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Presented by PhRMA: POLITICO's must-read briefing on what's driving the afternoon in Washington. | | | | |  | | By Eugene Daniels and Garrett Ross | | | | 
VP Kamala Harris is bringing on a new domestic policy adviser. | Susan Walsh/AP Photo | SCOOP — VP KAMALA HARRIS has tapped CARMEL MARTIN as her next domestic policy adviser. Martin is replacing ROHINI KOSOGLU, who left earlier this summer after serving with Harris since her Senate days. Martin was a senior advisor to the Biden campaign and is currently serving as the deputy director of the White House Domestic Policy Council. In an email to staff this morning, exclusively obtained by Playbook, Harris chief of staff LORRAINE VOLES told the team, “As you know, Rohini left big shoes to fill. Carmel is the woman to do just that. She is a self-described ‘policy wonk,’ and has enjoyed a successful career in politics and government.” Martin is already reviewing VP materials and will begin participating in team briefings before she joins the Harris office toward the end of the month, the email said.
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The midterm polling pendulum is swinging. But has it swung too far? | Elise Amendola/AP Photo | THE STATE OF THE POLLS — Midterm polling has been on quite a journey this year. Just months ago, the conventional wisdom and polls indicated that Democrats were in for a bruising November, with their prospects of holding the House and Senate seeming anywhere from merely dim to outright miniscule. Then, a shift: A combination of the super-charged public reaction to the Supreme Court’s seismic decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and a string of legislative victories for President JOE BIDEN seemed to flip the narrative, and Dems started clawing their way back up in the polls. But this week, there’s been quite a bit of buzz wondering if the polling pendulum has swung too far back in favor of Dems. And we’ve now hit Full Nate Saturation on the issue. In an analysis on Monday, NYT’s Nate Cohn surmised that , yes, the polling sirens are flashing again. “Democratic Senate candidates are outrunning expectations in the same places where the polls overestimated Mr. Biden in 2020 and Mrs. Clinton in 2016,” he wrote. The broad trend: “The more the polls overestimated Mr. Biden last time, the better Democrats seem to be doing relative to expectations. And conversely, Democrats are posting less impressive numbers in some of the states where the polls were fairly accurate two years ago, like Georgia.” Put more simply: “If you put this relationship on a chart … you see a consistent link between Democratic strength today and polling error two years ago.” This morning, FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver posted “something of a rebuttal,” though not necessarily to Cohn’s analysis, “but rather to the presumption I often see in discussion about polling that polling bias is predictable and necessarily favors Democrats.” Silver’s argument: “My contention is that while the polls could have another bad year, it’s hard to know right now whether that bias will benefit Democrats or Republicans. People’s guesses about this are often wrong. In 2014, for example, there was a lot of discussion about whether the polls would have a pro-Republican bias, as they did in 2012. But they turned out to have a pro-Democratic bias instead.” So, should we trust the polls? Well, here’s what Silver has to say: “Prepare for the polls to be wrong — in either direction.” Right on cue, the new NYT/Siena College poll is up today, and here’s the topline finding: “Even as they struggle to persuade voters that they should be trusted on the economy, Democrats remain unexpectedly competitive in the battle for Congress as the sprint to November’s midterm election begins.” The breakdown:
- Biden approval rating: The president’s mark has climbed up to 42%, including a 13-point bump among Democrats and 14-point increase among independents. Though NYT notes it is a rating “as weak as or weaker than the ratings of every president whose party went on to lose control of Congress in midterm elections, going back to 1978.”
- Generic congressional ballot: “Overall, 46 percent of registered voters say they back the Democratic candidate for Congress in their district, compared with 44 percent for Republicans — a difference well within the survey’s margin of error.”
- Bruise for Biden: “The poll’s findings also suggest that Mr. Biden’s legislative successes have done relatively little to boost his or his party’s credibility on economic issues.” The Inflation Reduction Act received only 36% approval, while many said they hadn’t even heard of it. And the admin’s student debt plan has 49% approval.
