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Welcome to POLITICO’s West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration. With help from producer Raymond Rapada and Ben Johansen

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REHOBOTH BEACH, Del. — President JOE BIDEN was ready for another bike ride, and the pool of reporters monitoring his weeklong stay here had to hustle.

After being told to meet at 10 a.m. Thursday, reporters got emails and phone calls just after 8 notifying them to be ready in less than 20 minutes. There was some light rain in the forecast and the president’s bike ride was being moved up.

It was the fourth straight day Biden has gone biking along the woodsy beachside path here, continuing a summer vacation that has also included multiple trips to the beach and visits to a local restaurant and movie theater and been surprisingly active compared to previous stays.

You might think this would be the week for the president’s top aides and other West Wing officials to take a breather, or their own vacations. You would be wrong.

While a small contingent of staffers have accompanied the Bidens here, along with the usual trail of Secret Service agents, most aides remained back in Washington. They work away, largely disinclined to take time off even though the president is off campus, spending part of his days basking in the Delaware sun.

Out of public view, however, Biden has been working from his home here. He continues to receive his daily presidential brief, has gotten regular updates on extreme heat affecting parts of the country and speaks by phone with top aides several times a day on various issues, an administration official said.

Back in Washington, there has been no break from the daily morning staff call. Senior staff meetings have continued and Cabinet members are keeping busy schedules.

Vice President KAMALA HARRIS traveled to Florida for a speech Tuesday and met Wednesday with the president of Mongolia. On Thursday, she headed to Wisconsin for an event with Commerce Secretary GINA RAIMONDO to talk about how new investments in high speed internet are spurring a manufacturing boom.

Meanwhile, second gentleman DOUG EMHOFF traveled Thursday to Pennsylvania to tour and discuss antisemitism at the country’s largest Jewish summer camp complex. And Secretary of State ANTONY BLINKEN appeared earlier on Good Morning America from the show’s New York studio to discuss the United Nations Security Council meeting on food security he chaired Thursday.

Maybe it has something to do with America’s collective work ethic obsession, all this labor in August, a month when the entire European continent escapes to the beach. Or maybe it’s that the presidency is not a job where you can just set an out-of-office auto-reply email and disappear from the grid. And it can’t be lost on anyone at the White House that this month has, historically, been one where presidents’ best laid vacation plans have been upended by various events or scandals — including Biden, whose 2021 vacation was largely scrubbed amid the difficult U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

The only major change to the routine at 1600 Penn this week is that press secretary KARINE JEAN-PIERRE is not holding daily briefings, although she has been in the office.

Inside the West Wing, aides huddled to plot out upcoming Senate confirmations, according to a White House official. The press shop, working with their Treasury Department colleagues, shifted into high gear on Tuesday after Fitch downgraded the U.S. credit rating, responding with a flurry of TV appearances and email blasts highlighting economists and surrogates who criticized the move. And Treasury announced Wednesday it would offer taxpayers the option of going paperless when submitting their 2024 tax returns.

Biden’s absence from campus, however, has enabled staffers to catch up on work that’s been on the back burner, aides said. And to make time for more informal, personal engagements.

Chief of staff JEFF ZIENTS hosted the summer crop of White House fellows for dinner at his home Monday night, serving a Mediterranean spread of chicken, rice, hummus and baklava, a person familiar with the event said. He also had lunch with several interns on Tuesday and wandered across West Executive Drive for Taco Tuesday at Ike’s, where he chatted with lunching staffers, the person also said.

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Which president liked to sing with his dog?

(Answer at bottom.)

THE GHOSTS OF ’16: Biden and Democrats are bracing for a series of roadblocks that risk siphoning away critical votes in next year’s election, creating a scenario similar to 2016 when a third party candidate helped DONALD TRUMP clinch the presidency, our HOLLY OTTERBEIN and JONATHAN LEMIRE report. Party leaders are increasingly worried about CORNEL WEST’s Green Party bid, which they fear could make inroads among younger voters who have concerns about Biden’s age. Democrats are also keeping a watchful eye on Sen. JOE MANCHIN’s (D-W.Va.) flirtation with No Labels, although Manchin has said he won’t play spoiler if there isn’t a viable path to 270 Electoral College votes.

DO WE NEED THIS?: Florida Gov. RON DESANTIS agreed Thursday to a debate on Fox News with California Gov. GAVIN NEWSOM, finally accepting the challenge from his Democratic counterpart after months of taunting. As our CHRISTOPHER CADELAGO reports, it comes as DeSantis looks to ramp up his lackluster presidential campaign.

