Playbook Deep Dive

Elaine Kamarck is a longtime member of the DNC’s rules committee, a scholar at Brookings, a former advisor to top Democrats such as Bill Clinton, Al Gore, and Walter Mondale; and author of “Primary Politics: Everything You Need to Know about How America Nominates Its Presidential Candidates.” On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Playbook co-author Eugene Daniels asks Kamarck all of your questions about how the Democratic Party would choose a new nominee should Joe Biden step aside. 

Topics include: How and when Joe Biden would go about dropping out; if his delegates can rebel against him if he doesn’t; whether or not he can choose a successor; how exactly an open convention would unfold in Chicago; and what she thinks the public’s reaction will be if the Democratic nominee for president is chosen by a handful of party insiders in smoke-filled back rooms.

Eugene Daniels is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Elaine Kamarck is a scholar at The Brookings Institution.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Utah Governor Spencer Cox is a longtime Trump critic who is known nationally for his work to depolarize American politics. 

This week, Cox easily defeated a far-right opponent in the Republican primary. So too did a slate of other Utah Republicans. While national Republicans continue to move in Trump’s direction, in Utah, the Romney faction of the GOP is still holding its own.

On this episode of Deep Dive, Cox joins host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to discuss Utah politics, as well as Cox’s disagreements with Trump; how he’s preparing to be cast as MAGA’s next boogeyman; what he thinks Trump’s other Republican critics, such as Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, get wrong; and why “disagreeing better” doesn’t mean giving up your most strongly held beliefs.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Spencer Cox is the governor of Utah.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Bob Bauer is President Joe Biden’s personal lawyer and was general counsel to both of Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns. But over the last three decades, he’s developed another specialty practice: playing the role of his candidate’s rival during debate prep.

Bauer has helped Democratic candidates prepare for debates by playing the likes of Bernie Sanders, Al Gore, and Donald Trump. He’s also been involved with efforts to reform the process and production of presidential debates themselves.

So with the first presidential debate less than one week away, and both Biden and Trump cramming to prepare for it, Bauer is joining the show to preview the event, as well as to discuss his new book, “The Unraveling: Reflections on Politics without Ethics and Democracy in Crisis”.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Bob Bauer is a lawyer for President Biden and a veteran Democratic debate coach. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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South Carolina Congressman Jim Clyburn is often considered the single most important person in helping Joe Biden win the Democratic nomination in 2020. Now, in 2024, Clyburn is one of Biden’s six campaign co-chairs. 

On this episode of Deep Dive, Clyburn joins host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to discuss: Biden’s weakness with Black and Latino voters; the rebellion on the left over Israel’s war in Gaza; the continued Democratic carping about the Biden campaign’s messaging; Biden’s dismal approval ratings; who will be the post-Biden leaders of the Democratic Party; what side he’s taking in that New York Democratic primary that’s pitting the likes of Hakeem Jeffries against Hillary Clinton; and more.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Jim Clyburn is a U.S. Congressman from South Carolina. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), one of President Joe Biden’s closest foreign policy advisors, gives his assessment of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s controversial upcoming address in front of Congress, the politics of the Hunter Biden trial, why Coons thinks the president’s executive order on asylum is hollow, how our allies around the world are bracing themselves for the coming election, what would happen if China invaded Taiwan in a Trump versus a Biden administration, and his honest assessment of what’s changed about Biden as he’s aged,.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Chris Coons is a U.S. senator from Delaware. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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POLITICO’s senior legal affairs reporter Kyle Cheney and legal columnist Ankush Khardori debrief on what happened at the Hush Money trial, how Trump’s team may have hurt its own case, and what their best plan is to win an appeal after Thursday’s massive guilty verdict. 

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Kyle Cheney is a senior legal affairs reporter for POLITICO.
Ankush Khardori is a columnist and senior writer for POLITICO Magazine.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) joins host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to discuss his entry into the Senate GOP leadership race to succeed Mitch McConnell. They discuss why Sen. Scott is running, what Donald Trump told him about his decision, his relationship with key Republicans such as McConnell and Susie Wiles, his policy agenda on foreign aid, abortion, entitlements, and Israel if he’s elected leader, Trump’s running mate choices, and the importance of having a purpose in life.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Rick Scott is the junior U.S. senator from Florida. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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On Wednesday morning, Frank Fahrenkopf received a letter from the Biden presidential campaign that ruined his day. Fahrenkopf is co-chair of the Commission on Presidential Debates, which has produced 33 debates since 1988, the first election year it was in business.

He was planning on four more this year: three with Biden and Trump as well as the quadrennial vice presidential debate. But the Biden campaign told Fahrenkopf that the president would not be participating in any of them.

Instead, the Biden campaign announced that it would negotiate with the Trump campaign and individual media organizations to plan two debates outside of the Commission’s process.

By the end of the day Biden and Trump were set to debate in June on CNN and in September on ABC.

On this episode of Deep Dive, Fahrenkopf joins host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to discuss the fall-out from this decision, including the roles of Biden, Trump, and Anita Dunn; why he thinks RFK Jr. may have grounds for a lawsuit against CNN and what some of his favorite behind-the-scenes stories are from his decades of producing debates. 

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Frank Fahrenkopf is the co-chair of the Commission on Presidential Debates. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Fresh off fending off a hard-right coup attempt, the House speaker opens up about his strategy and his future plans for the GOP Conference.

Topics in this lengthy interview include: Johnson’s victory over the GOP radicals; Israel; Ukraine; January 6th; the Trump trials; abortion; and his relationships with key Washington leaders, such as Joe Biden, Hakeem Jeffries, Kevin McCarthy and, of course, Donald Trump.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Rachael Bade is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Mike Johnson is the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Rep. Jerry Nadler, who has represented a big piece of Manhattan since 1992, is one of the longest-serving Jewish members of the House. 

He’s also a Columbia University alumnus: he was on campus in 1968 when police cleared Hamilton Hall of anti-Vietnam war protesters.

Nadler is a close observer of the Middle East and the politics of Israel in the U.S. And he’s the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, where he’s long seen himself as a champion of civil liberties.

All of this background helped put Nadler at the center of a swirl of events this week as pro-Palestinian protesters at Columbia were ejected from Hamilton Hall, as President Biden made his first public remarks about campus protests, as a ceasefire deal between Hamas and Israel seemed tantalizingly close and as the House passed, by an overwhelming majority of 320 to 91, the Antisemitism Awareness Act — a bill against which Nadler led the opposition.

On this week’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza talked talks with Nadler about all of this and about Trump’s interview in Time Magazine, the potential for disruption at the Democratic Convention in Chicago, the vote Nadler most regrets in his long career and the nature of truth.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Jerry Nadler is the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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The biggest movie in the country right now is about a civil war — in America.

If you see the film “Civil War” at a theater in downtown Washington, the scenes of the Lincoln Memorial exploding and the White House being attacked are jarring when you exit into the D.C. air. 

The movie is writer and director Alex Garland’s very in-your-face attempt to imagine the unimaginable in America — an authoritarian leader in the White House, intractable political differences being resolved through violence and the very specific horrors of modern warfare — urban fighting, refugee camps, mass atrocities, the collapse of the currency — all the things that we associate with stuff that can happen over there happening right here in the United States.

“Civil War” is also a movie about journalism.

It follows four reporters traveling from New York to Washington, D.C., via a circuitous route through Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Virginia. 

The movie takes on a lot of the weighty issues we talk about on shows like this one: media ethics, political polarization, disinformation polluting our media ecosystem and the potential threat from an autocratic leader.

Wagner Moura plays a hardened war correspondent addicted to the battlefield. He also provides some much needed levity in the movie.

Moura is best-known for his role as Pablo Escobar in “Narcos.” But he’s also a former journalist, a political activist and a writer and director himself. His 2019 movie “Marighella” about the coup and counter-revolution in Brazil in the 1960s incurred the wrath of then-president Jair Bolsonaro in Moura’s home country of Brazil. 

Deep Dive host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza talked with Moura on Thursday just as Washington’s annual White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner festivities were getting under way. It’s the time of year when the relationship between journalists, politicians and Hollywood is at its peak in this town. 

They had a fascinating conversation about how making a movie about a new civil war changed Moura’s own personal thinking about politics, how his experience with Bolsonaro in Brazil is a warning for Americans and the role of art in politics.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Wagner Moura is a star of A24's film "Civil War".
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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After months of delay, this week House Speaker Mike Johnson advanced his much awaited version of the Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan foreign aid package.

Standing between that legislation and the House floor: two very powerful committees. 

First, the House Appropriations Committee, which controls about a third of federal spending. And second, the Rules Committee, which controls access to the House floor, and which has become a problem for GOP leaders in this Congress.

Johnson needed to pick the lock on both of these committees. And there is one Member of Congress who has chaired them both. Not just in the past year — but in the past month: Oklahoma Republican Tom Cole.

Deep Dive host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza caught up with Cole on Thursday afternoon after he’d just testified in support of the foreign aid bill in front of his old committee. 

They got deep into the weeds of why the Rules Committee has been such a trouble spot for recent GOP speakers; and they discussed Johnson’s tenure so far and whether Cole thinks the Speaker can hang on as members threaten to oust him. 

Cole also previewed how he will run the Appropriations Committee, including how he’ll handle the controversial earmarks process. And Cole answered some prying questions from some of his favorite historians on the subject of Donald Trump.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Tom Cole is the chair of the House Appropriations committee. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Michael Cohen may be the only person standing between Donald Trump and jail. Three of Trump’s four criminal trials — the ones in Washington, Florida and Georgia — seem hopelessly stalled. But on this coming Monday in New York, the hush money case is set to begin.

Deep Dive guest and former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen is the star witness in the case. On this episode, he joins host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to discuss how he will defend the assault on his credibility at the trial, why Alvin Bragg’s case is stronger than analysts believe, the legal tactics he’s expecting from Trump’s team and whether he ever regrets breaking with Trump.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Michael Cohen is Donald Trump's former lawyer and fixer.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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On April 1, the Florida Supreme Court issued a pair of decisions on abortion that led the Biden campaign to declare that Florida, which Democrats have lost twice to Donald Trump, was now “winnable.”

The only problem with that? Some of Florida’s abortion rights advocates want the president to stay away. At issue is Amendment 4, a measure on November’s ballot that would enshrine abortion in the state constitution — and will also need Republican and independent votes to pass. 

On this episode of Deep Dive, Anna Hochkammer, the executive director of the Florida Women’s Freedom Coalition and one of the architects of Florida’s abortion ballot initiative, joins host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to discuss the delicate politics of building a bipartisan coalition around abortion rights in a red state like Florida.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Anna Hochkammer is the executive director of the Florida Women's Freedom Coalition. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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A year ago today, Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was arrested in Russia and charged with espionage, an allegation he and the Journal said was absurd. The State Department declared that Gershkovich was “wrongfully detained,” an official status that commits the Biden administration to work for his release.

Journal publisher Almar Latour has played a key role in the legal and diplomatic effort to free Gershkovich. On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza talks with Latour to learn the inside story of this effort. 

They discuss: how the shadow of basketball star Brittney Griner’s detainment in Russia is influencing talks to bring Evan home; why a Russian hitman serving a life sentence in Germany may be the key to unlocking a deal with Putin; and how the 2024 election may affect Gershkovich’s fate. 

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Almar Latour is CEO of Dow Jones and publisher of The Wall Street Journal.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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The politics of the Israel-Hamas war have become one of the most divisive issues in the Democratic Party. Mark Mellman, the president of Democratic Majority for Israel – and a longtime pollster – joins host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to get into the weeds on the new politics of Israel within the Democratic Party. 

Other subjects covered include the polling data behind Biden’s age, Trump’s hold on the GOP, double doubters, abortion, the fate of Nikki Haley voters, and whether you should bother paying attention to polls in the first place. 

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Mark Mellman is the president of Democratic Majority for Israel.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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TikTok, abortion, and IVF: three of the biggest issues in American politics right now and Kellyanne Conway is in the middle of all of them.  

Conway has been advising Donald Trump and Mike Pence for years and lately she’s best known for urging the GOP to leave TikTok alone and moderate the party’s message on reproductive rights.

On this episode of Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza has a spirited conversation with Conway at POLITICO’s Health Care Summit, where they recorded Deep Dive’s first-ever live show.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Kellyanne Conway is a GOP strategist and former Trump adviser. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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First ladies are among the most powerful advisers in any White House and Jill Biden is no exception. On this episode of Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza is joined by NYT White House correspondent Katie Rogers, who recently published  “American Woman: The Transformation of the Modern First Lady, from Hillary Clinton to Jill Biden,” an authoritative account of how this century’s first ladies have influenced the nation. 

Ryan and Katie discuss Jill Biden and Melania Trump’s roles in staffing, campaigning, and policy decisions; sensitive items from their times in the White House, such as Melania and Donald’s prenup; and whether or not Jill Biden has ever forgiven Kamala Harris for what she said about Joe in 2020. Additionally, Katie opened up about the time her editors at the New York Times sent her to Arkansas and forced her to report a story about the Bidens that she didn’t want to cover — and how it ended up forcing Jill and Joe to confront an uncomfortable truth about their family.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Katie Rogers is a White House correspondent for The New York Times. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Carlos Lozada is a columnist for The New York Times, and before that, the longtime nonfiction book critic for The Washington Post. 

In 2019, Lozada won the Pulitzer Prize for criticism for a series of pieces that judges described as “trenchant and searching reviews and essays that joined warm emotion and careful analysis in examining a broad range of books addressing government and the American experience.”

Well, he's now collected nearly a decade of such reviews in what he calls “The Washington Book: How to Read Politics and Politicians,” which was released this week. 

“If the art of politics can be to subtract meaning from language to produce more and more words that say less and less,” he writes, “then it is my purpose as a journalist to try to find that meaning and put it back.”

He reads a lot of books by politicians. As he likes to say, he reads all those books so that you don't have to. 

But he's found a way to use those books to say something interesting about those same politicians. 

So what does Carlos's close reading of the likes of Barack Obama, Donald Trump, Joe Biden, Mike Pence, Ron DeSantis and many others reveal about our politics in 2024?

It turns out quite a lot. On this week’s episode of Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza sits down with Carlos in POLITICO's offices to find out more.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Carlos Lozada is an opinion columnist and co-host of the weekly “Matter of Opinion” podcast for The New York Times. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) has a way of being in the middle of things, whether it’s standing up to Trump after Jan. 6 when many in her party kept quiet, helping overthrow House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, or warning Republicans about how they were wrong when it comes to the politics of abortion. 

But some of that drama is catching up with Mace back home in South Carolina, which on Saturday will be the center of the political world as voters head to the polls in the state’s presidential primary. Mace is now back in Trump’s corner and facing a primary which features not one but two candidates at least partly motivated by revenge: a candidate backed by McCarthy and Mace’s own former chief of staff.

On this episode of Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza talks to Rep. Mace about her on-again, off-again history with Trump; the revenge plots playing out in her primary; her prediction about Trump’s margin of victory on Saturday; and the backstory to that time she wore a giant scarlet “A” on the House floor.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Nancy Mace is the representative for South Carolina's 1st district. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.), the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, joins host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to discuss everything you might want to know about Russian space weapons, Section 702 reforms, and the behind-the-scenes action at the Intelligence Committee during a week of extraordinary volatility. 

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Jim Himes is the representative for Connecticut's 4th district. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) was the Democratic lead on the much anticipated bipartisan border legislation that was supposed to sail through the Senate and unlock funding for the war in Ukraine. But everything went sideways this week when Republicans, at Donald Trump’s insistence, abruptly turned against the bill. On this episode of Deep Dive, Sen. Murphy tells host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza what really happened behind the scenes in the negotiations that assembled the bill and how things unraveled so fast.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Sen. Chris Murphy is the junior senator from Connecticut.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Congresswoman Veronica Escobar (D-Texas) discusses the unique role she plays as one of President Joe Biden’s campaign co-chairs who is also opposed to some of the key policies he is pursuing on immigration and in the Middle East.  

