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Full Episode - Texas Primary Result Is Bad News For Republicans + The Power Of All The Empty Rooms · The Chuck ToddCast

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  Speaker 1: com slash chuck. Hello, They're happy Wednesday, and welcome to
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  Speaker 1: another episode of the Chuck Podcast. So, boy, did we
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  Speaker 1: have quite the tuesday. If you uh dipped into our
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: livestream coverage of the first midterm twenty twenty six election
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  Speaker 1: night with my friend Chris Eliza, Jeffrey Scaling and this
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  Speaker 1: and the team from Decision Desk HQ, you know that
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  Speaker 1: we went all the way close to midnight and did
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  Speaker 1: not yet have a call in the Texas Democrat primary.
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  Speaker 1: And of course the only thing that we don't know
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  Speaker 1: is whether Tallarico's number will end up below fifty percent,
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  Speaker 1: therefore triggering a runoff on that side of the aisle.
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  Speaker 1: We do know that Ken Paxson and John Cornyn are
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  Speaker 1: going to be facing off in a day after Memorial
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  Speaker 1: Day run off there in late May. It promises to
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  Speaker 1: be an epic, probably among the nastiest runoff inter primary
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  Speaker 1: runoffs we have probably witnessed in the twenty first century.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, this is going to be nasty, this is
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  Speaker 1: going to be negative. And the question, you know, the
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  Speaker 1: million dollar question or the fifty first Senate seat question,
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  Speaker 1: could very well be what does Donald Trump do? Does
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  Speaker 1: he get involved? Does he try to bail John Cornyan? Out? Right?
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  Speaker 1: We know John Thune, Senate Republicans, major donors, they all
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  Speaker 1: believe the safest way to hold the Senate is to
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  Speaker 1: help Cornyn get the nomination. That Cornyn has a better
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  Speaker 1: shot at holding that Texas senden see than the very
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  Speaker 1: scandal plague ethically and morally challenged Ken Paxton. The one
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  Speaker 1: could argue it seems like no matter what you throw
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  Speaker 1: at him, he just sort of keeps on going and
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  Speaker 1: keeps on surviving. Kind of reminds you of a certain
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  Speaker 1: leader of a certain party that Ken Paxton is a
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  Speaker 1: member of. But here we are. The votes came in
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  Speaker 1: a little slower on election day. We had a massive
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  Speaker 1: early vote turnout. It does appear as if Democrats narrowly
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  Speaker 1: outpolled overall Republicans, and talking to one Republican polster, it
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  Speaker 1: is important to note, you know, where do these voters
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  Speaker 1: come from? These are mostly Democratic voters who just don't
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  Speaker 1: normally vote in primaries. They vote in general elections. Well,
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  Speaker 1: this primary certainly got their interest, and it looks like
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  Speaker 1: that the Democrats got just you know, maybe one hundred thousand,
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  Speaker 1: maybe a little bit more than the Republicans. It's a
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  Speaker 1: big deal for Democrats. The question is did they just
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  Speaker 1: max out all their voters or is this the sign
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  Speaker 1: of something happening in the state of Texas. I think
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  Speaker 1: the most interesting aspect of the James Tall Rico likely
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  Speaker 1: victory in this primary. And I say likely. Look, I
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  Speaker 1: don't think Jasmine Crockett. You know, she made it clear
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  Speaker 1: when she decided she wasn't going to stay up and
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  Speaker 1: wait for the results. She went to bed. She made
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  Speaker 1: the decision to wait until this morning and more votes
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  Speaker 1: come in to see what the status is. I don't
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  Speaker 1: think she's going to concede until it is she is
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  Speaker 1: one hundred percent certain there is no shot at making
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  Speaker 1: a runoff. Look, if this narrow lead for tallar Rico holds,
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  Speaker 1: and there's every indication it's probably gonna hold unless she
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  Speaker 1: just the Dallas County numbers come in some in some
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  Speaker 1: big ways for Crockett. I think a few things are
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  Speaker 1: fair to look at when it comes to explaining how
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  Speaker 1: did tall Rico win number one? You can't you can't
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  Speaker 1: talk about tal Rico's victory without talking about Stephen Colbert
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  Speaker 1: in that moment. The moment was a pivotal moment. It
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  Speaker 1: was the beginning of early voting, and it was at
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  Speaker 1: a time when tall Rico was struggling and Crockett was
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  Speaker 1: on the rise. She was pulling strongly. Tall Rico was
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  Speaker 1: still having to explain what he apparently said about Colin Allred.
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  Speaker 1: That moment seemed to galvanize Colin Allred to support Jasmine Crockett.
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  Speaker 1: I think ideologically was not necessarily ready to go there.
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  Speaker 1: I think he was ready to be, but he you know,
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  Speaker 1: and in fact, he felt kind of pushed out of
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  Speaker 1: the race, I think by Crockett, not by tall Rico,
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  Speaker 1: but he sort of rallied around her, she rallied around him.
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  Speaker 1: He's now, of course running for a congressional seat. That's
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  Speaker 1: that's also going to end up in around. This is
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  Speaker 1: going to be an extraordinarily busy runoff ballot in Texas.
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  Speaker 1: It's not just one or two races that are in
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  Speaker 1: a runoff. We've got races up and down the ballot
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  Speaker 1: that are in a runoff. We're going to have multiple
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  Speaker 1: congressional primaries end up in runoff, including the Member versus
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: Member that features Al Green. He trails, but he's gone.
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  Speaker 1: He's going to at least have a shot and a
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  Speaker 1: run off. Looks like Colin all Right and Julie Johnson.
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  Speaker 1: He's running basically for much of his old seat in
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  Speaker 1: the Dallas suburbs. There that's likely to go to a runoff.
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  Speaker 1: We've got the age races on both sides are going
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  Speaker 1: to end up in runoffs, including Chip Roy who finished
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  Speaker 1: a fairly distant second, but he's going to be strong
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  Speaker 1: enough to end up in a runoff on that front.
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  Speaker 1: So it has been a very to say it's been
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  Speaker 1: a competitive and lively primary season in Texas as an
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  Speaker 1: understatement and the fact that there's so many of these
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  Speaker 1: races ended up in a second round that's just the happiest.
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  Speaker 1: Campers are those that make money off of political advertising,
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  Speaker 1: whether you're the digital side of things or the legacy
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  Speaker 1: television side of things. This extended season in one of
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  Speaker 1: the largest states that we have with so many media
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  Speaker 1: markets is show we say Manna from heaven for some
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  Speaker 1: of those local businesses. But to break down tall Rico,
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  Speaker 1: the big difference for him is and the big question
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  Speaker 1: mark was what we were Latino voters going to do
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  Speaker 1: in the Democratic primary? Right, we saw in these voters,
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  Speaker 1: Tall Rico was strong with independence that lean left and
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  Speaker 1: progressive whites. Jasmine Crockett was strongest with older voters and
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  Speaker 1: African American voters and those that are self described Democrats. Now, Texas,
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  Speaker 1: you could pick a ballot, right, you could decide in
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  Speaker 1: each side. It's sort of one of those types of primaries.
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  Speaker 1: So it's possible Tall Rico, right, had, you know, was
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  Speaker 1: perhaps trying to appeal to some of the same voters
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  Speaker 1: that John Cornet was trying to appeal to. It's just
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  Speaker 1: worth noting there. But let's stick to this Democratic primary
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  Speaker 1: here a minute. When you looked at all the polling,
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  Speaker 1: and it was a bit erradic, but one thing that
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  Speaker 1: was pretty consistent is that Latino voters it was a
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  Speaker 1: fairly high undecided among Latino voters. They were making the decision,
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  Speaker 1: you know, where they're going to go with a candidate
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  Speaker 1: that was projecting herself more as a fighter and Jasmine
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  Speaker 1: Crockett or somebody who was grounded himself a bit more
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  Speaker 1: in religion, James Tallerrico, And I think the assumption was
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  Speaker 1: that tall Rico might have had the inside track that
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  Speaker 1: his the fact that he wears his faith on his
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  Speaker 1: sleeve is something that I think appeals to some Latinos.
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  Speaker 1: And when you look at the dominant performance he had
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  Speaker 1: in the Rio Grande Valley, that I think shows you
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  Speaker 1: that that really was the difference. If you're gonna pick
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  Speaker 1: some knits at Jasmine Crockett's campaign, she didn't run a
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  Speaker 1: very conventional campaign. She seemed to run as if she
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  Speaker 1: wasn't a well funded candidacy. But she did, and she
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  Speaker 1: ran it slightly more unconventional, a bit more social media
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  Speaker 1: heavy sort of one could argue, sort of trying to
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  Speaker 1: see if she could win it the new way instead
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  Speaker 1: of having to do it some of the old way.
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  Speaker 1: Tall Rico had more money and so they could do
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  Speaker 1: some of the more old school ways of blocking and
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  Speaker 1: tackling and getting out the vote and running a more
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  Speaker 1: statewide campaign in a more traditional sense probably was worth
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  Speaker 1: the extra two points that tall Rico needed to avoid
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  Speaker 1: a runoff. And so again I'm gonna be a little
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  Speaker 1: tentative here because I think that this is you know,
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  Speaker 1: I do think that Jasmine Crockett's going to not concede
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  Speaker 1: quickly here, that she's going to exhaust every effort make
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  Speaker 1: sure this question mark about which bat make sure all
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  Speaker 1: the ballots in Dallas County get counted there with some right. First,
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  Speaker 1: a judge extended vote times. Then the state Supreme Court
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  Speaker 1: came in and said, well, no, some of those votes
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  Speaker 1: shouldn't count if people didn't wait in line at seven.
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  Speaker 1: So there was a bit of a dispute over that.
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  Speaker 1: So she's going to exhaust every effort here. So I
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  Speaker 1: wouldn't be surprised if this takes a day or two
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  Speaker 1: for the Democrats to unify. And I think that's going
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  Speaker 1: to be a bit of a challenge for tall Rico,
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  Speaker 1: is unifying the party. I assume they get there. I
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  Speaker 1: think the fact that what you you know, these days,
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  Speaker 1: beating Donald Trump and beating Ken Paxton and getting power
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  Speaker 1: usually can pay over these divisions now the question is
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  Speaker 1: our Democrats, you know, is that going to be easy
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  Speaker 1: to paper over those divisions? We'll see. Like I said,
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  Speaker 1: I think, I think Crockett feels a bit aggrieved and
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  Speaker 1: has shown her grievance's face a little bit on the
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  Speaker 1: campaign trail ever since the Colbert moment, right, which always
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  Speaker 1: felt a bit manufactured, a bit over over sold for
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  Speaker 1: what it ended up being, for what it was, what
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  Speaker 1: it was sold as. Right. The FCC never stepped in,
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: there was nothing about it yet. It was basically CBS's
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: lawyers versus Colbert's producers. And it's a he said. He
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: said that, I still don't feel like any of us
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  Speaker 1: got the full story. But the fact of the matter
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  Speaker 1: is the moment worked. It really did change the narrative
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  Speaker 1: a bit for tall Rico, and it gave him some space,
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  Speaker 1: and it gave him some extra money, and it gave
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  Speaker 1: gave him some extra juice, and it did put Crockett
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  Speaker 1: on the defensive. And when you look at a race
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  Speaker 1: this close, it's hard not to look at that moment
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  Speaker 1: as having been perhaps more decisive. I wasn't one hundred
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: percent sure of how decisive it was, but perhaps more
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: decisive now There's another question that I don't know if
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: we've got the answer for tonight. Does this mean that
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: given the choice of a candidate who says he's about
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  Speaker 1: love in tall Rico versus Crockett, who says, Hey, I'm
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: meeting the moment, and the moment right now is essentially
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: fight and she thinks she used the phrase raw. You
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: know what do voters want? Right? Well? I think it's
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  Speaker 1: clear Democratic primary voters about half of them wanted a
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: fighter and about half of them wanted a unite her
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: And I think in many ways this is the divide
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  Speaker 1: in the party. What is the best way to get
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  Speaker 1: power back? What's the best way to win swing voters.
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  Speaker 1: Is it to show yourself as strong to overcome the
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: perception that the Democratic Party has become soft and weak?
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: Or is it better off to be post Trump and
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: to be the polar opposite of Trump? Or do you
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: sort of accept the Trump tactics and get as pugilistic
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: on the left as they've been getting on the right.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure this primary resolves that answer. You know,
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: when you basically have a forty seven result, right, maybe
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: fifty two forty eight At the end of the day,
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: something like that. I don't think you could say that
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: that fully resolves things, but I think when people look
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: at Tallarico's messaging and how he has been pitching himself,
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: I do think you will see more more strategists make
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: the case that hey make the case that you can
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: win and it Democratic primary voters look, this idea of
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: electability is incredibly subjective. But if you can convince a
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: majority of a primary that you are the more electable candidate,
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: you can Trump ideology, you can Trump style, if you
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: are seen as the more likely to win. Clearly, that
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: is not how Republican primary voters behave because if Republican
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: primary voters behave that way, Cornyn wouldn't be in a runoff.
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: Cornyan would have won without a runoff. And so that's
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: where I think the open question and really what the
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: next two months are going to be is Cornyn's going
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: to be begging Trump for the endorsement when all the
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: votes are counted. I do think if Cornyn can be
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: one vote ahead of Paxton in the first round of
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: voting rather than even one vote behind, that those superficial
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: things matter to Trump, right he wents tobacco quote winner,
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: not a loser. But Paxton in many ways is Trump,
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: and Paxton has been a warrior for Trump. Right. He
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: filed the original suit that you know, the sort of
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: that basically stalled and created the illusion that the twenty
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: twenty election was was somehow disputed. But he'd been going,
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: you know, he was. He was an early warrior for Trump.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: Trump is not known to be loyal. We know this, right,
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: and you can get to Trump. Do you want to
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: be seen as a loser? Do you want to back
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: a loser? Do you want to be you want this
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: to be on you that one of your acolytes lost
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: control of the Senate and lost the single most important
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  Speaker 1: state in Republican party politics over the last thirty five years? Right?
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  Speaker 1: do think that Tallarico being the Democratic nominee instead of
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  Speaker 1: Cricket probably gives, uh, probably gives cornn and John Thune,
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: who are going to be making this case to Trump,
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: a stronger set of variables to say, hey, this tall
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  Speaker 1: Rico can win, He can beat Paxton. Tall Rico might
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  Speaker 1: be able to beat Corny for all we know when
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  Speaker 1: all of a sudden done on this. So that's you know,
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  Speaker 1: that's that's the other part of the fallout from this primary.
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  Speaker 1: It's going to be, you know, can John Cornyn convinced Trump?
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: And if Trump endorses, he's got to do so emphatically.
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: And that's the it's hard to imagine he would. He
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: might endorse corn but might not do it emphatically. Say
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: I like Ken Paxton too, that Republicans will be great
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: no matter who wins, but all my people tell me
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: that that Cornan has a better shot at winning, and
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: we gotta hold the Senate. Right, I'm trying to think
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: of the different ways he could communicate this. I could
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: picture him communicating it that way. I like him both,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: and I plan to you know, and whoever loses is
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: going to work for me in the administration.
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: He could do something like that. So it's going to
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: be interesting to watch the dance that Cornyn Senate Republicans
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: because here's the awkward part for Senate Republicans. If Paxton
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: wins the runoff, and look, the history says when an
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: incumbent is dragged into a runoff against somebody who's either
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: you know, more liberal or more cons or whatever whatever.
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: If the Democratic primary, the more liberal candidate wins runoffs,
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: in a Republican primary, the more conservative candidate usually wins
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: the runoffs. The only time this has not happened that
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: way was a Mississippi Senate race in twenty fourteen. In
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: that race that Cochrane looked like a sure loser after
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: the you know, in the first round of voting to
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: Chris McDaniel, a Conservative challenger, and then Cochrane and National
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: Senate Republicans ran a campaign to convince a whole bunch
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: of voters who didn't vote in either primary to show
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: up in a runoff and more. I think the Cochrane
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: McDaniel race actually had more voters in the runoff than
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: the original first round Republican primary. Well, what did that mean?
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: Cochrane somehow changed the electorate and he got in this
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: case a lot of African Americans who hadn't voted in
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: either primary because the Democratic primary wasn't really highly contested.
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: They showed up and he voted for Cochrane. The point
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: is it's an outlier. It's an exception. Every other every
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: other time we've had primaries go like this with an
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: incumbent dragged into a runoff by a challenger closer to
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: the political base, the result is just about always been
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: the same. It is hard to imagine that there is
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: a that they're going to be able to somehow do
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: this differently. Right, he needs a higher turnout then you
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: would normally get in a runoff. This is taking place
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: the Tuesday after Memorial Day, so there are a lot
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: of things going against corn In here. But given all,
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: given the hand he was dealt in this primary, everything
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: basically happened about the best possible way it could happen
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: for him to possibly find a way to be Paxton right,
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: he needed Tallarico to be the nominee without a runoff,
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: so the threat of tallar Ico being seen as the
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: more formidable challenger in a general election, he needed to
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: himself do better than what the polls had shown he
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: would do. Cornan has done much better than what the
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: polling had shown he was going to do, so we'll see.
