Latest / Pod Save America / “Herd mentality.”

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“Herd mentality.” · Pod Save America

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: This is a life-changing election. This will determine what America
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: is going to look like for a long, long time.
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: This is the most important election in the history of
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: our country.
• 0:20
  Speaker 3: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 4: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 0:23
  Speaker 3: On today's pod, Dan talks to political message guru Anat
• 0:26
  Speaker 3: Shankar Osorio about the most effective ways to persuade voters
• 0:29
  Speaker 3: in the homestretch. Before that, we'll talk about Trump going
• 0:32
  Speaker 3: to war with the head of the CDC, what the
• 0:34
  Speaker 3: president's town hall might tell us about how he'll handle
• 0:36
  Speaker 3: the debates, and the results of our latest change research
• 0:40
  Speaker 3: polar coaster survey of new and infrequent voters. But first,
• 0:45
  Speaker 3: check out this week's Pod Save the World to hear
• 0:47
  Speaker 3: Tommy and Ben call bullshit on the Israel-UAE-Bahrain peace deal,
• 0:51
  Speaker 3: dig into what's going on with the Taliban peace talks,
• 0:53
  Speaker 3: and chat with former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Mike McFaul
• 0:56
  Speaker 3: about the protests in Belarus and how a Biden administration
• 0:59
  Speaker 3: should approach Russia. Also, make sure to check out the
• 1:02
  Speaker 3: latest episode of Mystic America where Ben talks about ending
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: our endless wars in the Middle East. It's an outstanding series.
• 1:08
  Speaker 3: I highly recommend you catch up if you haven't had
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• 1:34
  Speaker 3: let's get to the news. The top headline on the
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: New York Times homepage last night was Trump again scorned
• 1:40
  Speaker 3: science on vaccine and masks, which I imagine is exactly
• 1:44
  Speaker 3: what the campaign planned as the message of the day,
• 1:46
  Speaker 3: just seven weeks before the election. Want to get that
• 1:50
  Speaker 3: Trump scorned science headline. So here's what happened. Centers for
• 1:55
  Speaker 3: Disease Control Director Robert Redfield said, made two important statements
• 1:59
  Speaker 3: during his Senate testimony on Wednesday. First, he said that
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: universal mask use could end the pandemic and added, quote,
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: I might even go so far as to say that
• 2:09
  Speaker 3: this face mask is more guaranteed to protect me against
• 2:12
  Speaker 3: COVID than when I take a COVID vaccine. Second, he
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: said that even if a vaccine were approved now, it
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: won't be, quote, generally available to the American public to
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: get back to our regular life until mid-2021. Later that day,
• 2:29
  Speaker 3: Trump called a White House press conference to publicly rebuke
• 2:32
  Speaker 3: Redfield for offering, quote, incorrect information on both the effectiveness
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: of masks and the timeline for a vaccine. Here's what
• 2:39
  Speaker 3: Trump said.
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: I saw the statement. I called him. I said, what
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: did you mean by that?
• 2:44
  Speaker 4: And I think he just made a mistake.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: We're ready to go as soon as the vaccine happens.
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: I think it would be very soon. When I called
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: up Robert today, I said to him, what's with the mask?
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: He said, I think I answered that question incorrectly. I
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: think maybe he misunderstood it.
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: So I want to dive into the specifics on both
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: the mask comments and the vaccine comments. But just overall,
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: do you think anyone in the White House or in
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: the campaign believes that Trump going to war with his
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: CDC director is good for him? That a political plus?
• 3:19
  Speaker 4: Well, someone in a campaign thinks that. Just not Trump's campaign.
• 3:24
  Speaker 4: Because The important context here is that Biden went out
• 3:27
  Speaker 4: and gave a speech yesterday that said that if he
• 3:29
  Speaker 4: were elected president, he would listen to the scientists when
• 3:32
  Speaker 4: it came to the vaccine and was worried that Trump
• 3:36
  Speaker 4: would overrule the scientists. So Trump called a press conference
• 3:39
  Speaker 4: with the specific purpose of overruling the scientists on the vaccine.
• 3:43
  Speaker 4: So no, John, it is not good for Trump. I
• 3:47
  Speaker 4: think Trump is probably, I'm not sure how much more
• 3:51
  Speaker 4: damage he can do to himself on the how voters
• 3:54
  Speaker 4: view his management of the coronavirus. It has been pretty steady,
• 3:58
  Speaker 4: high in the beginning, a little lower the summer, and
• 4:00
  Speaker 4: then kind of steady for the last six weeks or so.
• 4:03
  Speaker 4: But every day he's tripping over his own two feet
• 4:05
  Speaker 4: when it comes to the pandemic is a day he
• 4:06
  Speaker 4: is not doing anything that will help him come from behind,
• 4:10
  Speaker 4: which is where he is in this race.
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: I agree with that. I think voters' judgment of how
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: he handled the coronavirus crisis is pretty set in stone
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: when it comes to the past six months. I think
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: the question now is people want to know, how do
• 4:27
  Speaker 3: we get back to normal? You know, when can I
• 4:30
  Speaker 3: sort of resume my life? When is a vaccine coming?
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: And I think the problem for Trump is it's not just,
• 4:39
  Speaker 3: did he do well in the past on handling this pandemic?
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: It's who do you trust in the next six months,
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: in the next year, in the next year and a
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: half to finally get us out of this? And- There's
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: a path for him to be that person.
• 4:56
  Speaker 4: No, there's not. There is not.
• 4:58
  Speaker 3: Well, I'm saying if he went out there and said,
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: I'm going to listen to the science on vaccine, it's
• 5:01
  Speaker 3: going to take a long time. We're going to have
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: a universal mask mandate for a couple months. We're going
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: to then open things back up. I'm going to have
• 5:07
  Speaker 3: rapid testing at every school, at every home. We're going
• 5:10
  Speaker 3: to get this out there now. Like. He could at
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: least maybe improve his current ratings on that. And yet, like,
• 5:16
  Speaker 3: why is he still fighting over masks even now that
• 5:20
  Speaker 3: he's like occasionally wearing one? Like what was so bad
• 5:23
  Speaker 3: about his CDC director sitting in front of the Senate
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: and saying this mask could end the pandemic? What is
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: that bad for him?
• 5:31
  Speaker 4: Well, I think just to your, the point you just made, yes,
• 5:36
  Speaker 4: Trump could do all those things, but it would have
• 5:38
  Speaker 4: to be a different person than this Trump. Trump, I
• 5:40
  Speaker 4: don't think he can actually improve. I don't think he's
• 5:43
  Speaker 4: capable of doing the job that he would need to
• 5:46
  Speaker 4: do over the next few months to improve his standing.
• 5:49
  Speaker 4: But he could damage Biden's– how the public views Biden
• 5:56
  Speaker 4: on the coronavirus. But he's too busy stepping into his
• 6:00
  Speaker 4: own self-created messes. The mask thing is interesting. I think
• 6:04
  Speaker 4: there's two different ways to think about it. One is–
• 6:07
  Speaker 4: Trump views the mask as a monument to his failure
• 6:10
  Speaker 4: to get coronavirus under control. So he's like offended when
• 6:12
  Speaker 4: he sees it. And so it's just like he views
• 6:15
  Speaker 4: that mask thing through the prism of what it says
• 6:17
  Speaker 4: about him, what it says about his own weakness. And
• 6:20
  Speaker 4: the second part is he is very, very, very attentive
• 6:24
  Speaker 4: to the very, very far fringe of the Republican Party.
• 6:28
  Speaker 4: There is a sentiment of thought among the far right
• 6:31
  Speaker 4: about masks being this infringement of people's constitutional rights. They're
• 6:34
  Speaker 4: not good. And it's the same reason why he is
• 6:37
  Speaker 4: unwilling to denounce QAnon, is he never wants to lose
• 6:41
  Speaker 4: a single member of his base. And he's afraid that
• 6:43
  Speaker 4: if he becomes too pro-mask, he will lose those voters.
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: Yeah, he needs to be president of Republicans all the time.
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: On the vaccine timeline, why does Trump need people to
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: believe that it'll be sooner than what the CDC director said?
• 7:00
  Speaker 4: Because he just promised, like, 24 hours ago that they
• 7:03
  Speaker 4: would have one before that very special day, which also
• 7:06
  Speaker 4: happens to be the first Tuesday in November. Now this
• 7:09
  Speaker 4: is once again, speaks to just how short sighted he
• 7:11
  Speaker 4: is because people are going to vote on that quote
• 7:14
  Speaker 4: unquote special day. And they will know on that special day,
• 7:18
  Speaker 4: whether a vaccine has come, he would be much better
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: off talking about some shorter timeline, but that was past
• 7:25
  Speaker 4: the election day. You know, his, you know, the movie,
• 7:27
  Speaker 4: the Trumpian equivalent of Nixon secret plan for peace in
• 7:30
  Speaker 4: Vietnam is, Um, but he's putting himself in a position
• 7:32
  Speaker 4: where people will know on the day in which he
• 7:35
  Speaker 4: is telling them to vote, not to vote earlier, but
• 7:37
  Speaker 4: to vote on that day in person that he failed
• 7:40
  Speaker 4: at that. So it's once again, a, you know, he
• 7:44
  Speaker 4: is doubling down on a particularly, um, stupid tactical move
• 7:49
  Speaker 4: he made.
• 7:49
  Speaker 3: I mean, you know what he's going to do here.
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: We're going to hear from one or more of these
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: drug companies that the trials have gone well and he's
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: going to, hopefully, That would be great. And he's going
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: to use that news to say the vaccine is here.
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: It is happening. And then all of these pharmaceutical companies
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: are going to throw out all kinds of caveats and
• 8:11
  Speaker 3: be like, you know, the phase three trials went well,
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: but we still have not manufactured yet. We're still a
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: ways from distribution. We're not going to have it for months.
• 8:19
  Speaker 3: And then Trump's going to be like, oh, forget them. Like,
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: he's just going to take the headline and then lie
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: and say that the vaccine's right around the corner.
• 8:29
  Speaker 4: That could work with his voters, but who he already has.
• 8:32
  Speaker 4: But we've seen in polling, the navigator coronavirus tracker looks
• 8:36
  Speaker 4: at this question about who you trust more in a vaccine.
• 8:38
  Speaker 4: And Democrats in Congress are overwhelmingly more trusted than Trump.
• 8:43
  Speaker 4: And Democrats in Congress, although more popular and trusted than Republicans,
• 8:46
  Speaker 4: are like 18 points underwater. So he's already sort of,
• 8:50
  Speaker 4: I think, did not like on the list of October
• 8:53
  Speaker 4: surprises and things I worry about. Trump being able to
• 8:55
  Speaker 4: fabricate some sort of myth around a forthcoming vaccine is
• 8:59
  Speaker 4: very low on my list of concerns.
• 9:01
  Speaker 3: So as you mentioned, Joe Biden gave a speech earlier
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: that day, as luck would have it, about, he gave
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: the speech after a two-hour briefing with his coronavirus advisors
• 9:10
  Speaker 3: to talk about his plan to end the pandemic and
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: distribute a safe, effective vaccine to the whole country. Here's
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: a clip of Biden's speech.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: So let me be clear. I trust vaccines. I trust scientists.
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: But I don't trust Donald Trump. And at this moment,
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: the American people can't either. Last week, Senator Harris and
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: I laid out three questions this administration is going to
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: have to answer to assure the American people that politics
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: will not play a role whatsoever in the vaccine process.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: What criteria will be used to ensure that a vaccine
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: meets the scientific standard of safety and effectiveness? What's the criteria? Second,
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: if the administration greenlights a vaccine, who will validate that
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: the decision was driven by science rather than politics? What
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: group of scientists will that be? And thirdly, how can
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: we be sure that the distribution of the vaccine will
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: take place safely, cost-free, and without a hint of favoritism?
• 10:16
  Speaker 3: So Biden is saying we have to listen to the
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: science and not Trump when it comes to a vaccine.
• 10:21
  Speaker 3: Trump and the Republicans are now accusing Biden of being
• 10:24
  Speaker 3: an anti-vaxxer. Who will the American people believe?
• 10:31
  Speaker 4: So, you know, two, luckily it's two different realities. Who
• 10:34
  Speaker 4: could decide?
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: I mean, you are seeing, you know, I see this
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: not just from the Trump campaign. I see it from
• 10:40
  Speaker 3: asshole anti-anti-Trump conservative journalists that, you know, there's this whole, Oh,
• 10:46
  Speaker 3: there's a lot of wows from reporters when certain Democratic
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: candidates like Cal Cunningham in a debate in North Carolina said,
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: I'd be hesitant to take Donald Trump's word for it
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: on a vaccine. And reporters are somehow surprised that Democrats
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: are saying this. Like, is this something that could have
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: traction that's not like Democrats are playing politics with a vaccine? No.
