Welcome to POLITICO’s West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration. With Allie Bice. Send tips | Subscribe here | Email Alex | Email Tina President JOE BIDEN is flying to Michigan on Tuesday to build support for his bipartisan infrastructure and social spending packages, including from one key resident who is not yet on board. Rep. ELISSA SLOTKIN , a moderate Democrat first elected in 2018, will be among the local dignitaries to meet Biden at the airport. She is also planning to attend his speech at an International Union of Operating Engineers training facility in Howell, a town smack dab in the middle of her southeastern Michigan congressional district. DONALD TRUMP won the district by less than 1 percent in 2020, though Biden narrowly won the state. Slotkin, a former CIA analyst, has been on record in favor of passing the BIF, as the infrastructure package is known, and then negotiating out the rest of the president’s Build Back Better proposals that Democrats are looking to pass through budget reconciliation. “She’s said many times that she’s open to supporting the reconciliation package if it can make a real difference in Michigan and if it’s fiscally responsible — but she is not a guaranteed ‘yes’ and that’s exactly what she’ll tell the president tomorrow,” one of her aides told West Wing Playbook. The Michigan Democrat is focusing on the child care provisions in the reconciliation bill, her office said. Officially, the White House says Biden is traveling to Howell to “continue rallying public support for his bipartisan infrastructure bill and Build Back Better agenda, which will grow our economy by investing in working families, paid for by repealing tax giveaways to the rich.” “We're going to a state and a part of the state that could benefit from all of these packages because they're hugely popular,” said White House press secretary JEN PSAKI. “Whether you're Democrat, a Republican, an independent, people don't think of their roads as partisan for good reason, nor do they think [that] their childcare is partisan.” But — and let’s be real here — Biden is choosing his stops purposefully. An old-school pol, he knows the value that comes with a presidential visit to an on-the-fence member’s home turf. In fact, Tuesday’s trip is also part of a larger effort to send the president into congressional districts represented by vulnerable Democratic incumbents, according to a Democratic National Committee aide. In July, the president visited Illinois Rep. Lauren Underwood’s district in the Chicago suburbs, which Trump also won in 2020. Underwood and Slotkin are both on the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s list of “frontline” members, whose seats the party is working to protect in the 2022 midterms. Think of it as a “Don’t Ever Take Sides Against The Family'' approach. Biden may be seeing a serious dip in his approval ratings. But during these visits, he’s planning to highlight parts of his agenda that are “popular in swingier areas,” the DNC aide said, citing policies like lowering the cost of healthcare and tax cuts for the middle class. The economy continues to be a top priority for Michigan voters. The state’s unemployment rate hit an astounding 24 percent in April 2020, with the country shut down from the Covid-19 pandemic. As of August 2021, the unemployment rate had dropped to 4.7 percent, according to the Detroit Free Press. But the Detroit Regional Chamber released a poll last month that found nearly 58 percent of voters in the state thought the economy in Michigan was on the wrong track. While trying to woo Slotkin, the president will also be looking to bolster another key Democrat — Michigan Gov. GRETCHEN WHITMER, who played a prominent public role in the early pandemic fight and was on Biden’s VP short list. “Michigan’s governorship really swings based on who’s in the White House. I know there’s probably some political calculus for the governor there as well,” said ANDREA BITELY , a Republican strategist in Michigan. But Democratic operatives also have a, well, darker rationale for why Biden is, and should continue to be, making these trips. In an evenly split (or near evenly split) Senate, having a Democratic governor is an insurance policy should there be a Senate vacancy in the state. “I would not be surprised to see the president go to places like Maryland and Massachusetts, where we have Republican governors and Democratic senators. Anything happens to senators, we lose control of the Senate because of Republican governors,” Democratic strategist PETE GIANGRECO said. “I think the gubernatorial politics on Senate appointments is always hanging around. Gretchen is really, really important for a lot of people for a lot of reasons.” Do you work in the Biden administration? Are you in touch with the White House? Are you video producer MELANIE DURAN? We want to hear from you — and we’ll keep you anonymous: westwingtips@politico.com. Or if you want to stay really anonymous send us a tip through SecureDrop, Signal, Telegram, or Whatsapp here. | 
