HERE’S A QUESTION: WILL THE RECKONING ever come for House Republicans? We have a pretty good idea what Tuesday is going to look like in the House: Republicans are bracing for a whooping. Most suggest a net loss of between seven and 15 seats.
Will anyone in the House GOP leadership get held responsible? Will there be any reflection?
-- SOME REALITIES: No one has the stones -- or infrastructure -- to try to take out KEVIN MCCARTHY for leader. No one really wants to take out STEVE SCALISE (R-La.). But there’s one target that everyone is talking about: LIZ CHENEY (R-Wyo.).
House GOP Conference chair is a thankless job, but CHENEY has feuded with TRUMP backers and her House GOP colleagues, so keep an eye on this.
-- AFTER LOSING MORE THAN TWO DOZEN SEATS, it would be tough for @tomemmer to make a case that he’s the right guy for the NRCC. Keep an eye on @EliseStefanik. She can make argument GOP needs more women in ldrshp and the first female @NRCC chair.
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a late Playbook PM
2 THINGS ARE ABOUT TO HAPPEN: 1) House Ds are beginning to grapple w what happened . The spin is pretty weak gruel, but here it is: The polling was bad, and they lost a few more incumbents than they thought they would’ve a year ago
THIS ANSWER is going to need to improve. The DCCC is a campaign organization that’s funded by membership dues, to a large degree. They’ll want to hear why the polling was so off, and why they were being told to expect a result that never came to pass.
2) NOW, HOW DO THEY GOVERN? We hit at this in Playbook this morning, but almost any governing configuration currently imaginable will be a slog for BIDEN or TRUMP. Democrats could have a nearly ungovernable House of Representatives.
TUESDAY WAS AN ABJECT DISASTER for Democrats in Washington. To imagine the amount of soul searching and explaining the party will have to do after Tuesday is absolutely dizzying. The infighting will be bloody -- as it should be.
We fielded text after text from Hill Democrats Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning with existential questions about their leadership and the direction of their party.
Ds TOLD US in the weeks and months leading up to EDay that they were on track to win the majority in Senate, and they don’t appear poised to do that. Donors gave $90m to lose to @senatemajldr , $108 million to lose to @LindseyGrahamSC and $24 million to lose to @JohnCornyn .
DONALD JOHN TRUMP is going into today facing a significant chance of becoming the first one-term president in nearly three decades.
JOSEPH ROBINETTE BIDEN is pushing into states that supported TRUMP in his quest to become the oldest first-term president, and the 15th former VP to ascend to the Oval Office.
THE THROUGHLINE of this campaign and last several months of our country’s history is the TRUMP administration’s handling of the coronavirus and the economic fallout from the pandemic. Nothing more, nothing less. A quarter-million Americans are dead. Millions have gotten the virus
Playbook this AM: HAPPY MONDAY and welcome to election week!
HERE’S SOMETHING YOU SHOULD REMEMBER going into E Day: Candidates do not get to decide they won the election. Just like football coaches don’t get to call the game at halftime (h/t @jaketapper)
BUT IT IS CRITICALLY IMPORTANT to understand what President DONALD TRUMP is going to do, and AXIOS’ JONATHAN SWAN took us inside his head Sunday night. He reported TRUMP has told people he plans to declare victory if he’s ahead Tuesday.
WE SPOKE TO A FEW PEOPLE IN TRUMP WORLD on Sunday who said that they will publicly try to make the point that states and localities should make a clear delineation between the ballots that come in before Election Day and the ones that arrive afterward.
PELOSI: "[A]s the coronavirus surges and the stock market plummets, we are still awaiting the Trump Administration's promised responses on multiple items of critical importance."
Playbook: AFTER BARRETT was confirmed Monday evening, we got a sneak peek at both the stylistic and substantive rift that could come to dominate the Democratic Party in 2021 and 2022, should they win the Senate and the White House.
>@SenSchumer said this while leaving the Capitol, per the Hill pool: “I have two words for McConnell’s speech: very defensive.” … ON THE FLOOR, SCHUMER looked over to the R side of the chamber and said, “You will have forfeited the right to tell us how to run” the majority. “
SCHUMER: "The American people will never forget this blatant act of bad faith.” (FWIW: We didn’t think MCCONNELL sounded defensive at all, but rather gleeful. Also, who thought Republicans had the right to tell Democrats how to run their majority in the first place?)