Washington Examiner Night News Editor Christian Datoc, Washington Examiner Chief Political Correspondent Byron York, AEI’s Michael Rubin, The Weekly Standard Editor in Chief Stephen Hayes and Washington Post sports reporter Scott Allen joined WMAL on Thursday!

Mornings on the Mall

Thursday, June 7, 2018

Hosts: Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese

5am – A/B/C  DOJ watchdog finds James Comey defied authority as FBI director, sources say (ABC News) – The Justice Department’s internal watchdog has concluded that James Comey defied authority at times during his tenure as FBI director, according to sources familiar with a draft report on the matter.  One source told ABC News that the draft report explicitly used the word “insubordinate” to describe Comey’s behavior. Another source agreed with that characterization but could not confirm the use of the term.  In the draft report, Inspector General Michael Horowitz also rebuked former Attorney General Loretta Lynch for her handling of the federal investigation into Hillary Clinton’s personal email server, the sources said.  On Tuesday morning, President Donald Trump complained of “numerous delays” in the release of Horowitz’s final report, which is expected to run several hundred pages long and be released in the coming days. The sources who spoke to ABC News were willing or able to address only a portion of the draft report’s complete findings.

5am – D  Facebook allowed Chinese Firm charged as a national security threat to access user data (Washington Examiner) – Facebook allowed a Chinese firm charged by the federal government as a national security threat to the U.S. to access to user information, sometimes without the consent of the individual.  Facebook confirmed to Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., the top Democrat on the Senate intel panel, the social media giant entered into a third-party agreement with Shenzhen-based Huawei Technologies Co., one of roughly 60 other device manufacturers the company partnered with to help replicate a “Facebook-like” experience on other operating systems.  “Concerns about Huawei aren’t new – they were widely publicized beginning in 2012, when the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence released a well-read report on the close relationships between the Chinese Communist Party and equipment makers like Huawei. The news that Facebook provided privileged access to Facebook’s API to Chinese device makers like Huawei and TCL raises legitimate concerns, and I look forward to learning more about how Facebook ensured that information about their users was not sent to Chinese servers,” Warner said in a statement.

5am – E  Mueller News:

• Special counsel Robert Mueller’s team is requesting that witnesses turn in their personal phones to inspect their encrypted messaging programs (CNBC) – Special counsel Robert Mueller’s team is requesting that witnesses turn in their personal phones to inspect their encrypted messaging programs and potentially view conversations between associates linked to President Donald Trump, sources told CNBC.  Since as early as April, Mueller’s team has been asking witnesses in the Russia probe to turn over phones for agents to examine private conversations on WhatsApp, Confide, Signal and Dust, according to the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity.  Fearing a subpoena, the witnesses have complied with the request and have given over their phones, the sources said.  While it’s unclear what Mueller has discovered, if anything, through this new request, investigators seem to be convinced that the apps could be a key to exposing conversations that weren’t previously disclosed to them.
• Demoted FBI agent Peter Strzok had larger role in Clinton, Russia probes than previously known (Fox News) – Peter Strzok, who was pulled off Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigative team last year, played a more central role than previously known in both the Russia and Hillary Clinton email probes, a lawmaker familiar with the matter told Fox News Tuesday.  The lawmaker’s assessment of Strzok’s role in both investigations was based on the most recent records and testimony, including a closed-door interview with FBI espionage chief Bill Priestap.  Priestap was interviewed Tuesday as part of an ongoing joint investigation by the House Judiciary and Oversight committees. Priestap was Strzok’s supervisor and oversaw both the Russia and Clinton investigations.  The lawmaker described Priestap as a very cooperative witness, but added that unanswered questions remained about Priestap’s overseas travel. One line of questioning Tuesday concerned a trip to London by Priestap in May 2016 and whether it was connected to the Russia case.

6am – A  Trump Commutes Sentence for Kardashian-Backed Drug Offender (CBS Baltimore) – President Donald Trump has commuted the sentence of Alice Marie Johnson, a first-time non-violent drug offender, two White House officials told CNN, a week after Kim Kardashian West pleaded her case during an Oval Office meeting with Trump.  Johnson has already served 21 years of a life sentence after she was convicted on charges of conspiracy to possess cocaine and attempted possession of cocaine, according to the nonprofit Can-Do, which advocates for clemency for non-violent drug offenders.

