Pod Save America - "It’s Midnights In America (with AOC!)"

Episode Date: October 25, 2022

With just 2 weeks until the midterms, Democrats deliver their closing argument to voters. Trump and his goons get ready to screw with another election. And Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez makes a stop in Orange County to rally local Dems and talk to the guys about what the party must do to win. For a closed-captioned version of this episode, click here. For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail] and include the name of the podcast.

Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Vitor. On today's show, Democrats deliver their closing argument. Trump and his goons get ready to screw with another election, and then we sat down with Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Sunday to talk about the midterms and more. And midnights. And we talked about midnights as well. Oh yeah, you did ask some Taylor Swift questions. Yeah, we went to UC Irvine for a get out the vote rally. Go hand eaters. Oh yeah, you did ask some Taylor Swift questions. Yeah, we went to UC Irvine for a Get Out the Boat rally. Go Handeaters.

Tommy was part of the program. He spoke. Tommy revved up the crowd before AOC. I don't think we're putting it in this pod, but there was a moment where there was a bunch of MAGA protesters and I was like, oh, they're going to boo Tommy. I cannot wait. It's going to be great. I went after them in my remarks.

You did. You did. He engaged. I engaged them. He engaged. i singled them out and then i did a let's go brandon at the end yeah worked out well all right but first before we get to the news and and tommy and aoc uh election day is november 8th but the voting has already begun and everyone who's out there trying to save democracy needs your help they

need you to volunteer at phone banks, remind your friends to vote, read up on all those ballot initiatives, send people texts that aren't as annoying as those automated ones that come from the campaign. Yeah, good note. So we need your help. So sign up to do all of this at votesaveamerica.com. We'll have plenty for you to do. You got to do it.

You just have to do it. Couple weeks. Couple weeks. We're 15 days out. All right, let's get to the news. 15 days. The All right, let's get to the news. 15 days. The worrisome polling trend that shows a lot of tightening midterm races

hasn't changed all that much from last week, but the Democrats' strategy apparently has. The 538 average has Republicans up about a half a point on the generic ballot after a slew of polls that show inflation and economic concerns are once again voters top priorities polls are uh really putting the wine in wine mom oh oh why like complaining no no like

drinking like they're getting drunk oh oh oh i don't know if that was you know could have been a little sharper um generic ballots ever like, I'm special too? Okay. Jesus Christ. Anyway, if you're still listening, if you're still listening, in response, every Democrat from Nancy Pelosi to Bernie Sanders to Joe Biden has been delivering a closing argument focused on Republicans' extreme economic policies. Here's the president speaking at the White House on Friday. They're going to do big farmers bidding to repeal my plan to allow Medicare to negotiate prescription drugs prices.

We pay the highest in the world. And in doing so, it's going to raise drug prices. And they're going to raise big pharma's profits. They're doing fine, big pharma. They're not hurting at all. And they're going to raise your health insurance premiums. It's mega, mega trickle-down. Mega, mega trickle-down.

The kind of policies that have failed the country before and will fail it again. It'll mean more wealth to the very wealthy, higher inflation for the middle class. That's the choice we're facing. That's why I think that we're going to do just fine. Mega, mega trickle-down. Rolls off the tongue. What do you guys's why I think that we're going to do just fine. Mega, mega trickle down, rolls off the tongue. What do you guys think?

I think the broader argument is good and necessary. You know, I was curious about why they did the event sort of focused on the deficit versus other issues. But I'm sure there's some polling somewhere that's driving the decision. I think they're speaking to the reality that huge chunks of the electorate is worried about the economy, inflation and gas prices. We see it in polling. We see it in focus groups. Hear about it on the wilderness. We see it in anecdotal evidence from events and stories. It has been showing up in the wilderness.

You have to. Quite a few times. Biden, all Democrats need to speak to that. The anger, the anxiety and make the argument that Democrats will fight for you. Republicans will make things worse. Some of that's going to be policy based. Like we're going to re-up the child tax credit. We're going to reduce the price of drugs like Biden was talking about there. But the more important piece is that

contrast about how Republicans, they're going to fight for their donors, big pharma, fossil fuel interests are going to make it worse. I'll trust them on the mega, mega trickle down. Like I totally don't. Look. MMTD. That's what we're calling it. Again, they probably have data that I don't have. But my challenge with it is just sort of on its own. I don't know that everyone knows what it means. Because trickle down economics is kind of like a buzzword from the Reagan era.

I'm not sure what mega, mega means more than mega. But whatever. Hopefully it's catchy. We're talking about it. We're talking about it. It's ultra erasure. What happened to ultra? What happened to ultra mega? Ultra mega. They literally stole catchy. We're talking about it. We're talking about it. It's Ultra Erasure. What happened to Ultra? What happened to Ultra MAGA? Ultra MAGA.

They literally stole it. Mega MAGA. You think she trademarked Ultra and then they sent a cease and desist to the White House? It could be it. I also thought when I first heard that Rachel Maddow

was doing a podcast called Ultra, I was like, oh, this is going to be about MK Ultra, but it's not. So I like... A lot of bad Ultras out there. I'm going to say this. I'm going to say this.

I like Mega MAGA. Okay. I like it better than Ultra MAGA, which did sound fun, you know? Right. I just like Maga. I think that's it. That's all you need. It's bad enough.

