--:-- Michelle Martin: Democrats want to shift the conversation away from President Biden's listless performance in last week's debate. But can they convince voters to focus on former President Donald Trump's policies instead?
--:-- A Martinez: That's the question. I'm A Martinez, and this is Up First from NPR News.
--:-- Michelle Martin: In France, the far right has won a decisive victory in the first round of parliamentary elections. What does this mean for the centrist government of President Emmanuel Macron?
--:-- A Martinez: And gymnast Simone Biles dominated at the U.S. Women's Olympic Trials last night. Getting back in the gym and working hard and trusting the process, I knew I'd be back. She is headed to Paris to compete in what will be her third Olympic Games.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Stay with us. We've got all the news you need to start your day.
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--:-- Tamara Keith: President Biden's debate performance has worried many about his re-election prospects. Yes, Democrats have spent the last few days in uncomfortable public and private debates following the official presidential one last week. Instead of focusing on Biden's performance, they're trying to shift the conversation to Trump's character and policies.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Here's former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi yesterday on CNN. It's not about performance in terms of a debate. It's about performance in a presidency.
--:-- Tamara Keith: All right, here to discuss the state of the campaign is NPR senior White House correspondent Tamara Keith.
--:-- Tamara Keith: Since the debate, all I've heard about is different possible scenarios that would change the ticket. But what's the reality here for Democrats? There are some loud calls from places like the New York Times editorial page for President Biden to step aside. But Biden and his team have a long history of being counted out and then proving the doubters wrong.
--:-- Tamara Keith: It's basically in the Biden DNA, a political DNA at this point. He and his aides have been working the phone since the debate on Thursday, talking to Democrats, donors, party leaders and others and admitting that the debate was bad and talking about how to move forward.
--:-- Tamara Keith: And the campaign has raised a lot of money since the debate. So based on everything people in the campaign and the White House have told me, Biden isn't going anywhere.
--:-- Tamara Keith: But Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin told MSNBC Democrats are talking about next steps. We're having a serious conversation about what to do. One thing I can tell you is that regardless of what President Biden decides our party is going to be unified and our party also needs him at the very center of our deliberations and our campaign.
--:-- Tamara Keith: I can tell you how widespread or serious this conversation is. Publicly top elected Democrats are already coalescing behind Biden once again. And if they didn't want an 81-year-old to be the nominee, these conversations had to have happened two or three years ago and actually led to action.
--:-- Tamara Keith: Yeah. So what's the math looking like now? Well, Biden was trailing Trump narrowly before the debate in most polls. So far, at least the campaign doesn't think that that has dramatically changed.
--:-- Tamara Keith: That's because the electorate is super polarized and voters didn't start being worried about Biden's age on Thursday night. This is a preexisting condition.
--:-- Tamara Keith: The reality is Biden has already locked up the Democratic nomination and has enough pledged delegates to avoid a fight at the convention.
--:-- Tamara Keith: So at this point, essentially, the only way Joe Biden isn't the nominee is if Joe Biden decides to step aside. And as we've said, that isn't in his nature.
--:-- Tamara Keith: If he were to drop out, there would be a huge fight among the next generation of Democrats, and it would be an accelerated one. There's no guarantee that any of the names you hear thrown around would have a better chance against Trump.
--:-- Tamara Keith: So this is a very challenging position that Democrats have actually been in the entire time against an opponent. They see as an existential threat to democracy.
--:-- A Martinez: Okay, those are the Democrats. What are Republicans doing?
--:-- Tamara Keith: Well, they're consolidating further behind former President Donald Trump. NPR obtained a memo where Trump's top advisors say they plan to streamline and simplify the Republican Party platform.
--:-- Tamara Keith: This year's approach will mean fewer specifics, fewer pages, and a message built around Trump. You know, they feel like they are winning and they want to avoid putting anything in the platform that critics can run with.
--:-- Tamara Keith: That process, I'm told, will be closed to the press and take place a week before the convention later this month, which is unusual. Typically, cameras are in the room.
--:-- Tamara Keith: And actually, more big news for Donald Trump on the horizon as we're waiting for Supreme Court opinions this morning, including on presidential immunity.
--:-- Tamara Keith: Indeed, the justices were considering Trump's argument that a president should have absolute immunity. The decision would clear the way for the federal trial in D.C. on criminal charges for Trump's actions on and around January 6th.
--:-- Tamara Keith: Or more likely, the court could foreclose any chance of this getting in front of a jury before the election.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: French President Emmanuel Macron's gamble in calling a snap election has apparently backfired. French voters turned out massively Sunday to choose candidates for a new parliament, but they did not choose Macron's party.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Their first choice was the far-right national rally of Marine Le Pen. Macron's party came in a distant third of three main voting blocks after the left.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: There will be a second round runoff next Sunday to decide how France's 577-seat legislature will be divided up.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: All right, let's go down to NPR's Eleanor Beardsley in Paris, who has been following it all.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Eleanor, polls had predicted that the far right would lead. So is any of this really a surprise?
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Well, no. Though Macron clearly hoped until the end that the French would mobilize to support him over the two extremes, which is how he portrayed things in the short campaign leading up to yesterday's vote.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: And we're told that as his party saw the huge surge in voter turnout yesterday, more than 65 percent, Macron's camp became hopeful.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: But as you said, his plan to get a mandate for his last three years in office clearly backfired.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Let's listen to an elated Marine Le Pen, leader of the far right, addressing her supporters shortly after returns came in last night.
--:-- [Audio clip of Marine Le Pen speaking]
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: She says democracy has spoken and the French have placed our party in the lead practically erasing Macron's bloc in Parliament.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: And then Le Pen added that the French have clearly chosen to turn the page on seven years of what she called corrosive and contemptuous power.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: The far right now says it must have an absolute majority to be able to put in place its program of getting France back on the rails. So they are gunning for at least 289 seats going into this second round.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: All right. So has President Macron said anything?
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: No. His young prime minister who led the campaign, Gabriel Atal, was put out front. He spoke.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Imagine Macron did not even consult Atal before he dissolved the parliament in the first place. He was said to have been taken by total surprise.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: But he played the game. He campaigned hard. And this loss was clearly a huge disappointment.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Atal looked glum and very worried when he spoke last night.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Let's listen to him.
--:-- [Audio clip of Gabriel Atal speaking]
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: He says never in our democracy has our parliament risked being dominated by the far right.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Attal said our objective is clear to keep the far right from getting majority in the second round and putting in place its dangerous agenda, he called it.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: And he said everyone in his party must not give one single vote to the far right.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: So what happens now? We are heading into a week of furious campaigning with very high stakes.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Many are warning that French democracy itself is under threat if the far right gets an absolute majority.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: So everyone but Le Pen supporters is calling to block what is being called a racist, divisive far right that doesn't share French universal values.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: The left came out in second place. They're still hoping maybe they could get the majority. It's not very likely, but let's see.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: The choice today seems to be between having a parliament where there's no majority, in essence, what's called a hung parliament, or having the far right in power.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: So a far right that's a France that's far right versus a France that's ungovernable. And many clearly prefer the latter.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: What would happen, though, if the far right does get an absolute majority?
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Well, it means that Jordan Bardella, 28-year-old young protege of Marine Le Pen's, the new star of the party, is made prime minister.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: They will put their agenda in place, slowing or stopping immigration, restoring order, as they say.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: But no one really knows what to expect. The far right party has never been in power. It's always been portrayed as the boogeyman.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: And French voters have always band together to keep them out of power. So we are in uncharted waters.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: And I can tell you, I have never seen France more divided than it is today.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: Gymnastics superstar Simone Biles is heading to her third Olympics. She is looking to cap her remarkable comeback after pulling out of some events at the Tokyo Games three years ago amid struggles with her mental health that came in the wake of revelation she'd been among those abused by a former team doctor.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: Now she's ready for Paris. She won the U.S. Olympic trials last night by five and a half points, a huge margin.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: NPR sports correspondent Becky Sullivan was there in Minneapolis.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: Becky, how did Simone Biles look?
