The departure of the polarizing Carlson from Fox News came a few days after Fox’s massive $787 million settlement with Dominion Voting Systems — and in the wake of Carlson’s private texts coming to light because of that defamation suit over the network’s false election fraud claims. Also, Carlson had been named in a discrimination lawsuit filed by a Fox News producer who was fired.

CNN soured on Lemon following his comments a couple of months ago about presidential candidate Nikki Haley, stating on air that women in their 50s are no longer in their prime.

“Tucker Carlson and Don Lemon are two very different firings,” Tobe Berkovitz, associate professor of Advertising emeritus at Boston University, told the Herald on Monday.

“Carlson went because he besmirched Rupert Murdoch and the Fox News channel brand, and that’s just something that Murdoch won’t stand for, even if Carlson is his prime star,” Berkovitz said, later adding about Lemon, “He’s been the piñata for CNN for a long time, while Fox pulled the plug on Carlson when he was on top.”

Fox News in a statement did not explain why Carlson was leaving.

“FOX News Media and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part ways,” Fox News said in a statement. “We thank him for his service to the network as a host and prior to that as a contributor.”

His last program was on Friday, April 21. Fox News Tonight will have rotating Fox News personalities until a new host is named.

Because of the Dominion lawsuit, Carlson’s texts came to light. He wrote about his “hate” for former President Donald Trump, and his concerns that the network was losing viewers among Trump’s fans.

“Carlson’s numbers were still super strong,” Berkovitz said. “He thrives on controversy, and he thrives on battling what he considers ‘the woke insider beltway bad people.’ That never bothered Fox. That was fine.

“But when you trash your own brand and your own brand is run by Murdoch, bye bye,” he added.

The Los Angeles Times reported that Carlson’s departure was also tied to the discrimination lawsuit filed by the fired Fox News producer, Abby Grossberg. She claimed that Fox lawyers had pressured her to give misleading testimony in the Dominion lawsuit.

Meanwhile on Monday, CNN chairman and CEO Chris Licht announced that CNN and Lemon had “parted ways.”

Lemon then took to Twitter, saying he had been terminated.

“After 17 years at CNN I would have thought that someone in management would have had the decency to tell me directly,” Lemon posted. “At no time was I ever given any indication that I would not be able to continue to do the work I have loved at the network.”

Lemon had been moved to “CNN This Morning,” but the show’s ratings have been struggling in the competitive time slot.

“They wanted to try to keep him and moved him into another slot, but he just doesn’t play ball well,” Berkovitz said. “He’s just not a big enough draw to put up with the trouble.”

“Don Lemon has been past his prime for a long time,” he added.

The news about Carlson and Lemon came a day after Jeff Shell, the chief executive of NBCUniversal, left the company after an investigation into inappropriate conduct. Shell in a statement called it “an inappropriate relationship with a woman in the company.”

Herald wire services were used in this report.

On Tuesday, Fox settled with Dominion over charges that Fox News baselessly accused the company of rigging its voting machines against former President Donald Trump in 2020. It was the most-watched media libel case in decades.

Fox had about $4 billion of cash on hand as of December 2022, and MoffettNathanson analyst Robert Fishman expects the company to pay the settlement during the current quarter.

How much the lawsuit will actually end up costing Fox is unclear because there are ways it can defray some of the expense, primarily through insurance and the use of tax deductions.

Fox can deduct the Dominion settlement from its income taxes as an expense necessary for the cost of doing business. Fox Chief Communications Officer Brian Nick has confirmed the deductibility of the settlement.

Big companies often deduct large settlements to help offset some of the cost, but since settlement amounts are usually confidential, it’s difficult to pin down exactly how much they benefit. Payments that are seen as restitution or compensation can be deducted, while payments made to the government or at the direction of a government are usually not deductible.

Robert Willens, a tax professor at the Columbia University School of Business, estimates that after the tax write-off, Fox will incur about three-fourths of the settlement amount, about $590 million.

“The key is that if the payments are being made to private parties and not at the behest of the government then you can pretty much conclude without any fear of contradiction that the payment will be deductible,” he said.

A study by the Government Accountability Office in 2005 found that of 34 settlements totaling over $1 billion, 20 companies reported deducting some portion or all of their settlement payments. Big banks such as Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase reportedly also deducted portions of their settlements of charges tied to the financial crisis of 2008.

Also, if Fox is insured, insurance is likely to cover some of the settlement. Chad Milton, a partner at Media Risk Consultants, said a large media company such as Fox could have anywhere between $100 million to $500 million in coverage, including media liability insurance and other types of insurance.

“It’s not hard to stack up $100 million but as you go higher than that, it gets harder and harder,” Milton said.

Usually, there’s a certain amount a media company has to pay, which could be in the millions, before insurance kicks in. However, the deductible incudes attorney fees, which in a high-profile case like Fox-Dominion could be tens of millions of dollars or higher, so the deductible could be swallowed up just by attorney fees.

Pence and his attorneys are planning to cite constitutional grounds as they prepare to resist special counsel Jack Smith’s efforts to compel his testimony before a grand jury. They argue that because Pence was serving in his role as president of the Senate on Jan. 6, 2021 as he presided over a joint session of Congress to certify the election results, he is protected from being forced to address his actions under the Constitution’s “speech-or-debate” clause that shields members of Congress.

“I think he views it as essential protection of his Constitutional role,” said Marc Short, a close adviser to Pence who served as his White House chief of staff.

Short compared Pence’s position to the one he took on Jan. 6 when he refused to go along with Trump’s unconstitutional scheme to try to overturn the results of the 2020 election, as well as Pence’s rejection of using the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office in the aftermath.

“The vice president of the United State is the president of the Senate and the fact is the functions of Jan. 6 were specific to that role,” he said of Pence, who has been laying the groundwork for a likely presidential campaign that would put him in direct competition against his former boss.

Whether Pence’s arguments will succeed in limiting or altogether avoiding grand jury testimony is unclear, but the Justice Department is expected to oppose those efforts and to make the case that the former vice president’s cooperation is essential for a probe focused on Trump’s actions.

The decision to try to fight the subpoena, which was first reported by Politico, marks a change in posture from Pence, who has cooperated with the Justice Department as it investigates how documents with classified markings ended up at his Indiana home after the end of the Trump administration. He permitted the FBI to search the property last week.

Even if his objection is ultimately rebuffed from the courts, an antagonistic posture could allow Pence to argue that he tried to fight the Justice Department — a potentially useful position in a GOP primary, as many in the Republican base have grown distrustful of federal law enforcement, in part due to Trump’s drumbeat of criticism. And it could delay the special counsel probe, which Smith is working to rapidly advance.

Pence has spoken extensively about Trump’s pressure campaign urging him to reject President Joe Biden’s victory in the days leading up to Jan. 6, including in his book, “So Help Me God.” Pence, as vice president, had a ceremonial role overseeing the counting of the Electoral College vote, but did not have the power to impact the results.

Pence’s decision to resist the subpoena also came after extensive back-and-forth between his lawyers and the special counsel’s office, according to a person familiar with the discussions who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the closed-door negotiations.

The Justice Department declined to comment Tuesday on Pence’s plans.

Pence is expected to address the issue in more detail during a visit to Iowa Wednesday as he inches closer to a likely presidential run.

Richard Levy, a constitutional law professor at the University of Kansas, said it is true that the vice president is in a unique position as the technical presiding officer of the Senate, making the officeholder in some respects a member of the chamber.

But he said that not everything a member does is protected by the speech-or-debate clause and it is debatable whether the vice president’s role in certifying the election, which involves a mix of constitutional and senatorial functions, would be protected.

In any event, Pence’s argument would likely serve to limit the scope of his testimony rather than to block it altogether, he said.

“I don’t think the speech or debate clause would be a basis for quashing the subpoena altogether. It would be a basis for objecting to particular questions,” he said.

The subpoena has been an aggressive step from Smith as he continues to investigate efforts by Trump and his allies to remain in power, including the storming of the Capitol building on Jan. 6.

Trump supporters, driven by the lie that the election was stolen, brutally pushed past the police and smashed through the windows and doors while Pence was presiding over the certification of Biden’s victory. The vice president was steered to safety with his staff and family as some in the mob chanted, “Hang Mike Pence!”

While the mob was in the Capitol, Trump tweeted, “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution.”

A House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack recommended that the Justice Department bring criminal charges against Trump and others over his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss.

Housing Court Judge Joseph Michaud — a former Dartmouth selectman and Republican candidate for state rep. who was sworn in by Gov. Charlie Baker in 2018 — violated the Massachusetts Code of Judicial Conduct when he made those social media posts in 2020, the state’s Commission on Judicial Conduct has announced.

Michaud, who took home $195,472.70 as a judge last year, made those Facebook posts leading up to and following the 2020 presidential election between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. His social media posts were about political figures, political events, and politicized public events.

In its order, the Supreme Judicial Court adopted the Commission on Judicial Conduct’s recommendation that Michaud get publicly reprimanded for that social media activity.

“The Court accepts the recommendation of the Commission that the Judge be publicly reprimanded for his misconduct,” the Supreme Judicial Court wrote. “Public confidence in the judiciary is undermined when a judge’s social media activity casts reasonable doubt on the judge’s capacity to act impartially even if the judge is in fact impartial.”

His Facebook account is now deleted.

When the Herald reached Michaud by phone on Sunday, the judge declined to comment.

“The Judge has acknowledged that he erred by sharing these types of posts that undermine public confidence in the judiciary,” the Supreme Judicial Court wrote. “Contrary to the Judge’s belief that the postings were only visible to his Facebook ‘friends,’ the postings, relating to political figures, political events, and politicized public events, were publicly visible.

“Accordingly, Judge Joseph L. Michaud is hereby publicly reprimanded for the conduct described in the Stipulation of Facts, namely, his making posts on social media that expressed views on political candidates, political figures and issues, and posts that could create the appearance of bias based on gender, ethnicity, or immigration status,” the court added.

The Supreme Judicial Court also ordered that Michaud stay away from trying to identify, retaliate against, or influence any person who has — or who he believes — cooperated with the Commission on Judicial Conduct’s investigation into his judicial conduct.

In 2018, the governor swore in Michaud as an associate justice to the Massachusetts Housing Court, Metro South Division. A decorated member of the U.S. Army, Michaud had served on active duty intermittently for the previous 30 years as a lieutenant colonel in the Judge Advocates General Corps.

He had his own practice, the Law Offices of Joseph L. Michaud, where he specialized in residential and commercial real estate transactions and landlord-tenant matters.

