuela is a test for the Trump administration—but also for the Democratic Party, which needs to find its voice on foreign policy, Fareed writes in his latest Washington Post column. It must pursue a foreign policy that helps usher out the odious regime of President Nicolás Maduro without triggering a backlash against perceived U.S. “imperialism.” It must support a political transition that doesn’t threaten the old guard so much that it fights to the end. And the United States must join other nations to help a country that has virtually been destroyed over the past decade. All this requires careful diplomacy, multilateralism and quiet pressure, not bombast. Venezuela’s crisis has revealed “worrying signs that the new Democratic foreign policy could turn out to be a reflexive isolationism that is not so different from President Trump’s own ‘America First’ instincts,”Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) said, “The United States needs to stay out of Venezuela. Let the Venezuelan people determine their future.” Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) said, “We cannot hand pick leaders for other countries on behalf of multinational corporate interests.” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) noted, “We must learn the lessons of the past and not be in the business of regime change or supporting coups.” Leftist hero Noam Chomsky and several dozen other academics and activists have signed a letter largely blaming the crisis in Venezuela on U.S. actions. Fareed writes. Liberal voices have called for America not to meddle in Venezuela’s affairs and to let Venezuelans determine their futures, but “[d]oes one really have to explain that Venezuela’s problems have been primarily caused by its own nasty government? That the Venezuelan people have not been allowed to determine their own future or pick their own leaders for years, going back to Hugo Chávez’s rule?” Fareed asks, The current government has clung to power by rigging elections, crushing opposition parties, muzzling the media and using lethal force against protesters. During a single week in January, pro-Maduro forces allegedly killed at least 30 people and arrested at least 850, according to the United Nations. The Chávez-Maduro regime has destroyed what was once Latin America’s richest nation, producing an almost unimaginable inflation rate of 1 million percent. (Prices double approximately every 19 days.) The simplest, bleakest indicator of how bad things are in Venezuela is that since 2015, an estimated 3 million Venezuelans have fled the country. That’s about 10 percent of the country, equivalent to an exodus of 33 million Americans. But millions more Venezuelans are staying and fighting. They have come out in droves to vote against this government, almost driving Maduro out in 2013 despite an unfair election, and successfully bringing an opposition parliament to power in 2015. For the past few years, Venezuelans have organized massive protests against the regime, enduring tear gas, arrests and killings. They have rallied behind an opposition leader, Juan Guaidó, and are using a constitutional process to shift control of the government from the regime to the elected parliament.

Will the US Ask China for a Loan, Amid Its Trade War?

The US Treasury needs to borrow more money—a stunning $12 trillion over the next decade, by one estimate—and it’s not getting as much help from China as it used to, The Financial Times’ Gillian Tett writes. China has been a reliable buyer of US Treasury bonds, but its holdings have quietly dropped. Last year, US deficits hit their highest mark since 2013, and Bloomberg reported in October that Treasury planned to borrow more, in part, to finance Trump’s tax cuts, which have cut revenue. The U.S. Treasury Department said government borrowing this year will more than double from 2017 to $1.34 trillion as the Trump administration finances a rising budget deficit. Specifically, the department expects to issue $425 billionin net marketable debt from October through December, lower than the $440 billion estimated in July, according to a statement released Monday in Washington. The Treasury sees an end-of-December cash balance of $410 billion, compared with its previous forecast of $390 billion. Treasury could offer bonds more attractive to US buyers, but a question remains: From whom will the US borrow? The situation raises an uncomfortable prospect, if one that’s unlikely to succeed, of Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin asking China for a loan, whilst squaring off over trade—a distinctly un-Trumpian move. The uncomfortable truth for the bill’s supporters is that the tax cuts are substantially contributing to a widening federal budget deficit, which now appears on track to top $1 trillion this year. If growth fades in the coming years — as many economists believe it will — the cuts could exacerbate the deficit even more. The best-case scenario for proponents is that the cuts spur a sustained increase in productivity and growth, which in turn produces increasingly higher revenues several years down the road — enough to reduce the “cost” of the bill to the budget deficit. The 2018 results are, oddly enough, what a lot of economists predicted would happen with Mr. Trump’s cuts, including ones who generally favor tax cuts. Total federal revenues in 2018 came in roughly where the Tax Foundation, a Washington think tank that typically projects large growth boosts from tax cuts, had forecast — which is to say, well below the budget office’s baseline. Just because the new law helped to increase economic growth, said Kyle Pomerleau, an economist with the Tax Foundation, “it doesn’t mean that it is going to pay for itself.” Mr. Pomerleau said additional growth from the law “will continue to be modest over the next couple of years.” “That will offset some of the initial cost,” he continued, “but it will still be nowhere near enough to make the tax cut self-financing.” In December 2017, as Republicans sped the tax cuts through Congress, the Tax Foundation released a projection that the cuts would add about $450 billion to federal deficits over 10 years, after accounting for the additional economic growth it would spur. The group has since redone the analysis, with what Mr. Pomerleau called improvements to its methodology. It now predicts deficits will increase by $900 billion — double its original forecast.