On this episode, she tells Deep Dive host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza:

• Her views on Biden’s border policies and the senate bill 
• Her own ideas of what a winning immigration policy looks like 
• Her concerns about Biden’s policies in the Middle East — and what she fears is the potential political fallout for his re-election
• What might be on the agenda at the next secret meeting of Biden’s campaign co-chairs
• Whether she’d rather Biden run against Nikki Haley or Donald Trump

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Veronica Escobar is the representative for Texas's 16th district. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Mark Penn is best known for two things: his devotion to centrist politics and his former role as the top pollster and strategist for Bill and Hillary Clinton. Lately, he’s added a third: a barrage of polls that show a large majority of Americans are crying out for an alternative to Trump and Biden. 

On this episode of Deep Dive, he talks with host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza about his relationship (or lack thereof) with No Labels – a group promoting a third-party candidacy – the recent GOP primary results, his controversial polls, and why he thinks that Nikki Haley may still have a big role to play in this year’s election.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Mark Penn is the CEO of Stagwell and former Clinton strategist.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Joe McQuaid, the longtime publisher of The New Hampshire Union Leader – the 161-year old conservative paper that has operated like a Republican party boss for many decades – joins Deep Dive to tell host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza everything you need to know about Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary, including whether or not Nikki Haley can win, if she’ll get the Union Leader’s endorsement, and whether New Hampshire’s primacy in American politics has come to an end.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Joe McQuaid is the former publisher of The New Hampshire Union Leader.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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David Axelrod, the former top Obama strategist, has been offering some tough medicine to Joe Biden’s presidential campaign. In November, he suggested Biden think long and hard about running for reelection. He has been withering about Biden’s skills as a candidate and communicator. He is deeply concerned about the president’s age. And unlike other Democrats in the anti-bedwetting set, Axe has been clear that the party should be freaked out by the polls.  

On this episode of Deep Dive, he joins host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to discuss his critiques of the Biden operation, the parallels with 2012 when he led strategy for the Obama reelection, and what it’s like to be a critic of your own party when most partisans these days are expected to mouth the party line.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
David Axelrod is a Democratic political strategist and a CNN senior political commentator.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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As the Iowa caucuses near, Playbook’s Ryan Lizza and POLITICO Politics Bureau Chief Jonathan Martin go deep on what we know – and what we’ll soon find out – about Joe Biden, Donald Trump, Nikki Haley, and Ron DeSantis’ campaigns.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Jonathan Martin is politics bureau chief for POLITICO.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Arthur Brooks ran the American Enterprise Institute for more than a decade. Now, he’s a fulltime happiness scientist. Here’s his guide to making it in Washington without sacrificing your humanity.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Arthur Brooks is the Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor of the Practice of Nonprofit and Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School and the author of "Build the Life You Want: The Art and Science of Getting Happier".
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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A week of new developments in impeachment, Donald Trump’s D.C. case, and Hunter Biden’s congressional inquiry showcased how the collision of law and politics will determine much of Republicans’ and Democrats’ political fortunes in 2024. POLITICO legal editor James Romoser and national correspondent Betsy Woodruff Swan join to discuss the implications.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
James Romoser is the legal editor for POLITICO.
Betsy Woodruff Swan is a national correspondent for POLITICO.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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The GOP’s lead negotiator on the embattled Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan, and border security supplemental believes that a compromise will happen. But do his Democratic colleagues in the Senate and his fellow Republicans in the House agree?

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
James Lankford is the senior U.S. senator from Oklahoma.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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House Majority Leader Steve Scalise illuminates what happened behind closed doors after Kevin McCarthy’s ousting as well as what to expect next on impeachment; why he will vote against expelling George Santos; and how Speaker Mike Johnson is trying to use immigration to tame hardliners when it comes to the spending showdown with Joe Biden.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Steve Scalise is the House Majority Leader. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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John Judis and Ruy Teixeira, co-authors of “The Emerging Democratic Majority,” are back with a new book that argues that the Democrats are imperiled by a “shadow party” that is forcing them into “radical” positions on cultural issues and diverting them away from their core economic issues. 

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
John Judis  is editor at large at Talking Points Memo and co-author of "Where Have All the Democrats Gone?"
Ruy Teixeira is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and co-author of "Where Have All the Democrats Gone?"
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Australian TV hosts Chas Licciardello and John Barron explain how American politics has influenced culture and government in their homeland; and which single feature of Australian politics could fix many of America’s biggest problems.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Chas Licciardello is a comedian and co-host of Planet America.
John Barron is a journalist, broadcaster and co-host of Planet America.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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On this week’s episode of Deep Dive, Pulitzer Prize winner David Leonhardt joins host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to talk about his new book and what it says about how Democrats can save their relationship with working class voters.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
David Leonhardt is a senior writer for the New York Times and the author of "Ours Was the Shining Future: The Story of the American Dream."
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision in June 2022, the GOP has repeatedly paid a price electorally for its stance on abortion.

The chaos has been dispiriting to the anti-abortion activists who helped engineer the Dobbs decision in the first place. And now they think they have a new political strategy to get Republicans out of their defensive crouch and to start winning again on this issue. 

The woman leading this effort is Marjorie Dannenfelser, the head of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, one of the most important institutions in the GOP firmament. She’s known as the woman who killed Roe.

Dannenfelser and her colleagues are plotting, financing, and staffing the Republican Party’s counter attack on abortion. Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza sat down with her at SBA’s Virginia headquarters this week, partly because she had some news she wanted to share about how and where anti-abortion activists are making their first big move.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Marjorie Dannenfelser is the president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza joins Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) to learn how he and other GOP moderates, institutionalists, and Biden-district Republicans have organized against Jim Jordan’s campaign to be speaker of the House… and what the endgame is for Republicans to escape this mess.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Mike Lawler is the representative for New York's 17th district.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Jon Finer, President Joe Biden’s principal deputy national security adviser, opens up to Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza about how the administration is approaching some of the thorniest problems related to the war in Israel, including: striking the right balance between supporting Israel and expressing concerns about an extreme response; Biden’s warnings to Iran; and whether America should now consider itself at war with Hamas.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Jon Finer is the White House deputy national security adviser.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Marty Baron ran The Washington Post’s newsroom for nine years.

In that time, Marty clashed with then-president Donald Trump.

He pacified rebellions from his younger and increasingly more ideological staff.

And he partnered with Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos to take on arguably the biggest disrupter of all: technology. 

He’s written about all of this — and a lot more — in his new book, "Collision of Power: Trump, Bezos, and The Washington Post."

Today, Marty is joining Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza to spill the tea on what actually happened between Bezos and Trump; what the media should be doing to earn your trust; and whether billionaires like Jeff Bezos are secretly pulling the strings behind closed doors.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Marty Baron is the retired executive editor of The Washington Post. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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The center of presidential politics this week was the swing state of Michigan. Trump won the longtime Democratic stronghold in 2016, and Biden won it back in 2020. It will be pivotal again in 2024. And that’s why both candidates flew to metro Detroit on consecutive days this week to insert themselves into the United Auto Workers’ strike against the so-called “Detroit Three” — General Motors, Ford, and Stellantis, the company that owns Chrysler.

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza joins Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.), the House’s key player when it comes to the UAW strike, for a conversation about the strike’s political consequences, why she thinks that Democrats may be in danger of losing Michigan in 2024, and why the strike’s biggest sticking point is something you might not even have heard about.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Debbie Dingell is the representative for Michigan's 6th district. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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After losing a series of votes this week to avoid a government shutdown, Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy has effectively lost his majority. On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza asks the number two Democratic leader in the House, Minority Whip Katherine Clark, what price McCarthy will have to pay for Democrats to lend their votes to passing a CR and fending-off a potential challenge to his speakership.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Katherine Clark is the House Minority Whip and the representative for Massachusetts's 5th district.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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It would be easy to look at the House of Representatives and assume that the members of the Freedom Caucus — and not Speaker Kevin McCarthy — are the ones who are actually in charge. But is that actually true? 

On this week’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza talks with one of the top House moderates, Ohio Congressman Dave Joyce. Joyce is the Chairman of the Republican Governance Group, the pre-eminent faction for GOP centrists; and he’s also a senior appropriator, which means he’s one of the people who has to figure out how to avoid the possible government shutdown lurking at the end of the month.

Ryan caught-up with Joyce in his Washington office to learn how the Republicans you don’t see quoted on Breitbart are approaching the tumultuous issues gripping the lower chamber. 

They talked at length about the rationale behind McCarthy’s new impeachment gambit; if and how the Speaker can claw together the votes to avoid a government shutdown; the odds that McCarthy will face a vote to remove him as Speaker; and what it’s really like in private between Joyce and members of the Freedom Caucus he battles in public.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
David Joyce is the representative for Ohio's 14th district.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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What makes President Joe Biden?

We’re all pretty familiar with Vice President Biden and Senator Biden. But in his latest iteration as commander-in-chief, it hasn’t been as easy to see inside his mind. 

Cracking into Biden’s brain and inside the White House has been a challenge for the media.

He’s surrounded by a tight “clan” of family and advisors who have achieved Biden lifer status — and they don’t often leak. It consists of his sister Valerie, and the five advisers known as the Quint: Steve Ricchetti, Mike Donilon, Anita Dunn, Bruce Reed, and now former chief of staff Ron Klain. 

It’s been a notoriously tough circle to penetrate. 

But now one person has done it: Franklin Foer, who spent the last few years inside the heads of Biden and his team and has written the definitive account of President Biden’s first two years in office called “The Last Politician: Inside Joe Biden's White House and the Struggle for America's Future.”

The book was originally supposed to be about the first one hundred days. But the story was too interesting to stop. Next, he planned to wrap up after the passage of Build Back Better. The book ended up growing into a two-year project that ends tidily with the midterms.

But where the book really shines when it grapples with the core of who Biden is —  both psychologically and ideologically. Whether you love Biden or hate him,  Frank’s book just might change your mind about how you understand him.

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza sits down with Frank Foer to dig into the revelations that fill the pages of his new book, like how pivotal Biden’s inner circle is to his decision making; his relationship with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy; the low point of the presidency so far; and what’s in store for Biden as he prepares for another run as the oldest sitting president in history.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Franklin Foer is a staff writer at The Atlantic. 
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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On Wednesday night, eight Republican presidential candidates gathered in Milwaukee for the first GOP primary debate.

There was a lot on the line for each of them. But there was also an enormous amount at stake for the news organization that hosted the debate: Fox News.

Consider the cross currents that the two Fox moderators, Martha McCallum and Bret Baier, had to deal with: 

First there was Trump, who refused to participate and lashed out at Fox and its talent, including Baier, on social media.

Then there was Tucker Carlson, McCallum and Baier’s former star colleague who is in messy litigation with the network, and who nabbed Trump for himself and counter-programmed the evening with an interview that aired simultaneously with the Fox debate. 

Then there was Rupert Murdoch hovering in the background. In the days before the debate there were new reports that the man who runs Fox, MacCallum and Baier’s boss, has his own strong feelings about who the GOP nominee should be. 

If that isn’t enough, on the eve of the debate, several candidates who didn’t qualify to be on stage threatened to sue.  

Add to that the challenges of being the ones asking the uncomfortable questions in that arena on Wednesday. The candidates are primed to pounce on you if it serves their political interests. The boisterous crowd of partisans could turn on you at any moment. 

So what was it like behind the scenes at the Fox News debate? How did the hosts prepare, including for a possible last-minute appearance by Trump? What did they think of the highly caffeinated Mike Pence interrupting them at every turn? What was the deal with DeSantis and Christie during that one hand-raising moment? And whose idea was that UFO question, anyway? 

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza asks Martha and Bret those questions and a lot more as they bring us inside what is perhaps the most important event of the GOP primary so far.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Martha MacCallum is the anchor and executive editor of "The Story with Martha MacCallum" on Fox News Channel.
Bret Baier is the Fox News Channel's anchor and executive editor of "Special Report with Bret Baier" and chief political anchor of the network.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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This coming Wednesday, something big is happening in Milwaukee: the first Republican presidential debate. 

On this week’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host & Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza talks with North Dakota Governor & GOP presidential candidate Doug Burgum about how he hatched one of the most innovative schemes in memory to qualify for Wednesday's GOP debate; how he’s preparing to compete on the stage with big leaguers like Ron DeSantis and Donald Trump – if Trump shows up; how his background as a conservative in the tech world informs his worldview; and why one photograph of him cleaning a chimney in a tuxedo changed his life.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Doug Burgum is the governor of North Dakota and a GOP presidential candidate.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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This week, almost every Republican running for president is headed to the Iowa State Fair, famous for its fried Twinkies and statues of farm animals made out of butter and —  every four years — extremely embarrassing photos of candidates eating unwieldy treats.

The Iowa State Fair also kicks off a new more intense period of the Republican primary season as nationally televised debates begin this month and the five month countdown to the Iowa Caucuses begins. 

Iowa’s importance in presidential nomination contests ebbs and flows and this year the state looms as more important than ever. 

The conventional wisdom among Republicans is that if Donald Trump’s opponents can’t slow him down in Iowa, then the race may be over.  

Joining Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza for this episode is the man responsible for administering this critical contest – the chairman of the Iowa Republican Party, Jeff Kaufmann. Kaufmann is also a history professor and in the course of this conversation, he teaches a master class on everything you need to know about the Iowa Republican caucuses and what it will take to win them in 2024.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Jeff Kaufmann is the Chairman of the Iowa GOP.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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In 2023, there are two Europes: the Europe of the museums and the beaches – and the real Europe as lived by its people. And that Europe has changed dramatically in recent decades. 

The end of the Cold War collapsed many of the continent's political barriers. European unification brought countries as diverse as Ireland and Bulgaria under one umbrella. And more recently, a boom in migration, especially from the Islamic world, has changed Europe’s demographics and brought a host of opportunities, challenges, and political changes.

Today, the war in Ukraine has both created more solidarity among European nations and highlighted their big differences; and it has rattled the foundation of the region’s economy. 

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza talks with Ben Judah, author of “This Is Europe: The Way We Live Now,” about why this history means that you probably need to update your assumptions about Europe; and why it is that many American policymakers simply don’t understand the realities that leaders like Emmanuel Macron, Rishi Sunak, and Giorgia Meloni have to live with. 

Some of the reasons why will be familiar to Americans: immigration, crime, and the rise of right-wing populism. But according to Ben’s new book, their implications for Europe are quite different from those here in the United States. And they open a whole tin of worms for the broader notion of the Western alliance.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Ben Judah is a journalist, academic and the author of "This is Europe: The Way We Live Now"
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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This week, the action in the Senate was all about the annual defense authorization – the NDAA. Usually, the argument about what goes into this enormous bill that governs everything the military can and can’t do is a word soup cooked-up by defense nerds. 

You may recall things like SDI, the GWOT, and closing GITMO. All controversial in their own day, and all eventually resolved through the historically bipartisan NDAA process. 

But this time around, many in Washington are beginning to wonder if a new set of acronyms is fatally imperiling our armed forces. Issues like DEI, CRT, and abortion may be sinking a bill that has never failed to pass in more than 60 years.

It’s setting up a dramatic clash between the House and Senate. On one side, a partisan bill loaded with controversial amendments. On the other, a bipartisan one without all the baggage.

Meanwhile in the background, a separate drama is still playing out: that of Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s (R-Ala.) beef with Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin over abortion policy. 

The combination of these two events has been more than enough to make lawmakers, lobbyists, and service members alike begin to wonder: Is this the year that the NDAA fails?

Will this last sacred piece of bipartisanship in Congress succumb to the divisive forces that have sunk many before? 

Joining the show to discuss the prognosis for this year’s NDAA and the perils of this stand off is a man who knows what it’s like to write one of these bills. Because he has. Many times before. Arnold Punaro is a former staff director at the Senate Armed Services Committee and a retired two-star general. And if you’re a senator involved in national security issues, he’s probably also the guy you call for advice. 

Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza spoke with him about what the big challenge facing the military is — spoiler, it's not abortion policy; how – or if – Congress has perverted its oversight role of the Pentagon; what, if any, of the right’s objections to military “wokeness” are grounded in facts; and if an NDAA will pass this year at all.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Arnold Punaro is CEO of The Punaro Group and a retired Marine Reserve Major General.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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When Alejandro Mayorkas was tapped to run DHS – the now 20-year-old behemoth with 260,000 employees created in the aftermath of 9/11 – Mayorkas said that he was determined to be the Secretary of Homeland Security, NOT the Secretary of Immigration.

How’s that going? Yesterday, Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza sat down with him on the sidelines of the Aspen Security Forum to find out.

Mayorkas’s department is charged with preventing foreign and domestic terrorist attacks. It monitors threats from weapons of mass destruction, protects infrastructure and ensures we’re safe from cyber attacks. 

What many of DHS’s agencies do have in common is that you often don’t hear much about them unless something really bad has happened.

So even if Mayorkas didn’t also oversee immigration, the most fraught of political issues, being DHS secretary – responsible for defending the nation against terrorism, computer hackers, nuclear weapons, and natural disasters – can often be a thankless job. 

And despite his best attempts, it is Mayorkas’s management of Border Patrol, ICE, and Immigration Services that has dominated his tenure and made him the GOP’s main target of attack in the Biden Cabinet. 

On this episode of Deep Dive, Ryan and Sec. Mayorkas discuss how the terrorism threat has changed over the last two decades, the challenges of confronting domestic extremism, why the end of Title 42 didn’t lead to the border surge many predicted, the future of TSA, the fentanyl crisis, the prospects of impeachment, and how going through the meat grinder of D.C. politics has changed him.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Alejandro Mayorkas is the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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“Early one morning in April of 2016 I woke up and seriously contemplated the possibility that I would never be able to generate the strength, focus, and courage to get out of bed. The combination of crippling anxiety, chronic pain, muscle atrophy, and the fascinating mix of pharmaceuticals coursing through my body had, I feared, finally broken me.”

Those are the words of Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), the ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, on the first page of his new book, Lost and Broken. In his book Smith recounts his deeply personal story of suffering through —  and eventually overcoming — debilitating mental and physical illness.

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Smith joins Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza to discuss his difficult journey and some surprising lessons it taught him about the emotional and sometimes dark overtones that are animating American politics.

Additionally, Rep. Smith shares some secrets about what’s happening on the Hill right now: whether he thinks this is the year when Congress fails to pass a defense bill, the continuing fallout in the House from the debt limit deal, and whether Kevin McCarthy can rustle-up enough Republican votes to avoid a government shutdown this fall.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Adam Smith is the representative for Washington's 9th district.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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This weekend, President Joe Biden is headed to Europe. His first stop: the U.K.

Biden is scheduled to meet with both His Royal Highness King Charles, an old acquaintance and fellow head of state; and the Right Honorable Rishi Sunak, Britain’s prime minister and a fellow head of government – who just visited Biden in Washington this past month. 

On the agenda for these meetings: climate change, the war in Ukraine, and the “Atlantic Declaration” – that’s the diplomatic term for Biden and Sunak’s push to renew the U.K. and America’s partnership across a host of economic and security issues facing the West. 

Joining to talk about these issues as well as Britain and America’s special relationship is Karen Pierce, the British Ambassador to the United States. Pierce is one of the U.K.’s most experienced diplomats, having held an array of senior positions including ambassadorships to the U.N., the WTO, and Afghanistan; as well as directing British policy throughout South Asia, Pakistan, and Afghanistan during some key years of the War on Terror. 

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Pierce tells host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza what Sunak hopes to get out of Biden’s trip to London; how Britain and America’s relationship has changed throughout her many years of service; how the war in Ukraine is driving the two countries closer – and occasionally further apart; who Brits admire the most in our nation’s history; and what her secrets are for dealing with cagey diplomats on the other side of the bargaining table.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Karen Pierce is the British Ambassador to the U.S.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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In American politics, there is a small group of leaders who are – to borrow a term from Hollywood – hit makers. Everything they touch seems to turn to gold. 

There is perhaps no better example of this in Democratic politics than Rahm Emanuel. For those who need a refresher, Rahm is a former Bill Clinton advisor, turned Illinois Congressman, turned DCCC chair, turned Barack Obama chief of staff, turned mayor of Chicago… and currently, he is Joe Biden’s ambassador to Japan.

In his new posting, Rahm has been at the forefront of new multi-lateral agreements between the U.S., Japan, South Korea, and the Philippines; he is agitating for allies to stop what he calls “Chinese economic coercion;” and he has been a key player in a controversial effort to legalize same-sex marriage in Japan. 

This week, Rahm joined Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza to talk about his role organizing our allies around Putin and China; how hardnose politics is actually great for diplomacy; and why – even when you’re dealing with the president of the United States – it’s still much better to beg for forgiveness, than to ask for permission.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Rahm Emanuel is the U.S. Ambassador to Japan.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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The big debate in Washington this week is about realism versus idealism. It played out first in foreign policy, when Joe Biden hosted Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi for a state dinner.

Biden has made big claims about how democratic ideals are at the heart of American foreign policy; but he spent two days lavishing time and attention on Modi, who is persecuting Muslims and cracking down on public dissent from reporters and political opponents. 

Biden needs India to be an ally against China and that priority outweighed the instinct to shun Modi for his creeping authoritarianism. 

We talk about this debate all the time when it comes to American foreign policy.

But sometimes that same debate becomes central to American domestic politics as well. 

And across town, just as Modi was wrapping up his joint address to Congress, evangelical conservatives from across the country were gathering at the Washington Hilton to hear from their own flawed partner: Donald Trump.

Well actually not just Trump — Mike Pence, Ron DeSantis, Tim Scott, Chris Christie, and every major Republican candidate is scheduled to speak at the Faith & Freedom Coalition’s Road to Majority conference.

But, naturally, Trump is what religious conservatives are talking about. After all, he is the dominant frontrunner for the GOP presidential nomination. And he is the group’s keynote speaker at their gala dinner on Saturday night. And he is also the politician about whom two things can be said:

One, his personal and public life makes a mockery of the Christian ideals of evangelical voters.

And, two, he is the person who has delivered more policy victories for these same voters than any other president. 

The questions that evangelicals are debating in Washington this week are whether that deal with Trump was worth it… and whether they should renew the contract.

This week’s guest has a lot of thoughts about this. He is the founder and chairman of the Faith & Freedom Coalition, Ralph Reed.

Reed was recruited in 1989 by Pat Robertson, the late televangelist, to help run a new organization: the Christian Coalition. 

It grew to be a powerful political group that cemented social conservatives as a core constituency of the Republican Party and made issues such as opposition to abortion rights non-negotiable policies in the GOP. 

As you will hear in this episode, Ralph Reed is a political junkie. He left the Christian Coalition in 1997 and soon became one of the key strategists for George W. Bush. 

And then in Obama’s first term, Reed struck up an unlikely friendship with a guy named Donald Trump.

He did for Trump what he does for every presidential candidate who comes calling for his advice: he explained how to win over evangelical voters, who make up about 60 percent of the Republican presidential primary electorate.

In his view it worked out pretty well: Evangelicals overwhelmingly backed the thrice-married New York Playboy who famously botched bible verses on the stump. And Trump kept his word when it came to their most important issue: appointing Supreme Court judges who would overturn Roe v. Wade.

So what will evangelicals do in the 2024 Republican presidential primary?

That is the question that Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza spoke with Reed about in a backroom at the Washington Hilton as his conference attendees filed in.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Ralph Reed is the chairman of the Faith and Freedom Coalition.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Timothy Parlatore spent over a year working for Donald Trump on a number of legal challenges, including the Department of Justice’s probe into Trump’s role in Jan. 6 and the investigation of all those documents stashed at Mar-a-Lago.

Parlatore was inside the secret grand jury room in Washington. He oversaw the search for documents in Bedminster. He coordinated the former president’s response to Jack Smith’s subpoena for the national security files that eventually landed Trump in so much trouble.

And then, in May, after a long-running internal fight with one of Trump’s top aides, Parlatore quit.  

Since then, you may have seen him on cable TV talking about why he left the Trump team and offering his insights about the case. But he hasn’t sat down for an in-depth interview like the one you’re about to hear. 

Parlatore came by Politico’s offices in Arlington and spent the afternoon talking to Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza about why he became a criminal defense attorney in the first place, the moral dilemmas he’s faced representing people who he knew were guilty.  And, most important, what it was like being on the inside of Trump’s legal team as Jack Smith and his prosecutors closed in.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Timothy Parlatore is the founder and Managing Partner of Parlatore Law Group
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Ben Terris is a feature writer at The Washington Post, where he’s carved out a unique role: reporting on what he calls, “the weirdo beat.” While Ben’s colleagues focus on what’s happening on the main stage in politics, he keeps an eye on the freak show that’s happening just out of sight. 

This week, Ben published his much-anticipated book “The Big Break: The Gamblers, Party Animals, and True Believers Trying to Win in Washington While America Loses Its Mind.” 

“The Big Break” has a novel argument: that if you want to understand how American politics works in the post-Donald Trump era – then you really, really have to understand Ben’s field of expertise: weirdos.

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza joins Ben to discuss the rise and fall of the influential oddballs chronicled in “The Big Break,” and what their stories say about the future of politics.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Ben Terris is a feature reporter covering national politics for The Washington Post.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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In this episode of Deep Dive, Playbook co-author Rachael Bade joins House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) and Chief Deputy Whip Guy Reschenthaler (R-Pa.) just hours before final passage of the debt ceiling bill they shepherded through the House.

This is the behind the scenes story from inside the Republican whip's office of how Kevin McCarthy's leadership team convinced House Republicans to raise the debt ceiling for two years and embrace his agreement with Joe Biden, which many on the right decried as a betrayal of the base. It's a story of how Emmer and Reschenthaler pulled together a divided and fractious conference, dodging a ballooning effort to oust McCarthy from the gavel, and ultimately putting the ball back in the Democrats' court.

Rachael Bade is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Tom Emmer is the House  Majority Whip and the representative for Minnesota's 6th district.
Guy Reschenthaler is the House Republican Chief Deputy Whip and the representative for Pennsylvania's 14th district.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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This week, the rumors became reality as Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and South Carolina Senator Tim Scott announced their long-awaited presidential campaigns. The contrast between the two events foreshadowed all of the big questions for next year’s Republican primaries.

Tim Scott, who is a favorite among his senate colleagues —  but who is mostly unknown outside of his home state and the Washington, D.C., fundraising circuit — preached optimism and unity while sharing the stage with his mother.

Ron DeSantis, on the other hand, did something a little different. He announced his campaign on Twitter Spaces with Elon Musk. But for many, the event’s glitchy start was more memorable than DeSantis’s stern message to fellow Republicans.

It was the perfect setup for the choice Republicans will have to make in Iowa, New Hampshire, and beyond: Do they want a president who follows in Ronald Reagan’s footsteps – one who is optimistic and driven by ideas – who shakes hands and kisses babies? Or do they want someone like Trump: a leader who uses the Internet to press the attack on the cultural issues that have divided the country.   

Now, Scott and DeSantis join a crowded GOP field that includes former governors Nikki Haley and Asa Hutchinson; entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy; and of course, the dominant frontrunner, Donald Trump.

This week on Playbook Deep Dive, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza talks about Scott, DeSantis, and all things 2024 with Jonathan Martin, POLITICO’s Politics Bureau Chief; and co-author of the best-seller, This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for America’s Future. 

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Jonathan Martin is politics bureau chief for POLITICO.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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In the last year, a lot has changed in Washington for progressives like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.).

In 2021 and 2022, with Democrats controlling the House, she and her allies could block any piece of legislation if they held together. Their big fights were with moderate Democrats over how many trillions of dollars to spend on President Joe Biden’s agenda. 

And they had easy access to the White House with Ron Klain as Biden’s chief of staff.

Now they are in the minority and far from the negotiating room where Joe Biden is trying to make a budget deal with Kevin McCarthy to get him to raise the debt ceiling. Their main fight is trying to stop the president from caving to McCarthy on what they view as draconian budget cuts and policies that would weaken the social safety net.

And over at the White House, it’s not really clear who they should call anymore. 

AOC is keenly aware of these changed circumstances. She’s been carefully watching the debt limit debate play out and she has a clear view of what it’s all about: power, not policy. 

In this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Rep. Ocasio-Cortez tells host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza how House progressives can flex their muscles right now; and how she’s learned to use her unique influence to affect legislation, even when she’s not at the table.

Finally, she has some advice – and a warning – for Joe Biden as we approach the endgame of the debt limit.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is the representative for New York's 14th district. 
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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This week, after years of criticism from immigration rights activists and many progressive Democrats, President Joe Biden has ended the use of Title 42. That’s the public health law that Donald Trump first used during the pandemic to expel millions of asylum seekers arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border.

Biden’s decision has drawn predictable outrage from Republicans. But perhaps more worrisome to the president is the growing list of critics from within the Democratic Party who are concerned that Biden’s border policies could trigger a humanitarian crisis and perhaps an electoral backlash. 

Rep. Henry Cuellar is one of those Democrats. And he’s this week’s guest on Playbook Deep Dive.

Cuellar knows the issue of immigration better than most of his fellow Democrats. He was born to immigrant farm workers in Laredo, Texas, went to college and law school, and eventually jumped into Texas politics, and then the U.S. Congress, where he’s served since 2005 representing Texas’s 28th Congressional District, which stretches from San Antonio to Laredo and includes 200 miles of the southern border.

The left does not like him. He received a lot of attention in the last two election cycles when he was targeted by national progressives and barely survived two primary challenges.

One reason for those challenges: immigration, where Cuellar is well-known for being to the right of many of his Democratic colleagues. On the other hand, he voted against the border security bill that House Republicans put on the floor this week. Cuellar is a lonely centrist on an issue that has become much more polarized over the last decade. 

And, as he tells Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza, he thinks Joe Biden should join him in the middle and stop taking advice from the left, as the president prepares for the coming aftershocks of his Title 42 decision.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Henry Cuellar is the representative for Texas's 28th district. 
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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If you talk to Democratic strategists about the 2024 presidential election, there is a certain type of Republican nominee who they fear: Someone who knows how to speak in the language of inclusion; who can discuss abortion and guns without alienating suburban voters; who stands up to the GOP on some of the most fraught issues of the culture wars; who can argue that he or she has almost as much government experience as Joe Biden himself, but is still younger; who handled the pandemic in their state in a way that avoided some of the most unpopular decisions of both Democrats and Republicans; and who spends a lot of their time explaining to Republicans why they should leave Donald Trump in the past. 

Asa Hutchinson — who sounds an awful lot like that imaginary candidate that Democrats fear —  is here on Playbook Deep Dive this week to tell us why you shouldn’t count him out.

Hutchinson got his start in politics as a U.S. attorney during the Reagan Revolution, when his home state of Arkansas was still run by Democrats. He served two terms as governor and shortly after stepping down this year, he announced he’s running for president.

If there’s one thing that makes him stand out so far, it’s that he’s willing to say things about Trump that other Republicans aren’t. Hutchinson recently wrote that the former President “has led us astray,” “undermined the fabric of our democracy,” and is emblematic of bad leaders who are, “focused only on themselves or on settling scores with political opponents.”

In this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host Ryan Lizza speaks with the former Arkansas governor after his first official trip to Iowa. He opens up about why he’s running, how he thinks he can take down Trump, and why his record – which is among the most conservative in America – is full of surprises.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Asa Hutchinson is the former governor of Arkansas and a GOP presidential candidate.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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This past week, luminaries from politics, media, and Hollywood came together for the annual White House Correspondents' dinner in Washington. Playbook co-author and Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza joined forces with Major Garrett, CBS News’s Washington correspondent and host of the popular podcast, The Takeout, at the POLITICO-CBS News reception to bring you this very special live show. 

