National: Trump Should Address Russia’s Election Interference, McCain Says | Bloomberg

President Donald Trump should discuss Russian attempts to influence the outcome of the U.S. election in November in an effort to fill intelligence gaps, Senator John McCain said. “I would very much like to see the president address this issue including the issue we continue to wrestle with that is the Russian interference in the last election,” McCain said Saturday at a German Marshall Fund forum in Brussels. “There are a lot of answers that are required.” FBI Director James Comey told the House Intelligence Committee this week that the bureau is probing Russian efforts to “interfere” in the Nov. 8 election, as well as potential ties between Trump’s associates and Moscow during the campaign. The president’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, was fired for making misleading statements about contact with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak a few weeks before the inauguration.

National: Schiff: Nunes needs to decide if he wants to lead a credible investigation on Russia | The Hill

Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) on Sunday said House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) needs to decide if he wants to conduct a credible investigation into the Russian meddling in the presidential election. “We can’t have a credible investigation if one of the members, indeed the chairman, takes all the information he has seen to the White House and doesn’t share it with his own committee,” Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the panel, said on CBS’s “Face The Nation.” Schiff was further pressed on whether he believes the chairman of the committee is a “tool of the White House he’s investigating.”

National: Chairman and partisan: The dual roles of Devin Nunes raise questions about House investigation | The Washington Post

The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee was on his way to an event in Washington late Tuesday when the evening’s plans abruptly changed. After taking a brief phone call, Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) swapped cars and slipped away from his staff, congressional officials said. He appears to have used that unaccounted-for stretch of time to review classified intelligence files brought to his attention by sources he has said he will not name. The next morning, Nunes stepped up to a set of microphones in the Capitol complex to declare that he had learned that U.S. spy agencies had “incidentally collected information about U.S. citizens involved in the Trump transition.” Within hours President Trump was declaring that he had been vindicated for his tweets alleging that Trump Tower had been wiretapped by his predecessor, Barack Obama. Public attention on the revelation that the FBI was investigating possible coordination between the Trump campaign and Moscow had shifted to questions about whether Trump officials were victims of spying abuse. And by week’s end, a congressional probe capable of threatening Trump was consumed in partisan fighting and scheduling turmoil.

Arizona: Governor Signs Bill Targeting Initiative Signatures | Associated Press

Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey wasted no time Thursday signing legislation that opponents say would make it tougher to get citizen initiatives on the ballot, but supporters say will reduce fraud in signature gathering. Ducey signed the measure into law less than three hours after it received final House approval. House Bill 2404 bans groups seeking to put an initiative on the ballot from paying petition circulators by the signature and makes it easier to challenge citizen initiatives in court. The governor’s action gives Republicans and the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and Industry a victory in one of their top priorities of the year. House Bill 2404 was approved by the Senate Wednesday, with no votes from Democrats, and the House followed Thursday, also without Democratic support.

Arkansas: Gov. Hutchinson Passes Arkansas Voter ID Bill | Associated Press

Arkansas’ governor signed a measure Friday requiring voters to show photo identification before casting a ballot, reinstating a voter ID law that was struck down by the state’s highest court more than two years ago. The bill signed by Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson closely mirrors the law enacted by the Legislature in 2013 that was found unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court the following year. The latest law is aimed at addressing the argument by some justices that the 2013 law didn’t receive enough votes in the Legislature to be enacted. Unlike that measure, the latest version of the requirement allows voters with a photo ID to cast a provisional ballot if they sign a sworn statement confirming their identity.

Florida: Candidates helping voters vote? Legislator pushes to make it illegal | Palm Beach Post

State Rep. Emily Slosberg has proposed legislation to make it illegal for candidates to go into people’s homes and help them fill out their vote-by-mail ballot, closing a loophole revealed in a recent Palm Beach Post investigation. Slosberg, D-Boca Raton, cited The Post’s story when she proposed an amendment Wednesday to make the practice a third-degree felony. But she withdrew the amendment for the time being at the recommendation of a colleague. The freshman legislator said she was alarmed by Post stories that revealed that Palm Beach County Commissioner Mack Bernard and state Rep. Al Jacquet, both Democrats, won their seats after entering people’s homes and helping them fill out vote-by-mail ballots. Although their behavior drew condemnation from experts who believe it’s an improper campaign tactic, Florida’s laws did not make it illegal.

Kansas: House bill revoking Kobach’s appointment power held ‘hostage’ by GOP chairman | Topeka Capital-Journal

A Republican committee chairman formally submitted a bill Friday to the full House stripping Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach of power to pick the top election officer in the state’s four most populous counties after Democrats complained the legislation had inexplicably disappeared. Rep. Keith Esau, chairman of the House Elections Committee, said bill-drafting issues, instead of his personal opposition to the measure, delayed presentation of the measure to the House in accordance with a rule requiring delivery within two legislative work days. More than a week elapsed between the committee’s approval of Senate Bill 8 and the chairman’s compliance with the rule.

