Morning Report — A nail-biting night for Good

by Alexis Simendinger and Kristina Karisch - 06/19/24 6:30 AM ET

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A conservative House incumbent’s too-close-to-call race in Virginia and a defeated Georgia candidate convicted of illegally demonstrating in the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, stood out in Tuesday’s closely watched GOP primaries.

Contests in Virginia, Oklahoma and Georgia tested incumbents’ staying power and the make-or-break power of endorsements by former President Trump.

A Virginia primary race is a cliffhanger this morning, as Republican state Sen. John McGuire, backed by Trump, expressed confidence in the eventual outcome of his challenge to fellow Republican and House Freedom Caucus Chair Bob Good. While Good boasted endorsements across Capitol Hill, he drew the former president’s ire when he initially endorsed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s (R) presidential primary bid.

The winner may not be known for days, as officials wait for late mail-in ballots and a possible recount. Virginia is not expected to count ballots on the Juneteenth holiday.

In Oklahoma, Trump-endorsed House Appropriations Committee Chair Tom Cole (R) prevailed against a primary challenge from the right. Cole, an 11-term incumbent, faced off against well-funded businessman Paul Bondar. Bondar, new to politics, outraised Cole thanks to his $5 million loan to his campaign.

In Georgia, Chuck Hand, a convicted Jan. 6 defendant who served 20 days in prison for his actions during the attack on the Capitol, lost his Republican House primary runoff. Wayne Johnson, a former Trump administration official, defeated Hand and will now face Rep. Sanford Bishop (D) in the general election in a solidly blue district.

Other results from Tuesday’s primaries:

Retired Navy Capt. Hung Cao won the Senate GOP primary in Virginia and will take on heavily favored Sen. Tim Kaine (D) in November. … Also in Virginia, State Sen. Suhas Subramanyam (D) won the crowded Democratic contest to replace retiring Rep. Jennifer Wexton (D).

3 THINGS TO KNOW TODAY:

▪ The White House canceled a high-level U.S.-Israel meeting scheduled for Thursday after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a video on Tuesday claiming the U.S. was withholding military aid.

▪ Here’s how high school students can boost their college application appeal this summer.

▪ In a sign of consumer strain, retail sales barely budged in May, according to the Commerce Department. The economy slows when Americans put the brakes on spending.

LEADING THE DAY

© The Associated Press / Tom Williams | Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) in Washington last week.

MORE IN POLITICS

It took a few hours for Republicans in Congress and Trump. the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, to blast President Biden’s use of his presidential say-so to benefit an estimated half a million undocumented people living in the U.S. for a decade or more.

The Hill: Republicans slam Biden’s immigration order as election ploy.

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) predicted that courts will block Biden’s newest immigration policy, announced Tuesday, which offers legal status to some undocumented spouses of U.S. citizens currently in this country.

Johnson said the president granted “amnesty to hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens” as part of “an election-year charade.” Biden argues that Congress has failed multiple times to legislatively overhaul immigration law and fortify border security, most recently when Trump and the Speaker scuttled a bipartisan proposal that GOP senators privately believed could have passed if not for Trump’s public objections.

The incumbent president, who is preparing to debate Trump next week, knows that voters’ assessments of his record on immigration put his reelection chances at risk.

“I’m not interested in playing politics with the border or immigration. I’m interested in fixing it,” Biden said during a White House event marking another executive-invented program, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), created with a deportation waiver by former President Obama in 2012.

▪ The Hill: Biden’s policy fires up Hispanic organizers on the left.

▪ The Hill’s Niall Stanage in The Memo: Immigration is on the ballot in Trump-Biden race.

Meanwhile, the first of what is supposed to be two presidential debates is days away as Biden and Trump prepare — in their own styles. Biden’s prep with top advisers is akin to moot court. Trump’s prep is famously looser because he believes his performances benefit from improvisation, drama and the unexpected. He held one recent practice session at the Republican National Committee headquarters.

