Hello, and welcome back to The Best & The Brightest. I’m Julia Ioffe.

In tonight’s edition, news and notes from my partner Teddy Schleifer on the latest donor intrigues surrounding Donald Trump (will Larry Ellison break out his checkbook to get Tim Scott on the ticket?); a new push by Uncommitted (the progressive movement trying to hold Biden to account for his support of the Israel-Hamas war); and a fundraising show of force at Mar-a-Lago. We’ve also got Abby Liviginston with updates on the Mayorkas impeachment farce and the political bomb that just went off in Arizona, where the state Supreme Court has decided to uphold an 1864 law that bans nearly all abortions.

But first… In case you missed it, my interview with Rep. Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, got quite a bit of attention this week, in part because McCaul, a Republican, told me Russian propaganda has “infected a good chunk of my party’s base.”

Right on cue, Catherine Belton, the absolutely legendary investigative reporter behind Putin’s People, dropped a story in The Washington Post showing exactly how Vladimir Putin’s government continues to manipulate the discourse on the American right wing. Belton got her hands on some Kremlin documents, which show Russian government spin doctors’ instructions on how to influence Republicans. Their tactics include...