| | | | |  | | By Garrett Ross | | Presented by |  | | | |  | THE CATCH-UP | | | WE JUST CAN’T QUIT YOU — “It’s 2024. Elon Musk Rules X. And the Political World Is Still Addicted,” by Deseret News’ Evan McMorris-Santoro and Alex Roarty: “People do not like to be on it, but they also once again have to be.”
|  President Joe Biden delivers remarks at the Pointe du Hoc monument in Normandy, France, on Friday, June 7. | Evan Vucci/AP Photo | TO THE POINTE — President JOE BIDEN spoke at Pointe du Hoc in Normandy this morning as he continues to commemorate the 80th anniversary of D-Day. In his remarks, Biden emphasized the importance of democracy — a twofold message intended for audiences back home and abroad. “As we gather here today, it’s not just to honor those who showed such remarkable bravery that day, June 6, 1944,” Biden said in his speech. “It’s to listen to the echo of their voices. To hear them. Because they are summoning us. They’re asking us what will we do. They’re not asking us to scale these cliffs. They’re asking us to stay true to what America stands for.” Though he did not mention DONALD TRUMP by name, Biden’s words “were, to a large degree, geared not just towards a broad American audience but toward specific segments of it — those Republicans enamored by Trump’s isolationism, skittish Democrats and even traditional independents for whom his outward patriotism and traditional world view might strike a chord,” Eli Stokols and Eric Bazail-Eimil write. Earlier today in Paris, Biden met with Ukrainian President VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, to whom he apologized for the delay in sending the most recent aid package, noting that “some conservatives were holding it up.” Biden committed to Zelenskyy that the U.S. is in the fight to the end, Matt Berg and Eli Stokols report from Paris. “I will assure you, the United States is going to stand with you,” Biden said in a brief appearance before reporters at the outset of their meeting. “You are the bulwark against the aggression that is taking place. We have an obligation to be there. ... We’re still in, completely, thoroughly.” “Zelenskyy thanked the U.S. for its support, but he also noted that there was more to discuss. He said he didn’t want to share certain updates about the war while members of the press were in the room, but that he planned to bring them up with Biden. ‘There are some details on the battlefield you need to hear from us,’ he said. Their private meeting lasted 30 minutes.” BUSINESS IS BOOMING — On paper, a jobs report that shows surges in wages and a sinking unemployment rate would look like a boon for the president in a fraught election year. That’s exactly what the latest reading from the Labor Department delivered today. “But 2024 isn’t a typical election year, and for Biden, even the best news has its downside,” Sam Sutton writes. The details: “The Labor Department’s latest stunner showed that U.S. employers added 272,000 jobs in May, shattering expectations that nonfarm payrolls would reflect a softening market as other indicators point to a cooler economy. Average hourly earnings also rose by an annual pace of 4.1 percent, surpassing the rate of inflation. And while unemployment climbed to 4 percent for the first time in more than two years, it’s still below historic norms.” The double-edged sword: “The turbo-charged labor market will provide Biden and his Democratic allies fodder on the campaign trail as they work to convince voters that the economy is much stronger than public polling suggests. But it also puts a major obstacle in the path of the Federal Reserve lowering interest rates for businesses and consumers.” Happy Friday afternoon. Thanks for reading Playbook PM. Drop me a line at gross@politico.com.
| | | | A message from Groundwork Collaborative: Do you think the tax code is fair? We don’t — and it’s time to fix it.
For too long, the tax code has been slanted towards the wealthy and large corporations, and the economy and our country have suffered as a result. The expiration of key provisions of the Trump tax law in 2025 is a rare opportunity to reform the tax code and ensure it is fair, raises revenue, and supports equitable economic growth. Learn more. | | | | | 7 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW | | |  Hunter Biden and his wife Melissa Cohen Biden arrive to court on Friday, June 7. | Matt Slocum/AP Photo | 1. LATEST FROM WILMINGTON: Prosecutors have officially rested their case in the case against HUNTER BIDEN on criminal gun charges, Ben Feuerherd and Betsy Woodruff Swan report from Delaware. “Biden’s attorneys are expected to put on a brief defense case that will likely wrap up early next week. The president’s son has not yet indicated if he’ll testify in his own defense.” NAOMI BIDEN, Hunter’s daughter, was among the witnesses called by the defense today. “Before resting their case, prosecutors called their final two witnesses Friday morning. One was JASON BREWER, an FBI forensic chemist who works at Quantico. He testified about testing residue he determined to be cocaine from a pouch where Biden allegedly kept the gun. The other was JOSHUA ROMIG, an assistant special agent in charge at the Drug Enforcement Administration. He testified about a series of text messages that showed Biden was buying crack in 2018.” 2. STOCKING THE POND: The RNC has hired ED MARTIN — a former chair of the Missouri Republican Party and a major booster of Trump’s efforts to subvert the 2020 election — to help craft the party platform ahead of Trump’s nomination, NBC’s Sahil Kapur and Ryan Reilly report. Martin “gave a speech to Trump supporters in Washington on the eve of the Capitol attack, calling on ‘die-hard true Americans’ to work until their ‘last breath’ to ‘stop the steal,’ according to video posted on social media.” Video evidence shows Martin marching with Trump supporters toward the Capitol on Jan. 6, though there is no indication that he actually entered the building or broke any laws. But his involvement is yet another indication of the “extent to which the ‘Stop the Steal’ movement has become institutionalized in the GOP.” 3. BEHIND DOOR NO. 1: If Democrats manage to win control of Washington back this fall, they see next year as a major opportunity to “reset fiscal policy and raise taxes on corporations and high-income households” with the lapse of the Trump tax law set for the end of 2025, WSJ’s Richard Rubin writes. “Policymakers and analysts expect a yearlong fight and Christmas-season negotiations to prevent tax increases from hitting most Americans after Dec. 31, 2025, when the law’s cuts end. Lawmakers are starting to think through what leverage they have — and how and when to use it.” Of course, there is also the prospect that neither party will have enough control to maneuver and “a multitrillion-dollar stare-down could bleed into 2026.” Progressives, at least for now, “say no deal might be better than a bad one, at least temporarily, to force Republicans to split tax cuts for households making under $400,000 from those making more than that.” 4. BEHIND DOOR NO. 2: Should Trump secure a return to the White House in November, he and his team of advisers are “vowing to wrest key spending powers from Congress if elected this November, promising to assert more control over the federal budget than any president in U.S. history,” WaPo’s Jeff Stein and Jacob Bogage write. “The Constitution gives control over spending to Congress, but Trump and his aides maintain that the president should have much more discretion — including the authority to cease programs altogether, even if lawmakers fund them. Depending on the response from the Supreme Court and Congress, Trump’s plans could upend the balance of power between the three branches of the federal government.”
| | | | THE GOLD STANDARD OF POLICY REPORTING & INTELLIGENCE: POLITICO has more than 500 journalists delivering unrivaled reporting and illuminating the policy and regulatory landscape for those who need to know what’s next. Throughout the election and the legislative and regulatory pushes that will follow, POLITICO Pro is indispensable to those who need to make informed decisions fast. The Pro platform dives deeper into critical and quickly evolving sectors and industries—finance, defense, technology, healthcare, energy—equipping policymakers and those who shape legislation and regulation with essential news and intelligence from the world’s best politics and policy journalists.
Our newsroom is deeper, more experienced, and better sourced than any other—with teams embedded in the world’s most active legislative and regulatory power centers. From Brussels to Washington, New York to London, Sacramento to Paris, we bring subscribers inside the conversations that determine policy outcomes and the future of industries, providing insight that cannot be found anywhere else. Get the premier news and policy intelligence service, SUBSCRIBE TO POLITICO PRO TODAY. | | | | | 5. CARPETBAG CHRONICLES: During the 2022 midterms, one of the most intense political dramas played out in New York, where it appeared then-DCCC Chair SEAN PATRICK MALONEY switched districts to push Rep. MONDAIRE JONES into a choice to run against him or hop to another slice himself. The saga ended with Jones moving to an open Brooklyn district and Maloney eventually ousted, but the optics always seemed worse for Maloney. Now, there are new details emerging about the episode, calling into question the narrative of the time and Jones’ handling of the situation. “In May 2022, as progressives blasted Maloney for forcing Jones out of NY-17, Maloney contacted Jones and offered to pull out of the NY-17 race, only for Jones to turn him down because he preferred to run in a different district,” City & State’s Timmy Facciola reports. “And far from being reluctant to challenge Bowman, Jones was eager to primary his neighbor — at least until internal poll results showed that he had no hope of defeating him.” 6. GOIN’ TO CALIFORNIA: Trump’s swing through the Golden State, where he popped into a high-dollar fundraiser in San Francisco this week “highlights a rising power player in California: the nerd right,” Lara Korte and Dustin Gardiner report. “The former president traveled to San Francisco Thursday to court a small but vocal group of sympathetic tech entrepreneurs and venture capitalists who, following the likes of ELON MUSK, are embracing Trump’s bombastic but business-friendly platforms in rebuke of Biden and Democrats’ policies. Who they are: “As self-styled iconoclasts, they loudly rebel against California’s liberal tradition. Backing Trump helps scratch that contrarian itch. The $300,000-per-person fundraiser, hosted at billionaire venture capitalist DAVID SACKS’ Pacific Heights mansion, included many of the Silicon Valley elite that have bristled at Biden’s approach to antitrust enforcement, artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency.” 7. FAILURE TO STANCH: “U.S. Confronts Failures as Terrorism Spreads in West Africa,” by NYT’s Eric Schmitt and Ruth Maclean: “Groups that have declared allegiance to Al Qaeda and the Islamic State are on the march. Military coups have toppled civilian-led governments in Mali, Guinea, Burkina Faso and Niger. The new leaders have ordered American and French troops out, and in some cases invited Russian mercenaries in to take their place. As the United States withdraws 1,000 military personnel from Niger and shutters a $110 million air base there by September, American officials are scrambling to work with a new set of countries in coastal West Africa to battle a violent extremist insurgency that they perceive is steadily seeping south.”
| | | | POLITICO is gearing up to deliver experiences that help you navigate the NATO Summit. What issues should our reporting and events spotlight? Click here to let us know. | | | | | | | PLAYBOOKERS | | Joe Biden is leaning into the Caitlin Clark effect for the WNBA. Ketanji Brown Jackson got concert tickets from Beyoncé. Tulsi Gabbard is open to serving in Donald Trump’s administration. James Comer fell victim to a Washington classic: rules for thee but not for me. Eugene Vindman’s name is proving a major weapon in his bid for Abigail Spanberger’s seat. IN MEMORIAM — “T.D. Allman, Assertive Globe-Trotting Journalist, Dies at 79,” by NYT’s Adam Nossiter: “T.D. Allman, a free-spirited journalist who challenged American mythmaking in pointed, personal reporting over five decades on topics as varied as the Vietnam War and contemporary Florida, died on May 12 in Manhattan. He was 79. His death, in a hospital, was caused by pneumonia, his partner, Chengzhong Sui, said.” OUT AND ABOUT — The Future of Privacy Forum on Wednesday hosted its inaugural FPF DC Privacy Forum: AI Forward, exploring the intersection of data privacy and AI. SPOTTED: Jules Polonetsky, Christopher Wolf, Anne Flanagan, John Verdi, Josh Lee, Alan Raul, Dale Skivington, Agnes Bundy Scanlon, Adam Russell, Michelle Maldonado, Robert Rodriguez and Sam Levine. — SPOTTED at a Tobacco Harm Reduction Community event on Capitol Hill on Wednesday night: James Decker, Rey Anthony, Tim Costa, Nicolle Miranda, Mary Ann Gomez Orta, Parker Edwards, Jeyben Castro, Carissa Faña, Alex Bolton, Stuart Malec, Danny Ruiz and Diego Zambrano. TRANSITION — Ken Dieffenbach is now executive director at the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee. He previously was deputy assistant inspector general for investigations at DOE’s Office of Inspector General. 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.
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