I do think Trickle Down is in the category of like voodoo economics, but you know what? It was catchy. It gets the message out. You know, there was a, the thing that was more interesting to me than Mega Maga, Mega, Mega, Mega. Maybe the strategy was to just get everyone glitching guys glitching uh happens every election but uh what i was more interested in is the you know like what i was realizing and seeing this speech and also obviously reading where i get all my opinions message box by dan fiverr is democrats did get behind this very clean idea give us two more senators keep the house and we'll codify Roe.

There was not as clean of an economic story. Do this, do that. And we'll do these things and getting back to the child tax credit and some of this making it more of a choice on the economy. Because for the last couple of weeks, everybody's been talking past each other. You've had Republicans running nonstop crime, economy, immigration ads. And then you've had Democrats running Republicans or extreme abortion ads. And I'm not saying a lot of Democrats

aren't talking about cost and inflation on the trail. They are, and maybe their ads are about it too. But for the most part, there wasn't that clean choice on the economy. It's a really good point. Wow. Look at you. I haven't said that in fucking weeks.

I would say years. But, no. Here we go. You don't know when John sends you a well, comma. That's when you know you're in big trouble. He didn't say it's actually a good point. It's making me wonder why they didn't propose any kind of economic agenda, the Democrats. I'm guessing it's probably because.

So they passed the Inflation Reduction Act. And then everyone. And so then they celebrate that. Look, we fixed everything. Then everyone freaked out about inflation so i'm guessing they probably thought if we start proposing more spending we'll just total it up then everyone will total it up but i don't know if that's a reason to like not have an economic agenda for the for the midterms and beyond you know yeah i would say two points one i would say say that democracy is like a sexy baby

and inflation is a monster on the hill. That's point number one. Wait, wait, wait. You have to spell that out. I don't think I do. Okay. Oh, I think everyone knows that at this point. And then, but the second,

so the second one, in 2006, when Democrats were running to win the House, the Senate women, Democratic women, had a caucus and they came out with their checklist for change. And it was a list of very clean, simple policies. See, I remember the we can do better. I knew.

So yeah, the checklist for change was more of a kind of like acoustic set that they weren't really doing on the road. It was a smaller thing. It was more of a kind of like acoustic set that didn't that they weren't really doing on the road it was a smaller thing it was more for touring but the um didn't sell as well but uh uh hillary clinton was going to speak at some kind of a of a rally or something and i wrote a whole speech and she threw it out and she just read the checklist for change and then when i got back to my desk i was like what the fuck just happened and then i had missed an email from hillary clinton saying i'd like my speech to focus on the checklist for change did you seriously i swear to god it just reminded me of that one that like you know 2006

was a lot about the failures of the bush administration but there was a clean simple set of things democrats were getting behind that was the corruption while you were telling that very succinct story about the checklist for change i started thinking unbelievable what was that couldn't have been more than 90 fucking seconds i know you bring your your fucking phone to the urinal but some people have an attention span it wasn't that bad well no the good news is i thought of an idea instead of instead of like uh you didn't have to propose a whole bunch of spending you could have done the child tax credit which they didn't get done and you could said oh and we're gonna have it fully paid paid for by taxing rich assholes.

Mineral wage increase, something like that. Right. Or, you know, all the loopholes that Kyrsten Sinema made you take out of the inflation reduction act. Put it back in. That's your agenda. Like, you know, a lot of like online kind of conservatives have been giving Gavin newsom shit for talking about these uh gas credits in california but like you were talking about this that like people like that's simple that's something people can latch on to that will help me bunch of 20 somethings who didn't even know a midterm

election was coming were all talking to me about uh when i asked them what democrats they like they talked about gavin newsom giving them gas cards i didn't even know that was a thing turns out free money is popular so uh you guys both like this overall strategy of closing by focusing on the economy. Is there anything you change or add to the message? Anything else you guys? I mean, I imagine that most Democrats are going to do some sort of combination, right? It's not binary. Like they'll have some negative spots focusing on their opponent's record on abortion, some general sort of oppo hits, some attacks on the economic record. But I do think like ABC Ipsos, that poll found that Americans trust Republicans more than Democrats to handle like almost every economic problem, inflation, gas prices, the

economy broadly. So I do think you have to go at that strength to win those people back. What do you think about this debt ceiling issue? Like, I realize that the Republican threat to hold the debt ceiling hostage for entitlement cuts is complicated. It seems like it's a tomorrow problem because it's going to happen in like 2023. It's like, as we know all too well, it's extremely difficult to explain the intricacies of the debt ceiling to anyone. But I do think like, if you're just being honest about what might happen if Republicans take the House, there's going to be a lot of investigations. There's probably going to be impeachment of Joe Biden. There's going to be a lot of nothing that happens. They're not going

to be able to pass anything because Joe Biden's still president and can veto anything, right? But they will actually be able to hold the fucking economy hostage with the debt ceiling unless they get their cuts to Social Security and Medicare. It's actually something that could very easily happen next year if Republicans take the House. And I just wonder if that's something that you really hit in your closing message. What do you guys think? It's tough. You know, it's it's oddly, in some ways, it's similar to like our struggle to make this argument around Republicans as a threat to democracy. You know, threats to democracy, the debt ceiling on some level require imagination in a way that inflation doesn't. You see it,

