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Presented by the American Beverage Association: POLITICO's must-read briefing on what's driving the afternoon in Washington. | | | | | |  | | By Ryan Lizza, Eli Okun and Garrett Ross | Presented by |  | | The LARRY SUMMERS op-ed about the Biden stimulus bill that we flagged this morning has set the left wonkosphere on fire. Summers is warning that $1.9 trillion in new spending would amount to three times what is needed to fill in the hole in the economy, and could lead to an overheated economy and financial instability before next year’s midterms. And, more important to progressives, make it difficult to pass President JOE BIDEN’S long-term agenda on climate change, infrastructure, education and health care. JARED BERNSTEIN, who sometimes clashed with Summers in the Obama White House, was asked about the op-ed during a feisty interview with POPPY HARLOW on CNN earlier today and he responded, “I think [Summers is] wrong. I think he is wrong in a pretty profound way.” He added: “Right now we have inflation that’s been below the Fed’s target rate of 2% for well over a decade. We also have tremendous unused capacity in this economy. We have Black and Hispanic unemployment rates around 9%. We have 10 million people unemployed. … It is all that capacity that the American Rescue Plan plans to get back online into this economy … It doesn’t mean there won’t be some heat. Where Larry got something importantly wrong, by the way, is by suggesting that the administration was being dismissive of any potential inflationary pressures.” Bernstein repeated the same points during a White House briefing where he was peppered with questions about the Summers op-ed. More reactions: Biden in the Oval Office this morning: “The one thing we learned is we can’t do too much here. We can do too little. We can do too little and sputter.” Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii): “Why would we listen to the economist who admits he went too small last time if he’s warning us to go small again? I swear this town is nuts. It’s like people can only remember thirty names and so they just keep going back to the same people.” NBC’s Sahil Kapur: “Several Republican senators I spoke to yesterday, including @MittRomney, cited this Larry Summers op-ed to argue for shrinking Biden’s proposed stimulus. Democrats broadly disagree with it.” Progressive Policy Institute’s Ben Ritz: “This is a historic opportunity for progressive R&D, infrastructure, and climate spending that we have needed for decades. It would be tragic to waste our unique capacity to do so on excessive checks & other very short-term policies when we need it to finance long-term investment.” Max Boot: “@LHSummers makes a strong case that the Biden stimulus package is too large—risking reigniting inflation and making it impossible to fund Biden’s ambitious infrastructure investment plans.” Erick Erickson: “Everybody save this Larry Summers op-ed so when the recession hits next year and the press and Democrats blame Trump, you'll have on record that the Democrats' most prominent economist was warning the Democrats they were about to cause a recession.” Demand Justice’s Brian Fallon: “The three lessons from 2009 are: 1. Dont spend months chasing Republican votes that will never come 2. Dont listen to Rahm on how much to prioritize judges 3. Dont listen to Larry Summers on the size of your stimulus package.” Tim Noah: “Maybe I’m looking in the wrong places, but is anyone engaging Larry Summers’s arguments rather than disparaging his character and the inadequacy of the Obama stimulus?” Ezra Klein: “After four years of ‘senior White House official says the president has lost his [mind],’ it is sort of nice to fire up Twitter and the uproar is ‘former senior White House official says the rescue package exceeds the size of the output gap, possibly raising inflationary pressures.’” SPEAKER NANCY PELOSI, after the White House meeting this morning, per CNN’s Kaitlan Collins: “We didn’t talk about Larry Summers.” | | A message from the American Beverage Association: At America’s beverage companies our plastic bottles are made to be remade. We’re carefully designing them to be 100% recyclable, including the caps—so every bottle can become a new one. That means less plastic waste in our environment. Please help us get Every Bottle Back. EveryBottleBack.org | | | Pelosi said House Dems are aiming to have the Covid relief bill passed and sent to the Senate in two weeks. BIDEN GETTING BLUNT in his remarks this afternoon, which reiterated that he’d choose a partisan bill over what he deems an insufficient one: “What Republicans have proposed is either to do nothing or not enough. All of a sudden, many of them have rediscovered fiscal restraint and the concern for the deficits. But don’t kid yourself: This approach will come with a cost. More pain, for more people, for longer than it has to be.” ON THE CHECKS … The president once again said he won’t budge on the $1,400 size. And while he said wealthy people shouldn’t get checks, a two-income family pulling in $70,000 or $80,000 — “yeah, they need the money. And they’re going to get it.” THE UNEMPLOYMENT PICTURE — “U.S. employers add just 49K jobs as unemployment falls to 6.3%,” AP: “The unemployment rate for January fell sharply from 6.7% to 6.3%, the Labor Department said Friday. Most of the drop in unemployment occurred because some people out of work found jobs, while others stopped looking for work and were no longer counted as unemployed. “Friday’s figures reflect a faltering job market, slowed by a pandemic that is still causing consumers to avoid traveling, shopping, dining out, attending entertainment venues and engaging in other forms of face-to-face