🤫 Targeting "Sellout" Sinema

Plus: White House poll dispute | Thursday, January 13, 2022

Open in app View in browser   Presented By Facebook   Axios Sneak Peek By the Axios Politics team ·Jan 13, 2022 Welcome back to Sneak. Was this only the second week of the year? 🚨Breaking: President Biden to nominate Sarah Bloom Raskin as Fed's top banking regulator. Smart Brevity™ count: 1,114 words ... 4 minutes. Edited by Glen Johnson.     1 big thing: Candidates target "Sellout" Sinema Sen. Kyrsten Sinema enters the Democratic caucus meeting today with President Biden. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images   Democratic candidates for the U.S. Senate are now explicitly campaigning against one of their potential colleagues, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) — branded by one as a "sellout" for opposing filibuster changes to enact party priorities. Why it matters: It's an evolution of an increasingly popular strategy among Democrats: turning legislative inaction to their advantage by casting themselves as the "50th vote" for programs or the filibuster changes needed to pass President Biden's agenda, write Axios' Andrew Solender and Alexi McCammond. Former Rep. Abby Finkenauer, a Democrat running to challenge Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) in November, called Sinema a "sellout" in a video posted to Twitter today. "[Sinema] is there for what reason I don't know, but refuses to actually do anything that works for working families," said Finkenauer. The former frontline House member styles herself as a moderate. John Fetterman, the progressive Pennsylvania lieutenant governor running for Senate, told Axios in a statement: "Now more than ever, Democrats need to vote like Democrats. Protecting the right to vote > Filibuster." Sinema's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Don't forget: Democratic pressure against Sinema will only get louder this weekend. Relatives of the late Martin Luther King Jr., including his namesake Martin Luther King III and his wife, Arndrea Waters King, will hold a rally in Phoenix to urge the senator to change her position. They'll be joined by the Rev. Al Sharpton and other civil rights leaders. The president hosted her and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) at the White House this evening to continue his own lobbying. Keep reading.     2. Dems seek state-level voter protections Pennsylvania Attorney General Joel Shapiro and New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham. Photos: Natalie Kolb/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Images (left); Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call   Democratic gubernatorial candidates are unveiling their own voting rights plans ahead of this fall's midterms, Lexi also reports. Why it matters: Congressional Democrats have, so far, failed to deliver federal legislation. Because Republicans have succeeded in introducing restrictions at the state and local levels, the ability to vote in 2022 will largely depend on where a person lives. That makes state executive races a high priority for both parties. The president waved a flag of surrender today, saying after his meeting with Democrats on Capitol Hill: "If we missed the first time, we come back and try it a second time. We missed this time." Democrats also are shifting their sights because they expect to lose the House and Senate. Governors, in their view, are the last line of defense for democracy. Driving the news: Last week, Democratic candidates for governor in Pennsylvania and New Mexico outlined their plans. In Wisconsin and Nevada, the sitting Democratic governors — who are both running for re-election — also addressed voting rights last year by either striking down restrictive measures or codifying absentee balloting. Gov. Tony Evers has vetoed at least six Republican bills so far in Wisconsin, and Gov. Steve Sisolak made mail-in voting permanent in Nevada and expanded access to the polls. Keep reading.     3. Focus groups: Biden falters on virus Photo illustration: Eniola Odetunde/Axios. Photo: Pool/Getty Images    As Biden approaches the one-year mark of his presidency, some swing voters say his handling of the pandemic has weakened him in their eyes. But they see him projecting strength when he talks about protecting American democracy, Axios' Sarah Mucha writes. Driving the news: These were key takeaways from the latest Engagious/Schlesinger swing-voter focus groups for Axios, conducted Tuesday, just days after the president's Jan. 6 anniversary speech. Why it matters: Voters like them could be crucial to the outcome of the 2022 midterms, and their views of the president may color their enthusiasm for Democrats trying to retain control of the House and Senate. The earlier and further Biden's approval ratings fall with voters, the more leverage he loses with lawmakers in both parties. Details: Nine of the 13 said COVID-19 is the issue that concerns them most, but only four of the 13 said Biden is doing a "good or excellent" job handling the pandemic. But 10 of the 13 voters, after watching a clip from Biden's Jan. 6 speech assailing an assault on democracy, said the president projected strength through his comments. The bottom line: "Among Trump-to-Biden voters, there's virtually no 'buyer's remorse,' but there's minimal 'buyer's enthusiasm'" for Biden, said Rich Thau, president of Engagious. He moderated the focus groups. Keep reading.     