The flood of calls, texts and emails came swiftly and most with the same message. Dave Millage sat by the fireplace in his living room in a quiet Bettendorf neighborhood as he read them.

He had braced for some blowback ever since he’d told a local reporter what he thought about President Donald Trump s behavior on Jan. 6. Still, one email stung.

QAnon supporting congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene has said she has the “full support” of former US president Donald Trump, after they spoke on the phone.

Ms Greene, who has become surrounded by controversies in recent days, said on Saturday that she was “so grateful for his support” following their conversation.  

It comes amid multiple reports of her behaviour on social media before she was elected to Congress in November 2020, as a House Representative for Georgia. 

We’ll have more on this story as it develops: 

Two Latino members of Congress, Reps. Joaquin Castro and Ruben Gallego, want Trump loyalists on a panel charged with renaming US military bases to be removed.

The bases are those with names that honour Confederate leaders, and have come under scrutiny since the country’s reckoning with systemic racism last year.

In a letter addressed to defence secretary Lloyd Austin on Friday, the congressmen argued that four panellists should be dismissed because they were appointed by Donald Trump’s administration.

Gino Spocchia has more details below: 

The Census Bureau’s missed deadlines could be a boon for Virginia Republicans but a bust for the New Jersey GOP — and the reverse for Democrats — as the only two states with legislative elections this year do so without the data they need to draw new boundaries.

The 2021 election cycle, the first since Democrats took control of the White House and Congress, is also supposed to be the first conducted after redistricting based on changes captured in the once-a-decade census required under the Constitution.

The delay in census figures means Virginia and New Jersey will continue to use decade-old maps that don’t reflect growth in areas such as northern Virginia and may undercount people of color, factors that could contribute to shifts in their statehouses.

As the Biden administration considers whether it should pull remaining U.S. troops out of Afghanistan in the coming months, some fear for the fate of an American who could be left behind: an abducted contractor believed held by a Taliban-linked militant group.

On the one-year anniversary of Mark Frerichs’ abduction, family members and other supporters are urging the Biden administration not to withdraw additional troops without the Navy veteran being released from captivity. 

The Democratic push to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour has emerged as an early flashpoint in the fight for a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package, testing President Joe Biden s ability to bridge Washington’s partisan divides as he pursues his first major legislative victory.

Biden called for a $15 hourly minimum wage during his campaign and has followed through by hitching it to a measure that, among other things, calls for $1,400 stimulus checks and $130 billion to help schools reopen. Biden argues that anyone who holds a full-time job shouldn’t live in poverty, echoing progressives in the Democratic Party who are fully on board with the effort.

The House’s chief law enforcement officer is tightening security for traveling lawmakers as Congress reassesses safety in an era when threats against members were surging even before Donald Trump’s supporters attacked the Capitol.

Capitol Police officers will be stationed at Washington-area airports and the city’s Union Station train depot on busy travel days, the acting House sergeant at arms said in a memo obtained Friday.

GOP campaigners have called on senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley to resign through billboards that condemn them for supporting claims the 2020 election was “stolen”. 

Gino Spocchia has details on this story: 

After President Donald Trump lost his reelection bid, most Senate Republicans, his Justice Department and the courts dismissed or disputed his baseless claims about a “stolen election.” Not Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson

The GOP senator used his chairmanship of the Senate Homeland Security Committee to highlight Trump’s allegations, claiming millions of Americans “have real, legitimate suspicions that this election was stolen” and worrying about “so many irregularities here.”

That sort of fealty to Trump has endeared Johnson to the far-right base in his state, but it could prove costly if he decides to seek a third term in 2022.