First Run News

Posted at 4:02 pm on June 30, 2017 by streiff The head of the Civil Rights Division of Department of Justice is one of the most important sub-cabinet positions in government. This office sets the tone for how civil rights law will be enforced in the United States. Under a racialist and activist leader, the office becomes a tool for the magnification of grievance based upon real or imaginary issues.

Posted at 4:30 pm on June 30, 2017 by Susan Wright Trump son-in-law and White House senior adviser, Jared Kushner, once again turns up as the extra ingredient in another Trumpian controversy. This time, it’s the revelation by MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski that the White House called Scarborough and threatened him with a negative tabloid in the National Enquirer, unless Scarborough and Brzezinski apologized to Donald Trump for their coverage of him on their show, “Morning Joe.”

Posted at 7:47 pm on June 30, 2017 by Andrea Ruth Rep. Justin Amash (R – S.D.) — along with Sen. Mike Lee (R – Utah) in the Senate — introduced a bill to re-kill the Export-Import Bank after it was revived earlier this year. The Ex-Im Bank has long been a thorn in the side of conservatives and libertarians alike.

Posted at 2:57 am on July 1, 2017 by Andrea Ruth As of Friday afternoon, twenty-two states have declined to cooperate completely with the Trump administration’s request for them to submit sensitive voter data. Voter data they have no right to have.

"Morning Joe" co-host Mika Brzezinski says she introduced President Trump and his elder daughter Ivanka to Dina Powell, the former Goldman Sachs executive that has become one of the most influential players in the Trump White House. “Dina Powell was in there because I brought her to Trump Tower and introduced her to Ivanka and Donald,” Brzezinski told The New York Times's Jim Rutenberg on Friday.

A federal prosecutor in Manhattan is joining special counsel Robert Mueller's probe into Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election. Andrew Goldstein is departing as chief of the public corruption unit in Manhattan after serving in the role for roughly a year, The New York Times reported Friday. The office is known for its work pursuing public corruption and white-collar crime cases. Goldstein was a member of the prosecuting team that won the conviction of former New

A Republican activist who sought last year to obtain The Wall Street Journal reported Friday. Among those listed in the document are now-White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, now-counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway, now-Agriculture Department policy adviser Sam Clovis and former national security adviser Michael Flynn. The document is dated Sept.

LGBT advocacy groups are blasting the Pentagon’s decision to delay for six months a plan to allow transgender people to enlist in the military. The decision, reportedly announced in a memo from Defense Secretary James Mattis on Friday, gives military branches six months to prepare for the enlistment of transgender soldiers. The service chiefs last week made the re

An Illinois man has been charged in the kidnapping of a Chinese student at the University of Illinois, the Justice Department said Friday. Yingying Zhang, a 26-year-old graduate student at the university's Urbana-Champaign campus, went missing on June 9. A security camera video from that day shows her getting into a black car. The FBI said earlier this week that agents had found the car, though Zhang was not found with it. Brendt Christensen, 27, has been charged in her disappearance.

The New Jersey state government was forced to shut down at midnight on Friday, as the State Legislature remained locked in a standoff with Gov. Chris Christie that left them unable to agree on a budget plan. The most immediate effect of the shutdown will be on those headed to state-run parks and beaches for the holiday weekend. Mr. Christie’s office indicated that those parks and beaches would be closed, although their municipal counterparts will remain open. Mr.