With help from Eli Okun, Ali Bianco, Irie Sentner and Makayla Gray
On today’s Playbook Podcast: Jack and POLITICO’s California bureau chief Melanie Mason discuss the rise and fall of Eric Swalwell, who announced his resignation last night.
Good Tuesday morning. This is Jack Blanchard. Drop me a line.
SCOOP — WHITE HOUSE DEPARTURE LOUNGE: White House Director of Cabinet Affairs Lea Bardon is joining D.C.-based public affairs firm The Sovereign Advisors as executive VP, Dasha scoops this morning. Key detail: The firm was founded by Trump’s longtime confidant and former deputy chief of staff Taylor Budowich, who left the White House last fall.
The context: Bardon (profiled here on the Washingtonian’s latest female power list) was the person every Cabinet chief of staff needed a relationship with, serving as the nerve center through which policy, events and presidential directives moved across the executive branch. In her new role, she’ll be working on Budowich’s Innovation Council Action — an outside group that dropped a $100 million commitment for the 2026 cycle — and brings a contact list of agency heads and Cabinet deputies to the project. Her departure comes hot on the heels of White House deputy chief of staff James Blair, who — as POLITICO scooped last week — is moving to a political role to boost the GOP’s midterms campaign.
SPOTTED: Bardon said farewell on Friday at a gathering of top officials including Blair, Cabinet secretary Meghan Bauer, the VP’s deputy chief of staff Will Martin, Jodee Hanson, Sam Mulopulos, Department of Commerce counselor Cooper Godfrey, Director of Medicare Chris Klomp, FDA Deputy Commissioner Kyle Diamantes, SSA Deputy Commissioner Arjun Mody, and Commerce deputy chief of staff Beatrice Brooke.
AND IN THE CONGRESSIONAL DEPARTURE LOUNGE: Accountability is back. Disgraced Reps. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) and Tony Gonzales (R-Texas) announced their resignationswithin an hour of one another last night — and now Republicans are piling pressure on Swalwell’s closest allies, as it emerges that rumors about his conduct swirled for years.
Under pressure: Swalwell’s longtime champion, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, last night denied any prior knowledge of the allegations against him and said it was “absolutely not true” that Dems long turned a blind eye. (Watch the clip.) And in an ashen-faced interview, Swalwell’s (now former) close friend Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) — still defending him just a few days ago — said Swalwell “led a double life” and “tricked many of us into believing he was something he is not.” Expect the GOP to keep ramping up the pressure about who knew what. (Also ramping up the pressure: FBI Director Kash Patel.)
Quiet quitting: The next big question is when they both go, given the insanely small margins in the House. “A staggered departure … could shift the balance of power” in one direction or the other, as POLITICO’s Inside Congress reports. Also worth noting: “Republicans are worried a special election to fill Gonzales’ seat could risk a Democratic win in what is now a more competitive district.”
TODAY’S ESSENTIAL READING: “The whisper network that caught up to Eric Swalwell,” by POLITICO’s Melanie Mason and Jeremy White
In today’s Playbook …
— It’s tax cut week in Trump world. Will anyone notice?
— The House is back … and a DHS funding deal could follow.
— And JMart hits Augusta! And he’s inviting you along for a BBQ sandwich.
SO MUCH FOR TAX WEEK: President Donald Trump and Republicans had this week highlighted as a crucial moment for the midterms campaign. April 15 should have marked the perfect opportunity for Trump and the GOP to highlight the (largely very popular) tax cuts delivered via the One Big Beautiful Bill last year. Hill Republicans have a big event planned Wednesday, before Trump hits the campaign trail in Nevada and Arizona. What could go wrong?
Quite a lot, actually: Trump’s “no tax on tips” PR stunt with a DoorDash employee yesterday was, of course, completely overshadowed by his jaw-dropping attack on the Pope and the furor over his AI-Jesus meme. And in truth it’s going to be hard for Republicans to land any cost-of-living messaging right now, given the economic storm clouds caused by the president’s war on Iran.
Storm watch: You don’t have to wander far in D.C. to hear financial big-hitters issuing grim warnings, with the IMF/World Bank Spring Meetings in full swing. “A year ago, these meetings took place shortly after Trump unveiled his new global tariff regime, which sent shockwaves across the world,” POLITICO’s economics guru Victoria Guida tells Playbook. “But vibe-wise, things actually seem much gloomier now, maybe because the Iran conflict has a less obvious path toward improvement. The global economy will likely keep on keeping on — certainly the U.S. economy seems OK — but the oil price shock is hitting countries hard.”
