joined WMAL on Wednesday!
Mornings on the Mall
Wednesday, May 10, 2017
Hosts: Brian Wilson and Mary Walter
Executive Producer: Heather Hunter
5am – A/B/C F.B.I. Director James Comey Is Fired by Trump. WASHINGTON — President Trump on Tuesday fired the director of the F.B.I., James B. Comey, abruptly terminating the top official leading a criminal investigation into whether Mr. Trump’s advisers colluded with the Russian government to steer the outcome of the 2016 presidential election. The stunning development in Mr. Trump’s presidency raised the specter of political interference by a sitting president into an existing investigation by the nation’s leading law enforcement agency. It immediately ignited Democratic calls for a special counsel to lead the Russia inquiry. Mr. Trump explained the firing by citing Mr. Comey’s handling of the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server, even though the president was widely seen to have benefited politically from that inquiry and had once praised Mr. Comey for his “guts” in his pursuit of Mrs. Clinton during the campaign.
5am – D FOREIGN AFFAIRS NEWS:
- Trump to meet with Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov Wednesday. (CNN)President Donald Trump plans to meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Wednesday, according to his schedule. The meeting will take place at 10:30 a.m. ET in the Oval Office and will be closed to press, according to the White House. Lavrov had planned to be in Washington Wednesday to meet with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Tillerson and Lavrov are scheduled to meet earlier Wednesday to discuss Ukraine, Syria and bilateral issues, the State Department announced. In addition to the tensions between Washington and Moscow over geopolitics, the meetings between Tillerson and Lavrov, and now between Trump and the Russian foreign minister, come against a backdrop of recriminations over alleged Russian interference in the 2016 elections and the firing of FBI director James Comey.
- Trump to Arm Syrian Kurds, Even as Turkey Strongly Objects. WASHINGTON — President Trump has approved a plan to arm Syrian Kurds so they can participate in the battle to retake Raqqa from the Islamic State, a strategy that has drawn deep opposition from Turkey, a NATO ally. American military commanders have long argued that arming the Y.P.G., a Kurdish militia fighting alongside Syrian Arab forces against the Islamic State, is the fastest way to seize Raqqa, the capital of the militants’ self-proclaimed caliphate. And Mr. Trump, who made fighting Islamist militants a priority during his campaign, again showed the high regard he has for Pentagon generals by endorsing their advice when faced with a policy dilemma. Turkey has objected vociferously to such a move, raising fears of a backlash that could prompt the Turks to curtail their cooperation with Washington in the struggle against the Islamic State. A high-level delegation of Turkish officials was informed of the decision by Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, Mr. Trump’s national security adviser, when they visited the White House on Monday, and the Pentagon announced the move on Tuesday.
- Russia sends more weapons to Syria ahead of Lavrov visit to Washington. (Fox News) – A day before the Russian foreign minister arrives in Washington, Moscow has sent dozens of new artillery howitzers to Syria to be used by the Assad regime in a future ground campaign against rebel forces, U.S. officials told Fox News on Tuesday. The additional military weaponry comes days after a new ceasefire effort began in Syria. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov is set to sit down with his U.S. counterpart, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, on Wednesday. Some 21 M-30 Russian artillery pieces arrived via cargo ship in the southern port city of Tartus in the past few days, according to two U.S. defense officials. “This is not done by people who want to turn down the volume,” one official said.
- President Trump is considering sending 5,000 more troops to Afghanistan, adding to the 8,400 already stationed there. The Trump administration is weighing a drastic change when it comes to Afghanistan: Whether to send as many as 5,000 more troops in the fight, a military official told NBC News. Trump, however, is still deciding on a variety of options being presented to him by U.S. military leaders, senior administration officials told NBC News. The Washington Post first reported that the plan could involve an increase of at least 3,000 troops, with the U.S. asking other NATO nations to match. The U.S.’s force in Afghanistan currently totals about 8,400.
