Good morning. We will have a splendid day with a high of just 80 and low humidity. A low of 61 overnight. Get out your sweatshirt! The Nats begin a three-day visit to the Yankees tonight. You can find me on Bluesky, I’m @abeaujon.87 on Signal, and there’s a link to my email address below.
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I can’t stop listening to:
Bobby Bare Jr., “Visit Me in Music City.” Few people have a Nashville pedigree like Bobby Bare Jr.’s, which is why this satire of his hometown bites so deeply: “The world’s greatest living guitar pickers / Can deliver you a pizza or sell you weed.” Dang, Bobby! Bare and Lou Barlow will play an acoustic “song swap” at Comet Ping Pong on Friday, and both men are very much worth catching live.
Take Washingtonian Today with you! I’ve made a playlist on Spotify and on Apple Music of my daily music recommendations this year.
Here’s some administration news you might have blocked out:
Gov is a battlefield: President Trump claimed he had fired Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook in a letter he posted on his Truth Social website Monday. The US President may fire a board governor for cause, a bar Trump claimed he had cleared because of allegations of mortgage fraud against Cook made by Bill Pulte, an administration appointee. Needless to say, that rationale is in dispute. (AP) Cook said Trump lacked the authority to fire her and said she would not resign. (Politico) “The firing, if successful, could give Trump a majority of allies on the Fed board and allow him to fulfill his goal of lowering interest rates.” (Washington Post)
Blue blockers: Trump’s war on blue states heated up yesterday. Republicans in Congress are investigating the DC police department’s crime statistics, which inconveniently show crime declining at a time when Trump has declared an emergency in the nation’s capital. Another spot of bother: Ed Martin, Trump’s onetime pick for US Attorney in DC and now the director of the “Weaponization Working Group” within the Department of Justice, issued a press release earlier this year trumpeting the decline. (Washington Post) Trump signed executive orders that aim to further his clampdown on the District by mandating pretrial detention and directing the Park Police and US Attorney to hire more staff. He also claimed he would criminalize flag-burning and end cashless bail, though the practical effects of those declarations are unclear. (Washington Post) Trump claimed that Governor Wes Moore of Maryland, another jurisdiction where the President is electorally unpopular, told him he was “the greatest president” of Moore’s lifetime. On X, Moore replied, “lol” and followed that with “Keep telling yourself that, Mr. President.” (Wes Moore via Washingtonian Problems) Video shows that Trump is lying. (Washington Post) Illinois Governor JB Pritzker vowed to challenge Trump’s reported plan to send troops to Chicago, another Democratic stronghold. (WSJ)
The war against one guy: Feds detained newly freed Kilmar Abrego García, a Maryland resident they wrongly deported, then accused of human trafficking, and then had to release, when he reported to an immigration check-in in Baltimore yesterday. (NPR) A judge ordered the administration it could not deport Abrego García to Uganda, as it now hopes to do. (Washington Post)
Administration perambulation: The House Oversight Committee subpoenaed the estate of deceased, disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, seeking records such as a birthday book in which Trump reportedly wrote “Happy Birthday — and may every day be another wonderful secret,” drew a naked lady, and signed his name in a manner to suggest pubic hair. (Washington Post) FEMA employees wrote a letter to Congress “warning that the Trump administration had reversed much of the progress made in disaster response and recovery since Hurricane Katrina pummeled the Gulf Coast two decades ago.” (NYT) The US Department of Labor hung a giant banner of Trump outside its DC HQ. (Benjamin Alvarez/X) Flashback to two weeks ago: The USDA spent $16,500 on its banners of Trump and Lincoln, but they look like they were a little smaller than Labor’s. I’ll FOIA for the cost of these, too. (Washingtonian) Trump threatened an investigation of former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie over the 2013 “Bridgegate” scandal after Christie criticized him on TV. (NYT) He floated the idea of changing the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of War, the name it held until 1947. (Politico) He also said he would impose tariffs on countries “that tax or regulate U.S. tech firms.” (WSJ) Finally, he invented a governor, Kristi Whitman, whom he later identified as “Whitmer,” perhaps thinking of Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, for whom he claimed he had done a “good favor, I think. With the fish, the carp, the China carp—you ever hear of it?” (Daily Beast)
The National Gallery Nights series is nigh, by Daniella Byck
One of DC’s most popular post-work traditions, National Gallery Nights, returns to the National Gallery of Art on Thursday, September 11. This fall, there are three opportunities to party in the East Building after the museum’s official closing time, each taking place on the second Thursday of the month. Tickets are doled out through an online lottery system, and the first entry window is from Monday, September 1, at 10 AM through Thursday, September 4, at 12 PM. Tickets grant you access to a back to school-themed celebration, with an opportunity to flex your crafty side and jam out to jazz/funk band Butcher Brown. If you don’t win the lottery, the museum hands out a limited number of same-day tickets on a first-come, first-serve basis. Additional National Gallery Nights will take place on Thursday, October 9, and Thursday, November 13. Read our rundown of the after-hour events here.
Recently on Washingtonian dot com:
• Trump’s crackdown on homeless encampments in DC is simply shuffling people around, people displaced from encampments say.
• Bao Bei, once a Taiwanese ghost kitchen, will open a brick-and-mortar location in Rockville tomorrow.
• Last month’s most expensive real estate transactions.
Local news links:
• The Commanders came to a deal with wide receiver Terry McLaurin, putting an end to that particular saga. (Washington Post)
• US Attorney for DC Jeanine Pirro expressed hope that she’d soon be able to prosecute 12-year-olds. (NBC4 Washington)
• The Heights food hall in Chevy Chase has closed. (WTOP)
• Stephen Nakagawa, who the Kennedy Center named its new director of dance programming yesterday, wrote “a letter to the center’s president, Richard Grenell, in which he noted his support for the Trump administration and complained about ‘radical leftist ideologies in ballet.'” (NYT)
Tuesday’s event pick:
• It’s Plant Week in DC, and you can get free admission to Vienna’s Meadowlark Botanical Gardens on Tuesdays.
See more picks from Briana Thomas, who writes our Things to Do newsletter.
Andrew Beaujon joined Washingtonian in late 2014. He was previously with the Poynter Institute, TBD.com, and Washington City Paper. He lives in Del Ray.
