Presumptuous Politics

Wednesday, October 26, 2016

Emails show Clinton camp scrambling over 2015 threat of Biden run

Newly revealed emails detail how Hillary Clinton's allies scrambled last year to head off a brewing presidential bid from Vice President Biden -- showing just how close he came to running and the role an ex-Biden aide played in the "demise" of that idea.
Biden was well-known to have considered challenging Clinton, the eventual Democratic presidential nominee, to be the party’s standard-bearer before taking himself out of the running a year ago.
However, the hacked emails of Clinton Campaign Chairman John Podesta that have been released by WikiLeaks pull back the curtain on how seriously Biden was planning for a campaign – and how seriously Clinton’s staffers took that threat.
BIDEN WISHES HE COULD TAKE TRUMP 'BEHIND THE GYM'
The first mention of a Biden run in the Podesta emails came on June 11, when former U.S. Ambassador to Hungary Eleni Kounalakis told Podesta that a wealthy Bay Area broker “swears Biden is running. He said he took him on Air Force Two, and he’s getting emails.”
Podesta then referenced the recent death of Biden's 46-year-old son Beau, who had cancer.
“Some speculation that Biden will run because of Beau’s loss,” Podesta wrote back. “I think that would be a little crazy and sad but you never know. I like him and grieve for him and hope he doesn’t do it for his sake.”
The Biden speculation jumped into high gear for Team Clinton after Maureen Dowd wrote an Aug. 1 column for The New York Times in which she said Beau, before he died, had pushed his dad to run for president. The column angered many in the Podesta-Clinton orbit, though it didn’t immediately seem to change the calculus.
“I think he’ll hang back unless she explodes and that won’t happen just because your friends at the [New York Times] wish it so,” Podesta wrote to CNBC’s John Harwood the same day the Dowd column came out.
But by mid-month, President of the Center for American Progress Neera Tanden emailed Podesta with news that a hedge fund manager reported “that Biden (or his people – unclear to me who) are calling asking for support. Not doing a hard sell.” Podesta indicated he had heard the development, as well.
Just days later, on Aug. 23, Podesta advised New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio about how to answer potential Biden questions, adding a pro-Clinton spin: “Great guy, serious, grieve with him on the loss of his son, he has to make up his own mind whether to run, no big clamor out there for additional candidates.” Podesta on Aug. 24 told an inquiring Harwood that he now was “not sure” if Biden was leaning toward running.
Biden’s campaign appeared to be gearing up by the end of the month, when, on Aug. 28, a former White House staffer informed Podesta that Democratic consultants out West were being calling by Biden’s Chief of Staff, Steve Ricchetti, asking them to be regional coordinators or consultants for a campaign.
On Sept. 2, Podesta emailed Tanden: “Heard he is now telling union Presidents he is running.”
At that point, Clinton aides seemed to go from information-gathering to a more pro-active approach.
Podesta told Clinton in a Sept. 21 email that he had lunch with President Obama and discussed Biden. He didn’t reveal via email “the color of the conversation,” preferring to speak on the phone. But he did tell Clinton the news was “Nothing that can’t wait.”
Podesta next moved to shoring up those already likely to support Clinton. He spoke to Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti and told top Clinton aide Huma Abedin on Sept. 23 that Garcetti “won’t commit until Biden is definitive. Probable outcome is he stays neutral followed closely by he endorses Biden.”
Podesta went directly to Clinton regarding ex-UBS CEO Robert Wolf.
“Most importantly, Biden is courting him hard,” Podesta wrote. “He has told Biden he is with you, but Biden has pushed him to reconsider if he gets in or at least stay open to that possibility. Because Robert is known as an Obama confidante, he would probably be seen as a bellwether of Obama’s preference and there is no question that Biden would market it that way if he were to defect. He’s not just one more Obama fundraiser. I think he believes you would be the better President so I think he’s solid, but not rock solid.”
Wolf emailed Podesta 10 days later providing him with an agenda for a meeting the two were scheduled to have. Item 3 is “VP Biden update.”
On Oct. 12 Podesta forwarded an email from a Chicago “super-volunteer” with updates on the area to a group that included Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook. Podesta noted Chicago is “probably a place Biden will try to play so we should pay some attention.”
It’s unclear what happened next, but, just three days later, the Biden threat appeared vanquished. Ron Klain, a former Biden chief of staff who is now an operative for the Clinton campaign, emailed Podesta with a cryptic note of thanks.
“It’s been a little hard for me to play such a role in the Biden demise – and I am definitely dead to them -- but I’m glad to be on Team HRC, and glad that she had a great debate last night,” Klain wrote.
Six days later, on Oct. 21, Biden, with Obama by his side, gave a news conference from the White House declaring he wouldn’t run.
Clinton, in a statement, said: “I am confident that history isn’t finished with Joe Biden.”

Numbers game: Trump battles media and polling establishment in insisting he can still win

Kurtz: Trump vs the 'phony polls'

Donald Trump, who loved to tout the polls when he was winning, is now accusing the media of pushing “phony polls.”
But even some of his own people aren’t backing him up.
Trump says he’s winning this election, even though most public polls show him losing nationally and in many of the key battleground states. The coverage is all about how big Hillary Clinton’s margin of victory will be and how she’s now turning her attention to helping Democratic congressional candidates. “Victory in Sight,” said a New York Times headline.
Here’s why it matters. Trump is right that if the country believes the race is essentially decided, some deflated Republican voters may stay home. (Of course, some Democrats may also stay home if an ultra-confident Clinton camp acts like this thing is in the bag.)
But for Trump’s allegations to be true, the surveys by New York Times/CBS, Wall Street Journal/NBC, Washington Post/ABC, Politico/Morning Consult, Fox News, CNN, Quinnipiac and others would have to be distorted.
There are three polls—L.A. Times, Rasmussen and IBD—that have given Trump a national lead of 1 to 3 points in recent days, or a virtual tie. So they would have to be right and the other surveys wrong.
All this plays into Trump’s broader argument about a crooked system. “When the people who control the political power in our society can rig investigations like [Clinton’s] investigation was rigged, can rig polls -- you see these phony polls -- and rig the media, they can wield absolute power over your life, your economy and your country and benefit big time by it,” he said the other day in Florida.
But his campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, has acknowledged her candidate is “behind” in the polls. Ed Rollins, head of a Trump Super PAC and a Fox News contributor, said yesterday that “if the election were today, he’d lose and lose big time…They know it.”
The Electoral College projections are more damaging for Trump. Fox’s map gives Clinton 307 electoral votes, more than the 270 she needs to win.
Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball gives Clinton 352 votes.
Nate Silver’s 538 gives Clinton 338.9 votes (I love the specificity).
And each new survey generates a new round of stories. Just yesterday, the New York Times said its poll had Trump trailing by 7 in North Carolina, without which it’s extremely difficult for him to win the White House. Another headline said, “Could Clinton Win Texas? Democrats Say Maybe.” (It’s still highly unlikely.)
“Florida Spirals Away from Trump,” says a Politico story, with Clinton leading there in 10 of the last 11 public polls.
Now some caveats are in order. Individual polls can be off. Democrats can be oversampled. Fewer people have land lines or want to spend time talking to pollsters. Trailing candidates can surge.
And outside events can intervene. The news that ObamaCare premiums will rise an average of 25 percent, and that consumers are being left with fewer insurance options, gives a strong argument to Trump and other critics of the federal program.
Are such issues enough to change the dynamic of what is now a two-week campaign, with the conventions and debates behind us? It’s an uphill climb for Trump.
And by the way, many trailing candidates in both parties, in an effort to fire up their base, question the polls or declare that the only poll that counts is on Election Day (a little less true in this age of early voting).
The difference is that Trump is saying the majority of polls aren’t just wrong but deliberately off base.
And he has a receptive audience. In a Reuters survey, almost 70 percent of Republicans said a Hillary win would be the result of rigged voting or voter fraud. In an ABC poll, 84 percent of Trump supporters say the same. (That is, if these polls can be believed.)
Whether Trump is trying to shake up the race or give himself a post-defeat rationale, he’s made the media’s polling—usually taken for granted as a rough barometer of public sentiment—a major issue in the home stretch.
Howard Kurtz is a Fox News analyst and the host of "MediaBuzz" (Sundays 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. ET). He is the author of five books and is based in Washington. Follow him at @HowardKurtz. Click here for more information on Howard Kurtz.

Trump cuts off fundraising events for Republican Party

Trump frustrated by lack of support from GOP establishment?