5am – E COFFEE SHOPS ARE TURNING OFF WIFI AND SO ARE SCHOOLS IN MADISON, WI:
- Coffee Shops Skip Wi-Fi to Encourage Customers to Actually Talk. At many coffee outlets, workers set up makeshift offices and rely on the stores’ Wi-Fi, which has come to be considered a given — if not a right. While HotBlack is not the first cafe to withhold Wi-Fi from the public, industry experts said such shops are in the minority and risk alienating customers. Mr. Bienenstock said he has traveled extensively, including 15 years of living in Europe, and found that the practice of setting up a temporary workplace in a cafe was largely confined to North America. He said he did not see his approach as revolutionary but as a response to society’s deep immersion into all things digital that leads people to seldom communicate face to face. Customers initially were aghast at the decision. “What do you mean you don’t have Wi-Fi?” was a common refrain, he said, adding that the camps are divided between those who love it and those who loathe it. (Only four of 28 reviews on Yelp noted the shop’s lack of Wi-Fi.) While the business does rely on volume, Mr. Bienenstock said the lack of Wi-Fi was not meant to get customers to linger less. He said he measured success by the din of his shop. “You’d have a hell of a time concentrating in our place because there’s so much noise,” he said. “There’s so many people talking to each other.” To promote conviviality, other shops have adopted a no-Wi-Fi policy and gone a step further: doing away with some comfy furniture and narrowing counters to make them less accommodating for laptops. Caroline Bell, co-owner of Café Grumpy, said it offers Wi-Fi only at its Greenpoint, Brooklyn, location, which has a larger space for customers who want to work, she wrote in an email. The cafe does not offer Wi-Fi at its seven other New York City locations.
- The Madison, Wisconsin school district is blocking students’ access to social media sites at several schools during the school day as part of a pilot project aimed at reengaging students. School officials at East High School and Wright and Cherokee Middle Schools killed access to Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat and dozens of other social media sites on May 1, and West High School followed suit on Monday.
6am – A/B/C F.B.I. Director James Comey Is Fired by Trump. WASHINGTON — President Trump on Tuesday fired the director of the F.B.I., James B. Comey, abruptly terminating the top official leading a criminal investigation into whether Mr. Trump’s advisers colluded with the Russian government to steer the outcome of the 2016 presidential election
6am – D INTERVIEW: JOE PERSICHINI — former Assistant Director in Charge of the Washington Field Office for the FBI AND he’s the new Executive Director of National PAL! (Police Athletics/Activities League!) — analyzed the firing of the FBI director.
6am – E OBAMA’S MILLION DOLLAR SPEECH:
- Obama Climate Change Speech Earns $3.26 Million for Personal Foundation. (Breitbart) — Former president Barack Obama’s speech on climate change in Italy raised €3 million ($3.26m) in ticket sales for his personal foundation, according to a report from The Times. Having travelled to Milan in a private jet, Obama settled into a presidential suite at the Park Hyatt hotel, costing roughly €8,400 a night. Meanwhile, his entourage of security occupied two separate floors across the hotel, while his security detail required a convoy of 14 cars, a helicopter, and 300 extra police. The event, which attracted 3500 people paying €850 a ticket, raised nearly €3 million, all of which will go to the Obama Foundation dedicated to “renewal and global progress.” “When it comes to climate change, the hour is almost upon us,” Obama told the summit, urging the world to “set aside our parochial differences” to create a better planet for the world’s children. “If we seize the future, there is nothing that we cannot do … I do not believe that this planet is condemned to ever-rising temperatures,” Obama said. “I believe these are problems that were caused by man and can be solved by man.”
- People are obsessing about Obama’s unbuttoned shirt. (Washington Post) — Former president Barack Obama is in Italy on Tuesday, speaking at a summit about climate change. Wait, is it really getting hotter? Because Obama is sporting a button-down shirt with the top few buttons undone, and although it’s not a full-on Burt Reynolds, it’s certainly … summery. And relaxed. The former POTUS is no doubt enjoying the more casual dress code of his post-presidency — and hey, it’s Italy, after all, the land of loafers and no socks. The relaxed look certainly didn’t go unnoticed — it rivals the Leather Jacket Melee earlier this year for the biggest collective freakout over an Obama sartorial choice since the Great Tan Suit Incident of 2014.
