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01/30/2019 10:00 AM EDT

By ZACH MONTELLARO (zmontellaro@politico.com; @ZachMontellaro)


Editor's Note: This edition of Morning Score is published weekdays at 10 a.m. POLITICO Pro Campaign subscribers hold exclusive early access to the newsletter each morning at 6 a.m. To learn more about POLITICO Pro's comprehensive policy intelligence coverage, policy tools and services, click here.
QUICK FIX
- Stacey Abrams will give the Democratic response to President Donald Trump's second State of the Union, as the party pushes her to run for Senate in Georgia.

- Rep. Tulsi Gabbard's (D-Hawaii) presidential campaign is in disarray, and it hasn't even formally launched yet.

- An early poll of Democratic voters found that the 2020 primary field is wide open. No candidate got in the double digits.

Good Wednesday. Email me at zmontellaro@politico.com or DM me at @ZachMontellaro.

Email the great Campaign Pro team at sbland@politico.com, dstrauss@politico.com, jarkin@politico.com, and lbarron-lopez@politico.com. Follow them on Twitter: @PoliticoScott, @DanielStrauss4, @JamesArkin and @lbarronlopez.

Days until the 2019 election: 279

Days until the 2020 election: 643

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THE TOPLINES
Abrams, who narrowly lost Georgia's gubernatorial election in November, will deliver the Democratic response to the State of the Union, POLITICO's Marianne Levine reported. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said he asked Abrams to deliver the response three weeks ago.

The spotlight comes as Democrats try to recruit Abrams to run for the Senate. Democrats have brought out the works to try to get Abrams to run against Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.). Campaign Pro's James Arkin reported last week that she met with both Schumer and DSCC Chairwoman Catherine Cortez Masto, and talked to prominent black Democrats like Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) and Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.). Abrams also recently launched a "thank you" tour across the state that looks awfully similar to listening tours that prospective presidential candidates hold in early primary states before they announce.

The State of the Union response has not been a surefire launching pad in the past. Some politicians who recently delivered responses are now out of Congress - like former GOP Reps. Carlos Curbelo and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen - or were lampooned following awkward moments - like this incident Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) would probably rather forget.
IN THE TRENCHES
PRESIDENTIAL BIG BOARD - Gabbard is supposed to have a launch rally for her presidential campaign on Saturday on Oahu. But her campaign is tripping before she's even out of the starting block. "Campaign manager Rania Batrice and Gabbard's consulting firm Revolution Messaging are set to depart after this weekend's official kickoff in Hawaii," POLITICO's Daniel Strauss and Alex Thompson reported. "Gabbard is leaning on her sister, Vrindavan, to fill the void."

- Thanks, but no thanks. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti is not running for president, POLITICO's David Siders, Christopher Cadelago and Daniel reported. The consolation prize for Garcetti: He had the joke of the day when he said "Garcetti 2040" at his press conference announcing his decision - when he'll still be younger than some of the top-tier contenders considering a run now.

- Former Maryland Rep. John Delaney picked up endorsements from three county chairs in Iowa, POLITICO's Alex Thompson reported. All three are from small counties that President Donald Trump carried in 2016.

- Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg made his second visit to New Hampshire on Tuesday, when he criticized just about everyone from Trump to Howard Schultz to Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Harris, POLITICO's Stephanie Murray and Marc Caputo reported.

- A preview of Bloomberg's messaging regarding his wealth, if he ultimately gets in: A poll from Bloomberg's camp found likely Democratic primary voters "would be comfortable with a candidate whose wealth was self-made," The Wall Street Journal's Ken Thomas reported. "The polling also found it 'matters enormously' to primary voters to know that a wealthy candidate had supported philanthropic causes."

- Former Vice President Joe Biden really doesn't know when, or if, he'll announce. He said Monday he'd make "the decision" soon, but he sung a different song on Tuesday. "I don't think there's any hurry to have to announce," he told CNN's Arlette Saenz. "I don't have any particular timetable."

