Today’s edition of quick hits.
* Biden at the United Nations General Assembly: “President Joe Biden urged world leaders not to abandon Ukraine in its grinding war with Russia, warning that Russia is pinning its hopes on other nations growing “weary” of the fight.”
* In related news: “Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy appeared somber and, at times, angry in a blistering address to the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday, as he sought to shore up support for his country’s war effort and demand that Russia be punished for the invasion.”
* Do you ever getting the feeling the chamber is getting worse? “House Republicans are considering making deeper spending cuts in their proposed stopgap funding bill to win support from conservative detractors whose votes are critical to the measure’s passage. The House had been scheduled to vote Tuesday afternoon on a rule to take up the bill, but GOP leaders postponed that vote after members acknowledged they wouldn’t have enough support to get the continuing resolution on the floor in its current form.”
* An update on a story I mentioned the other day: “The White House team that President Joe Biden said Friday he was ‘dispatching’ to Detroit to help resolve the auto workers’ strike will no longer travel there this week, a White House official told NBC News.”
* This should, but won’t, give Republican conspiracy theorists pause: “Ray Epps, a Jan. 6 participant whose removal from the FBI’s Capitol Violence webpage sparked conspiracy theories that he was a federal informant, was charged in connection with the Capitol attack on Tuesday.”
* A serious allegation: “Canada is investigating possible links between the Indian government and the assassination of a Canadian citizen in Canada who was an activist on behalf of an independent Sikh homeland in India, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Monday.”
* The review from Brett McGurk, the National Security Council’s coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, on the Iran hostage deal was informative and clarifying.
* There’s been plenty of news surrounding Rudy Giuliani lately, and none of it’s good: “Former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani was sued Monday by his onetime lawyers in a lawsuit that says he owes $1.36 million in unpaid legal fees.”
* Good move from the IRS: “The Internal Revenue Service is overhauling how it scrutinizes the tax returns of lower-income Americans as part of an effort to reduce enforcement disparities that have made Black taxpayers far more likely than anyone else to be audited.”
* What would destroy the Platform Formerly Known As Twitter once and for all? This ought to do it: “Elon Musk discussed his plans for Twitter, now called X, on Monday during a livestreamed conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Among other things, Musk said the social network is ‘moving to having a small monthly payment for use of the X system’ in order to combat ‘vast armies of bots.’”
See you tomorrow.
