How’s this for a rallying cry? If we lose the midterms, Trump will run again and (could) steal 2024

Posted on May 30, 2021 by Aldous J Pennyfarthing

I never thought a fascist takeover of the galaxy could ever be less entertaining than the one depicted in The Phantom Menace, but here we are. One major American political party remains tethered to reality, whereas the other is a barmy cult of personality that worships at the clay feet of the worst human being I’ve ever laid eyes on outside of the port-a-potty queue at the annual Chilton, Wisconsin, Beer Festival—which is a long story, but trust me. And the line to pee in the creek is even worse. I only wish I were kidding.

Being the guileless backwoods naif that I am, I figured Donald Trump would be forced to slink away after the sound beating he received in November from the guy he kept calling a senile loser. After all, when George W. Bush left the country in a smoldering heap after his eight years of misrule, Republicans scrambled away from him like Quint trying to escape the shark on the deck of the Orca at the end of Jaws.

But Trump is different. For one thing, he doesn’t have the common decency to concede an election he lost—by a lot. For another, he’s somehow mesmerized a majority of Republicans into believing he’s their bumblefuck messiah, despite having surrendered the White House and his congressional majority during his truncated tenure—and despite having incited a deadly insurrection based on corrosive lies about the integrity of our elections.

So here we are. I fully expected Republicans to dip a diffident toe or two back into consensus reality after the big dopey Dr. Zaius cosplayer was 86’d from the White House, but it looks like they’re all-in on febrile fantasy.

The Maricopa County audit, the conspicuous (and appalling) lack of enthusiasm among Republicans for a Jan. 6 commission, the rebuke of ultraconservative but anti-Big Lie Republican Liz Cheney, polls showing that a majority of Republicans still think the election was stolen from Trump—it’s all more than a little scary. I was already freaking out about 2024 and the possibility that Donald Trump would run again instead of vanishing forever under a pile of fast food detritus after removing a load-bearing McRib box.

Then MSNBC’s Mehdi Hasan welcomed Yale professor Timothy Snyder and Emory University professor Carol Anderson, both historians and experts on democracy, onto his UpFront show. He asked them a chilling hypothetical: What happens if Republicans hold Congress in 2024 and a Democrat wins the White House?

Buckle in. This gets weird.

"If the Republican candidate is running on the Big Lie, if that's their issue in 2024...the Republican candidate who loses the election will indeed be appointed by Congress to be President of the United States," Prof @TimothyDSnyder tells me tonight. Wow.pic.twitter.com/Vaj4QL5Brx
— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) May 25, 2021

Transcript!

HASAN: “Tim and Carol, I’m going to ask you both the exact same question I asked Norm Ornstein and Ruth Ben-Ghiat on the show last week. If the Republicans are in control of the House and Senate come 2024 and a Democrat wins the presidential election narrowly, do you believe a Republican Party in Congress will certify that Democratic candidate’s win in Congress? Yes or no? Tim.”

SNYDER: “I think if the Republican candidate is running on the Big Lie, if that’s their issue in ‘24 the way that it seems to be in ‘22, then the answer to your question is the Republican candidate who loses the election will indeed be appointed by Congress to be president of the United States.”

HASAN: “Wow. Carol?”

ANDERSON: “Given that we have Republicans now who refuse to back the Jan. 6 commission, which was about the overthrow of an election … a fair election, given that we have the refusal of the Republicans to go in on impeachment, and given that they’re doing all of this work to undermine democracy with voter suppression and taking over control of electoral certification, I see this as a dress rehearsal for 2024 where they will not certify.”

HASAN: “Wow. So that’s Norm, Ruth, Tim, Carol. Four experts on this show all have answered this question in a very, very depressing way, but it’s important that we have this discussion.”

Jaw ===> floor

These experts aren’t in the mold of modern-day Republican “experts.” Ornstein, a contributor to The Atlantic and The Washington Post, helped draft parts of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law. Ruth Ben-Ghiat is a professor of history at New York University who “writes frequently for CNN and other media outlets on threats to democracy around the world.”

None of them, as far as I know, makes a living selling mediocre pillows to donkey-brained dipshits. So that’s scary shit, indeed. But it could also be an opportunity. Why? Because Donald Trump is a coward.

Let me explain.

In a recent Politico story on Republicans’ attitude toward a potential Trump 2024 run, Trump flunky and perduring magic toadstool hallucination Lindsey Graham said this:

“It’s more likely than not that he does” run, Graham said. “How we do in 2022 will have a big effect on his viability. If we do well in 2022, it helps his cause. I want him to keep the option open.”

So there it is, from Hermey himself. Graham doesn’t explain why Trump’s viability as a candidate would be improved if Republicans take back Congress in 2022 and then build their momentum enough to hold onto it in 2024, but I will: It would make stealing the election a piece of cake.

Trump is a loser. Full stop. He lost in 2020 and, if our elections are conducted in 2024 the way they always have been (i.e., with Congress’ certification of the results being taken as a mere formality), Trump would almost certainly flame out, assuming President Joe Biden isn’t handed some major crisis that he fails to get under control.

After all, Trump lost by 7 million votes last time, and that’s before he tried to shiv democracy with his stabby little Chucky doll hands. The guy’s poll numbers were underwater for all but a few days of his White House tenure. On the day he left office, his aggregate disapproval rating, according to FiveThirtyEight, was a whopping 57.9%. Sure, the guy would likely skate through the primary process and would almost certainly be the GOP nominee if he ran, but he’d likely be dead in the water in the general election. Who (beyond his death cult) would want him back?

Most of the country has moved on and never wants to lay eyes on this sodden heap of off-brand urinal cake ever again. But Republicans—who, let’s not forget, make up less than 30% of the population—can’t get enough of the guy. Fifty-three percent of these deludenoids still think Trump is the rightful president, FFS.

And so there’s our opportunity. Participation in midterm elections is typically far less than that of presidential elections. Voter turnout was strong in 2018—particularly in the suburbs—as many Democrats, independents, and disaffected Republicans came out to rebuke Trump and his agenda. Trump was on the ballot in 2020, and 81 million people came out to toss his ass, swamping the MAGAs’ own enthusiastic turnout.

Without a doubt, Trump can be a motivating factor, whether he’s on the ballot or not.

So here’s our motivation—and our rallying cry—for 2022.

If we lose Congress in the midterm elections, Trump will almost certainly run again, seeing his opportunity to cheat and manipulate his way to victory regardless of the actual results. If we keep Congress, Trump may finally slink away, knowing that he’d have little to no chance of pulling off another upset.

Incumbency is a huge advantage in a presidential election, and Trump won’t have that this time. His only advantage would be the likelihood—dare I say the guarantee?—of Republican treachery. But that can’t happen if there aren’t enough treacherous GOPsters in Congress to pull off an election theft.

So if you want Trump to run again—to be a major part of your waking life again—by all means, skip the midterm elections. If you don’t, show the fuck up, and make sure your friends and neighbors do, too.

That’s a rallying cry for 2022 if I’ve ever heard one. If we win in 2022, which we must, Trump will likely bugger off—finally and forever. Because he knows he can’t win, and he’s nothing if not a coward. If we lose, well, that could be the end of democracy as we know it.

Let’s win. In the face of insurmountable odds, let’s make sure we win.

The alternative is simply too awful to consider.

