A roundup of the most important political news stories of the day
ADVERTISEMENTTRUMP AGENDA: "We're getting crushed"
Trump is trying to stand firm on the shutdown. But the New York Times reports that he privately laments "we're getting crushed."
Furloughed workers are turning to odd jobs to keep their heads above water during the shutdown.
More and more warnings of a recession keep coming as the shutdown drags on.
Hmmmm… Now, Rudy Giuliani says this: "I never said there was no collusion between the campaign, or people in the campaign."
The Wall Street Journal reports that Michael Cohen paid a small technology company to rig online polls for Trump in 2015.
The deaths of four Americans in Syria is causing more critics to question Trump's new policy in the region.
The Trump administration wants to beef up America's missile defenses on a scale not seen since the Reagan "Star Wars" era.
A top HUD official is leaving the agency after butting heads with Trump on Puerto Rico disaster recovery money, among other policies.
The New York Times sums up the chaos in Britain right now.
THE DEM AGENDA: No State of the Union for you!
The Washington Post writes that Nancy Pelosi has "moved aggressively to leverage her decades of congressional experience to needle, belittle and undercut Trump with swipes at his competence and even his masculinity."
Could Trump actually benefit from Pelosi's move to ask him to postpone or cancel the State of the Union?
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is still taunting her conservative critics.
2020: Show me the money
Small donations are increasingly being viewed as a key measure of success for 2020 Democrats.
Trump aides are trying to make the best of the shutdown by raising money and firing up the president's core supporters.
Bernie Sanders met with former staffers about accusations of sexual harassment on the 2016 campaign. (But in the process, he missed a vote on Russian sanctions.)
ADVERTISEMENTDemocrats have to figure out whether to fight Trump head-on or just ignore him, the AP notes.
Julian Castrosays he visited Puerto Rico to send a message that "everyone counts."