| | | | | |  | | By Anna Palmer, Jake Sherman, Eli Okun and Garrett Ross | Presented by |  | | PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP has fired Defense Secretary MARK ESPER. @realDonaldTrump at 12:54 p.m.: "I am pleased to announce that Christopher C. Miller, the highly respected Director of the National Counterterrorism Center (unanimously confirmed by the Senate), will be Acting Secretary of Defense, effective immediately.....Chris will do a GREAT job! Mark Esper has been terminated. I would like to thank him for his service." PRESIDENT-ELECT JOE BIDEN'S FIRST WEEKDAY: THE MARKET is ripping -- the Dow is up nearly 5%. We have a promising vaccine. BIDEN called for mask wearing. PFIZER CEO ALBERT BOURLA on CNBC -- his first stop this morning: "It is a great day for science. It is a great day for humanity. When you realize that your vaccine has a 90% effectiveness, that's overwhelming. You understand that the hopes of billions of people and millions and businesses and hundreds of governments that were felt on our shoulders. Now, we can credibly tell them: I think we can see the light at the end of the tunnel." VACCINE DOWNLOAD … STAT: "Covid-19 vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech is strongly effective, early data from large trial indicate," by Matthew Herper: "The companies said an early analysis of the results showed that individuals who received two injections of the vaccine three weeks apart experienced more than 90% fewer cases of symptomatic Covid-19 than those who received a placebo. For months, researchers have cautioned that a vaccine that might only be 60% or 70% effective. … "[T]he companies will not file for an emergency use authorization to distribute the vaccine until they reach another milestone: when half of the patients in their study have been observed for any safety issues for at least two months following their second dose. Pfizer expects to cross that threshold in the third week of November. … Although the estimate of the efficacy of the vaccine could change as the study is completed, it is close to a best-case scenario." THIS IS CAUSING A LOT OF RED FACES IN THE WHITE HOUSE, via NYT's Katie Thomas, David Gelles and Carl Zimmer: "Operation Warp Speed, the federal effort to rush a vaccine to market, has promised Pfizer $1.95 billion to deliver 100 million doses to the federal government, which will be given to Americans free of charge. But [Pfizer SVP Kathrin] Jansen sought to distance the company from Operation Warp Speed and presidential politics, noting that the company -- unlike the other vaccine front-runners -- did not take any federal money to help pay for research and development. "'We were never part of the Warp Speed,' she said. 'We have never taken any money from the U.S. government, or from anyone.'" NYT BUT, BUT, BUT … IT'S COMPLICATED -- NYT'S @virginiahughes: "Why Pence and Pfizer are framing this so differently: Warp Speed has promised $2 billion to Pfizer to buy doses when they're ready —an advanced purchase deal. Administration counts this in Warp Speed's umbrella. But unlike other WS companies, Pfizer did NOT take $ for development." BIDEN this morning in Wilmington: "It's time to end the politicization of basic public health steps like mask wearing. … Please, I implore you, wear a mask. Do it for yourself. Do it for your neighbor. A mask is not a political statement." | | A message from Morgan Stanley: Announcing the Morgan Stanley HBCU Scholars Program – As part of an ongoing effort to strengthen our commitment to diversity and inclusion, Morgan Stanley has launched an initiative to fund full scholarships and providing career training for students at Morehouse College, Spelman College and Howard University. The first 60 scholarships, 15 per institution, will be awarded next year. | | | ABC'S KATHERINE FAULDERS (@KFaulders): "NEWS: Sec. Ben Carson tested positive for COVID-19 this morning. His deputy chief of staff says he's 'in good spirits & feels fortunate to have access to effective therapeutics which aid and markedly speed his recovery.' Carson attended the election night party at the White House." PALM BEACH DAILY NEWS: "Use of helipad at Mar-a-Lago ends with Trump's term on Jan. 20" Good Monday afternoon. TRUMP'S NEXT MOVE -- BLOOMBERG'S @JenniferJJacobs: "No Trump rallies featuring the president himself are being planned, sources tell me, @justinsink and @MarioDParker. Any events will be pop-up ones, like boat parades. But no big campaign-style Trump rallies are being scheduled right now." TRUMP CAMPAIGN LATEST -- "Trump campaign staffers face uncertain future," by CNN's Jeremy Diamond: "Even as Trump campaign leadership told staff on Monday that this election isn't over and they need to stay in the fight, they have offered no indication to staff that they will be employed into next week. "Campaign staffers are employed until Nov. 15 and have so far gotten no signal that their contracts will be extended despite the campaign's fundraising for a legal battle. 'They're saying, "Stay in the fight!"' one campaign source told CNN. 