Will Saletan: Why Aren’t People Voting on Democracy?

Welcome to the Bulwark podcast. I’m Charlie Sykes. It is Tuesday and it may be a day late. But we are certainly not a dollar short. So Will Salitan back on the podcast.

Will, how are you doing?

I’m okay, Charlie. I you know, how usually, you have me in stitches on this show. And I decided to get a head start. I already have the stitches. I was in a basketball game on Sunday and I got elbow, so I’m gonna be working on a goatee to cover up

the stitches on my face. Okay. Was I mean, was it a was it a flagrant foul? Was it, I mean, what? At what time?

You know to to add

was not I don’t know. I was supposed to do, like, a non

context sport. I’m just mentioning

Yeah. Supposedly. Well, what happened was I was defending this guy and I decided he wasn’t going to the best it and he decided he was. So I believe to add insult to injury, I would have been called for backing up

during the confrontation. So how many you actually literally have stitches. You went to the hospital, and then you went to the urgent care

center? Yeah. Just went in and then then they said, oh, yeah. You need stitches for that. So but I know I’m I’m fine.

It’s I’m all soaked up and I’m gonna be back on the court next Sunday.

Okay. So where do you wanna start today? This is one of those those target rich environment stories. I actually was working on a on a piece which I I didn’t write for today, but they they’re just the casual acceptance of anti Semitism by American Conservatives, which, you know, under two point zero, would be kind of in a historic new chapter in a very, very old book. But there’s so much else that’s that’s going on here.

We have this New York Times, Sienna Pope, that basically says that voters really are concerned about the the death of democracy, but they don’t appear inclined to do anything about it. We we had senatorial debates in Ohio and Utah, and I know you were watching the Utah debate in which I think barbs were traded. Right?

Yes. Yes. Is that the cliche? As an as an old hotliner from the early days of of Internet political journalism, we always said every headline. Barb’s traded in debate.

Yes.

So and so did what they had to do. The bar was low, but they they cleared it you know, and I’m also wrestling with the fact that one of the reason why I think it feels like we’ve taken crazy pills every single day is that our politics are really beyond parody. I mean, really when you think about it, the whole crystal walker badge story is so ludicrous and it won’t go away and it feels like it’s a metaphor for everything that’s going on everybody knows this story. Right? You know, he’s holding up the badge where he’s just just makes him a cop.

You know? And as I I I said yesterday, look, you know you know, once I founded holder ring in a box of cracker jacks. Does that mean that I’m a CIA agent? I don’t know. And now, Did you see what he’s doing now?

They’re actually the campaign is doubling down on this. They’re they’re they’re printing a thousand of these badges to hand out as sort of campaign bling. Because it it it’s not a cringe worthy, you know, joke. It’s like, hey, this is cool.

Yeah. Well, I think what’s happened is that that today’s Republican Party, in this case, represented by Hershel Walker in Georgia, has managed to capture an audience of people who just don’t care, who just don’t care about what’s true or not sure what’s fake, were not fake. And so this is all a marketing opportunity for him. He’s been caught, you know, he’s brought up this badge that sort of pretends he’s a police officer when he isn’t. And his people have figured out, hey, this will get us more of our voters because our voters don’t

care. That’s right. And it is it is a perfect example of what’s you know, what’s happening in politics? You know, how much of it’s fraudulent? And then once you’re called on the fraud, what do you do?

You just simply double down. You you make it an asset. Right? You you hug it as closely as possible. So okay.

Let’s start with there’s again, there’s there’s so much to talk about to can we start with the low hanging fruit as a way of easing ourselves into into all of this? And the lowest of of low hanging fruit always is Eric Trump. Just to remind people, back in two thousand nineteen, Donald Trump’s other fails on Eric explain why it was a great idea to hold, like, the g seven summit at one of Donald Trump’s golf courses because it didn’t. Cost anybody anything. This is what this is what Eric Trump had to say back then.

When they do g sevens and, you know, this is one other thing that people don’t ever kinda give us credit for anytime the government comes and, you know, if if my father travels, people they stay at our properties for free, meaning it’s like, you know, cost for housekeeping effectively because you actually have to legally charge government something. So everywhere that he goes, if he stays at one of his places, the government actually spends meaning it saves a fortune. Because if they were to go to hotel across the street, they’d be charging them five hundred bucks a night, whereas, you know, we charge them like, you know, fifty bucks.

Now, will it will shock you to learn this is a complete and utter lie. As we learned yesterday from Elenigrating in the Washington Post Carolina who actually wrote the book about the Secret Service. Former president Donald Trump’s company charged the Secret Service as much as five times more than the government rates for agents to stay overnight at Trump hotels while protecting him and his family. According to expense records newly obtained by Congress. In one case, they were charging agents one thousand one hundred and eighty five dollars a night to stay at the Trump International Hotel in DC, and they spent this kind of money actually also, you know, watching over Eric and and Donald Junior.

So it is it is the

grift and the lies all the way down. Yeah. Is so remind me, wasn’t it at, like, Turnberry, the in the Scottish Golf, of course, where they were they were they also built the what they made I can’t remember what they but basically, Trump family managed to extract more money for its property by directing government’s business to this thing. And it never ceases to amaze me at the number of Trump supporters who talk about how he gave up his salary. He gave up like so what?

It’s like four hundred thousand a year. Right? He made way more than that back in self

dealing. He is so selfless. He wants nothing. He is sacrificing his billionaire lifestyle for people like me.

Yeah. And and everything we’ve learned from what we can glean so far about his finances is He’s he’s always been an operator finding ways to monetize, you know, everything. And if he found ways to monetize the presidency, and this is one of them, he is. No. I was asked about this on one

of the cable shows yesterday. And, you know, obviously, it’s it’s outrageous. Another example of self dealing. And I I may have disappointed everybody when I said, but, you know, put this into some context that this whole story about the ripping off of the tax payers, they’re using the secret service is basically a piggy bank, you know, charging taxpayers, you know, eleven hundred dollars for a room that they’re authorized to spend, you know, two hundred dollars a room for, which by the way, you can you can do, believe it or not. This whole thing is going to end up as less than one paragraph in the book of Trump Grifft, which will run about ten thousand pages.