• 11:10
  Speaker 4: I mean— Can there be a series of really bad
• 11:14
  Speaker 4: press coverage that could sand down the edges of Trump's
• 11:17
  Speaker 4: giant problem on this?
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 11:20
  Speaker 4: Is there going to be a world in which the
• 11:21
  Speaker 4: public all of a sudden trusts Trump on a vaccine
• 11:23
  Speaker 4: as much as a Democrat or more than a Democrat?
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: No.
• 11:26
  Speaker 4: But we deserve better press coverage on this because saying
• 11:29
  Speaker 4: that you do not trust someone who has already announced–
• 11:34
  Speaker 4: that he is going to politicize the vaccine process is
• 11:37
  Speaker 4: a completely common sense and natural thing to say. Like
• 11:40
  Speaker 4: you wouldn't trust Trump to give you a tissue, let
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: alone a vaccine.
• 11:43
  Speaker 3: He told us to drink bleach. Here's the thing is
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: why they all look stupid. And they did all look stupid.
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: The other people who questioned this, because they, most of
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: the questions were before Trump's press conference yesterday. So it's like,
• 11:57
  Speaker 3: what are Democrats saying about vaccines that now they might
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: not trust Trump, blah, blah, blah. And they all say that.
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: And then Trump calls a press conference where he rebukes
• 12:06
  Speaker 3: his CDC director's comments on vaccines, where he rebukes his
• 12:10
  Speaker 3: CDC director's comments on the effectiveness of masks. Like whenever possible,
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: Donald Trump makes sure he seizes the opportunity to substitute
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: his judgment, which is based on making sure he is
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: reelected for science. for the judgment of scientists everywhere. He's
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: done it time and time again. It is basically like
• 12:31
  Speaker 3: the hallmark of his leadership through the pandemic to overrule
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: science again and again.
• 12:37
  Speaker 4: That's the hallmark of his entire presidency. Climate change, pandemic,
• 12:43
  Speaker 4: every other thing. And it is not something that is
• 12:45
  Speaker 4: new to him. He is someone who, as we've talked
• 12:47
  Speaker 4: about before, has raised false conspiracy theories about vaccines for years.
• 12:55
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: Now look, I mean, I think for people who are
• 12:59
  Speaker 3: hoping for a vaccine that is effective, safe, and that
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: is distributed quickly, which I certainly count myself as one
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: of those people, I think we can be sure that
• 13:09
  Speaker 3: if there is a vaccine that works in a phase
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: three trial, it is not going to be like Trump
• 13:16
  Speaker 3: and a bunch of scientists that let us know this, right?
• 13:19
  Speaker 3: This is a global race for a vaccine. There are
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: scientists all over the world. who have been working on this.
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: There are companies all over the world invested in this.
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: There are governments all over the world invested in this.
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: I believe that we will know if a vaccine is
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: safe or if Donald Trump is just telling us a
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: vaccine is safe. We will know the difference because this
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: is such a global effort. But I do think the
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: question that voters are going to have to answer is,
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: and Biden hit at this in his sort of last
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: criteria that he mentioned, is, Who do we want distributing
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: a vaccine in this country? Which candidate do we want
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: distributing a vaccine that's safe, effective, and that's gonna go
• 14:01
  Speaker 3: to the people who need it as fast as possible?
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: Do we want Donald Trump, who basically punished blue states
• 14:10
  Speaker 3: during the beginning of the pandemic? Do we think that
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: Donald Trump is going to fairly and equitably distribute vaccines
• 14:18
  Speaker 3: to everyone in this country? Or do we think he's
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: going to take care of his people, people who voted
• 14:24
  Speaker 3: for him, people supported for him, rich people, and not
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: everyone else. If I were Biden and the Democrats, I
• 14:30
  Speaker 3: would start pushing on that more than anything else, that
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: the distribution of this vaccine in the hands of Donald
• 14:36
  Speaker 3: Trump is going to be a fucking disaster. And it's
• 14:39
  Speaker 3: going to be politicized because he politicized everything else.
• 14:42
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think that's a really good point and an
• 14:44
  Speaker 4: opportunity for the Biden campaign. Like, do you want your
• 14:47
  Speaker 4: kid's teacher to get a vaccine? Do you want firefighters
• 14:50
  Speaker 4: to get a vaccine? Or do you want Tucker Carlson
• 14:51
  Speaker 4: to get a vaccine? Like those are the choices, right?
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: No, that's exactly. And of course that's going to happen.
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: Of course that's going to happen. He said at the
• 14:58
  Speaker 3: press conference yesterday, if you took out the blue states,
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: there wouldn't be that many deaths, which is also incorrect.
• 15:05
  Speaker 3: It is also incorrect because like five of the top
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: 10 states with the most deaths in this country are
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: red states.
• 15:10
  Speaker 4: Well, well, if we get, if we do our job,
• 15:11
  Speaker 4: some of them become blue. So yeah, there's that. If
• 15:16
  Speaker 4: we convince Trump that losing Florida will shift the balance
• 15:22
  Speaker 4: into the blue column, he might play along with that trick.
• 15:26
  Speaker 3: I will also say from yesterday, like the one last
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: thing I was surprised about at all is that I'm
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: surprised that this is the territory that Trump wants to
• 15:33
  Speaker 3: focus the campaign right now is who can better manage
• 15:36
  Speaker 3: the pandemic. Because it doesn't seem like territory that he
• 15:40
  Speaker 3: should want to fight on. You know, like he's done
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: his law and order stuff, his crime stuff. You know,
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: he's obviously tighter ahead on economic issues, but he keeps
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: coming back to the pandemic and talking about the pandemic
• 15:52
  Speaker 3: when every single poll shows Joe Biden with an enormous
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: lead on who can handle the pandemic. And Donald Trump
• 15:59
  Speaker 3: just keeps stepping right into it.
• 16:02
  Speaker 4: John, it's been almost four years now, and I'm getting
• 16:06
  Speaker 4: the sense that he is not some sort of master strategist.
• 16:08
  Speaker 4: There is not a game plan here. He has not
• 16:11
  Speaker 4: read Sun Tzu. Like this is not– it's very possible
• 16:15
  Speaker 4: that he brings to bear the strategic acumen of a
• 16:21
  Speaker 4: rat in a maze trying to get cheese, right? We
• 16:26
  Speaker 4: are living in a Pavlovian presidency, right? Like that is
• 16:28
  Speaker 4: what is happening.
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: The only thing I wonder, just trying to look at
• 16:31
  Speaker 3: it from every angle to see if we're missing anything,
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: I wonder if we are missing– Like a desire for
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: normalcy that will make people or enough people want to
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: believe Trump, that maybe masks aren't really needed, that a
• 16:43
  Speaker 3: vaccine is just around the corner, that we just need
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: to get back to our lives, that we don't want
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: to keep wearing masks, that we won't want to keep
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: staying at home. Like, is there any evidence in the
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: polling that that desire for normalcy exists?
• 16:57
  Speaker 4: There is evidence that there is a strong desire for normalcy,
• 17:00
  Speaker 4: but it is going in the opposite direction of what
• 17:03
  Speaker 4: Trump wants.
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 17:04
  Speaker 4: Right. There are many, many, as we say, both on
• 17:09
  Speaker 4: this podcast and apparently on Stress Balls in the merch store,
• 17:12
  Speaker 4: we worry about everything, panic about nothing. But I don't
• 17:17
  Speaker 4: think we're missing something here. It may turn out to
• 17:19
  Speaker 4: be not as consequential as we want it to be,
• 17:23
  Speaker 4: that people may value other things when they go into
• 17:26
  Speaker 4: that voting booth. But I don't think they're going to
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: all of a sudden adopt Donald Trump's view of the pandemic.
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: Because all of the polling, even among Republicans, is that
• 17:36
  Speaker 4: people want more social distancing, not less. They're worried about
• 17:39
  Speaker 4: opening up too quickly rather than too slowly. And they
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: believe in masks. And that has not changed. It's been
• 17:45
  Speaker 4: very steady for a very long period of time.
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: So Trump hasn't been able to control the racist narrative
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: all week. On Tuesday night, he appeared on an ABC
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: News town hall in Pennsylvania. The president faced questions from
• 17:58
  Speaker 3: moderator George Stephanopoulos and a group of undecided voters who
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: pressed him on quite a few issues. I just want
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: to go through a few of these exchanges. Here's Trump
• 18:06
  Speaker 3: answering a question about systemic racism.
• 18:09
  Speaker 6: You've coined the phrase, make America great again. When has
• 18:12
  Speaker 6: America been great for African Americans in the ghetto of America?
• 18:16
  Speaker 6: Are you aware of how tone deaf that comes off
• 18:19
  Speaker 6: to African American community?
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: Well, I can say this. We have tremendous African American support.
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: You've probably seen.
• 18:25
  Speaker 4: It in the polls.
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: We're doing extremely well with African American, Hispanic American at
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: levels that you've rarely seen a Republican have.
• 18:34
  Speaker 6: We need to see because you say again, we need
• 18:37
  Speaker 6: to see when was that great? Because that pushes us
• 18:41
  Speaker 6: back to a time in which we cannot identify with
• 18:43
  Speaker 6: such greatness. And I mean, you've said everything else about
• 18:46
  Speaker 6: choking and everything else, but you have yet to address
• 18:48
  Speaker 6: and acknowledge that there's been a race problem in America.
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: So if you go, well, I hope there's not a
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: race problem. I can tell you there's none with me.
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: I just a lot of parts about that exchange. They're special.
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: But I really I really enjoyed. him answering the question
• 19:05
  Speaker 3: about systemic racism by saying, we're doing phenomenal. You've probably
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: seen it in the polls. You've probably seen how well
• 19:11
  Speaker 3: I'm doing with black voters in the polls. I'm sure,
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: I'm sure you have.
• 19:16
  Speaker 4: I think, you know, that was a, like that exchange
• 19:18
  Speaker 4: is fascinating in a whole host of ways. Like the
• 19:20
  Speaker 4: question is truly incisive and brilliant because it gets at
• 19:24
  Speaker 4: the absolute core of what Make America Great Again is
• 19:28
  Speaker 4: all about. And we don't talk about it as explicitly enough,
• 19:31
  Speaker 4: which is, Trump is running on a restorative nostalgia appeal
• 19:35
  Speaker 4: to a time in which white people and white Christians
• 19:38
  Speaker 4: in particular had total control of the political power in America.
• 19:41
  Speaker 4: And what has fueled a lot of the enthusiasm for
• 19:43
  Speaker 4: Trump among some segment of the population is this fear
• 19:47
  Speaker 4: of a changing America where there's going to be a
• 19:49
  Speaker 4: moment in the not too distant future. future where white
• 19:51
  Speaker 4: people are a minority in the country, where we've just
• 19:53
  Speaker 4: recently had a black president. And he's basically saying the
• 19:57
  Speaker 4: question goes right at the core of that. Now, Trump
• 20:00
  Speaker 4: did not get that, right? That did not, which is
• 20:04
  Speaker 4: odd for someone with such an in-depth studious knowledge of
• 20:08
  Speaker 4: history that he did not fully comprehend that. But it
• 20:11
  Speaker 4: does go once again to what we've always talked about,
• 20:14
  Speaker 4: which is one of the better messages against Trump is
• 20:16
  Speaker 4: Trump first, America last. And Trump can even take a
• 20:19
  Speaker 4: question about systemic racism and view it through the prism
• 20:21
  Speaker 4: of his own reelection.
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: And also it's like, I hope there's not a problem
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: in America. Well, certainly not a problem with me, right?
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: It's literally all about him. Also, the only thing he
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: can say about racism, in his mind, the only thing
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: he says every time he's asked this question is basically
• 20:39
  Speaker 3: the economy he inherited from Barack Obama included some of
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: the lowest levels of unemployment for black Americans.
• 20:47
  Speaker 4: That's it.
• 20:48
  Speaker 3: That's all he can say. He has nothing to say
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: about his own actions over the last four years. He
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: has nothing to say about what he's going to do
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: in the next four years. He has nothing to say
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: about any other problem that confronts black Americans in this country.
• 21:04
  Speaker 6: Nothing.
• 21:05
  Speaker 3: He has one stat about unemployment that he just says
• 21:09
  Speaker 3: over and over again. And, you know, we're going to
• 21:11
  Speaker 3: talk about sort of what this all means for the debates.
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: But I think if you're Joe Biden, you know that
• 21:16
  Speaker 3: all Trump has ever said, can ever say in public
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: when he's not hiding behind his tweets, you know, about
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: black Americans is they should basically be happy that before
• 21:27
  Speaker 3: the pandemic, there was a good unemployment rate. That's Trump's message.
• 21:32
  Speaker 3: Here's Trump standing by his comments that the coronavirus will
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: just disappear.
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: And we are going to be okay. We're going to
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: be okay. And it is going away. And it's probably
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: going to go away now a lot faster because of
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: the vaccine. It would go away without the vaccine, George.
