In our latest edition, we have an interview with Mark Cuban on Kamala Harris, crypto, and Lina Khan, a scoop on a Democratic Senator’s questionable op-ed, a story on how Eric Adams’s impact on the House, an op-ed from Rep. Anthony D’Esposito about public safety, and much more!
By: Matthew Foldi
Billionaire Mark Cuban has emerged as an unrelenting supporter of Vice President Kamala Harris in recent weeks. But don’t count on Cuban, who told the Washington Reporter that he talks with Harris’s team “almost every day,” to join a future Harris administration.
“I say hell no to any government job,” he told the Reporter in a wide-ranging interview. “I can have more of an impact with Cost Plus Drugs,” he said, referencing one of his latest innovations that has revolutionized the health care industry.
Cuban believes that Harris is “best for the country,” but has also taken up positions that put him at odds with others in the Democratic Party. Cuban opposes progressive Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) and thinks that it is “time to move on” from Federal Trade Commission (FTC) chairwoman Lina Khan, a darling of the left.
“I am concerned that her quick trigger to break up tech companies could hurt our global competitiveness in AI,” he said of Khan. Cuban’s opposition to Khan has sparked backlash from far-left lawmakers such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.), who said on Twitter that “Anyone goes near Lina Khan and there will be an out and out brawl [sic]. And that is a promise.”
Click HERE to read more of what Mark Cuban thinks about the 2024 election
Should Lina Khan stay if Kamala is elected president?
Matthew Foldi
Editor-in-Chief of the Washington Reporter
I think it’s time to move on. I am concerned that her quick trigger to break up tech companies could hurt our global competitiveness in AI.
Mark Cuban
Businessman and Kamala Harris campaign advisor
How proactive do you find Kamala Harris in seeking your advice?
Matthew Foldi
Editor-in-Chief of the Washington Reporter
I text or talk with her team almost every day.
Mark Cuban
Businessman and Kamala Harris campaign advisor
What we’re hearing from people we trust on and around the Hill – please send us more tips!
By: Matthew Foldi
A Senate Democrat wrote an op-ed praising a “historic” clean energy merger, without disclosing that parties on both sides of the merger bankrolled him for years.
Sen. Martin Heinrich (D., N.M.) wrote in the Santa Fe New Mexican in 2021 that he “hope[s] they [the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission] will vote to approve [the] merger” between Avangrid and PNM Resources.
“This merger will accelerate our decarbonization, directly and financially benefit PNM customers, create new jobs in New Mexico and grow our economy,” Heinrich wrote.
Heinrich has in the past accepted tens of thousands of dollars from employees and PACs of both Avangrid and PNM Resources. Prior to publishing his op-ed, Heinrich received thousands of dollars from the Avangrid Political Action Committee, which is still donating to the Senator since his failed advocacy for the merger, according to campaign finance records. Last year, employees of Avangrid gave Heinrich over $13,000 on a single day, according to campaign finance records.
Click HERE to read more about how there was much more to a Senate Democrat’s op-ed than initially met the eye.
By: Matthew Foldi
Since Lina Khan was sworn in as Chairwoman of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in June, 2021, she has received criticism from Republicans, the business community, and even moderate Democrats like Mark Cuban — who told the Washington Reporter in an exclusive interview that it is time for Democrats to “move on” from Khan.
For decades, American antitrust law has centered around the “consumer welfare standard,” which holds that mergers harming consumers warrant regulatory action, while deals that have no impact or benefit consumers — through lower prices or increased innovation — are not targets for antitrust law.
Khan’s critics have argued that she has upended this standard, leading the FTC to oppose nearly every merger and deal, regardless of its merits. Khan opposed — and lost — Microsoft’s purchase of Activision. Khan targeted Twitter after Musk purchased the site, resulting in an investigation from the House Weaponization Committee into Khan’s conduct.
But in the past two weeks, Khan’s actions have attracted more ire from both Republicans and Democrats, including Cuban, a close Kamala Harris ally.
Click HERE to read more about how FTC Chairwoman Lina Khan is causing Democrats major problems on and off the Hill.
By: Matthew Foldi
New York City Mayor Eric Adams is polling at only a 9 percent approval rating across a panoply of Empire State swing districts, compared with a 64 percent disapproval rating, weeks after federal authorities charged him with selling his influence to foreign nationals. Even before Adams’s indictment, polling conducted by the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) found that Adams did not break 30 percent approval in any competitive House race in New York.
