Subject: Playbook PM: W.H. prepares for shutdown announcement
From: "Anna Palmer Jake Sherman Daniel Lippman" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2019 12:08:03 -0600
List-Id: <1376319.xt.local>

Presented by BP: Playbook is POLITICO's must-read briefing on what's driving the day                Jan 25, 2019 View in browser                   
 By Anna Palmer, Jake Sherman, Daniel Lippman, Eli Okun and Garrett Ross 
             
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OK, HERE IS WHAT WE KNOW ... 

-- PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP is planning on making an announcement this afternoon about the government shutdown -- they are prepping the Rose Garden. Washington is in such a weird state of paralysis that no one is certain what the president might say. One option on the table includes a short-term stopgap measure and negotiations during a short period of several weeks -- three weeks is what we've heard most often from sources. Again, this isn't final. Nothing is until the president utters it, and even then, it's subject to change, revision and alteration. The scoop, from Jake, Andrew Restuccia, Gabby Orr and Burgess Everett

-- F FOR EFFORT? ... THE IDEA OF A SHUTDOWN, according to the proponents who pushed Trump into this, is to cause pain, and thereby force the other party -- Democrats, in this instance -- to the negotiating table. The unambiguous verdict of this shutdown is that Republicans could not, in any way, force the Democrats to blink. Republicans blinked.

-- THE COMMISSION IDEA that we wrote about in this morning's edition is still being chattered about in the White House and on the Hill. We're pretty bearish on a "commission" -- it's the puntiest punt of them all. Hard to see it appeasing Trump's base who want the wall. And, the idea of negotiations between anyone besides the leadership is a bad idea based on lots of evidence.

-- THE FACT that LaGuardia -- the nation's 21st-busiest airport -- was shut down has ticked a lot of people off. Senators are definitely ready to end this thing. 

-- AS SOON AS THE PRESIDENT makes his preference known, the House and Senate can move quickly -- as long as he moves away from the "I'm-not-caving" and "I need $5.7-billion-for-the-wall" position that he's held until now. The House can pass this thing by voice vote, since most of its members are out of town. We assume the Senate can move quickly, too.

SPOTTED: REP. JIM JORDAN (R-OHIO) at DCA next to a LaGuardia "Flight closed" sign. Pic

HAPPY FRIDAY AFTERNOON! Roger Stone is out on a quarter-million-dollar bond, and said outside a Florida courthouse that he'll plead not guilty.

SKY WATCH ... BLOOMBERG'S MARY SCHLANGENSTEIN and ALAN LEVIN: "LaGuardia Inbound Flights Disrupted as FAA Crimped Amid Shutdown": "The Federal Aviation Administration temporarily halted flights into New York's LaGuardia Airport because of a shortage of air-traffic control staff, escalating the pressure on President Donald Trump and lawmakers to end the government shutdown.

"A lack of workers at an air-traffic control facility in the Washington area prompted the FAA to stop inbound flights to LaGuardia, one of the nation's busiest transportation hubs. While the delay program known as a ground stop was lifted at 10:37 a.m. Friday after an hour and 22 minutes, the disruption rippled through East Coast airports such as Newark Liberty International and Philadelphia." Bloomberg 

SIREN ... DARREN SAMUELSOHN, KYLE CHENEY and JOSH GERSTEIN: "Roger Stone arrested in Mueller investigation": "The seven-count indictment suggests Stone misled lawmakers on the committee about his efforts to communicate with Wikileaks and his contacts with the Trump campaign. It also alleges he attempted to intimidate another witness: radio host Randy Credico, who was in contact with Wikileaks head Julian Assange in 2016. ... 

"The Stone indictment marks Mueller's biggest move yet against a Trump associate on grounds that the person allegedly worked with Russian operatives to sabotage Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign in 2016.

