Meet the Press Full Episode — June 28

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: This Sunday, holding power with just over four months until the midterms, President Trump is putting his own party to the test, pressuring Republicans and derailing a bipartisan housing bill to press for a proof of citizenship voting bill. [00:00:14] Speaker 2: We're very proud of the party. We like our leader. We like everybody really in the room. [00:00:20] Speaker 3: I don't like a few people, but that's okay. He really doesn't care about American families and doesn't care about the fact that prices are up. [00:00:28] Speaker 1: We'll sign it. But he wanted to make a point today. I'll talk to Democratic Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut and Republican Senator Roger Marshall of Kansas. Plus, Regime Change, a new look inside President Trump's second term, how he's redefining the limits of the presidency. I'll talk to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan about their new book, Regime Change. [00:00:51] Speaker 4: And Left Lane, Congresswoman Claire Valdez. [00:00:57] Speaker 1: Democratic Socialists backed by New York City Mayor Zoran Mamdani score key primary wins. What does it mean for the future of the Democratic Party? Joining me for insight and analysis are Leanne Caldwell, chief Washington correspondent for Puck, Mark Short, former director of legislative affairs for President Trump, and Ashley Etienne, former communications director to Vice President Harris. Welcome to Sunday. It's Meet the Press. [00:01:23] Speaker 5: From NBC News in Washington, the longest running show in television history. This is Meet the Press with Kristin Welker. [00:01:34] Speaker 1: Good Sunday morning. I'm Ryan Nobles in for Kristin Welker as she continues to recover from a medical procedure. She is doing well and will be back with you soon. Tensions are rising again in the Middle East after the war with Iran escalated overnight with new U.S. strikes following an attack on a commercial ship in the Strait of Hormuz. Back home in Washington this week, President Trump abruptly canceled the signing ceremony for a bipartisan housing bill, saying he wouldn't sign the bill unless Congress passes the Save Act, legislation that would require voter ID, documentary proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections, and would limit mail-in voting. [00:02:12] Speaker 6: Would you be open to a compromise measure that has provisions of the Save Act into a reconsent of the Asian bill? Not really, no. The Save Act should be just not compromised. It's voter ID, it's proof of citizenship, and it's also the mail-in ballots. I said I'm not signing the housing bill. I want to see what happens. We said, look, the housing bill is housing. I made billions of dollars with housing. I know housing better than anybody, maybe anywhere. [00:02:40] Speaker 1: The President attending lunch on Capitol Hill that same day with Senate Republicans, reportedly getting into a shouting match with Senator Bill Cassidy over support for the war in Iran. [00:02:51] Speaker 7: I'm not going to be bullied when I'm trying to get answers from the American people. And so it escalated from there, at some point it de-escalated. [00:02:59] Speaker 8: We're told the President called you a lunatic? [00:03:03] Speaker 7: Can I imagine that the President called me things that would be said on a playground? Yeah, I can imagine that. [00:03:09] Speaker 1: Meanwhile, in New York this week, a slate of progressive candidates, all backed by Mayor Zoran Memdani, prevailed in three Democratic House primaries, two of those defeating incumbents. [00:03:20] Speaker 9: We are showing there is a new path for politics in our city and in our country. We are showing that last June, a year ago tomorrow, was not an anomaly. [00:03:34] Speaker 1: At the same time, President Trump trying to cast those primaries in his own terms. [00:03:40] Speaker 2: And joining me now is Democratic Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut. [00:03:54] Speaker 1: He's the author of the new book, Crisis of the Common Good. And of course, Mr. Murphy, welcome back to Meet the Press. Yeah, thanks for having me. Let's, first off, start with your reaction to the latest primary results out of New York. You've heard President Trump say that these candidates aren't socialists. He's gone as far as to call them communists. As someone who identifies as a progressive, is this a moment of reckoning for establishment Democrats? [00:04:18] Speaker 10: Oh, I think you're going to have different candidates being nominated in New York City and suburban Connecticut. This is a party that is also nominated and won with candidates like Abigail Spanberger and Mikey Sherrill. I want us to be a big tent party. I mean, I've been saying this for years. I think that it's actually a sign of a party that is alive and growing when there's a contest of ideas inside the party. So I'm not a Democratic Socialist, but I do believe that the Democratic Party has been historically way too timid in taking on corporate power. I think our party should have bigger ideas. I put one on the table last week, a $25 minimum wage. And I think we do have to have answers for the way in which corporations and billionaires are taking over and corrupting our politics. So I do think that there is somewhat of a trend that candidates who are confronting concentrated corporate power in a meaningful way are winning. And I think that that is something that the Democratic Party should pay attention to. [00:05:24] Speaker 1: There is a lot of polling that shows that the rise of socialism is becoming a big part of the Democratic base. In fact, over two thirds of Democrats view socialism more positively than capitalism. Does the Democratic Party actually need to embrace the moniker of socialism, lean into it? [00:05:42] Speaker 10: No, but I think we have to understand that people do not believe that this version of capitalism has worked. And frankly, it hasn't worked. I mean, you have 40 percent of Americans today that are working full time and don't have enough money saved up in the bank for an emergency car repair. Meanwhile, we just saw the first trillionaire made in this economy. This version of capitalism isn't working. Now, I make the argument in the book that we should embrace, you know, what I call a common good capitalism, a capitalism where we have more shared prosperity, where we want more millionaires and less trillionaires, where we have a higher minimum wage, where unions are more powerful. Democrats are not going to win by defending this version of capitalism, but I think we'll be able to offer ideas on how to dramatically reform it rather than throwing out the entire system. [00:06:33] Speaker 1: Well, let's talk about one of those candidates who won on Tuesday, who describes herself as a socialist. And that's Daryliza Avelia Chevalier. She's faced criticism now over deleted social media posts. I want to take I want you to take a listen to this attack ad from her former opponent. [00:06:48] Speaker 4: Let's meet Daryliza in her own words. [00:06:52] Speaker ?: Thank you. [00:06:53] Speaker 4: She won't stand by Kamala Harris. [00:06:55] Speaker 2: Let's get to business. [00:06:57] Speaker 4: She won't stand by Joe Biden. She even called him a rapist. She won't stand by veterans or the American flag. She stands with dividing us by race. Meet the real Daryliza, the one she tried to delete. [00:07:16] Speaker 1: So to be clear, Senator, that was an attack ad from a fellow Democrat. You've talked about this bigger tent. If you're saying the Democratic Party needs a bigger tent, does that include someone who called a former Democratic president of the United States a rapist? [00:07:31] Speaker 10: Yeah, well, I mean, I'm not super familiar with that race. All I'm saying is that this party has to have a real contest of ideas. And I just don't think that our defense of incrementalism has worked. So I don't mind a contest of ideas. And I just don't know that we have had it to the extent that voters have been satisfied. Listen, it's no secret. Voters aren't super happy with establishment Democrats or establishment Republicans these days. I will say, though, what binds together, I think, every Democratic candidate that is running, including the ones in New York, is that they are standing up to protect American democracy. And right now, the biggest threat to this country are not a handful of House candidates in New York. It is the president of the United States that is trying to destroy American democracy. And the Democratic Party, left, right and center, is united around the fact that we need to protect this nation from Donald Trump's attacks on the rule of law. [00:08:32] Speaker 1: OK, to that end, I do want to read to you part from your latest book, Crisis of the Common Good. You say that many leading Democrats and even more in the pundit class treat populist leaders like Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Zoran Mandami as fringe threats to the party's electoral success. Voters chose Trump because they wanted a revolution. But my party doesn't yet seem completely ready to seize the moment. How do you seize the energy of the left wing of the party without alienating mainstream voters and maybe even some Trump voters that might be willing to cross over and vote for Democrats? [00:09:08] Speaker 10: Yeah, the argument that I make is that there are a lot of Trump voters who believe that the economy is rigged and they mistakenly thought that Donald Trump was going to unrig it. They now see him as a fake populist. And so they are open for to listen to a Democratic Party that is for increasing the minimum wage, breaking up concentrated corporate power, bringing back the strength of labor unions. Now, I think we have been probably far too judgmental of some of these voters on the right because they don't share all of our cultural and social views. I don't argue that the Democratic Party should change our views when it comes to issues like guns or climate or abortion. I just think that we have to accept into the coalition people that may have voted for Donald Trump and wants a party that is going to unrig the democracy, but may not be ready to join us on all of our social and cultural views. We should give them a place in our party. And I think the only way that we give them that place is by being stronger in the way that we confront the consolidation of corporate power in this country. [00:10:14] Speaker 1: OK, let's zero in on that topic that you raised earlier, and that is your new bill to raise the minimum wage. You are calling for a minimum wage of twenty five dollars an hour. It has not been raised nationally since above seven dollars and twenty five cents an hour since 2009. The most recent analysis from the Congressional Budget Office said that even a seventeen dollar per hour raise would result in massive job cuts. Would your bill actually do more harm than good? [00:10:43] Speaker 10: No, it wouldn't. And there's plenty of economic analysis to show that if you gradually raise the minimum wage to twenty five dollars an hour, you're going to create more jobs than you're going to lose. And my bill doesn't do it automatically. But this is actually a unifying issue. And so when I talk about how you bring Republicans who voted for Trump over to the Democratic side, a an aggressive increase in the minimum wage is part of the answer. If you ask Democrats in an open survey what they think the minimum wage should be, they say twenty seven dollars. If you ask Republicans independence, they say twenty six dollars. You know why? Twenty five dollars is just the minimum wage you need to pay your bills in this country. And in the most affluent, most powerful country in the world, if you work full time, you should be able to pay your bills. And by the way, we can afford it. It's not like we can't pay a twenty five dollar minimum wage. We just choose not to because we've become OK with dozens and dozens of people in this country making hundreds of billions of dollars. So this is the kind of idea that shows that the Democratic Party is ready to fundamentally change this economy. And I think this is the kind of idea that brings Trump voters over. Remember, there was a meme online about a year ago in which folks were claiming to the right that Donald Trump had already implemented a twenty five dollar minimum wage. And people in his coalition were super pumped about that. We can't let Donald Trump pretend that he's actually going to raise wages. But we've got to show that the Democratic Party, if we get power, is really willing to do it. [00:12:18] Speaker 1: So on the issue of affordability, there was a bipartisan housing bill that passed both chambers of Congress. But it's currently stalled after President Trump said that he won't sign the bill until the Save Act is passed. One of the elements of the Save Act requires voters to show ID. If there was a vote that came to the floor that just required voters to show photo ID, would you support it? [00:12:40] Speaker 10: Well, I mean, it depends on what the what it looks like in Connecticut. You know, we have safe and secure elections. This whole idea behind the Save Act is trying to push a mythology that our elections aren't secure or are rigged. That's not true. The problem with the Save Act is that they don't really care about the voter ID provision. That's not why they're pushing the Save Act. They care about a provision that would create a national voter list that would allow Trump to go in and take people out of it so he could claim that the wrong people voted in state elections. That's actually why a lot of Republicans in the Senate don't support the Save Act. Donald Trump is the most unpopular president in the recent history of this country. And so he is trying to rig the election in part by creating this national voter. [00:13:25] Speaker 1: But, Senator, if I could pin you down on that, though. Do you think establishing a standard by which a photo ID is necessary to vote in elections is something that should exist in the United States? Is that a simple premise? [00:13:38] Speaker 10: Yeah, I think there are a lot of people in my state that don't have that ID. And there is no evidence, no evidence, zero evidence in this country that there is a problem at scale with people faking their identification in elections. And again, let's just let's just dispense with the idea that that's what this bill is about. That's not what this bill is about. This bill is about trying to create a national voter list that creates the pretext for Donald Trump to try to say that state elections have been rigged or manipulated. [00:14:10] Speaker 1: OK, Senator Murphy, we're going to leave it there. Thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate it. [00:14:14] Speaker ?: Thank you. [00:14:15] Speaker 1: And when we come back, Republican Senator Roger Marshall of Kansas joins me next. Welcome back. And joining me now is Republican Senator Roger Marshall of Kansas. Senator Marshall, welcome back to Meet the Press. [00:14:38] Speaker 11: It's great to be with you. [00:14:39] Speaker 1: All right, let's start with the war in Iran. The war now there has passed 120 days. Secretary Rubio testified that the war is over, yet overnight the U.S. launched new strikes inside Iran. If the U.S. is still bombing Iran 120 days into this conflict, how can the Trump administration credibly say the war is over? [00:15:01] Speaker 11: Well, Ryan, look, I'm just going to stay focused on what my goals have been all along. No nukes for Iran, no forever wars. Bring the cost of gas and grocery down. The major war is over. And think of this as almost just a mop-up operation. We have to press them. If they strike us, we have to strike them back by 10. We're making great progress, to your point about Secretary Rubio. He just made a great landmark case over in Lebanon and Israel, getting those folks together. Look, let's not -- let's root for the Trump team for once rather than try to tear him down. So I think we're doing what we need to do, making great progress here. And again, working toward those goals. No nukes for Iran. No forever wars. And let's keep bringing that cost of gas and groceries down back home. [00:15:42] Speaker 1: But more to the principal question here, Senator. Is the war still going on? Can we credibly say that the war is over at this point? [00:15:50] Speaker 11: Well, I don't think the war is over. I think there is a detente going on right now that President Trump for the first time ever got Iran to sign a document that they will not develop any nuclear weapons in the future. That's great. And then he followed that up as they're going to sign a U.N. security resolution as well. We're making great progress. So America -- I'm asking America to hang in there. This is a detente. This is a ceasefire. And yeah, they broke the ceasefire. We have to answer that as well. They only understand strength. You know, we've destroyed their economy. We've destroyed their military. We're in a good spot right now. All right. [00:16:27] Speaker 1: Well, you mentioned affordability as a backdrop to the war and the situation there. And this week, the housing bill that was passed by a bipartisan measure in both the House and Senate is currently stalled. And that's because President Trump has refused to sign it. I want to show you what White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt posted about the Housing Act. She said it was, quote, one of the most significant pieces of housing affordability legislation in American history. She added promises made, promises kept. But within hours of that post, President Trump canceled the bill signing saying that it was just of minor importance. Did President Trump break his promise when it comes to housing and affordability? [00:17:05] Speaker 11: Look, this is a long book right now. I'm concerned about the cost of living right now under Joe Biden. We saw the cost of housing, health care, child care all go up 50%. And we're still reeling from that. But we're getting back in the game again, that America is truly back, that real wages are outpacing inflation right now. Housing is part of the puzzle. But this is classic Donald Trump negotiation style. He's going to grab every leverage point he can. And this is one to get the bigger priority to cross the finish line. And that's election integrity. [00:17:35] Speaker 1: But, Senator, we'll get to the SAVE Act in a second. First of all, we should point out that at this point, wages are not outpacing inflation. That's not correct. But if you insist that the housing crisis is of an imminent crisis and need, why wouldn't the president just sign this bill and push that along? Why is it necessary to hold that process up? [00:17:58] Speaker 11: Well, Ryan, again, to push back, I think real wages are up since President Trump became president. We do have a little blip going on right now. But as the gasoline prices come down, inflation is going to come down and wages will get back up. You can't look at just one day, one week, one month. You have to look at the bigger deal right now. Look, we can do both. We can have people show voter IDs and pass the housing bill and actually have the president sign the housing bill. We can have both. I understand the cost of living is the defining issue right now. But also, everyone back home is really concerned about election integrity. We needed an election that are trustworthy. And right now, some Americans don't feel it is trustworthy. OK, well, let's talk about that. [00:18:37] Speaker 1: And let's talk about the realistic possibility of getting the Save America Act passed. Even though President Trump has refused to sign any legislation until it is, the Save Act calls for several changes to existing voting requirements. But not only do Republicans not have the votes, but I want to play for you what Senator Tom Tillis raised his questions about this particular piece of legislation. Take a listen. [00:18:59] Speaker 12: Does any rational person who's ever had any experience with implementing election law really think that it's possible to have all that in place in time for this election and not be disruptive? [00:19:11] Speaker 1: Senator Tillis says there's not enough time or money to even get this in place by November. Is he right? [00:19:18] Speaker 11: Well, that's very possible. But we shouldn't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. When are we going to do this? Look, I think that there is a huge concern on the part of Americans right now that our elections are not trustworthy. I don't think that fraud will ever end our democracy. But I'm worried about is those that had this belief, this fear that fraud is indeed possible, and then it could go unpunished. So that's why we need to build an election process with integrity. [00:19:45] Speaker 1: But let's talk about the root of that feeling that Americans have, at least a certain sect of Americans, as it relates to the integrity of elections. You've said if you could pass one bill the rest of your career, it would be the Save America Act. Every issue we care about starts with secure elections. Federal law already prohibits noncitizens from voting. There's no evidence that fraudulent votes have changed any election outcomes. Are you trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist? [00:20:14] Speaker 11: Look, we make pilots before they start flying a plane, we make them get a license to do that. We don't wait until they crash a plane until we make them go through a process. The issue right now is, again, is that Americans don't feel that the elections are trustworthy. No one wants their vote canceled by an illegal alien or by a dead person. All you have to do is look at the elections, recent elections in Los Angeles, just to see the concern there. But the concern exists. I think there's real concerns. And the perception here is reality, Ryan. People want election integrity. That's not -- 90% of Americans want voter IDs. So why not do that? [00:20:51] Speaker 1: Let's look at the facts connected to this, Senator. Because the perception is actually not the reality, particularly when it comes to the claims of election fraud. In fact, it was the Conservative Heritage Foundation that did an exhaustive study on this, going back all the way to the 1980s, and pointed out that there's only 100 total instances of non-citizens voting. Again and again, part of the problem with election integrity is that President Trump keeps accusing election systems of not being fair and not being secure. But there's actually no evidence to support that. So don't you need to bring to the American people a suite of issues, a suite of evidence that demonstrates this need? Just give me one example of where there was some level of fraud that the Save America Act would have prevented that would have altered an election. [00:21:39] Speaker 11: Yeah, Ryan, I guess we just look at this differently. I think, again, I'm going back to that election process needs to be trustworthy, that the election process is important to the backbone and the survival of this nation. Everything I've done professionally, trust has been so important as a physician, the trust between the doctor and the patient, the military officer, the trust between those below me and above me in rank, and now as a senator, that there needs to be trust. So what are Democrats running from? Why are they afraid? If what you're saying is true, then why are you worried about this? Why not have voter ID? Why not have some type of proof of citizenship? Again, you can't get on a plane without your own ID. Look, when I go to a plane in Kansas, they know who I am, but they make me show our ID as well. Why? They don't want to wait for a plane to crash before they start enforcing that particular law. So I think, again, this is just part of trustworthiness and the integrity of our election is that important to our democracies. [00:22:38] Speaker 1: OK, but there are some concern among your fellow Republican senators that President Trump's heavy focus on this is getting in the way of some of the other business that you would like to accomplish. We already mentioned the housing bill. This led to a shouting match. You were in the room for this on Capitol Hill last week. How did you feel when you left the room? And are you concerned about the relationship between Republican senators and the White House? [00:23:02] Speaker 11: Yeah, I guess I'm just shocked that there's a world out there that thinks that grown people can't have a firm discussion. I've been through so many hospital board meetings when doctors yelling at each other over what time surgery should start. And maybe I was part of some of those yelling matches as well. Look, but it worked. At the end of the day, he got a couple of people to flip and vote in favor of him to allow him to make better progress. He felt like he's got his legs cut out from under him, that they were negotiating on Iran. And then this war powers ad comes through and he feels like his own team pulled his legs out from behind him. And again, emphasis here, he thinks that this voting rights issue is the main issue. It's the big deal, the voting rights bill. [00:23:45] Speaker 1: Okay, sir, you are on the ballot this fall. And before I let you go, there are rumors in Kansas that you're being eyed for a Trump cabinet post. Are you interested in serving in the Trump administration? And would you say yes if asked? [00:23:57] Speaker 11: Yeah, there's no truth to that at all. I have no interest in doing that. No one from the Trump administration has approached me over anything like that. I'm right where I need to be. I'm where God has put me, that he's prepared me for this day. My background as a physician, a fifth generation farm kid, military experience. All those coming to fruition right now. I'm right where I need to be. Have a great relationship working with Secretary Kennedy and Dr. Oz. I'm right where we need to be right now. [00:24:24] Speaker 1: Okay, and just before we go, though, there's a new vacancy law in Kansas. If you were to resign before October 2nd, a Republican replacement would be appointed through 2028. That would take the power of picking your replacement out of the hands of voters. Can you tell us today that you're committed to staying on the ballot through election day? [00:24:43] Speaker 11: I will be on the ballot on election day and would be honored to represent the people of Kansas for the next six years going forward. It's been the honor of my lifetime. Look, America is back. The economy is being fueled back home by energy independence. Our manufacturing is growing. I got work to do on health care, lowering the price of health care through our price tax bill. I got so much more work to do as a United States senator, but America is back and I'm just proud to keep serving on this position. [00:25:09] Speaker 1: So that means you're ruling out any sort of an appointment in the Trump administration just to button it up? [00:25:16] Speaker 11: I am ruling out any appointment in the Trump administration at least through the next two or two or three years. Who knows what would happen four years from now? [00:25:28] Speaker 1: Okay. All right. You're going to stay on the ballot. All right, Senator Marshall, I'm glad we cleared that up. Thank you so much for being here. We appreciate it. [00:25:34] Speaker ?: Okay. [00:25:35] Speaker 11: Thank you. [00:25:36] Speaker 1: And when we come back inside President Trump's decision to launch the Iran war, I'll talk to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan about their new book, "Regime Change." Welcome back. And joining me now are "New York Times" reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan. They are the authors of the new book, "Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump." Maggie and Jonathan, thank you both for being here. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Had a little time off this week. Dove into this incredible read. It is so good. And I'm so glad that you're here to talk about it. I want to start with the midterms. It's interesting coming off our conversation with Senator Marshall. Your reporting suggests that President Trump may not share the same concerns that Republicans have about maintaining their majorities this fall. You write, quote, "Trump had already climbed his own mountain with his improbable comeback in 2024. If Republicans were wiped out in the 2026 midterm elections or in 2028, he could simply boast that they couldn't win without him. Trump could barely be stirred to even think about the midterms. Jonathan, does President Trump actually care whether or not Republicans win in the fall?" [00:26:42] Speaker 13: Well, it's not black and white. And it's not to say he doesn't care at all. But what we found in our reporting for the book is that his closest aides, his top aides wish he cared more. OK? And there was a very revealing comment that Trump made last year when Republicans did extremely poorly in the off-year elections. He said, "People have been saying they can't win without Trump on the ballot." And he said, "That's a great honor." OK? So, play that forward a little bit. He obviously doesn't want to get impeached again. But at the same time, you know, he's not going to get convicted. There's no universe in which he gets convicted. The Supreme Court gave him sweeping immunity in 2024. We have reporting in our book that he has told people privately that he's going to pardon anyone who came within 250 feet of the Oval Office. He uses different distances. Sometimes he says 200 feet. Sometimes he says 25 feet. But there's some radius around the Oval Office, which is a pardon zone. Yeah. So, really, what he's spending his time doing is trying to make his own imprint on Washington, physical and figurative, and on the world. Yeah. [00:27:56] Speaker 1: So, one of the other striking portraits in your book is of Vice President J.D. Vance. He appears to be someone, at least on some level, willing to tell President Trump things he doesn't necessarily want to hear. The best example, of course, being Iran. You write, quote, "Vance believed a regime-changed war with Iran would be a disaster." In front of his colleagues, Vance had warned Trump that a war with Iran could break apart his political coalition and would be seen as a betrayal by many voters who had bought into his promise of no new wars. How did Vice President Vance's willingness to push back ultimately affect his standing with President Trump? [00:28:30] Speaker 14: So, it's a really interesting dynamic because he was not the only person who opposed this war in Trump's world, to be clear. In our reporting, and we write about this in the book, none of Trump's senior advisers, none of his cabinet, really thought this was a good idea. Although we should make clear that the people who were let into these discussions were so tiny as a group that it excluded the Treasury Secretary and the Energy Secretary, the people who would have to manage the after effects of an energy fallout from this war because they were concerned about leaks. But Vance was the only one who really vocally took issue with this with Trump. And it irritated Trump. It cost Vance with Trump. But he was the only person who was really sort of rattling the cages. There were other advisers who did make cases against this. We should note that Dan Cain did lay out the scenarios for what could happen. Munitions, depletion, which clearly the U.S. is seeing right now in a real way, despite the fact that the administration keeps insisting otherwise. The fact that Iran could close the Strait of Hormuz. So the president will keep saying he wasn't warned. He absolutely was warned. But Dan Cain is not Mark Milley of Term 1. Right. He is not engaging in these angry arguments with Donald Trump. And you do sort of see that play out. [00:29:48] Speaker 1: But there is an interesting dynamic between the vice president and the secretary of state, Marco Rubio. Many view them as one of his potential successors. In any way, did the Iran debate maybe tilt that competition toward secretary Rubio? [00:30:00] Speaker 14: So Trump likes to play games with people. That's not new to anybody. He has been doing this version of poll testing. Who do you like? Do you like Marco or do you like J.D. Vance? In fact, we have this pretty remarkable scene in the book where at a dinner with Rupert Murdoch and a bunch of other people in the Blue Room of the White House last October. Vance is there. Rubio is there. Several other people are there. And Trump starts asking Murdoch, you know, what do you think of Vance? And Murdoch, who did not want Vance to be the VP, says that J.D. has the potential to be great. And Trump says, what about Marco? And Murdoch just sort of flatly says Marco is brilliant. So I don't know that it needed too much tilting. I will say there is nothing in our reporting that suggests that Rubio is doing the things one would be doing to run. And it is still Vance is to lose, which also doesn't necessarily thrill Trump, who doesn't, as Jonathan said, like the idea of somebody coming next. Yeah. [00:30:53] Speaker 1: Well, let's talk about the backdrop of Iran. And that's President Trump's relationship with the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. And you describe a very tense phone call between the two leaders when President Trump suspected that Netanyahu was trying to back out of negotiations around the ceasefire in Gaza. I'm sure many people have seen this quote many times. I'm going to read it anyway. Bellowing, Trump told Netanyahu that he was sick of his antics. I've done everything to protect you. You better effing going along with this. It's been going on for too effing long. Everybody's sick of you. Everybody's sick of you, BB, Trump said. All the Jews are sick of you. Even the two Jews on this call are sick of you. Trump added, referring to Kushner and Wyckoff. And Jonathan, you've gone on to write that President Trump has used his leverage with Netanyahu in a way that President Biden never could have. Why is that? [00:31:42] Speaker 13: In that instance, he did. And what was really notable about that instance was it was the first time that Trump had used his leverage against BB. He got him to go along with the hostage deal with Hamas. And it was a genuine accomplishment. They got the final hostages out of Gaza. And we write about how Trump in that moment squeezed him. What's been notable for the rest of the presidency until pretty recently is Trump hasn't used his leverage with Netanyahu. The first bombing campaign last June, Operation Midnight Hammer. Initially, Trump was very skeptical about going to war in Iran. And he'd been warned by people like Tucker Carlson and others that this would ruin his presidency. He wanted to do a deal with Iran. Netanyahu did a months long charm offensive. He brought him a gold-plated pager, you know, that they used to blow up different Hezbollah operatives and others. And so in the end, Trump decided to go along with it. He didn't use any of his levers against Netanyahu. So that was a very interesting moment because you can see what he's capable of. I mean, Israel can't fight alone. It's just a fact. There's a perception that they can. But when you actually look at the numbers and what they're using in terms of air defenses, they absolutely cannot fight this war alone. But Trump, so far, it's mostly been rhetorical. He hasn't really used his full leverage. [00:32:59] Speaker 1: Let's talk now about the Epstein files. That's been an issue that has been very difficult for the Trump administration. President Trump's decision to move on from the Epstein files, that launched a series of top-secret meetings in the Situation Room. Maggie, what do those moments reveal about how Trump's top advisers handled that crisis? [00:33:18] Speaker 14: So you have to set this picture here, Ryan. This had been something that top officials in the Trump government, J.D. Vance, Kash Patel, the FBI director, Dan Bongino, the deputy FBI director, they had spent years talking about how there was a secret cabal of pedophiles. And once they were in charge, they would open this up and make this visible. Trump, to be fair, had never actually really quite gone that far. He had talked about it more in 2015, but it kind of went away. He certainly didn't reject it, though. Yeah, I mean, it was, as he often does, he sort of leaves it as an option. And there were a number of senior officials in Trump's White House who didn't understand what a driving force this was for the MAGA base, for Trump's own base. Trump wanted nothing to do with any of this. He didn't want anything out. He was snapping at people who would talk about it. And then he started attacking his own supporters and saying this is a hoax. So we write about a series of meetings in the White House Situation Room, which is intended to deal with national security crises, with foreign wars, you know, with sensitive matters, but not usually matters about, you know, Epstein PR crisis comms. Mm-hmm. And there were several of these, but we zeroed in on a few. These start, the ones we write about, right after the White House has used all of its political capital on the one big, beautiful bill. Mm-hmm. Which, you know, was what they would have rather been talking about. Yep, yep. Instead, they find themselves -- and it's the top levels of government. Uh, J.D. Vance, White House Chief of Staff, Attorney General, Deputy Attorney General Kash Patel. Uh, you know, several lawyers -- and that's like half the crew who are in some of these -- Mm-hmm. -- talking about how to get themselves out of this. And this goes on and on and on. And all it does is allow a greater clamor, uh, among Trump's supporters, including this surreal meeting that we end up writing about, where they were planning on putting out some public-facing website with things old and new. And, you know, they were discussing what universe it would be. And then somebody had looked up in that mock website they were setting up Trump's name. And up pops up this unverified, already public claim, uh, with a -- with an allegation that Trump, you know, was made secondhand. But it was about Trump, and that was sort of the end of that. Yeah. [00:35:32] Speaker 1: Uh, if there's a thesis in your book, and -- and there are so many great points that you raise, and so many inside conversations that you guys reveal. It's this idea that perhaps losing the 2020 election ultimately ended up benefiting Trump. What you write is, the indictments, the convictions, the assassination attempts, the four years of exile that allowed him to shed the restraining forces of his first term, to assemble a team of true loyalists who'd spent years studying the levers of government and plotting how to seize them. All of it had paradoxically made Trump stronger, more ruthless, and more commanding than he could have been otherwise the most powerful president of our lifetimes. Trump himself has kind of hinted at this, right? That maybe losing -- well, he would never say that he lost, but not retaining the White House in 2020, uh, had made him more powerful. Was losing the 2020 election the best thing that ever happened to Trump? [00:36:26] Speaker 13: I -- I don't even think it's disputable. I mean, if he had won that election, he would have been hobbled. He was already pretty unpopular. COVID was raging. Inflation was raging. Um, instead, Biden was the one who ate all of those conditions. And now, the whole point of this book, the title "Regime Change," is we're watching presidential power expressed in a way that we haven't seen in our lifetime. When George W. Bush took America to a war in Iraq and Afghanistan, it went through Congress, the branch of government that under the Constitution authorizes wars. Trump didn't even talk to Congress. He just did it. Right. When he went and snatched a sovereign head of state out of his bedroom in his pajamas in the middle of the night, he didn't talk to Congress. He just did it. When he started a trade war with the whole world, he didn't talk to anyone. He just did it. And then, of course, it takes weeks and months for the court system to catch up. He just changes facts on the ground. So he is governing like no president in our lifetime. And it occurred to us that we were covering a form of regime change in our own country. There's no universe he would have been able to pull that off if he had just won a consecutive term. And, Meg, I'll let you have the last word. [00:37:32] Speaker 14: No, I was actually thinking about exactly this listening to your interview with Roger Marshall. One of the things that that interregnum period let him do is continue grinding out any pockets of resistance to him in the Republican Party. And you saw it systematically. Remember, one of the first things that he did was start targeting the people who had voted to impeach him. Right. One of the things that he did was, you know, merrily write about, you know, 10 to go or something like that when he had to win. He couldn't do a lot of what he was doing even without going to Congress. Congress, in other times, would have voiced an objection even without being consulted. You do hear some of that now, a little, but it's not at all what it would have been under other circumstances. Yeah, I would argue a very little. [00:38:12] Speaker 1: Yes. That's an excellent point. Maggie Haberman, Jonathan Swan. This is an excellent read. Thank you. A terrific reporting. Really well put together. Thank you guys so much for being here. [00:38:21] Speaker 13: Thanks for having us. [00:38:22] Speaker 1: Thank you. victories and affordability worries what it will mean for the midterms. The panel is coming up next. Welcome back. We want to take a moment now to remember Alan Greenspan, who passed away this week. Greenspan served as the chair of the Federal Reserve for nearly two decades, helping guide the U.S. economy through a period of extraordinary growth and change. But to all of us here at NBC News, he was also the devoted husband of our dear colleague and friend Andrea Mitchell. The two of them joined Meet the Press together in 2007. Alan Greenspan, [00:39:01] Speaker 15: this is not your first appearance on Meet the Press. That was back in 1974. I want to show you [00:39:06] Speaker 7: what it looked like back then. Let's watch. Our guest today on Meet the Press is the new chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisors, Alan Greenspan. Other than a white shirt and [00:39:18] Speaker 15: different glasses, it's pretty close. Not bad for 33 years. There's a mildly different amount of [00:39:25] Speaker 16: hair, but I won't comment on that. It's been a great life, hasn't it? It has. A musician? Yes. [00:39:34] Speaker 15: Presidential advisor? Economist? Husband? Yeah. He's a great husband. That's a great husband. That was your cue. And what's your nickname for him? You want me to come clean? Can't lie on Meet the Press. Sweet Pete. I finally got it out all these years. I wish you both many more years of a rational exuberance together. Thank you. And rational exuberance. Thank you, Jim. [00:40:10] Speaker 1: Alan Greenspan was 100 years old. Welcome back. The panel is here. Chief Washington correspondent for PUC, Leanne Caldwell. Ashley Etienne, former communications director for Vice President Harris and Speaker Pelosi. And Mark Short, the former Trump legislative affairs director. Welcome to you all. Thank you guys for being here. So, Leanne, let's talk about this tense meeting between President Trump and Senate Republicans. He refused to sign the bipartisan housing bill because he wants them to pass the Save America Act. Those of us that cover Capitol every day know there's no chance they're ever going to pass the Save America Act. What are your sources telling you about the growing frustrations inside the Senate Republican conference about the way the White House and Trump's political arm are acting? [00:40:59] Speaker 17: Well, first, I think it's important to note that Trump's insistence on the Save America Act has completely paralyzed Congress. Not only did he not sign the bipartisan housing bill, his nominee to be director of national intelligence, he's not allowing move through because of the Save America Act. The House floor was completely stalled this week. They had to leave town early because nothing could get through because of the Save America Act. So, with that, that is extremely frustrating to members of Congress, especially Senate Republicans, who think legislation like the bipartisan housing bill is good for voters heading into the midterms. It's a key economic issue that addresses this. And what, but the president, he doesn't think so. He thinks that the Save America Act is better for base voters and there's an ideological difference on how they think how to win in November. [00:41:52] Speaker 1: Well, Mark, I'd like to get your take on this housing bill. You've been critical of it in the past. You say that it's an expansion of federal government intervention into housing development and regulation. You think that goes too far. Do you think it actually hurts the Republicans' messaging when it comes to affordability? [00:42:07] Speaker 18: Ryan, I think the president himself last week noted that this was Elizabeth Warren's bill. He himself knows that basically if you're going to continue to subsidize markets or basically have the government tell you who's allowed to buy a house and who's not, that's not going to make housing more affordable. It's one more step in Republicans in the last two years basically embracing Democrat economics. Whether it was massive tariffs, whether it's price controls, or now, you know, basically nationalizing private sector companies. And so you've seen the Republican Party basically abandon free markets and they've continued on this path. And, you know, now, now Trump himself has decided it's not good. But, you know, to Leanne's point, I think that for the president, he doesn't care about the midterms because not just is it the fact that, you know, he views it as the Democrats could, he can withstand Democrat attacks on him because he did it before in surviving a couple of impeachments. But, frankly, he likes having an adversary. And if the adversary of Foyle, yeah, is going to be Jeffries or whoever's going to be the Senate leader, in some ways that's more fun for than Johnson and Thune being the absolute. Yeah. So, but, but, but how did Democrats. [00:43:11] Speaker 1: And passing good legislation, right? But talk about this. It's not good legislation. I mean, Democrats think it's good legislation. I mean, this had overwhelming bipartisan support. I mean, this had overwhelming bipartisan support. How did Democrats sell this bill to voters, especially given the fact that so many Republicans were involved? [00:43:22] Speaker 8: Well, I mean, I think the reality is, is this is a tremendous opportunity for Democrats. You've got more than 25 million Americans under the age of 35 that are still at home and with their parents because they can't afford to leave their, their house because of housing prices are too high. And so the reality is this gives Democrats an opportunity to really appeal to those voters. Those are the same voters that we lost ground with in 2024. So if my, my advice to Democrats would be go in, micro target, put ads up, micro target, those constituencies, even target their parents and then frame this up as Donald Trump is not serious about addressing the economic pressures that everyday [00:43:58] Speaker 1: people are faced with. So we had a primary this weekend or this week, Leon, on Tuesday. We saw progressive candidates, some that describe themselves as socialists when big races in some Democratic congressional districts. What do these progressive victories tell us about the reality of governing if Democrats ultimately end up winning both or both or even just one house or Senate [00:44:18] Speaker 17: majority? Yeah. So if Democrats win control of the house, this is going to make it much more difficult for Hakeem Jeffries, who will be the speaker of the house in that case to govern. You have a different faction of the party, perhaps a more rebellious faction of the party. But looking ahead to 2028, this is where it gets much more complicated. Democrats I talked to say that these socialists winning in these safe blue seats aren't going to jeopardize control of the house in November. But what it does is it sets up a big divide and fight within the party on who the nominee is going to be and what the electorate looks like heading into 2028 presidential election. [00:44:58] Speaker 1: And Ashley, you already see President Trump staking out ground when it comes to this label. He's actually gone a step further and called them communists. Listen to what he had to say this week. [00:45:07] Speaker 2: These are not social Democrats. These are hardcore, godless communists. They're godless communists. [00:45:14] Speaker 1: Are you concerned that messaging could hurt Democratic candidates in the fall? [00:45:18] Speaker 8: No. I mean, I don't think it's Trump's scare tactics and his name calling that's actually the threat to Democrats. It is what we heard from Senator Murphy, which is that there's a disconnect between the party and sentiment on the ground, that we have no new ideas, no vision. And so uh, that's why you're seeing Democrats vote for these, the socialist socialist Democrats against incumbents and even in these open seats. That's why the party's polling at 28%. That's why continues to bleed support among its base vote voters. I'm primarily focused on black voters right now. That'll make the difference in some of these highly competitive races. I wrote an op-ed for Essence magazine that really laid out the case in the autopsy that the democratic ecosystem puts $8 billion into these elections and less than 1% of that is actually engaging black voters. So that's the trend we're seeing with a whole host of voters that the party is has to... Let's get Mark in here. Yeah, I was going to say the party has to address this or we're going to lose prices. Mark, is the economy though the biggest [00:46:14] Speaker 1: issue here? Is the name calling going to work for President Trump? We have less than 30 seconds. [00:46:17] Speaker 18: The economy remains number one issue. Affordability name's number one issue. But when Democrats nominate crazy, this isn't just garden variety socialists. These are people who have called in their chance death to America and some of the rallies they've attended. So, but I agree with Leanne. I think ultimately a midterm is the referendum on the president in power. We got to be a problem for them coming [00:46:35] Speaker 1: in government. All right. Thanks everyone for being here. We appreciate it. Great discussion. Before we go, be sure to join my colleagues and me on Saturday, July 4th for all of our coverage of America's 250th birthday on NBC, including special editions of the Today Show and NBC Nightly News. That's all for today though. Thank you so much for watching. We'll be back next week, because if it's Sunday, it's meet the press. [00:47:06] Speaker ?: We'll be back next week. We'll be back next week.