Latest / Pod Save America / “Let the healing begin!”

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“Let the healing begin!” · Pod Save America

0:20
Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
0:22
Speaker 2: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
0:23
Speaker 1: On today's pod, Stacey Abrams is here to talk about
0:26
Speaker 1: the voting clusterfuck in Georgia on Tuesday and her brand
0:29
Speaker 1: new book, Our time is now. Before that, we'll talk
0:33
Speaker 1: about the mixed messages coming out of the White House
0:35
Speaker 1: and the Trump campaign on police violence and racism, and
0:38
Speaker 1: why the president has grown, quote, malignantly crazy about his
0:42
Speaker 1: poll numbers against Joe Biden. But first, check out this
0:47
Speaker 1: week's Pod Save the World, where Tommy and Ben talk
0:49
Speaker 1: about what policing looks like abroad, evidence there may not
0:52
Speaker 1: have been fraud in Bolivia's presidential election after all, Netanyahu's
0:56
Speaker 1: latest dangerous annexation push, and an interview with the Washington
1:01
Speaker 1: Post's David Ignatius. Also, big announcement. Crooked has a brand
1:08
Speaker 1: new podcast premiering tomorrow, June 12th. It is called Unholier
1:13
Speaker 1: Than Thou. We've had this one in the works for
1:15
Speaker 1: a while. Award-winning journalist and editor Philip Picardy is on
1:19
Speaker 1: a quest to better understand his relationship with spirituality by
1:22
Speaker 1: learning how faith plays a role in other people's lives.
1:25
Speaker 1: The first two episodes are out tomorrow, Friday. They are fantastic.
1:29
Speaker 1: One includes an excellent conversation with the rector of St.
1:32
Speaker 1: John's Episcopal Church, who was there when Trump staged his
1:35
Speaker 1: photo op last week. Fascinating conversation. So go subscribe to
1:40
Speaker 1: Unholier Than Thou on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you
1:44
Speaker 1: listen to podcasts. Exciting.
1:47
Speaker 2: That's great.
1:47
Speaker 1: Dan, I think you have a new video too, a
1:50
Speaker 1: new campaign, Campaign Experts React.
1:53
Speaker 2: I would note that that is not the title I
1:55
Speaker 2: would have chosen.
1:56
Speaker 1: The title keeps changing every time I see it in
1:59
Speaker 1: documents on YouTube.
2:01
Speaker 2: I don't know what the title is. I, this is
2:04
Speaker 2: my overlords, Elijah and Yale, uh, who really, um, they really, uh,
2:10
Speaker 2: ward their digital nativity over me all the time. And, uh,
2:16
Speaker 2: or digital nativism. I don't know whatever it is they do.
2:18
Speaker 2: They say they're younger. Therefore they understand the internet better.
2:20
Speaker 2: And so when they offered the title campaign experts react,
2:23
Speaker 2: I said, uh, You know, Crooked's pretty good at naming things.
2:26
Speaker 2: Could we come up with some other titles? They said yes.
2:30
Speaker 2: They said yes, as long as it has the words
2:31
Speaker 2: experts react in it.
2:34
Speaker 1: Oh, okay.
2:35
Speaker 2: It's like a thing. I don't know. But anywho, Campaign
2:38
Speaker 2: Experts React. It's on YouTube. It's a series we're going
2:40
Speaker 2: to do every couple weeks where we break down political ads.
2:43
Speaker 2: The most recent episode, which went up on Tuesday, includes
2:46
Speaker 2: Cornell Belcher, our old friend who was one of Barack
2:49
Speaker 2: Obama's pollsters in 2008 and 2012. We look at some
2:52
Speaker 2: ads from the Trump campaign, the Lincoln Project, and a
2:55
Speaker 2: Senate majority pack ad against Susan Collins. And dig into
3:00
Speaker 2: the question of whether it is possible for the Trump
3:03
Speaker 2: campaign to make being an asshole a political asset, which
3:06
Speaker 2: seems to be their latest strategy. So check it out.
3:09
Speaker 1: It's a great one. It's my favorite one yet. Cornell
3:11
Speaker 1: is fantastic. So check it out. All right, let's get
3:14
Speaker 1: to the news. So on Sunday... Donald Trump's top political
3:20
Speaker 1: advisors told Axios that, quote, their boss needs more hopeful,
3:24
Speaker 1: optimistic and unifying messages. And that, quote, he has to
3:29
Speaker 1: tone down the most incendiary rhetoric. The White House was
3:32
Speaker 1: even telling reporters that Trump might deliver a speech on
3:35
Speaker 1: race and unity. And sure enough, the president spent the
3:39
Speaker 1: week testing out some new material, Dan, on Monday.
3:42
Speaker 3: Okay.
3:42
Speaker 1: He said that an elderly protester who was assaulted by
3:45
Speaker 1: police in Buffalo was actually an Antifa provocateur who faked
3:48
Speaker 1: the whole thing. On Wednesday, he stood up for the
3:51
Speaker 1: ideal of naming military bases after Confederate leaders. And the
3:55
Speaker 1: White House just announced that Trump will be spending Juneteenth,
3:58
Speaker 1: our national commemoration of the end of slavery, by holding
4:01
Speaker 1: a campaign rally in Tulsa, the site of the single
4:05
Speaker 1: worst incident of racial violence in American history. Dan, let
4:10
Speaker 1: the healing begin. So I want to unpack all of this,
4:17
Speaker 1: starting with Trump's completely insane Antifa conspiracy theory about 75-year-old
4:23
Speaker 1: Martin Gugino, a Catholic peace activist who's still in the
4:27
Speaker 1: hospital recovering from a serious head wound that he got
4:32
Speaker 1: from the police in Buffalo. Where did this Antifa lunacy
4:36
Speaker 1: come from?
4:38
Speaker 2: It came from OAN, which is a network. It was
4:43
Speaker 2: created on the idea that Fox was too sane.
4:46
Speaker 1: Makes Fox look like MSNBC.
4:50
Speaker 2: I mean, like to fully understand, OAN is this fringe
4:53
Speaker 2: conservative television network that has minimal viewership that was started
4:57
Speaker 2: about six or seven years ago. And they rose to
5:00
Speaker 2: prominence in 2016 because they became very pro-Trump. Trump started
5:05
Speaker 2: amplifying them. He often threatens Fox with OAN and constantly
5:10
Speaker 2: touts them. They are completely insane. They have– they put
5:13
Speaker 2: forward a whole series of conspiracy theories and their whole
5:16
Speaker 2: modus operandi is Trump. They go out of their way
5:19
Speaker 2: to put forward content that they believe reinforces Donald Trump's worldview.
5:25
Speaker 2: That is ultimately what this conspiracy theory that Martin Gugino,
5:29
Speaker 2: a social activist– Catholic social activist in his 70s was
5:34
Speaker 2: standing there– faked his fall first off and secondly was
5:37
Speaker 2: there to disrupt police signals with his phone I believe.
5:42
Speaker 2: I mean, it's complete bananas. But there's a strategic-ish, which is,
5:45
Speaker 2: I think, how I describe all things Trump does. It's strategic-ish.
5:48
Speaker 2: Strategic-ish purpose to this, which is Trump wants to show
5:52
Speaker 2: that somehow these protests are being led by or infiltrated
5:56
Speaker 2: by bad people that he can demonize. And so he's
5:59
Speaker 2: struggled so much to do that that he picked Martin Gugino.
6:02
Speaker 2: And then ultimately, this is part of a much bigger
6:05
Speaker 2: problem in American media in the Trump era, which is
6:10
Speaker 2: You have these media outlets, OAM, but also Fox and Breitbart,
6:14
Speaker 2: who know that they need Trump attention and Trump retweets
6:18
Speaker 2: to drive their business and drive their attention. So they
6:20
Speaker 2: put out content that they think Trump will like and
6:23
Speaker 2: therefore share. And so you end up with this sort
6:25
Speaker 2: of Mobius strip of misinformation where they're putting out this
6:28
Speaker 2: information because they think Trump believes it, but then Trump
6:30
Speaker 2: believes it because they put it out and then he
6:31
Speaker 2: tweets it. And you end up in this cycle where
6:33
Speaker 2: it's not clear where Trump's brain begins or ends and
6:37
Speaker 2: the misinformation starts.
6:39
Speaker 1: Yeah. And, you know, and like all of these conspiracies,
6:43
Speaker 1: you know, the whole thing falls apart when you think
6:46
Speaker 1: about it for five seconds or when you watch the video,
6:48
Speaker 1: first of all, and you see that he was pushed
6:50
Speaker 1: to the ground and was not fucking faking it. And
6:52
Speaker 1: then you think to yourself, like, yeah, you know. Antifa's
6:54
Speaker 1: just sitting there and be like, we got to send
6:56
Speaker 1: this 75-year-old to Buffalo to disrupt the police communications equipment.
7:01
Speaker 1: That's how we're going to– Antifa, which, by the way,
7:05
Speaker 1: isn't a defined organization in the first place. I mean,
7:09
Speaker 1: it goes back to Trump is very good at attacking
7:14
Speaker 1: imaginary enemies. He needs imaginary enemies all the time. Um,
7:19
Speaker 1: to keep his whole thing going. Like he can't fight
7:21
Speaker 1: with real people. There's always like, there's a caravan coming,
7:24
Speaker 1: there's Antifa's out to get you. Um, and so it
7:27
Speaker 1: is part of his whole gestalt.
7:29
Speaker 2: Um, I don't know.
7:30
Speaker 1: Is that, is attacking a 75 year old man, the
7:32
Speaker 1: best way to, uh, shore up the senior citizen vote?
7:36
Speaker 2: I look, it's been a while since I've been like
7:39
Speaker 2: actively working on campaigns, but I think not. I mean,
7:42
Speaker 2: to give the numbers, Trump won seniors by five points
7:47
Speaker 2: in 2016. He is currently losing them by seven points,
7:50
Speaker 2: according to the polling average that Nate Cohn put together
7:52
Speaker 2: in a recent piece. He cannot win if he is
7:55
Speaker 2: losing seniors by seven. And I don't see the benefit
8:00
Speaker 2: in attacking a senior as a member of a quasi
8:02
Speaker 2: made up domestic terrorist group.
8:04
Speaker 4: Yeah.
8:06
Speaker 1: So the reaction to Trump's tweet was a classic of
8:09
Speaker 1: the genre. Republicans in Congress all found different ways to
8:11
Speaker 1: pretend they didn't see it. But of course, none of
8:14
Speaker 1: them could out pathetic little Marco Rubio, who said, quote,
8:17
Speaker 1: I don't read Twitter. I only write on it.
8:23
Speaker 2: Which is so funny because everything that Marco Rubio has
8:26
Speaker 2: said or done since 2016 has been very clearly in
8:29
Speaker 2: response to his mentions.
8:32
Speaker 1: He's deep in the mentions. Deep in the mentions. And
8:35
Speaker 1: a few sad White House staffers texted Jonathan Swan of
8:38
Speaker 1: Axios to tell him that they're at, quote, wit's end.
8:42
Speaker 1: And tweets like that make them wonder if Trump even
8:44
Speaker 1: wants to get reelected. Dan, what's a poor Trump White
8:47
Speaker 1: House staffer to do?
