| | | | |  | | By Myah Ward, Eli Stokols, Lauren Egan and Ben Johansen | Welcome to POLITICO’s West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration. Send tips | Subscribe here | Email Eli | Email Lauren President JOE BIDEN has a crime problem. It’s not that crime is out of control. Violent crime has actually fallen dramatically since the pandemic surge. Property crime is down, too. The issue, particularly in an election year, is that Americans still see it as a serious problem. “Voters are definitely feeling that crime is increasing,” said CELINDA LAKE, a pollster for Biden’s 2020 campaign. “And I think you have a combination of increased shootings and increased media coverage of crime and increased petty crime post-Covid that is really unnerving to voters, particularly women voters.” Evidence that Biden understands the hand he’s playing has come in his public appearances. The president has been talking about the issue more, touting the positive data points and his efforts to reduce crime every chance he gets. He highlighted the drop in crime during his State of the Union address and had police chiefs at the White House in February to celebrate it. But it’s also been evident in subtler ways. The Department of Justice has been ramping up its efforts to tout violent crime reduction, dashing off news releases and organizing public appearances to highlight progress being made. Attorney General MERRICK GARLAND kicked off the year touting the drop and pledging to do even more to tackle all crime. DOJ officials have also fanned out across the country, speaking about crime reduction efforts at local and state events. Garland is set to deliver another crime-related speech on Wednesday. “The most important thing for the White House to do right now is to focus on how successful their policies have been in impacting peoples’ lives — reminding people outside the Beltway, we passed this law, and because we passed this law, you’re seeing fewer firearms on the streets in the hands of criminals,” said former Garland spokesperson ANTHONY COLEY, referring to the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which created two statutes that prohibits firearms trafficking and straw purchasing, while allowing for harsher prison penalties. Authorities have seized more than 1,300 guns from individuals not authorized to have them, according to recent data. But Biden and his team have to thread the needle with their messaging, said AUSTIN SARAT, a political scientist at Amherst College. The president can tout progress. But he does so at a risk of not recognizing the fear people continue to feel. Biden tried to strike that balance twice last week, when he called New York Mayor ERIC ADAMS to offer his condolences about the killing of an NYPD officer and when he put out a statement about a spate of stabbings in Illinois. “Families across America want the same thing: the freedom to feel safe in their community. That is my priority and the reason we’ve made major investments to provide communities with resources and law enforcement officers to prevent and fight crime,” Biden said after four people were killed in the stabbing spree. The administration’s message is complicated by former President DONALD TRUMP, who’s leaning into the issue in advance of the election, including today when he met with law enforcement in Michigan. While Biden was in New York for his fundraiser last week, Trump flew in to attend the wake of the slain NYPD officer, JONATHAN DILLER. The DNC and Biden campaign, for its part, isn’t willing to let Trump claim the high ground, slamming his presidency as the “opposite of law and order” in a statement on his Michigan trip. And from the White House, spokesperson ROBYN PATTERSON noted that the U.S. saw the largest one-year increase in murders in 2020 under the Trump administration. The president, Patterson said, will “continue working to hire over 100,000 more officers while reminding Americans that Congressional Republicans are attempting to pass a budget that cuts funding for the law enforcement officers who keep our communities safe.” Biden’s success in turning public opinion around on the issue of crime could play a large part in determining his electoral fate. But experts see it as a difficult task, even with the statistics showing clear improvement. Precisely because it has become political kindling, there will be heightened attention paid to each horrifying story. Social media has intensified the issue for Americans, said ADAM GELB, president and CEO of the Council on Criminal Justice. Videos and posts about crime can infiltrate feeds, bombarding users with footage they can watch on a loop, making these crimes no longer feel like random acts but a pervasive problem. “One of the advantages that Biden has is security and stability versus chaos under Trump,” Lake said. “And I think that emphasizing the crime issue is a way to try to undermine that strength and make it seem chaotic under Biden.” MESSAGE US — Are you AARON WATSON, senior White House video producer? We want to hear from you. And we’ll keep you anonymous! Email us at westwingtips@politico.com. Did someone forward this email to you? Subscribe here!
