| | | | | |  | | By Ryan Lizza, Tara Palmeri, Eugene Daniels and Rachael Bade | Presented by Facebook | |  | DRIVING THE DAY | | JOE BIDEN has been president for 26 days, but today is the unofficial start of his presidency. It's the first day of the post-Trump era. Biden's November and December transition period was dominated by DONALD TRUMP, who refused to concede the election, delayed the formal transition process and instructed non-cooperation from his aides. Biden's pre-inaugural January was dominated by Trump, who incited a mob of supporters to sack the Capitol and was impeached by the House. Biden's first weeks in office in late January and February were dominated by Trump, who at the White House was the target of dozens of Biden executive actions meant to reverse his policies on immigration, climate, health care and several other areas, and in Congress was the subject of the Senate trial. Trump was kicked off social media but continued to drive an attention-hogging debate within the Republican Party that dragged on for weeks. Even the general election, a referendum on Trump's failed response to the pandemic, was also dominated by Trump rather than the more low-key Biden. Fittingly, on Presidents Day, Biden, who returns to the White House from Camp David this afternoon, finally gets to be president. On Tuesday he'll be in Wisconsin for a CNN town hall, where he will no doubt make the case for his Covid relief bill. On Thursday he'll do the same in Michigan while touring one of Pfizer's vaccine manufacturing plants. On Friday, Biden will Zoom into a virtual meeting of the G-7 and the Munich Security Conference, where he has been a regular guest for years. (The conference is to Biden what Burning Man is to tech moguls.) | | A message from Facebook: It's time to update internet regulations
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Learn More | | | The key clips from the morning papers are filled with takes on what the post-Trump era means for the White House. The WSJ notes that the end of the Trump trial "sets the stage for his successor to pursue his agenda with a Congress no longer encumbered by the wrenching task of accounting for the storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6." The NYT adds, "Without the spectacle of a constitutional clash, the new president 'takes center stage now in a way that the first few weeks didn't allow,' said Jennifer Palmieri, who served as communications director for President Barack Obama. She said the end of the trial means that '2021 can finally start.'" The WaPo warns, "now that Biden has undone the most easily reversible Trump policies, the hard part begins." Trump, of course, is not going away. There's talk of a spate of interviews coming, and his aides have been making plans for a new online presence. But Biden will now be the central focus in American politics in a way that he never has and in a way that his White House staff, who are mostly veterans of his Trump-focused campaign, have never had to deal with. What happens when they won't have Trump to kick around anymore? | | | |   | | | There are three dynamics to watch as they navigate this new political-media era: The GOP: Does the party become less defined by its divisions over Trump and unify around opposition to Biden's agenda? (The political dynamics of Biden's Covid bill, which has no Republican support in Congress, suggest the answer is yes.) The media: Does the Biden White House encounter a much more aggressive press corps than it was accustomed to during the Trump-dominated campaign that catches them off-guard? (The TJ Ducklo episode suggests the answer is yes.) Biden: Does a solo-act Biden retain his relatively high approval rating (54%) and leverage it to pass his agenda now that the deeply unpopular Trump is off center stage? (Only time will tell!) BIDEN'S MONDAY — The president will depart Camp David in the afternoon and arrive back at the White House at 3:10 p.m. | | | | GET TRANSITION PLAYBOOK TO 100K: In three months, our scoop-filled Transition Playbook newsletter has grown from zero to more than 90,000 subscribers. Find out what's really happening inside the West Wing, who really has the ear of the president, and what's about to happen, before it occurs. Transition Playbook chronicles the people, policies, and emerging power centers of the Biden administration. Don't miss out, subscribe today. And once you do, we'd be grateful if you could spread the word to your friends and colleagues, or, even better, post about Transition Playbook on Facebook or Twitter using this link: politico.com/newsletters/transition-playbook | | | | | | | PLAYBOOK READS | | | 
