Latest / Pod Save America / Introducing The Wilderness Chapter 1: The Divide

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Introducing The Wilderness Chapter 1: The Divide · Pod Save America

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hey everyone, it's Jon Favreau, and I'm dropping in to
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: let you know that I just launched a brand new
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: season of The Wilderness. In past seasons, I looked at
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: the state of the Democratic Party during the Trump years.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: And now with the midterms coming up, I thought it'd
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: be a good idea to take a little temperature check
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: on what people are thinking and feeling about politics right now.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: So without further ado, here's episode one. And to hear
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: more of the series, you can subscribe to The Wilderness
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: feed where you can listen to episode two right now.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: We'll also be dropping the series here each week. But
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: subscribing to the Wilderness Feed is the only way to
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: get early access. New episodes every Monday. I'll admit, there
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: was a brief moment where I didn't think we'd need
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: another season of The Wilderness.
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: After four long, tense days, we can now project the
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: winner of the presidential race.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden.
• 0:46
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden. Joe Biden.
• 0:48
  Speaker 4: Joe Biden.
• 0:48
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: President-elect Joe Biden. Tonight, we're seeing.
• 0:52
  Speaker 5: All over this nation, all cities and all parts of
• 0:54
  Speaker 5: the country, a now point of joy, of hope, renewed
• 0:58
  Speaker 5: faith in tomorrow.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Bring a better day.
• 1:01
  Speaker 6: Black voters in Georgia turned out in record numbers to
• 1:03
  Speaker 6: vote for Reverend Raphael Warnock and John Ossoff, giving Democrats
• 1:07
  Speaker 6: a majority.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: In the Senate. Remember that feeling? I think it lasted
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: about a day.
• 1:12
  Speaker 7: They've got the gallows stood upside this Capitol building.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: It's time to start fucking using them.
• 1:20
  Speaker 5: Start hunting them down one by one.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: Two years later, I think it's fair to say that
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: things haven't settled down all that much.
• 1:31
  Speaker 8: Former President Trump's baseless claims about his 2020 election defeat
• 1:34
  Speaker 8: are trickling down to the next cycle of Senate races.
• 1:38
  Speaker 9: That election... was rotten to the core.
• 1:41
  Speaker 10: We all know it, right?
• 1:43
  Speaker 5: You know that, right?
• 1:44
  Speaker 11: Our attorney general, you know, declared a winner before one
• 1:47
  Speaker 11: vote was counted.
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: And so the whole process has been corrupted.
• 1:50
  Speaker 5: This is the year we're going to take back the House.
• 1:53
  Speaker 5: We're going to take back the Senate. We're going to
• 1:56
  Speaker 5: take back America. And in 2024, we are going to
• 2:05
  Speaker 5: take back that beautiful, beautiful house that happens to be white.
• 2:12
  Speaker 12: MAG is a threat to our country, not the Democratic Party.
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: That's Democratic political strategist Michael Podhorzer, a senior advisor to
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: the AFL-CIO who Time magazine called the architect of a
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: shadow campaign that saved the 2020 election. Basically, He was
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: part of a team of strategists and legal experts who
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: saw Trump's coup coming and helped make sure it didn't succeed.
• 2:35
  Speaker 12: This is deadly serious. You see Pinochet, you see Berlusconi,
• 2:39
  Speaker 12: you see Mussolini, you see Hitler, right?
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: There are times over the last several years, even in
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: the days after Trump refused to concede, when I've wanted
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: to just dismiss comparisons like Michael's as overly alarmist. Part
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: of it may have been a stubborn faith in the
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: American experiment that comes from my years of writing speeches
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: with Barack Obama. Big hope guy, if you recall. It
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: also may have just been wishful thinking on my part.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: Who really wants to wake up every morning, take a
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: quick scroll through the news, and wonder if today is
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: the day democracy falls apart? But it's become clear that
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: American politics is now operating in two entirely different realities.
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: In one reality, we have President Joe Biden, Democratic politicians,
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: and a few Republicans. Like most politicians since forever, they're flawed.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: They make mistakes. Sometimes they take bad votes. Sometimes they're
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: just annoying. But it's hard to deny that at least lately,
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: the Democrats have been on a roll.
• 3:33
  Speaker 8: History was made today when Congress sent to President Biden's
• 3:35
  Speaker 8: desk the first major new gun control legislation in nearly
• 3:38
  Speaker 8: 30 years.
• 3:39
  Speaker 13: With a major victory for President Biden and the Democrats,
• 3:42
  Speaker 13: the Senate passage of a landmark $ 740 billion economic package.
• 3:47
  Speaker 13: The package will make the single biggest investment in clean
• 3:49
  Speaker 13: energy in the nation's history. set a $ 2, 000 annual cap
• 3:53
  Speaker 13: on drug costs for seniors and lock in a minimum
• 3:56
  Speaker 13: corporate tax rate of 15%.
• 3:58
  Speaker 5: My campaign for president, I made a commitment that would
• 4:01
  Speaker 5: provide student debt relief.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: And I'm honoring that commitment today. Of course, we're also
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: living through another reality, the MAGA reality.
• 4:12
  Speaker 5: We're going to walk down to the Capitol because you'll
• 4:15
  Speaker 5: never take back our country with weakness.
• 4:18
  Speaker 10: An armed man tried to enter a field office in
• 4:21
  Speaker 10: Cincinnati with a nail gun and a rifle.
