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Presented by Walmart: | | | | |  | | By Zach Montellaro, Alex Thompson and Max Tani | Presented by Walmart | Welcome to POLITICO’s West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration. With help from Allie Bice. Send tips | Subscribe here | Email Alex | Email Max President JOE BIDEN and White House Press Secretary JEN PSAKI have a new side gig: trying to sell you auto insurance. Or that’s at least what some incredibly bizarre “cheapfake” social media ads want you to believe. Over the last week, a mysterious Facebook page called “Homes Panel” spent over $80,000 on ads — making it the fourteenth highest political spender over that time period — that apparently showed POTUS promoting a way to save money on car insurance. “Some people in the country will start seeing those direct deposits in their bank accounts this weekend, and payments to eligible Americans will continue throughout the course of the next several weeks,” ‘Biden’ says in the ad.
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A screenshot of a fake political ad promoted by Homes Panel | Facebook | The only problem? It definitely isn’t him speaking. The ad features someone impersonating Biden’s voice — poorly, we might add — dubbed over an entirely unrelated clip of Biden giving a speech. The Psaki ad, which ran for a day in February, is even stranger: It uses the exact same script as the Biden one, only this time it is actually her voice. She said as much during a March 2021 press briefing about Covid relief payments — although the audio from the original press conference was stripped out, and overlaid on a different video of a Psaki appearance. The ads redirect to a website selling auto insurance, promising hundreds of dollars worth of savings, all with the imprimatur of the most powerful man on the planet. This attempt to deceive people is an obviously ham-fisted one — they didn’t even bother to try to match up the new voiceover with how Biden and Psaki’s mouths were moving! But it recalls the 2019 panic over a similarly low-tech digital manipulation, where a video of House Speaker NANCY PELOSI that was slowed down to make it sound like she was slurring her words spread like wildfire across social media. But this time, there was a good chunk of (verifiable) change behind it. Facebook’s ad archive noted that over $80,000 worth of ads emanated off of the Homes Panel page last week — which was more than groups like the Biden-aligned nonprofit Building Back Together and every single national political committee from both parties. Facebook had already previously yanked some of the Homes Panel ads off its platform before we contacted the company, and the entire page was spiked shortly afterward. But people had already seen them: Since March 6, ads from the page got at least 4.5 million impressions. “We removed this Page and multiple associated Pages for violating our rules prohibiting deceptive tactics, including those meant to scam people out of money or personal information,” said DEVON KEARNS, a spokesperson for Facebook's parent company Meta. The label “deepfake” — which has bounced around the last couple years — probably shouldn’t even be applied here, because that is typically used to describe more sophisticated efforts with more convincing results. (See, for example, this 2018 attempt from BuzzFeed News of former President BARACK OBAMA, which still feels off.) But these videos — “cheapfakes,” as HANY FARID, a professor at UC Berkeley who studies digital forensics, dubbed them — still present an inherent danger. They can spread across social media either organically or by paid campaigns, tricking less technologically savvy users into believing an incredibly powerful person said something they didn’t, all for the cost of hiring a mediocre presidential impersonator and basic video editing software. “It’s sort of like spam, right?” said Farid. “What’s the success rate of spam? I don’t know, like 1/100th of a percent? But that’s enough when you work at scale.” Predictably, whoever is behind the “Homes Panel” Facebook page did not respond to emails sent to addresses on their Facebook page and website asking what they were up to, and a phone number listed within Facebook’s ad archive for the page appeared to be disconnected. But the sheer amount of spending suggests that Homes Panel has found some success — which has a more ominous lesson for misinformation on the internet at large. “What’s interesting is that we’ve been really worried about disinformation around the election, and now around the Russia-Ukraine conflict, but you’re not seeing deepfakes, you’re seeing cheapfakes,” said Farid. “The reason is you can get away with the cheap stuff pretty easily, and it sort of works.” TEXT US — Are you BEN LaBOLT, a member of Biden’s Supreme Court “sherpa” team? We want to hear from you (we’ll keep you anonymous). Or if you think we missed something in today’s edition, let us know and we may include it tomorrow. Email us at westwingtips@politico.com or you can text/Signal/Wickr/WhatsApp Alex at 8183240098 or Max at 7143455427.
