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Congress reflects the diverse population of this country both at the elected and staff level. Michelle Obama was very excited to greet the Trumps. A Muslim registry will bring all religious extremism and terrorism to a halt. The Women’s March was sparsely attended with crowds paling in comparison to Trump’s Inauguration. Trump’s Cabinet appointees are all well qualified to lead their respective agencies. Mexico will pay for that wall. And the Green Bay Packers will face the Pittsburgh Steelers in the Super Bowl. Now that we’ve gotten the alternative facts out of the way, back to real life. Here’s your Monday read...
Real Facts Matter
President Trump's inauguration ratings fell below the first inauguration numbers of presidents Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama, according to Nielsen data examined by Bloomberg. Trump's nearly 31 million television audience came 7 million short of Obama's 2009 inauguration, and had almost 11 million fewer viewers than when Reagan was sworn into office in 1981. More here.
Pretty in Pink
Some members of the DC Metropolitan Police Department donned the same hats as hundreds of thousands of marchers on Saturday as they worked alongside the activists during the Women's March. More here.
Dear Donald…
Donald Trump thanked President Obama for the traditional letter left for his successor. "I just went to the Oval Office and found this beautiful letter from President Obama," Trump said Sunday, addressing senior staff members before they were sworn in. "It was really very nice of him to do that and we will cherish that. We will keep that and we won't even tell the press what's in that letter." More here.
Trump Meets with Mexican Prez
Trump will meet with Mexico President Enrique Peña Nieto on January 31st at the White House. Trump has said he wants to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement -- signed in 1994 with Canada and Mexico -- in order to improve terms for U.S. workers. More here.
High Times at the Inauguration
Hundreds of people waited in line in the Dupont Circle neighborhood in DC for a free joint on the morning of Trump’s inauguration. The activist group DCMJ Dupont held its “Inaugural #Trump420” event on Friday morning, giving away free coffee, tea, and marijuana. More here.
Democracy in Color Presents: DNC Debate Tonight
Democracy in Color’s DNC Chair Candidate’s Forum will be the only grassroots-organized forum and the only one focused on race and voters of color. It happens tonight at 7P on the campus of George Washington University. To attend or for information on how to view it live online, click here.
Trump’s First Executive Order Targets ACA
In one of his first executive orders, President Trump gave no specifics about which aspects of the Affordable Care Act he was targeting. But its broad language gave federal agencies wide latitude to change, delay, or waive provisions of the law that they deemed overly costly for insurers, drug makers, doctors, patients or states, suggesting that it could have wide-ranging impact, and essentially allowing the dismantling of the law to begin even before Congress moves to repeal it. More here.
Jones Day Lawyers Join Trump Administration
Chaka Patterson is one of 12 lawyers from Jones Day who will be joining the Trump administration. Patterson previously served as a Cook County Assistant State's Attorney and chief of the Civil Actions Bureau in Illinois. Before joining Jones Day, Patterson led the special litigation bureau in the Illinois attorney general’s office and was later an executive at Exelon Corp., one of the largest public utility holding companies in the country. More here.
Civil Rights Under Trump
Another Jones Day attorney joining the administration is John Gore, the attorney who defended North Carolina’s controversial transgender bathroom bill, HB2. This is who Trump has chosen to head the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division. More here.
Girl Bye
Fox News has cut ties with the Clueless actress Stacey Dash. She was one of several commentators the network dropped as they appear to be making more room for Trump-friendly pundits. More here.
Black Woman, White House
Meanwhile, Omarosa appeared to have been the only woman of color who was sworn in along with other senior White House staffers in the East Room on Sunday.
HUD Suspends FHA Mortgage Insurance Rate Cut
An hour after Donald Trump assumed the presidency, his administration indefinitely suspended a pending rate cut for mortgage insurance required for FHA-backed loans, which are popular with first-time home buyers. The move by HUD reversed a policy announced in the waning days of the Obama presidency that would have trimmed insurance premiums for typical borrowers by hundreds of dollars a year. More here.
Lewis Rallies the Crowd in Atl
“I know something about marching.” That’s what Congressman John Lewis (D-GA) said to an Atlanta crowd on Saturday during the city’s Women’s March that coincided with events across the country, recalling his experience protesting during the Civil Rights movement. More here.
Another Appointee Expresses Differences with Trump
During SC Governor Nikki Haley’s Senate Foreign Relations committee confirmation hearing to become the country’s UN Ambassador, she joined other Cabinet nominees in expressing differences with Trump on foreign policy issues, starting with Russia. More here.
DeVos Hearing
An executive session for the committee voting on President Trump's Education Secretary nominee Betsy DeVos has been postponed until January 31st. More here.
Tax Returns
Despite Trump and his administration saying that the American people don’t care about the president's taxes, a WhiteHouse.gov petition urging him to release his tax returns has reached the 100,000 signatures minimum needed to warrant a response from the administration. More here.
Jump Man Cruz
In an effort to build (and repair) some relationships with fellow GOP members, Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) has started a weekly basketball game in the Russell Senate Office Building and has been urging colleagues to attend. According to Politico, Cruz is said to be a surprisingly good jump-shooter with miserable form. Senator Tim Scott (R-SC) has played, and Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) is said to be joining soon. More here.
Evans Hires Dep CoS
Kendra Brown has joined the office of Congressman Dwight Evans (D-PA) as Deputy CoS and Legislative Director. She previously served as Policy Director for the Congressional Black Caucus. For more on Kendra’s professional background, click here.
