| | | | |  | | By Ryan Lizza, Rachael Bade and Eugene Daniels | | | With help from Eli Okun, Garrett Ross and Bethany Irvine
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“This tragedy reminds us of the stakes of the moment,” President Joe Biden said of the death of Alexei Navalny. “History is watching the House of Representatives. The failure to support Ukraine at this critical moment will never be forgotten.” | Ian Langsdon/AFP via Getty Images | |  | DRIVING THE DAY | | DOES NAVALNY’S DEATH CHANGE ANYTHING? — Support for Ukraine has now become a fundamental dividing line in the Republican Party, with the two sides of the debate becoming more dug in. This is happening even as events in Washington, Europe and Moscow conspire to make the threat from Russia more and more apparent. Consider the events of the last week: — The United States, spurred to action by Rep. MIKE TURNER (R-Ohio), the chairman of the House intelligence committee, revealed that Russia was developing a space-based anti-satellite weapon. — Ukraine is short of weapons and has retreated from the city of Avdiivka, which the BBC calls, “Moscow's biggest victory since Ukraine's failed counter-offensive last year.” — As world leaders, including Ukrainian President VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY and American VP KAMALA HARRIS, gathered for the annual Munich Security Conference — a bastion of pro-Ukrainian sentiment — prison officials in Russia announced the death of opposition leader ALEXEI NAVALNY, who Russian autocrat VLADIMIR PUTIN tried to assassinate in 2020 and then jailed in 2021, when Navalny returned to Russia from exile. All of these events were greeted with hopes that they would change the calculus of Republicans, especially in the House, and unlock funding for Ukraine. “I hope to God it helps,” President JOE BIDEN said in remarks about Navalny at the White House yesterday. “This tragedy reminds us of the stakes of the moment,” he added. “History is watching the House of Representatives. The failure to support Ukraine at this critical moment will never be forgotten.” In Munich, the atmosphere is bleak, POLITICO’s Alex Ward said. “The POLITICO team in Munich has picked up on a pall that has fallen over the conference,” he texted us. “Concerns about America’s commitment to Ukraine and Europe writ large loom over the whole event, and there are genuine questions about what Kyiv can achieve even if military aid gets through Congress. “Only the staunchest Ukraine backers are willing to say it can win against Russia. But most attendees aren’t willing to say that, and quietly, behind closed doors, they’re skeptical about a total Ukrainian victory against Russia any time soon — if at all.” Rep. JIM HIMES (D-Conn.), who is one of the dozens of members of the House and Senate in Munich, texted us as he and his colleagues were about to meet with Zelenskyy today. “The [Navalny] news hit Munich like a bolt of lightning,” he said. “Especially since YULIA [NAVALNAYA]” — Navalny’s widow, who spoke last night — “was here and continued meeting with people. Domestically I’m intrigued because the pro-Putin right, TUCKER [CARLSON] and friends, deal in obfuscation: NATO expansion caused this, the Azov Battalion has Nazis, applesauce, applesauce, applesauce. There is no way to obfuscate or rebut the story that Putin murdered a charismatic young man who had risked everything for freedom and democracy.” But as with almost every other issue that becomes definitional for the two parties, the political polarization around the issue of Ukraine may just get more entrenched, no matter the real-world events. This was Sen. J.D. VANCE’s (R-Ohio) reaction this morning: “If Putin is such an existential threat to Europe why isn’t every European country emptying [its] armories and its treasury to help Ukraine?” Meanwhile, in the Republican presidential primaries, NIKKI HALEY used the opportunity to excoriate DONALD TRUMP, which seems to just reinforce Russia and Ukraine as another tribal issue between the dominant MAGA and dwindling non-MAGA factions of the GOP. “Putin did this. The same Putin who Donald Trump praises and defends,” Haley said on X. “The same Trump who said: ‘In all fairness to Putin, you’re saying he killed people. I haven’t seen that.’” She later added: “Putin murdered his political opponent and Trump hasn’t said a word after he said he would encourage Putin to invade our allies. He has, however, posted 20+ times on social media about his legal drama and fake polls.” Sen. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-S.C.), a regular in Munich, skipped the event this year after voting against the Senate’s Ukraine aid bill. He’s been tweeting up a storm about his trip to the U.S. border, but as of this morning had nothing to say about Navalny. Trump also has been silent on the issue, though he had a lot going on yesterday (see below). But there are still some optimists who believe Congress will get Ukraine aid to Biden’s desk. A narrower bipartisan bill was introduced yesterday before the Navalny news. Sen. CHRIS COONS (D-Del.), who is also in Munich, told Playbook this morning that there were “lots of discussion about the urgency of U.S. support for Ukraine,” and that House members there were “talking about several potential paths forward.” He added, “I’m not a former House member, so my grasp of their rules and process isn’t strong but I sat with a bipartisan group of six House members for 30 minutes and it seems difficult but possible.” In his speech to the conference today, Zelenskyy tried to extend an olive branch to Trump, offering to personally show him the consequences of Putin’s invasion. “If Mr. Trump will come, I am ready even to go with him to the front line,” Zelenskyy said. “Please, everyone, remember that dictators do not go on vacation,” he said of Putin. Further reading:
Good Saturday morning. Thanks for reading Playbook. Drop us a line: Rachael Bade, Eugene Daniels, Ryan Lizza.