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: But the bottom line is, with Tallarico's the dem nominee
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: and the like possibility right now, I'd say it's probably
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: a sixty to seventy percent chance. Now that Ken Paxton's
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: Republican nominee. I can't believe I'm saying this, but Texas
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: Senate is in play and Paxton may still win. But
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: the amount of money Republicans are going to have to
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: spend to bail him out. One two. The rhetorical gymnastics
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: that the Senate Republicans are going to have to take
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: I mean, they have all and and it's clear that
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: Cornyan has promised a scorched earth runoff campaign. I can't
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: imagine Republicans are not going to walk away from the
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: center race, right, they can't afford to walk away from it.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: This isn't you know. As much as they don't like
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: Ken Paxton, I don't think they would treat him like
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: David Duke in this situation. It's uh, it's going to
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: be a tough road, very tough road. And so but
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: they're in for a dime, in for a dollar now,
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: and so there's going to be more money dropped on
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: Ken Paxton. Now here's a few interesting strategic decisions Democrats
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: have to make. Do the Senate Democrats play in the
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: Republican runoff? We were joking on the live stream. Does
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: the you know, we've seen Democrats have done this and
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: especially during the Trump era, have done this a few
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: times to try to help a candidate win a primary
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: or a runoff that they think is more beatable in
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: a general election. So does the Senate? Does Chuck Schumer
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: Senate pack run an ad that says call Senator Cornyn
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: and thank him for his vote on gun control, or
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: do they run ads talking about how Ken Paxton is
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: supports Donald Trump too much to support him in the Senate,
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: right support an independent like John Cornyn in the Senate.
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: There's all sorts of games, game theory you can do there. Now, look,
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: there's risk to that, but one would one could argue
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: it is it is a it is a cheaper way
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: to play in Texas because look, if it's Cornyn tall Rico,
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: tall Rico is probably going to be on his own.
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: I don't think the National Party comes in and helps them.
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: They do some, but I don't think they go all
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: in it's Paxton. I think they're going to be tempted
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: to go all in. Right, And it's and if you
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: look at the Senate map, it's really not that expensive
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: of a Senate map for Democrats. Right, you have North
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: Carolina where your candidate is ahead, your candidate's out raising everybody,
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: You're in good shape. I mean, I think arguably roy
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: if there hadn't if Democrats had won more than one
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: Senate race this century in the state of North Carolina,
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: I think most handicappers would already have labeled this race
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: as lean Democrat instead of toss up, but because Democrats
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: have only won one Senate race this this century in
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: North Carolina. It was in two thousand and eight, So
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: you know, John Edwards got elected in ninety eight in
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: case you're wondering about that about him. So I think
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: it's the only reason why it's seen as a toss up.
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: But it's a race that they should you know, they're
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: going to have, you know, it's a presidential swing state.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: You don't ever screw around. But they're in pretty good
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: shape there. Main's going to be super expensive and they're
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: probably going to have to spend even more money because
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: it's going to be a messy primary and the eventual
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: Democratic nominee is probably going to be starved for resources
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: come the end of that primary campaign. So they're going
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: to have to come in and they're going to go
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: in big there. So then the question is you've got Ohio, Iowa, Alaska, Texas,
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: you know, maybe Nebraska if you expect the National Party
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: to go in for an independent like Dan Osborne. Right,
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: maybe at Kansas if that other independent candidate takes fire.
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: But ultimately you're looking at those aren't super expensive states, right,
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: Iowa's not super expensive Alaska's not super expensive. Ohio and
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: Texas are. And Ohio is about half the cost of Texas.
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: But you know, well, yes, Georgia and Michigan are expensive defenses.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: I think Minnesota is an underrated expense for the Democrats
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: there in that Senate race in New Hampshire. It's the
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: Boston market. So it's not a cheap state either to defend.
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: So you know, now they're not defending a huge place
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: like Illinois, and they're not going to be defending in
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: a California. They're not going to be defending in a Pennsylvania,
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: and they're not going to be defending in a Florida
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: or something like that. So you could argue that compared
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: to previous cycles, the Democrats should have the budget to
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: also target Texas if they so choose, But it is
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: super expensive and they've never really done it before. Right,
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: They've always kind of been half in, half out. But
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: the Republicans they are, they're going to be in no
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: matter what they have to be, right, Democrats can get
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: to a setup majority without Texas in their minds, right,
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: North Carolin on A, Maine, Ohio, Iowa, Alaska. They just
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: win four of those five. We haven't even gotten to Texas.
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: That assumes they hold Michigan, then they hold Georgia, and
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: they hold Minnesota, and they hold New Hampshire. Of those four,
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: I think Michigan's the most precarious. I think I've said
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: that to you before. It's why it's the one Republican
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: seat in my top five most likely to flip. But
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: Texas is a nice to have for Democrats Republicans. It's
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: a half to half right, and and it's bigger than
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: just losing a Senate seat if they somehow right, if
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: the Democrats crack open Texas. I just went you're going
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: to later in this Later in this podcast, you're going
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: to hear my top five all time races in Texas,
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: because I think there's a chance this Senate race, if
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: it's particularly if it's Paxton v. Tall Rico, may end
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: up in the all time in an all time list
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: when all is said and done. But one of the
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: five races in all time list is the first time
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: a Republican wins statewide in Texas, and happened in nineteen
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: sixty one with John Tower, and it was literally a
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: foot in the door. And once they won a special
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: election in a state wide contest and sort of broke
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: the streak. They hadn't won a statewide race in reconstruction.
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: Then money came in and funded the state party. Then
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: the state party was able to fund county parties and
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: so on and so on, and you know, John Tower,
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: you know, it took them another seventeen years before they
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: were able to win a governor's race, but they won
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: that in seventy eight, and then essentially, by nineteen ninety
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: it is a it is an evenly divided state, and
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: then by ninety four it becomes a solid Republican state.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: And nineteen ninety four is the last time a Democrat
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: won any state wide race on any level in the
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: state of Texas. So the point is is denying Texas
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: any Democrats any win is a big deal for Republicans.
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: You let, It's sort of like you let, you let,
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: you open the door, and all of a sudden money
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: starts pouring in. They win one, then there's belief they
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: can win two, they can win three, et cetera. So
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: pop your popcorn. It's going to be fascinating this Republican primary.
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: John Cornyn has promised that, you know, he hasn't even
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: that that Ken Paxton hasn't seen what's about to become,
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: and I think he've referred to a Judgment Day. It
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: sounded like a trailer for a Jerry Bruckheimer movie. Judgment
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: Day is coming to Ken Paxton. In a world where
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: Ken Paxton thinks he's going to be a United States
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: Center incomes John Cornyn. It's going to be something else.
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: I'm happy that I'm going to be in the state
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: of Texas a couple of times between now and the runoff,
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: and I look forward to uh dipping my toe in
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: that race. Some other things down the ballot that are
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: worth worth noting. My favorite result of the night is
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: the two vote margin for the state Senate president in
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: I think he trails by two votes in the state
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: Senate president in North Carolina. It's to a political rival
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: that goes back thirty years. Kind of love an old
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: fashioned grudge match, right, But this is a big deal
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: for Republican Party operations in the entire state. In the
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: legislature of the Republican legislature is extraordinarily influential in North Carolina.
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: And here's the state Senate president who is going to
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: need a recount at best to survive a primary, and
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: who knows, but I think you're going to see a
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: lot of litigation in that state, and that's going to
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: be a dominant story among political types in North Carolina
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: for a few weeks. Incumbents, boy it is. You know,
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: the tight incumbent races we expected, a few are going
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: to end up a runoffs. I think Al Green's in
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: a runoff. Crenshaw does not look like he's going to
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: get a runoff. The only Republican incumbent member of Congress
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: to seek reelection and not have Donald Trump's endorsement was
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: Dan Crenshaw. I think Donald Trump will love making note
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: of that. That the that you know, if you don't
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: have his endorsement, you can't win. That still matters in
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: Republican Party politics, that's for sure. But overall, I think
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: that if you're John Cornyn, you probably got the best
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: possible result you could hope for it. It still may not
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: be good enough if you're National Democrats and you you know,
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: tall Rico appears to be probably the more the candidate
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: that can win. It has a higher ceiling. I'm not
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: as I'm not as convinced Crockett couldn't win. For what
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: it's worth, but I you know, tallar Rico certainly has
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: a his strength with self described independence that's going to
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: be key this In so many of these elections, you're
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: seeing independence look more like Democrats across the board. And
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: then I would argue the news of the day nationally
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: was not very helpful if you're a Republican on the ballot,
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: whether it's Christynome doubling down and calling those folks in
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: Minneapolis domestic terrorists, to suddenly Americans waking up to finding
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: out that we've launched military strikes, and yet another country,
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: this time it's Ecuador going after Narco so called Narco Terras.
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: You have a president flailing to sort of explain the
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: rationale for Iran. Now it appears we didn't do enough
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: before the attacks to get Americans out of the region,
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: and there seems didn't seem as if the president felt
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: like he felt bad about that. So he's not showing
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: himself to be a very stable wartime leader at this moment.
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: The Iran you know, I go back to something I
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: said earlier. The best news he can hope out of
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: this Iran campaign has already happened, and that's the death
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: of Kamani. Every other headline so far out of this
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: war feels like it is it is only stoking voter
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: skepticism about this decision and about the timing of this decision.
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: This doesn't seem to be wearing well. I mean, I've
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: never seen an initial military and this is you've arguably
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: been a was a successful start right when you when
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: you kill the bad guy, and you know, the supposed
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: bad guy in the first twenty four hours, it's a
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: pretty good start to your military intervention. And yet voters
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: are starting in a negative position. And again, what turns
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: this around. There's no obvious way this turns around right away.
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: And if anything, it looks like and you know, now
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: there's reports or we're going to try to help the
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: Kurds become an insurgent force inside of Iran. I mean,
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: that looks like you're opening up a can of worms.
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: And we know that the Kurds, well, they're a lethal
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: fighting force. Suddenly that creates issues with the Turks, it
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: can create issues in Syria.
• 35:39
  Speaker 3: It's just.
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: A lot of folks had warned that, you know, if
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: you start open hostilities with Iran, you don't know how
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: this there. You know, it's in the cliche It's easy
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: to start a war, it's hard to end one. And
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: it feels like more countries are finding themselves involved all
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: of a sudden, not less. There's more uncertainty, not less.
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: So I would say that when you look at this,
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: you look at the what happened in these primaries tonight,
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: and then you look at the larger, sort of bigger
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: news picture that is impacting the larger political conversation. This
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: is about the worst start to a midterm election cycle
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: that an incumbent party could have. At the moment, their
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: single most important state is suddenly potentially a swing state,
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: or at least for this election cycle it is. And
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: you've just started a war in the Middle East that
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: is starting out very unpopular and it's hard to imagine
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: how it gets more popular. And oh, by the way,
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: the stock market, which was once a barometer that Donald
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: Trump cared a lot about, is not something he wants
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: to be pointing people to now. So you've now got
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: a disrupted economy due to this war in Iran, a
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: disrupted national security space in general, and all of this
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: overlays what was already an election cycle that looked like
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: it was just going to be an old fashioned referendum
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: on the party in power. So there you go. This
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: podcast has got a lot more to it. My interview
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: today is Josh Seftel. He is one of the he's
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: the director of All the Empty Rooms. It is a
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: very moving and heartbreaking documentary about the untouched rooms of
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: victims of school shootings where parents have just not been
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: able to touch the rooms, pack them up, and many
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: of them are completely untouched. What's interesting about this documentary
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: is it does not you never hear the word guns,
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: never mentioned. It is not about the policy debate. It
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: is simply about how parents grief and if you're a parent,
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: it's going to hit you and it's going to hit
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: you hard. That I promise. So that's my interview for this.
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: After that, I got my top five all time races
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: in Texas and I'll let you decide how I stack
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: them up and where you would put a Tallerico Paxton
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: Senate race and whether we'll qualify in the top five,
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: and of course I've got more questions. So quite a
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: start to the week, quite a start to the campaign year,
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: and quite a start and finish to this podcast. So
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: as always appreciated. Thank you for tuning into the live
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: stream last night. Those of you that didn't, you can
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: always go back and see some of the highlights. But
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: if not, I hope I gave you a good summary here.
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: So let's take a break and when we come back,
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: Josh Seftler, this episode of the Chuck Todcast is brought
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  Speaker 1: at checkout for the fifteen percent cap. Again, use the
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: code Chuck podcast. So joining me now. He is the
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: directory that you can see on Netflix right now. It's
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: called All the Empty Rooms, and this is uh, it's
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: it's it's about gun violence, but it's not about gun violence.
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: What the doc is is about is going back to
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: the victims of school shootings, to their parents who allowed
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: my guest and his filmmakers. My guest is the director
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: of this film of All the Empty Rooms, called Joshua Seftel.
• 42:39
  Speaker 2: And.
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: It's in some ways a a it's the bigger picture.
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: And I want to talk to josh about this because
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: I've I've done my own little things when I was
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: doing Meet the Press reports, our document and document series
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: that I had put together in conjunction with me, and
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: we were constantly looking for different ways to portray gun violence,
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: to try to break through the numbness that the public felt.
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: And I you know, one time we featured a mortician
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: who explained what it was like to deal with gunshot victims.
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: And so we did our own ways to do this.
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: This was a very powerful, another powerful way to do it,
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: and in fact, as powerful as I've seen yet. And
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: so the director of All the Empty Rooms, josh Seftel,
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: joins me. Now, jefs, it's nice to meet you.
• 43:38
  Speaker 3: Same here, Chuck. Great to be here.
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: So I mean, that's the you know, in some ways
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: you could say, Okay, I already know everything I need
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: to know about this doc, right, I mean, it's a
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: straightforward thing, and yet if you don't want it, you
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: don't get it.
• 43:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah. A lot of people have said that they after
• 43:59
  Speaker 3: they watched they say, Wow, that's not what I was expecting.
• 44:03
  Speaker 3: And I think what has happened is that a lot
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: of us in this country have become numb to the
• 44:15
  Speaker 3: idea of school shootings. You know, there was a school
• 44:19
  Speaker 3: shooting last week, and then there was one in the
• 44:21
  Speaker 3: week before, and there are about over one hundred school
• 44:25
  Speaker 3: shootings a year. Now we don't even hear about most
• 44:28
  Speaker 3: of them. And we've reached the point where it just
• 44:32
  Speaker 3: becomes a headline that literally fades away within hours or
• 44:36
  Speaker 3: even minutes, and.
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: We almost treated like the flu. Oh there's an outbreak.
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: It's crazy. We've accepted it as something that's normal and
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: it's not normal. And we you know, with this film,
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: like your story about the mortician, it's another way of
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: talking about the issue, but it's really what we've done
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: as we've gone into the empty bedrooms and told the
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: stories of each child through the objects that are left
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: behind in that room. And there's something about that that
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: I think has resonated with people where it forces you
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: as a human being to feel something. You know, we've
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: shifted on this, and i'd say, you know, you guys
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: talked about in the in the dock the media's role
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: in this, and when when school shootings first started, and
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: and sort of the patient zero in this case was
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: the probably the University of Texas. You know, that was
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: the modern sort of beginning of this. And in the eighties,
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: you and I are about the same age. We grew
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: up with the so called postal shootings right where it
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: was supposedly post you know, people were going, remember it
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: became a phrase, going postal, postal. Then Columbine happens, and
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: it shifts and and and it's and there is something
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: about this mass shooting virus that's in our society where
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: you know, yes, the workplace is still a place that
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: is a potential vulnerable spot. But we haven't stopped with
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: the school shootings, like we haven't moved past that. Its
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: continues to be and and it's a what I think
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: we're all trying to figure out, why is it accelerating?
• 46:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, in the in our film Steve Hartman,
• 46:43
  Speaker 3: who is the CBS news reporter. He's on CBS Sunday
• 46:48
  Speaker 3: Morning and the evening news.
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: Right, he's the good news guy. You feel better? Right,
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: He's the he is the way do you hear this one?
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: And in a in a good way? Right? He makes
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: you cry. It's it's one of those, but it's in
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: a good cry usually exactly.
• 47:02
  Speaker 3: And he decided, you know, seven years ago that he
• 47:07
  Speaker 3: was sick and tired of all the school shootings and
• 47:10
  Speaker 3: even having to report on them in a way where
• 47:12
  Speaker 3: they would say, hey, Steve, go go figure out, like
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: what's the silver lining on this one? You know, find
• 47:17
  Speaker 3: a hero, find the librarian that you know collected all
• 47:21
  Speaker 3: the condolence cards, or find the EMT who got there
• 47:25
  Speaker 3: in time to save one of the lives. And he
• 47:28
  Speaker 3: and you know, those stories matter, but he just reached
• 47:32
  Speaker 3: a point where he said, I don't want to do
• 47:33
  Speaker 3: that anymore because nothing's changing. And when he started, when
• 47:38
  Speaker 3: he covered his first school shooting, which was in nineteen
• 47:40
  Speaker 3: ninety seven in Pearl, Mississippi, he I think there were
• 47:45
  Speaker 3: seventeen school shootings a year, which is too many. But now,
• 47:52
  Speaker 3: when we were making the film, there were over one
• 47:54
  Speaker 3: hundred and thirty school shootings a year, so you know,
• 47:58
  Speaker 3: you do the math on that, and it's just insane.
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: Well, this is why I understand why many people think,
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: is it the media's fault that this is accelerating, Not
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: that the media causes it, but that the media helps
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: plant the seed. Right, And look, you guys delve into this.
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: You know, when we first covered school shootings, it was
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: always through the perspective of the shooter. Who is this guy?
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: Who is this person that climbed up on the on
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: the Texas on the on the bell tower, who is
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: this person that was wearing a long coat, leather coat?
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: And they became infamous, right, and then we rightly realized, hey,
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: what are we doing? You know, don't do this because
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: that does you will encourage copycatters. Right. It's the same
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: thing with the coverage of serial killers in the eighties
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: and how how media covered serial killers in the eighties.
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: And I think it's a much different situation now, but
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: it's I mean, what is the right way to do this?
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: I think we the fact that this gets worse, not
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: better means we're not doing this the right way. We
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: haven't found it yet.
