Russia hacked the DNC, which is precisely what we said would happen when Debbie Wasserman Schultz tried to obtain the GoldenEye. Washington Democrats grumbled about their meaningless presidential primary, but took solace in being able to vote in their non-voting delegate’s uncontested reelection. And reporters continued to raise concern over the Trump campaign’s media blacklist -- the campaign's clear objective to have the only things covering their events be a Breitbart reporter and a comb with several tendrils of Sean Hannity’s hair stuck to it. This is HUFFPOST HILL for Tuesday, June 14th, 2016:
DEM PRIMARY WRAPPING UP, UNCLEAR IF HILLARY HAS IT ALL - John Wagner, David Weigel and Abby Phillip: "Bernie Sanders declined Tuesday to endorse Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, saying that he would continue to push for a 'fundamental transformation' of the party up until its convention next month in Philadelphia. 'The American people are hurting, and they are hurting badly,' Sanders said during a news conference outside a campaign office off Capitol Hill. 'They want real change, not the same ol’, same ol’.' His comments came as voters in the District were casting the final ballots of the long Democratic nominating contest, and as Sanders and Clinton were preparing for a highly anticipated meeting Tuesday night to discuss the party’s agenda heading into the fall election against presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump." [WaPo]
Clinton has a big lead over Trump in this new Bloomberg national poll.
GOP LAWMAKERS NOT KEEN ON TRUMP'S ANTI-MUSLIM BAN Elise Foley, Jen Bendery and Laura Barron-Lopez: "The Huffington Post asked a number of Republicans on Tuesday if they thought a President Trump could unilaterally ban Muslims from entering the country. Most of them bristled. 'The Constitution is the Constitution — it doesn’t work that way,' Rep. David Schweikert (R-Ariz.) said. 'As a member of Congress, we are going to, whether it be a Republican president or a Democratic president, I think we will vigorously defend the fact that we’re Article I,” he added, referring to the statute of the Constitution that puts legislative powers in the hands of the House and Senate. Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) said he didn’t know whether Trump would have that kind of power as president and emphasized that he opposed the president doing something like that. Kinzinger also said it would run counter to what he called one of Republicans’ 'big hopes: reclaiming Article I of the Constitution.' 'At the end of the day, I hope he respects the role of Congress and assume he will,' Kinzinger said." [HuffPost]
@ericawerner: "We don't have a nominee" Sen Alexander says in response to question on Trump. Informed he's the presumptive nominee: "That's what you say."
Be sure to read all of Sam Stein's interview with campaign gurus for three vanquished GOP candidates.
I AM INVINCIBLE!!! RUSSIA HACKS DNC - We're waiting for President Trump to fix this with some zoom and enhance. Ellen Nakashima: "Russian government hackers penetrated the computer network of the Democratic National Committee and gained access to the entire database of opposition research on GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump, according to committee officials and security experts who responded to the breach. The intruders so thoroughly compromised the DNC’s system that they also were able to read all email and chat traffic, said DNC officials and the security experts. The intrusion into the DNC was one of several targeting American political organizations. The networks of presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump were also targeted by Russian spies, as were the computers of some GOP political action committees, U.S. officials said. But details on those cases were not available." [WaPo]
Please join The Huffington Post and many other media outlets on Donald Trump's media blacklist!
