What the Michigan tape means for Trump

Dec 22, 2023

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MISSION ACCOMPLISHED? — “Prices Fell in November for the First Time Since 2020. Inflation Is Approaching Fed Target,” by WSJ’s David Harrison and Amara Omeokwe: “The Fed’s preferred inflation measure, the personal-consumption expenditures price index, fell 0.1% in November from the previous month, the first decline since April 2020, the Commerce Department said Friday. Prices were up 2.6% on the year, not far from the Fed’s 2% target.”

Related read: “How Biden allies learned to love the Fed — or, at least, dread it less,” by Adam Cancryn

GOP Chair Ronna McDaniel speaks.

Donald Trump and RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel were recorded in a phone call with Republican members of the Wayne County Board of Canvassers in 2020. | Rich Bowmer/AP Photo

CALL OF THE WILD — How big of a deal is the Detroit News’ Thursday night scoop that a recording exists of DONALD TRUMP and RONNA McDANIEL pressuring two county officials in Michigan not to certify the 2020 election there?

On one hand, the fact that Trump and McDaniel called MONICA PALMER and WILLIAM HARTMANN, the two GOP canvassers in Wayne County, has been known for some time and is included in the House Jan. 6 committee’s report.

Furthermore, Trump’s efforts to overturn the results in Michigan are already a core part of JACK SMITH’s election subversion case in Washington. Smith’s indictment includes more than two pages of narrative about Trump’s machinations there.

But the events of Nov. 17, 2020, the night of the call, are not part of the litany of facts in the indictment, which a prosecutor will generally stud with the most damning info.

It may be that what Smith knew about the November call was too ambiguous to use as evidence. Palmer has described the call far more innocently than the new tapes reveal. As the Detroit News points out, Palmer previously characterized the call as, "Thank you for your service. I’m glad you're safe. Have a good night.”

To some legal analysts, the tape — in which Trump tells the canvassers to “fight for our country” and McDaniel promises legal assistance — instead tells a story of bribery.

“Trump and Ronna McDaniel - Offering a thing of value to a public official to violate oath of office = a crime,” ANDREW WEISSMANN, a former DOJ prosecutor, said on X last night.

Others we spoke to see new fuel to power Smith’s election subversion case as well as something that Georgia prosecutors might use to bolster their own case against Trump.

“This new evidence is of a piece with, and bolsters, the considerable other similar evidence of the former president’s interference in the 2020 presidential election that both Jack Smith and FANI WILLIS have assembled,” said former federal judge J. MICHAEL LUTTIG. “The president was not acting in furtherance of his duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed when he attempted to interfere in the presidential election in Michigan and elsewhere."

TY COBB, who once served as Trump’s lawyer and whose views on the 14th Amendment the Trump campaign has recently highlighted, told Playbook he saw the recordings as “likely a violation” of the federal honest services fraud statute.

“Also, shows the depths to which Trump personally participated in fraudulently pimping the big lie,” Cobb said. “McDaniel is equally exposed. Clearly, evidence going to the core conspiracies charged by the special prosecutor.”

But for every seemingly damning piece of evidence in a criminal case, there’s a defense attorney who can explain it away. For that, we turned to TIMOTHY PARLATORE, who previously served on the former president’s criminal defense team.

He wasn’t impressed with the new tapes.

“Seems selective,” he told us. “I’d like to hear the entire tape. Much like the Georgia call, an individual sentence without context can seem misleadingly incriminating, but context matters. The promise to get them lawyers does seem like this was part of a legal process.”

He added, “Ronna’s comment makes sense. If they were asking for a pre-certification audit, I don’t see anything incriminating about that. Better to ensure accuracy precertification than to try to do it after the fact.”

Happy Friday afternoon. Thanks for reading Playbook PM. Drop us a line at rlizza@politico.com and birvine@politico.com.

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MORE BACKING DOWN — With the Iowa caucuses just over three weeks away, Florida Gov. RON DeSANTIS’s primary super PAC, Never Back Down, is canceling all of its 2024 television ad reservations in Iowa and New Hampshire, according to the media tracking company AdImpact. Never Back Down Chair SCOTT WAGNER said the cancellations, totalling around $2.5 million, will allow the group to focus on “the ground game” while the DeSantis campaign and other PACs concentrate on ads, CBS News’ Aaron Navarro reports.

