The NPR Politics Podcast - At Last, We Can Stop Writing "Debt Ceiling" In Our Headlines

Episode Date: June 2, 2023

President Biden is expected to sign the debt ceiling agreement into law as soon as Saturday, after bipartisan majorities in both chambers of Congress approved the legislation. But the manufactured crisis, brinkmanship and last-minute U-turn are not encouraging signs about the health of the American political system.And how conspiracy theories have undermined an effective voter fraud prevention tool.This episode: White House correspondent Asma Khalid, congressional correspondent Claudia Grisales, senior political editor and correspondent Domenico Montanaro, and voting correspondent Miles Parks.The podcast is produced by Elena Moore and Casey Morell. Our editor is Eric McDaniel. Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi. Unlock access to this and other bonus content by supporting The NPR Politics Podcast+. Sign up via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Connect:Email the show at [e-mail] the NPR Politics Podcast Facebook Group.Subscribe to the NPR Politics Newsletter.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hi, this is Jow Jow in Overland Park, Kansas, where I just saw my second grader read poetry at his school's poetry cafe. This podcast was recorded at 1.08 p.m. Eastern Time on Friday, June 2nd of 2023. Things may have changed by the time you hear this, but I'll still be beaming with pride at his courage and his confidence to read his poems in front of his classmates and parents. Enjoy the show. Aw, that's so cute. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Asma Khalid. I cover the White House.

I'm Claudia Grisales. I cover Congress. And I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent. The self-created debt ceiling crisis that Congress manufactured, which threatened to tip the global financial system into utter chaos, is now all but over. So if you have somehow managed to tune out all the debt ceiling drama over the last few weeks, I will say kudos to you. But here are the CliffsNotes. Congress orders the government to spend its money through every law that passes, but Republicans recently refused to allow the government to borrow the money it needs to actually pay for all the things that Congress orders it to pay for. That led to months of uncertainty until last night. On this vote, the yeas are 63, the nays are 36, the 60 vote threshold having been achieved, the bill is passed. The House and Senate have now

both passed a deal that allows the government to borrow money again in exchange for spending cuts. The bill now heads to President Biden's desk for a signature. Claudia, I want to start with you. I mean, this debt limit debate was an awful lot of drama around one of the most basic government functions. And in the end, all that drama and noise did not really change much. So I would say there's a lot of people like me who wonder, what was the point of this entire fight? Right. I think a lot of folks are left thinking that, even those who voted for it. I think there was a lot of frustration in terms of how this negotiation dragged on for months

and more intensely in the last few weeks between President Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. And in the end, an ugly baby was born, if you will. Not everybody loved this baby, but they were glad it arrived. There was relief because it could address this issue of the debt ceiling, cross the finish line. And we did see a lot of political theatrics around it. A lot of leaders in Congress and other members solidified their roles through these negotiations, expanding on those roles. At the same time, this is House Republicans' last chance, really, when we look at this congressional session for two years to exercise some sort of leverage, and they wanted to get some sort of spending cuts packaged together. Of course,

it was much less than many folks wanted in the party, many who voted against it in terms of the more conservative members. So for them, there was a really big point here in terms of getting President Biden to the negotiating table, getting some provisions through, such as revamping the budget process. That's something we're going to see play out later this year in terms of appropriations. And for President Biden and Democrats to finally see this resolved and see the debt ceiling lifted. You know, let's be real, though. I mean, this was a lot of drama for something that's a pretty meager bill, you know, and you wind up with almost three quarters of the House voting for it, two-thirds of the Senate.

And really, it seemed that Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the Senate, kind of let a lot of the conservatives kind of not vote for this thing. We saw two-thirds of Republicans in the House vote for it. Almost 80% of the Democrats in the House vote for it. Almost 80% of the Democrats in the House vote for it. You know, how many things can we say get 72% approval in this country? And this bill did. And honestly, in the lead up, who do we hear from most? But the Chip Roy's of the world who wound up losing, the Pramila Jayapal's of the world who wound up losing. Certainly there were founded concerns.

