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James Hohmann: The Dems’ Squad Fatigue

August 25, 2022
Notes
Transcript

Four years after AOC’s surprise win, the pendulum is swinging back to moderates, turnout in the midterms may be historic, and both sides underestimated the effect of overturning Roe. Plus, Biden’s cave on student loans. James Hohmann joins Charlie Sykes today.

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This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors and omissions. Ironically, the transcription service has particular problems with the word “bulwark,” so you may see it mangled as “Bullard,” “Boulart,” or even “bull word.” Enjoy!
  • Speaker 1
    0:00:08

    Good morning. Welcome to the Bullework Podcast. Happy Thursday. I am Charlie Sykes. If you are new to this podcast, you really consider subscribing.
  • Speaker 1
    0:00:16

    We’ve had an interesting week earlier in the week, as Dorian Nicole Hammer talked about the rise of the alternative conservative media and the death of of Reaganism. Yesterday, we talked with Elliot Ackerman, veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan. And today we are joined by James Hermann, a columnist for the Washington Post, covers politics, policy, the law, and other matters. Welcome back to the podcast, James. Great to be with you, Charlie.
  • Speaker 1
    0:00:44

    Well, last time you were on the podcast, we created a little bit of trouble because you were talking about the internal debate in the Biden White House about the forgiveness of student loans. We’ll double back on that a little bit later, but I haven’t done this lately, but I feel the need for a palate cleanser. To start off. So Mike Glendale, my pillow guy, goes on it doesn’t matter where he was. And he’s talking about he’s still at it, by the way, you know, pushing his demented, debunked, insane crazy, whatever you wanna say.
  • Speaker 1
    0:01:20

    Election lies. But he came up with an interesting new twist that was so interesting that the governor of the state of Utah tweeted it out. This is what Michael and Dell, my pillar guy had to say about his most recent research. Into non existent election fraud. You know,
  • Speaker 2
    0:01:36

    I believe you have the CCP, the globalist, the unity party. I believe it’s all one just to help your family and and and we showed it on on all the fifty states, you get to Utah where there’s no one for a day day election, it’s all mail in as pure crime. Nobody votes in Utah, nobody branded. It’s all
  • Speaker 1
    0:02:00

    just made up Nobody votes in Utah. So Spencer Cox is the Republican governor of Utah who tweeted out this morning big if true. Who knew this about Utah, James? Really?
  • Speaker 3
    0:02:13

    I know you’re not really Giuliani. It reminds me of Rudy Giuliani telling Rusty Bowers. We have are theories. We just need evidence. Part of me feels a very infatestimally small
  • Speaker 1
    0:02:23

    part of me feels a little bit guilty before dunking on Michael Lindel who appears to be, let’s say, wrestling with certain challenges. I I I I’m not going to I’m not gonna speculate about his mental state right now, but and I I also think that it’s for those of you wondering why even paying attention to my pillow guy. I regret to inform you that my pillow guy still is remarkably influential, not just in the fever swamps. I mean, this is the the moment we are in, James, is that in a rational universe, we would be able to ignore Michael Lindel, but we can’t anymore. He’s at every Trump rally.
  • Speaker 1
    0:03:02

    He he, you know, he often speaks
  • Speaker 3
    0:03:04

    before Trump and warms up the crowd. This is this is someone who is not, you know, just babbling somewhere. This is someone who has appliential following among people who may
  • Speaker 1
    0:03:19

    run from president again? Yes. No. No. Katie speaking of which, The former president of the United States put out a statement on truth social.
  • Speaker 1
    0:03:28

    He’s he he woke up in a I would say kind of a cranky mood today. This is what he posted. This is the former president of the United States. Even though I am as innocent as a person can be, And despite my capitalized campaign being spied on by the radical left, the Pfizer Court being lied to and defrotted all of the many hoaxes and scams capitalized that were illegally placed on me by very sick and demented people. And without even mentioning, well, this is the one sentence here.
  • Speaker 1
    0:03:58

    We’re still the one the first sentence. By very sick and demented people. And without even mentioning the many crimes of Joe and Hunter Biden, all revealed in great detail in the laptop from hell also capitalized, It looks more and more like the fake news media is pushing hard for the sleighs capitalized to do something that should not be done. Exclamation point. Everyone needs an
  • Speaker 3
    0:04:22

    editor, Charlie.
  • Speaker 1
    0:04:25

    They do. So I think it’s safe to assume, you know, feel free to disagree with me. I feel like I think it’s safe to assume that that is unfiltered Donald Trump. That that that was not written by a staffer, that was not edited. This is what was going through his mind at Mar a Lago or wherever he is, when he woke up this morning.
  • Speaker 3
    0:04:45

    You really need like a key to keep track of a lot of these buzzwords that Trump throws around. It’s hard to you know, if you you if you’re not watching NewsMax all day, it’s not obvious what half the stuff he’s talking about means. That’s
  • Speaker 1
    0:05:00

    a really good point. You you do sort of have to have a a rosetta stone of Mad Libs, you know, phrases that are out there that are sort of randomly throwing. But somebody tweeted, it looks like somebody woke up scared. I don’t know whether you’re scared or not. But it it it does have this sort of randy defensive feel to it, you know, even though I am as innocent as a person can be.
  • Speaker 1
    0:05:22

    And then he just it’s like this festival of the airing of all of his grievances. I mean, he he just felt the need to just download everything. So he’s saying it it looks more and more like the fake news media. He’s pushing hard for the sleeves to do something that should not
  • Speaker 3
    0:05:37

    be done. Do you know off hand who the sleeves is? I think he’s saying the media is pushing for him to be indicted.
  • Speaker 1
    0:05:44

    Yeah. But who’s the sleeves? Well, that’s
  • Speaker 3
    0:05:47

    I assume we’ll find out. It’s never the the last we’ll hear. I you know, he’s probably maybe he’s referring to Mary Garland. See, I don’t think the
  • Speaker 1
    0:05:57

    sleeves works with Maricarlin. Maybe maybe okay. See, we have many listeners who I’m sure know the difference to this. Okay. So let’s talk about where we’re at in the in the political world right now.
  • Speaker 1
    0:06:08

    Your latest column comes after Tuesday’s primaries in New York with all the caveats, the special elections, can be overanalyzed and because they are low turnout affairs. We did get some interesting, I think, signals about what’s going on within the Democratic Party. So talk to me a little bit about what what you saw in New York, you wrote when it comes to that New York City is to Democrats as Florida is to Republicans, it predicts the future. And so what happened this week in the Empire State is something of a harbinger for the party of Joe Biden. What do you see?
  • Speaker 1
    0:06:42

    Yeah. So let’s unpack two things. The, you know, there were the special
  • Speaker 3
    0:06:45

    elections. Which is, you know, Republicans versus Democrats, and and we can talk about those. But there were also these primaries, Democrats facing Democrats very messy redistricting process. Democrats overreached, tried to draw an exceedingly generous map. It was struck down by the courts.
  • Speaker 3
    0:07:04

    And it ended up creating this mess where, you know, Jerry Nadler, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, is in a primary against Carol and Maloney, the Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, lots of members of congress moving around. But this is the place where four years ago, Alexander Ocasio Cortez beat Joe Crowley, who was the number four in leadership, the chairman of the Democratic caucus, two years ago, Jamal Bowman beat Elliot Engel, the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, both Bowman and AOC and and others members of the Democratic socialist of America. And I do think that that reflected where the base of the party was at that moment. But things have changed. You know, you saw Joe Biden become the Democratic standard bearer.
  • Speaker 3
    0:07:50

    Last year, you saw Eric Adams, a former Republican, and a former New York police captain become mayor. And then on Tuesday, you saw sort of the establishment for lack of a better word strike back. Sean Patrick Maloney, the Chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, won by a more than two to one margin against this woman, Alessandra Byaghi, We just speak center who very much of the AOC mold, had AOC support, and and really got smoked. The Maloney said on Tuesday night, mainstream one and common sense one. And then the the race that I was focused on in Lower Manhattan and sort of Brownstone, Brooklyn, was this contest with Dan Goldman, who in anyone who watches MSNBC, you’ll see him a lot.
  • Speaker 3
    0:08:37

    The
  • Speaker 1
    0:08:37

    Vulnerability — Okay. —
  • Speaker 3
    0:08:38

    chief counsel. Oh, yeah. But I worked for Pre Barrera — Mhmm. — for the Southern District of New York and then worked for Adam Schiff. As the chief counsel on the first Ukrainian impeachment.
  • Speaker 3
    0:08:48

    And he was running as a sort of unapologetic moderate spoke critically of the Green New Deal, opposed Medicare for All, spoke out against expanding the Supreme Court as undemocratic. At one point, he even said he was open to merchants on abortion once the fetus is viable. He walked right back and said he misspoke. And instead, you know, he focused his campaign on saying, look, my background prepares me well to run interference next year when House Republicans are gonna impeach Joe Biden and go after Hunter Biden. And you want me on that wall fighting against that.
  • Speaker 3
    0:09:23

    And it was a situation where the left was fragmented, you know, sort of along racial lines in some way. There were three people who had all previously had the support of the working families party, an Asian American who’d immigrated from Taiwan, an African American, and a Latino who who’s Puerto Rican. And so they they fragmented the vote combined to those three hardcore leftists got about sixty percent of the vote. And Dan Goldman was able to win the moderate with twenty six percent of the vote, but a win is a win. And And I think it is a reflection of the the desire to have a fighter.
  • Speaker 3
    0:09:59

    They see Dan Goldman as a fighter, but also they do sort of care about pragmatism and being effective. And I do think that there’s fatigue with sort of the the squad. You saw it in my home of state of Minnesota two weeks ago now, Ilhan Omar who championed in that effort to defund the police and literally get rid of the Minneapolis police department. She barely got reelected in her primary, and it was entirely because of of her lack of support for the police. So I think that there is a pendulum that’s swinging back hard after twenty eighteen and twenty twenty, and we saw that in those primaries.
  • Speaker 3
    0:10:36

    There
  • Speaker 1
    0:10:36

    was an interesting little twist in that primary that there was one by Dan Goldman. Donald Trump at right near the end, sort of sarcastically endorsed Dan Goldman, which was just weird. Yeah. He right before the the final debate that the candidates all had,
  • Speaker 3
    0:10:51

    televised in primetime, in New York last week, Trump put on Truth’s social that Dan Goldman is a great guy and hard worker and fighting for America is a wonderful
  • Speaker 1
    0:11:03

    future
  • Speaker 3
    0:11:04

    ahead. It’s a tongue in cheek and obviously reflects, you know, he what’s ironic is that for a lot of the same reasons that the left didn’t like Goldman. Trump fears Goldman, which is that he’s independently wealthy. He’s the heir to the Levi Strauss for He’s worth, like, two hundred and sixty million dollars — Mhmm. — highly educated, went to Stanford Law School.
  • Speaker 3
    0:11:26

    And, you know, he is a very telogenic aggressive prosecutors put a lot of bad guys in jail. And it was funny though because during that debate, two of the three leading contenders both emphasized and sort of seized on the Trump endorsement as if it was authentic and it was sort of preposterous because it obviously wasn’t.
  • Speaker 1
    0:11:47

    But I guess, unsurprising. You can never never discount stupid. No. No. You you can.
  • Speaker 1
    0:11:51

    I mean, you you wrote about, you know, one of his opponents, Mondher Jones, who who moved to the area to run for the open seats that it was horrifying to be on the same stage with somebody endorsed by Trump and Goldman, of course, fired back. The fact that my opponent seems to actually take him seriously just shows how little he knows Donald Trump. So one of the other results was this this sort of epic battle between Jerry Nadler against the Democrat Carolyn Maloney. I mean, these are these are sort of by iconic figures who’ve been around forever in New York politics and and jury
  • Speaker 3
    0:12:24

    Nadler won that relatively easily as as well. Is that part of the same pattern? It absolutely is. This is the establishment striking back. You know, Chuck Schumer and Doris Nadler.
  • Speaker 3
    0:12:35

    It was sort of the battle of the Upper East side versus the Upper West side. Then I I also think in fitting with the same pattern, it’s also a rejection Charlie of Identity politics. Carolyn Maloney went all in on being a woman. And and I I don’t say that lightly. I mean, she literally said a woman needs to hold the seat no one doubted Jerry Nadler’s liberalism in commitment to abortion rights or or what have you.
  • Speaker 3
    0:12:59

    But she really leaned hard on on identity politics. And I think even liberal voters in Manhattan are kind of tired of of that kind of politics. So
  • Speaker 1
    0:13:10

    the other race that got a lot of attention was a special election won by a Democrat, a Democrat, Pat Ryan, who won in New York’s nineteenth Congressional District. And it was it was a narrow victory, but it’s part of this pattern that the pundits are seeing that Democrats are doing better than Joe Biden in all of these special elections post dobs. And so I wanna get your take on all of that because, of course, there was a big big question mark, you know, with the overturning of Roe versus Wade. Would it have an effect on the midterms? Would it galvanize Democratic voters?
  • Speaker 1
    0:13:44

    And there’s more than a few data points now suggesting that, yeah, it is working. It it is it is moving and you’re seeing in district after district, even districts that are won in some special election races that are won by Republicans, their margins are actually being cut rather substantially. So is they’re a Dobbs backlash that is playing out right now in the midterm elections. And how big is it do you think? Yeah.
  • Speaker 1
    0:14:12

    I
  • Speaker 3
    0:14:13

    sort of imagine John Roberts at the Chevy Chase Club telling his friends. See, I told them so. It’s very much a a dog catching up with the truck sort of phenomenon. And frankly, you know, I’ve been talking to Republican and Democratic strategists in on both sides, the operative class underestimated the effect that overturning Roe would actually have. Obviously, Democrats hoped it would, but they didn’t expect that there would actually be the energy, frankly, because there wasn’t, you know, after the supreme court vacancy in twenty sixteen, after Ruth Bader Ginsburg died.
  • Speaker 3
    0:14:51

    You just have never seen Democrats activate, you know, more than some activists. But in this case, it really is driving people to the polls. You know, the National Republican congressional committee had a statement yesterday that said majorities are decided in November, not August. And I thought that was a good line and there’s something to that. You know, we’ll see if the energy holds, but it’s now been two months since Dobbs.
  • Speaker 3
    0:15:14

    There have been four special elections and Democrats have won all four of them. They’ve over performed Joe Biden’s approval rating. And a lot of it is because There was a big enthusiasm gap earlier in the year. I think people were sort of frustrated with Democrats for not getting anything done. Joe Biden’s too old.
  • Speaker 3
    0:15:33

    You know, Trump sort of had relative to Trump drifted away from the spotlight for a little while. And now Trump’s back reminding Democrats why they were so agitated in twenty eighteen and twenty twenty. And Roe is gone showing that a lot of this is you know, this isn’t just rhetoric that we’ve heard for fifty years. And so I don’t think that this fundamentally changes the underlying dynamics, which is that seven and ten Americans still think the country’s on the wrong track. Yeah.
  • Speaker 3
    0:16:01

    Providing approval rating is in the low forties. It’s lower than Donald Trump’s was in twenty eighteen. Three quarters of Americans think we’re in a recession. And all of that is just really bad for the party in power. And it’s a, you know, Republicans only need to pick up five seats to win control the house.
  • Speaker 3
    0:16:17

    The Senate is fifty fifty, even if it’s not a red wave, you know, basically a ripple could tip control of of both chambers. To Republicans. I I still expect that to happen. Yeah.
  • Speaker 1
    0:16:29

    I mean, you can drown in in a in a bathtub. So let’s talk about this because I I think it’s always important to disaggregate the wish casting from the actual data. And so, you know, yeah, there are some good signs for Democrats. I mean, they’re averaging a four point over performance in the House special Schulzborough has overturned a ten point shift from where they were before. But there can be the irrational exuberance especially when you consider that the elections are not decided by these national poll numbers that are decided by the swing districts and, you know, whether you wanna blame journey mandering or whatever.
  • Speaker 1
    0:17:03

    You know, the This is a very very challenging environment. So let’s let’s talk about that. There does seem to be? And how do you explain this? The decoupling if that’s the right term of between these Democratic poll numbers would show them to be quite competitive in the generic Congressional ballot and Joe Biden’s approval rating.
  • Speaker 1
    0:17:26

    I mean, you would think that with Joe Biden’s approval rating being minus twenty, that it’d be being blown out. So there does appear to be sort of dissociation of Democratic candidates with Joe Biden? I mean, are you seeing the same thing? Or is that a Mirage? I mean, I think there’s a couple of
  • Speaker 3
    0:17:41

    things going on. I mean, that’s absolutely true. But we saw it in twenty fourteen to the races that decided to control the Senate that year were in red states like Arkansas and — Right. — Alaska and West Virginia. Those Democratic candidates all outperformed Barack Obama by seven to nine points, but that wasn’t enough to win.
  • Speaker 3
    0:18:02

    I think the other big difference is that Donald Trump won’t go away. The criminal investigation, Trump saying he wants to run again in twenty twenty four, Trump waiting into all these primaries and elevating fringe candidates, that really matters. You think back to twenty ten, I can’t remember the number of times that I heard in Barack Obama’s stump speech in twenty ten, him essentially attacks George w Bush. He didn’t say it by name, but he said, you know, the Republicans drove our country into a ditch, and now they want the car keys back. And and that just it sounded very stale in in October of twenty ten because Bush hadn’t been in power for two years.
  • Speaker 3
    0:18:40

    Democrats had had a super majority in the senate had done all this stuff. They they owned the economy. And obama failed in trying to blame Bush, and voters just didn’t buy that in twenty ten. It’s
  • Speaker 1
    0:18:52

    easier for
  • Speaker 3
    0:18:52

    Democrats in twenty twenty two to blame Trump and attack Trump because Trump is out there every day and is still a deeply polarizing figure. So I think that that it it is, you know, has helped close the enthusiasm gap. But the truth is both sides are enthusiastic politicians are still very motivated. Democrats are just as motivated now as Republicans were a few months ago. And I think we’re in this new era in American politics where we’re just gonna have really high turnout elections.
  • Speaker 3
    0:19:24

    As you know, you know, typically turnout drops hugely from the presidential to the midterm. It still will drop. You know, we’re not gonna see eighty one million Democratic voters or seventy four million Republican voters. In the midterms. But I I definitely think we’re gonna see higher turnout that we saw in twenty ten or twenty fourteen, maybe even than twenty eighteen.
  • Speaker 3
    0:19:45

    And it’s because both parties feel like the fate of the country is on the line. So in some ways, it’s it’s good for democracy when people are engaged in voting. In other ways, it’s sort of scary because it means people think that they have to vote because the future of the country depends on it. You know, but, frankly, we’re likely to see the highest midterm election turnout in a in a century. You know, in twenty eighteen, it was the highest since nineteen twelve.
  • Speaker 3
    0:20:11

    And and and I I wouldn’t be a price to see numbers like that. Again, we saw huge turnout in Virginia last year in the governor’s race compared to every previous gubernatorial election in Virginia. So
  • Speaker 1
    0:20:24

    I agree with you about the house. I don’t see there’s really any way that the Democrats hold onto the house, but the senate seems to be a very different story in Mitch Connell seems to be seeing the same thing with sort of the euphemism about candidate quality, which is which is a way of acknowledging that you have the senatorial candidate clown car. You know, we’ve talked about this before about whether the rules have changed, but Republicans have blown winnable Senate elections in the past by having cooks on on on the ballot. And this year, you have this this class of candidates that seemed really intent on snatching defeat from the jaws of victory at Hershel Walker in in in Georgia, a doctor Oz in Pennsylvania. You have JD Vance who’s underperforming, maybe not sufficiently underperforming, but, you know, it’s now becoming a little bit more of a question mark.
  • Speaker 1
    0:21:14

    I think that just got moved from on the crystal ball from likely Republican, the liens republican. You have Blake Masters in in Arizona. So let’s let’s talk about at least about this, the the fact that, you know, Donald Trump endorsed candidates did well in the primaries but now are not playing that well in a general election. And that could cost I mean, do you agree? I mean, that could cost a couple of times what
  • Speaker 3
    0:21:41

    should be a pretty easy shot to take control of the senate. Totally. Lots to unpack their I agree with everything you said. You know, in in house races typically the r or the d after your name matters more because you’re less defined, you’re less known. In a senate race, you know, statewide contest you can define yourself and your opponent in a way you just really struggle to in a house race with the exception being a special election where it’s the only race and everyone is focused on and there’s lots of ads about it.
  • Speaker 3
    0:22:09

    And so that’s I think one of the reasons Democrats have been able to outperform. I feel guilty saying this, but I don’t really trust the polls anymore. And I I put so much stock in and I admire so much someone like Charles Franklin at at Markhead, and, you know, these are serious, really independent guys. But I just I mean, after the last couple elections, I have a hard time putting stock in polls that show Democrats so comfortably ahead. I just don’t feel like there has been soul searching in the polling community to not repeat the mistakes of twenty twenty and twenty eighteen and twenty sixteen.
  • Speaker 3
    0:22:44

    Right. And so I I I will have been there. Maybe the polls are right, but I get pause when I see, you know, Mandela Barnes in your home state up more over Ron Johnson than Tony Evers over to Michaels. It it just doesn’t quite make sense to him. This is the problem with the polls.
  • Speaker 3
    0:23:03

    Is is, you know, after twenty sixteen, there was all
  • Speaker 1
    0:23:06

    of this well, we are going to get it right, you know. And in twenty eighteen, there were some significant misses and a lot of, you know, irrational exuberance, you know, you and I were talking before we began. I would, you know, I’d be interested to go back to a lot of the punditry back from August of two thousand eighteen where we were told, you know, Democrats gonna win in, you know, the governorship in Georgia, in Florida. Beto O’Rourke was going to be Ted Cruz, and that turned out to be wrong. And then we get to twenty twenty.
  • Speaker 1
    0:23:32

    And after all of these years of talking about how we’re gonna fix the problem with the polls, the reality is that we didn’t and assure your reaction to all of that. And also the the fact that, you know, what we’ve seen is that, you know, where you’re at in August does not necessarily mean after somebody has dropped ten million dollars or twenty million dollars worth of Aqua Research on you where you’re going to be in November. And that’s you know, I mean, I’m I’m I’m watching, obviously, very closely the senate race here in in Wisconsin, and I have argued, and I may be wrong about this. That I thought that Mandela Barnes would be a very vulnerable candidate against Ron Johnson. And of course, people are saying, well, what about these polls showing that these seven points up?
  • Speaker 1
    0:24:14

    Think the only response is, well, let just wait. You know, get back to me in October. How how this is how this is playing out.
  • Speaker 3
    0:24:21

    Yeah. I totally agree with that. And I think, you know, one of the things that has been problematic for Republicans is complacency. I think Republicans were complacent and believe that there was going to be this huge red wave. Donors weren’t that engaged.
  • Speaker 3
    0:24:37

    It’s you you hear a lot of complaints. I think from people who in the Trump era Democrats
  • Speaker 4
    0:24:46

    we’re able to
  • Speaker 3
    0:24:47

    raise so much small dollar money. And on the Republican side, Trump just sucks up all the money, which goes to his packs and operations. So I think that this these special elections may counter intuitively help galvanize Republican donors and voters. So let’s talk about student loan forgiveness, which you and I have talked about in the past. There was a really intense debate
  • Speaker 1
    0:25:11

    within the White House. They finally did it giving ten thousand dollars in student loans for families who make up to two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. I guess it’s also for giving up to twenty thousand dollars of debt for borrowers who had received a held grants. Progressive Twitter is, of course, celebrating how wonderful this is, but I think political’s playbook summed up some of the blowback, the centrist revolt against Biden’s student debt plan. So James Roman, How does this play out politically?
  • Speaker 1
    0:25:39

    We’ll get to the policy in a moment, but politically, what is your take? Maybe
  • Speaker 3
    0:25:45

    it it helps activated and galvanized some young voters and some progressives. But I think that they were gonna be there anyway. I think Dobbs did that. I I think that the overwhelming backlash is, you know, I I heard from a bunch of friends yesterday from back home in Minnesota Iota from Wisconsin from other places who said I voted for Joe Biden in twenty twenty. I’m not gonna vote for him again.
  • Speaker 3
    0:26:07

    This is outrageous and I think that the politics of envy and the politics of resentment are very strong. Moreover, I think that this is a
  • Speaker 1
    0:26:16

    this is a
  • Speaker 3
    0:26:17

    reflection of democrats becoming the party of the college educated elite, which is not a a coalition that can win in the electoral college and in national elections. And Democrats get more and more of their votes from college graduates. And so they’re appealing to that constituency. But, you
  • Speaker 1
    0:26:41

    know, they you
  • Speaker 3
    0:26:42

    hear all the time about how Democrats need to figure out how to do better with rural voters and non college educated whites. And this kind of thing making truck drivers pay the the student loans for you know, young grads from Harvard Law School. It just triggers so much frustration and an outrage And I do think it makes it hard for moderates and centrist to to win as Democrats. You
  • Speaker 1
    0:27:09

    know, this is one thing though that Joe Biden seemed to get that. Until recently. Right? I mean, he was I mean, all the reports that I’ve seen, your reporting would suggest that he was very skeptical, first of all, of the politics as well as his his power as president to do this by by Fiat. I mean, that that that legal question is, somewhat complicated a year ago, Nancy Pelosi was saying the president can’t do that.
  • Speaker 1
    0:27:35

    Joe Biden was saying, I don’t have the power to do that. So he’s decided he did have the power to do it. But also, I mean, he was reluctant to ask non college educated middle class voters to pay hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out college students with debts? Yeah. The politics and
  • Speaker 3
    0:27:54

    the policy are different. I actually yeah. I think the politics are bad. I think the policy is even worse. Yeah.
  • Speaker 3
    0:27:59

    Thank you. And, you know, I think this is just terrible policy. Larry tribes tweeted last night this is, you know, so many of my former students are really gonna be helped out from that. He’s a professor at Harvard Law School. I mean, Harvard Law School.
  • Speaker 3
    0:28:13

    Harvard law school grads
  • Speaker 1
    0:28:14

    are not
  • Speaker 3
    0:28:14

    the people that need help from the government. And I don’t think it’s legal. There was a background call yesterday. Where a senior administration official was asked about the legal authorities and answered, I’m not a lawyer. You’ll have to talk to lawyers at the education department or the justice department.
  • Speaker 3
    0:28:30

    Clearly was not the intent of the emergency powers. Unemployment among college educated people is two percent. There’s you can’t argue that there’s an emergency that necessitates the postponement. Just the cost here that is being put on the government and the taxpayers negates all of the deficit reduction over ten years in the inflation reduction act. This is going to create this terrible dynamic where future students are gonna want their debt forgiven and are going to assume that it will be and therefore we’ll take on more debt.
  • Speaker 3
    0:29:05

    It’s going to lead to more inflation because colleges are gonna be able to jack up tuition and it it just is such terrible policy, and it’s so unAmerican to to give these bailouts to people the income threshold means that, you know, if you’re just out of law school and you’re an associate, you know, some white shoe firm and you’re not making a ton of money yet, but you’re gonna make partner in a couple years and then be making seven figures, you’re still gonna get the advantages of of this you know, bail out, hand out. I it just it it really is I think one of the
  • Speaker 1
    0:29:44

    dumbest
  • Speaker 3
    0:29:45

    things that Joe Biden has done as president. Both politically and substantively. Well, I
  • Speaker 1
    0:29:50

    agree with you there. I I saw that described as an unforced error, but, of course, it wasn’t unforced. This was the late top priority of of of progressives. But I do think that it shows kind of a a blinkered view of how this plays with the rest of the electorate. And I I wrote in my newsletter this morning, I think Progressive Twitterverse has no idea how this is actually playing in the real world here.
  • Speaker 1
    0:30:11

    I mean, that’s, you know, That’s part of the problem. And it is it is massively expensive. It is it is regressive. And part of the problem is that it’s a one time fix. I keep coming back to this.
  • Speaker 1
    0:30:23

    This is a one time fix. It does nothing for future borrowers. It does nothing to deal with the higher education card tale. It does not reform higher education in any way. And this is why it’s not playing well.
  • Speaker 1
    0:30:36

    Also, I was really struck by the number of Democrats in swing districts who came out against this yesterday. I mean, for people who think, well, you know, Republicans or opposed. Well, of course, they’re opposed. But the real political problem, I think, is is the fact that is is that a lot of Democrats who are on the ballot this year understand that this is exactly the wrong message at the moment. Yes.
  • Speaker 1
    0:31:04

    We talked about the clown car of Republican senate candidates who
  • Speaker 3
    0:31:06

    got their nominations because of Trump. I’m super interested in the Colorado senate race. Where the GOP nominee is Joe O’Dea, who’s a moderate, rejects Trump. He’s I think pro choice And I I really think he could win in this environment. And his opponent is Michael Bennett.
  • Speaker 3
    0:31:26

    And Michael Bennett yesterday, the Democratic senator, said that he wished this Biden program had been more targeted and to help the needy. And I do think that that’s just a reflection of how even in a, you know, very highly college educated state like Colorado, this is just someone like Michael Bennett sees the the politics are very bad for Democrats. Well,
  • Speaker 1
    0:31:48

    you know, political rounded up some of the reaction. I mean, so you have embattled Democratic senator, Catherine Cortez Mazda, from Nevada saying I don’t agree with today’s executive action because it doesn’t address the root problems that make college unaffordable. You have Democratic congressman from Maine Jared Golden who says the decision by the president is out of touch with what the majority of the American people want from the White House. These are these are Democrats. And it’s it’s I mean, it’s quite it’s quite a list.
  • Speaker 1
    0:32:17

    Chris Pappas, Democrat from New Hampshire, another swing state. This announcement by president Biden is is no way to make policy and sidestep’s Congress and our oversight and fiscal responsibility any plan to address student debt should go through the legislative process. Charisse Davidson’s, Democrat of Kansas. It’s not how I would have and he goes on, Tim Ryan. Who is, you know, the great Democratic hope for senate in Ohio says, well, there’s no doubt that a college education should be about opening opportunities, waiving debt for those already on a trajectory to financial security sends the wrong message to the millions of Ohioans without a degree working just as hard to make ends meet, and then you mentioned Michael Bennett also, however extraordinary that you would have that kind of contributor.
  • Speaker 1
    0:33:04

    So what changed Joe Biden’s
  • Speaker 3
    0:33:06

    mind? You know, he he was getting pressured by the left and poster is in his orbit like Selinda Lake who does work for him were saying that young people weren’t gonna turn out at the levels that Democrats need unless they did this. There was a lot of pressure on the White House from the Democratic candidates in Georgia. Which we talked about last time I was on. And so I think cumulatively, there was a sense they had to do something the extension of the suspension and payments expired on the end of August.
  • Speaker 3
    0:33:42

    And so, you know, that’s the weird timing you know, Biden is in Delaware and the whole thing is just weird, but I think Biden was just worn down by pressure from his left flank. Well,
  • Speaker 1
    0:33:53

    as you pointed out the last time you were here on the podcast, this was a a very, you know, top notch issue for Stacey Abrams and Warrnock. From Georgia who are really turning up the pressure. And, of course, we know that Chuck Schumer was on board with a much bigger forgiveness. He and Elizabeth Warren were talking not just about forgiving ten thousand dollars. They were talking about up to fifty thousand dollars.
  • Speaker 1
    0:34:15

    Which again kind of makes your head hurt because, you know, every study would show that the vast majority of those benefits would go to the you know, upper income individuals. So to your earlier point, this is less about relieving people in economic distress then it feels like a payoff to what they regard as the Democratic base. I mean, and and it comes off that way too.
  • Speaker 3
    0:34:41

    Yeah, this is not about, you know, helping the middle class or low income really. It just it feels like a a payoff. And it to me, it comes back to the politics of Indian resentment and you know, I just think that weren’t you know, it’s it’s complicated. But I, you know, for people who worked minimum wage jobs through college to not take on debt,
  • Speaker 1
    0:34:59

    like me, it is annoying. Well, it is. And that’s not envy and resentment. That’s also this sort of fundamental principle of, you know, you work hard, you play by the rules, you pay your debts, you know, and and that’s, you know, that should be the way the system works. And I think that a lot of centrist Democrats are still harkening back to that, which is their is why they’re opposed to all of this.
  • Speaker 1
    0:35:22

    So I do think that there is that I mean, from the Republican point of view from Republican candidate point of view, I think that they were feeling that they had kind of a little bit would had lost their footing temporarily there. They they, you know, were were caught a little bit flat footed by the inflation reduction act. Democrats seem to be kind of on a role. Jobs is working against them. This feels like a gift.
  • Speaker 1
    0:35:45

    I’m a republican candidate. I go at the unfairness of this as well as, okay, this is inflationary. Now whether it’s inflationary or not, I’m I’m I’m agnostic on this. I I I don’t know. But when you have people like Larry Summers saying it’s inflationary, when you have the former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors for Obama saying that it’s inflationary.
  • Speaker 1
    0:36:08

    This strikes me as as pretty good fodder to use against democrats. I mean, it’s it’s devastating coming from him.
  • Speaker 3
    0:36:15

    I mean, the the I don’t you’re the expert on on the cartel of higher education. I mean, you’ve written so powerfully about this written books on it. Like, I I just this is not, as you noted, a few minutes ago, do anything to address the root causes of colleges jacking up tuition. And in fact, I think, like, ads to the incentive structure for colleges to just charge more because they know students will take on bigger debt loads and they can get away with charging fifty thousand dollars for what really, you know, is twenty thousand dollars worth of of education. And, of course, that’s been the story of the last fifty years of higher education.
  • Speaker 3
    0:36:48

    And and look,
  • Speaker 1
    0:36:49

    I wanna make it clear that I do think that there is a crisis with the higher education bubble, the the obscene costs, and really, I think, unjustifiable cost of a college degree in our society. It’s a problem. But the problem is the cost and a one time fix that does nothing about that doesn’t solve the problem. Okay. So I think we’ve we’ve established where we stand on that.
  • Speaker 1
    0:37:10