- Looking ahead to 2024: The poll found Biden with a 45-42% lead over Trump in a hypothetical presidential rematch in 2024.
And here’s a pair of interesting Pennsylvania polls, for good measure: — Steve Shepard writes in: Monmouth University is eschewing the typical horse-race polling for this election cycle, but their latest poll in Pennsylvania shows why Democrat JOSH SHAPIRO is the favorite in the open governor’s race against controversial Republican DOUG MASTRIANO. Nearly six-in-10 voters say they are unlikely to support Mastriano (including 45% who “definitely” won’t back him), while Shapiro’s favorable rating (55%) is perhaps the highest for any swing-state candidate you’ll see in this environment. See the Monmouth poll Related read: “Pennsylvania GOP gubernatorial nominee was registered to vote in N.J. until 2021,” by the New Jersey Globe’s David Wildstein — Trouble in Scranton? Former Trump appointee JIM BOGNET, the Republican who's challenging Rep. MATT CARTWRIGHT (D-Pa.), whose district includes Biden's hometown of Scranton, shared an internal poll with our colleague Holly Otterbein showing the race is a dead heat. Bognet is up 47.7% to 47.5% over Cartwright, according to the survey. The Democrat's own polling had him ahead by 6 points just a month ago. The poll was conducted by Cygnal from Sept. 6-8 with a sample size of 440 and a margin of error of +/- 4.46%. See the polling memo from Bognet’s campaign Good Friday afternoon.
| | | | A message from PhRMA: Did you know: 39% of insured Americans say they don’t understand what’s covered by their insurance. Health insurance coverage should be predictable and transparent, and insured Americans agree. Learn more from our latest Patient Experience Survey report. | | | BIDEN’S 2024 PLANNING — A cabal of Biden hands is “quietly building a 2024 campaign effort, with increasing discussions about who might manage the operation, potential themes and structure,” NBC’s Carol Lee, Mike Memoli, Peter Nicholas and Jonathan Allen report , citing nine(!) sources familiar. “The current plan is for a Biden re-election effort to rely heavily on the resources of the Democratic National Committee and only have a small campaign staff, a cost-saving configuration that follows the model of then-President BILL CLINTON’s re-election bid and dramatically differs from then-President BARACK OBAMA’s campaign.” PRESIDENTIAL PREVIEW — CBS released a preview clip of its sitdown with Biden for “60 Minutes” this Sunday in which they discuss the averted national railroad strike, which Biden said would have triggered “a real economic crisis.” Watch the 2-minute clip LIFE ON THE VINEYARD — WaPo’s Marissa Lang has an exceptionally timed look at the state of Martha’s Vineyard: “This is the part of Martha’s Vineyard most people never see. An island known for its opulence and natural beauty, a playground for presidents and celebrities, it is kept afloat by workers for whom America’s housing crisis is not an eventuality. It’s here. “Even before Florida Gov. RON DeSANTIS (R) this week made a political statement by sending two planes full of asylum seekers to the summer haven, the dearth of affordable housing on the Vineyard had pushed its year-round community to a breaking point. … This hollowing out is nothing new in cities like Los Angeles, New Orleans and Austin, where short-term rentals and investor home buyers have overtaken razor-thin housing markets and destabilized whole neighborhoods. But on an island where commuting means setting sail over temperamental waters, the Vineyard’s housing crisis is also an existential one.” MAR-A-LAGO FALLOUT WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT — AP’s Michael Balsamo digs into a mysterious document that appeared this week on the docket of the case for the FBI’s search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago compound. The premise was juicy: “The document purported to be from the U.S. Treasury Department, claimed that the agency had seized sensitive documents related to last month’s search at Mar-a-Lago and included a warrant ordering CNN to preserve ‘leaked tax records.’” But then the twist: “The document remained late Thursday on the court docket, but it is a clear fabrication. A review of dozens of court records and interviews by The Associated Press suggest the document originated with a serial forger behind bars at a federal prison complex in North Carolina. “The incident also suggests that the court clerk was easily tricked into believing it was real, landing the document on the public docket in the Mar-a-Lago search warrant case. It also highlights the vulnerability of the U.S. court system and raises questions about the court’s vetting of documents that purport to be official records.”
