Daily Digest: Trump picks Kavanaugh
Good morning, and happy Tuesday. Here's the Digest.
1. Kavanaugh is Supreme Court pick. President Donald Trump chose Brett Kavanaugh, a solidly conservative, politically connected judge, for the Supreme Court, setting up a ferocious confirmation battle with Democrats as he seeks to shift the nation’s highest court ever further to the right. A favorite of the Republican legal establishment in Washington, Kavanaugh, 53, is a former law clerk for retiring Justice Anthony Kennedy. Like Trump’s first nominee last year, Justice Neil Gorsuch, Kavanaugh would be a young addition who could help remake the court for decades to come with rulings that could restrict abortion, expand gun rights and roll back key parts of Obamacare. With Kavanaugh, Trump is replacing a swing vote on the nine-member court with a staunch conservative. Kavanaugh, who serves on the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, is expected to be less receptive to abortion and gay rights than Kennedy was. He also has taken an expansive view of executive power and has favored limits on investigating the president. (AP)
2. Family members of man shot by police say they won't talk to investigators. Community activists and family members of a man killed by Minneapolis police said Monday he wasn't a threat when he was shot and called on the officers involved to face criminal charges. Thurman Blevins, 31, was shot in the late afternoon on June 23 in an alley in north Minneapolis, after police responded to 911 calls about a man with a gun in the area shooting into the ground and in the air. The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, which is investigating the shooting, said Blevins was armed and running from police officers who fatally shot him a short time later. The BCA said in a written statement that its agents found a black and silver handgun at the scene of the shooting. On Monday, though, family members and activists said they have no interest in talking to the BCA and said in a statement that "the only thing that will satisfy us is justice." "I feel like my brother was murdered. I feel like that should have been the headline on the news," Blevins' sister Darlynn Blevins told reporters. "I feel like the police violate our lives out here." (MPR News)
3. Ryan campaigns for Paulsen and Lewis. U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan appeared Monday with two Republican lawmakers in tough races, touting the nation’s strong economy and plugging initiatives the GOP hopes get more attention in a fall campaign expected to revolve around President Donald Trump. Ryan, of neighboring Wisconsin, bounced from event to event with Minnesota Reps. Erik Paulsen and Jason Lewis, whose suburban seats are high on Democratic target lists this fall. The Ryan-Paulsen appearance at the Best Buy headquarters was closed, although protesters gathered nearby. Ryan also toured a trucking company with Lewis and later held a business roundtable at a Burnsville construction firm. About 20 minutes of the roundtable was open to reporters. At it, Ryan and Lewis discussed the need to make vocational education more attractive for youth about to leave high school, arguing that manufacturers face a shortage of technical workers. “We have to go pull people off the sidelines into the workforce. What we’re trying to do is come up with every incentive we can think of to get people into the workforce and make two year school cool again,” Ryan said. (MPR News)
4. St. Paul leaders pledge changes to police dog unit. St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter and police chief Todd Axtell vowed to make "significant changes" to the police department's K-9 unit following an incident Friday where a citizen was bitten by a police dog as officers responded to a weapons call. The unit will also undergo an external audit examining its policy, practices and training, the two city leaders said in a statement Monday. Police say a dog slipped out of its collar and bit a bystander officers encountered while responding to a gun call early Friday morning. "The man was not involved in the incident but had been directed by officers to lie on the ground as they searched for the suspect, who had fled," according to the mayor's office. "As the canine officer approached the scene to search for the suspect, his dog's collar broke and the dog ran to and bit the man on his forearm." Carter called it "very disturbing, especially viewed in the context of other events that have occurred over the past two years." (MPR News)
5. Former city council member, mayoral candidate and talk show host Barbara Carlson dies. In a career that boldly swerved from real estate to Minneapolis city politics to the bombast of talk radio, the self-described “broad” often said or acted on whatever came into her head. In the end, the return of lung cancer she thought she’d beaten four years ago finally did what political opponents and the people she skewered on her radio show never could: Silence “Babs.” Carlson, 80, died Monday, surrounded by loving family and friends. “Right before she died, we were all piled on her bed and she said, ‘I wasn’t a great mother. But, damn, I was a fun mother,’ ” Carlson’s daughter, Anne, said Monday afternoon. (Star Tribune)
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