Latest / INSIGHT TODAY / Polls open in critical Michigan Senate primary

Transcript

Polls open in critical Michigan Senate primary · INSIGHT TODAY

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Let's bring in ms NOW reporter Nam the Iguan Wu,
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: who is on the ground in Birmingham, Michigan. John Della
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Volpe ms NOW, political contributor and director of polling the
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Harvard Kennedy Schools Institute of Politics. Also with us is
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: our friend Craig Mager, state politics reporter with the Detroit News,
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: and Adrian L. Rod, former senior advisor to the Harris campaign.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: Appreciate you all.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Joining us on this big day. Suddenly Michigan has become
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: the place where everybody around the country is looking at
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: and I think for good reason, but Nom that you've
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: been on the ground for a long time now in Michigan.
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: Here in the day's leading up to the primary. What
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: are you hearing from voters and pulling aside for a moment,
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: What are the issues that you keep hearing from folks
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: bring up?
• 0:43
  Speaker 3: You know what, Ron, It's been interesting. I feel like
• 0:46
  Speaker 3: today we're finally hearing what issues have landed with voters
• 0:50
  Speaker 3: after all of the advertisement, all of the campaign remarks,
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: what people are actually remembering as a cast ballot. I'm
• 0:55
  Speaker 3: in Oakland County right now, birminghamp Specifically, this is an
• 0:58
  Speaker 3: area that you would expect Haley Stevens to do relatively well.
• 1:02
  Speaker 3: One it's because it's her district, but two because this
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: is a bit more of a moderate area in the
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: state that's traditionally favored Democrats and years ago was more Republican.
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: That being said, when I talk to people about the
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: reason they are backing Hailey Stephens, what I'm hearing is electability,
• 1:15
  Speaker 3: a belief that she would do better against Mike Rogers
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: in a general election, which you know polling casts adjusted
• 1:20
  Speaker 3: as well. When I talk to people who aren't supporting her,
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: the one issue that seemed to be the most salient,
• 1:26
  Speaker 3: the most elicit, the most passion from people certainly was
• 1:30
  Speaker 3: her stance on Israel and her support for tax payer
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: dollars continuing to be used to support the is raerely military.
• 1:36
  Speaker 3: I want to play you portions of my conversations with
• 1:38
  Speaker 3: voters here today, and I'll start with that point. Specifically,
• 1:41
  Speaker 3: this is what a voter had to say when she
• 1:43
  Speaker 3: learned that Hailey Stevens rather relative to Abdul say, yeah,
• 1:48
  Speaker 3: it supports us support for Israel. Take a listen.
• 1:53
  Speaker 4: I just wouldn't want a single of our family's tax
• 1:57
  Speaker 4: paying dollars to go towards something like that, it's like
• 2:01
  Speaker 4: giving money to violence.
• 2:04
  Speaker 3: So would you support a Senate candidate, in this case,
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: Hayley Stevens, who's more of a but more of a
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: moderate like you tend to like. But would that be enough?
• 2:12
  Speaker 4: Well, definitely, that would definitely turn me off as a
• 2:16
  Speaker 4: hundred percent I couldn't. I couldn't. I would vote for
• 2:20
  Speaker 4: a communist.
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: First, I thought that Stevens has a better chance of
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: winning in the general election. I like her. I've voted
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: for her when she ran for Congress. I think elseihead
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: has some very good policies that I do support. I
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: think it might be sad to say I think that
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: the fact that he uses the term democratic socialism may
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: be a negative factor. Not that I'm opposed to that.
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: I just think that that scares people away some.
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: People, So what's interesting. I also spoke to a Republican
• 3:03
  Speaker 3: voter and I asked her who would you prefer, Mike
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: Rogers' face off against Hayley Stevens or Abdul Elsayad. She
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: said quickly, Abdul Lsaiyad. And it's because of what you
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: kind of heard from that last voter. Despite his best
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: efforts to shake the perception that he's a democratic socialist.