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Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: The anti-democracy, pro-coup Republicans, unmasked

Posted on May 29, 2021 by Greg Dworkin

Greg Sargent/WaPo:

A GOP senator’s angry shaming of Mitch McConnell demands more from Democrats

In an extraordinary nine-minute session with reporters, Murkowski called on McConnell to stop placing “short-term political gain” before the need to grapple with what really happened on Jan. 6. At stake are the “principles of democracy we hold so dear,” which must be valued “beyond just one election cycle.”

It didn’t work, of course. Senate Republicans just successfully filibustered the commission. A couple more Republicans voted for it than expected, but still, virtually all voted against even allowing it to be debated.

Murkowski did a good job shedding light on the problem we now face. But here’s the thing: In the end, only Democrats can begin to solve that problem.

It’s crystal clear that the only thing the GOP cares about is power, and absolutely nothing else.

A telling stat on Newsmax and Trump's waning influence. Trump's Tuesday interview was Newsmax's top-rated hour -- with 295,000 total viewers. In comparison, Maddow drew 2.6 million and Hannity nabbed 2.3 million viewers in the same hour. Even Cuomo more than tripled Trump.
— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) May 27, 2021

Susan B Glasser/New Yorker:

American Democracy Isn’t Dead Yet, but It’s Getting There

A country that cannot even agree to investigate an assault on its Capitol is in big trouble, indeed.

Before leaving town for their Memorial Day recess, in fact, Senate Republicans successfully used the legislative filibuster for the first time this session to block the proposed bipartisan panel. Their stated arguments against a commission range from the implausible to the insulting; the real explanation is political cynicism in the extreme. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who is so far delivering on his pledge to focus a “hundred per cent” on blocking Biden’s agenda, even claimed that an investigation was pointless because it would result in “no new fact.” John Cornyn, a close McConnell ally, from Texas, was more honest, at least, in admitting, to Politico, that the vote was all about denying Democrats “a political platform” from which to make the 2022 midterm elections a “referendum on President Trump.” For his part, Trump has been putting out the word that he plans to run for reëlection in 2024—and exulting in polls showing that a majority of Republicans continue to believe both his false claims of a fraudulent election and that nothing untoward happened on January 6th. Needless to say, these are not the signs of a healthy democracy ready to combat the autocratic tyrants of the world.

“Turns out, things are much worse than we expected,” Daniel Ziblatt, one of the “How Democracies Die” authors, told me this week. He said he had never envisioned a scenario like the one that has played itself out among Republicans on Capitol Hill during the past few months. How could he have? It’s hard to imagine anyone in America, even when “How Democracies Die” was published, a year into Trump’s term, seriously contemplating an American President who would unleash an insurrection in order to steal an election that he clearly lost—and then still commanding the support of his party after doing so.

Time to give up on Marco Rubio, who will never do the right thing if there’s any risk | Editorial https://t.co/Ln6bgE7I72 pic.twitter.com/xHHt61oXwi
— Orlando Sentinel (@orlandosentinel) May 27, 2021

Stephen Richer/ National Review:

The Madness of the Maricopa County Election Audit

I’m a libertarian-minded Republican. I hate taxes. Especially the income tax. But I pay all required taxes.

I suspect you also pay your taxes. And like most Americans, you probably don’t cheat or lie.

For that reason, even though an IRS audit might annoy you and cause you some stress, you’d eventually realize that you have nothing to fear as long as the audit is done fairly and properly.

But you’d likely feel differently if the IRS outsourced the audit to someone who:

Had no applicable professional credentials

Had never previously run a tax audit

Believed that Hugo Chavez had nefariously controlled your tax-auditing software

Had publicly stated prior to examining your taxes that you’d certainly committed tax fraud

That is what is happening to elections in Maricopa County, Ariz. — the home of almost two-thirds of Arizona’s voting population.

STEPHEN RICHER is the Maricopa County recorder. He was elected, as a Republican, in November 2020, and took office in January.

The cool thing about taxing the rich nationally is you don't have to worry about them leaving for a lower-tax state (and no they don't generally leave the country, lol).
— Daniel Marans (@danielmarans) May 28, 2021

Ronald Brownstein/CNN:

Is the GOP's extremist wing now too big to fail?

Congressional Republicans have crystallized an ominous question by rejecting consequences for Donald Trump over the January 6 riot in his impeachment trial and welcoming conspiracy theorist Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia into their conference: Has the extremist wing of the GOP coalition grown too big for the party to confront?

Pro-insurrection Republicans are already claiming a 1/6 commission with an equal number of Dem and GOP nominees that has bipartisan majority support in both houses is somehow partisan and unfair, which indicates they’d lie about any report regardless, so just do it, bill or no.
— Nicholas Grossman (@NGrossman81) May 28, 2021

Peter Hotez/Daily Beast:

The Only Way to Resolve the Wuhan ‘Lab Leak’ Controversy

Increasingly, the longstanding near-consensus that the likely origins of human COVID-19 was in an animal virus reservoir, such as bats, is coming under fire. In that scenario, which I continue to think is the most plausible, the virus’ gestation or circulation in bats may have been followed by increasing human-bat interactions, possibly as a result of the expansion of human populations in forested areas. A similar scenario was likely responsible for the emergence of Ebola virus infection in Africa. Many scientists feel it is more likely that the novel coronavirus may have jumped from bats to humans indirectly, through an intermediate animal.

The major competing view throughout this pandemic has been that the virus was conceived artificially through manipulations in the laboratory (especially the Wuhan Institute of Virology), that it was a naturally occurring virus that leaked from a lab accidentally, or both. While many have suggested there may be so-called “smoking guns” for one or the other hypothesis, to my mind, they are inconclusive at best. For example, the finding of unique RNA sequences in the COVID-19 virus, including a so-called furin-cleavage site, is considered by some as evidence of virus manipulation in the laboratory or “gain-of-function” research. The latter refers to cases where scientists attempt to actually make a virus more transmissible or infectious deliberately.

However, furin-cleavage sites are well-known to be present in multiple naturally-occurring coronaviruses, including the MERS coronavirus. Therefore, it is not at all clear that such sites were engineered by scientists working on SARS CoV-2.

It's actually genuinely remarkable that 6 Republican Senators joined Democrats on a major bill. But instead of encouraging that to happen more often, the filibuster just prevents this kind of bipartisanship from even being a possibility.
— Steven White (@notstevenwhite) May 28, 2021

Gregory J Wallance/The Hill:

Marjorie Taylor Greene should be expelled from Congress — but Republicans are too afraid of Trump to do it

Greene should be expelled from Congress. Perhaps once it was tempting to dismiss her as just a fringe character with her past support for QAnon, her claim that the Parkland, Fla., school shootings were a false-flag operation and her suggestion that space lasers caused the California wild fires for the benefit of, among others, an investment banking firm that bears the name of a prominent Jewish family. It started to dawn on people that Greene is potentially dangerous when it emerged that she had endorsed social media posts advocating violence against Democrats, which caused House Democrats and a handful of Republicans to vote to strip her of her committee seats.

