Let's Find Common Ground - Election Briefing: "Why I'm Voting For...." Philippa Hughes and John Pudner

Episode Date: October 29, 2020

With just days to go before the 2020 election, we invited a Trump supporter and a Biden backer to join us in the same (virtual) room, and share the personal reasons behind their vote. We have a lively, spontaneous and surprisingly friendly discussion about the President's controversial personality, the final debate, and big policy and leadership differences between the two candidates.  John Pudner is voting for Donald Trump. He is Executive Director of Take Back Our Republic, a non-profit group and a member of Bridge Alliance. John spent three decades managing Republican political campaigns, and was the eldest of 9 children growing up in a 3 bedroom house in inner city Richmond, VA where he attended a conservative, Catholic high school whose alumni included Steve Bannon. Now John is the father of 9 children. Philippa P.B. Hughes is voting for Joe Biden. She produces and creates art projects, and is CEO, Chief Creative Strategist and Social Sculptor at CuriosityConnects.us, a non-profit organization that designs pop-up galleries and physical spaces that bring people together who might not normally engage in dialogue and thoughtful interaction. Philippa is the daughter of a conservative Vietnamese mother and a white father who was a lifelong union member. She also grew up in Richmond, but until our podcast conversation had never met John.

With just days to go before the election, we invited a Trump supporter and a Biden backer to join us and share the reasons for why they made their choice. One aim of this episode is to help us understand each other, whatever our views or political identity. This is Let's Find Common Ground. I'm Ashley Nantite. And I'm Richard Davies. In our last episode, we spoke with two members of Congress, one Democrat, the other Republican. This time, it's two voters.

Get ready for a lively spontaneous conversation between two people of very different views. John Pudner is voting for Donald Trump. John is Executive Director of Take Back Our Republic, a nonprofit group that's a member of Bridge Alliance, an organization that aims to bridge the divides that separate us and help fix our political system. John spent three decades managing Republican political campaigns.

Philippa Hughes is voting for Joe Biden. She heads up Curiosity Connectsus, which designs pop-up art galleries and physical spaces that bring people together who might not normally engage in dialogue and thoughtful interaction. Philippa is the daughter of a conservative Vietnamese mother and an American dad who was a lifelong union member. We recorded this interview the day after the final Trump Biden presidential debate. You're both from Richmond, Virginia.

Is that coincidence? Oh my gosh. Really? Yeah. But we both were, I knew I was. Oh, I went to Medabrik High School, which is in Costa Fille, actually. Yeah, I went to Benedictiburk High School, which is in Costa Fille, actually. You're kidding. I went to Benedictine.

Awesome. Mom still lives right by the Virginia Museum. Love Richmond. So, John, you're the eldest of nine children, and you had a paper round growing up so did I. Tell us a bit about how you grew up, and how that upbringing influenced your politics. Well growing up in Richmond, Virginia, the oldest and nine children we were actually below the poverty line during my high school year. So I don't know a lot of people like talk rags to riches,

but yeah it really was. The paper out was great because it had 500 newspapers and it formed the rest of my life. We had the conservative Catholic church that I went to, actually Steve Bannon went to it too. Then the Jewish synagogue on the next block, in my neighborhood, then you had the first black neighborhood. It was still kind of segregated. And then the fifth block on my route was the first big gay population of these. Really it was called the San Francisco of the East of that and I'm a Gary Street. So those were my interactions for years. You know, it was really a very diverse group

from a five block paper route that I think taught me to deal with different people and communicate at least. And Phillipa, how about you? This is so great, John. I actually grew up in a suburb outside of Richmond, and I was the other than my brother, I was the only Asian kid in my school. It was very black and white. So I actually did not have a particularly diverse upbringing, but I do think that being the only Asian kid in the school definitely informed a lot of my worldview. And, you know, I've been thinking about also like my family is quite conservative.

And in fact, my cousin who also grew up like a few blocks from me is now the director of ICE. And so, you know, we have a lot of conflict in how we view the world right now. So ICE is US immigration and customs enforcement. Oh, and I wanted to mention one more thing. I'm sorry to interrupt, but I was born is US immigration and customs enforcement? Oh, and I wanted to mention one more thing. I'm sorry to interrupt, but I was born as an American citizen. My father is American.

I'm half and half. My cousin actually came through the refugee program. Our family is Vietnamese. And his family was sponsored by the Catholic Church to come to Richmond. And that's part of the reason why I grew up in Richmond was because our family moved to where his family was so that our family could all be together. So, you know, the Catholic Church played a big role in our family. And in fact, that part of

family is Catholic as a result. So let's ask the question that is the title of this podcast episode, which is why I'm voting for John, you go first, why are you voting for Donald Trump in this election? Yeah, I think as angry as I get at him for saying things that I think may just cost him this election, I actually think on policies, he's been pretty true to what he campaigned on, most of which I agree with,

certainly not all, but this kind of populism, all the way to the stopping never-ending wars and being tough on trade. I mean, those were kind of a unique view on conservatism that appealed to me. I think he's been kind of true to that. It wasn't the Chamber of Commerce Conservatism that seems more focused just on big business. So I think he's been true to that. I think the New York Times economic writer that I had the election said the stock market would never recover from his election. And when you watch what happened for the next few years,

this stock market certainly did well. Yeah, so I think the economic policy work, the unemployment rate was so low going into COVID. And then socially, we didn't know what we were getting. It clearly had not been a social conservative most of his life, but everything, the court and the appointments down. So I just purely on his record, as much as I wish he wouldn't

say stupid things, set up not just things. Yeah, on his record, I think he's true to what those was good for him last time, you know, wanted. So he's been actually surprisingly good philosophically. Is there any one thing or one area of policy that you particularly like where he's acted, where he's where he's born out, what he promised? Well, none of us thought there'd be three-quarter appointments.

And I know that's as aggravating to the left, you know, as it is encouraging does, but to see the vetting of those appointees is probably the most encouraging thing. And I think at times that's what pulls Republicans back together before the election they're fighting. If they start realizing for different reasons, they all do want the court to be more conservative

and we'd say restrained. So that's probably the biggest plus of the four years, whether or not he loses or makes a comeback here these last two weeks. And Philippa, why are you voting for Joe Biden? You know, I think it's kind of summed up in Joe Biden's final remarks in the debate last night when he really underscored the idea that he's not here to represent the blue side. If he wins, he's here to represent all Americans. And I thought that was so powerful.

Like that is a populous message that I'm more drawn to. And over and over in the debate, the president kept trying to divide red from blue. And so that was the biggest thing for me is that final statement of, I am here for all Americans. And I think that is so important. And I think another thing that, you know, he said he made a mistake when he was asked about the 1994

prison reform and I thought, you know, wow, what an amazing thing to be able to say is I made a mistake and I've learned from that and I'm going to do better. And I thought that was very powerful for a leader. Like that is what a quality I really look for in a leader. And then the third really big thing is his empathy. I, you know, there's that video going around right now where he hugs the boy who is the son of a man who was murdered at Parkland. And it's just so spontaneous.

There's no political thought to it. A boy runs up to him asking for comfort and he gives it in the most powerful way. I thought, again, that's what I want in a leader. Somebody who cares about actual people and not puts people above the market, puts people above profit. I mean, in many ways, this election is a referendum on Trump,

right? His behavior has outraged his critics. It's delighted many of his supporters. He's struggled to condemn white nationalist militia groups for one thing. And he hasn't said anything critical about the QAnon conspiracy. John, how do you come down on this stuff? Yeah, he's also outraged some of us supporters. So it's something so it's not exclusive. Some of us are just mad that he's costing himself the election for some of these things. I joked at one point I was going to change my Facebook page to say pro mask, pro Fauci and pro Trump just to make sure everyone hated me.

But you know, the taking pochettes with a guy like Fauci and not stop is bad politics. Forget everything else. Certainly they're not wearing a mask. That does have real implication. We pull our hair out sometimes. So yeah, I for a different reason I get angry at the antics, but it's because it's going to cost him the election. So there's a fundamental difference between both of you apart from who you're voting for and that is it seems John you're voting more for policy and Philippa you're voting at least as much for character as for anything else is that is that fair to say? I'm putting more emphasis on the character for sure

and I do think this is a referendum on character but Biden does have policies Is that fair to say? I'm putting more emphasis on the character for sure, and I do think this is a referendum on character. But Biden does have policies that I deeply agree with. I do believe that he has a health care plan, whether it's an awesome plan or not, is yet to be seen, but the president doesn't appear to have a plan. Biden is really good on climate change. he actually has a plan on what we need

to be doing and that is very exciting to me because that is a major threat to our society, to our existence right now. So there are policy reasons to support Biden as much as his character. Are you, Philippa, would you say you're excited about Biden or are you mostly voting against Trump? You know, when we came into this, he was not my choice in the primary, like many people, but he's really grown on me. You know, I was a big booted judge fan in the beginning

and I was excited about him. And he's doing such a great job right now speaking on Fox News and really laying out the case for, he's gonna be great. Anyway, yeah, Biden has really grown on me. So John, what about the separation of children from their parents at the Southern border? Is that something that upset you?

We've recently learned that 500 of those little kids, they can't find their parents. Yes, no, that's a grave concern. What is the background of those children? Did they come over with parents? No, but I certainly think there are very least legitimate stories of children being pulled away from parents. And it would be strongly against that. And some of the immigration has had way too hard an edge with consequences. There's certainly is the other side,

which I think open borders would be a disaster. So I'm certainly somewhere in the middle of an immigration. Like Philipp, I actually have a good friend from college who is the ice guy in Texas. We both have a similar friend and it's interesting to talk to those people just how hard a lot of them work to look, we're just trying to process things here. No, that is a tough one. I do think there's a problem in reporting here that does go beyond the problems that have been caused by being over

aggressive on immigration. Well, let me ask you about that, John. You're a committed conservative. I imagine most of your family and friends are conservatives for the people who you know and for yourself is the vote in the election partially a vote against the media, against the news media. I do think the anti-media vote for Trump is someone like the anti-Trump vote for Biden.

I mean, there is a feeling that gosh mainstream media just will no longer report both sides. We're fighting against that. You have makes it a bigger battle. And Trump's kind of the, you know, the the symbol guy in the middle of it, but how do we how do we not get any coverage? We just don't feel like there's the second side. There's a different network. But now we're all watching our own bubbles of news. So I think the media has some long term thinking to do on this. And Philippa, how about you?

How do you view the media and how it covers politics? I've been touting this idea of the polarization industrial complex. This idea that media tech companies, they profit from keeping us polarized and from keeping us reading only certain things. And it's really bothering me because then we start distrusting anything, any source, any media. And so I think that, you know, we need to take a look at ourselves and figure out like how are we going to force a change here and change the narrative? We need to stop saying fake news and we need to stop looking at only our sources and only believing those sources because that only benefits them. Yeah, well, John, what do you think about that? Because I think a lot of people wouldn't

have thought about this idea of different types of media profiting from keeping us apart. Yes, oh, that's so true. I remember reporters coming to me during the last presidential election saying, my editors beat me up if my story's not about Trump. And that was on both sides. That was either I need to either be going after him or praising him. I don't get the clicks if I don't. So I thought, well, what a terrible business model. I think I sense a little common ground here.

I agree. I think so. And I actually do mind if we go back to the immigration question that you asked John earlier, because I think there might be common ground there too. I think we have a systemic problem with immigration. And we need to fix that. And Obama didn't fix that.

It was broken before Obama. And so the fact is, is that we have a broken system, and nobody is fixing it. Even though there is actually broad support for fixing the actual immigration system, I think though what bugs me about the current president is that he's now putting more emphasis on enforcement rather than fixing the immigration system. He doesn't want any more immigrants to come to our country. In fact, he's actually been lowering the number of immigrants who are allowed to come to our country, little by little, and now, specifically, lowering

the number of refugees that can enter our country. It's so interesting to me because my cousin and his family entered our country through a major refugee program and under our current system, my cousin could have made it into this country based on the system that we have now. I'm very frustrated by that. John? Yeah, and from two ends, I see the immigration problem consumers have now hate to quote Mitt Romney now in conservative circles, but he had a great comment. I was running his campaign out Wyoming and he said, you know, when we get one of the brightest people in the universe to show up at MIT, the first thing they do is sign a huge stack of papers saying that when they finish benefiting from educational and coming out as the most brilliant whatever engineer in

the world that they promise they will immediately leave the country and not stay here. He's like, why are we chasing that immigrant out? So you have that at the one end, like why? And then at the other end, also ran politics for the farmers' federation in a state, one of the most conservative groups out there. But for them, that's the issue. They completely part with other conservatives. I mean, you can go to farmers, they're conservative almost everything, but like guys, no, we cannot

hire Americans to, as Sarah and I, lives get, pick their own strawberries. It just doesn't work. So, the need for immigration, if everyone in the family were having nine children like I did, we probably wouldn't have any immigrants because every job would be full. We're at the exact opposite extreme. So this is a natural course that has to happen. Take away all ideology. And just to replenish the people we have and have normal growth in the country.

So, you know, conservatives are stuck in a spot in immigration. I know it appeals to some, but it really is a problem. This is Let's Find Common Ground. I'm Richard. And I'm Ashley. Common Ground Cremity publishes this podcast and they've come up with something new. It's Common Ground Scorecard, which rates elected officials on how they reach out to find Common Ground. Each presidential candidate, Senator, Member of Congress, and Governor gets a rating.

Find out more at commongroundschoolcard.org. Now back to our interview with John and Philippa, we've been talking about the media. If you want to find news and opinion from left, right, and center, I found that a good source is allsides.com, another member of the organization, Bridge Alliance. At all sides, you can easily see how the coverage of one story varies from different news outlets.

Yeah, I subscribe to that. And there's another one called the flip side. I subscribe to all of those because I do think we should do, you know, we should see all the sides, but it is really hard. Like, to really absorb all those different perspectives. You have to be so conscious. So, John, your group, take back our Republic, it is a member of Bridge Alliance, which is dominated really by very well-meaning civic-minded liberals to a large extent. well-meaning civic-minded liberals to a large extent, how do you go about seeking common ground or at least working with people you don't agree with sometimes?

Yeah, and actually I was originally on the board of Bridgeline, I was really enjoyed doing that for a couple of years, and the nice thing was, they were always very respectful and there were times, yeah, there was some talk of putting something out. I said, boy, I think this will really be viewed as an attack on conservatives. They were always very open on that.

So, not to get in depth conversation, but just having that sensitivity that they really wanted to hear. Is there something just in the language? If we disagree on an issue, that's fine. But if it's just that we're using the wrong word as striving people away, that can happen too, when you don't realize there's common ground because someone used a word, you know, campaign finance or form the term,

turns out most conservatives drain the swamp, turns off most progressives. I would argue that a lot of cases, they're talking about the same issue. Yeah, I've been a couple, in the last several years, you've actually hosted dinners, bringing together people from different sides of the aisle politically.

I mean, what spurred you to do that and how has that been going? It's been going great. You know, what spurred me to do it is the November 2016 election. I was so frustrated and outraged, frankly, about the result that I felt like I just had to do something. And, you know, I and just make dinner and talk and, well, argue. But I just kept doing it over and over because I realized, like, you know, kind of going back to our media conversation is that no matter what you read and hear, like listening to actual people talk is so different, like it's unfiltered and you get to ask your own questions rather than, you know, having a journalist ask the question that you might not have asked and hearing it directly from their mouths was a very powerful experience for me.

And so I wanted to share that experience with other people who were curious about why this happened and who are these people? Because we are in our bubbles, and most of us hang out with people just like ourselves. And so, I feel like when people say, I hate liberals, or I hate conservatives, I hate Democrats, or I hate Republicans, they probably haven't really actually sat down and talked to any Republicans when they say stuff like that. And in fact, I know they haven't.

And so that's what motivated me. Like, we've got to actually talk to real people. And what did you learn? You know, the biggest thing I learned was that, oh, these are not these horrible avatars who are ogres, who want to destroy America. These are people who are just trying to live their lives and support their families and go to their job every day and go to church. And these are like normal people.

I'm doing air quotes for people who can't see me doing air quotes. You know, I mean, of course, I knew that at some gut level, but you know, it's so important to actually have the experience. And it's really weird because I think I grew up in a much different world than I live in right now. And so I realized I knew all of that before. I just forgot because I got brainwashed in my liberal bubble. I don't listen to extreme liberal media anymore

because I saw myself getting brainwashed. And this pandemic has been a bummer in many ways, but one of them is I'm not able to travel around the country with my project and talk to people right now. I do it on Zoom a little bit now, but I'm worried that I'm getting back into my little bubble again. And so I'm very conscious of trying to make sure I poke holes in that bubble as much as possible. Philippa, what's your project? Oh, it's called Looking for America. And so what we do is we curate art shows all across the country and different communities with local artists answering the question,

what does it mean to be American? And so when we answer that question, it does give us common ground. It helps us to see more common ground, to see what our shared experiences as being Americans, and to see our differences, which I think is important to know that we're different, in many ways, but at the end of the day, we're humans and we're Americans. And then I organize very large dinners

around that question as well, after they've experienced the art, and the art becomes a sort of framing device and a way to spark the conversation. And you make red and blue food, right? Yeah, well when I made dinner at my house, I would try to make red and blue foods and that was really fun. I always ended with a blueberry and cherry crisp that would mush into a purple goo at the end. And that's how we would end our conversation. So that's Philip's way of bringing people together.

John, why do you believe building coalitions is so important? What brought you to this place where you like to talk to people who feel differently? Well, interestingly, even running partisan campaigns for 25 years, for most of that time, you used to always get together with the opposing staff after the election and have a beer and make fun of your own candidate, things you couldn't say until the election was over.

And that was a nicer time. And I just noticed the last several years, it was getting more to, we're going to try to get our opponent staff thrown in jail for some violation. I mean, it just took this nasty turn, even at the campaign level. So, you know, just seem like, yeah, the old example for older people like me, of course, is the tip o'Neill and Ronald Reagan going out having a beer after fighting it out. Probably doesn't mean anything for your younger listeners, but, um, but just, Yeah, tip o'Neill was the Democratic house speaker House Speaker and of course Ronald Reagan at that time

was considered to be a very conservative president. Absolutely. And as little as a little to you though, just getting that these are real people, I thought one of the best pieces written in 2016 during the campaign was by Benji saying at MSNBC, he went to Trump rally and walked around the whole rally, just talking to people about why they were there. And his piece was fascinating. He said, no one mentioned immigration, no one mentioned building a wall. All they talked about was, I'm sick of all the deals being cut in DC.

I think he's finally tough enough to stop it. So again, maybe get to that where even if you hate Trump and view him as a borish, he can add as many adjectives as you want, yeah, somebody's attacks on his people in general. Yeah, there's a bad element certainly, but it's almost like the people who view every protester in the racial riots as someone who's throwing things through windows of stores. Obviously, that's a small percentage, most are there for justice. So just the stereotype in of supporters has been troublesome to me, you know, directed at the candidate

who said the things you're angry about, but don't put those, those about every value on every supporter, I think that's unfair. We're in a pretty rough time right now when it comes to rigid divides and people saying mean things about the other side. Are you hopeful, Philippa, that finding common ground will be a growing movement? I'm really hopeful. I've been traveling around the country talking to people everywhere and my anecdotal experience is that people are exhausted.

