Sacramento town hall on immigration inspires heated protest, assembly bill aims to protect college athletes, reviving the fashionable Easter hat
Need help understanding what Devin Nunes did?
We have you covered.
Devin Nunes, as a reminder, is a California congressman and the highest ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee.
That committee is trying to figure out if there was Russian interference in last November's presidential election.
Democrats and Republicans are on that panel – Nunes co-chairs it with California Democrat Adam Schiff – and members pledge to look for the truth regardless of whether it helps or hurts their own party.
This is where the controversy over Nunes starts (and this is oversimplifying things a bit, but hopefully gets you caught up to speed on some of the basics)
Tuesday evening, March 21st
It's a cool, clear evening on Capitol Hill in DC.
According to the Washington Post, Devin Nunes gets into a car with some aides to head to an event.
As they're sitting in the car, Nunes gets a phone call. It's unknown who was on the other end.
But Nunes hops out of the car, leaving his staffers behind.
Then, according to the Post, two congressional staffers see him get into another car and pull away. His own team – they don't really know where he's going.
A few minutes later, Nunes arrives at the White House grounds.
There, he meets with an unnamed source who gives him info that says, during the election, Trump and his aides were caught up in surveillance by the intelligence community.
The technical term is "incidental intelligence," which is when spies pick up information about a subject who are not the focus of their investigation.
For instance, intelligence agencies may have tapped into a phone call between two Russian diplomats and recorded them talking about Trump or one of his staffers.
That's pretty common in surveillance, and it's no smoking gun that Trump or anyone on his campaign was the target for eavesdropping
Wednesday morning, March 22nd
Devin Nunes calls a press conference outside the Capitol.
"First, I recently confirmed that on numerous occasions, the intelligence community incidentally collected information about U.S. citizens involved in the Trump transition," he announces.
Then, Nunes heads back to the White House and talks, in private, with President Trump to share the details he knows.
Afterwards, Nunes emerges onto the White House lawn to speak to a gaggle of reporters waiting there.
"Today, I briefed the President about the concerns I had about incidental collection and how it relates to President-elect Trump," he said.
Almost immediately, Democrats and also some Republicans step up to call foul.
They say Nunes is the co-head of a Congressional investigation into ties between Trump and Russia, and he should've shared this info with his committee first instead of going to the Oval Office.
And remember, the President and his campaign staff are targets of that probe.
Wednesday afternoon and evening, March 22nd
Another California congressman stands before reporters – Adam Schiff.
He's the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. He and Nunes co-chair it.
Schiff says to the press that, when Nunes bypassed the committee and shared info with the President, he put the entire investigation under a cloud.
"The chairman will need to decide whether he is the chairman of an independent investigation," he says, "or if he's going to act as a surrogate of the White House."
That same evening, Republican John McCain appears on MSNBC to say the whole thing has left him baffled and that the committee is dysfunctional.
"This just shows a tremendous chasm between the two senior members of the House Intelligence Committee," he says.
Tuesday, March 28th
Adam Schiff and other Democrats call for Devin Nunes to recuse himself from the investigation.
"I think it would be in the best interest of the investigation going forward if someone else on the committee were to lead it," says Schiff in an interview with CBS.
Nunes insists he's done nothing wrong, and he indicates he'll continue to chair House Intelligence Committee and continue the investigation into Russian efforts to influence the presidential election.
But right now, the committee has no hearings scheduled, and even its standard meeting later this week has been cancelled.
And that's where things stand.
Sacramento forum on immigration enforcement turns raucous
A public forum on immigration enforcement got very loud, very quickly in Sacramento Tuesday night.
Anger was in high supply in the youth gym where hundreds were gathered — most of it directed at two men: Thomas Homan, acting director for ICE, and Sheriff Scott Jones.
The two men faced pointed questions about how deportations would be carried out in Sacramento County.
Capital Public Radio's Ben Adler was there. He joined Take Two with more.
