| | | | |  | | By Ryan Lizza, Rachael Bade and Eugene Daniels | | | With help from Eli Okun and Garrett Ross
| 
Ron DeSantis started his media tour last night by giving his first interview about his new book to Mark Levin, on Fox News’s “Life, Liberty & Levin.” | Wilfredo Lee/AP Photo | |  | DRIVING THE DAY | | THIS WEEK — Tuesday: SCOTUS hears oral arguments in a major case concerning President JOE BIDEN’s student debt forgiveness policy. Senate Foreign Relations Committee meets to consider nominations, including ERIC GARCETTI’s nomination for ambassador to India. … Wednesday: AG MERRICK GARLAND testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee. House Democrats kick off their annual policy retreat in Baltimore. CPAC 2023 begins at Maryland’s National Harbor. … Friday: German Chancellor OLAF SCHOLZ visits the White House. DON’T CALL IT A CAMPAIGN BOOK — RON DeSANTIS’ “The Courage to Be Free” will be released tomorrow, kicking off a media tour that is widely assumed to be the prelude to a formal announcement this spring that he’s running for president. The book rollout is taking full advantage of DeSantis’ relationship with the RUPERT MURDOCH media empire. The book is published by HarperCollins, which is owned by Murdoch’s News Corp. The first excerpt, “How the Florida blueprint can work for the whole US,” was published in the NY Post. Two authorized leaks from the book, one about his relationship with Trump and, early this morning, one about a private phone call with former Disney CEO BOB CHAPEK, have been published on the Fox News website. And DeSantis started his media tour last night by giving his first interview about the book to Mark Levin, on Fox News’s “Life, Liberty & Levin.” The 40-minute conversation was as friendly and fawning as you’d expect. After midnight, The New York Times published a review of the book by Jennifer Szalai, who is, to put it mildly, not impressed. Taken together the Levin interview and the Szalai review perfectly capture how the right and left are greeting the DeSantis 2024 rollout. Let’s start with some key insights from the Levin-DeSantis sitdown that help show where DeSantis is headed with his 2024 messaging: — On why he’s more Midwestern than Floridian: “My father’s from western Pennsylvania; my mother’s from northeastern Ohio. So that is like steel country, that is like blue collar salt of the earth. And as you know, Mark, Florida is very eclectic, people kind of come from all over. We do have a culture, and so I grew up in that culture, but really it was kind of those Rust Belt values that raised me.” — On how staying on offense disorients his media critics: “If you’re not on offense, then you’re basically a sitting duck and you let these people come and just take pot shots at you all the time. … It’s hard for them to keep up with you when you’re constantly doing new things and leading on different issues, and we’ve pretty much kept that pace going throughout my entire tenure as governor.” — On libertarian critics who object to his meddling in public institutions: “Our K-12 schools are public institutions that are funded by our taxpayers. And so that line of thinking is saying: Even though they’re public institutions, the people that are elected to direct those institutions have no right to get involved if the left is pursuing the agenda. So, basically, we can win every election, and we still lose on all of these different things? That is totally untenable.” — On the power of federal bureaucrats: “Whoever gets a majority of the Electoral College has the right to impose their agenda through the executive branch, and what they did with President Trump was basically try to nullify the election.” — On corporate power: “If Wall Street banks will not give a loan to someone — say, in the firearm industry — that’s effectively changing gun rights in America. They are not getting any votes to do that. They are not winning any elections to do that. But they’re bringing power to bear in a way that does affect public policy. So I think you have to look at how the government’s become unmoored from constitutional accountability, but I think you also have to look at all these other institutions that are exercising, effectively, public power.” Meanwhile, the review of “The Courage to Be Free” in the Times takes a decidedly more critical approach. Szalai describes the “dull coldness at this book’s core,” mocks the title “with its awkward feint at boldness while clinging to the safety of cliché,” and sees the governor “trying his best to tiptoe around the Trump dragon.” Here are the most memorable lines: — “[T]he overall sense you get from reading his new memoir is that of the mechanical try-hard — someone who has expended a lot of effort studying which way the wind is blowing in the Republican Party and is learning how to comport himself accordingly.” — “For the most part, ‘The Courage to Be Free’ is courageously free of anything that resembles charisma, or a discernible sense of humor. While his first book was weird and esoteric enough to have obviously been written by a human, this one reads like a politician’s memoir churned out by ChatGPT.” — “Of his childhood baseball team making the Little League World Series, he says: ‘What I came to understand about the experience was less about baseball than it was about life. It was proof that hard work can pay off, and that achieving big goals was possible.’ You have to imagine that DeSantis, a double-barreled Ivy Leaguer (Yale and Harvard Law School), put a bit more verve into his admissions essays.” — “Take out the gauzy abstraction, the heartwarming clichés, and much of what DeSantis is describing in ‘The Courage to Be Free’ is chilling — unfree and scary.” — “Reading books, even bad ones, can be a goad to thinking, but what DeSantis seems to be doing in ‘The Courage to Be Free’ is to insist that Americans should just stop worrying and let him do all the thinking for them. Any criticism of his policies gets dismissed as ‘woke’ nonsense cooked up by the ‘corporate media.’ (Rupert Murdoch’s Fox Corporation and News Corp, which owns the publisher of this book, doubtless don’t count.)” Related read: “DeSantis moves toward GOP presidential bid on his own terms,” by AP’s Steve Peoples: “[I]t is becoming increasingly clear that the 44-year-old Republican governor will manage his presidential aspirations in his own way, on his own timeline, with or without allies in national GOP leadership or relationships with the press.” Good Monday morning. Thanks for reading Playbook. Drop us a line with your DeSantis book reviews: Rachael Bade, Eugene Daniels, Ryan Lizza.
