Joe Biden has told former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid that Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) is in his “top three” to be his vice presidential nominee, Mediaite reports.
“A source close to the Biden campaign said Biden has privately mentioned Cortez Masto as someone who would be on his shortlist for vice president and said he really likes and respects her, appreciates her intellect and leadership, and the history she made as the first Latina U.S. senator.”
Associated Press: “Despite wild swings in financial markets and signs that unemployment is surging — both of which could hurt Trump in an election year — many businesses say it’s not clear that reopening will be even an option in a few weeks: They have to follow the orders set in each state, and many of those are open ended or could be extended at any time. They are worried that opening too soon could be seen as irresponsible. And even if they did reopen, would customers come if the virus isn’t under control?”
“Listen to the science. Do your part and take care of each other.”
— Barack Obama, in an Instagram chat with basketball star Steph Curry and Dr. Anthony Fauci.
“The 3.3 million new unemployment insurance claims that the Labor Department reported Thursday is likely a significant undercount, experts say, because laid-off workers have been calling into state unemployment agencies much faster than the agencies can process their requests,” Politico reports.
“A tidal wave of workers trying to file claims has overwhelmed websites and jammed phone lines at state unemployment agencies, leaving states scrambling to hire more staff.”
Politico: “President Trump and senior administration officials have begun employing a new turn of phrase to describe America’s war against the coronavirus pandemic — insisting that the same social-distancing guidelines the president has suggested rolling back in recent days are in fact revealing a ‘light at the end of the tunnel’ to the public health crisis.”
Wall Street Journal: “With new infections dwindling, factories are restarting, stores are reopening, and people are venturing outdoors. In some ways, China is where the U.S. and Europe hope to be within weeks or months. Yet many Chinese factories find demand for their products has evaporated. Consumers in China and elsewhere are reluctant to spend over worries about what they have lost and what lies ahead.”
“For U.S. businesses tied to global trade, exporters and multinational companies, China’s limited return to normal foreshadows the potential for a sluggish U.S. recovery. Consumption, which makes up more than two-thirds of the American economy, looks to be hobbled by lost jobs, fallen income and diminished confidence for an unknown period. Even countries emerging from national lockdowns later than others will likely see weaker demand among trading partners also hurt.”
In new letter to governors, President Trump says his administration is revising social distancing guidelines and working to classify counties as high-risk, medium-risk, or low-risk.
This is a must-read: Pelosi by Molly Ball.
“Ever since the Democrats took back the House in the 2018 midterm elections, Nancy Pelosi has led the opposition with strategic mastery and inimitable elan. It’s a remarkable comeback for the veteran politician who for years was demonized by the right and taken for granted by many in her own party—even though, as speaker under President Barack Obama, she deserves much of the credit for epochal liberal accomplishments from universal access to health care to saving the US economy from collapse, from reforming Wall Street to allowing gay people to serve openly in the military. How did an Italian grandmother in four-inch heels become the greatest legislator since LBJ?”
Wall Street Journal: “Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin indicated that the U.S. government would take stakes in airline carriers in exchange for billions in direct grants to the companies, part of a $2 trillion economic rescue package.”
“He detailed his plans during last-minute negotiations when the aid to airlines emerged as a major sticking point. Republicans had rejected providing cash grants to airlines, and an earlier version of the legislation would have provided $50 billion in loans and loan guarantees to passenger airlines and $8 billion to cargo airlines—but no direct aid.”
Playbook: “The House GOP leadership says there are some lawmakers who will be in Washington for Friday’s vote on the emergency coronavirus bill that passed the Senate last night. They are going to try hard to quash dissent, and any effort to call for a roll call vote on the legislation, and they say they will involve President Trump and senior White House officials should they need to. Republicans have a conference call at 1:30 p.m. today.”
“As hospitals, health-care staff and governors clamor for ventilators, intensive-care beds, and protective gear, President Trump and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce are opposing the one thing many say would do the most good in the fight against the runaway coronavirus pandemic: Activate the Defense Production Act to coordinate a war-like effort to ramp up the manufacture and distribution of critical supplies,” Bloomberg reports.
“More than 100 former national security officials urged Trump in a letter Wednesday to use the act’s authority, saying it was necessary that government coordinate the effort and assign priorities to confront the crisis. Trade groups, governors, attorneys general and Democratic senators are lodging similar calls.”
From a new study on the 1918 flu pandemic: “We find that cities that intervened earlier and more aggressively do not perform worse and, if anything, grow faster after the pandemic is over.”
“The Trump administration cut staff by more than two-thirds at a key U.S. public health agency operating inside China, as part of a larger rollback of U.S.-funded health and science experts on the ground there leading up to the coronavirus outbreak,” Reuters reports.
“Most of the reductions were made at the Beijing office of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and occurred over the past two years.”
“It’s hard to overstate just how remarkable the Senate’s work to craft and pass a $2.2 trillion coronavirus rescue package is — and the fact that they did it in a matter of days underscores how remarkably terrified they are of what coronavirus is doing to the economy and U.S. health-care workers,” the Washington Post reports.
“That kind of bipartisan agreement for any actual legislation, let alone one this massive and complicated, is unprecedented in modern Senate history. And it underscores just how fearful lawmakers are of not acting ASAP to prop up an economy that has already fallen off a cliff.”
Today should have been Opening Day of the baseball season — one of my favorite days of the year — but like virtually everything else, that’s been scrapped by the coronavirus pandemic.
Let us know how you’re doing in the comments.
New York Times: “Democrats proudly announced that they had won agreement on language to block President Trump, other government officials and their families from receiving assistance from a $500 billion fund to be administered by the Treasury Department.”
“But it turns out that the provision might not preclude funds from going to companies owned by the family of Mr. Trump’s son-in-law and White House adviser, Jared Kushner, while Mr. Trump’s companies would not be barred from benefiting from other elements of the bill intended to help broad swaths of American business.”
“For example, certain hotel owners, even those employing thousands of people, will be eligible for small-business loans, a provision that could potentially benefit Mr. Trump’s company to help to continue to pay wages for his employees. The Trump Organization could also benefit from the $15 billion change to the tax code won by restaurants and retailers.”
The U.S. unsealed drug trafficking charges Thursday against President Nicolás Maduro and other senior Venezuelan officials, Axios reports.
Out next month: It Was All a Lie: How the Republican Party Became Donald Trump by Stuart Stevens.
“This is not a book about how Donald Trump hijacked the Republican Party and changed it into something else. Stevens shows how Trump is in fact the natural outcome of five decades of hypocrisy and self-delusion, dating all the way back to the civil rights legislation of the early 1960s.”
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.
