New Federal Election Commission filings show President Donald Trump has already topped $100 million in fundraising for his 2020 reelection bid — an enormous haul for a president barely two years into his first term. No other president dating back to at least Ronald Reagan had raised any money at this point for his own campaign committee, according to the Campaign Finance Institute, a nonpartisan research group. Trump began fundraising shortly after his 2016 win. [WaPost]
Happy Tuesday.
Topping the news: U.S. House candidates Ben McAdams, a Democrat, and incumbent Rep. Mia Love, a Republican, squared off Monday night in a debate at Salt Lake Community College, where they addressed issues ranging from Social Security and Medicare to tax reform. [Trib] [ABC4] [APviaKUTV] [KUER] [DNews]
-> A poll conducted for the Salt Lake Tribune by the Hinckley Institute of Politics at the University of Utah revealed the race between McAdams and Love could not be tighter. Each has 46 percent support, while 8 percent of voters remain undecided. [Trib]
-> In the seven use-of-force investigations completed by Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill this year, three officers have invoked the right against self-incrimination and have declined to give the prosecutor a statement. The attorney who has represented those officers says, “This is a Sim Gill problem.” [Trib]
Tweets of the Day: From @zzsman_1005: “If I had one wish this holiday season it would be for Ben McAdams and Mia Love to get along and be friends.”
From @DannyCalidonia: “Donald Trump promised Elizabeth Warren $1M if she could prove her claim she is Native American. She took a DNA test which shows she is 1/1024th Native. So, Trump owes her $976.”
-> From @ryanbeckwith: “Under the Constitution, the House tweets. If the Senate retweets, it goes to the President, who favs it into law.”
Happy Birthday: To former Lt. Gov. Greg Bell.
In other news: The heated campaign between Utah’s House candidates is personal for McAdams and Love, whose families were good friends for a period of time before the relationship dissolved as campaigning began. Both have expressed disappointment with the tone the campaign has taken on. [DNews] [DNews]
-> U.S. Senate candidate Mitt Romney, a Republican and a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, said his parents, his faith, and religious, political and business leaders have helped shape his political philosophy. [DNews]
-> Romney’s opponent, Democrat Jenny Wilson, named her political influences as her father, who served as Salt Lake City mayor for nine years, and Bill Orton, the late three-term Democratic Utah congressman for whom Wilson worked as chief of staff. [DNews]
-> Utah has used roughly $75 million in federal funding for assisting needy and economically disadvantaged families, but an audit of the state’s Department of Workforce Services revealed that many programs selected for funding were chosen arbitrarily, without defined goals or a standard for evaluating success or failure. [Trib]
-> A scathing audit released by the Office of the Legislative Auditor General on Monday said the board that oversees tuition hikes at Utah colleges regularly approves them with little or no scrutiny and has never denied a request. [Trib] [DNews]
-> A professor of medicine and psychiatry at the Veterans Affairs Hospital in Salt Lake City who specializes in treating marijuana addiction said the affliction has become more common in states that have legalized the drug. He’s using his experience with the substance as an argument against voting for Proposition 2. [KUER]
-> Utah Gov. Gary Herbert has declared a drought emergency in Utah, which he said is “at, or near, historic levels” in some areas and is impacting, agriculture, recreation and wildlife, and worsening wildfire conditions and air quality. [Trib] [DNews]
-> A Utah toxicologist was promoted to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee, which advises the agency on national standards for air quality and pollutants. He says his focus will be to bring Utah’s air quality issues to light and help address issues like the winter inversion as soon as possible. [KUER]
-> The Utah Transit Authority introduced four new decorative trolley buses, which will run in Davis and Weber counties. [Trib]
-> Pat Bagley illustrates Trump with his BFFs from around the world. [Trib]
Nationally: Trump echoed the possibility Monday that “rogue killers” might have been responsible for the murder of a dissident Saudi journalist who Turkey reported dead and dismembered earlier this month. King Salman of Saudi Arabia has denied the country had any connection to the man’s death. [NYTimes] [BBC] [CNN] [WaPost]
-> U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Massachusetts, released the results of a DNA test indicating “strong evidence” of her Native American ancestry on Monday, after Trump said he would donate $1 million to her favorite charity if she proved her claimed ancestry. The move also signaled her strong intent to run for president in 2020. [NYTimes] [BostonGlobe] [Fox] [BBC]
-> In an interview with “60 Minutes,” Trump denied denying climate change, backing off his claim that it is a hoax. But he still cast doubt on whether humans were responsible for the earth’s rising temperatures. [NYTimes] [BBC] [CNN] [BostonGlobe]
-> The U.S. Treasury reported Monday that the federal budget deficit has swelled to $779 billion in the current 2018 fiscal year, driven in part by Trump’s tax cuts. This marks nearly a 17 percent increase per year, and the deficit will likely top $1 trillion by the next presidential election. [NYTimes] [WSJ]
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-- Taylor Stevens and Cara MacDonald
https://twitter.com/tstevensmedia and Twitter.com/carammacdonald