Pennsylvania: The 197th District has an unofficial winner, and an official investigation | Philadelphia Inquirer

The contentious and controversial special election for the 197th District of the state House has an unofficial winner — Democrat Emilio Vazquez. It also has an official investigation by the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office into allegations of voter fraud during Tuesday’s election. Staffers from the city’s Board of Elections spent Friday morning methodically combing through long reams of narrow paper tapes, calling out the votes for write-in candidates such as Vazquez. The count showed Vazquez winning with 73.5 percent of the vote. Green Party nominee Cheri Honkala, who like Vazquez was kept off the ballot by a Commonwealth Court judge’s ruling, finished second with 10.5 percent. Other write-in candidates took a combined 8.6 percent.

Bulgaria: Ex-Premier Nears Return to Power in a Key Election for Europe | The New York Times

The former prime minister of Bulgaria verged on retaking power Sunday as his center-right party held a narrow lead in a contested election, a sign that Bulgarians still see their future lying with the European Union. While official results were not expected until Monday, it appeared that the former leader, Boiko Borisov, would form a new government in Bulgaria, the European Union’s poorest member, probably in a coalition with an alliance of smaller right-wing nationalist parties. The Socialists, who had advocated stronger ties with Russia and had vowed to block a renewal of European Union sanctions against the Kremlin, could not convince enough voters that they were the better alternative and conceded defeat.

China: ‘A selection, not an election’: Pro-Beijing committee picks loyalist to lead Hong Kong | The Washington Post

An elite election committee composed of Beijing loyalists chose a new leader Sunday for the 7.3 million people of Hong Kong: Carrie Lam, who is expected to follow the central government’s instructions to the letter. To become Hong Kong’s chief executive, Lam beat out John Tsang, a former finance secretary who enjoyed considerable popularity, according to opinion polls, and Woo Kwok-hing, a retired high court judge who never stood a chance. The three-person ticket was itself the product of tightly controlled, small-circle vetting. “We have a qualified electorate of millions, but I don’t have a vote, and most other people don’t have a vote,” said Anson Chan, who once served as Hong Kong’s top civil servant.

France: Le Pen Visits Putin Amid Fears of Russian Interference in French Vote | Fortune

French far-right leader Marine Le Pen dropped in on Russia’s Vladimir Putin for a chat Friday, in a move that once again stoked the argument over Russian influence in Western politics. According to her Twitter account, the two “discussed at length the international situation and Islamist terror,” as well as “the fate of eastern Christians, who are threatened every day by Islamist fundamentalists.” Le Pen, who is currently tipped to win the first round of the French presidential elections at the end of April, is politically closest to Putin out of all the candidates running—with a platform of nationalism, euro-skepticism and a hard line on Islamist terror and immigration that her opponents decry as racist.

Germany: Merkel’s conservatives win Saarland vote in boost for national campaign | Reuters

German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives won a regional election in the western state of Saarland on Sunday, dealing a setback to their Social Democrat rivals and boosting her prospects of winning a fourth term in September’s national election. Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) strengthened their position as the largest party in the state despite expectations ahead of the vote that the Social Democrats (SPD) would be boosted by their new national leader, Martin Schulz. The CDU won 40.7 percent of the vote, up from 35.2 percent in the previous election in Saarland in 2012, preliminary official figures showed. The SPD slipped to 29.6 percent, down from 30.6 percent.

Turkey: Erdogan says Turkey may hold referendum on EU accession bid | Reuters

President Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday Turkey may hold a second referendum on whether to continue with European Union accession talks, following a planned vote on April 16 that could give him sweeping new powers. “Right now we are holding a referendum on April 16 and after that we could choose to do a second one on the (EU) accession talks and we would abide by whatever our people would say there,” Erdogan told a joint forum with Britain in the southern city of Antalya. His comments came a day after he vowed to review all political and administrative ties with the EU, including a deal to curb illegal migration, but it would maintain economic relations with the bloc.

Venezuela: Government ‘terrified’ of calling election | CBC

The late Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez and his allies triumphed nearly every time voters went to the ballot box. But Chavez’s successor, President Nicolas Maduro, appears to have lost interest in testing the will of the people. Amid a severe economic crisis, opinion polls show that support for Maduro and for ruling United Socialist Party (PSUV) politicians is collapsing. In response, electoral authorities — whom analysts claim take orders from the executive branch — have over the past year shelved or delayed elections large and small.