The NPR Politics Podcast - 2019 Elections Show Impeachment Might Not Boost GOP; More Inquiry Testimony Released

Episode Date: November 6, 2019

Trump's campaign may be raising lots of money off impeachment, but it may not be firing up rural voters as Republicans thought it would. Plus, William Taylor, the top U.S. diplomat to Ukraine, told congressional investigators that President Trump's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani was acting in the president's interests. This episode: Congressional correspondent Susan Davis, White House correspondent Tamara Keith, justice correspondent Ryan Lucas, political reporter Jessica Taylor, and senior political editor and correspondent Domenico Montanaro. Email the show at [e-mail]. Find and support your local public radio station at npr.org/stations.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hi, my name is Griffin, and I'm in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, exit polling with the University School of the Low Country. This podcast was recorded at 321 p.m. on Wednesday, November 6th. Things may have changed by the time you hear it, and if so, my classmates and I will know first. That's awesome. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Susan Davis. I cover Congress. I'm Ryan Lucas. I cover the Justice Department.

And I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. Don't worry, Griffin, we're going to get all into last night's election results. But first, we have to talk about the latest release of deposition from the ongoing House impeachment inquiry. Today's comes from William Taylor, the top diplomat currently working in Ukraine. Tam, remind us how Taylor fits into the narrative. So Taylor is this sort of lifelong public servant who was recruited by Mike Pompeo and others by the Trump administration to go sort of fill in as the top diplomat in Ukraine after the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine was drummed out of the country, in part by the president's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani.

So Taylor is someone who Democrats see as a very credible witness in all of this, who has a lot of firsthand knowledge, as we are seeing through this transcript, of many of the events that we have heard about leading up to and after the call. He's also someone who was not dropped into Ukraine with a blank slate. He's someone who had served as an ambassador there before. And so he's familiar with the players and how the country works. And one of the things he had testified to when he came in was that he wanted a commitment from the Trump administration to take the job, that it would maintain a strong U.S. commitment to the security of Ukraine. That's right. It had been the policy of Republicans, Democrats, Congress,

administrations going back for years to provide strong support to Ukraine, because Ukraine is seen as a sort of a linchpin. Sort of a barrier, a critical ally, bulwark. Because Ukraine is on the front lines of this sort of struggle back and forth with Russia, with Vladimir Putin's Russia. Okay, so this deposition is again, hundreds of pages long. We're still digging through it. Brian, what's your sense as you read through this of what sticks out to you? So there is a ton in here. There is an absolute bonanza of information in these 324 pages or so. What stuck out to me, though,

is that withholding aid from Ukraine had consequences. When the Ukrainians learned that the aid was being withheld, this happened in late August, that they learned of this. Taylor testifies that a Ukrainian official, a senior official in the Ukrainian government, came to him and contacted him and said he was very concerned about this aid being withheld. And Taylor said that he was embarrassed that he couldn't explain to the Ukrainians why the aid was being held up. Taylor says that the Ukrainians thought that there had to be some rational reason for this, that maybe they could go to the Defense Department, they could go to the State Department, they could talk to the right officials, and then the aid would be released. And Taylor knows the whole time that they couldn't just do that. There was no simple answer for why it was being withheld. Taylor himself didn't know

at that point in time why he just knew that the White House had put a hold on it. Tam, he also in his testimony speaks to the involvement of one of the central players in this narrative, which is Rudy Giuliani, the president's personal attorney. Here's the excerpt from his testimony that really stood out to me, and I just want to read it. He says, I had been making and continue to make this point to all of my Ukrainian official contacts. The push to make President Zelensky publicly commit to investigations of Burisma, now that's the company tied to the Bidens, and alleged interference in the 2016 elections showed how the official foreign policy of the

United States was undercut by the irregular efforts led by Mr. Giuliani. He says at first, when he took the job, he was not concerned by the fact that Giuliani had this sort of outside advisor role. He said people do that all the time. Presidents bring in outside advisors who play some sort of consulting role on policy. He didn't have a problem with Giuliani being involved. Over time, he developed concerns about Giuliani and then became deeply concerned, ultimately, because Giuliani was pursuing the president's own personal political interests and not the interests, the national security foreign policy interests of the United States, which is how

most outside foreign policy advisors would be doing. One of the things we look for in these testimonies is how they corroborate each other, how the details line up. And what's interesting to me about Giuliani is Taylor's testimony is very consistent with the other testimonies we've seen come out this week. People like Marie Ivanovich, the former ambassador to Ukraine, or Gordon Sondland, the ambassador to the EU. Even people like Sondland, who are maybe seen as allies of Giuliani from the outside, testify that they really saw his influence as negative and meddling and wasn't always what they thought was in the best interest of the country or the president, but they felt

they had to deal with Giuliani because of his closeness to the president. Yeah, and that Giuliani in a way was sort of poisoning the president, that the president's very dim view of Ukraine and corruption in Ukraine was in part colored by conversations he was having with Giuliani. And so these officials were trying to they were kind of working with Giuliani just to try to convince him to convince Trump that actually no U.S. policy toward Ukraine should continue as it had been. Right. They were trying to work through Giuliani to counter the messaging that Giuliani, to counter the negative flow of information that Giuliani was providing the White House. They had to go through Giuliani to get Ukrainian President Zelensky in front of the president to make everything OK. Taylor's testimony to me, too, is a reminder that there's so many pieces of this puzzle we still don't fully understand, partly because not everyone has come up to Capitol Hill to talk to Congress. And the White House has encouraged many of those people not to come up.

But specifically, three people that he talks about in his testimony are former National Security Advisor John Bolton, the Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and the Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney. Three people that Congress would like to hear from, but they would love to hear from, but hasn't shown up. And his testimony speaks to, you know, they are central witnesses in this investigation, too. And each one of them has information. We just don't know the answer to those questions. For example, you know, he testifies to John Bolton leaving a meeting in July because he got angry that people brought up that they would pressure Ukraine to do these investigations. He talks about

he sent a cable to Mike Pompeo in late August voicing Taylor's upset at withholding military aid. And he says that he was in a meeting with OMB officials in which he was told that acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney directed the withholding of military aid at the direction of the president. Bolton is supposed to come up tomorrow? Yes, he is scheduled to appear this week, but our indication, our reporting is that he won't show up. He won't show up. And the public is going to get to hear from Taylor very soon. That's right. The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee leading this impeachment inquiry, Adam Schiff, said today that Taylor will testify on Wednesday, next Wednesday, as will George Kent, who is a senior State Department official with a focus on Ukraine.

And then we'll hear from the former Ukrainian ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, who was unceremoniously pushed out of her post as part of this effort by Giuliani. Yeah. And, you know, Taylor is seen as likely the biggest, best witness that that the Democrats are going to get in this inquiry unless there's someone that appears that we don't know about simply because he has this very long history, because he took meticulous notes, because his testimony behind closed doors really sort of tells the broadest swath of the story of what happened with the call and with U.S. relations with Ukraine. And as the House is preparing to go more public, the White House now, we have learned today, is also preparing for a more public push against the impeachment inquiry. They're bringing on two new people to help push the president's message. Tony Sayegh, who's a former Treasury Department spokesman, and Pam Bondi, the former attorney general of the state of Florida.

And she's someone who you can really imagine going out and doing the cable hits and defending the president the way that he wants to be defended. It does seem to be, though, a recognition from the White House that the current message strategy might not be enough. There are numerous people at the White House who would agree to that, though not on the record. And there are numerous people in the president's orbit who are saying it loudly from the rooftops, trying to get the White House to be more focused. OK, we have to leave it there and you two need to get back to work. But when we come back, we're going to talk about last night's elections and what they mean. This message comes from NPR sponsor CBSN, the live streaming video news channel from CBS News. CBSN is perfect for cord cutters because you can watch the news

wherever you are across all streaming devices. You can find CBSN on your phone, tablet, smart TV. It's also available through Roku, Fire TV, Apple TV, Samsung, and more. You can find and download the CBS News app in any app store and start watching CBSN today. In 1987, dozens of federal agents surrounded a trailer park in Ozark, Missouri. Their target, white supremacist threatening violent revolution. I have eight teams of freedom fighters prepared to start a race war nationwide. The agents fired tear gas, arrested him, and found a massive arsenal. C4 plastic explosives, hand grenades, thousands of rounds of ammunition. So years later, why did the FBI stop watching him?

That story on Embedded from NPR. And we're back, and Jessica Taylor and Domenico Montanaro are now here to help us sift through last night's election results. Hey, guys. Hey there. Hey, guys. Hey, there. Hey, Sue. So state and local elections took place in much of the country, but the focus has really centered on three states. Jess, can you talk us through the elections that we are going to focus on specifically? So there were two big governor's races last night, and the main one that we were looking at is Kentucky, where Democrat Andy Beshear has declared victory over Republican incumbent governor

Matt Bevin. Beshear leads by about 5,300 votes, but Bevin is not yet conceding. In Mississippi, an open seat contest there that Republicans held on to with Lieutenant Governor Tate Reeves defeating Democratic Attorney General Jim Hood. And in Virginia, Democrats took over the state legislature and they now have every statewide elective office. It's really amazing what's happened in that state over the last decade going way more Democratic. So a ton of races last night and a ton of lessons. But I think one of my takeaways from last night is the fact that Virginia, just in even the time that I've covered politics, has transitioned from

what was seen as this red reliable state to a purple state to now maybe just a blue state? Totally. And, you know, in 2008, I remember we would talk about how Virginia matched closest to the rest of the country. And we would say, as goes Virginia, so goes the rest of the country. Well, Virginia kept going while the rest of the country went the other way or at least went a little more slowly. Last night, again, was a story of the suburbs. Democrats flipped three congressional seats last November in Virginia. We saw some of those big gains that they made in Northern Virginia, in the Richmond area. And the growth in Virginia, I think, is driving that. And now Democrats could pass gun control measures in Virginia, possibly the Equal Rights Amendment.

So major changes that could be coming. The home of the NRA may very well pass gun control measures in Virginia, possibly the Equal Rights Amendment. So major changes that could be coming. The home of the NRA may very well pass gun control measures now. Jess, what about, can we focus a little bit on the Kentucky governor's race? Because this is one of those races that people in politics are going to try and draw big lessons from, because Kentucky is a state that Donald Trump won by 30 points in 2016, and Democrats might be poised to win the governorship. It's a weird state because it does sort of trend ancestrally Democratic as some of these southern states have. Bevin, when he won in 2015, was actually just the third Republican to win the governorship since World War II. But Bevin was also just super, super unpopular. He

made teachers angry. He insulted them. He just made a lot of people in the state very, very mad. And I think it showed us that candidates still matter. Trump came in there on Monday night, really tried to rally to save him. And if you lose, they're going to say Trump suffered the greatest defeat in the history of the world. This was the greatest. You can't let that happen to me. It wasn't enough. And I would caution against reading too much into this because Bevin was so unpopular. But also, I think it showed us that voters are still willing to make a differentiation between federal and state races. Voting for someone of the different party on a state level is very different than voting for someone

for president or for senator. And I think that's why a lot of people pointed out to me last night on Twitter. OK, Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader up for reelection, also has incredibly low approval ratings. But again, I think casting that vote is very, very different. And that's why I don't think McConnell is in any real danger next year. And Domenico, this was also the first major elections that have taken place since the impeachment investigation was launched. What kind of clues were people looking for in these elections? And is there any lessons to take away from it? Yeah, I mean, I think Kentucky and Virginia showed that impeachment just isn't

the issue that Republicans hoped it would be. I mean, they were promising that this issue would be a third rail for Democrats, that it would backfire and fire up rural Trump-based voters. Well, the Trump campaign may be raising money off it, but the voters didn't show up to vote last night in the same ways that urban Democrats and suburban voters came out to the polls. So is the big lesson takeaway from Tuesday, the suburbs are really what matters here? Yeah. I mean, look, I think for 2020 Democrats, who are the people that won and did well in these places? Moderate Democrats.

And that's not exactly the kind of message you hear on the Democratic presidential campaign trail. But you wonder if it'll come back to that if all the evidence says, hey, in 2018, Democrats won the House because of moderates. In 2019, they're winning races because of moderates, if they get that message. All right. Well, we have to leave it there for today. Thanks, guys. I'm Susan Davis.

I cover Congress. I'm. Well, we have to leave it there for today. Thanks, guys. I'm Susan Davis. I cover Congress. I'm Jessica Taylor, political reporter. And I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent. And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.