Saturday’s Headlines: Trump’s words add fuel to questions about legality of firing Comey

Democracy Dies in Darkness

The morning’s most important stories, selected by Post editors

Top Stories

Trump’s words add fuel to questions about legality of firing Comey

In a television interview and on Twitter, the president in the past two days has given ammunition to arguments by some legal experts that his actions constitute a possible case of obstruction of justice — a central charge in the impeachment proceedings against two presidents in the last 43 years.

By Karen Tumulty • Read more »

Trump has a long history of secretly recording calls, according to former associates

For some who have had regular dealings with Donald Trump through the years, there was something viscerally real about the threat implied by the president’s tweet warning the former FBI director about possible “tapes” of their conversations.

By Marc Fisher • Read more »

Acting FBI director, Sen. Cornyn among 4 to be interviewed for top FBI job

The administration is interviewing four people Saturday for the job, according to people familiar with the matter: Andrew McCabe; John Cornyn, a Republican representing Texas; Alice Fisher, a white-collar defense lawyer who previously led the department’s criminal division; and Michael J. Garcia, a judge on the New York State Court of Appeals.

By Matt Zapotosky and Ed O’Keefe • Read more »

Massive shipments of non-organic food are sent to the U.S. — and labeled ‘organic’

Fooling regulators is all too easy, critics say. The Post uncovered shipments of millions of pounds of corn or soybeans — enough to constitute a meaningful proportion of the U.S. supply — that were presented as organic despite evidence to the contrary.

By Peter Whoriskey • Read more »

Malware described in leaked NSA files cripples systems worldwide

Malicious software that blocks access to computers spread swiftly across the world, snarling critical systems in hospitals, telecommunications, corporate offices and beyond. The Russian Interior Ministry said that it, too, was under assault.

By Craig Timberg, Griff Witte and Ellen Nakashima • Read more »

Opinions

Trump’s top aides must go

By John Podesta • Read more »

Former attorney general: Trump made the right call on Comey

By William Barr • Read more »

A theory: Trump fired Comey because he’s taller

By Kathleen Parker • Read more »

The left’s misguided obsession with ‘cultural appropriation’

By George F. Will • Read more »

Protests against removing Confederate monuments are not really about history

By Christine Emba • Read more »

What we know Trump did this week — and why it matters

By Editorial Board • Read more »

More News

In service to Trump, Pence keeps saying things that aren’t true

Vice President Mike Pence has been unflagging in his loyalty and deference to President Trump. But the White House has repeatedly set Pence up to be the public face of official narratives that turn out to be misleading or false.

By Abby Phillip • Read more »

U.S. to stop seizing tax refunds to pay off old family debt

After three years of complaints and pressure from taxpayers, the federal government will stop seizing the tax refunds of Americans whose long-dead parents had incurred debts to Social Security many years earlier. About 65,000 people will be eligible for a total of about $56 million in refunds.

By Marc Fisher • Read more »

Travel groups, airlines brace for possible expansion of laptop ban to all flights from Europe

Officials have briefed U.S. airlines on aviation security threats and a possible extension of the ban to routes affecting more than 400 daily flights.

By Luz Lazo • Read more »

L.A. touts plan for cheaper Olympics

Rather than using glitz and glamour as the biggest selling point, the Los Angeles bid for the 2024 Summer Games has tried to impress Olympic officials with a plan based on fiscal restraint and the use of existing venues and infrastructure.

By Rick Maese • Read more »

Uber’s problems grow as judge requests federal investigation in trade secret case

A judge requested a probe of whether Uber Technologies and one of its executives colluded to steal key technology from Google’s self-driving car project, now known as Waymo, before the executive joined Uber last year.

By Elizabeth Dwoskin • Read more »

Ex-congresswoman guilty of soliciting scholarship donations for ‘slush fund’

Florida jurors convicted Corrine Brown, a Democrat in the House for more than 20 years, for her role in a scheme that used a foundation to get more than $800,000 in donations that were then used mostly for her own interests.

By Lindsey Bever • Read more »

Out of prison, coal exec says he was unfairly blamed for deadly accident

Massey Energy’s unrepentant former chief executive Don Blankenship took to Twitter and cable television to lash out about who is responsible for a 2010 accident that killed 29 miners in West Virginia.

By Steven Mufson • Read more »