6am – F Express Lanes near $30 in Fairfax County. (WJLA) — Earlier this year, a funny thing started happening on the way to work for a group commuters in the DC region. They began noticing higher prices in the 495 Express Lanes, going from $18 to $24, and all the way up to $29 and $30. “The first time I saw 30 I was like, ‘you’ve gotta be kidding,'” says Tami Martin from Alexandria. All the commuters drive to work in Bethesda: Martin, Sarah Riedl from Mt. Vernon, and Terrell Lawyer from Wilder. All say riding in the Express Lanes, or Hot lanes, can sometimes save them more than an hour on a one-way commute. But the recent spike in tolls is leading to some changes. “I just got to the point where it really didn’t make sense,” says Lawyer, who is ditching the Express Lanes. But Martin is on the fence. “If it continues to regularly be at $30 I’m going to have to cut it,” she says. “I can’t support $500 to $600 a month on transportation.” Pricing in the 495 Hot Lanes is based on traffic in the regular lanes. When traffic is light, so are the tolls. But during the morning and evening rush hours, when 495 can be bumper to bumper, the cost of the Hot Lanes goes up.
7am – A INTERVIEW — CLIFF MAY – President of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies – discussed the latest in foreign affairs.
- Trump to meet with Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov Wednesday.
- Trump to Arm Syrian Kurds, Even as Turkey Strongly Objects.
- Russia sends more weapons to Syria ahead of Lavrov visit to Washington.
- President Trump is considering sending 5,000 more troops to Afghanistan, adding to the 8,400 already stationed there.
7am – B/C INTERVIEW — JOE DIGENOVA – legal analyst and former U.S. Attorney to the District of Columbia – analyzed the firing of the FBI director.
7am – D INTERVIEW — DAN STEIN – president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR)
- BACKGROUND: Dan Stein is an attorney who has worked for nearly 35 years in the field of immigration law and law reform. He has been in his present position as President since January 2003. Prior to leading FAIR, Mr. Stein was the Executive Director of the Immigration Reform Law Institute, a public interest litigation group that has represented a variety of organizations in immigration and administrative law matters.
- TOPIC: MD Illegal immigration news:
- Montgomery says it made mistake releasing suspect wanted by ICE. A 19-year-old Salvadoran national — arrested in Maryland last week on charges that he brought an AR-15 assault-style rifle into a high school parking lot — was released from the Montgomery County jail despite a request that he be held for possible deportation proceedings, officials said Monday. The suspect — Mario Granados Alvarado, a high school student also believed to have been driving a stolen car — was found the day after his release from the county jail and arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, authorities said. The process created needless risk, federal officials said.
- New York Times Surprised to Learn Legal Immigrants Oppose Sanctuary Laws. The New York Times reported Monday that a sanctuary bill in a liberal Maryland county faced “surprise” opposition from the county’s legal immigrant communities. “Sanctuary Bills in Maryland Faced a Surprise Foe: Legal Immigrants,” the Monday headline read. The Times‘ Sabrina Tavernise reported on a sanctuary bill that was shot down in Howard County, where one in five residents were born outside the country and Democrats outnumber Republicans two to one. The legislation would have made Howard County a sanctuary for illegal immigrants, requiring the jurisdiction to not fully cooperate with federal immigration officials. It turns out the county’s legal immigrants were not too keen on having an influx of illegal immigrants, arguing that “offering sanctuary to people who came to the country illegally devalued their own past struggles to gain citizenship.” The Times spoke to four legal residents who explained why they were opposed to the measure.
- Md. attorney general: Federal immigration detainers involve legal risks. Maryland Attorney General Brian E. Frosh this week advised state and local law-enforcement agencies not to hold undocumented immigrants past their release dates on behalf of federal authorities unless they have a judicial warrant or probable cause. He said in a memo Thursday that following his guidance would allow agencies to “comply with federal law in a manner that respects the constitutional rights of individuals, protects local agencies and officials from potential legal liability, and allows them to remain faithful to their mission of promoting public safety.” Frosh (D) warned that state and local jails could be subject to legal challenges regarding unconstitutional detention if they hold individuals suspected of immigration violations past their release dates without a judicial warrant or probable cause. “As an overriding principle, the government bears the burden of proving that the detention of someone beyond the person’s State-law release date does not violate the Fourth Amendment and its Maryland counterpart,” the memo said.
