1/ Trump’s top economic adviser “can’t guarantee� taxes won’t go up for the middle class. Gary Cohn said Trump’s tax plan is “purely aimed at middle-class families,� but “it depends which state you live in.� He added that the rich will not benefit under the plan. Trump wanted to propose a 15% corporate rate rather than the 20% announced, which is down from the current 35%. (ABC News / Axios)

2/ Jared Kushner didn’t disclose the existence of his personal email account to the Senate intelligence committee when he testified in July, which he used from January through August. The chair and vice chair of the committee wrote his attorney, Abbe Lowell, instructing Kushner to double-check that he has turned over all relevant documents to the committee, including those from his personal email account, “as well as all other email accounts, messaging apps, or similar communications channels you may have used, or that may contain information relevant to our inquiry.� (CNN)

3/ Trump waived the shipping restrictions for Puerto Rico, which were limiting access to food, medicine, clothing, and supplies for hurricane relief. The move comes after criticism that the White House had been slow to help Puerto Rico recover from Hurricane Maria. The waiver will be in effect for 10 days and will cover all products being shipped to the island. The State Department evacuated 225 people from the Caribbean island of Dominica, who signed promissory notes agreeing to reimburse the State Department for travel costs. (CNN / Washington Post / The Hill)

UPDATE:

The State Department is not requiring anyone evacuated from hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico to sign promissory notes reimbursing the government for travel costs.

The electric power grid in Puerto Rico is totally shot. Large numbers of generators are now on Island. Food and water on site.

4/ Twitter briefed members of the Senate and House intelligence committees about fake news spread by Russian accounts and what steps the company took to stop it. Twitter told Congress that about 200 accounts are tied to some of the same Russian-linked sources that purchased ads on Facebook. The vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee criticized Twitter for failing to aggressively investigate the Russian misuse of its platform beyond the accounts linked to fraudulent profiles already identified by Facebook. Mark Warner said the company’s presentation “showed an enormous lack of understanding from the Twitter team of how serious this issue is, the threat it poses to democratic institutions and again begs...

1/ Trump’s tax plan will cut rates for businesses and the wealthy, while eliminating widely used exemptions and deductions. He dubbed the plan a “middle class miracle,� which would collapse the tax brackets from seven down to three while raising the lowest rate from 10% to 12% and cut the top rate from 39.6% to 35%. The standard deduction would double to $12,000 for individuals and to $24,000 for married couples. The White House and the Republicans haven’t said what loopholes would be closed in order to offset the trillions of dollars in revenue lost by cutting tax rates. Republicans want to pass a tax bill by the end of the year, which would be their first major legislative achievement this year. (Washington Post / Reuters / New York Times)

2/ Trump will cap refugee admissions at 45,000 in the next fiscal year. The ceiling has never been lower than 67,000, the number Ronald Reagan set in 1986, and the US hasn’t taken in so few refugees in a single year since 2006, when 41,223 were allowed to enter. In 2016, the US welcomed 84,995 refugees with Obama pushing to raise that number to 110,000 in 2017. Defense and State Department officials, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the United Nations had recommended that Trump admit at least 50,000 refugees during the next fiscal year. Meanwhile, Stephen Miller and John Kelly advocated admitting as few as 15,000 refugees. (Associated Press / New York Times)

3/ The acting head of the DEA will resign after losing confidence in Trump’s respect for the law. Last month, Chuck Rosenberg sent an agency-wide memo rebuking Trump’s suggestion that police were being “too nice� to suspects and shouldn’t shield their heads from hitting the roof of the police car during arrests. “We must earn and keep the public trust and continue to hold ourselves to the very highest standards,� Rosenberg wrote. “Ours is an honorable profession and, so, we will always act honorably.� Rosenberg will resign at the end of the week. (Politico / New York Times)

4/ Trump deleted his tweets supporting Luther Strange after Strange lost in Alabama’s primary runoff. The deleted tweets were archived by ProPublica and are no longer public on Twitter, but watchdog groups believe Trump is breaking the law when he deletes his tweets. Trump deleted at least three favorable tweets, including one saying that Strange “has been shooting up in the Alabama polls since my endorsement.� Strange lost to Roy Moore, who took nearly 55% of the vote. (New York Times / Washington Post)

5/ Russian-bought political Facebook ads criticized Hillary Clinton, promoted Trump, and supported Bernie Sanders even after his presidential campaign had ended. The ads appeared d...

