POLITICO Playbook PM: Schumer and McConnell scuffle over election reform and WaPo makes historic hire – POLITICO – Politico

It isnt often that the Senate Rules Committee kicks up the drama. But today, sparks are flying as the panel debates S1, the Democrats signature voting-reform package. | Brendan Smialowski/Pool via AP

SOME BIG MEDIA NEWS THIS MORNING

WAPO PARLOR GAME COMES TO AN END Sally Buzbee of the Associated Press named executive editor of The Washington Post, the first woman to lead the newsroom, WaPo: [SALLY] BUZBEE, currently APs executive editor and senior vice president, will take over leadership of The Posts nearly 1,000-person newsroom next month, said publisher FRED RYAN, who made the announcement to the newspapers staff on Tuesday.

Buzbee, 55, has headed APs news operations since 2017, and has been with the organization since she began her career as a journalist in 1988. Buzbees experience overseeing international newsgathering made her an attractive candidate as The Post expands its operations abroad, said Ryan. The newspaper has announced plans to open news hubs in London and Seoul this year that will enable its newsroom to report stories around-the-clock. It will also open new bureaus in Sydney and Bogot, expanding its total to 26 outside the U.S.

AS WE AT POLITICO LIKE TO SAY: WOMEN RULE WaPos Paul Farhi noted on Twitter that Buzbee joins an ever-growing number of women leading newsrooms at places like CBS News, ABC News, NPR, MSNBC, Reuters, Financial Times, Guardian, the Economist, POLITICO, HuffPost, BBC, PBS and many more. The fact that this is not a big deal is kind of a big deal.

MEANWHILE, OVER ON THE HILL

SCHUMER-MCCONNELL GO AT IT OVER VOTING REFORM It isnt often that the Senate Rules Committee kicks up the drama. But today, sparks are flying as the panel debates S1, the Democrats signature voting-reform package. Consider this a preview of whats to come when the bill moves to the chamber floor, where it will likely die due not only to GOP opposition but because Sen. JOE MANCHIN (D-W.Va.) has also expressed reservations.

The debate in committee is a microcosm of the fight raging nationwide over GOP-led changes to election laws, as Marianne LeVine and Zach Montellaro report. In dueling remarks, [Senate Majority Leader] CHUCK SCHUMER and [Senate Republican Leader] MITCH MCCONNELL each accused the others party of trying to weaponize voting laws to expand its political power. Democrats say they must act soon to rein in laws pushed by GOP-controlled state legislatures they warn are designed to disenfranchise voters.

Schumer used his testimony to raise the stakes of a battle against state-level voting laws that he said carry the stench of oppression. He implored the GOP: Are you going to stamp it out or are you going to allow it to be spread? I plead with my Republicans, think twice. I plead with Leader McConnell: think twice.

McConnell retorted that Democrats wrote their elections bill in response to the results of the 2016 election and that their supposed rationales [for it] have changed constantly. Our democracy is not in crisis, and were not going to let one party take over our democracy under the false pretense of saving it, the Senate GOP leader said. The Democratic Party wants to rewrite the ground rules of American politics for partisan benefit. Read the full story

BIDEN MAKING THE ROUNDS WITH CENTRISTS President JOE BIDEN is meeting with Sen. KYRSTEN SINEMA (D-Ariz.) at the White House today to discuss the American Jobs Act and the ongoing negotiations in Congress about investing in our infrastructure, per WaPos Matt Viser, todays White House pooler.

The meeting comes just a day after Biden huddled with Manchin on the same topic a sign that Biden is employing a charm offensive to woo the two moderates who have expressed reluctance about using reconciliation to pass infrastructure spending. Perhaps the president is trying to butter them up before making the pivot to a Democrats-only strategy? Remember: Due to the Senates 50-50 split, the Dems cant do much of anything without both Sinema and Manchin on board.

ON-THE-GO JOE Biden will travel to Dearborn, Mich., to visit Ford Motor Companys Rouge Electric Vehicle Center home of the all-electric F-150 on Tuesday, May 18, the White House announced today.

FYI: The Senate voted to confirm ANDREA PALM to be deputy HHS secretary by a 61-37 vote.

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THE JUICE Trump family members got inappropriately close to Secret Service agents, book claims, The Guardian: Zero Fail: The Rise and Fall of the Secret Service, by the Washington Post reporter CAROL LEONNIG, is published next week. The Guardian obtained a copy. [S]he writes that Secret Service agents reported that VANESSA TRUMP, the wife of the presidents oldest son, DONALD TRUMP JR., started dating one of the agents who had been assigned to her family.

Leonnig also writes that TIFFANY TRUMP, DONALD TRUMPs daughter with his second wife, MARLA MAPLES, broke up with a boyfriend and began spending an unusual amount of time alone with a Secret Service agent on her detail. Both Tiffany Trump and the agent said nothing untoward was happening, Leonnig writes, and pointed out the nature of the agents job meant spending time alone with his charge. The agent was subsequently reassigned.

