Reid Pressured on Public Option in Liberal Group’s New Ad

ABC News’ Teddy Davis reports:

A liberal group called the Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC) is launching a new television ad in Nevada pressuring Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., to back a government insurance option as part of comprehensive health-care reform.

The ad features Nevada nurse Lee Slaughter. She says in the ad that she has seen insurance companies cut off care to patients in need — and says that in 2010, she will vote on only one issue: “I’m watching to see if Harry Reid is strong and effective enough as a leader to pass a public option into law.”

Watch it HERE.

The PCCC is the same organization which joined Rep. Alan Grayson, D-Fla., last week in delivering nearly 90,000 petition signatures to Reid’s office telling him to strip Democratic senators of plum committee assignments if they join a Republican filibuster on health care.

Reid’s office did not take too kindly to the petition.

“The only thing Senator Reid is worried about right now is putting together a bill that can get the 60 votes necessary to overcome a Republican filibuster,” Reid spokesman Jim Manley told the Washington Post last week. “He has no intention of stopping by” to receive the petition.

In its push for a public option, PCCC is taking advantage of the fact that Reid finds himself in a tough fight for re-election.

Last week, the Senate Majority Leader launched two television ads in Nevada more than a year before he faces the voters.

Republicans have not yet settled on a nominee against Reid.

Top GOP contendersinclude Sue Lowden, a former head of the state GOP who was the second runner-up for Miss America in 1973, Danny Tarkanian, the son of legendary UNLV basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian, and John Chachas, a wealthy investment banker.

The ad pressuring Reid on the public option was filmed over the weekend and will start airing Wednesday in the Las Vegas media market on both broadcast and cable.

PCCC, which has touted the ad in an email to 225,000 members, is setting an initial online fundraising goal of $100,000.

ABC News’ Rick Klein contributed to this report.

Key House Liberal: No Public Option, No Deal

ABC News’ Rick Klein reports: Amid the praise from Democrats for Sen. Olympia Snowe’s vote to help pass a health care bill from the Finance Committee, liberal members of both the House and the Senate remain concerned about the shape the health care bill is taking.

On ABCNews.com’s “Top Line” today, Rep. Raul Grijalva, the co-chair of the House Progressive Caucus, said he will join liberal colleagues in voting against any health care reform bill that doesn’t include a strong “public option” that would compete with private insurers.

“I venture to say that without a robust public option, a bill cannot get out of the House of Representatives,” said Grijalva, D-Ariz. “If that’s not in there, I can’t support it.”

Grijalva called it a “waste of time” to try to try to address the concerns of Snowe, R-Maine, when Democrats have the votes to pass a bill without any Republican support.

“Obviously it worries many of us a great deal that we’re going to basically write the legislation to cater to a vote or maybe two votes in the Senate on the Republican side,” Grijalva said. “The fact of the matter is I think at the end of the day there’s going to be unanimity among the Republicans, both in the House and in the Senate, to vote against any health care reform.”

“So I think it is a waste of time for the White House and to some extent for leadership to continue to cater to one vote, when in reality the best opportunity to pass it is [with] a solid, unified caucus of the Democrats pushing for reform with a robust public option.”

He rejected Snowe’s proposal that a public option be applied through a “trigger” mechanism, where it would kick into place only if the private sector doesn’t provide the savings Congress expects.

“The trigger will never occur. That’s our fear,” Grijalva said. “So the consequence of a trigger is effectively to kill a public option.”

Grijalva also said the White House has made a commitment to stakeholders to take up immigration reform next year, even though big legislative items are difficult to tackle in congressional election years.

“That is a commitment both in the political sense, and in a moral sense, that was made to many people. And I think the Latino community invested in hope in this election, and in overwhelming numbers to help his fine administration and this new Congress that we have in this country. I think they’re looking for a reciprocal response. And immigration reform is that response we want, that’s the commitment that was made.”

Click HERE to see the interview with Rep. Raul Grijalva.

We also chatted with Ana Marie Cox of Air America, who said liberals are frustrated after months’ of committee talks that were designed to draw the vote of a single Republican senator.

“We’re now crafting legislation to please a single person. One person. And that is tremendously frustrating,” she told us. “And if people can make that case to voters, I think they will be frustrated with that kind of negotiation, and hopefully the moderate Democrats will gain some spine.”

