A year after NCLR President Janet Murguia called Obama the “deporter-in-chief,” she will rip into Republicans at the NCLR Capital Awards Tuesday, in prepared remarks viewed by BuzzFeed News. “Our complaint is not partisan, it is personal.”

Janet Murguia will say the Republican Party needs to get it right with the Hispanic community before the 2016 election Tuesday at the NCLR Capital Awards.

Alex Wong / Getty Images

Almost a year to the day National Council La Raza (NCLR) President Janet Murguia called President Obama the "deporter-in-chief," she will lay into Republicans for opposition to his executive actions and immigration legislation, saying they don't care about Latinos and have made it "personal" with the community ahead of the 2016 election, according to prepared remarks provided to BuzzFeed News.

Murguia will make the speech at Tuesday's NCLR's annual Capital Awards in Washington, D.C., an event recognizing officials from both parties for their support of issues that affect the Hispanic community. In her remarks, she makes clear she is now training her ire and that of her organization at Republicans, lumping together those who support tying Department of Homeland Security funding with ending Obama's immigration actions and the governors and attorney generals leading the 26-state legal fight against the president.

"This feels like it is about us — that when it comes to Latinos and their families, too many in the Republican Party simply don't care," she will say, according to the remarks. "They don't care about the human toll their inaction has on our community. They don't care how many of our children will lose a parent. They don't care about the financial devastation they cause to our families and our communities."

In an interview with BuzzFeed News, Murguia said Republicans should see her tough words through the prism of the coming 2016 election.

"We're taking the opportunity to make it crystal clear to Speaker Boehner and the Republican Party that if they don't change course, they will lose the Latino vote for a generation," she said, arguing former California Gov. Pete Wilson's perceived anti-Latino rhetoric in the early 1990s made the state a bastion for Democrats.

She also addressed a concern recently shared by DREAMer activists who met with advocates close to the White House. The activists see an opportunity to attack Republicans on the issue, but worry doing so could stoke fears in the undocumented immigrant community and prevent people from even considering applying, if the program is reinstated during or after the legal challenge.

"We need to do both," she said of the balance between partisan attacks and informing the community about the status of the legal challenge to Obama's actions.

Murguia incurred Obama's wrath after calling him the "deporter-in-chief" last March — she wasn't invited back to the White House again until late last year — but many advocates highlight the moment as a turning point in the fight for immigration actions.

This year Murguia won't hit Obama — she'll thank him.

"The reason I'm thanking the president is we have had our differences on timing but at the end of the day he acted, he had a lot of options, but he did act boldly," she said.

The awards will also honor New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker and Frank Sharry of America's Voice.

With her speech framed toward the 2016 election, Murguia not-so-subtly hinted at what she wants to hear and see from presidential candidates, like Hillary Clinton, whose shadow looms over the entire field.

"That they can articulate their positions on policy issues that we care about and their campaigns reflect our community in staff, including in their inner circles, and that they're present in our communities with outreach and messaging," she said.

"Nobody is going to get by on their past record, we need to understand what they are committed to doing in the future."

“America’s rabbi” managed to cause quite a stir in a week with bigger things on the agenda.

WASHINGTON — During a week in Washington consumed by high-stakes wrangling over a speech by the Israeli prime minister and nuclear negotiations with Iran, an unlikely figure has emerged as a flash point for both right and left, condemned in Congress and on the AIPAC policy conference stage. A rabbi, in fact: Rabbi Shmuley Boteach.

Boteach's organization's attack ad in the New York Times last week that accused National Security Adviser Susan Rice of turning a blind eye to genocide and depicted her against a backdrop of skulls, got a resounding thumbs down from pretty much all the major Jewish groups, as well as the Obama administration and AIPAC, which is holding its yearly policy conference this week. Boteach, the author of Kosher Sex: A Recipe for Passion and Intimacy and the former host of reality television show "Shalom in the Home," is suddenly radioactive. After hanging tough for the weekend, Boteach apologized for the ad on Monday. But the rabbi has managed to make himself the center of attention — or a center of attention — during a tense period between the U.S. and Israel, and during an AIPAC conference strenuously trying not to seem partisan.

The ad was the talk of a pre-AIPAC party attended by journalists and operatives on Saturday night, and has come up often in conversations on the margins of the conference. On Monday evening, AIPAC chairman of the board Lee Rosenberg denounced the ad while introducing Rice's speech at the conference.

It's not just the ad, though: On Monday afternoon, Boteach held an event on Capitol Hill with Holocaust survivor and Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel and with Republican Sen. Ted Cruz. Democratic Rep. Brad Sherman was scheduled to be there as well, but backed out because of the ad. "I cannot appear at a forum which was advertised using an unwarranted incendiary personal attack. I will be working with Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel, and others, to create appropriate forums to focus on the danger posed by Iran," Sherman said in a statement. "Nothing has done as much to unify the Jewish community, and nothing has done so much to bring the Jewish community in agreement with the Obama administration, as this ad."

Boteach began the panel by apologizing, saying that his group which was responsible for placing the advertisement, This World: The Values Network, had not meant it as a personal attack against Rice.

But in an interview after the panel with BuzzFeed News, Boteach struck a slightly less apologetic tone.

"We're not apologizing for our strong stance on the need to stand up against genocide," Boteach said. "We're not apologizing for our strong belief and concerted media campaign to have the prime minister of Israel speak in the national capital. I continue to strongly disagree with Susan Rice's comments on Charlie Rose that the prime minister of Israel, just by giving a speech, is going to be destroying the fabric of U.S.-Israel ties."

Rice last week called Netanyahu's speech to Congress on Iran "destructive" to the U.S.-Israel relationship.

"We're apologizing for the perception that this is a personal attack," Boteach said. "It's not a personal attack."

"To the extent that our ad conflated the personal and policy is what we're apologizing for," he said. "I have no interest in offending Susan Rice."

Boteach said that he'd come to the decision to apologize after "discussions with close friends," not because of the widespread condemnation or because of his ties to Democrats like Sen. Cory Booker, who was a co-president of Boteach's L'Chaim Society at Oxford University, and U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Samantha Power.

The Jewish community "can be a very insular place," Boteach said, and they have a "fear that rattling the powers that be can shake Jewish security."

"When you write a book called 'Kosher Lust,' you're used to being attacked by rabbis, used to being attacked by the community, when you're Michael Jackson's rabbi, you're used to being attacked by everyone," he said.

Of course, not everyone has it out for Rabbi Shmuley this week. Asked after the panel if the ad went too far, Cruz didn't condemn it.

"After Prime Minister Netanyahu was invited to speak in Congress, there have been debates after debates after debates on questions of personality," Cruz said. "And they've all served as distractions. A back and forth about protocol. A back and forth about an ad in the newspaper. The people pressing these distractions want them to be distractions."

