* During the presidential campaign, rather than try to bridge the divide between the police and BlackLivesMatter, Trump took sides and promised to further empower the police. In response, the Fraternal Order of Police endorsed him. Now they’re not so happy with his Attorney General.

Leaders of the largest police union in the United States have warned President Donald Trump that he could endanger public safety if he follows through with cuts in federal grants to immigrant “sanctuary cities,” the union’s director told Reuters after a White House meeting.

In a move that concerned the Fraternal Order of Police, one of Trump’s biggest supporters in the 2016 election campaign, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions said on Monday that the Justice Department would restrict grants to jurisdictions that do not cooperate with federal immigration authorities…

The Justice Department plans to restrict sanctuary cities from using grants from the department’s Office of Justice Programs and Community Oriented Policing Services, both of which send grant money to local and state police departments.

Pasco said the union does not support the policies of sanctuary cities, but its executives are concerned that cuts in funding could hurt police departments in those areas.

* All I can say about this graph is, “Wow!”

* As a result, you can literally smell the desperation.

With President Donald Trump trying to find his footing after his failed effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act, a group of wealthy backers is launching a 10-state media blitz to pressure Democratic senators to support him — or at least think twice about piling on.

Making America Great, a nonprofit run by Rebekah Mercer, one of Trump’s most influential donors, will begin airing $1 million in television ads on Wednesday, coupled with a $300,000 digital advertising campaign. The TV ads will run in the District of Columbia, along with ten states Trump carried in the presidential election where a Democratic senator is up for re-election in 2018: West Virginia, Wisconsin, Missouri, Michigan, North Dakota, Florida, Ohio, Indiana, Montana and Pennsylvania. The digital campaign also will focus on voters in those states.

* Ryan Lizza doesn’t pull any punches.

The evidence is now clear that the White House and Devin Nunes, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, have worked together to halt what was previously billed as a sweeping investigation of Russian interference in last year’s election. “We’ve been frozen,” Jim Himes, a Democratic representative from Connecticut who is a member of the Committee, said.

* As if the Trump administration hadn’t already alienated enough people…

The inclusion of LGBT categories in the Planned Subjects for the 2020 Census Report unveiled on Tuesday must have been music to the ears of LGBT advocates seeking to include sexual orientation and gender identity in federal surveys. But the celebration was short-lived: The U.S. Census on the same day announced those categories were included in error.

Just days before its deadline, the U.S. Census delivered to Congress its report on planned subjects for the survey, including gender, age, race, ethnicity, relationship and homeownership status…

The report outlines the importance of including these questions in either the decennial U.S. Census or the newer and more detailed annual American Community Survey, which was established in 1985 and seeks to ascertain socio-economic and housing statistics.

But apparently an initial version of this report went too far. The U.S. Census issued a notice shortly afterward indicating the report was corrected because the initial appendix “inadvertently” included LGBT categories.

* It’s still pretty early to forecast the 2018 midterms, but Josh Kraushaar thinks there might be some hope for Democrats.

The de­feat of the Re­pub­lic­ans’ health care over­haul was a pain­ful re­mind­er that the GOP re­mains badly di­vided, even on an is­sue that was the ral­ly­ing cry for the party for the past sev­en years. Re­pub­lic­ans, with con­trol of the White House and Con­gress, look em­bar­rass­ingly in­cap­able of gov­ern­ing. The polit­ic­al con­sequences are severe: GOP voters are likely to be de­mor­al­ized in the run-up to next year’s midterm elec­tions, es­pe­cially if Pres­id­ent Trump is un­able to achieve any oth­er le­gis­lat­ive vic­tor­ies. This, at a time when Demo­crat­ic polit­ic­al en­gage­ment is sur­ging—fueled by their off-the-charts an­im­os­ity to­wards Trump.

Demo­crats now have a real­ist­ic shot at re­tak­ing the House in 2018. Each of the past three midterm elec­tions have swung wildly against the party in power—re­flect­ive of the long­stand­ing dis­sat­is­fac­tion of voters to­wards polit­ic­al lead­er­ship, no mat­ter who’s in charge. Trump’s job ap­prov­al rat­ing is hov­er­ing around 40 per­cent, a tox­ic level for the dozens of Re­pub­lic­ans run­ning for reelec­tion in swing dis­tricts. Re­pub­lic­ans would be fool­ish to as­sume that Pres­id­ent Obama’s co­ali­tion of mil­len­ni­als and non­white voters—many of whom stayed home in past midterm elec­tions—re­mains dis­en­gaged giv­en their aver­sion to Trump.

* Finally, when a friend shared this video with me today, I was struck by how it is even more salient today than it was when it originally aired. The entire segment is predicated on the question of why Republicans are trying to suppress the right to vote.

Nancy LeTourneau

Follow Nancy on Twitter @Smartypants60.