Archives for January 2018

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Republicans Have No Path Forward on Health Care

January 2, 2018 at 6:57 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Politico: “Republicans start the year divided over whether to tear down or prop up Obamacare, a split that could derail their legislative agenda leading up to the 2018 midterm elections. GOP leaders on Capitol Hill don’t want a repeat of last year’s Obamacare fumble: They spent precious time on a failed attempt to repeal the health care law every member of the GOP was presumed to hate. But they also don’t want to take repeal off the table, which would provoke conservatives who are still determined to undo Obamacare.”

“The reality is the GOP is so divided on Obamacare, they don’t have the votes to achieve either objective — repeal or stabilization. That means former President Barack Obama’s signature legislative accomplishment could keep limping along, crippled by the repeal of the individual mandate in the tax law but lifted by the surprisingly strong enrollment for the coming year.”

White House Is Anxious About 2018

January 2, 2018 at 6:55 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Politico: “They’re facing a brain drain on a White House that already had trouble recruiting top talent. Many senior West Wing aides are expected to depart in the coming year, with no replacements lined up. White House chief of staff John Kelly — who has already fired several presidential aides — wants to push out more, but has struggled to find suitable alternatives. And they’re still working under the shadow of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, despite repeated assurances from the White House legal team that the inquiry is wrapping up.

“The grim reality of 2018 has generated a sense of foreboding among White House aides, according to more than a dozen current and former officials and outside advisers. West Wing aides, who worked furiously to push through legislation and executive actions during Trump’s first year in office, expect limited prospects for getting things done in Washington this year heading into a contentious midterm election.”

Jonathan Swan: “Over the past few weeks — especially since Roy Moore’s defeat — sources close to Trump say he’s finally recognizing a harsh reality: If Republicans lose the House in 2018, it will pose an existential threat to his presidency, with endless investigations, legislative obstruction and a likely move toward impeachment.”

Iowa Has Soured on Trump

January 2, 2018 at 6:54 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Washington Post: “Iowa has seemingly soured on the president and his party. The end-of-year Iowa Poll, an industry standard conducted by Des Moines-based Selzer and Co., found Trump with just 35 percent approval in the state. Only 34 percent of Iowans said they would back Republicans for Congress in 2018, and 61 percent said they were turned off by politics altogether.”

Democrats Have Advantage as Congress Reconvenes

January 2, 2018 at 6:52 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Playbook: “Republicans were able to get through December relatively unscathed. They kept the government funded without giving up much of anything. But as D.C. barrels toward Jan. 19 — when government funding runs out — Democrats have a strong hand to play. Fixing DACA and stabilizing Obamacare are issues that unite Democrats and divide Republicans.”

“There will be an effort by Republicans to take care of some of these issues on their own terms early this month to avoid getting jammed up against the January deadline.”

“A few Republicans have been telling us that it will be incumbent upon President Trump to get GOP lawmakers comfortable with an immigration deal — something that nearly toppled Republican leaders in past years.”

Axios: The congressional to do list.

Democrats Want to Depose Priebus About Election Night

January 1, 2018 at 1:12 pm EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“Fresh from interviewing former White House press secretary Sean Spicer over what he was doing on the fifth floor of Trump Tower on election night, Democrats now want to interview former RNC Chairman Reince Priebus,” Politico reports.

“Spicer’s presence that night has caused some unease among Republicans because the expiration of a 35-year-old settlement, or consent decree, barring the RNC from engaging in ballot security operations may depend on it. The fifth floor was the nerve center of then-candidate Donald Trump’s poll-watching operations.”

“The consent decree originated from the RNC’s voter intimidation efforts in New Jersey’s 1981 gubernatorial election. Republicans, some of whom were armed off-duty law enforcement officers wearing armbands, showed up at urban polling places and challenged voters. The display was blamed for suppressing the black vote, allowing Republican Tom Kean to squeak out an extremely narrow victory over Democrat Jim Florio.”

The President’s First Year

January 1, 2018 at 12:20 pm EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Coming soon: Crucible: The President’s First Year by Michael Nelson,‎ Jeffrey L. Chidester, and Stefanie Georgakis Abbott.

“Is the presidency a position one must learn on the job, or can one learn from others’ experience? No common thread runs through the list of forty-five presidents; no playbook provides the answers to all the challenges a president will face. Yet even in the most unprecedented situations, history can be instructive.”

‘Back to Work’

January 1, 2018 at 11:41 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Think Progress: “On Christmas, Trump tweeted that he would be going ‘back to work’ the next day.”

“Trump has since gone golfing for seven consecutive days, while the press pool ate pancakes at a local IHOP.”

Happy New Year!

