A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
President-elect Trump is taking the oath of office in Washington, though - the day, though, it is not unfolding as originally planned.
LEILA FADEL, HOST:
Yeah, the inauguration has moved indoors because of the cold. The temperature here in Washington was 20 degrees at sunrise and not expected to get much warmer. And, Steve, you were going to be outside, but now you're here with me in this oh-so-warm Studio 31.
STEVE INSKEEP, BYLINE: Which is a little bit of a bummer. I mean, I bought a heated vest.
MICHEL MARTIN, BYLINE: He was ready.
FADEL: (Laughter).
INSKEEP: I had stuff to try out.
MARTIN: He was so ready. He was so ready.
INSKEEP: I was so ready. But we will still have live coverage from indoors at 11 o'clock Eastern time.
MARTÍNEZ: And Steve still has the heated vest on, which is odd.
MARTIN: Yeah.
FADEL: Yeah, exactly.
(LAUGHTER)
MARTÍNEZ: So, OK, a different kind of start to an administration that, you know, as we know from his first term, governs in a very different way. Now, Trump's core supporters want big change, while Trump's critics fear too much change.
INSKEEP: In fact, over the weekend, a Wall Street Journal survey found many Americans favor what the journal termed MAGA Lite - following through on some promises, but without radically changing the federal government or, for that matter, violating the Constitution.
MARTIN: And we'll find out very soon how Trump decides to manage that. At his rally last night, he promised a flurry of executive orders on Day 1. He said his supporters would have, quote, "a lot of fun" watching television today. Those were his words, and he made a big promise.
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DONALD TRUMP: I will act with historic speed and strength and fix every single crisis facing our country. We have to do it.
(CHEERING)
MARTIN: Now, of course, there still remains people who don't agree with him on his - either his strategy or his approach. How they push back on this, how forcefully, remains to be seen. Because now he has full control of the Congress, and the Republicans who control it are also negotiating legislation for tax cuts and more. You know, nobody knows how this is all going to work out over time, but we can tell you a few things we are watching for. So let's go around. Steve, you want to start?
INSKEEP: Well, yeah. We are all watching immigration. There is, of course, widespread expectation of high-profile raids to round up people. News reports point to Chicago, where we'll see where it really happens. The question is how many the administration tries to pick up. Trump talked of everybody in the country illegally being rounded up. Stephen Miller, an adviser, talked of camps. But Tom Homan, the guy who's running the program, talked of first going after a narrower category - people who already have deportation orders. And that's a lot smaller population, a lot less dramatic or disruptive.
FADEL: Yeah, I mean, and then the concern there is around this mass deportation plan, as you point out. So when ICE shows up at someone's home who's on a deportation list because they've committed a crime, or for whatever reason, and their grandma's also there...
INSKEEP: Yeah.
FADEL: ...And undocumented - do they get swept up? Will American-born kids be separated from their families or deported with the undocumented parents, as Trump's border czar, Tom Homan, has suggested will happen?
INSKEEP: Yeah, and Trump himself has said in interviews this is going to be a political problem. Somebody very sympathetic is going to be swept up.
FADEL: Yeah, and I'm also watching what the impact is of the dehumanizing language that was used around immigration. I mean, Trump saying that undocumented immigrants are poisoning the blood of our country or that, in some cases, they aren't people - that they're animals.
INSKEEP: Yeah.
FADEL: And, of course, the mass deportation plan could have serious economic impacts, with something - impact, which is something A's been focused on.
MARTÍNEZ: Right. And, yeah, and that mass deportation plan, if it happens - and when it happens in California, I've been wondering, because California feeds the nation. The farms feed the nation. So a lot of the workers do not have documentation, but they - those farms still have to be up and going. And now, with all the damage in Los Angeles, in Palisades and Altadena...
INSKEEP: Yeah.
MARTÍNEZ: ...There's going to be a lot of work for construction workers and construction firms. But a lot of those jobs are taken up also by workers who don't have proper documentation. So if that recovery is going to happen soon, it needs to happen with workers that maybe are not going to be there.
INSKEEP: Michel, you had a point to make on it.
MARTIN: Well, yeah. One of the things I just keep thinking about is the fact that for a lot of voters, it's about a sense of disarray in their communities, of disorder. It's about street crime. It's about a - just a general sense of disorder in their cities and in their country. Trump places immigration at the center of that, but it isn't just about that. In fact, the data shows that immigrants are actually less likely to commit crimes...
INSKEEP: Yeah.
MARTIN: ...Than native-born citizens, but that's not necessarily how people experience it. So the question will be whether these moves that Trump is making, and his supporters in Congress - does it actually make people feel safer or less safe when they start seeing, perhaps, their neighbors disappearing?
INSKEEP: Getting a deeper insight there. So that's one thing we're watching. Leila, what's another?
FADEL: I mean, foreign policy. Trump's isolationist message, promising to end the war in Ukraine, getting a ceasefire in Gaza on Day 1, was really appealing to some voters, for very different reasons. And he promised to end both of those wars quickly. And as he goes into office, a ceasefire in Gaza took hold on Sunday, and a lot of people are crediting him with that. Meanwhile, he's actually shifted this isolationist message that appealed to voters to this expansionist message, right? He wants to annex Greenland, take back the Panama Canal for economic and security reasons.
INSKEEP: Well, let's go back, though, to Ukraine...
FADEL: Yeah.
INSKEEP: ...That big one. A Martínez, you were there.
MARTÍNEZ: Yeah, and I remember back then - this was years ago now - how hopeful people were that nothing was going to happen. And, of course, something did happen there. But now, what happens? I mean, Trump has very famously said he can end this quickly. Now he has kind of expanded on how long it might take him to end this.
INSKEEP: Yeah.
MARTÍNEZ: But how much territory does Russia get to keep, and what kind of Ukraine is left standing after?
MARTIN: And speaking of what's standing after - you remember last week I spoke with one of the people who negotiated - who helped negotiate...
FADEL: Yeah.
MARTIN: ...This long road to the ceasefire in Gaza. One of the big questions that has not been answered is, what happens now? What happens to the governance in Gaza? What happens to the Palestinian people? You know, the Biden administration's vision was that they - the Palestinian people would return to Gaza. But that is clearly not something that the entire region, or even people in the Trump administration, agree with.
FADEL: Right.
MARTIN: What happens now?
INSKEEP: Yeah.
FADEL: That's the big question.
INSKEEP: Yeah. And we should remember that for large parts of this administration, the big concern is not Ukraine, is not even the Middle East. It's China. They're super focused on China, and many want to confront China more strongly than the United States has even up to this point. So let's go for another topic here. A Martínez, what are you watching?
MARTÍNEZ: All right. So let's raise the big issue that supposedly decided the election - inflation and the economy. But we really haven't heard that much about it since the election.
INSKEEP: Yeah.
MARTÍNEZ: But, yeah, very much on the minds of voters that we met in the run-up in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Nevada, the big swing states.
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KAJA BRAZIEL: It is absolutely ridiculous that you can work 40-plus hours and not be able to support yourself, let alone a family.
BOBBY STOKES: I got to be able to eat, man. I need some wiggle room with my check. I don't have enough wiggle room to survive.
MARY MELLINGER: We're the working population. We're producing food for everyone. So we're not interested in tax breaks for the wealthy.
JOVONIE TEJERO: Before, Las Vegas - it was so easy to get a house here. It used to be so cheap. And now I'm sitting here paying 3K to live in this apartment. That's ridiculous. Like, I'm a teacher. That's my whole paycheck, you guys.
FADEL: Yeah. I mean, Trump has been pushing tariffs as the answer, which a lot of economists say won't actually help make things cheaper for all those people we just heard - it's something that will drive up costs on products that Americans buy. And Trump denies this will happen.
INSKEEP: Yeah, and I guess we have to find out. There were tariffs raised on China in the first term. They did not immediately cause inflation, but we don't know what a broader tariff program would do. We don't know what removing immigrants from the workforce would do...
FADEL: Yeah.
INSKEEP: ...To wages, which could be good for people if, in fact, wages went up, but that drives inflation. We should acknowledge, I guess, the overall economy is good. A lot of individuals - millions of them - feel very insecure. And one big factor for people is housing, which did get some discussion in the campaign. Housing costs are too high for a lot of people. Trump's campaign blamed immigrants without legal status for taking up housing. There's a lot of questions about whether there's anything to that at all. Trump talks about cutting regulations. It's not clear if you can really do that at the federal level for housing. But I want to mention another factor here - interest rates, expected to remain a little bit higher right now to contain the inflationary pressures of the president-elect's other policies.
MARTIN: Well, yeah, interest rates do remain high. And you know what else remains high, which is something that hasn't really been talked about very much - is gun violence in the country, which is something...
FADEL: Yeah.
MARTIN: ...That the president-elect, soon to be president, again, has direct experience with, having been the target of two assassination attempts. And I just think it's interesting that gun violence is such a concern for Americans, you know, across the country in communities large and small, urban and rural - we heard surprisingly little about that...
FADEL: That's true.
MARTIN: ...During the campaign. And I have to wonder whether this is something that will even be talked about
INSKEEP: It's a concern of the majority of the public, according to surveys, but there is a passionate minority that feels very strongly about the Second Amendment. The Supreme Court has largely found they have the law on their side, and that has blocked action. It has been difficult for Democrats to raise this as an issue. They've sometimes had to drop it, and, of course, Republicans have.
MARTIN: OK, one more issue - let me just jump in on this.
INSKEEP: Yeah.
MARTIN: One more issue that I think we should talk about. It's the media, which we...
FADEL: Yeah.
MARTIN: ...Are obviously a part of, and social media. You remember, during the first Trump term, there were - there are elements in the media who are obviously very supportive of him, one network in particular. And there are others who...
INSKEEP: What network could you be talking about?
MARTIN: What could I be talking about?
INSKEEP: Oh, yeah. OK. I got it.
MARTIN: And there are others who really organized their coverage around critiquing Trump. And - you know, and now it's a very different environment for these organizations. Legacy organizations are facing declining revenue and audience. There are - there's an aggressive sort of antimedia strategy being sort of followed by Trump - you know, these aggressive sort of lawsuits. And it's not a secret that a lot of leaders of social media companies have made a point of aligning themselves with Trump. So then the question is, what kind of information are people going to be hearing, and from whom? What kind of coverage is he going to...
INSKEEP: The SEC Chairman is also promising...
MARTIN: Exactly.
INSKEEP: ...To go after media organizations.
FADEL: Yeah.
MARTIN: So it'll just be - right? - what kind of information are voters and citizens and people around the world going to be receiving?
INSKEEP: Leila.
FADEL: Yeah, and as someone - I mean, I've worked in a lot of places where independent press is suppressed or demonized or outlawed. And I know from that experience how important it is to accountability and democracy and what happens when it's marginalized or destroyed. And suppressing the press can happen by chipping away at public trust or bankrupting it. And lawsuits might be something big media companies can withstand, but they can destroy smaller outlets covering school boards and city councils, city council meetings that impact day-to-day lives for Americans across this country. And the Committee to Protect Journalists is tracking a huge uptick in those lawsuits.
INSKEEP: A Martínez.
MARTÍNEZ: And one thing really quick - being based in California, the state sued Trump over 100 times in his first term. And Gavin Newsom, last November, called a special session to speed up and prep for more lawsuits. But the ironic and tragic thing this week - Trump is meeting with Gavin Newsom in Los Angeles to survey the fire damage. So California, as much as they might battle Trump, will need Trump.
INSKEEP: (Laughter) Thanks for the reminder that there's going to be this red-state, blue-state tension. There's also going to be this tension between the media and the administration. Although, to an extent, that's the way it's designed to work. It's supposed to be an adversarial relationship. And I guess we can mention that our approach here at NPR has been and will remain to be traditional, straightforward journalism - hopefully, done really well. Try to prove what we say, ask other people to prove what they say, call it out when they don't, and keep listening, day after day after day of this new administration.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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