• 49:09
  Speaker 3: There is you know, the most popular nonfiction programming out
• 49:15
  Speaker 3: there is true crime. Yeah, there's something about human beings
• 49:21
  Speaker 3: that we want it. I personally am not interested in it,
• 49:24
  Speaker 3: but we want to hear these stories. We want to
• 49:28
  Speaker 3: hear about the person who did something bad. We want
• 49:31
  Speaker 3: to understand them, judge them, maybe see them face justice
• 49:37
  Speaker 3: or not. Yeah.
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: I have a thesis that it's just all about making
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: ourselves feel better about our place.
• 49:41
  Speaker 3: And you know, I think you might be right.
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: Right. That's why this appeals so much because I I
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: don't get it either. I don't want to see how
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: bad humanity is to each other all the time.
• 49:52
  Speaker 3: But I think that the news organizations, you know, are
• 49:55
  Speaker 3: are tempted by that kind of storytelling. And it's hard,
• 50:00
  Speaker 3: you know, because people are interested. But I do commend
• 50:04
  Speaker 3: many of them for shifting over time because a lot
• 50:08
  Speaker 3: of the organizations, including CBS News where Steve worked, have
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: made a commitment to not focus on the on the
• 50:16
  Speaker 3: shooters and to spend less time on that and what
• 50:20
  Speaker 3: Steve Hartman wanted to do and this is you know,
• 50:23
  Speaker 3: we followed him for this was a seven year project.
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: We followed him our film crew for a couple of years,
• 50:34
  Speaker 3: of the toward the end of the project, and what
• 50:36
  Speaker 3: he wanted to do was to shift it even further
• 50:38
  Speaker 3: away from talking about the shooters to completely just focusing
• 50:45
  Speaker 3: on the lives lived by these children. And that's where
• 50:48
  Speaker 3: the empty bedrooms come in, is we You know, I
• 50:54
  Speaker 3: haven't told you how the project started. Steve was fed
• 50:56
  Speaker 3: up and he actually wrote a letter to every family
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: who lost to child since Sandy Hook and he said,
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: I want to come to your house with a photographer
• 51:08
  Speaker 3: and I want to take pictures of your child's empty room.
• 51:12
  Speaker 3: And to his surprise, a bunch of people said yes.
• 51:19
  Speaker 3: And he started to collect these photographs. And then he
• 51:24
  Speaker 3: reached out to me three years ago and he was
• 51:27
  Speaker 3: he said, you know, I'm starting to collect these photos.
• 51:30
  Speaker 3: I don't know what to do with them, and do
• 51:32
  Speaker 3: you think there might be a documentary film here? And
• 51:36
  Speaker 3: he showed me one of the photos. It was a
• 51:38
  Speaker 3: photo of a child's bathroom and there was a toothpaste
• 51:42
  Speaker 3: too with the cap left off, and you could tell
• 51:46
  Speaker 3: and feel the sense of the child who had once
• 51:51
  Speaker 3: been there and left that cap off, went to school
• 51:55
  Speaker 3: saying like I'll put that on later, and never came home.
• 51:59
  Speaker 3: And you could feel the absence literally, and I just thought, Wow,
• 52:04
  Speaker 3: this could be very powerful and a whole new way
• 52:06
  Speaker 3: to reframe this issue. And so that was three years ago.
• 52:14
  Speaker 3: We set out on the road a couple months after that,
• 52:18
  Speaker 3: using credit cards, trying to figure out how to piece
• 52:21
  Speaker 3: this together. And three years later, you know, we have
• 52:25
  Speaker 3: this film. It's on Netflix, it's nominated for an Academy Award,
• 52:30
  Speaker 3: and we're trying to show people a different side of
• 52:36
  Speaker 3: the issue, which is the children, Like, what is the
• 52:40
  Speaker 3: cost of all of this? What is the cost? What
• 52:44
  Speaker 3: is the human toll that we're all facing from this?
• 52:48
  Speaker 3: And because we don't get to see that, no, just
• 52:51
  Speaker 3: doesn't cover that.
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: We when I was telling you about the what I
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: actually the piece that we had done. It's about three
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: years ago now, it still sits in new YouTube, and
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: it was it was part of this. You know, I
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: got frustrated that I that the regular meet the press,
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: I couldn't tackle these issues right for a variety of reasons, right, meaning, oh,
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: you've got to be on the news, and you've got
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: to react to what's happening in the White House, and
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: the Trump era is the Trump era, right, And you
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: realize we needed an outlet. We have all the we
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: have all the room in the world and the wage
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: of streaming, right, and so we thought we wanted to
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: go back to these places where there were mass shootings
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: and just find out how people were living their lives
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: a year later, two years later. And that's how we
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: We were at a bar, where how are people getting
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: along now with you know, six months later, because we
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: don't go back. You know how often I've had to
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: cover a ton of school shootings, just like Steve did.
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: I mean, that was just you know, if you you
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: were in the main in in television media in the
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: in the last twenty years, you've had to and had
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: to anchor, You've anchored your shriff of school shootings. We
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: all say we're not you know, hey, we'll be back.
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: You know, we're not just telling the story right now,
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: we're coming back. We don't come back, right, we don't
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: we by the way, when we say we're going to
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: come back, we do mean it in the moment. You know,
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: I really genuinely believe that, like, yeah, we should, we
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: definitely will come back. And then stuff happens. More school
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: shootings happen.
• 54:22
  Speaker 3: Usually, And what was interesting for us was that some
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: of the people we visited and photographed the empty rooms
• 54:30
  Speaker 3: in their houses was they had never talked to the press.
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: It's amazing why they.
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: Had said no. They said no, I mean, why would
• 54:40
  Speaker 3: they want to talk to the press, you know, after
• 54:43
  Speaker 3: they but.
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: They need to share that, you know, in some ways,
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: I think what you're hopefully with this, what this does
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: for families of victims. You have to tell your story.
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: I know it's hurts, but you have to tell your story.
• 54:57
  Speaker 1: People need to see this. And that was exactly that
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: was all the way back to Emmett Till, right when
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: Emmitt Till's mother said, you must print these photos in
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: Life magazine.
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: Yes, that's right, agreed.
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: This is in some ways it's a derivative of that.
• 55:12
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a great comparison. The families said to us,
• 55:17
  Speaker 3: we don't want our child to be forgotten. We want
• 55:21
  Speaker 3: the world to know about them. And we were saying
• 55:24
  Speaker 3: to them, we're coming here to tell the world about
• 55:27
  Speaker 3: your child and who they were and the life they
• 55:31
  Speaker 3: lived through through the empty room, and we were very
• 55:36
  Speaker 3: much aligned in that way. And it's what they want.
• 55:41
  Speaker 3: They want the world to not forget, you.
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: Know, in this day and age where there's record there's
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: so many recordings now, and you know, I'm sitting here
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: watching your film and I'm thinking at the same time,
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: and I'm wondering, if I'm in this position for whatever reason,
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: two kids in college, I don't I don't know what
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: I would want. I don't know if I would want
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: to say videos of them and see them alive, if
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: I can't be with them alive. I was just thinking,
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: you know, it was one of those It was I
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: didn't know if that was gut wrenching or not. The
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: keeping the room as it is made that really resonated
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: with me. Yeah, it is this day and age where
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: you get to go back into time and see see
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: these people alive. It's spooky and I don't know how
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: I would handle that as a as a parent. I
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: that was it was one of those I've just was,
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: you know, you do you let your own mind wander
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: when you have your own you know, when you when
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: you're and I'm sure a lot of people who have
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: watched this film have shared with you experiences like that
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: where you just start putting yourself in that place. What
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: would you do? How would you do it? I really
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: connected with the mother who said you know what I did.
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: I want the room to smell like my son. Yeah,
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: and I thought about that because my kids just are
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: in college. They're still here, they're still alive, but their
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: rooms smell like them in my empty nest, and it
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: means a lot to me. So I don't it is
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: it is. That's what made this move film so powerful,
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: is that you actually didn't need you barely needed narration.
• 57:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah there, well, there's so there's You know that that
• 57:33
  Speaker 3: room in Santa Clarita Dominic Blackwell's bedroom, the parents keep
• 57:41
  Speaker 3: the dirty laundry basket. Yeah, it's been there for six
• 57:44
  Speaker 3: years and they haven't got that. Yeah, and and they,
• 57:49
  Speaker 3: like you said, they keep it because they don't want
• 57:51
  Speaker 3: to lose the smell of their child. And Frank was
• 57:56
  Speaker 3: telling me the other day, Frank's Dominic's father was saying
• 58:00
  Speaker 3: that the hardest part is that you start to forget
• 58:04
  Speaker 3: what their voice sounded like. And I think that's why
• 58:09
  Speaker 3: they liked having the video. You actually start to forget
• 58:13
  Speaker 3: what their voice sounded like, and then you hear the
• 58:16
  Speaker 3: you watch the video and you remember. So it's it's uh, yeah,
• 58:22
  Speaker 3: it's unimaginable.
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: How do you compartmentalize when you make something like this,
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: because there are days, there were days when I'd cover
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: school shooting. So I mean, look, I was at the
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: White House lawn for Sandy Hook and my kids were
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: the same exact age, right, And I was on the
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: lawn with the Jake Tapper and Nora O'Donnell at the time,
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: and we all had kids the same age, and we
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: were a wreck and we had to do live shots
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: all day and it was exhausting, and you know, no, please,
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: it wasn't even I wasn't a victim, right, It was
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: just you know, having to having to pull it together
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: right and not be able to. So how do you
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: how did you how did you compartmentalize putting this together?
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: Because it's this, this, this really had to hit you
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: on some days.
• 59:11
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean two of the kids in the film
• 59:14
  Speaker 3: are this We're the same age as my daughter, my
• 59:18
  Speaker 3: oldest daughter, nine years old. Yeah, it is. It's tough.
• 59:28
  Speaker 3: I try not to center my experience in the in
• 59:31
  Speaker 3: talking about the film, because that, you know, what these
• 59:35
  Speaker 3: families have have gone through is.
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: Just, yeah, this is their experience. I totally get that.
• 59:41
  Speaker 3: It's unacceptable, it's it's horrible, But I think that you
• 59:47
  Speaker 3: know the experience of being in those bedrooms. You know,
• 59:52
  Speaker 3: I travel a lot for my work. I'm away from
• 59:54
  Speaker 3: my family a lot this project. When I was a
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 3: every time I came home I had never been. I
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 3: always love coming home, but it was a different level
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 3: of getting to see my kids again and feeling a
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 3: sense of gratitude for what I have. I think that,
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 3: you know, our hope is that the power of this
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 3: film is in trying to capture what it was like
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 3: to be in those rooms, what it was like for
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 3: me and my team to go into those bedrooms, because
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 3: our hope is that everyone will feel the weight of
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 3: the loss, will feel that absence, and it will, you know,
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 3: reconnect them with something that's already within them. I mean,
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 3: you think about how you felt when you heard about
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 3: Sandy Hook, or how you felt when you heard a valuability,
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 3: or how you felt when you heard about Columbine, and
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 3: I don't think most of us feel that way anymore.
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 3: When we hear about a school shooting, we're not as shocked,
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 3: we're not as outraged, we're not as engaged. We might
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 3: not even read the article. And what we're trying to
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 3: do is to get people reconnected to feel that those
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 3: feelings again that they felt back then, because we Our
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 3: hope is that we can take that empathy we might
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 3: feel from watching this film and channel it into change,
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 3: into re engaging with the issue, into having hope again
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 3: that maybe we can create change because where we are
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 3: right now is unacceptable.
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: Look, it's on Netflix, which means a lot of people
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: can see it. The question is are the right people
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: going to see it? You know, I would love to
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: see organized screenings of lawmakers, state houses as well as
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: the US Capital, because you want to know that the
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: people that have the power to do something right, we don't.
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: You know, not everybody agrees on what the something is,
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: but I think there's collective agreement we ought to do something.
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: And in order to motivate people to go find find
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: a maybe not the solution, but a mitigation strut, whatever
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: it is, to at least focus on it, they need
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: to feel this right, They need to you know, It's like,
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: how do you get everybody to watch this that maybe
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: has decided. Look, I'm you know, it is not going
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: to change my view on whether, you know, we should
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: even manufacture weapons that can do this to the human body.
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 3: Yeah, Well you might have noticed this, but in the
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 3: film we never mentioned the word gun. Yeah, it's never said.
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 3: And that was by design because we did not want
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 3: people to have a reason to ever turn the film off.
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 3: We wanted to tell a story that was purely human,
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 3: that on the surface was a political that is about
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 3: the absence of these children.
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 5: And and you know, I think what we've been seeing
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 5: is that people of all kinds of opinions are watching and.
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 3: Are affected by it. I'll give you a couple of examples. One,
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 3: we took the photographs from the film. So these are
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 3: the photos of the objects around the room, the little
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 3: toys and trinkets and things that are left beyond that
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 3: tell the story of each child. And they're familiar. You know,
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 3: there are things that if you have kids, you're going
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 3: to see things that are in your kid's room. If
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 3: you don't have kids, you're going to see things that
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 3: probably were in your room growing up. And and we
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 3: took those photos and we created a photo exhibit which
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 3: is actually right now in Los Angeles and New York.
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 3: And we when when they were when they were installed,
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 3: they were installed by this guy who apparently was quite conservative,
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 3: and we found out later he you know, he wears
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 3: a T shirt that says guns aren't stupid, people are anyway.
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 3: This is the guy who's hanging the photographs of the
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 3: empty rooms, and halfway through the day of hanging them
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 3: up in the gallery, he started to weep and he
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 3: told his boss that he needed to go home. Anyway.
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 3: The next day, this guy comes back in, goes up
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 3: to his boss and he says, I just need to
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 3: tell you something. I will never wear that T shirt again.
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 3: And we've heard stories like this where people who you know,
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 3: you couldn't imagine that they would change their mind. But
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 3: there's something about these photos and the stories of the
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 3: kids that like softens people's hearts and we just feel hopeful.
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 3: You know. Steve Hartman got an email from someone who
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 3: had been a Sandy Hook denier who saw the film
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 3: and watched it all the way through, and he said
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 3: to Stevie, said, thank you for this film. I didn't
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 3: feel preached or lectured to, and therefore I was able
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 3: to watch it and it opened my mind.
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: You know what you just described just triggered an interesting
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: exhibit that I remember that's extraordinarily powerful. At Yad Vashem
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: mhm in Uh in Israel, the Holocaust Museum there where
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: fairly recently in the Warsaw ghetto in Poland. You know,
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 1: they have a where where they know a lot of
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: Jews lived. When there's development, there's an attempt you know,
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: if they dig, you know, and they find stuff they
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: try to preserve, and they ended up finding all sorts
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: of just ordinary everyday stuff that belonged to you know,
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: Jewish families who were rounded up. And the whole display
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 1: is that it is just the stuff. There's stuff that
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: they lived when they lived in Warsaw, and you know,
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: there's toys, there's you know, costume jewelry, there's and it's
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 1: and it you know, it just it does bring a
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: humanity to the to the to the victory. You know,
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: these are you know, when it comes to the Holocaust,
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 1: there's still some nameless and faceless people, right and and
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: there is something about you know that that in some
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: ways having these exhibits, you know, can can just humanize
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: the situation. And it sounds like what the responses you're
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: sharing are the It's like all of a sudden, the
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: victims became three dimensional figures. Right. I go back to
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: I think what we were just chatting about before the
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: before we were talking about just politicians, right, and you know,
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: as a as a reporter, I'm eternally always looking for
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: the third dimension and political candidates. But in some ways
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: that's what we failed to do when we talk about victims.
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 3: Yeah, there's something about someone said to us they watched
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 3: the film and they said, you know, you read a
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 3: headline and you think, oh, that's someone else's child, But
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 3: when you see the bedroom and you see all the
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 3: objects in there, it's easier to say that's my child,
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 3: or that could be my child. And I think that's
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 3: the difference, is that it suddenly becomes part of your
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 3: world and your life.
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: And has this been an issue you've tackled before in
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 1: documentary form or you've wanted to, or you've been looking
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: for a way to, like, you know, what's a better
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: way to get people to focus on this issue.
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 3: Well, the first film I ever made, when a long
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 3: time ago, when I was twenty two, was about the
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 3: abandoned children of Romania, and so it was a different
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 3: kind of story about children. But at that time, in
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 3: nineteen ninety, Communism had just fallen, josh Escu had fallen,
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 3: and it was discovered that there were over one hundred
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 3: thousand abandoned children in the country, and I went there
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 3: and I lived in the orphanages and documented the conditions
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 3: of the children, and there was some you know, obviously
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 3: that footage of seeing children tied up and treated like
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 3: animals was had a real resonance with the people who
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 3: watched the film, and it led to the American adoption
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 3: of thousands of Romanian children when it was on public television.
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 3: This film is share some of the DNA, but it's different,
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 3: you know, this film is about the absence of children.
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 3: This film is about the empty rooms and trying to
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 3: feel the presence of someone who's gone. And there's something
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 3: that seems to be resonating with people about that. We
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 3: can all imagine that happening to us, and that creates
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 3: a kind of empathy, I think, which we hope will
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 3: lead to good things.
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 1: Did the how many of the parents volunteered sort of
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: like how what? You know, I'm just curious if there was,
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: you know, how many of them have decided to you know,
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: I'm focusing on this right. You know, different parents do
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: different things in response to this right. Some get galvanized
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: and want to, you know, deal with one policy issue others.
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: You know, maybe it's about helping helping other victims who
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: go through this, right, that sort of thing. I'm just
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: curious the various. I'm sure you just heard lots of
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: stories of how how how parents chose to grieve besides
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 1: keeping the room, that's clearly. I mean, you know, it
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 1: made me think we all memorialize people we love in
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: some form or another, and there's always something where like
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: I'm not letting that go, you know, I'm not. You
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: can't throw away that painting, honey, you can't get rid
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: of that, you know, this beat up coin. You know,
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: I've got this. I got this tattered two dollar bill
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: that my father gave to me. Was I always got
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: a two dollar bill when I lost a tooth. Later
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 1: I'd figure out it was the same two dollar bill.
