AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
The federal government is gearing up for its first full week of work following the end of the shutdown, but the president is facing pressure on a number of issues, one of them being affordability. Traveling on Air Force One, he explained his decision to lift tariffs on a number of items.
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PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We just did a little bit of a rollback on some foods, like coffee as an example, where the prices of coffee were a little bit high. Now they'll be on the low side in a very short period of time.
RASCOE: So where does this leave the president's signature economic policy? Joining me now to discuss that and much more is NPR senior political correspondent Mara Liasson. Good morning, Mara.
MARA LIASSON, BYLINE: Good morning, Ayesha.
RASCOE: So President Trump's appeared, you know, I mean, maybe a little bit more defensive in the last few days. What's behind that?
LIASSON: What's behind it is his dropping poll numbers and his party's poor performance in the off-year elections, and he is trying to address this affordability issue. He's throwing some of his tariffs overboard. He announced on Friday he's scrapping U.S. tariffs on beef and coffee, tomatoes, some fruit. And this is a big backpedal for him.
He's not stopping at tariffs. He is floating the idea of sending Americans rebate checks of $2,000 to buy health care. He's floated the idea of a 50-year mortgage. He's started an investigation of meat-packing plants. Recently, he signed a deal with drug companies to lower the price of obesity drugs.
So this is a very big turnaround for a president who, until recently, was saying polls that showed voters' concerns about the cost of living were fake. He said the economy has been great. It's booming. Inflation was down. Now he seems to be acknowledging that prices are up and that his own tariffs are making these prices higher. This is a big reversal.
RASCOE: A lot of these economic issues kind of feel a little bit like deja vu, right?
LIASSON: Well, they're very similar to the problem that President Biden faced. Affordability was one of the big reasons Democrats lost in 2024. Biden kept on saying, just like Trump was, inflation is down. The economy is good. But that's not how voters felt. They don't care about the rate of inflation. Voters care about prices, whether they're higher or lower, and mostly, they're higher. And voters who are struggling with affordability feel like politicians who tell them the economy is great is - are insulting them. And it certainly didn't work for Biden, and it's a big challenge for Trump because with affordability, you can't just post your way or tweet your way out of it. You actually have to deliver, and that's hard.
RASCOE: The government has reopened, and many federal workers are, you know, breathing a sigh of relief. But politically, how do you think the shutdown played out for the two parties?
LIASSON: Well, one thing it did for Democrats was unite them in anger and frustration at Chuck Schumer, the minority leader in the Senate, who couldn't keep his party together. Democrats are angry at the eight Democratic senators who broke ranks and voted with Republicans to end the shutdown. They feel it was too soon, particularly after their triumph in the off-year elections. But the funding bill only goes till the end of January, so we'll get to do this again in a couple of months.
And the other thing Democrats feel is a silver lining for them is they did get a vote on health care next month. Republican senators will get the choice to join with Democrats and extend the affordable care, Obamacare tax credit subsidies or not. Democrats feel they are on the right side politically of this issue, and they think they're going to put some pressure on Republicans.
RASCOE: And Jeffrey Epstein is the scandal that, you know, just refuses to go away. House Speaker Mike Johnson said he'd put forward a bill this week that would compel the Department of Justice to release the complete Jeffrey Epstein files. What does all of this mean for the president?
LIASSON: It means that the issue that Trump would like to disappear is not going away, and the reason there's going to be a vote next week in the House is because four Republicans joined the Democrats to sign what's called a discharge petition, which is a way that the rank and file in the House can circumvent leadership and bring a bill to the floor even if the speaker doesn't want it on the floor.
This week, the House Oversight Committee released more than 20,000 documents related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, including some emails from Epstein mentioning President Trump, but none of those emails were more incriminating than showing that Trump might have known more about Epstein than he has said he did. Trump is now trying to turn the tables. He's ordered Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate Jeffrey Epstein's ties to Democrats, including former President Bill Clinton.
RASCOE: And finally, Mara, an official told NPR the table is being set for possible military action in Venezuela. What more do we know?
LIASSON: What we know from NPR's reporting is that the world's largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald Ford, will arrive in the northern Caribbean today, and it remains unclear if President Trump will actually use military force against Venezuela. He told reporters on Air Force One, quote, "I sort of made up my mind," unquote, about whether to launch an attack. But he also said, I can't tell you what I've decided. So that's something to watch.
RASCOE: That's NPR senior national political correspondent Mara Liasson. Thank you so much, Mara.
LIASSON: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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