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“The Electoral College is f*cking stupid.” · 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: Later in the pod, you'll hear Jon Lovett's conversation with
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: Congresswoman Lauren Underwood, who stopped by Cricket Headquarters this week.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: Before that, we're going to talk about the news from
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: why Democrats are embracing ideas like eliminating the Electoral College
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: and the filibuster to Trump's new strategy around a potential
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: Mueller report to the latest on the candidates looking to
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: beat the president in 2020. On the new episode of
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: Pod Save the World, Tommy talks about online extremism with
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: Charlie Wartzel of The New York Times. On Keep It,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: the gang talks about the new Elizabeth Holmes documentary and
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: they interviewed Busy Phillips of Busy Tonight. Tickets are still
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: available for our shows in New England, in Boston, and Concord.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: You can get them at crooked.com slash events. If you
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: live in Boston, you might also be seeing a promo
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: video that involves Tommy and me teaching Lovett how to
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: speak in a Boston accent. Might be coming to a
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: Facebook page near you. It's worth checking out.
• 1:17
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: Let's start with the news. So over the last few weeks,
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: a lot of the Democratic presidential candidates have been talking
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: a lot about what I will call small d democratic reforms.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: During a CNN town hall this week, Elizabeth Warren endorsed
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: eliminating the Electoral College. Multiple candidates have talked about adding
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: seats to the Supreme Court or instituting term limits on justices.
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: They've talked about statehood for DC and Puerto Rico. They've
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: talked about getting rid of gerrymandering and making it easier
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: to vote. And you might have heard me nag Cory
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: Booker about getting rid of the filibuster in our interview
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: this week. And He did change his position a little,
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: saying he's not closed the door on it. Dan, why
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: do you think a big discussion about these Democratic reforms
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: is happening now in this campaign in a way that
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: it hasn't in any other presidential campaign I can remember?
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: And why is it so important? Why should people care
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: about these seemingly unconnected set of proposals?
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: I like that you call them small-D Democratic reforms as
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: opposed to Soros-funded socialist power grabs.
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I thought, you know, I'm a messaging guy. Good job.
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: Good job. I think that this set of issues has
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: risen to the top for a couple of reasons. One
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: is there is sort of a homogeneity on policy issues
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: where people are pretty close to each other on what
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: they would do if they were president. And the area
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: of distinction is how they would get those things done.
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: This discussion comes from the fact that both Trump's election
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: and the behavior of Mitch McConnell and the Republicans, both
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: before Trump's election and certainly after Trump's election, has shown
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: that there are fundamental flaws in our political system, that
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: the system itself is based on this. notion that you
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: would have two parties operating in equally good faith, trying
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: to achieve different visions for the country, that you would
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: have people who would be president or a Senate leader
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: who would put patriotism above profit-making or lining their own pockets,
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: and that people would naturally abide by some set of
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: good behavior. And we now know that's not true. We
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: know that the Republican Party, both through Trump, but also
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: before Trump, have exploited the loopholes in the system to
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: push forward a essentially plutocratic minority rule in this country.
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: And something has to be done about it because the
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: system can't sustain a world in which the voices of
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: the majority of Americans are diminished by a set of
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: anti-democratic rules and laws in this country.
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: I think that last point is key. I mean, we
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: now have one political party that's established minority rules by
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: maintaining a set of anti-democratic rules, laws, and institutions. The
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: last two Republican presidents won elections without winning the popular vote.
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: Republicans held on to the House of Representatives for so
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: long because they got to draw congressional districts and basically
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: pick their voters. Republicans have an advantage in the Senate
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: because their voters, as polarization has continued, now live in rural,
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: mostly sparsely populated states. Plus, in addition to that, there's
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: a rule called the filibuster, which says that nothing can
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: get past past the Senate without 60 votes. So that
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: is going to benefit the party that represents more states,
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: especially more sparsely populated states. And between the two presidents
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: who lost the popular vote and the Republican Senate leader
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: who represents the population of Kentucky, those those three men
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: were able to install four extremely conservative justices to the
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: Supreme Court. That is the situation in our country right now,
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: that one party using a bunch of laws and institutions
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: and rules has established minority rule in a country. And
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: so the majority of people in this country, when they
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: go to vote, their voices are not being heard like
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: they could because of all these other rules and institutions.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: And because, by the way, I mean, the thing that's
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: really driving this is that as the way that the
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: parties have sorted themselves over the last couple of decades
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: means that Democrats are increasingly living in densely populated urban
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: areas and Republicans are living in sparsely populated rural areas.
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: And so the states that comprise those rural areas are
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: having more power and their politicians that they're electing having
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: more power in Washington. And if this continues this way
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: and we do not do anything about it, it is
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: extremely unlikely the Democrats will ever win 60 votes in
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: the Senate, that we will ever be able to pass
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: any kind of progressive majority. We could continue to see
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: popular vote losers become the president of the United States
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: and And we could continue for a generation to have
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: a Supreme Court where no Democratic president, and thus the
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: voters that elected that Democratic president, ever have a say
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: in who their Supreme Court justice is. It's not great, Dan.
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: No, it's not great. And obviously we are biased. We
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: are progressives. We want progressive policies to be the law
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: of this country. That's all true. But I think we
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: just have to take a step back and look at
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: this through just a nonpartisan lens, which is what is
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: better for democracy, that we hang on to these outdated, anachronistic,
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: archaic norms that were written at a time in which
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: we were 13 colonies and not a large country of
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: 300-some million Americans, or we change the rules so that
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: people that the actual majority of Americans get to have
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: a say in their government. Because I can tell you
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: that what will be deeply damaging to American democracy, as
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: flawed as it has been in history, but as we
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: know it, is if generations of a progressive majority are
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: ruled by a conservative minority because of how the Supreme
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: Court is constructed, because of the Electoral College, because of
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: filibustered how the Senate is done. And that is dangerous.
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: And the argument should not be what is best for
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: Democrats or Republicans. It is what does the majority want?
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: And then it is for the Democrats and Republicans or
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: whatever other parties may come to exist one day to
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: argue for what that is. Because the Republicans had a
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: choice after they lost the 2008 election. They could develop
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: a set of policies that were broadly appealing, or they
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: could change the rules to diminish the voices of the
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: people who wanted progressive policies. And so they just, instead
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: of trying to win the game, they changed the rules.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: And I think large swaths of the public And large
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: swaths of Democratic elected officials in the Senate in particular
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: are completely numb to what is happening in this country,
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: and that is deeply dangerous.
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and look, the general thrust of American history has
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: been towards reforms, constitutional amendments, and laws to give more
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: people more of a voice in this country. There was
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: one point where we didn't have people directly elect the president.
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: They direct, they, you know, and so the electors and
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: the electoral college elected the president. Then we changed that
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: so people have a choice to, people can vote directly
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: for the president. We used to have a situation where
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: people couldn't directly vote for senators, right? And so like,
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: and then not to mention, you know, amendments to the
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: constitution that protected voting rights, that gave citizenship to everyone,
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: that gave women suffrage, that gave African-American suffrage and equal rights, right?
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: Like every reform and law or, at least the general
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: sweep of them, has been towards the general direction of
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: giving more people more of a voice. And I think
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: that if Democrats argue that, that's what we have to
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: keep in mind. You're absolutely right. It's not about giving
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: one party an advantage over the other. If we have
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: a system where the majority of people in this country
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: are represented adequately and those people are Republicans because Republicans
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: have policies that more people like, then fine. But that's
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: not what's happening right now. you know?
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: It's the exact opposite.
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: So the question is, do voters care about these reforms?
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: And if not, how do we make them care?
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: They probably don't care, at least with the same level
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: of passion that we apparently care about it. But I
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: think the reason that you were just nagging Cory Booker
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: and that we have raised this a bunch of times,
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: and I talked to Pete Buttigieg about it, and Tommy
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: talked to Elizabeth Warren, and the reason we raised this,
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: I think, is because we have a certain perspective, which
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: is we all sat in that White House and tried
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: to figure out how we take the things that Barack
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: Obama ran on, and a significant majority of Americans voted for,
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: and turn that into actual policy. How do you deliver
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: on those campaign promises? And I think this discussion around
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: the filibuster, the electoral college, what you do in the
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: Supreme Court is all, it's a proxy for a more
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: important question. It's what is your theory of change? How
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: are you going to succeed where others have failed? How
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: are you going to take these promises and turn them
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: into policy? And I think voters care probably about that
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: larger question and are interested in that larger question more
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: so than the sort of the details of how you
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: get there. But it's like, why are you going to
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: be different? Why are you going to be able to
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: enact change that others have failed? And I think that
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: is something that voters do care about.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: And look, and I was saying this to Cory Booker, right? Like,
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: what's driving anger, disgust with politics, cynicism, apathy, people turning
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: away from the political system is gridlock in Washington. The
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: fact that Washington never seems to get anything done. This
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: was true when Barack Obama started his race in 2007.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: We saw it throughout his presidency. We have seen it recently.
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: We saw it in 2016. Like, people are angry that
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: nothing ever seems to get done. Pundits treat that like
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: people are upset that everyone's yelling at each other and
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: there's no bipartisanship. I think people care even less about
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: bipartisanship than they do. They just want action from Washington.
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: They want to see that the people they're electing are
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: actually solving their problems. And my concern is if a
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: Democrat gets elected in 2020 and it turns out that
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: all of the big promises they made on the campaign
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: trail were just promises because they don't have an actual
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: plan to get them passed, that will deepen people's cynicism
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: and lead to more Republican governance and more people like Trump,
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: more demagogues, more populists. Like, our job in this election,
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: and if a Democrat wins, is to prove that a
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: Democratic president, a Democratic Congress, and Democrats in general can
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: actually bring about the change that they talked about on
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: the campaign trail. To me, like, That's even more important
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: than your policy agenda for the reason that you said.
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: Everyone's policy agenda is pretty progressive. There's differences. Some are
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: a little more moderate than others, but generally they're all
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: moving in the right direction. The difference is, what's your
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: theory for how you're going to get that passed? And
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: that's why people talk about how new and ambitious Elizabeth
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: Warren's policy ideas are. I think what makes her even
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: more fit to lead is her embrace of these democratic reforms.
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: And she's been a leader in the field in embracing
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: a lot of these. Her Pete Buttigieg has embraced a
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: lot of them as well. We've heard Jay Inslee, Beto O'Rourke.
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: Some of these people are really embracing these reforms, and
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: that to me is a really good sign. And I
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: think more candidates will. I think a lot of them,
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris said she was interested in abolishing the Electoral
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: College as well, which was great. So I think a
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: lot more of them will be catching on to this.
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: What was most interesting, I thought Elizabeth Warren's most interesting
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: answer of this entire campaign has been when she was
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: asked what bill she would do first, right? Because theoretically,
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: you have the most political capital immediately after you're inaugurated.
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: The first bill you take up is the one you
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: have the most likelihood to succeed on, right? So prioritization
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: is a really important question. It's one that we've all
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: been asking people in the 2020 interviews we've done. And
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: Elizabeth Warren's answer was not Wall Street reform. It was
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: not her childcare policy or Medicare for all. It was
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: her anti-corruption legislation. And her argument was, that everything else
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: would be easier if you could reduce the influence of
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: special interests in Congress by passing that bill.
