The NPR Politics Podcast - Trump Scorches Democrats As Pelosi Broaches Prospect Of 'Impeachable Offense'

Episode Date: May 22, 2019

Negotiations over a potential infrastructure program fizzled on Wednesday as a White House meeting between President Trump and Democrats escalated into blame-trading and political threats — including impeachment. This episode: White House correspondent Tamara Keith, Congressional reporter Kelsey Snell, and national political correspondent Mara Liasson. 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, this is David from California walking down the grandstand of the Las Vegas Motor Speedway preparing to dance the night away with over 155,000 people from dusk to dawn at the Electric Daisy Carnival. This podcast was recorded at 1.07 p.m. on Wednesday, May 22nd. Things may have changed, but probably not as dramatic as our bank account or energy levels from all the dancing and festival food by the time you hear it. Okay, here's the show. Wow, I have no idea what he's talking about. Yeah, it's an electric dance music festival, and I'm looking at pictures right now with lots of fireworks.

Ooh. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Tamara Keith, I cover the White House. I'm Kelsey Snell, I cover Congress. And I'm Mara Liason, national political correspondent. It was a tale of two meetings today. So we got up early this morning, Kelsey, you and I were both on Morning Edition. And we were up to talk about a meeting that Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats were having to talk about impeachment. And then later in the day, there was going to be a meeting about infrastructure at the White House. So, Kelsey, tell us what happened at that impeachment meeting. Yeah. House Democrats were getting together to start their day to try to figure out where they

stand as a party on the question of impeachment. It was thanks in part to the fact there were a bunch of Democrats who started to get a little bit more vocal about their concerns that going down the impeachment route would be the only way to get the White House to start delivering documents and answering subpoenas. But then things started to change. Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House, has for a very long time been saying, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, let's slow down. Let's not go the impeachment route just yet. Was she able to convince her family, you know, the Democratic family there in the House, that she was right on that? Yeah, it was described to me yesterday as a vocal minority of Democrats

who want to talk about impeachment. And it seems today that that is still the case, a vocal minority, people who are willing to speak up about impeachment, but not so many that it's enough that they could walk out of a meeting where all of them got together and say, we have a consensus that impeachment is the answer. So what is their argument here? The folks on the impeachment side say that impeachment proceedings give them powers that they just don't have right now. They want to find new ways to force the Trump administration to actually respond to these requests that they're making on things like the president's tax returns, information about his private business dealings, you know, the

involvement of members of his campaign and other Pete Close associates when it came to the Mueller report. They want all kinds of answers. And the White House has basically said they won't participate at all. Well, and just this week, another thing that I think probably helped push some people was that the former White House counsel, Don McGahn, was in theory supposed to come testify before the House Judiciary Committee. And the White House said, mm-mm, i said, it's not going to let that happen. Was that a surprise? No, it wasn't a surprise. But it's just another example of a great many examples where this White House is claiming privilege, claiming that there is no legitimate legislative purpose for any of these investigations.

And members of Congress, you know, there maybe was this idea like Democrats are going to win. They're going to come into the House. They're going to start holding hearings. They're going to get all these documents. They're going to use their subpoena power. And their subpoena power just hasn't been as powerful as maybe they imagined it would be. On the other hand, they did have a little bit of progress in the courts this week, didn't they, Kelsey? Yeah. The court ruled in favor of Democrats on some of the documents requests. And, you know, that's something that Pelosi argued and that her deputies have been arguing,

is that they want the pro-impeachment folks to slow down and realize that they are having success and that, you know, the Department of Justice is getting ready to turn over more information as well on another part of the investigation. And they're urging people to wait because Pelosi's argument all along about impeachment is that if it isn't bipartisan and if there isn't a national consensus, it will be a political downfall for Democrats. The other side of it, though, and the pro-impeachment folks say this all of the time, is that the politics don't matter as much to them because they're really worried about the rule of law here. And also the separation of powers. I mean, this is about whether Congress, the Article 1 branch of government, has the right, which they have under the Constitution, to exercise oversight.

And they're afraid if they capitulate or don't fight back, and some of them say if they don't impeach the president, they'll lose that power and the executive branch will become above the law in effect. Right. But there's a trend in all the people who say that they don't care about the politics. And those people are politically safe. They tend to be people from districts where they don't have to worry about running against a very viable Republican in 2020. And so it's easier for them to go forward and say impeachment and let the politics go out the window. Yes, impeachment is a political decision. It was designed as such. And that's why it's insane to say that you can take the politics out of impeachment.