This isn't the first time Rabbi Shmuley has been in the limelight. The last time the rabbi got this much press was probably in 2012, when he ran for Congress in New Jersey as a Republican and lost. Boteach did get a half-million dollar donation for his campaign from Republican megadonors Sheldon and Miriam Adelson, who were in attendance at the event on Capitol Hill on Monday and who are thought to be major funders of This World (they don't show up in the most recent publicly available IRS 990 form, from 2012). Boteach said at last year's This World gala that he was dedicating Kosher Lust to the Adelsons.

"There are many backers, thank God," Boteach said. "There are thousands of backers around the world." When asked whether the Adelsons were footing most of the bill, Boteach said, "No, of course not."

Boteach was vague about the purpose of his organization. "We try to make the Jewish people a light unto the nations," he said. Asked what that entails, he didn't name specifics.

Boteach also seemed unsure of how many employees This World has, saying "It fluctuates because we, we have a lot of consultants — it fluctuates."

The rabbi is fairly buoyant, all things considered. He's been tweeting photo after photo from the AIPAC conference, and told BuzzFeed News that he still finds Rice's comments to Rose unacceptable.

"I don't want to be involved in negative conversations, that's not our purpose," Boteach said. "We want to be provocative of course, but not negative. A little tiny nation that has experienced a lot of suffering has to sometimes be provocative to be heard."

Boteach jokingly said he was even considering a run for president: "Shmuley 2016."

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke to a joint session of Congress Tuesday in defiance of the White House, as tensions between the U.S. and Israel escalate over a possible nuclear deal with Iran. President Obama later said the speech didn’t “offer any viable alternatives.”

Mandel Ngan / Getty Images

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used his highly anticipated speech Tuesday to the U.S. Congress to warn about what he sees are the dangers of a nuclear deal between Iran and the United States.

"(The) deal will not prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, it would all but guarantee Iran gets those weapons, lots of them," Netanyahu said.

"We must now choose between two paths. One path leads to a bad deal that will, at best, curtail Iran's nuclear ambitions for a while, but it will inexorably lead to a nuclear-armed Iran whose unbridled aggression will inevitably lead to war. The second path, however difficult, could lead to a much better deal that would prevent a nuclear-armed Iran, a nuclearized Middle East, and the horrific consequences of both to all of humanity."

The address has become a partisan political issue in the U.S. and an increasingly public display of deep disagreements between the Obama administration and Netanyahu over how to address Iran's nuclear program, as well as the tensions between the White House and the Israeli prime minister.

President Obama later said he read a transcript of the speech and said it "didn't offer any viable alternatives" and added "there was nothing new."

Netanyahu touched upon the controversy surrounding his speech, saying, "I know that my speech has been the subject of much controversy. I deeply regret that some perceive my being here as political. That was never my intention."

Throughout his address, Netanyahu painted a picture of an Iran that is dangerous to Israel and the rest of the world.

"Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei spews the oldest hatred, the oldest hatred of anti-Semitism with the newest technology. He tweets that Israel must be annihilated. He tweets. In Iran there isn't exactly free Internet, but he tweets in English that Israel must be destroyed," Netanyahu said.

"The greatest danger facing our world is the marriage of militant Islam with nuclear weapons. To defeat ISIS and let Iran get nuclear weapons would be to win the battle but lose the war. We can't let that happen," Netanyahu said to a standing ovation, one of several.

House Speaker John Boehner invited Netanyahu to speak before a joint session of Congress, without informing the White House of the invitation. Obama will not meet with Netanyahu, citing prior practice of not meeting with foreign leaders close to when their country holds elections. Netanyahu is up for election on March 17.

President Obama told Reuters in an interview Monday that Iran must halt its nuclear program for at least a decade if it ever hopes to see sanctions ease.

Watch the address here:

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Did you know that Pat Boone and Robert Kraft are really interested in Iran’s nuclear program? Me neither.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in Washington to give a much discussed, much hyped, much slammed speech of the decade before Congress, a speech that will either be extremely damaging or just a distraction.

Cliff Owen / AP

Some of the hubbub has been over the fact that Bibi was invited by Speaker of the House John Boehner, without coordinating with the White House, and it became A Thing. Nearly 60 Democratic legislators won't be attending in protest.

Happier times, back in 2011.

Susan Walsh / AP

“If Taylor Swift and Katy Perry did a joint concert at Madison Square Garden wearing white-and-gold and black-and-blue dresses, accompanied by dancing sharks and llamas, that’s the only way you’d have a tougher ticket,” Boehner's spokesman actually said.

You'll just have to imagine the llamas and T-Swift

David J. Phillip / AP

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Groups representing the military, business, academia, and the White House will be weighing in at the court this week in support of same-sex couples’ marriage rights.

Amanda Keller holds a flag as she joins other marriage equality supporters in Linn Park, at the Jefferson County courthouse, Monday, Feb. 9, 2015, in Birmingham, Ala.

Hal Yeager / AP

Supporters include the Obama administration and the former Republican National Committee chair

Amicus curiae, or friend of the court, briefs are submitted in most cases before the justices, but hot-button issues like marriage, abortion, and affirmative action often present many filings — some of which, because of the lawyers involved and issues or arguments discussed, can end up as key points in the oral arguments or even ultimate decisions.

The same-sex couples challenging the bans in Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and Tennessee submitted their briefs on Feb. 27. In them they argue that the bans on marriage and/or marriage recognition are unconstitutional for violating equal protection and due process "fundamental right" guarantees. Amicus briefs supporting their position are due by Friday.

Attorney General Eric Holder wrote in USA Today on Monday that the Justice Department's planned brief will argue that "[n]othing justifies excluding same-sex couples from the institution of marriage."

Mandel Ngan / Getty Images

Ken Mehlman, the former chairman of the Republican National Committee, is bringing together a group of more than 250 Republicans and libertarians who support a marriage equality ruling.

Those working to finalize the brief told BuzzFeed News on Tuesday that they expect to have a total of more than double the 131 signatures they had on a similar brief filed when the Supreme Court considered the constitutionality of California's Proposition 8 in 2013.

In addition to Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Richard Hanna, two additional members of the House, Illinois Rep. Bob Dold and Florida's Rep. Carlos Curbelo, have signed on to the Mehlman brief. Additionally, former Sen. John Danforth, who opposed the Federal Marriage Amendment to the Constitution back in 2006, has signed on to the brief.

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“The main thing that bothers me, and I think should preclude her from being considered for the presidency, is that she didn’t defend our mission in Benghazi.”

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Sen. Rand Paul, a potential presidential candidate in 2016, says he's more bothered by the Clinton Foundation accepting donations from foreign governments than Hillary Clinton using a private email address in her capacity as secretary of state.

The Kentucky Republican also said he was bothered more by Clinton's oversight as head of the State Department during the lead up to the 2012 attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya.

"The emails don't bother me as much as several other things. The main thing that bothers me, and I think should preclude her from being considered for the presidency, is that she didn't defend our mission in Benghazi. She was asked repeatedly for security, didn't defend the consulate there and I think as a consequence I think lost our ambassador there," Paul told NewsMaxTV during an appearance on Tuesday.

Paul furthermore said foreign donors giving money to the Clinton Global Initiative gave the appearance of buying influence, saying it "really bothers" him.

