--:-- Steve Inskeep: Hey, this is Steve Inskeep. We have some news for you as it looks at 6:17 in the morning Eastern time. We have news, not quite final, of a ceasefire in the Middle East.
--:-- Kat Lonsdorf: A senior official speaking anonymously to our colleague Kat Lonsdorf in Tel Aviv says that Israel and Hamas and other negotiators are very, very close to a ceasefire agreement that could unroll over the next few weeks.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: This involves a cease to shooting in Gaza for six weeks, the release of some but not all Israeli hostages, as well as the release of some Palestinians. That's our understanding a little bit after six o'clock Eastern time.
--:-- A Martinez: You can stay tuned to NPR News for the latest on this.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And now here's the rest of today's news. The final report from a special counsel investigating President-elect Trump does not back down. Jack Smith's report is now public.
--:-- Jack Smith: He writes that only the election prevented him from holding a trial on a case he would have won.
--:-- A Martinez: I'm A. Martinez. That is Steve Inskeep. And this is Up First from NPR News.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Amid the other losses of the L.A. wildfires is the scar on a landscape that people depended on for their mental health. We really felt the loss of the forest.
--:-- Katia Riddle: Beyond the physical loss of the fire is the toll on some people's spirits. How do you address that?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And Pete Hegseth has President-elect Trump's stamp of approval to lead the Pentagon, but does not yet have that of the Senate. How do lawmakers weigh his qualifications and the criticisms of his conduct?
--:-- Katia Riddle: Stay with us. We've got the news you need to start your day.
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--:-- Steve Inskeep: Special counsel Jack Smith will not record a criminal conviction against President-elect Trump. He will leave his conclusions for the history books.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: The Justice Department lawyer investigated Trump for his bid to overturn his defeat in the 2020 election. Smith dropped two indictments after Trump's win in 2024, following a long-standing policy against prosecuting a sitting president.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: But his report on one of those cases is now public, and it asserts that the evidence would have convicted him.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: Smith also says it is, quote, laughable that he acted from political motives.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: NPR's Kerry Johnson joins us now after a very late night and early morning on this story.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: Good morning, Steve. What does it matter that Jack Smith's report would be public now, given that he's not going to prosecute?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: This was really a last chance for prosecutors to explain their decisions and defend themselves.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: It also could accomplish some measure of accountability for people who were hurt on January 6, 2021. Some of those police officers are civil lawsuits that are ongoing that continue against Donald Trump and others.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And it's also really a record for history at a time when Trump and many other Republican lawmakers are clinging to fake claims about election fraud in 2020 and calling those people who stormed the Capitol patriots.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: Because the final report was being argued over, the release of the report was being argued over in court.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: I had my doubts as to whether we would see it before January 20th, Inauguration Day.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: How did that work out?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Yeah, every step of this investigation has been a battle. And even late last night, Trump tried one last time to get a judge to block this report, but he did not succeed.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: On social media overnight, Trump said the voters had spoken and returned him to the White House.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And remember, the Supreme Court handed him a significant victory last year, ruling he had some immunity from prosecution.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: The justices there took so long to decide the clock ran out on this indictment here in Washington, D.C.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And really, over the past week, Trump's former aides at the Mar-a-Lago resort had asked Florida Judge Eileen Cannon to block this report, even though that case was no longer in front of her.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: It was really an open question whether we'd see it up till last night. In the end, she did not block it.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And so last night you get these 150 pages.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: What stands out for you?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Jack Smith wrote there was enough evidence to convict Trump at trial of these four felony charges related to efforts to overthrow the 2020 election.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: Smith says the ultimate decision in this case to charge Trump was up to him, and he stands by that.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: He says even though they couldn't get to trial because of the DOJ view that a sitting president cannot face criminal trial, that this effort mattered, that the rule of law matters, that the example his prosecutors set to fight for justice despite personal costs and attacks and threats, that all matters.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: Jack Smith wrote, as a prosecutor, You cannot control the outcome, but you can do your job in the right way for the right reasons.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And he says they did.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: And it is interesting, given that Trump and his supporters have characterized Smith very negatively, that Smith is saying, no, actually, we set an example.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: We were doing the right thing here. That is his case.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: Is that the last word from him?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: You know, special counsels are typically invited to testify in Congress once their work is done.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: Democrats have asked the Justice Department to save all of Smith's files.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Republicans want to investigate him.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: And President-elect Trump has vowed retribution.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Jack Smith actually resigned before he could be fired by Trump.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: And other prosecutors who worked on the Smith investigations have been making plans to leave the Justice Department to Trump's nominees to lead the DOJ and the FBI in the next administration.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Have promised to investigate those investigators.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: So it could be a difficult road ahead financially and otherwise for a lot of these people who worked in the government.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And there might be questions about those investigations, promised investigations, and confirmation hearings to come.
--:-- Kerry Johnson: Carrie, thanks so much.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: My pleasure.
--:-- Katia Riddle: The physical devastation of the Los Angeles wildfires is plain.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: What's not as clear is how the destruction is affecting people's mental health.
--:-- Katia Riddle: And that weighs on residents' lives, even if it's harder to quantify than the value of someone's house.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: NPR's Katia Riddle is in Los Angeles.
--:-- Katia Riddle: Hi, Steve. How do you see this aspect of the story?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Well, I was at an evacuation center yesterday, and there were a lot of people who still just looked very dazed as they waited in line for resources like FEMA, paperwork, or services from the Red Cross.
--:-- Katia Riddle: Experts I've talked to have pointed out that even for people here who weren't forced to evacuate, there can be ripple effects.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: If someone you know is affected, the trauma response can be contagious.
--:-- Katia Riddle: And then some people are still awaiting the possibility that they will have to evacuate.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: So the cycle of trauma is still very much happening.
--:-- Katia Riddle: One thing that is unique to these kinds of natural disasters is that people are grieving not just their own homes and communities but there a kind of grief for the land that happens LA, you know, is a place of just staggering, really breathtaking beauty.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And people here rely on that natural environment for emotional support.
--:-- Katia Riddle: Here's a gentleman named David Eisenman.
--:-- David Eisenman: He's talking about a hike that he and his wife would take regularly in the Palisades.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: It would just calm us down and center us and make everything right for the moment.
--:-- Katia Riddle: And we've lost that.
--:-- David Eisenman: And that was when my wife and I heard that, we turned to each other, and I think we had tears in our eyes.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: I mean, we really felt the loss of the forest.
--:-- Katia Riddle: Eisenman is a doctor here in Los Angeles, and he is also an expert in disaster response.
--:-- David Eisenman: He's the director of the UCLA Center for Public Health and Disasters.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: He studied this phenomenon. It has a name, solastalgia.
--:-- David Eisenman: He says, soul nostalgia can be just as real as any other kind of grief and that it needs to be addressed with mental health strategies.
--:-- Katia Riddle: Okay, mental health strategies. What do you do?
--:-- David Eisenman: Well, there are evacuation centers throughout the city with mental health providers on call to help people who are in crisis.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Many of them are practicing something called psychological first aid.
--:-- David Eisenman: That's a kind of CPR equivalent of mental health care.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: It means working with people to identify and address their immediate needs, things like shelter, food, medication, in service of supporting their mental health.
--:-- Katia Riddle: Like I said, I visited one of these shelters yesterday.
--:-- David Eisenman: Clinicians there said they have seen hundreds of people in the last week.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: While I was there, I talked with Lisa Wong.
--:-- Lisa Wong: She's L.A. County's director of the Department of Mental Health.
--:-- Katia Riddle: She said her staff across the city have really risen to the occasion.
--:-- Lisa Wong: But she says, in a way, people still have a lot of adrenaline.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: This is the easy part.
--:-- Lisa Wong: I think that is the real challenge, the sustainability of these efforts and also the longer term care of folks who have gone through such devastation.
--:-- Katia Riddle: People are going to need support in the workforce and in the community.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And some are going to need that support while they're trying to deal with a home that was destroyed, rebuilding a neighborhood that has changed beyond recognition.
--:-- Katia Riddle: Which makes me wonder, Katie, as you're talking, are we thinking in terms here of post-traumatic stress?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Well, research shows that most people will not develop debilitating post-traumatic stress disorder in these kinds of situations.
--:-- Katia Riddle: But even if folks aren't at risk of developing PTSD, it's well documented that wildfires are correlated with increases in anxiety and depression in communities.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: In Los Angeles, as in many places, there are shortages of clinicians like psychiatrists and psychologists, just not enough people to provide one-on-one mental health care for all the people who will need it.
--:-- Katia Riddle: Several experts I've talked to here have pointed out that in the face of increased disasters like this one, the mental health system is not equipped to handle the resulting needs.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And Pierce, Katie Riddle in Los Angeles, take care of yourself, okay?
--:-- Katia Riddle: Thanks, Steve.
--:-- A Martinez: Today, President-elect Trump's choice to lead the U.S. military gets a public hearing.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Pete Hegseth has already been the subject of public debate.
--:-- A Martinez: The veteran and TV personality he faced news stories about alcohol and even the revelation of a critical email from his own mom.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: His mother, though, has now since publicly supported him, and as has the president-elect and some senators who were initially skeptical.
--:-- Tom Bowman: NPR Pentagon correspondent Tom Bowman is covering this story.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Good morning, Steve. What are the questions about Hegseth?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Well, first of all, there are questions about his personal behavior.
--:-- Tom Bowman: A woman alleged that Hegseth assaulted her during a Republican conference in California back in 2017.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Hegseth strongly denied the charge though he signed a nondisclosure agreement with the woman.
--:-- Tom Bowman: He said that agreement was only to save his job at Fox News.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And also Hegseth has denied allegations of public drunkenness saying he never had a drinking problem.
--:-- Tom Bowman: And finally, Steve, there were issues of poor management when he ran this group, Concerned Veterans of America, a decade or more ago.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: He eventually left that group, and he said both he and the group just decided to part ways.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Isn't that part about management the essence of the job here? Because this is an assignment running one of the largest and most complex organizations in the history of the world.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Absolutely.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Besides the personal issues, the lack of experience is a huge issue.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: You look at people like Senator Tammy Duckworth, an Illinois Democrat and Army combat veteran.
--:-- Tom Bowman: She says that Hegseth is unqualified for the position since he never reached a senior military position or ran a large company.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Here's Duckworth speaking on CNN.
--:-- Tammy Duckworth: We're talking about an organization that is 3 million servicemen and women and civilians and a budget of over $900 billion.
--:-- Tom Bowman: He does not have the experience to run an organization of that size.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And Steve, all those who have served as defense secretary since the position was created in 1947 came from top posts in government, the military or industry.
--:-- Tom Bowman: That's not the case with Pete Hegseth.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: What he does seem to have, though, is opinions that match those of the president-elect on diversity, equity and inclusion.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Correct.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Yeah. And he opposes women serving in ground combat units.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Here's Hegseth speaking last year on the Sean Ryan Show.
--:-- Pete Hegseth: I'm straight up just saying we should not have women in combat roles.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: It hasn't made us more effective, hasn't made us more lethal, has made fighting more complicated.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Now, Steve, women have been eligible for ground combat jobs since 2016.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: There are now some 3,800 women serving in Army infantry, armor, artillery.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Another 700 women are in Marine ground combat units.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Hexeth's lawyer, Tim Parlatour, he's a Navy veteran, has charged that the standards for the arduous Army Ranger School have been lowered to pursue quotas for women.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Army officials deny that to NPR, saying the standards for Ranger School are the same for both men and women.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Some 150 women have now passed Ranger School.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Listening to those numbers, Tom, tells me something.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: People will point out that on average, men are bigger and stronger than women.
--:-- Tom Bowman: But some women are big and strong.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And you're telling me there is a limited number of women, not 50-50, but a limited number of women who meet the standards.
--:-- Tom Bowman: No, absolutely, Steve. These are really hard things to get through.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: I've been out in the field with male and female Marines going through training.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Some women were rock stars. They could really do the training.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And others said, listen, I can't carry a 100-pound pack. It's not for me.
--:-- Tom Bowman: But you're right. Small numbers of women, relatively small numbers of women, can achieve the standard and get into these ground combat roles.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: NPR's Tom Bowman will be listening to your coverage of the hearing.
--:-- Tom Bowman: Thanks so much.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Thanks.
--:-- [Closing music plays]
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And that's up first for this Tuesday, January 14th, which just happens to be the 20th birthday of my daughter, who's a listener to this podcast.
--:-- A Martinez: I'm A. Martinez.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: NMA Martinez, remember you can listen to this podcast sponsor-free while supporting public media with Up First Plus.
--:-- A Martinez: Learn more at plus.npr.org.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: That's P-L-U-S dot N-P-R dot org.
--:-- [Closing music continues]
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Today's birthday episode of Up First was edited by Emily Kopp, Diane Weber, Eric Whitney, Anna Yukonanoff, Ali Schweitzer, and Lisa Thompson.
--:-- A Martinez: It was produced by Ziad Bach, Nia Dumas, Iman Ma'ani, and Lily Quiroz.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: We get engineering support from David Greenberg, and our technical director is Stacey Abbott.
--:-- A Martinez: You don't hear a thing unless she does her job, which she always does very well.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Join us tomorrow.
--:-- [Closing music ends]
