In other news, McClatchy reports that the investigation of Trump and his campaign now includes a possible cover-up. Senators were reportedly briefed on this.
Meanwhile, Goldman Sachs executive Jim Donovan has dropped out as a nominee for deputy treasury secretary. Donovan says he wants to spend more time with his family, which I assume is code for not wanting to touch the Trump shitfest with a 10-foot pole.
Finally, the FBI reportedly warned Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) that the Russians were trying to recruit him. This is funny to me because I'm pretty sure Rohrabacher wants to be recruited. This is a guy who has openly fantasized about Putin's muscles.
There was a metric ton of news this week that I didn't get to, mostly because Trump is a bottomless shit fountain, so here's a lot more stories on my radar:
Conspiracy theory kingpin Alex Jones is very sorry for saying yogurt maker Chobani hires immigrants who rape children and spread tuberculosis. Everyone who has the means should take Jones to court.
Volkswagen is under fire by the National Labor Relations Board for allegedly punishing workers who voted to unionize in West Virginia.
A federal investigation of Princeton University's admissions process found that the school sometimes passed on students of color because they weren't stereotypical enough.
Documents obtained by BuzzFeed News show Princeton’s admissions officers repeatedly wrote of Asian applicants as being difficult to differentiate, referring to them dismissively as having “very familiar profiles,” calling them “standard premeds,” or “difficult to pluck out.” The comments were noted by civil rights investigators at the Education Department as they probed allegations of racial bias in the school’s admissions system.
Of a Hispanic applicant, an admissions officer wrote, “Tough to see putting her ahead of others. No cultural flavor in app.” Of a black student, another said, “Very few African Americans with verbal scores like this.”
The NAACP is expected to dismiss its current president as it reorganizes to fight Trump's agenda.
The Texas Tribune has a story on how state Agricultural Secretary Sid Miller decided safety regulations for the use of poison to control feral hog populations were impractical so he simply wouldn't warn people about the danger.
Hunnicutt, 58, operates a hog hunting business on 3,000 acres — he owns 600 and leases another 2,400 — in Northeast Texas. He regularly sends the meat of the pigs they kill home with his clients.
When he couldn’t find answers online, he called the agriculture department to get more information. To his surprise, he got a return call from Commissioner Sid Miller, who assured Hunnicutt the poison would be safe to humans and other wildlife and directed him to his Facebook page for more information on the poison that’s marketed under the name Kaput.
When Hunnicutt found the product’s label, he was so alarmed he called his state representative.
“That label didn’t look anything like what the man [Miller] told me on the phone — I thought, 'My god, that can’t be right — people can’t eat this,' ” he said. “How in the world can you put something in the human food chain that can kill somebody, to kill an animal that people eat?” [...]
In the March 3 meeting set up by VanDeaver’s office, which was recorded with Miller’s permission, the commissioner responded to some of Hunnicutt’s safety concerns by saying that his agency could change the poison’s federally approved label to eliminate an important warning — as well as a requirement to bury the carcasses of poisoned hogs, which Miller said simply wasn’t “doable.”
In the recording, which Hunnicutt provided to The Texas Tribune, Hunnicutt says: “That product label right there says ‘all animals’ ... every one of them has to be recovered and put 18 inches under the ground. How you going to do that? ... How you going to find all of them, Mr. Miller?”
“I guess we should take that off the label, it’s not doable,” Miller says. “We’ll take it off.”
Politico Magazine has a story on the "widening blast radius" of the Fox News scandal which isn't going anywhere even though Roger Ailes is dead. Federal investigators are now looking at people outside the network who conspired with Roger Ailes.
The Associated Press reported this morning that Trump's attorneys did not want him to sign a letter certifying that his financial disclosure was accurate. Now why wouldn't they want that?
Trump's approval rating has dropped to its lowest point yet in the latest Reuters/IPSOS poll.
Foreign Policy reports that Israeli intelligence officials were literally shouting at their American counterparts over Trump's intelligence leak.
Last but certainly not least, TIME Magazine has a major cover story on Russian interference that goes way beyond the 2016 election. The report details Russia's use of paid sockpuppets, malware, viruses, algorithms and bots that influence public opinion. The really worrying thing is I don't believe Republicans in Congress care about this at all. They certainly aren't treating it as seriously as they should.
Have a good weekend.