Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Mollie John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
Speaker 1: where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
Speaker 1: today's best minds and moms for liberty laws nearly every
Speaker 1: race they were involved in.
Speaker 2: We have such a great show for you today.
Speaker 1: Inside Elections, Jacob Rubashkin talks about the hidden lessons from
Speaker 1: the twenty twenty three election. Then we'll talk to George
Speaker 1: Laws about new legislation to finally make Puerto Rico estate.
Speaker 1: But first we have the Bulwarks. Charlie Sykes. Welcome back
Speaker 1: to Fast Politics, the great Charlie Sykes.
Speaker 3: Hey, it's good to be here, good to be anywhere.
Speaker 4: Me too.
Speaker 1: I just got your newsletter this morning. Morning Shots from
Speaker 1: the Bulwark, that headline you're just scum.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is the debate we deserve. You know, I
Speaker 3: was watching the debate last night, as I said, and
Speaker 3: you know, I suppose I'm supposed to be watching for
Speaker 3: all the nuance and the substance and you know who's
Speaker 3: making this move on abortion or an on Ukraine, And
Speaker 3: unfortunately I just got distracted by you know, asking you know,
Speaker 3: what is what is Nikki heally gonna do? Is she
Speaker 3: going to push Vivic into the locker, or is she
Speaker 3: going to skewer him with a five inch heel because
Speaker 3: the guy is such an insufferable prick. This is the
Speaker 3: problem and the fact that five minutes ago anybody in
Speaker 3: this country took him seriously as a plausible presidential candidate.
Speaker 3: I mean it doesn't that say something about the times
Speaker 3: we live in?
Speaker 1: Obviously he's a complete joke, but there is a world
Speaker 1: like I actually feel bad for you as like the
Speaker 1: last of the normal Republicans.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
Speaker 3: Does that mean I relish You're pity?
Speaker 2: Here's Nikki Haley.
Speaker 1: She is actually a good candidate who could win a
Speaker 1: general election, and there's no way she's going to get
Speaker 1: the nomination.
Speaker 3: No, there isn't. Actually, that was something else I was watching,
Speaker 3: you know, thinking that if you're a normal, rational Republican
Speaker 3: and you're watching this debate, and look, you know, I
Speaker 3: have a lot of problems with Nikki Haley. Have read
Speaker 3: a lot about her. She's made some should we say,
Speaker 3: compromises in her life. But yes, true, if you're a
Speaker 3: Republican and you're looking at her, you're thinking, who would
Speaker 3: you rather go into twenty twenty four with? Behind NICKI
Speaker 3: Haley or Donald Trump, and for all of her flaws,
Speaker 3: think about what a superior candidate she would be. By
Speaker 3: the way, just think about how our politics would be
Speaker 3: transformed in the blink of an eye if you swapped
Speaker 3: out Donald Trump for some just reasonably normal Republican like
Speaker 3: Nicki Haley. But it's not gonna happen.
Speaker 1: As you point out, it's interesting because it's like the
Speaker 1: thing I think about is, I don't agree with her
Speaker 1: on almost everything, but you could see her like people
Speaker 1: voting for her because she's offering them something right, and
Speaker 1: she's also just making some of those policies which I
Speaker 1: don't agree with, sort of palatable for mainstream people.
Speaker 3: Well. Also, look, I mean she's got some substance. She's
Speaker 3: able to speak with a good deal of authority on
Speaker 3: foreign affairs. You know, her discussion of Israeli Ukraine I
Speaker 3: thought was really solid. When she first talked about, you know,
Speaker 3: getting a compromise on abortion, I think people thought she
Speaker 3: was dancing and dodging, but I think it actually sounded
Speaker 3: more reasonable last night. Now, whether or not you can
Speaker 3: sustain that in a campaign, I don't know. I think
Speaker 3: it's kind of silly to engage in the who's the
Speaker 3: winner and who's the loser in the debate, although clearly
Speaker 3: Tim Scott was the loser and vivek make him made
Speaker 3: himself a joke, and I thought that she did about
Speaker 3: as well as she could. As long as we recognize
Speaker 3: this is a attemptiontion debate that they're just going through
Speaker 3: the motions right exactly. This is a debate among people
Speaker 3: who either want to be vice president or want their
Speaker 3: own podcast or something else because they're not going to
Speaker 3: be the Republican nominee. And by the way, nobody seems
Speaker 3: to care the fact Donald Trump just completely blows off
Speaker 3: these debates, does not even show up, has no intention
Speaker 3: of ever showing up. And I guess I'm old enough
Speaker 3: to remember when that would be a thing. And it
Speaker 3: doesn't even register. It's we completely normalize the fact that
Speaker 3: he's off with Roseanne Barr who's having the irrational meltdown
Speaker 3: at one of his rallies, and people go, yeah, okay,
Speaker 3: so I'm thinking that Donald Trump is the big winner tonight. Yes, okay, hello, people,
Speaker 3: just can we focus on the crazy for a moment.
Speaker 3: I just I'm sorry a little PTSD.
Speaker 1: You're right to bring this up, and I want to
Speaker 1: ask you because you have actual experience with a Republican party.
Speaker 1: I mean, isn't this sort of a sign of how
Speaker 1: weak the party is that they have no power over
Speaker 1: their front runner?
Speaker 3: Oh? Absolutely. I mean it's just like Donald Trump on
Speaker 3: an hourly basis giving Ronna McDaniel, Romney or whatever her
Speaker 3: name is, now, giving her a noogie and just reminding
Speaker 3: her that you know, I own you, I own you.
Speaker 3: What you want to have another debate, Kim here, let's
Speaker 3: try this again. No, it's Hlili eating. But also the
Speaker 3: fact that you have all of these candidates on stage.
Speaker 3: And I'm sorry, Molly, You'll know where I'm coming from
Speaker 3: on all of this. But as I'm reading a lot
Speaker 3: of the punditry, I'm thinking, have we forgotten what we're
Speaker 3: actually talking about? Here? The firm running candidate for President
Speaker 3: of the United States on the Republican ticket. He is
Speaker 3: facing more than ninety felony charges. He's on trial for fraud.
Speaker 3: A federal judge has found him liable for rape. He
Speaker 3: is being accused by the federal government of violating the
Speaker 3: espionads AT. He is facing racketeering charges. The US government
Speaker 3: is accusing him of trying to overthrow the election, engaging
Speaker 3: in Lie's trickery, deceit, and fraud. And none of these
Speaker 3: Republican candidates can figure out, huh, how do I run
Speaker 3: against this guy?
Speaker 2: How do I be this trying? They're not even trying.
Speaker 1: I mean, New York is about to take away his
Speaker 1: business license so he cannot have a business, and they're
Speaker 1: not and they're like, oh, we shouldn't dare to try
Speaker 1: to make a case against this guy.
Speaker 3: I mean, Chris Christie does it, but I mean, you
Speaker 3: know the problem is that if you're Chris Christie, you
Speaker 3: needed Donald Trump there as a foil. And so it's
Speaker 3: you know, as much as I want to root for Christie, can't.
Speaker 3: You can't punch a punch bag that doesn't show up.
Speaker 3: So yeah, so he's been saying the right things and
Speaker 3: he'll go through you know, he'll he'll point out that
Speaker 3: it seems like a bad idea to nominate somebody who's
Speaker 3: gonna spend most of their time in the dock in
Speaker 3: a criminal trial. I mean, yeah, you know again, five
Speaker 3: minutes ago, a rational political party he would have said, yeah,
Speaker 3: that makes sense. It's a really bad idea. And Chris
Speaker 3: Christie says it'll.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, that's true.
