Principals

1. Trump’s bond trouble
2. Johnson’s vacancies
3. NBC’s RNC hire
4. Harris meets Guatemalan president
5. Tammy Murphy withdraws
6. Putin’s propaganda

PDB: Diverging messages on Ukraine aid

Israel’s Gallant meets U.S. officials … Congress out for two weeks … EU probes Apple, Alphabet, Meta

— edited by Benjy Sarlin, Jordan Weissmann and Morgan Chalfant

Trump faces his $464 million deadline

New York State Attorney General Letitia James could start trying to snatch Donald Trump’s assets as soon as today if he can’t secure a bond for the $464 million civil fraud judgment against him. But don’t expect her to go after Trump Tower right away. First, the former president has asked an appeals court to let him post a smaller bond, and James might wait to start the complicated seizure process until after its ruling, expected later this week. “She doesn’t want to be accused of being overly aggressive and unfair,” one criminology professor told the Washington Post. Seizing assets is also difficult and James might choose to focus on easier targets like bank accounts, rather than Trump’s buildings or personal property. Keep in mind that Trump should eventually have some financial cushion thanks to the tidy $3 billion he’s expected to net from the recent SPAC deal to take Truth Social public. But he may not be able to sell shares to unlock cash for six months. In other legal news: Trump is expected in court today for his Manhattan criminal case at a hearing that will decide whether his trial gets pushed back beyond April 15.

Mike Johnson has to fill a bunch of empty committee slots

Early retirements aren’t just whittling down the GOP’s House majority — they’re also forcing Speaker Mike Johnson to restock key committees, Semafor’s Kadia Goba reports. In the coming weeks, Republicans will need to select new leaders for two top panels and fill at least a half dozen other vacancies including on the Foreign Affairs, Oversight, and Intelligence committees. The Speaker’s office said they’ll decide on at least one replacement this week. The vacancies are growing in part due to House China select committee Chairman Mike Gallagher’s decision to leave Congress early on April 19, as well as plans by Rep. Kay Granger to step down from her position as House Appropriations chair. Tom Cole, R-Okla., the current chair of the House Rules Committee, is expected to easily capture the Appropriations post, Kadia reports, but that will open up yet another committee gavel.

McDaniel’s hire sparks an on-air rebellion at NBC

NBC News’s hire of former RNC chairwoman Ronna McDaniel is part of a broad effort in corporate America — and its big media conglomerates — to get ready for a second Trump administration, Semafor’s Max Tani writes. Former “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd criticized network executives on air yesterday after his successor, Kristen Welker, interviewed McDaniel. “Our professional dealings with the RNC over the last six years have been met with gaslighting, have been met with character assassination,” Todd said. MSNBC anchors voiced concerns about her RNC’s challenges to the 2020 results, and the cable channel’s president reassured them that they won’t be forced to book McDaniel. During the interview with Welker, McDaniel defended her November 2020 phone call with Trump to Michigan GOP canvassers, but broke with him on his vow to pardon Jan. 6 rioters and acknowledged that Biden won the 2020 election. Meanwhile, NBCUniversal and CNN have begun to take Trump live again, but Fox won’t. Notable: NBC also faced some newsroom blowback for hiring Jen Psaki quickly following her stint in the Biden White House.

Harris takes on the ‘root causes’ of the migration crisis

Vice President Harris is reprising her ambivalent role as the face of the Biden administration’s efforts to address the “root causes” of the migration crisis. She’ll meet with Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo today and plans to announce several new actions aimed at slowing the flow of Central American asylum seekers to the U.S., including $1 billion in new private funding for economic development. As the administration’s point person on the Northern Triangle, Harris has enjoyed some low-key success scoring these sorts of pledges by companies to invest in the region. But as the LA Times recently reported, immigration experts now see the administration’s early focus on Central America as a “miscalculation” that failed to anticipate how the migration problem would expand to other nations, such as Venezuela. President Biden is still considering an executive order on border security (the “nuclear option,” as one official described it to Axios) as polls show substantial public dissatisfaction with the government’s handling of the influx of migrants.