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: But it's going to go away a lot faster.
• 21:46
  Speaker 7: It would go away without the vaccine?
• 21:48
  Speaker 8: Sure.
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: Over a period of time.
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: Sure.
• 21:50
  Speaker 4: With time. With many deaths.
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: And you'll develop, you'll develop like a herd mentality. It's
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: going to be, it's going to be herd developed and
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: that's going to happen. That will all happen. But with
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: a vaccine, I think it will go away very quickly.
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: You know, everyone focused rightly so on the phrase herd mentality,
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: but he follows up with, it's going to be herd developed.
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: It's going to be herd developed. You know, that's something
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: that people say.
• 22:15
  Speaker 4: It's true. It will be herd developed.
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: I mean, I also like, it's always the case with
• 22:20
  Speaker 3: Trump that we can mock the ridiculous words he uses
• 22:25
  Speaker 3: because he's dumb and he doesn't understand anything. But there's
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: something incredibly frightening about that answer because following a strategy
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: of herd immunity in this country would mean millions more deaths,
• 22:41
  Speaker 3: millions more deaths. And he just sort of, that he's
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: just fine saying that.
• 22:47
  Speaker 4: I mean, this has been a problem for many years
• 22:50
  Speaker 4: because We become, ourselves included, overly focused on the dumbness
• 22:55
  Speaker 4: of Trump's words and not the dangerousness of his ideas.
• 22:57
  Speaker 4: And this is exactly like, we're all dunking on him
• 22:59
  Speaker 4: for herd mentality. We will probably even name this podcast
• 23:02
  Speaker 4: herd mentality. That seems highly likely.
• 23:04
  Speaker 3: We can't now.
• 23:05
  Speaker 4: As long as, well, I'm trying to cut off Mr.
• 23:08
  Speaker 4: Elijah SEO cone at the pass here by making the
• 23:13
  Speaker 4: sausage on tape.
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: Elijah would call it smash that subscribe button.
• 23:20
  Speaker 4: Yes, he would. But yeah, it's incredibly dangerous. And it
• 23:23
  Speaker 4: is ultimately what the strategy is. Yes, of course it is.
• 23:28
  Speaker 4: It is the one that eventually gets Trump to where
• 23:33
  Speaker 4: he wants to be, which is the virus spreads less.
• 23:36
  Speaker 4: But that's because it has already infected and killed lots
• 23:38
  Speaker 4: of people with him doing the least amount of work.
• 23:41
  Speaker 4: To solve the problem of the virus quickly is hard.
• 23:44
  Speaker 4: And he has spent his life avoiding hard work. And
• 23:46
  Speaker 4: so this is the path of least resistance for Trump. Someone,
• 23:49
  Speaker 4: as he pointed out in his press conference yesterday, who
• 23:50
  Speaker 4: is tested all the time. Everyone he comes in contact
• 23:52
  Speaker 4: with tested. That is not a privilege available to the
• 23:55
  Speaker 4: rest of us who would suffer in this herd mentality strategy,
• 23:58
  Speaker 4: if you will, as we are herd developing this.
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: Herd developed. You know, his strategy is basically to tell
• 24:05
  Speaker 3: older and sicker people, stay home. Think that will protect them,
• 24:09
  Speaker 3: which it won't because they all live with people who
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: will be going out into the world and working. And
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: he wants everyone else back to work because he thinks,
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: like you said, that will fix the economy, that will
• 24:20
  Speaker 3: get everyone back to normal. And the people who were
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: very vulnerable to this virus, like, hey, best of luck
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: to you. Best of luck to you. In his convention speech,
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: he said, we are protecting them. They're not doing anything
• 24:31
  Speaker 3: to protect vulnerable populations at all. They're basically just telling them, hey,
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: be careful. That's it. That's all he's doing. That is
• 24:39
  Speaker 3: the Trump plan for the virus. Basically, it is whatever
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: comes first, herd immunity, herd mentality, or a vaccine. That's
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: his plan. And here's an exchange with a voter who
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: asked about healthcare. I think this is an important one.
• 24:53
  Speaker 8: I was born with a disease called sarcoidosis. And from
• 24:57
  Speaker 8: the day I was born, I was considered uninsurable. That
• 25:01
  Speaker 8: disease started in my skin, moved to my eyes, into
• 25:05
  Speaker 8: my optic nerves, and when I went to graduate school,
• 25:08
  Speaker 8: into my brain. When it hit my brain, I was
• 25:11
  Speaker 8: automatically eligible for disability for the rest of my life.
• 25:16
  Speaker 8: I chose instead to get a bachelor's degree, a master's degree,
• 25:20
  Speaker 8: a PhD, and become a professor. It is great, except
• 25:24
  Speaker 8: I still have similar healthcare problems. It costs me, with co-pays,
• 25:28
  Speaker 8: I'm still paying almost $ 7, 000 a year in addition to
• 25:32
  Speaker 8: the co-pay and should pre-existing conditions which Obamacare brought to
• 25:39
  Speaker 8: fruition be removed.
• 25:44
  Speaker 6: No.
• 25:45
  Speaker 8: Please stop and let me finish my question, sir. Should
• 25:48
  Speaker 8: that be removed within a 36 to 72 hour period
• 25:53
  Speaker 8: without my medication, I will be dead. And I want
• 25:56
  Speaker 8: to know what it is that you're going to do
• 25:59
  Speaker 8: to assure that people like me who work hard, we
• 26:02
  Speaker 8: do everything we're supposed to do, can stay insured. It's
• 26:05
  Speaker 8: not my fault that I was born with this disease.
• 26:08
  Speaker 8: It's not my fault that I'm a black woman and
• 26:10
  Speaker 8: in the medical community, I'm minimized and not taken seriously.
• 26:14
  Speaker 8: I want to know what you are going to do
• 26:16
  Speaker 8: about that.
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: So first of all, I hope you are taken seriously.
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: I hope you are. And we are not going to
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: hurt anything having to do with preexisting conditions. We're not
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: going to hurt preexisting conditions. And In fact, just the opposite.
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: If you look at what they want to do, where
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: they have socialized medicine, they will get rid of pre-existing conditions.
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: If they go into Medicare for All, which is socialized medicine,
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: and you can forget about your doctors and your plans,
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: just like you could forget under President Obama.
• 26:47
  Speaker 7: I just have to stop you there, because it's just
• 26:48
  Speaker 7: on a couple of points. Number one, Joe Biden has
• 26:50
  Speaker 7: ran against Medicare for all in the primaries. But much
• 26:52
  Speaker 7: more importantly, Obamacare guaranteed people with pre-existing conditions could buy insurance,
• 26:58
  Speaker 7: guaranteed they could buy it at the same price as
• 27:00
  Speaker 7: everyone else, guaranteed a package of essential benefits guaranteed that
• 27:04
  Speaker 7: insurance companies couldn't put a lifetime limit on those benefits.
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: You fought to repeal Obamacare.
• 27:10
  Speaker 4: You are arguing.
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: Well, I essentially did.
• 27:12
  Speaker 7: You are arguing in the Supreme Court right now to
• 27:15
  Speaker 7: strike it down.
• 27:16
  Speaker 4: That would do away with preexisting conditions.
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: No, so that we can do new health care.
• 27:20
  Speaker 7: But you've been promising a new health care.
• 27:22
  Speaker 3: So I thought that was interesting for a couple of reasons.
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: The first is just that in the first question about
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: systemic racism. It is really hard for him to have
• 27:33
  Speaker 3: interactions with real voters. Like Maggie Haberman had an interesting
• 27:39
  Speaker 3: take about the town hall. She was tweeting Trump by
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: only doing rallies and almost never doing town hall forums
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: has been insulated from the kind of voter interaction that
• 27:47
  Speaker 3: usually help incumbents as they're running. But he craves adulation
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: and many of his aides enable it. So this town
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: hall is bracing for him. What do you think of that?
• 27:56
  Speaker 4: Well, I think that's right. Trump lives in a bubble, right?
• 27:58
  Speaker 4: It's not just his Fox News right-wing media bubble. It
• 28:00
  Speaker 4: is that he is completely surrounded by people whose entire
• 28:04
  Speaker 4: existence is to profit off of Trump, right? So he
• 28:07
  Speaker 4: never hears bad news. He never hears criticism. He only
• 28:10
  Speaker 4: hears what he wants to hear. And that includes the
• 28:14
  Speaker 4: polling in his own campaign, right? There's that famous story
• 28:16
  Speaker 4: of when Brad Parscale came in, showed him polling that
• 28:19
  Speaker 4: showed he was in trouble. Trump basically threw him out
• 28:21
  Speaker 4: of the office, threatened to fire him, and he came
• 28:22
  Speaker 4: back magically a couple of days later with better polling
• 28:25
  Speaker 4: and everything was good. And so when he has to
• 28:28
  Speaker 4: actually interact with people who exist outside of the Trump
• 28:32
  Speaker 4: media ecosystem, it's like visiting another planet. He doesn't know
• 28:37
  Speaker 4: these people exist. He doesn't know they have these critiques
• 28:38
  Speaker 4: of him. He doesn't know about their concerns. He just
• 28:40
  Speaker 4: is completely detached from reality. And that is a problem,
• 28:44
  Speaker 4: not just in the context, as we're going to talk about,
• 28:46
  Speaker 4: of what happens in debates when he has to deal
• 28:48
  Speaker 4: with this, but it also– affects his campaign strategy and
• 28:51
  Speaker 4: his messaging because he is campaigning to be president of
• 28:54
  Speaker 4: a country that doesn't actually exist outside the confines of
• 28:57
  Speaker 4: Fox News. And that is why he does things like
• 28:59
  Speaker 4: that press conference we referenced earlier, because he's not living
• 29:02
  Speaker 4: in the same reality as the rest of us.
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: Talking about the debates, what did the town hall tell
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: you about how he might handle these debates, especially the
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: second one? which is a town hall. I mean, the
• 29:22
  Speaker 3: other thing that I noticed from this is the difference
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: between like a Trump press conference. And this is like,
• 29:29
  Speaker 3: Trump can't yell at voters either. He'd like to, but
• 29:32
  Speaker 3: he can't. He can yell. He yells at reporters all
• 29:33
  Speaker 3: day long. He gets challenged, but he gets challenged by reporters.
• 29:36
  Speaker 3: He calls them fake news. And then he moves on
• 29:38
  Speaker 3: when he's faced with voters. he can't play that game,
• 29:43
  Speaker 3: and so it's a little tougher for him. But what
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: did you think about when you were watching this town
• 29:48
  Speaker 3: hall about what that might mean for the debates?
• 29:51
  Speaker 4: I mean, I think it's a huge warning sign for him,
• 29:54
  Speaker 4: particularly as you mentioned that second debate, which is a
• 29:56
  Speaker 4: town hall one. He As you say, he can yell
• 30:00
  Speaker 4: at reporters. The other thing he can do in the
• 30:01
  Speaker 4: White House briefing room is he has a bunch of
• 30:03
  Speaker 4: plants in there. He did this yesterday where he gets
• 30:06
  Speaker 4: a tough question and then he's just like, oh, OAN, Fox, Breitbart.
• 30:10
  Speaker 4: He always has a safe harbor zone.
• 30:12
  Speaker 3: He's got a lifeline. Yeah.
• 30:13
  Speaker 4: And that will not exist in that debate. But the
• 30:19
  Speaker 4: thing that I think we should just modulate expectations is
• 30:22
  Speaker 4: which he can just vomit up a bunch of words
• 30:24
  Speaker 4: that don't mean a ton. And unless he is very
• 30:28
  Speaker 4: specifically and aggressively pressed on those points, he can look
• 30:31
  Speaker 4: out of touch and that is bad for him. But
• 30:33
  Speaker 4: it's just very hard to press Trump because he will
• 30:36
  Speaker 4: just change his lie in the middle of the conversation.
• 30:39
  Speaker 4: We just saw that he can say a lot of words,
• 30:40
  Speaker 4: most of them not true, many of them nonsensical. And
• 30:42
  Speaker 4: at the end, it's hard for someone to pull out
• 30:45
  Speaker 4: a coherent thought from them. And that is somewhat to
• 30:48
  Speaker 4: his benefit, I think.
• 30:50
  Speaker 3: It is. I think in that last clip about pre-existing
• 30:54
  Speaker 3: conditions– George Stephanopoulos did an admirable job trying to fact
• 30:59
  Speaker 3: check him. I do not know that any of the
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: moderators in the debates will be able to spend that
• 31:05
  Speaker 3: much time fact checking Donald Trump. I don't think it's
• 31:08
  Speaker 3: realistic for us to think that they will. I think
• 31:11
  Speaker 3: they should. I think he's, you know, in a perfect world,
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: they would. But I think it's gonna be hard. There's
• 31:16
  Speaker 3: a time limit on these debates. I don't, I also
• 31:18
  Speaker 3: don't believe that Joe Biden wins that debate by playing
• 31:22
  Speaker 3: fact checker for an hour and a half on Donald
• 31:25
  Speaker 3: Trump's lies. Like, I don't know that that gets him anywhere.
