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Presented by Delta Air Lines: Playbook is POLITICO's must-read briefing on what's driving the day Nov 12, 2018 View in browser
By Anna Palmer, Jake Sherman and Daniel Lippman

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DRIVING THE DAY
25 DAYS until a partial government shutdown. ... JUST 12 LEGISLATIVE DAYS until Dec. 7, when funding runs out for a chunk of the government.

PELOSI SKEPTICS' MAJOR PROBLEM ... RACHAEL BADE and JOHN BRESNAHAN: "'You can't beat somebody with nobody': Pelosi foes struggle to find a leader": "The House Democratic rebels trying to keep Nancy Pelosi from becoming speaker have a big problem: They can't seem to find someone to run against her.

"The naysayers claim they have the 15 to 20 votes it would take to block Pelosi on the House floor. But so far, no one's stepped up as an alternative, and it's unclear who might. Also unknown is whether that person would have a prayer against the experienced Pelosi, as flawed as her detractors say she is.

"Pelosi is acting like the next speaker already, and any effort to replace her faces immense obstacles without a viable alternative, said Democratic lawmakers and aides. 'In politics, nobody is perfect, including Nancy Pelosi. But the basic rule is you can't beat somebody with nobody,' said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), who backs the California Democrat. 'That's the problem with Nancy's skeptics.' ... In 2016, Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) waited almost two weeks after the GOP crushed House Democrats to declare his bid against her. ...

"'The idea that you can't beat someday with nobody isn't true when you have a minimum threshold to meet,' said Rep. Ed Perlmutter (D-Colo.), one of the organizers of the movement against Pelosi. 'We have a lot of great, diverse candidates from all across the caucus who would be fantastic as our next speaker - they just need the opportunity to rise up and step forward.'" POLITICO

-- REMEMBER: The internal House Democratic election is not until after Thanksgiving. Pelosi only needs half of the caucus then. The floor vote for speaker is Jan. 3 -- 52 days from now.

-- IT'S WORTH NOTING, THOUGH NOT ENTIRELY SURPRISING ... PELOSI got public endorsements during the Sunday shows from a trio of ranking members, who are all expected to be chairmen. REP. ELIJAH CUMMINGS, ranking member on the oversight panel, on ABC'S "THIS WEEK" said "She's got my vote ... She's a phenomenal speaker. ... And we now have all of these women coming into Congress it would be a damn shame that you replaced this fearless leader with a man."

-- REP. ADAM SCHIFF, ranking member on the intel panel, on NBC'S "MEET THE PRESS" called Pelosi the "strongest general that we have. We need the best tactician. We need the best organizer ... And that's her. There's no one else, honestly, that comes close."

-- REP. JERRY NADLER, ranking member of the judiciary committee, on ABC'S "THIS WEEK" described Pelosi as one of the "finest legislative craftsman of our time ... She most certainly has my support, I would do anything I can to make sure she's the speaker again."

ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE AISLE ... THE GOP CASH PROBLEM ... ALEX ISENSTADT: "'A 5-alarm fire': GOP desperate to match Dems' online ATM": "Mitch McConnell stood before a roomful of Republican donors on Wednesday night to thank them for their help in the midterms. But the Senate leader also issued a dire warning: Democrats had just thumped them in the all-important online donor game, and the GOP badly needs to catch up.

"The heart of the problem, McConnell said at the event at party headquarters on Capitol Hill, is ActBlue. The Democratic fundraising tool funneled over $700 million in small donations to House and Senate candidates over the course of the 2018 campaign. The GOP leader said Republicans were getting swamped in the hunt for online givers and that he'd charged his political team with coming up with a solution to enable them to compete in 2020.

"McConnell's push underscores the urgency confronting Republicans. In race after race, turbocharged liberal donors pumped cash into Democratic coffers - much of it through ActBlue, an easy-to-use site that allows givers to plug in their credit card information and send contributions to their candidate of choice with a click. Republicans have no such centralized fundraising platform." POLITICO

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NEW -- "Whitaker Dismissing Notion He'll Starve Mueller's Probe of Money," by Bloomberg's Chris Strohm: "Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker has told associates that the Justice Department under his leadership won't cut the budget for Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian election interference, said a person familiar with the matter.

"It's a signal that some of the worst fears that critics have about Whitaker's potential to interfere with Mueller's probe won't come true in the immediate aftermath of the former DOJ chief of staff being chosen to replace Attorney General Jeff Sessions." Bloomberg

FIRST PERSON - IOWA STATE SENATOR MATT MCCOY in POLITICO Magazine, "I Was the Subject of a Political 'Witch Hunt.' Matt Whitaker Directed It: Trump's interim pick for AG was part of an investigation that was covered in partisan fingerprints."

