POLITICO Playbook: Why Biden’s base is in distress
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DRIVING THE DAY
Democrats are desperately trying to understand what’s roiling the electorate heading into a brutal midterm environment.
HIT Strategies has been conducting weekly focus groups to find out in real time how Americans are processing events in 2022. On Monday night we watched discussions with two different subgroups of partisan Democrats assembled by the firm: “Black Base, Always vote for Dems, Ages 25+” and “Youth Base; Always vote for Dems, Ages 25 – 39.”
There were significant differences within and between the two groups of nine voters. But there were some broad takeaways:
— A preoccupation with inflation and crime.
— Exhaustion with pandemic restrictions.
— Cynicism about politics.
— Deep frustration that President JOE BIDEN and Democrats have failed to deliver on their early promises.
— Sympathy for Ukraine mixed with a lack of enthusiasm for Biden spending too much time and money on the issue.
— Ambiguity about how important Jan. 6 should be for Democrats in the midterms.
These sentiments are captured in recent polling: Biden’s decline in approval from Black voters and millennials has been well documented, as of course has the rise in importance of inflation, crime and pandemic fatigue.
But watching the three-and-a-half hours of conversations, you notice a yawning gap between what Democrats here in D.C. are saying and what their most loyal voters are experiencing outside the Beltway. This was especially true on two big issues:
The economy: A cottage industry of White House officials and left-wing media critics who talk to each other on Twitter has convinced themselves that the media is responsible for the public’s overwhelming focus on the bad news of inflation rather than the good news of low unemployment and rising wages. The focus groups exploded that bit of Democratic self-deception.
When the voters were asked to describe how they feel about how things are going, they responded with words like “exhausted,” “uptight,” “unsure,” “concerned” and “anxious.”
A woman from the Boston area who went first mentioned rising gas and food prices, food shortages at her local Whole Foods, and the increasing cost of housing. “It just seems like everything is going up and there’s no end in sight,” she said.
In the other focus group, a Black man from the Houston area talked about trying to subsist on the $12- and $13-per-hour jobs he was being offered. “No one can live off of that, especially with inflation,” he said.
And so it went across hours of hours of conversation. Rising costs — of food, gas, education, medication and more — dominated.
The Biden record: After the Build Back Better bill collapsed, Biden and many Democrats began talking about last year’s two big wins: the American Rescue Plan and the bipartisan infrastructure law. But these two panels of base Democratic voters kept returning to what still needs to be done.
They had little positive to say about all the Covid money in the ARP or the new bridges that would be built with the infrastructure money.
A typical response came from a young white woman from Montana: “I think Democrats have just been really ineffectual.”
One young white man from the L.A. area was a bit more forgiving, but no less frustrated: “I’m not ready to blame the party as a whole because there are two bozos by the name of [JOE] MANCHIN and [KYRSTEN] SINEMA who really handcuffed the Build Back Better plan, and handcuffed pretty much almost every meaningful social piece of legislation that’s been proposed.”
One Black female participant said she didn’t feel much urgency about the midterms “because at this moment the Democrats [are] running the House and they’re not getting much done.”
Two other issues also generated noticeable attention from the groups: crime and the war in Ukraine.
Crime: It was impossible to ignore how much it came up. A Black man from New York complained about bail reform laws in that state leading to “repeat offenders” who get arrested and released and are “re-arrested in less than 24 hours.” A Black woman in the Philadelphia area wanted something done about gun violence and carjackings in the city by “repeat offenders.”
The white woman from Boston said she was reading a lot about “unprovoked attacks” on tourists in New York. “It’s out of control,” she said.
Ukraine: There was a divide between the first group of Black base voters and the second group of millennial white base voters. The Black voters were more openly skeptical about the wisdom of the recent $14 billion aid package for Ukraine. After hearing the price tag of the bill, one Black male Biden voter replied, “They need to take that money back and give it to Black people for reparations.”
Good Tuesday morning. Thanks for reading Playbook. Drop us a line: Rachael Bade, Eugene Daniels, Ryan Lizza.
