Time: “Gone is the rickety operation that eked out an upset victory over Hillary Clinton. In its place, advisers boast, is a state-of-the-art campaign befitting an incumbent President. Trump’s campaign is gearing up to spend $1 billion, and may well get there. His team has spent more money, earlier in the campaign, than any re-election bid in recent history. Campaign staff sit in slick offices in a glass-skinned tower overlooking the Potomac River in Arlington, Va. And Trump has won total control of the Republican National Committee, which fought against him for much of 2016.”

“Despite the trappings of convention, however, Trump has for the most part thrown out the playbook for incumbency. The last three two-term Presidents were lifted in important ways by a bipartisan message. Bill Clinton ran on the 1994 crime bill and tax reform. George W. Bush ran on keeping America safe in the wake of 9/11. Barack Obama reminded voters that Osama bin Laden was dead and General Motors was alive.”

“Trump, who lost the popular vote in 2016 and is the only President in the history of Gallup polling never to crack 50% approval, says he’s ready to defy that legacy. ‘I think my base is so strong, I’m not sure that I have to do that,’ he tells Time, after being asked whether he should reach out to swing voters. The mantra of Trump 2020 is ‘turnout, turnout, turnout,’ as campaign manager Brad Parscale puts it. ‘People all think you have to change people’s minds. You have to get people to show up that believe in you.'”

“The House GOP campaign arm is under fire from Republicans who are growing increasingly anxious about the party’s plan to win back the chamber in 2020,” Politico reports.

“Republicans still don’t have an answer to Democrats’ online fundraising behemoth ActBlue. GOP leaders are bickering behind closed doors. The head of recruitment has decided to retire. And some rank-and-file lawmakers are starting to express alarm about the party’s strategy as the campaign ramps up.”

Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX), a well-connected Democratic incumbent, is now facing an insurgent primary challenge from Jessica Cisneros (D), a 26-year-old immigration attorney who once interned in his Washington office, CBS News reports.

“The centrist congressman has represented Texas’ 28th congressional district, which stretches from Laredo and other border communities along the Rio Grande to the outskirts of San Antonio, since 2005.”

Said Cisneros: “He might have that ‘D’ next to his name, but in reality he’s been walking and talking like a Republican. He’s Trump’s favorite Democrat.”

“Joe Biden declined to answer questions on the campaign trail this week about his son’s overseas business dealings in countries where the then-vice president was conducting diplomatic work, an issue his political opponents have already begun to wield against him as he wades into the 2020 presidential campaign,” ABC News reports.

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.”

“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.”