8:50
Speaker 2: Like, what did they think was going to happen? Was
8:52
Speaker 2: there some other period in their sad, depraved tenure where
8:56
Speaker 2: Trump was really behaving well and doing smart things? They
8:59
Speaker 2: chose to work for a man who rose to the
9:02
Speaker 2: White House by spreading hate. depraved conspiracy theories. And so
9:06
Speaker 2: now they're sad he's doing the thing that he has
9:08
Speaker 2: always done. It's absurd. And it's so funny because these
9:12
Speaker 2: staffers who are constantly talking to Jonathan Swan and others,
9:16
Speaker 2: it's like they're, they're, they're having this internal struggle where
9:21
Speaker 2: they're feeling some measure of discomfort with the way things
9:25
Speaker 2: are going, but not enough to do anything about it.
9:28
Speaker 2: So it's like, they just, you know, Maybe they don't
9:31
Speaker 2: have time to get to their therapist appointment, so they
9:33
Speaker 2: just call Jonathan Swan to make themselves feel better.
9:36
Speaker 1: But I thought it was very revealing when one of
9:38
Speaker 1: them said they wonder if Trump even wants to get reelected.
9:41
Speaker 1: None of this is bothering them from a moral perspective.
9:44
Speaker 2: Oh, yeah.
9:46
Speaker 1: They're upset that he might not win, that it's not
9:48
Speaker 1: a politically wise move. That's all they give a fuck about.
9:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, they have bet their reputations, their place
9:54
Speaker 2: in history on a four to eight year period of
9:58
Speaker 2: being able to share a table with Corey Lewandowski, David Bossie,
10:02
Speaker 2: and a member of the five at the Trump Hotel.
10:05
Speaker 2: And if that ends in four years, then it probably
10:07
Speaker 2: wasn't a worthwhile investment.
10:09
Speaker 1: And, you know, and the same thing with these Republican
10:11
Speaker 1: senators running away. I mean, reporters had printed out the tweet.
10:15
Speaker 5: You know what?
10:16
Speaker 2: It took three and a half years, but good for you,
10:19
Speaker 2: Capitol reporters, for figuring that out. Good for you.
10:22
Speaker 1: And I saw there was a Washington Post story about
10:24
Speaker 1: a bunch of Republican senators and Republican strategists worried that
10:28
Speaker 1: Trump would take down the Senate with them if he
10:30
Speaker 1: loses in November. And they said, you know, what's the
10:32
Speaker 1: best advice that you're giving to your bosses? And someone
10:34
Speaker 1: was like, Well, I would just tell them to like
10:36
Speaker 1: run away from Casey Hunt whenever you're in Capitol Hill,
10:39
Speaker 1: who's a reporter for NBC. It's just like great strategy.
10:44
Speaker 1: That's a great strategy. Very bold. I do want to
10:48
Speaker 1: get back to the larger conflict within the Republican Party
10:51
Speaker 1: and the White House and the Trump campaign itself over
10:54
Speaker 1: how to respond to both the protests and the massive
10:56
Speaker 1: shift in public opinion around police brutality and systemic racism
11:01
Speaker 1: that we've seen over the last few weeks. On one hand,
11:05
Speaker 1: You've got Senate Republicans led by South Carolina Senator Tim
11:09
Speaker 1: Scott working on a very modest police reform bill, but
11:15
Speaker 1: certainly much further than they've ever gone. You've got the
11:18
Speaker 1: White House saying Trump might implement some of these reforms
11:21
Speaker 1: via executive order soon. Stephen Miller's hard at work on
11:25
Speaker 1: that speech about racism. He's for it, I guess. But
11:30
Speaker 1: then on Wednesday... After the secretary of defense and the
11:35
Speaker 1: secretary of the army both said they'd be willing to
11:38
Speaker 1: rename the 10 army bases named after Confederate leaders, Trump
11:42
Speaker 1: says he won't even consider it. And it's not just
11:45
Speaker 1: him tweeting. Here's White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany saying
11:49
Speaker 1: that it is official policy.
11:51
Speaker 3: Fort Bragg is known for the heroes within it that
11:54
Speaker 3: train there that deployed from there. And it's an insult
11:57
Speaker 3: to say to the men and women who left there
11:59
Speaker 3: the last thing they saw on American soil before going
12:03
Speaker 3: overseas and in some cases losing their lives to tell
12:06
Speaker 3: them that what they left was inherently a racist institution
12:10
Speaker 3: because of a name. That's unacceptable to the president, and
12:13
Speaker 3: rightfully so. And I would also note, where do you
12:16
Speaker 3: draw the line here? I'm told that no longer can
12:20
Speaker 3: you find on HBO Gone with the Wind because somehow
12:23
Speaker 3: that is now offensive. Where do you draw the line?
12:27
Speaker 3: Should George Washington and Thomas Jefferson and James Madison be
12:30
Speaker 3: erased from history? What about FDR because of internment camps?
12:34
Speaker 3: Should he be erased from history? Or Lyndon Johnson, who
12:37
Speaker 3: has a history of documented racist statements? And finally, what
12:42
Speaker 3: about people that are alleged by the media to be segregationists?
12:46
Speaker 3: NBC tells us Joe Biden didn't just compromise with segregationists.
12:49
Speaker 3: He fought for their causes in schools, experts say. CNN
12:52
Speaker 3: tells us letters from Joe Biden reveal how he sought
12:55
Speaker 3: support of segregationists in the fight against busing. Washington Post
12:58
Speaker 3: tells us that Biden's tough talk on 1970 schools desegregation
13:02
Speaker 3: plans could get him new scrutiny. And there are several
13:04
Speaker 3: more where that came from. So I'll leave you with
13:07
Speaker 3: the question. Should we then rename the Biden Welcome Center?
13:10
Speaker 1: I got an idea. Let's start with people who fucking
13:13
Speaker 1: fought for the Confederacy. Let's start there. Then we'll see
13:17
Speaker 1: where we are. People who seceded from the Union for
13:21
Speaker 1: the cause of slavery. Let's start there and then see
13:27
Speaker 1: where we go.
13:28
Speaker 2: I mean, it is wild, although consistent with much of
13:32
Speaker 2: the post-Civil War history of the United States that We
13:37
Speaker 2: have a bunch of military bases named after generals who
13:40
Speaker 2: tried to defeat the U.S. military. And lost.
13:47
Speaker 1: To this day. And we have, and like, I mean,
13:49
Speaker 1: so that's, I mean, that's fucking, that's them. That's crazy.
13:54
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the political dynamics. Like, first of all,
13:57
Speaker 1: and let's start with the Senate Republicans. Do you think
14:00
Speaker 1: they feel pressure to do something on police reform because
14:03
Speaker 1: of public opinion? Do you think... It is an effort
14:07
Speaker 1: to separate themselves from Trump. Is it both?
14:11
Speaker 2: I think they do. And you can what made me
14:14
Speaker 2: think that there was something in their polling or something
14:17
Speaker 2: that is telling them they have to be seen as
14:19
Speaker 2: being for something and not against everything was John Cornyn,
14:24
Speaker 2: one of the truly worst people in all of American politics,
14:27
Speaker 2: tweeting about the need to deal with police violence against
14:32
Speaker 2: the black community. I mean this is someone who in
14:35
Speaker 2: the run-up to the 2018 election, John Cornyn tweeted an
14:39
Speaker 2: article about how Texas was going to become a majority-minority state, right?
14:45
Speaker 2: Where he was trying to make the point– like his
14:47
Speaker 2: political philosophy in the Trump era has been to scare
14:49
Speaker 2: white people. The fact that he did this and he
14:51
Speaker 2: is in a race, in a state that is trending
14:54
Speaker 2: much bluer as it becomes more suburban– So his desire
14:58
Speaker 2: to be on record being for something that Trump is
15:00
Speaker 2: not was notable. I don't necessarily think it's a specific
15:04
Speaker 2: strategy to separate from Trump, but I think they, at
15:07
Speaker 2: least some of them, and McConnell was pushing this for this,
15:10
Speaker 2: do not like a political dynamic where you have these
15:14
Speaker 2: millions of people peacefully protesting. You have Joe Biden and
15:19
Speaker 2: congressional Democrats pushing for something, knowing that the House is
15:21
Speaker 2: probably going to pass a bill. Trump, uh, demonizing it
15:26
Speaker 2: and just doing whatever insane shit he's doing that moment
15:28
Speaker 2: and Republicans being there, at least I think they feel
15:30
Speaker 2: better somewhat in the middle of that dynamic as opposed
15:32
Speaker 2: to on the Trump side. Yeah.
15:35
Speaker 1: I mean, look, you know, our, this is, this is
15:38
Speaker 1: also an example of the power of protests and the
15:41
Speaker 1: power of changing public opinion. Um, Like, do I think
15:46
Speaker 1: most of these Republicans are serious about these reforms?
15:50
Speaker 4: No.
15:50
Speaker 1: Do I think a lot of the reforms they'll come
15:52
Speaker 1: up with are going to be worth much? Probably not.
15:55
Speaker 1: But they're scared. They're all scared of public opinion and
16:00
Speaker 1: the politics around this, which should tell everyone who's been
16:04
Speaker 1: in the streets and who's been fighting these battles that
16:08
Speaker 1: it's working. It's working. Tom Cotton. Tom Cotton stood up.
16:13
Speaker 1: At this at the Senate lunch, apparently, and said young
16:15
Speaker 1: black men have a very different experience with law enforcement
16:17
Speaker 1: in this nation than white people. And that's their impression
16:20
Speaker 1: and experience. And we need to be sensitive to that
16:22
Speaker 1: and do all we can to change it. You know,
16:25
Speaker 1: just just a week after he was ready to send
16:28
Speaker 1: in the American military to attack some of those young
16:33
Speaker 1: black men who were protesting, he decides to say this.
16:37
Speaker 2: I think one note about Tom Cotton's remarks that some
16:40
Speaker 2: context is he was actually holding James Bennett's head. When
16:43
Speaker 2: he said them.
16:46
Speaker 1: I mean, so it's like, again, fucking it's bullshit. It's
16:49
Speaker 1: coming from Tom Cotton. But it shows you that even
16:52
Speaker 1: Tom Cotton, crazy right wing lunatic as he is, is scared.
16:58
Speaker 1: He's scared. And he sees where the country is.
17:01
Speaker 2: And he made sure that the press knew he said
17:02
Speaker 2: that because that was not this is a closed private lunch.
17:05
Speaker 3: Of course.
17:06
Speaker 2: Somehow, some political reporters just happened to get a scoop
17:09
Speaker 2: about Tom Cotton's big West Wing moment in here. And
17:13
Speaker 2: so he felt after being on the side of invading
17:16
Speaker 2: American cities that he had to sort of leaven that
17:19
Speaker 2: absurd position with saying one thing that was not terrible,
17:23
Speaker 2: which is very off brand for Tom Cotton.
17:26
Speaker 1: The ultimate both sides there. And why do you think
17:29
Speaker 1: the White House and the Trump campaign are talking about
17:32
Speaker 1: unifying race speeches in police form one day and the
17:34
Speaker 1: next day they're defending the Confederacy and announcing a MAGA
17:37
Speaker 1: rally in Tulsa on Juneteenth?
17:40
Speaker 2: You know, this division has manifested itself in some of
17:44
Speaker 2: the stories that have been written about sort of the
17:46
Speaker 2: state of the Trump campaign these days, which is, to
17:48
Speaker 2: be clear, not good. And There are some people who
17:55
Speaker 2: are– some of them are newer to Trump world. They're
17:58
Speaker 2: not necessarily veterans of the 2016 primary who are looking
18:00
Speaker 2: at the numbers. And the numbers are very clear, which
18:03
Speaker 2: is Trump is underperforming with seniors, which is related to
18:07
Speaker 2: a whole bunch of things, including coronavirus and the economy
18:12
Speaker 2: and maybe his proposal to cut Medicare and Social Security
18:15
Speaker 2: and those sorts of things. But he also has a
18:17
Speaker 2: massive suburban problem and a problem with women. And his–
18:22
Speaker 2: his positions and racially divisive rhetoric are contributing to that.
18:26
Speaker 2: So they are trying to, there are some people who
18:28
Speaker 2: look at the data and say that we cannot win
18:30
Speaker 2: with the same numbers we won in 2016. We have
18:32
Speaker 2: to grow our support beyond the quote unquote MAGA base. Therefore,
18:36
Speaker 2: we have to sand down the edges and make Trump more,
18:39
Speaker 2: slightly more broadly acceptable. This is not, like they need
18:42
Speaker 2: to get like three points more broadly acceptable. And then
18:46
Speaker 2: you have Trump's natural instincts in a set of people
18:50
Speaker 2: who feel like that approach of appealing to people is
18:57
Speaker 2: inconsistent with how he won in 2016 and want to
19:00
Speaker 2: double down on the base. Now, I'm not really sure
19:03
Speaker 2: how the numbers work in that scenario. I sort of
19:06
Speaker 2: have a theory of how they could work. But if
19:08
Speaker 2: you're looking at polling, it is very clear that you
19:10
Speaker 2: need to sand the edges down here. And so I
19:14
Speaker 2: think that's that there's a push and pull between political
19:17
Speaker 2: professionals and the cable racist for profit that advise Trump
19:23
Speaker 2: on the side.
19:25
Speaker 5: Yeah.
19:25
Speaker 1: And you saw some of this play out, like you said,
19:27
Speaker 1: in some of these stories. There's an ABC story about
19:30
Speaker 1: this that ran last night. Some of the base first people.
19:36
Speaker 1: The people who want him to remain in his racist
19:39
Speaker 1: roots are, you know, training their fire on Kushner. Jared Kushner,
19:42
Speaker 1: his son-in-law. ABC says Trump people believe Kushner is alienating
19:46
Speaker 1: the president's voter base because he is too moderate a force.
19:50
Speaker 1: And Jared assumes our base is going to go along
19:53
Speaker 1: with anything we say. It does set up a real
19:58
Speaker 1: challenge for him, for Trump, because like you said, his
20:02
Speaker 1: instincts are everything we've seen him tweet this week. This
20:05
Speaker 1: is who he is. We've known this for years now.
20:09
Speaker 1: he's never going to be able to not be that
20:12
Speaker 1: guy that we've seen in those tweets. And I think
20:17
Speaker 1: it to me, then their only hope is, this base
20:20
Speaker 1: strategy and base plus where somehow they like win by
20:24
Speaker 1: registering a whole bunch of people who, you know, a
20:27
Speaker 1: lot of non-college educated white people in some of these
20:30
Speaker 1: swing States who didn't vote at all in 2016, but
20:34
Speaker 1: might be inclined to vote for Trump now who just
20:36
Speaker 1: haven't been registered because I don't know with this, like
20:41
Speaker 1: with these issues in the news, with the election being
20:45
Speaker 1: about both the pandemic, the recession and, Sort of the
20:50
Speaker 1: the racial and social upheaval in the country right now,
20:53
Speaker 1: like Donald Trump being who he is tweeting like he
21:00
Speaker 1: does is not going to win over a bunch of
21:03
Speaker 1: new people. Right.
21:06
Speaker 2: Well, do you want to know sort of my theory
21:11
Speaker 2: of how they can make that work?
21:12
Speaker 1: Yeah.
21:13
Speaker 2: So I want to be very clear. I do not
21:15
Speaker 2: think this is a good political strategy. But if you
21:17
Speaker 2: were trying to divine a strategy that they could approach
21:21
Speaker 2: this way would be, one, nuke Joe Biden, right? And
21:26
Speaker 2: you nuke him in two ways, right? You knock down
21:29
Speaker 2: his numbers with seniors. Even if you don't win him
21:32
Speaker 2: by five like you did in 2016, you get that
21:34
Speaker 2: number closer to even, which is a doable proposition because
21:38
Speaker 2: these are people who have not been firmly in the
21:40
Speaker 2: Democratic camp for a long period of time. And in
21:43
Speaker 2: the course of nuking Joe Biden, this is very similar
21:46
Speaker 2: to what they had some success with Hillary, which is
21:49
Speaker 2: you make him unacceptable and unexciting to some small percentage
21:54
Speaker 2: of Democratic base voters. So you take your base, you
21:58
Speaker 2: jack it up high, as high as you can, which
22:01
Speaker 2: is not that high, but you get turnout up. And
22:03
Speaker 2: there are large pockets in the battleground states of unregistered
22:08
Speaker 2: likely Trump voters. So you get that up. And then
22:11
Speaker 2: you make Biden unacceptable to some number of voters. And
22:15
Speaker 2: that doesn't mean you move them to Trump. You move
22:19
Speaker 2: them into either some third party candidate, which that obvious
22:22
Speaker 2: vessel does not exist now like it did with Jill
22:24
Speaker 2: Stein and Gary Johnson, but also in a world in
22:26
Speaker 2: which voting requires you potentially to go stand in line
22:32
Speaker 2: next to an unmasked MAGA person and maybe get coronavirus.
22:35
Speaker 2: You just don't go. So where you can reduce turnouts
22:38
Speaker 2: among both some Democratic base who Biden still has some
22:42
Speaker 2: challenges with and the group of Trump disapprovers who remain
22:47
Speaker 2: somewhat skeptical of Biden. That is a theory for how
22:51
Speaker 2: you could do this. And it does not work on
22:53
Speaker 2: a national scale. Trump still loses the popular vote by
22:55
Speaker 2: millions under that. But it is a world in which
22:57
Speaker 2: you could theoretically, theoretically, if everything goes right, win a
23:03
Speaker 2: very narrow electoral college victory.
23:05
Speaker 1: And it does seem like it is not just a
23:09
Speaker 1: strategy that happens because of Trump's instincts, though that's a
23:13
Speaker 1: big part of it, but that the campaign is, or
23:16
Speaker 1: at least some elements of the campaign are coalescing around
23:18
Speaker 1: the strategy. I mean, do we, do we think that
23:22
Speaker 1: any of them knew about the fact that they were
23:25
Speaker 1: going to hold the first MAGA rally in three months
23:29
Speaker 1: in Tulsa on Juneteenth? Do you think this was a
23:32
Speaker 1: purposeful thing? Do you think they were just morons? Again,
23:35
Speaker 1: this is the old, uh, incompetence versus malevolence debate. I
23:39
Speaker 1: personally don't know how no one could have Googled that,
23:44
Speaker 1: researched it, understood the significance of both the date and
23:49
Speaker 1: the place.
23:50
Speaker 2: I don't know.
23:51
Speaker 1: What do you think?
23:51
Speaker 2: Well, look, John, as you know, Oklahoma is the state
23:54
Speaker 2: that traditionally decides presidential elections. And so you got to
23:57
Speaker 2: get there and you got to win that state. So
24:00
Speaker 2: I'm sure that's why he went to Oklahoma. Look, it
24:02
Speaker 2: is always possible that they... fucked up. And they are
24:10
Speaker 2: capable of making mistakes that are so bad that they
24:13
Speaker 2: seem impossible to just be mistakes, right? So that is possible.
24:16
Speaker 2: But I do think everyone, journalists, people on Twitter are
24:21
Speaker 2: letting them off the hook. Because the entire response to
24:23
Speaker 2: this from most people was, ha ha, look what happens
24:27
Speaker 2: when they have to Google this, right? Aren't they going
24:29
Speaker 2: to be shocked? And he's the President of the United States,
24:32
Speaker 2: someone who has run on an explicitly white nationalist message
24:36
Speaker 2: for years now. We are in the middle of a
24:39
Speaker 2: national conversation on systemic racism and state-sponsored violence against the
24:45
Speaker 2: Black community. And here you have the President of the
24:49
Speaker 2: United States going to a non-battleground state on a specific
24:53
Speaker 2: day to have this rally. And so I don't think
24:56
Speaker 2: we can just let him off the hook. The burden
24:58
Speaker 2: of proof must be on Trump to prove that this
25:02
Speaker 2: was some sort of unbelievable coincidence and not a very
25:04
Speaker 2: specific attempt to send a very strong message to some
25:10
Speaker 2: portion of white people in America. And there is a
25:11
Speaker 2: history with this, which is in 1980, when Ronald Reagan
25:14
Speaker 2: was running for president, he gave one of his first
25:16
Speaker 2: speeches at the Neshoba County Fair in Mississippi, which is
25:19
Speaker 2: a stone's throw away from Philadelphia, Mississippi, which was the
25:23
Speaker 2: site of the Mississippi burning murders of civil rights workers
25:26
Speaker 2: and gave a speech about states' rights. And that was
25:29
Speaker 2: based on reporting from inside the campaign at the time,
25:31
Speaker 2: a very explicit message to white Southerners that Reagan was,
25:35
Speaker 2: that this California Hollywood governor was on your side, because
25:38
Speaker 2: the only path to victory for Reagan was to get
25:41
Speaker 2: white people on the South to support him instead of Carter.
25:44
Speaker 2: And I think there was a very real possibility that
25:47
Speaker 2: this is the updated version of the Neshoba County Fair speech.
25:51
Speaker 2: And we should look at it through that context. And
25:53
Speaker 2: I just presume that Trump and the people around him
25:55
Speaker 2: are idiots.
25:57
Speaker 5: Yes.
25:57
Speaker 1: And for those of you who aren't familiar with all
26:00
Speaker 1: the details of Tulsa, you should look at it. You
26:05
Speaker 1: should look it up because it is one of the
26:07
Speaker 1: more horrific episodes in American history. It was in 1921,
26:10
Speaker 1: basically a mob of white citizens conspired with the city,
26:18
Speaker 1: with the National Guard to terrorize the black population of
26:22
Speaker 1: Tulsa at the time. There were murders. There were like
26:27
Speaker 1: houses were burned down, like generations of wealth were lost.
26:31
Speaker 1: It was a horrific incident, maybe the worst incident of
26:36
Speaker 1: racial violence in our history, which is littered with incidents
26:40
Speaker 1: of very, very bad racial violence. So You know, as
26:44
Speaker 1: much as we're talking about the politics of this, you
26:47
Speaker 1: should read up on that because it is truly horrific
26:50
Speaker 1: and especially more so now that Trump has decided that
26:53
Speaker 1: he wants to go there on Juneteenth of all days.
26:55
Speaker 2: And it is notably a racial incident that is not
26:58
Speaker 2: included in much of the history that is taught in
27:02
Speaker 2: American schools.