"The other that's come out recently that really bothers me is that she's taking foreign donations from the heads of foreign states from I guess different sovereign funds but basically foreign countries for her foundation. And I think this almost, it has the appearance anyway whether it's true or not, it has the appearance of foreign countries buying influence with someone who could potentially run for the presidency."

The Clinton Foundation stopped taking money from foreign governments in 2009 when Clinton became the secretary of state, but dropped the ban after she left that office in 2013.

"So, I think there's a lot of things she gonna have to answer and really that some of her behavior I think really should make a lot of Americans think twice about whether or not whether to consider her," Paul later added.

Adrienne Elrod, a spokesperson for Correct the Record, a research group that defends the Clintons labeled Paul an extremist in comments defending her record.

"Rand Paul's brand of extremism would hurt Americans and foster global instability. Americans want a tested and proven leader like Hillary Clinton who has worked to create opportunity and security throughout the world. As Secretary of State, Hillary took action, responsibility, and was fully transparent in working to make the world a safer place following the Benghazi tragedy, and through the charitable work of the Clinton Foundation, she has helped improve the lives of millions."

With Hillary Clinton dominating the field, and a full Republican slate of debates scheduled, Democrats haven’t announced one yet. “We’re talking to everyone to try and get the buy-in on the front end, so that when the time comes we can pull the trigger and it’ll work.”

Stan Honda / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — Just before Thanksgiving last year, without much fanfare, former Sen. Jim Webb of Virginia launched an exploratory committee for the presidency of the United States. Against a deep blue backdrop, Webb laid out a case for his brand of leadership and detailed his public service in the Senate, as an officer in the Marine Corps, and at the Department of Defense.

"Each time," he said, "I served not with the expectation of making government a career, but to continue to the good of the country during a period of crisis or great change."

Webb became the first major name on either side to make his designs on the White House so publicly known and he has largely maintained a low profile since. But a spokesperson for the 68-year-old Democrat said there was no immediate plan in place for a crucial exercise in the primary process: the Democratic debate program.

"Actually, we've had no discussions internally or externally about debates," Webb spokesperson Craig Crawford said in an email to BuzzFeed News. "Will cross that bridge when we see it."

Webb's exploratory committee is currently the closest thing to a challenge to Hillary Clinton's expected, but yet-to-be-announced campaign. The thinned-out presidential field presents an obvious, but murky question: What exactly is the Democratic Party going to do about presidential debates?

The DNC says publicly that it's not worried about the dearth of candidates leading up to the election and that, instead, it's focused on inclusion of the debate's stakeholders: the networks, the candidates, and their surrogates.

"This is not a candidate-driven process," DNC spokesperson Mo Elleithee said in a recent interview with BuzzFeed News. "It's a process-driven process. Having said that, it's why we're talking to everyone to try and get the buy-in on the front end, so that when the time comes we can pull the trigger and it'll work. We want to put together a debate program that helps the process of selecting our nominee."

Six years ago, the field was crowded with big ticket names, including then Sens. Barack Obama, Joe Biden, John Edwards, and Clinton herself. The candidates took part in more than two-dozen debates that many Democrats believed left the last two candidates standing — Clinton and Obama — unnecessarily battered for the general election.

Elleithee added there will almost certainly be fewer debates, but did not have a number or offer a range. It's in direct contrast to the strategy pursued by the RNC, which announced a nine-debate from August 2015 through March 1, 2016. The schedule is complete with sites, partnering networks, and approximate dates.

In addition to Webb, the next strongest potential contender is former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, who on Tuesday removed himself from bottleneck of names vying for the Senate seat that will be vacated by Sen. Barbara Mikulski in 2016. An O'Malley spokesperson declined comment for this story.

Debates play a critical role in the process — candidates can advance a national profile, and a party can redefine or test core principles with multiple candidates. The former and current Democratic Party officials that spoke with BuzzFeed News during the DNC Winter Meetings earlier this month shared an optimistic, but slightly untraditional view of the party's locus heading into the second quarter: With the current field, they said, Clinton would coast to the Democratic nomination with her entire war chest and few to no scars, even if she did not test her mettle against a Democratic rival that might improve her stamina against the Republican candidate.

"When you have a primary and you're spending tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars competing against your brethren, you've got to redo all of that and compete against the Republican," John Wisniewski, a Democratic New Jersey lawmaker and former state party chair told BuzzFeed News. "When you don't have that kind of primary process you have the ability to save those resources. The downside in all of that is that is there's less of an opportunity to test-market your views and develop your team early on because there's no challenge."

Elleithee thinks the RNC's straight-into-your-living room blueprint is too archaic when companies like Facebook will help drive information, analysis, and data to voters.

The RNC did not immediately respond to a message asking for comment.

"I think the days are over when a network throws a debate on television, promotes the heck out of it and expects people to come watch it," he said. "That's part of it. But at the same time people are getting their information differently. They're not watching live television the way they used to. People are getting more of their information digitally... They're not watching entire shows or programs anymore, they're watching snippets that are important to them."

Elleithee said he's less interested in people watching entire debates. Part of the DNC's approach is working on on-demand programming that will allow viewers to pick and choose what they want to see. But he said the DNC is not in negotiations yet. Instead it's creating a collaborative method for networks, news organizations, and special interest groups to work with likely candidates.

"As we get a better sense of when and how our field takes shape, then I think there will be some more clarity and we'll start to make some decisions that we hope will work for everybody," Elleithee said.

“Alabama law allows for ‘marriage’ between only one man and one woman,” the Alabama Supreme Court states, reaching its own conclusion about the constitutionality of the state’s marriage ban.

Angela Channell, right, and Dawn Hicks, left, display their marriage license on Feb. 13, 2015.

Robert Sutton / AP

WASHINGTON — The Alabama Supreme Court ordered probate judges throughout the state to stop issuing marriage licenses temporarily to same-sex couples.

A growing number of probate judges had begun issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples ever since the U.S Supreme Court let a federal district court's rulings that the state's bans on such marriages are unconstitutional go into effect.

The Tuesday night order — to which only one justice of the state's high court dissented — is the result of an emergency request brought to the court by two conservative nonprofit organizations, the Alabama Policy Institute and the Alabama Citizens Action Program.

In addition to ordering all probate judges to halt the issuance of marriage licenses to same-sex couples temporarily, the Alabama Supreme Court directs any probate judges who wish to do so to file a response in the next five business days as to why they should not be bound by the Alabama Supreme Court's order.

The Alabama Supreme Court then decided that the marriage ban in Alabama is constitutional.

Then, because the federal district court injunctions only apply to a couple officials, the Alabama Supreme Court ordered all probate judges who are not specifically covered by those injunctions to stop issuing licenses.

In the opinion, the court states that the request from the conservative groups claims that "Alabama probate judges are flouting a duty imposed upon them by the [laws and amendment banning same-sex couples' marriages] and that we should direct the respondent probate judges to perform that duty."

