| | | | |  | | By Elena Schneider, Eli Stokols, Lauren Egan and Ben Johansen | | Presented by |  | | | Welcome to POLITICO’s West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration. Send tips | Subscribe here | Email Eli | Email Lauren There’s chaos in the Middle East. His GOP opponent is sitting in a New York City courtroom. And House Speaker MIKE JOHNSON is, once again, under threat. But President JOE BIDEN was in Scranton today, talking about taxes. In a campaign speech on Tuesday afternoon, Biden accused DONALD TRUMP, as president, of rewarding mega donors over middle class Americans, derided GOP proposals to cut taxes and called for a higher tax rate on corporations and the rich. Biden’s campaign dropped a digital ad tied to drawing out the contrast further, with Pennsylvania voters speaking of the president’s values as “understand[ing] normal middle class people like me.” "I learned a lot in Scranton,” Biden said to supporters gathered inside a Masonic temple. “When I look at the economy, I don't see it through the eyes of Mar-a-Lago, I see it through the eyes of Scranton." It was a vintage Democratic populist pitch befitting a candidate who has used his hard-scrabble Scranton roots and biography as a political touchstone for decades. But the meta story may have been the more interesting one. Biden is, once more, running a conventional, paint-by-numbers campaign. He is an old-school politician. And, God damn it, the day after Tax Day, you talk about taxes. The let’s-get-back-to-normal pitch worked just fine for him in 2020, when the backdrop was a global pandemic and an economy in freefall. It worked again in 2022 when Biden framed the Supreme Court’s repeal of Roe v. Wade as a radical break from normalcy and helped Democrats avoid the usual midterm wipeout. Now, the backdrop is porn star hush money payments and historic criminal trials involving the ex-president. But it is also foreign policy tinderboxes and lingering economic uncertainty under his own watch. For Democrats, however, the split screen with Trump — and the framing of him as a force of chaos — is what they ultimately believe will work. “There’s always shiny objects [with Trump],” said KAREN FINNEY, who served as HILLARY CLINTON’s senior spokesperson during the 2016 campaign. “What we grappled with in 2016 was trying to always figure out, is this one significant enough that it requires a response from us?” Finney argued his “wisdom for how campaigning works” means that he “doesn’t get distracted by [those] shiny objects.” The Biden approach is premised on the idea that people simply don’t consume news with the voraciousness of those who, say, are reading this newsletter. In Pennsylvania, which serves as basically Biden’s backyard (he has visited roughly once a month since taking office), voters are more likely to be preoccupied with what they just paid in taxes than the latest in Kyiv. On Tuesday, with cable news consumed by Trump trial coverage, Biden taped an interview with Nexstar TV that will air in Pennsylvania and several other swing states and then stopped by his childhood home. “As bad as the war in Ukraine and the war in Gaza is, the average person in Pennsylvania is not thinking about that,” said DOC SWEITZER, a Pennsylvania-based Democratic consultant. “They’re thinking about taxes, they’re thinking about bumps in the road, they’re worrying about paying bills and the cost of prescription drugs.” “The average person is just trying to get through the day,” he added, “and Biden knows that.” To that end, Trump’s trial serves as a useful contrast point: not because the campaign will focus on it — they are, decidedly, avoiding mentioning it — but because the president’s team believes it will allow them to portray the ex-president as both distracted and a distraction. On Tuesday, Biden didn’t just rip Trump’s approach to taxes as another giveaway to the rich, he also took aim at his business stumbles, mocking the steep decline in the value of Truth Social’s parent company and the impact of the former president’s numerous legal battles on his own bottom line. It was paint by numbers, with just a splash of vivid color. “This is the tale of two very different presidential campaigns,” said MEREDITH KELLY, a Democratic consultant. “One that is focused on the kitchen table issues, like affordability that dominate voters’ concerns every day, and one that is as distracted, poorly focused and as self-centered as the candidate himself.” MESSAGE US — Are you ALLEN IVERSON? We want to hear from you. And we’ll keep you anonymous! Email us at westwingtips@politico.com. Did someone forward this email to you? Subscribe here!
