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President Donald Trump delivers remarks during a breakfast with Republican senators in the State Dining Room at the White House in Washington on Nov. 5, 2025. | Yuri Gripas/Abaca | ABOUT LAST NIGHT: Democrats’ dominant performances in last night’s elections have left Republicans scrambling to make sense of what the resounding results mean for their party — with a few different takeaways permeating from GOP leaders in Washington. THE VIEW FROM 1600 PENN: “Last night, it was, you know, not expected to be a victory,” President Donald Trump said at the White House this morning as he convened a private breakfast meeting with Republican senators. “But I don't think it was good for Republicans. I’m not sure it was good for anybody. But we had an interesting evening and we learned a lot,” Trump told reporters. The president said the historic government shutdown played a “big role” in the GOP losses. But the biggest factor, according to James Blair, the political director for Trump's 2024 presidential campaign and the RNC, was pocketbook issues. Blair, who now serves as White House deputy chief of staff, told Playbook’s Dasha Burns in an exclusive interview for “The Conversation” that Mikie Sherrill in New Jersey “overwhelmingly” focused on cost of living in her campaign messaging, and Republican candidate Jack Ciattarelli didn’t do enough to combat that. And in Virginia, Blair said Winsome Earle-Sears talked too much about transgender issues. “It’s not even in the top five issues, according to voters,” he said. As for Zohran Mamdani in New York, Blair commended his messaging discipline. “Why did Zohran Mamdani do so well last night? He relentlessly focused on affordability. People talk about communists, they can say all these things, but the fact is he was talking about the cost of living.” In light of all that, Blair told Dasha that he expects Trump will have a laser focus in next year’s midterms. “I think you’ll see the president talk a lot about cost of living as we turn the year and into the new year,” Blair said in the interview. “The president is very keyed into what’s going on, and he recognizes, like anybody, that it takes time to do an economic turnaround, but all the fundamentals are there, and I think you’ll see him be very, very focused on prices and cost of living.” (The full episode will be released on Friday.) Watch the full clip Zooming out: “The Night Democrats Finally Stopped Losing,” by POLITICO’s Jonathan Martin: “If the message was in the margins, there was no mystery in the why. Voters are, again, unhappy with the political status quo and, again, fault a White House they see as unfocused on their priorities. And Trump isn’t just failing to address the cost of living — many voters see him as abusing his power.” THE VIEW FROM THE HILL: Republican leaders at the Capitol this morning sought to downplay the election results and wave them off as outcomes that were already baked in. Though Senate Majority Leader John Thune acknowledged that “we lost by more than we should have,” he noted that they were “pretty much as expected.” Meanwhile, Speaker Mike Johnson searched for more distance. “I don't think the loss last night was any reflection about Republicans at all,” Johnson said. “There’s no surprises,” Johnson said at the news conference this morning. “What happened last night was blue states and blue cities voted blue. We all saw that coming. And no one should read too much into last night’s election results. Off-year elections are not indicative of what’s to come. That’s what history teaches us.” House Majority Leader Steve Scalise said last year’s election was a better indication of the current electorate than last night’s Democratic sweep. “Is it any surprise that last night blue states voted blue?” he said. “We’re talking Virginia, New Jersey, New York. By the way, none of those were swing states. You had seven swing states in the election a year ago today.” More from POLITICO’s Gregory Svirnovskiy THE VIEW FROM MAGA WORLD: But that line of thinking isn’t sitting too well on the right. In an exclusive interview with POLITICO’s Megan Messerly, Trump’s former White House strategist Steve Bannon issued a stark warning to his fellow Republicans that Mamdani’s election as NYC’s first democratic socialist mayor should “be a wake up call” to the party. Though many in the GOP have celebrated Mamdani’s win as a way for them to vilify Democratic candidates ahead of the midterms, Bannon said Republicans should be concerned about the growing anti-establishment force on the left. Bannon continued hammering home his point on his “War Room” show today, specifically calling out the blue-state “excuse” that Republicans are pointing to, which he said is “not going to hack it.” “Modern politics now is about engaging low-propensity voters, and they clearly turned them out [on Tuesday], and this is kind of the Trump model,” Bannon told Megan. “This is very serious.” Good Wednesday afternoon. Thanks for reading Playbook PM. Drop me a line at birvine@politico.com.
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Senate Majority Leader John Thune reiterated after this morning's breakfast that he has done the math in his chamber and a vote to ax the filibuster is “not happening.” | J. Scott Applewhite/AP | 1. BUSTING THE FILIBUSTER: With the government still stuck in the longest shutdown in history, Trump’s breakfast meeting with Republican senators was called to discuss a path forward — plus his latest crusade to upend the gears of government. Trump reiterated his call to “terminate the filibuster,” though he admitted the party may not agree. “It's possible you're not going to do that and I’m going to go by your wishes,” Trump said. “I think it’s a tremendous mistake. It would be a tragic mistake, actually.” After reporters left the room, Trump reportedly told lawmakers that Republicans “are getting killed” as the shutdown drags on, per Punchbowl’s Andrew Desiderio, and that they would become a “dead party” if they don’t nix the filibuster. How it’s playing: Despite the renewed push and dire message he delivered this morning, Trump’s call is landing with a thud, per POLITICO’s Jordain Carney and Jennifer Scholtes. Here’s a taste of the distaste: “I’ve said before there are not the votes there,” Thune said. “I’d never vote to nuke the filibuster,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said. Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) called it a “important aspect of how the Senate operates.” 2. SCOTUS WATCH: The Supreme Court this morning opened arguments in one of the most consequential tests of Trump’s second term to determine the legality of Trump’s use of emergency powers to impose his sweeping global tariff regime. So far, justices on both ends of the high court’s ideological spectrum have signaled they are skeptical of the administration’s legal arguments surrounding Trump’s aggressive use of executive power, POLITICO’s Doug Palmer and colleagues report. Oral arguments started at 10 a.m. and went well into two-and-a-half hours of discussion over the highly anticipated case. In the first half of the discussions, Chief Justice John Roberts quizzed Trump’s team over the administration’s claim that the tariffs aren’t taxes and the balance of powers. Tariffs are a form of taxation and “that has always been the core power of Congress,” Roberts said. “So, to have the president’s foreign affairs power trump that basic power for Congress seems to me to kind of neutralize between the two powers, the executive power and the legislative power.” In another signal of the court’s skepticism, Justices Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett later pushed back on Trump’s unilateral assertion of power without congressional approval: “So Congress as a practical matter can’t get this power back once it’s handed it over,” Gorsuch said. “It’s a one way transfer to the gradual but continual accretion of power in the executive branch and away from the people’s elected representatives.” A thorny question: In the latter half of the discussions, Barrett posed an interesting question to the legal team representing the businesses challenging Trump’s authority: “If you win, tell me how the reimbursement process would work … Would it be a complete mess?” 3. FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — Candidate callout: New Politics is out with a memo today arguing that Mikie Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger — candidates with public-service backgrounds — are the model for Democrats who want to win in 2026 and beyond. Voters “are ready for authentic leaders who have already demonstrated, through service – in the military, AmeriCorps, the Peace Corps, and other forms of public service – that they will always put mission before self and work with others to get things done,” the memo says, pointing to the campaigns of James Talarico, David Crowley, Jo Mendoza, Rebecca Bennett, Cait Conley and Maura Sullivan as “Races to Watch.” Read the full memo Anybody have a map? Sabato’s Crystal Ball made a slew of House race rating changes following last night’s Democratic sweep — particularly in response to the passage of California’s redistricting measure and the redistricting efforts that have made their way through state legislatures. The topline takeaway: Factoring in all of the recent redistricting moves, Sabato’s Crystal Ball is currently projecting 209 safe/likely/leans Democratic seats, 209 safe/likely/leans Republican seats and 17 toss-ups. Deep in the heart: Last night’s turnout among Latino communities could be a signal for how voters will show up in newly redistricted areas. And as Cook Political Report’s Amy Walters points out, Republicans “should not feel great” about their hopes to flip their newly redrawn seats in South Texas based on Trump’s 2024 performance among Latino voters. … Meanwhile, the special election to replace late Rep. Sylvester Turner (D-Texas) in the Houston area is heading to a runoff between attorney Christian Menefee and former Houston City Councilmember Amanda Edwards, guaranteeing the historically Democratic seat will stay blue, per The Houston Chronicle. 4. SHUTDOWN SHOWDOWN: Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer took to the Senate floor today to laud last night's election results, arguing it’s proof that the GOP needs to come to the table to negotiate a solution to the shutdown: “The Republicans' high-cost house is on fire, and they’ve only got themselves to blame,” Schumer said. Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries also sent a letter to Trump today calling for a meeting with their GOP counterparts to end the shutdown and address their ongoing concerns around health subsidies, POLITICO’s Jordain Carney reports. “Democrats stand ready to meet with you face to face, anytime and anyplace,” they wrote.
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➡️ Subscribe to West Wing Playbook | | | | | 5. ON THE JOBS: Payroll-processing giant ADP reported today that the U.S. added an estimated 42,000 private-sector jobs last month — indicating the job market may be leveling out following months of sharp decline. The October numbers significantly up from a reported 29,000 net loss in September and nearly double what some economists expected to see out of the revised numbers, WSJ’s Harriet Torry reports. Though the private report is not as comprehensive as the government’s monthly jobs numbers, the stronger-than-expected data “offers some reassurance that the labor market remains stable, despite signs of weakening in certain sectors.” 6. GOING NUCLEAR: Russian President Vladimir Putin today moved toward resuming nuclear testing, in a “direct response to President Donald Trump's surprise instruction for the United States to begin testing for the first time in more than 30 years,” NBC’s Alexander Smith reports. Putin warned in a televised meeting that the Kremlin would “be required to take appropriate retaliatory measures” if the U.S. conducted nuclear tests. The Russian leader told his foreign and defense ministries “to do everything possible to gather additional information on this matter, analyze it in the Security Council, and submit coordinated proposals on the possible commencement of preparations for nuclear weapons testing.” 7. INVESTIGATION STATION: “New warning signs for DOJ’s Trump-ordered case against Comey,” by POLITICO’s Kyle Cheney: “A federal magistrate judge scolded Justice Department prosecutors on Wednesday for an ‘indict first, investigate second’ posture in the criminal case against former FBI Director James Comey, raising new questions about a ‘highly unusual’ case that was ordered up at President Donald Trump’s command. Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick raised his concerns at a hearing to resolve questions about how prosecutors were handling evidence against Comey, who is facing a two-count indictment for allegedly lying to Congress in 2020 about the FBI’s investigation into Trump’s contacts with Russia.” | | | | POLITICO’s Global Security briefing connects the policies, deals, and industrial shifts shaping the global defense landscape. From Washington to Brussels, we follow who’s funding what, what’s being built, and how power moves across continents. Subscribe now for the free preview. | | | | | | | TALK OF THE TOWN | | OUT AND ABOUT — Crypto met Critical Materials at a forum hosted by Steve Clemons of Widehall and Petr Pudil of Draslovka last night. The reception and pop-up discussion focused on the race for on-shoring critical materials and the rise of digital assets and stablecoins via the Genius Act. Clemons had fireside chats with Pudil, Sens.Tim Sheehy (R-Mont.) and James Risch (R-Idaho) and Coinbase’ Kara Calvert. SPOTTED: David Malpass, Devon Lammert, Elizabeth O’Bagy, Amanda Russo, Boris Chumak, J.P. Freire, Richard Tesoriero, Eric Pahon, Rob Wagener, Alena Kudzko, Kaycee Ikeonu, Christopher Colford, Kristopher Klaich, Tiffany Prest, Freddy Barnes, Eric Breckenfeld, Mark Vlasic and Robb Harleston. Did someone forward this email to you? Sign up here. Send Playbookers tips to playbook@politico.com or text us on Signal here. Playbook couldn’t happen without our deputy editor Garrett Ross and Playbook Podcast producer Callan Tansill-Suddath.
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