The Biden admin announced today it will include cluster bombs in the U.S.’ next $800 million weapons package for Ukraine, as well as armored vehicles and air defense missiles. “It was not an easy decision,” President Biden said. “It took me a while to be convinced to do it.” 🔉 Cluster bombs are controversial because they’re designed to destroy multiple targets at once by dropping explosive “bomblets” over a wide area, risking potentially harming civilians or other unintended targets. They’re banned by more than 120 countries, including most NATO countries, because the ordnance that fails to explode can end up killing civilians, even long after conflict has ended. Both sides are already actively using the weapons. National security adviser Jake Sullivan defended the decision, saying the danger to Ukrainians would be even greater if Russia overtook the country, and that if Moscow’s tanks rolled into Kyiv “because Ukraine does not have enough artillery, that is intolerable to us.” Ukraine has also sent assurances that it would use the U.S.-provided weapons, supposedly with a dud rate of 2.5% or less, in ways that minimize harm to civilians. However, while there are powerful members of Congress who support Biden’s move, some top Democrats are breaking with the president, arguing that providing cluster bombs cedes the moral high ground and will end up indiscriminately killing civilians. “The legacy of cluster bombs is misery, death and expensive cleanup generations after their use,” said Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Mo.), the ranking member of the House’s defense appropriations subcommittee. “These weapons should be eliminated from our stockpiles, not dumped in Ukraine.” Link in bio for more details and the divided reaction within Congress and the Democratic Party. https://politi.co/3rg1QTM

A D.C.-based bar discipline committee concluded today that Rudy Giuliani should be disbarred for “frivolous” and “destructive” efforts to derail the 2020 presidential election in support of former President Trump. “His hyperbolic claims of election fraud and the core thesis of the Pennsylvania litigation were utterly false, and recklessly so,” the three-member panel concluded in a 38-page decision. “Mr. Giuliani’s rash overstatement claiming that the election was stolen had no evidence to support it.” “By prosecuting that destructive case Mr. Giuliani, a sworn officer of the Court, forfeited his right to practice law,” they declared. Giuliani, who came to national prominence during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and was sometimes hailed as “America’s mayor,” previously served as the hard-charging U.S. attorney in Manhattan and as a top official in the Justice Department under President Ronald Reagan. Now he’s under heightened risk of losing his law license. A spokesperson for Giuliani responded by saying today’s decision was a “great injustice” and calling the panel members “nothing more than an arm of the permanent regime in Washington.” The former New York City mayor plans to challenge the panel’s findings and recommend sanction in front of a larger bar-discipline board. Ultimately, his disbarment or other penalty would be decided by the D.C. Court of Appeals. Full story at the link in our bio. 📷 Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images

In a Barbie world, who controls the South China Sea? A handful of Republican lawmakers are joining much of Southeast Asia in criticizing a map shown in the upcoming “Barbie” movie that includes a dashed line drawn more than a thousand miles off China’s coast that claims the vast majority of the South China Sea as Beijing’s territory. GOP lawmakers are accusing filmmakers of pandering to Chinese censors. Republican Sens. Ted Cruz (Texas) and Marsha Blackburn (Tenn.) were among the first U.S. lawmakers to lodge complaints about the “Barbie” movie over what critics call the nine-dash line. “While it may just be a Barbie map in a Barbie world, the fact that a cartoonish crayon-scribbled map seems to go out of its way to depict the PRC’s unlawful territorial claims illustrates the pressure that Hollywood is under to please CCP censors,” Rep. Mike Gallacher (R-Wisc.) said in a statement to us. Warner Bros said there wasn’t any geopolitics involved and the map wasn’t meant to “make any type of statement.” “The map in Barbie Land is a child-like crayon drawing,” a spokesperson told us in a statement. “The doodles depict Barbie’s make-believe journey from Barbie Land to the ‘real world.’” The contested maritime boundary has made waves far beyond U.S. political circles. Vietnam banned all domestic screenings of Barbie because of the map, and the film’s under review in the Philippines and could result in a similar ban. Meanwhile, the Pentagon has already taken steps to curb its own cooperation on Hollywood projects that might cater to Beijing’s interests. More details at the link in our bio. 📷 AP Photo/Lee Jin-man