So how does Biden world view all this? A source familiar with their thinking told Chris that the president’s team has been in the loop with Newsom, who has become a top campaign booster, and views his participation as part of its larger surrogate efforts.

WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE WANTS YOU TO READ: This piece by the Atlantic’s DEREK THOMPSON analyzing how economists incorrectly forecast a U.S. recession this year. “The chair of the Federal Reserve is the chief vibemeister of the U.S. economy, and conceivably the combination of his statements and his actions has maneuvered the U.S. economy into the Goldilocks zone by making Americans just anxious enough to throttle consumer spending and wage growth while other economic disruptions went away,” Thompson writes. White House deputy press secretary ANDREW BATES tweeted the piece.

WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE DOESN’T WANT YOU TO READ: This new CNN poll which found that roughly half of Americans believe the economy is getting worse, and only a third of respondents approve of Biden’s handling of inflation. “Perceptions of the economy remain bleak,” write CNN’s JENNIFER AGIESTA and ARIEL EDWARDS-LEVY. “Overall, just 25% say economic conditions are at least somewhat good.”

And this piece by our JAMES BIKALES and BEN LEFEBVRE about how oil refinery outages and OPEC+ limits on production risk hurting the U.S. economy. The oil cartel is expected to announce it will extend its production cuts and some fear that an additional disruption, like a hurricane, could cause prices to soar. “Because OPEC has cut production so significantly, now we’re relying on oil that is being pumped out in the Gulf of Mexico on rigs,” said PATRICK DE HAAN, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy.

DARK BRANDON, DARK ROAST: The Biden campaign wants to convince voters inflation is coming down. The same Biden campaign is now selling Dark Brandon coffee mugs … for $22! Just sayin’.

FIRST IN WEST WING PLAYBOOK: FELTON BOOKER, the deputy assistant secretary of financial institutions at the Treasury Department, is leaving for a private sector job, he told colleagues in an email obtained by (the still honeymooning) DANIEL LIPPMAN.

BRINGING IN THE BREAD: Biden’s campaign is growing its fundraising team. It brought on COLLEEN COFFEY and MICHAEL PRATT to serve as finance co-directors, in addition to tapping JESSICA PORTER as the grassroots fundraising director, our Holly Otterbein reports.

Coffey and Pratt served as senior advisors during Biden’s 2020 campaign, while Porter worked as an online fundraising director for the DNC.

The additions come as Biden is trying to replicate the same 2020 historic fundraising figures that propelled him to victory, even after a $72 million second quarter haul has raised concerns within the party about the money-raising pace.

BRACING FOR NEW RULES: Businesses are preparing for a slew of new work rules from Biden appointees who oversee various labor-related posts, our NICK NIEDZWIADEK reports.

After navigating a transition period following the spring departure of former Labor Secretary MARTY WALSH and challenges to confirming his deputy, acting Secretary JULIE SU, the administration is ready to push out rules — from proposed safety standards for miners exposed to hazardous silica dust to regulations affecting overtime requirements.

New leaders at the National Labor Relations Board and Equal Opportunity Employment Commission also are racing to finalize rules that affect joint-employer status and enhance pay data reporting requirements.

Fitch Downgrade Won’t Break Washington’s Tax, Spending Habits (WSJ’s Andrew Duehren)

Taylor Swift gave $100,000 bonuses to about 50 truck drivers who worked on Eras Tour (CBS News’ Caitlin O’Kane)

Devon Archer said the opposite of what Republicans claimed (WaPo’s Philip Bump)

White House special assistant to the president for economic policy JOSH ZOFFER was an avid debater in college. The Harvard alumnus was the 2014 World Universities Debate Champion and helped secure the first title for the university in more than 20 years, according to the Harvard Crimson. We salute you Josh, but we’ll also be careful not to ever get in an argument with you!

President LYNDON. B. JOHNSON harmonized with his dog YUKI to the delight of dignitaries and visitors to the White House. Yuki was a mixed breed found by Johnson’s daughter, LUCI BAINES JOHNSON, at a Texas gas station on Thanksgiving Day in 1966 while on her way to the LBJ Ranch. “Yuki” means “snow” in Japanese.

Thanks to the White House Historical Association for this question!

A CALL OUT! Do you think you have a harder trivia question? Send us your best one about the presidents, with a citation or sourcing, and we may feature it!

Edited by Eun Kyung Kim and Sam Stein.