Read it and weep: The IMF’s world economic outlook is published at 9 a.m. Eastern.
Housing woes: Sky-high gas prices, and the inflationary effect of sky-high diesel prices, remain Republicans’ biggest worry. But there are knock-on effects all over the economy — not least in the housing market, POLITICO’s Sam Sutton reports. Mortgage rates are up, home sales are down and applications for home loans are declining as the spring homebuying season gets underway. “People are worried,” said Mike Simonsen, chief economist at the housing brokerage Compass. “I was on a call with 500 agents today, and that was definitely one of the comments that popped up: ‘We’re worried about war.’”
U.S. farmers, meanwhile, will be fretting about fertilizer shortages for as long as the Strait of Hormuz remains closed, POLITICO’s Scott Waldman and Grace Yarrow report. Those who do not have long-term prices locked down are going to struggle, and the likely impact will be “to drive up food prices possibly for months to come, even in the best case scenario.” (Higher food prices being the exact opposite of what Trump promised voters in 2024.) Daily reminder: The midterms are less than seven months away.
FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — Punching the bruise: The League of Conservation Voters is kicking off a $4 million ad campaign targeting House Republicans over energy costs — with a focus on the One Big, Beautiful Bill Act and a nod to war-fueled gas prices. They’ll air in the districts of Reps. Juan Ciscomani (Ariz.), David Valadao (Calif.), Jeff Crank (Colo.), Gabe Evans (Colo.), Mariannette Miller-Meeks (Iowa), Bill Huizenga (Mich.), Tom Kean Jr. (N.J.), Mike Carey (Ohio), Scott Perry (Pa.), John McGuire (Va.) and Derrick Van Orden (Wis.). The Van Orden ad
Given all of the above … it wouldn’t be too surprising to see the Trump administration launch into another round of peace talks with Iran in the coming days. (We’re halfway through the two-week ceasefire today.) CNN reports Trump administration officials “are internally discussing details for a potential second, in-person meeting,” which AP reports Pakistan has already offered to host. The NYT reports that so far, Iran has offered a five-year freeze of its nuclear program, while the U.S. is demanding 20 years.
Some negotiations are happening: Secretary of State Marco Rubio today will mediate the first in-person peace talks between Israel and Lebanon in decades. The two delegations — led by Israeli Ambassador Yechiel Leiter, and Lebanese Ambassador Nada Hamadeh — meet in D.C. today.
And separately, America’s NATO allies are intensifying conversations about their own efforts to reopen the strait. British PM Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron announced another summit with allied nations on a “strictly defensive mission” to allow the free passage of ships. My London Playbook colleague Sam Blewett reports it’s penciled in for Friday.
MEANWHILE ON THE HILL
WELCOME BACK! The House is officially back in session today as lawmakers return from the two-week recess to chaos on multiple fronts. Up to bat today are discussions to finally end the 58-days-and-counting DHS shutdown. Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Speaker Mike Johnson will meet and will tackle the tricky topic of reconciliation 2.0 — the “anorexic” bill Thune promised yesterday to fund DHS.
But but but: They’ll undoubtedly face pushback from fiscal conservatives as they race to meet Trump’s June 1 deadline, POLITICO’s Jordain Carney reports. And things could get even more dicey if the scope of reconciliation expands. Watching brief: “The ultimatums could start pouring in as soon as the Senate GOP’s closed-door Tuesday lunch, when Thune and Senate Budget Chair Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) will get the chance to talk through the plan with their colleagues,” Jordain writes.
How things will play out: The text for the party-line bill could be released as soon as today. Republicans aim to bring the budget resolution to the floor as soon as next week. DHS is using its available funding to bring back all its workers in the meantime.
DEADLINES, DEADLINES: The House Rules Committee meets this afternoon to consider a straight 18-month extension of FISA Section 702, which Johnson is trying to muscle through to a vote this week ahead of its expiration next Monday. Over a dozen House Republicans already voiced concerns. The White House is piling the pressure on, with Joint Chiefs Chair Gen. Dan Caine penning a letter yesterday arguing the loss of 702 would “significantly impair U.S. security,” POLITICO’s John Sakellariadis and colleagues report. “The intervention of Caine — one of Trump’s most trusted advisers — is a sign the White House is nervous it doesn’t have enough votes to preserve the spy statute,” our colleagues write.
