| | | | |  | | By Ankush Khardori | | Presented by |  | | | With help from Eli Okun, Garrett Ross and Bethany Irvine
|  | DRIVING THE DAY | | A note from the editors: Good morning, Playbookers! As we approach the election, we're pleased to occasionally welcome some guest POLITICOs to share their unique reporting, analysis and perspectives with the Playbook family. First up: Please welcome POLITICO Magazine senior writer, recovering lawyer and unrecovered politics junkie Ankush Khardori …
|  This is a coin-toss election — and will probably remain one all the way through Election Day. | AP Photo | 2016 ALL OVER AGAIN? — With a little more than three weeks to go, the race for the White House between KAMALA HARRIS and DONALD TRUMP is, as a practical matter, a dead heat. You can obsess over the polls day in and day out. (This morning’s fodder: Harris +3 in Pennsylvania, Trump +5 in Arizona, per NYT/Siena.) You can revisit your favorite forecaster’s projections. You can track the political betting markets. The reality is, this is a coin-toss election — and will probably remain one all the way through Election Day. That dynamic has generated a wave of anxiety throughout the anti-Trump political coalition this past week — with concerns that the campaign is “stuck in the mud,” that there’s a “familiar feeling of despair creeping in,” that Harris is failing to make inroads with the necessary demographic groups in the key states, that the campaign “has stalled.” Along with the bedwetting have come the pre-criminations — with groups within the coalition starting to turn on one another in the press and pre-position themselves to avoid blame for a loss. (If you’re in the mood to be generous, you can also call this “sounding the alarm.”) Maureen Dowd pretty much sums up the vibes in her NYT column this morning: “Where Is the Fierce Urgency of Beating Trump?” Given all that, we figured it’s a good moment to take a bit of a political deep breath, so we dialed up MICHAEL PODHORZER, the former political director for the AFL-CIO whose prescient analysis of the 2022 midterms drew our and many others’ notice. Back in August, as Democrats were descending on Chicago for the DNC and feeling fabulous about their chances after JOE BIDEN stepped aside, Podhorzer argued that everyone should in fact hunker down for a brutal fight in the seven swing states that will effectively decide the election. Two months later, that analysis is looking pretty damn sharp — particularly coming off a new battery of battleground state polls that helped fuel this week’s mini-panic among Trump’s political opposition. Here’s what Podhorzer had to say about the next 24 days: — About those pre-criminations: He has heard some of the same concerns about the Harris campaign’s targeting and resource allocation decisions, but he cautioned against taking them too seriously at this stage. “One of the underlying weaknesses of the Democratic party ecosystem is that it is just so market-driven that it creates anti-collaborative, anti-supportive incentive structures” among the professional Democratic class, he said. Not all players are the same — he drew a distinction between political activist organizations (think unions and abortion rights groups) and political firms (think PACs, polling companies, digital ad companies) — but they are in competition, whether it’s for business or for elite status within the Democratic coalition. He also warned about overly slicing-and-dicing the polling to over-obsess about particular demographic groups. “The secret” to winning an election, Podhorzer said, “is that you’re trying to get more votes. You don’t get bonus points because you figure out how to get more white non-college voters.” — A lack of urgency across the electorate: Podhorzer’s diagnosis of the close race is a deceptively simple one: “People were more alarmed” about Trump’s presidency in 2018 and 2020, he said, which brought out a critical mass of voters who sat out the race in 2016. The question is whether that urgency can be reignited, and on that Podhorzer and Dowd are