• 31:28
  Speaker 3: I think like, to me, Biden's argument about Trump should
• 31:31
  Speaker 3: be that he's a weak, ineffective president who's in over
• 31:34
  Speaker 3: his head, Michelle Obama's line, because he can't focus on
• 31:38
  Speaker 3: anything other than himself. This is what we've talked about. And,
• 31:42
  Speaker 3: you know, we know according to the research, like that
• 31:45
  Speaker 3: is what the largest and broadest group of voters believe
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: to be true about Trump. That includes undecideds, infrequent voters,
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: some Trump voters. So everything that Biden says about Trump
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: should fit within that frame. If Trump lies on that stage,
• 31:58
  Speaker 3: in the debate stage, about protecting pre-existing condition, which he will,
• 32:03
  Speaker 3: Biden should say, do you even know that your administration
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: is in court right now trying to eliminate these protections?
• 32:09
  Speaker 4: Are you aware?
• 32:11
  Speaker 3: That your budget has eliminated these protections three years in
• 32:13
  Speaker 3: a row. Can you explain why you've been promising people
• 32:15
  Speaker 3: a health care plan for four years but didn't actually
• 32:18
  Speaker 3: do anything? Like Biden had this great line a few
• 32:22
  Speaker 3: weeks ago where he said, does he even know he's president?
• 32:25
  Speaker 3: And I think Biden making him out to be a
• 32:28
  Speaker 3: doddering old idiot early on who's completely out of touch
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: with people and basically is so absorbed with himself that
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: he allows the chaos around him to just like, hurt
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: the people that he's supposed to govern is probably the
• 32:43
  Speaker 3: most effective message. And then after Biden says all that,
• 32:45
  Speaker 3: he pivots to, you know, I was part of a
• 32:47
  Speaker 3: team that actually passed healthcare reform and I'm ready to
• 32:49
  Speaker 3: do it again. Here's my plan. And he looks like
• 32:51
  Speaker 3: the more competent president who's also in touch with the
• 32:55
  Speaker 3: needs of the American people and cares about them and
• 32:58
  Speaker 3: will fight for them. So it seems to me that
• 33:00
  Speaker 3: like there is a way to fit Trump's lies into
• 33:03
  Speaker 3: a frame of Trump has no idea what the fuck
• 33:05
  Speaker 3: he's doing as president.
• 33:07
  Speaker 4: Two points on this, which I generally agree with. One is,
• 33:10
  Speaker 4: you're correct that Biden is not three Washington Post fact
• 33:15
  Speaker 4: checker Pinocchios away from becoming president. He's running to be president,
• 33:19
  Speaker 4: not the editor of Politico fact. That is all true.
• 33:21
  Speaker 4: He does need to correct lies about his record. Because
• 33:25
  Speaker 4: as we're going to talk about, there is a tremendous
• 33:28
  Speaker 4: dearth of knowledge about what Biden stands for. And if
• 33:31
  Speaker 4: Trump goes on stage and lies about it, and both
• 33:33
  Speaker 4: the moderator and Biden do not correct him, that could
• 33:36
  Speaker 4: be damaging. Second, I think the other way to look
• 33:40
  Speaker 4: at this is when we think about trust in politics,
• 33:44
  Speaker 4: we often think about in terms of honesty. And I
• 33:46
  Speaker 4: think that's a mistake. Voters tend to believe that most
• 33:50
  Speaker 4: politicians at bare minimum shade the truth and often lie.
• 33:53
  Speaker 4: And that's particularly true of Trump. Like that is baked
• 33:55
  Speaker 4: into the cake. That's the entirely stupid, seriously, not literally
• 33:58
  Speaker 4: construct that exists out there. Trust in politics, particularly presidential politics,
• 34:04
  Speaker 4: is more about capacity than honesty. And what that means
• 34:10
  Speaker 4: here is do you– it's not do you trust them
• 34:12
  Speaker 4: to tell you the truth every time to say completely
• 34:14
  Speaker 4: accurate statements. It's do you trust them to make your
• 34:15
  Speaker 4: lives better, to keep the country safe, to protect you
• 34:17
  Speaker 4: from a pandemic. And that's where the approach you talk
• 34:21
  Speaker 4: about makes a lot of sense, which is undermining the
• 34:23
  Speaker 4: idea that Trump is up to the job of president,
• 34:26
  Speaker 4: as Michelle Obama said, as Barack Obama said, as Joe
• 34:28
  Speaker 4: Biden and Kamala Harris said throughout this campaign. And while
• 34:31
  Speaker 4: doing that, you have to also build up their belief
• 34:34
  Speaker 4: that you can do it. So it's going to be
• 34:37
  Speaker 4: a bit of both. The debate is fascinating and incredibly scary,
• 34:40
  Speaker 4: as we've talked about. 84 million people watched the first
• 34:44
  Speaker 4: debate in 2016. I suspect that number could be higher
• 34:47
  Speaker 4: this time. Yeah. given the inability to– I'm sure that
• 34:53
  Speaker 4: in 2016, some number of people had plans outside the
• 34:55
  Speaker 4: House that may not be available to them right now.
• 34:59
  Speaker 4: I do wonder how much Trump's performance is going to matter.
• 35:07
  Speaker 3: No, I think Biden's performance will matter more than Trump's performance,
• 35:11
  Speaker 3: I think.
• 35:11
  Speaker 4: Like 10x more.
• 35:13
  Speaker 3: I think we know what kind of Trump we're going
• 35:15
  Speaker 3: to get on that debate stage. We all know it.
• 35:17
  Speaker 3: He's going to lie a bunch. He's going to get
• 35:18
  Speaker 3: defensive when Biden puts him on the defense. He's going
• 35:21
  Speaker 3: to yell about things. He's going to make up shit
• 35:23
  Speaker 3: about Biden. He's going to act like his presidency has
• 35:26
  Speaker 3: been the best thing ever. He's going to seem off guard.
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: There's going to be a whole bunch of times that
• 35:30
  Speaker 3: Trump says crazy fucking things that'll be trending on Twitter. Like,
• 35:33
  Speaker 3: we know it all. And what we're about to talk
• 35:35
  Speaker 3: about with the poll is, the question is not can
• 35:38
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden, like, put Donald Trump in his place, right? Like,
• 35:40
  Speaker 3: people have... largely decided what they think about Donald Trump.
• 35:44
  Speaker 3: The question is, can Biden both defend his record from
• 35:47
  Speaker 3: Trump's attacks without seeming defensive and give people the confidence,
• 35:52
  Speaker 3: like you said, that he can bring this country out
• 35:55
  Speaker 3: of a pandemic, manage an economic recovery, and just basically
• 36:00
  Speaker 3: lead this country better than Trump has? And does he
• 36:05
  Speaker 3: have plans that would tangibly improve people's lives and a
• 36:08
  Speaker 3: path to get those plans done? That's what Joe Biden
• 36:11
  Speaker 3: needs to do. And there's a lot of people who
• 36:13
  Speaker 3: don't have a strong opinion of Joe Biden that will
• 36:15
  Speaker 3: be looking for that. And so if Joe Biden spends
• 36:18
  Speaker 3: all his time in a back and forth with Trump,
• 36:21
  Speaker 3: if he spends all the time fact checking Trump, if
• 36:23
  Speaker 3: he spends all the time attacking Trump, he will miss
• 36:25
  Speaker 3: the opportunity to do those things. And I would bet
• 36:29
  Speaker 3: anything that in debate prep right now, you know, they
• 36:32
  Speaker 3: are telling Joe Biden no matter what, before you walk
• 36:34
  Speaker 3: off that debate stage, like here are the three things
• 36:36
  Speaker 3: you have to do. And I bet a lot of
• 36:38
  Speaker 3: those things are, you know, making sure people know what
• 36:41
  Speaker 3: he stands for and what he'd do as president. So
• 36:44
  Speaker 3: let's talk about the latest installment of the Crooked Media
• 36:48
  Speaker 3: Change Research Polar Coaster Series. You like that noise? You
• 36:54
  Speaker 3: like the sound effects that we've added? It only took
• 36:59
  Speaker 3: us like eight of these to figure it out.
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 37:03
  Speaker 3: Who do we poll this time? So between September 9th
• 37:06
  Speaker 3: and September 13th, we surveyed 3,098 new or infrequent voters
• 37:11
  Speaker 3: across the six closest battleground states, Arizona, Florida, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania,
• 37:16
  Speaker 3: and Wisconsin. We define new and infrequent as three different
• 37:19
  Speaker 3: types of voters, voters who registered for the first time
• 37:22
  Speaker 3: in 2016, voters who skipped 2016, and voters who skipped 2018.
• 37:28
  Speaker 3: Why did we pick these kinds of voters? Well, we
• 37:31
  Speaker 3: spent a lot of time focused on people who switched
• 37:33
  Speaker 3: their vote from one party to the other Obama Trump
• 37:36
  Speaker 3: voters or Trump Biden voters or Romney Clinton voters. And
• 37:39
  Speaker 3: we spent a lot less time on the people who
• 37:41
  Speaker 3: are deciding between voting and not voting, even though these
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: are people who could transform the entire electorate because there
• 37:48
  Speaker 3: are a lot of them. Anything else to add about
• 37:51
  Speaker 3: why we chose this group of voters?
• 37:53
  Speaker 4: Well, it's an under, as you point out, it's an
• 37:56
  Speaker 4: under-scrutinized group. And they very well can be how Biden wins.
• 38:02
  Speaker 4: This is a group that, as we'll talk about in
• 38:04
  Speaker 4: this poll, are critical. And if you turn them out,
• 38:07
  Speaker 4: they will make up the, they could make the difference
• 38:10
  Speaker 4: in six battleground states. They're also the, you know, we
• 38:13
  Speaker 4: did this poll not to give the Biden campaign advice
• 38:17
  Speaker 4: or provide guidance to the DNC or a super packer thing.
• 38:20
  Speaker 4: It is to inform our listeners, the folks who have
• 38:24
  Speaker 4: adopted a state who are, who are volunteering in various ways,
• 38:26
  Speaker 4: how to communicate with the people on the other end
• 38:28
  Speaker 4: of that phone or in their lives who are reluctant voters,
• 38:32
  Speaker 4: who are new to this, who are thinking about voting,
• 38:33
  Speaker 4: but we want to give them actual specific message guidance.
• 38:35
  Speaker 4: And this is, I think, a way to offer people
• 38:39
  Speaker 4: actionable advice on how to turn out the people in
• 38:42
  Speaker 4: your lives that you are talking to, because we all
• 38:44
  Speaker 4: know a lot of voters like this, particularly in the
• 38:47
  Speaker 4: current environment we're in.
• 38:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah, because believe it or not, if you are an
• 38:51
  Speaker 3: organizer or volunteer and you are text banking or phone
• 38:54
  Speaker 3: banking or reaching out to voters, your list is not
• 38:56
  Speaker 3: going to include a lot of the MAGA hat-wearing Trump
• 38:59
  Speaker 3: supporters that The New York Times interviews in diners.
• 39:02
  Speaker 8: Exactly.
• 39:03
  Speaker 3: I hope not. Otherwise, the lists are wrong. But your
• 39:08
  Speaker 3: list of people will probably include a lot of people
• 39:11
  Speaker 3: who are deciding whether or not they vote in the
• 39:13
  Speaker 3: first place, hopefully, you know, infrequent voters, new voters, people
• 39:16
  Speaker 3: who are, you know, who are undecided still. And so
• 39:20
  Speaker 3: we do hope that the messages that we tested will
• 39:22
  Speaker 3: help you in your conversations with these voters. So what
• 39:24
  Speaker 3: do we find? I'll just do some top lines that
• 39:27
  Speaker 3: we can dig in. We found that Biden leads the
• 39:30
  Speaker 3: group of voters 49 to 37%, which is an improvement
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: over how Hillary Clinton did with these voters who split
• 39:36
  Speaker 3: this group with Trump 35 to 30% in 2016. Biden's
• 39:40
  Speaker 3: biggest gains over Clinton are among suburban voters, Latino voters,
• 39:43
  Speaker 3: young voters, and women. These voters overwhelmingly say that they
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: intend to vote in 2020, even though a lot of
• 39:50
  Speaker 3: them are infrequent voters. Only 3% said they're definitely or
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: probably not voting. And only 5% said that there's still
• 39:58
  Speaker 3: a maybe. 76% rate their motivation to vote a 10
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: out of 10. But there are still about 9% who
• 40:06
  Speaker 3: are undecided and 9% who say there's a chance they
• 40:10
  Speaker 3: could vote for another candidate still, which is a larger
• 40:13
  Speaker 3: share of uncertain voters than us. than we see in
• 40:16
  Speaker 3: normal polls of the broader electorate. Dan, what does the
• 40:19
  Speaker 3: poll say about who these voters are and what they
• 40:22
  Speaker 3: think about both candidates?
