(swong@politico.com or @scottwongDC)
McCONNELL TAKING NO PRISONERS – POLITICO’s Manu Raju reports from Frankfort, Ky.: “Kentucky is the Bluegrass State, but by the time Mitch McConnell is done with his reelection campaign, it may be better known for scorched earth. The top Senate Republican is preparing to wage a ruthless campaign to hang on to his job. He’s already on the air with nearly $ 200,000 in TV and radio ads, is assembling streams of data to target voters with tailor-made messages, and has quietly moved to lock down support from virtually every state GOP legislator. He says he’ll use ‘every penny’ of a war chest certain to exceed the $ 21 million he spent in 2008. He may have already scared away one contender: Ashley Judd, who Wednesday decided to forgo a bid for the Democratic nomination. McConnell’s strategy is similar to recent efforts by Senate stalwarts Majority Leader Harry Reid and John McCain, who each won reelection with big fundraising numbers to discourage possible opponents and constant attack ads to discredit those who do run.
– “The bull’s-eye on McConnell’s back has never been larger — tea party foes are unhappy with some of his compromises over his three-decade career, and Democrats see both a prime pick-up opportunity and a chance to knock off the opposition GOP leader. But neither have recruited a challenger yet, and McConnell isn’t waiting for his opponents to field one. ‘My view is if you’re going to be a bigger target, you’re going to adopt different tactics,’ McConnell told POLITICO in a wide-ranging interview this week before Judd dropped out. ‘I think we’ve made it pretty clear … that we intend to be very aggressive from Day One. And we are. And that involves not ignoring any potential opponent.’
– “The focus now shifts to Alison Lundergan Grimes, the 34-year-old Kentucky secretary of state. If Grimes doesn’t run, which is quite possible, Democrats could be without a top-tier candidate to take on the GOP leader. With GOP primaries threatening entrenched incumbents all over the country, the 71-year-old McConnell has worked aggressively to win over major players in the tea party movement through aggressive outreach, fundraising and efforts to help them politically … but also touting his efforts to cut bipartisan deals that could appeal to middle-of-the-road voters.” http://politi.co/YVk6Yd
JUDD made her announcement Wednesday afternoon in a series of tweets from her account @AshleyJudd: “After serious and thorough contemplation, I realize that my responsibilities & energy at this time need to be focused on my family. Regretfully, I am currently unable to consider a campaign for the Senate. I have spoken to so many Kentuckians over these last few months who expressed their desire for a fighter for the people & new leader. While that won’t be me at this time, I will continue to work as hard as I can to ensure the needs of Kentucky families are met by returning this Senate seat to whom it rightfully belongs: the people & their needs, dreams, and great potential. Thanks for even considering me as that person & know how much I love our Commonwealth. Thank you!”
– In a blog post, Judd later took a jab at McConnell and left the door open to a potential run down the road: “[I]t’s time Kentucky had an alternative to the cynical politics and self-serving tactics of Mitch McConnell. It would be the greatest honor of my life to be entrusted as a public servant to our beloved Kentucky. Perhaps someday I will be. However, with the help of my pastors and mentors, I have thoughtfully and prayerfully concluded that I won’t run for the United States Senate at this time.” http://bit.ly/YVs0ku
McCONNELL NOT CAVING TO OBAMACARE – National Journal’s Chris Frates reports: “A few minutes after the Supreme Court issued its landmark decision upholding President Obama’s health care law last summer, a senior adviser to Mitch McConnell walked into the Senate Republican leader’s office to gauge his reaction. McConnell was clearly disappointed, and for good reason. For many conservatives, the decision was the death knell in a three-year fight to defeat reforms that epitomized everything they thought was wrong with Obama’s governing philosophy. But where some saw finality, McConnell saw opportunity — and still does….
