Sign up for Read In today and get all the political news you need sent right to your inbox!
Leading Off: Our first thoughts of the morning.
-- In an age of Twitter snark and cable news, it is virtually impossible to hold a clearing-the-air news conference that actually clears the air. Hillary Clinton proved that again on Tuesday when she answered reporters' questions for about 20 minutes at the United Nations, her first full press conference in more than two years.
-- It's no surprise that the presser did nothing to squelch GOP criticism of her private email server. But it didn't do anything to calm growing Democratic nerves about a candidate who's been off the trail for seven years. The calls for a competitive primary remain; former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley got standing ovations in South Carolina this week.
-- But this isn't 2008, by a long shot. Clinton's hold on the Democratic nomination is stronger than any in modern history. The fight for the soul of the Democratic Party is much more likely to play out in O'Malley's home state, where progressives are already lining up behind Rep. Donna Edwards (D) over Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D), who has Harry Reid's support. The evolution of the Democratic Party has been quieter than the foment in the GOP, but it's happening nonetheless. And Maryland, a mix of old-line blue collar Democrats and the rising American electorate, is an early battlefield.
A1: Today's top stories.
-- Anti-human trafficking legislation authored by Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) stalled Tuesday on the Senate floor after Democrats accused Republicans of sneaking anti-abortion language into the bill. A provision in the bill would apply the Hyde Amendment, which bans taxpayer funding of abortions, to a new Domestic Trafficking Victims' Fund. Democrats said they hadn't been informed of that provision, while Republicans said Judiciary Committee Democrats were well aware of it. Debate continues today, and Democrats said an impasse could be broken if Majority Leader Mitch McConnell allowed a vote on an amendment to strip the provision, a vote that would likely fail. (Washington Post)
-- Seven Marines and four Army soldiers are missing after an Army UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter crashed in the Florida Panhandle, while on a training mission from Eglin Air Force Base. Debris from the crash was found at about 2 a.m. on a beach between Pensacola and Destin, Fla. An Eglin spokesman said there had been "weather issues" overnight. (Washington Post)
-- Ferguson, Mo., city manager John Shaw will leave his position after the Justice Department's report singled him out for criticism. Officials said Shaw's departure is a "mutual separation agreement," though the city council voted unanimously to give him the boot, effective immediately. The report found city officials urge police and court staff to deliver revenue, which they earn from ticketing Ferguson's largely African American community. Shaw denied he had ordered anyone to target African Americans. (Washington Post)
-- The Senate will vote on Loretta Lynch's nomination to become the next attorney general next week, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Tuesday. Four Republicans have said publicly they support her nomination, which means, assuming she carries all 46 members of the Democratic caucus, that Vice President Joe Biden could break a 50-50 tie if need be. (Washington Post)
-- A sensitive leak investigation into former Joint Chiefs vice chairman Gen. James "Hoss" Cartwright is in limbo amid concerns that a trial could confirm a joint U.S.-Israeli covert operation targeting Iran. Cartwright is accused of leaking details about the operation to The New York Times, and Israel is likely to object to any information about the operation being confirmed in open court. Cartwright's attorney, former White House counsel Greg Craig, said he hasn't heard from prosecutors in more than a year. (Washington Post)
-- Front Pages: Hillary Clinton, you're famous! WaPo: "Clinton aims to quiet uproar." LA Times: "Clinton tries to quell email scandal." NYT left column: "Clinton Says She Followed Rules on Email." WSJ at the fold: "Clinton Regrets Email Choice." USA Today: "'Convenience' is Clinton's defense." Susan Page front-page analysis: "Hillary out of practice in the media's glare."
White House 2016: The long, strange road to Pennsylvania Ave.
