Next Question with Katie CouricThe Democratic Disconnect with Astead Herndon and Charlamagne tha God
In this episode of Next Question, Katie is joined by Astead Herndon of The New York Times and Charlamagne tha God from The Breakfast Club for a pulse check on the polls, the rationale behind Kamala Harris’s campaign strategy, the struggles Democrats face to engage young Black voters, and the risks of relying on anti-Trump sentiment to win. We are down to the wire–buckle up for the final two weeks of the race!
Cancer Straight Talk is a podcast for Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center where hosts doctor Diane Reedy Lagunas has intimate conversations with patients and experts about topics like dating and sex, exercise and diet, the power of gratitude, and more. I love being her guest. Listen to Cancer straight Talk, You'll learn so much. Hi everyone, I'm Kitty Kuric and this is next question. The election is so close, nail biding, toss and turning, stomach churning close. So here to discuss the state of the race and the final leg is Charlemagne the God, host of the popular radio show The Breakfast Club, someone who's interviewed kamalast several times over the years. We're doing an audio threesome, if you will, with a Steed Herndon, national politics reporter from The New York Times and host of the podcast The Run Up. Together, We're unpacking everything from Vice President Kamala Harris's strategy to the dynamics influencing black voters in this critical election.
Plus we'll talk.
About why Donald Trump seems like the teflon candidate and whether Democrats have what it takes to rally voters feeling left behind. It's candid, insightful, and just a little spicy. So buckle up and take a listen before we start. What do your friends call you? Do they call you Charlemagne? Do they call you c the g?
What do they call it?
Yeah?
Leonard?
I mean it's a combination, you know, like, yeah, Leonard Charlot. It was between Leonard and Scharla Charlat.
I like that. And how did you get the name Charlomage the god?
Well, you know, when I was younger and I was doing things I had no business doing in Mon's Corner, South Carolina, like selling crack, I used to have an alias, and my alias was Charles because like, I come from a really small town and so like, you know, the people that would pull up to buy drugs for me, even though they were buying the drugs, they were still going tell my parents, right, So I would always have like a hoodie on and I would say my name is Charles or Charlie. And then I was in night school one day and I was reading in a history book and I saw the name Charlemagne and it was French for Charles the Great. And then you know, I also read about this Haitian Haitian general whose name was Charlomagne, and I just thought it was a cool name. I was like, you know what, that's the cool name that's going to look good on the front cover of a book one day. And you know, I've had you know, three New York Times bestsellers, national bestsellers, so.
Well, I was going to say, you have come a long way from selling crack on the corner in South Carolina and now you know, you're interviewing a presidential candidate. They say this is the first podcast election, and that seems to be true. And obviously Vice President Harris wanted to talk to you and to be on the Breakfast Club. How did the interview come about? Did she reach out to you or did you reach out to her?
Yeah.
You know what's interesting, I've been interviewing the Vice President on Breakfast Club since twenty and eighteen. I had her when she was a senator. You know, she came on the Breakfast Club back in twenty eighteen. It was got a great hour long conversation that you can go watch on YouTube. When she ran for president in twenty twenty, she came back to the Breakfast Club. I had a late night talked show on Comedy Central a couple of years ago. She was a guest on that when she was a vice president. So it's almost like at every iteration of her you know, career since about twenty eighteen, I've been there. Like I said, I interviewed her when she was a senator, interviewed her when she was running for president, interviewed her when she was vice president, and now I'm interviewing her again while she runs for president.
And you know, even in twenty twenty I was.
I was out there on the campaign trail with her too, Like you know, we was in South Carolina together. She unveiled her mental health initiative in some of Miville, South Carolina.
I was with her there.
I was with her at South Carolina State University. I was with her at Charlotte North Caroline, out with her in Brooklyn. So yeah, we've developed a pretty good rapport.
So you really know her quite well.
So much focus, as you know, has been on her declining support among black men, particularly black men under the age of fifty. So if you had to tell people listening in a nutshell, what would you say to this question, what is going on with Kamala Harris and young black dudes.
I think, well, two things.
I think number one is unfair to say it's black men in Kamala Harris. I think that it's black people in the Democratic Party period. This is something that's been you know, it's been a conversation since twenty sixteen. A lot of Black people feel like the Democratic Party haven't delivered for them. And I think it's you know, I think it's just a matter of not the fact that people have something against Kamala Harris, it's just how people feel about the Democratic Party as a whole. But even with that said, I think everybody he's freaking out for no reason. I think it's all overstated when they say they're losing support, because I have nothing to show me that yet. These are just all polls and speculation. In two thousand and sixteen, eighty five percent of black men voted for Hillary Clinton. In twenty twenty, I think like ninety percent of black men, I know it was definitely over eighty percent voted for President Biden and Vice President Harris was on the ticket. I'm a person that only voted for that ticket because of Vice President Harris. So I just think that when people say things like, oh, you know, black men, you know, they don't want to support the vice president. I just think that's overstated.
I don't believe that.
After come November, I could be proven wrong, but I just don't believe it because I mean, since Reagan, if I'm not mistaken, you know, black people have voted conservative between eight percent and fifteen percent. Like, you know, Trump got twelve percent of the black male either the black vote or the black mail vote in twenty twenty. I think it was the black vote as a whole. Maybe, so it might have been like I don't remember what, I think it was twelve percent. But so it's like those those numbers aren't far off from the average, Like there are black conservatives out here, you know, Like it just is so it's like that that number isn't far off from the average.
I think you said something.
Else earlier that made me remember one of my points that I kind of forgot a little bit.
But it's like, it's not that people.
Are necessarily wanting to go be conservative. They're just off everything. They're not feeling the political process period. They're not feeling Democrats, they're not feeling Republicans. There's a lot of black people who feel like, regardless of who's in office, you know, our communities don't change. You know, things are still the same. You know, you got somebody like President Obama who promised a lot of hope and a lot of change, but that didn't change anything.
Right.
So I think she's the vice president is fighting against a lot of that.
Right.
A lot of people see it feeling like, oh, we've had that before. We had a black face in a high place before. And I feel like she's fighting against you know how people feel about feel against it about the Democratic Party.
How did you find her in your interview? Did you think that she answered the questions? Did you feel that she was direct, authentic and you know her? So, how did you feel about this last go round when you guys talked well, you know.
In my new book Get Out Us a Dieline Why Small Talk Sucks, I have a chapter called the Language of Politics is Dead, and so I credit Donald Trump with killing the language of politics. So I feel like politicians can speak very freely if they choose to.
Plus, I'm a big fan of the movie Bullwharf No.
I love that, you know, So I've been waiting for a politician to sound like, you know, a send of the bullwharf. But I think she said something to be in the beginning of our conversation when I brought up the fact that people say she's very scripted, you know, people say she sticks to her talking points, she said, you're welcome.
You know.
I call that discipline, And it made me think about something. I think that we've seen such a lack of discipline since Donald Trump came on the scene that we forgot what that looks like. So when you have a politician who was in an interview or in a conversation and they're being disciplined, as she says, and getting their message across and telling us what their policies are, and you know, detailing their policies, it's kind of.
Like we want, we want to be entertained, right.