In a ten thousand page book, this may be a footnote. Because there’s just so much. And, you know, the zone is so flooded with this kind of self healing shit. So I

what what can you Yeah. So we were talking about basketball earlier. And this reminds me very much of the, like, 1990s New York Knicks. There was a strategy in basketball. Nobody said it explicitly, but they did it.

If you foul on every possession, the referee stopped calling it.

Right. Right. Right. They just

get used to it, and it becomes okay, it’s called physical. They’re playing a physical style. No. They’re not. They’re fouling by the rules.

Right? And that’s what Trump does. Right? The Trump family has fouled on every possession and by the you know, so as reporters, we’re just like the referees. We’re telling you again, they’re fouling, but nobody cares because they’re just used to it.

Alright. So yesterday, I wrote about, you know, Mitt Romney refusing to endorse Mike Lee, and I wanna talk about what’s going on in Utah, which I think it’s just a fascinating story. Evan McMullen, waging this independent campaign, actually doing way better than anyone thought it was good to be. But But of course, there’s there’s a lot of heavy breathing about Mitt Romney’s lack of party loyalty. You know, how dare he not endorse a fellow Republican and and there is, you know, I mean, there’s a lot of pressure on everybody to get in line.

Right? You know, it’s like, I will I will support the Republican nominee no matter who it is. And if you refuse to say that, then you’re obviously a rhino cock. Right? But have you noticed something, Will?

That rule applies to everyone with one exception. One notable exception. Donald Trump. Okay. So over the weekend, They’re the Republican senate candidate in Colorado named Joe O’Dea, who by the way is in a competitive race there.

Goes on CNN and distances himself from from Donald Trump. He wants to talk about other things. So so Joe O’Dea is in this very competitive rate There are pundits out there that think that this may be a sleeper race, that the control of the senate may actually be determined by a Republican upset in Colorado. I’m not saying that’s going to happen. I’m just saying that this is this is on, you know, one of the reasons why people are paying attention to the Colorado race.

So Joe O’Dea goes on CNN and says this. Do you

think what happened on January sixth should disqualify him from being president again?

Look, I believe that the January sixth was a black eye on the country. I’ve been very vocal that I thought he should have done more. To keep the violence from heading towards the the capital. Anybody that was violent at the capital or or towards something apart, they should be held accountable. We’ve got processes in place that hold people accountable, and we need to move the country forward.

So it but it’s moving Donald Trump should run again I’m gonna actively I’m gonna actively campaign against Donald Trump — Mhmm. — and make sure that we’ve got over five really great Republicans right now, Bronda Santos, Mickey Haley, Tim Scott — Yeah. — they can run and serve for eight years. I’m gonna do my job as a US senator to make sure that they have good campaigns in the primary here. So we have a good selection of candidates for twenty twenty

four. Okay. So Trump obviously heard about this. O’Dea saying he would actively campaign against Trump in the primary, I’m guessing. Trump lashes out calling O’Dea a rhino magnet doesn’t vote for stupid people with big mouths.

Jesus. I’m so I’m sorry. The irony just bursts every blood vessel in my head there. MEGA doesn’t vote for stupid people with big mouth. Good good luck Joe.

Trump wrote in his social media platform. So, again, here’s Donald Trump throwing a a competitive republican under the bus because he committed the cardinal sin of not kissing his orange ass. Yeah.

So this clarifies what the term rhino means. Right? We’re public in name only just means somebody who doesn’t support Donald Trump. There are no principals involved. And it it in turn clarifies what the republican or party is.

What is the defining principle of the Republican Party. It’s not any issue. It’s not any value. It is loyalty to Donald Trump. As evidenced by the fact, that you have to swear loyalty to Trump.

You that’s the apostasy you can’t do. Right? You can’t cite you. And and the fact that Donald Trump himself can do whatever he wants. Right?

Every religion has a prophet. And the prophet is the guy who gets to wake up one morning and change all and and just announce something and everybody has to go with it. And that’s Donald Trump. So this is what’s left with the Republican Party. It’s loyalty to the sky.

Yeah.

And then I wanted to stick with this point because every other Republican is is being told you have to eat, you know, whatever shit sandwich is out there. So Glenn Youngkin goes any campaigns for Curry Lake. You you have Chris Sununu, a, you know, reasonable Republican governor of New Hampshire, you know, has to support this guy, Ebola, another one of the election denier. Because because it’s party loyalty. It’s a binary choice.

You must vote for whatever republic. You have to support Hershel Walker. Because, I mean, even with the wall, the stuff with Hershel Walker and the abortions aligning the hypocrisy and the profound stupidity and the and the abuse, you have to support him because It’s all r versus d. Right? Because otherwise, the country will fall under the hands of the evil Democrats.

And yet, here’s Donald Trump basically saying, yeah, screw Joe O’Day in his winnable seat in Colorado because he he crosses the one uncrossable line. It’s just whatever. I’m sure there’ll be heavy breathing from, you know, the Washington Post resident ethicist, Henry Olson, about this, who always gets indignant whenever somebody like Mitt Romney commits an act of deep and terrible disloyalty not supporting Mike Lee.

So do you

wanna talk about what’s going on in Utah? Oh, totally. Totally. Okay. So here’s a little bit of a sound bite from the debate last night, Evan McMullen, with with Mike Lee, Mike Mike Lee, who really when you think about it could have easily but by the way, there’s a great profile in the ballwork today by AB Stothart, who who makes the point that Mike Lee could have just cruised to reelection if he had not become just a complete Trump sicker fan had not become, you know, purveyor of the big lie.