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: You know. We didn't have a lot of money, but
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: it was but I you know, this two dollar bill
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: and it was just I carried into my wallet. He
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: died in eighty eight. I had it. I still have it.
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: You know. It's like this two dollar bill and it's
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 1: just a little thing. So we you know, like I
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 1: won't shave because my father had a beard, and I
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: just somehow think I'm going to like lose his memory
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 1: if I somehow shave. It's irrational, of course, but I'm
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 1: just curious the various ways parents have chosen to channel
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: their grief.
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, one one of the things that really
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 3: struck me is, you know, we we spent time with
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 3: four families, all of them lost a child, two at
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 3: the Saugus High School shooting in Santa Clarita, one at
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 3: the rob Elementary School in Uvalde, and one at the
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 3: Covenant School in Nashville. And what we saw is that
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 3: each family has a different relationship with the room. Some
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 3: go in there all the time, even it even varies
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 3: between two parents in the same family. You know, for example,
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 3: the Blackwells in Santa Clarita, Nancy the mom doesn't like
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 3: to go into the room at all, and Frank goes
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 3: in there every day. So it's they all have different
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 3: relationships with the rooms. And what is inspiring to me
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 3: about all the families I met is that all of
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 3: them have different political points of view, but they've all
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 3: organized created foundations in memory of their children. All four
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 3: families to do different kinds of work that they deem
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 3: appropriate that they think is going to help change and
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 3: make things better. And I just have so much admiration
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 3: for them for channeling their grief into something that's helping
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 3: the world. And that's I've seen across the board with
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 3: most of the families that we've met. I want to
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 3: tell you one quick story about one of the rooms,
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 3: you know, talking about the relationships that families have with
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 3: the rooms. The mule Burgers Brian and Cindy, who lived
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 3: in Santa Clarita. Their daughter Gracie was killed six years
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 3: ago at the Saugus High School shooting, and right afterwards
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 3: they said to themselves, like, we need to leave here.
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 3: We don't want to be here anymore.
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: Perfectly rational, be a perfectly rational decision. I mean, widows
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: regularly say, you know what, I can't. I'm not living
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 1: in the house anymore. I mean, you know, just I
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: get it right.
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 3: Yes, And in their case, the thing that kept them
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 3: from moving was they couldn't bring themselves to pack up
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 3: the bedroom the room.
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 3: And so you know, Brian Muhlberger applied for jobs in
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 3: different places and he'd get the job offer, and then
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 3: when it came down to it, he just couldn't. They
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 3: couldn't do it, and they'd say no. And this went
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 3: on for for over five years. And in our film,
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 3: Steve Hartman, after they collect the photographs of the empty room,
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 3: he gave each family a photo book which contained all
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 3: the best pictures of the child's bedroom. So he gave
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 3: them this album. He gave the Muhlburgers this album of
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 3: Gracie's belonging to all the photos that were taken. And
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 3: after receiving that book, and after watching all the empty
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 3: rooms the film, they finally said they were ready to
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 3: move and they packed up the room. And they've since
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 3: moved to a different state, and what they've done is
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 3: in their new home, they're creating a garden in memory
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 3: of Gracie instead of having the bedroom, so they've kind
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 3: of turned it into something else. But they were able to.
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 2: Move out of the home and pack up the room.
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 1: It had to be hard, I imagine, almost not trying
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 1: to get prescriptive right when you're it is it is always,
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: you know, the journalist in you, I'm sure, was like, okay,
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 1: but all right, now what? Right? Now? What? But in
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: some ways we're not ready for the prescriptive. I think
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: that's the lesson I'm taking away from the last forty
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: years of how we've handled these as a society. We're
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 1: not and so we need more of We need more
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 1: of these because you need you need more people wanting
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 1: prescriptive before you can.
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 3: Get to prescriptive. I think I think the prescriptive exists,
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 3: you know too, we just have it just will. It's everywhere.
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 3: It's it's you know, it's on the news, it's in
• 1:16:35
  Speaker 3: and it's in most documentaries where there's a very strong
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 3: point of view that you know that is essentially alienates
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 3: about half the people in the country and invites the
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 3: other half to feel.
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 1: Here, you're trying to widen the lens, widen the aperture
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: a little bit.
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 3: I just yeah, I just feel for me as a filmmaker,
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 3: I mean, in those films, in that news and journalism
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 3: is important, But from me as a filmmaker, what interests
• 1:17:01
  Speaker 3: me is how can you tell stories that invite everybody
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 3: in and allow them to share in potentially feeling something
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 3: and potentially experiencing a story together, even if they have
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 3: opposing points of view, that they could watch a story
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 3: together and all get something out of it. And you know,
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 3: in the case of all the empty rooms, we hope
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 3: that for people who agree that we need to do
• 1:17:28
  Speaker 3: better with guns and gun safety. That they that those
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 3: people might feel re engaged with the issue, They might
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 3: feel like, okay, a little bit hopeful that change can happen,
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 3: That they might feel feelings they haven't felt in a
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 3: long time when they when they think about school shootings
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 3: and feel urged to do something. And then the other half,
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 3: we hope that they'll feel something too deeply that makes
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 3: them say, you know what, we need to figure this out.
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 3: We need to change something because what is happening is
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 3: unacceptable and we need to restart the conversation in a
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 3: new place, which says which just simply says like, we
• 1:18:15
  Speaker 3: all agree that our children need to be safe when
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 3: they go to school, and how do we build from
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 3: that place and restart the conversation in a constructive way
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 3: that could lead to positive change.
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 1: Did you ever contemplate making this feature length or was
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: it always a short in your mind?
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 3: We thought about it. We started as a short, and
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 3: then the first cut of the film came in at
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 3: like fifty five minutes.
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: And when is the cutoff for the oscars? Is it
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 1: forty minutes?
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 3: Forty minutes? So anything under forty is a short? And
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 3: then anything and then I don't know what constitutes a future,
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 3: but you know, usually they're like seventy to eighty minutes
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 3: at minimum.
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 1: Minimum.
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 3: We were thinking, okay, fifty five, maybe we add another fifteen,
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 3: and we're we have a short feature. But as we
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 3: started editing more, we the film got shorter and it
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 3: got better, and we finally got down to thirty four minutes,
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 3: and we looked at it and we said, you know,
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 3: what if we what did we cut out more of
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 3: the talking? What did we cut out more of the dialogue?
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 3: And we started just cutting and cutting and cutting, and
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 3: eventually we had cut six minutes of dialogue and talking
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 3: out of the film, out of a thirty four minute film.
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 3: But we left the film at thirty four minutes, so
• 1:19:37
  Speaker 3: suddenly we had added six minutes of essentially silence to
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 3: the film, which allowed people to be in the rooms
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 3: feel the absence. And we found that that was much
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 3: more effective because we weren't telling people what to think.
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 3: We were just them go in these rooms and then
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 3: you decide, you decide what you want to feel, and
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 3: you decide at the end of the film what you
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 3: want to do.
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 1: This is just such a reminder to me that, like
• 1:20:09
  Speaker 1: you just certain things you can't convey via the word.
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, right, it.
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 1: Did, It is it is, you know it is. And
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 1: this is what documentary filmmaking over the last ten years
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 1: is just grown by leaps and bounds. Part of it
• 1:20:25
  Speaker 1: is that distribution's never been easier, right, the buried entry
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 1: has never been never been easier. It's like, I mean,
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 1: if you thirty years ago, where do you distribute this? Sure?
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: M right? Yeah, I mean I'm just right. I mean
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 1: just imagine, you know, maybe you convince the folks over
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 1: at CBS Sunday morning, hey let's do a thirty let
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 1: me do a thirty minute piece. And of all programs
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 1: that might green light a thirty minute piece, it's it's
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: a Sunday morning. Right. Yeah, but that's difficult, right, that's
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 1: a that's a one shot, Like where would this have gone?
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 1: I mean, this is I mean, this is the beauty
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 1: of of of what you know. It's funny. I don't
• 1:21:07
  Speaker 1: think we all realized how hungry people were for documentaries
• 1:21:10
  Speaker 1: until we got a platform like Netflix in our everyday
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 1: life in Hulu and all these places now that that
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 1: that have made that If you know, there's always been
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 1: these great documentarians out there ready to make these films.
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 1: There just wasn't any place to put them.
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right, that's true. Thirty years ago it would
• 1:21:31
  Speaker 3: have been it would have played at festivals, maybe in
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 3: a couple of theaters before a feature, maybe those.
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 1: And it's always please I grew up, we had the
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 1: one you know, every town had the one theater that played,
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 1: you know, that had the docs. Right, it was always
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 1: the same theater that also had the foreign films, right,
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: you know, that was like the only place you could
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: get that stuff. You know, that's right.
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 3: But you're right, it wouldn't have been seen by you know,
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 3: this film has already been seen by millions of people
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 3: because of because of Netflix, and you know they acquired
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 3: the film at after the Telluride Film Festival where we premiered.
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 1: And so hard to get funding for this, I mean
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 1: you said you used a lot of credit cards, because
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 1: I can imagine you know, it's not a it. You
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: can't sit there and say, yeah, I definitely think we'll
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 1: be able to sell this. I mean, you know, you
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 1: don't know if the folks at Netflix or at or
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 1: at an Amazon, or at a Hulu or a Peacock
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 1: might say, yeah, I don't. I don't know that people.
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 1: We don't want, you know, we don't want something that
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 1: makes people shut the platform off. I mean I had
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 1: to be that cynical.
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah, let's just say that there's not a lot of
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 3: ROI on short documentaries. We you know, films like this
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 3: are made out of passion and out of care.
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: Well. I'm pretty involved with the folks at Docks d
• 1:22:50
  Speaker 1: DC Docs, and we used to do a film festival
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 1: to meet the Press Film Festival for five or six years,
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 1: and it was only for shorts. Yeah, and it was
• 1:23:00
  Speaker 1: a whole world of filmmakers that I was realizing were underserved.
• 1:23:04
  Speaker 1: It's an underserved community with tremendous content.
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, all the people that all the people that
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 3: were part of this film, all the people that eventually
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 3: came on board and gave us funding or helped us
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 3: in different ways where they just cared about the issue.
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 3: None of them expected to make money. We didn't make money.
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 3: We lost money, but that's not why we made the film.
• 1:23:30
  Speaker 3: We made it because all of us want to see
• 1:23:34
  Speaker 3: change happen.
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: And documentaries are like good investigative story books, right, you know,
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: only about one out of one hundred actually make money.
• 1:23:42
  Speaker 1: They're not meant to make money, They're meant to amplify
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 1: a story, amplify an idea. On those fronts, let me
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 1: let me close with this. What's next for you?
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 3: Well, in the immediate future, we're about to you know,
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 3: the voting for the Academy Awards is happening started today,
• 1:24:06
  Speaker 3: started on February twenty sixth, got it, and it goes
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 3: to March fifth.
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 1: So we're kind of, oh, it's campaigning. Huh.
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 3: We've been campaigning because we you know, our hope is
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 3: that look, being nominated is amazing. We've gotten so much
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 3: attention and brought it to the subject of school shootings
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 3: and gun safety because of the nomination, and we're so
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 3: grateful for that, and also the families who shared their
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 3: stories of their children and their dream of making sure
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 3: the world knows about their kids is coming true. And
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 3: you know, if we whether or not we win the Oscar,
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 3: obviously winning the Oscar would amplify that and you know,
• 1:24:52
  Speaker 3: help with this issue. But we're really happy about where
• 1:24:56
  Speaker 3: we've gotten to and we're not going to stop working
• 1:24:59
  Speaker 3: on this. We are going to continue traveling the country
• 1:25:03
  Speaker 3: and the world with this film and we're we and
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 3: we have this photo exhibit which is going to continue
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 3: to travel to different cities around the country for the
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 3: next year or at least.
• 1:25:15
  Speaker 1: Well. The photo exhibit feels like an incredible sort of
• 1:25:20
  Speaker 1: secondary way to bring attention to this, not just to
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 1: the topic and the and the film itself.
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 3: And you can put it in public places, which is
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 3: what we've done. You know, it's currently it's in Sunset
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 3: Triangle Plaza in uh Silver Lake, and it's in Dumbo
• 1:25:38
  Speaker 3: in Brooklyn, and you can just walk by it and
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 3: check it out. And you know, hundreds of people every
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 3: day are walking by and just taking it in. And
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 3: we want to keep doing that now.
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 1: I mean it's look, I don't know whether you can
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 1: get people to intentionally notice, but in some ways you
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 1: almost want to get the unintented, get it into unintentional
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 1: public the public spaces where people stumble into.
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 3: Absolutely.
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, Joshua was great and it's a what to me,
• 1:26:06
  Speaker 1: what's important about it as a as an artist? Is
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 1: it how important it was as a visual story? Right?
• 1:26:13
  Speaker 1: And that you know, I don't know if any judges
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 1: are listening, but I think that should be a huge criteria.
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 1: It's not just whether the topic is powerful, not whether
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 1: the words are powerful. But you're making up film, right,
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 1: you know? Is it visually powerful? And needless to say,
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 1: it's visually powerful.
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 3: Thank you, thanks Chuck for giving me the chance to
• 1:26:32
  Speaker 3: talk about it.
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 1: And sure, yeah, absolutely, all right, maybe i'll see in
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 1: the campaign trail. You've done with campaigns?
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 3: Huh?
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 1: Are you done with campaigns? Are you done covering political campaigns?
• 1:26:44
  Speaker 3: Do you know what? Did I tell you? I made
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 3: a film called Taking on the Kennedys. Do you know
• 1:26:48
  Speaker 3: about that one?
• 1:26:49
  Speaker 1: Oh? Which one was that?
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 3: It was the familiar It was about Pat Kennedy's campaign,
• 1:26:56
  Speaker 3: his first US congressional campaign.
• 1:26:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Land, oh, I remember this and the from the
• 1:27:03
  Speaker 1: other right.
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 3: For I followed his opponent, Kevin Vigilante, who was a
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 3: Republican and uh, it was a very kind of funny
• 1:27:12
  Speaker 3: and maddening story. Yeah, and it was on PBS. It
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 3: was very it was I do now remember this. It
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 3: was It wasn't the most flattering portrait, probably not back
• 1:27:25
  Speaker 3: in the day, and I'm a Democrat, but back in
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 3: the day it was you know, films like that really
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 3: got seen, you know, when there were fewer channels and
• 1:27:39
  Speaker 3: and so it was it was very popular.
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 1: But right, well that was that was basically actually when
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 1: we were talking about where would a film like this be,
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 1: maybe p PBS was the was the the that was
• 1:27:51
  Speaker 1: the home run. Right, if you got a PBS pick up,
• 1:27:53
  Speaker 1: you're like great.
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 3: At least a lot of people watched it there too, right, yeah,
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 3: right now it's not as much. There's it's harder to
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 3: get audiences anywhere. Me they're much more you know.
• 1:28:06
  Speaker 1: Right, who knows how this gets into people's algorithms, right, however.
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 3: That works exactly these days.
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 1: Well, Joshua, good luck with the campaign. I mean, you know,
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 1: with the campaigning, it's it's a it's a I know
• 1:28:18
  Speaker 1: that's a process.
• 1:28:19
  Speaker 3: And and are you still involved with DC docs?
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Whenever I can be. I mean, you know, whether
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 1: it's hope, you know, putting together program helping with their programming,
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 1: or amplifying their docs and all of that. Jamie sure
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 1: is you know Jamie I know Sky Sidney Okay, Sky's
• 1:28:39
  Speaker 1: her partner.
• 1:28:39
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, we Actually I was talking with Sky the
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 3: other day. So I do a I interview my mom
• 1:28:47
  Speaker 3: on CBS Sunday Morning, and we're on there regularly where
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 3: I just talk to her about her life and she
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 3: lives in DC, and you know what's going on in
• 1:28:57
  Speaker 3: her life and her opinions on things, and we've been
• 1:29:00
  Speaker 3: on for thirteen years. Anyway, she recently moved back to
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 3: d C. And so I was talking with Sky at
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 3: sun Dance about about this, and we decided we're going
• 1:29:11
  Speaker 3: to try to have my mom be the person who
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 3: tells you to turn off your cell phones and other
• 1:29:18
  Speaker 3: things for the festival. So we're going off. So we're
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 3: getting involved with DC docs.
• 1:29:23
  Speaker 1: Well, then I look forward to seeing you in whatever
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 1: way that Jamie recruits me to get involved. Great and
• 1:29:29
  Speaker 1: at a minimum, I'd like to use my podcast to
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 1: amplify And I'm a you know, probably probably at least
• 1:29:35
  Speaker 1: once a month have some documentary filmmaker on.
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 3: So grateful for that. And uh, when when do you
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 3: think you're running this?
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 1: We'll drop it next week, Okay during voting, don't worry.
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 3: Sooner the better I know.
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 1: I got you. We just did a feature length. You're
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 1: not in competition, but we just had I'm trying to
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: I'm like blanking on the title of the film, but
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 1: Alabama solution No no, no, no about that used body camera footage? Perfect, yes, perfect, neighbor.
• 1:30:07
  Speaker 1: Thank you. Yeah, Gita, I agree.
• 1:30:11
  Speaker 3: I was with her last night. We're all we're all
• 1:30:13
  Speaker 3: going to the same part.
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 1: You're on the same circuit. Yeah no, no, no, and uh
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: yeah you're not. Don't worry. You're in two different categories.
• 1:30:18
  Speaker 1: We are also, you know, we I am so the
• 1:30:22
  Speaker 1: check podcast is promoting Gaeta and we've got we've got
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 1: people were promoting in both categories.
• 1:30:27
  Speaker 3: Here we're we're I'm having lunch with her today too,
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 3: so I'll say.
