New York Times: “For the better part of two years, well before the federal government shut down and SNAP payments were paused, lower-income consumers have been slowing their spending, especially for discretionary items. Nearly three-quarters of individuals who receive SNAP benefits live below the poverty line, making less than $32,000 a year for a family of four.”
“The ripple effect of that spending pullback is being felt by retailers, food companies and restaurant chains.”
“On the campaign trail, President Trump couldn’t talk about affordability enough. He vowed that should he retake the White House, he would tackle it on many fronts,” the New York Times reports.
“Over the past week, he could barely stand to hear the word.”
“Since Democratic victories in elections last week on platforms that focused on bringing down the cost of living, Mr. Trump has angrily confronted the reality that he has lost ground on an issue that helped deliver him a second term.”
Since January, Washington, D.C. plastic surgeons have seen a wave of Trump insiders asking for overt procedures in line with the “Mar-a-Lago face” look, Axios reports.
You're reading the free version of Political Wire
Upgrade to a paid membership to unlock full access. The process is quick and easy. You can even use Apple Pay.
Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) told CNBC the eight senators who folded on the government shutdown were taking heat for others: “There were a lot more than eight that were really happy that the eight of us voted… the way we did.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune told Scripps that he and Speaker Mike Johnson haven’t talked lately about a House vote on a bill to restore Obamacare subsidies.
Said Thune: “My commitment was to have that vote here, and they’ll have to figure out what to do in the House.”
“Airlines braced for further chaos this week, despite a deal in the Senate to end the government shutdown,” the New York Times reports.
“About 5,000 flights were canceled from Friday through Sunday as federal restrictions on flying at the nation’s busiest airports kicked in… The disruption peaked at 10 percent of scheduled flights on Sunday, the fourth worst day for cancellations this year. By Monday morning, more than 1,400 flights had been canceled for the day, more than 5.5 percent of scheduled trips.”
“It’s not great when your defiant kid says you are wrong,” the New York Times reports.
“It’s a little bit worse when you are in the United States Senate and your defiant kid is running for Congress.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries backed Chuck Schumer, his Senate counterpart, amid a progressive backlash to Schumer’s handling of a compromise to end the government shutdown, Politico reports.
When asked if Schumer was effective and should keep his job, Jeffries said: “Yes and yes.”
USA Today: Progressive group calls for Schumer to resign over shutdown vote.
Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ) announced Monday that she is not running for reelection next year and will retire at the end of her term, saying that it is “time to pass the torch,” Politico reports.
The 80-year-old has served New Jersey’s 12th District since 2015, when she became the first Black woman to represent New Jersey in the House.
New York Times: “Mr. Thune had been offering for weeks to give Democrats a vote on extending the health care subsidies. They only relented after the Trump administration had made the consequences of the shutdown too painful to ignore.”
“The group of people affected by the shutdown grew with each week, beyond the hundreds of thousands of federal workers who have not been paid for weeks. The Trump administration’s legal fight to avoid paying SNAP food assistance benefits put tens of millions of Americans at risk of going hungry. And its decision to ratchet back air traffic capacity ensnared millions of others in air travel disruptions and flight cancellations that began over the weekend.”
“After a whopping 50 days out of session, Speaker Mike Johnson told members to begin traveling back to Washington Monday as he prepares for a Wednesday vote to reopen the government,” NOTUS reports.
“Right now, House GOP leadership is planning to rely exclusively on Republican votes to get the bill over the finish line… Especially after Sunday night, when Democrats in the House eviscerated the deal, and even Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries came out against it.”
Punchbowl News: “House Republican leaders haven’t started whipping on the funding bill yet. But with the tight margins – Johnson can only lose two votes – Democratic support would be a help for Johnson.”
“Senate Democrats’ embrace of a shutdown deal that doesn’t guarantee extended health care subsidies is already an electoral issue,” Politico reports.
“Nearly every major Democratic Senate candidate panned the deal, from Texas hopeful Colin Allred, a former member of Congress, deriding it as a ‘joke’ to Illinois Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton condemning it as a ‘complete betrayal of the American people.’”