And Evan McMullen, I think has surprised a lot of people by really taking it to Mike Lee and here’s just a little bit of a sound bite from last night’s debate. I

was one of the people trying to dismantle this situation. I’m trying to stop it from happening. Because I believe in this document written by the hands of wise men raised up by God to that very purpose. I followed it. I studied it.

And I defended it too. I think I’ll

have thirty seconds here in a in a moment.

For you to

suggest otherwise, looks right in the face of truth and in the face of the constitution. How dare you,

sir? Mister McMullen, you had thirty seconds to plug Senator Lee

has been doing this thing with his pocket constitution for the last several years. Senator Lee, it is not a prop. It is not a prop. Senator Lee, the constitution is not a prop for you to wave about. And then when it’s convenient for your pursuit of power to abandon without a thought, That’s what you’ve done with that.

Okay? If you’re committed to the constitution, then stand up for our free and fair election. Stand up for the peaceful transfer of power. You did. So you voted to certify the election in the last moment in the same way that someone knows of, you know, a a plot that isn’t quite working out auto abandon it.

That’s

what you did.

Okay. So, Will, you actually watched this debate. So tell me, what’s

going on? What’d you think? To me, this this race is different from every other senate race in the

country. It’s

different from all the governor’s races too. So what we have here is instead of having a conventional Democrat, We have Evan McMullen who is, as far as I know, historically a Republican, he’s certainly conservative. He doesn’t occupy most of conventional Democratic positions. So he sort of neutralizes the traditional Republican arguments that, oh, they’re socialist, they’re, you know, they’re the devil they’re gonna take over. And have the government invade your life.

So he takes that stuff away and that gives him the opportunity to focus this race on the one thing that most differentiates him from Mike Lee, and that is the obsequiousness to Trump and the betrayal of democracy. This debate was I mean, the most forceful denunciation I have heard of any politician for their complicity in Trump’s coup attempt. He went after he’s got remember, Mike Lee, as you pointed out in morning shots yesterday, He’s got a couple of specific things to tie him to this. One is that Mike Lee tried to help get the false slates of electors, the fake electors together. For Trump.

And the other thing was that Mike Lee is the guy who got Sydney Powell, the crazy quack player into the White House. Right? So he

was very and and and then he started pushing John Eastman. I mean, he he had this a track record of having fingerprints on all of the crazies, at least

early on. Totally. Totally. And so Evan McMullen is going at him and I’ve you know, he’s he’s called it he’s in the debate. It’s like Charlie, this was like one of those nineteenth century debates where you’re attacking the honor of the other guy in this very eloquent way.

He said it was the most egregious betrayal of our nation’s constitution in its history by a senator. You betrayed your oath to the constitution. I mean, It was everything that I wanted said about Mike Lee and Ted Cruz and a bunch of other people. And it was said in this very eloquent frank way by a guy who cannot be attacked the way Democrats can be attacked. So on

balance, I mean, look, now that you or I are from Utah, and I I make no claims understand the intricacies of Mormon politics. But is this enough? Because as you point out, this is unlike every other race. This is not Democrat versus Republican. This is not progressive versus conservative.

Evan McMullen is really making this about democracy. Is that going to be enough? Well,

I think the answer is probably not. Probably not because we have this national phenomenon of people just not caring enough about the democracy issues. It doesn’t take away from the fact that what Evan McMullen is saying is. First, it is the most important issue. You know, if you can’t wait back to basketball, you can’t have the game if people don’t respect the referees.

The whistle gets blown, you have to honor that, or the whole thing collapses. And democracy, of course, is not a game. It’s very serious. And the consequences of people not following the rules are that much worse. But people just don’t seem to care enough.

You’re right that Utah is a little bit different. And look, I’m a huge admirer of the LDS Church and the values of the people in it. And one of those differences is that even though this is a very conservative state that by all rights should be supporting a Republican president and a Republican senator, these folks, a lot of them recognize that Donald Trump is a person a very low character, and that very low character has very serious consequences, including the undermining of democracy. So Mike Lee in this debate. Charlie, I have not heard.

Have you heard in any other debate in any other race, the Republican nominee fleeing from Donald Trump like Mike Lee head to flee, at least twice in this debate, he said that there were only two other senators who voted less with Donald Trump than I did. That’s

crazy to

me. I mean, it’s not crazy. It’s sane, but it’s unusual. Well, also,

I mean, it’s this this is again underlines his problem because, you know, not only did Mike Lee push the big lie, not only did he vote unlike Mitt Romney to quit to a quit Donald Trump. You know, he he there was this just bizarre moment, and I keep coming back to this. This was actually way during the twenty twenty campaign were Mike Lee, who at one time was considered a serious kind of intellectual constitutional scholar, gets up on the podium and compares Donald Trump to a hero from Mormon Scriptures. I’m not I’m not familiar with this, but he goes, To my Mormon friends, my latter day same friends, think of him Trump as captain Marona, who is apparently this righteous military commander who was angry with the governor because of their indifference concerning freedom. This is what Mike Lee said about Trump, the line grifting erratic, seditionist, ex president who tried to overturn an election.

He seeks not power but to pull it down. He seeks not the praise of the world or the fake news. But he seeks the well-being and the peace of the American

people. Okay.

Well, you are a student. Of systrophinistic politicians. You are a student of Lindsey Graham.

Can you

explain

to me? You

know, how someone goes from the Mike Lee who stood on the floor of the convention in twenty sixteen trying desperately to derail Trump’s candidacy, to go from that, to saying stuff like this What is the dynamic? I mean, I understand the transactional nature of politics. I get that. I guess I’m still puzzling through. This desire to be a total licks piddle.

Okay.

So I would give you two answers. The first is that Michael is a lawyer. What he did after the twenty twenty election leading up to January sixth was you know, there are a lot of guys who are smarts in a lawyer way. And if they have a client, whether it’s an oil company or a tobacco company or a president trying to engineer a coup, they will find a way to do what the client wants. And I kinda think that’s what happened to Mike Lee.

