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“The 750 Dollar Man.” · Pod Save America

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: I do feel that Vice President Biden and Senator Harris
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: are the best choice to lead our country, and I
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: am endorsing them to become president and vice president of
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: our United States. In my opinion, you are a certified badass.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: I'm honored and thank you for that. That's a huge compliment.
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: I think you're welcome.
• 0:36
  Speaker 3: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:38
  Speaker 4: I'm Jon Levitt. I'm Tommy Vitor.
• 0:39
  Speaker 3: And that was Vote Save America founder Dwayne The Rock Johnson.
• 0:46
  Speaker 3: who endorsed Joe Biden and Kamala Harris over the weekend
• 0:49
  Speaker 3: and then linked to Vote Save America.
• 0:51
  Speaker 4: The more important endorsement.
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: Which was a surprise to all of us.
• 0:53
  Speaker 4: What an endorsement. Yeah, cool boss. That's the endorsement I
• 0:56
  Speaker 4: cared about.
• 0:57
  Speaker 3: It was Michael Martinez's best day, I think, at Crooked Media,
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: our fearless producer who's a big fan of The Rock.
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: Not just endorsed Joe Biden, came off the sidelines as
• 1:07
  Speaker 3: a longtime independent, but also... is now the founder of
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: Vote Save America, as it says on his Instagram page.
• 1:12
  Speaker 5: And shout out to the tensile strength of the fabric
• 1:14
  Speaker 5: of that sweater.
• 1:15
  Speaker 4: Yeah, no kidding.
• 1:17
  Speaker 5: My God, they could hold up a suspension bridge.
• 1:21
  Speaker 3: On today's pod, I talked to Obama campaign manager David
• 1:23
  Speaker 3: Plouffe about the state of the race and what it's
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: like to prep a candidate for presidential debate. Before that,
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: we'll talk about Donald Trump's nomination of Judge Amy Coney
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: Barrett to the Supreme Court, the New York Times investigation
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: into Trump's taxes, and what Joe Biden needs to get
• 1:36
  Speaker 3: out of tomorrow night's debate.
• 1:38
  Speaker 4: Hey, I just want.
• 1:41
  Speaker 5: To say congrats to both of you, both on the
• 1:43
  Speaker 5: Patriots' victory and the fact that the charges against Bob
• 1:45
  Speaker 5: Kraft were dropped.
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Oh, you really?
• 1:52
  Speaker 3: Workshopping that one, huh? You waited for that.
• 1:55
  Speaker 5: No, I just didn't want to say it when the
• 1:56
  Speaker 5: mics weren't on. I thought of it moments ago. I
• 1:59
  Speaker 5: could have said it right then. I saved it for
• 2:01
  Speaker 5: a second.
• 2:03
  Speaker 3: You went on the Bob Kraft beat.
• 2:07
  Speaker 5: Speaking of the Bob Craft beat, his charges were dropped.
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: Speaking of debates, let's do speaking of debates. There's no
• 2:17
  Speaker 3: better place to watch the debate than on crooked.com slash debate,
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: where a bunch of us from Crooked Media will be
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: doing live commentary on our group thread. Again, that's going
• 2:25
  Speaker 3: to be Tuesday, September 29th at 9 p.m. Eastern, 6 p.m.
• 2:29
  Speaker 3: Pacific at crooked.com slash debate. So come hang out with us.
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: Love it. You had a show this weekend.
• 2:34
  Speaker 4: How was it? We had a great Love It or
• 2:37
  Speaker 4: Leave It. Check it out. I plug it every week.
• 2:44
  Speaker 5: I know that not many of you are doing what
• 2:46
  Speaker 5: this plug asks at this point, so why bother?
• 2:49
  Speaker 4: You should check it out. It's your loss. It's doing
• 2:52
  Speaker 4: great without you.
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: I like that. That was a good pitch. Go listen.
• 2:55
  Speaker 3: Go listen, everyone.
• 2:56
  Speaker 4: Tara Brown was on. It was fantastic. It's a very
• 2:58
  Speaker 4: funny episode. Check it out. Excellent.
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: All right, let's get to the news. With just 36
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: days to go in an election that's taking place in
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: the midst of a deadly pandemic, Donald Trump has nominated
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: a Supreme Court justice who has written that the Affordable
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: Care Act is unconstitutional. If confirmed, Amy Coney Barrett would
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: be the court's youngest justice at only 48 years old.
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: She's been a judge for just three years on the
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: Seventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Before Trump appointed her
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: in 2017, she was a full-time professor at Notre Dame
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: Law School where she developed an extremely conservative judicial philosophy.
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: Here's what she said about that in the Rose Garden
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: on Saturday.
• 3:32
  Speaker 6: I clerked for Justice Scalia more than 20 years ago,
• 3:35
  Speaker 6: but the lessons I learned still resonate. His judicial philosophy
• 3:41
  Speaker 6: is mine, too. A judge must apply the law as written.
• 3:46
  Speaker 6: Judges are not policymakers, and they must be resolute in
• 3:51
  Speaker 6: setting aside any policy views they might hold.
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: Her judicial philosophy is Justice Scalia's. That sort of spells
• 3:58
  Speaker 3: it out, doesn't it?
• 3:59
  Speaker 4: Yeah, not great.
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: I want to talk about Barrett and the nomination fight,
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: but I just want to talk quickly about the other
• 4:06
  Speaker 3: serious candidate under consideration was Barbara Lagoa, who serves on
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. Lagoa is from Florida.
• 4:14
  Speaker 3: She's Cuban-American. She won a lot more Democratic votes during
• 4:17
  Speaker 3: her circuit court confirmation. She has a less controversial record.
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: She hasn't been openly hostile to universal health care during
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: a pandemic. Lagoa, why do you think Trump didn't choose her?
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: What does it say about the Trump campaign that they
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: didn't actually go with what may have been the more
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: electorally palatable choice?
• 4:35
  Speaker 5: I think that there's been a dirty deal at the
• 4:37
  Speaker 5: core of conservative intellectual support for Donald Trump from the
• 4:42
  Speaker 5: very beginning, including from people like Mitch McConnell and serious
• 4:48
  Speaker 5: adjacent conservatives, or what they call serious conservatives. And they've
• 4:52
  Speaker 5: wanted Amy Coney Barrett from the beginning. She is an
• 4:55
  Speaker 5: exemplar of their right-wing judicial philosophy. She is putting someone
• 5:02
  Speaker 5: like her on the court is what makes Donald Trump
• 5:04
  Speaker 5: worth it. And Donald Trump knows that because he knows
• 5:06
  Speaker 5: it's transactional for them and it's transactional for him.
• 5:10
  Speaker 4: I like that he didn't like that she had ties
• 5:11
  Speaker 4: to Jeb Bush. I just think that- That was my
• 5:13
  Speaker 4: favorite part. I just think that the grievance running through
• 5:16
  Speaker 4: this whole narrative is really, it's just a treat for
• 5:18
  Speaker 4: all of us. What do you think a conversation between
• 5:21
  Speaker 4: Donald Trump and a potential Supreme Court justice is like?
• 5:25
  Speaker 4: What- superficial level of the law does he know to
• 5:30
  Speaker 4: ask about? Is it just about cases about him before
• 5:33
  Speaker 4: the court, do we think?
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: Well, this is what's funny about... So the CNN has
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: a great TikTok on why he didn't choose Lagoa and
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: why he chose Barrett. And it's so funny that it's
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: for both the reasons Lovett mentioned and the reason Tommy mentioned,
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: which is classic Trump. There's a dirty deal that he
• 5:49
  Speaker 3: made with conservatives and there's political considerations. And then there's
• 5:52
  Speaker 3: just the very personal oh jeb nominated her so i
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: don't like her anymore but it was funny tommy that
• 5:58
  Speaker 3: in the cnn tiktok they they mentioned that they basically
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: were trying their best to prevent trump from eating even
• 6:05
  Speaker 3: meeting lagoa they didn't want to meet her because they
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: were afraid he would get too excited that she would
• 6:10
  Speaker 3: like bring in a cuban voter he would say something
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: crazy to her you know like they don't want him
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: meeting with these.
• 6:15
  Speaker 4: People can't even have a conversation who knows what he'll
• 6:18
  Speaker 4: say he's too stupid So.
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: Let's talk about how both parties are approaching this nomination fight.
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: Trump and Republican senators and MAGA pundits have already concocted
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: an alternative reality where Barrett is being persecuted by Democrats
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: because she's Catholic, a religion shared by the Democratic nominee
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: for president, the Democratic speaker of the House, the chairman
• 6:36
  Speaker 3: of the Democratic National Committee, and a Supreme Court justice
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: appointed by the last Democratic president. Tommy, why are Republicans
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: doing this? And aside from the reasons I just mentioned, like,
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: why is it such an absurd accusation?
• 6:48
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 6:48
  Speaker 4: I mean, on the absurdity question. So Joe Biden is Catholic.
• 6:51
  Speaker 4: He would be the second Catholic US president after JFK.
• 6:54
  Speaker 4: If Barrett is confirmed, the Supreme Court will have six
• 6:56
  Speaker 4: Catholics out of nine people. 30% of Congress is Catholic.
• 7:00
  Speaker 4: The suggestion that somehow Catholics are an aggrieved party in
• 7:04
  Speaker 4: this country is so completely ludicrous. It stems from this
• 7:08
  Speaker 4: moment in the 2017 confirmation hearing with DiFi, which she
• 7:11
  Speaker 4: said something that was kind of dumb. But what's clear
• 7:14
  Speaker 4: is they don't want to talk about the ways that
• 7:17
  Speaker 4: she would rule. They don't want to talk about getting
• 7:20
  Speaker 4: rid of the Affordable Care Act a week after the
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: election in the middle of a pandemic. And so they
• 7:25
  Speaker 4: do what they always do, which is try to create
• 7:28
  Speaker 4: these sideshows. You have clowns like Hugh Hewitt saying that
• 7:32
  Speaker 4: all progressives hate all Catholics and making these, you know,
• 7:36
  Speaker 4: absurd blanket statements based on some tweet they saw that
• 7:41
  Speaker 4: offended them. And it's, you know, it's actually kind of
• 7:43
  Speaker 4: laughable this time around. Look, I'm a self-hating Catholic, but,
• 7:49
  Speaker 4: you know, not all of us are. I mean, it's
• 7:50
  Speaker 4: just it is like completely ridiculous for them to be
• 7:54
  Speaker 4: talking about her being persecuted because of her religion somehow.
• 7:58
  Speaker 4: And Democrats hate religion, all this kind of stuff. The
• 8:01
  Speaker 4: president of the United States banned immigration from predominantly Muslim countries,
• 8:06
  Speaker 4: and they are all behind him 100 percent.
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: Lava, what do you think about the whole Catholic controversy?
• 8:12
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I would just add to it that they think
• 8:14
  Speaker 5: that there is a kind of pool of maybe moderate
• 8:17
  Speaker 5: or gettable Catholic voters out there. So it's sort of
• 8:19
  Speaker 5: a two for one thing, right? You can get the
• 8:22
  Speaker 5: conversation away from the radicalism of her actual judicial philosophy
• 8:27
  Speaker 5: and get it onto ground.
• 8:27
  Speaker 4: They feel more comfortable debating.
• 8:30
  Speaker 5: And you can maybe kind of make some kind of
• 8:32
  Speaker 5: appeal to these people that I just find hard to
• 8:35
  Speaker 5: believe will work because It's so ludicrous.
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: So, yeah, like they are trying to say that the
• 8:40
  Speaker 3: left hates Catholics because the left doesn't want to criminalize abortion.
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: But the right doesn't agree with the Catholic Church and
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: especially this pope on immigration, on climate change, on health care,
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: on poverty. Donald Trump called this pope disgraceful. So it's
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: not actually about being offended by anti-Catholic bigotry. It's about
• 8:58
  Speaker 3: the fact that Joe Biden is winning over more white
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: working class Catholics than Hillary did. It is like a
• 9:03
  Speaker 3: completely cynical play for a group of voters that they're losing.
