Comment on The Latest: Trump asserts 'absolute right to PARDON' himself

Rachel Maddow, who scaled back anchoring duties after the spring of 2022, holding forth only on Mondays, will return to five nights a week at that hour as part of a broader move by MSNBC to draw viewership to its coverage of the first 100 days of the Trump administration, Variety reports.

Thomas Zimmer: “I fear that, after so many years of Trumpism shaping American politics and culture, a lot of people have become so inundated with Trump’s bizarre stunts, so accustomed to his outrageous rhetoric, that they might be numb to how dangerous this is – and how much this isn’t just ‘Trump being Trump,’ but the face of a radicalizing Right in charge of the Republican Party.” “There is, unfortunately, no law of nature that says democracy can’t be brought down and wars can’t be started by a bunch of clowns if they have enough support from people, parties, and institutions who enable them.

Associated Press: “Incoming senior Trump administration officials have begun questioning career civil servants who work on the White House National Security Council about who they voted for in the 2024 election, their political contributions and whether they have made social media posts that could be considered incriminating by President-elect Donald Trump’s team.”

“President-elect Donald Trump’s unorthodox approach to his coming national-security team is set to come under the spotlight in Congress this week, and one constant remains from his first term: America is about to take the gloves off in its shadow bout with Beijing,” the Wall Street Journal reports. “Trump’s choice to lead the Central Intelligence Agency, John Ratcliffe, is likely to push for more aggressive spying operations targeting Beijing if confirmed to lead the most storied U.

Joyce Vance: “With Donald Trump’s criminal sentencing behind us, the question of the release, or not, of Special’s Counsel Jack Smith’s report seems destined to be one of the key issues we follow this week…” “Delay is ever Trump’s friend in legal proceedings, and the clock is ticking. A delay invoked by Judge Cannon and unchecked by the Eleventh Circuit, or one that happens at the Supreme Court if Trump’s allies appeal there, could, as a practical matter, end the possibility of release of the report.” Steve Vladeck: “And just to say the quiet part out loud, the urgency here stems from the unspoken but universally held understanding that, if the January 6 volume hasn’t been publicly released by January 20, it won’t be.” Chris Geidner: “The question now is what Garland; the Eleventh Circuit; and, if necessary, the Supreme Court or, if it comes to it, President Biden do about it.

“Outgoing FBI Director Christopher Wray defended the bureau as it faces a barrage of attacks from President-elect Donald Trump and his allies,” the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports. “And he offered a chilling warning about China, saying it posed a ‘unique and unprecedented’ threat that is taking aim at critical U. S.