Playbook PM: The abnormally normal Breyer retirement

Jan 27, 2022

By Rachael Bade, Eli Okun and Garrett Ross

Presented by

After a series of contentious Supreme Court nomination processes — BRETT KAVANAUGH, AMY CONEY BARRETT, MERRICK GARLAND — perhaps the most surprising thing about Justice STEPHEN BREYER's retirement is how normal and smooth the proceedings have been thus far.

This afternoon, Breyer and President JOE BIDEN appeared at the White House for a stately announcement, in which the president lauded the justice for "his remarkable career of public service and his clear-eyed commitment to making our country's laws work for its people." And the party's most conservative lawmaker signaled his openness to backing Biden's pick, as was widely expected. (More on that below.)

Biden said he plans to announce his nominee by the end of February, promising a "rigorous" process, and reiterating his campaign commitment: "The person I will nominate will be someone of extraordinary qualifications, character, experience and integrity. And that person will be the first Black woman ever nominated to the United States Supreme Court."

In his remarks, Breyer lauded the promise of America's commitment to bringing together people of diverse backgrounds and perspectives under rule of the law — and struck a hopeful tone about the country's ongoing experiment of democracy. "You know who will see whether that experiment works?" he said. "It's you, my friend. It's you, Mr. high school student. It's you, Mr. college student. It's you, Mr. law school students. It's us, but it's you. … They'll determine whether the experiment still works, and of course I'm an optimist, and I'm pretty sure it will." Breyer's official retirement letter

MANCHIN OPEN TO BACKING A LIBERAL SCOTUS NOM — Progressives worried about the Senate's Mr. No sinking a Biden Supreme Court nominee can rest easy. Speaking on local West Virginia radio today, Sen. JOE MANCHIN reiterated his personal philosophy about how he decides to support judicial candidates: "You look at the qualifications, and whether the person is competent enough to do the job," Manchin said. "What you want is someone — forget what philosophical beliefs they may have … it's basically how they have dispersed justice, their record. … Have they been fair? … Are they able to get along with the other eight Supreme Court justices? Even though you might disagree, do you do it in a civil way? … That's what I'm looking for, really: the character of the person."

Asked whether that means he'd be okay supporting someone more liberal than him, Manchin snickered. "It's not too hard to get more liberal than me, so it would not bother me having a person who was sound in their thought process and their disbursement of justice and the rule of law. … As far as just their philosophical beliefs, that will not prohibit me from supporting someone." More from Anthony Adragna on Manchin's comments on Build Back Better, voting rights, inflation and the child tax credit

Good Thursday afternoon.

ECONOMIC BOOM — The U.S. economy roared out of its pandemic hole with a 5.7% growth rate last year (adjusted for inflation!) — the highest since 1984, according to new data from the Commerce Department. Fourth-quarter GDP growth was even stronger, rising 6.9% annually, beating many economists' expectations. In another record, the economy created 6.4 million jobs last year. But experts are bracing for a slowdown in growth this month/quarter thanks to Omicron. Full details from USA Today

— U.S. economic growth outpaced China's for the first time in two decades, as Biden noted in a statement. "This is no accident," the president said. "My economic strategy is creating good jobs for Americans, rebuilding our manufacturing, and strengthening our supply chains here at home to help make our companies more competitive."

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RECORD ACA SIGNUPS — The Affordable Care Act marketplaces have blasted through records with 14.5 million sign-ups this year, per a new HHS report today. That's almost 2 million more than the previous high-water mark, with the final count likely to come in even higher. More from WaPo

CTC EXPIRATION FALLOUT — Many of the Americans who benefited from the expanded child tax credit found it to be a lifeline — and they're finding its end to be a slap in the face, Adam Cancryn reports . With Manchin's opposition to Build Back Better tabling any CTC extension for now, people in or near poverty are grappling with renewed financial hardship. And politically, Democrats have reason to worry: "The individuals interviewed for this article said they'd voted for Biden," Adam writes. "Some suggested the process had soured them on politics entirely."

DCCC EXPANDS FRONTLINER PROGRAM — House Democrats' campaign arm announced this morning that it is extending its so-called frontliner program of vulnerable Democrats. On cue, Republicans over at the Congressional Leadership Fund boasted that five of the seven incumbents the DCCC added hail from districts Biden won by double digits — suggesting that Dems are coming to terms with just how difficult this cycle will be. More from NBC

AMERICA AND THE WORLD

THE DRUMBEAT OF WAR — Kremlin spokesperson DMITRY PESKOV today responded to the U.S.' latest letter by saying there was "little ground for optimism" on the country's primary concerns. But he remained open to continued diplomatic talks, saying they would be in both countries' best interests. More from Reuters

— Biden is talking to Ukrainian President VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY today at 2 p.m., per CNN's Matthew Chance.