Michaud is a former selectman in Dartmouth, and he ran for state representative in the 9th Bristol District in 2010. He didn’t face any opponents in the Republican primary, and then he lost the general election to the Democratic candidate.

“So, with the revelation of MASSIVE & WIDESPREAD FRAUD & DECEPTION in working closely with Big Tech Companies, the DNC, & the Democrat Party, do you throw the Presidential Election Results of 2020 OUT and declare the RIGHTFUL WINNER, or do you have a NEW ELECTION?” Trump wrote on his Truth Social media platform Saturday morning, republishing again later that day.

“A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution. Our great ‘Founders’ did not want, and would not condone, False & Fraudulent Elections,” he continued.

Trump’s call for the U.S. Constitution’s termination comes following the release of information promoted by billionaire Twitter owner Elon Musk, which the former President and his followers have alleged demonstrates the social media platform, before Musk purchased it, had been working with the Biden Campaign in 2020 to suppress some information about the 46th president’s son, Hunter Biden.

Friday’s release of information by former Rolling Stone writer Matt Taibbi, presented in a lengthy Twitter thread, in fact showed the company had apparently made the decision to not promote a New York Post story about the younger Biden and a trove of information said to be from a laptop he once owned, and had done so without the Biden campaign, Trump’s FBI, or any relevant politician asking them to do so.

“UNPRECEDENTED FRAUD REQUIRES UNPRECEDENTED CURE,” the former President nevertheless maintained on his social media platform.

The White House, through a spokesperson, condemned Trump’s rhetoric.

“Attacking the Constitution and all it stands for is anathema to the soul of our nation, and should be universally condemned. You cannot only love America when you win,” White House Deputy Press Secretary and Senior Communications Advisor For Strategic Response Andrew Bates said.

Candidate Trump, then president in 2020, also worked with Twitter to remove negative content posted about the former president, according to Taibbi.

“For instance, in 2020, requests from both the Trump White House and the Biden campaign were received and honored,” Taibbi tweeted.

According to one Trump expert, if continuing to call for the a redo of 2020 is Trump’s plan to win 2024, it is a bad one.

“This episode shows the problem with a Trump 2024 candidacy to this point: there’s no new product or new selling proposition. It’s just continual complaining about the 2020 election: a contest that Trump lost and from which most of the public has moved on,” Kenneth Cosgrove, a political scientist at Suffolk University, told the Herald Sunday.

Cosgrove said Trump’s call for “termination” of the constitution represents a first in modern American politics.

“I recall no modern President who has suggested abolishing the whole system. This is probably because of the Constitution’s civil religious status but also because abolishing the Constitution would lead to abolishing the Presidency, meaning it would not be a logical thing for anyone interested in having that job would propose,” he said.

Ohio Rep. Mike Turner, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, said he “vehemently” disagrees with the former President and “absolutely” condemns the remarks.

“There is a political process that has to go forward before anybody is a frontrunner or anybody is even the candidate for the party,” he said. “I believe that people certainly are going to take into consideration a statement like this as they evaluate a candidate.”

Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, no fan of Trump, said he’s showing his true colors.

“Donald Trump believes we should terminate ‘all rules, regulations and articles, even those found in the Constitution’ to overturn the 2020 election. That was his view on 1/6 and remains his view today. No honest person can now deny that Trump is an enemy of the Constitution,” she Tweeted Sunday.

Herald wire service contributed.

In 2020, they succeeded.

That’s the main takeaway from Elon Musk’s release Friday night of the internal Twitter documents about the biggest Democrat presidential-election scandal since… the last one, in 2016.

Musk conclusively proved that corporate management conspired with Democrats to suppress the story of Hunter Biden’s laptop, which revealed the breathtaking corruption of the entire Biden crime family.

To recap, in 2016 the DNC and Hillary Clinton concocted a fake scandal about Donald Trump and then peddled it to Democrats in the media, who hysterically promoted it for years knowing that it was 100 percent false.

In 2020, after the discovery of Hunter Biden’s X-rated laptop, the Democrats, knowing that everything on it was 100 percent true, peddled the fantastic tale that it was Russian disinformation.

And the same corrupt Democrats in the media, who four years earlier had promoted a bogus scandal about Republicans, now refused to cover a real, far worse scandal about Democrats.

As one person summed it up Friday night on the newly liberated Twitter:

“They stole the election. And they tried to make you think you were crazy for thinking you knew they stole the election.”

Now the Democrats are busted. Their new fallback alibi is that it’s really no big deal to steal an election, at least as long as they’re the ones stealing it.

Thank you, Elon Musk, for your courageous attempt to get the truth out. I don’t care how much money he’s got, what Musk has done could be hazardous to his health. So let me just state the obvious:

Elon Musk did not commit suicide.

Most of the information about Twitter’s Orwellian operation to install a senile vegetable in the White House was already well-known. But the release of the documents (through journalist Matt Taibbi) fills in a lot of the blanks.

The New York Post in October 2020 obtained Hunter Biden’s laptop, complete with endless references by the criminal, crack-addled, degenerate, alcoholic son himself to his role as bagman for his demented father.

It was all right there, on the record, undeniable. So, to stop Trump from being reelected, Democrats demanded that their fellow travelers in Silicon Valley prevent the story about “the Big Guy” from getting out before the election.

Twitter’s multi-millionaire Democrat operatives received their marching orders:

Deny, deny, deny!

“More to come from the Biden team,” was one message on Oct. 24. Another one was: “An additional report from the DNC.”

The response back from Twitter: “Handled these.”

The Democrat fluffers instantly shut down the Post’s Twitter account. They cancelled the White House press secretary’s. They’d already banned President Trump. Anyone who tried to get around the bans was likewise cut off.

This was an insurrection — the real insurrection.

The First Amendment? Democrats don’t need no stinkin’ First Amendment!

All of Twitter’s multi-millionaire conspirators came from the same fabulously pampered backgrounds — including membership in multiple protected classes and graduate degrees from elite American-hating universities, as well as few, if any, connections to any traditional national institutions such as the military, religion, the working classes or public schools.

The leader of the Twitter coup d’etat against MAGA appears to have been one Vijaya Gadde. Born in India, Vijaya went straight to the Ivy League — Cornell, and then to the even more expensive NYU School of Law.

NYU Law, by the way, is also the alma mater of Colinford Mattis, the equally woke New York lawyer who firebombed an NYPD cruiser during the BLM murder-arson-looting riots of 2020.

Gadde wept when she found out that Musk was going to blow the lid off her sinister conspiracy, but don’t cry for her. She made $7 million in 2020 and then $17.3 million last year for her service above and beyond the call of duty to the New World Order.

Gadde was fired from Twitter by Musk, along with the new CEO, Parag Agrawal, who arrived in this nation in 2006 from India. He was immediately admitted to Stanford University, which is where the parents of Sam Bankman-Fried, the mega-fraudster and donor of $5 million to the Biden campaign, are employed as tenured professors.

After the laptop story was deep-sixed and Trump lost, Agrawal bragged to an MIT publication about his disdain for the Bill of Rights, saying he wanted to “focus less on thinking about free speech but (instead) thinking about how the times have changed.”

Yeah, times have changed all right. Immigrants to this country used to want to protect the Constitution, not trash it.

Another comrade involved in Twitter’s First Amendment suppression campaign was one Yoel Roth, the head of “safety and integrity.”

Roth was a disinterested observer, obviously, having described the Trump administration in all capital letters in a tweet of his own as “ACTUAL NAZIS IN THE WHITE HOUSE.” On the day after the 2016 election, Roth described Trump as a “racist tangerine.” He later likened Kellyanne Conway to Nazi propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels.

Roth is a scholar, a Ph.D., having written for academic publications on, among other subjects, “gay digital communities,” “gay geosocial media,” and “the digital geography of gay social media.”

Roth lives in San Francisco, having graduated from Swarthmore College, which is also the alma mater of failed far-left Democrat presidential candidate M. Stanley Dukakis.

As they attempted to prevent Americans from learning about the Biden family’s racketeering enterprises, the Democrats of Twitter turned to a veteran of the previous attempt by Democrats to steal a presidential election — the Russian collusion hoax.

James Baker had worked for the corrupt FBI in 2016 on, among other frame-ups, the phony-baloney surveillance FISA warrants. For his unstinting efforts in trying to railroad POTUS and everyone around him, Baker’s Democrat comrades rewarded him with a big job at Twitter.

Soon the bent G-man was assuring his fellow travelers that “caution is warranted” in preventing any real news about Democrat corruption from being disseminated to the electorate.

It was the same BS being peddled by 51 other Democrats in the “intelligence community.” They had claimed that Biden’s laptop bore the “hallmarks” of Russian disinformation, which gave the Big Guy cover to lie about it at one of the debates against the racist tangerine.

I could go on, but I’ll close by repeating an earlier statement.

Elon Musk did not commit suicide.

“Massachusetts is home to the greatest people, innovation, and know-how in the world, and it’s going to be the job of our next Governor to harness these resources to grow our economy,” Healey said.

Healey spoke at the Verizon Innovation Center in Boston, a “technology-based workspace” housed on the 15th and 16th floors of the Hub Causeway, where Verizon staff demonstrated for the prospective governor some of what the communications company is working on at their research and development site.

Healey seemed impressed by the breadth of what was being shown during her brief tour, from the latest in robotics to facial recognition and shot spotting technology, as well as virtual and augmented reality products, and said it’s a perfect showcase of what she says will grow the state’s economy.

“The Verizon Innovation Center is a wonderful example of how we can do this. As Governor, I’ll be committed to creating spaces where the greatest minds in our technology sector can get together to take their ideas to the next level,” she said.

According to Healey that means putting a focus on making it so people want to work and live in Massachusetts, and so she used the visit to tout a recently launched housing plan her and her running mate, Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll, hope will help alleviate the housing shortage which has plagued the commonwealth for decades.

“This requires a focus on making Massachusetts more affordable, especially when it comes to housing, seeking out public-private partnerships and supporting workforce development programs,” she said.

Before touring the Verizon site, Healey met with members of the Massachusetts Business Roundtable, to explain “her plans to make Massachusetts more affordable and strengthen our economy,” her campaign said. There too, her housing plan was the subject of discussion.

“Diana DiZoglio has gotten 34 audit letters from OCPF since launching her campaign for State Auditor,” Amore’s campaign told the Herald. “DiZoglio has been flagged an average of three to four times per month for submitting bad or incomplete records.”

Amore, an investigator perhaps best known for his role in the Isabella Stewart Gardner heist case, is hoping to secure the job state Auditor Suzanne Bump has chosen to retire from.