Speaker 1: And I also think as we watch this, we see
Speaker 1: Christy remember has like got COVID from Trump and was
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, he nearly died because of Trump.
Speaker 1: I mean, and he worked in the Trump administration. I
Speaker 1: feel like the one thing I don't feel like we
Speaker 1: talk about this enough again, it's like one of the
Speaker 1: uncomfortable realities. But like, there are a bunch of people
Speaker 1: who served in the Trump administration happily. I mean a
Speaker 1: lot of people, and then they sort of decided it
Speaker 1: was a bridge too far, or maybe it wasn't or
Speaker 1: maybe they were about to get you with perjury, and
Speaker 1: so they decided they'd write a book and get out
Speaker 1: of it. Now, you know, there's something to be said
Speaker 1: for that, and you know, what's good for people to
Speaker 1: pull back the curtain. But it's also there's a percentage
Speaker 1: of craven there. There's a big wallaping dose of craven there.
Speaker 1: But on the other hand, you know, when when you're
Speaker 1: in the foxhole, you you really, you know, can't be
Speaker 1: checking the resumes of everybody that's jumping in with you.
Speaker 1: I am willing to welcome any conrad. I continue to
Speaker 1: be amazed at the fact that and this also is
Speaker 1: I continue to be amazed that something's happening that has
Speaker 1: never happened in American presidential history. The number of people
Speaker 1: who have worked in the Trump White House or served
Speaker 1: on the Trump cabinet who are out there saying this
Speaker 1: man is nuts, this man is disconnected from reality, he
Speaker 1: is dangerous, and it doesn't seem.
Speaker 3: To be mattering. I mean, normally you would think, okay,
Speaker 3: what would happen if his hand picked attorney general, if
Speaker 3: his own chief of staff, if his secretary of state,
Speaker 3: if his secretary of defense, if his national security advisor,
Speaker 3: if one aid after another came out and said, guys,
Speaker 3: this is terrible. This man is completely unfit to serve.
Speaker 3: You would think that. Again, a rational political party in
Speaker 3: a world we do not innhabit would say, yeah, maybe
Speaker 3: we got to listen to the people who were in
Speaker 3: the room while the shit was happening. And again, it
Speaker 3: doesn't seem to be making much of a difference.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is unbelievable that a month ago there was
Speaker 1: this news cycle where Trump said, you know, I think
Speaker 1: we should execute Mark Milly and people were like, well,
Speaker 1: this seems pretty bad.
Speaker 2: And then it sort of went away.
Speaker 3: Okay, we could play this game, and the one before
Speaker 3: that there was a news cycle where I've lost track
Speaker 3: of the new cycles. Remember, Mollie, do you remember when
Speaker 3: he actually put in writing that we should suspend the
Speaker 3: US Constitution to allow him to be returned to power?
Speaker 3: And you remember that news cycle when he was having
Speaker 3: dinner with Neo Nazis. Huh? And then there was a
Speaker 3: new cycle. And this is part of the problem, is
Speaker 3: that we keep moving on and the default setting of
Speaker 3: most of our punditry now is just horse race up. No,
Speaker 3: let's let's gaze a little bit more in our navel.
Speaker 3: We'll talk about this pole, or we'll talk about that,
Speaker 3: or we'll do this game theory about all of that.
Speaker 3: It's like, hello, do you remember who Donald Trump is,
Speaker 3: what Donald Trump has done, what Donald Trump tells us
Speaker 3: on a regular basis, he's going to do. See, Mully,
Speaker 3: you and I can engage in Trump derangement syndrome and say,
Speaker 3: you know what second Trump term? He would be all
Speaker 3: about revenge and retribution. Trump is like you know, says
Speaker 3: hold my beer, absolutely, and we're going to execute the
Speaker 3: top general. And I have this list of people that
Speaker 3: would incredibly prosecute. It's like you can't come up with
Speaker 3: something that he is not going. No, I'll do you
Speaker 3: one better. You know you think I'm not going to
Speaker 3: support you, creat I'm going to fuck NATO all together.
Speaker 3: I'm going to amend it all of our allies.
Speaker 1: And I want to point out for our listeners that
Speaker 1: I'm not laughing because this is funny. I'm laughing because
Speaker 1: it's just so upsetting that the only way I can
Speaker 1: process it is and I mean, what you're saying is funny,
Speaker 1: but it's funny tragic, not fun.
Speaker 3: Oh no, no, it's it's also if you're not laughing
Speaker 3: at it, what are you doing, You're like blowing your
Speaker 3: brains out?
Speaker 2: You know, It's like it's yeah, exactly, and it's it
Speaker 2: really is.
Speaker 1: You know, it's up to eleven, so there's no world
Speaker 1: in which he disappears. The thing I wanted to ask
Speaker 1: you is we've seen the polls. Again, we don't even
Speaker 1: need to talk about the polls, but obviously they somehow
Speaker 1: have American people deciding against It's three thousand people in
Speaker 1: five states, but who answer their cell phones to unknown numbers.
Speaker 1: So I'm just going to put that out there but
Speaker 1: that group has decided they love Donald Trump and think
Speaker 1: he has incredible mental acuity, which, okay, that's baffling. But
Speaker 1: if Trump loses in twenty twenty four, which we really
Speaker 1: need to happen so democracy survives, I don't think he
Speaker 1: goes away.
Speaker 3: Oh see, I was hoping I didn't have to go
Speaker 3: here this early. I remember that moment when I was
Speaker 3: doing my podcast back in twenty twenty and I said,
Speaker 3: you know, even if he loses, he could run in
Speaker 3: twenty twenty four. Nothing bands He's not going to have
Speaker 3: He's not going to made loss because Donald Trump never loses.
Speaker 3: He's gonna run in twenty nine. People, No, no, oh
Speaker 3: my god. And so so you raise the question he
Speaker 3: loses in twenty twenty four, there's no chance that he
Speaker 3: graciously concedes. See, there is no chance that he acknowledges
Speaker 3: his defeat. There's no chance that he does not press
Speaker 3: the Republican Party in Congress to overturn the election. And
Speaker 3: there is a very real chance that Donald Trump will
Speaker 3: fully intend to run again in twenty twenty eight. Okay,
Speaker 3: I need to start day drinking. Just you just have
Speaker 3: pushed me right over the limit here.
Speaker 1: I don't think he's a better candidate in twenty twenty eight.
Speaker 1: I mean he's not a right, he'll be eighty two
Speaker 1: that or no, he'll be eighty I don't know, he'll
Speaker 1: be eighty five or something.
Speaker 3: I mean he'll be the most robust candidate. He'll will
Speaker 3: be the best and strongest candidate. This has been part
Speaker 3: of this sort of this this cycle, this nightmare cycle
Speaker 3: that we're in here evolving this. But and what I'm
Speaker 3: also noting is that and I'm going to take a
Speaker 3: shot at some of our never trump friends. I am
Speaker 3: a never Trumper that because we've been doing this for
Speaker 3: eight years. There's almost a PTSD about this where I
Speaker 3: sense a bookend on social media between the triumphilism of
Speaker 3: the MAGA folks we're going to win, nothing you will
Speaker 3: do will stop us, and the never trumpers who go,
Speaker 3: we will never win. There's nothing we can do to
Speaker 3: stop them. It's a bookend. It's like the arrogance and
Speaker 3: the despair. Let's swallow in our despair. At a certain point,
Speaker 3: you just got to suck it up and go, Okay,
Speaker 3: we're not the crazy ones. We don't have to buy
Speaker 3: the bullshit. Let's not fall into the trap of assuming
Speaker 3: that we are dealing with some other worldly genius who
Speaker 3: has scoped out everything, and that we are incapable of
Speaker 3: finding a way of stopping him, or blocking him, or
Speaker 3: humiliating him. I mean, it is almost a Stockholm syndrome
Speaker 3: that I'm seeing here, the people going, Hey, you know,
Speaker 3: here's my hot take. Who won the elle? Donald Trump's
Speaker 3: the big winner? Who won the debate? Donald Trump's the
Speaker 3: big winner. What's gonna happen on abortionble? Donald Trump is
Speaker 3: going to figure? No, this guy is he has this
Speaker 3: reptilian instinct, which I do not underestimate. He does have
Speaker 3: a reptilian instinct and a certain low cunning. But if
Speaker 3: you watch him, which you also realize that his arrogance,
Speaker 3: his narcissism, and his fundamental shallowness does catch up with
Speaker 3: him occasionally. You know. You put him on the stand
Speaker 3: in New York, and I'm sorry that was not a
Speaker 3: master class in being a defendant. That was and raging
Speaker 3: against the dark.
