AMNA NAWAZ: President Trump traveled across the ocean to make trade deals while spending some time at his golf club in Scotland, but he can't seem to escape the growing debate over the Jeffrey Epstein documents back here at home, all while his vice president hits the road to sell the administration's signature legislative achievement.

It's a perfect time for Politics Monday with Tamara Keith of NPR and Jasmine Wright of NOTUS.

Amy Walter is away.

Great to see you both.

Thanks for being here.

TAMARA KEITH, National Public Radio: Good to be here.

JASMINE WRIGHT, NOTUS: Great to see you.

AMNA NAWAZ: So as you saw, President Trump's able to announce this big trade deal, Tam.

It's a huge deal with our largest trading partner, one that's been described as lopsided, asymmetrical in, the U.S.' favor, by many who've looked at the early contours.

So we didn't get 90 deals in 90 days exactly, but you have now deals with the U.K., with the Philippines, Japan, now the E.U.

Is the president's approach here working?

TAMARA KEITH: Well, the president is certainly getting to make a lot of big splashy announcements, and he's able to declare victory.

I think one thing to watch for, though, is many of these deals aren't as fully baked as they seem when he's making the announcement.

There's still a lot of questions underneath about exactly what is being agreed to and whether that might change going forward.

That's certainly been the case with some of the other deals that have been announced.

For instance, with the U.K. deal, which they have literally signed, Trump said that there would be some refining happening on his trip that's under way right now.

So, also, there is this issue that six or whatever number we're up to is not 90.

And there's something like 160 countries that were given tariff numbers on liberation day.

I have asked the White House what happens with those.

Trump has said maybe they get 15 to 20 percent tariffs.

The baseline here is, whatever it is, these tariffs are going to be higher than they were when he took office, and I don't think that we have seen the economic impact yet.

AMNA NAWAZ: Jas, how do you look at this?

And, also, how do the American people look at this?

Is this promises made, promises kept, or are they waiting to see?

JASMINE WRIGHT: I think, if you are a Trump supporter, it is promises made, promises kept.

So I think that it is gratifying.

They feel that he is doing exactly what he said and that what he said is working.

Obviously, we haven't seen this enormous downturn of the economy, which I think a lot of economists projected would happen by now.

Of course, to your point.

We don't necessarily know if the full effect of the tariffs have kicked in.

We were actually doing a review at NOTUS.

And we found that of the U.S.' 15 largest trading partners, we only have a deal right now with eight.

And that does not include Mexico, and that does not include Canada, two huge partners.

With Mexico, we asked the White House official what happens if they don't get a deal by Friday.

Again, the clock is ticking.

They said that USMCA, that original trade deal that he negotiated back in his first term, that would kick in and protect a lot of goods from tariffs.

But, still, there are a lot of questions.

And, of course, you're getting really close to that deadline.

And even though Donald Trump says that those letters are deals, they're not necessarily deals.

AMNA NAWAZ: A deadline, we should underscore, that he set himself and could move again.

Meanwhile, we saw the president continue to face questions about their failure so far to release any of the documents related to the late Jeffrey Epstein after senior members of administration pledged to do so.

He was asked about it today.

Here's a look at just some of what he said about the files and about potentially pardoning Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell.

DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: Well, I haven't been overly interested in it.

It's something - - it's a hoax that's been built up way beyond proportion.

I can say this.

Those files were run by the worst scum on earth.

They ran the files.

I was running against somebody that ran the files.

If they had something, they would have released.

Now, they can easily put something in the files that's a phony.

Pardon for who?

QUESTION: Ghislaine Maxwell.

DONALD TRUMP: Well, I'm allowed to give her a pardon, but nobody's approached me with it.

Nobody's asked me about it.

It's in the news about that, that aspect of it.

But, right now, it would be inappropriate to talk about it.

So... AMNA NAWAZ: Tam, what do you make of the president's responses?

TAMARA KEITH: Right.

And she is currently appealing her conviction to the U.S. Supreme Court.

So this all comes in that context.

President Trump, he is not making this go away.

The words that he said today are not going to quiet this down.

He has a problem.

This isn't just Democrats.

This isn't just the media.

This is the very people who helped him get elected are still raising concerns, saying that he's gaslighting them.

And so that is a very real issue.

And the things that he said today, like, I don't know -- it just raises more questions.

And saying that you won't pardon a convicted sex offender or sex trafficker, that seems like it would be an easy thing to do.

And he has had a couple of occasions where he just hasn't gone that far.

AMNA NAWAZ: Jasmine, know how you're looking at it.

JASMINE WRIGHT: Yes, the allies that I have talked to are kind of confused why he won't just say, no, I will not pardon her.

They hope that she doesn't end up with a pardon, of course.

But I think it's this constant drip, drip, drip that leads a lot of people who support him and who want to see these files come out say that there's not a lot of transparency around it.

And that's what their issue is.

Of course, this is a huge, a very serious issue dealing with child sex abuse and all of these things.

But it also comes back to whether or not the White House and the Department of Justice is being transparent or whether or not they oversold what they could actually deliver.

And so I think that people are going to continue to ask questions.

And it's going to come not just the rest of the summer, but also when Congress comes back in September.

It's going to be an issue again that the White House just can't get their hands around.

AMNA NAWAZ: Meanwhile, Vice President J.D.

Vance is hundreds of miles away from all of this.

He's in his home state of Ohio to sell the passage of that One Big Beautiful Bill.

We haven't really had a chance to check in with his role six months into this second Trump administration.

He went from Trump critic to a loyal MAGA warrior.

Tam, in an administration full of eager people to please the president, is he still the heir apparent?

TAMARA KEITH: President Trump has left that open.

He definitely has not crowned an heir apparent.

And I will note that Ohio is not a critical swing state.

It hasn't been a critical swing state in presidential elections since 2004, though certainly many candidates have campaigned there, thinking that it could go Democratic.

And it hasn't.

It's gone Republican every time.

He has really shrunk as vice president.

And really, that's kind of the role of a vice president.

He's been pretty invisible.

But I will note that he is one of the only people out there selling the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill that actually really does need to be sold to the American people because it's underwater.

AMNA NAWAZ: Yes, the polling on that has not been so great.

Jasmine, how are you looking at Vice President Vance?

JASMINE WRIGHT: Yes, I actually look at it from the lens of the former vice president.

I remember, her first six months, Kamala Harris, the office was inundated with questions from reporters and other people about, what is on her portfolio.

What is she doing?

What tasks are Biden giving her?

And I just don't think that you see the same type of questions about J.D.

Vance, at least from reporters that I talked to.

But I do think what you're seeing him doing is not just ingratiating himself with the White House.

He's always in the Oval Office, they say.

He's always talking to various top officials, working his way through the strategy of what the White House is doing, but also ingratiating himself with the MAGA allies, explaining to them what Donald Trump is doing, what he's thinking, and hitting against critics, and then, of course, making sure that he is invaluable on the Hill as he convinces people to vote for Donald Trump's legislation.

So I think that the questions about what he's doing may not be there, but he is doing things, not just in Ohio, but certainly on Congress and in the White House.

AMNA NAWAZ: Thirty seconds left.

Is he the heir apparent or still too early to tell?

JASMINE WRIGHT: I will leave that to Donald Trump, but I think that it's going to be clear that he's probably going to have a primary.

I mean, it's three years, but he probably will have a primary.

The question is, does he win that?

TAMARA KEITH: Well, and Marco Rubio, the secretary of state and national security adviser, is also spending a whole lot of time with the president.

AMNA NAWAZ: He might have something to say.

Jasmine Wright and Tamara Keith, great to see you both.

Thank you so much.

TAMARA KEITH: You're welcome.

JASMINE WRIGHT: Thank you.