- An unnamed Harris adviser told CNN's Gregory Krieg, Tami Luhby and Maeve Reston that she is open to more moderate health care reforms. But the money quote is from Harris spokesperson Ian Sams: "Medicare-for-all is the plan that she believes will solve the problem and get all Americans covered. Period."

POLLS POLLS POLLS - Surprise surprise: A new Washington Post/ABC News poll has the Democratic 2020 primary wide open. Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents were asked an open-ended question about who they'd back in the primary, and 56 percent had no preference yet. Of the 44 percent who voiced a preference, Biden was at 9 percent, Harris was at 8 percent and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) was at 4 percent. Interestingly, Trump was also at 4 percent, with other candidates drawing 19 percent (447 Democratic-leaning adults, Jan. 21-24).

INTERFERENCE, AGAIN - Other countries will likely try to interfere in the 2020 elections, according to Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats. Coats wrote in "a worldwide threat assessment to the Senate Intelligence Committee ... that competitors such as Russia, China and Iran 'probably already are looking to the 2020 U.S. elections as an opportunity to advance their interests,'" POLITICO's Martin Matishak reported.

IN MICHIGAN - Freshman Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) was part of a Facebook group whose founder had shared an anti-Semitic video that described Jews as "satanic" and denied 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust, via The Daily Caller's Peter Hasson. Maher Abdel-qader, the founder, has also campaigned for her.

#METOO - Just a month before New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio hired aide Kevin O'Brien, who was later quietly forced out over sexual harassment allegations, O'Brien had been fired for similar reasons from his job at the Democratic Governors Association. O'Brien was a senior staffer for Montana Gov. Steve Bullock. "When Mr. O'Brien left the governors association in December 2015, Mr. Bullock was among those who knew the reason: A woman employed at the association had accused Mr. O'Brien of sexually harassing her, and an investigation had backed her up," The New York Times' William Neuman reported. De Blasio's press secretary told the Times the mayor was unaware of the allegations when
O'Brien was hired.

TURNOUT JUICED - The proportion of Latinos who voted in the seven California House districts Democrats flipped in the midterms "rose to levels normally seen in presidential elections," The Sacramento Bee's Katie Irby reported.

WALKING IT BACK - After a lot of hullabaloo about potential non-citizens being on the rolls (and voting) in Texas, the starting number is already being walked back. "The secretary of state's office incorrectly included some voters who had submitted their voting registration applications at Texas Department of Public Safety offices, according to county officials," The Texas Tribune's Alexa Ura reported, writing it is still unclear how many were incorrectly included.

HOOK 'EM - Texas Republicans are signaling that the national party should devote resources to the state to avoid an upset in 2020, with state chair James Dickey and Sen. John Cornyn trying to secure more money, the Washington Examiner's David Drucker reported.

UP NEXT - North Carolina Lt. Gov. Dan Forest, a Republican, took a step to running for governor by announcing an exploratory committee.

PRIMARY WATCH - In a "primary for thee, not for me" attitude, an anonymous House Democrat told The Hill's Scott Wong that they have been urging the New York delegation to try to find a challenger to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. For her part, Ocasio-Cortez's spokesperson Corbin Trent welcomed a challenge: "We believe in primaries as an idea. We're not upset by the idea of being primaried."

WE MISSED YOU! - Everyone's favorite federal agency, the FEC, is back in business. On Tuesday, the commission published its 2019 filing deadlines. The next open meeting is on Feb. 7 after the first two of 2019 were canceled due to the shutdown.

NOT I - Former Sen. Jeff Flake (who is now a CBS contributor) said he won't be the one to challenge the president in a primary. "I still hope that somebody does, but that somebody won't be me," per POLITICO's Caitlin Oprysko.

THE FIRM - Former Democratic Governors Association Executive Director Elisabeth Pearson and veteran ad maker Adam Magnus are teaming up to start their own consulting firm, Daniel reported.

CODA - QUOTE OF THE DAY: "They're far better than us ethically, I think," a National Zoo visitor reflecting on the shutdown while watching the pandas, via DCist.

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