Rep. Mark Amodei (R-NV) told Nevada Newsmakers that Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) may soon resign as Speaker of the U.S. House.
Said Amodei: “The rumor mill is that Paul Ryan is getting ready to resign in the next 30 to 60 days and that Steve Scalise will be the new Speaker.”
Former President Jimmy Carter told CBS News that President Trump’s choice of John Bolton as his new national security adviser is “the worst mistake” he’s made.
Said Carter: “I have been concerned at some of the things he’s decided. I think his last choice for national security adviser was very ill-advised. I think John Bolton has been the worst mistake he’s made.”
Gallup: “Fifty-five percent of Americans worry ‘a great deal’ about the availability and affordability of healthcare, topping concerns about 14 other issues Gallup tested. Slim majorities also worry about crime and violence, federal spending and the budget deficit, and the availability of guns.”
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Recent topics include the “Outlook for the 2018 Midterm Elections” and “How the Trump Era Ends.”
A new CNN poll finds 42% approve of the way President Trump is handling his job, while 54% disapprove.
Trump’s approval is up 7 points overall since February, including 6-point increases among Republicans (from 80% to 86% now) and independents (from 35% to 41% now).
For comparison, the FiveThirtyEight polling average shows Trump’s approval at a similar 41% to 53%.
David Corn ran into former Solicitor General Ted Olson and asked about reports he considered an offer to represent President Trump.
I asked Olson about being recruited for Trump’s squad. He rolled his eyes, suggesting that this was never going to happen and that it was not just a matter of conflicts…
So this didn’t get too far? I queried. Olson shrugged in an I’m-not-getting-into-details way. “Who knows how these trial balloons happen?” he said, in a manner that definitely suggested he knows how they happen. He then joked, “Joe diGenova lasted longer. At least two days.”
So is Trump going to have trouble finding attorneys? Olson shrugged again. “Let me ask this a different way,” I said. “In the last few days has any lawyer come up to you and said, ‘I’m willing to work for Trump?’”
Without hesitation, Olson said, “No.” Not at all? “Not at all.”
Several employees at the Interior Department have told CNN that Secretary Ryan Zinke repeatedly “says that he won’t focus on diversity, an apparent talking point that has upset many people within the agency.”
Three high-ranking Interior officials said that Zinke has made several comments with a similar theme, saying “diversity isn’t important,” or “I don’t care about diversity,” or “I don’t really think that’s important anymore.”
“I think everybody would agree, this is turmoil.”
— Former Solicitor General Ted Olson, in an interview on MSNBC, commenting on the Trump White House.
“A White House spokesman says the president still has confidence in embattled Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin,” Bloomberg reports.
“Three administration officials told The Associated Press Sunday that Trump is planning to oust the embattled secretary amid an extraordinary rebellion at the agency and damaging government investigations into his alleged spending abuses.”
“After sixty-one weeks in the White House, President Trump has found two people he won’t attack on Twitter: Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal,” the New York Times reports.
“The verbose commander-in-chief has posted more than 2,900 times on Twitter since taking office, using the term ‘FAKE NEWS’ to describe everything from the Russia probe and allegations of chaos in the White House to harassment accusations, the size of his inaugural crowds and heated arguments with world leaders.”
“But he has been uncharacteristically silent in recent days — to the relief of his advisers — as a pornographic film star and a Playboy model described intimate details of sexual encounters with Mr. Trump. Stormy Daniels, the porn star, said Sunday night on CBS’s 60 Minutes that she once spanked the president with a copy of Forbes magazine bearing his face on the cover.”
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A new Brennan Center report says “extreme gerrymandering” could cost Democrats control of the House unless they ride a massive blue wave.
Because of maps designed to favor Republicans, Democrats would need to win by a nearly unprecedented nationwide margin in 2018 to gain control of the House of Representatives. To attain a bare majority, Democrats would likely have to win the national popular vote by nearly 11 points. Neither Democrats nor Republicans have won by such an overwhelming margin in decades. Even a strong blue wave would crash against a wall of gerrymandered maps.