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: Really smart.
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: That is a theory of change, right? That is a
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: very well thought out theory of how you go about
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: passing your agenda. And I think that is the standard
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: that Democratic voters, whether they're in Iowa or New Hampshire
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: or any of the other states that people are going
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: to come to, should push them on that. It's not
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: just what you're going to do, it's how are you
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: going to get it done? Because you can have the
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: best policy agenda in the world, It can be the
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: exact thing I want, but if you have no concept
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: or no actual theory of how to get it done
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: with an understanding of the moment we're in and who
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: the opposition is– because you've got to understand that in
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: this world with this Republican Party bolstered by a propaganda
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: operation like Fox News, funded by billionaires like the Kochs,
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: that it is a fucking war to keep the lights on,
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: let alone to transform the economy into a green economy
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: or to move large portions of the population to Medicare. Like,
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: it is– like, you have to– it is not as
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: simple as going down the hall to talk to Mitch
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: McConnell or having more people over for drinks or playing
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: golf with Kevin McCarthy or someone. It is like, you
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: have to have a theory and voters should push people
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: on that because a, somebody can get something done is
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: incredibly important here.
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And, and look, I think a lot of voters
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: either don't know about these reforms, don't think about them
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: that much, but when you pull them, people have been
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: in favor, majorities have been in favor of doing away
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: with the electoral college since, the late 80s, according to polls.
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: I looked this up, but I saw only one poll
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: about the filibuster. There was a narrow plurality that wanted
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: to get rid of the filibuster. I'm sure most people
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: don't know what the fuck the filibuster is. So I
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: think the field and all of us would benefit from
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: a lot more polling on these issues, and hopefully that
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: will happen over the course of this race. Let's talk
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: a little bit about the media reaction to this, which
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: is as dumb as you might imagine. Headline in NPR said,
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: Democratic candidates embrace the risk of radical ideas. They got,
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: you know, governor of the D.C. Green Room, Ed Rendell,
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: in that piece saying Democrats will lose to Trump if
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: they embrace these reforms. And here's James Homan of The
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: Washington Post, quote, It's discordant to watch Dems warn in
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: apocalyptic terms that Trump's disregarding sacred norms and destroying the
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: republic in one breath while calling for court packing, abolishing
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: the Electoral College, ending private insurance and paying out reparations
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: in the next. I don't know why those last two
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: things are part of this discussion. I guess that tells
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: you something right there. Dan, you want to take that one?
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: Want to tee off here?
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: Before the Twitter hordes go after James Homan, he's a
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: good reporter. His daily watchmost newsletter is smart.
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I love it.
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: I just want to not tell people. I vehemently disagree
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: with this tweet, as you will hear in a second,
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: but He's not the cause of all the problems in
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: American journalism, so I just want.
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: To stipulate that.
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: This idea is so fucking stupid it hurts my brain.
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: The argument is basically is that the Democrats are responding
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: to unconstitutional power grabs from the Republicans by using constitutional
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: processes to ensure that more people's voices are heard. to
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: that they're undertaking a crazy idea to make it so
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: that the person who gets the most votes wins the election.
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: Like what the fuck are we talking about? Like the
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: Democrats are not proposing stealing any Supreme court seats. They're
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: proposing passing laws to be signed by presidents, passing constitutional
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: amendments to be ratified by state legislatures. Like, and then
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: to even put in the, to put in the same bucket, um,
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: under radical power grabs, taking power away from the insurance
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: industry so that more people could have access to affordable
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: quality health care is bananas. It is just this desire,
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: this like fucking tractor beam of asinine conventional wisdom pulling
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: people into a both sides argument when there are not
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: two sides of the argument. There is one side. There
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: is the right side. It is the fact that the
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: Republicans have disregarded every norm, every bit of their constitutional
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: duty and to protect Trump, to hoard power, to benefit
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: billionaires and Wall Street, et cetera. And all Democrats want
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: to do is fix the problems that this period in
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: American history have revealed in the U.S.
• 18:07
  Speaker 4: Political system.
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: Right. And also every norm that Donald Trump has broken,
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: including possibly some laws, has been about anti-majoritarian, anti-democratic, authoritarian moves, right? Like,
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: calling the press the enemy of the people, you know,
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: trying to, oh, selling access and influence to your White
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: House by, you know, letting foreign leaders stay in your
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: hotels and pocketing the money and having members at Mar-a-Lago
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: pitch you on policy, right? Like every norm he is
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: breaking is about consolidating power, is about less democracy, you know?
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: And so it's like there's a complete, and he's breaking
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: the norms, like you said, We're just asking to pass
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: some laws, right? Like if we can't pass them, we
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: can't pass them. We're trying to ask for some constitutional amendments,
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: which will be also pretty hard to pass. But we're
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: just asking about them. We're not saying like, let's elect
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: our president and then have that president declare a national emergency, say,
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: to pass a bunch of legislation. We're not proposing that.
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: It's wild. The whole conversation is wild. And just as
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: you're talking about selling access, I think I would just
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: like to note A story that should be the biggest
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: story in America, which is that the woman running the
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: sex trafficking ring in Florida that ensnared Bob Kraft is
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: a Mar-a-Lago member selling access to Chinese officials as part
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: of an influence peddling scam through Trump's privately held club.
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: Just completely under the radar.
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: That is like textbook scandal. And we're too busy having
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: a national conversation about George Conway and John McCain and
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: everything else.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: But Dan, the Democratic response to that is to move
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: more people onto Medicare.
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: Extreme.
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: Radicals. Hashtag radicals.
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: So the question is, is there any political risk here
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: for Democrats, potentially? Trump clearly sensed some sort of opportunity
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: when he tweeted the following this week, quote, the Democrats
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: are getting very, in quotation marks, strange. They now want
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: to change the voting age to 16, abolish the Electoral College,
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: and increase significantly the number of Supreme Court justices. Actually,
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: you've got to win at the ballot box. I mean,
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: he didn't actually win the majority of the people at
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: the ballot box, but That's neither here nor there. How
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: do we avoid that trap, Dan?
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: And it's not avoidable. Yes, there is political risk. There
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: is political risk in getting out of bed in the morning.
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: And the question is, how do you manage that risk?
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: And I do think it's important that if Democrats are
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: going to propose these reforms, that they are specific about
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: what they mean, right? And I think there's been some...
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: It's early in the campaign, but a lot of people
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: are like, yeah, let's open the door to court packing,
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: or let's open the door to filibuster reform, whatever else.
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: So let's say what that means. When we had Pete
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: Buttigieg on, he didn't outline what his specific proposal on
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: court packing was, but he floated an idea that probably
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: makes a lot of sense to people by having a
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: larger Supreme Court where some members of the members have
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: to be selected on a bipartisan basis. So I think
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: if you're going to do it, you have to be
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: specific about it because that makes it harder for Trump
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: and the Republicans to demagogue. But ultimately what he wants
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: to do is scare The public, because any election involving
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: an incumbent is a contest between frustration with the status
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: quo and fear of change. And Trump was able to
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: win the election by telling people that their frustration with
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: the status quo exceeded their fear of Trump as president.
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: And now he's going to try to do the reverse
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: with Democrats. But that doesn't– we also– we've talked about
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: this in 2018. We've talked about this in relation to
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: immigration or Medicare for All or whatever it is, is
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: that Trump is going to lie about your position. So
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: just– If you think you can be for keeping electoral
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: college and keeping the Supreme Court and Trump and the
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: Republicans are not going to attack you every day for
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: court packing and eliminating electoral college, then you're insane. Then
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: you have been sleeping through the last many years of
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: Republican politics.
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: So before we move on, we've talked at length about
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: filibuster and court reform on this pod before, but we
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: haven't actually talked much about eliminating the electoral college. We
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: mentioned that Elizabeth Warren called for this during her town
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: hall this week. It's something Pete Buttigieg has been talking
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: about for quite a while. He talked about it in
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: his CNN town hall a couple weeks before. Kamala Harris
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: told Jimmy Kimmel she'd be open to the discussion this week.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: Beto O'Rourke said, quote, there's a lot of wisdom in
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: the idea. What do you think, Dan? Good idea?
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: The Electoral College is fucking stupid. It is a stupid idea.
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: It is an old idea. It makes absolutely zero sense.
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: The idea that we exist in a system where A
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: minority of Americans can elect the president because of what
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: state they happen to live in is such an outdated idea.
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: It should be eliminated. And the fears about the changes
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: that would rot are also stupid. It is so common
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: sense that it's stunning and telling that we actually haven't
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: done this a long time ago.
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: So– you know, the, the big argument, well, there's a
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: couple arguments against doing this, right? The first argument is
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: this is what the founders intended. Uh, you know, the
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: founders and all their brilliance. Um, and so we must
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: not change what the founders intended. And look, we have
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: already talked about this just on this pod, right? Like
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: the founders also set up a system where, um, people couldn't,
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: you know, directly elect the president of the Senate and
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: the people who could participate in democracy were, um, white
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: male landowners, right? So like the founders' intentions have gone
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: a little bit astray on who participates in our democracy.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: That's number one. So the other big argument against this is, okay, well,
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: if that happens, then presidential candidates will only compete in
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: densely populated areas in the cities, right? Like the election
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: will just take place in Los Angeles and New York
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: City and in Chicago and places like that. And no
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: one else will have a voice. What do you say
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: to that argument?
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: Well, John, I have some thoughts on this. But you
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: and I have... We've done a lot of traveling during
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: presidential campaigns.
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: How many times did you think we went to Ohio, Florida, Colorado, say,
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: in the last, I don't know, month or so of
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: the 2008 or 2012 election?
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: All the times.
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: All the time. So fucking often you... You know exactly
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: what hotel you're going to stay in. We went all
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: the time. How many times did we go to Idaho?
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: Never been.
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: How many times did we go to Los Angeles in
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: the last month?
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: Just to raise money. Yeah, but to actually campaign and
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: see voters? Never. No campaigning and seeing voters. You go
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: visit with some rich people, you get their money, and
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: then you do a show. Like Pod Save America. If
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: you're in LA, everyone, please come do Pod Save America.
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: We want to change the electoral college so more people
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: will be here to do Pod Save America. People are
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: already campaigning in a narrow set of states. And the
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: idea that they would only go to densely populated areas,
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: and people only go to mostly densely populated areas in
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: those states now. You go to the largest media market.
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: You go to where there are voters. This is not
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: a problem that you're not creating a problem and you're
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: not fixing a problem. You're simply changing the fact that
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: you think it's a good idea that the majority of
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: Americans should be able to pick the president. And there
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: are densely populated areas like Atlanta, Jackson, Mississippi, or places
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: like that that candidates never go to that they might
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: go to now because that vote, right now, a vote
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: in Georgia, at least before this upcoming election, and a
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: vote in Mississippi is worth almost nothing because you already
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: know how the outcome is going to be. But if
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: you could get some number of votes out of those states,
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: you would go to those states. It would actually make
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: it that people would campaign more places, not fewer places.
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: And frankly, it seems to be the reason that Elizabeth
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: Warren wanted to have that town hall in Mississippi and
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: break that news in Mississippi, because Mississippi is a state
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: with a very high percentage of African Americans who live
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: in that state. But because the state is so Republican,
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: because of the system that we have, presidential candidates don't
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: go there because they know it's going to go to
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: the Republican. And if it was about stitching together a
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: national coalition and not a coalition that adds up to
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: 270 electoral votes in different states, presidential candidates might go
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: to Mississippi and campaign there and talk to those voters
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: and give those voters a voice. And this goes for
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: both sides as well. If you're a Republican in California,
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: do you really think about going to the polls to
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: elect the president? Like, might Might you think about it
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: a little more if you knew that your vote counted
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: towards a national popular vote as opposed to thinking, well,
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: California always goes to Democrats, so what does my vote matter?
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: I grew up in Massachusetts, and then I lived in D.C.,
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: and then I lived in Chicago, and now I live
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: in Los Angeles, right? Like, I have never lived in
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: a place where my vote for president, where I thought
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: that my vote for president would really make much of
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: a difference because I lived in deep blue states all
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: the time. Think of what would be on everyone's mind
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: about voting, knowing that your vote could add to a
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: national popular vote tally that would then directly elect the
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: President of the United States. Think of the strategies that
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: would change on behalf of the presidential campaigns, where they
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: would go, the different coalitions they would try to assemble,
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: the different states they would try to go to. And
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: also the idea that you can't just campaign in the cities.
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: Beto O'Rourke campaigned in Texas. Do you think he spent
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: all his time in Austin, Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio?
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: He did not. Do you think Stacey Abrams spent all
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: of her time in Atlanta? She did not. She organized
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: a lot of people in rural areas. Do you think
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: Andrew Gillum spent all his time in the population centers
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: in Florida? He did not, right? These progressive candidates who
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: are running in some of these very red states in 2018,
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: they actually went around those states to try to assemble
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: a coalition beyond just the population centers.
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: I mean, the other way to think about this is
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: just from the perspective of a campaign, how it spends
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: its money, how it spends its time, is right now
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: a Republican candidate has zero incentive to narrow the margin
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: in California. A Democratic candidate has zero incentive to narrow
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: the margin in Texas or Louisiana or any of those
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: states like that. So now it would make so much
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: sense in a popular vote election for a Republican to
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: campaign and spend money in California because if you can
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: just narrow that margin by five points, that's millions of
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: votes that are available to you, right? If you narrow
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: the margin in Texas for a Democrat from nine, even
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: if you lose a state, but you narrow it from,
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: I think, the seven or nine that Hillary lost, two
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: to three, that's millions of votes into your tally. And
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: so there is actually not really, other than clinging to
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: this idea of 13 separate colonies, there really is not
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: a legitimate argument for the Electoral College. Just from a
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: pure what is good for the country, how candidates would
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: spend their time, how candidates would spend their money, what
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: would increase voter participation in this country, all of the
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: arguments push towards eliminating the Electoral College.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: Just, you know, one last stat here. 94% of the
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: 2016 presidential campaign events were in 12 states. 24 states
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: plus the District of Columbia... got zero campaign visits in 2016.
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: 24 states.
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: I think we settled this. Let's get rid of that.
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: That's the Electoral College. So the question is, what do
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: we have to do to eliminate the Electoral College? Obviously,
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: this is in the Constitution, so there is a constitutional amendment.
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: Constitutional amendments are extraordinarily difficult to pass because... You need
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: two-thirds majorities. You need state legislatures to ratify, right? But
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: there's another way to do this. It is something called
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. This is how it works.
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: Individual states change their own laws so that they award
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: their electoral votes to the winner of the National Popular Vote.
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: And the compact doesn't take effect until states representing 270
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: electoral votes opt in and pass these laws. Once they do,
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: The winner of the national popular vote would be guaranteed
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: a pool of 270 electoral votes from the states that
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: are part of the compact. This week, Colorado just passed
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: the law to make themselves part of the compact, which
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: brings the total electoral votes right now in the compact
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: to 181. New Mexico, Delaware, Nevada, Maine, and Oregon could
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: all be next. They have Democratic governors who've been on
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: record as supporting this. We won Democratic majorities in some
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: of these states in 2018. And so if these states
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: pass the compact as well, it brings it to 206
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: electoral votes, which is just 64 votes short of ending
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: the Electoral College. So this is actually something that could
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: pass without a constitutional amendment. Pretty exciting.
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Now we need to get some of those solidly
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: red states to do the same thing.
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I need some of the big states here. We
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: need some of the big states and some of the
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: red states. I think those last 64 votes will be
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: pretty difficult, but who knows? Who knows?
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: Can I do one addendum to our norms discussion that
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: I think... Sure. I don't want there to be confusion,
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: because in the beginning, you mentioned the things people are
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: talking about, including D.C. and Puerto Rico becoming states. And
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: sometimes when we say this, it leads to some confusion
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: of what our actual position is on this, which is,
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: that D.C. should become a state. That should be one
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: of the first things that a new Democratic president, Democratic
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: majority does. But Puerto Rico should decide its own future.
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: And if it wants to become a state, Congress should
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: do that. If it wants to become independent, they should
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: do that. If they want another option, they should do that.
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: Sometimes we hear from people who think we're using the
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: people of Puerto Rico as a political pawn here, and
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: we're not. We think Puerto Rico should pick its path,
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: and then the U.S. government should do that. D.C. has
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: indicated it wants statehood. It should have statehood. It should
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: become a state.
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: Again, it fits with our larger theme here. More democracy.
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: People get to choose. If people want to choose that
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: they become a state, great. If they don't want to,
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: that's okay, too. Just give more people a voice in
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: our democracy. That's what we're saying.
• 32:34
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about the investigation of the president. I don't
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: know if you've noticed, Dan, but Trump has been acting
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: up a bit lately. He's a little unwell. He continued
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: his feud with deceased Senator John McCain, complaining he didn't
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: receive a thank you for giving him the kind of
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: funeral he wanted. I don't even know where to begin
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: on that one. He lashed out at White House senior
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: advisor Kellyanne Conway's husband, George, and he attacked Robert Mueller himself, saying, quote,
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: I know that he's conflicted and I know that his
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: best friend is Comey, who's a bad cop. He also
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: complained that even though he had one of the, quote,
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: greatest elections of all time in the history of this country,
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: now Mueller gets to write the report when no one
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: voted for him. Dan, do these seem like the deranged
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: musings of an innocent man?
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: They certainly do not seem like the musings of someone
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: who is feeling very centered and comfortable in their own
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: personal situation. Yeah, it's not great.
• 33:41
  Speaker 3: This is.
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: I know we never want to ascribe strategy to the
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: things Trump is doing because his strategy is to watch
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: Fox News and then immediately say or tweet the thing
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: that is most, that most fires the synapses of his
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: very addled brain. But we are all talking about the
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: Conways and their marriage and what it means that Trump
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: did this and this feud with John McCain. And my
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: personal opinion on both of those stories, including the John
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: McCain story, is I do not give a shit. We
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: all knew a long time ago that Trump was an asshole.
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: That is part of his brand. He has advertised his
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: assholery for years. We don't have to talk about it anymore.
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: It's gross that he attacks McCain. I don't give two
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: shits about the Conways either way. But let's move on
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: and talk about the most important thing, which is the
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: fact that the president is involved in multiple criminal enterprises
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: and a massive amount of corruption. And somewhere in there,
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: there is a message and a strategy. It's just pretty
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: fucking hard to find.
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: So, well, it is hard to find because the House
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: voted last week 420 to nothing on a resolution demanding
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: that Mueller's work be made public upon completion. Lindsey Graham
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: then blocked a similar resolution in the Senate. He actually
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: asked to amend it to include the appointment of a
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: new special counsel to look into Hillary's emails. I shit
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: you not. But then Trump has said, quote, and he
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: said this again yesterday, let it come out, let the
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: people see it. That's up to the attorney general. So
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: what do you think's going on there? Does Trump really
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: want people to see the Mueller report? And will we
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: see the Mueller report?
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: I don't know whether we'll see it or not. We've
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: had long conversations with Marcy Wheeler and others about how
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: it could become public one day, regardless of what Attorney
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: General Barr decides. But Trump also swore up and down
• 35:33
  Speaker 2: that he would be more than happy to testify or
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: be interviewed by Mueller. And he did not do those things.
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: And so Right.
• 35:40
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: Right. Well, so we get a preview of how Republicans
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: are likely to spin this report from the Associated Press,
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: which ran a story this week that said the following, quote,
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: Trump and his allies are starting to see Mueller's investigation
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: as something potentially very different, a political opportunity. With Robert
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: Mueller's findings expected any day, the president has grown increasingly
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: confident the report will produce what he insisted all along,
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: no clear evidence of a conspiracy between Russia and his
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: 2016 campaign, and Trump and his advisors are considering how
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: to weaponize those possible findings for the 2020 race, according
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: to current and former White House officials and presidential confidants
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: who spoke on condition of anonymity. Dan, is being investigated
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: for multiple felonies and watching some of your closest aides
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: go to jail actually good for Trump?
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: Imagine the editorial meeting around the table of the Associated Press,
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: where they're like, wow, we've written so many stories about
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: why the criminal investigation into the president is bad for
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: the president. What if we wrote a story about how
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: it's good for the president? That is like a it's
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: like a sports radio hot take that burns. It's so stupid.
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: It is not. There's no world in which is good
• 37:09
  Speaker 2: for the president. It's also shitty journalism because you're just
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: transcribing the spin without any level of scrutiny to that spin.
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: The fact that the president is having a fucking meltdown
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: over the last few days suggests that maybe he's not
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: so confident that this report will be good for him.
• 37:25
  Speaker 2: And the fact that his allies, Republicans in Congress, and
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: his wholly-owned propaganda network are out shitting all over Mueller
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: in his report suggests that maybe they're not so confident
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: this is a good thing. Because if they thought this
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: thing was going to, A, be a political winner, and B,
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: be a political winner by declaring his innocence, then they
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: would not be undermining the legitimacy of said report. So
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: it's an insane spin, and it's sort of embarrassing to
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: have transcribed that with zero scrutiny.
• 37:55
  Speaker 4: But.
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: I will say I expect that the media, the mainstream media,
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: or at least much of the media, has set this
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: bar so high now where if Robert Mueller doesn't come
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: out and say, this man must be impeached, or if
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: he doesn't indict Don Jr. or Jared Kushner or anyone else,
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: then they'll say, or if there's not, as we've always
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: talked about, the recording of the phone call between Donald
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: Trump and Vladimir Putin, where they say, hey, let's collude,
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: then somehow this whole thing is going to be this
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: big disappointment, a problem for Democrats, a win for Donald Trump.
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: And you can imagine all those analysis pieces getting written.
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: You can imagine cable news running crazy with this. And,
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: you know, I don't quite know what Democrats do about it, except,
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: you know, bang their heads against the wall and scream.
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: But it does seem pretty wild. that given the information
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: we already know about the president's criminality, his advisor's proven criminality,
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: and all the other corruption that's going on in this administration,
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: how that can be good for him, I don't know.
• 39:10
  Speaker 2: I'm like pre-angry about this. I already know exactly what's
• 39:14
  Speaker 2: going to happen. I already know who's going to say what.
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: I know who's going to write what. I can read
• 39:17
  Speaker 2: the fucking chyrons on TV. I know what my reaction's
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: going to be. I already know What I'm going to tweet.
• 39:22
  Speaker 2: I know what you and I are going to text about.
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: I know what I'm going to yell in that podcast.
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: I have seen the future. I know how this is going.
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: And it's going to be really fucking annoying.
• 39:29
  Speaker 4: But.
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: But it is, let's get this thing out of the way.
• 39:35
  Speaker 2: Let's get this fucking report over with. Let's turn it
• 39:38
  Speaker 2: in Bob Mueller. If you've got to send some people
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: to jail, let's send them to jail. If you're not,
• 39:41
  Speaker 2: let's get the report out. Let's go through this ritual
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: process where the press decides that this is a winner
• 39:47
  Speaker 2: for Trump. Democrats overplayed their hand. Oh my God, what
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: are Democrats going to do?
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: It's over.
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: People will start pre-drafting Trump's second inaugural. Let's get that
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: out of the way. Everyone needs to focus on the
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: fact that Bob Mueller ain't going to solve our fucking problem.
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: The only way Trump is getting out of here is
• 40:04
  Speaker 2: if we, not Positive America, we, the American public, do
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: the hard work of winning elections, just like we did
• 40:12
  Speaker 2: in 2018. We knew Bob Mueller wasn't going to save
• 40:14
  Speaker 2: the Democrats from not getting control of the House. So
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: we have to know that Bob Mueller is not the
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: solution to our problem. We have to beat Trump at
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: the ballot box. So let's get this behind us and
• 40:25
  Speaker 2: start focusing on that.
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: Dan, there's some good news. By saying this right now,
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: you've ensured that before this podcast comes out, Bob Mueller
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: will come out with a host of indictments and potentially
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: save us all.
• 40:40
  Speaker 2: John, I knew this was a possibility today because the
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: chatter is quite high in Washington that.
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: The Mueller report.
• 40:46
  Speaker 2: Is coming anytime soon. My afternoon is free, basically. After
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: 1 o'clock today, I am ready for emergency pods, bonus pods,
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: live tweeting of things. I am prepared for the rage
• 40:59
  Speaker 2: that will come when this report does not. Because the
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: only thing the press would accept would be just one
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: page that just says guilty.
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: Guilty. And then Bob Mueller perp-walking Donald Trump out of
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: the White House. That's what they're looking for. Perp-walk Donald
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: Trump out of the White House in cuffs with Bob
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: Mueller and he's got his hands raised high. Victory. That's
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: what some people think is going to happen.
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: It would be like one of those huge busts where
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: they also take Pence down and Nancy Pelosi just moves
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: into the office. Anything short of Nancy Pelosi moving herself
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: in the office by five today is a massive loss
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: for Democrats and Trump the election.
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: And then at the end of the episode, she just
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: puts on her shades, just walks out of Capitol Hill,
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: walks down to the White House, takes a seat. That's it.
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: That's the end. Roll the credits.
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: She will only govern in those sunglasses.
• 41:48
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: It's a good segue to what we really need to
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: do in 2020. There were a pair of somewhat concerning
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: stories about Democratic enthusiasm heading into the next election that
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: ran this week. The first was by Matt Iglesias at Vox,
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: who wrote about what he believes is the demobilization of
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: the resistance since the midterms. He said that there wasn't
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: a mass mobilization around the emergency declaration from Trump. There
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: wasn't a mass mobilization forcing a Senate vote on the
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: House Democrats anti-corruption pro voting rights bill. H.R. 1. Our
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: friend Ezra Levin of Indivisible responded saying there was plenty
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: of activism around both of those issues. But Ezra did
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: agree that we have got to build political engagement now
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: in advance of 2020, that we can't wait till 2020.
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: In the other piece, Washington Post reporter Philip Bump noted
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: that in special elections before 2018, Democrats overperformed by an
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: average of nine points, overperformed their usual margins. But in
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: the special elections since the midterms, the ones we've had recently,
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: which I haven't even noticed them all, to tell you
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: the truth, but there have been a bunch, and Republicans
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: have overperformed by one point and have already picked up
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: four seats held by Democrats. So first overall question, how
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: much should Democrats be worried about complacency heading into 2020?
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: As we say....
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: Or as I say, I guess, worry about everything, panic
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: about nothing. Yes, we should be worried. I think in
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: both these pieces, they're sort of two separate things, but
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: they are related around the enthusiasm question. I think it
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: is unfair, to talk about the Vox piece for a sec,
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: to expect Democrats to have a same level of civil
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: disobedience response we had to taking healthcare away from people
• 43:39
  Speaker 2: or banning all Muslims from coming to this country as
• 43:41
  Speaker 2: to the moving around the federal dollars for small portions
• 43:46
  Speaker 2: of a fence that will be built. It's not the
• 43:48
  Speaker 2: same thing, right? I don't think you can... The emergency
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: declaration has long-term process concerns about how our government functions,
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: but the actual result of it is not something that
• 44:01
  Speaker 2: is immediate or real or affecting people. The building of
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: the wall itself is something people should mobilize around, but
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: this is a very small piece of it and it's
• 44:07
  Speaker 2: a very esoteric sort of dumb argument, and everyone knows
• 44:10
  Speaker 2: that everyone's sort of playing a part in a fake
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: game here. So I'm very cognizant and receptive to Ezra's
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: response to this. But we do have to assume that
• 44:26
  Speaker 2: Republican enthusiasm is going to be through the fucking roof.
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: And we have to remember that Republican enthusiasm in 2010
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: swept them to one of the largest, at least in
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: terms of seat pickups, uh, elections ever. And then they
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: got their ass kicked in 2012. And so, you know,
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: you have to recognize that 18 can teach us lessons
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: about how to win in 20, but it's not predictable
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: what's going to happen in 20. So we have to
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: be even better, even smarter, even more enthusiastic. The, in
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: a larger presidential field, you actually need more enthusiasm. Like
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: you need more people to come out because they're like
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: small increases enthusiasm here and there. are minimized by the
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: fact that it's happening in a larger pool of voters.
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: So this is a, it's going to be hard and
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: we have to be aware of that.
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And look, and the other thing that can sort
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: of hurt us, or at least sap our enthusiasm about
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: beating Trump, is an extended fight with each other about
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: who we're nominating in 2020. And I, you know, look,
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: I think It is true that most Democrats in the
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: country right now, most Democratic voters, the vast, vast majority
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: of voters, probably have warm feelings towards all the candidates.
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: Most of them don't know all the candidates. They've heard
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: like Bernie's name and Biden's name and then probably after
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: those two, Elizabeth Warren. But they don't know a lot
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: of the other candidates that well yet. And, you know,
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: they like them all and they're not really paying close
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: attention yet. But a lot of Democratic activists... And writers
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: and journalists and people on Twitter are already paying way
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: too much attention to the race, us included, all the time,
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: reading about 2020. And the sniping, the early sniping among
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: Democrats about the field already is causing me a little concern,
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: I have to say, over the last couple weeks. And,
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm a huge fan, as you know, of
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: saying Twitter is not real life, so it's not causing
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: great concern yet. But I also know that Reporters now
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: report off Twitter and then they have they, you know,
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: create media narratives and the media narratives eventually bleed out
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: into the public. And my worry is that when this
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: my new worry here is that worry about everything, panic
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: about nothing, is that when this race gets heated up,
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: you know, there will be there will be just a
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: lot of angst in this party. And I will say this.
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: It's great that it's not coming from the candidates and
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: campaigns themselves right now. You know, they are being good
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: to each other. They're being respectful of each other. They
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: are acting exactly how they should. But a lot of
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: other people are not. And it's quite annoying.
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: It's annoying, and we'll have to see whether it's impactful.
• 47:10
  Speaker 2: The length of the Democratic primary does not concern me
• 47:15
  Speaker 2: on its face. Obviously, the tenor does, right? If we
• 47:18
  Speaker 2: get into this world where it's either my person or
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: no one, then that's going to be a that's going
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: to be that state. Like we need every voter. There
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: is no world, like we cannot afford a single Democratic,
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: someone who voted for someone in Democratic primary to then
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: vote for a third party candidate or sit out because
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: they're pissed about the outcome. The tenor is what matters, right?
• 47:37
  Speaker 2: We can, and particularly when people are focused on winning,
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: you can put these, you can put aside those problems.
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: You know, or put aside the division. So I have
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: lots of concerns. And I do think we have to
• 47:53
  Speaker 2: be cognizant and aware of the fact that beating an
• 48:00
  Speaker 2: incumbent president is very hard. The history of it is
• 48:05
  Speaker 2: not great. It usually requires everything to go your way.
• 48:08
  Speaker 2: And that's even true when the incumbent president you're trying
• 48:12
  Speaker 2: to beat is an incompetent clown who is treating the
• 48:15
  Speaker 2: presidency as some sort of pre-trial diversion program to avoid
• 48:18
  Speaker 2: going to jail. This is going to be challenging. We
• 48:21
  Speaker 2: are going to have to do everything right. We are
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: all going to have to get on board, and people
• 48:25
  Speaker 2: have to. The question for me is, as this primary
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: places itself out and everyone's getting involved and picking the
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: candidate they support and donating that candidate or texting for
• 48:35
  Speaker 2: that candidate or making calls for that candidate, what are
• 48:38
  Speaker 2: we doing, we writ large, the larger progressive universe, to
• 48:43
  Speaker 2: do two things. One, what are we doing to build
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: up the infrastructure of the Democratic Party and the larger
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: progressive– world to help that nominee once we have that nominee?
• 48:56
  Speaker 2: And second, what are we doing to prevent Trump from
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: strengthening while we have this fight? And those are the
• 49:03
  Speaker 2: questions I think a lot. We will spend time talking about,
• 49:06
  Speaker 2: the DNC will spend time talking about, Democrats in Congress
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: and others will spend time talking about, which is, as
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: his primary place itself out, we can't put all the
• 49:13
  Speaker 2: other work of beating Trump on hold.
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: Right. And I think, yeah, so what do we do
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: about all this? I think we have to remember to
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: focus on on Donald Trump, on what he's doing, because
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: that unifies us, that unified us during 2018, right? We
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: can't completely ignore Trump here. I also think we have
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: to focus on down ballot races, right? We have to
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: focus on the Senate. It's going to be huge, to
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: try to take the Senate back. That's going to be
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: a big, big goal in 2018. I think, by the way,
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: we also have to focus on keeping the House. You know,
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: I was talking to some of the newly elected members
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: of the House, and, you know, we're facing sort of
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: the end of the, and we're going to talk about
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: fundraising in a second, but we're facing the end of
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: the fundraising quarter at the end of March. And the NRCC,
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: which is the Republican committee that deals with House elections,
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: are already set to target a bunch of the most
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: vulnerable Democrats who just won in 2018. And those Democrats
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: need to raise money. And it was easier for them
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: to raise money in 2018 because the focus was on
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: the House. And it is harder to do so now
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: in 2020 with everyone focused on the presidential election. So
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: I would tell everyone, you know, if you go to
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: the Cook Political Report, they have 16 House seats held
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: by Democrats that they have in toss-up, that they will
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: be toss-up seats in 2020. And I would think about
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: giving some of those candidates some money, especially in advance
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: of the end of the March deadline, because that's when
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: the Republicans will think, okay, who's got a lot of
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: money on the Democratic side, who doesn't, and the people
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: who don't, maybe we'll target them and we'll run really
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: good candidates and spend a lot of money in that district.
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: And it is not going to be easy keeping the House.
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: It is not going to be easy winning the Senate back.
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: And we need to make sure, and that's to say
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: nothing of the state legislatures and governor's mansions that we
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: could flip in 2020 as well, or the ones that
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: we need to hold onto. I think it's really important
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: for everyone to focus on the party as a whole
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: and making sure we build a progressive majority in 2020.
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: And that goes beyond the presidency.
• 51:10
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 51:10
  Speaker 2: All those things play together, right? The, if you're, if
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: these Democrats in these toss up seats, many of which
• 51:17
  Speaker 2: are in, you know, the quote unquote swing States, um,
• 51:20
  Speaker 2: if they have money to run good campaigns, that's going
• 51:22
  Speaker 2: to benefit the presidential election, right? If, uh, whoever our
• 51:28
  Speaker 2: Democratic nominee is to, or let's take whoever the Democratic
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: nominee is in Arizona or Iowa or North Carolina, if
• 51:33
  Speaker 2: they have money to run real races and really organize
• 51:37
  Speaker 2: that state starting now, then that will benefit the presidential.
• 51:41
  Speaker 2: If the presidential candidate is strong and well-funded, that will
• 51:45
  Speaker 2: benefit down ballot because there is, like, we have to
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: be aware of how hard it is going to be
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: to hold on to some of these House seats and
• 51:52
  Speaker 2: how much work it's going to take. What was the
• 51:54
  Speaker 2: popular vote margin at 18? Was it seven points?
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: I think so, yeah.
• 51:58
  Speaker 2: So it is extremely unlikely that absent a collapse in
• 52:04
  Speaker 2: Trump's numbers or some exogenous event that were to happen,
• 52:10
  Speaker 2: that a Democrat is going to win the popular vote
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: by seven points.
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: So you're going to be, this is a tougher playing
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: field already. So it's going to take even more work,
• 52:18
  Speaker 2: even more organizing, even more focus and smart strategy to
• 52:22
  Speaker 2: hold on to some of these seats and ensure that
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: if we have a Democratic president, we have a Democratic
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: Senate and House to actually do the things we care about.
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: All right, let's talk about fundraising in the presidential and
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: how much it really matters. The Wall Street Journal reported
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: this week that former Vice President Joe Biden has told
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: at least a half dozen supporters that he will be
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: running for president and has asked for their help to
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: kickstart his fundraising. According to the journal, Biden could have
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: an exploratory committee set up by sometime after Easter, which
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: is April 21st. But he's also reportedly concerned about making
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: a big fundraising statement right out of the gate. And
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: he told supporters he's worried he won't be able to
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: report the same kind of online donor numbers that people
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: like Bernie Sanders and Beto O'Rourke did as they kicked
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: off their campaigns. So just to step back for a minute, like,
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: is Biden right to be worried about raising money online?
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: Why is online money treated as more valuable than traditional
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: fundraising these days? Like a lot of people hear these
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: numbers and I think There's not a lot of context
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: for what it means, how much it matters, why should
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: we give a shit about this?
• 53:24
  Speaker 2: It's a pretty stunning statement about how fundraising in campaigns
• 53:30
  Speaker 2: has radically changed in the last few cycles. Because here
• 53:34
  Speaker 2: you have the two-term Vice President of the United States,
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: been in Democratic politics for decades. who I'm sure has
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: met every Democratic fundraiser, has one of the largest Rolodexes
• 53:47
  Speaker 2: in the history of Democratic politics. And he is worried
• 53:51
  Speaker 2: about fundraising because he cannot raise money. He's worried he
• 53:57
  Speaker 2: cannot raise money from people who are giving $ 5, $ 10, $ 27, $ 48,
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: whatever the average for your chosen candidate is. And now
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: we're in a world where having a large fundraising email
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: list is seen as more valuable and more important than
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: having a large Rolodex of rich people. And I think
• 54:14
  Speaker 2: that's great progress for the country. Biden is right to
• 54:17
  Speaker 2: be worried in the sense that it takes– you have
• 54:20
  Speaker 2: to have the list. You have to have been working
• 54:21
  Speaker 2: on this for a long time. You have to have
• 54:23
  Speaker 2: built up a donor base. And he just has not
• 54:26
  Speaker 2: run a campaign that's had the ability to do that
• 54:30
  Speaker 2: in– ever, right? He did not have that success in 2008,
• 54:35
  Speaker 2: and then he was on the ticket in 2012. And
• 54:38
  Speaker 2: so it wasn't his list, and he didn't run in 2016.
• 54:41
  Speaker 2: And as far as I know, his team has not
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: spent the same amount of time and energy and money
• 54:47
  Speaker 2: that Kamala Harris's team in particular spent in the last
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: few years using digital ads and using other strategies to
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: build up their list. And so you're sort of starting
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: from scratch. And so it's going to be very hard
• 54:58
  Speaker 2: to come anywhere close to what some of these other
• 55:02
  Speaker 2: candidates have done, let alone what Beto or Bernie did.
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: And how much does money... matter? Obviously, we know it
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: matters in the sense that you need money to hire
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: staff and run ads and do all the things you
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: do in a campaign. But what, if anything, does the
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: amount you raise, and I guess more specifically, how many
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: people you've raised it from, tell us about a candidate's
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: chances or a candidate's political strength? Does it tell us anything?
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: Well, President Jeb Bush would tell you that whoever has
• 55:30
  Speaker 2: the most money wins.
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: Please clap.
• 55:33
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 55:35
  Speaker 2: I think there's two separate things here, right? Which is
• 55:38
  Speaker 2: if you can raise lots of money from lots of
• 55:41
  Speaker 2: different people, it is a measurement of enthusiasm for your candidacy, right?
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: That people are excited enough about you. The large enough
• 55:49
  Speaker 2: people are excited enough about you that they are going
• 55:51
  Speaker 2: to give you money. And that is important. Now, I
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: think the lesson of the joking Jeb Bush reference is
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: the person with the most money doesn't necessarily win. And
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: there's lots of changes in how politics are conducted with
• 56:08
  Speaker 2: the invention of the internet, social media, the new media
• 56:11
  Speaker 2: landscape that allow it that you can be smarter and
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: succeed with less money. But I do think you need
• 56:19
  Speaker 2: to hit a threshold to be able to run credible
• 56:21
  Speaker 2: campaigns in the early primary states, primarily Iowa. And so
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: in that sense, I think there will be some sort
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: of cutoff. I have no doubt that Biden can cross
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: that threshold through whatever means he gets there. But you
• 56:34
  Speaker 2: have to hit a threshold to be able to run
• 56:35
  Speaker 2: a real campaign and blow that. Then you're just sort
• 56:37
  Speaker 2: of wasting your time and everyone else's.
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, but you know, the, the leaders on
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: how many donors they have right now are Bernie and
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: then Beto and then Kamala. And it does show, and
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: you know, they have, you know, they can show that
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: they have these small dollar donors in all 50 States.
• 56:54
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: And that means that they're, at least their initial support is,
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: has breadth to it, right? Like we don't know how
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: much depth it has, but it has breadth. There's like
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: a lot of different people that are contributing to their campaigns.
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: And so I think it's like one early measure for
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: those candidates to say, look, we have pretty widespread support
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: outside our donor lists, outside our home states. But you're
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: right that beyond that, like, especially as we get into,
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: it's like one of those early indicators. And as we
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: get deeper into the race, it matters less. One way though,
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: it does matter a lot this time that it hasn't
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: mattered in the past. The DNC, is offering debate invitations
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: to candidates who have at least 65,000 donors, so long
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: as they also have a minimum of 200 donors in
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: each of at least 20 states. So you can get
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: into the debate by hitting that threshold of donors or
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: earning at least 1% in a series of public polls.
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: And so for candidates who aren't polling well, and aren't
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: polling well just because no one knows who they are,
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: because they're just like brand new names to people, building
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: this donor base... is a way to get on stage
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: at the debate. And that's why Pete Buttigieg recently surpassed
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: the 65,000 donor threshold. Andrew Yang has surpassed the 65,000
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: donor threshold. He's a venture capitalist who believes in universal
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: basic income. I don't think we've talked about him much
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: on the pod yet, but he's going to be on
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: the debate stage. And fucking former Senator Mike Gravel is
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: floating a presidential bid And for those who don't know
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: who Mike Revell is, what year.
• 58:27
  Speaker 2: Was it that he was on the debate stage, Dan?
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: 2008. 2008, Mike Revell was on the debate stage, and
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: let me tell you, he is a character, to say
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: the least. So, like, I don't know, there was some
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: interesting Politico piece the other day, like, was this the
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: smart move of the Democratic National Committee to make it
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: based on donors? Because could just very random people sort
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: of game the system to get 65,000 donors, and suddenly
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: you have All kinds of folks on the debate stage.
• 58:54
  Speaker 2: I mean, sure. Yes. You have to be able to
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: put together a real campaign to get 65,000 donors and
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: spread out over 20 states. That's a fucking hard thing
• 59:03
  Speaker 2: to do. And you have to draw a line somewhere.
• 59:05
  Speaker 2: And I think the ability to build a grassroots fundraising...
• 59:09
  Speaker 2: base is a better measure of deciding whether people should
• 59:12
  Speaker 2: get on the stage than a series of poorly conducted
• 59:14
  Speaker 2: media polls where people have very limited name ID. Because
• 59:17
  Speaker 2: that's a self-fulfilling prophecy, which is if you don't... You
• 59:21
  Speaker 2: aren't known, so you can't get on the debate stage,
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: so you can't get known, so you can't get on
• 59:24
  Speaker 2: the debate stage. It's sort of not an ideal way
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: to do it. So having both measures, you know, either
• 59:30
  Speaker 2: or I think makes sense. And yeah, we might end
• 59:32
  Speaker 2: up with, you know, it might have seemed absurd, you know,
• 59:36
  Speaker 2: two months ago for you to say, well, the mayor
• 59:39
  Speaker 2: of South Bend, Indiana, who's 37 years old, is going
• 59:42
  Speaker 2: to be on the debate stage. But now that everyone's
• 59:44
  Speaker 2: gotten a chance to hear Pete Buttigieg and see him,
• 59:48
  Speaker 2: and he's been able to build this fundraising base, I
• 59:49
  Speaker 2: think everyone's excited he'll be on the debate stage. And
• 59:52
  Speaker 2: so like, I don't, I think it's a fine measure.
• 59:55
  Speaker 2: Is it a perfect measure? No, there's no perfect measure here.