They're sick and tired of polarization and they want to talk to each other. And so I do feel hopeful across the political spectrum. When real people are in the same room, they want to talk to each other. John, what do you think? I think people need to see that everything isn't in lockstep. You're either with the left on everything

or you're with the right on everything because that's where we are. So many groups are just feeding off that and that's how they do their fundraising, et cetera. So the more groups that can look for some sense of finding common ground, the better, I think we just need homes for people. One of my favorite interns,

we've had some great conservative interns, but we had one from Yale who showed up in blue hair, Elizabeth Ward, back or everything else, and I said, I love to read a wang, and I said, so why do you want to come intern for us? I just want to understand how Southern conservatives think. You know, I just have more people, that was six weeks of her just absorbing it. You know, no false pre-test, no pretending she was conservative, but we just need more people willing to do that, and hopefully we realize these are real people. I heard just absorbing it. You know, no false free test, no pretending she was conservative,

but we just need more people willing to do that. And hopefully we realize these are real people. This Philip was found around her dinner table. These are real people. They aren't the stereotypes. The media is showing you of the other side. It reminds me of my daughter who in 2004, when George W. Bush was president,

decided to go off to school in Texas. We're from the Northeast and I said, Kate, why? And one reason she gave was I've never met a Republican. I'm not a big part of my education. Both of you come from families where there are lively discussions no doubt because you don't all agree on politics and other matters as well. So John first how do you talk to those members of your family who you love but you very strongly disagree with. We have great conversations. And we always close with families

more important than politics. We enjoy it lively and it's usually very friendly. It's usually not very pointed, et cetera, but just to get along and it's people for us, we've had, I did have one brother who didn't talk to me for four months after Trump wins, but now we're completely buddy again. So only one had a negative reaction to actual election night.

But that has been very friendly and mainly joking, as we argue about serious issues, we joking laugh. Well, I find it very difficult to have political conversations with my family. We argue a lot and we end up sort of having to stop the conversation and change the subject. It hasn't been as friendly in my family environment. And so I was thinking, wow, I can have a conversation

like this all day long with John Pudner and my friend Joe Wilson in Northwest Arkansas who could not be more different from me. But we can just joke around and we eat barbecue together and so fun and we laugh. But when it comes to my family, I haven't figured out how to have that kind of conversation. And so I'm sure there's other family dynamics going on.

So I feel, you know, I've been thinking about people ask, often ask me like, what do I do when, you know, a Thanksgiving? And it's really hard because when I set up my dinners and my conversations, I definitely have like rules and guidelines. And it's really hard to set rules and guidelines with your family around Thanksgiving. That's, that's, it's just weird actually. It's a really hard to set rules and guidelines with your family around Thanksgiving. That's just weird, actually.

It's a weird feeling to do that. But I think if you just keep practicing over and over outside of your family, then it becomes easier to do it when you're actually sitting around the dinner table. And let me tell one tactic I've done is I've actually blocked when things have really gotten heated with one of my brothers.

I've actually without telling them, blocked them from my phone, just so I won't respond to them. I don't tell them I block them. I don't tell them when I block them three days later, I said, okay, this is getting nasty. I'm going to be too tempted to respond. So that sounds like a nasty tactic, but it's really not. It's just, we're getting too hot. We're going to do some personal damage to our relationship

if I don't end this conversation for three days. And I think it's on us, like you and me, John, to do that. And because we have been, I've been practicing a lot longer than, you know, my family member. And so it is, I do take responsibility for dialing it down when it does heat up. Thank you very much. Yeah, thank you so much for joining us on. Thank up. Thank you very much. Yeah, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you. Thank you.

Trump supporter John Pudner and Biden Backer, Phillipa Hughes. And some good advice from both of them on how to get along a little bit better during Thanksgiving, whether that's in person or by a Zoom. This is episode 16 of Let's Find Common Ground. Listen to other episodes, we've got some great interviews, subscribe or ever you get your podcasts. More information at commongroundcommity.org slash podcasts. I'm Richard Davies. I'm Ashley Maltight. Thanks for listening.

Thank you for listening.