The state auditor is responsible for conducting “audits, investigations, and studies to promote accountability and transparency, improve performance,” according to that office.

Gov. Charlie Baker previously said Amore is the only qualified candidate. He’s the only person running in any race with the outgoing governor’s spoken endorsement.

Amore’s campaign says audit letters sent to state Sen. Diana DiZoglio’s campaign by the state’s Office of Campaign and Political Finance demonstrate she is not fit for office.

“This is a big deal because if she can’t be accurate about her own campaign, how can voters expect her to be accurate as State Auditor?” Amore’s campaign said.

DiZoglio says he’s desperate.

“Mr. Amore is getting really desperate and grasping at straws if he’s trying to misrepresent standard and routine communication letters that have also occurred between candidates like himself, Governor Baker and Geoff Diehl with OCPF,” the senator told the Herald. “For instance, Governor Baker has a much more sizable amount of similar, routine letters as does my opponent’s statewide Republican running mate. But if my opponent cares so deeply about these routine letters, I call on him to publicly and equitably criticize his Republican statewide running mates on this matter as well–unless he is not willing or able to hold members of his own party’s establishment to the same standards that he has for his opponents.”

According to an OCPF spokesperson, “it is normal and common for candidates to receive letters from our audit department, as part of the audit process, asking them to clarify or answer questions.”

Dizoglio said Amore needs to look at his own house before he throws stones.

“We already know Mr. Amore has refused to denounce his running mate’s support for Trump and Trump’s anti-Massachusetts policies,” she said.

“Ms. DiZoglio is desperately trying to spin the fact that she is the most audited candidate for State Auditor that the Commonwealth’s campaign finance office has ever investigated. Anthony Amore was among the very first Republicans to call for Trump’s impeachment and he will be an independent State Auditor if elected,” Amore’s Campaign manager told the Herald.

ATLANTA (AP) — A Republican Party official in Georgia told a computer forensics team to copy components of the voting system at a rural elections office two months after the 2020 election and spent nearly all day there, contradicting her sworn deposition testimony about her role in the alleged breach of the equipment, a new court filing says.

The filing late Monday is part of a broader lawsuit challenging the security of the state’s voting machines that has been drawn into a separate investigation of former President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn his loss in Georgia. The apparent breach happened on Jan. 7, 2021, the day after a violent attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters seeking to stop the certification of the election.

Interior security camera video from the Coffee County elections office shows Cathy Latham, the county Republican Party chair at the time, welcomed the computer forensics team when it arrived, introduced the team to local election officials and spent nearly all day there. She also instructed the team what to copy, which turned out to be “virtually every component of the voting system,” the filing says. The video directly refutes Latham’s testimony in a sworn deposition and her representations in filings with the court, the document states.

The filing comes in response to Latham’s attorneys’ attempt to quash subpoenas for her personal electronic devices, including any cellphones, computers and storage devices.

Robert Cheeley, an attorney for Latham, did not respond to an email seeking comment. He previously said his client doesn’t remember all the details of that day. But he said she “would not and has not knowingly been involved in any impropriety in any election” and “has not acted improperly or illegally.”

Latham said in a deposition last month that she moved to Texas over the summer. In January 2021, she was chair of the Coffee County Republican Party and was the state party caucus chair for more than 125 of Georgia’s smaller counties. Latham also was one of 16 Georgia Republicans who signed a certificate in December 2020 falsely stating that Trump had won the state and declaring that they were the state’s “duly elected and qualified” electors.

Trump in fact lost Georgia by nearly 12,000 votes to Democrat Joe Biden. The investigation into Trump’s efforts to change the results includes a phone call he made to the Georgia secretary of state, a fellow Republican, suggesting he could “find” just enough votes to make Trump the winner.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, a Democrat who’s leading that investigation, has notified Latham and the other fake electors that they could face criminal charges.

The Georgia secretary of state’s office has described the copying of data from Coffee County’s election system as an “alleged unauthorized access” and last month asked the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to get involved. It’s the latest of several suspected breaches of voting system data around the country tied to Trump allies since his election loss.

Attorney Sidney Powell and other Trump allies were involved in arranging for the copying of the election equipment in Coffee County — which is home to 43,000 people and voted overwhelmingly for Trump — as part of a wider effort to access voting equipment in several states, according to documents produced in response to subpoenas in the long-running lawsuit over Georgia’s voting machines.

Latham’s “data likely will reveal additional details about the work performed and information obtained in the breach, what was done with the compromised software and data, and the people involved in planning and orchestrating the breach, which puts voters and future elections at enormous risk,” the filing says.

An exhibit attached to the Monday filing juxtaposes quotes from Latham’s deposition with images pulled from security camera footage that appear to directly contradict her statements.

Latham said that she went to her job as a high school teacher and stopped by the election office briefly that afternoon. But the video image shows her arriving at 11:37 a.m., and time stamps on other images show her there throughout much of the day. She also said she didn’t see specific people and saw others only briefly, but the video images show otherwise.

The lawsuit that includes the fight over Latham’s personal electronic devices was originally filed several years before the 2020 election by individual voters and the Coalition for Good Governance, an election security advocacy group. It alleges that Georgia’s touchscreen voting machines are not secure and seeks to have them replaced by hand-marked paper ballots.

The Monday filing said the plaintiffs have identified multiple documents that Latham failed to produce in response to a previous subpoena. It seeks to have a third party make a temporary forensic copy of her devices and search for responsive documents.

“Liberal news organizations are obsessed with trying to get Republican politicians to commit to accepting the results of the 2022 election before it happens. These ‘gotcha’ questions from liberal outlets are not worth engaging in because all they are trying to do is weave a false narrative,” Republican gubernatorial candidate Geoff Diehl told the Herald in an emailed statement.

A Sunday New York Times story about Republican refusal to accept the results of legitimate elections headlined “Echoing Trump, These Republicans Won’t Promise to Accept 2022 Results” indicated a spokesperson for Diehl replied “no comment” when asked if the former state representative would accept the results of the upcoming election.

Diehl’s Democratic rival, Attorney General Maura Healey, is also quoted in the article, and her campaign on Sunday attacked the “no comment” answer given by Diehl spokesperson Peggy Rose as a sign Diehl would not accept the results of the election.

“The choice in this election could not be more clear. Geoff Diehl is endorsed by Donald Trump and has fully embraced the Trump playbook of lies and division. He repeats Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was rigged and is already laying the groundwork to cast doubt on the results of our election because he knows that voters will reject his efforts to bring Trumpism to Massachusetts,” Healey campaign manager Jason Burrell said.

Diehl told the Herald he isn’t going to put the cart before the horse.

“It is ridiculous and preposterous to ask any candidate — Democrat or Republican — for any public office to blindly accept the results of an election that hasn’t even happened yet and to thereby waive their legal right and responsibility to raise questions and assert challenges if appropriate,” he said.

However, the Whitman Republican said that if he saw no reason not to accept the results, he would.

“If I see problems with the voting process that I believe in good faith cast doubt on its outcome, I intend to call out those problems and seek resolution by means of accepted legal process. Once those means are exhausted, or if there are no such irregularities in the first place, the election is over and its results must be respected according to our democratic tradition,” Diehl said.

“Any insinuation that I would resort to any methods to protest any election outside of legally accepted means and consistent with the rule of law is demeaning, offensive and most of all categorically false,” he said.

Still, according to Diehl, he may have good reason to be concerned about the results of future elections held in Massachusetts.

“I think every American — Democrat and Republican alike — should be concerned about any insufficiency, error or external force that could influence the outcome of an upcoming election. I also have concerns about the future integrity of our election process here in Massachusetts, given Governor Baker’s past statement that issuing driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants in this state ‘significantly increases the risk that noncitizens will be registered to vote,’” he said.

The Legislature, in June, passed the Work and Family Mobility Act over Gov. Charlie Baker’s veto. It will allow those who cannot demonstrate lawful presence in the U.S. to use home country documents to establish their identity and receive driver’s licenses. The state also automatically registers eligible voters upon issuance of a license, which opponents of the law maintain will inevitably result in unauthorized voter registrations and ballot casting.

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren had just finished speaking at an Iowa Democrat caucus in Marshalltown, a working-class city of 27,500 along the Iowa River, about the virtues of cancelling billions in student loan debt.

As she completed her remarks a local man approached and said, “I just want to ask you one question.” Warren nodded.

“My daughter is getting out of school. I saved all my money just to pay student loans. Can I have my money back?”

“Of course not,” Warren curtly replied.

Iowa man: “You’re going to pay for people who didn’t save any money — and those of us that did the right thing are getting screwed.”

Warren: “No, you’re not getting screwed.”

Iowa man: “Of course we are. My buddy had fun, bought a car, went on vacation. I saved my money. He made more than I did. I worked a double shift working to get extra money. My daughter worked since she was 10. You’re laughing at me. That’s exactly what you are doing. We did the right thing, and we get screwed.”

Warren had no reply. But when Joe Biden announced his plan to forgive billions in student loan debt, Warren called it “a great day.”

Of course, the man was getting screwed — no matter what Biden, Elizabeth Warren, Eddie Markey and the rest of the Democrats say.

You play by the rules under Biden, and you get punished. You break the rules, and you are rewarded, whether you are a well to do college graduate who owes borrowed money, or an illegal immigrant.

The student who borrowed money promising to pay it back is rewarded with a $10,000 handout.

The illegal immigrant who breaks the law gets free transportation to New York, a free hotel room, free medical care, free food, a free phone and free schooling for his children.

Everything free in America — except for the Americans who play by the rules. They just pay. Democrats call it equity.

If they were really concerned about equity — or equality — they would at least require those receiving the $10,000 handout to provide some public service in return, like joining the military, or volunteering for community service. Anything.

If nothing else, Biden’s act is a message to future student loan applicants that you can borrow as much as you want and not worry about paying it back. Uncle Joe will pick up the tab.

And as far as the man from Marshalltown is concerned — well, he is screwed, big time, as is everybody else who scraped and save to pay off their college loans.

That will teach you to play by the rules, sucker.

What is interesting about it all is that the people who are turning the country into a handout haven are all millionaires who have been on the public payroll, or the college payroll — which these days amounts to the same thing — for years.

Joe Biden and Eddie Markey, for instance, have never had to work for a living but have been on the government payroll for 50 years each. Once elected to public office, they never left. And they don’t pay for anything.

And Warren, who snaked her way through the academy by falsely claiming to be a Native American, was paid $429,981 by Harvard for the 2010-2011 academic year, as she disclosed when she ran for the Senate in 2012.

