POLITICO Playbook: The Trump show hits pause Presented by Amazon

President Donald Trump listens during a briefing about the coronavirus at the White House on Friday. | Alex Brandon/AP Photo

DRIVING THE DAY

WELL, THAT WAS DIFFERENT. The coronavirus briefing Friday night lasted roughly 20-some minutes and President DONALD TRUMP didn’t take questions. It was a new day for the daily briefings that have grown increasingly long and unwieldy, testing the president’s allies’ patience and becoming an easy punching bag for his critics.

BUT THAT ALL CAME TO AN ABRUPT HALT, or at least a pause, after the president was roundly criticized by public health experts -- and even by some of his allies -- for suggesting ingesting bleach may be a cure for Covid-19. The president later said he was being sarcastic when he talked about injecting disinfectant. STILL, LESS INTERACTION with Trump may be a sign of things to come: Axios’ JONATHAN SWAN scooped that Trump is considering paring back the daily briefing.

-- TO WIT: The only thing on the president’s daily schedule is a 3 p.m. phone call with Catholic leaders and educators.

AND/BUT … THE PRESS CONFERENCE wasn’t without its drama. The White House unsuccessfully tried to make CNN’s KAITLAN COLLINS move several seats back in the briefing room. However, it’s the WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENTS ASSOCIATION, not the White House who assigns seats in the briefing room.

FROM 30,000 FEET -- GABBY ORR and NANCY COOK: “Trump team faces a new 2020 risk: Too much Trump”: “Donald Trump’s top aides are fiercely debating a question their boss rarely confronted during his decades of jousting with tabloid newspapers, starring on reality TV shows and running a media-soaked presidential campaign: whether there’s such a thing as too much Donald Trump.

“A series of missteps during Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic is triggering fears among some advisers that the president is damaging his reelection prospects with his communications during the crisis. White House allies have become exasperated with his dominance at coronavirus task force briefings, a daily rundown of testing and public health updates that Trump has transformed into a performance-art version of his freewheeling — and sometimes conspiracy-filled — Twitter feed.

“Network producers have been unable to book him on shows that might reach more swing voters, as Trump chooses to stick to late-night appearances on ‘Hannity,’ or virtual town halls with friendly Fox News hosts.”

NEW: JOE BIDEN’S campaign is up with a new video titled “One America” marking the one-year anniversary since his campaign launched. Watch

-- BEHIND THE SCENES: NYT’S ALEX BURNS, SHANE GOLDMACHER and KATIE GLUECK: “A Candidate in Isolation: Inside Joe Biden’s Cloistered Campaign”: “With the coronavirus outbreak freezing the country’s public life, Mr. Biden has been forced to adapt to a cloistered mode of campaigning never before seen in modern American politics. He was unable to embark on a victory tour after the Democratic primaries or hold unity rallies with onetime rivals like Senators Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. Instead, the former vice president is in a distinctive kind of lockdown, walled off from voters, separated from his top strategists and yet leading in the polls.

“For a famous backslapper like Mr. Biden, this open-ended period of captivity has tested both his patience and his political imagination. He has lamented being deprived of human contact, and he has expressed exasperation with media coverage critiquing his limited visibility compared with President Trump’s daily performances in the White House briefing room. He does not make a habit of watching the president’s briefings in full; he is said to be fixated mainly on the eventual challenge — if he wins — of governing amid a pandemic.

“Interviews with dozens of people in touch with the presumptive Democratic nominee and his advisers revealed a newly detailed picture of Mr. Biden’s life in seclusion, one spent in long-distance consultation with a wide array of coalition leaders helping him map out the fall campaign and a potential administration.” NYT

THIS IS TERRIFYING … “Young and middle-aged people, barely sick with covid-19, are dying from strokes,” by WaPo’s Ariana Eunjung Cha: “Reports of strokes in the young and middle-aged — not just at Mount Sinai, but also in many other hospitals in communities hit hard by the novel coronavirus — are the latest twist in our evolving understanding of its connected disease, covid-19.

“Even as the virus has infected nearly 2.8 million people worldwide and killed about 195,000 as of Friday, its biological mechanisms continue to elude top scientific minds. Once thought to be a pathogen that primarily attacks the lungs, it has turned out to be a much more formidable foe — impacting nearly every major organ system in the body.” WaPo

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Good Saturday morning.

THE REOPENING … “No rest for Kemp from critics as GA launches reopening amid COVID-19,” by AJC’s Alan Judd … “ Short on cash, scared of coronavirus, Georgia businesses grapple with reopening,” by WaPo’s Cleve R. Wootson Jr. and Haisten Willis in Woodcross, Ga.

