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03/21/2016 08:16 AM EDT


By Lauren French (lfrench@politico.com or @LaurenNFrench)

TRUMP COULD PUT HOUSE REPUBLICAN MAJORITY IN JEOPARDY. Via, Theodoric Meyer and Elena Schneider, "Trump is on the verge of two things once thought to be impossible: winning the Republican presidential nomination, and putting Republicans' historically large House majority in danger. Democrats have for the past year discussed the GOP's 30-seat majority as a long-term problem, solvable only by shrinking it over several successive elections. But Trump's remarkable rise in the GOP presidential race, and the backlash he has already provoked among the broader electorate, has suddenly raised the prospect of a large November wave against Trump and the Republicans who would share the ballot with him.
The House GOP's leading indicators - its most vulnerable members, like Reps. Bob Dold and Carlos Curbelo - are already sounding the alarm against Trump and his rhetoric on women, Hispanics and other groups. The party's outside groups are preparing an intensified fundraising push to help defend the chamber." http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=b34210c71d7e4047d1dd4238399496ba7d6c86d5eaf7a96d9d999d26406b4cde

DEMOCRATS TO SANDERS: GET OUT. Burgess Everett reports, "Democratic senators of all stripes are as impressed as they are surprised by Bernie Sanders' insurgent campaign. But the time has come, they say, for Sanders to start winding things down. After holding their fire on Sanders for the better part of a year, the senators - all backers of Hillary Clinton - are gently calling on Sanders to face the reality that there's almost no chance he's going to be the Democratic nominee. They don't say outright he should quit; doing so would be counterproductive, they say. But nearly a dozen Democratic lawmakers suggested in interviews that Sanders should focus more on stopping Donald Trump and less on
why he believes Clinton's stands on trade, financial regulation and foreign policy would make her a flawed president." http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=b34210c71d7e4047bec73a7bb7dfec4b71a96eb54370578077fd52f7b96042b8

HAPPY MONDAY. It's March 21, 2016, and you're reading Huddle, your daily inbox round up of all things Congress. Lauren French here and I'll be your Huddle guide this week. Thanks for reading and please reach out at lfrench@politico.com or @laurennfrench.

TODAY IN CONGRESS. The House returns at 6:30 p.m. for a series of votes. The Senate is out of town until April.

AROUND THE HILL. Not exactly congressional news but both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are in D.C. today to address AIPAC. Donald Trump will meet with Republican lawmakers at the law offices of Jones Day this morning. Sen. Jeff Sessions, a Trump supporter, is organizing the meeting.

ON THE MOVE. The Ted Strickland for Senate campaign announced this weekend that former Rep. Kurt Schrader communications director Liz Margolis is joining the campaign as press secretary. -- Evan Hollander, formerly with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, is joining Minnesota Democrat Rep. Betty McCollum's office as communications director.

SCOTUS HEARS VIRGINIA REDISTRICTING CASE. By Robert Barnes and Jenna Portnoy for the Washington Post, "The Supreme Court on Monday takes up a long-running political fight about whether Virginia lawmakers redrew the state's congressional map to protect the commonwealth's lone African American congressman - or to make sure he was not joined by a second. The court will consider whether Republican lawmakers packed African American voters into Democratic Rep. Robert C. "Bobby" Scott's district to comply with the Voting Rights Act or to make surrounding districts more hospitable to white candidates." http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=b34210c71d7e4047f1b2585c24447eb294c7acc2db2ac01b78319e1b4b6934b1

IT IS UNLIKELY BUT HERE ARE THE FEW WAYS GARLAND COULD SIT ON THE COURT. By the Washington Post's Amber Phillips, "We've said it before, and we'll say it again: President Obama's pick for the Supreme Court is very unlikely to get a hearing, much less to be confirmed, by the Republican-controlled Senate this year. But a few Republican senators have indicated they'd be willing to at least meet with Judge Merrick Garland -- and one, Sen. Mark Kirk (Ill.), has said he thinks Garland should get a vote. (Maine Sen. Susan Collins has called for a hearing.) There's a possibility, however remote, that more GOP senators could split with their party and endorse Garland's consideration."
http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=b34210c71d7e404764cee4bfef4d115377d0a0bd649e710e138c362a166867e1

CHASER: MCCONNELL SAYS NO LAME DUCK VOTE. David Cohen reports, "Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Sunday that he wouldn't consider holding a vote on Merrick Garland's nomination in a post-election congressional session even if a Democrat were to be elected president. McConnell (R-Ky.) had previously said he would not move on Garland's nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court - a hard-line stance he reaffirmed on multiple Sunday morning TV shows - but there had been speculation that Republicans in the Senate might relent after the November election, particularly if it were clear that another Democrat would be occupying the White House." http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=b34210c71d7e4047bc24031bcf9427e6952806b2b55ac53db7c7e68e9011cf9a

SOROS PAC WILL ENDORSE IN PRIMARY RACES. Jonathan Swan reports for the Hill, "A progressive Jewish political action committee with ties to the son of Democratic Party mega-donor George Soros is intervening in Senate races for the first time, endorsing Rep. Tammy Duckworth of Illinois and former Sen. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin. The endorsements from Bend the Arc Jewish Action PAC will involve fundraising support from the group, which makes direct payments to candidates running for office. It will also marshal what are known as "conduit" payments, linking its network of donors to the group's favored candidates. http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=b34210c71d7e40473d3f1076389722fc8b4ce27b4332cc671bec8fe1880acbbc

DATELINE HAVANA:

Obama's Cuba policy gains new allies: From Edward-Isaac Dovere, "The American political revolution on Cuba is already over. Donald Trump proudly declared he was fine with the Cuba reopening at the debate in Miami, and then went on to wallop the two candidates -both Cuban-American-who strongly opposed it in the Florida primary, just five days later. ("I don't agree with President Obama, I do agree something should take place," Trump said.) Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders both say they're on board without any qualification. The senator carrying the bill to lift the travel ban is a Republican; the congressman carrying the bill to lift the embargo is the guy who won Michele Bachmann's old
seat who says he disagrees with Obama on basically everything else. Most expect both will pass comfortably when they eventually get to the floor." http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=b34210c71d7e4047dbb17be7bb12e73f42c6351b591e97152d729a7ff8011e32

Obama's Cuban revolution: Also from Edward-Isaac, "President Barack Obama's trip to Cuba is a metaphor for his foreign policy and a potential glimpse into his post-presidency, all embodied in one landing here at José Martí International Airport on Sunday afternoon. With his decision to move toward normalized relations with the Castro regime, Obama forced a geopolitical transformation, a rare instance when a president can start and nearly finish so complete a change in foreign policy within his term in office. And he did it less with a pen and a phone than with a series of prods and the force of his personality. The Cuba reopening is a snapshot of Obama's approach the past
seven years: an analytic rethinking of America's interests and a pragmatism about how to achieve them, pursued despite political resistance and without much cooperation from Congress." http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=b34210c71d7e40471fcac599b66f6535b360c8e7a999c20cc0103cff64d03950

FRIDAY'S TRIVIA WINNER: Wyeth Ruthven was the first to correctly answer that James Rhodes was the last Republican to win the Ohio Presidential primary without going on to win the nomination in 1968.

TODAY'S TRIVIA: Our winner has today's question. On what date in 2008 did Barack Obama take the lead in total delegates, both pledged and unpledged combined? Email me at lfrench@politico.com.

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