.@OfficialSGP’s @TeriChristoph joined @TheDCVince as a co-host this morning on @WMALDC! #MOTM pic.twitter.com/phzebPK6iu

— WMAL DC (@WMALDC) February 15, 2019

Jessica Vaughan, J. Christian Adams, Ken Cuccinelli, Gregg Jarrett and guest host Teri Christoph joined WMAL on Friday!

Mornings on the Mall

Friday, February 15, 2019

Hosts: Vince Coglianese and Teri Christoph

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

5am – A/B/C McCabe Says Justice Dept. Officials Had Discussions About Pushing Trump Out:

• The former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe said the Justice Department discussed using the 25th Amendment to remove President Trump. (NY Times) – WASHINGTON — Andrew G. McCabe, the former deputy F.B.I. director, said in an interview aired on Thursday that top Justice Department officials became so alarmed by President Trump’s decision in May 2017 to fire James B. Comey, the bureau’s director, that they discussed whether to recruit cabinet members to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Mr. Trump from office. The dire concerns about the president’s actions also prompted Mr. McCabe to order the bureau’s team investigating Russia’s election interference to look into whether Mr. Trump had obstructed justice by firing Mr. Comey. The F.B.I. also began examining whether Mr. Trump had been working on behalf of Russia against American interests. Mr. McCabe’s explosive remarks were made in an interview with “60 Minutes” scheduled to air in full on Sunday. He was promoting his memoir, “The Threat: How the F.B.I. Protects America in the Age of Terror and Trump,” which will be released next week.
• McCabe, Rosenstein must testify to explain claim DOJ discussed removing Trump, GOP leaders say. (Fox News) — The top Republicans on the House and Senate Judiciary Committees are calling for former FBI Acting Director Andrew McCabe and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to testify before their respective panels, following McCabe’s explosive claims in an interview this week that senior Justice Department officials had considered removing President Trump using the 25th Amendment. According to McCabe, Rosenstein offered to wear a wire to record the president, seemingly confirming reports last year. Rosenstein on Thursday again strongly denied that allegation, calling McCabe’s statements “factually incorrect.” House Judiciary Committee ranking member Doug Collins, R-Ga., said in a letter to the committee’s chairman, Democratic New York Rep. Jerry Nadler, that the two top officials should be asked to testify — and subpoenaed if they refuse to comply. “Today, news broke confirming Americans’ worst fears about the highest-ranking leaders in the Department of Justice and the FBI,” Collins wrote. “In fact, we now know certain government officials plotted to investigate and undermine” the president.
• Trump blasts former FBI official McCabe after explosive interview. In a string of morning tweets, Trump wrote that the “disgraced” McCabe “pretends to be a ‘poor little Angel’ when in fact he was a big part of the Crooked Hillary Scandal & the Russia Hoax” and “a puppet for Leakin’ James Comey.”  The president added that an internal watchdog report that was used to justify McCabe’s ouster was “devastating.” The report found that McCabe had a “lack of candor” with investigators looking into FBI leaks about its probe into the Clinton Foundation during the 2016 presidential race.  “McCabe is a disgrace to the FBI and a disgrace to our Country. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!” the president wrote.
• Legal legend says alleged FBI-DOJ plot described by McCabe was ‘attempt at a coup d’etat’ // Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz on Thursday said the Department of Justice’s discussions to employ the 25th Amendment to oust President Trump– if true– amounted to an attempted coup. Dershowitz appeared on Fox News’ “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” to give his take on former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe’s descriptions of Justice Department meetings where he said officials discussed ousting the president. “If [McCabe’s comments are] true, it is clearly an attempt at a coup d’état,” Dershowitz said.

5am – D         Trump physician releases results of medical exam. (The Hill) —

The top White House doctor said Thursday that President Trump “remains in very good health overall,” even though his physical exam showed his weight is up from last year and he is taking a higher dosage of cholesterol medication. Navy Cdr. Sean Conley, physician to the president, on Thursday released more information about Trump’s exam conducted last week at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. “After taking into account all the laboratory results, examinations and specialist recommendations, it is my determination that the president remains in very good health overall,” Conley wrote in a memo summarizing the results. The president’s height was listed at 6 feet, 3 inches and his weight was 243 pounds, up from 239 pounds in Jan. 2018. Trump’s body mass index, a measure of body weight based on height, is 30.4, putting him in the category of obese. Trump’s total cholesterol was 196 mg/dL, down from 223 last year. But his daily dosage of the drug rosuvastatin was increased to 40 milligrams daily. Conley said there were “no findings of significance or changes to report on his physical exam, including the eyes, ears, nose, mouth, teeth/gums, heart, lungs, skin, gastrointestinal, and neurologic systems.”

