Jonathan Bernstein

A decision Monday by a federal judge granting former President Donald Trump’s request for an independent review of the FBI’s seizure of documents at Mar-a-Lago last month has prompted an unusually forceful backlash within the legal community. It isn’t just partisan analysts who are reacting with…

It’s time to give President Joe Biden credit for achieving something no one predicted: bipartisanship in foreign policy. The Senate on Wednesday delivered a victory for Biden’s foreign policy agenda, voting almost unanimously to admit Finland and Sweden into the North Atlantic Treaty…

Legislation helping veterans exposed to toxic trash-incineration pits while serving overseas finally passed the Senate this week. Comedian and activist Jon Stewart, who had worked hard to elevate the problem and then to help get the bill across the finish line, expressed frustration that the…

Inflation, and especially the price of gasoline, appears to be what’s driving President Joe Biden’s unpopularity right now. That’s how it goes for presidents: Policy outcomes, especially on the economy, are what matter to voters — whether or not the administration has much short-run influence over…

President Joe Biden gave a prime-time speech Thursday about gun violence. It was carried by all three broadcast networks, as well as the cable stations. As presidential speeches go, it was fine; he mixed some aspirational policy goals with support for more modest objectives that may have a…

In a predictable sequence, just after President Joe Biden’s approval rating fell below where Donald Trump’s had been four years ago, we get a story from NBC News about problems in a White House described as “adrift.” Political scientist Brendan Nyhan nails it: Versions of this story are written…

The 50th anniversary of the Watergate arrests is approaching: The first break-in at Democratic National Committee headquarters was on May 28, 1972, but the botched return on June 17 produced arrests and eventually brought Richard Nixon’s presidency to a premature end on Aug. 8, 1974. The Washington…

The bad news for President Joe Biden is that his popularity has fallen, this past week, into dead last place. Of the 13 presidents during the polling era, none has been in worse shape at this point in his first term, almost 500 days into a presidency, than Biden’s 40.5% approval rating. That’s…

President Joe Biden spoke in Buffalo on Tuesday after visiting the families of victims of a racist mass shooting in a supermarket there on Saturday. It was a speech that’s likely to get lost in the current-events shuffle, but it shouldn’t. It was a good one, well written and well delivered, and…

Vice President Kamala Harris voted six times to break Senate ties this week. That brings her total to 23 ties broken, a record pace. She’s already third all-time, behind only John C. Calhoun (31 from 1825-1832) and John Adams (29 from 1789-1797). What she’s voted on tells an important story…