A message from Facebook Why Facebook supports updated internet regulations     Rochelle is one of many experts working on privacy at Facebook—to give you more control over your information. Hear more from Rochelle on why Facebook supports updating regulations on the internet's most pressing challenges, including federal privacy legislation.     4. First look: White House criticizes bleak poll White House deputy chief of staff Jennifer O'Malley Dillon speaks with White House counsel Dana Remus last July. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images   White House deputy chief of staff Jennifer O'Malley Dillon is publicly attacking a new poll that gave the president a 33% approval rating, using the full weight of her office to call it an "outlier," according to a memo shared with Axios' Hans Nichols. Why it matters: By releasing a memo questioning the Quinnipiac University poll's methodology, the White House is demonstrating how seriously it takes negative perceptions of the president's job performance at the outset of a critical midterm year. It's also acknowledging the president's approval rating is well underwater — just not as deep as Quinnipiac found. "The FiveThirtyEight average of all public polls finds the president's approval is at 43% approval," O'Malley Dillon writes. "Quinnipiac, on the other hand, is at 33% approval. This is drastically different from all other recent polls." The poll, released yesterday, showed 53% of Americans disapproved of the job Biden is doing, with 13% telling the pollster they didn't have an opinion. "We stand by our numbers," said Doug Schwartz, associate vice president and director of the Quinnipiac University Poll. Keep reading. Go deeper: Read the memo.     5. U.S. braces for Russian escalation OSCE Chairman-in-Office Zbigniew Rau said today "the risk of war in the OSCE area is now greater than ever." Photo: Askin Kiyagan/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images   The crisis over Russia's threatening military buildup on the border with Ukraine entered a dangerous and unpredictable new phase in both Vienna and Washington today, Axios' Zachary Basu reports. Driving the news: Russian diplomats said this week's round of security talks from Geneva and Brussels to Vienna have resulted in a "dead end," and it's time for them to return to Moscow to brief President Vladimir Putin on the "very disappointing" state of affairs before deciding the path forward. "It seems the risk of war in the OSCE area is now greater than ever before in the last 30 years," Zbigniew Rau, the Polish chairman of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, said at the outset of Thursday's meeting in Vienna. Michael Carpenter, the U.S. ambassador to the OSCE, told reporters: "We're facing a crisis in European security. The drumbeat of war is sounding loud and the rhetoric has gotten rather shrill." At the White House, national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters the intelligence community has information that Russia is "laying the groundwork" for a potential pretext to invade Ukraine, such as fabricating a provocation by Ukrainian forces. Sullivan said the administration would share more details with the press over the next 24 hours. Keep reading.     6. Pic du jour Photo: Stefani Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images   The star of the week was the snowy owl flying around Capitol Hill, including atop Union Station. The predator has been feasting on, among other things, unsuspecting rodents.     A message from Facebook Facebook puts your safety and security front-and-center     Since July, Facebook's safety and security teams have taken action on: 1.8 billion fake accounts. 9.8 million terrorism-related posts. But our work to stop bad actors is never done. Learn more about how we're working to help you connect safely.   🥂 Thanks for reading this week. We'll be back Sunday evening. A reminder your family, friends and colleagues can subscribe to Sneak or any of Axios' other free local and national newsletters through this link. Like this email style and format? 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