Trump's last full day

In a city that resembles a fortress, bedecked with thousands of flags that will stand in for people at an inauguration during a global pandemic, outgoing president Donald Trump is having a rough day. While the last full day for a sitting president is often filled with bittersweet reflections and public accolades from colleagues, Trump fittingly lost one of his staunchest allies in Congress. Ahead of an impeachment trial, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell accused Trump from the Senate floor of provoking the violent crowd that stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. "The mob was fed lies. They were provoked by the president and other powerful people," McConnell said, in an apparent preview of what Trump can expect at his trial. —The Hill

• — Impeachment trial likely next week. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is expected to send the article of impeachment against Trump to the Senate later this week, triggering formal proceedings the next day and opening arguments on the Senate floor the following week. The timing of formal transmission from the House to the Senate is critical, as the Constitution dictates that the trial begins at 1 p.m. the following day. —ABC News
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• — Trouble in Georgia. Trump faces a post-presidency impeachment trial and potential criminal proceedings in New York. And now, prosecutors in Georgia appear increasingly likely to open a criminal investigation of him over his attempts to overturn the results of the state's 2020 election, an inquiry into offenses that would be beyond his federal pardon power. —The New York Times
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• — Here come the pardons. Most presidents exercise their clemency power during their last week in office, and Trump is no different. He is preparing to issue about 100 pardons and commutations today, including to white-collar criminals, high-profile rappers, and others championed by criminal justice reform groups. He is not expected to pardon himself or his family members. Stay tuned. —CNN
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• — The swamp to the bitter end. Trump allies are raking in tens of thousands of dollars from wealthy felons to push the White House for clemency. Pardons and commutations are intended to show mercy to deserving recipients, but Trump has used many of them to reward personal or political allies. The unusually brisk market reflects the access peddling that has defined Trump's presidency. —CNN
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• — Trump loyalist to be installed at NSA. The National Security Agency is moving forward with hiring attorney Michael Ellis after acting Defense Sec. Christopher Miller ordered that he be made the spy agency's top lawyer. Ellis' allies pushed for him to be installed before President-elect Joe Biden's inauguration, as it will be difficult to fire him under Civil Service rules. —The New York Times
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• — Another exit. Steven Dillingham, the director of the Census Bureau, will step down from his post tomorrow. Democratic lawmakers pushed for the move since the Commerce Department's inspector general released a memo last week alleging that he was pressuring bureau employees to rush a technical data report on the number of unauthorized immigrants in the country. —Politico

Rubin: The media must change

"The next challenge is not new, but it becomes more acute in a universe of crazed Trump supporters. The media must resist the fetish for moral equivalence that makes politics seem like merely a matter of policy preference. We know politics today is about something far more basic: Do you accept reality? Evenhandedness puts the deluded on the same level with the sensible." —Jennifer Rubin in The Washington Post

Jennifer Rubin is an attorney and political opinion columnist at The Washington Post.

MORE: Stunning poll: Trump leaves office with lowest average approval in Gallup's entire history, lower than Nixon —Mediaite

Hoping for the best, bracing for the worst

Joe Biden will be inaugurated tomorrow as the nation's 46th president. Washington, D.C., and statehouses around the country are preparing for potential violence, as extremist groups have threatened additional attacks in the wake of the storming of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. Twelve National Guard members have been removed from the security mission for the inauguration as they have been identified as having ties to fringe right-wing groups or have posted extremist views online. To date, no active plots against Biden have been found. —Associated Press

• — First conspiracy charge. As security experts, law enforcement officers, and government officials warn of the continued rise of extremism—and the lack of resources to counter it—another significant arrest in the Capitol siege has been made. Prosecutors have levied a conspiracy charge against a leader in the paramilitary right-wing group The Oath Keepers, alleging the Virginia man was involved in "planning and coordinating" the breach of the Capitol earlier this month. —CNN
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• — FBI foils Russian plot. Federal authorities have arrested a Pennsylvania woman who was wanted for her role in the Capitol uprising. Authorities say Riley June Williams allegedly stole a laptop from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office. Police say she may have "intended to sell the computer device to a friend in Russia, who then planned to sell the device to SVR, Russia's foreign intelligence service." Investigators are probing any additional ties between the insurrectionists and foreign governments. —CBS News
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• — "She's not on the home team." Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen said yesterday that he and a fellow lawmaker personally saw freshman Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert guiding a group of people through the Cannon House Office Building tunnel in the days leading up to the insurrection. "Now whether these people were people that were involved in the insurrection or not, I do not know," Cohen said. —CBS News