-- “Hospitals’ health is key driver of push to lift lockdowns,” by Dan Goldberg: “Governors eager to lift pandemic lockdowns are zeroing in on the health of their hospitals. If emergency rooms are overwhelmed with coronavirus cases, a state can’t move ahead. But if they’re coping, it may be enough for some states to reopen economies and let businesses start to stagger back.

“Much of the public discussion about easing restrictions is dominated by talk of the virus peaking. But that doesn’t just mean people showing up in distress. It’s also a question of whether hospitals can handle it. And you can’t begin to repair a state without that. Nebraska Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts says government should not restrict people's freedoms once the immediate concern over flooding the health system has passed. ‘Primarily, all this is focused around the health care system,’ Ricketts said Friday. ‘If we are not overwhelming the health care system, we are winning.’

“Colorado Democratic Gov. Jared Polis expressed comfort loosening restrictions on social distancing this week because the health system was capable of handling a potential surge in patients. ‘We can’t be frozen for months,’ he said. ‘Our role in this is to figure out how to wed the public health goals with the social, psychological and economic needs of the people of Colorado, and that everyone who contracts this has a fighting chance and that we don’t overwhelm our health care system.’” POLITICO

THE DOWNTURN -- “Coronavirus Projected to Trigger Worst Economic Downturn Since 1940s,” by WSJ’s Paul Kiernan: “The coronavirus shutdown will induce the sharpest economic downturn and push the U.S. budget deficit to the highest levels since the 1940s, the Congressional Budget Office projects.

“The economy is likely to shrink 12% in the second quarter — a 40% drop if it were to persist for a year—and the jobless rate will average 14%, the nonpartisan research service said Friday. Job losses will come to 27 million in the second and third quarters. The federal budget deficit is expected to reach $3.7 trillion by the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30, the CBO said, up from about $1 trillion in the 12 months through March.”

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-- “Millions of Credit-Card Customers Can’t Pay Their Bills. Lenders Are Bracing for Impact,” by WSJ’s AnnaMaria Andriotis and Orla McCaffrey

SHORTAGES AT THE VA … “VA health chief acknowledges a shortage of protective gear for its hospital workers,” by WaPo’s Lisa Rein: “For weeks, nurses and other employees at Veterans Affairs hospitals have said they were working with inadequate protective gear. VA officials denied it. But in an interview, the physician in charge of the country’s largest health-care system acknowledged the shortage — and said masks and other supplies are being diverted for the national stockpile.

“‘I had 5 million masks incoming that disappeared,’ said Richard Stone, executive in charge of the sprawling Veterans Health Administration. He acknowledged that he’s been forced to move to ‘austerity levels’ at some hospitals. Stone said the Federal Emergency Management Agency directed vendors with equipment on order from VA to instead send it to FEMA to replenish the government’s rapidly depleting emergency stockpile.” WaPo

DOWN BALLOT -- NYT’S JONATHAN MARTIN and MAGGIE HABERMAN: “Nervous Republicans See Trump Sinking, and Taking Senate With Him”: “President Trump’s erratic handling of the coronavirus outbreak, the worsening economy and a cascade of ominous public and private polling have Republicans increasingly nervous that they are at risk of losing the presidency and the Senate if Mr. Trump does not put the nation on a radically improved course.

“The scale of the G.O.P.’s challenge has crystallized in the last week. With 26 million Americans now having filed for unemployment benefits, Mr. Trump’s standing in states that he carried in 2016 looks increasingly wobbly: New surveys show him trailing significantly in battleground states like Michigan and Pennsylvania, and he is even narrowly behind in must-win Florida.

“Democrats raised substantially more money than Republicans did in the first quarter in the most pivotal congressional races, according to recent campaign finance reports. And while Mr. Trump is well ahead in money compared with the presumptive Democratic nominee, Joseph R. Biden Jr., Democratic donors are only beginning to focus on the general election, and several super PACs plan to spend heavily on behalf of him and the party.

“Perhaps most significantly, Mr. Trump’s single best advantage as an incumbent — his access to the bully pulpit — has effectively become a platform for self-sabotage.” NYT

-- ALEX ISENSTADT: “GOP memo urges anti-China assault over coronavirus”



PLAYBOOK READS

PHOTO DU JOUR: Cars line up for food at the Utah Food Bank's mobile food pantry on Friday in West Valley City, Utah. | Rick Bowmer/AP Photo

ZACH MONTELLARO and LAURA BARRÓN-LÓPEZ: “States rush to prepare for huge surge of mail voting”: “A huge surge in voting by mail is coming whether states prepare for it or not — and without clear direction from the federal government, states are preparing to muscle through their own changes to get ready for the glut of mail ballots coming their way in November.