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 1: Hi, please do okay, thanks a lot, thanks, take care well.
• 1:30:45
  Speaker 1: I hope you enjoyed that conversation about just a different
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 1: way to try to tackle the school shooting issue without
• 1:30:58
  Speaker 1: dealing with doing in a different way. And I will say,
• 1:31:02
  Speaker 1: this is all the empty rooms is. It's it's pretty powerful.
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 1: It's not you know, you're not sitting there for two hours,
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 1: and it definitely is worth your time. So I hope
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 1: you give it a chance. I know, I joked with
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 1: Josha our interview was longer than the than the documentary,
• 1:31:19
  Speaker 1: but in some ways it is really visually. I go
• 1:31:22
  Speaker 1: back to the visually powerful and I'm always very impressed
• 1:31:28
  Speaker 1: because you know, the the easy way to make a
• 1:31:30
  Speaker 1: documentary is to do interview and it's really just talking
• 1:31:34
  Speaker 1: heads and you sort of file footage when you can
• 1:31:38
  Speaker 1: tell a story in an unusual way, whether it was
• 1:31:41
  Speaker 1: it was the story of using all that bodycam footage
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 1: for perfect Neighbor, or on this one, it is it
• 1:31:49
  Speaker 1: is going back to the empty rooms, the rooms that
• 1:31:55
  Speaker 1: parents won't touch after they lose a child. It's powerful imagery,
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 1: but it's a unique way. It's another just another way
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 1: to do storytelling. But let me pivot here. It is
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 1: a Wednesday, which means I have a top five list
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: and I'm going to do a twist on it. And
• 1:32:12
  Speaker 1: it's something I told you I was going to be
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 1: working on pretty soon, and this will continue to evolve.
• 1:32:20
  Speaker 1: But that is sort of campaign history.
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 3: And I have.
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 1: Those of you that those that know me have known
• 1:32:31
  Speaker 1: me a long time, know that I've got a file
• 1:32:34
  Speaker 1: boxes filled with research of unwritten books, whether it's on
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 1: crazy stories from the presidential campaign trail that my late
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 1: mentor Doug Bailey was working on and I inherited all
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 1: of that scholarship, or what I worked on on what
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 1: I called Tales from the Trail, sort of the crazy
• 1:32:50
  Speaker 1: Every state has had a crazy campaign at least one,
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 1: if not more, once you sit back and wait till
• 1:32:57
  Speaker 1: I tell you a story. But this is the beauty
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 1: of this format, right is you have an opportunity to
• 1:33:03
  Speaker 1: test out some of your theories of the case and
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 1: some of your storytelling. So this episode, obviously it's huge
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 1: Texas Senate. We kicked off the midterm election coverage at
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 1: the start of this podcast. Obviously, everything that happened Texas
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 1: has a chance the Texas twenty twenty six Senate race
• 1:33:22
  Speaker 1: with these messy primaries and everything that has happened inside
• 1:33:25
  Speaker 1: both parties a we have Obviously we're still sorting ourselves
• 1:33:30
  Speaker 1: out with the runoff situation, but it has a chance
• 1:33:35
  Speaker 1: to become an all timer in Texas history. And it
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 1: got me thinking what are the all time great Texas
• 1:33:45
  Speaker 1: statewide campaigns? And my it's just governor and Senate that
• 1:33:49
  Speaker 1: qualify for this. And I've done I've worked on this
• 1:33:52
  Speaker 1: for all fifty states, and I've got sort of different
• 1:33:57
  Speaker 1: lists that I've put together over the years of this
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 1: and different ways that I've wanted to publish content about it.
• 1:34:03
  Speaker 1: But I thought today I would at least make my
• 1:34:07
  Speaker 1: top five lists, my top This is my top five
• 1:34:10
  Speaker 1: all time statewide campaigns in Texas history. Top five, top
• 1:34:20
  Speaker 1: top We've had a few minutes here give you a
• 1:34:26
  Speaker 1: little little background in each of my top five inning
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: we'll also note some races that get honorable mentioned but
• 1:34:34
  Speaker 1: didn't quite crack my top five. I would love for
• 1:34:36
  Speaker 1: my Texas listeners, my Texas and my political science and
• 1:34:40
  Speaker 1: political junkies. If you don't agree with my ranking reranked
• 1:34:44
  Speaker 1: the five, we'll get to it in a minute. Or
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: what did I leave out? What did you what were
• 1:34:49
  Speaker 1: you surprised by? Etc? Because look, Texas, you know, as
• 1:34:53
  Speaker 1: we did with my podcast time Machine earlier this week,
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 1: it has an incredible history, right being an dependent country
• 1:35:00
  Speaker 1: for a small period of time, there's a lot that
• 1:35:03
  Speaker 1: has happened. Texas has produced multiple presidents, political legends, and frankly,
• 1:35:09
  Speaker 1: some of the strangest campaigns in American history. Not all
• 1:35:13
  Speaker 1: these races that I'm going to put in the top
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 1: five were actually close races, but in some cases they
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 1: were extraordinarily consequential for the result that happened. But these
• 1:35:23
  Speaker 1: races changed something, something bigger. Some of these races launched careers,
• 1:35:28
  Speaker 1: some of them ended eras, some of them featured something
• 1:35:31
  Speaker 1: so unusual you just couldn't make it up. Look, I
• 1:35:34
  Speaker 1: get it. All time lists are subjective. The point is
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 1: to spark debate, get people thinking about political history and
• 1:35:40
  Speaker 1: how it matters to today's politics. And again, if you
• 1:35:44
  Speaker 1: disagree with my choices, please send me your feedback, your pushback,
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 1: your own nominees Aschuck atdchucktodcast dot com. So I got
• 1:35:53
  Speaker 1: five races for you today. And if the Texas the
• 1:35:56
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty six Texas Senate race turns into the humdinger
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 1: that some people expected to be by November, it may
• 1:36:02
  Speaker 1: earn its own place on this list someday. But hey,
• 1:36:06
  Speaker 1: I'll let you decide. The question is which one of
• 1:36:09
  Speaker 1: these five would you bump from this list? So this
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 1: is my top five. Number five is actually one race
• 1:36:18
  Speaker 1: in the twenty first century. And there's only one race
• 1:36:21
  Speaker 1: on my list that I include from the twenty first century,
• 1:36:23
  Speaker 1: and it's two thousand and six. Texas Governor Rick Perry
• 1:36:26
  Speaker 1: wins this race with thirty nine percent. The Democratic nominee
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 1: Chris Bell gets thirty percent, Carol Keaton Strayhorn gets eighteen
• 1:36:34
  Speaker 1: percent running as an independent Republican, and the late Kinky Friedman,
• 1:36:40
  Speaker 1: who once had a hit song called they Don't make
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 1: Jews like Jesus Anymore, got twelve percent. So here's what
• 1:36:48
  Speaker 1: you need to know about this campaign. Rick Perry's running
• 1:36:50
  Speaker 1: for a second full term as governor, a term he inherited. Right,
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 1: he be inherited the term when Bush became president. Wins
• 1:36:59
  Speaker 1: in O two fairly easily. Six is his attempt at
• 1:37:02
  Speaker 1: a second full term. His approval ratings are not great, right,
• 1:37:06
  Speaker 1: two thousand and six not a good year for Republicans
• 1:37:09
  Speaker 1: in general. Right across the board nationally and Poles had
• 1:37:15
  Speaker 1: consistently showed that roughly six and ten Texans said they'd
• 1:37:18
  Speaker 1: vote for someone other than Perry. And the final results
• 1:37:21
  Speaker 1: showed that six and ten Texans voted for someone else
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 1: other than Perry. So why why didn't this end up
• 1:37:28
  Speaker 1: a real race? Well, those six and ten Texans were
• 1:37:32
  Speaker 1: split up between three other candidates. So yet Chris bout
• 1:37:35
  Speaker 1: he was an accidental member of Congress, ended up member
• 1:37:38
  Speaker 1: of Congress in the Tom Delay seat for a brief term.
• 1:37:41
  Speaker 1: He ends up the Democratic nominee because no one else
• 1:37:44
  Speaker 1: really wanted the job, the most interesting candidate and the
• 1:37:47
  Speaker 1: chief rival to Rick Perry for This was Carol Keaton Strayhorn.
• 1:37:51
  Speaker 1: She was the sitting Comptroller of Texas. She decided to
• 1:37:54
  Speaker 1: skip the Republican primary because she didn't think she could
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 1: win a primary, but she thought she could run as
• 1:37:58
  Speaker 1: an independent, herself as one tough grandma, and really was
• 1:38:04
  Speaker 1: a big chunk of her funding came from travelers, came
• 1:38:07
  Speaker 1: from the same communities that normally back in the nine
• 1:38:10
  Speaker 1: eighties and nineties used to support Democrats. She was trying
• 1:38:13
  Speaker 1: to run a sort of hybrid, trying to get sort
• 1:38:15
  Speaker 1: of the oppositional funding, you know, to try to sort
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 1: of you could call it moderate Republican, Republican light, whatever
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 1: you want to call it. But that was the theory
• 1:38:24
  Speaker 1: of her case. But she needed the Democrats not to
• 1:38:28
  Speaker 1: essentially run a series campaign. And in theory Chris Bell
• 1:38:32
  Speaker 1: really was an incredibly underfunded campaign, didn't really run anything.
• 1:38:36
  Speaker 1: And of course Kinky Friedman, was it a publicity stunt?
• 1:38:39
  Speaker 1: Was it a frustration? Well, at that time iMOS was
• 1:38:43
  Speaker 1: if you remember the late great Don Imis, Kinky Friedman
• 1:38:47
  Speaker 1: was sort of a regular fixture of iMOS so had
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 1: his own sort of he had his own sort of
• 1:38:55
  Speaker 1: persona and as he used to he had a campaign
• 1:38:58
  Speaker 1: slogan that simply was how hard could it? There was
• 1:39:01
  Speaker 1: a libertarian on two? Now what's interesting about But it
• 1:39:04
  Speaker 1: was Strayhorn that was the chief challenger. Now, over the
• 1:39:08
  Speaker 1: course of her political career she used several last names McLellan, Rylander, Strayhorn,
• 1:39:13
  Speaker 1: and eventually back to Keaton. She actually wanted to get
• 1:39:17
  Speaker 1: Grandma officially added to her ballot name, but the Perry
• 1:39:22
  Speaker 1: appointed Secretary of State denied that request. What was what
• 1:39:26
  Speaker 1: added to the drama of this Republican inner fighting? Was
• 1:39:30
  Speaker 1: it one of her sons, Scott McClellan, was the press
• 1:39:32
  Speaker 1: secretary for George W. Bush. So she had the president's
• 1:39:36
  Speaker 1: press secretary's mother running as an independent against the Republican
• 1:39:39
  Speaker 1: governor of Texas who succeeded George W. Bush. Right, that
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 1: was quite the story. And then of course you had this,
• 1:39:47
  Speaker 1: you know, to understand this race, the money was really
• 1:39:52
  Speaker 1: only with Perry at twenty four million, Strayhorn at thirteen million,
• 1:39:55
  Speaker 1: Kinky Friedman raised about three and a half million, and
• 1:39:58
  Speaker 1: Chris Bell, the Democratic nomine only two million dollars, and
• 1:40:01
  Speaker 1: in fact, at one point Strayhorn had more than eight
• 1:40:03
  Speaker 1: million cash on hand, Bell had less than one hundred thousand.
• 1:40:05
  Speaker 1: Bell was not at all a serious candidate, and yet
• 1:40:08
  Speaker 1: he finished second with thirty percent of the vote. And
• 1:40:12
  Speaker 1: it to me, the reason I find this fascinating is
• 1:40:16
  Speaker 1: because it was a reminder that the major party line,
• 1:40:20
  Speaker 1: there is a habit that a chunk of voters in
• 1:40:23
  Speaker 1: both parties just always pull the lever for whoever has
• 1:40:27
  Speaker 1: the D or the R next to their name. We
• 1:40:30
  Speaker 1: know what the baseline number of that is. In Texas,
• 1:40:32
  Speaker 1: it's thirty percent, because that's what Chris Bell got. He
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 1: got thirty percent. My guess is the baseline for just
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 1: an R is somewhere in that same range, right thirty
• 1:40:42
  Speaker 1: to thirty five percent, probably on the Republican side too,
• 1:40:45
  Speaker 1: no matter the state you went, which is, you know,
• 1:40:46
  Speaker 1: unless it's a you know, state of Vermont, but you know,
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 1: there is a voter that always pulls a lever. You know,
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 1: had there, had she you know, worked harder to win
• 1:40:58
  Speaker 1: over some Democrats. There were all sorts of ways, but
• 1:41:02
  Speaker 1: it's why third party candidacies only succeed when one one
• 1:41:09
  Speaker 1: of the two parties has to basically give up on
• 1:41:11
  Speaker 1: a race, has to completely walk away, because just simply
• 1:41:15
  Speaker 1: having their presence on the ballot will eat into that.
• 1:41:19
  Speaker 1: And it really it's why I include this race because
• 1:41:23
  Speaker 1: I think it's one of the great lessons of to
• 1:41:26
  Speaker 1: independent those trying to break up the two parties, How
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 1: do you do it? You know, you're just you know,
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: don't assume that just because one of the two major
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 1: parties only fields a guidfly candidate that's underfunded, that there
• 1:41:39
  Speaker 1: isn't going to be a strong poll by voters there.
• 1:41:42
  Speaker 1: So that's why that makes my top five number four
• 1:41:45
  Speaker 1: on the list. Nineteen ninety four, Texas Governor George W.
• 1:41:50
  Speaker 1: Bush wins with fifty three and a half percent of
• 1:41:52
  Speaker 1: the vote and Richards gets forty six percent of the vote.
• 1:41:56
  Speaker 1: She's the incumbent governor. She's incredibly popular, she's witty, nationally known.
• 1:42:02
  Speaker 1: You know, she delivered the keynote at the eighty eight
• 1:42:03
  Speaker 1: Democratic Convention, and is poor George he was born with
• 1:42:07
  Speaker 1: a silver spoon in his mouth. Was sort of the punchline,
• 1:42:10
  Speaker 1: and it just went from there. And she actually had
• 1:42:14
  Speaker 1: a pretty good story to tell. The Texas economy was
• 1:42:16
  Speaker 1: doing well, crime was down. By most normal political standards,
• 1:42:19
  Speaker 1: she'd have been in good shape for reelection, but she
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 1: faced an opponent with an incredibly famous name, George W. Bush,
• 1:42:26
  Speaker 1: son of the former president, part owner of the Texas Rangers,
• 1:42:29
  Speaker 1: and he was pretty untested politically. Richards kind of dismissed
• 1:42:34
  Speaker 1: the candidacy at first, said, ah, some jerk is what
• 1:42:38
  Speaker 1: she called him at first, and a lot of Democrats
• 1:42:40
  Speaker 1: dismissed it, thinking, oh, hey, George H. W. Bush just
• 1:42:43
  Speaker 1: got walloped in nineteen ninety two. There's Bush fatigue. That's
• 1:42:48
  Speaker 1: not gonna work now. Ironically, this was a race going
• 1:42:51
  Speaker 1: into election day. Both candidates had their favorable ratings over
• 1:42:53
  Speaker 1: sixty percent. Both were well liked. Richards wasn't unpopular, Bush
• 1:42:58
  Speaker 1: wasn't unknown. There was a scandal election or a bad
• 1:43:01
  Speaker 1: economy election. The initial polling of this race, one poll
• 1:43:05
  Speaker 1: had a forty seven forty in late nineteen ninety three,
• 1:43:08
  Speaker 1: and it is basically, you know, that's when you get
• 1:43:13
  Speaker 1: to start that way, before you're spending any dollars. There
• 1:43:15
  Speaker 1: you go. The real issue is the race unfolded in
• 1:43:19
  Speaker 1: the middle of the nineteen ninety four Republican Revolution. Democrats
• 1:43:22
  Speaker 1: lost fifty four House seats nationally and in governor's races.
• 1:43:25
  Speaker 1: Bush was one of four Republicans that year to defeat
• 1:43:28
  Speaker 1: a sitting incumbent governor, a sitting incumbent Democratic governor. I've
• 1:43:34
  Speaker 1: told you it's one of the hardest things to do.
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 1: In ninety four, a lot of incumbent governors lost, including
• 1:43:40
  Speaker 1: Anne Richards, and she basically lost because of this. It
• 1:43:45
  Speaker 1: was the shift, if you will, Carl Rove understood it.
• 1:43:49
  Speaker 1: He saw the key dynamic clearly, the rise of the
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 1: Republican suburbs in Texas in and around the major cities,
• 1:43:55
  Speaker 1: and the success in those suburbs is why Bush won.
• 1:44:01
  Speaker 1: And this race is important because it marks the beginning
• 1:44:05
  Speaker 1: of something his storic. Texas Republicans have held every single
• 1:44:08
  Speaker 1: statewide office ever since that election. No Democrat has won
• 1:44:12
  Speaker 1: statewide in Texas since November eighth, nineteen ninety four. One guy,
• 1:44:16
  Speaker 1: a land commissioner, Gary Morrow, won a race that year
• 1:44:18
  Speaker 1: in ninety four, and then and then that was it.
• 1:44:21
  Speaker 1: So no Democrat has held state wide office since that
• 1:44:25
  Speaker 1: Landmark Bush victory over Richards. Bush goes on to win
• 1:44:29
  Speaker 1: re election ninety eight with sixty nine percent of the vote.
• 1:44:32
  Speaker 1: Two years later, he runs for president. You can trace
• 1:44:34
  Speaker 1: a direct line from a governor's race in Texas in
• 1:44:36
  Speaker 1: nineteen ninety four to the Iraq War, Bush tax cuts,
• 1:44:39
  Speaker 1: and a generation of Supreme Court appointments. Right, butterfly flaps
• 1:44:43
  Speaker 1: his wing. Number three on my list, you have to
• 1:44:45
  Speaker 1: go back to nineteen twenty four. Texas Governor Miriam ma
• 1:44:49
  Speaker 1: Ferguson defeats the clan backed candidate Felix Robertson in the
• 1:44:54
  Speaker 1: Democratic primary. Then she goes on to become the first
• 1:44:59
  Speaker 1: woman governor of Texas and actually technically the second woman
• 1:45:04
  Speaker 1: governor in American history, because a woman in Wyoming took
• 1:45:08
  Speaker 1: the oath a few days before Ma Ferguson did. But
• 1:45:12
  Speaker 1: here's the story. To understand nineteen twenty four, you have
• 1:45:15
  Speaker 1: to go back to nineteen seventeen. A man named James
• 1:45:19
  Speaker 1: pah Ferguson. Man pah Ferguson was the governor of Texas.
• 1:45:23
  Speaker 1: He was a populist politician known as Farmer Jim, and
• 1:45:27
  Speaker 1: he was also deeply corrupt. The charges against him read
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 1: like a corruption checklist that would look familiar today. Misuse
• 1:45:33
  Speaker 1: of state funds, co mingling his personal bank accounts with
• 1:45:36
  Speaker 1: state money. A mysterious personal loan of one hundred and
• 1:45:38
  Speaker 1: fifty six thousand dollars that he refused, to explain, which,
• 1:45:41
  Speaker 1: of course, would be like nearly a million dollars in
• 1:45:43
  Speaker 1: today's money. It was later found to have come from
• 1:45:45
  Speaker 1: San Antonio beer Brewers, which was particularly damaging given the
• 1:45:49
  Speaker 1: prohibition politics of that era. And then, most infamously, he
• 1:45:53
  Speaker 1: tried to purge professors at the University of Texas who
• 1:45:56
  Speaker 1: he personally disliked, and when the ut president refused to
• 1:46:00
  Speaker 1: fire them, Ferguson actually tried to defund the university entirely.
• 1:46:04
  Speaker 1: So the legislature impeached him on ten of twenty one
• 1:46:08
  Speaker 1: charges and barred him from holding state office ever again.
• 1:46:11
  Speaker 1: But guess what, Pah, Ferguson refused to leave politics. He
• 1:46:15
  Speaker 1: found another way back. Now. By the early nineteen twenties,
• 1:46:19
  Speaker 1: the Ku Klux Klan had become a major political force
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 1: in the state of Texas. It wasn't a fringe movement,
• 1:46:24
  Speaker 1: it was a pretty mainstream. One clan day at the
• 1:46:26
  Speaker 1: Texas State Fair, for instance, in October nineteen twenty three,
• 1:46:29
  Speaker 1: drew massive crowds. The Klan had elected sheriffs, judges, legislatures,
• 1:46:33
  Speaker 1: district attorneys all across the state. They voted as a
• 1:46:36
  Speaker 1: block and used violence and intimidation to enforce their political will.
• 1:46:41
  Speaker 1: Their candidate for governor in nineteen twenty four was a
• 1:46:44
  Speaker 1: gentleman by the name of Felix Robertson, so Pah Ferguson
• 1:46:47
  Speaker 1: saw an opening. He couldn't run himself, so he put
• 1:46:49
  Speaker 1: his wife on the ballot, Miriam Ma Ferguson. Miriam Ferguson
• 1:46:53
  Speaker 1: had spent most of her life as a private citizen,
• 1:46:55
  Speaker 1: a homemaker who had no political career of her own,
• 1:46:57
  Speaker 1: and in fact, her initials were M A. And it
• 1:47:00
  Speaker 1: was a reporter that combined the initials to give her
• 1:47:03
  Speaker 1: the nickname MA. And then of course Pa ran the
• 1:47:05
  Speaker 1: campaign behind the scenes, and then they actually used the
• 1:47:09
  Speaker 1: campaign slogan two governors for the price of one. So
• 1:47:13
  Speaker 1: Ma wins the Democratic primary over the clan backed Robertson,
• 1:47:16
  Speaker 1: effectively the election in a one party Texas back at
• 1:47:19
  Speaker 1: that time there really was no Republican party back then.
• 1:47:22
  Speaker 1: She then defeated the Republican George Butte in the general election,
• 1:47:25
  Speaker 1: and in January nineteen twenty five, she was inaugurated, as
• 1:47:30
  Speaker 1: I said, the second woman governor in American history, because
• 1:47:33
  Speaker 1: she took her fifteen days after Wyoming's Nelly Taylo Ross,
• 1:47:37
  Speaker 1: now one of her early campaign promises targeted the Klan directly.
• 1:47:42
  Speaker 1: She supported an anti masked law aimed at preventing masked
• 1:47:47
  Speaker 1: clan demonstrations in public. The courts actually would later strike
• 1:47:51
  Speaker 1: down the law as unconstitutional, but the political damage that
• 1:47:55
  Speaker 1: she did to the Klan was real and lasting. Clan
• 1:47:58
  Speaker 1: membership in Texas once you couldn't use those face masks
• 1:48:02
  Speaker 1: collapse from roughly ninety seven thousand at it's nineteen twenty
• 1:48:05
  Speaker 1: four peak to about eighteen thousand two years later, and
• 1:48:08
  Speaker 1: by nineteen twenty seven, the governor declared the plan in
• 1:48:12
  Speaker 1: Texas effectively dead. Anti mask ordinance. Anyway, there's number three
• 1:48:18
  Speaker 1: on the list. Number two on the list. The nineteen
• 1:48:21
  Speaker 1: sixty one Texas Senate special election, John Tower becomes the
• 1:48:25
  Speaker 1: first Republican to win statewide in Texas since reconstruction. He
• 1:48:31
  Speaker 1: defeats William Blakely by roughly ten thousand votes out of
• 1:48:35
  Speaker 1: a million cast, and he has Liberal Democrats to thank
• 1:48:39
  Speaker 1: for it. So let me give you this setup. LBJ
• 1:48:41
  Speaker 1: becomes Vice president January sixty one, obviously vacates a senatecy.
• 1:48:45
  Speaker 1: The city governor is Price Daniel. He appoints a conservative
• 1:48:48
  Speaker 1: Dallas oil man by the name of William Blakely as
• 1:48:51
  Speaker 1: the temporary replacement for LBJ until the special election could
• 1:48:54
  Speaker 1: be held. And they hold the special election pretty quickly there.
• 1:48:57
  Speaker 1: And here's the rules of that special were fairly unusual.
• 1:49:00
  Speaker 1: There were no party primaries, so instead there were seventy
• 1:49:04
  Speaker 1: one candidates, including future Speaker of the House Jim Wright
• 1:49:07
  Speaker 1: was on this list, by the way. But there were
• 1:49:09
  Speaker 1: seventy one candidates that appeared on this single ballot, Republicans, Democrats,
• 1:49:13
  Speaker 1: and Independence all at once. And the idea was the
• 1:49:15
  Speaker 1: top two finishers would advance to a runoff, regardless of party.
• 1:49:18
  Speaker 1: Quite the ballot right, seventy one candidates. So how did
• 1:49:21
  Speaker 1: Tower break through? Well? John Tower was a political science
• 1:49:24
  Speaker 1: professor at Midwestern State University in Wichita Falls. Genuinely was obscure,
• 1:49:29
  Speaker 1: not a political figure anyone had expected to matter, but
• 1:49:32
  Speaker 1: he was the Republican nominee against LBJ in nineteen sixty
• 1:49:37
  Speaker 1: and here you know LBJ on the ticket with Kennedy.
• 1:49:40
  Speaker 1: He was on the ballot twice, both as vice president
• 1:49:42
  Speaker 1: for the electors and then of course he was running
• 1:49:44
  Speaker 1: for reelection to the Senate. Tower gets a surprisingly strong
• 1:49:47
  Speaker 1: forty one percent of the vote against the sitting senator.
• 1:49:51
  Speaker 1: That gave him some name recognition. So in a special election,
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 1: he ended up leading the seventy one candidate field with
• 1:49:56
  Speaker 1: about thirty one percent of the vote, and he advanced
• 1:49:57
  Speaker 1: to the runoff against the leading Demomocrat, which ended up
• 1:50:01
  Speaker 1: being the appointed Senator Blakely. But here's where the liberal
• 1:50:05
  Speaker 1: Democrats get involved. You know how today's Texas Republican Party
• 1:50:10
  Speaker 1: is divided into and it's the dominant party, right, Well,
• 1:50:13
  Speaker 1: back then it was the Texas Democratic Party that was
• 1:50:15
  Speaker 1: the dominant party, and they were divided into So here's
• 1:50:20
  Speaker 1: where things got a bit interesting, and how John Tower
• 1:50:22
  Speaker 1: has Democrats to thank for becoming the first Republican senator.
• 1:50:26
  Speaker 1: Texas Democratic partly was very, very divided between the Liberals
• 1:50:29
  Speaker 1: and the Conservatives, and the Liberals had been losing their
• 1:50:32
  Speaker 1: own primary for years. The Conservatives were well backed. Blakely
• 1:50:37
  Speaker 1: represented everything that they hated about the so called conservative establishment.
• 1:50:41
  Speaker 1: He opposed Third Good Marshal's appointment to a federal jug ship.
• 1:50:44
  Speaker 1: He was hostile to organize labor. He was, in the
• 1:50:47
  Speaker 1: view of Texas liberals, a conservative masquerading as a Democrat.
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 1: But this was Southern conservatives back then would end up
• 1:50:54
  Speaker 1: being Republican by the nineteen eighties. Now, some of the
• 1:50:57
  Speaker 1: liberals strategists made a cold calculation in the sixty one
• 1:51:00
  Speaker 1: special better to let a conservative Democrat lose to a
• 1:51:03
  Speaker 1: Republican than keep propping up the conservative wing of the
• 1:51:06
  Speaker 1: Democratic Party. The theory was that if the conservative Democrats
• 1:51:10
  Speaker 1: kept losing general elections, they'd eventually just migrate to the
• 1:51:13
  Speaker 1: Republican Party, where they belonged ideologically, and they'd leave the
• 1:51:17
  Speaker 1: Texas Democratic Party to its liberal wing. Well, congrats, Texas Democrats,
• 1:51:22
  Speaker 1: you pulled it off eventually. How did that work out?
• 1:51:25
  Speaker 1: But I digress. So enough liberal Democrats crossed over and
• 1:51:28
  Speaker 1: voted for Tower. Tower wins the runof by about ten
• 1:51:31
  Speaker 1: thousand votes, and he becomes the first Republican Senator from
• 1:51:35
  Speaker 1: Texas since reconstruction. Of course, it is worth noting the
• 1:51:40
  Speaker 1: Conservatives didn't just leave the Democratic Party. They took Texas
• 1:51:43
  Speaker 1: with them to the Republicans, and Tower was the first
• 1:51:46
  Speaker 1: domino in a realignment that ended with Democrats shut out
• 1:51:49
  Speaker 1: of statewide office for now thirty two years.
• 1:51:52
  Speaker 3: In county.
• 1:51:54
  Speaker 1: Anyway, Tower's victory cracked the Democratic slid south than Texas
• 1:51:57
  Speaker 1: for the first time. The State Republican Party mediately got
• 1:52:00
  Speaker 1: to double its budget, hired an actual staff, moved its
• 1:52:03
  Speaker 1: headquarters to Austin. They realized that they could actually become
• 1:52:07
  Speaker 1: a competitive second political party. Tower would serve twenty four
• 1:52:11
  Speaker 1: years in the Senate, ended up chair of Armed Services,
• 1:52:14
  Speaker 1: mentored a generation of Texas Republican operatives, became a major
• 1:52:17
  Speaker 1: figure in Cold War defense policy. Ended up essentially being
• 1:52:21
  Speaker 1: humiliated out of politics in a very When he was
• 1:52:24
  Speaker 1: nominated to be Defense Secretary by George H. W. Bush,
• 1:52:29
  Speaker 1: his drinking became a big story. He withdraws, he ends
• 1:52:34
  Speaker 1: up not getting actually he did. The Senate rejected him.
• 1:52:39
  Speaker 1: It was so unusually. He actually went for a voke
• 1:52:41
  Speaker 1: becaus he was a sitting senator. Senate rejected him and
• 1:52:48
  Speaker 1: Dick Cheney would be the backup plan for Defense Secretary.
• 1:52:51
  Speaker 1: Tower himself would die two years after being rejected by
• 1:52:54
  Speaker 1: the Senate. But the most important thing to know about
• 1:52:58
  Speaker 1: this race is the sixty one victory modern Texas. The
• 1:53:01
  Speaker 1: modern Republican Texas Republican Party was born with that sixty
• 1:53:05
  Speaker 1: one special election victory, and the number one race on
• 1:53:10
  Speaker 1: my list of all timers is the nineteen forty eight
• 1:53:13
  Speaker 1: Texas Democratic Senate primary, LBJ beats Coke Stevenson by eighty
• 1:53:20
  Speaker 1: seven votes, eighty seven votes out of nearly one million casts.
• 1:53:25
  Speaker 1: If those eighty seven votes go the other way, Lyndon
• 1:53:28
  Speaker 1: Johnson probably never becomes president. So you could argue it's
• 1:53:32
  Speaker 1: the most consequential eighty seven votes in American political history.
• 1:53:36
  Speaker 1: Does the Civil Rights Act pass, let alone get signed
• 1:53:40
  Speaker 1: by LBJ. So let me give you a little backstory.
• 1:53:44
  Speaker 1: By nineteen forty eight, LBJ had served eleven years in
• 1:53:47
  Speaker 1: the House of Representatives. He was a protegee of FDR.
• 1:53:49
  Speaker 1: He was a new dealer, fierce operator in the new
• 1:53:53
  Speaker 1: deal in the FDR machine. But he'd figure something. House
• 1:53:56
  Speaker 1: in the House, you climb the seniority ladder, but you
• 1:53:58
  Speaker 1: have to wait. The Senate was where he thought real
• 1:54:00
  Speaker 1: power in Congress lived, and he didn't have to wait
• 1:54:04
  Speaker 1: for seniority. And Johnson didn't have patience for waiting. He'd
• 1:54:07
  Speaker 1: already run for the Senate once in nineteen forty one,
• 1:54:09
  Speaker 1: and he lost a race that was itself probably stolen
• 1:54:11
  Speaker 1: from him. So he decided he wasn't going to wait
• 1:54:14
  Speaker 1: any longer. So who was Coke Stevenson? This is important
• 1:54:18
  Speaker 1: context because Stevenson wasn't some unknown challenger. He was one
• 1:54:22
  Speaker 1: of the most formidable politicians in Texas history. As Robert
• 1:54:25
  Speaker 1: Carrow in the Incredible biographical series on Johnson, he notes
• 1:54:31
  Speaker 1: that Stevenson had run for public office twelve times, County judge,
• 1:54:34
  Speaker 1: state legislator, Speaker of the House, lieutenant governor, governor. He
• 1:54:37
  Speaker 1: never lost, not once. When Texas legislator summed it up simply,
• 1:54:41
  Speaker 1: Coke Stevenson was just like Coca Cola. He was quiet,
• 1:54:45
  Speaker 1: deeply conservative, personally incorruptible. He projected an image of a
• 1:54:50
  Speaker 1: man who didn't need to seek power. Power just came
• 1:54:52
  Speaker 1: to him. He'd spent all of nineteen forty seven on
• 1:54:55
  Speaker 1: his ranch, and friends had talked him in to run it.
• 1:54:58
  Speaker 1: Johnson ran one of the first his modern campaigns in
• 1:55:01
  Speaker 1: American history. He was the first candidate in Texas to
• 1:55:03
  Speaker 1: campaign by helicopter. He swooped into small towns from the air,
• 1:55:07
  Speaker 1: drawing crowds, working them with his volcanic energy, moving on
• 1:55:12
  Speaker 1: before the next stop. He broadcasts statewide radio nearly every day.
• 1:55:16
  Speaker 1: Right Being connected to that fledgling radio industry was a
• 1:55:20
  Speaker 1: huge so he run a modern media campaign and a
• 1:55:23
  Speaker 1: barnstorming campaign, and the contrast in styles was itself part
• 1:55:28
  Speaker 1: of the campaign. One man was the future, one man
• 1:55:31
  Speaker 1: was the past. So the fight between Johnson and Stevenson
• 1:55:35
  Speaker 1: wasn't just personal. It reflected a genuine ideological divide inside
• 1:55:39
  Speaker 1: the Texas Democratic Party. Stevenson was aligned with the anti
• 1:55:42
  Speaker 1: Truman faction, the Texas Regulars as they were called Conservative Democrats,
• 1:55:46
  Speaker 1: who opposed both FDR and Truman's New Deal liberalism and
• 1:55:50
  Speaker 1: were sympathetic to the emerging Dixiecraft movement. Johnson was aligned
• 1:55:54
  Speaker 1: with the pro Truman Texas Loyalists. They were labor backed,
• 1:55:58
  Speaker 1: they were the New Deal wing of the party. So
• 1:56:00
  Speaker 1: Truman understood what was at stake. His entire national operation
• 1:56:03
  Speaker 1: back Johnson, and in late September eighteen forty eight, right
• 1:56:06
  Speaker 1: in the middle of the contested post election period, Truman
• 1:56:11
  Speaker 1: brought his famous whistlestop campaign through Texas. Johnson and Truman
• 1:56:15
  Speaker 1: were photographed together on the back of that train in Austin.
• 1:56:19
  Speaker 1: The image mattered the liberal wing of the National Democratic
• 1:56:21
  Speaker 1: Party had a stake in Johnson winning Stevenson. A Stevenson
• 1:56:24
  Speaker 1: victory would have been a signal that the Dixie krat
• 1:56:27
  Speaker 1: faction was ascended in Texas. Johnson also weaponized the Cold War.