Speaker 1: And screaming at the judge who was about to decide
Speaker 1: his fate, which in my mind is not a great move.
Speaker 3: Really. Huh See, I'm not a lawyer either, but VI
Speaker 3: didn't seem smart to me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that is the thing is, you know,
Speaker 1: he is not some cunning genius. We only have a
Speaker 1: few minutes left, and I don't want to just talk
Speaker 1: about Trump because I want to talk to you about
Speaker 1: this is theoretically a good Senate map Republicans. We have
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three is over. We had this election where
Speaker 1: Democrats really won. I'm hoping you can talk about gun
Speaker 1: Youngkin was sort of shopped as this moderate. He never
Speaker 1: was really a moderatey. I think he offered a sort
Speaker 1: of more deluded form of trump Ism.
Speaker 2: The people of Virginia's they sort of they did not
Speaker 2: give him a mandate.
Speaker 3: Well, he's a moderate in the sense of in terms
Speaker 3: of where the windows moved. I mean, the definitions are
Speaker 3: shifting here. But you know, there was the fever dream
Speaker 3: of the donor class that he was going to be
Speaker 3: able to come in and, you know, perhaps save them
Speaker 3: from Trump. That was never going to happen. That's why
Speaker 3: I said, no, his ambitions have gone to the rapidly
Speaker 3: filling unicorn graveyard. He was a unicorn there. But I
Speaker 3: think what's really rattled Republicans after this election is the
Speaker 3: recognition they have two problems and they are separable problems.
Speaker 3: I mean, number one is the obvious problem of abortion.
Speaker 3: Abortion is not going away. It's still motivating voters. And
Speaker 3: they had hoped that they had cracked the code in
Speaker 3: Virginia by coming up with a fifteen week ban, figuring
Speaker 3: that a fifteen week ban pulls much better than a
Speaker 3: six week ban, right, which it does. Yeah, and you
Speaker 3: can tell that you talk to Republicans that are thinking, hey,
Speaker 3: this is the way out of this particular problem that
Speaker 3: we have created. What you saw in Virginia was that
Speaker 3: voters are not focusing on the number of weeks. They're
Speaker 3: focusing on the word ban. And so the fifteen week
Speaker 3: ban flopped and that was their default setting, that was
Speaker 3: their off ramp, and now they're going, oh, we're screwed
Speaker 3: on this. Their second problem, besides wars, which is not
Speaker 3: going away, is that MAGA continues to be a loser.
Speaker 3: You know, what happened in Kentucky is amazing really when
Speaker 3: you think about it. Trump wins by twenty six points
Speaker 3: deep red state Andy Basheer was elected governor by I
Speaker 3: think bout five thousand votes. Four years ago. Donald Trump
Speaker 3: goes all in Daniel Cameron, the Republican puts on the
Speaker 3: MAGA red hat runs full out, full throatd MAGA. The
Speaker 3: Democrats pushback, say, you know, we're running against MAGA extremists.
Speaker 3: We have a centrist Democrat against MAGA extremists. And Andy
Speaker 3: Basheer wins by five points. That is a comb margin
Speaker 3: in that state, a state that Donald Trump won by
Speaker 3: twenty six points. So MAGA continues to be a boat anchor.
Speaker 3: Abortion is not going away, and they haven't figured out
Speaker 3: how to handle it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and this is Kentucky. This is not Georgia. This
Speaker 1: is not a sweet state. This is a red state.
Speaker 1: Now Wisconsin, Yeah, wiscon Sorry. I think it's really a
Speaker 1: good point that they can't win on abortion. I would
Speaker 1: like to talk to you for a second about what
Speaker 1: happened in Mississippi, because again I haven't seen enough reporting
Speaker 1: about what happened in Mississippi, but I have some anxiety
Speaker 1: that it was not so easy to vote in Mississippi.
Speaker 3: I honestly don't know. I mean, I've seen the same
Speaker 3: reports you've seen about running out of ballots. I do
Speaker 3: think that there have been efforts to make it harder
Speaker 3: to vote, particularly in urban areas. I was on a
Speaker 3: conference call yesterday about voting in Wisconsin. No, voting in
Speaker 3: Wisconsin is the vote turnout is dramatically up everywhere except
Speaker 3: in the urban areas in places like Milwaukee, where they
Speaker 3: have made it harder to vote the various changes in
Speaker 3: state law. So I don't know, you know, how that
Speaker 3: played out in Mississippi. If I remember my history, I
Speaker 3: believe the Mississippi has kind of a checkered past when
Speaker 3: it comes to voting rights.
Speaker 2: Yes, I'm pretty sure it's.
Speaker 3: Kind of a track record there. It is not implausible
Speaker 3: to think that in Mississippi they made it more difficult.
Speaker 3: But I simply don't don't have enough information, right.
Speaker 1: But I do think that's a good point, and I
Speaker 1: do think that the battle for voting rights, I think
Speaker 1: people find it boring, but it is actually quite an important,
Speaker 1: you know, thing that underscores all of those.
Speaker 3: Well, yes, obviously, you know a lot of things that
Speaker 3: we had taken for granted are now obviously at risk.
Speaker 3: And I think this is we're living through an ror
Speaker 3: in which, you know, our complacency has been shattered on
Speaker 3: one issue after another, and certainly ought to be shattered
Speaker 3: about our complacency about the robustness of our democracy.
Speaker 2: Charlie Sikes, thank you so much. I hope you'll come.
Speaker 3: Back anytime, Molly, anytime. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Jacob Rubashkin is an analyst and reporter for Inside Elections.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Fast Politics.
Speaker 5: Jacob, Yeah, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: We are a few days out from an off here.
Speaker 1: I think it's like an off off here election. First,
Speaker 1: I want you to explain a little bit about what
Speaker 1: you do, and then I'm going to make you interpret
Speaker 1: the results.
Speaker 5: I'm a reporter and analyst for Inside Elections. We exclusively
Speaker 5: cover elections primarily for the House and Senate and governor,
Speaker 5: but also some presidential and when the need arises a
Speaker 5: state level things that can inform us about the national
Speaker 5: political environment. So we spend our.
Speaker 2: Whole day looking at data.
Speaker 5: Looking at data, but also interviewing sources, interviewing candidates, talking
Speaker 5: to people here in DC, but also out in all
Speaker 5: of these districts and states where the races are taking place,
Speaker 5: and combining the data that we see with those interviews
Speaker 5: and on the ground reporting we do to paint as
Speaker 5: full of picture as possible.
Speaker 1: There were a few state elections, some very important, some
Speaker 1: an indicator I was told that from the White House
Speaker 1: world that this is the first time in thirty years
Speaker 1: that a president's party has done this well consistently on
Speaker 1: an off year. Talk to me about sort of the
Speaker 1: meaning of these elections. I mean, were they from just
Speaker 1: a sort of straight data, no opinion point of view.
