| | | | |  | | By Eugene Daniels and Rachael Bade | | Presented by |  | | | With help from Eli Okun, Garrett Ross and Bethany Irvine
| | | |  | DRIVING THE DAY | | | SCOOP: MIKE LEE MAKES HIS MOVE — Sen. MIKE LEE (R-Utah) is shaking up the low-key race to replace MITCH McCONNELL as Senate Republican leader. As Rachael scooped last night, he circulated his proposals for overhauling the Senate GOP — a de facto list of demands for Sens. JOHN THUNE (R-S.D.), JOHN CORNYN (R-Texas) and RICK SCOTT (R-Fla.) to ponder as they woo the bloc of roughly a dozen conservatives that Lee informally leads. The list is less about policy and more about procedure — and it’s giving us flashbacks to the demands House conservatives made of KEVIN McCARTHY before he became speaker. We (and plenty of GOP senators) remember that McCarthy gave away the store and still couldn’t keep his gavel for more than nine months. Expect Lee’s letter to at least get some conversations going as the Senate’s young conservatives look to throw their weight around. Read more from Rachael … Read Lee’s letter
| 
The National Hurricane Center writes this morning that Hurricane Milton has the potential to be one of the most destructive hurricanes on record for west-central Florida. | Mike Carlson/AP | STURM UND STURM UND DRANG — The warnings about Hurricane Milton continue to be dire. The National Hurricane Center writes this morning that it “has the potential to be one of the most destructive hurricanes on record for west-central Florida." Tampa Mayor JANE CASTOR said this on CNN last night: “I can say this without any dramatization whatsoever: If you choose to stay in one of those evacuation areas, you are going to die.” As if it weren’t enough to prepare for sustained 150 mph winds and 15 feet of storm surge, government officials on the local, state and federal levels are also preparing for a fresh tide of misinformation driven by the approaching election. Mixing hurricanes and politics, of course, is nothing new. What has been novel, and alarming to many observers, is the unabashed campaign by DONALD TRUMP to question the federal response led by President JOE BIDEN and VP KAMALA HARRIS — one that has been encouraged and amplified (often with fabricated stories and artificial AI images) on his ally ELON MUSK’s social media platform. The consequences have been on full display over the past 12 days with Hurricane Helene. We spoke to a North Carolina state official who starkly described just how overwhelming the deluge of false information has been. At best, the person said, it’s a distraction. At worst, it’s obstructing needy Americans from getting help they need — falsely suggesting, for instance, that disaster victims are entitled to no more than a $750 FEMA check. “The scale of the misinformation — and simply the number of posts and the eyeballs that each of those are being given online, particularly on [X] — that is what is different and truly scary,” the official said. “This has felt like you're in the Thunderdome, and people are just piping this noise in. They create this great confusion. It creates chaos and a crisis moment where you need people to be able to work together and come together.” GRAHAM BROOKIE, a misinformation expert at the Atlantic Council, told us that disaster-related online deceptions have rapidly changed: What used to be driven by greed by folks looking to make a quick buck is now being driven more by ideology. People are engaging online, believing they are putting together the pieces of a secret puzzle, he said, that has no basis in reality Add in a tense election in a torn country with a fractured media environment, and, well, you get the picture. North Carolina Gov. ROY COOPER lashed out Sunday: “Politicians, billionaires and grifters who peddle lies during a time of crisis should be held accountable.” Now, with Milton approaching, the White House is looking to play offense. Yesterday from the briefing room podium, press secretary KARINE JEAN-PIERRE made debunking the online rumor campaign a central message. We spoke separately with deputy ANDREW BATES, who decried conspiracy theories that “have the depraved effect of scaring innocent people who have lost homes and loved ones out of the financial help they are owed and divide communities when standing together is more important than ever.” Behind the scenes, we’re told, the White House intergovernmental affairs team has been making hundreds of calls directly to state and local officials to communicate directly about what aid is needed and what efforts are underway to get help to where it is needed. Down in Florida, meanwhile, there is serious dread as online lies threaten to compound an already dire situation. Those concerns, we’ll note, are playing out against a backdrop of more conventional political sniping. Yesterday, after NBC’s Matt Dixon reported that Florida Gov. RON DeSANTIS has refused to take Harris’ calls about Helene recovery, the VP remarked that “anyone who calls himself a leader [should] put politics aside and put the people first.” That prompted DeSantis to fire back on Fox News last night, saying Harris “has no role in