With an assist from POLITICO’s Hill team.

The Senate’s most vulnerable Democrats are steering clear of the week’s biggest news: the third indictment of former President Donald Trump.

Your Huddle hosts asked seven incumbents expected to face competitive reelections in 2024 to weigh in on the charges but heard nothing but crickets. Of Sens. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Bob Casey (D-Pa.), Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.), Jon Tester (D-Mont.) and Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.), only Sinema’s team replied, with a no comment.

Their silence stands in contrast to many other Democrats — including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who quickly weighed in Tuesday with a joint statement alongside House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries calling the Jan. 6 Capitol riot “the culmination of a months-long criminal plot led by the former president.”

A tricky balancing act: The seven endangered lawmakers need to win over independents and even Republicans to win their Senate races. However popular Trump’s indictments may be among Democrats, piling on the former president isn’t a winning strategy for incumbents who need to reach beyond the party base in order to keep their jobs.

Manchin, Tester and Brown are all defending seats in states where Trump won bigly over President Joe Biden in 2020: West Virginia (39 points); Montana (16 points); and Ohio (8 points). Biden did carry Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Nevada and Arizona, but only narrowly.

Bipartisan phenomenon: Due to the nature of the 2024 map, few incumbent Republicans are in truly competitive races. But in the House, the 18 GOP lawmakers representing House districts won by Biden have been relatively quiet on the indictment, too — more evidence, if you needed it, that there’s little upside for frontline members in wading into the former president’s legal morass.

The kid-gloves treatment reflects the split public opinion on Trump’s behavior: 45 percent of adults surveyed in an AP-NORC poll conducted last month (i.e. before this latest indictment) said Trump had done something illegal related to the events of Jan. 6. A higher percentage, 53 percent, concluded he had done something illegal related to the handling of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago residence.

What the challengers are saying: Not all of the Republicans running to unseat the Senate’s vulnerable Dems are weighing in on Trump, but those who have are firmly in the former president’s corner. “Joe Biden knows he can’t beat Trump at the ballot box, so he’s trying to throw him in prison,” wrote Tim Sheehy, who’s challenging Tester in Montana.

West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice, who’s seeking Manchin’s Senate seat, told Huddle in a statement that the indictments are part of a “witch hunt and the weaponization of the federal government,” while his primary rival, Rep. Alex Mooney (R-W.Va.), also lambasted “unprecedented witch hunts from corrupt left-wing Democrats” and vowed to fight “DOJ’s disgusting abuse of power.”

Sam Brown, who’s seeking the Republican Senate nomination in Nevada, told Huddle: “It is deeply concerning that we appear to be creating a two-tiered system of justice under the current administration where the rules don’t apply to everyone evenly.”

One prominent Republican, however, remained mum as Trump was arraigned: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who predicted criminal consequences for Trump in the immediate aftermath of Jan. 6, again declined comment to us through his office Thursday.

GOOD MORNING! Welcome to Huddle, the play-by-play guide to all things Capitol Hill, on this Friday, August 4, where the only thing better than a recess week is a recess weekend.

TRUMP INDICTMENT LATEST

Even with a Trump arraignment just down the block, there was not a lawmaker in sight Thursday when the former president pleaded not guilty to four felony charges related to efforts to block the transfer of power following the 2020 election.

There were roughly a dozen protesters outside the federal courthouse in Washington, along with hundreds of onlookers who gathered to observe as Trump’s motorcade rolled in. But unlike previous arraignments — which featured cameos by the likes of Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) and George Santos (R-N.Y.) — no members chose to devote a precious recess day to showing up for (or against) the former president.

Don’t miss our team’s coverage on all things arraignment: Trump pleads not guilty to charges that he conspired to overturn 2020 election, from Kyle Cheney and Betsy Woodruff Swan.

— Daniella Diaz and Andrew Zhang

A SOLEMN BIPARTISAN SCHOOL VISIT

Florida Reps. Jared Moskowitz and Mario Diaz-Balart will lead a bipartisan group of nine lawmakers on a Friday visit to the scene of one of the nation’s worst school shootings, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Moskowitz, a Democrat, led a similar tour for Florida legislators in the immediate aftermath of the 2018 shooting and credits it in part with building support for a state-level gun safety package signed into law weeks later by then-Gov. Rick Scott. He’s hoping Friday’s visit might crack open a window, however slightly, for more action.

“We got a full tour around the building — the blood outside the doors where people dragged themselves out, the bullet holes, the backpacks piled up outside, the homework scattered everywhere,” Moskowitz told Huddle of the prior visit. “I think the most impactful thing was the legislators seeing that firsthand.”

Why now: Moskowitz said he doesn’t have “a specific policy objective” for Friday’s tour, but the goal remains the same: that an in-person visit might inspire an appetite for further legislation to prevent gun violence and protect students.

“I don’t ever want to underestimate what political times we live in,” he said. “Because I didn’t at the time — at that moment, I didn’t think we would respond the way we did.”

Refresher: The last gun control package passed Congress just over a year ago, spurred by the May 2022 shooting that left 19 children and two adults dead at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas. That legislation provided grants for states to implement so-called red flag laws and closed what’s known as the “boyfriend loophole.”

The product of across-the-aisle negotiations in the Senate, the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act passed in that chamber on a 65-33 vote that included support from 15 Republicans. Just 14 Republicans in the House voted in favor of the bill, which passed 234-193.

What’s next: The post-Uvalde package appears to have exhausted whatever bipartisan interest existed on Capitol Hill to pursue gun legislation. Republicans have resisted any effort to kick-start talks on the issue, and Diaz-Balart suggested in an interview Thursday that lawmakers focus on schools, not guns.

“That may be things like whether it’s bulletproof glass design areas, so that people’s kids are safe,” said the Florida Republican, who voted against the post-Uvalde legislation. “Make sure that you just can’t walk up and do whatever you want to, whether it’s to kidnap a kid or to do mass shootings.”

Moskovitz conceded this week that additional movement will be incremental: “We’re not gonna get a Hail Mary on this issue. So we’ve got to continue to try to make progress, because making progress means we’re gonna save kids.”

Also attending: Reps. Bowman, Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D-Fla.), Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.), Nanette Barragan (D-Calif.), Carlos Giménez (R-Fla.), John Rutherford (R-Fla.) and Frederica Wilson (D-Fla.)

ABOUT THAT DEVON ARCHER TRANSCRIPT

Congress’s days-long fixation on ex-Hunter Biden business associate Devon Archer is going down a new rabbit hole: into the backstory behind the quick release of his Oversight Committee interview transcript.

The Thursday release of a 140-page record came less than 72 hours after Archer met privately with staff and lawmakers, and it happened without Archer’s attorney verifying the transcript’s accuracy. It’s an unusual step in politically sensitive congressional investigations, though some Democrats began calling for its release on Monday before the transcript was even in the committee’s possession. The committee’s July 17 interview with a former FBI official about the Hunter Biden investigation, for example, hasn’t yet been released.

A GOP committee aide told POLITICO that releasing the transcript followed committee protocols and they did not hear from Archer’s attorney ahead of 4 p.m. Wednesday deadline to review and correct the transcript — and still had not heard from him as of Thursday evening. “We gave a deadline,” the aide added, “and we received no corrections, no response, and no request for an extension.”

Matthew Schwartz, Archer’s attorney, isn’t directly criticizing the transcript release — which came amid a pitched battle between Republicans and Democrats on the committee over what precisely what Hunter Biden’s former business associate said. But Archer, Schwartz said, was “happy for people to read for themselves what he shared with the Committee,” but Schwartz warned that “we cannot confirm the accuracy of the transcript that was released, as Committee staffers gave us only a handful of hours to review it before it was made public.”

— Jordain Carney

Kathy Manning and a staffer are okay after being involved in a car accident on their way to a district event.

Brendan Boyle thanked the Jan. 6 committee, saying “if it were just up to the weak and feckless Merrick Garland and Lisa Monaco” then the indictment wouldn’t have happened.

Julia Letlow (and her kids) are enthusiastic supporters of National Watermelon Day.

The rodent saga continues in Cannon 107, where they’re finding — and picking up — baby mice.

QUICK LINKS

A Progressive Powerhouse’s Surprise Layoffs Fuel Concerns About The Left’s Future, from Daniel Marans in The Huffington Post

Congressman Dale Strong, nurses aid in saving police officer’s life, from Javon Williams

GPO vacates regional offices, embraces 100% telework for all eligible employees, from Drew Friedman at Federal News Network

TRANSITIONS

Zach Deatherage is now Rep. Elise Stefanik’s legislative director. He was previously her senior legislative assistant.

TODAY IN CONGRESS

The House convenes at 11 a.m. for a pro forma session.

The Senate convenes at noon for a pro forma session.

AROUND THE HILL

*crickets*

THURSDAY’S WINNER: Bruce Mehlman correctly guessed that former Rep. Clare E. Hoffman (R-Mich.) opposed the funds for the construction of the Rayburn Building because he thought it would be improper to fund a project that had not been authorized. Rayburn was able to secure approval of his amendment on a voice vote.

TODAY’S QUESTION from Bruce: Which winning presidential candidate who won the popular vote eked out the smallest plurality of voters?

The first person to correctly guess gets a mention in the next edition of Huddle. Send your answers to [email protected].

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Follow Daniella and Anthony on X at @DaniellaMicaela and @AnthonyAdragna.