• 59:57
  Speaker 2: You're going to anger some people. You're going to ask
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: people who you wish were on stage who aren't, who
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 2: you wish weren't on stage who are, and that's just
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 2: sort of how it is. But it's better than just
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: simply using polls, which I think is not a great
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 2: way to do it.
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: Right. Last question before we go, since this is in
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: the news this morning. What do you think about the
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: various reports that Biden is considering the selection of an
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: early running mate like Stacey Abrams?
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 3: I am.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: I am as pro-Stacey Abrams as you can get. I
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 2: want more Stacey Abrams in my politics. I want more
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 2: Stacey Abrams in my life. She is one of my
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 2: most favorite politicians that I have had a chance to
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 2: meet in my life. I think she is amazing. I
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 2: have to say, and I say this as someone who
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 2: has a longstanding level of affection for Joe Biden as
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 2: a Delaware native, and obviously we worked very closely with
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 2: him for a long time, I'm deeply uncomfortable with the
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 2: way this conversation is happening, that Stacey Abrams, someone who
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 2: has as much claim to run for president as anyone
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 2: who's running for president, is being slotted into a vice
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 2: presidential slot before she even makes a decision. And I
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 2: think that's unfair to her, and it's an unfortunate way
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 2: for the conversation to take place, and it's diminishing of
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: someone who should not be diminished in any way.
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: Stacey Abrams is a star. She is brilliant. She is...
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: I agree that she's one of my favorite people in
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: democratic politics. And if I were her, I would be like, okay,
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: I'm either going to run for president or I'm going
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: to run for Senate. And if she runs for president,
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 1: she will be an incredible addition to the field. And
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: if she runs for Senate, that's great too. It should
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: be up to Stacey Abrams. But the idea that through
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: like reports about advisors that like, they're thinking of like
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 1: slaughtering her in a ticket. I don't know if, if
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: I were her, I wouldn't, I wouldn't want that.
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 3: Right?
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: Like I'd be like, I'm a star. I got more
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: votes than any Democrat in Georgia's history. I should run
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: for Senate here, or I should run for president myself,
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: which she could. So I think it's a little silly.
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: And I don't think it's great for Biden either, by
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: the way. I think that if you're going to run
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: for president, you need to go out there and say,
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: I'm running for president on my own. Vote for me.
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: Don't vote for me because you like that there's a
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: package deal here. Like, it doesn't seem... It doesn't I
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: don't know. It just doesn't seem like it seems more
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: of like a gimmick than a well thought out move.
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's exactly right. Like the American public's
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 2: bullshit detector is quite high and it will just it'll
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 2: seem gimmicky. It's basically like putting a flashing sign over
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 2: your head that says weak. And it's just like this.
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 2: The similar idea also flowed in these stories that Biden
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 2: would commit to running for only one term. which is
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 2: being talked about as a way to deal with his age.
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 2: But I remember seeing polling in 2008 because people were
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 2: floating this idea about McCain, who was also an older
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 2: presidential candidate, and it pulled terribly. I think they don't
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 2: want to go through election twice. If you were too
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 2: old to do, or for whatever reasons, unable to do
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 2: two terms, why would I pick you to do one term?
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: Now, maybe.
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: It's a different world than it was a decade ago,
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: but it seems alarming. I think the biggest threat to
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 2: Biden's candidacy right now is not the lack of an
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 2: email list. It's not age. It's not his older positions.
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 2: It's the verbal diarrhea of his advisors who are having
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 2: these conversations in the pages of The New York Times
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 2: instead of within a conference room at his headquarters somewhere.
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 2: And so he is like, put all the ideas on
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 2: the whiteboard. Just don't show the whiteboard to Jonathan Martin
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: at The New York Times. I think it's really diminishing
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 2: to Biden. It hurts his chances. And it makes whenever he...
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 2: If he were to decide to run, it makes his
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 2: announcement less of a clean shot by having this big
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 2: national discussion about how weak his advisors think he is
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 2: and what absurd measures they can take to address that weakness.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: For all we know, Joe Biden has already decided against
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: either of these moves and is just going to announce
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: his run for president on his own. But now because...
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: People couldn't keep their mouths shut. This is out there
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: all over the news today. So that's, you know, it's
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: a good lesson on running a tight ship in a
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: campaign so there aren't a lot of leaks. That's, you know,
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: we tried very hard to do that in 2008. And
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: so I think it's a wise move. Okay. When we
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: come back, we will have John Lovett's interview with Congresswoman
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 1: Lauren Underwood.
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 3: She is the Democratic representative from Illinois' 14th congressional district,
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 3: a health policy expert, and the youngest African-American woman ever
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 3: elected to Congress. Congresswoman Lauren Underwood, welcome to Pod Save America.
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 4: Thank you. So glad to be here.
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 3: So good to have you. So this is the first
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 3: time we've gotten a chance to speak with you since
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 3: you won last year. You started your work in Congress.
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 3: What's been the biggest surprise so far about the job?
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 4: Well, I think the biggest surprise is honestly the pace
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 4: of the work. You know, there's such a reputation of,
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 4: you know, gridlock and dysfunction. And I feel like we
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 4: are just moving at a clip, getting things done. And
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 4: the way that we have to sort of divide our attention,
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 4: I'm on three committees. I do education and labor. And
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 4: on that committee, we actually do health care stuff, too. uh,
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 4: veterans affairs and Homeland security. And then, you know, there
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 4: might be a bill on the floor about Yemen, or
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 4: there might be a bill on the floor about, you know,
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 4: HR one and anti-corruption or whatever. And so we're just
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 4: keeping all these different balls in the air and just
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 4: getting it done.
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 3: Imagine how busy it would be. There wasn't gridlock.
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 4: I mean, the Senate is completely dysfunctional and, you know,
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 4: I think our constitution did not contemplate having a chamber
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 4: that did not want to be separate and co-equal. Right.
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 4: And it's part of the legislature. And, uh, And so
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 4: we need to make some changes over there. And that's
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 4: why elections are so important. And each vote counts. But
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 4: for now, I'm excited about the progress we're making in
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 4: the House.
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 3: So you're the youngest African-American woman ever elected to Congress.
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 3: What's an issue where you feel like being a young
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 3: African-American woman in this space that is, you know, I
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 3: was looking before you came in, the average age of
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 3: a member of Congress is now around 60, which is
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 3: the oldest or close to the oldest it's ever been.
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 3: What is something that you find you're bringing that some
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 3: of the members are learning from you just by your presence?
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 4: Well, I'll say that I certainly approach problems differently. And
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 4: during orientation, we had a training for the first time.
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 4: They had us do a sexual harassment and assault training
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 4: for members. And I sat in that training. It was inadequate.
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 4: And I was just like, God, it needs to be better.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 4: And so I started looking at what policies were in
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 4: place and realized, yikes, this place was set up to
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 4: support these bad actors and enable them to, you know,
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 4: have sexual misconduct in the workplace. And so I was
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 4: not sworn in yet and submitted some amendments to the
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 4: rules package that we would vote on on the first day.
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 4: They were accepted by the rules committee and they passed
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 4: on our first day in office saying that members could
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 4: not use nondisclosure agreements to prevent witnesses or victims from
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 4: coming forward with information and saying that members of Congress
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 4: couldn't have sexual relationships with committee staffers And that kind
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 4: of thing had been longstanding accepted practice in this workplace,
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 4: but would never fly in any other workplace around the country.
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 4: And so I think that it takes a millennial woman,
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 4: millennial woman of color to come in and say, not okay,
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 4: and find a creative way to get it done.
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 3: Have you found that there are some of your older
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 3: colleagues that kind of feel a bit flummoxed by this
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 3: sort of, there is a phalanx of young people who
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 3: have come in and they don't seem to really care
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 3: about the way it used to be done. That's right.
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 3: Do you find that they're surprised, caught off guard, some
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 3: of the sort of like old guard members of both parties?
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 4: 100%. I think that some people feel a little threatened.
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 4: They've learned how to thrive in the dysfunction. And so
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 4: now we're finally back in the majority. Folks have their
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 4: gavels or they have their little fiefdom. And here comes
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 4: this new crew of freshmen who are now a quarter
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 4: of the caucus. The new members are a quarter of
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 4: the Congress and nothing can pass if we're not on board.
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 4: And that just immediately is disruptive. And so I think
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 4: that some people were surprised. And I've sort of felt
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 4: that maybe kept us at a distance. But it's up
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 4: to me to build relationships and build bridges and to
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 4: get to know people for individuals because I'm not a
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 4: threat to my colleague. What we are, though, is going
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 4: to say that, you know, we put people first and
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 4: we're here to serve. And it doesn't matter if you're
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 4: a Democrat or Republican. Right. Because there's corruption across the
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 4: board sometimes and not afraid to call it out, not
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 4: afraid to stand up and say no and not afraid
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 4: to lead by example.
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 3: Have you had to show any older members how to
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 3: use their phones?
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 4: No, but I've done a few selfies, and selfies on
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 4: the floor, and you would be surprised. the number of
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 4: people who are interested in that. You're not supposed to
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 4: take pictures on the floor, obviously, of the House. But,
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 4: you know, this is what we do.
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 3: So you're from a district that Donald Trump won in 2016.
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 3: And the swing on the congressional vote was tremendous, right?
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 3: The person you defeated by around five points had won
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 3: his previous race by 20 points.
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 4: That's right.
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 3: Something like that. There have been these pieces coming out
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 3: of Washington, coming out of the coverage of the presidential cycle,
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 3: covering some of the debates about the Green New Deal,
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 3: about Medicare for all, and about this question around Democrats
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 3: moving to the left. Now, you were asked this about,
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 3: there was a story about this in Politico that asked
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 3: a bunch of members from districts that were flipped from
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 3: Trump winning to a Democrat taking the seat about whether
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 3: or not that is hurting you in your district. You
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 3: basically said that's not the questions you're getting. But do
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 3: you feel like this conversation is one that matters inside
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 3: of your district? Are people talking about socialism? Are people
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 3: talking about the Green New Deal? Do you get some
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 3: questions or skepticism from voters when you're back home?
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 4: I get questions about climate change. I get questions about
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 4: health care affordability. What are we going to do to
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 4: lower the price of insulin? We get questions about, you know,
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 4: affording higher education and making college, you know, reasonably priced
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 4: so that people aren't having hundreds of thousands of dollars
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 4: in debt. I don't get questions necessarily about, like, hashtag
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 4: Green New Deal or, you know, what kind of label that.
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 3: Argue, right?
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 4: Like I'm a Democrat. People know I'm a Democrat. And
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 4: so it's not framed in that way. And so what
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 4: I encourage my colleagues to do is to be prepared
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 4: to have conversations that regular middle-class families understand and it's
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 4: grounded in reality in their lives, right? There's a lot
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 4: of aspirational goals and that's great. And I think bold
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 4: ideas are wonderful, but I think that we have a
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 4: tremendous responsibility responsibility to the people that elected us to
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 4: make sure that we engage in a two-way conversation. And
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 4: if we're up having a conversation and debating around these
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 4: aspirational goals that may not happen for another 25 or
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 4: 50 years, right, that long-range planning is important. It really is.
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 4: But the people in my community are, like, literally struggling
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 4: with $ 2, 500 a month for their kids' insulin. And that's
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 4: a problem in their day-to-day life, literally struggling because they
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 4: can't have sick leave to take care of their son
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 4: because their job doesn't offer it, right? These concrete issues
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 4: that may not be the bold ideas that make headlines,
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 4: but certainly make a real impact in people's lives.
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 3: Well, it seems like there's this divide, right? There are
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 3: those who are saying, well, sure, we need to address
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 3: those issues right now, but we need to set a
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 3: goal for where we're A, aiming towards in the long run,
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 3: and B, to pull the debate in the left, right?
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 3: That if we are talking about only preserving the Affordable
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 3: Care Act and Republicans are talking about repealing the Affordable
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 3: Care Act, we're not talking about where we want to
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 3: get to. So Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal has introduced a Medicare
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 3: for All bill. You have not yet signed on to it.
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 3: You've talked more about stabilizing the Affordable Care Act. How
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 3: do you feel about this debate over Medicare for All?
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 3: And do you believe that's the goal we should be
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 3: aiming towards?
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 4: So I believe healthcare is a human right. And that's
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 4: been foundational to my nursing practice. I'm a nurse, been
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 4: a nurse for 10 plus years. And I think that
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 4: absolutely in 2019, we should not have tens of millions
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 4: of people in this country that don't have access to
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 4: health care, don't have health insurance. And so, yes, heard
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 4: about Medicare for all. When I talk to people in
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 4: my community and I say, well, what do you mean
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 4: by that? I usually get a variety of answers. People
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 4: say Medicare 55 and up, Medicare 40 and up, 18
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 4: and up, Medicare birth. Those are all very different things.
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 4: And some people want to buy in. Well, I know
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 4: just based on our healthcare system, right, each of those
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 4: have different timelines for implementation. It would transform our healthcare
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 4: system or not. And I think that the details matter
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 4: when it comes to healthcare, right? We saw with the
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 4: Affordable Care Act that people might have supported the broad idea,
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 4: but the way that it was implemented created winners and losers.
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 4: And we want, as we think about transforming our healthcare
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 4: system moving forward, to make sure that We design it
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 4: in a way where folks come out ahead. And one
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 4: of the concerns that I have from my district is
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 4: just we're not sure how much it costs and how
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 4: we would pay for it. And so until I get
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 4: that information, I'm not co-signing the bill. But I do
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 4: think it's a great goal. And I think that a
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 4: lot of people are really energized and excited about the
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 4: idea of expanding health care coverage. And that's where we
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 4: need to be moving as a country.
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 3: So you are someone that has this nursing experience, this
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 3: policymaking experience at the local level and also at the
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 3: national level. You have a kind of There are a
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 3: few people that could say that they've been a nurse.
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 3: They've worked on a Medicaid plan at the local level,
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 3: that they've been in the Obama administration as health care,
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 3: Obamacare was being implemented. It sounds to me that you
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 3: are more concerned about the transition than a lot of
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 3: people are right now.
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 4: I mean, you got to remember a year ago, two
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 4: years ago, our health care was under attack. So those
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 4: of us that were on Obamacare and I'm one of them,
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 4: I have a preexisting condition for people like us. We
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 4: did not have certainty. that our plans would even be
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 4: offered through the end of 2017. We'd not have certainty
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 4: that if we were trying to plan a procedure that
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 4: we would even have coverage. And so I think there's
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 4: a lot of people, millions of people in this country
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 4: who felt threatened and not having a stable environment for
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 4: their health care is one that creates a lot of uncertainty.
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 4: And they were looking to their elected officials to say,
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 4: who's going to have our back for this basic need,
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 4: health care? And so I think that the Medicare for
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 4: All debate has been framed as an either-or, ACA or
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 4: Medicare for All. And I think that that is fundamentally flawed.
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 4: We should be able to do both. We should be
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 4: able to fix the health care system that we have
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 4: right now and ensure that people like me and millions
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 4: of other Americans, right, over hundreds of millions of Americans
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 4: have preexisting conditions, and we need to make sure that
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 4: they have their coverage. Make sure. While we have this
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 4: very important policy debate, that has now gotten to kitchen tables, right?
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 4: Like all across the country, people are talking about, you know,
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 4: what should our healthcare system look like? And that's great.
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 4: But we haven't settled on that final plan, that final policy,
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 4: that conclusion. We are in this idea generating phase right now.
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 4: And so let's let the process play out. But I
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 4: think that we can fix our system.
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 3: But letting that process play out, like, do you have
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 3: a position on, do you believe in the end, most
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 3: people should end up with a Medicare-like plan? Or do
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 3: you think that private insurance has a valuable role to
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 3: play for people that currently have it and like their
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 3: private insurance?
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 4: I think that we should be creating an opportunity to
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 4: cover more people. And right now we have tens of
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 4: millions of people who don't have healthcare coverage, many of
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 4: whom live in states where they chose not to expand Medicaid.
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 4: And so we can look at expansion opportunities in a
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 4: way that is fully consistent with existing laws, but offers
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 4: people a pathway to coverage. I don't think that we should...
• 1:16:13
  Speaker 4: necessarily say that, you know, your private policy that you
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 4: enjoy and it works for your family is wrong, it's flawed,
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 4: it should go away tomorrow, right? And some ideas say that,
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 4: and I don't support those policies. But I do think that,
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 4: you know, we need to have an upfront conversation in
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 4: this country about the amount of money we spend on
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 4: health care throughout the lifespan, how we pay for it,
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 4: and what kind of quality care are we getting in return?
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 4: We have all sorts of people who are going to
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 4: the hospital coming out with infections, leaving the system in
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 4: worse shape than they entered. And certainly for the amount
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 4: of money we spend, we should be able to provide
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 4: higher quality care.
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 3: So about oversight, you had a moment with the Secretary
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 3: of Homeland Security talking about family separations, about the impact
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 3: it has on the children, the kind of effect it
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 3: has on these families. It was a big moment. There's
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 3: this question now about the kind of oversight Democrats are doing,
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 3: questions around impeachment. Are you worried about Democratic overreach, whatever
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 3: that means? Or do you think that's a silly Washington thing?
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 4: You know, we came from an environment with the Republican-controlled
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 4: Congress that didn't want to do any oversight. They don't
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 4: want to ask any questions, any kind of critical questions
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 4: what the Trump administration was doing. And so, you know,
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 4: I'm on three committees where we have I think, robust
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 4: oversight agendas. And that's part of the Article I responsibility
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 4: of the Congress. And we had a Congress in the
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 4: 115th that just ignored that responsibility. So I don't think
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 4: it's overreach. I think that these are really important questions.
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 4: We had Kirsten Nielsen come in and I asked her
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 4: about the family separation policy, and she was not prepared
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 4: to provide candid answers. And that's unacceptable, right? And I
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 4: think that we are making a good faith effort to
• 1:17:59
  Speaker 4: do oversight in an orderly way. Let's bring the secretary
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 4: in and ask her to be upfront and honest before
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 4: we go. And and have subpoenas, or before we go
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 4: and make this a really difficult working environment for all involved, right?
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 4: We should be able to just, as colleagues, share information.
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 4: And it's not, it should not be a surprise. I
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 4: worked in the executive branch for many years during the
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 4: Affordable Care Act, and the Congress cared how we were
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 4: implementing that program. Were we doing it in accordance with
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 4: legislative intent? And how was it going to change our
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 4: healthcare system? I also worked on the Flint water crisis,
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 4: and those lawmakers from Michigan And around the country would
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 4: bring us in and the Obama administration say, what are
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 4: you doing and how are you helping these people? And
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 4: that kind of oversight posture is critically important to a
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 4: well-functioning democracy. And so I believe that what we are
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 4: doing as House Democrats in the Congress. is one that
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 4: is important for the long-term health and vitality of our democracy.
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 4: And it's doing it in a way that allows for
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 4: bipartisan action. And I'm really encouraged that, you know, maybe
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 4: not during the hearings when the cameras are on, but
• 1:19:05
  Speaker 4: maybe the closed-door briefings. My Republican colleagues have a lot
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 4: of questions about the topics that they hadn't wanted to
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 4: raise on their own, right? So on Homeland Security, we've
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 4: had private briefings on election security. What happened in 2016
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 4: with the hacking? You know, what's gone on in 2018
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 4: and how are we able to ensure that our elections
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 4: were able to go on without interference, right? Publicly, you
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 4: don't see Republicans wanting to ask any questions about that,
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 4: but privately, they have follow-up questions and they want information, right?
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 3: Amazing how courageous some of these people are privately. Well,
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 3: you know what?
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 4: I'm not here to ask for sympathy for our Republican colleagues.
• 1:19:41
  Speaker 4: But what I will say is there is a responsibility
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 4: to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.
• 1:19:50
  Speaker 4: And I believe that there are true patriots and lawmakers
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 4: who are willing to uphold that oath from both political parties.
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 4: And that's encouraging.
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 3: So I think we've seen a little bit of that, right?
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 3: There was this 400 to 0 vote that the Mueller
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 3: report should be public.
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 1: 420.
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 3: 420 to 0. Though a few presents. A couple people voted,
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 3: I'm here. I'm around.
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 4: Whatever.
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 3: But at the same time, you know, we've seen a
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 3: breakdown in the House Intelligence Committee between Democrats and Republicans.
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 3: Congressman Nadler has faced criticism from his Republican colleagues for
• 1:20:25
  Speaker 3: the sweeping requests that he made, which, you know, I
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 3: personally think are justified. Speaker Pelosi has talked about the
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 3: need for a bipartisan basis if we ever, you know,
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 3: bipartisan buy-in if we ever move toward impeachment. And yet,
• 1:20:36
  Speaker 3: if we decide that the standard is not some objective
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 3: nonpartisan standard, but one in which both Democrats and Republicans
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 3: agree that something went wrong, aren't we giving a veto?
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 3: Aren't we saying that, uh, if Republicans don't, if there's
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 3: no standard by which Republicans will decide that Donald Trump
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 3: did something impeachable, there's no standard by which Donald Trump
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 3: did something truly terrible that demands being called out because
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 3: they're worried about calling him out because of their base,
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 3: because of Fox news, because of all the pressures they're under, uh,
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 3: Are we creating a standard in which Democrats are held
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 3: to a set of norms and values and principles, but
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 3: Republicans aren't because Republicans aren't willing to call out their
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 3: own as much?
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 4: Well, OK, I have a lot of thoughts. One, haters
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 4: are going to hate. And the Republicans, right, we know
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 4: that they are going to protect their own. They are
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 4: going to always criticize what we do in terms of
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 4: oversight action. And they want to talk about something else.
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 4: It makes them uncomfortable. It's not flattering to their base,
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 4: to their colleagues. And they want to deflect. That does
• 1:21:37
  Speaker 4: not mean that we change the subject. It means that
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 4: we continue forward with our priorities, which are to protect
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 4: and defend the Constitution. Really basic. Now, in terms of
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 4: the standards that Democrats are held to, I think that
• 1:21:53
  Speaker 4: we all are held to the same standard because we
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 4: all are up for election in 2020, right? And so
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 4: it's up to the American people and how they judge
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 4: our performance. And impeachment is one issue. It's not the
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 4: only issue. And in communities like mine, it's not the
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 4: main issue. It's really not. And so when I heard
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 4: the speaker's comments about impeachment needing to be bipartisan, I
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 4: saw that as a tactical assessment. If we receive information
• 1:22:26
  Speaker 4: that suggests that there are such high crimes where impeachment
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 4: is warranted, We literally will need Republican votes in order
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 4: for it to move forward. That's not some kind of,
• 1:22:39
  Speaker 4: you know, theoretical let's all skip and hold hands and
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 4: walk down the yellow brick road together. That is like
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 4: literally that's how you move something through the Senate.
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 3: Through the Senate.
• 1:22:50
  Speaker 4: Yeah, you need bipartisan support. And we saw that the
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 4: House came out ahead of the Senate on the emergency
• 1:22:57
  Speaker 4: declaration and In the joint resolution, we were able to
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 4: get some bipartisan support in the House. We saw there
• 1:23:04
  Speaker 4: was bipartisan support in the Senate. And we'll see next
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 4: week when we go back with this veto override how
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 4: many people are willing to be courageous. But the key
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 4: is there's going to need to be bipartisan action. It
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 4: doesn't mean that the standards are different. It's just tactically
• 1:23:16
  Speaker 4: where we are.
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 3: Well, that would suggest then that even if there is
• 1:23:19
  Speaker 3: a majority in the House made up of Democrats who
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 3: believe Donald Trump has committed impeachable offenses, she might not
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 3: pursue it if she didn't believe there was bipartisan support.
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 3: support for it in the Senate, even though we have
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 3: the power to impeach him without those Republican votes?
• 1:23:34
  Speaker 4: You'd have to ask her.
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 1:23:36
  Speaker 1: Okay. Fine. Sorry.
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 3: We'll ask her.
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 4: Yeah, you should. I think she'd love to come on.
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 3: I mean, I was hoping you would, you know, spitball
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 3: with me, but.
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 4: Well, okay. What do I think might happen?
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 4: I think that whatever information moves forward, it will be
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 4: done in the most transparent way. Because what we were
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 4: talking about is so critical to the future of our
• 1:23:59
  Speaker 4: democracy that it will not be provided in some closed
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 4: door classified briefing just to the members of Congress. This
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 4: is going to be a national conversation and all policymakers
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 4: are going to feel pressure to act. And so that's encouraging, right?
• 1:24:16
  Speaker 4: We talk about transparency and sunshine rules, and we talk
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 4: about how, you know, we want to lead in a
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 4: way that is inclusive and reflects the values of our communities.
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 4: And this is the test.
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 3: Okay. You're a very good member of Congress. Sustained eye
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 3: contact with me.
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 4: Oh, good.
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 3: It's making me very intense.
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 1: Uh-huh.
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 4: What?
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 3: I feel as though I'm the only person in the room.
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 1: Good.
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 4: Good. It's just a private conversation that we're having here.
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 3: So you're roommates with Congresswoman Katie Hill.
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 4: Katie is my girl.
• 1:24:50
  Speaker 3: She is a friend of this show. She was one
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 3: of the Crooked Eight. Oh, really? One of the people
• 1:24:56
  Speaker 3: we campaigned for and sort of led an effort out
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 3: here in California because we were going to flip those
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 3: seats on election night. We weren't sure if we were
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 3: going to get them all. We ended up getting them all.
• 1:25:03
  Speaker 3: Does she leave towels on the floor? What is the
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 3: most annoying thing that she does as a roommate? Are
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 3: there old boxes... In the fridge that should be thrown away,
• 1:25:12
  Speaker 3: but she won't do it.
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 4: Okay. So Katie is the best.
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 4: First of all. We have... Okay. This is such an
• 1:25:20
  Speaker 4: odd thing. I'm 32. Katie's 31. We are regular people
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 4: that were living our normal lives, cared about our country,
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 4: and decided to step up and run during this chaos
• 1:25:29
  Speaker 4: and confusion.
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 3: I hope that this buildup is leading to a pretty
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 3: good day.
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 4: I'm going to tell you the truth.
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 4: And it is so... This is an odd thing, being
• 1:25:38
  Speaker 4: a member of Congress. It's weird. It's fun. It's challenging.
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 4: And I get to go through it every day with
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 4: a real friend in Katie Hill. And so, you know,
• 1:25:48
  Speaker 4: we have lots of Amazon deliveries that come and her
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 4: family sends all kinds of fun stuff. And it's like
• 1:25:55
  Speaker 4: an unboxing, you know, like the bloggers do the unboxing.
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 4: It's like that. Sometimes it's pretty fun. She goes on
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 4: TV shows. you know, like the news shows and stuff.
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 4: And so sometimes it's really early, sometimes it's really late.
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 4: So sometimes we miss each other, but I'm always excited
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 4: when we're both home and we can catch up. I
• 1:26:13
  Speaker 4: would hope that everyone can have a friend and support
• 1:26:17
  Speaker 4: person like I found in Katie Hill, and I'm grateful
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 4: to be able to serve with her in Congress.
• 1:26:22
  Speaker 3: That is such a moving answer. Does she leave We
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 3: don't share a bathroom.
• 1:26:27
  Speaker 4: We don't share a bathroom.
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 3: You're dodging the Congresswoman.
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 4: Listen, there's no dirt.
• 1:26:31
  Speaker 3: This is the kind of politics that people are sick of.
• 1:26:34
  Speaker 2: Are they?
• 1:26:34
  Speaker 3: They're sick of this. You're dodging the question. All right.
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 3: Does she not throw away her chopsticks if you have sushi?
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 3: If she left little things of soy sauce when you
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 3: order takeout? I need some dirt.
• 1:26:45
  Speaker 4: Okay. Some dirt. We don't eat that much in the apartment.
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 1:26:53
  Speaker 4: And she listens to her podcast.
• 1:26:56
  Speaker 1: On speaker.
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 3: That's brutal.
• 1:26:58
  Speaker 4: And so I am always very well informed of what's
• 1:27:02
  Speaker 4: going on because I hear her news of the day.
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 3: All right. I guess we can count that. That is
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 3: a frustrating thing for a roommate to do.
• 1:27:10
  Speaker 4: It's not frustrating. It's just, you know, I am hearing
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 4: from news outlets that I would not have otherwise picked myself.
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 3: Now you just turned it into a compliment. Unbelievable. I
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 3: understand how you won this Trump-friendly district with this kind
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 3: of smooth operation.
• 1:27:25
  Speaker 4: No, that is not how we won. We showed up
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 4: in people's living rooms, in their soybean fields, in their cul-de-sacs,
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 4: and we talked. And you know what? I invite everybody
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 4: to come. The 14th District of Illinois is a beautiful place.
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 4: It's half suburban. It's half rural. We have these wonderful women.
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 4: I call them Pat and Barb and Sue and Marge
• 1:27:43
  Speaker 4: because they are the real ladies of the 14th. And
• 1:27:47
  Speaker 4: they will sit, I'm telling you, they will sit and
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 4: have a wonderful conversation with you. They will tell you
• 1:27:51
  Speaker 4: all about their families and their concerns and what we
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 4: need to do about climate change and how we can
• 1:27:56
  Speaker 4: lower drug prices. And then they will offer you some
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 4: cookies and some tea and then they will ask you
• 1:28:02
  Speaker 4: all about your life. And you'll be like, but I
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 4: have these talking points. They'll be like, no, tell me
• 1:28:06
  Speaker 4: about your life in California. What are you doing? How's
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 4: your family? And you won't want to leave.
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 3: And she uses coasters whenever she's using the coffee table.
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 4: Absolutely. And you need to take your shoes off and
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 4: come into her living room.
• 1:28:18
  Speaker 3: Okay. Congresswoman Lauren Underwood, thank you so much for being here.
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 4: Oh, well, thank you. This is so fun.
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 1: This is fun.
• 1:28:26
  Speaker 4: And you know what? I hope that everybody takes some
• 1:28:30
  Speaker 4: pride in the work that we're doing in the Congress.
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 4: We work for you, the American people. And so be
• 1:28:36
  Speaker 4: in touch with us, right? Like, I love seeing the
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 4: comments on on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram. I love
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 4: people stopping at the airport or on the train or whatever.
• 1:28:47
  Speaker 4: And that kind of dialogue is important. For so long,
• 1:28:49
  Speaker 4: we millennials have not had elected representatives in the Congress.
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 4: And for the first time in the Democratic side, we
• 1:28:55
  Speaker 4: have a whole little caucus that And and, you know,
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 4: let's make sure that we are doing the work that,
• 1:29:02
  Speaker 4: you know, will improve all of our lives.
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 3: Do you think that titling this episode, Congressman Underwood slams
• 1:29:08
  Speaker 3: roommate Katie Hill will get people to hear it? You
• 1:29:11
  Speaker 3: know what?
• 1:29:11
  Speaker 4: Let's talk about that clickbait culture. And let's talk about
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 4: these reporters that are so pressed to sow division between
• 1:29:18
  Speaker 4: me and my other congressional colleagues.
• 1:29:20
  Speaker 3: I'm sick of it.
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 4: Particularly the women of color in the caucus. that they
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 4: will slap my picture on an article that I am
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 4: not quoted in, that is not relevant, and they'll be like,
• 1:29:29
  Speaker 4: you know, centrist Democrats are worried about socialism in the
• 1:29:33
  Speaker 4: Democratic Party. And I'm just like, that has nothing to
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 4: do with me. Take my picture off of it.
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 3: I feel as though maybe I played into this in
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 3: some way by trying to divide you and Katie.
• 1:29:44
  Speaker 4: I would just encourage everyone to reflect on the importance
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 4: of having a big tent party, And the opportunity for
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 4: voices to speak authentically. And perhaps if folks are, you know,
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 4: a little bit uncomfortable with, you know, the thoughts being expressed,
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 4: maybe let's just focus on those sentiments and not who
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 4: is speaking.
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 3: Right?
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 4: Because for the first time, the superstars coming out of
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 4: the Democratic Party are young women of color. Isn't that incredible?
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 3: It's exciting.
• 1:30:17
  Speaker 1: It's exciting.
• 1:30:17
  Speaker 4: It's exciting. And, you know, that's disruptive in and of
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 4: its own. And people get, you know, they start to
• 1:30:22
  Speaker 4: feel some kind of way. But we're here. And we're leading.
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 4: And we're making change. And we're serving the people. And
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 4: I'm really excited.
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 3: Let's just leave it there.
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 1:30:34
  Speaker 3: What are we supposed to do?
• 1:30:35
  Speaker 4: Thanks to you.
• 1:30:35
  Speaker 3: We can't say anything after that. Thank you so much.
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 4: Appreciate it.
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 1: That's our show for today. Thanks for joining us. And
• 1:30:45
  Speaker 1: we will see you next week.
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 2: Bye, everyone.
• 1:30:55
  Speaker 3: Thank you.