5am – E         AMAZON vs NY:

• Amazon cancels plans to open second headquarters in New York. (The Hill) – Amazon on Thursday announced that it has canceled plans to open its second headquarters, dubbed “HQ2,” in New York City following aggressive pushback from some local lawmakers and activists. “After much thought and deliberation, we’ve decided not to move forward with our plans to build a headquarters for Amazon in Long Island City, Queens,” a company spokesperson said in a statement.  “While polls show that 70 percent of New Yorkers support our plans and investment, a number of state and local politicians have made it clear that they oppose our presence and will not work with us to build the type of relationships that are required to go forward with the project we and many others envisioned in Long Island City,” the statement from Amazon said.  New York lawmakers, including progressive superstar Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D), for months have been drumming up resistance to Amazon’s decision to bring half of its second headquarters to Queens. The activists and politicians have raised concerns that Amazon’s new headquarters would displace poor residents and raise rents. They have also sharply criticized New York City’s decision to offer $3 billion in state and city incentives to lure in Amazon.   “We are disappointed to have reached this conclusion,” Amazon said in its statement, noting that it intends to continue growing the group of 5,000 employees already in New York City. New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio (D) and Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D), however, had both hailed Amazon’s second headquarters as an economic boon to the city, claiming it would attract significant investments and other tech companies. “We are deeply grateful to Governor Cuomo, Mayor de Blasio, and their staffs, who so enthusiastically and graciously invited us to build in New York City and supported us during the process,” Amazon wrote.  De Blasio issued a sharply worded statement after the announcement. “You have to be tough to make it in New York City. We gave Amazon the opportunity to be a good neighbor and do business in the greatest city in the world. Instead of working with the community, Amazon threw away that opportunity,” his office said. Amazon had also aggravated New York politicians and union leaders when an executive at a City Council hearing said the company would not remain neutral if workers tried to unionize.

6am – A/B/C House passes border-security bill, sending it to Trump’s desk as WH prepares to declare national emergency. Hard-fought legislation that gives President Donald Trump 55 additional miles of fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border — well short of what he requested — is on the way to his desk after a bipartisan House vote. The bill also closes a chapter by preventing a second government shutdown at midnight Friday and by providing $333 billion to finance several Cabinet agencies through September. Trump has indicated he’ll sign the measure though he is not happy with it, and for a few hours Thursday he was reportedly having second thoughts. The White House has announced Trump will declare a national emergency that would enable him to transfer funding from other accounts for additional miles of border fencing.

6am – D         Signs You’re a Gen X Mom. (Themomelette.com) They call Generation X the “forgotten generation” because we find ourselves sandwiched between the behemoths known as Baby Boomers and Millennials. I disagree. We’re not forgotten, not at all. We just can’t be bothered to be upset by the fact that we’re bookended by two generations that seem quite happy to talk about themselves. No big deal — they do them, we do us. What we are is distinctive. We are the Cold War/MTV/latch key kid/big hair generation … our childhoods were spent doing fun and stupid things without the shackles of social media to eventually come back and bite us in the arse. We saw some stuff, you all … some really crazy stuff. And now we’re moms. We’re not Baby Boomer moms, who gave birth to Millennial moms. Oh, no, we’re Gen X moms who are raising Gen Z. And it is great when those two generations collide.

6am – E         DC among nation’s worst for traffic. WASHINGTON (FOX 5 DC) – Every driver in the DMV will tell you the traffic here is bad – but a new study shows just how bad it is. Analytics company Inrix says D.C. is the second-most congested city in the U.S. The study says that D.C.-area drivers waste 155 hours a year sitting in traffic. That travel time costs each driver just over $2,000. This year, Boston took the top spot for most congestion. D.C. outpaces the nationwide average – where most Americans spend 97 hours a year in traffic.

6am – F         Democrat Beto O’Rourke says he wants to knock down the existing border barriers on the southern border

MSNBC’s Chris Hayes: “If you could, would you take the wall down now? Knock it down?”

O’Rourke: “Yes, absolutely. I would take the wall down.”

7am – A         INTERVIEW – JESSICA VAUGHAN – Director of Policy Studies for the Center for Immigration Studies –discussed the landmines in the border security bill.

