1. Newly released court documents reveal that Robert Mueller zeroed in on Michael Cohen very early in his Russia investigation. Mueller was already investigating Cohen by July 2017, just two months after Mueller was appointed special counsel and almost a year before the raids on his properties — much earlier than previously reported. Mueller started by looking into possible misrepresentations Cohen made to banks in order to solve financial problems with his ailing taxi business. Investigators also looked into the money coming into Cohen’s accounts from consulting fees he charged after Trump was elected to see if Cohen failed to register as a foreign agent. (Associated Press)

  2. The White House missed a deadline imposed by the House Judiciary Committee to turn over documents related to a House investigation into whether Trump abused his power while in office. Republican aides said nine of the 81 officials who received letters requesting documents have submitted responses, but Democrats said there were more recipients who agreed to provide documents to the committee. Chairman Jerry Nadler also requested documents related to the firing of James Comey, internal discussions about Jeff Sessions’ decision to recuse himself from the Russia probe as then-AG, any talks about dismissing Mueller, and court records about hush-money payments Trump made to keep his alleged affairs secret. The White House has not responded. (CNN)

  3. Trump met with Brazil’s new far-right president Jair Bolsonaro and held a joint news conference at the White House, where Trump announced that he would designate Brazil as a “major non-NATO ally.” Trump also said he would be open to granting Brazil full NATO membership, even though Brazil doesn’t qualify to join the alliance. Bolsonaro said Brazil and the U.S. stand “side by side in their efforts to ensure liberties and respect to traditional family lifestyles, respect to God, our Creator, against the gender ideology or the politically correct attitudes and against fake news.” Trump later remarked that he was “very proud to hear the president use the term ‘fake news’.” Bolsonaro’s goals for his visit were to expand trade, as well as diplomatic and military cooperation between Brazil and the U.S., which Trump signaled he would be willing to do. (Associated Press / Reuters)

  4. A federal judge ruled that Trump’s ban on transgender people in the military can not go into effect yet, and that the 2017 court order blocking the ban remains in place. The White House released a memo last week saying that it planned to implement the ban in April because “there is no longer any impediment” to doing so. But Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly said “Defendants were incorrect in claiming that there was no longer an impediment.” (BuzzFeed News)

  5. Trump plans to nominate former Delta Air Lines pilot and executive Stephen Dickson to lead the FAA. If confirmed, Dickson will become the first permanent FAA administrator since Obama-appointee Michael Huerta resigned in 2018. Daniel Elwell has been serving as the acting administrator since then. Dickson recently retired as senior vice president of Delta, where he was in charge of the “safety and operational performance of Delta’s global flight operations, as well as pilot training.” (NPR)