Brooks and Atkins Stohr on Trump trying to change narrative on abortion access

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• Geoff Bennett:

  Vice President Harris sits down for her first interview since launching her presidential campaign, as former President Donald Trump tries to change the narrative on abortion access.

  On that and more, we turn tonight to Brooks and Atkins Stohr. That is New York Times columnist David Brooks and Boston Globe columnist Kimberly Atkins Stohr. Jonathan Capehart is away this evening.

  It's great to see you both.

• Kimberly Atkins Stohr, The Boston Globe:

  Good to see you.

• Geoff Bennett:

  So it would appear that Donald Trump is having trouble staking out a consistent stance and message on abortion access and reproductive rights.

  David, just yesterday, in an interview with NBC News, he slammed Florida's six-week abortion ban as being too restrictive. He says it's too short. He said, "I want more weeks." That was a direct quote. Today, he tells FOX News that he's going to vote to uphold that same ban when it comes up for a ballot — when it comes up for voters, a ballot measure, come November.

  It would seem that he's struggling to find an answer for this environment that he's created.

• David Brooks:

  Yes, well, Donald Trump has two principles here. One is the Republican Party's pro-life, and, two, it's not a good way to get elected president.

  And so he seems to be toggling between the two. And if I were him, I would just stick to the pro-life position. You know, he appointed the judges that did Dobbs. He's effectively a pro-life person. His party's a pro-life party. He should just simply stick with the pro-life. But he can't help it.

  When he wants to position himself more favorably, he shifts. But this was the first time when he shifted, saying six weeks was too short, or really trying to push the Republican Party in a pro-choice direction, this was the first time I really saw social conservatives furious and just putting tremendous pressure on him not to do this.

  And so usually they just get in line, but this time they really were mad.

• Geoff Bennett:

  What about that, Kimberly?

• Kimberly Atkins Stohr:

  Yes, I think that is absolutely true.

  Look, we have seen in the elections since Dobbs was overturned by the Supreme — or Dobbs was handed down by the Supreme Court overturning Roe that every time an abortion access question is on the ballot, the abortion access wins. And we have in — not just in Florida, but in some 40 other states some measure on November's ballot that's going to be about abortion access.

  And if you have Donald Trump suddenly saying, oh, I think that this is a problem, it's going to do a lot of damage to the conservatives that are pushing those measures. So you're seeing him thinking about his own hide and then clearly talking to somebody and trying to pull that back.

  But it also goes against what he's always said was, leave it to the states, right? Well, then he was telling states it was too short, telling them what to do. So he's really struggling to find where his lane is here.

• Geoff Bennett:

  He's also talking about access to IVF, because, in that same NBC News interview, he's saying that, if he's reelected, his administration would not only protect access to IVF, but would also have either the government or insurance companies cover the cost.

  Take a listen.

  Donald Trump, Former President of the United States (R) and Current U.S. Presidential Candidate: Under the Trump administration, we are going to be paying for that treatment. So we are paying for that treatment.

• Question:

  All Americans who want it?

• Donald Trump:

  All Americans that get it, all Americans that need it.

• Geoff Bennett:

  Now, neither he nor his campaign have offered any specifics about how this would work or how you would pay for it. IVF is not cheap. Per patient, per cycle, it's roughly $20,000. What's he trying to accomplish here?

• David Brooks:

  Get elected. And so it's just — I mean, he tweeted out a couple or whatever, TRUTH Social'ed something saying women will have complete reproductive freedom under my administration.

  And so on this IVF issue, that's obviously an issue where Americans are more supportive than — abortion is obviously complicated. But he's a salesman and he's just trying to sell himself and he will say whatever will help you buy. And so he's lost in salesman mode.

• Geoff Bennett:

  Is this the gift to the Harris campaign?

• Kimberly Atkins Stohr:

  It is.

  I mean, when he posted that reproductive health care, reproductive freedom under my administration, when did he do that? He did that on Thursday after Kamala Harris gave her accepted speech and made that a central theme in her campaign, protecting reproductive choice for women.

  So what he is doing is — well, he's lying, first of all, because he worked throughout his tenure to — vowing to repeal Obamacare, tried to do that, never put forth a replacement plan for what would replace Obamacare. And now suddenly he's talking about mandates.

  He's not going to do a mandate. He is trying with all of his might to say anything. He's throwing spaghetti at the wall or ketchup at the wall in an effort just to try not to have this be the torpedo of his campaign.

• Geoff Bennett:

  Well, let's talk about that CNN interview last night with Kamala Harris and her running mate, Tim Walz. It's evident that the vice president is trying to establish herself as the change candidate, even as she's the sitting vice president, trying to make this election a referendum on Donald Trump.

  She said last night that the country is ready to turn the page.

  Kamala Harris, Vice President of the United States (D) and U.S. Presidential Candidate: I think that people are ready for a new way forward in a way that generations of Americans have been fueled by hope and by optimism.

  I think, sadly, in the last decade, we have had in the former president someone who has really been pushing an agenda and an environment that is about diminishing the character and the strength of who we are as Americans, really dividing our nation. And I think people are ready to turn the page on that.

• Geoff Bennett:

  So what about that, David? Can she have it both ways, be a change candidate while also serving as vice president?

• David Brooks:

  Yes, first, I thought she did a very credible job. I mean, the most important thing was, can people look at that person and say, could be president? And I think she passed that test. She seemed self-assured. She was in control.

  I think she's right to drop all her 2019 positions, basically. She should just do that ruthlessly. I mean, I'm personally I'm glad to see her moving toward the center with the Republican — it's sort of gimmicky to put a Republican in my Cabinet, but Obama did it, George W. Bush did it. And so it's a gesture toward the center.

  As for the change, I do think there's peril here. It's a tradition. A lot of vice presidents run for — sitting vice presidents run for president. That happens a lot in American history. Most of them lose and they lose because they're not willing to break with the current administration.

  And if you want to be a change agent, it's good to say, I want to — we got — have to have a new path forward. There has to be some substance to it. And if you're just embracing the Biden agenda up and down the line on economic policy and everything, it's not a change. And so I think eventually she has to show some substantive change and not just rhetoric change.

• Kimberly Atkins Stohr:

  Yes, I think it's a little different here. Yes, vice presidents have not done well when they have won — run for president, but that's often after eight years of the other president running.

  This is after four. This is with a lot of people who I have spoken to who were relieved because they voted for Joe Biden thinking that he was a transitional president and were freaked out by the idea of him not.

  And so now they are encouraged by not just Kamala Harris, but the energy that her candidacy has created with — Democrats are saying they haven't felt this since Obama, right, this really big change. So it is a change. She does have positions. She is staking out positions that are different from the presidents, and even in centering reproductive rights in the way that she has and really taking on the issue of immigration as much as she can so far in five weeks that has allowed her.

  So I think that there is a change. And we have also been reintroduced to Donald Trump after four years of being able to forget about him a little bit. So that does — I think that makes this needle she's threading between change and incumbency tough, but she seems to be hitting it right on that mark.

• Geoff Bennett:

  And, David, you mentioned her move toward the center.

  She was asked last night to explain her shifting policy stances on matters like the Green New Deal, Medicare for all, her position against fracking. Those were at the time big progressive measures. Here's how she explained herself.

• Dana Bash, CNN Host:

  In 2019, you said — quote — "There is no question I'm in favor of banning fracking."

  Do you still want to ban fracking?

• Kamala Harris:

  No. And I made that clear on the debate stage in 2020.

• Dana Bash:

  What made you change that position at the time?

• Kamala Harris:

  Well, let's be clear. My values have not changed. What I have seen is that we can we can grow and we can increase a thriving clean energy economy without banning fracking.

• Geoff Bennett:

  That line, "My values have not changed," even though her stance is on policy has changed.

• David Brooks:

  It was opportunistic in 2019. It's opportunistic now.

  The Democratic Party moved pretty far left on a whole bunch of issues in ways that I thought were politically suicidal, decriminalizing the border, obviously the defunding the police, the ban on fracking. But it wasn't just her. It was all sorts of people on that Democratic debate stage as well. There were 20 people running that year.

  And Jim Clyburn decided, no, we can't be there, and Nancy Pelosi too. And they said, Joe Biden. And so when it became a political option for her to go back toward the center, talk about being a prosecutor, she went that way.

  And so she's not the only opportunist to be a politician, but it was opportunist.

• Geoff Bennett:

  In the time that remains, I want to put a marker on something that happened this week, the U.S. Army issuing a stark rebuke of the Trump campaign over this incident at Arlington National Cemetery.

  The army said in a statement, a rare statement, that the campaign was made aware of federal laws prohibiting political activity at the cemetery. And they confirmed the reporting that a campaign staff — Trump campaign staffer abruptly pushed aside an employee of the cemetery. This was a female employee who, according to The Times, didn't want to press charges because she was afraid of retaliation from Trump supporters.

  Kimberly, your thoughts on all this?

• Kimberly Atkins Stohr:

  You know, there was a time that being disrespectful in any way at Arlington National Cemetery, one of the most sacred places in our nation, would have put an end to a political career.

  But we have seen Donald Trump time and time again disparage members of the military, Gold Star families. And so this seems par for the course. I really would love to return to a time where people would look at this in a bipartisan way, in a nonpartisan way, say this is absolutely outrageous. He is not an official at the moment. He is a civilian. He had no business being there.

  And he certainly didn't have any business trying to shoot a video, a campaign video, that would have knocked Kamala Harris for not being there. I mean, it's really one of the lowest political moments that I have seen in my 20-plus years in covering politics.

• Geoff Bennett:

  David?

• David Brooks:

  Yes, lowest political Trump moment I have seen in the last 48 hours, I think.

  One of the things that strikes me, obviously, it's to transgress Arlington as a serious thing. But one of the things that strikes me is, will it have a political effect? And the answer is no. And that's partly because people are used to Trump. They like Trump. But partly it's just because of the change in our politics.

  And so when George H.W. Bush was running for president in 1988, he went into his convention 17 points down. And, obviously, he went on to win. So that's when you could have these big public swings in public opinions, that daily eventually mattered. That's no longer the case.

• Geoff Bennett:

  David Brooks, Kimberly Atkins Stohr, it's great to see you both. Have a good Labor Day weekend.

• David Brooks:

  You too.

• Kimberly Atkins Stohr:

  You too.