The Hill’s Morning Report — Biden, Harris hit themes of race, rights, economy

by Alexis Simendinger and Kristina Karisch - 07/25/23 6:41 AM ET

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As Congress prepares to head home at the end of the week for its August recess, the White House is ready to step into the spotlight.

Lawmakers will end their session with major spending bills still in limbo ahead of the Sept. 30 government funding deadline, and President Biden on Monday added a further challenge when he threatened to veto a proposed spending bill for military construction and veterans’ affairs, arguing that House Republicans are pursuing a partisan spending proposal that deviates from an agreement struck during debt ceiling talks. In a separate statement, the administration said Biden would veto a proposed agriculture spending bill, citing similar concerns that it contained deeper cuts than were agreed upon earlier this year.

“House Republicans had an opportunity to engage in a productive, bipartisan appropriations process, but instead, with just over two months before the end of the fiscal year, are wasting time with partisan bills that cut domestic spending to levels well below the [Fiscal Responsibility Act] agreement and endanger critical services for the American people,” the White House said in a statement of administration policy.

The compromise agreement reached between Biden and Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) was intended, the White House said, to protect “vital programs” from “draconian” cuts House Republicans proposed (The Hill). Members of the House Freedom Caucus are seeking further cuts to this cycle’s spending bills, and House leadership has signaled that they will cut spending levels even further than the amount laid out by the Appropriations Committee. However, the Senate is pursuing its own funding bills with higher spending levels, so the bills House Republicans are considering are unlikely to be approved and are intended to stake out a negotiating position (Roll Call).

McCarthy threw a new punch at Biden on Monday night, suggesting that House Republicans may try to impeach him. “We’ve only followed where the information has taken us,” the Speaker told Fox News, referring to GOP investigations involving unsubstantiated accusations that Hunter Biden’s international business dealings roped in then-Vice President Biden. “This is rising to the level of impeachment inquiry, which provides Congress the strongest power to get the rest of the knowledge and information needed,” McCarthy told Sean Hannity (The Hill). House conservatives are pressuring McCarthy for a floor vote to try to expunge former President Trump’s impeachments.

▪ The Washington Post: The federal government could shut down in October. Here’s how and why.

▪ Politico: Senate aims to sidestep culture war land mines in race to pass defense bill.

Monday’s announcement marked an impassioned start to a major White House week that is set to highlight both Biden and Vice President Harris, who is leaning further into a typical vice-presidential role: that of a White House rapid responder. As The Hill’s Alex Gangitano and Brett Samuels report, when Tennessee Republicans moved to expel state Democratic lawmakers who protested at the state Capitol over gun violence, the White House sent Harris to Nashville to call out GOP tactics. And when Florida passed controversial new educational guidelines for how issues like slavery be taught in schools, it was Harris who was quickly on a flight to Jacksonville.

The vice president appears eager to step into the role as she and Biden prepare for what could be an intense, mudslinging 2024 campaign next year. But the role also comes with its risks, with polls consistently showing many Americans hold an unfavorable view of the first woman and person of color to serve as vice president — yet strategists say it could also be a good thing when it comes to her own political future.

“If you think about her political position, she’s thinking about Joe Biden being reelected and then she’s running four years from now,” said one strategist who has worked on Democratic campaigns. “So a role where she’s attacking Ron DeSantis, Trump and others is perfect because it gives her a lot of visibility with the base and the people who will be deciding the next nominee.”

Harris got another opportunity to amplify the White House message Monday, when she urged members of the largest Hispanic civil rights group in the country to stand against extremists at the UnidosUS 2023 annual conference in Chicago. Biden and Harris’s focus on race and civil rights stands in stark contrast to Republican candidates, who have minimized or sidestepped issues of race beyond their individual biographies.

Harris’s trip to the Windy City continued a monthlong series of events to gain the support of key Democratic groups, including Latino and Black voters. On the itinerary are a trip to Indianapolis to Delta Sigma Theta’s conference, three separate trips to Chicago, the NAACP conference in Boston this Friday and the Women’s Missionary Society of the African Methodist Episcopal Church in Orlando (Chicago Sun-Times and The Boston Globe).

