Clyburn floods the zone

Jan 22, 2024

By Elena Schneider, Lauren Egan, Myah Ward and Ben Johansen

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In 2020, Rep. JIM CLYBURN’s endorsement of then-Vice President JOE BIDEN breathed life back into a nearly dead campaign. But the congressman said it didn’t happen “in a vacuum.” He taped radio ads. He cut robocalls. He aimed to talk to every Black radio station in South Carolina within hours of his endorsement to explain why he was backing Biden.

In 2024, Clyburn believes the same strategy applies to Biden’s reelection campaign. While many in the nation are affixed on New Hampshire’s primary tomorrow, Clyburn is looking ahead to the contest in his state next week and, in particular, reaching out to Black voters, with whom Biden has been underperforming.

“I’m concerned when I see these obvious accomplishments being left out of all the stories,” Clyburn said. “We’ve got to flood the zone.”

West Wing Playbook sat down with Clyburn to discuss that and much more.

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

What does a strong showing look like for Joe Biden in South Carolina on Feb. 3?

I don’t expect we’ll have turnout like we’ve had over the last several years because those were open, contested primaries. I suspect — a good strong 65 percent of the electorate [for Biden].

On CNN, you recently said you were “very concerned” about the Biden campaign reaching Black voters and “breaking through the MAGA wall.” What are you specifically concerned about?

The best example I know is student loan debt relief. Joe Biden made a big commitment to student loan debt relief. I pushed him, publicly, for a long time. I carried a bill over here for $50,000 a year in debt relief. Joe Biden would never go there (to the Senate). Quite frankly, looking back at what he did, and the way he did it, I am absolutely ecstatic that he didn't because that is the part of the effort now determined to be unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

[But] $57 billion dollars was eliminated under the public service category. I didn't see one word about that. That's the wall that concerns me.

I didn't talk to a single Black person who did not say, ‘I am not going to vote for Joe Biden because he didn't keep his promise.’ But he had! How do people know? It wasn’t being reported.

What, very specifically, do you think the campaign should be doing to break down that wall?

We just have to do less esoteric stuff. You’ve got to be pointed. I'm reading all these stories now about Black men, and Trump getting about 15 percent of them. Every time a Black man says to me that he's looking at Trump, I look him in the face and ask him, ‘Do you have a sister? I know you’ve got a mother. Would you vote for a person who looks in a TV camera and refers to a Black woman as a dog? Would you do that?’

The Biden campaign did spend $25 million on positive ads in battleground states to explain what it's done. It didn’t move the numbers.

I didn’t see a single ad on student loan debt. I talked to a statewide candidate last week. He said, ‘The biggest problem Joe Biden’s got in my statewide poll is student loan debt.’ That's what he said.

Are there any other issues they need to focus on to help them break through?

Oh, yeah! Take the insulin stuff. My wife was a four-shot-a-day diabetic. Now, she got taken care of, but when Biden proposed a $35 cap for everybody, the Senate would not go along. When the bill got to the Senate, Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) put up an amendment to strike that out of the bill. … We tried to do it for juvenile [diabetes]. How many children are being born with diabetes every day? Some of them, their families got insurance, but if they live in South Carolina and you don't have insurance, and the state has not expanded Medicaid, then how much are they going to pay? That’s the way you talk to people.

What about third-party candidates? Do you worry about someone like Cornel West appealing to these voters?

I’m not worried about that. My job is to make the case. If I don’t make it, if I fail, then I fail. If I sit around worrying, then I won’t make the case.

OK, not worry — concerned?

I’m concerned about my ability to break through that wall. Because I used to be in this business. If I'm not getting help from the media, then how am I gonna do it? We’re going to break through it. I’m concerned when I see these obvious accomplishments being left out of all the stories.

I need to ask about one of your colleagues. Dean Phillips stripped “diversity, equity and inclusion” from his website, after one of his top donors Bill Ackman publicly criticized the position. What’s your reaction to it?

You know, I think that what voters look for more than anything else are two things: honesty and authenticity. And that's lacking in both.

What advice do you have for the Biden campaign right now?

My whole thing is, I think we’ve got to rely less on TV ads and more on validators. We’ve got to flood the zone because this is not going to be an ordinary election.

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POTUS PUZZLER

Which comedian became known for running a satirical presidential campaign in New Hampshire every cycle from 1968 to 1996?

(Answer at bottom.)

The Oval

FRONT AND CENTER: The White House on Monday announced a series of abortion initiatives aimed at protecting access to contraception and abortion medication. The new guidance, which comes on the 51st anniversary of the Roe v. Wade ruling, requires insurers “to cover a broader range of contraceptives at no cost under the Affordable Care Act,” our ALICE MIRANDA OLLSTEIN writes.

Biden also convened the fourth reproductive rights task force meeting to discuss abortion rights, as well as to hear from physicians on the fallout since Roe was overturned last year, according to a statement from the president.

Vice President KAMALA HARRIS traveled Monday to Wisconsin to begin her nationwide tour on abortion access, homing in on an issue that will be key to the campaign’s message. She bashed former President DONALD TRUMP while there: “Let us be clear eyed about the harm people across our nation are experiencing and who is responsible,” referring to the three Trump-appointed Supreme Court justices who voted to overturn Roe.

FOR REAL, IT IS MALARKEY: Democrat voters in New Hampshire have received deepfake robocalls of President Biden discouraging supporters from voting in Tuesday’s primary, NBC’s ALEX SEITZ-WALD and MIKE MEMOLI report. The voice in the message begins the call with a classic Biden line: “What a bunch of malarkey.”

WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE WANTS YOU TO READ: This op-ed by WaPo’s JENNIFER RUBIN, who calls the positive media coverage on the economy long overdue. She writes that the positive coverage Biden is seeing as a result of 2023 year-end economic numbers — such as consumer sentiment — should have come earlier.

“Much of the media appears to be scrambling to catch up to reality,” Rubin says. “That has significant political implications for President Biden, whose economic success has been played down, dismissed or ignored — on the grounds that the public does not feel better. Well, now there is no excuse for the derisive coverage of Biden’s economic stewardship.”

Deputy communications director HERBIE ZISKEND shared the piece on X.

WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE DOESN’T WANT YOU TO READ: This piece by The Hill’s JULIA MUELLER, who rounds up a Harvard CAPS-Harris poll that shows Trump beating out Biden with independent candidate ROBERT F. KENNEDY on a hypothetical 2024 ballot. The poll finds Trump leading Biden by 7 points in a head-to-head matchup. The poll also finds Trump’s lead growing when other third-party candidates CORNEL WEST and JILL STEIN are thrown into the mix.

CHEESEHEAD: The president will travel Thursday to Wisconsin, press secretary KARINE JEAN-PIERRE told reporters at today’s press briefing. Biden will visit Superior, where he will tout his administration’s economic agenda and how it is “spurring a small business boom and creating good paying jobs,” Jean-Pierre said.

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THE BUREAUCRATS

FIRST IN WEST WING PLAYBOOK: EDUARDO CISNEROS is leaving the White House, where he most recently was a senior adviser in intergovernmental affairs, our DANIEL LIPPMAN has learned. He started on the first day of the Biden administration on the White House Covid-19 response team as its intergovernmental affairs director.

MORE PERSONNEL MOVES (BUCKLE UP): ZACHARY NOSANCHUK has been promoted to deputy press secretary at the Department of Housing and Urban Development and KALEENA DWYER has been promoted to be senior digital strategist at HUD, Lippman has also learned. Nosanchuk most recently was assistant press secretary, while Dwyer was digital strategist.

— ADAM HODGE is now managing director at Bully Pulpit International. He has served in senior Biden administration roles, including as the National Security Council spokesperson and as the assistant U.S. trade representative for public affairs.

— MICHAEL MORRIS on Monday left the White House, where he served as director of public affairs for the Office of the National Cyber Director. He plans to do communications work in the private sector.

— ALLIE PECK is now a press assistant for the Department of Energy, after serving for three years as a senior legislative affairs adviser at the White House.

— SARAH MILLER has been promoted to be chief of staff for FTC Chair LINA KHAN. She most recently was a senior adviser for Khan.

— CHLOE KOSEFF is now a special assistant in the Office of Science at the Department of Energy. She most recently was a legislative assistant for Sen. LAPHONZA BUTLER (D-Calif.).

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Agenda Setting

SCOTUS WIN FOR BIDEN: The Supreme Court on Monday sided with the Biden administration in allowing Border Patrol agents to remove the razor wire that Texas Gov. GREG ABBOTT had deployed along the U.S.-Mexico border, CNN’s DEVAN COLE reports. The decision overrides a federal appeals court last month that ordered that the agents stop removing the wire.

Chief Justice JOHN ROBERTS and Justice AMY CONEY BARRETT joined the court’s three liberal justices in the ruling.

TOUGHEN UP: The top two bipartisan members of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party have urged the Biden administration to crack down on imported goods linked to Chinese forced labor, WSJ’s RICHARD VANDERFORD reports.

In their letter to Homeland Security Secretary ALEJANDRO MAYORKAS and Attorney General MERRICK GARLAND, the leaders urged the administration to ramp up criminal prosecutions and further enforce the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, “a law that blocks the import of goods tied to forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region,” Vanderford writes.

MAN, EVEN MORE WISCONSIN STUFF: Treasury Secretary JANET YELLEN will travel to Wisconsin on Friday, where she will join the growing list of Biden officials headed to the state, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s LAWRENCE ANDREA reports. The secretary plans to tour a labor training nonprofit in Milwaukee aimed at helping people get jobs in manufacturing, construction and other sectors.

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What We're Reading

AI is destabilizing ‘the concept of truth itself’ in 2024 election (WaPo’s Pranshu Verma and Gerrit De Vynck)

On a Remote Island, Blinken Signals U.S. Attention to Africa (NYT’s Michael Crowley)

In Long-Shot Challenge to Biden, Dean Phillips Goes Where Few Democrats Dare (WSJ’s Molly Ball)

POTUS PUZZLER ANSWER

For 28 years, PAT PAULSEN used slogans such as “We Cannot Stand Pat,” and “We Can Be Decisive, Probably” during his parody campaigns. In 1996, Paulsen received 1 percent of the vote in New Hampshire (1,007 votes to be exact), finishing second behind incumbent President BILL CLINTON.

A mock biography on his campaign website toward the end of his campaigning years said: ''Pat's campaign was based in comedy and he ran it using outright lies, double talk and unfounded attacks on his challengers. Who thought that this style would be the method of campaigns in the future?''

A CALL OUT! Do you think you have a harder trivia question? Send us your best one about the presidents, with a citation or sourcing, and we may feature it!

Edited by Eun Kyung Kim and Sam Stein.

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