Watch the full discussion with Ana Marie Cox, including some our nominees for Least Powerful People in DC (in homage to GQ, which came out with its “most powerful” list this week), HERE.

High Noon for the Public Option in the Senate Tomorrow

ABC News' Jonathan Karl reports:

Tomorrow is high noon for the public option in the Senate.

I am told that Senators Chuck Schumer and Jay Rockefeller will force a roll-call vote tomorrow morning in the Senate Finance Committee on two amendments that would create a government-run insurance program – a top priority for liberal Democrats that was left out of the bill drafted by Finance Chairman Max Baucus.

The amendments are not likely to pass because they will be opposed by all Republicans, and at least four Democrats on the committee are cool to the idea of a public option (Lincoln, Carper, Conrad, Bill Nelson), but Schumer has been trying to negotiate with those Democrats to craft a version of the public option they could support.

If the amendments fail, it would appear the public option is all but dead in the Senate (although liberals will try to resurrect it when the full Senate takes up the bill).

UPDATE: Rockefeller and Schumer announced the vote last night, declaring “it's time for a debate on the public option.” But, it turns out, that time won't come until next week, because the Finance Committee is only working until noon today, giving Baucus & Grassley time to catch 2pm flights back home.

Liberals Pressing Obama On Public Option

ABC News’ Rick Klein reports: Leading liberal groups are ratcheting up pressure on President Obama to maintain his support for the public option — using some of Obama’s own words.

Today, MoveOn.org and the Progressive Change Coalition Campaign launched petition drives to urge the White House to keep the public option as part of the health care plan it’s pushing Congress to pass.

“The worst thing would be to pass a big reform bill that doesn't really change things,” MoveOn.org’s executive director, Justin Ruben, wrote his members in an e-mail.

“There's only one thing that's really going to cut costs, provide real security and peace of mind to the millions of Americans who are suffering, and take on the big insurance companies who have complete control of our system. That is the public health insurance option. During his campaign, President Obama often said that he believed that change had to come from the bottom up — not from the top down.”

The Progressive Change Coalition Campaign is asking former Obama campaign workers and volunteers to sign a petition urging the president to hold firm on a public option.

“We'll make sure the White House gets our message. In addition to delivering the signatures and personal notes from the petition page, we're planning an ad featuring the voices of those who sign,” the group wrote in an e-mail to members.

The drives are an indication of the liberal backlash the president is likely to face if — as expected — his list of demands next week does not include a public option.

For MoveOn.org, the letter-writing campaign comes a day after a bizarre, violent incident at one of the group’s vigils in California, where a 65-year old opponent of Democratic reform proposals had his finger bitten off.

UPDATE: Washington Post blogger Greg Sargent is reporting that a group of House liberals today sent a letter to President Obama reiterating their commitment to vote against any health care bill that doesn’t include a public option.

“Any bill that does not provide, at a minimum, a public option built on the Medicare provide system and with reimbursement based on Mediare rates — not negotiated rate — is unacceptable,” reads the letter, signed by Rep. Lynn Woolsey and Rep. Raul Grijalva, the leaders of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. “A health reform bill without a robust public option will not achieve the health reform this country so desperately needs. . . . We cannot vote for anything less.”

The Note: Obama Sells Health Plan to Public, Congress

By RICK KLEIN

The table is set. Everyone’s been in their seats for a while. The restaurant is getting crowded. More than a few customers are already disputing the bill.

Is it almost time for President Obama to start ordering off the menu?

It’s a moment, of course, that the president has been putting off — his inclination being to let Congress handle the messy work, and show up in time to embrace something that’s been tidied up.

But the first full week of health care debate on Capitol Hill makes clear that the default position — the easiest outcome to achieve — is going to be getting nothing done. All of which might make it helpful for Democrats (and maybe a few Republicans) to know what something should look like.

Enter Obama (again), selling people what they think they need, still aren’t sure they want, are pretty sure they don’t understand, and are growing convinced that they can’t afford.

“Americans overwhelmingly support substantial changes to the health care system and are strongly behind one of the most contentious proposals Congress is considering, a government-run insurance plan to compete with private insurers, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll,” Kevin Sack and Marjorie Connelly write in the Sunday New York Times.