• 4:23
  Speaker 13: We begin tonight in Buffalo, New York, after a gunman
• 4:26
  Speaker 13: killed 10 people.
• 4:27
  Speaker 3: And a racially motivated shooting rampage.
• 4:29
  Speaker 4: An alleged plot.
• 4:29
  Speaker 14: To overthrow Michigan state government and kidnap the governor.
• 4:33
  Speaker 7: Just another con game by the Democrats calling something one thing.
• 4:37
  Speaker 13: Tonight, outrage from Trump-aligned Republicans after federal agents searched the
• 4:42
  Speaker 13: former president's Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida.
• 4:45
  Speaker 4: There was a failed murder plot to kill the vice
• 4:47
  Speaker 4: president of the United States.
• 4:49
  Speaker 15: Folks died.
• 4:50
  Speaker 4: January 6th insurrectionists running for Congress and who will be
• 4:53
  Speaker 4: the ones who have to certify the 2024 presidential election.
• 4:57
  Speaker 4: We are participating in this fiction as if everything is normal,
• 5:01
  Speaker 4: as if conventional political wisdom applies here.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: That's Nse Ufa, one of the organizers who's most responsible
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: for the record turnout that flipped Georgia and helped save
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: democracy in 2020. She's acutely aware of what's now at
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: stake in 2022 because she's been on the front lines
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: in one of the country's fiercest battlegrounds. She's seen how
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: far the other side's willing to go to tear down democracy.
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: She's been on the receiving end of their threats. And
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: she knows what's most alarming is that despite all of this,
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: November's midterm election, and likely the 2024 presidential, will be
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: extremely close. This probably alarms you too. I wouldn't say
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: I'm all that chill about it myself. It's terrifying. And overwhelming.
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: And exhausting. I'm sure a lot of you were still
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: burnt out from the last few elections. Especially if you
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: did more than just vote. If you donated to candidates
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: and registered voters and volunteered for phone banks and tax banks.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: Maybe you thought that beating Donald Trump would be enough
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: to beat Trumpism, that electing even the narrowest Democratic majority
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: would be enough to save democracy. But it wasn't. And
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: I get why that might leave you feeling a little frustrated,
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: or angry, or even a little hopeless. I'd be lying
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: if I said I didn't feel the same way from
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: time to time.
• 6:12
  Speaker 16: Good afternoon, Ms.
• 6:13
  Speaker 17: Moss.
• 6:13
  Speaker 18: Thank you for being here.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: Back in June, when the Supreme Court was in the
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: middle of ruining our summer, I was watching one of
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: the January 6th hearings.
• 6:21
  Speaker 10: I understand that you were employed by the Fulton County
• 6:23
  Speaker 10: Registration and Elections Department for more than 10 years. Please
• 6:28
  Speaker 10: tell us what made you so fond of the work.
• 6:30
  Speaker 13: That you did.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: It was the one where the committee heard testimony from Seamus,
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: an election worker from Georgia who'd processed ballots in 2020
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: for the Fulton County Elections Board with her mother, Ruby Freeman.
• 6:40
  Speaker 17: I've always been told by my grandmother how important it
• 6:44
  Speaker 17: is to vote and how older people in my family
• 6:48
  Speaker 17: did not have that. So what I loved most about
• 6:53
  Speaker 17: my job were the older voters. They like to know
• 6:57
  Speaker 17: that every election I'm here, I was excited always about
• 7:01
  Speaker 17: sending out all the absentee ballots for the elderly, disabled people.
• 7:06
  Speaker 17: I even remember driving to a hospital to give someone
• 7:13
  Speaker 17: her absentee application. That's what I loved the most.
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump and the MAGA media spread a conspiracy that
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: the two women had planted 18,000 fake ballots for Joe Biden.
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: It was quickly proven to be a complete lie. But
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: for nearly two years, Shay and her mother were harassed
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: and threatened to the point where Ruby had to leave
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: her home of over 20 years.
• 7:36
  Speaker 17: A lot of threats, wishing death upon me, telling me that,
• 7:41
  Speaker 17: you know, I'll be in jail with my mother and
• 7:45
  Speaker 17: saying things like, Be glad it's 2020 and not 1920.
• 7:50
  Speaker 17: A lot of them were racist. A lot of them
• 7:53
  Speaker 17: were just hateful. It's affecting my life in a major way.
• 7:58
  Speaker 16: In every way.
• 8:02
  Speaker 17: All because of lies.
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: I just felt.
• 8:04
  Speaker 17: Bad for my mom and I felt horrible for picking
• 8:08
  Speaker 17: this job and being the one that always wants to
• 8:11
  Speaker 17: help and always there. Never missing out one election. I
• 8:16
  Speaker 17: just felt like it was my fault for putting my
• 8:19
  Speaker 17: family in this situation.
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: It was the angriest I had been since Donald Trump
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: tried to steal the election. These two women were just
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: trying to be good citizens. They didn't want to just
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: vote in the election. They wanted to make sure the
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: election was fair for everyone else, no matter which party
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: they voted for. And maybe that work was important to
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: Shea and Ruby because their parents and grandparents didn't have
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: the right to vote and were part of a generation
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: that marched and fought and refused to give up until
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: they won that right. And now, all these years later,
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: Trump and his gang of D-list hacks and criminals tried
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: to scare these two women away from simply trying to
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: make their democracy work.
