Zaz’s Flack Attack, Buffalo’s $230M Renaissance, Disney Marketing Intrigue

Welcome back to The Daily Courant, your digital guide to Puck’s best new reporting.

First up today, John Heilemann gets the inside story of how Democrats are reacting to Kamala Harris’s essentially flawless first week as the party’s de facto nominee. What’s required to maintain the momentum—and is it all too late, anyway?

Plus, below the fold: William D. Cohan digs into the bewildering pre-I.P.O. hype cycle of Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square USA. Dylan Byers chronicles David Zaslav’s two-pronged legal and P.R. war against the NBA. Marion Maneker gets the skinny on Buffalo’s $230 million art revival. On The Town, Matt Belloni is joined by Asad Ayaz to discuss how Deadpool & Wolverine represents a departure from Disney’s tried-and-true marketing playbook. And on The Powers That Be, Jon Kelly reunites with Peter Hamby to recount the latest bizarre twists in the NBA rights auction and consider the Kamala TikTok phenomenon.

JOHN HEILEMANN

The first week of Kamala Harris’s wholly unexpected, wildly unlikely stint as the de facto Democratic nominee was more smashingly successful than she or her team could have dared to hope or the political class expected. Now comes the hard part.

WILLIAM D. COHAN

News and notes on the bizarre and bewildering saga of Pershing Square USA’s long journey to the public market.

DYLAN BYERS

After losing the NBA rights, David Zaslav has sued the league and now brought in Edelman to ensure the situation is both litigious and toxic. Meanwhile, he’s managing it all from the Crillon…

MARION MANEKER

A $230 million expansion of Buffalo’s groundbreaking fine art museum has anchored the city’s revival—offering a blueprint for other once-great American hubs looking to overlay a cosmopolitan future on a broad-shouldered past.