A BUNCH OF INTERESTING CAMPAIGN FINANCE NUGGETS \u2026 <\/b><\/p>\n
1) THIS IS NEW \u2026 THE NATIONAL REPUBLICAN CONGRESSIONAL COMMITTEE<\/b> has spent nearly $400,000 buying 25,500 copies of Rep. DAN CRENSHAW\u2019S<\/b> (R-Texas) book \u201cFortitude\u201d for donors. They used the book to entice Republicans to give money to the NRCC. <\/p>\n
ONE OF THE SOLICITATIONS FROM THE NRCC READS: <\/b>\u201cAs a strong supporter of Conservative values, I thought you\u2019d like to get one, so we\u2019re putting one aside for you for 24 hours. Claim it now to make sure you receive your exclusive signed copy of my book, Fortitude. Not only will you be getting this great book, but you\u2019ll also be supporting efforts to take back President Trump\u2019s Conservative House majority in November. Don\u2019t miss out on your chance to read about the divisive mob politics that is coming to characterize America, described and explained from my perspective.\u201d<\/p>\n
A PARTY OFFICIAL<\/b> said the promotion raised the NRCC $1.5 million. A campaign filing made public Wednesday showed $240,800 of these purchases from Politics and Prose. The party official told us the remainder of the purchases totalling $394,800 will appear on the next campaign finance filing. CRENSHAW\u2019S<\/b> book has been a New York Times bestseller for six weeks. <\/p>\n
2) MIKE BLOOMBERG\u2019S<\/b> presidential campaign spent $982,651.53 with the law firm Venable in April. The Markham Group, which did Bloomberg\u2019s events, got nearly $3.3 million from the Bloomberg campaign.<\/p>\n
3) THE BIGGEST<\/b> donors to JOE BIDEN\u2019S<\/b> super PAC are Anita and Joshua Bekenstine. Joshua is a managing partner at Bain and Company. They gave Unite the Country $500,000.<\/p>\n
4) SENATE LEADERSHIP FUND,<\/b> the Republican super PAC run by allies of Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, got $5 million from Charles Schwab and his wife, Helen. <\/p>\n
5) VIA ZACH MONTELLARO: \u201cSen. Loeffler\u2019s husband cuts $1 million check to pro-Trump super PAC\u201d<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n 6) TIMOTHY MELLON<\/b> — a member of the Mellon family of banking fame — gave $10 million to the Trump super PAC America First Action.<\/p>\n 7) AMERICA FIRST ACTION<\/b> spent $1.3 million on legal fees, per The Washington Post<\/a>.<\/p>\n DEPT. OF TAKING THINGS FOR GRANTED \u2026 BURGESS EVERETT<\/b> and HEATHER CAYGLE: \u201cBiden\u2019s outreach to Dems lags as Trump syncs up with GOP\u201d<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n PAGING MITCH AND MARK MEADOWS! GOP\u2019ERS WANT INFRASTRUCTURE! \u2026 CNN\u2019S MANU RAJU<\/b> and LAUREN FOX: \u201cInternal divisions linger as GOP push grows for new recovery package\u201d<\/a>: <\/b>\u201cSen. Lindsey Graham, a close Trump ally and chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he\u2019s pushing Trump to get behind a plan to pump more money into infrastructure projects — even though that idea has gotten an icy reception from McConnell so far.<\/p>\n \u201c\u2018I want to do infrastructure,\u2019 Graham \u2026 said to CNN.<\/b> \u2018I told Trump, this is the time. We got it teed up. This is the time to go big. \u2026 It really is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to give a facelift to the country.\u2019 <\/p>\n \u201cGraham isn\u2019t alone. Other powerful members of the Senate GOP<\/b> Conference, including two committee chairmen — Sens. Roy Blunt of Missouri and Roger Wicker of Mississippi — want to move on an infrastructure package to pump money into roads, bridges and transportation projects. <\/p>\n \u201c\u2018I think June doesn\u2019t need to come and go without a phase four,\u2019<\/b> said Wicker, chairman of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, referring to a fourth major rescue package after nearly $3 trillion has been approved by Congress this spring alone.\u201d<\/p>\n Good Thursday morning.