Welcome back to your daily roundup of the ongoing catastrophe that is the Donald Trump presidential campaign. It's been quite the day, yet again, so let's jump right in.
Fresh off Donald Trump specifying unspecific regret for some of that stuff he once said, it was off for a candidate-rebranding Apology Tour. Or, barring that, a visit to flood-stricken Louisiana, where he helped offload toys from a truck and mused that the sitting president was probably out playing golf. (Obama will visit next Tuesday, after being asked by the state's governor to delay his visit so that state officials could focus on the current rescue efforts.)
He then traveled to Dimondale, Michigan, to give another speech to a nearly-all-white audience billed as an "outreach" effort towards black Americans not present. "You're living in poverty, your schools are no good, you have no jobs. What the hell do you have to lose? And at the end of four years, I guarantee you that I will get over 95 percent of the African-American vote. I promise you."
So it appears "Hey black people, what do you have to lose?" is genuinely part of Trump's stump speech now. Well, it does fit on a bumper sticker. (And is, as usual, the Trumpian reduction of twenty years of Republican rhetoric into a phrase you can burp.)
As for the home office: After the instillation of two new campaign figures from the fringes of the conservative movement, yesterday in this column we predicted that previous campaign head Paul Manafort would be out of the campaign within four days. Instead, it took about 12 hours. On the heels of still more information about Manafort's deep involvement with pro-Russian forces in Ukraine, Manafort offered his resignation this morning. (Trump's son Eric, however, gave strong indications the campaign manager was pushed out by his father.)
This leaves Breitbart head Steve Bannon and ex-Ted Cruz, ex-Todd Akin, ex-Newt Gingrich professional jackass whisperer Kellyanne Conway firmly in charge of the campaign, so buckle up.
• One last insult? Despite the official campaign statement keeping mum on it, Kellyanne Conway confirmed this evening during a radio interview that Manafort "was asked" to resign. "He was asked and he indeed tended his resignation today."
• While Kellyanne Conway insists that Donald Trump's apology speech was "all him", others see the strong hints of Conway's own playbook in the would-be pivot. In the end, however, it comes down to whether Trump can maintain control of his own worst tendencies.
• It doesn't appear xenophobic fearmongering is one of the things Donald Trump intended to apologize for, as his first ad of the general election shows footage of ostensible immigrants riding on the tops of freight trains as the ad warns Clinton will leave the border open. "[T]he anxiety being targeted here is anxiety about the physical threat posed by foreigners—precisely the sentiment of fear that has driven Trumpism from the beginning."
• The FBI and Justice Department are now examining Paul Manafort's firm in a probe of possible U.S. ties to Yanukovych-era Ukrainian corruption. Of key interest: Whether Manafort worked to skirt American laws against foreign lobbying.
• Donald Trump told Fox News mouth Sean Hannity that he would throw the Muslim father of the Orlando shooter out of the country. "If you look at him, I'd throw him out." Mateen is a U.S. citizen.
• An 18-year-old Indian-American Trump fan was ejected from Trump's Charlotte rally by police after the campaign fingered him as a "known" protester. He wasn't, but after the experience he says he will no longer be voting for Donald Trump. He and his parents both believe he was singled out for being dark-skinned.
• While nearly any credible Trump path to victory must include North Carolina, things are looking bleak there, with Republicans alarmed that the candidate has failed to consolidate the state's Republican base.
• South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham expresses the fear of his colleagues watching the Trump "death spiral": "Nobody knows where the bottom is at."
• Another Republican bows out: This time it's Mitt Romney national finance committee chair David Nierenberg, who says in an op-ed that he will be voting for—and endorses—Hillary Clinton.
• Presented without comment: While eating man's face, Florida 'cannibal killer' wore Trump 'Make America Great Again' hat.