https://twitter.com/planetepics/status/1035512556494966784

https://twitter.com/MorningExp/status/1035479378124128256

Source: ABC News

Disapproval of Donald Trump is at a new high, support for the Mueller investigation is broad and half of Americans in a new ABC News/Washington Post poll favor Congress initiating impeachment proceedings against the president.

Sixty percent in the national survey disapprove of Trump’s performance in office, numerically the highest of his presidency, albeit by a single point; that includes 53 percent who disapprove strongly, more than half for the first time. Thirty-six percent approve, matching his low.

The results come a week after Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, was convicted of fraud, and his former longtime personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, pleaded guilty to eight felonies, including illegal campaign finance actions that he said Trump directed.

Trump’s average approval rating since taking office is the lowest for any president in modern polling since the 1940s. One factor: Contrary to his “drain the swamp” rhetoric, 45 percent say corruption in Washington has increased under Trump, while just 13 percent say it’s declined.

Read more: https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trouble-trump-disapproval-high-63-back-mueller-half/story?id=57507081&cid=social_twitter_abcn

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https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1035482435402833922

Source: WaPo

Technology giants in the United States offer some of the country’s most generous employee benefits, but the workers who mow the lawns or serve lunch in the company cafeteria — jobs that are often staffed by outside firms — tend to get far smaller packages.

Microsoft announced a new policy Thursday that it hopes will shrink that gap, pledging it will ink contracts only with service providers who give their employees 12 weeks of paid family leave.

Analysts say it’s a first for large American firms, which often outsource culinary, housekeeping and receptionist work to contractors that may not supply paid leave.

“We want to focus our resources on doing business with companies that share our values,” said Dev Stahlkopf, Microsoft’s corporate vice president and general counsel.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/microsoft-to-business-partners-if-you-want-to-work-with-us-offer-paid-family-leave/2018/08/29/979ffcca-abc0-11e8-8a0c-70b618c98d3c_story.html?utm_term=.3618beca757d

Source: CNBC

President Donald Trump said Thursday that civilian employees of the federal government will not receive raises in 2019.

In doing away with the 2.1 percent across-the-board pay increase that was scheduled to take effect in January, Trump said he was working "put our Nation on a fiscally sustainable course."

"I have determined that for 2019, both across the board pay increases and locality pay increases will be set at zero," the president said in a letter addressed to Speaker of the House Paul Ryan and released by the White House. "These alternative pay plan decisions will not materially affect our ability to attract and retain a well qualified Federal workforce."

In contrast to civilian employees, troops are due for a 2.6 percent pay increase next year. Trump has touted the military pay bump, which was authorized by a giant $716 billion defense bill he signed earlier this month.

Read more: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/30/trump-says-government-wont-give-civilian-employees-raises-in-2019.html

https://twitter.com/JonErlichman/status/1034771819616772096

Source: WaPo

President Trump went on Twitter on Thursday to deny news reports that his daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner played a role in the announced departure of White House counsel Donald McGahn.

Trump announced Wednesday that McGahn, a low-key, 50-year-old lawyer who has been at his side since the early days of the 2016 presidential campaign, would leave his post at the White House in the fall.

“Ivanka Trump & Jared Kushner had NOTHING to do with the so called ‘pushing out’ of Don McGahn,” Trump wrote on Twitter on Thursday morning. “The Fake News Media has it, purposely, so wrong! They love to portray chaos in the White House when they know that chaos doesn’t exist-just a ‘smooth running machine’ with changing parts!”

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1035131133997068288
Multiple news organizations reported Wednesday that there had been friction between McGahn and the president’s daughter and son-in-law, both of whom are advisers at the White House, which has experienced unusually high turnover under Trump.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-says-daughter-son-in-law-played-no-role-in-departure-of-white-house-counsel-mcgahn/2018/08/30/8021f7aa-aaa9-11e8-b1da-ff7faa680710_story.html?utm_term=.858492d6d992&tid=sm_tw

Source: The Hill

President Trump ripped CNN President Jeff Zucker on Twitter Thursday morning, saying that network’s ratings "suck" and Zucker should be fired, amid heightened rhetoric in a feud between the president and the news channel.

“The hatred and extreme bias of me by @CNN has clouded their thinking and made them unable to function. But actually, as I have always said, this has been going on for a long time,” the president tweeted.

“Little Jeff Z has done a terrible job, his ratings suck, & AT&T should fire him to save credibility!” he wrote.

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1035117507839967232
Trump then targeted NBC and MSNBC Chairman Andrew Lack in a subsequent tweet.

Read more: http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/404309-trump-rips-cnn-boss-his-ratings-suck-att-should-fire-him

Source: NYT

Federal investigators have provided ample evidence that President Trump was involved in deals to pay two women to keep them from speaking publicly before the 2016 election about affairs that they said they had with him.

But it turns out that Mr. Trump wanted to go even further.

He and his lawyer at the time, Michael D. Cohen, devised a plan to buy up all the dirt on Mr. Trump that the National Enquirer and its parent company had collected on him, dating back to the 1980s, according to several of Mr. Trump’s associates.

The existence of the plan, which was never finalized, has not been reported before. But it was strongly hinted at in a recording that Mr. Cohen’s lawyer released last month of a conversation about payoffs that Mr. Cohen had with Mr. Trump.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/30/nyregion/trump-cohen-national-enquirer-american-media-recording.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage