part about the whole sordid affair, trying to understand marjorie, rothstein, barnes and the rest. fractured intellectuals, broken souls who lost their humanity on a descent into evil. descent into evil this sunday, back from europe. >> i did what i came to do. >> president biden faces challenges here at home. a new democratic compromise on voting rights. >> i'm heartened to see the discussion moving forward. >> gets a promise filibuster from republicans. >> equally unacceptable, totally inappropriate. all republicans, i think, will oppose that. a bipartisan framework on infrastructure. >> i think it's encouraging people are still talking. >> could lose support from progressive democrats. >> this is as clear as day. no climate, no deal. >> can president biden get his agenda through? my guests this morning senator bernie sanders of vermont and

senator rob portman of ohio. plus, after the summit -- >> the tone of the entire meeting was good and positive. >> -- president biden and vladimir putin take the measure of each other. >> this is not about trust. this is about self-interest and verification of self-interest. >> putin deflects evidence of russian cyber hacking, but both leaders say they hope for a better relationship. i'll talk to trump and obama russia adviser fiona hill. for the third time, obamacare survives a supreme court challenge. >> the supreme court has just ruled the aca is here to stay. >> signaling the likely end of the republicans' decade-long efforts to kill it. joining me are "washington post" bureau chief ashley parker, democratic pollster, cornell

belchr e belcher. pbs "newshour's" amna nawaz and republican strategist brad todd. >> announcer: from nbc news in washington, the longest running show in television history, this is "meet the press" with chuck todd. good sunday morning and happy father's day to all the dads out there. after a largely successful week of meetings in england, belgium, and switzerland, including the much anticipated summit with vladimir putin, president biden came home to find his domestic challenges waiting for him. for every sign of hope for some progress, there is a flashing yellow light warning of disappointment. yes, joe manchin released his counteroffer to protect voting access. but, no, republicans are certain to filibuster that. some have agreed on a bipartisan framework on infrastructure. progressive democrats are taking a dim view of the deal. yes, republican senator tim scott says he's cautiously optimistic about passing a bipartisan police reform bill. but no, there is no guarantee but, no, there is not a guarantee that this, like

previous signs on police reform, will hold up. president biden has been remarkably silent on these issues, but soon enough he'll have to decide how to move forward and where to assert pressure. now that the overseas trip is in the veer view mirror, the road ahead is much more politics than it is putin. >> -- bipartisan plan, do you have any reaction to that? >> i'll tell you when i get a copy of it. >> after a whirlwind trip abroad, president biden returns to high-stakes political diplomacy at home, a test of how far he'll press his own political party to push his agenda through congress. a bipartisan bill on infrastructure, 11 republicans supported in the senate, enough to clear the 60-vote hurdle if it doesn't lose democratic votes. >> my chief of staff thinks there's some room in which there may be a means by which we can get this done.

>> the deal is already being panned by progressives. >> this is as clear as day. no climate, no deal. >> i continue to believe that most of what is being discussed in this effort would heap new taxes on working people. >> the bipartisan deal sucks up trillions of dollars in bridges to nowhere because it makes people feel good, then that's going to be a huge concern. >> then there's the problem of paying for it. an early draft included raising the gas tax, something the white house has ruled out. >> there's still issues. >> democrats are crafting their own ambitious package which they said this week could cost up to $6 trillion and include top progressive priorities, climate change provisions, money for elder care and paid family leave, a medicare expansion, and legal status for millions of undocumented immigrants. >> there's plenty of reasons to do another package, but i think the key is how are we going to pay for it, and are we going to

get enough voting rights to do it. >> west virginia's joe manchin extended an olive branch to progressives, backing a narrower alternative, making election day a holiday, requiring 15 days of early voting, and banning partisan gerrymandering. >> i've been working across the aisle with all republicans trying to get people to understand it. that's the bedrock of our democracy, accessible, fair, and security voting. >> key progressives endorsed manchin's plan, surprising republicans, who hoped to drive a wedge between democrats on this issue. >> is that a compromise you can support? >> absolutely. what senator manchin is putting forward are basic building blocks we need to ensure that democracy is accessible no matter your geography. >> republican leader mitch mcconnell vowed to block the compromise offer. >> equally unacceptable, totally inappropriate. all republicans, i think, will oppose that. >> joining me now is senator bernie sanders of vermont. of course, the chair of the senate budget committee. senator sanders, welcome back to "meet the press."