27:04
Speaker 1: No, right. And then there was a commission that took
27:07
Speaker 1: a long time to actually figure out, to find out
27:09
Speaker 1: all the details and to discover what really happened there.
27:12
Speaker 1: So it was a very long history there. So the
27:15
Speaker 1: Trump campaign also on this note released an attack ad yesterday,
27:20
Speaker 1: which also doesn't feel too unifying. Let's let's play the ad.
27:25
Speaker 5: Antifa is destroying our communities rioting looting yet joe biden
27:30
Speaker 5: kneels down and his staff sends money for bail and
27:34
Speaker 5: biden fails to stand up to the radical leftists fighting
27:37
Speaker 5: to defund and abolish the police with biden kneeling to
27:40
Speaker 5: the left we'd have chaos in the streets president trump
27:44
Speaker 5: is standing up for us keeping our communities safe protecting
27:48
Speaker 5: minority-owned businesses and always standing for our flag i'm donald
27:53
Speaker 5: j trump and i approve.
27:54
Speaker 1: This message Now, you can tell me if there's anything
27:58
Speaker 1: in this ad that is concerning to you. But the
28:02
Speaker 1: line like Biden kneeling to the left is going to
28:06
Speaker 1: lead to chaos in the streets is one of the dumbest.
28:11
Speaker 1: I have heard in an ad because like it is
28:14
Speaker 1: so I mean, we'll talk about this, but it is
28:16
Speaker 1: such an ad directed only towards the most Trumpy Trump
28:22
Speaker 1: voters who can put together a the kneeling reference, the streets,
28:26
Speaker 1: the Antifa stuff. It's a greatest hits of all of
28:30
Speaker 1: Trump's craziness and the rights craziness that you see on
28:32
Speaker 1: Fox News. I can't imagine it's anything but an ad
28:36
Speaker 1: that would get MAGA folks excited and maybe raise some money,
28:40
Speaker 1: but I don't know what you think.
28:41
Speaker 2: I mean, in our poetically named YouTube series, Campaign Experts React,
28:47
Speaker 2: we've looked at a couple of Trump ads and this
28:50
Speaker 2: one fits with all the ads we've looked at, which
28:53
Speaker 2: is embedded in it is a measure of potentially effective strategy.
28:58
Speaker 2: It is just that strategy is executed incredibly poorly because
29:02
Speaker 2: these ads are made by people who only watch Fox
29:07
Speaker 2: and are therefore made for people who only watch Fox.
29:09
Speaker 2: Like you have to know a lot about what life
29:13
Speaker 2: is like inside the right-wing media ecosystem to understand what
29:17
Speaker 2: the fuck this is about, right? It is like, you
29:19
Speaker 2: got like Colin Kaepernick illusions and Antifa illusions, and the
29:22
Speaker 2: average person does not get that. A strategy that tries
29:26
Speaker 2: to make Biden unacceptable to some group of older moderate
29:32
Speaker 2: voters because he is in line with sort of a
29:35
Speaker 2: more radical element of the Democratic Party. You're going to
29:38
Speaker 2: see a lot of this in the conversation around socialism.
29:40
Speaker 2: and trying to make that. Now, I think that is
29:43
Speaker 2: a very difficult thing to sell about Joe Biden, right?
29:47
Speaker 2: Like to the extent people know things about him is
29:49
Speaker 2: that he was a vice president for Barack Obama, that
29:53
Speaker 2: he is an old white guy, and that he was
29:57
Speaker 2: probably somewhat more moderate than the other Democrats were. Like
30:00
Speaker 2: that's sort of the.
30:01
Speaker 1: General, that's like the, that's like the thing you would
30:03
Speaker 1: remember about the primary if you're someone who casually pays
30:06
Speaker 1: attention to politics.
30:07
Speaker 2: So it's going to, so that is a hard thing
30:10
Speaker 2: to like the execution of that. And like the voiceovers
30:15
Speaker 2: in all of these Republican ads are so bad, right?
30:20
Speaker 2: Like it's not, it did like we discussed and we
30:23
Speaker 2: looked at a, um, this other Trump ad Cornell and
30:26
Speaker 2: I did where basically it sounds like a Fox news, uh,
30:29
Speaker 2: buy gold commercial in how they sell it. And it's like,
30:33
Speaker 2: you know, like, so it's, I think they're, that is
30:36
Speaker 2: not a good execution of a strategy. It's, it's a
30:40
Speaker 2: pretty bad ad, but you can sort of see where
30:42
Speaker 2: they're going and they just don't have to move numbers
30:45
Speaker 2: in mass to make this a very close race. They
30:47
Speaker 2: only have to shave a few points off here and there.
30:49
Speaker 2: And we cannot forget that.
30:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I think it's also an example of an
30:53
Speaker 1: ad that is sort of swimming against the tide of
30:55
Speaker 1: the prevailing media narrative, right? Like, people know, or at
31:01
Speaker 1: least according to sort of all of the polling and
31:04
Speaker 1: research we have seen over the last few weeks, people
31:07
Speaker 1: don't hold Joe Biden responsible for the chaos in the streets.
31:12
Speaker 1: In fact, people largely hold Donald Trump responsible for chaos.
31:17
Speaker 1: They think he has handled the protest wrong. They are
31:19
Speaker 1: on the side of the protesters over the police. They
31:23
Speaker 1: believe that systemic racism is a huge problem in the country.
31:25
Speaker 1: They do not think that Antifa is responsible for all this. Like,
31:29
Speaker 1: they are one of the challenges for the Trump campaign
31:32
Speaker 1: in this moment is sort of the reality. And this
31:36
Speaker 1: has been their challenge for the last couple of months
31:38
Speaker 1: through the pandemic as well. The reality that people are
31:40
Speaker 1: feeling in their own lives and seeing on their television
31:43
Speaker 1: screens and their phone screens is very different than the
31:46
Speaker 1: narrative that Donald Trump and his campaign are trying to
31:49
Speaker 1: deliver to them. And I think that's really hard when
31:52
Speaker 1: you're running a campaign to be that opposed to the
31:55
Speaker 1: predominant narrative. It's hard for Democrats when the narrative is different,
31:58
Speaker 1: but like, In this instance, they're not doing a very
32:01
Speaker 1: good job of meeting people where they are in terms
32:06
Speaker 1: of the reality that they're experiencing right now.
32:08
Speaker 2: There's always too much spit on the ball.
32:11
Speaker 6: Right, right.
32:12
Speaker 2: If you go through all the– like everything we've talked
32:15
Speaker 2: about here today besides the Antifa tweet, but the gone
32:19
Speaker 2: with the wind comments about the banning of gone with
32:22
Speaker 2: the wind, the toppling of the Confederate statues, getting rid
32:25
Speaker 2: of Christopher Columbus. What all of this is about is
32:28
Speaker 2: trying to send a message to a certain set of
32:30
Speaker 2: voters that change is happening– is scary and it's happening
32:33
Speaker 2: too fast. And that Donald Trump is a break on
32:35
Speaker 2: that change. One of the things we've said about Joe
32:38
Speaker 2: Biden in the past is like whatever else you thought
32:40
Speaker 2: about him in the primary– He was perhaps the best
32:42
Speaker 2: fit for the electorate of all the other candidates. And
32:45
Speaker 2: what Trump wants to do is make change seem like
32:48
Speaker 2: it's happening too fast and too scary. He can be
32:49
Speaker 2: a break against that change. There is a way to
32:52
Speaker 2: do that message, but you have to do it in
32:54
Speaker 2: a way that is credible for who your opponent is.
32:57
Speaker 2: And making Joe Biden seem like an Antifa leader is
33:01
Speaker 2: not a credible way of doing it. Although maybe, maybe
33:04
Speaker 2: that was the whole point of the Martin Gugino tweet was.
33:08
Speaker 1: Yeah, he is the same age.
33:09
Speaker 2: Same age, right?
33:10
Speaker 5: Yeah.
33:11
Speaker 2: If Martin Cucino can.
33:13
Speaker 1: Be an ad with Biden's face on his body, trying
33:17
Speaker 1: to scam police equipment.
33:19
Speaker 4: Yes.
33:28
Speaker 1: So let's talk about the state of the race. Over
33:30
Speaker 1: the last few weeks, Biden has opened up a significant
33:32
Speaker 1: lead over Trump, about eight points nationally right now, which
33:35
Speaker 1: would almost certainly be enough to also win the Electoral
33:37
Speaker 1: College if the race was today. As Nate Cohn of
33:40
Speaker 1: The New York Times pointed out this week, Trump's standing
33:43
Speaker 1: has eroded among most demographic groups, but particularly women, white
33:47
Speaker 1: voters without a college degree and seniors, which puts Biden
33:50
Speaker 1: in a stronger position to oust an incumbent president than
33:54
Speaker 1: any challenger since Bill Clinton in the summer of 1992. Trump,
33:58
Speaker 1: per usual, is taking this in stride. One of his
34:00
Speaker 1: staffers told Vanity Fair's Gabe Sherman that the president is, quote,
34:03
Speaker 1: malignantly crazy about the bad poll numbers. I'm going to
34:06
Speaker 1: stop there because that's too much good news that I
34:08
Speaker 1: refuse to get excited by. Throw some cold water on
34:11
Speaker 1: the numbers for us, Dan.
34:13
Speaker 2: Well, most importantly.
34:14
Speaker 1: Campaign experts act like wet blankets. That's the next video series.
34:22
Speaker 2: Well, the most important point is the election is not today.
34:26
Speaker 5: Right. Yeah.
34:27
Speaker 1: In fact, it's a couple months. Couple months. Wish it
34:30
Speaker 1: was today. Wish it was next week.
34:31
Speaker 2: As we pointed out last week, the distance between the
34:35
Speaker 2: Iowa caucus and today is shorter than the distance between
34:38
Speaker 2: today and the election. So a lot can happen. Even
34:41
Speaker 2: reading all these stories about Trump standing where it's like,
34:44
Speaker 2: this is his lowest rating since the government shutdown of 2019.
34:48
Speaker 1: I know.
34:50
Speaker 2: Do you remember that?
34:51
Speaker 5: 2017?
34:51
Speaker 2: No, 2019.
34:53
Speaker 1: 2019. Oh, for some reason, I thought that was in 2017. Oh, no,
34:56
Speaker 1: that was a mini.
34:58
Speaker 2: That was when we shut the government down for a weekend.
34:59
Speaker 1: That's right.
35:02
Speaker 2: But then Trump himself shut it down for several months.
35:04
Speaker 2: We just basically didn't have a government for like three months.
35:07
Speaker 5: Yeah.
35:08
Speaker 2: And then there was like that. It's like the other
35:10
Speaker 2: time it was this low was in 20 in the
35:12
Speaker 2: like the fall of 2019 during impeachment. Also think that happened.
35:16
Speaker 2: So like things are going to change and you can
35:18
Speaker 2: even see how they begin to feel more normal. Even
35:24
Speaker 2: if we– this is not because we have a vaccine
35:28
Speaker 2: or a therapeutic. We figured out coronavirus. It's more that
35:30
Speaker 2: we have just become numb to a situation where 800
35:34
Speaker 2: to 1,200 Americans die every day because it may not
35:38
Speaker 2: be happening in our community or in our lives at
35:41
Speaker 2: one moment in time. The press has sort of moved
35:43
Speaker 2: on from it. The protests recede somewhat to the background.
35:47
Speaker 2: I hope they don't, but that can happen. the economic
35:50
Speaker 2: news starts to feel a little bit better and people's
35:52
Speaker 2: anxiety leavens. And then the race reverts back to where
35:55
Speaker 2: it has been from the beginning, which is Joe Biden
35:58
Speaker 2: with a four to five point national poll lead, which
36:02
Speaker 2: means a very narrow, close electoral college race. Like this
36:09
Speaker 2: is like we, everyone on this podcast should stop looking
36:13
Speaker 2: at national polls because they give you a false sense
36:15
Speaker 2: of comfort. Joe Biden can win. the popular vote by
36:19
Speaker 2: four to five points and still not become president. Now,
36:22
Speaker 2: that is a huge indictment of our political system. But
36:25
Speaker 2: that is the reality in which we are living in.
36:27
Speaker 2: And so you look at these polls, like Biden is
36:29
Speaker 2: up by seven and a half points. That means Trump
36:32
Speaker 2: has to move the race to two and a half
36:34
Speaker 2: to three and a half points to be right back
36:36
Speaker 2: where he was in 2016. So we have to be
36:39
Speaker 2: prepared for an incredibly close race. Throughout the Trump presidency,
36:43
Speaker 2: there have been these, it has operated within this narrow band.
36:47
Speaker 2: where at his high point, it is a close race.
36:51
Speaker 2: And at his low point, he's going to lose by
36:52
Speaker 2: a lot. But it always seems to revert back. That
36:55
Speaker 2: may not happen, but we should presume like it will,
36:57
Speaker 2: because that is what the three and a half years
37:00
Speaker 2: of the Trump presidency thus far have told us will happen.
37:03
Speaker 1: I think also, you know, one reason to be concerned
37:07
Speaker 1: are the demographic groups that are giving Biden some of
37:10
Speaker 1: this lead. So non-college educated white voters and seniors are Right.
37:17
Speaker 1: Two groups that traditionally have been with Republicans have not
37:22
Speaker 1: shown that they were moving away from Republicans in recent years.
37:26
Speaker 1: In fact, have shown over the last several election cycles
37:29
Speaker 1: that they've moved towards Republicans. So that's sort of where
37:33
Speaker 1: the demographics are going. So the fact that, you know,
37:36
Speaker 1: like Hillary Clinton did worse among white voters without a
37:41
Speaker 1: college degree than Barack Obama did. Um, in 18, it's
37:46
Speaker 1: not like a lot of the candidates in even in
37:48
Speaker 1: 18 and the midterms made up much ground with, uh,
37:52
Speaker 1: white voters without a college education. So it is unusual
37:55
Speaker 1: that Joe Biden is doing well among those voters right now,
37:57
Speaker 1: which means it's, it's even easier to see them going
38:00
Speaker 1: back to Donald Trump. Um, you might say the same
38:03
Speaker 1: thing about senior citizens, senior, senior voters. Um, the other
38:07
Speaker 1: thing is, you know, Biden made no gains among men.
38:11
Speaker 1: or non-white voters, and he's pretty flat with young voters,
38:15
Speaker 1: meaning he's probably now getting the same share of the
38:18
Speaker 1: youth vote as Hillary Clinton did. But with non-white voters,
38:23
Speaker 1: Biden has not made up much ground.
38:26
Speaker 2: Even if you look at 2018, huge Democratic year, the
38:30
Speaker 2: states that we need to win, like let's say we
38:33
Speaker 2: win Michigan, we win Pennsylvania. We have to win either
38:36
Speaker 2: Arizona or Wisconsin to get over 270. In Wisconsin, in
38:40
Speaker 2: this amazing Democratic year, Tony Evers barely won the governorship.
38:46
Speaker 2: Kyrsten Sinema barely beat Martha McSally. So even with everything
38:50
Speaker 2: going our way, the battleground states are still incredibly close.
38:56
Speaker 2: Like Michigan, the polling in Michigan has been overwhelmingly in
38:59
Speaker 2: Biden's favor. It is demographically and partisan makeup-wise of all
39:04
Speaker 2: the states that Trump flipped, the one most likely to
39:06
Speaker 2: flip back, followed by Pennsylvania. Um, but so, but even
39:12
Speaker 2: if those move in our direction, Wisconsin, Arizona are going
39:14
Speaker 2: to be very close. And we like that, like, it
39:18
Speaker 2: doesn't matter what anything else says. As a matter of
39:19
Speaker 2: the poll say this, we are in 2016, all over again,
39:23
Speaker 2: even in 2012, many of the battleground states barely tipped.
39:27
Speaker 2: I don't know if you remember if you were there
39:30
Speaker 2: for this, but 2011, we did this off-site White House retreat.
39:34
Speaker 2: And Plouffe did a presentation of the 2008 election data.
39:39
Speaker 2: And the small increments of change that would flip the
39:43
Speaker 2: White House to Republicans in 2012 was just like, A
39:46
Speaker 2: 2% drop in youth vote in this state, a, you know,
39:50
Speaker 2: moving our independent numbers by four points. And all of
39:54
Speaker 2: a sudden we're losing, uh, you're in all of a
39:57
Speaker 2: sudden the points are getting 300 electoral votes. And so
39:59
Speaker 2: like these things are happening in these very, very narrow spaces.
40:03
Speaker 2: Like if we were a normal country where the person
40:05
Speaker 2: with the most votes in the country became president, this
40:07
Speaker 2: would not be a problem because we have this fucked
40:10
Speaker 2: up electoral college system, which overweights voters, most likely to
40:14
Speaker 2: beat Republicans. we are forced that we're going to have
40:17
Speaker 2: to scrap our way across the finish line.
40:20
Speaker 1: So let's talk about the best way for Biden to
40:22
Speaker 1: maintain or even build this lead. Some Democrats believe he
40:25
Speaker 1: should lay low. Former Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe was heard
40:28
Speaker 1: on tape this week telling Democrats, quote, he's fine in
40:31
Speaker 1: the basement. Let Trump keep doing what Trump's doing. Biden
40:35
Speaker 1: hasn't necessarily been taking that advice. He was in Houston
40:37
Speaker 1: earlier this week meeting with George Floyd's family, and he's
40:40
Speaker 1: participating in an economic roundtable in Philadelphia today. I will
40:45
Speaker 1: say that Biden's biggest lead in the race has happened
40:48
Speaker 1: during a period where he's been seen in public more
40:51
Speaker 1: than any time in months. So I don't think it's
40:53
Speaker 1: certainly certainly hasn't hurt him. But what do you think?
40:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, that's right. He has been out there.
40:58
Speaker 2: He has been. And I think over the last. two
41:02
Speaker 2: and a half weeks, three weeks, whatever it's been, it
41:04
Speaker 2: has been by far the best stretch of the Biden
41:06
Speaker 2: campaign since he got in the race in 2019. He
41:11
Speaker 2: has met the moment. It was very good on The
41:13
Speaker 2: Daily Show last night. And I think they're doing a
41:17
Speaker 2: very good job in a very challenging situation. But what
41:21
Speaker 2: McAuliffe is hinting at is this view of Trump is
41:24
Speaker 2: hurting himself, so we should get out of the way.
41:27
Speaker 2: And I would imagine, Terry McAuliffe, knows a lot about
41:30
Speaker 2: politics and that he probably has a more nuanced view
41:35
Speaker 2: than what we heard in that one audio snippet. But
41:39
Speaker 2: like this referendum choice thing is a false debate. Yes,
41:43
Speaker 2: the election is ultimately going to be most influenced by
41:47
Speaker 2: people's opinions of Trump, but it is just makes no
41:51
Speaker 2: sense to think that their opinions of Biden do not
41:52
Speaker 2: interact with their opinions in vote choice in the election.
41:56
Speaker 2: And we are right now in a race to see
41:59
Speaker 2: who is going to define Joe Biden first, the Republicans
42:03
Speaker 2: with ads like the one we played earlier, or Joe Biden,
42:06
Speaker 2: the Biden campaign. And Trump still can define Biden as
42:13
Speaker 2: unacceptable to enough voters to win the election. He has
42:16
Speaker 2: the ability to do that. We know from polling that
42:19
Speaker 2: Joe Biden remains particularly undefined to the persuadable voters that
42:25
Speaker 2: we're talking about, which includes sort of the seniors, those
42:27
Speaker 2: white working class voters who are unfavorable to Trump, and
42:31
Speaker 2: younger voters, and particularly younger voters of color. And if
42:35
Speaker 2: Trump gets to them before Biden does, then he could
42:40
Speaker 2: win this race.
42:42
Speaker 1: And look, I saw some sort of data analysts and
42:45
Speaker 1: journalists talk about, well, when Trump is the focus of
42:48
Speaker 1: the news cycle, it's bad for Trump, and Trump does
42:51
Speaker 1: worse in the horse race. When the news cycle is
42:54
Speaker 1: focused on Biden, like when it was focused on Hillary
42:57
Speaker 1: in 2016, Trump does better. Biden or Hillary or whoever
43:00
Speaker 1: his opponent is does worse, right? And I think that's true.
43:04
Speaker 1: That has been borne out. But that's the media narrative
43:07
Speaker 1: which you can't fully control as a campaign. What you
43:10
Speaker 1: can control is your candidate's message and your ads and
43:14
Speaker 1: where you compete and what you say and all that.
43:17
Speaker 1: There was a great study by political scientists David Brookman
43:20
Speaker 1: and Joshua Kala this week. that looked at the effective
43:23
Speaker 1: pro-Biden ads and anti-Trump ads on the horse race. Here's
43:26
Speaker 1: what they found. Overall information about Biden, whether pro or anti,
43:32
Speaker 1: is around twice as effective at moving vote choice in
43:35
Speaker 1: the presidential election than messaging about Trump, whether pro or anti.
43:39
Speaker 1: The positive information about Biden appears to be broadly persuasive
43:42
Speaker 1: across all voters, but it is especially clear among Republicans
43:45
Speaker 1: and independents. This effect isn't just a case of Democrats
43:48
Speaker 1: coming home after a contested primary who might've come home
43:51
Speaker 1: later anyway. it appears that pro-Biden information can cause people
43:55
Speaker 1: who would otherwise have voted for Trump to instead vote
43:59
Speaker 1: for Biden. Seems pretty clear cut.
44:01
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. We've been saying this for
44:04
Speaker 2: a long time. And there are enough voters who do
44:08
Speaker 2: not want to vote for Trump to win this election
44:12
Speaker 2: for Joe Biden. But he has to convince those voters.
44:15
Speaker 2: He has to give them, as we always say, a
44:16
Speaker 2: permission structure to be for something other than Trump. You
44:18
Speaker 2: have to create an acceptable alternative. And Joe Biden, it
44:23
Speaker 2: is pushing on an open door with Joe Biden. He
44:24
Speaker 2: does not bear the baggage of 30 years of Republican
44:30
Speaker 2: attacks like Hillary Clinton did. He is not under, as
44:33
Speaker 2: of yet at least, depending on what Bill Barr's plans
44:35
Speaker 2: are for the day, under FBI investigation. He is a
44:41
Speaker 2: mainstream Democratic politician who is associated with a president who
44:47
Speaker 2: has an approval rating around the 60s with the general electorate.
44:53
Speaker 2: But that can be changed. And so it's not just
45:01
Speaker 2: on the Biden campaign. It's not just on the super PACs.
45:03
Speaker 2: It's on all of us to help define Joe Biden.
45:07
Speaker 2: Because here's the challenge that he and his campaign have.
45:11
Speaker 2: They have a lot less money than Donald Trump. And
45:14
Speaker 2: their ability to get access to the airwaves through free
45:17
Speaker 2: media is incredibly limited because of Trump's domination of the media.
45:22
Speaker 2: We talked about this last week. The media did not
45:24
Speaker 2: cover some of Biden's events. He gave a big set
45:27
Speaker 2: of remarks on Jobs Day, was not covered live. MSNBC,
45:32
Speaker 2: the liberal network, MSDNC, covered Trump's insane remarks about the
45:38
Speaker 2: economy and did not cover Biden's. That seems like a problem.
45:41
Speaker 2: And so what are the strategies you can do with
45:44
Speaker 2: less money less paid media, less earned media to define
45:47
Speaker 2: yourself before your opponent defines you. And that is where
45:50
Speaker 2: I think people can play an important role.
45:55
Speaker 6: Yeah.
45:56
Speaker 1: And one other thing that they found, which is specific
45:59
Speaker 1: pro-Biden messages were better than vague messages. And I do
46:03
Speaker 1: think as we get to not just what the Biden
46:05
Speaker 1: campaign should do, but what we can do, I think
46:09
Speaker 1: in the coming weeks, as you know, a lot of these,
46:12
Speaker 1: there's these unity policy counsels, with sort of Bernie Sanders
46:16
Speaker 1: staffers that they're working on. They're going to come out
46:18
Speaker 1: with more policies. Joe Biden will be rolling out more
46:20
Speaker 1: policies and proposals from now through when he's nominated. There
46:24
Speaker 1: will be a lot of information about his biography, about
46:27
Speaker 1: who he is, about what he believes, what he's going
46:29
Speaker 1: to do for the country. I think as specific as
46:32
Speaker 1: we can be in sharing information about what Joe Biden
46:36
Speaker 1: stands for, what he pledges to do, I think that's
46:39
Speaker 1: going to really help. And it's not just about getting
46:41
Speaker 1: ads up there. It's about sharing this information with your friends,
46:45
Speaker 1: your family, people on Facebook, colleagues, neighbors, whatever it may be.
46:50
Speaker 1: But I think the reason that specific ones work better
46:54
Speaker 1: than vague ones is, again, the audience for so much
46:57
Speaker 1: of this is not people like us or people who
47:00
Speaker 1: are listening right now who pay really close attention to politics.
47:03
Speaker 1: It is people who do vote or have voted in
47:06
Speaker 1: the past or who might vote who just don't spend
47:10
Speaker 1: a lot of time paying attention to politics and just
47:12
Speaker 1: don't know that much information about who Joe Biden is
47:15
Speaker 1: and what he's proposed.
47:16
Speaker 2: I mean, there is a, we've seen this in all
47:18
Speaker 2: of the polling that we have done various background CS,
47:20
Speaker 2: which is the most influential messages are ones that have
47:24
Speaker 2: specific information because the media environment is so overwhelming and
47:27
Speaker 2: so confusing that getting specific information is very hard. And
47:31
Speaker 2: even for like, we are sadly, I would say professional
47:35
Speaker 2: news consumers are And it can be very challenging just
47:37
Speaker 2: to get one very specific piece of information that you're
47:40
Speaker 2: looking for because you are overwhelmed with content. And everyone's
47:44
Speaker 2: running an SEO game and you just can't find the
47:47
Speaker 2: one specific thing you want. Because a lot of political
47:51
Speaker 2: coverage is written in this very narrative form that is
47:54
Speaker 2: just telling the story of the Trump advisor, which is
47:57
Speaker 2: good for the political junkies who are often serviced by
48:01
Speaker 2: political coverage these days. But for a specific voter wanting
48:03
Speaker 2: a specific piece of information, that is very hard to get.
48:06
Speaker 2: And this is a thing that I have been thinking
48:08
Speaker 2: about in trying to figure out the right way to
48:10
Speaker 2: do for a very long time, which is Trump has
48:14
Speaker 2: more money. He has a propaganda operation. He has a
48:17
Speaker 2: domination of traditional media, even progressive media, ourselves, like ourselves,
48:22
Speaker 2: spend a ton of time talking about Trump. How do
48:25
Speaker 2: we turn all of our supporters who are walking around
48:31
Speaker 2: with a phone with access to the internet and on average,
48:35
Speaker 2: a couple hundred contacts through their phone contacts, Facebook, Instagram,
48:39
Speaker 2: whatever else, in their pocket? How do we give those
48:42
Speaker 2: people the information and the tools they need to share
48:48
Speaker 2: information at scale? How do we get them? People are
48:52
Speaker 2: very engaged. And they are tweeting about a lot of stuff.
48:55
Speaker 2: And they're posting a lot of stuff on Facebook, like
48:57
Speaker 2: our activist types. But most of that is Trump information.
48:59
Speaker 2: And this study is really interesting because it shows that
49:02
Speaker 2: even specific information about Trump will change people's opinion about
49:08
Speaker 2: Trump on an issue. If they find out that he
49:11
Speaker 2: jacked up the deficit by a trillion dollars to pay
49:13
Speaker 2: for a tax cut, that will raise concerns about how
49:17
Speaker 2: he handles the deficit and fiscal responsibility issues, but it
49:19
Speaker 2: doesn't change their mind on voting. And even Democratic activists
49:26
Speaker 2: online are caught up in this Trump news cycle of
49:31
Speaker 2: Trump does something outrageous, we react to it. And by
49:32
Speaker 2: reacting to it, and retweeting him or sharing his content
49:36
Speaker 2: with outrage, we are showing it to more people and
49:38
Speaker 2: playing their game. And they're probably in Trump's a moron,
49:41
Speaker 2: but his staff is pretty clever about how to use
49:44
Speaker 2: internet trolling to generate virality for their content. Um, and like,
49:50
Speaker 2: I've always struck by this piece of content they did
49:51
Speaker 2: last year, last year, it could have been two weeks ago.
49:54
Speaker 2: I'm not entirely sure, but it was when Trump attacked
49:57
Speaker 2: Greta Thunberg and his staff, uh, and that people were outraged.
50:01
Speaker 2: Like Trump is attacking a, teenager, which is disgusting. But
50:08
Speaker 2: then his campaign did a Facebook post of that attack,
50:12
Speaker 2: but then they appended a bunch of Trump's rhetoric on
50:15
Speaker 2: energy and the economy to it. And so all these
50:17
Speaker 2: liberals got angry.
50:18
Speaker 1: It was a delivery device for specific information, which I
50:21
Speaker 1: think is what we need to figure out how to do.
50:24
Speaker 2: And I think one thing that campaigns can do, this
50:27
Speaker 2: isn't just about Biden, it could be any campaign that
50:28
Speaker 2: has some set of supporters, is like, sort of moving
50:31
Speaker 2: in some ways to this open source campaigning idea where
50:36
Speaker 2: you're going to put your polling information out there very explicitly.
50:40
Speaker 2: You don't have to let all the state secrets out.
50:42
Speaker 2: But if the Biden campaign were to put out a
50:46
Speaker 2: memo or a video with Jenna Malley Dillon or Anita
50:49
Speaker 2: Dunn or any of their advisors that said, we just
50:52
Speaker 2: came out with you with this poll, and we know
50:54
Speaker 2: that the following four things are the best way to
50:57
Speaker 2: persuade people that Joe Biden is the right choice, people
51:01
Speaker 2: would take that and go share those things, right? You
51:03
Speaker 2: would give them specific language. You would give them, uh,
51:07
Speaker 2: you know, specific issues. And I think, you know, we've
51:10
Speaker 2: done a bunch of this polling at Kirk and I
51:11
Speaker 2: thought about this a lot with that poll we wrote
51:13
Speaker 2: on that poll we did on Michigan. And the thing I,
51:15
Speaker 2: in the memo I wrote about is that too often
51:18
Speaker 2: we think about that in me in particular, like I
51:20
Speaker 2: write that memo and in my head, the audience is
51:23
Speaker 2: politicos in Michigan or at super PACs or the DNC
51:26
Speaker 2: who will read that like back when I was a
51:28
Speaker 2: person who did things for a living. Um, And then
51:33
Speaker 2: influence their strategy when instead what we should be doing
51:36
Speaker 2: is finding out how can we ourselves at Crooked Media
51:39
Speaker 2: Ponce America give information to our millions of listeners and
51:43
Speaker 2: the tens of thousands of people who are most engaged
51:45
Speaker 2: in our activism activities the exact information they need to
51:48
Speaker 2: go do things on their own, right? And I think
51:51
Speaker 2: that that's a real, like that is part of the
51:53
Speaker 2: next turn of the wheel in how you make campaigns
51:57
Speaker 2: work and compete in this modern media environment is that
51:59
Speaker 2: How do you turn all of your supporters into messengers?
52:02
Speaker 2: How do you do distributed communications? And like, that's the
52:05
Speaker 2: thing I'm going to, that we all will keep figuring out.
52:08
Speaker 2: I'm looking forward to other Democrats trying to figure out.
52:11
Speaker 1: You were a campaign expert. Now you're a campaign expert
52:13
Speaker 1: who reacts.
52:14
Speaker 2: Yes, that's right.
52:18
Speaker 1: Just to, I mean, just to put a finer point
52:19
Speaker 1: on it, like, and when we, part of this is
52:21
Speaker 1: when we say specific pro Biden messages, it is not,
52:25
Speaker 1: it is obvious that people are, are not, some people are,
52:28
Speaker 1: which is great, hungry for policy details, the minutia of
52:32
Speaker 1: policy details. I wish more people were, but a lot
52:35
Speaker 1: of voters, when we say specifics, just like, what's your
52:38
Speaker 1: big three point plan on creating jobs? That's, that's what
52:40
Speaker 1: we're talking about. Like people, basic information about what he
52:44
Speaker 1: stands for and what he's proposing. You don't even need
52:47
Speaker 1: to get into like super detailed stuff that even, you know,
52:50
Speaker 1: we talk about on the pod. Um, And I think
52:53
Speaker 1: figuring out what that is, what that information is that
52:55
Speaker 1: moves people and sharing it and how to share it
52:58
Speaker 1: and how to make sure it goes far and wide,
53:00
Speaker 1: like you said, is not just a challenge for the
53:04
Speaker 1: Biden campaign. It's not just about advice. It is a
53:06
Speaker 1: challenge for all of us. It is a responsibility for
53:08
Speaker 1: all of us in this campaign. OK, when we come back,
53:12
Speaker 1: I will talk to Stacey Abrams. I'm joined now by
53:24
Speaker 1: the founder of Fair Fight, the former Democratic leader of
53:26
Speaker 1: the Georgia House of Representatives, and 2018 Democratic gubernatorial candidate
53:31
Speaker 1: Stacey Abrams. She's also the author of the new book,
53:34
Speaker 1: Our Time Is Now, which is out now. Thanks for
53:37
Speaker 1: coming back on the show.