Yet this is misleading without also mentioning the “the great sorting” of voters that has taken place over the last two decades. An equal, if not bigger, barrier to Democrats winning the House is the extreme urbanization of Democratic voters which leads to millions of “wasted” votes.
A Pew Research study shows:
Voters in urban counties have long aligned more with the Democratic Party than the Republican Party, and this Democratic advantage has grown over time. Today, twice as many urban voters identify as Democrats or lean Democratic (62%) as affiliate with the GOP or lean Republican.
Overall, those who live in suburban counties are about evenly divided in their partisan loyalties (47% Democratic, 45% Republican), little changed over the last two decades.
In addition, while mapping technology has made it easier for congressional maps to be gerrymandered in the redistricting process, the sorting of the electorate into distinct geographic areas makes it even easier.
Both phenomena — the use of gerrymandering during redistricting and the geographic sorting of voters — coexist and give Republicans an advantage in congressional elections.
What does this mean for the 2018 midterm elections? The Cook Political Report has found that in the last three election cycles, Democrats have won roughly 4% fewer seats than votes received nationally. If this trend holds true in 2018, then Democrats would need to win the House popular vote by roughly 7% to win the 23 seats they need to take a majority. This is a similar to a projection made by Emory University political scientist Alan Ambramowitz.
In contrast, the Brennan study, which looks at responsiveness of vote margins in individual states, suggests Democrats would need an 11% margin to take control of the House.
Daily Beast: “First, it’s chiefly concerned with ‘certain still images and/or text messages.’ Yes, later in the agreement, the ‘confidential information’ at issue is expansively defined, to include absolutely anything, tangible or intangible, that Daniels might know about Trump, including, of course, whether she spanked him with a magazine or not.”
“But far more ink is spilled discussing what Daniels is supposed to do with those texts and images: give copies to Cohen and destroy the originals.”
“Now the strategy starts to make sense. This dispute isn’t about the affair: it’s about those pictures or texts. As viewers of Daniels’ 60 Minutes interview surely noticed, the only question Daniels refused to answer was about whether she’s got more evidence of the affair. Avenatti suggested the answer is yes: he tweeted a photo of a DVD inside a safe.”
“Kim Jong Un made a surprise visit to Beijing on his first known trip outside North Korea since taking power in 2011,” Bloomberg reports.
“The unannounced visit is the latest in series of diplomatic power plays in Asia as U.S. President Donald Trump’s battle to lower the U.S.’s trade deficit becomes entangled with his effort to get Kim to give up his nuclear weapons.”
With the Cook Political Report shifting Pennsylvania’s 6th congressional district from Toss-Up to Likely Democrat, there are now 8 current Republican-held seats rated Lean-Likely Democrat and another 21 Republican-held seats rate Toss-Ups.
Jonathan Swan: “Trump’s red line on Russia is Vladimir Putin. The president is loathe to criticize him by name or call him out in one-on-one conversations. But he has taken some tough steps against Russia that his predecessor didn’t. An example: sending lethal arms to Ukraine.”
“It’s part of the Trump paradox. He still believes the U.S. and Russia have plenty of shared interests and wants to mend the relationship. He also thinks the only way to do this is by building a warm personal relationship with Putin. But this dual-track strategy — be nice personally and tough administratively — becomes more fantastical every time Trump authorizes a harsh action against the Kremlin.”
“Today’s actions — expelling the Russian diplomats – make sense when you bear this in mind.”
The night before 60 Minutes aired its interview with Stormy Daniels, President Trump had dinner with Michael Cohen, his longtime personal attorney, CBS News reports.
Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) is set to make a “major announcement” on April 9 amid long-running rumors he will run for U.S. Senate, Politico reports.
Out next month: President Carter: The White House Years by Stuart E. Eizenstat.
“Famous for the legal pads he took to every meeting, Eizenstat now draws on more than 7500 pages of notes and 350 interviews of all the major figures of the time.”
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.