She is expected to be released from prison soon.  Trump has issued five pardons since taking office, and Wednesday’s move is the second act of clemency granted by Trump after a celebrity appealed to him. Last month, Trump posthumously pardoned the boxer Jack Johnson after the actor Sylvester Stallone raised his case with the President.

6am – B  Secret Obama-era permit let Iran convert funds to dollars (Fox News) – After striking an elusive nuclear deal with Iran, the Obama administration found itself in a quandary in early 2016: Iran had been promised access to its long-frozen overseas reserves, including $5.7 billion stuck in an Omani bank.  To spend it, Iran wanted to convert the money into U.S. dollars and then euros, but top U.S. officials had repeatedly promised Congress that Iran would never gain access to America’s financial system.  Those assurances notwithstanding, the Obama administration secretly issued a license to let Iran sidestep U.S. sanctions for the brief moment required to convert the funds through an American bank, an investigation by Senate Republicans released Wednesday showed. The plan failed when two U.S. banks refused to participate.  Yet two years later, the revelation is re-igniting the bitter debate over the nuclear deal and whether former President Barack Obama was too eager to grant concessions to Tehran.  “The Obama administration misled the American people and Congress because they were desperate to get a deal with Iran,” said Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, who chairs the Senate panel that conducted the investigation.  And Republican Rep. Ed Royce, the House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman, accused Obama of trying to “hide a secret push to give the ayatollah access to the U.S. dollar.”

6am – C  ‘Happy Days’ star Henry Winkler says he was ‘left off’ LA county voter roster (CNN) – A Los Angeles County voter roster wasn’t exactamundo Tuesday night, according to “Happy Days” star Henry Winkler, who said he was one of the many California voters left off the rolls during the primary night.  “My name was left off the polling registry today on Los Angeles,” Winkler, who played Arthur “Fonzie” Fonzarelli on the iconic ’70s sitcom, posted on Twitter.  A message left with the county seeking comment about Winkler’s claim was not immediately returned Wednesday.  According to the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder, the names of 118,522 voters were omitted from the roster that poll workers use to check in voters at their polling place, due to a random printing error.

6am – D  INTERVIEW – CHRISTIAN DATOC – Night News Editor at The Washington Examiner – discussed Facebook user data sharing with a Chinese firm

6am – E  Government watchdog clears Zinke, EPA:

• EPA’s Tweet Shaming Dems Did Not Violate Hatch Act, Special Counsel Finds (Daily Caller) – An independent government watchdog cleared the Environmental Protection Agency of a potential Hatch Act violation related to an April 13 tweet appearing to chide Democrats, The Washington Post reported. The EPA tweeted a celebratory knock against Senate Democrats after Andrew Wheeler was confirmed as the EPA’s deputy administrator. An EPA employee union, AFGE Council 238, claimed the tweet broke federal law and violated the 1939 Hatch Act, which prohibits most federal employees and officials from using government resources to participate in political events and actions.  The Office of Special Counsel investigated the incident and ruled the tweet did not violate federal law because “it was not aimed at the electoral success or defeat of a political party or candidate for partisan political office.” The special counsel also found no evidence that EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt had any involvement in the message, according to a May 23 letter obtained by WaPo.

• Ryan Zinke cleared of Hatch Act allegation for Golden Knights speech (CNN) – The Office of Special Counsel found “no evidence or allegation” that Zinke “gave a political speech or otherwise engaged in political activity during this event” with the Las Vegas Golden Knights in June 2017.  The speech drew attention because of travel costs and the event host. Zinke left the event on a $12,375 charter flight that “might have been avoided” if his schedule had been better arranged, the Interior inspector general found in a separate report this spring. Knights owner Bill Foley was “a major donor” to Zinke’s 2014 campaign for Congress, and campaign finance records show Fidelity National Financial Inc. — where Foley is chairman of the board — has contributed nearly $155,000 to Zinke’s campaigns.   “And the fact that the team is owned by a political donor is not enough for OSC to conclude that he engaged in prohibited political activity in violation of the Hatch Act,” reads a letter dated May 31 from the Office of Special Counsel, citing a federal law governing how executive branch officials can engage in political activities.

