| Good morning, Early Birds. Send us your tips: earlytips@washpost.com. Thanks for waking up with us. In today's edition: What some of the highest-profile backers of Donald Trump's false claims of election fraud are pitching to state and local officials ... The Senate Judiciary Committee will vote this morning on the nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson for the Supreme Court ... mass graves have been reported in Bucha, a suburb near Kyiv ... but first ... | | |  | On K Street | | Washington firms line up to work for Ukraine, for free |  Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky reacting during an interview with Russian media, in Kyiv, Ukraine on March 27. (Photo by UKRAINIAN PRESIDENTIAL PRESS SERVICE HANDOUT/EPA-EFE) | | | When the European Centre for a Modern Ukraine hired a pair of Washington lobbying firms in 2012, it would end up shelling out millions of dollars for their services over the next two years. A decade later, Washington law and public relations firms are only too happy to help Ukraine's government and other Ukrainians for free. The Washington law firm Morrison & Foerster disclosed last week that it would advise Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's office on U.S., British and European sanctions. SKDK, a prominent Democratic consulting firm with deep ties to the Biden administration, briefly advised the Ukrainian ambassador to the United Nations several weeks ago. And PLUS Communications, a Washington firm started by several veteran Republican operatives, has helped connect Ukrainians — including members of the Ukrainian parliament — with American TV bookers and reporters. All of them are working pro bono. | | The current efforts to aid Ukraine couldn't be more different than the lobbying campaign that Paul Manafort helped orchestrate a decade ago on behalf of the nonprofit European Centre for a Modern Ukraine, which Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election found was ultimately controlled by Viktor Yanukovych, the Ukrainian president at the time. Yanukovych was aligned with Russian President Vladimir Putin and fled to Russia in 2014; Zelensky's government is battling a Russian invasion. The eagerness of Washington's consultant class to work for Ukraine has changed accordingly. "Ukraine, for lack of a better word, is hot right now," said Ben Freeman, a research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. "So there's a huge reputational gain for lobbying and PR firms to be seen as working on behalf of Ukraine." None of the firms that have rushed to help Ukraine so far, though, appear to be doing any lobbying. Zelensky speaks regularly with President Biden and has been hailed as a hero by lawmakers in both parties. He doesn't need K Street's help to get his message heard in Washington. "The Ukrainians don't need lobbyists, myself included," said Daniel Vajdich, a former Republican congressional aide who's represented the Ukrainian energy industry in Washington since 2017. "President Zelensky is someone who is speaking on his own in a way that no one can on his behalf. And I would say that for other senior Ukrainian officials as well." "While there's a desire for lobbying firms to quite frankly draw attention to themselves by working for the Ukrainians, the Ukrainians don't need that," Vajdich added. The Ukrainian Federation of Employers of the Oil and Gas Industry paid Vajdich's firm more than $800,000 last year, according to disclosure filings, but he too has been working pro bono since the Russian invasion. | | Washington firms have been able to help Ukraine in ways other than lobbying. | | Morrison & Foerster, for instance, said it would "provide advice" to Zelensky's office, "including analyzing regulatory regimes, contextualizing new policies and actions, providing guidance on and assisting with U.S. government engagement, and updating our advice in response to emerging conditions," according to a copy of the contract filed with the Justice Department. The Ukrainian embassy in Washington "does not use the services of lobbying organizations, including on the issue of sanctions" Volodymyr Riznichenko, an embassy spokesman, wrote in an email to the Early. But the advice the firm is providing to Zelensky's office will be passed onto the embassy, he added. John Smith, a partner at the firm and a former Treasury Department sanctions official, declined to comment on the advice he's giving Zelensky's government. In an interview with the Early last month before the firm's work for Ukraine became public, though, he said the Biden administration and its allies could impose additional sanctions on Russian oligarchs, companies, industries and Russian government agencies. "My expectation is that the U.S. government is feverishly going down its list of industry sectors in Russia to determine the ones where Russia is far more vulnerable and we can live without those Russian products or services," Smith said. "What are the industries where they need us more than we need them? That's going to be, I think, the most likely additional next step." | A 'wave of offers to help us' | | The details of what exactly SKDK did for Ukraine's government are less clear. Stephen Krupin, a onetime speechwriter for former president Barack Obama who's now SKDK's head of executive communications, registered as a foreign agent offering "speech writing support" to Sergiy Kyslytsya, Ukraine's ambassador to the United Nations, address the General Assembly. But hours later, Kyslytsya said he wasn't getting any help. In a Facebook post first spotted by Politico, Kyslytsya wrote that while he