| | |  | BY ADAM WREN | | 
Timothy Schaefer inspects firearms at the Israel Weapon Industries booth to make sure they are not operational before today’s opening of the NRA Annual Meetings & Exhibits. | Scott Olson/Getty Images | COME AND TAKE IT — Amid an advertised “14 acres of guns & gear” on display in Indianapolis, a phalanx of announced and unannounced 2024 GOP candidates paraded in front of rank-and-file members of the National Rifle Association’s leadership forum. Pummeled by lawsuits and scandal in recent years, the NRA show went on this week in the shadow of a pair of mass shootings. In 2019, this event took place in the belly of the cavernous Lucas Oil Stadium. Now it’s reduced to a ballroom at the Indiana Convention Center and tiered ticket prices were dropped for free admission to fill out the room. But the annual cattle call—which drew the likes of former President Donald Trump, Vice President Mike Pence, South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, among others—stood out for its red-meat policy pitches on guns. (Former ambassador Nikki Haley, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and U.S. Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina all appeared by pre-recorded video messages.) Even after recent mass shootings in Louisville and Nashville, none of the candidates staked out middle ground — thus shaping the contours of a familiar gun control debate ahead of 2024. Prior to the most recent shootings in Louisville and Nashville, a Gallup poll showed 63% of Americans are dissatisfied with gun laws. You wouldn’t know it from listening to the speeches or the lusty applause they received inside the hall here this afternoon. The two parties seemed farther apart than ever on guns. Pence — who just four years ago came to Indianapolis and declared Indiana’s first-in-the-nation red flag law a possible national model to prevent mass shootings — made no mention of them from the stage. Instead, he called for expedited executions of perpetrators. Businessman and author Vivek Ramaswamy, who boasted about owning an AR-15 and received perhaps the warmest welcome of the crowd behind only Trump, called for the abolition of the FBI and ATF. Noem even went so far as to sign an executive order on stage, flanked by NRA CEO and Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, putting an end to some banks’ recent efforts to stop lending to gun retailers and manufacturers. And Trump, meanwhile, proposed reimbursing any teacher for the full cost of a concealed-carry firearm and training from highly qualified experts. Elect Trump, the former president told the red hat-flecked crowd to close out the confab, “and no one will lay a finger on your firearms.” “This is not a gun problem, this is a mental health problem, this is a social problem, this is a cultural problem, and this a spiritual problem,” Trump concluded, all but ending any prospect of gun control legislation among the GOP field ahead of 2024. Welcome to POLITICO Nightly. Reach out with news, tips and ideas at nightly@politico.com . Or contact tonight’s author at awren@politico.com on Twitter at @adamwren .
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| | STEP INSIDE THE WEST WING : What's really happening in West Wing offices? Find out who's up, who's down, and who really has the president’s ear in our West Wing Playbook newsletter, the insider's guide to the Biden White House and Cabinet. For buzzy nuggets and details that you won't find anywhere else, subscribe today . | | | | | | | — Alleged Pentagon leaker hit with 2 federal charges: Jack Douglas Teixeira, a member of the Air National Guard suspected of leaking classified Pentagon documents, was c harged in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts today with two federal offenses . The two charges are for “unauthorized retention and transmission of national defense information” and “unauthorized removal and retention of classified documents or material.” — Alito keeps access to abortion pill unchanged for next five days while Supreme Court reviews emergency appeals: Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito temporarily froze a lower court’s ruling that would restrict access to a common abortion pill, preserving the status quo for the next five days but leaving the drug’s future availability uncertain. The interim orders issued this afternoon do not signal how Alito or the full court is likely to rule on the substance of the case. They merely give the justices more time to consider a pair of emergency appeals from the Biden administration and a drug company that manufactures the medication.
