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Leigh Ann Caldwell, Peter Hamby, Julia Ioffe, Marianna Sotomayor, John Heilemann, & Abby Livingston
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Sunday through Thursday
Puck’s daily political newsletter from Washington—featuring Leigh Ann Caldwell, Peter Hamby, Marianna Sotomayor, Julia Ioffe, John Heilemann, and Abby Livingston—on what’s really happening in this town, from the White House to the Pentagon to Capitol Hill, K Street, the campaign trail, and beyond.
THE LATEST ARTICLES
Abby Livingston
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July 7, 2025
A Big Beautiful Midterm Battle
Democrats see Trump’s signature legislation as an obvious liability for the G.O.P.—and a wide-open path to flip the House in the midterms. But Republicans have a sales pitch of their own.
Abby Livingston
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June 30, 2025
Mamdani Dearest
Democratic strategists and operatives are processing Zohran Mamdani’s shocking victory in New York in real time: the implications for incumbents, lessons for candidate recruitment, the challenge of managing the far left, and why the Israel issue isn’t going away. Herewith, some of their early takeaways.
Abby Livingston
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June 24, 2025
Miracle on the Potomac?
Republicans are bracing for an emergency landing of their Big Beautiful Bill, on or around the July Fourth holiday, whether they want it or not. It may not be pretty, but “it will pass,” a source close to G.O.P. leadership assured me—“one way or another.”
Abby Livingston
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June 16, 2025
D.C.’s Stock Trading Epidemic
Senate Democrats (and a few Republicans) are reviving efforts to ban stock trading by members of Congress—a surprisingly complex issue with bad actors on both sides of the aisle.
Abby Livingston
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June 9, 2025
Mike Johnson’s Blood Sacrifice
The Big Beautiful Bill will likely return to the House with cuts to the SALT deduction that blue-state Republicans can’t stomach—forcing them to decide between aggravating Trump or their constituents, with the fate of the G.O.P. majority on the line.
Abby Livingston
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June 2, 2025
More Rahm Than Right
As Trump’s grip weakens, Democrats are recruiting candidates straight from the Rahm Emanuel 2006 playbook: military vets, small-business owners, health care workers, etcetera. Career politicians and Biden insiders need not apply.
Abby Livingston
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May 26, 2025
The Democrats’ Original Sin Pandemic
As the Tapper-Thompson exposé on Biden’s gerontocracy hits Washington, House Democrats are coming to terms with their own culpability in supporting an aging caucus.
Abby Livingston
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May 19, 2025
A Big, Beautiful Mistake?
A growing contingent of Republicans point to Trump’s decision to unleash tariffs before tax cuts as a tactical error—and wonder if they still have the political momentum to pass his megabill with all its components intact.
Abby Livingston
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May 12, 2025
Liberation Day Revisited
Republicans are enjoying a sudden reprieve from the looming economic calamity of tariff-induced dislocations and the specter of empty shelves. But there’s still plenty of political pain ahead, from a battle over SALT and Medicaid cuts to nagging fears that the G.O.P. could be in trouble in Texas.
Abby Livingston
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May 5, 2025
All the Oversight We Cannot See
Gerry Connolly’s looming retirement from Oversight has once again set off a leadership scramble: A.O.C. may be out, for now, but the dam has broken for a House Democratic caucus riven by generational change.
