Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Trump trials take the spotlight this week

The New York Times

Judge Sets Trial Date in Trump’s Manhattan Criminal Case

Ruling that the case against Donald J. Trump can proceed, Justice Juan M. Merchan said he planned to begin the trial on March 25.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

In fiery testimony, Willis defends herself against accusations of misconduct

Ex-employee claims relationship began earlier than acknowledged

Add to this the expectation that Judge Arthur Engoron will make public his judgment in the real estate fraud case, and the possibility of a SCOTUS decision on an immunity challenge. 

Philip Bump/Washington Post:

Remember the ‘Biden bribe’ allegation? DOJ now says it was made up.

It is hard to overstate how much energy Republicans and their allies in the right-wing media invested in the idea that this was credible. When he announced the launch of an impeachment probe of Biden in September, then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) invoked the Smirnov allegation…

Fox News has mentioned Biden in the context of “bribe” or “bribery” more than 2,600 times over the past 12 months. A Media Matters review of host Sean Hannity’s efforts to bolster the Republican impeachment effort tallied at least 85 segments focused on the allegation and the FBI form that documented it — despite the complete dearth of evidence supporting the idea.

On Sept. 7, Comer was asked by a Fox Business host about the lack of movement on the bribery allegation. Comer suggested there had been a “coverup” by the government.

It appears that Comer was wrong.

The Taylor Swift effect was real for this year's recording-breaking Super Bowl: • Female viewership ages 12-17 up +11% • Female viewership ages 18-24 up +24% Women also represented 47.5% of the total audience for this year's Super Bowl — an all-time high. (h/t @paulsen_smw) pic.twitter.com/koBzRiao5n

— Joe Pompliano (@JoePompliano) February 14, 2024

Jake Sherman/X:

THE DISASTER THAT IS HOUSE REPUBLICAN LEADERSHIP

Just this week, @SpeakerJohnson has:

  • Seen Democrats win a special election in New York, narrowing the already minuscule GOP majority to two votes.
  • Lost a sixth rule vote on the House floor — a measure that would’ve allowed an increase in the state-and-local tax (SALT) deduction — when 18 Republicans bucked their own leadership and voted no. This Republican majority has lost more rule votes than any other majority in five decades, a stunning sign of weakness.
  • → Abruptly pulled a bill to overhaul FISA due to Republican infighting. The GOP leadership said the House would vote on the bill before locking down the votes, despite some senior Republicans raising internal objections. This is the second time Johnson had to pull a FISA bill this Congress.
  • → Seen another committee chair announce his resignation. @RepMarkGreen, chair of the Homeland Security Committee, is leaving Congress after only six years. The 59-year-old Green — the fourth committee chair to retire — just led the impeachment of DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
  • → Decided against putting a bill on the floor to provide billions of dollars in new aid to Israel without offsets. Just a week ago, Johnson allowed a vote on Israel aid that he knew was going to fail.
  • → Provided absolutely no insight to rank-and-file lawmakers on how he’ll handle the Senate’s bipartisan $95 billion foreign aid package. Johnson said the bill isn’t a priority because the federal government is scheduled to shut down in a few weeks.
  • → Witnessed the House Intelligence Committee chair issue a dire public warning about a “serious national security threat” to the country, only to have Senate Intelligence Committee leaders and the White House downplay the issue.

Rep. Carlos Giminez, a Florida Republican, says he supports Ukraine aid and won’t rule out sidestepping Speaker Johnson to pass it: “It’s necessary that we fund Ukraine,” he tells reporters — adding a bill doesn’t need border provisions. “One has nothing to do with the other.”

— Haley Byrd Wilt 🌻 (@byrdinator) February 15, 2024

Paul Waldman/”The Cross Section” on Substack:

Why everyone refuses to believe what voters are telling them about immigration

Republicans keep losing on the issue, yet Democrats are supposed to be the ones who don't get it.

Republicans just lost yet another election in which they figured fear-mongering on immigration was all they needed to succeed. Now they’re embarking on a farcical impeachment of Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas for imaginary crimes and misdemeanors, because just as they believe that khaki-clad trips to the southern border are public relations gold, they think impeaching Mayorkas will help Donald Trump win November’s election and secure their razor-thin House majority, simply by keeping the issue of immigration in the news.

Despite the GOP’s record of repeated failure to turn immigration into electoral results, the vast majority of the political class in Washington — including Republicans, Democrats, and journalists — remains convinced that the losing Republican strategy is actually brilliant, and it’s the Democrats who need to change their ways. The issue of immigration, they assume, is a kind of electoral magic weapon whose unstoppable power will slay all Democrats who stand before it.

But they’re just wrong. The voters keep telling them so, and they refuse to accept it.

This is a terrific podcast interview of Tom Suozzi’s pollster by Greg Sargent, fresh off Suozzi’s Tuesday special election win.

Among the things discussed: how the campaign approached the immigration issue (order and fairness), how persuasion mattered (getting Republicans and independents to vote for Suozzi), and the salience of abortion (very).

Very good interview with a very good pollster, Mike Bocian, who led Suozzi's polling team. This point about abortion rights is massive. The issue didn't mobilize Dems in NY3 in '22. By emphasizing the threat of a national ban in this race, they changed that. https://t.co/J2BW7F7h7K

— Tom Bonier (@tbonier) February 15, 2024

It may not be predictive of a November win, but it’s something of a roadmap for how to get there. It’s well worth your time.

Fox's talk shows have been obsessed with the allegation of a "Biden bribe." Now the so-called "informant" has been arrested and charged with lying. The # of times this bombshell was mentioned by Laura Ingraham, Jesse Watters and Sean Hannity tonight: Zero.

— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) February 16, 2024

Jill Lawrence/The Bulwark:

Whatever Donald Wants, Donald Gets

Trump’s march through the GOP is leaving it in ruins.

Right now, Trump has far too much control over Republicans who should know better, using a disconcerting but effective combination of brute force and sinister charm.

He’s rampaging through U.S. politics like a modern-day William T. Sherman on his Atlanta-to-Savannah March to the Sea. Gen. Sherman’s goal was to foster fear, inflict pain, and get Georgians to ditch the Confederate cause. Trump has adopted his own fear-and-pain approach on his march toward ever-greater domination of the GOP House, the Republican National Committee (he wants it run by an election denier and his daughter-in-law, nothing to see here), and, of course, the Republican presidential primary season and 2024 nomination.

"I'm not telling you I won't [vote for Biden], I'm just telling you I'm not there yet. The only thing that I have decided firmly is that I will not vote for Trump under any circumstances." - @GovChristie Full interview: https://t.co/jiB0jYnwPm#PodSaveAmerica #CrookedMedia pic.twitter.com/hrxqMbIpsW

— Pod Save America (@PodSaveAmerica) February 15, 2024

He’ll get there before Nikki Haley, methinks.

From a ⁦@tarapalmeri⁩ newsletter, on “normie” Republicans retiring from the House: pic.twitter.com/Jdhb6zmJD4

— Steve Inskeep (@NPRinskeep) February 16, 2024

Joe Perticone/The Bulwark:

The Biden Impeachment Has Been Great for Joe Biden

But this week, the House Oversight Committee deposed [Hunter Biden associate Tony] Bobulinski as part of its ongoing haphazard impeachment inquiry into the president. What happened the moment the deposition concluded felt quite familiar to those who have followed the inquiry:

  • Oversight Chairman James Comer issued a declarative statement, unencumbered by evidence or specific details, that President Biden is corrupt.

  • Fox News reporter Brooke Singman published EXCLUSIVE bombshell reports recounting Bobulinski’s story that Biden “enabled” the sale of access to “dangerous adversaries” and that Biden is “the big guy,” along with other words in liability-limiting “scare quotes.”

  • What Bobulinski actually offered Oversight members inside the room turned out to be more of what he’s been trying to sell lawmakers and journalists for years: more conjecture and underwhelming, questionable testimony. The result is as familiar as the process: The impeachment inquiry, though shaking and whirring loudly, remains stuck in the hyperpartisan muck.

From Cliff Schecter:

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: A lose-lose for Republicans in the Senate

Washington Post:

Senate votes to advance Ukraine-Israel package after border deal fails

GOP senators have been deeply divided on how to proceed on the foreign aid package, with some critics arguing that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) led them into a political box canyon where Democrats have claimed the political edge on border security after they voted down the border deal they initially demanded. A vocal faction of McConnell critics have grown louder over the past week, with a handful even calling for his ouster, as Senate Republicans have gathered in meeting after meeting and argued about the uncomfortable political situation they find themselves in.

“The Republicans wanted something and then decided that they didn’t want that thing," said Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), referring to border security provisions. “Now, some of them want it again, and I think the adults are just moving on.”

