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1:45 PM ET, March 21, 2018

Top Items:

Jeff Zeleny / CNN:

Kelly furious over leak of warning to Trump to not congratulate Putin — WaPo: Trump warned not to congratulate Putin — Washington (CNN)White House chief of staff John Kelly is furious about the quick leak of a warning to President Donald Trump to not congratulate his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin …

Discussion: Washington Post, RedState, Washington Examiner, Mediaite, The Root, Splinter, Shareblue Media, Raw Story, The White House, The Daily Caller and The Week

New York Times:

White House Job Requirement: Signing a Nondisclosure Agreement — As a real estate executive and reality TV star, Donald J. Trump tightly controlled his image by insisting that everyone around him sign nondisclosure agreements threatening steep monetary penalties if they revealed anything about him or his company.

Discussion: Axios, Outside the Beltway, The Week, The Guardian, Washington Post and Daily Kos

Washington Post:

Trump's national security advisers warned him not to congratulate Putin. He did it anyway. … President Trump did not follow specific warnings from his national security advisers when he congratulated Russian President Vladimir Putin Tuesday on his reelection, including a section …

Greg Sargent / Washington Post:

A GOP senator's remarkable admission about Trump and Mueller … THE MORNING PLUM: — President Trump just uncorked a new round of Twitter attacks this morning on special counsel Robert S. Mueller III and on the English language, quoting one of his staunchest legal allies as follows …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Washington Examiner, Reuters, Raw Story, CNN, Lawyers, Guns & Money, Daily Kos and Joe.My.God.

Jonathan Swan / Axios:

A stunning leak rattles Trump and his aides — One of the most startling leaks — and stunning revelations — of this whole administration has left President Trump and his senior staff furious and rattled. The Washington Post reports in its lead story: “Trump did not follow specific warnings …

Discussion: Washington Post, Mediaite, Althouse and Raw Story

Alex Isenstadt / Politico:

White House opposed Republican picked to replace Cochran — White House officials this week told Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant that President Donald Trump did not plan to campaign for or endorse Republican Cindy Hyde-Smith if she was appointed to the state's open Senate seat, saying they were worried that the former Democrat would lose.

Discussion: Mississippi Today

Julia Manchester / The Hill:

Hannity rips Mueller's career: ‘Anything but impeccable’ — Conservative talk show host Sean Hannity ripped special counsel Robert Mueller — late Tuesday, saying his career has been “anything but impeccable.” — “Everybody says, 'He's the greatest guy in the whole wide world. Just trust us!'

Discussion: RedState, Washington Post, IJR and Fox News Insider

NBC News:
Trump, master of the political insult, declines to chide Putin

Discussion: Axios and Daily Wire

Tony Plohetski / Austin American-Statesman:

Austin bombing suspect, 24-year-old man, dies as police close in, chief says — 5:50 a.m. update: The suspect in a string of bombings in Austin is dead, interim Austin Police Chief Brian Manley confirmed early Wednesday. — The name of the suspect, described only as a 24-year-old white man …

NBC News:

Austin bomb suspect Mark Anthony Conditt blows himself up as SWAT team approaches — The suspect in a spate of bombings that terrorized residents of Austin, Texas, died early Wednesday after detonating an explosive inside his vehicle as a SWAT team tried to apprehend him on the side of a highway, officials said.

Discussion: ThinkProgress, KXAN-TV, NBC News, Daily Wire, The Daily Caller, Shakesville, Joe.My.God. and Gizmodo

Austin American-Statesman:

Authorities: Bombing suspect was Pflugerville resident Mark A. Conditt — The suspected Austin serial bomber who apparently killed himself early Wednesday as authorities closed in on him was Pflugerville resident Mark A. Conditt, local and federal law enforcement sources told the American-Statesman and KVUE.