To hear the full segment, click the blue play button above.
Sports Roundup: The NFL and politics
Is there a faction of NFL owners that are preventing quarterback Colin Kaepernick from playing because of his politics? Exactly who decides who gets to put on a uniform and play - and who doesn't?
A Martinez gets the latest sports news with Take Two contributors Andy and Brian Kamenetzky.
Meet the California Assemblywoman who wants to better protect college athletes
The month of March is ALL about NCAA college basketball for many sports fans. And now we know who's going to Final Four: Gonzaga, Oregon, South Carolina and... after a last second shot, the North Carolina Tarheels.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwHp3w9uozU
But with athletic play comes injuries. Concussions are getting the most attention from media observers, but that's far from the only thing that can harm an athlete during their college career.
"There's problems with CTE [chronic traumatic encephapolopathy]," said California Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher. "There's problems with chronic injury. We had a death at UC Berkley dealing with an athlete that had sickle cell."
Fletcher is a HUGE sports fan - a former cheerleader at Stanford, in fact. Being a fan helped her realize the difficulties that college athletes go through and the need to help them.
"I think the only way we save the future of these sports is by having them really ensure that our play is regulated. "
To that end, Fletcher has announced a new legislative proposal: The Athlete Protection Commission Bill. The commission, Fletcher says, will be made up of nine individuals with wide-ranging sports expertise.
"We want former college athletes," she said. "Somebody who's familiar with sports economics, governance folks; somebody who knows about athlete's abuse; people with specific qualifications that understand college athletics as well as some of the effects of play or of unsafe play on athletes."
If Fletcher has her way, they won't just show up when an athlete has a debilitating injury.
"It will also allow whistle-blower powers because right now the athletes themselves don't have anywhere to go, inform anyone when they're in a dangerous situation or they're put in or if they're told that they have to continue to do something and risk losing their scholarship. "
But what about the NCAA itself? It's the regulator of college athletics. Shouldn't it be making sure these sorts of things are… well, regulated?
"We haven't seen any true commitment for the NCAA to hold colleges accountable for player safety," Fletcher said. "That's why we're picking up the slack.
"We think there needs to be an independent commission that really serves as a watchdog over this and ensures that there’s some sort of best practices that are developed. Some of that may come from some of the work that the NCAA is starting to do; they may have some ideas about the best practices and policies for these athletes. But where they're not willing to act, we need to have something that will."
Fletcher's proposed Athlete Protection Commission is in committee. She hopes it will come to a vote in the next few weeks.
The Styled Side: Easter is now a major shopping holiday
Easter is hopping over the horizon, but it's more than just a religious holiday – it's become one of the biggest shopping seasons of the year.
"It's the fourth biggest consumer holiday in terms of retail spending," says Michelle Dalton Tyree of Fashion Trends Daily, "and it turns out that this year's Easter spending is on track to outpace Valentine's Day."
Shoppers are expected to buy up $18.4 billion worth of products this year, according to the National Retail Federation, with half of it spent on clothes, not candy or flowers.
"With the economy improving, people are in a shopping mode and retailers are in a discounting mode," says Tyree.
Local retailers like Polkadots and Moonbeams is seeing some of this "bunny" bump.
"Christmas is always a great time," says owner Wendy Freedman. "This spring, Easter comes very close to that."
Old-fashion trends are driving some of those sales, with a big trend towards feminine, vintage style dresses that are flowy and less overtly sexy.
Also, "sets" have come back into fashion. That's where a dress might be paired with a little jacket over it.
Of course, hats are also very big.
"People are really into hats!" says Freedman. "Did you know that years ago nobody wore a hat? Now everyone is wearing a hat to complete the outfit, from fascinators to a big straw hat."
But Easter shopping is for the whole family.
"A lot of families are buy new outfits for the entire family for Easter, similar to how they would for Christmas," says Tyree.