But ultimately McConnell was joined by 17 fellow Republicans to advance the deal...

So what did all the drama over the border bill get the GOP? Bipartisan reprobation from their colleagues, international scorn, bad press, and in the end the bill Democrats wanted.

“They reacted to it like it was a poison,” said Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut of Senate Republicans who had previously signaled they were supportive. “I think it’s unforgiveable what they did to James.” @MCJalonick @stephengroves https://t.co/S2qgqITeNP

— Michael Tackett (@tackettdc) February 8, 2024

Associated Press:

Abandoned by his colleagues after negotiating a border compromise, GOP senator faces backlash alone

As the Republican quietly watched from a floor above, briefly the outsider after defending his legislation in a last Senate floor speech, fellow negotiator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona was down on the floor excoriating the Republicans who had abandoned Lankfordone by one, after insisting on a border deal and asking him to negotiate a compromise on one of the country’s most intractable issues.

“Less than 24 hours after we released the bill, my Republican colleagues changed their minds,” said Sinema, a former Democrat turned Independent. “Turns out they want all talk and no action. It turns out border security is not a risk to our national security. It’s just a talking point for the election.”

Lankford voted no on the Ukraine-Israel bill that advanced.

Poland’s Prime Minister:

Dear Republican Senators of America. Ronald Reagan, who helped millions of us to win back our freedom and independence, must be turning in his grave today. Shame on you.

— Donald Tusk (@donaldtusk) February 8, 2024

Rick Hasen/Slate:

A Grand Bargain Is Emerging in the Supreme Court’s Trump Cases, But Chaos May Be Ahead

After oral arguments at the Supreme Court in Trump v. Anderson, a grand bargain that appears to make practical sense as a compromise is beginning to come into view: The Supreme Court unanimously, or nearly so, holds that Colorado does not have the power to remove Donald Trump from the ballot, but in a separate case it rejects his immunity argument and makes Trump go on trial this spring or summer on federal election subversion charges. Depending upon how the court writes its opinion, however, it could leave the door open for chaos in January, if Donald Trump appears to win the 2024 election and a Democratic Congress rejects Electoral College votes for him on grounds he’s disqualified. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, however, may have seen this danger and found a way around it. If the court’s going to side with Trump in the disqualification case, it should embrace Justice Jackson’s rationale, even if it is not the most legally sound one.

I’ll take that bargain.

"My memory is fine." President Joe Biden slams a special counsel’s report for raising questions about his mental acuity and age https://t.co/wBLRZa9cjB pic.twitter.com/xpl0rc4MZn

— Bloomberg Politics (@bpolitics) February 9, 2024

Kevin Lind/Columbia Journalism Review:

Q&A: Dahlia Lithwick on the Colorado case, the election, and the press

I don’t think this is the vehicle that the Supreme Court will use to decide the outcome of the 2024 election. My sense is that this is both an intensely political case about the branches checking each other, and there are legitimate claims that the underlying process in the Colorado courts didn’t afford due process to Trump. In other words, if you’re going to do something that is the death penalty for a presidential election, you can’t do it with this little process. My instinct is that there are five votes on the current Supreme Court, at least, who do not want to see Donald Trump as the president in 2024—if he legitimately hasn’t won—and I don’t think this is the vehicle that they would choose to do it. It is the biggest, most dramatic intervention, and it would have the biggest fallout.

GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski said it was unclear who could trust the GOP to negotiate after they scuttled the bipartisan border bill. She told me: “I’ve gone through the multile stages of grief. Today I’m just pissed off.”

— Manu Raju (@mkraju) February 7, 2024

New York Times:

Johnson Stumbles, Deepening Republican Disarray and His Own Challenges

Little more than 100 days into his tenure, the speaker who was handed an impossible job has only made it more difficult for himself, baffling his colleagues.

The back-to-back defeats highlighted the litany of problems Mr. Johnson inherited the day he was elected speaker and his inexperience in the position, roughly 100 days after being catapulted from the rank and file to the top job in the House. Saddled with a razor-thin margin of control, and a deeply divided conference that has proved repeatedly to be a majority in name only, he has struggled to corral his unruly colleagues and made a series of decisions that only added to his own challenges.

Nancy Pelosi thought bubble: count the votes, and then bring it to the floor for a vote, not the other way around. 

Due largely to an unexpected surge in immigration, the U.S. economy will be about $7 trillion larger - & federal revenues about $1T bigger - the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday

— Jeff Stein (@JStein_WaPo) February 7, 2024

Washington Post:

GOP leaders face unrest amid chaotic, bungled votes

Former president Donald Trump has used his perch as the GOP front-runner to bend Congress to his political whims

Moments before pandemonium broke out on the House floor on Tuesday evening, House Majority Whip Tom Emmer approached Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.), who had assumed a leisurely slouch in a rickety wooden chair in the back of the House chamber, for what appeared to be a quick chat.

...

“Speaker Johnson never called me,” Buck said. “[Former speaker Kevin McCarthy] would have yelled — Mike knows me well enough not to yell. And [former speaker John A.] Boehner would have broken my arm. It’s gotten easier as I’ve been here.”

NEWS—Biden issues national security memorandum on “safeguards and accountability” for U.S. military aid Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) tells us this is in keeping w/his amendment to the foreign aid bill that would require recipients of U.S. aid to comply w/int’l humanitarian law

— Andrew Desiderio (@AndrewDesiderio) February 9, 2024

This goes along with Biden remarks at his brief press conference last evening about Israel going ‘over the top’.

David Bier/The UnPopulist:

Secretary Mayorkas Is Being Impeached for Following the Law on Border Enforcement

Republicans are the ones making unconstitutional demands

Mayorkas would have been the first government official to be impeached for actually staying within the bounds of the Constitution. In fact, it is the Republicans who are making unconstitutional demands.

In the impeachment articles they drafted, they alleged that Mayorkas failed to block immigrants entering not just illegally but also legally and detain them—in inhumane and unconstitutional conditions—rather than release them. Even more absurd than the allegations is the fact that in the process of making them, Republicans repeatedly misstated the law, quoted overturned court decisions, and, hilariously, confused DHS Secretary Mayorkas’ actions with those of Secretary of State Antony Blinken and others.

All of this proves just how Orwellian our political discourse on immigration has become.

Let’s go through their allegations.

And just for fun, this from Walter Shapiro/Roll Call was from late January:

Will voters punish total incompetence? House Republicans are about to find out Evidence is scant that voters would punish blundering ineptitude

So what if Johnson is poised to reject the first serious effort in years to control the chaos on our southern border? So what if Johnson is willing to let aid to Ukraine go down the tubes as part of a package deal on immigration?

The House Republicans are living in a fairy tale world. Alas, the fairy tale is taken from the Grimm Brothers and the Republicans are emulating Rumpelstiltskin, stomping their feet through the ground when they don’t get their way.

Reality check: There is no coherent strategy for House Republicans to prevail, with their fragile three-vote majority, when the Democrats control the Senate and the White House. That may explain why they are banking on divine intervention in the form of a second Trump presidency.

Cliff Schecter with a musical/political interlude:

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Citizen Trump loses in court, judges unanimous he is not above the law

ABC News:

Appeals court rejects Trump's immunity claim in federal election interference case

Trump had wanted the case dismissed based on his claim of "absolute immunity."

"We cannot accept former President Trump's claim that a President has unbounded authority to commit crimes that would neutralize the most fundamental check on executive power -- the recognition and implementation of election results," wrote the judges. "Nor can we sanction his apparent contention that the Executive has carte blanche to violate the rights of individual citizens to vote and to have their votes count."

"At bottom, former President Trump's stance would collapse our system of separated powers by placing the President beyond the reach of all three Branches," they wrote

Happy "no blanket presidential immunity" day for those who celebrate. As Joe Biden probably said to his staff, this is a BFD. Trump has until Monday to appeal.

See also SCOTUSBlog for a cert explainer, since that’s where this is headed.

PBS/NPR/Marist poll suggests the public agrees with the decision:

Trump should not get immunity, 2 out of 3 Americans say

About two-thirds of U.S. adults do not think former President Donald Trump should have immunity from criminal prosecution for actions he took while president, according to a PBS NewsHour/NPR/Marist poll to be released Wednesday. The majority of Americans are aligned with a new federal appeals court ruling that found Trump can stand trial on charges tied to a plot to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

Yes. It was a complicated, multi-faceted issue that required thorough analysis, which is more likely to be allowed to stand by the Supreme Court than not. It also has important influence on proceedings in Georgia. A job well done is better than a job… done. https://t.co/4Ay1JmQrDG

— Anthony Michael Kreis (@AnthonyMKreis) February 6, 2024

On the immigration issue, Catherine Rampell/Washington Post writes:

The GOP dog caught the car. Again.