| PHOTO OF THE DAY: While in office, Trump tried to repaint Air Force One red, white and blue. Like a lot of his worst ideas, that never happened, but he did have a model of the plane that he kept in the Oval Office and that often appeared in official photos with world leaders. He apparently really liked the souvenir, because instead of leaving it behind for Biden, Trump packed it up and brought it down to Mar-a-Lago, where it's now prominently displayed on a coffee table in the lobby. SIGN UP! — With Trump's second impeachment over, Democrats in Congress will shift their focus to Biden's agenda, from Covid-19 relief to the vaccine rollout and more. Join RACHAEL on Tuesday at 9 a.m. for a live conversation with Assistant House Speaker KATHERINE CLARK (D-Mass.) on the most pressing legislative priorities and her approach to getting things done as the fourth highest-ranking member of the House. Register here PRESIDENTS DAY CLICKER — "Time for a new Uncle Sam?" by Matt Wuerker: "The nation is in the midst of a reckoning with representation and our national symbology. … It got us thinking: How can we make Uncle Sam more up to date? Is it as simple as a wardrobe change—or does something bolder need to be done to match the moment? We hit the streets to test the idea." IMPEACHMENT FALLOUT GOP CIVIL WAR — "Trump's acquittal further polarizes factions within the GOP," WaPo — "Burr voted to convict Trump. Now NC Republicans plan to censure their senator," The News & Observer: "Members of the NC Republican Party's central committee will hold an emergency meeting Monday night to vote on censuring Burr … The outcome of Monday's vote is not really in doubt." TOP-ED — SEN. BILL CASSIDY (R-La.) in THE ADVOCATE: "I voted to convict former President Trump because he is guilty": "I have no illusions that this is a popular decision. I made this decision because Americans should not be fed lies about 'massive election fraud.' Police should not be left to the mercy of a mob. Mobs should not be inflamed to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power. I took an oath to support and defend the Constitution, and I take that oath seriously. This was, is, and will remain my commitment to you." ABC: "Trump impeachment lawyer Michael van der Veen's home vandalized" : "Vandals targeted the home of one of former President Donald Trump's impeachment lawyers, spray-painting the word 'TRAITOR' in red on his driveway in suburban Philadelphia, police said. The vandalism occurred around 8 p.m. on Friday at attorney Michael van der Veen's residence in West Whiteland Township, Pennsylvania." THE NEW DEM DARLINGS — "Dems buzz about breakout stars of Trump's impeachment," by Holly Otterbein: "Rep. Madeleine Dean is being talked about as a potential candidate for the open Senate seat in Pennsylvania in 2022, a top priority for the party. Democratic strategists are speculating that Rep. Joaquin Castro, relatively well-known before the impeachment trial, further distinguished himself as an impeachment manager, advancing talk of a statewide bid in Texas. And an ex-Jeb Bush aide went so far as to say that Colorado Rep. Joe Neguse gave his '2004 convention speech.'" THE WHITE HOUSE WAPO: "Ambassador sweepstakes underway as figures jockey for plum posts": "[C]onsiderable donor agitation is being directed at Katie Petrelius, Biden's campaign finance director who is now at the White House Personnel Office … Biden is expected to place a premium on prior diplomatic or government service in choosing many ambassadors, further reducing the number of posts that could go to donors, according to two people who helped organize campaign events for Biden." CONGRESS CHANNELING MITCH MCCONNELL — GEORGE WILL in WAPO: "Now begins McConnell's project to shrink Trump's GOP influence": "He has his eyes on the prize: 2022, perhaps the most crucial nonpresidential election year in U.S. history. It might determine whether the Republican Party can be a plausible participant in the healthy oscillations of a temperate two-party system." THIS WEEK: CHINA TAKES CENTER STAGE IN GAMESTOP HEARINGS — We hear that several Republicans on the House Financial Services Committee have raised concerns about possible manipulation by Chinese actors in regard to the inflating of GameStop stocks through the trading app Robinhood and a slew of Reddit day traders. Expect to hear from China hawks, who will question specifically whether any role was played by Chinese conglomerate Tencent, which owns a piece of Reddit, as well as 38% of another trading app, the Chinese company Moomoo, one of Robinhood's biggest competitors. | | | |   | | | POLICY CORNER BEYOND THE BELTWAY — "How a Minimum-Wage Increase Is Being Felt in a Low-Wage City," NYT: "Is $15 an hour too much, or not enough? Fresno, Calif., may be a laboratory for a debate over the minimum wage that is heating up on the national level." INSIDE DHS — "The agency founded because of 9/11 is shifting to face the threat of domestic terrorism," WaPo: "Since [the Jan. 6] attack on the U.S. Capitol, calls have intensified for DHS to emphatically turn its attention inward and do more to protect Americans from other Americans. … "The proposals have revived some of the civil liberties concerns that arose after the creation of the department as a large, internal security bureaucracy with a broad mandate. And the possibility of the department