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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 and Garrett Ross | | | BREAKING — “DeSantis signs Florida’s contentious LGBTQ bill into law” THE BIDEN BUDGET — Sometimes the best way to get a sense of how a new presidential proposal is being greeted in Washington is to look closely at reporters’ questions during the unveiling. By that measure, President JOE BIDEN’s budget plan is facing extreme skepticism. Every administration tries to spin a favorable narrative about its annual budget. Some years the claims stand up to scrutiny better than other years. Last year’s Biden budget was closer to a real governing agenda. The document came at the start of an ambitious legislative push and translated Biden’s election-year poetry into governing prose. It came when Biden had good poll numbers and a relatively unified party behind him. It was about getting stuff passed. This year’s budget comes at a time of high inflation , low approval ratings for Biden and the likelihood of a brutal midterm election on the horizon. It’s about providing Democrats with some advantageous political messaging. And budget reporters are calling BS. During a conference call this morning OMB Director SHALANDA YOUNG and CEA Chair CECILIA ROUSE presented the president’s new budget to a press corps that was unimpressed with several of their key claims. Some highlights: — About that deficit reduction. “A lot of the budget experts are saying, you know, look, the reason the deficit is falling is because the expiration of inherently temporary economic programs, and it's kind of absurd for the administration to be taking credit for the decline from inherently temporary economic programs. Can I get a response to that?” — About that inflation forecast. “One question on the inflation assumption. So, 2.3% this year and next year, and [remaining] stable, is not realistic . Under a more realistic inflation assumption, can you still claim $1 trillion in deficit reduction? Would you still stand by that number?” — About that interest rate forecast. “You also have a very low interest rate forecast…Can you tell me how a more up-to-date interest rate assumption might affect the budget outlook, the deficits and debts, et cetera?” The full call transcript The budget deets, via Jennifer Scholtes’ breakdown: — What he’s asking for: Biden wants to boost military funding by 4 percent and non-defense spending by 5 percent, while forcing the wealthiest households to pay more taxes. — The defense dance: “Biden’s call for $773 billion in Pentagon funding is itself an acknowledgment that top lawmakers in both parties have rapidly embraced higher defense totals in the month since Russia invaded Ukraine. “Lamenting the shift, progressive Democrats are already urging the president to do everything in his power to ‘resist’ calls for increased defense funding, after they first lost that battle earlier this month when the president signed a $1.5 trillion government funding package that increased current national defense spending by 6 percent.” Paul McLeary has more on the defense request — The GOP response: “Republicans are expected to offer a stiff counteroffer — demanding that Biden go even bigger than his proposed $813 billion for the national security budget, and shrink his ambitions for $769 billion in non-defense spending.” — Energy and environment boost: CNN’s Ella Nilsen writes that under Biden’s request, the “Department of Energy would receive $48.2 billion, the Environmental Protection Agency would receive $11.9 billion and the US Department of Interior would get $17.6 billion — all significant funding increases from the Trump-era funding levels each agency started with when Biden came into office.” More links: The White House fact sheet … Biden statement Biden is scheduled to deliver remarks on the budget at 2:45 p.m. and then take questions from reporters. Hope he’s been prepped on some of those economic forecasts! Good Monday afternoon.
| | | | 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 — 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 | | | JAN. 6 AND ITS AFTERMATH SIREN — A federal judge this morning ruled that former President DONALD TRUMP “more likely than not” attempted to illegally obstruct Congress when he tried to subvert the 2020 election on Jan. 6, 2021, Kyle Cheney, Nicholas Wu and Josh Gerstein report. “U.S. District Court Judge DAVID CARTER made the determination in a ruling that orders 101 sensitive emails from Trump ally John Eastman be turned over to the House’s Jan. 6 select committee.” CRUZ CONTROL — Sen. TED CRUZ (R-Texas) has been at the forefront of defending former Trump's efforts to reverse the results of the 2020 Election. But how far did he really go? “An examination by The Washington Post of Cruz’s actions between Election Day and Jan. 6, 2021, shows just how deeply he was involved, working directly with Trump to concoct a plan that came closer than widely realized to keeping him in power. As Cruz went to extraordinary lengths to court Trump’s base and lay the groundwork for his own potential 2024 presidential bid, he also alienated close allies and longtime friends who accused him of abandoning his principles,” WaPo’s Michael Kranish reports. Why it matters: “Now, Cruz’s efforts are of interest to the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, in particular whether Cruz was in contact with Trump lawyer John Eastman, a conservative attorney who has been his friend for decades and who wrote key legal memos aimed at denying Biden’s victory.” WAR IN UKRAINE — “As Russian and Ukrainian forces battled across Ukraine, diplomats from the two nations were scheduled to arrive in Turkey on Monday for talks, with President VOLODYMYR [ZELENSKYY] saying his country was 'ready' to discuss adopting neutral status, while the Kremlin offered little hope for an agreement that would end five weeks of fighting,” NYT’s Austin Ramzy, Ivan Nechepurenko and Shashank Bengali report. “In an interview on Sunday with Russian journalists , Mr. Zelensky said that Ukraine was willing to discuss lifting restrictions on the Russian language and adopting a neutral geopolitical status. But he insisted that any deal would need to be validated by a referendum to be held after Russian troops withdraw, and that other countries would need to provide his nation with security guarantees.” More on that interview: “Kremlin orders Russian media not to publish rare Zelensky interview,” WaPo
| | | | SUBSCRIBE TO NATIONAL SECURITY DAILY : Keep up with the latest critical developments from Ukraine and across Europe in our daily newsletter, National Security Daily. The Russian invasion of Ukraine could disrupt the established world order and result in a refugee crisis, increased cyberattacks, rising energy costs and additional disruption to global supply chains. Go inside the top national security and foreign-policymaking shops for insight on the global threats faced by the U.S. and its allies and what actions world leaders are taking to address them. Subscribe today. | | | | | CONGRESS POWER MOVES — Senior Democratic leaders are preparing to use a discharge petition to advance the nominations of ALVARO BEDOYA to lead the FTC and GIGI SOHN to head up the FCC after both selections were held up by Republicans on the Senate Commerce Committee, WSJ’s John McKinnon reports . “The vote for Mr. Bedoya could happen as early as this week, the people familiar said. But the maneuver could be difficult to pull off and could take weeks to accomplish. … Without Republican support—and so far at the committee level there has been none—that means all 50 Democratic-voting members along with Vice President Kamala Harris must be present to support the petition.” THE PANDEMIC COVID CASH — U.S. officials are still ringing the alarm that absent an influx of new cash for Covid programs, the administrations’ global goals risk falling short. “With a more than $4 billion request stalled in Congress, USAID officials are now forced to plan for the possibility that their funding will run dry in the next few months, limiting their ability to vaccinate vulnerable populations in dozens of countries,” Erin Banco reports . THE WHITE HOUSE UNUSUAL INFLUENCE — ERIC SCHMIDT, the billionaire former CEO of Google, has long sought influence over U.S. science policy. Under Biden’s former science chief, ERIC LANDER , Schmidt’s charity arm helped pay the salaries of two employees in the science office and has maintained a close relationship with Lander and other Biden appointees, Alex Thompson reports in a big watchdog story today. “While his spokespeople presented his efforts to help Biden as part of Schmidt Futures’ mission to ‘focus and mobilize these networks of talent to solve specific problems in science and society,’ his foundation’s involvement in funding positions for specific figures raised repeated red flags from internal White House watchdogs. The science office’s efforts to arrange for Schmidt Futures to pay the salaries of Lander’s staff sparked ‘significant’ ethical concerns, given Schmidt’s financial interests in areas overlapping with OSTP’s responsibilities, according to the science office’s then-general counsel, Rachel Wallace, in internal emails obtained by POLITICO.” FOR YOUR RADAR — “A federal tax investigation into HUNTER BIDEN is gaining momentum as prosecutors gather information from several of his associates about the sources of his foreign income, including from Ukraine, and examine President Biden’s son’s relationship with a company that handled some of his finances,” WSJ’s Aruna Viswanatha, Sadie Gurman and James Areddy report.
