| | | | | |  | | By Kyle Cheney | Presented by Responsibility.org | with help from Sarah Ferris and Mel Zanona A DONE DEAL -- It took weeks of intense, protracted negotiation, but House and Senate leaders have finally clinched an agreement to send a $900 billion aid package to President Donald Trump's desk, Congress' first measure to provide emergency coronavirus relief to individuals and businesses since the CARES Act passed in March. The bill includes $160 billion for $600 direct payments to individuals and families. It will restore $300 a week in additional unemployment assistance, about half the level provided by the CARES Act that expired at the end of July. It also includes $300 billion for small businesses harmed by the pandemic and large amounts for schools. Caitlin and Marianne have the details on what's in the bill: https://politi.co/3h4a4oI All that's left is for the House and Senate to translate the deal into legislative language and vote on it today. Leaders of both parties say they're confident they have the votes. President Donald Trump has been largely absent from the negotiations, but his team expressed support for the contours of the final proposal. An aide said late Sunday that Trump would sign the measure. What's next, courtesy of Burgess, Andrew, Mel and Heather: https://politi.co/2Wzobcg HOW WE GOT HERE: A roller-coaster weekend, as covered by the POLITICO Congress team: - Friday evening: '"This is ridiculous": Congress avoids shutdown but deadlocks on stimulus': https://politi.co/34tpI8k - Saturday afternoon: 'Stubborn Fed feud freezes stimulus talks' https://politi.co/2WztmZK - Saturday night: 'Stimulus deal in sight after compromise reached on Fed dispute': https://politi.co/2KeCvVi - Sunday evening: 'Congress strikes stimulus deal after days of frantic talks' https://politi.co/2Wzobcg Related story: 'A shining moment': Congress agrees to restore Medicaid for Pacific Islanders," by POLITICO's Dan Diamond. https://politi.co/34yr4hX The big picture: Read Paul Kane's piece in the Washington Post on the troubled relationships among the Capitol's "four corners" — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Senate Minority Leader Schumer — and President-elect Joe Biden's prospects for cutting deals with them. https://wapo.st/34u3932 | | A message from Responsibility.org: December is National Impaired Driving Prevention Month. High-risk impaired drivers are at a higher crash risk, are disproportionately involved in fatal crashes, often escape accountability and typically become repeat DUI offenders. Learn more about these offenders and what research shows will be effective in deterring them. StopHRID.org | | | WHILE YOU WERE WATCHING CONGRESS -- While lawmakers careened toward a stimulus deal, Trump spent his Friday and Saturday strategizing desperate efforts to reverse his defeat in the 2020 election, convening his top advisers and outside attorney Sidney Powell, a conspiracy theorist who has led a blizzard of failed legal attempts to subvert Joe Biden's victory. Trump discussed the possibility of naming Powell a special counsel to pursue election related matters built around his baseless claims of election fraud. Powell also used the meeting to upbraid Trump administration officials who she said weren't doing enough to support Trump's efforts. Former national security adviser Michael Flynn, recently pardoned by Trump and who has suggested deploying martial law to force a new election, was in attendance as well. https://politi.co/3mBl3Y5 -Powell was back at the White House on Sunday night pitching a plan to seize voting machines from swing states, an effort top Trump administration officials have already said can't be done but that Trump continues to entertain. -Trump has amplified calls for incoming Sen.-elect Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) to challenge Biden's victory when the Electoral College tally is certified by Congress on Jan. 5, a step McConnell has warned GOP senators against. Trump told a radio interviewer that he spoke on Saturday to Tuberville, the subject of frequent praise from the president in recent days. HAPPY MONDAY! Welcome to Huddle, the play-by-play guide to all things Capitol Hill, on this Dec. 21 — the shortest day of the longest year. Get through it with Rep. Debbie Dingell's updated lyrics to "Let it Snow," updated for Capitol Hill in the era of social distancing. https://bit.ly/37BarUC FRIDAY'S MOST CLICKED: Roll Call's report on Rep. Steve Palazzo's ethics investigation was the big winner. | | | | TUNE IN TO NEW EPISODE OF GLOBAL TRANSLATIONS: Our Global Translations podcast, presented by Citi, examines the long-term costs of the short-term thinking that drives many political and business decisions. The world has long been beset by big problems that defy political boundaries, and these issues have exploded over the past year amid a global pandemic. This podcast helps to identify and understand the impediments to smart policymaking. Subscribe for Season Two, available now. | | | | | WAIT FOR IT -- President-elect Joe Biden will slow-walk his nomination of two House Democrats for cabinet roles in order to maximize the narrow margin Speaker Nancy Pelosi has in the House, according to a strategy House leaders outlined for the Associated Press on Friday. Majority Whip Jim Clyburn indicated he anticipates Biden will quickly tap Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-La.) as a White House adviser but will delay the nominations of Reps. Marcia Fudge (D-Ohio) and Deb Haaland (D-N.M.) — his picks for Housing and Interior, respectively — until March. The delay ensures that the two Democrats will remain in the House until after the early 2021 legislative sprint. Read Lisa Mascaro's story here: https://bit.ly/3p8Q3Aq Meanwhile: Republicans have their own ideas about the pace of Biden's nominations. Sen. John Barasso (R-Idaho) said Sunday that Republicans wouldn't forget the hurdles Senate Democrats put in place to slow Trump's nominees and that Democrats under Biden's presidency should expect the same. https://politi.co/37zayAi Biden's team anticipates the friction and is already planning a counteroffensive to build support for his nominees among senators in both parties. Read Natasha Korecki, Chris Cadelago and Alex Thompson on the effort: https://politi.co/2J8QRpz SHOT SHOTS -- Over the weekend, House and Senate lawmakers started a new trend: Posting photos of themselves getting the coronavirus vaccine, which was made available to them as part of a "continuity of government" plan. The goal is to instill public trust in a vaccine that will require widespread public acceptance to be effective. Here's Sen. Marco Rubio getting his shot: https://bit.ly/3h3Z9vr; And here's Rep. Ocasio-Cortez: https://bit.ly/38fUXVa But the easy access for lawmakers — including many who flouted coronavirus precautions and exposed themselves or others to the virus over the past nine months — also rankled people off Capitol Hill who have aired frustrations about the challenge of getting vaccines to frontline workers. And while Ocasio-Cortez touted the vaccine on her social media accounts, not every member of the Squad was on board. Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) said it was wrong for the vaccine to be offered to younger, healthier members of Congress while frontline workers were still waiting to gain access. https://bit.ly/2WxYDwb Related: Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-Wash.) talked about his experience with coronavirus in an interview with the Spokesman-Review in Spokane. https://bit.ly/2KgYdIe | | | | A message from Responsibility.org:   | | | SWALWELL THAT ENDS WELL -- Pelosi and McCarthy were briefed Friday by the FBI on the details of Swalwell's interactions with a woman identified as a Chinese spy. Though Pelosi didn't address reporters after the briefing, McCarthy emerged and reiterated his demand that Swalwell be removed from the House Intelligence Committee, which will be reconstituted in the next Congress. McCarthy took his demand to the Fox News airwaves on Sunday. https://bit.ly/3mEDBql VETO WATCH -- Trump is expected to veto the pending NDAA by Wednesday, when he's required to act on the measure. The bill passed overwhelmingly in both chambers, and lawmakers of both parties have pressed him further as the extent of a massive cybersecurity breach across government and the private sector — likely by Russia — became clear. The House anticipates calling members back on Dec. 28 to override Trump's veto. More from Sarah, Connor and Heather: https://politi.co/3pdNYTP EYES EMOJI -- The Capitol has been tense of late. But this comment by Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) and a rejoinder from Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) stood out as particularly emblematic of this unsettling moment. Higgins, on Sunday afternoon, described Biden's election win as a "conspiracy to dismantle the American elections process." This is, of course, a baseless allegation. Higgins added, for good measure, that Biden's presidency would amount to a conspiracy to end America altogether. Huffman replied late Sunday, essentially suggesting Higgins might be a gun violence risk inside the Capitol: "Folks: under current House rules, this guy is allowed to have assault weapons in the United States Capitol. He's allowed to bypass security and do whatever he wants with his guns, unlike everyone else in the Capitol." Huffman said it's a reason he wants to pass "security reforms." RUNOFF RUNDOWN -- Senate Majority PAC is getting lapped in the TV ad war in Georgia, the result of donor fatigue after a brutal presidential election and frustration about dollars spent on failed Senate campaigns. Republicans have spent $86 million on TV compared to just $30 million for Democrats. Small-dollar donations have helped Democrats Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock trim the GOP edge, but the focus for them has been on ground game over TV ads so far. Elena Schneider and James Arkin take a deep look at the state of the races that will decide control of the Senate: https://politi.co/3mxNIgt | | | | KEEP UP WITH THE PEOPLE AND POLITICS DRIVING GLOBAL HEALTH IN 2021: The pandemic revealed just how critical it is to keep up with the politics, policy and people driving global health. The Covid-19 vaccine is here — now what? What will the distribution look like globally? Our Global Pulse newsletter connects leaders, policymakers and advocates to the politics impacting our global health. Join the conversation and subscribe today. | | | | | |  | TRANSITIONS | | Mariel Sáez, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer's (D-Md.) deputy communications director and the deputy communications director for the Presidential Inaugural Committee, has been tapped to serve as the White House director of broadcast media. | | TODAY IN CONGRESS | | The House meets at 9 a.m. with votes TBD, but no earlier than 10 a.m. The Senate meets at noon. | | AROUND THE HILL | | Nothing scheduled. | | TRIVIA | | FRIDAY'S WINNER: Natalie Pavlatos was the first person to guess that the Department of Peace has been proposed by Senator Matthew Neeley in the 1930s, Congressman Dennis Kucinich, and Marianne Williamson. TODAY'S QUESTION : From Natalie: Which annual political collectible was first released in 1981 with the theme "Angel in Flight"? The first person to correctly guess gets a mention in the next edition of Huddle. Send your answer to mzanona@politico.com. GET HUDDLE emailed to your phone each morning.
| | A message from Responsibility.org: December is National Impaired Driving Prevention Month. Each year, nearly a million people are arrested for impaired driving. Though laws and processes vary by state, each of them goes through a similar experience after an officer observes suspicious driving: Detection/arrest, awaiting and preparing for trial, screening and assessment, the court process/sentencing, supervision, and treatment. StopHRID.org identifies common challenges as well as system improvements and how to implement them in order to eliminate impaired driving, especially among high-risk impaired drivers. Responsibility.org has collaborated with key partners in the fields of traffic safety, criminal justice, and supervision and treatment to eliminate impaired driving. The DUI system is complex and contains many gaps and addressing those issues requires practitioners, policymakers, and the public to better understand those gaps and how the system operates and reforms that are needed to effectively reduce recidivism and fatalities. StopHRID.org | | | | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Follow us | | | | |
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