ROBERT COSTA: President Trump prepares to tilt the Supreme Court to the right, but who
will he pick? I'm Robert Costa.
We discuss the confirmation fight ahead, the resignation of EPA Administrator Scott
Pruitt, and China strikes back on trade, tonight on Washington Week.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: (From video.) I've spent the last three days interviewing and
thinking about Supreme Court justices. Such an important decision.
ROBERT COSTA: President Trump, in New Jersey this weekend, considers his shortlist to
replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy.
WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY SARAH SANDERS: (From video.) He's looking for somebody with
tremendous intellect, he's like somebody with the right judicial temperament, and he
wants somebody who's going to be focused on upholding the Constitution.
ROBERT COSTA: We examine the leading contenders and the confirmation battle that's
brewing on Capitol Hill.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: (From video.) Administrator Scott Pruitt.
ROBERT COSTA: Not anymore - he resigns one day after celebrating July 4th at the White
House. Pruitt worked relentlessly to roll back environmental regulations and had a close
relationship with the president, but scandals and multiple probes into spending and
potential ethics violations cost Pruitt his job. We look at the legacy he leaves and
his successor. Plus, after months of threats and brinksmanship, the U.S. begins a
trade war with China, but at what cost? We discuss it all with Seung Min Kim of The
Washington Post, Kimberly Atkins of The Boston Herald, and Mark Landler of The New York Times.
ANNOUNCER: This is Washington Week. Once again, from Washington, moderator Robert Costa.
ROBERT COSTA: Good evening. The decision looms, but President Trump is still
deciding who will replace Justice Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court.
The top three contenders, all federal judges, could secure a conservative majority on the
bench, but not before facing a political firestorm on Capitol Hill.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: (From video.) I think you'll be very impressed.
These are very talented people, brilliant people, and I think you're going to really love
it, like Justice Gorsuch. We hit a home run there and we're going to hit a home run here.
ROBERT COSTA: The finalists are Brett Kavanaugh and Raymond Kethledge, both of whom
clerked for Justice Kennedy; and Amy Coney Barrett, who clerked for the late Justice
Antonin Scalia. Barrett is the youngest, at age 46, but both Kavanaugh and Kethledge
are in their early 50s, a sign the president is intent on leaving a lasting legacy.
President Trump says he'll make a formal announcement on Monday. Seung Min, welcome back.
When you think of the president there at his New Jersey golf club this weekend, what's he
thinking about? Who's he talking to as he makes this decision?
SEUNG MIN KIM: Well, the interesting thing about how the White House has handled this
confirmation process is that they are - I mean, he's talking to everyone you can think
of. He's talking to advisors. He's talking to members of Congress. But up until nine p.m.
on Monday night, when we'll know who he ultimately picks, it's going to be very closely
held to - you know, Trump is going to hold it very close to his vest. It's
mirror-imaged to how he rolled out the nomination of Justice Gorsuch in January 2017.
Recall that we had no clue - I mean, we knew it was down to Neil Gorsuch and Thomas
Hardiman, but we weren't sure until Gorsuch appeared on that - basically on that stage
with his wife that he had picked him to replace Justice Scalia, and we expect that
process to play out very similarly this coming Monday.
ROBERT COSTA: And he's reading the papers I'm sure, Mark. We know the president reads
the print edition of the newspapers. We can thank him for that, reading the print edition.
But one of your stories in the Times this week looked at Judge Kavanaugh, and there's
been a lot of scrutiny not only from Democrats, but from Republicans, some conservatives
this week on Judge Kavanaugh, even though he's the front-runner. Why is that?
MARK LANDLER: Well, a couple of reasons, and it depends on what angle you're approaching
him. There's one ruling that he made on a jurisdictional issue involving the Affordable Care
Act that some conservatives point to as maybe evidence of squishiness, but there's also
his history as a member of Ken Starr's team investigating the Clinton-Monica Lewinsky
affair way back in the late 1990s. He was one of the prime authors of the Starr
Report, and in that report he laid out grounds for impeaching a president.
And in this case, it was Bill Clinton, and those grounds were remarkably broad.
They involved things like lying to your aides about what you did, or lying to the
American public, or misleading the American public.
The concern that some around President Trump have is that a lot of these same grounds
could be applied to President Trump in the Russia case.
And I think that the fear among some is that if he is the nominee and sits through a
Senate confirmation hearing, Democrats will seize on this to turn the hearing into a
referendum on what are the standards for impeachment, and could the standards you laid
out 20 years ago apply to the president who nominated you?
I don't think it derails his candidacy by any means, but it is a red flag to some people.
ROBERT COSTA: And the other red flag, when you look at Judge Kavanaugh, is his
experience in George W. Bush's White House. The president is said to be weighing the
political cost with his own base should he pick someone with that Bush link.
Does that really matter to most Republicans?
KIMBERLY ATKINS: Well, it matters to a lot of Republicans, especially those who are very
strongly aligned with President Trump. They don't like that very close alliance with the
Bush family. But, on the other hand, President Trump, we know, likes to judge by his gut.
Now, 90 percent of the work on this was done for him by the Heritage Foundation - by the
Heritage Foundation, who put together this list that he had since the campaign of
conservative folks that conservatives would love that would keep the Evangelicals with
him, and others. But the - you know, the conservative groups helped to get him that far.
Now he's going to judge by his gut. And from the interviews, he really liked Kavanaugh.
He saw something about him. He liked his look. He liked his family.
And I think that's one thing that has put him ahead of the game here.
And I think the Bush connection was less apparent.
ROBERT COSTA: Kim, you're hitting on this list from the campaign, and it's an important
part of this whole discussion because the president's pulling from similar ideological
profiles with a lot of these judicial potential nominees.
But you think about why is he sticking to this list, Seung Min?
One of your stories this week was about Senator Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.
And he's recommending to the president: Go with Merrick Garland, the federal judge in
D.C. who President Obama nominated in 2016. (Laughter.) And you think for a moment,
the president's pretty unconventional. But is it because of that list? Is it because
Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, that he's not thinking about that kind of option?
SEUNG MIN KIM: I think it's a promise that the president had made since before he was
the president that he would stick to this prescribed list of jurists that were drafted
with help from the Federalist Society and the Heritage Foundation.
And well before there was a vacancy with Justice Kennedy's retirement you heard key White
House officials, such as Marc Short, the legislative affairs director, saying, if there
is a vacancy, when there is a vacancy, we will stick to that list, because that list, if
you recall, during the presidential campaign, gave reassurance to conservatives who were
initially a little bit skeptical about this Donald Trump, who was a Democrat, who had
proclaimed that he was pro-choice. It gave them - it gave conservative voters assurances
that he would govern like a Republican president, like a conservative leader. And so
that's why this list is so important. What was interesting to me is that, aside from the
Schumer anecdote, when I was speaking with some key swing votes on the Hill shortly
after Justice Kennedy's announcement, that they were really pushing for the president
to look off that list. Lisa Murkowski was pretty blunt with me, saying: This list
didn't come from us. This list didn't necessarily come from the White House solely.
So why is it out there?
ROBERT COSTA: So if not Kavanaugh - let's say the president moves away from Kavanaugh.
What about Judge Kethledge? University of Michigan Law School graduate. Also clerked
for Justice Kennedy. And you have Amy Coney Barrett really being pushed by a lot of
social conservatives who say: She's young. She's a Notre Dame law professor.
Yes, she was just nominated to the bench a year ago, but she could be someone who really
galvanizes the culture wars on issues like Roe v. Wade.
MARK LANDLER: I think to the extent that there is a difference between this list of
finalists, it is between Amy Coney Barrett on the one hand and Judge Kethledge and Judge
Kavanaugh on the other hand. And that is to say that the social conservative side of
Amy Barrett is a big issue for some people. You'll recall there was this famous prior
hearing where Senator Dianne Feinstein said to her, about her Catholic faith: The
dogma lives within you. That's something that Feinstein was harshly criticized for by
Catholic leaders. But it got at a deep concern that people would have about Amy
Barrett, particularly if Roe versus Wade was ever again on the table.
I think Judge Kethledge is more of a traditional Gorsuch-style jurist.
I think, you know, one of the things that's remarkable about him is how much he looks
like Gorsuch in some ways, how they're fishing buddies. They have the same kind of
lifestyle. They come from the middle of the country. To some extent, if what makes
you comfortable is another Neil Gorsuch, you're going to go with Kethledge.
And so the extent that there's a split, it's between the more traditional, perhaps
pro-business types that would be comfortable with a Gorsuch/Kethledge and the social
conservatives, who would like to really strike a blow with Judge Barrett.
KIMBERLY ATKINS: And that raises a potential fight, right?
Democrats are really focusing hard on Senator Susan Collins right now, who has said she
doesn't want anybody who expresses a hostility toward Roe. And I think that would
be - raise a lot more questions with someone like Barrett than it would with the
other two candidates, not that she may not vote for any of them but that would be
a tougher sell. But I think for President Trump himself, while he has said that Roe v.
Wade is probably a foregone conclusion that it's gone in his presidency, he said that
during the campaign, he has always fought against what he sees as judicial activism, as
Democratic judges who he thinks are biased and who are going to, you know, importantly,
rule against some of his administration's policies as they are challenged.
So I think that sense while, yes, as I said, this list was compiled by conservative
groups for him, I think he's pretty comfortable sticking with it because I think if he -
he's not a judicial guy. He has a list of people who he thinks are conservative,
who are Republican, and who are going to rule on his side.
And I don't think that he has a big problem sticking with it.
ROBERT COSTA: Final thought on this. You've been covering the Senate for years.
Can Senator Schumer keep his conference together or, in this rocky midterm season,
does he let some red state Democrats go and vote for the nominee?
SEUNG MIN KIM: Well, he is under tremendous pressure from the base to keep his caucus
together. And recall that he was able to keep all of his members together during the fight to
repeal the Affordable Care Act last year, where they were able to pluck off Susan Collins
and Lisa Murkowski who, again, are the swing votes this time around, and to fight back
against repeal. But you're dealing with really complicated and difficult midterm
dynamics here for the Senate Democrats. You have 10 Democratic senators who are up for
reelection in states that Trump won in 2016 and three of them voted for Neil Gorsuch
last year. So we're really looking at Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Joe Donnelly
of Indiana, and Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who have all expressed openness to
considering fairly the president's nominee once he puts forward that person on
Monday. Speaking of Amy Coney Barrett, has deep Indiana ties. Joe Donnelly's from
Indiana; he voted for her. If it is her, he's going to be under tremendous pressure.
ROBERT COSTA: Joe Donnelly, also a Notre Dame graduate. And Indiana, that's a lot
of pressure on these senators. We're all going to be trying to break the story this
weekend. Pretty hard to break exactly who is on this short list the last few days,
but we'll try. And let's turn to another big story: former EPA administrator Scott
Pruitt. Despite months of unwavering support from President Trump, Pruitt resigned
on Thursday. There are multiple probes into Pruitt's alleged misconduct.
Among the controversies, extravagant spending on travel, office furniture, and a $43,000
soundproof phonebooth, renting a D.C. condo from an energy lobbyist wife, asking
his staff to put his travel charges on their personal credit cards, and Pruitt
also assigned some staff the task of finding his wife a six-figure job.
The mounting scandals generated criticism from both parties.
REPRESENTATIVE DON BEYER (D-VA): (From video.) It's just unbelievable. In any other
administration, Democrat or Republican, he'd have been gone months and months ago.
SENATOR JOHN KENNEDY (R-LA): (From video.) I know some of them are allegations.
Some of them are facts. He is acting like a moron and he needs to stop it.
ROBERT COSTA: In his resignation letter, Pruitt wrote, "The unrelenting attacks on me
personally, and my family, are unprecedented and have taken a sizeable toll on all of
us." President Trump stood by Pruitt until the end. He tweeted, "Scott has done an
outstanding job." Pruitt will be replaced for the moment by his deputy, Andrew Wheeler,
a former coal industry lobbyist. Start there. Mr. Wheeler. We know about all the
controversies, we just laid them out, about Mr. Pruitt. But Mr. Wheeler
comes in and this same agenda of pulling back Obama-era regulation continues, of
working closely with different industries and energy companies, that continues.
That, to me, may be the big story here, that the Pruitt agenda goes on without Pruitt.
KIMBERLY ATKINS: And perhaps even more effectively.
I mean, some people have said that some of the regulations or the rollbacks have -
they've faced legal challenges, they haven't always gone the way that was planned, and
has really been overshadowed by all of the controversy around Scott Pruitt.
You have someone who is coming in, who's very close to the coal industry, who understands
this regulations and rulemaking very well, might actually do better at carrying out this
- the president's agenda of rolling back these things and being more pro-business.
MARK LANDLER: I mean, I think one of the points to make about Scott Pruitt's demise is
that people have failed for very different reasons in this administration.
Rex Tillerson failed because of his inability to develop a relationship with the
president. In Scott Pruitt's case, that was never a problem.
He had by all accounts a robust relationship with the president.
The president stood by him because of his success in rolling back Obama-era initiatives
through just an absolutely staggering number of questions about ethics, about corruption,
about abuse of his office.
And so this to me is a case where it's mostly remarkable how long this guy survived, and
that tells you how successful he was viewed as being by the people who are in Mr.
Trump's base who cared about rolling back environmental regulations.
ROBERT COSTA: And he had an impact. If you think about not only the greenhouse gas regulations
and coal plant regulations, the Paris Climate Accords, in the president's ear for that decision.
SEUNG MIN KIM: Yeah, you saw his influence in so many ways throughout the administration
in terms of the environmental policies, but at some point there was something - there was
a point where for the administration and for the president it was just - it just went too
far. And frankly, for Senate Republicans, who have had to deal with this mounting drama from
the EPA, from the administration, you know, that point where it went too far was months
ago. I mean, I was talking with several Senate Republicans in early June when the last batch
of negative stories towards Pruitt broke about his behavior at the EPA, and I remember
Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa, who is not a Trump antagonist by any means, saying her
patience level was, quote, "pretty much fed up." John Thune, who is a party leader, told
me he was wearing thin on Pruitt.
Pruitt was actually supposed to testify on Capitol Hill sometime in August before John
Barrasso's committee, the Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee, but he was
able to escape in time before he came under quite the Capitol Hill grilling.
ROBERT COSTA: And those grillings were part of the whole equation here. It was also he
was isolated at the end in the Cabinet, didn't have a relationship with Chief of Staff
John Kelly, and his own staff was burning him in these congressional testimonies.
KIMBERLY ATKINS: Right, the one person who was still on his side was the most important
one, which was the president of the United States. And the reason that they were
able to keep that close relationship, he spent a lot of time at the White House.
And if you looked at his resignation letter to the president, which was so effusive in
his praise for the president, he literally deified him.
He spoke of him in - you know, saying that he was blessed by -
ROBERT COSTA: My friend, I'm serving you.
KIMBERLY ATKINS: My friend, I was blessed with this opportunity. That is the thing
that Trump likes. Trump likes people who are loyal to him. Trump likes that praise.
Trump likes that closeness. And that's what kept him onboard for so long when even
people close to Trump who wanted to advance Trump's agenda within the EPA were
fed up with him. So that's what ultimately led in the end to his exit.
ROBERT COSTA: But it's a revealing moment about the president, even at his rally this
week didn't want to really pile on on Mr. Pruitt. It appeared to be, based on a lot
of reporting this week, that it was John Kelly, the chief of staff, who said it's time.
MARK LANDLER: I thought that was an interesting footnote to the story because I think if
you'd ask people in our business a month ago to handicap who would last longer, Scott
Pruitt or John Kelly, we probably would have said Scott Pruitt.
I mean, a lot of us have - work at places that have been running articles predicting John
Kelly's hasty exit for quite a while now, and it turns out that it was John Kelly who
administered the death blow to Scott Pruitt, which may suggest that John Kelly - even if
these are his waning days, and I think most people think they are - is still exerting influence
and still has the ability at critical moments to say, Mr. President, this has gone far enough.
ROBERT COSTA: Can the Democrats take the Pruitt controversies, take what the EPA has
done under President Trump, and make it a midterm issue, or does this fade with the
president's trip to Europe, with the president making a Supreme Court pick?
SEUNG MIN KIM: I think it fades in many ways because, again, the Europe trip and the
Supreme Court nominee are monumental news stories that will consume all of our attention
in the coming weeks. But Democrats will continue to hammer home the point that, look,
the president promised to drain the swamp, he promised to come to Washington and clean
it up, and this seems to be as swampy as it gets. So that is a message you will hear.
But I also don't expect a confirmation battle over a permanent replacement to the EPA
anytime soon because, as we talked earlier, Andrew Wheeler is the acting administrator;
he is sure to carry out the policies that were already in place.
Part of the reason why Senate Republicans were more confident when they started to speak
out against Pruitt was that after Andrew Wheeler was confirmed a few months ago you had
someone that they trusted in place. So I think that will fade away.
ROBERT COSTA: Let's leave it there because trade war. China has accused the United
States of starting one. On Friday, U.S. tariffs on $34 billion worth of Chinese goods
took effect. The Trump administration's 25 percent tariffs cover more than 800 Chinese
products, including heavy machinery, medical devices, and auto parts. China immediately
implemented its own tariffs on U.S. goods including soybeans, pork, and other products.
This is the president being the president. Is it - where does Secretary Mnuchin,
who seems to be a little bit more free trade inside of this administration versus
Peter Navarro, the trade advisor - is there an internal fight going on right now in
this administration over trade, or is the president just driving it all?
KIMBERLY ATKINS: Yeah, I don't think it's that much of an internal fight.
I think that the president and Navarro are winning in this case. Look, the president
didn't just campaign on this tough trade talk and this idea that the U.S.
has been in awful trade deals and that's hurting the American worker and the American
company; this is something he's believed for decades.
So this is - this is a genuine - this is as genuine as it gets when it comes to this
president, and he believes that being tough and issuing tariffs and starting trade wars
with China is a good idea. Some people agree with him, but even some who agree with
perhaps tariffs - China needs increased tariffs would say, well, you know what, it
would be nice if we had some allies who would join us in this fight.
Unfortunately, the president is picking trade wars with everyone, and so we're standing
alone while we are picking trade wars with the EU, with - we don't even have Canada by
our side right now; we're fighting with them too. So that's bringing a lot of
concern that a protracted trade war could really affect the economy.
And there's no chance, it seems, that China's going to back down, at least not now.
MARK LANDLER: I mean, Kim makes exactly the right point that this is on the list of core
beliefs of Donald Trump. Trade and the need for fairer trade, in his view, is a core
belief, and he's delivering on it.
I think what's interesting about the internal battle is that Gary Cohn, who has since
departed, and Steve Mnuchin, and to some extent Wilbur Ross, the commerce secretary, have
all warned President Trump that if he really goes down this path the stock market is
going to get hit and long term the economy is going to suffer.
And I think in the past that has caused Trump to pause a little, to second guess, and to
reconsider, and to perhaps throw it open to a negotiation.
I think what's emboldened him a little bit in the last few months is as the job market
has continued to strengthen, the economy has continued to hum along, and the stock market
has kind of shrugged off a lot of these trade-related shocks, I think he's feeling that
he has a lot more room for maneuver than perhaps these more traditional advisors told
him. And that makes him even more inclined to side with the nationalists, with the
Peter Navarro-Steve Bannon school, which is really where he firmly is now.
ROBERT COSTA: Well, what about the map?
The president cares about his base in the middle of the country, farmers.
You look at the people who get hit by trade, it's a lot of these agricultural producers.
SEUNG MIN KIM: We mentioned soybeans, we mentioned pork. I mean, that is the heart
of Trump country right there, who will definitely get hit as the trade war escalates.
ROBERT COSTA: But do they care? It seems like they're sticking with him, or no?
SEUNG MIN KIM: I've been talking to a lot of Republican lawmakers, particularly from
these agricultural states as they try to push President Trump away from the tariff and
away from the trade war, but a lot of what lawmakers are saying, which is really
interesting to me, is that their voters - the farmers back home - a lot of them are
saying we trust the - President Trump. We're going to give him a little bit of
maneuvering room, a little bit of negotiating room.
We may not traditionally like what he's doing, but we have faith in the president that he
has - that he knows what he's doing, which I think is a really interesting dynamic.
ROBERT COSTA: I want to - the grievance towards the global economy seems to keep the
bonds together in the Republican Party, even if people are actually individually getting hit.
KIMBERLY ATKINS: Yeah, I think that tough talk is really popular, and I think it's early
enough in this process that the tough talk is still winning the day. The tough talk may
take him through the midterms. The question is, come 2020 when we start seeing the job
losses, when we start seeing farmers feeling that, will they stick with him?
ROBERT COSTA: And it's fascinating to watch the Democratic Party because they're not
exactly countering the president on trade on every respect.
They have their own concerns about China and trade as well.
KIMBERLY ATKINS: They do, and this started even before the election with Hillary
Clinton, who went against the TPP. And the Democrats have sort of been figuring
out where they are when it comes to trade, and they haven't really landed yet.
MARK LANDLER: I mean, the one point I would make is as this begins to unfold, the
question is, what is the president's endgame? Is he really ready to stomach a series
of retaliatory measures leading to some uncertain end, or does he still view this to some
extent as I'm going to scare these guys enough that they're going to come to the table?
I think that he would probably tell you it's the latter, but I'm not sure some of his
advisors don't just see the value in a punishing, all-out, grinding trade war. And I
think the next big question is going to be what's the plan. You've now scared everybody.
You've scared the Europeans, you've scared the Chinese, you've scared the Mexicans and the
Canadians, but to what end? When are we going to actually sit down and try to work something out?
ROBERT COSTA: We'll keep an eye on all of that. Thanks, everybody, for the great
conversation tonight, and thank you for joining us. Be sure to watch the PBS NewsHour
on Monday for special coverage of President Trump's announcement of his Supreme Court
nominee. Our conversation will continue online on the Washington Week Extra.
You can find that later tonight at PBS.org/WashingtonWeek. I'm Robert Costa.
Thanks for coming to the table, and see you next time.
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