--:-- [Up First theme music fades out]
--:-- Host (Michelle Martin): Vice President Kamala Harris is closer to locking down the presidential nomination. It is my intention to go out and earn this nomination and to win.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): She's got delegate support, but what are the voters saying?
--:-- Host (Michelle Martin): I'm Michelle Martin, that's Michelle Martin, and this is Up First from NPR News.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): Republicans are scrutinizing campaign finance laws for ways to block the transfer of funds from Biden to Harris at the top of the ticket. What are the rules in this unprecedented situation?
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): And Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheadle was on Capitol Hill yesterday answering questions about the attempted assassination of Donald Trump. The Secret Service's solemn mission is to protect our nation's leaders. On July 13th, we failed.
--:-- Host (Michelle Martin): Can she withstand growing calls for her to step down?
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): Stay with us. We'll give you the news you need to start your day.
--:-- Host (Michelle Martin): This message comes from NPR sponsor Adobe. Introducing the all-new Adobe Acrobat Studio, now with AI-powered PDF spaces.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): Need to turn 100 pages of market research into 5 insights with a click? Templates for a sales proposal that'll close that deal? Or an AI specialist to tailor the tone of your market report? You can do all that with the all-new Adobe Acrobat Studio. Learn more at adobe.com slash do that with Acrobat.
--:-- Host (Michelle Martin): Vice President Kamala Harris makes her first official campaign stop as a likely Democratic nominee with a trip to Milwaukee today.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): Harris is technically not yet the Democratic nominee, but party leaders have quickly rallied around her.
--:-- Host (Michelle Martin): NPR White House correspondent Asma Khaled has been reporting on Harris, and she's with us now to fill us in on the latest.
--:-- Asma Khaled: Good morning, Asma.
--:-- Asma Khaled: So this is all happening so fast, and as everybody has noted, there is no modern precedent for all this. What's Harris saying about it?
--:-- Asma Khaled: Well, late last night, she issued a statement saying that she is proud to have secured the support to become the party's nominee.
--:-- Asma Khaled: We, in fact, got word that she has reached that delegate count. I will say in just the last 24, what, 36 hours, she's been trying to quickly rally Democrats behind her.
--:-- Asma Khaled: She visited her campaign headquarters in Delaware yesterday.
--:-- Asma Khaled: And I should point out that this had been the Biden-Harris campaign headquarters until the president dropped out of the race this past weekend.
--:-- Asma Khaled: And Harris told the campaign team there that she is going to work hard to unite both the party and the nation.
--:-- Asma Khaled: It is my intention to go out and earn this nomination and to win.
--:-- Asma Khaled: And in her remarks there, she also outlined a broad agenda for what she would do in the White House, including fighting for reproductive rights and lifting up the middle class.
--:-- Asma Khaled: And then, Michelle, she went on and she spoke about her background as an attorney general and a prosecutor.
--:-- Asma Khaled: In those roles, I took on perpetrators of all kinds.
--:-- Asma Khaled: And, you know, what she's trying to do here is really set up a contrast between her role as a prosecutor and Trump as a felon.
--:-- Asma Khaled: I will say, I imagine it's something we're going to hear more of.
--:-- Asma Khaled: Predators who abused women. Fraudsters who ripped off consumers. Cheaters who broke the rules for their own gain.
--:-- Asma Khaled: So hear me when I say, I know Donald Trump's type.
--:-- Asma Khaled: So this is obviously a big moment for Harris.
--:-- Asma Khaled: What's going on with President Biden?
--:-- Asma Khaled: Well, we've gotten word that President Biden intends to return to the White House later today after isolating with COVID.
--:-- Asma Khaled: He called into the room where Harris was speaking with campaign staff and he said that dropping out was the right thing to do.
--:-- Asma Khaled: He also encouraged his former team to embrace Harris.
--:-- Asma Khaled: The name has changed at the top of the ticket, but the mission hasn't changed at all.
--:-- Asma Khaled: And, you know, Michelle, I was there in the room covering this visit that Harris made to Delaware.
--:-- Asma Khaled: I will say that the mood was really party-like.
--:-- Asma Khaled: It was not a funeral.
--:-- Asma Khaled: You know, there was some emotion.
--:-- Asma Khaled: It appeared that Harris's eyes were glistening as she spoke.
--:-- Asma Khaled: The staff, though, seemed incredibly enthusiastic.
--:-- Asma Khaled: Beyonce was playing, people were chanting Harris's name, and I noticed there were some already newly minted Harris for president signs around the campaign office.
--:-- Asma Khaled: I will say it is also worth pointing out that Harris repeatedly in her remarks there, but also earlier, paid tribute to the work Biden has done as president.
