(swong@politico.com or @scottwongDC)

CAN RUBIO SAVE THE GOP ON IMMIGRATION? -- Lois Romano and I write for the hometown paper: “Barely an hour after Mitt Romney conceded the presidential election Wednesday morning, Marco Rubio laid down his marker for 2016: No, he wouldn’t be the candidate of the tired old white guy. ‘The conservative movement should have particular appeal to people in minority and immigrant communities who are trying to make it,’ the GOP Florida senator posted on his Facebook page at 2:16 a.m. ‘And Republicans need to work harder than ever to communicate our beliefs to them.’ This is indisputably Rubio’s moment, and how the 41-year-old senator and the most prominent Latino in national politics today carries his party’s demographic burden will define not only his own future — but the future of the Republican Party. He was the biggest Republican winner Tuesday, Republicans will tell you, as it became painfully clear that Romney would carry only 27 percent of the nation’s fastest-growing demographic.

-- “Now, as fingers are pointed and blame is assigned, all eyes are on Rubio to help lead his party out of the political abyss with Hispanic voters. As Rubio positions himself for a 2016 run, his advisers are adamant that he not become merely the Latino candidate but a conservative leader with a compelling voice who can articulate to Hispanics that the Republican Party’s values are their values — family, social conservatism, free-market entrepreneurialism.

-- “He is without question a world-class political talent with the ability to lead the party into the 21st century … a party that has become synonymous with intolerance and loons to too many swing voters,” said Republican strategist Steve Schmidt, who ran Sen. John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign. …. Rubio and his advisers are well aware of the risks: He must thread a needle as he tries to portray an open, tolerant party while not incensing the ultraconservative base who want tall fences, closed borders and nothing that looks like amnesty for illegal immigrants.”  http://politi.co/TOyUJQ

KRAUTHAMMER: GOP NEEDS TO ACCEPT ‘AMNESTY’ – Conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer writes in the Washington Post: Hispanics “should be a natural Republican constituency: striving immigrant community, religious, Catholic, family-oriented and socially conservative (on abortion, for example). The principal reason they go Democratic is the issue of illegal immigrants. In securing the Republican nomination, Mitt Romney made the strategic error of (unnecessarily) going to the right of Rick Perry. Romney could never successfully tack back. For the party in general, however, the problem is hardly structural. It requires but a single policy change: Border fence plus amnesty. Yes, amnesty. Use the word. Shock and awe — full legal normalization (just short of citizenship) in return for full border enforcement.” http://wapo.st/Udn0Ft

--Florida’s typically GOP-leaning Cuban American community favored President Obama, reports National Journal’s Beth Reinhard. http://bit.ly/YX5VFp

--House Speaker John Boehner is “confident” Congress and the White House can reach a deal on comprehensive immigration reform, the New York Times reported. “Immigration reform is ‘an important issue that I think ought to be dealt with,’ Mr. Boehner, an Ohio Republican, said in an interview with Diane Sawyer on ‘ABC World News.’ ‘This issue has been around far too long,’ he said, ‘and while I believe it’s important for us to secure our borders and to enforce our laws, I think a comprehensive approach is long overdue, and I’m confident that the president, myself, others, can find the common ground to take care of this issue once and for all.’” http://nyti.ms/UdfUk4

-- The GOP is in disarray over what to do next on the health care law after Boehner told Sawyer “Obamacare is the law of the land,” Brett Norman and Jason Millman write for POLITICO: http://politi.co/Z9eDQg

Watch the full ABC News interview here: http://abcn.ws/SQLNSS

TWITTER TRAFFIC: @HotlineReid: Charles Darwin won 4,000 write-in votes against Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) after Facebook campaign #HotlineSort

CBO: FISCAL CLIFF COULD TRIGGER RECESSION — Damian Paletta, Carol E. Lee and Naftali Bendavid write on A1 of the Wall Street Journal: “The White House and Republican lawmakers faced pressure to reach a solution to the looming budget crisis after a nonpartisan agency detailed Thursday how inaction would push the U.S. economy back into recession next year, and skittish investors continued to drive stocks lower. Economists from the Congressional Budget Office detailed new warnings of an economy speeding toward a so-called fiscal cliff created by a combination of government spending cuts and tax increases set to take effect Jan. 1. … The CBO on Thursday detailed its view that if Washington policy makers don't act before the end of the year, the economy would contract by 0.5% in 2013. The unemployment rate would jump from 7.9% to 9.1% by the end of 2013, according to the CBO—a nonpartisan arm of Congress.” http://on.wsj.com/VX9uXP

-- New York Times, A1, “Congress Sees Rising Urgency on Fiscal Deal,” http://nyti.ms/UqESCM

