The NPR Politics Podcast - Weekly Roundup: Trump on the Hill, older voters in Florida

Episode Date: June 14, 2024

Donald Trump returned to Capitol Hill for the first time since his supporters disrupted the peaceful transfer of power on Jan. 6, 2021. The event was a clear demonstration of how the party has coalesced entirely behind him.And voters over 50 are an essential part of both candidates' strategies. We traveled to Florida to speak with them about the issues they care about most.This episode: White House correspondent Asma Khalid, campaign correspondent Franco Ordoñez, congressional correspondent Deirdre Walsh, and national political correspondent Don Gonyea.The podcast is produced by Jeongyoon Han, Casey Morell and Kelli Wessinger. Our intern is Bria Suggs. Our editor is Eric McDaniel. 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

Hi, this is Amiel and Patrick in Los Angeles, California. We just finished 545 miles of cycling from San Francisco to L.A. to raise money to help end AIDS. It is 12.06 p.m. Eastern Time on Friday, June 14th, Flag Day. By the time you hear this, we will have hung up our bikes and put on our dancing shoes. Happy Pride, y'all. Oh my God, how do you have energy to dance? I was going to say, I feel like my legs would be limp. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Asma Khalid. I cover the White House. I'm Frank Ordonez. I cover the campaign. And I'm Deirdre Walsh. I cover Congress.

And we begin our Friday Roundup today with the news of Donald Trump's visit to Capitol Hill this week. It was his first trip there since the January 6th riot. And Deirdre, I want to begin with you because you cover Congress. Tell us a bit about what this visit was for. What was the purpose of it? Well, top congressional Republicans said they invited Trump to talk about planning their agenda for 2025. Obviously, Republican leaders are hoping to retake control of the Senate, grow their majority in the House, and elect Trump and have this full control, if you will, of two branches of government to enact their agenda. It didn't end up being a lot of policy talk. I think it was more of a political rallying event to put out this message that the Republican Party is unified around former

President Trump and they're headed into the elections and they're all on the same page. I think the image that sort of captures where the Republican Party is today is this picture of Mitch McConnell shaking hands with former President Trump. Remember, after the attack on the Capitol on January 6th, McConnell basically said Trump was practically and morally responsible for the attack. He doesn't talk to him. He hasn't talked to him in almost four years. He did endorse him back in March, but he largely deflects questions about Trump regularly on Capitol Hill. But it is a image that speaks to where the Republican Party is today. It is Donald Trump's party. I mean, let's just remember that, you know, since the primaries, Trump has been calling for Republicans to rally around him. And obviously they were very reluctant to do that.

So, you know, this meeting, this visit was kind of vindication for Trump or a culmination of those efforts for months and months and months of saying that the party needs to unite and not only unite, but get behind him. And it was very clear yesterday that the party was behind him when you saw them in the room and you saw the strong applause, the huge smiles. Many of the people in the room were very top likely VP candidates. And you have Mitch McConnell, who was, you know, the reluctant bride, per se, saying, you know, look, he said he was going to support who the Republican voters support. And that's Donald Trump. And now you have the two of them coming together. And I mean, this is what Trump's wanted for a long time. And now he's getting it. So what was Trump's message to his party yesterday? A lot of it was about party unity.

I mean, he talked about how they're all on the same page and they're moving forward to win in November. There's tremendous unity in the Republican Party. We want to see borders. We want to see strong military. We want to see money not wasted all over the world. And so it sounds like Republicans have this vision that Donald Trump will potentially retake the White House in November, but also that Republicans will retake control of the Senate so that they can enact this broader agenda. How does the map look in terms of Republicans being able to retake control of the Senate? I mean, Republicans have a lot of opportunities. Remember, they only need to pick up a seat and they can retake control of the Senate majority. So I think they're hoping to pick up Montana. They're looking at Ohio. Republicans think they can knock off Sherrod Brown, the Democrat there. And Nevada is another state where Republicans hope to knock off a Democrat. So the map is looking favorable for Republicans. They also have an opportunity in Maryland, which is a blue state, but a very

popular former Republican governor, Larry Hogan, is running in an open seat there. And Trump essentially endorsed him after this visit with Hill Republicans yesterday, which I don't necessarily think Larry Hogan welcomed. Yeah, I was going to ask you, Franco, what is Trump's role in trying to help Republicans retake control of the Senate? I think he is trying to express the same kind of uniting message with Senate Republicans, with Republicans on Congress, that he wants them to return back to him. You know, Trump is Trump and a lot of his goals are self-centered. And I think you can see that in this as well. If he helps Republicans get elected, that's why politicians give money to Senate Republicans, to House Republican races, is so that they can get help back. And I think that's what Trump is doing in this case as well. But obviously, Hogan and Trump have had such hard, you know,

a hard relationship, a difficult relationship. I found it fascinating that Trump was saying this. And also, very interestingly, and probably not surprisingly, Hogan, on the other hand, was still saying, I said before, I'm not going to support Trump and I'm not going to do it this time either. And there were Republicans coming out of these meetings with Trump who were essentially saying that critics of Trump or critics of what happened on January 6th aren't really welcome in the party anymore. I mean, that is a marked departure from where this party was right after January 6th. That was a moment where there were a lot of Republicans, including McConnell, openly criticizing Trump.

But that window closed very quickly. And now the party is really fully behind him. All right. We will keep an eye on all of that. Deirdre, we're going to let you go, but please don't go too far away because we're going to bring you back if we can't let it go. I'll be back. Let's take a quick break and then we'll talk about a key demographic in this year's

presidential election. That is older voters. And we're back and we're joined now by our colleague Don Gagne. Hey there, Don. Hi there. And Don, I'm so grateful that you're with us because you just got back from a trip to Florida where you were reporting on older voters. And, you know, on this show, we've talked a lot about younger voters, also, of course, a key voting coalition in any presidential election cycle. Don, I want to be clear.

We know definitionally what we mean when we talk about older voters. So what do you mean? What's the age demographic here? We were looking mostly at people 50 plus for this particular reporting trip. I mean, this was a huge group for Trump, you know, particularly like the 65 plus group. I mean, Trump, according to some polls, won this group by seven percentage points in 2016. Biden did kind of narrow that gap four years later in 2020. Trump still won it. So it is really fascinating to watch kind of this evolution because there are a number of polls that show that Biden is now ahead.

And it has been an opportunity that they're seeing as they've been hurting with younger voters. This older generation has excited them. And that's why you're seeing actually this week a big push from the Biden campaign. The first lady, Jill Biden, is traveling the country, playing pickleball, going to bingo games, you know, sending a message and telling senior voters that they are important to the campaign. Older voters tend to turn out frequently in presidential elections. They have a big voter turnout. So I'm curious what you were hearing. When I was talking to voters, mostly in and around Pinellas County, which is St. Petersburg, Clearwater over there on the Gulf side of the state, older voters were engaged. You never get an, oh, I'm not paying that much attention or, oh, I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I mean, I did talk to people who are

undecided, but again, they are very engaged. They do talk about the things you would expect, protecting social security and Medicare. They talk about the economy. They also talk about what kind of world they feel like we're leaving for their kids and their grandkids. That's very much top of mind. I also heard people talk about character, and they were also pointing to former President Trump in that regard. And I talked to a lot of people, especially older women, who raise reproductive rights and abortion as really important issues. This is a woman we met at a Democratic meeting in Pinellas County. Her name is Sandra Garish. We asked what issues are important to her, and this is what she said.

The attack on women's rights is really frightening. So I'm a mother of three, and they're all in Pinellas County, and it's scary to have women's rights taken away. And Florida has recently enacted a six-week abortion ban that has been signed by the governor. And Garish said that alone is terrifying. She harkens back to those early battles over abortion rights when she was very young, and she's kind of shocked that here we are in the middle of this fight again. Don, I'm curious what other issues you heard about from some of these older voters. What were their top priorities?

I talked to a gentleman named Louis Berwick. He is 81 years old. He was in the town of Dunedin, which is also in Pinellas County. We retired from Worcester, Mass., so we brought some of those Massachusetts sensibilities down with him. He cited Social Security and protecting it. Again, no surprise there. But then he went into Donald Trump's character. Give a listen to Mr. Berwick here. It concerns me greatly because Trump seems to create a situation where bigoted people have a tendency to feel, I'm represented by Trump. Wow.

And they can get away with being bigoted again. So it's kind of scary to me. And then he went on to say that he's worried about how this is going to play down the road in generations to come. If people who have that mentality are in control, it's going to be a disaster for my grandchildren and so forth. I mean, I'm 81. I don't know how many years I've got left, but I'm still hoping that I have at least 10 years more or more. It's striking, Don, to hear the reference to grandchildren, because I can't tell you the amount of times I heard Republicans talk about their fears with their grandchildren during the 2016 election.

That's right. And again, now these were two voters who are clearly going to be supporting Joe Biden that we bumped into in Pinellas County. And again, Pinellas County is one of those boomerang counties. It supported Barack Obama. Then it supported in 2016 Donald Trump. Then it supported Joe Biden last time. We don't know what it's going to do this time. We're just assuming it will be close. But I met a gentleman named Angel Cruz. He's 67 years old. He's a retired truck driver. He was playing with his grandkids

in a park in the town of Largo. He is something you don't bump into a lot. He describes himself as a Republican, but he voted for Joe Biden in 2020. He says he's undecided this year, but definitely leaning towards supporting Trump. And he says it is all about the economy. Everything is all expensive right now. The people, even if they retire with a check with Social Security,

they cannot afford to buy everything. Before, it was not like this. It seems like everything's going up, but nothing helps on the payment, like in the Social Security payment and all that. You can hear the frustration in his voice. You can also hear his grandkids playing behind him there. But again, that is a Joe Biden 2020 vote that sure feels like it's going to be a Donald Trump vote in 2024. Franco, I want to ask you about what the Trump campaign is doing to court these kinds of voters, because you said earlier that Trump had

a greater percentage of their support in the past, certainly if we look at the 2016 election cycle, but the Biden campaign is actively trying to court senior voters. They're trying to chip away. And what is the Trump campaign doing? I mean, the Trump message is, you know, speaking to those concerns that Angel just brought up about the economy and the feelings about the economy. Now, of course, we've talked endlessly about the data points that show the economy is doing okay, that it's doing well, particularly with unemployment levels. But the reality is still a lot of people at least feel that the economy is hurting. They see their grocery bills rising, gas staying high. People who

may be on a fixed salary, fixed income, you know, those increased bills hurt a little more, have a little bit of a different impact. You know, the Trump campaign is making a very clear point that Trump is the better person for the economy and the economic issues. He has also talked about prescription drugs and efforts like those, you know, Biden has as well. But I think the large message from Trump is economic and who is better for the economy and your investments. I want to ask you about the candidates' ages. Today is Donald Trump's birthday.

He's turning 78. Joe Biden is 81 years old. Does that factor into how older voters are thinking about their choices? The people I talked to this past week in and around Pinellas County, some of them said, oh, gee, I wish we had some young blood in there. But nobody saw it as disqualifying and nobody was ready to say, boy, Joe Biden should just hang it up. Donald Trump just a couple of years behind him. What are these guys doing? Again, maybe a little bit of frustration

and a readiness to look to the next generation. But again, these people see this as their choices. And for the most part, people see it as a pretty clear choice, and they're going to make their decisions. All right. Don, thanks so much for joining us and bringing us all your fabulous reporting. Really appreciate it. Thank you. Always a pleasure. All right. Let's take a quick break. And when we get back, it's time for Can't Let It Go. And we're back. And Deirdre Walsh is back with us. Hey there.

Hey, guys. So it is time now to end the week like we do always with Can't Let It Go. That is the part of the show where we talk about the things that we just cannot stop thinking about, politics or otherwise. And I think I'm going to kick it off today. Do it. All right. So what I cannot let go of, and maybe you all knew this, but I feel ashamed to say I didn't know this because I was a huge basketball player in my youth. And I realized this week I heard all these tributes to Jerry West, who was this Hall of Fame basketball

player who passed away this week. And I did not know that it was purportedly his logo that is on like every basketball. I didn't know that either. Like for the NBA logo. Apparently, the NBA has never actually admitted that this was him. But, you know, now there's all these debates about like how you can use someone's likeness with permission or not. And so I just thought, you know, here we all were giving tributes to Jerry West all the time, every time we played the ball. And we didn't even know because I had no idea. I thought it was just a stencil of like a random character. I mean, I think for a long time, people figured it was Jerry West. Jerry West even said he knew it was him, though it wasn't

like officially declared, as you point out. But I mean, I think a lot of people felt it was a tribute to him without, you know, acknowledging it directly. That kind of stinks, though, that he was like never actually acknowledged officially during his lifetime. You know, I kind of agree. I do think that, you know, like when Jerry West would talk about it, or when he did the few times that he did, he said he didn't really like the attention, that he had gotten enough attention. He had a very, very humble kind of response to it, you know, kind of the response

of an earlier era. You wouldn't expect necessarily to hear that today. I also didn't realize how much of his career spanned all these different events, the Olympics, his career in the NBA, and then afterwards. It's just like he's one of those figures that obviously towers over the league. All right. So here's to you, Jerry West. All right. What about you, Franco? What I can't let it go, and I really think that a lot of people are not going to let it go, and I want credit for this when Pixar decides to turn this into a movie, but this story of the three-legged lion and his brother who crossed this crocodile.

Wait, there's a three-legged lion? I have not heard about this. I have not heard this, Franco. Tell us more. There is video from a drone. So I'm not writing a script here. I'm telling a true story about this three-legged lion in Uganda and his brother who tried to cross over a river that was about a mile long. They took him several tries to do it the first time, kind of like a hippos were on the attack

and almost got him. Another one, like I think crocodiles were on there. Finally, they made it. And I just think it is such a powerful, such a powerful story that everyone can relate to and how can this not be a Pixar movie? Wow. Okay, so I am googling this and apparently there is a story so I'm just

fact checking you right now. When I first read the story I was like, how do these guys know that with like scientists like staking this place out? I mean, what in the world? He must have been attacked or something. So yes, essentially they got pushed off the territory that they were on. They were attacked, and it would have been dangerous to stay over there. You know, they're looking across the river, and they hear, according to the scientists here,

they hear female lions on the other side of the river. So they decide to make the trek and go over. And a scientist who wasn't directly involved with this, and I know this is a family podcast, this may have to be cut out of the Pixar movie, but was asked, why would they do this, risk their life? These are cats, remember? They don't like water.

Why would they go swim across a mile? And the scientist is like, well, sex. So, I mean, I just find it like an amazing story of, you know, survival, of biology, of, you know, I just, I think it's, oh, oh, and I should also note, allegedly this is a record distance crossing for a lion. Wow. All right. What about you, dear Joy? The thing that I can't let go of this week is this graduation speech. And I love graduation season. I love it.

I think I know where you're going. That was done by Roger Federer, who I have to admit, I'm more of a Rafa Nadal fan. And I thought, why is Roger Federer invited to give a commencement speech? He didn't go to college. He started competing professionally as a teenager. So he gave this commencement speech at Dartmouth College. And I think it was a fascinating speech. And I think it was like such a great message for people graduating from college to hear from this guy that most people think was just this amazing winner. He had all these championships and he focused a lot on losing and the fact that he won, in his words, almost 80% of his matches. But he said the thing that people don't realize is that he lost 54% of the points in those matches. He won 54% of the points.

So think about that. He almost lost as much as he won and what he learned from that. The truth is, whatever game you play in life, sometimes you're going to lose a point, a match, a season, a job. It's a roller coaster with many ups and downs. And it's natural. But negative energy is wasted energy you want to become a master at overcoming hard moments that is to me the sign of a champion i love this we actually shared it on our family group whatsapp chat we have one of those because i used to play tennis as well and i feel like it's one of these i did not know that deirdre but you do lose a lot of points in tennis and he doesn't but you can still win. And then what do you take away when you lose so much?

I think there's this whole idea of a successful failure that you learn a lot more from your failures in life. And I think that people who are graduating from college, there's all these like moments about like how well you get in, what accomplishments you have, but like that's, you're just starting your journey. And I think about all the times that I've failed since I graduated from college. And I think I learned more from them than the good times. All right. Well, on that note, let's leave it there for today. Our executive producer is Mathoni Maturi. Our editor is Eric McDaniel. Our producers are Jung Yoon Han, Casey Morrell, and Kelly Wessinger. Our intern is Bria Suggs. Special thanks to Lexi Schipitel and Megan Pratt. I'm Asma Khalid. I cover the White House. I'm Franco Ordonez. I cover the campaign. And I'm Deirdre Walsh. I cover Congress.

And thank you all, as always, for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.