From Texas Monthly: "What's Really Happening at the Border" -- an interview with Anne Chandler, "executive director of the Houston office of the nonprofit Tahirih Justice Center, which focuses on helping immigrant women and children, she has been traveling to the border and to detention centers, listening to the parents’ stories." What they do:

We run the Children’s Border Project, and we work with hundreds of kids that have been released from ORR (Office of Refugee Resettlement) care. We are not a legal service provider that does work when they’re in the shelters. To date, most of our work with that issue of family separation has been working with the parents in the days when they are being separated: when they’re in the federal courthouse being convicted; partnering with the federal public defenders; and then in the adult detention center, as they have no idea how to communicate or speak to their children or get them back before being deported.

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While third wife Judith insists Ruy is a "cheating liar" due to his relationship with Maria Ryan, which Rudy denies existed or occurred after their separation, Rudy is not deterred. In fact, Maria Ryan is so last week.

This week Rudy is pursuing yet another romance, with Jennifer LeBlanc, a Louisiana Republican fundraiser and former financial chair of Rudy's 2008 campaign. She is a widow, her husband died in a plane crash. At the time of her death, she and her husband were under criminal investigation. Neither were charged.

LeBlanc was the Louisiana finance chair for Giuliani's 2008 presidential campaign. She is a partner at LeBlanc & Associates, where she and her partner provide fundraising and consulting advice to clients in the state as well as to some prominent Louisiana officeholders in D.C.

...LeBlanc inherited substantial business assets after the death of her husband, Pat LeBlanc, a Lafayette, Louisiana businessman. He died in a plane crash at 53 while under investigation for an alleged bribery scandal for a Leblanc company that provided concessions services to Texas prisons. They proclaimed their innocence and were never charged. (my emphasis)

Rudy, who I would bet hasn't seen the inside of a state court in decades, last month entered his appearance in an auto insurance fraud case in Ft. Lauderdale where the defendant is Maria Ryan's daughter, who he said is his personal assistant.[More...]

I haven't seen any news yet today, so here's an open thread, all topics welcome.

Here's a tracing of the "Chinese Proverb" Ivanka used on Twitter.

The tweet said:

People Who Say It Cannot Be Done Should Not Interrupt Those Who Are Doing It

The NY Times reports China is confused by the tweet.

Andrew Giuliani, all grown up now, got a job at the White House. After Donald Trump and Pappa Rudy had dinner, Trump promised Andrew a promotion to Special Assistant to the Pr*esident. And then, bang, Gen, John Kelly took it away.

According to Axios, Kelly and others believe that Andrew "subverts the chain of command." Kelly stripped Andrew of his West Wing access about two weeks ago, Axios reported, leaving him with a "green pass." That means he cannot enter the West Wing without an escort.

Donald Trump's nepotism and employment of children with no skills in government is remarkable.

Meanwhile, Secret Service spent Tuesday night parked outside Kimberly Gilfoyle's apartment because Don Jr. spent the night there. (One mistake in the article: Guifoyle was never the District Attorney for San Francisco, which is an elected position. She was a deputy DA).

According to Vanity Fair, Michael Cohen is expecting to be arrested within days. Neither Cohen nor Trump filed objections to the Special Masters' Report as to which documents it agreed were protected by the attorney client privilege and should not be turned over to prosecutors. (No link due to autoplay video ad):

Trump allies view the legal cloud hanging over Trump’s former attorney and fixer, Michael Cohen, as at least as ominous as the obstruction investigation. According to a source close to Cohen, Cohen has told friends that he expects to be arrested any day now. (Reached for comment, Cohen wrote in a text message, “Your alleged source is wrong!”) The specter of Cohen flipping has Trump advisers on edge. “Trump should be super worried about Michael Cohen,” a former White House official said. “If anyone can blow up Trump, it’s him.”

Cohen responded that VF's source was wrong.

CNBC has this summary with additional sources and a copy of the Special Master's Report.

Three suicides by hanging in one week: First Kate Spade, then the sister of the Queen of Holland and now Anthony Bourdain.

I wasn't a frequent watcher of Bourdain's show, although I've seen several of them. He's someone you had to be in the mood for. I liked his shows on Asia. A few weeks ago I saw the episode of him eating with President Obama in Vietnam. But the episode that has stuck with me the most was one filmed in Miami a few years ago with a segment featuring Iggy Pop. Bourdain has explained he was an absolute fanboy of everything Iggy. Bourdain wrote at the time the show was about to air (in 2015):[More...]

I'm off to the jail in the mountains and won't be back until after dinner. It's a beautiful day for the drive though.

In the news, Argentina has charged Pablo Escobar's widow and son with money laundering. I tried to read the 57 page order in Spanish, but all I got was the investigation was started due to information received from our holy global warriors, the DEA, in conjunction with Colombia, who passed it on to Argentina. At first there wasn't enough evidence to charge them, but the court now believes there is. They will both remain free pending the outcome.

The charges seem to be that they invested money with a drug trafficker in Colombia named José Bayron Piedrahita Ceballos, who worked with the "Office of Evigago" and Cali Cartel who also managed investments in Colombia and Argentina. He was arrested last year and is awaiting extradition to the U.S. on bribery and obstruction of justice charges in the Southern District of Florida. The Indictment is here. (He allegedly bribed an ICE agent.) [More...]

Donald Trump has commuted the life sentence of Alice Marie Johnson, who came to his attention through Kim Kardashian, who learned of Johnson on Twitter.

As Kevin Drum writes at Mother Jones, while Johnson should have her sentence commuted, Trump is not due any praise for this.

Just in case anyone is tempted to praise Trump for this, please don’t. Sure, Johnson deserved to have her sentence commuted in some way, and I’m happy for her personally. But Trump has turned the pardon power into a cynical PR tool and this is just more of the same. The pardon power isn’t meant to be a lottery played out at the whim of a man-child in the White House who’s discovered a shiny new toy.

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Mexico has carried through with its threat to impose tariffs on some items the U.S. exports to Mexico.

With its presidential election 26 days away, Mexico’s government imposed a 20 percent tariff on U.S. pork, apples and potatoes and 20 to 25 percent tariffs on cheese and bourbon. Mexico tailored the list of retaliatory duties to hit states governed by senior Republicans, such as the bourbon produced in the home state of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.).

Donald Trump: The art of the deal, he is not. Not only is Mexico not paying for his wall, now U.S. manufacturers of these goods will suffer. According to Quartz, Trump's steel tariffs will cost Americans 400,000 jobs.

Here is an NPR article from 2015, How NAFTA changed American (and Mexican) Food Forever, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture's May 31, 2018 quarterly report, Outlook for U.S. Agricultural Trade.

Donald Trump today blamed Jeff Sessions (yet again) for the Russia "witch hunt, writing on his Twitter account:

The Russian Witch Hunt Hoax continues, all because Jeff Sessions didn’t tell me he was going to recuse himself...I would have quickly picked someone else. So much time and money wasted, so many lives ruined...and Sessions knew better than most that there was No Collusion!

Trump is becoming predictable in his attempts to steer the headlines away from the alleged ongoing malfeasance of so many people connected to him. Paul Manafort is now accused of witness tampering while on bail for which the government is seeking to modify or revoke his release order. A hearing will be held next week. [More...]

We haven't had an open thread in a while. Here's a new one, all topics welcome.