Politico

PHILADELPHIA — President Joe Biden’s campaign is finally waking up.

After inching forward earlier this year at such a slow pace that it worried Democrats, Biden is kicking his reelection bid into a higher gear. He’s hosting a series of fundraisers, rolling out new staff members and announcing key endorsements.

On Saturday, he is also holding his first rally of the 2024 presidential election cycle in Philadelphia.

The flurry of activity is likely to calm the nerves of at least some Democrats as Biden begins to show the urgency that they felt was lacking when he first announced he was running for reelection in April. But it almost certainly won’t appease others in the party who are concerned that Biden is still not moving at the clip needed to take on former President Donald Trump or, perhaps, a younger, more formidable Republican opponent.

“We see the cadence of activity ramping up significantly. There are two big things that I think make this important. One is it gets the president out there even more actively making a political as well as a policy case on a day-to-day basis,” said Robert Gibbs, who served as press secretary to former President Barack Obama. “Secondly, it takes a while to build a campaign. It takes a while to raise the money that they’re going to need, to get everybody in fighting shape and to kind of get in the rhythm of that.”

With 17 months to go until the election, and no serious primary contender challenging Biden, the biggest priority for the reelection campaign is raising money. Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and first lady Jill Biden are fanning out across the country over the next two weeks to headline fundraisers.

The president will travel to Atherton and Kentfield, Calif.; Chevy Chase, Md.; and Chicago for big-money events, according to invitations obtained by POLITICO. Govs. Gavin Newsom (D-Calif.) and JB Pritzker (D-Ill.) are among the boldfaced names who will be featured at those receptions.

The first lady will take off to Minneapolis and Nashville, Tenn. to collect checks, while Harris will be in New York City, Dallas and Potomac, Md., for fundraisers. The most expensive tickets for the events are going for $100,000, with perks that include platinum tables, photo lines and a VIP prereception.

The events in the final weeks of June are all timed around the end of the fundraising quarter, when Biden and other presidential candidates will be required to disclose how much money they raised. It is especially important that Biden posts a big number to stave off concerns within the party that there is a lack of excitement for him among voters and donors. Seventy percent of Americans — and 51 percent of Democrats — said Biden should not run for reelection in the days preceding his announcement, according to an April poll by NBC.

A faster pace by the campaign could also help tamp down some questions about Biden’s age. The president, who is now 80, would be 86 at the end of his second term if he were reelected. He has tried to deflect the persistent commentary about being too old through a touch of humor.

But a full-on campaign by Biden still likely won’t begin for months, people close to the effort said. Biden himself had, at times, signaled a desire to wait until the fall to launch the reelection effort, yet relented when aides stressed the need to begin fundraising. Additional major campaign rallies may not start until late this year or early next, following the example of other presidents’ Rose Garden reelection strategies.

While bringing in funds is the most urgent task at hand, the Biden campaign has also begun staffing up their communications team. Biden has tapped Michael Tyler, a Democratic National Committee and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) alum, to be his communications director. TJ Ducklo, who previously worked as a Biden White House aide before departing under a cloud of controversy, will be the campaign’s senior communications adviser. Rob Flaherty, Biden’s director of digital strategy, is also leaving the White House and expected to join the reelection effort.

Biden’s allies have unveiled endorsements in recent days as well, with the AFL-CIO officially backing Biden this week — earlier than it has ever voted to endorse a candidate in a presidential election, the group said. At the same time, four of the biggest environmental groups in the country threw their weight behind Biden on Wednesday.

“They’re showing momentum behind the president and his campaign. I think they’re showing that he’s going to go out and make a powerful case for his own candidacy. And that he’s got a lot of support from key constituency groups,” said Ron Klain, Biden’s former chief of staff. “They’re all signs of strength.”

Ray Zaccaro, AFL-CIO’s director of public affairs, said the group’s endorsement unlocks “a mobilization force unlike any other,” emphasizing that union members will now be able to start knocking on doors and advertising to boost Biden. He disputed the idea that an enthusiasm gap exists among voters for Biden.

“I will tell you that that is simply not true when it comes to labor,” said Zaccaro. “Labor is incredibly enthusiastic about what this president has done.”

Biden will cap off the week with a rally with union members in the president’s familiar stomping grounds of Philadelphia. The president will give a speech focused on his economic accomplishments, highlighting jobs created during his tenure, the country’s low unemployment rate and a manufacturing “boom,” according to a Biden aide.

“The values of the labor movement — our values — are written in his heart,” said Lee Saunders, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.

Along with the political events, Biden spent the last week running a kind of shadow campaign from the White House, according to four people familiar with the strategy but not authorized to discuss internal deliberations. Biden highlighted longtime Democratic priorities such as stricter gun laws, while also touting popular, easy-to-digest campaign appetizers like an effort to combat junk fees.

His team believes that those events showcased the type of successful formula that Democrats can and will use going forward: A heads-down approach that contrasts with a Republican Party rife with internal frictions. This week far-right Republicans fought against their own party leadership on the House floor, and the GOP’s leading 2024 candidate was inside a federal courthouse being arraigned for allegedly mishandling some of the nation’s most sensitive secrets.

