SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM’S WARNING AGAINST VOTING FOR WITNESSES … “I’ll make a prediction: [There will] be 51 Republican votes to call Hunter Biden, Joe Biden, the whistleblower.” GRAHAM (R-S.C.) said witnesses cannot be dealt with “surgically.” “If people want witnesses, we’re going to get a lot of witnesses.”
-- GRAHAM said he agrees with Oklahoma GOP Sen. JAMES LANKFORD’S idea that senators should be able to read JOHN BOLTON’S new book in a secure facility.
HERE’S THE WEAKNESS IN THAT PLAN: This isn’t a book club. It’s a trial to remove the president of the United States. If LANKFORD wants to introduce as evidence BOLTON’S book, the Senate would need 51 votes to consider witnesses and new evidence, and then would need to get 51 votes to get the book admitted as evidence. That would open the door to votes on all witnesses. Not to mention, they’d need to find a way to get this book from the White House or the publisher. And the book is not the same thing as sworn testimony.
WHY DOESN’T BOLTON JUST GO ON TV? … SEN. RON JOHNSON (R-Wis.) said he’d “encourage” BOLTON to come forward and publicly say what he knows that’s relevant to the trial. “Tell it to you,” Johnson told reporters when asked where he should say it.
IMPEACHMENT LATEST … TODAY COULD BE a short one in the Capitol. We’re being told the president’s team will wrap in the afternoon and the senators’ questions will begin Wednesday. They have 16 hours to question both the president’s team and the House managers.
NOTABLE WHEN THINKING OF WITNESS TRADES … SENATE MINORITY LEADER CHUCK SCHUMER: “What can Hunter Biden tell us about the president’s obstruction of Congress? Nothing, obviously.” SCHUMER said requests to call Hunter Biden are a distraction.
DEPT. OF TEA LEAF READING … HOW WILL HE VOTE? … SEN. JOE MANCHIN (D-W.Va.): “I think everyone’s done a good job so far. On both sides.”
FWIW … SARASOTA HERALD TRIBUNE’S ZAC ANDERSON: “Former Trump Chief of Staff John Kelly tells Sarasota crowd ‘I believe John Bolton’”
-- KELLY ON WITNESSES: “I think some of the conversations seem to me to be very inappropriate but I wasn’t there. But there are people that were there that ought to be heard from.”
SPOTTED: Alan Dershowitz getting stopped by Secret Service for additional screening at the White House ahead of the event with Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu.
TRUMP AND KUSHNER’S MIDDLE-PEACE DEAL -- AP: “Trump plan calls for Palestinian state, settlement freeze,” by Matthew Lee and Aron Heller: “President Donald Trump unveiled his long-awaited Middle East peace plan Tuesday, calling for the creation of a State of Palestine with its capital in portions of east Jerusalem, saying it is a ‘win-win’ opportunity for both Israel and the Palestinians.
“The plan calls for the creation of a State of Palestine with its capital in portions of east Jerusalem, ending speculation as to whether his administration, in preparing a proposal without input from Palestinian leaders, would abandon a ‘two-state resolution’ to the conflict.
“Trump, releasing the plan before a pro-Israel audience at the White House with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by his side, acknowledged that he has done a lot for Israel, but he said he wanted the deal to be a ‘great deal for the Palestinians.’ Trump said the deal is a ‘historic opportunity’ for Palestinians to achieve an independent state of their own.
“The plan more than doubles the territory currently under Palestinian control, although it also recognizes Israeli sovereignty over major settlement blocs in the West Bank, something to which the Palestinians will almost certainly object. The Palestinians have already rejected the proposal, accusing Trump of being biased in favor of Israel as he has adopted policies that bolster Israel at their expense.” AP
ON U.S.-PALESTINIAN RELATIONS: “We will be there, we will be there to help you in so many different ways, and we will be there every step of the way. … In other words, for the first time in many, many decades, I can say, it will work. It's going to work. If they do this, it will work.”
TRUMP to Secretary of State MIKE POMPEO, about berating and cursing at an NPR reporter: “That reporter couldn’t have done too good a job on you yesterday. I think you did a good job on her, actually.”
BEHIND THE SCENES … “White House urges Netanyahu not to begin annexations after peace plan,” by Barak Ravid of Israel’s Channel 13 news: “The White House has made it clear to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu that it expects him to hold off on any immediate unilateral steps — like annexing parts of the West Bank — after President Trump’s peace plan is presented later today, three Israeli and U.S. sources briefed on the matter tell me.