WARREN, BANKING’S ‘WORST NIGHTMARE,’ HEADS TO SENATE -- Victoria McGrane and Maya Jackson Randall report for the Wall Street Journal: “There may be a lot of bankers this week wishing Elizabeth Warren had been appointed director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau after all. Ms. Warren's defeat Tuesday of Republican Sen. Scott Brown of Massachusetts could make life far more uncomfortable for big banks than a role at the helm of the fledgling consumer agency, her brainchild. Ms. Warren embraced policies during her campaign that make big-bank officials cringe, including reinstating Glass-Steagall, the Depression-era law that separated commercial and investment banks. ‘Wall Street has reason to be afraid. She will add to…the voices in Congress saying that the megabanks need to be downsized,’ said Camden Fine, president of the Independent Community Bankers of America, a trade group that also supports breaking up the megabanks. … Many observers assume she will take a seat on the Senate Banking Committee given her expertise in financial issues, though her assignments are up to Democratic leadership and won't be officially settled until next year.” http://on.wsj.com/SHJ7EG

WSJ’S STRASSEL: ‘THE GOP’S EPIC SENATE FAIL’ – “Republicans had a bad night on Tuesday, though it is worth remembering that there are different gradations of bad. At one level, there is the disappointing failure of Mitt Romney to win the presidency. At another, there is the professional malpractice that once again lost Republicans control of the Senate.  The two deserve separation. Mr. Romney made his share of mistakes, though he was ultimately defeated by an Obama campaign that ground out a narrow turnout victory in battleground states. The National Republican Senatorial Committee, by contrast, lost everywhere, in states primed for a GOP victory, to middling Democratic candidates, and in the face of a decent night for the House GOP. Of the 23 Democratic Senate seats in play, Republicans won . . . one. The party further managed to lose three of its own seats—leaving it with just 45 members in the chamber. Not one Democratic incumbent lost a seat. This epic fail has its roots in the 2008 election, which was the opening shot in what became all-out war between the NRSC and the grass roots—a war that has left conservatives overall with no coherent Senate strategy.” http://on.wsj.com/TPp22e

HOW SESSIONS KEPT THE HOUSE RED – Alex Isenstadt reports for POLITICO: “Amid the heap of GOP losses on Tuesday, one unsung Republican emerged as a winner: Texas Rep. Pete Sessions, a onetime Eagle Scout and former telephone company district manager who for the second cycle in a row led the party’s campaign to keep the House under Republican control. Presiding over the National Republican Congressional Committee the past four years, Sessions has amassed a record that speaks for itself: In 2010, Republicans won 63 seats and the House majority. And though Tuesday’s results aren’t final, the party is on track to lose seven seats, rebuffing Democrats who until recently were talking up their chances of taking back the House.

-- “Sessions engineered a series of behind-the-scenes moves over the course of the cycle that paid big dividends on Tuesday, according to accounts of his actions that were kept under wraps during the campaign but shared with POLITICO afterward. He devised a blueprint to nearly wipe out the remaining Blue Dog Democrats, who for years had impeded Republican gains in the South. He persuaded wavering Republican lawmakers not to retire. And Sessions helped devise a strategy to neutralize the Medicare issue, which Democrats believed they’d use to beat the GOP back into the minority.” http://politi.co/TOwyKP

-- Isenstadt has a roundup of the House races that still haven’t been called: http://politi.co/SUYdK8

BEHIND BOEHNER’S NEW TONE -- Jake Sherman, Carrie Budoff Brown and John Bresnahan report that Speaker John Boehner sounds like he’s ready to make a deal on taxes: “Boehner has launched a carefully choreographed campaign on the high-stakes fiscal cliff talks. The new strategy was unveiled Wednesday in the Rayburn Room of the Capitol. But before that, just hours after Mitt Romney lost his bid for the White House, Boehner sent a copy of his 11-minute speech to Rep. Paul Ryan, sure to be a conservative power center in the House Republican Conference. His leadership team got a peek as well. ‘This is where I’m going,’ Boehner told his leadership colleagues, according to sources familiar with the conversation. The message — there should be no surprises what he’s aiming for. Boehner’s speech — there were 17 versions of it before the final draft — was read Wednesday from a teleprompter, almost unheard of for the off-the-cuff Boehner. Every word seemed carefully chosen. Boehner quoted from the Bible, mentioned former Speaker Tip O’Neill’s famous tax compromise with Ronald Reagan and pleaded with Obama to lead.