• 9:02
  Speaker 10: And did you end up leaving your position as well?
• 9:05
  Speaker 17: Yes, I left.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: So, yeah. I get why politics feels awful right now.
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: I get why people might be ready to give up.
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: But that's exactly what they want us to do. They
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: want us to quit. They want us to walk away.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: They are counting on our cynicism because that's how they win.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: That's how they beat us. That's how they take power
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: for good. And you know what? I don't think we
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: should make it that easy for them. From now on,
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: It's not just the Democratic Party we need to keep
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: out of the wilderness, but democracy itself. And that's not
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: just a job for Democratic politicians or strategists, but for
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: all of us, as voters, activists, organizers, and citizens. If
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: we want to defeat the MAGA threat, our coalition in
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: 2022 and beyond has to be as broad and diverse
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: as it was in 2020, and maybe even bigger.
• 9:59
  Speaker 12: The left has never been able to stop a determined
• 10:04
  Speaker 12: fascist push if it isn't aligned with the rest of
• 10:08
  Speaker 12: the country.
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: That might be the single most important observation about the
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: moment we're in right now. Here's why. In 2020, Joe
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: Biden won 81 million votes, more votes than any presidential
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: candidate ever in an election that saw the highest turnout
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: in the 21st century. And yet, out of more than
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: 155 million votes that were cast, Biden's total margin in
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: the three closest swing states that actually got him to 270, Arizona, Wisconsin,
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: and Georgia, was just about 43,000 votes. 43,000 votes. The
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: pro-democracy coalition that showed up to defeat Donald Trump in
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: 2020 was the biggest and most diverse in American history.
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: There were people who cast votes for AOC and Bernie Sanders.
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: There were people who voted for Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema.
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: There were even people who once supported Donald Trump. There
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: were people of color and young people who turned out
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: in record numbers. There were extremely online political junkies and
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: people who barely watched the news but decided to vote
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: for the very first time in their lives. Here's the challenge, though.
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: We had a coalition of every age, people from every background,
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: from every corner of the country, and even in an
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: election that shattered turnout records. It was a coalition that
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: still just barely stopped the determined fascist push that Michael
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: Potters talked about. But we did stop it. We won.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: Even in the face of voter suppression, gerrymandered districts, the
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: Electoral College, a raging pandemic, and a deranged incumbent who
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: used the full power of the presidency to attempt a
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: coup— We won. And according to Democratic messaging expert Anat Shankar-Osorio,
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: we shouldn't underestimate the significance of that victory.
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: We have dealt a critical blow to fascism at the
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: ballot box. And that is the only time that fascism
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: has been, again, not knocked out. We see what's happening.
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: I am not naive.
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: I live it.
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: Like, I'm very aware.
• 12:11
  Speaker 5: But we.
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: Put a check on fascism at the ballot box. The
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: only other way that fascism has ever been checked before
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: is through an army.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: Even Michael Podhorzer has some optimism.
• 12:24
  Speaker 12: I think the thing that Democrats just are making themselves
• 12:29
  Speaker 12: miserable over is that they forget that there are 81
• 12:31
  Speaker 12: million people in America who less than two years ago
• 12:35
  Speaker 12: said they don't want four more years of Trump. They
• 12:37
  Speaker 12: don't want him back. And that's how you win, right?
• 12:41
  Speaker 12: If America thinks that it's another MAGA versus whatever we're
• 12:47
  Speaker 12: going to call the alternative, then we win that election
• 12:51
  Speaker 12: because we have that majority. Never going to say that, oh,
• 12:55
  Speaker 12: don't worry, Democrats are going to win. But there is
• 12:58
  Speaker 12: a road here.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: There is a road here and we're going to find it.
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: I'm Jon Favreau. Welcome back to the wilderness. So the
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: question for this season is this. How do we keep
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: our fragile, unwieldy, pro-democracy coalition together in 2022, 2024, and beyond?
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: Maybe even more important is the question, how do we
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: grow this coalition so we're not just narrowly averting disaster
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: but making real progress? It won't be easy. Even in
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: an ideal political environment, which, let's be honest, this is not,
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: midterm elections are almost always challenging for the party that
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: controls the White House.
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: They're very powerful structural forces that sort of dictate American politics.
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: Sean McElwee is the founder of Data for Progress, a
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: progressive think tank that uses polling to figure out the
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: most effective way to message progressive policies. Sean's one of
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: the biggest political nerds I know, and I mean that
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: as a huge compliment.
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: Every president, with the exception of Bush, W. Bush, has
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: lost seats in the midterms after their first two years.
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: And the reason for that is that Once you've won
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: an election, your voters sort of start to disengage a
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: bit from politics.
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: Remember 2018? A historic accomplishment for the Democrats will win
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: the majority in the U.S. House of Representatives.
• 14:26
  Speaker 14: All this talk about a blue wave.
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: A huge blue wave.
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: We don't have to think too hard to imagine that
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: that's what Republicans feel like right now. They are very frustrated.
• 14:35
  Speaker 3: They want to make their voices heard. They're going to
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: make sure that they turn out in this election.
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: In the first big races after 2020... We saw hints
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: of that Republican enthusiasm.
• 14:46
  Speaker 18: Republican businessman Glenn Youngkin has emerged triumphant.
