The NPR Politics Podcast - Trump's First 100 Days: Promises Made, Promises Kept

Episode Date: April 25, 2025

When running for office, Donald Trump promised to execute the largest deportation in American history and issue massive cuts to federal spending. In his administration's first 100 days, has he kept those promises? This episode: senior White House correspondent Tamara Keith, political correspondents Susan Davis and Stephen Fowler, and immigration correspondent Ximena Bustillo.The podcast is produced by Bria Suggs & Kelli Wessinger and edited by Casey Morell. Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi.Listen to every episode of the NPR Politics Podcast sponsor-free, unlock access to bonus episodes with more from the NPR Politics team, and support public media when you sign up for The NPR Politics Podcast+ at plus.npr.org/politics.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Have you or someone you love been confused by the push to make America healthy again? Then you, my friend, are in dire need of our new series. On It's Been A Minute from NPR, we're delving into some of the origins, conspiracy theories and power grabs that have led us to this moment and what it could mean for our health. That's on the It's Been A Minute podcast from NPR. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. This week on the pod, we're doing something a little different, taking a look at some of the policies and decisions President Trump has made in the first 100 days of his second term. Today, how immigration policy in the United States has changed and quickly.

On the campaign trail, Donald Trump summarized his immigration policy simply. You're going to have to have mass deportations. The country can't stand it. The country can't handle it. We are going to start the largest mass deportation in the history of our country because we have no choice. It's not sustainable. Here's all we're going to do. It's going to be called a Trump mass deportation because we have no choice. Mass deportation. Upon taking office, the administration has invoked the Alien Enemies Act and used other policy changes to try and

move people out of the country fast and severely limited ways people can legally immigrate to the U.S., including removing protected status from some people who were here legally. So today, let's talk about the president's immigration policies, how they're working, and who's affected. Joining me, immigration policy reporter Jimena Bustillo and politics correspondent Susan Davis. Hello. Hey, Tam.

Hey. So, Jimena, let's start with you and start with the basics. What policies has the administration enacted with respect to immigration? The first day in office, the president signed several executive actions that did everything that we heard on the campaign trail, from seeking to end birthright citizenship to beginning to lay the groundwork to eventually invoke the alien enemies act you mentioned that is that wartime power that makes it easier to remove people from the country without giving them their day in court. I mean, he limited refugee entries and asylum entries at the southern border.

And this really was an effort to clamp down on legal pathways to migration and also allow for what resulted in several dominoes that have fallen over the first 100 days of making it easier to quickly deport those who are suspected of being in the country without legal status and other people as well. And there's also been a massive tone shift, which at least in part seems to be designed to get people to self-deport.

Right. The idea of getting people to just voluntarily leave the country was an idea that President Trump laughed at when Mitt Romney was once positioning that idea on the debate stage in 2012. But he has now embraced it. He is running multimillion dollar ad campaigns across the world, really encouraging people to not come to the United States through illegal means. So let's talk about Congress's role here. The Trump administration is asking Congress for billions in additional funding to make this policy a reality. What more do we need to know there? Congress has been incapable of passing

comprehensive immigration legislation almost in our lifetimes. It's been since former President Ronald Reagan was president that Congress could actually take the issue head on. I think Donald Trump winning the election changes the politics around that. I still don't think they have the votes in Congress to do a big bill. But what Republicans are looking at doing is taking the budget reconciliation bill that's making its way through Congress right now, and they want to supercharge immigration and border enforcement money. The resolution calls for a minimum of $90 billion and as much as $175 billion in additional spending

over the next decade to achieve Donald Trump's policy goals. That would include juicing ICE agents, the number of security at the border, the number of detention facilities. It would be money to build new detention facilities. If you think about the speed and velocity that Donald Trump has been trying to move with in these first 100 days, if Congress were to enact a bill that gave him that significant a pot of money, he would be able to accelerate deportations

on a scale that has probably never been seen before throughout the rest of his presidency. And Jimena, I do want to talk about this idea of mass deportations. In the absence of that supercharging and all of that money and all of those resources, has President Trump actually succeeded at executing the mass deportations that he promised would happen immediately? Mm-hmm. So in terms of arrests, being able to detain someone, immigration and customs enforcement and even their data shows that they are at max capacity in immigration detention centers which does indicate that they are arresting more people. We have also seen an expansion of who qualifies for

these arrests with the inclusion of students on student visas, arrests of lawful permanent residents for various issues, including protesting on college campuses. However, when actually thinking about how many people are being removed from the country, that is a little bit of a different story and that we're still not super sure what the data looks like on that front. You mean there's a lack of transparency? A little bit.

You see Secretary of Homeland Security Christine Noem post a lot on social media about how they've made hundreds of thousands of arrests. Those numbers are beyond what the publicly available, regularly updated data shows that are for arrest numbers and detention numbers by tens of thousands of people. And so there is a mismatch in terms of what the

administration is promoting versus the data that is readily accessible and available. So I want to talk about polling because immigration has been arguably President Trump's strongest area. It is the thing he has been campaigning on since he came down that escalator in the lobby of Trump Tower. So how are the American people viewing that 100 days in? This is such an interesting week to have this conversation because just this week there were three polls out showing that for the first time Donald Trump's unfavorable rating is higher than his favorable rating on the issue of immigration. It's still more favorable

on the issue of border security, but on immigration. And I think that it is potentially the sign of the political blowback that can happen if you're doing too much too fast and people don't like the way you're doing it. And there's a couple of things I would point to. I talked to one Democratic strategist

who said they think that the two mistakes that the Trump administration has made is the perception that they've defied a Supreme Court order to facilitate the return of Kilmar Arbrego-Garcia. And also the idea that, like, look, I don't think that the fundamental politics has changed. I think the country still wants less people coming in and more people going out that are here illegally. But the Trump administration is doing this outside the bounds of the legal deportation process.

And I think that that makes a lot of Americans, independent Americans, uneasy. I think that when you push the bounds of the law, that is not necessarily something that's going to cause a groundswell of support. And there is potentially, we're seeing warning signs that if they continue at this apace, they might continue to lose public support. I keep thinking about this interview that President Trump did after the election. He sat down with Kristen Welker at NBC's Meet the Press, and he was talking about immigration, and she asked, are you going to have to separate families? And he was like, well, the kids

could be deported with the parents. It'll be fine even if they're Americans. But he said the real risk was that there are going to be sob stories. There are going to be stories about families being torn apart, and that that could erode support for what he's doing. And in some ways, that is happening now. We are seeing more stories about families that we're not expecting to be broken up being broken up. I think the other thing here is the favorability is still starkly split between party lines and Democrats and Democratic leaders are still grappling with how to address the issue of immigration When it's connected with the issue of crime and you know

How it is that they're supposed to navigate that the very first bill that Trump signed into law was the Lake and Riley Act And that was a bill that got large increased Democratic support because they felt a need to be a little bit tougher on the issue of immigration and when it relates to public safety. That expanded the amount of people that are eligible for deportations. Now we don't know how many people have been deported under the grounds of that act, but it is something that has definitely put Democrats in a bit of a corner, and some since have said they regret voting for that act.

All right, we are going to take a quick break. Jimena, thank you so much for bringing us your reporting. Thank you. And when we come back, how the federal government itself has been reshaped. This message comes from NPR sponsor Air Canada. Ready for your next adventure? How about taking in views upon views in Athens, browsing mouth-watering night markets in Bangkok,

or dancing to carnival in the Caribbean? With amazing beach breaks, city breaks, and bucket list trips to choose from, Air Canada has you covered. Start planning your trip to over 180 destinations today at AirCanada.com or contact your travel agent. Air Canada, nice travels. At Planet Money, we'll take you from a race to make rum in the Caribbean. Our rum from a quality standpoint is the best in the world.

To the labs dreaming up the most advanced microchips. It's very rare for people to go inside. To the back rooms of New York's Diamond District. What are you looking for the stupid guy here? They're all smart, don't worry about it. Planet Money from NPR. We go to the story and take you along with us wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back.

Another one of the president's missions in his first 100 days has been to change how the government functions from the ground up. That has involved a new entity altogether. One of the most important initiatives is DOGE and we have cut billions and billions and billions of dollars. We're looking to get it maybe to a trillion dollars if we can do that. The group known as the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOJ, spearheaded by Elon Musk, has been trying to find ways to cut government spending and cut some of the things the government

does altogether. Political reporter Stephen Fowler has been covering DOJ for us. Hey, Stephen. Hey there. All right. So, Stephen, just walk us through some of the big things that Doge has done so far. Well, in many ways, the Department of Government Efficiencies' search to find waste, fraud, and abuse in the government has not found much waste, fraud, and abuse. But they have done a number of things. It's been a small group of software engineers and others with connections to billionaire

Elon Musk that have fanned out across federal agencies. They've been trying to fire tens of thousands of federal workers. They've overseen the effective dismantling of a handful of agencies, cut spending on things like foreign food aid, medical research, basic office supplies, and got access to a lot of sensitive data that the federal government maintains. So if you look at it on the one hand, they haven't really done that much so far to make the government more efficient. But on the other hand, you can make the case that they've done a lot efficiently to consolidate

power and to use it to help push President Trump's agenda around things like immigration. Stephen, what do you mean by they're using this data as part of their immigration policies? Well, multiple federal agencies all have their own databases with particularized information about people that don't normally talk to each other and now under DOGE, they've been granted access to multiple systems and they're combining it all in one big data pot to use for different purposes. For now, what we have seen start to emerge is that data being used for immigration, specifically to advance Trump's agenda around deportations and around identifying people who are in the country without legal status and the different ways that they interact with the government towards the end of removal. And they have also gone after things in the government

that the president disagrees with. They at times have called that fraud, but in many ways, it's more of a policy disagreement. It's a policy disagreement. You know, many of the contracts that they've canceled at these federal agencies have been for foreign aid programs and Scholarships and other things that basically Trump doesn't like there's nothing fraudulent about it It's just a matter of policy preference The president has said that billions and billions and billions may even trillions of dollars in government spending will be cut have been cut Let's fact-check How much has been cut? Well, it's difficult to say because like many things Doge have done, there have been things

that have been cut and then uncut, fired, unfired, so on and so forth. But the billions and billions number is not exactly the right context. Before Elon Musk and Doge started, he had this ambitious plan of $2 trillion cut from the federal budget that's about $6.5 to $7 trillion in spending. Doge started, that became $1 trillion. And now, just a few weeks ago at a cabinet meeting, Musk said, yeah, there's $150 billion we think that we can cut. Even that number is lower. It's important to look at the Treasury Department data that says compared to this point last year, federal spending is actually up 10%. Revenues are up 3%. And the deficit, that's 24% bigger than this time last year. So that spending is not necessarily being

chainsawed away. So what are the political implications of how this has been going? I think one of the things that's so interesting about this effort is that in some ways I think it has also taught the country how well their government works. People think that government is huge and inefficient, but then when you say things like, oh, we're going to make social security more efficient by reducing the number of physical offices, people go up in arms. Wait a minute, not my social security office.

The day-to-day connection with the government is much more positive. It's always the big government, the government out there that is the spending that needs to be cut. I think Doge has had a huge level of impact on Washington, on the federal workforce, on what the government prioritizes, on science funding and biomedical research. And look, Doge has made cuts to programs and changes to programs that could be felt for decades. In terms of spending money, it's like it's an all sizzle and no stake. They haven't really saved any money. DOJ from the start was always a bit of a trap because from the beginning, they took everything off the table that are the real drivers of debt, Medicare, Social Security, interest payments on the debt. And the largest chunk

of discretionary spending goes to the Pentagon, which also was effectively, for the most part, taken off the table. It's just a mathematical impossibility to get anywhere close to balancing the budget, just focusing on that teeny tiny little slice that happens to fund things like your social security offices and your roads and your cops and your schools. It's the part of the government that is actually the most popular. I think that Donald Trump will claim victory no matter how much spending they cut. And I will say this again, like while they're talking about being the party that's going to reduce spending and balance the budget, Republicans right now on Capitol Hill are moving forward with a tax cut bill that if enacted the way they're talking about it would add trillions

of dollars to the debt and deficit and not do anything to put it in anything close to balance in the duration of Trump's term. Stephen, there have also been a surprising number of just errors, like big errors. Yeah, there's this wall of receipts that Doge has kept that shows all of the grants that they've terminated, the leases they say they've terminated, contracts they've canceled. And from the start, it has been riddled with errors. There have been contracts that have been canceled that haven't actually been issued yet.

They have claimed savings from canceling contracts that were never issued, contracts that haven't actually been canceled and are actually spending money. They've been misinterpreting these things called blanket purchase agreements. And even when you go to click on the links to say, oh, this is the contract being canceled,

it's been linking to the wrong random things. Can we talk about whether what is happening here is on net popular, not popular? This is one of the signature aspects of the first 100 days of President Trump's administration. If you look at the town halls from both Democrats and Republicans and rallies that Senator Bernie Sanders has been holding, I would say no, it is not popular from what we are hearing. Now, granted, somebody who's likely to show up to a town hall might be a little bit more politically engaged than the average person,

but when you look at the polling, the Doge agenda is not something that people have a favorable view of. Fox News had a recent poll about the first 100 days of Trump's second term. There's also the Washington Post, ABC News poll that has the same thing, and the Pew Research Center that say people who might want to see the government change and the Trump administration change how the government works don't want their government dozed. I think the idea is still popular.

I mean, who doesn't want a more efficient government? But I think the execution hasn't gone as well as they wanted. And I think another data point I'd point to that is Elon Musk. If you look at his popularity, how the country views him, I mean, it has been on a straight decline since Trump took office. And I don't think it's any secret that Musk has indicated he's going to be stepping back from this effort in the coming weeks. And it's also taken a hit to him personally. And Tesla stocks down, they had a really bad, what was their most recent shareholder meeting. He kind of admitted things aren't going so great.

So the way the country views Musk and what it's done to him, I would say it's a takeaway from that is Doge has not been a resounding success. So with Elon Musk leaving, do we have a sense of where this effort to make the government more efficient, where does this go? Well, Elon Musk is the face of Doge, but he is not the foot soldier carrying it out. There are dozens of people that are Elon Musk associates that have become full employees of the different agencies that they're trying to work on. I mean, Trump's executive order announcing Doge gave them a deadline of America's birthday, July 4th, 2026, to

kind of finish that work. But like Sue mentioned earlier, you know, the work that is being done, the data access that has been given, the sort of changes that are being made by the people implementing the Doge agenda, isn't something that's just going to go away when Elon Musk goes back to Tesla. And look, don't forget, like most of the work of Doge of reducing spending should actually be done by Congress. It's their job to appropriate the money and decide what gets funded and not. I do think you're seeing a little bit of congressional muscle starting to step into this process.

I think a lot of it's happening behind the scenes because people don't want to publicly get crossways with Elon Musk and Donald Trump. Congress is going to have to go through another appropriations process for the next fiscal year pretty soon. I think it's going to be something that's very closely watched to see how much of Doge cuts are codified and how much maybe is clawed back. And one area that I would point to, which I think people connect to, is the NIH, the National Institutes of Health.

This has historically been hugely popular in both parties. It funds all kinds of science and biomedical research. And it has taken a lot of hits from Doge. And I think that's one area where you might suddenly see money going back to NIH that Doge tried to eliminate. All right well I think we need to leave it there for now. We promise that Can't Let It Go will return next week because we can't let it go. Our executive producer is Mathauni Maturi, Casey Morrell edits the podcast, our producers are Bria Suggs and Kelly

Wessinger. Special thanks to Lexi Schipitil. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Stephen Fowler. I cover government restructuring. And I'm Susan Davis. I cover politics.

And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.