Melanie Stansbury, a Democrat, Cruises in New Mexico House Race  —  Ms. Stansbury won a landslide victory in a special election to fill the seat vacated by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland.  The result is likely to hearten national Democrats worried about the 2022 midterms.

POLITICO Playbook: Infrastructure day: What to watch for in Biden's one-on-one with Capito  —  DRIVING THE DAY  —  BREAKING OVERNIGHT — Via our House elections guru Ally Mutnick: “Democrat MELANIE STANSBURY claimed a resounding victory Tuesday night in a contested special election for Congress …

An Infrastructure Deal Isn't Dead—Yet  —  Republicans cynically crushed the January 6 commission.  But bridges and roads aren't thugs and nationalists.  Here's what it would take to both sides to reach an agreement.  —  “[Senator Joe] Manchin's political worldview was put to the test …

Has Biden Lost His Nerve With Putin?  —  With another summit in the works, there's little to suggest any improvement over Trump's feeble policy.  —  I was one of the Russian opposition members who met then-Vice President Joe Biden at the U.S. ambassador's residence in Moscow on March 10, 2011.

Joe Biden is fine with Hunter's sleazy dealing, and the liberal media is giving him good reason  —  Powerful people will do what they can get away with.  When it comes to President Joe Biden and his family, that's a lot.  —  The latest demonstration: The establishment media in the United States …

Power Up: At least 20 Republican senators didn't meet with the Sicknick family  —  Good Wednesday morning.  We're halfway there.  Thanks for waking up with the Power Up newsletter.  —  On the Hill  —  NO SHOWS: Before Senate Republicans blocked the creation of a bipartisan commission …

Meat Plant Closures Are Spreading After a Cyberattack on JBS  — Some U.S. shifts canceled for Tuesday, Facebook posts show  — Sunday attack forced JBS to shut down some IT systems  —  A cyberattack on JBS SA, the world's largest meat producer, has forced the shutdown …

Leon Black Accused of Defamation and Sexual Violence in Lawsuit  —  Spokesman for the former Apollo CEO calls lawsuit a ‘wholesale fiction’  —  A woman on Tuesday filed a lawsuit against Leon Black, the former chief executive of Apollo Global Management Inc., accusing him of defamation and alleging he raped and harassed her.

Covid Hope Over Fear  —  We look at the effects of the C.D.C.'s new mask guidance on Covid cases and vaccinations.  —  When the C.D.C. reversed its Covid-19 guidelines last month and said that vaccinated Americans rarely needed to wear masks, it caused both anxiety and uncertainty.

Trump's company puts D.C. hotel lease up for sale, again  —  The former president's company previously considered selling the lease to its luxury Washington hotel before covid struck  —  Former president Donald Trump's company has again hired a broker to sell the lease to its D.C. hotel …

The jobs report that could upend Biden's economic agenda  —  Businesses say they can't find enough workers to hire.  The pace of Americans moving off the unemployment rolls is slowing.  And a top Federal Reserve official is warning that job trends in May might look “odd.”

The Republican plot to steal the 2024 election  —  Republicans have spent nearly seven months making bogus charges of fraud in the 2020 election under the banner of “stop the steal.”  Now they have segued into a “start the steal” offensive to ensure that they will win the 2022 and 2024 elections …

National Enquirer Parent, Ex-CEO Fined for Breaking Election Law in 2016 Campaign  —  FEC cites hush payment to ex-Playboy model Karen McDougal, who said she had an affair with Donald Trump  —  The publisher of the National Enquirer agreed to pay $187,500 as part of a settlement …

Oh great, Ellie Kemper is yet another rich white celebrity with a racist past  —  You may have noticed Ellie Kemper was trending on Twitter.  She's not dead.  So she must've done something really amazing, right?  Wrong!  Turns out Kimmy Schmidt isn't as inoffensive as she seems.

To build a crowd for a pro-Trump rally, Nevada GOP consultant sought help from Proud Boys  —  Two days after the tumultuous 2020 election, as President Donald Trump railed that his victory had been stolen, a small group of men dressed in yellow-and-black Proud Boys shirts appeared with dozens …

Dems' dark-money bid aimed to paint Josh Hawley as an anti-gun lefty  —  A dark-money group aligned with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer helped pay for deceptive ads aimed at depressing Republican general election turnout in 2018, newly released records show.

‘SpongeBob’ and ‘Transformers’ Cost U.S. Taxpayers $4 Billion, Study Says  —  A new report details ViacomCBS's use of a labyrinthine tax shelter to sell rights to its shows and films overseas.  —  Dismissed by critics and devoured by fans, “Transformers: Age of Extinction” …

The Conservative Book World Doesn't Know What to Do With Biden  —  Neither authors nor publishing houses have figured out how to turn the new president into a compelling villain.  —  In the conservative book world, nothing is supposed to set off a gold rush like a new Democratic president.

Arizona wants to use Zyklon B to execute inmates on death row  —  Hydrogen cyanide gas, named by the Third Reich as Zyklon B, was used by the Nazis to kill over a million people in the Holocaust.  The state of Arizona now wants to use it in executions.  —  The state of Arizona is preparing …

Flynn's Coup Talk Is a Warning About the MAGA Violence Ahead  —  IT'S HAPPENING HERE … The collapse of American democracy that Sinclair Lewis wrote about nearly a century ago as a fictional cautionary tale is what retired general Mike Flynn is calling for now.

The Conservative Media Double-Standard  —  The same people who advocated for HCQ and complain about election fraud are outraged over the lab-leak miss.  —  9 hr ago  —  1. Humanitarian Disaster  —  I want to be very clear about this: America is doing great against COVID right now.