Biden and Putin speak again at ‘moment of crisis’

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Dec 30, 2021 View in browser   By Ryan Lizza and Rachael Bade Presented by DRIVING THE DAY It's a slow news day, which is good news to your Playbook team, where two of us are dealing with one of the random aspects of this latest covid surge: households in which one person has tested positive but everyone else is negative (so far). THE BIDEN-PUTIN CALL — President Joe Biden, who is at home in Wilmington today, will talk to Russian President Vladimir Putin at 3:30. It's their second conversation since Dec. 7, when they held a video call to discuss tensions over Putin's military buildup around Ukraine. Today's call was requested by Putin and the White House has decided to turn the telephone summit into a somewhat public event. A senior administration official briefed reporters yesterday afternoon, the NSC's spokesperson released a statement about the call, and the call is the only thing on Biden's public schedule today. There's some mystery about the reason for Putin's request to chat. NYT's David Sanger and Andrew Kramer note that in Washington foreign policy circles there's speculation that the call could be about Putin backing down and "trying to de-escalate a situation largely of his own creation." But it could also be the opposite. Putin may be "seeking a response to a series of demands about Russian security concerns that, if left unfulfilled, may provide him with a pretext to initiate the military action he has threatened in Ukrainian territory." A senior administration official offered little more clarity to what's motivating Putin: "I cannot speak to why the Russian side has requested this call. I would only observe that over the course of the past year, we've requested calls with President Putin; President Putin has requested calls with President Biden." The White House's language about the Russian build-up is alarming. The senior administration official said "we are at a moment of crisis," that the Russian military presence around Ukraine has not de-escalated since Biden and Putin's last call, and that it "remains a continuing source of grave concern." The official added that Biden would reiterate that a Russian advance into Ukraine was a dangerous red line for Putin to cross: "President Biden will also make clear when he speaks with President Putin that we are prepared for diplomacy and for a diplomatic path forward, but we are also prepared to respond if Russia advances with a further invasion of Ukraine." COVID UPDATE: — NYT notes that the U.S. set a one-day record on Wednesday for new cases (nearly half a million): "The staggering figure is almost twice as high as the worst days of last winter, although hospitalizations are not rising as fast." — WaPo reports that the Biden administration is divided over whether vaccine booster shots should be made available to all adults. The story suggests a politics vs. science fight in Biden world, with some of the president's advisers pushing boosters as the best way to get past the current surge, focus on the economy, and improve the political environment ahead of the midterms. Meanwhile, CDC Director ROCHELLE WALENSKY has expressed concern that boosters may not be advisable for everyone: "Walensky's skittishness reflects the attitude of some CDC officials and advisers who are not convinced that young, healthy people need additional protection, especially since the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines have been linked to a rare cardiac side effect in male teenagers and young men. They also note that focusing on boosters may distract front-line personnel from the more critical effort to defeat the pandemic, which is to get the first shots to unvaccinated people." A message from Google: This year, the world searched to support nurses. For the length of the pandemic, nurses around the world have been heroes—and in 2021, the world searched to recognize them. "when is nurses week" was searched at an all-time high around the globe. Explore Google Year in Search 2021.   