"Mueller's 24-page indictment against Stone is replete with examples of alleged lies he told, some of them rather brazen. ... But perhaps the most politically damning and intriguing parts of the indictment are new details about alleged efforts by the Trump campaign and Trump backers to keep abreast of potential new disclosures from WikiLeaks, referred to as 'Organization 1' in the document." POLITICO ... The indictment ... 2-min. CNN video of his arrest

         
THE PRESIDENT RESPONDS -- @realDonaldTrump at 11:16 a.m.: "Greatest Witch Hunt in the History of our Country! NO COLLUSION! Border Coyotes, Drug Dealers and Human Traffickers are treated better. Who alerted CNN to be there?"

-- LET'S NIP THIS IN THE BUD ... CNN COMMUNICATIONS (@CNNPR): "CNN's ability to capture the arrest of Roger Stone was the result of determined reporting and interpreting clues revealed in the course of events. That's called journalism." CNN'S JEREMY HERB: "How CNN obtained video of the Roger Stone raid" ... Video

ABC'S JOHN SANTUCCI (@Santucci): "Statement from Trump legal team on Roger Stone -- Statement from Jay Sekulow, Counsel to the President: 'The indictment today does not allege Russian collusion by Roger Stone or anyone else. Rather, the indictment focuses on alleged false statements made to Congress.'"

STONE told reporters, "I would have been more than willing to surrender voluntarily. They terrorized my wife, my dogs. ... I will plead not guilty to these charges. I will defeat them in court. I believe this is a politically motivated investigation. ... I will not testify against the president. Because I would have to bear false witness against him."

   
MORE SHUTDOWN IMPACT -- STEPHANIE BEASLEY: "TSA screeners will get two weeks of back pay" 

-- BERNIE BECKER: "Thousands of recalled IRS workers aren't showing up": "The IRS called back 26,000 staffers to work without pay in a key division during the partial government shutdown, but less than half, around 12,000, actually reported by Tuesday, a Hill Democratic aide told POLITICO ... 

"The lack of manpower is showing up in the level of service the IRS is offering. So far this year, the IRS is only answering around a third of its calls, according to the Democratic aide, and the wait time is between 25 minutes and 40 minutes." POLITICO 

-- "'What a mess': Federal court cases go into deep freeze during shutdown," by Ben Lefebvre, Bruce Ritchie, Alex Guill&eacute;n and Paul Demko: "The freeze has already put major parts of the Trump agenda into limbo as government lawyers are no longer available to argue their legality. Whether the delay helps or hurts White House priorities varies case by case ... [T]he fate of Obamacare is now on hold after an appellate court halted its review of a lawsuit that could kill the entire 2010 health care law." POLITICO

-- AP'S COLLIN BINKLEY: "Colleges delay tuition, offer aid as shutdown hits students" 

INSIDE THE WHITE HOUSE ... NANCY COOK: "Mulvaney starts to draw ire as shutdown drags on"

THE LATEST IN VENEZUELA -- "U.S. diplomats hunker down in Venezuela Embassy amid standoff with Maduro," by WaPo's Mariana Zu&ntilde;iga, Anthony Faiola and Rachelle Krygier in Caracas: "The remaining officials from the U.S. Embassy in Venezuela hunkered down to await the consequences of disobeying an order by President Nicol&aacute;s Maduro to exit the country by Saturday - an act of defiance that the socialist government has previously suggested could lead to electricity and gas cuts at the American compound.

"Late Thursday, the State Department said it had ordered the departure of a number of embassy employees deemed nonessential and their families. They did not disclose how many, or when they would leave. The departure order was made on what a State Department spokesman said was its 'current assessment of the security situation in Venezuela.'" WaPo 

-- "Pence Pledged U.S. Backing Before Venezuela Opposition Leader's Move," by WSJ's Jessica Donati and Vivian Salama: "The night before Juan Guaid&oacute; declared himself interim president of Venezuela, the opposition leader received a phone call from Vice President Mike Pence. Mr. Pence pledged that the U.S. would back Mr. Guaid&oacute; if he seized the reins of government from Nicol&aacute;s Maduro by invoking a clause in the South American country's constitution, a senior administration official said.

