Latest / Pod Save America / “Trump gets Covid.”

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“Trump gets Covid.” · Pod Save America

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: When needed, I wear a mask.
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: Okay, let me ask.
• 0:06
  Speaker 3: I don't wear masks like him.
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Every time you see him, he's got a mask. He
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: could be speaking 200 feet away from me, and he
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: shows up with the biggest mask I've ever seen.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 0:23
  Speaker 4: And that was the President of the United States mocking
• 0:27
  Speaker 4: Joe Biden for the use of masks.
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: On today's pod... Dan will talk to Andre Banks.
• 0:33
  Speaker 4: Of Win Black about how we can handle the flood
• 0:35
  Speaker 4: of misinformation being directed at black and brown voters right now.
• 0:38
  Speaker 4: And before that, we will talk about how the president
• 0:41
  Speaker 4: of the United States and the first lady have contracted
• 0:43
  Speaker 4: the coronavirus. Joe Biden's decision to resume in-person organizing. And
• 0:48
  Speaker 4: we'll answer some of your questions about the final weeks
• 0:51
  Speaker 4: of the campaign. Few quick housekeeping notes before we start.
• 0:55
  Speaker 4: Check out this week's Pod Save the World, where Tommy
• 0:57
  Speaker 4: and Ben talk about everything from the security risk posed
• 0:59
  Speaker 4: by the debt that Donald Trump owes Americans to how
• 1:01
  Speaker 4: Bibi Netanyahu quite literally brought his dirty laundry to D.C. Also,
• 1:06
  Speaker 4: on Saturday, we will be exactly one month away from
• 1:08
  Speaker 4: the election.
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: Holy shit.
• 1:10
  Speaker 4: Voter registration deadlines come as early as this Sunday, October 4th,
• 1:14
  Speaker 4: so make sure to double-check that you're registered on votesaveamerica.com.
• 1:18
  Speaker 4: While you're there, you can also sign up to make
• 1:19
  Speaker 4: some calls, send some texts, get some pro-Biden content to share,
• 1:22
  Speaker 4: get other folks registered to vote before the deadlines, and
• 1:25
  Speaker 4: we have something fun for you, our brand-new Votes Save
• 1:27
  Speaker 4: America action calendar. It's like an advent calendar, but for
• 1:30
  Speaker 4: the election, instead of chocolate, there are stickers.
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: There you go. That sounds fun.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: That sounds very fun.
• 1:35
  Speaker 4: Doesn't that sound fun? Everyone needs some fun right now.
• 1:38
  Speaker 4: As always, a portion of every order in the Crooked
• 1:39
  Speaker 4: store goes to vote riders. So get yours now at crooked.com
• 1:43
  Speaker 4: slash store.
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: All right, Dan.
• 1:47
  Speaker 4: Late last night, we learned the shocking and yet not
• 1:50
  Speaker 4: entirely unsurprising news that President Donald Trump has tested positive
• 1:54
  Speaker 4: for COVID-19 and along with First Lady Melania Trump, Senior
• 1:57
  Speaker 4: Advisor Hope Hicks, RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, and U.S. Senator
• 2:01
  Speaker 4: Mike Lee. According to various reports, McDaniel was with the
• 2:05
  Speaker 4: president last Friday and tested positive on Wednesday. White House
• 2:08
  Speaker 4: aides believe that the president was exhausted and feeling sick
• 2:11
  Speaker 4: on Wednesday. Hicks tested positive Wednesday afternoon after traveling with
• 2:16
  Speaker 4: the president to the debate in Ohio on Tuesday and
• 2:18
  Speaker 4: a rally in Minnesota on Wednesday where she started feeling symptoms.
• 2:22
  Speaker 4: The White House hid the president's symptoms and Hicks' positive
• 2:25
  Speaker 4: diagnosis from the public on Thursday when Trump traveled to
• 2:28
  Speaker 4: a fundraiser at his golf club in New Jersey. And
• 2:31
  Speaker 4: according to the New York Times, quote, seemed lethargic as
• 2:34
  Speaker 4: he interacted with about 100 people at the fundraiser. He
• 2:38
  Speaker 4: also delivered remarks from the White House for the annual
• 2:40
  Speaker 4: Al Smith dinner where he said, quote, the end of
• 2:43
  Speaker 4: the pandemic is in sight. The president and the first
• 2:47
  Speaker 4: lady are now isolating at the White House with what's
• 2:49
  Speaker 4: being reported as so far mild symptoms. Vice President Mike
• 2:52
  Speaker 4: Pence and his wife Karen tested negative this morning, as
• 2:55
  Speaker 4: did Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and a number of other
• 2:58
  Speaker 4: Trump family and staff members. Just as a little reminder,
• 3:02
  Speaker 4: here's how Trump talked about the virus at a crowded,
• 3:05
  Speaker 4: maskless rally just 10 days ago.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: But it affects virtually nobody. It's an amazing thing. By
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: the way, open your schools. Everybody, open your schools.
• 3:15
  Speaker 4: Dan, is it weird that the most shocking news of
• 3:17
  Speaker 4: the 2020 campaign almost seems like it was inevitable all along?
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: I will say in that clip from Trump virtually is
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: doing a lot of work there. I mean, like the
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: way you sum this up is exactly right, which is
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: it is obviously shocking that the president and the first
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: lady have coronavirus a month before the election. That is,
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: you know, it's a huge news event. But it is
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: ultimately unsurprising, given the fact that Trump has flouted the
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: advice of his own scientists, has refused to do even
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: the bare minimum to prevent the spread of the virus,
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: including simply just wearing a piece of cloth over his face,
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: the right response is not, I can't believe that Trump
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: has COVID. It's, I can't believe it took Trump this
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: long to get COVID. And it, I mean, it really
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: is like the very, it was just three days ago,
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: three days ago that the president in front of 80
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: million people made fun of Joe Biden for social distancing
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: and wearing a mask as if that was a sign
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: of weakness. But what we've seen is when you ignore
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: the scientists, you ignore the doctors, it's a sign of
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: stupidity And Trump is paying the price for it. I
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: do think that we should have a caveat, which is
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: we don't want anyone in the country to get COVID.
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: And that includes the Trumps. We want everyone who contracts
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: COVID to recover without any complications. That includes the Trumps.
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: But that does not mean that because Trump has COVID
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: that he is now immune from criticism for what he
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: has done to the country and how he put himself
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: in this position. And so you can hold both of
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: those two thoughts in your head at the same time.
• 4:51
  Speaker 4: Well- especially because of the virus we're dealing with here,
• 4:53
  Speaker 4: which is incredibly transmissible, easily transmissible, very, very catchy. And
• 4:58
  Speaker 4: so like, even though more than 200,000 people have died
• 5:01
  Speaker 4: in this country of COVID, like another 40,000 plus were
• 5:04
  Speaker 4: diagnosed with COVID yesterday, in addition to the president of
• 5:07
  Speaker 4: the United States, no one in America, no one in
• 5:09
  Speaker 4: the world should have to suffer through this horrible, horrible
• 5:12
  Speaker 4: fucking disease. What makes this disease unique is that it's
• 5:16
  Speaker 4: not just about you catching it. It's not just enough
• 5:19
  Speaker 4: about whether you take precautions for yourself. It's when you
• 5:22
  Speaker 4: have the disease, you, when you have COVID, you are
• 5:25
  Speaker 4: very transmissible to everyone else. So you have a responsibility
• 5:29
  Speaker 4: not to put other people at risk. The president has
• 5:31
  Speaker 4: a responsibility not to put the fucking country at risk,
• 5:34
  Speaker 4: which he has been doing the entire time by flouting
• 5:37
  Speaker 4: scientist recommendations, uh, by not offering easy, accessible, fast testing
• 5:43
  Speaker 4: to every American. by not requiring people to wear a mask.
• 5:46
  Speaker 4: He's put the whole country at risk through his policies.
• 5:48
  Speaker 4: And over the last week, he put just about everyone
• 5:52
  Speaker 4: he came in contact with at risk. There's now reports
• 5:56
  Speaker 4: that the president of Notre Dame, who was at the
• 5:59
  Speaker 4: event on Saturday at the White House in the Rose Garden,
• 6:01
  Speaker 4: where the president nominated Amy Coney Barrett, for the Supreme
• 6:04
  Speaker 4: Court that he contracted the disease. It could have been,
• 6:07
  Speaker 4: there could have been a super spreader event at the
• 6:09
  Speaker 4: White House on Saturday. But even if that wasn't a
• 6:12
  Speaker 4: super spreader event, there have been multiple potential super spreader
• 6:15
  Speaker 4: events at the White House, at Trump rallies, indoors, no masks,
• 6:20
  Speaker 4: like just no social distancing whatsoever, people shaking hands, hugging.
• 6:25
  Speaker 4: And like those, if those people don't give a shit
• 6:27
  Speaker 4: about themselves, that's one thing. Doing that means you don't
• 6:29
  Speaker 4: give a shit about anyone else around you that you
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: come in contact with.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: It's like it has become this litmus test that if
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: you act responsible, you are somehow insulting Trump in his eyes.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: So the president of Notre Dame is a great example.
