CONGRESS/DEMS/NANCY PELOSI/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “President Donald Trump appeared before a divided Congress for the first time on Tuesday [2-5-19] to appeal to lawmakers’ sense of unity at a moment of deepening partisan spite. His calls for conciliation were met with mostly stone-faced silence from Democrats, who bitterly oppose his agenda and accuse him of hastening the decline in cross-party cooperation. It was his first time addressing the Democratic-majority House, and his political nemesis, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, offered applause only sparingly…Democrats have promised they will use new investigative powers to probe everything from Trump’s tax returns to his policy decisions to members of his Cabinet. The special counsel Robert Mueller is also continuing his look into Russian meddling in the 2016 election. Despite the partisan jabs, Trump sought to portray his agenda — one frequently defined by deeply divisive policies — as a nonpartisan venture.”
–Kevin Liptak and Jeremy Diamond, “Trump calls for rejection of ‘politics of revenge’ in speech that jabs Democrats,” CNN Politics, CNN.com, February 5, 2019 9:38 pm