Speaker 1: Thanks for listening. For earlier access to these episodes, access
Speaker 1: to Ask Me Anything sessions, and extended breakdowns of historical
Speaker 1: and current events, Please consider joining our Warning Premium community
Speaker 1: by clicking the link in the description to this episode.
Speaker 1: I'm very pleased today to be joined by the former
Speaker 1: Democratic Party Chairman of the great State of Ohio, David Pepper,
Speaker 1: an author of multiple books, including his latest, Saving Democracy,
Speaker 1: a user's manual for every American. Welcome David Pepper.
Speaker 2: Thank you, it's honored to be with you. Steve.
Speaker 1: David, you were the chairman Democratic Chairman, Democratic Party Chairman
Speaker 1: of the state of Ohio, which has become a Republican
Speaker 1: state in recent years, but up through the two thousand
Speaker 1: and four Bush election, which I was part of. In
Speaker 1: two thousand and eight, was considered to be the really
Speaker 1: top swing state along with Florida that decided the election.
Speaker 1: Just in a nutshell, what happened. This was a state
Speaker 1: that narrowly went to George Bush in two thousand and four,
Speaker 1: Barack Obama in two thousand and eight, to Donald Trump
Speaker 1: by two thousand and sixteen, and coming into twenty twenty four,
Speaker 1: this looks like a Republican state except for and we'll
Speaker 1: talk about that in a minute, some of the overreach
Speaker 1: of the party and in the election snapback, but in
Speaker 1: a nutshell for people who are not from Ohio, talk
Speaker 1: about what happened, and then secondly, talk about how corrupt
Speaker 1: the state has become under the one party rule of
Speaker 1: the Ohio Republican Party.
Speaker 2: Sure, and a great question, and it brings back painful
Speaker 2: memories when you were celebrated. I wasn't four all day.
Speaker 2: We were being told that Carrie was going to win,
Speaker 2: and I was out of the poll trying to help.
Speaker 2: But big picture, you know, I think it's fair to
Speaker 2: say that Ohio always lean, has always leaned a couple
Speaker 2: points to the right, and only it's been quite fifty
Speaker 2: to fifty, especially for state out sorry, state level elections,
Speaker 2: you know, governor others. So if you're winning Ohio as
Speaker 2: a Democrat, you're gonna win. You're going to win the country.
Speaker 2: But it's it's not a fifty to fifty proposition to begin.
Speaker 2: It's a little bit uphill from there. But obviously good
Speaker 2: candidates think Barack Obama could win it. What's happened, you know,
Speaker 2: A couple of things. One, I mean, there is there
Speaker 2: we have become a bellweather. Now I'm afraid of how
Speaker 2: you can use the powers of state government to make
Speaker 2: a state hard to win if you're a Democrat. The
Speaker 2: old old margins of victory that wet Barack Obama, for example,
Speaker 2: enjoyed in eight and twelve have been made far more
Speaker 2: difficult by pretty relentless purging of voters in Ohio. That's
Speaker 2: made the margins harder to achieve. You know, Hillary Clinton
Speaker 2: and Joe Biden both won Cuyahoga County by a greater
Speaker 2: percentage of registered voters than Barack Obama did, but because
Speaker 2: there's so many fewer registered voters thanks to years of purging,
Speaker 2: their actual raw vote margins were lower significantly than Barack Obama.
Speaker 2: So the base of Ohio's Democratic side has actually got
Speaker 2: a little smaller. And you could blame Democrats that are
Speaker 2: not firing up the base enough, but we also know
Speaker 2: that purging's part of that. There's no doubt that Donald
Speaker 2: Trump also, though, really started a fire in parts of
Speaker 2: the state that weren't turning out as much true rural
Speaker 2: but also flip some areas like the Valley to some degree,
Speaker 2: and all the way down the Ohio River on the
Speaker 2: east side of the state that Ted Strickland used to
Speaker 2: win handily. So our base has gotten smaller through purging
Speaker 2: and less energized voters. And Donald Trump took a part
Speaker 2: of the state that used to vote for Democrats and
Speaker 2: has moved it in some case because he's talked about
Speaker 2: issues like trade in the way that Democrats there used
Speaker 2: to talk about it. And you add that up in
Speaker 2: a state that used to be more swing has gotten
Speaker 2: harder to win. So you put those two together, it's harder.
Speaker 2: But it doesn't mean that a Sheriff Brown couldn't win
Speaker 2: in twenty four And it also means that Tim Ryan
Speaker 2: people don't give him enough credit. Tim Ryan lost by
Speaker 2: six when the governor candidate lost by twenty six, massive overperformance.
Speaker 2: That's a winning effort in a normal year with good turnouts.
Speaker 2: So it's still achievable for a Democrat, but it's gotten
Speaker 2: a lot harder with some of the trends I talked about.
Speaker 1: Well, Tim's a good friend of mine and I was
Speaker 1: involved in that race and it was as good a
Speaker 1: political campaign as I've ever been involved in. But you
Speaker 1: just you just can't win if the top of the
Speaker 1: ticket goes down by by twenty six points.
Speaker 3: And and I had a theory about that race, and it
Speaker 3: was that Mike DeWine, I think was evaluated by Ohio
Speaker 3: voters as he's been around for a long time.
Speaker 1: He's not going to do anything to particularly make my
Speaker 1: life more difficult. He's drama free. But not so long
Speaker 1: after the election here right where we're two years after
Speaker 1: or less than a year after. You know, the governor
Speaker 1: has seen seemed to be on his back. Heels uh
Speaker 1: to be severely weakened, and the Republican extremists in Ohio
Speaker 1: have overreached and been severely rebuked in recent weeks. And
Speaker 1: why don't you talk about that, talk about the issue
Speaker 1: and how you see that as a party chairman, as
Speaker 1: the winds are blowing out there that may well be
Speaker 1: contrary to what we're constantly told is going to happen
Speaker 1: from Washington, d C. Which rarely ever does.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, let me just say, Mike the Wine benefited
Speaker 2: from this long time image of being an old type
Speaker 2: of Republican, the more moderate one. He was actually quite
Speaker 2: responsible during COVID and I think versus Tim, Mike the
Speaker 2: Wine did very well in suburbs that Tim then ended
Speaker 2: up winning tim Ran ended up winning as well, so
Speaker 2: he really benefited from a responsible response to COVID that
Speaker 2: got a lot of credit with more moderate voters, including women.
Speaker 2: That's all dramatically changed since the second term began. We
Speaker 2: are now a bellweather, not as to who's win the presidency.
Speaker 2: We have become a bellweather as to what it looks
Speaker 2: like when a far right group of extremists takes over
Speaker 2: your state through a Jerrymaer state house. That's what we
Speaker 2: now represent and what this is why I wrote this
Speaker 2: first book called Laboratories of Autocracy. We are what happened.
Speaker 2: We are what can happen to a state that's been
Speaker 2: generally moderate when it's been hijacked by a jerrymannered extremist group.
Speaker 2: And that's why what we are seeing and living in
Speaker 2: Ohio is just like Missouri. It's just like Tennessee, and
Speaker 2: it's a downward spiral. And what was so great in
Speaker 2: what we see in states like Ohio is cowardly moderates
Speaker 2: who know better, like Mike DeWine and John Hughestead and
Speaker 2: others in Portman before them. They never stand up to it,
Speaker 2: and so the far right takes over these states. And
Speaker 2: what issue one was was a far right kind of
Speaker 2: a jail break. Try to say, Okay, we are living
Speaker 2: in these extremist legislative districts, we want to pass things
Speaker 2: that we know the people of how don't agree with.
Speaker 2: And because we've gotten away with jerrymandering, because the state
Speaker 2: Supreme Court is in the same hands of the party
Speaker 2: that controls our state House, we know that the only
Speaker 2: check on us, on our extremism and our lack of accountability,
Speaker 2: the only check are the people themselves going to the Constitution.
Speaker 2: And these greedy right wingers said, we're gonna get rid
Speaker 2: of that check too. We don't want any checks left.
Speaker 2: And the great and Mike DeWine, like he always does,
Speaker 2: like he did with Jerry Mannering, went along with all
Speaker 2: of it. And the great news last week is, and
Speaker 2: this is really important, a multi partisan coalition of people
Speaker 2: Democrats of course, but independence and a whole lot of
Speaker 2: Republicans and a whole lot of counties that you guys
Speaker 2: would have been planned on winning. And oh Ford, since
Speaker 2: when you were running those campaigns, said hell no, we
Speaker 2: may not agree on everything, but we see this for
Speaker 2: what it is. It's a power grab by extremists. To
Speaker 2: destroy a house democracy. We're not for it, we're voting
Speaker 2: it down. That's why Casey was against it. That's why
Speaker 2: Bob Taff was against it. That's why Democrats were against it.
Speaker 2: And you'll love this, Steve being having run in Ohio,
Speaker 2: that's where Delaware County. That's why Delaware County voted against it.
Speaker 2: That's why Portage County, that's why Butler County, a very
Speaker 2: republican large county, fifty to fifty, it almost reached a majority. Know,
Speaker 2: And so you saw this really broad. I would say
Speaker 2: it's sort of a new pro democracy coalition saying we
Speaker 2: see what this is. We may be Republicans, but this
Speaker 2: is not what democracy is about. And they joined hands
Speaker 2: with independent Democrats and we felt the thing. So it
Speaker 2: was a great day. That was basically Mike the Wine
Speaker 2: allowed himself to be taken in by the far right
Speaker 2: like he always does, and people saw it as a
Speaker 2: far right attackle democracy and it was rejected accordingly, which
Speaker 2: was obviously a great day, not just for Ohio but
Speaker 2: across the country.
Speaker 1: And what's the fallout, excuse me, what's the fallout been?
Speaker 1: Since people, the far right politicians who brought this to
Speaker 1: Ohio voters tried to foist it on them, are saying,
Speaker 1: what about it? Are they chasing it all?
Speaker 2: No? Again, most of these people have in their entire careers,
Speaker 2: especially the state House members, never been in the world democracy.
Speaker 2: They've been in districts that they cannot lose. So their
Speaker 2: reaction isn't just like nothing they do is the behavior
Speaker 2: you'd expect any normal democracy. Their reaction is not also
Speaker 2: what you'd expect normal democracy. What would you and I do?
Speaker 2: And if we were in anything close to competitive districts
Speaker 2: and this happened, we'd say, the voters are spoken, we've
Speaker 2: learned our lesson, We're going to eat some humble pie.
Speaker 2: We'll do things differently. What have they done, like Franklin
Speaker 2: Rose this horrible sector of state we're stuck with, or
Speaker 2: the state Senate president who's basically been in Jerrymaner District's
Speaker 2: whole life, they've basically repeated all the rhetoric that was
Speaker 2: called out by the voters. Well, this is just the
Speaker 2: left wing taking over the Matt Huffman, the Senate President,
Speaker 2: said we're going to do it again. So almost none
Speaker 2: of the people really in charge of this thing have
Speaker 2: learned a lesson in Franklin Rose and you'll recognize this behavior.
Speaker 2: He's now in a primary for Senate, so he's tripling
Speaker 2: down on the rhetoric because he wants to grab as
Speaker 2: many the Yes voters as he can for his own primary.
Speaker 2: So they have to learn the thing. Now, what what
Speaker 2: is the side for democracy? Need to learn? We need
Speaker 2: to learn that when we when we when we break
Speaker 2: bread across all sorts of divides to protect democracy, we
Speaker 2: can win. So we need to win. We need to
Speaker 2: learn our lesson, even as the other side clearly, stubbornly
Speaker 2: in some cases, with a whole lot of whining, failed
Speaker 2: to learn their lesson, which is, you go for broth
Speaker 2: throughtect democracy in the state of Ohio, You're going to lose.
Speaker 1: Do you do you have any sense of Trump deflating
Speaker 1: at all in Ohio with normal people, either by fatigue
Speaker 1: over the accumulation of criminal accusations, fatigue over the constancy
Speaker 1: of the news coverage, or just fatigue over Trump demand.
Speaker 2: Anecdotally, I'd say yes. I mean I think he will
Speaker 2: win big in the Republican prime. I think his endorsement
Speaker 2: in the Senate primary like it did you know, saving
Speaker 2: a JD. Vance, who is mired a third or fourth
Speaker 2: depending on the day. I think his endorsement in the
Speaker 2: Republican primary here probably settles that primary. But more broadly,
Speaker 2: I do think I think he's a worse candidate than
Speaker 2: he wasn't either sixteen or twenty, believe it or not,
Speaker 2: because all he's got now is this set of trials
Speaker 2: and these crazy statements about him being our retribution or
Speaker 2: whatever they are. It's not a campaign. I mean, it's
Speaker 2: just almost bizarre. So I have had, you know, family friends,
Speaker 2: die hard Republicans who my guess is didn't didn't voted
Speaker 2: for Trump in sixteen twenty, who now say to me
Speaker 2: things like, I can't even watch him on TV anymore,
Speaker 2: it's too much. Now does that mean that Biden wins Ohio? Maybe?
Speaker 2: I think it means it could be closer. I think
Speaker 2: it means it could be close enough that Sharon wins
Speaker 2: in a way that Tim Ryan couldn't overcome a twenty
Speaker 2: six point deficit. I think the Biden Trump of margin
Speaker 2: is close enough that Shared can win this race. I
Speaker 2: think I would greetly probably will be.
Speaker 1: So.
Speaker 2: I think that there is some and this is true nationally.
Speaker 2: Trump's gotten so sort of far into the bizarreness that
Speaker 2: I think some of his appeal in sixteen about forgotten
Speaker 2: America as he would put it, and some of his
Speaker 2: appeal in twenty I think now it's really down to
Speaker 2: just such a bizarre sort of feel for that campaign,
Speaker 2: the way he talks about it. Everything's backward looking. For example. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I think there's some fatigue here, and I've heard people
Speaker 2: express it literally as I can't even watch my TV
Speaker 2: anymore when he's talking and the person is saying this,
Speaker 2: I'm sensing. Voted for him twice.