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| | | VAL RETURNS — Biden’s sister, VALERIE BIDEN OWENS, has launched a public-facing Instagram account ahead of her book debut on April 22 — ”Growing Up Biden.” She unveiled her first promotional blurb as well: informal Biden adviser and historian JON MEACHAM. “With grace and candor, Valerie Biden Owens has given us an illuminating and moving memoir of an American family whose history is now inextricably intertwined with the history of our nation. From her unique perspective as her brother’s friend, adviser, and campaign manager through tumult, tragedy, and triumph, Owens paints a memorable portrait of the soul of a president whose mission is to save the soul of America ,” he wrote. WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE WANTS YOU TO READ: This CNN story from BETSY KLEIN with the headline: “White House warns of 'severe consequences' if Congress doesn't pass supplemental Covid funding.” BEN WAKANA on the White House Covid team tweeted: “We spent *weeks* briefing Congress on the urgent and immediate needs that required funding to sustain our response through June.” WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE DOESN’T WANT YOU TO READ: The New York Times published a story on Sunday detailing how the Biden White House continues to uphold some Trump-era immigration policies. The piece, far from the first on the subject, details anger from immigration activists and some Democrats at the White House, which pushed back against the criticism while also slow-walking changes out of fear of political backlash from the right. And today, Majority Leader CHUCK SCHUMER, Sens. CORY BOOKER (D-N.J.), BOB MENENDEZ (D-N.J.) and ALEX PADILLA (D-Calif.) issued a statement saying they were "deeply disappointed" with the administration maintaining what’s known as Title 42. “It is wrong that they made the decision to continue sending families with minor children back to persecution and torture," they added. Read more on that from ANTHONY ADRAGNA. EURO TRIP! — Biden is considering a trip to Europe soon, in a show of support for Ukraine and its allies amid the war, our JONATHAN LEMIRE reports. The trip has not yet been confirmed and is dependent on the state of Russia’s invasion. If the president were to go abroad, his first stop would likely be Brussels, where both NATO and the European Union headquarters are located. CATCH UP ON UKRAINE: Read today’s NatSec Daily by ALEXANDER WARD and JOSEPH GEDEON: Is China Going to Help Russia? | | | | WIN A VIP TICKET TO THE GREATEST POLITICAL SHOW ON EARTH! POLITICO and SHOWTIME are teaming up for an evening of cocktails and conversation featuring the POLITICO Playbook team and Mark McKinnon and Jennifer Palmieri from "The Circus" on Showtime in Washington, D.C. Enter for a chance to win a ticket to join fellow Playbookers and newsmakers at this exclusive, VIP event by Friday, March 18th. Winners will be notified on that date (travel and accommodations not provided, this is a widely attended event pursuant to House & Senate ethics rules). ENTER HERE. | | | | | | | | SPIN ZONE — The Biden administration and oil companies have been pointing the finger at one another over increased gas prices. The Biden administration can claim that they approved more permits to drill oil and gas wells on public lands than the Trump administration over their first year. But that stat belies the larger trend over that first year, E&E News’ HEATHER RICHARDS reports. In January 2022, the Bureau of Land Management “approved just 95 permits for oil and natural gas wells across federal lands in the U.S., an 85 percent drop from 643 issued last April. Despite the data, an Interior Department spokesperson said the agency “continues to process applications for permits to drill in a timely manner.” HOT TWITTER THREAD: From former Biden Covid adviser ANDY SLAVITT that ominously begins: “COVID update: Based on European case increases, the US could see a new rise in COVID cases over the Spring. The wave is likely to look different in several ways. 1/”
