The Playbook Podcast
POLITICO’s Jack Blanchard and Dasha Burns bring their fresh insight, analysis and reporting to the biggest story driving the day in the nation’s capital.
- Update frequency
- every day
- Average duration
- 6 minutes
- Episodes
- 1944
- Years Active
- 2016 - 2025
May 23, 2022: Biden’s midterm window is closing
A president’s first midterm election is both an enormous story and completely anticlimactic. It’s major news because there will likely be a dramatic shift away from the president’s party. It’s anticl…
00:05:45 |
Mon 23 May 2022
May 20, 2022: Trump’s real win-loss record
Trump’s endorsement losses are starting to pile up.
Most of his endorsements have been in races where his anointed candidate faced little or no competition. Nobody would be impressed by a handicapper…
00:05:14 |
Fri 20 May 2022
May 19, 2022: Dems’ face election year drag
With Memorial Day recess around the corner and much of President Joe Biden's agenda still stuck on Capitol Hill, a sense of helplessness has settled in among some Democrats: The closer they inch towa…
00:05:20 |
Thu 19 May 2022
May 18, 2022: Takeaways from the biggest primary night of the year
Sixteen months after Donald Trump supporters stormed Capitol Hill to try to stop the certification of Joe Biden as president, a prominent election denier in Pennsylvania inched closer to becoming the…
00:07:02 |
Wed 18 May 2022
May 17, 2022: 3 big storylines to watch in today's primaries
Today is one of the most consequential primary days of the year, with nominating contests in five states — Idaho, Kentucky, North Carolina, Oregon and Pennsylvania — that will tell us a great deal ab…
00:06:03 |
Tue 17 May 2022
May 16, 2022: The West's new fear: What if Ukraine wins?
Russia has faced a dizzying series of setbacks in its war with Ukraine over the last week:
Sweden and Finland are being fast-tracked into NATO membership, which means Russia will soon share an 810-m…
00:05:00 |
Mon 16 May 2022
May 13, 2022: SCOOP: Behind the McCarthy subpoena
When GOP Rep. Liz Cheney decided to risk everything politically and serve on Nancy Pelosi's newly created Jan. 6 investigative panel in the spring of last year, she made something of a vow to herself…
00:05:42 |
Fri 13 May 2022
May 12, 2022: Why Democrats don't actually ‘control’ the Senate
This week was another reminder that while Democrats “control” the Senate, they don’t actually control the Senate.
Covid relief was cut from the Ukraine aid bill.
A national law to codify abortion p…
00:05:15 |
Thu 12 May 2022
May 11, 2022: Inside SCOTUS, and Trump's first 2022 loss
Former President Donald Trump goes 1-for-2 on primary day in Nebraska and West Virginia.
And new reporting from inside the Supreme Court, via Josh Gerstein, Alexander Ward and Ryan, as the nine just…
00:04:02 |
Wed 11 May 2022
May 10, 2022: Another primary day test for Donald Trump
PRIMARY DAY: WHAT TO WATCH FOR — West Virginia and Nebraska hold primaries today. Like last week’s contests in Ohio, the action is mostly on the Republican side, and the main drama is about former Pr…
00:05:33 |
Tue 10 May 2022
May 9, 2022: Democrats go on offense over abortion
Happy Monday. Get ready for yet another week dominated by the debate over abortion rights, as the impending decision expected to overturn Roe v. Wade sucks up all the oxygen in Washington.
Two major…
00:04:18 |
Mon 09 May 2022
May 6, 2022: Trump’s strange silence
Overturning Roe v. Wade would be the culmination of former president Donald Trump’s bid to remake the judiciary — the very reason that many social conservatives held their noses and voted for him in…
00:03:37 |
Fri 06 May 2022
May 5, 2022: The book J.D. Vance doesn’t want you to read
J.D. Vance owes his GOP Senate primary victory in Ohio to two people: Donald Trump and Peter Thiel. Trump’s endorsement put him over the top in a crowded primary, while Thiel’s support — funneled thr…
00:05:32 |
Thu 05 May 2022
May 4, 2022: Poll: Voters back major SCOTUS reform after Roe bombshell
On her first day back in public since testing positive for the coronavirus last week, VP Kamala Harris spoke to a crowd of abortion rights supporters at the EMILY’s List conference Tuesday evening. H…
00:03:58 |
Wed 04 May 2022
May 3, 2022: Breaking down Alito's Roe bombshell
In his own words: “We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled. The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision, including …
00:05:50 |
Tue 03 May 2022
May 2, 2022: Team Biden eyes a new midterm strategy
It’s May 2, just over six months until the midterm elections, which are generally a referendum on the president’s performance. President Joe Biden is in rough shape. Let’s look at how it happened, an…
00:04:36 |
Mon 02 May 2022
April 29, 2022: A late-breaking shift in next week’s Ohio primary?
Most of the candidates chasing Ohio’s GOP Senate nomination have pledged allegiance to Donald Trump and beaten a path to Mar-a-Lago. But not state Sen. Matt Dolan. Instead, he’s poured millions of hi…
00:05:23 |
Fri 29 Apr 2022
April 28, 2022: Voters are not partying
The enormous gap between the excitement in Washington about the return of the WHCA weekend and the ongoing anxiety of voters hit us hard this week as we watched focus groups of voters conducted by lo…
00:04:57 |
Thu 28 Apr 2022
April 26, 2022: Republicans to Trump: Stay away from Twitter
The news that Elon Musk is buying Twitter has thrown Washington into a tizzy over one major question: Will Donald Trump return to his old favorite social media platform and start tweeting again?
As i…
00:05:48 |
Tue 26 Apr 2022
April 25, 2022: Groundhog Day on the Hill, hangover week in Washington
Congress returns from a two-week recess facing the same unresolved issues that have plagued lawmakers for months. Lawmakers left town unable to pass a bipartisan deal to provide the administration wi…
00:05:07 |
Mon 25 Apr 2022
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