Discussion: The Texas Tribune, The Federalist, Fox News, WIS-TV, IJR, Wall Street Journal, Fox News Insider, The Daily Beast, VICE News and Raw Story

KVUE-TV:
LIVE: Austin bombing suspect dead; other devices may be out there, police say

Discussion: USA Today, Austin American-Statesman, ThinkProgress, NPR, IJR, NBC News, National Review, The Gateway Pundit, VICE News, New York Magazine, Raw Story, Joe.My.God. and twitchy.com

CNN:
Austin bomber kills himself with explosive device

The Daily Beast:
Mark Anthony Conditt Reportedly Identified as Austin Bomber, Blew Himself Up After Police Chase

Discussion: Raw Story

Richard Pérez-Peña / New York Times:
Suspect in Austin Bombings Blew Himself Up, Police Say

Discussion: New York Daily News, CBS Dallas, San Antonio Current, CNBC, Oxford Mail, Breitbart, Common Dreams, Raw Story, CBS New York, FOX 4 Kansas City WDAF-TV, CBS Los Angeles, FOX31 Denver, WIS-TV, Unfogged, Mediaite and Althouse

CNN:
Austin serial bombing suspect's grandmother says he's a loving man from a tight family

Discussion: KFOR-TV, FOX 4 Kansas City WDAF-TV, CBS Pittsburgh, KTLA, fox8.com, The Daily Caller and Daily Kos

Liam Stack / New York Times:

Denounced by His Party as a Nazi, Arthur Jones Wins Illinois G.O.P. Congressional Primary — Arthur Jones, a Holocaust denier described as a Nazi by the Illinois Republican Party, won the Republican primary on Tuesday in the state's Third Congressional District, a heavily Democratic district …

Discussion: The Hill, Instapundit, Outside the Beltway, VICE News, IJR, Axios, The Root and Joe.My.God.

Ryan Grim / The Intercept:
What The Dan Lipinski-Marie Newman Democratic Primary in Illinois Means

Discussion: Common Dreams, Roll Call, Politico and NPR

Tom Maguire / JustOneMinute:
As Much As I Hate Seeing A Nazi Win Something...

Discussion: New York Times and Mother Jones

Josh Israel / ThinkProgress:
20,000 Republicans just voted for an actual Nazi

Discussion: CNN, Washington Post, KTLA, Vox and Splinter

Chicago Tribune:
Newman concedes, saying she put Lipinski on notice to do ‘better for all of the people in our district’

Discussion: The Atlantic, Capitol Fax.com, RRH Elections, Rewire.News, CNN, Political Wire and New York Magazine

Andy Sullivan / Reuters:
Newman concedes in Democratic Illinois congressional primary

Discussion: Washington Free Beacon and Daily Wire

Betsy Woodruff / The Daily Beast:

Cambridge Analytica Looked to Pounce on Russian Hacks, Email Shows … Cambridge Analytica hoped to capitalize on Russian hacking of Hillary Clinton and her ally, an email written by one of its employees indicates. — Emily Cornell, the employee, sent the email on July 29, 2016.

Discussion: Raw Story

Carrie Levine / Center for Public Integrity:
John Bolton — eyed for Trump post — leads super PAC that employed Cambridge Analytica

Discussion: Bloomberg, BuzzFeed, CNN, Motherboard, Washington Post, USA Today, Vanity Fair, The Daily Beast, Just Security, The Verge and VentureBeat, more at Techmeme »

Washington Post:
Bannon oversaw Cambridge Analytica's collection of Facebook data, according to former employee

Discussion: Axios, Politico, Vox, Bloomberg, ThinkProgress, One America News Network, ABC News, Reuters, The Week, Mediaite and KTLA, more at Mediagazer »

Ross Douthat / New York Times:

Trump Hacked the Media Right Before Our Eyes — Let's get one thing straight: I am not a fan of Facebook. I'm confident that social media is a cancer on our private lives and a source of derangement in our politics. I take it for granted that the tech barons are acquiring the power to tilt elections …

Discussion: National Review, The Guardian and CNBC

Tennessean.com:

New poll finds Bredesen with narrow lead over Blackburn in US Senate race — Former Gov. Phil Bredesen has a slight edge over U.S. Rep. Marsha Blackburn in a new poll on the U.S. Senate race from a Democratic-leaning firm. — The poll, conducted by North Carolina-based Public Policy Polling …

Valerie Strauss / Washington Post:

A University of Wisconsin campus pushes plan to drop 13 majors — including English, history and philosophy … (Note: An earlier version dropped part of the university's full statement because of coding errors and said the school faced a $4.5 million deficit over two days rather than two years.

