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By Elana Schor | 06/07/2018 07:57 AM EDT


By Elana Schor (eschor@politico.com or @eschor)

FBI GIVING CONGRESS NEW BRIEFING ON TRUMP CAMPAIGN PROBE - While many of us were sleeping, the Department of Justice announced that the "Gang of Eight," the group of bipartisan congressional leaders often privy to top-level national security briefings, will get access to documents about an FBI informant who communicated with several associates of President Donald Trump's campaign in 2016. More from Kyle and Rachael: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=0d845a66f64b49090ed7a24ef006654b48d505d6695df7179edd67b16e16e57caff1aa2b4c9449647f794d6bbb76c076

Why this matters: Trump's unverified claim that the FBI had installed an informant in his campaign continues to roil Speaker Paul Ryan's (R-Wis.) conference -- more on that later in your newsletter. This new information may help resolve the drama.

Or maybe not: The documents that the DOJ has offered to the Gang of Eight, Kyle tweets, "were simply sitting on the table for the Gang of 8 to read" during another briefing on the FBI informant last month. "And no one did."

HOUSE GOP's BIG IMMIGRATION MOMENT - House Republicans will hold a conference-wide meeting this morning to suss out their immigration agenda as a discharge petition bringing the issue to the floor looms. That petition only needs three more signatures to get to 218, the number required to force floor consideration, raising the stakes for GOP leaders who must bridge the gap between conservatives and moderates over the Dreamers.

Important reality check: As much attention as the meeting will get, our friends at Playbook have a valuable reminder. Any immigration deal that might be able to pass the House, "either via discharge petition or the leadership-driven process -- will not become law. This is a political exercise."

SENATE GOP VS. TRUMP ON TRADE - Republicans have stewed in frustration over President Donald Trump's protectionist trade policies for a long time now, but his move to slap metals tariffs on Mexico, Canada, and the European Union appears to be "their breaking point," Burgess reports.

Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) is leading the charge with bipartisan legislation that would give Congress power to approve or block Trump tariffs imposed on national security grounds. The president called Corker to try to dissuade him, but fellow Republicans are agreeing that the tariff bill should get a vote during the current defense debate.

Bad sign for the bill: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is no fan of the latest Trump tariffs, but he told SiriusXM that the Corker plan would be an "exercise in futility" and he'd prefer to try to talk the president down.


** A message from the American Clinical Laboratory Association: Millions of seniors who depend on lab tests to manage their health are facing reductions in access to Medicare lab testing because of HHS' flawed implementation of the Protecting Access to Medicare Act (PAMA). HHS is putting the nation's most vulnerable seniors at risk. It's time for Congress to act. Learn More. **


HAPPY #ALLCAPS THURSDAY! Thanks for reading POLITICO's Huddle, the play-by-play guide to all things Capitol Hill, on this June 7. I'm your fill-in host, and I'm not the only one wondering if tonight could be the Capitals' moment to break through years of playoff misery for Washington-area pro sports franchises.

WEDNESDAY'S MOST CLICKED: The top takeaways from Tuesday's primaries, penned by POLITICO's crack campaigns team, took top honors: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=0d845a66f64b4909c4bc9c71ee50cc6fb94d995d5a5df1e1c3cfd9f7ca757a109c80d18d5c2a89b12687d7c6b6657ddb

PEREZ'S SUPER(DELEGATE) STANDOFF - The DNC is gearing up to curb the power of "superdelegates," the lawmakers, governors, and other party elders who are unrestricted in their choice for the Democratic presidential nomination. And House Democrats are furious about it, as Bres and Heather scoop.

DNC Chairman Tom Perez tangled with House Democrats during a private Tuesday meeting about the party's plans to overhaul the use of superdelegates, a longtime frustration for some in the grassroots that spiked after 2016. Perez is backing a bid to bar superdelegates from voting during the first roll-call vote for the Democratic nominee, and the party's House members are livid. "I think this is absolutely an insult to us," Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-N.J.) said.

RYAN BREAKS WITH TRUMP ON RUSSIA - Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is facing a growing debate within his own conference over whether he should stay at the helm until he retires at the end of this Congress, but that's not stopping him from publicly volunteering that there's "no evidence" to support Trump's claim that the FBI had installed a spy within his presidential campaign.

"Ryan's pushback, delicate as it was, is risky," Rachael reports, given the withering reception that Trump allies gave House Oversight Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) for raising similar doubts about the president's unverified assertions.

