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Fighting back tears, British Prime Minister Theresa May said on Friday she would quit, triggering a contest that will bring a new leader to power who is likely to push for a more decisive Brexit divorce deal. May's departure will deepen the Brexit crisis as a new leader is likely to want a more decisive split, raising the chances of a confrontation with the European Union and a potentially unpredictable snap parliamentary election. May set out a timetable for her departure - she will resign as Conservative Party leader on June 7 with a leadership contest beginning the following week. Trump orders declassification of intelligence in Russia probe origins investigation  President Trump ordered the declassification Thursday night of certain intelligence to aid Attorney General William Barr in his investigation of the origins of government spying on the Trump presidential campaign in 2016. In a directive to the CIA, the Director of National Intelligence, the Pentagon and several other federal agencies, Mr. Trump said Mr. Barr has the authority to declassify or downgrade “information or intelligence that relates to the attorney general’s review.” The president directed the agencies to “promptly provide such assistance and information as the attorney general may request in connection with that review.” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the order “will help ensure that all Americans learn the truth about the events that occurred, and the actions that were taken, during the last presidential election and will restore confidence in our public institutions.”
Trump orders immigrant welfare crackdown, reimbursements President Trump ordered federal agencies Thursday to begin enforcing existing federal rules against immigrants who end up on the public dole, telling the government to begin demanding the money be repaid by the immigrants’ sponsors. The move is aimed at legal immigrants who are generally supposed to prove they are able to sustain themselves without becoming dependent on welfare assistance. Mr. Trump, in his new directive, said a 1996 law on the subject is plenty tough, but the government has never actually followed through on what Congress wrote. “The purpose of this memorandum is to direct relevant agencies to update or issue procedures, guidance, and regulations, as needed, to ensure that ineligible non-citizens do not receive means-tested public benefits, in better compliance with the law,” he wrote. In cases where immigrants do get payments, he said the people who sponsored them — and who were supposed to pledge they would be financially responsible — should be asked to pony up. Trump, Pelosi trade insults as their feud heats up  She’s calling for an “intervention” to save the nation from him. He says she’s “crazy.” The enmity between President Donald Trump and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi deteriorated Thursday into rude-and-then-some questioning of his fitness for office and her sanity, with personal attacks flowing from both the nation’s top elected officials after a dramatic blow-up at the White House. However intended, the exchanges left uncertain ahead of the 2020 election whether Trump and the Democrats will be able to work together on serious, must-pass tasks, such as funding the government and raising the federal borrowing limit, let alone thornier issues such as immigration, national security and more. Planned Parenthood, other health clinics sue Alabama over near-total abortion ban The law would criminalize abortion in almost all circumstances Planned Parenthood and the Alabama Women’s Center on Friday filed suit against the state of Alabama to block the most restrictive abortion law in the nation. The near-total ban, signed by Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey on May 15, would criminalize abortion in almost all circumstances — including cases of rape and incest — and punish doctors with up to 99 years in prison. Without any challenges, the law was set to go into effect in as soon as six months. The lawsuit, filed in United States District Court for the Middle District of Alabama, sets off a chain of events that both sides say is likely to lead to a years-long court battle. State lawmakers have said they passed the law specifically to bring the case in front of the U.S. Supreme Court, which they see as having the most antiabortion bench in decades. The bill was designed to challenge the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision by arguing that a fetus is a person and is therefore due full rights. India general election 2019: What happened? Results for India's general election released on 23 May saw a landslide victory for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which increased its huge parliamentary majority. Narendra Modi and his ruling BJP have swept back to power. The party won 303 seats in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of India's parliament, bettering the 282 seats they won in 2014 - a performance that not many thought was possible. A party needs to win 272 seats for a majority in parliament. The BJP's victory in 2014 was the first time in three decades that a party had been able to win that number of seats on its own. Robert Mueller wants to testify in private before Congress, House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler says Special counsel Robert Mueller wants to talk to Congress about his investigation into the Trump campaign and Russian interference in the 2016 election, but he wants to do it behind closed doors, says Rep. Jerrold Nadler, Nadler tells MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow that Mueller told the committee he would make his opening statement before the public. A transcript of Mueller’s testimony would be made public, Nadler adds. Nadler says he does not know why Mueller has been pushing for private testimony, but speculated that the Republican former FBI director “doesn’t want to participate in anything that he might regard as a political spectacle.” Democrat longshots 'getting creative' in battle for final debate stage podium The 20 podiums allotted for the first Democratic presidential debates are quickly filling up, and the decision about who gets on stage could soon become much more complicated. Montana Gov. Steve Bullock became the 19th candidate to qualify for the debates just a week after joining the race, leaving one more slot and five announced candidates vying to fill it. The five people still scrambling to get on stage include New York Mayor Bill de Blasio and Sen. Michael F. Bennet of Colorado. If both of them clear the low bar set to qualify, then the Democratic National Committee will switch to a ranking system to decide who’s in and who’s out. China ramps up war of rhetoric in trade standoff with US Stepping up Beijing’s propaganda offensive in the tariffs standoff with Washington, Chinese state media on Friday accused the U.S. of seeking to “colonize global business” with moves against Huawei and other Chinese technology companies. There was no word from either side on progress toward resuming talks between the world’s two largest economies, though President Donald Trump said he expected to meet with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, next month at a G-20 meeting in Japan. Negotiations over how to cut the huge, longstanding U.S. trade deficit with China and resolve complaints over Beijing’s methods for acquiring advanced foreign technologies foundered earlier this month after Trump raised tariffs on billions of dollars of imports from China. Iran says it will not surrender even if it is bombed Iran will not surrender to U.S. pressure and will not abandon its goals even if it is bombed, President Hassan Rouhani said on Thursday, stepping up the war of words between the Islamic Republic and the United States. Earlier in the day, Iran’s top military chief said the standoff between Tehran and Washington was a “clash of wills”, warning that any enemy “adventurism” would meet a crushing response, the semi-official Fars news agency reported. Tensions are festering between the two countries after Washington sent more military forces to the Middle East in a show of force against what U.S. officials say are Iranian threats to its troops and interests in the region. When the lady won't leave and she can't stay The lady is clearly in distress, and no one’s there to help her. Only a churl would say, even if true, Theresa May brought it on herself. She never wanted to lead Britain out of the European Union, but she’s probably entitled to give herself a B or maybe a C for effort. A grade of C might be worth a cup of tea at Starbucks, but she’ll have to pay extra for lemon or cream. She has been called “dead in the water” for weeks. She has been humiliated three times in Parliament, where her scheme for making an exit from the European Union has been thrice rejected. She has clearly lost the confidence of her party, if not the confidence of her people. She has been on the way out so many times that John O’Sullivan, the British commentator writing in the National Review, says she reminds him of a character in an Ernst Lubitsch movie who tells a rival for a lady’s hand, “See here, you keep saying that you’re leaving and then you stay, why don’t you say you’ll stay, and then leave.” Remembering those who never made it home Gary Wetzel will be at Rolling Thunder this weekend in our nation’s capital. Rolling Thunder is more than just the sound of the thousands of motorcycles roaring past the monuments, it is an organization founded in 1987 that puts together a ride to Washington, D.C., each year to raise awareness of the Prisoners of War and Missing in Action (POW/MIA) from Vietnam. Over the years, the ride has grown and their focus has expanded beyond the Vietnam War to include other wars. Sadly, 2019 is their final ride. Gary Wetzel has been the leader of the pack for most of the annual rides in Washington, D.C. To me, he is a friend and a fellow Harley Davidson rider. He is also a recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor.
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