Meet the Press NOW — May 26

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If it's Monday. A major shift in tone for President Trump lashing out at Russian President Putin saying he's gone quote, absolutely crazy after Moscow alleged launched massive deadly strikes across Ukraine this weekend. Plus another tariff turnaround. President Trump announces he will delay his 50% tariff on the European Union and says his tariffs are about encouraging American made tanks and technology, not textiles, despite the current policy.

And on this Memorial Day, the nation honors America's falling and commemorates those who serve with ceremonies and memorials across the country. Hello and welcome to MEET the press now online Nobles. We're going to begin today with breaking news in Liverpool, England, where a car drove into a crowd of people lining the streets for a soccer celebration. Police are describing it as a major incident.

Thousands of people were gathered to celebrate the Liverpool football team's English Premier League victory. You can see there is a heavy emergency presence and debris littering the road. Now we do have video of the moment of the incident. This from a witness who appears to be in a building overlooking the scene.

We do want to warn you though, the video which we've blurred to obscure bodies is graphic and extremely disturbing. It's, it isn't clear yet how many people were injured or killed, but police say the car stopped at the scene and that a 53 year old white British man from the Liverpool area has been arrested. Joining me now is NBC News international correspondent Molly Hunter in London. Molly, this is horrific.

Obviously, so much that we don't know yet. What do we know though at this point about this incident? Ryan, so much we don't know in that video that you just showed is incredibly disturbing. And you can set the police will be watching that, of course, trying to get any clues as to what exactly happened, what that driver might have been thinking.

What we do know from police is around 6pm that incident that you just showed our audience happens about three hours ago here local time. Emergency services were called immediately. And you can see from the video that you currently see, it's at 9 o' clock right now here in the UK still huge emergency service presence, ambulances everywhere. You see police kind of cordoning off the area and police right now, Ryan, have a really huge task, right, secure the area.

There were tens of thousands of people out for this soccer crate as you mentioned, was supposed to be a joyous day. So secure the scene, make sure everyone is safe, but also investigators. So talk to as many people of course who were there, who would have been witnesses to that incident. What we know from the mayor side police that the Liverpool area police, a 53 year old white British man has been arrested.

They have not released his name. They've also not released the make of the car. We do see from that video appears to be a black van. Now we also know for police tonight, they are really encouraging the public, people online to avoid speculating because lots of videos, lots of verified videos are of course going around on social media.

Our partners, Ryan Sky News, they're actually on the scene and they describe. Everyone is very shaken, of course, as you might imagine, people kind of huddled in the rain. It's pouring rain there now, making the police investigation, of course, all that more difficult. People are huddled in total shock, kind of just taking it all in again.

This was supposed to be a joyous day. Tens of thousands of people. It was a 10 mile long parade route and then this when there would have been kind of max crowds out there, Ryan. And we know the British Prime Minister has weighed in on this as well.

What is Keir Starmer saying? Yeah, the Prime Minister tweeted, just excuse me, posted on X just about half an hour, an hour ago. And I think we have that tweet, excuse me, that post to share with our audience. He wrote, the scenes in Liverpool are appalling.

My thoughts are with all those injured or affected. I want to thank the police and emergency services for their swift and ongoing response to the shocking incident. He adds, I'm being kept updated on developments and ask that we give the police the space they need to investigate. We've also heard, Ryan, from the Home Secretary who said the police are investigating.

I'm also being kept updated on developments. We will keep you posted, Ryan. We do expect some more information from emergency services, of course in the next couple hours. Okay, Mole Hur, stand by.

If you get new information, please come back to us. We appreciate you covering this breaking story for us and we're going to keep an eye on this breaking news, as we mentioned. Any updates when we get them but we're going to turn now to a solemn day here in this country as we honor our U.S. service members, the ultimate sacrifice defending this country.

President Trump marketed Arlington National Cemetery where he participated in a wreath laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and delivered remarks honoring America's fallen service members. At times varying the politics. These warriors, and that's what they are as great, great warriors, picked up their mantle of duty and service, knowing that to live for others meant always that they might die for others. They knew that they asked nothing for it.

They gave everything and we owe them everything and much, much more. Their valor gave us the freest, greatest and most noble republic ever to exist on the face of the earth. A republic that I am fixing after a long and hard four years. That was a hard four years we went through.

Well, today's speech came after a much more politically charged speech this weekend as the president addressed West Point graduates and touted his reshaping of the US Military to reflect his worldview. The job of the US Armed forces is not to host drag shows, to transform foreign cultures, or to spread democracy to everybody around the world at the point of a gun. The military's job is to dominate any foe and annihilate any threat to America anywhere, anytime and any place at the same time, the president today lashing out at Russian President Putin for Russia's latest strikes on Ukraine after Moscow launched more than 350 drones and missiles this weekend targeting more than 30 cities across Ukraine, including Kiev. Here's what President Trump told reporters yesterday.

I'm not happy with what Putin's doing. He's killing a lot of people and I don't know what the hell happened to Putin. I don't have a long time, always gotten along with him, but he's sending rockets into cities and killing people and I don't like it at all. President Trump doubled down in a post on social media this morning writing, quote, I've always had a very good relationship with Vladimir Putin of Russia, but something has happened to him.

He's gone absolutely crazy. A spokesperson for the Kremlin dismissed the criticism, seeming to blame President Trump's, quote, on emotional overload. Joining me now is NBC News White House correspondent Yamichel Sindor and NBC News international correspondent Ross Sanchez. Oh, I'm sorry.

Just Yamiche Yamichees, let's go to you. Let's start with these memorial commemorations. What more did we hear from the president? Well, Ryan, good afternoon.

The president did spend a large part of his speech talking about the service and sacrifice of military members. He recognized several service members by names and also talked about their families and said that they had made the ultimate sacrifice. It wasn't somebody's a more solemn speech than of course, that he gave in West Point, where it was both a sort of mix of graduation advice in politics. That being said, even today, he did talk about previous administrations in some ways hit back at Democrats saying that he was essentially fixing the messes of past administrations.

I mean, you talked about it over the weekend because I think we should probably roll some of that in. He laying out laid out the idea of a sort of Trump doctrine, saying that he was no longer going to be into nation building. He was no longer going to be into sort of trying to spread democracy instead, which is going to be about fighting America's enemies. I think it's going to be going to look back on when we think about sort of the military interventions or not interventions in the next few years, Ryan, and of course, that dovetails into his comments on Russia.

It was just a week ago that President Trump spoke by phone with Putin. How significant is the shift in rhetoric that we're seeing from the president's latest comments? You know, it's a key question, Ryan. And I've been talking to White House officials, but also exper been watching these peace negotiations.

And the big question is possibly how long will President Trump continue to engage in these negotiations. The president said that the United States could walk away altogether if he doesn't see enough progress, enough enthusiasm from both sides. And while he was very much lashing out uncharacteristically, frankly, when it comes to the president of Russia and Vladimir Putin, of course, he also said that the president of Ukraine was not being helpful and he wasn't sort of moving things along the way that he should either. So I wonder as the president clearly gets frustrated and clearly is not holding back when it comes to what he wants to see and what's happening.

There's a big question of whether or not the United States feel like this is going to be a place that it wants to try to get PC Said all over again. This is the war that really is he blames President Biden, former President Biden. Of course, it was Russia that invaded Ukraine. But I wonder if something he just cuts his losses and say, we know this is not my problem.

This is the war that didn't start my watch while I'm over it. I think that that's the big thing is this sort of ticking time clock to see whether or not he stays engaged. Interesting. He's so surprised by President Putin's behavior when people have been warning him about this exact outcome, basically, since he took office.

A leg shift gears. Now in a separate post on his social media platform, President Trump also threatened to take away grant funding from Harvard. What else can you tell us about this escalating spat between the White House and Harvard? Well, it is just that it is an escalating fight.

Let's remember one, that Harvard University is already in a legal battle when it comes to the Trump administration trying to take away funds from the university. And on Friday, we had a federal judge say actually to the Trump administration, you cannot at this point block Harvard from having international students because they are trying to stop university from enrolling and even keeping the foreign students that it already has attending. The president is claiming that Harvard is not being transparent and who is going to its university when it comes to foreign students. And he is also saying that they're not giving him this list that he's demanding.

But we should remind people one Harvard has said about a core of its student body is international students. And also for students who come into the United States and attend Harvard University or any other university, they have to get a visa. So the question is whether or not the federal government doesn't already have a list. I think what the president has been pushing for is more of a list of what other students are at Harvard University.

I think that that's what the university is pushing back online. Okay. We'll talk more about Harvard here just a few minutes. Thank you so much for your coverage of all these big stories.

We're going to turn now to another story out of the White House today, the latest walk back of a tariff threat. President Trump now saying his proposed 50% tariff on the European Union will be delayed by a month after his phone call with the president of the European Commission. I read your movement. I believe June 9th would be July 9th would be the day.

That was the date she requested, but we moved it from June 1 to July 9 and I agreed to do that and that she said we will rapidly get together and see if we can work something out. This is also latest in a series of tariff threats and then reversals that the president has made since first announcing what he called reciprocal tariffs. On April 2nd. He announced 20% tariffs on the EU the day before, slashing that rate to 10% a little more than a week later.

Then on Friday, he threatened the 50% tariffs on the EU only to back down two days later. NBC News business and data correspondent Brian Chung is covering the whiplash. He explains me now, Brian, the markets really didn't react strongly to President Trump's tariffs remarks on Friday. Based on his retreat yesterday, does it appear that investors really don't believe he's actually going to follow through with these tariff threats?

Yeah. And Ryan's answer to that question, you can't look to the markets today because they weren't open. But if you look at market futures, it does suggest that imply open that could be positive tomorrow morning when they open up at 9:30 Eastern Time. Now I do want to point out that the confusion over all these tariffs has in some respects almost been a little bit novocaine to the market because as you mentioned, even despite the threats of those tariffs escalating yet again last it seems like markets kind of just appeared to shrug it off, which means that there is perhaps a feeling among Walsh investors that they can almost look through some of these headlines given that the experience of these tariffs over the last few months has kind of been some story of you can't really predict what's going to happen under this administration because in any given hour that story could change fundamentally.

Maybe don't reposition thousands of dollars or millions or billions of dollars in case of hedge funds based off of those expectations. All of which is just continuing to add to this confusion. Although it does seem like by a large market would likely be happy with the idea of staving off a 50% tariff on European Union for at least another month longer than we originally thought. But the markets can't also like the sensitivity.

Right? I mean this lack of predictability is going to drive investors crazy. Yeah. Certainly even outside the market aspect of this.

If you are a company that's trying to bring goods here in the United States and you don't like that uncertainty either. I talked to a number of business owners, small margin. I've been telling you over the last few months. Look, we are okay if the administration were to say we've had a 10% tariff and ration up to 20% next year and 3% year after because at least then there's a plan.

We can plan around that plan. There is no plan to plan around. So that's the reason why a lot of these retailers are confused about the whole situation. Why Americans are basically kind of pulling back on expenditure because they don't know what prices will be either.

Let's get to this as well. The president also raised a few eyebrows this weekend, essentially agreeing with Treasury Secretary Scott Benson that the US does not need a booming textile industry. Listen what he said. No, I tend to agree.

We're not looking to make sneakers and T shirts. We want to make military equipment. We want to make big things. We want to make do the AI thing with the computers and the many, many, many, many elements.

But the textile, you know, I'm not looking to make T shirts, to be honest. I'm not looking to make shops. Phil he's actually talked about T shirts before because that jive with the actual tariffs that he's proposed or imposed. Well, it's consistent with the broad tone from the administration and the signaling they want to bring American manufacturing to the United States even though he's backtracking on what types of industries specifically.

But it is not consistent with the tariff strategy that this administration has embarked on since January 20th. Because what they've done is they put a 10% baseline essentially on every country around the world, which is akin to using which I think is the magnet to other aspects of policy on this administration as well, of using a hatchet and not a scalpel because they're not targeting specific industries. Even though we heard from President Netclips just now is that he's not interested in be shoring things like for example, screwing screws into an iPhone or making clothing. And I just want to point out that that's also underscore some of the tension inside the administration because it was Howard Lutt, the Commerce Secretary who said only a few months ago that he could see American screwing those little screws in iPhones.

So again, a little bit of, you know, interesting context within the administration's online. Okay, Brian, Jeff, stay on top of all of this. As always, we appreciate it. Turning now to the war in the Middle east and the escalating humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

Yesterday the head of a and Israel backed aid organization overseeing the distribution of aid in Gaza abruptly resigned, saying it was impossible to carry out the aid plan while also adhering to humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality and independence. It comes as Israel is expanding its military operations on the already war torn enclave. NBC News correspondent Matt Bradley is in Tel Aviv with more Israel's attacks on the Gaza Strip are continuing. Last night overnight we saw the Israelis struck a school killing as many as are nearly 40 people, most of them children.

This according to Palestinian health officials in the Gaza Strip, which is ruled by Hamas. Out the Israelis said that this school was being used as a Hamas command and control center. The Palestinian officials said this was basically a refuge place or sort of shelter for families who had been displaced from elsewhere in the Gaza Strip. But as we saw this horrific attack as that was going on over the past day, we also seen that Christine Noem was in town.

This is the homeland Security secretary. She was dispatched by President Donald Trump in order to effectively give her condolences to the Israeli government following the twin assassinations of a couple in Washington, D.C. both of them Israeli embassy employees just last week that shocked the world. But this also came just around the same time that we saw another violent incident facing diplomats.

This time it was a young American German national who was just detained last night in New York. He just appeared in court yesterday as well. Joseph Neumeyr, he's 28 years old. He is accused of trying to attack the US Embassy branch office here in Tel Aviv.

Now, according to documents from the Justice Department that were released yesterday, he approached this US Embassy branch office. He spat at one of the guards and then when they tried to detain him, he fled. He left his backpack, which contained ingredients for three Molotov cocktails, basically firebombs. Earlier that day, he posted on social media inviting people to come and watch him burn down this U.S.

embassy, which he called the U.S. eMC U.S. embassy that since been moved by the Trump administration back in 2018 to Jerusalem. This just goes to show that the war in the Gaza Strip is now spilling over into political acts of violence and not just here in Israel, but also in Washington, D.C.

all right, Matt Riley, thank you for that report. Coming up, policing in America. Five years after George Floyd's murder spark nationwide calls for police reform and racial justice. We'll take a deep dive into what's changed and what hasn't.

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Sunday marks five years since the murder of George Floyd. Caught on camera sparking nationwide protests and calls for social justice and police reform. NBC shack Rooster was on the ground during the protests and has been covering the response from cities and police departments even as Congress failed to act. George Floyd.

George Floyd. Five years after George Floyd's murder under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer put law enforcement across America in the spotlight. Changes to policing swept through the country despite Federal reform failing to pass. The biggest change since 2020 is that states now have a larger role in policing.

Since May 2020, more than 1500 policing related bills have been enacted across nearly every state, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. A number that doesn't include what we saw and covered within individual departments. It's gonna get some pushback and resistance. Like in Charlotte, where in 2021 Chief Johnny Jennings launched a mandatory customer service training for officers working with the same consulting firm used by companies like Disney and Chick Fil A.

We wanted to take a customer service approach. We wanted to look at how can we be the best part of somebody's worst day. Today, the department says external complaints are down 61 officer involved shooting spell 43 as more than 4 in 10 officers say they've applied what they've learned. And we're sitting in on some naturally informed, constantly updated and constantly evolving department is working 10 across the country interested in launching similar courses.

How much do you credit this customer service training for those clients? I have to credit it. I mean, there's no other explanation. They're going to make mistakes.

But at the same time, if the community knows that you're working to improve those relationships, how you respond and treat the community, they're going to give you a little bit more leeway when something does happen. In 2022, we saw departments quickly joining a Georgetown University training project focused on peer intervention and the duty to intervene. I appreciate you guys having open minds all with respect to this training. That training and its annual refreshers expanded from 179 departments then to 420 today, even as administrators say their batt a decline in philanthropic support.

It's not only about the intervention, it's also about being willing to accept it. Experts say the most lasting shifts are being seen in policing alternatives. I would much rather our officers not have to engage in the mental health crisis, but it's here. Like in Detroit, where in 2023 we rode along with a SWAT like mental health response unit.

That's still expanding today under new leadership. But there's also been a national push to boost support for individual officers. Around 2022 to 2023, we start to see a little bit more focus also on police well being themselves, focusing on making sure that officers had access to mental health support. And more than 63 state laws targeting police recruitment and retention.

99% of Detroit's officer vacancies have been filled after the department increased pay and offered seniority incentives for returning officers. When you have community barrel and police Morale that is high. Now you have a community that is willing to take the oath and become police officers. Charlotte activist Robert Dawkins in 2021 told us he was skeptical of the impact of changes being proposed.

We tried all of these different things, but you cannot reform within somebody's heart today. Do you still believe that policing is unreformable? I do. We do appreciate the work that the police are doing now.

This mitigation stuff that they do now feels good real, but that good real leads in the spur of the moment. You're just one bad police shooting away from it happening again. Back in Minneapolis, former police chief Madera Arredondo says reform is a work in progress but that it starts with individual officers. I know police agencies have really around the country and trying to do the best they can, whether it's hiring, recruitment, retention, but all that pals in comparison.

If you don't make sure you're bringing on people's character. And that character did not exist out here the night of May 25, 2020. Five years of police reform falling short of many demands. But back in the spotlight today.

And NBC Checkmarcer joins me now from Minneapolis. Officer, you have done some exhaustive reporting on this topic. And despite what we just saw in your piece there, there are still a high number of officer involved killings and the political momentum for this reform appears to have shifted to some degree. What can you tell us about that?

Yeah, that's a great point that you make. And that's because if you look at the number of people killed by police, it's higher in 2024 than it was even back in 2020. And yeah, the political momentum has not only shifted, it's almost completely flipped. You know, this past week we saw the Trump administration roll back the investigations and those court enforced agreements between the federal government and cities like Louisville and Minneapolis police.

Now the city, the cities are saying they're still going to continue those changes. They're every reform that was agreed to in those agreement that speaks to the frustration that you hear from people on the ground. We heard it all throughout the weekend that the change that they went out and protested for back in 2020, they feel like it's not just not happening, but in some cases it's being reversed. And you went to George Floyd's memorial this weekend.

What did you hear from members of his community now five years after his death? Yeah, you hear a lot of pain. There's still open wounds. I think the Star Tribune put it well this morning when they said their open wounds are still left to heal or slow to heal at this point.

That was the sentiment you heard as we saw a weekend of commemoration there at George Floyd Square. That's the exact intersection where he was killed. You heard people go to panel discussions. There was a gala to essentially honor members of the community.

And then last night we saw a candlelight vigil at the actual moment where George Floyd was killed. You hear that tension again where there's the hope that there's change, but there's also understanding that there's still a lot of pain that people are feeling five years later line? Yeah, hardly. It's been five years.

Chef, thanks for all your reporting on us. We appreciate it. Up next on this Memorial Day, from combat to Capitol Hill, a veterans fight to change a policy that keeps some wounded service members from receiving their full benefits. You're watching.

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That's like $99 a week. The Ford, it's a big deal. Events visit your Ontario Ford store or Ford Cat. In every hour of peril, in every moment of crisis, American warriors have left behind the blessings of home and family to answer their nation's call.

That was President Trump speaking about service and sacrifice on this Memorial Day and on this day when we honor members of the military and their families. NBC News Capitol Hill correspondent Mel Zanona has the story of a wounded warrior who traveled to Capitol Hill to fight a new battle. Calling on Congress to fix the so called wounded veterans tax. Army Staff Sergeant Dan Nevins was deployed to Iraq as a squad leader when an improvised explosive device detonated beneath his vehicle in 2004.

I remember everything about the day. Fortunately or unfortunately, the blast killed his platoon sergeant and took both of Nevins legs. The blast sort of vision, if you will. And it was my 10 year old daughter.

She was all grown up and dressed in white, head to toe and walking down the aisle without her dad and I, I was like I'm alive. I have to do something to keep it that way. After a painful and lengthy Recovery, which included 36 surgeries and an 18 month day at Walter Reed Hospital, Nevins started to live life again, even picking up new skills like becoming a certified yoga instructor. I was like, yoga?

That's wrong, dude. It made the nightmare stops. When he was forced to retire from the military in 2006 because of his injuries, Nevins thought he'd be financially taken care of, but that wasn't the case. It's a tragedy, really.

Nevins found out about the so called wounded veterans tax. Under current federal policy, some injured veterans who retire early, often not by choice, get a dollar taken out of their retirement for every dollar they receive in disability pay. I was told I could not receive both. You could either have retirement or the va.

Ahead of Memorial Day, Nevins traveled to Washington to advocate for a bipartisan bill that would give all veterans their full retirement and disability pay, calling on the country and Congress to honor its commitment to veterans. We should keep our promises. I mean, I teach my kids to keep our promises even when it's not convenient for them. Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal is leading the effort.

So they're being penalized financially. They're being penalized for being wounded. The bill would impact about 50,000 veterans currently losing out on 1900amonth because of the policy. Essentially, it's about simple justice and fairness.

But the legislation is costly and comes at a time when the Trump administration is looking to trim government spending, including at the Veterans Affairs Department. What the Doge musk Trump slashing and trashing is doing to our Veterans Affairs Department is absolutely unconscionable. A spokesman for the VA said the agency does not typically comment on pending legislation and vow there will be no cuts to healthcare or benefits for veterans. The Department of Defense did not return a request for comment.

Nevin's now hoping his personal experience will help inspire action. If it takes sharing a story or like digging up some uncomfortable wounds, then so be it. Mellie's known on NBC News Washington. And after the break, Republican rift.

President Trump seems to give senators the green light to make big changes to his big beautiful bill, which probably adds up to big problems in the House. Panel is next. You're watching you the press. Welcome back.

Just days after House Republicans narrowly pass President Trump's big beautiful bill, the president himself is acknowledging the Senate is going to make is going to be making changes to the package. Well, I want the Senate and the senators to change, you know, to make the changes they want. And we'll go back to the House and we'll see if we can get them. In some cases, those changes maybe are something I agree with, to be honest.

Of course, the big question is what do those changes look like and do the changes would that those changes allow the package to get through the Senate but then doom it when it gets back to the House. Joining me now is Rochelle, the Democratic strategist, founder of the Unassist Pack and the co host of the Latino Vote podcast, and Stephen Hayes, the editor and CEO of the Dispatch and NBC News contributor. Stephen, we saw how difficult it was for Mike Johnson to get this bill passed in the House if the Senate makes changes to this and some senators have been saying they want big changes. I mean, what can happen when it goes back to the House?

I mean, it could create a long, a really long process, a really difficult process. Look, I mean, it's hard at this point to take seriously the claims from those who are protesting or threatening to vote against the bill either in the Senate or in the House because they've said we've been through this so many times. This was true in Trump's first term, is true in Trump's second term. That said, you do have some pretty strong objections being locked by Senator Ron Johnson, Senator Rand Paul, among others who look at this and say this is a monstrosity add significantly to our national debt.

We don't have vote for it. But to your point, Republicans have told us they're gonna stand up and then fold almost every time I said one thing that's maybe a little bit different, I think the result is likely to be the same. But Ron Johnson in his comments over this weekend was specifically challenging the president of the United States. You don't hear Republicans do that very often.

He said, I want the president to help us bring down the deficit. That is a little bit different tone. You get a whole other argument from a few other senators you haven't heard from yet that are for reelection, like in North Carolina and in Maine and other places that think that this thing is going to weigh heavily in the midterms, that they just to be up because they're intercepting this year. So I think that you have two different parts of the same party fighting over different aspects of this.

That makes me more confused if they get what they're looking for. Right. If Ron Johnson and Rand Paul get bigger cuts, that's going to impact something like Tom Tis worried about making cuts. Right.

And as you move into all these folks in one home, it's not popular with lots of folks. You talk about adding 4 trillion is what the experts say to the national. You can see each part of folks having an argument. Nobody yet to that point.

Listen to what housekeeper Mike Johnson said yesterday about a Senate colleagues. I Met with the Senate Republicans on my colleagues over there last week on Tuesday at the weekly luncheon. And I encouraged them, you know, to do their work, of course, as we all anticipate, but to make as few modifications to this package as possible because remembering that we got to pass it one more time to ratify their change in the House. And I have a very delicate balance here, a very delicate equilibrium that we've reached for a long period of time.

And it's best not to meddle with it too much. Steven. I spent a lot of time talking to senators while the House members were negotiating this, and it was almost like they weren't paying attention to it. We're doing what we're going to do.

They can do what they're going to do. I mean, is there any chance that there's only going to be slight modifications? I don't think so. Remember, from the very beginning, the Senate wanted a different process altogether.

They went through that. They came to the Republicans or the House on this process. That was really among the more dignified versions of begging you're ever going to see from Mike Johnson saying, please, please don't do this. We don't want this to screw things up.

Yeah, we haven't talked about Democrats all over here, Chuck. Did they play any role in this conversation at this point? Especially given the fact that this reconciliation process and only requires 51 votes to pass? Look, I've been on campaign for over 30 years.

You live and die by contrast. You can contrast Joe Biden and we're contrasting everything against Joe Biden. Joe Biden is gone now. You can contrast against what they're going to take away from people where there's 13 million taking away their healthcare, 13 million people taking away their health care or other things.

Republican push back. Is they recording this? We don't. Lazy people.

That's going to be an argument. That's gonna be the difference. But what's not being said here is they got this through the House because there's three Democratic vacancies that have to be filled because of special elections. That's how narrow it is.

If they had any one of those folks who had not died in office or was not the vacant one out there, this would never pass. And Stephen, is there any chance that Republicans can win that argument in 2026 about this particular bill? I can never say on the floor this is the day that the Republicans lost the House of Representatives. Is that it could manifest itself that quickly?

Look, I don't think Republicans have a hard time keeping the House of Representatives anyway this past vote. But I think it's hard for Republicans to make the kinds of arguments I think are necessary to make on Medicaid reforms. I mean, the real problem Republicans face is this bill is not going to do the kinds of things Republicans who claim to be small government conservatives for years and years need to do to actually change the trajectory of our debt. And in the absence of that, I think it's harder for them to say, look, we've made these changes, we propose these changes to Medicaid because we really are serious about the national debt.

They've shown themselves not to be very serious about the national debt. There's no reform to Medicaid. We're not even talking about Social Security. These big entitlements are.

That's where the money is. And they're not touching. Two years after the president was elected last time you saw this groundswell of Democrats showing up. You've already seen that in special elections.

I'm not one of the beginners. Say, look at this poll. Look at this thing. Look at the elections that happened.

Look at the turnout in those elections. This has changed from when I ran campaigns in the 90s. We used to hate a special election. Now that switch to where our voters are more informed and show up at bigger numbers, show up in the term.

Okay, let's talk about the president's comments here over the last 24 hours. He delivered the commencement address at West Point over the weekend, and it turned out to be more than just an inspirational message to the graduates. Take a listen. So we can say we're liberal, we're conservative.

The new word is progressive. They don't like using the word liberal anymore. That's why I call them liberal. But whatever you are, you know, most importantly, you have to have common sense, because most of it's general.

Most of it's about common sense, when you get right down to it. And we have a lot of people with a lot of. A lot of very smart people, but they have to have common sense. And we've liberated our troops from divisive and demeaning political trainings.

There will be no more critical race theory or transgender for everybody forced onto our brave men and women in uniform, or on anybody else for that matter, in this country. He's wearing a political hat, Stephen. He made a number of political references. Is that inappropriate thing to be doing at a consensus like this?

It's not. This is Donald Trump, though, right? There are rules there. He likes to break the rules.

This is what you'd expect from him. He's done this in past commencement ceremonies. He does this in his formal remarks. He put out a tweet today on Memorial Day going after I can't remember the exact phrase for the equivalent of soccer losers.

Again, just do Donald Trump. Does it just add to the punch power but at the power of folks who are paying attention to this? Does every voter come about this? No multiple know even did it?

No. But the folks who do show up in midterms, going back to our last conversation, it's going to be those who are more engaged to keep up with news day to day, like the folks watching this program who they really offense. Okay. Thank you for being on holiday.

Really appreciate it. Still to come, mental health in America. The former US Surgeon general speaks out on loneliness, which he calls one of the most profound and urgent public health crises of our time. You're watching the President.

Welcome back. Experts say that Americans are facing a loneliness epidemic as more young people struggle with isolation and anxiety than ever before, even in our superconnected world. Public health officials say that smartphones and social media are exacerbating the mental health crisis. And as a part of a special edition of Meet the Press, Chris Walker sat down with Dr.

Vivek Murthy. He's the former U.S. surgeon General and the author of Together the Healing Power of Human Connection in a Sometimes Lonely World to discuss the importance of community and how it can help keep us healthy. Take a listen.

Thank you so much for being here for this important conversation. So, as surgeon general, one of your top priorities was to tackle what you called an epidemic of loneliness and isolation, especially in young people. Dr. Murthy, why is this such an important topic to focus on?

Why did you make this such an important focus when you were surgeon general? Of course, this issue came as a real surprise to me. I didn't start my tenure at surgeon general thinking I was going to focus on loneliness back in 2004. But what I found as I traveled around the country is that people were telling me stories about loneliness everywhere I went.

College students on campuses surrounded by thousands of other kids, but saying, I don't feel like anybody knows me. I don't feel like I can be myself. I feel alone. Parents were saying that, CEOs were saying this.

Members of Congress were telling me they were struggling with loneliness everywhere I went. This is a challenge. And as I dug into the data, two things emerged. One is that loneliness is extraordinarily common.

We've got over half of kids who are saying, for example, that they struggle with loneliness and by the way, kids across the population struggle the most, but it's also consequential. So when you struggle with loneliness and isolation, it raises your risk of depression, anxiety, and suicide, but it also increases your risk of heart disease by 29%, stroke by 31%, dementia by 50% among older adults. And the overall mortality increase, can I relate it to social discontinue? Is comparable to the mortality impact of smoking and obesity.

That's how powerful and how important loneliness is. Yeah. Just to delve into it, you say smoking it actually, as you say in your book together, is the equivalent to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Dr.

Murphy, that's a staggering figure. Explain the science behind those numbers, those figures that you just talked about. Well, it turns out that our connection with one another, this is not just a nice thing to have, it's a biologically imperative force. It's something we need for survival, just like we need food and water.

And when we're deprived of social connection, that actually puts our body into a stress state. We feel like we're under threat. Now, in the short term, stress can sometimes help you. Right.

When you're preparing for an exam or for a presentation. But imagine chronic stress that comes from chronic loneliness. That's when it starts to increase inflammation in our body, increase our risk for heart disease and other conditions that ultimately shorten our life. And when you were surgeon general, you actually went on a listening tour all across the country to talk to families about what they were experiencing.

Why is loneliness hitting young people so hard? What did you find? Well, there are a few things that have been happening. One is over time, we just moved around more.

We changed communities, changed jobs. We have to leave the people we know behind. We also find that over the last half century in our country, participation in the kind of organizations that used to bring people together, faith organizations, recreational service organizations, has all declined. But what I worry about for young people in particular is the impact that technology is having on their social connection.

We tend to think, oh, kids are on social media. That's great because they're connected to one another. But no, we have to recognize there's a difference between the connections you have online and the connections you have in person. As more relationships have shifted online, we're realizing that, number one, more kids are struggling with this intense culture of self comparison online, which is shredding their self esteem.

A lot of them are trying to be somebody that they're not online, and they actually don't have as many friendships in person as we all need. So you put this all together, what you see is escalating loneliness and isolation. And I'll tell you this, the people who know about this most are young people themselves, because they would tell me all the time how lonely they were. One student that I talked to at a college as I was traveling the country, he said to me, he said, how are we supposed to connect with one another when it's no longer the culture for people to talk to each other?

And I had him repeated the question that wasn't sure I heard him right the first time. He thinks it's no longer the culture for people to talk to each other. And I saw that on college campuses. The first college I went to, I walked into the dining hall and it was quiet.

I remember the dining hall being really loud in college, yes, but everyone's on their devices. Their ears are plugged, their earbuds. They're not talking to one another. Wow.

It's just staggering. That is a powerful anecdote. And you tell of meeting a mother also from Colorado who's. It's such a tragic story.

Her daughter committed suicide, suicide after she was bullied online. And this is a mom who was deeply engaged in her daughter's activities online. Dr. Murthy, talk to the parents out there who hear stories like that, and they are terrified, but also concerned their children may be falling through the cracks.

What's the message and what are the warning signs? Well, listen, parents do have good reason to be worried right now, and many parents already are. The most common question I got from parents around the country, it was about social media. They asked, is this really safe for my kids?

And that was the reason I issued a search and child's advisory on social media. Female health. Lori, the young mother that you mentioned in Colorado who I met, was one of the most tragic stories that I encountered that she did everything that you think a parent should want to do. She told her talk to her kids about social media.

She checked her daughter's phone every night before she went to bed to understand what she was using when she. But what she didn't know was that there were ways that her daughter could hide apps under other apps. Her daughter had multiple accounts that she didn't even know about. And she only realized after her daughter took her own life that she'd been mercilessly bullied and harassed online.

