Good Wednesday morning, I'm Jake Sherman and welcome to your political playbook audio briefing,

sponsored by Hewlett Packard Enterprises. And I'm Anna Palmer. Russian President Vladimir Putin

gave a stark assessment on North Korea. CNN is reporting that Putin said the situation may be

impossible to resolve. Back on the home front, Republican leaders were at the White House yesterday

to talk about tax reform. The White House told Republican leaders they hoped the priority wouldn't be swallowed

by Congress's new priority funding disaster relief programs for Hurricane Harvey. Treasury Secretary

Stephen Mnuchin had another message for Republican leaders. He told them Harvey will impact the

debt limit expiration date, and it was important that Congress would lift

the nation's borrowing limit this week.

Our own Rachel Bade, Josh Dossie, and Kyle Cheney have the story on how Trump's White

House is moving fast to quash growing opposition to his strategy to raise the debt ceiling

as part of the hurricane relief package.

House lawmakers have been told Trump will give a full-throated endorsement

of their plan to pair the two and send them to the Oval Office this week. The most recent plan

has Congress aiming to clear the debt limit until after the midterms. Why? Most lawmakers would

rather not have to vote to lift the debt limit more than once this Congress. There is also

talk of attaching a continuing resolution

which will keep the government open, but aides and lawmakers we talk to say they do not think

they'll have enough time to get it ready this week. There could be some opposition to this strategy.

The House Freedom Caucus, the conservative group led by Mark Meadows of North Carolina,

voted privately to support a debt ceiling increase if it is tied

to capping spending as a percentage of GDP. Still, broadly speaking, it's going to be tough

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