Trump's lawyers, Senate GOP allies work privately to ensure Bolton does not testify publicly  —  President Trump's legal defense team and Senate GOP allies are quietly gaming out contingency plans should Democrats win enough votes to force witnesses to testify in the impeachment trial …

Sanders apologizes to Biden for surrogate's op-ed alleging he has a “big corruption problem”  —  Des Moines, Iowa — Senator Bernie Sanders apologized to former Vice President Joe Biden on Monday for an op-ed written by one of his campaign surrogates that claimed Biden has a “big corruption problem.”

Trump's Impeachment Brief Is a Howl of Rage  —  Over the weekend, as the Senate prepared for the impeachment trial of Donald Trump, the newly appointed House impeachment managers and the president's newly appointed legal team both filed their initial legal briefs.  —  At least, one of them was a legal brief.

The worst thing about Trump's answer to the impeachment articles  —  President Trump has filed his answer to the articles of impeachment against him.  In legal parlance, an “answer” is a document filed at the beginning of a proceeding, typically a civil case, in which the defending side gives …

Devin Nunes' Ukraine lies are a betrayal.  Voters in his district deserve better  —  Kiev, Ukraine, is nearly 6,200 miles from Tulare, Calif. That's a long way from home for Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Tulare, who now faces explosive allegations that he and his staff contacted shadowy Ukrainian figures …

CNN poll: 51% say Senate should remove Trump from office  —  Schumer: We will force votes on witnesses and documents  —  (CNN)About half of Americans say the Senate should vote to convict President Donald Trump and remove him from office in the upcoming impeachment trial (51%) …

Richmond woman charged with wearing mask in public following gun-rights rally  —  A 21-year-old Richmond woman was charged Monday with wearing a mask in public following the gun-rights rally in Richmond.  —  Police said a Richmond officer warned Mikaela E. Beschler, of the 1100 block of North 34th Street …

Don Jr. Admits Meeting Lev Parnas: ‘I Thought He Was Israeli’  —  'IT'S FUNNY'  —  Presidential son Donald Trump Jr. admitted on Sunday to meeting indicted Giuliani associate Lev Parnas, claiming he and his father merely took fundraiser photos with the businessman whose involvement …

Denver Post Columnist Fired After Arguing There Are Two Sexes  —  A Denver Post columnist says he was fired after disputing the idea that there are more than two sexes.  —  Jon Caldara, president of the libertarian Independence Institute, announced that he has been fired from the Post …

Art preservationists want Frick Collection to buy Jeffrey Epstein's townhouse as part of museum expansion plan  —  Jeffrey Epstein's Manhattan perv palace could soon be an art museum.  —  The convicted sex offender's posh Upper East Side mansion — a house of horrors where he allegedly abused dozens …

How Trump Twisted a Vague Iran Worry Into an Imminent Danger to ‘Four Embassies’  —  “There were definitely questions [at the time, internally] about whether he had just made it up on the spot,” recalled one White House official.  —  When President Donald Trump publicly claimed earlier …

“It's Like a Foreign Language”: Donald Trump's Encounter With the Constitution Did Not Go Well  —  While being filmed for a documentary, the president stumbled through his chosen passage, taking his frustration out on everyone around him, Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig write in A Very Stable Genius.

January Poll Results  —  Focus on Rural America Co-Founders former Iowa Lt. Gov Patty Judge and Jeff Link released the results of their latest poll on a conference call with reporters Monday morning.  —  This is the 6th quarterly poll from Focus on Rural America which began tracking presidential preferences …

The Loser President  —  Trump could lose by many millions of votes and still secure an Electoral College win—and Democrats aren't paying this the attention it deserves.  —  Elizabeth Warren electrified a December town hall meeting in Iowa when she answered a question about the Electoral College with a stirring call to action.

Conservative States Seek Billions to Brace for Disaster.  (Just Don't Call It Climate Change.)  —  WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is about to distribute billions of dollars to coastal states mainly in the South to help steel them against natural disasters worsened by climate change.