“They’re going to have a carnival of chaos. We’re going to have serious, thoughtful, adult, grown-up leadership that is touching the issues that people actually care about,” said Pennsylvania Democratic state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta, a member of Biden’s national advisory board.

Or, as one senior Democrat close to the White House put it: “The more people are talking about Trump and less about us, the better off we are.”

The U.S. secretary of State is finally headed to Beijing, but the “thaw” in relations predicted by the administration may be slow to follow.

Antony Blinken is set to arrive in China this weekend for a series of meetings with senior officials including Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang. A senior State Department official who spoke on condition of anonymity told reporters to “stay tuned” regarding whether Blinken might meet with paramount leader Xi Jinping. The trip comes four months after Blinken’s initially planned visit was scuttled by the furor over a Chinese spy balloon found traversing the United States.

Since then, the Biden administration has repeatedly expressed its desire to reschedule Blinken’s visit, outreach thatBeijing has repeatedly rebuffed. The administration hopes this trip will be at least the first step toward an eventual summit between President Joe Biden and Xi.

The administration describes Blinken’s trip as part of a longer-term effort to cool the bilateral rancor that has effectively frozen high-level diplomatic dialogue for almost five months.

“It’s not a matter of one trip and one conversation,” the senior State Department official said. Blinken will use his Beijing meetings “to disabuse China of some of the misperceptions it has about what we’re trying to do even as we’re also very clear about our intent when it comes to standing up for our interests and trying to advance our values.”

U.S. officials say Blinken’s agenda will include tensions over Taiwan, unjustly jailed U.S. citizens in China and Beijing’s alignment with Russia’s war on Ukraine. Still “some sort of breakthrough or transformation in the way that we deal with one another” is unlikely, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel Kritenbrink told reporters on Wednesday.

Blinken will also underscore the objectives of U.S. economic policy toward China. “We are very determined to de-risk…. We’re not about decoupling. We’re not about containing China. We’re not about trying to hold it back economically,” the state department official said.

Chinese officials head into those meetings reiterating a narrative of China as a victim of U.S. suppression and containment efforts.

The U.S. should “stop interfering in China’s internal affairs and undermining China’s sovereign security and development interests in the name of competition,” Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang said in a readout of his phone call with Blinken on Wednesday. Blinken’s one-sentence summary of that call focused on avoiding “miscalculation and conflict.”

Beijing isn’t toning down that combative rhetoric. Successful dialogue with China requires the U.S. “to give up the illusion of dealing with China ‘from a position of strength,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said on Friday in reference to Blinken’s trip.

Last month President Joe Biden predicted a “thaw” in U.S.-China relations. Within days, Chinese Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao had flown to the U.S. for meetings with Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai. But Beijing’s denial of a request by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to meet with his counterpart Li Shangfu at the Shangri La Dialogue defense summit in Singapore earlier this month suggested that bilateral ties remained tenuous outside of the economic sphere.

“The script appears to have flipped — it feels like Beijing is granting a favor by merely allowing Blinken to go,” said Ivan Kanapathy, former director for China, Taiwan and Mongolia at the National Security Council. “Beijing is accepting a Blinken visit as a step toward engaging [Treasury Secretary Janet] Yellen, who they see as more favorable to their priorities and interests,” Kanapathy said.

The administration is pushing back on that perception. “We approach this visit from a position of strength and confidence,” said the senior state department official.

Asked about Blinken’s planned visit last week, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said: “Communication should not be carried out for the sake of communication…the U.S. needs to stop interfering in China’s internal affairs and stop harming China’s interests.”

And now Blinken’s trip could be overshadowed by another revelation about China’s espionage operations against the United States. A Biden administration official revealed last week that China has been spying on the U.S. from a base in Cuba for years. That allegation is “slander and smears,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said Monday.

Some GOP lawmakers are already arguing that Blinken’s trip effectively rewards Beijing for bad behavior. Blinken’s outreach reflects “a misguided desire to re-engage” that may be “emboldening CCP aggression,” said Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), chair of the House Select Committee on China. Blinken’s trip symbolizes the Biden administration’s “continued weakness in the face of PRC aggression,” said Michael McCaul (R-Texas), chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Others on Capitol Hill warn that abandoning efforts to reduce tensions with Beijing could backfire. The current communications deficit “could mean we’re one miscalculation or one misunderstanding away from a catastrophe,” said Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.), a member of the House Select Committee on China.

Rep. David Trone (D-Md.), co-chair of Biden’s Commision on Combating Synthetic Opioid Trafficking said the Blinken meetings are key to resuming cooperation on fighting fentanyl trafficking.Americans continue “dying in record numbers from fentanyl sourced from China-supplied precursors,” he said. A large portion of the precursor chemicals Mexican drug cartels use to make fentanyl come from China.

And the transactional approach could just lay the foundation for a longer-term improvement in ties.

A series of senior U.S. officials meeting their counterparts in Beijing over the coming months can “generate processes that hopefully break down distrust and create conditions for productive, cooperative engagements in the future,” said Nirav Patel, who served as deputy assistant secretary of State in the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs in the Obama administration.

And it could pave the way for a long-awaited summit between Biden and Xi later this year.There is speculation that their presence at the APEC summit in San Francisco in November could provide the opportunity for a sideline meeting, but neither Washington or Beijing have publicly disclosed any preparatory discussions for such a meeting. But the constraints of the U.S. political calendar require substantive progress on contentious bilateral issues long before November.

“We have like a six-month window,” said Zack Cooper, former assistant to the deputy national security adviser for combating terrorism at the National Security Council, now a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

“By the time that we get to December and January, between the election in Taiwan and the primary season in Washington, it’s going to be very difficult to make any progress or even perhaps to have any substantial meetings,” Cooper said.

The presumption that Democrats’ 51-seat Senate majority would give President Joe Biden a bit more breathing room has crashed hard into the reality of the 2024 election cycle, as several moderates have gone wobbly or — in Sen. Joe Manchin’s case — downright oppositional when it comes to advancing some of the White House’s legislative priorities and nominees.

But this week, presidential politics have actually bailed out the administration and saved Vice President Kamala Harris a few trips to Capitol Hill.

With Manchin opposing Biden’s nominee to lead the Council of Economic Advisers, Jared Bernstein, some Senate Democrats assumed Harris would have to head to the Hill on Tuesday to break a 50-50 tie, as she did a record 29 times over the administration’s first two years when the Senate was evenly divided. Harris, whose office is routinely in contact with Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s team and the Office of Legislative Affairs about what’s on the schedule, and where and when she may be needed, was on standby.

And she would have been needed — if every Republican was present.

Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) wasn’t in the Capitol when Bernstein’s floor vote took place. He had just traveled north to New Jersey to join Donald Trump at his Bedminster mansion for a rally of sorts just hours after the former president was indicted in a Miami courtroom. White House legislative affairs staffers keeping watch in the Senate chamber relayed the surprising news to the vice president’s office that she wouldn’t have to scramble her schedule and motorcade across town.

On Wednesday, Harris’ office was prepared for another deadlocked Senate vote. Once again, Manchin was voting against a Biden judicial nominee, Dale Ho. And, once again, a Republican missed the vote. Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), now running for president himself, was scheduled to host a town hall with caucus-goers in Pella, Iowa, according to a release from his campaign.

Harris, whose team got word Wednesday morning that aides felt “pretty good there would be a Republican absence,” stayed put across town in her office in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building.

According to a source familiar with operations, OLA staffers will send Harris’ team a weekly email flagging votes that could require her to break a tie. Her office will then chat through various contingencies, figuring out how her schedule might change in the event of a last-minute trip to the Hill.

Scott was absent once again on Thursday, sparing Harris for a third straight day. Even with Manchin opposed, the Senate was able to confirm Nusrat Choudhury to be a U.S. District Judge for the Eastern District of New York by a 50-49 vote.

“With an election right around the corner, vote counting is going to get a lot more difficult,” said Jim Manley, a longtime aide to Democratic Senate Leader Harry Reid. “It’s just a calculation both sides are going to have to make.”

Given that Republicans took back control of the House in November, the White House isn’t expecting the third and fourth years of Biden’s term to be as focused on legislation as his first two were. Instead, aides are looking to implement and sell voters on what they’ve done.

One main exception, however, is with nominations, as the administration continues what communications director Ben LaBolt called an “intense focus” on getting judges confirmed (Choudhury was the 134th Biden judicial nominee the Senate has approved). Chief of staff Jeff Zients, who an administration official said convenes a weekly meeting to go over confirmations and figure out creative ways to get nominees through a narrowly-divided Senate, tweeted that Choudhury’s confirmation was a demonstration of “what a priority this is for @POTUS.”

On such votes, Democrats can only afford to lose one member on their side and still confirm nominees with Harris casting the decisive vote — a matter complicated further by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), whose poor health could lead to future absences.

“We recognize we are in a new phase,” one White House official said, noting that Biden is ahead of his recent predecessors with the pace of overall confirmations.

Biden’s first nomination to replace a departed Cabinet member appears to be stalled, as acting Labor Secretary Julie Su does not appear to have the 50 votes needed to win confirmation and shed the “acting” label unless a Republican comes to her rescue. But the White House has yet to withdraw her nomination. That’s not because they’re hoping to sneak her through when enough Republicans are absent, officials said. Rather, discussions with key lawmakers are ongoing.

Senate Democratic leaders have thus far opted against taking advantage of GOP absences in a way that would be considered a breach of decorum that could alienate the moderates in their own caucus.

Tuberville has angered Democrats for imposing a hold on around 250 Pentagon promotions in protest of the department’s new policy to pay travel costs for service members seeking abortion or other reproductive care. His absence Tuesday offered Schumer and Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) an unexpected opportunity to attempt to push them through without him there. While Durbin said it was “tempting,” he decided against it.

That said, Democrats’ calculations could always change as election season nears, with decorum giving way to political expediency, the longer the administration’s nominees and promotions are stalled.

Several ticketing and travel companies are committing to get rid of hidden fees for buyers in the United States, President Joe Biden announced Thursday.

Biden made the announcement alongside representatives from private-sector companies including Airbnb, SeatGeek and Ticketmaster parent company Live Nation, all of which have pledged to provide consumers with the full price of their tickets upfront. The announcement marks a step forward in Biden’s plan to ban “junk fees” — the extra charges often applied to travel, ticket and banking transactions — as part of a broader appeal toward working-class voters.

“This deal shows collective bargaining works,” Biden said at the White House. “When employers and workers come together to agree on a deal that works for both of them, it’s good for the economy and keeping our supply chain open.”

The companies did not commit to eliminating the actual fees, promising instead to disclose them from the beginning of the transaction rather than in the final stage before payment. The issue came to national attention in November when Live Nation and its Ticketmaster subsidiary drew criticism for hidden fees, as well as widespread glitches, during sales for Taylor Swift’s latest tour.

In the last year, the president has made reducing these hidden surcharges a priority, calling for an end to junk fees in hisState of the Union address in February. He called on Congress to pass a “Junk Fee Prevention Act,” and has also asked the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the Transportation Department to increase their oversight on hidden charges.

“The companies represented here today are voluntarily committed to all-in, upfront pricing,” Biden said. “Some of them have used this process for years, like TickPick, Dice and the Newport Festival Foundation. Tens of millions of fans have already benefited from this decision. Others, like Airbnb, have started giving customers the option of seeing all-in prices since we called for action last year, and other businesses are committing today.”

The White House event followed aThursday-morning announcement from Biden that Live Nation had committed to introduce an “upfront all-in pricing experience” in September. Ticketing companies SeatGeek and xBk will also begin introducing all-in pricing models.

Biden has continued to call for action from Congress, requesting legislation that mandates upfront pricing for all ticketing companies and eliminates early termination fees from cable, internet and cellphone companies. Biden has also advocated for the elimination of family seating fees on airlines, and recently commended Alaska Airlines, Frontier Airlines and American Airlines for committing to fee-free family seating in light of his State of the Union address.

Four of the nation’s biggest environmental advocacy groups officially endorsed President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign Wednesday night, an early declaration of support that also served as a show of appreciation for having passed the most significant climate legislation in history last year.

Biden trekked across town from the White House to receive the endorsement in person, speaking at the League of Conservation Voters’ annual fundraising dinner in a concert venue along Washington’s southeastern waterfront.

“Many of you have been with me throughout my career and I can’t tell you how much it means to have your support again,” Biden said, taking the stage after the endorsement was announced. “Together we’ve made a lot of progress, but we’ve got to finish the job.”

The backing of the four major green groups — LCV, NextGen PAC, NRDC Action Fund and the Sierra Club — was no surprise, especially after last year’s passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, which included $370 billion in subsidies for clean energy projects.

But it does mark the first time the groups have jointly announced a presidential endorsement. And for Biden, running virtually unopposed for the Democratic nomination despite widespread concerns from within the party about his age, it may be the first of several such announcements to be rolled out early — locking in key advocacy groups and party constituencies at a moment when the nascent campaign is still being developed.

The president is scheduled to travel to Pennsylvania for a political event Saturday with union leaders, an event that will reportedly coincide with another major endorsement from the AFL-CIO, the labor behemoth that has never before backed a presidential candidate this early in the election cycle. The Wall Street Journal was the first to report that the endorsement was in the offing.

At Wednesday’s dinner, environmental advocates lauded Biden for signing several executive orders on climate during his first days in office and bringing environmental justice groups into the policy-making process. They also praised him for successfully shepherding a major climate package through Congress that has reshaped U.S. industrial policy around clean energy, drawing $200 billion in new investments to launch more than 130 projects in more than 30 states.

“Since Day One, President Biden and Vice President Harris have cut through the division in Washington to prioritize and deliver transformational progress on climate, jobs, and justice, and have jump-started our transition to a more equitable clean energy future,” said Tiernan Sittenfeld, LCV Action Fund’s senior vice president of government affairs. “We are so grateful for their leadership and are all-in to help reelect President Biden and Vice President Harris so they can finish the job.”

Not all environmental advocates are as thrilled with Biden; in March, the president approved the massive Willow oil-drilling project in Alaska despite pushback from activists who worried it would undercut efforts to meet the nation’s emissions reduction goals. Biden, who has tried to reframe the climate crisis as a huge economic opportunity, featured the IRA’s climate program during his appearances on the campaign trail last fall — but he also told lawmakers during the State of the Union that the U.S. would “still need oil for at least a decade.”

Buoyed by the IRA’s passage and Democrats’ better than expected midterm results last fall, climate activists are convinced that their movement has become something of a political force and vowed to mobilize younger voters and others galvanized by climate concerns to support Biden’s reelection effort as it takes shape.

Biden’s campaign manager, Julie Chavez Rodriguez, said in a statement that the four green groups’ will offer “essential organizational support … and will better position our campaign to reach into communities where they have built trusted relationships to activate voters.”

President Joe Biden and his top aides have taken a vow of silence on the federal indictment of his predecessor, Donald Trump — and have explicitly ordered the national Democratic Party and his reelection campaign to do the same.

That directive was issued in recent days after Trump was hit with federal charges for his handling of classified documents after he left the White House, according to three people familiar with the instructions. But that decision has some Democrats and allies worried that Biden could miss a chance to underscore the seriousness of the national moment as well as deliver a political blow to his top White House rival.

Biden declared at the start of his presidency that he would not discuss Department of Justice investigations, particularly those about the former president, and he remained tightlipped when Trump was arraigned Tuesday in a Florida courthouse.

Some in his inner circle hope the decision will be revisited if next year’s general election looks like it could be a rematch with Trump, even if the legal fight has not been resolved by then. As the president’s advisers chart a court for the campaign to come, they are aware that continued silence about the charges facing Trump would deprive Biden’s reelection effort of a potent political weapon.

The number of criminal cases Trump faces are growing and could soon include charges of election interference and inciting the Jan. 6 riot. Those acts make up much of Biden’s long standing case that Trump poses unique threats to American democracy, and there could eventually be a move to allow surrogates and leading Democrats, even if not the president himself, to squarely address the criminal charges.

But Biden to this point has been explicit: The entities that the White House controls, which includes the reelection campaign and the Democratic National Committee, are not to publicly discuss any of the criminal investigations into Trump. Those closest to the president are deeply wary of any perception that Biden is trying to influence the investigations.

“I have never once — not one single time — suggested to the Justice Department what they should do or not do, relative to bringing a charge or not bringing a charge,” Biden told reporters Thursday. “I’m honest.”

Some left-leaning groups outside Biden’s control have already commissioned ads about Trump’s legal woes, which Democratic officials believe helps do the dirty work for them. And first lady Jill Biden did venture a public comment, bemoaning the Republicans standing by Trump in the face of the indictment.

“My heart feels so broken by a lot of the headlines that we see on the news,” she told donors at a fundraiser Monday night in New York. “Like I just saw, when I was on my plane, it said 61 percent of Republicans are going to vote, they would vote for Trump.”

“They don’t care about the indictment. So that’s a little shocking, I think,” she added.

But those groups and the first lady have a more limited reach than the party’s political apparatuses and the president himself. Biden has privately told aides that he is disgusted by Trump’s behavior but is adhering to his promise that the Department of Justice would have independence from the White House. The DNC, meanwhile, has advised members of Congress seeking guidance on what to say that they should not comment on the Trump probes if they are speaking publicly in their role as Biden campaign surrogates.

While Biden has framed his stance as in line with longstanding tradition, it is not uncommon for presidents to occasionally weigh in on ongoing criminal investigations. Biden has at times done so himself — including weighing in before the verdict was announced in the 2021 trial of the white Minneapolis police officer who killed George Floyd.

Some people in Biden’s orbit believe that the moment calls for his imprimatur, outlining for the nation the gravity of a former president facing charges in a federal court. Others believe it would be political malpractice to not make Trump’s woes a campaign issue and privately said that they wish the president’s campaign would take on the issue directly.

They argue that the charges connected to Trump’s alleged reckless mishandling of some of the United States’ top secrets shows that he is unfit for the job. And they believe that both the ongoing January 6 and Georgia election interference probes illuminate their central campaign arguments.

“It’s a pretty easy argument to make,” said one senior Democrat not authorized to publicly discuss private conversations. “Vote for our guy, because the other guy is going to jail.”

There is a possibility that the decision could be revisited next year, multiple people close to the process said this week. One option being bandied about is that while Biden would maintain his silence on the Trump investigations, other top Democrats and surrogates would take up the argument. But even that — which aides warn may not ever happen — would likely not occur for months, perhaps after a possible conviction, or after Trump has clinched the GOP nomination. And advisors acknowledge that Biden himself may need to weigh in at a moment when it would be impossible not to comment, like a potential general election debate against Trump.

Some aides also think that if Trump were to be charged for his actions on Jan. 6, Biden would feel comfortable enough talking about the tragedy of that day without linking it to any crimes allegedly committed by his predecessor. Other Democrats believe the current silent treatment is the right approach — and don’t want to inadvertently get in the way of a bad Trump news cycle.

“The Justice Department needs to be able to make its prosecutorial decisions independent of influence from any administration,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said to Politico on Tuesday. “Donald Trump tried to use the Justice Department as a political tool. Joe Biden has said he absolutely will not do that, and I respect that.”

Those close to the president also acknowledge a particular sensitivity at the moment on matters related to the Department of Justice, which is believed to be nearing a charging decision in its investigation into Biden’s son. Hunter Biden is being probed for tax crimes and a potentially illegal purchase of a firearm. While the president has maintained his public silence on the case — other than to offer support for his son — he has privately expressed frustration at the length of the investigation and worries about the outcome of the probe, according to two people close to him.

While Biden has tried to maintain a distance from DOJ affairs, Republicans have been hammering home the talking point that he is using his Department of Justice to investigate his top political rival ahead of 2024.

“The Biden Administration continues to egregiously weaponize the federal government against Joe Biden’s top political opponent,” said Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), a member of the House GOP leadership, at a House Republicans news conference Tuesday. “The unequal application of justice by Joe Biden’s DOJ must be stopped. There cannot be one set of rules if your last name is Biden or Clinton and another set of rules for everyone else.”

Those supporting or working on Biden’s re-election ultimately believe they have other compelling arguments to make beyond pointing to Trump’s legal troubles. They believe the president’s week provides an advantageous split screen set nicely against the backdrop of chaos that has descended upon the Republican-controlled House after nearly a dozen far right members rebelled against Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

The president will hit a lot of key 2024 issues, including civil rights, environmental causes, the GOP tax plan and gun regulations, as well as appear with Vice President Kamala Harris at a rally with union workers Saturday in Philadelphia.

The White House, Biden campaign and the Democratic National Committee all, fittingly, declined to comment.

Jennifer Haberkorn, Adam Cancryn and Holly Otterbein contributed to this report.

It’s been more than a month since the Biden administration ended the Trump-era Title 42 public health order, and rather than a massive surge of migrants, the southern border has seen a reduction in crossings.

But privately, Biden officials worry that things could get bad again and soon.

“There was absolutely a feeling of, we can exhale now,” said a former Biden administration official, who was granted anonymity to speak freely about the mood among current administration officials. “But there’s also enough experience that nobody is going to roll out a band, or say it’s mission accomplished. It’s too fluid.”

For the White House, the southern border has long resembled something akin to political quicksand, creating major headaches for President Joe Biden. For a period of time, he deputized Vice President Kamala Harris to address the steadily increasing number of migrants coming to the country through Mexico. But the criticism has endured and has loomed over his reelection bid as 2024 GOP contenders latch onto the issue.

The administration’s hesitancy to declare victory now that border crossings have plummeted speaks to how vexing the issue remains for Biden and how politically scared his team has been by the matter. But it also reflects a belief inside the Biden administration that without a rewrite of immigration laws in Congress, its efforts to tackle the fundamental forces behind migration to the southern border won’t produce straight-line progress.

In anticipation of the end of Title 42, which allowed border agents to immediately expel millions of migrants on Covid prevention grounds for more than three years, the Biden administration took a carrot-stick approach, combining tough consequences for unlawful border crossers and an expansion of lawful pathways and processes for those coming to the country legally.

 Administration officials credit those steps with the success they have witnessed over the past month. But they also believe it is a Band-aid approach, one that can’t fix a broken immigration system or guarantee the prevention of another surge. In the coming months, a number of legal challenges to its humanitarian parole program and asylum ban threaten to undo the very crux of the Biden administration’s post-Title 42 policy response.

And so, they’ve remained subdued, as they continue to implement additional patchwork fixes.

While the new asylum restrictions kicked in on May 12, the administration is still working to launch centers throughout Latin America to process migrants. On Monday, the U.S. and Guatemala began a six-month pilot phase in the Central American country, and officials on Sunday announced a trial run for centers in Colombia will start on June 19.

“They are swimming in numbers. They are swimming in capacity. The scale of the operation here has been significant,” said an immigration policy expert who asked to remain anonymous to discuss private conversations with administration officials. “When I say swimming, I don’t mean to suggest that they didn’t plan well. But they planned as much as they possibly could with the resources they have. They are trying every day to make sure all the systems they’re trying to set up are functional, but it is building train tracks while the train is moving out of the station.”

The administration did issue a press release last week, linking their new immigration policies to a 70 percent drop in illegal border crossings. Their plan is “working as intended,” the Department of Homeland Security said in the press release.

But more detailed explanations for the drop in the number of border crossings may be things that the White House finds politically uncomfortable to discuss. Immigration experts, former administration officials, and lawyers working with migrants on the ground, note that the Biden administration’s policies are more punitive than Title 42.

Its new asylum ban, which many in the immigration advocacy space have likened to the Trump-era transit ban, bars some migrants from applying for asylum if they cross the border illegally or fail to first apply for safe harbor while crossing through another country on the way to the U.S. Last month, the Biden administration also returned to expedited removal processes under a decades-old provision of the U.S. Code (Title 8), which allows the government to remove from the country anyone unable to establish a legal basis.

While expulsions under Title 42 often led to repeat crossings, removal under Title 8 bans those migrants from the country for five years. The administration is also deporting some non-Mexican migrants to southern Mexico, enhancing the deterrent effect.

This is likely why encounters between ports of entry skyrocketed to more than 10,000 in the days leading up to May 11, said Dylan Corbett, founding executive director of the nonprofit Hope Border Institute. Migrants were trying one last time before punishments grew harsher.

From May 12 to June 2, DHS said it sent 38,400 migrants, including single adults and families, back to more than 80 countries. Unscheduled encounters plummeted to roughly 3,700 a day.

Other policy experts point to the Biden administration’s aggressive messaging campaign in the lead-up to May 11 as a reason for the number of crossings going down after Title 42 ended. DHS secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, among other administration officials, hit the airwaves multiple times that week, warning that the borders aren’t open.

“It may be one of the few instances in which a government communications campaign that was very strongly emphasized to say ‘no, the border won’t be opened and we have these new rules in place that will make sure not only that if you don’t do it the right way, you can’t get asylum but it would prevent you from ever asking’ caused people to take notice,” said Theresa Cardinal Brown, senior adviser for immigration policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center.

On a technical level, experts also tie the declining numbers to the decision to shift the main gateway for American asylum to the CBP One app, a mobile application that allows migrants to request an appointment to appear at a port of entry. DHS said it would now admit 1,250 asylum seekers through the application at official border crossings each day.

But, as with the case with the other administration policies, the increased use of the CBP One app may not be a panacea. While advocates have praised the increase in appointments, Zoe Martens, advocacy coordinator at Kino Border Initiative, said many migrants still can’t get a sought-after slot. Some people have decided to stay put on the Mexican side of the border while they try to secure an appointment, but others have told Martens they’re not sure they can continue to wait in often dangerous conditions and will take their chances without one.

“It’s kind of this impossible decision,” Martens said.

Ultimately, administration officials concede that one month is too early to know the long-term impact of Title 42 ending. There is broad uncertainty as to whether these patterns will hold and how migrants will decide to proceed in the coming weeks and months as desperation levels continue to rise.

Legal challenges from both sides of the political spectrum are also lurking in the background.

If a court manages to strike down the asylum ban, the Biden administration would lose its strictest deterrence measure to date. And without its humanitarian parole program, which accepts 30,000 migrants from Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Haiti a month, the administration would no longer be able to hold up its end of the deal with Mexico, which has agreed to continue accepting some migrants from Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba and Haiti if they don’t pursue available legal pathways.

The Biden administration, immigration policy experts warn, is simply in a holding pattern.

“We don’t know because we’re in such new territory. This administration is really developing and using new tools together that have never been used before,” the former Biden official said. “Are the measures big enough that they can diminish the urge to come between ports of entry and illegally? Nobody knows. And if they tell you they know, then they’re bullshitting.”

Relatively obscure nominations are turning into Senate knife fights as 2024 approaches. And the Commerce Committee is the center of the action.

So far this year, three Biden picks for executive-branch positions withdrew because they lacked enough support in the committee, which has four Democratic members up for reelection in swing states next fall. And when Republicans stick together — under the surprising leadership of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) — that can cause problems.

In theory, the Democratic Senate can unilaterally confirm anyone with 50 votes and push nominations through committees with simple majorities. But that requires near-total party unity — which isn’t always easy to achieve on the Commerce Committee, other panels or the Senate floor.

It’s a dynamic that could force Biden to keep acting officials in some top jobs, which Trump took to extremes and elicited Democratic criticism. But the Biden administration, congressional Democrats and the nominees themselves are realizing some fights aren’t even worth having.

Take Ann Carlson, who Biden tapped to run the National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration. Facing tough attacks from Cruz and committee Republicans, she removed herself from consideration two months after the White House nominated her.

The Biden administration “realized that there’s no reason to go through this” because the agency can continue to function without a Senate-confirmed nominee, said a Democratic senator familiar with the nomination, granted anonymity to speak candidly. A White House official said Carlson made the decision to withdraw.

The Carlson episode is instructive for a White House and Democratic Senate that’s faced several tough nomination crunches. At the moment, Labor Secretary hopeful Julie Su is in the highest-profile fight, as a handful of Democratic senators remain undecided and there’s no floor vote in sight.

Su may be able to serve as acting secretary through the election if needed, according to a person familiar with the nomination.

White House officials expressed confidence in the overall percentage of nominees they’ve pushed through the 51-49 chamber, including the recent confirmation of Dilawar Syed to the No. 2 job at the Small Business Administration after two years of delay.

The Senate has confirmed more than 850 Biden administration appointees as of this week, according to a White House official. That’s more than the Trump administration had at this point despite larger GOP majorities.

Still, it’s not hard to see why the Commerce Committee is so tough: The combative Cruz is the top Republican on the panel. And the committee’s Democratic members include incumbent Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.), Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.), Jon Tester (D-Mont.) and Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.).

In addition to Carlson, the nominations for Biden’s FAA administrator Phil Washington and FCC Commissioner Gigi Sohn both faltered in the Commerce Committee. Tester put it this way: “I could blame it on Cruz, but I don’t know that to be the truth.”

Still, the withdrawal is a point of pride for Cruz, who had criticized Carlson’s position on fuel economy standards, Washington’s lack of aviation experience and Sohn’s progressive positions.

“The Senate has defeated three non-judicial Biden nominees,” Cruz said. “All three had been in the Commerce Committee.”

Commerce Chair Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) said in an interview that each nominee’s circumstances were different, calling Carlson’s withdrawal a “surprise” and Sohn’s defeat earlier this year less so: The administration “knew exactly what was going to happen,” Cantwell said. “We tried to fight for her. We didn’t have the votes.”

“It’s no secret that Republicans have made blocking the president’s nominees a top goal, especially when it comes to positions protecting consumers,” Cantwell added in a statement. “Democrats will never stop fighting for President Biden’s nominees who will stand-up for American consumers.”

The American Accountability Foundation, a conservative opposition research group run by a former staffer for Cruz’s 2016 presidential bid, took credit for helping dismantle Sohn and Washington’s nominations. The White House official blamed “an onslaught of unfounded Republican attacks” for Washington’s defeat and said Sohn “would have been a strong FCC commissioner.”

Su, meanwhile, is still in limbo after she got through the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, which also has jurisdiction over her confirmation. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is laboring to confirm her but declining to guarantee confirmation, or even a floor vote.

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) said he’s “nowhere” on Su, but Democrats are operating as if he is opposed, according to a person familiar with the matter. That leaves no margin for error given the assumption that all Republicans will vote no. Moderate Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) both voted against Su in committee.

There’s little political upside for a vulnerable incumbent to publicly support a nominee who may never get a vote. Tester said “I want to keep my options open until we have a vote” on Su and Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) similarly demurred.

That’s frustrating their colleagues from solidly blue states.

“I haven’t been told factually why people would be against her. We’re not even talking about the Republicans,” said Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii). “I’m just at a loss.”

Biden “has confidence” in Su, who is currently serving as acting labor secretary, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said this week: “We’re going to do everything that we can to make sure that she actually becomes secretary.”

White House officials and outside groups — including labor unions — have maintained a steady drumbeat of support for Su’s nomination, according to a White House official granted anonymity to detail private conversations. They regularly participate in a “war room” call on the effort.

Chief of staff Jeff Zients and Director of Legislative Affairs Louisa Terrell are in regular touch with Schumer and senators, according to the official. Terrell is working with Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) and Rep. Judy Chu (D-Calif.) to coordinate support.

Past Su and the Commerce Committee, the logjam on judicial nominees has eased since Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) returned to the Judiciary Committee, allowing Democrats to advance Biden nominees who lack GOP support. Still, it hasn’t been all roses there either: Two of the president’s lifetime judicial picks, Jabari Wamble and Michael Delaney, have withdrawn in recent weeks and a third, Scott Colom, is facing a veto from Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi.

Still, Biden and the Democrats have prevailed on other tough fights. Former Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti muscled through the Senate in March after a nearly two-year stall. The Biden administration is making headway with Republicans on some judicial nominees.

And with an evenly split Senate last Congress, Cantwell was able to confirm FTC commissioners Lina Khan and Alvaro Bedoya and Consumer Product Safety Commissioner Mary Boyle over some rigid GOP opposition.

The president has already tapped Anna Gomez to replace Sohn as the FCC nominee, and Cantwell believes she has better prospects. The senator added that she hopes the administration nominates new candidates for the FAA and NHTSA.

And while Democrats are often able to go around Republicans to unilaterally confirm nominees, early Republican blockades make it that much more difficult to unite their caucus. Even the public defection of one Democrat, like Manchin’s opposition to Sohn, can be enough to force a withdrawal.

“They’re having problems on their side,” said Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), a former Commerce Committee chair. “They just hope that when they push hard enough, that eventually their members will come in line. But there are a couple of cases now where that’s not been true.”

John Hendel and Tanya Snyder contributed to this report.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken is planning to travel to Beijing as soon as next week, two people familiar with the scheduling told POLITICO.

The trip — for which the State Department is still finalizing details — will mark the highest-level visit of a U.S. official to China since that of then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in 2018.

Blinken is on track to arrive in Beijing following his current trip to the Middle East, one of the two people said. Both were granted anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about sensitive diplomatic travel.

The Secretary of State is in Saudi Arabia this week for multiple meetings, including a gathering of countries battling the Islamic State terrorist group.

Asked for comment about the China plans, State Department spokesperson Vedant Patel said we “don’t have any travel to announce for the Secretary.” The Chinese Embassy in Washington did not confirm Blinken’s upcoming China visit. Spokesperson Liu Pengyu said only, “China is open to having dialogue with the United States.”

Blinken can expect sharp criticism from GOP lawmakers for traveling to China in the wake of reports on Thursday that Beijing is in talks with Cuba to establish a foothold there to spy on the United States. Both the U.S and Cuban governments have denied those allegations.

The Biden administration has been working to renew high-level diplomatic and military communication following a near breakdown over the Chinese spy balloon incident in February. Blinken had originally been scheduled to visit China few days later and postponed because of the rancor over the balloon.

One of the goals of a trip to Beijing earlier this week by Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel Kritenbrink and National Security Council senior director for China and Taiwan Affairs Sarah Beran “was to make sure the lines of communication remain open and to talk about the potential for future visits, higher-level visits,” National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said on Tuesday.

Chinese Foreign Ministry officials have publicly rebuffed Biden administration outreach in recent weeks citing everything from U.S. export restrictions on high tech semiconductors, ongoing arms sales to Taiwan and the Biden administration’s rallying G-7 member countries last month to work on “de-risking and diversifying” their economies to rely less on China.

Last month, President Joe Biden predicted a “thaw” in U.S.-China relations. Within days, Chinese Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao had flown to the U.S. for meetings with Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai. But Beijing’s denial of a request by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to meet with his counterpart Li Shangfu at the Shangri La Dialogue defense summit in Singapore suggested that bilateral ties remained tenuous.

Nahal Toosi contributed to this report.