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Politico
6 days ago
- Business
- Politico
DOGE's next phase
Presented by Driving the Day WHAT'S NEXT FOR DOGE? The Department of Government Efficiency is continuing its work — even without its leader, Elon Musk, albeit now in a quieter way, POLITICO's Robin Bravender, Danny Nguyen and Sophia Cai report. 'DOGE is at work. They're not going away,' the Office of Management and Budget's director, Russ Vought, told Fox News recently. 'I talk to them every single day.' Yet, in recent weeks, some agency leaders, including those at HHS, have publicly broken with DOGE directives, a phenomenon that could become more widespread as Musk steps away from his role. Today is his last day with the White House. In April, leaders of the National Institutes of Health rolled back DOGE directives that instructed staffers to send weekly emails outlining their productivity and limited purchases and travel on company cards, according to messages obtained by POLITICO. That prompted some staffers to suspect the agency's recently confirmed director, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, and perhaps others at HHS, were willing to break with Musk and DOGE. Bhattacharya portrayed himself as powerless against DOGE's mass workforce terminations because they landed the same day he joined the agency in April, though he said he would reinstate some procurement staffers who shouldn't have been terminated. The movement at the NIH and other HHS offices weeks after illustrates a more complicated portrait. Since the start of the second Trump administration, at least six DOGE officials with NIH credentials have descended on the agency, and some have slashed scientific research grants and conducted staff reorganizations, terminations and other purported cost-cutting measures, according to an NIH staffer familiar with the matter and granted anonymity out of concerns they would face retribution. Bhattacharya and other HHS leaders have done little to stave off those deeper cuts, said the NIH staffer and another institute staffer who were granted anonymity out of fear of reprisal. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 'strongly supports DOGE's mission and views the team as a critical partner in restoring public trust in our health institutions,' said HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon. 'Cutting waste, fraud and abuse at HHS remains a top priority.' The White House, DOGE and Musk did not respond to requests for comment. In July, NIH is expected to submit plans to dramatically consolidate the NIH's information technology departments, where more than a dozen teams are based in various suboffices, even as it remains unclear how much work contractors can backfill, the staffers said. Now, employees have been charged with essentially firing each other by developing plans to slash down the IT departments, said the two staffers. 'DOGE is still hungry,' one of the NIH staffers said. 'We've still got to feed the f–ing dog.' WELCOME TO FRIDAY PULSE. Quick housekeeping note: This is my (Chelsea's) last edition of Pulse as I am leaving POLITICO for a new opportunity. It's been a pleasure being in your inboxes each morning. Thank you for all the tips, scoops and feedback — please continue to send them to my wonderful colleague Kelly at khooper@ and follow along @Kelhoops. AROUND THE AGENCIES STATE OF THE RIF — CDC layoffs planned for early June are being paused in the wake of a preliminary injunction, two employees at the agency, granted anonymity for fear of retribution, confirmed to POLITICO's Sophie Gardner. CDC employees who were sent termination notices in April received an email from the agency's Office of Human Resources on Thursday, informing them that, because of a preliminary injunction, HHS 'is staying further action on any existing Reduction in Force (RIF) notices, including final separation of employees, at this time.' The laid-off employees will remain on paid administrative leave 'or in their current employment status' until further notice, the email said. An HHS spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Background: On April 1, amid a massive restructuring of HHS, around 18 percent of the CDC's workforce received termination notices. But legal challenges have complicated the reduction in force and the HHS reorganization, meaning the vast majority of those employees are still technically employed at the CDC, with most remaining on administrative leave. Key context: On May 22, Judge Susan Illston of the federal district court in San Francisco issued a preliminary injunction that bars the administration from carrying out the reduction in force across 22 agencies — including HHS — that are defendants in the case. Federal employee unions, nonprofits and local governments are the plaintiffs. The email sent to CDC employees cites Illston's injunction as the reason for the decision. MAHA REPORT CORRECTED — The White House blamed 'formatting issues' for errors in the citations of the recently released Make America Healthy Again report after a media report found studies in it that do not exist. 