46.7 F
Mobile
41.3 F
Huntsville
44.4 F
Birmingham
42.3 F
Montgomery

7 Things: Trump and Kanye, Tennessee’s version of Doug Jones, Saudi Arabia probably killed a journalist and more …

7. Fusion GPS’s Glenn Simpson says he will not be testifying before Congress

— Simpson’s firm was hired during the 2016 presidential campaign by the law firm with ties to the DNC and Clinton campaign. He helped plant stories with news outlets which were then used as justification to launch further inquiries into the Trump campaign.

— His attorney says he is not appearing because the query “is not designed to discover the truth,” but some believe he may have perjured himself in a previous testimony where he and embattled Justice Department official Bruce Ohr told two different version of stories about their interactions.

6. A domestic terrorist wanted to blow himself up with a 200-pound bomb on election day to bring election to a process called “sortition” 

— A New York man is facing charges for making a 200-pound bomb and planning to blow himself up in Washington, D.C., on Election Day. On Wednesday, FBI agents continued searching a home just north of New York City, which is where they discovered the device.

— According to court papers, over the past two months, Paul Rosenfeld allegedly sent letters and text messages to a Pennsylvania resident detailing his plan to detonate the bomb on the National Mall to draw attention to the “sortition” political system, in which government officials are randomly selected.

5. President Donald Trump will talk to special counsel Robert Mueller via written communications instead of a face-to-face interview

— President Donald Trump’s legal team is putting together answers to written questions that have been provided by Mueller and this could mean that the Mueller investigation could be entering a final phase with regard to the president and he won’t answer questions during an interview.

— This investigation has been going on for over a year and a half. Negotiations over this part have taken almost a year, and while this doesn’t end the investigation because there could be follow-ups to this phase, it appears the end is near.

4. Governor Kay Ivey is surveying the damage and urging patience in the recovery following Hurrican Michael

— Gov. Ivey spent time in the Houston County Emergency Management Center and conducted a flyover and land tour of damage in the Wiregrass area as she urged people to be patient with recovery crews.

— The governor also was thankful that there was no loss of life in Alabama as of yet, saying, “I’m grateful to learn that there’s no loss of life in this area that we know of yet.”

3. It is becoming more evident that the Saudis killed a journalist and resident of the U.S. in their embassy

— The plot continues to thicken in the apparent death of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi as the Turkish government says it has audio and video recordings that appear to show he was tortured and killed in the Saudi embassy and dismembered.

— An anonymous source told The Washington Post, “You can hear his voice and the voices of men speaking Arabic,” and, “You can hear how he was interrogated, tortured and then murdered.”

2. Tennessee has their own Sen. Doug Jones in Democratic Senate nominee Phil Bredesen

— Our cowardly caretaker junior senator from the great state of Alabama publicly hemmed and hawed on where he stood on President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Most believed he was already a “no,” but was trying to appear as if he was being sincere on his pledge to have an open mind.

— In Tennessee, Phil Bredesen is now trying to play the same game. His lie was a little more brazen, but his staff has told Project Veritas that Bredesen is only saying he’d vote for Kavanaugh to “get the Republican vote.”

1. Kanye West has an amusing and weird meeting with the president of the United States

— The much-anticipated lunch with Kanye West and Donald Trump finally happened and it was all you would have expected: it was strange, it was silly, it was bizarre and the media bit on the troll job hook, line and sinker.

— West spoke extemporaneously about liberal Hollywood not being happy with him, daddy issues, North Korea, MAGA hats, Hillary Clinton, opportunity zones, jobs, African-American unemployment, opioids, high-crime rates and clemencies, but he also brought Trump a hat that read “Make America Great” and Yeezys. Ivanka Trump got a hat with “Make Earth Great Again” and Jared Kushner received a “Travel Space Again” hat.

Don’t miss out!  Subscribe today to have Alabama’s leading headlines delivered to your inbox.