TGIF! Welcome to our weekly roundup of political opinion cartoons from across America. There are hundreds every week that entertain and enrage readers of all political stripes. Swipe ← to see a few of them, or check out this week’s full roundup at the 🔗 in bio. 🎨 Week of July 3 - 7, 2023

The House Freedom Caucus voted to remove Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene from the pro-Trump group last month, a member confirmed Thursday. The vote happened less than two days after Greene got into a verbal fight with fellow member Rep. Lauren Boebert and called the Colorado Republican a “little bitch.” Greene didn’t shy away from it when the fight was first reported – she confirmed the fight and doubled down, adding another pejorative. “A vote was taken to remove Marjorie Taylor Greene from the House Freedom Caucus for some of the things she’s done,” Freedom Caucus board member Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.) said. “I think the way she referred to a fellow member was probably not the way we expect our members to refer to other fellow, especially female, members.” It’s the first time the conservative caucus has booted one of its own and reflects the group’s increasing level of frustration with Greene. She’s closely allied herself with Speaker Kevin McCarthy this year, lining up against many Freedom Caucus members when she supported both his rocky speakership bid and his debt deal with President Joe Biden. When asked if Greene's support for McCarthy and the debt deal fed into the decision to remove her, Harris replied, “I think all of that mattered.” “I think the straw that broke the camel’s back was publicly saying things about another member in terms that no one should,” he said. The conservative group is currently at the center of the fight over government funding as they try to push McCarthy and GOP leaders to go below levels set in the debt deal. More on what’s next for the House Freedom Caucus at the link in our bio. 📷 Getty Images, iStock

The FDA has granted traditional approval to an Alzheimer’s drug for the first time in more than two decades. Late-stage clinical trial data showed that Leqembi, which was previously granted accelerated approval, moderately slowed trial participants’ cognitive decline compared to a placebo, but had potentially serious side effects, including brain swelling and bleeding. The question now is how many people will be able to access the drug, which is targeted at patients in the early stages of the debilitating disease. Medicare has said that it will reimburse the drug’s costs — more than $26,000 annually — only for beneficiaries enrolled in a nationwide registry that tracks patient side effects and outcomes over time. Lawmakers and advocacy groups have pressed the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to reduce or eliminate coverage restrictions for Leqembi and drugs like it to ensure maximum patient uptake. Roughly 6.7 million people in the U.S. have Alzheimer’s, and there are few treatments for the disease. Link in bio for more details.

More than a dozen lawmakers have already made their way onto Threads, Meta’s new Twitter competitor, within hours of it launching yesterday. And some are already using it for political messaging. (If you’re not already on Threads, you’ve probably at least seen notifications about your friends who have joined.) Multiple Twitter competitors have popped up or gained traction ever since Elon Musk took the reins of the bird app (Bluesky, anyone?). But whether more lawmakers move en masse from Twitter or change their political messaging strategies on social media because of Threads remains to be seen. So far the list of Congress members on Threads includes House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, Reps. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Jeff Jackson (D-N.C.), Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), August Plfuger (R-Texas), Troy Carter (D-La.), Morgan Luttrell (R-Texas), Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.), Ben Cline (R-Va.), Seth Moulton (D-Mass.), Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), Lloyd Smucker (R-Pa.), Jim Himes (D-Conn.), Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and more. Are *you* on Threads? Have you seen any other notable posts from members of Congress? Is this making you more inclined to ditch Twitter? Let us know in the comments 👇 📷 AP; iStock

House Republicans are taking their fight with the FBI and Justice Department to a new level – weighing punitive steps against both agencies that would have been unfathomable a decade ago. Speaker Kevin McCarthy has already threatened to explore impeaching Attorney General Merrick Garland. Conservatives have also gone after FBI Director Chirstopher Wray, weighing whether to force a vote to recommend booting him from office. Many conservatives are eager to cut the law agencies’ budgets, believing they’ve been targeting Republicans. Then there’s the long-brewing congressional fight over a soon-to-expire warrantless surveillance program that has sparked bipartisan accusations of abuse by the FBI. Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.), a leadership ally, predicted that conservative colleagues on the House Judiciary Committee’s government politicization panel and their allies would take their battle against FBI and DOJ to the chamber floor. Those Republicans, he said, “believe the best way to send a message is to use the power of the purse.” Whether they prevail in the form of budget cuts, impeachment, or other measures remains to be seen. But either way, i’s unclear whether their efforts will work out in their favor. Conservative efforts could backfire and expose tensions with the more centrist and establishment Republicans who embrace the party’s traditional pro-law enforcement roots. More on what’s next in the right flank’s fight against the FBI and DOJ at the link in our bio.

