| | | | | Federal workers line up for a free meal at Andres in Washington. Credit: Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images | | What the White House is Talking About:
President Trump today met at the White House with the Problem Solvers Caucus.
What the White House Press Corps is Talking About:
The suicide bomb attack in Syria, almost four weeks after Trump said ISIS had been defeated. American service members are confirmed killed in the attack.
Shutdown Day 26:
Cruising toward the month mark. From our Phil Mattingly on the Hill: Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer told reporters Tuesday he hadn't spoken to the President since their last meeting at the White House. The President, having been told Democrats wouldn't agree to border-wall funding even if he re-opened the government for 30 days, said "Bye Bye" and walked out of the meeting.
Bottom line: another day with no real sign of progress, per our reporting.
Meantime, Shutdown Woes Reveal Trump Losing Base Support:
An interesting statistic in new polling shows the President has hit a new low of job approval among his most stalwart and committed supporters: Americans who do not have college degrees. The CNN poll indicates Trump is at just 45% approval in particular demographic, down from 54% among that same group from a poll taken pre-shutdown in early December.
Syria Bombing:
It's likely not coincidence that this horrific bombing comes after the President boldly stated in a tweeted video that ISIS had been defeated: "We've beaten them and we've beaten them badly. We've taken back the land and now it's time for our troops to come back home." Although not confirmed, ISIS has claimed responsibility for the deadly attack. The United States has about 2,000 troops stationed in Syria, a region of the world that remains volatile and, clearly, unstable.
A weird (and insensitive?) part of this story came this morning when Vice President Mike Pence, speaking at the State Department -- JUST HOURS AFTER LEARNING AMERICAN SERVICE MEN WERE KILLED -- said this: "Some of our greatest challenges, some of our most heinous enemies are in retreat. We promised under this president's leadership to take the fight to radical islamic terrorists on our terms on their soil. The President and I couldn't be more proud. Thanks to the leadership of this commander in chief and the courage and sacrifice of our armed forces we're now actually able to hand off the fight against ISIS in Syria to our coalition partners and we are bringing our troops home. The caliphate has crumbled and ISIS has been defeated."
I would pound my head on my desk, but it's just too sad to think about these troops and their families.
Pelosi Proposes SOTU Change:
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi this morning sent a letter to the President that suggests moving date of the State of the Union, currently scheduled for January 29. Pelosi cites security concerns related to the the shutdown, saying that the Secret Service, already under strain from furloughed support staff and essential members working without pay, doesn't have the bandwidth to make the event fully secure. Important point from CNN's story today: "While Pelosi's letter is framed as a request to find a new date, the decision of when to host the President is very much up to the speaker of the House. The House and the Senate have to pass resolutions to actually green light the State of the Union. Neither have done so yet, and Pelosi controls whether the House passes one at all. Speaking with reporters, Pelosi argued the security issues are 'completely out of my hands' and posited Trump 'can make it from the Oval Office if he wants.'"
Think about that for a second: the President might not be invited to give his address on the state of the country to the Congress because he and that Congress cannot come to terms on re-opening the government.
What is Karen Pence Thinking?:
Yesterday afternoon, news broke that second lady Karen Pence was going to return to teaching art a couple of days a week at a local Northern Virginia school. Ok, that's all fine and good. However, shortly after her announcement, it was revealed that the school she had selected, where she previously taught for 12 years (and I'm not going to name it here because I don't even want to give it more publicity), has a discriminatory policy against homosexuality. It literally has a parent agreement which states neither parents, nor children, can be gay, or bisexual, or, basically, anything other than heterosexual -- oh, and faculty must be straight, too. Now, here's my beef: while I'm not personally fine at all with this policy of banning gays, I do understand that this is a private school, entitled to uphold its beliefs no matter what they are because this is a free and great country and every man and woman has free will to decide what he or she wishes to believe or worship. My issue is with Pence. The fact that she has selected a school with an openly discriminatory policy shows her tacit agreement with its principles, and as a representative writ large for the country, I think it's an outrageously poor decision on her part. The craziest coda to this whole thing is that Pence is standing by her decision to teach at this school, and her spokeswoman went to far as to tell our Betsy Klein that the criticism against a learning facility that outright bans LGBT is "absurd." | | Can't Keep Up with 2020 Candidates? Here's a Handy Emoji Chart:
My friend and former colleague Joe Perticone tweeted this last night, right after Kirsten Gillibrand announced she was entering the Presidential race. | | | Credit: @JoePerticone/Twitter | | What Washington is Talking About:
It's Day Two of Attorney General nominee Bill Barr's confirmation hearing; the House voted 424 to 1 to condemn white supremacy and white nationalism as a disavowal of Rep. Steve King's comments (the one "no" vote came from Democrat Bobby Rush, who said the resolution doesn't go far enough); and 11 Senate Republicans have broken with President Trump over Russia to back a measure that would stop the Treasury Department from easing sanctions on three Russian companies.
