Principals

1. Heritage’s Trump playbook
2. Biden-Johnson Ukraine meet?
3. Trump on Navalny
4. Biden campaign fundraising haul
5. Tlaib goes anti-Biden
6. Hostage release push

PDB: Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas faces a serious primary challenge from her former intern, Amanda Edwards

Biden hits the campaign trail in California … Suffolk/USA Today poll: Trump trouncing Haley in South Carolina … WSJ: Musk’s SpaceX deepening ties with U.S. spy, military agencies

— edited by Benjy Sarlin, Jordan Weissmann and Morgan Chalfant

Heritage’s Project 2025 hits a milestone as it plans another Trump term

The Heritage Foundation has recruited over 100 coalition partners to Project 2025, its $22 million outside effort to staff and prep the next Republican presidency. The participants, which include groups like Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America and Turning Point USA, are being tapped to help build a 180-day plan for executive orders, rules, and regulations. “We are doing diagnostics on each federal agency,” Paul Dans, the director of Project 2025, told Semafor’s Shelby Talcott in an interview. While the group is “candidate-agnostic,” Dans said members both expect “and hope” Trump will return to office. Their work, along with similar efforts by groups like the America First Policy Institute, has sometimes created friction with the Trump campaign, which issued a statement last year clarifying that draft proposals from outside groups did not speak for Trump. This week, Project 2025’s policy guide drew the attention of the New York Times for its suggestion that the next GOP president could use the Comstock Act — an inactive 19th century law that banned birth control and abortion medication by mail — to restrict abortion access.

Biden, Johnson trade words on Ukraine

President Biden said he would be willing to meet with House Speaker Mike Johnson to find a path forward on Ukraine aid “if he has anything to say,” days after his own White House officials rejected the idea of a sit down between the two. Johnson’s office said they “welcome the President’s reversal.” Ukraine is in an increasingly precarious position as it waits for another batch of U.S. assistance. At the Munich Security Conference, U.S. senators heard a story about a Ukrainian soldier in a muddy trench “scrolling on his phone for signs the U.S. House would approve military aid,” Politico reported. Ukraine pulled back from the city of Avdiivka over the weekend, which Biden blamed on congressional inaction. The administration is again signaling it may supply Kyiv with longer-range ATACMS, NBC reported, something more hawkish Republicans have demanded for months. But that will only happen if more assistance is approved by Congress, which is on recess until late February. In a statement this morning, White House communications director Ben LaBolt bashed House Republicans for being on “Day 5 of an early, undeserved vacation while their inaction does escalating damage to our national security.”

Trump finally weighs in on Navalny

Donald Trump finally weighed in on Alexei Navalny’s death in an Arctic prison this weekend, but without mentioning the name Vladimir Putin. Instead, he seemingly compared his own legal plight to the Russian opposition leader’s. “The sudden death of Alexei Navalny has made me more and more aware of what is happening in our Country,” he posted on Truth Social. “It is a slow, steady progression, with CROOKED, Radical Left Politicians, Prosecutors, and Judges leading us down a path to destruction.” Other conservative figures have drawn the comparison as well, which Jonah Goldberg writes in the Los Angeles Times represents a “grotesque exercise in Soviet-style propaganda.” Nikki Haley, meanwhile, accused Trump of stealing “a page from liberals’ playbook, denouncing America and comparing our country to Russia.” Meanwhile, the U.S. is considering additional sanctions on Russia in response to Navalny’s death, President Biden said.

The Biden campaign is sitting on a whole lot of cash

The Biden campaign and its allied committees raised $42 million in January, leaving it with $130 million in cash on hand. “January’s fundraising haul — driven by a powerhouse grassroots fundraising program that continues to grow month by month — is an indisputable show of strength to start the election year,” Biden campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez said in a statement. That kind of money could be especially important, Shelby Talcott writes, because Biden is likely to be more reliant on advertising to get his message out and build up his brand than past presidents, who could drive news cycles with interviews and speeches more consistently. On the GOP side, Trump has yet to announce his January numbers, but called for a new RNC chair after a weak fundraising year, and his increasingly expensive legal troubles could limit his campaign’s finances moving forward. Trump-aligned groups spent $50 million on legal costs last year, while Bloomberg reports that funding earmarked for this purpose could run out by summer.

Rashida Tlaib goes there

Michigan Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib urged voters in her state to support the “uncommitted” option in next week’s primary to protest the war in Gaza. “Create a voting bloc, something that is a bullhorn, to say: ‘Enough is enough,’” Tlaib said in a video message posted by Listen to Michigan on the first day of early voting. “Don’t make us even more invisible.” The campaign, led by one of Tlaib’s sisters, is urging all Michiganders who want a ceasefire to vote “uncommitted.” Their goal: To demonstrate how many votes President Biden could lose in November if he doesn’t change course on Israel. Early voting was slow over the holiday weekend, but the Tlaib video represented the first endorsement against Biden by a sitting member of Congress; Rep. Dean Phillips, D-Minn., who is challenging Biden, canceled his planned Michigan events for this week. “When Rep. Tlaib weighs in, that means a lot,” said former Rep. Andy Levin, D-Mich., who endorsed the Listen to Michigan campaign. Levin called on frustrated Democrats to “vote uncommitted to express your anger at the president, and give him a chance to win you back by changing course.”

