| | | | | |  | | By Jake Sherman, Anna Palmer, Garrett Ross and Eli Okun | Presented by |  | | A SEA CHANGE … CAP LOUNGE -- the Pennsylvania Avenue pub just two blocks from the Capitol that has served the Hill masses for two decades -- announced this morning they will close. There is no bar as integrated with the political experience on Capitol Hill as Capitol Lounge. Twenty-somethings have drained beers there for 26 years. It famously had a no-politics mantra -- Republicans and Democrats went there in equal numbers and with equal comfort. The announcement -- THEIR TWITTER BIO: "No Politics. No Miller Lite." -- OK, who wants to buy it? THE PRESIDENT will hold a news conference at 3 p.m. BREAKING … KYLE CHENEY and NATASHA BERTRAND: "Treasury designates anti-Biden Ukrainian lawmaker for sanctions for election interference": "The Treasury Department has designated Andriy Derkach, a pro-Russian Ukrainian promoting discredited allegations against Joe Biden, for sanctions related to foreign interference in the U.S. election. "Derkach, who was previously identified as a malign actor by the intelligence community, met with President Donald Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani in Ukraine in December, as Giuliani mounted an effort to obtain derogatory information on Biden's relationships in Ukraine. On Thursday, the administration went even further in tying Derkach to the Kremlin. 'Derkach, a Member of the Ukrainian Parliament, has been an active Russian agent for over a decade' … "Treasury's announcement underscores growing evidence that Russia is mounting a similar campaign to its efforts in 2016 in an attempt to boost Trump's candidacy and damage his rival. … Democrats have raised alarms about evidence that Derkach has disseminated packets of anti-Biden information to Republican lawmakers investigating Biden's role in Ukraine." DECODING TODAY: THE SENATE failed to advance the Republicans "skinny" Covid relief bill, but Senate Majority Leader MITCH MCCONNELL notched a modest victory, corralling the majority of GOP lawmakers to vote for the bill. CONGRESS IS NO CLOSER to passing another Covid relief bill. In fact, the two sides are as far apart as they've ever been. -- THE TWO SIDES are deep in finger-pointing territory. Speaker NANCY PELOSI said today at her weekly news conference: "Let's not have a skinny bill when we have a massive problem." MCCONNELL has suggested Democrats are in favor of everything in the bill, but are holding out for a larger package. PUT SUCCINCTLY: They are nowhere. NEXT UP: GOVERNMENT FUNDING, which comes due in 10 DAYS. PELOSI said a clean continuing resolution -- which she and Treasury Secretary STEVEN MNUCHIN are arguing for -- will include no Covid relief. Hence the "clean" moniker. -- THE NEXT QUESTION: How long will the stopgap measure be? THE UNEMPLOYMENT PICTURE -- "U.S. Unemployment Claims Held Steady Last Week," by WSJ's Sarah Chaney: "U.S. unemployment claims held steady at 884,000 last week, the Labor Department reported Thursday, a sign the labor-market recovery is losing steam six months after the coronavirus pandemic struck the U.S. … "The total of about 29.6 million people, which isn't seasonally adjusted and lags two weeks behind new state claims figures, includes temporary federal pandemic-related programs for self-employed and gig workers in addition to those receiving regular state benefits." WSJ -- REALITY CHECK: "Do Jobless Benefits Deter Workers? Some Employers Say Yes. Studies Don't," by NYT's Patricia Cohen: "There has been striking agreement among conservative and liberal economists who have studied the issue that the $600 supplement has deterred few workers from accepting a job. … For most people collecting unemployment benefits, there are simply no jobs. Roughly half of the 22 million jobs that evaporated with the coronavirus outbreak have not yet returned." Good Thursday afternoon. | | A message from Morgan Stanley: COVID-19's Butterfly Effect - The idiosyncratic, nonlinear nature of systemic risk from events like a pandemic makes it challenging to predict the effects. We're closely monitoring the near- and longer-term consequences on sustainable investing, especially with respect to financial valuations and dialogue between companies and their backers. Learn more. | | | TV NEWS … VARIETY: "MSNBC Expands Weekend Programming; Kasie Hunt Revives 'Way Too Early' on Weekdays": "The NBCUniversal-owned cable-news outlet will on September 19 launch two new programs for weekend evenings, and add another anchor to its weekend afternoon coverage. Alicia Menendez, who joined the network in late 2019, will debut 'American Voices' on Saturdays and Sundays between 6 p.m. and 8 p.m. eastern, while Joshua Johnson … who joined MSNBC earlier this year, will premiere 'The Week' between 8 p.m. and 10 p.m. on weekend evenings. "Kasie Hunt, whose 'Kasie DC' offered viewers a Washington perspective on Sunday evenings, will re-launch 'Way Too Early,' an MSNBC early-morning offering for weekdays that was originally started under Willie Geist in 2009." AP/FRONTLINE: "Scarcity of key material squeezes medical mask manufacturing," by Martha Mendoza, Juliet Linderman, Thomas Peipert and Irena Hwang in Fresno, Calif.: "Early in the pandemic the White House failed to heed stark warnings — specifically about N95s — from high-level administration officials. The Associated Press has found the administration took months to sign contracts with companies that make the crucial component inside these masks: meltblown textile. "Meltblowing is the manufacturing process that turns plastic into the dense mesh that makes N95 masks effective at blocking vanishingly small particles, including viruses. Even today, manufacturers say the Trump administration hasn't made the long-term investments they need in order to ramp up to full capacity. Meanwhile, the administration allowed meltblown exports to slip out of the country as the pandemic, and the demand for masks, soared." VOTING UPDATE -- "Most Americans want to vote before Election Day, a significant shift from previous years, poll finds," by WaPo's Amy Gardner, Emily Guskin and Scott Clement: "About six in 10 registered voters nationwide say they want to cast their ballots before Election Day, a significant departure from previous years that will force the candidates to reshape how they campaign in the election season's final weeks, according to a Washington Post-University of Maryland poll conducted by Ipsos. … "Even as more voters want to mail their ballots than in 2016, just over 3 in 10 say they are 'very confident' that their vote will be counted accurately if they vote by mail, compared with nearly 7 in 10 who say the same about voting in person on Election Day. … The survey also reveals a sharp racial disparity in perceptions of election integrity, with 71 percent of Black Americans saying it is easier for White citizens to vote than Black citizens compared to 34 percent of Whites who believe that to be the case." WaPo … The poll -- WAPO: "Voting is a challenge for the homeless. Advocates are trying to make it easier," by Justin Wm. Moyer: "While advocates are registering people to vote in a polarizing election held during a pandemic, they are also registering a population traumatized by, in some cases, years on the streets. "It's these barriers to voting that Pathways to Housing DC, which has registered more than 60 voters since launching the voter drive last month, is trying to overcome. Some are battling mental illness and addiction. Others are illiterate — or simply might not have a pair of reading glasses they need to fill out a form." | | | | KEEP UP WITH THE WORLD FROM HOME: Our Global Translations newsletter, presented by Bank of America, layers international news, trends, and decisions that you may have missed with contextual analysis from the world's sharpest minds. For news, insight, and a unique perspective that you cannot find anywhere else, SUBSCRIBE TODAY. | | | | | VIDEO INVESTIGATION … WAPO: "Swept up in the federal response to Portland protests: 'I didn't know if I was going to be seen again,'" by Shawn Boburg, Meg Kelly and Joyce Sohyun Lee in Portland, Ore.: "The Washington Post conducted an in-depth examination of four instances when unsuspecting people were scooped up from the city's streets by federal agents in the middle of the night, based on information that turned out to be inaccurate or insufficient to charge them with a crime. "The cases bring to light the tactics employed by border agents and immigration officers deployed to Portland for an operation President Trump has touted as a success. … From detention to release, the four people whose cases were examined by The Post described experiences they found harrowing and unnerving. Three are speaking for the first time." WaPo LATEST IN BEIRUT -- "Huge fire breaks out at Beirut port a month after explosion," by AP's Zeina Karam and Hassan Ammar: "A huge fire broke out Thursday at the Port of Beirut, the site of last month's catastrophic explosion that killed nearly 200 people and devastated parts of the capital. The new fire nearly 40 days after the blast triggered widespread panic among traumatized residents of the area. "It wasn't immediately clear what caused the fire at the facility, which was decimated by the Aug. 4 explosion when nearly 3,000 tons of ammonium nitrate detonated. … The Lebanese army said the fire started at a warehouse where oil and tires are placed in the duty free zone, adding that efforts to battle the fire were ongoing." AP AS THE WEST BURNS -- "These Changes Are Needed Amid Worsening Wildfires, Experts Say," by NYT's Brad Plumer and John Schwartz: "Millions of Americans are moving into wildfire-prone areas outside of cities, and communities often resist restrictions on development. A century of federal policy to aggressively extinguish all wildfires rather than letting some burn at low levels, an approach now seen as misguided, has left forests with plenty of fuel for especially destructive blazes. This is all in an era when global warming is creating a hotter, drier environment, loading the dice for more extensive fires. "Some cities and states have taken important steps, such as imposing tougher regulations on homes built in fire-prone areas. And there has been movement toward using prescribed fires to scour away excess vegetation that can fuel runaway blazes in forests and grasslands. But these changes are still happening too slowly, experts say, and have been overtaken by the rapid increase in wildfires." NYT | | | | BEIJING IS WATCHING, ARE YOU? China has long been a nation of involved and cynical election-watchers, at least when it comes to American presidential campaigns. As the United States races toward Election Day, how do Chinese citizens believe each candidate will affect relations between the two nations? Join the conversation and gain expert insight from informed and influential voices in government, business, law, and tech. China Watcher is as much of a platform as it is a newsletter. Subscribe today. | | | | | TICK TOCK, TIKTOK … BLOOMBERG: "Trump Team Eyes Giving TikTok's Owners More Time to Line Up Sale," by Saleha Mohsin: "The Trump administration is considering whether to give more time to TikTok's Chinese owners to arrange a sale of the popular video-sharing app's U.S. operations to an American buyer, according to people familiar with the matter. … "TikTok's owner ByteDance Ltd. is likely to miss President Donald Trump's publicly stated deadline of Sept. 15 for the company to strike a deal to divest its U.S. operations after new Chinese regulations complicated negotiations with bidders Microsoft Corp. and Oracle Corp., Bloomberg News reported Thursday." Bloomberg CLICKER -- "Faces of Power: 80% Are White, Even as U.S. Becomes More Diverse," by NYT's Denise Lu, Jon Huang, Ashwin Seshagiri, Haeyoun Park and Troy Griggs YIKES … WAPO: "Humans are decimating wildlife, and the pandemic is a sign, report says," by Karin Brulliard: "Average populations of nearly 4,400 mammals, amphibians, birds, fish and reptiles dropped by 68 percent since 1970, according to the World Wildlife Fund report, which is based on vertebrate monitoring projects around the world. The losses have been driven primarily by habitat loss, it says, along with pollution, invasive species, overhunting and overfishing and, increasingly, climate change. … "World Wildlife Fund officials emphasized one catastrophic consequence of the declines is now before our eyes. The coronavirus pandemic, caused by the sort of 'spillover' of a zoonotic virus that is becoming more common as humans expand their footprint, should be viewed as 'an SOS signal for the human enterprise,' the report says." WaPo VALLEY TALK -- "Facebook may have to stop moving EU user data to U.S.," by AP's Kelvin Chan in London: "Facebook may be forced to stop sending data about its European users to the U.S., in the first major fallout from a recent court ruling that found some trans-Atlantic data transfers don't protect users from American government snooping. ... "The social network said Wednesday that Ireland's Data Protection Commission has started an inquiry into how Facebook shifts data from the European Union to the United States. … The result could be that the U.S. tech giant, which has data centers around the world, is forced to undertake a costly and complex revamp of its operations to ensure that European user data is kept out of the U.S." AP NO SECOND ACTS IN AMERICAN LIVES -- ONLY PODCASTS … "Megyn Kelly Launches Into Podcasting With New Venture," by WSJ's Anne Steele: "The former TV news commentator and talk-show host's new Devil May Care Media is slated to release the first episode of 'The Megyn Kelly Show' at the end of the month. Ms. Kelly, 49 years old, whose most recent morning show with NBC News ended almost two years ago, is funding the venture herself." AFTERNOON READ -- "A Comprehensive History of 'Loose Change' — and the Seeds It Planted in Our Politics," by Esquire's John McDermott: "Loose Change was made using nothing but archival footage and computer-generated graphics and distributed for free on the Internet. And the film's DIY style is arguably its greatest legacy. For years, techno-utopians pontificated about how the Internet would democratize the production and dissemination of information, freeing us from the tyranny of media gatekeepers and creating a true marketplace of ideas. Loose Change realized that promise. "Now, 15 years after it was first released, Loose Change also has a more troubling legacy, one that the filmmakers insist they never intended. It was a precursor to the conspiracy boom on the Internet and the mainstreaming of conspiracists — most notably InfoWars founder Alex Jones, who was executive producer on the third version of film—and it's connected to a number of prominent extremist movements on both the left and the right, including Occupy, the Tea Party, and Birtherism." Esquire | | | |   | | | | | | | 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 | Brussels Playbook | London Playbook View all our politics and policy newsletters | | Follow us | | | | |