WHAT’S IN THE COVID AID DEAL — CNN’s Katie Lobosco and Tami Luhby have a detailed breakdown of the $10 billion pandemic funding bill Senate negotiators reached Monday, pumping more money into domestic testing, vaccines and treatment but omitting the global response. The top line is less than half the administration’s original $22.5 billion request. It pays for the funding by repurposing unspent money from the ARP — but not the money set aside for state and local governments, which was the mechanism that prompted a House Dem revolt last month on a $16 billion package.
MEDIA MOVES — POLITICO has launched Digital Future Daily, an afternoon newsletter focused on the new digital landscape. Derek Robertson is returning to POLITICO to lead the newsletter, and Ben Schreckinger will helm the newsletter twice a week, covering crypto and the blockchain. Read the first edition and sign up here … The newsroom announcement
BIDEN’S TUESDAY:
— 10:15 a.m.: The president and VP KAMALA HARRIS will receive the President’s Daily Brief.
— 1:30 p.m.: Biden, Harris and former President BARACK OBAMA will deliver remarks on the Affordable Care Act and lowering health care costs. Adam Cancryn has the scoop: “The new policy is designed to close a loophole in the ACA known as the ‘family glitch’ that’s prevented an estimated 5 million people from qualifying for subsidized health plans — even when they can’t find affordable coverage elsewhere.”
The White House Covid-19 response team and public health officials will brief at 3 p.m. Press secretary JEN PSAKI will brief at 3:30 p.m.
THE SENATE will meet at 10 a.m. to take up the motion to discharge the nomination of JULIA GORDON to be an assistant HHS secretary, with a vote at 10:30 a.m. The Senate will recess from 12:30 p.m. to 2:15 p.m. for weekly conference meetings. HHS Secretary XAVIER BECERRA will testify before the Finance Committee at 10 a.m.
THE HOUSE will meet at 10 a.m. and at noon will take up various bills. Defense Secretary LLOYD AUSTIN and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. MARK MILLEY will testify before the Armed Services Committee at 9:30 a.m. FEMA Administrator DEANNE CRISWELL will testify before the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee at 10 a.m. U.S. Comptroller General GENE DODARO and CBO Director PHILLIP SWAGEL will testify before an Appropriations subcommittee at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m., respectively. Beccera will testify before the Ways and Means Committee at 2 p.m.
PHOTO OF THE DAY
PLAYBOOK READS
WAR IN UKRAINE
— At Monday’s White House briefing, “JAKE SULLIVAN, the president’s national security adviser, said that while Russia is refocusing offensive operations on eastern and southern Ukraine, Moscow will likely continue to strike the rest of the country ‘to cause terror,’” NYT’s Katie Rogers writes. “‘The next stage of this conflict may very well be protracted,’ he told reporters, and ‘will likely continue to include wanton and brazen attacks on civilian targets.’ … Mr. Sullivan said the images [from Bucha] show ‘further evidence of war crimes’ and that the United States will be working with allies to develop further sanctions against Russia.”
— At the State Department, spokesman NED PRICE said the “atrocities are not the act of a rogue soldier. They are part of a broader, troubling campaign,” per NYT’s Michael Crowley.
— “Ukrainian President VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY left the capital, Kyiv, for his first reported trip since the war began nearly six weeks ago to see for himself what he called the ‘genocide’ and ‘war crimes’ in Bucha. Later, in a video address to the Romanian parliament, Zelenskyy said he fears there are places where even worse atrocities have happened,” AP reports.
The global response … “Germany and France reacted by expelling dozens of Russian diplomats, suggesting they were spies,” AP’s Oleksandr Stashevskyi and Nebi Qena write.
THE INFORMATION WAR — WSJ’s Warren Strobel writes of the U.S.’ campaign to declassify and release intelligence about planned Russian moves before they’re made, which senior officials say represents a “major shift” from previous encounters with Russia. Said Sen. MARK WARNER (D-Va.): “My gosh, maybe the West is finally winning the information war.” But it wasn’t easy convincing everyone of the strategy at first: “We had a lot of, ‘Why should we trust you after Iraq, after…’ — name your perceived intelligence failure,” a senior U.S. official told WSJ. “The best antidote to that suspicion is that we have been proven right.”
