Pod Save America - “The Electoral College is f*cking stupid.”

Episode Date: March 21, 2019

2020 candidates embrace a host of democratic reforms to give more people a bigger voice, Donald Trump eagerly awaits Robert Mueller’s report, Democrats work to maintain enthusiasm ahead of 2020, and Joe Biden strategizes about fundraising and a potential running mate. Then Congresswoman Lauren Underwood sits down with Jon Lovett about the change a new generation is bringing to the House. Also – Pod Save America is going on tour! Get your tickets now: crooked.com/events.

Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Dan Pfeiffer. Later in the pod, you'll hear Jon Lovett's conversation with Congresswoman Lauren Underwood, who stopped by Crooked headquarters this week. Before that, we're going to talk about the news, from why Democrats are embracing ideas like eliminating the Electoral College and the filibuster, to Trump's new strategy around a potential Mueller report, to the latest on the candidates looking to beat the president in 2020.

On the new episode of Pod Save the World, Tommy talks about online extremism with Charlie Wartzel of the New York Times. On Keep It, the gang talks about the new Elizabeth Holmes documentary, and they interviewed Busy Phillips of Busy Tonight. Tickets are still available for our shows in New England, in Boston, and Concord. You can get them at crooked.com slash events. If you live in Boston, you might also be seeing a promo video that involves Tommy and me teaching Lovett how to speak in a Boston

accent. Might be coming to a Facebook page near you. It's worth checking out. All right, let's start with the news. So over the last few weeks, a lot of the Democratic presidential candidates have been talking a lot about what I will call small D Democratic reforms. During a CNN town hall this week, Elizabeth Warren endorsed eliminating the Electoral College. Multiple candidates have talked about adding seats to the Supreme Court or instituting term limits on justices. They've talked about statehood for D.C. and Puerto Rico. They've talked about getting rid of gerrymandering and making it easier to vote. And you might have heard me nag Cory Booker about getting rid of the filibuster in our interview this week. And he did change his position a little, saying he's not

closed the door on it. Dan, why do you think a big discussion about these democratic reforms is happening now in this campaign in a way that it hasn't in any other presidential campaign I can remember? And why is it so important? Why should people care about these seemingly unconnected set of proposals? I like that you call them small d democratic reforms as opposed to Soros-funded socialist power grabs? Yeah, I thought, you know, I'm a messaging guy, so. Good job. Good job. I think that this set of issues has risen to the top for a couple of reasons. One is there is sort of a homogeneity on policy issues where people are pretty close to each other on what they would do if they were president. And the area of distinction is how they would get

those things done. And I think these, this discussion comes from the fact that both Trump's election and the behavior of Mitch McConnell and the Republicans, both before Trump's election and certainly after Trump's election, has shown that there are fundamental flaws in our political system, that the system itself is based on this notion that you would have two parties operating in equally good faith, trying to achieve different visions for the country, that you would have people who would be president or a Senate leader who would put patriotism above profit-making or lining their own pockets, and that people would naturally abide by some set of good behavior. And we now know that's not true. We know that the Republican Party, both through Trump but also before Trump, have exploited the loopholes in the system to push forward a essentially plutocratic minority rule in this country.

And something has to be done about it because the system can't sustain a world in which the voices of the majority of Americans are diminished by a set of anti-democratic rules and laws in this country. I think that last point is key. I mean, we now have one political party that's established minority rules by maintaining a set of anti-democratic rules, laws, and institutions. The last two Republican presidents won elections without winning the popular vote. Republicans held on to the House of Representatives for so long because they got to draw congressional districts and basically pick their voters. Republicans have an advantage in the Senate because their voters, as polarization has continued, now live in rural, mostly sparsely populated states. Plus, in addition to that,

there's a rule called the filibuster, which says that nothing can get past the Senate without 60 votes. So that is going to benefit the party that represents more states, especially more sparsely populated states. And between the two presidents who lost the popular vote and the Republican Senate leader who represents the population of Kentucky,

those three men were able to install four extremely conservative justices to the Supreme Court. That is the situation in our country right now. That one party, using a bunch of laws and institutions and rules, has established minority rule in a country. institutions and rules has established minority rule in a country. And so the majority of people in this country, when they go to vote, their voices are not being heard like they could because of all these other rules and institutions. And because, by the way, I mean, the thing that's really driving this is that as the way that the parties have sorted themselves over the last couple of decades means that Democrats are increasingly living in densely populated urban areas, and Republicans are living in sparsely populated rural areas. And so the states that comprise those rural areas are having more power, and their politicians that

they're electing having more power in Washington. And if this continues this way, and we do not do anything about it, it is extremely unlikely the Democrats will ever win 60 votes in the Senate, that we will ever be able to pass any kind of progressive majority. We could continue to see popular vote losers become the president of the United States. And we could continue for a generation to have a Supreme Court where no Democratic president and thus the voters that elected that Democratic president ever have a say in who their Supreme Court justices. and thus the voters that elected that Democratic president, ever have a say in who their Supreme Court justice is. It's not great, Dan.

No, it's not great. And, like, obviously we are biased. We are progressives. We want progressive policies to be the law in this country. That's all true. But I think you just have to take a step back and look at this through just a nonpartisan lens, which is what is better for democracy, that we hang on to these outdated, anachronistic, archaic norms that were written at a time in which we were 13 colonies and not a large country of 300 some million Americans. Or we change the rules so that people that the actual majority of Americans get to have a say in their government. Because I can tell you that what will be deeply damaging to American democracy, as flawed as it has been in history, but as we know it, is if generations of a

progressive majority are ruled by a conservative minority because of how the Supreme Court's constructed, because of the Electoral College, because of filibustered how the Senate is done. And that is dangerous. And the argument should not be what is best for Democrats or Republicans. It is what does the majority want? And then it is for the Democrats and Republicans or whatever other parties may come to exist one day to argue for what that is. Because the Republicans had a choice after they lost the 2008 election. They could develop a set of policies that were broadly appealing, or they could change the rules to diminish the voices of the people who wanted progressive policies. And so they just – instead of trying to win the game, they changed the rules. And I think large swaths of the public and large swaths of Democratic elected officials

in the Senate in particular are completely numb to what is happening in this country. And that is deeply dangerous. Yeah. And look, the general thrust of American history has been towards reforms, constitutional amendments, and laws to give more people more of a voice in this country. There was one point where we didn't have people directly elect the president. And so the electors and the electoral college elected the president. Then we changed that so people have a choice. People can vote directly for the president. We used to have a situation where people couldn't directly vote for senators.

Right? And then not to mention amendments to the Constitution that protected voting rights, that gave citizenship to everyone, that gave women suffrage, that gave African-American suffrage and equal rights. Every reform and law, or at least the general sweep of them, has been towards the general direction of giving more people more of a voice. And I think that if Democrats argue that, that's what we have to keep in mind. You're absolutely right. It's not about giving one party an advantage over the other. If we have a system where the majority of people in this country are represented adequately

and those people are Republicansans but because republicans have policies that more people like then fine but that's not what's happening right now you know it's the exact opposite so the question is do voters care about these reforms and if not how do we make them care they probably don't care at least with the same level of passion that we apparently care about it. But I think the reason that, you know, you were just nagging Cory Booker and that we have raised in that White House and tried to figure out how we take the things that Barack Obama ran on and a significant majority of Americans voted for and turn that into actual policy. How do you deliver on those campaign promises? And I think this discussion around the filibuster of the Electoral College, what you do in the Supreme Court is all – it's a proxy for a more important question.

It's what is your theory of change? How are you going to succeed where others have failed? How are you going to take these promises and turn them into policy? And I think voters care probably about that larger question and are interested in that larger question more so than the sort of the details of how you get there. But it's like why are you going to be different? Why are you going to be able to enact change that others have felt? And I think that is something that voters do care about. And look, and I was saying this to Cory Booker, right? Like, what's driving anger, disgust with politics, cynicism, apathy,

people turning away from the political system is gridlock in Washington. The fact that Washington never seems to get anything done. This was true when Barack Obama started his race in 2007. We saw it throughout his presidency. We have seen it recently. We saw it in 2016. Like people are angry that nothing ever seems to get done. Pundits treat that like people are upset that everyone's yelling at each other and there's no bipartisanship. I think people care even less about bipartisanship than they do. They just want action from Washington. They want to see that the people they're electing are actually solving their problems. And my concern is if a Democrat gets elected in 2020 and it turns out that all of the big promises they made on the campaign trail

were just promises because they don't have an actual plan to get them passed, that will deepen people's cynicism and lead to more Republican governance and more people like Trump, more demagogues, more populists. Our job in this election, and if a Democrat wins, is to prove that a Democratic president, a Democratic Congress, and Democrats in general can actually bring about the change that they talked about on the campaign trail. To me, like, that's even more important than your policy agenda for the reason that you said. Everyone's policy agenda is pretty progressive.

There's differences. Some are a little more moderate than others. But generally, they're all moving in the right direction. The difference is, what's your theory for how you're going to get that passed? And that's why like, you know, people talk about how, you know, new and ambitious Elizabeth Warren's policy ideas are. I think what makes her even more fit to lead is her embrace of these democratic reforms. And she's been a leader in the field in embracing a lot of these. Her, you know, Pete Buttigieg has embraced a lot of them as well. We've heard Jay Inslee, Beto O'Rourke. Some of these people are really embracing these reforms. And that, to me, is a really good sign.

And I think more candidates will. I think a lot of them, Kamala Harris said she was interested in abolishing the Electoral College as well, which was great. So I think a lot more of them will be catching on to this. What was most interesting, I thought Elizabeth Warren's most interesting answer of this entire campaign has been when she was asked what bill she would do first, right? Because that, theoretically, you have the most political capital immediately after you're inaugurated. The first bill you take up is the one you have the most likelihood to succeed on, right? So that is, like, prioritization is a really important question. It's one that we've all been asking people in the 2020 interviews we've done. And Elizabeth

Warren's answer was not Wall Street reform. It was not her childcare policy or Medicare for all. It was her anti-corruption legislation. And her argument was that everything else would be easier if you could reduce the influence of special interests in Congress by passing that bill. Really smart. That is a theory of change, right? That is a very well thought out theory of how you go about passing your agenda. And I think that is the standard that Democratic voters, whether they're in Iowa or New Hampshire or any of the other states that people are going to come to, should push them on that. It's not just what you're going to do, it's how are you going to get it done.

Because you can have the best policy agenda in the world. It can be the exact thing I want. But if you have no concept or no actual theory of how to get it done with an understanding of the moment we're in and who the opposition is, because you've got to understand that in this world with this Republican Party, bolstered by a propaganda operation like Fox News, funded by billionaires like the Kochs, that it is a fucking war to keep the lights on, let alone to transform the economy into a green economy or to move large portions of the population to Medicare. It is not as simple as going down the hall to talk to Mitch McConnell or having more people over for drinks or playing golf with Kevin McCarthy or someone. You have to have a theory,

and voters should push people on that because someone who can get something done is incredibly important here. Yeah. And look, I think a lot of voters either don't know about these reforms, don't think about them that much, but when you poll them, people have been in favor, majorities have been in favor of doing away with the Electoral College since the late 80s, according to polls. I looked this up, but I saw like only one poll about the filibuster. There was a narrow plurality that wanted to get rid of the filibuster. I'm sure no one or most people don't know what the fuck the filibuster is. So I think the field and all of us would benefit from a lot more polling on these issues. And hopefully that will happen over the course of this race. Let's talk a little bit about the media reaction to this, which is as dumb as

you might imagine. Headline in NPR, Democratic candidates embrace the risk of radical ideas. They got, you know, governor of the D.C. Green Room, Ed Rendell, in that piece saying Democrats will lose to Trump if they embrace these reforms. And here's James Homan of the Washington Post, quote, it's discordant to watch Dems warn in apocalyptic terms that Trump's disregarding sacred norms and destroying the republic in one breath while calling for court packing, abolishing the Electoral College, ending private insurance and paying out reparations in the next. I don't know why those last two things are part of this discussion. I guess that that tells you something right there dan you want to take that one

i want to tee off here before the twitter hordes uh go after james homan he's he's a pretty good he's a good reporter his daily watch most newsletter is is. Yeah, no, I love it. So I just want to not tell people. I vehemently disagree with this tweet, as you will hear in a second, but he's not the cause of all the problems in American journalism. So I just want to stipulate that. This idea is so fucking stupid it hurts my brain the argument is basically is that the democrats are responding to unconstitutional power grabs from the republicans by using constitutional processes processes to ensure that more people's voices are heard to that they're undertaking a crazy idea to make it so that the person who gets the most votes wins the election like what the fuck

are we talking about like the democrats are not proposing stealing any supreme court seats they're proposing passing laws to be signed by presidents passing constitutional amendments to be ratified by state legislatures like and then to even put in the to put in the same bucket under radical power grabs, taking power away from the insurance industry so that more people could have access to affordable quality health care is bananas. It is just this desire, this like fucking tractor beam of asinine conventional wisdom pulling people into a both sides argument when there are not two sides of the argument. There is one side. There is the right side. It is the fact that the Republicans have disregarded every norm, every bit of their constitutional duty to protect Trump, to hoard power, to benefit billionaires and Wall Street, et cetera. And all Democrats want to do is fix the problems that this period in American history have revealed in the U.S. political system. Right. And also every norm that Donald Trump has broken, including possibly some laws, has been about anti-majoritarian, anti-democratic, authoritarian moves.

autocratic, authoritarian moves, right? Like calling the press the enemy of the people, you know, trying to, oh, selling access and influence to your White House by, you know, letting foreign leaders stay in your hotels and pocketing the money and having members at Mar-a-Lago pitch you on policy, right? Like every norm he is breaking is about consolidating power is about less democracy you know and so it's like there's a complete and and he's breaking the norms like you said we're just asking to pass some laws right like if we can't pass them we can't pass them or we're trying you know we're trying to ask them for some constitutional amendments which will be also you know pretty hard to uh pretty hard to pass But we're just asking about them. We're not saying, like, let's elect our president and then have that president declare a national emergency, say, to pass a bunch of legislation. We're not proposing that. selling access i think i would just like to note a story that should be the biggest story in america which is that the woman running the sex trafficking ring in florida that ensnared bob

craft is a moral logo member selling access to chinese officials uh as part of an influence peddling scam through trump's privately held club. Just completely under the radar. That is like textbook scandal. And we're too busy having a national conversation about the George Conway and John McCain and everything else. But Dan, the Democratic response to that is to move more people onto Medicare. Extreme. Radicals.

Extreme. Hashtag radical. So the question is, is there any political risk here for Democrats potentially? Trump clearly sensed some sort of opportunity when he tweeted the following this week, quote, The Democrats are getting very, in quotation marks, strange. They now want to change the voting age to 16, abolish the Electoral College, and increase significantly the number of Supreme Court justices. Actually, you've got to win at the ballot box. I mean, he didn't actually win the majority of the people

at the ballot box, but that's neither here nor there. How do we avoid that trap, Dan? It's not avoidable. Yes, there is political risk. There is political risk in getting out of bed in the morning. And the question is, how do you manage that risk? And I do think it's important that if Democrats are going to propose these reforms, that they are specific about what they mean, right? And I think there's been some... It's early in the campaign, but a lot of people are like, yeah, let's open the door to court packing or let's open the door to filibuster reform, whatever else. And so let's say what that means. Like when we had people to judge on, he he didn't he he didn't outline what a specific proposal on court packing was, but he floated an idea that probably makes a lot of sense to people by having a larger Supreme Court where some members and members have to be selected on a bipartisan basis. So I think if you're going to do it, you have to be specific about it because that makes it harder for Trump and the Republicans to demagogue.

But ultimately what he wants to do is scare the public because any election involving an incumbent is a contest between frustration with the status quo and fear of change. And Trump was able to win the election by telling people that their frustration with the status quo exceeded their fear of Trump as president. And now he's going to try to do the reverse with Democrats. But that doesn't – we also – we've talked about this in 2018. We've talked about this in relation to immigration or Medicare for all or whatever it is, is that Trump is going to lie about your position. So if you think you can be for keeping electoral college and keeping the Supreme Court and Trump and the Republicans are not going to attack you every day for court packing and eliminating electoral college, then you're insane. Then you have been sleeping through the last many years of Republican politics.

So before we move on, we've talked at length about filibuster and court reform on this pod before, but we haven't actually talked much about eliminating the Electoral College. We mentioned that Elizabeth Warren called for this during her town hall this week. It's something Pete Buttigieg has been talking about for quite a while. He talked about it in his CNN town hall a couple of weeks before. Kamala Harris told Jimmy Kimmel she'd be open to the discussion this week. Better O'Rourke said, quote, there's a lot of wisdom in the idea. What do you think, Dan? Good idea.

