Israel-Lebanon Ceasefire, Trump's Spending Cuts, A Conservative Activist's Plan

Summary

Israel-Lebanon Ceasefire Negotiations

The episode opens with significant developments in the prolonged conflict between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Leila Faulden (00:03) reports that officials are nearing a temporary truce between the two parties. Rob Schmitz (00:07) provides context, noting that the exchange of fire has persisted for over a year, with escalated Israeli attacks in the past two months severely impacting Hezbollah's leadership and destabilizing parts of Lebanon.

Lauren Frayer, NPR's correspondent in Beirut, details the proposed ceasefire terms (02:49). The agreement envisions an initial two-month ceasefire aligning with President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration. Key components include the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon, Hezbollah's relocation of fighters and weapons north of the Litani River—approximately 20 miles from the Israeli border—and the deployment of the Lebanese army alongside UN peacekeepers to monitor the ceasefire. Frayer emphasizes that an international committee will oversee the implementation, mirroring the 2006 ceasefire terms that were never fully executed.

The negotiations are complex due to Hezbollah's significant influence in Lebanon, despite being labeled a terrorist organization by the US and Israel. Frayer (03:40) explains that the Lebanese government, which negotiates on behalf of Hezbollah through the Speaker of the Parliament, is leading the discussions. Simone Abiramia, a Lebanese parliament member, asserts (04:09) that any US assurances to Israel regarding preemptive strikes are not part of the official agreement, highlighting Lebanon's sovereignty concerns.

The human cost of the conflict is stark. Frayer (05:18) describes the local sentiment in Beirut as "devastated and exhausted," with widespread destruction reminiscent of Gaza. Over 3,700 Lebanese have been killed since September, and despite ongoing negotiations, airstrikes continue to disrupt daily life. Frayer (05:30) notes the persistence of Hezbollah's rocket fire into Israel, with instances of up to 250 rockets launched in a single day, indicating that the threat has not been fully neutralized.

Trump’s Proposed Government Spending Cuts

Transitioning to domestic policy, the episode delves into President-elect Donald Trump's plans to significantly reduce government spending. Trump aims to utilize a relatively obscure mechanism known as presidential impoundment authority. Rob Schmitz (06:30) introduces this topic, mentioning Trump's announcement of Russ Vogt as the head of the White House Budget Office—a key figure in Project 2025.

Franco Ordonez, NPR White House correspondent, joins the discussion alongside Georgetown law professor Eloise Pasikoff (06:44). Pasikoff (07:25) clarifies that while Congress holds the "power of the purse," impoundment allows the president to withhold funds approved by Congress. This move has sparked concerns about the separation of powers and potential overreach, as established by the Impoundment Control Act of 1974, which mandates that presidents spend funds as directed by Congress.

Trump's approach has historical precedence; during his first term, he attempted to impound funds for foreign aid to Ukraine, leading to his first impeachment. Pasikoff (08:19) suggests that any current efforts to reinstate impoundment authority will likely face legal challenges, potentially reaching the Supreme Court. Experts anticipate that the judiciary may side with Trump, given the Court's recent favorable rulings on executive power, although this remains uncertain.

Rob Schmitz (08:35) raises concerns about the implications of reviving impoundment authority, noting that it was originally eliminated to prevent any single branch from controlling government spending unilaterally. Pasikoff (09:12) warns that bypassing the established legal framework could lead to significant constitutional conflicts, emphasizing the importance of checks and balances in the U.S. government.

Leonard Leo’s Strategic Moves in the Conservative Legal Movement

The third major topic centers on Leonard Leo, a pivotal figure in the conservative legal sphere. Steve Inskeep (10:03) introduces Leo, highlighting his instrumental role in assembling a conservative supermajority within the Supreme Court through the Federalist Society. Leo's influence extends beyond the judiciary, seeking to embed conservative principles across various sectors of American society.

In an interview, Leonard Leo (11:11) articulates his mission to "crush liberal dominance" (11:30), aiming to ensure a "level playing field" for Americans to shape their lives according to traditional values. Inskeep (11:30) probes Leo’s ambitions beyond the judiciary, questioning his ability to influence larger industries such as Wall Street, Silicon Valley, and Hollywood. Leo acknowledges the challenges posed by the size and decentralization of these sectors but remains optimistic about their gradual shift towards his ideological stance.

Leo's strategic focus has evolved due to the fewer judicial vacancies, redirecting his efforts towards promoting Western culture and traditional values in broader social and cultural arenas. Inskeep (12:25) raises concerns about Trump's potential legal actions and the independence of the judiciary, especially given Leo’s influence over conservative justices. Leo responds by affirming his commitment to the rule of law and the separation of powers, suggesting confidence in the courts' ability to act independently (12:54).

However, Inskeep (13:09) points out recent Supreme Court rulings that favored Trump, granting him immunity for certain actions. This precedent raises questions about the judiciary's role in containing presidential power under Leo's influence. Leonard Leo (13:26) maintains that the conservative justices will continue to uphold the rule of law, indicating a complex interplay between judicial independence and political influence.

Conclusion

The episode of Up First from NPR on November 26, 2024, provides a comprehensive overview of critical international and domestic issues. From the fragile ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon amidst ongoing violence, to President-elect Trump's controversial plans to reduce government spending through impoundment authority, and Leonard Leo's ambitious strategies to extend conservative influence beyond the judiciary, the discussions offer deep insights into the current political landscape. Notable quotes from key figures, such as Leo's declaration to "crush liberal dominance" (11:30) and Pasikoff's emphasis on the rule of law (07:27), underscore the episode's exploration of power dynamics and their implications for the future.

Transcript

[Leila Faulden]

Officials say they're close to getting a temporary truce between Israel and Hezbollah.

[Rob Schmitz]

They've been trading fire for over a year. In the last two months, Israeli attacks escalated, decimating Hezbollah's leadership in parts of Lebanon.

[Leila Faulden]

I'm Leila Faulden. That's Rob Schmitz. And this is up first from NPR News. Congress holds the power of the purse, but could the future president take that.

[Franco Ordonez]

Power to further crack down on rampant waste in the federal government? We're going to bring back presidential impoundment authority, which nobody knows what it is.

[Leila Faulden]

And look at one way President Elect Trump could slash government spending and what.

[Rob Schmitz]

A man central to the conservative legal movement plans to focus on during the next administration.

[Leonard Leo]

I want to crush liberal dominance.

[Rob Schmitz]

Stay with us. We'll give you the news you need to start your day.

[Ron Rudsen]

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[Franco Ordonez]

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[Steve Inskeep]

This message comes from HubSpot. Growing a business means a lot of audience, attracting lead scoring and long days. But with HubSpot, it's easier than ever for marketers to remix content, boost leads and score customers fast. Learn [e-mail] marketers a possible ceasefire is.

[Rob Schmitz]

In the works between Israel and Lebanon.

[Leila Faulden]

Yeah, both Israeli and Lebanese officials are set to hold meetings and vote on the proposal this week. Israel and Hezbollah had been fighting a low level conflict for more than a year now. Then in late September, Israel widened its airstrikes on Lebanon and sent in ground troops, killing most of Hezbollah's leadership and devastating the country. The UN Estimates a quarter of Lebanon's population has been displaced.

[Rob Schmitz]

For more on the details of the ceasefire, we're joined now by NPR's Lauren Frayer in the Lebanese capital, Beirut. Lauren, what are the terms of this proposal?

[Lauren Frayer]

So it's not a done deal yet, but here's what we understand it would be. An initial two month ceasefire, 60 days, takes us to Donald Trump's inauguration. Israeli troops would withdraw from Lebanon. Hezbollah would pull its fighters and weapons north of the Litany river. That's about 20 miles from the Israeli border. The Lebanese army move in alongside UN peacekeepers who are already there. An international committee would be set up to monitor implementation of this ceasefire. Incidentally, these are basically the terms of the last ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon in 2006, which was never fully implemented.

[Rob Schmitz]

Hmm. The US and Israel, of course, consider Hezbollah a terrorist group. So how do these talks work?

[Lauren Frayer]

So Hezbollah is really the power broker in this country, but it is the Lebanese government that is negotiating and signing this agreement. The speaker of the Leb Lebanese parliament is close to Hezbollah and is sort of deputized to negotiate on Hezbollah's behalf. So he's been shuttling back and forth between Hezbollah and the US envoy, Amos Hochstein, who has been shuttling back and forth between Beirut and Jerusalem, which explains in part, aside from all these sensitivities, why this process is just so time consuming.

[Rob Schmitz]

Right. So in Washington, of course, U.S. officials have been characterizing this as close to a deal, but not quite there yet. So what are some of these stumbling blocks that we're seeing?

[Lauren Frayer]

So one, Israel wants the freedom to attack Hezbollah if it thinks the group is violating the ceasefire by keeping weapons near the Israeli border, for example, by the way, Israeli surveillance here is intense. I don't know if you can hear me, but there's Israeli drone buzzing over the building where I am right now. If the US Guarantees Israel the right to strike preemptively, that could be seen here in Lebanon as a violation of this country's sovereignty and really a red line on this side. NPR spoke this morning to a Lebanese member of Parliam. His name is Simone Abiramia. And he basically says, no matter what the US may be telling Israel on the sidelines, any such right for Israel to attack preemptively is not part of this official agreement.

[Rob Schmitz]

And Lauren, you're there in Beirut. You mentioned the drones buzzing over your head. You know, I'm wondering, how are people there that you're talking to? How are they feeling?

[Lauren Frayer]

Devastated and exhausted. Lebanon and Hezbollah have paid a very dear Price in this war. Nearly all of Hezbollah' leaders have been killed in Israeli attacks. More than 3,700 people killed on this side of the border since September. You know, even today, airstrikes seem to be intensifying even during these negotiations in central Beirut, we get shaken from our beds. There are huge booms constantly. There's widespread destruction. Parts of Beirut look like Gaza. But Hezbollah is still managing to fire rockets at Israel this weekend, upwards of 250 rockets in a single day. So in that sense, Israel has failed to eliminate the threat.

[Rob Schmitz]

That's NPR's Lauren Frayer in Beirut. Thanks, Lauren.

[Lauren Frayer]

You're welcome.

[Leila Faulden]

President elect Trump is promising big cuts in government spending and he wants to.

[Rob Schmitz]

Use a little known tool to make those cuts to further crack down on.

[Franco Ordonez]

Rampant waste in the federal government. We're going to bring back presidential impoundment authority, which nobody knows what it is, but it allows the president to go out and cut things and save a fortune for our country, things that make no sense.

[Rob Schmitz]

And on Friday, he announced his pick for someone to wield that tool. It's Russ Vogt, a key architect of Project 2025 who will lead the White House Budget Office. NPR White House correspondent Franco Ordonez joins me now in the studio to break this all down. Good morning, Franco.

[Eloise Pasikoff]

Hey, Rob.

[Rob Schmitz]

So let's get into this. You know, we heard Trump there say nobody knows what empowerment authority is. I mean, this sounds like something you might do to a do. What does the administrative incoming administration say about this?

[Eloise Pasikoff]

Yeah, so Congress has the power of the purse. Right. It decides how money should be spent. Impoundment, it is an odd word, is when the president kind of holds back money that Congress has approved for a specific purpose. Trump and his allies like Russ Vogt argue a president has the right or should have the right to not spend those funds. And that's raising alarm bells across Washington that Trump may be trying to overstep his power.

[Rob Schmitz]

So what does the law say about that?

[Eloise Pasikoff]

Well, there is a law in the books. It's called the Impoundment control Act of 1974. It requires that the president spend money as Congress directs. I talked to Eloise Pasikoff. She's a Georgetown law professor. She says it's all part of the system's checks and balances.

[Lauren Frayer]

I'm cautiously optimistic because I think that this is the way the system is supposed to work.

[Eloise Pasikoff]

You know, I believe in the rule of law.

[Rob Schmitz]

I believe in government institutions doing what.

[Eloise Pasikoff]

They'Re set up to do.

[Rob Schmitz]

I'm also worried because these are complicated.

[Eloise Pasikoff]

Times But Vogt has argued, and I'd say forcefully, that it's unconstitutional. Trump is nominating him for his old job. The director of the Office of Management and Budget Vote told me last year when talking about Project 2025, that empowerment could be useful. And here he is talking about it on Fox Business.

[Rob Schmitz]

I believe that the loss of impoundment.

[Franco Ordonez]

Authority, which 200 years of presence enjoyed.

[Rob Schmitz]

Was the original sin in eliminating the ability from a branch on branch to control spending. And we're going to need to bring that back. So, of course, how would Trump bring that back?

[Eloise Pasikoff]

Well, I mean, he tested it out once before in his first term. He impounded foreign aid for Ukraine, but Congress objected. It was part of his first impeachment. So we'll see what Congress does this time. With Republicans in control, several of Trump's top aides want to use it. That includes Elon Musk, the tech billionaire, and former GOP presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy. They say bypassing the law could help them in their work on the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE for short. And Trump says he'll direct agencies to identify part of their budgets to impound. He also say it's a way to, quote, choke off the money to parts of the government he doesn't like.

[Rob Schmitz]

So, Franco, if there's a law in the books, though, I mean, wouldn't any moves to cut costs by using this impoundment authority be challenged in the courts?

[Eloise Pasikoff]

Yeah, and I talk to experts about this, you know, and they say it is is almost certainly going to be headed to the Supreme Court and that Trump would have to argue that his constitutional powers will override the 1974 law. But they also say that the Supreme Court has acted favorably toward Trump in terms of executive power, and they think it will be sympathetic again this time.

[Rob Schmitz]

That is NPR's Franco Ordonez. Franco, thank you.

[Eloise Pasikoff]

Thank you.

[Rob Schmitz]

A second term for President Elect Donald Trump means another opportunity for conservatives to entrench their power.

[Leila Faulden]

Trump appointed three Supreme Court justices in his last term, explicitly promising that they would overturn the federal right to abortion. And they did so at the first opportunity. So what do conservatives plan this time?

[Rob Schmitz]

Steve Inskeep has been talking with a man who's been central to the conservative legal movement. Steve, who are we talking about here?

[Steve Inskeep]

He's Leonard Leo, and he played a big role in assembling the Supreme Court's conservative supermajority. He has links with a lot of conservative donors and with several conservative legal groups, the most famous of which is the Federalist Society. And he's been central to setting up a network to identify and promote young lawyers, law clerks, with what Leo would consider the right political views or judicial views, and persuaded Republican presidents to appoint them to the bench.

[Rob Schmitz]

Hmm. So what does he plan this time around?

[Steve Inskeep]

Well, his network has potential judicial nominees ready, although there are fewer vacancies this time. So Leo is turning his fundraising and organizing skills on other targets. He wants people promoting Western culture and traditional values as he sees them in other industries. Wall Street, Silicon Valley, even Hollywood.

[Leonard Leo]

And there are a lot of young professionals in entertainment and in journalism and in business and finance who are looking, you know, for opportunities to inject their traditional values and the Western cultural tradition into other aspects of American social and cultural life.

[Steve Inskeep]

ProPublica obtained a video of you promoting this project and saying you wanted to, quote, crush liberal dominance. Is that what you want to do?

[Leonard Leo]

Yes. And the reason, Steve, and I would really call your attention to the words I use, I want to crush liberal dominance. In other words, I want to make sure that there's a level playing field for the American people to make choices about the lives that they want to have in our country.

[Rob Schmitz]

So this approach obviously was successful for the judiciary. But, Steve, I'm hearing him talk about Hollywood, the Wall Street. Is he able to do that for these sectors of American social life?

[Steve Inskeep]

Well, he can try, and he has access to funding, for sure. Although these industries are a lot bigger and less centralized. You can't just win a presidential election and have your guys start appointing people. It'd be a much more complicated process. Although he feels like those industries are moving in his direction now.

[Rob Schmitz]

Yeah. And I want to ask you about another aspect of the coming administration. Trump wants to greatly increase presidential power. He wants to take steps that may get him sued, and he'd end up in front of judges promoted by Leonard Leo. Can they rule independently in those cases?

[Steve Inskeep]

Well, I asked because Leo himself contends that he's for the rule of law. So does he want a lawless president? And he expressed confidence in the separation of powers to contain Trump.

[Leonard Leo]

I think the conservative justices of the court have consistently shown that they rule independently in 2020. During the earlier election, the Supreme Court and the lower federal courts ruled in the election cases the way they sought.

[Steve Inskeep]

Of course, the court has also ruled in the president elect's favor, most recently saying that the president has immunity for his official acts and even some private actions which impeded the prosecution of Trump and will now apply to his actions in 2025.

[Rob Schmitz]

That is our very own Morning Edition host Steve Inskeep. Steve, thank you.

[Steve Inskeep]

You're welcome.

[Rob Schmitz]

And that's up first for Tuesday, November 26th. I'm Rob Schmitz.

[Leila Faulden]

And I'm Leila Fauldel. For your next listen, why not try Consider this from npr? President Elect Trump has suggested that in his second term he'll take on the news media with more than just words. How might he do it? And how will the press respond? Listen to Consider this from npr.

[Rob Schmitz]

Today's episode of up first was edited by Diedrich Schenke, Roberta Rampton, Jan Johnson, Lisa Thompson and Mohamed El Bardisi. It was produced by Ziad Bhatch, Nia Dumas and Lily Quiros. We get engineering support from Arthur Laurent, and our technical director is Carly Strange. Join us again tomorrow.

[Leila Faulden]

I just love Carly's name so much. I just feel like she's, you know, an investigator, a private eye. Exactly. Some type of, like, superhero. Carly Strange.

[Rob Schmitz]

It is a good name. It's like a name bound for fame.

[Leila Faulden]

Exactly.

[Steve Inskeep]

Want to hear this podcast without sponsor breaks, Amazon prime members can listen to up first sponsor free through Amazon Music, or you can also support NPR's vital journalism and get up first [e-mail] that's plus.NPR.org this message comes from NPR sponsor Shopify, the global commerce platform that helps you sell and show up exactly the way you want to customize your online store to your style. Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at shopify.com NPR this message.

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