Transcript of Florida Primary Results, US-Canada Tariffs, Meta Trial Begins

Alaska, Florida and Wyoming held primaries last night.

In Florida, the tug-of-war between Democratic progressives and moderates continued. Progressives took a surprise win in the U.S. Senate primary, but moderates prevailed in several key House races.

I'm Sasha Pfeiffer. That's Michelle Martin. And this is Up First from NPR News. President Trump pushed back a new tariff on Canada at the last minute, but only by 3 days. He says the two countries may restart the Keystone pipeline, but the broader trade relationship is still up in the air.

A group of states is suing Meta. They accuse the tech giant of designing apps to be addictive and hiding the risks.

Just like a generation ago with big tobacco, Meta has engaged in behavior to maximize its profits while harming the public health.

We hear how the states made their case on the first day of trial. Stay with us, we'll give you news you need to start your day.

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3 states held primaries last night: Alaska, Florida and Wyoming.

In Alaska, results are still being counted in a U.S. Senate race. Incumbent Republican Dan Sullivan and former Democratic Congresswoman Mary Peltola each has about 45% of the vote, according to the AP. 2 more candidates will move on, but which ones remain undetermined. The next The next closest candidate is the other Dan Sullivan in the race with less than 3%.

In Florida, there's a mixed picture in the contest between progressives and moderates across races for House seats and the Senate. Here to fill us in on those races is NPR political correspondent Ashley Lopez. Ashley, good morning.

Good morning.

Let's start with a Democratic U.S. Senate primary where there was a win for a progressive candidate there, and I take it that that win was seen as a surprise.

Yeah, it was. So State Representative Angie Nixon beat Alexander Vindman in that race. Vindman became a national figure after he was a witness in President Trump's first impeachment trial. Nixon, in comparison, did not have a national profile. But, you know, I was a local reporter in Florida over a decade ago, and I often came across Nixon because she has been very active in state politics for quite a long time. Not only is she a member of the Florida legislature, but she's fought some high-profile labor and voting rights battles as an activist in the state. And that was apparently quite an asset in a race where she was drastically outraised. Vindman raised more than $16 million in this race, and Nixon barely raised $1 million. And yet she decisively. During her victory speech last night, she said her win was an example of what organized people can accomplish.

And what about in the general, though? Like, what are the odds for a candidate like Nixon in Florida these days?

I mean, she faces long odds, obviously. Florida has become a pretty solidly conservative state in recent years. I should say, this seat isn't one that national Democrats have been optimistic about flipping, unlike Alaska, which also had its primary last night. The top 4 vote-getters in that race will move on to the general later this year. But in Florida, Nixon will be running against Republican Senator Ashley Moody, an incumbent who was endorsed by President Trump. And moving forward, a big question is how Nixon positions herself as she tries to get votes from, you know, a broader electorate in a red state. And she ran on a lot of progressive ideas like Medicare for All, universal childcare, and raising taxes on billionaires. She also joined the Democratic Socialists of America but was never endorsed by the group.

And I take it there were other progressives in House races with platforms similar to Nixon's, but they did not win. Tell us about that.

Yeah, they lost. This wasn't an across-the-board win for the progressive candidates. Oliver Larkin, who was backed by the DSA in Florida's 25th Congressional District, lost his challenge to Congressman Jared Moskowitz. I mean, this is a fairly moderate district though. It's one of the very few actual toss-up races in the country this year. GOP lawmakers in Florida redrew this district this year to make it harder for Democrats to win that seat, so it would have been a tough race for whoever wins. And speaking of redistricting, Democratic Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz was drawn out of her district by Republicans earlier this year, and she decided to run for one of the few safe Democratic seats, Florida's 20th Congressional District, and she won last night. However, she ran against a slate of Black candidates in that race. This is a seat that had been held by a Black representative for years, so this outcome is pretty complicated for Democrats, especially in the wake of the Supreme Court all but gutting the Voting Rights Act this summer.

And what about the people running to replace Governor Ron DeSantis?

So it's two members of Congress running to replace DeSantis, who is term-limited. Byron Donalds won the Republican nomination, and former Republican representative, now Democrat, David Jolly won the Democratic nomination. A Democrat hasn't been elected governor in Florida since 90s, so this is also a long shot for the party. DeSantis' departure will be a big change in the state. He pushed a very conservative agenda, and since he took office, Florida has become a reliable state for his party.

That is NPR political correspondent Ashley Lopez. Ashley, thank you.

Yeah, thank you.

President Trump says the U.S. will delay an additional 50% tariff on about $20 billion worth of imports from Canada.

He wrote on his social media site Truth Social that Canada and the U.S. had reached a deal to potentially restart construction on a controversial oil pipeline project. This last-minute agreement extends the tariff deadline by 3 days. But still uncertain is the fate of a broader trade agreement for all of North America that is currently under review.

We have NPR's Emily Fang today to explain why. Good morning, Emily.

Hey, good morning, Michelle.

So, Emily, walk us through this. What are the tariffs that Trump has been threatening to impose, and why has he delayed them?

So the tariffs would have covered a real hodgepodge of goods— wine to hockey sticks to cement from Canada. Overall, it would cover about $20 billion worth of goods, which sounds like a lot. It is, but that's actually only about 5% of annual Canadian exports to the US. And these tariffs were part of a flurry of back-and-forth duties that were kicked off by the US last year that has really strained relations with Canada. Now, the deadline for these tariffs was supposed to kick in midnight last night, but with less than 2 hours to go before that deadline, Trump announced he was temporarily calling them off. And he wrote on Truth Social what was key behind this deal was the potential to restart the Keystone Pipeline. Remember that? It was a joint project between U.S. and Canadian companies to deliver oil from Canada to the U.S., but it got mired in an environmental controversy and its permit was ultimately revoked by President Biden through an executive order. Trump rolled back that executive order last year as part of his push to expand the U.S.'s oil and gas sector. And now Canada's prime minister has put out a statement acknowledging the postponement of the tariffs, but only until this Friday.

Neither country, neither Neither the U.S. or Canada has spelled out any details about the pipeline, and it's also unclear whether this postponement is enough to cool down real animosity in Canada against the U.S.

And say more about that, if you would. You know, describe that tension, the source of that tension.

So Canada is a historic partner of the U.S. It's a military ally, but President Trump has lobbed around rhetoric many Canadians find offensive. For example, comments like making Canada the 51st state of the U.S. or this month calling Canadian leaders, quote, nasty. That's put pressure on Canadian leaders to stand up to the US, and polls this month show Canadians are overwhelmingly against appeasing the US. And as you mentioned, hanging in the balance is this sweeping free trade agreement between the US and its two largest trading partners. That's Canada and Mexico, and that's up for renewal.

And tell more about the trade agreement.

It's called the USMCA, the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement. Very literal. It was signed during Trump's first term. But Trump has said he, quote, "doesn't care" about renewing this free trade agreement, even though it allows hundreds of billions of dollars of goods to trade pretty much duty-free through North America. For Canada, it's already seen the US put tariffs on goods that were supposed to be duty-free under this agreement. I talked about the USMCA's uncertain future with Philip Luck. He's the director of economic programs at the think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

If we are showing ourselves to not be very interested in upholding the tenets of the USMCA, it really raises the question of what's it worth to take on the sort of political pain of entering another agreement or making concessions if you don't get anything tangible out of it.

Trump has flip-flopped before on trade and security matters, but on economic matters, that uncertainty might also discourage businesses from investing in North America.

That is NPR's Emily Feng. Emily, thank you.

Thanks, Michelle.

A trial is underway in Oakland, California, that could end with huge consequences for social media.

A group of states is suing Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram. Those states say the social media platforms were designed in ways that are addictive to young users and that the company knew it but misrepresented the risks to the public.

NPR's Jon Ruetsch was in the courtroom, and he's with us now to tell us more about it. Good morning, Jon.

Good morning.

So social media companies like Meta have been in court a lot, but they have some legal immunity from being held accountable for what people post on their sites. So what is the argument that the states are taking here?

Yeah, so the states leading this case are California, Colorado, Kentucky, and New Jersey, and they are indeed steering clear of accusations about specific problematic content. Instead, they're going after Meta on two different grounds. The first is that Meta violated consumer protection laws. California's Deputy Attorney General Megan O'Neill, uh, gave opening statements for the states, and she argued that Meta's business model is the problem. And she summed it up in 4 words: hook, hold, harvest, and hide. So the model was to hook teens, to hold their attention, to harvest their data, and then to hide the truth from the public about the risks that they face while being on the platforms. The second accusation from the states is that that Meta violated federal law by gathering personal data about users under 13 without getting their parents' consent. And the state's got to call their first witness yesterday, a man named Arturo Bejar. He used to work on product safety at Meta. He's been a whistleblower, and he pointed to internal studies that he says showed that young people had much higher risks of coming into contact with harmful content than Meta publicly admitted.

So, and have we heard from Meta yet, and what did they say?

Yes, uh, Meta denies the accusations. In court, Meta's lawyer Paul Schmidt said the company was very sensitive to the risks to young people. It studies those risks, it takes them seriously, it has implemented policies to try to mitigate the risks. He noted features like time management tools and parental supervision controls. He also said Meta did not misrepresent those risks to the public and in fact has talked about them openly. And he accused the states of focusing on a tiny number of extreme examples from the billions of user experiences on Meta's platforms.

This case is one of thousands against social media companies. Meta even lost a couple of cases earlier this year. Have the states said something about this wave of litigation?

Yeah, they have. The states appear to feel like there's some momentum building. The attorney general from Colorado, Phil Weiser, spoke to the press after court yesterday, and he made a comparison that some legal experts I've talked to have also made, and I think it speaks to the kind of sweeping impact that the states hope to have.

Just like a generation ago with big tobacco, Meta, like other social media platforms, has engaged in behavior to maximize its profits while harming the public health. With this trial, we're sending an important message: powerful technology companies must follow the law, and if they don't, we will hold them to account.

So he's referring to court cases in the 1990s against cigarette companies that resulted in historic financial penalties, changes to how those companies operate, and —a real shift in the public perception of smoking in America.

So, Jon, what's next?

Well, we can expect to hear more from Arturo Bejar, that whistleblower, today, and we may eventually see Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg called to testify. The attorneys general say they haven't decided if they're going to do that yet. The stakes are certainly high for Meta, though. The AGs are seeking changes to the way its platform works to make them safer for teens and financial penalties that could be in the hundreds of billions of dollars.

That is NPR's Jon Rutsch. Jon, thank you. Thank you. You bet. And let me note here, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, a charity founded by Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Dr. Priscilla Chan, is a financial supporter of NPR. And that's Up First for Wednesday, August 19th. I'm Michelle Martin. And I'm Sasha Pfeiffer.

Today's episode of Up First was edited by Padma Rama, Cara Platoni, Rebecca Metzler, Tina Krya, Mohammed Elbardisi, and Alice Wolfley. It was produced by Ziad Butch and Nia Dumas. Our director is Katie Klein. We get engineering support from Jahinnes, and our technical director is Eowyn Fain. Our supervising producer is Michael Lipkin. Join us again tomorrow.

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Waylon, it seems like everything is being called a recession indicator these days.

Yeah, like the box of Hamburger Helper in my pantry.

Or the new Apple NeoBook.

Or the resurgence of press-on nails, or lipstick, or no lipstick.

I've lost track.

There is only one way to know if these are actual economic warning signs, though. Listen to The Indicator from Planet Money on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.