>> tonight on kqed newsroom, the week's major politics, how california lawmakers tre to the trump/putin summit. the bay wildfires, concerned about greed and lack of oversight. how climate change is fueling this intense fire season and damaging california's environment. hello and welcome to kqed "newsroom." i'm thuy vu. we begin with politics. there's continuingsi con over what was said during president trump's private meeting with russian president vladimir putin on monday in helsinki. after initially saying he did not believe russia had nterfered in american elections, president trump later told cbs news he had been firm with mr. putin about not putting up with such interference. the shifting statements from th

presideew condemnation from top democrats and some republicans and then on thursday the white house said president trump will invite ovladimir putin for a s meeting in washington, dc this fall. meanwhile, in california, the state democratic party snubbed senator dianne feinstein by endorsing r rival, kevin deleon. feinsin prepares to take a leading role over confirming supreme court nominee brett kavanaugh. joining me now to discuss this, kqed political reporter maurieso and political consultant sean walsh. thank you. >> good to be heree, >> there's been a lot of criticism over the helsinki meeting and what president trump said afterwards. what's been the reaction from california republicans in races as they tryne to deterhe house? >> reached out to all the republicans in althe hot house seats here. nine republicans. i said, what did you think of

what the president initially said and none of th would criticize trump by name. putin's a mess, all this stuff. hat speaks to the power of trump and his supporters. ev in blue california. these folks want to get elected and need that core of trump supporters to support them. >> i mean, we saw later in the week, because things move so quickly, you know, this indictment of somebody that the federal prosecutors say working as a russian agent and dana rohr backer called it bogus and acknowledged he met her at somei . i think rorbachers the only one dealing with this. a billboard democrat to put up. to bek that race is going interesting to watch around this russia issue. for a lot of people,his may be appalling and may be sort of crazy that we're having these conversations but it's pgobably notng to be the number one issue going to the poll.

>> republicans on the house intelligence committee essentially blasted the move from the helsinki summit. how much will these ongoinn rns about russian meddling and also over president trump's handlinof these worries mobilize democrats for the midterms? >> i think tha are hoping, right and i think that's the key wi congressional races. you're not talking about convincing rdcore republicans to vote against their own party. you want the democrats who v didnte two years ago, four years ago, out to the polls and i do think there's some indications that there could be ome of that democratic excitement. we've seen some stronnufund raisiners from some of these new democratic candidates. so, you know, i thin that's really where democrats need to focus. not on trying to pull people over. >> and shine a light amid all of this back peddling and back and forth statements. presidentnviting putin to the white house this fall. what do you make of this?

>> well, look, as long as you're talking, not shooting, it's not a bad thing. in regards to joe, i'm not sure if it's the power of the trump voters but the closeness of this election cycle. the races are going to be so close that if you peel off even ce few page points with people, you lose. that's why they're hesitant to and criticize president trump. with regard to the subpoena, it's just ridiculous. it's a complete political stunt andcutive privilege. it's never going to happen. that's just politi on the democrat's part. the real issue, which is ieresting, is every morning, the republicans wake up like, oh my god, what is it going to be today? so in january, republicans were very dieartened. think they thought they were going to lose the house by 52 votes. about amonth ago to three weeks ago, they were in great shape and felt with the social democratic party, this election in new york and all the t mayhe democratic side, they were feeling really good and poll numbers were trending theiy

now with russia, the poll numbers have gone down. >> and immigration stuff at the border, you know, really a moment where you saw a lot of, evemore moderate republicans, people like former first lady laura bush really come outs nging. >> i would say though, the fact the banned ice movement actually ayed against the democrats. republicans were feeling great three weeks ago. it's like being on aoller coaster down at great america. like, whoa, you're up and down. don't know what you're going to get. >> a number of critics saiwhat president trump said after the meeting with putin amounted to s tn. how much of that will stick or is it just like teflon? >> there is sok much, thout last week, okay. he goes to the nato meeting. basically says that our nato allies are opponents and then angela merkel is not helping us out. i think he was rightaln the natas issues, but every single day, he says something new. you have the epa secretary

resign in disgrace. poof. so literally, this guy drives so many newst ngs. >> the base or firmly behind him despite this? >> i thi the base is firm behind him. no offense to you media people but i think in certain ways, when the media comes out so attacks him, that solidifies his base and other people just saying it. >> what's different about this one, with the putin stuff is that he hadew the fox people coming out against him which rarely happens, very tepidly so sa things like, it wasn't his best day. >> even they seem to be in shock. >> but if they're saying that, that' something unusual. foreign policy doesn't it does matter. if you're a republican. the one thing you can't do as a republican is say russ is good. they've historically been bad to us. they spy.

they put dferent kind o poisons with their own signature on it killing off people around the world. they'll put up with a lot. they want the court to change the way it's been changing but they will not say that russia is goo it goes our fundamental dna. itjust depends on what happens between now and election day. it depends on whld i w argue, leading the news as ballots are mailed out in california especially, but, you know, nationally, and this s going.oaster just kee so i think that's going to be the problem for democrats to try a rehash these things when it's been three months. >> people are still casting ballots. how does that summit go? >> maybe. they said in the fall, i don't think they set a date for it. one thing i'll tell you though. we're talking about republicans. let's not forget. you're only good as your opponent and run as fast as the guy next to you and democrats are having a civil war with yo party. socialist with an active t.

moveme anders out campaigning with these groups and that is not something the democrats want to be facing going into a fall election. >> on that issue, eat back to what happened with the dianne feinstein situation with the democratic party, endorsed the rival and kevin deleon even though she campaignedrd not to have any endorsement at all, what does it suggestbout the state of the democratic vote? >> for some context, that was the exrdutive bo of the party that was 300 people out of 2800 delegates. >> and millions of voters. >> millions of voters but feinstein won 25% of democrats including her opponent and his district. about $8 million in the bank and she's worthateast $55 million. he's got 10 cents. it's going to be hard for him tv

cut her. >> completely irrelevant for the election and her reelection. it is relevant isofar as what's going on in the belly of the beast in the demratic party. >> i don't think it's, i don't agree with you, sean, it's bad as you're saying. lot with u can see a the tea party and that's not been great for the republican party long-term but when it came to elections, that dide excite right, the base they needed to take back the house and i think for people who you talk te who wernie delegates two years ago and just getting involved, they're happy to see this sort of movement happening. so you're right. nancy pelosi and dianne instein, they're not happy about this but, you know, it could play well for some voters in the coming months. >> it may not change the u.s. senate race, like you said but what's inerresting they symbolize these two factions. you have feinstein, old scho politics. she's 85. the oldest member of the senat and then you have deleon who's

the senator of tsimmigr he wants to abolish ice. believes president trump should be acimd. and so how is that rift going to play out come november especially wh democrats are trying to retake control of the house? >> it could go an energizing thing but already, deleon as influenced feinstein on a couple of issues and suddenly against the death penalty and been ainst it for years. what she neglected to tell me, eemigration policies. she's much more vocal against calling out trump. >> legalizing marijuana. >> that came out of nowhere because she was hardcore against it for a long time and let's not forget, she going to have a primetime free spot for weeks when the supreme court hearing. >> you hit the nail on the head. that's where she'll play to the lefd the activist in the party and hammer this appointee, particularly on his writings and

dealings with the bush administration with enhanced interrogation techniques. going to love it and help her politically with theis act. >> it was a sign. i think what you mentioned in new york. people like dianne feinstein need to take these challenges seriously even if they areay better funded. look. as joe said, you need mney to t on tv. deleon doesn't have it. i think it would be a mistake for feinstein to not make take him serusly but gotplenty of money and get plenty of media.s >> she's not yet agreed to a debate. she's aged she will debate. dut hasn't scheduled it yet. said on the rec to us at the chronicle, she wl debate. >> some time before the oelection? s she debating? we don't even know. >> fresno at 3:00 p.m. >> the real change could come after thelection if the democrats win or lose especially with a big fight over leadership with the direction o party and i think that's where that

will really bubble to the surface. >> we're talkingabout divisions but one thing that's undivided is the ste ofcalifornia. the three california ballotsu mes that went down pretty much defeat in the week before but cou bically said amounts to a change in the state constitution and in order for that to happen, it has to be decid by theegislature before going to the voters. so is this the last we'll hear of it or do you think behind it will come back >>swinging? s long as tim has money in the checkbook, he'll bring this back but let's look athy he's doing this. this speaks to concerns tha all sort of people have about california isn't working well. one out of five people live in poverty, you know? the health system doesn't rewor. t a lot of problems here. this is like a very clumsy way to address it. bu politicians should heed this as this is a warning sign. people are unhappy.

>> we should all have representatives. but you're right. the underlying issues are important. as long as tim drap has money, he'll probably keep pushing that. >> just somebody rich in silico valley throwing his money at something and not understanding the political intricacies of the policy? >> tim draper is a very, very bright guy a cares passionate about the state. i think he says that the stateu isf control. we've got a housing crisis here and yet you've got the same group thati actuallyd suit against him to stop this, has environmental policies that 'tops housing from being built. you could get a bike lane for three years built in berkeley because of these environmental laws, so he thinks it's out of control with the pet projects and smart enough like he is and rich enough like he is, your vote council big enough. >> all right.

consultant with the san francisco chronicle, marie, kqed, always nice to have yo on. >> thank you for having us. >> the deadly wildfire last october burned more than 00240 acres and claims 43 lives. supervised the massive clean-up. kqed investigation found troubling flaws with how they'ra rded and executed. who did the investigative report. this price tag is huge, $1.3 billion.o the expensive disaster clean-up. what was this money spent on and how much did it come out to per parcel?so >hat happened is the army corps of engineers have these contracts in place before disaste strikes so they can get

going immediately and start removing debris and stuff like that. the companies theyrought in with debris removal but from hurricanes becausehat's what the army corps has done in the past is hricanes,floods, other kinds of disasters and this was actually the first wildfire atclean-up the army corps of engineers had done. and so that price tag then gets basically given to these contractors who are then given the task of hiring truck drivers and cntractors and all the subcontractors going to actually do the work on th ground a that came out to about $280,000 per parcel. >> that massive. how does it compare to prior disaster clean-ups? >> th's what real struck me and why i started looking intoi there was a big clean-up in 2015 after the valley fire in la county that also devastated more

than 1,000 homes a the clean-up from that averaged about $77,000 to $80,000 p parcel. this is a jump of $280,000 per parcel which is just really significant.os >> a four times. >> yeah. >> the army corps of engineers, meaning the taxpayers foot this bil they weawarding actually es incentivizeductive and unsafe work. how so? >> part of the problem is they pay by the ton. so that incentivizes by ton of debris. exactly. so that incentivizes people to get the work done as quickly as possible wch is a positive, i but it alentivizes them to do it unsafely. so what i fod in my reporting is that incentivized truck drivers overload thei dump trucks and that can be dangerous and take materials that did not

need tbe taken. so kind of taking away concrete pads and taking awa extra soil and loading. >> the driveway w that thted to keep. >> yeah, yeah. so that l to a couple of pretty significant problems, you know, one of which was a serious accident that happened when truck driver lost hisres on a steep hill in the fountain grove neighbor in a devastating 10 car crash. a woman who aually lost her home in the wildfire was paralyzed in that accident. and then this ongoing issue of excavation, overexcavation where homeowners ar coming home to see if they can rebuild and coming home to a hole basically. >> because so much was dug out to basically have as muchebris an as much tons of debris as possible. so are there any charges being

filed? against some of these companies? >> so there are some related issues of prosecution that are being looked at. the district of sonoma county is looking closely at that accident, the ten car accident. the contractor license ford issued a citation to contractors not licensed by the state of california to be doing this worr and the core of engineers is also still investigating a very serious accidwhere a man named ezequiel sumner was killed when, you know, osha determined it was tampered with and caused it to roll over. >> you looked into the history of some of the contractors they used. the army corps of engineers used and someof them actually have prior records of allegations of waste and fraud. what did you find?

>> so yes, i found going back to katrina that the government accountability offe has taken this industry to task for ov overcharging taxpayers and load mixing, which basically mixing in concrete heavy metal things into tlheir loads to, again, get the weight and result overcharging and price gouginha things like the number of companies are under invtigationy the florida district attorney or the florida attorney general, i'm related price gouging to hurricane irma clean-up. >> how is it responding and do you anticipate they'll change th contracting methods in the future response to future disasters? >> i think there's a lot of high level conversations going on about that rightnow. i've talked to fema officials and army corps ficials.

and the army corps has kind of fairly ben reticent about communicating how they're going to change but in talking to fema, they said basicalllike, we have learned a lot of lessons and you're going to see those an these cos come in to recompete for new contracts, new disaster clean-up contracts. you'll see those lessons reflected in the bidding process. >> all right. suki louis, wonderful work here. thank u for being with us. kqed criminal justice reporter, suki louis. we turn nowo the fires that are currently burning. this year's fire season in california ost to the w start in a decade. and climate change may be playing a dry hot conditions with warmer nights making it harder to fight deadly blazes and the multistage rout and they can spark fires burning quickly and out of control. and joining me now to discuss all of this is kqed scienceai

editor miller. good to see you. cal fire responded to hundreds of fires this year. why has the start of this fire season characterized as one of the worst in a decade? >> a lot of people you might have noticed said, it's one of the earliest. it's like, why is this starting so soon? you know, it's not have wildfires in california in june, but i think this year, the si and the ferocity were arresting for people. you had the county fire started up in yolo county anded star spreading west and eventually burned more than 140 square miles, an area bigger than a la veg moved very, very quickly. quad druping in si vernight and people generally alarmed by that. it was pretty close to home too. ash was falling like snow flu y flurries in vallejo. why? you might want to ask. and the answer is last year, last winter, i should say, a little disappointing on the

precipitation side. things started drying out uickly and i was talking with the guys who go out on the field who measure wh they calluel moisture. basically, the water content in the vegetation on the landscape and they were finding moisture levels in june that they would normally see in august. so dried very quickly this year. >> also found another contributing factor that's nighttime temperatures. what's going on there? >> what is going on? you know, this is really strange and also, a littleunnerving. it's kind of the insidious side b climate changeause it's happening when most of us are sleeping. you don't even notice it butes temperatn general are rising but what they found is erat the overnight lows, the nighttime teures are rising faster. at a faster rate than the daytime highs. weird, huh >>yeah. >> this has a lot of implications for a agriculture it also affects wildfires

because what it means is that you used to get this reprieve at night. firefighters have bn saying in recent years, fires aren't yying down the way they used to at night becau used to get a reprieve, temperatures would fall, humidity would go up. the vegetation could soak up some of that moisture from the air but now you've got higher temperatures and lowe at night and there isn't the moisture. >> the fires just keep burning. >> they keep going. >> and, you know, climate change seems to b here.ng an impact what do we know about the connection between global warming and fire season? >> you can never really say. it's still a dodgy proposition to say what this fire season is bad because of global warming, but we can say theeairens in general are getting worse because of global warming. they're getting longer and we're seeing more catastrophic fires as well and that's because, again, temperatures are rising. things are drieeying out and o factors as well. >> there's rising temperatures that enhances droughts, with

wildfires. how else does climate change affect the environment? >> sea level rise is a big one. we've got cities suing over that and also, again, wildfires is another way that it'sec ang it. >> what about air pollution? do all the wildfires affect air pollution in california as well? becoming afact, it's challenge for cities who are already like not making their a threshol their air quality thresholds. so a lot of the smoke pollution for wildfires is setting usck on that but the big thing is extremes. you hear people talk t abo new normal, a phrase my boss hates for good reason because the new normal is there is no normal but weather events of a kinds, whether it's wet, dry, hot, all boming more extreme. and these extreme events are becomingore frequent and that's really i think the hallmark of climate change in california. >> and we can't talk about this

without talking about e mixmiss. what's going on? depends where you're talking about. this is some of the goodin news lved. a week or so go, california with this goal of rolling back greenhouse gas e moimissions to0 levels. it's already happening. >> we're ahead of schedule. >> four years ahead of schedule, actually, because the latest data from 2016. that's good. the bad news is california is 1% emissions. so it's a little hard. >> the rest of the world to contendith i >> it's good news and of course, the problem is that the federal government is moving in exactly the opposite direction promoting fossil s fuels and ine cases, endermining that momentum we had with renewable energy. >> and you alluded to this earlier that t fact some cities are taking this issue to the courts. we have the cities ofa san isco and oakland about a dozen cities nationwide suing oi companies for costs they say assocgeted with climate chan

because of the sea levels in their communities. how are the companies responding? >> the companies taking the position that number one, the courts are not the pla to set climate policy and number two, look, if you want to hold people accountable for, you're saying it's greenhouse gases and it's fosil fuels behind a of this, you should be suing everybody who drives a car because all we do is produce product that people buy and that's been their position anyway and theous have been a little bit friendly to that. the san francisco and oakland federas dismissed in court but just before we sat down, baltimore, the city of baltimore sued 26 fossil fuel companies in the state of marylan so there's a bit of a wave building here and i'm not sure. i am not trying to handicap but not sure they'll be able to fend this off. >> something else to watch. h ed sites. thank you so mr being with us. >> that will do it for us. you can find more coverage at kqed.org/newsroom. i'm thuy vu. thank you for joining us.

robert: isolated in his own party, at odds with advisers and as ever, defiant. president trump ignites a political firestorm over russia. i'm robert costa, we dig into the latest reporting onhe trump administration tonight on "washington week." noesident trump: i let him we can't have this. we're not going to have it. and that's the wayt's going to be. robert: under pressure from some republicans andemocrats, president trump insists he did confront russian president vladimir putin aboutlection interference. but earlier in the week, he mostly accepted putin's view. president trump: i have great confidence in my intelligence people but i will tell y, that president putin was extremely strong and powerful in his

denial today.