--:-- Asma Khaled: She said that he has accomplished more in one term than many do with two terms.
--:-- Asma Khaled: So Harris obviously has Biden's support.
--:-- Asma Khaled: What about other Democrats?
--:-- Asma Khaled: It does seem like a number of sort of prominent Democrats are moving in her direction as well.
--:-- Asma Khaled: That is indeed what it looks like.
--:-- Asma Khaled: You know, no serious challenger has stepped forward to challenge her.
--:-- Asma Khaled: And, you know, as we mentioned, as of late last night, she now has enough delegates backing her to become the nominee.
--:-- Asma Khaled: The campaign said that between Sunday afternoon and Monday evening, it also raised a record amount of money, more than $100 million.
--:-- Asma Khaled: But look, I was at the RNC last week.
--:-- Asma Khaled: There is tremendous enthusiasm behind Trump, and Republicans were incredibly also confident about their odds.
--:-- Asma Khaled: I will say that I think that the way Harris is trying to frame this is that this upcoming election is a choice between two different visions for the future of this nation, one focused on the future, one focused on the past.
--:-- Asma Khaled: And that's an argument that she is someone with nearly two decades younger than Trump, a Black and Asian woman can try to make in a very directly personal way.
--:-- Asma Khaled: So Asma, as everybody's scrambling to adjust to the race without President Biden, the Democratic National Committee is too.
--:-- Asma Khaled: What's the latest on the process for delegates to actually cast their votes for a new nominee?
--:-- Asma Khaled: The DNC expects to hold a virtual roll call with delegates in the next few weeks.
--:-- Asma Khaled: The Associated Press says Harris has picked up enough support from delegates to officially become the nominee.
--:-- Asma Khaled: Now that support is not binding.
--:-- Asma Khaled: Someone else could theoretically throw their name in.
--:-- Asma Khaled: No delegates could change their mind up until that roll call vote takes place.
--:-- Asma Khaled: But I will say securing the nomination is just one part of the process for Harris.
--:-- Asma Khaled: There's a lot for her to do in this very short, condensed campaign stretch.
--:-- Asma Khaled: She needs to vet and pick a vice president and build up a campaign operation.
--:-- Asma Khaled: That is NPR's Asma Khalid.
--:-- Asma Khaled: Asma, thank you.
--:-- Asma Khaled: Good to talk to you.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): As president Biden and many other top Democrats are throwing their support behind Vice President Kamala Harris, Republicans are warning there may be some obstacles in the way of a smooth transition from Biden to Harris as a presidential nominee.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): Here is House Speaker Mike Johnson on CNN on Sunday morning.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): I think they've got legal hurdles in some of these states and it'll be litigated. I would expect on the ground there, and they'll have to sort through that.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): That was before Biden announced he would not seek the nomination, and Harris garnered the support of enough delegates to replace Biden as the nominee.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): But the idea of legal challenges has not completely disappeared.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): Democrats are trying to fend off those challenges by moving forward with a plan to hold a virtual nomination vote early next month.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): NPR political correspondent Sarah McCammon joins us now.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: So, well, first let's start off with this idea that Democrats cannot swap out a candidate at this point. Is that a risk for Harris?
--:-- Sarah McCammon: In short, it's not.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Since Biden announced his plans over the weekend, Republicans seem to be backing away somewhat from this idea that there will be a serious legal challenge to the new Democratic nominee.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: I spoke to Zach Smith with the conservative think tank, the Heritage Foundation, which has been raising this possibility for several weeks now.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: By having him drop out before the convention, giving someone else to officially receive the party's nomination, that may have been an attempt by those on the Democratic side to head off some of these potential legal challenges.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Election experts I've been talking to seem to agree that at this point in the race, with Biden dropping out voluntarily before the convention, Democrats are free to pick a new nominee.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: And they tell me any legal challenges would probably be resolved by the courts quickly.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Okay, now Democrats say they're moving forward with a virtual vote in early August.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: What's the goal there?
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Right. Last night, DNC chairman Jamie Harrison told reporters that delegates will select a nominee through an electronic roll call vote by August 7th.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: This was already in the works because of some concerns that Democrats were holding their convention too late to comply with ballot deadlines in some states.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Democratic Party officials say this has become even more important now with Biden dropping out.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: And as of last night, the Associated Press, as we heard, is reporting that Harris has secured the support of enough delegates to become the party's nominee.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: OK, so even if there's no issue with selecting a nominee or getting that person on state ballots, we've been also talking about the fact that there could be some campaign funding challenges for Democrats with replacing Biden.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: So, Sarah, what are you hearing about that?
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Well, the argument from some Republicans is that Harris cannot use Biden's campaign funds.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Charlie Spies is a former counsel to the Republican National Committee and to the chairman of the Federal Election Commission.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: There's not a lot of precedent here, but I think they've got a legal problem by having Harris use the Biden committee as her campaign committee.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Other experts, though, argue that because Biden and Harris share the campaign committee, there should not be a problem.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: The head of the FEC told NPR that this is a complicated situation and challenges are likely.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Are likely.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Okay, got it. So how might those challenges play out?
--:-- Sarah McCammon: So I asked Rick Hassan about this.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: He's an expert on election law and a professor at UCLA Law School.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: I can tell you that the Federal Election Commission moves very slowly.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: We're still getting resolution of some issues from the 2016 campaign.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: And so I don't expect that there would be any quick term resolution of these issues before the election.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Which means Harris can probably spend the money and if there's a problem, pay the fines later.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): NPR's Sarah McCammon had answers.
--:-- Sarah McCammon: Thanks, Say.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheadle was on Capitol Hill yesterday.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): Yeah, for nearly five hours, she faced questions from House lawmakers demanding answers about the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): NPR Justice correspondent Ryan Lucas watched yesterday's hearing, and he's with us now to tell us about it.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: Good morning, Ryan.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: You know, the Secret Service has been under a very uncomfortable spotlight since the shooting at that Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: You know, a bystander was killed, and of course, we all know the former president was wounded.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: So what did the director have to say about what happened there?
--:-- Ryan Lucas: Well, Cheadle called the assassination attempt on the 13th of July the most significant operational failure for the Secret Service in decades.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: And she also said this: The Secret Service's solemn mission is to protect our nation's leaders. On July 13th, we failed.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: As a director of the United States Secret Service, I take full responsibility for any security lapse of our agency.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: She also said that she will move heaven and earth to make sure that nothing like July 13th happens again, and that the Secret Service is cooperating with the multiple ongoing investigations underway and conducting its own review of what went wrong.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: Have we learned anything new about what happened?
--:-- Ryan Lucas: In this hearing, lawmakers certainly didn't think so.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: This was nearly five hours. It was contentious much of the time.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: Here's how the committee's Republican chairman, James Comer, summed it up at the end.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: The American people have questions. They deserve answers. Congress deserves answers. You were subpoenaed today to provide answers. And ma'am, you did not do that.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: One of the main questions coming into this hearing was how the gunman was able to get up on a roof that gave him a clear line of sight on Trump at the rally.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: And Republicans and Democrats, one after another, pressed her for an answer on that.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: And time and again, she gave a version of this answer: We are nine days out from this event, and I would like to know those answers as well, which is why we are going through these investigations to be able to determine that fully.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: That was her answer on the big basic question.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: She did confirm some small details, but again, nothing that would change our understanding of what happened and what went wrong.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: What sort of details did she confirm?
--:-- Ryan Lucas: Well, she said the shooter had been flagged as a suspicious individual before Trump went on stage.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: She said law enforcement officers at the rally were trying to track him down.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: But she also said it's not rare for someone to be flagged as suspicious at an event like this.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: And she differentiated between suspicious and being identified as a threat.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: She also said that the Secret Service did not know that the shooter had a gun before Trump went out to speak.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: And if they had known, Trump wouldn't have been allowed out on that stage.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: But again, as I said, these are smaller things.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: And on the big questions, there was a lot of frustration from lawmakers that she wasn't providing the answers they wanted.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: OK, so even given the performative nature of a lot of congressional hearings that we've all seen, both Republicans and Democrats have expressed frustration about this.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: So is Cheadle going to remain in charge of the Secret Service, given that this is a kind of a bipartisan outrage here?
--:-- Ryan Lucas: That's a really good question.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: She said at the hearing that she believes she's the best person for the job and she's going to stay put.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: But pressure's definitely growing for her to step down.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: There were already calls, as you noted, for her to resign before this hearing.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: Then during the hearing, several lawmakers from both sides of the aisle, that includes the committee's top Republican and the top Democrat, told her point blank that they think she's lost the public's confidence and she needs to go.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: And then last night, a motion was filed in the House to impeach Cheadle.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: It's a motion that forces a vote within 48 hours.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: So the pressure on her to step aside is only growing.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: That is. NPR's Ryan Lucas.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: Ryan, thank you.
--:-- Ryan Lucas: Thank you.
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--:-- Host (Michelle Martin): And that's Up First for today.
--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): I'm Amy Martinez.
--:-- Host (Michelle Martin): And I'm Michelle Martin.
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--:-- Host (Amy Martinez): We hear at Up First give you the three big stories of the day.
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