-- Clinton: Clinton said in her press availability that she erred in using only private email during her time at the State Department, though she said there were never any security breaches and that she never emailed classified material. But she said she had deleted thousands of personal emails from the server before turning over the remainder to the State Department. Clinton's spokesman emailed out a nine-page FAQ document after her availability maintaining she had followed State Department rules. (Washington Post)
-- More Clinton: Hillary Clinton's staff debated how to deal with questions raised by the emails, with campaign manager-in-waiting Robby Mook pushing to respond most aggressively. Clinton herself chose the press conference over several one-on-one interviews with trusted network correspondents. (Politico) Bill Clinton has sent a total of two emails in his life -- one to former Sen. John Glenn (D-Ohio), congratulating him on his 1998 return to space and one to troops serving in the Adriatic Sea. (Wall Street Journal)
-- Bush/Walker: Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) held a fundraiser for Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) when Walker first ran for governor in 2010. Now, Bush allies are pushing back on what they see as Walker's not-so-subtle digs at their candidate. Prominent Florida Republicans Al Cardenas and Ana Navarro have labeled Walker a flip-flopper on issues like immigration and ethanol subsidies. Walker backers have criticized Bush for attending high-dollar fundraisers instead of meet-and-greets. (Washington Post)
-- If you had Walker vs. Bush in the rivalry pool, collect your prize.
National Roundup: What's happening outside the Beltway.
-- Utah: The state Senate on Tuesday passed a measure to reinstate the firing squad as a method for executions after less than a minute of debate. The state House has already passed the firing squad bill, and Gov. Gary Herbert (R) has hinted he'll sign it. (Salt Lake Tribune) Oklahoma is the only other state that allows executions by firing squad. Utah was the last state to execute someone by firing squad, convicted killer Ronnie Lee Gardner in 2010. (Washington Post)
-- Florida: Florida Senate is to Republicans as Maryland Senate is to Democrats? Rep. Ron DeSantis (R) told Hugh Hewitt on Monday he's thinking about running for Sen. Marco Rubio's (R) seat if Rubio runs for president. He'd likely face a handful of rivals in the GOP primary, including state CFO Jeff Atwater (R), who's already met with the NRSC. (The Hill) DeSantis won backing from the Club for Growth, Erick Erickson and other conservatives when he won his House seat in 2012.
-- Ohio: Former Gov. Ted Strickland (D) has hired Rebecca Pearcey to run his race against Sen. Rob Portman (R). Pearcey ran Strickland's field operation during his successful 2006 bid, and she was President Obama's Ohio political director in 2008. (Cleveland Plain Dealer) The DSCC said Tuesday it would endorse Strickland, putting new pressure on Cincinnati councilman P.G. Sittenfeld (D) to get out of the race. (Washington Post)
-- California: Controller Betty Yee (D) said Tuesday state tax revenue was $1 billion, or about 18 percent, higher than forecast in February, on the strength of higher-than-expected personal income tax revenue. General fund revenue for the entire fiscal year is 1.4 percent higher than Gov. Jerry Brown (D) projected in January. (Sacramento Bee)
-- Michigan: State House Republicans are reviving legislation that would award Michigan's 16 electoral votes on a proportional basis, rather than on an at-large basis. A similar bill died last year over Democratic objections. The legislation has been sent to the House elections committee. (Michigan Radio) Mitt Romney won nine of the state's 14 districts in 2012.
-- Maryland: Former Prince George's County State's Attorney Glenn Ivey (D) will announce today he's running for Rep. Donna Edwards' (D) open seat, after Edwards said she would run for Senate. Ivey, a former aide to Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) and Sens. Paul Sarbanes (D-Md.) and Tom Daschle (D-S.D.), briefly challenged Edwards in 2012 before dropping out of the race. (Washington Post)
DC Digest: What's on tap today in DC.
-- President Obama visits finalists in the 2015 Intel Science Talent Search in the Grand Foyer this afternoon. That's the only thing on his schedule as he prepares to head to Los Angeles tomorrow.
-- On Friday, he'll visit the VA hospital in Phoenix where so many veterans were made to wait months for treatment. Obama and VA Secretary Bob McDonald will meet with administrators at the facility, which cares for about 80,000 veterans in central Arizona. (Arizona Republic)
-- Vice President Biden delivers remarks at a Hamilton Project forum on expanding employment opportunities this afternoon at the Brookings Institution.
-- The House is still out.
-- The Senate convenes at 9:30 this morning to resume debate over Cornyn's anti-trafficking bill. They'll consider two amendments from Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) to strengthen protections for child victims of trafficking.