— David Weigel

Wife of American detained by Taliban presses Biden

The wife of Ryan Corbett, an American the U.S. says is wrongfully detained in Afghanistan, is pleading with the Biden administration to step up work to convince the Taliban to release him. “I am begging the administration to focus on bringing Ryan home as soon as possible before his health deteriorates completely and there’s irreversible physical, emotional damage,” Anna Corbett told Semafor’s Morgan Chalfant in an interview ahead of the couple’s 20th wedding anniversary (which is today). She also criticized the administration, saying the recent release of two former Guantanamo Bay prisoners from house arrest in Oman to Afghanistan shouldn’t have been allowed without some concessions on her husband’s case. Anna Corbett recently met with White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan and said her husband received a visit from Qatari officials in December. He’s lost an alarming amount of weight in prison, she said.

Beltway Newsletters

Punchbowl News: Speaker Mike Johnson’s personal stance on Ukraine aid is still a mystery to lawmakers, some of whom note his public and private statements expressing support for Kyiv and a desire to thwart threats from Russia.

Playbook: Donald Trump’s campaign will send out a memo later today saying that he will “clinch a majority of bound delegates” in the next four weeks and become the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.

The Early 202: Sens. Chris Coons, D-Del. and Thom Tillis, R-N.C. said in a meeting with Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas during last weekend’s Munich Security Conference that the U.S. must remember its isolationist past as Congress struggles to pass Ukraine aid. The lawmakers stressed that “isolationism had disastrous consequences and should not be repeated,” according to Coons.

Axios: A group of 13 Republican senators, led by Sens. Mike Lee, R-Utah and Ted Cruz, R-Texas, are sending a letter to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell calling on him to help force a full impeachment trial for Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.

White House

• President Biden is leaving for California today, traveling first to Los Angeles and then San Francisco and Los Altos Hills for political and official events.
• Vice President Harris will spend the day in Pittsburgh to announce $5.8 billion that will go toward water infrastructure upgrades for communities across the U.S.
• The Biden administration announced plans to give semiconductor manufacturer GlobalFoundries $1.5 billion in funding through the CHIPS and Science Act for three projects across New York and Vermont, the largest grant yet through the administration’s chips program. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo will host an event near Albany today to spotlight the news.
• First lady Jill Biden struggled to pinpoint what she wanted her legacy to be during a meeting with historians at the White House more than a year into Biden’s first term, according to an excerpt from New York Times reporter Katie Rogers’ new book “American Woman.” — Vanity Fair
• President Abraham Lincoln pardoned Biden’s great-great-grandfather, Moses Robinette, who had been convicted of attempted murder. — WaPo

Congress

• Speaker Mike Johnson said he met with Donald Trump on Presidents’ Day.
• Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa. and Jared Golden, D-Maine urged House members to support their foreign aid proposal that includes funding for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan in addition to border security reforms, which they offered as an alternative to the Senate’s failed package. “As we write, Ukraine’s position is imperiled. Its freedom fighters are running out of ammunition and withdrawing from the East, paving the way for Russia’s further advance. This is a direct result of Congress’ gridlock,” they wrote in a Dear Colleague letter. — Punchbowl News
• Get ready to hear a lot more about Jim Biden, President Biden’s brother who will be testifying behind closed doors in House Republicans’ impeachment inquiry later this week. The elder Biden used his brother’s name as he sought deals while working for a now-bankrupt rural health care provider. — Politico
• Donald Trump’s presidential run may be one factor driving the recent wave of retirements among senior Republican House members, CNN reports. “Some of them say, ‘I don’t want to have to endorse him, I don’t want to have to serve under him,’” one GOP lawmaker told the network when asked about the retirements. “That’s something else that is weighing in a lot of the private conversations I’m having.”
• After losing the Houston mayoral race, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas is facing a serious challenge in the state’s March 5 primary from Amanda Edwards — who used to be her intern on Capitol Hill. Kadia Goba profiles the race, which fits a broader pattern of younger politicians trying to move up as longtime incumbents block the way.

Outside the Beltway

Democrats are likely to pick up seats in Wisconsin’s state legislature come November, after Democratic Gov. Tony Evers signed a new legislative map into law on Monday.

Polls

President Biden ranks 14th out of all U.S. presidents in a poll of presidential experts, while Donald Trump still holds his last-place position. The survey leaders note that academics tend to lean left. — LAT

On the Trail

• Donald Trump is participating in a Fox News town hall in Greenville, S.C. today, while Nikki Haley is delivering a “State of the Race” address at Clemson University.
• “Many” top Democrats believe that President Biden would lose the general election to Trump if it were held today and see the March 7 State of the Union address as a chance for the president to reset and overcome concerns about his age. — Axios
• Vice President Harris has been holding meetings at the Naval Observatory with Democrats in order to gather information to push for changes to the Biden campaign’s strategy, including a recent Saturday session with Democratic governors during which she heard complaints from Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer about the campaign’s rhetoric on abortion rights and from Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker on the response to the migrant crisis. — CNN
• Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va. declined to endorse Biden after announcing he won’t launch a third-party presidential bid.
• Rep. Andy Kim, D-N.J. and New Jersey first lady Tammy Murphy debated their qualifications more than anything during the U.S. Senate primary debate, according to Politico. The New Jersey Star-Ledger declared Kim the winner. It’s the latest sign of how Kim turned the race for embattled Sen. Bob Menendez’s seat into a real fight, as Semafor’s David Weigel recently wrote.
• Trump debuted some new (very gold) merch on the campaign trail this weekend.

National Security

• Iranian-backed groups in Iraq have paused attacks on U.S. troops after the head of Iran’s Quds Force, Esmail Qaani, warned of a significant U.S. response to any death of American service members. — Reuters
• The State Department’s inspector general is reviewing the steps leading up to the security clearance suspension and leave of former Iran envoy Robert Malley, Semafor’s Jay Solomon reported.
• China’s announcement last year that it would restrict exports of gallium and germanium “sent a jolt through the White House” and raised concerns about the impact on the U.S. military’s stockpile of essential materials. — Bloomberg

Foreign Policy

• Secretary of State Antony Blinken raised U.S. intelligence suggesting Russia could put a nuclear weapon in space to take out communications during meetings with Chinese and Indian officials on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference. — NYT
• The U.S. is proposing a resolution at the United Nations Security Council warning Israel against an assault on Rafah in southern Gaza, calling for a temporary ceasefire. Israel gave Hamas until Ramadan — which begins March 10 — to return hostages being held in Gaza or else they will mount the ground offensive in Rafah.
• The crew of a cargo ship named the Rubymar had to abandon it after the ship was hit by Houthi missiles in the Gulf of Aden.
• Yulia Navalnaya, the wife of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, vowed to carry on her dead husband’s fight against Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has been widely blamed for Navalny’s death in an Artic penal colony.
• Hungary refused meetings with U.S. lawmakers in Munich who intended to push Prime Minister Viktor Orbán to quickly approve Sweden’s NATO accession. — NYT
• As the U.S. debates future Ukraine aid, Sweden announced a new $683 million military support package, while Estonia’s prime minister called for frozen Russian assets to be seized and given to Ukraine before the U.S. election.
• War in Europe means business is booming for the U.S. defense industry. — WSJ

Migration

The number of African migrants arriving in Mexico grew ninefold last year as tens of thousands attempted to reach the U.S. border.

Business

Capital One is set to buy Discover Financial in a $35 billion deal that would marry two of the country’s credit card giants. Sounds like the bat signal for Elizabeth Warren, if you ask us.

Technology

The European Union is opening a formal probe into whether TikTok violated rules on transparency and protecting minors.

Big Read

It’s a battle of the old-school bloggers over President Biden’s ability to campaign in 2024. On Friday, New York Times columnist Ezra Klein argued Biden should end his run amid signs “he is faltering in his campaign for the presidency because his age is slowing him” and instead allow for an open Democratic convention to choose a consensus replacement. TPM’s Josh Marshall argues this is “completely wrong” and underestimates the potential for a chaotic convention that could “become a forum for litigating highly divisive issues like Gaza, Medicare for All and the broader contest between progressives and establishment-oriented liberals” before producing a wounded nominee weeks before the election. Meanwhile, Nate Silver splits the difference and argues Biden should do a series of high-profile interviews that allow skeptical voters to make up their mind.

Blindspot

Stories that are being largely ignored by either left-leaning or right-leaning outlets, according to data from our partners at Ground News.

What the Left isn’t reading: “Shark Tank” co-host Kevin O’Leary criticized Donald Trump’s civil fraud verdict and said he would no longer invest in New York.

What the Right isn’t reading: Trump’s former lawyer turned critic Michael Cohen predicted his former boss would have to liquidate his assets after the $355 million fraud verdict.

Principals Team

Editors: Benjy Sarlin, Jordan Weissmann, Morgan Chalfant

Editor-at-Large: Steve Clemons

Reporters: Kadia Goba, Joseph Zeballos-Roig, Shelby Talcott, David Weigel

Brendan Boyle is a Democratic congressman from Pennsylvania. He was among a group of U.S. lawmakers who met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference over the weekend.