Monday, Jan. 9

• President Joe Biden arrived in Mexico for the “Three Amigos” summit: bilateral meetings with Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. The trio discussed migration, drug trafficking, climate change, manufacturing and trade among other issues of mutual interest. Biden said the gathering “will deepen our coordination and advance our shared priorities for North America.”
• Biden approved an emergency declaration for 17 California counties, including Sonoma County, in response to the devastating week of storms that killed at least 17 people since Dec. 31 and knocked out power for hundreds of thousands. The declaration authorized the Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate disaster relief efforts and mobilize emergency resources.
• The House, presided over by newly elected Republican Speaker Kevin McCarthy, passed a rules package to govern the House for the next two years. Democrats argued these new guidelines will make it more difficult to approve essential legislation like government budget measures.
• The Supreme Court allowed messaging platform WhatsApp to pursue a lawsuit against Israel’s NSO Group, which makes a spyware program called Pegasus that is linked to the state surveillance of journalists, human rights advocates and dissidents worldwide.
• Canada finalized an agreement with the United States government and arms manufacturer Lockheed Martin to purchase 88 F-35 fighter jets for $14.2 billion.
• The Securities and Exchange Commission charged former McDonald’s CEO Stephen Easterbrook with making false and misleading statements to investors about the circumstances of his 2019 termination. Easterbrook was hit with a five-year officer and director bar and a $400,000 civil penalty.

Tuesday, Jan. 10

• A White House lawyer announced that classified documents from Joe Biden’s time as vice president were discovered in November by the president’s personal lawyers at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement, a Washington think tank named after Biden. Attorney General Merrick Garland asked the attorney to review the classified documents, which had been handed over to the National Archives.
• House Republicans voted to launch an investigation into Biden’s so-called “weaponization” of the federal government. Republicans claim that Biden is unfairly using federal agencies to investigation former President Donald Trump and his supporters. Democrats branded the investigation as a “partisan fishing expedition.”
• The White House announced a series of pledges made with Mexico and Canada ahead of the “Three Amigos” summit including a commitment to cooperation on bolstering the supply of semiconductors in North America, a new agreement on addressing climate change, an updated strategy for dealing with drug smuggling and modest new migrant crisis measures.
• The Pentagon announced that about 100 Ukrainian troops would soon be headed to the U.S. to begin training on the Patriot surface-to-air guided missile defense system, which can target aircraft, cruise missiles, and shorter-range ballistic missiles that Russia has deployed.

Wednesday, Jan. 11

• White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Biden “commends the leadership” of Illinois’s governor and legislators whose work led to Illinois becoming the ninth state to ban the sale of assault weapons.
• Japan and the U.S. released a joint statement unveiling plans to strengthen security cooperation in the face of shared worries about China, which, they say, poses an “unprecedented” threat to international order. The two countries pledged to “prevail in a new era of strategic competition.”
• Deputy U.S. Ambassador Richard Mills lashed out at the Wagner Group, a Kremlin-backed Russian military contractor, at a United Nations Security Council meeting on West Africa and the Sahel region of North Africa. Mills accused the group of interfering in the internal affairs of African countries and “increasing the likelihood that violent extremism will grow” in the Sahel.
• The Federal Aviation Administration halted plane departures within the U.S. for over two hours due to a problem with a system used by pilots to alert them of hazards and changes to airport facilities and procedures.

Thursday, Jan. 12

• Scientists with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the past nine years have been the warmest since modern records began in 1880, and that 2022 is tied for being the fifth hottest year on record.
• The Department of Homeland Security announced that it extended temporary deportation relief to Somali citizens in the U.S. for 18 months due to the extremity of the humanitarian crisis and armed conflict in the African nation.
• The federal trial against former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and four lieutenants, who have been charged with seditious conspiracy in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack, began. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jason McCullough said the Proud Boys intentionally assembled a “fighting force” to stop the transfer of power to Biden.
• White House special counsel Richard Sauber said a “small number” of classified documents from Biden’s time as vice president were found at Biden’s Delaware home. The files were turned over to the Justice Department. More documents were discovered on Saturday.
• Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed a special counsel to investigate Biden’s handling of classified documents.
• Forty-six House representatives called on the Biden administration to revoke any U.S. visa held by former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro following Sunday’s attack on Brazil’s capital, when hundreds of Bolsonaro supporters stormed government buildings.
• The SEC charged two cryptocurrency firms, Genesis Global Capital and Gemini Trust Company, with illegally selling securities to hundreds of thousands of investors through their crypto lending program.

Friday, Jan. 13

• Biden hosted a visit with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida at the White House. “The United States is fully, thoroughly, and completely committed to the alliance [between the U.S. and Japan],” Biden said to Kishida. “And we’re stepping up to hold [Russian President Vladimir] Putin accountable for his unprovoked war in Ukraine, and I want to thank you, thank you for your strong leadership on this.”
• Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the U.S. will likely hit its $31.4 trillion statutory debt limit on Jan. 19, which will force the Treasury to launch cash management measures to prevent default until early June. She sent a letter to congressional leaders to warn them of this and urge them to raise the debt ceiling.
• Republican Rep. Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said he had written to Secretary of State Antony Blinken requesting records related to the U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan, including intelligence assessments and communications with the Taliban.

Saturday, Jan. 14

• Biden made another major disaster declaration for the entire state of California. The declaration orders federal aid to supplement state, tribal, and local recovery efforts in the areas that were affected by severe winter storms, flooding, landslides, and mudslides.

Sunday, Jan. 15

• In a Wall Street Journal interview, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani defended the U.S.’s continued presence in the Middle Eastern country, apparently contradicting the position held the powerful Iran-aligned groups that nominated the prime minister last year.