“Wisconsin’s conflict-ridden April 7 elections went off without the state government making any major policy changes to encourage absentee voting, but more than two-thirds of voters cast their votes via the mail anyway, many times higher than the 12 percent absentee voting rate in the spring 2016 election. The surge overwhelmed election officials, with some staff working 100 hour weeks to try to fill all the ballot requests and reports of the state’s system crashing under the intense workload.

“In the aftermath, election administrators in other states are moving quickly to avoid getting overwhelmed themselves. States that have already mastered massive vote-by-mail systems are serving as informal information clearinghouses for others, dispensing advice on everything from how to line up the best vendors for printing and distributing paper ballots to setting up drive-by or other drop-off points for voters who don’t want to rely on the U.S. Postal Service.” POLITICO

ACROSS THE GLOBE: “India reopens stores, speeding easing of virus lockdowns,” by AP’s Ashok Sharma and John Leicester in New Delhi: “A tentative easing around the world of coronavirus lockdowns gathered pace Saturday with the reopening in India of neighborhood stores that many of the country’s 1.3 billion people rely on for everything from cold drinks to mobile phone data cards.

“The relaxation of the super-strict Indian lockdown came with major caveats. It did not apply to hundreds of quarantined towns and other hotspots that have been hit hardest by the outbreak that has killed at least 775 people in India and terrified its multitudes of poor who live hand-to-mouth in slum conditions too crowded for social distancing.” AP

-- “Belgium to begin relaxing coronavirus restrictions on May 4,” by POLITICO Europe’s Barbara Moen

MEDIAWATCH -- Amanda Becker will be a Washington correspondent at The 19th. She currently is a national political correspondent at Reuters. Talking Biz News

CLICKER -- “The nation’s cartoonists on the week in politics,” edited by Matt Wuerker -- 16 keepers

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GREAT WEEKEND READS, curated by Margy Slattery and the staff of POLITICO Magazine:

-- “A Republican Crusader Takes on Oklahoma’s Prison Machine,” by Bret Schulte in POLITICO Magazine: “In the state that locks up more of its citizens than any other, a former politician is using the ballot box—and some surprising alliances—to nudge his own party toward change.” POLITICO Magazine … Read POLITICO Magazine’s new decarceration issue

-- “The Untold Story of the Birth of Social Distancing,” by NYT’s Eric Lipton and Jennifer Steinhauer: “The idea has been around for centuries. But it took a high school science fair, George W. Bush, history lessons and some determined researchers to overcome skepticism and make it federal policy.” NYT

-- “A New Doctor Faces the Coronavirus in Queens,” by Rivka Galchen in The New Yorker: “A front-line physician at Elmhurst Hospital sees how closely socioeconomic status is tied to the disease, and tries to help patients who are dying without their families.” New Yorker

-- “Coronavirus Entered My Father’s Nursing Home and Nobody Warned Me. I Did Not Get the Chance to Save Him,” by Jan Ransom in ProPublica: “When I called the state Department of Health to complain on my family’s behalf, I was informed that nursing homes in New York … were not obligated to tell families when the virus is detected in other residents.” ProPublica

-- “My Restaurant Was My Life for 20 Years. Does the World Need It Anymore?” by Gabrielle Hamilton in the NYT Magazine: “Forced to shutter Prune, I’ve been revisiting my original dreams for it—and wondering if there will still be a place for it in the New York of the future.” NYT Magazine

-- “Army Ranger School Is a Laboratory of Human Endurance,” by Will Bardenwerper in Outside magazine: “A Ranger graduate breaks down an ordeal that shapes some of the nation’s finest soldiers.” Outside

-- “Life of Zai,” by Jay Cridlin in The Tampa Bay Times: “A local singer with big dreams keeps getting close to stardom. Then her body and mind start to fail her.” Tampa Bay Times

-- “To Run My Best Marathon at Age 44, I Had to Outrun My Past,” by Nicholas Thompson in Wired: “After 20 years of long-distance competition, I ran my fastest. All it took was tech, training, and a new understanding of my life.” Wired

PLAYBOOKERS

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BIRTHDAYS: Patrick Mellody (h/t Anna) … Erica Suares, policy adviser for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, is 4-0 (h/t Nic Breeding) … Geoff Bennett, WH correspondent at NBC News … former Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) is 78 ... former Rep. Keith Rothfus (R-Pa.) is 58 … John Anzalone … Steve Murphy, managing partner at MVAR Media, is 69 … Michelle McGrorty (h/ts Teresa Vilmain) … Peter Daou … Patrick Mellody … Nike’s Kathy Baird … AFSCME’s Mark McCullough ... David Fenton, founder and chairman of Fenton Communications, is 68 ... Ron Tipton (h/ts Jon Haber) … Danielle Vogel, founder of Glen’s Garden Market, is 41 ... Susan Orr ... David Gardiner ... Bill Duhnke is 58 ... Mike Gwin, deputy rapid response director for Joe Biden’s campaign ... Teddy Goff, co-founder and partner at Precision Strategies (h/t Matthew McPartlin) … Joel Pollak … Andrew H. Schapiro ... Emily Singer, senior political reporter for the American Independent, is 31 ... Jeff Mascott ...

… AshLee Strong, founder of Granite Peak Communications … Julie Roginsky … ITA’s Andy Sigmon ... Robert Skidelsky is 81 ... POLITICO’s Alex Nieves … Mike Doran, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, is 58 … David Hart of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation and George Mason (h/t Sintia Radu) … Mike Tuffin, SVP for external affairs and head of government affairs at UnitedHealth Group, is 52 … Alejandra Cancino ... Arch Campbell ... Jaclyn Rothenberg ... Jennifer Anderson … Drew Anderson, director of campaigns and rapid response at GLAAD ... Claire Cooper ... Cameron Thrasher … Melissa Musiker ... Kristen Ricciardelli ... Emily Hesselbrock ... Smythe Anderson ... Derek LaVallee ... George Hunter ... Jim Mustian ... Alex Brown is 38 ... Josie Wilson ... Wendy Anderson, senior counselor at Palantir Technologies ... Kenny Gold is 34 ... Gretchen Lowe ... Tom Springer … David Litvack … Seth Amgott

SUNDAY SHOWS by Matt Mackowiak, filing from Austin:

-- NBC’s “Meet the Press”: Dr. Deborah Birx … Gov. Phil Murphy (D-N.J.) … Dr. Michael Osterholm … Stacey Abrams. Panel: Dr. Vin Gupta, Andrea Mitchell and Stephanie Ruhle.

-- ABC’s “This Week”: Gov. Larry Hogan (R-M.D.) … Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D-Mich.) … Kevin Hassett … Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.). Panel: Mary Bruce, Jonathan Karl, Matthew Dowd and Patrick Gaspard.

-- CNN’s “State of the Union”: Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) … Dr. Deborah Birx … Gov. Jared Polis (D-Colo.) … Stacey Abrams.

-- CBS’s “Face the Nation”: Gov. Larry Hogan (R-M.D.) … San Francisco Mayor London Breed … Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan … Barry Diller … Scott Gottlieb.

-- “Fox News Sunday”: Gov. Kevin Stitt (R-Okla.) … Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin … Thomas Inglesby. Panel: Ben Domenech, Katie Pavlich and Mo Elleithee. “Power Player of the Week” segment with Broadway performer and The Actor’s Fund chairman Brian Stokes Mitchell.

-- Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures”: Dr. Deborah Birx … Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) … House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) … Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) … New York Mayor Bill de Blasio.

-- Fox News’ “MediaBuzz”: Kristen Soltis Anderson … Mollie Hemingway …Ray Suarez … Ari Fleischer … Mara Liasson … Griff Jenkins.

-- CNN’s “Inside Politics”: Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) … Augusta Mayor Hardie Davis. Panel: Dr. Ashish Jha, Megan Ranney and Maggie Haberman.

-- CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS”: Bill Gates … Denmark prime minister Mette Frederiksen.

-- CNN’s “Reliable Sources”: Jonathan Karl … Dr. Seema Yasmin and Oliver Darcy … Brooke Baldwin … Panel: Nikki Vargas, Amy Brothers and Mary Spicuzza … Seattle Times president and chief financial officer Alan Fisco.

-- Univision’s “Al Punto”: Dr. Elmer Huerta … Arturo Morales … Beatriz Sánchez Rangel … Xavier Serbiá … Dr. Julio De Peña … Alejandro Sanz.

-- MSNBC’s “Kasie DC”: Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) … Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) … Mitch Daniels …Richard Carmona … David Shulkin … Philip Rucker … Jonathan Lemire … Shannon Pettypiece … David Plouffe.

-- Gray TV’s “Full Court Press with Greta Van Susteren”: Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) … Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-M.D.) … House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.).

-- Sinclair’s “America This Week with Eric Bolling”: Kellyanne Conway … HUD Secretary Ben Carson … Stephen Moore … Dr. Nicole Saphier. Panel: Dr. Todd Dorfman and Dr. Dave Campbell … Sebastian Gorka and Ameshia Cross.

--“Mack on Politics” weekly politics podcast with Matt Mackowiak (download on iTunes, Google Play, Spotify or Stitcher): Mehlman Castagnetti founder Bruce Mehlman.



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