--:-- Becky Sullivan: You know, she looked loose. She looked happy. And I say that for the most part because she did have a couple missteps, but she still finished, as you said, like just well ahead of the pack.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: And so some of these missteps I'm talking about, she had like a big slip on the balance beam. She fell off, which wasn't just her. A couple others had the same issue with the beam.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: And then she also had a few extra steps on the vault landing. But the difficulty of what Simone Biles is attempting here is so high that the little mistakes like that just doesn't matter.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: And so afterwards, she just had great humor about her night, the slips and all.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: We have a lot of weight on our shoulders to go out there and prove that we're better athletes. We're more mature. We're smarter. We're more consistent.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: But don't quote me on that because not tonight. But you know we have to get that out of the way. You feel me?
--:-- Becky Sullivan: We have to get that out of the way. But we are in training. So if we can just do what we do in training then I think we going to hit it out the ballpark.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: So you can just hear it in her voice there. I mean, she feels good. She's back.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: Yeah, she can laugh because she qualified. I mean, if she didn't qualify, maybe it wouldn't be so funny.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: Now, what might we see from her in Paris? Well, she is instantly going to be the favorite for the individual all-around medal, as well as the vault and the floor exercise.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: She also did win the balance beam at a world competition recently. And so that could be in play.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: And I think a thing I should mention here is that she's 27 now. And so her main competitors will all be younger than her.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: And it just doesn't matter. You know, with her competing, the U.S. will also be the favorite to win the team all-around, which is something that the U.S. won back in 2012.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: Again, in 2016, they took gold. But then in Tokyo, they took home silver after Biles withdrew from that event.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: And so winning gold there is now a focus of the women, Biles and her teammates. Used the word redemption to talk about it.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: So here's Suni Lee, who's also one of the ones headed to Paris. I think that we really want a team gold.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: I feel like this is the same team, basically, as 2020. So it's kind of like a redemption tour.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: All right, so who else is on the team? Well, so there's Lee, of course, who you just heard.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: She was the surprise kind of breakout star of the Tokyo Games three years ago. She won the gold medal in the individual all-around after Biles withdrew.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: So she's back. The other people who are returning are Jordan Childs and Jade Carey.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: So there's lots of experience on this team. And then there is one newcomer. Her name is Hesley Rivera.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: She just turned 16 last month. This is her first Olympic Games.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: All right. So when it comes to gymnastics, the women's team is always the main event. What about the men, though? Do they have a shot at a medal?
--:-- Becky Sullivan: You know, they might have a shot at that medal. So the men's team hasn't won a team medal since 2008.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: And then they didn't even win any individual medals in Tokyo, which was an incredibly disappointing showing.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: But this year they have a star in the making in Fred Richard.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: He is a 20-year-old who has made it his mission not just to have success in the Olympics, but also to raise the profile of men's gymnastics overall.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: So he says he's not aiming just for any old medal. He wants gold.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: That'll be an uphill battle for the men, but we'll see what they can do.
--:-- A Martinez: That's NPR sports correspondent Becky Sullivan at the Olympic trials in Minneapolis. Becky, thanks.
--:-- Becky Sullivan: You are welcome.
--:-- A Martinez: And that's Up First for Monday, July 1st. I'm A Martinez. And I'm Michelle Martin.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Today's episode of Up First was edited by Dana Farrington, Nick Spicer, Russell Lewis, H.J. Mai, and Jenea Williams.
--:-- Michelle Martin: It was produced by Claire Murashima, Chris Thomas, and Lindsay Totti.
--:-- Michelle Martin: We get engineering support from Arthur Laurent, and our technical director is Zach Coleman.
--:-- Michelle Martin: We hope you'll start your day here with us tomorrow. And thanks for listening to Up First.
--:-- Michelle Martin: You can find more in-depth coverage of the stories we talked about today and a lot more on NPR's Morning Edition.
--:-- Michelle Martin: That's the radio show that Steve Inskeep, Leila Fadel, Michelle Martin, and A Martinez host.
--:-- Michelle Martin: You can find Morning Edition and your NPR station at stations.npr.org.
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