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They’re the Senate GOP’s two favorite Democrats: West Virginia’s Joe Manchin and Arizona’s Kyrsten Sinema. They worked with Republicans to craft a massive bipartisan infrastructure deal and to save the filibuster — and now, “​​Republicans acknowledge that because Manchin and Sinema preserved the filibuster, they need to at least listen to Democrats who are desperate for an agreement to reduce gun violence,” Burgess Everett and Marianne LeVine report.— Manchin, asked if he can get 10 GOP votes, per the Hill pool: “​​I don’t know why you wouldn’t have 70 or 80, my goodness. … This is about basically protecting children. If they can’t rise to that, they ought to deep, deep dig inside and find out why in the heck we’re here.”Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook newsletterRaghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.Jenny Ament is the Executive Producer of POLITICO Audio.

Speaking from the White House, President Joe Biden reflected on the shooting and called for new gun restrictions without identifying any specific proposals. “While they clearly will not prevent every tragedy, we know certain ones will have significant impact and have no negative impact on the Second Amendment,” Biden said. “The Second Amendment is not absolute.” More from CBSSo what, realistically, will Washington do?And we have a new POLITICO/Morning Consult poll conducted entirely after the shooting in Uvalde, offering a snapshot of the mood of American voters at this moment in time, and where they stand on a variety of gun reform proposals (Toplines … Crosstabs). Here’s a rundown of what we found...Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook newsletterRaghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.Jenny Ament is the Executive Producer of POLITICO Audio.

Another Tuesday, another massive set of primaries that will test Trump’s grip on the GOP. Today’s most-watched state: Georgia. For the former president, the stakes could not be higher.In the gubernatorial primary, Gov. Brian Kemp faces former Sen. David Perdue. Trump — who partly blames Kemp for his loss of the state in 2020 — has bet bigly on Perdue. He recruited him to run and sunk $2.5 million of his own campaign cash into Perdue’s effort. And yet, according to the RealClearPolitics polling average, Kemp leads Perdue by an average of 22 points.“The Republican base is poised to take a turn delivering Trump a stinging rebuke in a state where, during his presidency, the GOP lost two Senate seats, two House seats and the state’s Electoral College votes for the first time since the mid-1990s,” Steve Shepard writes in his curtain-raiser this morning.

A president’s first midterm election is both an enormous story and completely anticlimactic. It’s major news because there will likely be a dramatic shift away from the president’s party. It’s anticlimactic because it’s one of the most predictable events in American politics.But history is not on Biden’s side. In fact, voters may have already made up their minds. That, at least, is the argument from Doug Sosnik in his latest memo that we are happy to share first with the Playbook audience. You can read the full memo hereSubscribe to the POLITICO Playbook newsletterRaghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.Jenny Ament is the Executive Producer of POLITICO Audio.

Trump’s endorsement losses are starting to pile up.Most of his endorsements have been in races where his anointed candidate faced little or no competition. Nobody would be impressed by a handicapper who won placing bets at a track featuring races with only one horse. The only Trump endorsements that matter are in competitive races. And there, the record is mixed.Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook newsletterRaghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.Jenny Ament is the Executive Producer of POLITICO Audio.

With Memorial Day recess around the corner and much of President Joe Biden's agenda still stuck on Capitol Hill, a sense of helplessness has settled in among some Democrats: The closer they inch toward Election Day, they realize, the more unlikely they are to notch any additional legislative victories. And yet, voters are angry and demanding action now.Just look at this quote from No. 2 Senate Democrat Dick Durbin in a Burgess Everett story up this morning on the ongoing reconciliation talks between Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.): “I put so much time into immigration on reconciliation. It took a year of my legislative life. I have nothing to show for it.” He continued: “I wish Chuck well on reconciliation. I’m going to focus my legislative efforts in the 60-vote world.”So what's a vulnerable Democrat to do? Dems in swing districts have been asking this very question for months now. Here are a few strategies Hill Democrats seem to be employing to protect themselves politically...Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook newsletterRaghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.Jenny Ament is the Executive Producer of POLITICO Audio.

Sixteen months after Donald Trump supporters stormed Capitol Hill to try to stop the certification of Joe Biden as president, a prominent election denier in Pennsylvania inched closer to becoming the next governor of Pennsylvania. State Sen. Doug Mastriano — who attended and helped organize for the “Stop the Steal” rally, has called for audits of Keystone State votes and has been subpoenaed by the House Jan. 6 panel — clinched the GOP gubernatorial nomination. If he wins this fall, he’ll be in a position to nominate the next Pennsylvania secretary of state, a position that oversees elections in the key presidential battleground state.And, one week after catapulting J.D. Vance to victory in Ohio, Trump had a somewhat decent night, though the verdict on perhaps his biggest gamble — supporting Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania’s tight Senate primary — is still out.Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook newsletterRaghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.Jenny Ament is the Executive Producer of POLITICO Audio.

Today is one of the most consequential primary days of the year, with nominating contests in five states — Idaho, Kentucky, North Carolina, Oregon and Pennsylvania — that will tell us a great deal about the direction of the two parties. There are three major storylines that continue to dominate the 2022 primary season: Donald Trump's grip on the GOP Progressive challenges to Biden-like Democratic centrists The rise of anti-democratic and extremist candidates All three storylines collide in today’s most-watched state: Pennsylvania.Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook newsletterRaghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.Jenny Ament is the Executive Producer of POLITICO Audio.

Russia has faced a dizzying series of setbacks in its war with Ukraine over the last week: Sweden and Finland are being fast-tracked into NATO membership, which means Russia will soon share an 810-mile border with NATO. More from NYT Ukrainian troops pushed the Russians from the outskirts of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city, and are now approaching the Russian border. Latest from Reuters Russia suffered “catastrophic” losses during a failed river crossing on May 11, according to The Institute for the Study of War, which notes that “the military incompetence displayed in that crossing have shaken the confidence” of influential Russian military bloggers. The UK Ministry of Defense said that the Russian offensive in the eastern Donbas region, the focus of Russian firepower since its retreat from Kyiv, has “lost momentum and fallen significantly behind schedule.” The Brits also claimed that Putin has lost one-third of the troops he sent into Ukraine since the start of the February invasion. On Sunday, Jens Stoltenberg, NATO’s secretary general, summed up the implications of these developments: “Ukraine can win this war.”And that is exactly the problem according to a growing number of western officials and analysts who fear the fallout from what French President Emmanuel Macron called the “humiliation” of Russia.Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook newsletterRaghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.Jenny Ament is the Executive Producer of POLITICO Audio.

When GOP Rep. Liz Cheney decided to risk everything politically and serve on Nancy Pelosi's newly created Jan. 6 investigative panel in the spring of last year, she made something of a vow to herself, according to people close with the Wyoming Republican: She would follow the facts wherever they went, and privately press for the panel to leave no stone unturned to get to the truth of the siege of the Capitol. No half-baked probes. No shrinking away from key witnesses, as Democrats had done in their past impeachments of Donald Trump. If she was going to do this, she was going to go all the way — even as some members of the panel, we heard back then, didn’t even want to investigate Trump’s actions that day.On Thursday, Washington saw the latest fruits of Cheney’s labor, when the Jan. 6 committee shocked This Town and subpoenaed five House GOP lawmakers to testify — including the likely next speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.). Well-placed sources tell us that Cheney — who was booted from her post as No. 3 Republican in the House one year to the day before the subpoenas were issued — was among those pressing hardest for this move, arguing that these GOP members had relevant information and they couldn’t just let them skirt without questioning.Listen to Playbook Deep Dive: ‘He absolutely betrayed me’: Steve Schmidt tells all about John McCainRaghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.Jenny Ament is the Executive Producer of POLITICO Audio.