Gov. George Allen, Matthew Bergstrom, Washington Post’s Aaron Davis, Bret Baier and guest host Lisa Boothe joined WMAL on Friday!

Mornings on the Mall

Friday, January 15, 2016

Hosts: Brian Wilson and guest host Lisa Boothe

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

 

5am – A/B/C GOP Debate Highlights:

• Trump-Cruz ‘bromance’ is over. North Charleston, South Carolina (CNN) Donald Trump and Ted Cruz clashed Thursday in their sharpest — and most personal — encounters of the campaign season. “I guess the bromance is over,” Trump told CNN’s Dana Bash after the debate. The 2.5-hour event sponsored by Fox Business Network was filled with testy exchanges between the seven candidates on stage. Cruz and Trump are battling for first place in Iowa with less than three weeks until the state’s caucuses, though the businessman has a commanding lead nationally. And with pressure mounting for someone to emerge as an establishment alternative to Trump and Cruz, sparks flew between Marco Rubio and Chris Christie. The much-anticipated Trump vs. Cruz showdown took a few minutes to materialize — but when it did, it packed a punch. Cruz forcefully responded to Trump’s accusations that he isn’t eligible to be president because he was born in Canada — a controversy that Trump has only recently embraced.
• Highlights from Thursday’s Republican debate: Here are some of the best lines from Thursday’s GOP debate in North Charleston, S.C.
  • Regarding Bernie Sanders possibly winning the Democratic nomination:    “Well, if that’s the case, we’re going to win every state, if Bernie Sanders is the nominee. That’s not even an issue.” – Marco Rubio
  • Accusing Chris Christie of endorsing many of Obama’s ideas: “Unfortunately, Governor Christie has endorsed many of the ideas that Barack Obama supports, whether it is Common Core or gun control or the appointment of Sonia Sotomayor or the donation he made to Planned Parenthood.” – Chris Christie
  • Responding to Rubio: “”When you’re senator, what you get to do is just talk and talk and talk.” – Donald Trump
  • About why he’s raising questions about Ted Cruz’s nationality now: “He’s doing a little bit better. I didn’t care before.”

5am – D         McSally: ‘Enraging’ that Iran forced female sailor to wear a hijab. Rep. Martha McSally (R-Ariz.), a retired Air Force colonel, said Thursday it was “enraging” that a female sailor was forced to cover her head while being detained by Iran. “Enraging. No reason ever why US servicewoman should be forced to wear hijab. Admin’s response has been embarrassing,” she Tweeted.    “Enraging. No reason ever why US servicewoman should be forced to wear hijab. Admin’s response has been embarrassing.”— Martha McSally (@RepMcSally) January 14, 2016 The Iranian military temporarily detained 10 U.S. sailors — one woman and nine men — on Tuesday after the two boats they were on entered Iranian waters. Iranian state media released videos and photos of the Iranian military aboard the U.S. vessels, forcing the sailors to kneel with their hands behind their backs.

5am – E         13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi coming out Friday. Movie is directed by Michael Bay and about six members of the Annex Security Team defend the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, from an attack by Islamic militants.

Trump rents Iowa theater to show Benghazi movie. (Des Moines Register) – DES MOINES, Iowa — Donald Trump has rented space at an Urbandale movie theater and will give Iowans free tickets to a showing of the Benghazi movie that critics of Hillary Clinton have been eagerly awaiting. “Mr. Trump would like all Americans to know the truth about what happened at Benghazi,” the GOP presidential candidate’s Iowa co-chair Tana Goertz said Thursday night. Trump will pay for the showing of 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi at 6 p.m. Friday at the Carmike Cobblestone 9 Theatre, Goertz said. “The theater is paid for. The tickets are paid for. You just have to RSVP,” she said.

6am – A/B/C Debate reveals contours of a three man race. (Fox News/By Chris Stirewalt) — NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. – You could still say the race was wide open, but after Thursday’s debate, that would be a lie. The Fox Business Network’s faceoff offered a hopeful glimmer for Republicans wondering when they will get past the preliminaries and on to the business of picking a presidential nominee. This long-running television show is about to see a spinoff. Call it “The Contenders.” It won’t happen all at once, but the trio of Donald Trump, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio stood far enough above the rest of the field here that you could, for the first time, really sense the separation of the two tiers on the debate stage.

6am – D         Hillary’s Campaign Is Imploding.

• Chelsea Clinton goes on the attack; Democrats ask why. Chelsea Clinton is stepping onto the 2016 battlefield against Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a shift that some Democrats are interpreting as a sign of trouble for her mother’s presidential campaign. Making her first solo appearance on the stump, Chelsea Clinton late Tuesday ripped Sanders over his proposals on healthcare and college affordability, arguing the White House hopeful wants to “dismantle” ObamaCare and Medicare. Democrats have almost universally panned the attack, believing it to be ineffective and a misuse of her talents.
• CNN’s JAKE TAPPER on WMAL: “It’s questionable to say HIllary is the front runner.”
• Iowa Poll: Clinton slides, leads Sanders by 2 points. Hillary Clinton has lost most of her lead over Bernie Sanders in the race to win Iowa’s Democratic presidential caucuses, a new Iowa Poll shows. Clinton, who has been the favorite all along, now leads Sanders by just 2 percentage points in The Des Moines Register/Bloomberg Politics poll. That’s down from 9 percentage points a month ago. Clinton is now the top choice of 42 percent of likely Democratic caucusgoers, compared with Sanders’ 40 percent, the poll finds. The poll’s margin of error is plus or minus 4.4 percentage points.