Speaker 1: Do you expect him to be the Republican nominee?
Speaker 2: I do, I do. I just one, I think that
Speaker 2: he clearly has a lock on the party two except
Speaker 2: for to their credit, Chris Christy and Asa Hutchinson. The
Speaker 2: others just yes, let's give pench credit. I think he's
Speaker 2: speaking up someone on January sixth, not enough the rest
Speaker 2: of them. You're not going to beat someone who's ahead
Speaker 2: of you if you just basically give them cover. And
Speaker 2: so the top people against him are all basically saying, yeah,
Speaker 2: all these trials are nothing, but you know, the weaponization
Speaker 2: VIAJ like, I just think it's a group of very
Speaker 2: weak candidates. I think this Sandus is especially shown from
Speaker 2: the very beginning. Personally, this is not a major league candidate.
Speaker 2: He just example, Yeah, he's a terrible candidate. As a
Speaker 2: party chair, you are assessing candidates all the time. This
Speaker 2: guy reminds me of the worst candids. He stands in
Speaker 2: the back of the room, can't talk to anybody, Just
Speaker 2: not comfortable his own skin, you know. So I just
Speaker 2: think that the main candidates are weak already. None of
Speaker 2: them really wants to take him on, and the ones
Speaker 2: who are willing to take him on, I'm glad they are,
Speaker 2: but I don't think they're really players. So yeah, I
Speaker 2: expect him through the worst of it. I just don't
Speaker 2: think even the worst situation in terms of the legal
Speaker 2: path he's stuck on right now, divert from him winning
Speaker 2: the primary.
Speaker 1: I was talking to my friend Matthew Dowd last week,
Speaker 1: who's as smart a guy as I've ever met when
Speaker 1: it comes to American politics, and he had a couple
Speaker 1: of observations about the Santas and one was basically, can
Speaker 1: you believe how bad he is at this? And it's
Speaker 1: it's shocking right as a as a national candidate, he's
Speaker 1: kind of been, I think, falsely lifted on this kind
Speaker 1: of hot air of assumptions by the national media absent
Speaker 1: absent any merit. But secondly, what he said was how
Speaker 1: disconnected the politics in Florida has become from from national politics.
Speaker 1: Because if if he's their guy, and and apparently he
Speaker 1: might be judging by the by the size of the
Speaker 1: landslide reelection, Uh, it just doesn't fly in the rest
Speaker 1: of America. And and I wonder when you when you
Speaker 1: look at the Democratic Party, there's something that's not talked
Speaker 1: about enough. In my view seven years on since Trump
Speaker 1: came down the escalator, Trump is beating who exactly right? Meaning?
Speaker 1: What is wrong with a party that it could conceivably
Speaker 1: lose to these people? What is it when you honestly
Speaker 1: look at the Democratic Party? And I come at it
Speaker 1: from a perspective as a former Republican who was always
Speaker 1: a moderate in my politics, that both of these parties
Speaker 1: are extremely important institutions in the history of the country,
Speaker 1: in world history for the advancement of human free eat
Speaker 1: them and democracy. But what is it about the Democratic
Speaker 1: Party that it has become so estranged from so many
Speaker 1: Americans that this mag of movement is seen as any
Speaker 1: type of alternative at all.
Speaker 2: No, that's a that's a great question, and it goes
Speaker 2: back to something I really focus on in the book
Speaker 2: that you mentioned in this Saving Democracy book. You know,
Speaker 2: I think on most of our core issues, we actually
Speaker 2: are in step with mainstream America, you know, a middle
Speaker 2: class based economics, public education, a woman's right to choose.
Speaker 2: But I think in many ways the way we run
Speaker 2: doesn't highlight that. Normally, when the question is called on
Speaker 2: these issues, like in Kansas, we win, or like in
Speaker 2: Ohio last week, we win. But one of my biggest
Speaker 2: sort of passions, if you hear me at all, is
Speaker 2: we got to run everywhere, because if we don't run everywhere,
Speaker 2: we're not communicating what we're for. We're letting them communicate
Speaker 2: who we are without us actually fighting back. And so
Speaker 2: what's happened? And when I say we're not running everywhere,
Speaker 2: that we're not even making an effort anywhere. It's fifty
Speaker 2: percent of the Tennessee Republicans who voted out those two
Speaker 2: justices no opponent the prior November fifty percent of them.
Speaker 2: Basically Oklahoma, it's above sixty, Texas and most states it's
Speaker 2: in the thirty or forty percentage. And when we're not
Speaker 2: in the fight in these areas a, we're not holding
Speaker 2: extremism accountable, and their extremism is a loser. We are
Speaker 2: seeing it lose all over. We saw it lose with
Speaker 2: every election denying sector of state candidate in a swing
Speaker 2: state last November, they lost everywhere. We see it lose
Speaker 2: again when it's exposed and they're bringing it out more
Speaker 2: and more of the Destantus and Trump primary. But if
Speaker 2: we're not in the fight exposing it for what it
Speaker 2: is and then saying what we're they're winning. And they're
Speaker 2: not only winning, they're defining the term. So I'll say
Speaker 2: it in this way. So much I see so much people,
Speaker 2: so many people sorry, taking credit for the good things
Speaker 2: that the Biden and Democratic bills did around infrastructure and
Speaker 2: chips in all these red states. In Ohio, the lieutenant
Speaker 2: governor runs around Ohio and he takes credit for all
Speaker 2: of it. And if you're not running it everywhere, you're
Speaker 2: not even there to raise your hands and say, oh,
Speaker 2: actually you had nothing to do with this, that was
Speaker 2: our side doing it. We're the ones that lifted the
Speaker 2: middle class. We're the ones that invested in infrastructure, and
Speaker 2: so what do they do when we're not running? They
Speaker 2: blame us for problems. They mischaracterized why those problems happen.
Speaker 2: You know, the reason that rural schools are suffering a
Speaker 2: lot of states isn't because of some caravan for Mexico,
Speaker 2: It's because the state houses voted to decrease funding for
Speaker 2: those schools. But if you're not running everywhere, they get
Speaker 2: to blame it on the people that aren't even in
Speaker 2: the game. And then we also aren't taking credit what
Speaker 2: we're doing. So I think that on core issues like
Speaker 2: you go back to and you, I assume agreed with
Speaker 2: me that Joe Biden's State of the State of Union
Speaker 2: was a masterful speech. Almost everything he talked about, you know,
Speaker 2: whether it's economics or social security or whatever, was very
Speaker 2: popular and it was a good speech. The reason they
Speaker 2: shouted him down was they didn't want people to hear
Speaker 2: about unpopular positions they have. But when you're not running everywhere,
Speaker 2: you're not able to give that communication where it needs
Speaker 2: to be heard, and you end up getting turned upside
Speaker 2: down all over. So I think that core messaging and
Speaker 2: core positions are actually quite strong. But we're not executing
Speaker 2: in a way that we're having. Most people in all
Speaker 2: the places you're talking about here are message and so
Speaker 2: I think there's a lot of work to do. And
Speaker 2: this is what I go through this book. Build an
Speaker 2: infrastructure that values running everywhere, that says we want you
Speaker 2: stepping up to run even in tough places. We celebrate
Speaker 2: you as a patriot when you do that. And then
Speaker 2: when you're in those places, message on the things that
Speaker 2: they are doing badly in those places. And all over
Speaker 2: states like Ohio that are corrupt. You mentioned the corruption.