'We have complete confidence in [Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.] and his team at HHS. I understand there were some formatting issues with the MAHA report,' White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Thursday. Her remarks came after NOTUS reported that seven of the sources cited in the report, which said children's health is in crisis and blamed chemicals, lack of exercise and ultraprocessed foods, don't exist. The report now lists five of its citations as 'corrected' or 'updated,' though that doesn't include the citations NOTUS reported as false. 'Some of the hundreds of citations in the report were formatted incorrectly or mistakenly referenced something other than what was actually intended,' a White House spokesperson told Pulse. 'That said, the content of the report is fully substantiated, and there is nothing in there that cannot be backed up; we did not conjure up any facts. Report has been corrected now.' REPORT: IMPROVE GRANT OVERSIGHT — The NIH must do a better job of providing oversight of ongoing research grants that the agency has awarded to outside entities, the Government Accountability Office said in a report released Thursday. The report comes as the federal government slashes a number of NIH-funded grants to research institutions and universities, including those focused on diversity, equity and inclusion. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has bemoaned bureaucratic bloat at his department for failing to focus its work on the root causes of chronic disease. According to Thursday's report, the NIH spent more than $35 billion supporting 65,000 grants to external entities in fiscal 2023. However, the GAO found that NIH program officers, tasked with tracking recipients' progress, didn't always close out awards when recipients failed to file final reports within a year of the project's end, as required by policy. As of Aug. 2024, nearly 1,000 final reports, or about 0.2 percent of awards made from fiscal 2014 through fiscal 2024, were missing. Their recommendations: GAO called on the NIH to identify the cause of the missing reports, develop an informational resource on how to manage unused award money and require NIH centers to track all unused funds. The NIH agreed with all three recommendations. In Congress FIRST IN PULSE: ANTI-ABORTION GROUP TARGETS GOP — A major anti-abortion group will launch a monthlong campaign in June to urge Senate Republicans to keep anti-abortion language in the sweeping megabill that passed the House. Students for Life Action plans to target 12 GOP senators who they call 'friends and sometimes foes,' the group's president, Kristan Hawkins, said in a statement, 'all of whom are expressing reluctance on the need to set aside our differences to prioritize getting abortion vendors out of our healthcare spending.' Background: The One Big, Beautiful Bill Act narrowly passed the House this month with language in it that would eliminate Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood. However, the bill will likely undergo major changes in the Senate when lawmakers return in June. Federal funding already can't fund abortion services. The Republican senators being targeted by the group are: — Shelley Moore Capito ( Susan Collins (Maine)— Ron Johnson (Wis.)— Mike Lee (Utah)— Mitch McConnell (Ky.)— Lisa Murkowski (Alaska)— Rand Paul (Ky.)— Rick Scott (Fla.)— Dan Sullivan (Alaska)— John Thune (S.D.)— Thom Tillis (N.C.)— Todd Young (Ind.) Names in the News Kevin Barstow is joining O'Melveny as a partner in its health care practice group and congressional investigations team. He was senior counsel and special assistant to the president in the Biden White House. The Congressional Budget Office has named its panel of health advisers, who will advise the agency on its analysis of the cost of health care policy. The members are Katherine Baicker, Michael Chernew, Jeffrey Clemens, Heather Dlugolenski, Marisa Domino, Erin Fraher, Craig Garthwaite, Darrell Gaskin, John Haupert, Anne Karl, Lisa Lee, Thomas Lee, Patricia MacTaggart, David Meltzer, Sergio Santiviago, Kosali Simon, Neeraj Sood, Cori Uccello and Melanie Whittington. WHAT WE'RE READING NBC reports on how a new Covid variant could impact cases this summer. POLITICO's Ruth Reader reports on a new CMMI official leading AI.