| | | | A message from Walmart:   | | | | | | AOTUS SUCCESSION — Retiring Archivist of the United States (known as AOTUS among us nerds) DAVID FERRIERO — who’s been in the spotlight recently over President DONALD TRUMP’s practice of tearing up White House records — says he’s told the White House the next head of the National Archives shouldn’t look too much like him, according to POLITICO’s JOSH GERSTEIN (do yourself a favor and follow him here! ) “That’s advice I’ve given to the White House already: that you better not hire another white male,” Ferriero said Monday during an annual Sunshine Week discussion at the archives. “We’ve had ten white males.” He also said he hopes that person will get more money for the agency, which runs most presidential libraries and is struggling with an avalanche of emails and digital data. The panel’s moderator, Carlyle Group founder and Archives benefactor DAVID RUBENSTEIN, repeatedly urged Ferriero to reverse his retirement — as NFL quarterback TOM BRADY just did — and even offered to have Brady call the former New York Public Library chief. “I want this administration to be the administration that replaces me,” Ferriero said, although the Massachusetts native did quip: “I’m looking forward to that call from Tom Brady.” KING MANCHIN’S A NO — Sen. JOE MANCHIN (D-W.Va.) said Monday he will oppose SARAH BLOOM RASKIN’s nomination to the Federal Reserve Board, derailing her confirmation further, our VICTORIA GUIDA and BURGESS EVERETT report. Her nomination is currently stuck in the Senate Banking Committee, with Republicans ducking a committee vote. In his announcement, Manchin said Raskin had “failed to satisfactorily address my concerns about the critical importance of financing an all-of-the-above energy policy to meet our nation’s critical energy needs.” His opposition means Raskin would need at least one Republican lawmaker to vote in favor of her nomination, if it reaches the Senate.
| | | How Does It End? A Way Out of the Ukraine War Proves Elusive. (NYT’s David E. Sanger and Eric Schmitt) White House Warns of Blow to Covid-19 Fight as Funding Stalls (WSJ’s Stephanie Armour, Natalie Andrews and Sabrina Siddiqui) Biden administration announces plan to help farmers as Russia suspends fertilizer exports (American Independent’s Oliver Willis) Democrats to report $14 million fundraising haul in February (NBC News’ Natasha Korecki)
| | | Biden received the President’s Daily Brief in the morning. He also delivered remarks at the National League of Cities Congressional City Conference at the Marriott Marquis in Washington, D.C. Aides who traveled with him to the conference included: Deputy Chief of Staff BRUCE REED, Deputy Homeland Security Adviser JOSHUA GELTZER, Office of Intergovernmental Affairs Director JULIE RODRIGUEZ, Deputy Director of Oval Office Operations ASHLEY WILLIAMS, and personal aide STEPHEN GOEPFERT, among others. Later tonight, the president will participate in a DNC fundraiser.
| | | She held separate phone calls with Bulgarian Prime Minister KIRIL PETKOV and Czech Republic Prime Minister PETR FIALA to discuss the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
| | | | DON’T MISS CONGRESS MINUTES: Need to follow the action on Capitol Hill blow-by-blow? Check out Minutes, POLITICO’s new platform that delivers the latest exclusives, twists and much more in real time. Get it on your desktop or download the POLITICO mobile app for iOS or Android. CHECK OUT CONGRESS MINUTES HERE. | | | | | | | | Sometimes people in D.C. get their stories told in movies. When it comes to VA Secretary DENIS McDONOUGH, he got enviable movie casting. When JON HAMM played McDonough — back when he was serving as former President BARACK OBAMA’s chief of staff — in a 2019 film “The Report,” about an investigation into the CIA’s torture program, Hamm never got to talk with him. “He never returned my phone calls,” Hamm told The Boston Herald in 2019. “Not a ‘Mad Men’ fan.” But McDonough’s team said that wasn’t the case (drama!). “On a side note, Jon Hamm never attempted to contact Secretary McDonough for the role. I asked him about that specifically,” VA spokesperson TERRENCE HAYES responded in an email.
| | | ELLIOT RICHARDSON. Richardson served as the Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, Defense Secretary, Attorney General and Commerce Secretary. AND, A CALL OUT — Think you have a more difficult trivia question? Send us your best question on the presidents with a citation and we may feature it. Edited by Paul Demko
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