“Older Judges and Vacant Seats Give Trump Huge Power to Shape American Courts” was my first headline-related heart attack of the day, how about yours? [New York Times]
The Southern Poverty Law Center’s annual intelligence report found that there’s been a 197 percent increase in the number of anti-Muslim hate groups in the U.S. SPLC senior fellow Mark Potok called Trump “the most important factor” behind the increase, which sounds about right. [Talking Points Memo]
Republicans in Congress passed a bill to undo an Obama regulation that restricted gun access for some mentally ill Americans. [NPR]
The Obamacare repeal doesn’t seem to be going so well! [Politico]
That completely unconstitutional Oklahoma bill requiring women to obtain consent from their sexual partner prior to getting an abortion (sponsored by the comic book villain who called pregnant women “hosts”) has just been advanced by a State House committee, one of many anti-abortion bills pushing through state legislatures across the U.S. [The Hill]
Michael Flynn will reportedly be replaced by Vice Admiral Robert Harward, who is not known to be a maniac and has previously worked with Defense Secretary James Mattis. [Reuters]
Flynn, on the other hand, has had his security clearance suspended “pending review.” [CNN]
Here’s a weird video of John McCain and Ashton Kutcher flirting with each other. [CSPAN]
God, are you ready for more terrifying facts about Trump’s dead-eyed 31-year-old white nationalist senior advisor Stephen Miller? Me either, but here you go: in college, Miller spearheaded a project to educate students about “Islamofascism,” and boy was it Islamophobic! [CNN]
A “family source” told Us Weekly that Melania Trump is “unhappy with how her life ended up” and “miserable.”
Texas, of course, becomes the first state to support Trump’s travel ban, even though Trump himself said he might rewrite it. [Washington Post]
Here are some tweets that the president was allowed to publish:
