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03/08/2018 08:07 AM EDT


By Nolan D. McCaskill (nmccaskill@politico.com or @NolanDMcCaskill)

TARIFFS ANNOUNCEMENT TIMING UNCLEAR -- President Donald Trump is not scheduled to formally announce his steel and aluminum tariffs today, though the White House has insisted the announcement will come this week. "The White House had been tentatively planning for a 3:30 p.m. Thursday announcement and even invited steel and aluminum industry workers to attend," Andrew Restuccia reports. "But an administration official told POLITICO late Wednesday that it was unlikely that the announcement would occur on Thursday because lawyers were still finalizing crucial paperwork required to put the tariffs into effect." White House guidance on the president's Thursday schedule made no mention of tariffs,
but Trump nevertheless tweeted this morning that he's looking forward to the 3:30 p.m. meeting.

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro told Fox Business Network that Trump would temporarily exempt Canada and Mexico from the tariffs as the U.S. continues its renegotiation of NAFTA. "Tying the tariffs to NAFTA could complicate the legal underpinning the administration is using to levy the sanctions," Andrew adds. "The administration argues that the tariffs are necessary for national security reasons -- an issue that is largely unrelated to the NAFTA talks. Navarro added the tariffs will go into effect 15 to 30 days after Trump signs documents green-lighting them." More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=d5e8e591f6f79b286ea33f1be3b2c2a97692bbdb0a56d34ad29b9207011cb7f15d9e206b5b9a95637e957dd80c3e4dd3

Related: "Trump tariff promise prompts U.S. steel company to restart Illinois plant," by Adam Behsudi: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a32580956e77bfd344b33eb6d87af1a27fcc9c3ebc3b6069666c34aa4ed0b762d0726e775be2ba07875 and "Trump eyes another trade crackdown," from Andrew and Adam: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a32d2556af27bc4ad654bd7fa78f8ede5ec88510c3055277835296c0716735973f2629420e112c09f69

REPUBLICANS HOPE PENCE CAN TEMPER TRUMP'S TARIFFS -- In public, Vice President Mike Pence praises Trump for putting America first, even with his polarizing proposed tariffs. But in private, Pence has quietly delivered pro-trade messages from Capitol Hill Republicans to the president, "though he's made sure to maintain a studiously neutral position, to the frustration of some who had hoped he would do more to exert influence over Trump," Matthew Nussbaum and Eliana Johnson report. The vice president's office said he "fully supports the president's policy agenda and ... should not be misconstrued as lobbying one way or another."

"Pence has been careful to air any disagreements with the president privately, scrupulously avoiding the sorts of public feuds that have damaged the standing of other top administration officials with Trump," they write. "At times, he has even kept his mouth shut behind closed doors, according to two senior administration officials, declining to express his views when they are at odds with those of the president." As Indiana's governor, Pence was a free-trade advocate, urging the state's congressional delegation to support trade promotion authority and the Trans-Pacific Partnership. A White House official said Pence would prefer to see tariffs targeted at specific countries, like China.
More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a327113e5f5ddc47dfbbeb7f0953f92b90aae2ce369b60d017ec4d15ac366f04ec9dcbcac208024e11c

Related read: "Cohn exit triggers GOP alarm," via Burgess and Rachael: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a32309c534a76926e59e4b124bffbb10cf6491d88b2b154472c9186df620dac49f7abaf9dcd6319b5c8

TRUMP HOSTING LAWMAKERS, VIDEO GAME INDUSTRY LEADERS TODAY -- The president is scheduled to host members of Congress and representatives of the video game industry this afternoon, continuing the White House's dialogue on gun violence in the wake of last month's Florida high school massacre. White House spokeswoman Lindsay Walters said participants will "discuss violent video game exposure and the correlation to aggression and desensitization in children." "The meeting could become a contentious affair -- and possibly a venue for Trump to slam video game executives for, in his view, increasing violent tendencies in young people," CNN's Dan Merica reports. "Trump, in the wake of the shooting,
said he thinks video game companies are somewhat culpable." More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a3291ec87720413c06f83a017d7aca9eb43a7a0edb96949cb37469dd010789631296ea91384b041fbe5


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GOOD MORNING! Thanks for reading Huddle, the play-by-play guide to all things Capitol Hill, on this Thursday, March 8.