| | | | A message from American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers: EPA is set to finalize a regulation designed to end the sale of new gas and diesel cars regardless of what drivers want, need, and can afford. Polling shows that Americans think the Biden EPA is moving too far, too fast. President Biden: Stop the EPA’s car ban. Vehicle policies can’t just work for some of us. They should work for all of us. | | | |  Donald Trump received another major penalty decision on Friday. | Pool photo by Steven Hirsch | A VERY EXPENSIVE FRIDAY — After a three-month trial in the civil fraud case against Trump, the saga reached its finale yesterday in New York with a judge handing down a $354.8 million penalty to the former president and barring him from running a business in New York for three years, our colleague Erica Orden reports. The verdict, laid out in a 92-page ruling, found that for roughly a decade Trump orchestrated massive business fraud by falsely inflating his net worth to obtain favorable rates from banks and insurers — striking at the heart of an aspect of Trump’s identity that he harnessed in his 2016 presidential run: his personal wealth and his success as a businessman. Trump and the other defendants in the case showed a “complete lack of contrition and remorse” that “borders on pathological,” Justice ARTHUR ENGORON wrote. Read the ruling The running tally: Combined with the other penalties that have thus far been delivered to Trump, he now owes $443.1 million in judgments, Erica notes. “It’s not clear if Trump has enough cash on hand to pay those penalties without selling any assets, especially because with the interest Engoron ordered Trump to pay, the total tab in the civil fraud case alone could amount to more than $450 million, according to the attorney general’s office.” ABC’s Peter Charalambous has more: “Courts allow defendants multiple mechanisms to collect damages, including liens and wage garnishments, and the fines are not dischargeable through traditional protections like bankruptcy. Multiple legal experts who ABC News spoke with suggested that Trump is unlikely to front the fines immediately, and will instead opt to delay any payment using a bond secured by his assets until after he exhausts his appeal options.” Can Trump use his campaign coffers? “The courts don’t have restrictions on the sources of funds used to pay judgments, and Trump would surely like to tap other funds than whatever money is in his own personal accounts. He could transfer assets from the Trump Organization to himself in order to help satisfy the judgments,” Erica writes. “Using his political vehicles to pay would be far trickier. There is a general ban on using campaign donations for personal uses unrelated to a campaign or the official duties of an officeholder. And as for his political action committees, RICHARD PILDES, a professor of constitutional law at New York University law school, said they can’t pay Trump’s judgments.” The lasting impact: Our colleague Meridith McGraw reports that “few cases have mattered more” to Trump on a personal level than the civil fraud one, adding that “the harm from that verdict cannot be measured solely in dollar signs and business transactions.” The duel continues: “The New York verdict’s in, but Donald Trump and Tish James aren’t letting up,” by Samantha Latson The media angle: “For Donald Trump, the Recriminations Will Be Televised,” by NYT’s James Poniewozik: “The former president’s trials aren’t being aired. That isn’t stopping him from turning them into a political reality show.”
| | | | A message from American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers:   | | | | | WHAT'S HAPPENING TODAY | | At the White House Biden has nothing on his public schedule. Harris this evening will return to D.C. from Germany, where she met separately with German Chancellor OLAF SCHOLZ and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy earlier today.