Though the people who are trying to say that you can take the politics out of impeachment. Though the people who are trying to say that you can take the politics out of impeachment are saying, we're not saying impeach him, we're saying begin an impeachment inquiry, which would in theory, you know, completely neuter the idea of no legitimate legislative purpose. But let me ask Kelsey this because I think Nancy Pelosi doesn't see a difference between impeaching him and opening an impeachment inquiry. Because when you open an impeachment inquiry, everything grinds to a halt. You basically have one branch of government considering the political death penalty for the President of the United States. And once that happens, Donald Trump gets to be the ultimate victim. He gets to rally his base,

regardless of what happens in the end, whether he's impeached or not. Can you imagine starting impeachment hearings and then not impeaching the president? Oh, yeah. Democrats gave up, just like Mueller with his angry Democrats couldn't even, you know, find any crimes. That would be the ultimate exoneration for him. Oh, yeah. And aside from that, I mean, they would all, whether or not Pelosi believes that there's a difference between impeachment and starting impeachment inquiry, the president probably doesn't. That's for sure. I guess who has the biggest megaphone ever? And he's also the same person who has to sign every piece of legislation that goes through Congress. I know that that we that that sometimes drops to the back burner when we're talking about this.

But at the end of the day, there are things that Congress has to do to keep the country functioning. And the president has to sign off on that. And he has already shown that he is willing to have shutdown fights and other said when she came out of that meeting, that family meeting with the Democrats. Kelsey, the one thing she said is getting a lot of attention. But what was her main message? Her main message was that they need to keep going forward with investigations, that Democrats need to stay the course. But then she made a comment about cover ups. The fact is, in plain sight, in the public domain, this president is obstructing justice

and he's engaged in a cover up. And we now know that that really got under the president's skin. So from that meeting on Capitol Hill, Nancy Pelosi, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, and a bunch of other Democrats headed over to the White House for a meeting about infrastructure. More on that when we get back. Support for NPR and the following message come from the American Beverage Association. America's beverage companies are working together to support families as they reduce the sugar in their diets. Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Pepsi are providing more great tasting options with less sugar or no sugar at all. Smaller portion sizes, clear calorie labels, and reminders

to think balance. More choices, smaller portions, less sugar. Learn more about how they're working together at balanceus.org. Today, China is a world superpower. But just over a century ago, the country was in complete turmoil. This week on ThruLine, we find out how China's response to that turmoil created a nationalist movement that reshaped the country into what it is today. ThruLine from NPR, the podcast where we go back in time to understand the present. And we're back. This morning, President Trump, Speaker Pelosi, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer,

and a bunch of other Democrats were all supposed to meet at the White House to talk about a $2 trillion plan for infrastructure. Roads, bridges, broadband. They were going to talk about how to pay for it. But then, well, that's not what happened. Nope, that's not what happened. The meeting lasted about five minutes. Trump stormed into the meeting really angry. He told Democrats that they could investigate him or work with him on things like infrastructure, but not both at the same time. He stormed out. He went to the Rose Garden, made statements to the press, which looked like had

been clearly planned in advance because there were some placards at the podium. So was this a stage tantrum? That's the question. Then I walked into the room and I told Senator Schumer, Speaker Pelosi, I want to do infrastructure. I want to do it more than you want to do it. I'd be really good at that. That's what I do. But you know what? You can't do it under these circumstances. So get these phony investigations over with. The thing that's amazing about that statement is that he says, I want to do it more than you want to do it. He's the one who wants infrastructure more than them. I thought he's supposed to take something hostage that the other side wants more. Anyway, I think he's just can't get his messaging right. But this is

something he's been saying for a long time, ever since the November elections, that if the Democrats investigated him, he would not work with them on any legislation. Now, who does that hurt more politically? We'll have to see. You know, after that, Schumer came back to the Capitol and held up a 35-page plan that he said he was prepared to hand to the president. About infrastructure, not impeachment. About infrastructure and how to pay for it, is what he said. We haven't actually seen that plan. You know, and Democrats, from people who are familiar with what happened in the room, are telling us that the president walked into the cabinet room and didn't shake anybody's hand or sit in his seat. And then he just said he wanted to do infrastructure and trade. But then he said something about Pelosi saying something terrible about a cover-up and things went south. So here's another question, though. Why would

Nancy Pelosi say something that she had to have known would get under the president's skin right before this meeting? And then that phrase shows up on all the chyrons on all the cable channels. First of all, I don't know what was in Nancy Pelosi's head when she says that. A couple of theories. Number one, at the same time she's trying to keep her finger in the dike of impeachment and stave off a kind of rebellion among her own members to go forward with that. She also has to acknowledge their incredible frustration with the president. So she acknowledges she agrees with them. He's stonewalling us. He's engaged in a cover up. On the other hand, if, and I think this is maybe overthinking it, did she want to get in his head? She seemed to have wanted to in that first meeting

where he ended up taking responsibility for the government shutdown. Did she want to rattle him today or not? I don't know. Yeah, it's hard to tell exactly why she would do that. But there are some Democrats who are already complaining that she's talking out of both sides of her mouth and she has to choose. Is it a cover up? If so, impeachment or is it something else? And then if that's the case, a slower process makes more sense. But they want her to pick a side. Yeah. So he then comes out to the Rose Garden where I was at the White House and keeps talking about a cover up. So I came here to do a meeting on infrastructure with Democrats, not really thinking they wanted to do infrastructure

or anything else other than investigate. And I just saw that Nancy Pelosi, just before our meeting, made a statement that we believe that the president of the United States is engaged in a cover-up. Well, it turns out I'm the most, and I think most of you would agree to this, I'm the most transparent president probably in the history of this country. And then goes on and on and on through things that we've heard a lot about, you know, the witch hunt, so much money spent on the witch hunt, the Mueller investigation saying he's the most transparent ever. But the thing that really stands out and and Mara already kind of touched on this is is the president saying, you know, I'm just not going to work on policy with Democrats until they finish investigating me. This is such a head-scratcher because we know that voters don't care about the Mueller investigation. They want Congress and the White House to work together on things they care about. Infrastructure is a bipartisan initiative with support from both parties. And why is the president choosing to obsessively focus

on the investigations into him instead of what people care about? This reminds me of Bill Clinton, who, of course, faced investigations from Congress. He was impeached by Congress. Many, many, many, many, many investigations. Yeah, many, many investigations. But he had approached this where he said, you know what, I'm not going to be distracted by these investigations. I'm going to focus on the country's business. He even had a little mantra. It was called M-M-E-E. He said, I'm going to focus on Medicare, Medicaid, education, and the environment. And he repeated it over and over again. And he made sure he communicated to the American people that he was focusing on what they cared about, not all of these distracting investigations.

Clinton was notoriously good at compartmentalizing. And Trump is incapable of doing that. The question I think I've been wondering is how much are voters going to parse that? How much are voters going to be willing to go down the path of arguing about who was to blame for basically Washington doing absolutely nothing. I think if the president looks like he has a tantrum and says, sorry, I can't do the nation's business until you stop investigating me. I think Democrats can make him look like a big baby. But, you know, a lot of these Democrats, Kelsey, ran on the idea that they were going to come to

Washington and get stuff done. They were going to do health care. They were going to do prescription drug prices. They were going to focus on the things that voters care about. And now, I mean, they've passed a number of bills on the House side, but nothing's moving anywhere. But it was never going to get passed through the senator signed by the president. The argument the Democrats made is we're going to pass a lot of things in the House that lays down a marker for 2020 and shows the country what we would do if we had complete control of Congress and the White House. As long as they keep on passing stuff, and as Nancy Pelosi would argue, and are not totally

distracted by impeachment, they can continue to make that argument. If the president is boycotting legislating, I think that helps them make the argument. The one thing I will say about that is that Democrats I talked to who were elected in previously Republican districts, some of these more vulnerable Democrats, say that they really did need to be able to pass something, though. blocking them, that a lot of the people who, you know, either were hesitant Democratic voters or people who just didn't show up and didn't vote for Republicans, giving Democrats more space to win, that part of their calculus was an expectation that Democrats would actually deliver. Whether or not that was realistic is another question, but that there is an expectation among some voters that Congress would do something. And that was the tale of two meetings.

And that's a wrap for today. We will be back as soon as there's political news that you need to know about. Until then, head to NPR.org slash politics newsletter to sign up for a weekly roundup of our best online analysis. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Kelsey Snell. I cover Congress. And I'm Mara Liason, national political correspondent. And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.