contact. With many employers still cutting staff, nearly 10 million jobs remain lost to the pandemic.” BLOOMBERG NEWS says the jobs report will strengthen Biden’s case for $1.9 trillion: “Biden’s Go-Big Push on Stimulus Gets Help From Weak Jobs, Senate” ANDY SLAVITT announced at the Covid-19 task force briefing that six additional companies “will surge manufacturing of at-home test kits.” Also: Defense Secretary LLOYD AUSTIN has approved a FEMA request and ordered an initial contingent of more than 1,000 military personnel to bolster vaccination sites, starting in California in the next couple of weeks. VACCINE LATEST — “AstraZeneca Covid-19 Vaccine Effective Against U.K. Variant in Trial,” WSJ TALKER — “The Left’s Vaccine Problem,” NYT: “Progressive leaders in much of the world are now struggling to distribute coronavirus vaccines quickly and efficiently … At the same time, there are clear success stories in places that few people would describe as progressive. … “A common problem seems to be a focus on process rather than on getting shots into arms. Some progressive leaders are effectively sacrificing efficiency for what they consider to be equity.” HEADS UP — “U.S. Air Force investigating intruder at Joint Base Andrews, home to Air Force One,” ABC: “The United States Air Force is investigating an incident of an intruder at Joint Base Andrews, a military facility in Maryland’s Prince George's County that houses Air Force One, the aircraft that carries the president. “‘An unauthorized individual gained access to Joint Base Andrews. The incident is under investigation,’ a Joint Base Andrews spokesperson told ABC News in a statement late Thursday. ‘The Air Force Office of Special Investigations (OSI) is lead on this investigation. Any requests for information related to the incident can be referred to OSI.’ … It’s unclear when the incident occurred or whether the individual was able to reach any aircraft on the flight line.” — “Rep. Greene revels in committee removal but says she’s ‘sorry’ for conspiratorial rhetoric,” by Quint Forgey: “In remarks to reporters outside the Capitol, the Georgia Republican claimed she had ‘been freed’ by the bipartisan vote on Thursday that stripped her of her seats on the House Budget and the House Education and Labor panels. ‘If I was on a committee, I’d be wasting my time, because my conservative values wouldn’t be heard and neither would my district’s,’ Greene said.” | | | | TRACK FIRST 100 DAYS OF THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION: The Biden administration hit the ground running with a series of executive orders his first week in office and continues to outline priorities on key issues. What's coming down the pike? Find out in Transition Playbook, our scoop-filled newsletter tracking the policies, people and emerging power centers of the first 100 days of the new administration. Subscribe today. | | | | | REPORT CARD — “Final 2020 Commerce figures verify Trump's failure to curb trade deficit,” by Doug Palmer: “The U.S. trade deficit over the four years of President Donald Trump’s presidency soared to its highest level since 2008, despite his tough tariff tactics intended to bring it down, a new Commerce Department report showed on Friday. “The combined U.S. goods and services trade deficit increased to $679 billion in 2020, compared to $481 billion in 2016, the year before Trump took office. The trade deficit in goods alone hit $916 billion, a record high and an increase of about 21 percent from 2016. Trump failed in one of his major trade policy goals because the U.S. trade deficit is driven more by macroeconomic factors, like how much a country spends and saves, than it is by tariffs and foreign trade practices, analysts said.” The report JAN. 6 FALLOUT — “Muddled Intelligence Hampered Response to Capitol Riot,” NYT: “New details about what authorities anticipated on Jan. 6 highlight failures to grasp the degree of the threat from pro-Trump right-wing extremists.” — “They Stormed the Capitol. Their Apps Tracked Them,” NYT Opinion’s Charlie Warzel and Stuart Thompson: “The data we were given showed what some in the tech industry might call a God-view vantage of that dark day. It included about 100,000 location pings for thousands of smartphones, revealing around 130 devices inside the Capitol exactly when Trump supporters were storming the building. … “While there were no names or phone numbers in the data, we were once again able to connect dozens of devices to their owners, tying anonymous locations back to names, home addresses, social networks and phone numbers of people in attendance. In one instance, three members of a single family were tracked in the data.” THE DERADICALIZATION QUESTION — “After Capitol riots, desperate families turn to groups that ‘deprogram’ extremists,” WaPo: “Parents for Peace, a 10-person operation of mostly volunteers, says calls to its national helpline have tripled since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, with a growing number of younger people being groomed in white supremacist ideology. … “The range of extremist ideas they encounter also has widened in the past year, driven by the 2020 election and the pandemic. … The deradicalization groups preach guidance and reform, as experts call on the Biden administration to invest more in preventing and reversing the kind of radicalization that was on display in the attack on the Capitol, not just prosecuting individuals when the danger escalates to violence and destruction.” OLIVIA NUZZI INTERVIEWS ERIC SWALWELL — “Eric Swalwell on Impeaching Trump, Surviving the Capitol Riot, and Being Linked to a Chinese Spy,” N.Y. Mag HAWLEY WATCH — “‘A kiss of death’: Top GOP tech critics are personae non gratae after election challenge,” by