<\/b><\/p>\n WHERE\u2019S TONY FAUCI? <\/b>On JULIA ROBERTS\u2019<\/b> Instagram page, that\u2019s where! This is part of the One Campaign\u2019s #PasstheMic promotion, which has health care professionals taking over famous people\u2019s pages. FAUCI<\/b> also did a YouTube video with ROBERTS<\/b> where she called him \u201cmaybe the coolest man on the planet right now.\u201d The 7:20 clip<\/i><\/a><\/b><\/p>\n \u2026 AND WHERE\u2019S MICHAEL COHEN? GETTING OUT OF PRISON \u2026 WSJ<\/a>,<\/b> by Sadie Gurman: \u201cPresident Trump\u2019s former lawyer Michael Cohen will be released from a federal prison due to coronavirus concerns and is expected to serve the rest of his three-year sentence from home, a person familiar with the matter said. Mr. Cohen will be leaving the facility in Otisville, N.Y., on furlough Thursday, pending processing to home confinement, the person said.\u201d<\/p>\n CLIP AND SAVE \u2026 LARRY KUDLOW<\/b> in the White House on Wednesday: \u201cThe Congressional Budget Office has just redone its estimates. And after a rough — a predictably rough pandemic contraction in the second quarter, they\u2019re looking for a 21 and a half percent growth rate, sir, in the third quarter. \u2026 Which would actually, if it came true, would be the biggest growth quarter in American history, or since the data were compiled.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2026 AND THE FLIP SIDE: \u201cBehind Bond Market\u2019s Stall, Investors See Hard Times Ahead,\u201d <\/b>by WSJ\u2019s Sam Goldfarb: \u201cYields on U.S. government bonds have stalled near all-time lows, a sign that investors are anticipating a difficult economic recovery and years of aggressive monetary stimulus. For much of the past month and a half, the yield on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note has hovered around two-thirds of a percentage point\u2014a shade above its all-time low of around 0.5% set in March.<\/p>\n \u201cTaken together, the low level of the 10-year yield<\/b> and its stability suggest that bond investors not only hold a dreary economic outlook but also are unusually confident in that perspective, a contrast with the optimism that has carried stocks to their highest levels since early March.\u201d WSJ<\/a><\/p>\n DETROIT NEWS <\/b>on TRUMP\u2019S VISIT TO MICHIGAN TODAY: \u201cIn swing through Michigan, Trump to find records \u2014 unemployment, floods and 5,000 COVID deaths,\u201d<\/a><\/b> by Jordyn Grzelewski and Keith Laing: \u201cPresident Donald Trump is set to arrive Thursday in Michigan, a state beset by the historic challenges of record 22.7% unemployment, a 500-year flood in the middle of the state and the loss of more than 5,000 residents to the COVID-19 pandemic. \u2026 <\/p>\n \u201cThe [visit to Ford Motor Co.\u2019s Rawsonville Components Plant <\/b>in Ypsilanti] is one stop on a presidential tour touting efforts by American manufacturers to produce medical supplies and personal protective equipment during the pandemic. It comes amid a campaign season upended by candidates\u2019 inability to host such traditional events as rallies — and as Trump seeks to shore up support in Michigan, a battleground state considered vitally important to his reelection chances.\u201d<\/p>\n JOHN HARRIS <\/b>column: \u201cOnce again, Democrats are caught in the Trump Trap\u201d:<\/a><\/b> \u201cFormer President Barack Obama since leaving office rarely wades into debates about his successor, but President Donald Trump\u2019s performance during the pandemic compelled him to raise his voice.<\/p>\n \u201cHe was sharp by his standards, though hardly by Trump\u2019s,<\/b> in a rapidly leaked conference call with former employees in which he credited the incumbent with \u2018an absolute chaotic disaster.\u2019 He was a bit more understated in a video commencement address in which he didn\u2019t mention Trump by name but said selfish and short-sighted values are \u2018why things are so screwed up.