Good Monday morning. Veterans Day is observed today.

THE LATEST IN CALIFORNIA -- "Gov. Brown, fire-besieged California hit back at Trump over blame tweet," by Carla Marinucci and Angela Hart in Mather, Calif.: "California Gov. Jerry Brown, now seeking a 'major disaster declaration' from the White House to bolster the emergency response to three catastrophic wildfires, warned Sunday that those who deny climate change 'are definitely contributing to the tragedy' of what he predicted could be years of damaging firestorms due to rising temperatures and increased drought conditions in his state.

"Things like this will be part of our future ... things like this, and worse,' warned Brown at a Sunday press conference, flanked by fire and emergency officials delivering an update on three major fires still raging through the state which have killed 25 to date." POLITICO

TRUMP ON THE WORLD STAGE -- "In Paris, a relatively understated Trump finds he's still the center of the world's attention - and outrage," by WaPo's David Nakamura in Paris: "President Trump likes to throw Twitter bombs that explode in concentric circles of offensiveness. He delivers speeches that contain insults and falsehoods. He announces policies on a whim, some constitutionally questionable.

"But on a trip to Europe, the president hardly said a word - and he still managed to outrage at almost every turn. Aside from a critical tweet aimed at French President Emmanuel Macron when Trump landed in Paris late Friday - one based on an inaccurate newspaper summary of an interview Macron gave suggesting that he had called the United States a threat - Trump didn't throw any sharp elbows at his peers here.

"It was still all about him. In this case, it was because of the images. He looked uncomfortable and listless in a bilateral meeting with Macron, whose sinewy energy stood in stark contrast to Trump's downbeat expression as the French leader patted him on the thigh." WaPo

FOR JARED ... NYT'S DAVID HALBFINGER in JERUSALEM: "Deadly Gaza Raid by Israel Threatens Nascent Cease-Fire": "A covert Israeli operation in the Gaza Strip apparently went bad on Sunday, leaving at least seven Palestinians dead, including one senior Hamas military commander, and puncturing a nascent cease-fire with a flurry of airstrikes and rocket fire.

"An Israeli lieutenant colonel was killed and another officer was wounded in the action near Khan Younis, the first known Israeli ground incursion into Gaza since Operation Protective Edge, in July 2014, set off a seven-week war." NYT

2020 WATCH -- NATASHA KORECKI: "Lack of qualified operatives could hamstring 2020 Dems": "Sen. Cory Booker is personally calling political pros in Iowa, South Carolina and New Hampshire to staff a 2020 campaign. Gov. John Hickenlooper is in touch with D.C. operatives about his search for a communications expert. Sen. Elizabeth Warren was interviewing campaign advisers even before Tuesday's midterms.

"With a sprawling field of expected candidates and a limited pool of high-caliber operatives, a sprint is on among 2020 Democratic hopefuls for campaign managers, strategists, finance directors and field directors who can run a presidential campaign." POLITICO

-- THE EXPANDING FIELD: "Ojeda to run for president," by Natasha Korecki: "Richard Ojeda just lost his bid for West Virginia's 3rd Congressional District, but by Sunday evening he filed papers to run for president." POLITICO

2018 WATCH ... IN MISSISSIPPI -- "A senator from Mississippi joked about 'public hanging.' Her black opponent called it 'reprehensible,'" by WaPo's Michael Brice-Saddler: "Drawing cheers from a gaggle of supporters, the line appeared to be a throwaway one. 'If he invited me to a public hanging, I'd be on the front row,' Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss) is heard saying in a video posted to Twitter on Sunday morning. The full context of her comment was not immediately clear, but she faced swift backlash. Lamar White Jr., a journalist and blogger who tweeted the video, said in his tweet that Hyde-Smith made the remark while campaigning with a cattle rancher in Tupelo, ...

"She faces Democrat Mike Espy in a Nov. 27 runoff to determine who will serve the remaining two years of Cochran's term, as neither candidate was able to win more than 50 percent of the vote in the Nov. 6 special election, according to the Clarion Ledger." WaPo

IN FLORIDA -- "One Florida Woman's Saga to Make Sure Her Vote Isn't Thrown Out: Scenes from Broward County's messy vote count," by Mother Jones' Pema Levy.


COMING ATTRACTIONS -- "House Democrats to Probe Trump's Role in Hush Payments," by WSJ's Rebecca Ballhaus: "House Democrats, set to take over majority control next year, plan to probe President Trump's involvement in hush payments arranged during the 2016 campaign to two women alleging affairs, according to a Democratic aide on the House Oversight Committee. The aide said House Democrats have already begun probing the hush payments, including requesting records from the Trump Organization in September, and 'plan to dig in deeper' by examining Mr. Trump's role." WSJ

TRUMP'S MONDAY -- The president has nothing on his public schedule.

YOU'RE INVITED: ANNA and JAKE are sitting down Thursday at 5:30 p.m. for a "PLAYBOOK ELECTIONS: WHAT'S NEXT?" event, part of the POLITICO-AARP Deciders series. NADEAM ELSHAMI, former chief of staff for House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, now policy director at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck; JOSH HOLMES, former chief of staff to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, now president and founding partner of Cavalry LLC; and GREG STRIMPLE, president of GS Strategy Group, will be there to discuss. RSVP
PLAYBOOK READS


PHOTO DU JOUR: A vehicle drives through smoke from a wildfire near Pulga, Calif., on Sunday. | Noah Berger/AP Photo

FIRST FAMILY - "A White House Challenge: Balancing the Roles of the First Lady and First Daughter," by NYT's Maggie Haberman and Katie Rogers: "Like her father, [Ivanka] Trump is acutely aware of her news coverage: A rotating cast of White House aides have often tried to get her credit in the news media for issues she has worked on. Her meetings are often summarized by the White House press office and emailed to reporters, a move that is not routinely extended to other senior advisers to Mr. Trump." NYT

THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION -- "Borrowers Face Hazy Path as Program to Forgive Student Loans Stalls Under Betsy DeVos," by NYT's Stacy Cowley: "The students attended institutions with pragmatic names like the Minnesota School of Business and others whose branding evoked ivy-draped buildings and leafy quads, like Corinthian Colleges. Tens of thousands of them say they are alike in one respect: They were victims of fraud, left with useless degrees and crushing debts. Now the government program meant to forgive the federal loans of cheated students has all but stopped functioning.

"No Education Department employees are devoted full time to investigating borrowers' complaints, according to three people familiar with the agency's operations. Instead, the agency's staff has fought in court to reduce the amount of relief granted to some students and to halt a rule change intended to speed other claims along. That has left more than 100,000 claims for relief in limbo, according to the Education Department's most recent data." NYT


FOR YOUR RADAR -- "Saudis Close to Crown Prince Discussed Killing Other Enemies a Year Before Khashoggi's Death," by NYT's Mark Mazzetti, Ronen Bergman and David D. Kirkpatrick: "Top Saudi intelligence officials close to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman asked a small group of businessmen last year about using private companies to assassinate Iranian enemies of the kingdom, according to three people familiar with the discussions. ... Saudi officials have portrayed Mr. Khashoggi's death as a rogue killing ordered by an official who has since been fired.

"But that official, Maj. Gen. Ahmed al-Assiri, was present for a meeting in March 2017 in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, where the businessmen pitched a $2 billion plan to use private intelligence operatives to try to sabotage the Iranian economy. During the discussion ... General Assiri's top aides inquired about killing Qassim Suleimani, the leader of the Quds Force of Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps and a man considered a determined enemy of Saudi Arabia." NYT

-- "In North Korea, Missile Bases Suggest a Great Deception," by NYT's David E. Sanger and William J. Broad: "North Korea is moving ahead with its ballistic missile program at 16 hidden bases that have been identified in new commercial satellite images, a network long known to American intelligence agencies but left undiscussed as President Trump claims to have neutralized the North's nuclear threat.

"The satellite images suggest that the North has been engaged in a great deception: It has offered to dismantle a major launching site - a step it began, then halted - while continuing to make improvements at more than a dozen others that would bolster launches of conventional and nuclear warheads." NYT

VALLEY TALK - "Why Did Facebook Fire a Top Executive? Hint: It Had Something to Do With Trump," by WSJ's Kirsten Grind and Keach Hagey: "Facebook Inc. executive and virtual-reality wunderkind Palmer Luckey was a rising star of Silicon Valley when, at the height of the 2016 presidential contest, he donated $10,000 to an anti-Hillary Clinton group. His donation sparked a backlash from his colleagues.

"Six months later, he was out. Neither Facebook nor Mr. Luckey has ever said why he left the social-media giant. When testifying before Congress about data privacy earlier this year, Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg denied the departure had anything to do with politics. Mr. Luckey, it turns out, was put on leave, then fired, according to people familiar with the matter.