Also, this little nugget: The president did repeatedly seek to remove Secret Service staff he deemed to be overweight or too short for the job. I want these fat guys off my detail, Trump is reported to have said, possibly confusing office-based personnel with active agents. How are they going to protect me and my family if they cant run down the street?

GAETZ-GATE LATEST Federal investigators press for cooperation from two key witnesses in Gaetz probe, CNN: Federal investigators scrutinizing Rep. MATT GAETZ are seeking the cooperation of a former Capitol Hill intern who was once a girlfriend of the Florida Republican, sources familiar with the matter tell CNN.

Investigators could also soon gain the formal cooperation of a second key witness, former Florida county tax collector JOEL GREENBERG, who is approaching a deadline this week to strike a plea agreement with the government on more than two dozen charges he's facing. The pursuit of the cooperation comes as investigators are nearly finished collecting evidence, one source said.

CALL HIM MR. DIPLOMATIC Rahm Emanuel to be appointed U.S. ambassador to Japan, Financial Times: Joe Biden has chosen RAHM EMANUEL, a former congressman and Chicago mayor, to be U.S. ambassador to Japan, according to eight people familiar with personnel discussions inside the White House. The U.S. president will name Emanuel, who was chief of staff to Barack Obama and has close ties to Biden, this month in a big package of ambassadorship nominations, several of the people said.

PIPELINE HACK LATEST EPA moves to boost gasoline availability in mid-Atlantic states after Colonial cyberattack, by Alex Guilln: EPA on Tuesday moved to make more gasoline available for sale in three mid-Atlantic states and the District of Columbia to ease potential fuel shortages related to the Colonial fuel pipeline shutdown as the Biden administration seeks to mitigate the impact of the cyberattack. The waiver covers Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia and D.C. through May 18.

AWFUL NEW NUMBERS FOR JENNER Opposition to Newsom recall grows as Caitlyn Jenner, GOP generate little support, poll finds, LA Times: The surveys results were especially bleak for retired Olympic gold medalist [CAITLYN] JENNER, as just 6% of Californians who took part in the survey said they would vote to have her replace [Gov. GAVIN] NEWSOM

Slightly over half of California registered voters, 52%, approve of the job Newsom has been doing as governor. [J]ust 36% of registered voters in the state said they would vote to recall Newsom In comparison, 49% of voters oppose removing the governor from office.

IMMIGRATION FILES Migrant children held in mass shelters with little oversight, AP: The Biden administration is holding tens of thousands of asylum-seeking children in an opaque network of some 200 facilities that The Associated Press has learned spans two dozen states and includes five shelters with more than 1,000 children packed inside.

Confidential data obtained by the AP shows the number of migrant children in government custody more than doubled in the past two months, and this week the federal government was housing around 21,000 kids, from toddlers to teens. A facility at Fort Bliss, a U.S. Army post in El Paso, Texas, had more than 4,500 children as of Monday.

EXPANDING AID Biden ends Trump ban on pandemic aid for undocumented college students, by Michael Stratford: The Biden administration is reversing a Trump-era policy that barred undocumented college students and others from receiving federal relief grants meant to help pay for expenses like food, housing, and child care during the coronavirus pandemic.

The policy change was unveiled on Tuesday as the Education Department announced it would begin distributing $36 billion in federal relief funding for higher education, part of the $1.9 trillion Covid relief package that President Joe Biden signed in March. Colleges and universities will each receive an allocation of the funding under a formula spelled out in that law, based in part on the share of Pell grant recipients enrolled at each school.

NEED A LIFT? Uber, Lyft to Provide Free Rides to Covid-19 Vaccine Sites Until July 4, WSJ: The White House will announce a new partnership with ride-sharing companies Uber Technologies Inc. and Lyft Inc. to make all rides to and from vaccination sites free until July 4, according to administration officials.

White House Covid-19 coordinator JEFF ZIENTS will detail the new steps in a Tuesday call with governors as part of the Biden administrations effort to meet a target of 70% of the U.S. adult population getting at least one vaccine dose by July 4. The administration will provide data on about 80,000 vaccination sites to Lyft and Uber as part of the transportation partnership, a senior administration official said.

THE VACCINE DISTRIBUTION CHALLENGE To Vaccinate Younger Teens, States and Cities Look to Schools, Camps, Even Beaches, NYT: The F.D.A.s decision, announced Monday afternoon, presents a bright new opportunity in the push for broad immunity against the coronavirus in the United States, but the challenges are more daunting than for immunizing older, more independent teenagers.

A recent survey by the Kaiser Family Foundations Vaccine Monitor found that many parents even those who eagerly got their own Covid shots are reluctant to vaccinate pubescent children. Yet doing so will be critical for further reducing transmission of the virus, smoothly reopening middle and high schools and regaining some sense of national normalcy.

CASHING IN Pfizer head Albert Bourla writing book about COVID vaccine, AP

FOR THOSE KEEPING TRACK White House says Biden will release updated health information this year, WaPo: The nations oldest president in history has yet to get a checkup or release an update to the three-page medical summary that was last provided to the public some 17 months ago. The White House has said more up-to-date information will be released soon and, when pressed, said he would do so by the end of the year.

