In the wake of the devastating tornado in Oklahoma, Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) “rejected comparisons between federal aid for this disaster and the Hurricane Sandy relief package he voted against,” the Washington Post reports.
Inhofe said that was a “totally different” situation arguing that the Sandy aid was filled with pork.
Said Inhofe: “Everyone was getting in and exploiting the tragedy taking place. That won’t happen in Oklahoma.”
Wonk Wire: Will Tornado relief need to be deficit neutral?
New York Times: “As proponents of a new immigration overhaul cast about for a Republican ally to help give their bill an extra boost, they have focused on a 79-year-old lawmaker with new hipster glasses (from Costco), black Nike sneakers (for his bad arches) and, perhaps most important, a deep and complicated relationship with immigration policy: Senator Orrin G. Hatch of Utah.”
“We’re going to win when we look like America. We need to be white, we need to be brown, we need to be black, we need to with tattoos, without tattoos, with pony tails, without pony tails, with beards, without.”
— Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), quoted by the Louisville Courier-Journal.
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Stuart Rothenberg: “Some Republicans are so excited at the thought of multiple controversies dogging the White House over the next few months (or longer) that they are already foaming at the mouth…. But Republicans ought to remember that they have seen this movie before, and the ending was not what they hoped for or expected.”
Charlie Cook: “These days, the country is even more polarized, and the conservative echo chamber is louder than ever before. Many conservatives made it all the way to Election Day last November unaware that their White House nominee was falling short. How could Mitt Romney possibly lose when everyone they knew was voting for him? Except that he did lose, and it wasn’t even a very close race.”
“Top conservative leaders, along with tea party activists from across the nation, have crafted a letter of opposition to the Senate’s bipartisan immigration overhaul,” the Los Angeles Times reports.
“The open letter to the Senate, which will be released Tuesday, marks the first large-scale attempt to halt the bill as it gains momentum with a key Senate committee vote expected this week.”
A new SurveyUSA/KOB Eyewitness News poll in New Mexico finds Gov. Susana Martinez (R) with a 66% approval rating. She fairs well with both men, 62% approval, and women, 70% approval.
Ken Cuccinelli (R) “is dropping his assertion that the Office of the Attorney General is exempt from state public records laws, indicating in a statement Monday that he had asked staff attorneys to stop including the claim in their responses to requests for records from his office,” the Washington Post reports.
Jon Stewart asks, “Can anyone do their job in that town?”
Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe (D) said State Treasurer Martha Shoffner (D) “ought to resign after she allegedly took cash from a broker who managed state funds,” KTBS-TV reports.
But Shoffner said she doesn’t intend to resign.
“Federal prosecutors say Shoffner accepted $12,000 a year from a broker who would sometimes deliver cash in a pie box — with a pie. The broker is cooperating with investigators.”
South Dakota’s U.S. Senate race “is turning into a tense feud between two longtime Democratic power brokers: Harry Reid and Tom Daschle, Politico reports.
“Reid and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee wanted to recruit former Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (D-SD) as their candidate to replace Johnson in 2014. As he spent weeks attempting to clear the field for Herseth Sandlin, Reid met privately with Johnson and his wife to ask them to persuade their son Brendan not to run for the seat, sources say. Or at the very least, let Herseth Sandlin make her decision on whether to get into the race before deciding whether Brendan Johnson should jump in.”
“But against Reid’s will, Daschle — Reid’s predecessor as Democratic leader and a South Dakota native — was privately encouraging a longtime former aide and personal friend, Rick Weiland, to mount a bid of his own. Daschle’s endorsement of Weiland helped persuade Herseth Sandlin to pass on the Senate race, according to Democratic sources close to the issue. Reid and top Senate Democrats were stunned and outraged by Daschle’s move.”
A new Survey USA poll in Los Angeles finds Eric Garcetti leading Wendy Greuel in the race for mayor by five points, 49% to 44%.
Roll Call: “The tornado damage near Oklahoma City is still being assessed and the death toll is expected to rise, but already Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) says he will insist that any federal disaster aid be paid for with cuts elsewhere.”
A new Washington Post-ABC News poll finds President Obama’s approval rating has remained steady at 51% to 44%, “in the face of fresh disclosures about the IRS, the Benghazi attack and the Justice Department’s secret collection of telephone records of Associated Press journalists as part of a leak investigation.”
Key findings: “A bare majority of Americans say they believe that Obama is focused on issues that are important to them personally; just 33% think so of congressional Republicans. Brighter assessments of the economy may be one reason that the president has been able to weather controversies. For the first time since the 100-day mark of Obama’s first term, most say they are optimistic about the direction of the economy. More than half, 56%, say the economy is on the mend, the most to say so in polls since 2009.”
Nate Silver says there’s evidence the economic recovery is helping Obama’s approval rating.
“When confronted with its worst scandal in decades, the IRS broke virtually every public relations rule on the books,” Politico reports.
“The agency could have first informed Congress that it was improperly targeting conservative groups for additional scrutiny when they applied for tax-exempt status. It could have issued a comprehensive press release. It could have even leaked to a friendly media outlet to get out in front of the story.”
“The IRS did none of those things. Instead, it took the highly unusual step of planting a question in the audience at an obscure law conference to get the word out about the controversial program.”
“This is an administration embroiled in a scandal that they created. It’s a cover-up. I’m not saying impeachment is the end
game, but it’s a possibility, especially if they keep doing little to
help us learn more.”
— Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT), quoted by the Huffington Post.
Bill and Hillary Clinton “are making clear they are staying out of the New York City Democratic mayoral primary, just as the race is about to be roiled by the candidacy of their close aide Huma Abedin’s husband, Anthony Weiner,” Politico reports.
“White House officials were first notified on April 16 about an investigation into Internal Revenue Service scrutiny of conservative groups and discussed its potential findings with the Treasury Department but never told President Obama,” the New York Times reports.
“The details provided by the White House on Monday went beyond its previous account, and may provide additional fodder for critics pressing to understand what and when the president and his team knew about the I.R.S. misconduct.”
Politico: “Monday’s revelation amounts to the fifth iteration of the Obama administration’s account of events, after initially saying that the White House had first learned of the controversy from the press.”
Howard Fineman says Whitre House aides “either have forgetten or are unable to implement the basic lesson of scandal control in Washington: Get the full story out — all of it — as fast as you can before your critics accuse you of a cover-up or worse.”
British Prime Minister David Cameron “moved to repair relations with a bruised Conservative party by emailing a ‘personal note’ to all members in which he said he would never work with anyone who ‘sneered’ at activists,” the Guardian reports.
“Amid anger in the party at the allegations that a senior member of his inner circle had referred to activists as ‘mad swivel-eyed loons’, the prime minister said the party was held together by ‘a deep and lasting friendship.'”
Said one senior figure: “This is worse than John Major… With Cameron it feels like this could be terminal – and will be so before the election.”
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.
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