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Find out how Emergent perceives, prepares, and protects. | | | FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — Fox News rejected an ad from the progressive group MoveOn that would have highlighted the recent revelations from Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit, addressing Fox viewers directly. Quoting messages from TUCKER CARLSON and LAURA INGRAHAM, the spot says, “Texts show they lied to you about the 2020 election for profit.” MoveOn says they wanted to run it nationally in prime time, but the network said no. Watch it here It would of course be a stretch to expect any network to run ads that directly criticize it. And Fox has criticized Dominion for having “cherry-picked quotes stripped of key context, and spilled considerable ink on facts that are irrelevant under black-letter principles of defamation law.” But Fox’s decision to exclude the ad further highlights how its audience has been kept in the dark about the blockbuster lawsuit — an assiduous decision by Fox executives, “MediaBuzz” host HOWARD KURTZ confirmed yesterday. “I believe I should be covering it,” he said. “But the company has decided that as part of the organization being sued, I can’t talk about it or write about it, at least for now. I strongly disagree with that decision, but as an employee, I have to abide by it.” More from The Daily Beast
| | | | A message from Emergent:   Helping protect millions against the things we hope never happen — just in case they ever do.
Find out how Emergent perceives, prepares, and protects. | | | | | BIDEN’S MONDAY:
8:05 a.m.: The president will leave New Castle, Del., to return to the White House, arriving at 8:55 a.m.
11:15 a.m.: Biden will receive the President’s Daily Brief.
5 p.m.: Biden and VP KAMALA HARRIS will speak at a Black History Month reception.
Press secretary KARINE JEAN-PIERRE will brief at 2:30 p.m.
HARRIS’ MONDAY — The VP will also travel to Columbia Metropolitan Airport in South Carolina for an event highlighting high-speed internet expansion at 12:45 p.m.
THE SENATE will meet at 3 p.m. for a reading of Washington’s farewell address and to take up JAMAR WALKER’s judicial nomination, with a cloture vote at 5:30 p.m.
THE HOUSE will meet at noon and take up several bills at 2 p.m.
BIDEN’S WEEK AHEAD:
Tuesday: The president will head to Virginia Beach, Va., for an event focused on health care.
Wednesday: Biden will go to Baltimore to speak at the House Democratic Caucus Issues Conference.
Thursday: Biden will go to the Senate Democratic Caucus lunch.
