PRISONER # P01135809: Former resident Donald Trump surrendered for arrest yesterday in Fulton County, Georgia, became the first president in history to have his mugshot taken, and was issued prisoner # P01135809. He used the services of a bail bondsman to post his $200,000 bail.

  Trump provided the jail with his personal information, giving his height as 6-3 and weight as 215, which is as true as his claims of election fraud. The New York Post headline says “Weight, What?”

  He listed his hair color as “blonde or strawberry.”

The former president was escorted through Atlanta by a motorcade and security that rivalled a sitting president.

  Trump’s booking took only about 20 minutes and he returned to the airport where his private jet waited to take him back to New Jersey. Speaking to reporters before he got on the plane, Trump said he had done nothing wrong, that the charges are a “travesty of justice” and that “we have every right to challenge an election we think is dishonest.”

  He is not charged with merely challenging the election. He is indicted for racketeering, conspiracy, filing false documents, and more in an effort to overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 election.

  Also turning himself in yesterday was Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows.

  In another development, following a request for a speedy trial by Trump co-defendant Kenneth Chesebro, a Fulton County Superior Court Judge yesterday set the date for October 23^rd, but only for Chesebro, who’s charged with helping to put together a slate of fake Republican electors in Georgia to vote for Trump.

  In furtherance of the Republican claim that criminal prosecutions of Trump are politically motivated, The Republican-led House Judiciary Committee opened an investigation into Georgia’s Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, who led the investigation into Trump and 18 other defendants indicted in that state. 

  The committee sent a letter to Willis asking whether she communicated or coordinated with the Justice Department, which has indicted Trump twice, or used federal money to complete her investigation. This is similar to Republican questions about the indictment of Trump in New York City.

  Willis has said she did not coordinate with federal prosecutors.

  Committee chairman Jim Jordan wrote to Willis, “You did not bring charges until two-and-a-half years later, at a time when the campaign for the Republican presidential nomination is in full swing.” He went on, “Moreover, you have requested that the trial in this matter begin on March 4, 2024, the day before Super Tuesday and eight days before the Georgia presidential primary.”

THE HIGH WINDOW: Russian president Vladimir Putin spoke of Wagner Group mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin in the past tense yesterday, even before Prigozhin’s remains were identified as among those of 10 people killed Tuesday in the crash of a business jet. “He was a man of difficult fate, and he made serious mistakes in life, and he achieved the results needed both for himself and when I asked him about it – for a common cause, as in these last months,” Putin said.

  American officials say they believe Prigozhin’s death was an assassination carried out with an on-board explosion.

  The 62-year-old Prigozhin led a brief rebellious march on Moscow two months ago. Putin had called Prigozhin’s rebellion “treasonous,” but after first banning him to exile, allowed the man to move about freely in Russia.

  Putin pledged an investigation saying, “It will be carried out in full and brought to completion.” Round up the usual suspects.

BAD SUSHI: China has invoked an immediate ban on the import of all fish caught in Japanese waters following Japan’s decision to begin releasing nuclear-contaminated wastewater from the destroyed Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant into the Pacific Ocean.

  The water has been treated. Both Japan and nuclear experts say it is safer than international drinking water standards.  The water release comes more than 12 years after the March 2011 nuclear meltdowns caused by a massive earthquake and tsunami.

THE WAR ROOM: Russia’s Ministry of Defense said today that Ukraine had launched a volley of 42 drones at Crimea and fired a missile near Moscow overnight in what may be the biggest aerial assault on Russian-held territory. 

  This comes a day after Ukraine claimed to have staged a brief special forces raid into occupied Crimea, attacking Russian forces. “Ukrainian defenders clashed with the occupier’s units,” an official statement said. “As a result, the enemy suffered losses among its personnel and destroyed enemy equipment.” 

THE OBIT PAGE: John Warnock, a founder of Adobe Systems who invented the ubiquitous PDF file, paving the way for a colorful digital world, died earlier this month at home in Los Altos, Calif. He was 82.

  Back in the days of dot matrix printers, Warnock was obsessed with making graphics that could look the same transferred from one computer system to another or printed regardless of the manufacturer.His solution was PDF, “Portable Document Format.”

THE SPIN RACK: The number of people believed “unaccounted for” after the Lahaina wildfire has fallen by more than half, with 388 names still on the list. County officials have published what they call a “validated list.” Confirmed deaths are 115. — A man in the Bronx fleeing narcotics officers on a motorbike, died after a police sergeant threw a cooler at him, knocking him to the ground. The sergeant was suspended without pay and the incident is under investigation.

BELOW THE FOLD: One of the latest trends in TikTok videos is parents smashing an egg on the head of their unsuspecting child and then laughing at the reaction. Child rearing experts say maybe this is not a good idea. 

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