6am – F  Should Capitals fans want the team to lose Thursday to try and win at home? –  It only took a few minutes, but tickets for the watch party for Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Final at Capital One Arena are sold out.  Tickets for the Thursday event were available beginning at 1 p.m. Wednesday. At 1:20 p.m., the Caps tweeted that all of the tickets were sold out. More than 70,000 people logged in at 1 p.m. when tickets became available, Monumental Sports & Entertainment said.  The tickets were free to the public, but there were fewer to pull from after Monumental announced Tuesday that tickets to the Thursday afternoon Mystics game would be free and that attendees could stick around to watch the viewing party after the WNBA game.  Tickets to the Mystics game are sold out as well.  The growing crowds for the Game 1 and Game 2 watch parties led to the need to issue tickets for the Game 5 event “in order to ensure that we could keep everyone safe and that people could enter and exit the Arena in an orderly way,” Monumental said in a statement (WTOP).

7am – A  INTERVIEW – BYRON YORK –  chief political correspondent for the Washington Examiner – discussed the latest IG report news      

7am – B  Trump accuses media of spreading ‘unfair’ and ‘vicious’ rumors about the first lady’s absence (LA Times) – President Trump blasted “the Fake News Media” in two tweets early Wednesday for fanning speculation about First Lady Melania Trump, who hasn’t been seen in public for more than three weeks following a medical procedure last month.  “The Fake News Media has been so unfair, and vicious, to my wife and our great First Lady, Melania,” Trump tweeted. “During her recovery from surgery they reported everything from near death, to facelift, to left the W.H. (and me) for N.Y. or Virginia, to abuse. All Fake, she is doing really well!”  He followed that up with a second tweet, claiming that some reporters saw Melania Trump headed to a White House meeting and withheld the information to propel conspiracy theories about her health.  “…Four reporters spotted Melania in the White House last week walking merrily along to a meeting,” the second tweet began. “They never reported the sighting because it would hurt the sick narrative that she was living in a different part of the world, was really ill, or whatever. Fake News is really bad!”

7am – C  Tickets to Caps Game 5 watch party at Capital One Arena sell out in minutes (WTOP) –  It only took a few minutes, but tickets for the watch party for Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Final at Capital One Arena are sold out.  Tickets for the Thursday event were available beginning at 1 p.m. Wednesday. At 1:20 p.m., the Caps tweeted that all of the tickets were sold out. More than 70,000 people logged in at 1 p.m. when tickets became available, Monumental Sports & Entertainment said.  The tickets were free to the public, but there were fewer to pull from after Monumental announced Tuesday that tickets to the Thursday afternoon Mystics game would be free and that attendees could stick around to watch the viewing party after the WNBA game.  Tickets to the Mystics game are sold out as well.  The growing crowds for the Game 1 and Game 2 watch parties led to the need to issue tickets for the Game 5 event “in order to ensure that we could keep everyone safe and that people could enter and exit the Arena in an orderly way,” Monumental said in a statement.

7am – D  INTERVIEW – MICHAEL RUBIN –  resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, where he researches Arab politics, the Gulf Cooperation Council, Iran, Iraq, the Kurds, terrorism, and Turkey – discussed Obama administration granting Iran access to U.S. Financial System in 2016

 7am – E  Trump is not entirely wrong about the War of 1812 (The New Republic) – In late May, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had a crotchety phone argument about trade with President Donald Trump. As CNN reports, Trudeau objected to the idea that Canada was a “national security” problem (the legal justification for the tariffs Trump was introducing). Trump responded, “Didn’t you guys burn down the White House?” Trump was referring to the famous burning of Washington conducted during the War of 1812. (The event actually took place in 1814.)  Pedants immediately jumped in to accuse Trump of an error. After all, wasn’t the torching of the White House conducted by British troops, under the command of Admiral George Cockburn?  Canada as an independent nation didn’t exist until 1867. What is now Canada was then known as British North America. When the United States fought a war with Britain from 1812-1815, it was, by definition, also fighting with Canada.  In fact, one of the American goals during the war was to conquer Canada and incorporate it into the United States. In the course of the war, American troops burned the city of York (now known as Toronto). While many of the troops on the British side were from the United Kingdom and other parts of the globe, there were also many Canadian-born troops as well as Native allies (most famously the Mohawks under the leadership of John Brant).