Donald Trump's campaign has ended fundraising events meant to support the Republican Party's get-out-the-vote efforts in next month's elections.
Aides to the Republican nominee told Fox News that Trump Victory, the joint fundraising committee for the GOP and the campaign, held its most recent fundraiser on Oct. 19 and no more such events were scheduled.
The move, which was first reported by The Washington Post, cuts off a key money source for Republicans hoping to keep hold of both houses of Congress.
"We’ve kind of wound down," Trump national finance chairman Steven Mnuchin told the Post. "But the online fundraising continues to be strong."
By contrast, the Post reported that Democrat Hillary Clinton's campaign has scheduled 41 fundraising events between now and Nov. 4. The former secretary of state was scheduled to make her last personal fundraising appearance Tuesday in Miami.
Mnuchin told the paper that the real estate mogul was focusing on making his final pitch to the voters at a campaign events rather than raising money in the final two weeks of the race.
"We have minimized his fundraising schedule over the last month to emphasize his focus on political [events]," Mnuchin said of the candidate. "Unlike Hillary, who has been fundraising and not out and about, he has constantly been out and about."
According to the Post, the Republican National Committee had collected $40 million through Trump Victory as of Sept. 30.
RNC spokeswoman Lindsay Walters said the organization "[continues] to fundraise for the entire GOP ticket."
Meanwhile, Politico reported Tuesday that the Senate Leadership Fund, a Super PAC with ties to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., was putting $25 million into seven Senate races deemed crucial in determining the balance of power on Capitol hill.

Tuesday, October 25, 2016

Hillary like Nixon Cartoons

Republicans pounce on Obamacare after White House announcement

The unravelling of Obamacare

Republicans blasted the White House on Monday after President Barack Obama’s administration announced that premiums for his signature health care law will rise sharply next year and many consumers would be down to just one insurer.
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, while campaigning in Tampa, Fla., emphatically declared Obamacare “over.”
Trump added that his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, "wants to double down and make it more expensive and it's not gonna work. ... Our country can't afford it, you can't afford it." He promised his own plan would deliver "great health care at a fraction of the cost."
Trump’s running mate Indiana Gov. Mike Pence echoed his partner’s words, saying on Twitter “Higher premiums, less competition & fewer choices lie ahead for Obamacare. Hillary Clinton wants more of the same.”
Before taxpayer-provided subsidies, premiums for a midlevel benchmark plan will increase an average of 25 percent across the 39 states served by the federally run online market, according to a report from the Department of Health and Human Services. Some states will see much bigger jumps, others less.
Moreover, about 1 in 5 consumers will only have plans from a single insurer to pick from, after major national carriers such as UnitedHealth Group, Humana and Aetna scaled back their roles.
"Consumers will be faced this year with not only big premium increases but also with a declining number of insurers participating, and that will lead to a tumultuous open enrollment period," said Larry Levitt, who tracks the health care law for the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation.
Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., accused Democrats of only wanting to double-down on Obamacare instead of fix it and vowed that Republicans would “replace it with real, patient-centered solutions that fit your needs and your budget.”
“The president recently compared Obamacare to a Samsung Galaxy Note 7, and he's right: this disastrous law is blowing up. But at least you can return the phone,” Ryan added.
Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., urged the White House to admit that the health care law wasn’t working.
"We’ve reached this point because Obamacare is built on the lie that Washington’s bureaucrats are smart enough to plan health care for millions of Americans. At every turn—whether it’s CO-OPs collapsing, premiums skyrocketing, or big insurers bailing—the American people have paid the price. More spin won’t solve this—it’s time for the White House to admit that this law isn’t working."
HHS essentially confirmed state-by-state reports that have been coming in for months. Window shopping for plans and premiums is already available through HealthCare.gov.
Administration officials are stressing that subsidies provided under the law, which are designed to rise alongside premiums, will insulate most customers from sticker shock. They add that consumers who are willing to switch to cheaper plans will still be able to find bargains.

More on this...

"Headline rates are generally rising faster than in previous years," acknowledged HHS spokesman Kevin Griffis. But he added that for most consumers, "headline rates are not what they pay."
The vast majority of the more than 10 million customers who purchase through HealthCare.gov and its state-run counterparts do receive generous financial assistance. "Enrollment is concentrated among very low-income individuals who receive significant government subsidies to reduce premiums and cost-sharing," said Caroline Pearson of the consulting firm Avalere Health
But an estimated 5 million to 7 million people are either not eligible for the income-based assistance, or they buy individual policies outside of the health law's markets, where the subsidies are not available. The administration is urging the latter group to check out HealthCare.gov. The spike in premiums generally does not affect the employer-provided plans that cover most workers and their families.
Overall, it's shaping up to be the most difficult sign-up season since HealthCare.gov launched in 2013 and the computer system froze up.
Enrollment has been lower than initially projected, and insurers say patients turned out to be sicker than expected. Moreover, a complex internal system to help stabilize premiums has not worked as hoped for.

