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THERE COMES A POINT IN EVERY ADMINISTRATION when BOB WOODWARD turns up. You may not like him -- or in this White House’s case, you may not like, respect or understand reporters altogether -- but you have no choice but to participate with WOODWARD because, if you don’t, someone else will, and that will be awfully bad for you.
IT’S CLEAR THAT AFTER “FEAR” -- WOODWARD’S 18th bestseller -- President DONALD TRUMP got wise to WOODWARD’S ways. And, probably coincidentally, TRUMP granted him 18 on-the-record interviews. Since TRUMP was dealing extensively with WOODWARD -- he seems to have dialed him frequently, just to chat and, in many cases, brag -- many in the White House were spooked about just what the book would contain.
AS IS TRADITION, WOODWARD’S journalistic home -- THE WASHINGTON POST -- got the first crack at the book, with our friends BOB COSTA and PHIL RUCKER chronicling some of its most unbelievable moments.
FROM A JOURNALISTIC POINT OF VIEW, WOODWARD will own the next week or so. He’ll appear on “60 MINUTES” on Sunday night with SCOTT PELLEY, and his book is out TUESDAY. Costa and Rucker’s story, which is quoted below … CNN has some of the recordings of Woodward talking with Trump
SOME TAKEAWAYS:
-- TRUMP KNOWINGLY MISLED AMERICA ABOUT COVID: “‘You just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed,’ Trump said in a Feb. 7 call [to Woodward]. ‘And so that’s a very tricky one. That’s a very delicate one. It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flu.’ ‘This is deadly stuff,’ the president repeated for emphasis.
“At that time, Trump was telling the nation that the virus was no worse than a seasonal flu, predicting it would soon disappear, and insisting that the U.S. government had it totally under control. … Trump admitted to Woodward on March 19 that he deliberately minimized the danger. ‘I wanted to always play it down,’ the president said.”
-- ON RACE RELATIONS: “In a second conversation, on June 19, Woodward asked the president about White privilege, noting that they were both White men of the same generation who had privileged upbringings. Woodward suggested that they had a responsibility to better ‘understand the anger and pain’ felt by Black Americans. ‘No,’ Trump replied, his voice described by Woodward as mocking and incredulous. ‘You really drank the Kool-Aid, didn’t you? Just listen to you. Wow. No, I don’t feel that at all.’”
-- ON THE MILITARY: “‘Not to mention my fucking generals are a bunch of pussies. They care more about their alliances than they do about trade deals,’ Trump told White House trade adviser Peter Navarro at one point, according to Woodward.”
-- ON NORTH KOREA: “Trump was taken with [KIM JONG UN’S] flattery, Woodward writes, telling the author pridefully that Kim had addressed him as ‘Excellency.’ Trump remarked that he was awestruck meeting Kim for the first time in 2018 in Singapore, thinking to himself, ‘Holy shit,’ and finding Kim to be ‘far beyond smart.’ Trump also boasted to Woodward that Kim ‘tells me everything,’ including a graphic account of Kim having his uncle killed.”
-- GIVING AWAY SECRETS … U.S. HAS A NEW WEAPONS SYSTEM: “In the midst of reflecting upon how close the United States had come in 2017 to war with North Korea, Trump revealed, ‘I have built a nuclear -- a weapons system that nobody’s ever had in this country before. We have stuff that you haven’t even seen or heard about. We have stuff that Putin and Xi have never heard about before. There’s nobody -- what we have is incredible.’ Woodward writes that anonymous sources later confirmed that the U.S. military had a secret new weapons system, but they would not provide details, and that the sources were surprised Trump had disclosed it.”
-- ON BARACK OBAMA: ““I don’t think Obama’s smart. … I think he’s highly overrated. And I don’t think he’s a great speaker.’ Trump added that North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un thought Obama was ‘an asshole.’”
-- JARED KUSHNER is “quoted extensively” in the book, COSTA and RUCKER write. “Woodward writes that Kushner advised people that one of the most important guiding texts to understand the Trump presidency was ‘Alice in Wonderland,’ a novel about a young girl who falls through a rabbit hole. He singled out the Cheshire cat, whose strategy was endurance and persistence, not direction.”
-- FAUCI ON JARED: “Woodward describes Fauci as particularly disappointed in Kushner for talking like a cheerleader as if everything was great. In June, as the virus was spreading wildly coast to coast and case numbers soared in Arizona, Florida, Texas and other states, Kushner said of Trump, ‘The goal is to get his head from governing to campaigning.’”
CNN HAS THIS DETAIL: “Woodward reports new details on Russia’s election meddling, writing that the NSA and CIA have classified evidence the Russians had placed malware in the election registration systems of at least two Florida counties, St. Lucie and Washington.”
-- CNN: “Woodward concludes his book with a declaration that ‘Trump is the wrong man for the job.’”
Good Wednesday afternoon. Press secretary KAYLEIGH MCENANY is briefing shortly. TRUMP will brief today at 5 p.m.
BACK TO OUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED PROGRAMMING …
SO, IS WASHINGTON NOW publicly throwing in the towel on Covid relief for the month of September?
TREASURY SECRETARY STEVEN MNUCHIN, speaking to pooler EMILY GOODIN of the Daily Mail this morning at the White House, said the administration is focused on a clean stopgap funding bill -- no extraneous policies attached -- and the targeted GOP Covid relief bill.
-- Translation: He’s focused on funding the government with no Covid relief, and focused on a Republican bill that won’t pass the Senate. This is the status of things with something like 10 LEGISLATIVE DAYS until the government runs out of money. More from Marianne LeVine and John Bresnahan
PUT ALL THOSE things together, and the only conclusion is this: The chances for Covid relief are plummeting faster than the Yankees’ chances of making the playoffs!! (Sorry, Bres.)
HE’S NOT EVEN FAKING IT ANYMORE! … MNUCHIN, per GOODIN: “Asked what are the chances of another Covid relief bill this year: ‘I don’t know. We’ll see. I hope there is. It’s important to a lot of people out there.’”
OK THEN! … Senate Majority Leader MITCH MCCONNELL this morning, per WaPo’s ERICA WERNER, when asked if he has 51 votes on his skinny GOP proposal: “Well we’ll have the vote tomorrow afternoon and find out.”
SENATE MINORITY LEADER CHUCK SCHUMER this morning: The Senate GOP bill is “partisan” and “leaner and meaner” than their previous proposals. “Cynical. … This isn’t about making law. … It won’t pass on Thursday and we’ll be right back where we are today.”
MEANWHILE … NPR: “Financial Pain From Coronavirus Pandemic ‘Much, Much Worse’ Than Expected”: “In America’s four largest cities, at least half of people say they have experienced the loss of a job or a reduction in wages or work hours in their household since the start of the coronavirus outbreak. That’s the finding of a new poll published Wednesday by NPR, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
“Many of these problems are concentrated among Black and Latino households in the four cities … Nationally, the NPR poll finds very substantial proportions of households reporting that their savings have been depleted by the pandemic (if they had any savings to start with) or that they have fallen behind on housing payments or have had problems paying debts and/or utility bills.” NPR … The poll
JOE BIDEN is en route to MICHIGAN. He didn’t talk to reporters on the tarmac before boarding his plane, per NYT’s TOM KAPLAN, today’s pooler.
ON THE TRAIL -- “Joe Biden to tell Michigan: He’ll tax companies that move job overseas,” by the Detroit Free Press’ Todd Spangler and Dave Boucher: “In any other campaign, it would be one direct from the Democratic playbook, but given that President Donald Trump has made the same claims a central part of his presidency, it comes as a frontal assault on Trump’s economic record in a state the president won by just two-tenths of 1% …
“If elected, Biden said he would: Push for legislation that would increase the top corporate tax rate from 21% to 28% and implement an additional surcharge on any production moved out of the U.S. on goods and services to be sold or provided back into the U.S. … Ask Congress to approve a 10% ‘Made in America’ tax credit … Sign executive orders during his first week in office that would strengthen so-called Buy American provisions.” Freep
WAR REPORT -- “U.S. to reduce troops in Iraq to 3,000 as Trump looks to fulfill campaign promise,” by Lara Seligman: “The U.S. plans to cut the troop presence in Iraq from 5,200 to 3,000 by the end of September as President Donald Trump seeks to fulfill a campaign promise to end America’s ‘endless wars.’ … Trump is expected to also announce a reduction of troops in Afghanistan in the coming days.”
CHAOS AT THE POST OFFICE -- “Patients may have seen ‘significant’ delays in medicine deliveries by USPS, Senate report finds,” by WaPo’s Tony Romm: “Several major U.S. pharmacies told the two lawmakers leading the investigation — Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren (Mass.) and Robert P. Casey Jr. (Pa.) — that average delivery times have ticked up since the spring, leading to a flood of angry calls from customers and costly requests to resend their medications.” WaPo … The report
AP’S ELANA SCHOR: “GOP attacks Harris amid battle for Catholic voters’ support”: “The [anti-Catholic] charge stems in part from questions Harris posed in 2018 to a federal judicial nominee about his membership in the Knights of Columbus, a lay Catholic fraternal organization. Harris asked the nominee if he agreed with the anti-abortion views of the group’s leader, views that broadly align with the church’s stance.
“It inflamed Republicans at the time, with one senator authoring a resolution to affirm the constitutional ban on religious tests for federal officials and state that membership in the Catholic group is not ‘disqualifying.’ Now that Harris is Biden’s running mate, conservatives are replaying the moment to try to chip at the pro-abortion-rights Democratic ticket’s appeals to religious voters.” AP
REEFER MADNESS -- “Marijuana vote poses November risk for Democrats,” by Natalie Fertig and Paul Demko: “Democrats are taking an unprecedented gamble this month: voting to legalize cannabis at the federal level. The MORE Act would remove the penalties for marijuana, erase some criminal records and create grant programs for people hit especially hard by the war on drugs.
“Democrats say the timing is perfect: Support has been building for loosening marijuana restrictions over the last decade … The demands for racial justice that have ratcheted up following the killing of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd gave the bill the final push it needed to get a floor vote. … But the vote comes with risks. It’s landing in the midst of a stalemate between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the White House over a new coronavirus aid bill, raising worries about the optics of focusing on marijuana during a pandemic.” POLITICO
GETTING TESTY -- “Coronavirus Tests Are Supposed to Be Free. The Surprise Bills Come Anyway,” by Sarah Kliff in The Upshot: “Congress passed laws requiring insurers to pay for tests, and the Trump administration created a program to cover the bills of the uninsured. Cities and states set up no-cost testing sites.
“Patients, whether with or without insurance, are beginning to find holes in those new coverage programs. … About 2.4 percent of coronavirus tests billed to insurers leave the patient responsible for some portion of payment … In some cases, the charges appear to violate new federal laws that aim to make coronavirus tests free for privately insured patients. In other cases, insurers are interpreting gray areas in these new rules in ways that work in their favor.”
DEATH DISPARITIES … WAPO’S SIDNEE KING and JOEL JACOBS: “[T]he federal government doesn’t track such demographic data. A Washington Post analysis of data from more than two dozen states, however, found that the death rate was more than 20 percent higher in majority-Black facilities compared with majority-White facilities.
“The analysis, which used demographic data compiled by Brown University and included about 11,000 nursing homes — nearly three-quarters of all facilities in the United States — also found that death rates increased as the proportion of Black residents increased.”
P-P-P-PROBLEMS -- “Rolls-Royces, Rolexes and rowhouses: Feds crack down on small business loan fraud,” by Kellie Mejdrich: “Federal prosecutors are ramping up investigations against individuals who they say fraudulently obtained the government-backed small business loans … The Justice Department has brought more than 40 cases involving false applications for more than $170 million from both the Paycheck Protection Program and another federal lending vehicle. And the Small Business Administration’s inspector general’s office says it has ‘initiated hundreds of cases involving potential fraud’ in the two programs.
“Officials are targeting people who submitted false applications with the SBA — mostly through the PPP, which offered loans to employers that can be forgiven if they agreed not to fire workers. Prosecutors are also focusing on the Economic Injury Disaster Loan program, which relies on funds directly from the government, not private banks.” POLITICO
CALIFORNIA BURNING … SFGATE: “Bay Area sky turns bright orange, some areas see ‘snowing’ ash”
WALL STREET FILES -- “Deutsche Bank Hires Barr Friend to Up Its Game in Washington,” by Bloomberg’s Greg Farrell, Steven Arons, Christian Berthelsen and Tom Schoenberg: “The decision came from Frankfurt, where the bank’s supervisory board led by chairman Paul Achleitner has retained Robert Kimmitt, according to people familiar with the matter. Kimmitt, 72, is a lawyer and former U.S. ambassador to Germany whose friendship with Barr dates to the 1980s.
“Kimmitt’s precise role isn’t clear even to many executives within the bank. The view from Frankfurt, some of the people said, is that the bank’s senior leadership brought him on earlier this year to bolster its presence in the U.S. capital, where, in addition to the criminal inquiries, Democratic lawmakers are scrutinizing the bank’s relationship with one its highest-profile clients, President Donald Trump. The view from the U.S. side of the business has been murkier.” Bloomberg
HOT ON THE LEFT -- “Black Caucus faces upheaval as progressive pressure rises,” by Sarah Ferris and Heather Caygle: “[W]ith several Black progressives expected to win in November, pressure will rise on the CBC to embrace the leftward swing of its newest additions and their challenge to the broader party establishment. Longtime members have already started to privately fret over just how the CBC will be forced to evolve in the next Congress and how that will shape a group that has long been a central power in House politics. …
“Several members said they are anxious to see what’s next. Seniority and deference to party elders, bedrock values of the 50-year-old caucus, have started to slowly erode. And primary challenges, currently taken as a personal affront to any incumbent, may soon become the norm. In an interview, [Jamaal] Bowman said progressives like himself and [Cori] Bush are emboldened to take their fight to Congress — including within the CBC if necessary.” POLITICO
BATTLE FOR THE SENATE … KYLE KONDIK of SABATO’S CRYSTAL BALL: “If things do not break their way in the race for the Senate majority next year, Democrats may find themselves in a situation similar to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign four years ago: making inroads in historically unfavorable states — but not actually winning any of those targets — while coming up just short in top-tier races. …
“While the Democrats have a clear path to 50 Senate seats — with the hopes that a Democratic vice president will break ties — we do wonder how real their path is to get beyond 50 seats. And even some of the core races that form the foundation of the clearest Democratic path to the majority remain hotly contested. … We still think a 50-50 Senate is the likeliest outcome.”
WELCOME TO THE WORLD -- Katie Rogers, a White House correspondent for the NYT, and John Chinoransky, an audiovisual specialist for Latham & Watkins, welcomed daughter Lily on Aug. 24. Pic
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