The court then goes through the process by which same-sex couples began marrying in many counties in Alabama, concluding that "uncertainty has become the order of the day" and that "©onfusion reigns."

As such, the court held, "There is a need for immediate, uniform relief among all the probate judges of this State" — particularly given the "'magnitude and importance' of the issue."

The court then goes on to decide whether the groups can, in effect, stand in for the state in the action — called "public standing" — and concludes that they can.

"The final procedural issue we consider is whether the federal court's order prevents this Court from acting with respect to probate judges of this State who ... are not bound by the order of the federal district court in [the marriage case]," the court states. "The answer is no."

The Alabama Supreme Court goes on: "[S]tate courts may interpret the United States Constitution independently from, and even contrary to, federal courts."

Then, it did exactly that. "After careful consideration of the reasoning employed by the federal district court in [the marriage recognition case]," the court ruled, "we find that the provisions of Alabama law contemplating the issuance of marriage licenses only to opposite-sex couples do not violate the United States Constitution and that the Constitution does not alter or override the ministerial duties of the respondents under Alabama law."

As such, the court concluded: "Alabama law allows for 'marriage' between only one man and one woman. Alabama probate judges have a ministerial duty not to issue any marriage license contrary to this law. Nothing in the United States Constitution alters or overrides this duty."

Elmore County Probate Judge John Enslen, originally named as a respondent to the matter, was "realigned" to join the proceeding with the conservative groups because he, essentially, agreed with the groups.

Mobile County Probate Judge Don Davis, because he was subject to the federal court's order, asked to be dismissed from this action. The Alabama Supreme Court asked Davis whether he is bound by the federal court order to grant licenses to all same-sex couples or just the named plaintiffs in the federal case. It was not immediately clear whether he is bound by the Alabama Supreme Court's temporary halt on same-sex couples' marriages.

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Not that you had doubts.

I grabbed John Podesta, who is expected to be Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman, after a panel Tuesday at the Center for American Progress.

Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images

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At an Emily’s List gala, Hillary Clinton sticks to campaign themes: women, the family, wages. Meanwhile, questions continue about her State Department tenure.

Kris Connor / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — About a dozen introductory speakers at a Democratic gala here on Tuesday heaped praised on the honoree of the evening: Hillary Clinton. But in the back of the ballroom at the Washington Hilton, as yet another speaker took the lectern, reporters hovered instead around Clinton's spokesperson.

They hoped to pick up something, anything, about the pair of ongoing controversies that lent darker hues to an event intended to celebrate the former secretary of state, and preface the presidential campaign she is expected to launch this spring.

Clinton did not acknowledge the recent scandals in her speech at the gala, a 30th anniversary dinner for Emily's List, a national organization that boosts pro-choice women running for office and supports Clinton's likely presidential bid.

Negative headlines have run for weeks about foreign donations to her family's foundation. And this week, Clinton has faced questions about the use of her personal email account to conduct government business at the State Department.

Clinton's speech focused instead on the economic themes expected to play at the center of her second presidential campaign. She cast working families as the core of the economy and described the recovery from the recession as "real but fragile."

"Across our country, Americans feel the ground shifting under their feet," Clinton said, acknowledging efforts by the president to stabilize the economy. "Thanks to President Obama, we have fought our way back from crisis and recession … But there's still so much anxiety and uncertainty. And the gains we've made are real but fragile."

Her speech to the 1,600 in attendance gave the clearest picture yet of the language Clinton would use to pitch a weary electorate on the economy.

She returned to themes she tested during a string of rallies last fall for midterm Democrats. Her frame in those speeches was the family — and Clinton always made a passing reference to her newborn granddaughter, Charlotte.

"When a parent is short-changed, a family is short-changed," Clinton said on Tuesday. "And if you go all the way up the ladder, the economy is short-changed."

Following introductory remarks by such lawmakers as Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and California Attorney General Kamala Harris, Clinton praised Emily's List for its efforts on behalf of women in politics, naming Sen. Elizabeth Warren — the progressive often cast as her ideological foil — as an example. It's because of Emily's List, Clinton said, that Warren "can work to hold Wall Street accountable."

Clinton also spoke about affordable child care, closing the wage gap, and the right to collectively bargain. "The middle class was built in part by the right of people to organize and bargain on behalf of themselves," Clinton said to a standing ovation.

"We're fighting for an economy that works for everyone and includes everyone," she said. "That is the only way to achieve broad-based prosperity in a world that is growing more competitive and interdependent every day."

At the end of her speech, Clinton made one reference to what is now considered an imminent and inevitable presidential campaign. "I suppose it's only fair to ask, don't you someday want to see a woman president?" she asked the crowd, causing one group of guests in the ballroom to stand and swing their dinner napkins in the air.

Clinton closed with a call to action — "Let's keep up our pressure, let's understand what we're facing, and let's go forth and win some elections!" — then left.

Only one speaker mentioned the scandals still precipitating negative headlines: the head of Emily's List, Stephanie Schriock, who defiantly told the crowd that no other figure in the history of American politics has "faced more unfair attacks."

But, Schriock added, few know this better than Clinton: Just "ignore the haters."

“Why would I ever want to do e-mail?”

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Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has come under fire in recent days after the New York Times revealed she exclusively used a private email address to conduct official business in her capacity as the nation's top diplomat.

A subsequent Associated Press report revealed Clinton used a computer server registered to her New York state home to send and receive email, a move they described as "highly unusual."

An old ABC 20/20 report from 2001 that's been on YouTube since 2007 shows Clinton might have avoided email entirely later in her term as first lady because of all investigations the Clinton White House was under.

From the report's transcript, via the video and Lexis Nexis:

ROSS: (VO) Dionne Warwick sang for the small group. Ironically enough, "That's what friends are for." Numerous stars were there, but Paul and his wife Andrea were the ones seated right next to Mrs. Clinton. In fact, Paul's home videos picked up Mrs. Clinton saying she had stopped using e-mail messages because of all the investigations she had been through.

Senator CLINTON: (From home video) As much as I've been investigated and all of that, you know, why would I--I don't even want--why would I ever want to do e-mail?

Mr. PAUL: (From home video) No, no.

Senator CLINTON: (From home video) Can you imagine?

The homemade movie clip that revealed the anecdote was in an ABC report about accusations by a Hollywood multimillionaire of "aggressive fundraiser practice" by the Clintons. The homemade video of Clinton was a fundraiser for her 2000 Senate campaign.

The majority of the justices expressed concern with the consequences of the argument that subsidies under Obamacare are not available under the federal exchange.

Supporters of the Affordable Care Act gather in front of the U.S Supreme Court during a rally March 4 in Washington, D.C.

Susan Walsh / AP

WASHINGTON — Although past arguments over Obamacare show nothing is final until a decision is rendered, a majority of the justices appeared reluctant to send Obamacare into the "death spiral" that the government warned would occur if the court ruled that the law does not permit the government to subsidize health insurance purchased under the federal exchanges.

Specifically, Justice Anthony Kennedy, a potential swing vote in the case, appeared skeptical about whether a ruling disallowing subsidies under the federal exchange would create unconstitutional coercion from the federal government on the states. With differing reasons, the four more liberal justices — more clearly — also appeared to back the government's interpretation of Obamacare.

