Tag: us democratic party

Google earned $10 million by allowing misleading anti-abortion ads from ‘fake clinics,’ report says | CNN Business

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New York
CNN
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Google has earned more than $10 million over the past two years by allowing misleading advertisements for “fake” abortion clinics that aim to stop women from having the procedure, according to an estimate from a report released Thursday from the non-profit Center for Countering Digital Hate.

The estimated amount is microscopic compared to the more than $200 billion Google generates from ad sales annually. But the report’s data hints at the broad reach pro-life groups can have by placing these advertisements in Google results for common phrases searched for by abortion seekers.

Using Semrush, an analytics tool, researchers at the CCDH identified “188 fake clinic websites” that placed ads on Google between March, 2021 and February of this year. CCDH estimates that ads for fake clinics were clicked on by users 13 million times during this period.

Some searching for “abortion clinics near me” on Google instead found results directing them toward so-called “crisis pregnancy centers” that may try to talk abortion-seekers out of treatment and offer medically unproven abortion pill reversal techniques, according to the report.

Other Google searches populated by crisis clinic ads included “abortion pill,” “abortion clinic” and “planned parenthood,” the report said, with clinics in states where abortion is legal spending two times as much as those in states with bans.

In the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v Wade, Google faced calls from Congressional Democrats to do more to prevent searches for abortion clinics from returning results for misleading ads – as well as calls from Republican lawmakers to do the opposite. The dueling pressure from lawmakers highlighted how central Google can be for women searching for information on the procedure.

In a statement Thursday, Google said its approach to abortion ads follows local laws and that any advertiser targeting certain keywords or phrases related to abortions must complete a certification to confirm if it does or does not provide abortion services.

“We require any organization that wants to advertise to people seeking information about abortion services to be certified and clearly disclose whether they do or do not offer abortions,” a Google spokesperson told CNN. “We do not allow ads promoting abortion reversal treatments and we also prohibit advertisers from misleading people about the services they offer.”

“We remove or block ads that violate these policies,” the company added.

Google said it does not allow for abortion reversal pill advertisements because the treatment isn’t approved by the FDA. In response to Thursday’s CCDH report, the company told CNN it took “enforcement action” on content violating this policy.

Google has continued to face scrutiny in recent months for the steps it takes to protect abortion seekers’ location data.

Nearly a dozen Senate Democrats wrote to Google in May with questions about how it deletes users’ location history when they have visited sensitive locations such as abortion clinics. The letter came after tests performed by The Washington Post and other privacy advocates appeared to show that Google was not quickly or consistently deleting users’ recorded visits to fertility centers of Planned Parenthood clinics.

Google previously declined to comment on the lawmakers’ letter. Instead, it referred CNN to a company blog post that includes abortion clinics on a list of sensitive locations, but did not explain what it means when it claims the data will be deleted “soon after” a visit.

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April 12, 2021
Why Republicans can’t get out of their climate bind, even as extreme heat overwhelms the US | CNN Politics

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CNN
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Deadly heatwaves are baking the US. Scientists just reported that July will be the hottest month on record. And now, after years of skepticism and denial in the GOP ranks, a small number of Republicans are urging their party to get proactive on the climate crisis.

But the GOP is stuck in a climate bind – and likely will be for the next four years, in large part because they’re still living in the shadow of former president and 2024 Republican frontrunner Donald Trump.

Even as more Republican politicians are joining the consensus that climate change is real and caused by humans, Trump’s inflammatory rhetoric has driven the party to the right on climate and extreme weather. Trump has called the extremely settled science of climate change a “hoax” and more recently suggested that the impacts of it “may affect us in 300 years.”

Scientists this week reported that this summer’s unrelenting heat wave would have been “virtually impossible” were it not for the planet-warming pollution from burning fossil fuels. They also confirmed that July will go down as the hottest month on record – and almost certainly that the planet’s temperature is hotter now than it has been in around 120,000 years.

Yet for being one of the most pressing issues of the 21st century, climate is rarely mentioned on the 2024 campaign trail.

“As Donald Trump is the near presumptive nominee of our party in 2024, it’s going to be very hard for a party to adopt a climate-sensitive policy,” Sen. Mitt Romney, a Republican from Utah, told CNN. “But Donald Trump’s not going to be around forever.”

When Republicans do weigh in on climate change – and what we should do about it – they tend to support the idea of capturing planet-warming pollution rather than cutting fossil fuels. But many are reticent to talk about how to solve the problem, and worry Trump is having a chilling effect on policies to combat climate within the party.

“We need to be talking about this,” Rep. John Curtis, a Republican from Utah and chair of the House’s Conservative Climate Caucus, told CNN. “And part of it for Republicans is when you don’t talk about it, you have no ideas at the table; all you’re doing is saying what you don’t like. We need to be saying what we like.”

With a few exceptions, Republicans largely are no longer the party of full-on climate change denial. But even as temperatures rise to deadly highs, the GOP is also not actively addressing it. There is still no “robust discussion about how to solve it” within the party, said former South Carolina Rep. Bob Inglis, who now runs the conservative climate group RepublicEn, save for criticism of Democrats’ clean-energy initiatives.

“The good news is Republicans are stopping arguing with thermometers,” Inglis told CNN. Still, he said, “when the experience is multiplied over and over of multiple days of three-digit temperatures in Arizona and record ocean temperatures, people start to say, ‘this is sort of goofy we’re not doing something about this.’”

Meanwhile, the impacts of a dramatically warming atmosphere are becoming more and more apparent each year. Romney and Curtis, two of the loudest climate voices in the party, both represent Utah – a state that’s no stranger to extreme heat and drought, which scientists say is being fueled by rising global temperatures.

“There are a number of states, like mine, that are concerned about wildfires and water,” Romney said, adding he believes Republican governors of impacted states have been vocal about these issues.

Utah and other Western states are looking for ways to cut water use to save the West’s shrinking two largest reservoirs, Lakes Powell and Mead. And even closer to home, Utah’s Great Salt Lake has already disappeared by two-thirds, and scientists are sounding alarms about a rapid continued decline that could kill delicate ecosystems and expose one of fastest-growing metropolitan areas in the nation to toxic dust.