Unlike the Obamacare repeal debacle, the passage of the Senate border bill would not be so terrible. I maintain serious concerns about its Title 42-like powers, as well as some other provisions relating to asylum. But much of the bill would make useful changes that should, theoretically, receive robust bipartisan support.

For example, it would invest much-needed resources in the border. It would give our Afghan allies — people who’ve already been vetted and are here in the United States but stuck in legal limbo — a pathway to permanent legal status. And for the first time, it would mandate that vulnerable, unaccompanied children seeking asylum receive legal counsel.

The White House and the bill’s Senate negotiators are now trying to defend it against myriad falsehoods about open borders and the like. But the burden of proving — or disproving — the merits of this hard-fought deal should be on the speaker: What, exactly, is Johnson’s objection to doing so many things his party ran for office to do?

Biden says if border bill fails, he'll remind American voters every day until the election that the reason the border isn't secure is because of Trump

— Max Cohen (@maxpcohen) February 6, 2024

Michael Tomasky/The New Republic:

The GOP Owns the Border Now. Here’s How Democrats Make Sure of It.

Hard-right Republicans killed the Senate immigration deal out of fealty to Trump. That’s the perfect opening for Biden to go on the attack.

Last week, momentarily and evidently naïvely, I was actually impressed that some number of Republican senators, apparently a majority of them, was going to stand up to Trump and defy his wishes by voting for this bill. That was how it looked last Thursday. I almost devoted my newsletter last Friday to the topic, telling readers to take note of this moment, because it may signal a new willingness on the part of some prominent Republicans to stand up to Trump.

Some reflex deep inside me counseled that I might live to regret putting the words “Republicans” and “principles” in the same sentence. The angel on my shoulder knew better.

Passing a border bill would convey to MAGA voters that 1) the government can work, and be bipartisan; and 2) the “existential threat” is being dealt with. Both of these are Kryptonite for a would-be authoritarian: Trump needs his supporters to be disillusioned and afraid

— Asha Rangappa (@AshaRangappa_) February 6, 2024

Marc Jacob/”Stop the Presses” on Substack:

A dozen reasons Trump’s dictator threat is real

The short-attention-span media need to dwell on the danger

The news media aren’t talking enough about Donald Trump’s dictatorial ambitions. Sure, they quote his praise of despots and his dreams of “retribution,” but they need to make his stated intentions a major theme of campaign coverage.

In virtually every story about the campaign, they need to include at least a background sentence or two to remind people that he aims to be an autocrat if he wins. Repetition matters, as the right has long known and mainstream media often forget.

RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel resigning. Federal Appeals Court denies Donald Trump “immunity” for his role in January 6th. Republican majority House vote fails in attempt to impeach Secretary Mayorkas. Republican vote to provide aide to Israel fails. Yikes. What a day for the GOP.

— Travis Akers (@travisakers) February 7, 2024

Brian Beutler/Off Message:

The Mainstream Media Should Be Honest About Trump’s Border Sabotage

And Joe Biden should bully them into it

One of my first pieces for Off Message encouraged President Biden to (as we say in the business) “work the media refs” more consistently. Their doom-laden coverage of his Afghanistan withdrawal and the economy’s recovery from the pandemic left Americans badly misinformed and, relatedly, helped tank his public approval. A bit of grabbing the bull by the horns was thus in order and badly needed.

Well, it still is, and the House GOP’s seemingly successful effort to sabotage the Senate’s bipartisan border security and foreign aid bill presents another great opportunity: Everyone knows House Republicans took orders from Donald Trump, and Trump’s been quite clear that he wants to kill the Senate bill so that the border remains overwhelmed, and he can blame the disorder on Biden during the campaign.

But Trump’s self-interested angle on this bill is often omitted from or buried in news reports, when it’s really the whole story. And unless this pattern of subterfuge is widely understood, Trump’s plan could work

Back-to-back embarrassing failures for House GOP leadership tonight • Mayorkas impeachment vote fails — of the various impeachments they’re eying, he was seen as the easiest • Israel aid bill, facing bipartisan opposition, flops after leadership tried to fast-track it

— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) February 7, 2024

The House Republican Conference faceplanted tonight. Even if they take up impeaching Mayorkas tomorrow, they will have this humiliation. It also makes impeaching Joe Biden even less likely. via @independent https://t.co/EVxyjPAZFh

— Eric Michael Garcia (@EricMGarcia) February 7, 2024

And now for a musical interlude...

Jonathan Weiler/”Jonathan’s Quality Kvetching Newsletter” on Substack:

Why has Taylor Swift driven the rightwing crazy on the eve of the Super Bowl? A modest proposal :)

Enter Taylor Swift. For a quick refresher, she began dating KC tight end, Travis Kelce, during the 2023 season. Kelce is Mahomes’ favorite receiving target and is widely regarded as one of the best pass catching tight ends of all time, a key cog in the Chiefs’ two Super Bowl victories in the past four seasons. All of this was true and uncontroversial before last fall. But once his relationship with the planet's biggest pop star became public, and that pop star began regularly attending Kansas City games, the hype machines around both Swift and the NFL kicked into overdrive.1

That was a source of deep resentment for rightwing media even before last week. Swift has been a bane on the right for years now, especially since she endorsed Joe Biden in 2020. And Kelce has served as a pitchman for Pfizer's Covid vaccine which, you know….

John Fugelsang/X via Threadreader on the heels of Tracy Chapman’s Grammy duet with Luke Combs:

I can name TONS of great Tracy Chapman songs. (a somewhat outraged thread) (1) -"Baby Can I Hold You" was covered by everybody from Pavarotti to George Michael to Neil Diamond to Nicki Minaj -Clapton covered "Gimme One Reason" -Neil Young played on Tracy Chapman's 2nd album

Do we induct people into the rock ‘n’ roll Hall of Fame because of their sexuality? I thought it was about the music they produced. Can you name three Tracy Chapman songs? If you do… You googled it.

— Bill Miller (@MelaninDeficien) February 6, 2024

Read the whole thread, or just watch this:

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Bidenomics, baby. It’s what makes the economy hum

USA Today:

For President Biden, the economy goes from election liability to a potential strength in 2024

The recession that many economists predicted hasn't happened.

Consumer confidence is surging.

The stock market has soared to all-time highs.

And on Friday came a robust jobs report, with the U.S. economy adding 353,000 jobs in January, according to the Labor Department − nearly twice what was projected.

Here are some headlines on the good news:

Past 24 hours. 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/qo3HcEup12

— Carl Quintanilla (@carlquintanilla) February 2, 2024

The New York Times

January Jobs Report

U.S. Job Growth Surges

The labor market added 353,000 jobs in January, far more than expected, in a sign that economic growth remains vigorous.

The Wall Street Journal:

Jobs Growth of 353,000 Blasts Past Expectations as Labor Market Stays Hot

Unemployment was 3.7% as labor market defies predictions of significant slowdown

The Washington Post:

Labor market grew 353,000 in January, soaring past expectations

The unemployment rate has now been below 4 percent for two years -- the longest stretch since the 1960s

The economy is undeniably good. Want more proof? Look at this guy:

Kudlow on Fox Business: "We had a blowout jobs report ... I know many of my conservative friends are trying to drill holes in this report. But you know what, folks? It is what it is. It's a very strong report. Not every economic stat should be viewed through a political lens." pic.twitter.com/0w3oq51NM6

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 2, 2024

Or her:

Fox News Host Warns Republicans: Don't Run on the Economy — 'It's Good' https://t.co/ALhwViTenA

— Mike Walker (@New_Narrative) February 2, 2024

Meanwhile …

POLITICO Magazine:

30 Things Joe Biden Did as President You Might Have Missed

Drone armies, expanded overtime pay and over-the-counter birth control pills are just some of the new things Biden has ushered in as president that you might not have heard about.

Most of the work of government doesn’t go viral on social media or become fodder for TV talking heads. Every president’s administration makes changes both significant and trivial that largely escape the public’s attention — yet many have long-lasting impact.

So we asked POLITICO’s newsroom, including the reporters who track the minutiae of government policy, to tell us about the major but under-the-radar changes made so far during Biden’s tenure that most of us might have missed. And there was a lot, from building drone armies to making birth control pills available in drug stores to lowering overdraft fees and loosening restrictions on marijuana. His administration even made a big decision on the colors for Air Force One, the president’s official aircraft.

Here’s what they said. (And if you’re curious, here’s a similar list we compiled for Donald Trump’s presidency.)

Is Biden's economy creating too many jobs?