• House passes border-security bill, sending it to Trump’s desk as WH prepares to declare national emergency
• Mark Krikorian @MarkSKrikorian 17h17 hours ago: Lots of bad but swallowable stuff in $ bill. But Sec.224 is a poison pill: Gives deportation immunity to any sponsor—or POTENTIAL sponsor—of an “unaccompanied” alien child. Creates incentive for illegals already here to order up kids from Central America (or anywhere). Outrageous
• Center for Immigration Studies ‏@CIS_org As @JessicaV_CIS notes, there is a serious amnesty/sanctuary provision snuck into the spending bill.Section 224(a) would make it so ICE cannot detain or remove anyone who has effectively any kind of relationship (even just as a “potential sponsor”) with any unaccompanied minor

7am – B         Reports of Jussie Smollett’s alleged attack being a hoax ‘unconfirmed by case detectives,’ Chicago police say. (Fox News) — Chicago police said Thursday evening that reports about the alleged attack on “Empire” actor Jussie Smollett being a hoax were “unconfirmed by case detectives.” Anthony Guglielmi, the chief communications officer for the Chicago Police Department (CPD), tweeted that “media reports anout [sic] the Empire incident being a hoax are unconfirmed by case detectives.” He also wrote that Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson “has contacted @ABC7Chicago to state on the record that we have no evidence to support their reporting and their supposed CPD sources are uninformed and inaccurate.” Guglielmi’s tweet followed a report on the matter from WLS-TV. The report came hours after Guglielmi tweeted that Chicago police detectives had identified persons of interest in the case. The individuals were not identified. “Multiple sources have told ABC7 Eyewitness News that police are investigating whether Smollett and the two men staged the attack allegedly because Smollett was being written off of ‘Empire,’” WLS-TV reported.  Smollett, who is black and openly gay, told the Chicago Police Department that he was attacked by two men on Jan. 29 while walking home to his apartment. He alleged the men hurled racial and homophobic slurs at him, beat him and poured an “unknown chemical substance” on him.

7am – C         Warning in Kansas Home Depot bathroom mistaken for bomb threat. WICHITA, Kan. (KEYE) – What some people thought was a bomb threat at a Home Depot store turned out to be a warning to others in the bathroom that things were about to get, well, smelly. KWCH reports that a 911 caller reported a bomb threat at the Wichita, Kansas store. “We just had a customer here made what may have been a bomb threat,” said the caller in audio released by Sedgwick County Communications. “He said, uh, somebody told me there’s a bomb in here and you need to leave the building. He said it three times.” Someone at the store told staff they overheard the threat in the restroom, and when police arrived to investigate, they found the “bomb threat” came from a man in a bathroom stall warning others about the severity of his need to use the restroom. The quote, according to KWCH, was “You all need to get out of here because I’m fixin’ to blow it up.”

7am – D         INTERVIEW – J. CHRISTIAN ADAMS – President and General Counsel of the Public Interest Legal Foundation. He served from 2005 to 2010 in the Voting Section at the United States Department of Justice.

• CHRISTIAN filed briefs in the citizenship question case.
• MONTGOMERY COUNTY, MD LEADERS GEARING UP FOR 2020 CENSUS BY DOING OUTREACH TO IMMIGRANTS
• Montgomery County Leaders Focus on Making the 2020 Census Count. County executive backs outreach efforts to make sure immigrants, senior citizens take part. (Bethesda Magazine) – Montgomery County officials are gearing up for the 2020 census, and they want to make sure immigrants and senior citizens are counted. Among other things, the census determines how state and federal funds are allocated and serves as a guide for determining the county’s social service needs over the next decade. The census also determines whether congressional seats will be reallocated among the 50 states, as well as if district lines must be redrawn. The U.S. Census Bureau places the responsibility of counting with “complete count committees” of community leaders who encourage residents to participate by mail or online. Data collection is done every 10 years and will begin April 1, 2020, and must be completed by Dec. 31, according federal law. Montgomery’s census committee is being chaired by County Council President Nancy Navarro, and has more than 40 members in subgroups that deal with the specialty areas of government, workforce development, faith communities, education, media, technology, community organizations and business. County Executive Marc Elrich and Navarro met with reporters Wednesday afternoon at the White Oak Community Recreation Center in Silver Spring, saying it is essential that local leaders ensure the county’s immigrant and senior citizen populations are counted. About one-third of the county’s population is foreign-born, according to the Census Bureau. Navarro said that the policies of the Trump administration could cause fear in undocumented immigrants who are afraid of being detained. Last year, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross announced the introduction of a question on the 2020 census asking whether residents were American citizens. “We must acknowledge that there is a lot of tension and fear because of what has happened at the national level,” she said. Navarro added that the county’s senior population also was a focus for the census committee. “We have a lot of seniors living around the county who are not necessarily connected to a senior center, and we want to make sure that information is distributed throughout the county,” she said. Navarro said the census committee includes a number of members of the 2010 census committee. In the coming months, she said, the committee will be conducting outreach efforts such as a media campaign and a bus tour of the county. A legal battle is being waged in a number of federal courts over whether the citizenship question may be included in the census. Earlier this month, a ruling in the U.S. District Court in the District of Columbia declined to block the inclusion of the question, although a separate ruling by a New York federal judge in January found that the question was unconstitutional.