HOUSE MATH: Republican Rep.-elect Clay Fuller is expected to be sworn in today, replacing Marjorie Taylor Greene and filling a vacancy that will net Johnson a little extra breathing room on his margins … which will likely be erased soon, after the New Jersey special election to replace Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill takes place Thursday.
TRAIL MIX
MUST-WATCH FROM JMART: The latest episode of “On the Road” from POLITICO’s own Jonathan Martin is a dispatch from the sidelines of the Masters, and a sitdown with Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp. “The governor was eager to wrap our conversation and get over to the club for day one,” JMart writes. “But he was even more eager to make the case for his preferred Senate candidate, Derek Dooley, and said he’d do everything possible to get Dooley into a runoff after the first round of primary voting next month.” Read the Q&A … Watch the episode … Listen and subscribe on Apple or Spotify
RACE OF THE DAY: Rep. Young Kim (R-Calif.) is launching a $3.7 million ad blitz in California’s newly redrawn 40th District today as the primary showdown against Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Calif.) heats up. The ad buy is funded in part from the $1.3 million Kim brought in for Q1, bringing her cash on hand total to $5.8 million, her team told Playbook. The buy spans digital, streaming and TV and will hit Calvert through the June 2 primary — with the first two ads touting Kim as “100% pro-Trump” and criticizing Calvert as a creature of the swamp, “sabotaging” Trump’s agenda.
CASH DASH: Republican Terri DeBoer raised a quarter of a million dollars in the three weeks since launching her campaign to unseat Democratic Rep. Hillary Scholten in Michigan’s 3rd District. She’s reporting a total of $242,681.68, with a cash on hand of $223,702.46.
HITTING BACK ON AIPAC: Forty percent of American Jewish voters say they’re less likely to support Democratic primary candidates if they’ve been endorsed by AIPAC, and two-thirds oppose AIPAC spending money raised by Republican donors in Democratic primaries, according to new polling released by the center-left liberal Zionist group J Street, Playbook’s Irie Sentner scoops. The results are even more stark among younger voters: Two thirds of American Jewish voters under 35 said they were less likely to support an AIPAC-endorsed Democratic candidate. See the full results
BEST OF THE REST
THE POLITICO POLL: Vaccine skepticism has gone mainstream, as one of HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s marquee stances gains traction across the U.S. The POLITICO Poll found nearly half of the 3,851 U.S. adults surveyed believe the science on vaccines is up for discussion and that it can be damaging to enforce them, POLITICO’s Lauren Gardner reports. While the poll reveals a clear partisan split, with Republicans showing more skepticism, it’s worth noting that 36 percent of Democratic voters also showed skepticism.
Vax not: The Trump administration is floating Houman Hemmati, an ophthalmologist who’s regularly appeared on Fox News, to be the next top vaccine regulator and replace Vinay Prasad, WaPo’s Rachel Roubein and Dan Diamond report.
FEELING THE BERN: “Bernie Sanders Is Back as a Left-Wing Kingmaker,” by WSJ’s Eliza Collins: “He speaks at least once a week to Zohran Mamdani, an acolyte who pulled off a major upset to become mayor of New York City, where progressive policies will now be tested on a population of roughly 8.5 million people. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.), another protégée, is considering a run for the White House or a bid to take Democratic leader Chuck Schumer’s Senate seat when he is up for re-election in 2028.”
Worth watching: Mamdani’s mic-drop introduction for Sanders on stage over the weekend.
THE RETURN OF CENTRISM: Canadian PM Mark Carney’s stunning political ascent continues, with his Liberal Party securing an overall parliamentary majority last night. Carney began with a minority government, but has used defections and special elections to tighten his grip on power. “It gives him runway to execute his ambitious ‘Canada Strong’ agenda, including a slate of protectionist policies focused on reducing Canada’s economic reliance on the United States,” POLITICO’s Mickey Djuric and colleagues report from Ottawa.
DAY OF REMEMBRANCE — Members of Congress, Holocaust survivors, leaders of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and other dignitaries gather today at the Capitol for a Holocaust commemoration ceremony as part of the museum’s annual Days of Remembrance. The ceremony marks the largest gathering of the museum’s stakeholders since Playbook exclusively reported the USHMM took down a web page about American racism and renamed then canceled a workshop about the “fragility of democracy” — moves two former employees claimed were acts of premature capitulation to the Trump administration.
