September 6, 2023

Wednesday, September 6, 2023. Annette’s News Roundup.

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Joe is always busy.

New Biden ad to blanket swing states during NFL kickoff.

The Biden campaign plans to place a new TV ad targeted to battleground states during the NFL season opener Thursday, a source working with the campaign told Axios. The spot is part of a broader $25 million campaign that will focus on the president's economic record and last through December.

Why it matters: A new Wall Street Journal poll out Monday finds a majority of American voters disapprove of the president's handling of the economy and inflation.

What's happening: The new Biden campaign ad, titled "Got to Work," highlights President Biden's economic achievements amid inflation.

• "They said, 'millions would lose their jobs,' and the economy would collapse, but this president refused to let that happen," a narrator reads over a montage of videos and stills featuring news reports of the economy and the president at his desk.

• It continues by touting various economic achievements, such as "fixing supply chains, fighting corporate greed, passing laws to lower the cost of medicine and cutting utility bills and make us more energy independent."

• The ad ends by noting that inflation is down to 3% and that unemployment levels have reached "the lowest in decades."

Details: The ad will run during the NFL season opener Thursday across local broadcast networks in Michigan, the home state of the Detroit Lions, as well as in battleground states such as Georgia, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Nevada, the source said.

• The Lions are playing the Kansas City Chiefs Thursday for the NFL's season opener, which will be broadcast by NBC and streamed on Peacock.

• The campaign plans to spend at least seven figures promoting that specific 30-second spot. New ads touting the president's economic achievements will be rolled out in coming months.

• The broader campaign, which will also highlight the president's economic agenda, will air nationally across various cable new networks, as well as in key battleground states on digital and streaming platforms.

• The national cable ads are currently slated to run on all three cable news networks, but will only run during the day on Fox News.

• While the campaign doesn't have any national broadcast ads booked yet, it's eyeing highly-viewed news programs, such as CBS' "60 Minutes" and ABC's "World News Tonight With David Muir" as possible placements.

Be smart: Part of the $25 million spend will also be targeted specifically to Hispanic and African American voters on certain networks and programs, such as soccer matches and on the Oprah Winfrey Network, the source said.

By the numbers: To-date, Biden's campaign has already spent more than $4 million on re-election ads, including $2 million from the current $25 million economic campaign that will last through the beginning of December.

• Earlier this spring, the campaign launched a separate $2 million campaignfocused broadly on Biden's principles that lasted for a few weeks in April and May.

• In total, the campaign has spent and reserved nearly $30 million in ads for the year. While it has placed far more digital ads than its rivals, its television commitments are in line with those of Republican candidates, according to a new analysis out last week from AdImpact.
  While GOP front runner Donald Trump has yet to place many TV ads through his campaign, the affiliated MAGA Inc. political action committee (PAC) has spent and reserved $22.8 million worth of ads to date — mostly on TV. Sen. Tim Scott's PAC, Trust in Mission, has booked roughly $37 million in ads to date.

The big picture: The campaign is taking advantage of a unique window of opportunity to reach certain groups of general election voters that the Republican primary campaigns are mostly ignoring.

• "Republicans right now, as much as they like to say that they like running against Joe Biden ... they're all running against Trump, and Trump is running against his indictments," said Kyle Tharp, author of the FWIW newsletter on political campaign spending, in an interview with Axios.

• Between June and July of this year, anti-Trump ad spending by Republicans increased by over 420%, per AdImpact.

• Most of Trump's digital ads are currently targeted to supporters as he looks to raise money for his legal bills. Many of his TV ads last month focused on his latest indictment.

What to watch: Compared to 2020, the source working with the Biden campaign said Biden's 2024 effort will lean much more heavily on digital and streaming advertising, especially on YouTube.

• Unlike traditional TV ads, digital and streaming ads can be more narrowly targeted to specific demographics, making them more efficient. (Axios).

The Biden Ad. A Preview. 👇

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Around 70,000 child-care centers are expected to close.

An estimated 70,000 child-care centers are expected to close, leaving parents with even fewer — and less affordable — options.

Child-care cliff: As federal funding expires, a new crisis for parents, day cares.

In Indiana, Kelly Dawn Jones is inching closer to shutting down her in-home child-care center of 14 years, though she worries about leaving families in an impossible position.

At her home, Jones cares for five children — all of whom receive government assistance — while their parents work as pharmacy techs, delivery drivers and kitchen staff at local hospitals.

With her toddlers’ day care closing in weeks, Lexie Monigal is back in a familiar bind: desperately searching for child care while contemplating quitting her full-time job as a surgical nurse in Menasha, Wis.


It’s the second time this year her twins’ day care has suddenly announced plans to shutter — both for financial difficulties — leaving her without someone to watch her 2-year-olds and exacerbating a long-standing shortage of child care in this stretch of Wisconsin.
“I’ve called around, searched and searched and searched, and so far, nothing,” said Monigal, 27, who is eight months pregnant with her third child. “I’m getting to the point where I’d rather quit my job and really struggle financially than keep having to worry about finding care.”

Millions of parents — mothers, in particular — could soon be making similar calculations, as states run out of $24 billion in stimulus money Congress had set aside for child care during the pandemic. That record investment has helped keep the industry afloat by propping up workers’ salaries, boosting training programs and waiving family payment requirements.


Now, with the last of that money expiring this month, an estimated 70,000 child-care programs could close as a result of lost funding, causing 3.2 million children to lose care, according to a study by the Century Foundation, a liberal think tank. That translates to $10.6 billion in lost U.S. economic activity, researchers found, adding new strain to a nation already struggling with a profound lack of child care.


“It isn’t just individual children or parents that will be impacted, it’s the economy as a whole,” said Julie Kashen, a senior fellow at the Century Foundation. “When more than 3 million children lose care, that means all of those parents are going to have to figure out something else or reduce their work hours or leave their jobs altogether.”

Democrats in Congress are calling for $16 billion in emergency childcare funding this year, though such efforts appear unlikely at a time when Republicans are pushing to slash safety-net programs.

(Washington Post).

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A new Democratic Congressman is born.

Gabriel Amo, a former WH aide, wins the crowded Rhode Island 1st District Dem primary — all but assuring him victory in the November general election in the deep-blue seat. He is the first person of color to represent the state in Congress.

Amo beat out the Bernie Sanders-endorsed Aaron Regunberg and Lt. Gov. Sabina Matos.

He won the Primary. In November, he will be elected to Congress.

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Secretaries of the Navy, Air Force and Army tell Alabama Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville, he is putting our national security at risk.

Three service secretaries to Tuberville: Stop this dangerous hold on senior officers.

Carlos Del Toro is secretary of the Navy. Frank Kendall is secretary of the Air Force. Christine Wormuth is secretary of the Army.


As the civilian leaders of the Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, Space Force and Army, we are proud to work alongside exceptional military leaders who are skilled, motivated and empowered to protect our national security.


These officers and the millions of service members they lead are the foundation of America’s enduring military advantage. Yet this foundation is being actively eroded by the actions of a single U.S. senator, Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), who is blocking the confirmation of our most senior military officers.

The senator asserts that this blanket and unprecedented “hold,” which he has maintained for more than six months, is about opposition to Defense Department policies that ensure service members and their families have access to reproductive health no matter where they are stationed.


After the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, this policy is critical and necessary to meet our obligations to the force. It is also fully within the law, as confirmed by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel.


Senators have many legislative and oversight tools to show their opposition to a specific policy. They are free to introduce legislation, gather support for that legislation and pass it. But placing a blanket hold on all general and flag officer nominees, who as apolitical officials have traditionally been exempt from the hold process, is unfair to these military leaders and their families.
And it is putting our national security at risk.


Thus far, the hold has prevented the Defense Department from placing almost 300 of our most experienced and battle-tested leaders into critical posts around the world.


Three of our five military branches — the Army, Navy and Marine Corps — have no Senate-confirmed service chief in place. Instead, these jobs — and dozens of others across the force — are being performed by acting officials without the full range of legal authorities necessary to make the decisions that will sustain the United States’ military edge.


Across the services, many generals and admirals are being forced to perform two roles simultaneously. The strain of this double duty places a real and unfair burden on these officers, the organizations they lead and their families.
The blanket hold is also exacting a personal toll on those who least deserve it.


Each of us has seen the stress this hold is inflicting up and down the chain of command, whether in the halls of the Pentagon or at bases and outposts around the world.
We know officers who have incurred significant unforeseen expenses and are facing genuine financial stress because they have had to relocate their families or unexpectedly maintain two residences.

Military spouses who have worked to build careers of their own are unable to look for jobs because they don’t know when or if they will move. Children haven’t known where they will go to school, which is particularly hard given how frequently military children change schools already.


These military leaders are being forced to endure costly separations from their families — a painful experience they have come to know from nearly 20 years of deployments to places such as Iraq and Afghanistan.


All because of the actions of a single senator.
Any claim that holding up the promotions of top officers does not directly damage the military is wrong — plain and simple. (Washington Post).

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The Rule of Law is being applied.

New York Times - “The prison term for Enrique Tarrio was the most severe penalty handed down so far to any of the more than 1,100 people charged in connection with the Capitol attack.”

Proud Boys Enrique Tarrio gets record 22 years in prison for Jan. 6 Seditious Conspiracy.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio was sentenced Tuesday to 22 years in prison for orchestrating a failed plot to keep Donald Trump in power after the Republican lost the 2020 election, capping the case with the stiffest punishment that has been handed down yet for the U.S. Capitol attack.

Tarrio, 39, pleaded for leniency before the judge imposed the prison term topping the 18-year sentences given to Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and one-time Proud Boys leader Ethan Nordean for seditious conspiracy and other convictions stemming from the Jan. 6, 2021, riot.

Tarrio, who led the neofacist group as it became a force in mainstream Republican circles, lowered his head after the sentence was imposed, then squared his shoulders. He raised his hand and made a “V” gesture with his fingers as he was led out of the courtroom in orange jail garb.

His sentencing comes as the Justice Department prepares to put Trump on trial at the same courthouse in Washington on charges that the then-president illegally schemed to cling to power that he knew had been stripped away by voters.

The Justice Department is appealing the 18-year prison sentence of [Stewart] Rhodes, the Oath Keepers founder, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy in a separate case, as well as the sentences of other members of his antigovernment militia group that were lighter than what prosecutors had sought. Prosecutors had requested 25 years in prison for Rhodes.(Associated Press).

One more thing.

Here are some of Enrique Tarrio‘s GOP friends.👇

One more thing.

Andrew Weissman repeated this same message on Lawrence O’Donnell’s The Last Word last night. So he has the last word in the Roundup too.

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