“I think the evidence so far is that the West is getting drier and hotter,” Romney told CNN. “That means that we’re going to have more difficulty with our crops, we’re going to have a harder time keeping the rivers full of water. The Great Salt Lake is probably going to continue to shrink. And unfortunately, we’re going to see more catastrophic fires. If the trends continue, we need to act.”

While Republicans blast Democrats’ clean energy policies ahead of the 2024 elections, it’s less clear what the GOP itself would prefer to do about the climate crisis.

As Curtis tells it, there’s a lot that Republicans and Democrats in Congress agree on. They both want to further reform the permitting process for major energy projects, and they largely agree on the need for more renewable and nuclear energy.

As the head of the largest GOP climate caucus on the Hill, Curtis’ Utah home is “full solar,” he told CNN, and is heated using geothermal energy.

While at a recent event at a natural gas drilling site in Ohio, as smoke from Canada’s devastating wildfire season hung thick in the air, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy was asked how he would solve the climate crisis. He suggested planting a trillion trees to help offset the pollution created by burning fossil fuels – a bill House Republicans introduced in 2020. The measure has not yet passed the House and has an uncertain future in the Senate.

But the biggest and most enduring difference between the two parties is that Republicans want fossil fuels – which are fueling climate change with their heat-trapping pollution – to be in the energy mix for years to come.

Democrats, meanwhile, have passed legislation to dramatically speed up the clean energy transition and prioritize the development of wind, solar and electrical transmission to get renewables sending electricity into homes faster.

On Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Democrats want to pass more climate legislation if they take back a full majority in Congress. He later told CNN the GOP is “way behind” on climate and there’s been “too little” progress on the party’s stances.

“I think we’d get a lot more done with a Democratic House, a Democratic president and continuing to have a Democratic Senate,” Schumer told CNN. “Unfortunately, if you look at some of the Republican House and Senate Super PACs, huge amounts of money come from gas, oil and coal.”

Even though Curtis and Romney are aligned on the party needing to talk about climate change, they differ on how to fix it. While Curtis primarily supports carbon capture and increased research and development into new technologies, Romney is one of the few Republicans speaking in favor of a carbon tax – taxing companies for their pollution.

“It’s very unlikely that a price on carbon would be acceptable in the House of Representatives,” Romney said. “I think you might find a few Republican senators that would be supportive, but that’s not enough.”

The idea certainly doesn’t have the support of Trump, or other 2024 candidates for president, and experts predict climate policy will get little to no airtime during the upcoming presidential race.

“Regrettably, the issue of climate change is currently being held hostage to the culture wars in America,” Edward Maibach, a professor of climate communication at George Mason University and a co-founder of a nationwide climate polling project conducted with Yale University, told CNN in an email. “Donald Trump’s climate denial stance will have a chilling effect on the climate positions of his rivals on the right — even those who know better.”

Even if climate-conscious Republicans say Trump won’t be in the party forever, Inglis said even a few more years may not be enough time to counteract the rapid changes already happening.

“That’s still a long way away,” Inglis said. “The scientists are saying we can’t wait, get moving, get moving.”

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April 12, 2021
Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey will run for reelection, boosting Democrats’ Senate outlook for 2024 | CNN Politics

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Washington
CNN
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Sen. Bob Casey will run for reelection in 2024, the Pennsylvania Democrat announced Monday morning, providing good news for Democrats in a pivotal swing state.

“Folks, I’m running for reelection,” Casey, 62, said in an announcement posted on Twitter. “There’s still more work to do to cut through the gridlock, stand up to powerful special interests and make the lives of hardworking Pennsylvanians easier. The map is back, and I’m not done yet.”

Pennsylvania is one of several Senate battlegrounds where the party will be pressed to defend its slim majority. In 2022, the open seat Senate race in the Keystone State between Democrat John Fetterman, the eventual winner, and Republican Mehmet Oz was among the most expensive and competitive of the cycle.

Casey is seeking his fourth term representing Pennsylvania in the Senate. The veteran Democrat had been noncommittal on his reelection plans up to this point, and in February he announced that he had undergone surgery for prostate cancer which “should not require further treatment,” according to his office.

According to his latest FEC filings – which are set to be updated later this week – Casey had a little over $3 million in cash on hand stockpiled as of the end of 2022. Those funds and more will be critical in the upcoming contest, as Casey’s colleague, Fetterman, raised more than $76 million during his competitive 2022 race.

Potential Republican challengers include David McCormick, a wealthy businessman who unsuccessfully ran against Oz in the state’s 2022 GOP Senate primary and who could pour millions from his personal fortune into another bid.

McCormick has publicly expressed interest in the race, releasing a book and touring.

“I’m thinking about it, obviously,” McCormick told CNN about a potential Senate run.

And Doug Mastriano, the unsuccessful far-right nominee for governor in 2022, has also teased the possibility of running for Senate in 2024.

“What do you do with a movement of 2.2 million?” Mastriano told Politico. “We’re keeping it alive.”

Casey could stand to benefit from a competitive GOP primary with echoes of 2022, when a drawn out, bitter contest between McCormick and Oz helped Fetterman strengthen his position heading into the fall campaign.

This story has been updated with additional developments.

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April 12, 2021
Exclusive: McConnell details GOP efforts to not ‘screw this up’ in 2024 Senate battle | CNN Politics

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CNN
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Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell should be brimming with confidence.

Republicans are in the driver’s seat to take the Senate majority: with 23 seats held by Democrats, compared to just 11 for Republicans. There are likely just two GOP incumbents whose seats Democrats may try to flip – and both are in Republican terrain – while three Democrats hail from states that former President Donald Trump easily won in 2020.

The Kentucky Republican just scored a prized recruit in West Virginia and expects two other top candidates to jump into races in Montana and Pennsylvania. And after tangling last cycle with Florida Sen. Rick Scott, his last chairman of the Senate GOP’s campaign arm, he is now in line over strategy and tactics with the committee’s new chairman, Montana Sen. Steve Daines.

But in an exclusive interview with CNN, McConnell made clear he knows full well that things can quickly go south. So he’s been working behind the scenes for months to find his preferred candidates in key races – including during his recent recovery from a concussion and a broken rib – in an attempt to prevent a repeat of 2022: When a highly favorable GOP landscape turned into a Republican collapse at the polls and a 51-49 Senate Democratic majority.