Chief Justice John Roberts — the key vote upholding Obamacare in the 2012 constitutional challenge to the law — stayed mostly silent Wednesday, giving few clues as to his views on the challenge.

The coercion issue raises a "serious constitutional problem," Kennedy told Mike Carvin, the Jones Day lawyer representing the people who challenged the government's implementation of the law.

Carvin's argument, once considered a long shot, is that the language of the statute prevents the health care subsidies available under the act from being given to those people purchasing their health insurance through the federal exchange.

If subsidies aren't available to those getting their health insurance through the federal exchange, it would, effectively, kill Obamacare because a significant number of people would no longer be able to afford health insurance — a reality acknowledged by the Obama administration in recent days.

The law itself says subsidies are to be available to those who purchase health insurance on exchanges "established by the State." The challengers say that the "plain text" of the statute therefore prohibits subsidies to those who purchase their health insurance through the federal exchange — excluding millions of people from the subsidy, given that well over half the states did not set up state exchanges.

Justices Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, joined at points by Justices Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, appeared at points to find — or at least argue — that the challengers' arguments to be somewhat incomprehensible.

When Carvin argued that there was no legislative history to support the "death spiral" concern regarding the federal subsidy, Sotomayor shot back that it was "the entire point of the legislation."

Kagan described the "draconian choice" Carvin's argument would have states make, asking why the court should believe this is the most logical reading of the statute when "it took a year and a half" for this issue to be raised.

The federal government, represented by Solicitor General Donald Verrilli Jr., pointed to the entirety of the statute, and not just those four words, to argue that Obamacare provides for the subsidy to be available to any eligible taxpayer — the "only way" to interpret the act given its "structure and design."

Justice Antonin Scalia and Samuel Alito were incredulous.

When Verrilli argued that the statute must be read to allow subsidies for those on the federal exchange in order to make sense of the statute, Scalia shot back, "There are no statutes that make no sense?"

At the least, the federal government argues, the Treasury Department's interpretation of the statute to allow the subsidies for all exchanges is a "permissible" interpretation to which courts should defer — an argument that Scalia said was only available if the "established by the State" provision is reasonably read in any way other than meaning only state exchanges are eligible.

Even if multiple readings are possible, the challengers argue that the decision to extend subsidies to the federal exchange should not be given deference by the court.

A decision in the case is expected by late June.

LINK: Read the transcript of Wednesday's Supreme Court oral arguments.

A new “framework” issued by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms would effectively ban the sale and importation of so-called “green tip” AR-15 ammunition.

Karen Bleier / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — A bipartisan group of 239 House members Tuesday raised "serious concerns" with a new Obama administration rule that would essentially ban the sale of one of the most popular forms of AR-15 ammunition in the country.

According to the House Judiciary Committee, some five million Americans own AR-15s rifles, and it is one of the most popular target shooting rifles in the country. Conservatives worry the move is part of an Obama administration effort to use it's executive power to implement stricter gun controls absent congressional action.

In February, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms issued a "framework" for determining what constitutes armor piercing munitions that would effectively ban the sale and importation of so-called "green tip" AR-15 ammunition. The ATF argues new handguns that can use the ammunition pose a threat to law enforcement officials.

In a March 4 letter from Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte co-signed by 238 other House members, lawmakers argue the framework "establishes an unduly restrictive standard, does not comport with the letter or spirit of the law, and will interfere with Second Amendment rights by disrupting the market for ammunition that law abiding Americans use for sporting and other legitimate purposes."

Goodlatte and his colleagues note that ATF's proposed framework — which unlike most federal rules was not published in the federal register — is more restrictive than previous rules, and argue the Obama administration has yet to prove the ammunition actually poses a real threat.

"ATF has not even alleged — much less offered evidence — that even one such round has ever been fired from a handgun at a police officer. The idea that Congress intended [existing federal law] to ban one of the preeminent rifle cartridges in use by Americans for legitimate purposes is preposterous," the lawmakers argue.

The proposed ban has reportedly prompted a run on the ammunition across the country.

Former Rep. Henry Waxman, who railed against Karl Rove’s use of private email, says the office of the presidency is different than other government offices. Some Hill Democrats offer a cautious defense of Clinton.

Former Rep. Henry Waxman

Jason Reed / Reuters / Reuters

WASHINGTON — The former top congressional investigator who looked into Karl Rove's use of a private email system during the George W. Bush administration said there was a "distinction" between what Rove did and Hillary Clinton's exclusive use of her personal email while serving as secretary of state possibly in violation of the Federal Records Act.

Former Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman investigated Rove and other Bush White House officials in 2007 after the firing of eight U.S. attorneys and it was revealed that administration officials were using a private email system and blackberries provided by the Republican National Committee, in violation of the Presidential Records Act. Many of the emails had been lost.

Waxman, in an interview with BuzzFeed News on Wednesday, cautioned that he "didn't know the precise law that would apply to Secretary Clinton." While Waxman said he believed that she should turn all those records over there was a "distinction, though, between the presidency of the United States and other people in government."

"We were looking violations of the Presidential Records Act, not the Federal Records Act. It was very difficult and we had to go through a great deal of trouble to get those emails reconstructed," Waxman said. "From what I know about Secretary Clinton, she's going to turn her emails over. Presumably those emails will be recovered."

Waxman, who served as the chairman of the Government and Oversight Committee from 2007 to 2009, said at the time that the White House had set up the separate accounts to "to avoid creating a record of the communications."

While he maintains that Clinton can and should turn over all of her emails under the Federal Records Act, he said his sense was that she was "turning them over and getting out in front of" the story.

Other Hill Democrats were cautious in their defense of Clinton and many of them claimed they had not been following the story closely.

"She'll be required to provide some answers," said Vermont Rep. Peter Welch, who cautioned was not aware of all the details. "And I think that's appropriate."

Raul Grijalva, a progressive Democrat, said he was not convinced that Clinton's personal email use was "a huge issue" but that Clinton had not yet clarified what happened and whether she had turned all of the personal emails over.

"The policy at hand has to be clarified and quickly. She used a personal email adress, did she turn all of the emails over? I think the sooner that's clarified the better off this issue is going to be," he said. "You have to answer it, though, it just doesn't go away."

Joe Crowley, the vice chairman of the Democratic Caucus and a supporter of Clinton's, was confident that Clinton would come out OK in the end.

"My sense is that she's been through a lot of these things before as first lady, as senator, as secretary of state," he said. "She's been through a lot and I think it's helped prepare her to be the president of the United States if she chooses to run for that. My understanding is they are providing and will provide all the pertinent emails that are requested or needed."

All aboard the “RAPture Express.”

Baptist Trumpet

Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, who is exploring a bid for the presidency in 2016, wrote a column called "RAPture Express" as a high school senior and college freshman for the Baptist Trumpet, the weekly newspaper of the Baptist Missionary Association of Arkansas.

