Nightly Brief

Your Wednesday night briefing from the staff of Courthouse News

Top CNS stories for today including President Donald Trump availing himself of Twitter to unload on Michael Cohen for saying that he made hush payments ahead of the 2016 election to clamp down on Trump’s sex scandals; the D.C. Circuit holds the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has failed for years to issue and enforce adequate rules for the storage of toxic coal ash; in the latest chapter of California’s ceaseless war to manage shrinking water sources, regulators are considering drastic changes that would reduce the amount of snowmelt available to San Francisco and farmers during dry years; the newly tapped director of ICE’s Boston field office faces grueling questions from a federal judge; the Pew research Center reports a majority of Americans believe it’s good that more women than ever before are running for Congress this year; a federal judge orders a four-year prison sentence Wednesday for  Jose Maria Marin, the former boss of Brazilian soccer who went to trial and lost in the U.S. government’s crackdown on FIFA corruption, and more.

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National

1.) Implicated by his erstwhile personal attorney in campaign-finance violations, President Donald Trump availed himself of Twitter Wednesday to unload on Michael Cohen for saying that he made hush payments ahead of the 2016 election to clamp down on Trump’s sex scandals.

2.) In another defeat for President Trump’s pro-fossil fuels agenda, the D.C. Circuit on Tuesday found the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has failed for years to issue and enforce adequate rules for the storage of toxic coal ash.

3.) Attorneys for former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort on Wednesday asked a federal judge to seal a portion of the transcript in his bank and tax fraud trial, as Washington grapples with the fallout of Manafort’s conviction and the guilty plea of former Trump attorney Michael Cohen.

Regional

5.) In the latest chapter of California’s ceaseless war to manage shrinking water sources, regulators are considering drastic changes that would reduce the amount of snowmelt available to San Francisco and farmers during dry years.

6.) Testifying as part of a three-day hearing on claims that Immigration and Customs Enforcement targets the spouses of U.S. citizens for deportation, the newly tapped director of ICE’s Boston field office faced grueling questions Tuesday from a federal judge.

7.) One witness in to his federal bribery trial, the former mayor of Reading, Pennsylvania, looked nervous — bringing a bottle of water to his lips with a hand that shook visibly — as his attorneys began to cross-examine the city’s purchasing department coordinator.

8.)  As the Permian Basin region in Texas and New Mexico continues to experience a historic oil boom, a new study has found that water usage for hydraulic fracturing has increased nearly ninefold in the semi-arid region over a five-year period.

9.) The majority of Americans believe it’s good that more women than ever before are running for Congress this year, although there’s no consensus on whether the government would actually do a better job of dealing with the country’s problems if there were more women in office, the Pew Research Center reported Wednesday.

10.) As the affordable housing crisis continues to grip residents across California, a new study found that most low-income seniors in the state shoulder insurmountable housing costs.

International

11.) At the height of the Abbasid empire in the mid-ninth century, the palace city of Samarra was lavishly decorated with glass. Colorful tesserae, purple millefiori, and small perfectly translucent shapes adorned the walls, meant to inspire a sense of wonder and awe and perhaps even remind visitors of Solomon’s crystal palace.

12.) A federal judge ordered a four-year prison sentence Wednesday for  Jose Maria Marin, the former boss of Brazilian soccer who went to trial and lost in the U.S. government’s crackdown on FIFA corruption.

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