MORE: What Parler saw during the attack on the Capitol —ProPublica

Tiffany: The rise and fall of Parler

"Ultimately, what led to Parler's rise is what destroyed it. Parler launched in September 2018, but it attracted mainstream attention only after the 2020 election, when it entered the spotlight as the de facto home of the #StopTheSteal movement, a co-mingling of QAnon conspiracy theorists, MAGA diehards, and Republican elected officials. By December, COO Jeffrey Wernick told me the site had 11 million registered users, roughly doubling its user base in just a few weeks. By the time the site went down a month later, it reportedly had 15 million users. In just more than two years, Parler went from a small, spammy Twitter clone to the site that helped foment an insurrection. Leading up to the riot, discussions of civil war and firing squads were common, and sometimes named specific targets for violence." —Kaitlyn Tiffany in The Atlantic

Kaitlyn Tiffany is a staff writer at The Atlantic, where she covers technology.

MORE: Parler website partially returns with support from Russian-owned technology firm —The Guardian

Griffiths: Uganda to authoritarians: Controlling the Internet works

"[Ugandan President Yoweri] Museveni's growing grip over the internet, both technological and through new laws against 'cyber harassment' or 'offensive communication,' has enabled his government to limit the effect of the internet as a platform for organizing against him. As the former revolutionary begins his sixth term in office, other wannabe authoritarian leaders, facing their own online dissenters, will be taking note." —James Griffiths on CNN

James Griffiths is a senior producer for CNN International and author of "The Great Firewall of China: How to Build and Control an Alternative Version of the Internet."

MORE: Ugandan opposition party says it will challenge election result; two dead in protests —Reuters

'His fight is in Russia'

Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny was detained by Russian police on Sunday upon his return from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from an assassination attempt perpetrated by the Kremlin. Russia's most prominent critic of President Vladimir Putin, Navalny was tried yesterday for probation violations at a local police precinct outside Moscow, where the judge placed him under arrest for 30 days pending his next trial scheduled for Jan. 29. Navalny knew what awaited him on his return, but "the question 'to return or not' never stood before me," he said. —TIME

MORE: Biden national security advisor calls for Russia to immediately release detained Putin critic —CNBC

Sasse: A time for choosing for the GOP

"The violence that Americans witnessed—and that might recur in the coming days—is not a protest gone awry or the work of 'a few bad apples.' It is the blossoming of a rotten seed that took root in the Republican Party some time ago and has been nourished by treachery, poor political judgment, and cowardice. When Trump leaves office, my party faces a choice: We can dedicate ourselves to defending the Constitution and perpetuating our best American institutions and traditions, or we can be a party of conspiracy theories, cable-news fantasies, and the ruin that comes with them. We can be the party of Eisenhower, or the party of the conspiracist Alex Jones. We can applaud Officer Goodman or side with the mob he outwitted. We cannot do both." —Ben Sasse in The Atlantic

Ben Sasse represents Nebraska in the U.S. Senate.

MORE: 7 in 10 say U.S. democracy is threatened: survey —The Hill

I find it beyond fascinating, and that's being polite, that the people who are calling for unity are the same people who aim to divide the nation as they have done so for years. It is like the abuser who, when exposed, blames the abused. The abuser who shows no remorse for their actions but rather wants the abused to look the other way once again. Yet it follows their principle of not being responsible for their own words and actions and empowered when never held accountable.

I may be wrong here, but it seems that part of our criminal justice system, and just plain decent humanity, involves the perpetrator showing some remorse, some humility, to make restitution in some cases in order to receive some sort of leniency or forgiveness. They can ask for forgiveness, and some do, yet to demand it is beyond the pale. I just can't wrap my head around the people, as we now see in the GOP, who are calling for the people they have attacked for years (rhetorically, verbally, and even physically) to look the other way now, when they may finally be held accountable, and then to bow to them as they do so. —John A., Arizona

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