BuzzFeed News previously reported on his columns that were published in 1973. Huckabee also wrote the column in the year 1974 and 1975, the best of which have been included below.

The articles paint a picture of Huckabee as very much involved in the ministry (he would become a Baptist pastor) and covers topics such as gays, drinking, pot, how to dress, and Watergate.

"It's a column that I wrote for the Baptist Trumpet newspaper. It was actually even before I went to college, I was writing it when I was a senior in high school. I was 17 years old and I wrote this weekly column in the newspaper and it was sort of an advice column for teenagers who were believers," said Huckabee in a radio interview discussing BuzzFeed News' first story.

"So the term the 'Rapture Express' came from the very popular term in the 70's for 'rap,' meaning to converse and of course rapture was something we were all talking about in the 70s. So much talking about the second coming. But anyway, I did this so, BuzzFeed, I don't know how they got em', I'm not sure, don't really care, but they found sets, a whole selection of the columns I wrote, on which I discussed things like dating, dancing, smoking, I mean all sorts of issues that would be relevant to a 1973 teenager. Cause that's when it was, 1973. I was 17."

Here are the highlights:

On "Short Skirts!": "Some of the newer fashions include the very-low cut dresses on girls, extremely tight pants on guys, as well as the halters, bra-less looks on some girls...Don't make the temple of God look like some trashy slum-house."

Baptist Trumpet

On young people who drink: "The young person who drinks is to be pitied. Not from a pious view, but a compassionate one. The way of the drinker is destruction."

Baptist Trumpet

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WASHINGTON — If Bernie Sanders decides not to run for president, it will be for one of two reasons.

First, the dour Vermont socialist worried during an interview with BuzzFeed News Tuesday, he might wind up doing more harm than good to the progressive movement.

“If I do it, it has to be done well. And that’s not just for my ego,” he said, seated in his airy Senate office on blue couch beneath three indifferently framed Vermont tourism posters. “The worst thing I could do is run a poor campaign without the organizational support, without the money — and then have people say that the ideas themselves are ideas that people don’t support.”

So Sanders, who has spent his career fighting money in politics, who handily won his re-election without running a single television ad, will run only if he thinks he can raise “tens of millions” of dollars for the primary. And this brings us to the second reason.

Sanders is weighing a primary challenge to Hillary Clinton, a prospect with massive advantages — attention, a place on the debate stage — and the huge handicaps of facing a giant political network and a candidate whose super PAC plans to raise as much as $500 million. And then, after that, there’s the conservative money that would pour into a general election.

“The depressing part about that is that even if you did something phenomenally well — say you have 3 million people giving a $100 contribution each, which would be an enormous achievement — you’d be raising one-third of what the Koch brothers say they are spending.”

As Sanders continues, it becomes clear that this isn’t even the really depressing part. No, the really depressing part is grander than just him or one race.

“The question then occurs whether or not at this point in history you can beat the money folks,” he muses. “It may be that they have too much power and too much money and a real progressive may not be able to take them on.”

From Sanders’ vantage point (the corner of the couch, it should be noted, nearest the door), even the best campaign won’t be able to shatter the icy grip of the corporate oligarchy on American life: the corporate money, flowing floodgates opened by Citizens United, the three main television networks that have barely covered the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a major trade deal, the generalized American apathy.

“The situation,” Sanders pronounces, “is fairly dismal.”

The senator, with his striking bald dome, his Brooklyn accent, and a manner that’s blunt to the point of abrasiveness, is often caricatured as “grumpy” or “grouchy.” He tends to live up to the caricature. He received us with the enthusiasm of a smart, bored student forced to stay late for detention.

And yet, despite his lack of ordinary political skills and the deck that he sees as badly stacked against him, sometimes Sanders thinks he could pull it off. There have been sparks, lately, of a kind of leftism not seen in America for a generation — the Occupy movement, the surge of excitement for Elizabeth Warren’s candidacy, the daily feedback from Sanders’ own buzzing, under-the-radar Facebook page, which — with 906,000 likes — is the biggest of any Democratic senator’s official Facebook presence.

“We do very, very well on Facebook. We may have on some days more people talking about us than the rest of the Senate combined,” Sanders said. “It tells me, that is just one example, that there is a great deal of interest out there about the ideas we are talking about.”

For example, on Wednesday morning, Facebook statistics showed more than 1,000,000 people were “talking” about the senator — more than the entire Senate combined, more than the Washington Post, Speaker John Boehner, the White House, or the New York Times, a Sanders aide noted. His official page receives, according to the traffic tracking site Alexa, more visits than any other senator’s. Statistics provided to BuzzFeed News under an exclusive arrangement with Facebook showed his Facebook “interactions” trailing only Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, and John Kerry among prominent Democrats over the last week, and ahead of Joe Biden — though sentiment, by their calculations, was more split on Sanders (just 52% positive) than on other figures.

Brian Snyder / REUTERS

“I think there is a great deal of support for the necessity of taking on the billionaire class,” Sanders said, “for bringing people around the progressive agenda which talks about rebuilding our infrastructure, for creating jobs, for a national health care program, raising the minimum wage to a living wage, to dealing all the way with climate change, dealing with Wall Street. There’s a lot of support for those kinds of ideas.”

That is Sanders’ agenda, the same as it has been since he was elected out of Burlington City Hall to the House of Representatives in 1988: sweepingly progressive, drawn from an anti-corporate tradition whose roots are as much in Ralph Nader’s career as in the modern Democratic Party.

“We don’t need establishment politics. We need a level of grassroots organizing that we have not seen since maybe the 1930s,” he said.

Sanders has made a decision not to take shots at Clinton, and despite our repeated attempts, he will not be baited into it.

“If I run, I’m not running against Hillary Clinton,” he said flatly, and waited for the next question.

He listened impatiently as we read the names of Clinton’s speaking clients: Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Citigroup.

“I have not taken money from those groups. They have not invited me to speak,” he replied.

Sanders has, though, been preoccupied lately by questions of finance. Though the fight for which he is presently best known is the effort to derail the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement, he is also intensely focused on doing what he can to support Greece’s new government, led by the leftist Syriza party.

“Greece is in a sense the canary in the coal mine for austerity programs, which has in this case been pushed upon them,” Sanders said. “It’s terribly important that they be allowed to implement what they campaigned on: raising the minimum wage, undoing the privatization, getting the electricity to people who needed it and creating jobs in their country.”

Sanders has put in calls to the Treasury Department, the International Monetary Fund, and to Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen to plead the Greek case.

He’s “made my feelings known that we should do everything we can to allow Greece and their new government to develop a pro-growth policy.”

A question about whether he thought he could build support for this campaign was met with a deadpan glance.

“I don’t think there’s momentum in the Senate,” he said.

Sanders has been fairly effective for a guy who is by definition isolated — one of two independents in the Senate — and who isn’t a particularly easy person to deal with. But he, along with Republican Jeff Miller in the House, helped write and pass a sweeping $16 billion veterans bill as the chair of the Veterans Affairs committee last year, signed by President Obama in August.