53:38
Speaker 6: Thank you for having me once again.
53:40
Speaker 2: Of course.
53:42
Speaker 1: So Georgia primary on Tuesday, disaster for voting rights, broken machines,
53:47
Speaker 1: not enough ballots, people in line until after midnight. What
53:50
Speaker 1: can we do? right now to fix these problems in
53:54
Speaker 1: Georgia and elsewhere before November?
53:58
Speaker 4: So the reason for Fair Fight 2020, the national work
54:02
Speaker 4: that we're doing, is that we anticipated there would be
54:06
Speaker 4: multiple iterations of voter suppression in 2020. What we didn't
54:09
Speaker 4: know is what they would do in November, but the
54:12
Speaker 4: best way to find out would be to be on
54:14
Speaker 4: the ground in all of these battleground states during their primaries.
54:18
Speaker 4: And as grotesque as these primaries have been, They've been
54:22
Speaker 4: the perfect proof points.
54:23
Speaker 6: That we need.
54:24
Speaker 4: So we know what needs to be done. We know
54:27
Speaker 4: that we need federal action to invest in and scale
54:30
Speaker 4: up vote by mail across the country. We know that
54:33
Speaker 4: we need an adequate number of polling places, especially in
54:37
Speaker 4: the midst of COVID-19 because pushing people together into crowded
54:40
Speaker 4: spaces is a bad idea.
54:42
Speaker 6: We know we need early voting.
54:45
Speaker 4: We need at least 15 days of it so that
54:47
Speaker 4: people have the opportunity to vote when their schedules allow.
54:51
Speaker 4: And we know that we have to have fully staffed
54:54
Speaker 4: in-person voting on election day, which means secretaries of state
54:58
Speaker 4: and local election administrators have to be working together to
55:02
Speaker 4: ensure that this happens because you cannot put this all
55:05
Speaker 4: on local administrators who have limited budgets, limited reach. It
55:09
Speaker 4: is the reason that every state in the union has
55:11
Speaker 4: a secretary of state, someone who oversees the elections. And
55:16
Speaker 4: the most important piece is that because we've been on
55:19
Speaker 4: the ground since 2019, watching, preparing, advocating, organizing, we can
55:25
Speaker 4: now move into the agitation stage, which is that now
55:28
Speaker 4: that we know what the problem is, now that we
55:30
Speaker 4: can prove what the problem does, we can start demanding
55:34
Speaker 4: legislative action, legal action, and hopefully we can get administrative
55:38
Speaker 4: solutions that will help make sure elections work in November.
55:42
Speaker 1: You mentioned federal action. It seems like You know, the
55:44
Speaker 1: HEROES Act, which is sort of the otherwise known as
55:47
Speaker 1: phase four stimulus, has vote by mail and voter protections
55:52
Speaker 1: in it. You know, hopefully we see some action there.
55:56
Speaker 1: I worry about that with Donald Trump in the White
55:59
Speaker 1: House and him signing another bill. Absent federal action, do
56:03
Speaker 1: you feel confident that via legislation in the states or litigation,
56:09
Speaker 1: we can sort of protect the right to vote in Congress?
56:12
Speaker 1: all the states we need before November?
56:14
Speaker 4: We can do the basics and we can even do
56:17
Speaker 4: slightly better than the basics. The reason the HEROES Act
56:20
Speaker 4: is so critical is that states are collapsing under the
56:22
Speaker 4: weight of the economic disaster.
56:24
Speaker 6: That we're in.
56:25
Speaker 4: And so to get those states prepared to reach the
56:29
Speaker 4: scale of vote by mail that will be necessary in
56:32
Speaker 4: the midst of the second phase of COVID that is coming,
56:35
Speaker 4: we need to have the resources made available to those states.
56:38
Speaker 4: That's why we're asking for it. Because 34 states have
56:41
Speaker 4: vote by mail 16 have it. So 34 states have
56:45
Speaker 4: it with no excuses. 16 states have it, but with
56:48
Speaker 4: limited access. But no one has done it at this
56:51
Speaker 4: scale with the exceptions of the five states to do
56:54
Speaker 4: universal vote by mail. Washington, Oregon, Utah, Colorado, and Hawaii.
57:00
Speaker 4: Everyone else has a hybrid model. And the reality is
57:03
Speaker 4: that those hybrid models are not ready for the scale
57:05
Speaker 4: of November when so many people are going to need
57:07
Speaker 4: to use it because otherwise they have to stand in line.
57:11
Speaker 4: That's why the Heroes Act is so important. But saving that,
57:15
Speaker 4: we do have 34 states that have vote by mail
57:18
Speaker 4: with no excuses. So one of the pieces that we're
57:20
Speaker 4: part of is the National Coalition of Organizations, making sure
57:24
Speaker 4: people know about the right to vote by mail, making
57:26
Speaker 4: sure they know what the rules are where they live.
57:28
Speaker 4: There's the litigation that's helping to make certain that folks
57:31
Speaker 4: can get access. But then there's a litigation that's just
57:33
Speaker 4: trying to remove the barriers that we know exist in
57:36
Speaker 4: different states for wholly asinine reasons. And that's being led
57:43
Speaker 4: by Mark Elias, the Lawyers Committee, the ACLU, Fair Fight
57:47
Speaker 4: is part of this. I serve on the Board of
57:49
Speaker 4: Priorities and we're helping fund a lot of this. But
57:51
Speaker 4: we also know that Republicans have agreed to put in
57:54
Speaker 4: $ 20 million to fight to keep these barriers in place.
57:58
Speaker 4: And so I don't know what the outcome will be,
58:01
Speaker 4: but I do know that if we don't fight, we
58:04
Speaker 4: will not mitigate the harm we know they intend.
58:07
Speaker 1: So speaking of potential nightmares in November- I don't know
58:12
Speaker 1: that I've been more terrified during the Trump presidency than
58:15
Speaker 1: last week when he threatened to deploy the military against protesters.
58:19
Speaker 1: And right after he did, and I saw that, I
58:21
Speaker 1: saw you tweet, the final act of authoritarians is to
58:25
Speaker 1: dissolve the bonds of democracy, militarize police, and crush the vote.
58:28
Speaker 1: Trump is near his endgame. And then I thought to myself...
58:32
Speaker 1: All right, if Stacey's this worried, now I'm even more worried.
58:34
Speaker 1: You know, I take it you were as alarmed as
58:37
Speaker 1: I was. How close do you think we are to
58:39
Speaker 1: something truly dark?
58:42
Speaker 6: We are near the precipice.
58:45
Speaker 4: I mean, the benefit of the structures we do have,
58:48
Speaker 4: we saw the military refuse to comply. The National Guard
58:53
Speaker 4: that was deployed, with the exception of a few, I mean,
58:56
Speaker 4: the amorphous case of what happened in Washington, D.C., But
58:59
Speaker 4: by and large, governors had to call in the National Guard,
59:02
Speaker 4: not federal deployment, which is what we were concerned about.
59:06
Speaker 6: But let's take a step back.
59:07
Speaker 4: What Duarte and- the Philippines has done, what we have
59:12
Speaker 4: seen happen with Erdogan and what's happened with Viktor Orban,
59:15
Speaker 4: what we've seen happen around the world is that democracies
59:19
Speaker 4: have weakened and fallen because of the authoritarian actions of
59:24
Speaker 4: their presidents that were aided by legislators who have refused
59:28
Speaker 4: to take steps to.
59:29
Speaker 6: You know, to block them. So yes, I'm worried.
59:33
Speaker 4: In fact, I dedicate a whole chapter to this deep
59:35
Speaker 4: worry because it has deep impact, not only on us
59:40
Speaker 4: here in America, but our national or international position, but
59:44
Speaker 4: also the coalition of global willingness that when COVID-19 continues
59:50
Speaker 4: into 2021.
59:52
Speaker 6: We can't be by ourselves. Clearly we are not doing
59:55
Speaker 6: that well on our own.
59:56
Speaker 2: Yeah.
59:56
Speaker 1: Yeah. I want to ask you about the protests. When
59:59
Speaker 1: you were a college student, you led a protest at
1:00:01
Speaker 1: Spelman in response to the news that the police who
1:00:04
Speaker 1: beat Rodney King were acquitted. What did you learn from
1:00:06
Speaker 1: that experience about the power of protests to change minds
1:00:11
Speaker 1: and laws? And what advice would you give people who
1:00:15
Speaker 1: are on the streets for the first time today?
1:00:17
Speaker 6: Protest works.
1:00:19
Speaker 4: It's not a solution to all ills. It does not
1:00:22
Speaker 4: directly translate into every action. But the first step to
1:00:27
Speaker 4: solving problems, the first step to curing disease is diagnosis.
1:00:32
Speaker 4: And demonstrations are the diagnosis. What has been so remarkable
1:00:36
Speaker 4: about the demonstrations and protests we've seen in the last
1:00:39
Speaker 4: few weeks is the longevity. And it's the multicultural, multi-ethnic,
1:00:46
Speaker 4: multi-generational nature of those protests. Protests not only put into
1:00:51
Speaker 4: sharp relief what we need, They help us start to
1:00:53
Speaker 4: identify what the symptoms are, but also what the treatments
1:00:57
Speaker 4: can be. And so my two pieces of advice are
1:00:59
Speaker 4: keep going. Do not presume that because you've been out
1:01:02
Speaker 4: there for 13 or 14 days that your work is done. Unfortunately,
1:01:06
Speaker 4: in my era, we protested, we were promised, and then
1:01:11
Speaker 4: promises fell apart. And so there is something to be said,
1:01:15
Speaker 4: particularly juxtaposed with the upcoming election, with the persistence of
1:01:20
Speaker 4: this protest. But at the same time, we have to
1:01:22
Speaker 4: recognize that the cure, the cure that is voting, the
1:01:27
Speaker 4: cure that is policy change, like any other cure, it
1:01:31
Speaker 4: takes time. There is no magic pill. The magic pill
1:01:35
Speaker 4: does not exist. The magic pill is the process they
1:01:37
Speaker 4: tell you you have to follow.
1:01:38
Speaker 6: It's the chemo. It's the radiation.
1:01:40
Speaker 4: And so we have to eradicate and irradiate bigotry by
1:01:45
Speaker 4: removing bigots from our We have to irradiate those policies
1:01:50
Speaker 4: that are stymieing our humanity from being recognized. And so
1:01:53
Speaker 4: the second piece is voting feels inadequate, but it is
1:01:57
Speaker 4: absolutely necessary.
1:01:58
Speaker 6: It is painful.
1:02:00
Speaker 4: It is sometimes retrograde. It sometimes takes us in the
1:02:03
Speaker 4: wrong direction. But we will absolutely die from this if
1:02:07
Speaker 4: we do not continue to pursue the cure.
1:02:11
Speaker 1: Speaking of policies, you know, there's been quite a range
1:02:14
Speaker 1: of police reform proposals over the last several weeks, everything
1:02:17
Speaker 1: from abolition and defunding to some of the use of
1:02:19
Speaker 1: force restrictions being considered in Congress right now. What do
1:02:21
Speaker 1: you think the best solutions are from a policy perspective?
1:02:25
Speaker 1: How would you like to sort of reimagine the way
1:02:28
Speaker 1: public safety and the police are in this country?
1:02:30
Speaker 4: So we have to recognize that we must do the
1:02:34
Speaker 4: direct action of reformation and the macro responsibility of transformation.
1:02:40
Speaker 4: And so the eight steps, the removing the chokeholds, the deescalation,
1:02:44
Speaker 4: those practical practices for when police are necessary in a space,
1:02:48
Speaker 4: those must be adopted. Those reforms must become the law
1:02:52
Speaker 4: and the rule. It must be embedded in our training.
1:02:55
Speaker 4: So those clear prescriptions for how police behave are necessary.
1:03:00
Speaker 4: But the transformation is how we think about the role
1:03:03
Speaker 4: of public safety writ large. That is that we have
1:03:06
Speaker 4: to allocate necessary funding so that we are addressing the
1:03:10
Speaker 4: systemic inequities that lead to the increase in crime or
1:03:14
Speaker 4: the increase in the lack of safety. But we also
1:03:16
Speaker 4: have to address health issues like mental health illnesses and
1:03:20
Speaker 4: drug addiction. We have to address the recidivism rates that
1:03:23
Speaker 4: occur because when you get out of jail, you don't
1:03:25
Speaker 4: get healthcare, you can't get housing, you can't get a job,
1:03:28
Speaker 4: and therefore you're going to recidivate. We have to address
1:03:31
Speaker 4: the carceral system in a country that says that the
1:03:34
Speaker 4: solution to every problem is to lock it away. transformation
1:03:38
Speaker 4: is a part of this conversation. I know we are
1:03:41
Speaker 4: getting hung up on the language, but the message and
1:03:44
Speaker 4: the method is what's the most critical piece. And so
1:03:47
Speaker 4: my urgency is that we don't adopt the false choice
1:03:51
Speaker 4: of one or the other, but recognize that we have
1:03:53
Speaker 4: to do both and.
1:03:56
Speaker 1: So you have a new book out this week, Our
1:03:58
Speaker 1: Time Is Now. I started reading it last night. It
1:04:00
Speaker 1: is excellent. because you're also a novelist, you don't write
1:04:03
Speaker 1: like a politician, you write brilliantly, which is such a
1:04:05
Speaker 1: pleasure to read. Everyone should buy this book. You tell
1:04:08
Speaker 1: this very moving story at the beginning about how your
1:04:12
Speaker 1: grandmother was actually scared to go vote the first time
1:04:15
Speaker 1: she had the chance. And you write that even though
1:04:17
Speaker 1: she understood the meaning of the Voting Rights Act, quote,
1:04:19
Speaker 1: she also knew not to expect immediate change. And she
1:04:23
Speaker 1: was right. You were just referencing this in your other answer.
1:04:26
Speaker 1: I think about this tension all the time in terms
1:04:29
Speaker 1: of getting people to participate in politics and keep participating,
1:04:33
Speaker 1: even though the reality of our system means that the
1:04:36
Speaker 1: change we're fighting for usually comes in fits and starts
1:04:39
Speaker 1: and not for a long time often. How do you
1:04:42
Speaker 1: deal with that tension with so many people who are
1:04:45
Speaker 1: impatient for change and go to a protest and work
1:04:48
Speaker 1: hard and then they vote and maybe they get a
1:04:49
Speaker 1: little change, but they don't get enough and they say, well,
1:04:52
Speaker 1: now I feel cynical and I don't want to keep going.
1:04:54
Speaker 4: Politicians have to stop lying about the speed of change.
1:04:58
Speaker 4: So the first responsibility is to tell the truth. These
1:05:01
Speaker 4: are deep systemic problems and the systems were designed to
1:05:05
Speaker 4: maintain them. So anything we do to fix them is
1:05:08
Speaker 4: going to be going against what was intended. Number two,
1:05:12
Speaker 4: that we have to be held accountable not only when
1:05:15
Speaker 4: you vote, but when we're in office. And that responsibility
1:05:19
Speaker 4: rests on the politician to communicate what's happening and why
1:05:24
Speaker 4: and how but it also rests on the voters and
1:05:27
Speaker 4: the citizens to push back and say, what have you done?
1:05:30
Speaker 4: Have you done enough? And how can I help? I
1:05:33
Speaker 4: say that politicians are like, you know, 13, 15 year
1:05:36
Speaker 4: old girls. We respond to money, peer pressure and attention.
1:05:40
Speaker 4: And the responsibility we have is that we need to
1:05:44
Speaker 4: make sure all three levers are working to make our
1:05:48
Speaker 4: system better. But fundamentally cynicism comes about because despair overwhelms
1:05:53
Speaker 4: hope and Despair sets in when what you believe should
1:05:57
Speaker 4: happen seems impossible. And what I say is, it is possible,
1:06:01
Speaker 4: but it's going to take time, and I can't do
1:06:03
Speaker 4: it alone. And anyone who tells you that they can
1:06:06
Speaker 4: fix the problem is not telling you the truth. So
1:06:08
Speaker 4: we need authenticity from our politicians. We need engagement from
1:06:12
Speaker 4: our constituents. And we need to understand that the system
1:06:15
Speaker 4: is not this disembodied set of ideas. It is people
1:06:18
Speaker 4: making choices. And we have to change the people who
1:06:21
Speaker 4: are making the choices.
1:06:24
Speaker 1: I am not going to ask you about VP stuff
1:06:25
Speaker 1: because you get enough questions about that from everyone else.
1:06:28
Speaker 1: I do want to ask you, I feel like everyone
1:06:31
Speaker 1: else has got that covered. I do want to ask
1:06:33
Speaker 1: you to offer some messaging advice to the Biden campaign.
1:06:36
Speaker 1: We spoke for the wilderness and you had this great line.
1:06:39
Speaker 1: You said, if all you offer is darkness, then people
1:06:42
Speaker 1: don't know where you're going. Explain what the darkness is,
1:06:44
Speaker 1: but then offer what the light should be. I want
1:06:46
Speaker 1: Democrats to talk about why we win America. What kind
1:06:51
Speaker 1: of light should Joe Biden and other Democrats running be
1:06:54
Speaker 1: talking about right now at this moment? How do we
1:06:56
Speaker 1: win America?
1:06:57
Speaker 4: I will actually say that I think we're doing a
1:07:01
Speaker 4: pretty good job of it right now, in part because
1:07:04
Speaker 4: from the vice president across the spectrum, we are talking
1:07:09
Speaker 4: about the anger and the legitimacy of anger and pain.
1:07:13
Speaker 4: We're talking about the legitimacy of protest. I've disagreed with
1:07:16
Speaker 4: some of the characterizations. made by some politicians. But actually,
1:07:20
Speaker 4: I think Vice President Biden has done an excellent job
1:07:23
Speaker 4: of listening, of offering solutions, but more importantly, of saying
1:07:26
Speaker 4: he's made mistakes. And I think that's the important piece
1:07:30
Speaker 4: because people don't trust the light if it could be
1:07:31
Speaker 4: an oncoming car.
1:07:34
Speaker 6: They want to know that it's authentic.
1:07:36
Speaker 4: And so I think we have to not lose the
1:07:39
Speaker 4: honesty of this moment, that we have to keep talking
1:07:43
Speaker 4: about it, but we have.
1:07:44
Speaker 6: To enlarge the conversation. George Floyd is a tragedy. a travesty.
1:07:49
Speaker 4: But the extrajudicial killing that he faced also faced Breonna Taylor.
1:07:54
Speaker 4: And right now, Louisville is not being held accountable. Ahmaud
1:07:58
Speaker 4: Arbery was murdered in the streets and his assailants were
1:08:01
Speaker 4: given 74 days of freedom before they were held to account.
1:08:04
Speaker 4: But we also have trans women and men who are
1:08:06
Speaker 4: being murdered because there are no hate crimes laws in
1:08:10
Speaker 4: too many states that actually recognize their humanity. And so
1:08:13
Speaker 4: part of the light is making sure that we use
1:08:15
Speaker 4: this moment to enlarge the conversation, not lose the narrative
1:08:20
Speaker 4: and not lose the urgency of this conversation about justice
1:08:24
Speaker 4: and police brutality, but that we also, as Democrats, acknowledge
1:08:28
Speaker 4: that for a lot of folks, what they see may
1:08:30
Speaker 4: not be exactly what they feel, but it's emblematic of
1:08:33
Speaker 4: things they fear. And we have to be able to
1:08:35
Speaker 4: say we see.
1:08:35
Speaker 6: That as well.
1:08:37
Speaker 1: You've been in the fight to protect voting rights for
1:08:40
Speaker 1: some time now. What is making you hopeful as you
1:08:44
Speaker 1: look ahead towards November?
1:08:45
Speaker 4: So the Republicans love to bludgeon me with this narrative
1:08:50
Speaker 4: that because I turned out unprecedented numbers of voters in
1:08:53
Speaker 4: my 2018 campaign, that that's proof that there is no suppression.
1:08:58
Speaker 6: I think what we saw on.
1:09:00
Speaker 4: Tuesday does a better job of belying that than anything
1:09:03
Speaker 4: I could say. Because what we know is that suppression
1:09:06
Speaker 4: and turnout and participation can coexist. But what gives me
1:09:10
Speaker 4: such hope is that so many people are voting who've
1:09:13
Speaker 4: not voted before. So many people are braving COVID-19. What
1:09:17
Speaker 4: we saw in Wisconsin, is that people said the future
1:09:20
Speaker 4: was more important to them than their lives because they
1:09:23
Speaker 4: knew that what they were doing was setting the course.
1:09:26
Speaker 4: What we saw happen in Georgia, the same. And so
1:09:29
Speaker 4: I'm hopeful because people are angry about voter suppression, but
1:09:33
Speaker 4: they're not defeated by it. We have to keep fighting.
1:09:36
Speaker 4: And as long as we keep fighting, we have hope
1:09:38
Speaker 4: of success.
1:09:40
Speaker 1: Stacey Abrams, your new book is Our Time Is Now. Everyone,
1:09:43
Speaker 1: please go buy it. It's an outstanding book. Thank you
1:09:46
Speaker 1: always for coming by Pod Save America and come back
1:09:49
Speaker 1: again soon.
1:09:49
Speaker 6: John, thank you for having me. And it's always a delight.
1:09:55
Speaker 1: Thanks to Stacey Abrams for joining us today. Have a
1:09:58
Speaker 1: good weekend. We'll see you next week.
1:09:59
Speaker 3: Bye, everyone.
1:10:05
Speaker 1: Pod Save America is a product of Crooked Media. The
1:10:07
Speaker 1: executive producer is Michael Martinez. Our assistant producer is Jordan Waller.
1:10:11
Speaker 1: It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin is
1:10:14
Speaker 1: our sound engineer. Thanks to Tanya Somanator, Katie Long, Roman Papadimitriou,
1:10:18
Speaker 1: Caroline Reston, and Elisa Gutierrez for production support. And to
1:10:21
Speaker 1: our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Nar Melkonian, Yale Freed, and
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Speaker 1: Milo Kemp, who film and upload these episodes as videos
1:10:28
Speaker 1: every week.