As Donald Trump’s second term comes into focus, most news organizations are snapping up the most experienced reporters in D.C. to bolster their political coverage. Politico, however, is putting its flagship product, Playbook — the newsletter that markets itself as “the unofficial guide to official Washington” — in the hands of an unconventional choice: a foreigner.

It’s been just over a week since Jack Blanchard took over Politico’s early-morning newsletter, which reaches 300,000 subscribers and in theory provides the ultimate insider intel. But the 45-year-old Brit was still processing his visa when he made his debut on Inauguration Day. He has been charmingly open about his newbie status, writing of the wave of Trump pardons, “It probably shouldn’t take a Brit to tell you that none of this is remotely normal. At all.” Still, that hasn’t stopped the knives from coming out in Washington’s famously vicious press corps. “It’s really strange that they brought a Brit in to explain U.S. politics to people who know it best,” a former top Politico editor said. “It’s like Washington for dummies.”

John Harris, the editor-in-chief of Politico, doesn’t seem worried. “He’s both a foreigner coming to Washington with fresh and curious eyes and, in some profound sense, he’s a native,” he said. “He inhales politics. The drama, the interplay of people and ideas, jostling for influence — that’s his native language.” And Blanchard knows it will take some convincing to win over Playbook’s highly exclusive, highly demanding readership. “I’m planning on working on becoming an insider while I’m here,” Blanchard told me.

Politico’s email tip sheet has driven the Beltway day since early 2007, when Mike Allen would distill the news of the nation’s capital into bite-size tidbits that became a must-read for lawmakers and journalists alike. Over the years, as Playbook has evolved into a revenue driver for Politico, the franchise has expanded, with afternoon and evening editions........

© Daily Intelligencer