The Supreme Court rejected Biden’s student debt relief plan last week, but the White House has another trick up their sleeve. Alongside the president’s promise to start over on a new plan to cancel student debt, last week Biden unveiled the final details of his separate student loan repayment program. The “SAVE” program, which has been in the works for more than a year, will permanently reshape how borrowers repay their federal student loans. The administration estimated this income-driven plan would cost $156 billion over the next decade, although that number assumed the Supreme Court would allow student debt cancellation (it didn’t). One key feature of the program – cutting payments for undergraduate borrowers in half – won’t be available for another year, in July 2024, since the admin is implementing the new program in phases. Swipe ← for a quick look at the program, or head to the link in our bio for more details.

If money talks, then Rep. Adam Schiff's campaign is screaming at the top of its lungs. The California Democrat has raised over $8.1 million in the year’s second quarter, a record-breaking haul that’s likely to put more distance between his rivals. Prior to Schiff, Sen. Raphael Warnock, at the time an incumbent Democrat from Georgia, raised $7.2 million in the second quarter of the off-cycle in 2021. Schiff had more than 144,000 unique donors over the quarter who made more than 233,000 donations from 50 states and all of California’s 58 counties, according to contribution figures shared first with POLITICO. The average contribution was $34. Schiff is not accepting corporate PAC money. While California is decidedly blue, and winning there isn’t going to determine control of the Senate in 2024, Schiff’s fundraising does demonstrate how powerful using Republicans and specifically former President Trump as the central opposition to earning national Democratic support. Polls continue to show a close race to replace Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s seat. But in a memo from Schiff’s campaign to key supporters, aides emphasized his financial advantage and pointed to his list of endorsers — including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, more than half of California’s Dem congressional delegation and four statewide labor unions. None of the other candidates have gotten one yet.  “Our campaign continues to build up significant advantages that will propel Adam forward,” said Schiff’s campaign manager Brad Elkins in a memo. Full story at the link in @onthecampagintrail’s bio. 📷 Mario Tama/Getty Images

House progressives are calling for changes to the Supreme Court following a slate of decisions affecting affirmative action, student debt cancellation and LGBTQ protections. “If [the courts] were to proceed without any check on their power, without any balance on their power, then we will start to see an undemocratic and, frankly, dangerous authoritarian expansion of power in the Supreme Court,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.” Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), another prominent House progressive, also slammed the Supreme Court’s recent rulings on Sunday: “They continue to overturn the will of the majority of the people and to make history for all the wrong reasons, legislating from the bench and being political from the bench,” Pressley said during an interview on MSNBC’s “The Katie Phang Show.” Both members of Congress said that every option should be on the table when it comes to reigning in the court’s power and reforming its ethics, including expanding the number of justices on the bench. However, any bills to do so have little chance of passing in a divided Congress. And even if they do, President Biden does not support the change. Doing so would be a “mistake,” he said last week.

So you’re a politico heading out on vacation and you’re looking for something “political” to read. You might not want something as on the nose as All the President’s Men. You’ve probably already read This Town. And you’re tired of the classic political autobiography or ponderous memoir. We’ve got you covered. We reached out to our contributors, and the broader POLITICO newsroom, to find fun-to-read books that you won’t necessarily find in the zoom backgrounds of a typical politico or filed in the bookstore under “politics” but that do help us understand the power and politics of our time. Swipe through for a sample of those recs, or head to the link in @politicomag’s bio for our full list. 🎨 Phil Wrigglesworth for POLITICO https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/06/30/politico-summer-reading-list-2023-00103818