"That late-night call set in motion a plan that had been developed in secret over the preceding several weeks, accompanied by talks between U.S. officials, allies, lawmakers and key Venezuelan opposition figures, including Mr. Guaid&oacute; himself. ... But the White House and other branches of the government struggled to see eye-to-eye. The plan stirred concern among some officials who feared it could stoke instability and endanger U.S. diplomats in Caracas." WSJ

         
ON THE WORLD STAGE -- WSJ'S SUNE ENGEL RASMUSSEN: "U.S. Navy Veteran Detained in Iran for Months on Private Complaint": "A U.S. Navy veteran who was arrested last year in Iran is being imprisoned over a private complaint, an Iranian prosecutor said Friday, months after he was detained on undisclosed charges in a move that has threatened to further strain already-fraught relations between Washington and Tehran." WSJ 

-- NYT'S DAVID KIRKPATRICK in Riyadh: "U.N. Execution Expert Will Investigate Khashoggi Killing" 

FOR YOUR RADAR -- NBC'S CAROL LEE and COURTNEY KUBE: "Green Beret charged with murder urges military to dismiss case": "Army Maj. Mathew L. Golsteyn, in a letter Friday to the commanding general of the U.S. Army Special Operations Aviation Command, wrote that the handling of his case has been 'a miscarriage of justice.' ... 

"Golsteyn is accused of fatally shooting an Afghan man, who he suspected was a bomb maker, on February 22, 2010, near Forward Operating base McQuery in Marjah, Afghanistan. ... [His] letter focuses on the way investigators used the account he provided during a CIA polygraph test when he was applying for a job with the spy agency in 2011." NBC

PLAYBOOK METRO SECTION -- WAPO'S NICK ANDERSON: "Johns Hopkins to buy Newseum building in D.C. as journalism museum plans to relocate": "Johns Hopkins University is buying the landmark Pennsylvania Avenue building that houses the Newseum in a $372.5 million deal announced Friday that will enable the struggling cultural institution devoted to news and the First Amendment to seek a new home in the Washington area.

"The Freedom Forum - the private foundation that created the Newseum and is its primary funder - said the museum will remain open at 555 Pennsylvania Ave. NW for the rest of the year. Then, assuming the deal wins regulatory approval, the university will take control of the property and prepare to move several graduate programs to a prime address in Washington." WaPo 

MEDIAWATCH -- Taegan Goddard, publisher of Political Wire, is launching a new site called ElectoralVoteMap.com to track the electoral map in 2020.

TV TONIGHT -- Bob Costa sits down with CBS' Margaret Brennan, NYT's Elisabeth Bumiller, The New Yorker's Osita Nwanevu and CNN's Jeff Zeleny on PBS' "Washington Week" at 8 p.m.

SPOTTED: Jeff Sessions and John Ashcroft having dinner at Ray's The Steaks in Arlington on Thursday night. ... Tucker Carlson at the bar at Prime Rib on Thursday night. ... Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) in first class on an American Airlines flight Thursday from Tallahassee to DCA after visiting areas affected by Hurricane Michael.

SPOTTED at an MPAA screening Thursday night of the new HBO documentary "Breslin and Hamill: Deadline Artists" (trailer): Margaret Brennan moderating a Q&A with directors Jonathan Alter, John Block and Steve McCarthy; Charles Rivkin, Sid Blumenthal, Lyndon Boozer, Margaret Carlson, Matt Cooper, Francesca Craig, Gloria Dittus, Todd Flournoy, Mandy Grunwald, John Henry, Jamie Kirchick, David Leiter and Tamera Luzzatto, Chris Liddell and Renee Harbers Liddell, Jay Newton Small, Sally Quinn, Steven Rattner and Maureen White and Marie Royce.

TRANSITION -- Jason Oxman will be CEO at the Information Technology Industry Council. He previously was CEO at the Electronic Transactions Association. ... Melanie Roussell Newman will be head of comms for Planned Parenthood Federation of America. She previously was head of comms for the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund.

WELCOME TO THE WORLD -- Michelle Fitzpatrick, a director of regulatory operations at Centene, and Dan Peterson welcomed Jackson "Jax" Thomas Peterson. Pic
               
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