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: All righty, Virginia, we won this thing!
• 14:54
  Speaker 17: He was able to win because he was able to
• 14:55
  Speaker 17: tap into this magic that existed, end up driving out
• 14:59
  Speaker 17: record turnout on their side.
• 15:01
  Speaker 13: Governor Murphy, you see, holding that slim lead over Republican
• 15:04
  Speaker 13: Jack Cittarelli.
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: Even experts say this was closer than they expected.
• 15:08
  Speaker 18: It's less than 20,000 votes.
• 15:10
  Speaker 12: The number of Republican groups that were registering to vote
• 15:15
  Speaker 12: was crazy high.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: So even if Democrats weren't facing an electorate that isn't
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: feeling too hot about the economy, the direction of the country,
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: or the Democratic president, they'd still be dealing with a
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: relatively normal political dynamic where the party in power almost
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: always turns in a less-than-stellar midterm performance.
• 15:34
  Speaker 12: I'm not recommending for every future president that they take
• 15:36
  Speaker 12: a shellacking like I did last night.
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: But this, of course, is 2022. We left normal behind
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: like six years ago. And there's now growing evidence that
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: this midterm election could, and I emphasize the word could,
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: be different.
• 15:52
  Speaker 10: The candidates that are running in 2022 are extremely Trumpy candidates.
• 15:57
  Speaker 10: They feel Trumpy to people.
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: They feel extreme to people. Political strategist Sarah Longwell is
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: the publisher of The Bulwark, a media organization made up
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: of mostly Republicans that was founded in opposition to the
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: MAGA movement. Sarah also spends a lot of time conducting
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: focus groups, so she has a better sense than most
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: of how voters think.
• 16:16
  Speaker 10: These are crazy people. These are extreme people. Like, let
• 16:21
  Speaker 10: me introduce you to Carrie Lake.
• 16:23
  Speaker 9: Governor Ron DeSantis.
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: He's got BDE. Anybody know what that means?
• 16:27
  Speaker 9: He's got the same kind of BDE that President Trump has.
• 16:30
  Speaker 10: She is an anti-vaxxing, MyPillow guy endorsed. I'm not going
• 16:33
  Speaker 10: to certify the election when I'm governor. And like, if
• 16:36
  Speaker 10: you add Carrie Lake to Doug Mastriano.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: Yes, I was there to hear my president speak on
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: January 6th.
• 16:41
  Speaker 10: To Herschel Walker.
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: I was good air to start a phone over to China.
• 16:45
  Speaker 10: You look at the Republican Party and think, What is
• 16:47
  Speaker 10: going on with this crowd?
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: But it's not just the MAGA candidates that feel so
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: extreme to people. It's their agenda. It's what they're trying
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: to do to the country.
• 16:56
  Speaker 10: A group of lawmakers who are working to pass laws
• 16:59
  Speaker 10: that would stop people from crossing state lines to get abortion.
• 17:02
  Speaker 10: There's not a national ban on abortion right now, and
• 17:04
  Speaker 10: I think that's a problem.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: If this Supreme Court can rewrite history with abortion, then
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: there is a fear that gay marriage could be one
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: of the several other cases the Court will overturn.
• 17:12
  Speaker 18: The American Library Association has tracked more than 230 book
• 17:17
  Speaker 18: challenges nationwide. Right, maybe we should privatize social security, right?
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: Private retirement accounts, get the government out of it.
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: Birth control gives people the false sense of security, but
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: if there is no such thing as consequence-free sex, people
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: are going to be more likely to practice chastity.
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: None of these positions are even close to popular with
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: the vast majority of voters. And if you're skeptical of
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: what the polls say, which why wouldn't you be, think
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: about what actual voters have done in the months since
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: the Supreme Court eliminated the constitutional right to an abortion
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: in the Dobbs decision. In five special elections that have
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: been held to fill congressional seats in Nebraska, Minnesota, New York,
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: and even Alaska, the Democratic candidates haven't just performed as
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: well as Joe Biden did in 2020. They performed better
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: by anywhere from a few points to double digits. Then
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: there's Kansas. In a deep red state where Republicans put
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: a constitutional amendment on the ballot that could have outlawed abortion,
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: the measure failed by an overwhelming margin thanks to record
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: turnout among Democrats, independents, and Republicans.
• 18:21
  Speaker 9: I'm super proud to be from Kansas tonight, and I
• 18:24
  Speaker 9: feel like my state just showed up and boldly told
• 18:26
  Speaker 9: me that they are going to take care of me
• 18:28
  Speaker 9: and my female friends and everyone that can get pregnant
• 18:30
  Speaker 9: in the state of Kansas. We are protected tonight.
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: I think there are two lessons here. One, MAGA Republicans
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: have overreached. They've nominated extreme candidates with extreme views that
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: put them out of step with even more conservative voters
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: in conservative parts of the country. Two, it's up to
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: all of us to make sure that the rest of
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: the country knows that. Especially since the voters who tend
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: to show up in primaries and special elections tend to
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: be people who already follow politics pretty closely. And that
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: crew probably isn't enough for Democrats to win a midterm
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: election where a lot of voters show up who aren't
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: as politically partisan, opinionated, or engaged. That's one reason why
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: the pro-choice movement was on the ground in Kansas organizing
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: for months around that ballot measure. Because they wanted to
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: reach people who don't usually show up to vote in
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: an August primary. The same is true for everyone who
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: pushed and pushed and never gave up until President Biden
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: forgave student debt and worked with Democrats in Congress to
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: pass the most sweeping climate bill in history. Activists and
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: organizers didn't just leave that fight in the hands of politicians.