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: He is a university president. If the students in Notre
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: Dame had done what he had done to go on
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: to an event like that without a mask, they would
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: be in violation of the policies at Notre Dame. Like
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: no one is acting like adults here. It's not just Trump.
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: It's everyone around him. Right. It's the fucking debate commission,
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: which put in place rules for mask wearing, but then
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: did not impose them on the Trump team when they
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: did not wear them. Like everyone involved is so afraid
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: of seeming biased in some way, shape, or form that
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: they're ignoring scientists. The debate commission, the Cleveland Clinic, should
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: have thrown the Trump family and the Trump staff out
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: of that room because that is what the rules were.
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: But they did not do that, right? They did not
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: do that and they put everyone at risk doing it.
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: And it is– the whole thing is fucking disgraceful from
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: Trump to every member of the Republican Party to the
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: people who went to that event who may wear wet
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: masks normally but are afraid to do it in front
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: of the president because they think they will be ridiculed
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: for it. Everyone involved here. Like I started today– I
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: discovered this news at 2 in the morning when I
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: looked at my phone accidentally and wondered why I had
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: 700 texts. Obviously, there was shock. Then you do think
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: about it in the context of what does it mean politically,
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: which we'll talk about, and what does it mean for
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: government to have the leader of the free world incapacitated potentially?
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: What does all that mean? But the place where I
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: have landed emotionally is pure, unadulterated rage.
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, me too.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: Is what has happened to Trump, he has done to
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: everyone else. And he is obviously someone who was older.
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: He is not particularly healthy. He is in that vulnerable population,
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: but he also has access to the best healthcare in
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: the entire world. And at the same time that he
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: is going around being the single biggest source of misinformation
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: about the virus, modeling the absolute wrong behavior, he's trying
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: to take healthcare away from all of the people who
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: may get COVID because of his insipid stupidity. And that
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: is just absolutely infuriating at the most base level.
• 8:38
  Speaker 4: I mean, you know that Trump will eventually say, or
• 8:40
  Speaker 4: the White House will say, like, you can take all
• 8:43
  Speaker 4: the precautions possible. You can wear masks, you can stay
• 8:46
  Speaker 4: away from people, you can have rapid testing, and still
• 8:49
  Speaker 4: you might be able to contract this virus.
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: And that is true.
• 8:52
  Speaker 4: A lot of people take every possible precaution and you
• 8:54
  Speaker 4: could still do it. They have taken very few of
• 8:57
  Speaker 4: those precautions. They vote the rules all the time. I mean,
• 9:00
  Speaker 4: I remember during the debate seeing Naomi Biden- Joe Biden's granddaughter, tweet, like,
• 9:06
  Speaker 4: we're all sitting here masked up, all the Biden family,
• 9:08
  Speaker 4: all the Biden staff, and we're all looking at the
• 9:11
  Speaker 4: Trump family and the Trump staff sitting there with no masks.
• 9:15
  Speaker 4: And it's like that– it's just fucking common respect for
• 9:18
  Speaker 4: other human beings and their lives and their well-being, right? Like,
• 9:21
  Speaker 4: I mean– Just the idea that all those people who
• 9:25
  Speaker 4: were at the debate sitting there watching a bunch of
• 9:28
  Speaker 4: people who didn't have masks on because why? Because they said, oh,
• 9:31
  Speaker 4: we were tested this morning. They know that even if
• 9:34
  Speaker 4: you're tested walking into the debate hall, you should still–
• 9:37
  Speaker 4: what's the problem with wearing masks? What's the problem with
• 9:40
  Speaker 4: wearing masks while you're sitting watching the debate? There's no problem.
• 9:42
  Speaker 4: There's nothing that doesn't hurt anything. It's just an extra
• 9:46
  Speaker 4: precaution to make sure that you don't spread it to people.
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: Well, guess what?
• 9:49
  Speaker 4: A bunch of them had the fucking virus while they
• 9:51
  Speaker 4: were sitting there unmasked inside.
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: It's not even just being selfish. We have come to
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: expect that. from Trump and the people around him. That
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: is their defining quality, right, is self-interested narcissism. But that's
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: the problem is they're just so stupid. Like, I am
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: not shocked that the Trump family, the Trump staff don't
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: care about the Bidens or the staff who work the
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: debate hall, but they're too stupid to even protect themselves, right?
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: Like that is just how dumb this is, which is
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: even if you do not care about anyone else, you
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: can't even do the bare minimum to protect yourself because
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: you think– I don't even know what you think. Like
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: events is weakness. I'm trying– I'm going to give myself
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: COVID to own the libs. All of this is so stupid.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: And like everything else that has happened in this country
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: since March, it was completely and totally preventable if we
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: had the basic modicum of responsible leadership in this country,
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: which we do not.
• 10:50
  Speaker 4: Well, because they put, and they politicize it from the start.
• 10:52
  Speaker 4: Like I'm remembering, remember that, I forget which movie chain
• 10:54
  Speaker 4: it was, movie theater chain, but they said that we're
• 10:58
  Speaker 4: not going to necessarily require masks because we didn't want
• 11:00
  Speaker 4: to politicize, we don't want to get into politics. And
• 11:03
  Speaker 4: everyone mocked them for that. Eventually they relented and said
• 11:05
  Speaker 4: they were going to require masks. But because of what
• 11:07
  Speaker 4: Trump and Republicans have done since the beginning of this,
• 11:11
  Speaker 4: like the idea of doing something that every scientist say
• 11:14
  Speaker 4: would protect you from a disease and protect others from
• 11:18
  Speaker 4: the virus, that was politicized. And so stepping in to
• 11:21
  Speaker 4: say we're going to require masks became a political move
• 11:25
  Speaker 4: for a lot of people across this country because of
• 11:27
  Speaker 4: what Trump did. And the other thing too is like,
• 11:30
  Speaker 4: we can talk all we want about all the precautions
• 11:31
  Speaker 4: that they have not been taking at all of their
• 11:33
  Speaker 4: events at everywhere Trump has gone. But even after they knew,
• 11:37
  Speaker 4: what's also outrageous, even after they knew that Hope Hicks
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: tested positive For the coronavirus, they all decided to get
• 11:47
  Speaker 4: on a fucking plane and go to New Jersey with
• 11:50
  Speaker 4: the president and then have him mingle with 100 people?
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: What?
• 11:54
  Speaker 4: Like, that is just, like, he knowingly, the White House
• 11:57
  Speaker 4: knowingly exposed other Americans to the virus. And then they
• 12:02
  Speaker 4: tried to hide it from the press. We only know this.
• 12:05
  Speaker 4: We only know this because of Jennifer Jacobs at Bloomberg
• 12:08
  Speaker 4: News reported the news.
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: The White House.
• 12:11
  Speaker 4: If she hadn't reported that, would they have ever told us?
• 12:13
  Speaker 4: Or would they have just like let Melania and Donald
• 12:16
  Speaker 4: Trump just like hang out at home for 10 days
• 12:18
  Speaker 4: and the rest of us wonder why? Or if they
• 12:21
  Speaker 4: were feeling okay, would they just let them go out
• 12:23
  Speaker 4: and do an event? Who the fuck knows? We didn't
• 12:24
  Speaker 4: know because they didn't tell us. They didn't tell the
• 12:26
  Speaker 4: Biden campaign. They did not alert the Biden campaign that
• 12:30
  Speaker 4: they may have been exposed because they were with them
• 12:31
  Speaker 4: at the debate. Not even a fucking phone call.
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: And it's not even just an abundance of caution. There
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: were reports that Trump was feeling symptomatic On Wednesday night.
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: So you have Trump being in contact with someone for
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: days on end in a small room for debate prep
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: with no masks on, per the reporting by Dan Abash
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: at CNN. Then you get a positive test for that person.
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: Then Trump himself is exhibiting mild symptoms, according to reports.
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: And then you still go and think about it. If
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: he treats his rich friends at his golf club this shitty,
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: think about how he treats the rest of Americans. Yeah.
• 13:11
  Speaker 4: I mean, let's talk about what this means for, like,
• 13:15
  Speaker 4: whether we can have a functioning government here. Like, what
• 13:17
  Speaker 4: happens with, you know, the Supreme Court nomination? What happens
• 13:21
  Speaker 4: with Congress? We've got Mike Lee's tested positive. You know,
• 13:26
  Speaker 4: I guess all the other congressional leaders have to get tested, though.
• 13:28
  Speaker 4: There's not, like, a routine testing regime for Congress, which
• 13:33
  Speaker 4: seems like a problem, too. What happens with, like, you know...
• 13:38
  Speaker 4: the president was supposed to be on a call with
• 13:39
  Speaker 4: governors even today after the diagnosis, but then Mike Pence
• 13:44
  Speaker 4: jumped on. So we don't know how the president's doing.
• 13:46
  Speaker 4: Like what are the sort of implications for the functioning
• 13:49
  Speaker 4: of government here?
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: It's really hard to say because even under the best scenarios,
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: government hasn't been functioning really. So I mean, so let's
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: do the, let's do the executive branch in the white
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: house and then we'll come back to the Senate and
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: that confirmation of Amy Comey Barrett. It's, it's really unclear what,
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: the White House. Mark Meadows went out today and declared, essentially,
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: he was in charge, I guess, in a not particularly
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: confident sense.
• 14:14
  Speaker 4: By the way, with no masks on. Mark Meadows walked outside,
• 14:18
  Speaker 4: no mask on, and started talking to reporters. And he said, oh, well,
• 14:21
  Speaker 4: I was tested, so I'm fine.
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: And so if the White House is following the appropriate precautions,
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: most of the White House staff would be at least
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: working from home for the next 14 days, as I
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: understand it. Not sure if that's happening, will happen. And
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: I think the government is set up in a crisis
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: to function like that, right? In a world in which
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: there was a natural disaster, a terrorist attack, the White
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: House was incapacitated. We know that there are processes in
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: place to do that. So I think the government should
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: at least function at least as poorly as it was
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: functioning two days ago. And so that's not high, super
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: high on my list of concerns. They weren't doing a
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: lot anyway, and I don't think they're going to be
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: doing a lot now. You know, well, it's the fact
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: that Trump did not make that call is interesting. And
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: we just, and this is also the problem with dealing
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: with a president administration that has zero credibility. We just
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: don't know. We're going to hear from the White House doctor. Normally,
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: I would say that you could trust the White House doctor.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: I don't believe that anymore. And so at least take
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: everything report about who in the White House has COVID,
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: what their symptoms are, and what they are doing, certainly
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: with a grain of salt, because the Trump administration has
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: not earned the benefit of the doubt, but it's just imagination. Now,
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: right before we got on this Zoom or sort of recording,
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: however you want to say it, Schumer and Feinstein asked
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: for a delay in the hearings on Amy Coney Barrett
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: saying that they have to happen in person for a
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: lifetime appointment. Now, I am pretty confident that if the
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Capitol were on fire, Mitch McConnell would insist the Republicans
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: vote to confirm a Supreme court vote against the ACA
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: before you could evacuate the building. So I like, they
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: will put everyone at risk. They will run over every
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: norm to do this. I think what has been driving
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: so much of the momentum from McConnell and others here
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: is they believe that Trump is going to lose. And
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: I think that belief is probably even stronger today. We
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: don't know that that belief is correct or not, but
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: the urgency to get this done come hell or high water, um,
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: I think is going to continue from the Republicans. The
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: Democrats should push back against that as much as they can.
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: I think it's good that Sherman Feinstein did that. But
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: I think we know where McConnell's head is on this.
• 16:32
  Speaker 4: And look, and it's just and beyond the politics, every
• 16:35
  Speaker 4: Democrat who's working in Washington and their staff and everyone
• 16:38
  Speaker 4: who comes in contact with the White House, like should
• 16:40
  Speaker 4: follow every single protocol and procedure to protect themselves. You know,
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: like there's the CDC has guidelines. If you were around
• 16:46
  Speaker 4: someone who has COVID, you're supposed to quarantine for 14 days,
• 16:50
  Speaker 4: maybe 10 days. like depending on what kind of tests
• 16:54
  Speaker 4: you get back. And so like, yeah, we can't have
• 16:58
  Speaker 4: live hearings where, you know, who was around Mike Lee,
• 17:02
  Speaker 4: who was around, you know, like Nancy Pelosi has got
• 17:03
  Speaker 4: to get tested. She was around Mnookin, even though he
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: was tested negative. Like, Who was Mitch McConnell talking to?
• 17:08
  Speaker 4: Like all these people work together all the time and
• 17:11
  Speaker 4: they are all in like the line of succession here
• 17:13
  Speaker 4: to the president or a lot of them, right?
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: Like it is very.
• 17:16
  Speaker 4: Important now that both Republicans and Democrats in Congress in
• 17:20
  Speaker 4: the White House take every possible precaution right now to
• 17:25
  Speaker 4: make sure that there are no more positive tests in
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: addition to the ones that may come out. I mean,
• 17:30
  Speaker 4: Mark Meadows said when he went out there that he
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: expects more positive tests to come from the White House,
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: from White House staffers. So, un-fucking-believable, man.
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: It's so stupid. Like, everything else that has happened, it
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: is so stupid because we are led by stupid people
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: who do stupid things for stupid reasons.
• 17:48
  Speaker 4: And have no concern for other human beings. Have no
• 17:51
  Speaker 4: concern for anyone but themselves. That characterizes the whole fucking
• 17:55
  Speaker 4: administration the whole time. They just do not give a
• 17:57
  Speaker 4: shit about anyone else. They care about their own egos.
• 17:59
  Speaker 4: They care about their own fucking re-election. And they don't
• 18:02
  Speaker 4: care who they hurt, quite literally.
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 18:05
  Speaker 4: By possibly, you know, giving them a virus. The president's
• 18:09
  Speaker 4: diagnosis comes with only 32 days left until election day,
• 18:12
  Speaker 4: with over 2 million Americans having already voted. The next
• 18:15
  Speaker 4: presidential debate is 13 days away. We have no idea
• 18:18
  Speaker 4: whether that debate or even the final debate will take place.
• 18:21
  Speaker 4: We have no idea whether Donald Trump will hold another
• 18:23
  Speaker 4: rally again. We have no idea whether there will be
• 18:25
  Speaker 4: anything resembling a normal campaign. Those senior Trump aides have
• 18:29
  Speaker 4: already told the New York Times that, quote, the president
• 18:31
  Speaker 4: would face harsh judgment from voters for throwing the country
• 18:34
  Speaker 4: into greater uncertainty after one of the most trying years
• 18:36
  Speaker 4: in American history.
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no shit.
• 18:39
  Speaker 4: Republican consultant Rob Stutzman told the Times it's hard to
• 18:41
  Speaker 4: imagine this doesn't end his hopes of reelection.
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: Dan, is it even.
• 18:45
  Speaker 4: Possible to assess the political impact of this development yet?
• 18:49
  Speaker 4: And like, what are the various factors at play here?
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: I think you have to separate two related questions here.
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: How does this diagnosis impact the conduct of the campaign
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: over the next 32 days? And the other question is,
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: how does it impact the outcome of the election? On
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: the latter, we just don't know. This is too early.
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: We just heard right before this that Biden tested negative.
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: I think he's probably going to have to get tested
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: a couple more times. That's a huge factor in how
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: this plays out. We don't know that. I think we
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: can make some guesses about what could happen, and we
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: can talk about that. In terms of how the conduct
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: of the campaign is going to happen, I can't imagine
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: that the two presidential debates are going to happen in
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: the same way in which they were before, right? Do
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: they happen at all? Do they happen in Zoom? You know,
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: the president should be quarantining for the next 14 days, right?
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: So that's about half of the remaining time that he
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: should not be out campaigning or doing anything like that.
• 19:44
  Speaker 4: And we should tell people that 14 days is at
• 19:47
  Speaker 4: the low end, right? That's like a minimum for the president.
• 19:50
  Speaker 4: If the president continues to have, and hope he does,
• 19:53
  Speaker 4: mild symptoms and nothing more, then you could see in
• 19:57
  Speaker 4: 14 days getting another negative test and then he's clear
• 20:01
  Speaker 4: because he just had mild symptoms and that's all.
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: If he has.
• 20:05
  Speaker 4: moderate symptoms even like it can take three weeks four
• 20:07
  Speaker 4: weeks five weeks to recover so like and that's another
• 20:10
  Speaker 4: thing is he really we have to know that he
• 20:13
  Speaker 4: can't leave the white house and expose other people unless
• 20:17
  Speaker 4: he's had you know i think it's a couple negative
• 20:19
  Speaker 4: tests within 24 or 48 hours of one another that
• 20:21
  Speaker 4: he doesn't develop worse symptoms like all that has to
• 20:24
  Speaker 4: happen before he can ever leave the house or go
• 20:26
  Speaker 4: back to having any kind of public events where he's
• 20:28
  Speaker 4: around people And there are two.
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: Parts of that. There is the political impact, like when
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: can he go campaign, where I imagine people will want
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: to push the envelope. And then there is the institutional
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: effort to keep the president alive because of continuity of government,
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: regardless of who the president is. It was always reminded,
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: I always remember that the Secret Service takes protecting the
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: president so seriously that they put slip guards in the
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: shower in the hotels he's in so they don't fall
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: and hurt themselves.
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: I didn't know that.
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: And so they– I probably got in trouble for saying that,
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: but Alyssa will let me know either way. And so
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: you can– like there will be pressure to ensure that
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: he does– because even when the election is in a month,
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: he is still president for several months after that until January.
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: And so there is going to be this impetus to
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: try to keep him for the continuity of government. to
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: keep him safe, to abundance of caution. And so there
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: will be a push there. You know, for the political
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: impact in terms of what it means about who's going
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: to win the election or not, like I said, we
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: don't know. I do think we know enough to be
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: skeptical of some of the takes we saw last night,
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: which are, this will lead to an outpouring of sympathy
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: for the president. Will he be able to defeat COVID
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: and look like some sort of superhero? I'm very skeptical
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: of that because his greatest political weakness is it has
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: been his failure to deal with COVID, his unwillingness to
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: listen to scientists, his disregard of the appropriate behaviors like
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: mass wearing and social distancing. And so this is the
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: embodiment of that in the biggest way possible. And the
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: other thing to think about is we're just so conditioned
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: to think about the October surprise. What are the things
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: that happened in the days before the election that have
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: a huge impact on the election? You think about in 2004,
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: a lot of people believe that Bush won in part
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: because bin Laden released an audio tape that final weekend,
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: which shifted the focus to terrorism. In 2012, we were
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: incredibly nervous about the final jobs report that happened the
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: Friday before the election. And if that had been bad,
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: we were very concerned on that campaign that could hurt us.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: But what is different now. is that the bulk of
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: the voting is happening right now. In previous elections, something
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: that happened on October 2nd would have very limited impact
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: because the voting wouldn't happen. There's an entire month for
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: more things to happen. But right now, huge numbers of
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: people are going to go vote this weekend in states
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: with early voting. People are mailing in their mail ballots now.
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: And so the impact of these things are bigger either way, positive, negative, neutral.
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: The impact is felt more, will show up more in
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: the final vote count than in a normal election.
• 23:09
  Speaker 4: I'm just trying to think of the voter who says
• 23:12
  Speaker 4: to themselves, oh, the guy who for months has told
• 23:17
  Speaker 4: us that the virus isn't a big deal, just contracted
• 23:20
  Speaker 4: the virus, so I'm going to switch my vote from
• 23:23
  Speaker 4: Biden to that guy. It's hard to imagine that voter. Look,
• 23:31
  Speaker 4: you could see something where if Trump came out and said,
• 23:34
  Speaker 4: I just want to say this virus has hit me
• 23:36
  Speaker 4: hard and I was wrong. I was wrong that the
• 23:39
  Speaker 4: virus was not as deadly as it is. It's not
• 23:43
  Speaker 4: as scary as it is. It's very serious. I need
• 23:46
  Speaker 4: to take it seriously. The country should take it seriously.
• 23:49
  Speaker 4: Everyone needs to wear masks now. We need to be careful.
• 23:52
  Speaker 4: I'm not going to do any more rallies. If he
• 23:54
  Speaker 4: did all that, you could start to maybe see something.
• 23:58
  Speaker 4: But I don't know how Trump's going to react to
• 24:00
  Speaker 4: this whole thing. That's the other X factor, though. I
• 24:03
  Speaker 4: don't imagine he's going to change his personality overnight, but
• 24:06
  Speaker 4: who knows?
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, that's always the thing is you can
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: always look at this in a vacuum and say, this
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: is something that Trump could do that would improve his
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: political standing. But it is almost always something that is
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: not available in his temperamental toolbox, right? Self-awareness, apologizing, admitting
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: he's wrong. If you know, despite all the new tone
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: coverage we get every six weeks is not something that
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: he has ever shown any capacity to do. And I
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: am skeptical, highly skeptical that that will happen this time either.
• 24:34
  Speaker 4: It's also, it's one thing if a president or a
• 24:36
  Speaker 4: leader or a candidate falls ill and just sort of
• 24:41
  Speaker 4: came out of the blue. Of course, there's an outpouring
• 24:43
  Speaker 4: of sympathy. You want the person to get better. That's
• 24:45
  Speaker 4: still the case in this scenario. But the fact that
• 24:49
  Speaker 4: they tried to conceal it, knowingly exposed other people to
• 24:53
  Speaker 4: the virus when they knew that Hope Hicks had it
• 24:56
  Speaker 4: and they knew that the president was in close proximity
• 24:58
  Speaker 4: to her. And then they went to that fundraiser. He
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: was in close contact with 100 other people. and the
• 25:03
  Speaker 4: fact that he flouted all of the precautions that all
• 25:07
  Speaker 4: of the scientists told him to abide by, and so
• 25:09
  Speaker 4: did his team. The fact that he did all that,
• 25:11
  Speaker 4: I don't believe gets him much sympathy beyond hoping that
• 25:14
  Speaker 4: he recovers from the virus itself.
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it seems hard to fathom.
• 25:27
  Speaker 4: So Joe Biden tweeted this morning that he and Jill
• 25:29
  Speaker 4: send their thoughts to President Trump and First Lady Melania
• 25:31
  Speaker 4: Trump for a swift recovery, saying, quote, We will continue
• 25:34
  Speaker 4: to pray for the health and safety of the president
• 25:35
  Speaker 4: and his family. How does the Biden campaign deal with
• 25:39
  Speaker 4: this in the next few weeks? I read right before
• 25:42
  Speaker 4: we started that now that Joe Biden has this negative test,
• 25:45
  Speaker 4: he is continuing on to Michigan for an event.
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: What do they do?
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: I think a lot doesn't change for them. I think
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: you will, just because we know Joe Biden, you will
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: hear him at his events express the sentiment included in
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: that tweet. He will wish for the Trumps to recover.
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: I think that will obviously be a sincere belief of
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: his and very consistent with who he is. Their campaign
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: was centered around how to protect Joe Biden, attendees, and
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: everyone else from the coronavirus. And I think they have
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: confidence in those measures. And so, absent some information that
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: would suggest that they have been exposed in some way,
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: they should continue doing what they were doing. I imagine
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: there'll be some tonal shift, at least in the next
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: period here, about how they talk about Trump. But really-
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: But I think for the most part, the campaign will
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: stay the same. And I think you can wish Trump
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: well and still talk about his failures at the same time.
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: And this is not one of those situations where it's like,
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: although I can see the press treating it this way,
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: where somehow Biden is being disrespectful if he critiques Trump's
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: leadership on this very specific issue. It's the exact opposite.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: This is a reason to talk about it because this
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: is the example of why we need change.
• 26:59
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 27:00
  Speaker 4: And also, I mean, This is the central issue of
• 27:02
  Speaker 4: the campaign. The Biden campaign has tried to make it
• 27:04
  Speaker 4: the central issue. It is. There are tens of thousands
• 27:08
  Speaker 4: of people contracting a virus every day. There are almost
• 27:10
  Speaker 4: a thousand people still dying from a virus every day.
• 27:13
  Speaker 4: And the president of the United States hasn't had a
• 27:15
  Speaker 4: plan to deal with it, doesn't really believe it's a problem,
• 27:20
  Speaker 4: and is trying to install a Supreme Court justice that
• 27:23
  Speaker 4: may repeal the Affordable Care Act and take away health
• 27:25
  Speaker 4: care from 20 million people in the middle of a pandemic.
• 27:28
  Speaker 4: and protections for preexisting conditions from tens of millions more.
• 27:33
  Speaker 4: And one of those preexisting conditions is having COVID. Like,
• 27:36
  Speaker 4: of course we have to talk about that. Of course
• 27:38
  Speaker 4: that's part of the campaign these last 30 days, right?
• 27:41
  Speaker 4: Like that it's absurd.
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: It's life.
• 27:42
  Speaker 4: It's literally our life or death issue. I also think
• 27:45
  Speaker 4: the Biden campaign, like you said, from the beginning, they
• 27:47
  Speaker 4: have taken a lot of heat from Trump. and from
• 27:49
  Speaker 4: some pundits, about Joe Biden trying to be safe, trying
• 27:53
  Speaker 4: to stay at home, trying to do socially distanced events,
• 27:56
  Speaker 4: not trying to do big crowds, not trying to do
• 27:59
  Speaker 4: all this stuff. And everyone's like, was that a mistake?
• 28:02
  Speaker 4: Is Biden being too cautious?
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: Well, no.
• 28:06
  Speaker 4: Now we know what happens when you're not cautious and
• 28:08
  Speaker 4: when you are cautious. We have seen the contrast.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: Go ahead.
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: Now, I was going to say, you're right that Biden
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: has an obligation to push through whatever pearl clutching comes
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: from the morning Joe panel to make a case to
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: the country about why we cannot have a leader who
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: can't follow his own rules and then catches coronavirus because
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: of it and exposes his friends and family and staff
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: to the disease out of stupid selfishness, right? Like he
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: has an obligation to do that this close to the election.
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: The stakes are too high. And I promise you, promise you,
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: promise you, promise you, the voters will not penalize him
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: for that. Joe Biden has been incredibly respectful of this president,
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: respect this president does not deserve, has not earned. And
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: if he keeps with, as I mentioned, with the tone
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: he has used throughout this campaign, that will be perfectly
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: consistent with how to talk about this situation in a
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: way that the voters will respect, even if I'm sure
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: there'll be a lot of stupid gotcha driven by the
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: MAGA media.
• 29:11
  Speaker 4: So there's a lot we still don't know. There's a
• 29:12
  Speaker 4: lot of news breaking probably while we're recording this podcast.
• 29:15
  Speaker 4: But we had another topic on the outline that we'll
• 29:18
  Speaker 4: jump into. So there's many other topics that were just
• 29:22
  Speaker 4: discarded when this all happened. Remember, Melania Trump was caught
• 29:26
  Speaker 4: on tape attacking Christmas and children who were being separated
• 29:30
  Speaker 4: from their parents. That was something that briefly happened.
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: Can we talk about that for a second?
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: Sure, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 29:35
  Speaker 4: Melania's quote unquote friend, not so great of a friend
• 29:39
  Speaker 4: at all. at all, recorded a conversation with her where
• 29:41
  Speaker 4: she was complaining about Christmas decorations and then complaining about
• 29:47
  Speaker 4: being asked by children being separated from their families at
• 29:50
  Speaker 4: the borders. And what is she supposed to do about that?
• 29:53
  Speaker 4: She said it was sort of horrific to hear.
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: When we talk about the political impact, I guess if
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: you were to dig deep into this dark cloud for
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: Trump to try to find some silver lining, it would
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: be there were two stories this morning that in a
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: normal world would be relatively devastating. One, we got the
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: final jobs report before the election and the economic recovery
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: has slowed. And we're going to go into election day
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: down 11 million jobs since before the pandemic. Great job, Trump.
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: And the other one is this audio tape of his
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: wife saying– Who the fuck cares about Christmas? Which really
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: shouldn't matter. First ladies are put in this really sort
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: of an unfair position anyway. But it only is politically
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: relevant because Trump has been running around taking credit. for
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: winning a mythological war on Christmas. And so for his
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: wife to be on tape saying fuck Christmas, I sort
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: of think would be like Eleanor Roosevelt being caught on
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: tape saying fuck Normandy. It's like, it is obviously fallen
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: to the wayside. We should not let it, we were
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: going to even lead the show with it. It was
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: going to be in the intro before that, before this happened, uh,
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: just for fun. Uh, so let's at least we can,
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: we can just remind people that that actually happened moments
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: before this happened.
• 31:08
  Speaker 4: Well, and also the president, you know, he went on
• 31:11
  Speaker 4: Hannity last night when he at that point knew that
• 31:13
  Speaker 4: he was positive for the virus, probably. And he finally,
• 31:19
  Speaker 4: after the third attempt, the third time he was asked,
• 31:22
  Speaker 4: denounced white supremacy. There were plenty of stories yesterday about
• 31:25
  Speaker 4: Republicans either trying to run away from him on that
• 31:29
  Speaker 4: or just directly criticizing him, like former RNC chair and
• 31:33
  Speaker 4: Montana governor Mark Roscoe said that I decided to endorse
• 31:37
  Speaker 4: Joe Biden because I believe that Donald Trump is a
• 31:39
  Speaker 4: threat to the republic, a threat to the existence of
• 31:42
  Speaker 4: the republic. That's what was being said yesterday by Republicans
• 31:44
  Speaker 4: before this happened, that Mark Roscoe, not like some like
• 31:48
  Speaker 4: never Trump or middle of the road guy, conservative governor,
• 31:51
  Speaker 4: like chair of the fucking RNC. I'm with Biden because
• 31:55
  Speaker 4: Donald Trump is a threat to the existence of the republic.
• 31:58
  Speaker 4: That was yesterday before we learned about all this.
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: And let's not forget, in that same interview, he blamed
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: the troops and law enforcement for giving coronavirus two ho picks.
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: I forgot about that one. Forgot about that one. Yeah,
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: he did.
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: She just can't stop herself from hugging them.
• 32:15
  Speaker 4: That's what she, yeah, that was his explanation. That was
• 32:17
  Speaker 4: his explanation. All right, well, let's talk about the Biden
• 32:20
  Speaker 4: campaign because this is somewhat related to what we've been
• 32:22
  Speaker 4: talking about. They announced on Thursday that they'll be relaunching
• 32:25
  Speaker 4: in-person canvassing efforts in the battleground states in order to
• 32:28
  Speaker 4: connect with voters who are hard to reach remotely. starting
• 32:30
  Speaker 4: with Nevada, Michigan, New Hampshire, and Pennsylvania. Campaign manager Jen
• 32:34
  Speaker 4: O'Malley Dillon explained the change in plans by saying, we're
• 32:36
  Speaker 4: now expanding our strategy in a targeted way that puts
• 32:39
  Speaker 4: the safety of communities first and foremost and helps us
• 32:42
  Speaker 4: mobilize voters who are harder to reach by phone now
• 32:44
  Speaker 4: that we're in the final stretch. The decision came amid
• 32:47
  Speaker 4: an NBC report by Dave Wasserman that said, quote, new
• 32:53
  Speaker 4: data from the past few months shows that Republicans have
• 32:55
  Speaker 4: swamped Democrats in adding new voters to the rolls. and that, quote,
• 32:58
  Speaker 4: several Democratic strategists are deeply disturbed by their party's failure
• 33:01
  Speaker 4: to keep pace with its registration successes in 2016 and
• 33:04
  Speaker 4: felt the Biden campaign's lack of in-person outreach for the lag.
• 33:08
  Speaker 4: Why do you think the Biden campaign changed course on this?
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: I don't know the exact reason, although I think it's
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: probably embedded in that Dave Wasserman report. You and I
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: have heard from lots of people we know, activists in
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: the states that we've adopted that deeply concerned about this, right?
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: It feels like asymmetric warfare. This is how we've always campaigned.
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: We've put such pride into it. It was such a
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: huge part of how we won in 2018. Now you
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: see Republican canvassers going door to door and Democrats not
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: doing it. So you feel, are we losing because of that?
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: And when I originally heard Jen, who is someone I
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: know very, very well, and I think is the smartest,
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: most accomplished organizer in our party, explain that they weren't
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: going to do it, that made sense to me. And
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: if you've had someone come to your door unexpectedly and
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: in the last six months, you know, you sort of
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: understand their reasoning that who wants that, right? Like someone's
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: knocked on our door yesterday and I thought like, I
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: had to put on a hazmat suit. It was like,
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: where'd this person come from? Do I have to talk
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: to them? And the, and no, I did not want
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: to buy solar panels being sold door to door, which
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: was an odd choice for, to do that in the
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: middle of a pandemic. But the, but then relatedly, um,
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: Hallie was doing calls for the North Carolina Democratic Party
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: this week. And these were calls to, they're called cure calls.
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: They are to North Carolinians whose ballots have been rejected
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: to tell them that A, the ballots are rejected and B,
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: here's how you fix it. And the people doing the
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: calls are doing tremendous work. I was listening to the
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: training as it was happening, but it's really hard, right?
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: It's a complicated process. And what, you know, when Hallie
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: was an organizer in North Carolina in 08, when she
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: kept saying to me is, before this announcement was, this
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: is the sort of thing that you really need to
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: go door to door for. You need to be able
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: to show people the ballot, how to do it right,
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: or leave them a note. Who answers the phone from
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: an unknown caller these days? It's very hard to reach.
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: I mean, I don't.
• 35:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: And so being able to go to someone's door, leave
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: a door hanger that says, your ballot was rejected, please
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: call us, or to be able to talk to them
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: is hugely valuable. And so I think particularly because of
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: some of these ballot rejections in these states that have
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: a cure process, this makes it even more important to do.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: I'm sure per the report, it's going to be more limited.
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: It's not going to be this sort of mass effort,
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: but it's going to be focused on hard-to-reach voters, people
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: you can't get in contact with. You can know where
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: people live, but the number change is a huge– people's
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: phone number changes a lot of times, so it's sometimes
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: hard to find people whose votes did not count. And
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: so I understand why they are doing this. It seems
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: probably necessary in this area, and I have trust that
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: they can do it safely on a limited basis.
• 35:55
  Speaker 4: How much concern do you have about that Wasserman story
• 35:58
  Speaker 4: on party registration? I've heard a few different things, and
• 36:02
  Speaker 4: Dave says in the story too, some of this is like,
• 36:05
  Speaker 4: you know, people who've voted, who have been registered as
• 36:08
  Speaker 4: Democrats forever in some of these states who actually did
• 36:10
  Speaker 4: already voted for Trump in 2016 as Democrats, just finally
• 36:14
  Speaker 4: moving their voter registration over to Republican. A lot of
• 36:17
  Speaker 4: it is just that, you know, the time period that
• 36:21
  Speaker 4: Dave's story covers is sort of the end of the
• 36:23
  Speaker 4: primary through the summer, which is when the pandemic was
• 36:26
  Speaker 4: at its height. And so Democrats just didn't do a
• 36:29
  Speaker 4: lot of voter registration drives in person. And so they
• 36:32
  Speaker 4: fell behind a little bit. But that if you look
• 36:34
  Speaker 4: overall at registration numbers since 2016, we're still doing okay.
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: But I don't know. What level of worry do you
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: have about that?
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: It's definitely a level of worry. I would say I'm
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: worrying about it, but not panicking about it.
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: There you go.
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: Okay. Look, there's definitely real truth to the caveats you mentioned.
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: It is a relatively typical thing for when a party
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: takes– the White House for there to be a voter
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: registration shift in their favor because it's almost an incentive
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: to now finally become a Republican or a Democrat. We
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: saw similar things with Obama. The hard part is we
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: need new voters in many of these states more than
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: Republicans do. And the best way to register voters is
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: in person in ways that are very hard in a pandemic,
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: which is standing outside of supermarkets, universities, the places where
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: you would normally do it, and getting people to fill
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: out voter registration cards. In some states, Republicans have gone–
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: like Texas and Florida have gone to make that incredibly
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: difficult by basically lording criminal penalties over people who register voters.
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: But in the states where you can do it, that
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: is a tool in our toolkit that has been denied
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: to us. Even with the pandemic, we're still not going
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: to be able to do it at the same level
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: we would because you can't put– I don't think you're
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: going to put people out there just standing on street
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: corners and there's going to be less traffic on those
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: street corners and supermarkets, places like that than would be
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: in a normal world. But everything we can do– safely
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: we should be doing here. Um, cause yeah, it is,
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: it is absolutely concerning in a very close race.
• 38:05
  Speaker 4: And speaking of like doing things safely, I mean, reading
• 38:08
  Speaker 4: a lot of these stories about rejected ballots and, um,
• 38:12
  Speaker 4: just how, how difficult both how difficult Republicans are trying
• 38:17
  Speaker 4: to make it to vote by mail in States all
• 38:19
  Speaker 4: across the country. Like is it, should people think about
• 38:23
  Speaker 4: if you can, if it's safe, like voting in person,
• 38:26
  Speaker 4: voting early, Like, as long as you can be safe
• 38:28
  Speaker 4: about it, like, just make sure you go drop your
• 38:31
  Speaker 4: ballot off. Like, I'm starting to think I want to
• 38:33
  Speaker 4: drop my ballot off in person. Like, just because, I mean,
• 38:36
  Speaker 4: California is a good state for this because they're not, like,
• 38:38
  Speaker 4: rejecting ballots left and right. But, like, if I was
• 38:42
  Speaker 4: in a swing state, I would probably figure out a
• 38:45
  Speaker 4: way to, like, either drop my ballot off early or
• 38:49
  Speaker 4: vote early in person and avoid crowds.
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: So... It's going to differ massively by state and by person, right?
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: Everyone has a different risk factor for coronavirus themselves and
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: for the people in their lives, right?
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: That's right.
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: I see my in-laws all the time. They're older. So
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: we are extra careful than we would otherwise be. So
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: it's like super, super careful to super, super, super, duper careful, right?
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: And so we may think about that differently. Now, if you...
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: mail your vote in or you drop off your mail ballot,
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: you are still at risk of some of the similar
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: challenges around secrecy envelopes in some states, signature matches in others. Now,
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: if you're in a state that has a cure process
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: like North Carolina, the sooner you turn your vote in,
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: the longer time you have to find out that it
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: did not get counted and to fix it. And so
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: I would encourage everyone, whatever path they go through, to
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: do it early. Voting in person early is probably your
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: best bet to have your vote counted And so if
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: that is something people feel they can do safely, they should,
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: you know, that's what I would encourage people to do.
• 39:56
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 39:57
  Speaker 4: And again, go to Vote Save America. We have all
• 39:59
  Speaker 4: the options in every state for you so you can
• 40:01
  Speaker 4: figure out which voting option is right for you and
• 40:05
  Speaker 4: safe for you. Okay, let's take a few questions before
• 40:08
  Speaker 4: we go.
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: Questions.
• 40:12
  Speaker 4: John Staley asked us, and we got a lot of
• 40:15
  Speaker 4: versions of this type of question.
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: I don't believe it. Is it a ploy?
• 40:19
  Speaker 4: There is always an angle. I'm guessing he's referring to
• 40:23
  Speaker 4: the noose.
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: No. I mean, I can't imagine. It's like, yes, Trump
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: is a liar. Yes, you should take everything instead of
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: the grain of salt. I struggle to imagine in what
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: sort of hypothetical three-dimensional chess world Trump saying he has
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: coronavirus would be some sort of masterstroke.
• 40:44
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it doesn't seem like a big win. I mean, look,
• 40:46
  Speaker 4: I totally understand everyone who is skeptical, not trusting anything
• 40:51
  Speaker 4: they hear, conspiratorial about this kind of stuff. Like Trump
• 40:55
  Speaker 4: has given us every reason to be all of those
• 40:57
  Speaker 4: things for the last four years.
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: I get that.
• 40:59
  Speaker 4: But Remember that at their core, these people are incompetent buffoons, right?
• 41:05
  Speaker 4: Like that is what drives them more than anything else,
• 41:07
  Speaker 4: more than scheming, more, you know, like they're just, they're
• 41:10
  Speaker 4: bumbling idiots. And everything about this story so far, and they're,
• 41:15
  Speaker 4: they're bumbling selfish idiots. And everything about this story so
• 41:19
  Speaker 4: far fits very neatly into how they've acted for the
• 41:22
  Speaker 4: last four years. don't care about anyone but themselves, don't
• 41:25
  Speaker 4: really take science seriously, don't take a lot of precautions,
• 41:29
  Speaker 4: only thinking about Trump's election, not thinking about other people.
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: Like all of that.
• 41:34
  Speaker 4: Just fits perfectly into this story. So yes, there's like
• 41:37
  Speaker 4: an outside possibility they could be lying to us. But again,
• 41:39
  Speaker 4: you have to think why, you have to think what's
• 41:42
  Speaker 4: in character for this crew. And everything we've heard so
• 41:45
  Speaker 4: far is perfectly in character with this group.
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, here is someone who in the middle
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: of a pandemic has repeatedly met with strangers without a
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: mask on. So it is a safe assumption that if
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: he says he has coronavirus, he probably contracted it.
• 41:59
  Speaker 4: It was a matter of time. Jessica Bondi asks us,
• 42:03
  Speaker 4: can you touch upon media strategy for Biden going forward
• 42:05
  Speaker 4: since Trump will likely dominate the news cycle not in
• 42:07
  Speaker 4: a novel way, meaning it won't be campaign coverage, SCOTUS
• 42:10
  Speaker 4: confirmation processes, taxes, and there will be a unilateral focus
• 42:12
  Speaker 4: on Trump's battle with the virus?
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: What do you think about that?
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: Well, if the Biden campaign were to pick one topic
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: to be the number one topic between now and election day,
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: it would be coronavirus. Because it is the issue where
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: he has a plan, Trump doesn't. It is the perfect
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: manifestation of Trump's incompetence. And that is like, we've had
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: some fears when you and I have talked privately about
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: things we worry about. This idea that for some reason
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: or somehow coronavirus receded into the background of the public
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: consciousness would be an opportunity where Trump could gain some
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: political strength. That seems highly unlikely now. I think Biden
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: is going to have to find ways to communicate with
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: groups that he has probably... under-communicated with and needs to
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: communicate with more black voters, young voters, Latino voters, and
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: doing that in targeted ways, both with communications that media outlets,
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: platforms that speak directly to those audiences, and paid communications.
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: He's not going to be able to go on MSNBC
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: or CNN and talk about something other than the president
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: having coronavirus for a while, but there are still opportunities
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: to get your message out. You just have to be
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: a little more nimble about it. I'm sure that's what
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: they're thinking about.
• 43:23
  Speaker 4: And then finally, Brian Marble asks us, when was the
• 43:26
  Speaker 4: last time an outline survived 24 hours?
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: You know, the outline always survived. Well, I guess it's not.
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: I was going to say debate outlines always survive, but
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: that's only because they're only like eight hours old when
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: it happens.
• 43:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 43:40
  Speaker 4: Just yesterday, we were like, we've done two pods this week.
• 43:44
  Speaker 4: We got a third. You and I were going back
• 43:46
  Speaker 4: and forth all day yesterday with Michael and Jordan trying
• 43:48
  Speaker 4: to figure out like what we're going to do. And
• 43:51
  Speaker 4: We're like, all right, I think we got enough now.
• 43:53
  Speaker 4: And then all of a sudden this happened. I was
• 43:55
  Speaker 4: like in the middle of, it was like nine o'clock
• 43:57
  Speaker 4: when this started happening. And I'm just like staring at
• 44:00
  Speaker 4: the screen. Emily came downstairs, looked at me and she's like,
• 44:02
  Speaker 4: you look sort of crazy right now. And I'm like,
• 44:04
  Speaker 4: I think Donald Trump has coronavirus.
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: She's like, what? Are you crazy?
• 44:08
  Speaker 4: Is this like, have you like lost your mind? Now
• 44:10
  Speaker 4: there's like conspiracies. I'm like, no, I think he has coronavirus.
• 44:13
  Speaker 4: He like, we should have known by a test by now.
• 44:16
  Speaker 4: He has rapid testing. He hasn't told us. And then,
• 44:18
  Speaker 4: of course, it broke. And I was like, well, I'm
• 44:20
  Speaker 4: done with the outline for tonight. I'm just going to
• 44:21
  Speaker 4: do this tomorrow morning.
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: You know, up until like the last three months, the
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: sort of the naturally occurring dynamic with our podcast is
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: we record the podcast, then the news happens. It has
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: changed slightly, which is on a fairly regular notifications. Now,
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: I will say to you. I really don't know what
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: we're going to talk about this week. You guys have
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: covered a broad range of issues on Monday. Not that
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: much has happened. It's sort of the same stuff. And
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: then that happened with the Woodward story. I sent you
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: the outline after a long, like we had a long
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: back and forth about what are some off the news
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: topics we could bring up. And then to have the
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: Woodward story break, I think it happened with a couple
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: other things recently. And so this is fitting with the
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: dynamic of 2020.
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 45:06
  Speaker 4: When we come back, Dan talks to Andre Banks of
• 45:09
  Speaker 4: WinBlack about how we can handle the flood of misinformation
• 45:12
  Speaker 4: being directed at black and brown voters right now.
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: I'm now joined by Andre Banks, founder of AB Partners
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: and WinBlack, Palante, an organization dedicated to stopping the spread
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: of misinformation targeted at black and brown voters. Andre, thanks
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: for coming on Positive America.
• 45:34
  Speaker 3: My pleasure.
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: Tell me a little bit about your organization and what
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: led you to start it.
• 45:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely. So Win Black Palante is an organization that
• 45:44
  Speaker 3: is focused on countering misinformation and disinformation targeting Black and
• 45:48
  Speaker 3: Latinx voters. And what led me to start it was
• 45:52
  Speaker 3: an article that I read in the newspaper back in 2017.
• 45:57
  Speaker 3: In early 2017, the Senate came out with a report
• 45:59
  Speaker 3: about the 2016 election. And what they said was that
• 46:03
  Speaker 3: Black Americans were actually the number one target of misinterference
• 46:07
  Speaker 3: by Russian operatives. So basically, Russian people, trolls and content
• 46:12
  Speaker 3: and running people running content farms and bots were really
• 46:15
  Speaker 3: had an active campaign, the most successful campaign in history
• 46:18
  Speaker 3: to misinform voters and black people were the number one target.
• 46:22
  Speaker 3: So we brought together a network of organizations across the country,
• 46:27
  Speaker 3: some great creatives, great researchers to try to push back.
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: And what are you seeing this cycle in terms of
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: that kind of targeting?
• 46:35
  Speaker 3: We are seeing more of the same. You know, the
• 46:38
  Speaker 3: strategy in 2016 was incredibly successful. You know, there was
• 46:44
  Speaker 3: a 7% drop in black voter turnout from 2012 to 2016.
• 46:48
  Speaker 3: And so one thing we thought coming into 2020 was like,
• 46:51
  Speaker 3: why would they stop? This really worked the last time.
• 46:53
  Speaker 3: Why wouldn't they try it again? And that's a lot
• 46:55
  Speaker 3: of what we've seen. Every time we see big protests
• 46:59
  Speaker 3: around Black Lives Matter for racial justice, huge upticks in misinformation,
• 47:04
  Speaker 3: lots targeted around voting by mail, pretty much anything you
• 47:08
  Speaker 3: can think of, we're seeing pretty negative activity.
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: And what are some specific examples of what that misinformation
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: looks like this cycle? Sure.
• 47:17
  Speaker 3: So, you know, every time there's been kind of a
• 47:19
  Speaker 3: key moment where people have gotten into the streets, you know,
• 47:23
  Speaker 3: after the murder of George Floyd, more recently around the
• 47:27
  Speaker 3: decision not to prosecute the police officers who shot Breonna Taylor.
• 47:32
  Speaker 3: We see in literally hours, massive numbers of posts generated
• 47:37
  Speaker 3: from all corners of the dark web that do a
• 47:40
  Speaker 3: lot of things. They basically say that like the protests
• 47:44
  Speaker 3: are not actually run by black leadership and that they're
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: sort of just puppets who are driving these things. They
• 47:49
  Speaker 3: say that the protests are violent even when they're not.
• 47:52
  Speaker 3: They push people to fake demonstrations that don't actually exist.
• 47:57
  Speaker 3: So that's one thing where we've really been trying to
• 47:59
  Speaker 3: keep our eye on.
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: I imagine you're in somewhat regular contact with the social
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: media platforms who claim to be doing monitoring and they
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: tout when they take things down. What are you seeing
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: from them and what are you still concerned about from
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: their efforts, Facebook most.
• 48:18
  Speaker 3: Notably, I guess? I mean, you know, what am I
• 48:22
  Speaker 3: seeing from them? Not nearly enough. You know, when you
• 48:25
  Speaker 3: look at the scale of what's happening on their platforms,
• 48:29
  Speaker 3: if you look at the level at which Black voters
• 48:33
  Speaker 3: and Latinx voters are being, you know, depressed and suppressed,
• 48:37
  Speaker 3: the level of effort that they're bringing is just nowhere
• 48:39
  Speaker 3: near to meeting the challenge. And so, you know, what
• 48:42
  Speaker 3: we've seen is like, you know, it takes sometimes weeks, days,
• 48:46
  Speaker 3: weeks to take down a bot that's generating thousands comments
• 48:50
  Speaker 3: and driving a conversation in a wrong direction, like so
• 48:53
  Speaker 3: much that it actually gets picked up by mainstream media.
• 48:56
  Speaker 3: You know, it's just really not sufficient. It's been a challenge.
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: Are there some specific things you'd like to see them
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: do that they are not doing or policy changes that
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: they are refusing to make?
• 49:07
  Speaker 3: Sure, absolutely. I mean, I think one big thing is like,
• 49:10
  Speaker 3: you know, when we see misinformation and we identify it,
• 49:14
  Speaker 3: you know, it takes a very long time. Even when
• 49:16
  Speaker 3: you see something like that, you know, we had a
• 49:18
  Speaker 3: case earlier. in the year where you might have remembered
• 49:23
  Speaker 3: where the CEO of Goya Foods sort of made some
• 49:26
  Speaker 3: positive comments about Trump, and there was a lot of blowback.
• 49:29
  Speaker 3: Right after that, there was suddenly this wave of support
• 49:34
  Speaker 3: for the Goya CEO. It looked like there was kind
• 49:36
  Speaker 3: of this online wave coming behind him of conservative folks
• 49:40
  Speaker 3: who were supporting him. What we found through our research
• 49:43
  Speaker 3: was that actually almost all of that wave was bot activity.
• 49:47
  Speaker 3: One bot driving thousands of comments and engagements. And so
• 49:51
  Speaker 3: that's the kind of thing where we saw that, we
• 49:53
  Speaker 3: identified it, and it still took us, you know, days,
• 49:56
  Speaker 3: close to a week before that was actually taken down
• 49:58
  Speaker 3: from Facebook.
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: One of the strategies that you guys employ is creating
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: viral content to combat misinformation. Talk to me about how
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: you're doing that and why that is so important and
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: why it's not sufficient just to get this stuff taken down,
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: even if their companies were able to do it quicker.
• 50:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, The scale of what we're
• 50:18
  Speaker 3: up against is huge. I told you about what the
• 50:21
  Speaker 3: Russians were doing. We also learned last week through some
• 50:24
  Speaker 3: reporting that came out of the UK that the Trump
• 50:28
  Speaker 3: campaign in 2016 had a database with 3.5 million black
• 50:33
  Speaker 3: voters where they literally had a column in the database
• 50:36
  Speaker 3: that said, deter. So there was an active campaign also
• 50:39
  Speaker 3: inside the country to deter black voters. So this is,
• 50:43
  Speaker 3: to me... massive. I mean, it feels much more scandalous,
• 50:47
  Speaker 3: even in things like Watergate. Can you imagine a sitting
• 50:50
  Speaker 3: US president has like, his campaign has actively tried to
• 50:54
  Speaker 3: stop three and a half million American voters, black voters
• 50:57
  Speaker 3: in particular, from trying to cast their ballot. It's actually
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: really crazy. So, you know, we've got to fight that
• 51:03
  Speaker 3: with fire. So that means that we can't just like
• 51:06
  Speaker 3: research our way out of it. We've got to actually
• 51:08
  Speaker 3: create content that like can get on the feeds that
• 51:11
  Speaker 3: can compete with everything else that people are saying. So
• 51:14
  Speaker 3: what that looks like is a war room that involves
• 51:16
  Speaker 3: creative directors, strategists. editors, people who make video, people who
• 51:20
  Speaker 3: are copywriters, sitting together with researchers who are tracking misinformation
• 51:25
  Speaker 3: and coming up with the best content we can make
• 51:27
  Speaker 3: and getting it to millions and millions of people. So
• 51:30
  Speaker 3: we're doing that every day of the week. We've built
• 51:32
  Speaker 3: a partner network of 100 organizations in 17 states to
• 51:36
  Speaker 3: help get it out that way. And then we're also
• 51:38
  Speaker 3: pushing it on people's feeds through various kinds of other media.
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: I mean, we talk a lot when we talk about
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: misinformation online about the Russians and other foreign actors. You know,
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: what are some of the domestic things you're seeing, in
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: addition to what you just mentioned about the Trump campaign,
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: you know, trying to stop people from voting? Are you
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: seeing things from right wing groups, you know, other things
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: happening that's domestic in nature?
• 52:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, we definitely see a lot coming from
• 52:05
  Speaker 3: domestic organizations, lots of like partisan activity. You know, we
• 52:09
  Speaker 3: see bots. But, you know, at the end of the day,
• 52:11
  Speaker 3: I always say it actually doesn't. it's problematic, but it
• 52:15
  Speaker 3: doesn't matter where it's coming from. And it's actually kind
• 52:17
  Speaker 3: of hard to tell in the short term where it's
• 52:19
  Speaker 3: coming from. And often what ends up happening is we
• 52:22
  Speaker 3: don't act until we know where it's coming from, but
• 52:25
  Speaker 3: that might take days or weeks or months of research.
• 52:28
  Speaker 3: So a lot of our effort is to say, wherever
• 52:31
  Speaker 3: it's coming from, it's here. And it is actually working.
• 52:34
  Speaker 3: It is depressing voters. It's convincing people to sort of
• 52:38
  Speaker 3: move towards cynicism, not want to participate in this election.
• 52:42
  Speaker 3: And so we've just been trying to make sure we
• 52:43
  Speaker 3: have a volume of content that's true, that's inspiring, and
• 52:47
  Speaker 3: that we're getting it in front of folks.
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: You know, a lot of what are sort of where
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: the misinformation and radicalization things are happening. There's this type
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: we see like on our Facebook feeds or on Twitter
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: or elsewhere, but there's a lot that's happening both within
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: private groups on Facebook and Instagram in particular, but also
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: in private networks like WhatsApp. How do you go about
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: finding out about and then targeting misinformation that's happening in
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: those Walden gardens, if you will?
• 53:09
  Speaker 3: It's really tough. It's really, really tough to find it.
• 53:12
  Speaker 3: But what we've been doing is partnering with a couple
• 53:15
  Speaker 3: of research collaboratives that have come together just to do
• 53:18
  Speaker 3: this thing. So these groups are looking through with every
• 53:22
  Speaker 3: tool that's available to us, scouring every corner of the Internet,
• 53:25
  Speaker 3: looking at sort of both the open platforms and closed
• 53:28
  Speaker 3: groups where they can get into them. to try to
• 53:30
  Speaker 3: identify both the trends that we see in misinformation and
• 53:34
  Speaker 3: also new things that were coming up. So like I
• 53:36
  Speaker 3: just got a message in a signal group that was
• 53:40
  Speaker 3: telling me about, you know, what are some things that
• 53:42
  Speaker 3: are popping up right now around Trump announcing that he
• 53:45
  Speaker 3: has COVID? What are the conspiracies that are starting to
• 53:48
  Speaker 3: like populate and starting to get traffic and gain ground?
• 53:52
  Speaker 3: So we're working really closely with those partners and every
• 53:54
  Speaker 3: day get a brief from them on like what's happening
• 53:57
  Speaker 3: and where we need to take action.
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: So if you're Someone who's listening to this podcast, who
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: sees what they believe to be misinformation online. What should
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: that individual person do? What are some of the best
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: tactics that a person can use to push back against that?
• 54:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely. So I think one thing that we say
• 54:17
  Speaker 3: is if you see something, say something. So if you
• 54:19
  Speaker 3: see something that looks like a bot, report it. Don't
• 54:22
  Speaker 3: be afraid to click that button. It's one of the
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: few tools that we have with the platform to actually
• 54:28
  Speaker 3: make sure that somebody will look at it and investigate.
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: The other thing I say is sometimes botting It's actually
• 54:35
  Speaker 3: really good people who have the bad information. So it's
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: not always the paid troll. Sometimes it's like your mom
• 54:43
  Speaker 3: or your grandma or your uncle or your brother who's
• 54:45
  Speaker 3: in the family group chat. And it's like, don't just
• 54:48
  Speaker 3: walk away from that crazy chat room. Actually get in there.
• 54:52
  Speaker 3: Actually try to educate folks. You know, one thing that
• 54:55
  Speaker 3: we've done is created a ton of content that we've
• 54:57
  Speaker 3: made publicly available for people at winblack.org, where you can
• 55:01
  Speaker 3: find memes, infographics, videos, the stuff that you need to
• 55:06
  Speaker 3: just jump into that conversation yourself.
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: There's also a lot of misinformation that's going around in
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: Spanish targeting Latinx voters. And my understanding is there hasn't
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: been a lot of coverage of that within the Spanish
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: language media. How are you guys thinking about approaching that
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: challenge in this election?
• 55:25
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we've been doing quite a bit of Spanish language content.
• 55:28
  Speaker 3: We actually just yesterday worked with Univision to do a
• 55:33
  Speaker 3: piece about misinformation that's targeting Latinx voters. So one big
• 55:38
  Speaker 3: part of the way that we work is we felt
• 55:40
  Speaker 3: like it's not enough for me in Brooklyn to be
• 55:44
  Speaker 3: running a campaign like this and trying to figure out
• 55:47
  Speaker 3: what all the right messages are. So we actually built...
• 55:49
  Speaker 3: this network that includes, you know, state-based organizations in 17 states,
• 55:54
  Speaker 3: in Florida, in Arizona, people who do this work day
• 55:57
  Speaker 3: in and day out, are talking to communities there and
• 55:59
  Speaker 3: actually surfacing for us, what are the big messaging challenges?
• 56:03
  Speaker 3: What are the things that are happening in South Florida,
• 56:06
  Speaker 3: in Spanish, that we need to figure out ways to combat?
• 56:08
  Speaker 3: So that's really helped us be able to, like, refine
• 56:11
  Speaker 3: our content, make sure that we've got stuff in Spanish
• 56:13
  Speaker 3: that's allowing people to, you know, to get into a
• 56:16
  Speaker 3: different story.
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: For our listeners who want to support your efforts, who
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: want to contribute to what you're doing, what's the best
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: way to do that?
• 56:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you can go to winblack.org. You can smash that
• 56:27
  Speaker 3: donate button.
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: Well done.
• 56:29
  Speaker 3: That's definitely going to help. One of the big things
• 56:32
  Speaker 3: that we're doing now, at this point, all of our
• 56:35
  Speaker 3: operation is paid for. You're not paying for my time
• 56:38
  Speaker 3: or any of our staff's time. It's literally just to
• 56:40
  Speaker 3: pay for us to amplify content, getting in front of
• 56:43
  Speaker 3: more people in more states. So that's a huge help.
• 56:46
  Speaker 3: And also, if you go there, you can find a
• 56:48
  Speaker 3: link to our our library of of videos, content. And
• 56:53
  Speaker 3: the big thing for us is like share this stuff.
• 56:56
  Speaker 3: It's not enough for us to be right. It's not
• 56:58
  Speaker 3: enough for us to be smart. We actually have to
• 57:00
  Speaker 3: be in the conversation and we have to be getting
• 57:02
  Speaker 3: other people excited about the selection and getting people in
• 57:05
  Speaker 3: the right story about it. So please use your feed
• 57:07
  Speaker 3: and let us help you do that.
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: Andre, thank you so much for being here. Thank you
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: for the work you're doing. This is incredibly necessary and impressive. Um,
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: and I encourage everyone to support your efforts. So thank
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: you so much and good luck down the stretch here.
• 57:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Thanks so much.
• 57:22
  Speaker 2: My pleasure.
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: Crooked media has a new video series on disinformation. You
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: can watch episodes at youtube.com slash crooked media, which I'm
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: sure you've already subscribed to via some form of previous smashing.
• 57:36
  Speaker 4: Thanks Andre for joining us today. And, uh, You know,
• 57:40
  Speaker 4: we'll talk to you guys on Monday.
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: Stay safe, everyone.
• 57:43
  Speaker 2: Stay safe.
• 57:45
  Speaker 4: Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive
• 57:48
  Speaker 4: producer is Michael Martinez. Our associate producer is Jordan Waller.
• 57:52
  Speaker 4: It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin is
• 57:55
  Speaker 4: our sound engineer. Thanks to Tanya Sominator, Katie Long, Roman Papadimitriou,
• 58:00
  Speaker 4: Quinn Lewis, Brian Semel, Caroline Reston, and Elisa Gutierrez for
• 58:03
  Speaker 4: production support. And to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Nar Melkonian,
• 58:07
  Speaker 4: Yale Freed, and Milo Kim. who film and upload these
• 58:10
  Speaker 4: episodes as videos every week.