Speaking of the ground game … NYT’s Rebecca Davis O’Brien, Nicholas Nehamas and Kellen Browning published a deep look this morning, before the cancellations were announced, at how DeSantis’ costly gamble of outsourcing his extensive field operations has sputtered: “Interviews with more than three dozen voters, local officials and political strategists across Iowa and beyond revealed that — even setting aside the internal disruptions at Never Back Down — the immense, coordinated effort to identify and mobilize voters for Mr. DeSantis has struggled from the outset.”

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6 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW

Former President Donald Trump claps during a campaign rally.

President Donald Trump said that, should he be reelected, he would peacefully hand over the reins to his eventual successor. | Reba Saldanha/AP

1. ON THE RECORD: In an interview with conservative radio host HUGH HEWITT this morning, Donald Trump said that, should he be reelected, he would peacefully hand over the reins to his eventual successor, while simultaneously claiming that he had done just that following the 2020 election, Kierra Frazier reports: “‘Of course,’ Trump responded to Hewitt when asked if he would hand over power peacefully if reelected. ‘And I did that this time. And I’ll tell you what. The election was rigged, and we have plenty of evidence of it. But I did it anyway.’”

Mark it down … “Trump on Friday also said that if the 2024 presidential race was close, and there was one other Republican candidate left after the New Hampshire primary, he would debate them.”

2. IT’S 4:20 SOMEWHERE: “Biden is pardoning thousands convicted of marijuana charges on federal lands and in Washington,” by AP’s Zeke Miller: “The categorical pardon issued Friday builds on his categorical pardon issued just before the 2022 midterm elections that made thousands convicted of simple possession on federal lands eligible for pardons. The White House said thousands more would be eligible under Friday’s action.”

3. MIDDLE EAST LATEST — After a week of vote delays and intense negotiations to avoid a U.S. veto, the UN Security Council approved a modified proposal to raise humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip and urged immediate action "to create the conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities," Reuters' Michelle Nichols reports. The U.S. abstained on the resolution, which “no longer dilutes Israel's control over all aid deliveries to 2.3 million people in Gaza. … But a weakening of language on a cessation of hostilities frustrated several council members — including veto power Russia — and Arab and Organisation of Islamic Cooperation states.”

A look behind the curtain: As the Gaza death toll surges higher, the White House is working to prevent the conflict from ballooning on a wholly separate front, NYT’s Adam Entous, Ronen Bergman, Maria Abi-Habib and Euan Ward report. Biden administration officials, led by senior White House adviser AMOS HOCHSTEIN, have engaged in closed-door negotiations with Israel, Lebanon, and Hezbollah middlemen in an effort to “prevent cross-border skirmishes between Israel and Hezbollah … from escalating into an all-out conflict.”

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4. DISTRUST THE PROCESS: “‘He’s the only one that’s speaking the truth’: Trump’s fans trust nothing — except him,” by The Boston Globe’s Jess Bidgood and Niki Griswold: “The depth, intensity, and tenacity of these voters’ support of Trump has been a fixture of the presidential primary campaign, turning them into a bloc that is so well known, some pollsters have a name for them: the Always-Trump base. Less appreciated, however, is the fact that, for many of these voters, devotion to the former president is tightly bound with a deep distrust of the government, of basic institutions, and of his opponents.”

5. CLIMATE CORNER: In its latest climate incentive push, the Biden administration rolled out a divisive new plan today to award billions in tax credits to the makers of “green” hydrogen fuel, WaPo’s Evan Halper report. “The deep disagreement in Washington over how the money should be deployed, together with a lack of public awareness of how these technologies work and why they are chosen, creates a familiar challenge for the White House. … [E]ven some allies of the White House are worried about the challenges of controlling the narrative on a program that is so costly, controversial and confusing to the average voter.”

6. BANK ON IT: Biden signed an executive order today that takes action against banks and financial groups that assist Russia in dodging sanctions preventing it from obtaining military hardware and technologies that might help it fight Ukraine, NYT’s Alan Rappeport reports: “Senior administration officials described the new powers as a tool that would allow the United States to throw sand in the gears of Russia’s military industrial complex.”

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PLAYBOOKERS

Dean Phillips is accusing Joe Biden of “upending” the traditional primary process.

Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley will appear in back-to-back CNN town halls next month.

TRANSITION — Adam Finkel is now an economic policy legislative assistant for Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.). He previously was deputy chief of staff and legislative director for Rep. Brittany Pettersen (D-Colo.).

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