| | | | | PLAYBOOK READS | | 9 THINGS THAT STUCK WITH US
|  Since the House’s historic impeachment vote against DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, the agency head has gone about his daily business and left the messaging battle to outside allies. | Francis Chung/POLITICO | 1. WHAT IMPEACHMENT?: Since the House’s historic impeachment vote against DHS Secretary ALEJANDRO MAYORKAS, the agency head has gone about his daily business and left the messaging battle to outside allies. Internally, the administration is “hoping to demonstrate that it is business as usual at DHS, eager to show that the president’s team is unfazed by the impeachment and to portray Republicans as consumed by partisan vendettas at the cost of tending to the crisis at the southern border,” our colleague Myah Ward reports. “They believe the Mayorkas impeachment — and his public nonchalance about it — will help further the narrative carrying over from the bipartisan Senate border deal battle: that Republicans are not invested in solving the crisis at the border so much as perpetuating it as a political cudgel.” 2. MIDDLE EAST LATEST: “U.S. Plans to Send Weapons to Israel Amid Biden Push for Cease-Fire Deal,” by WSJ’s Jared Malsin and Nancy Youssef: “The planned weapons transfer comes during a crucial moment in the war in Gaza as Israel prepares to launch an assault on the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, where more than one million Palestinians are sheltering from the war. Israel has said it needs to expand its military offensive in the area to attack Hamas militants hiding among civilians who have fled there from other areas of the strip.” Top-ed: Sens. JEFF MERKLEY (D-Ore.), DICK DURBIN (D-Ill.), ELIZABETH WARREN (D-Mass.), CHRIS VAN HOLLEN (D-Md.) and PETER WELCH (D-Vt.) write for WaPo: “The U.S. should immediately mobilize ‘Operation Gaza Relief’” 3. PRIMARY COLORS: Despite the relative lack of drama on the presidential nominating side of things this election season, there is still plenty of action when you zoom out and look down the ballot. “Some of the biggest contests are in March, when eight states are holding their primaries for Congress, four for Senate and one for governor,” our colleague Steve Shepard notes in a wide-lensed look at the most interesting primaries on the calendar. “Republicans are facing yet another front in the ongoing insurgent takeover against the governing wing of the party. Democratic candidates are split on the war in the Middle East. And there’s also the political jiujitsu in California, where the math in the top-two primary means one side is in danger of being eliminated before the general election even begins. “And the outcomes of these primaries won’t just chart the trajectory of the two parties — they’ll also be central to determining which party controls the Senate, House and key governorships this time next year.” 4. SO MUCH FOR THAT ‘STAR WITNESS’: “Fate of Fulton DA’s role in Trump case uncertain after testimony concludes,” by AJC’s David Wickert and Tamar Hallerman: “As she mapped out her strategy to disqualify FANI WILLIS from prosecuting Fulton County’s sweeping election interference case, defense attorney ASHLEIGH MERCHANT referred repeatedly to a witness whose testimony would prove the district attorney’s office wasn’t truthful. Superior Court Judge SCOTT McAFEE even referred to him as Merchant’s ‘star witness.’ “But on Friday, TERRENCE BRADLEY took the stand and offered little to help. First, special prosecutor NATHAN WADE’s former law partner was hours late to the hearing … Bradley contended repeatedly that attorney-client privilege severely limited what he could say on the witness stand. At the end of the eight-hour hearing came a bombshell allegation of sexual assault that put his credibility on the line.” What’s next: “McAfee … agreed to review some evidence that will be submitted under seal and will schedule another hearing as soon as next Friday.” 5. TRUMP’S ABORTION AGENDA: As Trump and his allies are “planning ways to restrict abortion rights if he returns to power that would go far beyond proposals for a national ban or the laws enacted in conservative states across the country,” NYT’s Lisa Lerer and Elizabeth Dias report. “Behind the scenes, specific anti-abortion plans being proposed by Mr. Trump’s allies are sweeping and legally sophisticated. Some of their proposals would rely on enforcing the Comstock Act, a long-dormant law from 1873, to criminalize the shipping of any materials used in an abortion — including abortion pills, which account for the majority of abortions in America.” To no surprise: “In policy documents, private conversations and interviews, the plans described by former Trump administration officials, allies and supporters propose circumventing Congress and leveraging the regulatory powers of federal institutions, including the Department of Health and Human Services, the Food and Drug Administration, the Department of Justice and the National Institutes of Health.” To wit: “Trump won’t rule out 16-week abortion ban, but won’t commit either,” by Adam Cancryn and Alice Miranda Ollstein 6. THREAT ASSESSMENT: CNN has the latest details on the national security threat that came to light this week from Russia, raising the alarm across the country. “Russia is trying to develop a nuclear space weapon that would destroy satellites by creating a massive energy wave when detonated, potentially crippling a vast swath of the commercial and government satellites that the world below depends on to talk on cell phones, pay bills, and surf the internet,” Katie Bo Lillis, Jim Sciutto, Kristin Fisher and Natasha Bertrand report. “The weapon is still under development and is not yet in orbit, Biden administration officials have emphasized publicly. But if used, officials say, it would cross a dangerous rubicon in the history of nuclear weapons and could cause extreme disruptions to everyday life in ways that are difficult to predict.” 