| | | | SUBSCRIBE TO GLOBAL PLAYBOOK: Don’t miss out on POLITICO’s Global Playbook, the newsletter taking you inside pivotal discussions at the most influential gatherings in the world, including WEF in Davos, Milken Global in Beverly Hills, to UNGA in NYC and many more. Suzanne Lynch delivers the world's elite and influential moments directly to you. Stay in the global loop. SUBSCRIBE NOW. | | | | | | | | | First lady JACKIE KENNEDY convinced French minister of cultural affairs ANDRÉ MALRAUX to lend the U.S. which art exhibit in 1963? (Answer at bottom.)
| | DEVASTATING: President Biden spoke over the phone with chef JOSÉ ANDRÉS on Tuesday, expressing his “deepest condolences” after an Israeli airstrike killed seven aid workers working in Gaza with the disaster relief charity World Central Kitchen, which Andrés heads up. “The president conveyed he is grieving with the entire World Central Kitchen family,” press secretary KARINE JEAN-PIERRE said at Tuesday’s press briefing. “The president conveyed that he would make clear to Israel that humanitarian aid workers must be protected.” The nonprofit group announced it would be pausing all aid operations in Gaza after providing thousands of starving Gazans humanitarian aid since the war began. National Security Council spokesperson JOHN KIRBY, who was also at the briefing, said the U.S. is “outraged” over the Israeli strike. CATCHING UP: Biden spoke to Chinese President XI JINPING on Tuesday in their first conversation since a November summit, our PHELIM KINE reports. The call comes amid heightened international tensions, with the ongoing war in Gaza and Ukraine, as well as lingering concerns around North Korea’s nuclear capabilities — all issues that were likely touched on. In the latest effort to diffuse hostilities between the nations, the two were expected to discuss a number of issues of potential U.S.-China cooperation, including countering narcotics and the growing field of artificial intelligence. The talk also comes as Treasury Secretary JANET YELLEN is gearing up to visit China next week, where she will meet with top Chinese officials about U.S. national security concerns, our ARI HAWKINS reports for Pro subscribers. WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE WANTS YOU TO WATCH: Monday night’s monologue from the Late Show’s STEPHEN COLBERT, recapping the news from the week. “I hope everybody had a good Easter weekend … Mine was low-key, all I did was moderate a record-breaking fundraiser with Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Joe Biden,” Colbert opened. “No biggie.” Colbert poked fun at Fox News for complaining that the White House had banned religious themed designs from the Easter egg contest (which, he noted, wasn’t true, crediting our Playbook colleagues’ research.) He also laid into Trump and the many Republicans who attacked Biden for recognizing Transgender Day of Visibility on Easter, despite the former being held annually on May 31 since 2009. Communications director BEN LABOLT shared the monologue on X. That said, we got a bone to pick with you, Colbert. At the end, you highlighted Air Force One’s theft problem among the press corps … without crediting our reporting. Time to upgrade your research team. WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE DOESN’T WANT YOU TO READ: This piece by CNN’s ELLA NILSEN who writes that Biden’s new budget proposal would slash a vital program within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration that tracks ocean data in its relation to climate change. Biden’s new budget would cut the program’s funding from $42.5 million to $10 million — which is much steeper than cuts proposed under the Trump administration. The program uses over 1,000 monitoring instruments to track currents, water temperature, oxygen levels and more in oceans and the Great Lakes, providing data to users inside and outside the government. “Essentially, we would have to go dark. … It is completely inconsistent with the priorities of the administration,” said GERHARD KUSKA, a marine scientist who heads up the program’s mid-Atlantic region. What’s the big deal, folks? Just enjoy the alarmingly warm water that’s obviously not feeding intense natural disasters causing billions in property damages and future mass civilian displacement! WALKING IT BACK: The Daily Caller on Tuesday retracted a story it published last week suggesting that the Biden White House had banned children from submitting eggs with religious symbolism to the annual Easter egg art contest. As the retraction notice states, the guideline “has been longstanding, dating back decades, and the Biden administration did not make any modifications to this rule.” Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre recognized the outlet at the start of her daily press briefing for having “integrity” and deputy press secretary ANDREW BATES tweeted that it “did the right thing.” And, frankly, good on them.
| | SUNSHINE STATE OPENING: The Biden campaign on Tuesday rolled out a new seven-figure ad in response to Monday's Florida Supreme Court ruling that upheld a ban on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy and paved the way for an even more restrictive six-week ban to take place. The court also allowed a proposed amendment enshrining abortion protections into the state constitution to appear on the November ballot. The ad is running in battleground states such as Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan, Georgia and North Carolina, as well as in Florida, CBS’ WEIJIA JIANG reports. “I’m running to make Roe v. Wade the law of the land again, so women have a federal guarantee to the right to choose,” Biden, speaking direct to the camera, says in the ad. “Donald Trump doesn’t trust women. I do.” The ad includes Trump’s words taking credit for the overruling of Roe.
| | MOVES AT THE DOT: Department of Transportation Under Secretary CARLOS MONJE JR. announced on Tuesday that he will be leaving the agency in April. As the third-ranking official at the DOT, Monje led teams focused on policy, research, aviation and international affairs and more. Assistant Secretary for Transportation Policy CHRISTOPHER COES will serve as acting under secretary for policy upon Monje’s departure.
| | TRUMP-PROOFING: The U.S. and other Western allies are considering placing a U.S.-led multinational group that coordinates arms shipments to Ukraine under NATO’s purview, our LARA SELIGMAN, STUART LAU and PAUL MCLEARY report. The move is aimed at helping maintain the transfer of arms to Kyiv should Donald Trump be elected this fall. During the NATO foreign ministerial meeting in Brussels this week, officials are expected to discuss the potential move, with hopes of finalizing the transition at the NATO leaders’ summit in Washington in July. MAKING HIS PITCH: While in Paris on Tuesday, Secretary of State ANTONY BLINKEN warned of a “critical moment” for Ukraine in its war with Russia, Reuters’ SIMON LEWIS and JOHN IRISH report. Blinken made the case for more Western support, lamenting the stalemate in Congress over the president’s multi-billion weapons package for Ukraine. “It is absolutely essential to get Ukrainians what they continue to need to defend themselves, particularly when it comes to munitions and air defences,” Blinken told reporters. MORE WIND: The Interior Department on Tuesday approved the country’s eighth commercial-scale offshore wind project, Reuters’ VALERIE VOLCOVICI reports. The project, which will be built off of the coast of Massachusetts, is projected to bring electricity online to over 900,000 homes. The New England wind project, which will generate 2,600 megawatts of electricity, brings the U.S. one-third of the way to Biden’s goal of permitting 30 gigawatts of offshore wind capacity by 2030. Sorry, birds!
| | | | Nervous about November? Imagine being Biden’s campaign manager. (WaPo’s Jesús Rodríguez) Jon Stewart claims Apple wouldn't let him interview FTC chair on his podcast (Axios’ Sara Fischer) Left-leaning New Yorkers plan a primary protest vote against Biden’s war policies (POLITICO’s Emily Ngo and Shawn Ness)
| | We’ve previously highlighted deputy chief of staff ANNIE TOMASINI’s playing days on the Boston University women’s basketball team, but one thing we didn’t touch on was her gritty play. According to former teammate MARISA MOSELEY, who now coaches the University of Wisconsin women’s team, Tomasini once broke her nose during practice but kept playing with a wraparound plastic mask for weeks. And in this 2002 postgame analysis, her former coach said that even while recovering from a hand injury hindering her play-making ability as a point guard, Tomasini was a spark in the final 21 minutes of action, scoring 10 points, three assists, two rebounds and a steal in the team’s win. Not bad. But did anyone see Sam overcome a bad hangover during a game of pick-up ball on a Sunday morning in the winter of 2009 at the local JCC? That was truly something.
| | | | A year prior, Kennedy was able to persuade the minister to lend the Mona Lisa to the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, a move many in the art world opposed. The National Gallery of Art’s director JOHN WALKER’s worst fear was that the painting would become a “sitting duck for criminals, terrorists and thrill seekers.” Walker also called the move an example of American hubris and warned if it was damaged on the trip, U.S.-French relations would be impossible to repair. But Kennedy's move paid off, as it made it to the U.S. without damage and was seen by over a million people in New York and Washington during its stay. 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 Sam Stein.
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