Biden has a busy week: Today he and Harris will designate a national monument in honor of Emmett Till and his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley — both of whom served as catalysts for the civil rights movement. The new monument will be established across three locations in Illinois and Mississippi in an effort to protect places that tell Till’s story and reflect the activism of his mother, who was instrumental in telling the story about her son’s 1955 murder in Mississippi at age 14 (NPR).

The president will host Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni at the White House on Thursday (The Hill), and later that day will deliver remarks at the Truman Civil Rights Symposium at the National Archives. He is scheduled to visit Maine on Friday, where he will promote the administration’s “Bidenomics” campaign message (Portland Press Herald).

Related Articles

▪ The Associated Press: Hunter Biden will go before a judge Wednesday to formally strike a plea agreement with prosecutors on tax and gun charges.

▪ Insider: Hunter Biden sold his art to a Democratic donor later named by President Biden to an unpaid commission role.

▪ The Hill: Shuwanza Goff, Biden’s new White House legislative affairs director, is known for her productive working relationship across the aisle with House Republicans. Goff is the first Black woman to direct legislative affairs in the West Wing.

▪ The Hill: The House Oversight and Accountability Committee will hold a hearing Wednesday about “unidentified aerial phenomena,” or UAP, focusing on eyewitness accounts by U.S. military pilots describing aerial craft moving without identifiable technological means.

LEADING THE DAY

➤ POLITICS

© The Associated Press / Charlie Neibergall | Former President Trump in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, July 18.

Trump announced last week that he received an ominous “target” letter from the Justice Department, but possible federal indictments tied to the 2020 election remain shrouded in conjecture.

Special counsel Jack Smith has questioned numerous witnesses who have shared details from meetings with the former president in 2020 and election information he received. Legal experts suggest the government is interested in Trump’s state of mind, including what he was told privately about election security compared with conspiracy theories and misinformation about voter fraud he asserted publicly (CNN).

“Should [Trump] reasonably have known that there was no fraud and he lost?” said Elie Honig, a former federal prosecutor and CNN legal analyst, describing the prosecutorial angle. “Or does he have some sort of claim that he was acting in good faith, or acting on the reasonable advice of his advisers in contesting the election?”

“It’s one more piece of the larger, ‘[Trump] knew or should have known’ puzzle,’” Honig told CNN.

GOP senators who want to see a nominee other than Trump are worried that Smith is inadvertently helping the former president’s campaign with his investigation. Others suspect more purposeful strategies (The Hill).

Trump critic Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) on Monday called on GOP donors to consolidate around an alternative primary candidate who is not the former president and persuade “no-hope” rivals to abandon the presidential race by Feb. 26.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed Monday afternoon, the 2012 GOP presidential nominee issued what he sees as a warning: “Left to their own inclinations, expect several of the contenders to stay in the race for a long time. They will split the non-Trump vote, giving him the prize. A plurality is all that is needed for winner-take-all primaries.” Romney said the importance of his proposed February quit date is that it falls on the Monday following the Republican contests in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina. 

Amid the considerable legal suspense, the next event with potential to shake up the GOP contest is an Aug. 23 debate, possibly the last chance for some contenders to capture a standout moment to impress a large Fox News audience (The New York Times). Trump may be a no-show, and the complicated Republican National Committee rules mean some rivals won’t be invited.

Making the cut so far: DeSantis, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. Former Vice President Mike Pence has said his campaign is still working on assembling the required 40,000 individual donors. There are also polling thresholds the participants must meet.

The Hill’s Niall Stanage asks in his latest Memo why DeSantis appears stuck in recent polls if his campaign is so certain that his continued war on “wokeness” is persuasive with primary voters? 

Meanwhile, border clashes that DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott have been involved in this year took a new turn on Monday when the Biden administration sued the Lone Star State for what it says are unsafe and “unlawful” installations of floating barricades in the Rio Grande River that violate the Rivers and Harbors Act, plus mounds of razor wire erected at the border with Mexico (The Hill and KXAN).

