Donald Trump reportedly advised conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh not to apologise to Democratic 2020 contender Pete Buttigieg after saying America is not ready for a gay president kissing his husband on the world stage, prompting the candidate to mock Trump over his affair with porn star Stormy Daniels.
The president is touring the western swing states of Nevada, California and Arizona this week with one eye on November but caused offence to the cities of Los Angeles and San Francisco overnight by suggesting both are suffering from widespread drug addiction and homelessness.
Trump is meanwhile also facing criticism for pardoning 11 white collar criminals – including ex-Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, whom he once fired from The Celebrity Apprentice over a Harry Potter controversy – a decision that provoked fresh concern about the president exceeding the powers of his office and moved former acting solicitor general Neal Katyal to reassure the public: “The law will find a way to catch up with him.”
Meanwhile, sparring between Mike Bloomberg and the leading Democratic candidates erupted hours before Wednesday night's debate, previewing what's expected to be a tense night as the billionaire businessman meets his rivals onstage for the first time.
Both Bernie Sanders' and Joe Biden's campaigns took aim at Mr Bloomberg, the former raising questions about the 78-year-old's health and the latter pointing out reversals in Mr Bloomberg's stances on key issues.
The attacks underscore how seriously Democrats are taking the former New York mayor's campaign, now that he's rocketed to double-digit support in national polls and qualified for the next two debates.
Mr Bloomberg, who formally registered as a Democrat in 2018, has faced relatively little national scrutiny in his surprisingly swift rise from nonpartisan megadonor to top-tier presidential contender.
On CNN Wednesday morning, Mr Sanders' national press secretary Briahna Joy Gray tried to rebut questions surrounding the Vermont senator's health by pointing to Mr Bloomberg, who she said had also "suffered heart attacks in the past".
Mr Sanders suffered a heart attack last fall and released letters from doctors attesting to his health. But Mr Bloomberg has never suffered a heart attack; he released a doctors' letter last year that said he did undergo coronary stent surgery in 2000.
Ms Gray later walked back her statement, saying on Twitter that she "misspoke" about Mr Bloomberg's health.
Separately, the Biden campaign took on Mr Bloomberg over ads the former mayor is running that feature shots of him working closely with former President Barack Obama.
The Biden campaign posted a video to Twitter highlighting past comments Mr Bloomberg made criticising Mr Obama on health care and climate change and accusing him of failing to address racism during his term. The video also includes a clip of Mr Bloomberg declaring "I'm a friend of Donald Trump's, he's a New York icon."
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Donald Trump is facing criticism after pardoning seven white collar criminals and commuting the prison sentences of four more – including ex-Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, whom he once fired from The Celebrity Apprenticeover a Harry Potter controversy – provoking fresh concern about the president exceeding the powers of his office.
Other beneficiaries of Trump's mercy were former New York police commissioner Bernard Kerik and ex-San Francisco 49ers owner Eddie DeBartolo Jr, both of whom were charged with corruption, and Michael Milken, who pleaded guilty to insider trading in 1990 and was known as "the junk bond king".
Here's Chris Riotta's report on the angry response to the gesture.
Arriving in California yesterday where he is seeking to drum up unlikely electoral support, Trump told reporters he considered himself the top legal authority in the land, which is simply incorrect, and reasserted his belief that he has "an absolute right" to involve himself in cases such as the imminent sentencing of Republican political operative Roger Stone.
Here's Clark Mindock with a complete rundown of the 11 individuals whose misdemeanours he forgave.
Among those expressing their incredulity at Trump's latest post-impeachment liberty was former acting solicitor general Neal Katyal, who appeared on Ari Melber's MSNBC show l to reassure the public: “The law will find a way to catch up with him.”
Bernie Sanders was equally outraged, tweeting the following attack and saying the president's actions were indicative of a "broken and racist criminal justice system.
Here's Andrew Naughtie on Bernie's response.
John T Bennett has this explanation of the president's current post-impeachment vengeance lap, those clemency gestures following hot on the heels of his removing witnesses Alexander Vindman and Gordon Sondland from their posts and threatening to sue "everyone all over the place".
That line, delivered in an interview with ABC News last week, was largely thought to represent a strategic distancing of himself from the president over the politicisation of the Justice Department.
The reason to float this follow-up might be to rein the president in, gambling on the likelihood of his getting agitated about negative headlines.
Democratic presidential contender Pete Buttigieg meanwhile derided Trump at a CNN town hall in Las Vegas on Tuesday night, using a question on the topic of “family values” to mock the president’s affair with Stormy Daniels and declaring: “My marriage never involved sending hush money to a porn star.”
Mayor Pete was responding to conservative blowhard Rush Limbaugh's suggestion that America is not ready for a gay president, just as he did during his interview with Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday.
Limbaugh revealed yesterday that Trump - who handed him the Presidential Medal of Freedom as a stunt during his State of the Union address earlier this month - had advised him to "never apologise" for the remark, apparently taking his cue from John Wayne in She Wore a Yellow Ribbon.
