| | | | |  | | By Garrett Ross | | Presented by |  | | | |  | THE CATCH-UP | | | THE HOT NEW SPOTTED SCENE — “The Trendy French Bistro in D.C. That’s the Go-To Haunt for Trump World,” by WSJ’s Maggie Severns: “Donald Trump’s allies are plotting his second term over organic wine and a new wave soundtrack. Butterworth’s, an all day cafe-and-restaurant in Capitol Hill that opened three months ago and serves food on vintage china, has become the hub of activity for the who’s-who of pro-Trump operatives and media figures who mingle among tourists and neighborhood diners.”
|  President Donald Trump delivered virtual remarks at the World Economic Forum today. | Markus Schreiber/AP Photo | TRUMP GOES GLOBAL — As we previewed in Playbook this morning, Trump delivered his America First agenda to dignitaries huddled in Davos for the World Economic Forum. — On trade, the president was clear, echoing his promise from the campaign trail: “My message to every business in the world is very simple: Come make your product in America and we will give you among the lowest taxes of any nation on Earth,” he said in virtual remarks. “But if you don’t make your product in America, which is your prerogative, then, very simply, you will have to pay a tariff.” — On the war in Ukraine, Trump foreign policy hand Ric Grennell “beamed into the conference to chide European leaders for their handling of the war” and “warn[ed] that efforts to fold the country into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization during peace talks with Russia would run into an American ‘buzz saw,’” WSJ’s Alexander Ward reports from Davos. And NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said that Trump is being absolutely fair to demand that European allies spend more on defense, our colleague Camille Gijs writes from on the ground. “He is right of course, that the problem is not the U.S. and the problem is Europe,” Rutte said. One to watch: Spain, one of NATO’s lowest spenders, will likely have trouble meeting Trump’s call for increased defense spending “largely because of the unpopular politics of militarism in the Southern European nation,” AP’s Suman Naishadham notes. — The view from the Kremlin: Russia isn’t responding with particular urgency to Trump’s threat to impose new sanctions on the country if it doesn’t agree to a peace deal with Ukraine, Veronika Melkozerova reports. “We do not see any particular new elements here,” Kremlin spox Dmitry Peskov told Russian media Thursday. “Russia is ready for an equal and careful dialogue with the United States, which we had during Trump’s first term,” Peskov said, according to Russian independent media outlet Meduza. “We are waiting for signals that have not yet been received.” — On another front, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said today that he “wants to invest $600 billion in the United States over the next four years,” AP’s Jon Gambrell reports. The comment followed a phone call with Trump — his first with a foreign leader since his inauguration — and after the president “earlier put a price tag on returning to the kingdom as his first foreign trip,” as he did in 2017. “The readout did not elaborate on where those investments and trade could be placed. The U.S. in recent years has increasingly pulled away from relying on Saudi oil exports, which once was the bedrock of their relationship for decades.” INSIDE THE BROVAL OFFICE — Wired’s Makena Kelly runs down the list of MAGA influencers who are important to know as Trump returns to power. There are, of course, the well-knowns, like Joe Rogan and Charlie Kirk, but there’s also a helpful window into the meme pages and some downstream names that will be key to understanding the various factions of the Trump 2.0 era that swept him into office. WHAT IS SHE THINKING — “We’ve Heard About Trump 2.0. What About Melania?” by WSJ’s Ashley Wong and Natalie Andrews: “As she returns to the East Wing she left in 2021, Trump has an opportunity to reshape a role that is both prominent and poorly defined.” Good Thursday afternoon. Thanks for reading Playbook PM. Drop me a line at gross@politico.com.
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Mike Pompeo, who ardently campaigned for Trump, has reportedly seen his security protection revoked. | Chris Szagola/AP | 1. ATTENTION TO DETAIL: Trump has moved to revoke security protection for Mike Pompeo, Brian Hook and John Bolton — three alums of his first administration, who all face ongoing threats from Iran resulting from actions they took under Trump’s presidency, NYT’s Maggie Haberman reports. The outgoing Biden administration “had privately briefed the new Trump administration about continued threats from Iran to former Trump officials” and Bolton said he was personally notified of threats. “As recently as the end of last week, two separate government representatives, two separate government agencies called,” Bolton told NYT. “They said our current assessment is that the threat level remains the same.” 2. THE NOMINATION DANCE: A new slate of Trump admin nominations is headed to the full Senate after various panels met this morning to advance the officials out of committee. All but one Democrat on the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee voted with every Republican to advance Doug Collins’ nomination to lead the VA, Ben Leonard writes. In the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, there were bipartisan votes for Doug Burgum to lead Interior (18-2) and Chris Wright to head up Energy (15-5), per Josh Siegel and Ben Lefebvre. The lone party-line vote today came out of the Senate Banking Committee, which advanced Scott Turner’s nomination as HUD secretary, 13-11, Katy O'Donnell writes. Hurry up and wait: This quartet of nominations can now join the long line of prospective Trump officials who are awaiting formal approval in the Senate, which is expected to work well through the weekend to stamp through John Ratcliffe, Pete Hegseth, Kristi Noem and maybe Scott Bessent. But the Hegseth vote could provide some dramatics: “If I were JD Vance, I’d stick around,” Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) told reporters today of Hegseth’s confirmation. Mark your calendar: Tulsi Gabbard is set to get a confirmation hearing with the Senate Intelligence Committee next Thursday, per Punchbowl’s Andrew Desiderio. That session with the embattled nominee to be director of national intelligence is sure to provide some theatrics. SPOTTED: David Perdue, Trump’s nominee for ambassador to China, was making the rounds in the Senate this week as he seeks confirmation into the post, which is sure to be a high-profile diplomatic perch during Trump’s presidency. Perdue has also tapped his former chief of staff Megan Whittemore, now with Penta Group, and former counsel John Eunice to help steer his confirmation process. 3. DOD ON ARRIVAL: Dan Caldwell, who has opposed more traditional Republican foreign policy positions, has been one of the leading influences in staffing the Pentagon for the incoming Trump administration, marking what could be a major ideological shift, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Kassel scoops. Recent hires by Caldwell, an Iraq War vet with ties to the Koch network, “have reflected Caldwell’s preference for a more restrained foreign policy approach that would have the U.S. scale back its long-standing focus on the Middle East and regional adversaries such as Iran, while expressing a largely skeptical attitude toward Israel, among other views espoused by a growing isolationist wing of the GOP.” Ain’t that a Mitch: Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is issuing a warning to the Trump administration to “steer clear of Pentagon advisors who make their Obama and Biden predecessors look tough by comparison,” Jewish Insider’s Emily Jacobs reports. In a direct rebuke of recent hires, McConnell said he “finds it ‘alarming’ that such individuals had survived the vetting process given each of their well-documented records on Middle East policy.” 4. IMMIGRATION FILES: On the other side of Trump’s pledge to carry out the most sprawling mass deportation effort is Mexico, which is now sorting out and girding to receive potentially thousands of deportations. NYT’s Emiliano Rodríguez Mega and Annie Correal get inside the preparations, which have been underway for months: “Nearly every branch of government — 34 federal agencies and 16 state governments — is expected to participate in one way or another: busing people to their hometowns, organizing logistics, providing medical attention, enrolling the recently returned in social welfare programs like pensions and paid apprenticeships, along with handing out cash cards worth about $100 each.” Related reads: “How Trump’s Deportation Plans Could Blow Up the Food System and Increase Migrant Labor,” by the Food & Environment Reporting Network’s Teresa Cotsirilos and Ted Genoways for POLITICO Mag … “Republican Sen. Katie Britt Reintroduces Bill To Finish Border Wall Construction,” by The Daily Caller’s Adam Pack
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Amazon fulfillment centers create on average 3,000 local jobs with comprehensive benefits and career growth opportunities so hourly employees get the support they need to succeed. Amazon’s local investment in communities like Newark, New Jersey help employees and whole communities thrive. Discover more. Sponsored by Amazon   | | | 5. THE KNOCK-ON EFFECT: “Trump’s D.E.I. Order Creates ‘Fear and Confusion’ Among Corporate Leaders,” by NYT’s Emma Goldberg: “The executive order instructs the federal government to look at private sector D.E.I. initiatives: Each federal agency, it says, will identify ‘up to nine potential civil compliance investigations’ that could include publicly traded corporations, nonprofits and large foundations, among others. … Nearly a dozen companies did not respond to requests for comment on the future of their D.E.I. programming, and some declined to comment citing fear of attracting attention to their work.” 6. CHARTING THE COURSE: “Where Economists Think the Trump Economy Is Headed,” by WSJ’s Paul Kiernan, Peter Santilli and Anthony DeBarros: “Since the Journal’s previous quarterly survey, inflation has proved stickier than expected. The consumer-price index rose 2.9% in December from a year earlier, 0.4 percentage point higher than economists had anticipated in October. Unfortunately for bargain-hunters, economists expect that momentum to continue through the new year. They raised their average forecast for CPI inflation over the next 12 months to 2.7% from 2.3%. Only a few of the economists are projecting lower inflation than they did in October.” 7. THE DISTRICT SLEEPS ALONE: D.C. was among the more than a dozen states and cities to sue the Trump administration over the executive order striking down birthright citizenship this week. But you probably haven’t heard about it, because officials from the AG to the mayor have resisted blasting out news releases or public comments — a manifestation of city leaders’ tricky position with Trump, WaPo’s Jenny Gathright and Meagan Flynn write. “D.C., unlike other cities, has limited home rule and is subject to vast amounts of federal control. The city’s vulnerability has created a kind of inverse relationship between Trump and its top officials: As Trump has grown more vocal in his threats, D.C. officials have grown more muted, seeking to avoid inflaming a conflict.” 8. ON THE MAP: Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) today intends to introduce a resolution “calling on the Government of Panama” to sever any ties with China and Chinese businesses as Trump continues his crusade to reclaim control of the Panama Canal, WaPo’s Abigail Hauslohner and Karen DeYoung write. The nonbinding resolution — which is being co-signed by Sens. Tom Cotton, Roger Marshall and Katie Britt — “won’t compel any action, but Schmitt said he hopes it sends a signal to Panama, and to Trump, that the Republican-controlled Congress is ready to act on his foreign policy ambitions.” Meanwhile: Trump this week moved to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, and the Alaskan mountain previously known as Denali to Mt. McKinley. AP’s Laurie Kellman and Hillel Italie dig into the logistics, noting that Google and Apple haven’t changed either name yet. As for National Geographic, one of the leading U.S. mapmakers, a spox stressed an intention to be “apolitical” and make “independent decisions.” The AP, though, “will refer to the Gulf of Mexico by its original name while acknowledging the name Gulf of America.” But it will use the name Mount McKinley since the area lies solely in the U.S. 9. THIS IS CNN: NYT’s Benjamin Mullin has a download on the overhaul taking place at CNN, where hundreds of employees are facing layoffs as the company is angling “away from its reliance on traditional television and trying to cash in on digital audiences wherever they are, at the same time that President Trump has sent the news cycle into hyperdrive.” The elimination of jobs “focused on CNN’s traditional TV operations” is in tandem with an effort to “add about the same number for new digital roles like data scientists and product engineers.” CEO Mark Thompson also rolled out a few changes to CNN’s TV lineup, “replacing Jim Acosta’s 10 a.m. show with ‘The Situation Room With Wolf Blitzer and Pamela Brown,’ and introducing a new morning show anchored by Audie Cornish. The network is in talks with Mr. Acosta about another role.”
| | | | | TALK OF THE TOWN | | FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — Kyle Yadon-Smith is joining Flexpoint Media as VP. He previously was digital advertising director at the NRSC and is a Google Elections Team alum. MEDIA MOVE — Emily Kopp is now an investigative reporter at the Daily Caller News Foundation. She previously was at U.S. Right To Know, CQ Roll Call and Kaiser Health News. TRANSITIONS — Monica Oberkofler Gorman is now managing director at Crowell Global Advisors. She most recently was special assistant to the president for manufacturing and industrial policy at the Biden White House and is a Commerce Department alum. … Celeste Wallander is joining WestExec Advisors as a senior adviser. She previously was assistant secretary of Defense for international security affairs. … … Nelson Falkenburg and Marcella Mulholland are joining Clean Tomorrow. Falkenburg will be siting policy manager and previously was a senior associate at the Clean Energy Infrastructure team at Clean Air Task Force. Mulholland will be director of advocacy and public affairs and previously was deputy director of partnerships at the Carbon Removal Alliance. ENGAGED — Caroline Franklin, who does governmental and political affairs at the Business Council of Alabama and a Jodey Arrington, Clay Scofield and Martha Roby alum, and Brennan Johnson, who does legislative affairs for Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey, recently got engaged. The couple met in Washington while they were both working for former Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.). Pic BONUS BIRTHDAY: Eric Koch Did someone forward this email to you? Sign up here. Send Playbookers tips to playbook@politico.com or text us at 202-556-3307. Playbook couldn’t happen without our deputy editor Zack Stanton and Playbook Daily Briefing producer Callan Tansill-Suddath. | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook family Playbook | Playbook PM | California Playbook | Florida Playbook | Illinois Playbook | Massachusetts Playbook | New Jersey Playbook | New York Playbook | Ottawa Playbook | Brussels Playbook | London Playbook View all our politics and policy newsletters | | Follow us | | | | |