\u2019 Trump responded with customary overstatement, alleging a murky \u2018Obamagate\u2019 conspiracy and saying his predecessor was \u2018grossly incompetent.\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cAnd so in highlighting what he sees as Trump\u2019s obvious failures, <\/b>Obama also illuminated a less obvious Trump success: The incumbent president has managed to make American politics the first arena of national life to return to something recognizable as normal.<\/p>\n \u201cCampuses are still closed, and may yet be for months to come. <\/b>Most people still don\u2019t feel it\u2019s safe to visit aging relatives. Baseball has yet to have opening day.<\/p>\n \u201cBut political culture has returned to something close<\/b> to its pre-pandemic state. People are filled with resentment and malice toward their fellow citizens. They are arguing over eccentric or ephemeral controversies. They are sanctimoniously and often hypocritically denouncing the sanctimoniousness and hypocrisy of their opponents. Above all, many influential voices across the ideological spectrum are united in the assumption that the most important subject—constant and all-consuming — to be thinking and talking about is Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n THE NUMBERS — \u201cCoronavirus Case Count Tops Five Million World-Wide,\u201d<\/a> <\/b>by WSJ\u2019s Chong Koh Ping<\/p>\n — NYT<\/a>: \u201cLockdown Delays Led to at Least 36,000 More Deaths, Models Find\u201d: <\/b>\u201cIf the United States had begun imposing social-distancing measures one week earlier in March, about 36,000 fewer people would have died in the pandemic, according to new estimates<\/a> from Columbia University disease modelers.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd if the country had begun locking down cities <\/b>and limiting social contact on March 1, two weeks earlier than when most people started staying home, a vast majority of the nation\u2019s deaths \u2014 about 83 percent \u2014 would have been avoided, the researchers estimated.\u201d<\/p>\n A NEW CHALLENGE: \u201cTrump\u2019s promise of \u2018Warp Speed\u2019 fuels anti-vaccine movement in fertile corners of the Web,\u201d<\/a> <\/b>by WaPo\u2019s Isaac Stanley-Becker: \u201cAnthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said he has grown increasingly concerned that the name of the initiative has led to misconceptions about what is being put at risk by speeding up the effort \u2014 only financial investments, not safety or efficacy.<\/p>\n \u201c\u2018People don\u2019t understand that,<\/b> because when they hear \u201cOperation Warp Speed,\u201d they think, \u201cOh, my God, they\u2019re jumping over all these steps and they\u2019re going to put us at risk,\u201d\u2019 Fauci said in an interview Wednesday with The Washington Post.\u201d <\/p>\n UPDATE — \u201cUnder pressure, Trump administration weighs extending National Guard deployments,\u201d <\/b>by Alice Miranda Ollstein and Daniel Lippman: \u201cTrump administration officials are preparing plans to extend the federal deployment of more than 40,000 National Guard members performing coronavirus relief work across the country, after scores of lawmakers moved to pressure President Donald Trump to keep the Guards in place past June.<\/p>\n \u201cFour people familiar with the matter<\/b> said the administration is prepared to extend the deployments through July, which would maintain federal funding for troops administering Covid-19 tests, disinfecting nursing homes and performing other public safety duties in nearly every state and federal territory. An extension would also help thousands of Guard members qualify for federal retirement and education benefits for which they would otherwise fall only one day short of obtaining.<\/p>\n \u201cWhite House spokesperson Hogan Gidley <\/b>did not confirm or deny whether Trump planned to authorize an extension past the current cutoff date of June 24, saying that \u2018We will continue monitoring the impact of coronavirus in the states and will work to ensure they are equipped to respond.