| | | | DON’T MISS - MILKEN INSTITUTE ASIA SUMMIT : Go inside the 9th annual Milken Institute Asia Summit, taking place from September 28-30, with a special edition of POLITICO’s Global Insider newsletter, featuring exclusive coverage and insights from this important gathering. Stay up to speed with daily updates from the summit, which brings together more than 1,200 of the world’s most influential leaders from business, government, finance, technology, and academia. Don’t miss out, subscribe today. | | | | | POLICY CORNER WHAT POLICY WONKS ARE READING — “Biden’s Income-Driven Repayment plan would turn student loans into untargeted grants,” by Brookings’ Adam Looney COURTING CRYPTO — “Treasury recommends exploring creation of a digital dollar,” AP COMING FOR CRYPTO — “Justice Department Forms National Network of Prosecutors Focused on Crypto Crime,” by WSJ’s Dustin Volz
| | | | A message from PhRMA:   New research examines how insured Americans navigate unclear and unaffordable insurance coverage. | | | TRUMP CARDS ET Q, BRUTE? — Trump has taken a turn toward “overtly embracing” the baseless QAnon conspiracy movement, “even as the number of frightening real-world events linked to it grows,” AP’s David Klepper and Ali Swenson report. “He’s published dozens of recent Q-related posts, in contrast to 2020, when he claimed that while he didn’t know much about QAnon, he couldn’t disprove its conspiracy theory.” What it looks like: “On Tuesday, using his Truth Social platform, the Republican former president reposted an image of himself wearing a Q lapel pin overlaid with the words ‘The Storm is Coming.’ In QAnon lore, the ‘storm’ refers to Trump’s final victory, when supposedly he will regain power and his opponents will be tried, and potentially executed, on live television.” HOST-AGE SITUATION — Parler, the social media app that launched to appeal to conservative users, is “restructuring to focus on providing services to online businesses at risk of being forced off the internet for controversial content,” WSJ’s Sarah Needleman writes. “The company, which itself was knocked offline after the U.S. Capitol riot last year, said it bought a cloud-services provider that will serve clients that want to be able to operate without being penalized because of political ideologies.” Here’s what CEO GEORGE FARMER told WSJ: “We want to become a business powering what I call the uncancellable economy. … We are not going to cancel people for their opinions.”
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SUBSCRIBE TODAY. | | | | | AMERICA AND THE WORLD PULLOUT FALLOUT — The U.S. and Suriname are in negotiations “to send the remaining Afghans held at a U.S. base in Kosovo to the tiny South American nation” after failing to meet the requirements for entry into the U.S., WSJ’s Jessica Donati reports. “The Suriname ambassador to the U.S. confirmed that talks with the U.S. were at a preliminary stage, and the country was considering whether to move forward.” ON THE GROUND AT GUANTÁNAMO — “At Millions Per Detainee, Guantánamo Prison Stuck in a Cycle of Costly Delays,” by NYT’s Carol Rosenberg: “When a brigadier general from the Michigan National Guard becomes the 21st commander of the detention mission later this year, he will inherit many of the same challenges as those who commanded before him: moldy, unsafe buildings; an outsize prison staff; and ailing, aging detainees, some still suffering the consequences of torture in C.I.A. prisons two decades ago.” THE NEW KING — “Charles’ history with US presidents: He’s met 10 of past 14,” AP PLAYBOOKERS OUT AND ABOUT — Former Romney 2012 campaign staff held a 10-year reunion on Thursday night at Jack Rose. The event featured surprise