Hours after voting against the Jan. 6 Commission, Sen. Hyde-Smith released a statement about Memorial Day, saying that “those who died for us deserve to be honored every day.” I asked her office & Wicker's if they had met with Gladys Sicknick. No reply. https://t.co/iYcrYtvQ1x
— Ashton Pittman (@ashtonpittman) May 29, 2021

News Roundup: Republicans filibuster the commission, commission, commission

Posted on May 29, 2021 by Walter Einenkel

It is Friday! In the wee hours of the night, the Republican Party destroyed the chances for our country to investigate the closest our nation has come to a coup d’etat since the main form of visual media was the daguerreotype. It’s not surprisng but it is a sad statement about where our country is at. But it is Friday! We have a long weekend to spend with loved ones and friends, and to think about the millions of those who have come before us and passed on after defending our country in its many battles these last 244 years, 10 months, and 24 days.

From the community:

Hatred is the coward's revenge for being intimidated.

—George Bernard Shaw

There’s a second federal investigation underway looking at Rudy Giuliani’s actions in Ukraine

Posted on May 28, 2021 by Mark Sumner

Even before the 2016 election, Donald Trump and his supporters were pushing back against news that Russia was directly interfering in the U.S. presidential election. Even though Russia had engaged an army of false social media accounts, a network of sites dedicated to generating Trump-favorable false stories, and teams of dedicated hackers digging into documents at the DNC, Trump refused to say a bad word about the land of Vladimir Putin. Instead, Trump and his campaign pushed a conspiracy theory that all the hackers, bots, and Facebook ads didn’t actually come from Russia. Instead, said Trump’s campaign, the U.S. was being taken for a ride by that most powerful of opponents … Ukraine.

Trump and members of his campaign team pushed a completely unsupported idea that the “Cozy Bear” hackers were actually Ukrainians just pretending to be Russian. Then Trump took the whole thing further, insisting that Hillary Clinton’s emails were somehow stored on a “missing server” that was somewhere in Ukraine. That there was no missing server in the first place wasn’t a problem.

It was all ridiculous. But over the next four years, Trump set out to prove that not only was Ukraine behind the 2016 hacks, they were also hiding criminal activity on the part of Joe Biden and his son. So, with the help of Rudy Giuliani and a cast of seemingly hundreds of eager to help scam artists, Trump spent months making connections with pro-Russian elements in Ukraine and leaning on the Ukrainian government. Those efforts not only earned Trump his first impeachment, it seems they also opened the 2020 election to foreign interference … from Ukraine. By way of Rudy Giuliani.

As The New York Times reports, federal prosecutors are now investigating whether a group of Ukrainian officials launched a scheme to use Trump to get things they wanted in exchange for false information that Rudy Giuliani could spread in hopes of harming President Joe Biden. Which … yes. Yes, that happened. And it’s already been well-documented by House investigators.

It’s been clear for months that Giuliani established ties to both exiled oligarch Dmytro Firtash and corrupt officials like parliament member Andriy Derkach. Firtash, who is also connected with former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and employs Trump attorneys Joe diGenova and Victoria Toensing, gave Giuliani the indicted Igor Fruman and Lev Parnas to act as his guides to the Ukrainian underworld. With both Trump and Firtash leaning in, Giuliani had no trouble finding plenty of people willing to sign off on statements that smeared Biden—even if some of those same people instantly folded when questioned and admitted that they were just trying to “curry favor” with Trump.

However, Giuliani’s efforts in Ukraine did have some very serious consequences, including giving power to hoodlums who wanted a U.S. ambassador out of the way so they could increase their level of corruption. Giuliani gleefully served that role, helping to demean and dismiss a dedicated career official so that he could get crooks to sign onto his scheme.

Now that Giuliani is the subject of an ongoing criminal investigation that has seen his home and office raided, it seems that prosecutors are also looking at the people on the other end of the pipe. Particular attention seems to be focused on Derkach. Derkach has been both named by the intelligence community as an “active Russian agent” and sanctioned by the Treasury Department. He’s also one of Giuliani’s primary sources for claims against Biden and his son, Hunter.

The only person standing up for Derkach appears to be Giuliani, who said in an interview, “I have no reason to believe he is a Russian agent.” He said that after being officially warned that Derkach was … a Russian agent. Which is a pretty important denial for Giuliani.

The federal case against Giuliani seems to center on to what extent he acted as an unregistered foreign agent for Ukrainian elements in lobbying Trump to take actions such as the firing of Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch. That Giuliani did such a thing as a dupe of corrupt former officials supported by an oligarch who can’t even set foot in his own country for fear of arrest … that’s bad. But if it turns out that Giuliani did this as the knowing partner of someone who had been identified to him as an active agent of Russia … that’s considerably worse.

This investigation is based in the U.S. attorney’s office in Brooklyn, and is apparently running in parallel with the investigation into Giuliani’s activities being based in the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan. Hopefully they’re sharing notes.

Trump lickspittles have taken over Republican Party, but a handful of rebels play long game

Posted on May 28, 2021 (Updated June 1, 2021) by kos

All Republicans are awful. They are greedy, selfish, death-worshipping assholes. Let’s just stipulate that because it’s objectively true—it’s no accident that while they were happy to toss aside their supposed fealty to “family values” and “national security” during the Trump years, the one thing they got accomplished was tax cuts for the über-wealthy. Their priorities have always been clear.

That said, we can divide Republicans into two camps, one of them full of morons beyond belief, and the other not so dumb. The first has surrendered itself completely to the felon-in-waiting Donald Trump, who cost them the House, the Senate, and the White House—only the third president to lose reelection in the last hundred years. He isn’t just the nation’s biggest loser, but a living reminder of the GOP’s lack of any actual ideological core beyond tax cuts for the rich. Remember, Republicans didn’t even bother writing a party platform during their presidential convention! Why bother writing anything down when all that matters is what Trump thinks in the moment, subject to his changing irrational whims?

The Trump lickspittles have won the battle for control of their party. But there is a smaller faction—those Republicans who, while ideologically odious, at least remain loyal to the Constitution and the principles of American democracy. It’s a low bar to meet and a distressingly small number of Republicans meet it, but they exist.

Yet while this small minority of Republicans might be on the outs today, they’re playing the long game, and it’s a smarter game to play. They may not be the future of the party, but they have more of a chance to do so than any of the Lickspittle caucus ever will.

Six Republicans voted for the Jan. 6 commission:

Bill Cassidy, Louisiana Susan Collins, Maine Lisa Murkowski, Alaska Rob Portman, Ohio Mitt Romney, Utah Ben Sasse, Nebraska

This nearly mirrors the list of Republicans who voted to convict during Trump’s second impeachment trial. The only differences are that Pennsylvania’s Pat Toomey is missing (he didn’t bother to stick around) and Portman was added to this list.

Of those, Portman is retiring, Collins represents a blue state, and Murkowski is protected by the strange politics of her state (including the brand new “top-four” jungle primary that protects her from being ousted in a traditional Republican-only primary).

Cassidy, Romney, and Sasse, however, represent solid red states (even if Utah isn’t particularly Trump-loving), and Sasse, in particular, has presidential ambitions. (Maybe Romney too.)

Over in the House, 35 Republicans voted for the commission—a stunningly large number of defectors—led by Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, who was recently cancelled from the House leadership. That is a significant increase from the 10 who voted for Trump’s second impeachment. And if you look at that list, it’s not a list of “liberal Republicans,” or even moderates. No liberal Republicans are left, and precious few moderates, as well. Most were solid conservatives standing up for the Constitution.