ABOUT THAT MCCARTHY-LUNTZ RENTAL AGREEMENT: Rental to Rep. Kevin McCarthy violated condo bylaws: Last week, The Fact Checker revealed that the room that McCarthy rented from prominent pollster FRANK LUNTZ for at least two months was in a 7,000-square-foot space a combination of four penthouse apartments. It turns out that the bylaws of the condo building, Clara Barton at Penn Quarter, specifically prohibit condo owners from renting anything less than the entire space and for not less than six months. The bylaws also specify that all leases shall be in writing and say that all leases must be promptly forwarded to the buildings board of directors.

BIDEN TAKES A BIG RENEWABLES STEP Final Approval Expected for Nations First Major Offshore Wind Farm, NYT: The Biden administration on Tuesday will announce its final approval of the nations first commercial-scale offshore wind farm, a major step toward President Bidens goal of expanding renewable energy production across the United States, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The Vineyard Wind project calls for up to 84 turbines to be installed in the Atlantic Ocean about 12 nautical miles off the coast of Marthas Vineyard, Mass. Together, they could generate about 800 megawatts of electricity, enough to power about 400,000 homes.

MUCK READ Biden Wants To Take On The Fossil-Fuel Industry. Dozens Of His Officials Are Invested In It, Forbes: On the campaign trail, Joe Biden tried to distance himself from oil, gas and coal companies, pledging not to accept money from fossil-fuel firms. Dozens of those now serving in his administration, however, were less rigid about separating themselves from energy giants.

In fact, at least 74 Biden administration officials and nominees disclosed interests in the fossil-fuel sector, according to a review of federal disclosures by Forbes and the Brown Institute for Media Innovation.

THE NUCLEAR OPTION Decision on Minuteman to shape U.S. nuclear policy for decades, AP: For 50 years the Minuteman missile has been armed and ready, day and night, for nuclear war on a moments notice. It has never been launched into combat from its underground silo, but this year it became the prime target in a wider political battle over the condition and cost of the nations nuclear arsenal.

Minuteman was not intended to last half a century, so its overdue to be replaced or refurbished. Some see this as a moment to push for scrapping it altogether, abandoning one leg of the traditional nuclear triad weapons that can be launched from land, sea and air. Most in Congress favor keeping the land-based leg by replacing Minuteman with a new missile; President Joe Bidens position is not yet clear.

REPORT CARD State Department Covid review blasts 'void of U.S. international leadership' under Trump and Pompeo, by Betsy Woodruff Swan: Portions of a draft report, obtained by POLITICO, cited former President Donald Trumps decision to withdraw the U.S. from international forums as weakening U.S. global leadership.

The findings are detailed in a draft of the State Departments wide-ranging Covid-19 Interim Review, a report laying out what the Department learned in the first year of the global pandemic. POLITICO reviewed excerpts of a draft of the report, which has not been finalized. The draft notes deep frustrations that career State Department officials harbored regarding the past administrations pandemic response.

CLICKER Americans Up and Moved During the Pandemic. Heres Where They Went, WSJ: Washington lost residents the net loss from the nations capital nearly doubled from the previous year. A big portion went to nearby suburbs.

THE BRAVE NEW WORLD Army of fake fans boosts Chinas messaging on Twitter, AP: A seven-month investigation by the Associated Press and the Oxford Internet Institute found that Chinas rise on Twitter has been powered by an army of fake accounts that have retweeted Chinese diplomats and state media tens of thousands of times, covertly amplifying propaganda that can reach hundreds of millions of people often without disclosing the fact that the content is government-sponsored.

MEDIAWATCH Katherine Foley is now an FDA reporter at POLITICO. She previously was a health and science reporter at Quartz. David Lim will now author POLITICOs Prescription Pulse with Lauren Gardner. He currently is an FDA reporter.

SPOTTED: Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.) and his wife, Susan, in the Delta Sky Club in Detroit on Tuesday before the days first flight to Washington. Pic

TRUMP ALUMNI Christopher Gray is now VP in the office of strategic engagement at the American Bankers Association. He previously was deputy COS at the Small Business Administration.

TRANSITIONS James Rubin has been appointed diplomatic counsellor to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Developments incoming Secretary General Mathias Cormann. He currently is a partner at Ballard Partners. Elizabeth Stanley is now a principal at Resolution Public Affairs. She previously was COS for Rep. Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.).

Dan Gottlieb is now senior comms adviser for the Democratic Party of Georgia. He previously was comms director for Sima Ladjevardian, the Democratic nominee for Congress in Texas 2nd District. Michael Allen, Jonathan Burks, Kristen Silverberg, Eric Lorber and Roger Zakheim have started the Forum for American Leadership, focusing on free trade, defense, the U.S. intel budget and advocating for an assertive foreign policy around the world. Gabriel Noronha, who worked on Iran policy at the State Department in the Trump administration, is the executive director.

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POLITICO Playbook PM: Schumer and McConnell scuffle over election reform and WaPo makes historic hire - POLITICO - Politico