Full Episode: Washington Week full episode, July 28, 2023

William Brangham: Legal clouds and heat waves descend on the country.

Donald Trump, Former U.S. President: They're trying to intimidate people so that people make up lies about me. I did nothing wrong.

William Brangham: Former President Trump's legal issues worsen after he's charged with more crimes in the classified documents probe. And his defense team meets with the Justice Department to try and hold off what could be an imminent second federal indictment for January 6th and election interference.

Plus --

Unidentified Male: Is there any possibility that the president would end up pardoning his son?

Karine Jean-Pierre, White House Press Secretary: No.

William Brangham: -- Hunter Biden's plea deal implodes, continuing the political fallout for President Biden.

Then --

Joe Biden, U.S. President: Help is here, and we're going to make it available to anyone who needs it.

William Brangham: -- the nation broils under a punishing heat wave, increasing pressure on the president to do more to address climate change, next.

Good evening and welcome to WASHINGTON WEEK. I'm William Brangham.

While the country suffers through a -- a flurry of legal developments has dialed up the temperature on the former president. Special -- Jack Smith -- to prevent a likely second -- to Trump's alleged efforts to overturn his loss in the 2020 election.

The former president is also facing new charges in the classified documents case. Late Thursday, the special counsel's office revised its -- that Trump sought to delete surveillance video from inside Mar-a-Lago to obstruct the Justice Department's probe.

And for President Biden, his son's legal issues aren't going away as hoped. On, Wednesday, Hunter Biden's plea -- tax and gun charges was put on hold after a judge questioned the agreement's constitutionality.

This all but guaranteed the judge's scrutiny. This all but guarantees that the questions -- thus all of this and more, Peter Baker, he is the chief White House correspondent for The New York Times. And here with me in the studio, Devlin Barrett covers the Justice Department for The Washington Post, Leigh Ann Caldwell is the anchor of Washington Post -- Newsletter -- Anita Kumar is managing -- senior managing editor at Politico. Welcome to you all. Thank you so much for being here.

Devlin, to you first. We saw these new charges against the former president, just not in the case that we were expecting this week, but allegations that Trump tried to destroy surveillance video and a few other charges. Tell us what we learned.

Devlin Barrett, Reporter, The Washington Post: So, what we learned is that the prosecution case for obstruction and essentially a cover up in this case is bigger than we previously knew, and it involves another Trump employee who allegedly set out at Trump's direction to try to destroy security camera footage, according to -- and that's a big deal because it -- on the metal, great work doors of the Mar-a-Lago. They were reporting about this, this weekend.

And what happened to Carlos De Oliveira is the FBI and the prosecutors and the special counsel spent a period of months trying to make him a witness in their case. And what they increasingly came up against was, in their minds, a lot of bad memory, a lot of bad answers. And that all culminated -- these increasingly testy exchanges and questions all culminated in an April session, we report, in which he essentially had a queen for a day interview, which means you get a chance to make your final pitch for why you might be considered a witness, and we're told he did not pass that test. And so now he has gone from essentially a failed witness to a defendant.

William Brangham: Anita, this -- I mean, separate from the alleged crime here, everything that Devlin is talking about really strengthens this sense that this was a cover up. I can't remember what the old adage is about the crime being or the cover-up is worse than the crime, whatever that is. That seems to be very strengthened here.

Anita Kumar, Senior Managing Editor, Politico: It does. The question is, really, did Trump supporters care? And what we've seen after every single indictment and -- against him is that his supporters -- more. So, if you look at the polls, Republicans are supporting him.

Peter Baker, Chief White House Correspondent, The New York Times: -- if he has one.

William Brangham: Leigh Ann, to that point Peter is describing, yes, this is a truly extraordinary indictment, if it were to come for the alleged crimes here, let's say it does drop, what do you think the president does? Does it change his defense at all if this indictment does come, as we expect?

Leigh Ann Caldwell, Anchor, Washington Post Live: Donald Trump's defense?

William Brangham: Yes.

Leigh Ann Caldwell: I don't think so. I think that what is happening with Donald Trump is his political campaign is very closely intertwined with his legal effort as well. His people flat out tell you it is one and the same. The legal strategy and the political strategy are the same. And so I don't think a lot changes.

What I do think is unknown is if this January 6th indictment does hit a little bit differently with the American public, it might not hit differently. It probably won't hit differently with his base. But beyond that 35 percent of Americans who have diehard support for Donald Trump, where does this go?

And then meanwhile you have in the House of Representatives for the first time, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy opening the door to a potential impeachment inquiry into President Biden. And so this is also a very political tactic to muddy the waters and to ensure that both, perhaps, frontrunners for the presidential election are involved in these investigations.

William Brangham: Devlin, on this question of Trump's defense, I think contrary to the advice of every single defense attorney in America, the president, the former president, keeps talking publicly about this case. We just saw him again saying these two guys named in the in the Mar-a-Lago case, they're great employees. I love them. They're wonderful. I think they've been pressured to lie. Is there a greater potential that as the president keeps talking, the former president, that this puts him in more legal jeopardy?

Devlin Barrett:  We're already seeing that play out in real time. So, remember I mentioned that new account in the new indictment about the Iranian document, President Trump weeks ago said no such document exists. He came out and he just said that. And then, bam, not too long later, the government says not only it doesn't exist, it's a new charge in your case.

So, he continues to talk in ways that would be for any defendant, incredibly risky. And it's hard to expect that pattern to change just because, you know, he is his own chief legal counsel, for better or worse.

William Brangham: Peter Baker, I wonder if -- as Leigh Ann and Anita have touched on, do you think it's possible that these indictments could be a double-edged sword in the sense that the indictments might strengthen the former president's standing with his core base while at the same time making him increasingly politically radioactive to the independence that he might need to beat Joe Biden if he were to become the nominee?

Peter Baker: Yes, that's exactly the worry most Republicans, many Republican strategists have right now, right, is that, in fact, he may be unbeatable for the nomination, certainly at the moment he's far, far away the frontrunner, but he is turning off Democrats and independents he might need to win over, particularly in key battleground states in the Midwest and elsewhere, to win the general election.

And it's -- we don't know. Obviously, it has been remarkable to see a former president indicted not once, but twice on serious charges and only increase in the polls within his own party. That's something we've never seen before. And so we're trying to make judgments based on a lack of any kind of historical precedent here. But so far, yes, it has not been politically a problem for him.

Now, his defense is a political defense. They're out to get me. It's persecution. It's a witch hunt, blah, blah, blah. What you notice if you look at his statements and what he says on T.V. is he doesn't deny the facts. He doesn't actually deny doing the things that they're charging him with doing. He's simply saying that they're either not illegal, nothing wrong with it, or that it's all politically motivated. He doesn't deny that he tried to delete those tapes. He simply said that they didn't get deleted. He doesn't deny that he, in fact, tried to keep these documents long after the authorities came and asked him. He simply said he had the right to do it, or he didn't do it, or he makes some other version of the reality here.

And so his ability to change the narrative has been rather successful among Republican voters. We'll see where that leads if it gets to a general election.

William Brangham: Anita, you were touching on this before. You do believe that even if a January 6th indictment comes full guns blazing from the DOJ that it really doesn't dent him with that core base, that this only, as Peter was saying, strengthens his hold on the potential nomination?

Anita Kumar: I think -- I mean, as Peter said, it's really hard to tell because we've never been here. But I do think that we've seen four years of his presidency. We've seen years after, and we just haven't seen a dent, really. All these times -- and, you know, Peter and I covered the Trump White House together, all these times that we said, oh, this is really going to affect it --

William Brangham: Surely, this will be it.

Anita Kumar: -- it never did, not one time.

And so, you know, I just have that to go on. Obviously, this is very different than some of those other things we saw during the presidency. These are charges. This is serious. But it just doesn't seem to look that way. So, we don't know.

I think there's a couple of things that could impact it. One, first of all, January 6th, serious charges, fundamental to our democracy. The other thing is the timing of this. Are we going to actually see trials before the 2024 election? And if so, we're going to hear all sorts of things. We're going to see all sorts of people come forward and talk.

That may change something. It will, for a lot of Americans possibly. I don't know about that core base, though.

William Brangham: I want to pivot to Hunter Biden and what happened with him this week. And, Devlin, I'm going to turn to you again as our resident legal expert here. Hunter Biden and his legal team thought they were going to have a very boring hearing this week, and it did not turn out to be that way. What happened there?

Devlin Barrett: So, what happened is something that in fact happens a fair bit in the federal court system, which is prosecutors and defense lawyers cut deals. And sometimes there's parts of those deals that are tricky and they really don't want to spell out too clearly. And a good judge will kick the tires and good lawyers will have good answers to the judge's questions.

What you saw this week was the lawyers did not have good answers to the judge's questions. And the problem is there are too many vague parts of this deal. And the judge said, basically, look, you guys got to go back and work on this some more because I don't even understand what I'm approving right here.

That's not a great look for the Justice Department, for Hunter Biden, but, again, most of these issues get resolved along the way. This is just taking like everything to do with the Hunter Biden case. This is just taking even more time than it normally should.

William Brangham: And, Leigh Ann, we know that certainly this is not going to tamp down any of the House GOP's investigations into Hunter Biden, the allegations that this is a two-tier justice system. With regard to Hunter Biden, though, we did also see another revelation that just happened today. Tell us a little bit about that.

Leigh Ann Caldwell: Yes. So tonight, for the first time, President Biden acknowledged that he has a seventh grandchild. That seventh grandchild is the illegitimate child of -- illegitimate, I should say, with -- of Hunter Biden's. And the reason this became an issue, there was a paternity case, there was a big legal case that just finished up and Hunter Biden had originally denied this grandchild or this child. It turns out, of course, it is his.

But the reason it became an issue as well is because President Biden, after this case finished just a couple of weeks ago, said he loves all of his six grandchildren and he left out this seventh, this child of Hunter Biden's. 

And, you know, Joe Biden got a lot of criticism for that, including in the columns of The New York Times where Maureen Dowd wrote, this might be the one Hunter Biden scandal that people care about. And now, we have seen Hunter Biden or Joe Biden for the very first time acknowledge that he does have this seventh grandchild. They broke it to People Magazine. And so you can absolutely see where their audience is. His audience is people who Maureen Dowd was talking about, the mothers, the families, people who they can emotionally connect with.

William Brangham: Okay. We are going to leave that section for here. I know. Devlin, we have to say goodbye to you. Thank you so much for your insight and for joining us tonight.

Devlin Barrett: Thanks for having me.

This week, all of Washington was alarmed when Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell seemed to freeze up midsentence and just stood there. After nearly 20 seconds, he was helped away from the podium by his colleagues.

The 81-year-old senator later came back, said he was fine and has continued to do his work. But questions now linger over the future of one of the most influential Republicans in the nation's capital.

And as this relentless heat wave continues its journey across the country, it is also increasing calls for President Biden to do more to address one of its underlying causes climate change.

Peter Baker to you first about Mitch McConnell. Again, this was just such a striking thing for a figure in Washington politics for as long as he has been to be such an influential figure. He says he's going to continue his term and there're no changes in leadership, but it sounds like the Republicans are concerned about this. What is your sense?

Peter Baker: Yes. I mean, look, Mitch McConnell has been a giant in Washington now for many years, and he has been one of the most successful party leaders we've seen in a long time in the Senate. So, to see him so weakened in this way, I think, has been striking and disturbing for a lot of his friends as well as for some of his rivals.

He, of course, had a fall in March, I believe it was, in which he tripped and broke, I think he got concussion and he was out for six weeks. Apparently, he's now -- we're told he had a couple of other falls and we didn't know about. They use a wheelchair when he goes to the airport to try to get him through to the plane because that's the best way to go forward. So, it reinforces that, at 81, he is having troubles that a lot of 81-year-olds would have.

And this is something we've seen now repeatedly in the last year or so in Washington. Dianne Feinstein, the Democratic senator from California, and, of course, the big issue, the big controversy -- not controversy, but the debate, I would say, over President Biden wanting another term. He himself is 80 right now and hasn't had moments of confusion or tripping over his memory or something like that. Polls show that's been a big concern for President Biden.

So, the person, other than Mitch McConnell and his supporters who's unhappy about this, this week, would be probably President Biden and the White House, which is doing this issue not be front and center. But it reminds us that our leaders are, in fact, human. They do get older. And the question is, at what point is it right for them to step aside and when can they continue to do their jobs?

William Brangham: Anita, in Politico, you all reported just recently that the White House has been watching McConnell in this regard, and that concerns over his leadership, because it used to be the stereotype was that he was the arch villain for Democrats, the guy who denied Merrick Garland a seat on the Supreme Court. But now, as Politico has been reporting, that he has been seen in some ways as a check on the more rambunctious McCarthy House. And I wonder what your sense is as to how Democrats might be thinking about negotiations going forward.

Anita Kumar: Yes. I mean, that's right. And, remember, Joe Biden and Mitch McConnell have a long, long, decades-long history. So, you don't really hear them. They might have a couple funny lines about each other, but you don't really hear them out and out criticizing each other because there is that long history.

And, remember, Joe Biden is the guy who says, look, he can get along with anyone. He can cut deals. It's actually made some people in his party not very happy sometimes. So, we do see that. I mean, there are definitely people that in the Democratic Party, they do feel like he's the villain, right?

I don't think they're going to get that from the White House, but they are feeling that, they are thinking that. You have people in Mitch McConnell's own party thinking, sort of looking at their watch, is this the time? They're not saying that out loud yet, but people are sort of talking about it and whispering it.

I think this week, a lot of people were buzzing about this but they don't want to say it out loud. That's just not the place yet, because he has been around for so, so very long.

William Brangham: And, Leigh Ann, please go ahead.

Leigh Ann Caldwell: I was just going to say, and he has such a grip on his party. There has been -- he had the biggest -- closest challenge he had to his leadership this year when 13 Republicans voted that he should not be the leader. But beyond that, he has, like I said, such a grip on his party.

And no one -- it's interesting, I was talking to a Republican source on Monday, and I asked about McConnell's health. And this --

William Brangham: This is prior to this event.

Leigh Ann Caldwell: This is prior to this, what people are saying, what people are talking about. We know he had the head injury. And this source said no one talks about it.

They think his mind is still very strong. No one talks about his age or him getting older. And then this incident happened. People started talking about it a little bit more. But still, no one is willing to come out and challenge him.

And his team reminds us that he has had a long history of falls. He is a polio survivor. He fractured his shoulder in 2019 by falling on his porch. And so they're saying they are also trying to reinforce that he is mentally completely there. He just has always had physical challenges.

William Brangham: Peter Baker, I want to turn lastly to this issue that we are all experiencing, at least currently almost half the country living under these just stupendous heat waves. These have re, again, brought up this push to press Biden, even though he has already passed some substantive legislation, to address climate change, to do more.

And I wonder if you think that this kind of a calamity that we are living through with electrical grids being taxed all over the country and people literally sweltering, if this does really dial up the pressure on the president, and what he might do with that?

Peter Baker: Yes, that's a really good question because of course you're right, he did pass $350 billion worth of climate action last year as part of the Inflation Reduction Act, the largest expenditure on climate issues in our history, and yet that doesn't necessarily mean that that's enough, right? A lot of climate activists would say fine, good start, keep going, don't sit there and count your laurels at this point.

The question is whether the heat wave we're seeing, the kind of climate impacts we're seeing right now, change the political dynamic at home, right? Does that build a larger, more broad-based consensus among everyday people who can now look outside and see the impact of climate change on their own lives? They can't send their kids to camp. Their air conditions may break, in which case they don't know what to do at night with their families, that their work is more complicated because of the heat. And if this impacts their lives and they associate with climate change, does that mean that the political environment changes over time?

Now, there are a lot of people who say, look, this is just weather, weather happens, it's not a sign of anything all that big. The question is whether or not the arguments that climate activists have been making get through in a moment like this when people see it in their everyday lives.

William Brangham: Leigh Ann, in the last 30 seconds we have, is your sense that this moves the needled, especially with Republicans who have basically shown a good deal of intransigence on any climate action?

Leigh Ann Caldwell: Not really, no. They are still on all of the above energy policy, as far as Republicans are concerned, even the White House too, but they really are intent on ensuring that fossil fuels remain a central part of our energy sector. There are outliers within the Republican Party but not really. We have not seen a major shift yet.

William Brangham: All right. I think we are going to have to leave it there for tonight. Thank you all so much for joining us and for Peter joining us remotely. And thanks to all of you for joining us as well.

I'm William Brangham. Good night from Washington D.C.