— New York Times Pitchbot (@DougJBalloon) February 2, 2024

The Daily Mail:

Mayorkas impeachment in doubt as outgoing Republican Ken Buck says he will vote AGAINST it: GOP facing disaster if one more member rejects probe over border chaos

  • 'It's maladministration. He's terrible, the border is a disaster, but that's not impeachable,' Buck told reporters
  • 'The people that I'm talking to on the outside, constitutional experts, former members, agree that this just isn't an impeachable offense,' Buck said

CNN:

House GOP skeptical Biden inquiry leads to impeachment as election draws near

A growing number of senior House Republicans are coming to terms with a stark realization: It is unlikely that their monthslong investigation into Joe Biden will actually lead to impeaching the president.

Top Republicans are not expected to make an official decision on whether to pursue impeachment articles until after a pair of high-stakes depositions later this month with Hunter Biden and the president’s brother, James. But serious doubts are growing inside the GOP that they will be able to convince their razor-thin majority to back the politically perilous impeachment effort in an election-year, according to interviews with over a dozen Republican lawmakers and aides, including some who are close to the probe.

While no formal whip count ahas been conducted, one GOP lawmaker estimated there are around 20 House Republicans who are not convinced there is evidence for impeachment, and Republicans can only lose two votes in the current House margins.

Charlie Sykes/The Bulwark:

The GOP’s Sop to Cerberus

Grassley’s comment wasn’t a gaffe.

Even as the resident senior citizen around here, I find myself wishing that I could write off Iowa Senator Chuck Grasley’s latest gaucherie as the result of senility. But no such luck.

When Grassley raised doubts about a bipartisan tax cut bill because it would make President Biden “look good,” and make it harder for Donald Trump to regain the White House, the remark hardly qualified as a gaffe in today’s GOP.

To be sure, the octogenarian seemed confused about some of the details. “Passing a tax bill that makes the president look good — mailing out checks before the election — means he could be re-elected, and then we won’t extend the 2017 tax cuts,” Grassley said. There are, however, no checks in this bill. It’s a tax credit. For children.1 The bill is also packed with goodies for businesses, making it exactly the sort of thing that Republicans from the Before Times would have enthusiastically embraced.

The legislation is so popular that it passed a bitterly divided House by a huge margin — 357-70. Now it goes to the Senate where it faces Grassley. And Trump.

At this point, the details of the bill aren’t really that important here. What Grassley was saying was that helping Trump is more important than that passing any legislation. And, despite the House vote, he reflected the central dynamic of the GOP in 2024.

  • It’s why Republicans will likely kill a border bill that includes almost everything they want.

  • It’s why they have tanked proposals to aid Ukraine and Israel.

  • It’s why they consistently opt for chaos over the more mundane business of actual governing.

It’s just the GOP’s latest sop to Cerberus.

Cliff Schecter reviews how to do a proper interview:

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: The shape of the Republican primary, which is over but not done

Brian Beutler/Off Message:

This Is Why Trump Is So Desperate To End The GOP Primary

He's winning handily, but he's in for a ton of bad news before Haley's last stand in South Carolina

The jury awarded Carroll a mere high-eight figures in damages. But Judge Arthur Engoron’s verdict in Trump’s civil fraud case is still due imminently, as is a DC Circuit Court of Appeals’s decision rejecting Trump’s claim to immunity for all crimes he committed as president. Trump will appeal all of these, but they each give Haley real fodder to confront Republican voters with the immense risk they’d be taking by nominating Trump for a third time: He’s impulsively crooked and consequences will catch up with him before the election.

Haley still won’t put it as bluntly as possible, still won’t warn Republicans that Trump, as a crook, could end up justifiably imprisoned later this year. But she’s moving in that direction.

“I absolutely trust the jury,” she told Meet the Press on Sunday. “And I think that they made their decision based on the evidence.” It’s not a hoax; it’s not a witch hunt.

Brian Beutler/Off Message:

Taylor Swift Exposed The GOP Freakshow By Being Normal

Maybe Republicans should wonder why all the attractive, likable people hate them?

There’s nothing terribly interesting underlying this bizarre freakout. Swift has millions of devoted fans and is also a liberal who endorsed Biden in 2020. Since this year’s election is shaping up as a 2020 rematch, she’s likely to endorse Biden again. If that’s interesting for any reason it’s because it exposes the intentionality behind the Big Lie: The same propagandists who apparently fear Swift’s mobilizing powers also claim Trump won in 2020—if their “rigged election” conspiracy theories were sincerely held, they wouldn’t fear that Swift’s endorsement might make Biden unbeatable.

Republicans haven’t misread American society this badly since Terri Schaivo https://t.co/sfBsq3q6wg

— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) January 30, 2024

David Rothkopf/Daily beast:

A Gaza Ceasefire Deal Is the Only Way to Avoid a Wider War

If the war between Israel and Hamas rages on indefinitely, the conflict will spread. It doesn’t have to be that way.

Republicans calling for massive attacks against Iran and its proxies—like Sens. Tom Cotton, Roger Wicker, Lindsey Graham, and John Cornynargue that this attack was just one among over 160 that have targeted U.S. personnel stationed in the region, arguing that U.S. deterrence strategies have been unsuccessful.

That said, calls for direct attacks against Iran, long a goal of Iran hawks, must be weighed not against past grievances, but against the consequences those attacks would have.

Such attacks could trigger a full-scale region-wide war that would put thousands of U.S. forces at risk and could necessitate deployments that would put even more members of the U.S. armed services in harm’s way. The U.S. and our allies must also be cognizant of the fact that an ill-considered or badly timed response could cause Iran to seek to derail talks between its proxy, Hamas, the Israelis, the U.S,. and intermediaries like Qatar.

Because the war in Gaza is the proximate cause of much of the heightened tension in the region (although admittedly far from all of it) and, therefore, because producing a ceasefire or moving toward a longer-term settlement in that war is one of the best ways of reducing risks to U.S. troops and facilities—as well as those of our allies—and because we appear to be at a very delicate point in negotiations to release Israeli hostages that might produce at least a ceasefire of some meaningful duration, the wrong kind of response could produce the opposite of the effect we seek.

On the domestic front, you can read the details here on the sham impeachment of Secretary Mayorkas from David J Bier, but this will give you the gist of it:

Mayorkas has made many mistakes, but it is nothing like the slew of illegal, unconstitutional, and immoral actions taken during the 4 years of the Trump admin, which resulted in the total destruction of the immigration system. This case is a joke.

— David J. Bier (@David_J_Bier) January 30, 2024

Jamelle Bouie/New York Times:

If It Walks Like an Insurrection and Talks Like an Insurrection …

I’ve argued, relying on evidence drawn from an amicus brief to the Colorado Supreme Court, that the former president’s actions make him an insurrectionist by any reasonable definition of the term and certainly as it was envisioned by the drafters of the 14th Amendment, who experienced insurrection firsthand. If that isn’t persuasive, consider the evidence marshaled by the legal scholars Akhil Reed Amar and Vikram David Amar in a more recent amicus brief. They argue that top of mind for the drafters of the 14th Amendment were the actions of John B. Floyd, the secretary of war during the secession crisis of November 1860 to March 1861.

During the crucial weeks after the election of Abraham Lincoln, as pro-slavery radicals organized secession conventions throughout the South, Floyd, “an unapologetic Virginia slaveholder,” Amar and Amar write, used his authority to, in the words of Ulysses S. Grant, distribute “the cannon and small arms from Northern arsenals throughout the South so as to be on hand when treason wanted them.” When it became clear that President James Buchanan would not surrender Fort Sumter to South Carolina, in late December, Floyd resigned to join the Confederacy.

What’s more, the Amars note, “the insurrectionary betrayals perpetrated by Floyd and other top officials in the lame-duck Buchanan administration went far beyond the abandonment of Southern forts. They also involved, through both actions and inactions of Floyd and his allies, efforts to prevent President-elect Lincoln from lawfully assuming power at his inauguration.”

Adam Bass/Third Party Crashers:

No champions for No Labels means yes problems

How a lack of eager candidates is threatening the political organizations chances of making an impact in the 2024 election

[Nikki] Haley and her former 2024 rival, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (R), have quashed the idea of joining No Labels once Trump becomes the nominee. While Christie's reason for not joining the organization is unknown, it is likely that Haley sees another opening in 2028 as the next generation of Republican leadership after Trump. While this scenario is unlikely due to the GOP becoming more Trump-like by the day, Haley's reasoning has some merit, as she is almost certain she will become the runner-up in the primaries.

No Labels's problem also extends to non-presidential candidates.

Utah Senator Mitt Romney (R) and former Governor of Utah Jon Huntsman (R) have also declined to run on the presumptive ticket. Huntsman, a supporter of No Labels who joined Senator Joe Manchin for a listening session in New Hampshire last year, told Deseret News that it was "unlikely" he would run for office again, even on a No Labels ticket.