“Netanyahu hoped to get a green light from the White House to begin annexations in the West Bank, something that would mobilize his base ahead of the March 2 elections. … Israeli and U.S. sources tell me the White House position was also conveyed to Gantz, who met President Trump yesterday. Gantz told Trump he supports the plan but thinks it should be implemented only after Israel’s election.” Axios
-- MEANWHILE, IN JERUSALEM … HAARETZ: “Israel’s attorney general on Tuesday filed the indictment against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in three corruption cases to a district court, effectively launching the trial against the premier.
“Earlier on Tuesday, Netanyahu announced he was withdrawing his request for immunity from prosecution in the three corruption cases, in which he is charged with bribery, fraud and breach of trust.” Haaretz
Good Tuesday afternoon.
INSIDE THE BATTLE FOR THE HOUSE … JAKE reports: “House Republican leaders privately conceded in a closed meeting Tuesday morning that they are in the midst of a full-blown fundraising crisis, which would imperil any chance they have at regaining their majority in 2020.”
“HOUSE MINORITY LEADER KEVIN MCCARTHY put it bluntly: ‘They are kicking our ass,’ he said, in a meeting at the Capitol Hill Club, the private GOP haunt around the corner from the Capitol, referring to Democrats. … ‘My intention today is to sound a loud alarm,’ NRCC Chairman Tom Emmer of Minnesota said in the meeting. ‘We can’t ignore the campaigns that need to get better with their individual fundraising. ... They’re crushing us,’ Emmer said, referring to the DCCC.” POLITICO
-- REPUBLICANS have fallen so far behind Democrats in fundraising, it is like they are fighting with their hands behind their backs. The NRCC was outraised by $40 million in 2019 -- and the GOP had its best off-year ever. Democrats are just that much better.
THIS GET-YOUR-ACT-TOGETHER MEETING got Republicans to open their wallets. A list of contributors during the meeting
MORE DEM FUNDRAISING NUMBERS, via ALLY MUTNICK: “House Majority PAC raised a whopping $41 million in 2019, nearly three times more than the $14.8 million it raised in the 2017 off-year. It started 2020 with $37.5 million on hand. The haul includes a $10 million donation from Bloomberg.
“HMP raised more than its GOP counterpart, the Congressional Leadership Fund, which said Monday that it raised $32.6 million (which is also an off-year record for them), and has $28 million in the bank. (This a reversal from the 2017 off-year when CLF raised $26.9 million and HMP raised $14.8 million.) Meanwhile, American Action Network, the nonprofit tied to CLF, raised about $35.4 million in 2017 — they did not announce a cash on hand balance — while the Democratic nonprofit House Majority Forward did not announce a fundraising total.”
NEW … CONDOLEEZZA RICE will be director of the Hoover Institution starting in September. She currently is the Denning professor in global business at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and the Thomas and Barbara Stephenson senior fellow on public policy at the Hoover Institution.
SNEAK PEEK -- ANNA sat down with KATHRYN MURDOCH for the latest Women Rule podcast out Wednesday morning. The famously private Murdoch opened up about being a liberal in a conservative family, the $100 million she is spending on political issues like voting reform and climate change, and who she’ll support in 2020. Subscribe now
THE PRODUCER IN CHIEF -- @realDonaldTrump at 10:44 a.m.: “Really pathetic how @FoxNews is trying to be so politically correct by loading the airwaves with Democrats like Chris Van Hollen, the no name Senator from Maryland. He has been on forever playing up the Impeachment Hoax. Dems wouldn’t even give Fox their low ratings debates....”
“.....So, what the hell has happened to @FoxNews. Only I know! Chris Wallace and others should be on Fake News CNN or MSDNC. How’s Shep Smith doing? Watch, this will be the beginning of the end for Fox, just like the other two which are dying in the ratings. Social Media is great!”
CORONAVIRUS UPDATE -- “U.S., others prepare evacuations as virus spreads from China,” by AP’s Joe McDonald in Beijing: “The United States and several other nations prepared Tuesday to airlift citizens out of a Chinese city at the center of a virus outbreak that has killed more than 100 people. …
“The U.S. government chartered a plane to fly out diplomats from the U.S. Consulate in Wuhan, where the outbreak started, and other Americans. The plane will make a refueling stop in Alaska before flying on to Ontario, California, the U.S. Embassy said.” AP
-- “Azar stops short of declaring public health emergency for Wuhan coronavirus,” by Brianna Ehley
HUAWEI OR THE HIGHWAY -- “Boris Johnson allows Huawei to build parts of U.K. 5G network,” by Annabelle Dickson and Laurens Cerulus in London: “At a meeting of his national security council, the U.K. prime minister approved the use of equipment made by ‘high-risk vendors’ — widely understood to mean Chinese firm Huawei — but restricted access to ‘sensitive core’ parts of the network. … The White House, which was informed of the decision just after noon U.K. time, blasted the move. ‘The United States is disappointed by the UK’s decision,’ a senior administration official, who declined to be named, said in a statement. ‘There is no safe option for untrusted vendors to control any part of a 5G network.’” POLITICO Europe
BEYOND THE BELTWAY -- “Harvard’s Chemistry Chair Charged on Alleged Undisclosed Ties to China,” by WSJ’s Aruna Viswanatha and Kate O’Keeffe: “The chair of Harvard University’s chemistry department was charged in a criminal complaint unsealed Tuesday on allegations that he did not disclose Chinese government funding he received, in an escalation of U.S. efforts to counter what officials describe as Beijing’s aggressive recruitment at U.S. universities.
“The professor, Charles Lieber, allegedly lied to the Defense Department and the National Institutes of Health about his participation in China’s Thousand Talents Plan, the complaint said.” WSJ
TURMOIL INSIDE TEAM BUTTIGIEG … NYT’S REID EPSTEIN: “How Some People of Color Feel Inside the Buttigieg Campaign”: “In early December, more than 100 members of Pete Buttigieg’s presidential campaign staff gathered at the South Bend City Church a mile from headquarters for a mandatory half-day retreat about diversity and inclusion. … In interviews, current and former staff members of color said they believed that senior Buttigieg officials didn’t listen to their concerns and ideas about the campaign.
“One said there was a daily ‘emotional weight’ on people of color who felt they were employed in order to help the campaign meet its ambitious diversity targets. Some Hispanic employees felt disrespected when managers asked them to translate text, even if they didn’t speak Spanish. … A follow-up meeting nearly two weeks after the retreat — organized by staff members — became emotional, according to two people who attended. Some employees of color spoke about feeling disrespected by white colleagues.” NYT
-- WSJ’S TARINI PARTI and DUSTIN VOLZ: “Buttigieg Campaign Faces Personnel Issues as Iowa Caucuses Approach”: “Nadia Singer, the talent director for the campaign responsible for identifying potential new hires, parted ways with the former South Bend, Ind., mayor’s team earlier this month, some of the people said. … Two cybersecurity aides also left the campaign around the same time. The campaign described the staffers as midlevel. …
“As his operation grew in the late summer and fall, these people say, top officials made a concerted effort to diversify its staff. About 40% of Mr. Buttigieg’s staff and leadership ranks is now nonwhite … Still, some staffers felt the makeup of the campaign leadership didn’t reflect those making campaign decisions, particularly on how to reach out to minority voters.” WSJ
NYT MAGAZINE’S MARK LEIBOVICH: “Is a Good-Enough Candidacy Good Enough for Joe Biden?”: “As much as any campaign in recent memory, Biden’s has been defined by the alternative. The perennially left-for-dead former vice president is not a socialist, and he is not Trump. … He is still sitting here, still the front-runner, despite everything — despite himself. …
“An aura of fatalism runs through the Biden enterprise, starting with the candidate. He has already endured five decades of political travail and far worse from life. ‘I could drop dead tomorrow,’ Biden told an Iowa crowd in January, as he often does at his rallies — a curious line from someone trying to allay fears about his age. Either this will work out for him or it will not. But no matter whom the Democrats nominate, he says, they will come under merciless attack. He has already, and he is still here.” NYT Magazine
14 DAYS TO NEW HAMPSHIRE … “Why Biden scaled back in New Hampshire,” by Marc Caputo and Trent Spiner in Salem, N.H.: “Biden has been dark on New Hampshire television since the New Year. He has a smaller presence on the ground compared to his rivals, barely takes questions from voters, and he’s trailing in the polls here. Biden’s New Hampshire media buys, events and overall footprint indicates it’s the early state that’s getting relatively short shrift so he can more effectively contest the other three before Super Tuesday.
“The former veep’s campaign stresses he’s not writing off New Hampshire, that he has more major endorsements here than any other candidate and visited last Friday and Saturday. But in recent weeks, Biden has intensified his focus on the two states whose caucuses bookend the Granite State’s Feb. 11 primary — Iowa and Nevada — according to those familiar with the campaign’s strategy.” POLITICO
THE POLICY PRIMARY -- “Warren offers infectious-disease plan amid China outbreak,” by AP’s Will Weissert in Des Moines, Iowa: “The Massachusetts senator on Tuesday unveiled a plan that includes fully funding the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s pandemic prevention and response programs. The agency has faced stiff budget cuts under President Donald Trump, including to emergency funds and global health programs that were established following West Africa’s Ebola epidemic in 2014.” AP … The plan
AP INVESTIGATION -- “In Klobuchar’s past, questions about a teen jailed for life,” by Robin McDowell in Minneapolis: “An 11-year-old girl was killed by a stray bullet while doing homework at her dining room table in 2002. And Klobuchar’s office put Tyesha Edwards’ killer -- a black teen -- behind bars for life. But what if Myon Burrell is innocent? An Associated Press investigation into the 17-year-old case uncovered new evidence and myriad inconsistencies, raising questions about whether he was railroaded by police.” AP
THE NEW GOP -- “A Primary From the Right? Not in Trump’s G.O.P.,” by NYT’s Elaina Plott in Doylestown, Pa.: “Challenges to incumbents from the right are nothing new. But whereas conservative primary candidates once fashioned their campaigns as referendums on reckless federal spending or the elitist sensibilities of leadership, their pitches are much simpler now, carte blanche offerings of complete and total fealty to the president. And with Mr. Trump’s stranglehold on his party, their targets are much fewer, too. …
“In this new moment of G.O.P. unity, it is difficult to find a district where one can claim -- at least credibly -- that the incumbent Republican has been insufficiently supportive of the president. … Hovering over all of these races is the Senate impeachment trial, and how Republican incumbents respond stands to be a critical consideration in how they are viewed by voters — and by Mr. Trump. The president, who once seemed to believe that no slight was too small, no grievance too stale, now appears to regard lawmakers who covet his endorsement through the prism of impeachment alone.” NYT
FOR YOUR RADAR -- “IS tries to stage comeback amid rising U.S.-Iran tensions,” by AP’s Bassem Mroue in Beirut: “Islamic State group sleeper cells intensified ambushes in Iraq and Syria in the past few weeks, killing and wounding dozens of their opponents in both countries. Activists and residents say the attacks have intensified since the U.S. killed top Iranian general Qassem Soleimani in a Jan. 3 drone strike at Baghdad’s airport.
“It is not clear whether the uptick is related to the repercussions that followed from the strike, and it is possible some of the attacks had been planned before Soleimani’s killing. U.S. officials deny seeing any particular increase in IS activities. … Still, the militants clearly gained at least temporary breathing room as the killing of Soleimani, along with a senior Iraqi militia leader, brought Iran and the U.S. to the brink of all-out war and outraged Iraqis, who considered the strike a flagrant breach of sovereignty.” AP
MYSTERY CRASH -- “Official: Remains of 2 U.S. troops recovered from Afghan site,” by AP’s Lolita Baldor and Robert Burns: “They were the only two people aboard the Air Force E-11A electronic surveillance aircraft when it went down on Monday in Ghazni province, [an] official said ... The official said the American recovery team met no Taliban resistance in reaching the crash site and said there is no indication that the plane was downed by hostile action.” AP
THE KREMLIN’S LONG REACH -- “Russia Exerts Growing Influence in Africa, Worrying Many in the West,” by NYT’s Eric Schmitt and Thomas Gibbons-Neff: “Nearly 200 Russian mercenaries have deployed in recent months to Mozambique to combat a growing Islamic State offshoot there, even as Moscow is taking initial steps toward building a military port in the Horn of Africa that could become Russia’s first permanent base on the continent.
“Russia is steadily expanding its military influence across Africa by increasing arms sales, security agreements and training programs for unstable countries or autocratic leaders. … American officials, analyzing what they call great power competition, say they are alarmed by Russia’s growing influence, as well as China’s, as Washington struggles to exert its economic and security goals on the continent.” NYT
FIRST PERSON -- NICOLAS PELHAM for THE ECONOMIST’S 1843 MAGAZINE: “Trapped In Iran: In July 2019 Nicolas Pelham, The Economist’s Middle East correspondent, received a rare journalist’s visa to Iran. On the day he was due to fly home, he was detained.”
MEDIAWATCH -- Wesley Lowery is leaving The Washington Post, where he’s a national correspondent, to join CBS’ “60 in 6” program as a correspondent on its new Quibi platform.
-- NBC’S DYLAN BYERS: “Facebook has tapped former Fox News executive producer Jennifer Williams to head video strategy for Facebook News, the dedicated news tab that will launch wide later this year.” NBC
BONUS BIRTHDAY: Courtney Subramanian, White House reporter at USA Today (h/t David Sucherman)
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