Alexis Simendinger

The prosecution Monday told jurors that then-candidate Donald Trump orchestrated a criminal plot to corrupt the 2016 election. Influencing voters is not a felony, the defendant’s lawyer countered. It’s politics. “President Trump did not commit any crimes. The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office should never have brought this case,” defense attorney Todd Blanche told jurors. Boiled...

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) will have to prove his juggling skills this week. The Speaker unveiled his plan to move foreign aid through the House during a closed-door GOP meeting Monday, pitching four separate bills to address aid for Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan and other national security priorities. After months of delaying any decisions on the...

Israel is weighing a reaction to Iran’s historic air offensive, which was largely foiled Saturday with help from unprecedented coordination with the U.S. and Jordan to destroy exploding drones and missiles. President Biden, seeking restraint to avert a wider war in the Middle East, spoke Sunday with partners from the seven leading industrialized nations by video hookup and consulted Israeli...

History suggests third-party candidates can’t win U.S. presidential elections, largely because of the power of the major parties. But they can change the math. With eight months of campaign drama to go and eight battleground states in mind, Morning Report asked experts this week whether independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will draw enough votes...

Congress is back in session this week, but what lawmakers can accomplish will be complicated by internal politics and events overseas. The House is increasingly chaotic, as Republicans juggle a razor-thin majority and lawmakers struggle to find consensus on issues from spending to international aid. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) faces a moment of truth on Ukraine aid...

President Biden’s escalating messages of frustration with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over events in Gaza are pointed and apparently partially persuasive. There has been no change in U.S. policy or arms sales. There are warnings without specifics. There is no set timetable. But Thursday presented the first signal that Biden would reassess backing Israel’s...

Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), first elected in 2012, is high up on vice presidential “guess lists” amid informed speculation and strategic teases from former President Trump about an eventual running mate. Morning Report asked political analysts this week about Scott, the 58-year-old former GOP presidential primary rival and the Senate’s sole Black Republican. “I feel...

President Biden and his campaign team vow to try to flip the Sunshine State in November, lobbing a bold boast that challenges recent election history. Former President Obama (with Biden on the ticket in 2012) was the last Democrat to capture Florida. But the Biden campaign is developing a nimbler strategy, has money to spend,...

At some point, House Republicans may confront the latest internal challenge to yet another in a line of embattled Speakers amid continued GOP resignations that have whittled the party’s majority to the size of a pea. Atop the Republican Party, former President Trump faces a court hearing today and a legal deadline that could test his brand, the limits...

Immigration, an emotional debate in American politics for decades, has dominated every branch of the federal government and Texas state law this week. If there was any doubt that America is tied in knots over who crosses its borders, events prove the point.  Migration issues will help determine a presidential election, harm or help the...