0:00

Presented by the National Association

0:02

of Realtors. Hey,

0:08

good morning. I am Playbook co-author Eugene

0:11

Daniels. It is Tuesday, April 9th. Here's

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what's driving the day. Tonight,

0:17

President Biden will be welcoming Japanese

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Prime Minister Kishida for a state

0:22

visit. According to the

0:24

Washington Post, the two men are

0:26

expected to make a long list

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of announcements. The Washington Post, in

0:30

its preview, say the two countries

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will commit to modernizing their military

0:35

alliance, outlining a vision for an

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integrated air defense network that links

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Japanese, Australian, and US sensors, and

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announced that a Japanese astronaut will

0:45

become the first non-American on a

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NASA mission to the moon. Most

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of the events take place Wednesday, but

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on Thursday, the first ever

0:55

summit among Japan, the United

0:57

States, and the Philippines will

0:59

begin. Also, a

1:01

state appeals court judge on Monday

1:03

denied President Trump's bid for an

1:06

emergency delay of his criminal trial

1:08

in New York. The former president

1:10

and his team said that the

1:12

trial had to be halted because,

1:14

quote, an impartial jury cannot be

1:16

selected right now based on prejudicial

1:19

pretrial publicity that

1:21

was rejected in a one-line ruling

1:23

on Monday afternoon with no explanation.

1:26

And on Monday, former President Trump

1:28

posted a video on his social

1:30

media site, Truth Social, that

1:33

detailed his position on abortion. Many

1:36

people have asked me what my

1:38

position is on abortion and abortion

1:40

rights, especially since I

1:42

was proudly the person responsible for the

1:44

ending of something that all

1:46

legal scholars both sides wanted

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and, in fact, demanded be

1:50

ended. He

1:54

also added some clarification on

1:56

his current position of abortion.

2:00

from a legal standpoint, the

2:02

states will determine by vote or

2:04

legislation or perhaps both, and

2:06

whatever they decide must be the

2:08

law of the land, in this case, the

2:11

law of the state. And

2:14

joining me now to talk about all

2:16

of that is national political correspondent and

2:18

our friend Meredith McGraw. Meredith, good morning.

2:21

Good morning. Thank you

2:23

for coming on. You know, you are one of our

2:25

Trump whisperers. So I appreciate you coming

2:27

on in this moment. You know, I guess

2:29

the first thing at top

2:31

of my mind, and probably a lot of people

2:33

who are listening, is how did Trump come

2:35

to this? Trump has called

2:38

himself a champion of the

2:40

pro-life movement. And he did

2:42

get conservative justices on the

2:44

Supreme Court that ultimately led

2:46

to the overturning of Roe

2:48

v. Wade. And he

2:51

has been called by his own

2:53

party, the most pro-life president

2:55

that they've ever had. And

2:57

he really campaigns on that.

3:00

But this decision to put

3:02

out a video on abortion

3:04

really is about pure, raw

3:06

2024 politics. Last week,

3:08

Trump was asked about his

3:10

position on abortion, specifically the

3:12

Florida ballot measure. And

3:15

he told reporters that he would be coming

3:17

out with a statement in the coming week.

3:19

And it took some of his own advisors

3:22

by surprise. So they

3:24

really knew that at some point soon, Trump was

3:26

going to have to come out with some kind

3:28

of statement. He was going

3:30

to have to articulate where he

3:32

stood, especially on the issue of

3:35

a national abortion ban, because the

3:37

Biden campaign, President Biden, they were

3:39

making this, this is going

3:42

to be a big part of their

3:44

argument in the election. And so Trump

3:46

really needed to come out and say

3:48

something. Yeah, I mean, it

3:50

kind of makes me think of the Nikki

3:52

Haley argument when you asked

3:54

her questions about abortion during the

3:56

primary, right? She talked about a

3:59

more realistic view that basically you're not going

4:01

to have 16 senators, so it doesn't matter. So

4:05

you can't make those promises. And

4:07

trying to think about how will a general

4:09

election audience engage with this, right? And it

4:11

sounds like that's what Trump's trying to do.

4:14

He seems to be wanting it kind of

4:16

both ways, both saying, you know,

4:18

I'm the reason that Roe is gone, but you

4:21

know, leave it to the States. Don't

4:23

try to think too hard about how involved I am.

4:26

And the split of the party was really quick.

4:28

We had Mike Pence, his former VP who called

4:31

it a slap in the face. Trump

4:34

has been knocking Lindsey Graham

4:36

over and over again as

4:38

Lindsey Graham criticized him, quote

4:40

unquote, respectfully about this

4:42

stance. Talk a little bit about

4:44

that, that this is not the

4:46

thing that anyone wanted to hear. It's too in

4:48

the middle. It's too much, I guess, as someone

4:51

put it to me, him trying to have it

4:53

both ways. Yeah, in some ways, this is

4:55

Donald Trump trying to have it both ways.

4:57

And he's been asked about abortion in

5:00

the past. He's talked a lot about

5:02

wanting to find consensus. He wanted to

5:04

negotiate a deal so that

5:07

quote, everybody would be happy. And

5:10

he is a politician who

5:12

has understood the trickiness

5:15

that this issue has had for

5:17

the Republican Party for years. And

5:20

I think he was particularly burned

5:22

in the 2022 midterm elections. He

5:26

had had conversations with some of the

5:28

candidates he had endorsed in the primaries,

5:31

telling them that they need to just

5:33

soften their position on abortion. In

5:36

particular, I'm thinking of a case

5:38

like Tudor Dixon in Michigan,

5:40

who was running against Governor Whitmer,

5:43

who never came out

5:45

and publicly said that she supported

5:47

exceptions. And that's something that Trump

5:50

has been a staunch believer

5:52

in exceptions for the

5:54

life of the mother, for rape,

5:56

for incest. And he thought

5:58

that some of these candidates had a good time. having these

6:00

hardline approaches on abortion

6:03

ultimately cost them in

6:05

the midterms. And over

6:07

the course of the day after

6:09

his video on Monday, Trump repeatedly

6:11

talked about the politics of all

6:13

of this and how he

6:16

feels that if Republicans don't get it right, that

6:18

it could end up costing them again in 2024.

6:22

Last question before I let you go. The

6:25

people that are upset are still very

6:27

likely to vote for Donald Trump, right?

6:29

They're not all regretted gonna on this

6:31

one issue go to Biden because Biden's

6:33

on the exact opposite end of them

6:35

and Trump on this issue publicly at

6:37

the very least. But this

6:39

is about those kind of moderate women

6:42

in the suburbs, right? You know, definitely.

6:44

I think this was

6:47

certainly a calculation

6:49

by Trump. Sometimes he

6:51

just goes with his gut decision on

6:53

things and certainly that could have played

6:55

a role in this. But he's

6:59

looking ahead to 2024. And

7:01

like you said, he's looking to

7:04

these constituencies that he is the

7:06

most vulnerable with. And

7:08

with his statement, he really is giving a

7:10

lot of cover to

7:12

Republicans down ballot who can

7:14

punt on the issue of

7:17

abortion. He's also giving cover

7:19

to some of the Republicans

7:21

who have even more restrictive

7:23

positions on abortion. I'm thinking

7:25

of people like Kristi Nome,

7:27

the governor of South Dakota, a

7:29

state where abortion is

7:31

completely banned. I think the only

7:33

exception is the life of the

7:35

mother. So he's giving cover

7:38

to a lot of Republicans, but at

7:40

the same time, he's trying to communicate

7:42

that he's not

7:44

willing to go as far and

7:47

that by leaving it

7:49

up to the states, he's not having

7:51

to take responsibility for

7:53

some of those harsher bans. As

7:56

one person put it to me on Monday when I was talking to

7:58

them about this, for now,

8:00

right, asterisk on how he feels today,

8:02

because we have seen over and over

8:04

again how on really any

8:06

issue he's kind of moved away from

8:09

the more scripted version of that. So

8:11

you will be on top of how,

8:13

if at all, that that position changes

8:15

or even modifies. So Mayordeth, thank

8:17

you, thank you, thank you so much for coming

8:19

on. Thanks for having me Eugene. And

8:24

for your schedule today, the House and the

8:26

Senate are both back. And

8:28

in the afternoon, President Biden will be

8:30

delivering remarks on the care economy from

8:33

Union Station in DC. And

8:35

around 6pm, he will be welcoming the

8:37

Prime Minister of Japan and his wife

8:39

to the White House. I'm

8:42

Eugene Daniels. Thanks for listening. We

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believe fairness is worth fighting for,

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and we won't stop until we

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have fair housing for all. That's

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why the National Association of Realtors

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providing cutting edge training to take

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