\u2019\u201d POLITICO<\/a><\/p>\n VEEPSTAKES — \u201cWarren pivots on Medicare for All in bid to become Biden’s VP,\u201d <\/b>by Alex Thompson: \u201cIn the thick of primary season, Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden brawled over Medicare for All: He called her approach \u2018angry,\u2019 \u2018elitist,\u2019 \u2018condescending\u2019; she shot back anyone who defends the health care status quo with industry talking points is \u2018running in the wrong presidential primary.\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cSix months later, with Biden the presumptive nominee<\/b> and Warren in the running for VP, she is striking a more harmonious chord. \u2018I think right now people want to see improvements in our health care system, and that means strengthening the Affordable Care Act,\u2019 she told students at the University of Chicago\u2019s Institute of Politics this week, while adding that she still wants to get to single payer eventually.<\/p>\n \u201cThe shift is the latest public signal Warren has sent Biden’s way<\/b> in recent weeks that she wants the job of vice president \u2014 and wants Biden to see her as a loyal governing partner despite their past clashes, which go back decades.\u201d POLITICO<\/a><\/p>\n DEM KUMBAYA — \u201cBernie Sanders, seeking peace with Joe Biden, asks his own delegates to turn down the volume,\u201d<\/a> <\/b>by WaPo\u2019s Sean Sullivan<\/p>\n — \u201cHillary rakes in millions for Biden campaign,\u201d <\/b>by Marc Caputo: \u201cHillary Clinton collected $2 million for Joe Biden’s new joint fundraising committee with the Democratic National Committee this week \u2014 an enormous one-night haul for the once cash-strapped campaign. …<\/p>\n \u201cThe campaign and DNC last week began working <\/b>fully in unison, which President Trump and the GOP have been doing for years. Trump and Republicans had a nearly $190 million cash on hand advantage at the end of March.\u201d POLITICO<\/a><\/p>\n ALLY MUTNICK: \u201cGOP leaders rebuke Republican House candidate over insulting social media posts\u201d<\/a>:<\/b> \u201cHouse GOP leaders distanced themselves Wednesday night from the Republican nominee for a hotly contested California congressional district, after POLITICO’s reporting revealed dozens of social media posts on his accounts that demeaned Muslims and immigrants.<\/p>\n \u201cThe National Republican Congressional Committee<\/b> abruptly yanked Ted Howze, the party\u2019s nominee against vulnerable freshman Rep. Josh Harder (D-Calif.), from its Young Guns program for top recruits. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy issued a stern warning to Howze, whom he endorsed personally before the primary election in March.<\/p>\n \u201cIn a statement, McCarthy said he and NRCC Chairman Tom Emmer<\/b> of Minnesota \u2018will take immediate action\u2019 if Howze \u2018is found to be the originator of these posts.\u2019 Howze\u2019s campaign has told POLITICO that he denies writing them personally, suggesting other, unidentified individuals had access to his accounts. \u2026 <\/p>\n \u201cThe statements came less than a day after a second POLITICO <\/b>story about Howze\u2019s past social media activity. McCarthy and the NRCC did not comment after the initial story, on May 6, which detailed posts in which Howze called the Islamic prophet Muhammad a rapist and a pedophile, suggested prominent Democrats were responsible for murder and accused Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) of \u2018hitting the crack pipe too hard.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n TALKER \u2026 CBS\u2019 \u201cTooning out the News\u201d<\/b> with ALAN DERSHOWITZ: 3:59 clip<\/i><\/a><\/b><\/p>\n TRUMP\u2019S THURSDAY —<\/b> The president will leave the White House at noon en route to Detroit. He will arrive at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport at 1:40 p.m. He will head to Ford Rawsonville Plant in Ypsilanti, Mich., and arrive at 2:10 p.m. Trump will participate in a listening session with African American leaders at 2:15 p.m., followed by a tour of the components plant at 3 p.m. He will deliver remarks at 3:20 p.m. Trump will depart at 4:10 p.m. and return to Washington. He will arrive at the White House at 6:15 p.m.