The NPR Politics Podcast - Weekly Roundup: Thursday, July 27

Episode Date: July 28, 2017

Senate Republicans inch forward on health care. This episode Host/correspondent Tamara Keith, congressional correspondent Susan Davis, congressional reporter Geoff Bennett, justice correspondent Carrie Johnson, and editor/correspondent Ron Elving. More coverage at nprpolitics.org. Email the show at [e-mail]. Find and support your local public radio station at npr.org/stations. And check out https://nprontheroad.tumblr.com/ for photos from the Register's Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

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I just finished skiing at Mammoth Mountain in California in July, in the middle of summer. And yes, there is still plenty of snow at the mountain here. The following podcast was recorded at 1.05 p.m. on July 27th. Things may have changed by the time you hear it. Keep up with NPR's political coverage at npr.org, the NPR app, or your local public radio station. Okay, here's the show. It's the NPR Politics Podcast, here to talk about what's happening with health care, to the extent that anyone really knows. Plus, the president's beef with his attorney general,

as well as other related White House beefs. And the President's announcement about banning transgender individuals from military service. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House for NPR. I'm Susan Davis. I cover Congress. And I'm Ron Elving, Editor-Correspondent. So, Ron and I are here at NPR HQ, and Sue, you are in the palatial NPR booth over on the House side of the Capitol. Is that right?

It is. And I spent a lot of hours this week inside this booth. So it's good to hear your voices. Yeah. Someday we'll see you again. One day. Later in the podcast, we're going to hear from Jeff Bennett, who is at the White House, and Kerry Johnson, who will be joining us as well to talk about Jeff Sessions. But let's start with Capitol Hill. So, Sue, what the heck's going on over there? Yeah, that's a great question, right? I think we're all trying to figure it out. So I think the timestamp in the podcast matters more maybe

on health care in this episode than it normally does. This is a live moving vehicle and we don't really know the hard answers to the tough questions about health care. This is where we are as of Thursday afternoon. Senate Republicans are trying to come up with what is being dubbed on Capitol Hill skinny repeal. This is repeal of the Affordable Care Act, which is what they've been trying to do for six months. We don't know. So skinny repeal is some combination of the policies that I would call the lowest common denominator policies, the things that all Republicans have at one point said they support. Yes, one of those is repealing the individual and employer mandates. Some of it is repealing some of the taxes in the Affordable Care Act. There's talk of including a one year defund of Planned Parenthood that has passed before, as well as

some conversation about how to maybe let insurance companies waive some of these essential health benefits that they have to offer in their coverage plans under the Affordable Care Act. What combination of those that are going to come together, or if even a skinny repeal bill can come together, are very, very much open questions. Senate Republicans are meeting this afternoon. They're trying to assess where everyone is. And having just talked to a bunch of those senators and heading back over there to talk to them again after this podcast, they're all over the map. There's no consensus. I think the pitch that leaders are giving members to try and get them to yes on something is this isn't going to be the final bill. This is not the last say on health care. It is simply our best option to get a bill into what is known as a conference committee,

which would be a third round of negotiations between the House and the Senate. The House has passed a more comprehensive repeal and replace plan and to try and come up with a final, final bill that both chambers can ultimately pass. I have a question. Yeah. Is that true? Like, you know, with the Affordable Care Act, there was talk of there will be a conference. This isn't the final bill. And then all of a sudden it was the final bill. Yeah, I would say that I've talked to enough senators today, including Senator Mike Rounds of South Dakota. Just talk to Lindsey Graham of South Carolina who are saying to leadership, we won't vote for skinny repeal if we don't have some guarantee that this isn't the final bill or some guarantee that the House just doesn't take it up and pass it, right? You can't make a guarantee on what the other chamber is going to do. So there is a lot of skepticism and caution around this approach,

and it's still a pretty big sell for leadership to try and get something. But I think where Mitch McConnell had a victory this week is that he was able to get 50 Republicans to vote on that motion to proceed earlier this week. So Mitch's pitch is essentially what they said to people back in March and April and May in the House. Just don't let it die. We'll fix it down the road. The one thing we can't let it do is die on our doorstep. Exactly. And it has actually been described to me by several aides as a live to fight another day strategy. OK, I want to talk about a few individual senators because I think up for reelection in 2018 in a state that went for Hillary Clinton. So he is a he is a Republican in a blue state and his position has been tortured. Is that is that the right way to put it so? Convoluted is also maybe another word for it. He is also the only Senate Republican running in a blue state for reelection next year. So I think that's one of the reasons why you hear

Dean Heller's name so much when we're talking about getting the votes for health care. He's a critical vote. He's an up in the air vote. And he's taken, I would say, unclear positions on this because on the one hand, Dean Heller, I think, wants to be a loyal Republican. He wants to be a team player. So that means he wants to be a vote that Mitch McConnell can rely on. On the other end, he wants to win the election. And this bill and the politics in this bill are not going over so well in Nevada, particularly with his Republican governor, Brian Sandoval. And because he was one of those reliable party votes earlier this week and voted for that procedural motion to start debate, he is already being attacked on the TV airwaves in Nevada

for that vote. Senator Heller just broke his promise by casting the deciding vote to repeal our health care. Tell him to keep his promise to protect our care. Senator Heller, vote no on health care. Tell him to keep his promise to protect our care. Senator Heller, vote no on health care repeal. The votes that are being taken this week are going to haunt. They are meant to be the votes that people want to run political ads about. Another good example today on the other end of the spectrum is Steve Daines, who's a Republican from Montana, is offering an amendment to the bill that would be single payer health care. And the intention

from Republicans in this is a political maneuver to put Democrats on the line to say, where are your votes in your party on this? Now, Democrats just say, like, well, you didn't structure it the way we would have structured it. Exactly. So I believe they're using the language from John Conyers bill. It is the longstanding legislation by John Conyers of Michigan that is essentially Medicare for all. Democrats are not taking the bait. Bernie Sanders has already announced he's a no on that amendment. And if Bernie's a no. And if Bernie's a no, it gives Democrats the leeway to just vote no. So it will go down. But as you can see, offering that as kind of an amendment is the ways that senators are kind of taking the stick and prodding each other with these votes and trying to jam people into tough positions.

Ron, another senator who has been fascinating in recent days is Lisa Murkowski. She is a Republican from Alaska. She is one of the two senators who voted against the motion to proceed. That was this big vote. That was a very big procedural vote to just begin debate on the bill. That was the big threshold. That was Mitch McConnell's one big win this week. She voted no. She voted no, just like Susan Collins from Maine. They had both talked a lot about how the plan to replace Obamacare might actually be worse for the people in their states,

particularly because of the Medicaid expansion in their states. And that was their really big issue. And they did not feel that that issue had been addressed. And they stuck by their guns because a lot of other senators like Dean Heller and some others who had raised the same concern and had the same concern, in the end decided they would vote with the leadership and proceed to consider the bill. That's why they're in the pickle they're in today. If they had just followed Lisa and Susan and said, look, you know what? This is going to turn into a bummer for everybody. We should stop here if we can't guarantee that there's going to be a protection for our state's Medicaid recipients. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia was another one like Dean Heller in that same category on that same issue.

And she continues to say the same things that she's been saying about protecting the 30 percent of the families in her state who are on Medicaid at this time. But she didn't vote that way. She didn't vote that way in terms of at least proceeding to the bill. And so we'll see where she winds up on Skinny repeal. So Lisa Murkowski, the president himself tweeted about her and not in a nice way. And Sue, there's reporting out there that then the interior secretary kind of maybe threatened. There's reporting out there and I can confirm it because I we just talked briefly talked to Lisa Murkowski as she was heading into a meeting where we she confirmed at least that she did have that conversation with Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke. What is this conversation? So the Alaska Dispatch News issued a report citing her Senate colleague Dan Sullivan,

another Republican who did vote for the bill or to move forward on the bill, that both he and Lisa Murkowski received a phone call from Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, essentially threatening the senators, saying that if the fact that she was a no and the fact that she's expected to continue to be a no means that there could be consequences. You got a nice state here. I'd hate to see something bad happen to it, you know, suggesting to threaten that the Interior Department could make decisions that could negatively impact Alaska. Dan Sullivan turned around and told the local Alaska media that this conversation happened. I do not believe the Alaska Dispatch News walked up to the senator and said, hey, Senator, by any chance have you received a threatening phone call from Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke? The senator very clearly and on the record gave this information to his local paper,

which of course has made it a very big news story that has reverberated back here in Washington. And then Lisa Murkowski is not only the top authorizer, but the top appropriator for the Interior Department in the Senate. So as the chairwoman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, she also announced this morning that a hearing to consider Interior Department nominees has been indefinitely postponed. So all those horses at Interior are going riderless for now. There is one other senator who we absolutely need to talk about today, and that is Senator John McCain, who, and this does feel like it was a

lifetime ago, but it was only just Tuesday, made his return to the Senate after having surgery. And he has this form of cancer called glioblastoma. He flew back across the country from Arizona to make this procedural vote to allow the Senate to begin debating the health care bill. After taking that vote, he gave a speech. Let's take a little listen. Let's trust each other. Let's return to regular order. We've been spinning our wheels on too many important issues because we keep trying to find a way to win without help from across the aisle. That's an approach that's been employed by both sides, mandating legislation from the top down without any support from the other side with all the parliamentary maneuvers

that requires. We're getting nothing done, my friends. We're getting nothing done. I think McCain hits on a point that he, I mean, he hammered that nail, but it's a conversation that I've heard from other Republicans that so much of the focus this week is on health care. But take a breath and take a step back and look at the sum total of this Congress in this first year of Republican-controlled Washington, and they don't have a lot to show for it. The House is leaving today for the month of August. The Senate is struggling very much in health care. There's no agreement on the budget.

There's no agreements on how to do tax reform. They can't agree on how to do the spending bills. Health care is, I think, a mess, is a fair way to characterize the state of that debate. And there is increasing concern and frustration that the Republican majority is not delivering. And there needs to be a course correction. And I'm not sure that there is a consensus yet on how best you do that. So as they head into the August break, which is normally a time where Congress likes to sort of have a go out of town press conference and toot their own horn, they're kind of leaving

with their tail between their legs and trying to figure out how to come back in the fall and have a much better end of the year than the first six, seven months. We may or may not know the answer to all of these questions by the time this podcast shows up in your feed. But one way or another, we will come back and talk about where the dust ended up settling. So, Sue, I know that you need to go back out there and chase more senators down hallways. And we are all going to take a quick break. And when we come back, NPR's justice correspondent, Kerry Johnson, will talk about the president's beleaguered attorney general, Jeff Sessions. Bye, Sue. See ya. Okay, we'll be right back. A quick shout out to one of our sponsors who brings you this message,

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so you can mortgage confidently. To get started, go to rocketmortgage.com slash NPR politics. Equal housing lender licensed in all 50 states. NMLSConsumeraccess.org number 3030. I'm Linda Holmes. And I'm Stephen Thompson. There's more stuff to watch and read these days than any one person can get to. That's why we make Pop Culture Happy Hour. Twice a week, we sort through the nonsense, share reactions and give you the lowdown on what's worth your

precious time and what's not. Find Pop Culture Happy Hour on the NPR One app or wherever you get your podcasts. We're back. And here with us is Kerry Johnson, who covers the Justice Department for NPR. Hey, Kerry. Hey, yeah. And also on the line, Jeff Bennett, who is in that tiny little radio booth we have at the White House. Keeping your seat warm, I am. Thank you for keeping my seat warm, Yoda man. So in the last week, the president has called his attorney

general beleaguered and weak. He's asked why he isn't investigating Hillary Clinton, asked why he didn't fire the acting director of the FBI, and of course complained that Jeff Sessions recused himself from the Russia investigation. And yet, Attorney General Jeff Sessions is still the Attorney General. He's on the job. The message from the Justice Department is that it's business as usual. In fact, today he is traveling to El Salvador to meet with the FBI anti-gang task force there, meet with foreign counterparts. Tam, you know it's bad when you have to go to the heart of MS-13 in order to escape your boss, the president of the United States. And MS-13 is like a totally vicious gang. Murderous. Really bad. So the president is mad that the attorney general didn't fire the acting director of the FBI.

But can't the president do that? A couple of things. One is that the acting director of the FBI. But can't the president do that? A couple of things. One is that the acting director of the FBI, Andrew McCabe, is only the acting director because President Trump fired the director, James Comey, in May, precipitating this crisis and perhaps the appointment of an independent counsel or special prosecutor, Robert Mueller, to begin with. Second, Andy McCabe is a career FBI official. He could be reassigned or supplanted in some way by action from the president or the attorney general. Perhaps the best course of action is to have the Senate vote on President Trump's nominee for the FBI, Christopher Wray. But the Senate has a lot of other priorities and

maybe doesn't want to rush to do this right now while the president is making a lot of trouble for the Senate. That's certainly the case because Republicans on the Hill were quick to rally around Jeff Sessions and make it clear that they think all of this talk that the president is doing on the record, frankly, is really just uncalled for. I mean, even the Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said that Sessions made the right choice to recuse himself. Senator Chuck Grassley, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, that's the committee that would have oversight and have to hold hearings for a new AG, said yesterday on Twitter, and Chuck Grassley, by the way, he tweets in a very specific sort of bizarre way.

Chuck Grassley tweets are kind of like the best tweets. Yeah, yeah. So he wrote, everybody in D.C. should be warned that the agenda for the Judiciary Comm, meaning committee, is set for the rest of 2017. Judges first, subcabinet second, slash, A.G. no way. So in plain English, that means there's no space for the committee to have to hold confirmation hearings for a replacement. Now, he could make space, but basically what he's saying is, I don't want to open up my dance card. That's right. He's not going to play along. And Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, was in the hallways of the Senate

today talking to reporters. And he had a pretty strong message for President Trump. If Jeff Sessions is fired, there will be holy hell to pay. Any effort to go after Mueller could be the beginning of the end of the Trump presidency unless Mueller did something wrong. At the moment, there is no indication that Mueller has done something wrong. There have been some efforts by people in the Trump orbit to claim that because some people on Robert Mueller's investigative team, because they made contributions to Democrats, that they were somehow tainted and had a conflict of interest. The law and Justice Department regulations say that people are allowed to make political contributions and that is not seen as a conflict of interest. That is all true. But let's just look at this for one moment from the

standpoint of Donald Trump in order to try to understand why he is so upset about all this. It has also been reported, although not from Bob Mueller's mouth, that he and his team are looking at some things that might not have to do directly in the most literal sense with the 2016 election, but rather with some of the financial dealings of the larger Trump world, which would involve some members of his family, some of his business associates, and that some of that might have had something to do with Russia and that it would be related to what Russia tried to do in 2016. And when that subject started popping up in the reporting, that's when Donald Trump seemed to hit some kind of a button, maybe the panic button. So, Kerry, the Justice Department is saying that Jeff Sessions, the attorney general, is not going to quit.

He loves his job. He's in. But what happens if he does quit or if he's pushed? A couple of things could happen. Right now, the deputy attorney general, Rod Rosenstein, is in charge of supervising the Russia investigation because Sessions is recused. Presumably, if Sessions leaves, the new attorney general or the new acting attorney general could then go on to supervise the special counsel. The president has a couple options here. He can try to use the break that the Senate is going to take in August to install his own candidate to serve as the acting attorney general for some period of time, legal experts say, maybe through the end of 2018, without having to nominate that person formally to be the attorney

general. Because if he were to nominate someone to be the attorney general, there would be a colossal, massive, I don't even know how many more epic terms we could use to describe the confirmation battle and what that person would have to commit to confirmation battle and what that person would have to commit to. Not just what that person would have to commit to, but who in their right mind would want to do this job to begin with when one has witnessed the current occupant of the job, Jeff Sessions, be publicly berated by his president for some weeks on end here. And the Senate could demand like we are simply not going to confirm you unless you promise to leave Robert Mueller, the special counsel, alone. That's a completely legitimate line of inquiry for any Senate confirmation hearing moving forward. And in fact, we should expect that to come up and and and be a strong part of any any hearing for somebody

who might replace Jeff Sessions in the future. Which is why there's sort of this rumbling talk that's sort of coming out of somewhere around 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue about the idea of this thing called a recess appointment. That's right. And all the Senate needs to do to prevent that, of course, is to stay, quote, in pro forma session. They leave a couple of people assigned to be, if you will, sham conductors of an actual session. They've been doing this back over the Obama years. They've even done it some already in the Trump era. And they do it to prevent recess appointments, which used to be a fairly regular feature of the federal government. But that was mostly in previous generations. Now that people can fly back here in a hurry, it's really kind of an anachronism. Carrie, one last thing. What is the mood like

in the Department of Justice when you have the head of the Department of Justice twisting in the wind? Well, you know, let's be clear. There are only three Senate-confirmed political appointees at the Department of Justice. One of them is in serious jeopardy now from the President of the United States. The mood is dark. People are uncertain. People are distracted. That said, not everybody inside the Justice Department career employees were big fans of Jeff Sessions when he came on board this year. And in fact, this experience, this onslaught that he's been suffering at the hands of the president has endeared him to some people inside the department, in part because they view him as

a proxy for the independence and integrity of the institution. He's in trouble with the president has endeared him to some people inside the department, in part because they view him as a proxy for the independence and integrity of the institution. He's in trouble with the president because he recused himself following the rules in place at the Justice Department. He's in trouble because he did the right thing in their view, and they don't think that sounds fair. Moving along, Jeff Sessions is not the only member of the Trump administration who is part of a public spat right now, or even who's, let's say, twisting in the wind. In the last 12 hours, we have seen some incredibly weird airing of dirty laundry in public. Late last night, Anthony Scaramucci, who is the new White House communications director, sent out a tweet. It says, quote, In light of the leak of my financial disclosure info, which is a felony, I will be contacting FBI and the Justice Department.

Hashtag swamp. And then he copies Reince Priebus, the chief of staff who he hasn't always gotten along with. So that posted at 10.41 p.m. And what's weird about this is there isn't a leak. It wasn't a leak at all. The reporter from Politico who found this document said it was the result of a public records request that she made. It wasn't a leak. It wasn't criminal. It wasn't classified. It was a financial disclosure that was disclosed. Yes, but if you're a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And Anthony Scaramucci has made it his crusade. He has made it his absolute mission and charge to find the leakers in the White House and specifically the ones who are closest to the president. And he has decided or apparently decided here, and he's had some conversations with reporters that seem to corroborate this,

although on the day after he was trying to clarify all that and say he wasn't necessarily accusing Reince Priebus. But we do know that he and Reince Priebus have been sideways with each other from the beginning of the Scaramucci era a week ago. And before that, when Scaramucci was still just trying to get into the White House and being blocked at every entrance by some of the other senior people, Reince Priebus, Steve Bannon, some others. And now that Scaramucci is in, he seems to be going directly at the chief of staff. There are those who believe that's the job he really came to the White House hoping to have, and that being director of communications is just a stopover for him. But he has used his current job to go after the leaks question and to use that as a reason to be interviewing all these other people who are powerful and to pressure them. And what brings us to what happened this morning really begins with what happened last night in

that Ryan Lizza, a reporter for The New Yorker, tweeted that Scaramucci had dinner with President Trump, First Lady Melania Trump, some former Fox News executive, and Sean Hannity. So Scaramucci then called Ryan Lizza to find out how he learned that. CNN had booked Ryan Lizza to talk about it on this morning's show. Scaramucci apparently saw that interview taking place and then called the control room directly and then ends up holding court with Chris Cuomo for longer than a half hour as this entire thing just transpired. Maybe we should just hear part of it. And just to put this in context, Scaramucci has previously said that he and Reince Priebus are like brothers. We have had odds. We have had differences.

When I said we were brothers from the podium, that's because we're rough on each other. Some brothers are like Cain and Abel. Other brothers can fight with each other and get along. I don't know if this is repairable or not. That will be up to the president. But he's the chief of staff. He's responsible for understanding and uncovering and helping me do that inside the White House, which is why I put that tweet out last night. When the journalists who actually know who the leakers are, like Ryan Lizard, they know the leakers. Jonathan Spain at Axio, these guys know who the leakers are.

I respect them for not telling me because I understand and respect journalistic integrity. However, when I put out a tweet and I put Reince's name in the tweet, they're all making the assumption that it's him because journalists know who the leakers are. So if Reince wants to explain that he's not a leaker, let him do that. The mooch is loose. So Cain and Abel, Cain and Abel were the Genesis, Book of Genesis sons, first sons of Adam and Eve. And Cain... One of them doesn't survive. Cain and Abel did not get along very well. And in fact, Cain slays Abel.

Gee, I wonder what Mooch might be talking about there. Which one is he? I mean, what's remarkable to me about this is laying bare the dysfunction of the White House in the way that he did has a far greater negative impact than any anonymous leak, or at least that's the way it appears to me. Well, a lot of the anonymous leaks also lay bare the dysfunction of the White House. Well, that's true. And I think it's also clearly a reflection of the president himself in that the way he runs his government. I mean, he clearly has created an administration in which the only way to get his attention is to leak information that then takes hold in the press and then ends up on cable TV or on the radio for that matter. Okay. Can we just clarify what a leak is? Because that word seems to be being used very liberally. What is a leak and what is just public record? Well, you know, I think it's hard to say that something one can get as a reporter or a member

of the public by simply asking a federal agency is a leak. That's public information. That's basic public information. Now, there are leaks which are embarrassing and politically sensitive. And then there are leaks which may be evidence of a crime or criminal wrongdoing. It's a criminal offense to leak national defense and certain kinds of national security information. That's very bad stuff. That's the kind of stuff the Justice Department and the FBI would investigate and possibly prosecute moving forward. Things like Anthony Scaramucci saying nasty things about Reince Priebus or vice versa, not so much. Not at all a criminal leak and maybe not even really a leak at all. More like gossip or bad mouthing, I think. And here's one other just like little interesting thing about this. Normally, the chief of staff would supervise the communications director. However, President Trump has set it up when he brought in Scaramucci, Scaramucci reports directly to the president. Bad signal. Which means that Reince Priebus,

his empire shrunk when Scaramucci came in, his area of influence shrunk. And, you know, this guy just went on television and accused the chief of staff of being a leaker. And the chief of staff can't do anything about it. Just one last piece of Kremlinology here. Yesterday, the president announced at the White House an enormous new project to bring jobs to southeastern Wisconsin and bring jobs to the United States having to do with a production of LCD screens. And this prospective site for this fabulous plant, which they say could create 3,000 to 13,000 jobs in

southeastern Wisconsin, is just a few miles from Reince Priebus's hometown, where he grew up. And Reince Priebus was there at the White House yesterday, but he wasn't allowed to speak at this ceremony talking about the location of that particular extraordinary event in his home state near his hometown. All right. So yesterday, President Trump sent out a series of three tweets. And I think it's pretty clear to say that tweets are policy. Tweets can be policy. And in this case, tweets were policy. And let us read this. The United States government

will not accept or allow transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. military. Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs

and disruption that transgender in the military would entail. Thank you. So that was an announcement via Twitter. There were no background briefings. There were no fact sheets. There was no official announcement on official White House letterhead. When our reporters got in touch with the Pentagon, they said, ask the White House. There was nothing but the tweets. In a normal administration, these kinds of pronouncements undergo layers of review, not just with the agency that is in charge of the substance, but also with lawyers. And it's now clear that no such legal review has occurred. So where we've landed today is the Pentagon is saying, we're not changing any policy or any action. And we're supporting the people who are serving in

active duty in the military. And we're not doing anything until we get legal interpretations and guidance from the White House. And the heads of the military services apparently didn't know this plan was coming either. And scrambling to catch up is something that the military never wants to do. The organization really just thrives on rules and guidance. And you can imagine that clarity is essential when it comes to something like this, because there's a big question hanging out there, which is, will transgender people be forcibly discharged from the military? And at the moment, no one seems to know. So yesterday at the White House, this is a very big question for the press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders. What happens to transgender service members now? Are they immediately thrown out of the military? That's something that the Department of Defense and the White House will have to work together

as implementation takes place and is done so lawfully. And then she was asked again about that and asked again about that, and she just simply wouldn't get more specific. You can't answer the question of what's going to happen to transgenders who are in the military now. Shouldn't you have been able to answer that basic question with a policy of this magnitude? Look, I think sometimes you have to make decisions, and once he made a decision, he didn't feel it was necessary to hold that decision, and they're going to work together with the Department of Defense to lawfully implement it.

I have a question. She keeps saying lawfully. Carrie, could they find out that they can't lawfully implement it? Possibly. finally reversed that don't ask, don't tell policy. And so in the military, forgive me, things have been marching in one direction. President Trump has ordered a halt. And for about a year now, people who are transgender, it has been the policy of the U.S. government and the U.S. military that they can serve openly in the U.S. military. Now, Jeff, up on Capitol Hill, there had been sort of this brewing fight that was happening around some funding legislation for the military. It also included funding for the for the president's border wall. And there were conservative members of the House

of Representatives who tried to attach an amendment to this spending bill, to this funding bill, that said that the U.S. military can't spend money on transition treatments, gender reassignment surgeries and other treatments for people who are transgendered. And that was blocked by a combination of moderate Republicans. 24 of them. And Democrats. And that amendment was blocked by a combination of moderate Republicans. 24 of them. And Democrats. And that amendment was blocked. It was blocked. And I think the fact that the White House did this on its own without consulting the military forces Democrats in Rust Belt states to take ownership of it and talk a lot about it in the upcoming election.

And the whole thing just strikes me as a total misread of cultural politics, because for Trump supporters, cultural politics for them is really about immigration. It's about supporting the police. It's about bringing back manufacturing jobs, that sort of thing. And one really need only look at Pat McCrory, who was the first sitting governor to ever lose re-election in befuddles me the reasons why the Trump administration has identified this as an issue that they want to take up. Well, and so there's another little like piece of this puzzle, which is that we heard from a leadership source that leaders had been talking to the White House about this issue of paying for treatments and whether taxpayer money should go to treatments, but that the president took it way farther than anyone was expecting and that this was far beyond leaders' expectations and caught many of them by surprise. The thing that makes transgender troops more expensive, theoretically, is gender reassignment surgery. And that is really where the big money is. And that's where the question marks had been raised. It does make an argument to be put forward in certain circles

to say we shouldn't be on the hook for reassignment surgery. And that does motivate a certain number of members of Congress and certainly does motivate some of their constituents. And that seems to have been significant enough in the House to have produced a speed bump, at the very least, on a defense spending bill the president would very much like to see passed, at least in the House, before they leave for their August recess. And that could have had something to do with the timing and the haste. And to your point a little bit, Jeff, is that the Democrats weren't the only ones who had a problem with this. You had Senator Joni Ernst, a Republican from Iowa, who's a colonel in the Army Reserve, say that although she opposes government funding for gender reassignment surgery, quote, Americans who are qualified and can meet the standards to serve in the military should be afforded that opportunity.

You get Senator Orrin Hatch from Utah, who said in a statement, I don't think we should be discriminating against anyone. Transgender people are people and deserve the best we can do for them. I look forward to getting much more information and clarity from our military leaders about the policy the president tweeted today. And for people in the LGBT community, there were two things yesterday that really hurt. The Justice Department also filed a brief in an appeals court in the Second Circuit in its view, arguing that the 1964 landmark civil rights law did not cover discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and employment. And nobody from the career civil rights division at the Justice Department signed that brief, only a political official. But that, in tandem with the president's tweets on transgender troops,

really dealt a blow to that community yesterday. And it also just comes in conflict to what President Trump said as a candidate when he said, I'm going to be a friend to the LGBT. He at one point held up a rainbow flag that said LGBT for Trump. He he argued that he was going to be better for LGBT Americans than Hillary Clinton. Well, he implicitly did. He said, we'll see who's going to be the better friend. Who would be a better friend to the community? Would it be Hillary Clinton or would it would be me? We'll see. I was speaking to a veterans advocate about all this, and he pointed out the fact that the note that Marine General Joe Dunford, who's the chairman

of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the note that he sent around providing some guidance about this, no portion of that statement has any support for the president's position. And what this person told me was that that was not an oversight, that anything coming out of the president's position. And what this person told me was that that was not an oversight, that anything coming out of the chairman's office, you know, is poured over because of the nature of the office that he holds. It was vetted. Yeah. Jeff, it sounds like you need to actually run and go to the White House press briefing. That's right. So sadly, we're going to have to let you go before or can't let it go. Well, you know what? I'll just have to save it for next week. It'll still be relevant.

I promise. Okay. So Jeff, thank you for taking the time and go have fun in the briefing. All right. See you soon. And with that, we're going to take one more quick break and we will be right back with Can't Let It Go. Support for this podcast and the following message come from SimpliSafe Home Security.

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with ZipRecruiter.com, you can post your job to 100 plus job sites with just one click. Let ZipRecruiter's powerful technology match your job to the right candidates and use their simple dashboard to find the right hire. That's why 80% of jobs on ZipRecruiter get a qualified candidate in just one day. Try ZipRecruiter for free at ZipRecruiter.com slash weekly roundup. TheMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveMoveM This is something that happens every four years. Presidents have been going for quite a long time to just make sort of a salute to the Boy Scouts and just make a few remarks. They're like the honorary head of the Boy Scouts, right? That's right. The Boy Scouts have for many years gotten the president to agree to be the honorary head of all Boy Scouts in America. Of course, there are Boy Scouts all over the world. It was a wonderful occasion for Donald Trump to go and speak to something like more than 30,000 young fellows who were out there in T-shirts and so forth and all these wonderful colors, enormous crowd, incredibly enthusiastic. And, well, let's just hear a little bit of what he said.

We're going to talk about success, about how all of you amazing young scouts can achieve your dreams, what to think of, what I've been thinking about. You want to achieve your dreams? I said, who the hell wants to speak about politics when I'm in front of the Boy Scouts? After beginning with that, the president proceeded to talk a lot about how he beat Hillary Clinton and what some of his political problems were in Washington and how the Republican Party could use some more loyalty, presumably in the context in which he used it to himself. And then he started telling kind of random stories like this. I'll tell you a story that's very interesting for me. When I was young, there was a man named William Levitt, Levittown. You have some here, you have some in different states.

Anybody ever hear of Levittowns? He was a home builder, became an unbelievable success. And then he was offered a lot of money for his company. And he sold his company for a tremendous amount of money. And he went out and bought a big yacht. And he had a very interesting life. I won't go any more than that because you're Boy Scouts, so I'm not going to tell you what he did. Should I tell you? Should I tell you? Oh, you're Boy Scouts, but you know life. You know life. Okay, so that was the president in front of the quadrennial Boy Scout jamboree. There were some people who were not amused. And many of them

were involved in the Boy Scout organization. And as I say, presidents have been coming to this or sending a video, as President Obama did, for quite a long time. And they have always tried to kind of play it the way you would normally speak to Boy Scouts if you were the President of the United States. And a lot of people felt that the president crossed that line. So today, Michael Serbaugh, who is the current chief scout executive of the Boy Scouts of America, put out this statement on behalf of the organization. I want to extend my sincere apologies to those in our scouting family who were offended by the political rhetoric that was inserted into the jamboree that was never our intent. The invitation for the sitting U.S. president to visit the

national jamboree is a longstanding tradition that has been extended to the leader of our nation that has had a jamboree during his term since 1937. Obviously, there were a fair number of people who thought the president did not honor that tradition. That he politicized the Boy Scouts. Politicized and to some degree embarrassed the organization by some of the places where he went in his remarks. Carrie, what can't you let go of? All right. So this is my inaugural can't let it go. It's a tough call. I was animated by the notion that Sean Spicer is apparently being considered for Dancing with the Stars.

But in the end. But that is. Oh. In the end. This was tough. It was a tough call. In the end, I decided to go with the notion that our current secretary of state is taking a little time off. His spokeswoman this week said Rex Tillerson was taking a little break.

He'd been traveling a lot overseas and he just needed some time. In my many years in Washington, I have never known of a public official to declare that they were taking a break, especially amid a lot of reports that they were unhappy with the White House and vice versa. Yeah, I mean, like in this briefing, I'm pretty sure somebody asked, is he planning to resign? And then somebody else asked, and where has he been? Taking a little time off. He's got a lot of work. He just came back from that mega trip overseas. As you all well know, many of you were there with the G20 and his other travel as well.

So he's entitled to take a few days himself. Of course, I don't think anyone's arguing against that. But why not just say he's on vacation then? I don't know what is standard for secretaries of state, how they actually list private days. I can check to see what the prior arrangements were. Matt Lee probably knows as our State Department historian, but that I'm not aware of. Yeah, well, so there you go. You know, listen, Rex Tillerson has been working really hard.

He's been traveling a lot. He was the former CEO of Exxon, which is a huge job. He has a really cushy ranch in Texas. But taking a little time off in this environment when we have threats from North Korea, Iran, and all sorts of other places was perhaps not the best messaging in Washington right now. But it turns out the Secretary of Defense is also on vacation this week, which we found out when the president announced a major policy on transgender troops. And everybody was like, and where's the Secretary of Defense? Oh, he's on vacation. Maybe we're the ones that are doing something wrong.

I endorse that. We're the problem that are doing something wrong. I endorse that. We're the problem. That's right. Tamara, what can you not let go of this week? So the thing I can't let go of is a little hot mic incident. A Republican congressman named Blake Farenthold from Texas said something in an interview about the female senators who were opposing the bill, like he would like to take them out and have a duel out back. Like the old days. Like the old days, which is weird. And I don't know why he only wanted to go after the female senators who

opposed it and not also the male senators who also have concerns. But that's OK, because there was a hearing and Senator Jack Reed, who's a Democrat from Rhode Island, and Senator Susan Collins, who is a Republican from Maine and is one of those female senators who apparently could be challenged to a duel. I guess they didn't realize their mic was still on after their hearing ended and they were just chatting. And at first they were talking about how they're concerned about the president and the budget and the budget. And then Senator Collins brought up the duel. Do you see the one who challenged me to a duel? I know. Trust me.

You know why I challenged you to a duel? Because you could beat the s**t out of me first. And then she said, he's so unattractive. And large. And big. She said about Congressman Farenthold. And then she said... Did you see the picture of him in his pajamas with the Playboy bunny? Which, yeah, we've all seen that picture. And I guess it's hard to unsee it, actually, Tam. Yes.

You know, Congressman Farenthold used to interrogate former Attorney General Eric Holder a lot in the House Judiciary Committee. And among the Justice Department beat reporters, I'm telling tales out of school, that photo would make the rounds whenever Congressman Farenthold would lean in on former Attorney General Eric Holder. It's something that is a sight to behold. So this did get resolved, though, I think. I think they both said, oh, gosh, we said things we shouldn't have said happily ever after. Yeah. Unlike Hamilton Burr, there were apologies. No deaths, no criminal charges, no violence of any kind.

No actual duel. No. And then Senator Collins voted against the motion to proceed. OK, that is a wrap for this week. We will be back in your feed on Monday. And make sure you're listening to Up First tomorrow morning, when I'll be on, and every weekday morning for the latest news on health care in the Senate. And of course, hear more of our radio reporting on the NPR One app and on your local public radio station. And a few more plugs. Keep up with us on the NPR One app and on your local public radio station. And a few more plugs, keep up with us on the NPR Politics Facebook page. And if you like the show, leave us a review on

iTunes. That helps other people find the podcast. And, and, and, and, and many of our fellow podcast members are currently riding bikes across the Iowa countryside, part of an annual bike ride across the state sponsored by the Des Moines Register. So if you want to see Scott Detrow, Scott Horsley, and Daniel Kurtzleben eating a lot of pie and maybe pork chops on a stick, check out the NPR On the Road Tumblr. And we will put a link to that in the episode information. All right, that is it. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House for NPR. I'm Carrie Johnson, justice correspondent.

And for Bombastic Loudmouths Everywhere, I'm Ron Elving, editor correspondent. And thanks for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.