Outside the Beltway

The state of the union is . . . not good.

The White House has succeeded in killing, for now, the White House Daily Press Briefing and in making itself the least transparent Administration in recent history.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders has signed on with Fox News Channel to continue her career of lying on behalf of the President.

Stephanie Grisham, presently a top aide to First Lady Melania Trump, has been named the new White House Press Secretary and Communications Director.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders is leaving office at the end of the month.

Expanding on events that have been going on for months, two oil tankers were attacked today near the entrance to the Persian Gulf

It’s been three months since the White House held a press briefing. Meanwhile, the President continues his unhinged attacks on the media.

Donald Trump has betrayed the legacy and the sacrifices of the soldiers who fought their way onto the beaches of Normandy.

It’s time to invoke the 25th Amendment, folks.

Thanks to Donald Trump and the GOP, there’s plenty of material out there for Saturday Night Live.

Patrick Shanahan, who has been serving as Acting Defense Secretary since James Mattis left in December, is being selected to replace Mattis in that position.

In an effort to block the release of the full report of Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the Trump Administration is invoking Executive Privilege.

The tumultuous turnover at the top of the Trump team is too much.

President Trump personally overrode the objections of security officials, the White House Counsel, and the Chief of Staff to make sure his son-in-law got a security clearance.

Michael Cohen, the President’s former lawyer and “fixer,” is set to deliver several bombshells in his testimony before Congress today.

Rather than pulling completely out of Syria the United States will be leaving behind a token force of about 200 troops. This is a mistake.

The President will sign the bill to fund the government and avert another government shutdown, but in doing so he’ll also lay the groundwork for another showdown with Congress.

The White House isn’t ruling out the idea of a second government shutdown, but Senate Republicans have other ideas.

As the shutdown enters day thirty-five, there are some signs of movement in Washington but no real progress.

The Senate rejected Republican and Democratic proposals as expected but there are some signs of movement forward.

President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will meet again in February, but it’s hard to see why.

In a rare public statement, the office of Special Counsel Robert Mueller is disputing reports that the President directed Michael Cohen to lie to Congress.

President Trump’s speech on the border wall and the shutdown was fact-free, misleading, and overall a bomb.

President Trump is claiming that he could use authority to declare a “national emergency” to build his wall even if Congress doesn’t authorize it.

The Trump Administration is reportedly preparing to withdraw the small contingent of American troops from Syria. If it actually happens, this would be a good move.

With three days to go before a government shutdown, there are at least some signs that the President may be backing away from his threats to shut down the government over funding for his border wall.

President Trump has canceled a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin over the recent confrontation between Russia and Ukraine in the Black Sea.

The White House and CNN have settled the dispute over Jim Acosta’s press pass, but future conflict between this Administration and the press corps seems inevitable.

Despite a court ruling that says otherwise, the Trump White House appears prepared to once again revoke the press pass of CNN reporter Jim Acosta.

CNN fires back in the Administration’s ongoing war with the news media.

Donald Trump is talking about a tax cut that appears to exist only in his own mind.

In the wake of attempted bombing attacks on people he has criticized, the President is blaming the media for poisonous political rhetoric. He needs to look in the mirror.

At this point, corruption, dishonesty, and insanity are just baked in.

Much of what Donald Trump has claimed about how he built his fortune is a lie, and at least part of it originated in his father’s shady efforts to evade taxes.

Is the reopened investigation of Brett Kavanaugh a real investigation of the charges made against him by three separate women, or is it a political sham? It’s beginning to look much more like the latter than the former.

Republicans have set a Judiciary Committee vote for less than a day after hearing from Christine Blasey Ford and Judge Brett Kavanaugh.

In an extraordinary anonymous Op-Ed, a senior White House official describes a White House in chaos.

President Trump reportedly vetoed a plan to issue a statement lauding Senator John McCain after he died on Saturday.

The former CIA Director has been stripped of his access to classified information after repeatedly criticizing the President.

In what appears to be a move based purely on vindictiveness, President Trump has revoked the security clearance of former CIA Director John Brennan.

Omarosa Manigault Newman, who used to be a Trump favorite, is out with a book that makes sensationalistic claims about the Trump Administration. The real story, though, is what she has on tape and how she got it.

Based on what can only be described as pure vindictiveness, the President is apparently planning on revoking security clearances of former officials who have been outspoken against the Administration and its policies.

The Trump Administration is inviting Vladimir Putin to Washington, D.C. for a second summit in the fall. What could possibly go wrong?

We still don’t know what President Trump and Vladimir Putin talked about or agreed to during their two-hour meeting on Monday.

The NATO Summit is going about as well as can be expected.

There is a frustration and a growing sense that the American political system is illegitimate.

The Presidents of the United States and Russia will meet next month and there’s reason to worry about what Trump might give away.

Donald Trump continues to demonstrate that he has nothing but utter contempt for the Rule of Law. At some point, he will either be called to account for this or our nation’s institutions will suffer as a result.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked to leave a restaurant in Virginia last night, and the incident raises questions of how far we should let politics infiltrate everyday life.