Friday: Biden will award the Medal of Honor to retired Army Col. PARIS DAVIS, welcome Scholz to the White House and finally head to Wilmington, Del. | | | | | | We’re spilling the tea (and drinking tons of it in our newsroom) in U.K. politics with our latest newsletter, London Playbook PM. Get to know all the movers and shakers in Westminster and never miss a beat of British politics with a free subscription. Don’t miss out, we’ve got some exciting moves coming. Sign up today. | | | | | PHOTO OF THE DAY
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Ukrainian military medics treat their wounded comrade at the field hospital near Bakhmut, Ukraine, Sunday, Feb. 26, 2023. | Evgeniy Maloletka/AP Photo | | | PLAYBOOK READS | | 2024 WATCH SURVEY SAYS — “Fox News Poll: Trump, DeSantis top 2024 Republican preference,” by Fox News’ Dana Blanton: “Trump tops the list with 43%, followed by RON DeSANTIS at 28%, NIKKI HALEY and MIKE PENCE at 7% each, and GREG ABBOTT and LIZ CHENEY at 2% each.” Inside Elections’ Jacob Rubashkin has some interesting analysis of the poll: It “underscores the difficulty and opportunity of beating Trump. At 43% he’s not invincible but that’s almost exactly what he won in 2016. … Also despite what you may see on Twitter, [Ukrainian President VOLODYMYR] ZELENSKYY is as overwhelmingly popular among Americans as he has been since the beginning of the war.” PALMETTO PRIZE — “In 2024 campaign, kingmaker reprise for South Carolina?” by AP’s Meg Kinnard in Charleston, S.C. THE SHADOW PRIMARY — “G.O.P. Donors in New York Await a Parade of Presidential Hopefuls,” by NYT’s Maggie Haberman and Nicholas Fandos ALL POLITICS DEMOCRACY WATCH — Some of the nation’s most prominent election deniers lost big races in November — and now they’re turning their focus to winning state GOP chair posts, AP’s Nicholas Riccardi and Joey Cappelletti report from Parker, Colo., and Lansing, Mich. In Colorado, TINA PETERS is hoping to follow in the footsteps of KRISTINA KARAMO in Michigan, MIKE BROWN in Kansas and DOROTHY MOON in Idaho, appealing to the hard right of the Republican Party base. And Peters isn’t the only contender in Colorado focusing on false claims of fraud in the 2020 election. ON WISCONSIN — “The biggest election of 2023 reaches final sprint,” by Zach Montellaro and Megan Messerly: “The contest is poised to be the most expensive state Supreme Court race ever, with major outside groups — particularly those focused on abortion — rushing in funds.” WAKING UP IN VEGAS — “Nevada Democrats implode over battle for party control,” by NBC’s Natasha Korecki: “[I]nternal party documents obtained by NBC News … lay out a pressure campaign in advance of an ultimately abandoned plan to de-charter Washoe County Democrats from the state party, including a desire to hit back at the party’s own senator [CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO].” THE WHITE HOUSE KERRY GOLD — “John Kerry plans to stay in special climate envoy role at least through late this year,” by the Boston Globe’s Jess Bidgood: “JOHN KERRY, the nation’s top international climate envoy, has told President Biden he will stay in his role at least through this year’s United Nations climate summit in Dubai, which begins in late November.” FIRST LADY FILES — “Jill Biden sees East Africa drought up close, seeks more aid,” by AP’s Darlene Superville and Evelyne Musambi with a Lositeti, Kenya, dateline CONGRESS KNOWING KAY GRANGER — The House Appropriations chair and Texas Republican has a difficult task ahead in trying to keep the House GOP together on spending bills, Jennifer Scholtes and Caitlin Emma write this morning. The senior appropriator and former Fort Worth mayor says her experiences as a high school teacher and a mother of three babies in two years have equipped her to handle this. But it could get raucous: There will be an “amendment for free-for-all” on each of the dozen appropriations bills, and she’s holding firm against defense cuts. THE NEW GOP — “Two Arizona Republicans Show the Divide Over House Speaker Kevin McCarthy,” by WSJ’s Eliza Collins in Hereford, Ariz.: “Reps. JUAN CISCOMANI and ELI CRANE both flipped Democrat-held seats in the 2022 midterm elections, helping Republicans eke out a small majority in the House. They live close to each other and their children even attend the same school. But the first-term Arizona lawmakers are now on opposite sides of a still-simmering intraparty fight over the leadership of House Speaker KEVIN McCARTHY.” MANCHIN IN THE MIDDLE — “Joe Manchin Declines to Describe Himself as a Democrat,” by WSJ’s Dustin Volz: “‘I identify as an American,’ said [Sen. JOE] MANCHIN when asked repeatedly during a Fox News appearance if he still considered himself a Democrat.” TRUMP CARDS JUST FOR LAUGHS — “Trump White House Pressured Disney to Censor … Jimmy Kimmel,” by Rolling Stone’s Asawin Suebsaeng and Adam Rawnsley
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Find out how Emergent perceives, prepares, and protects. | | | JUDICIARY SQUARE SCOTUS WATCH — The Supreme Court will take up a challenge to the Biden administration’s $400 billion student loan forgiveness plan tomorrow — and the implications are massive across several different fronts. Not only are the debts of 40 million Americans at stake; so too is the executive branch’s ability to create policy without congressional authorization, and so is the ability of partisan state attorneys general to sue the federal government. Three big previews from WSJ’s Andrew Restuccia and Jess Bravin, NYT’s Adam Liptak and WaPo’s Robert Barnes and Danielle Douglas-Gabriel lay out what to expect:
- WSJ: “The court has adopted a new test, called the major-questions doctrine, that restricts federal agencies from steps with vast economic and political significance without what the majority considers explicit direction from Congress. … The high court’s decision on the student-loan plan could mark the biggest curbing of those powers to date.”