January 1, 2018 at 11:05 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Get ready for another wild year in politics…

No Names Line Up to Run Against Trump

January 1, 2018 at 11:02 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Politico: “The usual early trickle of potential presidential candidates into Iowa and New Hampshire is already a full-on flood ahead of Trump’s reelection bid. And in the place of the traditional assortment of senators and governors is an ever-expanding hodgepodge of long shots — from mayors to House members to state-level bureaucrats — each absolutely convinced they hold the key to kicking the president to the curb come 2020.”

“Eyeing a historically unpopular commander in chief, a national party devoid of an obvious front-runner, and increasingly accessible online tools providing a semi-reliable source of funding, Democrats find that the barriers to entering the presidential conversation are lower than ever. And each new entry begets others eager to be in the mix or at least raise their profile — however slim their chances of winning the nomination might be.”

A Worldwide ‘Fake News’ Crisis

January 1, 2018 at 11:02 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“Even the strongest of Trump backers should think long and hard about a world without facts and common truths,” Axios reports.

“You might love his middle finger to the media. But even the strongest of Trump backers should think long and hard about a world without facts and common truths. His techniques — especially claiming bad or unwanted news is ‘fake news’ — are getting copied worldwide, just as evil actors like Russia are getting better at spreading misinformation.”

“Despots use fake news as a weapon: Leaders or state media in at least 15 countries have used the term ‘fake news’ to try to quell dissent or defuse questions about human rights violations.”

“In the U.S.: Within seconds of any major attack or shooting, fake news (real fake news: news that is actually false) starts circulating about the suspect and victims, forcing tech platforms to apologize for surfacing news from faulty sources — think Vegas shooting, Times Square subway bombing, etc.”

Conspiracy Is Main Issue in Russia Investigation

January 1, 2018 at 10:52 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Nick Ackerman, a former Watergate prosecutor, told MSNBC that the big issue in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation is not whether the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia, but whether it conspired to steal emails from prominent figures in the Democratic Party.

Said Ackerman: “I think the big enchilada here is the conspiracy to break into the Democratic National Committee in violation of the federal computer crime law and to use those emails to help Donald Trump get elected. All of that is motive as to why Donald Trump and others were endeavoring to obstruct the investigation, and why Donald Trump told James Comey to let the investigation on Michael Flynn go. All of this is going to come together in 2018.”

Gillibrand Sure Looks Like She’s Running for President

January 1, 2018 at 10:40 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Washington Post: “A Democrat hoping to run for president might have a strategy of tacking noticeably to the left — in an attempt to grab the attention and enthusiasm of the progressive activists most likely to work for her and vote in the primaries. And Gillibrand has been doing precisely that. She was the first senator to call for Al Franken (D-MN) to step down, has been criticizing Bill Clinton’s failure to resign over allegations of inappropriate sexual conduct, and was an early supporter of Sen. Bernie Sanders’s ‘Medicare for all’ bill. Earlier in December, she called on President Trump to resign over numerous credible allegations of sexual harassment and abuse, to which Trump responded with an insult- and insinuation-laden tweet reaction.”

“But wait, there’s more — several actions piquing the interest of party activists. In Illinois, Gillibrand endorsed a progressive challenger to incumbent Democratic Rep. Daniel Lipinski — even before the challenger, Marie Newman, had filed petitions to run. Gillibrand has also taken notably progressive stands in the Senate. Along with Sanders (I-VT) and only four other Democrats, Gillibrand voted against the massive annual defense bill. And she unveiled a plan with Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) to ban states from passing ‘right-to-work’ laws, which enable workers in unionized shops to refuse to pay dues, a major conservative priority.”

High-Tax States Plot to Blunt Impact of New Tax Law

January 1, 2018 at 10:33 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

“Democrats in high-cost, high-tax states are plotting ways to do what their states’ representatives in Congress could not: blunt the impact of the newly passed Republican tax overhaul,” the New York Times reports.

“Governors and legislative leaders in New York, California and other states are considering legal challenges to elements of the law that they say unfairly single out parts of the country. They are looking at ways of raising revenue that aren’t penalized by the new law. And they are considering changing their state tax codes to allow residents to take advantage of other federal tax breaks — in effect, restoring deductions that the tax law scaled back.”

A Tax and Spending Debate Worse Than Last Year

January 1, 2018 at 10:31 am EST By Taegan Goddard Leave a Comment

Stan Collender: “This year’s spending and tax debate is going to be worse than last year’s, and 2017 was an absolute slum of a year as far as the federal budget is concerned.”

“From trying to discredit and dismantle the Congressional Budget Office, to ignoring the trillion dollar deficit increase projected by the Joint Committee on Taxation from the Trump Family and Friends Tax Cut, to misusing and abusing the congressional budget process, to coming close to 3 government shutdowns, to not even trying to enact any of the 12 regular 2018 appropriations by the start of the fiscal year, to enacting what may well be the most nonsensical and damaging tax policy in U.S. history, there was nothing about what the Republican House and Senate majorities and Trump administration did that had any redeeming value.”