7. THE LONG GAME: “Haley’s Attacks on Trump Over Veterans Aren’t Working, and Could Help Biden,” by NYT’s Anjali Huynh, Michael Gold and Jazmine Ulloa: “Haley’s campaign has increased its focus on the subject as recent polls show her flailing in her home state, and there is widespread doubt, even among her supporters, that she will have a strong showing. Yet in raising Mr. Trump’s past comments about military personnel, Ms. Haley may be indirectly helping the Biden campaign by reinforcing an argument against Mr. Trump it made in the 2020 election — and one that is likely to return in the 2024 general election contest.” 8. CLIMATE CONUNDRUM: Biden’s freeze on gas export permits has flipped the traditional partisan arguments about fossil fuels: Republicans extol the climate benefits of natural gas, while Democrats make populist arguments about keeping fuel prices low, our colleagues Ben Lefebvre and Zack Colman write. “The clashing messages are an example of the novel controversies being created by the United States’ emergence as an energy superpower — a role that has enhanced its leverage in conflicts such as the Russia-Ukraine war but also set up a collision between soaring U.S. oil and gas production and the president’s pledges to slash climate pollution.” Related reads: “White House set to back tougher climate model for ethanol, sources say,” by Reuters … “Biden Administration Is Said to Slow Early Stage of Shift to Electric Cars,” by NYT’s Coral Davenport 9. A HOMECOMING: “Jimmy Carter’s Long Goodbye,” by NYT’s Peter Baker: “Carter entered hospice care one year ago Sunday, choosing to forgo further life-prolonging treatment with the intent to return to his simple home in Plains, Ga., to pass his final days in comfort and peace. As it turns out, there have been more final days than he or anyone around him anticipated. The former president’s long goodbye has defied the odds and absorbed many around the world who have spent the last 12 months honoring his memory even as he has refused to follow anyone else’s timetable.” Put in perspective: “Hospice care is meant to ease the end for both patient and family, prescribed for those with less than six months to live. About half of those who enter hospice care last no more than 17 days. Just 6 percent are still alive a year later. Mr. Carter, the only president ever to live to age 99, seems destined to keep pushing the limits.”
| | | | A message from American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers:   | | | CLICKER — “The nation’s cartoonists on the week in politics,” edited by Matt Wuerker — 17 funnies
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| GREAT WEEKEND READS, curated by Ryan Lizza: — “The Death of Alexey Navalny, Putin’s Most Formidable Opponent,” by The New Yorker’s Masha Gessen: “The opposition leader, who died in prison, had been persecuted for years by the Russian state. He remained defiant, and consistently funny, to the very end.” — “Life Aboard a Nuclear Submarine as the US Responds to Threats Around the Globe,” by Vanity Fair’s Adam Ciralsky: “How the Navy prowls today’s uncertain seas—and prepares for possible superpower conflict tomorrow.” — “The Day I Put $50,000 in a Shoe Box and Handed It to a Stranger,” by The Cut’s Charlotte Cowles: “I never thought I was the kind of person to fall for a scam.” — “How Two Irish Businessmen Almost Took Nigeria for $11 Billion,” by Jesse Barron for NYT Magazine: “A mundane contractual provision met with rampant corruption — revealing a serious vulnerability in one of the backbones of international commerce.” — “Circuit Breakers,” by Jeffrey Toobin for the NY Review of Books: “Judges on the Fifth Circuit, many of them Trump appointees, are attempting to transform the law and challenge the very structure of American government.” — “The Year After A Denied Abortion,” by Stacy Kranitz and Kavitha Surana for ProPublica: “Tennessee law prohibits women from having abortions in nearly all circumstances. But once the babies are here, the state provides little help. We followed one family as they struggled to make it.” — “200 cats, 200 dogs, one lab: the secrets of the pet food industry,” by The Guardian’s Vivian Ho: “Pet food is a £120bn industry, with vast resources spent on working out how best to nourish and delight our beloved charges. But how do we know if we’re getting it right?” — “The text file that runs the internet,” by The Verge’s David Pierce: “For decades, robots.txt governed the behavior of web crawlers. But as unscrupulous AI companies seek out more and more data, the basic social contract of the web is falling apart.”