appreciated "the wave of offers to help us," he had "never hired or approached any PR or lobbyists either in the US or abroad" and that "all possible claims that we have received guidance from others than my Government are untrue and misleading." SKDK deregistered the next day. The firm declined to comment. Not all of the offers to help Ukraine have come from well-known firms. Lukas Kaczmarek, a lawyer in suburban Baltimore involved in local Republican politics, registered last month as a foreign agent working for Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In a disclosure filing, Kaczmarek — who declined to comment on his work when reached on Friday — reported working with Ukraine's embassy on securing "an expedited export license for a batch of small arms" bound for Ukraine. "I expect to work in this capacity for the duration of the Russian invasion of Ukraine," he wrote, "and I have not, am not and shall not receive any monetary compensation for my assistance." | | |  | On the Hill | | | On the calendar: Biden is flying back to Washington from Wilmington, Del., this morning as the White House and Congress confront a packed week. The Senate Judiciary Committee is set to vote today on Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's nomination to the Supreme Court. Senators are also hustling to move a stalled covid relief package as well as a bill barring Russian oil imports and ending normal trade relations with Russia and Belarus before lawmakers in both chambers head home for two weeks at the end of the week. | Senate begins voting today on Ketanji Brown Jackson's Supreme Court bid |  Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson during a Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing on Wed., March 23. (Julia Nikhinson/Bloomberg) | | | More on Jackson's vote: "The Senate Judiciary Committee kicks off the action at 10 a.m., with its 22 members debating Jackson's credentials and qualifications for sitting on the nation's highest court," our colleague Seung Min Kim reports. | - The Judiciary Committee "is almost certain to deadlock on her nomination. That will force Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) to put a measure on the Senate floor discharging Jackson's nomination from the committee, a vote that is expected to occur on Monday evening."
- "Her final confirmation vote on the Senate floor will occur Thursday or Friday."
| | |  | At the White House | | Obama to head to the White House to celebrate ACA |  Former President Barack Obama speaks during a memorial service for former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in Las Vegas, on Jan. 8. (Susan Walsh/ AP Photo, File) | | | Return of the (former) prez: "Former President Barack Obama will return to the White House on Tuesday for the first time since he left office to promote the Affordable Care Act in an event alongside Biden," NBC News's Mike Memoli first reported. | - "Vice President Harris will join them in delivering remarks about the expansion of health care benefits under the law, as well as Biden's efforts to further reduce health care costs and expand access to care."
- "Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra and other members of the Cabinet, which includes a number of people who served in the Obama administration, are also expected to attend."
| | |  | The campaign | | Trump allies are pushing to hand-count ballots around the U.S. |  New York City Board of Election staff member counts absentee ballots in the primary election on July 2, 2021. (Mary Altaffer/AP Photo) | | - "Speaking at a commissioners meeting in deeply conservative, mostly rural Nye County, they argued the county should ditch all its voting machines."
- "The electronic voting machines are so vulnerable and so uncertifiable, I don't see how we can trust them," Jim Marchant, a Trump supporting Nevada secretary of state candidate, told Nye County commissioners.
- "Instead, they insisted, the county should adopt an old-fashioned and largely obsolete method: tallying the results by hand."
| | "Also presenting to the commission were retired Army Col. Phil Waldron and businessman Russell J. Ramsland Jr., who had worked with Trump's legal team to raise doubts about the machines in 2020," our colleagues write. | - "Now they're part of a network of Trump allies traveling the country to press for hand-counted paper ballots. The message is connecting: In recent weeks, officials have discussed the idea in public meetings in Colorado, Louisiana, Kansas and New Hampshire, and bills to require hand-counting have been proposed in at least six states."
- "None of the statewide bills have passed, nor have the proposals gotten traction in large jurisdictions. But there has been increasing pressure placed on Republicans to endorse the idea, and a number of smaller towns and counties are now seriously considering it."
| Trump endorses Sarah Palin for Alaska's congressional seat |  Former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin speaks at a rally in Montgomery, Ala., on Sept. 21, 2017. (Brynn Anderson/AP Photo, File) | | | Trump's move: "Former president Donald Trump on Sunday endorsed Sarah Palin for Alaska's lone congressional seat, throwing his weight behind the ex-governor who embraced Trump before he came to dominate the GOP," our colleague Hannah Knowles reports. | - "Sarah shocked many when she endorsed me very early in 2016, and we won big," Trump said in a statement Sunday. "Now, it's my turn! Sarah has been a champion for Alaska values, Alaska energy, Alaska jobs, and the great people of Alaska."
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