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PRESENTED BY

BY JOHN BRESNAHAN, ANNA PALMER AND JAKE SHERMAN
WITH MAX COHEN AND CHRISTIAN HALL

THE TOP

Happy Monday morning, and happy Presidents’ Day. This is our only edition of the day — no Midday or PM in honor of the holiday. We’ll be back on normal schedule beginning tomorrow. We have a special edition Tuesday morning. Get excited!

This is a short week in D.C., and Congress is out of session. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy are visiting Israel this week with separate congressional delegations.

Deadlines: 7 days until President Joe Biden has said he’ll announce his Supreme Court nominee. 8 days until the State of the Union. 18 days until government funding runs out. 260 days until the midterm elections.

Inside a potential Biden-Putin summit

The news late Sunday night that President Joe Biden had agreed “in principle” to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss the crisis in Ukraine was another surprising development during a weekend of high-stakes diplomatic maneuvering.

The tentative summit – which will only take place if Russian forces forgo a threatened invasion of Ukraine – was brokered by French President Emmanuel Macron, with further details to be worked out by Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who are scheduled to meet this week in Europe. Other “stakeholders” will also take part in the talks. Russian officials have not yet confirmed that Putin will take part in any meeting, Bloomberg reported. German media is reporting that Chancellor Olaf Scholz will speak with Putin today.

Again, any face-to-face sessions between U.S. and Russian officials would only occur if Russia doesn’t initiate military action against Ukraine. Biden and White House officials have said for days that Putin has decided to attack. 

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki: 

“As the President has repeatedly made clear, we are committed to pursuing diplomacy until the moment an invasion begins. Secretary Blinken and Foreign Minister Lavrov are scheduled to meet later this week in Europe, provided Russia does not proceed with military action. President Biden accepted in principle a meeting with President Putin following that engagement, again, if an invasion hasn’t happened.  We are also ready to impose swift and severe consequences should Russia instead choose war.  And currently, Russia appears to be continuing preparations for a full-scale assault on Ukraine very soon.”

There’s a lot in that statement that we’ll examine further, but it incorporates several key elements of White House messaging from recent days. The intended audiences include Moscow, Kyiv, Paris and other European capitals, Beijing, world financial markets, Capitol Hill and the broader American public.

For Biden, the politics of a summit involving Putin are extraordinarily tricky, which underscores the cautious response from White House officials to this Macron initiative. There seems very little chance that Biden would sit down with Putin while 150,000-plus Russian troops are massed on the Ukrainian border. What if Biden and Putin meet and Putin then orders an attack? This would be a disaster for an already weakened Biden, opening him up to Neville Chamberlain comparisons. 

Yet Biden also wants a peaceful resolution to the crisis. And if there is a chance that Putin wants that as well – despite everything that’s transpired up until now – Biden can’t afford to pass up an opportunity to stabilize Eastern Europe’s flank at comparatively low cost to the United States.

CNN: “Why a Putin summit would be a huge risk for Biden,” by Stephen Collinson

Putin will meet with his Security Council Monday and Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov said, “It’s clear that tensions are rising. It’s too early to talk about concrete plans for organizing any summits,” per the NYT. 

Biden pointedly remained in Washington this weekend in order to meet with his National Security Council. He also placed calls to other world leaders, including Macron. Biden scheduled a trip to Wilmington, Del., at around 2:40 p.m. Sunday.

But by 4 p.m., the White House announced this: “The President had a family-related issue that was going to take him to Wilmington, DE tonight but he will no longer be going and will remain in Washington, DC tonight.” 

A warning from the U.S. Embassy in Moscow: “Have evacuation plans that do not rely on U.S. government assistance.”

More on the last 24 hours: The Ukraine crisis is dominating headlines in the United States and worldwide. As we mentioned above, Biden met with the National Security Council on Sunday, including Vice President Kamala Harris and Blinken, both of whom attended the Munich Security Conference over the weekend. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan were also in Europe. Harris joined the NSC call from Air Force Two en route back to Washington.

Harris’ meetings in Munich included a one-on-one session on Saturday with Ukrainian President Volodmyr Zelensky. Zelensky used his appearance at the conference to call for more action by the United States and other Western allies against Russia, including new additional economic sanctions. Zelensky told conference attendees: “We are going to protect our country with or without the support of our partners.”

In response to Zelensky’s comments, Harris told reporters that she understood the urgency of Zelensky’s viewpoint, but she offered no new pledge on sanctions or a path for Ukraine to join NATO.