— The military context: Under VLADIMIR PUTIN's reign over the past two decades, Russia has undergone a massive military upgrade, getting "overhauled into a modern sophisticated army, able to deploy quickly and with lethal effect in conventional conflicts," NYT's Anton Troianovski, Michael Schwirtz and Andrew Kramer write.

— WSJ's Drew Hinshaw, Laurence Norman and Bojan Pancevski delve into the details of how the U.S. is working to shore up energy supplies for Europe should a Russian invasion of Ukraine cause major disruptions.

— Pipeline watch: "If Russia invades Ukraine, Nord Stream 2 will not move forward, one way or another," State Department spokesperson NED PRICE said to CNN's Jim Sciutto today.

ON THE CALENDAR — New German Chancellor OLAF SCHOLZ will visit the White House on Feb. 7, press secretary JEN PSAKI announced today. (This after plenty of reporting that Germany remains among the most dovish holdouts on Russia in the NATO alliance.)

LITTLE ROCKET MAN — Biden already has plenty of crises on his plate. But KIM JONG UN may be ready to hand him one more, NYT's Edward Wong writes in a look at North Korea's recent provocations. "We're at the start of something, and we just need to cross our fingers," a former intelligence analyst tells him.

JOIN FRIDAY TO HEAR FROM GOVERNORS ACROSS AMERICA : As we head into the third year of the pandemic, state governors are taking varying approaches to public health measures including vaccine and mask mandates. "The Fifty: America's Governors" is a series of live conversations featuring various governors on the unique challenges they face as they take the lead and command the national spotlight in historic ways. Learn what is working and what is not from the governors on the front lines, REGISTER HERE.

POLITICS ROUNDUP

POLL OF THE DAY — Bad numbers for Dems in the Peach State: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution/University of Georgia poll finds Biden's approval rating in the state plummeting to roughly 34%, Greg Bluestein writes. Gov. BRIAN KEMP is 7 points ahead of STACEY ABRAMS, DAVID PERDUE is up over Abrams by 4 points, and HERSCHEL WALKER nudges out Sen. RAPHAEL WARNOCK by 3 points (a statistical tie). Other interesting tidbits: Just 20% of Georgians say DONALD TRUMP's endorsement would make them likelier to vote for someone. And elections/voting is the top issue on voters' minds. The poll

2022 WATCH — Republican KEVIN NICHOLSON is officially jumping into the race for Wisconsin governor. A Marine veteran and former Senate candidate ( and former Democratic rising star ), Nicholson has cast himself as a party outsider and will face a high-profile primary against former Lt. Gov. REBECCA KLEEFISCH. More from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel … His launch op-ed

ANALOGY OF THE DAY — Former North Carolina Gov. PAT MCCRORY said Duke University not giving him a job after he left office was comparable to Black people not being served at lunch counters in the 1960s, CNN's Andrew Kaczynski and Em Steck revealed . McCrory, now a GOP Senate candidate, said the head of Duke's public policy school told him alumni and donors didn't want him there after his polarizing tenure. Listen to his comments

BEYOND THE BELTWAY

TWEET OF THE DAY — NIKKI HALEY, apparently pulling for a President NANCY PELOSI : "If Joe Biden loved our country, he would step down and take KAMALA HARRIS with him because the foreign and domestic policy situation is beyond dangerous at this point."

AFTERNOON READ — From the small town of Benson, Minn., AP's Tim Sullivan has a lyrical and disturbing story about America coming apart at the granular level, as people beset by conspiracy theories and polarized politics increasingly inhabit different realities. "It's another measure of how, in an America increasingly split by warring visions of itself, division doesn't just play out on cable television, or in mayhem at the U.S. Capitol. It has seeped into the American fabric, all the way to Benson's 12th Street, where two neighbors — each in his own well-kept, century-old home — can live in different worlds."

POLICY CORNER

TRANSPARENCY TICKER — DNI AVRIL HAINES is speaking out skeptically about the amount of information the intelligence community chooses to classify, saying the approach "is so flawed that it harms national security and diminishes public trust in government," reports WSJ's Dustin Volz.