Christine Pelosi (D) will not run for her retiring mother’s seat in the House of Representatives, but instead will seek a California state senate seat.
Speaker Mike Johnson plans to swear in Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva (D-AZ) before the House votes on a government funding package, Punchbowl News reports.
Grijalva’s installation in the House does not change the voting math for the funding bill. But she said she will sign the discharge petition to release the Epstein files. Grijalva’s signature will force a vote in the House.
President Trump on Monday threatened to sue the BBC for $1 billion for a documentary that his lawyer claimed included “malicious, disparaging” edits to a speech Mr. Trump delivered on Jan. 6, 2021, the New York Times reports.
“The Supreme Court said on Monday that it would hear a challenge to Mississippi’s counting of mail-in ballots received after Election Day, a case that could upend mail-in rules in dozens of states, creating chaos ahead of the 2026 elections,” the New York Times reports.
“The case, Watson v. Republican National Committee, asks the justices to determine the meaning of ‘Election Day.’ It is a potential blockbuster and adds to the court’s other elections and voting cases for the term, which include a case about who can sue to challenge Illinois’ mail-in ballot rules and a challenge to the Louisiana congressional district map that could gut a remaining pillar of the Voting Rights Act.”
Abdul El-Sayed, a progressive Democrat running for the U.S. Senate in Michigan, has quietly erased thousands of old social media posts — including a dozen tweets that championed the “defund the police” movement, described police as “standing armies,” and urged cities to divert money from law enforcement to social services, CNN reports.
Nate Silver: “Once the shutdown began on Oct. 1, I disagreed with the conventional wisdom that Democrats were ‘winning’ it. True, polls found that a slight plurality of voters blamed Republicans rather than Democrats. But those same polls showed that voters didn’t understand why there was a shutdown in the first place, and that Democrats’ message on health care wasn’t breaking through. Moreover, Democrats’ advantage on the ‘blame’ question was eroding over time — while Trump’s approval rating actually improved initially once the shutdown began.”
“Then something changed — and I was getting ready to eat crow. Late last month, Trump’s numbers began to plummet, with his net approval rating falling from −7.5 on Oct. 17 to −13 three weeks later. It wasn’t a huge shift in absolute terms. But Trump has had a high popularity floor and a low ceiling. It was something real enough to contribute to Democrats absolutely crushing Republicans in a series of elections last Tuesday in New Jersey, Virginia and other states. Meanwhile, Trump was starting to feud with Congressional Republicans, urging them to ‘nuke’ the filibuster when leadership was reluctant to do so.”
“So what did Democrats do with their newfound leverage? Over the weekend, they just gave up.”
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.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
“There are a lot of blogs and news sites claiming to understand politics, but only a few actually do. Political Wire is one of them.”
— Chuck Todd, host of “Meet the Press”
“Concise. Relevant. To the point. Political Wire is the first site I check when I’m looking for the latest political nugget. That pretty much says it all.”
— Stuart Rothenberg, editor of the Rothenberg Political Report
“Political Wire is one of only four or five sites that I check every day and sometimes several times a day, for the latest political news and developments.”
— Charlie Cook, editor of the Cook Political Report
“The big news, delicious tidbits, pearls of wisdom — nicely packaged, constantly updated… What political junkie could ask for more?”
— Larry Sabato, Center for Politics, University of Virginia
“Political Wire is a great, great site.”
— Joe Scarborough, host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe”
“Taegan Goddard has a knack for digging out political gems that too often get passed over by the mainstream press, and for delivering the latest electoral developments in a sharp, no frills style that makes his Political Wire an addictive blog habit you don’t want to kick.”
— Arianna Huffington, founder of The Huffington Post
“Political Wire is one of the absolute must-read sites in the blogosphere.”
— Glenn Reynolds, founder of Instapundit
“I rely on Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire for straight, fair political news, he gets right to the point. It’s an eagerly anticipated part of my news reading.”
— Craig Newmark, founder of Craigslist.