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"The filibuster is the last refuge of the RINO,” Paul Dans, told Playbook's Adam Wren. | J. Scott Applewhite/AP | When President Donald Trump inevitably flicks on the television at Mar-a-Lago this weekend, Rep. Wesley Hunt is hoping the president catches a nearly 60-second message his campaign spent just $2,500 on, buying up every remaining spot of airtime on Fox News cable. “Business as usual in D.C. is over,” the Texas Republican, who is running in a three-way Senate primary against Sen. John Cornyn and Texas AG Ken Paxton, says into the camera. “We saw that with the election of President Trump.” The ad, shared first with Playbook, displays Trump’s Truth Social post calling for Republicans to “play their ‘TRUMP CARD,’ and go for what is called the Nuclear Option” before cutting to a string of clips from Cornyn calling ending the filibuster “an example of the arrogance of power,” among other arguments against the so-called nuclear option. Hunt’s gambit — aimed at ingratiating himself with Trump by finding common cause with the president’s repeated calls in recent days for nuking the filibuster — is a sign of what has become the latest MAGA litmus test in contested GOP Senate primaries around the map. A spokesperson for Cornyn in a statement to Playbook shared his remarks from earlier in the week, in which he appeared to tack to the right on the filibuster, saying: “Having a willful minority being able to shut down the government anytime they want to — obviously, we can’t tolerate that. So I think that calls for some changes and I think appropriations, including CRs, may be a good candidate for that.” “We should not unilaterally disarm,” Paxton told Playbook. “We should follow President Trump’s lead, end the filibuster, open the government without any concessions, and deliver real wins for the American people.” The matter is riling and reshaping the contours of primary fields in states such as Texas, Kentucky, South Carolina and Georgia, as a crop of Senate hopefuls look to tap into MAGA hot spots and put daylight between themselves and their competitors. In South Carolina “The filibuster is the last refuge of the RINO,” Paul Dans, the Project 2025 architect who is primarying Sen. Lindsey Graham in the Palmetto State, told Playbook. “It allows these duplicitous senators to mask their true intentions from the voting public. And I think the only casualty of nuking it would be the end of the three-day work week that the senators would actually have to get to work for the American people and deliberate on issues and be transparent with the American people.” A campaign spokesperson for Graham did not respond to a request for comment. In Kentucky There is a three-way GOP race in the Bluegrass State to succeed Sen. Mitch McConnell. Nate Morris, the MAGA-aligned businessman, quickly echoed Trump’s post-election call for nuking the filibuster on Wednesday, posting to X that he would “stand with Trump when it matters most.” Spokespeople for Rep. Andy Barr and former Kentucky AG Daniel Cameron did not respond to requests for comment. In Georgia Roughly 18 minutes after Morris’ post this week, Rep. Buddy Carter, who is running in a crowded Senate primary, too, added his voice to the kill-the-filibuster chorus. Spokespeople for his opponents, Derek Dooley, the attorney and former college football coach, and Rep. Mike Collins didn't respond to requests for comment. If hot on the trail among the most MAGA-coded candidates, Trump’s quixotic pitch to deep-six the filibuster appears dead on arrival back in the upper chamber. “I’ve said before there are not the votes there,” Majority Leader John Thune said this week, adding that Trump “could have some sway with members, but I just know where the math is on this issue in the Senate.” The view from the White House: Alex Bruesewitz, the Trump adviser and Gen Z MAGA social media bulldog, told POLITICO that the Senate “seems to have forgotten” that Republicans “won the White House and the Senate because of President Trump and his vision to make America great again. It was his vision that carried everybody across the finish line.” Bruesewitz predicted “complications” for members who don’t line up behind Trump’s blitz to blow up the filibuster. “And I’m not saying that we are going to primary everybody, but I think it’s going to send the wrong signals to the voters, and the voters will be discouraged and either they want to go in a different direction or they’re going to be so discouraged that they don’t vote. Either way, it’s going to be a massive problem for Republicans in the Senate.” Trump renewed his futile effort to kill the filibuster Friday. “I am totally in favor of terminating the filibuster, and we would be back to work within 10 minutes after that vote took place,” Trump told reporters Friday. “It doesn’t make any sense that a Republican would not want to do that.” His inability to do so is the freshest sign that he may be entering a lame duck era and cannot bend what has otherwise been a pliant Senate to his will. “The president’s insistence to pivot away from the unproductive filibuster strategy — and Senate Republicans exhibiting a rare refusal to go along with his agenda — provides little clarity on how the shutdown, now in its 39th day, may end,” POLITICO’s Myah Ward and Irie Sentner write this morning. The movement toward Trump on the issue in Texas, though, signifies a path where the incoming GOP Senate in 2027 is far more amenable to a makeup that knows what time it is. Or, as Dans put it: “The RINO habitat is shrinking, and these folks are being flushed out right now.”
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POLITICO and Public First modeled how Trump can shape voters’ opinions of legislation versus the cost. | Roberto Schmidt/Getty Images | 1. ON THE MONEY: The POLITICO Poll, in partnership with Public First, found that Trump supporters are willing to endure a fair amount of economic pain in order to back his policies, POLITICO’s Jessica Piper reports. In the survey, POLITICO and Public First modeled how Trump can shape voters’ opinions of legislation versus the cost. The polling found that “the typical Trump supporter would overlook having to pay about $65 more per month in taxes to back their leader, while anti-Trump voters would forego about $33 in savings if it meant opposing Trump’s agenda,” Jessica writes. Zooming out: The “results are a reminder that — while many of Trump’s supporters have a reputation for intense loyalty — they also have a breaking point. And Tuesday’s election results suggest that despite Republican voters’ willingness to pay a literal price for Trump’s policies, the Trump agenda to date may have pushed voters too far.” 2. SHUTDOWN SHOWDOWN: With the federal government shutdown dragging into day 39, the Senate is working through the weekend to try and hash out a deal to turn the lights back on. But as POLITICO’s Jordain Carney and colleagues report, there’s no promise it’ll work. Though Majority Leader John Thune has hoped the weekend workload could ramp up the pressure on Democrats to reach a deal, the newly emboldened party is not ready to cave on their health care demands. And with “bipartisan rank-and-talks moving slowly, there’s plenty of skepticism anything can get done until at least early next week,” Jordain and colleagues write. Hot on the left: Meanwhile, WSJ’s Lindsay Wise and Cameron McWhirter report how Georgia’s Jon Ossoff — the only Democratic senator up for reelection next year in a state Trump won in 2024 — has become a symbol of the impasse. The Georgia Democrat “has shown little sign of buckling. … He sharply criticizes Trump, saying the president needs to step in and make a deal. And he sticks tightly to that script, giving virtually the same answers every day no matter what the shutdown-related questions might be.” 3. OH SNAP: In a late night order, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson agreed yesterday to grant the Trump administration an administrative stay of a lower court order’s to fully fund SNAP food aid payments amid the government shutdown, POLITICO’s Josh Gerstein and Marcia Brown report. Jackson’s decision came after the administration had pushed back against the lower court order that “required officials to tap into a separate nutrition account at USDA to deliver the usual SNAP payments for November.” The 1st Circuit Court of Appeals had previously declined to grant the administration an immediate reprieve. “Jackson, a Biden appointee, noted that the appeals court indicated it planned to release a further ruling ‘as quickly as possible’ and she said lifting the deadline for now would ‘facilitate’ the appeals court’s next action, which she said she expected ‘with dispatch,’”Josh and Marcia write. The ruling comes after USDA announced it was working to comply with the prior order to pay out full benefits, while some recipients had already seen funding trickle in over the past week. And on the homefront: D.C.’s Capital Area Food Bank is “bracing for the swell of people who will need its help before the holiday season” as residents of the nation’s capital struggle with layoffs, the shutdown and other economic woes, AP’s Gary Fields and Fatima Hussein report.
| | | | Washington is fixated on the shutdown fallout — and POLITICO is tracking every move.
Inside Congress breaks down how lawmakers are navigating the politics, policies, and power plays driving the debate.
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West Wing Playbook follows how the administration and federal agencies are responding — and what it all means for the people running government day to day.
➡️ Sign up for West Wing Playbook | | | | | 4. ON DEFENSE: In a speech to industry executives at the National War College, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shared the Pentagon’s new plan to overhaul its weapons acquisition process, POLITICO’s Paul McLeary and colleagues report. The address focused on the ins and outs of the reform plan, marking a dramatic tone shift for the oft-fiery secretary: “It was also a far cry from his usual focus on culture war issues, often aimed at the MAGA base and dedicated to the perils of diversity, equity and inclusion.” “I’m not here to punish. I’m here to liberate,” Hegseth said. “I’m not here to reform, but to transform and empower. We need to save the bureaucracy from itself.” 5. UP IN THE AIR: Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has promised more nationwide flight cuts as the shutdown drags on, and told reporters yesterday that more “drastic reductions could be in the cards if the funding stalemate lingers and ongoing air traffic control staffing issues persist,” POLITICO’s Sam Ogozalek and Pavan Acharya report. Duffy has cited complaints from pilots that controllers are “‘more stressed’ under the shutdown conditions and mentioned some cases of ‘loss of separation in the airspace,’ a reference to incidents in which aircraft fly too close to one another.” 6. IMMIGRATION FILES: A federal judge in Oregon issued a permanent injunction yesterday prohibiting the Trump administration from mobilizing the National Guard in Portland as a part of his nationwide immigration crackdown, NBC News’ Dareh Gregorian and Alicia Victoria Lozano. Oregon officials and the administration have been locked into a legal dispute since September over the deployment, which U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut, a Trump appointee, described as legally unfounded: “[T]here was neither 'a rebellion or danger of a rebellion' nor was the President 'unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the United States,” Immergut wrote in her ruling.”
| | | | Global Security is POLITICO’s new weekly briefing on the policies and industrial forces reshaping transatlantic defense. From Washington to Brussels and beyond, we track how decisions ripple across borders — redefining the future of security and industry. Sign up for the free preview edition. | | | | | 7. CLIMATE CORNER: Trump posted on Truth Social yesterday that no U.S. officials would attend the G20 summit this year in South Africa, and reiterated his criticism of the country over their alleged mistreatment of white farmers: “It is a total disgrace that the G20 will be held in South Africa,” the president wrote. “Afrikaners …. are being killed and slaughtered, and their land and farms are being illegally confiscated. No U.S. Government Official will attend as long as these Human Rights abuses continue.” The boycott of the annual gathering comes after VP JD Vance was reportedly expected to take Trump’s place at the event, though will no longer do so, AP’s Seung Min Kim and Michelle Price report:”The country’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa, has said he’s told Trump that information about the alleged discrimination and persecution of Afrikaners is ‘completely false.’” 8. AT THE PUMP: “Trump says he brought down gas prices. The reality is more complicated,” by POLITICO’s James Bikales and Ben Johansen: “U.S. oil companies’ output is indeed forecast to surpass 2024’s record this year — and is expected to continue growing through 2026. … But industry analysts are mixed on how much credit Trump deserves for bringing down prices at the pump, which are largely driven by the global price of crude oil.” 9. PLAYBOOK METRO SECTION: “Trump wants Commanders' new D.C. stadium named for him,” by ESPN’s Don Van Natta Jr. and Adam Schefter: “A senior White House source said there have been back-channel communications with a member of the Commanders' ownership group, led by Josh Harris, to express Trump's desire to have the domed stadium in the nation's capital bear his name. The new stadium is being built on the old RFK Stadium site that served as the team's home from 1961 to 1996.”
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| | | | GREAT WEEKEND READS: — “She Was Ready to Have Her 15th Child. Then Came the Felony Charges,” by NYT’s David Gauvey Herbert: “MaryBeth Lewis’s desire to be a new mom again, at 65 years old, led to a custody battle like no other.” — “The Runaway Monkeys Upending the Animal-Rights Movement,” by The New Yorker’s Ava Kofman: “A troop of macaques escaped one of the largest primate-breeding facilities in America. Now a strange coalition of uncompromising activists and MAGA loyalists is demanding that all lab animals be set free.” — “The unregulated industry that coaches veterans to pile on benefits,” per WaPo: “The number of veterans receiving a 100 percent disability rating has surged in recent years. For-profit firms, influencers and VA itself are behind the trend.” — “Speak and Sell” by The Baffler’s Sophie Pinkham: “Ms. Rachel and the disappearing world of books.” — “What Happened When Small-Town America Became Data Center, U.S.A.,” by WSJ’s David Uberti: “Residents, politicians and local agencies are making the most of the tech boom, but prosperity comes with costs; ‘What’s going to happen once they stop building?’” — “The Company Quietly Funneling Paywalled Articles to AI Developers,” by The Atlantic’s Alex Reisner: “‘You shouldn’t have put your content on the internet if you didn’t want it to be on the internet, Common Crawl’s executive director says.” — “End of The Line: how Saudi Arabia’s Neom dream unravelled,” by FT’s Alison Killing: “Mohammed bin Salman’s utopian city was undone by the laws of physics and finance.” | | | | A message from Instagram: Instagram Teen Accounts: Automatic protections for teens.
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Explore our ongoing work. | | | | | | TALK OF THE TOWN | | DISPATCH FROM ‘CPAC FOR THE LEFT’ — A day of simultaneously jovial and existential panels marked the first ever “Crooked Con,” the convention put on by Crooked Media of “Pod Save America” fame, drawing a fervent crowd of devotees. It was a day for liberal creators, Democratic politicians and the consultant class to bask in the glow of Tuesday’s margins of victory — declaring, as Jessica Tarlov did, that “people showed up all over the country and said, f--k off” to the Trump administration, Playbook’s Ali Bianco writes in. The convention convened the party’s “Big Tent” (literally, that’s what one of the atriums was called) as popular streamer Hasan Piker and The Bulwark’s Tim Miller sparred over their Kamala Harris campaign post-mortems, drawing at least a thousand people in the audience and even more waiting in a line outside. Hours later, Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) sat in jeans and a baseball cap, explaining the mechanics of low-riders and candidate likability to Jon Lovett. Following the roughly eight hours of programming, a smaller gathering descended on the glitzy Waldorf Astoria for a private reception on the upper floor of Bazaar by José Andrés. With a giant American flag draped in the background — in what was, it seems a lifetime ago, the Trump Hotel — party-goers mused about the rise of authoritarianism while clinking frothy cocktails, with names like “Epstein didn’t Tequila himself.” But nothing was quite so on-the-nose as the TV screens playing in the background behind Tommy Vietor, on which Fox News’ Jesse Watters could be seen displaying photos from the convention’s panels and slamming their praise of New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani — a scene that tickled more than one attendee. SPOTTED at the after party: Jon Favreau, Jon Lovett, Tommy Vietor, Dan Pfeiffer, Lucinda Treat, Jane Coaston, Shaniqua McClendon, Reid Cherlin, Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.), Jessica Valenti, Sarah Longwell, Adam Mockler, Marc Elias, Neera Tanden, Morris Katz, Tara McGowen, Waleed Shahid, Amanda Litman, Anderson Clayton, Kate Barr, Terrance Woodbury, Kelly Dietrich and Meredith Lynch. OUT AND ABOUT — SPOTTED at the Picnic Theatre Company's sold out “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” parody play at Dupont Underground last night: Steve Rochlin, Christina Sevilla, Sara Cook, Riikka Hietajarvi, Ana Harvey, Nihal Krishan, Amirah Sequeira, Molly Martinez, Marisela Ramirez, Adam Green, Raquel Krahenbuhl, Sarakshi Rai, Bernie Debussman, David White, Kimball Stroud, Matt McDonald, Romina Kazandjian, Tom Rogan, Elizabeth Hagedorn, Nova Daly, Antonio Olivo, Chris Fowler, Alexa Newlin, Paul Massaro, Cristobal Vasquez, Gideon Lett, David Lunderquist, Fraser Jackson, Jay McMichael and Jennifer Simpson. — SPOTTED last night at a public service career reception at the Hay Adams hosted by American Juris Link: Marina Golovkin, Elizabeth Langan, Adam Gustafson, Jonathan Skrmetti, Rachel Jag, Ketan Bhirud, Abhishek Kambli, Eric Hamilton, Andrea Lucas, Drew Ensign, Heather Olowski, Lew Olowski, Jason Muehlhoff and Stephen Raiola. — SPOTTED at a book party honoring EqualAI’s Miriam Vogel, co-author of “Governing the Machine at the House” ($32) at The House at 1229 last night: Karen Sessions, Michael Chertoff, Nicoletta Giordani, Jim Bankoff, Lael Brainard, Kathleen Buhle, Neal Katyal, Joanna Rosen, Massimo Calabrese, Michael Petricone, Tiffany Moore, Niamh King, Ed Luce, Arun and Anjali Gupta, Aneesh Chopra, Liz Johnson, John McCarthy, Ashley Callen, Taylor Stockton, Max Katz, Dan Meyers, Kimberley Fritts, John Clarey, Missi Tessier, Colin Moneymaker, Chris Russo and Virginia Coyne. HAPPY BIRTHDAY: ABC’s David Muir … FEC Chair Shana Broussard … former Rep. Mark Green (R-Tenn.) … Charlotte Law … Blackstone’s Wayne Berman … Bob Jones … Missouri AG Catherine Hanaway … Holland & Knight’s Leon Fresco … Narrative’s Tory Newmyer … POLITICO’s Roger Jeannotte and Barbara Van Tine … Matt Sandgren of Innovative Policy … Amazon’s Erin Cohan … Council of State Governments’ Jay Nelson … Johanny Adames of Rep. Adriano Espaillat’s (D-N.Y.) office … AARP’s John Hishta … Weston Loyd … Kelsey Suter of Upswing … Courtney Stamm … former FEMA Administrator Michael Brown … Laurie Moskowitz … Marta Richenburg of Rep. Kevin Mullin’s (D-Calif.) office … Casey Hernandez of Seven Letter … Robin Walker … Ira Magaziner THE SHOWS (Full Sunday show listings here): CBS “Face the Nation”: Kevin Hassett … Maryland Gov. Wes Moore … West Virginia Gov. Patrick Morrisey … New Jersey Gov.-elect Mikie Sherrill …Virginia Gov.-elect Abigail Spanberger. NBC “Meet the Press”: House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries … Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) … Jon M. Chu. Panel: Ashley Etienne, Ryan Nobles, Marc Short and Amy Walter. CNN “State of the Union”: California Gov. Gavin Newsom. … Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. Panel: Rep. Riley Moore (R-W.Va.), Bakari Sellers, Kristen Soltis Anderson and Xochitl Hinojosa. FOX “Fox News Sunday”: Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy … DNC Chair Ken Martin … House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) Panel: Richard Fowler, Meridith McGraw, Hans Nichols and Mollie Hemingway. Sunday special: Karen Kingsbury. MSNBC “The Weekend”: Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.) … Rep. Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pa.) … David Hogg. NewsNation “The Hill Sunday”: Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.) … Rep. Eric Sorensen (D-Ill.) … Malcolm Gladwell. Panel: Burgess Everett, David Swerdlick and Blake Burman. ABC “This Week”: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent …. Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) … David Miliband. Roundtable: Donna Brazile, Chris Christie and Sarah Isgur. Fox News “Sunday Morning Futures”: EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin … Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) … Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) … Devin Nunes. CNN “Inside Politics Sunday”: Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.). Panel: Leigh Ann Caldwell, Jonah Goldberg, David Weigel and Priscilla Alvarez. 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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