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In his first news conference since July, Donald Trump blasted allegations in a dossier claiming he has close ties to Russia.
Trump said the allegations — made in an unverified dossier published by BuzzFeed News — that Russia has compromising information on the president-elect “didn’t happen” and are “a disgrace.” He didn’t, however, answer whether he or anyone on his team had communications with Russian officials during the campaign.
Meanwhile, the director of National Intelligence told Trump that no judgment has been made on whether the dossier is reliable. Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence strongly criticized BuzzFeed News for publishing the dossier.
Here’s what you need to know about this story.
And a little extra
Trump also addressed how he’d handle his many business interests to avoid conflicts of interest as US president. Trump’s lawyer, Sheri A. Dillon, said the president-elect would put his business assets in a trust, but not divest. His company, now run by his sons, will still go after deals in the US — but not abroad.
The head of the US Office of Government Ethics, however, said Trump’s plan “doesn’t meet the standards” that every president in the past four decades has met.
At the press conference, Trump said, “As a real estate developer I have very, very little debt.” But his real estate companies owe hundreds of millions of dollars, much of it to foreign banks.
Here’s what will happen to Trump’s businesses once he’s president.
WE’RE KEEPING AN EYE ON
Confirmation hearings.
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, who has expressed concerns about Trump’s nominee for secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, and is a must-get vote for the nominee, wasted no time grilling the former ExxonMobil chief about his views on Russia on Wednesday.
New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker took the unprecedented step of testifying against his Senate colleague Jeff Sessions, saying "we cannot count on him" to defend civil rights as attorney general.
A prominent anti-vaxxer might lead Trump’s new vaccine commission, and now he's urging fellow activists to mobilize.
Trump’s pick for transportation secretary, Elaine Chao, offered few details about what the president-elect’s $1 trillion infrastructure plan will do. “If confirmed, I look forward to working with you on that,” she said.
DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THIS?
Inside the alt-right’s campaign to smear Trump protesters as anarchists.
Sources told BuzzFeed News that viral photos of a sign urging violence against Melania Trump at an anti-Trump protest were planned by Jack Posobiec, one of the organizers of the Deploraball.
DC Protestor "Rape Melania"
Ryan Gosling is a star after his time.
Playing both offbeat characters and romantic heroes, Ryan Gosling has been our go-to weird boy next door for more than a decade. His real allure lies in the old-fashioned way he navigates Hollywood, writes BuzzFeed News’ Bim Adewunmi.
It might be because he’s carved out an old-fashioned movie star’s aesthetic, in which he purposefully holds out on much of his personal life, and lets his deliberately unconventional choices do the majority of the talking for him.
QUICK THINGS TO KNOW
In tech: A video of two original iPhone prototypes shows that the past decade might have been very different — the first iPhone almost had a scroll wheel. A Twitter bug is baffling some users by inserting tweets in their timelines from people they don’t follow. And why did this man’s bank want to read all his emails to approve a credit card?
Tennis match-fixing: A year after charges of widespread match-fixing shook the tennis world, the sport’s authorities have announced that warnings about suspicious activity are up 20% and that the sport’s anti-corruption group increased its budget by a third and doubled its staff size.
Saying goodbye: Celebs are paying tribute to President Barack Obama after his farewell address.
A new year: Get ready for the 32 most exciting books coming this year, and here are 22 cleanses that will help you start 2017 off right.
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