The NPR Politics Podcast - Weekly Roundup: New Speaker, Same Challenges

Episode Date: November 3, 2023

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-La.) has a lot on his agenda — aid to Israel and Ukraine, a looming government shutdown & more. He'll need bipartisan support to get things done, but how doable that is remains to be seen.And, polls in New Hampshire are tightening ahead of January's primaries — even with a major candidate off the ballot entirely. This episode: voting correspondent Ashley Lopez, congressional correspondent Deirdre Walsh, and senior political editor and correspondent Domenico Montanaro.The podcast is edited by Casey Morell. It is produced by Elena Moore and Jeongyoon Han. 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

Support for NPR and the following message come from the Kauffman Foundation, providing access to opportunities that help people achieve financial stability, upward mobility, and economic prosperity, regardless of race, gender, or geography. Kauffman.org Hi, this is David in San Francisco. I'm currently at the airport anxiously awaiting the arrival of my brand new puppy. This podcast was recorded at 10.52 a.m. Central Time on Friday, November 3rd, 2023.

Things may have changed by the time you hear this, but I'll still be caring for my little furry potato. Okay, here's the show. Congrats. Oh, congrats. A cute little thing. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Ashley Lopez. I cover voting. I'm Deirdre Walsh. I cover of his fellow members after a very fraught election. But one of the things a speaker has to be able to do is help raise money, right, for candidates up

and down the ballot. And correct me if I'm wrong, but that's not necessarily a thing Johnson's had to do before. Not at all. I mean, and he has big shoes to fill. You know, the former speaker, Kevin McCarthy, raised all together with all the various super PACs and political operations, half a billion dollars, $500 million in the 2022 campaign cycle. Even House Republicans who support Johnson say those are huge shoes he's going to have to fill. He's going to need a lot of help from people like McCarthy, from people like the head of the House Republican Campaign Committee, Richard Hudson. So far, he's done pretty well. In the few days after he was elected, he raised a million dollars from grassroots supporters. But that's a long way from the sort of big donor corporate relationships that McCarthy developed

over many years in House Republican leadership. That's a lot of pressure not to mention the added pressure that is a potential government shutdown now just two weeks away. I mean, what's the strategy to try and avoid that, especially that issues related to government spending and bipartisanship helped bring down Kevin McCarthy? Right. I think Republicans don't want to go there again. I mean, after the three-week drama of not having a speaker and not being able to function as a House, there will be some grace period for Mike Johnson, and there will be some kind of stopgap bill. funding through potentially sometime in January. But the details are really still really up in the air. And there's a lot of pressure on him to step into this role and negotiate with people like the Senate majority leader and the president when he doesn't really have relationships with any of these people. Domenico, like Republicans and Democrats have to figure out a way to work together on these things. I mean, how tight of a

rope is Johnson walking on here? I mean, we're talking a couple of weeks here until the government is set to shut down again, unless there's funding to, you know, keep the lights on. And the government, we say this over and over again, I feel like we've said it so many times. And, you know, he's really trying a lot of different types of methods to try to keep the party together, to be able to give them things on one end that'll make the right wing of the party happy. And then on the other hand, make the moderates happy about wanting to keep the government going. And he's going to have to also do that not only to get legislation through his conference, but he's going to have to get legislation through that can then be agreed upon by the Senate and the White House. They also have this responsibility

as well. And we've seen how difficult it's been for past speakers to do this. And he's going to face a major test here very quickly. Yeah. And if that weren't enough plate spinning in the air, we have to mention the struggle involving aid to Israel and to Ukraine. I wonder what you make of this added, I guess, struggle that he's open to moving a bill that ties it to border security, which is obviously a very popular issue within the Republican base. I mean, I think he passed this first test of passing this bill that did present this $14.3 billion aid package to Israel, but also linked it to this popular idea among Republicans to, you know, sort of clawback funding for IRS enforcement. But Senate Republicans I talked to are sort of like, what's the endgame? They understand he needed to pull together something that would bring

House Republicans all together after what they just went through. But they're not really clear on what the end game is to essentially get all these things done that everyone agrees are a priority in terms of aid to Israel. It has overwhelming bipartisan support. There's also bipartisan support for aid to Ukraine. And Deidre, let's remind folks that Johnson was one of the Republicans who voted to decertify the election. And he has also supported a nationwide abortion ban. I mean, this is pretty great fodder for Democrats, right? Right. And they're obviously jumping on those positions. I mean, as Speaker so far, Johnson has talked about the fact that his positions are ones that he's taken,

but he's the Speaker of all House Republicans. He's going to work with members. I talked to some moderate Republicans who've said he's assured them he's not pushing this national abortion ban as the speaker, even though it's something he's backed. I should also say, you know, there are 147 House Republicans who voted against certifying the 2020 election. So it's, you know, it's a big chunk of the House Republican conference. So it's not necessarily an unusual position. And House Democrats were going to paint whoever the new speaker is, as you know, a MAGA extreme House Republican speaker. With Johnson, there is more of a voting record on culturally conservative issues for them to dig into. I sat down with Susan DelBene. She's the chair of the House Democrats Campaign Committee, and they are very focused on linking all House Republicans who voted to elect Mike Johnson's speaker to his voting record.

While he may be unknown to folks, I think a lot is coming out every day about where he stands and how extreme he is, you know, as someone who wanted to overturn the 2020 election, someone who wants to see a nationwide abortion ban, someone who wants to cut Social Security and Medicare. The other point that Del Bene makes is every House Republican voted to elect Mike Johnson as Speaker. So, well, there may be some moderates in some of these swing districts in California and New York who don't agree with him on issues like abortion, who don't agree with him on his position on the 2020 election. They voted for him. So Democrats are going to try to tie all of them to Mike Johnson. Well, the thing is, every party uses whoever the Speaker of the House is in a lot of their campaign ads and a lot of these districts to be able to say, hey, this is what that party represents. And they're too extreme. And this is why you should go for the other person. You know, right now, I would venture to say that not many people know who Mike Johnson

is or have an opinion about who Mike Johnson is. So there's a period of time he's going to have here now over the next few months to be able to define himself, to be able to publicly, you know, go forward in the way that he wants to most represent how these candidates are going to be able to run and, you know, what the Republican Party stands for. Yeah. I mean, that being said, do you think like the average voter, one knows or two cares about whatever the Speaker of House is up to? Well, the thing is, Johnson is not well known at this point, but he's going to have a lot of face time on television. He's going to be at the press conferences and his profile is going to be raised more and more and people are going to learn who they are. I mean, look at what

Republicans did with Nancy Pelosi and putting her in ad after ad, you know, really kind of demonizing her. And, you know, Democrats have done the same with people like Kevin McCarthy, for example, though not quite as successfully because he wasn't in the job for very long. But this is the kind of thing that the more attention he gets, the more he's going to be associated with the party writ large. We're only a year away from the election. So I think, you know, over time, Republicans were able to build up this image of Pelosi among the Republican base, and they used it effectively in some midterm elections. But I think the challenge for Speaker Mike Johnson is, can he govern? Can the House get things done? Can they avoid a shutdown? If things blow up and go off the rails, like we saw during the three weeks where there wasn't a speaker, that is more of a problem for him and Republican candidates, likely just sort of on the basic test of should this party be able to keep control of the House if they can't run it? Okay, let's take a quick break and more in a moment.

Before we get back to the show, a quick plug for our bonus episode out this weekend. We'll be answering some listener questions and get a little behind-the-scenes look at our coverage of the Speaker's race these past couple of weeks. You can hear that if you're an NPR Politics Plus supporter. If that's you, thanks. If that's not you, it could be. You get bonus episodes like this one, sponsor-free listening, and support the work we do. Sign up at plus.npr.org slash politics. And we're back. Let's look at New Hampshire now.

It's the first primary in the nation for the 2024 presidential election. Republicans are campaigning hard there. And Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and ambassador to the U.N., is gaining ground on Donald Trump. Domenico, what's causing her rise here? Well, you know, it really started with this debate that she had over the summer that she did a pretty good job in, the one that Trump skipped. He hasn't gone to any of the debates. And she had a pretty good showing there. And, you know, we're seeing a rise in some of the issues that Haley is pretty strong with around the world. I mean, if you think about when foreign policy becomes something that is an issue, you know, she's a former ambassador to the

U.N. from the U.S. So, you know, some of these issues are in her wheelhouse. We were also seeing really Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor, just continue to not impress as a candidate. And he's, you know, was supposed to be the Trump alternative. He hasn't been impressive as a candidate. Donors and the like have just started to kind of wander away. And I think it's also very difficult when you're Ron DeSantis and you're saying, I'm going to be Trump without being Trump when a significant portion of the base still wants Trump and the alternatives don't want Trump. What is your lane exactly? And Haley is sort of starting to pick up on what that means. And we look at a lot of national polls. This is really a time to

start looking at the state polls. And you're seeing Haley really start to spike in places like Iowa and New Hampshire. And if she can finish ahead of DeSantis in these places with South Carolina coming up after that, where she was a former governor, she really has a legitimate path to being the principal alternative to Trump. Yeah, and I wonder what you make of why Ron DeSantis is struggling so much and hasn't seemed to be able to break out of that. You know, DeSantis has just from the beginning gotten bludgeoned by the Trump campaign, even before he got into the race. His popularity nosedived among Republicans while these withering attacks were taking place. And he thought that he had enough of a reservoir of goodwill where he would do well enough. But he's

had a reputation as somebody who doesn't really love campaigning, isn't really great on the stump, isn't somebody who likes to go and shake hands and do rope line things. And when you don't seem to be a political athlete who likes being in the arena, it makes it really tough if there's all these expectations and you're not living up to them. Yeah. Well, still a few months out from the primary, though, but a lot can change. Meanwhile, President Biden, who is not on the New Hampshire primary ballot for Democrats, has a new challenger in Minnesota, Representative Dean Phillips. Deidre, he's not exactly a household name as much as anybody in the House can be one, right? Right. What kind of lawmaker is Dean Phillips? Tell us about him.

He sort of has this moderate centrist Democrat profile. He came in after the 2018 election, and he was one of the House Democrats who, even as a candidate before he was elected, was challenging whether Nancy Pelosi should continue on as speaker. He has been on this bandwagon about raising concerns about older elected officials. That's obviously the key platform he's running on against Biden right now, raising concerns about his age and competence to continue in the job at a time where Dean Phillips is also pointing to a lot of the state polls that Domenico is talking about, where Biden is trailing a head-to-head matchup against former President Trump. So, you know, in terms of his profile in the House, he's not, you know, a top leader. He was elected to a lower level leadership position as part of this effort that Pelosi had when he came in to try to keep sort of a regional balance, a Midwestern Democrat, more of a centrist, he had to step down from that job because it was causing a lot of consternation among his colleagues because he was challenging the president. You know, it's really difficult because you don't normally have somebody come in to challenge a sitting president of the same party. And usually when that happens, the sitting president winds up having a difficult time winning reelection. And maybe it's a chicken and egg thing, but it does indicate a degree of vulnerability from Biden and one that conservatives are more

than happy to press forward on. I think the big issue for Dean Phillips is what is his vision for the country? I mean, he's really only taking on Biden's age, talking about how he's, you know, perhaps the only Democrat who could lose to Trump, which, you know, from a data standpoint, that just doesn't hold up. But that's the kind of message that he's pushing. And you really need a policy foundation to be able to stand on. And he doesn't have a lot of policy differences with Biden. Now, a place like New Hampshire has never been about the delegates because there aren't very many delegates there. It's about headlines and momentum. And, you know, it's going to be an expectations game. If the write-in campaign for Biden, because Biden's not on the ballot in New Hampshire, New Hampshire decided to continue to go first. The DNC wanted

to move up South Carolina to go first. You know, if the write-in campaign for Biden loses to Phillips and the White House and campaign are seen as attached to that and really made an effort, well, then it's going to not look great for Biden. So it's really going to be a measuring stick of expectations on this write-in campaign and whether or not Phillips is going to be a real thorn in Biden's side or just a splinter? The other thing about Dean Phillips is he's saying the quiet part out loud. There are a lot of Democrats in Congress who are concerned about Biden's age and his ability to compete in 2024. In a lot of the swing districts, right, there's a very small margin. There's an opportunity for Democrats to win back the chamber. But in some of these swing districts, there are concerns about Biden's ability to campaign, right? There are a lot of infrastructure

projects that are now, you know, generating jobs in their districts. There's new chip manufacturers who are bringing new opportunities to their districts. So they believe, you know, lower prescription drug costs and pocketbook issues are going to be popular. And at the end of the day, Democrats will come home and given the choice between Joe Biden and Donald Trump they will turn out for Democrats. Yeah and this is why you know members of the party are keeping the quiet part quiet right like it seems like the difference between Dean Phillips and everyone else is that he seems to not mind making the party mad in a way that other Democrats are maybe more reticent to. Well the party thinks that's a huge risk that could get Trump elected again.

Yeah. And, you know, that's a difficult part of, yes, they are concerned about Biden's age. It's his biggest vulnerability. But at some point, it's what is the decision that you're going to make? Who are you going to nominate? Is there somebody who polls better? Is there somebody who is better? Is there somebody who gives you a better shot?

And, you know, the first time around, a lot of Democrats held their nose to vote for Biden because they just didn't want Trump to be in office again. And, you know, if you're going to have somebody who's going to be an agitator, who's going to throw the message off, it's going to give them a lot of agita. The other thing Democrats tell me is, you know, look who Biden's likely opponent is, right? Donald Trump is not that much younger than Joe Biden. So they think that makes the issue sort of a wash. Well, they hope that's the case. Although Trump, of course, comes across sometimes as a younger, late 70s person. But, you know, he's had his own missteps on the campaign trail, frankly, that haven't gotten as much attention because it doesn't fit the narrative that, you know,

he's old and all of this. But if Democrats start pushing that message and start putting together some of these clips on the campaign trail that we've started to see from Trump, it could mitigate some of this age conversation if Trump winds up being the nominee. Yeah. Okay. There will be more to watch as the campaign continues. We'll take a break for now. And when we come back, can't let it go. And we're back. And it's time for Can't Let It Go, the part of the show where we talk about the things that we can't stop thinking about, politics or otherwise.. I'm a fan of marathons. I went to school in Boston. So I used to go to the Boston Marathon. And so I'm just sort of fascinated by people who run marathons. And recently, I think it was the Chicago Marathon, the winner set this crazy new record. In a previous marathon, not that long before that in Berlin, the female runner sent

a new marathon record. And I was like, what is going on? How are people running so much faster now? And it's because they have these things called super shoes. And basically, the big athletic shoe companies, Nike, Adidas, are creating these new running shoes that basically you just wear to run a marathon. And they have carbon plates in them and these funky soles. Like if you look at the picture of the Nike shoes that the winner of the Chicago Marathon wore, they're like these funky, foamy soles, but they're super light. Like I don't know how they put a carbon plate in a shoe and make it lighter, not heavier, but it propels runners faster. So I'm sort of fascinated. I'd like to try them on maybe somehow. Help you walk around the Capitol.

Well, and I will say reporters at the Capitol now pretty much always wear sneakers because it's been kind of a crazy pace to keep up with and all these scrums. So I want some super shoes for my scrums. I have never done my grocery shopping so fast in my life. So Ashley, what can't you let go of this week? Also on the topic of shoes, what I can't let go of this week is a story about menswear this week in Politico, specifically Republican Florida governor and presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis' choice of footwear. So folks on the internet have noticed something funny about like the cowboy boots that he's been wearing on the campaign trail. And Politico asked three expert shoemakers what

they make of his shoes. And these experts are pretty much convinced that DeSantis has been wearing lifts in his boots. The consensus was that they're like an inch and a half tall lifts. Wow. Yeah. And I don't know, I will say like one of the bootmakers in the story said it was very common for politicians, especially here in Texas, where I live, to have some lifts added to their cowboy boots. But I think this whole situation raises some interesting questions about, you know, masculinity in politics. And we should note the front runner of the Republican nomination is like a tall and big man. And I'm assuming this is like something that weighs on the minds of people like DeSantis as they're vying for the nomination.

I thought it was fascinating that Nikki Haley picked up on this when she was, you know, talking to Charlamagne Tha God on The Daily Show, which, by the way, that's its own thing. The fact that Nikki Haley was talking to Charlamagne Tha God was another conversation. But she was talking about how we'll have to figure it out. I can tell you, I've, was another conversation. But she was talking about how we'll have to figure it out. I can tell you, I've always talked about my high heels. I never hid that from anybody. I've always said, don't wear them if you can't run in them. So we'll see if he can run in them. Wow, that's some shade from Nikki Haley. That is out in the open. I feel like every presidential cycle, there is always a story about the height

of one party's nominee versus the others. Maybe we just need to let go of that and just sort of like judge people on their political platforms. I say this as a vertically challenged person, so maybe that's where I'm coming from. Good luck with that, right? I mean, that's Americans. I mean, I will say, I feel like we should leave the lying about your height to like dating apps and then just like let it go. Domenico, what can't you let go of this week? You know, it's on the same vein of masculinity, to be honest with you. I'm talking about Bobby Knight's death this week.

He's the former legendary college basketball coach, coached in Indiana, won several national championships. You know, look, I'll get out of the way. First of all, I'm a former high school basketball player. I, you know, learned a lot of Bobby Knight's, you know, offenses that he had invented. My dad was a coach. So I've lived sort of under this idea that he is like this great coach. He's a brilliant tactician, but he's also a bully. And this was somebody who was what was thought to be what men were supposed to be like. You know, you're tough. There's a certain way about doing things. You don't talk back. And it was this psychological kind of warfare, a lot of fealty that he demanded from the people below him that he didn't necessarily return a lot of that loyalty to a lot of those folks. And everywhere he went, there was another controversy that surrounded him. And I think that it's an interesting discussion and debate about the type of men and what it means to coach and how you're supposed to coach kids. And I think that the culture has really moved away from the Bobby Knight style of things to a different place.

And I think, frankly, that's a good thing. I agree with Domenico. I also wonder if someone like Bobby Knight could succeed in the NCAA right now. I mean, just like. I don't think so. I just remember the viral chair throwing moments, right? Those would be on SportsCenter, but also the way he talked about his players and how sort of tough and could be very demoralizing to some of his players.

I don't think that would fly in a culture where social media and viral moments, any of those at a practice that could go viral. I just don't think a university administration could really tolerate that kind of behavior from a coach. The good thing is that we have seen a culture change around that, and there's a very different way that people consider how they should be trying to motivate kids. Yeah. All righty, that does it for today.

But before we go, we want to take a moment and thank some folks who have been key to making this podcast for the last couple of years, who are moving on to some other exciting things with our team. Thank you. Executive producer is Mithoni Mathuri. Our editor is Casey Morrell. Jung-Yoon Han and Alina Moore produced today's podcast. Thanks to Krishna Dev Kalamer and Lexi Schipittel. I'm Ashley Lopez. I cover voting. I'm Deirdre Walsh. I cover Congress.

And I'm Domenica Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent. And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.