Considering that most of No Labels's supporters are Republicans disillusioned with their party, the number of politicians saying they would not be interested in running on the unity ticket is startling.

So why is this happening?

After giving their workers a raise too https://t.co/Qao3sytpLw

— kleinman.bsky.social (@BobbyBigWheel) January 30, 2024

Michael Harriot/The Grio:

The lazy, stupid analysis of the ‘Black vote’ obscures the most important political issue of our time

OPINION: If the future of American democracy is really on the ballot, why aren’t we discussing the one issue hovering over the upcoming election?

Let’s get this out of the way: Black people are not going to vote for a Republican. It ain’t gonna happen.

Nearly a century has passed since a Republican presidential nominee even came close to winning a majority of the Black vote (Herbert Hoover in 1928 was the last). It is asinine, bordering on malpractice, for a journalist to publicly suggest that one of the most vociferously anti-Black candidates could achieve what no Republican has done in the last 96 years. Setting aside the media’s lazy, inexplicably stupid exercise in speculative fiction, one wonders why the mainstream media narrative seems to intentionally avoid the one topic that — when it comes to presidential elections — is more important and more mathematically relevant.

What about the white voters?

I haven’t seen the insurrection polling data or the turnout from Trump rallies but judging from the hyperbolic handwringing on cable news, you’d almost think that Black people make up the majority of voters in this country. The same organization (Pew Research) that said that thing about the “important role” of Black voters in 2024 knows that 55% of non-Hispanic whites voted for Trump in 2020, while 92% of Black voters, 59% of Hispanics and 7% of Asians voted for his opponent. Political scientists concede that white voters of both parties are more likely to switch parties when the candidate is Black. The New York Times article about Black voters drifting to the GOP didn’t even mention white people!

Republicans gamble on border politics

Democrats, meanwhile, see political opportunity in Republicans’ divisions whether or not the bill passes.

Maybe Trump’s opposition to a deal leads Republicans to walk away from it. If that happens: “I think we know who to blame,” said Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), who represents a crucial swing state. “The person that orchestrates it and then the individuals that follow him.”

  • “It puts the Republicans in a really, really bad position if they’re saying, ‘We’re not going to do a deal here because we want to play election-year politics because we think it’s going to help Donald Trump,’” said Ian Russell, a former Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee political director who is now a consultant. “That has the potential to really blow up in their face.”

On the other hand, if Congress manages to pass a border bill that President Biden signs into law, Biden and House and Senate Democrats can run on the accomplishment in November.

Matt McNeill and Cliff Schecter discuss Republicans kissing Trump’s ring:

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: The argument for sweeping presidential immunity hits rough seas

Greg Sargent/The New Republic:

How Trump’s Unhinged Immunity Demand Could Unleash a Second-Term Crime Spree

If the courts decide that insurrection merits immunity, and Trump wins back the presidency, what might he feel emboldened to do in term two?

This has been widely depicted as a Hail Mary effort to scuttle special counsel Jack Smith’s prosecution of Trump for conspiracy to obstruct the official proceeding of Congress’s count of presidential electors—otherwise known for nearly 250 years in this country as the peaceful transfer of power.

But there’s another way to understand Trump’s move: It’s about what comes next. If he wins on this front, he’d be largely unshackled in a second presidential term, free to pursue all manner of corrupt designs with little fear of legal consequences after leaving office again.

That Trump might attempt such moves is not idle speculation. He’s telling us so himself. He is openly threatening a range of second-term actions—such as prosecuting political enemies with zero basis in evidence—that would almost certainly strain the boundaries of the law in ugly new ways.

2024 is the "better angels" election. And it's pass-fail. 🙏

— Jill Lawrence (@JillDLawrence) January 9, 2024

Let’s hear from some law professors on this, starting with Randall Eliason/Sidebars:

D.C. Circuit Skeptical of Trump's Immunity Claims

Judges highlight the extreme consequences of Trump's argument

Early in Sauer’s argument, Judge Pan hit him with a great series of questions that highlighted the extreme consequences of his position. Trump is arguing that the impeachment judgment clause in the Constitution means that a former president may only be criminally prosecuted if he or she was impeached and convicted for the same or similar conduct.

The impeachment judgment clause provides:

Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States: but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law.

Trump’s argument is that because this clause refers only to the “party convicted” at impeachment being subject to later prosecution, that means, by negative implication, that a party who is not convicted after impeachment cannot be prosecuted.

If you're just tuning in, the Trump argument today in federal court is that a President can order the murder of opponents and political rivals - but cannot be prosecuted for those crimes - unless Congress first impeaches and convicts for that conduct.

— Jamie Dupree (@jamiedupree) January 9, 2024

Lee Kovarsky/X via Threadreader:

ADDITIONAL THOUGHTS ON TODAY’S DC CIRCUIT (CADC) ARGUMENTS ON PRESIDENTIAL IMMUNITY (PI) (LAYPERSON FRIENDLY). Today, CADC heard oral arguments on whether DJT has PI for 1/6, in specific reference to Jack Smith’s prosecution in DC. Trump almost certainly lost 3-0.

The judges were Henderson (R-appointed), Childs (Biden), and Pan (Biden). The major issues were as follows.

CBS News' latest poll asked Americans whether they think that "Donald Trump should have immunity from criminal prosecution for actions he took while he was president pic.twitter.com/Gn1Cokk4X3

— Maggie Jordan 91 criminal charges, 4 jurisdictions (@MaggieJordanACN) January 9, 2024

Jonathan V Last/The Bulwark:

This Might Be the High-Water Mark of Trumpism

An argument for why Trump’s numbers can’t get much better and Biden’s numbers are likely to improve.

[Mark] Halperin then says that Biden’s three big problems are:

  1. That he’s playing from behind as an incumbent, which sets a media narrative against him.

  2. That Republicans have quickly and decisively rallied to Trump.

  3. That parts of the Obama coalition—black, Hispanic, and young voters—have not (yet?) rallied to Biden.

I slightly disagree with Halperin on the importance of #1 and what he calls the Dominant Media. My own view is that journalists tend to overdetermine the influence of the media in electoral politics.

But however much weight you want to give this factor, Halperin is directionally correct: Because Biden is trailing Trump, the media slant is always something like, “Unemployment is 3.9%; Here’s Why That’s Bad for Biden.”

And the only way that’s going to flip is if Biden moves ahead in the polling.

As for #2 and #3, those are vectors along which Biden can reasonably hope to improve and Trump probably cannot.

For instance: I would posit to you that, over the next month, we will be approaching the high-water mark for Trump’s poll numbers.

I’ve now spoken to three folks at this Haley event - most decidedly supporting her - who voted for Trump both times but are now looking for new leadership. I asked what their turning point was. For all of them, it was Election denialism and January 6th.

— Ali Vitali (@alivitali) January 9, 2024

Brian Beutler/Off Message:

We Can't Afford Weak-Kneed Liberalism In The Trump Era Sincere objections to disqualifying Trump from the ballot are reasoned backward from misplaced fear

The glaring weakness here is that Republicans are real adults, making decisions for themselves, with a mix of real and fake information, and the fact that their leader engaged in insurrection and might thus be disqualified from office was not hidden from them at any point. They called it an insurrection. They acknowledged Trump’s culpability. Then they decided to reanoint him as their leader. This strikes me as Their Problem, not Our Problem.

2 new New Hampshire polls, with very different margins CNN Trump 39 Haley 32 USA Today/Boston Globe/Suffolk Trump 46 Haley 26

— Aaron Blake (@AaronBlake) January 9, 2024

Marc Jacob/”Stop The Presses” on Substack:

Media play dumb and amplify Jan. 6 lies

When journalists sidestep the truth, MAGA disinformation wins

On Thursday, the Associated Press wrote this both-sides headline: “One attack, two interpretations: Biden and Trump both make the Jan. 6 riot a political rallying cry.

On Sunday, USA Today chimed in with this outrageous lead: “For Donald Trump, Jan. 6, 2021, was ‘a beautiful day.’ For Joe Biden, it was the day ‘we nearly lost America.’” And then USA Today proceeded with a story that acted as if it didn’t know which view was more valid.

In between those two examples of performative ignorance, the New York Times weighed in with its own “dueling realities” spin:

These news outlets know who’s telling the truth and who’s lying. But they’re afraid to tell the public directly. In the Times’ case, its headline got roasted on social media (including by me), and was later rewritten:

Here are your dueling New Hampshire polls:

Where they generally agree: DeSantis is in single digits. The CNN poll actually DeSantis him at 5% -- behind Ramaswamy.