A Bad Sign for Climate Change: The World Wants More Oil

The Economist points to a stark reality: Oil demand is rising, and major producers intend on pumping more, not less—a development that will not help the world meet emissions-reduction and warming targets.The world’s largest economy and its second biggest polluter, climate change is becoming hard to ignore. Extreme weather has grown more frequent. In November wildfires scorched California; last week Chicago was colder than parts of Mars. Scientists are sounding the alarm more urgently and people have noticed—73% of Americans polled by Yale University late last year said that climate change is real. The left of the Democratic Party wants to put a “Green New Deal” at the heart of the election in 2020. As expectations shift, the private sector is showing signs of adapting. Last year around 20 coal mines shut. Fund managers are prodding firms to become greener. Warren Buffett, no sucker for fads, is staking $30bn on clean energy and Elon Musk plans to fill America’s highways with electric cars. Yet amid the clamour is a single, jarring truth. Demand for oil is rising and the energy industry, in America and globally, is planning multi-trillion-dollar investments to satisfy it. No firm embodies this strategy better than ExxonMobil, the giant that rivals admire and green activists love to hate. As our briefing explains, it plans to pump 25% more oil and gas in 2025 than in 2017. If the rest of the industry pursues even modest growth, the consequence for the climate could be disastrous. Rising emissions would be the biggest obstacle to mitigating climate change, but other problems loom against that larger one: The world isn’t getting any leadership from the US, The Washington Post writes, and a better funding mechanism may be needed to help countries implement climate plans, Sagatom Saha writes in the World Politics Review.

Trusting the Taliban

America shouldn’t, Hudson Institute Director for South and Central Asia Hussain Haqqani writes in Foreign Policy, arguing that the framework under discussion—withdrawal, in exchange for peace and denial of terrorist safe haven—looks a lot like the Soviet withdrawal conditions of 1988. Cracks have already appeared in US/Taliban negotiations, as the State Department denied a Taliban claim that the US had promised to withdraw half its troops by April. The Pentagon and the White House did not immediately respond to the Taliban official’s comments. In December, a U.S. official said Trump was planning to pull out more than 5,000 troops, or about a third of the total 14,000 U.S. personnel in Afghanistan. Last week, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Scott Miller, told ABC News that he was always looking for ways to reduce the U.S. footprint there where possible but said there was no order to drawn down. “I want the right capabilities here, not necessarily specific numbers, so I’m always looking to reduce where I’m able to, and be as efficient as possible,” he said.” In Moscow the Taliban delegation reiterated the group’s demand that all U.S. forces withdraw from Afghanistan. The group’s representatives have been taking part at the highly unusual meeting with key Afghan powerbrokers, among them Afghanistan’s former president, Hamid Karzai, who have said they hope the event can build trust and lay a foundation for a possible political settlement in the future. Afghanistan’s government though has refused to attend the talks in Moscow, criticizing them as undermining its legitimacy. The government, led by president Ashraf Ghani, is already uneasy that it has been sidelined from the U.S.-Taliban talks and faces the challenge of other powerful political figures in Afghanistan seeking to take leading roles in the burgeoning peace efforts with the Taliban. Afghanistan’s government is anxious that a sudden U.S. exit could see it rapidly weakened and there are worries the country could fall further into violent chaos or renewed civil war as other warlords emerge to compete with the Taliban. On Tuesday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called Ghani to reassure him of the U.S. commitment to Afghanistan. Ghani in a tweet said that Pompeo had “stressed that there is no uncertainty and ambiguity about the U.S. commitment to Afghanistan” and that Pompeo had “underscored the central importance of ensuring the centrality of the Afghan government in the peace process.” A readout released by the State Department, however, said Pompeo had also emphasized the importance of an “intra-Afghan dialogue” and expressed the U.S. determination to find “the conditions for the Afghan government, other Afghan leaders and the Taliban to sit together and negotiate a political settlement.” Trump’s desire to withdraw points to a larger question about America’s role in the world: While Trump is right to reject the role of world policeman, Haqqani writes, America should accept the more-limited role of umpire. The Wall Street Journal, for its part, agrees, writing that Trump seems to misunderstand that keeping troops abroad can maintain stability and that he “shouldn’t mislead his supporters at home and upset friends abroad by suggesting that peace can be purchased by American retreat.” President Trump won applause in Tuesday night’s State of the Union address when he declared that “great nations do not fight endless wars.” It’s a resonant line in a country that has been fighting in parts of the Middle East for nearly two decades. And, in a literal sense, the statement is true.

Will the World Bank Take a Free-Market Turn?

President Trump’s nominee to run the World Bank, David Malpass, laid out his vision in a Financial Times op-ed, giving a nod to “freer markets … that have lower taxes, fewer regulatory burdens.” Those are long-held tenets of the so-called Washington Consensus on model governance, and Malpass appears poised to uphold them. While Malpass has criticized the bank, he won’t “look to burn [it] to the ground” if he’s installed as president, Ian Bremmer writes at Time, predicting instead Malpass will reform its bureaucracy while pushing developing countries to seek more private financing. If you look at congressional testimony Malpass gave last year, it seems he and the Trump administration have three main goals when it came to the administration’s dealings with the World Bank and IMF. The first is to get emerging markets to start relying more on international market-based financing rather than the below-market-rate financing the Bank offers; the second is to make sure that money is lent for projects that are more financially sustainable; and third is to seek more debt transparency from countries receiving the loans in order to keep better tabs on the financial diplomacy China is pursuing around the world. Expect Malpass to make progress towards these three goals rather than set about dismantling the organization completely.

Fareed’s MHI 

WHITE HOUSE REPORT

From : The White House <info@mail.whitehouse.gov>To : <redaksi@mediahukumindonesia.com>Date : Wed, 06 Feb 2019 07:54:53 +0700   Subject : TONIGHT: What President Trump will tell Americans

TONIGHT: What President Trump will tell Americans

In a few minutes, President Donald J. Trump will travel to the U.S. Capitol to deliver the second State of the Union Address of his presidency. Watch it live at 9 p.m. ET. Here’s a preview of what he’ll tell Congress and the American people: “Together, we can break decades of political stalemate. We can bridge old divisions, heal old wounds, build new coalitions, forge new solutions, and unlock the extraordinary promise of America’s future. The decision is ours to make.” The President picked one simple, powerful message for our country tonight: “Choosing Greatness.” When our leaders in Washington put citizens first and their careers second—when they choose a spirit of compromise over the politics of retribution—there is no limit to what America can achieve. Both parties can rally behind this vision. We can protect American workers by passing the U.S.–Mexico–Canada Agreement to replace NAFTA. We can rebuild our country with a bipartisan infrastructure package that puts people to work. We can rebuild trust with a safe, legal immigration system that halts the flow of drugs and crime into our country. President Trump was elected to solve the problems that Washington gave up trying to fix. He is a dealmaker offering common-sense, bipartisan solutions. In the past few months, Republicans and Democrats have already come together to pass historic criminal justice reform and crucial legislation to fund the war on opioid abuse. These issues matter. Americans don’t want resistance. They want results. Watch President Trump’s second State of the Union live at 9 p.m. ET. Behind the scenes: Meet the First Lady’s special guests for tonight’s speech