8am – A  INTERVIEW – STEPHEN HAYES – editor in chief of The Weekly Standard – discussed the latest on the Caps run to the Stanley Cup  

8am – B  Immigration News:

• Pizza delivery man detained by ICE after delivering to military base (The Hill) – A soldier called Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on a pizza delivery man after he made a delivery to a military base in New York City, El Diario reported.  Pablo Villavicencio was arrested on Friday after delivering the pizza to Fort Hamilton in Brooklyn.  Villavicencio’s wife, Sandra Chica, said Villavicencio was then taken to an immigration jail in Manhattan, where he contacted her, according to the report.  “As usual, he went to the military base to deliver a pizza order. But this time, the guard — whom he identified as African American — asked him for a valid identification document, and since he didn’t have one, the soldier called immigration to arrest him,” Chica told El Diario.
• ICE: A “Clean DACA Fix” Will Create An Explosion Of Illegal Immigration (Hotair.com) – At an event sponsored by the Center for Immigration Studies yesterday, outgoing chief of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Thomas Homan shared his thoughts on the possibility of upcoming congressional debate over a “clean” DACA bill. To put it mildly, he was not enthusiastic. If any sort of deal such as the one being described by supporters of the measure were to go through, Homan warned that potential border jumpers would take that as a signal to get into the United States while the getting is good, potentially overwhelming our immigration enforcement officials. (Washington Times)Passing a “clean” Dream Act to legalize illegal immigrant “Dreamers” will spur a new wave of illegal immigration and create a new population that will need an amnesty 10 or 20 years in the future, the government’s chief deportation official said Tuesday.  Tom Homan, who has been acting as the chief at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement since the beginning of the Trump administration, said even the talk of a renewed immigration debate on Capitol Hill will entice people to make the perilous journey to try to jump the border, saying during his nearly 35 years in immigration enforcement he’s seen it happen “every time you talk about some sort of benefit” such as legal status for illegal immigrants.

8am – C  North Korea Latest:

• Sebastian Gorka, Sean Hannity headed to Singapore for Trump-Kim summit (Washington Examiner) – Former White House aide Sebastian Gorka and Fox News host Sean Hannity will be in Singapore next week during President Trump’s historic summit there with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.  “I’m delighted to go with Sean Hannity and his team, so we will be there on the ground reporting for Fox and Fox Business,” Gorka told Fox Business on Tuesday.  The June 12 summit will take place at the Capella Hotel on Sentosa Island in Singapore.  Trump and Kim are expected to meet a 9 a.m. local time, the White House said this week.  Gorka previously served as a deputy assistant to President Trump and said he resigned his post in August.
• Kim Jong Un terrified someone will kill him at Singapore summit: report (Fox News) – White House official confirms President Trump has read the letter Kim Yong Chol delivered to him from North Korean leader Kim Jong Un; Rich Edson reports from the State Department.  North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un reportedly fears an attempt on his life at the historic Singapore summit that will bring the hermit kingdom leader the furthest he’s ever been from his country since coming to power.  U.S. officials believe Kim is worried about security and the possibility of an assassination attempt at the high-stakes summit where he will meet President Trump for the first time after months of back-and-forth negotiations, sources told Bloomberg.  In 2017, North Korea accused U.S. and South Korean intelligence services of hatching an assassination plot against Kim with a “biochemical substance.”  According to North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency, “a hideous terrorists’ group” directed by CIA and South Korean spies “ideologically corrupted” a North Korean dissident identified as “Kim” and paid the man more than $20,000 to carry out the attack.

8am – D  DOJ watchdog finds James Comey defied authority as FBI director, sources say (ABC News) – The Justice Department’s internal watchdog has concluded that James Comey defied authority at times during his tenure as FBI director, according to sources familiar with a draft report on the matter.  One source told ABC News that the draft report explicitly used the word “insubordinate” to describe Comey’s behavior. Another source agreed with that characterization but could not confirm the use of the term.  In the draft report, Inspector General Michael Horowitz also rebuked former Attorney General Loretta Lynch for her handling of the federal investigation into Hillary Clinton’s personal email server, the sources said.  On Tuesday morning, President Donald Trump complained of “numerous delays” in the release of Horowitz’s final report, which is expected to run several hundred pages long and be released in the coming days. The sources who spoke to ABC News were willing or able to address only a portion of the draft report’s complete findings.       

8am – E  INTERVIEW – SCOTT ALLEN – Sports reporter, Washington Post – discuss Caps game – previewed Thursday night’s Game 4 between the Capitals and Golden Knights