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The Washington Post’s David Ignatius reported this week that President Joe Biden will sit down with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman during a trip to the region later in June. 

The White House’s thinking here is pretty straightforward. The president has a gargantuan domestic political liability — high gas prices — that Saudi Arabia is in a position to help with. Combine that with the international political realities — MBS is young and will likely lead the kingdom for decades, the West needs new sources of oil given Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and Saudi Arabia’s role as a regional power — and you have the makings of a rapprochement.

In a letter obtained exclusively by Playbook and being sent to Biden today, 9/11 Families United is demanding Biden bring up “accountability for 9/11 in any conversations” he has with MBS. If Biden doesn’t, the family members write, “it would signal to the world that you are willing to indulge years more of Saudi obfuscation and obstruction, and that America prioritizes the interests of foreign powers and economics more than the lives of its citizenry.” Read the letter

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Raghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.
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Heidi Przybyla has an enormously important and carefully reported article for POLITICO that just went live: “‘It’s going to be an army’: Tapes reveal GOP plan to contest elections”

Przybyla obtained video recordings of GOP operatives assembling a disturbing multipronged network of party loyalists that could cause chaos on Election Day. She documents evidence of four different networks being created:

1. Poll workers steeped in 2020 election fraud conspiracy theories who are being trained to contest votes, especially in Democrat-heavy areas.

2. GOP lawyers who the poll workers can quickly connect with to document alleged voter fraud.

3. “Party-friendly district attorneys who could intervene to block vote counts at certain precincts.”

4. “Installing party loyalists on the Board of Canvassers, which is responsible for certifying the election, also appears to be part of the GOP strategy.”

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The Biden White House is rolling out a new monthlong economic campaign today to try to “communicate on our accomplishments to date on the economy,” according to a White House official.

President Joe Biden's kicked off the effort with a WSJ op-ed that posted Monday evening, in which he boasted that his “administration’s economic and vaccination plans helped achieve the most robust recovery in modern history.”

But Biden’s desire to turn June into an inflection point for his trajectory has some serious challenges.

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Raghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.
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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.”

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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 CBS

So 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...

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Raghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.
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Tuesday night’s primaries brought some major news: 

Former President Donald Trump suffered embarrassing defeats in Georgia (A must-read from Alex Isenstadt: “‘We’re going to go f---ing scorched-earth’: How Brian Kemp crushed Trump in Georgia”) … Rep. Mo Brooks mounted a successful comeback and is now headed to the Alabama Senate runoff despite losing Trump’s endorsement … And Rep. Henry Cuellar's narrow lead over Jessica Cisneros means she could request a recount in the Democrats’ most-watched House primary, though Cuellar declared victory Tuesday night. … Five key takeaways from Tuesday night, by David Siders, Adam Wren and Ally Mutnick

And will this time be any different? At least 19 elementary school-aged children and two adults are dead at the hands of an 18-year-old gunman in Texas. And once again, the nation is mourning the loss of precious lives. But in Washington, there is a serious question of not just whether lawmakers will do anything about gun safety following the latest mass shooting — but whether they will even try.

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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 here

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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.

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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...

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Raghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.
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