ROBERT COSTA: Hello. I'm Robert Costa. And this is the Washington Week Extra.
The opioid crisis in the United States has killed more than 59,000 people in the last
year, and this week President Trump declared the rise of drug addiction a public health
emergency. He stopped short, however, of his August pledge to declare it a national
emergency, and he has yet to allocate any funding to combat the crisis.
What does this declaration of a public health emergency mean in the effort to stop the
opioid epidemic? Julie, that's the question.
JULIE PACE: It is the question. And we sent AP reporters out across the country to
a lot of these communities that have been really hard-hit by the opioid crisis.
The stories that they come back with are really just heart-wrenching.
And what they say is that they're quite pleased that the president and the first lady
have made this an issue that is at the forefront of this national debate.
I think President Trump really does feel this one personally.
He and the first lady have met with people who have been affected by this.
But over and over again, our reporters in the field heard that while they are happy that
there is attention focused on this, they were quite disappointed that there wasn't new
funding because money is not the answer completely here, but it is part of the problem.
Especially in these rural communities you have people who are separated physically from a
lot of treatment options, a lot of programs, and they have told our reporters that
putting more money into this effort, getting more treatment options on the ground where
people are living, is really crucial to addressing this.
It's a massive problem that's going to go on for quite some time.
ROBERT COSTA: The president talked a little bit about his own family and how he's seen
addiction up close.
JULIE PACE: Yeah, he talked about his brother. It's a story he's told a couple of
times, but it's not something he brings up that often. It is quite powerful.
He talks about the impact that seeing his brother's addiction had on him.
It made him decide not to drink, not to smoke, to pass that on to his children.
And again, I do think that this is an issue that you see him connecting with.
He's someone who has difficulty with empathy, really connecting with people who are in
difficult circumstances, but on this one you've seen him and Mrs. Trump really take this on.
I think it's an issue you are going to see him at least discussing quite a bit during his presidency.
ROBERT COSTA: Do we expect the funding, Ed?
ED O'KEEFE: I'll tell you, as Nancy Pelosi said yesterday when asked about it, show me
the money. There's nothing in the current budget proposal that would significantly raise it.
And while the White House may claim that they're working on plans to fund the money - or
to, you know, ask for the money, they have not produced that yet, and it doesn't appear
that many lawmakers up there are aware of it. But certainly that was one of the
criticisms I noticed, was great that you're doing this, but show us the money.
NANCY CORDES: And Democrats have pointed out that all of the Republican health care
plans that were put forward this summer would have dramatically cut Medicaid by almost a
trillion dollars, and Medicaid is often the first line of defense for a lot of these
opioid addicts. And you know, it's great to pour money into a 12-step program, but
you know, a lot of them have ongoing health needs that really can only be addressed
by their Medicaid coverage. And so, you know, to your point, what a lot of
Democrats have argued is, you know, if you're cutting Medicaid, you are, you
know, directly hurting the people that you're claiming you want to help.
ROBERT COSTA: We'll keep an eye on how that all unfolds.
And sticking with Capitol Hill, in the wake of a national discussion - and it is truly
national; more and more people are talking - about sexual harassment and assault, female
members of Congress are joining forces. Nancy, you've been tracking this on Capitol Hill.
NANCY CORDES: Yeah. So Jackie Speier, who's a five-term congresswoman from California,
put out a very moving video this week talking about facing harassment herself at a
young age on Capitol Hill back in the 1970s when she was a staffer to a member of Congress.
And she talked about the chief of staff coming up to her and sticking his tongue in her
mouth in his office, and the shame that she felt and the confusion and not knowing what
to do. And the reason that she told the story was because she, and other female members of
Congress who have talked about their own experiences this week, want to make it clear to
female staffers on the Hill that you should not feel ashamed, you should come forward if
something like this is happening to you and maybe happening to other women as well, and
also, secondarily, to draw attention to the fact that there is a very unusual system on
Capitol Hill that governs claims of sexual harassment. It's different from the rest of
the federal government. Essentially, if you want to file a complaint, you first need to
get 30 days of counseling. You then need to go through 30 days of mediation with the
person who you are accusing before you could move along in the system, file a formal
complaint, file a lawsuit, that kind of thing.
And so it really discourages a lot of victims from speaking out, and these women
lawmakers say that's something that has to change.
ED O'KEEFE: I covered this years ago when I was covering sort of government workers here
in Washington. It is a ridiculous system. And it makes you wonder how many people left
public service because something happened to them, and they figured getting out and
getting out of the way made more sense than trying to work their way through this labyrinth?
It's ridiculous, and one would hope that this will compel Congress to take it up.
ROBERT COSTA: And it seems like, Julie, in Washington - we saw Hollywood and journalism
this week are all dealing with different fallouts from this new national discussion.
And this national discussion was prompted by reporting - reporting which is so healthy to
now have people speaking out. Do you think the political orbit of D.C.
and perhaps even beyond D.C are going to see more talk of reform, more talk of people
just speaking about their experiences?