PLAYBOOK POOL: March Madness is here, which means it's time for the 2nd Annual Playbook Pool bracket challenge hosted by our Playbook outposts across the country (DC, NY, NJ, MA, IL, FL & CA)! Track who's up and down throughout the tournament as you compete against your friends, top Playbookers, and political insiders and VIPs to win prizes including Apple Watches, Airpods, GoPros, Google Home, Snapchat Spectacles and more. Create your bracket starting on Selection Sunday (March 11) after the highly-anticipated field of teams in this year's tournament are chosen, and look for a special delivery of Playbook basketballs to House and Senate offices next week. Click HERE to get in the game!

WEDNESDAY'S MOST CLICKED: Gabriel Debenedetti and Elena Schneider's top takeaways from the Texas primary was the winner.

HARRIS 2020? -- If Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) has aspirations of running for president, she's not saying so right now. "I have aspirations to get through this interview," she quipped to Burgess and Elana. "One year into her stint in the Senate, the Democratic Party's newest rising star -- and one of its most buzzed-about potential 2020 hopefuls -- has cut a profile that offers few clues about her political aspirations," they write. "Expectations for her are especially high given that Harris hails from California, the center of the resistance engaged in an ongoing battle with the Trump administration."

"I have seen so many people along the way focused on that thing out there, and they trip over the thing in front of them," Harris said. "And the thing in front of us is so important. I'm going to let everybody else sit around and think about things that have yet to approach." Much more: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a32699d5f804cbc2e331b9115864fd46b20e60e5f5b7d0c7d09a05adc340304bbb90d45ab4f03d438e6

WOMEN AIM TO MAKE HISTORY IN MIDTERMS -- Just one in five elected officials on Capitol Hill is a woman. But more women this cycle than ever before are filing runs for the highest elected offices. "There's no single explanation for the crush of female candidates flooding the field this year, though reaction to Donald Trump's presidency and the burgeoning #MeToo movement is certainly playing a part on the Democratic side," Heather reports this morning. "Nearly three-quarters of potential female congressional and gubernatorial candidates this year are Democrats."

"But women on the ground -- candidates, consultants, pollsters, researchers and lawmakers -- say they think the reason for the deluge of female candidates is much deeper than just a knee-jerk reaction to Trump or the national conversation around sexual harassment," Heather notes. POLITICO will track the status of female candidates through Election Day, telling the story through text and the innovative Women Rule Candidate Tracker. "It will include up-to-date information about who's winning and losing, where election dollars are flowing and the issues dominating the debate," Heather writes. Much more: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a322f62590bec8e8a15cbc2e03449b9bdb3411967b5d1a7014e875e212251c8082dd5c9507d13aafe4e

GOP PUTS SACCONE ON NOTICE -- NRCC Chairman Steve Stivers (R-Ohio) issued a stern warning in January to Pennsylvania Republican special election candidate Rick Saccone, imploring him to start pulling his weight. "Stivers' warning ... was intended to put the candidate on notice," Alex Isenstadt reports. "The national GOP would be helping him out substantially, Stivers said. But if Saccone didn't start upping his fundraising game and getting his sluggish campaign in order, he could lose a race that should be a gimme for the party." That election comes Tuesday in a district Trump won by 20 percentage points in 2016.

The election "has emerged as the latest testing ground of whether Republicans are headed for a midterm bloodbath," Alex writes. Republicans privately acknowledge a loss would be embarrassing, and with the election just days away, the national GOP is increasingly blaming Saccone for what could be a devastating loss. Nearly two dozen administration officials, senior House Republicans and top party strategists "universally panned [Saccone] as a deeply underwhelming candidate who leaned excessively on the national party to execute a massive, multimillion-dollar rescue effort." And to make matters worse, Alex adds, "Saccone is up against a Democratic rival the party could hardly have engineered
had it tried: Conor Lamb, an Ivy League-educated 33-year-old Marine veteran and former federal prosecutor. More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a3204227126216f09cdcc87bf70be7052c57eab7e9438f348c438c15d664855e4e2f58536ac69bba70b