And while he may not be known as a guy who wants to be everyone's best friend, Sanders is a reliable vote in the caucus, described by several sources and members who have worked with him as a team player who gets along with Democratic leadership. There’s a level of understanding that Sanders will take a stand when he feels like it’s necessary (and is given space by Democratic Leader Harry Reid to do so) but is not one to gum up the works.

And while he is a radical in his politics, he can stand, to a surprising degree, on ceremony. Sanders has, for a 73-year-old Vermont grandfather, gone viral rather regularly on the internet, once for shouting down several anti-Israel hecklers at a town hall in Cabot, Vermont, to the glee of supporters of Israel. He bridled at the notion that this was about Israel. This was about town meetings, which are “what democracy is about.”

“You want to ask me a question, ask me a question," he continued in spirited defense of town hall meetings. "Don’t disrupt me. I don’t believe that’s democracy.”

Indeed, Sanders said he remains troubled by “the terrible attacks on Gaza, the loss of civilian life, and the overreaction by Israel. He had skipped Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress that day — he was the first member of the U.S. Senate to say he wouldn’t attend it — and has no illusions about what he sees as the “bad players on both sides” of the Middle East conflict.

Sanders is more focused, as always, on domestic policy, and in particular on the TPP, whose broad spectrum of agreements around everything from intellectual property to food safety and labeling has become a rallying cry for the left in the United States, Britain, and around the world.

“Minimum wage in Vietnam is 56 cents an hour,” Sanders says. “American workers should not be forced to compete against people making 56 cents an hour.”

These are the lonely fights Sanders is used to fighting — often on his own — but now his causes are at the top of the agenda for the progressive left in the House and Senate as those coalitions have expanded.

And if he does run, he keep his Senate seat, unlike his colleague Marco Rubio.

“Of course I will. I’m a Senator," he said.

Drew Angerer / Getty Images

“I want the public to see my email,” the former secretary of state said in a tweet.

Yuri Gripas / Reuters

Hillary Clinton broke her silence Wednesday night on the controversy surrounding her exclusive use of a personal email account to conduct official business while serving as secretary of state, saying in a tweet she has asked the State Department to publicly release a cache of emails she handed over to the government.

When reached for comment by BuzzFeed News on Wednesday night, a Clinton spokesman did not have an additional comment on the tweet.

In response to Clinton's request, the State Department said it would begin a review of her emails "as quickly as possible" but cautioned it would take some time before the emails could be released publicly.

"The State Department will review for public release the emails provided by Secretary Clinton to the Department, using a normal process that guides such releases," Marie Harf, deputy spokesperson at the State Department, said. "We will undertake this review as quickly as possible; given the sheer volume of the document set, this review will take some time to complete."

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The former secretary of state said late Wednesday that she’s asked the State Department to release her emails. But questions remain about how those emails were selected to be sent to State — and what might have been left out.

Marcio Jose Sanchez / AP Photo

The State Department asked, and Hillary Clinton's reply was swift and seemingly thorough: She handed over a massive cache of emails, totaling 55,000 pages, in response to the administration's request last year that former secretaries of state make their official correspondence available for government record.

Late Wednesday, Clinton said she wanted to release those emails.

"I want the public to see my email," she wrote on Twitter. "I asked State to release them. They said they will review them for release as soon as possible."

But an undisclosed number of pages from the email account that Clinton used exclusively during her four-year tenure as secretary will remain private.

The State Department does not have access to the full archive of messages from Clinton's personal account, which she used in lieu of government email. Instead, officials have been given the 55,000 pages selected by her aides during a review process that open government experts say lacked sufficient oversight.

The messages excluded from the State submission were identified as strictly personal in nature by Clinton's office, where aides have already started work on the presidential campaign she is expected to launch this spring.

Clinton's staff has not provided an estimate of the number of emails sent during her term at the State Department that were not a part of the disclosure.

On Monday, the New York Times revealed the existence of the personal account, registered to a "clintonemail.com" domain. The discovery set off a spate of questions — from Republicans, open government advocates, even some Democrats — about whether the use of personal email was legal, secure, or sound.

But others have directed their criticism at the opaque process by which Clinton's aides sorted work-related emails from personal correspondence — a review that effectively determined public record with no apparent outside oversight.

"It's somewhat ridiculous that we are trusting the decisions of private citizens hired by this person to preserve the country's records," said John Wonderlich, policy director of the Sunlight Foundation, a government transparency nonprofit.

"Would we even know if they destroyed things?" Wonderlich said. "We wouldn't."

After reviewing the tens of thousands of pages, Clinton's staff sent the State Department "anything that pertained to her work," according to an aide.

"So if she emailed with her daughter about flower arrangements for her wedding, that didn't go in," the Clinton staffer said.

It is not clear how Clinton's small retinue of aides handled murkier cases.

A Clinton spokesperson did not respond to questions on Tuesday about which aides conducted the review and for how long the process lasted.

"How do we know that the review and selection of emails to transfer to State was done correctly and in good faith?" said Steven Aftergood, who directs the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists.

Aftergood said a "trusted third-party" should perform an independent review.

"Maybe everything is fine, which would be great," he said. "But it would be nice not to have to rely on mere assurances."

The request for Clinton's emails came as part of an effort last year to collect correspondence from former secretaries of state "for proper preservation," said Marie Harf, a deputy spokesperson at the State Department. Officials specifically requested all "federal records," including "emails related to their work."

Clinton is the only former secretary to have fulfilled the request so far, Harf said.

At a press briefing on Tuesday, Harf conceded that she did not know if the State Department had been given every single responsive document.

"She has taken steps to preserve those records by providing the State Department with the 55,000 pages," said Harf. "It sounds to me like that has been completed."

"She provided a large amount, those 55,000," she said.

A reporter pressed, asking, "But just say it's everything if you think..."

"Well, how can I," Harf said. "I'm not in her email."

At the briefing the next day, Harf assured reporters again that the selection of emails had been careful and comprehensive: "Her staff has said that is everything."

Clinton's successor, John Kerry, is the first secretary of state to rely primarily on a "state.gov" email, officials said. Clinton's staff also points to Colin Powell, a former secretary who also relied on a personal account. Another, Condoleezza Rice, has said she rarely used email during her tenure at the State Department.

"Nothing nefarious was at play," a Clinton aide said this week.

"She had a Blackberry, she used it prior to State, and like her predecessors she continued to use it when she got to State. This was not bucking the system. This was in keeping with exactly what former secretaries had done."

But while at the State Department, Clinton did not take steps to have her personal email account preserved. Since 2009, the National Archives and Records Administration has required agency employees to ensure that all work-related email be "preserved in the appropriate agency record-keeping system."

The National Archives said on Tuesday that its staff had reached out to the State Department to ensure the records had been "properly identified."

Wonderlich, the official with the Sunlight Foundation, still described Clinton's approach to government email as a "system she made for herself."

"The best we can do now is to have it not happen again," he said.