It would be hard to point to any elected official and not think that they have higher-office aspirations. So these Republicans, in all future campaigns, will have this vote hung around their necks during their primaries. It’s the reason so many Republicans took the coward’s way out and stood by Trump. They were afraid to face their base voters having stood up to Trump. There are the loyalists, like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who are far gone in Q-conspiracy land and worship their idol Trump. But aside from those, there are the opportunists—the Sens. Josh Hawleys and Ted Cruzes, Republicans working feverishly to capture that Trump electoral magic in a bottle and releasing it for their own benefit in their inevitable future presidential bids. George P. Bush is the latest of that crowd to humiliate themselves in a bid to win Trump’s approval.

What the Liz Cheneys and Ben Sasses know, because it’s obvious, is that Trump will never anoint any of that crowd—not the loyalists, and not the opportunists—for anything in which he or his spawn have their eye on. He is loyal to himself first, and Ivanka Trump second. Then, to a lesser degree, his sons. And after that, the spouses and partners. That’s it!

There isn’t a chance in hell that a Trump doesn’t run for president in 2024. It might not be Donald Trump himself—he might be too indicted, too convicted, too in jail, or too dead from all those disgusting Big Macs he eats. But if it isn’t the Liar in Chief himself, it will be one of his children. The loyalists might not care, pathetically worshipping at the altar of Trump. But the opportunists are making a bet that will never pay off. They will never inherit the Trump movement, because Trump doesn’t give a rat’s ass about anyone but himself and his clan. They have thrown in with an odious, morally obscene man who will never give them the approbation they so desperately want from him.

Cheney and Sasse are ambitious politicians. They know what they face inside their party, and they’re making a calculated bet that someday sanity will return to their party, and their brand of competent conservatism will once again have value. These are smart politicians, and they know the pitfalls and dangers they face ahead. They may lose their next primary bids. They may be further ostracized and marginalized. They may simply fail to stem the tide of a Republican Party falling deeper into conspiracy territory.

But if the Republican Party ever breaks out of this current fever, they’ll be there to pick up the pieces and lead it onward.

The chance that happens is slim. What, 5% or 10%? Let’s not pretend odds are good. But it’s not out of the realm of impossibility. And even 10% is a higher chance of success than the big 0% the lickspittles have of ever becoming president, becoming leaders of their party, or even winning any seats coveted by the Trump clan.

Senate GOP blocks Jan. 6 commission, likely dooming independent investigation

Posted on May 28, 2021 (Updated May 28, 2021) by By Nicholas Wu

Senate Republicans on Friday blocked a bill that would form an independent commission to probe the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, the first filibuster of the year by the chamber's 50-vote minority.

The 54-35 vote, with six Republicans breaking ranks to join every Democrat in favor, came after Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell lobbied his members forcefully against the House-passed commission measure. The vote was delayed through the night by a handful of Senate Republicans who obstructed China competitiveness legislation, though Democrats decided to punt that bill until after the Memorial Day recess week in order to push forward on the commission bill.

Several undecided Republicans came down against advancing the commission ahead of Friday’s critical procedural vote, despite efforts by Sen. Susan Collins of Maine to broker a compromise and last-minute lobbying by the family of fallen Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick. McConnell took an increasingly hard public and private line against establishing the new panel to probe the Jan. 6 Capitol attack by pro-insurrectionists, dubbing the commission idea “extraneous” on Thursday.

Senate Republicans had not blocked any of Democrats’ bills on the floor before Friday. Democrats lamented the blockade of the legislation, with the memory of the violent insurrection still fresh in the minds of many lawmakers.

“On Jan. 6, we all walked over that broken glass. We all saw the spray paint on the walls. We all stood huddled together in shelter," Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) said on the floor before the failed vote.

The six Republican senators who voted to advance the commission proposal were Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, Mitt Romney of Utah and Rob Portman of Ohio. All but one of them also voted to convict former President Donald Trump in his second impeachment trial earlier this year. All six received public thanks from Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), evicted from her party's House leadership 16 days ago after vocal criticism of Trump and his role in the riot.

A seventh GOP senator who also voted to convict Trump this year, retiring Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, would have supported advancing the House-passed commission bill had he not been called away from Washington for a family commitment, a spokesperson said.

Given Trump's role in encouraging his supporters to storm the Capitol on Jan. 6, as well as his public opposition to the House-passed commission bill, Democrats wasted no time in tying the Friday filibuster to the former president.

"Donald Trump's big lie has now enveloped the Republican Party," Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said on the floor.

The GOP blockade could put further pressure on senators to consider reforms designed to weaken the filibuster, despite Sen. Joe Manchin's (D-W.Va.) repeated affirmation that he supports a 60-vote threshold to pass most legislation.

Sen. Ben Ray Lujan (D-N.M.), called Friday’s vote one of the “defining moments that all of our colleagues need to take a look at, I think for the good of our country.”

Collins’ efforts to negotiate a compromise to allay some Republicans’ fears about the makeup of the commission failed to gain traction, with many Republicans opposing a separate commission regardless of its form. Democrats were also skeptical of her changes, arguing they already made alterations in the House to address Republicans’ concerns.

The proposed commission, modeled after the 9/11 Commission, would have equal subpoena power and an even split between Republican and Democratic appointees, both top Republican requests.

Romney described his colleagues' filibuster as “unfortunate."

“I think it would be appropriate to have further evaluation of what happened on Jan. 6 and who's responsible and how we can prevent that from happening again,” he said.

Cassidy warned of the consequences for Republicans of a partisan investigation. “The investigations will happen with or without Republicans,” he said, arguing that only Republican involvement would keep them “fair, impartial, and focused on the facts.”

The Senate voted on the Jan. 6 commission shortly before leaving for recess. It’s unclear if the concept might come back up for another vote, or whether Democrats will abandon the commission to pursue their own investigations. Friday’s filibuster, however, likely dooms the prospects of any comprehensive independent investigation into the insurrection.

Top Democrats are weighing whether to deploy a one-party inquiry into the events of Jan. 6. Such an approach, known as a select committee, would not require Republican support but could be seen as partisan. Speaker Nancy Pelosi did not indicate her plans on that front in an otherwise scathing statement after the GOP filibuster.

“Leader McConnell and Senate Republicans’ denial of the truth of the January 6 insurrection brings shame to the Senate," Pelosi said. "Republicans’ cowardice in rejecting the truth of that dark day makes our Capitol and our country less safe."

House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn said Thursday on CNN that Pelosi should “empower certain committees” or “create a select committee” like the coronavirus committee he chairs to conduct investigations, though he acknowledged there was “no question” Republicans would cast either effort as partisan.

Democrats could also continue with existing committee investigations into the insurrection. FBI Director Christopher Wray is set to testify before the House Oversight Committee next month, and several Senate committees are expected to issue their own reports on the insurrection in the coming weeks.

Klobuchar, who chairs one of the committees set to issue a report, said it would be “no substitute” for an independent commission, calling it an analysis of immediate security fixes rather than a deeper dive into the attack.

Burgess Everett and Sarah Ferris contributed to this report.

Trump Will Run For President In 2024, Jim Jordan Predicts

Posted on May 27, 2021 by LifeZette

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) went on Fox News on Tuesday night to predict that Donald Trump will run for president again in 2024.