this” and “is trying to politicize the storm.” More from Kierra Frazier But local leaders are more concerned at the moment about what’s coming online. Tampa-area Rep. KATHY CASTOR (D-Fla.) has previously spoken out about misinformation in other contexts, and she told Playbook she’s afraid the phenomenon is only going to get worse. “The partisan political motivations behind disinformation campaigns are insidious,” she said. “Manipulating the facts and using a natural disaster to build political capital is a disgraceful tactic that risks delaying our communities’ recovery from these increasingly severe storms.” We asked Trump spokesperson KAROLINE LEAVITT if the GOP nominee felt any responsibility to tamp down the feverish false accusations coming largely from his supporters. “The only misinformation is coming from the Biden-Harris Administration,” she responded, accusing Jean-Pierre of downplaying FEMA spending on migrants. (Those funds, we’ll note, are appropriated separately from disaster relief funding by Congress.) “If he were in office today, the federal government would be moving at a business speed, not a bureaucratic speed, like we are unfortunately seeing happen under Kamala Harris and Joe Biden right now and lives have been lost because of it,” Leavitt added. Related reads: “Back-to-back hurricanes test Florida’s recovery work as Milton rushes for Gulf Coast,” by Arek Sarkissian … “US disaster programs are teetering. Milton could topple them,” by Thomas Frank … “Helene’s devastation has disrupted voting in battlegrounds,” by John Sakellariadis, Liz Crampton and Jessica Piper Good Tuesday morning. Thanks for reading Playbook. Drop us a line: Rachael Bade and Eugene Daniels.
| | | | A message from United for Democracy: Banning IVF, abortion, and many types of contraception. Creating a national pregnancy registry. Criminalizing porn. Making you pay more for healthcare and housing. Sound like a nightmare? No - it's Project 2025. And if Trump is elected, it will be the MAGA movement's dream that the corrupt Supreme Court justices made come true. But we can vote to stop them – learn more at Project2025.wtf. | | | ‘VIEW’ TO A GRILL — Harris’ mini media blitz continues today in NYC with a live appearance on ABC’s “The View” later this morning at 11 a.m., followed by a drop-in at HOWARD STERN’s SiriusXM show at 1 p.m. and a taping of tonight’s CBS’s “Late Show” with STEPHEN COLBERT. The interview flurry comes after her foray into the new-media sphere with “Call Her Daddy” on Sunday and last night’s decidedly old-media “60 Minutes” broadcast, where veteran correspondent Bill Whitaker pressed her persistently on the math behind her economic plans, her foreign policy outlook and whether she and Biden should have been faster to pivot on border security. More from Myah Ward By the time Harris’ town hall with Univision airs Thursday, her campaign is expecting to reach as many as 20 million voters through the media onslaught — connecting strategically with a variety of different voting blocs. This morning, we’re told, her appearance on “The View” will be aimed at the “sandwich generation” — middle-aged Americans who find themselves squeezed financially by having to support both school-aged children and aging parents. To that end, a senior campaign official said Harris will unveil a new policy proposal: a home care benefit administered through Medicare to help families take care of their aging parents at home rather than in assisted living or nursing homes. More from Megan Messerly
| | | | A message from United for Democracy: If MAGA extremists win this fall, they will pursue Project 2025 policies to gut the checks and balances that protect American freedoms.
You think the Courts will save us?! LOL. The six MAGA Supreme Court Justices are already implementing some of Project 2025’s worst ideas.
Learn more at Project2025.wtf. | | | | | WHAT'S HAPPENING TODAY | | On the Hill The Senate and the House are out. What we’re watching … In the latest evidence that the coattails in the modern Republican Party belong only to Donald Trump, our colleague Nick Wu reports from Toledo on the GOP’s uphill fight to unseat Rep. MARCY KAPTUR (D-Ohio). A couple of months ago, the thinking was that Sen. JD VANCE’s (R-Ohio) ascension to VP candidate would be the rising tide that would help Ohio Republicans finally oust the 40-year incumbent. But Vance is basically a non-factor in the race, and Kaptur seems to have a comfortable lead over challenger DEREK MERRIN with a month till Election Day. At the White House Biden will get a hurricane briefing at 10 a.m. and deliver a public update at 10:15 a.m. He’ll travel to Milwaukee to speak about his administration’s efforts to clean up lead pipes at 1:45 p.m. Eastern. Then Biden will head to Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, for a campaign event to boost Sen. BOB CASEY (D-Pa.), before returning to the White House at night. On the trail Harris is in New York, where she’ll take part in live interviews at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. and record an interview at 6 p.m. Sen. JD VANCE (R-Ohio) will speak in Detroit at 2 p.m.