Speaker 1: Do you see this as having been a good cycle
Speaker 1: for Democrats?
Speaker 3: Absolutely?
Speaker 5: I think for the most part, when you look at
Speaker 5: kind of these disparate races that took place in a
Speaker 5: handful of states across the country, Democrats did well in
Speaker 5: almost all of them. Right. I think if you looked
Speaker 5: at any individual contest, right, if you said, I'm only
Speaker 5: going to look at Virginy R. I'm only going to
Speaker 5: look at Kentucky, you would say, okay, well Democrats did
Speaker 5: well in that race. But it's just one state, right,
Speaker 5: it's a local race.
Speaker 1: But Andy Burscher, let's talk about Kentucky for a minute.
Speaker 1: He won by five thousand in that first race. In
Speaker 1: this second race, he actually did better.
Speaker 5: Right, Absolutely, I mean he got went from winning by
Speaker 5: five thousand votes to five percent. And in Kentucky, no less,
Speaker 5: which is obviously a very republican state these days. So
Speaker 5: you know, I think that the sum total of everything.
Speaker 5: The fact that they didn't just do well in one
Speaker 5: or two of these states, but that they did well
Speaker 5: in almost every state that was holding an interesting election.
Speaker 5: Here is what makes it a good night for Democrats
Speaker 5: across the board.
Speaker 1: Virginia and Kentucky both have this issue of abortion. Right
Speaker 1: for Chaer ran on abortion. He was an apologetically pro choice.
Speaker 1: He talked about it. He really is a little bit
Speaker 1: counterintuitive in a red state like that, but he really
Speaker 1: ran on it. And in Virginia, you know, the idea
Speaker 1: here was that Democrats needed to hold and we interviewed
Speaker 1: a ton of people from both the state Senate races
Speaker 1: and the House of Delegates races, because we are nothing
Speaker 1: if not in the weeds. They needed to hold the
Speaker 1: state Senate. Winning the House of Delegates didn't even in
Speaker 1: my mind, I was prize the Democrats did that. They
Speaker 1: really ran on this idea that if Youngkin was able
Speaker 1: to have a rubber stamping state legislature, he would ban
Speaker 1: abortion at fifteen weeks.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Absolutely, Abortion certainly the dominant issue in those Virginia races.
Speaker 5: You know, it was really interesting. We saw for the
Speaker 5: first time Republicans try and coalesce around a single message
Speaker 5: on abortion right. Ever since the Dobbs ruling came down
Speaker 5: a year and a half ago, Republican candidates have struggled
Speaker 5: to get on the same page about what they're proposing
Speaker 5: to fill the gap that you know, Roe versus Wade
Speaker 5: used to fill. And some candidates wanted a total ban,
Speaker 5: no exceptions, Oklahoma style, some wanted six weeks, ten weeks,
Speaker 5: fifteen weeks, twenty weeks. It was all over the map,
Speaker 5: and what they were trying to do in Virginia was
Speaker 5: Youngkin basically said we're going to go fifteen weeks. That's
Speaker 5: what the polling tells us is popular. Everyone who's running
Speaker 5: for state legislature is going to get on the same
Speaker 5: page about fifteen weeks. We're all going to run ads
Speaker 5: fifteen weeks. It's not a ban, it's a reasonable limit,
Speaker 5: and it was not enough to get over the finish line.
Speaker 5: So I do think it'll be interesting to see what
Speaker 5: Republicans do now that that experiment fell short. Do they
Speaker 5: stay with this fifteen weeks because that's what the polling
Speaker 5: numbers say, or are they back to a state of
Speaker 5: disarray when it comes to what exactly the party as
Speaker 5: a whole is proposing on abortion.
Speaker 1: That is a really interesting point, right, because this is
Speaker 1: here someone who took a more quote unquote moderate view.
Speaker 1: There's a lot that's sort of supported by polling, right,
Speaker 1: not like a Mike Johnson view, but a really kind
Speaker 1: of careful view. And he too, really got his clock cleaned.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you know, I think that. You know, it's been
Speaker 5: fascinating to see Republicans kind of within this particular issue
Speaker 5: sphere learn a lesson that I think Democrats have been
Speaker 5: learning for quite some time. For instance, when it comes
Speaker 5: to guns, right, Democrats talk all the time about how
Speaker 5: universal background checks have a ninety percent approval rating in
Speaker 5: the general public. Right, ninety percent of voters support more
Speaker 5: restrictive gun laws like universal background checks, a saw weapon ban,
Speaker 5: things like that. And yet when they go to the polls,
Speaker 5: they aren't just going to vote for the candidate that
Speaker 5: supports that policy, right. There are a lot of other considerations,
Speaker 5: primarily whether they think they'll just stop at that, you know,
Speaker 5: either the fifteen week ban when it comes to abortion,
Speaker 5: or you know, just a universal background check. There's a
Speaker 5: lack of trust when it comes to Republicans on abortion.
Speaker 5: That meant that even though they were saying in these ads,
Speaker 5: I'm only going to go fifteen weeks. Voters didn't necessarily
Speaker 5: believe that, because they saw them cheering on the striking
Speaker 5: down of Row versus way, they saw them take more
Speaker 5: restrictive stances in the past, and so they weren't willing
Speaker 5: to vote on faith that Republicans would just do that
Speaker 5: and nothing more, at least the voters who might be
Speaker 5: open to that. And then of course you've got a
Speaker 5: lot of voters who don't support fifteen weeks and were
Speaker 5: never going to back a Republican who they thought was
Speaker 5: going to pass any sort of abortion restriction.
Speaker 1: Is there a sense in which it's trump But I
Speaker 1: think it's more than that. It's sort of because not
Speaker 1: all of these people are Trumpet. But there is a
Speaker 1: certain maga bravado, right, and we see it in Mike Johnson,
Speaker 1: and we see it in Jim Jordan, this sort of
Speaker 1: performative politics that is very crazy.
Speaker 2: And very loud.
Speaker 1: And Lauren Beaupert and MTG do you think that this
Speaker 1: is creating an atmosphere of mistrust for the Republican Party.
Speaker 1: I'm just thinking out loud when I think about like
Speaker 1: voters not taking politicians at their word. Youngkin's whole thing
Speaker 1: was that he was talked about as someone who could
Speaker 1: sell himself as a moderate. What he was unable to
Speaker 1: do in this election cycle was sell himself as a
Speaker 1: motor right. They didn't trust him. So I just wonder
Speaker 1: how you get to a place where voters really where
Speaker 1: the R next to your name hurts you in your
Speaker 1: inability to you know, sell the game.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Look, I think that there are a couple of things
Speaker 5: going on, right. I think that specifically to this race
Speaker 5: and this set of races, Junkin was not on the
Speaker 5: ballot himself. I think he is still popular in Virginia
Speaker 5: as an individual figure. And obviously he won that election narrowly,
Speaker 5: but he still won two years ago, and he did
Speaker 5: that by winning over a lot of voters who have
Speaker 5: typically voted Democratic. But I do think that in the
Speaker 5: Trump era, right, really ever since twenty sixteen, Yeah, there
Speaker 5: has been a shift in the way that a lot
Speaker 5: of voters, voters that are heavily represented in Virginia, right,
Speaker 5: Virginia's kind of ground zero in a lot of ways
Speaker 5: for a lot of the shifts that we've seen in
Speaker 5: the two party coalitions over the last decade or so
Speaker 5: have become more skeptical of Republicans. And I think everyone
Speaker 5: is skeptical of their politicians in general, and that's.
Speaker 3: Not a bad thing.