Jordan Predicts Trump Will Run In 2024

“I think he is,” Jordan told host Sean Hannity when asked if Trump will run. “Every time I speak to him, it — he says that he wants to run. He plans to run, I think, but he hasn’t fully committed that yet. But I certainly hope he does because no president has done more of what he said he would do than President Trump. Best president I think we’ve ever had:”

“Keeping his word, doing what he said, doing what he was elected to do,” he continued. “That’s the kind of individual we need in the White House, and that’s the kind of individual that our adversaries respected because they knew he was putting America’s interests first and standing strong for the principles that matter.”

Mark Meadows Agrees

Jordan’s former House Freedom Caucus colleague Mark Meadows feels the same way.

“Listen, Sean, when he came down that escalator, the left has been going after him attack after attack after attack, from Russia hoax to impeachment,” Meadows said. “Now, we’re even still seeing it in New York City.”

“Here’s what I will say is, the American people want him to run,” he added. “I believe he’ll run. And at the end of the day, it’s a time for choosing, and the American people will choose Donald Trump.”

Trump ‘Beyond Seriously’ Considering Running

Last month, Trump said that he is “beyond seriously” considering running for president again in 2024.

“I say this: I am looking at it very seriously, beyond seriously,” Trump told Fox News when asked about a potential 2024 run. “From a legal standpoint I don’t want to talk about it yet.”

When asked if he’ll run again, Trump says “From a legal standpoint, I don’t really want to talk about it yet” pic.twitter.com/bSNrWrtGmr

— Acyn (@Acyn) April 20, 2021

Sources close to Trump told Politico that he has been saying that he will run again assuming he is healthy enough to do so.

“He has been saying he’s going to. He’s seriously considering it — he’s probably going to do it — so we’ll see what happens,” said Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-TX), who served as White House physician, told Insider’s Kimberly Leonard.

This piece was written by James Samson on May 27, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

The post Trump Will Run For President In 2024, Jim Jordan Predicts appeared first on The Political Insider.

Liz Cheney Says Her Re-Election Bid Will Be ‘Referendum On The Future Of The Republican Party’

Posted on May 27, 2021 by John Hanson

On Wednesday, former GOP conference chair and Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney said that she sees her “re-election bid as a referendum on the future of the Republican Party.”

Cheney made her comments during an interview with the Wall Street Journal’s “Women, Power and Equity” event.

ICYMI – Rep. Liz Cheney (R., Wyo.) said at a WSJ event that she sees her re-election bid as a referendum on the future of the Republican Party.

— Paul Cogan (@PaulCogan) May 26, 2021

Cheney: 2022 ‘Very Important In Terms Of The Future Of The Party’

Cheney said that voters are “potentially facing a choice between what she sees as traditional conservative values and loyalty to former President Donald Trump.”

She acknowledged that 2022 midterm election was going to be difficult for her, after she was booted from House Republican leadership earlier this month for repeatedly criticizing former President Donald Trump for his statements on the 2020 election.

Mrs. Cheney said the she “anticipates it’s going to be a hard-fought race.” She now also says openly she regrets ever supporting and voting for Trump.

“I really do think it’s one that will be a moment where the people of Wyoming can demonstrate to the country our commitment to the Constitution,” she said during her interview.

Cheney believes the 2022 election will be “very important in terms of the future of the party and the future of our republic.”

Cheney has at least four primary opponents so far – though she has outraised them all to this point.

Rep. Liz Cheney is interviewed Wednesday afternoon at The Wall Street Journal’s Women, Power and Equity event https://t.co/4c1biXV6bA

— Nell Henderson (@NHendersonWSJ) May 26, 2021

Cheney Said She Refused To ‘Perpetuate The Lie’ That Trump Won The Election

Cheney was one of the ten Republicans who voted to impeach Trump during his second impeachment.

The Wyoming Republican said, “It became very clear that staying in leadership would require me to perpetuate the lie about the last election, perpetuate the big lie, perpetuate things that are dangerous.”

Wall Street Journal interviewing Liz Cheney for its “Women, Power, and Equity” event. https://t.co/nXhtjdkG5x pic.twitter.com/WpGLGNTVrA

— Richard Hanania (@RichardHanania) May 26, 2021

Polls Not Looking Good For Cheney

She told the WSJ that “she hoped Republicans would begin to rally around traditional conservative policy issues like military spending” instead of Trump in the future.

A Club for Growth PAC poll showed earlier this month Cheney with a net negative image, with an unfavorable rating at 65 percent with a net rating of -36 percent.

52 percent also said they would rather vote for her opponent, no matter who it is.

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Morning Digest: Mega MAGA perennial candidate is throwing a scare into New Jersey GOP’s frontrunner

Posted on May 27, 2021 by Daily Kos Elections

The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Carolyn Fiddler, and Matt Booker, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.

Leading Off

● NJ-Gov: It looks like the Democratic Governors Association wants to stir up some GOP anxiety by releasing a poll of New Jersey's June 8 Republican primary for governor that shows the ostensible frontrunner, Assemblyman Jack Ciattarelli, leading perennial candidate Hirsh Singh just 29-23.

But with Hudson County pastor Phil Rizzo taking 8% and former Franklin Mayor Brian Levine at just 2%, according to the survey from Public Policy Polling, that means 38% of voters are undecided, so there's lots of room left for wiggling. Perhaps most surprisingly, PPP's numbers also suggest that a recent Singh poll that had him up 22-20 weren't completely bonkers.

Ciattarelli seems to agree. As the New Jersey Globe's David Wildstein notes, he just went up with ads criticizing Singh for "attacking our men and women in blue" alongside "the woke mob" and aggressively criticized his rival in the lone debate of the race on Tuesday night. Singh has portrayed himself as the only true Trump acolyte running, which explains why Ciattarelli's ad labels him a "fake MAGA candidate."

Campaign Action

It's all quite a turnaround from where we were just last month: Ciattarelli was acting as though he had the nomination sewn up, seeing as he was firing off a barrage of ads attacking Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy. We'll know in less than two weeks how premature his pivot to the general election really was.

Senate

● MO-Sen: The Missouri Independent reports that, according to unnamed "sources familiar with her plans," Republican Rep. Vicky Hartzler will announce a Senate bid early next month.

● OH-Sen: Republican Rep. Bill Johnson, who'd been considering a Senate bid ever since Rob Portman unexpectedly announced his retirement in January, has opted against joining the race. Johnson cited the presence of several well-funded candidates already seeking the GOP nod (including some with personal wealth) as an obstacle, explaining, "I'm not going to deny that coming from a base in Appalachia, where fundraising is a challenge under the best of circumstances, it can be exceptionally slow in a contested primary." Johnson's 6th Congressional District ranks 359th in the nation in median household income.

● WI-Sen: State Sen. Chris Larsen kicked off a bid Wednesday for the Democratic nomination to take on Republican Sen. Ron Johnson (who still hasn't said whether he's seeking re-election). Larsen has represented a seat in the Milwaukee area for a decade and has twice sought the position of Milwaukee County executive, including an extremely tight 2020 race that he lost 50.05-49.52 to fellow Democrat David Crowley.

Larsen is the fourth notable Democrat to enter the race, after state Treasurer Sarah Godlewski, Milwaukee Bucks executive Alex Lasry, and Outagamie County Executive Tom Nelson.