-- “Boehner sounds like a man ready to make a deal, but he has an excruciating negotiating task in finding something that somehow passes muster with an invigorated second-term Democratic president, a reinforced Senate Democratic majority and a conservative House majority. Boehner said he was prepared to raise new revenue for the government — but not increase tax rates — as long as the White House would agree to entitlement reform. Republicans were “ready to be led,” Boehner said, attempting to shift the burden for what comes next squarely onto Obama’s shoulders.” http://politi.co/Z9dw33

McCONNELL RESPONDS: NO TAX HIKES – The Senate Minority leader issues a statement to Breitbart.com: “One issue I’ve never been conflicted about is taxes. I wasn’t sent to Washington to raise anybody’s taxes to pay for more wasteful spending and this election doesn’t change my principles. This election was a disappointment, without doubt, but let’s be clear about something: the House is still run by Republicans, and Republicans still maintain a robust minority in the Senate. I know some people out there think Tuesday’s results mean Republicans in Washington are now going to roll over and agree to Democrat demands that we hike tax rates before the end of the year. I’m here to tell them there is no truth to that notion whatsoever.” http://bit.ly/RotSBm

-- And the Washington Post’s Paul Kane and David Fahrenthold write: “The new conciliatory tone among House Republican leaders this week will soon have to confront an old Washington reality: the GOP’s deep opposition to higher tax rates. As they begin bipartisan talks on a broad debt deal, White House and congressional leaders face a group of skeptical rank-and-file Republicans in the House who don’t view Tuesday’s Democratic victories as a reason to retreat on taxes. ‘The president may think that he’s got a mandate, but so do we. The president may have won a second term, but I won a third term,’ Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) said Wednesday.” http://wapo.st/QtrpIY

MEET THE HOUSE FRESHMEN – POLITICO’s Seung Min Kim introduces us to the House freshmen: “It wasn’t a wave election, but the 2012 races will sweep in an outsize freshman class nonetheless. The 113th Congress will welcome at least 79 new House members — 44 Democrats, 35 Republicans. That total would grow to 85 new faces in the House if current results in still-uncalled races hold. It will be the largest freshman class of the past dozen years, aside from the 89-member class elected in November 2010. The newest members knocked out more than 20 incumbents. But a large number of retirements and redistricting in key states also helped bring fresh blood to the Capitol. California alone will be responsible for 11 new members in the House. Kim writes that the new members have five key traits: some are diverse, suburban, tea party faithfuls, retreads and oddballs. http://politi.co/TOwwTi

-- National Journal has an online facebook of the new members of the 113^th Congress: http://bit.ly/UdnoDV

***NEW CAREER SITE COMING TO WASHINGTON: POLITICO, ABC7/WJLA and WTOP are teaming up to launch POWERJobs.com, an innovative new career site for employers and employees in the defense, education, energy, finance, government, health care and technology industries as well as the nonprofit arena. Select job listings will also be featured in the print edition of POLITICO. Watch for the launch of POWERJobs.com in January.***

GOOD FRIDAY MORNING, NOVEMBER 9, 2012, and welcome to The Huddle, your play-by-play preview of the day’s congressional news. Send tips, suggestions, comments, complaints and corrections to swong@politico.com. If you don't already, please follow me on Twitter @scottwongDC.

My new followers include but are not limited to @AndreaLMcCarthy and ‏ @kslongo.

GIFFORDS’ SHOOTER GETS LIFE SENTENCE – The AP’s Brian Skoloff reports from Tucson, Ariz.: “Gabrielle Giffords limped to the front of the courtroom and stared silently Thursday as she came face-to-face for the first time with the man who tried to kill her. The former congresswoman hadn't been near Jared Lee Loughner since the deadly rampage outside a meet-and-greet at a supermarket that killed six people and left her partially blind, with a paralyzed right arm and brain injury. Giffords' astronaut husband told Loughner what Giffords couldn't, before he was sentenced to seven life terms for the January 2011 slayings and attempted assassination of a member of Congress. ‘Mr. Loughner, you may have put a bullet through her head, but you haven't put a dent in her spirit and her commitment to make the world a better place,’ Mark Kelly said.

-- “Giffords, wearing a black brace around her torso, looked closely at the 24-year-old Loughner for several minutes without uttering a word. Loughner returned their gaze, but showed no emotion. His mother sobbed nearby. Loughner was then ordered to serve the seven consecutive life sentences, plus 140 years in federal prison for the shootings that killed six people and wounded 13, including Giffords, as she met with constituents in a Tucson shopping plaza. His guilty plea enables him to avoid a federal death sentence.” http://bit.ly/VXbTC3

-- Kelly blasted Gov. Jan Brewer and other Arizona leaders as “feckless” for failing to enact tougher gun control laws, Rebekah Sanders writes for the Arizona Republic. http://bit.ly/VLUIb2

