Good morning. I'm Playbook Deputy editor Zach Stanton. It is Friday, April 28th. The White House and

Congressional Democrats are preparing to ramp up attacks on House Republicans in the wake of the

Republican Party's narrow passage on Wednesday of a debt limit bill packed with spending cuts.

Notably, it's a bit different than what Democrats had

expected to be doing. They hadn't really imagined that Kevin McCarthy would have success

getting this package through the House floor. And so now that's forcing Dems to recalibrate

their tactics a little bit. Coming down the pike, something that you can expect to see is that

Democrats are going to target swing district Republicans, really escalating the attacks on them

in the weeks and months to come, especially those in suburban areas over some of the cuts that are in

the Republican proposal that passed this week. And in public, Democrats express

real confidence that they're going to win that messaging war. They feel like it's kind of a layup.

But in private, they're kind of concerned about how this brinksmanship on the debt ceiling

and the potential default that stands in the balance. And ultimately,

what damage that standoff may do to the economy, which is still fragile, still recovering,

and frankly is critical to Joe Biden's case for re-election now that he is officially running

for president again in 2024.

And as we head into the weekend, here in Washington, things are a buzz with the White

House Correspondent dinner festivities that are really dominating the social scene in the

nation's capital. And we wanted to give you a taste of that. So last night, while I was at Politico's party at the British Embassy,

I found a corner in their garden and pulled aside playbook co-author Eugene Daniels

to talk with me about the frivolity of it all, but also why it matters

and the bigger issues at play beneath the bubbly surface of this week in Washington.

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