Yet: “It is not clear how fully the public understands the complexities of the government plan proposal, and the poll results indicate that those who said they were following the debate were somewhat less supportive,” Sack and Connelly write. “It is not clear how fully the public understands the complexities of the government plan proposal, and the poll results indicate that those who said they were following the debate were somewhat less supportive.”

“A New York Times poll released [Sunday] said that a striking 72 percent of Americans support a public health-care plan, and 57 percent are willing to pay higher taxes to cover all Americans,” ABC’s John Hendren reports. “Nevertheless, the president's chances for an optional health care plan that would be run by the government may be fading. Republicans and some Democrats have expressed skepticism.”

With the president’s sales pitch continuing this week, his first obstacle: perceptions.

“No one can figure out a politically acceptable way to pay for an overhaul of America's health care system, and until someone does, the effort is stalled,” McClatchy’s David Lightman and William Douglas report. “Maybe indefinitely.”

“President Barack Obama is seeing the downside of his light touch on revamping the nation's health care system,” per the AP’s Chuck Babington. “While too early to rule out eventual success, it seems Obama will have to be more forceful and hands-on.”

Against that backdrop, illusions (or more than that) of momentum: “AARP, the nation's largest seniors lobby, will give its blessing today to an offer by drug manufacturers to contribute $80 billion over the next decade to reduce the cost of comprehensive health reform, in part by discounting the price of Medicare prescriptions,” Ceci Connolly reports in The Washington Post.

“This is an early win for reform and a major step forward,” the AARP’s Barry Rand plans to say, alongside President Obama at the White House Monday.

“The agreement is the latest in a series of cost-cutting deals the government has made with insurance companies, doctors, hospitals and medical-device manufacturers as it seeks to find ways to pay for proposed changes to the health-care system, including expanding insurance coverage to 46 million uninsured Americans,”Janet Adamy and Jonathan D. Rockoff report in The Wall Street Journal. “The agreements would take effect only if Congress passes legislation to fix the health system.”

Plus, a bill signing: The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act becomes law at 2 pm ET in the Rose Garden — a great chance to urge Congress along for a fresh week.

The next choice up may a familiar one (blame preexisting conditions): Is bipartisanship even a goal anymore?

“Behind-the-scenes attempts to get a deal with Republicans on nonprofit co-ops as an alternative to a public plan have led only to frustration, complains a key Democrat. He and his colleagues may have to go it alone, said Sen. Chuck Schumer,” the AP’s Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar reports.

“I don't think I could say with a straight face that this [co-op proposal] is at all close to a nationwide public option,” Schumer, D-N.Y., told the AP. “Right now, this co-op idea doesn't come close to satisfying anyone who wants a public plan.”

Over to Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont.: “I think it’s very important to get a good, bipartisan bill.”

“I think there's a lot of concern in the Democratic caucus,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.

“Senate Democrats say President Obama doesn't have the votes yet to pass health-care reform,” Ken Bazinet writes for the New York Daily News. “Disagreements over how big a role the government should play, staggering cost estimates and concerns that states could get shortchanged on existing programs have some senators urging a go-slower approach.”

Then there’s Republicans — if anything, more united than they were a week ago: “The CBO estimates were a death blow to a government run health care plan,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on “This Week” Sunday.

“A government plan, no matter what you call it, will increase costs, it will reduce choices, and essentially, it will not allow you to keep what you have,” said House Minority Whip Eric Cantor, R-Va., on “Good Morning America” Monday.

Where’s the pressure headed next? “The question now is whether we will nonetheless fail to get that change, because a handful of Democratic senators are still determined to party like it’s 1993,” Paul Krugman writes in his New York Times column. “The real risk is that health care reform will be undermined by ‘centrist’ Democratic senators who either prevent the passage of a bill or insist on watering down key elements of reform. . . . This time, the alleged center must not hold.”

Time to sell? “Obama’s supporters are clamoring for him to campaign for health care like his own election was on the line,” Politico’s Carrie Budoff Brown reports. “In a way, they say, it is — because the fate of health care may well determine the course of his presidency, given how far out on the limb he is in calling for a bill this year.”