Ten thousand dollars is less than loose change to these people. They spent $1.9 trillion on Biden’s American Rescue Plan, another $1.2 trillion for his infrastructure program, or now $500 billion in loan forgiveness.

Not only is the Iowa man getting screwed for paying his student loans, but he will also be doubly screwed when he has to pay new taxes to pay for the student loan write-off of his neighbor.

Peter Lucas is a veteran Massachusetts political reporter and columnist.

“Donald Trump, because of yesterday’s testimony, is going to stand forever in disrepute,” Markey said at a Wednesday press conference. “It is very clear, compellingly clear, that Donald Trump was, in fact, inciting an armed revolution against the Constitutionally-elected new president of the United States.

“He was doing so with full knowledge that his supporters were armed and were headed towards the Capitol with those weapons, and that he knew and did nothing to stop that insurrection,” he added.

Markey said what Trump and his “co-conspirators” in the White House did — in an effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election — was criminal, and whatever steps needed to ensure full accountability should be taken. He characterized Tuesday’s testimony as a “blistering, scalding indictment of Trump and his presidential staff.

Markey’s remarks were made in response to a reporter’s question regarding testimony from former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, who told the House committee investigating the insurrection that Trump rebuffed his own security’s warnings about armed protesters in the Jan. 6 rally and made desperate attempts to join his supporters as they marched to the Capitol.

Hutchinson described an angry president unwilling to concede his election defeat to Democrat Joe Biden, and who refused to intervene even when the crowd was shouting for his vice president, Mike Pence, to be hanged.

Warren said the testimony proved that Trump did not care about the Constitution or the nation, but only cared for himself.

“He was willing and knowingly engaged in activities against the United States,” said Warren. “We need to call this out for the treasonous man that he is. No one wants to believe that anyone who is elected president of the United States would urge an armed insurrection against our nation.

“But yesterday’s testimony was first-hand evidence that that is exactly what Donald Trump did. He should be held accountable.”

WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal agents searched a former top Justice Department official’s home and seized records from key Republicans in at least five states linked to Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election, in what were clear signs that authorities are ramping up their investigation of associates of the former president.

Authorities on Wednesday searched the Virginia home of Jeffrey Clark, who was known at the Justice Department to champion Trump’s false claims of election fraud. Agents in recent days also served subpoenas on the Republican Party chairmen of Arizona, Nevada and Georgia, three states that went for President Joe Biden and where Trump allies created slates of “alternate electors” intended to subvert the vote. And Republicans in two other states — Michigan and Pennsylvania — disclosed they had been interviewed by the FBI.

The Justice Department appears to be escalating its probe of pro-Trump efforts to overturn the 2020 election, which culminated in the deadly Jan. 6 insurrection. The disclosures of law enforcement activity came as the U.S. House committee investigating the riot said it had new evidence of Trump’s efforts and his knowledge that he had no legal basis to try to overturn the election.

The committee’s Thursday hearing focused on Trump’s desire to install Clark atop the Justice Department in his administration’s last days. The reason for the search of Clark’s home was not immediately clear and it was not known what information agents were searching for. The person who confirmed the search was not authorized to discuss it by name and spoke on condition of anonymity.

In an interview Thursday night on Fox News Channel, Clark alleged the timing of the search warrant was “highly politicized” and questioned why his home was searched one day before the congressional hearing.

“It looks highly coincidental and … I just don’t believe in coincidences,” he said.

Both the committee and federal authorities are probing the use of replacements for duly chosen electors in seven battleground states that voted for Biden. Trump and his allies furiously pressured authorities in those states to replace Biden’s electors with ones for him on specious or nonexistent allegations that his victory was stolen.

The committee this week disclosed text messages that showed an aide to U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, a Wisconsin Republican and Trump ally, tried to hand-deliver fake elector certificates to an aide for former Vice President Mike Pence. The texts show Pence’s aide refused to accept the votes.

Johnson told a Wisconsin conservative talk radio host on Thursday that the fake elector slates came from the office of Rep. Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania. A spokesman for Kelly responded that Johnson’s claim was “patently false.”

Said the spokesman, Matt Knoedler, “Mr. Kelly has not spoken to Sen. Johnson for the better part of a decade, and he has no knowledge of the claims Mr. Johnson is making related to the 2020 election.”

Among those who have received subpoenas in recent days, according to a person familiar with the matter who was not authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation, was Georgia Republican Party Chair David Shafer.

Nevada GOP Chair Michael McDonald turned over his phone to federal agents Wednesday when they approached him outside his car in Las Vegas and presented a warrant, according to another person familiar with the matter. McDonald in December 2020 stood outside Nevada’s state capitol with other fake electors to swear a so-called “oath of office,” flanked by men in camouflage with semi-automatic rifles.

Arizona Republican Party Chair Kelli Ward, her husband, Michael Ward, and two other alternate electors also received subpoenas, according to a third person familiar with the matter who was not authorized to discuss it publicly.

In Pennsylvania, FBI agents interviewed the chairman of the Allegheny County Republican Party at his home Thursday and gave him a subpoena for communications between him, Trump electors in the state and members of Trump’s campaign and legal team, the party official, Sam DeMarco, told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

DeMarco said in a statement that his conduct as an elector was “open, above-board and predicated solely on protecting President Trump’s legal rights should he prevail in court. That is why I agreed to serve as an elector solely in the event the president prevailed in his legal challenge to the Pennsylvania vote.”

And in Michigan, Michele Lundgren told the Detroit News that someone from the FBI served her with a subpoena Thursday and that another Trump elector was served on Wednesday. Lundgren, 72, said her discussion with the agent was “long” and “pleasant” and that she let one of the agents go through her phone and computer.

“They kept asking me questions and asking me questions, and I kept telling them answers,” she said.

Clark’s home was searched by federal agents shortly before a committee hearing in which he was the focus. Three other former Justice Department officials testified about an extraordinary Jan. 3, 2021, Oval Office meeting at which Trump contemplated naming Clark — who led the department’s civil division — as acting attorney general in place of Jeffrey Rosen, who resisted Trump’s efforts to involve the agency.

Trump relented only when other senior Justice Department officials warned Trump that they would resign if he followed through with his plan to replace Rosen with Clark.

A lawyer for Clark did not return an email and phone message seeking comment.

Chairman Bennie Thompson said he read about the raid on Clark’s home moments before the hearing started. “We’re not privy to what the Department of Justice’s reasoning is for doing it,” he said. “As you know, we demonstrated that he was recommended to lead the Department of Justice and people felt that he was absolutely unqualified to do so.”

Russ Vought, president of the Center for Renewing America, which Clark recently joined as a senior fellow, tweeted that federal officers forced Clark “into the streets” while he was wearing pajamas and “took his electronic devices.”

“All because Jeff saw fit to investigate voter fraud,” Vought continued. “This is not America, folks. The weaponization of govt must end. Let me be very clear. We stand by Jeff and so must all patriots in this country.”

____

Associated Press writers Scott Bauer in Madison, Wisconsin, Sara Burnett in Chicago, Marc Levy in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Sam Metz in Salt Lake City, Utah, and Michelle L. Price in New York contributed to this report.

__

For full coverage of the Jan. 6 hearings, go to https://www.apnews.com/capitol-siege.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The House 1/6 committee heard chilling, tearful testimony Tuesday that Donald Trump’s relentless pressure to overturn the 2020 presidential election provoked widespread threats to the “backbone of our democracy”— election workers and local officials who fended off the defeated president’s demands despite personal risks.

The panel investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack at the U.S. Capitol focused on Trump’s efforts to undo Joe Biden’s victory in a most local way — by repeatedly leaning on public officials in key battleground states with shocking proposals to reject ballots outright or to submit alternative electors for the final tally in Congress.

The high-profile pressure, described as potentially illegal, was fueled by the president’s false claims of voter fraud — which, the panel says, spread dangerously in the states and ultimately led directly to the deadly insurrection at the Capitol.

“A handful of election officials in several key states stood between Donald Trump and the upending of American democracy,” Chairman Bennie Thompson said, praising them as heroes and the “backbone of our democracy.”

The hearing was punctuated throughout with accounts of the personal attacks faced by state and local officials.

Arizona Republican House Speaker Rusty Bowers said he was subjected to a public smear campaign, including relentless bullhorn protests at his home and a pistol-wielding man taunting his family and neighbors.

Officials in Michigan, Pennsylvania and other states told similar stories of having their cellphone numbers and home addresses spread publicly after they refused Trump’s demands.

At one gripping moment, two Georgia election workers, a mother and daughter, testified that they lived in fear of saying their names aloud after Trump wrongly accused them of voter fraud.

“There were a lot of threats wishing death upon me,” said Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss, a former state election worker.

The public hearing, the fourth by the panel this month, stemmed from its yearlong investigation into Trump’s unprecedented attempt to remain in power, a sprawling scheme that the chairman of the Jan. 6 committee has likened to an “attempted coup.” The panel insisted that Trump’s lies over the election threaten democracy to this day, as local officials face ongoing threats and challengers try to take over their jobs.

The committee’s vice chair, Republican Rep. Liz Cheney, implored Americans to pay attention to the evidence being presented, declaring, “We cannot let America become a nation of conspiracy theories and thug violence.”

One key witness was Republican Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who testified about Trump’s phone call asking him to “find 11,780” votes that could flip his state to prevent Biden’s election victory.

While the committee cannot charge Trump with any crimes, the Justice Department is watching the panel’s work closely.

Trump defended himself on social media, describing his phone call to Raffensperger as “perfect,” similar to the way he described the 2020 call with Ukraine President Volodomyr Zelenskyy that resulted in his first impeachment.

The public testimony from Raffensperger came weeks after he appeared before a special grand jury in Georgia investigating whether Trump and others illegally tried to intervene in the state’s 2020 election. Raffensperger beat a Trump-backed challenger in last month’s primary election.

He and Gabe Sterling, his chief operations officer, detailed their painstaking efforts to count the Georgia vote, going down the “rabbit hole,” he said, investigating one false claim after another of fraud. After a hand recount of 5 million ballots, Biden’s victory was unchanged.

“The numbers don’t lie,” said Raffensperger, who said that some 28,000 Georgia voters simply bypassed the presidential race but voted down-ballot for others. “At the end of the day, President Trump came up short.”

Bowers, the Arizona House speaker who also appeared in person, walked through what started with a Trump phone call on a Sunday after he returned from church. The defeated president laid out a proposal to have the state replace its electors for Biden with others favoring Trump.

