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11/20/2017 07:57 AM EDT


By Heather Caygle (hcaygle@politico.com or @heatherscope)

TAX REFORM: THE TOUGH ROAD AHEAD - Happy Monday, Huddle readers. Congress is gone for the week but Senate GOP leaders are furiously working to shore up support for their tax bill before bringing it to the floor after Thanksgiving. House Republicans were able to muscle a tax code rewrite through their chamber last week with relative ease. Don't expect the same in the Senate. "GOP leadership is confronting mushrooming demands from individual senators with much more power to bollix up the tax plans, thanks to the party's super-thin majority," Brian Faler reports.

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) is the first GOP senator to publicly oppose the Senate tax bill but there are several other wildcard Republicans who could easily derail the proposal in the upper chamber. Deficit hawks like Sens. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) have raised cost concerns. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) has avoided taking a public position so far. And Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Susan Collins (R-Maine), both critical swing votes, have expressed concerns about language in the tax bill that would repeal Obamacare's individual mandate.

About that Obamacare mandate... Collins said on Sunday she'd like to see several alterations to the bill before it gets to the Senate floor, including cutting the individual mandate language. "I think there will be changes," she told ABC's George Stephanopoulos, calling attempts to repeal the mandate in the tax bill "the biggest mistake." OMB Director Mick Mulvaney said Sunday the White House is on board with nixing the Obamacare language if it threatens to hold up the bill's passage. "If it becomes an impediment to getting the best tax bill we can, then we're OK with taking it out," he told CNN's Jake Tapper.

The White House whipping operation: Not helping matters is President Donald Trump taking to Twitter over the weekend, saying Flake is a guaranteed "no" vote because his political career is "toast." Flake's office quickly shot back: The Arizona Republican "is still reviewing the #TaxReform bill on its merits," spokesman Jason Samuels said on Twitter. "How he votes on it will have nothing to do with the president."

The Democratic playbook: "Coming off Election Day wins from Seattle to Long Island, Democrats are starting to see the shape of a new majority, built on a potential suburban backlash to changes in the tax code," David Weigel reports for the Washington Post. "The Republicans are going to pay a real price," said Michigan Democratic Rep. Debbie Dingell. More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ddf45f57ae3a5a572e64fe1383ab1d5052f1c628651e6bd55c706d88d8bbc13d59d110c3ed2d5899551b85bb8e1da436

FRANKEN FALLOUT BACK HOME - Sen. Al Franken has no plans to resign over recent groping allegations despite calls from some Minnesota Democrats to do so, his spokesperson said over the weekend. "He is spending time with his family in Washington, D.C., and will be through the Thanksgiving holiday," the Franken staffer told the Minneapolis Star Tribune, "and he's doing a lot of reflecting." Franken is bracing for a Senate Ethics Committee investigation into allegations he groped a woman during a USO tour in 2006. "'It's hard. He's a friend, he's an ally and he's very effective. But we cannot have a double standard when it comes to having safe places that do not allow for sexual harassment,'
said State Auditor Rebecca Otto, one of two DFL candidates for governor in 2018 to call for Franken to resign. The other was state Rep. Erin Murphy." Jennifer Brooks with more: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ddf45f57ae3a5a57283dc38264fe49b99f5e68ed0a9deae289faa79b1db2582b539bbe21e2b14a6794e6f20d117e874e

WELCOME TO THANKSGIVING WEEK Y'ALL. Thanks for reading Huddle on this Monday, Nov. 20, the play-by-play guide to all things Capitol Hill. Programming note: Huddle will be taking Thursday and Friday off to eat all of the things but we'll be back in your inboxes Monday, Nov. 27.

FRIDAY'S MOST CLICKED: Elana and Seung Min's story about Franken apologizing was the most-read item on Friday.

MOORE CONTROVERSY HANGS OVER 2018 - The sexual misconduct controversy facing Roy Moore is threatening to bleed into the 2018 midterms as Democrats look for a way to tie other GOP hopefuls to the scandal and raise money. Democrats have used the Moore accusations "to attack candidates including Ohio Senate hopeful Josh Mandel, Arizona Rep. Martha McSally and South Carolina gubernatorial candidate Catherine Templeton. All three were criticized for refusing to take sides on whether Moore should drop out of the race," Kevin Robillard and Gabriel Debenedetti report.