- ILLEGAL CROSSINGS DROP EVEN MORE: (Washington Times) – Illegal immigration across the southwest border dropped yet again in April, with the number of illegal immigrant children fallen below 1,000 for the first time in recent records, Homeland Security announced Tuesday. The numbers are part of a stunning drop since the beginning of the Trump administration. Border Patrol apprehensions alone are down a shocking 70 percent compared to last year under President Obama.
7am – E Dems Show Outrage Over Comey’s Firing After Wanting Him To Resign Months Ago.
8am – A INTERVIEW – SCOTT ALLEN – Sports reporter, Washington Post – discussed the latest in DC sports playoffs
- TONIGHT is the night for the CAPS! Pittsburgh Penguins vs Washington Capitals: Penguins and Capitals take it the distance. The Washington Capitals and Pittsburgh Penguins will meet in a Game 7 for the fourth time and second time in the Sidney Crosby/Alex Ovechkin era. FLASHBACK: The first time Crosby and Ovechkin met in a Game 7 was May 13, 2009, a 6-2 Penguins victory at Washington’s Verizon Center. Crosby scored twice and had an assist, while Ovechkin scored as well. Each superstar had three shots in the game. Oh, how the lineups have changed since then. Among the long departed who played that night: Bill Guerin, Mirolsav Satan and Hal Gill for the Penguins; Tom Poti, Viktor Kozlov and Sergei Fedorov for the Capitals. Only five Penguins players from that game remain with the team; Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Marc-Andre Fleury, Chris Kunitz and the injured Kris Letang. The Capitals have three remaining; Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom and Jay Beagle. Washington defenseman Brooks Orpik played for the Penguins that night.
- ALSO TONIGHT: Washington Wizards vs Boston Celtics: NBA Conference Semifinals against Boston Celtics tied 2-2 / Game 5 / When: Wednesday, May 10th at 8:00 p.m. ET / Where: TD Garden, Boston, Massachusetts
- Wizards vs. Celtics Game 5 preview: Washington heads to Boston for pivotal game. After back-to-back blowout wins at Verizon Center, the Wizards take on the Celtics Wednesday evening in what will be the most important game in Washington’s franchise history since 1979. Washington held leads by 14+ points during Games 1 and 2 in Boston. Let’s hope the Wizards hang on in this one, as they’ll need to win at least one game on the road to take down the Celtics.
- NATS: YESTERDAY @ Oriole Park: Washington Nationals 4 vs Baltimore Orioles 5
- Warrant issued for former Redskin Clinton Portis for failure to appear in court in Md. MONTGOMERY COUNTY, Md. (ABC7) — A warrant has been issued for former Redskins star Clinton Portis after he failed to show up in Montgomery County court on traffic charges Tuesday. Online Maryland state court records indicate Portis came in contact with a Montgomery County police officer around 9:12 p.m. on January 3. At the time, Portis was in downtown Bethesda at the intersection of Old Georgetown Road and Woodmont Avenue. Court records say Portis was driving a Florida vehicle without a valid license or registration. The records indicate his Florida license was suspended after he failed to appear in court – the same thing he’s accused of doing in Montgomery County.
8am – B/C Calls on the FBI Director Getting Fired.
8am – D INTERVIEW — RONALD KESSLER — is the author of “The Secrets of the FBI” and author of new book “The First Family Detail: Secret Service Agents Reveal the Hidden Lives of the Presidents” – discussed the firing of the FBI director.
8am – E JEFFREY TOOBIN UNHINGED:
- CNN LEGAL ANALYST JEFFREY TOOBIN lost it last night over Comey’s firing. He claimed it was a GROTESQUE ABUSE OF POWER and claimed the new FBI director will a Trump STOOGE.
- Toobin tears into Trump’s firing of Comey: ‘A grotesque abuse of power’ Calling it “a dark day in American political history,” CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin tore into President Trump’s decision to fire FBI Director James Comey in the middle of the bureau’s open investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties with Russia. “It’s a grotesque abuse of power by the president of the United States,” Toobin said on “The Situation Room” shortly after the news of Comey’s firing broke Tuesday evening. “This is the kind of thing that goes on in non-democracies, that when there is an investigation that reaches near the president of the United States, or the leader of a non-democracy, they fire the people who are in charge of the investigation.”
- Jeffrey Toobin: They are going to put in a stooge who will shut down this investigation!