“No, no – I’m not,” McConnell said with a chuckle when asked if he were confident they’d take back the majority next year. “I just spent 10 minutes explaining to you how we could screw this up, and we’re working very hard to not let that happen. Let’s put it that way.”

In the interview, McConnell gave his most revealing assessment in months of the field forming in the battle for the Senate. He said that his main focus for now is on flipping four states: Montana, West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania. He said Republicans are still assessing two swing states with Democratic incumbents: Wisconsin, where the GOP is searching for a top-tier candidate, and Nevada, where he expects to likely wait until after next year’s primary to decide whether to invest resources there.

And in what is emerging as the most complicated state of the cycle – Arizona – McConnell said there’s a “high likelihood” that Republican leaders would wait and see first who wins the GOP primary next year before deciding whether to engage there at all. Plus he doesn’t see any chance that Sen. Kyrsten Sinema – who became an independent and left the Democratic Party last December but is still weighing a reelection bid – will join his conference.

“I think that decision was made when she ended up continuing to caucus with the Democrats,” McConnell said when asked if trying to get Sinema to flip to the GOP was a live discussion. “We would love to have had her, but we didn’t land her.”

While he knows the presidential race could scramble the map, he believes a potential Trump nomination could bolster Republican chances in three key Senate battlegrounds. But above all else, McConnell is making clear that his outside group, the Senate Leadership Fund, along with the National Republican Senatorial Committee, are prepared to take a much heavier hand in contested Republican primaries than the past cycle, a move that could escalate their intraparty feuding but one the GOP leader sees as essential to avoiding the pitfalls from 2022.

“We don’t have an ideological litmus test,” McConnell said flatly. “We want to win in November.”

“We’ll be involved in any primary where that seems to be necessary to get a high-quality candidate, and we’ll be involved in every general election where we have a legitimate shot of winning – regardless of the philosophy of the nominee,” the Kentucky Republican said.

But McConnell and Republican leaders are treading carefully in deciding which primary races to engage in, since trying to tip the scales could generate backlash from the conservative base and help far-right candidates – something GOP leaders learned in past election cycles, like the tea party wave of 2010.

In the 2022 cycle, Republicans also seemed to have the wind in their sails. With inflation running rampant and President Joe Biden’s poll numbers taking a nosedive, Republicans had several paths to the majority.

But Democratic incumbents hung onto their seats as they campaigned on issues like abortion rights and took advantage of Trump’s late emergence on the campaign trail, while several GOP candidates who won messy primaries turned out to be weak general-election candidates. McConnell’s allies worked in the Missouri and Alabama primaries to defeat GOP candidates they viewed as problematic but largely steered clear of a number of other contested primaries.

Part of the issue: Trump hand-selected candidates in key races, bolstering their chances in primaries even though they were vulnerable in general elections.

“In other places where we did not get involved in the primaries it was because we were convinced we could not prevail, and would spend a lot of money that we would need later,” McConnell said, reflecting on 2022.

Plus, in the last cycle, Scott’s NRSC made the strategic decision to steer clear of primaries, arguing they would let the voters choose their candidates without a heavy hand from Washington. (Scott and his allies later blamed McConnell for hurting their candidates by not embracing an election-year agenda.)

This time around, the Daines-led NRSC is heavily involved in candidate recruiting and vetting and has already signaled its support for certain GOP candidates in Indiana and West Virginia, aligning its efforts with McConnell’s.

“I think it’s important to go into this cycle understanding once again how hard it is to beat the incumbents, no incumbent lost last year,” McConnell told CNN on Friday. “Having said that, if you were looking for a good map, this is a good map.”

But he later added: “We do have the possibility of screwing this up and that gets back to candidate recruitment. I think that we lost Georgia, Arizona and New Hampshire because we didn’t have competitive candidates (last cycle). And Steve Daines and I are in exactly the same place – that starts with candidate quality.”

McConnell, who has faced incessant attacks from Trump after he blamed the former president for being “practically and morally responsible” for the 2021 Capitol attack, is not publicly letting on any concerns about the possibility that Trump could be on the top of the GOP ticket again.

As Daines has already backed Trump for president, McConnell didn’t answer directly when asked if he’d be comfortable with him as the party’s 2024 presidential nominee.

“Look, I’m going to support the nominee of our party for president, no matter who that may be,” he said.

McConnell believes that Trump at the top of the ticket could help in some key states with Senate races.

“Whether you are a Trump fan or a Trump opponent, I can’t imagine Trump if he’s the nominee not doing well in West Virginia, Montana and Ohio,” McConnell said.

Left unmentioned: Wisconsin, Michigan, Nevada, Arizona and Pennsylvania, all of which Trump lost in 2020 but are key parts of the Senate map in 2024.

“I didn’t mention Wisconsin; I think clearly you’d have to have an outstanding candidate. And I think there are some other places where with the right candidate, we might be able to compete – in Nevada, Arizona,” McConnell said. “But as of right now the day that you and I are talking, I think we know that we are going to compete in four places heavily, and that would be, Montana, West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania.”

Yet each of those have their own challenges for the GOP.

In Pennsylvania, McConnell and the NRSC have their eyes on David McCormick, the hedge fund executive who barely lost his primary last cycle to Mehmet Oz, the Trump-backed TV doctor who later fell short in the general election to Democrat John Fetterman.

While McCormick is widely expected to run for the seat occupied by Democratic Sen. Bob Casey, he could face a complicated primary if the controversial candidate, Doug Mastriano, runs as well. Mastriano, who won the Trump endorsement in the 2022 gubernatorial primary and later lost by double digits in the fall, is weighing a run for Senate. But McConnell and the NRSC are expected to go all-out for McCormick, whom the GOP leader called a “high-quality candidate.”

Asked if he were concerned about a potential Mastriano bid, McConnell said: “I think everybody is entitled to run. I’m confident the vast majority of people who met Dave McCormick are going to be fine with him.”

While the GOP field in Ohio to take on Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown is expected to be crowded and has yet to fully form, top Republicans are signaling they’d be comfortable with several of them as their nominee. But that’s not necessarily the case in Montana or West Virginia.

