Trump declares himself 'chief law enforcement officer' as he issues numerous pardons

President Trump on Tuesday exercised his pardon power, granting clemency to or commuting the sentences of nearly a dozen people convicted of crimes, including former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich and junk bond pioneer Michael Milken. Trump also referred to himself as the nation's “chief law enforcement officer,” a title typically reserved for the attorney general. On Tuesday morning, the White House announced Trump's pardoning of former San Francisco 49ers owner Edward DeBartolo Jr. for his involvement in a 1998 corruption case against former Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards.

• 
  Ex-Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich's sentence commuted by President Donald Trump

  KABC – Los Angeles
• 
  Trump refuses to rule out commuting Roger Stone sentence amid string of controversial pardons

  The Independent

Lawyer: Assange was offered US pardon if he cleared Russia

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange plans to claim during an extradition hearing that the Trump administration offered him a pardon if he agreed to say Russia was not involved in leaking Democratic National Committee emails during the 2016 U.S. election campaign, a lawyer for Assange said Wednesday. Assange is being held at a British prison while fighting extradition to the United States on spying charges. At a preliminary hearing held Wednesday in London, lawyer Edward Fitzgerald said that now-former Republican congressman, Dana Rohrabacher, visited Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in August 2017.

• 
  Julian Assange: 4 things to know about the WikiLeaks founder

  USA TODAY
• 
  Future of journalism 'at stake' over Assange: WikiLeaks chief

  Reuters Videos

Netanyahu's trial to begin on March 17: Israeli Justice Ministry

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's corruption trial will start on March 17, two weeks after Israel holds its third national election in less than a year, the Justice Ministry said on Tuesday. Netanyahu, the first sitting Israeli prime minister to be charged with a crime, has denied any wrongdoing in the three corruption cases against him. In addition to his legal battle, Netanyahu, who heads the right-wing Likud party, is fighting for his political life in a March 2 election, after inconclusive ballots in April and September.

• 
  Netanyahu Corruption Trial to Begin March 17, Soon After Voting

  Bloomberg
• 
  Netanyahu trial clouds last days of Israel election campaign

  Associated Press

Coronavirus updates: Quarantine ends on cruise ship as death toll passes 2,000

Almost 450 passengers allowed to leave quarantined cruise ship in Japan • U.S. evacuee from cruise ship confirmed to have virus • American passenger still on cruise ship unclear happens next • 2,004 dead, more than 74,100 confirmed cases in mainland China • Second coronavirus death recorded in Hong Kong • China announces measures to cut costs for business affected by outbreak • Adidas, Puma warn of coronavirus hit to China business Iran reports 2 coronavirus deaths Two Iranians have died in hospital after testing positive for the new coronavirus in the holy Shi'ite city of Qom, the head of the city's University of Medical Sciences told Mehr news agency on Wednesday.

• 
  Americans arrive home from virus-infected cruise ship

  AFP
• 
  'I smell a rat here': British couple quarantined on cruise ship claim their coronavirus diagnosis 'might not be true'

  Yahoo News UK

Bernie Sanders splits from AOC and says Medicare for All is 'already a compromise'

Stephen Maturen/Getty Images Sanders split with AOC at a CNN town hall on Tuesday night, saying his signature Medicare for All plan was already a compromise. AOC said last week that passing a softer version of the plan would still be a significant progressive achievement. "But my view is that Medicare for All, the bill that we wrote, is in a sense already a compromise.

• 
  Bernie Sanders and Mike Bloomberg are both 78. And both, it turns out, have had heart operations.

  The Week
• 
  Trevor Noah: Bernie Sanders rubs his hair with a balloon

  USA TODAY

ICE says it plans to destroy a trove of detention records, including numbers on detainee deaths and sexual assaults

Customs & Border Protection Agency/Reuters The National Archives and Records Administration approved ICE's request to destroy years of detention records last year. The records included in the trove contain information related to deaths of detainees and allegations of sexual assault and abuse of detainees in December. On Tuesday, the ACLU filed Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to retrieve the documents before they are erased.

Andrew Yang is headed to CNN

Andrew Yang's presidential bid failed, but it did land him a gig with CNN. The entrepreneur who made a run at the Oval Office before dropping out last week after a poor showing at the New Hampshire primary will be joining the network as a political analyst. He's doing so just in time for Wednesday night's Democratic debate in Las Vegas, as the remaining candidates take the stage before the Nevada caucuses Saturday.

• 
  CNN Hires Former Presidential Candidate Andrew Yang as Political Commentator

  The Wrap
• 
  Andrew Yang Joins CNN As Political Commentator, Will Provide Analysis Of Wednesday’s Democratic Debate

  Deadline

Hunter Biden Served on Board of Trade Group That Lobbied Obama Admin for Increased Ukraine Aid: Report

Hunter Biden, son of former vice president Joe Biden, was on the board of a trade group that lobbied the Obama administration for increased U.S. aid to Ukraine, according to a report Tuesday. From 2012 through 2018, the younger Biden served as a director for the Center for U.S. Global Leadership and was connected as well with its affiliate, the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition, The Daily Caller reported. The two groups, which include about 400 larger corporations and non-government organizations, lobbied for increased spending abroad by the State Department's International Affairs Budget, including a special focus on Ukraine.