you feel it. And I feel like right now, Democrats, we're paying in two different ways. Like, on the one hand, we're paying because people really don't believe there's a lot of cynicism. People don't really think things can get better. But even after Trump and even after the pandemic, even after our financial crisis, there's still not so much pessimism that things act. People actually believe things can get much, much, much, much worse, right? They just, it's hard to really explain to people. I don't think we've successfully, I think we've done a really, I think the hearings have done a really good job of making the case that January 6th is connected to a broader effort by Trump, but it's still seen as quite acute as opposed to the broader threat to democracy. And I think the same thing, like on, on economic issues, we haven't done a good enough job of explaining to people what Republican extremism actually will result in. And so two weeks before the election, making this argument around a debt ceiling, a concept they never fully grasped the last time we went through this fight,

and how bad it could be, even though we had that argument, and we said how bad it could be, and then it didn't happen a couple times in the past. I just think, I'm not saying it's a bad idea. I think it's hard. But the politics were pretty bad for Republicans last time they tried to do it. Of the shutdown. Yeah. Yes. That's a very different ceiling thing. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. That was that was a great I remember that moment. It was bad for us, too. But it was bad for that. They ended up blinking. Yes, they did blink. They did blink, of course. But I'm just saying you have to find a way to tell that story. That's sort of they will hold the economy hostage to cut Social Security and

cut taxes for for rich people is more about the policies, not the hostage taking. Yeah. It may be easier to hit them for what people have preconceived notions on the Republican Party, which is, you know, even if you're not a partisan, what do you think about the Republican Party? They help the rich and they're pretty extreme on social policies like their abortion bans, right? And so you think they want to, I still think it goes back to, oh, you want to solve inflation? They're not going to solve inflation. They're going to help their rich friends

and ban abortion everywhere. That's what they want. Yeah, they'd rather, they'll threaten the whole economy to cut taxes for rich people. So Tommy, Stan Greenberg, who's a longtime Democratic pollster, who has always argued for more populism,

recently told Politico that the worst performing message he's tested is Democrats touting their accomplishments. What'd you make of that interview with Politico that the worst performing message he's tested is Democrats touting their accomplishments. What did you make of that interview with Politico? Yeah, tough message from Stan. I mean, intuitively, it made sense to me. A huge percentage of the country thinks the country is on the wrong track. I think I saw 71% in some polls over the weekend think we're on the wrong track.

percent in some polls over the weekend think we're on the wrong track if our message comes through to those voters sounding like look what i did for you as opposed to a more nuanced look we got a lot of work to do here's our track record so far but this is what we'll keep fighting for and this is who's in the way i could understand how that would land wrong and maybe annoying so i do think it's maybe a little nuanced, although Stan's full quote was stark. Yeah. I mean, it's a good example of something that sounds like a big note, but it's actually a small note, which is that in framing... And Biden actually does that quite well. And sometimes he goes a little ham on just, look what we did, look what we did. But a lot of that speech is about framing it as a forward-looking choice. Like, here's what we're doing and here's how it will help you. Here's how we'll keep doing that.

Here's why Republicans would want to undo it. Right. I think it's really about, it's like the idea of taking what we've done and making it a story about how things will, can get better if you stick with us and how they'll make everything worse is obviously I think right. Yeah. I think the accomplishments basically only serve as credibility for when you say, I'm going to take on the drug companies, the insurance companies, the oil companies, because look, I've already been taking them on over the last couple of years, right? Like that they can serve as that beyond that, I think. Well, also a lot of things we did take are going to take years to go into effect. You know, like the climate spending is not helping anybody out right now. The, the Medicare

negotiation of drug prices doesn't happen for years. I mean, like, what are we telling people we did for them? We hooked you up in 2026. That doesn't work. And I don't think that people are sitting around being like, oh, well, I thought that the price of gas is expensive right now and that costs are pretty high. But then you just told me the gas prices have gone down for a couple of days in a row. So I'm sorry. I stand corrected. I think there's like a mood music. I get why the White House is always pushing like Ron Klain specifically retweeting, like the gas price buddy guy and trying to like sort of push the narrative that prices are going down.

I think that's more of like a media narrative thing because they are so quick to freak out when the Saudis and OPEC announce a production cut, nevermind the fact that it's not clear that it'll make any actual material impact on the amount of gas or oil on the market right now But like prices go up the media freaks out and they overreact So he's trying to push back and over correct to that and that impacts sort of the mood music around an election and I get It yeah, there's a difference between working the refs on Twitter and like what you put in your campaign at sure We're saying the speech. I'm sure yeah, we've also we've we've seen this movie before Obamacare took a

number of years to become popular and to become cemented in people's kind of brains as something good that they wanted to keep to the point where Republicans, even when they had the votes, couldn't repeal it. Just we had to lose a thousand seats to get there. Yeah. Anything else you guys have seen in the polling or early vote numbers that stuck out? In the ABC poll that we're just talking about that has a bunch of really bad news, it says if a candidate in this November's election says they believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Donald Trump, are you more likely to vote for that candidate? 52% said no. So there is still this desire to vote against these fucking people. It's out there. It's there. We just, it's like, it's just, it has to, it has to stay in people's minds. It has to be connected

to these other issues that feel more tangible. And I just, that's the, that's the struggle. I think you have to believe that if you vote for these Republicans, then like, it's going to negatively impact your life in a whole bunch of ways. And you have to see what those impacts are and know what they are, right? Like, I think it for example you know josh sapiro is very far ahead of doug mastriano in pennsylvania i think the knock on wood knock on some goddamn wood but now he's you know it's a it's a greater margin in that race and most of these polls than the federman oz race and i think shapiro did a very good has done a very good job saying like we're talking about abortion it's very simple in this case. Josh