CLIMATE FILES — In the first year of the Biden administration, permits for drilling on public lands have actually come at a faster pace than during the Trump administration, WaPo's Anna Phillips reports . Activists say the administration's actions belie its climate goals, while Biden officials say their hands have often been tied by court decisions.

HITTING THE ROADS — The Transportation Department today issued a new National Roadway Safety Strategy aimed at reducing traffic fatalities using, in part, money from the bipartisan infrastructure law. The efforts will range from safer road design to speed limits to automatic emergency braking in vehicles. More from The Hill … The report

STEP INSIDE THE WEST WING: What's really happening in West Wing offices? Find out who's up, who's down, and who really has the president's ear in our West Wing Playbook newsletter, the insider's guide to the Biden White House and Cabinet. For buzzy nuggets and details that you won't find anywhere else, subscribe today.

THE PANDEMIC

KNOWING ANTHONY FAUCI — WaPo Style section veterans Dan Zak and Roxanne Roberts have a big profile out of the president's chief medical adviser two years into the pandemic, in which Fauci says he's been exhausted and shaken by the pandemic and the fervent conspiracy theories around it. Here's a telling snippet:

"He knows how a virus works. He knows how Washington works. He thought he knew how people worked, too — even ones who called him a murderer, as AIDS activists did decades ago because they felt left for dead by a neglectful government. Back then the angry people were motivated by truth and science. Fauci had something to learn from them, and they had something to learn from him. The shared mission was pursuing facts and saving lives. Fear and uncertainty could be eased by data and collaboration. Combatants, however scared or passionate, shared a reality. Now? 'There is no truth,' Fauci says, for effect. 'There is no fact.'"

JUDICIARY SQUARE

SCOTUS WATCH — Justice SONIA SOTOMAYOR went on the "TAMRON HALL" talk show, where she voiced some hesitation about the likes of RUTH BADER GINSBURG bobbleheads and her salience as a pop-cultural figure: "It's important not to think about the court as an institution for entertainment," Sotomayor said, adding that she thought cameras in the court could contribute to the problem.

Sotomayor also spoke out about the recent NPR/ NEIL GORSUCH/mask-wearing brouhaha: "Each individual has to make that choice for themselves, and I think that it's important to remember that people feel differently about these issues, and you don't have to engage in negative colloquy with friends or colleagues about the question. You can engage in conversation around it, and respect the choice that each person is making. And that's the best, or the most, that I can say about that situation with respect to my work environment. I'm choosing to be safe."

PLAYBOOKERS

ANNALS OF INFLUENCE — A new high-profile lobbying shop is launching on K Street: Actum, led by several people who were formerly at Mercury Public Affairs, Caitlin Oprysko reports. Mick Mulvaney and Heidi Heitkamp are steering the ship in D.C., while Barbara Boxer and Antonio Villaraigosa are among the leaders of the Los Angeles office. Other big names include Kirill Goncharenko and Fabian Nuñez.

BOOK CLUB — Kellyanne Conway is writing a memoir, "Here's the Deal," about her personal journey, her time in the White House and her politically divided family. $30 preorder

FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — Jacob Garber is joining DSPolitical as senior director of media planning. He previously was VP of advertising at progressive digital agency Foglamp, and is an Elizabeth Warren presidential campaign alum.

MEDIA MOVES — Vanessa Mobley will join the NYT as head of the op-ed team. She's coming from the book publishing world, most recently as VP and executive editor at Little, Brown and Co. Brian Zittel is also expanding his role to be managing editor for op-ed and newsletters. Announcement … Annalisa Quinn is starting as an editor at the Boston Globe Magazine. She most recently was reporting in Germany. … Nima Elbagir has been promoted to chief international investigative correspondent at CNN.

TRANSITIONS — Erin Hass will be state affairs manager (East Coast) on the Lucid Motors policy team. She most recently has been a government affairs officer at the Pew Charitable Trusts. … Adam Aston will join RMI in the new role of chief storyteller. He previously co-founded the NYT's T Brand Studio and was founding editor of BusinessWeek's green business beat.

BONUS BIRTHDAY: Williams & Connolly's Kevin Downey

A message from The American Beverage Association:

America's beverage companies are working together to reduce our industry's plastic footprint by investing in efforts to get our plastic bottles back. Our goal is for every bottle to become a new one, so they don't end up in our oceans, rivers and landfills. EveryBottleback.org