The Justice Department last week gave Texas an ultimatum to remove the barricades, but Abbott responded in a letter to Biden that “Texas will fully utilize its constitutional authority to deal with the crisis you have caused.”

A group of 87 congressional Democrats on Friday sent a letter to the president, asking him to intervene. Led by Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas), the lawmakers expressed “profound concern” about Abbott’s border policies, known as Operation Lone Star (Politico). The letter cited reports of “barbaric” practices making the border areas “death traps for migrants,” and arguing that the border policies interfere in the federal enforcement of immigration laws and violate U.S.-Mexico border treaties.

More 2024 roundup: West Virginia Republican Gov. Jim Justice, a primary candidate for a Senate seat held by West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin, endorsed Trump for president Monday (The Hill). CNN reported last week that Trump had signaled he will endorse Justice for the Senate over GOP Rep. Alex Mooney. … Former Republican Sen. Kelly Ayotte announced Monday she will run in New Hampshire to try to succeed Gov. Chris Sununu (R), who is not seeking reelection next year. She lost a Senate seat in 2016 (WCVP). … Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has been accused of making racist and antisemitic comments, speaks at 8 p.m. about “fighting antisemitism and championing Israel” at the New York Society for Ethical Culture in New York City as part of the World Values Network’s presidential candidate series. … Here’s what to know about the battle over Alabama’s congressional maps (The Hill).  

IN FOCUS/SHARP TAKES

➤ INTERNATIONAL

© The Associated Press / Maya Alleruzzo | Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and lawmakers during a Monday session of the Knesset in Jerusalem.

Israeli citizens woke up to a divided country this morning following the Monday passage of a law that limits the Supreme Court’s ability to overturn decisions made by government ministers. The law marks the first stage of a wider and deeply contentious effort by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu government — the most right-wing and religiously conservative in Israeli history — to weaken the power of the judiciary. 

Conservative lawmakers passed the measure 64 to 0 following a chaotic debate, as opposition members walked out of the chamber to boycott a vote they had no chance of winning. Opposition activists said they had already asked the Supreme Court to review the law limiting its power, but a decision could take months, but the case would set up a crisis among the branches of the government. (The New York Times). Demonstrations against the law began early in the day, and police were seen dragging away protesters who had chained themselves to posts and blocked the road outside parliament. In a sign of the country’s divisions, sporadic clashes broke out overnight between the government’s critics and supporters (Reuters).

“It is unfortunate that the vote today took place with the slimmest possible majority,” the White House said in a Monday statement amid a widening rift between Netanyahu and Biden. “The United States will continue to support the efforts of President [Isaac] Herzog and other Israeli leaders as they seek to build a broader consensus through political dialogue.”

Former Israeli Supreme Court Justice Yoram Danziger told The Times of Israel he believes the government’s passage of the bill to limit court oversight “is a first and dangerous step towards Israel becoming a country on the verge of dictatorship.”

▪ The New York Times analysis: Netanyahu scored another victory, but at what price?

▪ The Washington Post: What’s next for Israel after Netanyahu’s judicial overhaul?

▪ Al Jazeera: In photos: Israelis protest as divisive law passed.

Sunday’s national election in Spain failed to produce a clear majority, with no political force commanding enough seats in parliament to form a government, which is likely to usher in prolonged coalition negotiations between large and smaller parties. And while Spain may be facing political gridlock and possibly a new election, the national ballot produced one result that will be welcomed across Europe: Vox, a far-right party aiming to get its hands on the levers of power, was thwarted. The mainstream conservative Popular Party won the election, but performed well below polling data that had forecast it could oust Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez (The Wall Street Journal and The Associated Press).

Politico EU: Sánchez’s tricky road to victory after the shock Spanish election result.

Ukrainian forces carried out a series of drone strikes in Moscow early Monday. An official from Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence, an arm of its Ministry of Defense, said the agency was responsible for the operation that Russia described as a “terrorist attack of the Kiev regime,” using the Russian spelling for Ukraine’s capital. Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s minister of Digital Transformation whose ministry oversees his country’s “Army of Drones” procurement plan, also claimed the attack and said there would be more strikes to come. The drones struck two nonresidential buildings in the Russian capital — including one near the Ministry of Defense headquarters — in Monday’s early hours, according to Russian authorities, who said they had “thwarted” the attack (CNN and Reuters).