| | | | DON’T MISS POLITICO’S INAUGURAL HEALTH CARE SUMMIT ON 3/31: Join POLITICO for a discussion with health care providers, policymakers, federal regulators, patient representatives, and industry leaders to better understand the latest policy and industry solutions in place as we enter year three of the pandemic. Panelists will discuss the latest proposals to overcome long-standing health care challenges in the U.S., such as expanding access to care, affordability, and prescription drug prices. REGISTER HERE. | | | | | ALL POLITICS HOT ON THE RIGHT — NYT’s Jeremy Peters has the details on Rumble, the right wing’s preferred video site that “now draws 44 million monthly visitors, according to the analytics firm Similarweb, giving it a larger reach than other top destinations for conservative content, including Breitbart, Newsmax and The Daily Wire. … “The story of Rumble’s success is instructive for both sides of the tense debate over balancing the right to free speech with the growing threat that disinformation poses to the stability of governments around the globe. For those who argue that Google and Facebook algorithms are blunt, deeply flawed instruments for policing discourse, Rumble offers a welcome alternative, albeit an imperfect one. And for those who fear that lawmakers and technology companies aren’t doing enough to tame false and fabricated information ahead of the next presidential election, Rumble has opened up a potentially dangerous loophole.” KNOWING WILL HURD — The Atlantic’s Tim Alberta has a big read on WILL HURD as the former GOP Texas congressman tries to turn toward a 2024 presidential run amid a Republican Party that he finds in opposition to many of his views. “‘Look, there’s some people I’m not going to appeal to — the right-wingers. That’s okay. But there’s more of the other people. The normal people. And I’m going to find them,’ he says. ‘It will be hard. The cost per acquisition of those voters is higher than it is for the traditional Republican primary voter—you know, the people who have voted in the last four primaries. That’s why most people don’t bother trying to find them or turn them out.’ “Wouldn’t it be easier, I ask, to just concentrate on wooing those existing likely voters? ‘Maybe,’ he says. ‘But if you want to change the party, you need to change the primary electorate. This isn’t rocket science. If you want to get back to normal, you need to get more normal people to vote in primaries.’ It’s a provocative notion. Hurd isn’t just hinting at a campaign against Trumpism; he’s suggesting an assault on the structural realities of the Republican Party.” JUDICIARY SQUARE THOMAS RETURNS — Supreme Court Justice CLARENCE THOMAS participated in arguments remotely this morning after he was discharged from the hospital this weekend, per the AP. AMERICA AND THE WORLD MISSILE MISUNDERSTANDING? — “U.S. and South Korean officials are reviewing whether North Korea tested its newest intercontinental ballistic missile last week as it had claimed, with mounting public signs that Pyongyang may have exaggerated its milestone,” WaPo’s Michelle Ye Hee Lee reports in Tokyo . “The launch appeared to be a modified version of the Hwasong-15, an older model that is slightly smaller than the Hwasong-17 and was the last ICBM that North Korea tested in 2017 … Still, the test showed that North Korea is making incremental progress in improving its ICBM capability, the U.S. official said.” PLAYBOOKERS SPOTTED: Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) at L’Ardente on Saturday night. TRANSITIONS — Andrew Tabler is joining K&L Gates as a government affairs analyst. He most recently was a VP of government affairs at J.A. Green & Company and is a DoD alum. … Nanci Bompey is now science communicator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Janelia Research Campus. She previously was director of media relations at the American Geophysical Union. ENGAGED — Gabe Rubin, a national economics reporter at the WSJ, and Juliet Bellin Warren, a Georgetown public policy master’s student and former head pastry chef at Ris, got engaged Saturday on Roosevelt Island. They originally matched on Hinge and first met at the much-mourned Room 11 in Columbia Heights on an unseasonably warm February day in 2018, after they rescheduled once following the realization that they had initially planned their first date for Valentine’s Day. Pic
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