'Hard for people to stay in the fight when they'll be unemployed a week from today.' This source also said that campaign leadership made note of lackluster attendance at today's staff meeting, which was announced with just 15 minutes' notice." CNN DAILY RUDY -- "Man featured at Giuliani press conference is a convicted sex offender," by Matt Friedman NYT'S ANNIE KARNI reports that JON MEACHAM has been helping write BIDEN speeches, including his acceptance speech Saturday night. FIRST IN PLAYBOOK -- The NATIONAL COUNCIL ON ELECTION INTEGRITY is going up with a new cable TV ad entitled "We did it" in English and Spanish as part of a $1.3 million buy this week. "We did it. Americans, from both parties … turned out to vote in numbers like we haven't seen in 100 years," a narrator says in the ads that will run on Fox News, CNN, MSNBC and Univision and Telemundo in the D.C. media markets. "And election officials counted those votes carefully, transparently and in accordance with the law. So no matter who you voted for, if you cast a ballot, or counted them, thank you." The ad SCOTUS WATCH -- "Obamacare faces Supreme Court remade by Trump," by Susannah Luthi: "The court will hear a lawsuit Tuesday that likely represents Republicans' last chance to knock out a health care law they've opposed for over a decade, and that President-elect Joe Biden is vowing to expand. One of the most-watched participants at the oral arguments will be Trump's latest appointee to the high court, Amy Coney Barrett. … "The case takes up whether Congress, by eliminating the penalty for not having health insurance, made all of Obamacare unconstitutional. It marks the third major challenge to the health care law heard by the Supreme Court and is regarded in legal circles as perhaps the weakest among those. Few in the $3.6 trillion health care industry believe even the court's fortified 6-3 conservative majority would overturn [the] law … But the law's survival depends on support from at least two conservative justices – likely including at least one of Trump's picks." | | | | TRACK THE TRANSITION, SUBSCRIBE TO TRANSITION PLAYBOOK: The definitive guide to what could be one of the most consequential transfers of power in American history. Our Transition Playbook newsletter—written for political insiders—tracks the appointments, people, and power centers of the new administration. Don't miss out. Subscribe today. | | | | | HAKEEM JEFFRIES SPEAKS -- "Hakeem Jeffries Wants Democrats to Take a Deep Breath," by NYT's Nick Fandos: "Unbowed by the disappointment and division, Representative Hakeem Jeffries, a Brooklynite who as chairman of the unruly Democratic Caucus helps plot his party's policy and legislative strategy in the House, plans to announce on Monday that he will seek re-election to that post. … [W]hile he represents a different generation of leadership from Ms. Pelosi, he sees little need to upend the approach that Democrats put in place after the 2016 election, either by veering further to the left or tacking to the center. "He has no problem with a hard 'family conversation' about what went wrong in last week's elections, Mr. Jeffries said in an interview, but his pitch to fellow Democrats is that their strategy — focusing on policies that affect Americans' wallets and broadly popular issues, like gun safety — is sound and their message is resonating. … [H]ow he navigates the coming weeks and months, when Democratic infighting is only likely to blossom in the absence of a common enemy in Mr. Trump, could go a long way in determining how high he climbs." NYT TRADE WARS -- DEUTSCHE WELLE: "EU to impose tariffs on U.S. goods over Boeing dispute": "European Commission Executive Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis said on Monday that the EU will push ahead with plans to impose tariffs and other penalties worth up to $4 billion (€3.37 billion) on an array of U.S. imports. "The tariffs come in retaliation to the U.S. awarding illegal subsidies to the airplane manufacturer Boeing. A World Trade Organization (WTO) ruling granted authorization for the tariffs in October. … The new step taken by the EU surprised those who believed that the European bloc may hold off from an aggressive response following the election of Joe Biden who is seen as a friendlier face for the White House." DW KNOWING LAEL BRAINARD -- "With pick for treasury secretary, Biden will tip hand about his economic agenda," by WaPo's Rachel Siegel: "A leading candidate for the post is Federal Reserve governor Lael Brainard, who served as a senior Treasury Department official in the Obama administration. Brainard has broad policymaking experience, particularly during economic crises, as well as wide respect among international foreign ministries and central banks from her time as the department's top diplomat. "At the same time, Biden could face pressure from the Democratic Party's left wing to pick a more liberal figure, someone who could push for aggressive financial overhauls and prove more adversarial to supporters of free trade. Such a nominee, however, could face difficulty winning Senate confirmation if Republicans retain control." WaPo POST-MORTEM -- "How Democrats Missed Trump's Appeal to Latino Voters," by NYT's Jennifer Medina in Phoenix: "The Latino vote is deeply divided, and running as not-Trump was always going to be insufficient. … For Latinos, this was an election that turned on feelings about Mr. Trump above all else. That just didn't mean what Democrats, and the Biden campaign specifically, assumed it did. … "Fellow Democrats complained about the Biden campaign's sluggish Latino outreach for months, though the campaign eventually spent a record $20 million on Spanish-language television and radio advertising … Democrats also did not seem to account for how effective Mr. Trump's efforts to tie their party to socialism would be, especially among Venezuelan- and Cuban-American voters in Florida." NYT -- DAVE WASSERMAN (@Redistrict): "It's harder to argue the GOP coalition is demographically 'dying out' after Tuesday's results. As with past waves of immigrants throughout U.S. history, Hispanic voters are beginning to vote a little closer to the rest of the country - and it's one possible path forward." | | | | NEW EPISODES OF POLITICO'S GLOBAL TRANSLATIONS PODCAST: The world has long been beset by big problems that defy political boundaries, and these issues have exploded in 2020 amid a global pandemic. Global Translations podcast, presented by Citi, unpacks the roadblocks to smart policy decisions and examines the long-term costs of the short-term thinking that drives many political and business decisions. In the latest episode, we look at the renewed interest in an old phrase: industrial policy. Is it still too controversial in policy circles, or is it the future of policy as governments worldwide reshape global supply chains? Subscribe for Season Two, available now. | | | | | AFTERNOON READ -- "Pulling Our Politics Back from the Brink," by The New Yorker's Evan Osnos: "As Americans confront the uncertainty of the next four years, it's not clear if the tradition of force or of reason is ascendant. Some theorists and philosophers are optimistic, beginning to map out plans to revive social cohesion and common purpose. Others fear that the cleavages will only widen, until Americans reckon with a culture of political warfare that comes ever closer to actual combat." New Yorker IN GENEVA … AP: "China, Iran join queue to scrutinize U.S. at U.N. rights body": "The United States is facing its first review in five years at the U.N.'s main human rights body, with the detentions of migrant children and the killings of unarmed Black people during the Trump administration's tenure among issues high on minds. "Foes from countries like Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Russia and China were among those seeking to question and scrutinize the United States as the Human Rights Council gave the U.S. its turn Monday in a regular examination of every U.N. member state's record on human rights known as the Universal Periodic Review. Nearly 120 countries lined up for slots to raise questions in the 3 1/2-hour session that follows up on an August report about the U.S. rights record over the past several years — and what steps U.S. authorities are taking to improve it." MEGATREND -- "Even as Trump Cut Immigration, Immigrants Transformed U.S.," by NYT's Miriam Jordan in Grand Island, Neb.: "Even with one of the most severe declines in immigration since the 1920s, the country is on an irreversible course to becoming ever more diverse, and more dependent on immigrants and their children. … "Mr. Trump's immigration legacy cannot be unraveled overnight. … But as Grand Island shows, nothing that Mr. Trump has done was able to halt the inexorable shifts unleashed by the biggest wave of immigration since the 1890s, when Southern and Eastern Europeans arrived in huge numbers through Ellis Island." NYT HOT ON THE RIGHT -- "Parler's winning the right-wing app war," by Protocol's David Pierce: "Parler's been the most popular free app on both iOS and Android for the last several days, besting even chart-topping mainstays TikTok and Zoom. … A who's who of conservative celebrities, led by Parler patron saint (and investor) Dan Bongino, have been telling their followers on Twitter and elsewhere to jump to Parler. "Many of them are saying things like, 'I'm about to get kicked off Twitter, follow me on Parler!' Which mostly wasn't true, but it seemed to work. … The other app to keep an eye on? Rumble, a video platform positioning itself as a similarly free-speech-friendly alternative to YouTube." Protocol MEDIAWATCH -- "Times Change: In the Trump years, the New York Times became less dispassionate and more crusading, sparking a raw debate over the paper's future," by New York magazine's Reeves Wiedeman TRANSITION -- Katie Webster is now a comms manager at Growth Energy. She previously was comms director for Rep. Trey Hollingsworth (R-Ind.), and is a Brad Wenstrup alum. | | | |   | | | | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook family Playbook | Playbook PM | California Playbook | Florida Playbook | Illinois Playbook | Massachusetts Playbook | New Jersey Playbook | New York Playbook | Brussels Playbook | London Playbook View all our politics and policy newsletters | | Follow us | | | | |
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