“I said, ‘Look, you’re asking me to do something that is counter to my oath,’” Bowers testified.

Bowers insisted on seeing Trump’s evidence of voter fraud, which he said Trump’s team never produced beyond vague allegations. He recalled Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani later told him, “We’ve got lots of theories, we just don’t have the evidence.”

Trump wanted Bowers to hold a hearing at the state Capitol, but the Republican leader said there was already a “circus” atmosphere over the election. The panel showed video footage of protesters at the Arizona statehouse including a key figure, the horned hat-wearing Jacob Chansley, who was later arrested at the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

Trump nevertheless pressed the Arizona official, including in a follow-up call, suggesting he expected a better response from a fellow Republican.

But Bowers said that because of his faith, including a belief the U.S. Constitution is divinely inspired, what the president was asking him to do was “foreign to my very being.”

Bowers called Trump’s effort a “tragic parody.”

With in-person testimony, Moss, who had worked for Georgia’s Fulton County elections department since 2012, and her mother, Ruby Freeman, a temporary election worker who spoke earlier to the panel, gripped the audience with their accounts of the fallout from the smear campaign by Trump and Giuliani.

“Do you know how it feels to have the president of the United States target you?” Freeman testified. “The president of the United States is supposed to represent every American, not to target one. But he targeted me.”

The select committee outlined Trump’s elaborate “fake electors” scheme that sought to have representatives in as many as seven battlegrounds — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Nevada and New Mexico — state that he, not Biden, had won their states.

Several Republicans in Congress latched onto the scheme in the run-up to Jan. 6.

The committee displayed a text message from an aide to Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., to an aide for Vice President Mike Pence the morning of Jan. 6 saying Johnson wanted to give Pence an “alternate slate of electors for MI and WI.”

“Do not give that to him,” Pence aide Chris Hodgson replied. And Johnson didn’t, a spokeswoman said Tuesday.

Conservative law professor John Eastman, a lawyer for Trump, pushed the fake electors in the weeks after the election. The idea was to set up a challenge to Biden’s win when Congress met on Jan. 6 with Pence presiding in what is typically a ceremonial role to certify the election. Trump sent thousands of his supporters to the Capitol to “fight like hell,” as he pressured Pence to reject the ballots. The effort ultimately collapsed amid the deadly riot, as Pence refused Trump’s demands that he reject the electors.

___

Associated Press writers Mary Clare Jalonick in Washington and Bob Christie in Phoenix contributed to this report.

Brnovich is a Republican and a U.S. Senate candidate, so his report held much promise for finally justifying Trump’s claims. Indeed, Arizona Republican party Chairman Kelli Ward jubilantly tweeted that Brnovich “has determined widespread FRAUD in the Maricopa County 2020 election.” (emphasis hers).

Well, it depends on what one means by “widespread.” Writing in the Arizona Republic, Laurie Roberts uncovered that the report actually revealed a total fraud of only nine votes — mostly outside Maricopa County. That’s NINE votes out of 3.4 MILLION votes cast statewide (emphasis mine). For the record, Trump lost Arizona by considerably more than nine votes (actually by about 10.5K).

Trump charges that Biden won the state because his vote total was corruptly augmented by the addition of thousands of counterfeit votes — from illegal immigrants and faked ballots. But even before the attorney general’s report, this claim never held together in view of the election results.

Here’s why. In Arizona in 2020, at the same time as the presidential election, there was a U.S. Senate race — about which there have been no claims of voter impropriety. The result was that Democrat Mark Kelly defeated incumbent Republican Martha McSally.

But in that race, Kelly got 44K more votes than Biden. This shows there were enough legitimate Democrat votes cast that one doesn’t have to claim illicitly manufactured ballots to explain Biden’s vote total.

Additionally, 2020 was a census year, which means it is being used for redistricting congressional seats until 2030 — with important implications for control of Congress. Redistricting is controlled by the state legislatures, and the Democrats spent a lot of money in 2020 trying to flip legislatures in several states, including Arizona. They failed. The 2020 election results gave Republicans continued control of both houses of the Arizona legislature.

If enough allegedly fabricated or invented Biden ballots had also gone for Democrats down-ballot, Arizona could have had different outcomes in the state legislature — significantly benefiting the Democrats. It defies credulity that the putative election riggers, supposedly seasoned and nefarious-minded Democrat operatives, overlooked or failed to include this in their vote manipulation strategy. The idea that all those allegedly faked ballots were bulleted for Biden makes no sense. In fact, single-vote ballots are inherently more suspicious than fully filled-out ones.

Nonetheless, Trump and his followers continue to claim an election steal. And some Republicans elected to the Arizona state legislature also still support that claim, although, unsurprisingly, none of them question the legitimacy of their own winning vote totals.

So, we’re left with the conclusion that the “conspirators” were inept bumblers and arithmetically feeble when it came to knowing how many ballots to “manufacture” for legislative election victories. But at the presidential level, they were super-savvy and able enough to pull off what Trump proclaims is the greatest electoral heist in the history of the world — stealing from Trump his self-described “landslide” win.

The conspiracy theory of Arizona’s “stolen” election falls apart at several levels, as does the extended conspiracy at the national level. But the “stolen election” credo has become an article of faith for Trump and his true believers. Unable to accept the reality that Trump lost because he was flat-out rejected by the majority of Americans, they believe because they want to believe.

Avi Nelson is a Boston-based political analyst and talk-show host.

That phrase — strange new respect — was coined 30 years ago to describe the odd, desperate compulsion some Republican politicians have to win accolades from left-wing Democrats who despise them.

These Republicans apparently seek nothing more than to pick up a Democrat tract that nobody reads any more and see themselves described as — pick a word, evolving or growing or mature or thoughtful. Maybe even be compared to … Mitt Romney.

The strange new respect never lasts. Just ask Rep. Fred Upton — a 36-year House veteran from Michigan. He voted to impeach Trump last year. He just announced his retirement from politics due to ill health — the voters got sick of him.

That makes four out of 10 of the House Republicans who voted for impeachment who have now evolved and grown and matured themselves out of office. But they have one consolation in their impending unemployment — a file folder full of clippings about the strange new respect they briefly got from Democrats.

In case you missed it, Sununu flew down to D.C. on Saturday and put on the Republican version of a minstrel show for an audience of more than 600 millionaires known as the Gridiron Club. That’s a group of “journalists,” i.e., Democrat operatives with press passes.

Sununu wowed the SRO crowd by sneering that ex-President Trump is “bleeping crazy,” after which he added that if POTUS were in a mental institution “he ain’t getting out.”

Needless to say, the “high-society” crowd, as Politico described them, swooned over Sununu’s knee-slappers.

In fact, the slobbering Democrat sheet said that Sununu “stole the show … by saying out loud what most Republicans in Washington ‘privately’ whisper about Donald Trump.”

In other words, he reinforced the Ivy League trust-funders’ own fondest fantasies.

Here are some of the other headlines Sununu garnered from his new fans in state-run media:

The Washington Post: “Chris Sununu goes there on Trump.”

The Hill: “Sununu mocks Trump’s sanity at Gridiron dinner.”

The Guardian: “Republican governor blasts Trump as ‘crazy’ during a Washington roast.”

See what I mean about that strange new respect?

Sununu came on my show Monday to discuss his excellent adventure. He basically said it was all a joke, and that I and everybody else who’s complaining were just “grumpy” and taking it all too seriously, because it was all in good fun.

I asked him how many non-Democrats were in the bipartisan crowd of “journalists,” and he said he had noticed “a few Republican elected officials.”

I asked him to name five. He didn’t answer. I asked him to name one other Republican in the room. He again couldn’t.

But he could rattle off the names of assorted Democrats in the house: Jen Psaki, John Forbes Kerry, Dr. Anthony Fauci. In other words, it was all Beltway banditos.

One of Sununu’s coat holders described the jokes as “self-deprecating.” A typical one-liner involved Mike Lindell of My Pillow, who I admit is a sponsor of my show. Mike Lindell is a big Trump guy, and Sununu is apparently an expert on My Pillow.

“His stuff is crap,” Sununu told the Democrats. “I mean, it’s absolute crap.”

I asked Sununu if he owned any My Pillow products.

“I don’t think I own any of his products.”

But they’re crap — he’s sure about that. Because Lindell likes Trump, his products must be crap. That’s the kind of self-deprecating humor that works when you’re seeking that strange new respect. Sununu continued tossing off bon mots about My Pillow.

“You only find that kind of stuff in the Trump Hotel,” he said.

So I asked the governor if he’s ever stayed in one of Trump’s hotels.

“I cannot afford a Trump hotel,” he said.

I asked Sununu about a hypothetical referendum among New Hampshire Republicans between him and the guy who’s bleepin’ crazy, Donald Trump. Who did he think would win such a popularity contest?

“I don’t know and I don’t care.”

Here’s how Sununu was picked for this moment of strange new respect. He decided not to run against Sen. Maggie Hassan, the wretched incumbent who wouldn’t even be in office if then-Sen. Kelly Ayotte hadn’t deserted Trump in the final days of the 2016 election.

Landslide Maggie, buoyed by thousands upon thousands of same-day registrations by out-of-state man buns and snowflakes in the college towns, defeated Ayotte by 1,017 votes.

In the early polls this year, Sununu was running ahead of Hassan. But he demurred, seeking instead yet another two-year term as governor.

Chuck Schumer breathed an enormous sigh of relief. The Gridiron Club invitation was soon in the mail.

Seriously, Chris, do you think that you would be the toast of the town — Georgetown — if you were threatening in any way to impede the Democrats’ campaign to fundamentally transform America into a Third World hellhole?

That’s why your voters are infuriated. You went down there to comfort the comfortable, and afflict the afflicted. You let them kiss your rear end, and you loved it.

If you were running against Hassan, all those grandees at the Renaissance Hotel Saturday night would be claiming you weren’t paying taxes, or that you were driving around with your dog in a crate on the roof of your car.

Wouldn’t matter if you have a dog or not, they’d just make it up. That’s what fake news is all about, and that’s what the Gridiron Club epitomizes.

Strange new respect? It’s a great thing, until it isn’t. Just ask Rep. Fred Upton, Chris.

“What’s interesting is that no political candidate has captured a majority of any political party,” Paul Craney of the Fiscal Alliance Foundation said Wednesday. “But it’s very clear from this to me at least that (candidate Geoff) Diehl and Healey seem to be the candidates that people are paying the most attention to at this point.”

Healey came out on top among both Democrats and Republicans in the race, taking 29.2% of the support, according to a new poll of 750 likely voters commissioned by the Fiscal Alliance and Advantage Inc.

Former state Rep. Geoff Diehl, who is endorsed by former President Donald Trump, captured 13.5% of total support, but more than 52% of voters surveyed said they still did not know who they would vote for if the election were held today.

Rather than ask voters who they would support in the upcoming party primaries, the survey asked voters to rank support for the full spectrum of candidates. Among Democrats, Healey does even better, capturing 46% of support compared to 1.9% for state Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz.

Just over 46% of Democratic voters have yet to settle on a candidate, the poll revealed. More than 12% of Republicans and 23% of unenrolled voters also picked Healey.

Diehl’s lead over opponent Chris Doughty, a Wrentham businessman and political newcomer, is 27% to 2.5%.

Poll numbers surveying support for a so-called “millionaire tax” proposal were “pretty damaging for the proponents,” Craney said.

The proposed constitutional amendment going before voters in November would add a 4% surcharge on all income tax over $1 million, taxing it at a total of 9%.

But rather than lay out the numbers, Mass Fiscal chose to characterize the tax only as an increase on “some high-income earners and middle-class small businesses.” More than 37% of voters “strongly oppose” the question, according to the poll.

But supporters of the wealth tax that would generate an estimated $1.3 billion annually called the Mass Fiscal poll “just another smoke screen from the secretive, extremist group” and pointed to three separate polls from the last year that showed high support for hiking taxes on the wealthy.

Asked why the poll didn’t lay out the details of the proposal, pollster Jim Eltringham of Washington-based Advantage Inc. said, “there’s a fair amount of connotation when you start talking about it as a millionaire’s tax and you start talking conjuring up images of people in top hats and monocles so we didn’t want to talk about it in terms of that number.”

Did we miss something? Is President Bernie Sanders or President Elizabeth Warren in office?

You’d think so considering how Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s “Squad” and Sanders and leading liberals activists are approaching the stalemate over Democrats’ $3.5 trillion social spending overhaul and a $1.2 trillion public works package.

Here’s what the deluded and power hungry Sanders said on Sunday about the massively expensive “reconciliation” spending bill now clogged up in Congress.

“Maybe the time is now for us to stand up to powerful special interests who are currently spending hundreds of millions of dollars trying to prevent us from doing what the American people want,” he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Really? Is that what the American people really wanted when they voted to crush you and Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s presidential campaigns last year?

Here’s a little reminder. Democratic voters overwhelmingly chose the moderate Joe Biden over Sanders and Warren. They voted for centrist compromise — not threats and gridlock.

In a meeting with members of Congress last week, Biden reportedly dialed down the social spending package to about $2 trillion — which Sanders strongly denied.

“That is not my understanding of what (Biden) said,” Sanders insisted.

Of course not. Because you’re always right, Bernie. That’s why you won the nomination.

Sanders and some of his cohorts, who are now holding up the $1 trillion infrastructure bill, just don’t get the whole, “moderates” thing. They don’t realize that there are tens of millions of them around the country.

In fact liberals dislike moderates so much that they want to purge them from the lexicon.

First, liberals got the mainstream media to get rid of the word “liberals” because it was being weaponized by the opposition. So the media limply went along and started referring to them as “progressives” — a much more positive sounding word.

Now “progressive” groups are complaining that the media should stop calling Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., “moderates” — they want to use the term “conservative” Democrats. And there is a move afoot to slime and shame them. Sinema is reduced to a buffoonish “Saturday Night Live” caricature.

The truth is that Manchin and Sinema are centrists who are ostracized because they’re not part of the cool “progressive” kids who want to spend $3.5 trillion on global warming initiatives and social safety net programs.

They are so uncool they don’t get to wear “tax the rich” gowns at lavish events filled with rich people.

But Manchin and Sinema have one thing that Sanders craves and doesn’t have — the support of most of the American people.

Three dozen groups filed the various petition initiatives with Attorney General Maura Healey’s office by the end-of-day deadline Wednesday, kicking off a months-long process that will determine which of the proposals go before voters next year. Two proposed constitutional amendments were also filed.

A petition filed Wednesday by state Rep. David DeCoste would bar restriction or reduction of gas, something the Transportation Climate Initiative aims to do in order to reach its goal of reducing carbon emissions by 26% by 2032.

Paul D. Craney, of Mass Fiscal Alliance, said the ballot question would let “the people who will be on the hook for this get the final say.” Gov. Charlie Baker, who backs TCI, has solely decided to involve the state.

Fresh off a trip to Washington where she joined hundreds of federal and state lawmakers and voting rights advocates from across the nation, state Sen. Becca Rausch called a MassGOP-backed plan to require voters to present identification at the polls “voter suppression.”

“We are certainly not in as dire straits as other states in the nation, but we are not immune to this wave of efforts to rig the vote by excluding people from being able to actually cast their ballots,” Rausch said.

National polls have found 81% of voters and 62% of Democrats back voter ID laws.

Another question asks voters to once again allow “happy hour” drink specials that have been banned since 1984.

Other potential ballot questions include one backed by big-tech that would classify app-based gig workers like those that drive for Uber, Lyft, GrubHub and others as independent contractors.

The attorney general’s office will review each initiative petition to determine if they meet necessary constitutional requirements. Certified petitions will be listed by Sept. 1, at which time supporters will then need to collect signatures from 80,239 registered voters and file them with local elections officials by Nov. 17.

At least one question is ready to be put in ink: A so-called “millionaire tax” constitutional amendment that would impose a 4% additional income tax on income of more than $1 million.

NEW YORK (AP) — An appeals court suspended Rudy Giuliani from practicing law in New York on Thursday because he made false statements while trying to get courts to overturn Donald Trump’s loss in the presidential race.

An attorney disciplinary committee had asked the court to suspend Giuliani’s license on the grounds that he’d violated professional conduct rules as he promoted theories that the election was stolen through fraud.

The court agreed and said suspension should be immediate, even though disciplinary proceedings aren’t yet complete, because there was an “immediate threat” to the public.

“The seriousness of respondent’s uncontroverted misconduct cannot be overstated,” the court wrote. “This country is being torn apart by continued attacks on the legitimacy of the 2020 election and of our current president, Joseph R. Biden.”

Trump called the suspension a politically motivated “witch hunt,” while Giuliani said it was a “disgrace” on his afternoon radio show. The court’s opinion, Giuliani said, was based on hearsay and “could have been written by the Democratic National Committee.”

“The bar association should give me an award,” the Republican told listeners on WABC-AM. “I defended an unpopular client. I’ve been threatened with death. I’ve had a good deal of my income taken away. I’ve lost friends over it.”

“This is happening to shut me up,” he added. “They want Giuliani quiet.”

The court held that Giuliani, as a lawyer for Trump, “communicated demonstrably false and misleading statements to courts, lawmakers and the public at large.”

Giuliani, a former New York City mayor and U.S. attorney in Manhattan, claimed the investigation violated his First Amendment right to free speech and that he did not knowingly make false statements.

The court rejected those arguments, noting that in Pennsylvania, Giuliani failed to “provide a scintilla of evidence for any of the varying and wildly inconsistent numbers of dead people he factually represented voted in Philadelphia during the 2020 presidential election.”

“False statements intended to foment a loss of confidence in our elections and resulting loss of confidence in government generally damage the proper functioning of a free society,” the court wrote.

Interim suspensions are often a precursor to disbarment but are typically “reserved for lawyers convicted of a crime,” said Bruce Green, a former federal prosecutor who directs the Louis Stein Center for Law and Ethics at the Fordham University School of Law. “It’s rarely done in cases involving lying lawyers.”

Still, Giuliani will be allowed to fight the suspension and even call witnesses as part of his challenge — a process that could take months to play out — and Giuliani’s attorneys said they expect him to be reinstated “once the issues are fully explored at a hearing.”

“He gets another day in court,” Green said.

The ruling prevents Giuliani from representing clients as a lawyer, but it could have limited practical impact. Before pleading Trump’s case in November, the former mob prosecutor had not appeared in court as an attorney since 1992, according to court records.

Giuliani was the primary mouthpiece for Trump’s false claims of election fraud after the 2020 vote, standing at a press conference in front of Four Seasons Total Landscaping outside Philadelphia on the day the race was called for Biden and saying they would challenge what he claimed was a vast conspiracy by Democrats.

Lies around the election results helped push an angry mob of pro-Trump rioters to storm the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 in an effort to stop the certification of President Biden’s victory. Since that time, Republicans have used that lie to push stricter voting laws nationwide.

The suspension comes as Giuliani is under scrutiny by federal prosecutors over his interactions with figures in Ukraine while he was trying to get that country to launch an investigation of Biden’s son.

Federal agents raided Giuliani’s home and office in April, taking electronic devices including phones and computers.

The investigation includes an examination of whether Giuliani was required to register as a foreign agent in the U.S. Some of the Ukrainian figures Giuliani was worked with were also interested in getting his help lobbying the Trump administration.

Giuliani has said he is innocent of any wrongdoing and that the investigations are politically motivated.

Giuliani could also face consequences in Georgia, where he made statements to legislative committees casting doubt on the legitimacy of that state’s election that are cited in the New York court’s decision.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has opened a criminal investigation into potential attempts to influence the 2020 election in Georgia, including looking into “the making of false statements to state and local governmental bodies.”

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican who has come under attack from Trump and his allies for not taking steps to overturn the former president’s loss in the state, saw vindication in the New York court’s decision.

“The judges recognized that the baseless conspiracy theories Giuliani repeated were not true and punished him for spreading lies, particularly about Georgia’s election,” he said Thursday.

The suspension won’t affect Giuliani’s ability to act as a lobbyist or do security consulting, but will likely will prevent him from practicing law in jurisdictions even beyond New York, said David S. Weinstein, a former federal prosecutor.

Giuliani would be obligated to tell other states about the suspension, he said, which “in all likelihood will cause them to say, ‘You won’t be able to practice here.’”

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This story has been updated to correct the attribution on the decision. It was made by the court, not the attorney disciplinary committee.

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Associated Press writers Kate Brumback in Atlanta, Michael Hill in Albany, New York, and Michael Balsamo in Washington contributed to this report.

“They didn’t count lawfully cast ballots. The system is absolutely broken, and this is the evidence. Every single member of that commission should resign immediately. Election integrity in the city of Boston is a failure,” Lyons said.

The Boston Board of Election Commissioners on Saturday conducted a recount of the race for the committee seat for the Second Suffolk District.

In the process, they found a four-fold increase in write-in ballots and came up with a result at odds with the party’s appointment to the seat.