• 9:06
  Speaker 5: Well, there's a connection too, I think, between the manufactured
• 9:11
  Speaker 5: grievance around an attack on Catholicism when the court will
• 9:15
  Speaker 5: have six Catholics on it, if this person is confirmed,
• 9:18
  Speaker 5: in the same way that they claim that there's been
• 9:20
  Speaker 5: this great, you know, scorched earth campaign to prevent conservative
• 9:26
  Speaker 5: judges from reaching the bench when they're about to achieve
• 9:28
  Speaker 5: a 6-3 majority. Their whole mode of running these kinds
• 9:31
  Speaker 5: of campaigns is is rooted in grievance and rooted in
• 9:34
  Speaker 5: the fact that, oh, liberals are running roughshod all over them,
• 9:36
  Speaker 5: but it doesn't work as well when they're winning. It
• 9:38
  Speaker 5: doesn't work as well when they've successfully been able to
• 9:42
  Speaker 5: remake the courts, when there's no reality to the accusation,
• 9:45
  Speaker 5: whether it's around attacks on conservative judges generally or this
• 9:48
  Speaker 5: ridiculous Catholic conspiracy, basically conspiracy.
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: I also think it's very easy for Democrats to avoid
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: falling into this trap because there's no views that Barrett
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: holds that because she's Catholic that are different than views
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: that a normal conservative would have who isn't Catholic, right?
• 10:02
  Speaker 3: Like there is no need to talk about her religion.
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: She's just a right wing. She believes in a right
• 10:07
  Speaker 3: wing judicial philosophy. That's all you need to know, you know?
• 10:10
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 10:10
  Speaker 5: It's not, it's not, it's not a well hidden trap.
• 10:14
  Speaker 5: It's not, there's not a lot, there's not grass over
• 10:16
  Speaker 5: the hole. Just walk around it.
• 10:18
  Speaker 4: Dianne Feinstein said at this 2017 confirmation hearing, like the
• 10:21
  Speaker 4: dogma lives loudly within you. And she was referring to
• 10:24
  Speaker 4: an article Barrett wrote in 98 that said something like
• 10:27
  Speaker 4: the duty of judges, something about a duty of judges
• 10:30
  Speaker 4: to put their faith above the law and potentially recuse
• 10:33
  Speaker 4: themselves in cases around the death penalty, et cetera, et cetera.
• 10:37
  Speaker 4: But she has not actually lived up to that suggestion.
• 10:41
  Speaker 4: She has repeatedly ruled on death penalty cases. So it
• 10:44
  Speaker 4: sort of undercuts the entire argument. All that said, yeah,
• 10:48
  Speaker 4: this is just a sideshow. They just don't want to
• 10:49
  Speaker 4: talk about the ACA. They don't want to talk about
• 10:51
  Speaker 4: her overturning Roe versus Wade. There's a whole bunch of
• 10:54
  Speaker 4: really unpopular positions she will undoubtedly take if she is confirmed.
• 10:59
  Speaker 3: I will say I'm a little surprised that it doesn't
• 11:01
  Speaker 3: seem Republicans understand at all the political danger. that they're
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: in here in having a nominee that is so openly
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: hostile to both the Affordable Care Act and Roe. I mean,
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: Senator Mike Lee said over the weekend, the fact that
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: Congress chose to enact an unconstitutional law shouldn't tarnish Judge
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: Barrett in this. And Donald Trump himself tweeted, Obamacare will
• 11:20
  Speaker 3: be replaced with a much better, far cheaper alternative if
• 11:23
  Speaker 3: it is terminated in the Supreme Court. So saying that
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: it might actually be terminated with her on the court. Why, Lovett,
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: why doesn't this, why don't they seem to think this
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: will hurt them? Or do they just not care about
• 11:32
  Speaker 3: the politics?
• 11:33
  Speaker 5: Yeah, there's also been a few conservatives who have tried
• 11:36
  Speaker 5: to say, don't worry, she won't actually, this case isn't
• 11:39
  Speaker 5: going to happen.
• 11:39
  Speaker 4: It's not going to happen. Don't worry.
• 11:41
  Speaker 5: They won't actually overturn the ACA. So I think some
• 11:43
  Speaker 5: do recognize the pitfalls in this. You know, it's really
• 11:50
  Speaker 5: hard to say. I think that there are different equities
• 11:53
  Speaker 5: in this. I think Senate Republicans have a different set
• 11:56
  Speaker 5: of goals than Donald Trump. I think they believe in
• 12:00
  Speaker 5: her philosophy. They want someone like that on the court.
• 12:03
  Speaker 5: It feels sometimes in this past couple of days that
• 12:05
  Speaker 5: we're watching like the Senate Republicans and Mitch McConnell is
• 12:08
  Speaker 5: like an old gang getting together for one last heist,
• 12:11
  Speaker 5: just one last time while the walls close in. You know,
• 12:13
  Speaker 5: they probably wouldn't have done it otherwise, but the score
• 12:14
  Speaker 5: was so big they couldn't walk away. So, you know,
• 12:18
  Speaker 5: I think they just they're pushing their chips forward and
• 12:21
  Speaker 5: want to go out as legends, you know.
• 12:23
  Speaker 4: I just think like this is what they do on
• 12:24
  Speaker 4: almost everything, right? I mean, they talk about discrimination against
• 12:27
  Speaker 4: white people. It's all about grievance, right? There's always a
• 12:30
  Speaker 4: group that's in power and they try to act aggrieved
• 12:33
  Speaker 4: as part of their political strategy, which is just to
• 12:36
  Speaker 4: rally the base, sort of invoke this tribalist partisan sentiment
• 12:41
  Speaker 4: and try to own the lips. I mean, they want
• 12:43
  Speaker 4: to make it about those things. They want to make
• 12:44
  Speaker 4: it about defeating Democrats and partisan advantage and not about
• 12:48
  Speaker 4: the issues that ever come before the court. I mean,
• 12:50
  Speaker 4: that's sort of like the whole the whole play here.
• 12:52
  Speaker 4: And I think it was for Kavanaugh too and many
• 12:55
  Speaker 4: others before him.
• 12:57
  Speaker 3: I will say I'm very proud so far of the
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: Democrats for really keeping this on the message of the
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: Affordable Care Act. And I think that's going to be
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: the main challenge in the hearings because they're going to
• 13:07
  Speaker 3: want to, like you said, Tommy, they're going to want
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: to make it about grievance and we just have to
• 13:10
  Speaker 3: hammer ACA for the next four weeks, which again, closing
• 13:14
  Speaker 3: out the last couple of weeks of this election is,
• 13:17
  Speaker 3: about making it about Trump and Republicans wanting to overturn
• 13:21
  Speaker 3: the Affordable Care Act in the middle of the pandemic.
• 13:23
  Speaker 3: I can't think of a topic I'd rather talk about
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: for the last couple of weeks of the election.
• 13:27
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I also think, John, to go to your question too,
• 13:30
  Speaker 5: they know that they have a pool of very dedicated
• 13:33
  Speaker 5: voters who vote on these issues. And they are counting
• 13:36
  Speaker 5: on the fact that enthusiasm amongst a minority that supports
• 13:39
  Speaker 5: overturning Roe, that supports a right-wing judiciary, will surmount the
• 13:44
  Speaker 5: losses that come from people worried about Roe, worried about
• 13:46
  Speaker 5: the Affordable Care Act, fundamentally at odds with a court
• 13:49
  Speaker 5: that is so far to the right.
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: So we're going to talk all about the debates in
• 13:52
  Speaker 3: a minute, but one of the issues that will almost
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: certainly come up is today's New York Times report that
• 13:56
  Speaker 3: Donald Trump only paid $ 750 in federal income taxes in
• 14:01
  Speaker 3: 2016 and 2017, and no federal income taxes at all
• 14:05
  Speaker 3: in 10 of the past 15 years. The piece says
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: that Trump has avoided all these taxes because his businesses
• 14:09
  Speaker 3: reported losing more money than they made. which also means
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: that Trump will have to pay back hundreds of millions
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: of dollars in loans over the next few years. As
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: the Times wrote, quote, ultimately, Mr. Trump has been more
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: successful playing a business mogul than being one in real life. Tommy,
• 14:24
  Speaker 3: reactions to the story? Any other financial malfeasance I missed there?
• 14:27
  Speaker 4: So much of it. Such a long story. My reaction
• 14:31
  Speaker 4: is positive. multi-part and probably contradictory. I mean, in some ways,
• 14:35
  Speaker 4: we knew a lot of this. We've seen previous glimpses
• 14:38
  Speaker 4: into his financial life that showed the entire persona as
• 14:41
  Speaker 4: a successful businessman is just made up. He inherited a
• 14:44
  Speaker 4: ton of money from his dad. He squandered it. And
• 14:47
  Speaker 4: then whenever he lucked upon a business idea that did
• 14:50
  Speaker 4: make him money, like Trump Tower or The Apprentice, he
• 14:53
  Speaker 4: squandered that by investing all the profits in stupid things
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: that lost money, like a dozen golf courses or whatever.
• 15:00
  Speaker 4: So it shows his brazen public corruption, which is shocking,
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: but not surprising, I guess. And it also explains that
• 15:07
  Speaker 4: like failing to divest his businesses to, you know, steering
• 15:11
  Speaker 4: government business to like his golf courses all the time,
• 15:14
  Speaker 4: like trying to get the G7 there, for example, was
• 15:17
  Speaker 4: born not just of his ego, but also desperation. Like
• 15:21
  Speaker 4: he knows that the US government could foreclose on him
• 15:23
  Speaker 4: if he's not able to pay these debts. And so,
• 15:25
  Speaker 4: you know, the other piece of it that just drove
• 15:27
  Speaker 4: me crazy is It made me mad at Jeff Zucker
• 15:29
  Speaker 4: all over again and The Apprentice because not only did
• 15:32
  Speaker 4: that show manufacture his image as a great businessman, it
• 15:35
  Speaker 4: provided him a literal financial lifeline that kept him afloat
• 15:38
  Speaker 4: long enough to run for president. And then my bigger takeaway,
• 15:42
  Speaker 4: I think, was probably that it made me nervous all
• 15:46
  Speaker 4: over again about what this guy will do to maintain
• 15:48
  Speaker 4: power because it's not just about ego and not wanting
• 15:51
  Speaker 4: to be a historic failed one-term president. it's about existential
• 15:58
  Speaker 4: legal and financial threats for him and maybe even for
• 16:01
  Speaker 4: his kids. I mean, there's some stuff in there about
• 16:04
  Speaker 4: Ivanka getting these consulting fees when she was clearly not
• 16:07
  Speaker 4: a consultant on the project that lead me to believe
• 16:10
  Speaker 4: she could be in some trouble too. So there's a
• 16:12
  Speaker 4: lot to this and it sounds like the Times is
• 16:14
  Speaker 4: going to keep rolling out stories for the next couple
• 16:16
  Speaker 4: of weeks. Love it.
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: What did you think of the story and how do
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: you think Biden should talk about this issue? There's like
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: a hundred different targets in the story and a lot
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: of details, but like, how would you sort of drive
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: at this?
• 16:29
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it's, um, that's right.
• 16:32
  Speaker 5: It is hard to sort of drill down. Like what's
• 16:34
  Speaker 5: the most valuable political piece of this? Like, I don't
• 16:37
  Speaker 5: feel like I know exactly, but you look at the
• 16:40
  Speaker 5: $ 750 taxes, you know, Dan wrote about this in, in, uh,
• 16:43
  Speaker 5: the newsletter, people can't stop talking about message box.
• 16:46
  Speaker 4: Uh, but, uh, uh, it seems pretty clear, right?
• 16:48
  Speaker 5: That there's some core idea here that fits with the
• 16:51
  Speaker 5: larger story of Trump, which is, this is somebody that
• 16:54
  Speaker 5: cares about only himself, who used a rigged tax code
• 16:58
  Speaker 5: to get money that he didn't deserve to keep himself afloat.
• 17:01
  Speaker 5: He then became president and rigged the tax code even
• 17:04
  Speaker 5: more to protect himself and other people like him. Something
• 17:08
  Speaker 5: that I found striking is, you look at these, there's
• 17:12
  Speaker 5: been a lot of, I think, I don't know, I
• 17:14
  Speaker 5: think with Trump, there's this Right-wing cynicism that's sort of like, ah,
• 17:18
  Speaker 5: this is what these people do.
• 17:20
  Speaker 4: And you're like, no, no, no, hold on a second.
• 17:21
  Speaker 4: This is extraordinary.
• 17:22
  Speaker 5: And then it's like, this is unusual even for the
• 17:25
  Speaker 5: super rich, even for tax cheats.
• 17:26
  Speaker 4: This is very unusual.
