And now, a message from Google. The spirit of innovation is deeply ingrained in America,

and Google is helping Americans innovate in ways both big and small. Central Texas Regional Mobility

Authority is using Google AI to create smarter tolling systems and improve traffic flow for Texans.

This is a new era of American innovation. Find out more at g.co slash American Innovation. Good morning. I'm Anna Palmer. And I'm Jake

Sherman. And welcome to The Daily Punch. Brought to by Punchhole News. It is Tuesday, January 17th,

2023. Let's get into the mix. Here are your Washington headlines of the day. Number one,

why Tom Tillis matters. Number two, Jim Banks makes his governor bid official. And number three,

meet Biden's defender, Daniel Goldman. All right, Jake, let's get into it.

Congress is out, but we are here.

Let's talk about this number one story of the morning.

We have leading Punch Bowl News AM by our very own Andrew Desiderio

with a deep dive into Tom Tillis, the senator from North Carolina,

and how he has kind of become the dealmaker in the

Senate, if there is such a thing. There is. I would say it's interesting because North Carolina

has seen a lot of shifting politics in recent years. It used to be a pretty red state. It is now

probably, you could call it a purple state.

It is Tom Tillis won by a narrow margin in 2020 against Cal Cunningham.

And I would just say that the politics of the state lends itself to to being, for Republicans

being a little bit more flexible and open, given kind of the blue shift in areas like

the Research Triangle and in Charlotte.

And Tillis was keyed in almost every bipartisan negotiation, infrastructure, gun safety, same-sex marriage.

He was kind of a critical Republican player. Andrew caught up with him at the border last week

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