The show features guests such as Senator Mark Warner (D-Va.); Asa Hutchinson, the GOP presidential candidate and former Arkansas governor; comedian Roy Wood, Jr., who provided the entertainment at the dinner; and many other big names in the world of politics and media. 

This originally aired live on SiriusXM, but it’s just so good that we had to put it out here for all of you to enjoy. 

Follow The Takeout with Major Garrett wherever you get your podcasts. You can also listen ad-free on the Amazon Music or Wondery app. Visit the The Takeout’s page here: 

https://link.chtbl.com/CBSNewsTheTakeout

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This week in Washington – more so than anytime in Joe Biden’s presidency – the news has been all about… the news.

To start, it’s the weekend of the White House Correspondents Association Dinner. But outside of the brunches and parties, a different type of media intrigue has been dominating politics. 

BuzzFeed News, the colossus of yesteryear’s viral reporting and the entity that published the infamous Steele Dossier about Donald Trump, announced that it was shutting down for good.

On Monday, Fox News fired Tucker Carlson, their top-rated host. Within an hour, Don Lemon announced he was parting ways with CNN, where he had worked for 17 years. 

On Thursday, Vice News, another struggling pioneer of 21st century digital news, became the latest media company to lay off some of its best known reporters. 

These are all isolated events with circumstances specific to each newsroom. But in an excellent new book called Traffic: Genius, Rivalry, and Delusion in the Billion-Dollar Race to Go Viral,  Ben Smith argues that we are indeed at the end of an era in media, but that the next one might be something to look forward to. 

That’s a forceful prediction coming from Ben, who was a longtime reporter at POLITICO, the top editor at BuzzFeed News, a New York Times media columnist, and now is the editor-in-chief of Semafor. He’s also this week’s Playbook Deep Dive guest.

Ben’s book and this interview with Deep Dive Host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza do their best to answer the questions we all have about why our political culture is so fragmented, and whether there is any hope that we can return to a place where Americans agree on simple things — like facts.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Ben Smith is the editor-in-chief of Semafor.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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On May 1, the hotly-anticipated HBO series White House Plumbers will premiere. The 5-episode series takes viewers along on a darkly funny ride with the fumbling ex-spooks and misguided “patriots.” E. Howard Hunt, played by Woody Harrelson and G. Gordon Liddy, played by Justin Theroux. The duo — along with some helpers — use any means necessary to secure the 1972 re-election of Richard Nixon, including breaking into the Democratic National Committee's headquarters at the Watergate Office Building. 

Of course instead of saving Nixon, Liddy and Hunt end up destroying his presidency.

The show is a warped version of a buddy comedy that explores one of the most relevant issues in politics: what happens when true believers lose their integrity and moral compass in pursuit of their cause.

David Mandel, the director of White House Plumbers, is a man who knows more about the intersection of Hollywood and Washington than just about anyone. Mandel has had a storied career as a comedy writer and producer. He’s a veteran of Saturday Night Live, Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm. He went on to lead production of Veep —  one of the funniest and most accurate shows ever made about Washington — for its final three seasons.

On this week’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza talks with Mandel about lessons he’s learned translating Washington for Hollywood, first with Veep and now with White House Plumbers —  and how a certain president elected in between these two shows changed everything about what makes politics funny.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
David Mandel is the director of White House Plumbers. 
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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This week, Florida’s statehouse cleared the way for Gov. Ron DeSantis to sign a six-week abortion ban. The man who shepherded the bill, House Speaker Paul Renner, joins Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza for this episode of Playbook Deep Dive. 

You might not know Renner’s name – but you definitely know his work: 

• A bill to ban surgeries and prescription treatments for transgender minors, which has passed the state Senate and Renner will soon push through the House
• One of the most comprehensive new school voucher laws in the country
• Legislation removing books with sexual content from Florida public schools
• A major tort reform bill, big tax cuts
• And if he gets around to it this session: a bill aimed at over-turning the 1964 New York Times v. Sullivan decision, the most important First Amendment ruling of the last century

All of this is aimed at Renner’s other project: helping Gov. Ron DeSantis build a record of accomplishments in Florida on which he can base his presidential campaign. 

While Republicans have created a legislative assembly line that is spitting out laws to change seemingly every aspect of life in Florida, a big question suddenly hangs over their project: 

Are they building a record of accomplishments that can launch the DeSantis rocket to the White House? Or are they weighing down the governor with so much right-wing baggage that he crashes upon liftoff?

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Paul Renner is the speaker of the Florida House of Representatives.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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The 2024 Republican presidential primary is off to a bit of a slow start.

Donald Trump and former governors Nikki Haley and Asa Hutchinson have entered the race, but other likely candidates, such as Ron DeSantis and Mike Pence, are still sitting on the sidelines.

Almost every Republican senator who flirted with the idea seems likely to pass, with the notable exception of Tim Scott, who’s been making stops in Iowa and New Hampshire.

Into this vacuum has come Vivek Ramaswamy, who stated his intentions in a Wall Street Journal op-ed. He declared that he was running to forge “an inspiring national identity that dilutes the woke agenda to irrelevance.”

In a subsequent interview with POLITICO’s Daniel Lippman, Vivek added that, “The GOP has a historic opportunity to answer the question of what it means to be an American.” 

You probably don’t know much about Vivek Ramaswamy – he’s a young entrepreneur from Ohio who’s never run for anything. But there are a few reasons to keep an eye on him: 

1. He says he’s willing to spend millions of dollars of an estimated half-billion dollar fortune on the race 
2. He’s a regular presence on the Fox News Channel, which is the top information source for Republican primary voters
3. And he seems to be putting together a serious campaign made up of political pros

Vivek swears he has a plan to break out of the single digits and take down Donald Trump.

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza joins Vivek at the restaurant Art & Soul to learn whether he is completely delusional —  or whether he just might be onto something.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Vivek Ramaswamy is a biotech entrepreneur and Republican presidential contender. 
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Playbook Deep Dive host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza gathers three of the best journalists in the POLITICO’s newsroom to break down the immediate questions of what Trump's indictment means. Joining him is Jonathan Martin, POLITICO’s Politics Bureau Chief; Meridith McGraw, who covers Trump for POLITICO; and Erica Orden, who is new to POLITICO and is one of the best legal reporters out there. All three have been breaking news on this story – and they’re on deadline. These are their thoughts about what has led to this moment and what will occur because of it.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Erica Orden is a legal reporter for POLITICO.
Meridith McGraw is a national political correspondent for POLITICO.
Jonathan Martin is politics bureau chief for POLITICO.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio. 
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Lanny Davis long ago established himself as the go-to operative in Washington when you’re in the middle of a PR crisis. 

He was famously the public face defending Bill Clinton during the Monica Lewinsky scandal in 1998. But today, 25 years later, he’s on the other side of a presidential sex scandal representing Michael Cohen, Trump’s longtime lawyer and self-described “fixer,” who went to jail for a number of offenses, including his role in paying Stormy Daniels $130,000 in exchange for her not telling the media her account of an alleged affair with Donald Trump. 

Cohen is now a central witness in the Manhattan DA’s case against Trump, one that could send the former president to jail. It’s a case that has died and been resurrected so many times that prosecutors have nicknamed it the “zombie” case. And a major obstacle that prosecutors face is whether or not jurors will believe that Cohen, who lied for Trump for over a decade, is telling the truth. 

On this episode of Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza catches up with Davis at his office in Washington, D.C., to hear the story of how the Trump “zombie” case came back from the dead and why he insists jurors should believe his client.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Lanny Davis is the lawyer and spokesperson for former Trump fixer Michael Cohen.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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On Thursday, the Senate began to re-evaluate one of the most controversial episodes in American history: the Iraq war. 

After a generation of use and abuse, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is calling a vote to repeal the Iraq AUMF, or authorization for the use of military force, which has been a key underpinning for America’s so-called “forever wars” in the Middle East.

But Stephen Hadley, the man who was the architect of many of the national security policies that the Iraq AUMF enabled, has something to say before Congress votes. Hadley was President George W. Bush’s national security advisor from 2005 to 2009 and was Dick Cheney’s guy at the negotiating table with Russia during the George H.W. Bush administration. Now, he has just published a book called Hand-Off: The Foreign Policy George W. Bush Passed to Barack Obama that chronicles 20 years of war and politics in America. 

On this week’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza speaks with the former Bush adviser about what we stand to lose if Congress is sloppy about repealing the Iraq war AUMF, what Bush got right and wrong on China, how Joe Biden’s foreign policy echoes Bush’s Freedom Agenda, and how President Biden can learn from Bush’s successes and failures dealing with Vladimir Putin.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Stephen Hadley is the former National Security Advisor for President George W. Bush.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Last November, when the artificial intelligence platform ChatGPT launched, an old science fiction question suddenly became very real: How long until the machines are smarter than the humans? 

It marked the beginning of a new era in technology – one that has enormous implications for the economy and the nation’s politics. On the Hill, members of Congress suddenly needed answers about the coming disruption. The expert they turned to for those was a video game developer from Southern California, Rep. Jay Obernolte (R-Calif.).

Obernolte is, according to his peers, the guy you need to know on AI. He has a masters in the field and owns a very successful video game company. On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, he tells Playbook’s Ryan Lizza the truth about this powerful new technology and what it means to Washington, D.C.; from AI’s regulatory forecast to what – if anything – Congress can do to soften a potential white collar job apocalypse that its widespread adoption might bring.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Rep. Jay Obernolte is the congressman for California's 23rd district.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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The war in Ukraine is just over one year old. There is widespread talk of a major spring offensive from both sides. War in Europe, once unthinkable, is now the new normal. But for one nation on Russia’s northern border, this feels like deja vu.

Like Ukraine, Finland knows what it’s like to share a long border with Russia. The Finns have had Vladimir Putin as a neighbor, and they’ve been performing the same delicate dance of decoupling under his very watchful eye.

Before his posting to Washington, Mikko Hautala was Finland’s ambassador to Russia, where he met Vladimir Putin more times than he can count. Hautala occupied his post in Moscow during the critical years following Putin’s first invasion of Ukraine. 

Since the war began, he’s become well known as the person to talk to to understand Putin, Russia and the conflict in Ukraine. 

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host Ryan Lizza talks with Hautala about what Americans don’t understand about the Russian leader, the implications of the growing alliance between China and Russia, Finland’s accession to NATO, and why he believes the West needs to massively ramp up its industrial capability if it wants Ukraine to survive.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Mikko Hautala is Finland's ambassador to the U.S.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Until last month, Anthony Coley was Director of Public Affairs at the Justice Department and a Senior Adviser to Attorney General Merrick Garland. 

Coley was in the middle of some of the most extraordinary episodes at DOJ over the last two years: 

The appointment of two special counsels investigating one current and one former president.

Responding to the drama around the investigation of the president’s son. 

Taking incoming from right-wing pundits saying Garland was protecting President Biden and left-wing pundits saying the attorney general was protecting former president Trump. 

And occasionally grappling with perhaps the most difficult dilemma that any government official faces: what do you do when you disagree with the boss?

In his first interview since leaving Merrick Garland’s side, Coley joins Playbook Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza from his home on Capitol Hill to discuss how the Justice Department separates law from politics, why two special counsels might just take the pressure off Garland, and much, much more.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Anthony Coley is the former director of public affairs at the Department of Justice
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, and President Donald Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations, is running for president. But not everyone on the right is impressed.

In a brutal Valentine’s Day editorial, The Wall Street Journal said that there is “no clear rationale for her candidacy.” Over at The New York Times, the paper assembled 10 pundits to assess Haley’s candidacy, and the majority opinion was that she shouldn’t be taken very seriously. 

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Rob Godfrey, a senior aide and spokesman for Haley when she was governor, and a longtime ally to her successor, Henry McMaster, shares why the critics may be wrong. Godfrey discusses Haley’s career of defying expectations, her record as governor, South Carolina’s uniquely influential role in American politics, and invites host Ryan Lizza to come visit.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Rob Godfrey is the former senior aide to Nikki Haley. 
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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In Washington, there is now a bipartisan consensus around being tough on China.

This was happening even before the Chinese sent a spy balloon drifting across the United States. Last month, by a vote of 365-65, the House created a new “Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party.”

And with China hawks now dominating the thinking of both parties when it comes to Sino-U.S. relations, Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza decided to check in with Max Baucus, who is one of the leading voices warning that the hawks have things dangerously wrong. 

Baucus was the U.S. ambassador to China from 2014 to 2017. Before that he was, depending on the year, the chairman or ranking member of the very powerful Senate Finance Committee. And in this fascinating interview, he’s surprisingly critical of Republicans and Democrats alike for muddling the U.S. relationship with China in order to score political points at home.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Max Baucus is the former U.S. Ambassador to China. 
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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After losing both chambers of Congress during Trump’s presidency and after waging a disappointing campaign to recapture them in 2022, the Republican Party is having a lot of intra-party feuds.

This week, the post-election search for new leadership moved to the Republican National Committee. Right now, there’s no agreed-upon leader of the party, so like the recent battles in the Senate and the House, the RNC election has turned into a fight to define the GOP’s future.

And once again, Donald Trump is at the center of the debate.

Playbook co-author Rachael Bade flew to Orange County, California, to watch the fireworks at the RNC’s winter meeting, where the three-time incumbent chair Ronna McDaniel faced a challenge from conservative lawyer Harmeet Dhillon.

To understand what this fight is all about, Rachael had breakfast with Bill Palatucci, a longtime party member who is also a close ally of Chris Christie’s and a loud critic of Donald Trump.

In this week’s episode, Palatucci explains how the Dhillon-McDaniel contest isn’t just about the RNC chairmanship – it's about who will lead the Republican Party into 2024 — and beyond — and why the GOP could languish for a very long time depending on the outcome.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Bill Palatucci is an RNC national committee man for New Jersey.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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What do you do when you are one of the guardians of your state’s most precious political and cultural institution — the very thing that defines New Hampshire — and the president you love and the party you’ve served your whole life, tells you to destroy it?

To find out, we spoke to Ray Buckley. Buckley has served as the chairman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party since 2007 and he was involved in every New Hampshire presidential primary campaign since he was an organizer for Jimmy Carter.

A big part of his job is protecting the status of the New Hampshire primary, which by state law is required to be the first in the nation. Any Democrat who wants to be president makes a point of becoming Ray Buckley’s friend. When Buckley got a call in December from Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, the worst part was that it was Joe Biden who had screwed him. Biden had decided to end New Hampshire’s decades-long reign by hosting the first presidential primary — at least for the Democrats. In its place: South Carolina, the state that resurrected Biden’s candidacy in 2020.

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza speaks to Buckley about New Hampshire’s fight to preserve their first-in-the-nation primary.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Ray Buckley is the chair of the New Hampshire Democratic Party.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Alex Keeney is a senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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In off-the-record conversations and private emails, AFL-CIO political director Michael Podhorzer argued that the pundits focusing exclusively on the fundamentals of the race — Biden’s approval rating and the dismal economic indicators — were missing the bigger picture. Yes, presidents usually lose an average of some two dozen House seats in similar circumstances, but that wasn’t the whole story.

While many analysts argued that inflation would be more important than the diffuse issue of democracy, Podhorzer said that was myopic. He was much more right than wrong.

Podhorzer has now left the AFL-CIO after 25 years and is able to speak freely. On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host Ryan Lizza sits down with him in his kitchen for his first wide-ranging interview. They talk about what everyone got wrong about 2022, his critiques of the media’s coverage of the right, his ongoing battles with the so-called popularists in the Democratic Party, and why Podhorzer already thinks the presidential election of 2024 is headed for a dangerous endgame.

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Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.) and his allies are trying to end Kevin McCarthy’s reign as leader of the House Republicans. Good is one of five Republicans in the far-right Freedom Caucus vowing to block McCarthy’s path to the 218 votes needed to become Speaker of the House. The two have a history.

In 2020, Good was running for Congress to represent Virginia’s 5th Congressional District. Incidentally, also home to the race between James Madison and James Monroe to be the district’s first representative in Congress. Madison won. While Good was running for Congress, Kevin McCarthy tried to consolidate power in the Republican House conference on his way to becoming Speaker. During his campaign, Good knocked out one of McCarthy’s loyal member’s at the GOP nominating convention. At a private meeting recently, Good and McCarthy had a heated exchange about events at the time.

On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Playbook co-author Rachael Bade went to the Hill to meet Good at his office and dig for details on the history of his relationship with McCarthy and whom Good and his allies intended to support for Speaker instead.

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Department of Energy announced a breakthrough in the decades-long quest to recreate on Earth the process that powers the Sun: nuclear fusion. To simplify slightly, scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California recently fired a bunch of lasers at a piece of hydrogen. The lasers used 2.05 megajoules of energy to hit the hydrogen. The resulting reaction produced 3 megajoules of energy.

For the first time in the history of fusion research, scientists achieved ignition — more energy was produced by the reaction than was used to create it. Here in Washington, and the world of politics, no elected official was as excited about these results as Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.).

Beyer is the former lieutenant governor of Virginia and was an ambassador in the Obama administration. A few years ago, Beyer became consumed with the promise of fusion. How it could become a cheap and plentiful alternative to fossil fuels. How it could solve the climate crisis.

In this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host Ryan Lizza joins Congressman Beyer to explore the policy and politics of this big scientific breakthrough. Is it the turning point we’ve been promised for decades, or will it once again lead to the same dashed expectations that has long-characterized the history of fusion research?

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Gov. Chris Sununu was recently re-elected to his fourth term in office. The Republican governor has been positioning himself for the 2024 presidential primaries for a while now. 

Before Election Day, there were a lot of reasons to be skeptical about his chances. He’s a New England moderate in the party of MAGA. He endorsed DONALD TRUMP twice, but he’s also been a stinging critic. And he’s pro-choice, which might be seen as a non-starter in a GOP primary.

Trump’s recent decline has emboldened his potential competitors. The underwhelming results for Republicans in the 2022 midterms have led to an outbreak of interest on the right in electability. 

Now Sununu is trying to define himself against not just Trump, but many of the right’s obsessions that he sees as political losers. On this week’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza went to the statehouse in Concord, NH, where Sununu was keen to discuss 2024 presidential primary politics in a way that he hasn’t recently. 

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Michael Bennet is the senior Democratic senator from Colorado, a famously purple state. In the weeks leading up to the 2022 midterms, Colorado seemed to be a place where Republicans might flip a few seats. But as it turned out, not only was there no red wave in Colorado, there was something of a blue wave instead. On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, host Ryan Lizza visits Sen. Michael Bennet on the Hill to dissect the 2022 midterms and pick his brain on 2024 presidential campaigns and what might be in store for the lame-duck session.

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There are some members of Congress who have famously struggled to understand the online world. Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) prides himself on not only understanding the internet, but also for passing some of the key legislation that he likes to say helped lay the foundation for the digital revolution.

More recently, Markey has been leading fights to enhance online privacy and regulate social media. So when Elon Musk took over Twitter recently, Markey was paying close attention to see what kinds of changes the richest man in the world might bring to the platform. 

The two men have a little history: they previously tussled over safety issues with self-driving technology in Musk’s Tesla electric vehicles. The Muskification of Twitter was equally concerning to the senator. But it was when Musk unveiled a plan to sell blue check marks — the Twitter verification symbol that prevents users from masquerading as other people and corporations — that Markey started to get really worried. What followed turned Markey into Musk’s chief tormentor in Washington. 

In this week’s Playbook Deep Dive, host and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza went up to Sen. Markey’s office on Capitol Hill to find out what it’s like to be in a Twitter war with the self described chief twit, and what might come next in this escalating confrontation.  

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Senator Ed Markey is a Democratic senator from Massachusetts.
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Why were Democrats seemingly able to by and large defy history and avoid a catastrophic result in the midterms? Across the country, Democrats successfully defended seats that Republicans had confidently expected to pick up, while also adding wins in gubernatorial races in five swing states that flipped from Trump to Biden in 2020.

There are many explanations: backlash to the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, exhaustion with Donald Trump and some of the candidates that he backed, and a big turnout for Democrats among Gen Z and millennials. The coalition of voters that turned out to oppose Donald Trump in 2018 and 2020 remained largely intact in 2022.

There were also a lot of races that turned on local issues where none of these common explanations seem to tell the full story. We’re all going to be unpacking the results for a while. So, we wanted to hear why these Democrats think they were able to defy history. On this week’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Ohioan and POLITICO Playbook co-author Rachael Bade talked to Greg Landsman, a Democrat who on Tuesday, ousted 13-term incumbent Republican Rep. Steve Chabot in Ohio’s 1st District.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Greg Landsman is the representative-elect for Ohio's 1st Congressional district.
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Simon Rosenberg is the head of the progressive think tank NDN, and he has a message for jittery Democrats on the eve of the midterms: cheer up! This week on the Playbook Deep Dive podcast we sit down with the Democratic Party’s apostle of optimism.

“I'm not sitting here and telling you we're going to win,” Simon told us over lunch this week. “What I'm telling you is that the narrative about this election, about there being a red wave— there isn't one. There never has been.”

If you spend a lot of time on political Twitter, you have no doubt encountered Simon’s tweets and threads over the last few weeks. He’s built a large and loyal following of Democrats looking for silver linings amid the clouds of negative media coverage about their party’s prospects in the midterms.

— Hispanics abandoning his party? Simon says that NDN’s polling doesn’t show it.

— Polling averages tilting to the GOP in the last few weeks? Simon says they’ve been polluted by a barrage of Republican polls dumped strategically to depress Democrats and excite Republicans. (This claim has been met with a lot of skepticism, because surely Democratic campaigns would be leaking their own internals, but we digress…)

— And that red wave? Simon says that if you look at the Kansas abortion referendum, the five House special elections earlier this year, and especially the early voting data, that the anti-Trump coalition that powered Democrats to victory in 2018 and 2020 is holding strong in 2022.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Simon Rosenberg is president of NDN. 
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Dan Conston is the president of the Congressional Leadership Fund, the super PAC aligned with Rep. Kevin McCarthy with the singular mission of making the California Republican Speaker of the House. Most forecasts suggest that Conston and CLF are on the verge of success.

In a candid hour-plus interview, Conston took Playbook behind the scenes of CLF’s operation. We talked about the issues and demographics of this election, emerging GOP opportunities in the final days of the campaign and the inside strategies that one of the best-funded super PACs in American politics uses to take down its Democratic opponents.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Dan Conston is the president of the Congressional Leadership Fund.
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Robert Draper's "Weapons of Mass Delusion: When the Republican Party Lost Its Mind" focuses exclusively on the GOP during the crucial 18-month period after January 6 and vastly adds to our understanding of the Trump era. Far-right representatives Paul Gosar, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and Matt Gaetz are part of a new breed of Republican party fighting with their GOP elders. The subtitle of Draper's book — emphasizing when, not how — Trump-inspired elected officials helped the former president solidify his grip over the Republican party is as important as understanding what has happened to the party.

In this week's Playbook Deep Dive, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza unwinds Draper's chronicle of what has happened to the Republican party, and America, through his character-driven account of the people and events shaping the extremes of American politics today.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Robert Draper is a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine.  
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Scott Bland is POLITICO’s national politics editor and leading all of POLITICO’s 2022 midterm coverage. To do it, he has a team of about 15 reporters around the country following campaigns.  

Despite the cooling temperatures, this is when people like Bland start to sweat. 

His job is to ensure readers and listeners aren’t surprised on election night — that POLITICO has considered and reported on all possible outcomes, including the outliers — those black swan scenarios with seemingly low probabilities. Not just the most likely ones, according to conventional wisdom.

The specter of 2016 still haunts newsrooms. 

Bland and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza dissect how 2016 midterm misses can be applied lessons for reporters covering the 2022 elections. Bland also weighs in on pressing questions like; what are the chances of Democrats winning the House while the Republicans take the Senate? Could all of those allegedly flawed Trump-backed candidates sweep their races? And could Biden be the first President since 2002 to avoid a party defeat in the first-midterm election?

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Scott Bland is the national politics editor for POLITICO.
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Sarah Matthews has a political resume similar to a lot of conservatives her age. At Kent State, she joined the College Republicans and made her first pilgrimage to the annual CPAC conference in Washington. Sarah interned on Capitol Hill for John Boehner and Sen. Rob Portman, both of Ohio. And then she got a job doing comms for Republicans on the Hill.

But a few years later, in June 2020, she was working for Donald Trump. Like a lot of her colleagues, she was well aware of Trump’s flaws, but she agreed with his policies. When her mentor, Trump press secretary Kayleigh McEnany invited Sarah to be her deputy, Sarah didn’t think twice. It was a chaotic seven months, marked by the Lafayette Square protest incident, Covid, the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the confirmation of Justice Amy Coney Barrett. Then came Jan. 6.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

You probably remember Matthews from her primetime testimony to the Jan. 6 committee in July. She testified about her experience in the White House during the insurrection and how Donald Trump’s actions that day so disgusted her that she resigned that night. The January 6 committee is back next week, on October 13th, for its first hearing since the one at which Matthews appeared. 

Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza sat down with Sarah Matthews, former deputy White House press secretary, to hear the full story of what it was like for a young Republican to publicly break with the president, upend her career, and experience the full wrath of Trump and his supporters by cooperating with the January 6 committee.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Sarah Matthews is a former White House deputy press secretary for the Trump administration
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Last Sunday, Italians voted for the most right-wing government since Benito Mussolini. The controversial politician leading the winning coalition, Giorgia Meloni, will become Italy's first female prime minister.

Meloni has become a darling of sorts for many Republicans in America, who invited her to speak at this year's CPAC conference. The "Brothers of Italy," co-founded by Meloni in 2012, was a fringe party with neo-fascist roots. It rebranded itself in recent years as a socially conservative, ultra-nationalist party that's also a European voice in the growing trans-national culture wars.

From a rooftop bar near central Rome, Ryan Lizza and POLITICO Europe's Rome correspondent, Hannah Roberts, dig into Meloni's history, rise, and how she's likely to lead Italy's government with EU, NATO, and Russian relationships center stage.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Hannah Roberts is POLITICO Europe's Rome correspondent.
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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It’s hard to imagine a political event that was covered more intensively in real time than Trump’s two impeachments. But only now, 18 months after the Senate acquitted Trump a second time, we are learning crucial new details about what happened behind the scenes of those proceedings. And only now are we starting to reckon with what those two failed impeachments have wrought for Congress, the presidency, and the Constitution — and who was responsible.

That reckoning comes courtesy of Playbook’s own Rachael Bade and Washington Post national security reporter Karoun Demirjian, who on Oct. 18 will publish “Unchecked: The Untold Story Behind Congress's Botched Impeachments of Donald Trump.” It’s an unsparing look at the characters, the calculations and, frequently, the cowardice that shaped Congress’s dealings with Trump — and how the results have likely changed impeachment forever.

On this week’s Playbook Deep Dive, Rachael and Karoun talk extensively about their book and its provocative argument with Playbook editor Mike DeBonis. It’s a reunion for the trio, who covered Capitol Hill together at the Washington Post and watched closely as Congress struggled to hold Trump to account. They discuss why “Unchecked” is an unapologetically “both sides” book, how congressional leaders’ public rhetoric rarely matched private reality, and just how many impeachment articles President Joe Biden might be facing if Republicans take the House.

Mike DeBonis is Playbook's editor for POLITICO.
Rachael Bade is Playbook's co-author for POLITICO. 
Karoun Demirjian is a national security reporter at The Washington Post.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio. 
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio. 

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UCLA political scientists Lynn Vavreck and Chris Tausanovitch and Vanderbilt’s John Sides argue that political party identity has become increasingly “calcified” in surprising new ways. Their latest book,“The Bitter End,” describes both the long-term trends and short-term shocks that shaped the 2020 presidential election and continue reverberating today. 

What’s driving the increasing distance between the parties and the growing homogeneity within the parties? 

Playbook Co-Author Ryan Lizza met Vavreck on UCLA’s campus to learn why so-called “identity-inflected issues” are the great new dimension of political conflict and present a dangerous direction in America. 

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Kara Swisher has hosted the annual Code Conference for the last twenty years. Recently she announced that this was her final year organizing and running the event, which concluded on Thursday in Los Angeles.

At the final big panel on Wednesday evening, Swisher ended things where she started: with a conversation about Steve Jobs.

She gathered the famous Apple designer Jony Ive and the widow of Steve Jobs — Laurene Powell Jobs — and the CEO of Apple — Tim Cook — who flew to Los Angeles for Swisher hours after unveiling the new iPhone 14 at Apple's headquarters in Cupertino. The event ended much more poignant than one would expect at a conference about technology and politics.

Afterward, Playbook Co-Author Ryan Lizza met Swisher in a suite on the 8th floor of the Beverly Hilton at what was Code's last secret poker party. They talked about the end of her running the Code Conference, her long and winding career … and why she loves saying no.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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On Tuesday, Leahy, who is retiring this year after representing Vermont in the Senate since 1975, released “The Road Taken,” an engrossing memoir that covers his long career, from his politically fraught vote against the Vietnam War to his account of rallying his fellow senators back into the chamber on Jan. 6 after they fled the mob that stormed the Capitol. In between, you meet dozens of politicians, Supreme Court Justices, presidents, world leaders, musicians, and Hollywood celebrities.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) is the president pro tempore of the United States Senate.
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio. 
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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The White House suddenly has a lot to brag about. And the president’s aides, led by chief of staff Ron Klain, are reaching deep into the 20th century to make the case that Joe Biden is a transformational president with “historic achievements.” We ventured over to the White House and sat down with Klain in the Roosevelt Room to review the last 18 months of the Biden presidency and talk about what’s next. At the start of the summer, this conversation would have been vastly different. Now, gas prices have dropped, the last CPI report hints that inflation may finally be trending down after hitting a peak. Election forecasters are writing pieces at least entertaining the idea that Democrats might not suffer the long-predicted midterm wipeout. And there’s that burst of legislative victories that were squeezed out of Congress in July and August that had Biden, a lover of alliteration, calling this period “a season of substance.”

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Ron Klain is the White House Chief of Staff.
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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This week the Senate passed the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 using the process known as budget reconciliation. The upside? No filibuster is allowed. You only need a majority to approve a reconciliation bill. And the downside? There are strict rules about what can be included. 

On the last episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Eric Ueland and Greg D’Angelo, two GOP budget nerds, previewed the final challenges that the Inflation Reduction Act would face to pass the Senate. They even nailed one of the parliamentarian’s rulings: she nixed a portion of the bill that would have applied inflation caps to the private pharmaceutical market.

For their most significant policies, neither party has sixty votes. Reconciliation is how presidents get big things through Congress now. And it’s likely to be that way for the foreseeable future. To understand how major policy changes can happen these days, you need to know how this byzantine process works.

In this week’s episode, Eric and Greg step back and explain the long history of reconciliation and how it has come to dominate lawmaking in ways never anticipated when the process was created in the 1970s.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Eric Ueland is a commissioner on the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom.
Greg D'Angelo is a partner at the Nickles Group.
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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The biggest remaining obstacle for the Democrats is now Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, who will continue to host Democratic and Republican aides behind closed doors today (no press allowed) to scrub the reconciliation bill for potential violations of the Byrd Rule.

MacDonough broke the hearts of progressives on several occasions last year, including when she nixed the minimum wage from the Covid relief bill, which was passed using reconciliation, and rejected three different versions of immigration reform from the Democratic reconciliation bill that was eventually scrapped in December.