- NYT: “For most of American history, partisan lawsuits by states challenging federal programs were rare. … Still, states can sue only when they can show they have suffered direct and concrete injuries. And while the Supreme Court may have relaxed that requirement, it has not abandoned it.”
- WaPo: “[T]he administration’s track record at the court — fortified in recent years with justices nominated by President Donald Trump who are more conservative than their successors — is not encouraging for the president.”
ONE TO WATCH — “How a Supreme Court justice’s paragraph put the Voting Rights Act in more danger,” by NPR’s Hansi Lo Wang: In a brief 2021 concurrence, Justice NEIL GORSUCH flagged “a question he said no one in the case had raised before the court: Who has the right to sue to try to enforce that key section of the landmark law?” POLICY CORNER ANTITRUST THE PROCESS — The Biden administration’s major antitrust push against Big Tech is running into significant hurdles halfway through his term, WaPo’s Will Oremus, Cat Zakrzewski and Naomi Nix report. “[T]he movement’s losses have outpaced its wins, key figures are stepping down and Republican control of the House has taken bills that could break up tech giants off the table.” DIPPING INTO CHIPS — “With billions at stake, chip lobby pushes Biden to waive enviro rules,” by Brendan Bordelon: “The Semiconductor Industry Association … is pressing the Commerce Department to grant new manufacturing projects a ‘categorical exclusion’ from a key environmental law. With billions ready to be spent under the CHIPS and Science Act, industry lobbyists worry the law’s review requirements could delay domestic chip production for years.” WAR IN UKRAINE OIL ACROSS THE WATER — “War in Ukraine Drives New Surge of U.S. Oil Exports to Europe,” by WSJ’s David Uberti and Bob Henderson: “The growth in exports marks the latest milestone in the revival of U.S. oil production after years of dwindling market clout.” UKRAINE AND THE GOP — “Ron DeSantis wanted to send weapons to Ukraine when he was a congressman – as a presidential hopeful he questions U.S. involvement,” by CNN’s Em Steck, Andrew Kaczynski and Olivia Alafriz AMERICA AND THE WORLD FOR YOUR RADAR — “U.S., Poland And Germany May Hold Joint Manoeuvres: Minister,” Agence France Presse DANCE OF THE SUPERPOWERS — “Why Can’t Democrats Explain Themselves on China?” by Alex Burns: “If both parties agree that China poses a uniquely complex threat, only one has made it a daily obsession.” LAB LEAK BACKLASH — “China Dismisses Latest Claim That Lab Leak Likely Caused Covid,” by NYT’s David Pierson: “‘Covid tracing is a scientific issue that should not be politicized,’ MAO NING, a Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman said of the Energy Department’s conclusion. She then repeated calls for the United States to ‘stop defaming China’ by raising the lab leak theory.” BEYOND THE BELTWAY MEDICAID MELEE — Medicaid now covers 20 million more people than it did just before the pandemic hit, and its eligibility lists haven’t been trimmed in three years. That’s about to change, with experts predicting that up to 15 million people could be booted from the rolls in the next year, starting in April in some states, AP’s Amanda Seitz previews. Arkansas is set to be the leading edge of that change, compressing the federal government’s yearlong timeline into just six months at the behest of Gov. SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS, Megan Messerly reports this morning. It’s moving faster than any other state, and some experts worry that tens of thousands of people in the state could see disruptions to their doctor and medication access if they fail to complete the right paperwork. On a different Medicaid front, Mississippi Gov. TATE REEVES changed his position yesterday and said he would sign a bill into law to give women a year of postpartum Medicaid coverage, AP’s Emily Wagster Pettus reports from Jackson. UP IN SMOKE — “Dodgy science, poor access and high prices: The parallel medical world of medicinal marijuana in America,” by Natalie Fertig in Burton, Mich.: “[C]annabis is still classified federally as a Schedule I drug on the Controlled Substances Act … which means it’s considered to have no medical value and a high potential for abuse. The disconnect between state and federal policies leads to all kinds of problems for patients.” MEGATREND — “Rural Hospitals Are Shuttering Their Maternity Units,” by NYT’s Roni Caryn Rabin in Toppenish, Wash.