In other 2018 news: Retiring Rep. Ruben Kihuen (D-Nev.) is considering filing for reelection: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a327e39ae1534bb6bf36404c53b445e1b1cb378b52f78893492d48116990b8b920aa4bd1cc4c9b58e95 the so-called "Cannabis Candidate" faces accusations of abusing women and inflating his resume: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a3241f6310e8c49d589c09370fc6664b1c9c82aec7c117a48d9adbc75c880e04768ea275137da14de57 and former George W. Bush ethics lawyer Richard Painter explores a Minnesota Senate run: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a321c9642ed4b62df5e74a169e7c0c867b14acb233b534a8f212b57071e73550d5b5e67dd3fb049dfb3

PLANNED PARENTHOOD DEFUNDING THREATENS OMNIBUS -- House Republicans are demanding a series of controversial abortion and health care riders be included in a spending bill as Congress negotiates a massive, must-pass omnibus spending package. "The riders would cut off federal funding to Planned Parenthood, eliminate a federal family planning program and ax the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program, according to sources on Capitol Hill," Jennifer Haberkorn and Sarah Ferris report. "Republicans also want to insert a new prohibition on funding research that uses human fetal tissue obtained after an abortion." Democrats are threatening to block the long-sought conservative priorities.

"The dispute has stalled negotiations on other health issues, such as how much to spend on the opioid epidemic and prompted discussions about buying negotiators more time, with short-term government funding set to expire on March 23 and many of Congress' other spending panels nearly finished with their bills," they write. "Democrats say an agreement was near on overall funding levels for the fiscal 2018 Labor-Health and Human Services funding measure, typically one of the most contentious spending bills. But when top appropriators met to finalize the numbers, the Democrats said Republicans reneged on women's health issues, according to Democratic sources familiar with the talks." Much more:
http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a32392b5fcf140c604a5d0b80724d95c4340c198164ef194334204b646870fe45fed3e53191c3f1f3dc

SENATE DEMS PROPOSE TAX-CUTS REPEAL TO FUND INFRASTRUCTURE -- Senate Democrats unveiled a $1 trillion infrastructure plan on Wednesday that would be funded by repealing much of the tax-cuts package Republicans passed last year. "The plan would return the top individual tax rate to 39.6 percent, set the corporate tax rate at 25 percent, go back to 2017 law for the Alternative Minimum Tax, undo the exemption increase for the estate tax and end the beneficial tax treatment of carried interest," Toby Eckert reports. "With Republicans in control of Congress, the plan is mostly a political marker for the midterm elections." More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a3252e6ed96f4cc20eb98f313d7cc607b9a7f826ad895213da386a0f26cab76791e1c1966bc54d4c9ad

HICKS HACKED -- White House communications director Hope Hicks told the House Intelligence Committee last week that one of her email accounts was hacked. "Hicks indicated that she could no longer access two accounts: one she used as a member of President Donald Trump's campaign team and the other a personal account," NBC News reports. "Hicks, who portrayed herself as not savvy in matters of technology, told lawmakers that one of the accounts was hacked, according to two sources who were in the room. It is unclear if Hicks was referring to the campaign or the personal account."

"Her assertion of a hack raises the questions of who might have compromised her account, as well as when, why and what information could have been obtained," Jonathan Allen, Mike Memoli and Ken Dilanian write. Lawmakers routinely ask witnesses about phone numbers and email accounts. People familiar with the committee process, however, tell NBC News it's uncommon for a witness to testify that he or she no longer has access to past accounts. More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a3253f3be2b08f15b6a3081a2a874e37ae23572100b2847fb2ea9caab8c0daf7a7a69014a62fa014000

Related Russia reads: "Trump Spoke to Witnesses About Matter They Discussed With Special Counsel," by The New York Times' Michael S. Schmidt and Maggie Haberman: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a3288bd77e790be488b6af222d9eed789c7c84f04e8981c7ff915c3b0a235d274bc9009f9cb9a377e13 and "Mueller gathers evidence that 2017 Seychelles meeting was effort to establish back channel to Kremlin," from The Washington Post's Sari Horwitz and Devlin Barrett: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a32e1fa0b12e192405821b5806d9e220fee74fa979d26480e4437826bbe0e7df310110f7f72ee15d381