6am – E         Undercard Debate Highlights: Fiorina Attacks Clinton, Huckabee Eyes Obama, Santorum Wants to Be Googled. GOP candidate Carly Fiorina came out firing in her first undercard debate, attacking Hillary Clinton right of the bat in her first question about the state of the economy. “Unlike another woman in this race, I actually love spending time with my husband,” says Fiorina, while saying the “state of the economy is not strong” citing women in poverty and men out of work. While former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee goes after President Obama’s optimism in the State of the Union address saying he should have stood in line at the layaway counter at Wal-Mart (WMT) around Christmas. And, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum attacks Democrats and addresses climate change.

7am – A         INTERVIEW — GOVERNOR GEORGE ALLEN – former governor of Virginia from 1994-1998 and represented Virginia in the United States Senate from 2001-2007 – analyzed the GOP debate and discussed why he’s endorsing Marco Rubio.

7am – B         GOP Debate Highlights

7am – C         Bush donors await green light to jump ship. ‘I need you to throw away money on Jeb — out of loyalty,’ a fundraiser told donors. (Politico) — When Jeb Bush announced a record fundraising haul in July, the Florida Republican rewarded major donors with a two-day celebratory retreat at the family compound in Kennebunkport, Maine. They also delivered a message: $114 million was just the beginning of how much cash they would need to win. Now, seven months later and just 17 days before the first ballots are cast, Bush’s donors are no longer high-fiving or strategizing how to keep funds flowing. Instead, the money spigot is shutting off as the donor class believes it is just a matter of time before the candidate they threw so much money behind drops out of the race. POLITICO talked to nearly two dozen major donors, and most say they are waiting for what one veteran Republican and former Bush 43 administration appointee described as the “family hall pass” to jump to another campaign after the New Hampshire primary.

7am – D         INTERVIEW — MATTHEW BERGSTROM — attorney representing Nova Firearms and Managing Attorney of Arlington-based Arsenal Attorneys, a nationwide law firm handling firearms law.

• President Obama’s push for gun control last week
• VA Attorney General’s attack on concealed carry permits
• The Virginia legislative session now underway (the protestors are pushing a ban on firearms business near schools)
• This Saturday at 11 am anti-Second Amendment protesters will strike again at Nova’s store in McLean.

7am – E         INTERVIEW – BILL HESS – Program Director for WMAL

• Giant panda cub Bei Bei makes first public appearance Saturday. (WTOP) — WASHINGTON — At almost five months old, and weighing close to 25 pounds, giant panda cub Bei Bei will go on public display at the National Zoo on Saturday. Named by Michelle Obama and Peng Liyuan, the first ladies of the United States and the People’s Republic of China, Bei Bei will have his choice of wandering the panda house and its outdoor enclosure. The panda house will be open 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. Visitors should use the Asia Trail entrance, across from the Visitor Center. Flash photography and video with handheld devices is permitted inside the panda house.

8am – A         INTERVIEW — AARON DAVIS — covers D.C. government and politics for The Washington Post

• Can D.C. afford to give all workers 16 weeks of paid family leave? Depends on whom you ask. (Washington Post/By Aaron C. Davis) — District lawmakers’ support for a proposed landmark law giving workers 16 weeks of paid family leave appeared shaken Thursday after a series of reports showed disagreement over how much the benefit would cost local businesses. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser’s administration released the first of the reports, a study funded by the Obama administration. And to the delight of proponents, it showed that salaries of every worker in the District who would take paid time off for the birth of a baby or to care for a dying relative could be covered for about the cost of a proposed 1 percent salary tax on employers. Within a few hours, however, it wasn’t clear that the lawmakers believed those figures, which found that the initiative could cost $300 million.
• DC CFO says paid-leave benefits too expensive as proposed. WASHINGTON (AP) — The District of Columbia’s chief financial officer says a proposal to guarantee paid family leave to people who live and work in the city is too expensive. The bill as written would provide the nation’s most generous paid leave benefits to District residents. It would mandate 16 weeks of paid leave for the birth of a child, a medical condition or caring for a sick relative. The proposal calls for a 1 percent payroll tax to pay for the benefit. Chief Financial Officer Jeffrey DeWitt said in prepared remarks to the D.C. Council on Thursday that such a tax wouldn’t bring in enough money, and the District can’t pay for shortfalls. For the bill to become law, the CFO has to certify that it won’t negatively affect the city’s finances.

8am – B/C     Took calls on DC’s 16 weeks paid leave proposal.

8am – D         INTERVIEW — BRET BAIER — Anchor Special Report, Fox News Channel – discussed the GOP debate and Hillary Clinton’s campaign in freefall.

8am – E         10 Yemeni detainees sent from Gitmo to Oman, in ‘troubling’ transfer. (Fox News) — The Obama administration on Thursday quietly transferred 10 Yemeni detainees from the prison at Guantanamo Bay to neighboring Oman – so quietly, in fact, that the news was first reported by state-run Middle East news agencies. And once the news got to Capitol Hill, it set off alarm bells given the host country’s proximity to Al Qaeda’s most active branch. The transfer is the largest batch of detainees shipped out of the Cuba prison camp so far this year. It is part of a wave of transfers as the administration steps up efforts to shrink the prison population, with the ultimate goal of closing the facility despite congressional resistance. Fox News reported earlier this week that the 10 detainees were slated for transfer, but the destination at the time was not known. The state-run Oman News Agency published a brief statement Thursday morning saying the detainees had arrived in Oman.