The Indiana mayor also told host Erin Burnett he would have no qualms about taking donations from billionaire rival Michael Bloomberg if he should beat him to the party's nomination.
Here's more on Limbaugh from Andrew Naughtie.
The aforementioned billionaire has qualified for tonight's latest Democratic primary debate in Las Vegas and will no doubt come under fire for buying his way into the contest during his maiden appearance on the stage.
Trump made the same argument on Twitter last night and assured his fellow New Yorker he is his preferred candidate to take on.
There were also several rather cruel and distinctly unpresidential memes making fun of his stature.
Elizabeth Warren has been getting her jabs in early too, reports Graig Graziosi.
Glosser has now made a donation to a refugee organisation as part of comedian Samantha Bee's spoof wedding registry set up to mark Miller's marriage to Katie Waldman over the weekend.
On another note, take a moment to bask in the agonising self-loathing caked onto this Elvis impersonator's face during their first dance.
Here's Alex Woodward on Glosser's gesture.
Jon Sharman has this report on a swift denial that the attorney general is really on his way out of the door in exasperation at the president's tweets.
Andrew Naughtie has this on a backlash against a backlash.
Here's a reminder of a gleefully idiotic footnote to this presidency.
"Your Harry Potter facts were not accurate! Who did the research?" the future commander-in-chief demanded to know in 2010.
Like Elizabeth Warren - and in addition to bashing Trump - Pete Buttigieg has also been getting in an early dig at Bloomberg.
“I think he has to answer for his treatment of others, for his language and above all for an attitude that seems to have dismissed the humanity of a lot of people,” the candidate told Kristen Welker of NBC Nightly News.
Any number of questionable past comments have resurfaced from the former NYC mayor since he announced his tilt at the White House.
James Besanvalle has news of another for Indy100.
The Saturday Night Live veteran will take the mic alongside Hasan Minhaj at this year's annual presidential roast, ending the comedy ban brought in after Trump took umbrage at Michelle Wolf's brutal set in 2018 and handed the gig to historian Ron Chernow last year.
The president appears to have woken up in a rage and is currently slamming out retweets from loyalist GOP congressmen Lee Zeldin and Mark Meadows and Judicial Watch weirdo Tim Fitton, including the following, apparently promising vengeance...
The Fitton retweets are up to 10 at the time of writing, most of which are pushing rabid "deep state" conspiracy theories about liberal bias in the Justice Department and urging AG Barr to "clean house".
Aaaaaand now we're back to Bloomberg:
The Vermont senator is soaring ahead in the polls right now, leading the Democratic field by a cool 15 points nationally according to a new survey by ABC News/Washington Post and thriving in South Carolina and California too.
However, the 78-year-old is under increasing pressure to make his health records public after suffering a heart attack on the campaign trail in the autumn.
“We have released, I think… quite as much as any other candidate has," he told Anderson Cooper at the CNN town hall last night. "We released two rather detailed letters from cardiologists and we released a letter that came from the head of the US Congress medical group, the physicians there. So I think we have released a detailed report, and I’m comfortable with what we have done.
“If you think I’m not in good health come on out with me on the campaign trail and I’ll let you introduce me to the three or four rallies a day that we do,” he added.
His team have since complained that asking for them amounts to a "smear campaign" while some commentators have suggested that, like Trump and his tax returns, he wouldn't withold them if he didn't have something to hide.
The South Carolina senator reportedly fell out with Trump's defence secretary during a meeting on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference last week over plans to withdraw American troops from the Sahel region of Africa, according to NBC News, citing four people who were in the room.
Graham is on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and angrily told Esper Congress would not support any such potentially destabilising manoeuvre and was backed up by Delaware senator Chris Coons, who is understood to have made his point equally "forcefully".
But Pentagon press secretary Alyssa Farah has denied the fracas took place: "The secretary had a productive conversation with bipartisan, bicameral members of Congress on the future of US force presence in West Africa."
Disputed or not, Graham has form in standing up to Trump on troop movements - and any dissent in the Magaverse is worth heeding.
As the ex-NYC mayor prepares to take to the debate stage for the first time in Nevada, Max Burns writes for Indy Voices that a vote for him would mean the opposition sacrificing everything it stands for.
Stephanie Grisham quite literally turned green live on Fox yesterday due to a technical glitch and the jokes wrote themselves...
The president has just confirmed the ousting of top Pentagon policy official John Rood after the undersecretary of defence lost the support of senior national security personnel and was asked for his resignation as CNN reported this morning.
Part of Rood's role in overseas policy involved certifying that Ukrainian anti-corruption reforms were underway to Congress in order to justify its receipt of aid from the US and his making that guarantee fatally undermined the administration's rationale for witholding the smoking $391m (£302m) last summer, a move that would prove central to the impeachment inquiry.
