A second member of the Oath Keepers facing a seditious conspiracy charge for his role in the Jan. 6 breach of the Capitol pleaded guilty Friday and is preparing to cooperate with prosecutors.

Brian Ulrich, one of 11 Oath Keepers facing the gravest charges to emerge from the Jan. 6 attack, pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy and obstruction of Congress’ electoral vote-counting session. He follows Joshua James, an Oath Keeper who provided personal security to Roger Stone, who pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy last month.

Cooperation from Ulrich of Georgia and James of Alabama — in addition to others who have previously reached cooperation deals with the government — could arm prosecutors with substantial evidence as they work to secure the convictions of the remaining defendants, including Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes III.

The indictment against the broader group suggests Ulrich discussed bringing firearms and ammunition to store at a hotel in Arlington, Va., where the group amassed a cache of weapons they called a “quick-reaction force” or QRF.

For the second month in a row, temperatures in India and Pakistan are abnormally high because of a string of strong and prolonged heat waves — and now another surge is building.

Temperatures have already soared to dangerously high levels. They topped 110 degrees in the Indian capital of Delhi on Thursday and Friday, where pavement melted amid the heat, while several cities broke April records.

The Times of India reported Delhi clinched its second hottest April in 72 years Friday with an average high temperature of 104 degrees (40.2 Celsius).

The city of Nawabshah in Pakistan hit 117.5 degrees (47.5 degrees Celsius) Thursday — the hottest temperature in the Northern Hemisphere this year so far.

Former President Donald Trump said in a sworn affidavit that he doesn’t have any documents sought by the New York attorney general in its investigation of the Trump Organization’s finances.

In a one-page signed affidavit filed with the court Friday, Trump wrote, “To the best of my knowledge, (i) I do not have any of the documents requested in the subpoena dated December 1, 2021 in my personal possession; and (ii) if there are any documents responsive to the subpoena I believe they would be in the possession or custody of the Trump Organization. 2. At all relevant times, I have authorized, and continue to authorize, the release of any responsive documents to the Office of the Attorney General.”

Trump signed the document on April 27, the day after the judge issued a written order holding him in civil contempt and fining him $10,000 a day. The former president has appealed that order.

Trump’s lawyer also submitted a sworn affidavit that she had checked the records, and during a hearing told a judge she had gone to Florida to speak with Trump himself.

The European economy slowed in the first three months of the year due to a combination of soaring inflation and early fallout from the war in Ukraine.

Preliminary first quarter data published Friday showed GDP grew by 0.2% across the 19 countries that use the euro, over the previous quarter. That was weaker than the 0.3% growth recorded in the final three months of 2021.

Consumer price inflation, meanwhile, rose to 7.5% in April — the highest since the European Union began keeping records 25 years ago. Rising costs for energy and food — driven higher by the turmoil in Ukraine and Western sanctions on Russia — were largely to blame.

“Russia’s brutal war against Ukraine has driven up prices for energy and foodstuffs, disrupted supply chains and dealt a serious blow to consumer confidence,” economists at Berenberg wrote in a note Friday. “As the most exposed major region globally, the eurozone has fallen into stagflation as a result.”

Senate Democrats’ campaign arm is reserving $33 million in advertisements this fall, with the bulk of its resources devoted to protecting the party’s quartet of embattled incumbents in the hopes of keeping their tenuous hold on the majority.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee is plowing most of its initial reservation money into backing Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, Mark Kelly of Arizona and Raphael Warnock of Georgia. In the 50-50 Senate, just one Republican net gain would flip Senate control to the GOP next year, which makes each race critical.

And because the DSCC’s first job is to protect incumbents — which coincidentally is also the most straightforward path to retaining Senate control — the organization is also reserving ad slots in New Hampshire, which the Democratic Senate Majority PAC and Republican Senate Leadership Fund left off their initial reservation list. Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) is running for reelection, and though her odds seem more favorable since GOP Gov. Chris Sununu declined to challenge her, Senate Democrats aren’t taking any chances.

The DSCC is reserving $8.4 million in Nevada, $7.5 million in Arizona, $7 million in Georgia and $4 million in New Hampshire, according to a DSCC aide. The party is also going on offense in two states, reserving $3 million in Pennsylvania, which is an open seat due to the retirement of Republican Sen. Pat Toomey, and $3 million in Wisconsin, where GOP Sen. Ron Johnson is running for reelection.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer is wading into the crowded Democatic gubernatorial primary in his home state of Maryland, endorsing author and entrepreneur Wes Moore.