• 40:24
  Speaker 4: This poll, unsurprisingly, shows that this is a group of
• 40:26
  Speaker 4: voters who engage with politics and political news less than
• 40:30
  Speaker 4: certainly we do, and obviously people who subscribe to a
• 40:33
  Speaker 4: podcast like Pod Save America. It also shows, I mean,
• 40:36
  Speaker 4: you can see this in the numbers, which is nearly
• 40:38
  Speaker 4: half of the undecided voters in this poll have no
• 40:40
  Speaker 4: opinion on Joe Biden. Crazy.
• 40:43
  Speaker 8: Right?
• 40:44
  Speaker 4: Here is someone who was vice president of the United
• 40:45
  Speaker 4: States four years ago, been on the national stage forever,
• 40:47
  Speaker 4: been the Democratic nominee for six months, and they feel
• 40:50
  Speaker 4: like they do not yet have enough information to have
• 40:53
  Speaker 4: a conclusion about him. A shockingly high number of them
• 40:55
  Speaker 4: also don't know enough about Trump. This is the hardest
• 40:59
  Speaker 4: group of voters to get. As you point out, there's
• 41:02
  Speaker 4: lots of good news in here. They are more favorable
• 41:04
  Speaker 4: to Biden than the electorate overall. They are more engaged.
• 41:07
  Speaker 4: And I think we even thought possible at this point,
• 41:10
  Speaker 4: given all the conversation about enthusiasm for Biden and concerns
• 41:13
  Speaker 4: about politicking in a pandemic. And I think the really
• 41:17
  Speaker 4: interesting and important part is this undecided number shows there's
• 41:20
  Speaker 4: real room for growth for Biden with this cohort.
• 41:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that was also interesting. This is typical among undecided voters,
• 41:28
  Speaker 3: but the undecided voters in this poll are largely negative
• 41:31
  Speaker 3: about both candidates, but they're much more strongly negative about Trump.
• 41:35
  Speaker 3: He's got a negative 53% favorability rating than Biden, who
• 41:41
  Speaker 3: has negative 38%. So there's obviously, like you said, more
• 41:44
  Speaker 3: growth for Biden. And it's also important to remember, because
• 41:46
  Speaker 3: we're going to talk about, you know, anti-Trump messages versus
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: pro-Biden messages. Most of these people have made up their
• 41:53
  Speaker 3: mind about Donald Trump. You know, there's still some who
• 41:56
  Speaker 3: would be swayed by different information about him who haven't
• 41:58
  Speaker 3: completely made up their mind, but they are strongly negative
• 42:01
  Speaker 3: about Donald Trump. And yet, even though they're strongly negative,
• 42:05
  Speaker 3: they still haven't decided, which should tell us something. that
• 42:09
  Speaker 3: it's not just more anti-Trump stuff that's going to put
• 42:11
  Speaker 3: them over the edge because a lot of them have
• 42:13
  Speaker 3: made up their mind about Donald Trump. I also thought
• 42:15
  Speaker 3: it was interesting that undecided voters here said that the
• 42:18
  Speaker 3: way they're going to make up their mind is more
• 42:20
  Speaker 3: research on their own about the candidates. 47% said that,
• 42:24
  Speaker 3: which is scary because God knows where they're going for information.
• 42:27
  Speaker 3: And then listening to the debates, 19% said will help
• 42:30
  Speaker 3: them make up their mind. So that, you know, one
• 42:33
  Speaker 3: in five of these undecided voters say that the debates
• 42:35
  Speaker 3: are going to help them make up their mind, which
• 42:36
  Speaker 3: goes to the importance of the debates. Before we get
• 42:39
  Speaker 3: to the message test that we did, what other good
• 42:41
  Speaker 3: news did you see for Biden in this poll? And what,
• 42:44
  Speaker 3: if anything, concerned you?
• 42:47
  Speaker 4: I mean, the other good news is we tested 16
• 42:50
  Speaker 4: different questions about who you trusted more on these issues,
• 42:53
  Speaker 4: like economy, COVID, crime, immigration, health care, tell you the truth,
• 42:59
  Speaker 4: a whole bunch of things. Biden led in 15 of
• 43:01
  Speaker 4: those 16. And this is in a world in which
• 43:04
  Speaker 4: the voters do know very little about Biden. So they,
• 43:09
  Speaker 4: like their feelings about Trump are so strong that even
• 43:11
  Speaker 4: in issues where they probably could not name one element
• 43:14
  Speaker 4: of Biden's immigration plan or healthcare plan or crime plan,
• 43:17
  Speaker 4: they default to believing Biden is better than Trump. That
• 43:20
  Speaker 4: is a strong base to start from that you can
• 43:22
  Speaker 4: only strengthen by providing more information. So I thought that
• 43:25
  Speaker 4: was an important piece of good news. Now, because we
• 43:28
  Speaker 4: could never focus too much on good news, here are
• 43:30
  Speaker 4: the concerning things. And we'll talk about this, some of
• 43:33
  Speaker 4: this a little more in a second. Trump still retains
• 43:34
  Speaker 4: some surprising strengths, particularly on the economy. But also, these
• 43:38
  Speaker 4: voters are hearing a ton about rioting and looting. And
• 43:43
  Speaker 4: this buttresses other findings we've seen in other polls recently,
• 43:46
  Speaker 4: which is Trump and the right-wing media machine has had
• 43:48
  Speaker 4: real success in moving the conversation somewhat off of coronavirus
• 43:54
  Speaker 4: onto an issue, the impact of which they are massively exaggerating.
• 43:58
  Speaker 4: And so these are people who engage with traditional news
• 44:00
  Speaker 4: less than your average voter. And they are hearing a
• 44:03
  Speaker 4: ton about rioting and looting and crime. And that says
• 44:06
  Speaker 4: the problem is much bigger than Fox News. These are
• 44:08
  Speaker 4: not Fox News watchers, by definition. They are not people
• 44:10
  Speaker 4: who read Breitbart or The Daily Caller or watch Tucker Carlson.
• 44:13
  Speaker 4: They're people who are organically getting a lot of information
• 44:17
  Speaker 4: that is pushing the issue environment in Trump's direction. And
• 44:20
  Speaker 4: that is alarming somewhat in the context of this race,
• 44:23
  Speaker 4: because as the poll shows, Trump is not particularly trusted
• 44:25
  Speaker 4: on solving the problem Trump wants to focus on. But
• 44:28
  Speaker 4: it is a gigantic problem for democracy writ large about
• 44:32
  Speaker 4: how bad and flawed the information ecosystem currently is in America.
• 44:37
  Speaker 3: It's really important what you said that they're not just
• 44:39
  Speaker 3: Fox News watchers either, because basically we asked, we had
• 44:42
  Speaker 3: a list of items and we said, what do you fear, right?
• 44:45
  Speaker 3: And the growth of racism in America was feared by
• 44:49
  Speaker 3: 72% of voters, including 75% of independents and 43% of Republicans.
• 44:55
  Speaker 3: We then asked white supremacists, what do you fear about
• 44:57
  Speaker 3: white supremacists? Also, was very feared by a lot of
• 45:00
  Speaker 3: voters and 30% of Republicans, which is somewhat hopeful, I guess,
• 45:05
  Speaker 3: depending on how you look at it. I would have
• 45:07
  Speaker 3: thought it would have been worse. But so these are,
• 45:09
  Speaker 3: these same voters who fear the rise of racism in
• 45:12
  Speaker 3: America also fear looting, rioting, and crime in American cities.
• 45:18
  Speaker 3: 66% of voters feared that, including 51% of Democrats. And
• 45:22
  Speaker 3: now that was right after climate change on the list.
• 45:25
  Speaker 3: So slightly more people, voters, feared climate change, which is
• 45:28
  Speaker 3: a good thing.
• 45:28
  Speaker 2: But.
• 45:29
  Speaker 3: it was above fearing COVID-19 on the list. So more
• 45:33
  Speaker 3: people were afraid of looting, rioting, and crime in American
• 45:36
  Speaker 3: cities than the virus, the deadly virus that's spreading through
• 45:39
  Speaker 3: the country, which is a very scary thing, I think.
• 45:43
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, we saw a similar finding in the
• 45:45
  Speaker 4: New York Times, Siena College polls over the weekend in
• 45:48
  Speaker 4: some of the four states they did. We should not
• 45:52
  Speaker 4: be dismissive of the fact that the right-wing media advantage
• 45:55
  Speaker 4: in this country is gigantic.
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: Right?
• 45:57
  Speaker 4: You know, this, most of this.
• 45:58
  Speaker 3: And it's not just, and it doesn't just exist on Fox.
• 46:00
  Speaker 3: It exists on Facebook, primarily on Facebook, YouTube. Like there
• 46:05
  Speaker 3: are all kinds of sources that are getting to these people.
• 46:07
  Speaker 4: And the, and the mainstream media is also falling for this, right?
• 46:10
  Speaker 4: As part of the both sides is, you know, they're
• 46:13
  Speaker 4: giving undue weight to Trump's coverage. And sometimes the stories
• 46:17
  Speaker 4: written about it are very fair. And they point out
• 46:19
  Speaker 4: that Trump's exaggerating and he's full of shit on all
• 46:21
  Speaker 4: of that, but it is the headline and the images
• 46:24
  Speaker 4: that are getting shared by All across social media. And
• 46:27
  Speaker 4: it is permeating the public consciousness in a very concerning way.
• 46:31
  Speaker 3: There's also we basically offered a list of sort of
• 46:35
  Speaker 3: lies and conspiracies and asked if people believe them. And
• 46:37
  Speaker 3: 30 to 40 percent of voters, mostly Republicans, believe every
• 46:41
  Speaker 3: conspiracy we tested. Biden having serious mental health issues. Biden
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: is a puppet. Biden wanting to defund the police. Only 9,000
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: Americans have died of COVID. All of these lies, a
• 46:52
  Speaker 3: lot of Republicans believe them. Fortunately, obviously, almost no Democrats
• 46:55
  Speaker 3: and fewer independents. And then we asked for one word
• 46:58
  Speaker 3: descriptions of Biden and Trump. Trump, the most common words
• 47:01
  Speaker 3: were like liar, corrupt, and strong leader, I think. Biden,
• 47:06
  Speaker 3: the most common positive word was honest, which is good.
• 47:08
  Speaker 3: That was the most common word to describe him. The
• 47:10
  Speaker 3: most negative word was puppet. some focused on age, and frighteningly,
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: 2% of voters use the word pedophile, which is a
• 47:20
  Speaker 3: QAnon conspiracy. It's a right wing conspiracy. It's bubbling up there.
• 47:24
  Speaker 3: You know, they were just about all Trump supporters. But
• 47:29
  Speaker 3: this is something that is like bubbling up in the
• 47:31
  Speaker 3: dark corners of the internet now, which is, you know,
• 47:34
  Speaker 3: sometimes we know like the conspiracies, like, you know, there's
• 47:38
  Speaker 3: going to be rioting in every city and, you know,
• 47:42
  Speaker 3: Trump's lies about COVID. But there are other conspiracies that
• 47:44
  Speaker 3: are sort of like in these dark corners of the
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: internet that sometimes we miss. And I think this is
• 47:48
  Speaker 3: one of them.
• 47:49
  Speaker 4: Well, if by the dark corners of the internet, you
• 47:50
  Speaker 4: mean Trump's Twitter feed because he retweeted one of these
• 47:53
  Speaker 4: 25 hours ago.
• 47:54
  Speaker 3: I definitely count that. I count that as the dark
• 47:56
  Speaker 3: corner of the internet for sure.
• 47:57
  Speaker 8: Yes.
• 47:58
  Speaker 3: All right. Let's talk about the message we tested. Dan,
• 48:01
  Speaker 3: you wrote a memo about this for your outstanding morning newsletter,
• 48:04
  Speaker 3: The Message Box. You want to tell us about what
• 48:06
  Speaker 3: you found and tell us a little bit about The
• 48:08
  Speaker 3: Message Box. I don't know that we've actually talked about
• 48:10
  Speaker 3: it on the pod.
• 48:11
  Speaker 4: We have not actually talked about.
• 48:12
  Speaker 3: It because- We've referenced it a lot.
• 48:14
  Speaker 4: Yeah, we have alluded to it. And as anyone who
• 48:16
  Speaker 4: watches Campaign Experts React, our YouTube series on ads knows,
• 48:21
  Speaker 4: I'm a particularly awkward promoter of my own enterprises. So
• 48:26
  Speaker 4: I actually was going to announce it on a podcast
• 48:30
  Speaker 4: and then your- son was born hours before we, your
• 48:36
  Speaker 4: wife went to labor hours before we did it. And
• 48:38
  Speaker 4: I was so consumed with doing your much harder job
• 48:40
  Speaker 4: of moderating the podcast that I completely forgot to do it.
• 48:43
  Speaker 4: And here we are six weeks later. So the message
• 48:45
  Speaker 4: box is a political newsletter I started about six weeks
• 48:47
  Speaker 4: ago that with the idea that one, I wanted to
• 48:51
  Speaker 4: write more in depth about what is happening in politics,
• 48:54
  Speaker 4: but it also was born of this vision of politics
• 48:57
  Speaker 4: I have where We in the Democratic Party do not
• 49:01
  Speaker 4: do enough to empower our supporters to carry the message
• 49:05
  Speaker 4: for us. In an age where everyone has access to
• 49:07
  Speaker 4: social media and a smartphone, if we give them the
• 49:11
  Speaker 4: sort of message guidance that we give politicians in campaigns,
• 49:15
  Speaker 4: they can help us take on this massive right-wing media
• 49:17
  Speaker 4: advantage we're talking about. So it's called the message boxes.
• 49:20
  Speaker 4: goal is to do political analysis, but also offer people
• 49:23
  Speaker 4: actionable advice on how they can communicate with voters in
• 49:26
  Speaker 4: their lives, much like we're doing right here. And I
• 49:29
  Speaker 4: am contributing a portion of every subscription every month to
• 49:31
  Speaker 4: the election to Black Voters Matter, Latasha Brown's group we've
• 49:34
  Speaker 4: talked about here many times. MessageBox subscribers are already on
• 49:37
  Speaker 4: pace to raise $ 5, 000 for Black Voters Matter. Fantastic. My
• 49:43
  Speaker 4: goal is to double that by the election, which math
• 49:46
  Speaker 4: suggests is quite, quite challenging. But if you would like
• 49:49
  Speaker 4: to subscribe, it is messagebox.substack.com.
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: And I.
• 49:54
  Speaker 4: It is also my pinned tweet because I know you
• 49:57
  Speaker 4: are constantly all on my Twitter profile page, so you
• 49:58
  Speaker 4: will find it very easily. So that's the newsletter. In
• 50:02
  Speaker 4: the newsletter this morning, I took what we found in
• 50:07
  Speaker 4: the poll and wrote out a strategic memo about what
• 50:09
  Speaker 4: we do with it. And as we mentioned, there's lots
• 50:12
  Speaker 4: of good news in here. There was room for growth.
• 50:13
  Speaker 4: So the question is, how do we grow Biden's march
• 50:16
  Speaker 4: and how do we turn those undecided voters into Biden
• 50:18
  Speaker 4: voters who are going to turn out in a pandemic?
• 50:20
  Speaker 4: It is a two-step process. The first is, Trump continues
• 50:23
  Speaker 4: to maintain an economic advantage. He has a 49% economic approval.
• 50:27
  Speaker 4: He has a 12-point advantage among the undecided voters over
• 50:31
  Speaker 4: who they trust to manage the economic recovery. And interestingly enough,
• 50:38
  Speaker 4: the two best messages that we tested, the most persuasive
• 50:40
  Speaker 4: ones with the overall population in this poll and the
• 50:44
  Speaker 4: undecided voters, are about health care and comparing and contrasting
• 50:49
  Speaker 4: Biden and Trump's economic plans, focusing particularly on how Trump
• 50:53
  Speaker 4: wants to cut social security and Medicare and Medicaid to
• 50:55
  Speaker 4: pay for tax cuts for the wealthy. So as we've
• 50:59
  Speaker 4: talked about before, there's a two part process to take
• 51:01
  Speaker 4: down Trump in the economy. First part is, uh, showing
• 51:03
  Speaker 4: voters that he is a plutocrat, not a populist. And
• 51:05
  Speaker 4: we do that by talking about the things he actually
• 51:07
  Speaker 4: wants to do and has done, including most importantly, his
• 51:09
  Speaker 4: tax cut. And the second is informing people of Biden's plans.
• 51:12
  Speaker 4: They simply do not know enough about Biden's plans to
• 51:14
  Speaker 4: come to a conclusion on the economy in particular, because
• 51:17
  Speaker 4: Trump has this aura of credibility from his, uh, Business experience,
• 51:22
  Speaker 4: as bullshit as it is, and the pre-COVID economy. The
• 51:27
  Speaker 4: second piece that I took away from this poll that
• 51:28
  Speaker 4: is absolutely critical for all of us who are trying
• 51:31
  Speaker 4: to help Joe Biden win is we need to help
• 51:33
  Speaker 4: voters know more about Joe Biden and his plans. They
• 51:36
  Speaker 4: simply do not know enough. As we've mentioned, nearly half
• 51:39
  Speaker 4: of the undecided voters have no opinion on Joe Biden.
• 51:42
  Speaker 4: They know very little about his plans. And we did
• 51:44
  Speaker 4: this exercise where we asked people what they had recently
• 51:48
  Speaker 4: heard about the two candidates.
• 51:50
  Speaker 5: Oh, yeah.
• 51:51
  Speaker 4: Yeah, very good news as relates to Trump. These non-engaged voters,
• 51:54
  Speaker 4: the number one story was the Woodward book. And the
• 51:56
  Speaker 4: number two story was the Atlantic article, right? So like that,
• 52:01
  Speaker 4: as we say, tough blow for the nothing matters crowd.
• 52:03
  Speaker 4: But for Biden, the most popular answer was nothing.
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: Nothing.
• 52:08
  Speaker 3: They couldn't remember hearing anything about Joe Biden.
• 52:11
  Speaker 4: And so what that says is negative information about Trump
• 52:16
  Speaker 4: is getting to these voters organically and positive information about
• 52:19
  Speaker 4: Biden is not. So we have to lean into pro-Biden messaging.
• 52:24
  Speaker 4: It doesn't mean you stop negative contrast messaging about Trump,
• 52:29
  Speaker 4: but you do it together. And a message that is
• 52:32
  Speaker 4: just negative against Trump is of limited utility with these voters,
• 52:35
  Speaker 4: at least, compared to a message that compares and contrasts
• 52:38
  Speaker 4: the plans of the two candidates. And so we just
• 52:40
  Speaker 4: have to, in our conversations with voters, in our social
• 52:43
  Speaker 4: media postings, in our conversation with families and friends, spend
• 52:46
  Speaker 4: more time talking about what Joe Biden would do as
• 52:48
  Speaker 4: president to help overcome this right wing media advantage.
• 52:52
  Speaker 3: And I just want to give people some specifics. So
• 52:55
  Speaker 3: we tested pro-Trump messages as well. Trump's best message was
• 52:58
  Speaker 3: on the economy. And it is Joe Biden is proposing
• 53:02
  Speaker 3: a $ 4 trillion tax hike that would kill jobs and
• 53:04
  Speaker 3: collapse the economy. Donald Trump says he already built the
• 53:06
  Speaker 3: greatest economy in history during his first term and will
• 53:09
  Speaker 3: do it again in his second term so that we
• 53:11
  Speaker 3: have full employment, soaring incomes and record prosperity. I tried
• 53:14
  Speaker 3: to be as fair to Donald Trump as possible when
• 53:16
  Speaker 3: I wrote that. That is what he says, basically. And
• 53:19
  Speaker 3: that's what his advertisements on the economy are saying as well.
• 53:22
  Speaker 3: That message tested the best of all the Trump pro-Trump
• 53:25
  Speaker 3: messages that we tested. And yet it tested worse than
• 53:29
  Speaker 3: every other pro-Biden message that we tested on every other
• 53:33
  Speaker 3: single issue. The number one testing message of all, as
• 53:36
  Speaker 3: you said, actually, this was tied with health care. This
• 53:39
  Speaker 3: is our economy message for Biden. Donald Trump says the
• 53:43
  Speaker 3: economy is great because the stock market is up and
• 53:46
  Speaker 3: wants to cut Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security in order
• 53:48
  Speaker 3: to fund more tax cuts for the rich. Joe Biden
• 53:51
  Speaker 3: says a strong economy depends on a strong middle class
• 53:54
  Speaker 3: and wants only the wealthiest 1% to pay higher taxes
• 53:57
  Speaker 3: so we can expand health coverage, invest in clean energy
• 54:00
  Speaker 3: and infrastructure, and create 5 million manufacturing and technology jobs.
• 54:05
  Speaker 3: So the message works because it does a few things.
• 54:08
  Speaker 3: It does have a contrast with Donald Trump. It talks
• 54:11
  Speaker 3: about what Joe Biden would do in terms of values.
• 54:15
  Speaker 3: It does what you said, which is it turns Trump
• 54:17
  Speaker 3: into a plutocrat, not a populist. And it gives some
• 54:19
  Speaker 3: specifics about Joe Biden's plan. The health care message we
• 54:22
  Speaker 3: did has even more specifics about Biden's plan. We say
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: that Biden wants to give everyone the choice to enroll
• 54:28
  Speaker 3: in a Medicare-like insurance plan, make sure no American pays
• 54:31
  Speaker 3: more than 8.5% of their income on premiums, which is
• 54:34
  Speaker 3: a policy I'm sure No one knows about Joe Biden's
• 54:37
  Speaker 3: health care plan. I didn't even know that exact statistic
• 54:39
  Speaker 3: until I was looking it up the other day and
• 54:41
  Speaker 3: bring down the cost of prescription drugs by allowing Medicare
• 54:44
  Speaker 3: to negotiate with drug companies. So I think and you've
• 54:47
  Speaker 3: talked about this a lot in polls. Messages that tend
• 54:50
  Speaker 3: to pop are ones that give voters, you know, their
• 54:53
  Speaker 3: value statements, but they also give voters new information that
• 54:56
  Speaker 3: they don't have. They have a piece of new information
• 54:58
  Speaker 3: in there. And there are so many pieces of new
• 55:00
  Speaker 3: information about Joe Biden's plans on health care, on the economy.
• 55:04
  Speaker 3: on climate, on race. We should mention that three of
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: the other messages that tested almost as well as the
• 55:09
  Speaker 3: economy and healthcare, they were very close, are a message
• 55:12
  Speaker 3: on race. For everyone who's now afraid of a race
• 55:16
  Speaker 3: message because of what we found on looting and rioting,
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden's message on bringing the country together and supporting
• 55:22
  Speaker 3: peaceful protesters was very powerful. His message on climate was very,
• 55:27
  Speaker 3: very effective at moving voters. And his message on education,
• 55:31
  Speaker 3: which has been such a sleeper issue, I think, in
• 55:33
  Speaker 3: this race Joe Biden has some great education proposals from
• 55:36
  Speaker 3: universal pre-k for three and four year olds to making
• 55:39
  Speaker 3: four-year college free for anyone making under 125,000 dollars to
• 55:43
  Speaker 3: making community college absolutely free for everyone to forgiving student
• 55:47
  Speaker 3: loans in exchange for national service all of these proposals
• 55:51
  Speaker 3: have the ability not just to find favor with some
• 55:53
  Speaker 3: of these undecided voters and undecided voters saying that they're
• 55:56
  Speaker 3: going to agree with that statement but but it actually
• 55:59
  Speaker 3: moves vote. And we found that after testing all of
• 56:02
  Speaker 3: these messages with voters, the horse race number actually moved
• 56:06
  Speaker 3: three points in Biden's direction to 52 from 49, which
• 56:11
  Speaker 3: is basically a bigger jump than we've seen in almost
• 56:15
  Speaker 3: any of the change polls that we've done. So this
• 56:18
  Speaker 3: cohort of undecided infrequent voters are persuadable and messages about
• 56:22
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden's plan can move them into his column. Very important.
• 56:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 56:27
  Speaker 4: What is really fascinating and important here is that this
• 56:30
  Speaker 4: poll shows that these voters want to support Biden. They
• 56:34
  Speaker 4: like his policies. They find his messaging persuasive. They just
• 56:37
  Speaker 4: have to hear it. And, you know, some people responded
• 56:40
  Speaker 4: to the various pieces and tweets we had about this
• 56:43
  Speaker 4: morning saying, you know, you guys have been saying voters
• 56:46
  Speaker 4: need to know more about Biden for months. What does
• 56:48
  Speaker 4: this say about his campaign? Well, the fact that these
• 56:51
  Speaker 4: voters are super engaged is a very positive sign for
• 56:54
  Speaker 4: Biden's campaign. But these are the hardest voters to reach.
• 56:58
  Speaker 4: In every election, right? Whether it's Obama, Joe Biden, anyone else.
• 57:02
  Speaker 4: And we're going to be trying to persuade them all
• 57:04
  Speaker 4: the way up until the moment the polls close on
• 57:06
  Speaker 4: election day. That is the task, right? And it's the
• 57:10
  Speaker 4: gains we make among these voters between now and election
• 57:13
  Speaker 4: day that could very well decide the election. Because this
• 57:16
  Speaker 4: is a group of people who want to support Biden.
