Good Monday morning. Here are some of the stories making news in Washington and politics today.

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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Sunday that President Trump ended peace negotiations with the Taliban because the group had “failed to live up to a series of commitments they had made,” but left open the possibility that American troops could be withdrawn from Afghanistan anyway.

What would have been one of the biggest headline-grabbing moments of Mr. Trump’s tenure was put together on the spur of the moment and then canceled on the spur of the moment. Here’s more on how the secret meeting with the Taliban fell apart.

House Democrats return to Washington this week poised to significantly broaden their nascent impeachment inquiry into corruption accusations against the president, including claims that he dangled pardons to aides and that his resorts illegally profited from government business.

The House Judiciary committee plans to vote this week to formalize procedures for an impeachment inquiry, which could allow the panel to elicit more information about instances of possible obstruction of justice and abuses of power by Mr. Trump.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senator Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader, called on the president to defy the N.R.A. and expand background checks to nearly all gun buyers, saying that he has a “historic opportunity to save lives.”

Faced with an ever-shrinking calendar before February’s Iowa caucuses and voters who are eager to narrow the choices, the 17 Democratic presidential candidates lagging behind the three front-runners are grasping for fresh ways to distinguish themselves.

As Senator Elizabeth Warren has risen in the polls on her populist and anti-corruption message, some donors and opponents are chafing at her campaign’s purity claims of being “100 percent grass-roots funded.”

Mark Sanford, the former governor and representative from South Carolina, announced Sunday that he would challenge the president and seek the Republican nomination.

The billionaire and impeachment activist Tom Steyer became the 11th Democratic presidential candidate to qualify for the October debates on Sunday after a new poll showed him with 2 percent support in Nevada.

A do-over vote in North Carolina’s Ninth Congressional District on Tuesday is in many ways becoming the first test of the political terrain heading into 2020.

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Today’s On Politics briefing was compiled by Isabella Grullón Paz in New York.

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