— Aaron Blake (@AaronBlake) January 9, 2024

Ron Desantis is tanking in the polls. But, of course, the only polls that matter are on election day. Losers always say that before they lose.

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Christmas edition

Jonathan V Last/The Bulwark:

2024 Is Democracy's Moonshot

Like it or not, a crisis is coming. But we are facing it on good ground.

Just objectively speaking, the forces of stability are actually in a strong position.

The pandemic is over. I don’t think we appreciate this enough. COVID was so traumatic that we’ve memory-holed how unstable and deadly a place America was in four years ago.

The economy is strong. Forget the attitude surveys. If you were handed reams of economic data you would come to two rock-solid conclusions:

(1) The American economy is in a good place: Low unemployment, bottom-led wage growth, increasing household wealth, solid GDP growth.

(2) Relative to the rest of the world, the American economy has performed marvelously. Every advanced economy would trade places with us in a heartbeat.

We are not involved in any wars. The conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are over and our troops are no longer in harm’s way. This gives America extra freedom of maneuver in dealing with our adversaries because we no longer have active conflicts leaching away our political will on a daily basis.

We are certainly involved in Ukraine, Gaza and other places but that’s not at all the same thing.

Steve Almond/WBUR:

Joe Biden’s drama-free White House is America’s most under-appreciated Christmas gift

Whatever the reasons, I can’t help but think of Biden and his economic team, toiling away without much fanfare, like Santa and his elves. Whether or not you support him, it’s worth acknowledging a few of the gifts Santa Joe has tucked under our tree this year.

A holiday meal sans masks. COVID hasn’t gone away; it’s now endemic. But thanks, in part, to Biden’s aggressive push to vaccinate the public, 2023 brought the end of the national emergency phase of the pandemic.

More buying power. For all the hyper-ventilating about inflation in the conservative media, Biden and the Federal Reserve have managed to engineer the “soft landing” once thought impossible. The result? Wage growth is now outpacing inflation.

Cheaper prescription drugs. As part of the Inflation Reduction Act, Biden took the fight to Big Pharma and capped the cost of insulin at $35 per month. By allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices directly, the law will eventually lower the price of numerous additional drugs.

A reminder of how Democrats always, always, always fret, from New York Times (September, 2011):

Democrats Fret Aloud Over Obama’s Chances

And in a campaign cycle in which Democrats had entertained hopes of reversing losses from last year’s midterm elections, some in the party fear that Mr. Obama’s troubles could reverberate down the ballot into Congressional, state and local races.

“In my district, the enthusiasm for him has mostly evaporated,” said Representative Peter A. DeFazio, Democrat of Oregon. “There is tremendous discontent with his direction.”

Democrats feared Mitt Romney and—uhm—Rick Perry, according to that piece. Meanwhile:

2024 GE, Battleground States: Biden 52% (+8) Trump 44% . Biden 50% (+8) DeSantis 42% . Biden 45% (+2) Haley 43% .@EchelonInsights, 1,012 LV, 12/12-16 https://t.co/mjsGvNVmdx

— Political Polls (@Politics_Polls) December 24, 2023

Same as all the other polls, (I) too early for predictive value and (II) basically tied before the campaign gets started in earnest, but not where it matters most. If that bothers you, see the New York Times piece above from 12 years ago.

USA Today with a headline we should be reading more often, because it’s true:

Donald Trump faces many signs of potential political trouble; here are a few of them

Here are some of the things that can and will happen to Trump as he pursues the presidency again.

Adverse court rulings

The potential of legal trouble is all around Trump, and could pop up any time..

Falling poll numbers; rising rivals

Trump's GOP rivals warn that his continued legal woes will eventually wear out voters who might start to consider alternatives…

Bad voter reaction

The ultimate bad sign for Trump would come from voters.

Des Moines Register:

Why does Trump keep saying migrants are 'poisoning' America? Many GOP caucusgoers like it

The poll found that 42% of likely Republican caucusgoers are more likely to support Trump for his "poisoning the blood" comments; 28% said they are less likely to support him; and 29% said it does not matter.

The poll, conducted by Selzer & Co., has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percentage points.

That includes respondents of all age and income levels. It also includes married and single caucusgoers and those with children under 18, as well as likely caucusgoers from all four of Iowa's congressional districts.

Pluralities of men and women both say their support increases, with 45% of men and 38% of women saying they are more likely to support Trump after hearing him say illegal immigrants are "poisoning the blood" of America.

In 1962, “a star dancing in the night with a tail as big as a kite” couldn't help but remind of a rocket. https://t.co/KjlSLLgvcv

— Anthony Clark Arend (@arenda) December 25, 2023

Politico:

House GOP traps itself in impeachment box

Republicans are barreling toward an impeachment vote, still short of a majority. But if they skip one altogether, it might look like failure to the base.

Much of the House GOP has tried to keep the question of a full-scale removal vote at arm’s length, despite the course they’ve charted toward formal articles of impeachment. It’s not hard to see why: They’ll start the election year with only a three-vote majority, which could shrink even further, and 17 incumbents who represent districts Biden won. Plus, Democrats are almost guaranteed to unanimously oppose impeachment.

All that means a vote to recommend booting the president from office would be highly risky.

Wall Street Journal:

Prices Fell in November for the First Time Since 2020. Inflation Is Approaching Fed Target.

Spending and personal income rose, as Americans’ confidence in the economy rebounded

The Federal Reserve is winning its fight over inflation, boosting Americans’ spirits and offering greater reassurance that the U.S. economy can avoid a recession while bringing prices under control.

The Fed’s preferred inflation measure, the personal-consumption expenditures price index, fell 0.1% in November from the previous month, the first decline since April 2020, the Commerce Department said Friday. Prices were up 2.6% on the year, not far from the Fed’s 2% target.

New York Times:

What Went Wrong for Ron DeSantis in 2023

The Florida governor entered the year flush with cash and momentum. In the months since, internal chaos and Donald Trump’s indictments have sapped even his most avid supporters.

“I don’t think it’s fair,” Mr. DeSantis said. “But it’s reality.”

He was talking about Mr. Trump’s predicament. But he could just as easily have been talking about his own.

Boxed in by a base enamored with Mr. Trump that has instinctively rallied to the former president’s defense, Mr. DeSantis has struggled for months to match the hype that followed his landslide 2022 re-election. Now, with the first votes in the Iowa caucuses only weeks away on Jan. 15, Mr. DeSantis has slipped in some polls into third place, behind Nikki Haley, and has had to downsize his once-grand national ambitions to the simple hopes that a strong showing in a single state — Iowa — could vault him back into contention.

For a candidate who talks at length about his own disinterest in “managing America’s decline,” people around Mr. DeSantis are increasingly talking about managing his…

“He lacks charisma,” [New Hampshire voter] Mr. Scaer said in an interview later. “He just doesn’t have that.”

If the great promise of the DeSantis candidacy was Trump without the baggage, Stuart Stevens, a top strategist on Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign, said that what Republicans got instead was “Ted Cruz without the personality.”

Cue the “Never Back Down” jokes about the DeSantis campaign backing down.

Can’t be good for business having a quote like this about your client appear in the NYT pic.twitter.com/kJGllnDHQw

— Pat Dennis (@patdennis) December 24, 2023

Matt McNeil and Cliff Schecter:

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Republicans can’t run fast enough from the abortion issue.

The Hill:

GOP struggles to outrun Texas, Supreme Court abortion cases

Across-the-aisle tensions on abortion have been on full display over the last week after the Texas Supreme Court blocked Kate Cox, a pregnant woman whose fetus was diagnosed with a fatal condition, from having an abortion. Cox left the state to obtain an abortion just hours before the Texas court rejected her challenge.

Biden has already sought to wield the case as a cautionary tale against Republicans in power and against the GOP presidential front-runner, former President Trump.

“I don’t think they can escape it,” Republican strategist Liz Mair said of next year’s White House candidates, adding that the recent Texas case underscores the salience of the issue.

Alabamain Sean Lulofs and Iowan Steve Deace have a convo, which Nicholas Grossman frames beautifully:

Why didn't Fox simply show evidence of electoral fraud to avoid a loss in court costing $787m? Why didn't Giuliani simply show evidence of electoral fraud to avoid a loss in court costing $148m? And why didn't Trump in any 2020 court case? Credit for accepting the obvious answer. https://t.co/Tn6TZynpBE

— Nicholas Grossman (@NGrossman81) December 16, 2023

Let it sink in everywhere.

Greer Donley/New York Times:

What Happened to Kate Cox Is Tragic, and Completely Expected

As someone who has been studying state abortion definitions and exceptions in the wake of Roe v. Wade’s demise, I was not shocked.