Shapiro's governor, abortion is legal in Pennsylvania. Mastriano's governor, it's not. And people get that, you know? And so I just think like drawing these connections about what, these aren't just like Republican extremists who are scary. If they are elected, this is what will happen that will impact you. Yeah. There was, you know, we've been having this conversation. We asked AOC about it. We asked President Obama about it, which is, you know, we've been having this conversation. We asked AOC about it. We asked President Obama about it, which is, you% of Americans agree that American democracy is in crisis, but more, 70% feel America itself is in crisis. And I feel like in that you feel this, you feel the connection between these economic issues and these concerns about day-to-day, the day-to-day experience of just trying to get by and the crisis we're trying to drop people's

attention to in democracy, which is one way in which people really feel democracy is failing, is it's just not delivering. And like that's the kind of cynicism that we're kind of entering into this fight. And it's it's tough. You know who is delivering? Who? Hashtag Democrats. Hashtag Democrats deliver. We do.

It's been a while since the Democrats did that hashtag. Tommy, anything we can do better? Anything you saw in the polling or the early vote numbers? No. And I'm also just going to not let myself read about, think about, worry about early vote numbers because we're coming off a pandemic. We're still somewhat in one.

I don't know. All the rules are changing in different states. Like, it's just... You can look at the early vote numbers and the early vote numbers and the mail-in ballot numbers we've seen, and you can blur your eyes and say it looks good. You can blur your eyes and say it looks good you can blur your eyes and say it looks bad nobody fucking knows totally yeah i would say

that by the end of uh next week uh we look at john ralston's blog in nevada and he updates with all the early vote numbers it's too early now and he's as he says when he updates it but like by two weeks in you get a good sense yeah if you want to feel bad for a full two weeks about the results rather than just on election day, check out Ralston's blog. Yeah, and if you just want to cut yourself every... Exactly. That's a nice thing. That's a good way to do it.

Anyway, speaking of the not enough people identifying threat to democracy as their top issue, as Lovett was just saying, over the last few days, we got a few more reminders about why this isn't great. In Pennsylvania, Rolling Stone and Semaphore report that Trump is already laying the groundwork to challenge the midterm results in that state. And he's also trying to get their Republican legislature to ban mail-in ballots. also trying to get their Republican legislature to ban mail-in ballots. In Arizona, multiple reports of voter intimidation have been sent to the Department of Justice after armed vigilantes started patrolling drop boxes. Very cool. And in Nevada, the Washington Post reports that election officials and supervisors in most counties

have left their jobs over threats and abuse, while the guy who's leading the race to become Secretary of State, Jim Marchant, just ran this ad. George Soros is helping to elect anti-American politicians, and these same politicians keep winning re-election. How is that possible? It's not. Elections have consequences, and rigged elections have catastrophic consequences. Help save America. Vote for Jim Marchant for Secretary of State. It's time to take our elections back now uh you can't see it because this was audio but the politicians in that ad that he was saying weren't elected

or were elected you know improperly pelosi schumer schiff and nadler oh wow well do we know that they were elected properly that's who he's saying was saying was the beneficiary of rigged elections. He's going as far back as... I mean, it's a great style of politics if you can get it. You know, I won or else if you won, it was illegitimate. Heads I win, tails you lose. Right. That's what a fun thing.

Do you guys think that stories like these are just not getting through to voters? Or do you think they're getting through, but that these voters just aren't prioritizing democratic threats over economic concerns? I mean, I think fundamentally that like the three of us, people who listen to this show are space aliens compared to most of the country and the amount they pay attention to politics. So they're probably just not paying attention. They're probably paying even less attention to down ballot races and what a secretary of state does, what a county clerk does. You kind of have to explain what these jobs even do before you can really describe how Republicans are screwing it up. There's also probably a bit of a boy who cried wolf thing.

You know, I mean, we were laughing before we started recording that. And we're as guilty of this as everyone when every election is the most important election of our lifetime. Maybe you tune that out. They stop believing you. The hyperbole goes a little too far. But I do think like we criticize the media a lot. I do think they need to do better here because when votes came in late in Pennsylvania and that led to people questioning the validity of the results, That was a deliberate Republican strategy. They voted to ensure that those votes weren't counted until after polls closed on election day. So it looked

suspicious. That's why Donald Trump gave us those fun quotes about the big late night dump. We all remember that fondly. Less fond now, he's going to try to get rid of mail-in voting and do it again. I thought that then the media did a pretty good job explaining to viewers that night what was going on there and what Trump was trying to do and what Republicans were trying to do. I do think that it's going to happen again in these midterms and now is the time, we're a couple weeks out, where the media should probably let people know that the same thing is going to happen again. That night, sure. But like, look where we are

today where, you know, you have like half the country questions the validity of these elections. We, you know, look, we've spent time on the show talking about the media and where we think it is not up to snuff, I would say, from time to time. And we talk about the way in which they kind of are biased towards treating every fight like a political food fight between Democrats and Republicans. I think sometimes we forget that that's a bias Biden didn't win. And the remaining 41% don't care either way. And that's even bigger for independents. And it really tells you that like, I don't, that's, that's of course, where, how is this information mediated through terrible political coverage? But there really is like, Republicans have successfully made, did Joe Biden win the election, election a partisan question and people now view