And that's not what That's not what I think we need from our politicians. So to say that, do I think she was being authentic? Yeah, I think she was being authentically authentically who she is, which is a very disciplined, seasoned, veteran politician.
I have to beg to differ with you on that point. I think that she takes a really long time to get to her point and that she does rely on talking points too often. I think she's gotten much better than she used to, but it's almost as if she's afraid to say something that will later come back to haunt her. And I find the fact that she just doesn't really articulate to me her true policy position and that she isn't really directly answering the questions a lot of times. That's been my experience and my experience watching her. I just wish she would say, this is our plan, or you're right, a lot of illegal immigrants have come into this country during the Biden administration, but this is why, and this is what I want to do about it moving forward. You know, I just I don't find her explanation of policy that compelling compared to say, someone like Bill Clinton or Barack Obama.
Have you ever interviewed them?
Yeah, I interviewed the President Obama before. I interview President Obama when his book came out. I'm never interview President Obama when he was running for office. I've interviewed you know, Hillary Clinton a couple of times as well when she was running.
I can understand what you're saying.
I think that you know a lot of politicians, or at least disciplined ones, are scared of saying things that you know, may come back to haunt them. But my thing is, in twenty twenty four, what can truly come back to haunt you? But then again, there's only one Donald Trump. Nothing seems to haunt Donald Trump. Nothing seems to stick to Donald Trump, but everything seems to stick, you know, to everybody else.
But how do you explain that? How do you explain that? I think a lot of people are media.
I really truly believe it's the media's fault because we created this double standard, like not just the media, government, because you know, people will say things like Donald Trump is a threat to democracy. But as I told the Vice President, I don't feel like the administration acted like it. Like Merrick Garland could have, you know, arrested Donald Trump a long time ago for leading an attempted to cool with his country, but he chose not to. So now when you choose not to, you get Donald Trump at you know, dinners, telling jokes. So it doesn't even look like he's a guy that has ninety plus criminal charges who've been convicted of thirty thirty.
Four of them already or whatever.
The number was, you don't even look at him as you know what he actually is, which is a true threat to our democracy. Like I was reading something in The New York Times the other day and it said how this election is a moment of truth to Donald Trump, and they just laid out every single thing he's ever been accused of in life. This guy should have been disqualified from running for president a long, long, long, long time ago. And if Kamala Harris or President Obama or a Bill Clinton back in the day, any of those people had said one of the things that Donald Trump has said are done one of the things Donald Trump's done, they'd be disqualified already.
Well, let's bring in our guest, Astad Herndon. He's a national politics reporter for the New York Times. He's so the politics podcast The Run Up. In twenty nineteen, he was the Times campaign reporter for Kamala Harris's presidential campaign. And the three of us have something in common. We have all interviewed Kamala Harris. So I thought it would be interesting for us to compare notes and talk about her interview style and then talk about the state of the race.
Highest ed, thank you for doing this.
Yeah, thank y'all for having me. I really appreciate being here and y'all hearing us out.
Well, you know, we were just talking and we were saying that nothing, as you overheard, seems to affect Donald Trump. I think the word teflon presidency was first came to be talking about Ronald Reagan, I believe. And now I'm not sure what's stronger than teflon. And I guess teflon is now considered a dangerous substance. But I don't know what it is about Donald Trump that nothing sticks no matter what he does. Ostead, what do you think is the reason for that that people are willing to forgive so many host things?
Yeah, I mean I think to what you know, Charlemagne just said, I agree that if half the things that Donald Trump is said are done, one percent of the things Donald Trump is said have done had been you know, has was true about the Democratic candidate or even most other Republicans, you would see them pretty clearly disqualify from the jump. I mean, I think we know some of the answers to this, like there is a different type of relationship with supporter that he fosters. I think it's important to see Trump as a more movement candidate than that's particularly party figure, because his voters feel as if they know and can interpret what he believes more so than mainstream media, more so to the things that they hear and read. They're willing even to dismiss stuff that doesn't fit within that overall picture. But I guess I'm not someone who thinks that this stuff hasn't affected Donald Trump. Donald Trump is the second most unpopular presidential candidate who's ever run. He just happens to be running against people who were just as impopular as him, particularly in twenty sixteen, I think, and much of this race against Joe Biden. In fact, I frankly would go even further and say, if the Democratic Party had kind of followed through on the plan they implied in twenty twenty, where Biden didn't run, they held a primary, worked out some of their kind of internal ideological shifts, and then produced a nominee, even if that nominee was still Kamala Harris, I think that person would have been in a much stronger position than they currently find themselves, because I don't think Donald Trump actually is all that massively popular. I think Donald Trump has a hard ceiling of popularity that is greater than most other politicians. But what we know is that the anti Trump coalition is one that is just as strong, if not stronger. We saw that in the midterms, We've seen that in special elections. We see that kind of over and over, and frankly, it's what gives democratics some confidence even as this looks really fifty to fifty. So I guess I would take the other side and say I don't think that Donald Trump is fully teflon. I think that a lot of the things are just priced in for most people, so they see him as untrustworthy. They see him as someone who will fly out rules and norms. But I think for a lot of people that's being held up against a desire for change that he can also represent when Democrats that feel a little more status quo, which I do think they do feel now, and part of that is part of the process question. Like, I don't think it was inherent that Kamala Harris felt like that. I think there was a version of that that did feel like a big new way forward some ways. I think that this process has played out has hurt their ability to cast themselves as that well let's.
Talk about this whole idea of having a more open primary, given that there were only a few months between the time Joe Biden stepped down or decided not to run and the election itself. I mean, it's great to say that in hindsight, right Astead, And I'd love to hear what Charlemagne says about this as well. But do you really think it would have put the Democrats in a stronger position. I mean, that's sort of a fantasy, isn't it.
I hear why you're saying that, But I was there in early twenty twenty three asking them the same questions about Biden's age. It was only the evidence was there that the public thought he was too old for a second term. The donor money was there for interest in the open and other candidates. It was their own deference to Joe Biden that put them in this position. It's the only thing that put them in this position is their traditional deference to his reelections. I'm really talking about early twenty twenty three.
Oh, you're saying if he had dropped out a year early.
I'm saying, if he would have followed through and what he implied to the public in twenty twenty, which is that he would be a transitional president lead to another generation of Democrats.
They wouldn't be in this position.
I think a lot of their voters assumed that they wouldn't be in this position, and that the party would have a new conversation with itself in an open primary way. But that's obviously not how it developed. He ran and folks stuck by him for a year and a half, two years, and then by the time I think it became really clear that something different needed to happen after the debate, there was no real's plan B.
There was no other option, I think.
So I guess I say that to say, I don't think there's a different way this could have developed after they put themselves in the position they put themselves in, got it, But I do think there were different options, and so somehow I think the conversation has to start not just in what they could have done with Kamala Harris's message or what she can do individually to win these people back in the short term. I think the biggest thing they could have done is recognized that a lot of the country wanted a different direction or thought of the Democratic Party in a transitory period, and they ignored that evidence for way too long.
That's all I'm saying. Yeah, I I agree with a set one hundred percent.