The Texas anti-abortion law that went into effect shortly after Roe was overturned was drafted to ban the care needed by Ms. Cox and other women with similar cases: It does not include an exception for fetal anomalies, unlike laws in a handful of other states. The law does have a narrow exception allowing abortions in some medical emergencies, but it is written in such a vague and confusing way that it is difficult for even experts on this topic, like myself, to parse.

What is clear to me is that the Texas Supreme Court would have needed to make a broad and compassionate interpretation of the law for Ms. Cox to meet the high bar of that exception. Instead, the court interpreted the law narrowly — which is exactly what the state lawmakers who passed the legislation were hoping for. And the results have been tragic.

Jonathan V Last/The Bulwark:

The Case for Why Biden Will Win

We're all gonna make it.

I’ve been feeling more pessimistic than usual, because let’s be honest: Things are not great.

  • There’s a yawning disconnect between voter sentiment and economic reality.

  • The most successful first-term president since either Clinton or H.W. Bush has an impeachment proceeding against him for [reasons] and voters don’t seem to care.

  • Republicans are going to nominate a guy who attempted a coup and now expressly says he’d like to be a dictator.

  • This aspiring dictator is leading the incumbent president in most polls.

  • Ukraine has bogged down, Russia is making small gains, and America is wavering in its support for the most consequential European war since WWII.

But last night on TNB our economist friend Noah Smith made a pretty radical argument:

Even though it feels like we’re in a moment that is outside of historical norms, the long-running dynamics of economics and politics are still at work. And these dynamics suggest that Joe Biden is likely to win reelection.

So let’s unpack Noah’s thesis.

Even if, as seems to be true, the negative impact of inflation on consumer sentiment decays slowly, it's odd that the inflation rate being literally cut in half without any significant impact on employment seems to have had only a trivial impact on consumer sentiment.

— James Surowiecki (@JamesSurowiecki) December 16, 2023

Ronald Brownstein/The Atlantic:

Biden’s Economic Formula to Win in 2024

Could this be the president’s new strategy?

President Joe Biden and Democrats cannot win the debate over the economy without fundamentally reframing the terms of the choice they are offering voters, an extensive new research study by one of the party’s prominent electoral-strategy groups has concluded.

The study, scheduled to be released today, seeks to mitigate one of the party’s most glaring vulnerabilities heading into the 2024 election: the consistent finding in surveys that when it comes to managing the national economy or addressing inflation, significantly more voters express confidence in Republicans than in Democrats.

To close that gap, the study argues, Biden and Democrats must shift the debate from which party is best equipped to grow the overall economy to which side can help families achieve what the report calls a “better life.” The study argues that Democrats can win that argument with a three-pronged message centered on: delivering tangible kitchen-table economic benefits (such as increased federal subsidies for buying health insurance), confronting powerful special interests (such as major corporations), and pledging to protect key personal liberties and freedoms, led by the right to legal abortion.

"I don’t know why he doesn’t resign. Hes at a $1 salary. He has no power. The vice chair is basically the chair. It was a unanimous vote. No one wants him here," said state Rep. @michellesalzman https://t.co/M5nJDXrF0P

— Marc Caputo (@MarcACaputo) December 17, 2023

Politico:

Republican strategist Jeff Roe quits pro-DeSantis super PAC amid turmoil

Roe announced his resignation late Saturday.

[Ron] DeSantis has been heavily leaning on Never Back Down to oversee his campaign’s functions, including its field deployment.

Why it matters: DeSantis was trying something new—using an outside group and not the campaign for basic campaign blocking and tackling. To abuse a football analogy even further, outsourcing your offensive and defensive lines means there’s no team coordination whatsoever (pretend it’d be illegal to coordinate), and you can imagine how that plays out on the field.

Well, it didn’t work. And DeSantis is is big trouble without a game plan just as Nikki Haley threatens to eclipse him altogether.

See also from PoliticoDeSantis on the ropes

This is why Iowa is so critical to DeSantis and less critical for Haley. https://t.co/NNdxnaQyVQ

— Joe St. George (@JoeStGeorge) December 17, 2023

David French/New York Times:

To Support Ukraine, Persuade the Elephant

One of the most interesting explorations of the art of persuasion comes from New York University’s Jonathan Haidt, who several years ago described the process of persuasion as well as anyone I know. In his book “The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom,” he compares people’s relation to their emotions to a “rider on the back of an elephant.”

The rider is our rational mind. It’s the part of our brain that deals with facts and reason. It acknowledges, for example, that two plus two equals four, the sky is blue and the Southeastern Conference is the greatest college football conference in the history of the universe.

The elephant is basically everything else about us. As Haidt later explained in an excellent podcast discussion, the elephant represents “99 percent of what’s going on in your mind that you’re not aware of.” By controlling our emotional and social aspects, the elephant controls us far more than we might like; we are, after all, only riders. If the elephant doesn’t want to move, it won’t move. But if the elephant wants to move, as Haidt said on the podcast, “then it is effortless to persuade the rider to go along.” Thus the best way to persuade the elephant and rider to change course is to “reach the elephant first.”

Tom Sullivan/Hullabaloo:

Those Left-To-Right Sliders

What spurs some to lurch right is rejection by the left. Trust me, I’ve heard that one. Some new volunteers are quickly discouraged at not being elevated to positions of prominence and authority in political campaigns that are mostly grunt work directed by the more experienced. Grunt work is beneath their dignity. They are “big ideas” people.

We see something similar among better-knowns of the post-left. 

Cliff Schecter & Stephanie Miller:

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Rudy Giuliani is out of luck, and the courts are sending a message

The Rudy Giuliani defamation trial is now over.

NBC News:

Rudy Giuliani hit with $148M verdict for defaming two Georgia election workers

An attorney for Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, had urged the eight-person jury to “send a message” with its verdict.

$148 million total

— Scott MacFarlane (@MacFarlaneNews) December 15, 2023

It was a unanimous decision by an eight-person jury. Giuliani deserved punitive damages, and the plaintiffs—Fulton County, Georgia, election workers Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss—deserve to be compensated.

The courts are saying that lying can be expensive. And Donald Trump’s fraud trial in New York is still yet to resolve (and it might send the same message).

In other news:

People were negative on the economy ahead of the 2018 midterms, because of stagnant wage growth and falling behind—the GOP got clobbered. But a year later after wage growth turned up and people felt a lot better about it. If trends continue, don’t bet against people feeling it. https://t.co/ukxpRKYmih

— Jesse Lee (@JesseCharlesLee) December 15, 2023

Neil Irwin/Axios:

What the Fed's rate policy pivot means for the economy

Why it matters: The end of the war on inflation is in sight. Barring some unpleasant economic surprises, the central bank is now prepared to take its foot off the brakes and move to a stance in which it is no longer actively trying to slow growth.

  • Importantly, the majority of policymakers are now envisioning significant rate cuts in 2024, while also envisioning the economy remaining basically solid, with low unemployment and steady growth.
  • In other words, rates will probably be coming down next year even in the absence of a severe downturn. That's a sweet spot both for financial markets and for families and businesses.
  • The cycle of monetary tightening that has whipsawed markets and the economy for the last two years is, for all intents and purposes, over.

House Republicans are secret Never Trumpers https://t.co/UURqy5FRuK

— Michael McDonald (@ElectProject) December 15, 2023

John Stoehr/The Editorial Board:

House Republicans ‘will regret’ voting for impeachment inquiry

An interview with the peerless Jill Lawrence.

Biden’s impeachment, which is imminent, is part of Trump’s vengeance movement. Fortunately, it’s being seen that way. Stories about it seem to have two critical features. One, that there’s no evidence linking Joe Biden to Hunter Biden’s businesses. Two, that beneath all the innuendo and conspiracy theory is an obsessive, driving force – a disgraced former president who’s still stinging from being impeached twice.

Since these impeachment proceedings are going to be based on nothing, one could say nothing will come of them – meaninglessness has no meaning. But that overlooks something important about the House GOP’s smear campaign. It represents fundamental weakness.

this is so goodhttps://t.co/XVaL3WAXSu pic.twitter.com/hshAIZsg6X

— Greg Dworkin (@DemFromCT) December 15, 2023

Craig Mauger/Detroit News:

In court, Michigan Republicans tie false elector effort to Donald Trump's campaign

While the Trump campaign has previously been tied to the overall strategy of crafting electoral certificates in seven battleground states, the testimony Thursday described campaign staffers as being involved in recruiting attendees and running the meeting of the false electors in Lansing on Dec. 14, 2020. During that gathering, 16 Republican activists signed a document that was used to claim the then-incumbent Republican president won Michigan's 16 electoral votes.