that as a partisan question that they they think that it is more non-partisan like oh i don't want somebody who thinks about that issue either way and i just think we're paying for the ways in which this has become a right left divide and i think to be fair to the non-mega media like which we want to do they've been pretty pretty clear who won the election yeah who was lying they use the phrase big lie all the time they talk about election deniers all the time and the reason it's not getting through to people is i think originally what tommy said which is it's just most people aren't consuming that information most people aren't fucking new york times readers they're not watching in post readers right they're not watching the big three

networks it's just not happening. Yeah. I mean, this did manifest. There's some reporter on reporter violence on Twitter last night about this topic, about whose job it is

to talk about. I mean, there is a piece of this. Remember, democracy dies in darkness. I mean, it didn't. Did it? The Washington Post slogan, it wasn't democracy dies in darkness if Democrats say it does.

And in response, a Republican spokesman said, no, socialism killed the democracy and then a political science professor said uh both sides have flaws which would have been a very long tagline that's not how i think you know it's very frustrating for me yeah yeah no they they put a stake in they they they said we're gonna do democracy does the washington post is on great reporting i'm not criticizing anyone the piece we're talking about for this segment is actually by dana millbank an opinion columnist at the washington post but i think there is this this argument happening about whether democrats should be the one educating voters about these threats to democracy and my

view on that is no our job is to win elections period i do not think it's our job oh i think it's our to be the one carrying the message and educating people about every single issue we can talk about it but if it's at the expense of talking about something that's more likely to make us win fuck that it's every talk about what makes us yeah like we have them we go you go to work the media have not the media you wish i had like they're the media they're they're going to run stories about or not run stories about it if they're not educating people about the threats to democracy, then really we have no other choice. I mean,

but if the threats are not what are motivating people to turn out and vote like the poll Lovett just read there, then I think our, then we should fight on economic grounds or on abortion or whatever it takes to win. I agree with that. I'm just saying that I don't think the, I don't think we should be counting on that. Like,

no, of course not. I'm not counting on them. I'm, I'm shadowboxing Twitter in my own head. Yeah. I think, and I, like I said, I love fucking complaining about the media. I think they're doing a great job on this. Okay. I'm not counting on them. I think I'm shadowboxing Twitter in my own head. Yeah, I think. And like I said, I love fucking complaining about the media.

We love it. They're doing a great job on this. OK, let's not let's lose our heads. I would say I did two things. One, yes, it is Democrats job to win elections. Most important thing Democrats can do to defend democracy is not convince people democracy under threat. The most important thing we can do is win. That said, it is, I think, absurd for reporters who are not supposed to care who wins or who loses to say, oh, if the American people don't understand the threat to democracy, which when we're talking at a bar, when I'm not writing this in the newspaper, I share completely in your concern about if that fails to resonate, and that means that there's a

bunch of electioneers who win, and then we have a bunch of elections thrown into chaos too bad the democrats didn't have a better strategy it's not my job to do their job for them it's everybody's job it's everybody's job and like everybody kind of wrings their hands of this um but it all comes down but it does come down to convincing voters of this and if the voters are not paying attention to the media which most of them are not paying attention political news then who's job because they get a lot of people who are like oh people are just pissed about high gas prices at a moment when democracy is under threat it's like yeah i wish that wasn't the fucking case either but they are yeah and the only way that you have a democracy is to actually convince people who are pissed about high gas prices to vote for your person.

And that's how you save democracy. And to convince them. I mean, look, like democracy and also like democracy is about like people like self-governance. These people are feeling like they're not being governed well. So listen to them. We have grown pretty complacent. I mean, this is actually when we were when we were talking to Obama you watched his speech in Stockholm. And one of the points he made is that Western democracies have grown pretty complacent. And one of the ways we've grown complacent believe Republicans help. If you're listening to this, you know how much we know there are structural disadvantages. We know how the filibuster has stood in our way and gerrymandering and the electoral college

and the courts and all of that. All of that is true, of course. And yet we are still inside of that system trying to convince people that it works. And when they care about these other issues and they don't see a democracy delivering, of course, they're not believing this is the big threat we face. This is why it's just an asymmetric fight, because Democrats fundamentally believe that government should exist and help people and Republicans want to drown it in a bathtub. And that's why Republicans can prevent any immigration reform from happening. And then Ron DeSantis can do this stunt and fly people

to martha's vineyard and it's a news cycle for a week and it hurts us because of a problem his party is perpetuating yeah and and that's why everyone's like oh republicans are so smart why are they so smart and we're not why do they play dirty and we're not just like no no they just have an easier job they're just trying to tell you that government doesn't work and people don't have institutions right exactly and that's and it's also like it's not just a political problem They're just trying to tell you that government doesn't work. And people don't have faith in institutions. Right, exactly. And it's not just a political problem. I mean, people like conspiracy theories. They like feeling like there is some grand plan that only they understand and know about.

I kind of feel like you're pushing on an open door by telling people that, oh, yeah, of course elections are rigged and stolen. People kind of want to believe that stuff. And people are more likely to believe conspiracy theories at a time when they don't have faith in institutions right like those things go together as well and when they're drowning in a bunch of fucking noise on their social media feeds and then the local news has been co-opted by sinclair and oh there's fox news and oh you know liberal billionaires want centrism and conservative billionaires want to burn the fucking country to the ground like they're headwinds people yeah and look this is this is not to be all like nihilistic about shit absolutely not it's just to say that like when there's a whole country of people out there who don't necessarily agree

with you do not assume it's because they've been like brainwashed by right-wing media and donald trump or assume that it's just because they don't give a shit about your issues like people are complicated their lives are complicated they're not consuming the same media you are yeah i i think the bigger mistake the pundit class sometimes makes is to like scold people based on their own hierarchy of needs it's like i don't know maybe if you couldn't literally couldn't afford to put gas in your car you would care about that more than democracy. I get that one is bigger and existential and a longer term risk to all of us. But, you know, sometimes when you're dealing with something right now, that's what you care about. Yeah. It's like, wish everyone thought the way we did.

Of course. Yeah. Given they don't. So what do we do now? It's not. Yeah. And it also, you know, it's like we also pay in part because it's like the the conservative elite is driving is like funding and driving this massive propaganda apparatus and the vast majority of uh of news anchors of like of talk show hosts of all of them like they are they are not connect they're in a couple cities and they are not connected to the material needs of the vast majority of people and it's why why like you turn on like what's supposed to be the liberal, like the liberal version of fucking Sean Hannity, someone like Bill Maher. It's like half the episodes about Democrats being terrible and the other half's about cancel culture. It's like, there's very few places to go where this, where like the actual substance of what, like the, the, the actual lived experience

people are having with the state of the economy meets a actual rational conversation about what would help and what wouldn't. It just simply doesn't exist in our political media system at all. Meanwhile,

Carrie Lake is a local anchor for 20 years. Yeah. That seems like a flaw in the whole thing. Shooting her videos through two inches of fascist gauze.

That was my nice thing that I said about her. What was it? Good camera angles? In the last episode of PSA, when Hallie had us play that game where Dan and I each had to say something nice about the candidate,

my thing with Carrie Lake was her sepia-toned Instagram filter. Yeah, it does work. Anyway, this is all why, all of this is to say that these elections are close. All these races are very close they're all fucking margin of error races and the conversations you have between now and election day really will matter i will say uh sitting in a studio and talking about the state of democracy can feel

dark yesterday getting out to irvine being with hundreds and hundreds of young voters who are fired up, talking with AOC, like getting on the trail, that feels really good. So I highly recommend people do that. And then seeing all the assholes screaming, fuck Joe Biden, that felt less good. Honestly, I found them kind of funny. It made me have a sort of a pro wrestling vibe to the whole thing. It's good to have a heel. They do bore themselves out pretty quickly. It's're sort of it's like they start they start and then like halfway through the second speaker they're just like we're just gonna chant the same thing now although there was one there was one um there was one woman who was walking around with a flag that

said like american christian something and with like and just shouting bloody murder. And then all of a sudden, she disappeared for 30 seconds. She came back and she had a different flag, which was All Lives Matter. And it's like, so you were- Switched flags mid- Switched flags mid-rally.

Yeah. Switched flags mid-rally. Everyone knows that. Anyway, if you got a ballot sitting at home, Vote Save America has you covered. Our ballot tool has been updated with all the information you need about what's on your ballot, when and where

you can vote, and you can get reminders to do it. It's all in one convenient location now. Just head to votesaveamerica.com slash be a voter. B-A voter. Wait, was that the website? Just go to votesaveamerica.com

and hit enter after. Enough of these bespoke URLs. You're fine. You'll figure it out. Sign up. When we come back, our interview with AOC. We are so excited to welcome on to the pod, Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez. It's great to meet you.

Great to see you in person. Of course. Thank you. It's great to be here. We're sitting here at UC Irvine because we're all Katie Porter fans. We're about to go to a rally hosted by the Orange County Young Democrats. Just want to talk about the midterms because our listeners are freaking out. Maybe they probably refresh 538 too often,

too many Nates in their lives. They're not loving what they're seeing in the last couple of weeks. How are you feeling about the elections? And like, what's your pitch to our audience, to everyone about why we need to turn out in midterms and volunteer and kind of how you're feeling about things? Yeah, I mean, I think polling data,

it's a data point, but it's really not the end-all be-all. And if anything, it should act as just a motivator. The stakes of this midterm are so incredibly high. House, they have stated in no unclear terms that they intend to support a national criminal abortion ban, that they want to hold the United States economy hostage in order to gut Social Security and Medicare. And I mean, like the list goes on, climate change, criminalization of everything, all this stuff, not to mention just trying to put a halt to any of the progress that President Biden has been trying to make and the progress that he has been making. But if anything, I think that the discontent is that we need to be doing so much more, not so much less. But the stakes are really high right now. It's very serious. I was on a

flight on the way out here. And the flight attendant just kind of came up to me and she just started getting tears in her eyes. And she just said, I'm just so scared. I'm just so scared. Are we going to be OK? And what I had to really tell her was, listen, I'm not going to tell you not to worry. I think we need to work really, really hard because we are still very much at this very critical precipice of fascism in this country. And that's very, very real.

Yeah. So I noticed you led off with the concern about abortion access in this country and then, you know, the gutting of Social Security and Medicare. So, you know, I know Bernie Sanders has been talking about sort of warning that, hey, Democrats, we need to make sure we get the right balance in talking about both of those issues, not just talking about abortion access. Oh, yeah. I'm wondering, like, do you think there is an imbalance currently in the messaging? And if you do think there is one, what's the right balance in talking about, like, obviously critical issues? Yeah, I think that we can speak more forcefully to the intersection of class and identity issues. to the intersection of class and identity issues. A lot of times there's this accusation that's made that issues, if you're talking about gender rights, if you're talking about race issues

and racial inequities, that this is somehow separate or distinct from focusing on what quote unquote really matters, issues like class and inflation. And I think it's really important that we send a message that is that, I mean, really, it's not a buzzword, a message that is very distinctly intersectional. Abortion is a class issue. If you are working hourly and you get pregnant and you are not prepared to have this child, you are really concerned about generational poverty. And you are really concerned about putting food on the table, not just for yourself or any children you may already have. And the other way around, too, I think that we can beef up and be more aggressive in talking about root causes of inflation being corporate greed.

This is not, you know, inflation is kind of spoken about as this really vague kind of floaty concept, but that we're all feeling, right? Prices of things are going up, but we don't really talk about why. And we need to have a real confrontation about the consolidation of market power and the fact that increasingly the most basic goods that we have, housing, food, et cetera, are concentrating into oligopolies. And that it is these huge corporations that are price gouging just because they can, just because they want to. And it's not just, oh, prices are going up because of supply chain issues. It's really a lot more distinct than that. You mentioned sort of the dangers of fascism and authoritarianism. I think we all feel that. I know you feel that acutely. You were in the Capitol on

January 6th. Obviously, we had these hearings that we all paid super close attention to. You know, you ask most voters what they care about, and inflation tops the list. Abortion access tops the list. And I think, you know, in the New York Times poll, it was like 7% of people said threats of democracy in the way that we think about it. Election denial, all that kind of stuff. There was also like 40% of people would be willing to vote for an election denier. How do you balance the need to make sure people understand the threat that we're facing with also speaking to people's immediate concerns, which tend to be about issues that immediately impact their lives in a way that they can see? Yeah. I mean, I think we have two things here.

lives in a way that they can see. Yeah. I mean, I think we have two things here. We have long-term arguments and long-term issues and how we deal with issues long-term and a lot of these short-term arguments and issues. When I think about threats to democracy, when we message that, that in and of itself can seem like a vague message. We have to communicate in our senses. Good storytellers communicate in their five senses. What does it look like? What does it sound like? What does it smell like, taste like, if that applies? And so when we say threats to democracy, that doesn't give a visceral, sensory understanding of what that means. But if you are, you know, if you don't feel safe to vote, that I think is much more salient. And a lot of people increasingly don't feel safe even voting in person or acting as a poll worker or having a trans kid, which is also part of our threats to democracy, whether people's basic

civil rights are protected. Do you feel safe existing in public in society? Whether you're black or a woman walking down a street or whether you're trans or whatever that may be, whether you're homeless. And so I think when it comes to communicating that, that visceral case outside of the hearings of January 6th, how that's put into context and the threat that it is today, I think we could do a better job of that. But a lot of elections, a lot of times, are driven by very short-term issues, thinking, and priorities. And when you see this jockeying over narratives, it's about what we make urgent and how we respond to the urgent issues in our society right now. I think a great example of this in New York is public safety. I think that if you actually look at, if you do look at some of the public opinion polling, while public safety is a high

concern in a lot of areas, people's conception of what makes us safe has also changed dramatically. And it has changed dramatically in the direction of activists and advocates that really, you know, whose decades of work just splashed out to the rest of the American electorate in 2020. But we're seeing huge shifts in public opinion on the fact that housing, access to mental health care, et cetera, keeps us safe. And not only that, it's not only an opinion, we're starting to see the real public data come out saying that too. In the Bronx, one of the arguments that I've made is because there is an election denier in New York. I mean, they exist in New York City. Lee Zeldin is running for governor.

These are people who foundationally don't believe in the peaceful transition of power, you know? I mean, that's really what this is about. And so he's running on public safety. But one of the things that we've done is that we secured a community project fund. And we started a pilot project in Jacobi Hospital to treat people who are committing violence and who have been victims of violence. And we've reduced reoccurrence of crime by more than 50%. It's been more effective than any policing intervention. And so using that storytelling is really important because it's not just about what issues are salient, but it's about what we're saying about those issues. You built a very successful multiracial coalition, a working class coalition in the Bronx in your district a couple times now.

Obviously, the party has been having trouble with non-college voters for some time. Originally, it was white voters. Now it's starting to be Latino voters and even some black voters as well. Is this simply a matter of making a sharper economic argument? Are there cultural issues at play? Like how can Democrats sort of win back, uh, working class voters without a college degree? Uh, I think there's a couple of things. One, uh, I don't think we are aggressive on corporate power enough. I think that this, I think our party is shy. We're too scared. We're part of

the same, you know, our entire political system is designed to be very, very acquiescent to money. And the difference is that Republicans, that's not a, that is part of Republican ideology is to support corporate America. I think the Democratic Party, we really struggle because we're supposed to be the party of the working class. But in reality, there's a lot in our big tent, it's highly segmented. And I think that there is a lot of objections from that within our party, which prevents us from being as forceful on these issues as we can be. You know, and we can see this play out over and over across a lot of different issues. You look at insulin, right? We're able to cap it at 35 if you're insured.

What are we doing about the price of insulin for people who don't have insurance? And that's where it really requires that at one juncture or another, there has to be a reining in of what's happening here. And I think that the sensing of that conflict is part of the complications that we're seeing in some of this working class support. I also think there's a conversation to be had about men and male identity. Because when we look into this, I mean, it's not like, oh, we're shedding Latino voters

or we're shedding men. Yeah, young men too. Men. And it is important that we don't paint this with a broad brush because when we look into this, that is what's going to help us inform a strategy. And I can at least say with Latino voters, we've never tried as a party. The Democratic Party has not tried in terms of Latino electorates. And, I mean, where's our DREAM Act? Where is our immigration reform? And even recently with President Biden's marijuana executive order. I very much applaud that he went there, but

he exempted people who were convicted if they were convicted while they were undocumented. And that is 90%. We're looking at the overwhelming majority of people who have been convicted that would benefit from that pardon have status, like they have status complications. And so we really need to step up both in our efforts on campaign, but also our efforts in governance. And I see these conversations and it's tough because on the other side, they have no qualms. They have no qualms about having an anti-immigrant message. But I think we get scared of that. And that segmentation prevents a clear message. And that lack of clarity makes it hard to win people over.

I mean, I think another brand challenge we have as a party is I listen to you talk. And you're like, a few years ago when I was tending bar and trying to make the rent, you've lived the experience that a lot of voters have. And then you look at the Democratic leadership, and they may have lived that experience 50 years ago. But they don't seem, they don't look like a lot of the voters that we're trying to reach today, right? At this youth rally. How do you convince people you talk to on the trail that Democratic Party gets their challenges, will fight for them when they don't necessarily see themselves reflected in the people on TV all the time? Yeah. I mean, I'm honest with people.

Yeah, I mean, I'm honest with people. I'm not here to sell people on this idea that like our are the leadership of the Democratic Party, which is overwhelmingly from one generation, almost uniformly from one generation. And overwhelmingly, from a lopsided class perspective, is the same as me or you or anything else like that. The Republican Party, like worse, but still, I think this is why I've put a lot of effort into down ballot candidates across the country. I started an organization called Courage to Change, and a lot of it was motivated by our housing crisis because it's one of the biggest issues that we have right now. But also, we can't just solve it federally. We need city councils. We need municipalities.

fighting real deal candidates, especially on a local level. And we've done this and it's been very successful in New York City. Tiffany Caban, Zohran Mamdani, Jabari Brisport, Julia Salazar. People are like, holy shit, there's like cool people in my area that like are actually saying things that I never thought I'd hear a Democrat say. Jamal Bowman. Yeah, there's like all these exciting people. Yeah. yeah and so you know I think party leadership is a distinct conversation but I think what actually matters more is is are you excited to vote for anybody on your ballot who's going to turn it out on your ballot and the more local you get I actually think the more flexible and exciting your candidates can be. Because the broader your basis, those people need to appeal to like everybody and it kind of can water things

down a little. Yeah. All right. Let's talk about some important things. Have you listened to Midnight's yet? I have not listened to Midnight's yet. I need to. I know. What am I doing? Just to be clear, we're recording this. It's Sunday. It's been out for 72 hours. It took me like two weeks to listen to Renaissance too. You've flown on a plane since. You've had a whole plane ride. Were we reading a briefing book? I had to listen to the whole

thing through too. I'm not gonna do the one song, wait for a song on a radio either. Yeah, I hope not. I hope notic adams recently did a press conference where he declared war on the rats uh do you support that war and more importantly do you support hilarious press conferences where they talk about the rats as the enemy and is it something that could unite new york city and maybe the country listen i will say I'm so sorry I'm I'm a huge department of sanitation stan and so sanitation I'm department of sanitation I am the secretary and so I am a hundred percent biggest fan of

New York City DO uh DOS did department of sanitation um so yeah I think it's great I think it's wonderful. Do you have a Halloween costume picked out? I was shopping for them on the flight over. What were you thinking about? I was thinking like, you know, if I could do like tune squad with my dog, that would be fun.

But I'm still taking suggestions. And while you're out here, will you be going to In-N-Out? And is there anything you can do at a federal level to take on the quality of the fries? Thank you for saying this. People need to talk about it. Thank you for saying this. Because every time I come out here, everyone's like, Oh my god, In-N-Out, In-N-Out. And I'm like, my controversial non political opinion is that it's overrated. Yes, yes. but it's because like i'm a big

fry person what are they doing what is this dry fry thing going on here drive there's other fries nearby they can sample and learn i agree and then the people say get order them well done i gotta do a special order make them right yeah thank you i mean you said it all so that's it that's all I had to say thank you AOC for being here of course no thank you thank you all really appreciate it

thanks to AOC for joining us today thanks to everyone in Irvine who talked to us and we'll talk to you soon yeah if you live in Orange County you you better help Katie Porter turn on the polls. You better help Katie Porter.

Please get to the polls. That whiteboard is for you. We need her. I don't know what that means. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive producer is Michael Martinez. Our senior producer is Andy Gardner Bernstein. Our producers are Haley Muse and Olivia Martinez.

It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis sound engineered the show. Thanks to Hallie Kiefer, Ari Schwartz, Sandy Gerard, Andy Taft, and Justine Howe for production support. And to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Phoebe Bradford, Milo Kim, and Amelia Montuth. Our episodes are uploaded as videos at youtube.com slash podsaveamerica.