Rebecca Savransky / The Hill:
University of Wisconsin campus proposes elimination of majors such as English, history

Discussion: The Daily Caller and Daily Wire

Jason Schwartz / Politico:

Breitbart's readership plunges — Breitbart, the alt-right news site whose executive chairman Steve Bannon was pushed out in January after feuding with President Donald Trump, has lost about half its readership according to comScore, raising questions about its future.

Discussion: New York Post, The Mahablog, Splinter and Outside the Beltway, more at Mediagazer »

Alvin Chang / Vox:

Fox News really doesn't want to say “Trump” and “porn star” on air — Fox News is censoring a Trump sex scandal again. — There is something Fox News really doesn't want on air, and it's this: President Trump's name uttered in the same sentence as the words “porn star” or “Stormy Daniels.”

Discussion: Washington Post

Judd Legum / ThinkProgress:
Karen McDougal is the woman with the best chance of bringing down Trump

Discussion: Political Wire, New York Times, TVNewser and Vox

New York Times:

The End for Facebook's Security Evangelist — Alex Stamos, the Facebook executive who plans to leave the company by August amid a backlash over disinformation, has not been one to hold back. — Mr. Stamos, Facebook's chief information security officer, was often known to push superiors …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Law & Crime and Mashable, more at Techmeme »

David Streitfeld / New York Times:
Welcome to Zucktown. Where Everything Is Just Zucky.

more at Techmeme »

Karma Allen / ABC News:

Biden says he would have ‘beat the hell out’ of Trump in high school for disrespecting women — Former Vice President Joe Biden took fresh jabs at President Donald Trump on Tuesday while speaking at an anti-sexual assault rally, telling students at the University of Miami that he probably would have …

Discussion: Daily Wire, Shakesville, The Gateway Pundit, IJR, Washington Times, Political Wire, twitchy.com, NTK Network and Breitbart

Sanah Faroke / WSVN-TV:
Joe Biden speaks on sexual assault at UM for It's On Us campaign

Discussion: The Daily Beast and The Daily Caller

Ben Penn / bnanews.bna.com:

Mulvaney, Acosta Override Regulatory Office to Hide Tips Rule Data — Sources: DOL released rule to permit restaurant tip sharing over objections of regulatory chief Neomi Rao — Labor Department leadership convinced OMB Director Mick Mulvaney to overrule the White House regulatory affairs chief …

Discussion: Vox, ThinkProgress and Common Dreams

Sacramento Bee:

Police fired 20 times at South Sacramento man fatally shot while holding a cellphone — Stephan Clark was holding only his cellphone when he was fatally shot Sunday night by two Sacramento police officers who fired at him 20 times, the department said Tuesday.

Discussion: New York Daily News, ThinkProgress, Hit & Run, KTLA, FOX40, WGN-TV and WPIX 11 New York

Liam Stack / New York Times:

Children's Book About Mike Pence's Gay Bunny Jumps to No. 1 — This is the story of a little gay bunny. — A little gay bunny who belongs to Vice President Mike Pence. — A little fictional gay bunny whose book is beating the memoir of James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director, on the Amazon best-seller list.

Discussion: twitchy.com, NewsBusters and Mediaite

Hugo Martin / Los Angeles Times:

TSA denies accessing data on electronic devices carried by domestic airline passengers — The Transportation Security Administration said Tuesday that its airport security agents do not scan or review the data held on electronic devices carried by passengers on domestic flights.

Discussion: Associated Press