Murphy bows out of New Jersey’s Senate race

New Jersey first lady Tammy Murphy ended her U.S. Senate campaign on Sunday, explaining in a three-minute video that she wanted to avoid “a divisive and negative campaign.” She never mentioned Rep. Andy Kim, who’s now on a glide path to win in the June 4 primary, after indicted Sen. Bob Menendez said he’d skip it and run as an independent after his expected “exoneration.” Murphy was initially seen as the race’s favorite, but found herself trailing in polls against Kim, who also bested her at nine county Democratic conventions to decide which candidate’s name would win the party’s critical endorsement line on the ballot. Kim portrayed himself as an insurgent progressive facing a machine candidate, while some of his supporters went negative on his behalf. Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman, for instance, called Murphy a “nepo” Democrat who was leaning on her husband to win, and Jersey City Mayor Stephen Fulop, who’s running to succeed Gov. Phil Murphy next year, switched his support to Kim and said he’d been “disappointed” by the first lady’s lackluster campaign.

— David Weigel

Following the Moscow attack, the Kremlin blames the West

Islamic State militants quickly claimed credit for last week’s Moscow terror attack that left more than 130 dead. But so far, the Kremlin is trying to lay blame on the West. In his speech following the killings, President Vladimir Putin suggested the perpetrators were fleeing “toward Ukraine” where a “window” had been prepared for their escape. Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of state broadcaster Russia Today, was blunter — “It was not Isis. It was the Ukrainians,” she wrote on Telegram. She also suggested the U.S. was a “direct” participant in the strike. The message has been greeted with some skepticism inside Russia, as The Wall Street Journal reports. (“What could Ukraine gain from this terror attack is not very evident,” one political analyst mused on RBK TV). The U.S. quickly judged that ISIS-K was behind the attack, and Vice President Harris knocked down the Kremlin claims during an ABC interview. But given Putin’s near total domination of Russian information, it’s unclear that the attack will ultimately dent his image as a strongman capable of guaranteeing security. Outside the country, analysts are noting the Kremlin’s single-minded focus on Ukraine has led it to drop its guard elsewhere.

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Beltway Newsletters

Punchbowl News: Speaker Mike Johnson will hold fundraisers as well as meetings in California, Arizona, Arkansas, and Florida during the two-week recess.

Playbook: The on-air protests against NBC’s hiring of Ronna McDaniel continued this morning, with Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski pushing back on “Morning Joe.” “We weren’t asked our opinion of the hiring but, if we were, we would have strongly objected to it for several reasons,” Scarborough said.

The Early 202: The motion to vacate offered by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga. could further complicate any effort by Johnson to bring Ukraine aid to a vote.

Axios: Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio was a major force behind Ohio Senate candidate Bernie Moreno’s fundraising. Organizers credited Vance with bringing in $1 million in donations to the super PAC backing Moreno, who won the GOP primary last week.

White House

• The White House criticized House Republicans for barring U.S. embassies from flying the LGBTQ pride flag in a government funding bill that President Biden signed last week and said he would work to repeal it.
• Biden and Vice President Harris are having lunch today.
• Biden has actually cut taxes overall. — NYT

Congress

• Welcome to spring break: The House and Senate are on recess and return the week of April 8.
• Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. defended her use of the word “genocide” to describe the looming famine Palestinians are facing as Israel wages war in Gaza. — CNN
• House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul told CBS that Speaker Mike Johnson committed to putting a Ukraine aid bill on the floor “after Easter.” “I would like to be done with it as soon as possible. I think the situation in Ukraine is dire,” he said. Meanwhile, Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas predicted on CNN that Johnson would face “a problem within the ranks” if he allowed a vote on Ukraine aid without border security measures, pay-fors, or a path for Israel aid.
• Lawmakers who support a bill that would force ByteDance to divest TikTok (or ban the app) are facing unusually personal pushback — from their own kids. “I’m driving home and she sent me some texts, and it was ‘please don’t destroy TikTok, I’m going to get bullied,’” Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa. said of his daughter. — WSJ
• Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska wouldn’t rule out leaving the Republican Party to become an independent.
• Vice President Harris visited the scene of the 2018 shooting in Parkland, Fla. over the weekend. She met with Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Fla.

Outside the Beltway

Voters in Chicago rejected a “mansion tax” pushed by Mayor Brandon Johnson that was supposed to pay for homelessness services.

Polls

Less than a third of U.S. adults say they attend religious services every week or almost every week, according to new figures from Gallup that are coming out amid Ramadan and ahead of Easter and Passover. The group most likely to say they attend services every week? Mormons.

On the Trail

• Billionaire GOP donor and ByteDance investor Jeff Yass was, as of last December, the largest institutional shareholder of the company that just merged with Donald Trump’s media group. Yass — and Trump’s relationship with him — have come under scrutiny following Trump’s reversal of his position on banning TikTok in the U.S. “A person close to Mr. Trump’s campaign said that Mr. Yass was expected to give a large donation to a group supporting the former president’s political campaign. Mr. Yass said through a spokesman that he had never given to Mr. Trump and had no plans to do so,” the New York Times reports.
• President Biden’s campaign and the DNC have a team dedicated to knocking down Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — Axios

Foreign Policy

• The U.S. and Japan will unveil plans to “restructure the US military command in Japan to strengthen operational planning and exercises between the nations” when President Biden welcomes Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida for a state visit next month. — FT
• Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen plans to travel again to China next month. — Politico
• Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador laid out his plan for securing the border in an interview with “60 Minutes.” One plank: He’d like the U.S. to give $20 billion per year to poor countries in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Technology

China has an edge over the U.S. in artificial intelligence research talent. — NYT

Big Read

Republicans might have a House majority on paper. But in practice, Speaker Mike Johnson has been forced to lean on Democrats in order to pass major legislation, including last week’s $1.2 trillion spending plan. On Sunday, the Wall Street Journal published the best breakdown yet of the bipartisan coalition that has de facto been responsible for running business in the House, and concludes that its “largest voting bloc by far is made up of House Democrats.” That often put Republicans at a disadvantage in budget negotiations. “What we heard from the other side was, ‘Hey, we’re gonna bring 200 votes to the table.…What are you going to bring?’” one GOP member said. “It gave them leverage that they wouldn’t otherwise have.”

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: James Carville blamed “preachy females” for President Biden’s slump in the polls.

What the Right isn’t reading: Celebrities including Arnold Schwarzenegger joined with California Gov. Gavin Newsom to launch an effort dedicated to restricting new oil and gas wells.

Principals Team

Editors: Benjy Sarlin, Jordan Weissmann, Morgan Chalfant

Editor-at-Large: Steve Clemons

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

Nick LaLota is a Republican congressman representing New York’s 1st congressional district.

What’s your biggest policy obsession at the moment?

Beyond addressing [state and local tax deduction], it’s imperative for Congress and the Administration to overhaul our Status of Forces Agreements with allies. Our service members and their families deployed overseas deserve the same legal rights and protections as they would have in the U.S. I successfully included provisions in last year’s NDAA to address this issue, but there’s much more to be done.

You meet a genie that can magically make one single bill become law. What would it be?

Lifting the SALT cap, hands down. Thousands of families on Long Island would be helped by any increase in the cap but I want to see it lifted completely.

Which Democrat would you call a pal?

Fellow Naval Academy grad and [House Armed Services Committee] member Chris Deluzio, who co-chairs the Navy and Marine Corps Caucus with me. I worked with him on a bipartisan rail safety bill and always love sharing stories about Annapolis and our time in the Navy with him.

What’s the best restaurant ON Long Island? Let’s keep it within your district.

Those who know me understand I’m a proud Italian-American and if you follow my social media you know I love grabbing a slice of pizza between meetings back home. For a quick bite, get a cold-cheese pizza slice at Little Vincent’s in Huntington. For a nice sit down meal, go to Robke’s in Northport and get the Bronx chicken parm – with the vodka sauce. Fuhgettaboutit.

It’s a tough call though.

OK, now for a tough question: It’s a milestone birthday. Who do you pick to perform for the night? Taylor Swift or Billy Joel?

Long Island’s own Piano Man for sure – not just because he went to the same high school as my mother (Hicksville HS). Though I hope that my daughters (ages 14, 12, and 9) and their friends don’t read this because they are already mad at me for “banning” TikTok.

• NATO may take over some US responsibilities for Ukraine aid.
• Hydrogen’s biggest problem: No one wants to buy it.
• Big tech companies are relying on old playbooks to expand their AI empires.