“President Trump has told confidants as recently as Wednesday that he believes he has the authority to replace Jerome Powell as chairman of the Federal Reserve Board,” Bloomberg reports.
“In Trump’s line of thinking, he could demote Powell to be a board governor, but isn’t planning to do so right now.”
Politico: “Biden’s support for the death penalty was consistent throughout his 30-plus years in the Senate. Whether that stand holds will be another case study of how he reconciles long-held beliefs with the leftward march of his party. His record is full of tough-on-crime bills and statements that were in line with Bill Clinton-style centrism, but now look out of step.”
“Most of Biden’s Democratic opponents support abolishing—or at least halting—capital punishment.”
Washington Post: “As seemingly random as it was for Biden to reference Sen. James O. Eastland, a long-ago deceased segregationist senator from his own party, some in Biden’s campaign had heard him discuss this relationship before — and warned him against mentioning it in public. Eastland, who represented Mississippi in the Senate from the early 1940s to 1978, often said that African Americans were ‘an inferior race.’”
“Aides said they had urged Biden to find a less toxic example.”
Said one: “It might move him to pick a different senator. But he’s not someone you can go to and just say, ‘You’ve been doing this x number of years and you can’t do this anymore.'”
Politico: “But rather than bolster his image as an effective pragmatist, Biden’s parables of working with long-dead Dixiecrats have started to reinforce two of his biggest liabilities: his age and his record on race.”
Politico: “Though Senate and House leaders have been seeking a broader, two-year spending deal aimed at taking shutdowns and default off the table through the presidential election, negotiators left the huddle in Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office far from a deal.”
“Democrats said Republicans were reluctant to do anything to get ahead of President Donald Trump, while Republicans said they couldn’t get a serious counteroffer from their Democratic counterparts.”
Playbook: “Does Trump realize how good of a deal Mnuchin is offering the Democrats right now? A yearlong budget deal coupled with a yearlong debt-limit package sidesteps the $100 billion in budget cuts Democrats so desperately want to avoid. It once again punts on Trump’s border wall. This seems like a too-good-to-be-true deal for Dems, given the complications in cutting a deal with the White House. Of course, Democrats have no incentive to accept this deal now, but come September, if it’s on the table, it might look pretty darn good with deadlines looming.”
“President Trump said he hadn’t thought about live-tweeting the first Democratic debates but now that the media has brought it up, he just might,” Politico reports.
“Several people close to the president told Politico and The Wall Street Journal that Trump’s closest aides hoped the president wouldn’t unleash a stream of consciousness on Twitter during the debates but were resigned to the fact that restricting the president would be unlikely.”
“America’s military budget is set to grow for a fifth consecutive year to near-historic highs in 2020, as lawmakers push increases in defense spending for next year despite opposition from some liberals in Congress and deficit hawks,” the Washington Post reports.
“The Trump administration has proposed $750 billion in defense spending as part of its budget request to Congress for next year, as well as steep cuts to domestic programs in health care and education.”
“U.S. Steel announced it will temporarily halt production at two domestic plants despite the boost from the Trump administration’s tariffs, as a steel industry singled out for federal support shows signs of weakening,” the Washington Post reports.
“The closure runs in sharp contrast to the narrative President Trump has offered about the steel industry. Tuesday night in Orlando, as he formally announced he was running for reelection, Trump boasted about helping the steel industry through the use of tariffs on imports.”
“Felix Sater, a Russian-born real estate developer, is set to testify Friday before the House Intelligence Committee about his experience working on a proposed Trump tower project in Moscow during the 2016 election,” the Washington Post reports.
“The closed-door interview is part of an inquiry by the House panel into President Trump’s long-standing interest in expanding his brand to Moscow, a topic that Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), chairman of the committee, has said he intends to explore further.”
“A federal district judge in Maryland on Wednesday ruled that new evidence in the case of a census citizenship question merits additional consideration, opening the door for plaintiffs’ lawyers to request that an appeals court return the case to him,” the Washington Post reports.
“Civil rights groups who had sued the government over its addition of a citizenship question to the 2020 Census had asked U.S. District Court Judge George Hazel to reconsider his ruling on whether the government was guilty of conspiracy and intent to discriminate after new evidence in the case emerged last month. Files discovered on hard drives of a deceased Republican redistricting strategist suggested he had communicated with the Trump administration about how to get the citizenship question onto the survey and that the strategist had determined that adding the question would create an electoral advantage for Republicans and non-Hispanic whites.”
NPR: “The latest development in the legal battle over the hotly contested question could complicate the Census Bureau’s plans to finalize census questionnaires and start printing paper forms for the national head count by July 1.”
“Two senior officials and three other individuals with direct knowledge of the administration’s strategy in the region tell the Daily Beast that the president has asked officials to tone down their heated rhetoric on Iran, despite the attacks on tanker ships in the Gulf of Oman that Washington has blamed on Tehran.”
The president has previously said he is less hawkish on Iran than some of his advisers and this week, in a Time magazine interview, said the attacks on the tankers were ‘very minor.'”
“Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said he intends to serve his full four-year term as head of the Federal Reserve, after President Trump asked White House lawyers earlier this year to explore options for removing him,” Bloomberg reports.
Said Powell: “I think the law is clear that I have a four year term, and I fully intend to serve it.”
Politico: “The divide has led to stalled projects, disputes over Medicaid and fetal tissue research, duplicated work on Trump’s drug pricing priorities — and bitter personal attacks, say a dozen current and former White House and HHS officials as well as multiple other people familiar with the conversations.”
“Despite the recent tensions, Alex Azar is not perceived to be at risk of losing his job — although the president is famously fickle and, by some accounts, Trump’s trust in his health secretary has eroded.”
“A source familiar with the conversations told the Daily Beast that, in recent weeks, the Fox News host has privately advised Trump against taking military action against Iran.”
“And a senior administration official said that during the president’s recent conversations with the Fox primetime host, Carlson has bashed the more ‘hawkish members’ of his administration.”
Federal Reserve officials held their benchmark interest rate steady on Wednesday, but hinted they would cut rates in the months ahead if the economic outlook weakens, the Wall Street Journal reports.
CNBC: “The decision came amid divisions over what is ahead and still leaves open the possibility that policy loosening could happen before the end of the year depending on how conditions unfold.”
Politico: “Three House Judiciary Committee lawmakers exiting the closed-door interview said a White House lawyer repeatedly claimed Hicks had blanket immunity from discussing her time in the White House. They said she wouldn’t answer questions as basic as where she sat in the West Wing or whether she told the truth to Mueller.”
New York Times: “Administration officials are briefing Congress on what they say are ties between Iran and Al Qaeda, prompting skeptical reactions and concern on Capitol Hill that the White House could invoke the war authorization passed in 2001 as legal cover for military action against Tehran.”
“Statements tying Iran and Al Qaeda by Mr. Pompeo and other officials point to the potential for the administration to justify invoking the 2001 authorization… And when asked in recent weeks by lawmakers and journalists whether the administration would use the 2001 authorization, Mr. Pompeo has deflected the questions.”
A new Monmouth poll find Joe Biden leading the Democratic presidential race with 33%, followed by Elizabeth Warren at 15%, Bernie Sanders at 14%, Kamala Harris at 8%, Pete Buttigieg at 5% Beto O’Rourke at 3%, Cory Booker at 2% and Andrew Yang at 2%.
Said pollster Patrick Murray: “Biden maintains his lead but there is plenty percolating in the tier right below him. Next week will provide the first opportunity for voters to see these candidates side by side. Well, at least they’ll see some of them side by side.”
“The creation of the Trump Leadership Council back in 2016 went almost entirely unnoticed at the time. Until now, the members of the council have not been made public. But Rolling Stone obtained a complete list of the members and interviewed half a dozen people who attended and organized the council.”
“Together, they form a lost chapter in the story of how Trump’s pro-industry, anti-regulation America First agenda became a reality.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
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