One of those stakeholders is Steve Ludsin, a member of former President Jimmy Carter’s 1978 Commission on the Holocaust — which recommended the museum be created — and one of the founding members of the museum’s board. Ludsin, who’s in Washington for the Days of Remembrance, told Playbook’s Irie Sentner he found the content changes “outrageous.” “They are undermining the progress,” he said. “They want to set the clock back.”
NGA FIRINGS — The National Governors Association let its entire lobbying team go, according to a note sent to staff and obtained by POLITICO, our colleague Marcia Brown reports. “NGA is restructuring its internal operations to align core policy expertise with intergovernmental communications,” an NGA spokesperson said in a statement. “As part of this restructuring, four positions were dissolved and Timothy Blute, newly named Chief Policy Officer, along with a new State-Federal Affairs Director, will be tasked with advancing governors’ priorities.”
The move is part of a restructuring that will include bringing on outside lobbying firms, NGA CEO Brandon Tatum explained in the note to staff. The bipartisan NGA has undergone turmoil as Democratic governors clashed with the Trump administration. The White House earlier this year excluded Democrats from its annual governors meeting, breaking from a decades-long tradition.
ANOTHER PODCAST — Republican strategist Erin Maguire and Democratic strategist Kurt Bardella launched a new podcast distributed by Politicon called “Party Lines.” Their inaugural episode focuses on the fall of Eric Swalwell.
OUT AND ABOUT — Semafor hosted a dinner for its World Economy Summit at the Library of Congress last night featuring an interview with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. SPOTTED: Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) and John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), British Ambassador Christian Turner, Swiss Ambassador Ralf Heckner, Argentine Ambassador Alejandro Oxenford, UAE Ambassador Yousef Al Otaiba, Austan Goolsbee, Sarah Rogers, David Petraeus, Ken Griffin, David Rubenstein, Penny Pritzker, V. Anantha Nageswaran, Henry Paulson Jr., Justin Smith, Ben Smith, Salil Parekh, Brett McGurk, Ermenegildo Zegna, Dina Powell McCormick, Hadi Badri, Kurt Björklund, Liz Claman, Jim Clifton, Robert Costa, Mark Ein, Sim Tshabalala, Burgess Everett, Liz Hoffman, Jonathan Karl, Ynon Kreitz, Prashant Rao, Steve Rattner, Satish Reddy, Francine Lacqua, Andrea Mitchell, Eleanor Mueller, Rohan Goswami, Mohammed Sergie and Matt Murray.
— Kellyanne Conway, Catherine Reynolds and Rachel Pearson co-hosted a party last night at the Jefferson Hotel to celebrate “The Power Pivot,” a new book by Ashley Davis. SPOTTED: Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.), Ann Scott, Wayne Reynolds, Marlene Malek, Frank McCourt, Stephanie Cutter, Susan Nealy, Grace Bender, Julie Cram, Sarah Fagan, Adrienne Elrod, Malloy McDaniel and Rita Braver.
MEDIA MOVE — Casey Wooten is joining NBC News as a breaking news editor. Casey was most recently at National Journal.
TRANSITIONS — Alexandria Duque is now digital director for the House Judiciary Committee Democrats under ranking member Jamie Raskin (D-Md.). She previously worked for Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.). … Steve Chartan is now executive VP of Heritage Action. He is a Ted Cruz, Jim Jordan, Pat Toomey and Senate Steering alum.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Rep. David Valadao (R-Calif.) (favorite treat: his wife’s homemade strawberry pizza). … NBC’s Garrett Haake … Francis Collins … Joe Rospars of Blue State Digital … Boeing’s Betsy Stewart … Matt Zapotosky … Mike Duncan … POLITICO’s Jeff Tomich, Lynn Fine and Sasha Issenberg … Amy Brundage of SKDK … BPI’s Adam Hodge … Ellie Hockenbury … CNN’s Adam Levine … Keith Appell … Steve Glickman … Ashok Pinto … Roberta Jacobson … Brad Schweer … Stephen Groves … NAM’s Erin Streeter … David Medina … Signal Group’s Blake Androff … Lina Francis … NYT’s Eileen Sullivan … Jeff Schogol … Shari Redstone … Kellen Moran … Axios’ Ashley Gold … Mark Bryant of Agency Advisors … Amanda Marsh … Elisse Walter … Bobby Shringi … Neil Sroka … Nick Merrill … Ascent’s Lisa Moore … Sara van Geertruyden
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