Thursday, April 30, 2020

POLITICO NIGHTLY: The open question in 2020 swing states






 
POLITICO Nightly: Coronavirus Special Edition
Presented by
Nightly Number
4 — The pounds of tissue produced last month for each U.S. resident by American tissue mills, according to record-breaking data released today by the American Forest & Paper Association. The industry manufactured nearly 700,000 tons of tissue in March, including toilet paper, napkins and paper towels — more than any other month since 2007, when the group started collecting monthly data.
Nightly Cartoon
Matt Wuerker/POLITICO
SWINGING OPEN AND CLOSED — The battleground states in 2020 have a big decision to make before they choose between Donald Trump and Joe Biden: Are we open or closed? Here's our scorecard for what will surely be the biggest issue of the campaign:
Opening soon:
Florida: Retail stores and restaurants can open Monday with reduced capacity in some parts of the state, according to new guidance from Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis. The new order does not include the populous counties hit hardest by the virus: Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach — home to Mar-a-Lago. Bars, gyms and salons will stay closed.
Georgia: Republican Gov. Brian Kemp will lift a statewide shelter-in-place order on Friday and has barred mayors and other officials from imposing stricter local measures.
North Carolina: A stay-at-home order by Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper expires on May 8. Right now, North Carolinians are barred from gatherings of more than 10 people, though funerals are an exception. Funeral attendance is capped at 50 people with social distancing protocols, and stores are ordered to limit their capacity. Hair salons and gyms are closed.
Closed — for at least two more weeks:
Arizona: Republican Gov. Doug Ducey has extended his state's stay-at-home order through May 15. By May 8, retail stores can open on a voluntary basis with reduced occupancy and strict cleaning protocols.
Michigan: The state extended its stay-at-home order through May 15, but Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer lifted some restrictions on outdoor activity like golfing and boating. Construction resumes May 7.
Minnesota: Democratic Gov. Tim Walz extended a stay-at-home advisory for another two weeks on Thursday.
Wisconsin: Democratic Gov. Tony Evers extended his state's "safer at home" order until May 26. Evers said he is working on a plan to reopen the economy in phases, but cautioned against opening parts of the state at different times.
The undecideds:
New Hampshire: Republican Gov. Chris Sununu says he will announce Friday whether he plans to extend his state's stay-at-home order, which ends May 4.
Pennsylvania: Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf is taking a regional approach to reopening. He plans to announce Friday which counties or regions can begin to reopen at the end of next week.
Adding it up: Biden leads in most of the battleground states right now — including Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — but Trump has the edge in two of the three states that are opening soon: Georgia and North Carolina, according to the Real Clear Politics polling average . Voters in the South, even ones in states with significant caseloads and deaths from coronavirus, seem more aligned with Trump's push to reopen than those in the Midwest and elsewhere.
Watch for whether Trump will try to expand the reopening map next week: His first trip away from the White House in weeks will be to still-closed Arizona. where he plans to visit a Honeywell mask production site on Tuesday. After Trump's rebuke of Kemp for reopening Georgia, we're curious to see how he treats Ducey, a Republican who's opting to remain on the other side of the open-or-shut debate.
Trump is trailing Biden by around 4 percentage points in Arizona, per RCP.
Welcome to POLITICO Nightly: Coronavirus Special Edition. I'm off Friday, but you will be in the good hands of Ryan Heath. Thank you for all the picture submissions and see you on Monday. Reach out with tips: rrayasam@politico.com or on Twitter at @renurayasam.
 
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Palace Intrigue
LAB TEST NEGATIVE — The agency that oversees the entire U.S. intelligence community released an unusual public statement today saying it agrees with the assessment of scientists that Covid-19 was not a manmade or genetically modified virus, Natasha Bertrand reports. The agency does not typically comment on intelligence-gathering matters, let alone publicly confirm a particular finding. The Trump administration has been pressuring analysts, particularly at the CIA, to search for evidence that the virus came from a lab accident in Wuhan and that the World Health Organization helped China cover it up, according to a person briefed on the discussions. The agency confirmed that it is still investigating the origins of the outbreak, including the lab theory.
 
WHAT DOES SUSTAINABILITY MEAN TO YOU? In the midst of a global pandemic, sustainability is quickly evolving. What will a business and policy agenda look like as we work to fight off coronavirus? How can we restart the economy while addressing long-term challenges like climate change and workers' rights? The Long Game newsletter answers these complex questions and more with insightful interviews and analysis of sustainability issues across all industries. Subscribe today.
 
 
From the Health Desk
PATIENTS, PLEASE — Scientists and drug companies searching for a coronavirus treatment have launched so many clinical trials that some now fear they will run out of patients to enroll, trial sites or personnel to carry out the tests, health care reporter Zachary Brennan writes.
 