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: He has said again and again he supports capitalism, He's
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: just a progressive. Voters here seem to still have that perception,
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: and it's certainly influencing the way they're voting today.
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: Craig An ms NOW analysis of federal campaign finance record
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: shows more than fifty seven million dollars in outside spending
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: aim debt shaping the outcome of this Michigan race, including
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: thirty four million supporting Stevens and twenty million opposing el
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: Saad and then three point five million supporting Elsaiad. I
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: have followed your work for years now, Craig, and have
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: used it as a gut check. And for folks that
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: are not living in Michigan, what should they understand about
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: what the outcome of this race says? And if Alsaiad
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: does overcome that kind of spending gap, it.
• 4:00
  Speaker 5: Will be a historic win. If Elsa does take this
• 4:03
  Speaker 5: race today one because of the level of spending, we
• 4:06
  Speaker 5: have not really seen in recent times a competitive race
• 4:10
  Speaker 5: like this that has had such a difference in terms
• 4:12
  Speaker 5: of the amount of money flowing to the two different candidates.
• 4:17
  Speaker 5: That figure, you know, sixty million dollars in outside spending
• 4:20
  Speaker 5: benefiting Hayley Stevens is so significant, so large, and voters
• 4:24
  Speaker 5: have picked up on it. The money in this race
• 4:27
  Speaker 5: is one of the things you hear when you talk
• 4:29
  Speaker 5: to people out on the street about it over and
• 4:32
  Speaker 5: over again. I was just in downtown Lansing talking to
• 4:35
  Speaker 5: some voters, and a seventy two year old woman named
• 4:37
  Speaker 5: Janet Taylor told me the reason she wanted to go
• 4:39
  Speaker 5: out on a vote was to get the clowns out
• 4:41
  Speaker 5: of Washington. I think that tells you that there's a
• 4:44
  Speaker 5: little bit of that vibe of a change election, and
• 4:47
  Speaker 5: if that is what is driving people to the polls,
• 4:49
  Speaker 5: that probably benefits. Abdul El said.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: John to Craig's point, there's kind of this weird dynamic
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: here when it comes outside money. How galvanizing when it
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: comes to polling of an issue. Is outside money for
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: a campaign it's Pro Israel group APAX thirty million dollars
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: helping stevens candidacy or is it a vulnerability because we
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: have seen outside repeatedly use it as a message that
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: he cannot be bought and beholden by outside influence.
• 5:16
  Speaker 6: It feels wrong, like there's a backlash to it, and
• 5:18
  Speaker 6: it's I would argue that it's hurting more than helping
• 5:21
  Speaker 6: and really kind of a fuel behind Outside's campaign wrapped
• 5:27
  Speaker 6: around obviously his economic populism. What we're seeing, I think
• 5:30
  Speaker 6: within the Democratic Party is a generational realignment. And when
• 5:35
  Speaker 6: you look inside the polling numbers, this is not just
• 5:39
  Speaker 6: a kind of a youth focused campaign by Elsa that
• 5:42
  Speaker 6: he's leading by forty two points according to the Emerson
• 5:46
  Speaker 6: College Pool among voters in the twenties, thirties, forties, all
• 5:50
  Speaker 6: the way up to age fifty. He's actually leading by
• 5:53
  Speaker 6: double digits among Democratic primary voters in their fifties as well.
• 5:58
  Speaker 6: So what we're seeing is I think the lashed to
• 6:00
  Speaker 6: corporate money. His message is quite clear kind of in
• 6:03
  Speaker 6: that regard, and I think that is really what's feeling
• 6:06
  Speaker 6: his economic populism in the campaign right now.
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: And Adrian Democrats will need to unite behind whoever wins
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: today's primary. Mike Rodgers lost by just about twenty thousand
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: votes when he ran in twenty twenty four. Yesterday, Hailey
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: Stevens told them as now that despite how contentious this
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: race has become, she expected whoever lost to endorse the winner.
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: Depending on who wins, how do the different Democratic Party
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: factions come together for the general And in twenty sixteen,
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: Bernie Sanders outperformed Hillary Clinton in the twenty sixteen Democratic
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: presidential primary. As someone who was working for Hillary Clinton
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: at the time, did you see the results? You know,
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: what was it now twelve years ago? As an early
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: sign of this growing tension in the Democratic Party. And
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: can these two factions in the year of twenty twenty
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: six effectively fuse themselves together to win a competitive Purple
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: seat outside had we're to win tonight?
• 7:03
  Speaker 7: Yeah, Vaughon, I light the way you tee that up,
• 7:04
  Speaker 7: because here's the bottom line. I was on Hillary Clinton's
• 7:07
  Speaker 7: campaign in twenty sixteen. We certainly started off that campaign
• 7:10
  Speaker 7: thinking either Martin O'Malley, the former governor of Maryland, was
• 7:13
  Speaker 7: going to be our strongest opponent. Obviously that was not
• 7:16
  Speaker 7: the case. Bernie Sanders, you know, certainly had a movement
• 7:19
  Speaker 7: behind him, and that movement is now transitioning into some
• 7:23
  Speaker 7: of these DSA candidates. I think to an extent, Vaughn,
• 7:26
  Speaker 7: we've sort of been putting a band aid on not
• 7:29
  Speaker 7: this problem, but this scenario where you know, you've seen
• 7:33
  Speaker 7: this emergent part of the electorate that is frustrated with affordability,
• 7:38
  Speaker 7: frustrated with establishment candidates, feels that they've been putting faith in,
• 7:42
  Speaker 7: whether it's an incumbent or somebody who tax some word
• 7:45
  Speaker 7: to the middle, and they have not been getting in
• 7:47
  Speaker 7: seeing the results.
• 7:48
  Speaker 5: That they want.
• 7:48
  Speaker 7: Now that being said, I still think that Hailey Stevens
• 7:51
  Speaker 7: in Michigan has a very strong chance of winning tonight,
• 7:54
  Speaker 7: especially if the coalition she's put together turns out Black
• 7:58
  Speaker 7: women are staunchly behind her. And you cover campaigns for
• 8:01
  Speaker 7: a long time, you know that black women are the
• 8:03
  Speaker 7: strongest voting block of the Democratic Party and they are
• 8:07
  Speaker 7: largely behind her. So if we see high black turnout
• 8:10
  Speaker 7: in Detroit and some of these more urban areas of Michigan,
• 8:14
  Speaker 7: I think Hayley's got a strong shot. But look, the
• 8:16
  Speaker 7: bottom line is this, I think Democrats are going to
• 8:19
  Speaker 7: have to grapple the establishment. Democratic Party rather will have
• 8:22
  Speaker 7: to grapple with how to handle some of these DSA candidates.
• 8:25
  Speaker 7: Some are more I think tacking, you know, more to
• 8:29
  Speaker 7: the middle, as you know LSI ed said he is
• 8:32
  Speaker 7: a capitalist than some of the others. But ultimately there
• 8:35
  Speaker 7: is a strong aspect of the DSA platform that the
• 8:38
  Speaker 7: Democratic Party just does not support, like abolishing the Senate,
• 8:43
  Speaker 7: you know, abolishing the military, whatever things that they've said
• 8:45
  Speaker 7: in their platform. So this is, I think, regardless of
• 8:48
  Speaker 7: the outcome tonight, going to be a huge proxy issue
• 8:52
  Speaker 7: that Democrats are going to have to focus on in
• 8:54
  Speaker 7: twenty eight.
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: I appreciate the conversation. I know, especially tomorrow will have
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: that potential follow up that if als I had were
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: to win tonight, this would be really the first time
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: we've seen a progressive of the Bernie sanders ilk run
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: in a competitive Senate seed or even House seed. And
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: the question here is in the year of twenty twenty six,
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: I think as to what extent can they put up
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: a fight against somebody who has tried to position himself
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: as more of a moderate Republican here in the Trump area.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: Non the Iguana, John Della Volpe, Craig Mauger, and Adrian Elrod,
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: we appreciate you all.