Presented by PhRMA: The power players, latest policy developments, and intriguing whispers percolating inside the West Wing.
Oct 29, 2024 View in browser
 
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By Lauren Egan, Eli Stokols and Ben Johansen

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Welcome to POLITICO’s West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration and Harris campaign.

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Vice President KAMALA HARRIS ’ Tuesday evening rally on the Ellipse could be the largest crowd she’s drawn since becoming the Democratic nominee — even outdoing the 30,000-person rally she hosted in Houston last week with BEYONCÉ.

After her campaign initially requested a National Park Service permit for 20,000 people, they increased it to 40,000 expected participants.

That’s a huge number of people for any campaign rally. But it’s an especially impressive number given the location: Downtown Washington.

We can set aside the strategic choice to locate the speech in the nation’s capital — and not, say, in a swing state — to put a sharper symbolic point on the contrast with DONALD TRUMP by offering her own final argument at the spot where he incited a violent insurrection nearly four years ago. As our MYAH WARD reports, Harris intends to focus largely on her agenda, not the JOE BIDEN-esque obsession with saving democracy — though the subtext of the location itself could register as much as the text.

But pulling off a high-impact final event here is no easy feat. Current and former Democratic advance staffers said that D.C. political rallies are notoriously difficult to build a crowd for. For starters, the parking downtown sucks, especially at rush hour. People tend to be a bit more on edge about mass gatherings in the nation’s capital. In a city teeming with government employees who are beholden to strict guidelines about attending political events during work hours, few are willing to take time off to stand in line to attend a campaign speech. Plus, if you’re constantly getting stuck in Massachusetts Ave. traffic thanks to the vice president’s motorcade, the idea of waiting for hours to see her speak might be slightly less appealing.

“These events aren’t as special to a lot of the politically engaged people in the city who often have big jobs themselves and have been to a million of these types of events before,” said a Democratic advance staffer, who was not authorized to speak publicly. “Or they’re used to getting invited to a White House reception here and there. So why wait in a long line with thousands of other people at the end of the work day? It’s a hard sell.”

A Harris campaign official said they built the crowd for the Tuesday night event the same way that they’ve been doing for her other large rallies across the country, and that a lot of the enthusiasm was organic, including from Maryland and Virginia.

Inside the West Wing, senior staffers have been urging colleagues to attend the speech and bring their significant others and friends. Many of them got a “friends and family” link to reserve tickets that would get them closer to the stage, according to administration officials. At the same time, the White House Counsel’s office reminded staffers that time spent attending the campaign event would have to be declared as time off (as such, you can expect the White House contingent to file in on the later side, between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. when the gates close).

The massive event has somewhat disrupted the White House campus and federal agencies headquartered near the National Mall. Some agency staffers said they were working from home on Tuesday to avoid the downton chaos. Those still required to go into their offices were ditching their cars for the metro or scooters.

White House Operations Center sent out a campus-wide email reminding staff that those with parking spots on the Ellipse (many of whom tend to leave their cars there for days on end) could not park there between 6:00 a.m. and 11:00 p.m. on Tuesday, otherwise they would be towed. “Placard holders are encouraged to travel to and from work by public transportation or utilize a nearby parking garage,” the WHOC email read.

On top of that, the White House has yet to build out its “Hallo-Read” event, which is scheduled to take place Wednesday on the South Lawn. “Typically, they’re working on that build like a week ahead of time, but they held off because of the rally — a giant inflatable pumpkin probably isn’t the right vibe for Harris,” one administration official said. “But those guys are going to be working on it all night once the speech is over.”

And then there’s Biden himself. The president, kept at a distance from Harris in the campaign’s final weeks, will be coming back from a fundraiser in Maryland some time in the 6 p.m. hour, his motorcade likely pulling into the gates just as thousands await Harris on the grass south of the White House. Upon returning, Biden is scheduled to do a Zoom event with Voto Latino before retreating to the residence to watch the Harris speech on TV — not from the Truman Balcony.

Asked by a reporter Tuesday why he wasn’t attending, Biden replied: “It’s for her.”