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First In Nightly
test
TRAIL FEVER — It's been two months since Trump had a campaign rally. The last time Biden appeared in public was March 12. That's 50 days ago and counting. This is how long it's been since reporters got on planes to trek around the country to follow either of the likely major presidential contenders to anything remotely resembling the kind of campaign stop that has been a staple of political life for decades.
"There is no more campaign trail," a story in The New York Times confidently pronounced.
Except, yes, there is. POLITICO Magazine's Michael Kruse spent seven days consuming close to every bit of digital content offered by both major-party presidential campaigns. Both Biden and Trump, Trump more than Biden by the numbers, are hitting tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, even millions of voters with streams of produced, coordinated campaign events — delivered totally online, he writes. Biden is hosting a readily available podcast and having split-screen conversations with big-name current and former elected leaders and attempting to approximate the one-on-one interactions that he craves. And the Trump machine — quite apart from Trump's briefings or news conferences, which the president increasingly has treated as de facto campaign set pieces — is pumping out a relentless schedule of spin-off shows of sorts, every night at 8, starring characters familiar by now to Trump fans and detractors alike (Donald Trump Jr., Corey Lewandowski, Diamond and Silk ...). For anyone willing to tune in and follow along, it's personal, revealing and sometimes kind of bonkers.
However this shakes out, it's difficult not to wonder how much of these all-digital efforts will survive the pandemic. There's plenty of reason to think that what we're seeing here is more than just Biden vs. Trump online but also an early window into the future of politics.
From The Transportation Desk
LITTLE AIRPORTS, BIG PACKAGES — Congress and the Federal Aviation Administration wrote the federal stimulus legislation to give an edge to small airports, according to House aides and airport analysts — but in the process, they created massive disparities in funding from one airport to another, transportation reporter Sam Mintz writes. The story behind the $10 billion in airport funding effort is simple: Airports with little or no debt and a decent amount of cash on hand were entitled to receive a relatively large share of the money. That benefited small airports, because they don't have the huge amounts of debt associated with capital projects at larger airports.
Graphic of CARES Act Funding for airports
Taylor Miller Thomas & Kamran Rahman
Mask up — Delta Air Lines, American Airlines and United Airlines today mandated that passengers must wear face masks on board planes.
Around the Nation
SURFIN' SAFARI — Some local officials are opening parks, golf courses and other outdoor areas, but many are keeping bars shut. Beaches, as evidenced by much-tweeted pictures of Florida's spring break revelers, fall somewhere in between. With warm weather approaching, states and cities are weighing how to keep beachgoers from becoming virus spreaders.
There's a national jumble of shoreline restrictions:
In Texas, Gulf Coast beaches are set to reopen Friday.
California's Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom hinted that he would shut down all of the state's beaches, but said today that he was just keeping Orange County's beaches closed, setting up a fight with local officials.
Massachusetts has closed parking lots at state-owned beaches.
In New Hampshire, beaches are for "transitory use only," meaning you can run on them, but you can't sit down.
In New Jersey, local officials are pressuring Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy to open beaches by Memorial Day.
In South Carolina, some beaches are opening only to residents, while others are opening to everyone.
In Florida, a task force appointed by DeSantis has recommended reopening beaches to groups of 10 or fewer people. There's been no statewide announcement, but local officials are opening beaches with restrictions such as banning gatherings of 10, limiting parking to two hours and closing restrooms.
Even Illinois has beaches. In Chicago, which borders Lake Michigan, Mayor Lori Lightfoot closed the beaches and Lakefront Trail after crowds were seen flouting the social distancing rules. (h/t our colleagues around the country, Stephanie Murray, John Appezzato, Shia Kapos, Bruce Ritchie)
UNITED AT HOME — Americans, both Democrats and Republicans, overwhelmingly support coronavirus restrictions, according to results from a new survey released today from a group led by Northeastern University. A majority of residents in all states, except for Idaho, supported waiting a month or more to lift restrictions.
That broad consensus comes even as people get their information from different sources and have varying levels of trust in government. About 81 percent of people surveyed trusted their state government, and 82 percent trusted their city government, compared with 51 percent who trusted Trump. Another finding: More people (40 percent) are tuning into Trump's briefings than CNN (37 percent), Fox News (37 percent) and MSNBC (19 percent).
 
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Parting Words
LIFE VS. LIBERTY — As politicians try to balance public health with the need to reopen the economy, founding editor John Harris' latest Altitude column shows that they're just grappling with a more obvious version of the conundrum they always face: "Combating climate change requires balancing one compelling value, the freedom of individual people and companies to pursue their interests, against the value of protecting the long-term health of the planet. Humane use of artificial intelligence pits attractive goals (public safety, market demand) against other imperatives (privacy, the economic security of workers). The Pandemic Generation has seen its future."
 
A message from PhRMA:
In these unprecedented times, America's biopharmaceutical companies are coming together to achieve one shared goal: beating COVID-19. The investments we've made have prepared us to act swiftly:
· Rapidly screening our vast global libraries to identify potential treatments and have 284 clinical trials underway
· Dedicating our top scientists and using our investments in new technologies to speed the development of safe and effective vaccines
· Sharing learnings from clinical trials in real time with governments and other companies to advance the development of additional therapies
· Expanding our unique manufacturing capabilities and sharing available capacity to ramp up production once a successful medicine or vaccine is developed
Explore our efforts.
 
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RSN: Norman Solomon | Joe Biden Needs an Intervention: An Open Letter to DNC Chair Tom Perez






Reader Supported News
30 April 20


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30 April 20

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RSN: Norman Solomon | Joe Biden Needs an Intervention: An Open Letter to DNC Chair Tom Perez
Vice President Joe Biden and DNC chair Tom Perez. (photo: Getty)
Norman Solomon, Reader Supported News
Solomon writes: "Joe Biden is not helping to assemble a broad tactical alliance. Instead, he's ignoring the wisdom that Jesse Jackson offered at the Democratic National Convention in 1988: 'It takes two wings to fly.' Right now, Biden is idling in the cockpit of a political aircraft with one wing."


  hatever our political differences, vast numbers of Democrats and others agree that it’s imperative to defeat Donald Trump. But with scarcely five months to go before the voting starts, Joe Biden is not helping to assemble a broad tactical alliance. Instead, he’s ignoring the wisdom that Jesse Jackson offered at the Democratic National Convention in 1988: “It takes two wings to fly.”

Right now, Biden is idling in the cockpit of a political aircraft with one wing.
As chair of the Democratic National Committee at a time when the party’s presumptive nominee for president seems likely to crash and burn, you should be openly working to fix the problem rather than merely proclaiming that Biden is a great candidate.
Indications are profuse that Biden is proceeding with a business-as-usual campaign while elevating establishment figures. His rhetorical nods toward Bernie Sanders supporters have been notably superficial, while the nitty-gritty of policy is being placed in corporate hands.
On April 27, The Nation summed up one of the latest ominous signs: “Larry Summers is a dead albatross around Biden’s neck. Why should we believe Biden’s promises of progressive reforms, when he seeks out the advice of this plutocrat-loving economist?”
I have often heard you talk about the “north star” of party principles. Surely that must involve democracy. Yet the cancellation of the New York presidential primary is a flagrant Machiavellian maneuver by that state’s Democratic Party leadership.
“This means that our campaign will receive no delegates from New York, weakening our ability to fight for a progressive platform and progressive rules at the Democratic convention,” the Sanders campaign pointed out in a statement on April 29. “It also means our voters are less likely to turn out, which will hurt progressive New York candidates who are still facing primaries.” Using the pandemic as an excuse for the cancellation was clearly bogus, since the entire New York election on June 23 could be conducted by mail.
The corrosive ill will created by such machinations — heightening progressives’ distrust of the Democratic Party — will weaken support for the Biden general-election campaign across the country. As the Sanders campaign put it, what Democratic Party power brokers did in New York “is an outrage, an assault on democracy.”
But where is your voice to challenge this “assault on democracy”? The corporate cats seem to have your tongue. With silence, you’re an enabler of this travesty. You should firmly declare that New York will be stripped of all its national-convention delegates unless this decision is reversed and the state’s presidential primary is reinstated.
A related situation looms in California and some other states, threatening to deny Sanders his statewide allocation of delegates beyond congressional districts. The threat involves undemocratically depriving Sanders of delegates that he — and millions of people who voted for him — are entitled to. But again, your voice is silent.
You might think it’s all well and good for you to claim a “hands off” approach of deferring to decisions by state party leaders. But in mid-March you didn’t hesitate to flatly proclaim that Illinois, under a Democratic governor, should go ahead with an in-person presidential primary election, thereby aiding Biden’s momentum to widen his delegate lead over Sanders. To the detriment of public health, you publicly and emphatically sought to influence a state decision about a Democratic primary.
But now, your enabling silence is conspicuous as hundreds of duly elected Sanders delegates are in jeopardy nationwide.
As in New York, the bogus pretext in various states is that Sanders is no longer a candidate — even though, when he announced the suspension of his campaign three weeks ago, the senator explicitly stated that “I will stay on the ballot in all remaining states and continue to gather delegates.” And, he added, “we must continue working to assemble as many delegates as possible at the Democratic convention, where we will be able to exert significant influence over the party platform and other functions.”
The committees and delegates of the national convention will make key decisions on crucial platform issues, such as healthcare as a human right, student debt, immigration reform, institutional racism, the climate emergency, economic justice and much more. Also on the line are major choices about whether the party will democratize or slam the door on internal reforms.
In a mass email that the DNC sent out last weekend, you declared with ample self-congratulation: “Today, the DNC looks massively different than it did in the wake of the 2016 election. That’s a good thing. In early 2017, we were rudderless…. [I]t was obvious we had to rebuild our party from the ground up.” You wrote of “rebuilding trust with Democrats across the country” — and asserted “that is exactly what our new leadership did.”
But whatever trust has been rebuilt over the last three years is now being damaged by your refusal, as DNC chair, to speak up for party democracy in the states where it is now under threat.
Biden is a weak candidate in grave danger of losing a decisive number of progressive votes in the fall. Consider the latest polling data that has just appeared under this USA Today headline: “Nearly 1 in 4 Sanders Supporters Not on Board Yet with Voting for Biden.”
That’s what happens when a presidential campaign is all set to fly with one wing.

Norman Solomon is co-founder and national director of RootsAction.org. He was a Bernie Sanders delegate from California to the 2016 Democratic National Convention. Solomon is the author of a dozen books, including “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death.”
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader Supported News.















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