THE WHITE HOUSE  MHI 

WEST WING MHI Daily

With Pitch for Unity, President Trump Urges Republicans and Democrats to ‘Choose Greatness’ “President Trump in his State of the Union address Tuesday night issued a call for unity and an end to the political divisiveness that has ensnared Washington,” Melissa Quinn reports for the Washington Examiner. During the speech—with its theme of “choosing greatness”—President Trump laid out five priorities that should unite both parties in Washington: “American jobs and fair trade, rebuilding the nation’s infrastructure, reducing the price of healthcare and prescription drugs, creating a safe and lawful immigration system, and pursuing a foreign policy agenda that ‘puts America’s interests first.’” “There is a new opportunity in American politics if only we have the courage together to seize it,” Trump said. “Victory is not winning for our party. Victory is winning for our country.” The president struck notes of unity and bipartisanship with his speech, which marked the third address he has delivered before a joint session of Congress and lasted 82 minutes. During the remarks, he urged lawmakers in attendance to put aside their differences and reject gridlock. “We can make our communities safer, our families stronger, our culture richer, our faith deeper, and our middle class bigger and more prosperous than ever before,” the president said. “But we must reject the politics of revenge, resistance, and retribution — and embrace the boundless potential of cooperation, compromise, and the common good.” Trump used his address to tout the accomplishments of his first two years in office, including the passage of tax reform in 2017 and the addition of more than 5 million new jobs to the economy. He also noted the legislative achievements of the last Congress, including reforms to the Department of Veterans Affairs, the farm bill, and criminal justice reform. Trump’s comments about the economic gains particularly benefiting women earned the him a standing ovation and chants of “USA, USA” from lawmakers led by female members, including Democrats. “Don’t sit yet. You’re going to like this,” he joked. “And exactly one century after Congress passed the constitutional amendment giving women the right to vote, we also have more women serving in Congress than at any time.” But the president took aim at the ongoing investigations on Capitol Hill, including those focused on his administration and presidential campaign. Those probes are expected to ramp up this Congress, with Democrats now controlling the House and gaining subpoena power. “An economic miracle is taking place in the United States, and the only thing that can stop it are foolish wars, politics, or ridiculous partisan investigations,” Trump said. “If there is going to be peace and legislation, there cannot be war and investigation. It just doesn’t work that way.” Casting a shadow over the State of the Union is the ongoing fight over funding for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border and efforts to avert a second government shutdown. Trump continued to push for Congress to quickly pass legislation that will fund a slew of government agencies, for which funding will lapse Feb. 15, and secure the U.S.-Mexico border. “This is a moral issue,” the president said of border security. “The lawless state of our southern border is a threat to the safety, security, and financial well‑being of all Americans. We have a moral duty to create an immigration system that protects the lives and jobs of our citizens. This includes our obligation to the millions of immigrants living here today, who followed the rules and respected our laws.” Trump added, “Simply put, walls work and walls save lives. So let’s work together, compromise, and reach a deal that will truly make America safe.”

Three-quarters approve of Trump speech: polls In The Hill, Tal Axelrod reports that roughly three-quarters of American voters approved of President Trump’s State of the Union address, according to CNN and CBS News polls. “Seventy six percent approved of the speech in the CBS poll, with 24 percent saying they disapproved,About 59 percent of respondents to the CNN poll had a very positive reaction to the speech, while 17 percent said they had a somewhat positive reaction. Roughly one-quarter — 23 percent — had a negative reaction in that survey.” Axelrod writes. But the telling stat: CBS found that “about 82 percent of independents in that survey who watched the speech liked what they heard.” About 87 percent of Republicans told CNN they had a very positive reaction to the speech, while 64 percent of Democrats had a very or somewhat negative response. Trump Tuesday night hopscotched between calling for bipartisanship and national unity and doubling down on hot-button issues such as immigration and abortion. “I stand here ready to work with you to achieve historic breakthroughs for all Americans,” Trump said, adding later that “countless Americans are murdered by criminal illegal aliens.” Only a third, 33 percent, of respondents, however, told CBS they believed Trump and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) will work together more after the speech, while 63 percent said there would not be much change in their working relationship. The CBS News survey polled 1,472 adults who watched the State of the Union address and has a margin of error of 3 percentage points. The CNN poll surveyed 584 adults who watched the State of the Union address and has a margin of error of 5.4 percentage points.

