January 29, 2025 • 25 mins
KFI News White House correspondent Jon Decker joins the show to speak on Trump’s new press secretary. Judge temporarily blocks part of Trump administration’s plans to freeze federal aid. EPA’s plan to truck Eaton Fire debris to a park spurs strong backlash. RFK Jr. expected to face tough questions during conformation hearing today.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Bill Handle on demand from KFI AM
six forty KFI.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
AM six forty as we are broadcasting here six to
nine o'clock every morning. A couple of big stories that
were covering the president planned freeze all federal aid, all
federal aid, no more techs has run in its first
challenge federal judge temporary blocking the order until February.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Third at least.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
And now God bless Google and God bless the President
because it is the Gulf of America and it is
Mount McKinley again. John Decker, who is kfi's White House correspondent,
was in the press room yesterday when Caroline Levitt held
their first briefing White House Press Secretary, and he even
(00:56):
was able to ask a question, So, John, would you
think you've.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Been covering Washington for a long time? Give her a grade?
And I'd like to know what your impression is.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Well, I actually teach at Georgetown University, and I'm notoriously
a very easy grater. I tell you that, right off
the top, I give her a n A. I thought
that she was incredibly poised. She took questions for forty
seven minutes from a variety of news organizations. It doesn't
surprise me. Caroline worked in the first Trump administration. She
(01:29):
was the spokesperson for the Trump campaign, so she's had
this experience of being in there taking the tough questions
from reporters. And I thought she had a terrific first
day out of the box as the White House Press secretary.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
How adversarial was the press to her.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
I've seen worse, you know. I mean, generally, I think
you want to avoid that, and I thought that her
tone was perfect. Her job is defending her boss, President Trump.
That's always the job of any White House Press secretary
is speaking on behalf of the President of the United States.
It's also conveying truthful information to the public, and I
(02:12):
think that the first day she did just that. And
I think we'll see more of that now. If she's
pushed she I know, Caroline, she's going to push back.
We saw little of that yesterday, with potentially a little
bit of contentiousness between Caroline and the NBC correspondent Peter Alexander.
But that was it, you know, as far as that
(02:35):
type of tone that we saw in the White House
Press briefing room yesterday.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Now, how much influence I know You've covered what seventeen
press secretaries. Some have a lot of influence on the presidency,
some have virtually none. Case in point, Donald Trump with
the communications the Comms.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Director having almost no influence.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Because Donald Trump is his own communication as director. And
that's not to say that he hasn't gotten good ones.
It's just that that you don't tell Donald Trump what
to say and what not to say. The day's message
doesn't really have a lot of influence.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
So how do you see her role and her influence
on this administration?
Speaker 3 (03:21):
The job of a White House press secretary, I admit this,
it's never to make news. You never want to put
something out there that gets in front of the president
in any way. In fact, today there's just one event
on President Trump's schedule. There's no press briefing. The one
event will take place in the East Room at the
(03:41):
White House, and that's signing the Lake and Riley Act,
and that will be the first piece of legislation that
President Trump will sign in this second term as president.
But you know, I think Caroline understands what her role is.
We saw a little bit of that yesterday. She quoted
what Donald Trump has said over the course of the
past week areas settings, and I think that that's essentially
(04:03):
what she intends to do, making certain that she doesn't
step on the toes of the person that she speaks for.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
Oh, that's fair, and so you are let me get this,
let me get this correctly. You're going to put her
at sort of the top of the list. There have
been terrible ones. Sean Spicer, for example, who is god
awful as a press secretary? If I remember, you had
to stand on a bunch of what do you call
it the stepstools to even get over the lectern. And
(04:32):
let's talk about the press secretaries that you have.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
You have experience. Who's good, who's bad? Some of the
big ones. I'm just curious.
Speaker 3 (04:42):
Well, I don't talk about the bad ones. You just
did it for me, so I don't need to go there.
I think that the standard for me on the Republican
side was Tony Snow. Tony Snow represented George W. Bush
during his two terms in the White House that he
served for a number of years. Tony unfortunately passed away,
but he was terrific. He was a former journalist, so
(05:04):
he understood the needs of journalists and worked very well
with us and the gold standard as far as a
Democratic press secretary, someone whose name you may not recall,
but it's Mike McCurry who was press secretary for Bill Clinton.
He was the press secretary when the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke,
and boy, he handled his job extremely well during that
(05:27):
period of time, So I put him on the top
of the list for Democratic press secretaries.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Now, the press room is actually very small, and people
who were watching it on team really don't know that.
So they're relatively few reporters allowed in there, and that
are given credentials.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
Why you, well, let me correct the record. Any individual
who's a journalist from anywhere in the country can apply
for a day pass and come into the White House
complex and attend the White House Press briefing. That's always
been the case. It was the case with Joe Biden,
It's going to be the case with Donald Trump two
point zero now that he's back in the White House.
(06:06):
I have what's called a hard pass, and that means
I've gone through a background check by the Secret Service.
I've covered the White House since nineteen ninety five, and
for those reasons, that's the reason why I have a
hard pass, which allows me to come and go into
the White House complex anytime of day. I mean, with
(06:26):
ridden reason, I'm not going to be there, you know,
at two in the morning. But I can come and
go to the White House complex throughout the day without
having to worry about having a day passed. And that's
the advantage of having that hard pass that you know,
those who've covered the White House for a while also have.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
And what are the rules of the questions that are asked?
You know, do you get more than others? I'm assuming
CNN gets fewer than let's say, a Fox or a
conservative paper.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Is that true?
Speaker 3 (06:59):
Well, let me explain. You know, every administration's different, so
you know, this is a new administration. And if I
were to I'm just doing this based upon what happened yesterday.
If I were to time out the amount of time
that CNN's correspondent had to ask questions of Caroline, it
was probably the same amount of time that Fox's White
(07:19):
House correspondent used to question Caroline. Right, you know, I
asked two questions of Caroline yesterday, and I typically keep
it at that. I don't like the step on the
toes of my colleagues that also would like to get
a question in there, and to me, if you ask
more than three, I think it's rude personally to the
other correspondence in that briefing room.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
Okay, So, based on yesterday, you're looking at an administration
that's pretty fair in the press room, and hopefully that
continues on and is willing to take questions. I'm assuming
that the liberal press asks a lot more biting questions
of the president. That's my last question. I won't ask
another one because it's wrong.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
Well, we'll see. We're basing this all, you know, in
terms of the Trump administration, all based upon one briefing
and you know, I think that what you should aim
for if you're in the White House press briefing room,
and I've done this since Bill Clinton's first term, is
to ask those tough but fair questions to the press secretary,
(08:21):
regardless of if regardless of whether they are representing a
Democratic president or a Republican president. If you stick to that,
then I think you're doing your job.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
All right, John, thank you.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
We're going to have you on tons and tons over
the next certainly four years and probably beyond that and
to the next administration. Take care, John, Thank you very much.
White House News corresponding, Okay, so.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
What happened yesterday?
Speaker 2 (08:50):
There were there was an order, a directive from the
White House freezing all the money, all federal dollars, trillions
of federal spending dollars, and the agencies and the nonprofits
who receive money, individuals who receive money from.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
The federal government food stamps for example, didn't know what
to do. What does this mean?
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Two things about President Trump. One is he promised to
redo the government. He said when I get into power,
I am going to do some pretty extraordinary things with
the federal government because it is wasteful, it is full
of fraud, it is too big, it is just too fat.
(09:39):
And that's exactly what he has done. Again, I will
say over and over again, he was elected to do
certain things and he's doing exactly what he promised to do.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
Look at immigration. Okay.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
With that being said, this is a man who shoots
from the hip a lot, and that's just his personality.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Wakes up in the morning and he goes, you know what,
I think I'm going to do this. And in this case,
this took everybody for a loop.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
By the way, Republican senators and congress people, a lot
of people in the administration. Wow, all of a sudden,
freezing everything. Now, it's not halting everything temporarily, it is
because the administration wants to take a look at it,
I think for ninety days. But there are people that
(10:25):
have to eat, There is medicaid, there are bills to
be paid, salaries to be paid to the nonprofits and
various agency employees.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
I mean, it is a problem. So it ended up happening.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Lawsuits hit immediately, I mean didn't take long for the
lawsuits to hit. And one of the lawsuits not only
questioning the president's ability to do this because one of
the things he has done, Congress has already passed the funding.
There is money in the pipeline, and the president is saying,
I don't care. I don't care what Congress says or does.
(11:04):
I can stop it by directive. That is one question
is the president exceeding his powers under the constitution.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
And the other question is how quickly this can go?
Speaker 2 (11:18):
And so one of many lawsuits in front of a
federal judge or many federal judges files saying, wait a minute,
we can't do it this quickly, this is crazy, And
federal judge did exactly that. He stopped it temporary blocked
the order until February third, giving the administration time to
figure it out. Because after the first memo, a few
(11:41):
hours later, there's another memo saying, wait a minute, here's
what we really meant, and we didn't mean people directly affected,
in other words, direct aid to people.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
Except what is direct aid? We don't know what that is.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
The vast majority of money doesn't go directly to individuals.
It goes to the nonprofits, It goes to the state agencies.
Most of the money that when we talk about childcare
and funding for poor kids, supplementing the school districts, lunches,
(12:18):
free lunches for poor people, that's not paid from the
federal government directly.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
That goes to the states.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
And it seems what the White House is doing is
saying direct money from the government that'll be paid. But
I guess third party read school boards, read lunch programs,
I mean the people that actually make the lunches. Now,
is that direct help to the kids?
Speaker 3 (12:48):
You know?
Speaker 2 (12:49):
No one knows at this point. No one knows. And
now we're back to shooting from the hip. Usually when
you have a directive, it's pretty well thought out. I mean,
there are advisors that come in and they talk about
the consequences, the unintended and intended consequences of what's going
to happen. And you're not going to see that in
(13:11):
the Trump administration. Again, a president who shoots from the
hip and was elected to just go crazy in the
sense that he was elected to not only disrupt but
dismantle a lot of the federal government. Why because of waste,
because of overreaching, because people don't trust the government anymore,
(13:32):
and they trust Trump to undo what the government is about.
They just don't trust it. And what the President says
is trust me. I will be your spokesperson. I'm on
your side. I'm not on the side of.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
The deep state. And people believed it.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
I still think they do. He is following what he
said exactly. He's just doing it really quickly. I mean,
how many days are we into his presidency and look
what he has done starting day one.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
He did exactly what he said day one.
Speaker 2 (14:13):
Who Okay, by the way, it's eight fifty or eight thirty.
I'm going to do a topic in which this week
I'm saying, starting yesterday over the weekend, what the president
has said, what he is going to do and the reaction.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
And it's not small stuff either.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Okay, the debris of the Palisades fire and the Eaton fire.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
What do they do with it?
Speaker 2 (14:40):
Because if you look at the video, you look at
the photos, My god, it is full of debris. When
these houses were burned down to the foundation, there is
more stuff there right than you can imagine.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
So they have to clean out the debris. Where do
they put it? Where do put it? Well, here's what.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
The EPA is doing with the Eton fire, the Palisades
fire not quite yet. What they're going to do is
open up a site to process the debris. And of
course swift backlash. Local leaders why because of the toxic waste.
So you got Duarde, Zuza, Irwindale, Baldwin Park all announced
(15:22):
joint opposition to the plan.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
EPA plan to use.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Lario Park for the hazardous household debris from the fire,
including lithium ion batteries used in electric vehicles.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
That's kind of fun.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
And this area is an unincorporated area of the county
adjacent to these four cities and is slated to begin
receiving this debris early next week. And the city leaders say,
we're pretty upset about the potential dangers which are plenty.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
And they weren't even consulted.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Well, it's not their call, it's not their city, it's
the county and the fact that it's right next to
their city.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Okay, they're a little upset.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
The EPA designated Lario Park as this processing site and
they're already preparing the site to begin accepting the waste.
Now what is the EPA saying, Well, we're taking control
to We're going to control spills around the area. The
debris will be processed once the site is open. Debris
(16:30):
will be brought in daily and then processed into various
different waste streams and then package for shipment. I don't
know where they're going to send it and sent out.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
To be deposed. Well, it's going to go into another area.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
And a similar processing site for the Palisades Degree is
actually been planned for six acre parcel land east of
the Pacific Coast Highway near to paying A Canyon, where
there are plenty of insanely expensive homes. No or not,
they all got burnt, so no one can complain at
that point. LA County Supervisor Hilda Solice, who represents these communities,
(17:09):
said she was deeply concerned by the health and environmental
risk posed by this site. Oh it's a nimby, not
in my backyard. Go ahead and do it, just not
next to me. And she said the removal of these
materials should not come at the cost of creating a
toxic environment for communities already disproportionately impacted by pollution. Well,
(17:34):
they're right next to the fire, they're right next to
the debris field. They're going to be impacted, come hell
or high water. They got to go someplace. They're not
going to go in ease with these sites. So you
have unincorporated areas of the county that is allowing the
EPA to do something with this debris, this toxic debris.
(17:58):
So trucks transporting this debris will use back roads, will
not go along the two ten freeway.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Once the material is processed, I don't even know what
that means.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
Trucks approved by the state Department of Transportation will then
transport the materials to permanent disposal sites, facilities which have
no idea. Now, this particular parcel is in an unincorporated
area of the county, but it is owned by the
US Army Corps of Engineer. I didn't even know they
(18:32):
owned land. I guess they do, and they'll work alongside
the EPA to run this facility. And do you remember superfunds?
Superfund sites that were extraordinarily toxic. We're talking about factories
(18:54):
that processed metals, for example, where the waste when into
the ground, it cannot be used at all. Some gas stations,
for example, over forty years, had leakage of oil where
there can be and they shut down either sold or
they can't be sold because you can't build on those areas.
(19:15):
You just can't because there's no so much toxicity in
the soil. So that's why they created the superfunds to
clean those areas up. By the way, do you think
all those areas have been cleaned up across the United States?
And we haven't heard much about what's going on with
those superfund sites or ordering to hear a lot about
(19:36):
what's going on with this debris. And then the cost
of removing this debris. Now the government is willing to
do it, but all a homeowner, a business owner, property
owner has to do is sign up and the government
will get to it at some point. Don't know when
(19:56):
or if someone wants to rebuild their house or rebuild
their commercial builduilding, they can remove the debris themselves part
of building costs. I got to tell you, this thing
is a mess with this fire has not only caused
the destruction of so many homes, so many businesses, to
the utter devastation of homeowners and business owners and people
(20:19):
who lived and work in that area. But the aftermath,
what do you do with the stuff that's left over?
Speaker 1 (20:29):
It is a mess.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Okay, Today Robert Kennedy Junior is now facing questions. He's
in front of a Senate paddle who is going to
suggest to the House whether or not to vote further
to vote to be Secretary of Health and Human Services.
It's a cabinet post which, let me give you an
(20:51):
idea of how important this is. It has a budget
of over one hundred billion dollars. It oversees he's the
health of our entire country. I mean, it is massive,
the different agencies and President Trump nominated him. Why it
has nothing to do with the fact that he has
(21:12):
vast experience in health and human services as in zero
he's never run an agency of any kind. It's because
he switched from being a presidential candidate, of course, to
being a supporter of Donald Trump and if you're a supporter,
you get great jobs.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
So let me tell you a little bit about how
it works.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
You would think if you go in front of a panel,
and I've gone in front of various panels, not a
senator a certainly not a congressional panel. But you know
I answer questions. They throw me questions, I answer them.
Not when you're going in front of a going for
a cabinet position. First of all, the nominee does the
dog and pony show and goes to every senator that
(21:55):
will see him, and sits down, has private conversations, have
any questions, well, and let me tell.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
You why you should vote.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
Then, prior to going in front of the committee, it's
almost like doing a how do I. It's like preparing
for a state of the Union or a debate, a
presidential debate where they have people throwing questions, where your
(22:25):
own people, your own.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
Team, throwing everything at you. How are you going to answer?
Speaker 2 (22:29):
And you have the experts, and you have the analysts,
and you have the advisors who help you do this.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
It's all rehearsed. You don't know what the questions are,
but you anticipate every question, and then you go for
a vote.
Speaker 2 (22:44):
Now, so far, every nominee has been confirmed, and it
doesn't matter the experience because Donald Trump controls the Republican Senate.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
It's that simple. Is he going to make it? Is
Robert Kennedy going to make it?
Speaker 2 (22:58):
Yeah? I'm guessing yes, even though Carolyn Kennedy, his cousin,
has said this guy is a predator.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
He is a sleezeball.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
When he was in college, his dorm was the center
of drug use. He has admitted and he pled guilty
to having heroin and or the heroin or cocaine and
bringing it on an airplane.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
It's pretty bad.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
He praised on the desperation of parents of sick children
addicted to attention and power. And here's something that the accusation,
which I thought was the most important one. He has
a reputation of being anti vaccine. We know that he
has vaccinated his children, and he tells parents, don't vaccinate
your kids. What he did Samoa, for example, he went
(23:58):
ahead and said don't vaccinate your kids.
Speaker 1 (24:01):
Samoa went ahead and did that.
Speaker 2 (24:02):
There was a measle outbreak that killed a bunch of
kids and people got very sick. Now he has backtracked
and said, wait a minute. I'm not against vaccines. I
just want to study vaccines to see if there is
efficacy there, well, like polio vaccines that he.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
Has talked about. By the way polio.
Speaker 2 (24:24):
Vaccines came out in nineteen fifty three, you think they've
studied them enough. Mitch McConnell, who is going to go
is going to vote no to Robert Kennedy. I am
sure why. He's a survivor of polio and a big
fan of vaccines. So you'll see Robert Kennedy coming back
(24:44):
and just say, wow, I really didn't mean that, And
what I really meant is we have to do more studies.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
Well we don't.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
I mean, if you're talking about studies of vaccines that
have been used by the.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Entire world for eighty years.
Speaker 2 (25:02):
And millions upon millions of kids have been saved from polio.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
Now we got to study it more. We don't know
enough about it.
Speaker 2 (25:12):
Head of Health and Human Services cabinet level position, and
because of the control of the Republican Senate, I'm.
Speaker 1 (25:23):
Guessing he's going to be confirmed. Just guessing.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
If I were a betting man, I would bet yes.
This is KFI AM six forty. You've been listening to
the Bill Handle Show, Catch My Show Monday through Friday
six am to nine am, and anytime on demand on
the iHeartRadio app
You're listening to Bill Handle on demand from KFI AM
six forty KFI.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
AM six forty as we are broadcasting here six to
nine o'clock every morning. A couple of big stories that
were covering the president planned freeze all federal aid, all
federal aid, no more techs has run in its first
challenge federal judge temporary blocking the order until February.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Third at least.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
And now God bless Google and God bless the President
because it is the Gulf of America and it is
Mount McKinley again. John Decker, who is kfi's White House correspondent,
was in the press room yesterday when Caroline Levitt held
their first briefing White House Press Secretary, and he even
(00:56):
was able to ask a question, So, John, would you
think you've.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Been covering Washington for a long time? Give her a grade?
And I'd like to know what your impression is.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Well, I actually teach at Georgetown University, and I'm notoriously
a very easy grater. I tell you that, right off
the top, I give her a n A. I thought
that she was incredibly poised. She took questions for forty
seven minutes from a variety of news organizations. It doesn't
surprise me. Caroline worked in the first Trump administration. She
(01:29):
was the spokesperson for the Trump campaign, so she's had
this experience of being in there taking the tough questions
from reporters. And I thought she had a terrific first
day out of the box as the White House Press secretary.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
How adversarial was the press to her.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
I've seen worse, you know. I mean, generally, I think
you want to avoid that, and I thought that her
tone was perfect. Her job is defending her boss, President Trump.
That's always the job of any White House Press secretary
is speaking on behalf of the President of the United States.
It's also conveying truthful information to the public, and I
(02:12):
think that the first day she did just that. And
I think we'll see more of that now. If she's
pushed she I know, Caroline, she's going to push back.
We saw little of that yesterday, with potentially a little
bit of contentiousness between Caroline and the NBC correspondent Peter Alexander.
But that was it, you know, as far as that
(02:35):
type of tone that we saw in the White House
Press briefing room yesterday.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Now, how much influence I know You've covered what seventeen
press secretaries. Some have a lot of influence on the presidency,
some have virtually none. Case in point, Donald Trump with
the communications the Comms.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Director having almost no influence.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Because Donald Trump is his own communication as director. And
that's not to say that he hasn't gotten good ones.
It's just that that you don't tell Donald Trump what
to say and what not to say. The day's message
doesn't really have a lot of influence.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
So how do you see her role and her influence
on this administration?
Speaker 3 (03:21):
The job of a White House press secretary, I admit this,
it's never to make news. You never want to put
something out there that gets in front of the president
in any way. In fact, today there's just one event
on President Trump's schedule. There's no press briefing. The one
event will take place in the East Room at the
(03:41):
White House, and that's signing the Lake and Riley Act,
and that will be the first piece of legislation that
President Trump will sign in this second term as president.
But you know, I think Caroline understands what her role is.
We saw a little bit of that yesterday. She quoted
what Donald Trump has said over the course of the
past week areas settings, and I think that that's essentially
(04:03):
what she intends to do, making certain that she doesn't
step on the toes of the person that she speaks for.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
Oh, that's fair, and so you are let me get this,
let me get this correctly. You're going to put her
at sort of the top of the list. There have
been terrible ones. Sean Spicer, for example, who is god
awful as a press secretary? If I remember, you had
to stand on a bunch of what do you call
it the stepstools to even get over the lectern. And
(04:32):
let's talk about the press secretaries that you have.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
You have experience. Who's good, who's bad? Some of the
big ones. I'm just curious.
Speaker 3 (04:42):
Well, I don't talk about the bad ones. You just
did it for me, so I don't need to go there.
I think that the standard for me on the Republican
side was Tony Snow. Tony Snow represented George W. Bush
during his two terms in the White House that he
served for a number of years. Tony unfortunately passed away,
but he was terrific. He was a former journalist, so
(05:04):
he understood the needs of journalists and worked very well
with us and the gold standard as far as a
Democratic press secretary, someone whose name you may not recall,
but it's Mike McCurry who was press secretary for Bill Clinton.
He was the press secretary when the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke,
and boy, he handled his job extremely well during that
(05:27):
period of time, So I put him on the top
of the list for Democratic press secretaries.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Now, the press room is actually very small, and people
who were watching it on team really don't know that.
So they're relatively few reporters allowed in there, and that
are given credentials.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
Why you, well, let me correct the record. Any individual
who's a journalist from anywhere in the country can apply
for a day pass and come into the White House
complex and attend the White House Press briefing. That's always
been the case. It was the case with Joe Biden,
It's going to be the case with Donald Trump two
point zero now that he's back in the White House.
(06:06):
I have what's called a hard pass, and that means
I've gone through a background check by the Secret Service.
I've covered the White House since nineteen ninety five, and
for those reasons, that's the reason why I have a
hard pass, which allows me to come and go into
the White House complex anytime of day. I mean, with
(06:26):
ridden reason, I'm not going to be there, you know,
at two in the morning. But I can come and
go to the White House complex throughout the day without
having to worry about having a day passed. And that's
the advantage of having that hard pass that you know,
those who've covered the White House for a while also have.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
And what are the rules of the questions that are asked?
You know, do you get more than others? I'm assuming
CNN gets fewer than let's say, a Fox or a
conservative paper.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Is that true?
Speaker 3 (06:59):
Well, let me explain. You know, every administration's different, so
you know, this is a new administration. And if I
were to I'm just doing this based upon what happened yesterday.
If I were to time out the amount of time
that CNN's correspondent had to ask questions of Caroline, it
was probably the same amount of time that Fox's White
(07:19):
House correspondent used to question Caroline. Right, you know, I
asked two questions of Caroline yesterday, and I typically keep
it at that. I don't like the step on the
toes of my colleagues that also would like to get
a question in there, and to me, if you ask
more than three, I think it's rude personally to the
other correspondence in that briefing room.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
Okay, So, based on yesterday, you're looking at an administration
that's pretty fair in the press room, and hopefully that
continues on and is willing to take questions. I'm assuming
that the liberal press asks a lot more biting questions
of the president. That's my last question. I won't ask
another one because it's wrong.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
Well, we'll see. We're basing this all, you know, in
terms of the Trump administration, all based upon one briefing
and you know, I think that what you should aim
for if you're in the White House press briefing room,
and I've done this since Bill Clinton's first term, is
to ask those tough but fair questions to the press secretary,
(08:21):
regardless of if regardless of whether they are representing a
Democratic president or a Republican president. If you stick to that,
then I think you're doing your job.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
All right, John, thank you.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
We're going to have you on tons and tons over
the next certainly four years and probably beyond that and
to the next administration. Take care, John, Thank you very much.
White House News corresponding, Okay, so.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
What happened yesterday?
Speaker 2 (08:50):
There were there was an order, a directive from the
White House freezing all the money, all federal dollars, trillions
of federal spending dollars, and the agencies and the nonprofits
who receive money, individuals who receive money from.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
The federal government food stamps for example, didn't know what
to do. What does this mean?
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Two things about President Trump. One is he promised to
redo the government. He said when I get into power,
I am going to do some pretty extraordinary things with
the federal government because it is wasteful, it is full
of fraud, it is too big, it is just too fat.
(09:39):
And that's exactly what he has done. Again, I will
say over and over again, he was elected to do
certain things and he's doing exactly what he promised to do.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
Look at immigration. Okay.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
With that being said, this is a man who shoots
from the hip a lot, and that's just his personality.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Wakes up in the morning and he goes, you know what,
I think I'm going to do this. And in this case,
this took everybody for a loop.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
By the way, Republican senators and congress people, a lot
of people in the administration. Wow, all of a sudden,
freezing everything. Now, it's not halting everything temporarily, it is
because the administration wants to take a look at it,
I think for ninety days. But there are people that
(10:25):
have to eat, There is medicaid, there are bills to
be paid, salaries to be paid to the nonprofits and
various agency employees.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
I mean, it is a problem. So it ended up happening.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Lawsuits hit immediately, I mean didn't take long for the
lawsuits to hit. And one of the lawsuits not only
questioning the president's ability to do this because one of
the things he has done, Congress has already passed the funding.
There is money in the pipeline, and the president is saying,
I don't care. I don't care what Congress says or does.
(11:04):
I can stop it by directive. That is one question
is the president exceeding his powers under the constitution.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
And the other question is how quickly this can go?
Speaker 2 (11:18):
And so one of many lawsuits in front of a
federal judge or many federal judges files saying, wait a minute,
we can't do it this quickly, this is crazy, And
federal judge did exactly that. He stopped it temporary blocked
the order until February third, giving the administration time to
figure it out. Because after the first memo, a few
(11:41):
hours later, there's another memo saying, wait a minute, here's
what we really meant, and we didn't mean people directly affected,
in other words, direct aid to people.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
Except what is direct aid? We don't know what that is.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
The vast majority of money doesn't go directly to individuals.
It goes to the nonprofits, It goes to the state agencies.
Most of the money that when we talk about childcare
and funding for poor kids, supplementing the school districts, lunches,
(12:18):
free lunches for poor people, that's not paid from the
federal government directly.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
That goes to the states.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
And it seems what the White House is doing is
saying direct money from the government that'll be paid. But
I guess third party read school boards, read lunch programs,
I mean the people that actually make the lunches. Now,
is that direct help to the kids?
Speaker 3 (12:48):
You know?
Speaker 2 (12:49):
No one knows at this point. No one knows. And
now we're back to shooting from the hip. Usually when
you have a directive, it's pretty well thought out. I mean,
there are advisors that come in and they talk about
the consequences, the unintended and intended consequences of what's going
to happen. And you're not going to see that in
(13:11):
the Trump administration. Again, a president who shoots from the
hip and was elected to just go crazy in the
sense that he was elected to not only disrupt but
dismantle a lot of the federal government. Why because of waste,
because of overreaching, because people don't trust the government anymore,
(13:32):
and they trust Trump to undo what the government is about.
They just don't trust it. And what the President says
is trust me. I will be your spokesperson. I'm on
your side. I'm not on the side of.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
The deep state. And people believed it.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
I still think they do. He is following what he
said exactly. He's just doing it really quickly. I mean,
how many days are we into his presidency and look
what he has done starting day one.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
He did exactly what he said day one.
Speaker 2 (14:13):
Who Okay, by the way, it's eight fifty or eight thirty.
I'm going to do a topic in which this week
I'm saying, starting yesterday over the weekend, what the president
has said, what he is going to do and the reaction.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
And it's not small stuff either.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Okay, the debris of the Palisades fire and the Eaton fire.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
What do they do with it?
Speaker 2 (14:40):
Because if you look at the video, you look at
the photos, My god, it is full of debris. When
these houses were burned down to the foundation, there is
more stuff there right than you can imagine.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
So they have to clean out the debris. Where do
they put it? Where do put it? Well, here's what.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
The EPA is doing with the Eton fire, the Palisades
fire not quite yet. What they're going to do is
open up a site to process the debris. And of
course swift backlash. Local leaders why because of the toxic waste.
So you got Duarde, Zuza, Irwindale, Baldwin Park all announced
(15:22):
joint opposition to the plan.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
EPA plan to use.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Lario Park for the hazardous household debris from the fire,
including lithium ion batteries used in electric vehicles.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
That's kind of fun.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
And this area is an unincorporated area of the county
adjacent to these four cities and is slated to begin
receiving this debris early next week. And the city leaders say,
we're pretty upset about the potential dangers which are plenty.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
And they weren't even consulted.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Well, it's not their call, it's not their city, it's
the county and the fact that it's right next to
their city.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Okay, they're a little upset.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
The EPA designated Lario Park as this processing site and
they're already preparing the site to begin accepting the waste.
Now what is the EPA saying, Well, we're taking control
to We're going to control spills around the area. The
debris will be processed once the site is open. Debris
(16:30):
will be brought in daily and then processed into various
different waste streams and then package for shipment. I don't
know where they're going to send it and sent out.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
To be deposed. Well, it's going to go into another area.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
And a similar processing site for the Palisades Degree is
actually been planned for six acre parcel land east of
the Pacific Coast Highway near to paying A Canyon, where
there are plenty of insanely expensive homes. No or not,
they all got burnt, so no one can complain at
that point. LA County Supervisor Hilda Solice, who represents these communities,
(17:09):
said she was deeply concerned by the health and environmental
risk posed by this site. Oh it's a nimby, not
in my backyard. Go ahead and do it, just not
next to me. And she said the removal of these
materials should not come at the cost of creating a
toxic environment for communities already disproportionately impacted by pollution. Well,
(17:34):
they're right next to the fire, they're right next to
the debris field. They're going to be impacted, come hell
or high water. They got to go someplace. They're not
going to go in ease with these sites. So you
have unincorporated areas of the county that is allowing the
EPA to do something with this debris, this toxic debris.
(17:58):
So trucks transporting this debris will use back roads, will
not go along the two ten freeway.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Once the material is processed, I don't even know what
that means.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
Trucks approved by the state Department of Transportation will then
transport the materials to permanent disposal sites, facilities which have
no idea. Now, this particular parcel is in an unincorporated
area of the county, but it is owned by the
US Army Corps of Engineer. I didn't even know they
(18:32):
owned land. I guess they do, and they'll work alongside
the EPA to run this facility. And do you remember superfunds?
Superfund sites that were extraordinarily toxic. We're talking about factories
(18:54):
that processed metals, for example, where the waste when into
the ground, it cannot be used at all. Some gas stations,
for example, over forty years, had leakage of oil where
there can be and they shut down either sold or
they can't be sold because you can't build on those areas.
(19:15):
You just can't because there's no so much toxicity in
the soil. So that's why they created the superfunds to
clean those areas up. By the way, do you think
all those areas have been cleaned up across the United States?
And we haven't heard much about what's going on with
those superfund sites or ordering to hear a lot about
(19:36):
what's going on with this debris. And then the cost
of removing this debris. Now the government is willing to
do it, but all a homeowner, a business owner, property
owner has to do is sign up and the government
will get to it at some point. Don't know when
(19:56):
or if someone wants to rebuild their house or rebuild
their commercial builduilding, they can remove the debris themselves part
of building costs. I got to tell you, this thing
is a mess with this fire has not only caused
the destruction of so many homes, so many businesses, to
the utter devastation of homeowners and business owners and people
(20:19):
who lived and work in that area. But the aftermath,
what do you do with the stuff that's left over?
Speaker 1 (20:29):
It is a mess.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Okay, Today Robert Kennedy Junior is now facing questions. He's
in front of a Senate paddle who is going to
suggest to the House whether or not to vote further
to vote to be Secretary of Health and Human Services.
It's a cabinet post which, let me give you an
(20:51):
idea of how important this is. It has a budget
of over one hundred billion dollars. It oversees he's the
health of our entire country. I mean, it is massive,
the different agencies and President Trump nominated him. Why it
has nothing to do with the fact that he has
(21:12):
vast experience in health and human services as in zero
he's never run an agency of any kind. It's because
he switched from being a presidential candidate, of course, to
being a supporter of Donald Trump and if you're a supporter,
you get great jobs.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
So let me tell you a little bit about how
it works.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
You would think if you go in front of a panel,
and I've gone in front of various panels, not a
senator a certainly not a congressional panel. But you know
I answer questions. They throw me questions, I answer them.
Not when you're going in front of a going for
a cabinet position. First of all, the nominee does the
dog and pony show and goes to every senator that
(21:55):
will see him, and sits down, has private conversations, have
any questions, well, and let me tell.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
You why you should vote.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
Then, prior to going in front of the committee, it's
almost like doing a how do I. It's like preparing
for a state of the Union or a debate, a
presidential debate where they have people throwing questions, where your
(22:25):
own people, your own.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
Team, throwing everything at you. How are you going to answer?
Speaker 2 (22:29):
And you have the experts, and you have the analysts,
and you have the advisors who help you do this.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
It's all rehearsed. You don't know what the questions are,
but you anticipate every question, and then you go for
a vote.
Speaker 2 (22:44):
Now, so far, every nominee has been confirmed, and it
doesn't matter the experience because Donald Trump controls the Republican Senate.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
It's that simple. Is he going to make it? Is
Robert Kennedy going to make it?
Speaker 2 (22:58):
Yeah? I'm guessing yes, even though Carolyn Kennedy, his cousin,
has said this guy is a predator.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
He is a sleezeball.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
When he was in college, his dorm was the center
of drug use. He has admitted and he pled guilty
to having heroin and or the heroin or cocaine and
bringing it on an airplane.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
It's pretty bad.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
He praised on the desperation of parents of sick children
addicted to attention and power. And here's something that the accusation,
which I thought was the most important one. He has
a reputation of being anti vaccine. We know that he
has vaccinated his children, and he tells parents, don't vaccinate
your kids. What he did Samoa, for example, he went
(23:58):
ahead and said don't vaccinate your kids.
Speaker 1 (24:01):
Samoa went ahead and did that.
Speaker 2 (24:02):
There was a measle outbreak that killed a bunch of
kids and people got very sick. Now he has backtracked
and said, wait a minute. I'm not against vaccines. I
just want to study vaccines to see if there is
efficacy there, well, like polio vaccines that he.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
Has talked about. By the way polio.
Speaker 2 (24:24):
Vaccines came out in nineteen fifty three, you think they've
studied them enough. Mitch McConnell, who is going to go
is going to vote no to Robert Kennedy. I am
sure why. He's a survivor of polio and a big
fan of vaccines. So you'll see Robert Kennedy coming back
(24:44):
and just say, wow, I really didn't mean that, And
what I really meant is we have to do more studies.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
Well we don't.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
I mean, if you're talking about studies of vaccines that
have been used by the.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Entire world for eighty years.
Speaker 2 (25:02):
And millions upon millions of kids have been saved from polio.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
Now we got to study it more. We don't know
enough about it.
Speaker 2 (25:12):
Head of Health and Human Services cabinet level position, and
because of the control of the Republican Senate, I'm.
Speaker 1 (25:23):
Guessing he's going to be confirmed. Just guessing.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
If I were a betting man, I would bet yes.
This is KFI AM six forty. You've been listening to
the Bill Handle Show, Catch My Show Monday through Friday
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