The incumbent’s team has been transparent about what it wants CNN moderators in Atlanta to focus on: abortion, risks to democracy and elements of Trump’s proposed tax cuts and other kitchen-table economic notions, The New York Times reports.

The former president, for his part, thinks the incumbent, responsible for governing, has the heavier lift with debate viewers and is easier to attack.

Biden’s team believes the Atlanta debate, scheduled early in the cycle and without an audience June 27, could help the president focus the public’s attention on Trump at a time when the contest is in a dead heat and the president’s job approval numbers are low. The Biden campaign is up with a new ad pounding Trump for his criminal convictions — a play for swing voters.

Trump since 2020 has declared Biden too mentally feeble to be president, a strategy that lowered public expectations for the incumbent at key moments, such as debates in their last faceoff and during State of the Union addresses. With a debate audience of potentially tens of millions of viewers, Biden believes that underpromising and overdelivering is the way to go. His challenger has been helpful on that score.

2024 ROUNDUP:

▪ Here’s a number that will be repeated until Election Day by politicians worried about federal red ink: This year’s deficit will hit $1.9 trillion, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reported Tuesday. That’s roughly equivalent to the nominal gross domestic product of Mexico.

▪ “It’s not lost on any of us in the fight for social justice that this Juneteenth comes at a time when every right we’ve won since the Civil War is under attack,” The Rev. Al Sharpton, founder and president of the National Action Network, told The Hill while lamenting politicization of Black history.

▪ The White House and the Biden campaign have punched back to refute deceptively edited and cropped images circulated by the president’s detractors to suggest that Biden, 81, lacks mental acuity.

▪ The administration does not have a specific plan to deal with domestic election disinformation during this election cycle, according to an NBC News report.

▪ Future Forward is a super PAC blessed by the Biden campaign, but it’s now in hot water. “They’re sitting on a battery of money that is largely going untouched until the fall,” said one Democratic strategist who disapproves. Future Forward has doled out money for swing state ads.

WHERE AND WHEN

Today, Juneteenth, is a federal holiday.

The House will meet Friday at 9 a.m. for a pro forma session.

The Senate will convene Thursday at 10 a.m.

The president and first lady Jill Biden are in Rehoboth Beach, Del. Biden will receive the President’s Daily Brief at 10 a.m.

Vice President Harris has no public events. She will record two political radio interviews this afternoon.

ZOOM IN

© The Associated Press / Manuel Balce Ceneta | Boeing CEO David Calhoun testified about his company’s renewed safety efforts at a hearing Tuesday held by a Senate investigations subcommittee.

CONGRESS

BIPARTISANSHIP IS MIA at the Senate Commerce Committee after Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) won plaudits last month for shepherding the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reauthorization through committee and on the floor. Now, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has ripped Cruz for fighting “petty partisan culture wars” over the Spectrum and National Security Act. The Hill’s Alexander Bolton reports Cruz has tried to present himself as a bipartisan problem solver ahead of his reelection race, but he also can’t resist taking shots at Democrats, muddling his effort to tack to the center ahead of November.

Boeing CEO David Calhoun faced tough questioning Tuesday from senators about the company’s safety and manufacturing practices as he made his first appearance before Congress since a panel blew off a 737 Max during an Alaska Airlines flight in January.

Calhoun told the Senate investigations subcommittee that Boeing’s culture is “far from perfect,” but he said the company is “committed to making sure every employee feels empowered to speak up if there is a problem.” Ahead of Calhoun’s testimony, the Senate panel released information from two additional Boeing whistleblowers who have recently emerged and raised concerns about the company’s practices. Among Calhoun’s harshest critics on the panel was Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) who asked the CEO why he had not yet resigned. Calhoun will depart his job by the end of the year (The Hill and CBS News).

