How This Week’s Surprise Hearing Happened

An open seat in Colorado’s 5th Congressional District has led to open warfare within the state Republican Party. On one side of the GOP primary is Dave Williams, who was elected state party chair last year and now running for Congress. He claims the mantle of the bare-knuckle conservative fighter — and, in doing so, is leveraging the party’s resources to sling invectives at his opponent. On the other is his rival, Jeff Crank, a longtime radio host and vice president with the influential conservative advocacy group Americans for Prosperity, with a comparatively simple pitch: Let’s push the Republican cause forward, without turning the party against itself. Both men have run for the seat before, and both lost to retiring U.

Denver voters and elected officials haven’t been timid about setting higher standards for the services and oversight they expect their city to deliver. In mid-2022, the City Council set in motion the launch of a pay-as-you-through trash collection program that also promised expanded compost and recycling pickup. Then, in that fall’s election, voters directed the city to take responsibility for sidewalk repairs and construction citywide — while also passing a mandate that apartment buildings, offices, restaurants, construction sites and special events follow new recycling and composting requirements.

This story was originally published by Grist and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. With much of the southwest baking under record temperatures, immigrants’ rights advocates worry President Joe Biden’s decision to effectively close the border to asylum seekers for the foreseeable future will endanger lives and further marginalize climate-displaced people seeking refuge in the US. Their concerns come as a heat dome lingering over Mexico and the southwestern United States has obliterated temperature records from Phoenix to Sacramento.

GOP senators were a vision of spinelessness as they slobbered over the convicted felon who nearly got them killed on Jan. 6, 2021. The felon, however, looked and sounded quite diminished. He spoke to a gathering of reporters in what seemed to be a planned press conference. But after five minutes, the guy who seems like he can never get enough attention called it quits and refused to take questions. Trump pretends to be so brave he’s willing to face down a guillotine.

Above, Berlin perform, No More Words. We gotta keep beating this drum: The GOP is falling in line behind and enabling a convicted felon and adjudicated rapist who tried to overthrow the government in 2021. That’s the message. News Corpse presents the latest conspiracy theory. Max's Dad has a blue plate special. The Daily Blast Greg Sargent's podcast had Dahlia Lithwick as a guest.

Representative Tom Tiffany (MAGA-WI) sat down with CNN's Boris Sanchez for an interview when he tried to spew the Republican conspiracy theory that President Biden was involved in influence peddling with Ukraine. He was not prepared for Sanchez who had done his homework and had the receipts. Tiffany didn't know what hit him: SANCHEZ: And there's no evidence in any of the documents put out by the Oversight Committee that a single dollar went to President Biden when he was in office, therefore there's no evidence that he did anything illegal, that he abused his power, or that he abused his power in office to help his family members or friends get wealthy. TIFFANY: Joe Biden has a check in, in the amount of $40,000 that has his name on it, you got another $200,000 check that came from Jim and Sarah Biden to him.