POLITICO Playbook: Is Kevin McCarthy toast?  —  DRIVING THE DAY  —  For years now, through controversy after controversy, House Minority Leader KEVIN MCCARTHY has bent over backward to stay in former President DONALD TRUMP's good graces, all to serve one major purpose: He wants to be speaker someday.

Trump says he threatened not to defend NATO against Russia  —  Former president Donald Trump on Thursday offered his most explicit statement to date that he threatened not to defend NATO allies from attacks by Russia.  —  Appearing at an event held by the Heritage Foundation in Florida …

End of Reedy Creek: Disney won't pay more taxes, but you will  —  ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — One of the biggest myths circulating on the internet is that the end of Reedy Creek will finally force Disney to pay its fair share of taxes, boosting the economies of Florida and the counties its resorts are located in.

Jan. 6 revelations will ‘blow the roof off the House,’ Rep. Jamie Raskin says  —  WASHINGTON — Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., suggested that the House Jan. 6 committee's upcoming hearings will be dramatic and include explosive revelations that the panel has been piecing together behind the scenes for months.

Mark Meadows was simultaneously registered to vote in three states  —  “I don't want my vote or anyone else's to be disenfranchised. ...  Do you realize how inaccurate the voter rolls are, with people just moving around? ...  Anytime you move, you'll change your driver's license …

Biden White House stands behind Title 42 decision amid party revolt  —  Facing a growing rebellion from within the Democratic Party, the White House is standing behind its decision to end on May 23 a Trump-era deportation policy for migrants encountered at the southern border.

‘We Build the Wall’ leaders who worked with Bannon plead guilty to fraud  —  “We Build the Wall” campaign crowd-funders Brian Kolfage and Andrew Badolato pleaded guilty Thursday for their roles in pocketing donations solicited to help build a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico.

The Marjorie Taylor Greene Insurrection Hearing LIVE!  —  Donate to MeidasTouch: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/ meidastouchBuy MeidasTouch Merch: https://store.meidastouch.comFollow MeidasTouch on Twitter: https:...

The battle for Donbas: Why the weapons the US is rushing to Ukraine are so critical  —  Russia hopes to surround and destroy Ukrainian forces in Donbas, officials say.  —  As Russia's military gears up for what it hopes will be a decisive victory over Ukraine in the eastern part of the country …

A Look Inside the Textbooks That Florida Rejected  —  The state rejected dozens of math textbooks.  The New York Times reviewed 21 of them to figure out why.  — Give this article- - - Read in app  —  After the Florida Department of Education rejected dozens of math textbooks last week, the big question was, Why?

How Disney found itself in the middle of a culture war  —  Ron DeSantis's political theater isn't about changing the company — it's about clout.  —  Disney doesn't like conflict.  —  Conflict means taking sides.  Conflict means making enemies.  Conflict means personally defining what's right and what's wrong.

Our Failed COVID Response  —  If, God forbid, we face another pandemic, we cannot use our COVID strategy as the baseline.  —  A February headline in the Washington Post read, “Mask Mandates didn't make much difference anyway.”  A month later, the New York Times gave us this: “Do Covid restrictions work?

Democrats, You Can't Ignore the Culture Wars Any Longer  —  Almost 60 years ago, the historian Richard Hofstadter described what he saw as the true goal of McCarthyism.  “The real function of the Great Inquisition of the 1950's was not anything so simply rational as to turn up spies or prevent espionage …

Sham Elections and Shameless Lies  —  The crowd that casts doubt on American votes but loves Russian referenda.  —  Every day, we learn more about politicians who conspired to overturn the 2020 U.S. presidential election.  Meanwhile, in Ukraine, Russia is planning phony referenda to fabricate a mandate for its occupation.

How much has Earth Day cost us?  —  Rachel Carson died before the first Earth Day in 1970, but her book Silent Spring is widely acknowledged to have inspired the modern environmental movement that pushed for its creation.  Carson did not actually call for an end to all use of the pesticide DDT …

Biden Job Approval Stuck in Low 40s  — Average approval rating essentially unchanged from fourth quarter  — All prior elected presidents except Trump had higher fifth quarter averages  — Presidents' approval ratings usually decline in their second year

Ukraine Can Win … Over the past weeks, Moscow's war on Ukraine has taken a turn.  After failing to seize Kyiv, Russian forces pulled back to Belarus and Russia, leaving behind a trail of civilian casualties, and regrouped in Ukraine's east with the aim of making additional gains in the Donbas.

‘You only win if you fight’: Will Gallego unseat Sinema?  —  This week Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza is in Arizona to dig into a few big plotlines ahead of this year's elections.  Trump narrowly lost the state in 2020, Senator Mark Kelly — the Democratic incumbent — is one of the most vulnerable senators …

Community Input Is Bad, Actually  —  Development projects in the United States are subject to a process I like to call “whoever yells the loudest and longest wins.”  Some refer to this as participatory democracy.  —  Across the country, angry residents and neighborhood associations have the power to delay …

Mariupol: Satellite images suggest mass graves dug near besieged city  —  A US satellite firm says it has identified a mass burial site containing about 200 graves near Mariupol, a city Russian forces have been trying to wrest control of for weeks.  —  Maxar said its images showed an expansion of graves that began at the end of March.