The Russian military, meanwhile, unleashed new strikes on port infrastructure in southern Ukraine (The Associated Press).

▪ Politico EU: China secretly sends enough gear to Russia to equip an army.

▪ The Wall Street Journal: Who will control the Wagner Group’s empire of war and gold?

▪ Reuters: North Korea fires two missiles after a U.S. submarine arrives in South Korea.

▪ NBC News: Talks begin over the U.S. soldier detained in North Korea, the United Nations confirms.

▪ The New York Times: Iranian mothers choose exile for the sake of their daughters. Some have risked their lives to escape to Iraq or other nearby countries, where they have found havens to start over.

OPINION

■ Women, Wall Street and unfinished business, by Timothy L. O’Brien, columnist, Bloomberg Opinion.

■ Is Ron DeSantis the next Scott Walker? by Douglas E. Schoen, opinion contributor, The Hill.

WHERE AND WHEN

The House will convene at noon.

The Senate will meet at 3 p.m. to resume consideration of the National Defense Authorization Act. 

The president will receive the President’s Daily Brief at 10 a.m. Biden will sign a proclamation at noon to establish the Emmett Till and Mamie Till-Mobley National Monument in Illinois and Mississippi (The Associated Press). Biden will deliver remarks at 3 p.m. in the East Room about proposed new rules to push insurers to expand mental health coverage.

Vice President Harris at noon will speak at the White House during Biden’s national monument event.

The secretary of state is headed to Tonga where later this week he will dedicate a new U.S. Embassy in Nuku’alofa. The United States considers the Pacific island strategically important amid efforts by China to expand its influence across the Pacific (Reuters).

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen will meet at 1 p.m. with Jordanian Finance Minister Mohamad Al-Ississ in Washington.

First lady Jill Biden is in Paris where she will meet today with Brigitte Macron at the Élysée Palace. In the afternoon, she will attend and deliver remarks at the UNESCO flag-raising ceremony and participate in a meet-and-greet with UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay. The first lady this evening will attend a reception hosted by the U.S. ambassador to France, Denise Bauer.

The Federal Reserve begins a two-day meeting in Washington.

The White House daily press briefing is scheduled at 3:30 p.m.

ELSEWHERE

➤ ECONOMY

The Federal Reserve on Wednesday is widely expected to raise interest rates again. Why isn’t the central bank ready to declare victory over inflation? (The Wall Street Journal).

Everyone knows how the housing market has been affected by higher interest rates, inflationary pricing pressures and buyers and sellers who say they feel ensnared by the economic uncertainty. The Hill’s Adam Barnes takes a look at how the housing bottlenecks could be solved and how policymakers could play a part. 

Days before a contract expires between UPS and workers represented by the Teamsters, here are five key things to know, including sticking points. A strike could have major implications for the U.S. economy (The Hill).

Jobseekers are using a white fonting hack to try to hurdle past artificial intelligence (AI) resume filters. The concept is simple: Copy a list of relevant keywords or the job description itself, paste it in a résumé and change the font color to white. The hope is that AI bots or digital filters in applicant tracking systems read the white text and surface the résumé for human review. Because keywords are in white, the résumé will look normal to human reviewers (The Washington Post). 

THE CLOSER

© The Associated Press / J. Scott Applewhite | The late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in 2018 wore her “pegasus” collar, to be auctioned in September.

And finally … 🏛️ One of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s collars, which famously accessorized the late Supreme Court justice’s black robes, will be auctioned in September in Alexandria, Va. The adornment known as “Pegasus,” with its layered metal feathers, was a gift meant to symbolize strength. Ginsburg wore it during the court’s official 2018 photo. Some of the auction proceeds will go to the Ruth Bader Ginsburg Endowed Fund for Research in Civil Rights and Gender Equality of the American Bar Foundation, an organization founded in 1952 for which Ginsburg served many years as an officer and board member (WUSA9 and The New York Post).

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