“President Barack Obama will take his case to the American people this week on a plan to overhaul the U.S. health-care system as Congress struggles to find a bipartisan way to approve his top domestic priority,” Bloomberg’s Kristin Jensen and Nicole Gaouette report. “Obama invited the ABC television network to broadcast from the White House on June 24 and will take health-care questions from the public in the East Room. Three House panels will hold hearings during the week, and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus is rushing to finish draft legislation before Congress starts a weeklong recess on June 29.”

Time to own? “Now it’s their turn to actually run the country,” New York Times columnist Ross Douthat writes. “And just as Bush-era conservatives couldn’t really make tax cuts pay for themselves, Obama-era Democrats aren’t really going to be able to finance universal health care without substantial middle-class tax increases, or substantial spending cuts. They’re looking for both, and maybe they can pull it off.”

“The president needs to get more involved, both to save his Democrats from self-induced chaos and to rescue his signature initiative from becoming an unappealing combination of higher taxes and meager help for the uninsured — the Amazing Shrinking Healthcare Plan,” Doyle McManus writes in his Los Angeles Times column.

Getting out there: “He’s not bound by convention. It has been an article of faith that the president may be overexposed, that the bully pulpit needs to be selective, carefully utilized; too much use of the currency would debase it,” Bloomberg’s Al Hunt writes. “To this White House, there seems no such thing as too much coverage. In five months, the president has given 173 speeches, held almost two-dozen press conferences, including three formal prime-time sessions, and given more than 50 media interviews, according to calculations by CBS News correspondent Mark Knoller.”

A good sign for those who miss Ted Kennedy’s voice: The senator is on-camera in a new TV ad for his friend, Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn. “Quality health care as a fundamental right for all Americans has been the cause of my life, and Chris Dodd has been my closest ally in this fight,” Kennedy, D-Mass., says in the ad, per Politico’s Glenn Thrush.

Perhaps a bigger concern — the context: “Despite signs that the recession gripping the nation's economy may be easing, the unemployment rate is projected to continue rising for another year before topping out in double digits, a prospect that threatens to slow growth, increase poverty and further complicate the Obama administration's message of optimism about the economic outlook,” The Washington Post’s Michael A. Fletcher reports.

As for the big foreign challenge of the day, a shift: “The violent day in Iran, and the White House’s condemnation of the government's reaction, seemed to move America ever further from the hard-headed negotiations with a distasteful regime that Obama had promised on his campaign, and toward a focus on freedom and democracy more associated with Obama’s predecessor,” Politico’s Ben Smith writes. “Also on display: The tension between Obama's pragmatism and his sense for a historic moment.”

ABC’s Jake Tapper: “But President Obama continued to keep arm's length from the protestors themselves, concerned that too tight an embrace of their cause would hurt their credibility and potentially lead to even more bloodshed. The president made clear that his concern focused on the violence, not the legitimacy of the elections.”

Columnist E.J. Dionne Jr.: “Obama's initial caution served the interests of freedom by making clear that the revolt against Iran's flawed election is homegrown. As the struggle continues, we cannot pretend that we are indifferent to its outcome. It's not easy to walk the progressive path. But Obama has always said that he knows how to deal with complexity. This is his chance to prove it.”

The bigger picture, per the Washington Times’ Jon Ward: “The tumultuous aftermath of Iran's presidential election more than a week ago has complicated the president's plans to engage Tehran in a quest for a ‘grand bargain’ to stop the Islamic Republic's pursuit of a nuclear weapon.”

For his critics, getting there: “I appreciate what the president said yesterday. But he's been timid and passive more than I would like and I hope he will continue to speak truth to power,” Sen. Graham said on ABC’s “This Week.”

On the stimulus, mayoral angst: “President Obama is facing complaints from big-city mayors and county politicians that parts of the economic stimulus package are shortchanging their constituents,” the Los Angeles Times’ Peter Nicholas writes. “Vice President Joe Biden has been holding private conference calls on the stimulus with elected officials from around the country, some of whom have been telling him that metropolitan regions are losing out to rural areas in the competition for stimulus money.”

Watchdog angst: “Most of the $2.2 billion in economic stimulus money for Army Corps of Engineers construction projects will be spent in the home districts of members of Congress who oversee the corps' funding, a USA TODAY analysis found,” Matt Kelley writes. “Two-thirds of the money will be spent in states or districts represented by members of the House and Senate appropriations subcommittees that direct how the Corps of Engineers spends its money, the analysis found.”

From your annals of transparency: “Five months into his administration, Mr. Obama has signed two dozen bills, but he has almost never waited five days. On the recent credit card legislation, which included a controversial measure to allow guns in national parks, he waited just two,” Katharine Q. Seelye reports in The New York Times. “Now, in a tacit acknowledgment that the campaign pledge was easier to make than to fulfill, the White House is changing its terms. Instead of starting the five-day clock when Congress passes a bill, administration officials say they intend to start it earlier and post the bills sooner.”

And — why we won’t hear about participants in White House meetings about “clean coal”: “After Obama's much-publicized Jan. 21 “transparency” memo, administration lawyers crafted a key directive implementing the new policy that contained a major loophole,” Newsweek’s Michael Isikoff writes. “In a little-noticed passage, the Holder memo also said the new standard applies ‘if practicable’ for cases involving ‘pending litigation.’ ”

Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., returns to work in Washington Monday, with not-so-flattering headlines back home: “In a new Las Vegas Review-Journal poll of Nevada voters, 39 percent had a favorable view of Ensign, a drop of 14 percentage points from a month ago. The percentage who regarded Ensign unfavorably, 37 percent, was up 19 points from a month ago, when just 18 percent viewed him negatively.”

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., gets a Washington Post profile: “The senator from Kentucky is shifting his role from behind-the-scenes fixer to party leader,” Perry Bacon writes. “He has cast himself as a man willing to work with President Obama when they agree on issues, although Democrats say they don't much see evidence of his bipartisanship. And while other Republicans attack Obama on nearly every issue, McConnell has persuaded his Senate colleagues to pick targeted, potentially winnable fights against the Democrats, such as the party's current push to make sure health-care reform does not include a government-run insurance option.”

Rep. Barney Frank — investment maestro? “While other lawmakers have suffered declines in their personal investments because of the plummet in stock prices, the liberal Massachusetts Democrat has fared better by being conservative in his own finances, putting his $896,000 investment portfolio largely in state and local municipal bonds,” The Boston Globe’s Susan Milligan reports.

“It’s not just coincidence — it’s putting my money where my mouth is,’’ said Frank. “I made money while other people lost money.’’

JibJab’s latest effort featuring the president — per the Chicago Sun-Times’ Lynn Sweet.

The Kicker:

“The president told me he was going to bronze my propeller.” — Peter Orszag, President Obama’s budget director, on his prize if he staves off a collapse in investor confidence because of the nation’s debts.

“I may be Darth Vader to some groups, but to a lot of others I'm Luke Skywalker.” — Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.

Today on “Top Line,” ABCNews.com’s daily political Webcast: Ralph G. Neas of the National Coalition on Health Care, and Karen Tumulty of Time magazine. Noon ET.

Follow The Note on Twitter: http://twitter.com/thenote

For up-to-the-minute political updates check out The Note’s blog . . . all day every day:
http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/

Sam Waterston: Wall Street Mess Shows Need for Public Campaign Funding

ABC News’ Rick Klein and David Chalian report: On Wednesday, lawmakers plan to introduce a measure that would allow congressional candidates to receive public funds for their campaigns — a bill that would dramatically remake what it means to run for Congress, and maybe what it means to serve in Congress.

The bailouts and deficits now dominating the discussion on Capitol Hill would make this seem like a less-than-perfect time for a bill that would give billions in public funds to candidates for office, via a new assessment on companies that receive government contracts.

But actor Sam Waterston, who is in Washington this week to press for the measure, sees it another way.

“I think one way to look at it is to imagine what the conversation about the bailouts would be — what it would be like and how it would be changed if we were all absolutely certain that money wasn’t a factor and anything that anybody was saying for or against helping these various industries,” Waterston told us on “Politics Live” today.

The scandal over AIG bonuses and other anger at Wall Street is an argument for this kind of overhaul of campaign-finance law, he said.

“I believe that the financial sector has contributed to $10 billion over the last 20 years to federal elections, and so at least there’s the question as to whether or not that didn’t buy some influence, and if it did then it’s got something to do with where we are today,” Waterston said.

