No plans for Trump and Putin to meet in ‘immediate future,’ White House says

(WASHINGTON) — Democratic senators are alleging that the Department of Homeland Security potentially violated the Hatch Act by asking airports across the country to play a video featuring DHS Secretary Kristi Noem blaming Democrats for the impacts of the government shutdown.

“This appears to be a flagrant violation of Sec. 715, which states ‘No part of any funds appropriated in this or any other act shall be used by an agency of the executive to branch… for the preparation, distribution or use of any… film presentation designed to support or defeat legislation pending before the Congress, except in presentation to the Congress itself,'” Connecticut Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal wrote in the letter to DHS citing a section from the Anti-Lobbying Act. 

The Hatch Act restricts certain political activities by federal employees and by some state, Washington, D.C., and local government workers who are involved or work in federally funded programs. Penalties for violating it include removal from federal employment, suspension without pay, demotion, or blocking a party from federal jobs for up to five years, according to the Office of Special Counsel.

“The law’s purposes are to ensure that federal programs are administered in a nonpartisan fashion, to protect federal employees from political coercion in the workplace, and to ensure that federal employees are advanced based on merit and not based on political affiliation,” according to the U.S. Office of Special Counsel’s website.

In response to ABC News’ request for comment on the call for an investigation, DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said “DHS responds to official correspondence through official channels.”

“It is TSA’s top priority to ensure that travelers have the most pleasant, efficient, and safe air travel security experience possible. It is a simple statement of fact that Democrats in Congress refuse to fund the federal government, and because of this, most of our TSA employees are working without pay. It’s unfortunate our workforce has been put in this position due to political gamesmanship. Our hope is that Democrats will soon recognize the importance of opening the government,” she said.

The letter followed a number of airports nationwide declining to play the video, saying their facilities’ policies bar the showing of political content. Some of them also pointed to the Hatch Act. 

Among the major airports that declined to show the DHS video are LaGuardia, Newark Liberty, John F. Kennedy, Charlotte Douglas International, Seattle-Tacoma, San Francisco, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta, Chicago O’ Hare, Phoenix International and Colorado Springs.

As of Wednesday afternoon, officials at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport in Michigan and Bismarck Airport in North Dakota said the video was being shown on screens controlled by TSA at the airports and out of their control. Both airports said they were not involved in the decision to play the video. A spokesperson for Detroit Wayne Airport said it has requested that TSA stop playing the video. 

The letter to DHS led by Blumenthal and Rhode Island Sen. Jack Reed was  cosigned by 15 other senators and asks the department to “immediately remove these videos from all TSA checkpoints and cease illegally using federal funds for partisan political messaging.”  

The senators also asked DHS to provide information on the funding used to produce the video, including the cost, the approver of the funds, whether anyone from the Trump administration was consulted on the video, and if any outside contractors or organizations were involved in its creation to assess whether any federal laws were violated or funds misused, according to the letter. 

A similar letter was sent by Washington Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell, ranking member on the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, to the Office of Special Counsel demanding an investigation into the video, adding that the OSC is responsible for enforcing the Hatch Act. 

“When viewed in its totality, Secretary Noem’s video can only be reasonably interpreted as a partisan message intended to misleadingly malign the Trump Administration’s political opponents, convince Americans to blame ‘Democrats in Congress’ for the ongoing government shutdown, and influence their future votes — all while omitting the fact that Republicans currently control the White House, U.S. Senate, and U.S. House of Representatives,” Cantwell wrote in the letter.

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(AUSTIN, Texas) — After weeks of delays and protests from Democrats, the Texas state House is slated Wednesday to consider moving forward on the controversial redistricting plan.

Republicans have put the bill for the redistricting on the agenda for when their special session convenes again today on the House floor at 10 a.m. local time.

The move came weeks after state Democrats decried the unorthodox mid-decade redistricting as blatant gerrymandering to increase the number of GOP congressional seats. The special session was delayed after Democrats left the state to avoid a quorum, despite threats of arrest from Gov. Greg Abbott and other Republican leaders.

Some Democrats returned to the statehouse on Monday and allowed the legislature to reach a quorum, but they continued to speak out against the controversial redistricting.

It is likely that the redistricting plan, which was pushed by President Donald Trump, will pass.

Texas House Democrats said they are still planning to resist the maps and call out what they say it means for their constituents. They plan on fighting the bill on the floor.

A handful of Texas House Democrats refused law enforcement escorts. It stayed overnight in the Texas House, in solidarity with state Rep. Nicole Collier, who had refused to sign a “permission slip” allowing her to leave the state Capitol with a law enforcement escort.

The Texas state Capitol also dealt with a social media threat Tuesday night that led to the evacuation of grounds and the building, but Democratic lawmakers who were already in the building remained inside.

The bill, which was newly filed for the second special session after the first one was adjourned due to not having a quorum, passed out of committee on Monday.

The Texas Senate is expected to pick up the bill once it passes the House.

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(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. Supreme Court should hear Ghislaine Maxwell’s appeal of her 2021 sex trafficking conviction because the government has an “obligation to honor” a non-prosecution agreement with Jeffrey Epstein that inoculated Maxwell from any criminal charges, her lawyers argued in a brief to the Supreme Court Monday.

“Plea and non-prosecution agreements resolve nearly every federal case. They routinely include promises that extend to others—co-conspirators, family members, potential witnesses. If those promises mean different things in different parts of the country, then trust in our system collapses,” the brief said.

Federal prosecutors have argued that the non-prosecution agreement applied only in Florida and did not bind New York, where charges against him, and subsequently Maxwell, were brought.

Maxwell’s attorneys argued the terms of the NPA Epstein signed were unqualified.

“It is not geographically limited to the Southern District of Florida, it is not conditioned on the co-conspirators being known by the government at the time, it does not depend on what any particular government attorney may have had in his or her head about who might be a co-conspirator, and it contains no other caveat or exception. This should be the end of the discussion,” the defense brief said.

The Justice Department has urged the Supreme Court to reject Maxwell’s petition even as Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche agreed to meet with Maxwell last week.

Prosecutors have argued Maxwell cannot enforce the NPA because she was not a party to it. The defense disagreed.

“Petitioner’s alleged status as Epstein’s co-conspirator was the entire basis of her prosecution,” the defense brief said.

“No one is above the law—not even the Southern District of New York. Our government made a deal, and it must honor it. The United States cannot promise immunity with one hand in Florida and prosecute with the other in New York. President Trump built his legacy in part on the power of a deal—and surely he would agree that when the United States gives its word, it must stand by it. We are appealing not only to the Supreme Court but to the President himself to recognize how profoundly unjust it is to scapegoat Ghislaine Maxwell for Epstein’s crimes, especially when the government promised she would not be prosecuted,” Maxwell’s attorney David Oscar Markus said in a statement.

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