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: They took matters into their own hands. They tried to
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: connect with people who don't normally participate in politics. That's
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: what needs to happen everywhere, in every race, from now
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: until November. Right now, the only thing standing between America
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: and the end of democracy as we know it is
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: the Democratic Party. And yes, I realize that statement may
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: not always inspire all that much confidence. But the truth is,
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: we don't have to treat the Democratic Party as some
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: far-off institution that we have no control over. We don't
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: have to just blindly accept all the decisions, positions, and
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: advice that come from the party's leaders. We have agency here.
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: We can support candidates we believe in. And if there
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: aren't enough of those candidates, we can help recruit more.
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: And if we can't recruit enough, we can run ourselves.
• 20:20
  Speaker 11: There are this year about 2,000 or so races on
• 20:25
  Speaker 11: the ballot across 26 states that touch local election administration.
• 20:30
  Speaker 11: And they are of critical importance when you think about
• 20:32
  Speaker 11: the long-term health and safety of democracy.
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: Amanda Lippman is the co-founder of Run for Something, an
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: organization that supports young progressive candidates running in their first election.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: She's seen plenty of people who are so worried about
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: the MAGA movement and so dispirited by the current crop
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: of elected officials, they decided to run themselves, especially in
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: local and state races that can have a huge impact
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: on our elections. In fact, that's exactly the strategy that
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: Republicans have been following for years.
• 20:58
  Speaker 11: The Republicans did not get here overnight, even though it.
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: Feels that way.
• 21:02
  Speaker 11: They got here to a place where it's basically minority
• 21:05
  Speaker 11: rule and we feel gaslit all the time. We're like,
• 21:08
  Speaker 11: why isn't the thing that we want, the thing that
• 21:10
  Speaker 11: is popular, why isn't that happening? It's because the Republican
• 21:12
  Speaker 11: Party and the ecosystem of mega donors and the far
• 21:16
  Speaker 11: right and the extremists and the white nationalists and the
• 21:20
  Speaker 11: evangelical movement has invested for decades. They've won school boards.
• 21:26
  Speaker 11: They've won county commissions. They've won city councils. They won
• 21:29
  Speaker 11: state legislatures. And they created the structure. that allows them
• 21:33
  Speaker 11: to win even when their ideas and their politicians are
• 21:35
  Speaker 11: not more popular. So when we think about what it
• 21:38
  Speaker 11: will take to fight back, what it will take to win,
• 21:41
  Speaker 11: we have to have the same kind of long-term vision.
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: Of course, not all of us are the type to
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: run for office. That's okay. Each of us still has
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: the ability to shape the Democratic Party's message, to be
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: the Democratic Party's messengers. When we talk to friends and
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: family about the election, when we call and text voters...
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: when we knock on doors, when we post and tweet.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: So what do we say? How do we persuade enough
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: people to join a coalition that's as big as it
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: was in 2020 and hopefully even bigger? Because if Democrats
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: hold the House and add two more Democratic senators who
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: are willing to get rid of the filibuster, we can
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: get some even bigger things done. But again, I'll go
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: back to Michael Podhorzer's warning.
• 22:23
  Speaker 12: The left has never been able to stop a determined
• 22:28
  Speaker 12: fascist push. if it isn't aligned with the rest of
• 22:32
  Speaker 12: the country.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: Being aligned with the rest of the country doesn't require
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: everyone to hold all the same positions and beliefs, but
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: it does require understanding other people's positions and beliefs. It
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: requires meeting people where they are, especially the 81 million
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: Americans who already came out to defeat Trump in 2020.
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: What do they think about politics right now? What do
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: they care about? What are they angry about? What are
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: their concerns, their fears, their hopes? How do we make
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: sure they don't vote Republican in November? And how do
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: we make sure they don't stay home? These are the
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: questions we'll try to answer this season. But before we
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: dive in, there's something important to know about these 81
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: million voters. The overwhelming majority are not like you and
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: me in one very significant way. They just don't follow
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: politics that closely. In fact, one of the biggest divides
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: in American politics.
• 23:26
  Speaker 18: Is is whether or not you're interested in political media
• 23:30
  Speaker 18: in the first place.
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: You, being someone who follows politics at least somewhat closely,
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: might recognize that voice as Ezra Klein's, who now hosts
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: a podcast and writes a column for the New York Times.
• 23:41
  Speaker 18: I think this is a thing people really, really miss,
• 23:43
  Speaker 18: that they're so often thinking about media bias and they
• 23:46
  Speaker 18: forget that the people they need to reach are not
• 23:49
  Speaker 18: either ideologues like them in politics or the ideologues unlike
• 23:53
  Speaker 18: them who they also relatively well understand. Like a hardcore
• 23:56
  Speaker 18: liberal kind of understands a hardcore conservative. What neither of
• 23:59
  Speaker 18: them understand is somebody who thinks they are both unbelievably
• 24:02
  Speaker 18: dull and would sooner get a root canal than watch
• 24:05
  Speaker 18: an hour of cable news.
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: I can certainly attest to that based on the voters
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: I talked to for this season. I just can't watch
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: the news. I stay out of it.
• 24:14
  Speaker 11: I don't know anyone in Congress.
• 24:15
  Speaker 12: And I always just say that politics divides people.
• 24:19
  Speaker 7: It gets... Way too confusing, way too quick.
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: On a scale of 1 to 10, how important would
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: you say politics are in your life?
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: I want to say zero, but I'm going to say two.
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: How many of you plan on voting in the midterm
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: elections this November?
• 24:34
  Speaker 17: What is that?
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: Again, these are all people who actually voted in 2020.
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: They're part of the 81 million who came out to
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: stop Trump. And they're by no means unique in their
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: attitude toward politics. They're the majority.
• 24:49
  Speaker 7: We would say the 20% of people are deeply involved
• 24:53
  Speaker 7: and 80% are not.
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: After the break, political scientist Yana Krupnikov introduces us to
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: those 80%. If you're surprised that 80% of America isn't
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: paying that much attention to politics, you're not alone. When
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: Yana Krupnikov studied this for her book, The Other Divide,
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: she was surprised too.
• 25:19
  Speaker 7: We look at how this divide affects how people feel
• 25:22
  Speaker 7: about political candidates and political parties, how people are willing
• 25:26
  Speaker 7: to talk about politics, whether they post on social media,
• 25:30
  Speaker 7: what they post on social media. But then we also
• 25:33
  Speaker 7: think about the implications of this divide more broadly and
• 25:36
  Speaker 7: the implications of this divide for whose voices we hear
• 25:40
  Speaker 7: in politics. And we suggest that oftentimes when journalists cover politics,
• 25:44
  Speaker 7: they are actually sometimes inadvertently getting the voices of those
• 25:48
  Speaker 7: who are heavily, heavily involved in politics.
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: I know what some of you might be thinking. Democracy
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: is hanging by a thread. How could so many people
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: not be paying more attention to politics? Don't they care
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: about the country, the planet? Can't they see what's going
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: on out there? The answer is yes, and no, and
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: kind of.
• 26:07
  Speaker 7: The first thing I want to say about the 80%
• 26:10
  Speaker 7: is that I definitely don't want to characterize them as
• 26:12
  Speaker 7: politically inattentive. Within that 80% certainly are going to be
• 26:16
  Speaker 7: people who are paying basically no attention, but there are
• 26:20
  Speaker 7: going to be people there who actually know big political
• 26:24
  Speaker 7: things that are happening. This is not the same as
• 26:27
  Speaker 7: saying 80% of people are checked out. That is not
• 26:29
  Speaker 7: at all the case. The difference is really how important
• 26:34
  Speaker 7: is following politics to your daily life. That's that idea
• 26:38
  Speaker 7: of deep involvement. There's another possibility at hand here. which
• 26:43
  Speaker 7: is that to be deeply involved in the sense where
• 26:48
  Speaker 7: you're literally checking in on politics regularly throughout the day,
• 26:54
  Speaker 7: almost hourly, you have to have the flexibility of a
• 26:58
  Speaker 7: job that allows you to do that. And so I
• 27:00
  Speaker 7: think income is here really correlated with the time that
• 27:04
  Speaker 7: you're spending on politics.
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: Even though Yana herself is a political science nerd, she's
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: at times found herself in this 80%. Maybe you have too.
• 27:13
  Speaker 7: What sort of drove this idea of attention home for
• 27:16
  Speaker 7: me in kind of a really kind of personal way
• 27:20
  Speaker 7: is that my daughter, who was really, really young at
• 27:22
  Speaker 7: the time, I think she was just about two, got
• 27:25
  Speaker 7: hospitalized for a virus that affected her breathing. And so
• 27:28
  Speaker 7: she is in the hospital for a week. She has
• 27:31
  Speaker 7: to have oxygen. She's super sad and super sick. And
• 27:35
  Speaker 7: during this week, I have no idea what is happening
• 27:39
  Speaker 7: outside of this kid's hospital room. I remember absolutely, absolutely
• 27:44
  Speaker 7: nothing because even the days after getting out of the hospital,
• 27:47
  Speaker 7: I just remember watching this kid and like counting her breaths.
• 27:51
  Speaker 7: And that was my dominant focus. And so after I
• 27:55
  Speaker 7: emerged from this and she's absolutely fine now, you realize
• 27:59
  Speaker 7: that a bunch of things happen that you don't know about.
• 28:03
  Speaker 7: You just don't have the capacity to follow up on
• 28:06
  Speaker 7: the news or follow on this thing. And I think
• 28:09
  Speaker 7: that is often something that, as people who are really
• 28:12
  Speaker 7: engaged in politics, we do, in a sense, forget. So
• 28:17
  Speaker 7: I think it's important to constantly acknowledge that in a
• 28:22
  Speaker 7: person's day, they have a finite amount of attention. And
• 28:26
  Speaker 7: a lot of this attention is going basically to just
• 28:30
  Speaker 7: figuring out how to live their lives, often in really
• 28:34
  Speaker 7: difficult circumstances.
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: Democratic pollster Margie O'Meara has moderated over 2,000 focus groups
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: in her life. She's heard it over and over.
• 28:43
  Speaker 6: I think what people feel fatigued about that is important is,
• 28:48
  Speaker 6: you know, they just, they feel broadly fatigued that the
• 28:51
  Speaker 6: political climate doesn't feel like it's improving. That we obviously
• 28:56
  Speaker 6: had tension under Trump, to put it briefly. And, you know,
• 29:00
  Speaker 6: people feel that there's still these tensions in daily life
• 29:04
  Speaker 6: and in a way where People feel concerned about where
• 29:07
  Speaker 6: we're headed as a country next.
• 29:09
  Speaker 7: So I think one thing to think about people who
• 29:12
  Speaker 7: are deeply involved is that when politics seems to come
• 29:16
  Speaker 7: out of everywhere, and oftentimes what we learn about politics
• 29:21
  Speaker 7: is utterly terrifying, a tendency for some people is going
• 29:25
  Speaker 7: to be really to disengage.
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: This is an important point. Even if you want to
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: pay more attention to politics... the coverage can be pretty terrible.
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: When former Vox editor-in-chief Lauren Williams was leading a newsroom
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: through the Trump years, she realized that politics in America
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: is treated like a.
• 29:45
  Speaker 14: Sport and not something that is about people's lives and
• 29:51
  Speaker 14: that it is covered like a sport. It is tackled
• 29:55
  Speaker 14: like a sport. And for many consumers, it's consumed like
• 30:00
  Speaker 14: a sport. But as we see, lives hang in the balance.
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: So when the vast majority of voters feel disconnected from
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: politics and the way it's covered, they will inevitably feel
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: disconnected from many of the debates that rage on Twitter
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: or cable news. from much of the language used by
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: pundits and activists, from the appeals that politicians and political
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: organizations use to get their attention.
• 30:25
  Speaker 7: When I see something happening on Twitter, I now take
• 30:30
  Speaker 7: a pause and I say, OK, but who knows about this?
• 30:35
  Speaker 7: Is this a big thing currently on social media or
• 30:40
  Speaker 7: is this a big thing for people who are not
• 30:42
  Speaker 7: on social media? Or is this going to translate to
• 30:46
  Speaker 7: people who are not necessarily deeply, deeply involved in politics?
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: This disconnected majority isn't necessarily who you think they are either.
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: I realize that media and political types have contributed to
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: a certain stereotype of a typical swing voter. It's the
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: working class white guy who the New York Times interviews
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: in a Pennsylvania diner. Or a suburban soccer mom who
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: some pundit tells us has the power to sway an
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: entire election. But the number of people who don't vote
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: along party lines or don't vote in every election is
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: much larger and more diverse than you might think. There
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: are Americans at the edges of the coalition that stopped
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: Trump in 2020. And while they're different in so many ways,
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: these voters tend to be united by one thing. They
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: feel disconnected from a political system that doesn't seem responsive
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: to their most urgent concerns.
• 31:34
  Speaker 15: There's a real disconnect between what politically savvy media experts
• 31:38
  Speaker 15: or politicians think believed to be the way that people
• 31:42
  Speaker 15: experience life and the way that everyday people actually experience
• 31:45
  Speaker 15: the world.
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: Alex Wallach-Hanson organizes working-class voters of all races in Pennsylvania.
• 31:50
  Speaker 15: That same group of people are exactly the ones who
• 31:52
  Speaker 15: are left behind by our current political system, who are
• 31:54
  Speaker 15: left behind by our economic system, and who are disconnected
• 31:57
  Speaker 15: from organization and institutions and who we need to bring
• 32:00
  Speaker 15: into the political process in order to win.
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: Like Alex, Tram Nguyen organizes working-class voters in Virginia. She's
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: seen this disconnect firsthand.
• 32:09
  Speaker 16: It drives me crazy when campaigns purely focus on turnout.
• 32:13
  Speaker 16: People are not light switches that can be turned on
• 32:16
  Speaker 16: and off. We actually have to persuade people and have
• 32:20
  Speaker 16: real conversations with people about, you know, what they care about.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: Tram is right. If you really want to figure out
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: what people care about and what they think about politics,
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: you need to have real conversations. And you can't do
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: that with just a poll. which is why campaigns, political organizations,
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: and some media outlets conduct focus groups in addition to
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: polling surveys.
• 32:43
  Speaker 6: It's opposite of a survey. Because in a survey, you're
• 32:46
  Speaker 6: making decisions about what you leave in and what you
• 32:50
  Speaker 6: cut to get to the survey length that respondents can handle.
• 32:54
  Speaker 6: You're making decisions about question wording. You're making decisions about
• 32:58
  Speaker 6: answer categories. So in a focus group, you're not making
• 33:02
  Speaker 6: those same kinds of decisions. You are asking open-ended questions.
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: Now, some of you might be thinking, how can a
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: group of eight or ten people sitting around a table
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: tell you what the rest of the country thinks? Fair point.
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: They can't. But focus groups aren't random. They're representative. There's
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: social and political science that goes into organizing them. People
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: are screened and recruited so that you're talking to a
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: set of voters with certain backgrounds and characteristics. In our case,
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: we recruited voters for this season of The Wilderness who
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: mostly cast their ballots for Joe Biden in 2020, but
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: aren't entirely sure what they'll do in 2022. Voters who
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: we know from polls and other data might decide to
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: either vote Republican or not vote at all. I conducted
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: these focus groups in some of the most competitive midterm battlegrounds,
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: places that have turned into what Michael Podhorzer calls civil
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: war states.
• 33:52
  Speaker 12: Because you're close enough to 50-50 that both sides think
• 33:58
  Speaker 12: that they can win each election. And so everything becomes existential.
• 34:03
  Speaker 12: You get Republicans doing all the anti-democratic things and all that.
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: Places like Virginia.
• 34:12
  Speaker 10: The race is being closely watched on a national level.
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: Pennsylvania.
• 34:16
  Speaker 15: The battleground state of Pennsylvania in focus.
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: Orange County. California.
• 34:20
  Speaker 6: One of the key battlegrounds that could determine who controls.
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: Nevada.
• 34:23
  Speaker 8: Democrats are divided in Nevada at a time when the
• 34:26
  Speaker 8: party desperately needs.
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: In Georgia.
• 34:28
  Speaker 10: One of the most critical battleground states.
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: Where the stakes are high and it could be anyone's race.
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: Everywhere we go, I'll try to better understand what these
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: disconnected voters are thinking, why they feel disconnected in the
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: first place, and how we can motivate them to show
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: up again in 2022. Some of these voters don't feel
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: like anyone in power has their best interests at heart.
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: There are the career politicians. They just want to make
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: sure they've got their job.
• 34:54
  Speaker 15: When people choose to not vote, it is because they
• 34:56
  Speaker 15: don't see somebody who wants to fight for them.
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: Others we just aren't reaching.
• 34:59
  Speaker 10: These swing voters think Democrats sound like aliens.
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: Then there are voters who've just about given up.
• 35:04
  Speaker 17: And I think people are exhausted in terms of things
• 35:08
  Speaker 17: in their daily life that government is not helping with.
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: And people who feel like politicians have given up on them.
• 35:13
  Speaker 3: I feel like I'm drowning.
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: Some don't have the luxury of time.
• 35:17
  Speaker 15: The average non-Pod Save America person is probably thinking about
• 35:21
  Speaker 15: how their families are going to get by and politics
• 35:24
  Speaker 15: is last, not first.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: And then there are people who don't even know where
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: to begin.
• 35:28
  Speaker 13: I filled out a ballot like a couple weeks ago.
• 35:31
  Speaker 15: Was that for the November election?
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: I don't even know. After each group, I asked a
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: panel of experts to listen to what these voters had
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: to say and offer some advice about what campaigns and
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: organizers could do to reach them. People like John De
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: La Volpe, Biden pollster in the 2020 campaign.
• 35:46
  Speaker 10: Katie Porter, I'm a congresswoman from Orange County, California.
• 35:49
  Speaker 15: Shakir, I was Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign manager.
• 35:52
  Speaker 14: Simone Sanders Townsend, and I am a host on MSNBC
• 35:56
  Speaker 14: of my own show, Simone.
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: These conversations with voters and strategists and organizers aren't meant
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: to give you a sense of how well Democrats will
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: do in the midterms. I'm also not trying to give
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: you the message that will lead the party to victory.
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: And that's because I don't think there is one perfect
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: bumper sticker slogan that will do the trick for every
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: candidate in every race. Voters are complicated. Humans are complicated.
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: For those of us who follow politics closely, it can
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: seem black and white. Why wouldn't it? when we're mainly
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: exposed to the voices of people who think just like
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: we do, and people who think nothing like we do.
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: That's not to say that everyone else is centrist, moderate, apolitical,
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: or apathetic. Far from it. As you'll hear from these voters,
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: many people who are disconnected from politics still have strong
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: political views. And some of those views are conflicting, surprising,
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: or just plain weird. Again, people are complicated. But the
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: fundamental promise of American democracy is that a diverse, flawed,
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: complicated country of more than 300 million people can somehow
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: figure out a way to live together in relative peace
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: and prosperity. That promise is now at greater risk than
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: at any time since the Civil War. And just like then,
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: it's at risk from forces within. But what we know
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: for a fact is that throughout our history, And just
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: two years ago, we were able to hold this democracy
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: together in the face of those who tried to pull
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: it apart. And we did that by talking to each other,
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: listening to each other, persuading each other to find the
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: common threads that still connect us as Americans. And that's
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: what we have to do again. In 2022, in 2024,
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: in all the days in between, and all the days after.
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: It's a tough and frustrating slog, but the good news
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: is the outcome is in our hands. We have agency here.
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: We get to be the messengers. So I hope these
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: conversations can help inform and inspire your own activism in
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: the days and months to come. Let's dive in. The
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: Wilderness is an original podcast from Crooked Media. Season three
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: is produced by Dust Light Productions. I'm your host, Jon Favreau.
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: From Crooked Media, our executive producers are Sarah Geismar, Katie Long,
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: and me. Special thanks to Allison Falsetta and Andy Taft
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: for production support. And to Mike Kulishek from Benenson Strategy Group,
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: who helped us with our focus groups. From Dust Light,
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: our executive producer is Misha Youssef. Arwen Nix is our
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: executive editor. Stephanie Cohn is the senior producer. Tamika Adams
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: is the producer and Francesca Diaz is the assistant producer.
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: This episode was sound designed by Stephanie Cohn. Valentino Rivera
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: is our senior engineer. Martin Fowler is the composer. Thanks
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: to our development and operations coordinator at Dustlight, Rachel Garcia,
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: and to Chrissy Marin for archival legal review. If you
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: want to learn more about how you can take action
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: in the fight for our democracy, head over to votesaveamerica.org.