MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
President Biden has less than 60 days left in office. And with so much focus on the Trump transition, the current president has diminished from view. So we wanted to know how he's spending his time, what he has planned. I'm joined now by NPR senior White House correspondent Tamara Keith. Hey there.
TAMARA KEITH, BYLINE: Hello.
KELLY: OK, so two months and counting to go. How is President Biden spending his time, treating this period? We're in lame duck days here.
KEITH: Yeah. In short, he's trying to get as much done and locked in as possible before his time is up. Biden and his chief of staff, Jeff Zients, held a call last week with about 2,000 political appointees throughout the administration. And a White House official tells me that Biden acknowledged the emotion they might be feeling after the election, but said he needed them to bring the same purpose they had throughout their time in the administration and to harness it to get as much done as they can in the closing days. Zients then brought his business world jargon, asking them to focus on execution, execution, execution, adding, let's finish strong.
KELLY: Finish strong. This sounds like a pep talk my ninth grade softball team got. I'm assuming the White House has something slightly more ambitious in mind?
KEITH: Yeah. In some ways, it's a lot of what the administration has been doing for the past two years. Early in the Biden administration, Congress passed these big pieces of legislation - the Inflation Reduction Act, which makes a lot of clean energy investments; the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law; the CHIPS and Science Act. And the administration has already obligated a lot of that money, awarding grants and signing contracts, and we're going to see more of that happening in the weeks ahead.
They're also trying to get the word out about popular parts of these laws. For example, in January, a provision goes into effect that caps out-of-pocket prescription drug costs for seniors at $2,000 a year. Trump has said he wants to roll back a lot of this Biden-era legislation, so the Biden team is trying to use its remaining time to make that harder to do.
KELLY: Well, and speaking of legislation, is the Biden team trying to get any more legislation passed before they leave office?
KEITH: They are, but it's not much more than the bare minimum needed to keep the government functioning. They need to pass a temporary government funding bill. There's a defense policy bill that comes up annually. And the White House has asked Congress to pass billions of dollars in additional funding for disaster relief because funds to help people recovering from hurricanes and wildfires are running low.
Perhaps the most significant push is in the Senate, where Democrats are trying to confirm as many of President Biden's judicial nominees as possible. This is something Republicans did at the end of Trump's term. These are lifetime appointments, and Biden doesn't want to give Trump the gift of judicial vacancies to fill with conservative judges. So Trump is complaining mightily about this on social media, but Democrats are doing their best to plow ahead, including some very late-night votes.
KELLY: OK. So as President Biden plows ahead in these last few weeks, is he staying put in Washington? Does he have travel, any vacations?
KEITH: Oh, he's totally going on vacation. He's going to be in Nantucket this week with his family. And then he is doing a formal - a more formal trip. He's traveling to Angola next month. He had promised to visit the continent of Africa earlier in his term. He has missed his deadline on that, but he is getting it in under the wire.
KELLY: Any last things you are watching for?
KEITH: Yeah. Pardons and commutations are a power of the presidency often exercised at the very end. The White House has insisted the President won't pardon his son Hunter, but Biden has used this power, the pardon power, to send a signal about inequality in the nation's drug laws, and he could do something like that again. I'm also expecting him to deliver a farewell address, as most presidents have done.
One thing he hasn't done yet since the election is hold a press conference. That had been a tradition up until Trump. We don't know why he hasn't, but I can guarantee if he does, he will be asked about his legacy and why his tune changed on Trump being a threat to democracy once the votes were counted.
KELLY: NPR's Tamara Keith, thanks so much.
KEITH: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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