On Politics A.M.: Joseph Biden Is Struggling in Iowa

2019年11月25日星期一

November 25, 2019

Good Monday morning. Here are some of the stories making news in Washington and politics today.

Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden is struggling in Iowa. The early front-runner in the Democratic primary he faces an increasingly difficult path in the state. His backers have noted a lack of enthusiasm and weak campaign infrastructure, not to mention a formidable moderate competitor, among reasons Mr. Biden is lagging.

After nearly a year of slowly, and then not so slowly, rising to the top of the Democratic primary, Senator Elizabeth Warren is facing her first period of apparent plateau. Now comes the hard part: maintaining momentum.
Michael R. Bloomberg entered the Democratic presidential race on Sunday, taking aim at the centrist voters now supporting Mr. Biden and Mayor Pete Buttigieg.
Anxious about the cost of a single-payer health system, more voters now support the idea of a government-run plan that would compete with private insurance.

Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper demanded that the Navy secretary, Richard V. Spencer, resign, saying he had lost confidence in Mr. Spencer after he diverged from the president over the treatment of a member of the Navy SEALs at the center of a high-profile war crimes case.
Emails uncovered during an internal review showed that Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, asked after President Trump’s July 25 call with the Ukrainian president if there was a legal justification for withholding hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid to Ukraine.

Representative Devin Nunes, the top Republican on the Intelligence Committee, is facing questions on whether he met with a former Ukrainian official to unearth damaging information on the Bidens.

It has been less than six months since Sarah Huckabee Sanders left Washington. Mr. Trump’s former press secretary has returned to Arkansas a bona fide star, eager to play a new role in a post-Trump Republican Party.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was released from the hospital on Sunday after treatment for chills and a fever. The 86-year-old justice has had a series of health scares in the past year.

Today’s On Politics briefing was compiled by Isabella Grullón Paz in New York.

Is there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at onpolitics@nytimes.com.