"More recently, he has told people the reason was his support for Donald Trump and the furor that his political beliefs sparked within Facebook and Silicon Valley, some of those people say. Internal Facebook emails suggest the matter was discussed at the highest levels of the company. In the fall of 2016, as unhappiness over the donation simmered, Facebook executives including Mr. Zuckerberg pressured Mr. Luckey to publicly voice support for libertarian candidate Gary Johnson, despite Mr. Luckey's yearslong support of Mr. Trump, according to people familiar with the conversations and internal emails viewed by The Wall Street Journal." WSJ

-- LUCKEY's full statement on the matter: "This is all in the past for me. My focus is on building my new defense technology company, Anduril. I believe the team that remains at Oculus is still the best in the VR industry, and I am rooting for them to succeed."
PLAYBOOKERS
SPOTTED: House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi attending a performance of the Kensington (Md.) Arts Theater's production of "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street" to see Em Lawrence (child of her former chief of staff, John) in the role of Tobias. Per a tipster: "At intermission, Pelosi signed autographs and posed for photos, here with director Craig Pertinati" - pic ... Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) at Bar Elena's trivia night last night. ... George and Laura Bush, Joe Biden, and Doug DeVos yesterday receiving the Liberty Medal in a ceremony at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia - pic ... Transcript of the Bushes' remarks

SPOTTED at the Veterans Day ceremony yesterday at Arlington National Cemetery: Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Labor Secretary Alex Acosta, DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, Elizabeth Dole, acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker and HHS Secretary Alex Azar (sitting together in box one), Heather Wilson, Jim Byrne, Brooks Tucker, Chris Syrek, Leah Le'Vell and Ashley Mocarski.

REMEMBERING TYRONE GAYLE -- Per a friend: "Tyrone Gayle would have turned 31 today. Over 600 friends and family members attended his memorial service Saturday, where speakers included his beloved wife, Beth Foster, close friends Miryam Lipper and Lily Adams, mentors Rodell Mollineau and Jennifer Palmieri, and former bosses Sen. Kamala Harris and Hillary Clinton."

ENGAGED -- Jesse Hunt, NRCC national press secretary, proposed to Kim Kaiser, assistant director of program management at Georgetown's McDonough School of Business. Pool report: "The couple met in 2014 when Jesse spotted Kim in their apartment building and pretended that he needed to borrow her vacuum as a ruse to talk to her." Pic ... Another pic

BIRTHDAY OF THE DAY: Ian Bremmer, president and founder of the Eurasia Group, is 49. How he's celebrating: "In Paris at the Peace Forum. Which isn't in itself festive. But my good buddy Kevin Rudd is there and we're playing hooky from official festivities to have an inappropriately celebratory dinner." Playbook Plus Q&A

BIRTHDAYS: Dr. Elena Allbritton ... Jeff Zients is 52 ... Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) is 69 ... USA Today's Nancy Trejos (hat tips: Tim Burger and Ben Chang) ... former Transportation Sec. Norm Mineta is 87 ... Stephanie Kotuby and Rhana Natour of "PBS NewsHour" (h/t Nick Massella) ... Facebook's Katie Harbath ... Rex Elsass ... Katie Stuntz ... Ryan Coyne, founder and CEO of Olympic Media, is 31 ... Mark SooHoo ... POLITICO's Bennett Richardson ... Jenn Ridder ... Luca Spinelli ... Steve Guest, RNC deputy rapid response director ... ThinkProgress' Kira Lerner ... Leo DiBenigno ... Dave Weinberg ... Kevin Gundersen is 37 ... David Lawrence ... Alex Brown ... Michelle Perry ... Kamal Marell ...
Jay Lumpkins ... Amber Cottle ... Vinny Minchillo ... Harlan Hill (h/t Josh Nass) ... Hassan Rouhani, president of Iran, is 7-0 ... Jeremy Skule, SVP and chief marketing officer at Nasdaq ...

... Ross Baird, founder of Village Capital (h/t Herbie Ziskend) ... Jessica Kahanek ... Maria Cardona, principal at Dewey Square Group ... Scott Beauchamp ... Josh Britton ... Patrick Hillmann (h/t Phil Elwood) ... Morley Winograd ... Alex Griswold of the Free Beacon ... Olivia Lange ... Pete DeAnna ... Eddie Mair is 53 ... Erica Sackin, director of political comms at Planned Parenthood ... Laura Mandy Mszar ... Carol Gluck ... Neal Shusterman is 56 ... Naomi Wolf is 56 ... Nina Brosh ... Jake Orta ... Crozer Connor ... Frank Mazza ... former Rep. Diane Watson (D-Calif.) is 85 ... Gina Hill ... Sheila O'Connell ... Mica Strother ... Pam Oatis (h/ts Teresa Vilmain)

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