Supreme Court Ruling Threatens Black Representation In Congress

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and shout out our show in the comment field. I really, really appreciate it. Thank you so much. and now on to left, right and center. Welcome to left, right and center. I'm Susan Davis in for David Green. This week, the Supreme Court dealt a major blow to the Voting Rights Act, a foundational piece of civil rights-era legislation. At issue was Section 2 of the Act

that allowed congressional districts to be drawn with race in mind to protect minority voting power, particularly in the South. Today, nearly all of the Southern Democrats in the House are black. At issue in this case was a 24 Louisiana map to create a new majority black district, which is now represented by Cleo Fields,

a black Democrat. The court struck down that map in a six-three ruling, and House Speaker Mike Johnson, who's from Louisiana, celebrated the decision. This is obviously the right result. They determined that the last map that was drawn for Louisiana was done unconstitutionally, and we've been saying that consistently from the beginning. That was the obvious result. In her dissent, Justice Elena Kagan warned of, quote, far-reaching and grave consequences for minority representation. Writing for the majority, Samuel Alito said Louisiana failed to show it created the district to prevent intentional discrimination.

And that quote, that map is an unconstitutional gerrymander. Meanwhile, Congressman Fields told reporters outside the courthouse why the act was critical for minorities. Name me one black congressman. They've been elected to Congress from Louisiana in a majority of white district. You know, not one, you know. And Louisiana's minority population is over a third. And the question is,

whether or not minority voters will have an opportunity to elect, to at least elect a candidate of their choice. Joining me today is Moelahe, executive director at Georgetown University's Institute of Politics and Public Service. He was also a communications director for the Democratic National Committee and an advisor to Hillary Clinton. And Sarah Isgar, senior editor at The Dispatch. Sarah's an ABC News legal analyst, host,

the advisory opinions podcast, an author of the book, Last Branch Standing. She was also a spokesperson of the Justice Department during President Trump's first term. Hello to you both. Hello. Hi. Mo, the impact of this decision is already being felt. Louisiana officials said that they're going to postpone their congressional primaries. They were supposed to happen in just a couple weeks in May.

Presumably, they're going to try to draw a new map. So step back, what does this ruling mean in practical terms for minority representation? Anyone that was worried whether or not this election season might not be chaotic enough, Supreme Court just walked in and said, hold our beer. Like this changes so much. Overseas absentee ballots have already been sent out in Louisiana. So to have just like days before the state now say, well, hold up, we're going to pause this whole thing. It throws so much into chaos.

Let's talk about the practical impact. Voting Rights Act was created because a lot of southern states primarily had gotten really creative in finding ways to dilute minority representation. They did poll taxes, they did literacy tests, and they did district lines. They couldn't ban black people from voting, so they did all these things to make it more difficult and to dilute their political power. That's where the Voting Rights Act came in. The key about the Voting Rights Act was it said if a state's voting practices have the effect of diluting minority voting power, that's illegal. And it seems to me that what the Supreme Court stated is, no, no, it's got to be the stated intent. The effect isn't enough.

It's got to be the stated intent. So now, as long as you don't stand up and say, I want to dilute the state of the state intent. power of black people, you can go out and dilute the power of black people. And some of those states have wasted no time in jumping on this opportunity. Florida had passed a law to change its lines within hours afterwards. Louisiana postponing its elections. This could have far-reaching effects on this year's election and on elections for decades to come. Sarah, I want to get your take on this because a lot of the reporting on the decision talks about how it broke down along partisan lines in favor of conservatives. But you've often said it's better to see this court as three factions of three.

So how do you read this decision and what's your take on the impact of it? Let's break down the decision. Everything Mo said is largely correct. I don't disagree with any of it. So I'm just adding information. What was happening was that you had this correct. cracking and packing issue. These states all had to take race into account when drawing their district lines. And then if they took race too much into account, that was a problem, not enough

into account that was a problem. And this Louisiana case was sort of the perfect example of the situation that states got into. Louisiana drew one majority minority district. They got sued from black voters who said that violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. So they were like, okay, we'll draw a second one. So then they drew a second majority minority district, and then they got sued by white voters who said you're violating Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act by taking race too much into account. And then a court sided with them on that. So each time they had a court order saying they had violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act no matter what they drew. That's why the Supreme Court took the case. And this goes back to a long line of cases the Supreme Court has been

deciding for the last 20 years. Chief John Roberts, I think, wrote it in an opinion 20 years ago where he said, the best way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race. There was no question that voters were being put into one district or another based on the color of their skin. Now, the argument on the other side is yes, and it is to remedy past discrimination. That's why we have to put voters into these districts, on the color of their skin. Nevertheless, there is something really insidious about that. It should give people pause, let's say that. So from, you know, this legal standpoint, what the majority has said is you cannot use race to draw these district lines. So if we see that you

looked at race at all, you can bring a racial discrimination claim under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. If you didn't use race at all, it's going to be very hard to prove any sort of racial discrimination. And the argument that had been happening for so long was, well, race is so closely correlated with partisanship. One side will claim, nope, we were doing partisan redistricting. Same as California did. Same as Virginia did. And the other side says, no, because look, you put all the black voters in this district, that's racial, not partisan. And they're like, well, they're so closely correlated, you can't pull them apart. And what the majority said was, if you can't can't pull them apart and there is no evidence that they used race to draw this district,

then it will be a partisan gerrymander. And we, the Supreme Court, have no way to rule on partisan gerrymanders. This is another part that's worth thinking about. Congress tomorrow could pass a law about partisan gerrymandering. They could have all sorts of rules about how you have to use nonpartisan or bipartisan commissions. You have to use these factors when drawing district lines so that they actually represent the voters in your state. They have to be compact. They have to be contiguous. They have to keep communities of interest together. Congress isn't doing that. Instead, they're issuing a bunch of press releases how they're mad at the Supreme Court about this, when in fact, once again, Congress could fix this problem tomorrow. Now, in terms of impact of this

decision, Mo is right-ish on that. This is the only part I might disagree with them on, but boy, is it a minor difference. I don't think it will have a huge impact in 2016. midterms. There just aren't many states like Louisiana. They're going to put their primaries on hold. Most of the filing deadlines have passed. It will have an effect in 2028 and 2030, etc. But maybe not the one that you think. Republicans actually liked Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act because it mandated that they pack minority voters into districts by law so that they could have majority minority voters. Democrats hated Section 2. to the Voting Rights Act because it packed their voters into districts at much higher levels

than they needed to win that district. So my prediction is the result will be slightly better for Democrats, slightly worse for Republicans, and devastating for black representation in Congress, if that makes sense, right? Black members are not going to get elected because they will not have these majority-minority districts drawn for them anymore. but it means that Democratic voters will have higher representation in several districts so that when you have a blue wave like the one we're expecting this fall, Democrats will actually outperform in a lot of those districts than they were

in the days when Republicans, when red states could pack in the minority voters and had to by law under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. I also think it's interesting, though, because, and you make a very good point, like there are solutions to the problem of partisan and racial gerrymandering that Congress could address, they could create nonpartisan commissions. Not all states do this through a partisan process. But again, in the real world, there's been an immediate impact to this. Already in Tennessee, you saw Senator Marsha Blackburn, who's running for governor,

call for a new map that would eliminate the state's only remaining Democratic district and very likely any black representation because of how strongly race correlates in the South. And then I think you're going to see as we've already seen in California and Virginia. It's like once you start this redistricting war, It only escalates. It's hard to see how this de-escalates. But let me give you some good news about that. In order to make every district in Tennessee red,

in order to make all of these other districts in Virginia blue, you actually do have to make the districts more competitive. If you spread out those voters, there's more of them in each district. Yes, they are still under 50%, but they're a lot closer to 50% than they were before. We are actually making the district slightly more competitive, which means in those wave elections, voters, if they're really sick of the bums, can throw them out in a way that actually they couldn't before. Although I think when you look at a state like Tennessee, which is a good example, they can very practically draw a map that would eliminate democratic representation.

And to me, I think about one of the practical impacts of this is do we just get more very red districts and very blue districts? Does this in the end ultimately just drive that polarization wedge even deeper? Yeah, I think it could, and I think we've seen plenty of examples of that happening. But a point that Sarah made earlier, we're thinking about in terms of red versus blue, but the biggest hit is going to be black and brown. Our Congress is just looking less and less like us as a result. That's going to have terrible effects. So, yeah, you might see it could go more partisan.

Maybe it gets more competitive the way Sarah's talking about. I don't know, but it certainly will become less representative. Sarah, I'm also curious for your take on this because this is not the first Supreme Court case that has weakened the Voting Rights Act under the John Roberts Court. Where do you see this ruling in that trajectory? And is there anything really left of this law or is it, in the words of Elena Kagan, a dead letter? It's funny what Mo is saying. Like, you'd have to be a total idiot to say the quiet part out loud and actually open yourself up to a racial gerrymander claim. don't, you know, put it past them, right?

Like we've seen... There's plenty of idiots out there, yeah. Plenty of idiots out there. This actually, in some ways, will make it much easier to prove a racial gerrymander. Because now these are all done by computer. We depose the map makers at infinitum after they draw these maps. If they use race, you will strike down that map. That's going to be very easy to prove one way or the other.

And I guess the argument that's worth thinking about is, if we're not using race, and you can only use partisanship. Then we have partisan gerrymanders. That will be very clear to everyone what we can do to fix it, and it won't be in the courts anymore to make these very partisan decisions every time because these lawsuits, for instance,

against the Texas gerrymander, against the California gerrymander, they've been claiming their racial gerrymanders when in fact, we all sort of know in our hearts. These were partisan gerrymanders. That was the point of them. Everyone knows that. And so we can be done with that

and pulling the courts into our partisan world and again put the pressure on Congress to stop doing this. So I don't think it's a dead letter. We have this decision saying you cannot use race to draw district lines. The previous decision was about Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, where certain states had to preclear any changes to their voting rules, but other states didn't. Congress refused to update what those states were,

and so they were sort of based on 40, 50-year-old demographic studies on segregation, you know, de facto segregation, when in fact, you know, some of the most segregated cities in America are not in the deep south. I'm looking at you, Boston and Chicago, and those states weren't pre-cleared. And so what the Supreme Court said in that case is Congress, you are welcome to come up with a new formula for which states need to be pre-clear before they can change their voting rules, but we're not going to look at the states from 1975 or whatever it was anymore. But, Mo, one of the tensions here I see is. is that in order to sort of overhaul a process like this, doesn't it fundamentally require lawmakers to give up power?

And so much of gerrymandering and redistricting is incumbent protection. And turning things like that over to nonpartisan commissions or third parties and taking it out of the hands of politicians. I mean, how often do you see politicians relinquish power like that? Yeah. I mean, the future looks bleak in terms of actually looking for real reform. We've seen just in the last few months examples of why, right? I mean, California and Virginia did exactly that. They said they wanted to take this away from politicians and give it to these nonpartisan, independent commissions.

But in the wake of what happened in Texas, right, because we do not have a uniform standard on this, it was easy to weaponize redistricting in states where the political partisans have. held on to power, at which point California and Virginia said, okay, hold up. We are putting ourselves at a disadvantage. If we had a uniform standard on this, I think it would be far easier, but we're not going to, right? But look, the notion that all politics is local is a farce. It is not. And so when the national political environment drives one side to do something, all of these local considerations like who should be representing which district in Congress suddenly change and become part of the big national fight.

And that's going to continue to escalate when it comes to redistricting. This is why we need to increase the number of representatives in the House like George Washington wanted. We should cap how many people, how many voters a representative can actually represent. It used to be 20, 30,000. Now it's 700,000, 800,000. You cannot actually represent 800,000 people counterintuitively. We need more members of Congress in order to make local politics great again.

More people to do less stuff. Yeah, I guess so. There you go. Here at Left, Right and Center, we're all about engaging with each other across the aisle and across the kitchen table. Have something to say about this week's topic? Well, now you can join Left Right and Center's Community Conversation on Substack. You can sign up for our weekly inbox reminder to hone up on the show and give you. get to debating. Join in on the latest discussion at KCRWLRC.substack.com. Again, that's KCRWLRC.

substack.com. I'll be back with Moelethy and Sarah Isgir to talk about the conspiracy theory spinning out after last weekend's attempted attack on the president. You're listening to left, right, and center. The United States is about to mark its 250th anniversary. And so on the Global Story Podcasts, from the BBC, we're telling surprising tales of American influence on the world stage and in ordinary people's lives all across the globe. We have this ability to export our story, and a lot of people have bought it. I feel like the American Dream is alive, but not well.

From the BBC, it's the United States at 250. Listen, wherever you get your podcasts or find us on YouTube. I'm Susan Davis in for David Green. We're joined by Moalathi Executive Director at Georgetown University's Institute of Politics and Public Service, and Sarah Isgar, lawyer, senior editor at the dispatch and former spokesperson at the Department of Justice under President Trump. And it was a chaotic scene at last weekend's White House Correspondence Dinner when an armed man tried to rush the event before Secret Service agents stopped him.

The suspect, 31-year-old Cole Allen, was arrested and charged with several counts, including trying to assassinate President Trump. He was unharmed in the attack. Afterwards, Trump called for civility. In light of this evening's events, I asked that all Americans recommit. with their hearts and resolving our difference peacefully. We have to resolve our differences. But almost as quickly as the news broke,

so did the conspiracies. Claims it was staged to distract from the Iran War to boost approval ratings, even to push to build the White House ballroom faster. There's no evidence for any of it. So why are these conspiracies taking such a foothold in our politics? And is there anything to do about it?

Sarah, one of the things that's so striking about this scenario is this attack, it was captured on video. There were eyewitnesses. There were hundreds of journalists everywhere. And still, conspiracy theories just took off almost simultaneously. And I wonder what that tells you about how people process these kinds of events now. And you know, we've talked about this before and it maybe ties into something we were ending with in the last segment. We have nationalized our politics. That is a bad thing. The culture has in a way where if you had a one in 30,000 opinion, you are unlikely to ever run into someone who shared your one in 30,000,

you know, weirdo view. But now it's very easy to find each other. It's very easy actually to create a whole bubble around your little group so that you actually never hear voices outside your one in 30,000 opinion. This is the result of that. I did see some guys with a patch from the Artemis 2 team. So it's like one of those, you know, mission patches. And it says it's round.

We checked. But, Mo, I think we should be clear here, too. Like, President Trump does not get a pass on conspiracy theories. He has a long history of amplifying conspiracies that have taken hold on the right. But in this case, a lot of this conspiratorial thinking was coming from the left. And I wonder what that tells you about the state of mind on your side of the aisle about this conspiratorial way of thinking about government. Yeah, I mean, he doesn't get a pass on it. His political career was born in a conspiracy theory that Barack Obama was not a citizen.

So, no, he doesn't get a pass on it. But neither do the people on the left who are peddling them. We had members of Congress going out there and questioning whether this was a false flag. Just cut it out because it's not helpful. and it's not good, and it's just cheapening our politics on both sides. We spent years on the left, rightfully calling out those on the right who peddled conspiracy theories. The answer is not to say, well, they won, so we should do it too. I have so many reasons, so many reasons to disagree with Donald Trump, to count down the days until he leaves office.

I can't wait. But the man has had now three attempts on his life. We can just acknowledge that that is fact and that the conspiracy theories and the culture of political violence are connected to one another. So we need to stop it if we ever have a hope of getting to a place where our politics is less toxic. I get what it's like to be angry at all of his lies, his many, many, many lies. but let's not fall into the same trap. Doesn't this prove, though, Mo, that it was never a right versus left. It wasn't that the right was more susceptible to conspiracy theories.

Again, this was a cultural moment susceptible to conspiracy theories, and Donald Trump was able to flip the switch on the right. And now we're just seeing the switch flipped on the left. I've always said, I think if Donald Trump had run as a Democrat, the Democrats would be the ones experiencing all these problems and the right would feel so, you know, morally superior about it, but they wouldn't be. They would be just as susceptible. They just, Donald Trump decided to change parties and run as a Republican because he saw them as more easily taken over in 2016 before, you know, I've always said this. He defeated the Republican Party before he defeated

the Democratic Party in 2016. I don't think it's ever been a question of whether the right or the left was more susceptible to it. I always thought it was more of a question of which side was going to weaponize it and turn it into political strategy more effectively. That's what Donald Trump did, right? He found a way to take this and turn it into a political campaign strategy. And for the most part, people on the left have refrained from doing that in terms of elected leadership. You don't see elected leadership rushing to weaponize this. That's what frustrated me this last weekend when I saw a couple of people in positions of authority on the left starting to do it. right, Jasmine Crockett from Texas did it.

That's where it's got to stop. I never like the word normalized because I feel like it gets overused and overstated. But one of the things about this that highlighted to me how normal conspiracy theorists have sort of infiltrated the mainstream. And by that I mean, I had a friend text me a conspiracy theory about the shooting before I had even gotten the news about the shooting. I got a text saying, I don't believe there's a gun. And I was like, what are you talking about? I don't even know what this is. And this is, and I don't know if you have these in your own life, but like this is not

someone in my entire life has ever, ever floated anything along those lines. And it was, it was, and I heard it from other people in my life. And I was like, oh, like, it's not the corners of the Internet anymore. It's not just random people on Twitter. It's not even politicians who are opportunistic about this kind of thing. It seems like it is just in our day-to-day lives now. And it's kind of scary, to be honest. We no longer have policy disagreements. We're not arguing over pieces of legislation or which, you know, group has the better solution to the problem that we all agree exists. Instead, we have vibes-based politics. And when it's vibes-based, it makes it very hard in moments like this to accept that your team did something wrong, because that would call into question the entire vibes of your team. And so that's why I think in moments like this,

We see very normal, rational, smart people jump first to the idea that it can't be true because then they'd have to have some cognitive dissidents about the moral question about our tribalism. I also think it highlighted, Mo, how mainstream media doesn't really stand a chance against conspiracy theories because this happened quite literally surrounded not just by mainstream media in all forms, but, you know, lefty journalist, righty journal. I mean, the whole spectrum of journalism was represented in that event. And there was extensive reporting and video about it. And yet it doesn't really seem to move people who are likely to believe these kind of theories.