Secret Service Settle Racial Discrimination Law Suit
The Department of Homeland Security and the Secret Service have agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit alleging racial discrimination in promotion practices by the agency that protects the president. More than 100 Black Secret Service agents alleged in the 2000 lawsuit that they were routinely passed over for promotions in favor of less-qualified white agents. More here.
Look to the Future
On November 6, 2018, 33 Senate seats, all 435 seats in the House of Representatives, 39 state and territorial governorships and numerous other state and local elections will be contested. Start studying for these midterms now.
Cory Booker 2020?
Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) said Saturday he doesn't "care about 2020," brushing off questions about running for president. "Too many things can happen that can hurt people in our nation and around the globe if this President isn't checked," Booker told CNN during an interview at the Women's March in Washington. "Right now, I don't care about 2020. I don't care about 2018," he said. "I am not open to being president," he continued. "I don't even want to have the discussion right now." More here.
Hill Harper Goes to CNN
HLN launches a new original series, “How It Really Happened with Hill Harper” on Friday, January 27th at 8P. Hosted by critically-acclaimed actor Hill Harper, the show will delve deeply into some of the most notorious crimes, mysteries, trials, and celebrity tragedies of our time. All future episodes will premiere at 9P on Fridays only on HLN. More here.
Kalorama Drama
The Kalorama neighborhood of DC, a stately jumble of embassies, ambassador residences, and many homes owned by financiers, lobbyists, and other members of the upper class, has always been tony. But a stormy political climate has produced an unusual medley of newcomers who have generated interest in the neighborhood that extends well beyond Washington. More here.
Spotted at Sundance
Hundreds of people fled DC to bypass the sea of red hats that draped the nation’s capital. The Beat traveled to Sundance. Turns out, we weren’t the only ones. Here’s who we spotted: Dolores Huerta, CNN’s Kelvin Davis and Kamau Bell, Intel’s Julia Sessoms, RLJ’s Traci Blunt, The Raben Group's Robert Raben, Juliette Gilliam, and Heidi Nel, former Daily Show correspondent Jessica Williams, Maynard Jackson, Jr. promoting a documentary about his father, ELC Executive Director and Blackhouse Foundation President Brickson Diamond, Nia Long, Jurnee Smollet, John Legend, Common, Aldis Hodge, Keanu Reeves, Molly Shannon, and many other celebs us DC politicos would bypass to chat with a world leader or MoC. It’s a different world in the mountains.
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David Duke: "We Did It!" The white supremacist radio host and former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan tweeted, “Hail Prez Trump!” and proclaimed, “We did it!”
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Neo-Nazi Site Daily Stormer: The neo-Nazi website The Daily Stormer, which frequently defends Adolf Hitler, attacks “kikes,” and has a section documenting the purported “Jewish Problem,” documented Trump’s inauguration in a post titled “It’s Victory Day.” The site’s founder and editor, Andrew Anglin, announced, “So, today is the day that all of our work comes to fruition...It is still almost unbelievable that we pulled this off.”
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Hate group leader Richard Spencer, leader of the white nationalist hate group National Policy Institute, praised Trump’s inaugural remarks in a brief video posted to his Twitter account. Spencer concluded that the speech “was great” and “really special.”
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White nationalist video blogger Paul Ray Ramsey (aka Ramzpaul), a white nationalist whom the Southern Poverty Law Center says "has emerged as the hottest right-wing video blogger this side of former Klansman David Duke,” tweeted that Trump was “kicking ass” in his "wonderful" inauguration speech.
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Anti-Semitic writer Hunter Wallace, whose real name reportedly is Brad Griffin, is an anti-Semite who is also a board member for the white supremacist hate group Council of Conservative Citizens. Wallace wrote on Twitter that he thought the inauguration was “awesome” and that Trump was “doing great.”
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Videos of the Day
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Want to know what the Obamas are up to next? They let you know here. | |
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 | The Congressional Hispanic Caucus held a press conference after the inauguration to talk about immigration and other issues of concern under a Trump administration. | |
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 | Amy Schumer photobombs march organizer Janaye Ingram. | |
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Janelle Monáe shares a powerful moment with mothers of the movement at DC’s Women’s March. | |
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 | Senator Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) talks with Roll Call about how the priorities of the Women's March will be addressed in Congress.
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"Saturday Night Live" honored former President Barack Obama’s legacy with a musical tribute during its first show after President Trump’s inauguration. | |
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Pics of the Day
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A Latino army gathers at the home of Stephanie Valencia and Oscar Ramírez before the Women's March. | |
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APALA's Greg Cendana stands strong in the movement. | |
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 | Marchers gather during the Sundance Film Festival in Park CIty, Utah with a stern warning. | |
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 | Angela Davis poses with actor Jeffrey Wright at the Women's March in DC. | |
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 | Spotted at the Women's March in DC -- this cutie. | |
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Mike Woestehoff with activist Samantha Eldridge at the Najavo Nation reception Friday night in DC. | |
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 | GOP strategists Ashley Bell and Rufus Montgomery (upper right) pose with Floyd Mayweather during an inauguration gala. | |
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Omarosa poses with House Speaker Paul Ryan at an inaugural gala. | |
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 | Obama left, Trump right. No trickery. Just the facts. | |
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