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Week In The News: Mueller Indictments, GOP Tax Plan, Social Media Scrutiny

New York terror attack. Mueller’s first charges and a guilty plea. GOP tax plan. Social media giants grilled by Congress. Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

This show will air Friday at 10 a.m. EST. 

An attack in New York this week, and a Republican tax cut that the GOP wants to hustle through by Christmas.  Who gets the goodies and who carries the debt, now up for what is sure to be a hot debate.  From the Mueller investigation, indictments and a guilty plea.  The Trump campaign manager charged with “conspiracy against the United States.”  We’ve got rigging charges against the DNC, NPR in the harassment parade.  This hour, On Point:  Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines. —Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Catherine Rampell, columnist for the Washington Post. (@crampell)

Josh Gerstein, reporter for Politico covering the White House and Department of Justice. (@joshgerstein)

Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst.

From Tom’s Reading List:

Washington Post: This Tax Reform Thing Won’t Be As Easy As Republicans Think — “Despite all that trickle-down propaganda, about three-quarters of Americans — and more than half of Republicans — believe that wealthy households and big corporations pay too little in taxes, according to a September Associated Press-NORC poll . Maybe they won’t storm town halls the way they did over threats to Obamacare, but they’re unlikely to be supportive.”

Politico: Manafort Defense Blasts Indictment As Based On ‘Tenuous Legal Theory’ — “Lawyers for former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort argued Thursday that the case against him is based on dubious legal theories and that there is no need for him to post millions of dollars in collateral to ensure he will appear for trial.”

Gizmodo: Tech Giants Testify Before Congress On Russian Election Meddling — “The companies—all of which were initially slow to acknowledge their role in the information war that took root as early as 2015—have as of this month confirmed the existence of an extensive misinformation campaign launched via social media to influence American voters. Tuesday’s hearing focused largely on how much the tech companies knew and how much they have since learned of foreign operations aimed at meddling with the 2016 elections—both through paid political ads and organic posts now believed to have reached a considerable portion of the American population.”

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wis., smiles during a news conference announcing GOP tax legislation.
 (Jacquelyn Martin/AP)
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House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wis., smiles during a news conference announcing GOP tax legislation. (Jacquelyn Martin/AP)

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