FBI special counsel Robert Mueller could hand in his report into allegations members of the Trump campaign conspired with Russia to influence the 2016 US presidential election as early as next week, according to reports on Wednesday.
As that report was hypothesised about, Donald Trump’s former confidant, the flamboyant political consultant Roger Stone, appeared in court after posting an image on Instagram appearing to threaten a US district judge overseeing his criminal trial, itself instigated by Mr Mueller’s investigation.
The judge, who he repeatedly apologised to, then issued a full gag order on him and warned him that he would not be given another chance to keep his freedom as he awaits trial.
House Democrats will meanwhile file a resolution tomorrow against Mr Trump’s controversial decision to declare a national emergency over illegal immigration from the southwestern border in order to bypass Congress and get his wall built.
As all of that Washington drama swirled, Mr Trump weighed in on a number of issues on Thursday, including the case of Empire actor Jussie Smollett, who was charged in Chicago on Thursday for filing a false police report.
"What about MAGA and the tens of millions of people you insulted with your racist and dangerous comments!?" the president tweeted, referring to Smollett's claims that he was attacked by two men who told him he was in "MAGA country", referring to the president's popular slogan. Chicago police have said that Smollett's attack was staged and orchestrated by the actor.
The White House also detailed on Thursday the president's upcoming trip to Vietnam, where he will have his second summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
That summit is scheduled for next week.
Hello and welcome to The Independent's coverage of a bright new day for the Trump administration.
The big news of the morning is that FBI special counsel Robert Mueller could turn in his report on possible collusion between the Trump camp and Russia in 2016 as early as next week, according to CNN.
Should new attorney-general William Barr announce the investigation's conclusion, it would mark the end of a near two-year process, regularly branded a "witch hunt" by the president, that has seen raids on the offices and homes of a number of his closest confidantes - including ex-campaign manager Paul Manafort, lawyer Michael Cohen and adviser Roger Stone - and those men charged with a variety of federal offences.
Here's Clark Mindock in New York.
Mueller report into Trump-Russia links 'could be delivered next week'
Special counsel Robert Mueller‘s report on his investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election could be delivered to Congress as early as next week, CNN reports.Speaking of Roger Stone, the extrovert Republican political consultant and Trump champion will return to court in Washington today after posting an image on Instagram of US district court judge Amy Berman Jackson with the cross-hairs of a rifle sight superimposed over her head.
The post, which he later removed, was widely interpreted as a threat against Judge Jackson, the accompanying comment also declaring Mr Stone's "show trial" had been organised through the "legal trickery" of Robert Mueller, describing the official as a "Deep State hitman".
Mr Stone's lawyers submitted a written apology to the judge saying their client "recognises the impropriety" of his actions.
He is charged with lying to Congress, obstruction and witness tampering related to discussions he had during the 2016 election about stolen Democratic Party emails published by WikiLeaks, pleading not guilty on all counts.
Roger Stone could be sent to jail over controversial Instagram post
Judge demands to know why she should not issue a full gag order and revoke Stone's bail as the trial proceedsAnyone at all acquainted with Roger Stone will know he has a reputation for sartorial extravagance, even writing a fashion column for the conservative website The Daily Caller.
CNN political analyst David Gergen caused a stir yesterday with a comment suggesting Mr Stone's status as a "dandy" could see him subjected to sexual violence should he go to prison.
"Roger Stone must worry if he goes there - he’s seen as something of a dandy. Will he be physically safe? Will he be subject to rape? There must be a lot of things that going through his mind. 'Oh my god what have I gotten myself into?' In light of that how odd, how perfectly odd, to even post this thing," Mr Gergen said.
Mr Stone issued an angry statement in response:
“Not only was CNN tipped off in advance of my arrest, allowed to video it from 25 feet away while the street was cleared, clearly had a draft copy of my indictment while it was still sealed, but now both Jake Tapper and David Gergen have salivated over the prospect that I could be raped in prison... These people are demons.”
Democrats in the House of Representatives will file a resolution to block Donald Trump's national emergency declaration on Friday.
The opposition argues the president has overstated and misrepresented the extent of the problem of illegal immigration from Central America at the southwestern border in order to activate emergency powers, allowing him to bypass Congress and reallocate federal funding to realise his 2,000-mile border wall, his signature campaign promise.
A vote on the measure - dubbed the "resolution of disapproval" by its co-sponsor, Texas representative Joaquin Castro - isn't likely until mid-March, however, because of a timeline set by law.
House speaker Nancy Pelosi told colleagues in a letter on Wednesday that the House will "move swiftly" to pass the resolution and that it will be referred to the Senate and then sent on to President Trump.
"The president's decision to go outside the bounds of the law to try to get what he failed to achieve in the constitutional legislative process violates the Constitution and must be terminated," she added.
Passage through the Republican-controlled Senate is not certain, but a veto by Mr Trump is.
The development follows the filing of a lawsuit by 16 states to challenge the same measure in court, an initiative spearhead by California, prompting the president to lash out at the Golden State's costly bullet train project, which he says has wasted almost $3.5bn (£2.7bn) in federal funds already.
The man himself has been busily tweeting about the progress of construction, which at least makes a change from endangering journalists.
Andrew Buncombe here with a disturbing report that killings by white supremacists in the US more than doubled last year.
“The organised hate movement may be showing signs of disappointment with Donald Trump, but the president, aided and abetted by Fox News, continues to push his noxious anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim ideas into the public consciousness — fueling fears of a forthcoming white-minority country,” the Southern Poverty Law Centre says in a strongly-worded statement.
Killings by white supremacists in US 'more than doubled last year'
Report says Donald Trump pushed 'noxious' anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim ideas during this periodAnother classic: President Trump's panel to examine the effect of climate change on national security will include at least one man who doesn't believe in global warming.
White House adviser William Happer, a physicist with no background in climate science, refutes the scientific community's consensus that carbon dioxide pollution is harmful to the planet.
"More CO2 will benefit the world," he told Greenpeace in an email.
"The only way to limit CO2 would be to stop using fossil fuels, which I think would be a profoundly immoral and irrational policy."
Trump panel examining whether global warming affects national security will include a climate change denier
William Happer rejects scientific consensus but has no formal climate science trainingActor Alec Baldwin, who has regularly annoyed Donald Trump with his unflattering impersonation of him on NBC's satirical sketch show Saturday Night Live, has repeated his fears for his personal safety as a result of the president's tweets denouncing the programme.
Here's Jack Shepherd.
Alec Baldwin 'fears for his family’s safety' following Donald Trump threat
'Trump signals people, not necessarily what to do, but how to feel, and that’s the beginning'Here's Sarah Harvard and Jon Sharman on the president's taking credit for blocking Isis bride Hoda Muthana, 24, from returning to the US with her 18-month-old son.
A Yemeni diplomat's daughter born in Hackensack, New Jersey, and raised in Alabama, Muthnana left to join the Islamist militants in Syria in 2014 while she was a university student but now says she rejects the group's extremist ideology.
"I’m a normal human being who has been manipulated," she says. "I hope America doesn’t think I am a threat to them and I hope they accept me. I hope they excuse me because of how young and ignorant I was."
Secretary of state Mike Pompeo announced the decision to stop her return on Wednesday, saying she did not have US citizenship, but apparently it wasn't his call after all.
"We cannot get to a point where we simply strip citizenship from those who break the law. That's not what America is about," the family's lawyer, Hassan Shibly, told AFP.
Alabama woman who joined ISIS will not be allowed to return to US
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claims Hoda Muthana, 24, is not a US citizen, but her family's lawyer says she is a natural born citizen."I think Andrew McCabe has made a fool out of himself over the last couple of days. He really looks to me like sort of a poor man’s J Edgar Hoover."
So said President Trump yesterday when questioned by reporters during his meeting with Austrian chancellor Sebastian Kurz.
Mr Trump has spent several days infuriated by comments made by Mr McCabe, who is currently on a media tour to promote his book The Threat about his firing from the FBI.
Mr McCabe's revelations that he discussed invoking the 25th Amendment to the Constitution to remove the president with senior bureau officials and that deputy attorney-general Rod Rosenstein offered to wear a wire in the White House caused particular consternation.
Writing for CNN Politics, analyst Stephen Collinson warns Robert Mueller's Russia report, said to be forthcoming, will only mark the beginning of a new chapter for the saga.
Little is known about what the special counsel's dossier will actually contain or constitute, Mr Mueller having been so careful to avoid talking to the media for much of his investigation's duration.
Whatever happens, Mr Collinson says, the report will mark a turning point for the Trump administration: clear evidence of collusion with Russia would mean protracted impeachment proceedings, no case to answer would embolden a triumphant president and rally his support-base.
"Mueller's endgame is obscured because no one really knows exactly what he will report and the information that [attorney-general William] Barr will choose - or feel compelled - to share with Congress and the public on a scandal that has polarised the nation," says Mr Collinson.