The bill is a long-shot to become law. It will be introduced by a bipartisan group of lawmakers this week — including powerhouse senators Arlen Specter, R-Pa., and Dick Durbin, D-Ill., one of President Obama’s closest allies on Capitol Hill.

We also talked to the “Law & Order” star about how the president has modeled himself on Abraham Lincoln. Waterston has portrayed Lincoln on stage and screen, in his words, “more than you can count on the fingers of two hands.”

“These are very, very large shoes to fill, as you can see if you go and look at his statue at the end of the Mall,” Waterston said. “But that he admires him, seems to me that any American politician who didn’t would be — you know, you’d want to ask him some sharp questions because he was such a strikingly great — he was such a great figure as a politician and as a spokesman for the issues that mattered in his time.”

Plouffe: ‘I Give Speeches In Public, Some Not’

ABC News’ Teddy Davis & Ferdous Al-Faruque report:

 

Obama campaign manager David Plouffe delivered an “off-the-record” speech at the National Press Club on Feb. 12, 2009, prompting a letter of complaint from the organization’s president. The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank (left) confronted Plouffe (right) following his remarks.
Ferdous Al-Faruque/ ABC News 

Obama campaign manager David Plouffe came under fire Thursday for insisting that a speech he delivered at the National Press Club as part of a two-day “Transitions 2009” conference be “off-the-record”.

“I give speeches in public, some not,” Plouffe told The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank following his speech. “These were the terms under which I was told to come in.”

“It was sponsored by Georgetown as you know, not by Politico,” Plouffe added.

Georgetown spokesman Andy Pino told ABC News that it was Plouffe’s preference, not the university’s, that members of the press be blocked from reporting on the remarks of Obama’s campaign manager.

As recently as Monday, Georgetown’s Office of Communications was credentialing reporters for Plouffe’s remarks.

By Tuesday, Georgetown’s media staff began notifying reporters that Plouffe was off limits per his request even though the rest of the conference, which included a discussion with three former White House chiefs of staff, was still on the record.

“To any media in the room, it’s been requested that these remarks be off the record,” said Rob Manuel, the dean of Georgetown University’s School of Continuing Education, during his introduction of Plouffe.

While Georgetown organized the paid event, Plouffe’s talk was originally billed as being co-hosted by Politico similar to the rest of the two-day conference.

When conference attendees arrived Thursday morning, Georgetown staff distributed copies of the day’s agenda advertising Politico editor-in-chief John F. Harris as the moderator of Plouffe’s luncheon keynote address. Plouffe was supposed to deliver prepared remarks. Harris was then supposed to moderate questions from the audience.

Politico learned Tuesday that Plouffe had told Georgetown University that he wanted his speech to be off the record.

The political news site worked with Georgetown University right up until Plouffe’s Thursday remarks to get the architect of Obama’s White House win to reconsider.

In an interview with ABC News, Harris said that Politico did not want to be in the business of co-sponsoring an off-the-record talk with a newsworthy person.

“I’m not trying to be on a high horse on this,” said Harris. “I can appreciate the bind that Georgetown was in. But I couldn’t participate in an off-the-record conversation. It seemed pointless to me.”

To showcase his displeasure with Plouffe’s off-the-record policy, Milbank stood outside of the National Press Club’s ballroom wearing a sandwich board on which he had written: “unPLOUFFable: what the Plouffe?”

Milbank then handed out reporters’ notebooks and pens to the lunch participants as they were walking into the National Press Club’s ballroom, urging them to take notes on Plouffe’s remarks and promising to cite their account of the speech in a future Washington Post column.

Shortly before Plouffe began speaking, the president of the National Press Club registered her displeasure with Plouffe’s off-the-record policy by e-mailing him a letter of complaint.

“Blacking out news coverage of this speech would not only reduce the free flow of information that is at the core of the National Press Club’s mission,” wrote NPC president Donna Leinwand. “It also would run contrary to the spirit of President Obama’s recent executive order and statements in support of a more open government.”

UPDATE: Plouffe Associate Moves to Quell Press Club Flap

On Thursday evening, an associate with Plouffe’s AKPD media firm attempted to quell Plouffe’s flap at the National Press Club by providing ABC News with a copy of a redacted contract signed with Georgetown University on Dec. 19, 2008.

The contract stipulates that Plouffe’s “portion of the program will be closed to the media.”

Read more here.