MUST-READ OF THE DAY: The WSJ's five byline investigative blockbuster about Facebook by Keach Hagey, Georgia Wells, Emily Glazer, Deepa Seetharaman, Jeff Horwitz, "Facebook's Pushback: Stem the Leaks, Spin the Politics, Don't Say Sorry" Here's the lede: "The day after former Facebook employee and whistleblower Frances Haugen went public in October, the company's team in Washington started working the phones. "To lawmakers and advocacy groups on the right, according to people familiar with the conversations, their message was that Ms. Haugen was trying to help Democrats. Within hours, several conservative news outlets published stories alleging Ms. Haugen was a Democratic activist. "Later, Facebook lobbyists warned Democratic staffers that Republicans were focused on the company's decision to ban expressions of support for Kyle Rittenhouse, the teenager who killed two people during unrest in Kenosha, Wis., and who was later acquitted of homicide and other charges. "The company's goal, according to Republicans and Democrats familiar with the company's outreach, was to muddy the waters, divide lawmakers along partisan lines and forestall a cross-party alliance that was emerging to enact tougher rules on social-media companies in general and Facebook in particular." SEE YOU IN THE METAVERSE — Finally, one of those VR headsets made an appearance in Ryan's house over Christmas so we were especially intrigued by this pair of articles in the Times today: — "Everybody Into the Metaverse! Virtual Reality Beckons Big Tech." — "The Metaverse's Dark Side: Here Come Harassment and Assaults" Good Thursday morning. Thanks for reading Playbook. Drop us a line and tell us about your favorite Oculus Quest apps: Rachael Bade, Eugene Daniels, Ryan Lizza, Tara Palmeri.   A message from Google: As the year comes to a close, see the people, stories, and events the world was searching for. Watch Google Year in Search 2021.   BIDEN'S THURSDAY: The president will hold a phone call with Russian President VLADIMIR PUTIN at 3:30 p.m. THE SENATE and THE HOUSE are out.   POLITICO TECH AT CES 2022 - We are bringing a special edition of the POLITICO Tech newsletter to CES 2022. Written by Alexandra Levine and John Hendel, the newsletter will take you inside the most influential technology event on the planet, featuring every major and emerging industry in the technology ecosystem gathered together in one place. The newsletter runs from Jan. 5-7 and will focus on the public policy related aspects of the gathering. Sign up today to receive exclusive coverage of the Summit.     PHOTOS OF THE YEAR A U.S. soldier holds up a sign saying a gate is closed outside of the Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 26, 2021. | Wali Sabawoon/AP Photo A U.S. Chinook helicopter flies over the U.S. embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan. | Rahmat Gul/AP Photo A carry team moves a transfer case containing the remains of a Marine Corps staff sergeant. | Carolyn Kaster/AP Photo PLAYBOOK READS ALL POLITICS WALKER'S DILEMMA — Former North Carolina Rep. MARK WALKER (R) is "stuck in political no man's land," Natalie Allison reports from Greensboro. Running a distant third in a Senate primary against Trump-endorsed Rep. TED BUDD and former Gov. PAT McCRORY, Walker was privately offered an endorsement from Trump if he runs for a House seat instead. The problem: The newly-created seat is being challenged in court and could be redrawn to be heavily Democratic. Now Walker — a pol who Allison writes "just isn't interested in following the conventional rulebook for the game of politics" — is "once again a candidate in search of a race he can winagain in search of a race he can win." EYES ON MICHIGAN — Republicans are attempting to recruit JOHN JAMES , an Army veteran, to run for one of Michigan's newly drawn districts. James ran for the state's Senate seat in both 2018 and 2020, but lost both times. "Recruiting James has been a top priority of House Minority Leader KEVIN MCCARTHY. And the Congressional Leadership Fund, a super PAC with close ties to GOP leadership, commissioned a poll that shows James significantly ahead of two sitting Democratic representatives in potential matchups in the new district," Zach Montellaro and Ally Mutnick report. — While The Detroit News reported Tuesday that James is "strongly considering" a run for the state's newly-created 10th district, he is also being pushed to run for governor. A final decision would come in January, and "he hasn't ruled anything out." — And NYT's Nick Corasaniti notes that the approved redrawn map of the state allows for more competition, in a state where Republicans have had safe majorities for years. The map "creates districts so competitive that Democrats have a fighting chance of recapturing the State Senate for the first time since 1984. … and the congressional map includes three tossup seats where the 2020 presidential margin was less than five points, and two more seats that could be competitive in a wave year, with presidential margins of less than 10 points." HAPPENING IN SLOW MOTION — Trump-supporting Republicans are running for statewide election offices that will play important roles in the 2024 presidential election. And AP's Nick Riccardi reports that "while the effort is incomplete and uneven, outside experts on democracy and Democrats are sounding alarms, warning that the U.S. is witnessing a 'slow-motion insurrection' with a better chance of success than Trump's failed power grab last year. … Experts say another baseless challenge to an election has become more likely, not less." CONGRESS MONEY WHERE THEIR MOUTHS ARE — Georgia Republican Reps. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE and ANDREW CLYDE have been docked a combined $100,000 for not following the mask-wearing requirement on the House floor. NYT's Luke Broadwater notes that "Ms. Greene has been fined more than 30 times for violating the mask rules, accumulating more than $80,000 in penalties. Only 20 of Ms. Greene's fines, totaling nearly $50,000, have been announced by the Ethics Committee. Mr. Clyde has been fined at least 14 times for violating the mask rule, accruing at least $30,000 in penalties." The fines come straight out of their paychecks. POLICY CORNER FOR YOUR RADAR — Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) is turning up the heat on the Biden administration as a spat continues over whether an impending 5G tech rollout could imperil aviation safety, Daniel Lippman and Oriana Pawlyk scoop for POLITICO Pro . Collins, the ranking member on the Senate approps subcommittee in charge of transportation, wrote to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg that the rollout should be suspended until agencies can guarantee that passenger planes won't be endangered. "While I understand the effort to deploy 5G services quickly, I do not believe the safety of our aviation system and the public should be potentially compromised," Collins wrote in the letter, dated Dec. 23 and obtained by POLITICO this week. She urged the DOT and FCC to figure out a "safe resolution" while the rollout, which is currently set to happen Jan. 5, is paused. An FAA spokesperson on Wednesday said that more work needs to be done to find adequate solutions "so that 5G and aviation can safely coexist." The FCC and FAA have been engaged in intense deliberations on the matter, as the White House urges a resolution. Wireless companies are pressing the administration — and White House National Economic Council director Brian Deese in particular — to reject calls to further postpone the rollout, saying 5G can safely coexist alongside aircraft navigation systems.   A message from Google: Google Year in Search 2021: "how to help haiti" was a breakout search worldwide.   AMERICA AND THE WORLD MASSACRES IN MYANMAR — AP's Sam McNeil, David Rising and Rishabh Jain are out with an investigation on Myanmar's ugly military tactics : "The massacres and scorched-earth tactics — such as the razing of entire villages — represent the latest escalation in the military's violence against both civilians and the growing opposition. Since the military seized power in February, it has cracked down ever more brutally, abducting young men and boys, killing health care workers and torturing prisoners. The massacres and burnings also signal a return to practices that the military has long used against ethnic minorities such as the Muslim Rohingya, thousands of whom were killed in 2017." CAUSE AND EFFECT — Sanctions imposed by the U.S. are forcing the Taliban in Iran and Afghanistan "to put longstanding ideological and political differences aside as they seek to fill the vacuum left behind by American troops," WSJ's Sune Engel Rasmussen writes . "Over the past decade, Iran maintained close ties with the Afghan republic's government while also nurturing relations with the Taliban and backing their goal of evicting American troops from the region. Iran, unlike Western nations, didn't close its diplomatic missions in Afghanistan after the Taliban takeover. No nation has yet recognized the Taliban as Afghanistan's legitimate government, however." — And former President of Afghanistan ASHRAF GHANI spoke to BBC about fleeing the country as the Taliban took over in August: "My instructions had been to prepare for departure for [the city of] Khost. He told me that Khost had fallen and so had Jalalabad. I did not know where we will go. Only when we took off, it became clear that we were leaving [Afghanistan]. So this really was sudden." JAN. 6 AND ITS AFTERMATH TRUMP VS. JAN. 6 COMMITTEE — WaPo's Robert Barnes reports on another attempt by the former president to block the Jan. 6 committee from accessing White House records: "Lawyers for former President Donald Trump told the Supreme Court Wednesday that a Washington Post interview with the chairman of the House Jan. 6 committee shows the committee is trying to establish a criminal complaint against Trump, something the lawyers say is beyond the committee's authority. … In the article, [Chairman BENNIE THOMPSON ] said the committee is looking intently into Trump's actions on Jan. 6 as it considers whether to recommend that the Justice Department open a criminal investigation into the former president." MEDIAWATCH MAKING A LIST — WaPo's Aaron Blake has a smart take on what he sees as the " the 4 most undersold political stories of 2021": The GOP creating the infrastructure to overturn future elections The decline of legislating The rise of alternative medicine on the right Democrats' potential buyer's remorse on redistricting reform   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.     PLAYBOOKERS Anthony Fauci, assuming he eventually retires (he just turned 81), is set to receive the largest federal retirement package ever: more than $350,000 a year, according to Forbes. Fauci has 55 years of federal service and made $434,312 in 2020. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver "are finally, officially divorced, more than a decade after California's former first lady filed her request to end their marriage," per LAT. The BBC interviewed Alan Dershowitz about the Ghislaine Maxwell guilty verdict — before realizing he was not an impartial analyst and acknowledging it messed up. TRANSITIONS — Katie Grant Drew is leaving House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer's office, where she's worked for 16 years, most recently as comms director and senior adviser. Margaret Mulkerrin is moving up from national press secretary to comms director. Catherine Valentine is now a senior publicist at the Washington Post in charge of the PR around politics, national security and newsletter strategy. She most recently was a producer at CNN's "New Day." ENGAGED — Mikayla Bouchard, managing editor of Washington beats for CNN Politics, and U.S. Air Force Maj. Kohl Hensler got engaged Dec. 23 in Oakland County, Mich., where he surprised her with a horse-and-carriage ride after a fresh snowfall. They met on Hinge in August 2019. Pic, via Cara Kerr Photography … Another pic WELCOME TO THE WORLD — Cassie Smedile Docksey, executive director of America Rising, and Max Docksey, regional political director for the RNC, welcomed Elizabeth (Eliza) Agnes Docksey. She was born at 12:22 a.m. on 12/22/21. Pic HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Tammy Haddad … Reps. Mike Bost (R-Ill.) and Tom Tiffany (R-Wis.) … Lauren Claffey Tomlinson of Claffey Communications … Jack Deschauer … POLITICO's Jennifer Scholtes and Philip Harman … Kevin Smith (5-0) … Sean Hannity (6-0) … Michael McLaughlin … former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo … Bill Thorne of the National Retail Federation … Heather Reid … Katie Hays … Justin Thomas Russell … Noelle Straub … Bob Cochran … Udai Rohatgi … Shannon Gilson of American Airlines … Nick Schmit … WaPo's Courtney Beesch … Meredith Vieira … former Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson … Michael Rekola … Jim Billimoria of America Express … Daniel Scarpinato … former Rep. Marty Meehan (D-Mass.) … Maria Elena Salinas … Kelly Curran … Hanna Hope … Hari Sevugan … Philippa Martinez-Berrier … Marcia Kramer of CBS New York … Reed Dickens … Leif Babin … Matt Latimer … Did someone forward this email to you? Sign up here. Send Playbookers tips to playbook@politico.com . Playbook couldn't happen without our editor Mike Zapler, deputy editor Zack Stanton and producers Allie Bice, Eli Okun and Garrett Ross. A message from Google: This year, the world volunteered to help get people vaccinated. As the pandemic continued on, the world wanted to help in any way possible. vaccination volunteer was the top trending volunteer opportunity the world searched for this year. Explore Google Year in Search 2021.     Follow us on Twitter Rachael Bade @rachaelmbade Eugene Daniels @EugeneDaniels2 Ryan Lizza @RyanLizza Tara Palmeri @tarapalmeri   Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook family Playbook  |  Playbook PM  |  California Playbook  |  Florida Playbook  |  Illinois Playbook  |  Massachusetts Playbook  |  New Jersey Playbook  |  New York Playbook  |  Ottawa Playbook  |  Brussels Playbook  |  London Playbook View all our political and policy newsletters Follow us

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