‘I Feel Your Pain’

Today’s notice: The GOP’s affordability talking points. Anti-abortion leaders celebrate a big win. Texas Democrats play a high-stakes game of musical chairs. And: Big Oil standing up for Big Wind?

THE LATEST

‘In politics, perception is reality. That’s the problem for Trump,” says Stephen Moore, an economist and outside adviser to Donald Trump who, among others, has offered the White House advice on how to weather this latest affordability conversation.

The pressure’s on Trump as tonight in Pennsylvania he’s slated to speak on the economy. Moore’s advice? Stay the course, he told Jasmine: “What we’re doing is working. It’s going to pay big dividends to you. Stay the course. Don’t go back to Biden policies.”

“I think Trump will probably start making the point that I care and I feel your pain when you go to the grocery store,” he added.

The RNC sent talking points to surrogates last week urging allies to blame Joe Biden for high prices, and that Trump is “repairing the mess,” per a memo Jasmine and NOTUS’ Violet Jira obtained.

Will Trump stay on message? There are some signs. Trump didn’t call affordability a “con job” or a “hoax” at the White House yesterday when asked about prices. The new line: “The Democrats caused the affordability problem, and we are the ones that are fixing it.” That certainly sounds talking points-y — and a shift from when he essentially told Americans to suck it up.

Then there’s the $12 billion aid package for American farmers hit by Trump’s tariffs, the president and Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announced yesterday. The money’s coming from an Agriculture emergency fund. Farmers should receive payments by Feb. 28. Trump said the money would be pulled from tariff revenue.

Open tabs: Alina Habba Resigns as New Jersey’s Top Federal Prosecutor (NOTUS); Trump’s Own Mortgages Match His Description of Mortgage Fraud, Records Reveal (ProPublica); Jared Kushner is part of Paramount’s hostile bid for Warner Bros. Discovery (Axios); Congress to withhold Pentagon travel funds until it sees boat strike videos (Politico)

From the Hill

Another victory for the anti-abortion crowd: Republicans stripped a provision from the annual National Defense Authorization Act that would have required insurance coverage of IVF services for active-duty military personnel — and movement leaders are thanking Mike Johnson for what they see as a big win, NOTUS’ Oriana González reports.

“Johnson is an effective Speaker because he is taking public arrows for his team,” John Shelton, the policy director for Mike Pence’s group Advancing American Freedom, said. “The majority of the Republican conference is pro-life and understands that this controversial provision should have never been in the NDAA in the first place.”

Nancy Mace’s hard truths: The unpredictable South Carolina Republican popped an op-ed in The New York Times yesterday entitled simply, “What’s the Point of Congress?” We like to imagine it read while snapping along to a bongo beat like a spoken-word performance.

“Nancy Pelosi was a more effective House speaker than any Republican this century … When Democrats hold the majority, they ram through the most progressive policies they can,” she wrote. “Republicans do the opposite.”

(A more poetry-slam-style reading down the hall would feature progressives saying some version of wait, Democrats do what now? in response to Mace’s piece.)

From the campaign trail

Inevitable Texas-two-step-themed headline: Former Rep. Colin Allred is out of the Democratic Senate primary in Texas and Rep. Jasmine Crockett is in. (As is state Rep. James Talarico.)

“I know y’all are ready to hear some good news,” Crockett told supporters at her kickoff rally in Dallas. NOTUS’ Daniella Diaz reports that the DSCC sidestepped questions about the primary shakeup, while the Republican establishment is busy trying to keep Sen. John Cornyn from losing his primary.

More stepping: Allred says he’ll run in the redrawn 33rd Congressional District, where he’ll face Rep. Julie Johnson in a Democratic primary. That primary is already getting nasty. Rep. Marc Veasey, the Democrat from the 33rd as it is currently drawn, was going to run in the redrawn version of Crockett’s 30th Congressional District — but is reportedly now dropping out of that primary to run for Tarrant County judge instead. Whew.

NEW ON NOTUS

Trump’s energy dilemma: Did the wind-farm industry, under a prolonged legal attack from the White House, just get some backup from Big Oil? The National Petroleum Council, the government advisory board made up largely of fossil-fuel-industry players, in a new report has asked Congress to clamp down on available avenues for legal challenges to approved federal industry projects under the National Environmental Policy Act, NOTUS’ Shifra Dayak reports.

Trouble is, those NEPA challenges are the exact strategy the Trump administration is actively using to roll back renewable projects that were approved by Biden — particularly for wind development.

SCOTUS set to expand presidential power? Yesterday’s Supreme Court oral arguments, summarized in one exchange: “I want to make it crystal clear that overruling or narrowing Humphrey’s Executor would not threaten the existence of these agencies but only would alter how the heads of those agencies can be removed, correct?” Justice Brett Kavanaugh asked Solicitor General D. John Sauer, referring to the unanimous 1935 ruling allowing Congress to limit the power of the president to fire members of commissions and boards with quasi-legislative or -judicial powers.

“Correct,” Sauer replied to Kavanaugh.

NOTUS’ Jade Lozada reports that the justices appeared to fall largely along partisan lines during the oral arguments, which suggests Kavanaugh’s take — and the take of the White House — will win the day. Short-term, that will mean the administration can go ahead with its push to fire an FTC commissioner over her politics. Longer term, a key separation of powers precedent could be fundamentally changed.

More: ‘Intentional Chaos’: Judge Chastises HUD in Dispute Over Homelessness Programs, by Raymond Fernández

Education Department Recalls Hundreds of Civil Rights Employees It Placed on Leave, by Adora Brown

NOT US

• The Trump Administration’s Chaos in the Caribbean, by Jonathan Blitzer for The New Yorker
  
• How the new H-1B visa fee is upending health care in rural America, by David Ovalle for The Washington Post
  
• How Chiropractors Became the Backbone of MAHA, by Catherine Kim for Politico

MEET US

Welcome to “Meet Us,” where we introduce you to a member of the NOTUS team. Torrie Herrington is a NOTUS reporter and Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow covering campaigns and Maine and Vermont politics.

Torrie Herrington Tracey Salazar

Hometown: Cabot, Arkansas

Past work: Editor in chief of The Echo at the University of Central Arkansas.

Why journalism: I love writing, and I love getting to meet new people and help tell their stories.

NOTUS + AJI highlight so far: Getting to learn from some of the best journalists! I have learned so much from the classes.

Thing you can’t live without: Caffeine. I live off of coffee and Red Bull.

Best advice you’ve ever been given: Life is not about finding yourself, it’s about creating yourself.

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