Abbott says top Malaysian leaders suspected pilot of MH370

Former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has said the “top levels” of the Malaysian government long suspected that the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 almost six years ago was a mass murder-suicide by the pilot. Australia, working on Malaysia's behalf, coordinated what became the largest search in aviation history, but it failed to find the plane before being ended in 2017. Speaking in a Sky News documentary to air on Wednesday and Thursday, Abbott said high-ranking Malaysian officials believed veteran pilot Zaharie Ahmad Shah deliberately downed the jet.

Secession in the Pacific Northwest? Some Oregon residents petition to join Idaho

Frustrated by liberal policies, some Oregon residents petitioned to leave the state – by moving the border with Idaho westward. The movement secured initial approval from two counties and aims to get enough signatures to put the proposal on ballots in November, according to the group called Greater Idaho. If the group succeeds, voters in southeast Oregon may see a question on whether their county should become part of Idaho by redrawing the border.

Group of more than 1,000 judges calls emergency meeting amid Trump concerns

A national association of federal judges has called an emergency meeting to address growing concerns about the intervention of Donald Trump and justice department officials in politically sensitive cases, according to US media reports. Cynthia Rufe, a Philadelphia US district judge who heads the independent Federal Judges Association, which has more than 1,100 members, told USA Today the group “could not wait” until its spring conference to discuss the matter. The meeting comes after more than 2,000 former US justice department officials, including some of the top government lawyers in the country, called on the attorney general, William Barr, to resign in the wake of the Roger Stone scandal.

• 
  Trump discusses Roger Stone case ahead of west coast trip

  Yahoo News Video
• 
  Stone sentencing to go ahead amid pardon speculation

  Reuters

Neighbor Found Dead in Home Abducted, ‘Asphyxiated’ 6-Year-Old Faye Swetlik: Police

Evidence shows that 6-year-old Faye Swetlik was strangled to death by her neighbor within hours of being abducted from her front yard in South Carolina last week, authorities revealed Tuesday. Police said Coty Scott Taylor, a 30-year-old neighbor who killed himself inside his home last week, was the “sole perpetrator” behind Swetlik's tragic slaying on Feb. 10. Taylor was found dead in his South Carolina home on Feb. 13, which is about 100 to 150 feet away from the Swetlik residence, just minutes after the first-grader's body was discovered in a nearby wooded area after an exhaustive three-day search around their Churchill Heights neighborhood.

• 
  Faye Marie Swetlik abducted, killed by South Carolina neighbor, officials say after autopsy

  USA TODAY
• 
  WATCH LIVE: Faye Swetlik case details, info on Cayce neighbor, to be released

  WPVI – Philadelphia

Coronavirus may be detectable before symptoms start

Tests can detect the new coronavirus in people before they show symptoms, though it's still unclear whether a person can spread it to others at this point, while they are asymptomatic, a study published Tuesday says. The new report in the New England Journal of Medicine looked at 126 people from Germany who were quarantined after being evacuated from Hubei province, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in China. "We discovered that shedding of potentially infectious virus may occur in persons who have no fever and no signs or only minor signs of infection," the authors wrote.

• 
  Hubei is sweeping the province for undetected coronavirus cases by tracking and investigating purchases of fever and cough medicine

  Business Insider
• China's Hubei province reports 132 new coronavirus deaths on Feb 18

  Reuters

9 Rural Farms of the 21st Century Featuring Stunning Modern Design

From Italy to Tasmania, a new book covers those farms with an eye on both sustainability and beautiful design Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest

Malaysia never ruled out 'murder-suicide plot' by MH370 pilot, says former PM Najib

Malaysia has never ruled out the possibility that missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 could have been downed by a suicidal pilot, the country's former prime minister Najib Razak said on Wednesday. Najib, who was premier when MH370 vanished with 239 people on board nearly six years ago, was responding to remarks by former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott that Malaysian leaders had considered from the outset that flight captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah may have committed mass murder. "My very clear understanding from the very top levels of the Malaysian government is that from very, very early on here, they thought it was a murder-suicide by the pilot," Abbott said in a clip from a Sky News documentary on the tragedy airing Wednesday.

• 
  Malaysian leaders suspected pilot in MH370 disappearance, says ex-Australian PM

  PA Media: World News
• 
  Malaysia suspected MH370 downed in murder-suicide: Aussie ex-PM

  AFP

Report: Obama reportedly expects he'll have to play a 'prominent role' in uniting Democrats this summer

The New York Magazine reports former president Barack Obama's radio silence on the 2020 Democratic primary is part of a "choreographed strategy" on the part of Obama, who is "increasingly sure he will need to play a prominent role in bringing the party back together and calming its tensions later this summer."