Early voting suggests tight race in key states despite Clinton camp boast

Hillary Clinton’s campaign is touting some “eye-popping” advantages in early voting, in an apparent effort to energize Democratic voters, but preliminary figures suggest the race remains tighter than her aides acknowledge.
The preliminary numbers appear to show Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee, with an edge in several of the roughly 10 battleground states that will decide the 2016 White House race.
“We're seeing eye-popping vote-by-mail application numbers,” Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook said on “Fox News Sunday.”
In Arizona and North Carolina, for example, more registered Democrats than Republicans have indeed cast early ballots.
But such numbers are open to interpretation, including how many Democrats in those two states voted for Clinton.
Meanwhile, early data shows Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump with potential advantages of his own in battleground states Florida, Ohio and elsewhere.
Only some of the 37 states that allow early voting make public the number of registered Democrats and Republicans who requested early ballots and voted early, so final numbers won’t be known until Election Day.
Still, the Clinton campaign seemed bolstered in recent days by mail-in balloting in battleground Florida, where in-person voting started Monday in a majority of counties.
Early Florida numbers showed about an equal number of Democrats and Republicans had requested a record 3.1 million early ballots, compared with 2008 when Republicans led 49-to-32 percent and President Obama still won the state.
However, registered Republicans now have a slight lead -- 1.8 percentage points -- in the nearly 1 million ballots received by Friday.
Trump, on a swing through Florida on Monday, made another push for supporters to cast their votes now.
“You got to get out there. Who’s voted already?” Trump asked a cheering crowd in St. Augustine. “If you’re not feeling well on Nov. 8, we don’t want to take a chance.”
Clinton said in battleground North Carolina on Sunday: “From now until Nov. 5, you can vote early. It’s a big deal. You get to vote today, right after this event.”
Mook also pointed out Sunday that in Nevada, officials saw a “record turnout” in Democratic stronghold Clark County, which includes Las Vegas.
However, Trump has throughout the campaign appeared to have the support of some potential crossover voters, including Latino immigrants who back his tough message on illegal immigration.
A recent CNN/ORC poll, for example, found 33 percent of registered Latino voters in Nevada support Trump, compared to 54 percent for Clinton.
The Clinton campaign declined Monday to provide details on the states to which Mook and vice-presidential nominee Tim Kaine referred Sunday.
Kaine told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the campaign “like(s) the early voting activity and the absentee-ballot requests coming in.”
Kendra Stewart, College of Charleston political science professor, said Monday that Kaine and Mook are “doing exactly what they should be doing by trying to use this as an opportunity to create enthusiasm within the party in the hopes of a bandwagon effect.”
However, she cautioned about the effort perhaps “leaving some Democratic voters less motivated to vote if they feel like their candidate doesn’t really need them” and giving the Trump campaign the opportunity to use the underdog strategy to try to rally supporters to get out and vote.
Elliott Fullmer, a Randolph-Macon College political science professor, suggested either camp could play up select early-vote trends.
“I don’t think it would be a surprise for a campaign to think any positive momentum would play well,” Fullmer said Monday. “And the more they can discuss an advantage in early voting, they will.”
According to the University of Florida’s U.S. Elections Project, roughly 6 million Americans have already cast early votes, which do not include absentee ballots.
More than 46 million people are expected to vote before Election Day -- or as much as 40 percent of all votes cast.
The District of Columbia also allows early voting. Included in the 37 states that allow early voting are Colorado, Oregon and Washington, which have only mail-in balloting.
Clinton holds a 6 percentage point lead over Trump in national polls, according to the RealClearPolitcs average.
Clinton -- who has been the frontrunner for the entire race -- also has leads in battlegrounds states New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Virginia.
Trump leads in battlegrounds Georgia, Iowa, Missouri and Ohio.
Though neither Georgia nor Ohio break down early balloting by party affiliation, Trump appears to have an advantage in both states.
In Ohio, such requests are down 10 percent among black voters, who in recent decades have tended to vote for Democrats. And requests among Ohio’s increasing white population, a voting bloc in which Trump appears to do well, is up 3 percentage points, to 91 percent.
In Georgia, ballot requests and returns among black voters trail 2012 levels.

