Senate Republicans have cast two separate votes since Tuesday that have removed the option of "repeal-only" and a replacement plan. Now it appears their only viable option is what is known as the "skinny repeal." This would remove some key provisions from the Affordable Care Act and leave the rest intact.

The skinny repeal would essentially remove the mandate that requires individuals and employers to get health insurance. The plan would also get rid of the medical device tax and eliminate a public health fund provision.

There is an important update in the most recent effort in California to secede from theUnited States.

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra has cleared the campaign behind the secession initiative to start collecting the 585,000-plus signatures required to make it onto the 2018 ballot. Supporters of the plan have 180 days to collect the signatures.

An earlier signature drive for a similar initiative failed in April.

The FEC wants a federal judge to throw out a second complaint against the Commission on Presidential Debates. The commission filed a motion to dismiss Level the Playing Field's (LPF) supplemental complaint on Tuesday, July 25.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmSBbh5QwEQ

US Rep. Scott Peters (D-Calif) blasted President Trump's announcement that transgender individuals will be banned from military service. He filed an amendment to the Department of Defense appropriations bill Wednesday to block it.

The congressional IT staffer working for the office of Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) and over 20 other Democratic House members, was arrested Monday by the FBI while attempting to flee the country from Dulles International Airport in Virginia.

Fox News reported that Imran Awan was arrested Monday night at the Dulles airport in Virginia 30 miles outside Washington D.C. and charged with bank fraud.

https://twitter.com/ChadPergram/status/889944148379394048

Arrested Feeling The Country

Imran Awan, a House staffer at the center of a criminal investigation potentially impacting dozens of Democratic lawmakers, has been arrested on bank fraud and is prevented from leaving the country while the charges are pending.

David Dameron, a spokesman for US Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz -- one of the lawmakers who employed Awan -- said late Tuesday Awan had been fired.

The focus of the Russia investigation this week is on Donald Trump Jr, Jared Kushner, and Paul Manafort. However, another name has been thrown into the ever-expanding Russia narrative: Dr. Jill Stein, former Green Party presidential candidate.

https://twitter.com/DrJillStein/status/888461093718429699

"A house divided against itself cannot stand.” - Abraham Lincoln

The almost-deadly attack by a gunman at a Republican baseball practice briefly focused national attention on the dangerous level political polarization has reached in the US. It’s been trending upward for decades.

"Partisan gerrymandering is diluting the voice of the American people," writes US Rep. John K. Delaney (D-Md.) in a Facebook post.

Delaney posted a video on his Facebook Page Monday explaining in simple terms how partisan gerrymandering works, and how his "Open Our Democracy Act" would end the partisan gerrymander.

The South Dakota State Legislature fully repealed a major anti-corruption law earlier this year that voters approved in November 2016. But voters in the state may get a second chance at reform.

Represent South Dakota, a nonpartisan anti-corruption organization that campaigned for the 2016 ballot measure, is now working to enshrine elements of the repealed law in the state's constitution through a voter-approved amendment.