China kicked out 3 Wall Street Journal reporters after it published an op-ed using a term that invokes the biggest humiliation in Chinese history

Reuters/Pool China is expelling three Wall Street Journal reporters, accusing the newspaper of publishing a racist headline about the country's battle with coronavirus. On February 3, the Journal had published an op-ed by a foreign-affairs academic titled "China Is the Real Sick Man of Asia." The "sick man of Asia" is a 19th-century term that referred to a time when China was internally divided and exploited by foreign powers — a period that still deeply humiliates the country's leadership.

• 
  China revokes 3 Wall Street Journal reporters' credentials

  Associated Press
• 
  Beijing expels three WSJ journalists over opinion piece calling China ‘real sick man of Asia’

  The Independent

Leaked data shows China's Uighurs detained due to religion

When a Chinese government mass detention campaign engulfed Memtimin Emer's native Xinjiang region three years ago, the elderly Uighur imam was swept up and locked away, along with three of his sons. The database profiles the internment of 311 individuals with relatives abroad in Karakax County, and lists information on more than 2,000 of their relatives, neighbors and friends. Taken as a whole, the database offers the fullest view yet into how Chinese officials decided who to put into and let out of detention camps, as part of a crackdown that has locked away more than a million ethnic minorities, most of them Muslims.

Democrats Still Haven’t Come to Terms with 2016

In an otherwise excellent Politico article advising Democrats how to avoid the fate of 2012 presidential candidate Mitt Romney, former Obama staffer Dan Pfeiffer offers his team some self-soothing revisionism regarding the 2016 election: When all is said and done, the 2016 election might end up being a black-swan event. The combination of Russian interference, Comey intervention and multiple third-party candidates make that election a hard one to extract guidance from. Guess what?

Michael Bloomberg is not the candidate who can beat Donald Trump

Take it from someone who lived under Bloomberg, who served with him, who fought against him — if you look behind the curtain, as I hope millions will in tonight's debate, that image begins to melt away. Mayor Bloomberg's policies created an affordable housing and homelessness crisis in New York City that has extended and exacerbated far beyond his tenure, creating a city that is the most expensive it has ever been.

• 
  Mike Bloomberg takes 2nd place in new Democratic primary poll, qualifies for Wednesday's debate

  The Week
• 
  Bloomberg campaign responds to attacks from rivals ahead of Nevada debate

  CBS News Videos

How Jewish American pedophiles hide from justice in Israel

Now another alleged Israeli victim has come forward, saying he began abusing her when she was 5-years-old, and continued for years. Karow has successfully evaded authorities by moving between communities in Israel for almost two decades, and he is not alone. A CBS News investigation has found that many accused American pedophiles flee to Israel, and bringing them to justice can be difficult.

U.S. Coronavirus Cases Nearly Double With No End in Sight

Confirmed cases of the new, deadly coronavirus in the United States almost doubled over the holiday weekend thanks to the messy evacuation of Americans from a cruise ship in Japan, while fresh numbers from China suggested the disease might be deadlier than first believed. The U.S. government evacuated 328 American passengers from Tokyo early Monday on two chartered cargo jets, leaving dozens others behind who preferred to stay on the Diamond Princess cruise ship—despite a strong disembarkation recommendation from the federal government. All travelers from Japan were screened before boarding the aircraft “to prevent symptomatic travelers from departing Japan,” according to the CDC.

• 
  Coronavirus updates: Americans quarantined on cruise ship return to U.S

  NBC News
• 
  The cruise industry has been rocked by the coronavirus. Here's you how can find out if your ship has been impacted.

  Business Insider

Russia Hates This: Why the Astute-Class Submarine Is the Pride of the Royal Navy

Key Point: London's Astute class submarines are powerful and very well-built. Since the commissioning of HMS Dreadnought in 1963, the Royal Navy has maintained a formidable force of nuclear attack submarines. The latest nuclear attack subs, the Astute class, have become a critical component of the future of the Royal Navy—but, given Russia's resurgence, are they enough?

• 
  The U.S. Navy's Submarine Force Is Shrinking Fast (And Trump Just Made It Worse)

  The National Interest
• 
  Why It Is Past Time for the Navy to Bring Back Diesel Submarines

  The National Interest

Putin sacks prominent Kremlin ideologue, Ukraine hardliner

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday dismissed a veteran, once close adviser who until recently managed Moscow's relations with war-torn Ukraine. Putin fired Vladislav Surkov, seen as a hardliner by many in Kiev, in a terse two-line statement on the Kremlin website. The decree was issued a week after the Kremlin said a senior Ukrainian-born Russian official, Dmitry Kozak, was now in charge of managing Moscow's relations with Ukraine, effectively sidelining Surkov.

What happened to winter? And where's the polar vortex?

If you're wondering what happened to winter, you're not alone. The first two months of winter – December and January – were the warmest on record across the U.S., the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says. In fact, dozens of cities east of the Mississippi River were reporting one of their warmest winters to date from Dec. 1 through Feb. 17, according to the Southeast Regional Climate Center.