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| | LOTS OF LUCK WITH YOUR SENIOR YEAR: President Biden isn’t sold on Speaker Mike Johnson’s new strategy to get aid to Ukraine and Israel, but as our JENNIFER HABERKORN, ADAM CANCRYN and ALEXANDER WARD report, he hasn’t ruled it out, either. Johnson on Monday announced he would break up the initial Senate foreign aid package into four separate votes on funding for U.S. allies and a larger national security bill. The White House is taking a wait-and-see approach to the plan. As of the time this newsletter hit your inbox, there is no final version of the bill, and Republicans are openly debating whether to add more to it. Biden, who spoke with Johnson on Monday, is being cautious until he sees more details on what will be included and how it will get through the House. The White House has two basic demands for the package (though they’ve not described them as “demands,” per se): that the end result includes aid to Ukraine and that action happens “this week,” in light of Iran’s attack on Israel and Ukraine losing ground to Russia. WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE WANTS YOU TO READ: This piece by Axios’ RUSSELL CONTRERAS, who reports that the number of homicides in major American cities is falling at its quickest rate in decades. In 204 cities, murders have declined 20 percent in the first three months of 2024, according to data from AH Datalytics, a criminal justice consulting firm. At the current pace, it could match its level during the BARACK OBAMA administration in 2014, when many cities saw 30-year lows in violent crime and homicides. Deputy press secretary ANDREW BATES, communications director BEN LABOLT and campaign spokesperson JAMES SINGER shared the piece on X. WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE DOESN’T WANT YOU TO READ: This interactive NYT op-ed from DOUG SOSNIK, a former senior adviser to BILL CLINTON, who breaks down the most likely scenarios for both a Biden and Donald Trump win. Through dissecting the electoral map, Sosnik gives the edge to the former president, who he argues has a clearer path to victory than Biden in seven key battleground states — the Blue Wall states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, and the Sun Belt states of Arizona, Nevada and Georgia. Ben LaBolt did not share that piece on X.
| | | | A message from Center for Western Priorities: The most recent “Winning the West” poll found that 74% of voters in key Western states say doing more to protect and conserve public lands and designate national monuments would make them view the Biden administration more favorably. That view is held by 93% of Democrats, 76% of Independents, and 53% of Republicans. Overall, 87% of Western Voters prioritize a candidate’s support for conservation issues to determine how they cast their ballots. | | | | | | MONEY, MONEY, MONEY: The Biden campaign ramped up its spending in March, dropping $29.2 million — more than four times the amount the campaign spent in the previous month, our JESSICA PIPER and ZACH MONTELLARO report. The campaign still added to its cash arsenal during March, thanks to $43.8 million in new contributions, ending the month with $85 million cash on hand. The campaign also bulked up its staff, adding about 50 people to its payroll throughout March. After media buys, payroll was the largest campaign expense, totaling $2.3 million in the month. A DIFFERENT ORACLE: DAVID ELLISON, the son of Republican megadonor LARRY ELLISON, gave $929,600 to the Biden campaign, making him one of the top donors to the president’s reelect, CNBC’s BRIAN SCHWARTZ reports. The recruitment to get the younger Ellison’s support was largely put together by Hollywood mogul JEFF KATZENBERG, who is also a co-chair of Biden’s campaign. Katzenberg’s pitch to land Ellison came with an arrangement to meet with Biden, according to Schwartz. Ellison attended a December private roundtable discussion at real estate investor and Biden donor KURT RAPPAPORT’s Los Angeles home which featured Biden and fewer than a dozen other attendees.
| | OPM BOSS TO STEP DOWN: The director of the Office of Personnel Management, KIRAN AHUJA, is leaving the administration, our NICK NIEDZWIADEK scoops. Ahuja, who took her post in mid-2021 and was the first South Asian American to lead OPM, plans to depart next month to deal with an ongoing health concern. Chief of staff JEFF ZIENTS had hoped to avoid these kinds of election year departures, given the growing difficulty of nominating and confirming replacements during the heat of the campaign. Deputy director ROB SHRIVER will fill the post on an acting basis in the short term. YOUR MOVE, CHUCK: The House of Representatives on Tuesday sent its articles of impeachment against Homeland Security Secretary ALEJANDRO MAYORKAS to the Senate, NBC News reports. They are likely to have a short stint in the upper chamber, where they could be dismissed by week’s end. House Republicans are pushing for a full trial, but Senate Majority Leader CHUCK SCHUMER will likely get Senate Democrats in line to quash the issue.