Right? He’s talking to John Eastman or whatever he’s talking to Sydney Powell, how can I construct an argument? How can I, within the law, technically, find a way to undo this election? So he just applied his lawyer mentality to that. The other answer is, he’s got kind of the form this is true of of a lot of the Trump worship in the Republican Party.

There are a lot of people who are nominally religious. They think of themselves as religious, but what they have is the form of religion. They don’t really have the substance of it. And so they just what they have is worship, and they find ways to dayify, to glorify whoever it is. It could be Jesus, But for these people, it could just as easily be orange Jesus.

It could be Donald Trump. And they don’t care that Trump is the polar opposite of Jesus. So compare and contrast, Mike Lee with Lindsey Graham. Well, Mike Lee is a little bit more obsequious. Can I say that?

Yeah. Really? Rapidly. Yeah. That is

I was not expecting that answer. Okay?

No. I mean, I’m trying to think of this because, you know, Lindsey Graham had things he he cared about. He wanted troops in Syria. He wanted troops in Afghanistan. And when Donald Trump crossed him on that, he drew a line.

I’m trying to think of what Mike Lee has actually drawn a line on, Charlie. Can you Well, he

no. As he was saying in the debate, I mean, he’s he’s voted against something. He he didn’t even vote against the emergency the emergency declaration to shift money to the

border wall. Yeah. He he I think that’s probably true, and that is a principled position, right, about the limits of executive power. So let’s give him credit there, and

that some head of Lindsay was on the other side. Well, okay. So Lindsay Graham has has lines, but, like, so what? I mean, Lindsay Graham’s a guy who’s If you cross this line, we’re done. Crosses the line.

Okay. Well, okay. This line, if you cross this line, I am really done with you. And yet there’s no line you can

cross with Lindsey Graham. Right, too. I mean, just but I think there are you know what, Charlie, what you’re bringing up here, I think, to me, is that there are a lot of these politicians who have been complicit in the rise of authoritarian as in this country in in the rise of Donald Trump and in sustaining it. They they do have issues on which they disagree. And as we’re talking about this, I’m remembering from the debate Mike Lee drawing some distinctions.

His were mostly about you were talking about executive power in the case of the wall. I was thinking about money. I mean, he voted against some of Trump’s spending. So there are issues. What they have in common, Graham and Lee and the others, is the commitment to Trump, the man.

Right? They’re committed to this guy. Yeah. So even if they disagree with him on the issues, the problem, and this is what the Mormons in Utah get, If the man is bad, if the president is a is a bad man, he will do bad things. And that becomes more important than any issue on which you distinguish yourself.

From him because he just proceeds from one offense, from one aggression to the next.

So, again, I want I’m gonna confess not fully understanding all of the dynamics of Mormon politics. However, I continue to be struck by the contrast between Mormons and white evangelical Christians, white evangelical Christian Church has gone all in with with Donald Trump, you know, has decided that character doesn’t matter that as long as you are going to give us these various things, we will come up with rationalizations and decide that your personal know, goodness or evil becomes irrelevant. The Mormons seem to have, you know, a much firmer grasp on the importance of character Otherwise, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Mitt Romney would not be a senator from Utah, and Mike Lee would simply be cruising to it to another term. So there there is something different about the way that Mormons have reacted to the personality and character of Donald Trump versus evangelical Christians, and I frankly couldn’t tell you what it is.

I don’t know if you have any insight into it. Well, it speaks well over them however. It it does. And it, you know, it’s funny because Mormons get,

you know, their caricature as people who believe silly things because their scripture would happen in America instead of the Middle East. I belong to a religion that believes that a guy parted the sea and walked across, you know, there’s a lot of every religion has these stories. I think you’re exactly right though about the difference. Mormons have this emphasis on character. It seems to be a cultural thing, not so much a scriptural thing.

In the case of the white evangelicals, okay, they believe in the religion, but they treat religion and practice as a matter of team, of tribe. Right? Does so they have the story about Trump being like King David. Okay. He doesn’t follow any of our morals that we espouse, but he’s on our side.

He protects us against the other guys. The other guys are the atheist or the Muslims or whoever it is. And you remember what Trump just said about Jews, the the line about how Jews need to get with it and defend Israel because Trump — The word is too

late.

Yeah. — you Jews are so ungrateful. But but

but he doesn’t but Trump treats the Jews as your team Israel. Right? Yeah. You’re you’re supposed to be and that’s all it is to him, and Trump talks about Christians the same way they’re a team. And I think a lot of unfortunately, a lot of white evangelical Christians treat their religion as a matter of team or tribe.

And so anyone who stand who defends them against some enemy, they’ll support regardless of that person’s betrayal of the values

the religion purports to a spouse. No. That is good. So the question about Utah coming back to that question about, would making democracy in the attack on a democracy, a centerpiece, would that be enough in Utah? And I think probably not, although it’s extremely interesting to watch.

And Evan McMullen is is really doing yeoman servers here. This is a good segue to this big poll out today that everybody is talking about in the New York Times to see it’s at the top of their online page. Voters see democracy in peril, but saving it is not a priority. Okay. Well, deep breath here.

Voters overwhelmingly believe American democracy is under threat, but seem remarkably apathetic about the danger. With few calling at the nation’s most pressing problem according to a New York Times, Sienna College poll, never deep breath. In fact, more than a third of independent voters and a smaller but noteworthy contingent of Democrats said they were open to supporting candidates who reject the legitimacy of the twenty twenty election as they assign greater urgency to their concerns about the economy than the fears about the fate of the country’s political system. Shorter version

will We

are so fucked.

Right. I hate it. So I guess we have to laugh about this, but it is really tragic. This poll, here’s one of the numbers from it that killed me. Seventy one seventy one percent of all voters in the poll said democracy was at risk, but seven percent.

That’s seven with no zero after it, identified that as the most important problem facing the country. And then as you point out, you know, what was it? Of the voters said they were not at all comfortable voting for a candidate who denied the election. Charlie, I feel like we’ve had this democracy for two hundred and fifty years And we’ve settled into what I can only call democracy privilege. We just assume it’s gonna continue.

Because we’ve had it. We You know, I was recently in Spain and I was shocked. I I didn’t realize Franco was in power there for like four decades. You know, we just haven’t had that here. And, I mean, if you’re a black American, you’ve experienced authoritarianism, you’ve experienced oppression in this country.

If you’re white, it feels like you just everything’s been fine. We’ve gotten along. We all there was this, you know, you have this Tucker Carlson image of America in the nineteen fifties. And everything’s gonna be cool so we can go on TV and and undermine faith in democracy. We can challenge elections.

We can refuse to accept the results. And nothing bad will happen. It does feel like a remarkable degree of complacency, doesn’t it?

That we we take all of this for granted. It almost seems like when you look at those numbers though, you know, the the gap between the number of people who say, yeah, this is a really serious problem versus those who actually care about it. It’s almost like the the issue of campaign finance reform that that all the talking heads, you know, think is really, really important. And we need to talk about this in the editorial writers, assume the editorial position. But when it comes right down to it, you know, almost nobody goes to the polls and votes on this issue.

And so for most Americans, democracy is this abstraction. That when you ask them about it, they’ll say, yes, this is a problem, but it is an abstraction to them unlike, for example, you know, what they’re paying at the pump. What they’re seeing in their cities on the streets and inflation. And I know by the way that, you know, the one thing that did our Democratic friends really truly hate is is any sort of suggestion that they’re not doing an ideal job at everything. But rather than denying that inflation is a serious crime or making fun of people who think that gas prices are high, or, you know, citing statistics.

Actually, crime is not that big a problem. They need to figure out ways to talk about it and to address the legitimate concerns of voters, and I’m not sure they’ve done that, but what’s your take? I

don’t think they have. Let me let me set that aside for just one second and I because I wanna come back to that in the context of Utah, which I think answers your point pretty well. This there’s there’s actually in this in this election denial stuff. There’s kinda two layers of the problem. One is all the people who are just passive.

They recognize there’s a problem with denial of elections, but they just they’re not gonna prioritize it in their voting. Right? But there’s a specific core of people who are, you know, the Trump supporters, the people who believe the election was stolen. One of the things that really came home to me looking at this New York Times story wasn’t so much in the data in the poll. It was they interviewed one of the respondents And she says, you know, it’s hard for me to believe that more of America’s citizens would vote for Joe Biden than Donald Trump because Joe Biden is an idiot.

Now let’s

set

aside her view of Joe Biden. It it is this hard for me to believe thing. Charlie, can I just put forward an idea here that I’m starting to think that the election denial is It’s a problem in its own right, but it’s a species. It’s a subcategory of evidence denial. It’s that the election results are their information that comes to you The ballots were turned in.

We counted them here as the result. And these people are have fallen preyed at the same thing Donald Trump does. I have this belief about the way the world is. I will not accept any evidence that contradicts my belief. And so the ballots are just another thing that these people refuse.

In other words, The problem that we ultimately have to tackle in this country is not a loss of faith in democracy. It is loss of faith in evidence. Or an unwillingness to accept evidence. And if we can solve that, we can go a long way towards restoring faith and election results. I don’t know what you think of that.

Well,

I I I agree with you, but that strikes me as much more difficult to solve.

Because

the thing about belief and faith is that it’s often non falsifiable. Right? If it was just simply a question of, okay, you know, were there, you know, ten thousand mules, was this machine tampered with Well, you know, there there is hope that you could actually show that, you know, there was no factual basis for this. But it but if it’s a matter of faith and belief, much more difficult problem. Don’t you think?

I agree. It doesn’t

it’s just the the the causality that I’m interested in, and I think you’re right. It is it’s gonna be very difficult, but let me come back to your point. Because you asked about the issues that Democrats don’t acknowledge. And part of what’s so interesting about the Evan McMullen race is that McMullen does what he he is the Charlie Sykes candidate. Right?

He’s going out there and saying, I’m gonna go after the the denial of democracy that matters to watch my results. That’s the kiss and myth. My apologies. So so you and I agree. We’re both pessimists about the affirmative part of McMullen’s case.

That is the his issue that he’s gonna try to run on here. But the negative part of what he’s doing is kind of interested to me. That is, he is taking away from Michael Lee, taking away from Republicans, the issues that they like to run on against the Democrats. You know, we’re not gonna talk about what Trump did because the real problem is you’re a bunch of socialist. Evan McMullen is not a social.

So in this debate, he’s he’s criticizing the American Rescue Plan, the two trillion dollars of spending that he says he agrees with the Republicans that contributed to inflation. He criticized the student loan plan, said it’s too big, it’s moral hazard, right, and it should have been narrowly. Done, and it should have been in consultation with Congress. A lot of things that a lot of conservatives agree with, abortion. Evan McMullen is not down the line pro choiceer.

Right? I’m pro life, but I’m moderate, I support contraception, I support exceptions, yada yada. So he’s taking away these issues, and I’m kind of fascinated to see whether this works I don’t know if it would vindicate the Charlie Sykes strategy, but he’s trying it. No. I’m

not actually looking for any vindication anytime soon here. Alright. Let’s talk about some of these other races there was also a debate in Ohio last night between JD Vance and Tim Ryan. That’s also a very, very close race. Obviously, you’d have to assume that Republican is favor in this race, but they had a number of barbs that were traded, including this.

Let’s play this sound bite from Tim Ryan.

I ran against Nancy Pelosi JD for leadership. And

you

have to have the courage to take on your own leaders. These leaders in DC also will They will they will eat you up like a chew toy. Right? I mean, you were calling Trump America’s Hitler. Then you kissed his ass.

Doctor. It is true. In man, you kissed his ass. And then he endorsed you. And you said he’s the greatest president of all time.

Mitch McConnell

gave you forty million dollars to prop up your campaign. Peter Till gave you fifteen million dollars. That’s fifty five million dollars, JD. What do you think they want for that? They want your loyalty, and you proved that you’ll kiss their ass too.

And look, it’s nothing personal. I’m just telling you like, I’ve been in this business. It’s tough business. If you think you’re gonna help Ohio, you’re not. If you can’t even stand up for yourself, how you’re gonna stand up for the people of the state how are you going to take on the corporate interests?

All the money you took are from the corporations who sent all our jobs overseas. Peter Till, fifteen million bucks. Buddy, what do you think

he wants? So, Will, Tim Line is one of the few Democrats who peers completely comfortable with a, you know, playing a just full throated populist. You are a toady of the interests of politics. And these also keep playing hits. Plan hits, you know, the top forty, you know, the the kiss ass thing.

So what do you think of what do you think of what do you think

of that race? Okay. So, Charlie, you just made me wish I’d watch that to be. That’s so I mean, that’s so beautiful. You’re a chew toy you’re The

chew toy is the chew toy is really that’s I have I have to say, you know, I doff my hat to you, mister Ryan. JD mess as the chew toy. I like it. Okay. And then and then the the cherry on

top is nothing personal. Yeah. I mean, just savage the guy. So it sounds to me like what Tim Ryan is doing is an kind of an experiment in Vance wants this to be about which side you’re on? Are you with because at Ohio’s a Trump state.

Right? Are you with Trump or are you against Trump? And what Tim Ryan seems to be doing there is saying, you know, you know, Mr and Mrs. America swing voter if you still exist out there, don’t focus so much on which side we’re on, although Tim Ryan is trying to be positioned himself as a Democratic populist as opposed to wake. Right?

But he’s saying, which of us has backbone Right? Choose your candidate by the character of the man. And I’m willing to stand up to the powers that be on my side. I’m willing to run against Nancy Pelosi. This guy has no backbone.

I mean, do you think Charlie that there is a backbone vote out there that will set aside party and ideology and vote on on that kind of

character? Yeah, I I just I don’t know. But this is one of those campaigns where I I think it is getting to the nub of the issue. Like, who is JD Vance? Why is he there?

Who paid for him, what does he actually believe? There was another exchange where Tim Ryan went after him for his praise of Alex Jones when when J. D. Vance said Alex Jones is far more reputable source of information than racial matter. And J.

D. Vance says, I never said that I never said that well, and brings the receipts. You know, he put it in a tweet. There’s videotape of him doing it. So he’s tying him to the billionaire Ola Garks.

He’s implying that he is a chew toy. He’s reminding people twice in that one sound bite that this was not a fighter. He’s an ass kisser. And he’s linking him to these, you know, really the plural extremist Whether that’s going to be enough, I don’t know. But I have to say that if I was drawing up a, you know, a strategy and I am not a consultant, I’m not to miller.

These would be the hits, the the high points that I would certainly, you know, urge him to touch on. Yeah. Whether it’s not? I don’t know. In in a year like this, I just don’t know.

It might be that the tsunami is so great that none of this actually is going to make a difference to the outcome. Yeah. I

mean, it’s two problems. One is it’s the year, the it’s the time. It’s a tsunami, as you point out. And the other is the place. Right?

Ohio these days is a difficult place for for Democrats to win. Charlie, I think when this race is over, I don’t know if Tim Ryan will win it. I don’t think anyone will be able to say that somebody else could have done a better job or there was a better way to go about it. I think he will get the most out of this that can be got. I I think in fact, I think there are gonna be a lot of Democrats looking at the Tim Ryan campaign, win or lose.

As a model, as a playbook for how to run-in the Midwest. I agree with you. And you know in the

past, there has been this tendency in the part of Democrats to fall in love with candidates who really never had a shot. Right? I mean, they they overhype, you know, candidates in in South Carolina or in Kentucky. In the case of Tim Ryan in Ohio, I think they’re underhyping the guy as far as I can tell, because he he certainly being entertaining. You know, let’s give him that.

Yeah. And it’s

it’s I’m remembering as we’re talking the twenty nineteen Democratic primary debates for president, and you see what happened to the various people who are in them, you know, where did people Buttigieg go where to come on a Harris’ go. And I’m thinking about Tulsi Gabbard who just flaked out and it became a Putin’s you know, it was a Putin’s dude, but became more than one. And crossover. And Tim Ryan, they’re both of them both of them back ventures. Right?

They were both barely in it. And Tim Ryan it has become to me kind of a hero. And I know there are Democrats on the left who disagree with Tim Ryan about some issues, but none of them none of them was gonna come anywhere near keeping this as the race in Ohio as close as it is. I mean, I think all Democrats owe him a debt of gratitude win or lose. Yeah.

Telsey Gabbard just me just spend, like, thirty seconds talking about her. I mean,

it’s certainly one thing to cross the aisle and say I’ve decided I’m more comfortable with with Republicans, with Democrats, it’s not a shock, but She’s gone from an apologist for Assad in Syria to a Tory for Vladimir Putin then now complete MEGA. I mean, it’s not just that she’s moved. She is now campaigning for Blake Masters in Arizona and Kerry Lake. She’s gone from being a, you know, somewhat eccentric Democrat to being full woolly fever swam maga. So Yeah.

And

this yeah. She’s kind of a story in what happens if you have no backbone? You know, we’re we’re in this polarized time. Right? Where if you leave one orbit, if you leave the progressive orbit as she did.

Right? Either you have character like, you know, Tim Ryan does, like Evan McMullen does, and you’re able to stake out your own position. And reject whatever you disagree with on either side. Or if you’re totally gabbard and you just float, then you’re just gonna drift from one or you leave one orbit, you’re gonna go into the other. And now she’s just become a Fox News, Aparacic.

Yes, I can be sucked into this vast

vortex of of crazy where all of the incentives and, you know, she has figured out, you know, these are my new people. They will celebrate me. They will celebrate me. As long as I say, the crazy stuff, if if I if I start to be I don’t know a little bit reasonable or nuanced. I’m not gonna get the clicks.

I’m not gonna get the likes. I’m not gonna get the invites back on Tucker Carlson. So go full crazy and there is that story. Well, speaking of of going full crazy, she is campaigning in Arizona. It’s interesting that conventional wisdom has really seemed to congeal around the fact that the Kerry Lake is the is the leading lake eighty of MEGA of MEGA World that she is going to be a a MEGA superstar and that that against I guess my expectations earlier this year that she’s likely to win in Arizona, Yeah.

I mean, Arizona is is one of those states that seemed to be trending towards sanity, and you had so many Republicans, you know, prominent Republicans willing to say the big lie is a big lie. And yet and yet they nominate Kerry Lake, who is I mean, the woman’s bats should create talented, but bats should crazy, or bats should crazy, but talented. And what do you think? Yeah,

it is a serious threat. And it’s a serious threat because once I’ll just speak for myself. Once again, I have made this this I’ve succumb to the fallacy that because something is crazy, it won’t happen. Yeah.

Right? Oh, I get that. Yeah. So

so what’s happened here, Charlie, just quote to you a poll because this is what I was looking at the last couple of days. Some of the state polling, similar to that New York Times poll we were just talking about on indifference. So this is a poll in Arizona. The CBS, you got a poll two weeks ago. The question was, do you generally, do you want elected officials from Arizona to be people who say Joe Biden legitimately won the twenty twenty election, the answer is only forty one percent of the voters of Arizona said that they wanted that.

Okay. Eighteen percent said they wanted people who politicians who said that Joe Biden did not legitimately win. Forty one percent said doesn’t matter. Do the math. Forty one plus eighteen.

That’s fifty nine percent of the people who are in play for Cary Lake. And that to me is the underlying problem. The fact that she is nuts about election denial just doesn’t matter to enough voters.

Okay. So let’s play a little sound bite because, of course, this really shouldn’t come as a surprise where she was asked, what about your race? I mean, it’s so far we haven’t seen a lot of Republicans who are willing to question, other races, this, of course, has been one of the, you know, ongoing paradoxes that, you know, the same people who who doubt that the Joe, you know, Joe Biden’s win was legitimate. Have had no problem accepting the legitimacy of other races for congress or for senate? But maybe that was temporary.

So Carrie Lake has asked whether she would accept the results of the election. This is what Carrie Lake had to say. Will you accept the

results of your election in November. I’m gonna win

the election

and I will accept that result. If you lose, will you accept

that? I’m

gonna win the election and I will accept that

result because the people will never the people of Arizona will never support and vote for a coward like Katie Hobbs who won’t show up on a debate stage. Oh, so then

now that goes back to your point earlier, Will. There’s just this belief that I I I’m going to win because it’s just I cannot possibly believe a result that has me losing. It’s just not it’s not it’s not possible that I would not beat this woman. Same thing. Right?

Yeah. Now let me give you a

little bit of cause for optimism. From that answer. Because that’s not a patent an answer about the past. Right? That’s an answer about the future.

Will she accept? And on that, the same CBS poll that I was just quoting to you Here’s a different question. Would you prefer the next governor of Arizona be someone who tries to challenge and investigate Arizona elections when Democrats win? Same thing about challenge and investigate when Republicans win or accept the results of Arizona elections. Whoever wins, seventy seven percent of the voters of Arizona.

Arizona said they want someone who will accept the election results. So I am hopeful. I don’t know if Katie Hobbs is up to this, the Democratic nominee. But if she can make the Kerry Lake insanity about the future, not about the past, about whether we can have a governor who doesn’t accept election results, including the one in her own race coming up, then she has a shot at getting a lot more voters on her side. Alright.

So Katie Hobbs. I don’t know her. I don’t know much about her. What I do know is that she’s all that stands between Arizona and this complete election denying a sedition is not job. However, I also know that she’s refusing to debate, which I have to say seems like a a self owned that if you what?

And I talked about the Adam Kinzinger. Adam Kinzinger is endorsed Katy Hobbs, a Democrat. And I asked him about this, and he said he thought it was a terrible mistake. She’s not showing. I mean, if you’re going to fight for democracy, if you think, you know, that this is this, you know, this existential threat.

Well, then you show the freak up. You show up. So what is your thinking about? This is because Carrie Lake has made this into a huge cudgel. You know, what are you of Freight of, why won’t you stand on the stage?

Why won’t you stand on the stage with Carrie Lake? Okay. So

to you and others, who think that Katy Hobbs made a terrible mistake here strategically. Okay. I I I call you optimist. That’s not the that’s the optimistic scenario. Here’s the pessimistic scenario, and I do not know this.

But what if Katie Hobbs did the rational thing? What if she had private advice telling her, don’t do the debate. Because in fact, you may think you you sweet liberals that debates are about arguing facts and that if you win on the facts, you will win the debate. Yeah. In in fact, Cary Lake is an extremely compelling charismatic personality on TV and that she will win that debate because even though she is insane, people will be attracted to her and Katie Hobbs is just not a forceful person if you’ve ever seen her on TV.

And maybe debates, you know, that’s the pessimist of you. That debates are not in fact settling disputes, but that that one of the reasons why Carrie Lake is doing so well and may do well in the election is because being attractive, charismatic being a strong speaker works. It’s more effective even if what you’re saying is crazy. Okay. So there’s there’s no good scenario here then.

Yes. What you’re what you’re

saying is that she is that her adviser say, she will clean your clock. You will be destroyed. Therefore, don’t get up on the stage. And so when Carrie Lake says that Katie Hobbs is afraid to get up with her. She’s right?

