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Then-national security adviser John Bolton was distressed about Rudy Giuliani. Trump's personal lawyer had bypassed established procedure for representing the White House with a foreign leader and had launched a secret back channel of communication with Ukraine. The shadowy moves were so potentially combustible that Bolton in private meetings earlier this year called Giuliani "a hand grenade who is going to blow everybody up."

In an interview with ABC News that aired Tuesday morning, Hunter Biden said his involvement in the board of Ukrainian gas company Burisma was, in retrospect, "poor judgment on my part," although he said he did "nothing wrong at all." Biden asked, "was it poor judgment to be in the middle of something that is ... a swamp in many ways? Yeah."

Biden also reiterated that he will not work for any foreign companies should his father become president.

Starting early last year, the nation's most powerful consumer protection agency sent examiners into companies that run student loan call centers to try to fix a troubled loan forgiveness program. But the Department of Education blocked the bureau from getting the information it needed, NPR has learned.

The Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program is designed to help firefighters, military service members, nonprofit workers and others. But thousands of people say they were treated unfairly and rejected.

Updated at 5:45 p.m. ET

In less than a week, a landmark battle over who bears responsibility for the U.S. opioid crisis will begin in federal court.

The case involves thousands of plaintiffs at virtually every level of government and defendants from every link in the chain of opioid drug production — from major multinational corporations such as Johnson & Johnson and CVS, right down to individual doctors. And on Oct. 21, the first trial is set to kick off before a judge in the Northern District of Ohio.