REPUBLICANS NAVIGATE STORMY ROAD -- While White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was willing to address the Stormy Daniels saga, Republicans in Congress were reluctant to wade in. "Most Republicans on Capitol Hill sought to avoid the topic altogether, while those who were willing to talk about it were careful not to criticize Trump for allegations that would have sent previous White Houses into a tailspin," The Washington Post reports. "Among the few Republicans willing to engage on the issue Wednesday was Rep. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.), who was at the center of a scandalous affair himself in 2009, disappearing for days with his mistress while he was his state's governor."

"I think we all ought to call it for what it is, which is it's deeply troubling," Sanford said. "If it was a Democratic president and hush money had been paid in the campaign, would there be a series of hearings going on? I think you could probably point to a fair number of indicators that suggest there would be." A lawsuit from the porn star claims her agreement not to discuss her alleged affair with Trump is null and void because Trump didn't sign it. Sanders told reporters that Trump has "made very well clear that none of these allegations are true." More: http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a323ba7e883293c85fc442ea84a4ce3156a5441fb939e1a3e8ab8f6818bf5fd065a2c5424e0e95081cb

WELCOME TO THE WORLD -- Ryan Brown, communications director for Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), and Christi Brown, a senior client associate at Merrill Lynch, on Tuesday welcomed Sloane Marie Brown, born at 2:25 a.m. Pics http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a323d7f67110929f795dfee9a2122ce66c3f9de7936a375adb376dff2c60d6eaa71d1a11d6c3699fc83 ... http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a32b1168c2ed8dd25b7c25090cce8c1b10c5350c3e872d65e876102454ee49ce9f75af7d5b19582ba55

Amy Pellegrino, health policy director for the Senate Aging Committee under Chairman Susan Collins (R-Maine), and Ian MacFarlane, executive director of the Northeastern Area Association of State Foresters, email friends and family: "Ian and I are thrilled to announce the arrival of Amelia Frances MacFarlane, who is two weeks old ... Amelia shares a birthday with her great-grandmother Frances as well as with Sen. Snowe." Pic http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=ba2e4e73e6e42a32abec7cddf811988a10998778cbf23363490db015543258afeb1a3db9a607578423043add1c0346f3

TODAY IN CONGRESS -- The House gavels in at 9 a.m. with first and last votes expected between 10:15 a.m. and 11:15 a.m. The Senate meets at 9:30 a.m. to resume consideration of a banking bill. Conversations will continue about a path forward for votes on amendments, and roll call votes are possible.

AROUND THE HILL -- Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.) will hold a briefing on women and kidney disease to honor World Kidney Day and International Women's Day at 10 a.m. in HVC-200.

Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) will hold a news conference on extreme risk protection orders that allow families and law enforcement to petition a court to temporarily suspend a person's access to firearms at 10:30 a.m. in the Senate Radio/TV Gallery.

Reps. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), Mark Pocan (D-Wis.), Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), Donald Norcross (D-N.J.) and Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) and others will hold a news conference to call on Congress to increase the minimum wage for the first time in nearly a decade and reject President Donald Trump's proposed cuts to nutrition programs and other investments that minimum-wage workers rely on at 10:30 a.m. in the House Triangle.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) will hold her weekly news conference at 10:45 a.m. in HVC Studio-A.

Reps. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) and Gwen Moore (D-Wis.), two FCC commissioners and others will host a briefing on the FCC's impact on the poor at 12 p.m. in 2044 Rayburn.

WEDNESDAY'S TRIVIA WINNER -- Jeff Trammell was first to correctly guess that Kansas was the first state to put prohibition in its state constitution.

TODAY'S TRIVIA -- From Jeff: Who was Florida's first female member of Congress, who was her father and what position did she hold after leaving Congress? The first person to correctly guess gets a mention in the next edition of Huddle. Send your best guess my way: nmccaskill@politico.com.

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