7am – E         GUYS WHO OUTDID THEMSELVES ON VALENTINE’S DAY:

• Local Virginia man surprises wife with winning $1 million lottery ticket on Valentine’s Day. STERLING, Va. — A local Virginia couple from Sterling is getting more than just chocolate and flowers this Valentine’s Day after winning $1 million in the lottery. Terry Mudd usually forgets to pick up at least one of the items on his wife’s shopping list. Luckily the man turned around to get the item and happened to pick up a $30 million cash out ticket from the Virginia Lottery.  As luck would have it, he scratched the ticket and discovered that he had bought the game’s $1 million top prize. Mudd decided to surprise his wife with the ticket as a Valentine’s Day present.  Mudd gave his wife the information a little early and gave her the ticket inside of an envelope labeled as “Terry + Madonna’s retirement.” The pair decided to opted to take the cash option of $657,030 before taxes. The Mudd just bought an RV and say they plan to travel throughout the country.The couple doesn’t planning on retiring just yet.
• Kenny G is trapped in a maze of roses, serenading Kim Kardashian for Valentine’s Day. Nothing screams “romance” more than Kenny G trapped in a room full of glass vases.  Kim Kardashian West posted a video showing how Kanye went all out for her Valentine’s Day present — surprising her with a room in their posh California mansion decorated with roses. Best of all he also brought in jazz love song icon Kenny G for a solo performance.
• Kim Kardashian West @KimKardashian  NO BIG DEAL KENNY G IN MY LIVING ROOM!!! Happy Valentines Day

 

8am – A         INTERVIEW – KEN CUCCINELLI – former VA Attorney General and President of Senate Conservatives Fund

• Senate votes to confirm William Barr as attorney general
• McCabe Says Justice Dept. Officials Had Discussions About Pushing Trump Out.
• House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she may file a legal challenge if Trump declares a national emergency

8am – B/C     House passes border-security bill, sending it to Trump’s desk as WH prepares to declare national emergency.

8am – D         INTERVIEW – GREGG JARRETT – author of “THE RUSSIA HOAX: The Illicit Scheme to Clear Hillary Clinton and Frame Donald Trump”

• The former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe said the Justice Department discussed using the 25th Amendment to remove President Trump.
• McCabe, Rosenstein must testify to explain claim DOJ discussed removing Trump, GOP leaders say.

8am – E         Colin Kaepernick, Tim Tebow Declined AAF Offers After League Reached Out. Executives of the Alliance of American Football reportedly reached out to two high-profile quarterbacks to gauge their interest in playing in the league. League co-founder Bill Polian told Lindsay Jones of The Athletic that CEO Charlie Ebersol contacted Colin Kaepernick to see if he was interested. “I don’t know what transpired, but he’s obviously not playing,” Polian said of Kaepernick. Barry Wilner of the Associated Press reported Kaepernick wanted at least $20 million to suit up for the new league. Polian also said he talked with Tim Tebow, although the former Denver Broncos signal-caller declined his offer to play in the league. Tebow won two national titles and a Heisman Trophy at Florida and played 35 games with 16 starts between the Broncos and New York Jets. However, he completed just 47.9 percent of his passes and hasn’t played a regular-season game since 2012. He is now focused on a baseball career and in spring training with New York Mets. As for Kaepernick, he most recently played in 2016 as a member of the San Francisco 49ers. While he has a Super Bowl appearance on his resume and threw for 16 touchdowns and four interceptions in his last season, no team has signed him since he opted out of his deal with the NFC West club.