• 1:56:32
  Speaker 1: This was a nineteen forty eight Soviet Union had just
• 1:56:35
  Speaker 1: blockaded Berlin. China was on the verge of falling to
• 1:56:37
  Speaker 1: the Communists. The Alger Hiss spy case was in the news.
• 1:56:40
  Speaker 1: Americans were genuinely frightened. Johnson hammered Stevenson as an isolationist.
• 1:56:46
  Speaker 1: The kind of thinking that he said invited aggression leads
• 1:56:48
  Speaker 1: to appeasement. He explicitly invoked Neville, Chamberlain and Hitler. When
• 1:56:53
  Speaker 1: you don't confront evil early, you end up fighting it
• 1:56:55
  Speaker 1: at home. So for Texas audiences in nineteen forty eight,
• 1:57:00
  Speaker 1: obviously that framing landed. It was also the exact argument
• 1:57:04
  Speaker 1: Truman needed Johnson to be making in the South. Of course,
• 1:57:08
  Speaker 1: the first primary between these gentlemen was in July, and
• 1:57:11
  Speaker 1: it produced no majority. Johnson and Stevenson went on to
• 1:57:14
  Speaker 1: have a runoff on August twenty eighth. On election night,
• 1:57:19
  Speaker 1: Coke Stevenson appeared to have won his lead held as
• 1:57:23
  Speaker 1: returns came in, and then six days after the polls closed,
• 1:57:27
  Speaker 1: officials in jim Wells County reported finding additional ballots Precinct
• 1:57:32
  Speaker 1: thirteen or Box thirteen in the small South Texas town
• 1:57:37
  Speaker 1: of Alice, two hundred and three additional votes two hundred
• 1:57:41
  Speaker 1: for Johnson, three for Stevenson. The names were all written
• 1:57:45
  Speaker 1: in the same handwriting in the same ink in alphabetical order.
• 1:57:51
  Speaker 1: Some of the voters listed were not in town on
• 1:57:53
  Speaker 1: election day, some others were dead. The man behind it
• 1:57:57
  Speaker 1: was a political boss of South Texas named George Parr.
• 1:58:00
  Speaker 1: He was known as the Duke of Duval. Parr controlled
• 1:58:04
  Speaker 1: the machine that ran elections in that part of the state,
• 1:58:06
  Speaker 1: and he decided his allegiance lay with Johnson. The election
• 1:58:10
  Speaker 1: judge who actually created the fraudulent ballots was a man
• 1:58:12
  Speaker 1: named Luis Sallas. He stayed quiet for nearly three decades,
• 1:58:16
  Speaker 1: and then, in nineteen seventy seven, after so many people
• 1:58:19
  Speaker 1: had died LBJ was no longer alive, he sat down
• 1:58:23
  Speaker 1: with an AP reporter named James Mangan and confessed it
• 1:58:26
  Speaker 1: all on tape. Salas said that on Parr's order, he
• 1:58:28
  Speaker 1: had fabricated the last two hundred and two votes from
• 1:58:30
  Speaker 1: Precinct thirteen. Those tape interviews have since been donated to
• 1:58:34
  Speaker 1: the LBJ Presidential Library. You can go listen to him
• 1:58:37
  Speaker 1: yourself anyway, Johnson wins by eighty seven votes landslide lended.
• 1:58:44
  Speaker 1: Stevenson challenged the result all the way to federal court.
• 1:58:48
  Speaker 1: He even hired Frank Hamer, the Texas ranger who had
• 1:58:52
  Speaker 1: killed Bonnie and Clyde, to investigate. Johnson's attorney was Abe Forties,
• 1:58:56
  Speaker 1: successfully argued that federal courts had no jurisdiction over a
• 1:58:59
  Speaker 1: state party primer Fordison should be noted later was rewarded
• 1:59:02
  Speaker 1: with a Supreme Court seat by Lyndon Johnson. Johnson was
• 1:59:07
  Speaker 1: certified the winner the general election in November was against
• 1:59:09
  Speaker 1: a Republican named Jack Porter. Never in doubt, and let's
• 1:59:13
  Speaker 1: just say, without those eighty seven votes, real or manufactured,
• 1:59:16
  Speaker 1: Lyndon Johnson goes, perhaps goes back to the House of
• 1:59:19
  Speaker 1: Representatives or who knows. No Senate career means no Senate
• 1:59:22
  Speaker 1: majority leader, Johnson the most powerful Senate leader of the
• 1:59:25
  Speaker 1: twentieth century. No majority leader means no vice presidential nomination
• 1:59:28
  Speaker 1: in nineteen sixty, no vice president means no President Johnson
• 1:59:31
  Speaker 1: after Dallas. It's amazing. Robert Carroll spent decades documenting this race.
• 1:59:38
  Speaker 1: His conclusion, essentially was the eighty seven vote margin and
• 1:59:41
  Speaker 1: a South Dexas Precinct is one of those moments where
• 1:59:43
  Speaker 1: a tiny contingent event cascades and does something that reshapes
• 1:59:47
  Speaker 1: the world. A butterfly flaps its wings, perhaps illegally, and
• 1:59:53
  Speaker 1: history has changed. So there you go. You see why
• 1:59:56
  Speaker 1: I love campaign history. There's so many incredible stories. So
• 1:59:58
  Speaker 1: those are my top five. Go back and do him again,
• 2:00:01
  Speaker 1: real fast. Number five the two thousand and two governor's race,
• 2:00:04
  Speaker 1: Rick Perry winning only governor yet to win under win
• 2:00:07
  Speaker 1: reelection with less than forty percent of the vote. Number
• 2:00:09
  Speaker 1: four Bush versus Anne Richards, the birth of a President.
• 2:00:12
  Speaker 1: Number three Ma Ferguson's win in nineteen twenty four over Klansmen.
• 2:00:16
  Speaker 1: Number two John Tower, the first Republican to break the
• 2:00:20
  Speaker 1: mold in Texas. And number one, of course, the LBJ
• 2:00:23
  Speaker 1: and the magical eighty seven votes that he wins by
• 2:00:29
  Speaker 1: a few races that didn't make the list that you
• 2:00:31
  Speaker 1: guys might push back on I didn't put in nineteen ninety,
• 2:00:36
  Speaker 1: which was Anne richards victory over Clayton Williams, who basically
• 2:00:41
  Speaker 1: threw the race away when he compared rape to bad
• 2:00:45
  Speaker 1: weather and he said, just sit back and enjoy it.
• 2:00:49
  Speaker 1: Let's just say Republican women abandon him in Moss and
• 2:00:52
  Speaker 1: Texas elected its second woman governor after Ma Ferguson nineteen
• 2:00:57
  Speaker 1: seventy eight, Bill Clements defeats John Helly becomes the first
• 2:01:01
  Speaker 1: Republican governor of Texas since reconstruction. Bill Clements would famously
• 2:01:05
  Speaker 1: be involved with the scandal that would take down the
• 2:01:07
  Speaker 1: SMU football program, and it actually messed with his eighty
• 2:01:11
  Speaker 1: six he wins reelection, and he wins election in eighty six.
• 2:01:15
  Speaker 1: He actually went back and forth with Mark White there.
• 2:01:19
  Speaker 1: But the scandal that took down SMU football also eventually
• 2:01:26
  Speaker 1: would end the political career of Bill Clements. And then
• 2:01:29
  Speaker 1: I could argue nineteen seventy Senate race where George H. W.
• 2:01:33
  Speaker 1: Bush loses to Lloyd Benson. Here's some fun family lore
• 2:01:37
  Speaker 1: for the Bushes. Bush's victory. The Bush victory in ninety
• 2:01:40
  Speaker 1: four launches George W. Bush's candidacy for the presidency. In
• 2:01:45
  Speaker 1: nineteen seventy, George HW loses a Senate race to Lloyd Benson.
• 2:01:50
  Speaker 1: Nixon consoles him after being recruited by Nixon to challenge
• 2:01:54
  Speaker 1: at the time a sitting Democratic senator who everybody thought
• 2:01:57
  Speaker 1: was pretty weak named Ralph Yawborough. Well, of course, Lloyd
• 2:02:01
  Speaker 1: Lloyd Benson thought he was weak too, and he beats
• 2:02:03
  Speaker 1: him in a primary, and then Benson beats Bush in
• 2:02:05
  Speaker 1: the general. But Nixon felt bad that his recruited candidate Leod,
• 2:02:11
  Speaker 1: so he gave him a succession of appointments you an ambassador,
• 2:02:14
  Speaker 1: R and C chair, CIA director, all of those that
• 2:02:18
  Speaker 1: if he if he wins the Senate race, he never
• 2:02:21
  Speaker 1: serves in any of those three capacities, and maybe he
• 2:02:24
  Speaker 1: never has the resume to even be thought of as
• 2:02:28
  Speaker 1: a viable running mate for then Ronald Reagan in nineteen eighty. Anyway,
• 2:02:35
  Speaker 1: there's your there's there's my top five for this week,
• 2:02:37
  Speaker 1: little Texas history campaign history. To me, the five most
• 2:02:42
  Speaker 1: fascinating and consequential camp statewide campaigns in Texas history. What's
• 2:02:47
  Speaker 1: your top five? And go ahead, quiz me tell me
• 2:02:53
  Speaker 1: tell me this great stories of your state. I'm I've
• 2:02:57
  Speaker 1: I've got these in my various archives, and I hope
• 2:03:01
  Speaker 1: to be sharing them with you throughout this campaign, yere.
• 2:03:06
  Speaker 1: I think it'll be a lot of fun, ask Chuck.
• 2:03:18
  Speaker 1: All right, let's get a few questions in here. I'm
• 2:03:21
  Speaker 1: going to try to do. Here's I'm doing four because
• 2:03:25
  Speaker 1: I have four complete questions on my screen, so I'm
• 2:03:27
  Speaker 1: no scrolling. This is how I'm deciding to do it.
• 2:03:30
  Speaker 1: So first question comes from Mike from Honolulu and he asks, Hey,
• 2:03:34
  Speaker 1: thanks for the timely past weekend update, real quick on
• 2:03:38
  Speaker 1: point if mainstream media educates us. On CNN for Reid Zacharia,
• 2:03:41
  Speaker 1: I did a piece August thirty first, twenty twenty five
• 2:03:44
  Speaker 1: that lays out the complex history of the US has
• 2:03:46
  Speaker 1: with Iran. Would appreciate your take on Secretary Pete eggset
• 2:03:49
  Speaker 1: briefing on Monday morning. I felt confusing, not sure if
• 2:03:51
  Speaker 1: he was addressing our armed forces or the public. With
• 2:03:54
  Speaker 1: a gesture that reminded me of King George six over
• 2:03:57
  Speaker 1: and over again, we tried to find a peaceful way out.
• 2:04:00
  Speaker 1: Ron started this, how real are our country's objectives? Thinks
• 2:04:02
  Speaker 1: for all your work, Well, Mike, I think this is
• 2:04:04
  Speaker 1: it's clear that there this is they're searching for a
• 2:04:08
  Speaker 1: rationale that they think the public will buy. They you know,
• 2:04:14
  Speaker 1: the best reason to do this is not a very
• 2:04:17
  Speaker 1: strong rationale to do this, which is they're vulnerable at
• 2:04:21
  Speaker 1: the moment. You're never going to have a time. This
• 2:04:23
  Speaker 1: might be the weakest they are and if you want
• 2:04:26
  Speaker 1: to do regime change, this may be the best time
• 2:04:28
  Speaker 1: to do it. That's not you know, right when you
• 2:04:32
  Speaker 1: can't tell the truth on your rationale and you start
• 2:04:36
  Speaker 1: looking for others, Well, they could be this, and they
• 2:04:38
  Speaker 1: could be that, and they could be this. It starts
• 2:04:41
  Speaker 1: to look an awful lot like Iraq. And I think
• 2:04:43
  Speaker 1: that's what they're stumbling into here. And you know, they're
• 2:04:47
  Speaker 1: finding out that all of a sudden, look at how
• 2:04:49
  Speaker 1: many Middle Look how many countries in the Middle East
• 2:04:51
  Speaker 1: have already been hit with stray stray fire, intentional arms.
• 2:05:01
  Speaker 1: What we get four or five countries already? This could
• 2:05:04
  Speaker 1: quickly get out of control in a hurry. And I
• 2:05:09
  Speaker 1: think that this they're really struggling with the rationale because
• 2:05:13
  Speaker 1: the rationale is thin. There isn't a lot of you know,
• 2:05:17
  Speaker 1: you want to talk about questioning the intelligence behind the
• 2:05:21
  Speaker 1: WMD during the run up to the Iraq War, where's
• 2:05:24
  Speaker 1: the intelligence that indicates where they were with their nuclear
• 2:05:29
  Speaker 1: and reconstituting the nuclear programmer where they were in ballistic
• 2:05:32
  Speaker 1: missiles essentially about the best case. I feel like I've
• 2:05:36
  Speaker 1: heard from Rubio and Hank Set doesn't have it. I mean,
• 2:05:39
  Speaker 1: he's just not very good at this, and he doesn't
• 2:05:42
  Speaker 1: have a great grasp of history either, so I think
• 2:05:44
  Speaker 1: he really struggles here. But if you listen to Rubio,
• 2:05:47
  Speaker 1: you know the essentially it's a preemptive strike against a
• 2:05:55
  Speaker 1: country that has the ambition to attack us but doesn't
• 2:06:02
  Speaker 1: have the means yet, and it goes back. I think
• 2:06:05
  Speaker 1: we all thought we learned a lesson about pre emptive wars.
• 2:06:10
  Speaker 1: But I have to tell you this. I'll tell you
• 2:06:12
  Speaker 1: something that I'm really one of the other rationales that
• 2:06:15
  Speaker 1: I think say terrible rationale. I don't buy it at all,
• 2:06:18
  Speaker 1: but I really hate that they're pushing this one. I'll
• 2:06:20
  Speaker 1: just be honest with you here personally, because I think
• 2:06:23
  Speaker 1: it impacts a lot of Jewish Americans, which is Rubio
• 2:06:29
  Speaker 1: seemed to say, well, Israel was going to do it
• 2:06:31
  Speaker 1: regardless of what we did, and we were going to
• 2:06:33
  Speaker 1: get drawn in any way, so we might as well
• 2:06:34
  Speaker 1: be there at the beginning. And you're just sitting there
• 2:06:36
  Speaker 1: going so you're telling the American people that Israel's making
• 2:06:40
  Speaker 1: this decision for the United States. What are you doing?
• 2:06:44
  Speaker 1: You want to talk about stoking more of this of
• 2:06:50
  Speaker 1: this sentiment out here that to me is in some places,
• 2:06:53
  Speaker 1: overdone and overcooked in some places, and the conspiracy theories
• 2:06:57
  Speaker 1: that it's this, it's Israel that drives our pe policy,
• 2:07:01
  Speaker 1: and then you go out there and say it's Israel
• 2:07:03
  Speaker 1: that drove our policy decision here. If that's the case,
• 2:07:08
  Speaker 1: then don't be surprised if you if you know, now
• 2:07:11
  Speaker 1: you know we're all wondering why is there a rise
• 2:07:14
  Speaker 1: in anti Semitism, a rise in anti Jewish rhetoric, and
• 2:07:19
  Speaker 1: how it gets conflated with anti Israel rhetoric. Well, when
• 2:07:24
  Speaker 1: you now say, use a rationale essentially saying that Israel
• 2:07:29
  Speaker 1: is going to do this regardless of what we did,
• 2:07:31
  Speaker 1: so we chose to go with them. You know you
• 2:07:34
  Speaker 1: already have you have critics and the left and the
• 2:07:38
  Speaker 1: right who are very skeptical of having Israel Israel's national
• 2:07:46
  Speaker 1: security concerns become America's national security concerns. So that again,
• 2:07:54
  Speaker 1: I think this administration searching for a rationale because the
• 2:07:57
  Speaker 1: real rationale is very hard to sell, which is, hey,
• 2:08:01
  Speaker 1: they were weak and we thought we can get them
• 2:08:03
  Speaker 1: in a moment. And oh, by the way, the Saudis
• 2:08:06
  Speaker 1: thought this was the best idea and the sad So
• 2:08:08
  Speaker 1: it's not that much better that the Saudis were pushing
• 2:08:12
  Speaker 1: us either, which you know when you realize that the
• 2:08:15
  Speaker 1: Saudis are funding the businesses of the President's son and
• 2:08:19
  Speaker 1: his son in law, Jared Kushner. And oh, by the way,
• 2:08:21
  Speaker 1: Jared Kushner was one of the negotiators with the Iranians
• 2:08:26
  Speaker 1: on trying to have a diplomatic exit ramp here so
• 2:08:30
  Speaker 1: that we didn't end up in war. Yet his biggest
• 2:08:33
  Speaker 1: financial benefactor, the Sovereign Fund of Saudi Arabia, the Crown Prince,
• 2:08:38
  Speaker 1: is lobbying the President to take out Iran. Now this
• 2:08:41
  Speaker 1: is the moment to strike. That's incredibly disconcerting when you
• 2:08:49
  Speaker 1: start to follow the money and connecting those dots on
• 2:08:53
  Speaker 1: that front. So bottom line, I think they're flailing at them.
• 2:09:00
  Speaker 1: And again I go back to something I said to
• 2:09:02
  Speaker 1: Chris Eliza earlier. The biggest problem Trump has right now
• 2:09:08
  Speaker 1: is the best, the best news that he could get
• 2:09:12
  Speaker 1: from this war has already passed, and it's the death
• 2:09:14
  Speaker 1: of Kamane. There is no other announcement of news that
• 2:09:20
  Speaker 1: is going to move the public that's more than the
• 2:09:24
  Speaker 1: death of Kamane. And so every the longer this goes,
• 2:09:29
  Speaker 1: it is this is again, it's it's at best this
• 2:09:32
  Speaker 1: is a neutral political problem for him. But the most
• 2:09:35
  Speaker 1: likely scenarios that this is a net negative across the board,
• 2:09:39
  Speaker 1: whether it's in his own party and it starts an
• 2:09:41
  Speaker 1: intra party debate inside his own party or with the
• 2:09:44
  Speaker 1: vast middle. And we've seen independents look like Democrats in
• 2:09:49
  Speaker 1: their opposition in the early polling. I've seen on a rock.
• 2:09:54
  Speaker 1: All right. Next question comes from Frank and New Jersey
• 2:09:56
  Speaker 1: SYS regular listener here, first time emailer. Hey, I know
• 2:09:59
  Speaker 1: Congress is considering more Powers Act to restrain what the
• 2:10:01
  Speaker 1: president can do. Of course it won't be signed by
• 2:10:03
  Speaker 1: the president even if it passes. But why is it
• 2:10:05
  Speaker 1: that even is that even needed? If the power of
• 2:10:07
  Speaker 1: war is already with Congress for the Constitution. So how
• 2:10:09
  Speaker 1: would Congress restrain the president? Do they bring it to
• 2:10:11
  Speaker 1: the courts? Can they only act through impeachment? Well they cannot.
• 2:10:15
  Speaker 1: I know they've got the power of the purse. So
• 2:10:18
  Speaker 1: in theory they could withhold appropriations they could not fund,
• 2:10:24
  Speaker 1: or they could withhold appropriations the next time Defense comes in,
• 2:10:27
  Speaker 1: because guess what the Pentagon's going to ask for a
• 2:10:30
  Speaker 1: supplemental This is an unbudgeted this was an unplanned war,
• 2:10:34
  Speaker 1: and we're going to have depleted our munitions, and you know,
• 2:10:38
  Speaker 1: we're already doing a sort of backdoor sale of arms
• 2:10:44
  Speaker 1: to Ukraine via NATO, because Trump doesn't look like he's
• 2:10:47
  Speaker 1: directing directly giving selling weapons to Ukraine, he's doing it
• 2:10:53
  Speaker 1: through NATO. So there's no doubt that the Defense Department
• 2:10:57
  Speaker 1: is going to come to Congress with the request for
• 2:10:59
  Speaker 1: supplemental So in theory, it's it's simply the power of
• 2:11:02
  Speaker 1: the purse. That is where they where they can have
• 2:11:04
  Speaker 1: the most leverage. But you know, this this until a president.
• 2:11:13
  Speaker 1: You know, there's a lot of presidential legal scholar that
• 2:11:16
  Speaker 1: doesn't accept the premise of the War Powers Act at
• 2:11:18
  Speaker 1: all anyway, and that it isn't fully tested in the Constitution,
• 2:11:24
  Speaker 1: and that hasn't been tested in supring court. So it's like,
• 2:11:29
  Speaker 1: is this a war? Is this something else? You know,
• 2:11:33
  Speaker 1: I think every time he calls it a war, he's
• 2:11:35
  Speaker 1: proving how unconstitutional this action is. It looks more illegal
• 2:11:40
  Speaker 1: or unconstitutional than than than finding a through line to
• 2:11:45
  Speaker 1: make this to make this constitutional. And I don't see it.
• 2:11:49
  Speaker 1: But you know, Congress has ceded so much authority to
• 2:11:53
  Speaker 1: the president when it comes to the use of the military,
• 2:11:58
  Speaker 1: and then there's you know these well, as long as
• 2:12:00
  Speaker 1: you inform Congress, well, what is the definition of informing Congress?
• 2:12:03
  Speaker 1: Is it just informing the leadership or is informing all
• 2:12:05
  Speaker 1: of Congress? But look, impeachment's the most extreme measure that
• 2:12:10
  Speaker 1: they have. But they have the power of the purse,
• 2:12:13
  Speaker 1: and I'll be very curious to see how the supplemental
• 2:12:16
  Speaker 1: support goes. I mean, it's usually unpopular not to pay
• 2:12:19
  Speaker 1: the troops, so ultimately you know it, you know, there's
• 2:12:24
  Speaker 1: usually that gets weaponized and makes it a very very
• 2:12:27
  Speaker 1: tough vote. But I that I'm not ruling out that
• 2:12:33
  Speaker 1: that becomes a very close vote when and it's inevitable
• 2:12:37
  Speaker 1: they have to They've got there, We're going to we
• 2:12:40
  Speaker 1: have munitions issues that this is going to put us
• 2:12:42
  Speaker 1: through four to six weeks. You know, the Department of
• 2:12:46
  Speaker 1: Defense is going to be begging for an appropriation supplement
• 2:12:50
  Speaker 1: and that's where Congress in theory, could have real leverage
• 2:12:54
  Speaker 1: if they if they so choose to use it, which
• 2:12:57
  Speaker 1: of course we know most Congresses don't. Next question comes
• 2:13:02
  Speaker 1: from John from Annapolis and he writes, Hey, I'm a
• 2:13:04
  Speaker 1: big fan of the show glad to have more options
• 2:13:06
  Speaker 1: now for how to get your take on what's happening
• 2:13:09
  Speaker 1: and what's happened as I work on my taxes and
• 2:13:11
  Speaker 1: see the amount I pay, it adds a certain sting
• 2:13:13
  Speaker 1: to the news regarding how our tax dollars are being
• 2:13:15
  Speaker 1: spent on this new war. Yeah, I bet it was
• 2:13:17
  Speaker 1: widely noted that the administration waited until after the stock
• 2:13:20
  Speaker 1: market closed to launch strikes in Iran, signaling at least
• 2:13:23
  Speaker 1: some thought to the timing. My question is do you
• 2:13:25
  Speaker 1: think this seemingly optional war would be received better by
• 2:13:28
  Speaker 1: the American public if it were not launched during tax season?
• 2:13:32
  Speaker 1: With affordability already a concern in Trump doing nothing to
• 2:13:35
  Speaker 1: sell the American people on the return on investment of
• 2:13:37
  Speaker 1: starting a war with Iran, it seems waiting until summer
• 2:13:39
  Speaker 1: might have been the better option from a messaging standpoint.
• 2:13:42
  Speaker 1: Go terms, I don't see how there's any good with
• 2:13:46
  Speaker 1: this Aran deal. Whether you waited till the summer you
• 2:13:49
  Speaker 1: did it six months ago, I don't know when a
• 2:13:54
  Speaker 1: good timing. Considering where our heads are at as an electorate,
• 2:13:57
  Speaker 1: right and how domess focused I think the voters are
• 2:14:02
  Speaker 1: at the moment. Certainly we have some theoretical fears about
• 2:14:07
  Speaker 1: communist China or terrorism. But I think our day to
• 2:14:11
  Speaker 1: day concern continues to be affordability and continues to be
• 2:14:15
  Speaker 1: sort of you know, I think it's affordability, but it's
• 2:14:18
  Speaker 1: more than that, right, I think the bigger issue in
• 2:14:20
  Speaker 1: which is why it's not affordability alone in the economy,
• 2:14:25
  Speaker 1: I think that that that it's not it's it's you know,
• 2:14:29
  Speaker 1: it's like, well, people have jobs, we aren't they happy?
• 2:14:31
  Speaker 1: Though there's this uncertainty. You know, how secure is my
• 2:14:34
  Speaker 1: job in the age of AI? How secure is my
• 2:14:37
  Speaker 1: job in this in this unstable war, in this unstable
• 2:14:41
  Speaker 1: world that we're in at the moment, especially one that
• 2:14:43
  Speaker 1: feels like we've got a president intentionally making us less
• 2:14:46
  Speaker 1: stable and secure, not more stable and secure. So, you know,
• 2:14:52
  Speaker 1: I don't know if I don't I don't know if
• 2:14:55
  Speaker 1: I buy that it would be any better or worse
• 2:14:57
  Speaker 1: for taxing. But you bring up an important point. Republicans
• 2:15:02
  Speaker 1: that are on the ballot in twenty six are counting
• 2:15:05
  Speaker 1: on tax season to be this positive, to have a
• 2:15:09
  Speaker 1: to be a positive moment for the average American voter
• 2:15:13
  Speaker 1: that they realize, oh, I'm getting a bigger refund and
• 2:15:16
  Speaker 1: all of this, and instead people are going to be
• 2:15:19
  Speaker 1: looking at it going, yeah, you know, my money's getting
• 2:15:23
  Speaker 1: eaten up by higher energy prices. Now, oh, look what
• 2:15:27
  Speaker 1: happened to my What little bit I had in the
• 2:15:30
  Speaker 1: stock market is now collapsing, right like, So, I just
• 2:15:36
  Speaker 1: don't know, I just don't know if it you know, yes,
• 2:15:39
  Speaker 1: I think they've stepped on whatever positive vibe that they
• 2:15:42
  Speaker 1: wanted to get out of tax season, right which they
• 2:15:44
  Speaker 1: wanted people to feel like, hey, look, Donald Trump, put
• 2:15:46
  Speaker 1: more money in your pocket, you can handle this affordability issue,
• 2:15:50
  Speaker 1: and that that would sort of turn things, turn the
• 2:15:52
  Speaker 1: perception of this economy, the country's perception about the Republican
• 2:15:56
  Speaker 1: management of this economy into a positive direction. I do think,
• 2:16:01
  Speaker 1: you know that the folly of this Iran decision and
• 2:16:05
  Speaker 1: I and I use the word folly because I, you know,
• 2:16:07
  Speaker 1: I think it's great that Commenee has gone. I think
• 2:16:10
  Speaker 1: the possibilities in Iran could be great. I just know
• 2:16:15
  Speaker 1: that every time we in history tried to orchestrate a
• 2:16:19
  Speaker 1: regime transition, it just doesn't go well. Uh, And it
• 2:16:23
  Speaker 1: usually is one of those feelings that it's one step forward,
• 2:16:27
  Speaker 1: two steps back, and I think that you know, we're
• 2:16:32
  Speaker 1: seeing why there were so many people quietly preaching caution
• 2:16:37
  Speaker 1: to Trump on Iran. Right. You know you saw me
• 2:16:40
  Speaker 1: share an op ed from John Ellis, a Bush cousin, right,
• 2:16:45
  Speaker 1: part of the Bush clan political observer, longtime political observer
• 2:16:48
  Speaker 1: is terrific substack that you should subscribe called news items,
• 2:16:53
  Speaker 1: where he was making the case, hey, don't do Iran.
• 2:16:56
  Speaker 1: If you if you're looking for an easy, a legacy moment,
• 2:17:01
  Speaker 1: that might be somewhat easy, go to Cuba. But now
• 2:17:06
  Speaker 1: by the time he gets to Cuba, it's after a run.
• 2:17:10
  Speaker 1: He then is going to take away whatever. You know,
• 2:17:12
  Speaker 1: the potential positives that could have come from Cuba are
• 2:17:16
  Speaker 1: just simply lessened. They'll be there in South Florida, don't
• 2:17:18
  Speaker 1: get me wrong, but outside of South Florida this will
• 2:17:22
  Speaker 1: you know, suddenly it becomes Venezuela, Iran and Cuba. And
• 2:17:25
  Speaker 1: that's an entirely different way that the American voter will
• 2:17:28
  Speaker 1: absorb that than if it had been just simply then
• 2:17:31
  Speaker 1: as will in Cuba. All right, last question comes from Kira,
• 2:17:38
  Speaker 1: and she writes, Hey, I love listening to your podcast
• 2:17:41
  Speaker 1: and occasionally my kids here at playing in the kitchen
• 2:17:42
  Speaker 1: while I'm cooking nice How did you handle explaining complex
• 2:17:45
  Speaker 1: political topics, particularly international conflicts, to your own kids when
• 2:17:49
  Speaker 1: they were younger. Of course, each kid in situation is different,
• 2:17:51
  Speaker 1: but I would love your insights. By the way, my
• 2:17:53
  Speaker 1: twelve year old is the one who suggested I ask you. So,
• 2:18:00
  Speaker 1: you know, it's funny you sit there and you think,
• 2:18:03
  Speaker 1: you know, sometimes you just don't bring it up. Sometimes
• 2:18:06
  Speaker 1: you you know, my kids went to elementary school here
• 2:18:11
  Speaker 1: in Arlington, Virginia, and let's just say, you know the
• 2:18:18
  Speaker 1: fact that their dad was on TV and in Arlington, Virginia,
• 2:18:22
  Speaker 1: meet the press is like this. It's like a bigger
• 2:18:25
  Speaker 1: deal in the Washington metro area than it might be
• 2:18:28
  Speaker 1: someone it's like, you know, other places. So you know,
• 2:18:31
  Speaker 1: they they would certainly get these, you know, they would
• 2:18:35
  Speaker 1: always get questions about, well, who's your dad voting for?
• 2:18:38
  Speaker 1: And I remember one time a teacher told me that
• 2:18:40
  Speaker 1: my daughter said in class, I think she was in
• 2:18:42
  Speaker 1: third grade. She said people were begging her, were pounding
• 2:18:47
  Speaker 1: her as your dad a Democrat or a Republican. And
• 2:18:50
  Speaker 1: my daughter would say, my dad's a Democrat and a Republican.
• 2:18:53
  Speaker 1: Because I used to always explain things always from both perspectives.
• 2:18:58
  Speaker 1: That was what my dad did with me. He did
• 2:19:00
  Speaker 1: not he had it and he would say, I believe this,
• 2:19:03
  Speaker 1: here's the here are the two or three arguments about
• 2:19:06
  Speaker 1: a story. And I think I'd like to think he
• 2:19:08
  Speaker 1: presented him pretty honestly. I that would be my I
• 2:19:13
  Speaker 1: would try to try to do my best to explain
• 2:19:15
  Speaker 1: it that way. I think on some of the international stuff,
• 2:19:20
  Speaker 1: I you know, you just sort of know, but I
• 2:19:24
  Speaker 1: guess my my basic advice is don't water it down,
• 2:19:30
  Speaker 1: don't dumb it down. You know, answer every question. And
• 2:19:37
  Speaker 1: I had sort of a simple answer, a sort of
• 2:19:42
  Speaker 1: I'd say, here, well, here's what you might learn in
• 2:19:44
  Speaker 1: school about this soon. And then there's a there's a
• 2:19:47
  Speaker 1: more complicated answer that you know that you know would change,
• 2:19:52
  Speaker 1: and so I kind of, you know, it was never
• 2:19:58
  Speaker 1: I don't want to say I sheltered them from it,
• 2:20:00
  Speaker 1: but I actually tried, you know. It was it was
• 2:20:05
  Speaker 1: more I didn't want to put my kids in the
• 2:20:08
  Speaker 1: position of having to try to answer questions when their
• 2:20:13
  Speaker 1: friends would say, well, what does your dad think about X.
• 2:20:16
  Speaker 1: So there was a time period where in some ways
• 2:20:19
  Speaker 1: we talked very little about it. But when they asked,
• 2:20:23
  Speaker 1: I would just tell them, well, look, I think this
• 2:20:28
  Speaker 1: sometimes if mom and I were on if mom and
• 2:20:31
  Speaker 1: dad were on different sides of it, your mother thinks this,
• 2:20:33
  Speaker 1: or we would say, you know, here're the difference. But
• 2:20:36
  Speaker 1: one of the things that I was obsessed with, and
• 2:20:40
  Speaker 1: my wife was right is right there with me, is
• 2:20:42
  Speaker 1: always explaining it from a three sixty perspective. I said, well,
• 2:20:47
  Speaker 1: here's the flashpoint is this? And so I think it's this,
• 2:20:52
  Speaker 1: But here's where other people will argue that it's this.
• 2:20:56
  Speaker 1: Because I wanted them to understand and I didn't want
• 2:20:59
  Speaker 1: them to be superficial and think that just because somebody
• 2:21:03
  Speaker 1: thought of something differently than I did, that that meant
• 2:21:06
  Speaker 1: that they were stupid or whatever. Right I didn't. I
• 2:21:09
  Speaker 1: didn't want that. So I guess the simplest way to say,
• 2:21:15
  Speaker 1: answer the question as honestly but simply as you can,
• 2:21:19
  Speaker 1: and as they get older, you get to add more context.
• 2:21:24
  Speaker 1: Probably I hope that helps, and I really appreciate the question.
• 2:21:29
  Speaker 1: And with that, I'm gonna go ahead and put a
• 2:21:32
  Speaker 1: pin in this episode. As you could see campaign season,
• 2:21:36
  Speaker 1: I'd like to think, this is what you want, this
• 2:21:38
  Speaker 1: is why you subscribe, we're gonna have, you know, can't
• 2:21:41
  Speaker 1: the campaign coverage. There will be no other podcast that
• 2:21:45
  Speaker 1: goes as in depth, that does as much both history
• 2:21:50
  Speaker 1: and context and all of this. I promise you Nobody
• 2:21:53
  Speaker 1: else will do it like we do it here at
• 2:21:55
  Speaker 1: the Chuck Podcast. So buckle up, it's going to be
• 2:22:00
  Speaker 1: quite and frankly between now and November twenty twenty eight.
• 2:22:05
  Speaker 1: In some ways we're going to be NonStop when it
• 2:22:08
  Speaker 1: comes to campaign season, but it is now here we are,
• 2:22:14
  Speaker 1: and let's just say the Wednesday episodes are going to
• 2:22:17
  Speaker 1: be humdingers, because if it's Tuesday, somebody's going to be
• 2:22:21
  Speaker 1: voting somewhere, and just like we just had with this Tuesday,
• 2:22:24
  Speaker 1: a lot of people are going to be voting,