Trump goes big, uses delayed State of the Union to make case on border, much more “The speech was big, not just in length — about 80 minutes — but also in concept. It had a structure. It had a message. It had passages to appeal to all Americans. It had passages to appeal to Trump’s conservative base. And it had passages to appeal to opposition Democrats,” Byron York writes in the Washington Examiner. “He delivered a big, broad, far-ranging statement of his approach to the presidency and to the country.” The strongest part of Trump’s speech that appealed to all Americans came after his “choose greatness” introduction, when he walked through recent progress in the American economy. “In just over two years since the election, we have launched an unprecedented economic boom — a boom that has rarely been seen before,” Trump said. Then the details: 5.3 million new jobs; 600,000 manufacturing jobs; rising wages; Americans off food stamps; low unemployment; low minority unemployment; low unemployment for disabled Americans; more people working (157 million); lower taxes; an increased child tax credit; soaring energy production; deregulation, and more. At times Speaker Nancy Pelosi, sitting behind the president, didn’t quite seem to know what to do. “Pelosi’s face during Trump’s comments about job growth could not have been more strained,” tweeted Miranda Green, a reporter for The Hill. Indeed, Democrats didn’t have much to say in response to Trump’s economic record. They could quibble with the numbers — maybe it’s really 4.9 million new jobs instead of 5.3 million, or maybe Trump was taking credit for President Barack Obama’s accomplishments — but the fact is, Trump had a strong case to make for the performance of the economy during his presidency, and he made it the first part of his speech.

GUILFOYLE: PRESIDENT TRUMP’S STATE OF THE UNION WAS A GRAND SLAM “The president also took time to highlight a few of the many incredible achievements under his administration” in last night’s State of the Union, Kimberly Guilfoyle writes in The Daily Caller. “Record-low unemployment rates for African Americans, Hispanics, and women. Rising wages and tax cuts for working-class families. A historic bipartisan criminal justice reform bill to give non-violent offenders a second chance.” Still, the speech stuck out because it challenged us as a nation to go even further. It challenged us to live up to our core values and advance bipartisan policies that give every American a chance to live the American Dream. To be sure, the speech was not only a vision, but a realistic blueprint to achieve that vision. Unsurprisingly, the president highlighted trade policy as a necessary first step to better the lives of all Americans. For too long, our trade agreements have put the interests of big corporations and foreign powers above those of the American people. Those types of agreements must become a thing of the past. Trade should always be fair, free, and put the interests of American workers first. Congress should follow President Trump’s lead and vote to pass his historic new trade deal between the U.S., Mexico, and Canada.  The agreement, known as the USMCA, would help bring manufacturing jobs back to America by revitalizing the automotive industry. Farmers would be better off too, thanks to the deal opening up new markets for their exports. President Trump also called for common-sense fixes to our broken immigration system. Our current open borders system benefits political elites at the expense of everyday Americans. To that end, the status quo is immoral, unfair, and unjust. That’s why the president called for a feasible solution: building a border wall. A wall on the southern border would uphold the rule of law, halt the flow of dangerous narcotics, and protect families from criminal aliens. The president also believes that in order to fully ensure our safety and quality of life, we must invest in world-class infrastructure. In fact, the American Society of Civil Engineer’s rated our infrastructure a D+ grade in a 2017 report.

Congress breaks out into Happy Birthday for Holocaust survivor “Members of Congress broke out into a spirited singing of ‘Happy Birthday’ for a guest of President Trump’s State of the Union who survived both the Holocaust and the anti-Semitic mass shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue,” Tamar Lapin reports in the New York Post. Judah Samet turned 81 Tuesday as he was honored at Trump’s address to the nation for his incredible stories of survival. Samet, who survived 10 months in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp during World War II also narrowly escaped the October 2018 massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue, in which 11 people were killed. “He arrived at the synagogue as the massacre began, but not only did Judah narrowly escape death last fall, more than seven decades ago he narrowly survived the Nazi concentration camps,” Trump said during his speech. “Today is Judah’s 81st birthday,” Trump continued, as the crowd cheered and began to sing “Happy Birthday.” After the song, Samet thanked the well-wishers and Trump quipped: “They wouldn’t do that for me, Judah” to laughs. President Trump also honored three veterans who served in World War II: Private First Class Joseph Reilly, Staff Sergeant Irving Locker, and Sergeant Herman Zeitchik.

WEST WING MHI