First Draft on Politics: Trump Wants to Ease Rules on Raids and Drone Strikes

The president’s national security advisers have advised relaxing certain Obama-era rules outside war zones. View in [Browser]( | Add nytdirect@nytimes.com to your address book. [The New York Times]( [The New York Times]( Friday, September 22, 2017 [NYTimes.com/Politics »]( [A proposal by the Trump administration would ease the way to expanding gray-zone acts of sporadic warfare beyond places like Yemen.]( A proposal by the Trump administration would ease the way to expanding gray-zone acts of sporadic warfare beyond places like Yemen. Yahya Arhab/European Pressphoto Agency Good Friday morning, Here are some of the stories making news in Washington and politics today: - The Trump administration is [preparing to dismantle key Obama-era limits on drone strikes]( and commando raids outside conventional battlefields, according to officials familiar with internal deliberations. - Facebook said that it was [submitting 3,000 Russia-linked ads]( to congressional committees investigating election interference. - The Justice Department is asking Skadden, a prominent New York-based firm, about a [report it prepared for Paul J. Manafort]( was used by allies of the Russian-backed former president of Ukraine. - Senator Luther Strange used every opportunity he had at a Republican candidate forum to [invoke his support from President Trump]( as he defended his seat against former state Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore — The First Draft Team HAVE A CONFIDENTIAL NEWS TIP? Do you have the next big story? Want to share it with The New York Times? We offer several ways to get in touch with and provide materials to our journalists. [Learn More »]( ADVERTISEMENT The New Washington Podcast [Senator Mitch McConnell]( The Senate majority leader has had a challenging few weeks. The Republican from Kentucky spoke to Carl Hulse about his complicated relationship with the president, why the Democrats didn’t strike as good of a spending deal as they let on and his non-reaction to Stephen K. Bannon’s attacks. [Trump’s Agenda]( We’ll keep you updated on the recent legislative action by the Trump White House. [• Sign up »]( TimesTalks D.C. | Thursday, Oct. 12 [The Press and Trump’s Washington]( Join The Times in Washington for a discussion of the political climate and the challenges of covering an administration that at times has put the media in its crosshairs. Featuring The Times’s executive editor, Dean Baquet, the White House correspondents Peter Baker and Maggie Haberman and the media columnist Jim Rutenberg. [• Buy Tickets »]( Public Health [The G.O.P. Bill Forces States to Build Health Systems From Scratch. That’s Hard.]( By MARGOT SANGER-KATZ [Mitt Romney, then the governor of Massachusetts, signing the state's landmark health care bill into law in 2006.]( Mitt Romney, then the governor of Massachusetts, signing the state's landmark health care bill into law in 2006. Elise Amendola/Associated Press In 2003, health care policy makers in Massachusetts agreed that the state should build a system to expand coverage to its uninsured residents. It took four years before Romneycare was fully up and running. In between, politicians had to think hard about how they wanted the system to work: how money would be raised and spent, what benefits would be offered, whether and how markets should be used to distribute coverage, whether people who didn’t buy coverage should be penalized. They had to build a computer system to help people check their eligibility and understand their options. They had to recruit insurers to participate. And they needed to find uninsured residents and persuade them to enroll. A new health care bill before the Senate would require all the states in the country to make a similar soup-to-nuts evaluation of how they’d like their health care systems to work, to build such a system and be ready to open their doors in substantially less time — just over two years. That may not be realistic. [Read more »](  [On Wednesday night, Jimmy Kimmel delivered a second monologue on Senator Bill Cassidy and plans to to change the health care law.]( Fact Check [Jimmy Kimmel Accused a Senator of Lying About His Health Care Bill. Who’s Right?]( By LINDA QIU AND DANIEL VICTOR Mr. Kimmel has emerged as a vocal critic of a bill co-sponsored by Senator Bill Cassidy. A review of statements Mr. Kimmel made Wednesday suggests he has a strong grasp of the measure. [Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, discussing the Graham-Cassidy bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act on Tuesday. The legislation is the most far-reaching repeal proposal yet.]( [Latest Obamacare Repeal Effort Is Most Far-Reaching]( By KATE ZERNIKE, REED ABELSON AND ABBY GOODNOUGH The Graham-Cassidy bill would turn federal funding for a law Republicans loathe into block grants to states, realizing a long-held goal of the party Right and Left: Partisan Writing You Shouldn’t Miss Read about how the other side thinks. We have collected political writing from around the web and across ideologies. From the Right [Daniel Larison]( in [The American Conservative]( “U.S. foreign policy already suffers from far too much self-congratulation and excessive confidence in our own righteousness, so it was alarming to hear Trump speak in such stark, fanatical terms about international affairs.” Articulating the views of the isolationist wing of conservatives, Mr. Larison criticizes Mr. Trump’s belligerent tone. He compares the president’s confrontational talk with President George W. Bush’s “axis of evil” remarks, and worries that Mr. Trump’s speech will commit the United States to more “avoidable wars.” This, according to Mr. Larison, has nothing to do with “putting American interests first.” [Read more »]( _____ From the Left [Spencer Ackerman]( in [The Daily Beast]( “Whatever nexus between Putin and Trump exists for Robert Mueller to discover, the evidence of their compatible visions of foreign affairs was on display at the United Nations clearer than ever, with Trump’s aggressive incantation of ‘sovereignty, security and prosperity’ as the path to world peace.” Not only was this speech a “worthy successor” to the president’s inaugural address — the “American carnage” speech — but it also resembles the United Nations address that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia gave to the international body in 2015. And though Mr. Trump briefly mentioned Russia’s aggression in Ukraine, his speech signals a potential opening to a “resurgent, aggressive Russia.” [Read more »]( _____ [More]( ADVERTISEMENT HOW ARE WE DOING? We’d love your feedback on this newsletter. Please email thoughts and suggestions to [washington-newsletter@nytimes.com](mailto:washington-newsletter@nytimes.com?subject=Newsletter%20Feedback). FOLLOW NYTimes [Facebook] [FACEBOOK]( [Twitter] [@NYTPolitics]( Get more [NYTimes.com newsletters »](  | Get unlimited access to NYTimes.com and our NYTimes apps for just $0.99. [Subscribe »]( ABOUT THIS EMAIL You received this message because you signed up for NYTimes.com's First Draft newsletter. [Unsubscribe]( | [Manage Subscriptions]( | [Change Your Email]( | [Privacy Policy]( | [Contact]( | [Advertise]( Copyright 2017 The New York Times Company 620 Eighth Avenue New York, NY 10018