I was a person that was calling for Joe Biden to step down, you know, a year ago, two years ago, you know, just because I knew that if we kept going the way that we was going, there was no possible way that you know, Joe Biden could win in November. And yeah, I think that he should have been a transitional president, like that should have been the plan. But it shouldn't have been just up to him. It should have been everybody around him should have known, like, hey, twenty twenty, you're gonna run, You're gonna win, but you got to set up the next generation of Democrats. The only thing I would say is maybe three four years ago, it didn't feel like Democrats had.
That strong of a bench.
But you know now, I remember Joe Biden said toward the end of last year, he was leaving one of the press conferences and they asked him, they said, you know who else can beat Trump except for you? When he turned around and he was like, there's about fifty of us that could beat Trump. And I was like, well, line him up, because I felt like when he said that it was true, right. I felt like Dumingapiro, I felt like Gretchen Whitmer, I felt like, you know, Wes Moore, I felt like the Vice president, Kamala Harris like I felt like there was people, you know, who would have been more formidable opponents.
So I think that the Democrats, you know, they they just didn't have a plan.
To me, I think they had a bench, but the bench needed a lot of I don't know, to use a sports metaphor, they needed a lot of practice, and they needed to be in front of a national audience. And some of those people you just mentioned, Josh Shapiro, Gretchen Whitmer, definitely Wes Moore, who I like and I think he has a great political future. But they are very unproven on a national stage. So I'm not sure how strong the bench actually was. And I think part of the problem is what Astead was saying. They didn't have an opportunity to develop the bench because Joe Biden was so entrenched in the presidency. I want to tell you all about the Cancer Straight Talk podcast from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center with MSK oncologist doctor Diane Reedy Lagunis. I was a guest, and we had a totally candid conversation about my family's experiences with cancer, including my husband Jay's illness, my own treatment for breast cancer, and of course the time I got that kolon uskby On National TV, Cancer Straight Talk features life affirming conversations with experts and patients alike about topics affecting everyone touched by cancer. If that includes you or someone you love, hope you'll listen to my episode and every episode of Cancer Street Talk. I thought we would talk about Kamala Harris as an interview subject, because that's something the three of us have in common. Instead, Charlemagne and I have all interviewed the Vice president, and I think we have different impressions. I was asking Charlemagne about Charla. I have a hard time calling you Charlotte, but I'll call you Charlotte charlt and he was saying he found her to be very disciplined, which made me smile because it's exactly what she said when you said something about her being scripted. I think she came back to you Astead in that twenty nineteen interview and said no, I'm just disciplined. How do you think she's changed as a candidate. You've been watching her interviews from your experience. Do you think she's getting better or is it all sort of remaining the same.
Yeah, I mean there's been an evolution, for sure.
I remember meeting with at that time Senator Kamala Harris when she was getting ready to announce her presidential run a year into her kind of time in Washington, and I think it's just important to remember how different Democrats felt at that time. They was really kind of set between two polls being Joe Biden's moderateness in Bernie Sanders's progressiveness, and there was a feeling for the folks who were sitting out in the middle that you kind of just had that the party was moving in an inevitably progressive direction. And so she did things at that time like signing on the healthcare bill, single payer, like embracing some progressive stuff that she's obviously walked back. But I think it was an uncomfortable fit even at that time. Like her record is one that has always suggested a hodgepodge of ideological ideas, a fluidity and a desire to kind of yes of reject some of the more rigid, particularly hard on crime stuff of the past, and also you know, kind of leading in a I would say, more progressive direction, but it's never been the leftissness of San Francisco in the way that Republicans are describing.
And so at the.
Time you could kind of feel the odd pairing that she was trying to do in that primary, and I don't think it really served them that well. So I remember to answer your first question, like I remember interviewing her initially, and you could kind of feel a candidate that was searching for the story they wanted to tell amid this like very intense democratic landscape where Elizabeth Warren's putting out a plan every five minutes and you got Pete Boudajeedge doing an interview every day. Right where do you find yourself in? That was really, I think fairly difficult. I think she found a lot more of her voice toward the end when it was going worse, to be honest, that's when you had them say, you know, she can be tough against Trump or or she was embracing the kind of prosecutor against a felon that I think they've arrived at and it got her away from the progressive stuff. She was never going to be a fit for people who wanted Bernie Sanders to be a president. She was never going to be a fit for people who are more interested in more and they kind of had to learn where that is. Interview wise, though she doesn't and I don't know how you are feel but like, if you're asking for a vision, if you're asking for a root cause, if you're asking for I think some of the answers we expect from typical presidential candidates, it's never really the lane she wants to play in. I have not found her to be like particularly reflective on that front or like an affirmative case to lay out where she stands on a lot of issues. But I do think she's true at is, you know, executing a set play, talking about decision making and being empathetic to a lot of different communities. And so it reminds me of a prosecutor in the way they come to issues because it's not it's oftentimes a reactive role, it's oftentimes an accountability role. It's not a vision setting role. And so sometimes I think in the interviews you're feeling that tension because the questions we're used to asking some of these candidates is I don't think really the lane her her. She's existed foremost in it's certainly a lawyer and a prosecutor, I think more and that is the foremost identities I've come to understand her through.
And maybe because she really deals with facts and evidence, I think she has a hard time being theoretical and as you said, visionary.
That's not really her laying.
I don't think, I know, because you know, I really wanted to talk to her about the conundrum the Biden administration was finding itself in with Israel. And I said, October seventh was horrible, horrific, unimaginable, the brutality, the barbarism that the world heard about, there are no words. Having said that, let's talk about where we are now. And I think it was last January, and you know, the Palestinian deaths were mounting, and I just wanted to give her permission, and I asked her about how challenging this was, because it is the most complex and historically complicated situation there is. And instead of saying, you know, picking up where I left off, she said, Katie, let's talk about October seventh and I was like, but I just basically did that. But she seems and so many interviews I've listened to she does the same thing. And I think that's why people feel she's scripted, because she often answers questions the same way. And that's why I think again, Charlotte, that they think that she relies on talking points because you often hear the same points again and again and again. But you found that to be disciplined, not frustrating.
Well, yeah, because once she's explained it in the the last conversation we had when she said, you know, she has to be disciplined and you have to repeat things over and over and over and over in this era that we're in, I agree with that. And you know, there are the double standards because we act like Donald Trump doesn't do the same exact thing, like Donald Trump will.
Eat the same thing over and over, same rhetoric, over and over.
All politicians do that, like I can't think of a Polo Petician who doesn't. I just think that we're in this news cycle in twenty twenty four where we see every single conversation, we see the conversations where she's just talking locally to people in Pennsylvania, locally in Michigan. But then we see the big national conversations and a lot of this rhetoric is the same, and I think it starts to become redundant to us what the reality is. Like, if you have a message that you're trying to get across to people, and you're trying to nail these points, you are going to repeat yourself over and over.
I think that's totally true, And certainly the comparison to Donald Trump isn't a fair one. Like Trump doesn't answer anything and has often, even increasingly over the last four to eight years, done less interviews, done less all of that type of stuff. The only thing I would say, and this is why, and I think some of this is based in my experience with her presidential campaign, is like there, I think Trump has told a you know, maybe bashing on this, but I think Trump has told a consistent story on the biggest issues that he cares about, Like he's always been basically saying the same thing about immigration, he's always been basically saying the same thing about crime, and like he has changed on.
Thirty forty other areas.
But you kind of have a sense of the issues he cares the most about and the ways he will go about it. And one thing I think is different with Harris is the story of twenty nineteen when she was introducing herself to a lot of the country is not exactly the same place the party is now, and so I partly think that more than just individual interviews or policy or vision, we're really talking about those things as a proxy of how to get to know someone's true beliefs, what is motivating them, what they prioritize more than other stuff.
And you don't think she's done that well.
And I don't think it's been consistent enough for people to really grab on to, Like I know that because the voters I talked to still feel like they haven't heard. And it's not because he hasn't done enough interviews. I don't think it's not because she hasn't. I just think that hasn't been at the story that you started with and the story you've landed with.
There's still some distance there that has not been explained. In my opinion.
Well, I think one thing that we have to keep in mind to talking about man one hundred days of Vice President Kamala Harris running for president versus twelve years of Donald Trump running for president, So of course we know all Donald Trump's messaging. Of course we know where he's staying on the biggest issues. She hasn't even had a chance to, you know, create that type of campaign for herself, Like you know, when she ran in twenty twenty, she was only here for a split second. Then she became vice president and had to play that role, so we didn't hear from her at all.
Now you got one.
Hundred days or however long it was to tell the American people what it is you're about versus you know, going against someone for twelve years. And to your point about what you said, a set about where she stood in twenty nineteen versus now is much different. And we all admit that the party was the Democratic Party was out of there goddamn mind in twenty nineteen.
I think that's an important point.
Like I'm so glad that I'm so glad that she's more of a of a interest I really am. Like I think that the right was too far this way, the left is too far this way. I'm glad we got somebody that's just in the middle. That's what we need to be.
Because all I'm saying, is that is a story that she could tell? You know that, I guess so all. And I can tell you in my experience when I have asked what has changed then from there? And you can say, looking back, I think the party went too far in one direction. And I think people will hear that for sure, And so I guess I'm saying there is an unwillingness to make that leader.
Don't you think that she'd be afraid to alienate progressives if she said something like that Astead.
I think that's probably true.
But she's camp her final message is campaigning with Liz Cheney and Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconson. She's already basically done it, you know, she's already She's the thing she's made most clear over the last couple of months to answer whether the differences between you and Biden question are basically that she's more of a centrist, she's more of a mother, And so I think she's basically doing it. She's just not making it clear. And I think that's a messaging choice that we've seen from the campaign, even before she was the nominee. There's clearly a desire to be everything that everyone because they want to recreate, I think an anti Trump. They don't want to break up the anti Trump coalition. I just think at that point then you're seeing some points on the vision scale too, and so that's the only thing that's the choice I think they're making.
I wanted to ask you all about her having to define herself in one hundred days. I just wish that she had been more forward facing or public facing during her years as vice president. And I think Joe Biden's hesitancy to do interviews, to get out there to do unscripted moments really hurt her because she was sort of in the witness protection program for four years.
Yes, that was my biggest critique of her.
You know, when I made a statement one time that I felt I was disappointed, you know, and I had a little bit of regret, you know, voting for that ticket. Not that I would have voted for Trump, but I just was like, damn, you know, I don't know if I could do this again come November.
And I don't know if that means I would you know, sit out.
No, I would. I wouldn't have sat out. I would have voted, but I just wasn't willing to endorse. I wasn't going to tell people, Hey, I'm voting for President Biden.
But that was my biggest partiker. My biggest partiker her was like, Man.
I voted for this ticket because of you, and because I thought Joe Biden was going to be a transitional president. I thought that, even though we know what the role of vice president traditionally has been, because you're a woman, because you're a woman of color, because you can speak to a lot of things in this moment that he can't, I just thought she would have been, like you said, Miss Cork, a little bit more front facing.
And when I didn't get that, I was disappointed.
But I think I personally had an unrealistic expectation of what I expected from her.
All I'm saying is I don't think that was unrealistic.
I think they pretty clearly implied that to most Americans in twenty twenty. I think the age was a big concern about Joe Biden in the primary when he was running four years ago, and they made those statements about transitional president, about pos signaling one term her selection. I remember what the campaign was telling reporters on background. They set up the idea that you should think about this as a two person ticket and that the future would flow through at least start with the Kamala hairs, right, And so I just think I don't think the plan that would have changed some of this stuff is all that mysterious.
I just think they backed off of it.
And for my reporting, it was pretty clear that in the first couple of years of Harris there was some stuff about her stepping back from media, particularly after the Lester Hold interview, but much more important was a White House that was trying to insulate Joe Biden. And so I do think, to your point, Katie, like she was a victim somewhat of that strategy because they created this adversarial media relationship that I'd never understood. Like I like, you know, but it's okay probably for Biden, who has such a brand in the country and people said have a sense that they know. I think it matters more for someone like Harris, where that is not as defined.
And it didn't.
And it didn't help that there was so much negative stories coming out of the White House about her, and a lot of that was was from the administration. It was people in the administration who was putting out these sort of hit pieces about her and saying out she has aspirations beyond being vice president, and so what you know, she can't keep anybody on her staff, you know, right?
Why would the administration do that? You guys, why would that? I mean just because they were being assholes? I mean, or were they threatened by her? Why would the administration do something like that put out all these bad stories.
I think somebody was scared of a potential president Kamala Harris like I think of.
I think it's a fair read.
I would say that the tensions between president and vice president are there's often those ten, right, But this one was different, I think partially because you had the looming question of age, and the White House's strategy was to deny that that was a real problem not just amongst but in the country, or that that was not a real Biden liability. And so it was coming from the White House an administration to say that Joe Biden is the only person who can beat Donald Trump, that Joe Biden is the only one who you know, and so all of some of that stuff I remember. I'll tell you an actual story. I remember one time talking to this White House official and saying, Okay, you know, I was building my profile of the Harris that we were doing in the Times magazine last year, and one thing I had heard was that they had seen some data that said when she goes out and delivers messages specifically on abortion, they get big movement among independence. So I'm running this past the White House and the way that you think they would support because it's their vice president. And the thing the person told me was actually like, Hey, that's not specific to her, that's anybody who gives the Biden message. And that is the type of weirdo relationship I'm talking about, because on one hand, you could see you would think that they would see her as a as a valuable asset, right because the duck, because they're incentive. And I think this is like how some of those White House ambitions work, is to insulate their own candidate. Sometimes that comes at the expense even of other Democrats.
Well, during that profile, I know that you said you felt like you were on trial when you were interviewing her. I want to play a short clip of the interview you did with her in twenty twenty three.
Another thing in twenty and twenty was, obviously those things were happening at the time that Biden was making his selection for running me and I was reading stories at the time that was basically saying, very clearly, you know the time story Harry Reid says that you know he came to decision that he needed to choose a black woman. While that is obviously about you, that's not necessarily you personally, but your identity.
How should it matter?
Does it matter that that narrative has existed that Biden needed to choose someone or who was a black person, And should it matter?
I don't think I understand your question.
I'm saying, does it matter that that kind of narrative around Biden needed to choose a black woman as a running mate still exists and has hovered over that selection, or is.
That it happened? I don't I don't think I understand you. Honestly don't understand your question.
I'm saying that.
He chose a black woman. That woman is me, So I don't know that anything lingers about what he should choose. He has chosen. He asked me to join him on the ticket.
I guess I was. I can move on. I want to ask I just gave up.
She wasn't picking up what you were putting down as.
She knows getting well what I'm talking about. I know she knows what I'm talking about, you know, and it's it's fine. I think it's so. I think this is my point about sometimes she also doesn't want to be put in the position I think sometimes journalists do more often of like respond to the thing you don't want to respond to, right, And so I think that the whole time I was doing that story, I heard so much about how the diversity, higherness of it all unfair or you know whatever, was still part of the reason people were kind of invalidating her selection and I think minimizing the prospect that she could be the eventual leader of the Democratic Party. And so you would talk to Democrats about what happens after Joe Biden and they wouldn't even include Kamala Harrison the picture. And that was of informing so many of those questions at the time. It's because it seemed very clear that some of this was really tied to what was a subtle dismissing of her role. And I think what I wanted to do in that is put it in front of her to respond to. And I think that there is somewhat a subtle way that discrimination works, where particularly in political media, people have these kind of silent, anonymous conversations around you and they won't give you the dignity of saying this is what I.
Think about that.
And so I thought, Okay, she would appreciate being able to be like this is ridiculous, blah blah blah blah blah, or whatever she wants to decide. But that's a critical misunderstanding of that I made, because I don't think she wants to do that, and frankly, I think she found it insulting to bring it up to her.
I think also you pointed out that she's not particularly introspective right in these interviews, not in that way.
She's not gonna do it with you, I don't. I think she does it with some other people. She's not gonna do it with me. She's not gonna do it, and that type of set it.
Yeah, And I also think that, you know, man, if there's anything that would like I don't want to say conflict right because I don't know if you remember, but there was, uh, he didn't just pick the vice president like there was was a huge too.
There was a there was a lot.
Of tension, radicitions, room convo, back combo.
They did.
They did the big They did a big, big write up in USA Today where it was like Angela Raie and Sonny Houston and all these different black women who were demanding, you need to pick a black woman as you're running mate. And you know, there was a lot of pushback on that because there was all of these rumors about, oh, I don't think the first lady at the time, Joe Biden didn't necessarily like Kamala, and a lot of people around Biden didn't like Kamala because of the way Kamala came it.
Uh, you know, Joe Biden during the debate.
Wasn't it all James Clyburn, you guys, wasn't it James Clyburn, who basically it was not.
Cliburn wanted the Supreme Court justin did not care about the VP, Yes right, he did not. Cliburn did not care about to be pep to climberk were like, you need a black woman Supreme Court judge.
That's so interesting was that misreported astead for a long time.
No, I think I think people have overinflated Clyburn's role a little bit. You know, I think the mythology posts South Carolina primary has become very large. But he's really clear about this, and he's been clear about this from the job. He did not he did not he did not say you need to choose Kamala Harris. He said he wanted his Supreme Court justice and he got it right. Like it was a big campaign discussion, to your point, like they basically had an internal fight among the Biden campaign of whether they had to choose a black woman, and there were people on multiple sides in that fight.
But the truth is that Harris was.
The only one who was qualified in a non race way and also sufficed this kind of racial conversation that was happening too, right, So I don't think it was just identity, you know, I don't think it was only that, but I do think it played a huge role, and particularly at that time when we had the post Floyd moment. And so I think to your point about twenty twenty seeming kind of crazy, like the fact that this happened so publicly was so unique anyway, And so that was part of the reason I was bringing those questions to her is because I know that conversation reached her I know that even the kind of backlash to that reached her too, And so the difference is she does not want that, and other people said it.
There were people in the story who.
Were like, you know, I think that they have you know, pigeonholed her and blah blah blah bla blah. But she doesn't want that to come from her, And I partially understand that. I just want something that's not the type of adversariness that then acts like you're crazy for asking it.
Dana Bass, I remember this vividly. Dana Bash was interviewing President Biden. They looked like they were outside somewhere, and Dana Bass said to him, Charlamagne and a host of others say, you have to choose a black woman as a running mate, and Joe goals, well, Miss Jim Carvern says, I don't ready. So this happened on CNN. So these conversations were happening everywhere.
This is a fact.
If you want to get smarter every morning with a breakdown of the news and fascinating takes on health and wellness and pop culture, sign up for our daily newsletter, wake Up Call by going to Katie Couric dot com you think she's improved in her interviews as stead I do.
I think she's done more of them, and so I think doing more is usually better. You know, there's multiple ways for politicians to think about interviews, but the best strategy I've learned is to is when they see it as an opportunity to get their message across. And I think there's been a change in thinking a little bit. But I have to also say they've changed the type of people they talk to, and that's been a big difference in the last four years too. Like they I don't think they're like, you know, anti New York Times or mainstream media of you know, kind of incentive or you know, the message they've been doing to kind of pull them away from that type of stuff as an accident, I think they prefer talking to people who are more explicitly supportive. You can have more intimate conversations. I know, podcasting and that stuff. I'm not saying like that stuff is bad. I'm just saying it's it's kind of been zero sum where they've done more interviews with people who support them a they've done less with more traditional media. And partially I think we underrated the intentionality of that.
Does that help them, because to me, I think people are craving not necessarily a Brettbear interview, And I think Charlemagne did ask some really good questions during his interming.
I'm not talking about the quality of questions. I think that interview is good.
I'm saying that they also, but I'm saying they they're choosing the places really specifically.
But what do you think that they're these questions, They're they're appealing to different groups like the Call Her Daddy podcasts and the Breakfast Club. Obviously, she knows that there are a lot of blackmail listeners for the Breakfast Club, so it seems like they're really being very intentional about reaching a certain audience. At the same time, do you think it's hurt her not doing an interview with a fair minded but tough traditional journalists who will really kind of go through some of the issues, not talk over her, not feel like they're reading Donald Trump's talking points. What Brettbear kind of felt like somebody who who really asks some some really well crafted, well thought out questions.
You don't think that's hurt her, you guys, I think.
She might need one big prime time interview.
Well, she did sixty minutes with Bill Whitaker.
She did, I'm gonna be honest with you know, they respect to sixty minutes. I hate how they do interviews. I can't stand when they narry when they asked the question then narrate the answer.
I hate. I cannot stand that. They drives me crazy. But I think she needed to.
Do one big prime time conversation for America from a from a traditional journalist.
I do agree that would help a lot. Yeah, And I think it's just a matter. And to me, it's like not just going there, but what are they willing to say when they're there?
Right?
And I think that, you know, the second to switch happened. The overall question in my head is are we still talking about the Joe Biden second term with the new person at the top, or is there something different about Kamala Harris that they want to lay out and make a different type of break from the administration or embrace it kind of change mantle more. And they've slowly gotten around to doing some breaks with the administration, but it's been really small. And I think that's the question I really have that I think a more traditional interview would really lay out is to the point about the vision question, what is that and what is the differences between that and what your just generic Democrat would be.
Well, she famously said on the view that she couldn't think of anything that she would have done differently in the Biden administration. She did say to Brett Baer, I'm not Joe Biden. I'm a different person. I'll bring my life experiences, my professional background, YadA, YadA, YadA, But she still didn't really, I don't think crystallize how they differ. And do you think that's because she didn't want to offend Joe Biden. I read somewhere that he kind of gave her permission to say, yes, it's okay, you can separate yourself from my agenda or my administration.
Do you think that's true.
Yeah, I've seen her say I saw her saying at different times when she was at this question. I thin couple days ago. You know, traditionally vice presidents don't criticize the president. All I would say the Democrats is like that sort of deference is part of the reason they have got themselves in this in the first place. Like their inability to see this administration as unpopular is a big problem, and so they can keep pretending as if people don't have those feelings about the administration, and then I think their play is basically an anti Trump one, which might work, or they have to acknowledge that some of that is in the air, and then it becomes more important to lay out what those differences might be. And so I really like and so to your point, like, I haven't seen that become clear. But I think that's downstream of a bigger problem I think they're facing, which is that they have not really come to terms with the fact that they cannot just be the Biden administration and tell people that's okay. For as much as they want to tell people the economy is better in the numbers than you might feel, as much as they want to say like Gaza would be worse under Trump, so get over it.
Like that's not.
Really working with those people, and so they keep going back to that. Well, I just think it's kind of a risky one to do because the kind of lecture strategy see Obama with black Man a week or two ago.
I don't think that's a winning one.
There were two places that I feel like she could really break away from Biden.
She's doing one of.
Them where she talks about her opportunity economy, like when she talking about rebuilding the middle class, when she talks about, you know, wanting to provide people with the opportunity to own a small business, own a home, I think speaking directly to that, directly rebuilding the class, I think that is very That could be something she could break away from Biden with and talking about how, you know, you have these conversations about the middle class. When we was in Detroit, my man e t Eric he had he said something to her, I hear all of this talk about the middle class, but how do we get people from poverty?
For sure? Middle class? That could be the way to break away. And another way to break away.
Is to simply say, hey, man, I feel like, you know, this administration got a lot wrong with the border. Yeah, you know, and and and and and and and it's gonna take by partisan legislation to fix the border. The border has been a problem under a lot of different administrations. So you know, Democrats Republicans were gonna have to come together and fix this. And guess what, we did have a bill that you know, Democrats agreed on Andy, Republicans agreed on but with what Trump shot it down because he didn't want us to get any political wins. But she should speak to that, like, she should really say, hey, we got it.
We didn't get it right on the board, this administration getting right.
I'm not the president, I'm the vice president, so I'm just you know, riding with my guy. But I don't think we got it all the way right on the border. I'm going to be stronger.
Why doesn't she do that because.
Politicians just don't admit they wrong. Politicians don't want to admit because if I admit I was wrong on the border, then that means the Republicans were right, so that gives them a political win, you know, so to speak.
It's just that simple. They don't want to admit that they got it wrong.
I think those are all great of options that she has in front of her in terms of making a more explicit break, and I think it is just that kind of simple the o. It goes to something I said earlier though this one. I think they kind of like politics galaxy, bringing themselves out of doing the obvious thing. It's because she's already the Jimcrats are already kind of conceding the Trump point that the borders a problem. It's clear in their ads, it's clear in how they talk. It's they've done a one to eighty from how they talk about the border from four years ago when they were running. And so all I'm saying is that it's already there. What's not there is a clear explanation of how you transition or where you find yourself in that. And so some of that is a leadership question, Like I would much rather be the person driving my party shifts in an election than a person feeling like I was just a weather vean and I'm flowing wherever the party's going. And so some of that is what I think they have to get comfortable and stepping into. And I just think at this point they're just gonna roll the dice with the election and kind of anti trumpness and call of the day. But like in the end, the question for her will be what does the party look like under you? And there's no way to avoid that, you know, Like so when I hear like even when I hear like a bipartisan Council of Advisors with Republicans, yeah, I think that does the signaling to the list Chaney types that you're open to more centrist ideas. But I also hear someone who's again seeding the vision question to other people, and I'm like, I don't think that really solves the biggest problem. I don't think people don't think you listen. I think people want to know what you believe, you know, and so I think that's a slight difference that they're not necessarily playing in right now. And I really think the answer is because they don't want those the beliefs to turn off the type of people who they can keep in line if it's just about beating Trump.
You know. That was a question I had for her. Yeah, that I didn't get to because I only had an hour.
But it's like, do do black people people of color who run for president do they have to say we're going to have Republicans in our cabinet just to appeal America?
That's a great question.
I like, there's a certain sector of white America that people of color when they are because President Obama did it, yes, not doing it?
They or do y'all have to do that just to appease?
Is it just black candidates who who have said that in the past. I don't think so. I think other candidates.
But I do think identity plays a big piece here because I think, like, think about how many times Obama made a point to clarify he just won't be the president of Black America.
Like I think that there is something and the opposite is true too.
Biden was free to talk about black people all the time, you know, like Biden made clear I will do things specifically for black communities in a way that I think black politicians sometimes scare away from.
And I also think his brand as moderate.
Yes it's true because he's been there for a long time, but I also think white manness allows you to pass some of those electability concerns. You know a story I will tell about hair specific to this point. Do you remember the second debate? You know, the first debate is the one she came to Biden about segregation and bustling, right, But the second debate she was kind of a different person, yes, like and it felt Jekyl Heidi from the person you met in the first debate. And I remember asking one of her advisors like, WHOA, what was up with that? Like what was the decision process there? And the answer I remember getting was we didn't want her to feel too much like a hard charging or angry black woman. And so partly it was about show some different sides of yourself. And this is some white guy telling me, you know, classic dim consultant type.
And I think, like, on one hand, you see.
How that why that is the advice, But you're also pulling someone away from who they are, Like I think Kamala Harris is a fairly direct, fairly hard charging black woman and that's fine, Like that's the appeal, you know, is mean, that's when she's at her best. That's when you understand her the most, Like that's when it's clear. So so I think partly there is these ways they tell themselves women black people have to operate, And I'm like, is that rule true? Or if she is just who she is, then do people pick up on that?
And that matters more.
She's a prosecutor, she's a person who used to hold people accountable in those Senate here. When I watched her with Brett Baer, when she gets angry, she's like, all righty, Brett, cut that out, Like we're not doing that. When I had her on my TV show and I was staying to her like, who is the real president is Joe mansion or is it Joe Biden. She was like, Charlamaine, cut it out, stop talking like a Republican president and Biden is the president, and I'm Kamala Harris the vice president.
Like she's at her best when she's when the fire is lit, when she's rosed than me.
I think you get it more even in the interview right, like I'm saying, like she is, it's who I think. And so sometimes I think I particularly learned this covering her and Warren in the last primary. There's often these people in the back room that have decided who these people have to be. And I think, particularly among Democrats in the post Trump era, I just think that like being what is most true matters more, and like if you're up against Donald Trump, who is gonna play who's gonna be himself every day of the week and lose on that front, I think inauthenticity is a much bigger risk than they acknowledge. And some of that stuff I do think is really tied to identity, blackness, and sexism.
You know, my sister was running for governor of Virginia and she got sick and had to drop out, and I remember her saying to me, when you run for office, you have to be willing to lose. And I think what she meant was you have to adhere to some north star. You have to be who you are through and through. And I think you're right a set. I think that authenticity. You know, you can smell inauthenticity a mile away. So I think there is something that has felt slightly amorphous of who she really is deep down inside.
And I guess I don't think she's I don't think she's in confusion about that, by the way, Like, I think this is actually about how you present and how you tell that story through politics and policy. Like I don't actually think she I think she knows who she is. Yeah, And so one of the it's about translating that into a way that people can most understand. I remember learning that you know, advisors had asked her, did she want to call herself a pragmatic progressive?
Right?
Like?
Is there a way that you can distill something so that people can have a sense of understanding how you make decisions?
That is what I think is the thing we're talking about.
The narrative over the past few weeks, And this is something Charlemagne has waged into and I wanted your view on this is she's struggling with black men, particularly under the age of fifty. Charlemagne said he thought that that was an unfair assessment that some black folks in the United States are struggling more with the Democratic Party than with Kamala Harris. So I'd love to hear your take on the kind of latest hair on fire issue in Democratic circles.
Yeah, and that I would love to hear you on this also, Charlotte Mane, I mean, I think felt like the first what you said, I definitely agree with. I think this is part of a broader story's much more about black people's relationship with the Democratic Party than it is about individual black men and Kamala Harris. If even if you look at the numbers post twenty twelve, we've seen a consistent decline a black share of support for Democrats. Even if you look at twenty twenty two, where Democrats did really well, Black turnout was their weakest points, their widest coalition yet, and they've actually as the party has got more college educated than things like they take on different types of issues, and so I don't think it's any surprise that if you have politicians that increasingly come from a more college educated lens. If you take on issues, even if you're a way you're appealing to black folks's representation, which is often about elite black folks and elite spaces, that that pulls you further and further away from the type of black folks we're talking about who feel distant from the party. I remember we did an episode about this at my family Thanksgiving table last year for the podcast, and then I got pulled together a whole bunch of family and friends. We talked about the kind of shadow of Obama because I'm from Chicago, and how that led to this kind of feeling of difference with Democrats.
And one thing that I think stuck.
Out is like when you ask people why are you a Democrat in the first place, the answer that I got was much more about thevery fight for poor people than it was they fight for black people. And I think that's an important thing to remember for a lot of these people, is like the drop off is partially because the brand has gotten further away from we fight for poor people, and it overlaps that that includes a bunch.
Of black men.
Who did you know that includes a certain share of these folks. But I don't think I think to say that it's just sexism, or it's just a white husband, or you know, or it's just excuses, you know, to not have a black woman president, I really think is a type of tone. And I think, particularly I think about what Obama said, There's no way he would go to white communities and make that same type of lecturing army.
He wouldn't go.
He wouldn't go to his cousins in Kansas and say it's your fault. He would say, what are your concerns? And how is the party speaking to that? And I just think it's not that hard. That's what folks are looking for.
Charlemagne, I'll call you Charlotte if you call me Katie, and you don't have to call me mss correct. But you did ask Vice President Harris on your show about what Barack Obama said in that more intimate setting when he seemed like he was scolding black men for not supporting her. Let's listen to that.
President Obama was out there last week waving his finger at black men. When are Liz Cheney and Hillary Clinton going wave day finger at white women? Win of Bill Clinton and Joe Biden going wave day finger at white men because fifty two percent of white women voted for Trump in twenty sixteen, fifty five percent voted for Trump in twenty twenty. They all voted against their own interests. When the finger waving gonna start at them?
Well, thank you for highlighting that I do have the support of over two hundred Republicans who worked for various administrations, including everyone going back to Ronald Reagan to the Bushes, to John McCain and Romney, and including Liz Channing.
I'm very proud to have her support.
And I believe that they who many of them who may have voted for Trump before, are supporting me because they know the stakes are so high in terms of our very democracy and rule of law, and.
So the finger wagon should start today Atamar.
Well, I think what is happening is that we are all working on reminding people of what is at stake, and that is very important.
So what did you think about the way she answered that question?
I mean, she didn't answer my question directly, but you know what I think, what I think the VP likes to do is she likes she likes me just to say things because you know it'll be out in it.
She knows somebody, she knows somebody, you'll hear it.
So it's just like, you know, me saying it right there in that moment in front of her. Liz Chaney will hear it, Hillary will hear it. Bill Clinton here, Joe bidenl hear it. And it's just like, yeah, you know what we do need to be out here, you know, rallying people that look like us to go out there and support her.
I think it's the difference between saying the words black people are not a monolith and truly believing right and truly operating from that front. I mean this pops up in other ways too. We should point out, like part of the black folks drifting to Trump, if you look at places like Florida are a bunch of first generation in African Americans who have different immigrant experience, different life experience than the voting block that's traditionally had a bunch of roots in America, and I think has a different lens on politics than you're more African American Southern core. So I'm like, if you actually think about the differences that are true among black people broadly, then of course there's drop off on some areas. Of course, some of these things interact differently, but I would only say that Obama has shown the consistent tone of lecturing over the years, like he did this while president, talking about your cousin Pooky and pull up your pants and things like that, and so I think, like it's just one of those things where you know, we had I talked to Governor Wes Moore about black man specifically, and what he says is, you need to acknowledge their frustration with the political system and the role that Democrats have played in that, and that's where you got to start.
And then I'm just going to say, how can they win them back?
And I think that's where you got to start from.
I think it's a I think it's a lens on issues and that, but I also think it is a tone that acknowledges frustration with the political system and frustration with the Democratic Party, Like it is not a even if seventy eighty percent of black folks vote for Democrats, when you talk to them, they have a lot of problems with the Democratic Party. And so I think when folks act like black folks are just mindlessly hitting the blue button, that's when you don't see the type of nuances that can lead you to make those marginal improvements.
You know, ms, I want to read the exact quote. You know, this is from President Obama's speech. It wasn't when he was talking in the more intimate setting. It was when he was talking at the rally in Pennsylvania, and he said, and so sometimes the other excuse we hear when we're talking to folks as well, it ain't gonna make no difference. Well, no, you're right that we're not eliminating poverty. We're not gonna get rid of all problems with race. We're not gonna prevent every bad thing from happening in this country, whoever we elect president.
That's not how things work.
The question is that we have somebody there who sees us, who cares about us, who will work on our behalf and can make things a little bit better. And so there are a whole bunch of things that I did not get done when I was president. After age is I couldn't do it because it was blocked by Congress. Couldn't do it because sometimes the Supreme Court stepped in. Couldn't do it because I couldn't persuade enough folks to do it.
This is how you get black men back.
This is how you get black people back, because there's a level of honesty in this state and an empathy to what voters are feeling that you're speaking directly too.
You don't got to get.
Up there, mister President Obama and tell me about all of this hope and change that we can believe in, and you know how you're gonna wave them long and you know, change the conditions of the black community.
No. I know you can't eliminate poverty.
I know you're not gonna get rid of all the problems with race, but I also convinced me that you care and you will work on my behalf to make things better. That should be a messaging at a Democratic party.
And it can't come this late, to be honest, they have said, they have said they understood this, they were investing early. But the reality is come the mid term, the midterms the last four years. There have been signs about this with black folks for a while. And so the fact that I think this conversation has only recently developed is already emblematic of a problem because it could have been a thing that they invested in early, and I think to the point about the primary early, these are the type of things that the primary would do, is talk about how to have a conversation about how they talk to black men in the first place. In that interview with Harris last year, I asked her the party talks more about race and blackness than before, why isn't that leading the more black votes? And her answer, you know, was ask me after twenty twenty four, which I think is the same type of dismissiveness of the problem that we've kind of seen from them. And so twenty twenty four might end up being the wake up call on this front. But I don't think it's limited to black people. There's a Latino men problem, There's a young man there is also.
A blue college edu.
It is a it is a broader thing, and so I, you know, the specificness of black men somewhat feels like an early attempt to blame a loss. In my opinion, if someone Harris supposed to lose first, the reason will not chiefly be black men, and so I don't I don't get why sometimes the conversation.
Has felt like that before we go and you guys have been so generous with your time this podcast is going to drop when there's less than two weeks to go before the election, and I know that instead, you've been traveling like crazy, You've qualified for the Delta Diamond Medallion, You've been crisscrossing the country. I think Charlemagne and I would both like to hear what you're hearing as you travel all across America. What are some of the things that are really sticking out in your mind?
I think the biggest thing is before the switch happened, so much of what we heard was an apathetic relationship to this presidential race and in a frankly downright hostile feeling of being forced to be choosed between those two candidates. And for a year or so, that was the overwhelming kind of malaise in the air, was why do I want to deal.
With this election?
And that was driven and I think for a lot of people we were talking to Democrats, they were saying, oh, well, you know, we have to deal with kind of getting people invested, but maybe weren't recognizing that they were part of that problem because of the candidates. Since the switch has happened, there has been a greater willingness to kind of like engage in the in the election and things like that. But I think we're still basically dealing with the landscape and when Trump is the main figure, partially Democrats own making and kind of messaging, but it feels like a referendum on him. And one thing that Republicans have done for four years ago to now is get their voters on the same page when it comes to things like early voting, when it comes to things like participating, and they use election denial in that message. So we're in Georgia last week and we are hearing people voting lined up to vote in the first day of early voting where they broke records, and they're saying the reason is because Dominion stole the.
Machines last year.
They're using the Donald Trump language of denial as a motivation to go vote, and so it has this kind of dual effect where I think it's created a more unified MAGA base.
But we're still going to deal with the situation.
Whereas some guy told me in Georgia, if Donald Trump doesn't win, I don't believe it. I think those questions are still hugely important from a democratic side. I think you have a good chance to do fine it's just with a little bit of a different base and coalition than they like to admit.
The Obama days are done.
Like, it's a little wider, it's a little more college educated, it's a little more affluent, it's a little in all of that type of stuff. I think it's just things that are uncomfortable for them to say out loud. But the people but who wanted to protect democracy and protect abortion rights are really real and you see that all across folks, and so without those issues, I think that Donald I think Donald Trump is correctly named people's desire for change from this administration.
But I think Donald Trump is a huge liability for.
Being the messenger of that, and so it creates That's how you get to fifty to fifty. And I think that that's been really clear in the different parts of the country. If you go to Georgia and Arizona, we hear so much more about immigration, we hear so much more about I think issues that I play well for Donald Trump. But when we're on Michigan and Wisconsin and hearing about abortion rights and protecting democracy, you see how there's still a path for Harris.
And I just think that the party itself.
Democrats specifically haven't had what we believe in adult combo since twenty nineteen, and so without that and the absence of that, what they believe in is just Donald Trump shouldn't be president again, and so like that's what this is a come to be. But it's ground that they seeded because the other conversation, the uncomfortable conversation, was one they weren't willing to have last year, before.
There was a VP Harris at the top of the ticket.
I was saying that this election is going to boil down to the criminals who are the Republicans, the cowards who are the Democrats because they don't fight hard enough on nothing in the couch, which is voting. And I think, you know, those people on the couch, they were totally checked out when she got to the top of the ticket. Now they're sitting up on the couch a little bit like, oh, let me see what's going on. They're listening and they're listening to, you know, hear things that you know they can resonate with. And it's really just something to the Democratic Party over the next couple of weeks. It's something to VP Kamala Harris to go out there and give them something, you know, to get up and go to that to that voting move for. You know, I think that they I think Democrats they do a terrible job of talking about people they never truly talked to. And I think that they have a real disconnect with working class people in America, not just working class Black people, leader the working class people period. I think that there's a level of eliticism that has happened in the Democratic Party. Even when they say things like the economy is great, look at the stock market.
The people I'm talking to where I'm.
From in rural Monks Corner, in the rural area in South Carolina, they don't know nothing about those stocks.
They don't have no stocks. They they don't care about that.
They want to know what the grocery prices, those rent prices that they're talking about.
They're talking about the cost of whiting being too high.
And you know, Democrats got to find a way to get back into the trenches and start talking to people instead of talking about people. And when they get that connection again with the working class, I think they'll be in a much better place.
I think the only thing I would add to that is so much of that disconnect, I think has been driven by a bad assumption that the racial changes, the demographic had changes in the country will just inevitably lead to more Democratic votes. I think it's still it's still they're still breaking themselves from that demographic destiny belief. And so more let's you know, does not mean inherently more Democrats, like that is a misunderstanding of the diversity of that community. More black folks does not inherently mean for Democrats.
That's not an understanding. That's I'm an Asian voter. We can keep going down the line.
But I think the missing piece for people's understanding is really just an assumption that folks had one that Donald Trump would just be invalidated either by January sixth or the legal cases, or that they, you know, something would happen by himself. And then the second piece, I think is they still have to break themselves from the assumption that all these minority folks will inevitably moved in their direction. And so whatever the new demographic version of America is, there's no telling what that means politically, you know. And I think they are just getting to that understanding, and some of the shifts, particularly on a class front.
We're talking about have forced that recognition.
Astead Herndon and Charloteage the God. This was so fun. Thank you both for spending this time with me. I really appreciate it. Thank you, Miss Katie, Katie Yeah, miss Katie's Miss Katie's fine.
That's so southern and cute.
Hey Bill, thank you for having it. Love the work, the audience though, happy to be here.
Thank your good money.
Thanks for listening. Everyone.
If you have a question for me, a subject you want us to cover, or you want to share your thoughts about how you navigate this crazy world reach out. You can leave a short message at six oh nine five point two five five oh five, or you can send me a DM on Instagram.
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Next Question is a production of iHeartMedia and Katie Kuric Media. The executive producers are Me, Katie Kuric, and Courtney Ltz. Our supervising producer is Ryan Martz, and our producers are Adriana Fazzio and Meredith Barnes. Julian Weller composed art theme music. For more information about today's episode, or to sign up for my newsletter wake Up Call, go to the description in the podcast app, or visit us at Katiecuric dot com. You can also find me on Instagram and all my social media channels. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. I want to tell you all about the Cancer Straight Talk podcast from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center with MSK oncologist doctor Diane Reedy Lagunis. I was a guest and we had a totally candid conversation about my family's experiences with cancer, including my husband Jay's illness, my own treatment for breast cancer, and of course the time I got that kolon uskby on National TV. Cancer straight Talk features life affirming conversations with experts and patients alike about topics affecting everyone touched by cancer. If that includes you or someone you love, I hope you'll listen to my episode and every episode of Cancer Straight Talk.