– “McConnell, a master of byzantine Senate procedure, immediately realized that, as a tax, the individual mandate would be subject to the budget reconciliation process, which exempted it from the filibuster. In other words, McConnell had just struck upon how to repeal Obamacare with a simple majority vote. The Kentucky Republican called a handful of top aides into his office and told them, “Figure out how to repeal this through reconciliation. I want to do this.” McConnell ordered a repeal plan ready in the event the GOP took back control of the Senate in November — ironic considering Democrats used the same process more than two years earlier in a successful, last-shot effort to muscle the reforms into law. …
– “By Election Day, Senate Republicans were ready to, as McConnell put it, ‘take this monstrosity down.’ ‘We were prepared to do that had we had the votes to do it after the election. Well, the election didn’t turn out the way we wanted it to,’ McConnell told National Journal in an interview. ‘The monstrosity has … begun to be implemented and we’re not giving up the fight.’” http://bit.ly/102hKtU
GRASSLEY WRITING GOP GUN BILL – John Bresnahan and Manu Raju write for the hometown paper: “Sen. Chuck Grassley is crafting an alternative Republican gun control bill, a move that could further complicate what will already be a difficult lift for Democrats and the White House. The Iowa Republican has strongly opposed expanded background checks for gun sales, the key provision of the Democratic gun bill set for debate next month, as well as an assault weapons ban or limits on high-capacity ammunition magazines. But Grassley was the only GOP lawmaker on the Senate Judiciary Committee who supported beefed-up penalties for ‘straw purchases’ of guns as part of a gun-trafficking provision approved by the panel. And Grassley has said he would back additional school-safety measures as well.” Republican Leader Mitch McConnell told POLITICO this week “it might be something I can support.” http://politi.co/14q6jkd
– Manu also reports that President Obama has set a second date with Senate Republicans for April 10. Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) is organizing the dinner. http://politi.co/YfZm1K
AT THE BORDER, SENATORS WATCH WOMAN JUMP THE FENCE – The Arizona Republic’s Dan Nowicki in Nogales, Ariz.: “The top Democratic and Republican Senate negotiators on forthcoming immigration-reform legislation toured the Arizona-Mexico border on Wednesday, watching as U.S. authorities apprehended a woman who had scaled a border fence and reiterating their commitment to strengthening security along the international line. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., are leading the ongoing bipartisan ‘Gang of Eight’ talks that many hope will result in the introduction of a sweeping bill when the Senate returns to session after a two-week Easter break. The two veteran lawmakers were joined on the tour, which included a helicopter ride, by two other Gang of Eight members: Sens. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., and Michael Bennet, D-Colo. The senators have been struggling to come to terms on big issues such as the future flow of foreign workers into the country, but the message from the quartet in southern Arizona was that the bill is moving forward.
– “At one point during the border tour, the senators witnessed a woman scaling an 18-foot fence a few yards from the entourage. McCain tweeted about the incident, telling his Twitter audience that the Border Patrol took the woman into custody. ‘One of the sad things about all of this is that most of those people who jump over the fence are doing that because they want a better life, and I understand that,” McCain elaborated to reporters later. “So we separate the drug cartels from individuals who are simply trying to cross over so that they can improve their lives, but at the same time, we have to have a legal way of doing that.’” http://bit.ly/WYgubq
@SenJohnMcCain: Just witnessed a woman successfully climb an 18-ft bollard fence a few yards from us in #Nogales pic.twitter.com/GnMwEeQwDB
– Schumer said the Gang of Eight was “90 percent” of the way toward a deal, our own Anna Palmer reports: http://politi.co/16Z5qPi
–Obama told Spanish-language network Telemundo that he expects immigration reform legislation to be ready next month and that it could pass by the end of summer. http://usat.ly/102cwOJ
New York Times, A1, “Success on Political Front Can Be Setback in Gay Rights,” By Peter Baker: “As the justices of the Supreme Court struggled with the question of same-sex marriage this week, politicians in Congress kept handing down their own verdict. One after another, a series of lawmakers in recent days endorsed allowing gay men and lesbians to wed. But momentum in the political world for gay rights could actually limit momentum in the legal world. While the court may throw out a federal law defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman, the justices signaled over two days of arguments that they might not feel compelled to intervene further, since the democratic process seems to be playing out on its own, state by state, elected official by elected official.