happy father's day. >> thank you very much. happy father's day to you. >> appreciate that. you said on monday you weren't going to support this bipartisan infrastructure deal as it stands right now. what would it take for you to support this deal, particularly if president biden starts to sign off on it. what would it take even if you don't love it? >> well, chuck, look, what we've got to do in these budgets is address the crises facing the american people. it is true that our roads and our bridges and our water systems and our wastewater plants are crumbling and we need to invest in them. as i understand it, the so-called bipartisan plan really only provides about 25% of the money that the president asked for, about $580 billion. the point goes beyond that. the working people of this country understand, chuck, that for decades, we have ignored

their needs while the very richest people in this country have become richer. we have a situation right now where people throughout this country cannot afford child care. people cannot afford -- elderly people cannot afford hearing aids or dental care. we have a disaster in terms of climate impacting this country right now. how do you go forward? right now, in this moment in history, and not address the terrible climate crisis we face and transform our energy system? how do you not deal with housing when 18 million families are spending 50% or more of their limited incomes on housing? the list goes on and on. rich get richer. working people are struggling. it is time we paid attention to the needs of working people. and when we do that, when we deal with climate, when we deal with infrastructure, when we deal with home health care, when we deal with child care, we can

create millions of good paying jobs. that is what the american people want. that's what we've got to do. >> are you comfortable with a two-step process where you do -- you noted, this is the 25% of what president biden asked for. is it worth it in your mind to take what you can get in a bipartisan way, especially if that's the way you can get joe manchin and kyrsten sinema to get on board a democrats-only bill that may tackle the care economy as you just outlined? >> well, look. as i said, what is in the bipartisan bill in terms of spending is, from what i can see, mostly good, roads and bridges, and we need do that. that's what we're proposing in our legislation, but in much greater numbers. one of the concerns i do have about the bipartisan bill is how they are going to pay for their proposals. they're not clear yet. i don't know that they even know yet. some of the speculation is

raising a gas tax which i don't support. a fee on election vehicles, privatization of infrastructure. those are proposals i would not support. >> at the end of the day, do you think this ends up passing as -- by raising the deficit? is that something you're comfortable with and then democrats have to go it alone and possibly raise taxes on their own? is that where this is headed? >> well, when you talk about taxes, let us also be clear and i think the average american, whether you're democrat, republican, or inten dent, understands something absurd, that at a time of massive income wealth inequality, when two people own more wealth than the bottom 40% of america, and you have billionaires out there who pay zero, not a penny in federal income tax, large corporations pay nothing in federal income tax. the president said he doesn't want do raise taxes on people making $400,000 or less, i agree with that. but you know what?

in order to lower the cost of prescription drugs, in order to deal with paid family and medical leave because we're the only major country on earth that doesn't provide that, yes, we are going to have to ask the wealthy and powerful to start paying their fair share of taxes. >> i want to go back because you kind of ducked the question the first time. would you support or at least vow not to kill the bipartisan deal if you got a commitment from the president and some of the centrist senators to support a larger attempt, a sort of a part two democrats-only reconciliation bill? >> chuck, i don't know that anybody can give you an honest answer to that because nobody really knows what is going to be in this bipartisan agreement and how it is going to be paid for. so if it is roads and bridges, yeah, of course, we need do that, and i support that. if it's regressive taxation, raising the gas tax or fee on electric vehicles or the privatization of infrastructure, no, i wouldn't support it. but we don't have the details right now. >> let me ask you about obamacare. the supreme court ruling this week -- this is the third one,

and i even heard republican senators say, okay, no more, no mas, they're not going to try to kill obamacare anymore. you preferred something bigger, medicare for all. where is your priority now? making obamacare closer to your vision on medicare for all, doing things like that, or do you still think in the future obamacare should be scrapped and replaced? >> obamacare has done a lot of good for a lot of people. that's clearly a fact and i support that. at the end of the day, chuck, we are the only major country on earth that doesn't guarantee health care to all people as a right. we are spending roughly twice as much per capita on health care as do the people in any other country, and 90 million of us are uninsured or underinsured. we pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. we don't have enough doctors and nurses and dentists, especially

in underserved rural areas. this is not a system that is working. we pay a fortune. we don't get good value. my own view is we must move to a medicare for all single payer program. by the way, there is growing support to at least right now expand medicare to cover dental, to cover hearing, to cover eyeglasses. it's outrageous that millions of seniors have trouble eating because they can't afford dentures. >> very quickly, there's a campaign by some groups that are very supportive of you throughout the years that are calling on justice stephen breyer to retire. one ad, it is time for justice breyer to announce his intent to retire from the supreme court. do you think this pressure campaign is appropriate? would you like to see him retire now? >> no. i will let the judge make his own decision. i'm not going to tell him what to do. >> senator bernie sanders, the independent progressive from vermont. i appreciate you coming on and sharing your perspective. thank you. >> thank you very much.

let's dive deeper into this potential bipartisan agreement. joining me is republican senator rob portman of ohio, a lead negotiator in this bipartisan infrastructure talks. senator portman, welcome back to "meet the press." so i've got to ask this first, before i get you to respond to senator sanders, given what we heard from senator tester on friday about the gas tax, i've got to ask you, are all 21 of you still on board this deal if you haven't agreed to how you're going to pay for it? >> yes. in fact, we do have pay-fors. i was interested in hearing from my colleague senator sanders. he said at one point with regard to the $6 trillion package, the list goes on and on. that's the problem. it's not about infrastructure. it's kind of a $6 trillion grab bag of progressive priorities. ours is about core infrastructure. it is paid for. it's paid for without raising taxes. i do think we have agreement on

that. i think there are very creative ways to pay for infrastructure that wouldn't be available for other expenses. as an example, the infrastructure bank, which is a bipartisan proposal that says let's use the power of the federal government to borrow at lower rates to leverage private sector funding as well as state and local funding. also, we're repurposing covid funding, chuck. over $100 billion in the proposal is repurposing in three ways funding not spent with regard to the covid-19 packages that have gone out, including the latest $350 billion package to state and local government. they would like to spend some of that on infrastructure. my state of ohio certainly would. we would permit them to do that and that helps pay for the package. >> so the gas tax is out? >> well, the administration said it's out for them. we don't have a gas tax, per se. it is, going forward, indexing the gas tax to inflation. it's been the same since 1993. the group does support that. we understand the administration has very strong views on that. it's a user fee. we think the user fee is

appropriate on electric vehicles. shouldn't electric vehicles or hybrid vehicles pay their fair share in terms of infrastructure needs, roads and bridges. i think there's some discussion left on those topics. >> is that code for it may end up not being in the final package? >> well, it may not, but the administration, therefore, will need to come forward with other ideas without raising taxes. what we don't want to do is hurt the economy right now as we're coming out of this pandemic by raising taxes on working families, and that's, frankly, what's done in the $6 trillion package, the largest tax increase in american history in addition to the huge spending. it's important that we have pay-fors, but we don't want to raise taxes. >> let me ask you this, why shouldn't either jeff bezos, the individual or amazon, the corporation, be contributing more to our infrastructure? >> well, they should be paying

taxes, and that's actually part of our proposal, too. we have about a $63 billion pay-for helping to close the tax gap, that assumes about a $40 billion investment in the irs, including, by the way, better taxpayer service, which is important right now, but also enforcement. let's be sure we're closing that tax gap, but not in a way that's too intrusive in the lives of americans in small businesses. i think that's a good sweet spot, a compromise. the administration talked about a $700 billion fund here. that isn't appropriate in our view. there's a bipartisan agreement on helping to close that tax gap. >> i am curious, though, it does seem as if all the pay-fors, you know, there's this big list, and, yes, you called it creative ways. the average person looks at this and says, he, these are countermaneuvers, this will increase the deficit. there seems to be comfort, okay, let the deficit go up if it's for infrastructure.

is that where this is going to end up being? >> no, no. absolutely not. i would disagree there, chuck. i think when you look at infrastructure, you have to think about what it is. it's long-term investments. as an example, we've got a bridge over the ohio river in downtown cincinnati where i am that's been in need of repair for a couple of decades now. it's about a $3 billion project. it's going to take a long time to do it, probably five to ten years. it's about a 50-year project we hope. these hard assets will last for many, many years. this is supporting long-term investments to increase our productivity as a country, increase our competitiveness, all the economics of this work well for our long-term economic growth. that's what this is about. it's something that can be paid for differently. it has been traditionally. traditionally we've allowed the federal government to provide low interest loans that get paid back. that's what we have in the proposal, the so-called infrastructure bank, which is a revolving loan program. much is being done with regard to water infrastructure and the

grid. of course, the ratepayers themselves will pay that back. it is a way to pay for it. not going further into deficit but understanding these are long-term capital assets that we need to do. by the way, we don't get good marks on our infrastructure in this counted and we're losing out to other countries in terms of competitiveness. it's important to do it. >> there are many whispering in the administration's ear. you think you have 11 republicans, and then the deal dies or this is being dragged out. how committed is this group of 11 republicans to sticking by this bill even if mitch mcconnell says he can't vote for it? >> i think we're absolutely committed to it. i think there's a number of others as well on both sides of the aisle. last week i heard from a lot of my colleagues saying i need to look at one other issue, can you do this, can you do that. there's a lot of interest in having a bipartisan proposal. chuck, this is growing the vote from the middle out. unfortunately, that's where we are right now in congress.

it's more likely we'll have success in doing that. you recall at the end of last year we did the same thing with regard to a covid-19 package, which helped to get that final package done at the end of the year after really almost a year of no activity on something that was really necessary. this is the same thing. everybody wants to do infrastructure. president trump had a $2 trillion package he was proposing. president biden proposed one in his campaign. by the way, this helps president biden keep that pledge of having an infrastructure package, but also to keep his pledge of doing things across the aisle and getting something done. >> speaking of getting something done from the middle out, i want to ask you about joe manchin's idea on voting reform. five bullet points, they look fairly reasonable. i'm curious what you think. make election day a public holiday, mandate 15 days of early voting, stop gerrymandering, require states to sendregistration,

requiring voter i.d., including things like utility bills. is that a basis to start a conversation in your view? >> well, first of all, i appreciate what joe manchin is doing here. he's trying to find some middle ground. unfortunately what he does is what the larger bill s-1 does. it takes the election system and federal lies it. it's a federal takeover of the election system. as you know under the constitution -- >> is that a takeover? >> extraordinary circumstances. it would be telling my state of ohio that -- >> federal government tells the state how to spend transportation money sometimes. >> well, that's true, and there's federal money provided for that. in this case what he's saying to the state of ohio or your state of florida, we're going to decide how redistricting is done. we'd be taking away from democracy, in effect, which right now in the state of ohio, our state legislature makes that decision. these are elected representatives. he wants to make it a federal responsibility through some kind

of commission. even provisional voting. he says if you get a provisional volt outside the precinct, you have to include it. that's a state rule that some states allow and some don't. the bottom line is we should make it easy to vote in this country. we should also make it hard to cheat. i'm proud of our ohio election system, and i sthi think they do a very good job. it's based on a bipartisan effort. that's the concern about what joe is trying to do. although, i appreciate him trying to find the middle ground. who knows? maybe something can be done. >> senator portman, happy father's day. >> happy father's day to you, chuck. coming up, the biden/putin summit. was it a success? or was it a mistake? i'll talk to fiona hill, a russian expert and former national security official under the trump administration when we come back. s! expense report! if you're using multiple systems, re-entering data over and over

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still came the belly pain, discomfort, and bloating. awful feelings she kept sugar-coating. finally, with the help of her doctor, it came to be. that her symptoms were all signs of ibs-c. and that's why she said yes to adding linzess. linzess is not a laxative. it helps you have more frequent and complete bowel movements. and is proven to help relieve overall abdominal symptoms-belly pain, discomfort, and bloating. do not give linzess to children less than six and it should not be given to children six to less than 18, it may harm them. do not take linzess if you have a bowel blockage. get immediate help if you develop unusual or severe stomach pain, especially with bloody or black stools. the most common side effect is diarrhea, sometimes severe. if it's severe, stop taking linzess and call your doctor right away. other side effects include gas, stomach area pain, and swelling. could your story also be... about ibs-c? talk to your doctor and say yes to linzess. ♪♪ welcome back. to borrow a line from "the godfather," last week's biden/putin summit wasn't

personal. it was strictly business. a brief no-frills meeting between two men who can neither trust nor verify especially when it comes to russia-based cyber attacks. so was it a success or was it a mistake? joining me is fee own in hill, a top advisor to president trump on russia, so concerned about what happened at the helsinki, she considered faking an illness. she helped brief president biden before this trip. dr. hill, welcome to "meet the press." >> thanks so much, chuck. >> let me start with this. instead of trying to gauge asking you whether it was worth it, when will you decide whether this geneva summit was worth it? what should we watch for to find out if this summit was a good idea or not? >> i think that's really the right approach, chuck, looking forward. we'll have to see if there are additional meetings at high level. we heard as we cut out of the

summit, there have been some plans to have strategic stability talks, talks about how we're going to manage our respective nuclear arsenals. the russians have a lot of new novel weapons. the russians themselves are extraordinarily concerned about some of our long-range precisional strike weapons. the old treaties we've had in the past, the inf treaty we've pulled out of, the new start treaty, we've extended it for a short period, but that has to be basically renegotiated. the whole nuclear world is much more complex than it was before because we've got china as an increasingly worrying nuclear power on the strategic side. the main problem is in cyber, as you were alluding to. that's where we'll have to sit down and have serious cyber talks, not just at the working level, but something that takes it up to try to reach some kind of agreement.

>> there's some concern we may have given putin a new status quo because he amassed troops to the border of ukraine and he got this summit. then he pulls them back. he's still got crimea. we got him to agree apparently not to kill navalny, but he's still in prison. did putin get out of this than we realized? >> well, in terms of the symbolism of having a sit-down with the american president, absolutely. that is a very important win for putin. but it's not a win if nothing happens out of it. that's an episodic event. he can't take that to the bank for a long time and cash it in. he's got to present himself at home as a great statesman because he has to subject his presidency to a re-election. we keep hearing he's going to stay until 2036. but in 2024 he's got to have elections as well. he's got to show he's still popular.

in the meantime, coming up there are parliamentary elections for the russian duma. basically the ruling party uniting russia has to subject itself for re-election and they're not looking very popular. on the back of that, putin has a big problem with covid and the pandemic. he's got a lot of problems on the domestic front. he's only got about 10% of the population vaccinated. he spent all this time being an anti-vaxer, talking down on the vaccines including astrazeneca, pfizer, moderna. now russians don't want to have shots in their arms either. so putin's got to figure out how to navigate things. he can't basically live off an episodic meeting with the united states president in geneva for a long time to come. he's got to show something out of it. the problem with the previous administration, with president trump for vladimir putin, fantastic meetings from his perspective, able to push all our political buttons, make fun of us, always have sit-downs or telephone calls, but he never got any kind of agreements. that wasn't really all that worthwhile. he has to get something out of this as well, something more

than the meeting in geneva. >> what are we miscalculating on our ability to punish putin and his behavior? as i look back on the past decade, there's been an array of attempts, whether embarrassing him in front of the international olympic committee, panama, the various sanctions. it isn't as if we haven't tried new things and none of it seems to work. why? >> look, you have to have a very clear red line and a very clear unified response. some of our problem is the inability to have collective action. on the previous segments this morning showed part of that problem. we have so many parties infighting, we can't agree on what can be a simple thing, like an infrastructure bill. any one riding in their car in the united states, filling potholes should be a fairly simple thing to do. it's the collective action. it's the fact we can't get congress to work together in national security and domestic

fronts. it's our inability to work with allies. oftentimes we've been at odds with them. but it does actually work. i'll give you one episode that did work with russia, and it's not a very pleasant one. everyone will recall in 2018 there was an incident in syria. our military was very clear to the russian military, you fire on our guys, we'll fire back. the russians tried covert action. they put in some paramilitary groups in there. they shot at our guys pretending to be rebels. they got shot back at. the russians accepted they had overstretched the mark, that they had gone over the red line and this was a massive mistake. that's the kind of action and response that we need to be able to set up. we have to try to find that in cyber as well. it's no good telling russians what we're going to do. we're reporting on it all the time. what we have to do is make a clear red line and have a response that they know why that response happened, and then they have to recalculate.

>> you brought up the 2024 elections that putin's got happening. i guess the question is what comes after putin, and how soon do you think that post-putin world begins? >> well, it's a really good question, isn't it? he said he's going to stay until 2036, which will make him 84 years old, and he'll been in pow fehr 36 years. in some respects there seems to be never anything beyond putin in our lifetimes. what he's signaling, however, is he wants to make the decision about who is the next president, just as he did when he stepped down for a believe period and put dimitri medvedev in power for a four-year period. he certainly doesn't want navalny president. he's been incredibly brave returning to russia, only to be put in jail. putin wants to choose someone, probably a protege, a younger version of himself from the security forces or somebody else that he's installed, a regional

governor, for example, or someone else from the inner circle. he has to show he's in complete control to make that happen. what he's trying to do is stifle the choice, the democratic choice of the russian people to decide for themselves. what comes after him could very well be another putin in some respects, but perhaps somebody from a different background, not somebody from the old kgb, the fsb. we might see something a little different, but he's trying to sense more of the same of him to protect himself. >> sounds like you're describing what we saw in iran, where the leaders are picking who gets to be on the ballot. >> exactly. >> fiona hill, great to have your perspective on here. thank you. >> thanks, chuck. happy father's day. >> thank you very much. when we come back, do republicans want to make deals with democrats, or do they want to deny president biden any victories? the panel is next.

>> announcer: "meet the press" is brought to you by ibm. the world is going hybrid with imm.

♪♪ for deb, living with constipation with belly pain was the same old story for years. trying this. doing that. spending countless days right here. still came the belly pain, discomfort, and bloating. awful feelings she kept sugar-coating. finally, with the help of her doctor, it came to be. that her symptoms were all signs of ibs-c. and that's why she said yes to adding linzess. linzess is not a laxative. it helps you have more frequent and complete bowel movements. and is proven to help relieve overall abdominal symptoms-belly pain, discomfort, and bloating. do not give linzess to children less than six and it should not be given to children six to less than 18, it may harm them. do not take linzess if you have a bowel blockage. get immediate help if you develop unusual or severe stomach pain, especially with bloody or black stools. the most common side effect is diarrhea, sometimes severe. if it's severe, stop taking linzess and call your doctor right away. other side effects include gas, stomach area pain, and swelling. could your story also be... about ibs-c?

talk to your doctor and say yes to linzess. ♪♪ welcome back. the panel is here. when i say here, i mean here! look. studio, with us, first time in more than a year. >> this is our new studio. this is the first time we've had anybody in our new studio. white house bureau chief ashley

parker, democratic pollster cornell belcher, republican strategist brad todd and pbs "newshour" correspondent amna nawaz. brad todd, no relation on that front. ashley, when you read the tea leaves of sanders and portman, it looks close. this seems close. you're the white house bureau chief. it's all about president biden at this point. i think he wants this deal. is he going to get it? >> he does want this deal. especially when you talk to republicans on the hill, they think he wants this deal even more than some of his staff: that's why in these moments where it starts to fall apart, you see these republican senators, much to the chagrin of their staffs, unable to blame president biden. they think he wants to get to yes. his staff is pulling him back. i think we'll see. this is a different animal than the covid rescue plan, which he felt tremendous urgency to do. first we shoulder say he does define that as bipartisan even though it got no republican votes. he was just going to push this through. when you talk to his team, this

is something where they're proceeding to go it alone, but they want the bipartisan buy-in. >> amna, what we're trying to figure out on the progressive side of things is how much patience do they have, and, you know, is this about -- would they really kill a deal that president biden endorsed? >> what you've seen from progressives early, to ashley's point, i think the next bill is so different from previous ones coming back from that foreign trip. this is the real test now, how can president biden move forward with the promise of bipartisanship which he campaigned on. he said i can do this, i have to relationships from my time in the senate to pull this off. the first 100 days exceeded expectations, now there's starting to be fraying around the edges. you're seeing much more of that consternation and frustration growing. this is kind of an issue of competing ambitions for biden because he wants to be this president who comes out with big, bold plans to move america through this time of great turmoil and uncertainty coming off a global pandemic. and at the same time he wants to

get things done. at some point he's going to have to make a choice. >> cornell and brad, let's do the political calculations. cornell, first to you, does biden need to have a small bipartisan deal to succeed, or does he need something big with democrats but risk it maybe not happening for an entire calendar year? >> the answer is either. you take either and then sell it. the americans are always talking about they want bipartisanship, bipartisanship, bipartisanship. you hear it all the time. there's a legislative grim reaper by the flame of mitch mcconnell who is 100% against the biden agenda. so any ideal that -- look. mitt romney says let's be open to the conversation. manchin is saying -- praising the senate leader for giving bipartisanship a chance. i think the optics of it -- sausage making is ugly. the optics of it, they're giving bipartisan a chance. they're trying. in the end, if they do get a bipartisan bill, i think it

will, quite frankly, politically be good for both sides. infrastructure is something that republicans, democrats and independents all want. >> brad, i had a republican staffer admit that the fact that the republican base is more worried about critical race theory gives them room to do this deal. if you think about what happened during obamacare -- >> republicans can support an infrastructure deal if it's concrete, water, and fiber, broadband road. but you can't be a trojan horse for bernie sanders' wildest fantasies. you have to have a deal that bernie sanders will vote against to get a significant number of republicans. is it worth losing 15 democrats to get a deal that includes 20 republicans? >> i had somebody say, if you don't like the $6 trillion deal, is it better to pass something or let the democrats go it alone? >> i think it's incredibly risky for democrats to run everything for two years on party line votes. that's a recipe for republicans to take both chambers of congress.

the fact you hear so many progressives act as if democrats have 70 senators and not 50, tells you the tug that the white house is dealing with. >> i don't think there's a bipartisanship bill progressives aren't going to kill it. >> sanders didn't sound like he was going to kill it. he talked about what he liked. >> that's politics. you say i want this, want this, hold out until you get it. i don't think the progressives are going to kill this bill. i think at the same time it's going to be hard to run in the next fall midterm election without us trying to block everything he tried to do. >> ipartisanship is incredibly important. as you said democrats don't want to do everything, go it alone. if you talk to some of the biden people, results are equally as important. you hear them often say they learned the lessons of the obama years. they pointed to the 2009 bailout package and says who remembers the three republicans? you maybe remember, chuck. nobody else does. they look at the covid relief bill, there were no republican votes. it was checks in pockets and shots in arms. that's what mattered.

that's what's always in the backs of their minds in deciding what they want to do >> can we say we saw some movement on mitch mcconnell. to say bipartisanship is dead after the talks broke down and to come back a few days later, 50/50 chance, maybe that's progress. >> let me ask a question for cornell and brad. had stacey abram's attacked manchin's compromise, is mitch mcconnell more open to it? >> you should have went to brad first. >> i thought it was fascinating because stacey abrams endorsed it, we can't touch it now. >> i think she endorsed it with the intent to kill it. >> oh, wow. >> she knows that it has to die in order for her to get what she wants with s-1 and the democrats. >> i'm not that cynical. quite frankly, most of the things in that bill are common sense. you talked about it. these are hard things for republicans, like redistricting. the senator went on to say this takes away the rights of ohioans. no, even 57% of republicans want

redistricting to be taken away from these partisan games we play. you and i make our livings from this. the gerrymandering has to stop. we're not even having fair medical elections anymore because incumbents keep winning. >> you want to circle the bernie sanders non-answer on stephen breyer. he wanted no part of that. >> that was a short and distinct answer. >> said a lot without saying a lot. >> that's what i thought too. it's weird. conversation, exchanges. i don't know what to do. as we go to break, i want to remind you that this season's episodes of "meet the press" reports are available. our final episode is a really good one. it looks at whether the u.s. military is ready for the next war which could start either in spaces or cyber. up next, there were celebrations across the country marking juneteenth. it's now a federal holiday.

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we are back. it's data download time. this time we're marking a new federal holiday. the first time a federal holiday has been added to the calendar in over 35 years. before juneteenth was a federal holiday, it was a state holiday almost everywhere. that didn't happen overnight. let me show you the journey of juneteenth in the states. it began, of course, in texas in 1980.

of course, texas was the first state to acknowledge juneteenth, which, of course, is their acknowledgement that they were the last state to knowledge emancipation. by 1999 three other states, minnesota, oklahoma, and florida were added. it was the first decade in this century that momentum took off. 30-plus states added it from 2000 to 2009. by the time congress voted on it every state but two had juneteenth as a state holiday. just south dakota and hawaii didn't have it. north dakota was the most recent state to add it in april. what's interesting here is just sort of where public opinion has been on this. overall, just 35% of adults say juneteenth should be a federal holiday. don't mistake that for a lack of support. it's more of a lack of knowledge about it. 40% said they didn't know, and public opinion, that tells you there's a bit of a knowledge gap on the issue overall. what's interesting on this knowledge gap in how much it is by age. a real generational divide.

among younger votes, a majority believe juneteenth should be a federal holiday. the older folks got, the less they think juneteenth should do that. this plays out in other issues, reparations, the idea that decedents of slaves should be compensated. support for it, there's still a majority that don't support reparations. check out this generational divide, 42% from 18 to 34% believe there should be reparations. the older the respondent gets, the less support there is for it. what does this tell you? juneteenth is not the end of something when it comes to marking racial inequality in this country. it may be the beginning of a new conversation because as this younger generation gets older, the discussion of racial justice inequality is only going to become more central.

keep an eye on that. when we come back, mike pence gets heckled at a christian conservative conference. >> i'm deeply humbled. >> just another sign that on the right these days, if you're not 100% with donald trump, you're considered 100% his enemy. stick with us. 100% his enemy. stick with us. refluxes into the esophagus. prilosec otc uses a unique delayed-release formula that helps it pass through the tough stomach acid. it then works to turn down acid production, blocking heartburn at the source. with just one pill a day, you get 24-hour heartburn protection. prilosec otc. one pill a day, 24 hours, zero heartburn.

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welcome >> just another sign that, on the right these days, if you're welcome back. well, we saw what happened to mike pence and this whole idea how do you cater to the trump base. let me show you examples of what some future president candidates are doing to cater to the trump base. take a look. >> we felt very strongly that our tax dollars should not be going to teaching these theories that are not based in fact and that really divide people and is effectively a form of state-sanctioned racism. >> i'm right here on the ground in arizona, maricopa county, at the election audit. >> the federal government has a legal responsibility under the federal immigration laws to do it. but because they are not doing it, texas taxpayers are having to step up. >> let me include ohio senate candidate josh mendel. there are no words to this one, i think the image speaks for itself. the burning of the mask there. yes were talking earlier, i said

republican senate staffers are sort of admitting the base isn't focused on infrastructure and what's going on on capitol hill, so there's some room to maneuver, but is the best way to win a minnesota senate primary to go to arizona for this audit? what is this political theater about? >> for about 12 years being outside rather than inside, it's been far more important in the republican primaries than the ideological scale of right to left. and so you cannot be nominated as a candidate unless you can first prove you're going to be a disrupter, and there are shorthand ways to do that. republicans by and large are agreeing on a lot of policy issues, especially when you're in the minority that tends to happen. proof that you'll be a disrupter and advance a pushback to the left is the first step to check. >> is not having, though, a unified -- you say it -- what are the issues that the party stands for? that seems to be the missing piece here. >> specific to this idea of

critical race theory, i have to tell you, i just spent time reporting on this county in virginia about an hour outside of washington. to your point, this is something mobilizing people and resonating very deeply. it was about a 100-degree day, dozens and dozens and dozens of parents, mostly white in this largely affluent county showed up to a school board meeting, if more, the very first school board meeting they ever attended, specifically because of this one erb. >> that's important to note. you mentioned critical race theory a couple times. this is a parent-led backlash at the grassroots level. >> it's manufactured and then sort of -- the fire was lit. >> i disagree. i think it started because parents have had it with the education bureaucracy after covid. they're fed up with it. they tend to trust democrats on education funding, but they trust republicans on education accountability. i think the backlash you're seeing on critical race theory in schools is another example of parents trying to hold educators

accountable. >> it's coordinated and intentional. the critical race theory is yet another tool in the racial tribal boogeyman's toolbox, which republicans think helps them in elections. this is trump 2.0. in is a continuation of this. critical race theory is an arcane ideal. why is it front and center right now? the same reason mitch mcconnell attacked stacey abrams when she came out for the voting bill. it is racial. it is tribalism. we've seen it grow under trump. this is part and parcel of it. they think this helps ignite their base. there's no way. this is not grassroots. brad, you know this is organized and is being paid for. >> they're not very good at organizing anything on our side. >> you all are better than us. >> in 2018, trump went culture with the caravans, right? some would argue there's some similar motivations with it. democrats went substance with

health care and they won the midterms. certainly some rural states on the senate side, you could argue, responded to the immigration message. is there a risk here that republicans are too focused on their culture war, that they may turn off swing voters? >> that's definitely possible, but the problem is you have republicans right now, as they were for the past four years, who are just terrified of donald trump and him coming out against them. it's unclear how much donald trump can affirmatively help, say, a house member get elected, but can he absolutely torpedo them in a republican primary by showing up and doing a friday night rally in their state or home district? absolutely. when you talk about the substance, you know, a picture of them paying homage to him at mar-a-lago going viral can be just as viral as a plan to reduce the national debt. >> hey, brad, sit bad ron desantis beat donald trump in a straw poll? >> i've been waiting.

>> do you want to be the first person to look like you're beating trump? >> i don't know that ron desantis is going to be calling on mar-a-lago until the next straw poll comes around, if that's what you're asking. that was interesting. i think you're talking about the western states straw poll. they're great fodder for all of us in our business. >> you know who cares about straw polls? donald trump cares about straw polls. he cares about fan polls, a lot of polls, not the accurate ones, but he does care about them. guys, great to have you in the building. >> good to be back. >> before we go, you know we love documentary film. we're partnering with our friends at the american film institute to sponsor the afi films festival. they've got 75 films this year. you can watch them june 22nd through 27th. tickets on sale at docs.afi.com. thank you for watching. enjoy your father's day, whether you're a dad or are your dad. we'll be back next week. if it's sunday, it's "meet the press."

what is in the bipartisan bill in terms of spending is from what i can see mostly roads and bridges. that's good. it's what we're proposing in our legislation, but in much greater numbers. >> i was centered in hearing from my colleague senator sanders. he said at one point the $6 trillion package, the list goes on and on. that's the problem. it's not about the infrastructure. ours is about core infrastructure. >> talks on infrastructure moving over to