• 17:27
  Speaker 5: And then you say, oh, well, you know, what's the
• 17:30
  Speaker 5: problem here?
• 17:30
  Speaker 4: You know, the crime is what's legal. It's like, yeah,
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: it is.
• 17:33
  Speaker 5: The crime is what's legal. It is a crime what
• 17:35
  Speaker 5: Trump is able to get away with legally.
• 17:37
  Speaker 4: Legally. But also the crime is what is.
• 17:38
  Speaker 5: Very clearly a set of illegal acts inside of these
• 17:41
  Speaker 5: manufactured losses and these fake consulting fees. And the kind of,
• 17:46
  Speaker 5: you step back and you look at it and you
• 17:48
  Speaker 5: see like, there is stuff we don't understand here. There
• 17:51
  Speaker 5: is a kind of, you know, when scientists, you know,
• 17:54
  Speaker 5: look up and try to find a black hole, you
• 17:56
  Speaker 5: can't find the black.
• 17:57
  Speaker 4: Hole, but you can see that it's disturbing things all
• 17:59
  Speaker 4: around it.
• 17:59
  Speaker 5: You look at Trump's finances, you look at Trump's ridiculous
• 18:03
  Speaker 5: borrowing and spending habits and tax cheating. And you say
• 18:06
  Speaker 5: there's some piece of this missing. There's some way to
• 18:08
  Speaker 5: make sense of this that we can't see. Illegal contact,
• 18:11
  Speaker 5: illegal money moving around the world. And it has driven
• 18:14
  Speaker 5: him from the day he became president. Now, should Joe
• 18:17
  Speaker 5: Biden say all that?
• 18:18
  Speaker 4: I don't think so.
• 18:19
  Speaker 5: Probably should focus on the fact that Trump didn't pay taxes.
• 18:22
  Speaker 5: And he's a tax cheat who wants to help billionaires
• 18:25
  Speaker 5: and billionaires just like him and rig the system against
• 18:27
  Speaker 5: the middle class.
• 18:28
  Speaker 4: But I'm just telling you what bothered me.
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: Well, I think there's a little bit of both, though.
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: I mean, we have talked before about you know, in 2016,
• 18:37
  Speaker 3: like Trump's economic appeal was based on, he said, he
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: had that quote, all my life I've been greedy. Now
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: I'm going to be greedy for the United States of America.
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: And it was somewhat believable because you're like, yeah, he
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: is a greedy asshole, but maybe he'll use some of
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: that magic to help all of us, right? Well, it
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: turns out he just decided to be greedy for himself.
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: He didn't give a shit about the rest of the country.
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: He got into office. He used the office to steer
• 18:59
  Speaker 3: money to his businesses and to sort of like, do
• 19:02
  Speaker 3: you have like lobbyists and foreign actors and everyone else
• 19:05
  Speaker 3: like give money to Trump properties because he needed the
• 19:07
  Speaker 3: money and didn't do anything for anyone else. And now
• 19:11
  Speaker 3: we have 8% unemployment. The guy couldn't even give people
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: an extra $ 600 a week for unemployment benefits. He wants
• 19:18
  Speaker 3: to take away their healthcare coverage. He doesn't want to
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: give any more direct payments. He doesn't want to help
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: any more small businesses in the middle of pandemic. But meanwhile,
• 19:25
  Speaker 3: he's working the system as hard as he can to
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: pay off his debts. That's who he is. That's who
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: he is.
• 19:31
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it's probably not how you want to close out
• 19:32
  Speaker 4: a campaign, if we're being honest here. I mean, yeah,
• 19:35
  Speaker 4: there's a bunch of pieces. Like, there are juicy details
• 19:38
  Speaker 4: in this story. Like, I bet you 80% of the
• 19:41
  Speaker 4: country ultimately knows that he paid $ 750 in federal taxes
• 19:46
  Speaker 4: one year. I bet a similar number here is about
• 19:49
  Speaker 4: the $ 70, 000 in write-offs for hair care or whatever it was.
• 19:54
  Speaker 4: And to your point, John, in 2015 and 16, he
• 19:57
  Speaker 4: did have this populist side of him. He pretended that
• 20:00
  Speaker 4: he was going to change the way you tax hedge
• 20:02
  Speaker 4: fund guys because they were getting away with murder. This
• 20:05
  Speaker 4: story shows that he has been exploiting all the same loopholes.
• 20:09
  Speaker 4: He is a tax cheat. And you have to make
• 20:11
  Speaker 4: a case about a corrupt system that lets rich jerks
• 20:14
  Speaker 4: like Donald Trump use tax loopholes and accounting tricks to
• 20:18
  Speaker 4: do things that would get the rest of us audited
• 20:20
  Speaker 4: or maybe thrown into jail. So I do think this
• 20:23
  Speaker 4: is a big deal. I think Biden should play this
• 20:25
  Speaker 4: up at the debate. And it's something that people will hear.
• 20:28
  Speaker 4: And for all the Teflon Don, nothing impacts him. This
• 20:32
  Speaker 4: will be remembered. This will undercut his core argument for
• 20:36
  Speaker 4: why he ran in the first place, which was that
• 20:38
  Speaker 4: he's a successful business guy who could translate that to
• 20:41
  Speaker 4: running the country. That didn't happen.
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: Well, and again, remember our change research polling in the
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: six battleground states of new and infrequent voters, the message
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: that was most successful at actually moving voters towards Joe
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: Biden was an economic message we wrote up that contrasted
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: Donald Trump's plan and Joe Biden's plan. And it was
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: populist in nature. And this just puts a finer point
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: on that. Trump if elected for a second term, wants
• 21:05
  Speaker 3: to give the 10 richest billionaires in the country a
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: $ 17 billion tax cut. Joe Biden would raise taxes on
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: the 1%, raise taxes on big corporation, cut taxes for
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: the middle class, $ 15 minimum wage, free college if you're
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: making under $ 125, 000, expanded rent subsidies, 12 weeks paid family leave.
• 21:22
  Speaker 3: Like if I were the Biden campaign, I would hope
• 21:24
  Speaker 3: in the debate that not only would you hit him
• 21:26
  Speaker 3: for the tax story, but talk about what you would
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: do to change the tax system, what you would do
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: for people and what Donald Trump will continue to do
• 21:33
  Speaker 3: for people just like Donald Trump.
• 21:34
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I also, one thing that you take away from
• 21:37
  Speaker 5: this too is there is a lot of political value
• 21:41
  Speaker 5: here I think, in talking about going after white collar crime,
• 21:46
  Speaker 5: that we need a new and renewed focus on white
• 21:48
  Speaker 5: collar crime. There's, you know, ProPublica put this out. A
• 21:51
  Speaker 5: few people have been talking about this, that the most
• 21:53
  Speaker 5: audited county in America is a small, rural, poor, black
• 21:57
  Speaker 5: county in Mississippi because they audit people who use the
• 22:01
  Speaker 5: earned income tax credit, but they don't take care of
• 22:04
  Speaker 5: and don't go after and don't look at people like
• 22:06
  Speaker 5: Donald Trump. And I think there's a lot of like,
• 22:08
  Speaker 5: that's good populism to me. Like, talk about that.
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: All right, let's move on to the debates. On Tuesday night,
• 22:21
  Speaker 3: Donald Trump and Joe Biden will face off in the
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: first of three presidential debates. This one will take place
• 22:25
  Speaker 3: in Cleveland, Ohio, and be moderated by Chris Wallace of
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: Fox News, who chose the following six 15-minute segments. The
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: records of Joe Biden and Donald Trump, the Supreme Court, coronavirus,
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: the economy, race and violence in our cities, is what
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: he's calling it, and the integrity of the election. Joe
• 22:42
  Speaker 3: Biden has been preparing with his staff, while Donald Trump
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: has been preparing by demanding that Joe Biden take a
• 22:46
  Speaker 3: drug test in between rounds of golf. Lovett, considering where
• 22:51
  Speaker 3: the race is and how many voters have told pollsters
• 22:54
  Speaker 3: they've already made up their minds, how much do you
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: think these debates matter?
• 22:59
  Speaker 5: You know, it's nothing has fundamentally changed the dynamic in
• 23:03
  Speaker 5: this race. The coronavirus hasn't done it. Nothing we've seen
• 23:07
  Speaker 5: in the past three months have been able to move
• 23:09
  Speaker 5: the polls very dramatically. You know, when people go and
• 23:13
  Speaker 5: say things like, oh, this tax story doesn't matter. It's like, well, OK,
• 23:16
  Speaker 5: but But for Donald Trump, things have to start mattering
• 23:18
  Speaker 5: and have to start mattering a great deal to start
• 23:20
  Speaker 5: changing the dynamic. Do I think it's possible that something
• 23:22
  Speaker 5: can happen in a debate that can fundamentally change the
• 23:26
  Speaker 5: dynamic in this race right now? It doesn't seem like it.
• 23:30
  Speaker 5: I think of it as an opportunity for Joe Biden to,
• 23:33
  Speaker 5: you know, make a case for himself while dodging the
• 23:37
  Speaker 5: kind of bullshit and torrent of lies and misinformation and
• 23:40
  Speaker 5: attacks and nonsense that will come from Donald Trump to
• 23:42
  Speaker 5: seem presidential to to demonstrate the kind of leader he
• 23:46
  Speaker 5: will be and give the people we've been talking about
• 23:50
  Speaker 5: in our polls and in other polls that are leaning
• 23:54
  Speaker 5: towards Joe Biden and are looking for information, looking for
• 23:56
  Speaker 5: a reason to come on board.
• 23:59
  Speaker 3: Tommy, what do you think? And if you're on the
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: Biden campaign, what do you want voters to take away
• 24:03
  Speaker 3: from this debate?
• 24:04
  Speaker 4: I mean, so here's what we know about debates, right?
• 24:06
  Speaker 4: Like a ton of people watch them. The first Clinton-Trump
• 24:09
  Speaker 4: debate had 84 million viewers. And then the coverage probably
• 24:13
  Speaker 4: reached tens of millions more. We also know that in 2016,
• 24:17
  Speaker 4: only 10% of voters said they had made up their
• 24:19
  Speaker 4: minds during or after the debates. And I suspect that
• 24:22
  Speaker 4: number will be lower this year, given how many people
• 24:25
  Speaker 4: are already decided. So that does suggest that it's going
• 24:29
  Speaker 4: to be hard to move the numbers a lot. I
• 24:30
  Speaker 4: also think for Trump, your debate performance isn't going to
• 24:33
  Speaker 4: convince anyone that you did a good job with the coronavirus,
• 24:36
  Speaker 4: that that ship has sailed. I want to see Joe
• 24:38
  Speaker 4: Biden- being the optimistic, happy warrior who's going to fight
• 24:43
  Speaker 4: for the middle class because that's who he is. I
• 24:45
  Speaker 4: love the framing of Scranton versus Wall Street. I think
• 24:48
  Speaker 4: that's aided enormously by this New York Times tax story.
• 24:52
  Speaker 4: And you know it's effective because the minute Biden started
• 24:54
  Speaker 4: down that path, Republicans were crying about class warfare, right? Like,
• 24:58
  Speaker 4: oh no, how dare you do this, right? So you
• 24:59
  Speaker 4: know that's when it hurts. I think he needs to
• 25:02
  Speaker 4: get past delivering a message about Trump being a bad
• 25:05
  Speaker 4: human being, be immoral, being unethical. It's got to be
• 25:08
  Speaker 4: a bigger story about Republican policies that are corrupt and
• 25:11
  Speaker 4: helping rich people cheat, like we talked about a minute ago.
• 25:14
  Speaker 4: You know, I also would love to hear him say
• 25:17
  Speaker 4: something like, I get why people wanted to change in
• 25:19
  Speaker 4: 2016 and considered voting for someone new, something different, but
• 25:23
  Speaker 4: it's clear that you are not up for the job
• 25:25
  Speaker 4: and you have failed, right? And so talk about who
• 25:28
  Speaker 4: you are, what you do, do it with a smile.
• 25:31
  Speaker 4: Don't get down too deep into the mud, but also
• 25:33
  Speaker 4: I don't think he can like let Trump just lie
• 25:35
  Speaker 4: the whole time.
• 25:37
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 25:37
  Speaker 3: I mean, I keep thinking of Michelle Obama's line from
• 25:40
  Speaker 3: her convention speech that Donald Trump is in over his head.
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: And like, if I was Joe Biden, the frame I'd
• 25:46
  Speaker 3: want to put Donald Trump in is not, he's a liar.
• 25:49
  Speaker 3: He's a scary authoritarian. He's a bad person, all that
• 25:51
  Speaker 3: kind of stuff. He is weak. He is ineffective. He
• 25:54
  Speaker 3: is in over his head and he is out of
• 25:56
  Speaker 3: touch with the problems of the country. He has no
• 25:58
  Speaker 3: fucking idea what's actually going on in people's lives. He
• 26:01
  Speaker 3: is a, because Donald Trump will try to paint Joe
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: Biden as like an addled old guy, right? You see
• 26:06
  Speaker 3: now he's been trying to do that the whole time.
• 26:09
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden can turn that on him early and show
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: that he's sort of like the dotty old racist, as
• 26:15
  Speaker 3: Levitt says, who like doesn't know what the hell he's doing,
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: isn't in control of his government, chaos all around him.
• 26:21
  Speaker 3: All he cares about is himself, doesn't care about other people.
• 26:24
  Speaker 3: And then I do think It's an opportunity for Joe
• 26:26
  Speaker 3: Biden to sort of lay out in broad strokes, not details,
• 26:29
  Speaker 3: like what he's going to do for the country for
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: some of those wavering voters. Love it. If you're prepping
• 26:34
  Speaker 3: Biden for Trump, what would you tell him to expect?
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: What would you tell him to watch out for?
• 26:38
  Speaker 5: I think it's almost like you can almost like have
• 26:44
  Speaker 5: in debate prep Donald Trump played by a noisemaker. Just
• 26:48
  Speaker 5: somebody that does this. Just somebody that spins a ratchet
• 26:51
  Speaker 5: and just makes noise, makes noise, makes noise.
• 26:52
  Speaker 4: Like a Bubu Zela? Yes. It just doesn't really like,
• 26:56
  Speaker 4: maybe that's too glib. Maybe that's not right.
• 26:58
  Speaker 5: Like Donald Trump is a broken old racist fool and
• 27:01
  Speaker 5: he's going to make a lot of noise. He's going
• 27:03
  Speaker 5: to throw a lot of shit out there. He's going
• 27:04
  Speaker 5: to interrupt.
• 27:05
  Speaker 4: No puppet, no puppet, your puppet. We're going to remember all,
• 27:07
  Speaker 4: it's going to be the same. He's not prepping. There's no,
• 27:09
  Speaker 4: there's no prep.
• 27:10
  Speaker 5: So there's no new, there's no new material going into
• 27:12
  Speaker 5: his brain. No new material has entered his brain in
• 27:14
  Speaker 5: quite some time. So it's going to be a kind
• 27:16
  Speaker 5: of like noisy bit of all the kind of greatest hits.
• 27:18
  Speaker 5: He's This is, as Tommy said, 80 million people, maybe
• 27:24
  Speaker 5: more watching this year. It's an opportunity to just sort
• 27:27
  Speaker 5: of reach the country and kind of situate the race,
• 27:31
  Speaker 5: the scale of it, the stakes of it, the pain
• 27:34
  Speaker 5: the country's in, the seriousness of the economic crisis, the
• 27:36
  Speaker 5: seriousness of the pandemic, the seriousness in terms of the
• 27:39
  Speaker 5: threats to our democracy, and kind of use it as
• 27:41
  Speaker 5: an opportunity to simply be president. We've talked about this
• 27:44
  Speaker 5: a lot, that in many ways, Donald Trump has tried
• 27:47
  Speaker 5: to run as a challenger, right? To kind of declare
• 27:50
  Speaker 5: bankruptcy on his first four years and get a restart.
• 27:53
  Speaker 5: And Joe Biden has been demonstrating throughout this campaign that
• 27:56
  Speaker 5: he is showing you what a president is supposed to do.
• 27:58
  Speaker 5: That this is what a president sounds like. This is
• 28:00
  Speaker 5: what a president looks like. And I think for a
• 28:02
  Speaker 5: lot of people, that's going to be really important. And
• 28:04
  Speaker 5: I think there's a lot of people out there who
• 28:06
  Speaker 5: that will resonate with quite deeply. And maybe for the
• 28:09
  Speaker 5: first time seeing it, you know, on this stage that
• 28:12
  Speaker 5: has such history to it.
• 28:13
  Speaker 3: And by the way, like, Don't let him slip into
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: challenger mode. Trump, don't let him act like he's the challenger.
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: I think it's one of the reasons that like it's
• 28:22
  Speaker 3: partly because he was a senator for so long, but
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: it's good for Joe Biden to continue to call him Mr. President, Mr. President,
• 28:28
  Speaker 3: President Trump and not Donald Trump.
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 28:30
  Speaker 3: Like I think he I think it helps to remind
• 28:32
  Speaker 3: people that they're talking about all the problems and all
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: the crises the country is facing. You are the president.
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: Because Donald Trump is going to complain about everything. He's
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: going to blame Joe Biden. He's going to blame Barack Obama.
• 28:41
  Speaker 3: He's going to blame politicians in Washington for the last
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: 47 years. You've been around 47 years and you haven't
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: changed anything. Hey, man, you're the president right now. Right now.
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: So Trump's obviously going to lie for most of the debate.
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: On Sunday, the Commission on Presidential Debates co-chair Frank Ferenkoff Jr.
• 29:00
  Speaker 3: said that he doesn't expect Chris Wallace or any of
• 29:02
  Speaker 3: the moderators to fact check the candidates because, quote, The
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: minute the TV is off, there are going to be
• 29:06
  Speaker 3: plenty of fact checkers at every newspaper and every television
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: station in the world. That's not the main role of
• 29:10
  Speaker 3: our moderators. Tommy, should it be up to Joe Biden
• 29:13
  Speaker 3: to fact check Donald Trump for the entire debate? Should
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: it be up to the moderators? What do you think
• 29:17
  Speaker 3: of that?
• 29:17
  Speaker 6: No.
• 29:17
  Speaker 4: I mean, some of my advice to Joe Biden would
• 29:19
  Speaker 4: be don't shake his hand because, you know, you never
• 29:21
  Speaker 4: know if he just like high five a COVID handkerchief. Like,
• 29:25
  Speaker 4: don't kind of look dumbstruck when he's lying and don't
• 29:28
  Speaker 4: fact check him on everything because you don't have to.
• 29:30
  Speaker 4: But what's the point of having a moderator, if they're
• 29:34
  Speaker 4: not fact checking in some way, you might as well
• 29:36
  Speaker 4: just have them read the questions to themselves off of cards.
• 29:39
  Speaker 4: I just don't, I don't understand this. The U.S. media
• 29:42
  Speaker 4: can be aggressive in a lot of ways. Presumably that's
• 29:45
  Speaker 4: why you picked Chris Wallace. Why are they so oddly
• 29:48
  Speaker 4: passive about this? Because if you don't do any fact checking,
• 29:51
  Speaker 4: you advantage the person who is willing to lie the most.
• 29:54
  Speaker 4: you play into the Trumpian, you know, alternate facts, facts
• 29:59
  Speaker 4: don't matter reality. I don't get it. I find it
• 30:03
  Speaker 4: so infuriating. I'm not saying you need to fact check
• 30:05
  Speaker 4: in real time every statement he made, but like some
• 30:08
  Speaker 4: things are true and some things are false. Why is
• 30:11
  Speaker 4: that not relevant in a political debate to see who
• 30:13
  Speaker 4: becomes the president of the United States?
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: Love it.
• 30:16
  Speaker 3: What do you think?
• 30:18
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 30:18
  Speaker 5: I mean, sort of, you know, sort of what the
• 30:20
  Speaker 5: point of refs are, you know, make sure that there's some. Otherwise,
• 30:23
  Speaker 5: there's no rules, right? If misinformation and information are treated
• 30:27
  Speaker 5: equally over the course of the debate, that does a
• 30:29
  Speaker 5: real disservice to the people watching. And yeah, there's going
• 30:32
  Speaker 5: to be tons of fact checking and people going over
• 30:35
  Speaker 5: the thing. But do you have any respect for the
• 30:37
  Speaker 5: people that are tuning in and aren't as well versed
• 30:39
  Speaker 5: in every policy detail as you are? Any respect for
• 30:41
  Speaker 5: them trying to trust you to help them understand the
• 30:44
  Speaker 5: stakes of this election? Any any fealty to them as
• 30:46
  Speaker 5: opposed to to Donald Trump and the two parties like
• 30:48
  Speaker 5: any any regard for those human beings at all?
• 30:51
  Speaker 4: That would be my that'd be my question.
• 30:52
  Speaker 3: Well, they're like, you know, Joe Biden can fact check
• 30:54
  Speaker 3: him and, you know, Donald Trump could. But like Joe
• 30:57
  Speaker 3: Biden is running for president, as is Donald Trump. They
• 30:59
  Speaker 3: don't have the same kind of credibility when they fact
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: check each other because they obviously have their own interests
• 31:04
  Speaker 3: at heart. The craziest thing is being like, oh, it's
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: up to Joe Biden to fact check Donald Trump. No,
• 31:09
  Speaker 3: it's fucking not.
• 31:10
  Speaker 4: It doesn't make any sense.
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: That's why you have a moderator. That's what you have
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: in a neutral party.
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: Like and I get it. Like it would be impossible
• 31:17
  Speaker 3: to spend 90 minutes fact checking everything Donald Trump says.
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: Chris Wallace. Kristen Welker, all these debate moderators, they cannot
• 31:23
  Speaker 3: do that. But there's going to be big ones. There's
• 31:25
  Speaker 3: going to be obvious ones that you can jump in
• 31:27
  Speaker 3: on at times.
• 31:28
  Speaker 5: It's also, you know, you kind of go back to like,
• 31:30
  Speaker 5: what is the purpose of this debate, right? It's not
• 31:32
  Speaker 5: actually a debate contest. It's an opportunity for these two
• 31:35
  Speaker 5: people to hash it out over who's best to lead
• 31:37
  Speaker 5: the country. If it's Joe Biden's job to not only
• 31:40
  Speaker 5: tell the American people what he'll do as president. but
• 31:42
  Speaker 5: also protect the American people from the misinformation coming from
• 31:45
  Speaker 5: the other podium, that's a lot to ask for the
• 31:47
  Speaker 5: other person to do. That's a real steep climb to
• 31:50
  Speaker 5: put on one side, and it really does advantage misinformation.
• 31:53
  Speaker 5: And one of the lessons of the last five years
• 31:56
  Speaker 5: is we have a fundamental problem in which we are
• 31:58
  Speaker 5: not doing enough to disadvantage the use of misinformation. Chris
• 32:01
  Speaker 5: Wallace has a real opportunity to help the American people
• 32:04
  Speaker 5: face the crisis of misinformation.
• 32:05
  Speaker 4: That is his job.
• 32:06
  Speaker 5: There's no other reason to be there. Otherwise, print the
• 32:09
  Speaker 5: questions out and put them on big signs and show
• 32:11
  Speaker 5: the signs.
• 32:12
  Speaker 4: But also, you know, if the moderator's job isn't to
• 32:15
  Speaker 4: fact check, okay. But we also know the press doesn't
• 32:18
  Speaker 4: view its job as to fact check either. They often
• 32:21
  Speaker 4: score these things on style points, right? I mean, the
• 32:24
  Speaker 4: famous Ronald Reagan, there you go again line was his
• 32:28
  Speaker 4: way of spinning out of getting called on all the
• 32:31
  Speaker 4: things he lied about or his very extreme positions that
• 32:33
  Speaker 4: he had taken previously in his career. And the press
• 32:35
  Speaker 4: was like, oh, What a performance. The audience laughed. He
• 32:38
  Speaker 4: seemed genial. Like, what's the point? Why is anyone doing
• 32:43
  Speaker 4: this nonsense if we don't care about facts and truth?
• 32:46
  Speaker 4: I mean, I feel like this is one of the
• 32:48
  Speaker 4: first times where I've really felt like we have not
• 32:51
  Speaker 4: learned anything from 2016.
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: These debates are not on the level, guys. They're not
• 32:55
  Speaker 3: on the level. All right, so in these last 36
• 32:59
  Speaker 3: days on Pod Save America, we are going to take
• 33:02
  Speaker 3: some questions from you guys since we don't have a
• 33:04
  Speaker 3: mailbag episode between now and the election. So we're going
• 33:06
  Speaker 3: to end every episode with a few questions. I think
• 33:09
  Speaker 3: we might have some music for this.