• 57:19
  Speaker 4: They just have to be convinced. And we know that
• 57:21
  Speaker 4: the arguments work. And so the roadmap is clear. We
• 57:24
  Speaker 4: just have the work to do between now.
• 57:26
  Speaker 3: And I also think it is it is very difficult
• 57:29
  Speaker 3: to break through in this media environment where everything is
• 57:33
  Speaker 3: about Donald Trump all the time. And look like Donald
• 57:37
  Speaker 3: Trump says crazy shit and argues with his CDC director.
• 57:40
  Speaker 7: Right.
• 57:41
  Speaker 3: You're Joe Biden. You're in his campaign. Let's say you thought,
• 57:44
  Speaker 3: you know what, we're not going to swing at that
• 57:46
  Speaker 3: pitch because we need to get our manufacturing agenda out there.
• 57:49
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden goes and gives a speech about his five
• 57:51
  Speaker 3: point manufacturing agenda. That's not going to get covered or
• 57:53
  Speaker 3: break through when Donald Trump just rebuked his CDC director publicly, right?
• 57:57
  Speaker 3: So sometimes you have no choice but to respond to
• 58:00
  Speaker 3: Donald Trump to get into that cycle. I do think
• 58:03
  Speaker 3: paid media helps. I think the debate is a huge
• 58:05
  Speaker 3: opportunity to deliver this message. And the thing that none
• 58:08
  Speaker 3: of us can forget, we're like, shouldn't the Biden campaign
• 58:10
  Speaker 3: be doing X, Y? We're all the Biden campaign. We're
• 58:14
  Speaker 3: all part of it. We all have agency here. And
• 58:17
  Speaker 3: as we're tweeting, as we're sharing on Facebook, as we're
• 58:19
  Speaker 3: talking to friends and relatives, It is up to us
• 58:23
  Speaker 3: to deliver messages about what Joe Biden would do as president,
• 58:26
  Speaker 3: who he is, what he stands for, and not just
• 58:29
  Speaker 3: talk about how bad Donald Trump is. And I am
• 58:33
  Speaker 3: often the worst offender of this. On this podcast, we
• 58:36
  Speaker 3: do it. On Twitter, we do it, right? And it's, again,
• 58:38
  Speaker 3: it's hard to avoid. Donald Trump does horrible things. We
• 58:40
  Speaker 3: need to call them out. That's just the way it is.
• 58:42
  Speaker 3: But I would try to spend more time, all of us,
• 58:47
  Speaker 3: sort of getting the word out there about All of
• 58:49
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden's plans, which are very popular with people, very popular.
• 58:53
  Speaker 4: The balance has to shift. No one is saying you
• 58:54
  Speaker 4: have to stop saying Trump is bad. And the poll
• 58:57
  Speaker 4: actually suggests you need to keep doing that. But the
• 58:59
  Speaker 4: balance has to go from almost all negative Trump to
• 59:04
  Speaker 4: much closer to 50, 50, if not more on the
• 59:06
  Speaker 4: Biden side, like we need all of us as a
• 59:09
  Speaker 4: group of people who are talking to voters over index
• 59:12
  Speaker 4: on the pro Biden stuff. Cause that is where we
• 59:14
  Speaker 4: are swimming upstream. And by stream, I mean the Facebook algorithm.
• 59:19
  Speaker 8: All right.
• 59:20
  Speaker 3: Uh, when we come back, Dan, we'll talk to a
• 59:21
  Speaker 3: not Shanker Osorio about all of this, about messaging to, uh,
• 59:26
  Speaker 3: new and infrequent voters in the homestretch. Anat's done a
• 59:29
  Speaker 3: lot of her own research. And so it's a great conversation.
• 59:32
  Speaker 3: Stay tuned right after the break.
• 59:42
  Speaker 4: Anat Shankar-Osario is the founder and principal of ASO Communications
• 59:45
  Speaker 4: and the host of the Words to Win by podcast. Anat,
• 59:47
  Speaker 4: welcome to Pod Save America.
• 59:48
  Speaker 5: Thanks so much.
• 59:51
  Speaker 4: We are obviously hitting the stretch run here. We are
• 59:53
  Speaker 4: under 50 days. You have recently done a lot of
• 59:56
  Speaker 4: work about the messages that we should be using down
• 59:58
  Speaker 4: the stretch. Can you tell us about that?
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 5: Yeah, for sure. So where we're focused most squarely is
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 5: in a couple of spots. What I would lift up
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 5: most immediately is how we talk about voting and the
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 5: election itself. Right now, understandably, there is a lot of panic.
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 5: In fact, maybe not even enough panic. around all of
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 5: the nefarious deeds that Trump and his ilk and various
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 5: Republican attorneys general and so on are implementing in order
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 5: to keep people from voting. And so it can seem
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 5: like the right thing to do to raise the alarm.
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 5: But in fact, what we have seen in testing is
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 5: that that has a concerted demobilizing effect on the folks
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 5: I like to call our high potential voters. In other words,
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 5: if we keep spreading the message, this is the Titanic,
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 5: people are not going to want to buy a ticket.
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 4: Is it, you know, I was thinking about this after
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 4: reading your work, which is fascinating, that, you know, in
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 4: the Obama 2012 campaign, we had a big debate about this, right?
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 4: Because so much voter suppression laws, voter ID laws put
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 4: in place since 08 and 12. And we had this
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 4: big debate about how do we talk about it with
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 4: this same fear about demobilization? We eventually discovered through our
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 4: own research at the time that if we talked about
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 4: it in the way, particularly to black voters, about these
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 4: Republicans trying to stop them from expressing their political power,
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 4: it could turn them out. But what was different between
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 4: that conversation in 12 and what's happening now is the
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 4: conversation was about whether you would be prevented from voting,
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 4: whether it would make it harder for you to vote,
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 4: whether it would be long lines. And the conversation now,
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 4: which I think is very different, is will your vote count?
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 4: And the context is even a bigger problem because the
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 4: risk of your vote not counting to yourself is so
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 4: much greater because you're not just going to be inconvenienced
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 4: or have to take time off work away from your family.
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 4: You're potentially exposing yourself to a virus. Is the vote
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 4: counting conversation part of making this a bigger problem?
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 5: Absolutely. And basically, I think we have this instinct and
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 5: it's understandable because you know, to speak in broad terms,
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 5: people who are listening to this podcast, they are political animals.
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 5: They are politically motivated. They are politically engaged to a
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 5: degree that makes them, makes us pretty atypical, right? The
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 5: typical American, certainly in an off year and more or
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 5: less in a presidential year, barely even votes. And the
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 5: notion of kind of going deeper and being more politically
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 5: engaged really renders us bad judges of what messaging works
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 5: and doesn't because we necessarily filter that through our own
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 5: experience and we think this works on me, this riles
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 5: me up. But actually what we see is that when
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 5: we use threat-based messaging around the votes not counting, around
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 5: all of the nefarious deeds happening and everything that you
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 5: laid out, It evokes a fight or freeze response. It
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 5: evokes fight out of our activists, but it evokes freeze
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 5: out of most people, especially given everything you said, that
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 5: it is incredibly challenging to be a voter and in
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 5: fact dangerous. And so the advice that we're giving, which
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 5: we've posted publicly, and obviously I'm more than happy to share,
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 5: is that we need to do a few things. Number one,
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 5: we need to avail ourselves of what President Obama did
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 5: so beautifully. It's something we call messaging from inevitability. It's
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 5: where you make what you're doing a matter, not of if,
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 5: but when, right? It's yes, we can, not no, we're
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 5: not sure, we may, might, if everything comes together perfectly,
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 5: but the enemy's really big. So first of all, it's
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 5: messaging from inevitability. Second of all, it's ascribing motivation. So
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 5: when we talk about the horrible things that Trump is doing,
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 5: it's really, really important to not just list the what,
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 5: but to list the why. to explain the nefarious deeds.
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 5: So what that means in the messaging is instead of
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 5: saying Trump is destroying the post office or Trump is
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 5: rigging the election or Trump is stealing the election, all
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 5: of which make people feel like why even bother? It's
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 5: not gonna matter. What's the point of even trying? What
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 5: we need to say is Trump knows that he is losing.
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 5: So he is trying to X, he is attempting to Y.
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 5: So we need to actually lift up the fact that
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 5: he is losing, we are winning, and he hopes that
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 5: by sowing chaos and stoking fear, it will stop us
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 5: from voting at all. But we're on to him and
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 5: we count on us. So we actually lean into what
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 5: we call social proof. Social proof is the middle school
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 5: theory of messaging. It's where you basically say, this is
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 5: what everybody's doing. And the reason for that is because
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 5: humans at the most fundamental level were social creatures. And
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 5: we want to do what we perceive our in-group or
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 5: our social affiliation is doing.
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 4: You know, you talk about framing this in the context
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 4: of Trump losing, which sort of connects to a conversation
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 4: you and I had when we talked about campaign ads
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 4: on our YouTube series a couple months ago. And at
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 4: the time, we were talking about how to frame Trump's
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 4: authoritarian instincts or behavior. And since we had that conversation,
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 4: believe it or not, things have gotten much worse on
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 4: that front. We have reports last night from Bill Barr
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 4: doing things. What is, based on your research, the best
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 4: way to push back on Trump's messaging, law and order messaging,
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 4: authoritarian messaging, et cetera?
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 8: Yeah.
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 5: So to me, it's kind of two separate things. There's
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 5: the authoritarian messaging, and there is the law and order.
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 5: So if it's okay, I'm going to take them separately.
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 4: Please do. Yeah.
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 5: So on the question of how we characterize Trump, it's
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 5: actually fundamentally vital that we not reinforce the image of
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 5: Trump as a strongman, as an authoritarian leader. This is
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 5: an understandable instinct, but it is absolutely wrong. And it's
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 5: wrong for a number of reasons. Number one, it again
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 5: has that demobilizing effect. Most people are not looking for
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 5: a ticket to the Titanic. Most people are not out
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 5: shopping for new problems. And so when our message to
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 5: apolitical people that we're attempting to engage, because remember, if
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 5: they're already engaged, if they're already listening, if they're already tweeting,
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 5: if they're already hot and bothered, they're not our problem.
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 5: We're not working on persuasion or mobilization with those folks.
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 5: We have to think through Who are the folks who
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 5: are our high potential voters? And when we tell them
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 5: this is an authoritarian strongman, again, it reinforces this sense
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 5: of why even bother? This is a lost cause and
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 5: most people are not out looking for a lost cause.
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 5: It's also not persuasive. In fact, what we see is
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 5: that the most persuasive way of portraying Trump is as
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 5: a weak loser, pathetic, bumbling, ineffective, corrupt, sure, but not
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 5: an authoritarian strongman, a weak loser. That is, in fact,
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 5: a much more apt and effective way. It also drives
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 5: him more crazy.
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 4: And you think that's good, the driving him crazy?
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 5: I mean, I think that it scratches an itch among
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 5: highly political people that we seem to need scratched. It's
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 5: not the primary reason to do it. But when we
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 5: drive him nuts.
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 5: It is when, I mean, I would say it's when
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 5: he gets off his talking points. He has no talking points,
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 5: so there is no off his talking points. But it's
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 5: when other forces in the Republican Party get off their
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 5: talking points because it's when we sort of hit a
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 5: nerve with them. The separate question of how we address
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 5: law and order, that's a different question.
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 4: How would you address it?
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, okay.
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 5: So the law and order is, issue is a trap
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 5: and it's a trap where they are holding out bait
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 5: and sadly, and unfortunately, unstrategically and immorally, I have feelings
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 5: about this. You may be able to tell.
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 4: Yes, I can tell. It's good.
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 5: We are taking that bait. Basically, instead of having a
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 5: conversation about who we are, what we stand for, what
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 5: we're going to deliver, they dangle this shiny object, which
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 5: is law and order and And we all agree tacitly
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 5: to stop talking about COVID. We agree to stop talking
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 5: about jobs. We agree to stop talking about economic well-being.
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 5: We agree to stop talking about having an actual functional
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 5: plan to make sure our families can get and stay well.
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 5: And we agree, yes, fine, we're going to have a
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 5: conversation about law and order. So first issue, now we're
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 5: on their turf. Now we're having their conversation and we're
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 5: not having ours. Second issue, the way that we address
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 5: law and order almost inevitably, and it doesn't need to
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 5: be this way. I have an alternative and I will
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 5: supply it. Almost inevitably is going to send our base panicking.
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 5: Because remember, the choice for the disaffected base is not
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 5: between Biden and Trump, it's between Biden and not voting.
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 5: You have to give people something to vote for. And
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 5: promising them Republican light, promising them authoritarian light, promising them
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 5: genuflecting at the altar of quote unquote law and order,
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 5: what that does is it says to people, you should
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 5: be thinking about riots, you should be thinking about looting, right?
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 5: So when our candidates are saying a riot is not
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 5: a protest, looting is not protesting, what you're doing is
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 5: you're calling rioting and looting top of mind. You're bringing
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 5: that into people's brains. It's also not persuasive. So the
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 5: theory that we need to do it because of the
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 5: white lady in the diner in Wisconsin that, you know,
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 5: pundits across America love to offer us up as evidence.
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 5: or the white ex coal miner in West Virginia, whoever
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 5: is speaking in broad vowels that we're supposed to take
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 5: as data, one of my favorite things, they're not persuaded
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 5: by it because what you've actually done is you've wandered
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 5: onto the opposition's turf and you've agreed to have their debate.
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 5: So the question is what actually works, right? What we've
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 5: seen in our testing, this is an example of an
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 5: actual message that we've tested that, hits it home with
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 5: that persuadable middle that we're told we're supposed to be chasing,
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 5: and is actually a forthright statement of our values. And
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 5: it goes like this. No matter what we look like
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 5: or where we're from, we want our families to be safe,
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 5: our voices to be heard, and our rights to be respected.
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 5: So we start by naming a shared value. We don't
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 5: start with the problem. We claim the moral high ground.
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 5: But Trump is trying to divide and scare us into
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 5: silence by sending federal forces into our communities, stopping people
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 5: from protesting and provoking aggression. With the election coming up,
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 5: he hopes to distract us from his corruption and failure
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 5: to ensure we have the care, security, and support we
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 5: need during this pandemic. By joining together black, white, and
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 5: brown to demand liberty and justice today and to vote
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 5: in record numbers in this election, we can swear in
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 5: a government of, by, and for the people. That's what
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 5: we say.
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 4: And I 100% agree with the danger of following Trump
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 4: down the rabbit hole. You saw the same thing in
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 4: 2018 with the caravan and which candidates decided to buy
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 4: the premise of his argument and which candidates decided to
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 4: explain what he was trying to distract you from and
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 4: why he was being dishonest with you. You know, the
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 4: thing that I, you know, we just did this poll
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 4: of new and infrequent voters with change research that we
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 4: talked about earlier in this podcast. And one of the
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 4: things that I found very concerning in it is the
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 4: number of people, and this is a group that is
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 4: 12 points pro-Biden, right? Relative, you know, 12 points pro-Biden,
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 4: much more pro-Biden than the electorate overall. And, you know,
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 4: per your point, less politically engaged than even the average voter.
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 4: Yet their biggest fear that they cite is rioting and looting,
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 4: more so than COVID. And like, I definitely think part
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 4: of that is perhaps some Democrats and certainly a lot
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 4: of media folks buying, you know, falling into the trap there.
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 4: But it's also just... sort of bespeaks the power of
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 4: the Facebook powered right wing media advantage that is changing that.
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 4: And you, like, I take it from this, you think
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 4: that the, how do you get that conversation back to
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 4: covert or the economy or where you think it is?
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 4: You know, do you have thoughts on that?
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 5: So first of all, even though you didn't ask me,
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 5: we don't call people infrequent voters, Dan, because we want
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 5: to make the reality that we want. We call them
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 5: high potential voters.
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 4: That's good. I should, I wish I talked to you
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 4: before I wrote a whole piece on it this morning,
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 4: but I can edit it, I guess. So well done. Yeah.
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 5: Or you'll just cut out this clip of me admonishing you.
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 4: Now we, now we, now we can't, we can't, now
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 4: that you've said that we absolutely can't cut that out.
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 4: So this will, this will exist for the historical record
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 4: and it's not the first time. It won't be the
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 4: last time. So your, your point is well taken.
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 5: All right. So that's just an aside. That's just me
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 5: proving that like, I'm never off. I only come in
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 5: one flavor and it's candid.
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 4: Yeah. That's it.
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 5: All the time for everyone. So let's play active. So
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 5: you tell me the sentence and I will respond back
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 5: to you, meaning you be this infrequent, sorry, high potential voter. See, look,
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 5: I did it too.
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 4: It's hard.
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 6: Yes.
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 5: You infected me. So you, you be this media person
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 5: or you be this high potential voter and say the thing.
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 4: I've been reading and seeing a lot about looting and
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 4: rioting and Democrat run cities all over the country. I'm
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 4: worried about it coming to our community. What say you?
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 5: I hear you, Dan. I mean, I talk to voters
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 5: all day long since I'm running here for Senate in Minnesota. And,
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 5: you know, it seems to me that most of us,
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 5: wherever we're from, whatever our accent, whatever our background or
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 5: zip code, We want pretty similar things, which is to
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 5: make it through our day and be able to spend
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 5: time with our families and know that we're healthy and safe.
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 5: But today, we have a handful of politicians who are
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 5: trying to divide and scare us. They want us pointing
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 5: the finger at whoever they come up with, new immigrants,
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 5: Black people, mayors, anything they can do to turn us
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 5: against each other and turn us against people who are
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 5: fighting for liberty and justice for all. I think that
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 5: we all know that in order to make change, in
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 5: order to make America live up to the promise of
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 5: a place where every single one of us can breathe
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 5: and be safe, we have to change things. And so
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 5: if we're pointing our fingers in the wrong direction, if
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 5: we're taking the bait and we're struggling and we're fighting
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 5: amongst ourselves, they're going to continue being able to make
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 5: off with the spoils. They're going to continue handing kickbacks
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 5: to their rich cronies, not protecting us from COVID. and
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 5: getting away with it. And that's why when I talk
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 5: to voters, what I really see is people white, black, brown, city, suburbs,
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 5: we pretty much want the same thing, which is better
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 5: policies for our families, the ability to make ends meet,
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 5: and someone to actually take charge of this virus and
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 5: look after all of us and respect our rights.
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 4: That's great. You have my vote. I fully support you
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 4: as the next Senator of Minnesota. Sorry, Tina Smith. So
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 4: you've just been primaried.
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 5: Running from California.
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 4: Yes. Well, you know, pandemic, you know, everyone's doing a
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 4: Zoom campaign, so you can do it from anywhere. That's right.
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 4: So last question before we let you go. We've been
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 4: having a big conversation about both on the podcast, it
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 4: relates to this poll, but just more broadly in the
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 4: Democratic Party about the balance between negative Trump messaging and
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 4: positive Biden messaging. Where do you think that, where do
• 1:16:19
  Speaker 4: you see that balance right now? Where do you think
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 4: it needs to be?
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 5: Yeah. So I think that if the left had written
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 5: the story of David, they would have written a biography
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 5: of Goliath. And I think that talking about Trump is
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 5: how we got Trump. And I don't just think that
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 5: I have reams of data, not just my own, but others.
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 5: For example, winningly, David Brockman and Josh Kala, thank goodness,
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 5: published a paper recently proving this over a really comprehensive study.
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 5: Pro-Biden messaging, pro-Biden ads, pro-Biden approaches are much more effective
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 5: than anti-Trump. And the reason for that is multifold. Number one,
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 5: for high potential voters, we actually have to give them
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 5: something to vote for. Because again, remember, for them, the
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 5: contest is not Biden-Trump. The contest is Biden, don't participate.
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 5: And so if you're not giving them a reason to
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 5: go out and, as you rightly said, potentially risk their
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 5: lives or at least engage in something that's really complicated
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 5: and that's rendered intentionally complicated in order to keep them
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 5: from participating, right? We've made it very, very hard. And
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 5: we've made it very, very hard specifically for Black and
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 5: brown people, as we all know. So first of all,
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 5: you have to give people something to vote for. You
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 5: have to give them a sense of meaning and agency
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 5: and a sense that we got this and that your
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 5: vote actually has a chance of making change when all
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 5: you're doing is talking about Trump. what you're doing is
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 5: you're reinforcing the sense of how terrible and horrible everything is.
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 5: I mean, genuinely, do you think that there's a Black
• 1:18:05
  Speaker 5: person in America, except for Candace Owens maybe, who needs
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 5: to hear another thing about how awful Trump is? Do
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 5: you think that there are Black and Brown folks in
• 1:18:15
  Speaker 5: America who are like, oh, I had no idea he
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 5: was terrible. Thanks for that new tidbit of information. There's
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 5: nothing left to say about how horrible this barely human is.
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 5: So first of all, and second of all, for the middle,
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 5: for the folks who are sort of on the fence,
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 5: when we're talking about Trump, we're lending him more airtime.
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 5: I can't remember if we had this conversation last time,
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 5: forgive COVID brain me, but, you know, it's really just
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 5: as simple as the analogy that when you take your
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 5: kid to the pool, if your kid is running, I
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 5: don't know if you remember pools, they were like public places.
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 5: I know that's confusing. If you take your kid to
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 5: the pool and your kid is running, a competent lifeguard
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 5: is going to yell, walk, because if you yell, don't
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 5: run at a kid, they're going to run. either out
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 5: of defiance or because you literally yelled run at them.
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 5: We have to tell people what we want them to
• 1:19:12
  Speaker 5: do and stop telling people what we don't want them
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 5: to do.
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 4: So just to put a fine point on that, does
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 4: that mean, like, if we anointed you in charge of
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 4: the entire Democratic Party, all the super PACs, campaign finance laws,
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 4: be damned, the Biden campaign, everyone else, would you run
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 4: no ads to talk about Trump? Would you run no
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 4: purely negative ads? Would you have some ads that were
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 4: Trump's plan versus Biden's plan or Trump, you know, comparing
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 4: the two, how would you think about that?
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I wouldn't say I would never, ever, ever reference Trump.
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 5: It would depend on sort of sub-demographics and micro-targeting and
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 5: all of these subtler things. And obviously the conversation you
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 5: and I have been having is broad strokes and there
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 5: are nuances and there are differences and the differences are
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 5: geographic and they're demographic and so on and so forth.
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 5: And of course that's the case. But broadly speaking, what
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 5: I would do is make the voters, make the voters
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 5: that I'm targeting the protagonist of the ad. And what
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 5: I would do is demonstrate in our ads and in
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 5: our messaging and in our approaches, all of the ways
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 5: that everyday Americans are standing with and for each other.
• 1:20:27
  Speaker 5: All of the ways we are pulling through by pulling together.
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 5: And Positing Biden and Harris as a means to facilitate
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 5: that journey, as a way of propelling us forward, as
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 5: an easier sort of path to tread to the beautiful
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 5: tomorrow that we know that we can have and create together.
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 5: And in that, of course, I would still have Trump sometimes.
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 5: He would be the villain. Stories need to have villains, right?
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 5: A story, the archetype of a story doesn't make sense
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 5: without a villain. But I wouldn't lead with the villains.
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 5: I would lead with the heroes, and the heroes would
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 5: be the voters. And Biden-Harris would be the mentor on
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 5: the journey. I'm, of course, speaking of sort of archetypal
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 5: hero's journey storytelling, which is kind of the fundamentals of
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 5: Western literature. And then I would posit our victory as
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 5: a matter not of if but when, again, availing myself
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 5: of this notion of messaging from inevitability. Because People want
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 5: to be on the winning team. And our tendency to
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 5: say either this is the Titanic, would you like to
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 5: buy a ticket? Or boy, have I got a problem
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 5: for you. Or we're the losing team. We're down in fundraising.
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 5: Everything is terrible. We might not win. Everything is horrible.
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 5: So give us money. That's not logic that most people
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 5: can follow. And so the reason why in the new
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 5: messaging on how to talk about the election, where again,
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 5: we're availing ourselves of all of these cognitive approaches that
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 5: we know work, our overarching message is summarized as count
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 5: on us. For the double meaning of both, you can
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 5: rely upon us. We are going to do this thing.
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 5: We are going to come through. You will be part
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 5: of a larger grouping of people who are all dedicated
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 5: together to get this thing done. And also count on
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 5: us because we need to count all votes.
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 4: That is great. And I thank you so much. This
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 4: is always such a fascinating conversation with you about this.
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 4: Good luck down the stretch here and we'll be watching
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 4: your work very closely.
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 5: Same to you. Thanks for everything.
• 1:22:42
  Speaker 3: Thanks to Anat Shankar Osorio for joining us today. Everyone
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 3: have a great weekend and we'll talk to you next week.
• 1:22:47
  Speaker 4: Bye everyone.
• 1:22:50
  Speaker 3: Pod Save America is a Cricket Media production. The executive
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 3: producer is Michael Martinez. Our associate producer is Jordan Waller.
• 1:22:57
  Speaker 3: It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin is
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 3: our sound engineer. Thanks to Tanya Sominator, Katie Long, Roman Papadimitriou,
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 3: Quinn Lewis, Brian Semel, Caroline Rustin, and Elisa Gutierrez for
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  Speaker 3: production support. And to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Nar Melkonian,
• 1:23:14
  Speaker 3: Yale Freed, and Milo Kim, who film and upload these
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 3: episodes as videos every week.