The Beltway & Beyond

As an unprecedented winter storm crippled the Lone Star state’s deregulated electrical grid and triggered mass outages - leaving millions trapped without heat for days in freezing homes and putting nearly half of all Texans under a boil-water advisory, Ted Cruz, the junior senator from Texas, made a spectacularly ill-timed decision to leave with his family for a vacation in Cancun in the middle of the energy crisis. Speaking of government blunders, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has been trying to contain political fallout from revelations that his administration had concealed the full extent of nursing home-related deaths during the Covid pandemic.

Public Strategies’ Howard Schweitzer, Mark Alderman, Patrick Martin, and Stuart Shorenstein discuss the impact of these scandals and whether they seem to indicate the return to old-school, rough-and-tumble, hardball-style politics.

In the midst of impeachment and the latest coronavirus relief package negotiations, Public Strategies’ Howard Schweitzer, Mark Alderman, and Kaitlyn Martin debate whether bipartisanship still matters if actions ultimately take place along partisan lines, and ponder whether President Biden is a transitional or transformational president.

In the shadow of the former president, the GOP is struggling to find its footing, as it continues to wrestle with a deep cultural divide that has moved to the forefront of Republican politics. Meanwhile, the White House is forming a government that must battle a variety of simultaneous crises. Where is the true power in Washington?

Public Strategies’ Howard Schweitzer, Mark Alderman, Patrick Martin, and Kaitlyn Martin break it all down.

Facing twin public-health and economic emergencies, racial justice, climate change, and other urgent and compounding crises, President Biden is working with little, if any, political honeymoon. Since January 20, he has signed more than three dozen executive orders and directives aimed at addressing those crises.

Public Strategies’ Howard Schweitzer, Patrick Martin, and Kaitlyn Martin grade the new administration’s first 10 days and discuss Biden’s daunting challenge to balance his stated desire for bipartisanship with his sense of urgency, as he wrestles with contentious legislative negotiations over his $1.9 trillion coronavirus package, a slow confirmation process for his senior team, and the Senate impeachment trial of his predecessor.

Joe Biden was sworn in as the 46th president on Wednesday amidst fear and uncertainty and facing a combination of overlapping and compounding crises. President Biden entered the White House hours after the historic inauguration and signed his first executive orders targeting Trump policies on immigration, climate change, racial equity, and coronavirus.

Can Biden make the executive branch function effectively and will his appeals for unity bear fruit? Can Congress juggle the Biden agenda and an impeachment trial? Public Strategies’ Howard Schweitzer, Mark Alderman, and Patrick Martin try to answer these questions as they reflect on the most consequential people of the past four years and discuss the thicket through which Biden and his team are navigating in the first week of the new administration.

On January 20 – two weeks after a violent mob stormed the Capitol and one week after Trump became the first American president to be impeached twice, Joe Biden will be sworn in as the 46th U.S. President, surrounded by an extraordinary show of security.

Even amid a global pandemic and economic downturn, Biden’s most pressing challenge when he takes office may be calming a rattled nation and assuring it that the unrest seen in Washington won’t continue under his watch. Can he restore a sense of normalcy and unite America’s disparate political factions after four tumultuous years? And is this the end of the road for Trump, especially if he is convicted in the Senate and barred from holding future office? If so, what does it mean for a badly divided Republican Party?

Public Strategies’ Howard Schweitzer, Mark Alderman, Patrick Martin, and Kaitlyn Martin discuss the anxious state of the country and ponder the possibility for Biden to restore bipartisan spirit within the government, along with the viability of Trumpism and the MAGA Movement.

January 6 will be remembered as one of the darkest days in U.S. history, when the unthinkable happened: an assault on the U.S. Capitol by a violent mob that drove Congress from its chambers as it was seeking to count Electoral College votes. The day before, a fractured Republican Party lost both Senate runoff races in Georgia, thereby handing the Senate majority to the Democrats, and serving as a prelude to a deadly week.

As Washington struggles to decide what to do in the wake of the assault in the 10 days before President-elect Joe Biden is sworn in on Jan. 20, Public Strategies’ Howard Schweitzer, Mark Alderman, Patrick Martin, and Kaitlyn Martin discuss the events of one of the most consequential weeks in American history and debate where a hyperpolarized country and a deeply damaged electoral system go from here.

The State of Illinois and the City of Chicago are going through periods of profound political change. Governor J.B. Pritzker and Mayor Lori Lightfoot, both first-time officeholders, are dealing with a number of political and fiscal challenges related to the Covid-19 pandemic. Michael Madigan, the longest-serving state legislative leader in American history, faces an unprecedented challenge to his decades-long career as Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives.

How will the leadership standoff play out and who will ultimately be in charge in Springfield? How will the pandemic impact the business of the state legislature and city council? And how do Governor Pritzker and Mayor Lightfoot respond to the multitude of challenges they face in the coming year?

Public Strategies’ Patrick Martin, Matt Glavin, Darren Collier, John Dunn, and Pat Carey reflect on the political battles of 2020, the road to recovery in 2021 and beyond, and what the future may hold for some of the biggest names in Illinois and Chicago politics.

‘Twas the Night Before the Election

-by Howard Schweitzer

'Twas the night before the election when all through the land,

Not a Trumpster was mailing, not even by hand;

Democratic ballots were sent by the thousands with care,

In hopes that Joe Biden soon would be there;

The Democrats assumed the elections was theirs,

With visions of Chuck and Nancy passing mores CARES;

But out in the country, Republicans arose with a clatter,

Other than Joe Biden, their votes surely did matter;

Away from DC the Donald will go,

The future is looking much like Obama 2.0;

In 2021, the White House will be redecorated and life will renew,

But no Mark, contrary to your predictions, the country’s not blue;

Let’s get rid of Covid and put it out of reach,

And say goodbye to Donald and his solution of bleach;

We wish you happy holidays and hope you come back for more,

No, not you Donald, it’s not yet ‘24.

As members of the electoral college are convening in state capitals throughout the country to formally vote for the nation’s next president and vice president, Public Strategies' Howard Schweitzer, Mark Alderman, Patrick Martin, and Kaitlyn Martin share their views on how President-elect Biden’s administration is taking shape now that he has announced top White House staffing picks and unveiled key members of his national security, foreign policy, economic, and health teams, many of whom served in the Obama administration.