Will Things Ever Go Back To Normal? | Bulwark on Sunday

Summary

Bulwark Takes: "Will Things Ever Go Back To Normal?" | Bulwark on Sunday Release Date: March 3, 2025
Hosts: Bill Kristol and Sam Stein

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Introduction

In this gripping episode of Bulwark Takes, Bill Kristol and Sam Stein delve into the tumultuous developments in U.S. politics and foreign policy, exploring whether the nation can ever return to a semblance of normalcy amidst unprecedented challenges. From a contentious Oval Office meeting to sweeping domestic policy changes, the hosts dissect the implications for both the United States and the global stage.

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1. The Oval Office Showdown: Trump vs. Zelenskyy

The episode opens with a vivid recounting of a historic and tense meeting in the Oval Office between President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Sam Stein describes the escalating tension leading up to and during the meeting:

Sam Stein [02:00]: “You start to see a dramatic exchange... And you start to look, okay, where's the video? ... Zelenskyy was just there... that made it not just a tense exchange, but a momentous one, frankly.”

Bill Kristol echoes this sentiment, highlighting the shockwaves the confrontation sent through political circles:

Bill Kristol [02:30]: “I'm very shocked and amazed by it.”

The hosts analyze the potential motivations behind the confrontation, suggesting it was orchestrated to discredit Zelenskyy and pave the way for a shift in U.S. policy towards Ukraine.

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2. Republican Response and Domestic Implications

Kristol and Stein explore the Republican Party's swift pivot in response to the Oval Office drama. They note the rapid alignment of Republican lawmakers in supporting Trump’s stance against Zelenskyy, often without prior indication of such views:

Sam Stein [07:10]: “...but there is very little appetite on the Hill to even push the envelope on new aid for Ukraine.”

Bill Kristol discusses the broader implications of this shift, suggesting it may signal a move towards a more isolationist or Russia-accommodating U.S. foreign policy:

Bill Kristol [05:52]: “Trump probably wants... to lay the predicate domestically for justifying a radical change of position of the US Government on Ukraine.”

The conversation highlights concerns about the weakening of bipartisan support for Ukraine and the potential for the U.S. to re-evaluate its commitments.

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3. European Reactions and NATO Sustainability

The hosts turn their attention to Europe's reaction to the U.S. administration's apparent retreat from its traditional leadership role in NATO and support for Ukraine. They cite sources indicating European leaders' frustration and the continent's efforts to bolster its own defense mechanisms:

Sam Stein [15:48]: “Mark Root said that they believe a number of different countries are going to up their defense spending... they believe that there's not going to be really any US Support going forward.”

Bill Kristol adds that this shift signifies a profound transformation in transatlantic relations, questioning the future of NATO and collective security:

Bill Kristol [14:15]: “They are looking ahead. They think... the alliance is over. They are looking ahead.”

The discussion underscores the potential long-term ramifications for global stability and U.S.-Europe relations.

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4. US Domestic Policy Shifts: Public Health and Science Funding

A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to analyzing drastic changes in U.S. domestic policy, particularly concerning public health and scientific research. Stein outlines the sweeping cuts to major institutions like the NIH, NASA, and NSF:

Sam Stein [20:28]: “They're just going to cut thousands of jobs from that... the idea is that they want to turn the Weather Service into a for-profit enterprise...”

Kristol emphasizes the shortsightedness of these policies, highlighting their immediate and long-term detrimental effects:

Bill Kristol [24:31]: “What's the point of that? There's no... it's just to punish and penalize public-spirited scientists?”

The hosts discuss the administration's failure to understand the critical role these institutions play in innovation, public safety, and maintaining global leadership in science and technology.

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5. Long-term Consequences: Brain Drain and Public Health Risks

Kristol and Stein express deep concern over the impending "brain drain" as talented scientists and researchers seek opportunities abroad due to reduced funding and support in the U.S.:

Sam Stein [21:19]: “We're going to look back and really be shocked at the damage we've done with respect to science and scientific research.”

They also highlight the immediate public health crises exacerbated by policy changes, such as the resurgence of measles outbreaks and inadequate responses to other health threats:

Bill Kristol [26:27]: “It's so stupid... it just seems like a complete ax. Boom, 15%.”

The conversation paints a bleak picture of declining public health infrastructure and the erosion of scientific integrity in addressing critical issues.

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6. Conclusion: The Path Forward Amidst Radical Changes

The episode culminates in a sobering reflection on the cumulative impact of these policy shifts. Kristol and Stein argue that the aggressive dismantling of established institutions and abrupt policy reversals are undermining both domestic stability and international standing:

Sam Stein [30:07]: “We're in a bad spot in terms of our public health expertise and in terms of the resources we're spending on it.”

Bill Kristol closes with a call to recognize the gravity of these changes and the necessity of thoughtful, incremental reforms over radical upheavals:

Bill Kristol [30:41]: “Stability mixed with some incremental change is what you need not.”

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Key Takeaways

• Oval Office Tensions: The confrontational meeting between Trump and Zelenskyy may have been a strategic move to shift U.S. policy towards Ukraine.
• Republican Realignment: Rapid Republican support for Trump's stance indicates a potential pivot towards isolationism and away from bipartisan foreign policy support.
• European Frustration: European leaders are re-evaluating their reliance on U.S. support, questioning the future of NATO and collective security.
• Domestic Policy Backlash: Sudden and significant cuts to public health and scientific research institutions are jeopardizing long-term innovation and public safety.
• Imminent Brain Drain: Reduced funding and support are driving talented scientists to seek opportunities abroad, weakening the U.S.'s competitive edge.
• Public Health Crises: Inadequate responses to health outbreaks like measles underscore the critical failures in current public health strategies.
• Urgent Need for Stability: Incremental and thoughtful policy changes are essential to restore stability and prevent further erosion of critical institutions.

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Notable Quotes

• Sam Stein [02:00]: “...that made it not just a tense exchange, but a momentous one, frankly.”
• Bill Kristol [05:52]: “Trump probably wants... to lay the predicate domestically for justifying a radical change of position of the US Government on Ukraine.”
• Sam Stein [07:10]: “...there is very little appetite on the Hill to even push the envelope on new aid for Ukraine.”
• Sam Stein [20:28]: “They're just going to cut thousands of jobs from that... the idea is that they want to turn the Weather Service into a for-profit enterprise...”
• Bill Kristol [24:31]: “What's the point of that? There's no... it's just to punish and penalize public-spirited scientists?”
• Sam Stein [30:07]: “We're in a bad spot in terms of our public health expertise and in terms of the resources we're spending on it.”

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Final Thoughts

Bulwark Takes provides a compelling and comprehensive analysis of the current political landscape, highlighting the precarious balance between national interests and the erosion of foundational institutions. Kristol and Stein's insightful discussion underscores the urgent need for prudent policy-making to navigate the complex challenges facing the United States today.

Transcript

[Bill Kristol]

Hi, Bill Kristol here. Welcome to the Bulwark on Sunday, our live stream. And I'm very pleased to be joined by Sam Stein, my colleague. Sam actually watched the Oval Office event in real time. Right. I was stuck at a conference. Stuck at a conference, during a conference, a little bit of a reprieve from Trump, actually discussing some other things and. But I found out about it pretty quickly. But what was it like to. So let's just begin. Get to dive right in, if that's okay to.

[Sam Stein]

It was. I was. I'll just say it wasn't much of a reprieve if you just get right back into it as soon as you step out of the conference. But I'm glad that you got that hour.

[Bill Kristol]

I appreciate the sympathy and the concern for my mental well being. But so what was it like? You're there and you're in the office.

[Sam Stein]

And it was just so, so I'm sitting here and here's how it works, is that you get pool reports and I think, I don't want to get too technical, but you begin to see updates in text on email about what's happening. And this is from the reporters who.

[Bill Kristol]

Are in the pool of the day.

[Sam Stein]

And the reason, the reason I'm. Yeah, exactly. And the reason to go through this is because this will give a sense of how radical and dramatic it was. So the early pool reports are like, oh, Zelensky and Trump are talking about the minerals deal there. You know, there's some exchanges, they're going back and forth, it's nothing extraordinary. And then the pool reports start taking a turn and you start to see a dramatic exchange has ensued between Zelinsky and Trump. And you're like, what, what's going. And then you start, then you get one. It's like J.D. vance is, is, you know, yelling at Zelinsky and Zelensky's yelling back. And you're like, what? This cannot be like. Because you just, this is not ever happened in the Oval Office. And then you're starting to look, okay, well, where's the video? Right? Like, I need to see the video of it. And then suddenly at a certain point, the video comes out and then you begin to really get a sense of just how grave the situation actually was. And the poor reports almost didn't do it justice because, yes, it was a very tense exchange, but you couldn't really appreciate the theater of it and how crowded that room felt and the fact that there were other cabinet officials sitting around and that Zelenskyy was just there and in the body language and seeing it in real time, that added an additional element to it that made it not just a tense exchange, but a momentous one, frankly. And so, you know, when you're watching it, you're getting bits and pieces coming in and then suddenly the whole picture. And it was just. I was floored by it.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah. I was struck how many just texts and emails I got in the next hour or two, including from. Not that political friends, and including for some friends who were much more Trump adjacent, let's just say, than I am sort of really shocked and amazed by it. So talk about, I mean, it seems like you said to me off yesterday you thought it was a setup. Explain.

[Sam Stein]

Well, so I, first of all, I got the same text you did. Non political friends who are like, did that really just happen? Like, there's something vivid about the video that I think people are just kind of.

[Bill Kristol]

Well, it just also, this is a country, a man we've admired a lot, who refused to flee Kiev to, despite the advice of our State Department on February 25, whom there's been bipartisan support for for three years in the U.S. obviously, Trump was at a different place on this than Biden administration or than half the Republicans in Congress. But he had been sort of mixed in his signals to some degree. And, and then, and Zelensky was here to sign a deal, to sign a minimalist deal. So he was accommodating Trump on that anyway. So then that's why it's such a.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, so my theory of the. Yeah, my theory of the case is that it, whether you want to technically call it a setup or not, the preconditions were there for exactly what they wanted to happen, which was they wanted to admonish Zelensky and humiliate him. And it was very evident from, from the get go. I mean, when Zielinski stepped out of his motorcade to get into the Oval Office, Trump was there to greet him, but he didn't greet him in any sort of diplomatic way. He mocked him for what he was wearing. He said, oh, nice of you to dress up. Sort of laughed at him. And you could tell from the jump that this was not going to go particularly well. And then there was other little nuggets that sort of gave away the game. I thought, for instance, there was a pool report that some White House aides were whispering, each amongst each other in the Oval, being like, oh, this is going to get good, you know, like they were ready for the drama. Now, I know subsequently there's been sort of Some revisionist analysis here about, well, you know, it was going fairly well for 30, 35 minutes. And then Zinski, you know, questioned Vance and, and that's what set it all off. But I think that sort of is credulous to an extreme. I think it's very evident that Vance and Trump, but really Vance honestly wanted to have a confrontation. Vance actually asked Trump to interject and pushed Zelensky and then made this whole thing. Well, you never even been, never said thank you when he has to thank you. And, you know, ultimately it didn't end well. I don't think anyone thinks it ended well. But I also think the other thing to consider is that this was the ultimate home court advantage, right? I mean, here you have this guy who's coming into very hostile turf. Honestly. He's doesn't speak the native language. It's the Oval Office. It's overly crowded. There's not just Vance and Trump, but Marco Rubio, other cabinet officials are sitting around. There's, there's, you know, dozens of cameras and they are just like on top of him. And maybe he should have come in with a different tack. Maybe he should have thought about, you know, not getting into it with Vance. But to me, at least just analyzing it, it would seem pretty evident that they wanted to pick some sort of confrontation or fight with Zielinski to at least lay the predicate to say he's not a good serious negotiator, he's not interested in peace, therefore we can do X, Y and Z. I think that.

[Bill Kristol]

Last sentence is very important. I mean, people say, well, the guy Trump got exasperated or Vance, you know, lost his temper. And Vance has a different, has always had more of a anti Ukraine view than Trump and all this. But at the end of the day, Trump probably wants, it's pretty safe to say he, he wants to lay the predicate domestically for justifying a radical change of position of the US Government on Ukraine, for maybe just walking away from Ukraine, maybe for siding with Putin against Ukraine. One way to do that is to make, is to have this confrontation in the Oval and immediately spin it. And this is what was striking to me as Zelensky was rude. Zelensky isn't a partner for peace. And therefore you don't sign the minerals deal, which Trump maybe wanted or maybe didn't really care about. But Zelensky is the guy who's the obstacle because it fits very much into the one condition Trump cited a week ago for Ukraine for the peace talks was going to be new elections in Ukraine. He's trying to have regime change in Ukraine to make it easier to, to sell them out and to cut. To come to a deal with Putin at a different, more accommodation as Ukraine, Ukrainian government, it seems to me, so that people who are thinking this is just psychological, you know, Trump being Trump, advance being Vance, I think they're missing. It fits into a, it's somewhat logical from their point of view. I think it fits into a pattern.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah. And I, I think the tell also is just how quickly every single cabinet official and Republican lawmaker was up with an identical tweet saying, thank God we have President Trump standing up for the American interests. And then of course, everyone adopted this idea of, well, I mean, even Lindsey Graham was like, well, I think now we need to get new leadership in Ukraine if we want to have actual, an actual enduring peace deal. As if Zelensky's been the obstacle, not Putin.

[Bill Kristol]

I'd say especially Lindsay Graham, because since he doesn't probably really, really, really believe it to the degree who knows what he really believes, believes anymore, he's always calculating about how to be in Trump's good graces. He see, he saw in a way, the point of it, the point of it is to discredit Zelensky as. Discredit Zelensky as a partner for peace, discredit Zelensky as an appropriate leader for Ukraine and let, and therefore begin a process conceivably of undermining him in Ukraine.

[Sam Stein]

That was, that was Core Graham of.

[Bill Kristol]

Lindsey Graham's tweet, right?

[Sam Stein]

Yeah. And for Graham especially, I mean, there's just like a week ago he was out there publicly praising Zelensky as like the most amazing leader in favor of Western values in his lifetime. It's like how you can do a 180 based off of, you know, a singular meeting with Trump is, is remarkable to me. I guess I'm really interested to see. I know it's supposed to happen. I'm not sure what the status of it is, this upcoming Putin Trump meeting, because obviously there will never be an. He's not going to admonish Putin anyway in any way similar to what he did with Zelensky. He'll be highly accommodating is the expectation. But are we really going to have a U. US Russia alliance to push Ukraine into the peace negotiations where they have to go to the Europeans for, you know, assistance? It's, it's, it's, it's hard to really fully comprehend and give justice to how quickly this all turned in a matter of months. And again, I think that meeting with Putin is going to be really remarkable for what it says about Trump.

[Bill Kristol]

No, I think that's. That's really true. And also, I think in this, in this meeting, some of the Europeans, I think, noticed this a little more maybe than American commentators who were focusing understandably, on the drama of it and Vance and so forth. The degree to which Trump excused Putin repeatedly for, you know, well, look, Putin's had a rough time. I mean, this Russia hoax was an attack on Putin as well as on the. I mean, he really made it seem as if he and Putin are these two innocents who were, you know, whom, I don't know, the Justice Department inexplicably decided to go after or something like that.

[Sam Stein]

You know, I think at one point, Trump said something akin to Zelensky is too critical of Putin. He's too. He hates Putin too much to possibly make peace. It's like, yeah, you know, I think he probably is justified for, for hating Putin. But, yes, it's all. There's a weird. I guess it's not weird because we've lived with it for eight years now. There's a consistent thread of empathy that Trump has for Putin where he sees himself as sort of a co traveler on this world journey with Vladimir Putin, and that they are the ones who need to restore some sort of semblance of order on the global stage, and Zelensky is the one who's disrupted it. And that. I mean, I'm used to this from Trump at this point. I think the, the more newsy thing, in a way, has been how quickly this meeting has given all the Republicans, save a few, the permission structure to basically adopt something similar in terms of their positioning.

[Bill Kristol]

Let's talk about that a little more as you follow this closely on the Hill, and not just the Hill, but sort of conservative thought leaders and so forth. Influencers. Yeah. How much is there any real reaction the other way?

[Sam Stein]

I mean, the one person who has spoken out forcefully on the Republican side against Trump is Lisa Murkowski, who put out a tweet, who said, I think she was such a sickened buyer or something like that, the spectacle. And that happened. But to. To a person, I think most Republican officials said, oh, it's really unfortunate what happened, but Zelensky really, you know, did this to himself and this was a mistake. And maybe we should actually consider, you know, getting new leadership in there. And, you know, I, They're. They're. Some of them are couching it by saying, well, we still stand with Ukraine and, and therefore like we're opposed to Russia, but I don't see any appetite for new aid for Ukraine at all on the Hill. And even if there was, it would have to go through Trump and I can't imagine at this point that he'd sign off on it. But I mean crazier things have happened I suppose. But it really seems like there's very little appetite on the Hill to even push the envelope on new aid for Ukraine. So we're at this weird place where the Republican Party's position on this is that they support Ukraine but they won't do anything to support Ukraine and they also think the Ukrainian leader might need to go.

[Bill Kristol]

It is pretty astonishing. I think it was Senator Wicker, I think who's chairman of the Armed Services Committee and has been a big Ukraine supporter. Genuine one went there been there several couple times. I think more he had a, if I'm not mistaken, he tweeted a photo of himself from the morning from Friday mid morning meeting with a bipartisan of a bipartisan group of senators including him meeting with Zelensky at a sort of favorable this was very nice to see our you know, Zelensky or have a good meeting with Zelensky or something. I think he or his staff deleted was only on orders deleted the tweet after the Oval Office meeting which is sort of a level of a level of I don't know what sort of Orwellian like I'm going to make this photo go away because I was being nice to Zelensky six hours before. Right.

[Sam Stein]

I presume that the White House was the one who instructed him to delete it. Right. I mean like they're not unless they're so proactively scared of Trump. But it's either way it's like such a bad look and it does raise the question of like are there principled foreign policy positions that for these Republican lawmakers that where they're unmovable on it and, and I'm not sure at this point. I mean I really am not I.

[Bill Kristol]

Think that's you know I, I think China incidentally do we that would be a good so their, their claim has been for some of them at least a little uncertain about this Europe stuff. And you know, the Europeans have to carry more of the burden. But China, we're really tough on China. I mean I am curious to see if and I think when Trump accommodates she and says he's you know, basically not so keen at defending Taiwan 10,000 miles away and all that how many of these China. Okay. Well you know what? That's. Yeah. The Asians could worry about Asia and the Europeans worry about.

[Sam Stein]

Right. Let's say in theory, I want to get too far ahead, but let's say in theory, China does something, some provocative military action in and around Taiwan. And Trump naturally says, well, you know, it's halfway across the globe. We don't want to. And, and we don't want to, you know, start World War iii. Like, let's not be at the time of these.

[Bill Kristol]

And we have a trade deficit with Taiwan. And they're very, they've been very bad and they're in the way they handle.

[Sam Stein]

They've been bad. If they want our help, they could pay for it. I, I just don't see a future in which any, you know, serious Republican leadership would be like, no, no, Mr. President, no, no, no, no. It's just that's, that's just not the current political climate we are in.

[Bill Kristol]

So I'm struck that you're. I tried to read up a little bit on what the Europeans were saying Saturday and Sunday, and a friend of mine happens to be in London send you some, some sort of clips from British tv. And then another, someone else I noticed, translated hopefully some headlines from the German press. And it, they, what were they saying? They're amazed for them. They've been sort of half hoping that they can manage the Trump situation. He'll maybe get, you know, there are, has been bipartisan supporters recently as less than a year ago for Ukraine here. Maybe there'll be a deal to get some aid then they'll do more. I think they've, I think they. And Apple man made this point earlier this week in that conversation I had with her. I mean, they're stepping, they're stepping up and saying things even a week ago before this oval. Obviously the European leaders didn't say before we have to really maybe take the lead. We can't really count on the US and defer to the US as we used to. Mertz said that after his election victory in Germany. But, but still, they, There was still a sense of we still. Now, now it's sort of, you know, the alliance is over. They, they are looking ahead. They think, I mean, is NATO sustainable? What does NATO mean? Do we really think Trump is going to follow Article 5 if the Russians start messing around in Estonia? Do we. I mean, just the degree to which everything, stuff that we've all seen happening and commented on a lot of the bulwark, I would say. And our friends Eric Edelman and Ellie Cohen have been terrific on this. On the Shield of the Republic podcast, and we've written a lot about it, Kathy Young in particular, but many others are currently. But it's all. It all kind of has come clear, I would say. This weekend, really. A moment. Yeah, the flash, the light sort of became unmistakable.

[Sam Stein]

Well, I thought. I thought the reaction from German leadership was very telling. Where they just were, like you said, they're just like, we cannot rely on the US Anymore, and we have to plan for not doing that as we're speaking. NATO Secretary General Mark Root said, you know, that they believe a number of different countries are going to up their defense spending, which is what Trump wants. But also, I think they're doing it because they believe that there's not going to be really any US Support going forward. And then I thought, you know, subtly, but actually not so subtly because he's got the world's biggest megaphone. But over the weekend, I mean, Elon Musk was endorsing the U.S. withdrawing from NATO and the U.N. you know, that's. That's the President's top adviser.

[Bill Kristol]

Right.

[Sam Stein]

I mean, like, that's not nothing. It seems unreal to me, but maybe it shouldn't, because this has been sort of where this has been heading directionally for some time. Obviously, this is exactly what Russia wants. And they must be just overjoyed in the Kremlin right now to see.

[Bill Kristol]

No, they've been. They've been cheerful in their. In their public comments, I think.

[Sam Stein]

Oh, yeah, they're. But I think you're right, the responses that they've recorded to the Zelensky meeting have been unbelievable.

[Bill Kristol]

I mean, you're right. We saw so many times in that. First, in those first four years that Trump would move in this direction, you know, say something an advisor might like. But then he was pulled back by the Mattis or the one. Then he would fire Mattis, but then at the end of the day, he ended up with Mark Esper and he would fire Tillerson. And then. And then. But then at the end of the day, it's Pompeo. I mean, Bolton replaced McMaster. I mean, the degree to which he just never quite was able to put a team together or didn't want to maybe to really pursue these. This agenda. But we war. We warned, we said, we argued the second term would be totally different from first. And I think this is a very good instance of it, as is domestic policy. Maybe we should just take a minute on that. I mean, you've been covering it very, very closely. What Doge has been doing. In some of these areas firing workers. But also the real effects in public health. I mean, just say a word about that. I mean, and that people keep waiting for it to kind of okay, they've done the initial burst, but now it's going to go back to normal. But it doesn't feel that way, does it?

[Sam Stein]

I've been trying to figure out what the. Because obviously at some point you imagine there's going to be will hit like some sort of new equilibrium right where they're done. And we have this totally revamped government that's just completely cut down in size and now we have to figure out how to live with this. But they're not done. They're not even close enough. I think they're just getting started. And part of that is because what Elon has done is actually not actually the big project. Elon's just kind of out there firing away and throwing whatever he can against the wall. And a lot of it's not actually sticking. A bunch of the stuff that he's cut, they've had to rehire. He's been shot down in court a bunch of times. His efforts to terrorize psychologically the government workforce have succeeded to a degree. But like, you know, we've seen interestingly enough cabinet officials push back on it to, to some degree that's, that's like the appetizer, that's the amuse bouche or whatever the hell you want to call it. We're getting to the Russ Bot stuff where he's going to systematically really, really pare down these agencies. Incredible reshuffling of different departments that will see reductions that would make the early ones look small. And there are things that I think are, people aren't going to appreciate until they get the consequences of it. So I'll just give you one example. We had a conversation with Matthew Capuchi, who's at the Capitol Weather Gang about these cuts that they're making to the National Weather Service. And, and they're, they're absurd. The National Weather Service gives us obvious important information on weather patterns across the country that helps innumerable number of industries, shipping, you know, anything like that involves weather, right? Disaster preparedness, fema, things like that. They are just going to cut thousands of jobs from that. And the idea, and this is a RUS VAT thing, is that they want to turn the Weather Service into a for profit enterprise more or less where we would sell weather data to companies like AccuWeather so that they can use that in their forecasting. That is insane. Weather Data is public service. We pay for it because it's important. It's no different than paying for postal service. Right. But these are like the projects here and there that they're producing and you're starting to see real impacts, but it's just going to get much, much worse.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, I'm struck that people, a lot of the coverage understandably has been the effect in government, government workers being laid off or the, let's call it the direct effects, but the indirect effects, the second order effects are really striking because some of these cuts and changes are both very large and very radical. It's what so the universe. I was at this little conference, there was a professor from a major university and she said that all her hiring and expenditures of her department, which is not in the sciences, have been frozen because of the cuts to reimbursement for the sciences, for the biomedical stuff, for the NIH stuff. They have a big medical school, this university. They just looking at their whole budget now it's a reasonably wealthy university they can end up, you know, tightening their belts on. And it's not a disaster. Some assistant professor of political science doesn't get hired this year, I guess, you know, and it doesn't maybe not a disaster for a bunch of young postdocs.

[Sam Stein]

But if you extrapolate, you know, hundreds of universities, so she's talking to her.

[Bill Kristol]

Colleagues in the medical school and in the science departments, biomedical and stuff. And you know, people are looking abroad for jobs. People are thinking maybe I'll just not go to, you know, public spirited research and go work for a drug company, which isn't terrible. But again, I mean the degree of brain drain and of people looking to leave, who's promising, you know, they've invested 10, 15 years in that age. They're on a pretty good ladder to near the top. And suddenly what's, you know. So I think, I think people haven't really, I haven't, I wasn't, I haven't fully sort of internalize kind of the, the indirect effects of this. Yeah, yeah.

[Sam Stein]

No, I, I, and this is, I've spent a lot of time talking to people in this field specifically and I think this is, we're going to look back and really be shocked at the damage we've done with respect to science and scientific research. The. Yes, I, at the University of Iowa. This is an interesting, this was one of my anecdotes for my piece. But once it became clear that NIH was going to cap indirect costs, that's administrative cost to help support the research, the University of Iowa sent out a note saying we will stop hiring graduate research assistants, which is insane. I mean, we're talking about people who are coming up and want to do science and they're just not going to be hired. If you think about doing that over every university. Now I'm not saying every university is going to take that type of step, but where we're going to cut off pathways for thousands of promising young scientists. And then that's just one agency, that's nih. I mean, this is, the same thing is happening in NASA, for instance, the nsf. I've been told reliably that foreign governments are ramping up, trying to recruit people to come to their country because they have more welcoming funding climates. And frankly, I've talked to a lot of scientists who feel like that's what they have to do because they're not in it to like, you know, make money. They're, that's why they wanted the government job, is because they wanted to do research that was, you know, maybe long shot research. But that's the only entity that would support that type of long shot research because private enterprise wants to support research that they could then use to turn a profit. And that's not always the case. So our brain drain will be epic and bad and it's one of those things that you don't feel in the moment, but down the line, boy, we're going to look back and say, why did we just eat all our corn seed? That was so stupid.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, it's so stupid. I mean, just two footnotes to that. The stupidity partly is the, the macho, we're doing it all at once, shock and all. You know, the fact is, if the University of Iowa were told we're going to take your reimbursement rate down from, I'm making this up from 52% to 42% next year and we want to aim for getting it all the way down to 25% in 40 years. Okay, they'll make different, they'll plan accordingly. I would still, we could still not have an argument about whether this is going to hurt our, our biomedical research in the future and so forth. But at least, but to do it all at once is just, I mean, what's the point of that? There's not. The savings are trivial, utterly trivial in terms of a few billion dollars in a massive budget. Right, so it's just to what, punish and penalize public spirited scientists?

[Sam Stein]

I mean, I don't get it. I don't get it. And who, who voted for this like no one, no one ran on this.

[Bill Kristol]

Trump didn't.

[Sam Stein]

This is not about.

[Bill Kristol]

I mean, he did a one or two gestures in this direction of abrupt changes, but really he didn't and, and got talked out of it or Congress resisted. Congress could resist some of this. I would. Do you think a little bigger chance of congressional resistance here than on the foreign policy stuff?

[Sam Stein]

There was like a little. Yes, I definitely. Then the foreign policy stuff. I mean, mean, on the USAID stuff. I mean, USA's been dismantled. Let's. Let's just call it what it is. And the people I've talked to there, they're in a state of complete PTSD over this because it just happened so fast and there was no one standing up for them. I mean, occasionally there was, you know, Jerry Moran in Kansas because he had food in from a state that needed to be shipped overseas, but no one was standing up for them with, with the nih and in the science. You do see, because every state has a major university that depends on this stuff. You do see some Republicans saying, I, I'm not totally on board with this. Like Katie Britt, for instance, down in Alabama, there's a number of universities there that rely heavily on these things. And they stood to lose hundreds of millions of dollars. And she said, can we get a carve out? Yeah, like, I don't think we should get a carve out. I think we should just not do the policy. Um, so there is some constituency here that's standing up, but I've been totally unimpressed by the opposition. I think what, what is the downside for like advocating for science funding? I mean, again, it's not saving. Cutting it is not saving you a lot of money. If anything, every economic model shows that investing in this stuff actually pays off fivefold down the road. And there's no rhyme reason to how they're doing. It's just like you said, it's just a complete ax. Boom, 15%.

[Bill Kristol]

I saw there was some study released Friday. I don't think it had anything to do with politics. This is just when it was. They got the data. Sloan Kettering testing, an mrn. I don't really understand this stuff, but an MRNA vaccine on cancer, pancreatic cancer, which is one of the worst.

[Sam Stein]

Cancer.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, Hardest. Lowest cure rate. Seeming. Seeming remarkable levels of success. You think people might. No, I have no, I assume directly, redirectly. There were NIH funds involved in this place, like Sloan, gathering at least indirect support and I don't know, feels like that would be something people should Start saying, and look at you really gonna. This is, of course it cuts also on the vaccine issue. It's just only Robert F. Kennedy is slowing down vaccine research. So I mean, what a time to be cutting both vaccine research and general biomedical research. Right?

[Sam Stein]

Well, and that's the thing, it's that we've hit this, and I'm using a cliche here, but we're in this perfect storm moment where you have budget cutters who just want to, you know, go after anything as quickly as possible without any sort of insight into what's happening. And quite literally means been reporting about these Doge boys who are just there sort of like checking box big. Actually, we don't need that. It's like they don't really know what they're cutting. I mean, I think that's fair to say. So we have that on one hand and the second hand we have this burgeoning movement of anti vaccine skepticism that is coloring a lot of this research. And so when you have these MRNA vaccine breakthroughs, it's running right into the fact that you have Robert F. Kennedy Jr. At the head of HHS, who clearly is oppositional to this type of stuff. And then of course, all this is happening as we're seeing really shocking global and domestic health moments, right? The measles outbreak in Texas is bad. It's really bad. We have an RFK saying they're being like, well, we've had measles outbreaks a couple years in a row now. It's like, well, we haven't had an infant die from measles. We haven't and he's not. I was talking to some folks like, you know, a normal HHS secretary would be out there publicly saying, people need to get the vaccine, people need to get their kids vaccinated for measles. Normal HHS secretary probably go down to Texas, frankly, and see what's going on. Hold a press conference. Promote public health. Promote science based public health. We don't have that right now. So that's domestically. And then on the foreign, there's so much happening problematically in the foreign. But most immediate is there's been outbreaks of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo and we pulled out of the who. We don't have monitors to do this stuff and nor do we seem to care about these things, as if we didn't just experience issues with Ebola a decade ago. So we are in a bad spot in terms of our public health expertise and in terms of the resources we're spending on it.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, I hate to end on a gloomy note, but I think it is is that gloomy. I think what it has in common with the foreign policy stuff is, you know, you don't know what damage you're doing when you take an ax to these, to NATO exactly in terms of world stability and nuclear proliferation and a million other other issues and say nothing of conceivably terrible outcome in Ukraine. And you don't know what damage you're doing to domestic, you know, health and well being when you take an axe to a whole bunch of programs. You know, the measles thing was just unbelievable. I mean, the idea that you wouldn't say, look, this is an outbreak, I think we can keep it on. You know, you can try to reassure people a bit. But we have a special task force set up here at NIH. We're monitoring this 24 7. I think we know. And some of that's just talk, but that really is actually important. And we're coordinating with the Texas Department of Public Health and if native boys experts, we'll send some people in there. I mean, that's what a normal government administration would do. And that's one reason we do have pretty good public health in this country, actually, is that we stop a lot of things and nip them in the bud. Right.

[Sam Stein]

100% and we're just not. And for some reason, I mean, again, this goes back to the sort of the idea that actually incremental change, incremental is good, dramatic change can be bad. And like just because you have this sweeping vision for cutting off the bureaucracy or dramatically reversing decades of proven scientific research or unengaging from the world stage and you think it sounds radical and cool and you want to mix it up, that doesn't mean it's good. Sometimes stability mixed with some incremental change is what you need not.

[Bill Kristol]

This is a good note to end on. Sam Stein, thanks for joining me today on Bulwark on Sunday.

[Sam Stein]

Thanks, Bill.