| | | | | PLAYBOOKERS | | IN MEMORIAM — “Bob R. Brooks Jr., 61, Chief Deputy Attorney General of Arkansas, unexpectedly passed on February 11, 2024, in Little Rock. … Bob served as Chief of Staff for former U.S. Congressman Jay Dickey (AR-04) before returning to Arkansas to become the Director of the Arkansas Ethics Commission by the appointment of former Governor Mike Huckabee. He then worked for the Republican National Committee, helping to oversee the 2000 Florida recount on behalf of the Bush-Cheney campaign. Following the election, Bob served as Chief of Staff to Jim McCrery (LA-04), former U.S. Congressmen and Ranking Member of the House Committee on Ways and Means. Bob later became a partner at Capitol Counsel LLC, a Washington, D.C. lobbying and advocacy firm.” Read the full obituary OUT AND ABOUT — SPOTTED at People For the American Way’s “People for Salon” on Thursday night: Rep. Gabe Amo (D-R.I.), Svante Myrick, Paul Thornell, Shaniqua McClendon, Bobby Cunningham, Kamau Marshall, Rory Gates, Kim Wehle, Erin McPike, Marvin Figueroa, Rick Wade, Gayraud Townsend, Michael Falcone, Matthew Brown, Vince Evans, Michael Falcone, Teddy Downey, Lydia Grizzel and Markus Batchelor. ENGAGED — Mimi Montgomery, a reporter at Axios D.C. and a Washingtonian alum, and Tripp Camden, an aerospace engineer at Northrop Grumman, got engaged last Saturday. The couple were both at UVA at the same time, but didn’t meet until years later in D.C. at a birthday party at the Adams Morgan karaoke bar Muzette. “He had the mic, I tried to steal it,” Mimi tells us. “He proposed last weekend at Wrightsville Beach, N.C., where I spent all my summers growing up. We were on a walk on the beach with our dog, Ziggy!” Pic … Another pic HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Reps. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) (6-0), Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.) and Jake LaTurner (R-Kan.) … Brian Jack … Sam Vinograd … Betsy Fischer Martin … Lachlan Markay … Keegan Goudiss … Kristin Roberts … Ashley Berrang … Dianna Heitz … Cara Camacho … Edith Honan … AARP’s Barbara Shipley … Danielle Most … POLITICO’s Kelsey Tamborrino and Mitchell Cain … Annamarie Rienzi … Mark Shriver … Drew Cantor … Frederick Hill of House Oversight … Steven Grossman … Allison Hunn … NAICU’s Emmanual Guillory … Shana Marchio … White House’s Stephanie Young … Cliff Sims … former Rep. Randy Forbes (R-Va.) … PwC’s Shantanu Chandra … Sonia Vasconcellos of Global Counsel … Fred Schwien … Mike Sager of EMILY’s List … Surya Gunasekara … Robert Giuffra … Baker Landon … Kelsey Rohwer ... Anna Koval THE SHOWS (Full Sunday show listings here): ABC “This Week”: Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro … Charlamagne Tha God. Panel: Donna Brazile, Selina Wang, Ramesh Ponnuru and Jonathan Martin. CBS “Face the Nation”: Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) … Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) … Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) … Amie Parnes … Doug Brinkley … Rikki Klieman. FOX “Fox News Sunday”: Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) … New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu … Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.). Panel: Josh Kraushaar, Katie Pavlich, Daniel Lippman and Richard Fowler. NBC “Meet the Press”: Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio) … Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) … Patti Davis. Panel: Cornell Belcher, Sara Fagen and Mara Liasson. CNN “State of the Union”: Liz Cheney … Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) … Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.). 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 Playbook Daily Briefing producer Callan Tansill-Suddath. Corrections: Yesterday’s Playbook misstated South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn’s party affiliation. He is a Democrat. It also misspelled the names of Dave Altimari and Jason Zaragoza.
| | | | A message from American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers: EPA is set to finalize a regulation designed to end the sale of new gas and diesel cars. This proposal would force automakers to phase out internal combustion engine vehicles – the most widely available, accessible, and affordable cars driven by the majority of Americans. The Biden EPA is rushing to do this before we are ready, and regardless of what American drivers want, need, and can afford.
Even worse, phasing out gas and diesel-powered vehicles for electric vehicles jeopardizes our hard-won American energy security, which is built on American-made and American-grown fuels. Instead, we will be reliant on China, the dominant player in the electric vehicle supply chain now and for the foreseeable future.
President Biden: It’s not too late to act. Stop the EPA’s misguided car ban. We need vehicle policies that work for all Americans, our economy, and our energy security. | | | | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook family Playbook | Playbook PM | California Playbook | Florida Playbook | Illinois Playbook | Massachusetts Playbook | New Jersey Playbook | New York Playbook | Ottawa Playbook | Brussels Playbook | London Playbook View all our political and policy newsletters | | Follow us | | | | |
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