scrutinizing Americans has added to the unease because providing homeland security is less controversial when the threats are foreign." POLITICS ROUNDUP 2022 WATCH — "Lara Trump for North Carolina Senate Seat? Trump's Trial Is Renewing Talk," NYT: "One senior Republican official with knowledge of her plans said that the Jan. 6 riot soured her desire to seek office, but that she would decide over the next few months whether to run as part of a coordinated Trump family comeback. … First, however, there is the question of her residence. Ms. Trump currently lives with her husband, Eric, and their children in the northern suburbs of New York City and would have to move back." 2024 WATCH — "GOP governor Kristi Noem, potential Trump successor, used state aircraft for tens of thousands of dollars in political travel," Raw Story: "Newly unearthed flight logs show South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem used a state airplane to travel to right wing political events around the country, a revelation that has state lawmakers questioning whether she violated a state law forbidding political and personal use of the aircraft." PRETTY STRIKING FOR THE GOP — "Support for Third U.S. Political Party at High Point," Gallup: "Sixty-two percent of U.S. adults say the 'parties do such a poor job representing the American people that a third party is needed' … Independents are usually much more likely than Republicans or Democrats to favor a third political party, but in the current poll, Republicans are nearly as likely as independents to hold this view, 63% to 70%. That represents a dramatic shift for Republicans since last September when 40% favored a third party." PANDEMIC TRACKER: The U.S. reported 1,363 Covid-19 deaths and 72,000 new coronavirus cases Sunday. FOR YOUR RADAR — "Batch of homegrown coronavirus mutations seen in U.S.," CNN: "Researchers said Sunday they have identified a batch of similar troubling mutations in coronavirus samples circulating in the United States. … The mutations all affect the same stretch of the spike protein -- the knob-like extension on the outside of the virus that it uses to dock onto the cells it infects, the researchers wrote in a pre-print report. It's not peer reviewed yet, but researchers are rushing such findings online to share them quickly with other experts." The report THE BURNING QUESTION — "Why Administering Covid-19 Shots Is So Hard," WSJ: "Getting them from the freezer and into arms is another journey, complicated by the special handling the doses require but also because of cumbersome data-management systems. Sites must take precautions to ensure that they don't contribute to the spread of the virus, measures that can slow down administration of shots." WHAT WE HAVE TO LOOK FORWARD TO — "Israeli study finds 94% drop in symptomatic COVID-19 cases with Pfizer vaccine," Reuters MEDIAWATCH CANCEL CHRONICLES — If you read CADE METZ'S NYT piece about Slate Star Codex, don't miss this response by MATT YGLESIAS, author of the always excellent Substack Slow Boring: "In defense of interesting writing on controversial topics" TURNING THE PAGE — "Judge tosses Page defamation suit against Verizon company," AP: "A Delaware judge has dismissed a defamation lawsuit filed by former Donald Trump campaign operative Carter Page against the media company that includes Yahoo! and AOL and that formerly owned HuffPost. "The judge ruled last week that Page had failed to demonstrate that articles written about his connection to an FBI investigation into suspected Russian interference in the 2016 presidential campaign were defamatory or untrue." BEN SMITH COLUMN — "Postcard From Peru: Why the Morality Plays Inside The Times Won't Stop," NYT: "The Times's singular status has left its leaders, in a period of high-profile firings and departures, vainly insisting that the exits reflect the normal, confidential and complex workings of human resources. … "I think it's a sign that The Times's unique position in American news may not be tenable. This intense attention, combined with a thriving digital subscription business that makes the company more beholden to the views of left-leaning subscribers, may yet push it into a narrower and more left-wing political lane as a kind of American version of The Guardian — the opposite of its stated, broader strategy. One modest and early sign that The Times may be focusing a bit: A spokeswoman told me that it won't restart the Journeys program next year." | | | | JOIN TUESDAY - PLAYBOOK INTERVIEW WITH ASSISTANT HOUSE SPEAKER KATHERINE CLARK: How are House Democrats helping move the Biden administration agenda forward, including a Covid-19 vaccine rollout economic recovery plan? Join Playbook co-author Rachael Bade for a live conversation with Assistant House Speaker Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) on the most pressing legislative priorities and her approach to getting things done. REGISTER HERE. | | | | | | | PLAYBOOKERS | | IN MEMORIAM — "James Ridgeway, Hard-Hitting