Debt ceiling deal passes House and heads to Senate, hurricane season begins: 5 Things podcast

On today's episode of the 5 Things podcast: Debt ceiling deal passes House, heads to Senate

USA TODAY White House Correspondent Joey Garrison is back, after the House passed the debt limit deal. Plus, federal officials reportedly have a recording of former President Donald Trump talking about a classified Iran document, Canada puts warning labels on individual cigarettes, USA TODAY Video Producer Callie Carmichael talks to a pair of single mothers who have turned to 'mommunes,' and hurricane season begins.

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Hit play on the player above to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript below. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.

Taylor Wilson:

Good morning. I'm Taylor Wilson and this is 5 Things you need to know Thursday, the 1st of June 2023. Today, the debt limit deal has passed the House. Plus, former president Donald Trump was recorded talking about an Iran classified document, and how some single moms are turning to "mommunes."

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The House yesterday voted to approve an agreement brokered by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Joe Biden to avoid default on the nation's debt. I spoke with USA TODAY White House Correspondent Joey Garrison for the latest. Hey there, Joey.

Joey Garrison:

Hey, how's it going?

Taylor Wilson:

Good. Thanks for joining us here once again this week. So the House has passed a bipartisan agreement to avoid default on the nation's debt. How did this vote play out, Joey?

Joey Garrison:

Yeah, I mean really it was an overwhelming vote. The final tally was 314 to 117. That's four versus against with strong majorities from both Republicans and Democrats voting for it. So heading into this, we heard a lot of unrest from kind of the left flank and the right flank of the Democratic and Republican parties respectively in Congress. Your more liberal Democrats were concerned with some of the work requirements. The Republicans gotten the bill for welfare programs as well as some of the permitting reform on oil and gas projects, whereas some of the hard-line conservative Republicans said hey, these aren't spending cuts that go far enough. But in the end, the middle stuck together and really it was, I say the middle, but also just a large majority of both parties stuck together to push this thing forward.

Taylor Wilson:

And Joey, can you just refresh our listeners on some of the big bullet point / main headline parts of this deal?

Joey Garrison:

Yeah, so most significantly, this bill suspends the debt ceiling through the end of 2024. So the next time that the next Congress will have to take this up will be in 2025. And that's the main thing the president wanted to do. We faced a possibility of default on June 5th unless the debt ceiling was raised or suspended. And then the most significant thing it does on spending cuts - and Republicans wanted to use this moment to cut back on spending - is it keeps discretionary spending relatively flat for the coming year and then caps it at only a 1% increase in 2025. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released its analysis earlier this week projecting the savings would be about $1.5 trillion over the next decade. So Kevin McCarthy, this is a really big win politically for him.

Taylor Wilson:

And the bill now moves to the Senate. What can we expect there, Joey?

Joey Garrison:

Well, I think largely we're seeing less drama in the Senate and that's often the case. You have heard several Republican senators, Rand Paul from Kentucky, for example, and Mike Lee from Utah who've have criticized this. But I think you're going to see sort of a very similar margin in terms of ratio that we saw in the House. I think you're going to see for the left, obviously, Bernie Sanders has said he's going to vote against it, but I think you're going to see again some of the more far-right members of the Republicans vote against it and some of the more left members of the Democrats. But that's ultimately not going to be enough to take this down, and I think it'll be a pretty overwhelming vote in the Senate as well.

There was a question heading into all this about whether Congress could get their act together to pass this quickly, because again, we have that default deadline on Monday. Schumer wants to have a vote on Friday. Worse comes to worst, they could meet over the weekend to pass it, but it sure looks like we're heading to avoiding default coming with that deadline ahead on Monday.

Taylor Wilson:

Thanks so much, Joey.

Joey Garrison:

Yeah, thanks, Taylor.

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Taylor Wilson:

Federal officials have an audio recording of former President Donald Trump after he left office discussing that he had a classified Pentagon document about a possible attack on Iran. That's according to a CNN report citing multiple unidentified sources. The recording is of a July 2021 meeting at Trump's Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey. And attendees included multiple people working on an autobiography of Trump's previous Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, along with aides for the former president. The report comes as Trump's attorneys are seeking a meeting with Attorney General Merrick Garland about the Justice Department investigation of classified documents found at Trump's home. This recording could be a major aid for prosecutors looking to prove that Trump knew his ability to possess classified documents was limited.

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Canada will soon become the first country in the world where warning labels must appear on individual cigarettes. The warnings in both English and French include the words "poison in every puff" along with warnings about tobacco smoke harming children and causing impotence. Regulations will be phased in beginning on August 1st. According to the CDC, cigarette smoking causes about one in every five deaths in the United States each year, and it's to blame for nearly half a million deaths annually, including deaths from secondhand smoke.

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According to the US Census Bureau, there are over 10 million single-parent families, 80% of which are run by single moms. Struggles with making ends meet and social isolation are common with this group, but as a solution, some mothers are now turning to shared living situations. These communes for single mothers, also called "mommunes" are gaining popularity as moms leverage shared resources to make family life more affordable and seamless. Two mothers involved in the movement, Heidi Hartmann and Christine Ye, both with new toddlers, sat down with USA TODAY Video Producer Callie Carmichael to share their stories.

Callie Carmichael:

Thank you, Christine, and Heidi, for joining us.

Heidi Hartmann:

Thanks for having us.

Christine Ye:

Thanks.

Callie Carmichael:

Christine, how did you come to this unique living arrangement?

Christine Ye:

I've been part of a Single Moms by Choice community since I've been thinking about having a child on my own. I've always wanted a kid. I decided to join a Facebook group that supported single parents. Heidi and I met on this site while we were pregnant, actually. We really clicked when we first met, and we were both looking for different living situations and we just got to talking that we thought it could work between the two of us.

Callie Carmichael:

Heidi, what made you decide to join a Single Mom Community or SMC?

Heidi Hartmann:

I had gone through a couple of different journeys of becoming pregnant with former partners and things didn't work out. And as I was looking ahead, I knew I wanted to be a mom with every ounce of my being. And when I sat down with a fertility doctor, I was still with my former partner. It was evident that he was not on board with this journey. And my fertility doctor said, "This is your moment. You got to do it now." And so I said, "Let's try it." And then as we fast-forward, Christine and I got to meet while we were pregnant and during one of our communal trips, we started talking about what it might look like to live together. And we were in the kitchen cooking together and we were like, "This works."

Callie Carmichael:

Heidi, why does this make sense for you? And what made Christine a great fit?

Heidi Hartmann:

As Christine and I were preparing for this interview, there's some shared values that really aligned for us when we were looking into it, and so that helps a lot. I've had roommates in the past where our values really didn't end up aligning and things did not turn out working as well as the one would hope. But with Christine and I, we are both empathetic good human beings, and our intention is always to be the best parent that we can be to our kids. And we have somebody who we can lean into when things go a little sideways or when we're about to break down and we just can't handle that one more moment. There's somebody there that's like, "I got it. Go. Take your time."

Callie Carmichael:

And Christine?

Christine Ye:

I agree with everything that Heidi said, and it's amazing to have a late day at work and say, "Hey, Heidi, like I'm on my way home, but can you watch Penny and feed her?" And that happens quite often for me.

Callie Carmichael:

Christine, what would be some advice you would give to moms thinking about the mommune life?

Christine Ye:

When Heidi says something to my child, I don't assume that she's yelling at my kid. She's trying to teach her something, and I really love that it's having another parent for my child in certain ways. And for the most part, we agree with one another, and being a parent is really challenging, but it's also the most rewarding thing that I've ever done. If you have it in your heart that this is something that's important in your life path, then I wouldn't take that dream away from anybody.

Callie Carmichael:

And Heidi?

Heidi Hartmann:

It's not for everybody. Absolutely. It is not for everybody. I recognize something COVID taught me early on is that I don't do well by myself and in isolation, I am an extrovert. Not that I need to talk all the time, but just being in the presence of others is a really important piece to help fuel me and give me energy. And so recognizing that that's something that's important to me also makes it very complimentary to be in a co-housing situation and having a shared living space with somebody else.

Callie Carmichael:

Thank you so much for joining me.

Heidi Hartmann:

Thanks for having us.

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Taylor Wilson:

The Atlantic hurricane season has officially begun. June 1st marks the start to the six-month season running through November 30th. This is the period when 97% of all tropical cyclones in the Atlantic form, though the season's peak is from about mid-August to mid-October. Many forecasts this year predict a near to below-average season because of the effects of El Nino. But unusually warm water in the Atlantic could counter that. An average season sees 14 named storms and seven hurricanes. This year's hurricane names range alphabetically from Arlene to Whitney.

Thanks for listening to 5 Things. If you like the show, please subscribe and leave us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. And if you have any comments, you can reach us at podcasts@usatoday.com. I'm back tomorrow with more of 5 Things from USA TODAY.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Debt ceiling deal clears House, hurricane season begins: 5 Things podcast