| | | |  | |  Elon Musk is planning to head to Pennsylvania in the coming weeks for campaign stops to boost Donald Trump. | Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images | THE NEW OLIGARCH — Elon Musk, the wealthiest person in the world, is increasingly working to bend the internet and the presidential election to his will as he steps up support for Trump. He’s planning to head to Pennsylvania again in the coming weeks for America PAC campaign stops to boost Trump, Alex Isenstadt scooped. Musk has personal ties to the state and is very focused on it as the likeliest tipping point. He also has taken control of the previously dormant @america account on X to amplify advocacy for Trump, per Axios’ Angrej Singh, even as his throttling of some left-wing accounts on the platform has raised free-speech questions. Another new Musk effort offers $47 for signing a petition supporting the First and Second Amendments, which could help build lists of conservative-leaning voters for America PAC to target, NYT’s Teddy Schleifer explains. It’s a novel way to collect valuable voter data. But Musk did suffer one setback yesterday at the Supreme Court, which rejected X’s appeal regarding special counsel JACK SMITH obtaining info from Trump’s account, per NBC’s Lawrence Hurley. RACE FOR THE WHITE HOUSE FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — VoteVets is rolling out a $10 million set of October campaigns to boost Democrats up and down the ticket, with about half of it starting today. The newest ad buys include $1.6 million for Harris in Pennsylvania, North Carolina and national digital, $1 million for Rep. RUBEN GALLEGO in the Arizona Senate race, and nearly $1.8 million across the House races in New York’s 18th District, California’s 45th and Wisconsin’s 3rd. NIGHTMARE FUEL — Experts and officials are bracing for the most perilous period of potential foreign misinformation to arrive after the election, AP’s David Klepper reports. That’s when theories or deepfakes alleging voter fraud could explode online more quickly than officials can investigate or the truth can be ascertained. The Office of the DNI warned yesterday that foreign efforts to spread disinformation are growing in congressional races too, per Klepper.
THE DIPLOMA DIVIDE — Paul Glastris has a smart piece in POLITICO Magazine that goes deeper than the refrain about Democrats shoring up college graduates and Republicans making inroads with the working class. There’s a huge group of college grads who are far from elite, often who went to “regional public universities” — and Minnesota Gov. TIM WALZ’s populism could help Democrats reach these “state college voters,” if they know to look for them.
CASH DASH — MIRIAM ADELSON and DANA WHITE will lead a $1-million-a-head fundraiser with Trump on Friday, per WaPo’s Josh Dawsey. QUOTE OF THE DAY — Trump transition honcho HOWARD LUTNICK tells FT’s Alex Rogers that he’s open to serving in a second Trump administration (though not as ambassador to Israel): “If he wants me in the mosaic, he would have to put me in,” the Cantor Fitzgerald CEO said. “I’m not putting me in.” DESTINATION: ARIZONA — The Grand Canyon State’s ongoing political evolution is one of the election’s biggest question marks. Some of the numbers look good for Republicans, as Democrats have lost serious ground in voter registrations since 2020, NOTUS’ Jasmine Wright reports from New River. A major influx of Californians into the state recently could give Democrats a boost, but the political impact is hard to determine, the L.A. Times’ Seema Mehta reports from Scottsdale. And amid concerns about election chaos, Maricopa County is preparing with unprecedented levels of security, Bloomberg’s Jamie Tarabay reports, while STEPHEN RICHER tells Scott Pelley on CBS’ “60 Minutes” he’s still working to restore faith in elections. THE MORMON VOTE — Latter-day Saints for Trump will launch this week as a Trump campaign initiative, the Deseret News’ Samuel Benson scooped. RACE FOR THE HOUSE NARRATIVE TREND — “House Dems blitz dozens of Republicans over Project 2025,” by Axios’ Andrew Solender RACE FOR THE SENATE FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — Republican HUNG CAO is launching his first TV ad campaign of the general election in Virginia’s Senate race. The seven-figure ad buy highlights Cao’s story as a veteran and refugee. It’s also a bit of a mirror image of Harris’ messaging, titled “Freedom” (like her ad campaign) and blasting Democratic Sen. TIM KAINE for “putting party over country.” Watch it here POLL POSITION FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — A new internal poll for the DCCC finds Democrat CHRISTINA BOHANNAN leading by 4 points — and hitting 50 percent — in a toss-up Iowa congressional race. The Dems say that GOP Rep. MARIANNETTE MILLER-MEEKS’ favorability is way underwater with independents. The polling memo Full set of swing-state surveys: Redfield & Wilton Strategies finds Harris narrowly leading in the Blue Wall and Nevada, Trump narrowly leading in Arizona and North Carolina, and a tie in Georgia. And more polls … National: Harris +2, per Yahoo/YouGov. Harris +3, per I&I/TIPP. Harris +4, per Big Village. … Arizona: Trump +4, per RMG Research. … Michigan: Harris +2.6, per The Detroit News/WDIV-TV. … New York: GOP Rep. MIKE LAWLER +1 and Democratic Rep. PAT RYAN +5, per Emerson. … California: Democratic Rep. MIKE LEVIN +12, per SurveyUSA/The San Diego Union-Tribune.