| | | | JOIN POLITICO ON 3/1 TO DISCUSS AMERICAN PRIVACY LAWS: Americans have fewer privacy rights than Europeans, and companies continue to face a minefield of competing state and foreign legislation. There is strong bipartisan support for a federal privacy bill, but it has yet to materialize. Join POLITICO on 3/1 to discuss what it will take to get a federal privacy law on the books, potential designs for how this type of legislation could protect consumers and innovators, and more. REGISTER HERE. | | | | | | | PLAYBOOKERS | | Cori Bush got married to Cortney Merritts, her campaign security guard, whom she paid last year in an arrangement that KSDK-TV’s Mark Maxwell reports could draw ethics scrutiny. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez discovered the wonder of bidets. OUT AND ABOUT — The film “Finding Fellowship,” directed and co-produced by former associate White House counsel Jason Green, had its D.C. premiere Saturday afternoon at the Ronald Reagan Building. Lesli Foster moderated a discussion with the Green family afterward. SPOTTED: Kisha Davis, John King, Natalie Bookey-Baker, Gabe Amo, Alethia Nancoo, Janis Bowdler, Greg Craig, Reggie Love, Salah Goss, Gwen Camp, Liz DeBarros, Raina Thiele, Megan Moore, Antonio White, Michael Akin, Rick Rome, Tatiana Torres and Cameron French. FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — American Bridge 21st Century is naming Alexandra De Luca VP of strategic comms and Tiffiany Vaughn Jones senior director of strategic comms and national press. De Luca previously was director of state and gubernatorial comms, and Vaughn Jones was national press secretary. — Alicia O’Brien is rejoining King & Spalding as a partner in the special matters and government investigations group. She most recently was senior counsel and special assistant to the president at the White House, and is a DOJ alum. MEDIA MOVE — Nolan Stout is now White House reporter for Courthouse News. He most recently covered Prince William County for InsideNoVa. TRANSITIONS — Clinton Soffer is launching PT Strategy, a new political consulting firm. He most recently was deputy political director at the RGA and is an NRSC, NRCC and RNC alum. … Mary Monica (Allen) Palmer is now leading strategy and government affairs at Gothams. She most recently was head of government affairs at Epirus, and is a Pentagon, State Department and Capitol Hill alum. … … Alice Su Jin Nam is now comms director for Rep. Marilyn Strickland (D-Wash.). She previously was deputy national press secretary and caucus and surrogates program manager for Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. … Peter Opitz is now press assistant for Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.). He most recently was Wisconsin finance associate for Mandela Barnes’ Senate campaign. ENGAGED — Woodham Kemmer, an account director at TAG Strategies, and James Cecil, an account manager at Socko Strategies, got engaged Saturday on Capitol Hill, followed by a surprise celebration with friends and family. The couple met in August 2020 and had their first date at Salt Line. Pic … Another pic WEEKEND WEDDING — Samantha Onofry, counsel for Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), and Jonathan Manning, clinical research coordinator at George Washington University, got married Saturday in Paradise Valley, Ariz. They originally met at tennis camp at age 12 in Phoenix. Pic WELCOME TO THE WORLD — Otto Heck, founder and principal of Rostrum LLC and a Trump DOT alum, and Mia Heck, director of federal health policy for Change Healthcare and a Trump HHS and CMS alum, welcomed Mary Catherine Heck on Feb. 13. Pic — Erin Morton, a partner at CRD Associates, and Don Morton, a financial adviser with Edward Jones, on Thursday welcomed Rosemary Patricia Morton, who joins big sister Juniper. HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Eugene’s dad, Anthony Daniels … Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) … Reps. Nick Langworthy (R-N.Y.) and Glenn Ivey (D-Md.) … Chelsea Clinton … Ralph Nader … Greg Speed … Robbie Aiken … Sasha Johnson of United Airlines … Rebecca Sinderbrand … Gary Knell … David Merritt of Blue Cross Blue Shield Association … Jill Chappell Adly … Fox News’ Ashley DiMella … Julie Merz … Dan Hull … SBA’s Kate DePriest … Trevor Kolego … Mark Blumenthal … Eric Lesser … Maria Koklanaris Bonaquist … former Reps. Luke Messer (R-Ind.) and Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) … POLITICO’s Mike Irwin, Kelsey Wessels and Kirsten Messmer … Adrienne Morrell … Aria Austin of Sen. John Fetterman’s (D-Pa.) office … Nils Bruzelius, celebrating today with breakfast in bed Did someone forward this email to you? Sign up here. Send Playbookers tips to playbook@politico.com or text us at 202-556-3307. Playbook couldn’t happen without our editor Mike DeBonis, deputy editor Zack Stanton and producers Setota Hailemariam and Bethany Irvine.
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