<\/p>\n LONG READ \u2026 WSJ: \u201cThe Day Coronavirus Nearly Broke the Financial Markets,\u201d<\/a> <\/b>by Justin Baer<\/p>\n YIKES — \u201cAfter New Coronavirus Outbreaks, China Imposes Wuhan-Style Lockdown,\u201d<\/a> <\/b>by NYT\u2019s Javier Hern\u00e1ndez<\/p>\n LARA SELIGMAN, ANDREW DESIDERIO <\/b>and BETSY WOODRUFF SWAN: \u201cSenior officials advised against Trump emergency arms sales to Saudis\u201d: <\/b>\u201cSecretary of State Mike Pompeo disregarded the advice of high-level officials at the State Department, Pentagon and within the intelligence community in invoking an emergency waiver last year to circumvent congressional review of billions of dollars in arms sales to the U.S. allies in the Persian Gulf region, according to two former administration officials and three congressional sources.<\/p>\n \u201cThat decision was under investigation by a government watchdog<\/b> who was fired last week at Pompeo\u2019s urging, and it has fueled renewed accusations from lawmakers that the Trump administration bucked the will of Congress and even violated the law when it fast-tracked the weapons sales. \u2026 <\/p>\n \u201c[D]uring meetings last spring of the National Security Council at several levels, <\/b>high-level career and political officials from the Pentagon, State Department and intelligence community agreed that there had been no change in Tehran\u2019s behavior to justify invoking emergency authorities and advised against doing so, according to a former administration official who attended the meetings.\u201d POLITICO<\/a><\/p>\n MUCK READ — \u201cTrump\u2019s Vaccine Chief Has Vast Ties to Drug Industry, Posing Possible Conflicts,\u201d <\/b>by NYT\u2019s Sheila Kaplan, Matthew Goldstein and Alexandra Stevenson: \u201cThe chief scientist brought on to lead the Trump administration\u2019s vaccine efforts has spent the last several days trying to disentangle pieces of his stock portfolio and his intricate ties to big pharmaceutical interests, as critics point to the potential for significant conflicts of interest.<\/p>\n \u201cThe scientist, Moncef Slaoui, is a venture capitalist <\/b>and a former longtime executive at GlaxoSmithKline. Most recently, he sat on the board of Moderna, a Cambridge, Mass., biotechnology firm with a $30 billion valuation that is pursuing a coronavirus vaccine. He resigned when President Trump named him last Thursday to the new post as chief adviser for Operation Warp Speed, the federal drive for coronavirus vaccines and treatments. …<\/p>\n \u201cBut the Moderna stock is just one piece of his pharmaceutical portfolio,<\/b> much of which is not public. And some ethics and financial securities experts have voiced concerns about the arrangement Dr. Slaoui struck with the administration.<\/p>\n \u201cIn agreeing to accept the position, Dr. Slaoui <\/b>did not come on board as a government employee. Instead, he is on a contract, receiving $1 for his service. That leaves him exempt from federal disclosure rules that would require him to list his outside positions, stock holdings and other potential conflicts. And the contract position is not subject to the same conflict-of-interest laws and regulations that executive branch employees must follow.\u201d NYT<\/a><\/p>\n WATCH THIS SPACE — \u201cEx-Green Beret nabbed in exec\u2019s escape has lived on the edge,\u201d <\/b>by AP\u2019s Adam Geller: \u201cWednesday, after months as fugitives, the 59-year-old [Michael] Taylor and his 27-year-old son, Peter, were arrested in Massachusetts on charges accusing them of hiding [former Nissan CEO Carlos] Ghosn in a shipping case drilled with air holes and smuggling him out of Japan on a chartered jet. Investigators were still seeking George-Antoine Zayek, a Lebanese-born colleague of Taylor.<\/p>\n \u201c[Paul] Kelly, now serving as the attorney for the Taylors, <\/b>said they plan to challenge Japan\u2019s extradition request \u2018on several legal and factual grounds.\u2019 \u2018Michael Taylor is a distinguished veteran and patriot, and both he and his son deserve a full and fair hearing regarding these issues,\u2019 Kelly said in an email.\u201d AP<\/a><\/p>\n COURT WATCH — \u201cSupreme Court stops House Democrats from seeing secret Mueller material for now,\u201d <\/b>by WaPo\u2019s Robert Barnes and Ann Marimow: \u201cThe Supreme Court on Wednesday stopped House Democrats for now from seeing secret grand jury material from Robert S. Mueller III\u2019s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election and whether President Trump obstructed the special counsel\u2019s work.<\/p>\n \u201cThe court, without noted dissent, agreed to a request<\/b> from the Justice Department to put on hold a lower court\u2019s decision granting the House Judiciary Committee some previously undisclosed material from Mueller\u2019s probe.<\/p>\n \u201cThe action could mean that Congress<\/b> will not receive the full Mueller report \u2014 without redactions of certain grand jury material \u2014 until after the November election, or perhaps not even during lawmakers\u2019 current term, which ends Jan. 3.\u201d WaPo<\/a><\/p>\n Send tips to Eli Okun and Garrett Ross at [email\u00a0protected]<\/span><\/a><\/i>.<\/p>\n BIRTHDAY OF THE DAY: Rick Reichmuth, <\/b>Fox News meteorologist. How he\u2019s celebrating: <\/b>\u201cWell, last year was a big one, so this year I\u2019ll be remembering that trip to Puglia and dreaming of when that can happen again. At 51, and in Brooklyn during Covid, it\u2019s probably best to just binge some Netflix and pour a few gin and tonics.\u201d Playbook Q&A<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n BIRTHDAYS: <\/b>Arthur Brooks is 56 \u2026 AP\u2019s Deb Riechmann \u2026 Rebecca Leber, Mother Jones reporter \u2026 Abigail P. Gage \u2026 Jeffrey Toobin, staff writer for The New Yorker and CNN chief legal analyst, is 6-0 \u2026 Fred Frommer, head of the sports business practice at Dewey Square \u2026 Joshua Henne of White Horse Strategies \u2026 Jennifer Treat \u2026 Mike Podhorzer \u2026 Susan Hansen \u2026 Robert Opacki (h\/ts Teresa Vilmain) \u2026 Beth Dozoretz \u2026 Steven Newmark \u2026 Jeffrey Kluger, editor at large at Time \u2026 Krista Ritacco \u2026 Brent Del Monte of BGR \u2026 IMF\u2019s Ross Rattanasena \u2026 Mary Ann Gomez Orta, president and CEO of the Congressional Hispanic Leadership Institute \u2026 former Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) is 69 \u2026 former Sen. George LeMieux (R-Fla.) is 51 \u2026 former Rep. Tom Feeney (R-Fla.) is 62 \u2026 CNBC\u2019s Steve Liesman is 57 … Monica Klein, co-founder of Seneca Strategies, is 31 \u2026<\/p>\n \u2026 Katharine Cooksey, <\/b>press secretary for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell\u2019s reelect \u2026 Matt Appenfeller (h\/t Jessica Church) \u2026 BBC presenter and Spectator chairman Andrew Neil is 71 \u2026 former Irish President Mary Robinson is 75 \u2026 Lacey Rose, VP at 617MediaGroup \u2026 Mike Viqueira is 6-0 \u2026 Mosheh Oinounou \u2026 City and State\u2019s Tom Allon is 58 \u2026 N.Y. Daily News\u2019 Michael Gartland \u2026 Gillian Reagan \u2026 Grace Barnes \u2026 Anna Smith Lacey, executive director of the Hungary Initiatives Foundation, is 35 … Edelman\u2019s Amy Larkin Long … Rachel Phelps Bayens … Darin McKeever is 46 … Baupost Group\u2019s Seth Klarman is 63 … Maria Devarakonda … Hampton Cokeley … Brandon Pollak is 4-0 … Dick Obermann \u2026 Erika Gutierrez Sheridan … Wally Hsueh \u2026 Jessica Lahey is 5-0 … Rebecca Shaw \u2026 Ken Herman \u2026 Emily Bucci … Kathryn Carlson<\/p>\n\n
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