1/ The House Oversight Committee asked the White House for information about the use of private emails for government duties by Jared Kushner and five other current and former senior aides. At least six of Trump’s closest advisers, including Steve Bannon, Reince Priebus, Gary Cohn, Stephen Miller, and Ivanka Trump have used private email addresses to discuss White House matters. Elijah Cummings said the committee would examine whether administration officials were “deliberately trying to circumvent (federal) laws by using personal, private, or alias email addresses to conduct official government business.� Hillary Clinton called the revelation “the height of hypocrisy.� It is not illegal for White House officials to use private email accounts so long as they forward work-related messages to their government accounts so the records can be preserved. (Reuters / New York Times / ABC News)

2/ The Senate will not vote on the Graham-Cassidy bill to repeal Obamacare, Mitch McConnell told Republicans in a closed-door meeting. Opposition by Susan Collins, John McCain, and Rand Paul was enough to sink the legislation. McConnell said Republicans are not giving up on a health care bill, but will pivot to tax reform in search of a legislative victory. (CNN / Bloomberg / Politico / New York Times)

3/ Senate Republicans are discussing whether to merge another Obamacare repeal effort into tax reform. They would use budget reconciliation, which would allow them pass legislation with just 50 votes. Republicans have two options: attempt to pass both health care and tax reform for the 2018 fiscal year budget, or take up a budget for the 2019 fiscal year early next year and address an Obamacare repeal in that budget. Doing so would put health care back in the spotlight during the 2018 midterm elections. The CBO said the latest Senate health bill would cause millions of people to lose “comprehensive health insurance� over the next decade. (Politico / Axios / Forbes)

4/ Roger Stone rejected all allegations of collusion between Trump’s associates and Russia during the 2016 election. In a closed House of Representatives Intelligence Committee hearing, Trump’s longtime ally denied he had any contact with Russian operatives during the campaign. Stone also denied that he had any advance knowledge that emails of Clinton’s campaign chairman would be hacked and his emails released by WikiLeaks, despite tweeting days before that John Podesta’s “time in the barrel� would soon be coming. (Reuters /

1/ The Graham-Cassidy bill appears dead on arrival after Susan Collins announced she’ll join John McCain and Rand Paul in opposing the legislation. The latest health care proposal included more funding to Alaska, Arizona, Kentucky, and Maine in an effort to win votes from Lisa Murkowski, McCain, Paul, and Collins. Ted Cruz said he doesn’t support the bill and suggested that Mike Lee also opposes it. The three “No� votes likely kill the last-ditch GOP effort to repeal Obamacare this week before protections against a Democratic filibuster expire. (Washington Post / New York Times / Politico / Associated Press / CNN)

2/ Trump issued an executive order to expand his travel ban and permanently restrict visitors from eight countries. With his revised, temporary travel ban now expired, the new order will stay in place until Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen, Chad, North Korea, and Venezuela meet security requirements set by Homeland Security. Starting October 18th, the new order indefinitely bans almost all travel to the US from the eight countries. (NBC News / New York Times / Washington Post)

Making America Safe is my number one priority. We will not admit those into our country we cannot safely vet.https://t.co/KJ886okyfC

3/ Jared Kushner used a private email account through his first nine months in the White House to trade emails with senior White House officials and outside advisers. At times, Steve Bannon and Reince Priebus also used private email accounts to correspond with Kushner. During the campaign, Trump routinely attacked Hillary Clinton for using a personal email account to handle government business when she was secretary of state. Kushner’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, said he adhered to government record-keeping requirements by forwarding all the emails to his government account. (Politico /