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PRESENTED BY

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

THE TOP

There’s no job in American politics as straightforward as being the minority leader in the House of Representatives, especially when your party controls none of the levers of power in Washington. That’s where Kevin McCarthy sits at the moment. Add to that McCarthy is very confident Republicans are going to win the House in 2022, and he’s got as good a chance of being speaker as ever before. 

The biggest challenge for McCarthy is keeping the House Republican Conference together. If Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) gets a vote on the $1 trillion bipartisan Senate infrastructure bill soon, there’ll be as many as two dozen House Republicans who cross the aisle to support the public works package. McCarthy will have to decide how to message the legislation if a significant block of Republicans is voting for it. Will he whip against it? Will the leadership take a hard line?

McCarthy and House GOP leaders have so far linked the Democrats’ $3.5 trillion budget resolution to the infrastructure package, noting that Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the White House are trying to use one to help pass the other. McCarthy has suggested Republicans should oppose both, but depending on his colleagues, he may have to shift his tune and say it’s a vote of conscience — meaning GOP lawmakers can vote how they wish without guidance from the leadership. 

McCarthy clearly feels like he has a winning issue on Afghanistan, where President Joe Biden has bungled the evacuation of thousands of U.S. citizens and Afghans who assisted coalition forces during the 20-year war. The only problem here is McCarthy supported former President Donald Trump’s plan to bring U.S. troops home from Afghanistan at an even faster pace, so he’ll be challenged to explain how Trump’s effort would’ve ended up any differently.

And McCarthy — like every other Republican — has slammed Biden’s handling of the migrant crisis as the U.S.-Mexico border. Combined with rising crime rates and inflation, McCarthy feels like he’s got a lot of issues to pound Democrats over these days.

But McCarthy has to worry about the House select committee investigation into the Jan. 6 insurrection, specifically his interactions with Trump during that horrible day. McCarthy has offered different public responses about his conversations with Trump. Some Democrats are calling for McCarthy to be subpoenaed by the select committee, which would be an unprecedented act that could end up in court.

The McCarthy-Pelosi relationship, which has never been good, hit a new low recently after Pelosi called him a “moron” over his criticism of her mask mandate for House members. McCarthy responded by talking about Paul Pelosi’s finances, a very personal shot at the speaker. Despite the fact they’re both from the same state — a first — the two have very little in common. Their age difference is one major difference; McCarthy is 56, Pelosi is 81. Their approach to politics and government is radically different as well; Pelosi has pressed for huge new government programs throughout her career, while McCarthy favors smaller government and less regulation. 

The biggest flashpoint, however, is Trump. McCarthy allied himself closely with the former president. We don’t need to rehash the Pelosi-Trump relationship here, we all lived it. McCarthy was the first top Republican to visit Trump in Florida after he left office in disgrace on Jan. 20 following the insurrection. That McCarthy would make that trip appalled many Democrats, seeing it as a betrayal of an institution he one day hopes to preside over. Yet for McCarthy, it was a hard-nosed realization that he still needs Trump if wants to be speaker. Or at least Trump not opposing his efforts to get the gavel. Understanding this is the key to understanding McCarthy.  

McCarthy has used August to his advantage. He has been on the road, freed from the hectic pace of the Capitol. He’s visited Miami, and this week, McCarthy is in Jackson Hole, Wyo., for his annual donor retreat.

Our friends at the Cook Political Report have written that Republicans will net as many as seven seats in redistricting alone. That fact, along with the traditional poor showing by the president’s party during the midterm elections, puts McCarthy’s House GOP in the driver’s seat heading into 2022. At least for now.

Airing this morning: Biden spoke with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos about the situation in Afghanistan. Biden was defiant and defensive. He said there was no way to get out of Afghanistan without chaos. Watch a clip here. 

THE BIDEN AGENDA

Sanders heads to Indiana, Iowa to rally support for reconciliation plan

This is quite interesting: Senate Budget Committee Chair Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is traveling to Republican-held areas in Iowa and Indiana to hold town hall meetings in support of the Democrats’ $3.5 trillion reconciliation plan, according to a source familiar with the situation. 

Sanders will be in Indiana on Aug. 27, and Iowa on Aug. 29, the source said.

Sanders is targeting districts where the Trump vote grew in 2020, arguing that the massive package Democrats are putting together will have huge benefits for middle-class Americans in those states, especially working families.

Sanders, who oversaw the Senate’s passage of the multi-trillion dollar budget resolution that paves the way for reconciliation, has turned into a sort of one-man P.R. offensive on the Democratic package. Earlier this month, he wrote op-eds for the Wall Street Journal and Fox News. Sanders has also done interviews with media outlets in 14 states that have two GOP senators.

Republicans often bring up Sanders when attacking the Democratic plan, which will  allow Congress to pass big chunks of President Joe Biden’s American Jobs Plan and American Family Plan with a simple majority vote. For instance, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell accused Democrats of wanting to “outsource domestic policy to Chairman Sanders,” while the NRSC has repeatedly targeted Sanders and the “Bernie Budget.”

Yet Sanders is also the most passionate advocate for the proposal as well. Sanders pushed hard for expanding Medicare to include coverage of the vision, dental and hearing programs as part of reconciliation, as well as allowing Medicare to negotiate on prescription drug prices. And his message on growing income inequality in the U.S. economy has become an issue both parties talk about frequently. Sanders’ longtime opposition to trade deals — which he says often favor corporate America at the expense of workers — sounds a lot like what became the GOP mantra under former President Donald Trump.

Even as the House prepares to take up the Democrats’ $3.5 trillion budget resolution next week — and whether that measure will pass is still up in the air — House committees have been quietly moving ahead with their portions of the reconciliation package, hoping to meet an aggressive Sept. 15 target date to have their work done.

The Senate-passed budget resolution calls for committees that receive reconciliation instructions to have finished their portions of the package by Sept. 15. In the House, whatever legislation is approved by those panels would be sent to the Budget Committee, which would combine all the different pieces into one package for consideration on the House floor.

While the language in the resolution is non-binding, the House Democratic leadership is pushing for the committees to have finished markups by that date, according to multiple sources. This would allow a floor vote potentially by late September, said the sources. While the House left town in late July, the panels have been moving forward on their respective pieces of the reconciliation puzzle.

Of course, House Democrats first have to pass the budget resolution, and that’s still an issue right now. Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the House Democratic leadership are bringing members back next week to vote on the plan. But a group of Democratic moderates led by Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) is vowing to oppose the measure unless they first get a vote on the $1 trillion bipartisan Senate infrastructure bill. Pelosi has said for months that the House won’t vote on that until the Senate passes the reconciliation package, which won’t be until October at the earliest. Neither side is backing down so far, so the drama over next week’s vote continues to build. We’ll be all over all of this, of course.

EMPIRE STATE LOOK-IN

Hochul hits fundraising circuit

Kathy Hochul, who will become governor of New York Aug. 24, will appear at a fundraiser for Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) Oct. 18. The event will be at the Williamsburg Hotel in Brooklyn.

Maloney faces a primary challenge from ​​Rana Abdelhamid, who is supported by the Justice Democrats, which has links to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.). Maloney has been in Congress since 1993, representing a swath of Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens.

Of course, Hochul may have a primary from the left herself. 

COMING ATTRACTIONS

Pompeo to brief House Republicans

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will speak to House Republicans today about Afghanistan. Rep. Elise Stefanik, the House GOP conference chair, organized the call.

Pompeo will discuss Afghanistan and do a question-and-answer session. Afterward, GOP members will talk about the Democrats’ $3.5 trillion budget resolution that is heading for a floor vote next week. 

Pompeo and Stefanik served in the House together. Pompeo, of course, is not only a subject matter expert here but also a potential 2024 presidential candidate.

As secretary of state under former President Donald Trump, Pompeo helped craft an agreement with the Taliban that called for the withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Afghanistan by May 1. President Joe Biden and Democrats have blamed that Trump agreement as one the key factors that led to the current Afghanistan debacle. 

However, both Pompeo and Trump said their deal called for a “conditions-based withdrawal,” including a ceasefire between the Taliban and the government of now former Afghan President Ashraf Ghani. Pompeo has been very vocal in his criticism of Biden’s handling of the pullout, telling “Fox News Sunday” that “I wouldn’t have let my 10-year-old son get away from this kind of pathetic blame-shifting.”

Briefing report: Members of the House will hear from the Biden administration Friday by telephone in an unclassified setting. On Tuesday, there will be a classified briefing for all members at 10:30 a.m. in the Capitol. Speaker Nancy Pelosi is working on scheduling a “Gang of Eight” briefing. That group includes the top four party leaders in the House and Senate, as well as the chairs and ranking members of the Intelligence Committees in both chambers. They have access to the most highly classified intelligence material. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy have publicly demanded such a briefing.

→ Also: The Biden administration said last night that it has evacuated ​​”approximately 1,800 individuals on 10 C-17s” since Tuesday evening. The U.S. has evacuated 6,000 people since Aug. 14.

MOMENTS

9:30 a.m.: President Joe Biden will get the daily intelligence briefing. 

10 a.m.: Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris will get an “intelligence, security and diplomatic update” on the “evolving situation in Afghanistan.”

Note: There is no White House briefing on the schedule as of now. 

CLIP FILE

NYT

→ “Series of U.S. Actions Left Afghan Allies Frantic, Stranded and Eager to Get Out,” by Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Annie Karni

→ “Biden Says Troops May Stay in Kabul Longer to Assist Evacuations,” by Eric Schmitt, Helene Cooper and Michael Shear: “President Biden said on Wednesday that the United States was committed to evacuating every American out of Afghanistan, even if that might mean extending the military mission beyond his Aug. 31 deadline for a total withdrawal. ‘If there’s American citizens left, we’re going to stay to get them all out,’ Mr. Biden said during an interview on ABC News.

“When asked whether Americans should understand that to mean that the troops might stay beyond the end of the month, Mr. Biden replied: ‘No. Americans should understand that we’re going to try to get it done before Aug. 31.’ But he then said, ‘If we don’t, we’ll determine at the time who’s left.’”

→ “Intelligence Agencies Did Not Predict Imminence of Afghan Collapse, Officials Say,” by Julian Barnes

→ “The I.M.F. says it will block Afghanistan from getting $460 million in reserve funds,” by Alan Rappeport

WaPo

→ “Pentagon defends against accusations it wasn’t ready for Kabul’s fall, won’t commit to evacuating all Afghan allies,” by Dan Lamothe and Greg Jaffe

→ “A once-vanquished insurgent returns as Afghanistan’s likely next leader,” by Kevin Sieff and Joshua Partlow

→ “Biden orders Education Department to take action against governors who ban school mask mandates,” by Valerie Strauss 

WSJ

→ “Alaska Oil Permits Blocked by Federal Judge,” by Timothy Puko

AP

→ “Tensions over aid grow in Haiti as quake’s deaths pass 2K,” by Mark Stevenson and Evens Sanon in Les Cayes, Haiti

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