Here’s Harris:

“Let me start by saying I appreciate and admire President Zelensky’s desire to join NATO. And one of, again, the founding principles of NATO is that each country must have the ability – unimpaired, unimpeded – to determine their own future, both in terms of their form of government and, in this case, whether they desire to be a member of NATO.

"And I’ll put that in context, because the obvious is also the point, which is that: and therefore no other country can tell anyone whether they should or should not join NATO. That should be their independent choice. That is the point of sovereignty. So I respect President Zelensky’s desire to be a member of NATO. 

"NATO is a membership. It is about nations coming together as a group, making decisions collectively around, again, principles and what will be, then, the conditions and the standards of membership. And so that is the process.

"It doesn’t happen overnight. No one country can say ‘I want to be, and therefore I will be.’  And no one country can say ‘You can’t be.’  And isn’t that at the heart of the very issue we’re presented with in terms of Russia’s aggression, or stated aggression, toward Ukraine?”

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING

Inside the administration’s Ukraine messaging

As the Ukrainian emergency unfolds, we wanted to look at some of the messaging coming out of the top ranks of the Biden administration.

→ Vladimir Putin has already decided to invade, but we’ll be happy to be wrong on this: President Joe Biden pushed this very stark line on Friday at the White House, and it was repeated by Vice President Kamala Harris, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki and others non-stop throughout the weekend. The NYT’s Julian Barnes and Eric Schmitt reported Sunday that the U.S. had intelligence from inside the Kremlin that Putin decided on an attack.

→ The United States is always open to a diplomatic solution – if Russia doesn’t invade: This includes a potential Biden-Putin summit, as we saw on Sunday evening. Biden is clearly offering Putin a way out of the crisis – if Putin wants to take it.

“President Biden has made very clear that he’s prepared to meet President Putin at any time, in any format, if that can help prevent a war,” Blinken said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

“President Biden is prepared to engage President Putin at any time, in any format, if that can help prevent a war,” Blinken repeated on CNN. “I reached out to my Russian counterpart, Foreign Minister Lavrov, to urge that we meet next week in Europe. The plan is still to do that, unless Russia invades in the meantime.”

→ We have intel, and we’re sharing it with everyone: Biden and other top administration officials have made extensive use of U.S. intelligence data and analyses throughout the crisis. Both in public and private with other Western governments.

Harris on Sunday: “I can tell you that there has been direct communication about the intelligence, so nothing is being held back.”

Biden on Friday: “We have a significant intelligence capability.”

Here’s a good New York Times story on the intelligence challenges. Or this report from the Washington Post, which has a distinct World War II or Cold War feel: “U.S. claims Russia has list of Ukrainians ‘to be killed or sent to camps’ following a military occupation"

→ This is Putin’s playbook: Throughout the crisis, Biden administration officials have talked about “Putin’s playbook.” They have the lessons from the Crimea invasion in 2014, Putin’s decision to intervene in Syria and Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. elections, and they’re using this to inform their assessment of the current situation.

Biden on Friday: “All these are consistent with the playbook the Russians have used before: to set up a false justification to act against Ukraine. This is also in line with the pretext scenarios that the United States and our allies and partners have been warning about for weeks.”

→ Sanctions are “deterrence” and shouldn’t be triggered prematurely: The White House dissuaded the Senate from passing a new Russian sanctions bill, despite repeated calls from both parties to do so, especially Republicans. The Biden administration faced hesitancy among Western allies, especially Germany and now Italy. So the White House insists that it needs to retain the deterrent effect of sanctions instead of preemptive implementation.

Harris: “The purpose of the sanctions has always been and continues to be deterrence.”

Blinken: “The purpose of that is to do everything we can to deter it, to prevent a war, to deter the aggression. And once you trigger the sanctions, you lose the deterrent effect. And as long as there is still even a minute’s worth of time in which we can deter and prevent a war, we’re going to try to use it.”

→ The future of NATO is at stake: Again, this has been a constant refrain from the White House throughout the crisis. It’s the cudgel that U.S. officials have used to overcome reluctance from Germany and now Italy for a more aggressive response to Putin.

Harris: “At stake is the NATO alliance, in terms of our unity, joining together — through, sometimes, compromise; certainly always through collaboration — to be a unified voice, especially when these very founding principles of our relationship are being compromised, if not attacked.”

The Coverage

→ NYT: “Blitzkrieg or Minor Incursion? Putin’s Choice Could Determine World Reaction,” by David Sanger in Munich; 

→ NYT: News Analysis: “A Subdued Munich Conference Hears a Troubling Word: Appeasement,” by Roger Cohen in Munich

→ WaPo: “With or without war, Ukraine gives Biden a new lease on leadership,” by Karen DeYoung and Missy Ryan

→ WaPo: “Putin may go to war to capture Ukraine. With Belarus, he did it without firing a shot,” by Robyn Dixon and Mary Ilyushina in Moscow

→ Bloomberg: “U.S. Warns That Russia May Target Multiple Cities in Ukraine,” by Alberto Nardelli and Jennifer Jacobs

→ WSJ: “Behind China’s Warning Against a Russian Invasion Is a Desire to Protect Ties With the U.S,” by Lingling Wei

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Who we’re watching

President Joe Biden: We don’t have to do much explaining here. Biden has to deal with the biggest threat to Europe in decades. Plus, he has a Supreme Court nomination that will likely be announced this week.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken: Blinken will likely fly to Europe this week for a one-on-one with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. With war looking more and more likely, Blinken will be the face of bringing Russia back from the brink.

Vice President Kamala Harris: Does the VP take a forceful role in the Russia-Ukraine crisis after spending the weekend at the Munich Security Conference?

STATE OF THE UNION

Will the Capitol fence be back for the State of the Union?

Fox News reported Sunday that the U.S. Capitol Police and other congressional officials have decided to reinstall the security fence around the Capitol for the State of the Union.

U.S. Capitol officials didn’t respond to requests for comment on this report, although the Capitol Police did acknowledge on Friday that this was a possibility. And it seems a logical move, considering the still high level of alert surrounding the Capitol. The Capitol Police also warned Friday that they’re aware of plans for “a series of truck convoys arriving in Washington, DC around the time of the State of the Union.” We’ve seen what this did in Canada. Police broke up the trucker protest in Ottawa over the weekend.

→ Larry Ellison, the co-founder of Oracle, gave $15 million to Opportunity Matters, a pro Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) PAC. It has $20 million on hand.

→ The NRCC raised $11.4 million and spent $7.7 million in January. The NRCC has nearly $82 million on hand. This is the most the committee has ever had in the bank.

The DCCC, as we reported last week, raised $11.7 million and has $87 million on hand.

The NRCC got $2.5 million from Take Back the House 2022, a House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy-led joint fundraising committee. House Minority Whip Steve Scalise’s political organizations transferred $959,473. Rep. Jason Smith (R-Mo.), who is running to be the top Republican on the Ways and Means Committee, transferred $138,500. Charles Schwab gave $255,500.

To get a sense how much more money is in politics now – The NRCC raised only $4.5 million in January 2010, the last time the GOP took the majority.

→ The DNC raised $9.8 million in January and has $63 million on hand. 

→ The RNC raised $13 million and has $51 million on hand. Elizabeth Uihlein gave $365,000, as did Arkansas billionaire Warren Stephens.

→ House Majority PAC, the leading House Democratic super PAC, raised just $1.6 million in January and has $40 million on hand. Roughly one-third of their January haul – $500,000 – came from Deborah Simon, who is a member of the Simon shopping mall family.

→ George P. Bush, running in the Republican primary for attorney general of Texas, has an ad up across the state saying he will finish “Trump’s wall” and his opponent, Eva Guzman, will not. Ken Paxton, the sitting attorney general, leads Bush 39% to 25% with Guzman at 13%, according to a recent Dallas Morning News poll. Paxton would be pushed into a runoff unless he gets 50% of the vote. Bush is trying to peel away at Guzman’s votes here.

FRONTS

CLIP FILE

NYT

→ “Biden Administration Halts New Drilling in Legal Fight Over Climate Costs,” by Lisa Friedman

→ “‘Nothing in Common’: Staten Island, Park Slope and an Unlikely Marriage,” by Katie Glueck 

AP

→ “EU mulls ways to stop the possible breakup of Bosnia,” by Lorne Cook

Bloomberg

→ “Trump’s Not Giving His Mountains of Cash to Other Republicans,” by Bill Allison: “Donald Trump’s Save America ended January with $108 million in the bank, yet the former president’s political action committee didn’t donate any of it last month to the dozens of candidates he’s backing.” 

LA Times

→ “Prominent Latino Democrats fight over rare open California congressional seat,” by Seema Mehta

Dallas Morning News

→ “Poll: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott up 7 points over Beto O’Rourke; AG Ken Paxton likely headed to runoff,” by Robert T. Garrett

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