| | | | | | | Presented By Meta | | | | Axios AM | | By Mike Allen · Jun 18, 2022 | | Happy Saturday. Smart Brevity™ count: 931 words ... 3½ mins. Edited by TuAnh Dam. 📉 Situational awareness: The S&P 500 had its worst week since March 2020. The Dow industrials had their worst week since Oct. 2020. (WSJ) - Early today, Bitcoin fell below $20,000 for the first time since 2020 — down more than 70% from its record high in November 2021. Go deeper.
| | | | | | 1 big thing: Trump's third impeachment trial | | Former V.P. Mike Pence uses a loading dock as a desk in his secure location after being evacuated from the Senate on Jan. 6, 2021. Exhibit: House Select Committee via AP The House Jan. 6 committee has obtained new information to connect the insurrection to former President Trump, Axios' Andrew Solender reports. - The committee has deeper details about Trump's "Be there, will be wild!" tweet on Dec. 19, 2020, which urged supporters to converge on D.C. on Jan. 6 — and how it spurred organizing on far-right message boards, according to a source close to the committee.
Why it matters: With at least two more hearings ahead, the committee aims to succeed where impeachment managers twice fell short. - The committee has consistently used a key impeachment tactic to synthesize evidence — drawing a connection between Trump's public comments and the actions of rioters.
The big picture: The committee is making the same case House Democrats made during Trump's second impeachment a year and a half ago — that Trump incited the violence that day at the Capitol. - But the panel's seven Democrats and two Republicans have far greater access to key evidence than the impeachment managers did — including subpoenaed documents and closed-door testimony, in some cases provided unwillingly by those close to Trump.
Zoom in: Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), who was the lead House manager in Trump's second impeachment, is also a member of the Jan. 6 committee. - Raskin told Axios' Alayna Treene that his focus in the investigation has been on "the activation and the mobilization of the mob and the domestic violent extremist groups."
Keep reading ... Go deeper: What we've learned. |     | | | | | | 2. 🏛️ Trump: "A simple protest that got out of hand" | | Former President Trump yesterday at the Gaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center in Nashville. Photo: George Walker IV/The Tennessean via USA Today Network Former President Trump, making his first public appearance since the Jan. 6 hearings began, told his faithful in Nashville yesterday that the insurrection was "a simple protest that got out of hand," AP reports. - Why it matters: Trump used his speech to tease his own run in 2024 ... to call the committee's evidence a "lie" and a "fraud" ... and, as the N.Y. Times' Maggie Haberman notes (subscription), to once again attack former Vice President Pence for not having "the courage to act."
"One of the most urgent tasks facing the next Republican president — I wonder who that will be," Trump said during the Faith & Freedom Coalition's Road to Majority conference, prompting chants of "U-S-A!" - "Would anybody like me to run for president?" he asked the crowd, unleashing more cheers.
Ralph Reed, founder and chair of the coalition, said: "We don't know whether or not he will run — although certainly given his speech, I think he wanted to let everybody know that that is his plan." | | | | | | | | 3. 🏠 Mortgages highest in 14 years |  Data: FRED. Chart: Axios Visuals U.S. mortgage rates surged to 5.78% — the highest level since 2008, during the financial crisis, Freddie Mac said. - A year ago at this time, the average was 2.93%.
It was the biggest weekly increase since 1987 — 35 years ago. | | | | | | | | A message from Meta | | Doctors can practice high-risk situations risk-free in the metaverse | | |  | | | | In the metaverse, future surgeons will be able to practice advanced procedures hundreds of times before seeing real patients — helping them gain experience and master their skills. The metaverse may be virtual, but the impact will be real. Learn how Meta is helping build the metaverse. | | | | | | 4. 📷 Viral tombstone | | Photo: Jung Ki-young via Reuters Jung Ki-young, a South Korean software engineer, marked this week's official retirement of Microsoft's Internet Explorer at the age of 27 with a mocking $330 headstone. - He installed it on the roof of a café run by his brother in the southern city of Gyeongju, South Korea.
"It was a pain in the ass, but I would call it a love-hate relationship because Explorer itself once dominated an era," the engineer told Reuters. | | | | | | | | 5. Gun sellers' new pitch: Man up! | | The Martinez family views rifles in the exhibit hall during the NRA convention in Houston last month. Photo: Brandon Bell/Getty Images An emboldened gun industry is luring buyers with rhetoric of fear, machismo and defiance, the N.Y. Times reports (subscription): - "Gun companies have spent the last two decades ... refocusing their message away from hunting toward selling handguns for personal safety, as well as military-style weapons attractive to mostly young men."
- Pressure points the industry has found useful in selling more guns: "self-esteem, lack of trust in others, fear of losing control."
Why it matters: The tactics have been remarkably successful. "Firearm sales have skyrocketed, with background checks rising from 8.5 million in 2000 to 38.9 million last year," The Times notes. - "Women, spurred by appeals that play on fears of crime and being caught unprepared, are the fastest-growing segment of buyers."
| | | | | | | | 6. 🎸 Paul McCartney = 80 today | | Paul McCartney performs during his "Got Back" tour on Thursday in East Rutherford, N.J. Photo: Christopher Smith/Invision/AP Today's cultural milestone: The "cute Beatle" is 80. - Paul McCartney celebrated by singing "Glory Days" with Bruce Springsteen on Thursday at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J., serenaded by 60,000 well-wishers, AP's David Bauder writes.
- Jersey guy Jon Bon Jovi brought out a fistful of balloons during the encore.
Why it matters: Like several other members of the "hope I die before I get old" generation — including Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones and former Beatles mate Ringo Starr — McCartney keeps working. - Another 1960s icon, Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys, is scheduled to play at the Starlight Theatre in Kansas City, Mo., on his 80th birthday Monday.
McCartney plays in his Got Back tour on Thursday. Photo: Alexander Lewis/Asbury Park Press via USA Today Network Between the lines: The fragility in McCartney's voice was evident while singing "Blackbird." He struggled for the high notes in "Here Today," his love letter to the late John Lennon. - McCartney's team announced yesterday that it is packaging "McCartney II" with his other DIY albums, "McCartney" of 1970 and 2020's "McCartney III," into a boxed set — "McCartney I II III."
Advanced birthday be damned, the irrepressibly cheerful McCartney left with a promise when the last firework burst and he walked offstage: | | | | | | | | A message from Meta | | The metaverse may be virtual, but the impact will be real | | |  | | | | Meta is helping build the metaverse so aviation mechanics will be able to practice servicing different jet engines — preparing them for any complex job. The result: A more skilled workforce. Learn more about what Meta is building in the metaverse. | | | | 📬 Invite your friends to sign up here to get their daily essentials — Axios AM, PM and Finish Line. |  | It's called Smart Brevity®. Over 200 orgs use it — in a tool called Axios HQ — to drive productivity with clearer workplace communications. | | | |
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