With the recount results now in, it’s up to a judge to straighten things out.

“What does it say about the Boston Election Department that a year after certifying just 40 write-in votes spread across three candidates, today they somehow managed to ‘find’ 167 votes? This is an indication that the Boston Board of Election Commissioners is either completely incompetent, in the pocket of the Democrat Party machine, or both,”  Lyons said.

Three write-in candidates vied for the position in the March 3, 2020, election. In the initial count of 40 write-in ballots Nicaela Chinnaswamy got 25 votes; Rachel Virginia Kemp got nine; and Eleanor C. Greene got six, according to boston.gov figures. None of the candidates surpassed the 50-vote threshold to win.

On March 4, 2020, Associate Justice David  A. Deakin ordered a recount, which was supposed to be conducted within 30 days. It’s unclear why that did not happen, though the order came at the height of the pandemic.

With no one elected, the state committee held a caucus last December, nominating Greene to the position and ratifying her status the following month.

But in Saturday’s recount, election officials certified 65 votes for Chinnaswamy, 52 votes for Kemp, and 50 votes for Greene, for a total of 167 votes — a sum Lyons pointed out is “four times” higher.

“How can they miss 75% of the ballots in a very small race? It raises questions — do the Democrats control the whole election division for the Democrats? It’s outrageous,” Lyons said.

“And yet Democrats on Beacon Hill want to ram through mail-in voting? Please,” Lyons said.

Boston election officials could not immediately be reached for comment on Sunday.

With the results in, it’s now up to the courts to decide what happens next.

A new Pew Research Center survey — conducted after the Capitol siege but before Trump’s second impeachment — showed that 40% of Trump voters say he “definitely” won the 2020 presidential election and 36% say he “probably” won, despite courts rejecting his claims of widespread voter fraud.

Just 7% of Trump voters said Joe Biden, who has been certified as the winner and who will be sworn in as the 46th president on Wednesday, “definitely” won the election, while 15% said he “probably won it.” Overall, 34% of voters say Trump definitely or probably won the election.

Trump’s approval rating tumbled to just 29% in the Pew survey days after a violent mob laid siege to the Capitol, shattering windows, ransacking rooms and sending lawmakers fleeing for their lives.

Trump’s job approval had previously remained “more stable than those of his predecessors” — hovering between 36% and 45%, Pew researchers said. But his support has waned among Republicans, dropping to 60% now from 77% in August.

Three-quarters of Pew respondents said Trump “bears at least some responsibility” for the Capitol violence — with 52% saying he bears “a lot” of responsibility, 23% saying “some” responsibility and 24% saying none at all. The U.S. House impeached Trump for “incitement of insurrection” in a bipartisan vote the day after the Pew survey concluded.

More than two-thirds of Pew survey respondents said Trump should not continue to be a major national political figure after he leaves office next week.

In a Quinnipiac University poll this week, 56% of voters said they held Trump responsible for the storming of the Capitol. Trump had a 33% job approval rating in that survey, down from 44% in December.

A Washington Post-ABC News poll showed 38% of Americans approved of Trump’s handling of the presidency — his lowest approval rating in that survey since fall 2019. Just over 70% of respondents felt that Trump bears “at least some” responsibility for the Capitol attack, while 28% said he bears none at all.

The court rejected pleas for quick consideration of cases involving the outcome in five states won by President-elect Joe Biden: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

The orders, issued without comment, were unsurprising. The justices had previously taken no action in those cases in advance of last week’s counting of the electoral votes in Congress, which confirmed Biden’s victory.

The court still could act on appeals related to the Nov. 3 election later this winter or in the spring. Several justices had expressed interest in a Pennsylvania case involving the state Supreme Court’s decision to extend the deadline for receipt of mailed ballots by three days, over the opposition of the Republican-controlled legislature.

But even if the court were to take up an election-related case, it probably wouldn’t hear arguments until the fall.

But Biden on Thursday wouldn’t address whether Trump — with 13 days left in his term — should be immediately removed from office as calls grow for the president’s removal via the 25th Amendment. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday called for the 25th Amendment to be invoked against Trump.

“For the past four years we’ve had a president who has made his contempt for our democracy, our Constitution, and the rule of law clear in everything he has done,” Biden said in Delaware, when announcing his picks for the Department of Justice leadership.

Trump for the last two months has claimed over and over again that the election was stolen from him and that there was widespread voter fraud. There is no evidence for these claims, and courts across the country have repeatedly ruled that these allegations are without merit.

On Wednesday, the House and Senate were meeting in a joint session to count the Electoral College votes that cemented Biden’s 306-232 victory when the pro-Trump mob breached the Capitol, plunging the proceedings into chaos and sending lawmakers scurrying for shelter.

“Inciting a mob to attack the Capitol, to threaten the elected representatives of the people of this nation and even the Vice President, to stop the Congress from ratifying the will of the American people in a just-completed free and fair election,” Biden said of Trump.

“Trying to use a mob to silence the voices of nearly 160 million Americans who summoned the courage in the face of a pandemic that threatened their health and their lives to cast that sacred ballot,” Biden added.

Biden on Thursday introduced nominees for the Department of Justice, including Judge Merrick Garland for attorney general; Lisa Monaco for deputy attorney general; and Vanita Gupta for associate attorney general.

Monaco in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombings coordinated the federal government’s response with local and state law enforcement to “get to the bottom of this horrible tragedy,” Biden said. Under President Barack Obama, Monaco was the White House Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Advisor.

The request for an FBI probe came as Trump planned to speak at a Georgia rally Monday night ahead of the crucial Senate runoff elections — as the majority in the Senate hangs in the balance.

On Sunday, a taped call between Trump and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger revealed the president pressured the election official to “find” 11,780 votes to help swing the election his way against President-elect Joe Biden.

Following that bombshell audio, House Democrats are calling for FBI Director Christopher Wray to open a criminal investigation into Trump.

California Congressman Ted Lieu and New York Congresswoman Kathleen Rice on Monday wrote a letter to the FBI director, alleging that Trump “engaged in solicitation of, or conspiracy to commit, a number of election crimes.”

“We ask you to open an immediate criminal investigation into the President,” they wrote.

Lieu tweeted about the criminal referral to the FBI, writing, “As former prosecutors, @RepKathleenRice and I believe @realDonaldTrump committed multiple crimes during the phone call in which he threatened GA SoS Raffensperger to ‘find 11,780’ votes or to ‘recalculate.’ Today we made a criminal referral to the @FBI.”

More than 100 Republican congressmen and at least a dozen GOP senators have vowed to challenge electoral votes in key states where they continue to push unconfirmed claims of voter fraud.

Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker on Monday slammed ongoing efforts by some of his fellow Republicans — including Trump — to overturn the presidential election.

“President-elect Joe Biden won the election fair and square,” Baker said at a press conference, later adding, “I think the noise and accusations and commentary about challenging this or that is an affront to democracy and to the voice of the people. It is my hope that these initiatives fail.”

“I can’t for the life of me figure out how people in my party can say all the elections in which their folks won are fine, but the only one they seem to have any concerns about are at the top of the ticket,” the governor said.

Congress convenes in a joint session on Wednesday to confirm Biden’s 306-232 Electoral College win.

Herald wire services were used in this report.

The bombshell call between Trump and Georgia’s secretary of state, Republican Brad Raffensperger, was the president’s latest unprecedented step in attempting to overturn the Nov. 3 election that Biden won with 306 Electoral College votes to Trump’s 232. Congress is due to meet Wednesday in a joint session to confirm Biden’s victory.

During the Saturday phone call, Trump told Raffensperger, “All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state.”

Biden won the state by 11,779 votes.

The audio of the call was first posted by The Washington Post. The Associated Press then obtained a recording.

Before the audio emerged Sunday, Trump tweeted, “I spoke to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger yesterday about Fulton County and voter fraud in Georgia. He was unwilling, or unable, to answer questions such as the ‘ballots under table’ scam, ballot destruction, out of state ‘voters’, dead voters, and more. He has no clue!”

Twitter flagged the tweet, saying the claims about election fraud is disputed.

Raffensperger tweeted in response, “Respectfully, President Trump: What you’re saying is not true. The truth will come out.”

Biden senior adviser Bob Bauer called Trump’s call “irrefutable proof of a president pressuring and threatening an official of his own party to get him to rescind a state’s lawful, certified vote count and fabricate another in its place.”

Meanwhile, the Republican congressional effort to overturn Biden’s win was met with pushback on Sunday from GOP colleagues on Capitol Hill.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, frequently a staunch supporter of Trump, called the party’s Electoral College challenge this week a “political dodge.” Republican Sen. Ted Cruz and a coalition of 11 senators, along with up to 100 members of the House are planning to object to certification of the Electoral College on Wednesday, proposing instead an election commission.

In response, Graham tweeted, “Proposing a commission at this late date — which has zero chance of becoming reality — is not effectively fighting for President Trump. It appears to be more of a political dodge than an effective remedy.”

Graham also tweeted, “I do look forward to hearing from and will listen closely to the objections of my colleagues in challenging the results of this election. They will need to provide proof of the charges they are making … . My colleagues will have the opportunity to make this case, and I will listen closely. But they have a high bar to clear.”

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has warned Republicans off such challenges but said little when asked about it at the Capitol as the Senate opened Sunday.

“We’ll be dealing with all of that on Wednesday,” he said.

Herald wire services were used in this report.

The author of the “Left Hand of Darkness” and so many more is right. Herald readers give us life. You push us to dig deeper and tell it like it is. As one of our old billboards once read, “If you want it sugar coated, buy a donut.”

Here’s what you read the most in 2020, based on page views. It’s an inexact metric, but I think you’ll see a trend: your favorites aren’t glazed, frosted or sprinkled with jimmies:

1.) Tom Brady-Bill Belichick phone call ‘didn’t go well’: The coach and the QB have finally spoken, Herald NFL columnist Karen Guregian reported in early March. Their conversation about Brady’s pending free agency “didn’t go well,” per a source. I’d say.

2.) Vitamin D can help reduce coronavirus risk by 54%: BU doctor says: This one is still soaring. Our health reporter Alexi Cohan dug up this medical self-help bulletin. We all want to avoid COVID-19 like the plague, isn’t that the truth. This doc swears by vitamin D.

3.) Coronavirus masks: What’s the difference between N95 and KN95?: Another example of the Herald digging for answers when you need them fast. Multimedia reporter Meghan Ottolini has the answer. (Hint: N95s are better, but I’d take either one.)