"The uncertainty is almost certain to spark a new struggle between Congress, the White House and the Justice Department that could lead to litigation and has every chance of reaching all the way up to the Supreme Court."
What the famously-methodical Mr Mueller has achieved so far in cornering Trump allies is to weave "a tale of Kremlin troll farms, social media campaigns, spear phishing operations and computer hacking," he writes.
"He's uncovered a pattern of compulsive lying by people close to Trump, often about contacts with Russians, which have raised the key question: What are all of these presidential associates trying to hide?"
While concerns have been raised about the administration using legitimate legal means to withhold damaging information when the report is finally published, legal analyst Susan Hennessy has a warning for William Barr should that happen.
"If he tries to withhold even one word of the Mueller report from Congress, they are going to litigate this question to the absolute end of the earth," she told Wolf Blitzer on CNN's The Situation Room.
In case you missed it, Michael Cohen has agreed to testify in public next Wednesday before Congress about his time working as Donald Trump’s personal lawyer and fixer.
He was originally set to do so on 7 February but the appearance was cancelled by Mr Cohen's legal team, who accused the president and his attorney, Rudy Giuliani, of making threats against the defendant's father-in-law.
As the 30 April deadline approaches for the US to withdraw its 2,000 troops from Syria following the "defeat" of Isis, America's European allies have unanimously refused to fill the gap with their own forces, The Washington Post reports.
French foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said last week he was mystified by President Trump's decision to withdraw and, on Tuesday, the UK's foreign secretary Jeremy Hunt said "there is no prospect of British forces replacing the Americans" in Syria.
Even Mr Trump's fellow Republicans are not on board with the decision.
Defence secretary Jim Mattis resigned over the plan in December and, as The Post reported this week, South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham unleashed hell on acting-defence secretary Patrick Shanahan on the matter at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday.
The withdrawal was "the dumbest f***ing idea I've ever heard", Mr Graham said, issuing a dire forecast warning that Isis would be allowed to regroup and rejuvenate, a Turkish attack on Syrian Democratic Forces would be inevitable and Iran would strengthen its influence in the region.
"I am now your adversary, not your friend," Mr Graham told the acting Pentagon chief.
A little more on William Happer, the climate change denier Donald Trump has appointed to a panel advising on the impact of global warming on national security.
Here he is arguing, "the demonisation of carbon dioxide is just like the demonisation of the poor Jews under Hitler", on CNBC's Squawk Box in 2014.
The president appears to be unaware of his own administration's pro-LGBT+ campaign to prevent the criminalisation of homosexuality around the world, seeming baffled when asked about it by a reporter.
The initiative's chief architect, Richard Grenell, the US ambassador to Germany, will no doubt be frustrated by his boss's apparent indifference.
Here's Tom Embury-Dennis.
Trump appears unaware of his administration's own pro-LGBT+ campaign just two days after launch
'I don’t know which report you’re talking about,' US president tells reporterThe president appears to be beginning his day with an early morning Twitter rant calling on American companies to become a leader in a technology that does not yet exist. Here's the latest:
The 6G technology Mr Trump is tweeting about is not due until at least 2030, according to Network World. The trade magazine spoke to Ari Pouttu, professor for Dependable Wireless at the University of Oulu in Finland, who said "6G will emerge around 2030 to satisfy the expectation not met with 5G" and "will eventually offer terabits per second." The technology remains in the very beginning stages of research and development.
The Academy of Finland, which is funded by the Finish government, has reportedly dedicated $290m (£221m) towards a new programme called 6Genesis, which will conduct developmental efforts towards 6G capabilities.
The president's tweets arrived as Finland is scheduled to host the largest mobile event in the world next week. The rest of the global economy has only just begun to adapt to 5G technology, the Associated Press reported on Thursday.
In a statement, Finland’s Minister of Transport and Communications Anne Berner said, “Finland plans to be a forerunner as a user and developer of 5G technology. Our Transport and Communications Agency, Traficom, has created a 5G ecosystem that will accelerate the development of new innovations and services through collaboration with other 5G experiments.
The tweets were just a pair of social media posts the president published on Thursday. Mr Trump also — once again — shared a video of barrier construction along the US-Mexico border in New Mexico.
“THE WALL IS UNDER CONSTRUCTION RIGHT NOW!” he wrote.
US officials have told Reuters the president plans to discuss with North Korean Regime Leader Kim Jong Un “what kind of future North Korea could enjoy” if the regime were to commit to full denuclearization along the Korean peninsula.
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