And I don't know what you can do in the face of it because it doesn't seem like fact-based reporting has been able to penetrate. We're in the Wild Wild West and it's hard to see a path out right now. There have always been conspiracy theories going back to the, the early days of the Republic. But the speed and scale at which things move now is different, just how fractured the information ecosystem is. The algorithms that act as our own personal assignment editors that tell us what news we should and should or what information we should and shouldn't consume make it incredibly difficult so that you're right. And Aunt Sally from, you know, Wichita, who isn't very political, isn't radicalized, but saw something on her

Facebook feed and decided to share it, becomes suddenly one of the tools for this sort of thing. And frankly, the mistrust that the public has in traditional media, in legacy media, means that they are more open to information from other sources. So it is difficult. And when I'm sort of talking with people in my life who share these sorts of things, I used to want to put my head through a wall because they would say it with such certainty and such belief. I would try to engage with them and ask them, all right, so you believe this. Show me why.

And one or two things would happen. They would either recount a bunch of facts that don't exist or they just. just didn't care. But I don't think the answer is to just like throw up our hands and say, uh, we quit. I think media needs to actually keep finding creative ways to get the information into the ecosystem. And I think that's a problem with the way things are right now. You're listening to left, right, and center from KCRW. We're talking with Mo Alethi and Sarah Isgher. And Sarah, I don't want to lose sight of the fact that this was also the third apparent attempt on Trump's life in the past two years, the first in Butler, Pennsylvania, and the other at his

Florida golf club. And Trump talked about this in a recent interview with CBS. When you're consequential, when you do things, a lot of things and things that work out very well for our country, Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. McKinnelly was assassinated. McKinley made the country very rich. People don't realize that. Then Teddy Roosevelt went out and spent the money that was made by McKinley, but he was very consequential, actually. He was assassinated. What do you make of that? It's almost like Trump is framing it as a complementary statement about his presidency.

It is true that we have had presidents try to expand their power vis-a-vis the other branches throughout our history. It hasn't always been a good thing, but it is the case that America has had violent reactions towards presidents. Now, it has not always been the case that the presidents who have been assassinated have done big things, of course, James Garfield assassinated by a office seeker who didn't feel like he was getting enough attention. McKinley wasn't assassinated because he made the country rich. JFK, you know, hadn't really been that consequential a president when he was assassinated.

So I'd rather solve the problem than come up with some grand historical narrative as to good presidents get killed and bad presidents get to live. Like, that hasn't been true. The reverse hasn't been true either, that the bad presidents get killed and the good ones get to live. It turns out we have a crazy person problem, and that problem has run through a lot of history. Moe, the president also used this attack to call on Congress to end the impasse of funding for the Department of Homeland Security, and he also used it to make an argument in favor of building his White House ballroom. It's actually a larger room, and it's much more secure. It's got drone-proof, it's bulletproof glass. We need the ballroom. That's why Secret Service. That's why they're

The military are demanding it. Is there any case to be made here for that, or do you just see this as stark opportunism? Yeah, it's pretty much stark opportunism. Oh, my God, Mo and I are going to have a violent disagreement about something. Let's do it. I mean, I'm not sure that the Washington Hilton remains the best place to do this sort of an event, right? We clearly saw some issues with it and the security. And if it does remain there, I trust that the security apparatus.

is going to make the adjustments it needs to. But to say that this attempt shows that we cannot do anything except in the president's pet project just seems to me to be nothing but opportunism. And I get why he would try that. He is very invested in this. He loves it. But look, I do not think the answer to our problems is to shove it. everybody into the White House for any type of major event. So, you know, I don't get what the end

game is there other than to fund this thing that the president is super excited about. Sarah, I'm eagerly awaiting your disagreement here. Okay, well, maybe I built this up too much because we don't disagree on everything. Sorry to disappoint. But obviously, the White House Correspondents, and I don't think would ever be held at the White House because the president doesn't speak at it every year and we can't like move it at the last minute when the president decides he's not speaking at it. So it doesn't really solve this problem. But I actually am like one of the few people I think who thinks that the ballroom is a great idea and didn't vote for President Trump. It feels like it falls directly along partisan lines. Like suddenly the east wing to

Democrats is like this sacred place. Like nope, never been a sacred place. It's not. It's not that great. And we need an event space for the White House. There are real reasons to have that. We've always needed an event space at the White House. Frankly, like the West Wing could use an upgrade too, for that matter. This idea that like we can't do it because Donald Trump is president, I get it. I wish he weren't president too. I don't like his taste. But he was elected by the rules that we've created. And some president needs to do this. So let's get it done. And the partisan and reaction to it. I'm just so sick of it. When you do react in a totally, you know, turn the amp up to 11 way because he's trying to build a ballroom so that somewhere at the White

House you could have events that aren't in a tent. You sound like an idiot. I just want to amplify something Sarah said because I agree with it wholeheartedly that I think in some regards a ballroom at the White House for the reasons you just stated is a good idea. I think a lot of people aren't against the ballroom. They're against a ghastly architectural monstrosity of a ballroom. And I think that, you know, Trump is not known for restrained taste. Well, then where were the protests for the, like, Department of Energy being built or the FBI building? We have ghastly buildings in D.C. I think the EEOB, the Eisenhower Executive Office building that's right next to the White House, is one of the ugliest buildings in D.C.

war of choice that he initiated. He promised to bring down the cost of living for Americans and the cost of living has not come down. Gas prices are higher than they've ever been. We did just have yet another incident of mass politically motivated violence. So the president's sitting down with architects to go over the ballroom that is only there because he wants it. Whether or not a president has, has the right to renovate the White House. I don't like his taste, but that's not what is offending me. What is offending me is that it is a vanity project for him at the expense of the things the American people sent him to Washington to deal with.

I think I just need a minute to recover from the fact that Sarah thinks the EEOB is one of the ugliest buildings in D.C. I think it's a beautiful building. We're just going to have to agree to disagree on that one. It looks like MC Escher, like, smoked a lot of pot and, like, didn't. know when to stop. Look, maybe I see beauty in that. I've been talking with Sarah Isgir and Moelaheith. We'll be back with Charles III' charm offensive to mend U.K. U.S. relations.

You're listening to Left, Right and Center. We're back again with Left Right and Center. I'm Susan Davis in for David Green. We're here with Sarah Isgir, senior editor at the Dispatch and Moa Lathie, executive director at Georgetown University's Institute of Politics and Public Service. And this year, America celebrates 250 years of independence. And who says exes can't be friends? Because this week, the UK's Charles III made an official state visit to Washington.

Here he is addressing Congress. With the spirit of 1776 in our minds, we can perhaps agree that we do not always agree, at least in the first instance. The King's visit comes as the so-called special relationship between our two countries is at its rockiest in decades. It's partly because of the Iran war and President Trump's frustration that the UK isn't providing

more military and more vocal support. Here's President Trump talking about Prime Minister Keir Starmer to reporters a few weeks ago. I think he's a lovely man, but I think he did something that was shocking. He didn't want to help us. And another time, he said this.

This is not Winston Churchill that we're dealing with. Sarah, the president has obviously clashed with the UK government. But he seems really personally charmed by the monarchy. How effective do you think Charles III' visit here was in terms of that diplomacy? Well, there's something really interesting that Charles III and Camilla did. They really focused a lot of their time on September 11th, the September 11th Memorial and other programs related to that in New York. And, of course, the purpose of that was to highlight that after September 11th, the U.K. was our closest ally.

They were standing next to us at every step of the way. The point being, look, we're a great ally. We're a friend, and the friends tell you when you're wrong, when they don't agree, and that's what we're doing here. Doesn't mean we're not your ally tomorrow, too, but we think you're going the wrong direction. Whether that sort of subtlety and it's really just passive, I wouldn't say it's passive-aggressive, will land with this president and this administration? No, probably not.

But sending the King of England to meet with Donald Trump is the most effective thing you could possibly do because this is, of course, Donald Trump's entire insecurity is based on being rejected by the elites and what could be more elite than the King of England. Mo did you make of it? I mean, the King is obviously just a figurehead. So what does a successful trip here look like to the UK?

Look, I think what the UK wants is to have a good relationship with the United States, but to make sure that the United States is not turning its back on the U.K. and on all of Europe. Remember, I mean, historically, when Europe is threatened, the U.K. does take its fair share of the beating. So, you know, and the king actually said it in his speech. In his speech before Congress, he made a call for NATO to stay strong. He said, we must not disregard everything that has sustained us for the last 80 years. other words, since World War II, since NATO came together. This was a very clear call for the United States to not turn its back on Europe and not turn its back on NATO. It's a little ironic

considering that the last party in power, the last government in the UK did turn its back on Europe when it walked away from the EU. But I think that bigger question lands, the president was clearly charmed for all the reasons Sarah talked about. He's a guy who has admitted he's got this infatuation with the whole concept of the monarchy, the British monarchy. So having the king do it, as opposed to the prime minister, makes a lot of sense. But I don't know that it's turning anything, right? I mean, the king called for NATO to stay strong and he called on the world to not turn its back on Ukraine. The president showed no interest in changing his tune on any of those things.

And before the king had even left the country, the president, frustrated with the chancellor of Germany's comments, threatened to pull American troops out of Germany. He's walking away. He continues this posture of pushing Europe away, pushing our allies away. I'm not sure any charm of fend. is going, and I don't care how infatuated he is with the crown. I don't know that he's going to change his tune on that. I was sort of surprised by how subtly political Charles was in his speech to Congress.

He referenced NATO support for Ukraine. He also called on Congress not to stop the fight against climate change. And he also said this. The U.S. Supreme Court Historical Society has calculated that Magna Carta is, cited in at least 160 Supreme Court cases since 1789, not least as the foundation of the principle that executive power is subject to checks and balances.

Checks and balances on the executive. I mean, Sarah, that line actually got a huge standing applause from Congress, and it was kind of funny to me that they're cheering this line, well, not effectively ever being a check and balance on this president. Indeed. Charles III also just deployed humor very effectively, I thought, in the speech. There were a lot of jokes, not like joke jokes maybe, but, you know, funny coming from the King of England jokes. I will just say, for the record, I'm not over it and I still hold a grudge toward Great Britain. I think that like all these people who are super into the monarchy and British stuff are traders to our country. I appreciate that view. It's the 250th anniversary, and if you're not going to stand for something now, you know, when are you? Look, I'm Irish. We forget everything but our grudges, so I see where you're coming from. Mel, I guess in terms of the U.S.-UK. relationship, obviously not at a great point right now,

but it still does seem to be underlying and enduring alliance between these two countries. Yes, and I would hope that it remains that way. But it is being stress tested, as is our relationship. with all of our European allies. And that should be worrisome. That should be troublesome because if our allies are willing to push back as forcefully as they have and have decided that we are not a reliable partner, they will stop working with us. You know, Sarah talked about the King's visiting of 9-11 or his revisiting of our relationship in the wake of 9-11.

remember the only time Article 5 of NATO has been invoked was after 9-11 when our European allies came to our aid. The president keeps saying he doesn't know if that's going to happen again. Well, if he keeps treating our friends the way he does, then it is worrisome whether or not we can continue to rely on them if they don't feel like they can rely on us. And the dirty secret that Donald Trump doesn't want to ever admit is we do. need them as much as they need us. We are not a go-it-alone country. We can't. And we are seeing China gain influence around the world by stepping into voids that we are just handing them. We are seeing Russia continue to be brazen because they are not seeing a unified wall of resistance from the West. So while I hope that the special relationship with the UK and all of our European allies can

continue, this president has done more to damage it than anyone has in recent memory. I mean, there is a lot of evidence that Europe and other allies are shifting or at least thinking of different tactics and how they deal with the U.S. I thought earlier this year when the Canadian prime minister gave a big speech at Davos and said basically the rules-based order is over and we must move on. And I mean, I'm as guilty as the next American is looking through all of this through an American lens. But I think you raise a really good point that a lot of these allies are looking at the U.S. through a completely different lens in the second Trump administration. This has always been a question that I have historically of how we will look back on this

administration. Will it be the case that Donald Trump fundamentally changed the world order, broke the world order, depending on what terms you want to use? Or did he recognize that the world order had changed about 10 years previously, and he was simply responding to that change, you know, by sort of bluntly recognizing that now China and Russia play this sort of triumvirate role with the United States that nobody wants to talk about and nobody wants to recognize. I don't know which one is true, and I don't know which one we will say was true 20 years from now. But that, to me, will be the question of the second Trump administration. We hear at KCRW want to hear from you.

Have questions you'd like to hear answered on the show? Record a voice memo around 30 seconds or so and send it to us at LRC at KCRW.org. Drop your first name, where you're calling from, and your question to potentially hear it on the show. We're going to have to leave it there. We've reached that time once again for our famed left, right, and center rants and raves featuring pet peeves and projects from across the political spectrum. Moelethy, what didn't we get to today? So I picked up a book recently that I'd been dying to read, and I couldn't find it anywhere, until I walked into my 13-year-old son's room, and there it was sitting next to his bed. The book was Last Branch Standing by one Sarah Isker.

And every day since then, in the car, my 13-year-old son, who previously loved mostly reading about superheroes, would cite all of these anecdotes about Brett Kavanaugh, Elena Kagan, telling me like all these what he found to be hilarious stories about the Supreme Court. And he turned to me and he said, you know, Dad, Sarah's a really good writer. She's fun. The most recent thing he said to me this morning in the car was, hey, do me a favor. When you read the book, make sure you read the footnotes because they're awesome. So I want to rave about Sarah Isker for writing a book. that makes my 13-year-old son think footnotes are awesome

and gets him a little bit outside of the world of superheroes. My plan is working. If you're not careful, you're going to raise a Republican. He's listening to Sarah more than you. You might want to be careful what influences your children, Mo. Sarah, what's on your mind? I'm in like the hangover stage of book tour world so that I'm having nightmares

and the Supreme Court justices are all in my nightmares. Oh, that's kind of how much of the country feels, though, right now. Oh. Well, thank you. And thank you again to all the left, right, and center listeners who have been so supportive and sending me so many nice emails and coming to events. I'm very grateful. I was going to rave about trees.

Say more. I really like trees. And I think we don't think enough about trees. These are, like, living organisms in our lives. We now know that they can communicate with each other. When one of them gets sick, it can tell everyone around them, like, I'm sick, don't come near me. The way that they grow, they're aware of who's around them so that if you actually look from above, they don't touch each other in the canopy. They give each other just a little bit of neighborly space.

Trees are incredible in the fungus that serves as that, you know, worldwide web for the trees. Get it? WWW. is amazing. I planted a willow tree three years ago. A weeping willow? Yes, a sprig in the ground. And that thing is now almost as tall as my house. It reaches into the second floor windows. I love it like I love my children. It brings me daily joy. And so I have planted this year a pawpaw tree. Pawpaws were George Washington's favorite fruit. I'm really into them. I'm not going to tell you my secret place to go get pawpaws because it's federal property. And A, I don't want you stealing my paupas and B, I don't want them know that I'm stealing their paupas. But they're sort of like American mangoes. And I will sit there like a wild

animal and like climb up a tree, go get the paupas and eat them. So I've planted my own pawpaw tree and I'm so excited. This is like the highlight of my life right now is watching this paw grow and cheering it on. Go Papa, go. I don't think I realized until you said this that I also have an emotional attachment to a tree at my house. We have a beautiful Japanese. maple right in front of our house on our lawn. And it's a perfect climbing tree for kids because they don't grow that tall, but they kind of grow wide. So all the neighborhood kids love to play in the tree and it's very safe and it's very cute. And a tree recommendation for you. If you ever have come across a linden tree, they are the best smelling trees in the world. And if you

plant one around your home, around this time of year, your house that your neighborhood will smell delightful. Oh, love this recommendation. There you go. I think I have a rant this week, although it is also nature-related. And my rant is, as you both probably know, we had kind of a miserable winter here in Washington, D.C. We had bad snow.

We've had these 50-degree temperature swings. It's just been, still is kind of up and down. And for months, everyone I chit-chated about the weather with, I would say, well, you know, at least the cold is good for less mosquitoes this summer. And I have been apparently gaslighting everyone in my entire life because this morning, on my way here, I saw a story quoting a mosquito expert saying that D.C. should prepare for one of its worst mosquito summers in 20 years. And apparently all that snow and cold is great for mosquitoes because it is melted and it kept the ground wet all through winter. So those little teeny tiny eggs in there have been thriving. and the mosquito expectation for the DC, the DMV this summer could reach, like, historically bad levels.

One, I'm just angry about that fact, but two, I think I should apologize to quite literally every single person that I've spoken to about. I made that mosquito fact up in my mind, and I was completely wrong. Apparently, you need very, very dry winters in order to have pleasant mosquito summers. So I apologize. So this was you peddling a conspiracy theory. Yeah. Yes, exactly. You were all guilty of it.

Yeah. For all of you who have been hating on your bats that live near you, Sarah, who loves her bats and encourages her bats, is going to be mosquito-free because my bats will come eat my mosquitoes. I was a member of the International Bat Society in junior high school. Bragg. Unrelatedly, I was not very cool in junior high school. You should have just done the screech owl impression.

That would have turned things around for you. All the bats will be living in your trees. Come on over, bats. That's all the time we have for today. Thanks to Sarah Isgir and Moly The Left, Right and Center is produced by Leo Duran. Our executive producer is Arnie Seiple. The show is recorded and mixed by Katie Gilchrest. Todd M. Simon composed our theme music.

Left Right and Center is a co-production of KCRW and Fearless Media. We are distributed by PRX. I'm Susan Davis. Thanks for joining us. Tune in next week for more Left Right and Center.

Download and subscribe at kCRw.com slash LRC, the KCRW app or wherever you find podcasts. Left, right, and center is produced and distributed by KCRW.