And she saw just how her self esteem had been shredded. Here's what I would tell parents. Number one, this is a journey that is difficult for any of us to make alone. And it's important for us to Talk to each other as parents to come together to support each other.

Because right now a lot of parents think that everyone else is figured out and they're the only ones struggling. That is not the case. The second thing she knows parents about technology and social media is delaying the use of social media for your kid as long as possible is important. And that's because the adolescent brain is not the same as an adult brain.

If you look biologically, young people's brains are in a different phase of development. They're more susceptible to social comparison, to social suggestion. Their impulse control is not as well developed and that puts them more at risk of the negative effects of social media. I would wait until at least after that middle school and in high school.

This is what we're trying to do for my kids. We're going to reassess based on whether real safety standards have put in place what the data is telling us in the maturity of our kids. But finally this, if your kids are already on social media, what you do, I think it's important for us to create tech free zones in their life to protect the dimensions of a kid's life that are critical for their development. Sleep, like in person interaction, learning and physical activity.

So that means no phones an hour before bedtime. You can get them back in the morning to meal times. Dedicate those in person face to face conversation without devices. We lead by example on this.

As parents we can do a lot to help our kids. You actually just referenced this as surgeon general called for warning labels to be placed on social media. And look, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, he puts a number on what you were just saying. He says kids should not be on social media until they're in at least 16 years old.

It's a part of rewiring children's brains. Can you take us through the science of that and 16. I know you said after middle school, would you say 16 is the appropriate age? I think 16 is a very reasonable age for parents to consider it as a threshold.

And look, some kids who might be very mature, perhaps some of them may be ready to be a bit earlier. Some kids actually may be more time past 16. I think 16 is a good benchmark. We know that our brain is evolving a lot during adolescence and we've also seen in studies is that kids who are using social media problematic social media use.

We do see changes both in the structure and the function of the brain. So the bottom line is these devices, these platforms in particular social media platforms are having effect on our children and it's why What I have called on conversity does not only put warning labels on social media platforms so that parents and kids are aware of the risks that we see, but I've also called on Congress, even more importantly to establish safety standards for social media platforms so that number one, data transparency is required. Researchers routinely say they can't get the full data about the impact of these platforms on kids health from the companies. But just like we did for cars a few decades ago, we put in safety standards that got us seatbelts, airbags, crash testing and those reduced by the number of deaths.

We gotta do the same for social media because what we're doing now is we're basically it's equivalent of putting our kids in cars with no seat belts, with no airbags and having them drive on roads with no speed limits and no traffic lights. And that is just morally unacceptable. I think Congress has so far failed and it's responsibility to protect our kids. But it's not too late.

They need to step up and act now. Absolutely terrifying comparison. And Dr. Murthy, you say the way to actually keep kids off social media is to get a group of parents a community.

And I do want to talk to you about that idea. Community. When you left office in January, you wrote what you call a parting prescription for America not to eat less sugar, not to exercise more. It was two words.

I want to put the two words up on the screen because they're powerful. Choose community. What is it, Dr. Murphy, about community that is so powerful and important?

Chris, over thousands of years we evolved to be with each other. The people who went off on their own in our hard to gather days and said, you know, I don't need anyone. I can be strong, independent, by myself. That person got eaten by predator.

Where they starve from an insufficient food supply. There is real strength in numbers. But I worry that in recent decades what has happened is we've lost sight of how vital and important our communities are, has been pulled more into our devices and we can get everything delivered to our doorstep. We have less interactions with each other.

What I have found is that community really is what we all create. It's what we need. And I know this because in the conversations I have with people across the country, in big towns and small, small areas of the country, in rural and urban spaces, people talk about the fact that they just wish that people knew their neighbors again. They wish that we looked after each other, we gave each other the benefit of the doubt.

Here's what community is. Community is where we know each other, where we help each other where we find purpose in lifting each other up. That's why relationships, purpose and service, that is the core ingredients of community. It's also the triad of fulfillment.

That's how I think of it. I think part of the reason we're seeing so much unhappiness in our world right now is because these three elements of relationships, purpose and service have eroded in many of our lives. And that's why I believe it's so important for us to build that back. It's why it was the focus in my party prescription to America.

And it's why going forward, forward long after I'm out of office, my goal is to do everything I can to help rebuild community in our country. All right. Really critical information. Dr.

Zvek Murthy, thank you so much for being here. Thanks so much. Really appreciate it. Thanks to Kristen and Dr.

Murphy for that. And a note, if you or someone you know is in a crisis, please call or text 988 or go to 988lifeline.org to reach the suicide and Crisis lifeline. And that does it for us today. Thank you so much for watching.

We'll be back tomorrow with more. Read the press now, but the news continues with Guy Schwartz, who's in for Hallie Jackson right now. Have a terrific Memorial Day. As the day wraps up, get the scoop on what's been happening with here's the Scoop, a new podcast from NBC News.

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