Health Spending Ticks Up, But Obamacare Proves It Can Be Controlled

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis’ first vetoes following this year’s legislative session included a bill aimed at fighting wage theft in the construction industry that he said “would not punish the real wrongdoers.” The bill sought to hold general contractors liable for wage theft committed by subcontractors. But Polis wrote in a veto letter that as passed, the measure would let subcontractors “off the hook” while penalizing good actors further up the project’s chain of command. In all, Polis nixed six bills.

CNN's Kara Scannell describes the dramatic moment in the Trump hush money trial where Judge Juan Merchan briefly cleared the courtroom after a tense exchange with Costello over his behavior on the stand.

This article is part of The D. C. Brief, TIME’s politics newsletter. Sign up here to get stories like this sent to your inbox. Alice Stewart represented a modern master class in how to hold sincere beliefs without surrender or skirmish. The Republican strategist respected the cynics and critics across the table enough to talk, not sneer.

The city of Denver announced Monday that it would pay $1,000 bonuses to qualifying young people who log at least 100 hours at a job this summer. The payments — available to Denverites ages 14 to 21 years old — are part of a broader effort Mayor Mike Johnston’s office is spearheading this summer to drive down rates of youth violence. “We are thinking about this as a multi-pronged approach to how we can engage young people into positive summer activities and how we can help prevent the risks of summer violence,” Johnston said during a morning news conference. The YouthWorks initiative will be funded through a $1 million state grant, according to city officials. City officials say the program is designed to provide payments to up to 1,000 youths in the city.

Spending like there is no tomorrow, because under Joe Biden, there is no tomorrow.

Whether he’s showing weakness to the International Criminal Court or bowing before the mullahs, we now see the Biden administration for what it really is.