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Drug price “negotiations?” Higher costs and less access to medicines are not what seniors were promised when the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) was signed into law. Learn more about the IRA’s unintended consequences.

 
POTUS PUZZLER

Under which presidency did the Halloween trick-or-treat event begin?

(Answer at bottom.)

CAMPAIGN HQ

WHO SHE’S TALKING TO: Harris’ speech will be aimed squarely at the small-but-still-significant chunk of remaining undecided voters, campaign chair JEN O’MALLEY DILLON told reporters on a call Tuesday morning. As our HOLLY OTTERBEIN reports, those gettable voters are a mix of young and low-information voters who need to be persuaded to cast their ballots, and more traditional swing voters, including suburban women, soft Republicans, moderates and independents — some of whom who drifted from the GOP because of abortion in the 2022 midterms.

And Trump’s racism-infused rally Sunday at Madison Square Garden — which the former president called “a love fest” on Tuesday — may be helping. “Perhaps after this weekend, [there’s] maybe some new segment of voters that are open to supporting us,” O’Malley Dillon said.

Myah also has a look at the speech excerpts released by the campaign here.

GOTV, BUSH STYLE: The daughter of former President GEORGE W. BUSH endorsed Vice President Harris on Tuesday, People Magazine’s DANIEL S. LEVINE reports. BARBARA PIERCE BUSH spent part of the weekend door knocking in Pennsylvania, adding that it “was inspiring to join friends and meet voters with the Harris-Walz campaign.”

Barbara Bush, daughter of former President George W. Bush, campaigned for Vice President Kamala Harris on Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024.

Jonathan Martin

GOT A LOTTA ASKS: The hugely popular podcast host JOE ROGAN on Tuesday said he declined the offer to record an interview with Vice President Harris because he “would have had to travel to her and they only wanted to do an hour,” our EMMY MARTIN reports. Rogan’s episodes are, typically, three-hour long episodes recorded out of his Austin studio.

“The Harris campaign has not passed on doing the podcast,” Rogan said in a post on X. He said he feels strongly the conversation should take place in his studio, adding that his “sincere wish” is to “get to know her as a human being.”

It’s a big ask to have the Democratic nominee for president spend three hours recording a podcast in Texas, a week before Election Day. Nonetheless, Trump — who is banking on a large turnout from Rogan’s largely male, white audience — did give the podcaster that three-hour ego stroke last week (making his rally attendees in Michigan wait several hours as he ran late).

And his running mate, JD VANCE , will also travel to Austin to make an appearance on the show — a medium that the Republican ticket has leaned on heavily in the last several months.

Here’s an idea for compromise: Harris should give Rogan the three hours, but record it in Wisconsin over a greasy bag of Culver’s.

WHAT WILMINGTON WANTS YOU TO READ: This post on X , explaining how Donald Trump’s plans to mass deport and fire government employees will — at least initially — cause a market “tumble,” more debt, artificially suppressed wages and “a severe overreaction in the economy.”

ELON MUSK responded with: “Sounds about right.”

Harris campaign spokesperson SARAFINA CHITIKA reposted the exchange, saying: “Donald Trump’s Economy according to @elonmusk.” And the campaign later sent out a whole email blast on Musk’s post, which by then he had deleted.

WHAT WILMINGTON DOESN’T WANT YOU TO READ: The latest NYT Opinion focus group featuring 11 Michigan voters. Harris’ problems with them boil down to two words: “change” and “Biden.” Nine voters said they’re worried she will pursue policies too similar to the current administration.

MUHAMMAD , a 25-year-old software engineer and registered independent, said he was struck by Trump’s ad showing Harris saying on “The View” she couldn’t think of anything she’d have done differently than Biden. “I understand not pushing Biden under the bus, but she needs to be more authentic and actually take responsibility for the failures of her administration,” he said.

The Oval

BIDEN IN BALTIMORE: The president stood at the Dundalk Marine Terminal with Baltimore’s Inner Harbor as a backdrop on Tuesday and spoke about his “Invest in America agenda,” announcing $3 billion from the Inflation Reduction Act that will go to modernize ports in more than two dozen states and territories — “including, yes, Puerto Rico.”

