The Commander-in-Tweet once again took to Twitter Sunday — this time to defend his controversial executive actions on immigration. President Trump was back to his typical morning social media smackdown — insisting that his push for a Mexican wall and a travel ban for seven Muslim-majority nations was necessary. “Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world – a horrible mess!” Trump fired off just after 8 a.m. The tweet came hours after federal judges in both Brooklyn and Boston temporarily blocked parts of Trump’s executive order, which he issue Friday.

As Americans gather to protest against President Donald Trump’s executive order that halted refugee resettlement and has prevented green-card holders from returning to the U.S., the White House is now considering whether to ask foreigners to share their social media info and phone contacts, CNN reported. There is no indication yet that the idea has advanced further than simply being discussed. The report added thatStephen Miller, White House policy director, spoke with officials from the State Department, Customs and Border Patrol and Department of Homeland Security to convey to them that Trump is 100 percent behind the executive order, despite “hysterical voices on TV.”

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A federal judge in Brooklyn issued a stay on Saturday night “on deportations for people who have arrived with valid visas fromseven-majority Muslim nations,” according to The Guardian. It’s an almost-instant setback for President Trump‘s executive order banning individuals from entering the U.S. from a set of Muslim-majority countries. The ruling was in response to a habeas corpus petition from the ACLU on behalf of Hameed Khalid Darweesh and Sameer Abdulkhaleq Alshawi who were stopped at JFK Airport in New York City and held by Customs and Border Patrol. Darweesh had been an interpreter in Iraq for the U.S. military and Alshawi had a visa to meet his wife and son who are permanent residents of the U.S. and had also served. During the hearing, the U.S. government seemed ill prepared, and at one point was unable to inform the judge how many people the government was holding.

In a tweet to supporters Saturday night, Hillary Clintonexpressed her support for the people across the country fighting against the executive order signed by PresidentDonald Trump that has led to the detainment of refugees and immigrants trying to enter the United States from a number of Muslim countries. “I stand with the people gathered across the country tonight defending our values & our Constitution,” the former Democratic candidate wrote. “This is not who we are.” The message came after a federal judge stayed the deportations of those already in transit.

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Roger Federer on Sunday defeated Rafael Nadal in the Australian Open final, extending his number of Grand Slam singles titles to 18. The 35-year-old has now won five Australian Open finals, making him the first man to win at least five championships at three different Grand Slams—the other two being Wimbledon and the U.S. Open. After defeating Nadal, Federer told him, “Tennis needs you. Keep doing everything you do.”

LBN-HOLLYWOOD INSIDER: While “La La Land” is the toast of Hollywood, with a record-tying 14 Oscar nominations, there’s an internal war over the casting of the hit musical at power agency CAA. Miles Teller and Emma Watson — both repped by CAA — were originally tapped as leads in the movie, but Hollywood insiders said both lost the roles for being too demanding. One movie insider said, “Miles was offered $4 million to star in ‘La La Land,’ but he said he wanted $6 million. Watson was offered the lead female role, but she initially wouldn’t commit. Then she began making all these crazy demands, like rehearsals for the film must be done in London — for a film called ‘La La Land!’ They jumped through hoops to make it work with her, but she just didn’t feel the film was right for her.

LBN-NOTICED:   ***Lorde on a downtown F train in NYC.    ***Veteran plastic surgeon Dr. Jon Perlman having dinner last night with his 11 year old son Justin   ***Michael K. Williamsand Brooklyn rapper Tony Testa at Bamonte’s restaurant in Brooklyn.   ***Marlo Thomas at Nello in NYC for dinner with friends.   ***New York Knicks legend Patrick Ewing at Catch New York with former Georgetown teammate Ralph Daltonand Medallion Financial’s Andrew Mur­stein.   ***New “Real Housewife of New York City” Tinsley Mortimer, who is apparently searching for love on the show, having drinks with a mystery man at Midtown hot spot Hunt & Fish Club in NYC.

LBN-COMMENTARY by Maureen Dowd: So now we’re getting the crazy straight up. The Doomsday Clock is ticking faster, the resistance is growing, and teetotaler Donald Trump already seems drunk with power. He’s got the role of his life and he’s casting his show: Steve Bannon is his Roy Cohn, the combative hammer and agitprop genius; Theresa May is Maggie to his Ronnie; Ivanka and Jared are his consiglieri, family to help him figure out who stays and who gets iced; Vladimir Putin echoes the role of Trump’s dad, Fred, who was supremely aggressive and calculating, cool where Donald was hot, someone who believed the world was divided into killers and losers. (But in Putin’s case, it’s literal.) It took us years to find out that Richard Nixon was swilling Scotch, eating dog biscuits, talking to the White House portraits and blowing up the Vietnam peace talks in 1968 to help his election bid. It took us years to find out that, despite that deep, reassuring voice, Dick Cheney was a demented megalomaniac.

MY REVIEW: “What I both respect and love about LBN is that it really keeps it real – 100%. I have read LBN for years, both when I lived in Cleveland and now that I have moved to Atlanta, and it is consistently unbiased, unafraid and unfiltered.” —– Charlotte S., an LBN reader from Atlanta, Georgia

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LBN-COMMENTARY by Andrew Sullivan: By the time the court opened, there were around two dozen of us in line, nervously fiddling with our official papers. I was recovering from a brief but brutal stomach flu, which meant I hadn’t eaten in two days and had split open my lip in a mad, half-asleep rush to the bathroom two nights before. Ashen-white, I looked like I’d just been punched in the face. They gave us all a number, handed us a packet, and instructed us not to take photographs after the judge walked in. A man in a shiny suit proceeded to entertain us intermittently for half an hour with some almost-funny jokes. And then, at long last, the judge walked in, we all stood up, and it began. Judge Mehta told us this was his favorite part of the job, and that he had immigrated to the U.S. from India as a child. A few weeks before, my naturalization interview had been with a man with an Arabic last name — and a Redskins helmet on his cabinet. Standing around me now, my fellow newbie Americans came from all over the world: Iran, Honduras, Ethiopia, and Canada, among other countries. Only two of us, as I recall, were white.

LBN-COMMENTARY by John Hartmann:  Reagan was the anti-christ, the pebble that started the avalanche that gutted the new deal and returned the wealth of the middle-class back to its previous owners, the 1%. The Bush-whackers were his enablers and Trump is their destroyer. Bernie was our only hope. Hillary at best would have been more of the same which is not acceptable to the American people.  The revolution is on.

LBN-COMMENTARY by Vickie Casas (Small business owner):The most important part of President Trumps’s inaugural address was that he did hold both Democrat’s and Republican’s accountable for the direction our country has taken. Somehow I have never been able to squeeze myself into either parties box! Democrat’s tend to want to ram their agenda down your throat and Republican’s just sell you out behind closed doors! President Trump must be honest with the people and hold all parties accountable if they do not make the right decisions for the American people. The United States of America’s people, their prosperity and safety must now come first and foremost.

LBN-SPOTLIGHT: Discover One Of The Most Unique, Historic, Charming Neighborhoods In New York City: Visit the page and click “Like”: —— 

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LBN-OVERHEARD:   ***Princess Diana is coming home and will soon be able to watch over her beloved children and grandchildren. A statue of the Princess of Wales is set to beerected on the grounds of Kensington Palace, at the request of her sons Prince William and Prince Harry, hopefully before the end of the year. This August will mark the 20th anniversary of her death.   ***Justin Bieber got a taste of NHL hockey and the Staples Center glass Saturday, courtesy of NHL greatChris Pronger. The pop star responded by showing off skills that would not have looked out of place in his native Canada during a celebrity exhibition game. Bieber was driven into the boards in the first half by a laughing Pronger, who spent 18 years in the league as a hard-nosed defenseman. The singer responded with an empty-net goal and an assist as Team Gretzky beat Team Lemieux 5-3 in the 2017 NHL All-Star Celebrity Shootout.

President Donald Trump on Friday signed an executive order that would institute “new vetting” measures aimed at preventing “radical Islamic terrorists” from entering the U.S. Speaking at the Pentagon after swearing in new Defense Secretary James Mattis, Trump said “we only want to admit those into our country who support our country.” The order temporarily suspends the refugee program for 120 days, and the Syrian refugee program indefinitely, according to the text released by the White House. Additionally, no new visas will be issued for 90 days to individuals coming from countries linked to terrorism: Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Syria, Libya, Somalia and Yemen.  “We are a compassionate nation and a country of immigrants. But as we know, terrorists are dead set on using our immigration and refugee programs as a Trojan Horse to attack us,” said House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, praising the order as helping “prevent jihadists from infiltrating the United States.” “President Trump is slamming the door on the world’s most desperate refugees,” said Rep. Eliot Engel, ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “He’s building a wall and banning a religion, actions that won’t keep us any safer, but will send a message that if you aren’t a certain color, or don’t speak a certain language or worship a certain way, you don’t have a place in America.”

After President Donald Trump on Friday signed an order banning refugees from seven Muslim countries, leading Democrats have vowed to take him to task for the move. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said the “tears are running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty,” denouncing Trump’s executive order as “backwards and nasty.” Sen.Elizabeth Warren called the ban a “betrayal of American values.” Sen. Cory Booker called the move “fundamentally un-American.” Others noted that it would most likely backfire in the war on terrorism. Sen. Chris Murphy wrote in Huffington Post that Trump had just “handed ISIS a path to rebirth.”

The American ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki R. Haley, issued a stark warning on Friday to allies and rivals abroad, saying in her first remarks at the headquarters of the world body that the Trump administration would hold to account those who do not back the United States. “You’re going to see a change in the way we do business,” Ms. Haley said. “Our goal with the administration is to show value at the U.N., and the way we’ll show value is to show our strength, show our voice, have the backs of our allies and make sure our allies have our back as well.” “For those who don’t have our back,” she added, “we’re taking names; we will make points to respond to that accordingly.”

Ever since American intelligence agencies accused Russia of trying to influence the American election, there have been questions about the proof they had to support the accusation. But the news from Moscow may explain how the agencies could be so certain that it was the Russians who hacked the email of Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee. Two Russian intelligence officers who worked on cyberoperations and a Russian computer security expert have been arrested and charged with treason for providing information to the United States, according to multiple Russian news reports. As in most espionage cases, the details made public so far are incomplete, and some rumors in Moscow suggest that those arrested may be scapegoats in an internal power struggle over the hacking. Russian media reports link the charges to the disclosure of the Russian role in attacking state election boards, including the scanning of voter rolls in Arizona and Illinois, and do not mention the parallel attacks on the D.N.C. and the email of John Podesta, Mrs. Clinton’s campaign chairman. But one current and one former United States official, speaking about the classified recruitments on condition of anonymity, confirmed that human sources in Russia did play a crucial role in proving who was responsible for the hacking.

Serena Williams beat her sister Venus on Saturday to claim her 23rd Grand Slam singles title in the Australian Open. The 35-year-old tennis star won 6-4 6-4 to top Steffi Graf for a Grand Slam record. The win came after an intense battle against her own sister, with whom she has played in nine Grand Slam titles throughout her career. “She’s an amazing person, there’s no way I would be at 23 without her,” Serena said of Venus after the win. “There’s no way I would have anything without her. She’s the only reason the Williams sisters exist, so thank you for inspiring me to be the best that I can be,” she said. Venus, who was the oldest finalist in Melbourne for the competition at 36, offered similar praise for Serena. “Serena Williams, that’s my little sister, guys,” she said. “Your win has always been my win, you know that,” she said.

Amid the diplomatic showdown over President Trump’s order to build a border wall — and who should pay for it — Mr. Trump and President Enrique Peña Nieto of Mexico spoke by telephone for an hour on Friday and agreed to proceed with negotiations on a range of bilateral issues, both leaders said. The presidents made an effort to say that the call had been productive, implying that tensions had cooled, but they stood their ground on their positions, with no suggestion that the conversation had resolved their disagreement over fundamental issues, most notably the payment for construction of a wall between the United States and Mexico. “With respect to payment for the border wall, both presidents recognized their clear and very public differences in their stances on this very sensitive issue, and agreed to solve these differences as part of a comprehensive discussion of all aspects of the bilateral relationship,” according to a statement issued by Mr. Peña Nieto’s office. The statement added: “The presidents also agreed for now not to speak publicly about this controversial issue.”

WHO READS LBN? Author Roxane Gay:

As Donald Trump cracks down on the EPA and USDA, saying their public-facing documents will be under review,astrophysicist Neil ­deGrasse Tyson tells us when it comes to science, “If you base policy on things that are not objectively true . . . it’s a recipe for disaster.” An outlook like that is “the unraveling of all that drives the growth of wealth in our nation and in the world,” he told us Wednesday. “Ever since the Industrial Revolution we have known that innovations in science and technology are the engines of tomorrow’s growth economy,” Tyson said. “If you don’t recognize that . . . you are undermining the future wealth of the nation. If there is no science happening here, other countries . . . will pass us by, and that’s inconsistent with the idea of making America great again.”

In a strange bit of irony, just as the surreality of the Trump administration has pushed George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984 to No. 1 on the Amazon charts, the star of the filmadaptation, John Hurt, has passed away after a fight with pancreatic cancer. He was 77. Born in Chesterfield, Derbyshire, UK, Hurt was the son of an actress and a vicar, and, after training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA), made his film debut in 1966’s A Man for All Seasons. With his pained British voice and poignant stare, the actor would make an indelible impact on cinema, earning his first Academy Award nomination as Max, a heroin addict trapped in a Turkish prison, in Midnight Express, before performing one of film’s most memorable death scenes in Ridley Scott’s Alien. His next two films, as the severely deformed and chastised John Merrick in The Elephant Man (Oscar-nominated for Best Actor) and Michael Cimino’s Heaven’s Gate, cemented his status as one of the greats, and marks a stellar 4-film run.

Lindsay Lohan on Friday met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Syrian refugee and blogger Bana Alabedin Istanbul. The meeting appeared to be aimed at drawing attention to the plight of Syrian refugees. Bana, who shot to stardom while tweeting about her and her mother’s day-to-day troubles in besieged Aleppo, posted a photo of the group’s meeting on Twitter, writing that she was meeting with Lohan and Erdogan “to support the people of Syria.” In a separate video of Lohan, she wrote, “Look who I am with. I have a new friend Lindsay Lohan.” Lohan offers a message in the video: “We want to send to all of the people in Syria and Aleppo suffering, and to all the refugees, we are here supporting you and you can hang on and be strong. Just like Bana has,” she said. The ‘Mean Girls’ star Lohan is rumored to have converted to Islam recently, and she has appeared on Turkish television praising Erdogan’s rule. The implausible meeting between the child refugee, strongman Turkish leader and former Hollywood wild child came as U.S. President Trump signed an executive order banning Syrian refugees from the U.S., along with refugees from six other countries.

Officials in Seattle on Friday approved the nation’s first “safe-injection” sites for users of heroin and other illegal drugs, calling the move a drastic but necessary response to an epidemic of addiction that is claiming tens of thousands of lives each year. The sites — which offer addicts clean needles, medical supervision and quick access to drugs that reverse the effects of an overdose — have long been popular in Europe. Now, with the U.S. death toll rising, the idea is gaining traction in a number of American cities, including Boston, New York City and Ithaca, N.Y.

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President Donald Trump reportedly floated the idea of scrapping the Electoral College, according to The Wall Street Journal. In a meeting with congressional leadership at the White House this week, Trump reportedly told the lawmakers he wanted to replace the Electoral College with a national popular vote. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell shot down the idea, pointing specifically to the costly Florida recount in 2000 and the potential headache it could cause if such a recount were conducted on the level of the entire country. Trump’s reported consideration of scrapping the Electoral College comes despite having lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton, and still won the presidency because of the required 270 electoral vote threshold he crossed. After losing the popular vote by several million ballots, Trump has called for an investigation into alleged widespread voter fraud, for which there is no evidence.

MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred and Cleveland Indians owner Paul Dolan have reportedly discussed a logo change for the team. The current “Chief Wahoo” logo, which has been in use since the 1940s, has been criticized as being offensive to Native Americans. The spotlight on the team has increased, however, as it is set to host the 2019 All-Star Game, and played in the World Series last season. “I’m not going to speculate about what I want the end of the process to be,” Manfred said, although he has said he “understands” why the logo is viewed as offensive. “I think that Paul has been fantastic about engaging in conversations. I want those conversations to continue, and I think we’ll produce a result that will be good for the Indians and good for baseball.” Manfred added that it would be premature to speculate on a potential outcome or agreement between the league and the Indians. While the logo remains in use, the team often wears caps displaying a red “C” rather than the “Wahoo” logo.

LBN-NOTICED:   ***Selena Gomez and The Weeknd are taking their romance to a different continent. The couple traveled to the Italian city of Florence, where they dined at Trattoria Borgo Antico for lunch. Plenty of pictures have popped up on social media, showing Selena and The Weeknd in the airport and getting into a car in an Italian piazza.   ***Former Republican nominee hopeful Jeb Bush and ex-Secretary of State John Kerry had a near run-in at New York restaurant ‘21’ on Thursday night. Both politicos were dining at separate tables at the popular eaterie — a regular haunt of President Donald Trump as well as former presidents including Bill Clinton.   ***Acclaimed security expert Kent Moyer held his 4th annual security lunch this week at the Beverly Hills Hotel featuring author Zudhi Jasser as a guest-speaker. ***Veteran entertainment industry attorney, Reid Nathan having lunch at Milo and Olive on Wilshire Blvd. in Santa Monica.

LBN-MEDIA INSIDER:   ***NBC’s shock cancellation of the third hour of “Today” has anchors shaking in their boots about further changes at 30 Rock. The 9am hour has been axed to create a spot for former Fox News star Megyn Kelly. Now strong rumors are swirling that Kelly is being groomed to take over Savannah Guthrie’s anchor spot on the flagship show. Kelly will first take over either the 9 a.m. hour from Tamron Halland Al Roker, or will replace Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Gifford at 10 a.m.

LBN-BOOK NEWS:   ***For six decades, she has been the silent woman linked to one of the most notorious crimes in the nation’s history, the lynching of Emmett Till, a 14-year-old black boy, keeping her thoughts and memories to herself as millions of strangers idealized or vilified her. But all these years later, a historian says that the woman has broken her silence, and acknowledged that the most incendiary parts of the story she and others told about Emmett — claims that seem tame today but were more than enough to get a black person killed in Jim Crow-era Mississippi — were false. The woman, Carolyn Bryant Donham, spoke to Timothy B. Tyson, a Duke University professor — possibly the only interview she has given to a historian or journalist since shortly after the episode — who has written a book, “The Blood of Emmett Till,” to be published next week. In it, he wrote that she said of her long-ago allegations that Emmett grabbed her and was menacing and sexually crude toward her, “that part is not true.”

LBN-R.I.P.:   ***Barbara Hale, the Emmy Award-winning actress who typified the ideal mid-20th-century secretary as the beautiful, loyal, confident but soft-spoken Della Street on the television series “Perry Mason,” died on Thursday at her home in Los Angeles. She was 94. Her death was confirmed byJacqueline Stander, the agent for the actor William Katt, Ms. Hale’s son.   ***Chuck Stewart, who could not master the piano but succeeded indelibly with a camera, becoming a fixture in the jazz world with his photographs of John Coltrane,Dizzy Gillespie, Dinah Washington and many others, died on Jan. 20 in Teaneck, N.J. He was 89. His death was confirmed by Kim Stewart, his daughter-in-law.

LBN-COMMENTARY by Charles Krauthammer: The flurry of bold executive orders and of highly provocative Cabinet nominations (such as a secretary of education who actually believes in school choice) has been encouraging to conservative skeptics of Donald Trump. But it shouldn’t erase the troubling memory of one major element of Trump’s inaugural address.  The foreign policy section has received far less attention than so revolutionary a declaration deserved. It radically redefined the American national interest as understood since World War II. Trump outlined a world in which foreign relations are collapsed into a zero-sum game. They gain, we lose. As in: “For many decades, we’ve enriched foreign industry at the expense of American industry; subsidized the armies of other countries” while depleting our own. And most provocatively this: “The wealth of our middle class has been ripped from their homes and then redistributed all across the world.” Bernie Sanders believes that a corrupt establishment has ripped off the middle class to give to the rich. Trump believes those miscreants have given away our patrimony to undeserving, ungrateful foreigners as well.

LBN COMMENTARY by Michael Levine (media expert and author): Memo to politicians – If you occasionally display honest self-appraisal and even moments of remorse, you’d have the world rooting for you, not against you. ***Firing people is brutal even when it is totally necessary. ***Politicians who make soaring, poetic promises are dominating a game we are no longer playing.

LBN-A DIFFERENT VIEW:….

Bill Gates and Warren Buffett on Friday expressed optimism that the United States will move ahead as a nation, even as it works through political differences and gets used to the new Trump administration.
The world’s two richest people were speaking to students at Columbia University after U.S. President Donald Trumpstarted to unwind the work of his predecessor Barack Obamain a series of executive orders, prompting concern from critics over what the actions mean for Americans and their place in the world.
“I am confident that America will move ahead,” Buffett said.
Gates, meanwhile, said the desire for innovation and support for research are “strong” and “largely bipartisan,” despite differences on how to accomplish and fund both.
“This administration is new enough; we don’t know how its budget priorities are going to come out,” but there is much intensity to ensure that the executive branch and Congress encourage “amazing things,” Gates said.