Speaker 5: That's probably a good thing that voters don't just blindly
Speaker 5: believe what a politician says they're going to do in
Speaker 5: a campaign.
Speaker 2: Ad Right, and they may be more skeptical of Democrats.
Speaker 5: That's possible too, right, Yeah, absolutely, And I think look,
Speaker 5: the Virginia races were very close. Right, We're going to
Speaker 5: look at a state Senate that's twenty one to nineteen,
Speaker 5: a state House that's fifty one forty nine. It doesn't
Speaker 5: get much closer than that. So I do think that
Speaker 5: this was a loss for Republicans. They put a lot
Speaker 5: of political capital, a lot of financial capital behind trying
Speaker 5: to flip the state Senate and get full control of government.
Speaker 5: They felt short, absolutely, But this was not a wipeout.
Speaker 5: This was a very very narrow result in favor of Democrats.
Speaker 5: But they lost the House of Delegates.
Speaker 3: They did, and.
Speaker 5: That's why I'm saying it's not it's not a good
Speaker 5: outcome for Republicans. It could have been a lot worse
Speaker 5: for them. There were four or five seats that were
Speaker 5: very narrow that went for Republicans that could have easily
Speaker 5: flipped to Democrats. And so I wonder what the lesson
Speaker 5: is going to be that Republicans draw from this, Whether
Speaker 5: it's a lesson about abortion, or whether it's a lesson
Speaker 5: about Virginia just not quite being there for them yet,
Speaker 5: whether it's a lesson about vote by mail, which is
Speaker 5: something that they invested in heavily this election cycle for
Speaker 5: the first time. There are a lot of different lessons
Speaker 5: that they might pull out of the results here that
Speaker 5: might not just be We've got to totally rethink on
Speaker 5: abortion again.
Speaker 1: Right, And quite frankly, Republicans are really in a sticky
Speaker 1: wicket when it comes to abortion because the people who
Speaker 1: are their bread and butter are the people who they
Speaker 1: must win in order to win elections. They have gone
Speaker 1: to the Republican Party because they want abortion van.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's tough. It is not something that the party
Speaker 5: has figured out how to solve yet. You know, I
Speaker 5: think it was interesting for the five people who watched
Speaker 5: the Republican primary debate last night. I don't know I
Speaker 5: was one of them. I don't know if you were.
Speaker 5: You know, we got to five on the podcast. Okay,
Speaker 5: what a five?
Speaker 2: They don't came enough to watch that debate, I'm sorry
Speaker 2: to tell you.
Speaker 5: One of the interesting moments was when abortion came up,
Speaker 5: you know, an hour and forty five minutes, in which
Speaker 5: I think was a little late for such a pressing issue.
Speaker 5: You know, there was a real difference in opinion among
Speaker 5: the people on this age that I thought was illustrative
Speaker 5: of the kind of internal struggle that Republicans are going
Speaker 5: on between people who want a national law, people like
Speaker 5: Nikki Haley, who might vote for a national law or
Speaker 5: sign a national law, but thinks it's not feasible and
Speaker 5: so not worth you know, even talking about because it'll
Speaker 5: turn voters off. People like Chris Christy, who are like,
Speaker 5: whatever the states want. If New Jersey wants to have
Speaker 5: no limits, that's fine with New Jersey.
Speaker 1: Again, you don't have to say anything here, but because
Speaker 1: I know you're not on the opinion side, but I
Speaker 1: will say, because this is I'm on the opinion side.
Speaker 2: This is a lie.
Speaker 1: This whole thing about that it's the state's rights they
Speaker 1: have right now, you know, a group trying to ban
Speaker 1: the abortion pills, so yes, they shop it that way.
Speaker 2: But that's not really what it is.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think that there was a lot missing from
Speaker 5: that discussion. Obviously, the judge down in Texas that's trying
Speaker 5: to ban life PRISTO and the dynamics there that went
Speaker 5: totally unremarked upon are important, and Republicans really don't have
Speaker 5: an answer for them. The movement to try and ban contraception,
Speaker 5: I think, which is even as unpopular as a lot
Speaker 5: of the abortion restrictions are right, contraception bans are times
Speaker 5: ten unpopularity. Not not really, of course, but you know,
Speaker 5: quite significant. They are not just all over the place
Speaker 5: in terms of what they want, but they're all over
Speaker 5: the place and how to talk about it and how
Speaker 5: to try and sell voters on trusting them on abortion policy.
Speaker 3: They have not.
Speaker 5: Figured that out yet, and I don't think they're any
Speaker 5: closer to figuring it out for next year's elections.
Speaker 1: The thing I am struck by with this Republican contest
Speaker 1: is there's no one who is offering a radically different
Speaker 1: view of trump Ism.
Speaker 2: Really.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, I think that the candidates who are
Speaker 5: even slightly deviating have really struggled to gain traction. Obviously,
Speaker 5: you know, someone like Asa Hutchinson, who's that right, the
Speaker 5: former governor of Arkansas, who I think is still technically
Speaker 5: running but hasn't made any of the debates since the
Speaker 5: first one. Honestly, he probably had the most clearly articulated
Speaker 5: kind of return to pre Trump Republicanism as his plat.
Speaker 5: He was one of the only candidates other than Chris
Speaker 5: Christy who basically has said Trump should be barred from
Speaker 5: running for president. He is probably going to be a
Speaker 5: convicted felon, you know. He obviously didn't get anywhere. But look,
Speaker 5: I think that most of the people who see a
Speaker 5: version of Republicanism that's different than trump Ism have voluntarily
Speaker 5: or involuntarily left the party, and they've certainly left any
Speaker 5: sort of real positions of power within the party. And
Speaker 5: if they are still there in positions of power, they're
Speaker 5: smart enough not to rock the vote too much because
Speaker 5: they know which way the elector at swings.
Speaker 1: But again, it does come back to this, the base
Speaker 1: wants something different than what the general wants.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, I think that is probably the case.
Speaker 5: I think there's a lot of data floating out there
Speaker 5: right now to suggest that, you know, if the election
Speaker 5: were held today, things might be a little closer than
Speaker 5: perhaps anticipated. I don't think that's necessarily a reflection of
Speaker 5: general election voters wanting trump Ism and more just they've
Speaker 5: forgotten what trump Ism is and they don't like Biden,
Speaker 5: and so they're just grasping for whatever altern it out.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about that poll, because there's actually also there
Speaker 1: was another one too. So there were two poles of
Speaker 1: c and And poll and New York Times poll, and
Speaker 1: they both basically said the same thing, which is that
Speaker 1: voters are not very happy with Biden, and for a
Speaker 1: number of reasons, him being old, being very high on
Speaker 1: the list. So I just want to like take a
Speaker 1: minute here to sort of look at this for a second.
Speaker 1: So these poles compared Biden, they were sort of they
Speaker 1: were like, how do you feel about Biden? Right? And
Speaker 1: even like the exit polls, I don't totally trust the polls.
Speaker 1: And again, three thousand people, six states, but they are
Speaker 1: the states that matter. But the exit polling in Ohio,
Speaker 1: for example, that's something I put more faith in, right,
Speaker 1: because they're voting anyway, they're in there. This is the
Speaker 1: exit polling. Biden got very poorer marks from them in Ohio,
Speaker 1: which is a red state, but then they absolutely voted
Speaker 1: for the abortion initiative. So is it a smart play
Speaker 1: to put abortion on the back everywhere and will that
Speaker 1: help Democrats on the ticket?
Speaker 5: I think absolutely. It's not a silver bullet, right. It's
Speaker 5: not like if there's an abortion right. Obviously, Ohio was
Speaker 5: not going to vote fifty six percent for Joe Biden
Speaker 5: if the abortion referendum were on the ballot next to Biden.
Speaker 5: But I do think that from a turnout perspective, once
Speaker 5: you get people into the voting booth for whatever reason, right,
Speaker 5: whether it's to vote for Biden or to vote to
Speaker 5: enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution, if they're a Democrat,
Speaker 5: they're far more likely to vote for Joe Biden.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 5: The worry that I think Biden has right now is
Speaker 5: that people just aren't going to show up. Younger voters,
Speaker 5: voters of color, people who are dissatisfied with the job
Speaker 5: he's doing might just sit it out. It's not that
Speaker 5: they're going to vote for Trump, because I think ultimately
Speaker 5: those people dislike Trump far more than they dislike Biden.
Speaker 5: But the thing that items like the ballot referenda helps
Speaker 5: with is is getting those voters in the ballot box
Speaker 5: in the first place, and once they're there, they're probably
Speaker 5: not going to leave the top of the ticket, like
Speaker 5: especially with Trump's name on the ballot. So I think
Speaker 5: we're seeing in states across the country. I think the
Speaker 5: most notable one is Florida. We'll see if they get
Speaker 5: there or not, because it's a tough process to get
Speaker 5: on the ballot, but we're seeing Democrats really try and
Speaker 5: get abortion referenda on the ballot and as many states
Speaker 5: as possible for next year so they can try and
Speaker 5: get whatever boost out of it they can.
Speaker 1: And there were a lot of tight races. But one
Speaker 1: of the things that Dave Wasserman, as you and I
Speaker 1: both know Blue Wave Dave or red Waves day, I
Speaker 1: want to read this to you because I think it's
Speaker 1: a little bit interesting. She said that it seems in
Speaker 1: his mind that there was a turnout problem for Republicans
Speaker 1: and that there was a sort of an enthusiasm problem,
Speaker 1: And I was wondering if you had seen that, and
Speaker 1: also what your take on that was.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Look, I think that one of the things that we
Speaker 5: are beginning to grapple with in kind of the Trump
Speaker 5: era of politics is this question of who is showing
Speaker 5: up to vote in off year elections and special elections.
Speaker 1: In Kentucky, Republicans had a turnout enthusiasm problem.
Speaker 2: Sorry, that was what I was looking for.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you know, I think that that is a very
Speaker 5: reasonable question to ask. You know, I think that it's
Speaker 5: become clear that one of the major shifts and coalitions
Speaker 5: over the last ten years, right has been you We've
Speaker 5: seen college educated voters move toward the Democratic Party, and
Speaker 5: we've seen lower propensity, non college educated voters, more rural
Speaker 5: voters moved toward the Republican Party. And that has resulted
Speaker 5: in potentially, right, a special election electorate, an off year
Speaker 5: election electorate that favors Democrats in some structural ways, because
Speaker 5: the more educated you are, the more likely you're going
Speaker 5: to show up to vote in an off year election.
Speaker 5: The more engaged politically you are, right, the more likely
Speaker 5: you are to show up in an off year election.
Speaker 5: And so Republicans, I think, as they've lost some of
Speaker 5: those voters in the suburbs of even in Stea. It's
Speaker 5: like Kentucky, right, which you know, has a lot of
Speaker 5: wealthy suburbs outside of Louisville and Lexington has wealthy suburbs
Speaker 5: up by Cincinnati, places where Andy Basheer did significantly better
Speaker 5: in twenty twenty three than he did in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 5: That's a real problem for them when it comes to
Speaker 5: these off year elections. Same thing in Virginia. You know,
Speaker 5: we saw in northern Virginia Democrats ultimately did pretty well,
Speaker 5: and you've got a lot of college educated voters. There
Speaker 5: are a lot of government workers there. In Hampton Roads,
Speaker 5: for instance, where the Democratic coalition skews a little bit
Speaker 5: more rural, a little bit you know, reliant on black voters,
Speaker 5: we saw Democrats not do as well in some of
Speaker 5: those districts. So even within Virginia, we saw kind of
Speaker 5: the effects of the change in coalitions on the turnout
Speaker 5: and the ultimate results.
Speaker 1: So Moms for Liberty and parental rights, let's talk about this.
Speaker 2: Prontal rights quote unquote.
Speaker 1: This was the sort of thing that a lot of
Speaker 1: Republicans sought would win them elections. And Moms for a
Speaker 1: Liberty a whole slight of school board candidates, including just
Speaker 1: As Alito's daughter, and they all lost except for one
Speaker 1: of them. Talk to me about that weirdness.
Speaker 5: We have seen a segment of the Republican Party really
Speaker 5: lean into social issues over the last couple of years,
Speaker 5: be it issues about schools and the kind of books
Speaker 5: that students are reading, transgender issues, treatment for trans kids.
Speaker 5: We have seen Republicans lean into those issues as political
Speaker 5: messaging tools to very very mixed, I would say, negative
Speaker 5: results from a political perspective. I think what happened ultimately
Speaker 5: was that there was a reaction to school closures during COVID.
Speaker 5: There was a reaction to masking rules during COVID that
Speaker 5: really did drive a lot of parents who otherwise would
Speaker 5: have voted down the line for Democrats to consider voting
Speaker 5: for Republicans. And when we look at like the twenty
Speaker 5: twenty one Virginia elections, right, I think it's clear that
Speaker 5: some of the things Terry mccauliffe said about parents and
Speaker 5: schools hurt him and they contributed to that loss. But
Speaker 5: I think the mistake Republicans made was they mapped that
Speaker 5: anger onto a different issue, which is books and learning
Speaker 5: about sexuality and learning about transgender people and like those
Speaker 5: kinds of issues which which were very different, very different
Speaker 5: than COVID restrictions. And they expected the same people who
Speaker 5: were angry about COVID to be angry about those things
Speaker 5: and they weren't right. And so we saw and it's
Speaker 5: not just the Mom's for Liberty on the school board.
Speaker 5: It was Daniel Cameron in Kentucky and his allies running
Speaker 5: ads a sailing Andy Basheer for you know, the line
Speaker 5: was that he supports gender change surgery for trans kids.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 5: That was in millions of dollars. I think they ran
Speaker 5: five million dollars in ads that mentioned those surgeries. And
Speaker 5: it wasn't effective. It didn't even in deep red Kentucky.
Speaker 5: That was not an issue that motivated people to go
Speaker 5: out and vote against Andy Bisheer. So we saw that
Speaker 5: at the school board level that they, you know, a
Speaker 5: lot of these Moms for Liberty slates failed to capture
Speaker 5: or retain control of school boards. We saw it at
Speaker 5: the state level as well in Kentucky where it just
Speaker 5: didn't click with voters at all.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Jacob.
Speaker 3: Of course.
Speaker 1: George Laws is the executive director of the Puerto Rico
Speaker 1: Statehood Council. Welcome, too fast politics, George.
Speaker 4: Thank you so much, Molly. It's great to be here.
Speaker 1: We are here to talk about something that isn't an
Speaker 1: obsession of mine. I feel like it's like a low
Speaker 1: key obsession of every Democrat we know, which is the
Speaker 1: fifty first state. No, I'm not talking about South South
Speaker 1: Dakota or North North Dakota or West West Dakota. I'm
Speaker 1: dogging about an actual place with a lot of people,
Speaker 1: which is part of America. Even though Donald Trump, I
Speaker 1: think now he knows, let's talk.
Speaker 2: About Puerto Rico.
Speaker 3: Definitely.
Speaker 2: Our project, tell me what is called, and tell me
Speaker 2: all about it now.
Speaker 4: Our project is called PR fifty first and you can
Speaker 4: go to PR fifty first dot com to check us out.
Speaker 2: And it makes a.