Republican budget nerds reviewing the latest reconciliation bill still believe they can knock out certain provisions. On Thursday, for the latest episode of the Playbook Deep Dive podcast, we sat down with two of the party’s leading experts on the process: Eric Ueland, who spent 25 years in the Senate, including as staff director of the Budget Committee, and Greg D’Angelo, who spent nearly a decade on the committee.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Eric Ueland is a commissioner on the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom.
Greg D'Angelo is a partner at the Nickles Group.
Afra Abdullah is associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Here’s something about Washington, D.C. that even a lot of people who live here don’t know: Psychedelic mushrooms are basically legal. In 2020 voters approved a ballot initiative that made growing, purchasing, and distributing mushrooms the lowest law enforcement priority for D.C. police.

Cities and states are way ahead of the federal government. There are movements in more than two dozen states to either study, decriminalize, or outright legalize mushrooms and other psychedelics. It’s happening in blue states like California, New York and Vermont, as well as in red states like Utah, Kansas, and Florida. Cities such as Ann Arbor, Oakland, Seattle, and Denver, have, like D.C., all decriminalized mushrooms.

The epicenter of this movement, as was the case with cannabis legalization, is Colorado. In November, voters will decide whether to approve the Natural Medicine Health Act of 2022, which would create state-regulated “healing centers” where anyone over 21 could receive psilocybin-assisted therapy.

In this week’s episode, Ryan traveled to Littlejohn, Colorado and sat down with Veronica Lightning Horse Perez, the co-leader of the Colorado mushroom campaign. They talked about how psychedelics helped treat her mental health issues, what it’s like to undergo psychedelic therapy with mushrooms and ayahuasca, and her journey to becoming the unlikely political activist at the forefront of mushroom legalization.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Veronica Lightning Horse Perez is co-organizer of Natural Health Colorado.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Ryan caught up with the former treasury secretary — and thorn in the side of Biden White House economists — Larry Summers on the sidelines of the Aspen Security Forum for a wide-ranging interview about last 18 months of economic debates, why so many policymakers got the inflation debate wrong, what Summers thinks about Joe Manchin blowing up Build Back Better over inflation concerns, what Biden — and Pelosi — are getting wrong in their approach to China, and why we are almost certainly headed into a painful recession.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Larry Summers is the former U.S. treasury secretary.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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THE PLAYBOOK INTERVIEW: GEORGE GASCÓN — Gascón was elected district attorney of Los Angeles County in November 2020 with 54% of the vote. 

“I won handsomely,” he reminisced Wednesday during a 90-minute conversation at the Hall of Justice in downtown L.A. “I got over 2 million votes.”

It was a big victory for criminal justice reformers: the leading progressive prosecutor in the country taking over the movement’s top target, the largest county in the country and one that has long been hostile to change. 

California makes it relatively easy to recall an elected official. It’s been part of the state constitution since 1911. 

There was talk of recalling Gascón as soon as he was sworn in. And those calls were coming from inside the Hall of Justice, where many of his deputy district attorneys revolted against the changes. 

“The week that I got sworn in, they started talking about recalling me,” Gascón said. “And they had to be told you have to wait at least 90 days.” 

Voters will know by August 17 whether a recall of Gascón will be on the November ballot.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
George Gascón is the District Attorney of Los Angeles County.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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The question of why so few Republicans have stepped forward to testify about what they heard and saw in the Trump White House, is very much at the heart of much of the House Jan. 6 committee’s work — and of Tim Miller’s new book, “Why We Did It,” which, by chance, was released the same day as Hutchinson’s explosive testimony.

Miller’s arc is, by now, somewhat familiar: At the dawn of the Trump era, he was an in-demand Republican strategist and a top aide to Jeb Bush. He watched in horror as Trumpism swallowed the Republican establishment and his fellow GOP strategists jumped on the MAGA bandwagon. He resisted, left the party, and devoted himself to Never Trumpism.

In his new book, Miller sets out to understand the mindset of those Republicans who remained — friends and former colleagues who weren’t all that different from him, but who enthusiastically worked to elect Trump and later joined his administration. 

In one chapter, he traces the journey of Alyssa Farah Griffin. In 2016, she was a 20-something conservative and top Capitol Hill aide who couldn’t bring herself to vote for Trump. By 2020, she was director of strategic comms in the Trump White House — before resigning that December.

On the outside, Griffin joined Miller in the ranks of the Never Trumpers, and began helping others do the same. Most recently, it was Griffin who helped guide Hutchinson, her good friend, through the fraught process of breaking away from the Trump world, a journey that culminated in Hutchinson’s devastating account of Trump’s actions on Jan. 6. 

On Thursday, Ryan met with Miller and Griffin at the Georgetown Club for lunch — and to talk about Miller’s new book, their respective journeys navigating Trumpism and what Hutchinson’s testimony could mean for the future of Trump’s grip on the Republican Party.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Tim Miller is a political strategist and writer-at-large for The Bulwark.
Alyssa Farah Griffin is a political commentator and former Trump White House aide.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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If documentary filmmaker Alex Holder’s memory is accurate, Donald Trump was on the phone with Vladimir Putin just minutes after the news broke that the Russian president had dismissed Trump’s Hunter Biden allegations. Holder began filming former President Donald Trump in September 2020 during his campaign for reelection. In the runup to the election and continuing after they left office, Holder had extensive access to film and interview Trump, his inner circle and former Vice President Mike Pence. 
 

The House select committee investigating Jan. 6 recently sent a subpoena to Holder for raw footage related to interviews and discussions Holder recorded, as well as raw footage from Jan. 6 when Holder and his cameraman were there filming as the mob attacked the Capitol. On Thursday, shortly after Holder finished talking to Jan. 6 investigators, Ryan Lizza met Holder at his hotel. On this week’s Playbook Deep Dive, Holder talks about what it’s like behind the scenes filming Trumpworld, the significance of his project and potential impact of the footage subpoenaed by the Jan. 6 Committee.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Alex Holder is a documentary filmmaker. 
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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J. Michael Luttig is the former federal appeals court judge who advised Vice President Mike Pence that the VP had no authority to reject electors on Jan. 6. Back in February, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza spent four hours interviewing Luttig for a Deep Dive episode that ended up being mostly about his extraordinary role advising Mike Pence on Jan. 6. Given the interest in Luttig this week, we went back through what was left on the cutting room floor to create a new show that goes deep on who Luttig is and where he comes from, which will help you understand why this lifelong right-winger is saying what he’s saying now about the threat to democracy. 

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This week in the GOP primary for South Dakota’s at-large district, Rep. Dusty Johnson (R-S.D.) defeated a challenger from his right who claimed he wasn’t aligned closely enough with former President Donald Trump, even though Johnson agrees with Trump on many policies. Johnson’s vote for a bipartisan commission to investigate the Jan. 6 attacks and his support for Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) to remain in House Leadership was cited as proof he is not an ally of the former president. Johnson also faced more than $500,000 in spending against him from Drain the DC Swamp PAC. He tells Ryan Lizza that South Dakotans like Trump – but they also like Dusty Johnson. Find out how he overcame the challenges faced from defying Trump and how he survived to win the Republican nomination on this week’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Rep. Dusty Johnson is the congressman at-large for South Dakota.
Afra Abdullah is an associate producer for POLITICO audio.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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There’s at least a few people in the Democratic establishment who have hope for the midterms. They’re the redistricting experts, people like Kelly Burton. She’s a long-time political operative and the president of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, an organization that she leads along with other top party names like former attorney general Eric Holder. The NDRC is leading the Democrats’ charge against Republican gerrymandering during the 2022 redistricting cycle.

So why are Burton and her counterparts so sanguine? Because for the first time since 2018, they are confident that redistricting and numerous legal battles are making the field more hospitable for midterm victories. The NDRC is bringing lawsuits to state courts to fight what it says are illegal attempts at gerrymandering districts. Florida, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Alabama — the list goes on. On the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, Burton tells Playbook Deep Dive host Ryan Lizza what it’s taken to draw an equitable voting map for 2022 and what she’s hoping to see in November. 

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Kelly Burton is the president of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Trump-backed candidates have lost recently in Georgia, Nebraska, North Carolina and Idaho. The biggest caveat about how the lessons of other states might apply in Wyoming is that in states where the Trump candidate lost, the non-Trump candidate was not anti-Trump. Rep. Liz Cheney’s political identity — at least, her identity on the national stage — is now defined by her criticism of the former president. The anti-Cheney effort in Wyoming has been led by Frank Eathorne, the Wyoming GOP chair and Trump’s most important ally in the state. Last weekend, Victoria Eavis of the Casper Star-Tribune and Rone Tempest of WyoFile, published a bombshell 6,500-word profile of Eathorne. On this week’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive, co-author Ryan Lizza is in the Casper Star-Tribune’s newsroom, where Eavis explains how the story came together. Plus, former chairman of the Natrona County Republican party Dr. Joseph McGinley explains what it’s like to be pushed out of his own party.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Victoria Eavis is the state politics reporter for the Casper Star-Tribune.
Dr. Joseph McGinley is a physician and former chairman of the Natrona County GOP.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Jennifer Ellis is the face of the movement that handed Donald Trump his biggest defeat of the year. She leads Take Back Idaho, a political action committee founded last year to beat back the growing tide of extremist candidates in Idaho.

Ellis’s main target on Tuesday was Janice McGeachin, the state’s far-right lieutenant  governor, whom Trump backed in her gubernatorial primary challenge to incumbent Gov. Brad Little.

Trump’s candidate lost by almost 21 points.

For this week’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive, we sat down with Jennifer Ellis at her cattle ranch in eastern Idaho to understand how the state’s GOP establishment delivered this stinging rebuke to Trumpism.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Jennifer Ellis is a cattle rancher and co-founder of Take Back Idaho.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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This week on “Playbook Deep Dive,” we sat down over Zoom with Steve Schmidt, the architect of the late Sen. John McCain’s 2008 presidential run, to hear what amounts to an untold chapter of that exhaustively chronicled campaign. It’s a story about regret and disillusionment that we are confident you will want to hear. 

Schmidt has long maintained that the roots of Trumpism, which he has spent the last seven years fighting, can be found in the movement that first gathered around Palin in 2008. But Schmidt has always been more circumspect about McCain, his one time hero and the man who actually picked Palin. 

Recently, though, he took to Substack to unfurl a surprising new chapter about the legendary senator and his failed 2008 campaign.

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This week on Playbook Deep Dive, POLITICO’s Peter Canellos talks with our own Josh Gerstein, who broke this week’s massive news that the Supreme Court’s conservative majority has drafted an opinion to overturn Roe v. Wade. Peter and Josh nerd out on everything from the history of the court, to potential implications of the draft opinion — both for the country and the judiciary itself.

Peter Canellos is POLITICO's managing editor for enterprise.
Josh Gerstein is POLITICO's senior legal affairs reporter.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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The White House Correspondents’ Dinner is back for the first time since 2019. Journalists, A-list celebrities and Washington’s power players will pack the cavernous ballroom at the Washington Hilton. That means brunch is back too. On this week’s episode, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza gets a tour from Tammy Haddad at the site of her annual garden brunch, one of the most sought after invites of the weekend. Plus, insights from comedian and WHCD alum Elayne Boosler and Ed Solomon of Anthony's Tuxedos in Georgetown.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Tammy Haddad is CEO & President of Haddad Media. 
Elayne Boosler is a comedian and the performer at the 1993 WHCD.
Ed Solomon is the owner of Wedding Creations & Anthony's Tuxedos of Georgetown.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Adam Allington is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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This week Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza is in Arizona to dig into a few big plotlines ahead of this year’s elections. Trump narrowly lost the state in 2020, Senator Mark Kelly – the Democratic incumbent – is one of the most vulnerable senators up for reelection this year and strategists are already looking at the 2024 Senate election to see who will run against Kyrsten Sinema. On this week’s Playbook Deep Dive Episode, Ryan joins Rep. Ruben Gallego for a long dinner and a few drinks. They discuss Gallego’s fraught history with Sinema, a potential campaign against her in 2024, the political environment in Arizona ahead of midterms and his deployment in the Iraq war.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Rep. Ruben Gallego is the congressman for Arizona's 7th district.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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In the coming weeks and months, the Playbook team will be out covering the key districts and states that will decide the outcome of the midterm elections. This week, co-author Ryan Lizza was in Las Vegas to interview John Anzalone, who is best known as President Joe Biden’s pollster, but who is also a top adviser to Gov. Steve Sisolak, who is up for reelection this year. In Nevada, two of the Democrats’ biggest political challenges collide: Democrats’ Hispanic voter problem is their working-class voter problem.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
John Anzalone is the founder of Impact Research.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Congressman Ro Khanna is one of the most influential progressives inside the house democratic caucus. He represents California’s 17th district – a large chunk of Silicon Valley. It’s wealthy, influential and home to companies like Apple, Intel, and Cisco Systems.

Today, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza asks Representative Khanna what went wrong trying to pass Biden’s Build Back Better plan and what he thinks progressives’ influence on Biden has been. Khanna also suggests how Democrats can improve their prospects going into the midterms.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Rep. Ro Khanna is the congressman for California's 17th district.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Doug Sosnik is a man whose deep dive political memos are considered essential reading in Washington. He's best known as a former senior adviser to then-President Bill Clinton. His latest memo dissects the new center of political power in America and argues that the most important battlegrounds are fought in the suburbs.

Today, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza has dinner with Sosnik to find out why he thinks a lot of conventional wisdom about the politics of American suburbs is wrong. 

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Doug Sosnik is a political strategist and former Clinton administration adviser.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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When you look at the major diplomatic events of the last thirty years, Derek Chollet has experienced them all. He’s worked with legends like James Baker, Strobe Talbott and Richard Holbrooke and served in some of the highest echelons of the White House, the Pentagon and the U.S. Department of State. From Bosnia to Syria — and now Russia — Chollet has helped to shape America’s approaches to its policy abroad.

Today, Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza sits down with Chollet, who’s currently the Counselor of the Department of State, to dig into Foggy Bottom’s approach to helping Ukraine and handling Putin.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Derek Chollet is the Counselor of the U.S. Department of State.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) pioneered the playbook that helped Democrats flip the House in 2018. Less than four years later, she announced her retirement. Her experience has raised alarms about the Democratic Party going forward.

Today, Playbook co-author Rachael Bade sits down with Rep. Murphy to talk about how the Democratic House leadership’s insistence on absolute party unity is fracturing the Dems and putting their congressional majority at risk.

Rachael Bade is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Rep. Stephanie Murphy is the congresswoman for Florida's 7th District.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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Even as President Joe Biden has emphasized that the U.S. and NATO do not want to engage with Russia militarily, Congress has pushed the administration to take a hard stance against Russia through unprecedented financial and economic sanctions. In recent years, behind the scenes, lobbyists representing Ukrainian interests pushed for sanctions on the other combustible issue, gas.    

Tonight, Playbook author Ryan Lizza has dinner in downtown DC with lobbyist Daniel Vajdich, on his strategy, before the war, to help deter Russian aggression and protect Ukraine, and his thoughts on the potential fallout from being burned by lobbyists.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Daniel Vajdich is the president of Yorktown Solutions.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Brook Hayes is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is executive producer for POLITICO audio.

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More than a week into the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin has escalated his military offensive. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has rallied international support for a major resistance. And major Western powers have isolated Russia by imposing devastating economic sanctions that leave Putin without an obvious off-ramp.

There is no end in sight to the war on the ground.

But there’s another war being fought in parallel through news interviews, social media posts and open source data: the information war. And it’s happening well beyond Ukraine’s borders.

Today, Playbook author Ryan Lizza talks with CNN senior international correspondent Matthew Chance, who’s on the ground in Ukraine, and former White House National Security Adviser Tom Donilon about the relationship between warzone dispatches and Washington policy. 