| | | | | PLAYBOOK READS | | JUDICIARY SQUARE
| 
Arguments unfold at the Supreme Court today over whether the Biden administration’s regulation of ghost guns can stand. | Mariam Zuhaib/AP Photo | SCOTUS WATCH — The Supreme Court returned yesterday with a low-profile case in which the justices, “dour and diligent,” got back to business in typical fashion, NYT’s Adam Liptak recaps. But the spotlight will shine brighter today as arguments unfold over whether the Biden administration’s regulation of ghost guns can stand, CBS’ Melissa Quinn previews. Experts say the 2022 rule stands a greater chance of surviving than the Trump ban on bump stocks, but the pivotal votes may be Chief Justice JOHN ROBERTS and Justice AMY CONEY BARRETT. The question is whether the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives overstepped its bounds. Multiple cities told the court the rule is starting to help them rein in ghost guns. Then tomorrow, the court will consider the capital punishment case of RICHARD GLOSSIP, AP’s Sean Murphy and Mark Sherman report. Notably, Glossip has the rare backing of Oklahoma AG GENTNER DRUMMOND, a Republican, who says he deserves a new trial. The justices also issued a number of notable rejections yesterday, declining to take up:
BEYOND THE BELTWAY THE ABORTION LANDSCAPE — A week after a lower court’s ruling, the Georgia Supreme Court reinstated the state’s almost-total abortion ban while an appeal proceeds. More from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution CONGRESS MUCK READ — “North Dakota’s likely next governor would regulate his own industry, testing ethics guardrails,” by the North Dakota Monitor’s Jacob Orledge with ProPublica: “[Rep. KELLY] ARMSTRONG earns nearly all of his personal income from oil and gas. If elected, he’ll lead boards overseeing the industry in a state with weak financial disclosure rules. … He said he doesn’t believe his financial ties to oil and gas companies will pose a conflict of interest.”
| | | | A message from United for Democracy:   | | | AMERICA AND THE WORLD
|  Smoke rises from destroyed buildings at the site of an Israeli airstrike hit yesterday in Choueifat, southeast of Beirut, Lebanon. | Bilal Hussein/AP Photo | MIDDLE EAST LATEST — As top U.S. leaders commemorated the anniversary of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel, the Biden administration is working to figure out what’s next for the region’s set of interconnected and worsening wars. But as of now, the U.S. isn’t even trying to revive an Israel-Hezbollah cease-fire deal, instead calculating that the best they can do is try to pressure Israel into limiting its offensives, CNN’s Natasha Bertrand, Kayla Tausche and Oren Liebermann report. (Biden officials say they successfully swayed Israel to shrink its Lebanese ground invasion.) The State Department also warned that U.N. peacekeepers in Lebanon should not be endangered, per Reuters’ Humeyra Pamuk. One of the biggest U.S. fears is that Israel will strike Iranian nuclear facilities. Though some in Israel see this as an opportunity they can’t waste, NYT’s David Sanger, Eric Schmitt and Ronen Bergman throw some cold water on how likely — or even feasible — it is. Politically, the Middle East keeps shaking the U.S. presidential election. Harris faces a serious threat in Michigan, where a lot of Arab American and Muslim support for Democrats has vanished, NYT’s Katie Glueck reports. On the other end, former Rep. PETER DEUTSCH (D-Fla.) announced he’s crossing party lines to vote Trump, in part over Israel, per Jewish Insider. But Harris was endorsed by three city councilmen in Muslim-majority Hamtramck, Michigan, in the wake of their mayor supporting Trump, the Washington Examiner’s David Sivak scooped. Say what now: Trump seemed to claim to Hugh Hewitt yesterday that he’d been to Gaza. NYT’s Maggie Haberman asked the campaign to clarify; they responded that Gaza is “in Israel” (which it’s not) and that he’s visited Israel. VALLEY TALK ANTITRUST THE PROCESS — “U.S. judge orders sweeping changes to Google’s Android app store,” by WaPo’s Shira Ovide POLICY CORNER ONE TO WATCH — “FDA’s promised guidelines on pulse oximeters unlikely to end decades of racial bias,” by KFF Health News’ Arthur Allen in CBS: “[A]s the FDA polishes draft guidelines it had hoped to publish by Oct. 1, clinicians and scientists are unsure what to expect.”
