My colleague Josh Zive and I were fortunate enough to grab Jonathan Martin from the New York Times to pick his brain about Joe-mentum and what it means heading into Super Tuesday. Give us a listen:
PRG Pulse: Understanding Ne-VAD-uh with Jon Ralston of The Nevada Independent
This week my colleague Josh Zive and I talked with Jon Ralston, editor of The Nevada Independent, godfather of Silver State political journalism, and a moderator for last week’s Democratic debate in Las Vegas. We check in with Jon about his experience moderating the debate, how he’s analyzing the results of the Nevada caucuses, and what he believes we’ve learned about the future of the presidential race.
Give us a listen!
POLITICO: Vulnerable GOP senators tie fortunes to Trump
I spoke to POLITICO‘s James Arkin about President Trump’s intentions to barnstorm key battlegrounds, and what his presence on the campaign trail means for in-cycle GOP Senators.
Strategists focused on Senate races largely agree. In 2016 many Republican senators outpaced Trump. In some cases, Republicans won by keeping the then-nominee at arm’s length, especially after the widespread condemnation of Trump for his comments in the “Access Hollywood” tape.
But none of the vulnerable incumbents are running that way now.
“This isn’t 2016 anymore. You’re not going to walk the tightrope of running far enough ahead of the president that it makes sense to shun him,” said Liam Donovan, a veteran GOP strategist. “Particularly in states like Arizona and North Carolina that the president needs to win — and you need him to win if you want to keep your job — they’re inexorably tied, and you need to embrace that for all it’s worth.”
Read the full piece here.
Cheddar: Green Energy Groups Hope to Woo GOP Senators. It’s Slim Pickings.
I spoke to Cheddar‘s Alan Neuhauser about green energy advocates’ efforts to identify GOP champions in the US Senate.
The Iowa senator, once a reliable partner for renewables like wind energy, is now off the market. That’s left green groups scrambling to find a new champion to help secure much-needed GOP votes – with remarkably slim pickings.“He was very reliable,” a renewable energy lobbyist said. “Now, I don’t know. The House has been a lot easier to identify Republicans who are interested and willing to go to bat for clean energy.”Liam Donovan, a Republican lobbyist specializing in tax policy and energy at Bracewell, offered a similar assessment:“On Senate Finance, where are your natural allies? No one obvious jumps out,” Donovan said.…
There are also signs of retrenchment, though. As the Trump administration has called for ending virtually all tax incentives for green energy and electric vehicles in its latest budget proposal, some Republican senators that once clearly supported certain green tax credits now appear to have hedged.“That’s what looms over all of this. We saw the way these negotiations played out and the apparent reluctance within the White House to really go there on any of these clean-energy issues. That’s going to color the willingness of some of these Republicans to engage on these issues this year,” Donovan said. “I don’t think Republicans are in the same place that they might’ve been when these incentives were originally enacted.”…
Renewable energy, electric vehicle and environmental advocates and trade groups hope that they might also be able to leverage so-called “technicals:” errors that are leftover from the 2018 GOP-led tax overhaul that have since hit retailers and restaurants especially hard. But the technical corrections alone, without other issues like biofuels, may not be enough – especially in the face of intense White House opposition to electric vehicles and renewable energy.“You’re not going to put things on the table that were non-starters the last time,” Donovan said.
Read the full piece here.
Battleground Florida Podcast: Liam Donovan is Back!
I once again joined WFTV Orlando’s Christopher Heath for his Battleground Florida podcast to talk about the state of the Democratic primary, the upcoming Nevada caucus, and where things go from here.