guests Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) and his wife Ann, as well as a video greeting from former VP nominee Paul Ryan. SPOTTED: Jamie and Matt Rhoades, Zac Moffatt, Abe Adams, Ryan Meerstein, Beth Myers, Russ Schriefer, Kelli and Will Ritter, Ashley O’Connor, Tim O’Toole, Lisa and Charlie Spies, Neil Newhouse, Jason McBride, Matt Gorman, Jill Barclay, Kristen Hoff, Katie and Rich Beeson, Evan Yost, Jon Adams and Matt Waldrip. — SPOTTED at European Union Ambassador Stavros Lambrinidis’ press cocktail reception at the EU Residence with performances by Suspicious Package and Picnic Theatre Company: Sam Feist, Carl Hulse, Josh Dawsey, Kate Sullivan, Matt Kaminski, Raquel Krähenbühl, Maria Belovas, Steve Rochlin, Christina Sevilla, Tim Burger, Tom Toles, Josh Meyer, Bryan Greene, Kimball Stroud, David White, Bruce Kieloch, Janet Donovan, Francesca Chambers, Jon Decker, Nadia Bilbassy-Charters, Sara Cook, Emily Lenzner, Hastie Afkhami, Chaitan Jain, Hugo Verges, Antonio Olivo, Chris Fowler and Bob Gerber. Pic … Another pic — SPOTTED at the HMH Foundation’s First Amendment Awards on Thursday night at the National Press Club honoring Amy Sohn, Joslyn Diffenbaugh, Manuel Duran, Dawn Wooten and Michael Bamberger: Neera Tanden, Wolf and Lynn Blitzer, Martha Raddatz, Lynn Sweet, Joe Crowley, Rep. Bill Foster (D-Ill.) , Steve Clemons, Gloria Dittus, Debra Lerner and Ed Cohen. MEDIA MOVE — Ruth Marcus has been named associate editor at WaPo. She previously was deputy editorial page editor. TRANSITIONS — Hannah Hughes is now director of operations for Rep. Glenn “GT” Thompson (R-Pa.). She most recently was director of scheduling and press assistant for Congressman Bob Gibbs (R-Ohio). … Shade Vaughn is now chief marketing and business development officer at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP. He most recently was chief growth and comms officer at Paul Hastings. … Bobby Panzenbeck is now a director at PR firm MikeWorldWide. He most recently was a director at DCI Group. ENGAGED — Alex Barker, an analyst at DoD, and Adrienne Shih, a senior staff editor at New York Times Opinion, got engaged on Sept. 5 at Book Hill Park in Georgetown, which overlooks the river and Virginia. The couple met in 2016 through mutual friends in NYC, stayed friends and started dating in 2019 when Alex moved to D.C. to start his master’s at Georgetown. Pic ... The ring WEDDING — Marcy Stech, director of portfolio comms at Emerson Collective and an alum of EMILY's List and Priorities USA, and Jeff Stephens, sustainability policy lead at HP Inc., got married on Saturday at Oldenburg House, right outside of Duluth, Minn., Stech’s hometown. The weekend included a pickup hockey game, ax throwing, a Stech family band performance, bonfires and ice cream instead of wedding cake. Matt Bevens and Tim Miller brought the house down as emcees. The couple met nine years ago after being set up on a blind date by mutual friends Caitlin Sullivan and Elliot Gillerman. Pic ... Another pic SPOTTED: Stephanie Schriock, Sasha Issenberg, Michael Falcone, Kate Hansen, Amy Dudley and Kip Wainscott, Kinsey Casey and Rick Siger, Meg Freshwater, Tony Lynn, Jordan Brooks and Brian Farnkoff, Jon Donenberg and Erica Andersen, Kaylie Hanson Long, Tyler Allard, Tyler Jameson and Jessica Wagstaff. WELCOME TO THE WORLD — Kelsey Snell, a congressional correspondent at NPR, and Brandon Wetherbee, founder of the online arts and culture magazine Recommend If You Like and host of the podcast “You, Me, Them, Everybody,” welcomed Cooper Clark Wetherbee on Wednesday. He came in at 7 lbs, 5 oz and 20.5 inches and joins big brother Daniel, 3. BONUS BIRTHDAY: Alekhya Tallapaka of Forbes Tate Partners
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