In The Know About Joe

Read Time: 3 Minutes

• Georgia Democrat Stacey Abrams says she has not heard from Joe Biden’s presidential campaign as it starts its vetting process to pick a nominee for vice president: “I have said many times that if called I will answer, but I have not received any calls.”

• Joe Biden’s search for a running mate has advanced to the next phase as his campaign conducts more extensive reviews of some prospects, including at least several African American women, according to people with knowledge of the situation.

Among the candidates who have progressed to the point of more comprehensive vetting are: Sen. Kamala D. Harris, Rep. Val Demings, former national security adviser Susan E. Rice and Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, all of whom are black. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who is white, is also in that group, as is New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, who is Latina.

• Ukrainian officials on Saturday said they were offered $5 million in bribes to end a probe into energy company Burisma’s founder, but said there was no connection to former board member Hunter Biden whose father is running for the U.S. presidency.

Artem Sytnyk, head of Ukraine’s national anti-corruption bureau, said three people had been detained, including one current and former tax official, over the bribe offer.

• Former President Obama will join Joe Biden for the first time in a virtual fundraiser on June 23, the former vice president announced Monday.

The campaign’s event plans to target tens of thousands of small-dollar donors. 

• About 50 liberal groups have signed on to a letter warning presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden that he could lose the November election to President Trump if he doesn’t adopt more progressive policing policies.

The letter urges Biden to adopt a 21-page policy proposal released by The Movement for Black Lives to promote reducing incarceration and scaling back police forces across the country.

The groups are also asking Biden to drop his recent proposal to add $300 million in funding for the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) program, which would hire and train additional police officers to patrol within the communities where they live.

• Joe Biden is making a big play for Florida, putting President Trump on defense in his own backyard in a must-win state for the White House.

Trump won the perennial swing state in 2016 over Democrat Hillary Clinton by a little more than 100,000 votes, but Biden’s campaign believes he can put it back in the Democratic column given the Obama-Biden ticket’s victories in 2008 and 2012.

• Republican operatives are reportedly launching a super PAC to help encourage GOP voters to head for the ballot box in support of the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, Joe Biden.

Axios reported Wednesday that Right Side PAC will include former officials from the Trump and George W. Bush administrations, including Anthony Scaramucci, who briefly served as President Trump’s communications director.

• Former President Obama called on voters to elect his former Vice President Joe Biden in his celebration of the Supreme Court decision preserving the DACA program, which protects immigrants who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children from deportation and allows them to work and travel within the country legally, saying Biden will work hard to defend so-called “Dreamers.”

“We have to move forward and elect Joe Biden and a Democratic Congress that does its job, protects DREAMers, and finally creates a system that’s truly worthy of this nation of immigrants once and for all.”

• Sen. Klobuchar announces she is withdrawing from consideration to be Joe Biden’s vice presidential choice: “I think this is a moment to put a woman of color on that ticket.”

Former Vice President Joe Biden’s campaign announced Thursday its first television ad buy of the general election, a $15 million, five-week blitz that will target six key battleground states that President Trump won in 2016: Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, North Carolina, Florida, and Arizona.

Sources:  ABC News, Axios, Bloomberg, CBS News, CNN, Financial Times, Fox News,The Hill, NBC News, NPR, NY Times, Politico, Reuters, Salon, Slate, Vanity Fair, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post