1. Gov. Kay Ivey’s poll numbers continue to look good, Huntsville’s mayor Tommy Battle is in second place with only 11 points
— In a poll of 600 Alabamians, Ivey leads the four person GOP field with 47 percent. She leads in all demographic groups.
— Battle is strong on his home turf of North Alabama but he still is tied, with he and Ivey getting 33 percent in an area where he has to win big.
2. Special Counsel Robert Mueller is reportedly ready to subpoena the President of the United States
— Mueller told Trump’s legal team directly he could “compel” the president to testify via a grand jury subpoena if he refused to sit down for an interview.
— Trump’s lawyers created a list of 49 questions, someone leaked, that could come up in the questioning between Mueller’s team and the president.
3. Nancy Pelosi believes she will be Speaker of the House, Democrats continue to play off impeachment threat
— Pelosi is telling supporters she intends to lead House Democrats if they recapture control of the chamber in November. Cook Political Report lists eight GOP held seats as likely or leaning toward Democrats and 22 more as toss-ups.
— Democrats are fund-raising off of the issue of impeachment with Rep. Maxine Waters saying 70 percent of Democrats want to vote for it, setting up a debate in House districts across the country.
4. President Donald Trump sees his strongest poll numbers in 11 months, but they still aren’t great
— Only 42 percent of Americans approve of the job Trump is doing as president; the economy continues to be a bright spot for his administration.
— The gap between disapproval and approval of the president also narrowed to the smallest in nearly a year, giving hope to the president’s supporters that they may not lose the House.
5. A fact checker has rated a Democrat candidate for Governor’s comments about Alabama being a low tax state as true
— In a never-ending series of mind-boggling proclamations by Democrat candidates for Governor, former Chief Justice Sue Bell Cobb is publicly bemoaning Alabama’s status as a low tax state.
— Cobb’s statement, “Alabama is operating government on the lowest amount of tax revenue of any state in the nation, which is why we’re lagging behind our sister southern states.” This must lead us to ask how much and where Sue Bell Cobb would like to raise taxes.
6. Rep. Maxine Waters is the latest Democrat to express anger at Kanye West for daring to “talk out of turn“
— West continues to have powerful people confirm that his original points were valid, but Waters declared, “I think maybe he should think twice about politics – and maybe not have so much to say.”
— Waters is concerned that West is having an impact on young people and African-Americans who are solid Democrat voting-blocks, so she wants him to be quiet, proving she wants diversity in appearance only, not in thinking.
7. Justice Kennedy might retire, the New York Times begs him not to
— The New York Times took a bold position yesterday when they declared that it was important that Justice Kennedy stay on the court for fear that Trump would get another Supreme Court nominee.
— This highlights how political our courts have become. It also should be a call for conservatives to fight to hold the Senate because, “if they can install another rock-ribbed conservative like Neil Gorsuch, the court will have a locked-in right-wing majority for the rest of most of our lifetimes.”