Cristiano Lima: “Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas) found rare agreement in recent years with progressive Democrats … But after Hawley and Cruz led efforts to object to Biden’s certification as president just hours after last month’s deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, those partnerships are splintering. … “[T]he break on tech policy deals an especially sudden and significant blow to bipartisan efforts on Capitol Hill to crack down on alleged abuses by industry giants, where surprise partnerships between liberals and conservatives sparked hope among big tech critics of legislative action.” — “The Knives Come Out for Josh Hawley,” The Atlantic: “The elite conservative world saw the Missouri senator as America’s next great statesman. Instead, he’s revealed uncomfortable truths about the movement.” BEYOND THE BELTWAY — “Big Trump donors converge on Newsom recall,” by Alex Isenstadt: “Big Republican donors — including some prominent backers of former President Donald Trump — are zeroing in on a new target as they dig out from the wreckage of the 2020 election: California Gov. Gavin Newsom.” 2022 WATCH — “John Fetterman files paperwork to run for U.S. Senate in 2022,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette | | | | KEEP UP WITH CONGRESS IN 2021: Get the inside scoop on the Schumer/McConnell dynamic, the debate over the filibuster and increasing tensions in the House. From Schumer to McConnell, Pelosi to McCarthy and everyone in between, new Huddle author Olivia Beavers brings the latest from Capitol Hill with assists from POLITICO's deeply sourced Congress team. Subscribe to Huddle, the indispensable guide to Congress. | | | | | THE ROY COOPER STRATEGY — “What Does This Man Know That Other Democrats Don’t?” The Atlantic: “In 2016, North Carolina Democrats went into Election Day thinking they could sweep the competitive races for president, Senate, and governor. Only [Roy] Cooper won. In 2020, the dynamic was the same: three marquee races, and only Cooper pulled it off. … Figuring out why Cooper keeps winning could have potentially huge implications for determining whether he’s a fluke or a model for Democrats across the South and in other red states. “Cooper’s races never became national Democratic causes. He has set no major fundraising records. He’s not an otherworldly political talent. And yet his success is already a source of chatter among some political obsessives gaming out the 2024 presidential ticket. Cooper, they told me, could offer a compelling balance to Vice President Kamala Harris as the white male Democratic governor of an important swing state.” PARDON DEEP DIVE — “How the Trump administration pardon process broke down in favor of the rich and well-connected,” WaPo: “Trump’s use of that power reflected how he viewed the presidency through the prism of his own interests and as a way to reward friends and spite enemies … His transactional approach largely sidelined low-level offenders who had waited years after filing petitions through the Justice Department and elevated those with personal connections to the White House — or the money to pay someone with those connections. “Even Trump allies who advised the White House on clemency say they were startled and disappointed by who was on the final list. In all, Trump granted 237 pardons and commutations … A Washington Post review of pardon records found that about 100 of those granted clemency had never even petitioned the Justice Department’s Office of the Pardon Attorney … An additional 14,000 people who had filed petitions under the federal guidelines were left in limbo.” KNOWING ALI MAYORKAS — “Alejandro Mayorkas fought for refugees and Dreamers. Can he undo four years of Trump immigration policies?” USA Today: “[T]he many traits former colleagues and staffers say Mayorkas possesses: Tough, hard-working, persuasive, personally invested in issues and owning an inherent empathy for the plight of refugees. … His family’s escape from persecution and new life in the United States left lasting impressions on a young Mayorkas.” AFTERNOON READ — “Environmental Groups’ Greatest Obstacle May Not Be Republican Opposition,” by Zack Colman in POLITICO Magazine: “Big environmental groups have an ambitious agenda, but success requires satisfying their Black, Latino and Indigenous critics.” IN MEMORIAM — “Remembering Robb Webb, longtime voice of 60 Minutes,” CBS: “Beginning in the mid-1990s, Robb Webb's warm baritone voice greeted 60 Minutes viewers to inform them what to tune in for on our Sunday evening broadcast. Webb was the distinguished voice of 60 Minutes and the ‘CBS Evening News’ during a long and storied career as a voice artist. Nelson Robinette ‘Robb’ Webb died this week in New York City, from complications related to COVID-19. A native of Whitesburg, Kentucky, Webb was 82 years old.” MEDIAWATCH — Jamie Fly is returning to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty as president and CEO. He most recently was senior fellow and senior adviser to the president of the German Marshall Fund of the United States and previously was appointed RFE/RL president in August 2019. — Jenny Deam will cover health care in D.C. for ProPublica. She most recently has been an investigative reporter covering the business of health care for the Houston Chronicle. Announcement — The Nation is adding David Bromwich and Alexis Grenell as monthly columnists, plus a new monthly column from Jeet Heer. BONUS BIRTHDAY: Trevor Kincaid, senior comms officer at the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation | | | | A message from the American Beverage Association:   Every Bottle Back is one way we’re driving solutions together. 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