Governors

● CA-Gov: The nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California finds the likely recall election of Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom failing by a 57-40 margin, virtually unchanged from its 56-40 result in March.

● NV-Gov: Politico's Alex Isenstadt reports that former Sen. Dean Heller is "preparing to run for governor" next year and is meeting with party leaders about a bid at a conference hosted by the Republican Governors Association, according to unnamed sources "familiar with the conversations." Heller's apparent interest in running—and the RGA's interest in him—is particularly notable because of the recent entry of Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo, who just gave the GOP a high-profile candidate with experience winning in Nevada's most populous (and bluest) county.

But that's precisely why Lombardo's conservative bona fides might come into question. Two years ago, for instance, he ended the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department's collaboration with ICE to detain individuals arrested on local charges until federal officials can apprehend them if they are also suspected of immigration violations.

Heller, however, may not be the antidote. These days, fealty to conservative dogma is entirely subordinate to fealty to Donald Trump when it comes to Republican primary voters, and the ex-senator has not scored well on that front. Most vividly, he earned undying Trumpist ire when he initially voted against repealing the Affordable Care Act in 2017, then sealed his doom when he later voted in favor of doing so. The painful flip-flop played a key role in his 50-45 loss to Democrat Jackie Rosen, which Trump himself claimed came as a consequence of Heller being "extraordinarily hostile" to him.

So who will claim the Trump mantle? The third notable candidate in the race, North Las Vegas Mayor John Lee, was a Democrat until last month (albeit a conservative one), a resume that poses its own obvious problems. That could leave an opening for someone else, but the most prominent name still considering the race, Rep. Mark Amodei, has been an imperfect disciple: Just two years ago, after he expressed a vague openness to Trump's first impeachment, the extremist (and extremely well-funded) Club for Growth threatened to back a primary challenger. Amodei wound up voting against impeachment, of course, but as far as the die-hards are concerned, it's very hard to erase the taint of sinning against Trump in the first place.

● VA-Gov: As the June 8 Democratic primary for Virginia’s open gubernatorial race approaches, we have a rundown of candidate spending on TV ads. According to Medium Buying, former Gov. Terry McAuliffe is outspending former Del. Jennifer Carroll Foy on the airwaves $3.28 million to $1.33 million. The pair are dwarfing the rest of the field as the third-biggest spender, state Sen. Jennifer McClellan, has shelled out just $108,000.

On the Republican side, businessman Glenn Youngkin, who already has the nomination locked up, is out with his first general election spot. In the commercial, he plays up his business experience and attempts to paint himself as an outsider. He also takes a veiled swipe at McAuliffe, the Democratic frontrunner, when he proclaims, “What we need isn’t a politician or worse: the same politician”.

House

● FL-10: With Rep. Val Demings running for Senate, fellow Democrats are lining up to succeed her in Florida's 10th Congressional District, located in the Orlando area. Former State Attorney Aramis Ayala, who served one term as the top prosecutor in Orange and Osceola counties, had been considering a Senate bid herself but quickly shifted gears and announced a bid for Demings' seat. State Sen. Randolph Bracy has jumped in as well; he, too, reportedly had his eye on statewide office—in his case, the governorship.

Civil rights attorney and Navy veteran Natalie Jackson also kicked off a campaign this week. She is best known for her work on behalf of a number of families who've lost relatives to police violence, including those of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd.

● GA-10: Wealthy businessman Matt Richards is the latest Republican to enter the race for Georgia's deep-red 10th Congressional District. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has reported that he's prepared to self-fund at least $1 million in his bid for this open seat.

● ME-02: Republican state Rep. Mike Perkins, who said last month that he was exploring a bid against Democratic Rep. Jared Golden, has now filed paperwork to create a campaign committee with the FEC.

● NM-01: Democrat Melanie Stansbury is out with a positive ad ahead of Tuesday’s special election. The spot touts her background in the district and also attempts to tie herself to the Biden administration. Stansbury is pictured with Interior Secretary Deb Haaland (whose confirmation to that position opened this seat) and first lady Jill Biden as the voiceover says “In Congress, she’s ready to get to work with President Biden.”

Stansbury was endorsed by Biden himself earlier this week, and second gentlemen Douglas Emhoff is slated to campaign with her on Thursday.

Attorneys General

● OK-AG: Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter abruptly announced his resignation on Wednesday, a day after The Oklahoman sent him questions about an alleged extramarital affair with a state employee. Hunter, who filed for divorce last week, did not respond to the questions or address any details, but in a statement he said, "Regrettably, certain personal matters that are becoming public will become a distraction for this office."

Hunter, a Republican, was appointed to the office by then-Gov. Mary Fallin in 2017 after the incumbent at the time, Scott Pruitt, was tapped by Donald Trump to run the EPA. He easily won election in his own right the following year, defeating Democrat Mark Myles 64-36, and had been gearing up to run for a second full term next year. Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt, who had experienced some friction with Hunter, will now be able to name a replacement of his own.

Mayors

● Boston, MA Mayor: There's no doubt that Boston will elect a person of color as mayor for the first time ever now that candidate filing has closed in this year's all-Democratic race, but as Gabby Deutch notes in her deep look at the field for Jewish Insider, this year's contest is very different from those of the past in another key way: None of the six serious contenders, writes Deutch, "are actively seeking the endorsement of the city's police union."

Of this sextet, only City Councilor Annissa Essaibi George has spoken out against the idea of reallocating funds from the police budget to other areas, though she's acknowledged that "tough conversations" are needed on the future of law enforcement. The rest of the field consists of acting Mayor Kim Janey, who was elevated from City Council president to the top job earlier this year; City Councilors Andrea Campbell and Michelle Wu; state Rep. Jon Santiago; and the former head of economic development for the city, John Barros. All have called for changes in how the police conduct their work.

While a major part of this shift is due to the national movement aimed at reforming law enforcement, two unrelated scandals involving senior Boston police officials have also dominated the headlines in recent months. In April, the public learned that former officer Patrick Rose, who would later go on to head the police union, remained on the force in the mid-1990s even though a contemporary internal report concluded there was enough evidence to charge him with molesting a 12-year-old.

Other documents said that Rose had been placed on administrative duty, but even this limited sanction was withdrawn after the union threatened to file a grievance on his behalf. Rose is currently under indictment for allegedly abusing other children during the subsequent decades.

The second matter is a still-unfolding debacle that began in late January, after then-Mayor Marty Walsh was nominated to become secretary of labor but before he was confirmed. Boston Police Commissioner William Gross announced his resignation shortly after Joe Biden tapped Walsh for his cabinet, prompting Walsh to immediately appoint Gross' close friend and chief of staff, Dennis White, to succeed him.

Just days later, though, Walsh placed White on leave after the Boston Globe began asking about allegations that the new commissioner had abused his wife in 1999. Walsh also commissioned a report into what had happened, but it was still unfinished when Janey took over as acting mayor in March.

That report was released this month, though, and it revealed a previously unknown 1993 confrontation between White and a 19-year-old. The investigator, Tamsin Kaplan, also said that both the police and the Walsh administration had interfered with her probe, with Kaplan writing, "One retired BPD officer told me that they had received at least five phone calls directing them not to talk with me."

Janey quickly announced she would fire White, who went to court in an effort to block her from doing so. Gross also filed an affidavit saying that Walsh had known about the allegations against White when he made the appointment, something that the labor secretary quickly denied. It may be some time before all of this is settled: While a state judge ruled that Janey could fire White, she issued a stay the next day, allowing the commissioner to keep his job while he appeals.