Investigative Journalist, Dies at 84," NYT: "In a career that spanned six decades, Mr. Ridgeway wrote for The New Republic as a staff member and as a contributor to The New York Times, The Nation, The New York Review of Books, Ramparts, Hard Times and Mother Jones. He was the Washington correspondent of The Village Voice for 30 years; wrote, co-wrote or edited 20 books on national or foreign affairs; and wrote, produced and directed several documentaries. "His targets were legion: Detroit automakers concealing unsafe car designs, the strutting Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazis, universities profiteering from government weapons research, unanswered questions on the Sept. 11 attacks, the shabbiness of the sex industry, and 1992 presidential candidates who were caught on film preening when they thought nobody was watching. … His longest and most fervent crusade was his last: a decade-long effort, in what might otherwise have been his retirement years, against solitary confinement." — "Albor Ruiz, a Journalistic Voice for Latinos, Is Dead at 80," NYT: "As a columnist for The Daily News, he wrote passionately about the issues facing immigrants and lobbied for the U.S. to lift its trade embargo of his native Cuba." CONWAY FAMILY UPDATE — Claudia appeared on the season premiere of American Idol on Sunday night. "My mother is Kellyanne Conway," she announced to an audience that may not be as clued into the details of the Conway family drama as our readers. "She worked for Donald Trump. And my dad is George Conway. He's a lawyer. He worked against Donald Trump." Stay tuned — the teenager made it to the next round. WORTH A LISTEN — On his latest podcast, BILL CLINTON reprises a 2019 speech on the evolution of the presidency. Whatever you think of the ex-president, this is Clinton at the heights of his explainer-in-chief powers, weaving together history and his own personal experiences to offer, as Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David Blight notes in the episode, "a reminder of what the future of the institution of the presidency can still be." SPOTTED flying over Palm Beach on Sunday afternoon: a banner reading "WE LOVE YOU PREZ TRUMP ❤️ HAPPY VALENTINES DAY! MP." (No, we don't know who MP is.) Pic (The banner appears to be a response to a recent one that said, "CONVICT TRUMP AND LOCK HIM UP.") SPOTTED at a virtual ceremony Sunday where Robin Roberts received the inaugural Brig. Gen. Charles E. McGee Unity Award from the Friends of the National World War II Memorial: Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Mark Milley, Lt. Col. George Hardy, Michael Strahan, Jason Wright, Marv Levy, Jeraldine Lehman, John Stankey and John McCaskill. FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — DONALD TRUMP JR. will be speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference this year, where he'll be introduced by girlfriend KIMBERLY GUILFOYLE. The appearance, which our Gabby Orr and Daniel Lippman recently hinted at, makes him the first member of the Trump family to confirm his role in the lineup for the Feb. 25-28 event. The annual confab is run by lobbyist MATT SCHLAPP (Comcast, Verizon, Walmart), who has recently taken to Twitter to spread the false 2020 election claim "that there was widespread illegal voting due to unsolicited reckless unsecured mail in voting" and that if "we had voted normally and legally" Trump, who lost by 7 million votes, would have won. In addition to Don Jr., Schlapp said recently he'd like to book Trump's impeachment lawyer. TRANSITION — Mark McLaurin is joining the 1833 Group as SVP for campaigns, expanding the Chicago-based Democratic consulting firm's East Coast presence. He previously was political director at the SEIU. WELCOME TO THE WORLD — Torrie Matous, chief of staff for the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, and Kyle Matous, senior director of U.S. government relations at Bono's ONE Campaign, and their dog Bennett welcomed Charles Miller Matous on Thursday at Sibley Hospital. Pic HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Rep. Kathleen Rice (D-N.Y.) … retired Adm. Jim Stavridis … State's Francisco Bencosme … Mercury's Jen Wlach … Ben Purdy … TPM's Josh Marshall … Fox Business' David Asman … WSJ's Amanda Lilly … Jonathan Salant … Carrie Sheffield … RJC's Alex Siegel … Beth Solomon … Bobby Panzenbeck … Jason Thielman … Art Spiegelman … Clare Flannery … Kerry Feehery … Michael Curto ... Walmart's John Bisio ... Amy Clark ... Andrea Bitely … S-3 Group's Sarah Dolan Schneider ... Grace Lloyd ... CARE's Paige Moody Erickson … Conor Oberst Got a document to share? A birthday coming up? Do you know who MP is? Drop us a line at playbook@politico.com or individually: Rachael Bade, Eugene Daniels, Ryan Lizza, Tara Palmeri. Playbook couldn't happen without our editor Mike Zapler and producers Allie Bice, Eli Okun and Garrett Ross. | | A message from Facebook: Internet regulations need an update.
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