“You are cutting corners, you are eliminating safety procedures, you are sticking it to your employees, you are cutting back jobs because you are trying to squeeze every piece of profit you can out of this company,” Hawley said. “You are strip-mining Boeing.”

▪ NBC News: Maine Sen. Susan Collins (R), in an interview, describes national security concerns that Chinese organized crime is tied to illegal marijuana growing in her state.

▪ The Hill: Cruz and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) on Tuesday introduced the Take It Down Act, which would require internet sites to take down deepfake revenge porn within 48 hours.

▪ The Hill: The House Ethics Committee said Tuesday it is probing whether Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) sought to obstruct investigations into his conduct and has issued 25 subpoenas in matters surrounding the congressman.

COURTS

New York’s Court of Appeals on Tuesday dismissed Trump’s appeal of the gag order imposed in his Manhattan hush money trial, dealing a setback to the former president’s efforts to strip the restrictions in the wake of his conviction. The gag order, imposed by Justice Juan Merchan, barred Trump from publicly attacking witnesses, court staff and prosecutors other than Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg (D). Trump was found guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records, and is set to be sentenced on July 11 (Politico).

Meanwhile, House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) said his panel may subpoena New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) to gain information about a top prosecutor on Trump’s Manhattan hush money trial. The prosecutor, Matthew Colangelo, is set to testify before the House Judiciary Committee on July 12 alongside Bragg (The Hill).

ELSEWHERE

© The Associated Press / U.S. Central Command | Weather and logistical issues may force the early dismantling of the U.S.-built pier, pictured in May, which was designed to facilitate aid delivery into Gaza.

INTERNATIONAL

The breakdown of Israel’s War Cabinet has revealed how polarized the country has become over its war in Gaza, with a once-united coalition now bickering over the direction the conflict has taken and how to address thorny issues like returning the hostages, religious exemptions for mandatory military service and a postwar plan.

Netanyahu formally dissolved the body Monday after centrist politician and opposition leader Benny Gantz — who had accused him of continuing the war for his own political survival — resigned from the group. With Gantz now out of the picture, Netanyahu will be relying more on his far-right party allies in his security Cabinet, which could complicate efforts to secure a deal to release hostages and reach a cease-fire (The Hill).

Six weeks after it defied its allies and attacked Rafah, Israel is close to achieving its goals in the southern city, The Washington Post reports, raising the possibility that months of major military operations might soon give way to a new, less-intense phase of the conflict.

▪ The New York Times: The $230 million temporary pier that the U.S. military built on short notice to rush humanitarian aid to Gaza has largely failed in its mission, aid organizations say, and will probably end operations weeks earlier than originally expected.

▪ The Hill : Democrats react to the lifting of holds that will allow further sales of F-15s to Israel.

What does Kim Jong Un, leader of Russian ally North Korea, have in his country that inspired President Vladimir Putin to leave Moscow to visit this week for the first time in 24 years? Answer: vast munitions stores. The two countries signed a comprehensive strategic partnership agreement Wednesday.

OPINION

■ The profound unseriousness of JD Vance, by David Firestone, deputy editor, The New York Times editorial board.

■ What Biden and Trump must say to win the debate, by Douglas E. Schoen, opinion contributor, The Hill.

THE CLOSER

© The Associated Press / Evan Vucci | President Biden designated Juneteenth as a national holiday in 2021.

And finally … On this day in 1865 in Texas, slavery officially ended, spawning national celebrations of emancipation, which eventually became a Juneteenth federal holiday in 2021.

Biden signed the measure at the White House surrounded by members of the Congressional Black Caucus, celebrants and advocates who for decades were determined to mark an important date from America’s imperfect past. The Senate voted unanimously for the Juneteenth holiday and just 14 House members, all Republicans, voted in opposition.

“By making Juneteenth a federal holiday, all Americans can feel the power of this day and learn from our history and celebrate progress, and grapple with the distance we’ve come, but the distance we have to travel,” Biden said three years ago.

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