JULIE PACE: I certainly hope so. I think it's been a really amazing couple of weeks
to experience. The women who have come forward are so brave, the people who have come
forward who are named and unnamed, because - we were talking about this, actually,
earlier - some of these stories are from years ago, but you wonder if these
incidents were happening right now, would people have felt like they could come
forward? Would they have felt like they would have support?
You hope now that so much is out in the open, that there's been so much support given to
women who have come forward, that people will feel like they are able to go to their
employers, to go to their coworkers and put this out there.
I think the role of journalism has been just incredibly vital to give a platform, to put
this out there and to show that there is positive feedback, that there is support.
But it's that next step, what happens. Is there - what happens in these workplaces,
the Congress for example? I mean, Ed is right, that is ridiculous that that is the
policy on Capitol Hill and in the government right now.
PETER BAKER: It helps that the - for the first time in a lot of these incidents that
women recognize some of the women who have spoken out, right?
With the Harvey Weinstein case, they were recognizing Angelina Jolie, they recognize, you
know, Ashley Judd, they recognize Gwyneth Paltrow. These are people who are part of
our cultural conversation. And if people like that can go through what I go through,
I think a lot of people must be thinking, maybe I can say something too.
And it's a different culture. This is not a new issue. We saw, going back to Clarence
Thomas, obviously, Washington has been consumed with these issues at times over the years.
The difference is, rather than attacking the women, we're now seeing the women, you know,
having a much more sympathetic audience and a more empowering, I think, moment, where
people do feel the - you know, the ability to speak out, including on Capitol Hill.
ROBERT COSTA: Moving to on a different topic, it's been more than 50 years since
President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas. But for the first time,
some 2,800 previously-classified records have been released by the National Archives.
And while there isn't a smoking gun about a second shooter that conspiracy theorists have
long debated, there were some interesting revelations, including news about an anonymous
call made to a reporter in London about 30 minutes before the shooting. Some of the
super-secret details included some FBI and CIA files that are still classified because
of national security concerns, and WikiLeaks is offering a $100,000 reward for those
documents. Peter, what did we learn this week about one of America's darkest days?
PETER BAKER: Well, one of the things I think we learned again is sort of the context in
which it happens. If you go through these documents, they do sort of amplify and
underscore some of the themes and ideas that we've had about this case for a long time.
But they also remind us of the context in which it happened - in the Cold War intrigue,
spy versus spy, assassination plots and schemes and the mafia, some of which is real and
some of which is fanciful. And you know, Cuba loomed large in our imagination back then.
Cuba must have something to do with this because it's the main battleground of the Cold
War at this point. So why did Lee Harvey Oswald go to Mexico City and go talk to the
Cuban consulate there? What must be happening? So some of it may not be a smoking gun.
It may not necessarily solve the case for those who think the case is still unsolved, but
it adds to our broader understanding. But the real documents we're going to see that
might change our understanding are still kept secret.
Under law, they were all supposed to be released as of Thursday of this week.
President Trump, under the law, was allowed to basically withhold some, and he gave the
intelligence community another six months to review. He got a last-minute lobbying
campaign by the CIA and FBI. Oddly enough, 25 years didn't turn out to be enough time
for them to go through these documents. (Laughter.) They needed some more time.
And he said, fine, you're going to have six more months, but - you know, he said very
clearly - the predicate the presumption is for disclosure.
You have to make a pretty good case to get me to not put these out in six months.
JULIE PACE: And we're told he was pretty irritated about that last-minute lobbying push.
Trump actually wants these documents out. He's fascinated by this as much as we are.
I thought he sent a great tweet this week where he was almost talking about this as
though he was an observer, you know, waiting for the archives to put out the documents.
It's a fascinating piece of American history. And even though the documents that
came out yesterday don't have any bombshells, don't change exactly, you know, what
the history books have told us about this. I think the excitement around it, the
transparency that it's bringing to what transpired there, is great for our country.
It's fascinating.
NANCY CORDES: And can someone translate that Grassley tweet for me, about -
ROBERT COSTA: Explain. What are you talking about?
NANCY CORDES: (Laughs.) Well, I was having trouble understanding it myself today.
Grassley, you know, he was also irritated about the six-month delay and he said, you
know, you guys didn't have enough time, and you know, there was lots of all-caps.
(Laughter.) And you know, Grassley tweets are kind of always a work of art, but this one,
you know, was special today.
ED O'KEEFE: Yesterday the House minority leader, Nancy Pelosi, had her weekly press
conference. And at the end I said, look, you've been receiving intelligence briefings
longer than any sitting lawmaker, because she was a member of the Intelligence
Committee, and now as a senior leader she still gets the classified briefings.
Has any CIA director or other intelligence official ever raised concerns with lawmakers
about the release of these documents? And she said no, never; we always focus on
operational stuff and current threats, but nobody has ever come to me and said that
they shouldn't be released or that there are issues with certain documents, so.
PETER BAKER: Well, and there are some of the documents they released yesterday, you're
wondering why on Earth did that take 50 years, right?
ED O'KEEFE: Exactly.
PETER BAKER: There's a memo about making the Secret Service and the FBI work better on
presidential protection, and the memo things - says things like we ought to have more
active verbs in this declaration and things like that.
So that makes you wonder why they kept these under wraps.
ROBERT COSTA: Let's end tonight where we began the show this week: Senator Jeff Flake's surprise
decision not to run for a second term. Ed, do Democrats have a chance of flipping this seat?
ED O'KEEFE: So I think they absolutely do.
Kyrsten Sinema is a moderate Democratic congresswoman from the Phoenix area.
She's served three terms, pretty moderate, pro-business voting record.
In talking to Republicans this week about the bad polling that Jeff Flake was seeing that
helped him decide that it was time to go, I asked three strategist types and Flake
directly today, did that polling show you a general election matchup against Sinema?
Yes, it did. Would you have won? Nobody said yes, which suggests that she's in
very good shape - would have been against him, and probably will be against whoever
else runs because their name ID across the state will be just as low as hers.
ROBERT COSTA: So you're saying Flake's decision in part may have been driven as much by
the threat of a primary challenge as it was by a general election threat.
ED O'KEEFE: Everyone said there was a bigger problem for him in the primary, but they
believed that he would be competitive and would have -
ROBERT COSTA: Who's going to run on the Republican side?
ED O'KEEFE: So that's still unclear. The one woman who is running is Kelli Ward.
She's a former state senator, ran against John McCain in the 2016 cycle, making a
generational and ideological argument. In the past year she had been making an
ideological argument against Flake, saying he's not loyal to the president, he's voted
with Democrats in the past. She's still in the race, but the state party is not uniting behind her.
You're going to see other members of Congress, sitting members of Congress - a woman
named Martha McSally, former Congressman Matt Salmon, and possibly a handful of others.
ROBERT COSTA: And State Senator Kelli Ward has Steve Bannon's support.
NANCY CORDES: Right, although, interestingly, a couple of Steve Bannon acolytes who were
working on her campaign actually left in recent weeks because -
ROBERT COSTA: What was that about?
NANCY CORDES: You know, it's a little bit unclear. Apparently, you know, they didn't
think that she was walking the walk, just talking the talk when it came to backing up
President Trump and his policies. And this is, again, something that really worries
Republicans, is that there is no amount of fidelity that is ever quite enough with this
Bannon crowd. And they're - you know, they do worry that even if you don't speak out
against the president, if you show the tiniest bit of daylight between yourself and
President Trump or yourself and Steve Bannon, you could very quickly find yourself
on the outs. So it's a little bit of a losing proposition. But I think it's
important to point out that part of the reason that Flake's approval ratings were so
low was because he started speaking out against President Trump a year ago and decided -
ROBERT COSTA: He even wrote a book about it.
NANCY CORDES: Wrote a book about it, decided not to endorse him.
And he knew what he was doing that entire time.
He knew that his popularity would take a hit if he did this, and he did it anyway.
ROBERT COSTA: Peter?
PETER BAKER: No, I think it's exactly right. And we'll be watching as a bellwether;
you know, will the Bannon wing, first of all, manage to capture the nomination with
either Kelli Ward or maybe somebody else who's like her?
And then, what is the cost in the fall?
As you mentioned earlier, you know, Mitch McConnell - or you mentioned earlier, sorry,
Mitch McConnell had already said candidates like these will lose us seats.
This is a seat they obviously cannot afford to lose if they want to keep a 52-vote - a
52-seat majority. A lot of money will be poured in there. And then waiting in the
wings is what happens with John McCain, obviously. He's ill and his seat at some
point, obviously, may be in play, and people will be watching for that one too.
JULIE PACE: Kelli Ward is basically the poster child for what Mitch McConnell was
talking about, the candidate who gets through the primary and ends up in the general
election and is simply not acceptable to most voters.
And the Sinema advisors would love for Kelli Ward to be that challenger.
You're going to see a lot of focus from more traditional Republicans trying to get
somebody else into that race and push Ward aside, because even people who have been
working around Ward right now and in that Bannon crowd are pretty realistic she's going
to have a rough road against Sinema if she makes it through to the general election.
ROBERT COSTA: And a lot of these primaries are not like Arizona.
You look at Tennessee, Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn.
She gets the support of some Bannon forces and the establishment GOP.
So how this all plays out in different states is going to be different in a lot of ways.
JULIE PACE: Absolutely. I mean, look, Republicans still have to put together a
coalition like anybody does. You can't win completely by being the sort of moderate,
business-minded Republican or completely being the Bannon-Trump candidate.
You have to be able to put together a coalition.
And I think that's why these races, while we are looking at them for patterns, while
we're looking for a trend in them, it's a little cliche to say in politics but it is true
these are local races. They're local and state races, and there are so many factors
that will go into play beyond what we're seeing play out at the national level.
ROBERT COSTA: We'll leave it there. That's it for this edition of the Washington
Week Extra. While you're online, take our Washington Week-ly News Quiz.
I'm Robert Costa. We'll see you next time.
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