Across all battleground districts in New York, Adams’s average approval rating had been 24 percent, compared with 52 percent disapproval. Given the primacy that New York is poised to have in the battle for the House majority, these numbers could spell doom for Democrats — if Republicans succeed in tying Adams to down ticket candidates.
Both Democratic incumbents and challengers are tied to the mayor to varying degrees, and Republicans have taken every opportunity possible to remind voters of Adams’s deep connections to other New York Democrats.
Rep. Claudia Tenney (R., N.Y.) put it simply to the Washington Reporter: “The Democrats suck,” she said. “I cannot believe how phony and manipulative they are.”
Click HERE to read more about how Mayor Eric Adams could drag Democrats in New York down, and help keep the House in Republican hands.
By: Matthew Foldi
The New York Times published a “deceptive” story suggesting that a top Republican House candidate posed with a family he implied is his own for a campaign photo — which is entirely false; the report in the Times has also led to harassment of the military family in question, the Washington Reporter can confirm.
The story focuses primarily on how Republicans use their spouses to “soften their image[s].” One of the photos used by the Times is actually a screenshot from a campaign video of supporters posted by Republican Derrick Anderson, a standard practice of any political campaign in America.
Click HERE to read more about one of the worst hit pieces we’ve seen this cycle.
By: Matthew Foldi
A leading Latino group has committed to spending big on a pair of two House Republicans facing uphill battles this November.
Reps. Bryan Steil (R., Wis.) and Dan Newhouse (R., Wash.) scored the backing of the LIBRE Initiative Action, which will support phone calls and digital ads for Steil as well as digital ads for Newhouse; the endorsements were first reported by the Washington Reporter.
LIBRE Initiative Action touted Steil’s work partnering “with families and business owners throughout every part of his district over the years, working with business owners to decrease burdensome regulations and lower taxes.”
Click HERE to read more about LIBRE Initiative Action’s latest 2024 moves.
By: Anthony D’Esposito
For over 14 years, I was a member of the New York City Police Department (NYPD). It was the honor of a lifetime to serve my neighbors. During my time at the NYPD, I worked to safeguard the streets of the city’s most violent neighborhoods where I made close to 700 arrests, most for felonies, including murder, assault, gang activity, and illegal firearms. Upon retirement, I had reached the rank of Detective — and I could not be more proud of that.
Early on in my career, I was sitting in my police car with the windows rolled up because it was a hot night in July, and a senior cop knocked on my window. He told me to roll down my windows and to always keep them rolled down. He made the great point that it was imperative to keep the windows down at all times in order to be able to better see, hear, and smell what was going on and how it was affecting the people I swore to protect and serve.
The philosophy I have held my entire career since then has been to “keep my windows down,” to ensure I am hearing and seeing everything so that I can better serve those who have entrusted me, and it is a philosophy that I have taken with me to Congress.
Click HERE to read more from Rep. Anthony D’Esposito about how he’s taken his lessons from over a decade in the NYPD to the halls of Congress.
By: Michael Chamberlain
If somebody ever gets around to writing a tell-all history of The National Institute of Health (NIH) and National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) in the COVID years, it’ll be a real page-turner. It has everything: smoking guns, a “FOIA lady who hates FOIA,” EcoHealth Alliance emails, Anthony “The Science” Fauci, and more.
There’s already more than enough material for that tome — and more coming every day. House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic issued a subpoena for the “FOIA lady” to come chat with them. But we need background. Our story so far:
Dr. David Morens was a top aide to Dr. Anthony Fauci at NIH and NIAID. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Morens was obsessed with secrecy — rather an odd preoccupation for a public health bureaucrat. But obsession doesn’t always translate to facility, and the Subcommittee possesses — and has published — a trove of Morens’s emails, despite his telling colleagues in February 2021 that he learned from the NIH and NIAID’s “foia lady” how to “make emails disappear after [he was] foia’d [sic] but before the search starts.” The “foia lady” was “an old friend, Marg [Margaret] Moore, who heads our FOIA office and also hates FOIAs.” “FOIA lady” is referenced multiple times in the 155 pages of emails the Subcommittee published.
Click HERE to read more from Protect the Public’s Trust’s Michael Chamberlain about the sordid saga from NIH and NIAID during the coronavirus pandemic and its aftermath.
