News : Playbook PM: Playbook Special Edition: President-elect Joe Biden and what’s next

Saturday, November 7, 2020

Playbook PM: Playbook Special Edition: President-elect Joe Biden and what’s next

Nov 07, 2020

By Jake Sherman, Anna Palmer and John Bresnahan

48 YEARS AGO TODAY, JOSEPH ROBINETTE BIDEN JR. was first elected to federal office, winning Delaware's Senate seat with 50.5% of the vote. Today, news outlets projected that BIDEN and Sen. KAMALA DEVI HARRIS of California will be the president and vice president of the United States come 2021.

BIDEN is the 15th vice president to ascend to the presidency, and will be the oldest man elected to the White House. HARRIS will be the first woman sworn in as vice president of the United States.

WHEN BIDEN addresses the nation in the Capitol sometime next year, he will likely say for the first time "Madame Speaker and Madame Vice President." Two of the top three officials in the federal government next year will be women.

BIDEN is expected to make his first speech as president-elect 8 p.m. in Wilmington.

WASHINGTON ERUPTED into celebration on a beautiful Saturday afternoon, with horns honking from Capitol Hill to downtown near the White House up through Cleveland Park and upper Northwest Washington.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP -- who was on the golf course when the race was called -- issued a defiant statement to keep fighting, although it looks like his time in the Oval Office will be ending on Jan. 20 barring a shocking turnaround. Anita Kumar on Trump's concession

WE SAID THIS WHEN TRUMP got elected four years ago Monday: WASHINGTON changes with each administration, and you should expect a shift in the vibe of the capital city once BIDEN takes office. TRUMP ushered in the TRUMP HOTEL as a center of the universe -- that will now become the mecca of the Republican resistance. An entire class of Democratic operatives had moved on from Washington, disenfranchised by the TRUMP era. Some will return to work for BIDEN, who was so instrumental in BARACK OBAMA'S administration. Others inspired to get involved with the BIDEN campaign will come to Washington for the first time.

JUST LIKE OBAMA, BIDEN will inherit a country wracked by turmoil -- instead of a collapse of the financial sector, BIDEN will take the reins of a nation in the midst of economic downturn, and suffering from a deadly virus that's killed nearly a quarter million Americans.

REPUBLICANS have suddenly discovered their love for fiscal restraint after running up trillions of dollars of new debt under TRUMP even before the pandemic. But that reality will clash with the fact that both parties concede the American people need fiscal stimulus.

BIDEN'S TASK WILL NOT BE SIMPLE, of course. BIDEN will likely face a Republican Senate run by MITCH MCCONNELL of Kentucky, who has been the bane of Democrats' existence for years. BIDEN has a good relationship with his "old friend" MCCONNELL, but time will tell whether the Kentuckian is in a deal cutting mood in 2021 and 2022.

THE REPUBLICAN PARTY in the BIDEN era will be bitter from losing the White House, and looking for a way forward. TRUMP is sure to be on the sideline, lobbing rhetorical bombs, and threatening to run again in 2024. PLUS, the GOP will be looking to take the House in 2022 -- and history is on KEVIN MCCARTHY's side in that quest. MCCONNELL , of course, will also be grasping for power. If Trump isn't the GOP nominee in '24, there are several Senate Republicans who think they could be, including Sens. TOM COTTON (Ark.), MARCO RUBIO (Fla.) and TED CRUZ (Texas).

THE GOP OF TODAY hardly resembles the GOP of old - forever altered by TRUMP, the Tea Party and QAnon, Republicans face serious questions about the future direction of their party and its values. It may not be pretty to watch them work it out. It won't be simple or resolved soon.

AND THEN, there's the Democrats. The left wants BIDEN to deliver on a progressive agenda, but moderates blame progressives for the party's poor showing in congressional races. It's up to BIDEN -- and HARRIS -- to balance these two factions.