The revelations came on the second day of preliminary examinations for six of the Republican electors as Attorney General Dana Nessel's office pursues criminal forgery charges against those whose names appeared on the false certificate.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and predict that SCOTUS affirms the DC Cir. and upholds the use of the obstruction law, 18 USC 1512, to Jan. 6 defendants - by 5-4 or 6-3, Justice Kagan writing for the majority. I'll explain why in a blog post after I finish grading final exams!

— Randall Eliason (@RDEliason) December 15, 2023

Bolts magazine:

The Thousands of Local Elections That Will Shape Criminal Justice Policy in 2024

Counties across the nation are electing DAs and sheriffs next year. Bolts guides you through the early hotspots.

Local DAs like [Georgia’s Fani] Willis have become a key GOP target this year, as Republicans go after prosecutors who they think are standing in the way of their political or policy ambitions. New laws in Georgia and Texas give courts and state officials more authority to discipline DAs. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who is challenging Trump for the GOP’s presidential nomination, has over the last 18 months removed two Democratic prosecutors from office, angry over their policies like not prosecuting abortion.

The presidential election is also pulling sheriffs into its orbit. Far-right sheriffs have allied with election deniers, using local law enforcement to amplify Trump’s lies about 2020, ramp up investigations, and even threaten election officials. One such sheriff, Pinal County’s Mark Lamb, is now running for the U.S. Senate in Arizona, leaving his office open. Over in Texas, Tarrant County (Fort Worth) Sheriff Bill Waybourn inspired a new task force that will be policing how people vote while he runs for reelection next year.

With roughly 2,200 prosecutors and sheriffs on the 2024 ballot, voters will weigh in on county offices throughout the nation next year, settling confrontations over the shape of local criminal legal systems while also choosing the president and Congress.

Bolts today is launching its coverage with our annual overview of which counties will hold such races and when: Find our full list here.

We sort of take it for granted at this point, but the breakdown of rule discipline and emergence of suspension as the one and only means of making law has been the biggest and most underwritten congressional story for going on six months. https://t.co/xV95bGNnAz

— Liam Donovan (@LPDonovan) December 15, 2023

Bloomberg:

Mike Johnson May Be the Next House Speaker to Lose His Job

  • Conservatives warn Johnson against deals on Ukraine, shutdown
  • Lawmakers due back just 10 days before next US funding lapse

House Speaker Mike Johnson is ending 2023 with an ominous preview of what to expect in the new year: dissension in his ranks that threatens to hamstring deals on US government funding, Ukraine war aid and border policy.

It could also cost him his job.

The Louisiana Republican, elected speaker in October after GOP hardliners ousted his predecessor for making deals with Democrats, sent the House home for the holidays on Thursday after passing a bipartisan defense policy bill over strong objections from 73 ultra-conservatives.

This YouTube lecture from New York Times analyst Nate Cohn on the state of polling is excellent:

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: The important poll question: ‘What if Trump is convicted?’

Joyce Vance/”Civil Discourse” on Substack:

Jack Smith's Bold Move

The issue comes down to this: Is Trump immune from criminal prosecution for the rest of his life for any acts he committed while president? In other words, is he above the law? Or can he be, as Jack Smith argues, prosecuted once he leaves the White House.

The Supreme Court has never decided this issue before. And it has to be decided, because if it goes in Trump’s favor, the case is dismissed and there will be no trial. I don’t think anyone expects that will be the outcome here, although you never know with the Supreme Court. But Smith is asking them to tell Trump that immunity (and double jeopardy, an argument with even less merit than immunity) is off the table so the case can proceed to trial.

It’s too early to do horse race polling, but if you want to look at a poll, look at the ones that ask about convictions.

Would you vote for Donald Trump for president in 2024 if he is/has been - Convicted of a felony crime by a jury? Yes 25% No 59% .@Reuters/@Ipsos, 4,411 Adults, 12/5-11https://t.co/HKnYKcWUAy pic.twitter.com/mUaqD9K8xR

— Political Polls (@Politics_Polls) December 14, 2023

CNN:

NY appeals court hands Trump another defeat over gag order

A New York appellate court rejected Donald Trump’s challenge of the gag order in his civil fraud trial Thursday. Trump’s attorneys petitioned the court over the gag order that bars him and the attorneys from speaking publicly about Judge Arthur Engoron’s court staff.

In rejecting the challenge Thursday, the appeals court said Trump didn’t use the proper legal vehicle to challenge the gag order and sanctions.

The appellate court in another order Thursday also rejected a Trump request to allow his legal team to seek a review of the gag order by the Court of Appeals, New York’s highest court.

Trial testimony ended Wednesday after 11 weeks in court.

The parties are scheduled to file supplemental briefs in the case January 5 and return to court for oral arguments January 11 before Engoron renders a final verdict.

And on that note, keep in mind how often Trump is losing in court, except for some delay moves.

In what may be a historic hat trick, Trump lost his 3d presidential immunity case in 2 weeks yesterday--this one in E. Jean Carroll's original defamation suit against him, which goes to trial 1/15/24. 2d Cir rules he waived prez immunity. ... https://t.co/gS5KEntI3R /1

— Roger Parloff (@rparloff) December 14, 2023

On the “vibes vs. the economy” debate, Nate Cohn/The New York Times:

Vibes, the Economy and the Election

Recent positive news may put two theories on economic disenchantment to the test.

Yes, voters are upset about high prices, and prices are indeed high. This easily and even completely explains why voters think this economy is mediocre: In the era of consumer sentiment data, inflation has never risen so high without pushing consumer sentiment below average and usually well below average. This part is not complicated.

But it’s harder to argue that voters should believe the economy is outright terrible, even after accounting for inflation. Back in early 2022, I estimated that consumer confidence was running at least 10 to 15 percentage points worse than one would expect historically, after accounting for prices and real disposable income.

In that regard, consider the following headlines:

  • CNN: Dow surges to new record as Fed signals three rate cuts in 2024
  • New York Times: Is Jerome Powell’s Fed Pulling Off a Soft Landing?
  • New York Times: The Markets Are Getting Ahead of the Fed
  • CNBC: Dow rises to fresh record after more strong economic data, falling rates
  • Reuters: US economy still resilient as retail sales beat expectations, layoffs stay low

Consider also that weak Chinese economic growth is likely to depress oil demand for some time.

This is another piece of evidence to file in "election results aren't matching the assumptions people are drawing from pessimism in the polls." I'll change my tune really fast if Dems stop overperforming in specials, but I mean, even in rural Oklahoma ... something is happening. https://t.co/2LidIwdedN

— Natalie Jackson (@nataliemj10) December 13, 2023

Jill Lawrence/The Bulwark:

Impeachment Is Just Another Word for Getting Even. Thanks, GOP.

Accountability is on life support and even Jack Smith may not save it.

No facts? No problem. House Republicans plan to launch an official Biden impeachment inquiry this week—if they can wrangle enough votes from their minuscule, divided majority. Greene predicted two months before the 2022 midterms that there would be “a lot of investigations” if the GOP won the House. It’s the Democrats’ fault, she told author Robert Draper, because they started it with their “witch hunts” against Trump. She introduced an impeachment resolution against Biden the day after he took office.

House Republicans are going to impeach Biden for the high crime of many people saying they should

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) December 13, 2023

The Associated Press:

The Republican leading the probe of Hunter Biden has his own shell company and complicated friends

Interviews and records reviewed by The Associated Press provide new insights into the financial deal, which risks undercutting the force of some of [GOP Rep. James] Comer’s central arguments in his impeachment inquiry of President Joe Biden. For months, the chairman of the House Oversight Committee and his Republican colleagues have been pounding Biden, a Democrat, for how his relatives traded on their famous name to secure business deals.

Expect more stories like this now that the hypocrisy is on full display.

so many people on here who haven't owned up to: a) how wrong they were, and b) how sneeringly dismissive they were of those who ended up being right https://t.co/0xNrxuzs4B

— John Harwood (@JohnJHarwood) December 13, 2023

Great point:

Two end-of-year pins in the House: 1) The NDAA passed with majority Dem votes. Once again the big vote is carried by the Democratic minority, just like both CRs, the debt limit, the Santos expulsion, McCarthy's removal. Jeffries wielded more power in 2023 than McCarthy or Johnson

— Aaron Fritschner (@Fritschner) December 14, 2023

He’s right about Leader Jeffries. Then again:

Both sides more than willing to play their part here. Ds reluctantly accept what's going to happen and declare victory because a) it could have been worse and b) it denies Rs any satisfaction. Meanwhile marginal Rs are eager to embrace the L because it suits their purposes. https://t.co/6ryYqhZW3n

— Liam Donovan (@LPDonovan) December 14, 2023

Tony Michaels and Cliff Schecter on a Trump dictatorship: