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0:30

Welcome to

0:32

Deconstructed. I'm Ryan

0:35

Grimth. The

0:38

last two presidential elections have been decided not

0:40

by the traditional swing voters we've come to

0:42

think of in politics, but what political

0:45

consultants now refer to as double

0:47

haters. A double hater

0:49

hates both candidates running and is

0:51

faced with a choice of picking between them, sitting

0:54

it out or voting third party. In

0:56

the last two elections, the double haters

0:58

who showed up to vote swung the

1:00

election. In 2016, double haters broke

1:03

for Trump. It turned out they

1:05

hated Hillary Clinton a bit more. In 2020,

1:08

they had some regrets and less hostility

1:10

toward the Democratic candidate. The double

1:13

haters that election broke for Joe Biden.

1:16

But voters are stunned to find

1:18

themselves facing the same stale choice

1:20

yet again. As Bo

1:23

Burnham puts it, a

1:30

recent Gallup poll found that 29% said

1:33

that neither Trump nor Biden are fit for

1:35

the job. Today, we're

1:37

going to get into the heads of the

1:39

double haters and will be guided on that

1:41

tour by Anant Shankarasuryo, a return guest on

1:43

the program. She's been part of

1:45

a team running focus groups in key swing states.

1:48

Here's how a group of Latino voters in

1:50

Nevada, for instance, responded to a question about

1:52

Biden. Joe Biden, first thing's

1:55

popping in, Joe Biden. See Now. See Now.

2:00

Okay yeah up in other words

2:02

or less have overview of her.

2:05

Friends of ours are being an

2:07

Alpha Joe Biden Joe Biden Five

2:09

or moving up for the day

2:11

sound familiar with I I I

2:13

see. Tell him what to do is like okay

2:15

that is Lana to the from what I've seen

2:17

as and. I've used as a as a

2:19

As or who would you say the face of

2:21

people love him. Or

2:25

not. A researcher, campaign adviser, and host of

2:28

the podcast words to Win By joins me

2:30

now to unpack how voters are feeling about

2:32

the two candidates for us this November. Welcome

2:34

back to Deconstructed A not. Thanks for

2:37

having me back! So. It's been

2:39

awhile since you've been on. A lot has happened

2:41

since then. We don't do a ton of. A

2:43

horse race. Focus. Here

2:45

on deconstructed. But I also don't want

2:47

to completely ignore the fact that there

2:49

is a horse race between these. Two

2:52

tired horses that are galloping

2:54

toward an inevitable finish line

2:56

in November and wanted to

2:58

get your sense of your

3:01

what you've been seeing out

3:03

there. In the world of polling

3:05

and focus grouping and nine and electioneering, so

3:07

thanks for thanks for coming back on. Galloping

3:09

is very generous. The same kind of you.

3:12

So. I think you're

3:14

elite in is a very apt

3:17

one. These are known horses so

3:19

this is a redo election, which

3:21

you would expect would mean that

3:23

people have their opinions pretty firmly

3:26

cemented a lot as opinions are

3:28

firmly cemented in any election because

3:30

most of voting behavior is just

3:32

reflexive partisan identity. People are team

3:35

flu or they are team bread

3:37

and that's what they're gonna do.

3:39

and that's what they're always going

3:41

to do. So. An interesting and

3:44

I would say go farther and

3:46

say a surprising dynamic in this

3:48

election. Given that and that these

3:51

candidates were the exact same candidates

3:53

and twenty twenties is that in

3:55

a recent Battleground States poll that

3:57

we. Conducted for their research. The

4:00

A of what we found is that

4:02

while six in ten voters across the

4:04

six battleground states are cemented, you know

4:07

they are gonna vote for Trump, or

4:09

they are gonna vote for Biden. And

4:11

that's that's Four in Ten are still

4:14

some form of up for grabs, are

4:16

undecided, and that's a lotta people, even

4:18

in March, which was the time that

4:20

we did that poll. So four in

4:23

Ten these folks what they appear to

4:25

be doing. You. Know there are

4:27

some sort of authentically drawn towards

4:29

Rfk like that is a decided

4:31

Magnets said that is the minority

4:34

by a lot. Mostly what we

4:36

see both in this survey and

4:38

in qualitative is that these Double

4:40

knows I call them the Know

4:42

knows they're commonly called the double

4:44

haters. Zero kind of cycling through

4:46

what am I gonna do when

4:48

I don't wanna do biden or

4:51

trump and sometimes they say i'm

4:53

gonna sit it out and sometimes

4:55

they say I'm. Gonna vote third

4:57

parties and sometimes the newer permutation that

4:59

their offerings if they are higher information

5:02

is. I'm gonna skip the top of

5:04

the ticket although, but I just won't

5:06

vote this one line at the top

5:09

which is a pretty sophisticated political calculus

5:11

out a people who you know are

5:13

different to the kind of people who

5:15

are like all, just sit it out,

5:18

I just won't do anything at all.

5:20

And so in this kind of toggling

5:22

between I'm a double know, double hate

5:25

or whatever. What can. I do. What can

5:27

I do? What Can I do? One.

5:29

Thing that we've really notice decidedly

5:31

is that when we are engaged

5:33

in a conversation is that starts

5:35

off by saying Trump is rates.

5:37

Trump is racist. Trump is a

5:40

criminal. Trump is under indictment. Trump

5:42

is a sexist. Trump is us.

5:44

There are so many ways to

5:46

fill in that sentence. We could

5:48

do that all day. He instantly.

5:51

Cats. the response from people

5:53

in qualitative that goes will

5:55

but fight in is because

5:57

basically them that a message

6:00

of Trump is, is

6:02

I want you

6:04

to think of this election in terms

6:06

of the characteristics of these two individual

6:09

candidates. And I want you to weigh

6:11

these characteristics. And even though for Democrats,

6:13

that should seem a no brainer, it

6:16

sort of draws top of mind

6:19

all of these associations that a

6:21

lot of these double nos are not thrilled with

6:23

Biden about. When we shift

6:26

instead from Trump is to

6:28

Trump will do away from

6:30

identity and towards future agenda,

6:33

that is where we are on much

6:35

more solid ground. And even more solid

6:37

ground is when we shift

6:39

away from the candidates at all toward

6:42

this election is really about which

6:44

country we will be, which future

6:46

we will have, as opposed to

6:49

which man, let's just cut

6:51

to the chase, we're going to elect at the helm. That

6:53

makes sense because as you were saying, Trump

6:56

will do, and I've seen some of your analysis of

6:58

these focus groups, it

7:01

made me ask then, okay, that

7:03

doesn't that raise the question

7:06

of well, what will Biden do in

7:08

the same way that Trump is

7:10

raises people's hackles? And they say, well,

7:13

Biden is, you know, XYZ

7:16

and Biden, at least in

7:19

my lifetime is the only candidate

7:21

other than maybe Trump, actually, who

7:23

is running for another term

7:26

in office, without really telling you what

7:28

he's going to do. He recently started

7:30

to say that he'll codify

7:32

Roe v. Wade. But beyond that, if

7:35

you hold a typical voter, voter

7:37

or pulled me, and said, what

7:39

will Biden do? You know, if you put

7:41

him back in and give him four more years, it

7:45

wouldn't be at my fingertips, what

7:47

he would do. Is there an effort

7:49

to change that? Or do they think that they

7:51

can just move it to vibes about

7:53

the kind of country that

7:55

we want and that we want to be,

7:58

and that that will get enough? of

8:00

those these players. Is

8:02

this deliberate or they just haven't gotten around

8:04

to telling people what they plan

8:06

to do if they get reelected? I'll

8:09

answer the question, but I just want to disaggregate

8:11

between, you know, what the main

8:14

campaign like team Biden is

8:16

doing, which is

8:19

not under my control is not like, you

8:21

know, I'm not in there telling them what to

8:23

do. So I just want to like, yeah, me

8:25

neither. So let's be clear about that out. Just

8:28

a couple people talking here.

8:30

Yeah. So as far as

8:32

the latter part of your question, is

8:34

that just not what they plan to do? I

8:37

think and here I'm offering

8:39

an informed conjecture to be

8:41

clear. I think they would argue

8:43

that that's what they've tried to

8:45

do, that they've tried to sort

8:48

of tout their accomplishments as an opening salvo

8:50

to this is what we've done. And this

8:52

is what we'll continue to do. But I

8:55

think what you're hitting upon, and then I'll

8:57

answer the other part of your question, is

9:00

that they ran into

9:02

a roadblock last year when they

9:04

were on the touting accomplishments train.

9:07

When they were on the, you know, here's what

9:09

we did, like you get a prescription drug and

9:11

you get a solar panel and you get a

9:14

paved road. And I'm exaggerating, you know, they didn't

9:16

get open Oprah to come, maybe if they had,

9:18

it all would have sunk in better. Not would

9:20

have been a more solid approach. Maybe

9:22

she didn't want to don't know. But

9:25

I think that they

9:27

understand that that sort of trying to

9:29

popularize by dynamics trying to kind of

9:31

sell, here's all the things that we

9:34

did for you. It

9:36

buttressed up against people lived

9:38

experience and their own feeling

9:40

of precarity of frustration of

9:43

hardship of, you know, WTF.

9:45

And I think the

9:47

fundamental problem with saying the economy is

9:49

good is that you're

9:51

saying to people that the economy is good, by

9:54

which I mean this system, which the

9:57

majority of voters we can see in

9:59

polling, no. to be vastly

10:01

unjust, funneling money out of the

10:04

hands of working people, you know,

10:07

that you can work super, super,

10:09

super hard and still not exit

10:11

hardship. So to say to

10:13

people the economy is good is to say

10:15

that the status quo is as it should

10:17

be and people don't feel that. So

10:20

I think that what team Biden would

10:22

probably argue is that they have moved

10:25

toward this, here's what we're going

10:27

to do. We're going to continue to tackle drug

10:29

prices. We're going to continue to take on corporate

10:31

price gouging. We're going to continue to expand

10:34

these programs. They've talked about

10:36

codifying Roe, as you noted. I think

10:38

that they sometimes, maybe they will more

10:40

often talk about passing the Voting Rights

10:42

Act, both the Freedom to Vote and

10:44

the John Lewis Act. So

10:47

I think that they think that they're

10:49

giving an agenda to the previous part

10:52

of your question. Yes, when

10:54

you shift from Trump is to Trump

10:56

will do, it does invite the same

10:58

thought bubble out of the respondent and

11:00

they go to, well, Biden will do.

11:03

And basically where that lands them, and

11:05

I'm speaking sort of in broad strokes, people

11:07

are individuals, but is most often

11:10

toward a, well, I guess what

11:12

Biden will do is keep

11:14

doing what he's been doing. It

11:17

will be a maintenance of what we

11:19

presently have. And to be

11:21

sure for a lot of people, and by

11:23

people I'm now specifically talking about this 4

11:26

in 10, these no-no's, these double haters, they're

11:28

like, I don't love the status quo. I'm

11:31

not thrilled with how things are, but I

11:33

am much, much more concerned with

11:36

this dystopia looming

11:39

of a group of people in

11:41

the form of macro Republicans trying to

11:43

control us and decide our futures for

11:45

us. And so they're weighing a like

11:47

continuation of a present they don't love

11:49

with a future that they truly find

11:52

repugnant. How is it that

11:54

it's so close if they find

11:56

this future that repugnant? So

11:58

multiple reasons. The first. I stated

12:00

earlier, a lot of political

12:03

behavior just really comes down

12:05

to partisan identity. A Islands

12:07

it is not dissimilar to

12:09

people's fanatical attachment to a

12:11

sports team and that's just

12:13

how it is. So that's

12:15

a big chunk of people

12:17

is that has decided before

12:19

theories and named candidate who

12:22

they will. Be for because of

12:24

the team. The other

12:26

reason why it's extraordinarily close and there's

12:28

multiple is because of the features of

12:30

are supremely undemocratic system where in the

12:33

election gets decided by a handful of

12:35

people in a handful of states and

12:37

people who live in the most populous

12:40

states like my own California kind of

12:42

don't matter at the presidential level. so

12:44

that's part of the dynamic as well.

12:46

and any other part of the dynamic.

12:49

And this is where you know I

12:51

will frequently quip I'd rather win elections

12:53

than polls we do see. A

12:56

systematic difference of behavioral when it

12:58

comes to surveys. Then when it

13:01

comes to voting, it seems that

13:03

voters know the difference between answering

13:06

online or on the phone. Someone

13:08

asking them, hey, what are you

13:10

gonna do right now Whether that

13:13

be you know back in October,

13:15

November, December of last year, or

13:17

more recently now. Did.

13:20

That question to some degree registers

13:22

as how do you feel about

13:24

things right now? Are you happy

13:27

with Joe Biden or not And

13:29

that people treat the.survey question differently

13:31

to how they treat the actual

13:33

act of going into a polling

13:35

booths and you know, filling out

13:38

the former whatever, pushing the lever

13:40

in times on by. Got.

13:42

It as I think about it to tell

13:44

me I'm wrong here I think about. Five.

13:47

Threads kind of running through. Fog.

13:50

This and I'm curious if. That's.

13:52

What you see showing up in your

13:54

focus groups and the polling and. or

13:57

timing of the three issues know abortion

14:00

the genocide in Gaza and

14:03

immigration slash the border. And

14:05

then kind of overlaid over all of

14:08

that, you've got Biden's age, and

14:10

then you've got just Trump as

14:12

a phenomenon and what people think

14:15

of him and just

14:17

Trumpism and Magaism. Is that

14:19

right? I have spent so much

14:21

time the last five months reporting on what's

14:23

going in Gaza. I wonder sometimes if I'm

14:26

in something of a bubble, like a

14:28

bubble of people who care about this

14:31

ongoing genocide. I

14:33

can't tell if I walk

14:35

outside of it, if how much it's

14:39

kind of resonating with a typical voter. So

14:42

first of all, I'm curious, like how much

14:44

of a actually caring about this genocide

14:47

bubble am I in? How much do

14:49

you see it among the

14:51

voting public? It is

14:53

a bit of a bubble. You're right

14:55

to sort of ask that question

14:58

in terms of for whom is

15:00

this not meaningful, I

15:02

would say, but salient, by which I

15:04

mean not that people

15:07

don't feel that this is to

15:11

use the lightest possible term,

15:13

like distasteful, horrific, horrible, not

15:15

okay, all those things, but

15:18

rather whether or not it rises

15:20

to the level of

15:22

their kind of daily thought

15:24

patterns, their electoral calculus, et

15:27

cetera. So that's what I mean by saliency.

15:31

That is a bit of a bubble. You

15:33

are sort of existing among outliers

15:36

if we're just looking at

15:38

kind of statistics. We even

15:40

purposely did focus groups in

15:43

Dearborn, Michigan among

15:45

young, disaffected voters of color

15:47

because we wanted to sort

15:49

of like go into where we thought the

15:51

bubble would be most highly concentrated

15:54

because we wanted precisely to

15:56

look at that. I

15:58

mean, a focus group is an idiot. Geosyncratic

16:00

thing and it's anecdotal especially when I'm

16:02

talking about that one single focus group

16:05

We were surprised to not get more

16:07

of that, you know coming at us

16:09

initially In terms of

16:11

people volunteering that as being court of their

16:13

calculus definitely aware of it But there's a

16:16

difference between aware and quarter the calculus I

16:18

think the thing to say about the bubble that

16:20

is really important is that

16:22

we tend to forget or Political

16:25

campaigns to their peril tend to

16:27

forget that it's not just about how

16:29

many people it's about which people this

16:32

upsets and why I say that

16:34

is because the people

16:36

that it upsets and rightly so are in

16:40

Many places like Michigan an important

16:42

part of the choir They are

16:44

if you will the like lead

16:46

tenor or lead alto lead alto,

16:48

etc and so if the

16:52

people that you rely upon to knock

16:54

on doors to drive voters out to

16:57

Kind of speak about this to get

16:59

their friends and family to be paying

17:02

attention to this election and to be

17:04

wanting to participate Even

17:06

if it's relatively few in numbers

17:09

It's not just the how many it's the

17:11

who and that's where it Does

17:14

matter as a political calculus not to

17:16

mention that it matters just as a

17:18

moral question, which I would argue is more important Yes,

17:22

and I want to underline that that this is ultimately

17:24

first and foremost and last day a moral

17:27

question But here we're talking about the election

17:29

and so we'll just have to muscle through

17:32

discomfort associated with talking about it

17:35

in those terms But I think I think

17:37

you're right in my experience that the types

17:39

of people who are going to go out and

17:41

vote Uncommitted or uninstructed are also

17:43

the types of people who in their friend

17:45

group are the ones Ended in their family

17:48

are the ones that people are going to for advice

17:51

now that might be more relevant on a

17:53

congressional or senatorial Level than on a presidential

17:55

level where everybody kind of has

17:57

their own opinion of Trump and Biden, but it

17:59

does seem like those are your workers, those are

18:02

your messengers. If the messengers aren't just not

18:04

unwilling to canvas, but actively

18:07

hostile to you,

18:09

that's a significant problem. This week

18:12

in Wisconsin, roughly 50,000 people

18:14

voted uninstructed with

18:16

a very tiny budget for a campaign, one

18:19

that's not intuitive at all, yet

18:22

still managed to get one

18:25

and a half times the number, the margin

18:27

between Biden and Trump in 2020. Biden won it by about

18:29

20,000 votes. So to see 50,000 Democrats

18:34

voting uninstructed does seem

18:36

concerning, but what is your sense

18:38

of what the Democratic Party plan

18:41

is for this? It doesn't

18:43

seem like any policy change

18:45

is on the horizon. And

18:47

absent that, I can't imagine that

18:49

there's any messaging

18:51

has its limits, I would imagine. True

18:54

story, messaging does have its limits. You cannot

18:56

solve a policy problem with a message. So

19:00

I'm going to answer in two ways. The

19:02

first is what do I think from my own

19:04

perch is their plan? And then what do I

19:06

think as a messaging answer,

19:08

as opposed to a policy answer, because I'm

19:10

in full agreement, the answer is

19:12

that the policy has changed. That's the answer period,

19:14

the end. I think that

19:17

probably their calculus is

19:20

that one of two

19:22

or both things will happen. And to

19:24

be honest, I certainly hope for moral

19:27

reasons, that there is a

19:29

leadership spill within Israel. It's poised

19:31

to happen. I don't know how

19:34

closely you observe politics happening there.

19:36

I'm actually Israeli. There are

19:38

growing demonstrations over last weekend. There were

19:40

the largest demonstrations, I believe to date,

19:43

and it was a merging of demonstration

19:45

movement that's been led by a

19:48

group called Um D'Imbiachat, standing together,

19:50

which is co led by Palestinians

19:53

and Jews. Yeah, I saw

19:55

this standing together duo when they

19:57

came to DC, actually, really, really

19:59

interesting. The organization yeah I am

20:01

not objective because they are friend

20:03

so. I'm actually I noticed some of

20:05

your rhetoric on their website. Now that I think

20:08

about it, some your mouth yes like the of

20:10

that's very kind of the not. Approach

20:13

to their highlighting our differences. So

20:15

the taken. The. Enrich themselves

20:17

and. Yeah,

20:19

basically ascribing vote of a send to

20:22

the villains. In order to explain how they

20:24

use this divide and conquer strategy that's actually

20:26

bad for all of us. They're.

20:28

Great Sioux. Big

20:31

protests and emerge in emerging

20:34

as ceasefire protests within Israel

20:36

with the hostage family's very

20:38

much in the lead as

20:40

they've always been and rightly

20:42

so and protest to demand

20:45

that Netanyahu stepped down or

20:47

that they. Are. Be a sort of

20:49

reconfiguration of what we already. Know to be

20:51

a very precarious coalitions. I know this is

20:53

hard for a lot as American listeners understand

20:55

that we don't have a parliamentary systems and

20:57

so if you're not used to it, it's

20:59

sort of seems. Like. Gobbledygook. But

21:02

there can be leadership. Change without

21:04

an election within a parliamentary

21:06

system. So. I think that part

21:08

of the hope and like I said,

21:10

my very naked hope is that Netanyahu

21:13

be gone. It's for reasons that I

21:15

think would just be beneficial to humanity,

21:17

not to the Us election and zip

21:19

zap scenes and a change in policy

21:22

because I think the percent poised to

21:24

kind of lead a new coalition. I'm

21:26

not saying he's a shining star of

21:28

humanity, but you know he is much

21:31

much better than Netanyahu, which is a

21:33

low bar. Did stare will just be

21:35

a change within Israel. And.will sort

21:37

of the fact that it will

21:39

help the situation and so on.

21:42

So that is like perhaps calculation

21:44

number one and he calculation number

21:46

two is something that you've already

21:48

intuitive. which is that November is

21:50

a long way away. Most people

21:53

are not paying attention to politics

21:55

and.is actually the bigger divide then

21:57

even partisanship that I've spoken about.

21:59

The. Or it's really a divide

22:01

between people who are sort of

22:03

falling all the machinations and the

22:05

news in what's going on and

22:07

people who are like father's election

22:09

in November. And believe it or

22:11

not, there are many people who

22:13

are. Ha, there's an election in

22:16

November, I know. Sure, listen to

22:18

this podcast that sounds like I

22:20

made that up, but trust that

22:22

most people so. I think

22:24

that is a calculation is probably

22:26

that something will change internally with

22:28

time in the region and is

22:30

this isn't gonna be what people

22:33

are focused on. I'm happy to

22:35

talk about. Why? It

22:37

feels like an interim for right

22:39

now sort of message in the

22:41

absence of policy change, which a

22:44

I'm intensely repeating is actually what's

22:46

required here. My. Year? What?

22:48

What Is this? The Interim. Message.

22:51

Sister you're noticing so. Not

22:53

noticing. Fight. Experimenting.

22:55

With and seeing has promise, I'm

22:57

not saying it's actually being undertaken.

22:59

So what we find his out

23:01

with these higher information folks that

23:03

were talking about that are contemplating

23:05

things like skipping the top of

23:07

the ticket or for engaged in

23:10

the effort that you just eat

23:12

held coming from Wisconsin and previously

23:14

in Michigan, Pennsylvania, etc of uncommitted

23:16

or whatever it's called in their

23:18

own state When we talk. To

23:20

folks about. How progressive

23:23

change happens in this country, How

23:25

it has happened in our past.

23:27

And we give examples like The

23:29

Civil Rights Movement i'm Women voting

23:31

of the Americans With Disabilities Act,

23:33

the eight hour workday child labor

23:35

laws, Forever. Like stuff

23:38

that we as progress is

23:40

agree were good things. Good

23:42

thing that happens. And.

23:44

We say to people. Not

23:46

a single one of those things

23:49

happened electorally. Not

23:51

a single one of those things where

23:53

a consequence of voting, and in fact,

23:55

if you try to kind of debt

23:58

your brain around the idea of. The

24:00

civil. Rights era of our past sitting

24:02

around and taking you know what the way

24:04

we're gonna like and Jim Crow and and

24:06

segregation and change the laws that are hop

24:09

that are here is by. Canvassing

24:11

to vote, needle picking a different leader.

24:13

they never would have thought that because

24:16

that wouldn't have worked into. When we

24:18

remind folks that every bit of progressive

24:20

change that we've had in this country

24:23

has come through agitation outside the electoral

24:25

system, than what we can say to

24:27

them is voting is really about setting

24:29

the preconditions for who will be in

24:32

power to respond when you wanna go

24:34

on strike, when you want a protests,

24:36

when you want to yell in the

24:39

face of the person, the policymaker, the

24:41

leader, And the question before

24:43

as his release will we have

24:46

the freedom to protest to strike

24:48

for better wages, to tell the

24:50

President of the United States that

24:53

we don't agree or will we

24:55

be thrown in the Go logs

24:57

for doing so is that seems

25:00

to help and of contextualize what

25:02

this voting decision is and it

25:04

is part of the toolbox. It

25:07

is one. Of the tools in the toolbox,

25:09

but it's certainly not the only one. It's

25:11

a statement of wouldn't have composition democrats

25:14

run the. The. Cannabis can do

25:16

is say okay yes one might be

25:18

committing a jazz and but you can

25:20

protest him for it. And must

25:22

be thrown into Go Look. Smart. As you

25:24

work with. What you've done and we

25:26

wonder if we want to give democrats. The

25:29

most optimistic. Slant. On

25:31

election with. That abortion that

25:33

continues to seem to break

25:35

through in every special election.

25:38

As. A decisive

25:40

issue in ways. That

25:43

we have a season. Electoral politics.

25:46

Him Forever. Were. You

25:48

seeing. Among voters. When.

25:50

It comes to their. Willingness.

25:52

To continue to come out for

25:54

democrats are this next cycle despite

25:56

everything else simply. Because. of

25:59

abortion rights and How much has

26:01

the IVF Alabama debacle played

26:03

into that? It not only

26:05

continues to break through, but it continues

26:07

to be a giant surprise to centrist,

26:10

democratic, mostly male pundits that women are

26:12

not done being pissed off. I'm not

26:14

sure if they've ever spoken to a

26:16

woman and why it is

26:18

they think that women are done being

26:21

pissed off and not just women, but like

26:23

obviously principally that is who is the most

26:25

pissed off in this situation. So

26:28

yes, what we are finding is

26:30

both that abortion and IVF as

26:32

an add-on, what we call the

26:34

freedom to decide for yourself whether and when

26:37

you have kids, that's sort of the encompassing,

26:40

freedomized version of

26:43

what all that package, you know,

26:45

because it also includes eventually, if

26:47

you read Project 2025, ending no-fault

26:50

divorce, right? Ending adoption for certain

26:52

kinds of people, sex

26:54

education, contraception. I mean, they have

26:56

their sites set on a big

26:58

set of ways of controlling us

27:00

and deciding our futures for us.

27:03

And so what we find is

27:06

that not only is abortion and

27:08

then newly IVF really, really motivating

27:10

and energizing and that people continue

27:13

to turn out to protect their

27:15

freedoms in this kind of most

27:17

bodily important domain,

27:19

but that what abortion

27:22

is, is what we call a

27:24

salient exemplar. It is the

27:26

thing that makes Democrats no longer sound like

27:28

chicken little, the sky is falling, sky is

27:30

falling. They're going to do this, they're going

27:32

to do that, they're going to do this,

27:34

they're going to do that. Back

27:37

before pre-dubs, there was a certain

27:39

amount of hesitancy

27:41

among voters to hear that as

27:43

real, as opposed

27:45

to just, well, that's what you say.

27:48

Like, team blue says shitty things about

27:50

team red, vice versa, whatever. We just,

27:52

like, that's just you yelling and screaming, right?

27:55

Because Of the

27:58

actual decisions made and the

28:00

consequences, the of those decisions,

28:02

it. Then. Makes talking

28:04

about the rest of their agenda no

28:06

longer seem like oh, that's just politics

28:09

we are. You intentionally make the opposition

28:11

sound really draconian, but that's not really

28:13

what's gonna happen. it's it's now. Sit

28:16

in to oh no, this is what's

28:18

gonna happen And so it has that

28:20

to folds. I mean, I hesitate to

28:23

say the word benefit because in terms

28:25

of real people's lives and what's going

28:27

on but policy, there's nothing beneficial or

28:30

just in terms of political calculus. Gas

28:32

people are still. Very very angry.

28:34

and they feel that macro republicans writ

28:36

large are here to control us. And

28:39

that's the word that the use over

28:41

and over again. That's what they com

28:43

to. They want to control laws, They

28:45

want to decide for us, They want

28:47

to take away our freedoms and not

28:49

brings us back if I can. you

28:52

know, split back to earlier in the

28:54

conversation to why. Toggling

28:57

into this frame of

28:59

these two competing futures

29:01

seems so much more

29:03

effective than talking about

29:05

candidates or even parties

29:07

because people. Don't want

29:09

a future in which the last decision they're

29:11

gonna make his who do I get to

29:13

vote? For And Twenty Twenty Four. That is Not the

29:15

future they want. Hey.

29:19

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Had burrow.com/a Cast burrow.com/a Cast. How

30:29

does Bidens h to this who?

30:31

everybody that I talked to previously

30:33

about a democratic on is willing

30:36

to move for Trump this time.

30:38

The Same thing because Gestalt. And

30:41

a distant the he's up for it. And

30:43

there's no amount of spanner or hopped

30:45

up performance at State of the Union.

30:47

that's gonna change that. My.

30:49

Sense is always been that people

30:51

have come to this conclusion organically

30:53

based on their own assessment of

30:55

seeing Biden and their understanding of

30:57

what it is age. We all

31:00

know elderly people. Use. Isn't something

31:02

that is a mystery to any of us? There's

31:04

in D. C seems to be. A

31:07

sense that actually this is a

31:09

creation of the media. Or

31:12

that is just looking for. Click.

31:15

Bait cynical journalism. And

31:18

it's got like a bought her emails. Style.

31:21

Attack on Democrats I these journalists

31:23

who just can't help themselves and.

31:26

After like laughed at our. Our

31:30

them liberal media combined with you

31:32

know various new or and see

31:34

accounts. For us

31:36

and. What's your sense

31:39

of? where? People.

31:41

Are getting the idea. That.

31:43

He's too old. My sense is

31:45

that it's a bit of both

31:47

hands that it is. A

31:51

reaction to. What?

31:53

You said real world's you know

31:55

feeling of by then. and

31:58

that it is all so

32:01

inflated and propped up and fed.

32:03

And the reason why I say

32:05

the latter thing is multifold. Number

32:07

one, Trump's not that much

32:09

younger than Biden. The difference

32:11

is really pretty minimal. If

32:14

you watch Trump, he is also to be

32:17

generous, unhinged and illogical. And I

32:20

mean, you're nodding, I think it's

32:22

hard to disagree. Like what he

32:24

says just simply doesn't make sense

32:27

to people. Period. Yeah. Period. So

32:29

it's not like he's this shining

32:31

beacon of lucidity and like coherency

32:34

and that he's also 50 years

32:36

old or whatever. He's not speaking in

32:39

Obama's like paragraphs. Exactly. Yeah. No,

32:41

he's not presenting like young, robust guy

32:43

who will then go onto the basketball

32:46

court and like make a three-pointer Obama

32:48

style. So the reason

32:50

why I say that part of it

32:52

is fed and spread is number one,

32:54

like I said, how is it

32:57

possible that there is this kind of discourse

32:59

around Biden and not this discourse around Trump

33:01

when they're really not that different in this

33:03

count? The second reason

33:06

why is because we

33:08

absolutely see variance among

33:10

different subgroups in terms of

33:13

how much this figures in and factors

33:15

in for them. And I think where

33:18

I would point to, and again,

33:20

I'm, you know, I know that the plural

33:22

of anecdote is not data and focus groups

33:24

are what they are, but in

33:27

our Latino group in

33:30

Nevada, it was striking. We had

33:32

a very, very seasoned moderator who's

33:34

done Latino groups forever and ever and ever.

33:36

And I've never seen him shook in a group

33:39

like he was shook in this group. The

33:43

right wing propaganda,

33:47

you know, that they were able to

33:49

sort of like spout and made up

33:51

things about stumbles that had not happened

33:53

and made up things. I mean, beyond

33:55

like what actually occurred in life that

33:58

you could just quickly then. Google

34:00

and see that this was you know,

34:02

like clear disinformation that had been spread

34:05

Particularly among Latinos particularly through channels

34:07

like whatsapp which are very popular

34:11

For communication and just

34:13

people like reciting that to us

34:16

Whereas that didn't happen among white

34:18

women in Pittsburgh like they they

34:20

were not kind of recreating memes

34:22

for us So you

34:24

can actually see in certain groupings

34:27

of people Which ones have

34:29

had this like dis info treatment

34:31

served to them more and that

34:33

lines up Perfectly

34:35

with the folks who monitor

34:37

dis info and say like this is where they're

34:39

spreading most of it This is where they're

34:41

concentrating their firepower We see a

34:44

match and that's why I say that

34:46

of course it is based on a true story

34:48

I'm not you know Biden is 81 years old.

34:50

He is how he is That's

34:52

not untrue. But some of this

34:55

feeling about it is absolutely produced

34:57

I think the funniest way of illustrating that

34:59

is when people tell us in groups that

35:02

you know One thing that intrigues them about

35:04

RFK is how young he is. I'm like

35:06

he's 70 Yeah,

35:08

but he's jacked up and he goes

35:10

around with his shirt off. Yeah,

35:12

and Looks looks younger

35:14

than 70. But yes, it is funny that

35:16

that RFK jr. Counts as the young one,

35:19

but okay that that's fair I will I

35:21

will amend my assessment to say that you

35:23

can move the needle you can move

35:25

the duck You can move the dial on how

35:27

decrepit people think Biden

35:30

is not just how decrepit

35:32

to be clear, but it is 100% about saliency

35:36

people only have so much room

35:38

in their Attention span

35:40

to kind of toggle through which issues are

35:42

important which are not what they think about

35:45

what they don't You know, they got to

35:47

get through a day. And

35:49

so it's not just the ability to

35:51

kind of take age and turn it

35:53

into Infirmity or

35:55

senility that's one thing but it is

35:57

to take that and know,

36:00

to use your butt her emails analogy to

36:02

make that be sort of the top line

36:04

in people's brains over and over again.

36:06

That's the magic trick being performed.

36:08

Got it. What are you seeing when it

36:11

comes to the border? You've seen a lot of

36:13

kind of political consultants, just pulling

36:15

their hair out at the Biden strategy

36:17

of trying to out nativist

36:20

Trump on the border to say,

36:23

look, like the only thing standing in

36:26

the way of Democrats and doing a

36:28

immigration crackdown is Trump, because

36:30

he's cynical and wants to exploit it for

36:32

his own political perspectives. And Democrats

36:35

really seem to feel like they had won

36:37

something there, they they've really gotten one over

36:39

on Republicans by showing how cynical they are

36:41

and showing that to them immigration

36:43

and the border are just, you know,

36:45

election issues that they're here to exploit.

36:48

My read on it is different, though,

36:50

that it seems to just be playing

36:52

right into Republican strengths. I mean, what are you what

36:54

are you seeing? Yeah, I

36:57

wish that I could say people are tearing their hair out.

36:59

I think what I've seen is a lot

37:01

of applauding and that this was a

37:03

brilliant gotcha maneuver on the part of

37:05

Democrats. And I could

37:08

not disagree more with that assessment.

37:10

I very, very much would underscore

37:12

what you said, and I would put even a finer

37:14

point on it. When you tell

37:17

voters when the meta message that you send

37:19

to voters is you should make this electoral

37:21

decision on the basis of who is going

37:23

to be the bigger xenophobe, or who is

37:25

going to be the bigger asshole, or who

37:27

is going to be kind of

37:30

the tougher on whatever fill in the

37:32

blank, in this case, border previously crime,

37:34

and I'm sure crime again, then what

37:36

you're doing is you're sending them into

37:38

the arms of robocop, you're not going

37:40

to make them hunger for mall security.

37:42

And regardless of what Democrats actually do

37:44

and put forward, that is

37:46

the way people understand the brand. It's

37:49

just as simple as people understand Coke

37:51

to be classic and Pepsi to be

37:53

the next generation, it is sort of

37:55

cemented into the calculus of who these

37:57

two kind of groups of people parties

37:59

are. And so it's

38:02

not just the.you're doing that,

38:04

you're undermining your broader story.

38:06

If you're broader story is

38:08

these people are fascists and

38:10

they are coming for your

38:12

freedoms. They will decide your

38:14

future for you. Stable take

38:17

away. Every. Decision that you've

38:19

ever wanted to make. From whether or not you

38:21

can retire and dignity to whether or not you

38:23

can go to the picket lines to demands you

38:25

know a fair returns to whether or not you

38:28

decide whether and when you have kids and what

38:30

your kids learn in school and the list just

38:32

goes on and on and on and on. Grades

38:34

and Project: Twenty Twenty Five is nine hundred pages.

38:36

They took it away, but. You. Know that's

38:39

Archive somewhere. It's that's

38:41

you. Overarching. Story You cannot

38:44

send Monday. These people are fascists

38:46

and on Tuesday I promise to

38:48

work with these assets. That is

38:50

a fundamentally contradictory message. It would

38:52

be as confusing as saying you

38:54

know prudent is the Is. Extraordinarily.

38:57

Terrible person and he's dangerous and his

38:59

dictator and he says in his that's

39:01

but he's got a decent ideas on

39:04

clean energy policy So I think we're

39:06

going to have a summit and like

39:08

you don't see, go out with Bill.

39:11

Like if you said that to

39:13

people they would be like move would

39:15

have would have. And so how is

39:17

it possible that you would call out

39:20

and I would argue rightly so Republicans

39:22

for the extraordinary danger they presents including

39:24

calling them out specifically. For they

39:27

are hit leary an armed him

39:29

or like rhetoric when it comes

39:31

to immigrants. And

39:33

then say you know all, meet you

39:35

Where you meet me and will work

39:37

out a deal together. Because.

39:40

What You're doing. Is you

39:42

are tacitly crediting Trump as

39:44

a leader, as a person

39:46

who is in charge, and

39:48

your tacitly crediting republicans with

39:50

having decent policy ideas, decent

39:53

legislative proposals And that just

39:55

doesn't make sense. And.

39:57

What's crazy is that. this

39:59

has actually been trying over and over and

40:01

over in Europe. I wonder if you've worked

40:03

with any of these parties, but the center-left

40:06

parties in Europe, particularly in response to the

40:08

Syrian migration crisis, began

40:12

embracing xenophobic rhetoric to try to outflank

40:14

the rise of the far right in

40:17

country after country. And the

40:19

results are in that voters, whenever

40:21

that was a salient issue, went

40:24

with the right-wing party rather

40:27

than the center-left party claiming to be a

40:29

right-wing party. I saw, and maybe you've seen this, an

40:32

analysis of some focus groups that the

40:34

Obama 2012 campaign did,

40:37

where they talked to voters

40:40

about immigration. And even when they could

40:44

get voters to kind of agree with their

40:46

take on immigration versus Mitt Romney, who at

40:48

the time was doing this hardline immigration thing,

40:51

just talking about immigration

40:53

moved voters towards Republicans,

40:56

no matter what they said about it. And so

40:58

they concluded, let's just not talk about this. There

41:01

is no winning argument for

41:03

us here. So have you worked

41:05

with any of those European parties? And how

41:08

does it that an entire continent can undergo

41:10

this experiment for the

41:13

last 10, 15 years and

41:15

our own political class just ignore it?

41:18

Luckily listeners can't see my face,

41:20

but every wrinkle on

41:22

this face is made out of the

41:24

consternation I have from like, let's just

41:27

try to out-centress them again. Surely this

41:29

time it will work. And just

41:31

like literally, it never

41:34

works. And even in the places that

41:36

they would point to it working, i.e.

41:38

the election of Bill Clinton, to some

41:41

extent they would maybe argue, it depends

41:43

on the day, the election of Barack

41:45

Obama, you know, Clinton presided

41:48

over the greatest midterm shellacking of

41:50

any president ever in a hollowing

41:52

out of Democratic elected leaders all

41:54

the way down to like the

41:56

dog catcher level. And it was

41:58

because he made the Republican For

42:01

me, what crystallizes this entire

42:03

ethos is the famous quotation

42:05

by Margaret Thatcher. She was asked what her

42:07

greatest political accomplishment was. Do you know what

42:09

she said? No, what'd she say? She

42:11

said, Tony Blair and new labor. Yeah,

42:14

there you go. We forced our opponents to

42:16

adopt our position. I mean, I think

42:18

there is no greater crystallization than that

42:20

for this phenomenon. I

42:22

mean, I have worked in the

42:25

European context, especially at the European

42:27

Union, like at the parliamentary level

42:29

and then on specific issues. And

42:32

I think that the illustrative counter

42:34

case, the like positive case, is

42:37

looking at Germany very recently.

42:40

And what happened when intrepid journalists,

42:42

as they should, leaked that the

42:44

center-right party met

42:47

with kind of pretty nakedly

42:50

white nationalist folks. And

42:54

instead of the center-left party genuflecting to

42:56

the altar of we will also bash

42:58

on immigrants, don't worry, you can have

43:00

your immigrant hatred with us too. You

43:02

can just have it with a side

43:04

of like polypests. We'll just do it

43:06

more nicely. They

43:08

had huge demonstrations that were led

43:10

by center-left parties and more left-wing

43:13

parties basically saying, no, absolutely no.

43:15

Like, this is not who we

43:17

are. This is not what we

43:19

want. Before these

43:21

uncommitted, these conflicted, these whatever voters

43:24

you want to call them, a

43:27

lot of what we see out of

43:29

them, there's this conditioned idea that they

43:31

are moderates, that they want a center

43:33

of the road thing. And

43:36

so Center-left parties around the

43:38

world are like, okay, well, we should

43:40

approach politics vis-a-vis the hot dog vendor

43:42

problem in game theory. And We will

43:44

just like position ourselves in the middle

43:46

of this ideological beach, presuming that voters

43:48

are rational actors and they will go

43:51

to the politician that is kind of

43:53

closest to them because all politicians are

43:55

exactly the same. They're serving an identical

43:57

product and really, it's just kind of

43:59

idealized. Oh, proximity on a uni dimensional

44:01

plane? As if people are not thinking

44:03

of multiple issues and have different issues.

44:05

A different ceilings is. I mean the

44:07

whole thing as built out of nonsense

44:09

because people. Are not rational actors to begin

44:12

with? So. That thinking just

44:14

is silly. but that dominant thinking

44:16

that if you position yourself in

44:18

this kind of quote unquote middle

44:21

position or closer to why it's

44:23

people in polls report wanting his

44:25

and you will get more people.

44:28

That just fundamentally goes against the

44:31

ways that people come to political

44:33

judgment and what we actually know

44:35

about these middle of the road

44:37

uncommitted swing vote or whatever they're

44:39

called indifferent geography is is that

44:42

they are especially prone to what

44:44

we call in psychology, anchoring the

44:46

fact that is changing their mind

44:48

about what is true and the

44:50

way the world works and what

44:53

is common sense on the basis

44:55

of what is repeated over and

44:57

over again in their environments. And

45:00

so they don't have a fixed ideological

45:02

position. They are not decided leads, pro

45:04

migraine or anti migrant the kind don't

45:06

know. But if what they hear repeated

45:08

over and over and over and over

45:10

and over again is basically everyone hates

45:12

immigrants, every is against this. Every one

45:15

is upset by this, then of course

45:17

they're like, okay, well I guess that's.

45:19

What? People think and that includes me. To

45:22

the no final one trump himself.

45:24

One reason. That despite

45:27

the polling, despite everything.

45:30

Seems to me that Biden still has

45:32

a fighting chance. To. Win this

45:34

election. Is Trump. And.

45:37

That the more trump. Because. Gets

45:40

in people's faces, In the election

45:42

my guess is the worse is going to do a

45:44

thing. One. Of the best things

45:46

that kind of liberals did for Trump

45:48

was kick him off of social media.

45:51

And. Give him distance. From.

45:53

People with the closer you get the people's

45:55

the more the scenes recoil. He. Gets

45:58

further way. and can

46:00

kind of just think back to inflation

46:02

was low, wages were high. Yeah,

46:04

he was maybe causing an international

46:06

incident every other day, but now

46:09

we didn't actually nuke North Korea. Now we have

46:11

two wars under Biden. So let's

46:14

go back to the growing wages and the

46:16

low inflation, but he can't stay

46:18

out of people's faces throughout the entire

46:20

election. How significant an issue do

46:22

you think Trump ends up being? Will it

46:25

be like everything throughout his life that the

46:27

whole kind of planet just orbits

46:29

around him? I want

46:31

to draw a distinction in

46:33

how Trump plays out. In

46:35

your narration, Trump's

46:38

increased presence and people's increased exposure

46:40

to this toxin will

46:42

sort of fix this memory hole

46:44

problem that we have, which we absolutely do,

46:46

where people like have blacked out the onset

46:48

of the pandemic and lots of other things.

46:50

And they kind of like, kind

46:53

of intentionally, I think for human survival,

46:55

we have these mechanisms that let us

46:57

like block out certain things or at

46:59

least background them very, very deeply because

47:02

they're painful and hard. It's

47:05

not so much that Trump's presence

47:07

will change people's calculus who were

47:10

like, maybe I'll vote for

47:12

him. It's that it changes the

47:14

calculus for people around whether or

47:16

not participating in the first place

47:18

matters. This election will be won

47:20

or lost in the battleground states

47:22

on the basis of differential turnout.

47:24

Yeah, there are some swing voters,

47:27

but there are very, very few

47:29

because not only have people already

47:31

cemented their partisan identity, like I

47:33

said at the outset, they've

47:35

actually made this specific electoral choice

47:37

before they have decided Biden or

47:40

Trump. What Trump's presence has

47:42

the ability to do is remind the

47:44

people who are thinking of just sitting

47:46

out, not paying any attention right now

47:48

at all, thinking of skipping the top

47:50

of the ticket, making salient for them

47:52

why those are not options, why

47:55

they've got to turn out, they've got to vote all the

47:57

way up and down, and they've got to

48:00

vote for Biden in order to stop

48:02

Trump from taking power. That's actually

48:04

the name of the game. So it's what

48:06

you're saying, but it's a tiny bit distinct. I

48:09

think that the main thing is the

48:12

reminder that, I mean, this is what we

48:14

see over and over again, and it's one

48:16

of the most widely replicated findings, is that

48:18

when it comes to the various trials, and

48:20

it's hard to keep track, and I'm speaking

48:23

not of the civil trials that have to

48:25

do with financial matters, but of the criminal

48:27

trials, the one that's about

48:29

to start up in New York, the

48:31

commonly referred to BRAG case, what I

48:34

would name as the OG, the original

48:36

voter deception case. Obviously, the

48:38

MASH nations going through the Supreme Court with

48:40

the January 6 case, the Georgia case. When

48:44

people see Trump on

48:46

trial or hear more about Trump on

48:48

trial, we are a very

48:50

courtroom trial obsessed culture.

48:53

There's a reason why legal procedurals have

48:55

always dominated as one of the top

48:58

TV shows in every generation. I mean,

49:00

I know it sounds like I'm being silly, but it's

49:03

a big part of our popular culture, this obsession with

49:07

trial and law and crime and true

49:09

crime and blah, blah, blah. And

49:12

so what we see is that it's not

49:14

just exposure to Trump, but it's Trump within

49:16

the context of being judged

49:18

by a jury. I refuse to call them a

49:20

jury of his peers because I don't know them

49:22

like that, to hate on them, a jury of

49:24

Americans. When that

49:26

is the context in which Trump

49:29

sits, it does absolutely

49:31

change people's view and calculus

49:33

around whether or not this

49:35

election is worth paying attention

49:37

to, whether or not

49:39

they're tuned in, whether or not they're watching and

49:42

whether or not they're going to recreate

49:44

what they did in 2020 and what they

49:47

did in key states, not all

49:49

states in 2022. Out

49:52

in the wild, I have met a

49:54

decent number of people who voted for Biden

49:57

in 2020, but are now

50:00

leaning towards Trump, is that unusual

50:02

that I'm running into them? Are you seeing,

50:04

you seeing that or no? That's very unusual.

50:06

You're seeing mostly fixed. And the question is

50:09

whether they vote or not. Yeah.

50:11

We're seeing what I said at the top.

50:13

We're seeing six and 10 fixed doing

50:15

what they're going to do. I'm speaking of

50:17

battleground voters. Like I don't spend time hanging

50:19

out with other state voters except when I'm

50:21

working on other kinds of races. So you

50:23

and I have been talking at the presidential

50:25

level and that's why I'm so fixated on

50:28

the voters in these six States. So

50:30

in these battleground States, when we're

50:33

talking about presidential, we find that

50:35

most of them are going to do what they're going

50:37

to do, but four and

50:39

10, that is a lot of people

50:41

are toggling between, I don't know what

50:43

to do. I'm

50:46

unhappy with these two choices, but

50:48

not, Oh, I did vote for Biden

50:50

and now I'm contemplating Trump. That's a pretty

50:52

rare person. Any guesses? I'm

50:55

sure you get asked that a lot. What do

50:58

you tell people? Oh, well, I have a very

51:00

clear answer. I'm a pathological optimist. I

51:02

don't have guesses. I have the

51:06

necessary certainty

51:08

until it's disproven. I mean, it's one

51:11

of the reasons why I'm so frequently

51:13

disappointed because I believe so

51:16

much better of voters than

51:19

I often get. I

51:23

believe that based on the

51:26

only poll that matters, which is

51:28

elections between, you know, when Trump

51:30

came into office and now basically

51:34

Democrats have been doing much, much, much, much

51:36

better than Republicans and much better than polls

51:38

and much better than would be expected based

51:40

on kind of the conditions on the ground.

51:43

And I believe that

51:45

once voters are fully aware

51:47

of, you know, not

51:49

just Trump as the architect and

51:51

lead of a criminal conspiracy in

51:53

which MAGA Republicans are, you know,

51:56

happy, willing, eager, and able to

51:58

act as accomplices. But that

52:00

the future that they contemplate for us is one that

52:02

is anathema to the majority of Americans. They're going to

52:05

turn out and they're going to turn out for

52:07

Democrats. So, yeah, I mean, I

52:09

have to believe that. That's how I do my job.

52:11

Well, Anot, thanks so much for joining me.

52:14

I really appreciate it. Thanks for having me. There

52:20

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52:22

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