| | | | A message from Center for Western Priorities:   | | | | | NOT PLAYING AROUND: Treasury Secretary JANET YELLEN is preparing a set of new sanctions for Iran, vowing that the U.S. will not hesitate to impose economic punishment on the nation after its attack on Israel, Axios’ HANS NICHOLS reports. During the annual spring International Monetary Fund meeting taking place this week, Yellen will press fellow finance ministers to focus their governments on possible coordinated sanctions on Iran. BEEN A FEW: Defense Secretary LLOYD AUSTIN on Tuesday spoke with his Chinese counterpart, Admiral DONG JUN, our LARA SELIGMAN reports for Pro subscribers. The call is the first time that the two defense chiefs have spoken in almost two years. The discussion marks an important step in repairing relations between the two superpowers, which have frayed in the past two years.
| | A Diplomatic Victory of Uncertain Staying Power (NYT’s Peter Baker) The abortion debate is giving Kamala Harris a moment. But voters still aren’t sold (LAT’s Noah Bierman) Why Biden Should Not Debate Trump (The Atlantic’s David Frum)
| | | | A message from Center for Western Priorities: Outdoor Voters want more national monuments in 2024. President Biden has an opportunity to inspire the 3 million active outdoor enthusiasts in the Mountain West region known as Outdoor Voters. Outdoor Voters consider public lands protections and conservation issues to be pivotal to their electoral choices. By designating new national monuments, President Biden can unify Americans across party lines and demonstrate his commitment to achieving his 30x30 promise. This strategic move can greatly influence candidates' ability to secure support and win the West. Find out more at outdoorvoter.org. | | | | | As a child in an Indian family that migrated to the United Kingdom, Canada and eventually the U.S., Surgeon General VIVEK MURTHY spent countless days in the kitchen helping his parents cook. Communal cooking and eating were such an elemental part of family life that, when he was in high school and had homework that kept him working late, his parents would still wait for him to finish before eating dinner, often as late as 9 or 10 p.m. Murthy recently spoke about his upbringing and the importance of food in bringing people together on Ruthie’s Table 4, a podcast by RUTHIE ROGERS, the founder and chef at London’s iconic River Cafe. His father, an improvisational cook, often made his own hot sauces from habanero and ghost peppers, donning “something equivalent to a gas mask” while other family members escaped the fumes and left the house, Murthy recalled. At Chinese restaurants in Miami, he’d ask waiters if they could make things extra spicy. “They would say, ‘We have a five star [spice] scale,’ and he would say, ‘Can you do a seven?’” At more American restaurants, like Pizza Hut, Murthy’s parents would bring their own spicy powder — “it looked like red pizza,” he said — a thing he started doing himself after going off to college. In the dining hall at Harvard, “I was the kid with the spicy powder,” he recalled. Asked to name his comfort food, Murthy recalled his mother’s rasam, a traditional South Indian soup made with spices, ripe tomatoes, tamarind and herbs and often served with rice. He described drinking it out of a cup. “When I do that, I feel like it’s almost like an elixir,” he said. “It fills me with warmth, literally, but also with beautiful memories of my mother. That’s what, to me, makes comfort food comfort food.”
| | | | In 1938, PAT NIXON was auditioning for the play “The Dark Tower” when she ran into a California lawyer named RICHARD who shared a similar interest in the arts. After driving Pat and her friend home, Nixon asked her out on a date. Pat rejected him, saying she was too busy. Nixon responded with: “I think we should go out because I’m going to marry you one day,” according to an interview years later. He added that “like most successful politicians,” he had “intuition” and that he always believed in “making the big play.” Where was that intuition when … erm, nevermind. A CALL OUT! Do you think you have a harder trivia question? Send us your best one about the presidents, with a citation or sourcing, and we may feature it! Edited by Sam Stein.
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