SUN-TIMES: JACKSON JR. IN PLEA DEAL TALKS – Michael Sneed reports: “Sneed has learned U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., who handily won re-election Tuesday despite a lengthy stay at Mayo Clinic for depression and bipolar disorder, is in the midst of plea discussions with the feds probing his alleged misuse of campaign funds. ‘No one has pled guilty, but plea discussions are ongoing,’ said a top Sneed source, who said Jackson is still undergoing treatment at Mayo Clinic.  Sneed is also told Jackson, who returned to Mayo Clinic after undergoing outpatient treatment in the seclusion of his home in Washington, D.C., is not only being investigated for allegedly using campaign funds to decorate his Washington home — but also Sneed hears he may also have used campaign funds to buy a $40,000 Rolex watch as a gift for a female friend.” http://bit.ly/ZcwSUV

JUDD DOESN’T RULE OUT SENATE RUN – Us Weekly reports that actress Ashley Judd isn’t planning to jump into the 2014 race against Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), though she didn’t rule it out: “Despite the public support she's received, Kentucky native Judd isn't setting up any exploratory committees just yet. ‘I cherish Kentucky, heart and soul, and while I'm very honored by the consideration, we have just finished an election, so let's focus on coming together to keep moving America's families, and especially our kids, forward,’ Judd told Us Weekly in a statement Wednesday. Regardless of whether or not she ends up running against their candidate, McConnell's team says they appreciate Judd's passion for politics in general. ‘Senator McConnell and his wife are big fans of Ashley Judd's movies and appreciate her energy, particularly when it comes to getting young people engaged in the political process,’ the Senator's campaign manager, Jesse Benton, told Us.” http://usm.ag/SQQkV7

SCHUMER TWEAKS ROVE –  David Cook writes for the Christian Science Monitor: “Sen. Charles Schumer (D) of New York says “Karl Rove’s reputation is going to take a significant hit” as a result of the poor Election Night performance of two groups the prominent Republican strategist formed to help elect GOP candidates – American Crossroads and Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies. “If Crossroads were a business, and Rove was the CEO, he would be fired for getting a poor return for his investors,” Senator Schumer said at a Monitor-hosted breakfast for reporters.” http://bit.ly/ZczLVF

THUNE WON’T TAKE ON CORNYN FOR WHIP -- Manu Raju reports for POLITICO: “John Cornyn’s path to become the Senate GOP’s No. 2 Republican is now clear after a potential challenger decided against challenging the Texas Republican for the plum spot. South Dakota Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) informed his colleagues Thursday he would stay as the Senate Republican Conference chairman, the No. 3 spot, averting a potentially messy leadership election after the GOP lost ground in Senate elections on Tuesday. Cornyn oversaw the National Republican Senatorial Committee the past two election cycles, but that does not appear to be a roadblock to his ascension atop the conference even though the NRSC failed to win the majority despite a favorable map. While other challengers may yet emerge, Cornyn has so far avoided any opponents in the race. http://politi.co/SHLaIY

GRAVES, SCALISE VIE FOR RSC POST – Molly Hooper writes for The Hill: “The race to become the next chairman of the conservative Republican Study Committee (RSC) in the House is heating up. Rep. Tom Graves (R-Ga.) has circulated a PowerPoint presentation and video production laying out his argument to succeed outgoing RSC Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) next year. In the presentation he sent to colleagues late Wednesday — titled ‘RSC 2.0: Cast a Vision. Build Consensus. Achieve Results’ — Graves ticks off action items that include ‘holding RSC markups of major policy initiatives’ and ‘listening sessions on major legislation to allow all members to influence the solutions RSC ultimately puts forward.’ … The sophomore lawmaker earned full backing of the conservative coalition’s “Founding Members,” earlier this fall — much to the dismay of his rival for the job, Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.).” http://bit.ly/SUXhpd

THURSDAY’S TRIVIA WINNER – Robb Watters of the Madison Group was first to correctly answer that "Morning Joe" regular Mike Barnicle made his feature film debut in "The Candidate.” He played the role of Wilson, a legal services lawyer.

TODAY’S TRIVIA – Jack Cobb has today’s question: Both Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan lost their home states in Tuesday’s election. Romney lost both Massachusetts and Michigan, where he was raised. When was the last time a presidential ticket lost both of their home states?

First to correctly answer gets a mention in the next day’s Huddle. Email me at swong@politico.com.

WEATHER – Sunny and cool but not blustery, according to ABC7’s Brian van de Graaff.

GET HUDDLE emailed to your Blackberry, iPhone or other mobile device each morning. Just enter your email address where it says “Sign Up.” http://www.politico.com/huddle/

***NEW CAREER SITE COMING TO WASHINGTON: POLITICO, ABC7/WJLA and WTOP are teaming up to launch POWERJobs.com, an innovative new career site for employers and employees in the defense, education, energy, finance, government, health care and technology industries as well as the nonprofit arena. Select job listings will also be featured in the print edition of POLITICO. Watch for the launch of POWERJobs.com in January.***