Speaker 1: Lot of sense because this is all about the fifty
Speaker 1: first date exactly.
Speaker 4: It's a project by the nonprofit that I lead as
Speaker 4: executive director, which is the Puerto Rico Statehood Council, and
Speaker 4: our goal is to advance full equality and democracy for
Speaker 4: the US citizens of Puerto Rico, which unfortunately, for over
Speaker 4: one hundred and twenty five years, have been relegated to
Speaker 4: a second class status by Congress because in American democracy
Speaker 4: under the US Constitution, unless you're a US citizen that
Speaker 4: lives in a state, you don't actually get voting representation
Speaker 4: in the Senate or in the House of Representatives. And
Speaker 4: you don't have any voting representation in the electoral College,
Speaker 4: so you're subject to federal laws, but you're deprived of
Speaker 4: any actual say in those laws.
Speaker 3: And then at top of it, you're treated unequally under them.
Speaker 4: And that's what we're seeking to end, and we support
Speaker 4: statehood as the best solution for Puerto Rico and America.
Speaker 1: Why is it that Puerto Rican statehood has such a
Speaker 1: hard time.
Speaker 4: Well, you know, this issue has been an issue that's
Speaker 4: been around for one hundred and twenty five years, and
Speaker 4: I think it has such a hard time because it's
Speaker 4: out of sight and out of mind for the majority
Speaker 4: of the American public most of the time. That changed
Speaker 4: significantly in twenty seventeen when we had the hurricanes Irma
Speaker 4: and Maria devastate Puerto Rico. Americans saw a lot of
Speaker 4: the horrible footage of the damage that was happening on
Speaker 4: the island and the lackluster response by President Trump and
Speaker 4: his administration during that time, and as a result, a
Speaker 4: lot of people were appalled that, hey, here are fellow
Speaker 4: American citizens just as important to us as our fellow
Speaker 4: citizens in Texas and in Florida and in Louisiana. When
Speaker 4: they experienced natural disasters, we should be taking care of
Speaker 4: them too. So I think that that's really elevated the
Speaker 4: awareness about the fact that, you know, our fellow American
Speaker 4: citizens in Puerto Rico are treated unequally, and then that's
Speaker 4: increasing the visibility of this issue. But traditionally most people
Speaker 4: a state side are just really unaware that our fellow
Speaker 4: citizens on the island are treated unequally and deprived of
Speaker 4: full democracy and full voting rates.
Speaker 1: How would Puerto Rican statehood actually happen? Give us the
Speaker 1: nuts and bolts here.
Speaker 4: So the US Constitution's very clear that Congress has the
Speaker 4: power to admit new states into the Union. They've done
Speaker 4: so thirty seven times since the original thirteen colonies became
Speaker 4: the first states, so there's a pretty clear precedent for
Speaker 4: how this happens. Congress has to pass legislation. The way
Speaker 4: that they did it in the case of Alaska and Hawaii,
Speaker 4: which were the last two states to be admitted, is
Speaker 4: that there were locally sponsored votes that were held in
Speaker 4: those territories. Majority of the citizens there said that they
Speaker 4: didn't want to continue being territories and that they wanted
Speaker 4: to be states, and then took a lot of pressure
Speaker 4: and a lot of work for Congress to finally get
Speaker 4: around to passing what they called it Admission Bill, but
Speaker 4: eventually they did. And what that bill said is, we're
Speaker 4: offering you Alaska Hawaii admission into the Union, and if
Speaker 4: your citizens vote yes in a final vote, then you're in.
Speaker 4: And that's basically what happened in nineteen fifty nine, and
Speaker 4: those were the last two states that joined the Union.
Speaker 4: It doesn't require constitutional amendment, it doesn't require two thirds
Speaker 4: vote in either chamber. It's a simple majority in the
Speaker 4: House and the Senate and the signature of the President.
Speaker 4: And Puerto Rico would beyond path to becoming America's fifty
Speaker 4: first state.
Speaker 1: So does that seem possible? And let's talk about the
Speaker 1: sort of support you have in the government.
Speaker 4: So it definitely seems more possible now than it has
Speaker 4: ever been. And I'll tell you why because much the
Speaker 4: same way that happened in Alaska Hawaii, in Puerto Rico.
Speaker 4: Over the last decade, we've held three locally sponsored votes
Speaker 4: they're called plubsites, where voters were given the option to
Speaker 4: choose between continuing to be a territory and the non
Speaker 4: territory options that are available under the Constitution, which are statehood, independence,
Speaker 4: and free association. And each time voters rejected continuing under
Speaker 4: the current territory status and they favored statehood over the
Speaker 4: non territory options, and that has generated significant momentum for
Speaker 4: this issue to advance. During the last session of Congress,
Speaker 4: the House actually passed a bill that would essentially authorize
Speaker 4: a federally sponsored vote that would give voters in Puerto
Speaker 4: Rico that very choice to choose between statehood, independence, or
Speaker 4: independence of free association. It passed with unanimous support among
Speaker 4: House Democrats and even sixteen Republican votes, which, considering that
Speaker 4: we were just a couple of weeks away from Republicans
Speaker 4: taking over the House majority, was amazing to be able
Speaker 4: to get that much bipartisan support. And it also passed
Speaker 4: with a statement of administration policy by the Biden administration
Speaker 4: saying that they endorsed this bill. So that passed in December,
Speaker 4: and unfortunately the Senate obviously didn't have time to take
Speaker 4: up the measure, and that's where we pick up with
Speaker 4: what happened this week with a Senator Martin Heinrich introducing
Speaker 4: a Senate companion bill that would allow for this process
Speaker 4: to take place for Puerto Ricans to choose their future.
Speaker 4: And the bill came out with a historic amount of
Speaker 4: original co sponsors, with twenty one Senate members one fifth
Speaker 4: of the Senate already saying that they endorse this idea
Speaker 4: and that they want to have this happen.
Speaker 2: What does that mean.
Speaker 4: It means that right now we have the opportunity to
Speaker 4: accumulate support for this legislation and have that legislation be
Speaker 4: brought up in committees so it can be debated, and
Speaker 4: other Senators aren't engaged on this issue can become aware
Speaker 4: of it, and you know, when the right opportunity comes,
Speaker 4: which you know, maybe during this session, but more likely
Speaker 4: than not, we'll have to wait until the next session
Speaker 4: of Congress. We have the opportunity to actually pass this legislation,
Speaker 4: have Congress officially commit to offering voters in Puerto Rico
Speaker 4: definitive choice among the non territory options, and then ultimately
Speaker 4: let Puerto Rico decide its future. And I firmly believe
Speaker 4: that if Congress offers the US citizens of Puerto Rico
Speaker 4: the opportunity to choose between statehood, independence or independence with
Speaker 4: free association, that an overwhelming majority of voters are going
Speaker 4: to choose statehood because I think they think that that's
Speaker 4: the best option for Puerto Rico, and they also feel
Speaker 4: very strongly that it's the best option for strengthening American democracy.
Speaker 2: Explain to me what happened yesterday.
Speaker 4: So yesterday we had a historic press conference. A Senator
Speaker 4: Martin Heinrich led the introduction of a bill called the
Speaker 4: Puerto Rico Status Act. This is the Senate companion to
Speaker 4: the House bill that I mentioned was passed in the
Speaker 4: House last session, was introduced, reintroduced again this session of Congress.