4.) Patriots trade Rob Gronkowski to Buccaneers for 4th-round pick: Let’s be honest — Brady and Gronk is synonymous with John and Yoko, Meghan and Harry, Beyonce and Jay Z. The Bucs made the playoffs, the Patriots didn’t. Here Karen Guregian had the scoop, again.

5.) Herald editorials hit a nerve: Disinformation from Adam Schiff and the media damaged America (Russian collusion) and Herald endorses President Trump both filled up our inbox.

6.) Nor’easter could slam Massachusetts, dumping more than a foot: Nothing like a December blizzard during a pandemic to get some attention. Reporter Rick Sobey warned an unseasonably balmy weekend would soon be flipped.

7.) When will we find out the presidential election results?: Election Day turned into Election Week then Election Month and reporters Lisa Kashinsky and Sean Philip Cotter had it covered. It’s not official until this Wednesday, Jan. 6.

8.) UMass Boston student first confirmed case of coronavirus in Massachusetts: I wish I never had to co-write this one. But a student back from Wuhan, China, came down with coronavirus. That was Feb. 1. You know the rest.

9.) Columnist Howie Carr’s one-two punch: Howie hit on two viral columns on how Joe Biden continues to lose his notes and mind, and Charlie Baker can’t admit he blew it over deaths at nursing homes.

10). NASA: Massive asteroid close call due Saturday, but won’t be hitting Earth: If it was going to happen, this would have been the year. Reporter Sean Philip Cotter got our attention with this one.

11.) Trust the man, Joe Biden is going to beat Joe Biden: Howie Carr strikes again with these: Live, from the basement, it’s Joe Biden and It’s a crime you haven’t heard about Hunter Biden.

12.) Charlie Baker issues Massachusetts stay-at-home advisory, business curfews, mask mandate: Our new normal and reporter Erin Tiernan had it covered.

13.) Sick passenger taken off Beijing-Boston flight at Logan Airport, refuses transport: I co-authored this Jan. 29. If only we could go back in time.

14.) 14 states side with New Hampshire in tax suit against Massachusetts: Wait until taxes are due. Reporter Sean Philip Cotter has the early warning.

15.) Could Tom Brady and Jimmy Garoppolo trade places? Don’t discount the 49ers buzz: It fizzled, but Karen Guregian had fun with this anyway.

16.) President Trump ordered the strike, and came down to dinner cool, collected: Scenes from Mar-a-Lago by Howie Carr.

17.) Trump signs coronavirus relief bill, still pushes for $2,000 stimulus checks: Reporter Rick Sobey had all the details others were slow to report.

18.) Fear and loathing in the Biden Crime Family: Count on Howie Carr to keep an eye on Biden and Co.

19.) Poll: Who do you think won the first 2020 presidential debate?: This took off like a rocket. Guess who you voted for?

20.) Americans would get two checks under proposed coronavirus stimulus package: Reporter Rick Sobey has been glued to the stimulus story. We’ll keep it up in 2021. It’s what readers demand.

Editor’s Choice: The Feb. 26-27 Biogen managers’ conference in Boston, a superspreader event said to be the source of 300,000 COVID-19 infections, remains a major story.

Joe Dwinell is the Herald’s senior editor.

The state House of Representatives next week will reject a package of rules reform that includes a measure to term-limit the Speaker to a time period that runs concurrently with the federal statute of limitations.

In 2021, more scandals in Massachusetts will involve payoffs to small-town police chiefs for gun permits than indictments involving marijuana-licensing bribes to mayors.

Most commonly used word in Boston mayoral race (including “and” and “the”): racism.

Second most commonly used word in Boston mayor’s fight: systemic.

For a third year in a row, A.J. Baker’s alleged groping incident will “baffle” the feds — unless Rachael Rollins is the new U.S. attorney.

Less snowfall than usual this winter will be blamed on global warming.

More snowfall than usual this winter will be blamed on global warming.

Despite enduring disastrous years, both Gov. Charlie Baker and Coach Bill Belichick will get exactly the same number of tough questions from the Boston media:

Zero.

After Jan. 20, the COVID-19 headlines “grim milestone” and “grim threshold” will vanish forever from the alt-left media.

Gov. Baker will never once be “disappointed” in a decision by Joe Biden.

Over-under line on how many MA state troopers will be indicted in 2021: 8.

Carnac advises, take the over.

Over-under on how many convicted state troopers will lose their pensions: 1.

Carnac advises, take the under.

The St. Patrick’s Day breakfast will be canceled again — it’s an ill wind that blows no good.

In March, the state Office of Campaign and Political Finance will issue an advisory to anyone checking out the reports of either Lt. Gov. Karyn “Pay to Play” Polito or AG Maura “Hold It” Healey to consider donning a hazmat suit before perusing the names of contributors.

Any summer droughts will be blamed on global warming.

Any unusually heavy summer rainfalls will be blamed on global warming.

If the COVID vaccinations are a success, they will be called the “Biden vaccines.”

Any fatalities will be blamed on “Trump’s rushed rollout.”

As layoffs approach, the MBTA and Massport will experience a huge spike in workplace injuries, also known as slip-and-falls.

Gov. Baker will at some point in 2021 threaten more statewide lockdowns to fight the alleged spread of a) homicide hornets, b) murder mosquitoes, c) squirrels in Colorado infected with bubonic plague, d) Burmese pythons slithering their way north from the Everglades, e) a GOP primary opponent against him, or f) all of the above.

Any abnormally large number of tropical storms in September will be blamed on global warming.

The absence of tropical storms in September will be blamed on global warming.

At least one of Charlie Baker’s unnamed, unverified, uncorroborated “friends” will finally perish of the virus, but not before phoning the governor from his deathbed to say, “Charlie, I wish I’d paid more attention to your endless hysterical fearmongering.”

Headlines you will NOT see in Boston in 2021:

“SJC rules against Baker’s ‘unconstitutional’ lockdowns.”

“Deval Patrick, Ayanna Pressley, now Michelle Wu — Why do you have to be from Chicago now to get elected in MA?”

“Ron Mariano Plays ‘Insider’ Game at State House — He’s a Hack; Katherine Clark Plays ‘Insider’ Game in DC — Isn’t She Marvelous?”

“Red Sox Will Suck Again in 2021.”

After a four-year absence, the word “unexpectedly” returns with a vengeance, as in, “The nation’s unemployment rate unexpectedly shot up again even though Joe Biden is president….”

The Mass. Restaurant Association will finally take a principled stand for what remains of its membership — just kidding!

In November, Mayor Marty Walsh will be re-elected — if he’s running against Michelle Wu.

In November, Mayor Marty Walsh will be defeated — if he’s running against Andrea Campbell.

“Devastating” layoffs and revenue shortfalls at UMass will be announced by a grim-faced President Marty Meehan, who under the school’s new austerity program will have his salary frozen at its 2019 level — $682,270.42 a year.

Casinos will be running wide-open long before churches, gyms or skating rinks — because Charlie Baker is “following the data,” the data of tax revenues.

Brilliant foliage next fall will be attributed to global warming.

Unusually dull foliage next fall will be attributed to global warming.

Gov. Baker and Lt. Gov. Polito will not appear as character witnesses at the impending criminal trials of two of their most loyal minions and campaign contributors — ex-Holyoke Soldiers Home boss Bennett Walsh and indicted MSP union boss Dana Pullman.

And Polito will not be posing for any more cute selfies with her BFF’s, indicted Lowell Rep. Dave Dangle or drug-dealing, money-laundering state cop Leigha Genduso.

Charlie Baker will celebrate Thanksgiving 2021 by declaring Santa Claus a “super spreader” of COVID (or flu, or the heartbreak of psoriasis or whatever else is needed to keep the Panic going) and place a $100 bounty on Jolly Old St. Nick.

Finally, 2021 will be a better year than 2020. It has to be. It can hardly be any worse.

It started as any other year and slipped into a twilight zone. A pandemic of unprecedented proportions — there’s that word again. Then political chaos and civil unrest. The photographers of the Boston Herald combed through their photos to capture the essence of what 2020 brought us. Let’s just hope 2021 is better.

It’s been a pivotal year in American and Massachusetts politics — an “unprecedented” time that Boston University presidential historian Thomas Whalen said carries similar historical significance to the nation-changing assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the world wars and the 1918 flu pandemic.

“We are going to be talking about this year for a very long time to come,” Whalen said. “And the aftereffects of this year are still to be written.”

Take a look back through the Herald’s biggest political stories of 2020:

Don’t call it a comeback, but when the Democratic primaries got underway in February it seemed like former Vice President Joe Biden’s third presidential bid was about to bite the dust. Biden suffered a “gut punch” of a fourth-place finish in Iowa and fled New Hampshire before finishing fifth there. But his fortunes soon changed and by November, Biden, 78, became the oldest person ever elected president, and his running mate, U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris, became the first Black woman and first South Asian woman elected vice president. But President Trump – who was briefly sidelined from campaigning by COVID-19 — is continuing to challenge the election results.

Speaking of comebacks, U.S. Sen. Edward Markey staged one for the history books when he fended off a Democratic primary challenge from U.S. Rep. Joseph Kennedy III. Markey was down by double digits when Kennedy launched his bid. But the 74-year-old Green New Deal coauthor harnessed the power of the youth and progressive movements to notch a 10-point victory over Kennedy, 40, and beat Republican challenger Kevin O’Connor in November.

It was good to be an incumbent in Massachusetts this year. The entire Bay State congressional delegation was re-elected, save Kennedy, who will be succeeded by Democrat Jake Auchincloss in the 4th Congressional District.

But Bay State pols didn’t get very far in the presidential race. U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s Oval Office bid flamed out after she failed to win a single state. Warren’s since been passed over for the vice presidency and most Cabinet positions under Biden. Former Govs. Deval Patrick and Bill Weld didn’t fare well, either.

State Rep. Robert DeLeo ended his historic run as the Massachusetts House Speaker on Tuesday and Quincy Democrat Ronald Mariano was elected his successor.

City Councilors Michelle Wu and Andrea Campbell fired the starting pistol for the 2021 Boston mayoral race as the two announced their runs in September. Either one would be the first person who’s not a white man to hold the powerful position. Mayor Martin Walsh hasn’t yet said whether he’ll run for a third term — he’s been discussed as Biden’s potential Labor secretary — but signs point to yes.

A thread that ran through every level of politics in 2020 was the call for change in policing. Several high-profile police killings of Black people in the spring ignited waves of Black Lives Matter demonstrations at home and across the nation this summer. Boston’s city council passed various changes to policing, including creating a civilian review board, and the state Legislature approved its own police reform bill that would create a licensing process for officers.