Politico
04-03-2025
- Health
- Politico
Makary's moment in HELP awaits
Presented by Driving the Day MAKARY TO MAKE HILL DEBUT — Dr. Marty Makary, the Johns Hopkins surgeon who's President Donald Trump's pick to lead the FDA, will face the lawmakers standing between him and Senate confirmation on Thursday when the HELP Committee publicly vets his nomination. There's been no shortage of pharma and public health news since Trump began his second term — and since Robert F. Kennedy Jr. took the helm of HHS. Here are the issues we expect Democrats and Republicans alike to raise with Makary: FDA staffing: Lawmakers on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee are likely to ask Makary about FDA staffing. The medical device industry successfully pushed the Trump administration to rehire several reviewers after Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency fired a swath of FDA probationary employees. But the specter of further efforts to reduce the government's size hangs over health agencies. Members might press Makary on his opinion of the FDA's user fee agreements with industry that fund nearly half the agency's work. Kennedy has championed reforming the programs, due to be renegotiated before their 2027 expiration. But the industry's payments might be difficult to replace with taxpayer funding in the current spending environment. Vaccine science: Expect Democrats to ask Makary about vaccine safety and efficacy in light of both Kennedy's vaccine skepticism and a large measles outbreak in West Texas and single cases reported in other states. The FDA maintains some government databases around vaccine adverse events, so system oversight would be part of his mandate. Kennedy has vowed to pursue new studies of vaccine safety after years of arguing that the products aren't adequately tested before they hit the market. But his calls for placebo-controlled studies gloss over clinical trial ethics: When testing a new vaccine, researchers should offer control groups an existing immunization if one is available. While at Hopkins and as a Fox News contributor, Makary pushed back on Covid-19 vaccine mandates and on certain recommendations, particularly around vaccinating children. But he's avoided some of the more bombastic chatter in contrarian circles against the shots and avoided discussing Covid in his most recent book. Advisory committees: Democrats will press Makary about his vision for the FDA's independent advisory panels, given the recent cancellation of a regularly scheduled meeting to review which strains should be included in next season's flu shot. 'We intend to use your nomination hearing next week to understand whether you support this ill-informed measure to slow critical public health decision making,' Washington Sen. Patty Murray and two other Democrats wrote to Makary on Friday. During the pandemic, Makary slammed the FDA for bypassing the panel to authorize booster shots for teens, seemingly to avoid being contradicted by advisers who had previously declined to recommend additional doses for young people. 'This is unconscionable—undermines the integrity of the FDA's standard process!' he posted on X in January 2022. Former Biden FDA Commissioner Dr. Robert Califf and Dr. Namandjé Bumpus, his No. 2 official, advocated for shifting how the agency uses its external advisory committees by emphasizing the groups' discussion about drug and device issues over their votes for or against formal recommendations to regulators. IT'S TUESDAY. WELCOME BACK TO PRESCRIPTION PULSE. Have you sat in on Makary's murder boards in preparation for Thursday's hearing? Let us know. Send your tips to David Lim (dlim@ or @davidalim) and Lauren Gardner (lgardner@ or @Gardner_LM). Eye on the FDA MAKARY PLEDGES TO DIVEST MILLIONS IF CONFIRMED — Dr. Mark Makary said he would divest from a variety of companies, including Global Appropriateness Measures, MedRegen and telehealth and health benefits firms, if he's confirmed as FDA commissioner. According to a financial disclosure document, GAM clients include payer lobby AHIP, Ballad Health, Booz Allen Hamilton, Devoted Health Services and Florida Health Care Plan. The filing shows the surgeon and author will not participate in matters related to many of the companies and entities he has had a financial relationship with for a year after his potential confirmation. But Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) wants Makary to recuse himself for at least four years while in office. 'Your predecessor, Dr. Califf, agreed to recuse from his former clients' specific-party matters for four years — going beyond the two-year recusal requirement in former President Biden's ethics pledge — as did over a dozen other Biden appointees,' Warren wrote to Makary in a Sunday letter. 