It now appears very likely that Sessions committed the very same crime he once voted to convict President Clinton of. The federal perjury statute forbids anyone who has “taken an oath before a competent tribunal, officer, or person” from “willfully and contrary to such oath” making a statement on “any material matter which he does not believe to be true.”

There is, to be fair, some wiggle room in this statute. To convict Sessions, for example, a prosecutor would have to prove that Sessions did not believe that his reportedly false statements about “the Russians” to be true. Thus, if Sessions had somehow forgotten about those meetings, that would provide him with a defense.

This is the sort of argument that Sessions’ defense attorneys could make on his behalf at trial. And Sessions, of course, should be afforded the same presumption of innocence that attaches to anyone accused of a crime.

An undocumented immigrant diagnosed with a brain tumor while under Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody was returned to a detention center from a Texas hospital, her lawyers said.

The woman, a Salvadoran national identified only as Sara, was released from Huguley Hospital in Fort Worth, Texas, and taken to Prairieland Detention Center against her will, according to her lawyers.

"She told us they tied her hands and ankles in her condition," Melissa Zuniga, a member of Sara's legal team, told The Hill. "She's complaining of a lot of pain."

Today, the Intelligence Community is deeply unhappy with President Trump. They dislike his repeated public insults and impugning of their professional integrity—something no president has ever done before. Many spies distrust the commander-in-chief, which is why some of our secret agencies are withholding highly classified intelligence from a White House they think is penetrated by Russian intelligence.

The Russia angle is most troubling to the IC. Behind closed doors, plenty of American intelligence experts believe that President Trump is the pawn of the Kremlin, wittingly or not, and assess that it’s only a matter of time before unseemly Moscow ties are exposed and the White House enters unsurvivable political crisis.

Rebellion is brewing in Washington. The resignation of the CIA’s spokesman, a career intelligence analyst, is a sign of how fragile IC morale has gotten under the new administration. If President Trump keeps upping the ante in his war on the spies, he can expect more damaging leaks to reach the media. Leaks happen in every administration, and Nixon’s ignominious fall ought to serve as a cautionary tale to any president who thinks he can find the right “plumbers” to fix the leaky faucet

...Firtash has been a sort of prisoner in Austria, unable to leave the country for fear the U.S. will have more success extraditing him from wherever else he may go. Ukraine isn’t an option, either; the current government has turned its back on him. For now, Firtash is a very rich man without a country. Not that he doesn’t continue to maintain a proprietary interest in his native land: In addition to his natural gas interests, he owns TV stations and dominates the country’s fertilizer and chemical industries. “First of all, I’ve never left,” Firtash tells me. “I work with Ukrainian businesses and people. My plants keep on working. People come here, to me, to discuss everything. Many people cannot understand—I live for Ukraine.”

The U.S. is scheduled to appeal Austria’s extradition decision in a Vienna courtroom on Feb. 21, just as Ukraine has once again become a flashpoint in the relationship between the U.S. and Russia. Trump’s national security adviser, Michael Flynn, resigned after allegedly concealing that before the inauguration he consulted with the Russian ambassador about the future of U.S. sanctions. The White House’s position on Ukraine’s war with Russian-backed separatists is hopelessly muddled: First, Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, blamed the violence on Russia; then Trump downplayed that position in a statement of his own. The FBI, meanwhile, is continuing to investigate Russia’s influence on the Trump campaign.

In all this, Firtash again finds himself the man in the middle—a canary in a coal mine for the Trump Justice Department. After Russia invaded Crimea in 2014, the Obama administration was widely perceived to be retaliating against Putin by going after his oligarchs. Should Firtash be forced into the U.S. to face charges, many observers have wondered, what might he have to offer the U.S. in exchange for a plea? Perhaps intelligence about Putin? About others in his inner circle? The U.S. has fought for extradition for three years—but there is a new president now. The Justice and State departments aren’t commenting on the case. But if the administration reverses course and no longer pushes hard on the Firtash prosecution, that would send a pretty clear signal that the president’s embrace of Russia and Putin is real.

A surprising name has been thrown out as a potential Republican contender for Michigan Democrat Debbie Stabenow’s Senate seat next year: Kid Rock.

The rocker’s name came up as a possible candidate at a Michigan Republican Party convention last weekend. There have been no official decisions announced as of yet.

Kid Rock, whose real name is Robert Ritchie, once said he tended to vote Republican but qualified himself as “more libertarian” to Rolling Stone in 2013. But he has supported several major Republican candidates.

(his wife) did say she tried calling him three hours after she talked with him that morning but it went straight to voicemail.

"Frank and I weren't getting along too well," Malissa said. "We were working on our marriage. He told me when he got back he was filing for divorce and took a bag of clothes with him."

Malissa said Frank's car was recently found in Washington County and authorities are searching the area on Saturday.

Leadwood Police Department is investigating and being assisted by St. Francois and Washington County Sheriff's Departments.