    You know, overshadowing everything we’re talking about, of course, of these ongoing investigations in in to Donald Trump and including the search, the rather remarkable search at at Mar a Lago in the back and forth about whether or not the affidavit is going to be released. Short term, it appears that the Republicans have decided they’re going to rally around Donald Trump, but Where do you think we’re at? I mean, there’s a lot going on here. What are you keeping your eye
  • Speaker 3
    0:37:38

    most closely on? One of the columns eye on my list that I wanna write and and just haven’t gotten to yet is that I really just don’t think this is going to be helpful in the long term for Donald Trump. I think this narrative that this is going to help him lock down the Republican nomination in twenty twenty four is just to me, it feels silly. I understand the short term rally around the flag effect, but the Republicans who wanna run for president in twenty twenty four aren’t gonna be dissuaded by this. And the reality is it’s just there is real Trump fatigue on the right.
  • Speaker 3
    0:38:11

    People are just tired of this stuff.
  • Speaker 1
    0:38:14

    And Trump
  • Speaker 3
    0:38:15

    can rally some supporters by saying this is an attack on you, not on me. He can raise money off of it. But, you know, and I guess, some of it ultimately depends on if the reports are true that there was information about special access programs, that’s really damning. If it was just the Kim Jong love letters, who — Right. — hit less.
  • Speaker 3
    0:38:32

    So you know, so you kinda have to have the goods, but it’s never good to be under FBI investigation. And it’s true of lots of different members of Congress who have in the short term, there’s tons of examples of whether local officials or congressmen who, you know, get raided by the FBI and get reelected while the investigation is still ongoing and then a year or two later take a plea deal because the case is so strong and overwhelming. So it’s not unusual for there to be a short term rally around the politician effect. I just I cannot see this ultimately being helpful to to Trump in twenty twenty four.
  • Speaker 1
    0:39:08

    No. And there’s so much we don’t know, which is also one of the things that I I thought was interesting watching all the Republican elected officials rally around the flag. This would be a perfect opportunity for them to maybe issue one statement and then to keep their powder dry because you don’t know what is next. There are so many different fronts here right now. I talked to one Republican who said, well, that actually helps him because, you know, there’s there’s so much people can’t keep track of it.
  • Speaker 1
    0:39:35

    One of the things that does work for Donald Trump is that he tells so many lies that you can’t keep track of the lies. There are, you know, so many outrages that you lose the track of the outrage. And this is a reality. Right? I mean, somebody like Ron Johnson will say a hundred and fifty outrageous things.
  • Speaker 1
    0:39:49

    And then when, you know, he asked the average voter a whereby they go, yeah, I I know he said something, but I can’t remember any of them. So, you know, for Donald Trump, he’s got possible charges in in Georgia. He’s got the January six. He’s got tax issues going on in New York. He’s got the documents.
  • Speaker 1
    0:40:03

    But I agree with you. At a certain point, it’s just the weight of it, the exhaustion. And, you know, I I do think that sometimes the polls are are low in picking this up that they may tell a pollster, yes, I support Donald Trump. But people are going, oh, man, how how long do I have to do this? How long do I have to carry this?
  • Speaker 1
    0:40:25

    You know, a thousand pound bag of shit around. Especially when there’s a conservative alternatives who don’t
  • Speaker 3
    0:40:29

    have a thousand pound bag of shit that they’re
  • Speaker 1
    0:40:32

    dragging behind them. Well, that that’s right. Speaking of irrational exuberance. And by the way, every time I think of irrational exuberance, you know, I I do think of all the predictions, you know, in twenty eighteen about about Stacey Abrams about the governor’s race in in Florida. I can’t even remember what the name of the Democrat was, but that turned out Andrew
  • Speaker 3
    0:40:50

    Gillum. That
  • Speaker 5
    0:40:51

    turned out
  • Speaker 1
    0:40:52

    very badly. And of course, Beto O’Rourke, I’m seeing some of this. You know, Charlie Chris could take down Rhonda Santos. I wanna raise my hand here and say, I think that is highly unlikely. What do you
  • Speaker 3
    0:41:04

    think? Yeah. Charlie Chris is gonna have the distinction of losing statewide elections as a Republican and independent anti Democrat. Well, on that note,
  • Speaker 1
    0:41:12

    James Home and James, thank you so much for joining me on the polar podcast today. My pleasure, Charlie, always
  • Speaker 3
    0:41:18

    wanted to chat.
  • Speaker 1
    0:41:19

    James Holman is a columnist for the Washington Post. He covers politics, policy law, and other matters. Always fun to have you back on the podcast. Thank you all for listening. Today’s Bulwark podcast.
  • Speaker 1
    0:41:29

    I am Charlie Sykes. We’ll be back tomorrow. We’ll do this all over again. You’re worried about the
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    0:41:42

    economy. Inflation is high. Your paycheck
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    0:41:44

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  • Speaker 6
    0:41:50

    okay, but you could be doing better. The afford anything podcast explains
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