Speaker 2: We have massive corruption Ohio, the biggest bribery scandal in history.
Speaker 2: The former speaker went to jail a month ago or
Speaker 2: two months ago. And every time you see a corrupt state,
Speaker 2: you see terrible outcomes. Ohio public schools who rank fifth
Speaker 2: of the nation fourteen years ago. Now we're in the
Speaker 2: mid twenties. You see small towns collapsing again, not because
Speaker 2: of caravans from Mexico, because of their policies and state
Speaker 2: houses not working. Run everywhere, and then explain to them
Speaker 2: the reason these things are happening is because of their policies,
Speaker 2: and we're going to do better, and that's how you
Speaker 2: have someone like the new Demo Lora Kelly, the second
Speaker 2: term Democratic governor of Kansas. She ran on issues like
Speaker 2: that and won. So I think it all starts with
Speaker 2: a different mindset. Be a national party, run everywhere, hold
Speaker 2: extremists accountable everywhere, and run hard on issues that frustrate
Speaker 2: everyday people that often are not doing well because of
Speaker 2: the policies coming out of these these rig state houses.
Speaker 1: Do you view the extremism and the corruption as deeply linked?
Speaker 2: Absolutely all, It's all once you have a I have
Speaker 2: these little sort of charts I go through in my book.
Speaker 2: Basically they're the two interests who love jerrymandered state houses
Speaker 2: are the extremists national and not just in state. National
Speaker 2: extremists who know that their worldview would lose every time
Speaker 2: in a fair democracy. They know Kansas would be their
Speaker 2: future forever, or Ohio this last week. If you have
Speaker 2: a straight up vote on abortion bands, no exceptions that
Speaker 2: send rape victims to other states, they will lose every time.
Speaker 2: They know it, so they want to They want a
Speaker 2: jerry managed state house. But who also wants a jerrymandered
Speaker 2: state house? The special interests? Because often what do these
Speaker 2: special interests want they want a piece of the public pie.
Speaker 2: When they get the public pie, public outcomes sintegrade, take
Speaker 2: public school money, give it to for profit scams like
Speaker 2: they did in Ohio. They were called doing so the
Speaker 2: public schools decline. So extremism and corruption are literally the
Speaker 2: outgrowths and ultimately the drivers of gerrymandering, because in a
Speaker 2: fair democracy, the corruption wouldn't work, the poor outcomes would
Speaker 2: lead to accountability for the politicians creating those outcomes. Once
Speaker 2: you gerrymander, they know that they can have terrible schools
Speaker 2: and worse health outcomes and no infrastructure and still get
Speaker 2: re elected, just like they know they can pass things
Speaker 2: like abortion bands no exception of rape princess and get
Speaker 2: re elected. So both extremism and the corruption are sort
Speaker 2: of tied to the hip with these with these broken
Speaker 2: state houses. And that's why we see what we see
Speaker 2: in Ohio, a downward spiral of both corruption and extremism.
Speaker 2: And the smart ones know they could you know, think
Speaker 2: of and you again, you've done this longer than I have.
Speaker 2: If you you're a politician, and you have dedicated your
Speaker 2: career to a path of extremism, out of touch with
Speaker 2: your voters, and corruption for which you could be held accountable.
Speaker 2: You have all these screwed up incentives, as in one being,
Speaker 2: keep attacking democracy, because if you ever allowed a fair
Speaker 2: democracy back into your system, back in your district, you
Speaker 2: know that the candidate would beat you by pointing out
Speaker 2: how extreme you are and how corrupt you are. So
Speaker 2: once they're on this course of extremism and corruption, they
Speaker 2: really have this intense incentive to keep gerrymannering. And that's
Speaker 2: why you see these states. People think it can never
Speaker 2: get worse. They can't keep suppressing. They keep gerrymannering. They
Speaker 2: know they have to because they would never survive at
Speaker 2: a fair democracy with records as extreme and as honestly
Speaker 2: corrupt as many of the records are.
Speaker 1: There's a couple of things I want to talk to
Speaker 1: you about, but let me start here. The Trump mag
Speaker 1: of faction in this country. What number do you put
Speaker 1: it at?
Speaker 2: I mean, my sense is it always shows up in
Speaker 2: the some level.
Speaker 1: In the thirties, right, I'll stipulate to thirty five percent.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what I mean.
Speaker 1: And I'll and I'll say thirty five percent of the
Speaker 1: country is into this, wants it, likes it, you know,
Speaker 1: President President for life. Now. The danger for the rest
Speaker 1: of us how that group takes power is them plus
Speaker 1: enough apathy to have a temporary majority where they take
Speaker 1: power and are able to structurally do things from the
Speaker 1: system that make the practice of democracy very, very difficult
Speaker 1: when when you think about how to beat them. I'm
Speaker 1: very concerned right now about something that I see playing out,
Speaker 1: and I wonder what your reaction to it is. First,
Speaker 1: the No Labels organization is not getting as much coverage
Speaker 1: I think as it deserves to get. But secondarily, if
Speaker 1: they are on the level, and that's an if, and
Speaker 1: and by on the level, I mean if they have
Speaker 1: the resources to secure BALLID access, which is a as
Speaker 1: you know, will will be in all fifty states, a
Speaker 1: cost that is that is upwards of one hundred million
Speaker 1: dollars in cash. But but they say they can do it,
Speaker 1: they say they're raising the money to do it. So
Speaker 1: I presume that they can do it, right, that they
Speaker 1: that they're not saying that to go out and fall
Speaker 1: flat on their faces. If they do do it, the
Speaker 1: Democratic Party, the Biden White House doesn't get a vote
Speaker 1: on whether they do it or not. They're in a game.
Speaker 1: Then that's essentially a three way race, and a three
Speaker 1: way race changes the dynamics of the race. One of
Speaker 1: the ways it changes the dynamics is it breaks the
Speaker 1: seventeen state monopoly where presidential races are decided, and it
Speaker 1: expands the field to at least thirty five forty states,
Speaker 1: bringing down the winning threshold right to the high thirties,
Speaker 1: which is a number within reach of Trump's hardcore base.
Speaker 1: So my first question, how concerned are you when you
Speaker 1: hear Washington democrats talk about the race to come talk
Speaker 1: about it in terms that discount the possibility that, in fact,
Speaker 1: the race that's coming doesn't look anything like the race
Speaker 1: they're talking about.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm concerned partly because of no labels, and
Speaker 2: partly more broadly that when we basically only go into
Speaker 2: the states that we think matter in the current conception
Speaker 2: of swing states, we give up so much of the
Speaker 2: battlefield of democracy to the other side. So I am
Speaker 2: actually concerned before we even bring them into the conversation.
Speaker 2: I think that the other side is basically their front
Speaker 2: line of attacking democracy and advancing extremism are the very
Speaker 2: states where we largely aren't there, And because we're not there,
Speaker 2: we make it easy for them, So I think we
Speaker 2: already need to have a much broader strategy. Democracy itself
Speaker 2: is what's at stake right now. If they're using state
Speaker 2: houses to make most of their progress, which they are,
Speaker 2: we should be there anyway. But to your point, yeah,
Speaker 2: the no labels adds a whole new and dangerous wrinkle.
Speaker 2: And I go back. I don't want to claim to
Speaker 2: be a history professor, but there's so much parallel in
Speaker 2: our history to what we're dealing with right now. And
Speaker 2: the biggest parallel with what you're describing is there was
Speaker 2: a pretty serious faction for a number of years against
Speaker 2: allowing white supremacy to retake back over the South. But
Speaker 2: those white supremacists were dedicated, and I don't know what
Speaker 2: the number was, but they were a big number in
Speaker 2: the South. And the reason they end up succeeding is
Speaker 2: they never gave up their unity, and at some point
Speaker 2: the folks that were dedicated to stopping them, like Ulysses Grant,
Speaker 2: who grew up not far from here, are very proud
Speaker 2: of what his work was. Was they divided over other issues,
Speaker 2: and once they allowed their divisions on economic issues and
Speaker 2: other things to divide up what was a majority that
Speaker 2: had been standing up to white supremacy. Once they allowed
Speaker 2: themselves to divide, then the white supremacist in the South
Speaker 2: one and all of a sudden, we had Jim Crow
Speaker 2: for a century, and the same thing could happen here.
Speaker 2: It's mid thirties. It's mid thirties. And if we allow
Speaker 2: the you know, the fifties and sixties that don't agree
Speaker 2: with this guy to divide up in the way that
Speaker 2: you're talking about, in the way that another candidate might
Speaker 2: divide up, we give away a majority that otherwise would prevail.
Speaker 2: And in the history of our country, is you let
Speaker 2: that happen the wrong time and you could be living
Speaker 2: with its consequences for generations.
Speaker 1: I wrote about an Ohio man last week, James Garfield,
Speaker 1: who is not well remembered by the country. But when
Speaker 1: you look at American history, this period of time that
Speaker 1: you just refer to was profoundly shaded by two murders,
Speaker 1: two assassinations. So Abraham Lincoln in eighteen sixty five, and
Speaker 1: we talk about Lincoln as America's greatest country is excuse me,
Speaker 1: as America's greatest president. But we forget and don't talk
Speaker 1: a lot about the fact that he was preceded by
Speaker 1: the man who before Trump was the worst president in
Speaker 1: American history, who's now the second worst because of Trump.
Speaker 1: And he was followed by the man who was the
Speaker 1: second worst, who's now the third worst, Andrew Johnson. So
Speaker 1: you come to eighteen eighty in Garfield, who only makes
Speaker 1: it two hundred days in office before he shot at combat.
Speaker 1: Veteran of the Civil War, committed to civil rights, committed
Speaker 1: to the protection of Black American civil liberties in the South,
Speaker 1: his murder sets back civil rights really in this treat
Speaker 1: as you suggested, for one hundred years. And the fact
Speaker 1: of the matter is that a devastating defeat, an absolute
Speaker 1: defeat in Civil War a few decades later has twisted
Speaker 1: into the lost myth that there was righteousness in the
Speaker 1: Southern cause, and that myth persists today, and it has
Speaker 1: not been dealt with in this country by our American
Speaker 1: society yet. But I want to ask you a political
Speaker 1: question that steeped in in what we just talked about.
Speaker 1: This minority, this thirty five percent, that through deed, through action,
Speaker 1: through result is hostile to the concepts of American democracy,
Speaker 1: which require both sides to recognize you may lose the election,
Speaker 1: and you'll have to try again next time. To the
Speaker 1: concepts of pluralism, equal rights, the ethos of much of
Speaker 1: the media. A lot of the opposition in this era
Speaker 1: has been to seek understanding of these people. Why do
Speaker 1: they feel the way that they feel, Why are they
Speaker 1: aggrieved the way that they are, Why are they angry
Speaker 1: the way they are. I've never been interested in it,
Speaker 1: just like I've never been interested at all in why
Speaker 1: Trump says the things he says around why he says it.
Speaker 1: I just take everything he says literally and seriously, because
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, there were people who
Speaker 1: followed him around carrying suitcases with the nuclear weapons codes.
Speaker 1: I just know that that thirty five percent that no
Speaker 1: matter what the act of corruption is, what the act
Speaker 1: of depravity is, what the vandalism towards the country is,
Speaker 1: what the assault on our democracy is, they will be
Speaker 1: with him Trump over country one hundred percent of the
Speaker 1: time and seven years and there's no place to compromise politically.
Speaker 1: A minority faction is going to bring the majority to submission,
Speaker 1: or the majority in this country who believes in America
Speaker 1: and American ideals is going to snuff out peacefully and
Speaker 1: at the ballot box. This minority faction and time is
Speaker 1: not on the side of the majority any longer. Seven
Speaker 1: years in what's your what's your reaction to that?
Speaker 2: I generally agree. I mean both books I've written are
Speaker 2: literally about that. They're I hate to make it even
Speaker 2: worse for a second, but I do think this goes
Speaker 2: beyond Trump. I mean this a lot of the work
Speaker 2: to the lock in minority rules started before Trump ran.
Speaker 2: It started after Obama won, and it's part of a
Speaker 2: long history of some people being really you know, threatened
Speaker 2: by a diverse majority getting its way. And that's why
Speaker 2: some of the worst beginning precursors of this began in
Speaker 2: eleven with jerry mandering and with certain types of voter
Speaker 2: suppression directly aimed at the Obama coalition. And it's been
Speaker 2: in place, it's been working all this time, and it
Speaker 2: began before Trump ran. He's made it worse. He's fuel
Speaker 2: and he's brought up the worst of some people. But
Speaker 2: I will say some of the things they are trying
Speaker 2: to do, like issue one, if Trump were locked up tomorrow,
Speaker 2: they'd still try and do it. So he is a threat,
Speaker 2: and if he wins, we know how it would be
Speaker 2: worse than ever. But we also have to deal with
Speaker 2: there's a deeper effort here that it's at the state
Speaker 2: level that already was working to lock in minority rule
Speaker 2: through taking through certain instruments of government, including state houses, jerrymandering, courts,
Speaker 2: et cetera. And so and the reason I mean I
Speaker 2: had no plan I stepped aside in his party chair
Speaker 2: in December of twenty I had no plans to write
Speaker 2: any books at all. But in about April twenty one,
Speaker 2: I had your same alarm bells in my head, like,
Speaker 2: my god, we're not seeing this threat. They are going
Speaker 2: after democracy itself, and we are still living as if
Speaker 2: they're not. We still are assuming that they're going to
Speaker 2: play by the same rules as we are, that they're
Speaker 2: not willing to break the law, which they are clearly
Speaker 2: willing to do. And so I literally wrote the first
Speaker 2: book in a matter of months, almost as alarm bells.
Speaker 2: See the battle for what it is. It's not some
Speaker 2: sort of clean little battle for a few federal swing stakes.
Speaker 2: This is an all out battle for democracy itself. It's
Speaker 2: been the same battle we've been in for centuries. Those
Speaker 2: are the stakes, and if you're gonna win that battle.
Speaker 2: You gotta fight it very differently than the short sort
Speaker 2: of cycle mindset of federal battles. So I've been alarmed
Speaker 2: about it. I've tried to get the word outse best
Speaker 2: I can. And once you see though that it's a
Speaker 2: long battle for democracy, you also can start to see
Speaker 2: though how to win it. One to realize it is
Speaker 2: a long battle. It's not some short cycle battle. Two,
Speaker 2: it's a battle you got to take everywhere the front
Speaker 2: line is in these states. So go start contesting in
Speaker 2: these states. Start this is how Tim Ryan ran his campaign. Way,
Speaker 2: Start campaigning in the parts of the states that we've
Speaker 2: even been in too long. Start using far more of
Speaker 2: your footprint in life. Don't just give a little money,
Speaker 2: don't just do a little volunteering a few months to go.
Speaker 2: This is a as you fight it, as Steve Bannon
Speaker 2: fights on the other side. They don't quit in December.
Speaker 2: They're not quitting after last week. You got to fight
Speaker 2: it all the time. You got to use everything you
Speaker 2: have in your network, in your life to lift the battle,
Speaker 2: to lift democracy. And then, of course we have to
Speaker 2: focus on Trump. But you also have to start to
Speaker 2: see and this is something we haven't seen it goes
Speaker 2: beyond Trump. When Biden won in November of twenty and
Speaker 2: beat Trump, but then Republicans down the ballot still won
Speaker 2: the Arizona State House and all those other state houses.
Speaker 2: Those Republicans within months were attacked, as we saw, We're
Speaker 2: attacking democracy through phony audits, more jerrymannering, depriving voters of
Speaker 2: water at poles. So don't just have the contrast be
Speaker 2: Let's have Biden beat Trump run the extremism that we
Speaker 2: now know. Therefore, after Dobbs especially, make that trest clear
Speaker 2: through every state house race. So I'm alarmed. Like you,
Speaker 2: I feel good about a winning streak once the people
Speaker 2: care about democracy start to see the battle as a
Speaker 2: state as a state level battle. We've won Kansas, we
Speaker 2: won the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, we won in Ohio,
Speaker 2: and that shows you the potential of the pro democracy
Speaker 2: majority when it's energized and when it sees a risk
Speaker 2: to democracy right in front of it. We have to
Speaker 2: wage that battle and make it clear that that's what's
Speaker 2: on in twenty four this November, by the way, in
Speaker 2: Virginia as well. And that's why right now, recruit everywhere,
Speaker 2: get candidates on these ballots at all levels everywhere, and
Speaker 2: gear up, not in mid twenty four, for November twenty four,
Speaker 2: start gearing up. Now. If we do all that, I
Speaker 2: think we can win. But if we don't do that,
Speaker 2: as you're saying, yeah, we are literally the make or
Speaker 2: break moment for democracy that we and these little kids
Speaker 2: behind me these photos, they'll spend the rest of their
Speaker 2: lives digging out from it if we don't succeed the
Speaker 2: next couple of years with a real pro democracy strategy
Speaker 2: and not just to win a few swing state strategy.
Speaker 1: So, uh so, let me ask you, Let me ask
Speaker 1: you a question about that, because there's a there's a
Speaker 1: there's a threshold issue in in American politics right now,
Speaker 1: so far as it concerns Donald Trump, right, so what
Speaker 1: with the American people the body politic and just take
Speaker 1: a side party labels writ large, the country does not
Speaker 1: want the Trump Biden rematch.
Speaker 2: Do you agree with that? I mean, I think polling
Speaker 2: would would suggest that. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Now, the Democratic Party nationally right is going to deliver
Speaker 1: on their side of the equation in terms of giving
Speaker 1: to the American people a candidate they don't want to
Speaker 1: run against, to run against Trump Biden Trump. Now, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say the one thing that drives me more nuts
Speaker 1: that anything that's said by any national Democrat is this.
Speaker 1: And it's the idea that they want Trump in the
Speaker 1: general election because he's an easy candidate for Biden to be.
Speaker 1: So there's a duality around Trump, right, And there's Trump
Speaker 1: the threat, and I think he is a threat. I
Speaker 1: think he is a threat to the continuity of the
Speaker 1: American Republic. And then there is Trump the prop the
Speaker 1: boogeyman Voldemort. Put Trump's name into the email, you raise money,
Speaker 1: Put Trump into the ad, you get ratings. Put Trump
Speaker 1: into the newscast. Right, at least he used to right
Speaker 1: the numbers, The numbers go up. And so I don't
Speaker 1: want to see Trump come forward right into a general
Speaker 1: election because I don't think there's a more irresponsible position
Speaker 1: in America or a more delusional one, which is the
Speaker 1: idea that he can't win a general election again, because
Speaker 1: he absolutely can win a general election again. Any any
Speaker 1: do you take any issues with anything, with anything else?
Speaker 2: When I say that he knows he's obviously incredibly dangerous,
Speaker 2: I think these things are very unpredictable. When I say
Speaker 2: that I think he's going to be the candidate. It's
Speaker 2: not because I necessarily want that. I just think that
Speaker 2: he will, and I don't know, I don't understand that.
Speaker 2: And I'm with you, you no, I agree. I mean, you
Speaker 2: don't want this man, well, only one ballot away from
Speaker 2: being president. And that's a highly risky proposition that I
Speaker 2: think we're all going to be dealing with.
Speaker 1: I think I think that fifty years from now, there's
Speaker 1: gonna be all sorts of infrastructure in this country, and
Speaker 1: you're gonna look back like we did growing up at
Speaker 1: things that were built during the depression years. When was
Speaker 1: that built? I was built in the nineteen thirties, it
Speaker 1: was built in the nineteen fifties. You, Joe Biden is
Speaker 1: the infrastructure president and then some that people have dreamed
Speaker 1: about for a couple of decades, and his and his
Speaker 1: legacy on that front puts him, in my view, on
Speaker 1: the same plane as Eisenhower. I think that he is
Speaker 1: the most effective foreign policy president coming out of a
Speaker 1: big ditch since George Herbert Walker Bush. If you look
Speaker 1: at the end of the Cold War, the First Gulf War,
Speaker 1: extremely successful. But I'm gonna I'm gonna challenge you on
Speaker 1: a a Biden proposition, and and give you a chance
Speaker 1: to make the make the Biden case. Respond to this argument,
Speaker 1: which is, none of that matters, not a thing. He
Speaker 1: was elected to do one thing, break the extremest threat
Speaker 1: to the country and it's still here. Didn't get the
Speaker 1: job done. Therefore, maybe it's time for Gavin Newsom, Maybe
Speaker 1: it's time for Gretchen Whimer, because at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, the defense of democracy has not succeeded thus
Speaker 1: far against this maga threat somebody and somebody, and it's
Speaker 1: the top guy in the world we used to live
Speaker 1: in is the guy that gets to blame for that.