Biden’s clear nod to comedian TONY HINCHCLIFFE’s controversial routine at Sunday’s Trump rally, where he referred to the U.S. territory as “a floating pile of garbage,” momentarily laid bare a desire to be a bigger part of the political conversation in the election’s final days. The president continued with an aside, appearing to reference the comedian: “I’d like to take that guy for a swim out there,” he said, to a few audible chuckles from the crowd.

The pooler for Biden’s trip, our JONATHAN LEMIRE, noted that the president stopped by a Baltimore ice cream shop — but was told they were out of chocolate chip. He opted for one scoop vanilla, one chocolate. Someone’s gotta give this man a pint of BEN & JERRY’s Half Baked.

 

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THE BUREAUCRATS

‘JUST BECAUSE IT’S LEGAL DOESN’T MAKE IT RIGHT’: Over the past several years, AVRIL HAINES — the director of National Intelligence and one of Biden’s closest advisers on issues from domestic surveillance to the year-old war in Gaza — has become “the ultimate government insider,” our ERIN BANCO writes in a sharp dive into the top official.

But now, 20 years into her career, Haines is beginning to question whether Washington is a place where she can effect the greatest good. The war in Gaza has become a moral quandary for Haines, who has been forced to reconcile her personal values with the demands of U.S. foreign policy under the Biden administration. Erin spoke with several people close to her who say that Haines is rattled by the growing death toll of Palestinians trapped in the war zone.

Haines is widely considered to be a candidate for an even higher office under a second Democratic administration, potentially to take the role of national security adviser under Kamala Harris. But according to several of Haines’ current and former colleagues, she’s reckoning with the inherent limits of what the government can do.

“I’m cynical enough to realize that it is very easy to think you are making something better — perhaps particularly in government work,” Haines said in an interview with Erin, “and it turns out, you are not improving the situation; you might even have made it worse.”

Agenda Setting

GOOD TO HAVE CONFIDENCE: U.S. consumer confidence increased in October by the most since March 2021, Bloomberg’s MARK NIQUETTE reports . The Conference Board’s gauge of confidence jumped 9.5 points to 108.7, the highest level since the start of the year. The median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists called for a reading of 99.5.

The share of consumers who expect business conditions to improve also increased by 21 percent, the largest since February 2022.

What We're Reading

Tony West, Harris’ brother-in-law, is corporate insider and campaign adviser (WaPo’s Michael Kranish, Tyler Pager and Cat Zakrzewski)

Harris Aides Quietly Grow More Bullish on Defeating Trump (NYT’s Reid J. Epstein, Lisa Lerer and Maggie Haberman)

She said she had a miscarriage — then got arrested under an abortion law (WaPo’s Caroline Kitchener)

How to Prevent the Worst From Happening (The Atlantic’s Peter Wehner)

POTUS PUZZLER ANSWER

President JOHN F. KENNEDY established the tradition of hosting trick-or-treating at the White House, along with a private family party for friends and staff, according to the White House Historical Association. Larger events have been held on the grounds of the White House for Halloween ever since.

In 1962, then-first lady JACKIE KENNEDY hatched the idea to go trick-or-treating in Georgetown with her sister-in-law, JEAN KENNEDY SMITH, and their children, CAROLINE and STEVE. The two adult Kennedys were … erm … red and black ghosts? They went unrecognizable through the boujee D.C. neighborhood.

A CALL OUT! Do you think you have a harder trivia question? Send us your best one about the presidents, with a citation or sourcing, and we may feature it!

Edited by Steve Shepard and Rishika Dugyala.

 

A message from PhRMA:

Seniors are feeling the true cost of drug price “negotiations.”

Instead of saving money, some Medicare patients will pay more for medicines.

Others may not be able to get their medicines – 89% of insurers and PBMs say they plan to reduce access to medicines in Medicare Part D because of the Inflation Reduction Act.

Higher costs and less access. That’s not what seniors were promised.

Learn more.

 
 

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