Yeah. I mean, look, to

be fair, I don’t know if someone is advising Katie Hobbs sales, suppose they are. There is another way of looking at this. They’re not telling Katie Hobbs to shut up. They’re saying don’t go on stage. Don’t go don’t do a debate.

Because you’ll lose in that format. But what if they intend to make the same points through TV ads in which Terry Lake doesn’t get to — Okay. — stand on stage

and beaver stick. It seems like a net negative. Alright. So we have a sound bite here from Katie Hobbs who’s being asked about her position on abortion. And I think that there’s a lot of feeling that the abortion issue is a real negative for Republicans, a real asset for Democrats.

I am I think it is. And all the polls would suggest that’s the case. This is in your wheelhouse will, so I wanna get your take on all of this. But I’m not completely convinced that all of the Democrats have figured out how to talk about this in this campaign. It strikes me as a high mob So let’s play this Q and A with Katie Hobbs, and you tell me how you think she did.

So can you

clarify, do you support any legal limits on abortion in Arizona? Look,

the

fact is right now that we are under an extreme fifteen week ban that limits healthcare options for women who need them. There’s the potential for a complete ban right now that ban is in the courts, but under my opponents administration, she would support a full badge. She’s called this a great law. She doesn’t support any exceptions.

What do you support

that? Look, When you’re talking about late term abortion, that is incredibly extremely rare. And it’s happening if there is if that conversation is happening, it’s because there’s something that’s gone incredibly wrong in the pregnancy. And politicians do not belong in that decision. But what

do you know or what should the limits

be?

The the decision about abortion should be between a patient and their doctor?

Will.

It’s a terrible answer. It’s a terrible, terrible answer. This this, by the way, explains why she doesn’t want her debate. Oh, it’s worse than that, Charlie. Oh, once again, you’re an optimist.

If you think this is a Katie Hobbs problem, this is a Democratic party wide problem. Right? It is yes. It rebounding abortions in all cases and raping itself. That’s all extreme and you wanna run against that.

But the Republicans have they’ve been telegraphing for months, for years. They’re gonna try to portray Democrats as being extreme on the other side. And you’re you’re being asked if you support any restriction and Katie Hobbs’s answer is, you know, women don’t get abortions till very late because of, you know, something has gone incredibly wrong with the pregnancy. That’s true. And the answer to that is not to say, I don’t support any restrictions.

The answer is to say, I support restrictions to make sure that those are the only cases. Right? We are going to have exceptions in the in the law to make sure that if something goes wrong with your pregnancy, you can get an abortion even in the third trimester because it’s medically necessary. And we’re gonna how yes, I support restrictions that say, you can’t just get up and have an abortion on a whim in the eight month in the eighth month because women don’t do that. Just say, I’m willing to take what women understand morally that they’re not gonna do that on a whim, and I’m gonna put that in law.

A lot of voters would be comforted by that, and then you can make

the case against the Republican extremism banning all abortions. I agree with you there. Okay. So one last raise. I usually have as my default setting the feeling that debates are always overhyped and never really matter that much, particularly, you know, at the at the state level.

You know, for example, you know, in Wisconsin, there have been debates between the candidates for governor and senate. They generally take place on, you know, Friday nights or over the weekend. Almost nobody sees them. They’re just I mean, you know, we can talk about them. We can analyze them.

But they don’t move any numbers at all. This is an exception. What’s going to happen in Pennsylvania where you have live debate between John Federman and doctor Oz. And I think it might matter because there are these questions about Federman’s health, about how he is recovering from the stroke. And my and you tell me whether you disagree.

I do think that’s gonna be very, very closely watched. If Federman does stumble, if he does look frail or or unable to communicate, that’s gonna hurt him I don’t know how badly, but it will hurt him. On the other hand, if he exceeds expectations, he could put to rest many of those doubts. So I I think this may be one of those exceptions in a very close run race. What do you think?

So, okay, this brings us back weirdly to what you

and I have previously discussed in the context of Joe Biden, that is Joe Biden seems incoherence a lot of the time. And it’s a different different situation. But Joe Biden, in terms of processing audio information, he just needs a little bit of time. And if he can show the voters that he’s got it together, which in my understanding is he absolutely does, that will reassure a lot of people. And if he doesn’t do that, I think if he doesn’t debate, if he doesn’t make some kind of a showing, the danger is too many voters in Pennsylvania will believe that Federman has a thinking problem and that would be lethal to him.

No. I

I think you have it exactly right. So, Will, what are you gonna be looking at for the rest of the week? Anything that you should keep an eye on? I’m looking at these statewide polls. This

problem, you and I have been discussing of why people are not voting on democracy, why they don’t care about it that much. And it is you know, in a lot of these races where deniers are running in Arizona, in Pennsylvania, in Michigan, this is a significant problem. So I’m gonna be looking at that New York Times poll as part of I’m also kind of fascinated by this thing coming up where Kevin McCarthy is signaling that the Republicans are gonna start tightening the purse strings on Ukraine if they take over the house. This is, to me, is a very alarming development and people are not paying enough attention to it. Oh, I completely agree.

In fact, I’m hoping to devote

tomorrow’s podcast to this this question because remarkable comments from McCarthy, not just that, but The suggestion that Republicans might provoke a debt crisis, which would be absolutely catastrophic. Catherine Grimpeld in the Washington Post is a great column about all of this. So you have Kevin McCarthy signaling that he might torpedo the global economy in a fit of peak in order to you know, cut entitlement programs and suggesting that they might tighten the purse strings with Ukraine, you know, both of that in this rather remarkable punch interview which we’re gonna be talking about on tomorrow’s podcast as well. Well, it is great to have you back again. I appreciate it very, very much.

This is great, Charlie. Thanks for having me back. The Bowler podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio production by Jonathan Seres. I’m Charlie Sykes. Thank you for listening to today’s Bulwark podcast.

We’ll be back tomorrow and do this all over again.

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