| | | | | PLAYBOOKERS | | Karine Jean-Pierre was promoted to be senior adviser to the president. Tony Dokoupil’s interview of Ta-Nehisi Coates has triggered a CBS brouhaha. Bill Kristol is in the Daddy Gang. IN MEMORIAM — “Former Ohio Congressman David Hobson, who championed Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, dies,” by the Cincinnati Enquirer’s Jessie Balmert: “He was 87. Hobson was first elected to Congress in 1990 to fill a Southwest Ohio seat vacated by Mike DeWine … In 2004, Hobson helped establish a visitor center and memorial at the American Cemetery in Normandy, France.” BOOK CLUB — Chris Wallace today is publishing a new book, “Countdown 1960: The Behind-the-Scenes Story of the 312 Days that Changed America’s Politics Forever” ($35). The third in his “Countdown” series, the book traces the 11 months leading up to the election between John F. Kennedy Jr. and Richard Nixon, including questions about voter fraud and the peaceful transfer of power that resonate with today’s political landscape. TRANSITIONS — Kevin Slagle is now SVP of comms at the American Petroleum Institute. He previously was VP of strategy and comms for the Western States Petroleum Association. … Timothy Ranstrom has been named senior manager of federal government relations at DJI. He most recently was senior adviser to House Ways and Means ranking member Richard Neal (D-Mass.). … Alex Terr is now deputy press secretary at the Progressive Policy Institute. He previously was a press assistant for Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.). WELCOME TO THE WORLD — Benjamin Rhodeside, legislative director for Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), and Lauren Rhodeside, senior counsel and operations director for Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), on Sept. 5 welcomed Rory Griffin Rhodeside, who joins big sister Rosie. Pic … Another pic HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Reps. David Kustoff (R-Tenn.), Marc Molinaro (R-N.Y.) and Kelly Armstrong (R-N.D.) … Adrienne Watson of the DNC … Rev. Jesse Jackson … former Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) … Shripal Shah of House Majority PAC … Larry Calhoun of Rep. Kat Cammack’s (R-Fla.) office … Steve Coll of The Economist … Axios’ Mackenzie Weinger … Dan Dunham … NBC’s Dan Gallo and Victoria Correia … Brianne Gorod of the Constitutional Accountability Center … POLITICO’s Andrew Howard and Katherine Herbert … Caroline Nonna Holland … Aaron Hiller of House Judiciary … Kirk Schwarzbach … Joe Gilson of the American Farm Bureau Federation … Nicole Schlinger … Bully Pulpit International’s Ivanka Farrell … Abdul Dosunmu … former HHS Secretary Tom Price (7-0) … Brian Frosh … LSG’s Caroline Carpenter … Adam Weiss of FIO 360 … Grace Chapman of Rep. Mike Ezell’s (R-Miss.) office … Blain Rethmeier … Sofia Ramirez 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.
| | | | A message from United for Democracy: Project 2025 is a policy blueprint created by the far-right Heritage Foundation meant to gut America’s system of checks and balances. Their goal? Take control of the government… and our lives.
If MAGA extremists win this fall, they will pursue Project 2025 policies like banning IVF and setting up a national abortion and pregnancy registry to force states to report abortion data. While raising taxes on middle-class Americans, they’ll also remove many environmental protections so companies can pollute our air, soil, and water with known cancer-causing toxic chemicals.
You think the Courts will save us?! LOL. The six MAGA Supreme Court Justices are already implementing some of Project 2025’s worst ideas.
In fact, they already deemed a president immune from all criminal acts they deem “official,” and stripped women of their reproductive freedom.
Learn more at Project2025.wtf, before it’s too late.
Paid for by United for Democracy. | | | | | | | 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 | | | | |
No comments:
Post a Comment