Related read: Rep. Tom Rooney (R-Fla.), a member of the House intelligence committee, is also slamming Trump's spying assertion as incorrect: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=0d845a66f64b49093cc036f430b4564ad3ad9ea3a30e128e0d7a662e42c01078d8028da07d869757ef3e7f5a59fe1f75

SCHUMER MORE BULLISH ON MIDTERM TAKEOVER - Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) knows that the 2018 map looks stacked against his party, which is defending 10 seats in states that Trump won in 2016. But he sees a path to seizing back control of a chamber now divided 51-49.

"We are much, much closer than people would ever think" to winning back the Senate in November, Schumer told Burgess and your fill-in host during an interview in his Capitol office. The four states to keep a close eye on, where Democrats are privately most concerned: North Dakota, Missouri, Florida, and Indiana. More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=0d845a66f64b4909f52d9294a774d35bfec3dc1763b3f3c79dba464c61273548c2ac46b7df159946b3ae5e8b0047bb37

HOUSE TO VOTE ON $15B BUDGET SLASH: The House will take up a package of $15 billion in budgetary rescissions today, though the fiscal cuts' future in the Senate is murky at best given the upper chamber's burgeoning bipartisan progress on appropriations. But the House vote is a big deal for conservatives - and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) as he vies to succeed Ryan as Speaker. The AP's Andy Taylor with more: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=0d845a66f64b4909de97503bf6b150bab5b6cdea86a523858b7ba80194b52b219333773b731faca72c261fb70183809d

The conservative group Americans for Prosperity is key-voting the rescissions measure, calling it "a down payment toward more comprehensive and long-overdue spending reform" in a letter to House members.

TRUMP COMMUTES KARDASHIAN FRIEND'S PRISON TERM: Alice Johnson, a first-time non-violent drug offender serving a life sentence, won a commutation from Trump yesterday after her friend Kim Kardashian visited the White House to personally lobby the president. Candice Norwood has that story: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=0d845a66f64b490903739d0422b64dcc465160de501e92487d86fda9162e9b1547ef3f6d8e5e95d4e97fee2a859639eb

The congressional context: The House passed a prison reform bill last month designed to reduce recidivism and better the lives of prisoners after release, but it doesn't include sentencing overhaul that could affect offenders like Johnson. And the current bipartisan impasse over whether to take up a prison-only approach is stalling the bill in the Senate. Despite the positive outcome for Johnson, her tale is unlikely to ease the Hill's reform stalemate.

TODAY IN CONGRESS - The House meets at 10 a.m. with first votes on the rescission package expected between 1:30 p.m. and 2:30 p.m. The Senate convenes at 10 a.m. with a vote on Department of Education nominee Kenneth Marcus set for 12:30 p.m.

AROUND THE HILL - Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) are expected to join attorneys from the Constitutional Accountability Center after oral arguments in federal court in a lawsuit filed by nearly 200 lawmakers alleging Trump has violated the Constitution's foreign emoluments clause.

Sens. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) will jointly unveil legislation designed to safeguard state-level decision-making on marijuana at 10:45 a.m. in the Senate Radio-TV Gallery.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) will hold her weekly news conference at 10:45 a.m. in HVC Studio A. Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) will follow with his weekly news conference at 11:30 a.m. in the same location.

Reps. Mike Bishop (R-Mich.) and Jimmy Panetta (D-Calif.) are expected to join an event highlighting bipartisan legislation ending Department of Agriculture testing on kittens (with cupcakes also served) at 2 p.m. in the Rayburn Building foyer.

WEDNESDAY'S TRIVIA WINNER - Brad Fitch was first to guess that Henry Wilson's bust is not in the gallery above the Senate chamber, unlike most of the early vice presidents. Instead, a sculpture of Wilson can be found in the vice president's room on the second floor, a memorial to where the nation's eighteenth vice president died after suffering a stroke.

TODAY'S TRIVIA - Brad's got the mic: With the NBA Championship going on, let's go with an NBA theme. Many ex-pro athletes have served in Congress. Who was the first ex-pro basketball player to serve in Congress?

The first person to correctly answer gets a shout out in tomorrow's Huddle: eschor@politico.com

GET HUDDLE emailed to your phone each morning.


** A message from the American Clinical Laboratory Association: Millions of seniors depend on lab tests to manage their health. Yet steep cuts by HHS to vital lab services put seniors on Medicare at great risk. By reducing access to vital lab tests for heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and many other conditions, other health care costs are sure to increase. Worst of all, these cuts will hit the most vulnerable seniors -- like those in nursing homes or in rural areas -- the hardest. HHS has deliberately ignored the law and Congressional intent, which will reduce access to lab testing for America's seniors. Congress must act now to restore the true intent of the Protecting Access to Medicare
Act (PAMA) and protect seniors from HHS' penny-wise and pound-foolish approach. Learn More. **

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