The Note: Policy-heavy primary to greet Biden in 2020 race

The former vice president is slated to become the 20th Democrat in the race

ByRick Klein and MaryAlice Parks
April 24, 2019, 6:11 AM

The TAKE with Rick Klein

It may yet prove to be Joe Biden's Democratic Party, but a whole lot of work has been done to define it in his absence from the 2020 race.

The former vice president plans to become the 20th Democrat in the race for president, with a video scheduled for release this morning and a public event scheduled Monday in union-heavy Pittsburgh.

Former Vice President Joe Biden speaks at a rally in support of striking Stop & Shop workers in Dorchester, Mass., April 18, 2019.
Michael Dwyer/AP

Biden will enter a space crowded with ideas.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren has been perhaps the most aggressive on that front -- pitching a plan to wipe out college loan debt to go along with plans to break up big tech companies -- while Sen. Kamala Harris has vowed executive action to mandate background checks for gun sales.

Sen. Bernie Sanders pointed out on Tuesday that Democrats "have come a long way in four years."

"We kind of opened the door to ideas that people believe to be feasible," he said.

The ideas door has been open for a while now. Among Biden's challenges will be to show he can walk through it with the same ease as other contenders.

The RUNDOWN with MaryAlice Parks

The National Rifle Association has scheduled its annual meeting in Indianapolis this weekend, and one of the largest gun-safety organizations in the country, Everytown for Gun Safety, plans to blanket the city in counter-ads.

The new ads will focus not only on gun ownership and gun violence but also attack the NRA as an organization and highlight negative headlines swirling around the powerful gun lobbyists.

In this undated photo shows the exterior of the Headquarters of the National Rifle Association inFairfax, Va.
Mark Peterson/Corbis via Getty Images

Over the last month, as reported by The New York Times, the NRA has been tangled in drama concerning its media contractors and in a public fight with NRATV.

Sources with Everytown told ABC News that the organization will spend over $100,000 on digital billboards and major online newspaper and social media ads. The group also plans to release a report online documenting negative headlines about campaign spending on a new site, NRAcrisis.org.

"In public, NRA executives push members to support an extreme 'guns everywhere' agenda -- but in private, their top priority seems to be lining their own pockets," John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety, said in a statement.

The NRA didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from ABC News.

The TIP with John Verhovek

Another day, another major event with more than half a dozen Democratic presidential candidates attending.

Eight Democratic hopefuls were slated to attend Wednesday's "She the People" summit in Houston for what is being billed by organizers as the "first-ever Presidential candidate forum focused on women of color." It's a key constituency for anyone hoping to capture the party's nomination.

Presidential hopeful Beto O'Rourke speaks during the "We the People" gathering, April 1, 2019, in Washington, D.C.
Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images

The event also highlights the newfound importance of the Lone Star State, which moved up its primary date this cycle.

Scheduled to attend today: Warren, Harris, Sen. Amy Klobuchar, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, Sen. Cory Booker former Rep. Beto O'Rourke and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro -- both Texans -- and Sanders, who is also set to hold rallies in Houston and Fort Worth in the days after the forum.

THE PLAYLIST

ABC News' "Start Here" podcast. Wednesday morning's episode features FiveThirtyEight Editor-In-Chief Nate Silver, who is joined by ABC News contributor and former Obama campaign adviser Stephanie Cutter to discuss former Vice President Joe Biden's upcoming 2020 presidential announcement and policies being discussed by Democrats on the campaign trail. http://apple.co/2HPocUL

ABC News' "Powerhouse Politics" podcast. Joe Lockhart, a former White House press secretary during the Clinton administration, talks with ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Jonathan Karl and ABC News Political Director Rick Klein about the politics of impeachment. https://apple.co/2Zfz5nD

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

  • President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump travel to Atlanta and will each deliver remarks at the Rx Drug Abuse and Heroin Summit at 1:15 p.m.
  • Presidential candidate and Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., wraps up his two-day visit in New Hampshire attending "Politics & Eggs" at 7 a.m. Later in the afternoon, he will travel to South Carolina for a beach clean-up project and meet-and-greet at 2:30 p.m. and then holds a virtual town hall at 4 p.m.
  • Presidential candidate and entrepreneur Andrew Yang continues his second day of "Humanity First Tour" with a series of meet-and-greet events beginning at 9 a.m. in Nevada.
  • Presidential candidate and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., appears on ABC's "The View" at 11 a.m.
  • Vice President Mike Pence will travel to Detroit to participate in a Trump Victory Lunch at noon. Later, he will tour the Ford Motor Company Dearborn Truck Plant and then deliver remarks at an auto industry discussion of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement.
  • Several 2020 presidential candidates travel to Texas to attend "She the People," a presidential forum in Houston: Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., former HUD Secretary Julián Castro, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii, Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., former Rep. Beto O'Rourke, D-Texas, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., are scheduled to attend the forum, which begins at 1 p.m. (CST) at Texas Southern University.
  • Several 2020 presidential candidates participate in the "African American Mayors Association 2019 Annual Conference" in Houston. The event begins at 3 p.m. (CST) and will include: Booker, Castro, Harris, Klobuchar and Miramar, Florida Mayor Wayne Messam.
  • Sanders will host a rally in Houston at 5 p.m. (CST) during his two-day visit to Texas.

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