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Matthew Chance is a senior international correspondent for CNN.
Tom Donilon is a former National Security Advisor in the Obama Administration.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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It’s an event that Russians, Ukrainians and the rest of the world have been thinking about, but one that many people didn’t think would actually happen: Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Tense warnings and attempts at diplomacy have been discarded, with airstrikes and resistance arriving instead. Today, Playbook author Ryan Lizza talks with two journalists — Nataliya Gumenyuk and Uliana Pavlova — about the events unfolding in Kyiv and along the Russian border right outside of the Donbas region.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Natalia Gumenyuk is a reporter in Kiev.
Uliana Pavlova is a freelance journalist in Moscow.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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For most of his life, J. Michael Luttig has operated behind the scenes at the top of the conservative legal world. He started his career as a young aide at the U.S. Supreme Court, worked as an attorney in the Reagan White House, clerked for Judge Antonin Scalia before he was a legal icon, helped guide the appointment of two other Supreme Court justices, and was appointed to a federal judgeship by President George H.W. Bush.

During Luttig’s time on the bench, one of his clerks was a young attorney named John Eastman. In recent months, Eastman’s name has become inextricably tied to the legal advice he offered to then-President Donald Trump in December 2020 and January 2021: In a now-infamous legal memo, Eastman argued that then-Vice President Mike Pence had the ability to discard certified electoral votes from contested states — a notion that has been roundly debunked, but which Trump’s closest allies clung to (and which helped to inspire some of his supporters to storm the Capitol in rage).

That story is, by now, well known. But there’s another part of the story — one that hasn’t been told until now.

Today, in his first in-depth interview on the topic, Luttig shares the story of those days before the insurrection, when he was unknowingly enlisted to help Pence reject Trump’s efforts on Jan. 6. 

For “Playbook Deep Dive,” Ryan Lizza talks with Luttig about his advice to Pence then, what needs to be done to rewrite the Electoral Count Act now, and why he’s choosing this moment to make his legal commentary loud, clear and very public — in panel discussions and op-eds in publications like The New York Times

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
J. Michael Luttig is a former judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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For months, the parental backlash against school closings has dominated headlines and driven speculation about a brewing electoral wave for Republicans. But what if the parents are part of the deep-blue core of one of the most heavily Democratic cities in the country? That's exactly what's happening in San Francisco, as the political collision between a liberal school board and a group of angry, just-as-liberal parents is earning national attention for what it tells us about the shifting and complicated politics of pandemic parenthood.

Today, Playbook author Ryan Lizza sits down with Siva Raj and Autumn Looijen, co-founders of the Recall SF School Board campaign, about their journey from concerned parents to political activists. Plus, Jeremy B. White, the editor of Politico's California Playbook newsletter, joins to explain the political significance of the recall election.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Siva Raj and Autumn Looijen are the co-founders of Recall SF School Board.
Jeremy B. White is the  editor of the California Playbook newsletter.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Now that Justice Stephen Breyer is retiring, the Biden Administration is racing to select the perfect nominee to be his replacement. According to one Democratic strategist, the rules for confirming a Supreme Court justice have changed and Democrats need a new strategy. The confirmation of a justice is no joke — at best, it’s a wild and bumpy ride filled with intense vetting, “murderboards” and senatorial grillings. Each SCOTUS nominee is appointed a guide by the White House. Today, Playbook author Ryan Lizza joins Stephanie Cutter, co-founder of Precision Strategies and one-time ”sherpa” for Justice Sonia Sotomayor, to explain what it’s like behind the scenes of a SCOTUS confirmation process.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Stephanie Cutter is the co-founder of Precision Strategies.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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More than 100,000 Russian troops are mobilized along the Ukrainian border. What is Vladimir Putin’s ultimate goal? Today, Playbook author Ryan Lizza talks to former US Ambassador to NATO Kurt Volker — who led Trump’s Ukraine negotiations — about how President Biden is responding to the Ukraine threat, and how he would counter Putin’s strategy. Plus, journalist Uliana Pavlova joins us from Moscow to describe the sentiment on the ground.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Kurt Volker is the former U.S. Ambassador to NATO and special envoy to Ukraine.
Uliana Pavlova is a freelance journalist in Moscow.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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President Joe Biden’s first year in office has been tumultuous, marked by domestic and international challenges that have overshadowed the administration’s wins. Playbook author Eugene Daniels talks with Cedric Richmond, Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement, about Biden’s plans for a rebound and checks in with White House correspondent Laura Barrón-López to assess the new strategy.

Eugene Daniels is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Cedric Richmond is the Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement.
Laura Barrón-López is a White House correspondent for POLITICO.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Steve Clemons is a DC institution — an operator who connects some of the biggest power players in the Capitol. He also happens to be the confidant of the most powerful senator in Washington, Democrat Joe Manchin. Playbook author Ryan Lizza joins Clemons for breakfast at the Four Seasons Hotel in Georgetown to dish on what's motivating Manchin behind the scenes, and what he might do next.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Steve Clemons is Editor At Large of The Hill
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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One year later, the ripples of the Jan. 6th riot continue to reverberate throughout American politics. For Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), who led the second impeachment of Donald Trump, bringing the people responsible for the attack to account has become his driving priority. Today, Playbook author Rachael Bade talks to Rep. Raskin and congressional reporter Olivia Beavers about the continued fallout from the Capitol siege.

Rachael Bade  is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Olivia Beavers is a congressional reporter for POLITICO.
Rep. Jamie Raskin is Maryland's 8th District in Congress.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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Unemployment is dropping and the economy, by many measures, is humming. But spiraling inflation is creating a serious drag on the economic recovery and hurting President Joe Biden's approval ratings. This week Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza chats with Jared Bernstein, a member of Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers, and POLITICO’s Kate Davidson about Build Back Better and the administration’s response to rising costs throughout the economy.

Jared Bernstein is a member of the White House Council of Economic Advisers.
Kate Davidson is the author of POLITICO's Morning Money.
Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Can Twitter carry a politician to victory in an election? Playbook co-author Eugene Daniels and deputy editor Zack Stanton talk to Republican digital strategist Eric Wilson, former Andrew Yang presidential campaign manager Zach Graumann, and Aaron Smith, director of the Pew Research Center’s Datalab, about the role of social media in political campaigns and the limitations of the platforms.

Eugene Daniels is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Zack Stanton is Playbook's deputy editor.
Zach Graumann was the campaign manager for Andrew Yang presidential run.
Eric Wilson is a Republican digital strategist.
Aaron Smith is the director of the Pew Research Center's Data Lab.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.

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From their lofty offices along K street, Washington lobbyists have spent decades trying to pull the levers of power. But changing times sometimes call for changing scenery, and these OG influencers are trading luxurious office space near the White House for quaint, intimate townhouses right across the street from Congress. Today, Playbook co-host Tara Palmeri with lobbyists Brian Bell and Scott Eckart and POLITICO’s Hailey Fuchs on why lobbyists are flooding Capitol Hill townhouses, and whether proximity equals power.

Tara Palmeri is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Brian Bell is a lobbyist for the Allied Pilots Association.
Scott Eckart is a co-founder of Emergent Strategies.
Kara Tabor is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Gerrymandering: Depending on where you stand, it’s either the cause of, or solution to, many of America’s political problems. Here’s what that fight looks like — from the outside looking in, and from the inside looking out. Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza dives into the subject with GOP strategist (and former gerrymanderer) Jeff Timmer, Common Cause North Carolina executive director Bob Phillips and Politico’s Ally Mutnick.

Jeff Timmer  is a senior advisor for the Lincoln Project.
Bob Phillips is the executive director of Common Cause North Carolina.
Ally Mutnick covers House campaigns and redistricting for POLITICO.
Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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 It’s one of the most demanding jobs in Washington journalism: tracking down a lawmaker who’s in the news but doesn’t necessarily want to talk. For the Congress press corps, scoring that story-making quote might mean standing on a marble staircase for hours — if the senator or representative decides to talk at all. Playbook co-author Rachael Bade takes us inside the Capitol Hill media “scrum” — as reporters like CNN’s Manu Raju reveal their tricks of the trade… and former Senator Jeff Flake discloses all the times he pretended to talk on his phone while walking past reporters.

Rachael Bade  is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Jeff Flake is former Republican Senator from Arizona  and current Ambassador-designate to Turkey.
Manu Raju is CNN's chief congressional correspondent.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Special thanks to Nicholas Wu, Kyle Cheney, Oriana Pawlyk, Nolan McCaskill, Juliegrace Brufke, Paul Kane who were also featured reporters in this episode.

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For the first time in 12 years, a Republican won the governorship in Virginia. And it wasn’t just any victory — to claim the seat, Glenn Youngkin had to beat Terry McAuliffe, former governor and Democratic royalty. Ryan Lizza digs into the narrow win with Youngkin campaign strategists Jeff Roe and Kristin Davison, and the mistakes they think McAuliffe’s campaign made. Plus, senior politics editor Charlie Mahtesian on the significant places Youngkin gained the most votes.

Ryan Lizza is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Charlie Mahtesian is senior politics editor for POLITICO.
Kristin Davison was a campaign strategist for Gov.-elect Glenn Youngkin.
Jeff Roe was a campaign strategist for Gov.-elect Glenn Youngkin.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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All summer long, activists have pressured Democratic leaders for a reconciliation package that delivers on all of President Biden’s promises. That means Senators Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin faced protesters in their offices, homes… and bathroom stalls. Today, Playbook’s Tara Palmeri explores the new face of activism, and she asks POLITICO’s co-congressional bureau chief Burgess Everett on whether the activism is having its intended effect on Manchin and the latest on the Democrats messy reconciliation fight.

Tara Palmeri is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Burgess Everett is POLITICO's co-congressional bureau chief.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Carlos Prieto is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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“Somebody’s gotta do it. It might as well be me.” So says Ivan Adler, the “lobbyist hunter” who plucks D.C.’s most idealistic Hill staffers and turns them into K Street top dogs. POLITICO’s Hailey Fuchs and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza pry open the revolving door between the Hill and K Street — one of the most controversial but everlasting features of Washington’s underbelly.

Ryan Lizza is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Hailey Fuchs is a reporter at POLITICO covering money & influence in D.C.
Ivan Adler is 'The Lobbyist Hunter' and an executive recruiter.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Read Hailey's full story: https://www.politico.com/news/2021/10/15/lobbyist-hunter-ivan-adler-516069

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What actually happens if the nation defaults on its debt? Planes fall out of the sky, the streets run red with blood — OK, not literally. But the reality could be economic catastrophe: "Market chaos, economic chaos, all for absolutely no good reason," explains POLITICO’s Ben White. After a week of debt-ceiling drama in D.C., Ben joins Playbook co-author Eugene Daniels to unpack the partisan fights, doomsday hypotheticals and one of the most absurd twists so far: a trillion-dollar coin.

Eugene Daniels is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Ben White is chief economic correspondent for POLITICO.
Carlos Mucha is an attorney who popularized the idea of minting a trillion-dollar coin.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Crypto trading! Bitcoin! Dogecoin! Stablecoin! Even if lawmakers don't understand blockchain, Capitol Hill is finally waking up to digital currency — Congress has introduced more than a dozen bills on crypto and blockchain this year alone — as  both sides of the aisle go head to head over the best way to regulate the $2 trillion market. Economics reporter Victoria Guida joins Playbook co-author Tara Palmeri to talk about lobbying around crypto and the time her dog ate her Bitcoin.

Tara Palmeri is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Victoria Guida is an economics reporter at POLITICO. 
Kristin Smith is Executive Director at Blockchain Association.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

We want to invite you to take our NEW listener survey — it helps us learn more about your interests and improve our content. What do YOU want to hear from Politico’s podcasts? Let us know at https://bit.ly/3zgKB30

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As Democrats' massive reconciliation bill makes its way through the machine, one item is getting all the attention right now: health care. It’s a fight that basically boils down to Nancy Pelosi versus … everyone else — with the legacies of Pelosi, Sanders and Biden at stake. Playbook co-author Rachael Bade and POLITICO's Alice Miranda Ollstein take us to Capitol Hill, where the knives are coming out: leaders fighting behind closed doors about policies they've agreed on for years — or thought they did — and plenty on the line: $3.5 trillion, the future of the Affordable Care Act and dueling visions for the Democratic Party.

Rachael Bade is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Alice Miranda Ollstein is a health care reporter at POLITICO. 
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Raghu Manavalan is a senior editor for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

We want to invite you to take our NEW listener survey — it helps us learn more about your interests and improve our content. What do YOU want to hear from Politico’s podcasts? Let us know at https://bit.ly/3zgKB30

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What does it mean to be the nation’s second Catholic president? Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza talks with senior staff writer Ruby Cramer about how Joe Biden balances a very public role with the “private matter” of his faith at a time of deep division over abortion, and among the bishops in his own church.

Ryan Lizza is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Ruby Cramer is a senior staff writer at POLITICO magazine.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Read Ruby’s piece in Politico Magazine here: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/09/05/joe-biden-catholic-church-509396 

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There's an intra-party fight on the right — and it's not (all) about Trump! For decades, conservatives have called for the government to take a hands-off approach to the economy. But now, a group of self-styled “common good capitalists” — like Sen. Marco Rubio — want to change that. And, they’re gaining power. It’s a divide not only over what policy approach is best, but what the most effective political strategy is for the GOP in the 21st century. Playbook co-author Tara Palmeri talks with an influential voice in this new economic counterculture — Oren Cass, head of American Compass and Mitt Romney's former campaign advisor, as well as Eliana Johnson, POLITICO Magazine contributor and editor-in-chief of the Washington Free Beacon, about this policy divide and where the 2024 GOP hopefuls land on this spectrum.

Tara Palmeri is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Eliana Johnson is a contributing editor for POLITICO Magazine and editor-in-chief of the Washington Free Beacon.
Oren Cass is Mitt Romney's former campaign advisor and executive director of American Compass.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Kamala Harris entered law school as the daughter of activists and came out as a prosecutor — an evolution that shaped the politician she is today. Now, as the vice president grapples with some of the thorniest issues in politics and builds relationships with a wide array of Democratic allies — which she could leverage in both the administration and a future presidential campaign — even some of her closest allies admit she needs help fending off incoming fire. POLITICO Magazine’s Jesús A. Rodríguez and Playbook co-author Eugene Daniels dig into the Veep’s law school past, her performance eight months in and how wearing the mantle of “first” comes layered with racism and misogyny.

Eugene Daniels is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Jesús A. Rodríguez is a contributing editor for POLITICO Magazine.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Read more from Jesús: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/08/18/kamala-harris-law-school-politics-503924

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The Taliban's return to power marks the first real foreign policy crisis of the Biden administration — and a rare moment of bipartisan criticism of Joe Biden. But will the bungled withdrawal from Afghanistan scramble American politics, or merely deepen long-building fissures across the political spectrum? On the right, attempts to save America's Afghan allies have resurfaced fierce divides over immigration and diversity. On the left, the pullout is reigniting a debate over the US's "forever wars." Playbook co-authors Rachael Bade and Ryan Lizza on Biden's political pitfalls.

Rachael Bade is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Ryan Lizza is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Andy Glass is a contributing editor for POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Nobody on Capitol Hill got much sleep this week. The Senate passed its infrastructure bill, stayed up all night in a vote-a-rama and provided foreshadowing for the set of fights yet to come. As Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza put it this week: “Threat of a government shutdown? Possibility of America defaulting on its loans? Dust off that Blackberry, fire off a manual RT, and put on some LMFAO. It’s feeling very 2011.” Ryan and POLITICO’s Jennifer Scholtes break down what’s ahead for Congress.

Ryan Lizza is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Jennifer Scholtes is budget and appropriations reporter at POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Read more from Jennifer: https://www.politico.com/news/2021/08/09/democrats-unveil-budget-to-launch-35t-plan-without-republican-help-502822 

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The Democratic establishment dealt a crushing blow to the progressive movement this week in Ohio, where tensions, bad blood and intraparty allegiances were on full display. What can we learn from a special congressional primary that quickly became a national spectacle? And what does it say about the direction of one of the most powerful political forces in Washington: the Congressional Black Caucus? POLITICO's Ally Mutnick performs an autopsy with Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza.