When the Obama Administration launched My Brother’s Keeper a year ago, it pledged to help clear a pathway to success for the most vulnerable black and Latino boys in the nation. One year later, a progress report says it’s accomplishing what it set out to do.

US President Barack Obama has lunch with My Brother's Keeper mentees at the White House in Washington, DC.

Yuri Gripas / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — A new progress report released by the White House Thursday says President Obama's initiative to improve outcomes for boys and young men of color has made inroads in its first year, securing buy-in from state and local governments and private enterprise.

Launched in February of 2014, My Brother's Keeper is one of Obama's signature initiatives focused on stemming the tide of challenges faced by boys and young men of color by implementing programs with support from both the private and public sector. Last September, Obama introduced the My Brother's Keeper Community Challenge, calling on communities to meet the challenge of helping MBK advance.

The report updates progress in those areas as set forth in the My Brother's Keeper Presidential Memorandum.

"The president has been very clear throughout his administration that we need to look at evidence-based programs and efforts that make a real difference that we identify and then scale," Broderick Johnson, assistant to the President, Cabinet Secretary, and chair of the My Brother's Keeper Task Force said a said in a call with reporters Thursday.

According to the report, nearly 200 mayors, tribal leaders, and county executives across 43 states and the District of Columbia have accepted the challenge. Those who participate commit to reviewing local public policy and hosting action summits within six months. Participating communities are also expected to begin applying solutions to address opportunity gaps.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is one of the mayors who accepted the MBK challenge.

"By embracing My Brother's Keeper, we are fighting inequality at its root in neighborhoods in every borough. New York City is answering President Obama's call and doubling down on its commitments to expanding literacy in our youngest children, ensuring our high school graduates are ready for college and career, and forging a deeper partnership between police and community to prevent crime," de Blasio said in an email statement to BuzzFeed News.

The report also underlined a partnership between the NBA and MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership to recruit 25,000 new mentors over the next five years, and a financial commitment of $13 million from Prudential. Over $300 million in grants and in-kind resources have been committed to the initiative.

The White House also cited the Department of Education and the Department Justice partnership on guidance to provide high-quality education for incarcerated boys and young men. Their work helped "ensure that incarcerated youth have the full protection of existing laws and benefits," according to the report.

"People have asked — and they have every reason to ask — 'So how are we going to measure the success of My Brother's Keeper?,'" said Johnson. He said those markers, by recommendation of the president himself, will be measured in part by the individual successes of the boys in My Brother's Keeper communities.

"The fact that so many communities have raised their hand and said we want to be an MBK community speaks to the community-based nature of this work," he said.

The mustachioed former U.N. ambassador wants to be the driver of foreign policy within the Republican Party.

Molly Riley / AP

WASHINGTON — The next Republican nominee will likely face a former secretary of state and represent a party with pockets of intense, unresolved disagreements over the role of the United States in the world. And so, into that morass, comes former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton who seeks to be Republicans' Svengali on these issues, aiming to set the standard for Republican foreign policy.

At the same time, Bolton keeps floating a presidential bid of his own — a gambit that puts his issues in the spotlight, but at the cost of potentially making him seem unserious.

Bolton, who served at the U.N. in 2005 and 2006, represents a hawkish wing of the Republican Party that is now seemingly coming back into vogue among conservatives nearly eight years after George W. Bush left office. With the exception of Sen. Rand Paul, the likely Republican candidates have so far mostly hewn to a hawkish, if often vague line on foreign policy, attacking Obama for not being tough enough on ISIS and decrying the potential nuclear deal with Iran. Jeb Bush made headlines when he announced his foreign policy advisers recently, which includes key Bush administration figures such as Paul Wolfowitz.

Bush's campaign has set off some Republicans who advise on policy issues by demanding they consult no other campaigns, the New York Times reported last week.

Bolton, so far, is not a one-campaign man.

The former ambassador, a familiar sight with his glasses and signature mustache, could be seen making the rounds at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) last weekend, where he spoke onstage and gave frequent interviews on Radio Row. Bolton has repeatedly floated the idea of a presidential run for himself, but he's also been informally advising some of the potential candidates on foreign policy.

In an interview with BuzzFeed News on the margins of the conference, Bolton said his objective was to keep the party close to what he views as its naturally interventionist nature.

"What I think is critical is to make sure that all the Republican candidates, to the extent it's possible, understand as a matter of the gravest presidential responsibility that national security is their top job," Bolton said. "And if they understand that and address the issues, I'd consider that a mission accomplished."

"I know what my objective is, and that's to make sure the party focuses on national security," Bolton said.

Bolton insists that his presidential considerations are for real, and that if he runs, he would run to win. But in reality, people run for president for all sorts of reasons: to sell books, to raise money, to highlight issues. Bolton's presidential hints keep him in the news from time to time, amplifying his platform and maybe keeping him more relevant than a former U.N. ambassador who is best known for a job he held 10 years ago would be otherwise.

What's less public is Bolton's dispensation of foreign policy advice to people who could be the next president. He's advised Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal on foreign policy, BuzzFeed News reported last year, and was recently overheard talking with Sen. Ted Cruz at a D.C. restaurant. ("To me, Johnny's Half Shell is like the Fox News cafeteria, so I normally don't pay attention to who else is in there," Bolton said when asked about the incident.) Bolton declined to elaborate on who else he's advising, but indicated there were others: "I think it's up to them to announce who they're talking to, I consider the conversations private," he said. "I thought the conversation with Cruz was private, too." Other potential campaigns didn't respond to inquiries about whether Bolton is advising their candidates. Marco Rubio spokesman Alex Conant said, "We don't discuss outside advisers, aside to say that Marco routinely talks to a broad spectrum of people."

Richard Grenell, who was Bolton's spokesman at the U.N., said he thought Bolton was unlikely to commit to a candidate.

"I signed a new contract with Fox through January 2017," Grenell said in an email. "So I will be complimenting, helping and criticizing every candidate — not sure what [Bolton] is doing. I think the same."

Bolton has also sought to influence Congressional campaigns via his PAC, which raised around $7 million during the midterms and spent it on candidates like new Sens. Tom Cotton and Joni Ernst, both of whom are very hawkish. Bolton was at CPAC with several staffers including his PAC director Sarah Tinsley, whom he pointed to when asked whether he had started doing the things a person who is running for president might do, like hiring a campaign staff.

One likely candidate who hasn't reached out to Bolton for advice, Bolton said, is Paul. Paul's non-interventionist foreign policy views have set him apart from the rest of the Republican field, but he hasn't pulled the others towards him in this area. Instead, he's an outlier.

In Bolton's view, this was never in question.

"There is no non-interventionist wing of the party," Bolton said. "I think people are attracted to a libertarian domestic policy because that's where the party is. I consider myself a libertarian on domestic issues. The Republican party has always believed that a strong American posture internationally is critical to maintain a free way of life here at home. I think a lot of people who might be attracted to Rand Paul's domestic policy are appalled when they learn what his foreign policies are."

National security is going to be a "key issue" in 2016, Bolton said.

"The question is whether the Republican Party has the wit to take it up and use it to our advantage," he said.