THE WHITE HOUSE
MAN IN THE MIDDLE — Biden is returning to something of a comfort zone ahead of the midterms: the middle. “Underscored by his budget last week, Biden’s emerging election-year blueprint is to emphasize police and defense spending, accentuate federal deficit reduction and propose higher taxes on the ultra-rich. It’s the early centerpiece of a platform that Biden’s defenders note he’s deployed consistently over his long career. But gone is his early-presidency emphasis on bold deficit spending and revamping the social safety net to achieve long-sought Democratic priorities. In its place is an increased focus on domestic and international security and stability,”Chris Cadelago writes in a story posted this morning.
“Biden’s approach, which has been evident in recent speeches and described in further detail by advisers and close allies, is the clearest sign yet that the White House is trying to reestablish his broader competency ratings, which have taken sustained hits going back to the fall. And it follows months of calls from within the party for the White House to more aggressively chart a path for what promises to be a bruising fall election cycle.”
JUDICIARY SQUARE
SURVEY SAYS — With Judge KETANJI BROWN JACKSON on track to be confirmed to the Supreme Court this week, new POLITICO/Morning Consult polling shows almost half of voters say the Senate should support her; that’s up 2 points since we asked last week. Just 26% of voters don’t think she shouldn’t get a yes vote, while 25% didn’t have an opinion.
The breakdown by party is, as you’d expect, much starker. Seventy-eight percent of Democrats, 24% of Republicans and 43% of independents say Jackson should be confirmed. But the plurality of support underscores a point the White House and Democrats have been making: that no matter how partisan the final vote is, she still has strong backing among voters who are paying attention to her nomination, especially considering the current political climate. They hope that it translates to a boost for the party in the midterms.
DOUG JONES SPEAKS — Jackson’s sherpa has had a great time returning to the Senate to shepherd her through the confirmation process — and his performance is prompting chatter about whether Jones might find a future in the Biden administration, Marianne LeVine and Burgess Everett report. They note that he’d sail through Senate confirmation even if Republicans retake the chamber. Great anecdote: Jones got the job because a reporter initially emailed him to ask if he was in the mix to be Biden’s SCOTUS sherpa, which “had not really been on my radar” previously. He passed it along to the White House, and the rest is history.
THE BIPARTISAN BOOST — The question of how many Republicans might vote for Jackson’s nomination to the Supreme Court seems to have gotten an answer Monday: three. GOP Sens. MITT ROMNEY (Utah), LISA MURKOWSKI (Alaska) and SUSAN COLLINS (Maine) joined all Democrats to signal their support for the historic appointment as it advanced out of committee, per CNN.
The statements: Both cited her qualifications, record and experience as reasons for their vote. Murkowski added: “It also rests on my rejection of the corrosive politicization of the review process for Supreme Court nominees, which, on both sides of the aisle, is growing worse and more detached from reality by the year.”
Now, Senate Majority Leader CHUCK SCHUMER is aiming to confirm Jackson before the week is over. The GOP support also gives Democrats a little breathing room in case of absences.
ALL POLITICS
DEMS GET REAL ABOUT LOSSES AMONG LATINOS — Matt Dixon reports from Tallahassee on the party’s latest efforts in Florida to make up lost ground among Latino voters: “The party is rolling out a blueprint that calls for crafting political messages similar to those aimed at independent voters, boosting resources for Latino outreach and campaigning sooner within Hispanic communities. … Yet with Republicans making huge inroads with Florida’s Latino voters in recent election cycles — Joe Biden won Latino-heavy Miami-Dade County by just 7 points while HILLARY CLINTON won it by nearly 30 points four years earlier — it could be too late for Democrats to succeed. Some say the new approach isn’t being adopted widely enough.”
COMING APART AT THE SEAMS — The most disturbing story you’ll read today is Elena Schneider’s dispatch from Green Bay, Wis., where she writes that DONALD TRUMP’s Big Lie is spawning conspiracy theories and widespread bitterness about local elections well beyond 2020. Republicans see ads throwing doubt on the legitimacy of elections as a reliable way to motivate base turnout. Even nonpartisan city council races are now heavily nationalized. It’s all made the city “an example of how Trump’s conspiracy theories have torn apart faith in government, from Washington, D.C. down to the local level,” she writes.
READY, SET, REDISTRICT — Maryland Gov. LARRY HOGAN signed off on the state’s redrawn congressional map, “ending a monthslong legal and legislative tussle with Democrats,” Baltimore Sun’s Jeff Barker writes. “State Republicans disliked the first map even more than the second. They view both maps as examples of partisan gerrymandering, but they consider the redrawn map — approved by the General Assembly last week — as more fair to the GOP. ‘This map is a huge step in the right direction,’ the second-term governor said.”