| | MORALITY PLAY — The morning after signing one of the nation’s most stringent abortion bills into law, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida pitched himself to thousands of evangelical college students as a defender of truth, common sense and morality in the public square. The New York Times reports that DeSantis spoke to about 10,000 students at Liberty University’s twice-weekly convocation service, which the school bills as “the world’s largest gathering of Christian students.” The visit was part of DeSantis’s national tour of centers of conservative influence as he builds momentum for his widely anticipated entry into the 2024 presidential campaign. More than that, it was a crucial opportunity to gauge, and perhaps advance, his relationship status with evangelical Christians — a voting bloc that helped vault Donald J. Trump to the presidency and appears to be open to new presidential suitors. RED FLAG — Mike Pence is aiming to get to the right of Donald Trump on guns , bringing debates the two once had behind closed doors in the White House into the public eye. The former vice president is slated to come on his Hoosier home turf for the National Rifle Association’s annual leadership summit in Indianapolis Friday, during which he is expected to draw implicit contrasts with his former boss, reports POLITICO’s Adam Wren, Meredith McGraw and Natalie Allison. What Pence won’t talk about, though, is perhaps more instructive: Championing red flag laws that give law enforcement officials the opportunity to intervene when a person is deemed as high-risk, as well as banning bump stocks. Those two issues were ones Trump was open to or acted upon during his administrations. POMPEO OUT — Mike Pompeo, the former secretary of State and CIA director under Donald Trump, announced today that he will not be seeking the Republican nomination for president , POLITICO’s Meridith McGraw reports. Pompeo’s decision came after months of private deliberation with his family and public assertions that his former boss would not play a role in his decision to seek the presidency. Pompeo said that he will “see how the primary plays out” before making a decision on any endorsement, but said that he might not support Trump.
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Protesters demonstrate in the rain through central Paris against the French Government's Pension Law today. | Kiran Ridley/Getty Images | WORKING LATE — France’s Constitutional Council ruled today in favor of the most contentious part of President Emmanuel Macron’s pensions reform bill, which raises the legal age of retirement to 64 from 62 , writes Clea Caulcutt . However, it chose to block several other measures, including a “senior index” which aims at encouraging the employment of senior workers. Some of them were added as “sweeteners” to the bill, to make it more acceptable to trade unions and opposition MPs. The government had come under fire during parliamentary debates about the reforms, because it had invoked a controversial constitutional maneuver — known as article 49.3 — as well as other moves that curtailed debates in parliament. Macron’s decision to bypass parliament and impose his deeply unpopular pensions reform last month led to a prolonged crisis, with a gridlocked parliament and continued protests. While the council greenlit the plan’s flagship measure, it is unlikely to quell the protest movement that has rocked France. Turnout at the almost-weekly demonstrations has been on the wane but some trade unions have warned they will continue protesting the pensions reform.
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| | GO INSIDE THE 2023 MILKEN INSTITUTE GLOBAL CONFERENCE: POLITICO is proud to partner with the Milken Institute to produce a special edition "Global Insider" newsletter featuring exclusive coverage, insider nuggets and unparalleled insights from the 2023 Global Conference, which will convene leaders in health, finance, politics, philanthropy and entertainment from April 30-May 3. This year’s theme, Advancing a Thriving World , will challenge and inspire attendees to lean into building an optimistic coalition capable of tackling the issues and inequities we collectively face. Don’t miss a thing — subscribe today for a front row seat . | | | | | | | | |
7.5 years The amount of time in prison that Patrick McCaughey was sentenced to today for his role in the Jan. 6 riot, among the lengthiest handed down to rioters so far. McCaughey — a 23-year-old from Connecticut — pinned a D.C. Police officer, Daniel Hodges, in a Capitol doorway as he howled in pain. His sentence was less than half of the nearly 16 years that the Justice Department sought. |
| | | PRICE GOUGED — Have you ever been at the airport searching through stores to find some lunch, taking a look at the prices and cursing yourself that you didn’t eat enough to hold you over before arriving? It’s a common sensation that usually leads to begrudgingly shelling out $15 or more for a plastic-wrapped sandwich with one or two slices of turkey on it. It turns out that these prices have to conform to state standards. Hell Gate NYC’s Christopher Robbins tried to get to the bottom of the New York version of this issue — specifically why the Port Authority, which regulates New York’s airports, is so shady about pricing. Follow his journey here .
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On this date in 2010: A renewed column of ash rises from Iceland's Eyjafjallajokul volcano. The plume of volcanic ash snaked its way through southern France, Switzerland, Italy and Germany, shutting down airports and disrupting flights across Europe. | APTN/AP Photo | Did someone forward this email to you? Sign up here . | |
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