In Montana, Rep. Matt Rosendale, a member of the hard-right House Freedom Caucus who lost to Democratic Sen. Jon Tester in 2018, is considering another run against him in 2024, though Rosendale posted a low fundraising number last quarter. But Senate GOP leaders are looking at some other prospective candidates, including state attorney general Austin Knudsen and, in particular, businessman Tim Sheehy, whom McConnell met with in recent weeks.

Asked if he were concerned about a Rosendale candidacy, McConnell said: “Yeah, I don’t have anything further to say about Montana. We’re going to compete in Montana and win in November.”

And in West Virginia, McConnell and top Republicans landed Gov. Jim Justice in the battle for the seat occupied by Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, who has yet to decide whether to run again. But Justice is already facing a primary challenge against Rep. Alex Mooney, who is backed by the political arm of the anti-tax group, the Club for Growth.

McConnell didn’t express any concerns about Mooney’s candidacy but said that they wouldn’t hesitate to help Justice.

“What we do know about West Virginia is it’s very, very red, and we have an extremely popular incumbent governor who’s announced for the Senate. And we’re going to go all out to win it,” McConnell said.

McConnell pointedly declined to discuss any concerns about other controversial candidates who may emerge this cycle, including Kari Lake, who is weighing a US Senate run in Arizona after losing her bid for governor last year and then later claimed the election was stolen. Blake Masters, who lost his bid to unseat Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly, is also among the candidates considering another run.

Asked about Lake and other prospective GOP candidates who deny the 2020 election results, McConnell wouldn’t weigh in directly.

“What I care about in November is winning and having an ‘R’ by your name, and I think it is way too early to start assessing various candidacies that may or may not materialize,” McConnell said.

McConnell also indicated they may want to until after the primary to decide if Nevada is worth pouring their money into, even as GOP sources say that national Republicans are recruiting military veteran Sam Brown, who fell short in the Senate GOP primary last cycle.

The GOP leader is signaling he has little concern about the races of two GOP incumbents – Scott in Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas, even as Cruz is facing a Democratic recruit, Rep. Colin Allred who is poised to raise big sums of money.

“Both of them are very skilled,” McConnell said of Cruz and Scott, characterizing Democratic efforts to beat them as “really long shots.” Democrats, he argued, “don’t have much hope there. I don’t think they have any opportunities for offense” in 2024, he said.

How long the 81-year-old McConnell – the longest-serving Senate party leader in history – plans to keep his job is a lingering question as well, especially in the aftermath of his recent fall that sent him to the hospital for concussion treatment. After Scott failed to knock him off from his post after the 2022 midterms, McConnell said, “I’m not going anywhere.” And he told CNN last fall that he would “certainly” complete his term, which ends in January 2027.

Asked on Friday if he still plans to serve his full term or run for leader again, McConnell let out a laugh and didn’t want to engage on it.

“I thought this was not an interview about my future,” he said. “I thought it was an interview about the 2024 Senate elections.”

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April 12, 2021
Biden faces key test as end of fundraising quarter looms | CNN Politics

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CNN
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President Joe Biden is racing to boost his campaign war chest as the end of the fundraising quarter approaches Friday, marking the first major test of his campaign’s ability to generate the cash and enthusiasm needed to compete against Republicans in 2024.

In the closing days of the quarter, the campaign is ramping up its push for grassroots donors, including enlisting former President Barack Obama to tape a video with Biden to help drive small-dollar donations, CNN has learned, along with hosting a slew of down-to-the-wire, high-dollar fundraisers.

Biden’s campaign is highly attuned to how closely their early fundraising numbers will be examined for signs of the campaign’s operational strength and enthusiasm. Aides have tightly guarded the state of Biden’s campaign haul, refraining from publicly laying out a fundraising target for the second quarter or providing an early read on how much they raised in the opening days of the president’s reelection bid.

Campaign advisers insist they’ll have the money to run a successful campaign. Jeffrey Katzenberg, a co-chair of Biden’s campaign, told CNN in an interview Wednesday that he’s growing more confident about their ability to exceed the $1 billion Biden raised in 2020.

“There’s no question whatsoever that he will have all of the resources to run a highly competitive campaign at or above the level of four years ago,” Katzenberg said. “The enthusiasm, the support, the loyalty is at a 10.”

Yet even Biden’s supporters acknowledge that the headwinds he faces in his overall campaign – including dampened enthusiasm and concern over his age – will influence his effort to raise as much as $2 billion for his reelection effort. Some donors have expressed anxiety over a slow start to the money race.

“Not a lot of people are engaging right now. They’re like, ‘We’re gonna give. We’re gonna support him,’ but people aren’t as engaged in the 2024 operation right now,” one Biden campaign bundler told CNN.

Katzenberg, who will be on hand at fundraisers in Chicago and New York this week, argued Biden isn’t facing the same time crunch to raise money compared to his 2020 run when he faced a competitive Democratic primary.

“He’s not on the same path that he was four years ago. There are no primaries. The urgency and the timeline is simply not the same,” he said. “Our fundraising efforts are actually being very strategic and thoughtful about when you can activate people. And you want to activate them at the point when they are ready to actually give, and that is always around very specific moments and around urgency.”

Biden’s campaign has yet to name a national finance director, a role tasked with overseeing the overall fundraising effort, prompting frustration among some donors who wanted to see a more formal structure from the outset. The campaign’s fundraising apparatus has largely been driven by the Democratic National Committee in the opening months of the campaign.

When the president announced his reelection campaign in April, the campaign declined to provide figures for first-day or first week fundraising – as some candidates, including Biden in 2019, do when jumping into the race to demonstrate (and generate) excitement.

One person familiar with the matter said the Biden campaign’s fundraising after the video announcement was “nothing special.” A separate source familiar with the matter said the reelection campaign’s fundraising has been stable since launch date and in line with the Biden team’s projections.

“The campaign will share its fundraising numbers when we submit our FEC filing next month,” said Kevin Muñoz, a Biden campaign spokesperson. “We are encouraged by the strong response we are seeing from donors and our grassroots supporters, including a significant number of new donors since 2020 that support the President’s agenda for restoring democracy, freedom, and growing the economy by growing the middle class.”

“While MAGA Republicans duke it out over extreme, divisive, and unpopular policies in their primary, we are ensuring that we have the resources needed to run an aggressive, winning campaign,” Munoz added.