Speaker 1: Not that he's a criminal, not that he's a bad person,
Speaker 1: but that he fell short. And in fact, this is
Speaker 1: someone who has fallen short doing that while doing all
Speaker 1: of these other great things. But it doesn't mitigate that
Speaker 1: on this thing, the threat in fact may be worse.
Speaker 2: Let me respond. There have been moments I've been frustrated
Speaker 2: about the intensity of the battle for democracy, I think
Speaker 2: early on, when I don't think I don't think there
Speaker 2: was enough attention to it or sensitivity to it. But
Speaker 2: my bigger response out of this, aside from moments of frustration,
Speaker 2: is This is not a conventional political battle. This is
Speaker 2: a long, much longer term battle. And I don't think
Speaker 2: it is the kind of battle you win immediately or
Speaker 2: even in one term. This is long, is the this
Speaker 2: is the arc of our country. And so I would say,
Speaker 2: you know, again, I'm not here to represent Joe Biden,
Speaker 2: but I would say that that he did articulate late
Speaker 2: in November, late in twenty two the threat, and we
Speaker 2: started to see some countercyclical results in terms of some
Speaker 2: of the underpinnings of why we've been losing democracy when
Speaker 2: we elected those when we did it, defeat at every election,
Speaker 2: Denial running for secuar state that in a normal off
Speaker 2: year quote unquote off year midterm, we would have lost
Speaker 2: those races. But that extremism was exposed. We picked up
Speaker 2: the Pennsylvania State House, what it was it double digit seats.
Speaker 2: We picked up the midtermer we're supposed to lose. We
Speaker 2: pipped up the Michigan State Senate, state House. So we've
Speaker 2: won these these special elections. Again, normally you wouldn't win
Speaker 2: these when we had the White House. So in the
Speaker 2: long arc, in the battle for democracy, Trump it remains
Speaker 2: the threat that he is. We have to defeat him
Speaker 2: next November. But what I liked it, we're starting to see,
Speaker 2: and I'm an optimist in the end, despite the dark
Speaker 2: topics of my book, which is the democracies under attack
Speaker 2: of a threat, we're starting to see some pick up
Speaker 2: in the awareness of how we protect democracy. We're starting
Speaker 2: to gain some wins like we didn't know how last week,
Speaker 2: and in the long arc. I'm feeling a little better
Speaker 2: than I was two years ago, because two years ago
Speaker 2: we didn't even see these things as a matter. But
Speaker 2: I think that there are there some voters who are
Speaker 2: thinking what you did, which is I thought voting right
Speaker 2: should be more protected over the next Over the last
Speaker 2: four years, I thought Jerry man Ering might see an
Speaker 2: end that it hasn't. I'm sure there's some frustration, but
Speaker 2: I also would say the battle for democracy is a
Speaker 2: longer term battle. And I think, as you said, in
Speaker 2: fifty years from now, In fifty years from now, we'll
Speaker 2: be able to see where the years twenty one, twenty two,
Speaker 2: twenty three, and twenty four together, the moment where people
Speaker 2: saw Trump saw the state level attack and geared up
Speaker 2: in a way that defeated over the coming years, that
Speaker 2: followed this moment a wariness were not. I think it's
Speaker 2: a little soon to say, well, someone had a couple
Speaker 2: of years to solve it and didn't. I just don't
Speaker 2: think the broader battle for democracy is determined on that timeframe,
Speaker 2: even though, as we're both saying, we're it's sort of
Speaker 2: the inflection point of that battle right now through the
Speaker 2: next couple of years.
Speaker 1: Here's the thing that I fundamentally feel disoriented about and
Speaker 1: I can't get a handle on. And it's how much
Speaker 1: of this is all completely illusory? Oz behind the curtain,
Speaker 1: and let me let me ask the get into it
Speaker 1: this way. I'm looking at your kids behind you. I
Speaker 1: am a I'm a girl dad. And I took my
Speaker 1: ten year old to the Tailor Swift concert and talking
Speaker 1: about it afterwards, and so I saw it in Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: Must have been ninety thousand people sold it out six
Speaker 1: nights in a row. And I said to my wife,
Speaker 1: I have never been anywhere with that many women in
Speaker 1: my life, not even close. Easy kind of guess ninety
Speaker 1: percent of the crowd female little girls wearing their friendship
Speaker 1: bracelets right, women in their thirties and their twenties. People
Speaker 1: are handing out their French A bracelets to each other.
Speaker 1: Now I have a good sense of how the media
Speaker 1: covers Trump and the ubiquity with which they cover him,
Speaker 1: and the attention that the Trump rally gets, as crazy
Speaker 1: as they are, as small as they've become. Now, I
Speaker 1: suspect if Donald Trump was selling out stadiums with eighty
Speaker 1: five ninety thousand people all over America going full maga, like,
Speaker 1: our level of being freaked out about that would be
Speaker 1: incredibly high. Now he's covered like he does do that,
Speaker 1: when in fact his world has become pretty small, right
Speaker 1: and in terms of the places he goes in the
Speaker 1: crowds he attracts. In essence, certainly, the media doesn't cover
Speaker 1: the world through the prism of the ninety thousand a
Speaker 1: person nightly gathering. We're the friendship bracelets are being handed out.
Speaker 1: They're both real, they're both happening. Violence isn't breaking out
Speaker 1: all around us everywhere all the time in America. Normal
Speaker 1: people don't and never have like having politics in their face.
Speaker 1: Twenty four seven, and all of the experts and all
Speaker 1: of the pollsters have basically been wrong for seven years.
Speaker 1: Everything that you're saying anecdotally, well when you look out
Speaker 1: in the country when the test comes at this quiet result,
Speaker 1: and over and over and over again, Americans are saying no.
Speaker 1: And to me, what you can never know, because we're
Speaker 1: fifty two. What was the sense of urgency to danger
Speaker 1: in nineteen thirty nine, in nineteen thirty eight, What did
Speaker 1: it feel like the people who were urgently alarmed who
Speaker 1: turned out to be correct? What did the zeitgeist in
Speaker 1: the culture feel like? And you just can't know, You
Speaker 1: really can't get a handle on it. Say for the
Speaker 1: fact that you know that in democracies, people rally towards
Speaker 1: facing danger very very late. They move late, but when
Speaker 1: they face it, historically, at least in this country, they've
Speaker 1: done so very very very decisively. And so I wonder
Speaker 1: if you think about that, in wonder how much of
Speaker 1: what we perceive is the threat in front of us
Speaker 1: has already largely dissipated. The prognosticators in Washington just haven't
Speaker 1: gotten caught up to it as it works its way out,
Speaker 1: and they just don't pay attention to the actual election
Speaker 1: results where these things are worked out already, in places
Speaker 1: like Ohio, anything, they're there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think that the other side has
Speaker 2: done a very good job of hiding their extremism and
Speaker 2: how it impacts everyday people for a long time. I mean,
Speaker 2: but they know it. They know that if fully exposed,
Speaker 2: it will cost them elections. And what's happened especially since
Speaker 2: Stobbs but Trump did it Marjorie Taylor Green dous. Every
Speaker 2: day people are seeing it now in a way they weren't.
Speaker 2: And when they see it, they clearly are reacting to
Speaker 2: vote against it, either because they're tired of it or
Speaker 2: they're scared of it. And that's why, you know, again,
Speaker 2: we should take it seriously, We should run knowing that
Speaker 2: if they ever win, the danger of that is horrible.
Speaker 2: But now that people are seeing and the post dobs
Speaker 2: really matters here, it's not just that they see a
Speaker 2: threat to democracy. They're starting to see through things like Dobbs,
Speaker 2: but other issues. Well, the reason they're attacking democracy is
Speaker 2: to inflict things on my life that not only do
Speaker 2: I not agree with, but that will make my life
Speaker 2: a lot worse. And once they see the connection between
Speaker 2: the attack on democracy, this you know, flirting with authoritarianism,
Speaker 2: and the everyday issue like post dobs, that will change
Speaker 2: their life because a minority is going to rule over
Speaker 2: them on issues they care about. That combination is really
Speaker 2: dangerous for their side. And as you see when people
Speaker 2: who may not want to engage in the thirty thousand
Speaker 2: foot level, you know, conversational on democracy or jerrymandering. See, oh,
Speaker 2: the result of that, the result of that issue one
Speaker 2: is my own choices in my life where I live
Speaker 2: in Ohio. It's that ten year old rape victim being
Speaker 2: forced to go to Indiana. That combination is very dangerous
Speaker 2: for them. And if we do a good job of
Speaker 2: making it clear that that's why they're attacking democracy, that's
Speaker 2: what Donald Trump will do in your state, in your community.
Speaker 2: That's what you know that state house will do in
Speaker 2: your community. That's what I think we we we pile
Speaker 2: together some wins. And the reason, going back to your
Speaker 2: point about no labels, the reason I so worry about
Speaker 2: them is because that will interfere. I believe with the
Speaker 2: potential of a majority finally coming together next year and
Speaker 2: saying we're done with all this, and the danger they're
Speaker 2: bringing is a disruption of something. And I hope, you know,
Speaker 2: I hope, and I think if we all do everything right,
Speaker 2: that we can finally say, you know, the hell with
Speaker 2: this Trump stuff, and the hell with the extremism all
Speaker 2: the way down the state level issue where they're atacking democracy,
Speaker 2: and and so anything that gets in the way, I think,
Speaker 2: which is some momentum in a little winning streak that's
Speaker 2: building in more quiet elections that could really come through
Speaker 2: in a big election, is a threat. And that's why
Speaker 2: I agree with you. But the threat that is that
Speaker 2: what otherwise could be a nice winning streat for democracy
Speaker 2: that we're building and seeing happening right.
Speaker 1: Now, that that coalition which which you're referencing is a
Speaker 1: coalition and its component parts right, its largest part will
Speaker 1: be Democrats, its second largest element will be independents, and
Speaker 1: it's and its third largest element, sizable and very important
Speaker 1: one will be disaffected Republicans who you need to be
Speaker 1: part of the coalition. We're running out of time here.
Speaker 1: Let me let me give you the last pitch here,
Speaker 1: make the pitch right that that you would like to see,
Speaker 1: you know, made out of the White House, out of
Speaker 1: the National Democratic Party to Americans that tells them to
Speaker 1: come together into a coalition. I mean, the one thing
Speaker 1: that we have not heard in seven years is basically
Speaker 1: someone from the Democratic Party I think very directly saying
Speaker 1: I don't care you're a Democrat, you're an independent, you're
Speaker 1: a Republican. I'm talking to you today as an American.
Speaker 2: Right, I mean what I would say. I'll do my
Speaker 2: best at this, but I think one side has clearly
Speaker 2: lost its way, and it is caught up in a
Speaker 2: very fringe approach to almost everything in American society day
Speaker 2: that most people just do not agree with. They sometimes
Speaker 2: hide it well, but we see it playing out in Florida.
Speaker 2: We see it play out with a ten year old
Speaker 2: rape victim being sent to Indiana because they passed something
Speaker 2: here that only ten percent of fewer of Ohioans agree with.
Speaker 2: And that side understands that its viewpoint is actually deeply unpopular.
Speaker 2: And the reason we keep running into things like issue
Speaker 2: on or Jerrymainering is because they're trying to keep in
Speaker 2: place policies that would never sustain broad the broad majority
Speaker 2: consensus of as you say, Republicans, Independence, and Democrats in Ohio.
Speaker 2: And so I think what Democrats need to pitch on
Speaker 2: is going to back for a middle class of middle
Speaker 2: class based economics that lifts people all over states like Ohio,
Speaker 2: not the narrow one we see from the other side
Speaker 2: a belief in certain public institutions like public schools that
Speaker 2: I don't care if you're in your rural or you're
Speaker 2: in urban Ohio. These are the centers of our communities.
Speaker 2: Let's lift them. So. I think there's a broad common
Speaker 2: agreement on most of where America needs to go. One
Speaker 2: side doesn't agree with that viewpoint, that's why they're trying
Speaker 2: to suppress democracy, and the other side, I think needs
Speaker 2: to do a much better job of bringing everyone together
Speaker 2: around those issues. I think remove a lot of the
Speaker 2: crazy stuff. I think that Joe Biden, as you said,
Speaker 2: has done a very good job on most of those issues.
Speaker 2: I think his state of the State of the Union
Speaker 2: speech actually weave them together very well. And I think
Speaker 2: in the coming year, the assignment is to take those
Speaker 2: elements of that common sort of fabric of what we
Speaker 2: want to get done and to make sure we're talking
Speaker 2: about it well, we're talking about it all parts of
Speaker 2: this country, and we're exposing that the other side doesn't
Speaker 2: agree with them. Was any of those things, and most
Speaker 2: of that agenda on the other side is something that
Speaker 2: at best thirty five percent agree on, and in many
Speaker 2: cases far less and the reason why we see them
Speaker 2: always rigging the rules of democracy is because they know
Speaker 2: that and they know they would lose if we have
Speaker 2: a straight up vote on what we want to do
Speaker 2: versus what they want to do.
Speaker 1: Well, we'll leave it there, David Pepper, thank you very
Speaker 1: very much for taking the time this afternoon. Wise words
Speaker 1: and great counsel for everybody listening. American democracy is under threat.
Speaker 1: It is not self sustaining. We're approaching the two hundred
Speaker 1: and fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. It's a
Speaker 1: momentous achievement and one that will require this generation of
Speaker 1: Americans to recommit to a sense of duty, obligation, and
Speaker 1: responsibility and also common sense. You know, I tell my
Speaker 1: kids this, someone will always be in charge. And in
Speaker 1: the case of a state like Ohio, if you give
Speaker 1: away the right to write your future, the people who
Speaker 1: take it may not have your best interest at heart,
Speaker 1: but rest assured somebody will take it. You show indifference
Speaker 1: towards who's running things. People take advantage of it every
Speaker 1: every time. One of the central lessons of history and
Speaker 1: and one of the real dangers in the democracy.
Speaker 2: M m hmmmm, h m h m hmmm.