OPINION - Brooks and Capehart 1/29/2021

"Brooks and Capehart on Biden’s first full week and the state of the Republican Party" PBS NewsHour 1/29/2021

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  New York Times columnist David Brooks and Washington Post columnist Jonathan Capehart join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week in politics, including President Biden's use of executive actions, Biden's $1.9 trillion relief package, and the state of the Republican Party after former President Trump.

Judy Woodruff (NewsHour):  And now it's time for our Friday analysis with Brooks and Capehart.  That is New York Times columnist David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart, columnist for The Washington Post.

Very good, as always, to see both of you on this Friday night.

David, I'm going to start with you.

President Biden's been in office, what, all of nine days now, maybe nine-and-a-half.  A flurry of executive orders, almost several a day.  What do you make of all this?  What stands out to you the most about what's happened so far?

David Brooks, New York Times:  I'm sort of struck by the fact that Donald Trump didn't do a lot of legislating.  And so he did a lot of stuff by executive order, leaving the Paris climate accord, the Keystone pipeline, a lot of stuff on the border.

And Biden has pretty much rolled it back.  And so what Trump signed in, Biden is signing out.  And, to me, it strikes me this is — mostly, it's standard Democratic policy.  Some of it, I think, is quite good, the racial equity stuff that he's put throughout the government.

I was struck, though, that my newspaper, my colleagues on the editorial board, which I'm not part of, wrote an Friday editorial saying they were over relying on the executive orders, and they should ease up a little.

And I noticed every single member of the Biden administration, down to the people who opened the door, went on Twitter to argue back against the editorial.  And I think they were thrilled to be accused of moving too fast.

(LAUGHTER)

David Brooks:  And so they wanted — they loved having that fight.  That was my impression.

I think — as I said last week, I don't love executive orders.  Nobody does, because what gets signed in can get signed out.  But, so far, it seems they're mostly doing what any Democratic President would do right now.

Judy Woodruff:  Jonathan, over-relying on executive orders and executive actions?

Jonathan Capehart, The Washington Post:  I don't think so.

I think President Biden made a lot of promises about what he was going to do on day one, two, three, and now nine or 10.  And he's following through.  I agree 100 percent with David.  What President Biden is doing is basically canceling out the executive actions and orders that were put in place by President Trump.

But in a perfect world, or, actually, in a functioning world, Congress would be making laws.  And one of the things I took issue with, with the New York Times editorial saying that the President should ease up on executive orders is, they use the example of DACA.

And what I found interesting is that they didn't go the extra step of saying why President Obama used executive action in the first place.  It was because years of trying to work with Congress, work with Republicans in Congress to get comprehensive immigration reform done failed.

And so, with people in the immigrant community, Latino community saying, hey, do something, use executive action, and President Obama coming back and saying, no, I can't do that, and then, in 2012, doing it, and then trying to do it again in 2014, that's what got that particular ball rolling.

If the House and the Senate were to actually start legislating, then chief executives, whether it's President Trump or President Biden, wouldn't have to rely, to use that word, on executive actions to actually do something to help the American people.

Judy Woodruff:  Well, speaking of legislating, David, we're hearing today from President Trump (sic) — and I was just speaking with Brian Deese, who runs the national — chairs the National Economic Council.

They are — it looks as if they're prepared to move ahead on their big COVID relief package, $1.9 trillion, through this, without getting into the weeds, budget reconciliation, basically meaning they do it with — they could do it without Republican votes, if necessary.

Is that — are they giving up too soon?  What do you think?

David Brooks:  It's hard to read.

There are certainly a lot of Republicans who like a lot of parts of what's in there.  There are probably no Republicans who like the $1.9 trillion price tag.

I do think he [Biden] ran a unity campaign.  And I think, if that means anything, he has to give it every single shot.

But part of what they're doing is just threatening Republicans, saying, hey, we're leaving without you if you're not on board.  So, you work.

What strikes me about shaping the Democratic Party on this is how much the echo of 2009 is here.  A lot of Democrats look back on the Obama stimulus, and they think Obama paid too much attention to deficits, he worked — tried to work too much with Republicans, and he didn't go big enough.

And so what they're going to do is, they're going to go big.  And it's a gigantic fiscal experiment.  Economists have always worried about overheating the economy, pumping too much federal money in, so you get — you overheat the economy, you get inflation, you may spur — spark an up and then a crash.

And they have decided that those rules, that too much fiscal stimulus will create inflationary pressure, they have decided those rules are off.  And maybe they're right.  Jerome Powell, the Fed chairman, seems to think they're right.

But it is a gigantic fiscal experiment, where I don't really trust anybody actually knows what's going to happen if we spend this much, on top of $900 billion from December.

Judy Woodruff:  How do you see this, Jonathan?  How risky is what they're doing, do you think?

Jonathan Capehart:  Well, I take two things from the interview with Mr. Deese.

One, I think that the Biden administration is working under the pressure of deadlines in March when it comes to unemployment insurance and also moratoriums on evictions.  And so that is a forcing mechanism.

The other thing that I take away from this, in terms of not ruling out using reconciliation, it goes back to a conversation that we all had last week about whether President Biden was ready to or willing to fight, whether he had it in him to fight to get things done.

And I think, by dangling, as David said, threatening Republicans, by using the reconciliation tactic, that is showing that President Biden is — unity and kumbaya and working together will only take you so far.  And so when you take the willingness to fight and the pressure of the March deadline that's there for millions of American people, I think that is what's pushing and driving the Biden administration to at least not take reconciliation off the table.

Judy Woodruff:  Well, meanwhile, let's talk for just a few minutes, David, about the Republicans and what's happened to your party.

President Trump's been out of office, what, nine or 10 days.  You have already seen the House minority leader fly down to Palm Beach, apparently to make nice, the president — former President Trump invited to speak at the Republican National Committee coming up.

You have got all this — just a lot of anger and frustration, and worse than that, flying around between Democrats and Republicans over security, over Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene.

What's going on inside the Republican Party?

David Brooks:  Yes, first, if it was my party, I'd be running it a hell of a lot better than they're doing right now.

(LAUGHTER)

David Brooks:  So, what's happening is, there were a couple days after the Trump — January 6, then when Trump left, where I thought the party was really going to shake off a bit of Trump, obviously not all, but at least have two wings, at least have a wing that says, Trump was one thing, but we still have our conservative beliefs, and we're going to try to work with that other wing, and we will fight with the other wing.

But, as far as I can tell, the normal wing has collapsed.  We have a party right now where you have Mary Taylor Greene.  It's easier to be a Republican and be Mary (sic) Taylor Greene than it is to be Liz Cheney.

And so a normal Republican is — now has her [Liz Cheney] job threatened, and the other one is now taking over the publicity wing of the party.  You see the loss.  You see Matt Gaetz, the very Trumpy guy, going to Wyoming to run against Liz Cheney, where Rob Portman, who's a normal human being, a very smart human being, and, frankly, a very good human being, a senator from Ohio, decides to retire, because he can't get anything done.

Then you see — I'm forgetting his name — Madison Cawthorn, a young freshman from — a Republican, who says — he writes an e-mail to his staff saying:  I'm putting all my staff into communications, not into legislation.

And a lot of these Trumpy Republicans, they run for office so they can get on FOX News, not to pass things.

And so what we're seeing is a party that is, as one person said, on fire, and going, in my mind, in the complete opposite direction, which makes life pretty easy for Joe Biden.

Judy Woodruff:  What does it look like from where you are, Jonathan?

Jonathan Capehart:  Well, I — I don't know if it makes life easy for Joe Biden.

Sure, it does if all he wants to do is executive actions.  But in order to make lasting policy change, you have to pass legislation.  And the only way you can pass legislation is if Democrats and Republicans can work with each other to get bills passed out of their chambers and onto his desk to sign.

But when you have, as David described, the intraparty warfare among Republicans, and then with Democrats, you have lots of Democrats who feel unsafe working with some of the Republicans who are there on Capitol Hill, I wonder how anything is going to get done.

I mean, we talk all the time about partisan gridlock in Washington stymieing — being able to govern this nation.  I don't know what to call this now.  I don't know what you call it when American legislators are fighting with each other or fearful of each other.  Where does that leave governing?  Where does that leave the American people in the end?

Judy Woodruff:  David, what's it going to take to fix this?

David Brooks:  Yes, well, I'd like to see an intraparty warfare.

I — the problem is, the normal Republicans are so far just taking this lying down.  They're laying low.  I think they're — some of them are afraid of death threats.  Some of them just don't want to get in the way of the Trump train.

But you look at people like John Thune, you look at people like Susan Collins, you look people like Mitt Romney, who's been a tower of courage, by the way, over the last several months.  Somehow, that wing of the party has got to get itself together, so it can stand against the wing that is very proud and loud right now.

And if we don't have some sort of rivalry over the soul of the party, it's not only the Rob Portmans of the world who are going to leave it.  It's suburban voters.  There are a lot of voters on that side who do not like what happened on January 6, and they're not going to stay for long.

So, the survival of the party depends on the rallying of what we used to think of as normal Republicans.  And so far, they have — they have been — they have stuck their head up here and there, but there's been no rallying, no organization, not much of a caucus.

And so there has to be at least the fight to defend the party.

Judy Woodruff:  In 10 seconds, Jonathan, anything Democrats can do as all this is going on?

Jonathan Capehart:  I have no idea, other than stand back and watch.

(LAUGHTER)

Judy Woodruff:  On that note, Friday night.

Jonathan Capehart, David Brooks, thank you both.

Jonathan Capehart:  Thanks.

David Brooks:  Thank you.

OPINION - Shields and Brooks 6/22/2018

"Shields and Brooks on family separation at the border, remembering Charles Krauthammer" PBS NewsHour 6/22/2018

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join John Yang to discuss the week’s news, including the national uproar over the separation and detention of migrant children and parents at the border and the prospects for immigration reform, plus tributes to conservative commentator Charles Krauthammer.

John Yang (NewsHour):  It has been quite a week in Washington

And here to analyze it all are Shields and Brooks.  That’s syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.

Gentlemen, welcome.

It has been quite a week.  We saw this unusual coalition of opposition to the President’s policy on the border, the President digging in, defending it, and then changing course.

David, what have we learned this week?

(LAUGHTER)

David Brooks, New York Times:  Chaos.

(LAUGHTER)

David Brooks:  Chaos reigns.  If you have an administration — usually, when you go into a White House, you say, well, why didn’t you guys do this?  And they say, well, how exactly would that work?  And they try to walk you through the details.

It seems nobody is asking that question.  And so how we do take kids away from parents?  How do we reunify?  No one is asking the practical questions.  It’s just — this is what you have when you have government by tweet.

What is infuriating about it is, the Republican Party exists for a few reasons.  One of them is to understand that government is at its most abhorrent when it can’t see human beings as human beings, and when it treats them as mere data points or as something in a bureaucratic game.

And that’s what we have seen this whole policy.  It’s not treating the people as the human beings.  It’s treating them as just sort of pawns in some sort of larger protest movement.  And that’s what happens.  When government does that, you get horrific pain and suffering.  And that’s what we’re seeing.

John Yang:  Mark?

Mark Shields, syndicated columnist:  Every administration is inevitably a mirror reflection of the man at the top.

Sadly, in this case, the Republican Party has become a reflection of the man at the top.  It is a combination of malice and incompetence.

It is shameful beyond description.  The idea of separating children, anybody who’s been a parent or a child or a sibling and knows the pain, the inconsolable pain of homesickness when a child is separated from the mother, even sometimes for a brief period, to do this as a matter of policy is unthinkable.

The one bright light to me, quite honestly, in a dark, dark picture has been organized religion speaking up and speaking out, with the exception of some of the President’s most ardent followers in the evangelical community.  Give credit to the Southern Baptists, the Protestant denominations, to Catholic Bishops, across the board.

Cardinal Cupich of Chicago put it so well.  He said, this is not moral, this is not American, this is cruel, and it is a shame on all of us that it is done in our name.

And I just think that’s where it is.  Beyond the political, which I think is a disaster for the Republicans, for the reasons, many of which David has spoken of, is just immeasurable.

John Yang:  But, David, the President seems to want the make this the center point of the midterm election campaign.

David Brooks:  Yes, the Republicans are having a debate.  Normally, you go with your strength.

And the Republicans have a clear advantage.  The country trusts the Republicans on the economy.  And so, on the normal thing, you would play up the economy.

Trump says, no, immigration is going to be our issue.  And the data point that backs him up — I doubt he’s seen this data point — is that if you ask voters what issue is top most on your mind, right now, it’s immigration first and health care second.

And so he can say, listen, the people care about immigration.  I think it’s what his people care about or what he thinks his people care about.  But the broader trend here is worth pointing out, that over the last two years and over the past 10 years, support for immigration in principle has been rising, not falling.

The number of people who say immigrants are good for the country, we should have more immigrants been rising.  The number of people say we have fewer immigrants, that’s been falling.  And so this is not the rise of nativism.  It’s the rise of Donald Trump mobilizing a certain portion of the electorate.

John Yang:  And yet you say the support for immigration is rising, but Congress can’t figure out what to do.  They have punted again this — a vote on a bill in the House.

Mark Shields:  No, it’s actually — David’s right.  It’s 17 years it’s been improving.

In fact, there’s a 6 percent drop just from last year in the Americans who think that we ought to cut immigration.  It’s down to 29 percent, which is a low.  So, Americans really are, if anything, more welcoming, more enlightened, more acknowledging of the value and importance of immigrants to our country.

But, in Congress, it’s been a political failure.  There’s been no public common consensus established on this issue.  It’s been a failure.  President Bush tried.  President George W. Bush tried.  President Obama tried.  They failed.  And President Trump has been like an arsonist in a gasoline station on this issue.

The only people who really want action right now, heading in November, are suburban Republicans, who are in districts where their constituents are more enlightened, more welcoming, more humane on immigration, and oppose the Republican Party.  And they want to see some action to be able to go back.

But there isn’t.  I mean, Democrats have been excluded from the process, and they’re not playing.  And the mainstream Republicans really don’t give a damn.

David Brooks:  Yes.  But it’s interesting.  It’s been a failure on three ways.

And there’s been sort of the ultra-hawkish side on the Republican side who wants to cut legal and illegal immigration and build a wall and all the rest.  There’s another part, we will call them moderate Republicans, though that may be stretching the term, who mostly care about just enforcing the laws and want to give dreamers a path.  And the realities of the people that are here, they want to give them a path to citizenship.

And those two can’t get along, so you can’t get a Republican policy.

And then there is the Democrats, who say, we aren’t going to play at any of these games, because we can’t be getting rid of families, we can’t be building a wall.

And so we have — we have — we’re going to be — in three weeks, we’re going to be exactly where we were today.  And so Andrew Sullivan in “New York Magazine” wrote a piece which I have some sympathy for.  It said, give the guy his wall.  Pay him off.  Build the damn wall.  It will do nothing, but build the wall, and then get a normal policy given the wall.

And somehow there has to be some solution, or else this problem will be exactly the same in two weeks as it was two weeks ago.

(CROSSTALK)

John Yang:  Go ahead.

Mark Shields:  It will be, John.

But I think you have to confront the reality.  This man is a racialist.  He really is.  The language he uses, Donald Trump, three years ago this week, he announced his candidacy.  And you recall what he said.  Mexico doesn’t send us their best.  They’re not our friend.  They send rapists.  They send drug carriers.

I mean, it’s always been.  The Nigerians don’t want to go back to their huts.  They come from the S-hole countries.  It’s always had a racial component.  He doesn’t talk that way about Canada.  He doesn’t talk way about France.  He talks about way about people from the Southern Hemisphere of a different pigmentation.

And I don’t think you can look at any of his statements, whether it’s infecting the country, like we’re talking about lice and vermin.

David Brooks:  Infesting, infesting, yes.

Mark Shields:  Yes, infecting the country.

And so I just — I think — I think this is the breaking point.  I think this is Katrina.  I think this is a defining moment for this Presidency and the American people.

I mean, if you could continue to support Donald Trump on these terms, you’re accepting the fact that he is what he is.

David Brooks:  Yes, I don’t agree.

Just analytically.  I agree with the moral objection, but I suspect there’s a lot of people who are not anti-immigrant, not nativist, they do want to enforce the border.  And they think too many people are coming here for asylum.  And then they think they can get in if they bring kids.

And so, analytically, frankly, I would be surprised if his approval rating went down more than 3 or 4 percentage points over this, if at all.  We will see.

OPINION - Shields and Gerson 5/5/2017

"Shields and Gerson on GOP health care bill fallout, Trump's order on religion" PBS NewsHour 5/5/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Syndicated Columnist Mark Shields and Washington Post columnist Michael Gerson join Hari Sreenivasan to discuss the week's news, including the House of Representatives' passage of a GOP health care bill to repeal and replace Obamacare, and the coming political consequences and an executive order by President Trump easing political restrictions on religious groups.

OPINION - Shields and Brooks 2/10/2017

"Shields and Brooks on immigration ban court defeat, Democrats' confirmation hearing opposition" PBS NewsHour 2/10/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week's news, including the decision by a federal appeals court to deny the Trump administration's request to reinstate an immigration ban, President Trump's comments attacking judges and the contentious battles in the Senate over Cabinet nominees.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Now to the analysis of Shields and Brooks.  That's syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks, who joins us tonight from Chicago.

And we welcome both of you.

So, before we talk about the immigration — the president's immigration order, Mark, which the court, appeals court, rejected the administration argument on last night, we have a short clip of what President Trump has just said a little while ago on Air Force One as he was flying from Washington down to South Florida to Mar-a-Lago.

Reporters were asking him what he plans to do now.

Here's that clip.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP:  We will win that battle.  But we also have a lot of other options, including just filing a brand-new order.

QUESTION:  (OFF-MIKE)

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP:  Could very well be.  But I like to keep you — I would like to surprise you.  We need speed for reasons of security.  So, it could very well be that we do.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  So, Mark, he says, “I like to surprise you.”

How big a setback is this for the president?

MARK SHIELDS, syndicated columnist:  It's a significant setback, Judy, in large part because it was self-inflicted.

They made mistakes, including green card holders, which weakened their argument completely, and made them vulnerable to the court's decision.  And it reflected, more than anything else, a sense of chaos and a sense of incompleteness and a sense of lack of thoughtfulness in the administration on an enormously serious issue.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  David, how do you see it?

DAVID BROOKS, New York Times:  Well, first, on that last clip of Trump on the plane, his staff is briefing reporters in somewhat of a chaotic manner in just the last few minutes.  People are saying, oh, they are going to just take it to the Supreme Court, they're going to rewrite it.

And the two different briefings are contradicting each other.  And that's something The Times reporters have been talking and tweeting about publicly, which is some of the White House staff is in a high state of misery because of the general lack of — chaos.

On the larger issue of the travel ban, our friend Charles Krauthammer of The Washington Post I think put it pretty well.  I'm not sure it's illegal, but it's extremely stupid.

I'm a little uncomfortable with the idea of judges overruling Presidents on national security matters.  Nonetheless, so whether it's unconstitutional or not, I leave to others.  But it certainly has sucked the wind out of two or three weeks of this administration for no good reason.

There has never been evidence that people from these countries are disproportionately likely to commit terrorist acts.  We have sent chaos to the airports.  We have offended the world.  We have derailed the administration.  We have done it in such an incompetent way, the administration has, that people with perfectly legal residence have been widely inconvenienced.

And so it's just been a screw-up from beginning to end, and so it's just been a running derailment.

TRUMP AGENDA - The Travel/Immigration Ban

"How both sides see the legal challenge on Trump's travel ban" PBS NewsHour 2/6/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  A Constitutional showdown is underway over President Trump's controversial executive order on immigration.  In Seattle, a federal judge issued a temporary halt to Trump's travel ban, resulting in an appeal from the Justice Department.  John Yang gets two takes on the legal arguments from Washington state Attorney General Robert Ferguson and Rep. Ted Yoho, R-Fla.

JOHN YANG (NewsHour):  Now to the constitutional showdown over President Trump's executive order on immigration.

For the first of two looks at what's at stake, we are joined first by Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson from Seattle.  It was his suit that led to this weekend's temporary shutdown of the ban.

Attorney General Ferguson, thanks for joining us.

BOB FERGUSON, Washington State Attorney General:  Thanks for having me on.

JOHN YANG:  If you — if the court lifts this ban, lifts the temporary restraining order, will you appeal to the Supreme Court?

BOB FERGUSON:  Well, to be crystal clear, I will use every tool I have to make sure that this unconstitutional executive order doesn't stand.

That said, we're confident the Ninth Circuit will affirm what Judge Robart, who was appointed, of course, by President George W. Bush, will affirm his decision to grant that TRO.

JOHN YANG:  I assume you're anticipating if he does keep it in place that the Justice Department will take it to the Supreme Court.  What's your sense of how your chances would fare on the current court?

BOB FERGUSON:  Well, I feel very confident.

As I mentioned, Judge Robart is a very serious, well-respected judge appointed by President George W. Bush.  And he took the significant step of granting a temporary restraining order.  There's a high hurdle for a lawyer to meet in a courtroom to get a judge to grant a TRO, a temporary restraining order.

So, given that and the fact the Ninth Circuit declined to give an emergency stay a couple nights ago, we feel confident with our case not just at the Ninth Circuit, but frankly all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, if that's what it comes down to.

"Intent of Trump's immigration order questioned in appeals court" PBS NewsHour 2/7/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  A federal appeals court heard arguments on Tuesday whether to override a lower court on President Trump's executive order on refugees and immigration.  How did the attorneys lay out their cases and what's at stake?  Audie Cornish speaks with Marcia Coyle of The National Law Journal.

"Why the 9th Circuit Court rejected Trump's immigration ban appeal" PBS NewsHour 2/9/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  A federal appeals court has refused to reinstate President Trump's immigration order in a unanimous decision on Thursday.  Mr. Trump called it "a political decision" and tweeted, "SEE YOU IN COURT."  Marcia Coyle of The National Law Journal joins Judy Woodruff to offer a recap of what the judges concluded and what's next for the Trump administration's case.

OPINION - Shields and Brooks 2/3/2017

"Shields and Brooks on Democrats' Gorsuch dilemma, refugee ban backlash" PBS NewsHour 2/3/2017

Excerpts

SUMMARY:  Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times Columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week's news, including President Trump's pick of Judge Neil Gorsuch for the Supreme Court, and the tough choice for Democrats on how to respond in light of GOP obstruction on Merrick Garland, plus the controversial refugee and travel ban and more.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Now to the analysis of Shields and Brooks.  That is syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.

Welcome to both of you.  So much to talk about.

David, week two of the Trump administration.

Let's start with his pick for the Supreme Court, federal Judge Neil Gorsuch.

What do you make of him?

DAVID BROOKS, New York Times:  Clearly qualified, first-rate legal scholar, first-rate judge, first-rate mind, apparently a first-rate person.  He's what any — the best any Republican President would have done.  So, I thought a very good pick for Donald Trump.

The Democrats have a challenge.  They can either behave the way the Republicans did to Merrick Garland, which would be disgraceful, but that would blow up the system.  They have a loyalty either — I think a primary loyalty to the Constitution and basically to the norms of how we have done justice constitutional — or justice confirmations for the past many decades.

And that is, if the President picks someone who is basically qualified, basically a good person, then you confirm that person even if you don't agree, because your side lost the election.

Now, I understand the Democratic thinking.  The Republicans didn't behave this way.  But I guess my belief is that two terrible behaviors don't make a good behavior.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  What's your take on Judge Gorsuch?

MARK SHIELDS, syndicated columnist:  Well, Judy, first of all, I agree with David on the assessment of him.

He went to Georgetown Prep, which is a rather exclusive local prep school, then on to Columbia College, and then to Harvard Law School, then to Oxford.

But the Vice President made a point when he was interviewed by you in this show, emphasizing he's a fourth-generation Coloradan, because his resume sounds very much like all the other justices on the Supreme Court.

And as somebody who said that we ought to have somebody on the court who went to night school or went to public school — but, nevertheless, he does seem by temperament — and I will say this.  In an administration that has been marked by total chaos and is unsettling in the way it's behaved and the impulses it's shown by its President, this was the exception.

It was incredibly normal.  They did it well.  The announcement was done well.  He's being — the Sherpa he has on Capitol Hill is former Republican Senator Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, who is well-respected with moderates and Democrats, and Ron Bonjean, who was Trent Lott's adviser and spokesman.



JUDY WOODRUFF:  I do want to get, David, to the executive orders.  They have been coming at us fast and furious just about every day.  But the big one I want to ask you about is the immigration order. It’s created a firestorm.  We just — we announced — we just reported a few minutes ago a couple of federal judges have ruled on it because of legal challenges.

There have been protests.  You have got State Department employees who have signed a letter of dissent.

Is the administration getting off on the right foot or not with this statement?

DAVID BROOKS:  Well, you know, I have been inundated by 18 inches of orders, like we all have over the last couple of weeks, and some of them are good.

I think some of them are completely toothless and symbolic.  But this one on the refuges is the one that’s truly abominable and reprehensible.  We can’t remind people enough that it responds to a problem that does not exist, that refugees in from these countries have killed no one in a terrorist attack.  That’s not where the threat has lain.

It’s from homegrown people.  It’s maybe from other countries.  The 9/11 people were from Saudi Arabia and some other places.  And so it’s a response to nothing.

And so you have to think that it’s just an outgrowth of nativism.  And there has been a whiff of nativism, to put it politely, in a lot of the measures that this administration has done.  And it has offended our career people in the State Department.  It has offended our allies.  It has offended a lot of people around the world, for no good effect.

Usually, when there’s some policy, there are pros and cons.  There are literally no pros to this one.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  Any good effect?

MARK SHIELDS:  No good effect.

And both the President and his Vice President made the mistake of referring to it as a ban, then tried to — Muslim ban — then tried to walk it back.  No.

And, Judy, the irony is, in a week where the President says he wants to unleash churches politically from being hobbled, and goes to the National Prayer Breakfast, I mean, forgotten is the message of Christ, that — how you treat the stranger among you.  Whatever you do for the least of these, that of Moses, that you shall not oppress an alien, because you yourselves have been aliens.

This has been the hallmark, this has been the defining value of the United States.  We had six Nobel Prize winners American last year.  All six were immigrants.  Immigrants have been the sustenance and the survival and the treasure of this country.

And Donald Trump is appealing, as he did during the campaign, to the basest, the most selfish and the most literally un-American of instincts.

OPINION - Shields and Brooks 1/27/2017

"Shields and Brooks on Trump's first week, the future of ‘alternative facts'" PBS NewsHour 1/27/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  From Mexico to Russia, pipelines to refugees, President Trump had a busy first week of work.  Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week's news, including an assessment of the President's executive actions and willingness to pick fights, the White House opposition against the media and whether the GOP will assert independence.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  From executive actions to early morning tweets, the first week of the Trump administration has been marked by a flurry of twists and turns.

To help make sense of it all, the analysis of Shields and Brooks.  That's syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.

And welcome to both of you.

And I guess you could say, Mark, from Mexico to Russia, from oil pipelines to health care, it has not been a quiet first week.  How's it gone?

MARK SHIELDS, syndicated columnist:  Well, if you're a Trump supporter, it's gone terrific.

He's done what he said he was going to do.  He was — honored his campaign commitments on the wall, on keeping the borders secure, or safe, or limited, and stopping immigration as much as possible, and building the pipeline and going ahead.  I mean, so, in that sense, he didn't lose any support among his supporters.

Among his critics, I think whose doubts were very much, in large part not simply ideological, but about the temperament of Donald Trump, it's reinforced those doubts, his performance, especially the smallness of his preoccupation about the size of the crowd, which he keeps returning to in a rather bizarre fashion.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  How do you see this first week, David?

DAVID BROOKS, New York Times:  We were here a week ago together, and it feels like a century.

And I wonder, over the course of his Presidency, can he keep up this pace of news and busyness and conflict without just exhausting everybody?

And I will say, among business people I have spoken to, among political class, and among the Republicans on the Hill, just a great sense of being unnerved, unnerved at the instability.

Partly, he's done what he said, as Mark said.  He's undermined the post-war international order pretty quickly.  Tearing down TPP was a bill that I think economists say would have produced hundreds of millions — billions of dollars of earnings every year for Americans.

Picking a fight with our second biggest export market, very unnerving.  I don't see the — but then I think the two other things I would say is, the general sense of chaos and incompetence on how you do it.

OK, you want to pick a fight with Mexico.  Do you have to do it by tweet?  Do you have put forward a proposal that would have Americans paying for the wall, and then sort of withdraw it, and then sort of not withdraw it, do in a way maximally designed to polarize Mexican opinion against the United States?

And then the final thing is, I wonder, I'm left wondering, how much of this is real?  OK, he signs a series of papers that Steve Bannon and others wrote for him, but who is going to implement it?  Does it make any sense?  We saw that with the Syrian ban in the discussion earlier in the program.

U.S. SUPREME COURT - Two Politically Charged Decisions

"Busy day at SCOTUS yields support for affirmative action, roadblock for executive orders" PBS NewsHour 6/23/2016

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  The reduced Supreme Court weighed in on two politically charged cases Thursday.  Justices confirmed the constitutionality of a college affirmative action program, but deadlocked on President Obama's executive action protecting millions of unauthorized immigrants from deportation -- thus nullifying the order.  Judy Woodruff talks to Marcia Coyle of The National Law Journal about the day in court.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  We return to the big day at the Supreme Court.  A split on immigration puts millions in limbo.  And justices uphold affirmative action.

We dig into both cases now with “NewsHour” regular Marcia Coyle, chief Washington correspondent of “The National Law Journal.”

Marcia.

MARCIA COYLE, The National Law Journal:  Judy.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  We know we need you here on days like this, especially on days like this.

(LAUGHTER)

JUDY WOODRUFF:  Let's talk about the affirmative action case first.

MARCIA COYLE:  OK.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  What was it that the University of Texas case was about?

MARCIA COYLE:  Well, actually, this was the second time the Supreme Court had looked at how the University of Texas uses race as a factor in its admissions policy.

Back in 2013, the case came to the Supreme Court by Abigail Fisher, a student who was denied admission to the university in 2008.  And she claimed that the use of race as factor was why she was denied admission and that it violated the Constitution.

The Supreme Court, in 2013, led by Justice Kennedy, a 7-1 court, sent it back to the lower federal court, saying, you gave too much deference to the university's explanation.  You have to give the toughest scrutiny we have under the Constitution, and the university has shown — has to show there are no workable race-neutral alternatives.

Well, that lower federal appellate court held hearings, briefings, upheld the plan again.  It came back to the Supreme Court.  Abigail Fisher brought it back with a conservative organization that had backed her from the beginning.  And the Supreme Court today, in a surprising 4-3 decision, upheld the university's use of race, as Justice Kennedy said, a factor of factor of a factor.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  Why do you say surprising?

MARCIA COYLE:  He had never voted to uphold an affirmative action plan, although he had written and spoken about the importance of diversity in higher education.  So, he did believe that it was an important, compelling interest to have a diverse student body.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  Now, this was — there were some really strong opinions voiced here.  Justice Alito wrote, this is affirmative action gone wild?

MARCIA COYLE:  Gone berserk, that's what he said.

"Experts weigh in on the validity of Obama's immigration executive action" PBS NewsHour 6/23/2016

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  The Supreme Court's deadlock on President Obama's executive action preventing deportation of unauthorized immigrants represents the latest blow to the administration's attempts at immigration reform.  For more on the cases for and against the President's initiative, Judy Woodruff talks to Angela Maria Kelley of the Center for American Progress and Jon Feere of the Center for Immigration studies.

U.S. SUPREME COURT - Obama's Immigration Executive Action

"Fate of Obama’s immigration actions goes to Supreme Court" PBS NewsHour 1/19/2016

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  The Supreme Court will consider whether President Obama overstepped his authority by deferring deportation and securing work rights for 4 million undocumented immigrants, an action opposed by 26 states.  Marcia Coyle of The National Law Journal offers background, while Judy Woodruff gets views from the Immigration Law Center’s Marielena Hincapie and Josh Blackman of the South Texas College of Law.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  It’s official, the Supreme Court will hear a case this term that could decide the fate of one of President Obama’s major immigration moves.  It would defer deportation for more than four million undocumented immigrants and permit them to work legally in the U.S.

Lower courts have sided with the 26 states that sued the federal government over the program, and those courts have put the program on ice for now.

But the White House said today the administration is confident the high court will rule in its favor.

JOSH EARNEST, White House Press Secretary:  The kinds of executive actions that the president took a little over a year ago now to try to bring some much-needed reforms and greater accountability to our broken immigration system were clearly consistent with the precedent that was established by other Presidents, and clearly within the confines of his authority as President of the United States.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  But that is the issue that 26 states dispute.  Texas is one of those states, and its attorney general, Ken Paxton, said today in a statement — quote — “There are limits to the President’s authority, and those limits enacted by Congress were exceeded when the President unilaterally sought to grant lawful presence to more than four million unauthorized aliens who are in this country unlawfully.”

For more on the case, we turn to our regular, Marcia Coyle of “The National Law Journal.”

And, Marcia, welcome.

MARCIA COYLE, The National Law Journal:  Judy, thank you.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  So, some background first.  This order the President made has been challenged almost from the very beginning, hasn’t it?

MARCIA COYLE:  It was.

The executive action came in November of 2014.  Less than a month later, 26 Republican-led states challenged it in federal district court.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  And what was the basis?

MARCIA COYLE:  The states are making a number of claims here.  One, they claim that the action violates the take care clause of the federal Constitution.  That’s in Article 2, Section 3 of the Constitution.  And it says the President must enforce — I’m sorry — must faithfully enforce the laws.

They also claim that his action is arbitrary and capricious, his action violates the notice and public comment requirement of the Administrative Procedure Act.  That’s a law that governs how agencies go about making rules and regulations.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  Well, we know the justices don’t ever, I guess, give a reason for taking up a case, but why is it thought that they’re doing this?

MARCIA COYLE:  Well, I think it was understood that they probably would take this case.  You have a federal court, a federal appellate court blocking a major federal government program.

The top lawyer for the administration in the Supreme Court, the Solicitor General of the United States, went to the Supreme Court after the injunction was issued and said, please take this case and resolve these legal questions.

And I think it was a given that the court would step into it.