The Biden campaign declined to share its own fundraising target for this quarter, but campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez told CNN in an interview earlier this month she believes the campaign will show “strong momentum and energy.”

“Folks are gonna want to try to poke holes at anything that they can, but I think that, you know, we’ll continue to show just strong momentum and energy,” Chavez Rodriguez said.

Biden’s second quarter fundraising haul will likely be compared to that of his recent predecessors.

When he announced his reelection in 2011, Obama burst out of the gate with a hefty second quarter fundraising haul of $86 million for the reelect and DNC, a record-setting figure for that time. Obama announced his reelection bid in the same fundraising quarter as Biden but had a three week lead on Biden’s entry into the 2024 race.

Biden, never a prolific fundraiser, raised $21.5 million in his first quarter in the 2020 campaign, a figure that was surpassed by newcomer South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg.

How much money Biden and his team can raise in these early stages of the campaign could dictate how his campaign apparatus ultimately looks. So far, Biden’s team had made only a few hires and has relied in large part on the DNC, including for office space as they search for a headquarters building in Wilmington, Delaware.

DNC fundraising officials organized a summit for top donors and supporters in the days after the launch, an effort to reengage some of the highest contributors from his 2020 bid.

One tool the campaign hopes to leverage early on in their efforts is a joint fundraising agreement between the campaign, DNC and state Democratic parties, consolidating efforts to raise money early in the race and allow individual donors to contribute up to $929,600 to the Biden Victory Fund.

The president has spent the past two weeks crisscrossing the country for campaign cash. He raised roughly $5 million in one day of events with California Gov. Gavin Newsom during a two-day swing through California’s Bay Area last week, a source familiar with the events said.

As the end of quarter approaches, the president is headlining five fundraisers in the span of three days, tapping into high-dollar donors in Chevy Chase, Maryland, New York City and Chicago, where the billionaire Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker is hosting an event.

First lady Dr. Jill Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have also hit the fundraising circuit as well. Harris brought in $1.25 million for the Biden Victory Fund at the LGBTQ Leadership Council Gala in New York City earlier this week, a source familiar with the fundraiser said.

The campaign also is leaning on its top surrogates this week to mobilize grassroots donors, including the Obama-Biden fundraising video rolling out on social media on Thursday.

A campaign official argued the Obama-Biden duo is “an effective pairing” to push for small-dollar donors and represented “some of our best performing content from 2020.” Obama and Biden had lunch together at the White House on Tuesday.

“He is throwing a marker down and saying, ‘Do not mistake, I am 100% in on supporting Joe Biden’s presidency,’” Katzenberg said of the Obama push. “As invaluable as his time is on the fundraising here, his endorsement, enthusiasm and continued support, friendship, loyalty. That’s what this about.”

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the chair of the campaign’s National Advisory Board and a prolific fundraiser herself, is hosting a call with other advisory board members Thursday to encourage them to tap into their donor networks in the closing days of the quarter, a campaign official said.

And advisory board members including Sens. Cory Booker, Amy Klobuchar, Chris Murphy, and Raphael Warnock as well as New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and a handful of members of Congress – Reps. Chrissy Houlihan, Sara Jacobs, and Lauren Underwood — are also expected to assist via e-mails, texts, and online fundraising.

The campaign is hoping to galvanize online donations after Biden raised $700 million online during the 2020 cycle. White House digital strategy director Rob Flaherty, who ran the 2020 campaign’s digital operation, is expected to join the campaign this summer with an eye in part towards boosting online fundraising.

Campaign advisers say they’ve seen positive signs about in the number of new donors drawn to the campaign, with one strategist saying, “The donor base right out of the box is expanded.”

The campaign has sought to use moments like former President Donald Trump’s CNN Town Hall and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ Twitter launch snafu to expand their donor network, though the official declined to say specifically how much was raised as part of those efforts.

Along with about a dozen fundraiser events headlined by the president, Chavez Rodriguez, her deputy, Quentin Fulks, and Democratic National Committee Executive Director Sam Cornale spent part of this month traveling the country to meet with top donors, local Democratic officials and other supporters in an effort to stir up enthusiasm and build fundraising momentum.

Still, among the donor class, there is a certain malaise – a combination of fundraising fatigue, the lack of a specific Republican opponent as a motivator and a general lack of enthusiasm for Biden’s candidacy.

Some Biden allies predict the president will have little trouble fundraising if Trump emerges as the Republican nominee, believing the former president is a strong motivator for donors and voters alike.

But that message and the sentiment behind it belie an overall weariness among those being asked to dig deeper into their pockets.

“There was fatigue during the midterms because you had this battle to save the country in 2020. People feel like the fundraising has just never stopped,” said one Democratic fundraiser, adding that any usual “cooling-off period” never arrived.

“It’s just constant. And every quarter is the most important quarter,” the fundraiser said.

Uncertainty in the Republican primary field could also hold back fundraising at this stage in the election, with nearly two months before candidates face off in the first GOP debate and more than six months before primary voters cast their first ballots.

“Ultimately, the campaign is relying on one big thing above all else: They’re relying on Trump or DeSantis or someone who’s just so unpalatable being the nominee. That’ll drive everything,” the fundraiser predicted.

John Morgan, one of a handful of donors to attend last week’s White House state dinner for Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, told CNN he’s looking to hold a fundraiser for Biden in the fall.

“The money is going to pour in – and if Trump is the nominee, it will pour in by double because Republicans will be writing checks too,” Morgan predicted.

“Everybody was panicked last time but then he got the nomination, and he raised a billion dollars, and if Trump is the nominee, he might raise two billion,” Morgan said.

The average minimum price to attend one of Biden’s first dozen fundraising events, a Democratic fundraiser said, is approximately $25,000 per person, with the average event raising between $1.5 to $2 million.

Biden has used these events to test drive and sharpen a 2024 message, seeking to reframe concerns about his age.

“It’s a legitimate thing to raise the question of age,” Biden told donors at a May fundraiser at the Manhattan apartment of former Blackstone executive Tony James. “I hope what I’ve been able to bring to this job, and will continue to bring, is a little bit of wisdom.”

Biden has also worked to cater his message to donors who want face time with their candidate.

“People want his time, which is much more difficult this time around,” compared to when he was a candidate in 2020, one bundler said.

Ahead of one of this week’s fundraising events, an expected attendee told CNN he had to warn his colleagues who are attending their first Biden fundraiser to manage expectations: “It’s gonna be cool no matter what. You get to shake hands with the president and take a photo with him. We’re all excited for that. But, you know, he is not Barack Obama. He’s not Bill Clinton. He’s not George W. Bush,” the attendee said.

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April 12, 2021
Feinstein’s return prompts renewed scrutiny over her fitness for office | CNN Politics

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Just a week after her return to the United States Senate after a roughly three month absence, questions continue to swirl around Sen. Dianne Feinstein and her mental capacity to serve in the world’s greatest deliberative body.

The 89-year-old Democrat had been recovering from shingles at home in California, and had been absent from the Hill since February.

Her long-awaited return on May 10 not only meant that the Senate Democratic Caucus would be at full attendance – since both Feinstein and Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman had been absent for much of the spring – but that the one-seat margin Democrats held on the powerful Judiciary Committee would be reconstituted to help advance President Joe Biden’s judicial nominations.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer greeted the frail Feinstein personally upon her return, when she was wheeled into the Capitol for a vote accompanied by staff on and off the floor. Schumer said Feinstein was “exactly where she wants to be, ready to do the things she loves the most – serving the people of California.” First elected to the Senate in 1992, she is the longest-serving woman senator in US history.

But questions quickly sprang up on whether Feinstein, though present, would really be able to resume her demanding job. In a statement released by her office last week, Feinstein said that she is still “experiencing some side effects” from shingles and her doctors have advised her to “work a lighter schedule” as she returned to the Senate. During her arrival at the Capitol for votes, she appeared confused and was heard asking staff, “Where am I going?”

And in an interaction with reporters Tuesday, as reported by the Los Angeles Times and Slate, Feinstein appeared confused by questions about her absence, saying, “I haven’t been gone. I’ve been here, I’ve been voting. Please, either know or don’t know.” It is not clear if Feinstein was referring to just the past week since her return or referring to the past several months while she was recovering at home.

Feinstein’s office was asked for comment but indicated the senator did not have one at this time.

Fellow Democrats remain unwilling to discuss Feinstein’s ability to serve, saying only they are glad to have a colleague back in the chamber.

“I’m happy she’s returned, and that’s all I’m going to say about it,” Hawaii Sen. Mazie Hirono told CNN.

Illinois Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin, who replaced Feinstein as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said, “We certainly hope” that Feinstein will be able to serve the remainder of her term in the chamber, but demurred when asked if he is confident that she can serve.

“I can’t be the judge of that. But I will tell you that she has to make that decision for herself and her family as to going forward, but we’re happy to have her back,” he said. “We’re monitoring her medical condition almost on a daily basis. Our staff is in touch with her staff.”

The top Republican on the panel, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, said of Feinstein, “She’s a dear friend. As a friend, you can see she’s hurting.”

Other Republicans echoed that sentiment, wishing Feinstein well, but reluctant to weigh in on her mental acuity.

“I have a lot of respect for Dianne Feinstein. She’s been great to work with. She’s a great committee member,” North Carolina Republican Thom Tillis told CNN’s Manu Raju, but said that “I haven’t had the chance to speak with her, so I couldn’t really comment on it.”

“If you just take a look at anybody that spent ten months with a chronic case of shingles, that has a huge impact, I don’t care how old you are, but again I just haven’t spoken with her,” he said.

Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn said that he is “not qualified to render a diagnosis,” but criticized some Democrats for calling on her to resign.

“That seems a little harsh to me. I think that decision ought to be made by Senator Feinstein,” he said.

Questions about a Senator’s health, and whispers about their fitness to serve, are not new. In the past decades, the median age of the Senate has ticked increasingly upward, with the 118th Congress median age at 65.3 years, according to the Pew Research Center.

The current Senate has multiple members in their eighties, including Feinstein, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, and Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley. Another 41 Senators are at least sixty-seven years old, the official retirement age in the United States.

In recent years, there have been prolonged absences by members of the Senate, notably Arizona Sen. John McCain, who battled brain cancer and was absent from the Senate almost eight months, but never faced calls from his colleagues to resign his seat.

The late Mississippi Sen. Thad Cochran was also out for several weeks with lingering health issues in the fall of 2017, and faced questions about his metal fitness, appearing frail and pale when he returned. The then-chairman of the influential Senate Appropriations Committee, told reporters that he was fit to serve, and said at the time that he planned to run again in 2020, saying “it’s up to the people to decide. I think I am.”

But the 79-year old Republican needed to be guided by staffers to a “Senators Only” elevator to find his way to the Senate floor. Cochran resigned from the Senate the following March.

“I regret my health has become an ongoing challenge,” Cochran said in a statement announcing the end of a four-decade long career in the Senate. “I intend to fulfill my responsibilities and commitments to the people of Mississippi and the Senate through the completion of the 2018 appropriations cycle, after which I will formally retire from the U.S. Senate.”

It is unclear if Feinstein will be given the same gentle off ramp afforded to her colleagues.

On November 2020, Feinstein relented to pressure from other Democrats to give up the chair of the Judiciary Committee. In November 2022, under similar pressure, she announced that she would not want to serve as the Senate Pro Tempore, a high-ranking constitutional position granted to the longest-serving member of the Senate majority. Feinstein also announced the following February that she would not run for re-election in 2024. Her February 16, 2023 votes on the Senate floor would prove to be her last ones for months.

Criticisms for Feinstein’s long absence started in earnest in April when fellow California Democrat Rep. Ro Khanna tweeted, “it’s time for @SenFeinstein to resign. We need to put the country ahead of personal loyalty.” Feinstein’s office pushed back on the criticism, arguing that there had not been a significant delay in advancing and confirming judicial nominees.

After Fetterman and McConnell – who was injured in a fall and spent nearly two weeks in a rehabilitation facility – returned to the Senate, but Feinstein did not, it prompted more questions about the impasse created by her absence and Feinstein asked Schumer to temporarily replace her on the Judiciary Committee. Schumer proposed that Maryland Sen. Ben Cardin take her spot, but Senate Republicans blocked the effort, saying the move would allow judicial nominees they opposed to advance.

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April 12, 2021
The Supreme Court just handed Joe Biden a series of setbacks. It may have also given Democrats new motivation to reelect him | CNN Politics

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President Joe Biden wasn’t planning to take questions on Thursday. His helicopter was waiting outside on the White House’s South Lawn.

But after a 10-minute statement on the Supreme Court’s affirmative action ruling, a CNN reporter called out, “Is this a rogue court?” The president stopped in his tracks.

Pausing to think a moment, he looked over his shoulder. “This is not a normal court,” he said before leaving.

This week’s monumental rulings – striking down affirmative action in college admissions and unraveling Biden’s student debt relief plan among them – amount to serious setbacks for a president who promised as a candidate to advance racial equity and erase student debt.

They are also an urgent reminder to Democrats of the enduring consequences of elections at a moment Biden’s advisers are searching for ways to inject enthusiasm into his bid for another term.

What impact that will have on the coming election remains unknown. But Biden and his team have already begun assigning blame on Republicans for dismantling programs that have benefited young, college-educated and minority voters – all critical components of the Democratic coalition Biden will need to mobilize if he hopes to win reelection.

That three justices within the court’s conservative majority were appointed by President Donald Trump – both Biden’s predecessor and, according to polls, his most likely opponent next year – creates even more of an impetus for Biden to use the rulings as a political cudgel as his campaign heats up.

“The excesses of the Supreme Court are going to backfire,” said Rep. Ritchie Torres, a New York Democrat. “You know, the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe versus Wade reduced what was supposed to be a red wave in the 2022 election cycle to nothing more than a red trickle. So not only is the Supreme Court’s decision bad law, it’s also bad politics and it’s going to come back to haunt the Republican Party.”

Speaking to a group of Democratic donors in New York City on Thursday evening, Biden sought to underscore the stakes of the court’s new supermajority, a preview of how he’ll frame the issue over the coming year.

“The Supreme Court is becoming not just conservative, but almost – it’s like a throwback. It’s like a throwback, some of the decisions they’re making,” Biden told donors in a private dining room inside the Seagram Building. “Did you ever think we’d be in a position, after 50 years of acknowledging the right of privacy in the Constitution, suggesting that there’s no such thing as the right to privacy?”

Despite his criticism of the court, Biden has rejected some liberal suggestions on reforming the panel. He opposes expanding the number of justices that sit on the court and hasn’t embraced term limits.

“If we start the process of trying to expand the court, we’re going to politicize it, maybe forever, in a way that is not healthy,” Biden said during a friendly interview on MSNBC shortly after Thursday’s decision on affirmative action.

Biden’s student loan plan, which came about last year after months of agonizing internal debate over its costs and eligibility criteria, was intended to free low- and middle-income Americans from crippling debt.

Throughout the process, Biden expressed concern at being seen as offering a handout to the wealthy. Eventually, pressure to fulfill one of his top campaign promises led to the plan to forgive up to $20,000 in student loan debt for certain borrowers.

For months the White House publicly said there was no alternative plan if the Supreme Court struck down the student debt relief program. But behind the scenes, top White House officials were working for several weeks to fulfill a simple directive from the president to “be ready in the event the Supreme Court did not do the right thing,” White House officials said.

The president’s charge to his team was described as this: “If the court ruled against the program, find other ways to deliver relief for as many working and middle-class borrowers as possible, accounting for all the legal issues.”

For the past few weeks, White House chief of staff Jeff Zients gathered his team for weekly meetings to map out all scenarios for the Supreme Court’s ruling and explore all legal avenues available to them after the president told his team to build a “fully developed response” to all possible rulings, officials said.

Zient’s office – led by deputy chief of staff Natalie Quillian, the Domestic Policy Council, National Economic Council and White House Counsel’s Office – worked with the Department of Education and the Department of Justice to come up with options the administration could take if the ruling was not in their favor.

“All of these meetings were structured around one question – how would we be able to deliver relief to as many borrowers as we could, as quickly as possible under any possible outcome of the Supreme Court,” official said.

The White House also stayed in touch with and fielded suggestions for next steps from debt relief advocate groups and congressional allies throughout the process. Lawyers from the White House, Justice Department and Education Department examined all of the recommendations, including administration action and the legal authorities available to the administration, and ultimately crafted responses for multiple scenarios.

Inside the White House, some officials had held out hope the court would uphold Biden’s student debt program, pointing to some surprising decisions over the past weeks that saw some conservative justices joining liberals on issues of voting rights and congressional redistricting.

But even Biden acknowledged after the court’s oral arguments in February he wasn’t certain the ruling would go his way.

“I’m confident we’re on the right side of the law,” Biden told CNN in March when asked if he was confident the administration would prevail in the case. “I’m not confident of the outcome of the decision yet.”

His instinct was correct. The president was in the Oval Office on Friday morning when he was informed of the Supreme Court’s decision by his senior aides and then engaged in meetings stretching into the afternoon to fine-tune their response after the ruling was not in their favor.

Ultimately, the president directed his team to move forward with a new plan, which includes pursuing a new path for debt relief through the authorities in the Higher Education Act of 1965, which was promoted by some debt relief advocate groups and progressive lawmakers, as well as creating a temporary 12-month “on-ramp repayment” program for federal student loan borrowers when payments resume in October.

A day earlier, Biden was watching the news on television when the affirmative action decision was handed down by the court, according to an official. A team from the White House counsel’s office came to brief him on the ruling.

“In our conversations with the White House about why student debt cancelation was needed, it’s about reducing the racial wealth gap,” said Wisdom Cole, national director of the Youth & College division at the NAACP. “If the administration is committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion, they must use every tool in their toolkit. Every legal authority to ensure that we see relief happen.”

Demonstrating urgency in responding to the court’s actions was a key objective as the White House prepared for both rulings, according to people familiar with the matter.

Looming over the preparations was the impression left after last year’s Supreme Court term that the Biden administration was unprepared for the decision striking down the nationwide right to abortion, despite a leaked court opinion months ahead of time indicating the justices were prepared to overturn Roe v. Wade.

The White House has strongly denied it was caught flat-footed on abortion and has pointed to actions taken in the months after the decision to expand access, including to medication abortion.

The issue proved galvanizing to Democratic voters in November’s midterm elections and has propelled Democratic victories even in traditionally Republican districts.

Whether the court’s ruling on student debt relief and affirmative action can have a similar effect will prove critical over the coming year, as Biden works to convince voters he is still fighting to fulfill his promises. Initial reaction from progressive Democrats was positive.

“It was not a foregone conclusion that the President would act so swiftly today. But he announced an alternative path to student debt cancellation by using his Higher Education Act authority given by Congress – and that deserves praise,” said Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Institute.

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April 12, 2021
How Kyrsten Sinema’s decision makes Democrats’ 2024 Senate map tighter | CNN Politics

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Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema decided to shake up the political world on Friday by becoming an independent. The former Democrat is still caucusing with the party in the Senate, so the Democratic caucus still has 51 members. Now, instead of 49 Democrats and two independents within their ranks, the caucus has 48 Democrats and three independents.

But that simple math hides a more clouded picture for Democrats and for Sinema herself. Sinema’s interests are no longer necessarily the Democrats’ best interests in the next Congress, and the 2024 Senate map became even more complicated for Democrats with Sinema’s decision.

To be clear, Sinema has always been a thorn in the Democrats side during her time in Congress. Over the last two years, Democrats have had to almost always make sure that any bill or nomination had Sinema’s support to have any chance of passing. That’s the math when you have only 50 Senate seats in a 100-seat chamber. A lot of bills and nominations were never voted on without Sinema and Manchin’s backing.

From 2013 (Sinema’s first term in Congress) to 2020, Sinema voted against her party more than almost any other member of Congress. She stayed with the party about 69% of the time on votes where at least one half of the Democrats voted differently than half of Republicans. The average Democrat voted with their party about 90% of the time on these votes.

It’s quite possible that Sinema’s percentage of sticking with the party will lower now that she is an independent. Consider the example of former Sen. Joe Lieberman. The longtime Democrat won reelection as a third-party candidate in 2006, after losing the Democratic primary to a left-wing challenger (the now fairly moderate Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont)

Relative to the average Senate Democrat, Lieberman voted with the party 10 points less of the time after becoming an independent than he had in his last term as a Democrat. If that happens with Sinema, she’ll become even more conservative than West Virginia’s Joe Manchin (the most conservative member of the Democratic caucus).

This would make sense because the incentive structure is now very different for Sinema. Ahead of a 2024 reelection campaign, she no longer has to worry about winning a Democratic primary. Sinema has to worry about building a coalition of Democrats, independents and Republicans. That is far more difficult to do if you’re seen as too liberal.

Indeed, the big reason Sinema became an independent is because it would have been very difficult to win a Democratic primary. Her approval rating among Arizona Democrats in an autumn 2022 CES poll stood at just 25%. A number of Democrats (e.g. Rep. Ruben Gallego and Rep. Greg Stanton) were already lining up to potentially challenge her in a primary.

A question now is whether Sinema’s decision to become an independent will dissuade some of those Democrats from running. The idea being that Sinema still caucuses with the Democrats, and Democrats wouldn’t want to split the Democratic vote in a general election allowing a Republican to win in a purple state like Arizona.

It’s an interesting bet from Sinema. After all, Democrats usually don’t run a candidate against independent Sen. Bernie Sanders in Vermont. The Democrats who run against independent Sen. Angus King in Maine have not gained traction in recent elections. Don’t forget the aforementioned Lieberman won as a third-party candidate.

The electoral math structure was and is totally different in these circumstances, however. Sanders wouldn’t attract a left-wing Democratic challenger because he is already so progressive. Lieberman declared his third-party candidacy after the primary, so Republicans didn’t have time to find a well-known challenger. Republicans also knew that Lieberman, who was an ardent supporter of the Iraq War, was probably the best they could hope for in the deeply Democratic state of Connecticut.

This leaves the King example. King, like Sinema, is a moderate from not a deeply blue or red state. There’s just one problem for Sinema in this analogy: King is popular. He had previously won the governorship twice as an independent and has almost always sported high favorables.

Sinema is not popular at all. The CES poll had her approval rating below her disapproval rating with Democrats, independents and Republicans in Arizona. Sinema’s overall approval stood at 25% to a disapproval rating of 58%. Other polling isn’t nearly as dire for Sinema, but the average of it all has her firmly being more unpopular than popular.

Put another way, Sinema’s current numbers are probably not going to scare off many challengers from either the Democratic or Republican side. Additionally, there’s zero reason for Democrats to cede the ground to Sinema because it would keep a Republican from winning. It isn’t clear at all that Sinema can win as an independent.

What Sinema’s move did accomplish is that it made the electoral math a lot more complicated in Arizona and therefore nationally. Having two people in the race who are going to caucus with the Democratic Party likely makes it more difficult for the Democrats to win.

One potential worrisome example for Democrats in a purple state (at least then) was the 2010 Florida Senate race. Then Republican Gov. Charlie Crist decided to run as an independent after it became clear he wouldn’t beat the more conservative Republican Marco Rubio in a Republican primary. Crist, who said he would caucus with the Democrats, split the Democratic vote with then Rep. Kendrick Meek, and Rubio cruised to a win.

I should point out that Democrats certainly have a chance. The 1968 Alaska Senate race, for example, featured two Democrats (Mike Gravel and then Sen. Ernest Gruening as write-in). Gravel won in the state which Republican Richard Nixon carried, too, by a few points.

In 2024, Arizona Republicans could nominate an extreme candidate that flames out. They just lost every major statewide race in 2022 because of who they nominated.

Don’t dismiss the possibility too that Sinema could win like Harry Byrd did in the 1970 Virginia Senate election when both parties nominated candidates. Maybe voters will like Sinema’s new independent registration.

Sinema also could find herself flaming out when running in the general election without a major party backing her like Gruening did in 1968 or then Sen. Jacob Javits in the 1980 New York Senate race.

We just don’t know.

All that said, the Democrats already have a difficult map heading into 2024. Depending on whether the Democrats win the presidency (and have a Democratic vice president who can break Senate ties), they can afford to lose zero to one Senate seats and maintain a majority.

The vast majority, 23 of the 34, senators up for reelection in 2024 caucus with the Democrats. An abnormally large number (7) represent states Republican Donald Trump won at least once. This includes Arizona.

With Sinema’s break from the Democratic party, the road is, if nothing else, curvier for Democrats.

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December 31, 1969