Filling the campaign coffers: "Democrats are also using the situation to raise their own campaign cash. Both Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine and Texas Rep. Beto O'Rourke have sent out a string of fundraising emails about Moore in recent days, denouncing their opponents' ties to the Alabamian," they report. "Democrats are hardly irreproachable on the sexual harassment issue. ...But the alleged sins of Moore - accused of engaging in unwanted contact, sexual and otherwise, with teenagers as a single man in his 30s - appear to be in a different category [than Franken]." More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ddf45f57ae3a5a57960a26b4a484a6ec5ea6d78142d3b274c77a009fb4f94abfbb7018783d1e4e87b0eaeec4dca715f0

Top White House aides made clear over the weekend that Trump has no plans to weigh in on whether Moore should step aside, despite private pleas from Republican leaders to do so. "I think he thinks it's best for the people of Alabama to make that decision," White House legislative liaison Marc Short said on ABC Sunday. "We think that the people of Alabama will have a lot of wisdom in making the right decision come December 12." OMB Director Mick Mulvaney used the same talking points on NBC yesterday.

DEMS PICK VETERAN FOR MURPHY SEAT - Pennsylvania Democrats on Sunday picked Conor Lamb, a former federal prosecutor and Marine veteran, as their nominee to replace former GOP Rep. Tim Murphy, who resigned amid scandal last month. Lamb, who has never run for office before, will face state GOP Rep. Rick Saccone in a special election March 16. "Asked whether he would support California Democrat Nancy Pelosi as speaker of the House, he said answering would be 'presumptuous,'" Chris Potter reports for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Trump won Murphy's district by a 20-point margin in 2016. More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ddf45f57ae3a5a577c378517487f86cd9163bc66c71af15919b1d3f9c2e55997cce3055cbf9c32fe3d928f0c67d739c5

WHAT CAPITOL HILL IS READING: THE RUSSIA LATEST - Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team is asking DOJ to turn over a wide range of documents related to its investigation into whether Trump tried to obstruct a federal probe into connections between Russia and his campaign. "Mueller's investigators are keen to obtain emails related to the firing of FBI Director James Comey and the earlier decision of Attorney General Jeff Sessions to recuse himself from the entire matter, according to a source who has not seen the specific request but was told about it," ABC News reports. Mike Levine: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ddf45f57ae3a5a5754e81ef0d1a54a0e39fe703cdb4192e0f6d81af6aceab3ed77627d14e9e35bdc1b876f172db959cc

HOYER HITS THE ROAD - House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) kicked off a cross-country listening tour Friday, appearing with Democrats in Nevada and Kansas City, Mo., as the party ramps up its effort to woo working-class voters next year. "We have a lot in common," Hoyer said about voters in the Midwest who have abandoned the Democratic Party. "But they may say it a different way or see it in a different perspective. They may not think you are talking about what they are thinking about, but you really are."

Hoyer didn't mention Trump by name during his stop in Kansas City as Democratic leaders try to keep the focus on their economic message, Natalie Andrews reports for the Wall Street Journal. Today he'll appear with Illinois Rep. Cheri Bustos, one of 12 Democrats in Trump-won districts. More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ddf45f57ae3a5a5772afe17bdf3129810a8b1e9194e85dd416b793ffdce69dd519cb22d7352a50587e90b700c400e2e6

COMING ATTRACTIONS: Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) will release his third annual government waste report next Monday, called "Federal Fumbles: 100 ways the government dropped the ball," carrying on the tradition of his predecessor, Sen. Tom Coburn. More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ddf45f57ae3a5a574bdf57d478bc66351e52ab9f715b92c9b39dba38fad4df19bfaf501c6d404336b120fd28220b9384

ARRIVAL LOUNGE - Jamie Shimek will join the Democratic staff on the House Appropriations Committee today, working on the Energy & Water subcommittee. She comes from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, and previously worked for DOE under Secretary Moniz and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.). Ian Staples has been promoted to legislative director for Rep. Susan Davis (D-Calif.) from military legislative assistant.

TODAY IN CONGRESS - The House and Senate are both out until after Thanksgiving.

AROUND THE HILL - T-minus three days until turkey time!

FRIDAY'S TRIVIA WINNER - David Morgenstern correctly guessed that Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) and Gov. Sam Brownback (R-Kansas) have both represented their states in the House, Senate and governor's mansion.

Also, as Stephan Kline pointed out regarding a trivia question last week, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson's brother Tim represented Arkansas as a senator, House member and in the state legislature. So the Hutchinsons, along with the Sununus, are both correct answers for the question about which close relative of this current governor also served in politics, both in the state and on Capitol Hill.

TODAY'S TRIVIA - David with today's question: If Roy Moore is elected, there has been some talk of trying to expel him - although no senator has been expelled since in more than 150 years. Who was the last sitting member of Congress to be expelled and why? The first person to answer correctly gets a mention in the next edition of Huddle. Send your best guess my way: hcaygle@politico.com.

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