FOREIGN POLICY will also be an area of special interest for BIDEN. TRUMP has vowed to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan by the time BIDEN takes office. FRANCE and GERMANY are sure to hail a BIDEN victory, but keep an eye on the U.K.'s BORIS JOHNSON and Israel's BENJAMIN NETANYAHU. They have been two of TRUMP'S closest allies abroad.

BIDEN has promised a tougher line on RUSSIA, but CHINA is sure to dominate BIDEN'S presidency. The US-China relationship has deteriorated rapidly under TRUMP , especially since the coronavirus pandemic originated there. NYT: "Biden to Face Long List of Foreign Challenges, With China No. 1"

PEOPLE GATHERED at the home BIDEN grew up in Scranton.

POLITICO on Biden's agenda … BIDEN'S CABINET OPTIONS

SPEAKER NANCY PELOSI and Senate Minority Leader CHUCK SCHUMER spoke with BIDEN and JILL BIDEN at 12:45 eastern time Saturday.

NYT: "CNN called it first, at 11:24 a.m. on Saturday, quickly followed by NBC, CBS, ABC and The Associated Press. Fox News waited until 11:40 a.m."

TICK TOCK … NATASHA KORECKI, ALEX ISENSTADT, ANITA KUMAR, GABBY ORR, CHRISTOPHER CADELAGO and MARC CAPUTO: "'This f---ing virus': Inside Donald Trump's 2020 undoing": "Brad Parscale was on the phone with President Donald Trump and top White House officials in mid-February when someone on the line asked the campaign manager what worried him the most. Parscale, speaking from his Arlington, Va. apartment, had just told the president how good his internal poll numbers looked. But now he had an urgent message: The coronavirus was a big problem – and it could cost him reelection.

"Trump was perplexed. The economy was strong. The president had built an enormous political infrastructure and was raking in hundreds of millions of dollars. That month, Trump's campaign conducted a $1.1 million polling project showing him leading prospective Democratic challengers even in blue states such as Colorado, New Mexico, and New Hampshire. 'Sir, regardless, this is coming. It's the only thing that could take down your presidency,' Parscale told the president. Trump snapped. 'This fucking virus,' Trump asked dismissively, according to a person with direct knowledge of the exchange, 'what does it have to do with me getting reelected?'"

-- WAPO, by Ashley Parker, Josh Dawsey, Matt Viser and Michael Scherer: "How Trump's erratic behavior and failure on coronavirus doomed his reelection"

-- HOLLY OTTERBEIN in Philly: "How Pennsylvania was won"

CALIFORNIA'S NEXT SENATOR … L.A. TIMES' PHIL WILLON and TARYN LUNA: "One of these people could be Vice President-elect Kamala Harris' successor and California's next senator": "Never shy about making a political splash, [Gavin] Newsom could appoint California's first-ever Latino senator. He might select a Black woman to replace Harris, who was only the second Black woman in the nation's history to serve in the U.S. Senate. The Democratic governor, who championed same-sex marriage while mayor of San Francisco, may choose to send to Washington California's first senator to have come out as gay."

-- S.F. CHRONICLE'S TAL KOPAN: "Kamala Harris, the transformative vice president-elect: Oakland native shatters barriers"

ALICE MIRANDA OLLSTEIN and DAN GOLDBERG: "Joe Biden will inherit a raging pandemic. Here's what he plans to do next.": "Joe Biden's top priority entering the White House is fighting both the immediate coronavirus crisis and its complex long-term aftermath by embracing science, pushing mask-wearing as a patriotic act and leaning on Congress to pass a massive stimulus package.

"It's a strategy that would toss out the Trump administration's patchwork response that put the burden on states and install a top-down national framework for testing, contact tracing and targeted business closures. Biden's also promised a national mask mandate, calling it 'a patriotic duty.' And public health experts rather than politicians will update the public once Biden is sworn in — meaning sober assessments and realistic timelines will replace Trump's declarations that the pandemic is all but over and the virus will 'disappear' with or without a vaccine."

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