Principals

1. Trump endorses Jim Jordan
2. Trump’s speaker offer
3. Biden administration restricts migration
4. U.S. downs Turkish drone
5. Deficit concerns rise

PDB: Trump spilled secrets on submarines with Mar-a-Lago guest

Biden talks key jobs report … Nobel Peace Prize to Iranian activist Narges Mohammadi … WaPo: White House lays plans for Biden-Xi meet

— edited by Benjy Sarlin, Jordan Weissmann and Morgan Chalfant

Jim Jordan’s good day

Jim Jordan’s quest to become the next House speaker won a coveted endorsement from Donald Trump, who called the Ohio Republican a “STAR” on Truth Social. But maybe just as important, the Ohio lawmaker also appeared to make some strides toward easing concerns from moderate colleagues about his reputation as a conservative attack dog. During an online meeting with the GOP’s Main Street Caucus Thursday, Jordan promised “to protect moderates and vowed not to put them in tough positions,” according to CNN. That got a positive reaction from Rep. Nick LaLota, a frontliner from New York, who pointed out another one of Jordan’s upsides: Members of the hard right Freedom Caucus actually listen to the guy. Jordan also received a ringing endorsement from Rep. Mike Turner, R-Ohio, one of the House GOP’s strongest supporters of Ukraine aid. That’s notable, since Jordan’s willingness to send Kyiv more help is considered a big question mark that could hurt him with centrists. (He told Fox & Friends he wants more information on the war’s objectives and how aid will be used before providing another round).

Some have already started attacking Jordan for getting too cozy with the GOP’s establishment. One staffer involved in speakership race discussions described Jordan as “McCarthy’s handpicked candidate” — referring to Semafor’s reporting that some of the former Republican leader’s staff have been making calls for Jordan. “Most of the people we’re hearing from who like Jordan are moderate,” the staffer told Semafor. Of course, Trump’s thumbs-up might help on that front.

— Joseph Zeballos-Roig and Kadia Goba

Trump volunteers himself as temporary speaker

If his new plan to play kingmaker in the speaker’s race doesn’t work out, Donald Trump is offering to take the job himself. He told Fox News on Thursday that he may run for the position as a temporary “unifier” until the House GOP can figure out a permanent solution. “I would only do it for the party,” he added. We at Principals are skeptical about how serious Trump’s interest in the job is, to put it mildly. Trump chronicler Maggie Haberman immediately dismissed the idea as “wacky.” Playbook reports this morning that Trump’s Capitol Hill allies talked him out of the idea of becoming speaker, describing the Jordan endorsement as a “pivot.”

The bigger news may be that he’s thinking of visiting the Capitol for the first time since Jan. 6 when the House GOP meets next week to discuss their next steps, though CNN reported last night he’s leaning against the idea. He has some fans eager to welcome him: Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga. gushed that if Trump became speaker, “the House chamber will be like a Trump rally everyday!!” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer dryly noted that “we’ve seen a Trump rally at the Capitol already” — the one that ended with a Trump supporter shot to death as she tried to break into the House chamber, where trapped lawmakers were hiding behind furniture.

Biden’s border crackdown

The White House spent Thursday defending its decision to waive two dozen environmental laws in order to resume building new barriers at the southern border from gloating Republicans and concerned Democrats. Trump claimed vindication and demanded an apology because Biden had promised in their 2020 contest there would “not be another foot” of wall if he won. Progressive Democrats, meanwhile, worried Biden was sliding into performative hawkishness. But the White House, which also announced plans to resume deportation flights to Venezuela on Thursday, claimed the administration’s hands were tied by appropriations bills that required them to spend the money. “The money was appropriated for the border wall,” Biden told reporters. “I tried to get them to reappropriate it, to redirect that money. They didn’t, they wouldn’t.” He added he still didn’t believe walls were an effective solution.

A senior administration official told the media that the new barrier sections would be built on a moveable jersey barrier foundation to give officials flexibility in deploying them and “mitigate the environmental impacts.” Congressional staff are expected to have a call with the Department of Homeland Security on the decision to waive the environmental laws. Rep. Maxwell Frost, D-Fla. argued the administration “could’ve stepped in” to override the move.

— Morgan Chalfant and Kadia Goba

Trouble for U.S.-Turkey relations

A U.S. F-16 fighter jet shot down an armed drone belonging to NATO ally Turkey that came uncomfortably close to U.S. forces operating in Syria on Thursday. The Pentagon said the U.S. was acting in “self-defense” but insisted there was no sign the Turks were deliberately targeting American troops. The decision came after a dozen calls to the Turkish military warning that U.S. troops were in the vicinity, according to the Associated Press. The U.S. has long partnered with Kurdish forces in the region, and the standoff occurred days after Turkey mobilized its military against a Kurdish militant group in response to a terrorist attack in Ankara. A Turkish defense official told Reuters that the drone was not the property of the Turkish armed forces, but didn’t say to whom it belonged. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has already tried to patch things up with his Turkish counterpart Yasar Guler, but the incident doesn’t help tension over Sweden’s membership bid to NATO and Turkey’s desire for more F-16s. “The Turks are downplaying it, and perhaps for NATO reasons the Biden administration may want to keep their views behind closed doors,” Steven Cook, an expert on Turkish politics at the Council on Foreign Relations, told Semafor’s Morgan Chalfant.

We have to talk about the deficit …

Deficits matter again. That’s the consensus taking hold in D.C. thanks to the recent surge in U.S. borrowing costs that has sent Treasury yields to heights last seen in 2007. The U.S isn’t in any danger of defaulting. But the cost of paying down debt is about to become more of a burden on the federal budget, and could cause debt to stack up faster in the future. Some are worried that will lead to higher interest rates across the economy, putting a crimp on business investment and growth. The “scale and upward trajectory of U.S. borrowing and absence of any political corrective now threaten markets and the economy in ways they haven’t for at least a generation,” The Wall Street Journal’s Greg Ip writes. At Slow Boring, Matt Yglesias argues now might actually be a good time for a fusty-sounding deficit reduction commission, unlike when Congress actually tried one under President Obama.

— Jordan Weissmann

RSVP to join us live in Washington D.C. next week. We look forward to welcoming you.

Debating the broadband connectivity challenge RSVP

Date: October 10 | Washington D.C

A morning program to discuss the recent infrastructure law, the new net neutrality proposal, and regulatory red tape create fresh barriers and new solutions for greater broadband connectivity. While there’s broad agreement on the need to increase digital access, there is much debate over how to get there. Program Partner: AT&T

Clean energy’s role in mitigating climate crisis RSVP

Date: October 11 | Washington D.C.

Join us for a 1:1 exclusive interview with Constellation CEO, Joe Dominguez examining the bumps on the road to netzero 2050, the nexus between AI bonanza and clean energy and the risks and opportunities in nuclear energy.

Beltway Newsletters

Punchbowl News: Fox News host Bret Baier will help moderate a “closed debate and discussion” between Republican speaker candidates on Monday.

Playbook: Steve Scalise is playing the “inside game” by lobbying individual members on his candidacy, while Jim Jordan is relying on more of an “outside game” of winning over conservative media figures and heavyweights (like Trump).

The Early 202: Scalise has stronger ties to K Street than Jordan does, both via his network of former staffers and his tenure as whip — and lobbyists expect Scalise would approach corporate America “in broadly the same way McCarthy did.”

Axios: Anti-Trump Republicans are starting to give up on the hope that another candidate can stop him, with donors and state-level candidates alike “quietly stepping back from pushing an alternative.”

White House

• The White House is planning a meeting in California between President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping, where they will attempt to repair the two countries’ fractured relationship. Sort of like a geopolitical couples therapy session. — ​​The Washington Post
• Just in time for the September jobs report, Biden will kick off another leg of his “Investing in America” tour — the administration-wide push to sell his economic agenda that, so far at least, doesn’t seem to have been awfully successful.
• Biden will also celebrate German-American Day by meeting with actual German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier at the White House.
• The administration is considering using the State Department’s foreign military financing program to provide more military assistance for Ukraine. — Politico

Congress

• At least one man in Washington is still all-in on Kevin McCarthy: Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif. released a statement demanding Republicans restore the Californian “as Speaker under party rules that respect and enforce the right of the majority party to elect him.”
• Adam Frisch, the Democrat trying again to unseat Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., reported a huge $3.4 million quarterly fundraising haul.
• New Jersey’s attorney general is reviewing a 2018 fatal car crash investigation involving Sen. Bob Menendez’s wife, Nadine, who hit and killed a person at the time according to a police report. — NBC
• Rep. Lori Trahan, D-Mass. is running for co-chair of the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee, after Rep. Dean Phillips, D-Minn. vacated the leadership spot.

Courts

• ABC News reports that former President Donald Trump allegedly discussed sensitive details about U.S. nuclear submarines with an Australian businessman and Mar-a-Lago member, Anthony Pratt, who went on to relay the information to “scores of others,” including foreign government officials. Special counsel Jack Smith’s team has reportedly interviewed the man.
• The ex-treasurer for indicted Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y. pleaded guilty to a federal fraud conspiracy charge. She admitted to fudging campaign finance reports and said a $500,000 loan Santos claimed to have made didn’t exist.
• Trump sought the dismissal of his federal Jan. 6 charges, arguing “presidential immunity.” He also abruptly dropped a $500 million lawsuit against former attorney Michael Cohen after a scheduling conflict arose between his deposition and a campaign rally.

2024

A federal judge panel finally selected the congressional map that Alabama will rely on in the 2024 elections, giving Democrats another likely pickup in a heavily Black district.

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: Florida sued the Biden administration this week, accusing it of threatening to hold back hundreds of millions of dollars for transportation infrastructure over a state law viewed by critics as anti-labor.

What the Right isn’t reading: Lawyers for MyPillow’s Mike Lindell are trying to withdraw from representing him in defamation cases brought by voting machine companies, citing millions of dollars in unpaid fees. Lindell famously spouted conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.

Hale Feary is a dog trainer at District Dogs in Washington.