'You should do the same.' AROUND THE AGENCIES HHS SPOX RESIGNS — HHS' top spokesperson has abruptly resigned after clashes over the department's management amid an intensifying measles outbreak, POLITICO's Adam Cancryn reports. Thomas Corry, a veteran of the first Trump administration, announced on his LinkedIn page Monday that he had resigned 'effective immediately,' just two weeks after joining HHS as its assistant secretary for public affairs. Growing disagreement with Kennedy and Stefanie Spear, one of his top advisers, prompted the departure of Corry, who was also troubled by the secretary's response to the Texas measles outbreak, according to two people familiar with the matter and granted anonymity to speak candidly. Kennedy, a long-time vaccine skeptic, published an op-ed on Sunday on Fox News in which he emphasized personal choice around receiving vaccines and noted that 'good nutrition remains a best defense against most chronic and infectious illnesses.' Industry Intel ABBVIE LOOKS TO OBESITY — AbbVie entered the obesity market on Monday, announcing it has licensed a potential therapy from Danish pharma Gubra for development. The drug candidate, currently undergoing an early-stage clinical trial, targets a hormone known as amylin that promotes feelings of fullness. Pharma Moves Former NIH Director Dr. Monica Bertagnolli is joining Friends of Cancer Research's board of directors. WHAT WE'RE READING The CDC's first public statement on the West Texas measles outbreak highlighted supportive vitamin A treatment for patients — an approach commonly used in countries with high rates of deficiency — but that doesn't obviate the benefits of vaccination, NBC News reports. The FDA has updated labeling for testosterone products after a clinical study showed no increased risk for adverse cardiovascular outcomes in men using them to treat a hormone deficiency, Reuters writes.
Politico
30-01-2025
- Health
- Politico
RFK Jr. to face HELP panel in HHS bid
Presented by The Pharmaceutical Reform Alliance Driving the Day KENNEDY'S NEXT TEST — Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President Donald Trump's choice to lead HHS, appears before a key Senate health committee stacked with lawmakers who could cast the deciding vote for or against him, I report with my colleagues Lauren Gardner and Daniel Payne. The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee is holding a courtesy confirmation hearing for Kennedy one day after he appeared before the Senate Finance Committee, which will decide whether to recommend his confirmation to the Senate. During his testimony before the Finance Committee on Wednesday, Kennedy tried to shed his history of anti-vaccine activism or speak broadly about the need for the U.S. government to address the rise of chronic disease. During questioning by Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who chairs the HELP Committee, Kennedy appeared to confuse Medicare and Medicaid. What to expect today: More questioning on Kennedy's anti-vaccine rhetoric and public health views is likely today, given the HELP Committee's jurisdiction over public health agencies like the CDC and the FDA, which play key roles in monitoring and regulating vaccines. He could also field questions from lawmakers who want commitments on their policy priorities, as they did at the Finance hearing. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) issued a statement Wednesday touting Kennedy's support for focusing on rural health care improvements and reining in pharmacy middlemen. Why it matters: Though the HELP Committee won't vote to advance Kennedy's confirmation to the Senate floor, his answers could make the difference in whether he ultimately helms the federal government's health agencies. The exchanges with key senators Wednesday might suggest whether Kennedy's plans for sweeping reforms and reframing the government's role in U.S. health care will come to fruition. The senators to watch include: — Cassidy, who's maintained a poker face about how he's leaning. He might continue his questioning on Kennedy's policy priorities when it comes to federal health programs. — Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who said earlier this week she wants to 'drill down on and try to get some commitments' from Kennedy, and Susan Collins (R-Maine). On Saturday, both lawmakers voted against Pete Hegseth, Trump's pick to lead the Pentagon. — Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said he liked Kennedy's adopted slogan, Make America Healthy Again, but sparred with him over whether health care should be a human right and his decision to put aside his past support for abortion rights to serve Trump, Sanders could also pick up on a line of questioning started by his colleague Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) on Kennedy's potential financial gain from lawsuits against drug companies. WELCOME TO THURSDAY PULSE. Opponents wearing Make Polio Great Again T-shirts and supporters wearing Make America Healthy Again hats came face to face Wednesday at Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s confirmation hearing. According to Capitol Police, six people were arrested for interrupting the hearing. What will we see today at the Senate HELP hearing? Send your tips, scoops and feedback to ccirruzzo@ and follow along @ChelseaCirruzzo. In Congress HEALTH POLICY? NOT NOW — Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appeared shaky on some finer health policy points during his Senate Finance confirmation hearing Wednesday — but his supporters aren't worried. Kennedy seemed to confuse Medicaid with the federal insurer for older Americans, Medicare, and struggled to answer a question about HHS' role in ensuring hospitals follow a longtime law requiring emergency rooms to treat patients regardless of their ability to pay. Calley Means, a former food industry lobbyist-turned-adviser to Kennedy, suggested on social media that some senators focused their questioning on arcane policy issues. 