largely in sync. “Harris needs to let her guard down, cut loose and turn on the afterburners,” she writes this morning. “Mainly, her pitch is that she’s not Donald Trump. And that’s an excellent pitch. But she needs to make the case for herself more assertively.” — Raising the stakes: Podhorzer offered some observations about how he’s seen the actual policy stakes of a second Trump presidency get lost in the typical election-year back and forth. “When we do focus groups with the segment of Latinos that are answering survey questions saying that they’re comfortable with mass deportation,” he said, “what comes out quickly is” that they do not appreciate how draconian and expansive Trump’s proposal could actually be. “That focus group flips,” he said, as soon as they learn that they or their loved ones could get swept up in it themselves. Like many Democratic political professionals, Podhorzer places much of the blame with the media’s coverage of the race. “A number of reporters have done really excellent articles about what a second Trump term might look like,” he said. But the reporting on the policy stakes, he argued, has not been sufficiently integrated into the daily campaign coverage — leading to questions, for instance, about how Trump can be making inroads with Latinos while campaigning on a program of mass deportation. — It’s on Harris, too: It’s not all the media’s fault. We noted, for instance, that Harris herself did not press on Trump’s mass deportation plan at her Univision town hall on Thursday night. “That’s kind of disappointing,” Podhorzer said. And with the exception of abortion rights, there has also been relatively little discussion by Harris about the implications of the election for the long-term trajectory of the Supreme Court — an issue that is of great interest to Podhorzer and many other Democrats. If Trump is reelected, it’s plausible, if not probable, that justices SAMUEL ALITO and CLARENCE THOMAS will step down, and perhaps others. That would give Trump the opportunity to appoint an outright majority of the court and to lock in a multi-generation conservative bloc. When we pointed out there seemed to be less emphasis on this point than people like Podhorzer would like, he agreed: “I know. I don’t get that.” The good news, he said, is there’s still time for course-correction: “The voters who we’re talking about are just, in a sense, beginning to actually check in.” Good Saturday morning. Thanks for reading Playbook. Drop me a line: akhardori@politico.com.
| | | | 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. | | | ABOUT THOSE ‘INTERNAL POLLS’ — “Harris and Trump take divergent paths in a tied race,” by WaPo’s Michael Scherer, Josh Dawsey and Tyler Pager: “Internal polls on both sides roughly match the public numbers that show the race in the seven battleground states within the statistical margin of error and mostly unchanged in recent weeks. … But the two camps are treating that information in divergent ways. Trump’s team has embraced bravado as it tries to keep its candidate on message and encourage him to avoid the sort of high-profile national audiences that might motivate Harris’s supporters. … Harris’s team has, by contrast, embraced the ‘underdog’ spirit of her July launch, hoping to motivate more action from her supporters and grab the attention of those sitting on the sidelines.” A VISUAL GUIDE TO THE HOUSE GOP — “The five factions Johnson has to appease to keep the speakership next year,” by Olivia Beavers and Jordain Carney: The Anti-Johnson 11 … Disgruntled Republicans … Rivals’ allies … First-term members … Silent Republicans
| | | | 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 | | At the White House Biden has nothing on his public schedule. Harris will travel to Raleigh, North Carolina, in the afternoon. On the trail Trump will be in Coachella, California, for a rally at 8 p.m. Eastern. Vance will be in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, to deliver remarks at 2:30 p.m. He will hold a town hall in Reading, Pennsylvania, at 5:30 p.m.
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Trump is feeling the fundraising gap as the race closes. | Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP | TRUMP TEARS INTO DONORS — Back in September, at a gathering of some of the top-dollar donors in the Republican Party at Trump Tower, Trump made it known to those gathered and “tore through a bitter list of grievances. He made it clear that people, including donors, needed to do more, appreciate him more and help him more,” NYT’s Jonathan Swan, Maggie Haberman and Shane Goldmacher report. “He disparaged Vice President Kamala Harris as ‘retarded.’ He complained about the number of Jews still backing Ms. Harris, saying they needed their heads examined for not supporting him despite everything he had done for the state of Israel. At one point, Mr. Trump seemed to suggest that these donors had plenty to be grateful to him for. He boasted about how great he had been for their taxes, something that some privately noted wasn’t true for everyone in the room. “The rant, described by seven people with knowledge of the meal who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations, underscored a reality three weeks before Election Day: Mr. Trump’s often cantankerous mood in the final stretch.” RACE FOR THE WHITE HOUSE BILL OF HEALTH — Harris this morning released a letter from the VP office’s official physician that advisers are hopeful will draw a sharp contrast for voters with Trump, who is now the oldest major party candidate in U.S. history and has kept information regarding his health undisclosed over the years. “In summary, Vice President Harris remains in excellent health,” the letter from Army Col. JOSHUA SIMMONS reads. “She possesses the physical and mental resiliency required to successfully execute the duties of the Presidency, to include those as Chief Executive, Head of State and Commander in Chief.” Read the full letter TRUMP IN AURORA — “Trump calls Aurora a ‘war zone.’ Even its Republican mayor disagrees,” by Irie Sentner in Aurora, Colorado: “Donald Trump has described this apartment complex in Aurora as a ‘war zone’ overrun by Venezuelan gangs intent on taking over the city of 400,000. But at the dwellings at the center of the controversy, on a quiet street near a local community college, children played outside Friday as residents and community organizers prepared for a cookout and neighborhood fiesta later that evening.” FACT CHECK — “Data shows migrants aren’t taking ‘Black jobs’ or ‘Hispanic jobs,’ despite what Trump says,” by AP’s Fatima Hussein JUST VANCE — Vance sat down for an exclusive conversation on NYT’s “The Interview” podcast with Lulu Garcia-Navarro, which was posted this morning. The headline news (which trickled out yesterday) from the interview was Vance dodging the question of whether Trump lost in 2020 on five occasions during the chat. But in the lengthy conversation, Vance also gives extensive and illuminating answers on his debate performance, his shifting views over the years, his Catholic faith, abortion, his comments on Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio and much more. Read the full transcript and listen to the episode … Five takeaways Related read: “JD Vance’s mom got health coverage under Trump — by using Obamacare,” by WaPo’s Dan Diamond and Isaac Stanley-Becker FOR YOUR RADAR — “Group with close ties to Trump transition says it was targeted in cyber attack,” by Meridith McGraw and Hailey Fuchs: “AFPI did not disclose whether any data was removed in the hack, how the breach occurred or the identification, if known, of the actors behind the intrusion.” LOOKING AHEAD — “America’s 250th birthday, the World Cup, the Olympics: The vibes promise to be much different under Trump or Harris,” by The Boston Globe’s Jim Puzzanghera POLL POSITION Pennsylvania: Democratic Sen. BOB CASEY +4, per Philly Inquirer/NYT/Siena. … Arizona: Democratic Rep. RUBEN GALLEGO +8, per NYT/Siena. Gallego +6, per ActiVote. … Nebraska: GOP Sen. DEB FISCHER +6, per Torchlight Strategies. … New Jersey: GOP Rep. TOM KEAN +2, per the DCCC.
| | | | | | PLAYBOOK READS | | | 5 THINGS THAT STUCK WITH US
|  World leaders are still bending the ear of Trump as he tries to return to the Oval Office. | Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP | 1. TRUMP IN EXILE: “Inside Donald Trump’s Shadow Presidency,” by NYT’s Peter Baker: “In the nearly four years since he left the White House, Mr. Trump has acted as something of a shadow president on international affairs operating out of what he used to call the Winter White House at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. Even before he kicked off a comeback bid to reclaim his old office, foreign governments realized that Mr. Trump was still a force in American politics and that they needed to take him into account in their dealings with the United States. “Now that he is the Republican nominee for president in next month’s election, foreign leaders have been playing up to Mr. Trump even more. A parade of world leaders has made the pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago or to Trump Tower in New York, including the leaders of Ukraine, Israel, Poland, Hungary, Argentina, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and other countries.” 2. COMPARE AND CONTRAST: “The Economy Under Trump vs. Biden,” by WSJ’s Justin Lahart: “Comparing exactly how the economy has done during the Biden administration versus the Trump administration is less than straightforward. The pandemic severely disrupted the country during Trump’s last year in office, and into the Biden years. Both men might like a pass or two on some aspects of how things fared under their watch. Some caveats probably are in order, and the president’s ability to influence something as large and complex as the U.S. economy is often limited. That said, both were in charge, and their economic records are their economic records.” 3. FLORIDA LATEST: “After Helene’s strong winds, heavy rains and a wall of water took 20 lives in the state along its path from south to north, Milton had claimed at least 17 more, bringing the ocean’s fury ashore with several feet of storm surge, three months worth of rain in three hours to some areas and a deadly tornado outbreak as it churned from west to east,” CNN reports. “The trail of destruction all the way from the Gulf to the Atlantic is vast. Flooded, blocked by fallen trees or damaged, impassable streets number in the hundreds. Exhausted emergency responders have rescued more than a thousand. And an already weakened power grid buckled for millions.” To say the least: “Hurricanes do little to move Republicans on climate,” by Emma Dumain Related reads: “A Retirement Community Prepared for a Hurricane. Tornadoes Came Instead,” by Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs in Fort Pierce, Florida … “‘Hope can really hurt sometimes’: Families agonize over loved ones still missing from Helene,” by WaPo’s Sarah Kaplan and Dino Grandoni 4. LIKE THEY NEVER LEFT: There is a segment of X users who were once banned from Twitter, accounts that have been reinstated now that ELON MUSK is running the show. The accounts — belonging to the likes of LAURA LOOMER, Rep. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R-Ga.), ALEX JONES and more — are picking up where they left off, consistently pushing “false claims and narratives about immigration, race, natural disasters and stolen elections,” NYT’s Kate Conger, Tiffany Hsu and Aaron Krolik report in an analysis of tens of thousands of posts by high-profile reinstated users. “The company has not disclosed how many people have been allowed back. The accounts tracked by The Times — political candidates, media personalities, Mr. Trump and members of his inner circle — are most likely a sliver and do not represent everyone who was reinstated. But they often propel the conspiracy theories that circulate on Mr. Musk’s social network.” 5. MIDDLE EAST LATEST: Officials in the U.S. and across the world closely watching the conflict in the Middle East “believe there may be a window for a new push to break the political deadlock in Lebanon to try to ease escalating war,” AP’s Matthew Lee reports. “To that end, Secretary of State ANTONY BLINKEN spoke by phone separately Friday with acting Lebanese Prime Minister NAJIB MIKATI and parliament speaker NABHI BERRI about the need to resolve the situation, the State Department said.” It comes as overnight Israeli bombings in the Gaza Strip “killed at least 20 people, trapped thousands more and prompted one of the area’s last functioning hospitals to issue desperate pleas for assistance,” NYT’s Liam Stack and Rawan Sheikh Ahmad. Related read: “No justice for Palestinian Americans killed in West Bank, families say,” by WaPo’s Miriam Berger
| | | | A message from United for Democracy:   | | | | CLICKER — “The nation’s cartoonists on the week in politics,” edited by Matt Wuerker — 17 keepers
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| GREAT WEEKEND READS: — “Inside the Patriot Wing,” by N.Y. Mag’s Tess Owen: “January 6 rioters are running their jail block like a gang. They’re leaving more radicalized than ever.” — “The Moment of Truth,” by The Atlantic’s Tom Nichols: “The reelection of Donald Trump would mark the end of George Washington’s vision for the presidency — and the United States.” — “The Endless Downfall of a Crypto Power Couple,” by NYT’s David Yaffe-Bellany: “Ryan Salame, an FTX executive, and Michelle Bond, a crypto policy advocate, were once a Washington power couple. Now they both face prison time.” — “The Trumpification of American policy,” The Economist: “No matter who wins in November, Donald Trump has redefined both parties’ agendas.” — “A Gun Law the NRA Opposes Could Have Saved Its Employee’s Life,” by The Trace’s Mike Spies: “The National Rifle Association once supported red flag gun laws, which are meant to protect people like Dawn Williams-Stewart, a staffer who was shot and killed by her husband.” — “The American Who Waged a Tech War on China,” by Wired’s Issie Lapowsky: “China is racing to unseat the United States as the world’s technological superpower. Not if Jake Sullivan can help it.” — “How ‘Snowflake Babies’ Could Change IVF Politics,” by POLITICO Magazine’s Joanna Weiss: “‘Snowflake’ babies helped people on the left become parents and helped people on the right make peace with thorny ethical issues with IVF.” — “What Really Happens on the Ground When the US Slaps Tariffs on China,” by Bloomberg’s Shawn Donnan and Bill Allison: “Pittsview, Alabama, and Emporia, Virginia, both make trailers essential for commerce. They show the surprising consequences of trying to protect American jobs.” — “Silicon Valley, the New Lobbying Monster,” by Charles Duhigg for The New Yorker: “From crypto to A.I., the tech sector is pouring millions into super PACS that intimidate politicians into supporting its agenda.” — “The Steele dossier author promises more Trump dirt. Will anyone buy it?” by WaPo’s Manuel Roig-Franzia: “In ‘Unredacted,’ Christopher Steele unveils the fruits of fresh sleuthing and warns that Trump is a threat to democracy.”
| | | | | PLAYBOOKERS | | Michael Pettis, a punk-music-club and record-label owner turned economist, has caught the attention of Trump and Harris. TRANSITION — Dominic Perrottet has joined BHP as head of corporate and external affairs for the U.S. He is the former premier and treasurer of New South Wales. ENGAGED — Savannah Viar, deputy comms director at the NRCC, and Chet Martin, national field director at the NRSC, got engaged on Friday in Athens, Georgia, where the couple met while they were students at UGA. Pic … Another pic WEDDING — Melissa Marovich, a tech executive who serves on the steering committee for Maverick PAC, and James Tang, MaverickPAC New York chair and a Navy Reserve officer, got married last weekend at the New York Athletic Club. Pic HAPPY BIRTHDAY: RNC co-chair Lara Trump … CNN’s Chris Wallace … NYT’s Michael Barbaro … Axios’ Juliegrace Brufke … Rosie Gray … VA’s Tanya Bradsher … State’s Stephanie Sutton … Kate Nocera … Megan Cheney … NPR’s Jack Speer … Jamie Hennigan of the National Association of Manufacturers … Collin Berglund … WSJ’s Gary Rosen … Kenneth Ahn … Glen Bolger of GP3 Tech … Jorge Guajardo of DGA Group … former U.S. Treasurer Anna Escobedo Cabral … Eric Wilson … Bloomberg’s Anna Edney … Jack Detsch … former Reps. Ed Royce (R-Calif.) and Joe Garcia (D-Fla.) … Simon Limage … former Sen. Jake Garn (R-Utah) (92) … Amber Lyons … former Michigan Gov. John Engler … David Oleksak … former Labor Secretary Seth Harris … AP’s Alan Suderman … Keifer Wynn of Rep. Ken Buck’s (R-Colo.) office … DCCC’s Kim Villalobos … POLITICO’s Gaelle Ngadjui and Dustin Racioppi THE SHOWS ( Full Sunday show listings here): ABC “This Week”: Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) … Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear. Panel: Donna Brazile, Reince Priebus, Rachael Bade and Susan Glasser. CBS “Face the Nation”: DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas … Speaker Mike Johnson … Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) … Anthony Salvanto. FOX “Fox News Sunday”: Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) … Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz … FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell. Panel: Richard Fowler, Mary Katharine Ham, Cal Thomas and Bob Cusack. Sunday Special: Hadassah and Matthew Lieberman. NBC “Meet the Press”: Speaker Mike Johnson … Liz Cheney … Steve Kornacki. Panel: Monica Alba, Cornell Belcher, Leigh Ann Caldwell and Lanhee Chen. CNN “State of the Union”: Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) … Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.) … Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.). Panel: Ashley Allison, David Urban, Doug Thornell and Scott Jennings. Fox News “Sunday Morning Futures”: Donald Trump. MSNBC “Inside with Jen Psaki”: Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.) … Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) … James Carville. NewsNation “The Hill Sunday”: Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) … Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-Neb.) … David Rubenstein. Panel: George Will, Jasmine Wright and Jessica Taylor. 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. Corrections: Yesterday’s Playbook misidentified Carol Joynt and misspelled the names of Leigh Ann Caldwell and Pamela Brown.
| | | | 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.
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