• 33:13
  Speaker 4: Questions.
• 33:14
  Speaker 3: Meredith Graves via Facebook asks, I have monthly donations set
• 33:17
  Speaker 3: up to various candidates but still get bombarded with panicked
• 33:20
  Speaker 3: sounding texts about quarterly fundraising deadlines, etc. What do these
• 33:24
  Speaker 3: deadlines actually mean? Are they important?
• 33:26
  Speaker 4: Tommy? They're important. I mean, there are moments when campaigns
• 33:30
  Speaker 4: have to disclose publicly how much money they've raised. And
• 33:34
  Speaker 4: if you have a good quarter, it's seen as a
• 33:36
  Speaker 4: sign of momentum and success with your candidacy. If you
• 33:40
  Speaker 4: have not raised a lot of money, it's seen as
• 33:43
  Speaker 4: a sign that you could be in trouble. It's also
• 33:45
  Speaker 4: something that's looked at by the campaign committees in Washington,
• 33:48
  Speaker 4: like the DSCC or the DNC, when they make determinations
• 33:52
  Speaker 4: at the end of an election and about where to
• 33:55
  Speaker 4: put their scarce resources. So that's why people are always
• 33:59
  Speaker 4: beating you at the end of the quarter. They just
• 34:00
  Speaker 4: want to post the best number they possibly can before
• 34:04
  Speaker 4: it becomes public.
• 34:07
  Speaker 3: Alex Goebel via Facebook asks, can a conservative majority in
• 34:12
  Speaker 3: the Supreme Court block any possibility of an expanded court
• 34:15
  Speaker 3: or other Supreme Court-related reforms, even if we get a
• 34:17
  Speaker 3: Democratic House, Senate, and President? Love it. You got thoughts
• 34:20
  Speaker 3: on that?
• 34:21
  Speaker 5: So there's nothing in the Constitution that requires there to
• 34:24
  Speaker 5: be nine Supreme Court justices that said anything is possible
• 34:27
  Speaker 5: with a conservative court trying to maintain its power. But
• 34:31
  Speaker 5: Congress has broadly a way to add justice to the
• 34:34
  Speaker 5: Supreme Court. It's happened many, many times in our past,
• 34:36
  Speaker 5: and there's no reason to believe they couldn't do it again.
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's the best bet is like there's
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: precedent for it. They've changed it. The Congress and the
• 34:44
  Speaker 3: president have changed the size of the Supreme Court before
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: via legislation. It has gone through. It can happen again.
• 34:50
  Speaker 3: Grant Weaver via community asks, can you go into more
• 34:53
  Speaker 3: depth on how campaign money is spent? We hear about
• 34:55
  Speaker 3: large amounts of money being raised. Just curious how many
• 34:58
  Speaker 3: TV or digital ads that gets the campaign, how many voters,
• 35:00
  Speaker 3: et cetera. The numbers are so abstract. I do not
• 35:03
  Speaker 3: know exactly. I don't know if you guys do exactly
• 35:05
  Speaker 3: how much money every ad costs. It depends on the market.
• 35:09
  Speaker 3: First of all, there are some media markets in the
• 35:10
  Speaker 3: country that are more expensive, some bigger cities than others.
• 35:14
  Speaker 3: But obviously campaign money is spent on digital ads, on
• 35:16
  Speaker 3: television ads, on on polling and data so they know
• 35:19
  Speaker 3: which group of voters to talk to, how the campaign's doing,
• 35:22
  Speaker 3: how to reach different voters, voter contact, staff, organizers, volunteers.
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: Am I missing anything? What else does campaigns spend money on?
• 35:30
  Speaker 4: Pieces of mail that gets thrown in the garbage.
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: Mail, yeah.
• 35:33
  Speaker 4: Junk food.
• 35:34
  Speaker 3: Mail that gets thrown in the garbage.
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 35:35
  Speaker 4: I think you nailed it. I'd take out volunteers because
• 35:38
  Speaker 4: they're free, but the rest, I mean, look.
• 35:41
  Speaker 3: Organizers.
• 35:42
  Speaker 4: Unfortunately, a lot of this money is going to be
• 35:44
  Speaker 4: spent on television ads. which is, uh, you know, not
• 35:49
  Speaker 4: how you wish democracy worked, but often can be effective.
• 35:53
  Speaker 3: That's true. Alex Trugman asks, Oh guys, why do I
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: keep eating late night dominoes? Love it.
• 36:02
  Speaker 5: Well, um, you know, we're in a pandemic and a
• 36:06
  Speaker 5: crisis in our democracy and a growing self-evident climate crisis. Um,
• 36:13
  Speaker 5: And one of the most important periods in politics in
• 36:15
  Speaker 5: our history, surrounded by chaos and anger and fear. So
• 36:26
  Speaker 5: normally you might turn to, say, grabbing a drink with
• 36:28
  Speaker 5: an old friend at a bar or maybe going to
• 36:33
  Speaker 5: the old bowling alley, knocking down a couple of pins.
• 36:37
  Speaker 5: But many of these things are not available as the
• 36:39
  Speaker 5: pandemic has basically drained joy from our lives and the
• 36:41
  Speaker 5: failure to contain it has meant we can't go back
• 36:43
  Speaker 5: to the things that made life worth living. And so
• 36:45
  Speaker 5: if you at night decide at 10 o'clock to add
• 36:48
  Speaker 5: dinner number two by ordering yourself a hand-tossed pan pizza,
• 36:52
  Speaker 5: you know what?
• 36:52
  Speaker 4: Don't say ugh. Say I deserve it. That's what I say.
• 36:56
  Speaker 4: It's better than Papa John's.
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: Then download some Noom.
• 37:00
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I did. I can't believe.
• 37:05
  Speaker 5: It is now six months of every day saying to myself,
• 37:09
  Speaker 5: you know what? You deserve dessert today.
• 37:12
  Speaker 4: Every day. For six months.
• 37:15
  Speaker 5: I had a slice of coconut cream pie last night.
• 37:18
  Speaker 3: That sounds delicious.
• 37:20
  Speaker 4: Very good.
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: Delicious.
• 37:23
  Speaker 4: All right.
• 37:24
  Speaker 3: If you have other questions, you can text us anytime
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: at 323-405-9944. We might just answer your question on an
• 37:29
  Speaker 3: upcoming Pod Save America. When we come back, we will
• 37:36
  Speaker 3: have former Obama campaign manager David Plouffe. Joining us today,
• 37:48
  Speaker 3: yet another former Obama staffer who's gone on to become
• 37:51
  Speaker 3: a host of multiple podcasts, Campaign HQ and Battleground. He's
• 37:55
  Speaker 3: also the author of A Citizen's Guide to Beating Donald
• 37:57
  Speaker 3: Trump and Ripples of Hope. David Plouffe, welcome back to
• 38:00
  Speaker 3: the pod.
• 38:01
  Speaker 7: Thanks, John. Always good to be with you. Just following
• 38:03
  Speaker 7: in your esteemed footprints. We're all following your podcast journey now.
• 38:10
  Speaker 3: Imagine if Obama knew that then when he left the
• 38:13
  Speaker 3: White House, all of us would just go make podcasts now.
• 38:17
  Speaker 3: That's our thing.
• 38:18
  Speaker 7: He'd be horrified.
• 38:20
  Speaker 3: Well, he's a podcast guy too. That's true. He jumped
• 38:24
  Speaker 3: on the bandwagon.
• 38:24
  Speaker 7: He was a holdout, but yes.
• 38:27
  Speaker 4: All right.
• 38:27
  Speaker 3: I want to talk about the map and the debate.
• 38:30
  Speaker 3: But first, I want to get your reaction to this
• 38:32
  Speaker 3: New York Times tax story. Biden folks are already out
• 38:35
  Speaker 3: with an ad about how almost everyone else in America
• 38:38
  Speaker 3: pays more taxes than Trump. How hard would you hammer
• 38:42
  Speaker 3: this issue, knowing, as we do, that most undecided or
• 38:45
  Speaker 3: uncertain voters already have a largely negative view of the
• 38:49
  Speaker 3: president and want to know more about Biden?
• 38:53
  Speaker 7: Well, I think, yeah, I would not make it front
• 38:55
  Speaker 7: and center necessarily. Let's just talk about the debate. So.
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 38:59
  Speaker 7: We're going to talk about our democracy and Trump wanting
• 39:02
  Speaker 7: to basically not accept election results. You can tie this
• 39:05
  Speaker 7: to that, which is now we know why he doesn't
• 39:08
  Speaker 7: want to leave the White House. He sees it as
• 39:10
  Speaker 7: a safe house because he fears what's on the other
• 39:11
  Speaker 7: side in terms of investigation and debt and recriminations. I
• 39:16
  Speaker 7: think when you're talking about your economic plans, your tax plans,
• 39:20
  Speaker 7: how you're going to rebuild the economy post pandemic, I
• 39:23
  Speaker 7: think putting this front and center is important to say
• 39:25
  Speaker 7: you can't trust this guy. This is the way he
• 39:27
  Speaker 7: sees the economy. So, um, you know, to me, it's still,
• 39:31
  Speaker 7: who do you trust, uh, to ultimately get this out
• 39:34
  Speaker 7: of the pandemic? But a lot of that is, uh,
• 39:36
  Speaker 7: you know, your economic plan. So to me, it's just
• 39:39
  Speaker 7: another piece of really important weaponry weaponry in your core
• 39:43
  Speaker 7: argument you're already making.
• 39:45
  Speaker 3: So, uh, let's talk about the map. Um, As you've known,
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: since we first started working together in 2008, I'm unable
• 39:51
  Speaker 3: to step off the polar coaster, even for a brief moment.
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: I think back then the state that I bugged you
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: about the most was Pennsylvania. Obama won it twice. Hillary
• 40:01
  Speaker 3: lost it very narrowly. And now Biden has a small lead,
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: but it's a lead that's not quite as large as
• 40:08
  Speaker 3: his leads in Michigan and Wisconsin, even though he's from Scranton,
• 40:11
  Speaker 3: lives next door in Delaware. What's your sense of what's
• 40:14
  Speaker 3: happening in Pennsylvania and what Biden needs to do there
• 40:17
  Speaker 3: to get over the top?
• 40:19
  Speaker 7: Well, John, first of all, it's good you've just fully
• 40:21
  Speaker 7: embraced your polar coaster issues.
• 40:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm not even going to try. Why lie to
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: everyone else and myself?
• 40:27
  Speaker 7: So I do think Pennsylvania is the state where Trump is,
• 40:32
  Speaker 7: of all the battlegrounds, sort of outperforming his core political standing.
• 40:38
  Speaker 7: So I think part of that is the state itself
• 40:41
  Speaker 7: is changing a little bit. So any Republican may benefit
• 40:44
  Speaker 7: from that. But I think Trump is a very strong
• 40:46
  Speaker 7: Pennsylvania candidate. He's going to overperform in the areas between
• 40:49
  Speaker 7: Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. He's going to overperform, I think, in
• 40:54
  Speaker 7: some of the exurban areas outside of Pittsburgh. So there's
• 40:58
  Speaker 7: so many parts of Pennsylvania. So what is going to
• 41:00
  Speaker 7: be Biden's margin out of southeastern Pennsylvania, both Philadelphia City
• 41:04
  Speaker 7: and the suburbs? What kind of margin can he walk
• 41:06
  Speaker 7: out of Pittsburgh with? But Trump, as you know, won
• 41:10
  Speaker 7: Erie County. We won it in 2012 by 18 points.
• 41:13
  Speaker 7: It's a big blue-collar county, Trump carried it. He also
• 41:17
  Speaker 7: did very well along the river, including in Scranton. And
• 41:21
  Speaker 7: so to me, if Biden can walk out of southeastern
• 41:25
  Speaker 7: Pennsylvania with margins like Hillary had or even better, I
• 41:29
  Speaker 7: do think he's going to do better in some of
• 41:30
  Speaker 7: those big blue-collar counties. I think there's a mistake when
• 41:33
  Speaker 7: we think, well, Trump just blew it out in rural
• 41:36
  Speaker 7: areas and exurban areas. He also did quite well in
• 41:38
  Speaker 7: some of these blue collar is, uh, you know, the
• 41:40
  Speaker 7: Eastern and Western parts of Pennsylvania being the greatest examples. Uh,
• 41:44
  Speaker 7: and I think Trump's going to get really good turnout.
• 41:45
  Speaker 7: I think he's going to drive turnout in Pennsylvania. So, um,
• 41:48
  Speaker 7: I think some of this is you remember back in 2012, John,
• 41:51
  Speaker 7: I mean, we won Pennsylvania, but it was closer. Uh,
• 41:54
  Speaker 7: we were confident we were going to win. We, we
• 41:56
  Speaker 7: didn't throw everything into Pennsylvania. We did other States like Ohio,
• 42:00
  Speaker 7: but we could see it moving a little bit. Uh,
• 42:03
  Speaker 7: and so I think Trump's going to drive big turnout there.
• 42:05
  Speaker 7: So to me, um, But if Biden can take back
• 42:09
  Speaker 7: some of the territory Trump took in Erie County, in
• 42:14
  Speaker 7: Northampton County, in areas like Scranton, he's not going to
• 42:17
  Speaker 7: win it by six or eight points in my view.
• 42:19
  Speaker 7: My view is Biden's ceiling there may be four or
• 42:21
  Speaker 7: five points at the max. But right now, I'd rather
• 42:24
  Speaker 7: be Biden than Trump. But that's what makes me nervous
• 42:26
  Speaker 7: is I think Michigan looks like almost a done deal
• 42:29
  Speaker 7: for Biden. Is there any other state right now you'd say, oh,
• 42:32
  Speaker 7: we definitely got that? I don't feel that way about
• 42:34
  Speaker 7: any state. I feel pretty good about Wisconsin, Arizona. But
• 42:37
  Speaker 7: Pennsylvania is going to be close. So that's when, you know,
• 42:38
  Speaker 7: and you're encouraging so many people to be active, adopt states.
• 42:42
  Speaker 7: We've got to keep that up because that's what keeps
• 42:44
  Speaker 7: me up at night is maybe less a poll that
• 42:46
  Speaker 7: comes out than just I can't say, oh, 270 is done.
• 42:49
  Speaker 7: It's just not.
• 42:51
  Speaker 3: No, I feel the same way. And I feel like
• 42:53
  Speaker 3: you just said better about Wisconsin and Arizona. But I
• 42:56
  Speaker 3: don't feel like either of those are locked down either,
• 42:59
  Speaker 3: especially I feel like some of the polling in Arizona
• 43:01
  Speaker 3: has been a little tighter. Why did you, I'm surprised
• 43:04
  Speaker 3: that Pennsylvania ended up being closer than Wisconsin. Do you
• 43:08
  Speaker 3: think it's something about the electorate in Pennsylvania that's different?
• 43:10
  Speaker 3: Are there issue areas?
• 43:12
  Speaker 7: Well, I think some of the areas outside of Pittsburgh
• 43:15
  Speaker 7: are getting more conservative. They, you know, 8 to 10,
• 43:20
  Speaker 7: 12 years ago, Democrats would do better in some of
• 43:22
  Speaker 7: those counties. And some of those counties have a decent
• 43:24
  Speaker 7: amount of population. So, you know, you add to your
• 43:27
  Speaker 7: margin there if you're Republican, those are real votes you're
• 43:30
  Speaker 7: putting on the board. I also think the, you know,
• 43:33
  Speaker 7: James Carville, in a way that insults people in Pennsylvania,
• 43:37
  Speaker 7: called it pencil-tucky, right, between Pennsylvania and Philadelphia. But, you know,
• 43:40
  Speaker 7: Trump won some of those counties, 75-25, where we might
• 43:44
  Speaker 7: have been able to keep him at 58-42 or 60-40.
• 43:46
  Speaker 7: So some of that's unique to Trump, but just some
• 43:49
  Speaker 7: of it's the state is getting more conservative. And not
• 43:52
  Speaker 7: to look beyond this election, listen, the Electoral College is
• 43:54
  Speaker 7: not static. It doesn't mean at the end of this decade,
• 43:56
  Speaker 7: if Arizona becomes like Nevada- And North Carolina becomes like Virginia.
• 44:00
  Speaker 7: Those would be two big moves in the Electoral College
• 44:03
  Speaker 7: to our side and much less Texas. But, you know,
• 44:06
  Speaker 7: some of these upper Midwestern states and Pennsylvania could get
• 44:09
  Speaker 7: harder and harder over time. So this isn't just like
• 44:12
  Speaker 7: we're going to keep them all and just add Texas
• 44:14
  Speaker 7: and Georgia and Arizona. My guess is we're going to
• 44:17
  Speaker 7: have to replace some of those states over time.
• 44:20
  Speaker 3: Well, let's talk about Florida. We haven't talked about that
• 44:22
  Speaker 3: state yet where a Biden win could actually end the
• 44:25
  Speaker 3: election on Tuesday night or early Wednesday morning. The race
• 44:29
  Speaker 3: is incredibly tight there. I'm still haunted not only by
• 44:32
  Speaker 3: Hillary's narrow loss, but Nelson and Gillum's losses in 18,
• 44:35
  Speaker 3: especially after the polls showed both of them with a
• 44:37
  Speaker 3: small but stable lead the whole time. What's your sense
• 44:40
  Speaker 3: of Florida and what Biden has to do there and
• 44:43
  Speaker 3: what's going on there?
• 44:44
  Speaker 7: First of all, it's enormously frustrating, and I've done this
• 44:47
  Speaker 7: as well, to say, well, if he wins Florida, that
• 44:50
  Speaker 7: means the election's over. That shouldn't matter. Or You know,
• 44:53
  Speaker 7: it'll be clear he's going to win by a lot.
• 44:55
  Speaker 7: So then Trump will finally concede like Biden. If Biden
• 44:58
  Speaker 7: wins by one vote or one state, you know, he
• 44:59
  Speaker 7: should be he'll be the president. So Florida to me
• 45:03
  Speaker 7: is the place where some of Biden's outside strengths, outside
• 45:07
  Speaker 7: strengths of some of the electorate really come into focus.
• 45:09
  Speaker 7: So his strength with white senior citizen voters, his strength
• 45:14
  Speaker 7: with suburban women, which, you know, was true for us
• 45:18
  Speaker 7: in 16, certainly for the party in 18. but we're
• 45:21
  Speaker 7: seeing him at even higher levels in some places. That
• 45:25
  Speaker 7: in the northern part of the state and the central
• 45:27
  Speaker 7: part of the state where there's so many swing voters
• 45:29
  Speaker 7: really gives him, I think, an advantage. The question will be,
• 45:34
  Speaker 7: just like in Pennsylvania, I think Trump's going to drive
• 45:36
  Speaker 7: huge turnout. It's actually, of all the battleground states in 16,
• 45:39
  Speaker 7: based on the data I've seen, the place where I
• 45:41
  Speaker 7: think Trump did drive great turnout. He didn't drive great
• 45:43
  Speaker 7: turnout in a lot of places. He got it in Florida,
• 45:46
  Speaker 7: one of the reasons Hillary lost. I think he'll add
• 45:48
  Speaker 7: to that. And clearly he's making a play for Cuban-American voters,
• 45:52
  Speaker 7: the Venezuelan community. Now, Biden is not going to win
• 45:56
  Speaker 7: the Hispanic vote in Florida by 70-30 like he might
• 46:00
  Speaker 7: in Arizona because Trump's going to do well with Cuban-American
• 46:04
  Speaker 7: voters in particular. But if Biden can keep the Cuban
• 46:07
  Speaker 7: vote close in the southern part of the state and
• 46:10
  Speaker 7: do very well with the Puerto Rican community, Colombian community,
• 46:12
  Speaker 7: Venezuelan community, he could probably get in the, let's say,
• 46:16
  Speaker 7: 55-56 range. So To me, I like what's happening with
• 46:19
  Speaker 7: Florida with Biden's strength in the central and northern part
• 46:22
  Speaker 7: of the state. What keeps me up at night is
• 46:25
  Speaker 7: Trump's is Trump going to get outsized turnout? And Biden,
• 46:28
  Speaker 7: either from a vote share or turnout standpoint, doesn't meet
• 46:31
  Speaker 7: his mark. Now, remember back in 16, John, it wasn't
• 46:33
  Speaker 7: just polls. The early vote looked exceptionally good for Hillary Clinton.
• 46:38
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 46:38
  Speaker 7: And then the Election Day story was much different for
• 46:40
  Speaker 7: Trump versus Clinton. So you got to run through the
• 46:42
  Speaker 7: tape all the way through. So but I feel good
• 46:45
  Speaker 7: about Florida because Biden also You know, and Biden, you know,
• 46:48
  Speaker 7: every candidate has strengths and weaknesses. Some of his weaknesses
• 46:52
  Speaker 7: with younger voters and intensity, you know, it's getting better.
• 46:55
  Speaker 7: And I think the debate can go a long way
• 46:56
  Speaker 7: to closing that gap. But he has unique strength with
• 47:00
  Speaker 7: older voters. And, you know, I think that is why
• 47:04
  Speaker 7: his lead in Florida, by the way, he has better
• 47:06
  Speaker 7: numbers in Florida than we had in either of our
• 47:08
  Speaker 7: two races.
• 47:10
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 47:10
  Speaker 7: You remember back in 2012, news organizations said they weren't
• 47:13
  Speaker 7: going to poll Florida anymore because Romney had won it.
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: I do remember that.
• 47:16
  Speaker 4: So, you know, I feel.
• 47:19
  Speaker 7: This is where like we shouldn't be dishonest with people.
• 47:21
  Speaker 7: Biden's in a really good place in the race in
• 47:24
  Speaker 7: Florida included. But polls aren't votes. And so when you
• 47:28
  Speaker 7: look at how many votes are actually going to be
• 47:29
  Speaker 7: cast in Florida, you know, millions and millions of votes,
• 47:32
  Speaker 7: maybe 10 million votes. You know, Trump's going to bring
• 47:35
  Speaker 7: his turnout, I think. And so that's Biden's challenge. I
• 47:38
  Speaker 7: think if it was just a normal turnout election, I'd
• 47:40
  Speaker 7: feel exceedingly confident about Florida. There's a lot of work
• 47:43
  Speaker 7: to do. to make sure that he reaches his turnout.
• 47:45
  Speaker 7: And Florida is like running a campaign on the planet.
• 47:51
  Speaker 3: It is super complicated.
• 47:52
  Speaker 7: It's large. And so Trump's had an advantage because he's
• 47:55
  Speaker 7: an incumbent. He's planned this Florida campaign for four years.
• 47:58
  Speaker 7: And you're really starting to see Biden, I think, pick
• 48:01
  Speaker 7: up the pace with some really great Spanish language media.
• 48:04
  Speaker 7: I think they're doing a lot of good organizing work.
• 48:05
  Speaker 7: They're virtually on the ground. So to me, it is
• 48:09
  Speaker 7: a checkmate state, not because that means Trump will concede.
• 48:11
  Speaker 7: It just means It doesn't mean Biden's at the presidency,
• 48:15
  Speaker 7: but he's at 259 or 261 if he carries all
• 48:19
  Speaker 7: the Hillary states in that one. So then he just
• 48:21
  Speaker 7: has to have one state of some significance, like a
• 48:23
  Speaker 7: Wisconsin or Michigan. At that point, Florida and Michigan is
• 48:25
  Speaker 7: probably your straightest way to the presidency.
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 48:28
  Speaker 3: If you're the Biden campaign, how much time and money
• 48:30
  Speaker 3: are you spending in places like Georgia, Ohio, Iowa, even Texas,
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: where the race is closer than we might have expected,
• 48:38
  Speaker 3: but they aren't likely to be the tipping point states
• 48:40
  Speaker 3: that get you to 270?
• 48:42
  Speaker 7: Well, one of the surprising things is from a financial standpoint,
• 48:45
  Speaker 7: they probably have the resources to do it all. We
• 48:48
  Speaker 7: didn't expect that to be the case. So here's what
• 48:49
  Speaker 7: I'd say. Is there a scenario where Joe Biden loses Arizona,
• 48:53
  Speaker 7: loses North Carolina, loses Florida and wins Texas? I don't
• 48:56
  Speaker 7: think that's likely.
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 48:58
  Speaker 7: So same thing. Is he going to lose Pennsylvania and
• 49:01
  Speaker 7: Michigan and Wisconsin and win Ohio?
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: No.
• 49:03
  Speaker 7: So these are likely his 330th or 350th electoral vote.
• 49:05
  Speaker 7: So I wouldn't spend a dollar. an ounce of brainpower,
• 49:12
  Speaker 7: or any staff time on those states until you're comfortable
• 49:14
  Speaker 7: you're doing everything you need to do in the core battlegrounds.
• 49:17
  Speaker 7: And I think they probably do finances to do that.
• 49:20
  Speaker 7: So the question is, as long as they're not straining,
• 49:23
  Speaker 7: you know, their staff too much, or their creative teams
• 49:26
  Speaker 7: too much, yeah, they've got the money to go put
• 49:29
  Speaker 7: spots on the ground and do some organizing in the Georgias,
• 49:33
  Speaker 7: in the in the core battlegrounds. But you see Trump
• 49:41
  Speaker 7: has taken the bait. I mean, he's also spent money
• 49:43
  Speaker 7: in those states. He's starting to restrain that a little bit.
• 49:46
  Speaker 7: To me, that's malpractice. I mean, Donald Trump's now getting
• 49:49
  Speaker 7: outspent by Joe Biden and he's losing. So their campaign
• 49:52
  Speaker 7: is the one that can't waste a single dollar, a
• 49:55
  Speaker 7: single second of thought on a state that's not a
• 49:58
  Speaker 7: tipping point electoral college state.
• 50:00
  Speaker 3: Are there any groups of voters that are sort of
• 50:03
  Speaker 3: keeping you up at night? Like I've been looking, digging
• 50:06
  Speaker 3: through some of these polls and the data and it's like,
• 50:09
  Speaker 3: young voters, particularly young voters of color, particularly young voters
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: of color who are men. Trump has won over some
• 50:18
  Speaker 3: of them, if you believe the polls, but they're also
• 50:21
  Speaker 3: sort of inching up in the undecided column, in the
• 50:24
  Speaker 3: third party column. I'm just not sure what to think
• 50:27
  Speaker 3: about that, but it does seem to be something that's
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: fairly consistent in all of the data.
• 50:32
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 50:32
  Speaker 7: And again, we should talk about this through the prism
• 50:34
  Speaker 7: of Joe Biden has a stable and significant lead right
• 50:39
  Speaker 7: now in the states he needs to win. So you're
• 50:42
  Speaker 7: looking probably more for things that could slip than areas
• 50:45
  Speaker 7: you're disappointed with. But listen, I think we ought to
• 50:47
  Speaker 7: take the Michael Jordan mentality to politics, which is if
• 50:50
  Speaker 7: you head into halftime winning by eight, you're like pissed
• 50:52
  Speaker 7: and kicking chairs because you're not up by 16, okay?
• 50:55
  Speaker 7: So where could we see slippage? Yes, you're right. Young,
• 51:00
  Speaker 7: both Hispanic and young black men, both in terms of turnout,
• 51:04
  Speaker 7: but also vote share. Trump is clearly, If I recall,
• 51:08
  Speaker 7: he got maybe 10 or 12 percent of the male
• 51:11
  Speaker 7: African-American vote back in 16. Actually didn't get much attention,
• 51:16
  Speaker 7: but you'd like to get that now south of 10 again.
• 51:19
  Speaker 7: So that's an issue. And then certainly on turnout. Does
• 51:23
  Speaker 7: Biden either keep or get as close to possible maintaining
• 51:28
  Speaker 7: his current support with seniors? You've got to watch that carefully.
• 51:30
  Speaker 7: Is there any movement there? College educated white men. you know,
• 51:36
  Speaker 7: have definitely been a source of strength for Biden right now.
• 51:39
  Speaker 7: They're not a massive share of the swing electorate. But,
• 51:42
  Speaker 7: you know, do you see any slippage there as we
• 51:45
  Speaker 7: get closer to Election Day? And then listen, suburban college
• 51:47
  Speaker 7: educated women may end up voting for Biden and Democratic
• 51:51
  Speaker 7: Senate candidates almost to the same level that Hispanic voters do.
• 51:54
  Speaker 7: It's becoming a core Democratic base. So I think you're watching.
• 51:59
  Speaker 7: That's where we are in the race, which is on
• 52:00
  Speaker 7: the I think on the persuasion side of things. Biden's
• 52:03
  Speaker 7: basically at a ceiling. So what you're watching for there is,
• 52:06
  Speaker 7: is there any slippage? What the Biden campaign is trying
• 52:08
  Speaker 7: to do is just keep those voters where they are.
• 52:10
  Speaker 7: I don't think there's much more to be gained. Then
• 52:13
  Speaker 7: I think on the turnout side, you know, John, that's,
• 52:15
  Speaker 7: you know, when you're up looking at polls at 3 a.m.
• 52:18
  Speaker 7: Pacific time, that's what's got me up at 3 a.m.
• 52:21
  Speaker 7: It's just it's not hard. I don't think it's likely
• 52:24
  Speaker 7: to happen, but it's not hard to construct a scenario
• 52:26
  Speaker 7: where Trump gets Bush 04 Ohio like turnout in five
• 52:30
  Speaker 7: or six states. Biden just doesn't meet that mark. And
• 52:35
  Speaker 7: then it doesn't mean Biden will lose, but then I
• 52:37
  Speaker 7: think it's going to be exceedingly close. So to me,
• 52:41
  Speaker 7: and that's where I think the debate can go a
• 52:43
  Speaker 7: long way to exciting Democrats. People have waited four years
• 52:47
  Speaker 7: for this fraudulent, grifting criminal to be held to account.
• 52:51
  Speaker 7: And other than Chris Wallace for a few minutes, they
• 52:53
  Speaker 7: haven't had it. And if Joe Biden can do that,
• 52:55
  Speaker 7: I really think that's going to help him with swing voters,
• 52:58
  Speaker 7: but also help with intensity. So those are the groups
• 53:01
  Speaker 7: that worry me. I think Miami-Dade County, there was a
• 53:04
  Speaker 7: poll that came out from Ben Dixon and Amani that
• 53:07
  Speaker 7: got a lot of attention, rightly so, that showed Biden
• 53:09
  Speaker 7: not doing quite as well as you'd like him to do.
• 53:13
  Speaker 7: He's offsetting some of that with his strengths up in
• 53:15
  Speaker 7: the central and northern part of the state. But I'd
• 53:16
  Speaker 7: also pay attention there. Now, there it is. The Cuban community,
• 53:20
  Speaker 7: young Hispanics, young black voters. You basically it's a window
• 53:23
  Speaker 7: into all that in a place that's really hard to
• 53:26
  Speaker 7: reach voters. So, yeah, those are all the voting courts.
• 53:29
  Speaker 7: I think we need to pay really, really high. And
• 53:30
  Speaker 7: then listen, in early vote where we we we don't
• 53:33
  Speaker 7: know how you voted, but we know that you have
• 53:35
  Speaker 7: requested a ballot or that you've returned it. Are you
• 53:39
  Speaker 7: seeing a lot of first time Republican voters? Are you
• 53:43
  Speaker 7: seeing a lot of infrequent Republican voters? That would be
• 53:45
  Speaker 7: a signal that Trump's going to, you know, really, really
• 53:48
  Speaker 7: juice his turnout.
• 53:49
  Speaker 3: OK, what what's your level of concern or do you
• 53:52
  Speaker 3: have any concern about the fact that Democrats aren't out there?
• 53:55
  Speaker 3: knocking on doors, but the Republicans are because they don't
• 53:57
  Speaker 3: give a shit that we're in the middle of a pandemic.
• 54:00
  Speaker 7: Well, yeah, my view on door knocking, I think most
• 54:02
  Speaker 7: people who would be targets for door knocking don't want
• 54:05
  Speaker 7: someone at their door. It's the same thing with the
• 54:08
  Speaker 7: rallies like Trump's rallies kind of reinforce the core Biden
• 54:12
  Speaker 7: message that this guy's a reckless narcissist. You know, he's
• 54:16
  Speaker 7: going to do two events in Wisconsin and two of
• 54:18
  Speaker 7: the five highest covid test areas in the country this week.
• 54:24
  Speaker 7: So That being said, there's no doubt that it's a
• 54:27
  Speaker 7: missing part of the arsenal. There are some people that
• 54:29
  Speaker 7: may be the only way you get them to register
• 54:32
  Speaker 7: or maybe the best way to convince them to turn out.
• 54:33
  Speaker 7: So if I were the Biden campaign and there's a
• 54:36
  Speaker 7: lot of other Democratic groups, obviously, they're also taking this approach,
• 54:39
  Speaker 7: which I think is the right approach, which is to
• 54:40
  Speaker 7: put safety first. But if you get to the point
• 54:42
  Speaker 7: where there's a decent chunk of voters in a state
• 54:46
  Speaker 7: who seem like they'd be open to receiving a door
• 54:48
  Speaker 7: knock and you've got plenty of people willing to do it,
• 54:50
  Speaker 7: you can do that in a safe way. So, you know,
• 54:52
  Speaker 7: I'd let I'd let the health experts and science guide that.
• 54:56
  Speaker 7: I don't think Trump's gaining much from from this activity.
• 55:00
  Speaker 7: But it does worry me a little bit because, you know,
• 55:03
  Speaker 7: we don't live in 100 percent virtual world. And I
• 55:05
  Speaker 7: think the Biden campaign and John, you guys have been
• 55:08
  Speaker 7: so amazing with Vote Save America, getting people activated. People
• 55:11
  Speaker 7: are doing great texting and phone calling. We know phone
• 55:15
  Speaker 7: answering rates are up, postcards, sharing content. So, you know,
• 55:19
  Speaker 7: that's a lot of the pie. But the missing piece
• 55:21
  Speaker 7: of the pie is that human contact. And again, my
• 55:23
  Speaker 7: sense is right now there's not a lot of people
• 55:25
  Speaker 7: who are interested in having that. But it makes me
• 55:28
  Speaker 7: nervous because, as we know from the Obama campaigns, you know,
• 55:31
  Speaker 7: it was graded to be the best voter contact there was.
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: Right. All right.
• 55:35
  Speaker 3: Let's talk about this debate. You and I have been
• 55:38
  Speaker 3: part of some successful debate prep sessions, few memorable unsuccessful
• 55:42
  Speaker 3: debate prep sessions. What would you be telling voters? Joe
• 55:46
  Speaker 3: Biden that he needs to get out of this debate? Like,
• 55:49
  Speaker 3: what is the list of top things he absolutely has
• 55:52
  Speaker 3: to do knowing that you can't have him do everything,
• 55:54
  Speaker 3: but you need like two or three things like don't
• 55:56
  Speaker 3: leave the stage without doing this?
• 55:59
  Speaker 7: Yeah. Well, you know, John, I think in general elections,
• 56:02
  Speaker 7: we had like five. Well, I don't know if the
• 56:04
  Speaker 7: prep sessions were good. We had five good debates. We
• 56:06
  Speaker 7: had some bombs in the primary for sure. I think
• 56:08
  Speaker 7: that my view is the most important thing from an
• 56:13
  Speaker 7: attribute standpoint is for him to be tough and in command.
• 56:17
  Speaker 3: Tough and in command. Is that like like how much
• 56:19
  Speaker 3: does he need to? Because, you know, I think there's
• 56:22
  Speaker 3: like a difference in how the judges score the things
• 56:25
  Speaker 3: like debates and maybe what he needs to do from
• 56:28
  Speaker 3: an electoral voter standpoint.
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 56:30
  Speaker 3: Which is like we know from the data that that
• 56:32
  Speaker 3: Biden needs to like people want to know who Biden is,
• 56:35
  Speaker 3: what he stands for, what he's going to do.
• 56:36
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 56:37
  Speaker 3: So that's like really important. On the other hand, Trump's
• 56:40
  Speaker 3: going to be a maniac at him the whole time.
• 56:42
  Speaker 3: And how much does Biden need to parry that, attack back,
• 56:45
  Speaker 3: defend himself? What's the balance?
• 56:48
  Speaker 7: Well, it's such a hard question. First of all, successful
• 56:53
  Speaker 7: candidates in debates remember who they are. So he has
• 56:57
  Speaker 7: to be who Joe Biden is. So here's the thing.
• 56:59
  Speaker 7: His empathy, for those that know it, his experience, people's
• 57:03
  Speaker 7: confidence that he would put together a good administration, all
• 57:08
  Speaker 7: those things are things he should remind people of. But
• 57:11
  Speaker 7: right now in the race, To the extent there are
• 57:13
  Speaker 7: still some swing voters and then there's some soft Biden's
• 57:16
  Speaker 7: voters and maybe a few soft Trump voters. And, you know,
• 57:19
  Speaker 7: who are like they've heard the comments. They've seen the ads.
• 57:23
  Speaker 7: Is Biden up to this? They're not looking at his interviews.
• 57:26
  Speaker 7: So I think he's got to answer the mail there.
• 57:27
  Speaker 7: And then, you know, we could we could use a
• 57:29
  Speaker 7: little bit more excitement amongst younger voters on the Democratic side.
• 57:32
  Speaker 7: So to me, it's not chasing down every Trump attack.
• 57:36
  Speaker 7: It's not being defensive. It's not being angry on your
• 57:39
  Speaker 7: own account. It's being angry. in a controlled way on
• 57:42
  Speaker 7: behalf of the American people. So Trump is not a
• 57:47
  Speaker 7: normal incumbent president. He has failed the country. He's suggesting
• 57:52
  Speaker 7: he's going to basically end our democracy and turn it
• 57:55
  Speaker 7: into an autocracy. Hundreds of thousands of people have died.
• 57:58
  Speaker 7: Many of them didn't have to if he'd handled this differently.
• 58:00
  Speaker 7: We now see that he is maybe the best example
• 58:03
  Speaker 7: of a corrupt cheat and fraud from a tax and
• 58:06
  Speaker 7: business standpoint. I think Biden needs to channel the anger
• 58:09
  Speaker 7: people have. And really be tough with him, not in
• 58:13
  Speaker 7: a yelling way, not in a screaming way, just in
• 58:17
  Speaker 7: an intense way. And he needs to do that. Basically,
• 58:20
  Speaker 7: the American people are his client. So as you know,
• 58:23
  Speaker 7: you and I have never believed that a successful debate
• 58:27
  Speaker 7: is determined by who had the best line. It's good
• 58:29
  Speaker 7: to have one or two of those, particularly in a
• 58:30
  Speaker 7: social media world. So Biden just needs to be a
• 58:33
  Speaker 7: consistent performance where it's he basically puts Trump on trial.
• 58:37
  Speaker 7: I think he can mock him somewhat. I think he
• 58:40
  Speaker 7: should interrupt Trump when Trump's lying somewhat. Um, and then
• 58:43
  Speaker 7: obviously fill in, but what's important is the next four years.
• 58:45
  Speaker 7: And here's what I'm going to do. What Biden can't
• 58:48
  Speaker 7: do is spend time defending his vote from 1994 statement
• 58:51
  Speaker 7: from 1976. We know Trump's going to come after Hunter.
• 58:54
  Speaker 7: Now I think the comeback is even easier with this
• 58:56
  Speaker 7: tax story. That is a place where I wouldn't know.
• 58:58
  Speaker 7: No one wants to hear about our children. You know,
• 59:00
  Speaker 7: I would have 10 or 15 seconds where you go
• 59:02
  Speaker 7: right at Trump and his family and say, but let
• 59:04
  Speaker 7: me focus on the rest of the American people. So,
• 59:07
  Speaker 7: this is a hard debate to prepare for. You know,
• 59:09
  Speaker 7: you want to win the pandemic exchange, the exchange on
• 59:11
  Speaker 7: tax rates, the exchange on democracy, and you can prepare
• 59:15
  Speaker 7: for that. But where Trump takes this debate, you don't know.
• 59:18
  Speaker 7: And so I think with Biden, you've got to embrace
• 59:21
  Speaker 7: his unpredictability and say, you know what, you're going to
• 59:23
  Speaker 7: go out there with some core things you've got to
• 59:25
  Speaker 7: get done, but you need to be agile. And that
• 59:27
  Speaker 7: means Biden may color out the lines two or three
• 59:30
  Speaker 7: times as well, but that's okay. But I want swing
• 59:33
  Speaker 7: voters to watch that debate tomorrow night and say, this
• 59:37
  Speaker 7: guy's up to the job. I think he can dig
• 59:39
  Speaker 7: us out of this hole. And I want younger voters
• 59:41
  Speaker 7: in particular to say, that was one tough SOB. I
• 59:44
  Speaker 7: loved how he just basically pushed Trump all over the stage, metaphorically.
• 59:48
  Speaker 7: I know that's a big standard, but I think that's
• 59:50
  Speaker 7: what we need. Because I think a good first debate
• 59:53
  Speaker 7: can help not put this race away but really frees
• 59:57
  Speaker 7: a lot of the great things we're seeing right now
• 59:59
  Speaker 7: with different demographics, as you asked earlier, and it's going
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 7: to make it really hard for Trump to unwind that.
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 3: Philippe Reines, who played Donald Trump in the mock debates
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 3: with Hillary Clinton back in 2016, wrote a piece in
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 3: The Post a couple of days ago, and he said,
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 3: Donald Trump is a bad debater, but he's hard to debate.
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 3: What do you think like Biden should be prepared for
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 3: in terms of Trump and like surprises from Trump? Or
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 3: do you just have to just go in there and
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 3: think he's going to be fucking nuts? He's going to
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 3: be just like his Twitter feed. And I just have
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 3: to play my game and not worry about him.
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 7: Well, I think, yeah. So you can't prepare for every
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 7: wild punch he's going to throw. But I think you
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 7: can have a sense of how you'll deal with stuff
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 7: that maybe you weren't anticipating. One is, you know, you
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 7: once again are just flat out lying to the American people.
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 7: you once again are distorting reality because you're worried about yourself,
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 7: not the American people. And, you know, it's time we
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 7: had an American president who spent every waking moment thinking
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 7: about them, not about, you know, the latest political attack
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 7: or tweet you're going to send. Whatever it is, you
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 7: need to have a home base to get back to.
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 7: And so whatever wild punch Trump throws, the key thing
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 7: is for Biden, in my view, no matter what it is,
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 7: not to really address it, you know, just basically to
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 7: put it in a corner of lying, or narcissism or
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 7: cheap political attacks, you know, if he does have to
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 7: respond to it, do it in like five seconds and
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 7: then get to your core argument. I mean, as you know,
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 7: your answer segments are so short. They are so short.
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 7: So he's got to be prepared, I think, for whatever
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 7: his retort is to get that done in five or
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 7: 10 seconds and go to the meat of his answer.
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 7: But listen, we know one of Joe Biden's strength. Yes,
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 7: his empathy and his goodness. And he's one of the
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 7: most empathetic and good people on the planet, not just
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 7: in politics. But as you know, he's got some rawness.
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 7: He's got some toughness. He's got Scranton on his sleeve.
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 7: And I think he needs to bring that.
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 4: I don't want this to be.
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 7: Like a geriatric WWE match. I don't think that works.
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 3: But here's the thing.
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 7: Trump's the bully.
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 7: There can't be a single moment in that debate where
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 7: it looks like Trump's getting the best of Biden. And
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 7: I think Biden is in Trump's head.
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 4: It's why he got impeached.
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 7: And I think Biden can really utilize that. I think
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 7: Trump's going to be, you know, wetting his depends tomorrow night.
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 7: I really do pre-debate. Now, the thing about Trump is
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 7: he'll look like there's nowhere he'd rather be than at
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 7: that debate. And I think it's important for Biden. I
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 7: think Biden will like you want to be the happy warrior.
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 7: Like there's no place I'd rather be than right here
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 7: talking about my record, your record, the American people. So
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 7: this can't look like a root canal.
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 3: No, I mean, look, I think Trump wants to play
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 3: authoritarian strongman who looks really tough. He says the word
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 3: strongly where it doesn't make sense a million times every
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 3: couple sentences. And I do think there's sort of an
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 3: opportunity for Biden to paint Trump as an ineffective, weak
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 3: president who's also confused. Like, I think he should turn
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 3: a lot of the lies into confusion. Like, Trump's going
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 3: to say, I protect people with pre-existing conditions. Biden will
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 3: be like. do you even know that you're in court
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 3: right now trying to take away preexisting conditions? Are you
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 3: confused about what your own government's doing? Like he, cause,
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 3: cause Trump will try to make Biden look like, you know,
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 3: he's having senior moments. He doesn't know where he is.
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 3: He can do that to Trump though.
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 7: Make him seem weak, weak, mock him in an appropriate way.
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 7: That's what I'm saying. I'm not saying like a screaming match, right?
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 7: Those moments of strength, uh, through your confused, um, you know,
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 7: The mocking Trump's never faced that. I mean, he's literally
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 7: had two or three tough interviews and in his entire
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 7: first term. And those are some of the worst interviews
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 7: any political figures ever given. So imagine having an opponent
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 7: who clearly has been in your head your entire first term,
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 7: the person you feared facing, challenging you, mocking you, you know,
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 7: undercutting your arguments. I think it could be a really powerful.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 4: Like I think.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 7: Listen, Trump is I love what Philippe said. I mean,
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 7: he's not a classic debater, but he's hard to prepare for.
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 7: He's just throws haymakers. But I think there's a chance
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 7: you could get halfway in this debate. And it's clear Trump,
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 7: who I think will enter the arena as I am
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 7: so happy to be here. I finally have my chance
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 7: to take on the addled, you know, drug infused Joe Biden.
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 7: You get the sense that he's not having a good time.
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 7: And that could be that could be really devastating for him.
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 3: Well, we know, I mean, from experience that incumbent presidents
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 3: don't usually do quite well in the first debate, partly
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 3: because they don't like being challenged because they haven't been
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 3: used to being challenged for many years. And Trump is,
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 3: you know, more in that category than almost any other
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 3: incumbent president. Yeah.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 7: And I also think to your point about confusing also say, listen,
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 7: you might even think that, Mr. President, because you live
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 7: in this like weird world in your own head and
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 7: Fox and Breitbart, because we know anybody that we're cared
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 7: about in this election, you know, doesn't like those entities.
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 2: Right. Right.
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 7: So this whole like you live in your own little reality.
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 7: You're a successful businessman. You tell yourself when clearly You're
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 7: a billion dollars in debt. Whatever the issue is, I
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 7: think you're right about that, which is not, you know,
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 7: policy distillation. This is very much a performance event, more
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 7: so than even the ones we were involved in. And
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 7: it drove our boss crazy that they were a performance
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 7: event before policy seminars. But this in particular, I think,
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 7: is going to be nobody is going to vote against
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 7: Joe Biden because they don't think he understands health care
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 7: taxes or foreign policy like he's got that he can
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 7: reinforce that. Part of that is just less what he
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 7: says than the energy and kind of the advocacy he
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 7: brings to that. But I think a lot of this
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 7: is the performance piece of this, which, you know, again,
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 7: maybe that shouldn't be the way our debates are, but
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 7: I think they are in this one even more so.
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 3: We will see. David Plouffe, thank you so much for
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 3: joining us. Everyone go listen to Campaign HQ and Battleground
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 3: with Steve Schmidt. Excellent podcast. And thanks for coming on
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 3: and I don't know. A couple more days, a couple
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 3: more weeks.
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 4: Hang in there, man. Well, let's hope so.
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 7: Imagine if we're counting votes through Thanksgiving. I mean, we're
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 7: going to need round-the-clock support for you.
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it would peel me off a ceiling somewhere. All right, man.
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 3: Thanks for doing this. Thanks to Ploth for joining us today.
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 3: Thanks to all of you who sent in some questions.
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 3: And we will have the debate tomorrow night. We'll be
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 3: on GroupThread Tuesday night. Check it out. And then on Wednesday,
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 3: we will have a special Pod Save America with all
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 3: four of us doing a debate recap. We're all still breathing.
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 5: You know, I hear we got the creator of MessageBox
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 5: for that one.
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 3: Yes, MessageBox guru Dan Pfeiffer will be in attendance on Wednesday.
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 3: And then Dan and I will do our usual Thursday
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 3: pod on Friday. So three pods this week. Lots of content.
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 3: Talk to you guys later.
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 2: Bye.
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 3: Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 3: producer is Michael Martinez. Our associate producer is Jordan Waller.
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 3: It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin is
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 3: our sound engineer. Thanks to Tanya Sominator, Katie Long, Roman Papadimitriou,
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 3: Quinn Lewis, Brian Semmel, Caroline Reston, and Elisa Gutierrez for
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 3: production support. And to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Nar Melkonian,
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 3: Yale Freed, and Milo Kim, who film and upload these
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 3: episodes as videos every week.