| | | | |  | | By Garrett Ross | Presented by Kidney Care Access Coalition | |  | THE CATCH-UP | | AFTERNOON MUST-READ — “The Low-Turnout Dems Who Might Deliver North Carolina for Harris,” by Michael Kruse for POLITICO Magazine: “Mecklenburg County has plenty of Democratic voters but getting them to the polls has been a challenge. New party leadership has a plan to fix that.” KNIVES OUT FOR LaCIVITA? — In the days after the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, Trump campaign manager CHRIS LaCIVITA was among the notable Republicans thrashing DONALD TRUMP for the violence, CNN’s Andrew Kaczynski reports. “In a series of reposts on X – formerly Twitter – LaCivita shared comments calling January 6 an ‘insurrection’ that was fueled by Trump’s baseless election lies. Some of those posts have since been deleted from LaCivita’s feed, but CNN was able to review them on the Internet Archive WayBack Machine, which archives internet webpages. “On January 6, 2021, LaCivita reposted several posts that harshly condemned Trump, suggesting that even some of his closest allies once viewed the deadly outcome as a direct result of Trump’s lies. In a statement to CNN, Lacivita said his likes and retweets on January 6 were not supportive statements. ‘Retweets and likes are not endorsements. I’m focused on winning the election two weeks from now, and not distractions from CNN,’ he said.”
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Democratic Rep. Colin Allred has GOP Sen. Ted Cruz on his heels in the Texas Senate race, according to recent polling. | Francis Chung/POLITICO | DEEP IN THE HEART — In a state known for everything being bigger, Sen. TED CRUZ (R-Texas) is staring down a shrinking lead as he fights off a challenge from Rep. COLIN ALLRED (D-Texas). A new Emerson College/The Hill poll, Cruz holds just a one-point edge (48% to 47%) over Allred with less than two weeks to go until Election Day. That follows September data from the same poll that saw Cruz with a four-point lead. In the presidential race, Trump has a comfortable 53% to 46% lead over Harris in the Lone Star State, up from his five-point lead in September. Digging in: The October data indicates that independents are breaking for Allred, 47% to 42%, and that the same segment backs Trump, 49% to 47%. Vibe check: Polls like these — along with a gusher of money from liberal billionaire financier GEORGE SOROS — have some Texas Democrats believing that 2024 “could be the turning point they’ve been waiting for,” NYT’s J. David Goodman reports. “This week, they received another boost after Vice President Kamala Harris announced that she would hold a rally in Houston on Friday, the first time in decades that a Democratic presidential candidate has held a major event in Texas in the closing days of an election.” Plus, the Harris campaign is up with a striking new ad featuring a Texas couple directly impacted by an abortion ban in the state following the overturning of Roe v. Wade. STAGGERING STORY — A new WaPo analysis finds that “nearly half of Republican candidates for Congress or top state offices have used social media to cast doubt on the integrity of the 2024 election,” Clara Ence Morse, Derek Hawkins and Carson TerBush write. By the numbers: “From Nov. 9, 2022, to Oct. 11, at least 236 Republican candidates posted or amplified a range of falsehoods or misinformation about election malfeasance. Many candidates baselessly accused Democrats of trying to sway the election through former president Donald Trump’s court cases or by registering noncitizens to vote. Others falsely likened Vice President Kamala Harris’s nomination to a ‘coup’ or promoted misinformation about voter fraud.” WHAT NYT LEADERSHIP IS READING — “What happens if the NYT’s tech staff strikes on election night?” by WaPo’s Laura Wagner: “In a statement announcing the strike authorization, the Tech Guild said the timing was ‘no accident’ and said that ‘roughly half of the workers in the bargaining unit work on election critical programs.’” AN OMG STORY — “‘The world doesn’t see us:’ What a militia chief said while holding me captive in Darfur,” by CNN’s Clarissa Ward Good Wednesday afternoon. Thanks for reading Playbook PM. Drop me a line at gross@politico.com.
| | | | A message from Kidney Care Access Coalition: Today, dialysis patients can be forced off the health coverage that works best for them – even impacting coverage for their spouse and kids.
The Restore Protections for Dialysis Patients Act (S. 5018 and H.R. 6860) is a bipartisan and bicameral bill that will restore protections for dialysis patients and ensure that these patients and their families have a choice in their coverage.
The time for Congress to act is now.
https://www.kidneycareaccess.org/ | | | | MORE CAMPAIGN NEWS …
- Republicans are sounding the alarm that they need to close the money gap with Democrats in the battle for state legislatures, calling the “financial disparity” in this cycle “more significant than ever,” Madison Fernandez reports. The Republican State Leadership Committee announced in a donor memo, first shared with POLITICO, that it increased its investment in state legislative races this year to $44 million, up from a previously announced $38 million.
| | | 6 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW | | | | 
Allies of Donald Trump are laying the groundwork for challenging the election results on a greater scale than happened in 2020. | Justin Sullivan/Getty Images | 1. BACK FOR MORE: In the years since the 2020 election, a cadre of deep-pocketed Trump allies has worked to put together a “more organized, better funded and far broader effort to contest the outcome — a Stop the Steal 2.0 — if the vote doesn’t go his way” this year, WSJ’s Rebecca Ballhaus and Mariah Timms report . The effort includes “scrutinizing voter registrations on an industrial scale and working to slow down the vote count, bury local election officials in paperwork and lawsuits and elect like-minded politicians at the state and local levels who will support efforts to contest the vote.” “A secretive network of GOP donors and conservative billionaires have fueled the effort, giving more than $140 million to nearly 50 loosely connected groups that work on what they call election integrity, according to a Wall Street Journal review of Federal Election Commission filings, tax filings and other records. Among the donors are organizations linked to Wisconsin billionaires RICHARD and ELIZABETH UIHLEIN and Hobby Lobby founder DAVID GREEN.” 2. INTO THE MAGA-VERSE: Since ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR. dropped out of the presidential race, his would-have-been VP pick NICOLE SHANAHAN has made a full turn into MAGA world, embracing the “Make America Healthy Again” moniker that her former running mate has trumpeted and positioning herself to have influence in a potential second Trump administration, WaPo’s Elizabeth Dwoskin, Ashley Parker, Meryl Kornfield and Aaron Schaffer report. That transformation “has alarmed former associates in Silicon Valley, a number of whom are Democrats, startled by her newfound political prominence. Interviews with 34 people familiar with her rise, many of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe sensitive matters, along with court documents, photographs, text messages, and screenshots paint a portrait of a chameleon who rose from a violent, hardscrabble childhood to join one of the most elite circles of the tech industry — doggedly pursuing influence.” But this shocking detail is all anyone is talking about: “Shanahan became aware of reporting for this article when she and Kennedy were still campaigning. In June, she texted an associate who had been contacted by The Post to suggest a deal: Shanahan said she would ‘pay your friend’ — The Post reporter — ‘half a million dollars to be a whistleblower’ to expose people Shanahan claimed were spreading false information about her.” 3. WAR IN UKRAINE: Defense Secretary LLOYD AUSTIN this morning confirmed that North Korea has “sent troops to Russia to join the fight against Ukraine, a major shift in Moscow’s effort to win the war. Mr. Austin called the North’s presence a ‘very serious’ escalation that would have ramifications in both Europe and Asia,” NYT’s Eric Schmitt and David Sanger report. “‘What exactly are they doing?’ Mr. Austin told reporters at a military base in Italy. ‘Left to be seen.’” Though Austin provided no details on the size of the troop presence, South Korean intelligence indicates that North Korea has sent 3,000 troops into Russia for training, report WSJ’s Dasl Yoon in Seoul and Thomas Grove in Warsaw and in Rome. “South Korean officials have said they believe North Korea plans to send 12,000 soldiers to Russia.”
| | | | A message from Kidney Care Access Coalition:   The Restore Protections for Dialysis Patients Act will right a wrong and ensure dialysis patients and their families aren’t forced off their health insurance. https://www.kidneycareaccess.org/ | | | 4. MIDDLE EAST LATEST: Israel “carried out extensive strikes in southern Lebanon, hitting the ancient city of Tyre after issuing its broadest evacuation order there so far, as Secretary of State ANTONY J. BLINKEN pressed on with a so far unsuccessful U.S. effort to cool the conflict in the region,” NYT’s Victoria Kim, Michael Crowley and Euan Ward report. “On the second day of Mr. Blinken’s visit, the Israeli military warned civilians in parts of Tyre to move about 25 miles north, the first such notice for a large section of the southern coastal city that was until recently a major hub for people fleeing other parts of Lebanon.” Stunning visuals: “Images capture the exact moments an Israeli bomb strikes a building in Beirut,” via AP The ripple effect: “Professors in Trouble Over Protests Wonder if Academic Freedom Is Dying,” by NYT’s Anemona Hartocollis 5. CONSPIRACY FILES: “How a conspiracy-fueled group got a foothold in this hurricane-battered town,” by WaPo’s Brianna Sacks, Scott Dance, Will Oremus, Samuel Oakford and Jeremy Merrill in Lake Lure, North Carolina: “Over the course of 11 days, this makeshift hurricane supplies depot in a supermarket parking lot became a snapshot of the chaos that can unfold in some corners of post-disaster America: Residents came together to help their community because local officials were unable to. People came searching for critical supplies because the federal government does not give those out as part of its disaster response. An extremist group motivated by anti-government beliefs and conspiracy theories was able to show up, wield influence and become a source of help for some and fear for others.” 6. MEGATREND: “Freshman Enrollment Appears to Decline for the First Time Since 2020,” by NYT’s Zach Montague: “Freshman enrollment dropped more than 5 percent from last year at American colleges and universities, the largest decline since 2020 when Covid-19 and distance learning upended higher education, according to preliminary data released on Wednesday by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, a nonprofit education group.” See the data
| | PLAYBOOKERS | | OUT AND ABOUT — The Washington Campus held a 45th anniversary celebration at the National Press Club last night with a special election discussion with Mike Lord, Ashley Etienne and Michael Steele. Special honorees included Doug Holtz-Eakin, Rick Klein, James Hohmann, Lesley Fair, Peter Carson, Michael Fitzpatrick, Ann Marie Buerkle and Al Wynn. TRANSITIONS — Jay Bhargava is now comms director for House Budget Committee Democrats under Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.). He is a Gary Peters, Tom Suozzi and Clinton Foundation alum. … Nahiomy Alvarez is now senior adviser for debt strategy and policy at Treasury. She most recently was senior manager for markets policy at Cboe Global Markets. WEEKEND WEDDING — Isaiah Mears, a former staffer for Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.), and Walton Stivender, scheduler for Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.), got married this weekend in Birmingham, Alabama. They met in D.C. in 2021 at a mutual friend’s St. Patrick’s Day party. WELCOME TO THE WORLD — Stephanie Silvestri (Zajac), health comms specialist at CMS, and Steve Silvestri, senior director of government affairs at Neurocrine Biosciences, both Rodney Frelinghuysen alums, welcomed Charlotte Silvestri on Oct. 7. BONUS BIRTHDAY: Alexandra Kendrick of Fundraising Inc. 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. | | | | 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 politics and policy newsletters | | Follow us | | | | |
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