It remains to be seen how this ongoing mess will impact September's officially nonpartisan face-off, which will winnow the field down to two ahead of the November general election. The entire field agrees that White needs to be replaced, though Essaibi George still accepted an endorsement from Gross, who briefly considered running for mayor himself. (A far-less controversial public safety group, the local firefighters union, is also backing her.)

There has been little polling here, though a MassINC survey conducted last month found a 46% plurality undecided. That poll also showed Wu leading Janey 19-18, while fellow Campbell was in third with 6%.

Janey's ascension to the mayor's office in March made her the city's first Black mayor, as well as its first woman leader, and she would again make history if she won the post in her own right this year. Wu, Campbell, and Essaibi George would also each be the first woman elected to the top job.

All of the contenders would also achieve another historic first. Wu, who has the backing of Sen. Elizabeth Warren and many of the young activists who helped propel Ed Markey to victory in his own Senate primary last year, would be the first Asian American person to lead Boston. Campbell or former city administration official John Barros, meanwhile, would be the first Black person elected in a city that still has a reputation for racism targeting African Americans. State Rep. Jon Santiago, meanwhile, would be Boston's first Latino chief executive, while Essaibi George would be its first Arab American leader.

● New York City, NY Mayor: A new poll from Core Decision Analytics on behalf of Fontas Advisors, a lobbying group that is not working for any candidates, shows Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams leading 2020 presidential candidate Andrew Yang 18-13 in the June 22 Democratic primary, with former city Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia at 13%. That’s a notable shift from March, when this firm had Yang beating Adams 16-10 as Garcia barely registered with just 2% of the vote.

Garcia was endorsed by the New York Times earlier this month, and another survey also shows her gaining ground since then. Yang recently released a Slingshot Strategies poll that found him edging out Adams 19-16, with city Comptroller Scott Stringer and Garcia at 13% and 10%, respectively; in late April, Slingshot showed Yang leading Stringer 24-16, with Garcia at 3%. This May survey has Yang beating Adams by a narrow 51-49 after simulating the instant runoff process.

Meanwhile, another candidate is in bad shape heading into the final weeks. Three senior staffers for nonprofit head Dianne Morales, including her campaign manager, resigned over the last few days over what Politico calls “accusations of mistreatment, inadequate pay and lack of unionization and health care.” Morales responded by saying she “accepted accountability in my role as the head of this campaign that allowed for this harm to occur.”

Prosecutors

● Manhattan, NY District Attorney: The June 22 Democratic primary to succeed Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance is coming up quickly, and voters got another reminder of the power of this office on Tuesday when news broke that the retiring incumbent had convened a grand jury to weigh potential charges for Donald Trump. It remains to be seen what role Vance's eventual successor would have in this matter, but there's no question that whoever wins the primary in this extremely blue borough will be the overwhelming favorite to head what's arguably the most prominent local prosecutor's office in America.

Eight Democrats are competing in a race where it takes just a plurality to win the Democratic nomination. (While New York City voters backed a 2019 referendum to institute instant-runoff voting in primaries for many local offices, the measure does not apply to state-level posts like this one.) Almost all of the contenders have pitched themselves as progressives who will bring much-needed changes to the post, but as the New York Times' Jonah Bromwich explained in March, there are some important differences between them.

"The race can be divided into two camps," wrote Bromwich, "with three candidates who have not worked as prosecutors and five who have." The former group consists of civil rights attorney Tahanie Aboushi, public defender Eliza Orlins, and Assemblyman Dan Quart, who is also the only elected official running. This trio, wrote Bromwich, has argued that the D.A.'s role needs to involve a shift "toward reducing incarceration and cutting back prosecution of low-level crimes."

The five ex-prosecutors in the contest are Alvin Bragg, Liz Crotty, Diana Florence, Lucy Lang, and Tali Farhadian Weinstein. Crotty, a self-described centrist backed by several police unions, has run to the right of the field and cast doubt on reform efforts, saying at one debate, "I am the candidate who from the beginning of my campaign has talked about public safety." The remainder, says Bromwich, have "pitched themselves as occupying a middle ground, focused on less sweeping changes."

(The Appeal's Sam Mellins has also detailed the candidates' views on key issues, including sentencing and sex work, with helpful graphics breaking down where the field stands.)

As Bromwich noted, every contender save Quart would achieve a historic first should they prevail. Six of the candidates would be the first woman to win this office, while Aboushi would additionally be the first Muslim or Arab American to hold the post. Bragg, meanwhile, would be Manhattan's first Black district attorney.

There's still no clear frontrunner, but two of the candidates have significantly more resources than the rest of the field. Farhadian Weinstein, who is married to wealthy hedge fund manager Boaz Weinstein, took in $2.2 million from mid-January to May 17, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that more than half of her haul "came from four dozen donors, many of whom work in the financial sector."

Bragg raised a considerably smaller $710,000 during this time, though he led Farhadian Weinstein, who has been spending heavily, in cash-on-hand for the stretch run, $1.2 million to $805,000. Bragg also has the backing of three of the city's most politically influential unions, and he's benefited from $1 million in outside spending from Color of Change.

Aboushi had the third-largest war chest with $560,000 on-hand, while Quart and Orlins had $555,000 and $525,000 in the bank, respectively. Lang, who has been self-funding much of her race, had $400,000 available , while Crotty was further back with $250,000; Florence brought up the rear with $115,000 on-hand.

Obituaries

● John Warner, a Republican who served as Senator from Virginia from 1979 through 2009, died Tuesday at the age of 94. Warner cultivated a reputation for moderation and bipartisanship during his 30 years in the Senate, and he was long willing to oppose Republicans he disliked. In 1994, rather than back Iran-Contra figure Oliver North’s campaign against Democratic colleague Chuck Robb, Warner recruited another Republican, 1989 gubernatorial nominee Marshall Coleman, to run as an independent, a development that helped Robb win in that disastrous year for Democrats.

Warner served as secretary of the Navy during the Nixon administration from 1972 to 1974, and he attracted global attention in 1976 when he married the famed actress Elizabeth Taylor. Warner ran for an open Senate seat in 1978 but lost the GOP nominating convention to a more conservative opponent, Richard Obenshain. Obenshain, though, died in a plane crash two days later, and party officials selected Warner as their new nominee.

Warner was often overshadowed by his famous spouse during that campaign. The most remembered incident of the contest occurred in the Appalachian community of Big Stone Gap, where Taylor was hospitalized after a chicken bone became lodged in her throat, an experience that made it to “Saturday Night Live.” Warner ultimately ended up very narrowly beating his Democratic opponent, former state Attorney General Andrew Miller, 50.2-49.8, a margin of fewer than 5,000 votes. Warner spent his first few years in office still known mostly as Taylor’s husband, though their marriage ended during his first term in 1982.

Warner himself easily won re-election two years later, and he had no Democratic opposition at all in 1990. In 1996, though, he faced a serious general election challenge from wealthy businessman Mark Warner. The race was defined by the novelty of a contest between the two unrelated Warners: The challenger ordered “Mark, not John” bumper stickers that were sometimes mistaken for a biblical reference, while the incumbent urged voters to “make your mark for John.” The Republican, though, appeared safe, so it was a surprise when he held off Mark Warner just 53-47.

