Brian Steinberg (2:26)

Hey, Brian, thank you for having me.

Yasmin Vesugian (2:28)

Brian, there's been a lot of online backlash when it comes to what has taken place at Jimmy Kimmel over the last 24 hours. Do you have any reporting that would indicate that Disney CEO Bob Iger might make the decision to bring Kimmel back on the air sooner than later?

Brian Steinberg (2:46)

A memo went out to affiliates from Disney last night saying they were going to put on A Family Feud for the foreseeable future. But our sense is that they'd like to have Kimmel come back. This is a guy, keep in mind, he's been on the air for more than 20 years. He is really entrenched in ABC. He does a game show, Wants to Be a Millionaire, does specials. This is not, you know, someone they didn't know. This is someone who's being authentic on the air. So it'd be surprising to me if they had to cancel him or chose to do so. Without some more discussion, how much of.

Yasmin Vesugian (3:16)

This is about politics? Because he has been a longtime critic of the President and now you have the president on Truth Social essentially applauding the move to indefinitely suspend Kimmel's show. You got a lot of folks, especially in the media world, wondering, is this the new normal?

Brian Steinberg (3:32)

It is a lot about politics and there has been a lot of backing down by major media companies including Paramount and cbs, Disney and abc. There are newspapers being sued that are worried about things. The New York Times is being sued right now, Wall Street Journal's being sued. So there's a lot of worry about can the White House and Trump administration use their desires and leverage to make the media act as they see fit and stop holding power to account, stop asking questions that might be unwanted or unseemly, but yet might be in the public interest nonetheless.

Yasmin Vesugian (4:03)

There's the politics and then there's the economics, Brian, which I think is important to talk about as well. Because when we talked about the cancellation of Stephen Colbert show at the end of his contract, CBS pointed to Paramount, pointed to the economics of it, all, right, that they just weren't getting the numbers that they used to get. How much do you think this is also about economics as well? Because the prediction then was that really Stephen Colbert was just the first of what is many to come.

Brian Steinberg (4:30)

Well, these late night shows are not the powerhouses they once were. These shows have over the years with Letterman leaving NBC and Agency playing on Kibble, some of the cable networks getting involved, much more fragmented. There are many more late night hosts all going after their own niches and to do so. They kind of cater to certain demographics, psychographics, leanings, et cetera. They're not broadcasting to all people, broadcasting to some people. So in the last years especially, they've gotten more pointed, more fiery. And these shows you see watched by younger people late at night, these people now watch these shows through clips. They pass them around on YouTube or X. What drives pass along. What drives virality? It's being hot, hot talk, outrageousness, surprise, drama, controversy. These are things that now drive conversation, but yet can also draw more scrutiny.

Yasmin Vesugian (5:18)

What is the mood inside the industry right now, as you've been kind of gathering this reporting? Is it fight? Is it capitulate? Is it worry? What is it?

Brian Steinberg (5:27)

It is worry. I think people are worried that these big companies that support artists, commentators, speakers that hinge on free speech and creation of new ideas are kowtowing because of economic concerns. At the same time, these companies need to continue on and exist. And if they can't make their money, nothing will be on their platforms.

Yasmin Vesugian (5:46)

Brian Steinberg, thank you.

Brian Steinberg (5:47)

Thanks so much.

Yasmin Vesugian (5:50)

So we were just talking about this question of freedom of speech, and that has been a huge talking point in all this. So I want to bring in Corey Brettschneider. He is a professor of political science at Brown University and host of the podcast the Oath and the Office and has a new book out, the Presidents and the People. Hey, Corey, thanks for being here.

Corey Brettschneider (6:11)

Thank you. I'm looking forward to the conversation.

Yasmin Vesugian (6:12)

Corey, what power does the FCC chair, Brendan Carr actually have as part of the fcc?

Corey Brettschneider (6:19)

Their licenses are in his hands. The FCC disallows cursing on air. And if all he was doing was enforcing rules like that and seeking to talk about them and protect them, there'd be no problem.

Ryan Nobles (6:35)

But.

Corey Brettschneider (6:35)

But no government official has the ability to shut down speech and certainly not an ability to use the power of government to target and punish viewpoints that are seen as wrong or overly critical of the president.

Yasmin Vesugian (6:50)

I want to read for you a social media post on X by FCC chair Brendan Carr back in 2022. And he wrote this. President Biden is right. Political satire is one of the oldest and most important forms of free speech. It challenges those in power while using humor to draw more people into the discussion. That is why people in influential positions have always targeted it for censorship. This is a guy who has lauded First Amendment rights his entire time at the fcc. What do you make of that social media post?

Corey Brettschneider (7:22)

I would say just pulling back a little bit from the law to think about the importance of free speech in a democracy. What defines the opposite of the First Amendment in other countries are dictators who are able to shut down their critics. Now, are we approaching something like that? That's the factual inquiry. And there's no question that even if it's satire, even if it's mockery, it's protected. One of the problems, of course, with the current administration is that it preaches free speech. It claims to respect Charlie Kirk because of free speech. And yet in threatening the opposition, as Trump has, in threatening to say that, for instance, as Pam Bondi did, there's a theory of hate speech that they're gonna use to shut down the Democratic Party or radical leftists, we don't have a hate speech doctrine of that kind in this country. Even the most extreme forms of speech are protected under the First Amendment. And so I'll give examples of things that are definitely not protected in countries like Germany that are protected here. One is Holocaust denial. The evil of the Holocaust is unquestionable. But under the First Amendment, you do have a right to deny it. And the same is true of the Ku Klux Klan rallying on a field. The court has been very clear that even cross burning, as vile as it is, is protected. That's how radical our First Amendment is. And so it's not a hard case when a government is coming in and saying, not even in those extremes, but satire, criticizing the president is going to be shut down. There's no world in which that's not protected speech.

Yasmin Vesugian (8:53)

So it's interesting you brought up Pam Bondi, the Attorney General, and I want to read for you the quote that you were referring to when it came to hate speech, in which she said there is free speech and then there is hate speech, and there is no place especially, especially after what happened to Charlie in our society. Tucker Carlson actually responded to that.

Corey Brettschneider (9:10)

You hope that Charlie Kirk's death won't be used by a group we now call bad actors to create a society that was the opposite of the one he worked to build.

Yasmin Vesugian (9:22)

This is Tucker Carlson, someone who is avowedly pro maga, pro Donald Trump. He is actually speaking out against some of what we've been hearing from the administration, specifically Attorney General Pam Bondi, in light of the horrific killing of Charlie Kirk.

Corey Brettschneider (9:37)

There were many responses to her comments, which really, I'll be just blunt about it, show a complete ignorance of the First Amendment and the way the Constitution works. We don't have hate speech laws in this country or hate speech restrictions. We have a broad protection of all viewpoints, short of a couple of very narrow exceptions. The idea that there's some opinion of the radical left or the left or the right for that matter, that's illegal in the United States is false. It was a cringe inducing moment because she was showing a total lack of understanding of how our Constitution works. And this is supposed to be the chief law enforcement officer who doesn't know Constitutional Law 101.

Yasmin Vesugian (10:16)

You're the expert on this. Do you feel as if free speech is under attack right now?

Corey Brettschneider (10:20)

There is no question we're here because the president of the United States in threatening the so called radical left. In Pam Bondi's comments which we've talked about about hate speech and wanting to make illegal it looked like some viewpoint are an attack on democracy itself and they are an abandonment of the longstanding understanding of what this First Amendment is about. Now, we have had moments in history where we have abandoned democracy. So think of the red scare and the court in many instances allowed for the prosecution of leftist viewpoints early in the 20th century. That's rightly seen as a shameful moment or a shameful series of moments. But my fear is that we're headed exactly back there.

Yasmin Vesugian (11:01)

Corey, Brett Schneider, thank you. Appreciate it.

Corey Brettschneider (11:04)

My pleasure.

Yasmin Vesugian (11:06)

When we are back from Hollywood Hills to Capitol Hill, the fury to fund the government by the end of the month. That's next.

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Yasmin Vesugian (11:46)

Who's ready for some football?

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Ryan Nobles (12:01)

Big game tonight.

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Yasmin Vesugian (12:05)

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Yasmin Vesugian (12:20)

And we are back with here's the scoop from NBC News. We are headed now to Capitol Hill where the clock is ticking, ticking to avoid a government shutdown. We are just weeks out from the September 30 deadline. Democrats in the House and Senate have released A spending bill laying out how they want to fund the government in the short term. The problem is they're miles apart from the plan that Republicans have put out, meaning we could actually see the government coming to a screeching halt. On top of that, there is some intense reaction from lawmakers to the former CDC director's testimony on Capitol Hill yesterday, which we talked about on this show. For more on this, I wanna bring in Ryan Nobles. He's our chief Capitol Hill correspondent. Hi, Ryan.

Ryan Nobles (13:00)

Hi, Yaz. How are you?

Yasmin Vesugian (13:02)

I'm good. Lots happening on Capitol Hill today. And I wanna start with first, kind of the fallout from the testimony we heard yesterday from former CDC head Susan Menares.

Ryan Nobles (13:11)

Yeah, it was explosive. She came there prepared to defend herself to attack Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. For what she believes is. Is forcing the CDC to make decisions and provide guidelines that are more based on his politics and his own personal ambitions as opposed to science. She was very concerned about this vaccine advisory panel that's meeting today and tomorrow, who many experts believe are gonna overhaul the vaccine schedule, particularly for the hepatitis B vaccine. We obviously have these recommendations that are gonna come out from this panel, which I think there's gonna be widespread questions raised about that in the public health community. But there are Republicans in the Senate who are very concerned about the direction of the hhs, primarily the Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, who's the chair of the committee. And he's already said he's going to bring Robert F. Kennedy back in to answer more questions in the wake of the Menara's testimony and the direction of the guidance related to vaccines. So this is something that, you know, most of the time, Senate Republicans just kind of step back and let Donald Trump do whatever he wants. This appears to be one where there's at least a slight bit of pushback. How far they're willing to go there, I think, remains to be seen.

Yasmin Vesugian (14:22)

And then there is this man, deadline looming, September 30, possible government shutdown, which it's looking more and more like is actually feasibly gonna happen.

Ryan Nobles (14:32)

Yeah, I'm always reluctant to say the government's gonna shut down because Congress loves a deadline.

Yasmin Vesugian (14:37)

Don't quote me on that.

Ryan Nobles (14:38)

And, you know, they're always like, we're never gonna make a deal until they make a deal. But this does have all the markings of, you know, if I were a meteorologist and I was forecasting a hurricane coming ashore, all the models show this hurricane coming ashore. The biggest thing. Right. I think we're dealing with is the scar tissue of the last spending standoff that we had in the spring. The Democratic leadership at that time made a calculated choice that if they voted to shut the government down or didn't vote yes for the short term spending plan at that time, that they would be the ones that would incur the wrath of the voters as a result of it. So now we find ourselves in a new position here where Republicans are asking for what they predominantly would describe as a clean cr, which means that there aren't many things added to it, that it's basically just a continuation of the existing funding level levels through the end of November to give appropriators more time to negotiate. But Democrats have a base that's screaming for them to stand up to Donald Trump. And it's not just on budget issues. It's on a whole long list of things. And Democrats have already said that they do not support this version of the continuing resolution. They've offered their own version, which Republicans are never gonna support. And Democrats, this is the one thing that they have a role to play here because it requires 60 votes to get through the Senate. That means you need Democrats. So there's gonna be a group of Senate Democrats that are gonna have a tough choice here week because they'll likely get the continuing resolution passed through the House, and then it'll be up to Senate Democrats to decide whether or not they're gonna vote yes or no. And that will tell us whether or not the government will shut down. But the one area that I think there could be some room for negotiation is that there are subsidies that are connected to the Affordable Care act, more commonly known as Obamacare, that are set to expire at the end of the year. Republicans are not in favor of extending those, but if they don't extend them, there are gonna be millions of Americans that are just straight up gonna lose their health. And so there is a group of moderate Republicans that may not necessarily be fans of Obamacare, but they also don't want their constituents to go without health care. Democrats are insistent that those subsidies be extended. So could that be an area where they could say, okay, Democrats will give you a win here by extending these subsidies? And then that would actually take some pressure off Republicans in some swing districts. The Republican leadership's really opposed to that right now. So. But that if you're looking for one carrot, perhaps that could be used to bring this two sides to the table? It could be that.

Yasmin Vesugian (17:00)

So amidst all this, you talked about how within the Senate, obviously they need the 60 votes to get this budget across the finish line. That's gonna take bipartisanship. And there is kind of some clues to the idea that there is a further chipping away of bipartisanship in the Senate right now. And what is leading you to see that?

Corey Brettschneider (17:20)

Yeah.

Ryan Nobles (17:21)

So, Yasmin, probably a lot of our listeners don't understand the in depth intricacies of this. It's my job to help them understand it. So the Senate really is, by the nature and the structure of its rules, one of the last bastions where bipartisanship is required. The latest attempt at chipping away at this is that Senate Democrats are basically using every procedural option that they have in their playbook to slow down the process of confirming a wide swath of Trump nominees to, in some respects to be, you know, kind of very perfunctory positions, not necessarily high profile positions that you've ever thought of. And it is grinding this process to a halt. So the way that Senate Republicans have responded is that they're saying instead of requiring every single one of these nominees to go through an individual process, we're going to start packaging them up in bunches. So now, instead of one person at a time going through this process, 15 can go through at a time. And that will allow us to move this process along and make it faster. Right now, it's not gonna really impact the average person on any kind of meaningful level today, but the next president, whoever that may be, Republican or Democrat, is now gonna be able to take all of their cabinet nominees under these new rules and say, okay, here's all 15 members of my cabinet. You're gonna vote up or down on all of them right now. So that's a huge difference than the way this is done before. So there are long term consequences to this, and it is just this chipping away of the bipartisanship that has really been kind of the hallmark of since it was created.

Yasmin Vesugian (18:57)

Ryan Nobles, thank you.

Ryan Nobles (18:59)

Thanks, guys.

Yasmin Vesugian (19:01)

All right, let's get to some headlines, and there are a lot of them today. On the final day of his state visit to the uk, President Donald Trump met with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer at Chequers. The Prime Minister's country residence leaders signed a new US UK investment agreement dubbed the Tech Prosperity Deal, which is expected to bring a total of more than $200 billion in US investment to the UK during his administration. During their joint press conference, the leaders also discussed other key issues, including the wars in Gaza and Ukraine and the UK's recent decision to recognize a Palestinian state, on which Trump noted a rare disagreement with Starmer.

Ryan Nobles (19:40)

We have to remember October 7th, one of the worst, most violent days in the history of the world. Not just there, the history of the world. And I got to see the tapes and I wish I didn't see them actually, but I got to see them and I want an end.

Yasmin Vesugian (19:57)

The Trump administration is asking the Supreme Court to step in and remove Lisa Cook from the Federal Reserve's Board of Governors. An appeals court had already rejected the move, but the White House is pushing ahead as part of President Trump's broader effort to reshape the seven member board despite its traditional independent status. Cook, appointed to the Fed by President Biden, says she will not step down or be, quote, bullied by Trump. Her lawyer, Abby Lowell added she'll continue carrying out her sworn duties as Senate confirmed governor. An immigration judge has ordered Mahmoud Khalil, a former Columbia graduate student, to leave the country. You might remember Khalil was detained by ICE this spring and released in June. His case became a flashpoint in the Trump administration's crackdown on student activism over the war in Gaza, but the official reason isn't his politics. The administration accused him of leaving out employment and membership details on his green card application, and Louisiana Judge Jamie Comins agreed. She's ordered Khalil be deported to either Algeria or Syria. Khalil's attorney said they have 30 days from the Friday order to appeal the decision to the Board of immigration appeals. The CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, a SIP, meets today to review and vote on vaccine recommendations for hepatitis B and MMRV, I.e. measles, mumps, rubella and varicella, also known as chickenpox. Tomorrow they're going to weigh in on this fall's Covid shot. Of the 12 members appointed by Health Secretary RFK Jr few are medical doctors or have vaccine expertise. The CDC doesn't mandate vaccines, but it does set the schedule for kids and for more than 30 years, for example, ACIP has recommended that the Hep B shot be given at birth. Kennedy is now reportedly pushing to change when and which vaccines children receive. Despite widespread concerns, three law enforcement officers were killed and two others wounded in a shooting in York County, Pennsylvania, on Wednesday. The officers were serving a warrant tied to a domestic investigation when the suspect opened fire. Attorney General Pam Bondi called the attack, quote, a scourge on our society and vowed state and federal support. The suspect died from a self inflicted gunshot wound. The investigation is continuing. A cheating scandal has just been uncovered at the World Stone Agent Skimming Championships on the tiny Scottish island of Easdale. It turns out. Some competitors weren't tossing nature's rocks. They were sneaking in perfectly shaped stones they'd illegally ground down, basically turning them into Olympic grade frisbees. The cheaters got caught, disqualified and apologized, all niquest, as organizers put it, for skimming immortality. In the end, American John Jennings not only won, he became the first American ever to take the crown. Proof that sometimes the smoothest operator is just a guy with a really good arm. That's gonna do it for us at here's the scoop of NBC News. I'm Yasmin Vesugin. We'll be back tomorrow with whatever the day may.

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This week on Meet the Press. As the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk sends shockwaves across the nation. Kristen Welker sits down with Utah Governor Spencer Cox, Pete Buttigieg and Senators Mark Kelly and Lindsey Grabb this week on Meet the Press. Listen to the full episode now. Wherever you get your podcasts.