You're talking about members of Congress on the right and the left there, Dominica Wright. Yeah. I mean we're talking about the most extreme voices, those who want spending cuts, those who are concerned about how this bill would affect work requirements for the poor, environmental approvals for certain things. You know, look, these are founded worries. But, you know, when it comes down to it, at the end of the day, this is a lot of drama for something, again, that doesn't make a huge difference one way or the other. You know, this fight, though, did seem somewhat inevitable to me, if you look at the way that the congressional map looks at this point. You know, if you talk about gerrymandering, primaries, all of this, it's set up for folks

to have very blue Democratic districts and very red Republican districts. And that is not a great way to find consensus, even if what you're saying, Domenico, is the consensus kind of was inevitable here. Yeah, I mean, you're right. There is not a lot of incentive for negotiation. Partisanship and polarization are worse than they ever have been. It's absolutely true, at least in the modern political era. There are only a few dozen seats that are truly competitive. And the incentive is to really cater to the basis. And I think we saw that play out over the last few weekends in terms of who we saw coming and going from McCarthy's office. I was there the last couple of weeks and weekends, kind of keeping an eye on these negotiations and seeing them come together on that final Saturday night. And the members that

were coming to work with McCarthy, Garrett Graves of Louisiana, Patrick McHenry of North Carolina, they were the key negotiators, along with other members such as Dusty Johnson, Tom Emmer, the whip, and as well as Guy Reschenthaler. These are members of kind of the more moderate wing of this party. It was really illustrative of the tone they were setting here. We did not see members of the House Freedom Caucus coming in and out of McCarthy's office over and over and over during these negotiations. It was clear McCarthy knew this, Biden knew this, they're going to have to run this thing up the middle, get the moderates to push this through. And that's what we saw play out. But when it comes to like those hard right members of the House Freedom Caucus, we'll see if there's a

reckoning to come after this from McCarthy, but they were not that present during the talks. I want to spend a moment here talking also about President Biden's role in this entire negotiation. You know, he began by saying that he would absolutely not negotiate over the debt ceiling. I would say that's a bit of a matter of semantics, because ultimately, at the end of the day, he did, in fact, negotiate. Right. He struck a deal on spending in order to get some Republicans to agree to lift the debt ceiling. You know, at the same time, though, I do think it is worth acknowledging here that this president managed to get fairly bipartisan consensus in divided government on another piece of legislation. And you can, you know, point at many other pieces of legislation, the CHIPS Act to boost semiconductor manufacturing, the infrastructure bill.

There are a number of things in which he has managed to find a way for Republicans and Democrats to get along. I am curious, Claudia, if you think though this was a one-off here, do you anticipate we're going to see a little bit more bipartisanship in the next two years? I don't. I think this is the one off for the two year period. You know, Biden has a lot of experience when it comes to working bipartisan deals. And we saw that play out. And McCarthy and McHenry and Graves admittedly were the rookies in this deal. And they did extract some provisions they wanted to see in this overall bill. But at the same time, Biden played it pretty smart in terms of trying to get to that middle ground with them and not losing too much, protecting critical provisions that

he was worried about and other Democrats were worried about, for example, in the Inflation Reduction Act. And so it's interesting in terms of how they were able to work together in this one scenario. And it was quite the love fest afterwards from McCarthy and the other negotiators talking about Biden and the White House negotiators who were involved as well on that end. But I think this might be a one off in terms of how things are so tightly divided in Congress. I don't see them working together much in terms of large bipartisan efforts in the future for the next couple of years. Yeah. And Biden and McCarthy can breathe a sigh of relief because they did one really big thing in this bill, and that was push off the debt ceiling to 2025, which means that that gets them past the presidential election, the congressional

elections of 2024. And, you know, essentially means that it's totally possible that they don't have to deal with something that's as urgent that they have to negotiate on. Because McCarthy may have spent quite a bit of political capital doing this. You know, he didn't turn to the Matt Gaetz's of the world, you know, the conservative congressman from Florida, he turned to the Dusty Johnson's of the world. And that's where this really kind of came down to. And he irritated probably a lot of those arch right wing Republicans who do hold significant power over whether he keeps his job. So he is not going to have to do much else from here on out. And the debt ceiling deal is through and he likely is able to keep his job through 2024.

All right. Well, that is a wrap for this conversation. Claudia, do not go far. We're going to talk to you again in just a bit, but thanks for joining us. Great. Thanks. And it is time for a quick break. I want you all to please stay with us because when we get back, we've got some really interesting exclusive reporting from our colleague, Miles Parks. And we are back and we're joined now by Miles Parks, who covers voting for NPR. Hey there, Miles. Hi there.

So, Miles, you have been working for many months on a reporting project that I am excited we finally get to talk about for real on this podcast. I feel like I've been sitting across from you and I just look like concerned, staring at my computer. And you're like, should I talk to him? Should I not? No, that's been great. But I've been hearing little snippets of this reporting. So I'm really glad we get to bring it to air. Your reporting has focused on this voting security tool called ERIC, which we should explain is an acronym. But tell us what it stands for and what it is supposed to do. Yeah. So it stands for the Electronic Registration Information Center. And it actually has a pretty simple duty. So 15, 20 years ago, every state in the country got mandated by Congress to keep a statewide voter registration list, a list of all their voters. But they had no way for those lists to talk to each other. So election officials had no way to

know if you're living in Georgia and you move to Missouri and get a driver's license. There was no communication happening. So ERIC was founded about 10 years ago as a partnership between states that allowed them to use DMV data, a number of other government sources and voting data to give them a way to start keeping their voter lists more up to date. And specifically, it really helps is the only way that states have to catch when someone illegally votes twice. If someone votes in two different member states, ERIC is the only way currently to catch that. So you can catch voter fraud. You can catch voter fraud. You can keep your lists more up to date when voters move. And then it also has this third aspect that allows, if you move to a member state, but you don't register to vote, it allows that state to know

about it so they can get you registration information. So Eric was a bipartisan success story is what a number of election officials told me, especially having covered this beat since 2017. Everyone loved it. Republicans loved it. Democrats loved it. Everyone. There was no issues. I'm not kidding. I never had one conversation. Even when I would talk to the most conservative voting officials in the country, and they loved this thing before the 2020 election. And so then over the last year and a half, we've seen this about face from all of these Republicans who are on the record talking to me, talking to a lot of other people about how great this thing is. They have been pressured by the far right to abandon it. So, Miles, what was the catalyst for their pivot? I mean, why did they go from

loving this voting system, loving this voting tool, the security tool, to suddenly believing, I guess, all sorts of conspiracy theories, as you've reported? It goes back to this website called the Gateway Pundit, which I would not be surprised if many listeners have not heard of. You're giving me a face that implies you've heard of this website. They have published a lot of conspiracy theories, like greatest hits, like, you know, the birther theory about former President Barack Obama, COVID-19 vaccine misinformation. So January of last year, they put out a series focusing on Eric, focusing on this obscure voting tool saying falsely that it's controlled by liberal billionaire George Soros, and it's actually a left-wing tool only registering voters. All of that is false,

but it caught fire. And a big part of our analysis was we analyzed hundreds of thousands of social media posts in election denier channels on these alternative social media sites that found that this one Gateway Pundit article really kicked off the election denial movement focusing on Eric. And it was pumped up by former President Trump. I mean, he would say on social media, for example, that Republican led states had to leave, that he would say that it was a terrible voter registration system that pumps the rolls, he said, for Democrats and does nothing to clean that up. And that is absolutely false. So our investigation also a big part of how this because that's I think the question a lot of people have is like, okay, a lot of bad stuff gets posted online. How did this actually turn into government policy, right? And a number of Republicans I talked to pointed back to the first

state to pull out, which was Louisiana. They pulled out a week and a half after the Gateway Pundit published their first article. The Secretary of State there, Kyle Ardoin, announced kind of quietly in a press release that Louisiana was putting its membership on pause. And our investigation really looked at his decision to dig into why did this election official who's been in the office for 10 years feel the need to respond to the Gateway Pundit. And I'm not going to reveal everything we found right here. Give us a little bit of a hint of what's going on. What it is, is Republican election officials still have to run to keep their job. And Kyle Ardoin was gearing up to run for re-election

in 2023. And you know who you need to win in a very Republican state like Louisiana is Republican primary voters. What are many of those voters reading, Asma, the Gateway Pundit? Yeah. And one thing, though, I kind of wonder about, you know, and I've seen some of these secretaries of state who do have to run for reelection. They've said that they've tried to make reforms with Eric's oversight and services. You know, they've talked about how this has been sort of pushed aside and not changed. Is that just a lot of bluffing? So our investigation gets a lot into that back and forth. But I think the important thing to realize is none of these states were criticizing this program before the far right started targeting it. So yes, it is true that after this pressure campaign, which

I will say we talked about the Gateway Pundit here, it evolved into a giant pressure campaign that involved local groups all over the country, reaching out to state lawmakers and election officials. It involved attorneys who've worked with former President Trump, starting podcasts and influencing people and pushing people to contact their legislatures that way. So it became this kind of giant thing that came from the Gateway Pundit. And a number of these Republican states did then start feeling the pressure to try to reform Eric in all these different ways that they hoped would appease the far right. That was ultimately unsuccessful.

So they pulled out then. And so they decided to pull out. Right. So now you've got a number of Republican states that have pulled out of this system, which makes me wonder how effective is Eric as a tool nationally? Because part of what you were saying at the beginning of this conversation is it kind of lets states talk to each other to know if people were were double registered. Exactly. And so now it will be slightly less effective. Right. Because the states that have pulled out are no longer going to be sharing their data. But I talked to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, and here's what he told me. It actually hurts

that state more than it hurts us, because more of those people are going to move here. So we'll register them, and the state that they moved from isn't going to get that information. So they just basically, indirectly, said we're going to have dirtier voter rolls over there. And so what he's saying basically is that, and I heard this a lot, is that these states are cutting off their nose to spite their face because a number of these election officials specifically have touted that they've been able to prosecute voters who have voted twice in federal elections. And it is very unclear right now how they would be able to do that in 2024. There is no tool at this point that exists other than Eric to find that kind of voter fraud. All right. Well, there is a lot more to this story. And we are, in fact, going to publish a full special episode of your reporting,

Miles, on Sunday morning. So make sure, folks, to check out this NPR Politics podcast feed. Until then, Miles, why don't you stick around for Can't Let It Go? And Domenico, we are going to say goodbye to you. Have a lovely weekend. All right. Thank you. Appreciate it. All right. It is time for a quick break, and we'll be back in a moment. And we're back and we're joined again by Claudia. And it is time now for Can't Let It Go. That's the part of the show where we talk about the things from the week that we just cannot stop thinking about, politics or otherwise. And I'm going to kick it off.

What I cannot let go of this week, I don't know if you'll have seen any photos of this, but there was a royal wedding in Jordan. I don't know if you'll have seen anything about this. No. But I'm sort of obsessed with this whole because it feels very anachronistic, I think, in some ways. Like it reminds me of the old European medieval weddings to tie two dynasties and empires together. So you have the crown prince of Jordan. I think he's in his 20s or so, who's going to, you know, eventually one day become king. He's marrying this Saudi architect who's related to MBS, Mohammed bin Salman. And I'm sure you all remember, MBS is the crown prince of Saudi Arabia.

Whoa. And it just reminded me, I mean, there have been very little details about how they actually met. And you just think there's these two countries that are clearly trying to become this power broker, right, in the region, who get together. And, you know, it's kind of how we thought about, right, in the region who get together. And, you know, it's kind of how we thought about royal weddings back in the day. See, I feel like we spend so much time talking about English royal weddings and they don't actually matter. But this one matters, which makes me really excited.

I'm like, I could get behind thinking about this. Like, that's super fascinating. It was a huge regional wedding. And you had, like, First Lady Jill Biden was there. Will and Kate were there. Interesting. Kate wearing a... Oh, Will and Kate. Will and Kate. Oh, Interesting. Kate wearing a... Oh, Will and Kate.

Will and Kate. Oh, interesting. Yeah, yeah. So it was super interesting. Kate, by the way, wearing a stunning gown. Highly encourage you all to Google it if you've not seen it yet. Nice, I will. But yeah, so that's what I can't let go.

But Claudia, what about you? So my can't let it go was the same kind of can't let it go I brought up just a few months ago when you were hosting. So I'm going back to Vanderpump Rules. I still can't let it go. I kid you not, I woke up at 6.45 a.m. this morning, and the first thing I did was catch up on more Vanderpump Rules. I still haven't seen this. Miles, have you watched it? I have not, but I'm curious. I feel like there's got to be a tie here to the debt ceiling where you're feeling some need to get your brain off.

I want to get this investigated by a professional. Exactly. I want to investigate something totally different, which was what went down with Skandoval and what is going on with Ariana and how he betrayed her and what's going to happen to Raquel, a.k.a. Rachel, which is her actual name, who was caught up in this affair with Scandival. And so the last episode of this three-part reunion is next week. I don't know how I'm going to go on. And it kind of marks like a sad moment because all these shows are ending, like a lot of my favorites, like Succession had its finale on Sunday. Ted Lasso had its finale this week. Oh my gosh. I'm so behind on Ted Lasso had its finale this week. Oh, my gosh.

I'm so behind on Ted Lasso, but that's another one. I can add it to my rotation, though. That's a good reminder. And then Kardashians is firing up. So I have hope that I'm telling you it is a tough moment, but you're so right, Miles. This is how I have survived debt limit is Vanderpump Rules and all these other shows. Thank goodness. And thank goodness for Ted Lasso.

I'll move on to that too. I'm just glad that these finales are happening at the beginning of summer and not at the beginning of winter when I know I'm going to be locked up with a television. I'm like, okay, I can go outside. I probably should take some walks on Sunday nights instead of sitting, pounding Succession podcasts and content. I think there's probably better things I can do in the summertime. I love it.

Pounding. What about you, Miles? What can you not let go of? So mine's, we things I can do in the summertime. I love it. Pounding. What about you, Miles? What can you not let go of? So mine's, we just got a dog in my household. Congratulations. Thank you so much. Her name is Birdie, and she is adorable. But what I can't let go of is that I seem to have accidentally entered a very special club of people who get dogs that look like them.

No way. I have not seen a picture of you with a brown thing. So she has brown eyes. I can show you. Okay, for folks who can't see Miles, Miles, too, has brown eyes. I have brown eyes. She has a slightly forlorn look on her face most times. The big thing that people say, and this happens on the street all the time now when I'm walking her and people I play basketball with, she has a mustache.

And I rock a mustache all the time. I like it. You can kind of see it. Yeah, I can kind of see it. Yeah, and I don't know if that's why we picked her. That's too psychological for me. Okay, so did you pick her or your wife picked her? So my wife has been pushing for a dog for months, if not years.

And I've been like vetoing dogs left and right that get sent to me. And then I got sent this dog and I was like, for some reason. Yeah, exactly. And I was like, okay, that's our dog. And so that's what worries me that maybe it was subconscious. And I'm super embarrassed about it, but I love her so much. How big? She's 45 pounds.

She's half New Finland, half poodle. I'm allergic to dogs, so she's very light-headed. Perfect. Oh, my God. Congrats to her. Thank you so much. You guys have to meet her at some point. She's very friendly.

I can't wait to see. I can't wait to see. And now you can buy outfits if you find anything. Exactly. There's all kinds of accessories. Yes. All right. Well, there's all kinds of accessories. Yes. All right. Well, that is a wrap for today.

Our executive producer is Muthoni Mathuri. Our editor is Eric McDaniel. Our producers are Elena Moore and Casey Morrell. Research and fact checking is done by our intern, Lee Walden. Thanks to Krishna Dev Kalimer and Lexi Shapiro. I'm Asma Khalid. I cover the White House. I'm Claudia Grisales.

I cover Congress. And I'm Miles Parks. I cover voting. And thank you all, as always, for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.