-- Some of the 47 Senate Republicans who signed an open letter to Iran's leadership aimed at sinking nuclear negotiations are starting to rethink their strategy. Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), the organizer of the letter, brought it up at the Senate GOP's weekly luncheon last week. (Daily Beast) He called Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who ultimately didn't sign on, while she was preparing for the start of the Iditarod. (Politico) And Cotton approached other senators on the floor to get their support.
-- Ford's Theater will display the Deringer used by John Wilkes Booth and a letter written by the doctor who attended to Abraham Lincoln after he was shot as part of an exhibit marking the 150th anniversary of the assassination. The exhibit opens March 23. (Washington Post)
B1: Business, politics and the business of politics
-- The growing popularity of short-term rental websites like Airbnb is taking housing and apartment units off the rental market in major cities. A new study from the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, a labor-backed group, estimated those websites will take 7,000 units off the market in L.A. alone. The study suggests they could account for about 4 percent of the total real estate market in popular neighborhoods like Venice and Hollywood. Airbnb itself spent $100,000 lobbying city hall last year and released their own study, which showed guests spent $200 million while in town. (Los Angeles Times)
-- The big news out of Apple this week isn't the watch, it's a tiny little slot on the newly redesigned MacBook. The new design incorporates a smaller USB Type C drive, which enables power, data and video signal transfers at faster rates than earlier versions. The single port on the new MacBook could be a problem for people who need to connect to a monitor while charging their computer, but expect to see more USB-C ports: They're small enough to fit most mobile devices. (Washington Post)
-- Stock futures are higher this morning after a pretty crummy day on Tuesday, when the Dow dropped 332 points. The Nasdaq is off 3 percent since it hit the 5,000 mark last week. Asian markets are mixed today, while European markets are trading higher. (CNN)
C1: Take time to digest the long reads
-- CIA researchers have worked for almost a decade to hack into security systems that protect Apple iPhones and tablets, according to documents from the Edward Snowden trove. Those researchers presented their research at a secret CIA conference called the Trusted Computing Base Jamboree, held at a Lockheed Martin facility in northern Virginia. It's not clear how successful their efforts were. (The Intercept)
-- Not to toot our own horn, but: "Human history is under assault in Iraq, and some of the irreparable damage is our fault. More than a decade of war in Iraq has taken an incredible toll on our cultural heritage, both in terms of priceless works of art and sites that hold evidence of some of the earliest civilizations in human history. ... Wealthy collectors in Europe, Asia and even the United States used the Iraq war to build their own private museums — and their money helped fund both the insurgency that claimed the lives of so many American soldiers then and the Islamic State now." (Washington Post) Finally, that archaeology degree pays off.
C4: Fun things to read when you're bored at work
-- Republicans are more than twice as likely as Democrats to live in a household with a gun, a long-term partisan divide that's actually widening. While the number of American households with a gun is declining overall -- from north of 50 percent in 1980 to less than 40 percent today -- the number of gun sales are on the rise. The FBI reported conducting more than 20 million background checks in 2014, double the number they conducted as recently as 2006. (Washington Post)
Attn Matt Drudge: What outrages conservatives today
-- The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said Tuesday it will drop its plan to ban armor-piercing bullets commonly used in AR-15 assault rifles after it received more than 80,000 comments. ATF said in a statement that the "vast majority" of the comments were critical of the proposed ban. The NRA, which launched a campaign to mobilize members, claimed credit for the win. (The Hill)
-- President Obama's Christmas vacation to Hawaii cost taxpayers more than $3.6 million in transportation expenses alone. Other documents obtained by Judicial Watch show a July fundraising trip to the West Coast cost taxpayers $2.4 million. (Judicial Watch)
Attn HuffPo: What outrages liberals today
-- New research from the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory projects the rate of climate change will rise dramatically by the 2020s. The scientists project human-caused warming will create rates of change "unprecedented for at least the past 1,000 years," and that Earth's temperature will rise by 1 degree Celsius over the next four decades. (ThinkProgress) Remember, government employees in Florida can't call it human-caused climate change. They call it that human-caused thing that's going to swallow Miami.
Reid Wilson covers state politics and policy for the Washington Post's GovBeat blog. He's a former editor in chief of The Hotline, the premier tip sheet on campaigns and elections, and he's a complete political junkie.
0 comments:
Post a Comment