Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is considered a potential candidate for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, dodged questions on Monday about whether Mike Pence had the authority to stop certification of Electoral College votes on January 6.

The issue has become a major point of contention between Donald Trump and his ex-vice president, who has refused to go along with Mr Trump’s push to cancel the 2020 election.

When pressed on the issue at a press conference on Monday, DeSantis quickly changed the subject and claimed he had a “great working relationship” with the former president, according to NBC News.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki was repeatedly asked on Monday whether Dr. Eric Lander’s conduct and the White House’s decision not to fire him undermined Joe Biden’s promise to fire anyone. appointed by the administration who would not treat her colleagues with respect.

After Dr Lander apologized for conduct described by an internal White House investigation as demeaning and disrespectful to his colleagues, it was a major issue addressed by reporters at Monday’s press conference.

Ms Psaki defended the White House’s decision and claimed that Dr Lander would be forced to comply with measures taken to ensure his treatment of colleagues was up to standard in the future, and claimed that Mr Biden was always “perfectly clear” about his expectations of the staff.

She was hammered by reporters on why Mr. Biden broke his promise to fire people; Ms Psaki has repeatedly asserted that the White House has taken steps to address the issue and avoided the question of whether employees should take Mr Biden at his word in the future.

Rep. Jamie Raskin, who serves on the Jan. 6 panel, said Sunday he hopes the panel will hold public hearings on the Capitol riot starting in April.

He said the committee will need time until then to work through the various delays that former officials and other figures close to former President Donald Trump are putting lawmakers through in an attempt to avoid their public testimony or private.

“But we’re determined to get to those hearings quickly in the spring, hopefully in April, certainly no later than May,” Raskin said on MSNBC.

“We’ve had overwhelming cooperation from witnesses, but there are still more than a dozen people in Trump’s immediate inner circle dragging sandbags and feet with the committee,” the committee member said. Congress, adding that those delays contributed to “a few weeks.” of time.

Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump’s 2016 opponent, weighed in on Twitter amid news that the former president had documents at his Mar-a-Lago property that should have been returned by law to the National Archives.

Referring to the attacks she faced in 2016 over her own document management scandal, she shared a link to an online store page for a mug in her image and the phrase “But her emails”. , a phrase used by his followers in the years that followed to mock coverage of his own wrongdoing.

“Take a sip from your new mug while you read the news,” Clinton tweeted.

David Perdue, the ex-senator who is running against the Republican governor of Georgia in the state’s primary, is focusing his fire for now on the woman who could be his opponent in the general election.

The hill reported that Mr. Perdue’s campaign has ended with a new ad that slams Stacey Abrams, a Democratic activist and former state lawmaker, for appearing without a mask in a photo taken inside a classroom where she is seen surrounded by masked students.

The ad apparently serves two purposes: hitting Ms. Abrams for disobeying the rule and hitting the governor for bringing in a mask mandate in the first place. Such anti-Covid measures are unpopular among Republican voters.

That’s what Georgia Stacey Abrams wants,” the ad reads, adding, “That’s the reality Brian Kemp has allowed.”

The White House Chief Correspondent for The New York Times pointed out the hypocrisy of the revelation that President Donald Trump was in possession of documents at Mar-a-Lago that should have been returned to the National Archives, including some that he attempted to physically destroy.

Peter Baker noted that Mr Trump was elected amid a scandal exploited by his campaign in which it was discovered that his opponent Hillary Clinton had conducted official State Department business on an unsupervised private email server by federal employees as required by law.

Rep. Adam Kinzinger, an Illinois congressman serving on the select committee investigating Jan. 6, issued some of his most vocal criticism yet of former President Donald Trump on Monday, ridiculing the GOP leader as unable to take criticism or ridicule.

In an interview with CNN New day, Mr Kinzinger called the former president a “charlatan” and “a man with a more fragile ego than anyone I have ever met”.

“The irony of it all is that he walks around like a badass, but he’s the most offended, hurt and saddened person than anyone I know,” the congressman said.

The Independents Andrew Feinberg has the full story:

A coffee table book chronicling Mr. Trump’s tenure would have brought in millions of dollars in sales.

The book, featuring photos of his entire presidency and captions allegedly written by Mr. Trump himself, flew off the shelves, according to CNN.

It starts at a hefty $75, but thousands of fans would have shelled out $230 for a signed copy.

The Independents Andrew Naughtie reports:

While many experts say it’s highly likely that Mr. Trump violated the Presidential Records Act with his handling of White House documents, they say the odds of him facing repercussions are low.

Charles Tiefer, a former House of Representatives attorney, said The Washington Post there is a “high bar” for bringing such cases, which require proof of “deliberate and unlawful intent” to violate the law.

“You can’t sue for just tearing up papers,” he said. “We should show [Trump] being very selective and having evidence that he wanted to behave illegally.

If such an intention is found, the penalty can be up to three years in prison.

However, former aides to the president say they don’t believe the intention was there.

“I don’t think he did this with malicious intent to avoid complying with the Presidential Records Act,” a former official told Reuters. To post. “Since he’s been in business he’s been very transactional and that was probably his long-time practice and I don’t think his ways changed when he got to the White House.”

A man charged with the Jan. 6 Capitol riots has asked Trump to testify in his defense, saying such testimony would prove he acted on orders from the former president.

Dustin Thompson’s attorney made the extraordinary request in a Feb. 4 court filing, saying the testimony will help establish that Mr. Trump “and his conspirators engaged in a concerted effort to mislead the public, including [Mr Thompson]to believe that American democracy was at stake if Congress were allowed to certify election results.

The Independents Alex Woodward has more: