Meet the Press NOW — May 2

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It's a big deal event is on really now hurrying to lease a 2026 Maverick XLP Hybrid all wheel drive for 197 bi weekly of 5.29% APR for 16 months with 2,995 down. That's like $99 a week. The Ford is a big deal events. Visit your Ontario Ford store or Ford CA if it's Friday, the White House touts a stronger than expected jobs report as a stable labor market braces for what's next with President Trump's unpredictable tariff policies with China now signaling it's time to negotiate.

Plus, President Trump signs an executive order attempting to pull public funding for NPR and pbs, accusing them without evidence of biased and partisan news coverage. In his latest move to use government power to punish perceived critics and Marco Rubio's ever expanding portfolio, NBC takes an in depth look at the Secretary of State's swift rise in the ranks of President Trump's White House as he assumes more of US Responsibilities amid a major staffing shakeup. Welcome to Meet the Press now on Ryan Nobles at the end of a wild week for the US Economy. Two days ago we got data that the economy was shrinking, but we end the week with data showing impressive resiliency in the job market.

It caps off a roller coaster 30 days that saw a so called Liberation Day announcement of unprecedented tariffs, many of which were later rolled back and then historic losses on Wall street, which markets later recovered. Which brings us to this moment. Stocks just finished the trading day moments ago up across the board on that stronger than expected jobs data. The Dow closing higher than more than 500 points and the S&P 500 closed higher for a ninth straight session.

It's the longest winning streak in more than 20 years. The bounce back for US stocks has been choppy and stomach churning, but persistent, coming after the S and p cratered by 13% in the wake of President the president's tariff announcement exactly one month ago on April 2nd. It's now reversed all of those losses, the market stabilization perhaps giving the president some additional breathing room on his tariff agenda. For now.

Here he is in a commencement address last night at the University of Alabama, boasting to graduates that he's doing exactly what people elected him to do. And it's all about November 5, the November 5 election and tariffs and incentives that we've given. They're going to make this country so much richer, it's making us very rich. And you'll be seeing the results pretty sooner than most people think because that's what other countries have been doing to us.

Just so you understand, they were tariffing the House out of us. Now, we mentioned the labor market's resiliency today. The Labor Department reported that the economy added 177,000 new jobs last month, beating expectations. The unemployment rate held at 4.2%.

It comes as Chinese officials said that Beijing was evaluating the possibility of starting trade talks with the US In a sign of potential easing of tensions between the world's two largest economies. And in another sign of easing tensions, Canada's prime minister announced that he's coming to Washington to meet with President Trump next week. But with that optimism comes the reality that Americans have not yet felt the full impact of the president's tariffs and neither has the global economy. NBC News senior White household Gabe Guillerro joins me now.

Also with me is NBC News senior business correspondent Christine Romans, as well as NBC News business and data correspondent Brian Chong, who's at a Subaru dealership in New Jersey with more on the potential effects of those auto tariffs. Let's start with Gabe. How much latitude does the White House now feel that it has to deal with the economy based on these new job numbers? Hi there, Ryan.

Well, the White House feels that it has the wind at its back. It's been posting over and over again the last several hours on President Trump's social media account, different clips of analysts looking at these numbers. Now, Ryan, I still am old enough to remember though just a few days ago when President Trump said that this was Biden's economy. But certainly they're looking to latch onto whatever they can.

Any strong jobs report after weeks of uncertainty over these tariffs. Right now, the president taking credit for today's jobs numbers, does he also risk they'll be on the hook for the future reports? It may not be as positive. I mean, we still haven't really seen the impact of these mass layoffs through the federal government.

Oh, that's right. But excuse me, the point I was making, the president will take credit when there is a strong jobs reporter when the stock market is up. He's very quick to deflect blame when things aren't going so well. Just a few days ago, he was saying that this was Biden's economy, even though he had previously said in January of last year when he was running for president that stocks were surging because he was running for president.

So he'll take credit if things are going well and deflect when things are going forward. And China appears to be willing to discuss trade, is there any thought of easing or delaying the tariffs on China in light of this? Yeah, there was a significant today, just an incremental change, but it's more than we heard over the last several weeks. Yes, China is now considering whether to start up these trade negotiations, but there needs to be some movement, the Chinese state media says, on the 145% tariffs at this point.

So it doesn't appear that there's a whole lot of movement at this point, but at least some signal that the two sides are at least talking or about to talk, which is more than what we knew about just a few hours ago. And of course, we learned today that Canada's brand new prime minister will be coming next week, set the expectations of that meeting. Well, it's interesting, the White House itself isn't even acknowledging that meeting so far, but we did hear from him, this Prime Minister Carney saying that he would be here next week, next Tuesday to speak with the president. And he said that two things were really on the agenda, of course, the immediate tariffs, which is a significant sticking point, of course, for the two allies or former allies, however you want to look at it.

But also the second issue is that the broader relationship between the two countries. And prime minister says that he expects to have constructive talks with President Trump, but certainly it will be difficult as well, but should be very significant when two leaders meet here at the White House next week. Okay, Gabe, thank you for that. Let's turn now To Christine Romans.

Christine, let's keep in mind here, the Americans have not yet felt the full effect of these tariffs here. Right. So what does this last month, though, showed us about the resiliency of the American economy? It showed us that we're heading into whatever this next turmoil is with a solid footing, the labor market, cash.

Ryan, you know, for like, two and a half years, people have been saying, oh, pretty soon here, you know, the market's gonna start to crack, and it just hasn't. So this is, this is not the gangbusters job creation you saw a couple years ago or even last summer. It is steady, it is predictable, and it is, it is resilient. I just keep saying that over and over again.

We had a couple of months. The prior couple months were revised down a little bit. It's cooling. So that's good.

I mean, these are the kinds of numbers that you want to see. We saw 9,000 jobs cut. That's the Doge effect there. There'll be more of those in the months ahead.

But this is just, this is a steady bas for whatever the next chapter is, the American economy. We talked about this a little bit with Gabe, but I'm interested to get your take on this jobs report. And it doesn't appear that these thousands and thousands of layoffs that have come from the federal government have any impact on those numbers, could they, in the future? Yeah, I mean, there's even a little like a line or two in this government report that says that not all of the recent government layoffs have been.

Have been counted because, look, some of them are buyouts where people are still getting paid. If you're still collecting the paycheck from the government, you know that you're not counted in these numbers. So I expect we're gonna see over the summer more of those Doge layoffs are showing in here. But I'm worried.

We also saw a bunch of hiring and warehousing and transportation that's probably tied to all of those goods that have been imported in ahead of the president's tariffs. I mean, really, just the biggest rush of getting ahead of tariffs we've seen in terms of importing packages in, I think, 40 years or something or 50 years. So there's transportation warehouse jobs that were tied to that. So we'll see, though I'm gonna be watching Main street in the months ahead, because these independent retailers or small manufacturers, factory owners who don't have lobbyists and don't have, you know, lawyers who are trying to go to Washington and get exemptions for, for, for, you know, for these tariffs.

As the Chamber of Commerce pointed out this week, they don't have much time. They don't have to have much time to bury these tariffs before they go out of business. And China says that it's evaluating the potential tariff talks. Evaluating much different than actually sitting down at the table.

But is this at least a positive sign that a deal could happen? I'm trying to find the right metaphor today. I mean, they haven't opened the doors to talk, but at least maybe they've unlocked the door to think about opening the door for talks. And then there's been, there's been some reporting today also in the Wall Street Journal about maybe some kind of fentanyl move is on the table so that they could, you know, start to negotiate in good faith with the U.S.

i mean, there's a lot of work to do here, really, but at least it's, at least it's some site of an off ramp, but it's a mixed mind force, quite frankly. But, you know, we're running out of time here for all these other reciprocal tarif. They've got a lot of deals they need to ink quickly. Otherwise the president has promised that tariffs go up for a whole bunch of countries in just a matter of six weeks or so.

And we spent a lot of time talking about how this is going to impact the American economy. But how devastating has the trade war been for China's economy? Yeah, and China's economy coming in here. I mean, remember, the US Led the world coming out of COVID I mean, the United States economy and its recovery out of COVID was literally the envy of the world.

So the US Is in the stronger position economically, no question, except that it is a totalitarian regime in China. So Xi has already been. The president there has already been stealing his nation for their own sacrifice for nationalist, for their nationalistic glory. So you have two very different situations here that maybe which country can withstand the most, the most pain longest.

I mean, you know, I mean, economists have told me that tariff wars like this, with these kinds of levels, this is mutually sure destruction in terms of jobs. Right. So who's going to blink first? Unclear.

Yeah. Okay. Christine Romans, as I was putting it into context for us, thank you so much for that. Let's go to Brian.

Sean, who's actually on the ground at a place that is dealing with this as frontline as you can get. You're at a Subaru dealership. Ryan, walk us through how these auto tariffs scheduled to take effect tomorrow and what that could mean. Yeah, I know a lot of people might be wondering, I think the auto tariffs were already in effect.

Well, yes, for Finnish automobiles for about a month. But what is news Friday going into Saturday are these auto parts tariffs 25%. But we understood is how complicated these tariffs are because again, I'm in a Subaru dealership. To my right is the Subaru Outback.

To my left is the subaru legacy. Now, 30% of the parts in both of these vehicles do come from Japan. It is a Japanese automaker. But the challenge that both of these cars are assembled in Lafayette, Indiana.

So per the revisions that the Trump administration put into place on Tuesday of this week, now automakers like these, that can actually assemble these vehicles in the United States, if they pay 25% more for the auto parts once they take effect tomorrow, they can get in some cases and apply for a reimbursement of part of that. So again, it's not necessarily a paring back or repeal of that 25% tariff. It just gives the automakers the opportunity to get some of that cost back, which makes it very confusing in terms of whether or not these costs will get passed on to consumers. Voiceover the Anderson Economic Group says even with the revisions announced by the Trump administration earlier this week, the cost of a new car can still go out between $2,000 to as much as $12,000 for some imported SUVs.

That could be some real big impact for those that are trying to make a big ticket purchase like these vehicles. So what kind of effect is that then having on the car companies here and abroad and then even American consumers that may be very nervous about this idea of buying a car with a much steeper price tag than they were anticipating? Yeah, well, look, I mean, for car dealers like this one here, this is the Pine Belt Subaru in Lakewood, New Jersey. You know, the car dealers here are telling us they haven't had to raise prices yet, but if Subaru, the manufacturer, has to raise the MSRP to take the price on the car, yes, that's going to get passed on to the consumer.

That's the price they have to at least start with when it comes to negotiating with people that come into the store. Now, the question is, is that going to impact their sales going forward and will the auto parts tariffs lead to even supply chain issues for the amount of cars that even have on the lot? Take a listen to what Dan Arielle, he is the manager here at this super dealer, told me earlier to say May, June, July, August is our busiest months and the unknown of not having inventory scares the auto industry a little bit. Normally we get allocated 100 to 120 cars a month.

This month we're getting 18. Just to give you perspective, we're concerned just 18 instead of the usual 100 to 120. You can imagine that means that price pressures could be going up if you can even find the car on a lot ride. And then of course, there's those of us that own cars aren't looking to buy cars, but we need parts for the cars that we own.

How could the car parts tariff affect folks like that? Yeah, we've been talking about people coming in to buy a new vehicle, but naturally, if car parts get more expensive, that means even people that have cars already that aren't in the market could still face higher costs if they bring it in. And the oil filter for their chain all of a sudden gets 25% more expensive. Now, again, here at this dealership, at their service center, they haven't had to raise cost on consumers yet, but they've been told to cap the amount of filters that they order.

They don't want dealerships hoarding hundreds of oil filters, and that might deprive other dealerships of that. And yet you have an insurrect saying that even insurance costs could go higher if car repairs get more expensive because the parts are more expensive. That can lead to higher premiums are estimated over $300 in added costs to yearly insurance rates simply because of the higher tariffs. Brian, you give a sense that we're a long way away from realizing the full impact of these decisions.

Brian, strong on the ground force there in New Jersey. Brian, thank you for that. Let's talk more about this now with Betsy Stevenson. She's a former chief economist at the Labor Department and a member of President Obama's Council of Economic Advisor.

She's now a professor of economics at the Michigan, which of course is the state that makes a lot of cars. Betsy, any surprises over how strong this April jobs report was? You know, I don't think that there's a lot of surprises. I mean, if you take a look at the report, what you see is the majority of the jobs were added in two sectors, private sector education and health services and leisure and hospitality.

And that's where a lot of our job growth has been coming from, really, for much of the 21st century. You know, people want to keep getting their medical care. They want to, you know, continue to go on holiday. You know, the reason there's not big surprises here is because, you know, think about when this, this report reflects that second week in April.

We were all a little shocked by what was going on the first week of April. But you don't really go out and lay off employees one week later. And, you know, if you're in the process of hiring someone, you might not even stop that one week later. I don't think we're really in a place where we're seeing even the full impact of the chaos that was April fully baked into our jobs number.

So we're going to be going to be going back out into the field, you know, about a week from now to take a look at what the job market looks like today. I think that's where we might start to see a little bit of a slowdown. But the way it's going to roll out is a slowdown in hiring first, really, before we see, you know, big uptick in layoffs. And so it's a gradual process, even think back to the big 2008 recession.

The first symptom that things were wrong was not a huge spike in unemployment. Yeah. One other metric that we've been following precisely our wages right now, they seem to be growing faster than inflation. As we see from the jobs report, hiring is still continuing at a pretty good clip.

Do you think that this makes it any more likely or less likely that the Fed is going to cut interest rates in the near future? You know, I think if you take a look at overall what's going on economy, a lot of people are overreacted to the GDP number and thought maybe the Fed, I should cut rates sooner. And of course, now we got this jobs report that says, well, maybe actually everything's okay. You know, I think the reality is that there is a threat to the economy of slowing down, but it's coming from a supply shock.

And that same supply shock is what might contribute to ongoing inflation. So the Fed's kind of between a rock and a hard place. You know, they don't want to stimulate demand for goods that are there. There's 18 cars on the lot stimulating demand, cutting rates so that more people chase those 18 cars is going to be a problem.

Yeah, right. You mentioned the GDP report, and we learned from the Commerce Department that the economy shrunk 3/10 of a percent during the first quarter this year. That's not a huge drop, but it is a drop nonetheless. But aside from imports, the economy does appear to be in pret decent shape.

I mean, does that bode well for the future of the labor market? Is there still too much uncertainty there's definitely too much uncertainty. And I do think there are some signs of weakness that we really need to be paying attention to. For instance, in the job openings and labor turnover survey, I know it's a mouthful of the jolts report that came out from March.

It showed that there was a slowdown in the number of job openings. Not a slowdown in hiring yet, not a slowdown or any kind of pickup in layoffs, but a slowdown in the number of openings being posted. And I think that that's a really good indicator of how these things unfold kind of slowly. The first thing you have to do is decide not to look for a worker.

And that's where we're going to start to see, you know, slowdowns in hiring. There's also some reports that young people graduating from college are finding it harder to get interviews, are finding it harder to find jobs. So, you know, those are the kind of cracks we want to look for first is, you know, do we see the youngest entering the labor market starting to struggle to find jobs? Do we see job openings coming down?

Does that continue in April and into May? Those are the kinds of things I'm going to be looking for. We are definitely not out of the woods. I wouldn't say this job report says the economy's still strong, but it's clear we're not in a recession right now.

One of your other commentators said people have been talking about a recession for two or three years. That's absolutely true. It's like we've been saying, you know, warning people of the wolf. And now everyone's like, well, we're warning of the wolf again.

Remember that the moral of the story of the boy cried wolf is not that there's no wolf, except you don't cry wolf when there's not one yet. We don't have a wolf yet, but I'm going to keep looking for one in the woods. And the wolf eventually gets the boy, as I remember that story from my childhood. Betsy Stevenson, thank you so much for your perspective.

We appreciate it. And before we go to break, an important programming note. Kristen Welker will have an exclusive one on one interview with President Trump marking his administration's first 100 days. You can watch it Sunday only on MEET THE press.

Coming up, the president and CEO of PBS calls President Trump's executive order to end public funding for PBS and npr, quote, blatantly unlawful. She joins us next. You're watching MEET THE PRESS now. It's here, the Ford.

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The Ford is a big deal events. Visit your Ontario Ford store or Ford Casual. Welcome back. President Trump is once again ramping up his attacks on two American institutions that he views as hostile to his agenda, public broadcasting and higher education.

Today, he threatened to revoke Harvard University's tax exempt status, which comes after Harvard sued the administration, arguing the government's decision to freeze more than $2 billion in federal funding violated the First Amendment. And then late last night, President Trump signed an executive order directing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which is a private non profit created by Congress to end its funding for NPR and pbs, baselessly accusing the broadcasters of, quote, biased and partisan news coverage. In a statement today, NPR says that it will challenge the executive order using all available means. Paula Kirker, CEO and president of pbs, called the executive order blatantly unlawful, adding that PBS is exploring all options to continue to serve members and stations and Americans.

The president and CEO of pbs, Paul Kerr, joins me now to discuss all of this. Paul, thank you so much for being here. I know you and your team are dealing with a lot. First, explain to me what exploring all options means.

Should we expect you to file a lawsuit against the Trump administration? Well, right now, we're actually trying to understand what it is that has been proposed. But, yes, I would not, I would not rule out the possibility that we would pursue litigation. Look, for more than 50 years, we have been serving our member stations.

Remember, we're not a network. I think a lot of people are a little confused about who we are and how we're organized. We were created by our member stations to create, to do for them at scale what individual stations couldn't do by themselves. An individual station wouldn't be able to create a NewsHour and a Sesame street and Mr.

Rogers and Ken Burns. Great work. And Nova and so forth. So we do that together.

And so for us, this is, this is quite out of what we have dealt in the past in terms of discussions about funding for public broadcasting. So we're going to fight this. Obviously, this would have enormous impact on our 330 stations around the country and their ability to provide content to people that enjoy our work and that value our work and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is already involved in litigation with the administration when it comes to its attempt to fire members of its board. Do you think or do you expect that the CPB will defy this latest executive order?

Well, I'm not going to speak for the cpb, but certainly we have been talking. We talk almost every day anyway because of the work that we do on behalf of our stations. And I know that they are aligned with us in wanting to ensure that we're able to do our work. You know, when we were created, we were specifically designed to ensure that there was no influence by anyone, whether that's government or anyone else.

And so there's a firewall that protects the funding that comes from the federal government into public broadcasting. It goes to the corporation, which is a private corporation, and they in turn make contributions to our member stations. What this executive order, as we understand it, would not only not allow any of that funding to come to us, but they're also trying to restrict what our local stations are able to do. And that, to me, feels against all of what was hopefully put in place when we were created, which is to ensure that we were able to do our work and to serve the communities across this country that do rely on whether it's our children's programming or whether it's primetime programming or whether it's even a little creature, Sprint and small.

I mean, we're a variety service and we look at bringing lots of content forward on behalf of the American people. But there might be many Americans who at least feel like never watched a single second of your broadcasting the programming that you have to offer. What would you say to them when they ask why their tax dollars are going to fund bbs? Yeah, well, actually, most Americans do watch us at some time.

Many people rely on us for our children's programming. And if for no other reason, that's a powerful argument for funding. Half the children in this country are not enrolled in formal Pre K. And we're here, and we are here with content that's not just safe, but it is also based on key skills that kids need to master before they enter school for the first time, whether that's at age 2 or 3 or 4 or 5.

Skills of counting and numbers and everything else that they need to be successful. The first time that they walk into a classroom that sets them on the path for success in life. That's a critically important part of the work that we do. I think we're all invested in making sure that our nation's children are ready to fulfill their Potential.

So that's just one argument. A lot of people count on us with our local stations for everything from the Farm report to a little known fact about public broadcasting, which is we are the backup INF infrastructure for America's early alert system. It's an investment that the federal government has made because we are broadcasters. We reach every part of this country for free.

And we also have a digital infrastructure that allows first alerts to go out. And, and so there's just, there's plenty of arguments of why, even if you don't watch every night, why public broadcasting is a good investment for everyone. Now, if you lose this federal funding, what impact will it have on PBS and its ability to broadcast? Just how big of a blow would it be?

Well, if we lost all of the funding for public broadcasting, it would impact a number of our stations. You know, we were set up with this idea that we're a public private partnership. And so for our stations that are in communities that can raise the resources, the percentage of government money that comes into them is relatively small. I've spent a lot of time since I've been in this job traveling and visiting lots of stations in small communities.

Those stations would not exist were it not for some support from the federal government. So that's the biggest thing. That's risk. But even as each station looks at its own situation in terms of federal appropriation, we're an interconnected system and our ability to serve comes from the strength of all.

Many of our programming comes from many stations, not just from a studio somewhere on either coast, which I think is what some people believe. Most of our content comes from stations. All of that comes at risk. Yeah.

All right, Paul Kerr, thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate it. Thank you, Ryan. I appreciate it.

All right, up next, the derby debt. New evidence that consumers and businesses aren't horsing around with President Trump's unpredictable tariff policies. We're gonna get a report from Churchill Downs where the hats are big, but the costs could be even bigger. You're watching me, the press now.

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Xfinity Imagine that subscription automatically reduces each year at 65.99plus tax and fees until canceled. On the ranch May 20, 2026 prices subject to change. Visit TODAY for full on for terms and details. Welcome back to the first major staff shake up of the second Trump administration is putting even more responsibilities on Marco Rubio's already very full play.

With Michael Waltz now out as National Security Advisor and expecting to be nominated as UN Ambassador, Rubio now holds four top jobs. He's of course the Secretary of State, which is a big job of its own, right, acting National Security Advisor, acting head of USAID, and the acting archivist of the National Archives. That's a lot of hats for anyone, and especially for someone who initially seemed a bit out of step with much of the rest of Trump's largely die hard MAGA cabinet. My NBC colleagues took a deep dive into Rubio's transformation into Trump world over the first 100 days.

And they write, first, he has adapted some of his foreign policy positions that in the past diverged from Trump's. Second, he's been on a MAGA charm offensive and he spends as much time as he can at the White House to be close to Trump. Joining me now on set, Tamara Keats. He's the White House correspondent for National Public Radio, Maria Teresa Kumar, the president of Voto Latino and an NC News contributor, and Stephen A.

The editor and CEO of the Dispatch. And he's of course an NBC News political analyst. Thank you all for being here. Spend another crazy week in Washington.

Tamara the Marco Rubio transformation is pretty incredible. Little Marcos was once called picking on the size of Donald Trump's hands in the 2016 campaign. Now he's become one of the most favored Cabinet secretaries with an ever growing portfolio. How is he going to handle all of these responsibilities?

And he is someone who had very strong views about foreign policy that don't actually match with Trump's. But he has done a masterful job of just putting aside everything he ever stood for and serving the President of the United States, which is the job of a Cabinet member. He's like, to use a Hollywood term, a slasher producer, slash writer, slash director. He is now the ultimate slasher.

But there are A number of people in the administration who wear a lot of hats. You know the OMB director and for a time head of Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Stephen Miller has a couple of hats. That's a thing in this administration. Rick Renell is the head of the Kennedy Center.

He's also a special envoy. Rubio is maintain proximity to the president and as your colleagues reporting laid out proximity to President Trump being the last person in the room or being nearby when he says hey I need somebody for this. That's how you survive in a Trump administration. And I take what you mean.

You're saying about all these different outfits a lot of people wearing in most cases those are agencies or outfits that the president wants to diminish. Right. He USAid he's not that big because we're trying to destroy it anyway. But National Security advisor and Secretary of State, not only are they two really important rules but they're distinctly different for a reason, right?

Yes. And often the national Security Advisor and the Secretary of State don't necessarily get along but there is historical pre know how long he's actually going to be in this role. I think it's pretty clear that they are looking for a permanent replacement. But Henry Kissinger did it.

He demanded to do it. In fact in different times on the 70s even part of Rubio's ascent has been his willingness to kind of frankly suck up the Donald Trump listen to how he handled himself in the cabinet meeting this week. Have you been in touch with El Salvador about returning Abrego Garcia because a formal request from his administration to make why I never tell you that you know what else he's the conduct of a foreign policy belongs to the president of the United States and the executive branch. So we will conduct foreign policy appropriately if we need to but I'll never discuss it and no one else remains to discuss it.

That's how foreign policy works. So there's two parts of this. There's obviously him saying Donald Trump in charge of everything but there's also a decided shift in his foreign policy view that manifests itself in that answer. I mean I would say decided shift is the gentlest possible way that you can put that diplomatic of you look we've seen from Marco Rubio a willingness to totally abandoned his long held and what we thought were deeply convicted views on foreign policy conservative in many respects old school Ronald Reagan conservative.

That same captive meeting he had a comment about Donald Trump thankfully steering the country away from 30 years of foreign policy decisions and foreign policymaking from the United States in The past, I would argue that nobody was a bigger defender and a more articulate defender of that 30 years of foreign policy than Marco Rubio until very recently. And, you know, I've been doing a lot of reporting on this. He talked to. I started reporting on Marco Rubio during his Senate Primary in 2009, 2010.

You talk to people who worked for him then, and they will say, we didn't recognize the guy, not who we thought we were working for. And that was true until just a few months ago in some respects. Others will say, look, this is the transformation that we expected to see. This is the real Marco.

What you heard before was more sort of Marco who was pleasing donors and pleasing the establishment because he wanted to run for president, things like that. I tend to believe the first set of people. I think what he's doing now is he's for play acting. Maria, what Stephen was talking about, that version of Marco Rubio, is what made almost every Democrat feel comfortable voting for him for Secretary of State.

Do you think they regret that? No. He was the only cabinet member that actually got the full Senate that spoke for the Senate. There is a meme going around right now on X and on Instagram saying, of course it's the Latino who's holding four jobs.

Right. And it's understood. But no, but I think one of the biggest challenges that we're seeing is that they are centralizing all this power. And, you know, we can't be flipping like, this is the last time we saw this was the 1970s.

Right. When USAID actually came out of the State Department, is going back in national security, is going back to the State Department. And it speaks to a broader vision of Trump. And that is he actually doesn't want the conflict.

He wants people to making sure that everybody's going the same direction and it's going to lend us, I think, into a place. And this is marker. We was going to have a hard time. The more you learn about Trump's policies, the more he wants to be isolationist.

And when you concentrate everything through one worldview and one. Through one lens, it'll be interesting to see whether or not Rubio will finally find his voice, because that has not been his. He still gives some comfort to hawks, Republican hawks in the Senate who worked alongside him on the internal committee in the Senate. And one of the reasons I've talked to some people who one of the reasons that he was named National Security Advisor, maybe on interim basis, is because they were losing an ally in Mike Waltz.

So Mike Waltz will see in the other hawk, there is a sort of two pronged attack on hawks, people who have traditional Reaganite views in the Trump administration. Now on the outside, from lawyer, the conspiracy theorist who's responsible for I think, gutting some of the National Security Council on the inside from people aligned with Tucker Carlson, J.D. vance. But I take it, and I agree with this, when I talk to these Republicans on Capitol, you get the sensible we know ultimately Marco's going to be okay, but isn't there more that he's bending himself direction?

But it's that lens, right? Like when you actually look at usa, that's the dove, right? The State Department diplomacy is the dove and national security is the pocket. All of a sudden they're converging into one worldview that I think makes us, I think a little more hostile.

On the national. Let me talk about Democrats quickly. Bernie Sanders out on the road. He's with Congressman Dulu today, who's a frontliner, a moderate, not someone you'd expect to see him on the road.

Is this a sign that the Bernie Sanders from the party is starting to control the Democratic Party? So the thing about Bernie Sanders, and you know this well, he is actually quite pragmatic and he is, he, he, he, he talks a lot about the millionaires and the billionaires, but he is actually pretty pragmatic when it comes to actually lawmaking or, you know, maintaining control of the House, of the Senate. He is ultimately not someone who burns it all down most of the time. You know, some caveats.

Yeah, talks about burning, but then he doesn't actually burn it all down. And Bernie Sanders is at this moment the person in the Democratic Party who can draw the biggest crowds in this country. And is that where Democrats need to go? So I think that there's two parts of the Democrats when they legislate, they actually meet the people where they are, but they don't want to be populous out loud.

And I do think that this actually brings folks together. We just released a poll of the first hundred days of Trump among a thousand voters in the Latino community. And one of the things that we found is that even among voters that voted Democratic last time around, there's a softness because they don't feel like they understand what the Democrats stand for. And this actually gives that populous moment for them to actually speak to their truths and say, look, the status quo isn't working for everybody.

We have to reimagine government. I think that it gives them that outlet. Okay, we're going to leave it there, guys. Thank you so Much for being here.

Appreciate it. Everybody's got journalism, right? Yes. Anybody feel differently about that?

Thank you guys so much. I appreciate it. I want to turn now to a place where tariffs are having a big impact across the board, and that is the aforementioned Kentucky Derby. And the Run for the Roses.

America's oldest sporting event is feeling the pinch this year. Trump's tariffs are saddling both Kentucky Derby attendees and organizers with more to worry about than just hats and mint juleps. Renovations and Church Hill Downs are on hold amid increased costs, especially on steel, and organizers say the ticket sales are soft, as some would be. Derby goers are saying nay due to economic uncertainty.

Miami's colleague Adrian brought us through the hardest assignment at the company, and now she joins us from Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kentucky. Adrian, you look amazing. You were right there in the midst of all the action there, of course, so much attention on Churchill Downs tomorrow for the Kentucky Derby, but the race does come with Trump's tariffs as the backdrop. What are you hearing there?

Hey there, Ryan. Yeah, this is the hardest assignment. I'm sweating bullets, let me tell you. There's so much excitement and enthusiasm here.

But then again, at the same time, we're hearing concerns about the uncertain economy as well as those tariffs, especially after hearing from the CEO of Churchill Downs pausing or putting a hold on those renovation projects. We're talking about a project that was nearly $1 billion. Here's what he had to say about that. Uncertainty is a theme out there in the American economy and that's what we pay attention to.

So we did pause our 900 million dollar construction project primarily and mostly because we weren't sure what things were going to cost. And whenever you build something particularly of that magnitude, you got to be very careful on the cost side because you need to get a return on your capital. So that was the primary, primary thing we were focused on. But certainly from a demand side, we want to prove it.

We want to be make sure that consumer demand is strong and consistent with prior years. And I, I think we'll do that. You know, he was transparent talking about the decision he had to make, and he does not know what is coming next. So he made the decision that he made based on what he sees in front of him now.

And for the foreseeable future, that project is on hold until he can figure out a plan or the best strategy to move forward. Fans we spoke with were a little bit disappointed, but they quickly cheered up because they looked around to see the renovation projects that are in place right now talking about how pristine this area is compared to years before Ryan. And of course, you know, there are the macro issues, the construction projects, everything along those lines. But there's also the micro impact that this is having.

Everything from the big hats to the birds, bourbon to the mid jewels all taking a hit. What are dirty goers telling you as they arrive in Kentucky? You know what, one man at Massey really comes to mind. I spoke with him at length today.

He said he's been coming to the Derby for years. He said keep in mind the Derby has been around for more than 150 years longer than he's been alive. Yes, he admits that tariffs do mean trouble and they we're already seeing the impact, especially with the delayed renovation project. But he says it is not going to halt or stop this iconic event.

Disappointed guess but he's hoping that they will get back on track soon so they can see some growth in the future. And we're leave the professional handicapping to our friend C. Before you go, who do you have winning the derby tomorrow? You dream.

My money is on journalism. I'm all about a great story and I want to see journalism the at finish line first. Yeah, I think all of us that do this for a line of work feel the same way. Adrian brought us at Church of Downs.

Thank you, Adrian. And we'll see if Adrian's right with our coverage of tomorrow's Kentucky Derby starting at 2:30 Eastern on NBC News and streaming on Peacock. First off after the break. Today marks two months since Israel cut off humanitarian aid into Gaza and the situation is dire.

That's where he next. You're watching the press now. Welcome back. According to the United nations, it has been two months since Israel imposed a blockade preventing any food, fuel or aid from entering the Gaza Strip in an attempt to ramp up pressure on Hamas to release the remaining hostages.

A groups however, are still scrambling to try to get more assistance into the war torn enclave as the humanitarian situation remains dire. One of those groups called the Freedom Flotilla Coalition says that their their ship that was to head to the Gaza Strip with aid volunteers was hit by drones causing serious damage to the ship. NBC News international correspondent Matt Bradley is in Tel Aviv and has more. Yeah, when we hear from the Maltese government, they said that all of the people on board that ship are now confirmed safe and that that fire is now under control.

Amazingly, miraculously, there were no casualties, no wounded even from among the people, the crew and the volunteers who were on board that ship called the Conscience when they said the crew member said that it was struck by what they said were two drone strikes in the middle of the night, disabling the ship and starting a large fire. This ship was headed to Gaza Strip and the intention that it was to deliver much needed food and medical aid to more than 2 million people who live there who have been suffering for the past year and a half under constant Israeli bombardment. And now just today, after two months of a massive Israeli blockade, the longest in Gaza's history, that have deprived those residents, Those more than 2 million people, of food and medical aid. I'm here from the Red Cross Red Crescent.

They said that all their aid efforts are essentially now falling short. They're not able to do anything without any outside aid coming in. The World Food Program has said they have hundreds of thousands of tons of aid waiting at shipment points outside of Gaza Strip for the Israeli government to lift that blockade. There's substantial pressure from the international community on the Israelis to allow that aid in.

And in fact, the Israelis are having to answer to accusations of using food as a weapon of war at the Hague. And this happened just earlier this week. Now, this is a humanitarian crisis that is getting worse and is on top of the already appalling conditions that people in Gaza have been suffering for the last year and a half, ever since those October 7 attacks set off that latest round of fighting. And the Israelis have said that they're trying to do this under pressure Hamas to come to the table to negotiate some sort of hostage release seal to let those what's thought to be about 59 hostages go.

We're still in the Gaza strait. Only about 24 of them are thought to still be alive. The Israelis also say that Hamas have been siphoning off the aid and using it to profit themselves. But regardless of what's actually going on here, the fact is the people of Gaza, women and children, civilians, are suffering the most.

Ryan. All right, Matt Bradley, thank you for that report. Still to come, fluoride fears and vaccine falsehoods. We're debunking RJ RK Jr.

S claims about drinking water and the measles vaccine. Don't go anywhere. You're watching me, the press. Welcome back.

According to the United nations, it has been two months since Israel imposed a blockade preventing any food, fuel or aid from entering the Gaza Strip in an attempt to ramp up pressure on Hamas to release the remaining hostages. Aid groups, however, are still scrambling to try and get more assistance into the war torn enclave as the humanitarian situation remains dire. One of those groups called the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, says that their ship that was set to head to the Gaza Strip with aid volunteers, was hit by drones, causing serious damage to the ship. NBC News international correspondent Matt Bradley is in Tel Aviv and has more.

Yeah, I only hear from the Maltese government. They said that all the people on board that ship are now confirmed safe and that that fire is now under control. Amazingly, miraculously, there were no casualties, no wounded, even from among the people, the crew and the volunteers who were on board that ship called the Conscience. When they said the crew, it was struck by what they said were two drone strikes in the middle of the night, disabling the ship and starting a large fire.

This ship was head to Gaza Strip and the intention of it was to deliver much needed food and medical aid to more than 2 million people who live there who have been suffering for the past year and a half under constant Israeli bombardment. And now, just today, after two months of a massive Israeli blockade, the longest in Gaza's history, that have deprived those residents, Those more than 2 million people, of food and medical aid, I'm hearing from the Red Cross Red Crescent, they said that all of their aid efforts are essentially now falling short. They're not able to do anything without any outside aid coming in. The WU Food program says that they have hundreds of thousands of tons of aid waiting at shipment points outside of Gaza Strip for the Israeli government to lift that blockade.

There's substantial pressure from the international community on the Israelis to allow that in in. And in fact, the Israelis are having to answer to accusations of using food as a weapon of war at the Haguen. This happened just earlier this week. Now, this is a humanitarian crisis that is getting worse and is on top of the already appalling conditions that people in Gaza have been suffering for last year and a half, ever since those October 7 attacks set off that latest round of fighting.

And the Israelis have said that they're trying to do this in order to pressure Hamas to come to the table to negotiate some sort of hostage release deal to let those what's thought to be about 59 hostages go were still in the Gaza strait. Only about 24 of them are thought to still be alive. Israelis also say that Hamas had been siphoning off the aid, using it to profit themselves. But regardless of what's actually going on here, the fact is the people of Gaza, women and children, civilians, are suffering the most.

Ryan. All right, Matt Bradley, thank you for that report. Still to come, fluoride fears and vaccine falsehoods. We're debunking R.J.

r Jr. S claims about drinking water and the Measles vaccine. Don't go anywhere. You're watching Meet the Press now.

Massive storm affecting almost all of Florida. This soldier is standing inside for Russian drones healing Bourbon Street. The healing has begun. Every angle, every night.

Stay right here. NBC Nightly News. More Americans turn to NBC News than any other news organization. Welcome back.

We learned today that Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Will testify before the Senate held committee later this month on the proposed HHS budget for next year. That comes after a week where we've heard Kennedy reprise misleading and false claims about both vaccines and fluoride issues were scientists say Kennedy could have disastrous impacts on public health.

Kennedy's long history of falsehoods about vaccines have been disputed and debunked by national medical professionals, including his claim this week about what's in the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine. There are populations in our country like the Mennonites in Texas, who are most afflicted, and they have religious objections to vaccination because the MMR vaccine contains a lot of aborted fetus debris and and DNA particles. Well, that is correct. The MMR vaccine, like many vaccines, is grown in fetal cells, but the vaccines do not contain those cells or pieces of DNA.

Here to fact check some of Kennedy's claims is NBC News health reporter Ari Benex. So, Ari, let's start with what we just heard. Explain why claims about aborted fetus debris is just scientifically and inaccurate. That's right.

So it's going to involve a quick history lesson here. So the secretary is referring actually to the rubella portion of the measles mumpson rbella vaccine. That's the one that almost all of us get in childhood. And in the 1960s, scientists actually obtained cells from elective abortion, and those cells over time have been replicated to create what's known as a cell line.

So we use those copies or replicated cells to produce the current version of the MMR vaccine. But none of that original human tissue is in these current vaccines. And in fact, those replicated cells aren't even in the final MMR vaccine that we give to kids. So the secretary is clearly mistaken about how this all works.

And then Kennedy dropped another bombshell on the scientific community this week when he announced that all new vaccines will be required to undergo placebo testing. I mean, what impact could this have on this new requirement when it comes to the development and approval vaccines? So I should say off the top right, that placebo testing is already very common for new vaccines. But let's take for Instance, a scenario where you have a new formula of a vaccine and you want to test it, usually the ethical thing to do, according to scientists, is to compare that new formula to an old version of the vaccine because you don't want to deny study participants access to a vaccine that we know is safe and effective.

What the secretary is calling for here is to actually use an inert substance like water or saline for all vaccine trials. And scientists are really worried that could delay the rollout of critical vaccines that need to be updated to match the current strains like Covid or RSV shots. And then of course, the next battlefront for the Secretary is fluoride. Florida looks boys to become the second state in the country to ban fluoride from its drinking water this week.

And it comes out for a push from Kennedy to nixit from one water supplies. I want you to quickly listen what Kennedy said about fluoride earlier this week. In August, the National Toxicity Program, which was honored with the NIH in a metaphor and found that there's a direct inverse correlation between fluoride exposure and lockdown human children. The more you get, the stiffer you are.

Ari, what do we know about this study that cannot be exciting? And why do we even put fluoride in our drinking water to begin with? Yeah, so I'll say off the top that fluoride exposure is not linked to lower intelligence in children. But we have seen several states obviously attempt to ban fluoride.

I think we have a map that shows those efforts, Florida obviously being the latest and hasn't yet banned fluoride that the governor just needs to sign. And that'll be a done deal in orange there at the bottom. Obviously the study that he's referring to is actually a meta analysis that was published in January that showed an association between higher of fluoride and lower IQ scores in kids. But it's important to note that that study was mostly based on research in countries that already have higher levels of fluoride in their drinking water compared to the US So it's really hard to say how it could apply here.

We do include fluoride in our water in most states because it helps prevent cavities. And that's a good thing. And that's the same reason why major medical groups support that practice as well. Okay, great reporting, Harvey.

Thanks. Thanks so much for being here. We'll be back Monday with more Meet the President. If it's Sunday, it's Meet the Press on our local ABC news station.

Chris. And course interviewing President Trump. That's it. For US News NOW continues now with Tom Cassell in.

I'm sorry. Yasmin Vesselian in for Hallie Jackson. Right now, everyone, I'm Dylan Dryer, co host of the third hour of Today and Bomb to three Wild Boys. I've learned a lot my years as a parent, mostly that I don't have all figured out yet.

And I'm not the only one. This is my new podcast, the Parent Chat. Each week I sit down with someone new, run this conversation and real world advice about parenting. I am over here just like winging it.

Hey, I'm trying not to screw my own kid though. I'm going to give you advice on how to screw yourself. Search the parent chat on YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts.