Playbook PM: Biden marks a different kind of Veterans Day

From: POLITICO Playbook - Thursday Nov 11,2021 06:18 pm

Nov 11, 2021

By Eugene Daniels, Eli Okun and Garrett Ross

Presented by

In his Veterans Day remarks this afternoon at Arlington National Cemetery, President JOE BIDEN sounded some of the typical notes we expect at these events — talking about vets as “the very spine of America” and people to whom we have a “sacred obligation as a nation.”

But there was one way this event was atypical: Biden is the first U.S. president in generations who knows firsthand the experience of having a son or daughter deployed overseas to an active war zone.

The president told the story of how his late son, BEAU, let him know he was enlisting in the military during the Iraq War. “After spending six months in Kosovo as an assistant U.S. attorney trying to set up a criminal justice system, I got a call from him one day. And he said, ‘Dad, what are you doing Friday? … I’d like you to pin my bars on.’ I said, ‘What the heck have you done?’” Beau responded: “Someone’s gotta finish these wars, dad.” (It’s worth noting that today marks the first Veterans Day in 20 years without a massive U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan.)

Biden also spoke about the sacrifices that military families make while their family members are deployed, and the need to ensure that they get the resources they need during and after deployment.

It’s a need I know all too well. My dad, a retired Army lieutenant colonel, was deployed more times than I can count over his 20-plus years of service.

The toll it takes on families can’t be overstated. Watching your mom have to raise three knucklehead kids solo while worrying about her husband is something that never leaves you.

So, from all of us at Playbook: Thank you to every single military veteran and family member. (And thanks especially to my dad and mom.)

SLOW BURN — Before his remarks today, Biden ordered the VA to examine new research connecting military members’ exposure to burn pits during their service with several types of cancer, per Stars and Stripes’ Nikki Wentling. The department has three months to deliver its recommendations, which could pave the way for ill vets to get more health care and compensation after the agency has “contended for years that there wasn’t sufficient evidence to support their claims.” The administration also announced other steps to help veterans who’ve had toxic exposures.

AFTERNOON READS — From Des Moines, WaPo’s Mary Jordan and Kevin Sullivan tell the story of JAMES DEAN RYAN, “another Vietnam veteran who died alone.” Their six-month investigation reveals that thousands of American veterans — many who served in Vietnam — join the ranks of the unclaimed dead annually. Now, they write, “a growing army of strangers are volunteering to wave flags and say prayers for the thousands who have no one.”

— “A veteran helped spread viral 9/11 conspiracy theories. Can he start over?” by WaPo’s Jose Del Real in Oneonta, N.Y.: “Nearly 20 years after shipping off to war, a soldier who helped make the ‘Loose Change’ video wrestles with the power stories have to heal and to destroy.”

— As membership falls in the VFW and American Legion, The Atlantic’s Andrew Aoyama looks at what will happen to veterans’ halls around the country.

Good Thursday afternoon.

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(IR)RECONCILABLE DIFFERENCES

A TAXING JOURNEY — WaPo’s Jeff Stein breaks down how Democrats massively scaled down their tax overhaul ambitions over the course of several months of negotiating over the Build Back Better package (BBB), and ended up pushing a 15% “minimum tax” on the largest corporations in the U.S.

Four things that stood out to us: (1) Sen. KYRSTEN SINEMA (D-Ariz.) was the primary source of resistance to many of the proposed tax changes, and at her behest, the “White House agreed to drop a proposed 3 percent tax on taxpayers earning over $5 million, instead agreeing to target the higher tax to those earning more than $10 million.” (2) The White House dropped its proposed tax on billionaires after Speaker NANCY PELOSI complained that “the plan amounted to a publicity stunt.” (3) Now there’s even trouble with the corporate minimum tax, as Rep. EARL BLUMENAUER (D-Ore.) and renewable energy advocates seek changes to make sure it doesn’t damage the bill’s clean energy tax credits. (4) Even curtailed, the BBB still adds up “to the biggest increase in taxes on the rich and large corporations in decades.” But some experts warn that the bill’s dilution leaves its true tax/revenue impact in doubt.