John Warner won his last term in 2002 again without Democratic opposition, and almost no one guessed this would be the last time Team Red would win a Virginia Senate race through today. Warner decided not to run again in 2008 and was easily succeeded by his old opponent Mark Warner, who had been elected governor during the ensuing years.

John Warner went on to back the Democratic incumbent in 2014, an endorsement that may have made the difference in what proved to be an unexpectedly tight race. Warner would go on to support Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden over Donald Trump and back a number of Democratic congressional candidates, though he still endorsed Republican nominee Ed Gillespie’s failed 2017 run for governor.

Biden prepared to extend infrastructure talks

Posted on May 27, 2021 by By Christopher Cadelago and Laura Barrón-López

White House officials and other Democrats close to the bipartisan infrastructure talks are willing to let the negotiations stretch past their Memorial Day deadline — but not too far.

Senate Republicans are slated to bring forward their latest proposal on Thursday, a plan that is unlikely to approach $1 trillion in new spending — making it far less palatable to the White House. There also are deepening doubts about an agreement on how to pay for the infrastructure spending package. Democrats are resistant to tapping leftover Covid-relief money, which the White House argues isn't sufficient to cover the plan, anyway.

White House aides and Democrats say they’re giving Republicans ample time to put forward their offers on “hard” infrastructure — money to build roads, repair aging bridges and expand broadband. Barring breakthroughs on a long list of sticking points, Biden advisers and Democrats are preparing to wind down talks within a week or possibly two, three people familiar with the discussions told POLITICO. At that point, they will start shifting their focus to what it will take to pass a bill on a party-line vote.

The White House’s flexibility with pushing the deadline would bring the talks into a familiar stage of negotiations in Washington, in which each side tries to deflect blame for being the one that gave up on the deal. Republican Senators are holding a news conference Thursday morning. Should their new offer prove inadequate, the White House could decide simply to stick to its Memorial Day weekend deadline.

The decision about how long to continue comes as progressives are expressing growing frustration with the pace of negotiations and fear that cutting a deal with the GOP would mean sacrificing spending on climate-focused initiatives. Many remain wary that the entirety of Biden’s plans could be passed in follow-up legislation with only Democratic support.

Undergirding Democrats’ worries are the lessons from former President Barack Obama’s first year, when Republicans drew out the negotiating process around healthcare reform for months before voting against the president’s signature bill and then turning the legislation into a political cudgel for the better part of a decade.

Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) speaks to the media following the weekly Democratic caucus luncheon in Washington, D.C.

“Even in the context of a Covid recovery, a trillion dollars is a wide gap,” Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) said in an interview, referencing the difference in top-line spending totals between the GOP offer and the White House proposal. “Now there are several groups within groups positioning themselves as the lead negotiators on infrastructure. We are rapidly approaching the witching hour.”

A growing number of progressive leaders and groups want Biden to cut Republicans loose right at his original deadline if a deal remains elusive. But Schatz said another couple of meetings, or a week of talks, would be “reasonable.”

“But lacking any intervening momentum we have to get pragmatic here and decide whether we want to pass something or not,” he added.

The White House all along has maintained it’s genuine about trying to forge a compromise with Senate Republicans, contending that it would make the bill more politically durable and that it was important for the country to see that bipartisan agreement on major policy proposals can still happen. Karine Jean-Pierre, White House deputy press secretary, told reporters Wednesday that she wouldn’t pre-judge the coming GOP counteroffer, but cautioned that there wasn’t enough Covid-relief money to repurpose for infrastructure.

By the end of March, she said, nearly all of the $3 trillion in “pre-Rescue Plan Covid relief funding'' was either obligated or is for SBA-backed small business loans known as the Paycheck Protection Program, unemployment insurance or nutrition assistance. Of the remaining five percent, the largest categories of potentially available funds are in accounts for healthcare provider relief, money for rural hospitals and disaster loans for small businesses.

“There are simply not hundreds of billions of dollars in Covid relief funds available to repurpose,” she said.

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) speaks during a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee hearing in Washington.

For weeks, White House officials had said they believed the GOP’s lead negotiator, Sen. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, was approaching the task in good faith. Separately, they were heartened by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee’s unanimous passage of a bipartisan bill to allocate $311 billion over five years for roads and highways.

Some have also bristled at the drumbeat of news media reports in recent weeks declaring a possible deal already dead. And other Democrats have grown increasingly annoyed at — what they view as — a strategy by Senate Republicans to paint Biden as more personally open to cutting a deal than his staff.

That was particularly true after Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said Wednesday that Biden had communicated to Republicans that he “would like us to get close to” a $1 trillion deal, and that GOP lawmakers would “get near that neighborhood.” The White House would not comment on whether Biden himself communicated the number in private, and Biden told reporters this week that he was not going to negotiate through the press.

Blunt went on to claim that in the meeting between GOP senators and Biden on May 13, the president was willing to allow the money Congress already spends on infrastructure each year, some tens of billions, to count toward the total. The senator insisted that “immediately after that, [Biden’s] staff who were not in the meeting except for [National Economic Council Director] Brian Deese, began to question whether that is where they’d be willing to go.”

When asked about GOP claims that administration aides weren’t on the same page as Biden, Jean-Pierre said “this negotiation is being led by the president.”

“He’s been in the room, he has close personal relationships with a lot of these senators,” she continued.

Aides said Biden has personally signed off on each element of his proposals to Republicans and an administration official added that despite all the noise leading up to the latest Republican counter offer Thursday, some key details of their private conversations — along with the actual tenor of the talks — have not been reflected in public accounts.

Meanwhile, patience on the left is waning. Most Democratic senators are tired of the negotiations, said one Senate Democratic aide, but are cognizant that Biden must convince moderates that he did everything he could. To pass the majority of Biden’s jobs and family plan, which includes paid leave, child care and elder care, through the budget reconciliation process, all Democratic senators must support it. Moderate Democrats like Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) have made clear they aren’t ready to ditch negotiations with Republicans just yet, stressing the need for bipartisanship.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) speaks as the House Judiciary Committee hears investigative findings in the impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump on Dec. 9, 2019.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said Biden’s Memorial Day deadline was already “difficult for us to swallow.” If Biden succeeds in striking a deal with Republicans, progressive lawmakers are also worried that other big items in the president’s sprawling $4 trillion jobs and family plans could get left by the wayside.

“It would be extremely difficult to imagine voting for a smaller package unless we have full agreement from the 50 Democratic senators about the reconciliation package at the same time,” said Jayapal.

Jayapal has told the White House that progressives want the budget reconciliation package — which is expected to contain the majority of Biden’s jobs and families plans — to move at the same time as any bipartisan infrastructure deal with Republicans through Congress.

Outside liberal groups are more blunt in their assessment of talks with Republicans and see the May 31 date as a hard cutoff the White House should hold to.

“Every moment trying to negotiate with Republicans is time wasted,” said Rahna Epting, executive director of MoveOn, adding that another two weeks of talks “is dangerous.”

“We're looking at Memorial Day as the pivot point and we intend to hold Democrats to that,” Epting said. “We need to stop negotiating with this Republican Party. We know we're going to move to reconciliation and we should start negotiating with Democrats.”

Burgess Everett contributed to this report.