Hoyer is the most prominent Maryland Democrat to weigh into the race so far, with the state’s two Democratic senators having not picked a side in the primary.

“While there are many great candidates in this year’s race, Wes stands out as a candidate whose experience, vision, and talent can lead Maryland toward a brighter future by inspiring our people — particularly our young people — to work together to face our toughest challenges,” Hoyer said in a statement, obtained first by POLITICO.

Hoyer is expected to join Moore for an event on Thursday to formally make the endorsement.

In some corners of the party, it’s caused intense frustration — and fingerpointing — about how it could be avoided.

“I think it looks bad. I think we’ve got egg on our face,” said Rep. Kathleen Rice (D-N.Y.), who is retiring from her Long Island seat next year. She was among some Democrats who questioned whether the legislature had overreached when it created a map so heavily slanted toward Democrats when the state constitution placed a check on gerrymandering.

“It didn’t need to be that way,” she said. “We could have made lines that were fair and followed the rules and still have been effective at making sure that Democrats are represented.”

The redistricting mess dominated a discussion of the state’s Democratic delegation during a Zoom meeting on Thursday, according to multiple people on the call. Members expressed concern over the uncertainty and confusion surrounding the process and discussed potential legal avenues for fighting the ruling.

Earlier polling has shown Kemp with a substantial advantage in fending off Perdue's campaign to end his reelection bid early. The 11Alive/SurveyUSA poll confirms his strong standing with Georgia Republican primary voters.

The poll gives the governor a 25-point edge on Perdue, 56% to 31%. The full results break down below:

11Alive's poll suggests a second race between Kemp and Abrams would again go down as a close one.

With a margin of error of 3.4% from a polling sample of 1,278 likely general election voters, the result breaks down below:

If the November election for Georgia Governor were today, and these were the only candidates on the ballot, who would you vote for?
Brian Kemp - 50%
Stacey Abrams - 45%
Undecided - 5%

Two children had always been the plan for Anna Carey, and in early 2020 she was getting ready to start trying to conceive. Her daughter had just turned 2, and she and her husband were living happily, albeit far from family, in Toronto, where Ms. Carey had a part-time job at a marketing firm.

Of course, we all know what happened next.

With no safe child care options during a pandemic, Ms. Carey was forced to quit her marketing job in August 2020 to care for her daughter. What had felt almost certain a few months earlier now seemed unthinkable.

“We couldn’t imagine going through another pregnancy, birth and newborn phase with so few options for support,” she said.

For a while, she still held out hope that the situation would improve before her 35th birthday this July, which for genetic health reasons, she and her husband, Graham, had always considered a cutoff.

The final straw, though, was seeing how the pandemic revealed a glaring lack of structural support for families. Now, Ms. Carey said, she feels sad but resolute about her decision. “The new realization of just how little society values kids and parents — especially mothers — in any way beyond lip service was a major deterrent.”

Elon Musk is hard to love. Elon Musk is hard to like. On his way to becoming the world’s wealthiest person, Musk has emitted so many metric tons of self-indulgent puerility he might have violated the Paris Accords.

But one need not find Musk personally or politically appealing to appreciate that his contributions to humanity could end up being profound.

Through his endeavors in solar power and electric cars, Musk might do more to combat climate change than just about any lefty environmental activist or politician you can name. Musk looks even better when judged against other globe-straddling billionaires in his orbit. His is not an empire built on inheritance, dumb luck, monopoly or, subsidies notwithstanding, insider access. Indeed, his businesses seek to undermine some of the most harmful and politically entrenched industries on the planet, among them defense contractors, utilities, oil companies and combustion-engine automakers.

There is also something straightforwardly inspiring about Musk’s story. After a troubled childhood in South Africa, he immigrated first to Canada and then to the United States, put himself through college and made his own fortune through unending hard work and in pursuit of ambitions far grander than slapping “like” buttons all over the web. Even Musk’s bluster is excusable because underneath the big talk he has repeatedly delivered on his far-out promises. He makes innovative products that work well, that delight customers and that are on balance probably good for the world. Isn’t that the best one can hope for from capitalism?