State lawyers arguing against Biden vaccine mandates test positive for COVID-19  —  Two officials presenting arguments on Friday to the U.S. Supreme Court seeking to block vaccine mandates ordered by President Joe Biden's administration have tested positive for COVID-19 and will make their cases remotely, their offices said.

Eric Adams taps younger brother Bernard as a deputy police commissioner  —  Mayor Eric Adams has tapped his younger brother to serve as a deputy NYPD commissioner, The Post has learned.  —  Bernard Adams, a 56-year-old retired NYPD officer, will oversee governmental affairs, he confirmed Friday.

QAnon Star Who Said Only ‘Idiots’ Get Vax Dies of COVID  —  Cirsten Weldon told her fans not to get vaccinated and wanted Dr. Anthony Fauci executed.  She just died of COVID.  —  A leading QAnon promoter who urged both her followers and strangers she passed on the street …

Three men convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery sentenced to life in prison  —  The three white men convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery, a Black man, in Georgia were sentenced Friday to life in prison.  —  The sentences for Travis McMichael, who shot Arbery; and his father, Gregory McMichael, do not carry the possibility of parole.

Today's deep question: Will Twitter suspend Sotomayor for COVID misinformation?  —  A wise axiom warns us not to deduce Supreme Court decisions based on the questions asked by its justices during oral arguments.  Perhaps, however, we can deduce their relative wisdom and grasp of reality from the questions they pose.

Hospitals Are in Serious Trouble  —  When a health-care system crumbles, this is what it looks like.  Much of what's wrong happens invisibly.  At first, there's just a lot of waiting.  Emergency rooms get so full that “you'll wait hours and hours, and you may not be able to get surgery when you need it …

Five myths about the filibuster  —  Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has thrown down the gauntlet, saying he will move to change Senate rules by Jan. 17 if Republicans continue to block the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.

Was the Jan. 6 Attack on the Capitol an Act of ‘Terrorism’?  —  A sharp rebuke of Senator Ted Cruz by the Fox News host Tucker Carlson has heightened a legal and semantic debate over a charged term.  —  WASHINGTON — After a mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol last year …

Lani Guinier, civil rights champion and Harvard law professor, dies at 71  —  A leading voice for voting rights long before her nomination to lead the US Justice Department's Civil Rights Division made her nationally known, Lani Guinier died Friday.  —  Ms. Guinier, the Bennett Boskey professor …

Drudge hits ‘mute’ on Biden  —  Welcome to POLITICO's West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration.  With Allie Bice.  —  The Drudge Report made its name by making life hell for Democrats in the White House.  —  But over the past several months …

Blinken accuses Russia of ‘false narrative’ on Ukraine ahead of talks  —  U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday accused Russia of “gaslighting” and pushing a “false narrative” that it was under threat from Ukraine and NATO to justify a troop build-up near its border with the former Soviet republic.

Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson expected to run for reelection  —  Wisconsin Republican Senator Ron Johnson is expected to run for reelection and kick off his campaign next week, according to a source familiar with his decision.  —  For months, the incumbent Republican declined to say whether …

It's time for the press to take Tom Cotton seriously  —  Journalists would do themselves a huge favor if they stopped treating Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas as a right-wing nut job and consider the possibility that he is actually smarter and more reasonable than his critics say.

Harris' new communications director apologizes for tweets on ‘undocumented folks’  —  (CNN)Vice President Kamala Harris' newly announced communications director Jamal Simmons is apologizing for decade-old tweets on “undocumented folks” that resurfaced after news of his appointment.

Why I Soured on the Democrats  —  Until recently, I was a loyal, left-leaning Democrat, and I had been my entire adult life.  I was the kind of partisan who registered voters before midterm elections and went to protests.  I hated Donald Trump so much that I struggled to be civil to relatives on the other side of the aisle.

An 85-year-old man in India says he got 12 Covid vaccine shots, and still wants more.  —  There is vaccine hesitancy, but on the flip side, there is Brahmdeo Mandal.  —  Mr. Mandal is so excited about the healing promise of a jab that he says he has received 12 coronavirus vaccine doses — so far.

The rise of a pro-democracy media  —  America's news media is increasingly covering the growing radicalism of the Republican Party and its democracy-eroding behavior.  That's a welcome shift.  But it still isn't going far enough.  —  The media has long had a problematic “both sides” approach to covering politics.

Mom who took her child into Capitol during riot gets prison  —  A North Carolina woman who brought her 14-year-old son into the U.S. Capitol during last year's riot was sentenced Friday to three months imprisonment.  —  U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly said she finds it …

Tech Startup Wants To Gamify Suing People Using Crypto Tokens  —  The new company plans to let everyday Americans bet on civil lawsuits by buying and trading associated crypto tokens in “initial litigation offerings.”  —  MS  —  A new tech startup plans to become “the stock market of litigation financing” …

This is how the Republicans are whitewashing the J6 insurrection out of existence  —  And how the Big Lie became so easy to believe.  —  The president pinned blame on the former president Thursday for causing the J6 insurrection.  His speech was part of events marking the one-year anniversary …

Unvaxxed couple dies of COVID holding hands: ‘True definition of soulmates’  —  A husband and wife married four decades died “seconds” apart while holding hands.  —  William Stewart, 73, and wife Carol, 69, had been hospitalized with severe cases of COVID-19 — unmitigated by the fact …