DELANEY DOWNER - Give poor people bigger food stamp benefits and they’ll buy more veggies and lean meats, according to a new study. An extra $30 worth of monthly Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits would also result in beneficiaries eating fewer fast food meals and spending more time cooking at home, according to the statistical analysis of federal survey data by researchers working for the liberal Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. "Most notably, consumption of tomatoes and yellow vegetables would increase by almost 3 percent and green vegetables by just over 2 percent, while consumption of fast food would fall by over 2.5 percent,” Patricia Anderson of Dartmouth College and Kristin Butcher of Wellesley College wrote in their report…. Most of the political conversation around food stamps, however, is about nudging people off the program. [HuffPost]
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APPEALS COURT UPHOLDS NET NEUTRALITY - While the eight-member Supreme Court will flail about impotently, like Leonardo DiCaprio on quaaludes in "Wolf of Wall Street." Dana Liebelson and Cristian Farias: "In a long-awaited decision, a federal appeals court on Tuesday upheld the Obama administration’s net neutrality rules, dealing a punishing blow to telecom and cable companies that have sought to overturn the regulations. Characterizing the government’s net neutrality effort as an 'attempt to achieve internet openness' and 'the principle that broadband providers must treat all internet traffic the same regardless of source,' the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit concluded that the rules are authorized under current law. The Obama administration’s rules prevent internet service providers, or ISPs, from charging content producers for faster or more reliable service, a practice known as 'paid prioritization.” Th' rules also ban blocking and purposefully slowing the traffic of lawful services, and apply to both mobile and fixed broadband service." [HuffPost]
PRESIDENT RIPS TRUMP AND GOP OVER TERRORISM - Lame Duck Obama is so much more fun … though it'd be nice if he sang more. Jessica Schulberg "President Barack Obama on Tuesday forcefully rebuked Republicans who have berated him for refusing to characterize lone wolf terror attacks by Muslim individuals as acts of 'radical Islam.' … Obama stood firm. 'Not once has an adviser of mine said, "Man, if we really use that phrase, we’re gonna turn this whole thing around."Not once,' he said...Without mentioning the reality star by name, Obama homed in on Trump’s proposed ban on Muslim immigration to the U.S., warning of “sloppiness about who, exactly, we are fighting.” Noting that both Mateen and Syed Rizwan Farook, one of the San Bernardino shooters, were U.S.-born citizens, Obama questioned whether Trump would eventually resort to treating Muslim Americans differently as well, possibly subjecting them to extra surveillance or discriminating against them based on their religion." [HuffPost]
RYAN JUST CAN'T DENOUNCE TRUMP - We imagine that every meeting between Trump and Ryan begins with Ryan reenacting Lando Calrissian's first lines from "Empire Strikes Back." Matt Fuller: "Committee headquarters and called out Donald Trump for his proposed ban on Muslims coming into the United States. 'This is not conservatism,' Ryan said in December. 'What was proposed yesterday is not what this party stands for, and more importantly, it’s not what this country stands for.' Six months later, with Trump seeming to have secured the Republican nomination, Ryan stood in the very same lobby and took a very different tone…[Ryan] was far less sharp-tongued about it. He wasn’t even willing to say that Trump would not, as the presumptive nominee contended on Monday, have the authority to prohibit Muslims from entering the country if he were president." [HuffPost]
Well, that's sure nice of him: "Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) criticized presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s views of Muslim Americans, saying most Muslims living in the U.S. are 'patriotic.' 'One of the points I think he’s missing is, there are an awful lot of patriotic, loyal American Muslims,' McConnell told HuffPost’s Howard Fineman. 'In fact, they are the best sources we have to find these lone wolves in our country.'" [HuffPost]
WORK ON YOUR CREEP, HILL STAFFERS - Dear Colleague discipline doesn't end at properly faking your boss' signature. Bend Adler: "With the home solar panel industry and the electric utility industry at war, you might expect a liberal Democratic congresswoman from New York City to support the solar side. But that’s not what happened recently when Rep. Yvette Clarke decided to wade into this fight. Instead, she signed her name to a letter apparently written by utility lobbyists that warns about the risk of solar companies duping consumers…But it appears that Clarke and her staff didn’t write the letter; utility industry reps did. Grist has obtained the letter that Clarke’s office distributed to other members of Congress, and the metadata on the Microsoft Word document show it was created by Eric Grey, director of governmental relations at the Edison Electric Institute, the trade association representing investor-owned electric utility companies. The last person to save changes to the document was Vincent Barnes, a lobbyist for Gray Global Advisors, which has EEI as a client. The letter makes no reference to EEI’s role in its creation." [Grist]
ALAN GRAYSON'S COLLEAGUES REALLY DON'T LIKE ALAN GRAYSON - Matt Dixon: "On the campaign trail, Democratic Rep. Alan Grayson is taking full credit for language in the House’s proposed defense budget that gives financial help to surviving military spouses — a contention congressional staff from both political parties involved with the negotiations said is 'inaccurate.'...Those involved in the process of crafting the NDAA say several people helped get the extension language, and that no one member of Congress can take credit, and particularly not Grayson, who is not a committee member...A Democratic staffer for one of the committee members said that their boss and others involved in the process have “no recollection” of Grayson being directly involved with the NDAA negotiations." [Politico]
BECAUSE YOU'VE READ THIS FAR - Here's a dog mastering steps.
COMFORT FOOD
- An evolution of Donald Trump's hair.
- A Chrome extension for Donald Trump's birthday.
- Why the 5K is the ideal race.
TWITTERAMA
@reuterszengerle: Reporters asked @LindseyGrahamSC about report that Russians hacked DMC Trump research. He laughed, asked: "Are you making that shit up?"
@BenjySarlin: In general, Congress feels like an alternate reality now where Donald Trump is a guy who says things on TV and not the presumptive nominee.
@gwenifill: "Oh, right, it's election day," said distracted DC reporter.
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