'While he is being questioned about minutiae, he continually raises the conversation to the existential stakes of our chronic disease crisis,' Means posted on Instagram as Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) grilled Kennedy about Medicaid. Later, at a Heritage Foundation reception for Kennedy supporters and the Make America Healthy Again PAC, Means told reporters that Kennedy's agenda on reducing chronic illness would eventually lead to federal health insurance policy change, saying 'standards of care' must be reworked. 'I think inevitably you'd have public policy decisions and administrative decisions around, potentially codes for Medicare, Medicaid, that come out of that science,' he said. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), co-founder of the Senate Make America Healthy Again caucus, devoted to advancing Kennedy's agenda, also criticized his colleagues' line of questioning. 'This is not a hearing to get into the details of a particular program that is mind-numbingly complex to begin with,' he told reporters outside the hearing room. 'These hearings are about 'What is your intention, what are your goals?'' Abortion ANTI-ABORTION GROUP'S ENVIRONMENTAL PUSH — A cadre of red and purple states is introducing bills this week to impose restrictions on abortion pills over claims that the drugs could be contaminating drinking water, POLITICO's Alice Miranda Ollstein and Ariel Wittenberg report. The new legislation in Arizona, Idaho, Maine, West Virginia and Wyoming — which would require doctors who prescribe abortion pills to make their patients collect and return their expelled fetuses in medical waste bags for disposal — is the latest development in anti-abortion groups' yearslong campaign to wield environmental laws to cut off access to the drugs. The group leading the push, Students for Life of America, is also preparing lawsuits, federal bills and a pressure campaign aimed squarely at the environmental inclinations of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who could soon lead the health agencies that regulate access to the pills. Students for Life and its lawmaker allies claim that as women increasingly use the pills at home to end pregnancies and flush the expelled tissue, trace amounts of the drug make their way into rivers and streams where they can harm endangered species and livestock. The group, which recently conducted its own testing in three U.S. cities and hopes to publish the results in a peer-reviewed medical journal later this year, has also claimed that the drug contaminates tap water and could threaten human fertility. Multiple environmental health experts told POLITICO that no evidence supports those claims. But they could be convincing to Kennedy, an environmental attorney who said during his confirmation hearing Wednesday that he plans to investigate the safety of abortion pills. Global Health U.S. TIME IN WHO TICKS DOWN — The U.S. has begun its one-year countdown to withdraw from the World Health Organization, POLITICO's Carmen Paun reports. The U.S. officially ends its membership on Jan. 22, 2026, according to a letter to the U.N. secretary-general and viewed by POLITICO. The letter doesn't provide a reason for the withdrawal. In an Inauguration Day executive order, President Donald Trump cited 'unfairly onerous payments from the United States, far out of proportion with other countries' assessed payments.' In 2020, during his first term, Trump threatened to withdraw, accusing the WHO of covering up Chinese negligence at the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic. He couldn't complete the withdrawal because he lost that year's election. President Joe Biden reversed the withdrawal plan. Why it matters: The notification squashes doubts about the current U.S. intention to withdraw and sets a clear deadline. The WHO will lose hundreds of millions of dollars in mandatory and voluntary contributions from the U.S., which will be excluded from a global network that decides the yearly makeup of the flu vaccine based on circulating strains. Trump has touted the planned withdrawal in several speeches over the last few days and noted in one that he didn't expect the withdrawal to be so popular. The WHO said it hoped the U.S. would reconsider withdrawing in a statement last week. WHAT WE'RE READING POLITICO's Kyle Cheney and Josh Gerstein report on a second judge preparing to block the White House's federal funding freeze. POLITICO's Adam Cancryn reports on Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s anti-vaccine group's response to his confirmation hearing. The Associated Press reports on a tuberculosis outbreak in Kansas. STAT reports on faltering mental health services despite the launch of a crisis hotline.
Politico
28-01-2025
- Politics
- Politico
Robert Garcia is in the DOGE house
Presented by California Resources Corporation / Carbon TerraVault Driving the Day President Donald Trump's Monday-night Truth Social post took his fixation with California water to new heights by claiming 'the United States Military just entered the Great State of California and, under Emergency Powers, TURNED ON THE WATER.' Not quite. Our Debra Kahn explains. And California Attorney General Rob Bonta said his office is reviewing a Monday order from Trump's budget office to freeze all federal aid with the exception of Social Security and Medicare, a move that could affect billions of dollars in grants to state and local governments. (More on this below.) THE BUZZ: BARKING BACK — Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia says Democrats trying to play nice with Elon Musk on his crusade to slash federal government spending are kidding themselves. Garcia has a different strategy: go on the offensive against the Trump administration's Musk-led effort from the outset. He is the only California Democrat appointed to a new House Oversight subcommittee on the upstart Department of Government Efficiency, better known as DOGE, and will be central to his party's response to proposed spending cuts. The panel is charged with evaluating proposals from DOGE leaders, Musk included, to overhaul federal agencies. Playbook spoke with Garcia over the phone from his office in Washington about why he's deeply skeptical that Musk, a confidant of Trump, is truly interested in efficiency. Garcia argues the true aim of the project is to slash funding for safety-net programs and the Department of Education. 'Their goal,' he said, 'is to destroy our agencies, eliminate the Department of Education, and no state has more to lose in this DOGE fight than California.' Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the subcomittee's chair and a Trump loyalist who has frequently clashed with Garcia, called Trump's DOGE effort a 'mandate from the American people' to 'eliminate waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement within federal agencies. This conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity. Do you think the committee's aims are entirely destructive? Or are there areas where you think it could be successful in finding unnecessary spending? Look, I would welcome a conversation on government efficiency. But I have zero confidence that Marjorie Taylor Greene or the Republicans on this committee are interested in that. They've been pretty clear in what they want to do: roll back the social-safety net. They're talking about how to make Medicare work better — we know what that means, it means making Medicare provide less benefits to people. They've said they flat-out want to eliminate the federal government's role in public education. It sounds like what you're saying is that 'government efficiency' is a guise for broader political aims. Is that fair? That's right. This committee is their way of trying to essentially forever damage our institutions and take away benefits from hard-working Americans. They are using terms like 'government efficiency,' which basically means eliminating departments and eliminating services, especially for working-class people. A handful of Democrats — California Rep. Ro Khanna comes to mind — have talked about finding a way to work with Musk on spending that Democrats consider wasteful. Do you think that's the right approach? I think we need to be very honest about [Musk's] intentions. You just have to read his social media platform to see what he wants to do. He wants to cut trillions of dollars from the federal government. There's no way of doing that without essentially changing the way we deliver Social Security benefits to the public. There's no way of doing that without eliminating or reducing benefits for veterans. We should be very clear that we should not be giving the reins to benefits for working-class people over to the richest man on the planet. I think it is insane to start with the premise that we're going to work with Elon Musk, Marjorie Taylor Greene and, quite frankly, Donald Trump on their scheme to remake the federal government. Californians pay a disproportionate share of the federal government's revenue relative to the benefits the state receives … Well, the most. We're essentially giving more to the federal government than taking back — dramatically more. Yet, we have the most to lose as it relates to our public school students, our veterans and so much more. Where does California stand to lose the most? People are asleep at the wheel in understanding the threat to public education that we're about to face over the next four years. I don't think people understand how dependent schools are — especially K-12, but also community colleges and universities — on federal funds. When it comes to helping the most vulnerable students, it's almost completely federally funded. This worldview that you take care of your own kid … does not take into consideration the needs so many kids and families have. GOOD MORNING. Happy Tuesday. Thanks for waking up with Playbook. You can text us at 916-562-0685 — save it as 'CA Playbook' in your contacts. Or drop us a line at dgardiner@ and bjones@ or on X — @DustinGardiner and @jonesblakej. WHERE'S GAVIN? In Los Angeles, working with emergency officials responding to the fires. DON'T MISS IT: POLITICO AT USC — Join POLITICO's own Chris Cadelago, Sasha Issenberg and Jonathan Martin alongside other political luminaries like James Carville and Reince Priebus at USC's annual Warschaw Conference on Practical Politics on Thursday, Jan. 30. Throughout the day, panelists from politics, government, media and academia will discuss 'The Trumping of America: Why and What's Next.' Please register via Zoom or email California Editorial Director Julia Marsh at jmarsh@ for an in-person invitation. LOS ANGELES HOMEWARD BOUND — Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass announced Monday that all Palisades residents could re-enter evacuated areas, just days after fielding criticism from Trump over the uncertainty of the city's timeline. Trump at a briefing in Los Angeles on Friday had urged the mayor to let people back into their damaged properties within 24 hours. Bass said she expected that would be possible 'within a week' — which, Trump retorted, was 'actually a long time.' Some residents at the meeting interjected to support the president's statements, venting their frustrations over the wait. Zach Seidl, a spokesperson for the mayor's office, said that it was always the plan to let residents back as soon as possible — and that Trump's visit did not affect the timeline. Some residents in the Palisades had already gained access to their properties before today. On Monday in the Pacific Palisades, during a news conference yards away from the damage, Bass suggested the presidential trip was successful. 'And as a matter of fact, they have followed up,' she said about the White House. Bass, who is under intense pressure from the president and Palisades residents to accelerate rebuilding timelines, said the next step is to allow the EPA to remove debris and hazardous waste but could not commit to a solid schedule. 'It would be nice if [the EPA] could say, 'By next week, on this day, at this time, it will be done.' But, you know, that's impossible to do.' Steve Soboroff, a longtime Palisades resident and newly named chief recovery officer, and the mayor will be reviewing major contracting firms, including AECOM, to assist in recovery efforts. They said they expect to have a decision this week. — Nicole Norman SAN FRANCISCO SANCTUARY BY THE BAY — The San Francisco Board of Supervisors will vote today on a resolution to reaffirm the city's status as a sanctuary for undocumented immigrants, a rebuttal of Trump's demands that cities and local law enforcement help carry out his order of mass deportations. The board has unanimously sponsored the resolution from Supervisor Jackie Fielder, a progressive elected last year. But the action is entirely symbolic. Fielder said that's because the city's existing sanctuary law is ironclad, having withstood a prior court challenge during Trump's first term. Fielder, however, said there is room for the city to go further by providing more support to undocumented immigrants seeking legal aid. Currently, she said, there's a waiting list of roughly 1,200 migrants seeking counsel through the city's nonprofit partners. She said while San Francisco talks big about protecting immigrants, 'we don't necessarily provide commiserate funding.' But Fielder's request could face a tough road as Mayor Daniel Lurie and the supervisors grapple with a budget deficit of nearly $1 billion. Lurie has also been hesitant to criticize Trump, arguing voters want him focused on the city's comeback. In a video posted Friday, Lurie said he supports San Francisco's immigration policies. But he didn't respond to Trump by name, a clear shift from prior mayors who've gone head-to-head with him. 'Our policies make us safe,' Lurie said in an Instagram post. 'Their purpose is to ensure that all residents can feel secure interacting with first responders and local law enforcement.' STATE CAPITOL NOT STONKS — Sacramento's budget savants are watching the tech-heavy Nasdaq apprehensively after American artificial intelligence and chipmakers saw their valuations tumble Monday. The cause was the Chinese upstart AI company DeepSeek, which rattled investors when it announced it had trained a sophisticated chatbot at a fraction of the price and with less computing power than American competitors. A sustained downturn in the sector could eat into capital gains and high-paying tech jobs at California companies — both of which power the state's progressive tax structure, as we've reported. 'In the first half of 2024, stock pay alone at four major technology companies accounted for almost 10 percent of the state's total income tax withholding,' the California Legislative Analyst's Office said in November. One of those companies is Santa Clara-based Nvidia, which saw its share price plummet nearly 17 percent by the time markets closed on Monday. California firms' valuations could rebound, preventing a budget hit, but an enduring loss would dent the state's revenue just after it turned a massive deficit into a minuscule surplus with budget cuts, reserve spending and complicated funding maneuvers. CLIMATE AND ENERGY FRIENDLY FIRE — A fire at the world's largest lithium-ion battery in Moss Landing is prompting a California Democrat to use the playbook she developed against oil and gas drilling on one of her party's own darlings — the energy storage industry. Read more about what she wants and who among her colleagues is already pushing back in last night's California Climate. TOP TALKERS OUT OF THE CROSSHAIRS — Kentucky Rep. James Comer appears to have not included any California cities in a letter that he sent to Democratic mayors of major cities that might not be in compliance with the federal government's new immigration policies. 'In addition to the efforts of the Trump Administration to ensure federal immigration enforcement can proceed unimpeded, Congress must determine whether further legislation is necessary to enhance border security and public safety,' Comer wrote. BIG FREEZE — Trump's budget office ordered an expansive freeze of all federal financial services on Monday, which could affect households receiving federal assistance like SNAP food aid, along with federal funding for energy and other infrastructure projects. Social Security and Medicare will not be affected by the freeze. 'The use of Federal resources to advance Marxist equity, transgenderism and green new deal social engineering policies is a waste of taxpayer dollars that does not improve the day-to-day lives of those we serve,' reads the memo obtained by POLITICO. As our colleagues Jennifer Scholtes and Nicholas Wu report, 'The new order could affect billions of dollars in grants to state and local governments while causing disruptions to programs that benefit many households. There was also widespread confusion over how the memo would be implemented and whether it would face legal challenges.' Within hours, Bonta signaled a legal challenge was coming: 'Make no mistake—any pause to critical funding would hurt families and threaten public health & safety,' California's AG wrote. 'We're prepared to protect CA's people and programs from @POTUS' reckless and dangerous actions.' AROUND THE STATE — Derek Kinnison, a Lake Elsinore resident who was pardoned for taking part in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, was met with a standing ovation at a church in Temecula. (Press Enterprise) — Lurie's 'hiring freeze' at San Francisco City Hall is aimed at helping the city address a $876+ million general fund deficit. But the rollout has been messy in practice. (Mission Local) — New Yorker reporter M.R. O'Connor recounts his experience embedding with SoCal firefighters in the Eaton Fire. (The New Yorker) PLAYBOOKERS BIZ MOVES — The Public Policy Holding Company is growing its footprint in California, acquiring TrailRunner International — a multi-continental communications firm founded in Truckee that still has an office of 15 employees in the Lake Tahoe resort town. PPHC, the bipartisan parent company of several government and public affairs firms in the U.S., bought Sacramento-based Lucas Public Affairs last year and KP Public Affairs in 2022 as part of a broader shift toward West Coast investments. It's set to close this latest deal April 1. PEOPLE MOVES — Doug Emhoff, the husband of former Vice President Kamala Harris, will return to corporate law as a partner at Willkie Farr & Gallagher. — Robert Traynham will be president and CEO of the Faith & Politics Institute. He previously has been global spokesperson for Meta, and is a professor at Georgetown University and a Senate GOP alum. — Aaron Sobaski joined the firm Buchalter as a shareholder in the Orange County office. He was previously a partner at Sheppard Mullin. BIRTHDAYS — Rep. Linda Sánchez … former Rep. Brian Bilbray … Matt Gelman at Microsoft … Judge Dean Pregerson … Courtney Subramanian … BELATED B-DAY WISHES — (was Monday): Reuven Firestone ... Avram Miller … (was Sunday): Assemblymember Mia Bonta WANT A SHOUT-OUT FEATURED? — Send us a birthday, career move or another special occasion to include in POLITICO's California Playbook. You can now submit a shout-out using this Google form.