Ryan Lizza is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Ally Mutnick is campaigns reporter at POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Read more on the Ohio special election from Ally: https://www.politico.com/news/2021/08/03/shontel-brown-beats-nina-turner-in-key-ohio-primary-502365

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Bernie Sanders is behaving a lot like a pragmatist (just don’t say it to his face). As the Senate Budget chair and a member of Sen. Chuck Schumer’s leadership team, the 79-year-old progressive is one of the most powerful people in Washington and finally has the opportunity he’s been waiting for his whole career: to pass a reconciliation bill with sweeping social reforms. If successful, the $3.5 trillion bill would be the biggest ever passed by Congress. The trick: Can he get it past the members of his own party?

Rachael Bade is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Laura Barrón-López is a White House correspondent for POLITICO.
Faiz Shakir is an advisor to Senator Bernie Sanders.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Read more:  Strange but true: Bernie takes a 'very pragmatic' turn

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Cuba’s sweeping protests — and sweeping crackdown — are historic. But the situation is a political hot potato for Biden, whose sanction orders came nearly two weeks after the unrest began. His go-it-slow approach has emboldened Republicans, while Florida Democrats fear the president could blow an opportunity to reorient U.S.-Cuba policy and improve the party’s political chances in a former swing state. POLITICO’s Sabrina Rodríguez and Marc Caputo unpack the political minefield with Playbook's Tara Palmeri.

Tara Palmeri is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Sabrina Rodríguez is an immigration correspondent for POLITICO.
Marc Caputo is a national political reporter for POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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$1.6 trillion — that's how much student loan debt there is in the United States. Progressives want to cancel student loan debt. Republicans say that's wildly unfair. And President Joe Biden is....waiting. Playbook co-author Tara Palmeri and education reporter Michael Stratford discuss the fight on Capitol Hill over student loans and whether Biden could tackle the problem through executive action.

Tara Palmeri is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Michael Stratford is an education reporter for POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Michigan’s Oakland County, once a Republican stronghold, is turning blue. Playbook's Eugene Daniels and Zack Stanton (also a Michigan native — he's from the "knuckle"), talk about whether shedding these suburbs is a warning light for Trumpism. Plus: Former Michigan GOP leader Jeff Timmer on what he thinks losing this stronghold says about the strength of a Republican electoral map.

Eugene Daniels is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Zack Stanton is Playbook deputy editor for POLITICO.
Jeff Timmer is a longtime GOP strategist who was executive director of the Michigan state party from 2005-2009.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Eight — that’s how many states have passed some form of cannabis legalization since November. And even though marijuana is gainingpopularity in conservative states, that's not breaking through with GOP senators on Capitol Hill. Cannabis reporter Natalie Fertig and Playbook co-author Tara Palmeri discuss the growing cannabis dissonance between Republican senators and voters in their home states, and why Chuck Schumer shouldn’t be optimistic about passing federal legislation.

Tara Palmeri is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Natalie Fertig is cannabis policy reporter for POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Special thanks to producer Olivia Reingold.

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Matthew Caulfield was a college senior when he was given a seemingly simple assignment that took him more than five years and 3,000 emails to start to answer: How much did a voting machine cost? And how big, precisely, was the U.S. elections industry? Playbook co-author Eugene Daniels and reporter Ben Wofford dive into the mysterious world of voting technology companies and the voting rights debate happening right now in Congress.

Eugene Daniels is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Ben Wofford is a contributor at WIRED.
Matthew Caulfield is incoming Assistant Professor of Management at West Chester University.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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It’s one of the top jobs in politics, period: mayor of the Big Apple. In a heavily left-leaning town, Tuesday’s crowded Democratic primary will essentially decide who will become the 110th mayor of New York City — an election that will determine who has the ear of powerful figures on Capitol Hill. POLITICO New York’s Sally Goldenberg and Playbook co-author Tara Palmeri unpack the race while producer Olivia Reingold pounds the pavement to find out what New Yorkers really think.

Tara Palmeri is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Sally Goldenberg is City Hall bureau chief at POLITICO New York.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Special thanks to producer Olivia Reingold.

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Imagine learning that someone you've known for 18 years is alleged to have been responsible for some of the worst violence on Jan. 6. How do you square that? Playbook co-author Rachael Bade and journalist Melanie Warner dive into the story of Jeffrey Sabol, one man whose alleged activity on Jan. 6 left many in his life confused and grappling for answers — about how a highly educated, middle-aged man with so much to lose could participate in what FBI Director Christopher Wray called “domestic terrorism." What does his story tell us about the Capitol insurrectionists, and how everyday Americans became the new face of extremism?

Rachael Bade is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Melanie Warner is a freelance journalist based in Boulder, Co.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Special thanks to Margy Slattery.

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A century ago, a violent white mob razed the heart of Tulsa's thriving Black community. Now, Oklahoma — and Republicans on Capitol Hill — are swept up in a national culture war over how schools teach kids about racism and sexism. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has inserted himself into that battle. POLITICO's education editor Delece Smith-Barrow and Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza delve into the tug-of-war, its implications for 2022, and how McConnell is turning what was once the subject of an occasional Fox News segment into a core piece of the Republican platform.

Ryan Lizza is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Delece Smith-Barrow is education editor at POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Special thanks to Juan Perez Jr. 

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Talking about UFOs was once kryptonite for your political career. Now, senators are openly talking about UFOs, and the Pentagon is set to deliver a long-awaited report in June detailing what it knows — and what it doesn’t. So why the sudden change? POLITICO’s Bryan Bender and Playbook co-author Rachael Bade dissect why lawmakers including former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) are concerned about national security and forcing UFOs into the political spotlight.

Rachael Bade is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Bryan Bender is a senior national correspondent for POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Special thanks to Mary Newman.

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This week's vote on a bipartisan commission to investigate the Jan. 6 insurrection exposed some serious rifts on the Hill — rifts that could get even wider as the bill heads to the Senate. POLITICO's Marianne LeVine and Playbook co-author Rachael Bade dig into the dynamics playing out among congressional leadership, from Mitch McConnell's 2022 calculations to Kevin McCarthy's quest to become speaker.

Rachael Bade is a Playbook co-author for POLITICO.
Marianne LeVine is a congressional reporter for POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is the senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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If you’ve paid any attention to the news lately, you’ve probably heard this line: There’s a “civil war” raging within the GOP. Republican leadership is duking it out in the open after losing the White House, the House and the Senate; just this week, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy ousted his No. 3, Rep. Liz Cheney. On this Playbook Deep Dive, political analyst Jeff Greenfield digs into a contrarian argument with Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza: There is no civil war. This is a purge of anyone who isn't sticking to the party line — and it might actually strengthen the GOP.

Ryan Lizza is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Jeff Greenfield is a five-time Emmy-winning network television analyst and author.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

SHOW NOTES

• A GOP Civil War? Don’t Bet On It, by Jeff Greenfield

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White House reporters have access to the highest seat in the country — and they’re a small group. An even smaller group? Reporters of color. On today’s episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Eugene Daniels gets honest with fellow Black White House correspondents April Ryan (TheGrio) and Ayesha Rascoe (NPR) about everything from microaggressions to death threats. “Covering the White House from Bill Clinton to now, race touches everything,” says Ryan. “Everything.” Plus, a look at the first Black female White House reporter Alice Dunnigan and her faceoffs with Eisenhower — who refused to take her questions for two years.

Eugene Daniels is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Carol McCabe Booker is a former journalist and attorney who edited Alice Dunnigan's autobiography "Alone atop the Hill."
April Ryan is White House Correspondent at TheGrio.
Ayesha Rascoe is White House Correspondent for NPR and part of the NPR Politics Podcast.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has made a name — and recently, fundraised over $3 million — on becoming a political celebrity by oiling gears in the "outrage machine," promoting extremist beliefs and false conspiracy theories and bypassing establishment media and establishment Washington. In Congress, she may not have committee assignments, but she's got an increasingly valuable email list and a growing war chest. What her rise reveals about the power (or lack thereof) of the party’s traditional gatekeepers and the increasing nationalization of local races, featuring Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill), Playbook's Ryan Lizza, and POLITICO's Melanie Zanona, Michael Kruse, and Charlie Mahtesian.

Ryan Lizza is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Rep. Adam Kinzinger is a Republican congressman from Illinois.
Melanie Zanona is congressional reporter at POLITICO.
Michael Kruse is a senior staff writer at POLITICO magazine. 
Charlie Mahtesian is senior politics editor at POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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“If we miss this opportunity, God help us.” Joe Manchin and Lisa Murkowski. Two moderate senators smack in the middle — and on either side — of a split 50-50 Senate. On our first episode of Playbook Deep Dive, the two friends open up in a rare interview with POLITICO’s Burgess Everett. They get personal: about reconciliation, frustration over the Senate’s hurdles — even why Murkowski hogs the best fishing holes. And Manchin reveals a major endorsement, heard first on this show.

Rachael Bade is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Burgess Everett is co-congressional bureau chief at POLITICO.
Adrienne Hurst is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Special thanks to Elana Schor, Anthony Adragna and Ben Lefebvre

SHOW NOTES

• Democrat Manchin backs Republican Murkowski's reelection, by Burgess Everett

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California is the country’s leader when it comes to climate policies. But not even Democrats could impose a ban on fracking despite holding all levels of power in California. On POLITICO Energy, Colby Bermel explains why.

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On this bonus episode of POLITICO Dispatch: Who is “Kacey Montagu”? Christopher Cadelago tells the wild and weird story of how a fictitious correspondent rose from the depths of internet role playing to the White House briefing room. 

Subscribe to POLITICO Dispatch here: https://www.politico.com/podcasts/dispatch

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Playbook Deep Dive is a new weekly podcast from Politico — for the stories that seem stranger-than-fiction, but are all too real. Underneath all the theater, backstabbing and strategy in DC are colorful characters and real life consequences. You know those stories that stop you in your tracks? That's what we're going to tell each week. Featuring Playbook authors, reporters from all across the Politico newsroom, and characters from all over DC. Launching April 23.

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Five cities, four countries and 15 days locked down in Australia: Global Translations author Ryan Heath talks to Playbook's Tara Palmeri about his 68-hour travel journey to get Down Under. He peers inside the hellish future of global travel and explains why it might be more expensive for travelers. Plus, a surprise ending to this special Nerdcast episode.

Tara Palmeri is a POLITICO Playbook co-author. 
Scott Bland is a politics editor at POLITICO.
Ryan Heath is  a senior editor at Politico and author of Global Translations.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Black civil rights leaders, voting rights advocates and elected officials are putting more and more pressure on Senate Democrats to nix the filibuster. The argument? Keep the filibuster OR pass voting rights legislation... 'cause you can’t do both! Playbook author Eugene Daniels and reporter Zach Montellaro dig into the politics behind the filibuster and voting rights legislation.

Eugene Daniels is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Zach Montellaro is  a campaign reporter and author of the Morning Score newsletter.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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POLITICO Playbook co-author Ryan Lizza interviews Senator Brian Schatz (D-HI) to talk the next bill on the Democrats' agenda, whether or not Democrats will have to go around Republicans to get anything done and what his philosophy degree can tell us about this moment. Come for the policy, stay for the Kant*.

*Actually it was the German poet Novalis (formally Georg Friedrich Philipp von Hardenberg) who said "Philosophy can bake no bread; but she can procure for us God, Freedom, Immortality." There's your trivia for the week.

Ryan Lizza is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Sen. Brian Schatz is a Democrat and the senior Senator from Hawaii.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Bipartisanship didn’t happen with Covid relief. But President Joe Biden says he really, really wants to go bipartisan on infrastructure — plus, he'll need the Republican votes. POLITICO Playbook co-author Rachael Bade calls up transportation reporter Sam Mintz to talk Biden's infrastructure hopes, the major players in Congress, and why at this early stage, there’s every indication that GOP cooperation is less likely on a massive public works bill than it was on the pandemic legislation.

Rachael Bade is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Sam Mintz is a transportation reporter at POLITICO.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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On today's episode, the PR campaign the government is waging on vaccine hesitancy and equitable access for vaccine. Playbook co-author Eugene Daniels talks to Dr. Ebony Hilton and POLITICO healthcare reporter Adam Cancryn about whose job is it to combat hesitancy, and how the Biden administration is stacking up.

Eugene Daniels is a co-author of POLITICO Playbook.
Dr. Ebony Hilton is associate professor of anesthesiology at UVA and a critical care physician.
Adam Cancryn is a healthcare reporter at POLITICO.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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On today's episode, everything you want to know about the mysterious but powerful Senate Parliamentarian. Elizabeth MacDonough ruled Thursday that Senate Democrats would be deemed out of order if they include a $15 minimum wage in their coronavirus relief package. Congress editor Elana Schor and congressional budget reporter Caitlin Emma talk to host Scott Bland about the Senate's referee and this blow to the progressive agenda.

Scott Bland is a politics editor at POLITICO.
Elana Schor is a congress editor at POLITICO.
Caitlin Emma is a congressional budget reporter at POLITICO.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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We're roughly one year out from Iowa's catastrophic caucuses, and people are already thinking about the next primary calendar. Amid growing concerns that Iowa voters don't reflect the country, and pushes by Nevada and South Carolina to move up in line, are we watching Iowa — and its influential, historic, weird caucuses — get sidelined? White House correspondent Natasha Korecki, senior politics editor Charlie Mahtesian and Scott Bland talk about the future of presidential politics and whether Iowa will lose its crown.

Scott Bland is a politics editor at POLITICO.
Charlie Mahtesian is a senior politics editor at POLITICO.
Natasha Korecki is a  White House correspondent for POLITICO.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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With Donald Trump's impeachment acquittal almost assured, at the moment, the Republicans occupying the anti-Donald Trump lane in the post-Trump GOP are in danger of being run over. But if the GOP’s fervor for the former president fades to any degree, Senator Ben Sasse may be better positioned than anyone to capitalize. National political correspondent David Siders and Scott Bland talk about Sasse's recent video which inflamed his party's GOP and the future of the Republican party.

Scott Bland is a politics editor at POLITICO.
David Siders is a national political correspondent at POLITICO. 
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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Gone are the late night tweets of yore. In their place? Meticulously managed calendars. White House correspondent Anita Kumar takes Scott Bland inside the West Wing to see who is managing President Biden's time and what that tells us about the administration — and how it plans to achieve its goals.

Scott Bland is a politics editor at POLITICO.
Anita Kumar is a White House correspondent and associate editor at POLITICO. 
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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In 2006, a young man holding no political office brought down a 180+ years program and reshaped Congress forever. Scott Bland talks to POLITICO magazine reporter Zack Stanton, a former House page who leaked transcripts of sexual messages that former Congressman Mark Foley sent to teen pages... which resulted in his resignation and torpedoed the Republican hold on power for years.

Scott Bland is a politics editor at POLITICO.
Zack Stanton is an editor at POLITICO magazine. 
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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"It became clear that Scott Pruitt had sought to purchase a used mattress from the Trump hotel. And I thought, 'This is not what I expected this job would look like.'" At the close of Donald Trump's presidency, POLITICO's reporters and editors share their strongest memories of the last four years. Shocking moments they witnessed, conversations they overheard and what will stay with them forever. Plus, new Playbook co-author Tara Palmeri talks to Scott Bland about what she really wants to see in Biden's first days in office.

Scott Bland is a politics editor at POLITICO.
Tara Palmeri is a POLITICO Playbook co-author. 
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

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He's spent a lifetime turning near-disasters into brand-building triumphs. POLITICO magazine writer Michael Kruse talks to Scott Bland about how President Trump could do it again—unless the Senate breaks the pattern. Plus, a dispatch from POLITICO Congress reporter Sarah Ferris.

Scott Bland is a politics editor at POLITICO.
Michael Kruse is a senior staff writer at POLITICO magazine.
Annie Rees is a producer for POLITICO audio.
Jenny Ament is senior producer for POLITICO audio.
Irene Noguchi is the executive producer of POLITICO audio.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices