CHUCK TODD:
This Sunday: supreme uncertainty.
POTESTORS:
Safe and legal!
CHUCK TODD:
The Supreme Court keeps the abortion pill available for now, with a final decision potentially coming in days.
VICE PRES. KAMALA HARRIS:
They attack medication that for 20 years the FDA ruled as being safe.
SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM:
I do believe in common sense restrictions on abortion. That's where America's at.
CHUCK TODD:
As Republican presidential hopefuls continue to struggle with the abortion issue, post-Roe --
SEN. TIM SCOTT:
I would literally sign the most conservative pro-life legislation that they can get through Congress.
ALI VITALI:
Even if it was six weeks?
SEN. TIM SCOTT:
I'm not going to talk about six or five or seven or ten.
CHUCK TODD:
And, the gun debate. After more mass shootings in Tennessee and Kentucky --
CALLER:
Oh my god, there’s an active shooter there.
CHUCK TODD:
The NRA holds its annual meeting, and Republicans pledge support.
FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:
With me at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, no one will lay a finger on your firearms.
CHUCK TODD:
Can the two parties find common ground on issues that have divided the nation for decades? My guests this morning Democratic Senator Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin and Republican Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana. Also, rising tensions. Israel is facing crises at home and criticism abroad.
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN:
They cannot continue down this road.
CHUCK TODD:
My exclusive interview with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
People will see at the end that Israel was a democracy, is a democracy, and will be even a stronger democracy after this democratic reform.
CHUCK TODD:
Finally, how did a 21-year-old gamer and air national guardsman gain access to the nation's top secrets? Joining me for insight and analysis are NBC News Senior Washington Correspondent Hallie Jackson, Former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, Leigh Ann Caldwell of The Washington Post and Stephen Hayes, editor of The Dispatch. Welcome to Sunday. It's Meet the Press.
ANNOUNCER:
From NBC News in Washington, the longest running show in television history. This is Meet the Press with Chuck Todd.
CHUCK TODD:
Good Sunday morning. Debates over guns and abortion have roiled this nation for decades. This week, those debates feel a bit more intense than they have in a while and there are some deepening tensions between activists who wield power inside Republican primary circles and the overall electorate.Today marks the 16th anniversary of the Virginia Tech shooting. At the time, it was the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. Thirty-two people were killed. Now, sadly it's been surpassed by mass shootings in Las Vegas and Orlando. After five people were killed this week in a mass shooting in Louisville, Kentucky, six more killed two weeks ago at a school in Nashville, 2024 Republican hopefuls gathered at the NRA convention on Friday and rejected the idea that gun restrictions could somehow limit violence -- gun violence. And the NRA continued to demand unlimited political allegiance from the GOP.
[BEGIN TAPE]
WAYNE LaPIERRE:
Gun-hating politicians should never go to bed unafraid of what this association and all of our millions of members can do to their political careers.
FMR. PRES. DONALD TRUMP:
The issue is not too many guns; the issue is too many thugs, hoodlums and savage criminals on our streets.
GOV. KRISTI NOEM:
Little Miss Addie, who is almost two … I want to reassure you, she already has a shotgun, and she already has a rifle. And she's got a little pony named Sparkles, too. So, the girl is set up.
[END TAPE]
CHUCK TODD:
A Gallup poll conducted before the Louisville, Nashville shooting showed 63% of Americans are dissatisfied with the nation's gun laws, but a majority of Republicans, 54%, are satisfied. And so far that overall dissatisfaction number hasn't translated to the ballot box. Not a single pro-gun elected politician has been thrown out over the issue. But that's not true on abortion. Nowhere is the gap between the Republican base and the overall general electorate greater than on this issue, particularly after the overturning of Roe v. Wade. On Friday, the Supreme Court put a temporary hold on a lower court ruling on the abortion pill, while the Court considers the Biden administration's request to preserve FDA approval of the drug. The stay keeps the abortion pill widely available for now, with perhaps another decision expected by Wednesday to try to clear some of this up. Of course, in theory, with the Dobbs decision, the court thought it was sending abortion back to the states. Clearly, that is not the case. The Dobbs decision is not popular with the public. While 61% of voters disapproved of the Court's decision to overturn Roe, in a fall NBC News poll 69% of Republicans approved of it. Republican elected leaders are well aware of the political challenges abortion presents right now. 2024 presidential hopefuls have struggled to answer simple questions about where they stand on abortion rights and access. This week, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis quickly signed a 6-week abortion ban before a speech at evangelical Liberty University, but he did it behind closed doors, and then he never mentioned what he did in his speech. Donald Trump has repeatedly refused to say whether he would even support a federal law that would restrict abortion and you'll hear Tim Scott, Nikki Haley, even Mike Pence, all of them are struggling to define their views on this issue.
[BEGIN TAPE]
REPORTER:
Is it encouraging a culture of life though to propose the death penalty for women to get abortions?
FMR. VICE PRES. MIKE PENCE:
I must tell you that I don't -- I'm not familiar with those proposals. And I don't -- I don't -- I don't have a way of responding to that or confirming it.
SEN. TIM SCOTT:
I would literally sign the most conservative pro-life legislation that they can get through Congress.
ALI VITALI:
Even if it was six weeks?
SEN. TIM SCOTT:
I'm not going to talk about six or five or seven or ten.
FMR. GOV. NIKKI HALEY
I don't want unelected justices deciding something this personal. … We're not going to let this be a political football. Let's let the states work this out. If Congress decides to do it -- but don't get in that game of them saying “how many weeks, how many weeks.” No. Let's first figure out what we agree on.
[END TAPE]
CHUCK TODD:
And joining me now is Democratic Senator Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, who announced this week that she plans to run for a third term. Senator Baldwin, welcome back to Meet the Press.
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
It's a delight to join you.
CHUCK TODD:
Let me start with the Supreme Court's decision to put a temporary hold on the ruling having to do with mifepristone and the future of medicated abortion in this country. Do you think five days is enough time to – for the Supreme Court to get all the information they need in order to make this decision?
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
Well, who knows how long that will take, but I'm certainly glad for the five days. But look, what we have in Texas is a judge who is not guided by science, but is part of an extreme Republican concerted effort to ban abortion nationwide. And we do not need judges, politicians or government telling women about what sort of health care they can have. It is an issue that is not only playing out in the court in Texas, but in the state of Florida, with the governor signing a near six-week ban, Idaho forbidding travel out of state for minors, Wisconsin where we've gone back to literally 1849. That is the date our criminal abortion ban was passed and that's 174 years ago. We are fighting back.
CHUCK TODD:
If the Supreme Court decides to allow the circuit's ruling to hold, which would roll back FDA-approval of mifepristone, essentially to pre-2016 regulations. If that happens, what do you want the Biden Administration to do? For instance, do you want them – do you think they should resubmit mifepristone to the FDA and get a new approval?
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
Yeah. So we don't know what the ruling is going to be. We know that this is a drug that was proven safe and effective back in 2000. We know there have been further FDA regulations and that the drug has been made available now in a recent ruling over the counter. And I don't think that there should be second guessing of the scientific-based process the FDA goes. It has such repercussions beyond the drug mifepristone to – you know, we want to be able to rely on a science-driven process that the FDA has.
CHUCK TODD:
Let me ask you about sort of federal versus state here. In Wisconsin, assuming that the newly-configured Supreme Court decides that the 1800 law is essentially null and void, that it's obsolete, it's likely that Wisconsin's abortion law would, would revert to a law that was passed in the '80s that would essentially make 20 weeks, I believe, the, the limit on when you can get an abortion. Your bill in the Senate would be Roe v. Wade, which is essentially 24 weeks. Do you think there's any meaningful difference between 20 and 24 weeks as this debate moves forward?
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
Yeah. So the Women's Health Protection Act codifies Roe v. Wade, but it takes the additional step to tell states that they can't pass laws that unduly limit access to that right. In Wisconsin, you, you talk about the 1980s law, but there have been laws passed in the '90s, and frankly, quite recently, that further restrict a woman's access to full reproductive healthcare, whether those are waiting periods, mandatory counseling, invasive ultrasounds. These are the types of state interference that the Women's Health Protection Act, Act would eliminate.
CHUCK TODD:
I'm just curious, though, how rigid are you on this? In order to get two-thirds of what you're hoping to get, and you thought – and you could get 60 votes with 20 weeks, would you do it?
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
I certainly would look at that. But here is what the bill does. The bill talks about pre-viability and viability and relies on medical expertise because that time may change, as medicine advances. So we recognize that from the get-go and I think that's the appropriate way to do it. But I do want to get this measure passed.
CHUCK TODD:
But you are willing to have some compromise, if, if that was the price of getting more Republicans on board? If you could get them on board at 20 weeks, rather than 24? We even heard Senator Tim Scott saying that if he – 20 weeks is all he could get, looking at it through the other way, that perhaps he would support that. Is that at all –
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
Well, I'm not –
CHUCK TODD:
Is that at all something worth –
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
I’m not going to negotiate.
CHUCK TODD:
I understand that. Is that at all something worth at least looking at?
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
Certainly, it's worth looking at. But I think the way to go is to have medical science establish what's pre-viable and what's post-viability. And that's what the bill does.
CHUCK TODD:
I want to ask you a couple of political questions. Over the last two presidential elections, just one U.S. senator was able to win reelection despite the presidential candidate of the same party winning – not winning their state. It was Susan Collins in Maine in 2020.
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
That's right.
CHUCK TODD:
Do you think you can win reelection if Joe Biden can't carry Wisconsin?
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
Well, I think Joe Biden will carry Wisconsin. Obviously, we don't know who the Republican nominee will be. But despite Republican national efforts to put the spotlight on Wisconsin by hosting their convention there and having the first Republican primary debate in Wisconsin, I think we will prevail. And I think you can look at last week's momentum in our state Supreme Court race. What people said, resoundingly, is, "We want our rights and freedoms back and we're willing to work hard, go to the polls and win elections in order to do that." That will not diminish in 2024 and if any Republican thinks that voters have simmered down on the abortion issue, they are wrong. It’s going to – that is going to continue well into the next presidential race.
CHUCK TODD:
Sen. Dianne Feinstein is recovering from a tough bout with shingles. There have been some calls for her to resign now. Where do you stand on this?
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
Well, I certainly wish Sen. Feinstein well and I'm pleased that she has made the decision to have a fill-in on her seat on the Judiciary Committee. I think that is really an important and responsible thing to do during her absence because we have President Biden's nominees waiting for hearings and votes and we want to keep that moving. But I wish her well and hope she returns to the Senate very soon.
CHUCK TODD:
Do you think these calls for her to resign are appropriate?
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
Look, it's up to Dianne Feinstein and her family to decide whether she wants to keep on serving and she's had a remarkable record and I respect that.
CHUCK TODD:
Senator Tammy Baldwin, Democrat from Wisconsin, running for a third term, appreciate you coming on and sharing your perspective with us.
SEN. TAMMY BALDWIN:
Thank you so much.
CHUCK TODD:
And joining me now is Republican Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, the top Republican on the Senate Health and Education Committee. Also, by the way, a medical doctor. Senator Cassidy, welcome back to Meet the Press, sir.
SEN. BILL CASSIDY:
Hey, thank you, Chuck.
CHUCK TODD:
I want to start with the dispute over mifepristone. You're somebody who, you’ve not wanted for a while this drug to be available by mail. So I'm curious: Why were you not one of the 11 Republican senators to sign onto a brief supporting the Texas ruling?
SEN. BILL CASSIDY:
I mean, I'm not quite sure what you're asking there. I mean, I can sign on briefs all day. I'm not sure that has any great importance. I think what is important is that we have a political process by which we resolve these issues. That particular ruling seems to be going through – it was on a process-oriented thing. Among the reasons that they ruled that way, I'm told, is that the FDA did not follow correctly the Administrative Procedures Act. Now, that's a question of fact. It can be resolved by the courts. It's actively being resolved. I think the broader question is how do you resolve the issues in general. I think that returning it to the states to allow a state's values to guide is very important. In Massachusetts and New York, California, nothing changes. In my state, a law written by a Democratic female state senator and signed into law by a Democratic governor established a more pro-life statute. That's the way I think it's going to resolve politically, I think the way it's going to resolve socially and culturally.
CHUCK TODD:
And on the decision on mifepristone, do you believe that the scientific community should sort of take precedent here? The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology says that mifepristone is safe and effective. You have said their word matters when it comes to over-the-counter birth control. Should their word matter when it comes to the use of mifepristone?
SEN. BILL CASSIDY:
So I think you're going back to the kind of assertion that the principle basis of the court case in Texas was about the safety. And I think specifically it said that it was supposed to – the accelerated pathway was supposed to approve a drug to treat an illness. It is a stretch to call a pregnancy an illness. And of course, obviously we know what happens to the unborn baby. And so I'm not quite really sure that you're framing this question accurately. Now, beyond that is also a cultural and social issue. In my state, we are a pro-life state. We have legislation which is far more pro-life than it is in, say, California. But the Californians keep their law, and we keep our law, and that's the way it's going to work out nationally.
CHUCK TODD:
Right. I guess, though, on this Texas decision, it does seem like it's going to call into question other FDA approvals on other drugs. I mean, do you worry about the upending a status quo and sort of upending the FDA's authority in a way that will be, create sort of chaos in the pharmaceutical industry?
SEN. BILL CASSIDY:
I think that's totally alarmist. It’s totally alarmist. And by the way, when did the FDA go above the law? It can ignore the Administration Procedure Act, which every other agency has to follow theoretically, but they don't have to? So, I mean, I think that's alarmist. And I also think that the FDA should not be above the law.
CHUCK TODD:
I want to get you to respond to something Governor Chris Sununu said about the larger debate about Roe v. Wade and this. Take a listen, I'm curious about your reaction.
[BEGIN TAPE]
GOV. CHRIS SUNUNU:
Roe v. Wade, whether you agreed with it or not, there was a 50-year precedent there. There's a 20-year precedent with this thing. So now to the American public, it looks like Republicans are coming in and trying to massively change and blow up the system and all of this sort of thing.
[END TAPE]
CHUCK TODD:
Do you think he has a point?
SEN. BILL CASSIDY:
If he's speaking about the public's perception, I would say that'd be the case, that would be the case. There was a doctor from New Jersey who was testifying before Congress and just grieving about how all of her patients were fearful. I'm thinking, "Nothing's going to change in New Jersey." She doesn't understand the law. Or if she understands it, she's deliberately mischaracterizing. So there is a perception issue out there. But what Dobbs does, it returns to states the decisions to allow the decision to be reflective of the state. In New Jersey, it doesn't change. In Louisiana, it reflects our values. Again, a law written by a Democratic female state senator, signed into law by a Democratic governor. So I agree with kind of the premise of what Governor Sununu said, but I'm kind of disagreeing with how you're presenting it.
CHUCK TODD:
Are you still, are you still glad that Roe v. Wade was overturned? Or do you think in hindsight, this was – you know, you've always said this is an uncomfortable – you know, it's hard to find a middle ground. Did it turn out Roe v. Wade was the uncomfortable middle ground for America?
SEN. BILL CASSIDY:
I think Dobbs is the uncomfortable middle ground, where people will confront that there is a diversity of opinion. And no one group has the ability to impose their will upon the other. And so Dobbs, I think, was the correct decision.
CHUCK TODD:
Are you, are you going to vote against any attempt at creating a federal standard, considering that you believe this goes back to the states, whether it's any attempt? At one time, you had supported a 20-week bill. Would that ever, would you ever be open to that, or do you think at this point always leave it to the states?
SEN. BILL CASSIDY:
First, I think that the Dobbs decision was the correct decision. You can give me theoreticals all day long. You truly can. I'm pro-life, by the way. I am pro-life. But the fact is, you're going to need 60 votes to get something through the Senate. What Tammy Baldwin was just talking about, there can be no restrictions in the states upon abortion, meaning that a child could be coming through the birth canal and could still be aborted, is that right? No, it's wrong. And most Americans think that is wrong. And the fact is, Tammy will not get that through the Senate. There's not 60 votes for allowing that. On a bipartisan basis, it's already been rejected. So I kind of reject giving me theoretical after theoretical just because I just – I mean, that's what you do if you want to fill air time and get people buzzing. But it's not how we actually govern.
CHUCK TODD:
I hear you, but there seems to be a real debate here on this front. But I'd also want to talk to you about something that you have decided to touch, which is the third rail of American politics and Social Security. And before I ask you about it, I want to play this ad that Donald Trump is running against Ron DeSantis on this issue. Take a look:
[BEGIN TAPE]
MALE VOICE:
DeSantis has his dirty fingers all over senior entitlements, like cutting Medicare, slashing Social Security, even raising our retirement age.
[END TAPE]
CHUCK TODD:
How much harder is the former president and, frankly, most now Republican elected officials who are suddenly running away from touching anything with Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid – how much harder is this making your job of trying to convince Republicans to have this conversation?
SEN. BILL CASSIDY:
You know, both Joe Biden and former President Trump have the same plan, which is to do nothing on Social Security, and to allow a 24% cut to benefits when the fund goes insolvent in about eight or nine years. They both have the same plan. It does make it harder. When your leading presidential candidates have made the decision to deceive the American people and to say there isn't a problem, when every actuary who looks at this says that there is a problem, and someone who's currently receiving – 80 years old, otherwise would be in poverty – will get a 24% cut in their benefits by current law, it makes it very hard when they are so irresponsible. It is true for President Biden. It is true for former President Trump.
CHUCK TODD:
Let me ask you, in this effort to get reform, are you open to tax hikes? It's going to have to be some combination of tax hikes and probably raising the retirement age.
SEN. BILL CASSIDY:
What we have is a big idea. And in our big idea, we create a fund which is separate from Social Security. We put about $1.5 trillion in it and we allow it to be invested in the nation's economy. There's no risk borne by the beneficiary. And there's no Social Security dollars put into this separate fund. And we allow it to sit there. And we allow it to grow. And at the end, it bridges, helps bridge Social Security's sustainability. All the risk is borne by the fund. Now, what you do in the additional 25% – that is 75% of what we need to do. The additional 25% are dials that politically we have to come together and resolve. If one side proposes something, the other side will demagogue it. We see Trump and we see Biden demagoguing it now. We need honesty with the American people. But we have a big idea that'll solve 75% of the problem, and that's a pretty good idea.
CHUCK TODD:
Well, Senator Cassidy, it is, it is a tough issue for you to try to take a leadership position on. Good luck. We'll be watching. And I look forward to continuing this discussion down the road. Thanks for coming on and sharing your perspective.
SEN. BILL CASSIDY:
Thank you, Chuck.
CHUCK TODD:
When we come back, is Florida Governor Ron DeSantis rebooting a campaign that has yet to begin? Panel is next.
CHUCK TODD:
Welcome back, panel is here. NBC News senior Washington correspondent Hallie Jackson. She's also host and anchor of Hallie Jackson Now and NBC News NOW, former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, Stephen Hayes, the editor of The Dispatch and Leigh Ann Caldwell, co-author of the Washington Post's Early 202 and anchor of Washington Post Live. Hallie Jackson, I want to focus on Ron DeSantis because it, I think, does get us into all of the current hand wringing inside the GOP, whether it's on abortion, whether it's about Donald Trump and everything. But look at these headlines. It's astonishing to me, for a candidate that is not in the race yet. We're talking about trying to stop Florida Republicans from endorsing Trump, "Top Republican donor sours on him over social issues. Down in the polls," Wall Street Journal says, "He looks to rebound." He's not announced yet. This has just been an incredibly shrinking candidacy.
HALLIE JACKSON:
It will not surprise you that there are people close to Ron DeSantis who are downplaying the headlines that you just showed here, Chuck, because they feel like it is still early days yet. Although I do think that I wouldn't be surprised. He has alluded to, I think, the people that he's talked to, he doesn't want to announce anything until after the state legislative session ends. My sense is it's going to be fairly soon after that and not a long time after that, because they want to get in this race and start to push back. I think you're already seeing some of that come out with these ads now going up against Donald Trump from the super PAC. You're starting to see some of it in the way that they are drawing some of these policy distinctions on issues like abortion, because on this, they – I think they have a sense that what's he going to do? He's not going to not sign. He's not going to veto a six-week abortion ban in Florida. And they think that while this is maybe an issue I think in a primary, there is no other good option here. So of course he's going to do it, and they're going to talk about it.
CHUCK TODD:
Steve Hayes, there is a Republican donor community that is desperate for a Goldilocks. They're looking for that person that can somehow bring the Trump wing and the establishment wing behind, and DeSantis was supposed to be Goldilocks. Is the porridge too hot?
STEPHEN HAYES:
It's a difficult balance to strike, I think. Look, there is certainly a thirst, I think among Republican elected officials, some Republican rank-and-file voters to move beyond Donald Trump. We saw this in remarks over the weekend from Governor Brian Kemp of Georgia. You've seen this from top Republican donors. There's polling that suggests this is the case with Republicans more broadly. What's curious about what Ron DeSantis is doing, Donald Trump has picked a fight with evangelicals, white evangelical voters who were the core of his base, blaming them for abortion-related problems after the 2022 midterms. And there's an obvious place for Ron DeSantis to drive a wedge between Trump and his base. And he's choosing not to do it.
CHUCK TODD:
Oh, I see. You think he was setting it up on policy but then not doing it?
STEPHEN HAYES:
As you pointed out, he's not talking about it. He went to Liberty University. He didn't tout it. He didn't mention it. This seems like an obvious place for Ron DeSantis to split Trump from some of the evangelical voters who are frustrated with his comments after the 2022 midterms.
CHUCK TODD:
Leigh Ann, watching DeSantis strikes me, in baseball there's an old term called "rabbit ears." Somebody's at bat and they hear all of the critiques behind them. And it seems like he hears every criticism and responds to it. "Oh, you're not doing this enough, you’re not doing this enough. Oh, I don't like your Ukraine response." And he's almost responding to it all. "Oh, wait, too many abortions are happening in Florida right now. Let me deal with that."
LEIGH ANN CALDWELL:
Yeah. Well, there's some concern among some Republicans that he's not yet ready for prime time. That's one of the messages that Nikki Haley is pushing, and that's what you hear from Republican sources as well. He's not tested. He's been in a bubble in Florida, not talking to the press, not engaging and he is very popular there. But what happens when he meets a national media? What happens when he meets Donald Trump, who is masterful at taking down his candidate -- or opponents?
CHUCK TODD:
You know, it's interesting, Jeh Johnson, I - one note of caution I throw at some people as we're writing off Don – I think Ron DeSantis is too quick, is about this time, Barack Obama in 2007, supporters were going, "Hey, he hasn't caught Hillary Clinton yet, what's wrong? He doesn't have what it takes." You know, donors were starting to wring their hands. And then the debates happened, the campaign happened, and things took place. Do you think there's a little bit of overreaction here?
JEH JOHNSON:
Chuck, as you know, in politics, a month is a year, a week is a month. I agree with Steve. I think DeSantis is making a very concerted effort to be the most aggressively conservative person in this field and is trying to go after Trump's base. I'm puzzled that he did not mention the six-week bill at Liberty University.
HALLIE JACKSON:
Especially at Liberty.
JEH JOHNSON:
I've spoken at Liberty University.
CHUCK TODD:
Especially the way he did it. Like he flew - he quickly flew from Ohio to Florida, signed the bill, so he could get there the next day. You're like, "Oh."
JEH JOHNSON:
I've spoken there, and it’s - the pro-life stance is the one big unifying thing among the student body and the faculty at Liberty University.
CHUCK TODD:
But, Hallie, let me show you something. Tim Scott did his sort of semi-rollout. Let me show you two versions of Tim Scott and the abortion issue. Watch:
[BEGIN TAPE]
REPORTER:
If that 20-week ban reached your desk, would you sign it?
SEN. TIM SCOTT:
Twenty-week ban? Definitely. I'm not going to talk about six, or five, or seven, or ten. I'm just saying the whatever the most conservative legislation is that can come through Congress--
ALI VITALI:
Is what you would sign?
SEN. TIM SCOTT:
Yes.
[END TAPE]
CHUCK TODD:
It underscores this. They don't know how to - what to say.
HALLIE JACKSON:
What may be interesting to you is that there are people close to Tim Scott who are happy with the headline coming out of our colleague Ali Vitali's interview, because they feel like the line is, he's going to sign whatever the most conservative policy is when it comes to Congress.
CHUCK TODD:
They didn't like 20 weeks the day before?
HALLIE JACKSON:
Well, and they think that whatever is going to come through Congress will have some conservative consensus. So that is going to be, I think, the line that you'll see from him moving forward. What's interesting is I heard from, on the other side of the aisle, because obviously the big issue and why we're talking about this, is what does this mean for a general election. When you look at where the American population is, where American voters are at large. And one Democrat phrased it to me this way: Tim Scott's present, essentially, could be Ron DeSantis's future, right? The idea that there is some difficulty in coming and answering some of that abortion question. I will say, doesn't some of this, though, on DeSantis, give you 2015 vibes? All of these other candidates sniping at each other.
CHUCK TODD:
Scott Walker?
HALLIE JACKSON:
Not Scott Walker, but the idea that Donald Trump is still the leader of the pack. And there has been a hesitancy so far to go after him in an aggressive and fulsome way, I think, because people are seeing where his numbers are post-indictment with the Republican primary base.
CHUCK TODD:
Steve, last week, though, Brendan Buck something I thought, he's like, "Look, no one's in charge of the party." And that's the problem. There is no consensus abortion position and without it, I think the Democrats can define the Republicans.
STEPHEN HAYES:
Yeah, you can make an argument that there are many places on many policies where Republicans don't have a consensus position because it's just whatever Donald Trump has wanted for the last six years. Look, I think part of this is also how early it is in the process. You have these candidates who are sort of quasi-candidates, right? They've come out. They said they want to be president. They're not really willing to take Donald Trump on because it's early and they're not articulating their own policy positions. So they're being asked to react and respond to everything else.
CHUCK TODD:
All right. When we come back, you think it's tumultuous here in the American domestic political scene? The lone democracy in the Middle East may be even more divided than we are. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu joins me next.
CHUCK TODD:
Welcome back. As tumultuous as the American domestic political debate is these days, the lone democracy in the Middle East may be even more divided. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's plan to weaken the Supreme Court in Israel has triggered nationwide protests. Meanwhile, in just a week, Israel has exchanged fire with Palestinians and Palestinian-linked groups in the occupied West Bank and in the Gaza Strip, as well as with both Lebanon and Syria. The crises have only deepened the tensions between the United States and Israel that have been simmering a bit for months. And I'm joined now by the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu. Mr. Prime Minister, welcome back to Meet the Press.
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
Thank you, good to be with you.
CHUCK TODD:
Let me start with your judicial reform package. To say that it has gotten a negative reception might be an understatement. Your own defense minister called for a pause in it. He was concerned about it hurting Israel's security due to so many reservists being upset about it. The Israeli public, public approval for you has plummeted. The most recent Channel 13 poll has 71% disapproving of the job you are doing. Even among your own Likud Party members, more people have a negative view of your job than a positive. And late last week, the credit agency Moody's downgraded Israel's economic rating due to what it said was what “reflects a deterioration of Israel's governance, as illustrated by the recent events around the government proposal for overhauling the country's judiciary." Given all of this, have you decided to rethink and pull back on some of your reform ideas?
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
Well, you loaded so many things, many of them incorrect, in your questions. And I'll try to, how do you say that, unpack that one by one. Okay. The first thing is that I look for a broad consensus on the judiciary. Every democracy, including your own, has continuous tension between the judiciary and the executive or the legislative. That's happening in America. It's happening in France. It's happening in Israel. It's the natural tension of trying to keep the balance between the three branches of government, and Israel is no different. And Israel, the last 30 years has been a growing arrogation by the Supreme Court of the powers of the executive and the legislative. We're trying to bring it back into a proper balance, but that obviously has concerns because democracy is based on the will of the majority, the will of the people, as reflected in the government that is elected and the legislature that is elected. And protecting individual rights, the will of the majority, and the rights of the minority. And how to balance that is something that we're working at now. It's not easy. I want to make sure the pendulum doesn't swing from an all-powerful judiciary, always independent, but not always all-powerful, that overrules the government or the Parliament. But at the same time, I don't want the Parliament overruling, automatically, every decision of the Supreme Court. So I've decided to take a time out, try to get a balance between the opposing views, and there are strongly opposing views on both sides of our society. And I hope to reach this by consensus. I think that's actually the right thing to do, and I'm doing it.
CHUCK TODD:
But do you understand why perhaps your opponents in the country just don't take you at face value about the judicial reforms because you yourself would benefit from these reforms due to your corruption trial and the ability, perhaps, to make this either corruption trial totally go away or be delayed? How can you lead this effort if you yourself may benefit from this effort? How do you make it credible to the public?
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
Here's another fib, another lie. It's just not true. My – my own legal proceedings, which by the way are crumbling, all these charges against me have been crumbling. It's interesting that the hostile press stopped covering it, stopped covering the trial the minute it began because things are just crumbling one after the other. But be that as it may, it's important to understand the judges in my case have already been chosen. I've made it absolutely, abundantly clear that the reform will not affect any judge who today or tomorrow, in the future has to deal with my case. So my case is completely independent from this. And the thing that people have to understand is --
CHUCK TODD:
Well, the Knesset did change -- they did change the incapacity law –
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
– a broad swathe of the public wants judicial reform –
CHUCK TODD:
– right? They changed the incapacity law on the prime minister to make sure that if you're indicted, that that wouldn't be cause for removal.
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
No, that actually is something that --
CHUCK TODD:
Or, excuse me, if you're convicted, then it wouldn't be cause for removal.
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
No, actually, that's not true. The important thing is that it actually would be a cause for removal. It's the charges that are not subject. Otherwise, you can charge anyone. You can have some politically appointed prosecutor, as Justice Jackson said, a famous American jurist, he said, "The power of a politically-motivated prosecution, they can just remove anybody on anything." And therefore, in Israel, under the unanimous decision of the Israeli Supreme Court, you cannot remove a prime minister based on charges – on charges that can be politicized. So that hasn't changed, and that is actually enshrined in law and in Supreme Court decisions. Look, the whole thing is – there is an issue. It's a real issue. It affects many democracies sooner or later. It's affected Israel because of the imbalance of the three branches of government. We're trying to bring it back in balance. But I think trying to bring it back into balance requires, at least for me as prime minister of a democratic – a fiercely, a robustly-democratic country called Israel, to try to do it in as broad an agreement as possible. And I'm definitely giving it a shot. By the way, willing to take blows - absorb blows from my side in so doing.
CHUCK TODD:
Do you accept that this has taken a toll on you politically, that the public doesn't like this? Do you accept the premise that the public is upset about this?
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
Well, some of it is upset. You wouldn't know about the other side that seeks -- that wants to have the judicial reform because their demonstrations are not covered.
CHUCK TODD:
You once said two terms should be enough for an Israeli prime minister. Why did you backtrack?
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
Yeah, I said – I didn't backtrack. I said if you had a presidential system, you could put term limits on the prime minister. There was no elected parliamentary democracy in which you have limitations on terms of service of the prime minister.
CHUCK TODD:
Well, I know there's not there, but you yourself said –
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
You only have that in a presidential system.
CHUCK TODD:
You yourself said you didn't think staying in power – that if you can't accomplish your goals in your first term you might accomplish them in your second, but you don't need any more time than that.
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
I was referring to a question on a presidential system. But if you want to know, I think I still have, and apparently the people of Israel think I still have, many things to do. lock Iran's quest for the bomb, expand the circle of peace with other Arab countries, forge Israel's economy to bring it to much higher levels. I've made it a free market economy. But I think we have incredible potential in all these things and perhaps arrive at a consensual judicial reform. These are four big tickets. By the way, I have another eight, but I'm not going to take your time or your audience’s time to itemize them. I have big goals.
CHUCK TODD:
I hear you. Very quickly, President Biden has weighed in, concerned about the judicial reform. Do you believe this is impacting U.S.-Israeli relations?
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
No, I don't. I think – I think President Biden has been a great friend of Israel. I've known him for 40 years, from the time he was a senator, through vice president, through president. I know his commitment to Israel's security. Friends can have disagreements on occasion. But I share with him the view that we should act – and not only share the view, I'm actually acting on it – to try to reach as broad consensus as possible. I want to tell you one thing, Chuck. When I compare the degree of coordination between Israel and America on security matters, on intel, on cyber, economical operations, I mean, there's just no comparison to where this was 27 years ago. Today it’s, I think Israel -- I always say America is Israel's indispensable, and by far the best, ally. But I want to tell you, I don't think you have a better ally in the world than Israel. Because Israel has become a great technological power and a great asset to the United States. And our cooperation, mutual cooperation, saves a lot of American and Israeli lives.
CHUCK TODD:
Speaking of our relationship, the damaging leaks that came out of the U.S. government and the U.S. military, one of those leaked documents indicated that Mossad, the Israeli version of the CIA, advocated for its members to protest the current government. Do you believe Mossad opposes your government?
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
No. God, no. I think that was -- first of all, I value American intelligence a little more than that. And I think they probably know the truth. The truth is that the Mossad legal advisor said that under Israeli law, junior members of Mossad can participate in their demonstrations, not senior members. That's, I think, what led to this misunderstanding.
CHUCK TODD:
Gotcha.
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU:
No, I think the Mossad, the military, our internal security services, are working hand in hand with me as prime minister to assure the security of the country. And they're doing a damn good job of it, too.
CHUCK TODD:Well, as you probably can tell, there’s a lot more to that interview. You can see my full interview with Prime Minister Netanyahu at MeetThePress.com. When we come back, gun violence has become the leading cause of death for children and teens. We're going to break down which communities are getting hit the hardest by this epidemic.
CHUCK TODD:
Welcome back, Data Download time. In 2020 for the first time since the start of the century, gun violence surpassed car accidents to become the leading cause of death for Americans under the age of 18. So let's take a look at how this happened and how it did not affect all kids and teens equally. I'm going to show you thi, in 2019 before the pandemic, over 1,700 kids and teens were killed by guns. By 2021, that number grew by 50%. It's now over 2,500. And this impacts everyone. But the data shows that it does not impact folks equally. In 2021, Black kids were about five times more likely to die from gunfire than white or Hispanic kids. And with a stark 11.8 gun deaths per 100,000 children and teens compared to just 2.3 deaths in white and Hispanic kids, and less than one death per 100,000 of Asian children and teens, that is a massive racial divide. And there are also racial disparities in how young people experience gun violence. In 2021, the overwhelming majority of gun deaths among Black kids were homicides, 84%. While just 9% were suicides. For white kids, that was reversed, with just a quarter being homicides and 66% being suicides. And remember, in 2021, many schools were still doing remote learning. So this data gives us a much clearer picture of gun violence in America and how youth experiences it outside of the mass school shootings that often dominate the headlines. Before we go to break, there perhaps has been no senator more closely associated with the guns issue than Dianne Feinstein. And this week, the California Democrat asked to be temporarily replaced on the Judiciary Committee during her health-related absence. She first appeared on this program as the mayor of San Francisco back in 1984, when presidential candidate Walter Mondale was considering her as his running mate.
[BEGIN TAPE]
SENATOR DIANNE FEINSTEIN:
I'm still not seeking the position of vice president. I've had an opportunity now to be the first woman and the first mayor to be asked to go through an interview process. And I view that as a major opening of a door, and something that's very important to do. It is very important that that door be open to a broad selection process, and that people, women, minorities, mayors, senators, be considered in a careful way so that the strongest possible ticket can be put together.
[END TAPE]
CHUCK TODD:
When we come back, how did a 21-year-old national guardsman, who's been in uniform just three and a half years, gain access to our nation's top secrets? Panel is back after the break.
CHUCK TODD:
Welcome back. Jeh Johnson, before you were at DHS, you were at the Pentagon.
JEH JOHNSON:
Yes.
CHUCK TODD:
How does a 21-year-old Air National Guardsman end up with all this access to classified documents? Last time I checked, Hertz Rental Car seems to have more scrutiny of our youth when it comes to deciding who gets that car than apparently the U.S. Military.
JEH JOHNSON:
That's my question. How does a 21-year-old enlisted member of the Massachusetts Guard get access to TS-level information? So it's one of two things. Either it was part of his job to review this stuff and then he took screenshots or hit print and walked out with it, which he shouldn't have done, obviously. Or I read somewhere he was a specialist, a technician. So he may well have had access to that level of classified information and then reached to get something he should not have read in the first place. And then walked out with it.
CHUCK TODD:
Is this a failure of imagination? I mean if– look, you put all these on computer networks. You need some tech support. Did they not think that the IT folks might be a vulnerable – vulnerability?
JEH JOHNSON:
Hey, don't look for the answer here. I'm stunned by this. And there are all these questions about, shouldn't we clamp down? Shouldn’t we clamp down? Shouldn't we make it tighter? I tend to be a little philosophical about this. You know, we have an incident like this, one in 10,000, where somebody steals something. And then you have an incident like another Boston Marathon bombing ten years ago and everyone says, "Why didn't you connect the dots? Why didn’t you connect the dots?" And we want to make it broader, wider, more access. And so it's like a pendulum. It goes back and forth. And there's a happy medium somewhere.
CHUCK TODD:
You know, Hallie, nothing that was leaked was stuff that we didn't largely know. Meaning, like we knew Egypt had a history with Russia. Look, there were some specifics that were embarrassing to these other countries. So in some ways, there's part of me going, "Oh, it's nice to know that the intelligence, this is what it is. It's what it looks like, and apparently this is what it is."
HALLIE JACKSON:
And I think the sense, and in talking with a couple of folks close to the White House on this, they are sort of pointing to what, of course, President Biden said. That there was nothing contemporaneous. Not when you're talking about the fact of the leak itself, but the underlying information that was released here. The sense is like, hey, they think people in the country largely support what the Biden administration is doing, let's say, on Russia and Ukraine. And that this is not going to be a game changer there. I think politically the question is how much hay is there. Although I've talked with some Democrats who want to frame it like, "Republicans are out there defending this guy, this leaker," it's really not all Republicans. It's really just one elected Republican, and that's Marjorie Taylor Greene.
CHUCK TODD:
Well, that seemed to be a bizarre thing she did there.
HALLIE JACKSON:
Yeah, more of a detour than a main event.
CHUCK TODD:
Yeah. The intel committees are going to want some pound of flesh here, aren't they?
LEIGH ANN CALDWELL:
Yeah, my sources on the intel committees in Congress are saying that this is absolutely going to be an issue. There's going to be an all-senator classified briefing when they return this week in the middle of the week. And the intelligence committees have a lot of questions. Not only, "Why do so many people have access to classified information," and what sort of fallout is there from this. They want to know, not from what President Biden says, but what the Intelligence Committee is saying, what the fallout is going to be. So this is going to be an issue. But this has also been an issue when there have been leaks before, after the Snowden issue.
JEH JOHNSON:
Yes.
LEIGH ANN CALDWELL:
And, Jeh, you know better. I'm not sure how much change there has been in the classified complex since, after each one. But Congress is going to focus on this.
CHUCK TODD:
Look, Steve, this is the challenge. Because of our ability in technology, we have more classified intelligence than ever before because we have so much signals intelligence. So we have this issue with so much incoming that does need to be sorted through and filtered.
STEPHEN HAYES:
No I mean, I think this is downstream from the over-classification problem, there's no question about it. More than a million people have access to U.S. government top secret clearances. I mean, that's a problem. I think it needs to be narrowed. I don't buy the argument from Joe Biden that this is of no great consequences. And the people I talked to in the intelligence community don't buy it either. You think about the ways that Joe Biden has downplayed other issues related to national security and intelligence -- the Afghanistan withdrawal was just fine, went according to plan; there was no real intelligence problems with the China balloon collection; you talk about, on domestic policy, inflation is transitory. I think Joe Biden has a credibility problem, generally, but I think he certainly has a credibility problem with respect to intelligence.
CHUCK TODD:
Really quick.
HALLIE JACKSON:
I think there are those that are trying to draw a distinction, though. Nobody thinks the leak was good. Everybody thinks it was bad, right, as far as the fact of the matter of the leak itself, and then the information that it revealed. I agree with you. I think Congress is going to hammer this. I think when you look at it through a political, let's say 2024 lens, I think that's it too.
CHUCK TODD:
I will get you on the post-game.
JEH JOHNSON:
Could’ve been worse. It could've been much worse. He could've put out stuff that was much more damaging.
CHUCK TODD:
Yeah, well, we don't know what else hasn't been seen, that’s it. That’s all I have for today. Thanks for watching. We'll be back next week, because if it's Sunday, it's Meet the Press.