What America is Talking About:
YouTube has announced new policies against dangerous prank videos, like the "Bird Box" and Tide Pod challenge; Kim Kardashian said her brother Rob will return to "Keeping Up With the Kardashians" next season; and if it wasn't before, the #10yearchallenge is now everywhere on your feed (I kind of like it and find it endearing).
Furloughed Workers Turning to GoFundMe:
There are at least 1,500 GoFundMe campaigns for furloughed government workers that have raised more than $300,000, a spokeswoman for the site told CNN. You can read more about some of the people behind the campaigns here.
Actual Fake News:
Fake copies of the Washington Post claiming Trump was leaving office were handed out today around Washington. The headline on them read "Unpresidented." The real WaPo said in a statement the papers and a corresponding website weren't real and wasn't from them.
Women's March Loses DNC:
As of Tuesday night, the DNC is no longer listed as a partner for the third annual Women's March, scheduled for Saturday. Organizers have been accused of anti-Semitism and of association with Louis Farrakhan, who's made derogatory comments about Jews.
Pink, a Color of Activism, Enters Presidential Politics:
In politics, pink signals activism. It's a color of feminism and LGBT rights. It's the color of pussyhats, of "I Stand With PP" avatar overlays, and the anti-war group Code Pink, Capitol Hill's loudest, most visible and most consistent protesters.
Pink is loud, it's proud, but it has not -- until 2019 -- been the color of a modern major party presidential candidate. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand announced her exploratory committee last night on "The Late Show" and debuted a campaign logo on her website framed in pink.
It's simple, just her name written in Alternate Gothic No. 2 D Regular, a tall, straight typeface, with "2020" and the two pink lines. But it's still the flashiest logo Gillibrand has used. In past Senate campaigns, her logo was blue, white, and corporate-looking. It might as well have been for a steel company or defense contractor. | | | #10yearchallenge, Gillibrand website edition, from 2019 and 2009.
A century ago, pink was actually associated with boys. Its shift to girls came beginning in the 1940s and was solidified by gender-specific baby clothes and merchandise in the 1980s, according to the Smithsonian. Today, it's the unofficial color of a generation, and football players wear it for Breast Cancer Awareness. Pantone picked two shades as its colors of the year this decade: the reddish Honeysuckle in 2011 and the more pale Rose Quartz in 2016. When some members of Congress wore white to honor suffragettes on the first day of the new Congress, Speaker Pelosi chose pink.
Gillibrand has made a name for herself in the Senate as a champion for women and #MeToo. She's spoken out against sexual assault in the military and on college campuses, and bucked her own party in condemning Sen. Al Franken, and former President Bill Clinton. When Stephen Colbert asked why she was running, she first framed it in terms of motherhood. "As a young mom, I'm going to fight for other people's kids," she said.
From Gillibrand's announcement, it's clear she intends to make issues facing women a major component to her candidacy. So major, in fact, she underlined her name in pink to launch her bid. Street Art Sighting:
This approximation of the American flag with a KKK member wearing a crossed out "45" in the canton was spotted on the Mexican side of the border wall in Ciudad Juarez. | | Credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images
Tag or DM me your political street art sightings @hunterschwarz on Twitter or Instagram, or email me at coverlinehunter@cnn.com. | | | | | | |
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