– “The prospect that gay rights advocates may become a victim of their own political success was underscored during arguments on Wednesday over the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act. Opponents of the law were left to make the paradoxical argument that the nation has come to accept that gay men and lesbians deserve the same right to marriage as heterosexuals while maintaining that they are a politically oppressed class deserving the protection of the courts. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. pressed that point with the lawyer for the plaintiff, a New York woman suing to recover federal estate taxes she would not have had to pay had her spouse been a man. ‘You don’t doubt that the lobby supporting the enactment of same-sex marriage laws in different states is politically powerful, do you?’ he asked the lawyer. For purposes of the law, said the lawyer, Roberta Kaplan, ‘I would, your honor.’ ‘Really?’ the chief justice asked skeptically. ‘As far as I can tell, political figures are falling over themselves to endorse your side of the case.’” http://nyti.ms/XiiVXw
Washington Post, A1, “Voters shift on marriage issue, and Senate Democrats follow,” By David A. Fahrenthold and Paul Kane: http://wapo.st/15YjRzL
LONELY HEARTS CLUB: THE DEM HOLDOUTS ON GAY MARRIAGE – Jonathan Allen has he story for POLITICO: “Only nine of the 55 Democratic senators don’t currently back gay marriage — and some of them are starting to feel the heat from frustrated base voters at home and from the example of their peers in Washington. President Barack Obama, the Democratic leaders in the House and Senate, and all of the serious potential contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016, are now firmly in support of gay marriage. That makes it increasingly difficult for Democratic lawmakers to defend positions that stop short of endorsing what proponents call ‘marriage equality.’ They’re seen as being on the wrong side of history — even bigoted — in the eyes of progressives, establishment Democrats and no small number of Republicans and political independents. …
–“The nine Democrats who haven’t endorsed gay marriage are Tim Johnson of South Dakota, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Mary Landrieu of Lousiana, Bill Nelson of Florida, Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Carper, Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Joe Donnelly of Indiana and Bob Casey of Pennsylvania.” http://politi.co/Yg1IO3
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GOOD THURSDAY MORNING, MARCH 28, 2013, and welcome to The Huddle, your play-by-play preview of the day’s congressional news. Send tips, suggestions, comments, complaints and corrections to swong@politico.com. If you don’t already, please follow me on Twitter @scottwongDC.
My new followers include @JohnJSpears and @SenBrianSchatz.
TODAY IN CONGRESS – The House and Senate are in recess this week and next week.
AROUND THE HILL – Join POLITICO at 8 a.m. on April 9 as our Chief Economic Correspondent Ben White takes his daily newsletter live for the first-ever Morning Money Breakfast Briefing featuring Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio). RSVP here: http://bit.ly/Zr2aEJ
BUDGET CUTS: SENATE TO PRIVATIZE ITS BARBERSHOP – Jeremy W. Peters writes in the New York Times: “They have survived the Civil War, the Great Depression and even Newt Gingrich. They are the caretakers of a Congressional institution that has often operated more like a gentleman’s club than a house of government, complete with a gilded members-only dining room, chandeliered sitting parlors and Carrara marble bath tubs. But the barbers of the United States Senate — along with a shoeshine attendant, a manicurist and the stylists who clip, color, feather and fluff senatorial locks from a basement salon across the street from the Capitol — may finally be losing their coveted status. Because of the automatic budget cuts known as sequestration, which are forcing government agencies to trim their spending and suspend some programs, the Senate will soon start privatizing its money-losing Hair Care Services unit, a cherished amenity that dates back to the early 19th century, when many senators lived in rooming houses with no running water. ‘It’s time,’ said Senator John McCain of Arizona, a longtime patron who, like many others in the Capitol, said he recognized the infeasibility of government-subsidized haircuts for senators and their staff. ‘In fact, I was talking to some of my friends there the other day,” Mr. McCain added, his thinning head of white hair looking freshly shorn, “and they said they recognized too that the time has come.’” http://nyti.ms/Yhg1BY
MARKEY, LYNCH TANGLE OVER OBAMACARE IN FIRST TV DEBATE – Martin Finucane reports for the Boston Globe: “US Representatives Edward J. Markey and Stephen F. Lynch tangled over Lynch’s vote against President Obama’s health care law in a televised debate tonight between the two contenders for the Democratic nomination in the special election race for US Senate. Lynch said he didn’t vote for the bill because ‘it was a very flawed bill and we missed a real opportunity to create real health care reform.’ Markey described his own vote for the Affordable Care Act as ‘the proudest vote of my career’ and said, ‘Steve, when that vote came up, you were wrong.’ Lynch responded, ‘What we did there was wrong,’ describing what he said were several flaws in the law and calling it a giveaway to health insurance companies. The half-hour debate between Markey and Lynch followed another half-hour debate that featured the Republican candidates, State Representative Daniel B. Winslow, former US attorney Michael J. Sullivan, and Gabriel E. Gomez, a private equity investor and former Navy SEAL.” http://bo.st/15YrKVQ
RECORDS DETAIL LOUGHNER’S BEHAVIOR BEFORE TUCSON SHOOTING – “In hindsight, the red flags seem to be everywhere,” the L.A. Times’ Cindy Carcamo and Michael Mello write from Tucson. “By the time Jared Lee Loughner shot and killed six people, wounding 13 — including then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords — his parents had already taken away his shotgun, tested him for drugs and forbade him from using the family vehicle after dusk. Months earlier, officials at his community college had refused to allow him to return to campus until he passed a mental evaluation. Hours before he went on a shooting rampage, a Wal-Mart clerk had declined to sell him ammunition.
– “These details emerged Wednesday when authorities released nearly 3,000 pages of investigative reports, painting a picture of a man who had become unhinged and the people who had tried to intervene, worried he was a danger to himself and others. The disclosure of the case documents — previously kept under seal — comes after Loughner was sentenced in November to life in prison without parole. The 24-year-old pleaded guilty to 19 federal charges in the rampage at a constituent event Giffords, a Democrat, was hosting at a grocery store parking lot in north Tucson in 2011. In an interview with law enforcement officials, Loughner’s mother, Amy Loughner, said her son had been acting strangely for about a year, often talking or laughing to himself, and was angry with the government, though she did not say why.” http://lat.ms/YVuj6U
GOHMERT PULLS RANK ON COPS OVER PARKING TICKET – Jake Sherman and John Bresnahan have the scoop for POLITICO: “A Texas Republican congressman got into a late-night verbal altercation with U.S. Park Police officers earlier this month, pulling rank in an attempt to get out of a parking ticket near the Lincoln Memorial. Shortly after 11 p.m. on March 13, officers wrote Rep. Louie Gohmert a citation for parking his black Ford SUV in a spot reserved for National Park Service vehicles, according to a Park Police report obtained by POLITICO. But Gohmert wasn’t having it: He told the Park Police that his congressional parking placard allows him to park in that spot, and he’s on the committee that oversees the agency. Gohmert took the ticket off his windshield and placed it on a police car along with his business card with a written message: ‘Oversight of Park Service is my job! Natural Resources Thus the Congressional Plate in window.’
– “He was ‘rude and irate,’ one officer reported. Another wrote that Gohmert was ‘ranting.’ ‘I was issued a ticket and I am a congressman and parked my vehicle in the NPS parking only because I have a Congress placard, see,’ Gohmert told one officer, according to the report. ‘I am going to a meeting on the Hill and I am the one who oversees the National Park Services Natural Resources.’” http://politi.co/11LXHnI
WEDNSDAY’S TRIVIA – We only got one correct answer to yesterday’s question. Shawn Hils answered that the only Democrat Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.) says he’s donated to in the past was his son-in-law, Ed Ableser, who serves in the Arizona state House of Representatives.
TODAY’S TRIVIA – Shawn Hils has today’s question: Former New York Knicks star Bill Bradley played ran for president in 2000 only to drop out during the Democratic primary. Name another presidential candidate who also played in the NBA and lost in a presidential primary. First to correctly answer gets a mention in the next day’s Huddle. Email me at swong@politico.com.
GET HUDDLE emailed to your Blackberry, iPhone or other mobile device each morning. Just enter your email address where it says “Sign Up.” http://www.politico.com/huddle/
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POLITICO – Top 10 – The Huddle
McConnell taking no prisoners, Judd: I"m not running, Grassley writes GOP gun bill, Sens. watch woman scale border fence, Senate"s Lonely Hearts Club, Markey/Lynch tangle on TV
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