PLAYBOOKERS
Marjorie Taylor Greene has an answer for “what is a woman”: “We are a creation of God. We came from Adam’s rib … We are the weaker sex, but we are our partner, our husband’s wife.”
Elon Musk, newly Twitter’s biggest shareholder, polled his followers on whether they want an edit button — and CEO Parag Agrawal added, “The consequences of this poll will be important.” (Yes is winning three to one.)
Hunter Biden is renting a Malibu mansion, prompting the Secret Service detail protecting him to rent one nearby — to the tune of $30,000 a month in taxpayer expenses.
Pete and Chasten Buttigieg took their twins to day care for the first time Monday.
SPOTTED: State Department spokesperson Ned Price at Dacha on Monday night.
OUT AND ABOUT — French Ambassador Philippe Etienne hosted a dinner in honor of Lally Weymouth on Monday night. The discussion, per our tipster, included talk about “what would mean a ‘loss’ for Putin, what Ukraine’s crisis means for all of us, and what the transatlantic relationship means now and into the future.” SPOTTED: Ukrainian Ambassador Oksana Markarova, Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Jim Risch (R-Idaho) and Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska), Israeli Ambassador Michael Herzog, Elaine Chao, Wayne and Sione Frederick, Jane Harman and Bob Dickie, C. Boyden Gray, Don Graham, Amanda Bennett, Andrew King, Steve Clemons and Pascal Confavreux.
FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — Richard Buangan is now the Bureau of Global Public Affairs’ acting assistant secretary at the State Department. He previously was the principal deputy assistant secretary. Bill Russo will take over Buangan’s gig as acting principal deputy assistant secretary. Russo has been serving as deputy assistant secretary for strategic messaging since the beginning of the Biden administration and was Joe Biden’s spokesperson and deputy comms director for press on the campaign.
— Ryan Jacobs has joined Fenway Strategies as a senior advisor. He previously was chief speechwriter and senior adviser to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and is a Gates Foundation alum.
— Zach Hudson is now an SVP at NP Agency. He most recently was comms director for Senate campaigns at American Bridge and is a Catherine Cortez Masto and Nevada Dems alum.
— Mike Del Moro is leaving “Morning Joe” after almost four years as a booking producer to be a comms manager for broadcast at Meta based in New York. Before “Morning Joe,” he was a segment producer at “Good Morning America.”
TRANSITIONS — Brendan Flanagan is now senior director of state affairs for the Consumer Brands Association. He previously worked at the National Restaurant Association. … Jeff Slyfield is now policy director for the Millennial Action Project. He previously was government relations manager for the Ocean Conservancy. … Maddy McGarry has been hired as senior content manager for BarnTools. She previously was deputy press secretary for Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa).
WELCOME TO THE WORLD — Sophie Quinton of the Pew Charitable Trusts’ Stateline and Jason Plautz, a freelance journalist, welcomed Owen Quinton Plautz on Wednesday in Denver. He came in at 7 lbs, 7 oz, and joins the family dog, Prof. Henry Higgins.
BIRTHWEEK (was Monday): Delaware A.G. Kathy Jennings
HAPPY BIRTHDAY: CNN’s Dan Berman … WaPo’s Annie Gowen … Josh Culling of Dezenhall Resources … Jacqueline Usyk … UAW’s Eric Heggie … PBS NewsHour’s Sam Lane and Yasmeen Alamiri … Jesse Rifkin … Matt Gertz of Media Matters … NYT’s Jill Rayfield … DLCC’s Leslie Martes … Shea Snider Miller … Sarah Horvitz of Bully Pulpit Interactive … PayPal’s Howard Wachtel … Lizzy Guyton of South & Hill Strategies … former FCC Chair Tom Wheeler … former Reps. Peter King (R-N.Y.), Katherine Harris (R-Fla.) and Reid Ribble (R-Wis.) … Terry Szuplat … Mary Katharine Ham … Wilson Shirley … Adham Sahloul … Luke and Brian Principato … Benjamin Rosenbaum … POLITICO’s David van Veen … John Diamond … Adam Rubenstein … Andrew Noyes
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