Republicans banking on carefully built House firewall

A map of an average congressional district would be - if one could channel the Founders’ intention - a fairly straightforward geometrical thing. But politics has distorted the geometry of modern congressional districts in a big way.
"Goofy kicking Donald Duck," is how one observer described a map of Pennsylvania's 7th congressional district - just one of several gerrymandered districts that Republicans are pinning their hopes on as a firewall against a Democratic run on November 8.
Having lost the White House and Congress in 2008, Republicans undertook a complex plan to win control of state legislatures around the country in the 2010 mid-terms. The first step was redrawing congressional districts.
Christopher Jankowski, a GOP strategist and former Executive Director of "Red Map," was one of the architects of the plan.
"The GOP has a built-in advantage from 2010 that continues to pay dividends and that advantage is going to prevent the House from flipping, certainly this year," he told Fox News.
In 37 of the 50 states, it is the legislature's role to draw congressional districts based upon population shifts recorded by the once-in-a-decade census. In those states, the party that controls the legislature can shape congressional districts in whatever way it sees fit, no matter how geometrically or geographically challenged they may appear.
North Carolina's 12th District is another case in point. That state's Republican-controlled legislature redrew the 12th into an amorphous shape that straddles and roughly parallels Interstate 85. The district is not much wider than the highway itself in some areas. One critic quipped, "You could drive down I-85 with both doors open and kill everybody in the 12th District."
But the bizarre shape effectively consolidated a big chunk of the state’s minority population into one district - ensuring minority representation in Congress, but also helping white, conservative GOP candidates in adjacent districts to win races by big margins - virtually guaranteeing their re-election through several cycles.
In Michigan’s 7th District, GOP redistricting sealed Democrat Mark Schauer's fate as a one-term congressman. "They drew a seat they expected to win and sort of took me out of the picture, just like they did with dozens, literally dozens of people just like me around the Congress," he told Fox News.
Schauer didn’t get mad over his loss, but he got even. He is now heavily involved with a super PAC, Advantage 2020, which is helping Democrats try to retake control of state legislatures before the 2020 census. Schauer has plenty of company.
In a swing through the West last week, President Obama told a Las Vegas crowd, "We gotta have more Democratic members of Congress in the House of Representatives."
To that end, the President is working with former Attorney General Eric Holder to develop the National Democratic Redistricting Committee to do what Republicans did in 2010 - take back the House and the statehouses and to preserve what they hope to win.

Top adviser on Clinton Wall Street speeches: 'It's pretty bad'

A veteran and trusted Hillary Clinton adviser ripped the Democratic presidential nominee after seeing transcripts of post-State Department speeches Clinton gave discussing Wall Street, ObamaCare and Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to emails released by WikiLeaks.
Mandy Grunwald, an adviser to Clinton’s current White House bid, offered a particularly frank assessment on Jan. 23 after seeing the text of three speeches given to Goldman Sachs in 2013.
“It’s pretty bad,” Grunwald wrote to a cadre of top Clinton aides. “She is critical to some extent of what led to the crash but the more memorable stuff is totally accomodationist.”
Grunwald cited Clinton saying the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory legislation was enacted because “people needed to do something for political reasons” and claiming “I’m not interested in pointing fingers.”
Grunwald has been in the Clinton orbit since 1992 when she was director of advertising for Bill Clinton’s presidential campaign. Grunwald remained a close adviser to Hillary after that election and later worked as head of campaign media relations on her failed 2008 presidential bid.
The email, uncovered in Monday’s WikiLeaks dump of emails hacked from Clinton Campaign Chairman John Podesta, came as Clinton was battling populist and uber-liberal challenger Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, a fierce critic of Wall Street. Grunwald may have also been especially sensitive to the language Clinton used since Grunwald worked on Elizabeth Warren’s successful Senate campaign in Massachusetts. Warren and Sanders arguably are the most vocal Wall Street critics on Capitol Hill.
EMAILS SHOW CLINTON PRAISED PUTIN DURING SPEECHES
During the primary campaign, Sanders repeatedly called for Clinton to release her post-State Department speeches. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has echoed that demand, though Clinton repeatedly has refused to do so.
Portions of the speeches, however, eventually were disclosed in a lengthy document citing remarks that could prove harmful to Clinton’s campaign. That file was contained in WikiLeaks releases.
But Grunwald's criticisms stretched beyond Clinton’s financial sector comments.
“There are also some very tepid comments about Obamacare,” she wrote. “And a ton of foreign policy stuff, including some naïve sounding comments about Putin – that could cause a whole separate set of issues – but [aide] Jake [Sullivan] should review all that.”
Clinton has been particularly critical throughout the general election of Trump’s praise of Putin and views on Russia. But the Goldman Sachs speeches show that Clinton could also be cordial with the former KGB operative.
“I would love it if we could continue to build a more positive relationship with Russia,” Clinton said during a June 4, 2013 speech at Goldman Sachs’ IBD Ceo Annual Conference.
During the same speech she said: “We would very much like to have a positive relationship with Russia and we would like to see Putin be less defensive toward a relationship with the United States so that we could work together on some issues.”