Speaker 4: He had twenty one members of the Senate in total
Speaker 4: participating as sponsors of the bill. The Governor of Puerto Rico,
Speaker 4: Pedro pier Luisi, who's a Democrat nationally, he was there
Speaker 4: and was endorsing this completely. And Puerto Rico's a Resident Commissioner,
Speaker 4: which is our non voting member in the House of Representatives,
Speaker 4: Jennifer Gonzales Coloone who's a Republican, she was there endorsing
Speaker 4: this too. So it really sets the stage for the
Speaker 4: opportunity to build on what happened you know last session,
Speaker 4: where the House passed this and the Senate didn't have
Speaker 4: the opportunity to take action. Well, now we've got to
Speaker 4: build in the Senate. We've got the opportunity to get
Speaker 4: Senate members on it and be able to push for
Speaker 4: that to be advanced in the legislative process. And one
Speaker 4: fascinating fact is that if you look at the senators
Speaker 4: who supported it, you have people from all the way
Speaker 4: to the left like Bernie Sanders to Senator Bennett from Colorado,
Speaker 4: which is, you know, one of the more centrist and
Speaker 4: moderate Democrats. So it really shows kind of a wide
Speaker 4: swath of ideological support for this legislation.
Speaker 2: I mean, how would Republicans pass something like this?
Speaker 4: Well, in the House, I think right now it's very
Speaker 4: very tough.
Speaker 2: You really have to have control of all three branches
Speaker 2: to do.
Speaker 4: This, right, I think that that's the most likely scenario.
Speaker 4: But let's think a little bit here, and it has
Speaker 4: to do with the Republican politics, right. So the common
Speaker 4: knowledge that Republicans have is that if Puerto Rico were
Speaker 4: a state, would practically add two Senate Democrats and you know,
Speaker 4: four Democrat House members. The electoral politics in Puerto Rico
Speaker 4: don't really back that up, right, So our current governor
Speaker 4: is a Democrat, our current Resident Commission of Congress. As
Speaker 4: a Republican, she has been the top vote getter in
Speaker 4: Puerto Rico elections for the last three election cycles, and she
Speaker 4: recently announced that she's actually challenging the governor in a
Speaker 4: primary in Puerto Rico. Because in Puerto Rico, they're both
Speaker 4: part of the pro statehood party right, which is the
Speaker 4: one that fields candidates on the ballot, So Republicans actually
Speaker 4: have a base of conservative support in Puerto Rico. They
Speaker 4: just have to realize that it's there appeal to those
Speaker 4: voters as opposed to just presuming that just because we're Hispanics,
Speaker 4: we're going to automatically vote Democrat. So there's a little
Speaker 4: bit of education that needs to happen there on the
Speaker 4: Republican side. I believe that there is a possibility that,
Speaker 4: looking at the close election that we're looking forward to
Speaker 4: in twenty twenty four, our Republicans are going to have
Speaker 4: to take a look at those Puerto Rican voters because
Speaker 4: they're not just on the island in three point two million, right,
Speaker 4: but stateside, there's a population of five point eight million
Speaker 4: Puerto Ricans, and they're not just in solid Democrat states
Speaker 4: like New York they're also in states like Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Georgia, Wisconsin, Arizona,
Speaker 4: and in all of those states, even just a few
Speaker 4: thousand votes can tilt the balance of the electoral college right.
Speaker 1: And it's also it's ultimately even more than that, like
Speaker 1: this is a state. These are people who are American
Speaker 1: citizens who don't have the same rights as everyone else.
Speaker 4: Well, most definitely, I think that anyone on the Republican
Speaker 4: side or the Democratic side that's looking at this from
Speaker 4: a perspective of our core values as a country. America
Speaker 4: has founded on the idea of government by consent of
Speaker 4: the government. That's literally why we fought the American Revolution,
Speaker 4: and territory status goes directly against that. Holding fellow US
Speaker 4: citizens under a permanent territory status where they don't have
Speaker 4: a say in the federal laws that they live under,
Speaker 4: and then on top of that they're treated unequally and
Speaker 4: worse than everyone else under those laws, that's un American.
Speaker 4: So on a principal basis, I think it's absolutely one
Speaker 4: hundred percent clear, and there's many Republicans that want you
Speaker 4: talk about it from a constitutional perspective, and that principles
Speaker 4: basis they really get it and they're on board with
Speaker 4: it. It's the politics and the short term thinking that really
Speaker 4: gets in the way of much of their potential for
Speaker 4: supporting this further. And that's part of what we're trying
Speaker 4: to to cut across now in our outreach efforts and
Speaker 4: our education efforts in the port Eco fifty first.
Speaker 1: Such an interesting project. I mean, do you need volunteers,
Speaker 1: do you need money? What do you guys need?
Speaker 4: So right now, our biggest need is for our fellow citizens'
Speaker 4: stateside to contact their members of Congress, to reach out
Speaker 4: to their representatives and senators. You can go onto our
Speaker 4: website at PR fifty first dot com and click on
Speaker 4: the take action button. We've got a web form that
Speaker 4: you can use to reach out to your members of
Speaker 4: Congress to let them know that America shouldn't be holding colonies.
Speaker 4: That America needs to make sure that all its citizens
Speaker 4: have the opportunity to have a say in the type
Speaker 4: of government that they live under. And in the case
Speaker 4: of the three point two million US citizens of Puerto Rico,
Speaker 4: we're being held as a territory on behalf of American
Speaker 4: citizens by Congress. So you guys have the power contacting
Speaker 4: your members of Congress to tell them, you know, sponsor
Speaker 4: this legislation, the Puerto Rico Status Act, and provide a
Speaker 4: pathway out of territory status for our fellow citizens in
Speaker 4: Puerto Rico. And that's not only going to help Puerto
Speaker 4: Rico significantly improve its local situation, but ultimately in a
Speaker 4: strengthen American democracy, because right now there's a lack of
Speaker 4: representation of US citizens in Congress, where we're passing laws
Speaker 4: that impact people in Puerto Rico, but we don't have
Speaker 4: any representation in the Senate, and in the House we
Speaker 4: only get one member that can speak on the flour
Speaker 4: but ultimately can't vote on bills that impact their constituents.
Speaker 2: So insane. Thank you so much for coming on.
Speaker 4: No, thank you so much, Molly. I greatly appreciate it,
Speaker 4: and definitely, if there's any opportunities to provide further updates
Speaker 4: on this issue or any other information that would be
Speaker 4: helpful for you or your audience, would love to be
Speaker 4: back here and continue showcasing the growth of this issue,
Speaker 4: which is, you know, not just an issue for elected officials,
Speaker 4: but it's really a citizens movement from people in Puerto Rico.
Speaker 4: As well as all of our allies and supporter state
Speaker 4: side that together are going to make the difference and
Speaker 4: change the course of American history for the better. Yeah,
Speaker 4: thank you, Thank you so much, Jesse Cannon.
Speaker 2: Molly junk Fest. The news just broke. That seems pretty disturbing.
Speaker 2: What do you see in here? Fucking guy? Can we
Speaker 2: just cue Nandor from what we do in the shadows?
Speaker 1: Yes? And guy, fucking guy, this fucking guy, as to
Speaker 1: quote Nandor Saten Island's best resident. That fucking guy, the
Speaker 1: Senator from West Virginia, Joe Manchin, messed up the Inflation
Speaker 1: Reduction Act, now trying to mess up the twenty twenty
Speaker 1: for president. See, Joe Manchin is not going to run
Speaker 1: for reelection, but instead he's going to going to do
Speaker 1: a listening tour, which means he's going to try and
Speaker 1: run for president and mess up the election for Joe
Speaker 1: Biden and bring us back into fascism. And that is
Speaker 1: why Joe Manchin occupies our moment of fuck. Right. That's
Speaker 1: it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday, Wednesday,
Speaker 1: and Friday to hear the best minds in politics makes
Speaker 1: sense of all this chaos. If you enjoyed what you've heard,
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Speaker 1: And again thanks for listening.