— And a 1% tax on corporate stock buybacks that has escaped the negotiating chopping block thus far isn’t scaring Wall Street at all: Brian Faler reports it won’t make a difference to most companies.

HEADLINE OF THE DAY — “‘We Don’t Fix This Because We Just Don’t Care About Old People’”: For POLITICO, Joanne Kenen examines the $150 billion in funding that the current form of the Build Back Better bill would provide for long-term care. It would be “a historic sum for home care” amid the country’s caregiving crisis, she writes. “But it barely scrapes the surface of what’s needed. And with Democrats in danger of losing their majorities next year, it’s clear the best shot at finally tackling one of the biggest holes in American health care is slipping away.”

POLITICS ROUNDUP

LEDE OF THE DAY, via The Daily Beast’s Roger Sollenberger: “A Republican senator faces serious allegations that he illegally loaned his campaign millions of dollars from his company. But the senator in question — Republican MIKE BRAUN of Indiana — says he can’t fully answer the government’s questions because one of his key staffers ‘vanished.’ The Daily Beast found him within minutes.”

The reporter found him — how else? — by calling his mother. And a new FEC audit of Braun’s 2018 campaign committee “raised eyebrows among campaign finance experts,” he writes.

— Indiana Democrats didn’t hold back in response, declaring that Braun “stole a United States Senate seat.”

NEW IN THE OLD DOMINION — Virginia Gov.-elect GLENN YOUNGKIN announced that outgoing Heritage Foundation President KAY COLES JAMES and state Sen. STEVE NEWMAN will co-chair his transition team.

JIM JORDAN SPEAKS — In his new book, “Do What You Said You Would Do,” Rep. JIM JORDAN (R-Ohio) recounts how he would do TV hits on Fox News, CNN and MSNBC to communicate with DONALD TRUMP rather than try to schedule a call or meeting with him during the Affordable Care Act repeal effort. Spectrum News’ Taylor Popielarz reports that Jordan also writes favorably about erstwhile rival, the House minority leader: “KEVIN MCCARTHY has amazing political skills and a strong work ethic, but in our fourteen plus years of serving together, what I respect most is his attitude.”

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JAN. 6 AND ITS AFTERMATH

MEADOWS IN THE SPOTLIGHT — Today, the Biden White House told Trump-era White House chief of staff MARK MEADOWS that it won’t assert the executive privilege he sought over his documents, report WaPo’s Jackie Alemany and Tom Hamburger. The move comes as the Jan. 6 committee is trying to increase pressure on Meadows to cooperate with their investigation, and is considering “more aggressive measures against him.”

— In a statement, Meadows’ attorney, GEORGE TERWILLIGER, said that “Mr. Meadows remains under the instructions of former President Trump to respect longstanding principles of executive privilege. It now appears the courts will have to resolve this conflict.” (h/t CBS’ Ellis Kim)

POINT OF PRIVILEGE — Trump’s legal team filed an emergency motion today asking for a stay to prevent the National Archives from beginning to release his Jan. 6-related records Friday, per The Hill.

— But CNN’s veteran Supreme Court reporter Joan Biskupic writes that if Trump eventually takes his executive privilege fight to the justices, he’d likely have “a weak case, even if heard by this increasingly conservative high court.” For that, he has RICHARD NIXON and the court’s Watergate-era precedents to thank.

TRUMP CARDS

THOSE LAZY HAZY CRAZY DAYS OF 2020 — In an excerpt for Vanity Fair from his new book “Betrayal,” ABC’s JONATHAN KARL reports that Trump’s infamous June 2020 rally in Tulsa was even wilder than we knew, and led to a Covid-19 outbreak among the mask-resistant campaign staff, who were then instructed to drive rental cars back to D.C. instead of quarantining. One was hospitalized and thought he was going to die, while others blamed themselves for HERMAN CAIN’s death from Covid a month later.

2022 WATCH — Some Trump aides and allies are batting around a “stay away” strategy for the midterms, wherein the former president may not campaign for GOP candidates in states like New Hampshire and Arizona, per CNN’s Gabby Orr. That follows Youngkin’s successful ploy to walk the Trump tightrope — with nary a Trump appearance in the state — but it also, of course, “assumes an unusual level of deference from the prideful ex-President.”

THE INVESTIGATIONS — Top legal experts tell Insider’s Ryan Barber that they’re frustrated over the lack of action from the Justice Department on investigating Trump, particularly regarding Jan. 6. There would be plenty of political pitfalls, though: “For the Justice Department to bring any case, it would need evidence so strong that it rendered a decision not to prosecute untenable.”

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THE PANDEMIC

THE UNMASKING — Many school districts are relaxing mask requirements and other pandemic restrictions as vaccines roll out for children ages 5 and up and the Delta variant surge fades, reports WSJ’s Betsy Morris. Even Democratic leaders like New Jersey Gov. PHIL MURPHY, Pennsylvania Gov. TOM WOLF and New York City Mayor-elect ERIC ADAMS are talking about easing mandates or devolving the decisions to local leaders in the months to come.

THE NEW HOT SPOTS — A string of states from Arizona to Minnesota is now battling an autumn surge of the virus, with ICU beds filling up. The pressure on hospitals in some places hasn’t let up since the summer Delta increase began, and in places like rural Colorado, “hospital staff are under siege and exhausted,” Bloomberg’s Jonathan Levin and Vincent Del Giudice report.

BEYOND THE BELTWAY

INFRASTRUCTURE YEAR — High-speed rail advocates are likely to be disappointed by the bipartisan infrastructure bill, which largely forgoes bullet train dreams to shore up Amtrak and freight rail instead, reports the L.A. Times’ Ralph Vartabedian . There might be more money coming in the Build Back Better bill, but for California’s bullet train project, “it is a small fraction of what is needed.”

OPIOID FILES — The long judicial odyssey to bring pharmaceutical companies to account over the opioid crisis is running into an obstacle: A new legal approach arguing that the companies created a “public nuisance” has now been twice rejected in court, reports NYT’s Jan Hoffman . “The rulings could well be ominous indicators for upcoming trials,” and they could force local governments to settle while strengthening the defendants’ hand.

THE PANDEMIC’S LONG TAIL — With many downtown office buildings still standing empty, cities around the country are weighing whether to repurpose them, possibly into housing, reports Janaki Chadha from New York : “How those buildings will be used, and how that transition will occur, will shape America’s cities for decades to come.”

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AMERICA AND THE WORLD

NEW CRISIS ON THE HORIZON? — The U.S. is telling Europe that it’s worried about Russia potentially trying to invade Ukraine, Bloomberg’s Alberto Nardelli, Jennifer Jacobs and Nick Wadhams scooped.

CLIMATE SIREN — The prospect of keeping temperature rise to just 1.5 degrees Celsius — the threshold beyond which effects will likely be devastating — is now “on life support,” U.N. Secretary-General ANTÓNIO GUTERRES said today in an interview with AP’s Seth Borenstein and Frank Jordans. In its waning days, COP26 now looks unlikely to secure the necessary emissions-slashing commitments from countries around the world to meet that goal — or, indeed, any of the U.N.’s three priorities for the Glasgow conference. Related reading: “COP26 Is Ending. What Comes Next?” by Paul Behrens

E-RING VIEWING — A three-year investigation by ABC into the deaths of four Green Berets in Niger in 2017 has yielded a stunning conclusion: that “almost none of the major allegations” top U.S. generals presented in depicting the men as poorly trained rogues “turned out to be true,” write James Gordon Meek, Andrew Fredericks and Brian Epstein . The details emerge in a new documentary, “3212 UN-REDACTED,” which premieres today on Hulu and reveals for the first time the CIA’s involvement in events while challenging the Pentagon’s official narrative of what happened.

ON THE ROAD — Iran envoy ROB MALLEY is traveling to the UAE, Israel, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain in advance of the next round of indirect nuclear talks with Iran, which begin Nov. 29, per Axios’ Barak Ravid.

PLAYBOOKERS

MEDIA MOVES — Patsy Loris will take the reins of Telemundo’s news division next year, as Luis Fernández retires at the end of the year. Loris has been at Telemundo since 2019 after three decades at rival Univision. Variety has more details

TRANSITION — Allie Traynor is now a senior analyst at Renaissance Strategic Advisors. She previously was a manager at Signal Group in the national security practice.