The electoral college is fucking stupid. It is a stupid idea. It is an old idea. It makes absolutely zero sense. The idea that we are exist in a system where a minority of Americans can elect the president because of what state they happen to live in is such an outdated idea. It is – it should be eliminated. And the fears about like the changes that would rot are also stupid. It is so common sense that it's stunning and telling that we actually haven't done this a long time ago. So, you know, the big argument, well, there are a couple arguments against doing this, right? The first argument is this is what the founders intended.

You know, the founders in all their brilliance. And so we must not change what the founders intended. And look, we have already talked about this just on this pod, right? what the founders intended. And look, we have already talked about this just on this pod, right? Like the founders also set up a system where people couldn't, you know, directly elect the president of the Senate and the people who could participate in democracy were white male landowners, right? So like the founders intentions have gone a little bit astray on who participates in our democracy. That's number one. So the other big argument against this is, okay, well, if that happens, then presidential candidates will only compete in densely populated areas

in the cities, right? The election will just take place in Los Angeles and New York City and in Chicago and places like that, and no one else will have a voice. What do you say to that argument? Well, John, I have some thoughts on this, but you and I have, we've done a lot of traveling during presidential campaigns. Yeah. How many times did you think we went to Ohio, Florida, Colorado, say, in the last, I don't know, month or so of the 08 or 2012 election? All the times.

All the time. So fucking often you know exactly what hotel you're going to stay in. We went all the time. How many times did we go to Idaho? Never been. How many times did we go to Los Angeles in the last month? Just to raise money. Yeah, but to actually campaign and see voters?

Never. No campaigning and seeing voters. You go visit with some rich people, you get their money, and then you do a show. Like Pod Save America. If you're in LA, everyone, please come do Pod Save America. We want to change the electoral college so more people will be here to do Pod Save America. We want to change the Electoral College so more people will be here to do Pod Save America. People are already campaigning in a narrow set of states. And the idea that they would only go to densely populated areas – and people only go to mostly densely populated areas in those states now.

You go to the largest media market. You go to where there are voters. This is not a problem that – you're not creating a problem and you're not fixing a problem. It is you're simply changing the fact that you think it's a good idea that the majority of Americans should be able to pick the president. And there are densely populated areas like Atlanta, Jackson, Mississippi, or places like that that candidates never go to that they might go to now because that vote right now, a vote, a vote in Georgia, at least before this upcoming election and a vote in Mississippi is worth almost nothing because you already

know how the outcome is going to be. But if you could get some number of votes out of those states, you would go to those states. It would actually make it that people would campaign more places, not fewer places. And frankly, it seems to be the reason that Elizabeth Warren wanted to have that town hall in Mississippi and break that news in Mississippi, because Mississippi is a state with a very high percentage of African-Americans who live in that state. But because the state is so Republican, because of the system that we have, presidential candidates don't go there because they know it's going to go to the Republican. have presidential candidates don't go there because they know it's going to go to the Republican. And if it was about stitching together a national coalition and not a coalition that adds up to 270 electoral votes in different states, presidential candidates might go to Mississippi

and campaign there and talk to those voters and give those voters a voice. And this goes for both sides as well. If you're a Republican in California, do you really think about going to the polls to elect the president? Like, might you think about it a little more if you knew that your vote counted towards a national popular vote, as opposed to thinking, well, California always goes to Democrats, so what does my vote matter? I grew up in Massachusetts, and then I lived in D.C., and then I lived in Chicago, and now I live in Los Angeles, right? Like, I have never lived in D.C. and then I lived in Chicago and now I live in Los Angeles, right? Like I have never lived in a place where my vote for president, where I thought that my vote for president would really make much of a difference because I lived in deep blue states

all the time. Think of what would be on everyone's mind about voting, knowing that your vote could add to a national popular vote tally that would then directly elect the president of the United States. Think of the strategies that would change on behalf of the presidential campaigns, where they would go, the different coalitions they would try to assemble, the different states they would try to go to. And also the idea that you can't just campaign in the cities. Beto O'Rourke campaigned in Texas. Do you think he spent all his time in Austin, Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio? He did not. Do you think Stacey Abrams spent all of her time in Atlanta? She did not. She organized a lot of people in rural areas. Do you think Andrew Gillum spent all his time in the population centers in Florida? He did not. These progressive candidates who are running in some of these very red states in 2018, they actually went around those states to try to assemble a coalition beyond just the population centers. I mean, the other way to think about this is just from the perspective of a campaign, how it spends its money, how it spends its time,

is right now a Republican candidate has zero incentive to narrow the margin in California. A Democratic candidate has zero incentive to narrow the margin in Texas or Louisiana or any of those states like that. So now it would make so much sense in a popular vote election for a Republican to campaign and spend money in California, because if you can just narrow that margin by five points, that's millions of votes that are available to you, right? If you narrow the margin in Texas for a Democrat from nine, even if you lose a state, but you narrow it from, I think, the seven or nine that Hillary lost, two to three, that's millions of votes into your tally.

And so there is actually not really, other than clinging to this idea of 13 separate colonies, there really is not a legitimate argument for the Electoral College. Just from a pure, what is good for the country? How candidates would spend their time? How candidates would spend their money? What would increase voter participation in this country? All of the arguments push towards eliminating the Electoral College. Just one last stat here. 94% of the 2016 presidential campaign events were in 12 states. 24 states plus the District of Columbia got zero campaign visits in 2016.

24 states. I think we settled this. Let's get rid of that. That's the Electoral College. So the question is, what do we have to do to eliminate the Electoral College? Obviously, this is in the Constitution. So there is a constitutional amendment.

Constitutional amendments are extraordinarily difficult to pass because you need two-thirds majorities. You need state legislatures to ratify, right? But there's another way to do this. It is something called the National Popular Vote Interstate Comp this. It is something called the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. This is how it works. Individual states change their own laws

so that they award their electoral votes to the winner of the National Popular Vote. And the compact doesn't take effect until states representing 270 electoral votes opt in and pass these laws. Once they do, the winner of the national popular vote would be guaranteed a pool of 270 electoral votes from the states that are part of the compact. This week, Colorado just passed the law to make themselves part of the compact, which brings the total electoral votes right now in the compact to 181. New Mexico, Delaware, Nevada, Maine, and Oregon could all be next. They have Democratic governors who've been on record as supporting this. We won Democratic majorities in some of these states in 2018. And so if these states pass the compact as well, it brings it to 206 electoral votes,

which is just 64 votes short of ending the Electoral College. So this is actually something that could pass without a constitutional amendment. Pretty exciting. Yeah. Now we need to get some of those solidly red states to do the same thing. Yeah, I need some of the big states here. I need some of the big states and some of the red states. I think those last 64 votes will be pretty difficult.

But who knows? Who knows? Can I do one addendum to our norms discussion that I think – Sure. I don't want there to be confusion because in the beginning, you mentioned the things people are talking about including D.C. and Puerto Rico becoming states. Right. And sometimes when we say this, it leads to some confusion of what our actual position is on this, which is that DC should become a state. That should be one of the first things that a new

Democratic president, Democratic majority does. But Puerto Rico should decide its own future. And if it wants to become a state, Congress should do that. If it wants to become independent, they should do that. If they want another option, they should do that. Just sometimes we hear from people who think we're using the people of Puerto Rico as a political pawn here, and we're not. We think Puerto Rico should pick its path, and then the U.S. government should do that. D.C. has indicated it wants statehood. It should have statehood. It should become a state.

Again, it fits with our larger theme here. More democracy. People get to choose. If people want to choose that they become a state, great. If they don't want to, that's okay too. Just give more people a voice in our democracy. That's what we're saying. All right, let's talk about the investigation of the president. I don't know if you've noticed, Dan, but Trump has about the investigation of the president. I don't know if you've noticed, Dan, but Trump has been acting up a bit lately.

He's a little unwell. He continued his feud with deceased Senator John McCain, complaining he didn't receive a thank you for giving him the kind of funeral he wanted. I don't even know where to begin on that one. He lashed out at White House senior advisor Kellyanne Conway's husband, George, and he attacked Robert Mueller himself, saying, quote, I know that he's conflicted and I know that his best friend is Comey, who's a bad cop. He also complained that even though he had one of the, quote,

greatest elections of all time in the history of this country, now Mueller gets to write the report when no one voted for him. Dan, do these seem like the deranged musings of an innocent man? They certainly do not seem like the musings of someone who is feeling very centered and comfortable in their own personal situation. Yeah, it's not great. I know we never want to ascribe strategy to the things Trump is doing, because his strategy is to watch Fox News and then immediately say or tweet the thing that most fires the synapses of his very addled brain. But like we are all talking about the Conways and their marriage and what it means that Trump did this and this feud with John McCain. And my personal opinion on both of those stories, including the John McCain story, is I do not give a shit. We all knew a long time ago that Trump was an asshole.

That is part of his brand. He is advertised as assholery for years. We don't have to talk about it anymore. It's gross that he attacks McCain. I don't give two shits about the Conways either way. But let's move on and talk about the most important thing, which is the fact that the president is involved in multiple criminal enterprises and a massive amount of corruption. And somewhere in there, there is a message and a strategy. It's just pretty fucking hard to find so well it is hard to find because so the house voted last week 420 to nothing on a resolution demanding that

muller's work be made public upon completion lindsey graham then blocked a similar resolution in the senate he actually asked to amend it to include the appointment of a new special counsel to look into hillary's emails I shit you not. But then Trump has said, quote, and he said this again yesterday, let it come out, let the people see it. That's up to the attorney general. So what do you think is going on there? Does Trump really want people to see the Mueller report? And when will we see the Mueller report? I don't know whether we'll see it or not. You know, we've had long conversations with Marcy Wheeler and others about how it could become public one day, regardless of what Attorney General Barr decides. But Trump also swore up and down that he would be more than happy to testify or be interviewed by Mueller. And he did not do

those things. And so there is zero connection between what he says and what he does. And there is no question that all of those Republican House members who voted that way will find a way to twist themselves into some sort of pretzel logic that will allow them to justify that vote and justify defending the Trump Justice Department for not releasing the report. Right. the Trump Justice Department for not releasing the report. Right. Well, so we get a preview of how Republicans are likely to spin this report from the Associated Press, which ran a story this week that said the following, quote, Trump and his allies are starting to see Mueller's investigation as something potentially very different, a political opportunity. With Robert Mueller's findings expected any day, the president has grown increasingly

confident the report will produce what he insisted all along. No clear evidence of a conspiracy between Russia and his 2016 campaign. And Trump and his advisors are considering how to weaponize those possible findings for the 2020 race, according to current and former White House officials and presidential confidants who spoke on condition of anonymity. Dan, is being investigated for multiple felonies and watching some of your closest aides go to jail actually good for Trump? Imagine the editorial meeting around the table of the Associated Press where they're like, wow, we've written so many stories about why the criminal investigation into the president is bad for the president. What if we wrote a story about how it's good for the president?

That is like a it's like a sports radio hot take that burns. It's so stupid. It is not. There's no world in which is good for the president. It's also shitty journalism because you're just transcribing the spin without any level of scrutiny to that spin. Right. The fact that the president is having a fucking meltdown over the last few days suggests that maybe he's not so confident that this report will be good for him. And the fact that his allies, Republicans in Congress, and his wholly owned propaganda network are out shitting all over Mueller in his report suggests that maybe they're not so confident this is a good thing. Because if they thought this thing was going to, A, be a political winner, and B, be a political winner by declaring his innocence, then they would not be undermining the legitimacy of said report. So it's an insane spin, and it's

sort of embarrassing to have transcribed that with zero scrutiny. But I will say, I expect that the media, the mainstream media, or at least much of the media, has set this bar so high now where if, you know, Robert Mueller doesn't come out and say this man must be impeached, or if he doesn't indict Don Jr. or Jared Kushner or anyone else, then they'll say, or if there's not like, you know, as we've always talked about, the recording of the phone call between Donald donald trump and vladimir putin where they say hey let's collude um then somehow this whole thing is going to be this big disappointment a problem for democrats a win for donald trump and you can imagine all those analysis pieces

getting getting written you can imagine cable news running crazy with this um and you know i don't i don't quite know what democrats do about it except you know bang their heads against the wall and scream but it does seem pretty wild that given the information we already know about the president's uh criminality uh his advisors proven criminality and all the other corruption that's going on in this administration, how that can be good for him. I don't know. I'm like pre angry about this.

Like I already know exactly what's going to happen. I already know who's going to say what I know who's going to write what I can read the fucking chyrons on TV. I know what my reaction is going to be. I already know what I'm going to tweet. I know what you and I are going to text about. I know what I'm going to yell in that podcast. I have seen the future. I know how this is going and it's going to be really fucking annoying. But, but it is, let's get this thing

out of the way. Let's get this fucking report over with. Let's turn it in Bob Mueller. If you got to send some people to jail, let's send them to jail. If you're not, let's get the report out. Let's go through this ritual process where the press decides that this is a winner for Trump, that Democrats overplayed their hand. Oh my God, what are Democrats going to do? It's over. People will start pre-drafting Trump's second inaugural. Let's get that out of the way. Everyone needs to focus on the fact that Bob Mueller ain't going to solve our fucking problem. The only way Trump is getting out of here is if we, not positive America, we, the American public, do the hard work of winning elections, just like we did in 2018. We knew Bob Mueller wasn't going to save the Democrats

from not getting control of the House. So we have to know that Bob Mueller is not the solution to our problem. We have to beat Trump at the ballot box. So let's get this behind us and start focusing on that. Dan, there's some good news. By saying this right now, you've ensured that before this podcast comes out, Bob Mueller will come out with a host of indictments and potentially save us all. John, I have free – I knew this was a possibility today because the chatter is quite high in Washington that the Mueller report is coming anytime soon. My afternoon is free basically after 1 o'clock today. I am ready for emergency pods, bonus pods, live tweeting of things. I am prepared for the rage that will come when this report does not – because the only thing the press would accept would be just one

page that just says guilty guilty and then and then bob muller bob muller perp walking donald trump out of the white house that's what they're looking for yes perp walk donald trump out of the white house in cuffs with bob muller and he's got his hands raised high victory that's that's what that's what some people think it's gonna happen it would be like one of those huge busts where they also take pence down and n and Nancy Pelosi just moves into the office. Anything short of Nancy Pelosi moving herself in the office by five today is a massive loss for Democrats and Trump the election. And then at the end of the episode, she just puts on her shades, just walks out of Capitol Hill, walks down to the White House, takes a seat. That's it. That's the end. Roll the credits.

She will only govern in those sunglasses. All right. It's a good segue to what we really need to do in 2020. There were a pair of somewhat concerning stories about Democratic enthusiasm heading into the next election that ran this week. The first was by Matt Iglesias at Vox, who wrote about what he believes is the demobilization of the resistance since the midterms. He said that there wasn't a mass mobilization around the emergency declaration from Trump. There wasn't a mass mobilization forcing a Senate vote on the House Democrats anti-corruption pro voting rights bill, HR1. Our friend Ezra Levin of Indivisible responded saying there was plenty of activism around both of those issues. But Ezra Levin of Indivisible responded saying there was plenty of activism around both of those issues. But Ezra did agree that we have got to build political engagement now in advance of 2020, that we can't wait till 2020.

In the other piece, Washington Post reporter Philip Bump noted that in special elections before 2018, Democrats overperformed by an average of nine points, overperformed their usual margin. But in the special elections since the midterms, the ones we've had recently, which I haven't even noticed them all, to tell you the truth, but there have been a bunch, and Republicans have overperformed by one point and have already picked up four seats held by Democrats. So first overall question, how much should Democrats be worried about complacency heading into 2020? As we say, or as I say, I guess, worry about everything, panic about nothing. Yes, we should be worried.

I think in both these pieces, they're sort of two separate things, but they are related around the enthusiasm question. I think it is unfair, to talk about the Vox piece for a sec, to expect Democrats to have a same level of civil disobedience response we had to taking healthcare away from people or banning all Muslims from coming to this country, to the moving around of federal dollars for small portions of a fence that will be built. Like, it's not the same thing, right? Right.

I don't think you can – the emergency declaration has long-term process concerns about how our government functions. But the actual result of it is not something that is immediate or real or affecting people. The building of the wall itself is something people should mobilize around, but this is a very small piece of it, and it's a very esoteric sort of dumb argument, and everyone knows that everyone's sort of playing a part in a fake game here. So I'm very cognizant and receptive to Ezra's response to this. But we do have to assume that Republican enthusiasm is going to

be through the fucking roof. And we have to remember that Republican enthusiasm in 2010 swept them to one of the largest, at least in terms of seat pickup, elections ever, and then they got their ass kicked in 2012. And so you have to recognize that 18 can teach us lessons about how to win in 20, but it's not predictive of what's going to happen in 20. So we have to be even better, even smarter, even more enthusiastic. In a larger presidential field, you actually need more enthusiasm. You need more people to come out because small increases in enthusiasm here and there are minimized by the fact that it's happening in a larger pool of voters. So it's going to be hard, and we have to be aware of that.

Yeah. And look, and the other thing that can sort of hurt us, or at least sap our enthusiasm about beating Trump, is an extended fight with each other about who we're nominating in 2020 and i you know look i i think it is true that most democrats in the country right now most democratic voters the vast vast majority of voters um probably have warm feelings towards all the candidates um they most of them don't know all the candidates they've heard like bernie's name and biden's name and then probably after those two elizabeth warren um but they don't know all the candidates. They've heard like Bernie's name and Biden's name. And then probably after those two, Elizabeth Warren. But they don't know a lot of the other candidates that well yet. And, you know, they like them all and they're not really paying close attention yet. But a lot of Democratic activists and and writers and journalists and people on Twitter are already playing way too much attention to the race,

and people on Twitter are already playing way too much attention to the race, us included, all the time, reading about 2020. And the sniping, the early sniping among Democrats about the field already is causing me a little concern, I have to say, over the last couple weeks. And, you know, I'm a huge fan, as you know, of saying Twitter is not real life, so it's not causing great concern yet. But I also know that reporters now a huge fan, as you know, of saying Twitter is not real life, so it's not causing great concern yet. But I also know that reporters now report off Twitter and then they have they, you know, create media narratives and the media narratives eventually bleed out into the public. And my worry is that when this my new worry here is that worry about everything, panic about nothing, is that when this race gets heated up um you know there will be there will be just a lot of angst in this party and i will say this it's it's great that it's not coming from the candidates and campaigns themselves right now you know they are they are being good to each other

they're being respectful of each other they are acting exactly how they should but um a lot of other people are not and it. And it's quite annoying. It's annoying, and we'll have to see whether it's impactful. The length of the Democratic primary does not concern me on its face. Obviously, the tenor does, right? If we get into this world where it's either my person or no one, then that's going to be that state. We need every voter. There is no world. We cannot afford a single Democratic, someone who voted for someone in Democratic primary to then vote for a third party candidate or sit out because they're pissed about the outcome. The tenor is what matters, right? And particularly when people

are focused on winning, you can put aside those problems or put aside the division. So I have lots of concerns. And I do think we have to be cognizant and aware of the fact that beating an incumbent president is very hard. The history of it is not great. It usually requires everything to go your way. And that's even true when the incumbent president you're trying to beat is an incompetent clown who is treating the presidency as some sort of pre-trial diversion program to avoid going to jail. Like this is going to be challenging. We are going to have to do everything right.

We are all going to have to get on board. And people have to do everything right. We are all going to have to get on board. And people have to, the question for me is, is this primary place to step out, and everyone's getting involved, and picking the candidate they support, and donating that candidate, or texting for that candidate, or making calls for that candidate. What are we doing, we writ large, large progressive universe, to do two things. One, what are we doing to build up the infrastructure of the Democratic Party and the larger progressive world to help that nominee once we have that nominee? And second, what are we doing to prevent Trump from strengthening while we have this fight? And those are the questions I think a lot. We will spend time talking about, the DNC will spend time talking about, Democrats in Congress

and others will spend time talking about, which is, as this primary places itself out, we can't put all the other work of beating Trump on hold. Right. And I think, yeah, so what do we do about all this? I think we have to remember to focus on Donald Trump, on what he's doing, because that's, you know, that unifies us, that unified us during 2018. We can't completely ignore Trump here. I also think we have to focus on down ballot races. We have to focus on the Senate. It's going to be huge to try to take the Senate back. That's going to be a big, big goal in 2018. I think, by the way, we also have to focus on keeping the House. You know, I was talking to some of the newly elected members of the House. And, you know, we're facing sort of the end of

the and we're going to talk about fundraising in a second, but we're facing the end of the fundraising quarter at the end of March. And the NRCC, which is the Republican committee that deals with House elections, are already set to target a bunch of the most vulnerable Democrats who just won in 2018. And those Democrats need to raise money. And it was easier for them to raise money in 2018 because the focus was on the House. And it is harder to do so now in 2020 with everyone focused on the presidential election. So I would tell everyone, you know, if you go to the Cook Political Report, they have 16 House seats held by Democrats that they have in toss-up, that they will be toss-up seats in 2020. And I would think about giving some of those candidates some money, especially in advance of the end of the March deadline, because that's when the Republicans will think, OK, who's got a lot of money on the Democratic side?

Who doesn't? And the people who don't, maybe we'll target them and we'll run really good candidates and spend a lot of money in that district. And, you know, it is not going to be easy keeping the House. It is not going to be easy winning the Senate back. And we need to make sure and that's to say nothing of the state legislatures and governor's mansions that we could flip in 2020 as well, or the ones that we need to hold on to. I think it's really important for everyone to focus on the party as a whole, making sure we build a progressive majority in 2020. And that goes beyond the presidency. Yes, all those things play together, right? If these Democrats in these toss-up seats, many of which are in the quote-unquote swing states, if they have money to run good campaigns, that's going to benefit the presidential election.

Right. If whoever our Democratic nominee is to – or let's take whoever the Democratic nominee is in Arizona or Iowa or North Carolina, if they have money to run real races and really organize that state starting now, then that will benefit the presidential. If the presidential candidate is strong and well-funded, that will benefit down ballot because there is – like we have to be aware of how hard it is going to be to hold on to some of these House seats and how much work it's going to take. What was the popular vote margin in 2018? Was it seven points? I think so, yeah. extremely unlikely that absent a collapse in Trump's numbers or some exogenous event that were to happen, that a Democrat is going to win the popular vote by seven points. Right. So you're going to be, this is a tougher playing field already. So it's going to take even more work, even more organizing, even more focus and smart

strategy to hold on to some of these seats and ensure that if we have a Democratic president, we have a Democratic Senate and House to actually do the things we care about. All right, let's talk about fundraising in the presidential and how much it really matters. The Wall Street Journal reported this week that former Vice President Joe Biden has told at least a half dozen supporters that he will be running for president and has asked for their help to kickstart his fundraising. According to the journal, Biden could have an exploratory committee set up by sometime after Easter, which is April 21st. But he's also reportedly concerned about making a big fundraising statement right out of the gate. And he told supporters he's worried he won't be able to report the same kind of online donor numbers that people like Bernie Sanders and Beto O'Rourke

did as they kicked off their campaigns. So just to step back for a minute, is Biden right to be worried about raising money online? Why is online money treated as more valuable than traditional fundraising these days? A lot of people hear these numbers, and I think there's not a lot of context for what it means, how much it matters, why should we give a shit about this? Why should we give a shit about this? It's a pretty stunning statement about how fundraising in campaigns has radically changed in the last few cycles. Because here you have the two-term vice president of the United States, been in democratic politics for decades, who I'm sure has met every democratic fundraiser, has one of the largest Rolodexes in the history of Democratic politics. And he is worried about fundraising because he cannot raise money. He's worried he cannot raise money from people who are giving $5, $10, $27, $48,

whatever the average for your chosen candidate is. And now we're in a world where having a large fundraising email list is seen as more value and more important than having a large Rolodex of rich people. And I think that's great progress for the country. Biden is right to be worried in the sense that it takes – you have to have the list. You have to have been working on this for a long time. You have to have built list. You have to have been working on this for a long time. You have to have built up a donor base. And he just has not run a campaign that's had the ability to do that ever. He did not have that success in 2008, and then he was on the ticket in 2012. And so it wasn't his list, and he didn't run in 2016. didn't run in 16. And as far as I know, his team has not spent the same amount of time and energy and money that Kamala Harris's team in particular spent in the last few years using digital ads and using other strategies to build up their list. And so you're sort of starting from scratch.

And so it's going to be very hard to come anywhere close to what some of these other candidates have done, let alone what Beto or Bernie did. And how much does money matter? Obviously, we know it matters in the sense that you need money to hire staff and run ads and do all the things you do in a campaign. But what, if anything, does the amount you raise, and I guess more specifically, how many people you've raised it from, tell us about a candidate's chances or a candidate's political strength? Does it tell us anything? Well, President Jeb Bush would tell you that whoever has the most money wins. Please clap. Yes. I think there's two separate things here,

right? Which is, if you can raise lots of money from lots of different people, it is a measurement of enthusiasm for your candidacy, right? That people are excited enough about you, the large enough people are excited enough about you that they are going to give you money. And that is important. Now, I think the lesson of the joking Jeb Bush reference is the person with the most money doesn't necessarily win. And there's lots of changes in how politics are conducted with the invention of the internet, social media, the new media landscape that allow it that you can be smarter and succeed with less money. But I do think you need to hit a threshold to be able to run credible campaigns in the early

primary states, primarily Iowa. And so in that sense, I think there will be some sort of cutoff. I have no doubt that Biden can cross that threshold through whatever means he gets there. But you have to hit a threshold to be able to run a real campaign and blow that, then you're just sort of wasting your time and everyone else's. Yeah. I mean, the leaders on how many donors they have right now are Bernie and then Beto and then Kamala. And it does show and, you know, they have you know, they can show that they have these small dollar donors in all 50 states. Right. And that means that they're at least their initial support is has breadth to it. Right. Like we don't know how much depth it has, but it has breadth.

There's like a lot of different people that are contributing to their campaigns. And so I think it's like one early measure for those candidates to say, look, we have pretty widespread support outside our donor lists, outside our home states. But you're right that beyond that, like, especially as we get into, it's like one of those early indicators. And as we get deeper into the race, it matters less. One way though, it does matter a lot this time that it hasn't mattered in the past. The DNC is offering debate invitations to candidates who have at least 65,000 donors, so long as they also have a minimum of 200 donors in each of at least 20 states. So you can get into the debate by hitting that threshold of donors or earning at least 1% in a series of public polls.

And so for candidates who aren't polling well, and aren't polling well just because no one knows who they are, because they're just like brand new names to people, building this donor base is a way to get on stage at the debate. And that's why Pete Buttigieg recently surpassed the 65,000 donor threshold. Andrew Yang has surpassed the 65 000 donor threshold um he's a venture capitalist who believes in universal basic income i don't think we've talked about him much on the pod yet but he's he's going to be on the debate stage and fucking set former senator mike gravel uh is

floating a presidential bid and for those who don't know who mike revell is um what year was it that he was on the debate stage dan 2008 2008 mike revell is on the debate stage and let me tell you he is uh he's a character to say the least so like i don't know there was there was some interesting politico piece the other day like is was this the smart move of the democratic national committee to make it based on donors Because could just very random people sort of game the system to get 65,000 donors, and suddenly you have all kinds of folks on the debate stage? I mean, sure. Yes. You have to be able to put together a real campaign to get 65,000 donors and spread out over 20 states. That's a fucking hard thing to do. Yeah. And you have to draw a line somewhere.

And I think the ability to build a grassroots fundraising base is a better measure of deciding whether people should get on the stage than a series of poorly conducted media polls where people have very limited name ID. Because that's a self-fulfilling prophecy, which is if you don't – you aren't known, so you can't get on the debate stage. So you can't get known, so you can't get on the debate stage, so you can't get known, so you can't get on the debate stage. It's sort of not an ideal way to do it. So having both measures, either or, I think makes sense. And yeah, we might end up with – it might have seemed absurd two months ago for you to say, well, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, who's 37 years old, is going to be on the debate stage. But now that everyone has gotten a chance to hear Pete Buttigieg and see him, and he's been able to build this fundraising base, I think everyone's excited he'll be on the debate stage. And so I think it's a fine measure. Is it

a perfect measure? No, there's no perfect measure here. You're going to anger some people. You're going to ask people who you wish were on stage who aren't, who you wish weren't on stage who are, and that's just sort of how it is. But it's better than just simply using polls, which I think is not a great way to do it. Right. Last question before we go, since this is in the news this morning. What do you think about the various reports that Biden is considering the selection of an early running mate like Stacey Abrams? I am as pro-Stacey Abrams as you can get. I want more Stacey Abrams in my politics. I want more Stacey Abrams in my life. She is one of my most favorite politicians that I have had a chance to

meet in my life. I think she is amazing. I have to say, and I say this as someone who has a longstanding level of affection for Joe Biden as a Delaware native, and obviously we worked very closely with him for a long time, I'm deeply uncomfortable with the way this conversation is happening, that Stacey Abrams, someone who has as much claim to run for president as anyone who's running for president, is being slotted into a vice presidential slot before she even makes a decision. And I think that's unfair to her. And it's just, it's an unfortunate way for the conversation to take place. And it's diminishing of someone who should not be diminished in any way. Stacey Abrams is a star. She is brilliant.

She is, I agree that she's one of my favorite people in democratic politics. And if I were her, I would be like, okay, I'm either going to run for president or I'm going to run for Senate. And if she runs for president, she will be an incredible addition to the field. And if she runs for Senate, that's great, too. It should be up to Stacey Abrams. But the idea that through like reports about advisors that like, they're thinking of like slaughtering her in a ticket. I don't know if I were her, I wouldn't, I wouldn't want that. Right? Like, I'd be like, I'm a star. I got more votes than any Democrat in Georgia's history. I should run for Senate here or I should run for president myself, which she could.

So I think it's a little silly. And I don't think it's great for Biden either, by the way. I think that if you're going to run for president, you need to go out there and say, I'm running for president on my own. Vote for me. Don't vote for me because you like that there's a package deal here. Like, it doesn't seem, it doesn't, I don't know. It just doesn't seem like, it seems more of like a gimmick than a well thought out move. Yeah, I think that's exactly right.

Like, the American public's bullshit detector is quite high. And it'll seem gimmicky. It's basically like putting a flashing sign over your head that says weak. And it's just like the similar idea also floated in these stories that Biden would commit to running for only one term, which is being talked about as a way to deal with his age. which is being talked about as a way to deal with his age. But I remember seeing polling in 2008 because people were floating this idea about McCain, who was also an older presidential candidate, and it was – it polled terribly. People – I think they don't want to go through election twice. It's just – if you were too old to do – or for whatever reasons, unable to do two terms, why would I pick you to do one term? Now, maybe it's a different world than it was a decade ago, but it seems alarming. I think the biggest threat to Biden's candidacy right now is not the lack of an email list. It's

not age. It's not his older positions. It's the verbal diarrhea of his advisors who are having these conversations in the pages of the New York Times instead of within a conference room at his headquarters somewhere. And so he is – like put all the ideas on the whiteboard. Just don't show the whiteboard to Jonathan Martin at The New York Times. I think it's really diminishing to Biden. Biden, it hurts his chances and it makes whenever he, if he were to decide to run, it makes his announcement less of a clean shot by having this big national discussion about how weak his advisors think he is and what absurd measures they can take to address that weakness. Yeah. For all we know, Joe Biden has already decided against either of these moves and is just going to announce his run for president on his own. But now, because people couldn't keep

their mouths shut, this is out there all over the news today. So that's, you know, it's a good lesson on keeping it running a tight ship in a campaign. So there aren't a lot of leaks. That's, you know, we tried very hard to do that in 2008. And so I think it's a it's a wise move. Okay. When we come back, we will have John Lovett's interview with Congresswoman Lauren Underwood. She is the Democratic representative from Illinois' 14th Congressional District, a health policy expert, and the youngest African-American woman ever elected to Congress. Congresswoman Lauren Underwood, welcome to Pod Save America. Thank you. So glad to be here. So good to have you. So this is the first time we've gotten a chance to speak with you since

you won last year. You started your work in Congress. What's been the biggest surprise so far about the job? Well, I think the biggest surprise is honestly the pace of the work. You know, there's such a reputation of, you know, gridlock and dysfunction. And I feel like we are just moving at a clip, getting things done. And the way that we have to sort of divide our attention, I'm on three committees. I do education and labor. And on that committee, we actually do health care stuff to Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security. And then, you know, there might be a bill on the floor about Yemen or there might be a bill on the floor about, you know, H.R.1 and anti-corruption or whatever. And so we're just keeping all these different balls in the air and just getting it done.

Imagine how busy it would be if there wasn't gridlock. Right. I mean, the Senate is completely dysfunctional. And, you know, I think our Constitution did not contemplate having a chamber that did not want to be separate and co-equal, right? And it's part of the legislature. And so we need to make some changes over there. And that's why elections are so important. And each vote counts. But for now, I'm excited about the progress we're making in the House. So you're the youngest African American woman ever elected to Congress. What's an issue where you feel like being a young African American woman in this space that is, you know, I was looking before you came in, the average age of a member of Congress is now around 60, which is the oldest or close to the oldest it's ever been.

What is something that you find you're bringing that some of the members are learning from you just by your presence? Well, I'll say that I certainly approach problems differently. And during orientation, we had a training for the first time. They had us do a sexual harassment and assault training for members. And I sat in that training. It was inadequate. And I was just like, God, it needs to be better. And so I started looking at what policies were in place and realized, yikes, this place was set up to support these bad actors and enable them to, you know, have sexual misconduct in the workplace. And so I was not sworn in yet and submitted some amendments to the rules package that we would vote on on the first day. They were accepted by the rules committee

and they passed on our first day in office saying that members could not use nondisclosure agreements to prevent witnesses or victims from coming forward with information and saying that members of Congress couldn't have sexual relationships with committee staffers. And, you know, that kind of thing had been longstanding accepted practice in this workplace, but would never fly in any other workplace around the country. And so I think that it takes a millennial woman, millennial woman of color, to come in and say, not OK, and find a creative way to get it done. Have you found that there are some of your older colleagues that kind of feel a bit flummoxed by this sort of, there is a phalanx of young people who have come in and they don't seem to really care about the way it used to be done. That's right. Do you find that they're surprised, caught off guard, some of the sort of like old guard members of both parties?

100%. I think that some people feel a little threatened. They've learned how to thrive in the dysfunction. And so now we're finally back in the majority. Folks have their gavels or they have their little fiefdom. And here comes this new crew of freshmen who are now a quarter of the caucus. The new members are a quarter of the Congress and nothing can pass if we're not on board. And that just immediately is disruptive.

And so I think that some people were surprised. And I've sort of felt that maybe kept us at a distance. And I've sort of felt that maybe kept us at a distance. But it's up to me to build relationships and build bridges and to get to know people for individuals because I'm not a threat to my colleague. What we are, though, is going to say that, you know, we put people first and we're here to serve. And it doesn't matter if you're a Democrat or Republican. Right. Because there's corruption across the board sometimes. And not afraid to call it out, not afraid to stand the board sometimes. And not afraid to call it out, not afraid to stand up and say no, and not afraid to lead by example. Have you had to show any older members how to use their phones? No, but I've done a few selfies, and selfies on the floor,

and you would be surprised the number of people who are interested in that. You're not supposed to take pictures on the floor, obviously, of the House. But, you know, this is what we do. So you're from a district that Donald Trump won in 2016. Yeah. And the swing on the congressional vote was tremendous, right? The person you defeated by around five points had won his previous race by 20 points. That's right. Something like that. There have been these pieces coming out of Washington, coming out of the coverage of the presidential cycle, covering

some of the debates about the Green New Deal, about Medicare for all, and about this question around Democrats moving to the left. Now, you were asked this about, there was a story about this in Politico that asked a bunch of members from districts that were flipped from Trump winning to a Democrat taking the seat about whether or not that is hurting you in your district. You basically said that's not the questions you're getting. But do you feel like this conversation is one that matters inside of your district? Are people talking about socialism? Are people talking about the Green New Deal?

Do you get some questions or skepticism from voters when you're back home? I get questions about climate change. I get questions about health care affordability. What are we going to do to lower the price of insulin? We get questions about, you know, affording higher education and making college, you know, reasonably priced so that people aren't having hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, I don't get questions necessarily about like hashtag Green New Deal or, you know, what kind of label are you, right? Like I'm a Democrat. People know I'm a Democrat. And so it's not framed in that way. And so what I encourage my colleagues to do is to be prepared to have conversations that regular middle class families understand and it's grounded in reality in their lives. Right. There's a lot of aspirational goals and that's great. And I think bold ideas are wonderful. But I think that we have a tremendous responsibility, responsibility to the people that elected us to make sure that we engage in a two-way conversation.

And if we're up having a conversation and debating around these aspirational goals that may not happen for another 25 or 50 years, right, that long-range planning is important. It really is. But the people in my community are like literally struggling with $2,500 a month for their kids insulin. And that's a problem in their day to day life, literally struggling because they can't have sick leave to take care of their son because their job doesn't offer it. These concrete issues that may not be the bold ideas that make headlines, but certainly make a real impact in people's lives. Well, it seems like there's this divide, right? There are those who are saying, well, sure, we need to address those issues right now. But we need to set a goal for where we're, A, aiming towards in the long run, and B, to pull the debate in the left, right? That if we are

talking about only preserving the Affordable Care Act, and Republicans are talking about repealing the Affordable Care Act, we're not talking about where we want to get to. So Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal has introduced a Medicare for All bill. You have not yet signed on to it. You've talked more about stabilizing the Affordable Care Act. How do you feel about this debate over Medicare for All? And do you believe that's the goal we should be aiming towards? So I believe health care is a human right. And that's been foundational to my nursing practice. I'm a nurse, been a nurse for 10 plus years. And I think that absolutely in 2019, we should not have tens of millions of people in this country that don't have access to health care, don't have health insurance. And when I talk to people in my community and I say, well, what do you mean by that? I usually get a variety of answers.

People say Medicare 55 and up, Medicare 40 and up, 18 and up, Medicare birth. Those are all very different things. And some people want to buy in. Well, I know just based on our health care system, right, each of those have different timelines for implementation. It would transform our health care system or not. And I think that the details matter when it comes to health care. Right. We saw with the Affordable Care Act that people might have supported the broad idea, but the way that it was implemented created winners and losers. And we want, as we think about transforming our health care system moving forward, to make sure that we design it in a way

where folks come out ahead. And one of the concerns that I have from my district is just we're not sure how much it costs and how we would pay for it. And so until I get that information, I'm not co-signing the bill. But I do think it's a great goal. And I think that a lot of people are really energized and excited about the idea of expanding health care coverage. And that's where we need to be moving as a country. So you are someone that has this nursing experience, this policymaking experience at the local level and also at the national level.

You have a kind of, there are a few people that could say that they've been a nurse, they've worked on a Medicaid plan at the local level, that they've been in the Obama administration as health care, Obamacare was being implemented. It sounds to me that you are more concerned about the transition than a lot of people are right now. I mean, you got to remember, a year ago, two years ago, our health care was under attack.

So those of us that were on Obamacare, and I'm one of them, I have a preexisting condition. For people like us, we did not have certainty that our plans would even be offered through the end of 2017. We did not have certainty that if we were trying to plan a procedure that we would even be offered through the end of 2017. We'd not have certainty that if we were trying to plan a procedure that we would even have coverage. And so I think there's a lot of people, millions of people in this country who felt threatened and not having a stable environment for their health care is one that creates a lot of uncertainty. And they were looking to their elected officials to say, who's going to have our back for this basic need, health care? And so I think that the Medicare for all debate has been framed as an either or,

ACA or Medicare for all. And I think that that is fundamentally flawed. We should be able to do both. We should be able to fix the health care system that we have right now and ensure that people like me and millions of other Americans, right, over hundreds of millions of Americans have preexisting conditions. And we need to make sure that they have their coverage. Make sure. While we have this very important policy debate that has now gotten to kitchen tables, right, like all across the country,

people are talking about, you know, what should our health care system look like? And that's great. But we haven't settled on that final plan, that final policy, that conclusion. We are in this idea generating phase right now. And so let's let the process play out. But I think that we can fix our system. But letting that process play out, like, do you have a position on, do you believe in the end, most people should end up with a Medicare-like plan? Or do you think that private insurance has a valuable role to play for people that currently have it and like their private insurance? I think that we should be creating an opportunity to cover more people. And right now we have tens of millions of people who don't have health care coverage, many of whom live in states where they chose not to expand Medicaid. And so we can look at expansion opportunities in a way that is fully

consistent with existing laws, but offers people a pathway to coverage. I don't think that we should necessarily say that your private policy that you enjoy and it works for your family is wrong, it's flawed, it should go away tomorrow. And some ideas say that. And I don't support those policies. But I do think that, you know, we need to have an upfront conversation in this country about the amount of money we spend on health care throughout the lifespan, how we pay for it. And what is what kind of quality care are we getting in return? A lot. You know, we have all sorts of people who are going to the hospital, coming out with infections, leaving the system in worse shape than they entered. And certainly for the amount of money we spend, we should be able to provide higher quality care.

So about oversight, you had a moment with the secretary of Homeland Security talking about family separations, about the impact it has on the children, the kind of effect it has on these families. It was a big moment. There's this question now about the kind of oversight Democrats are doing, questions around impeachment. Are you worried about Democratic overreach, whatever that means? Or do you think that's a silly Washington thing? You know, we came from an environment with the Republican-controlled Congress that didn't want to do any oversight. They don't want to ask any questions, any kind of critical questions of what the Trump administration was doing. And so, you know, I'm on three committees where we have, I think, robust oversight agendas.

And that's part of the Article I responsibility of the Congress. And we had a Congress in the 115th that just ignored that responsibility. So I don't think it's overreach. I think that these are really important questions. We had Kirsten Nielsen come in and I asked her about the family separation policy, and she was not prepared to provide candid answers. And that's unacceptable, right? And I think that we are making a good faith effort to do oversight in an orderly way. Let's bring the secretary in and ask her to be upfront and honest before we go in and have subpoenas or before we go and make this a really difficult working environment for all involved, right? We should be able to just, as colleagues, share information. And it should

not be a surprise. I worked in the executive branch for many years during the Affordable Care Act, and the Congress cared how we were implementing that program. Were we doing it in accordance with legislative intent? And how was it going to change our health care system? I also worked on the Flint water crisis. And those lawmakers from Michigan and around the country would bring us in and the Obama administration and say, what are you doing? And how are you helping these people? And that kind of oversight posture is critically important to a well-functioning democracy. And so I believe that what we are doing as House Democrats in the hearings when the cameras are on, but maybe the closed door briefings.

My Republican colleagues have a lot of questions about the topics that they hadn't wanted to raise on their own. Right. So on Homeland Security, we've had private briefings on election security. What happened in 2016 with the hacking? You know, what's gone on in 2018 and how are we able to ensure that our elections were able to go on without interference? And how are we able to ensure that our elections were able to go on without interference? Right. Publicly, you don't see Republicans wanting to ask any questions about that. But privately, they have follow up questions and they want information. Right. Amazing how courageous some of these people are privately. Well, you know what? I'm not here to ask for sympathy for our Republican colleagues.

But what I will say is right. But what I will say is, right, but what I will say is, there is a responsibility to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. And I believe that there are true patriots and lawmakers who are willing to uphold that oath from both political parties. And that's encouraging. So I think we've seen a little bit of that, right? There was this 400 to zero vote that the Mueller report should be public. 420. 420 to 0. Though a few presents.

A couple people voted, I'm here. I'm around. Whatever. But at the same time, we've seen a breakdown in the House Intelligence Committee between Democrats and Republicans. Congressman Nadler has faced criticism from his Republican colleagues for the sweeping requests that he made, which I personally think are justified. Speaker Pelosi has talked about the need for a bipartisan basis if we ever, you know, bipartisan buy-in if we ever move toward impeachment. And yet, if we decide that the standard is not some objective nonpartisan standard, but one in which both Democrats and Republicans agree that something went wrong,

standard, but one in which both Democrats and Republicans agree that something went wrong. Aren't we giving a veto? Aren't we saying that if Republicans don't, if there's no standard by which Republicans will decide that Donald Trump did something impeachable, there's no standard by which Donald Trump did something truly terrible that demands being called out because they're worried about calling him out because of their base, because of Fox News, because of all the pressures they're under. Are we creating a standard in which Democrats are held to a set of norms and values and principles, but Republicans aren't because Republicans aren't willing to call out their own as much? Well, okay. I have a lot of thoughts. One, haters are going to hate. And the Republicans, right, we know that they are going to protect their own. They are going to always criticize what we do in terms of oversight action.

And they want to talk about something else. It makes them uncomfortable. It's not flattering to their base, to their colleagues. And they want to deflect. That does not mean that we change the subject. It means that we continue forward with our priorities, which are to protect and defend the Constitution. Really basic. Now, in terms of the standards that Democrats are held to, I think that we all are held to the same standard because we all are up for election in 2020, right? And so it's up to

the American people and how they judge our performance. And impeachment is one issue. It's not the only issue. And in communities like mine, it's not the main issue. It's really not. And so when I heard the speaker's comments about impeachment needing to be bipartisan, I saw that as a tactical assessment, right? If we are going to, if we receive information that suggests that there are, you know, such high crimes where impeachment is warranted, we literally will need Republican votes in order for it to move forward. That's not some kind of, you know, theoretical let's all skip and hold hands and walk down the yellow brick road together. That is like literally, that's how you move something through the Senate. Through the Senate. Yeah, you need bipartisan support.

And we saw that the House came out ahead of the Senate on the emergency declaration and the joint resolution. We were able to get some bipartisan support in the House. We saw there was bipartisan support in the Senate. And we'll see next week when we go back with this veto override how many people are willing to be courageous. But the key is there's going to need to be bipartisan action. Doesn't mean that the standards are different. It's just tactically where we are. Well, that would suggest then that even if there is a majority in the House made up of Democrats who believe Donald Trump has committed impeachable offenses. She might not pursue it if she didn't believe there was bipartisan support for it in the Senate, even though we have the power to impeach him without those Republican votes.

You'd have to ask her. Okay. Okay. Fine. Sorry. We'll ask her. Yeah, you should. I think she'd love to come on. I mean, I was hoping you would spitball with me. Well, OK. What do I think might happen? Yeah. I think that whatever information moves forward, it will be done in the most transparent way. Because what we were talking about is so critical to the future of our democracy that it will not be provided in some closed doordoor classified briefing just to the members of Congress. This is going to be a national conversation, and all policymakers are going to feel pressured to act.

Okay. And so that's encouraging, right? We talk about transparency and sunshine rules, and we talk about how we want to lead in a way that is inclusive and reflects the values of our communities. And this is the test. Okay. You're a very good member of Congress.

Sustained eye contact with me. Oh, good. It's making me very intense. Uh-huh. What? I feel as though I'm the only person in the room. Good. It's just a private conversation that we're having here.

So you're roommates with Congresswoman Katie Hill. Katie is my girl. She is a friend of this show. She was one of the Crooked Eight. Oh, really? One of the people we campaigned for and sort of led an effort out here in California because we were going to flip those seats on election night. We weren't sure if we were going to get them all. We ended up getting them all.

Does she leave towels on the floor? What is the most annoying thing that she does as a roommate? Are there old boxes in the fridge that should be thrown away, but she won't do it? Okay. So Katie is the best. First of all, we have, okay, this is such an odd thing. I'm 32, Katie's 31. We are regular people that were living our normal lives, cared about our country, and decided to step up and run during this chaos and confusion. I hope that this buildup is leading to a pretty good day. I'm going to tell you the truth. Okay.

And it is so, this is an odd thing, being a member of Congress. It's weird. It's fun. It's challenging. And I get to go through it every day with a real friend in Katie Hill. And so, you know, we have lots of Amazon deliveries that come and her family sends all kinds of fun stuff. And it's like an unboxing, you know, like the bloggers do the unboxing. It's like that. Sometimes it's pretty fun. She goes on TV shows, you know, like the news shows and stuff.

And so sometimes it's really early. Sometimes it's really late. So sometimes we miss each other. But I'm always excited when we're both home and we can catch up. I would hope that everyone can have a friend and support person like I found in Katie Hill. And I'm grateful to be able to serve with her in Congress. That is such a moving answer. Does she leave dishes in the sink?

We don't share a bathroom. You're dodging the Congresswoman. Listen, there's no dirt. This is the kind of politics that people are sick of. Are they? They're sick of this. You're dodging the question. All right.

Does she not throw away her chopsticks if you have sushi? If she left little things of soy sauce when you order takeout? I need some dirt. Okay, some dirt. We don't eat that much in the apartment. Okay. And she listens to her podcast on speaker. That's brutal.

And so I am always very well informed of what's going on because I hear her news of the day. All right. I guess we can count that. That is a frustrating thing for a roommate to do. It's not frustrating. It's just, you know, I am hearing from news outlets that I would not have otherwise picked myself. Oh, now you just turned it into a compliment. Unbelievable. I understand how you won this Trump-friendly district. Well, you know what? This kind of smooth operation.

No, that is not how we won. We showed up in people's living rooms and their soybean fields and their cul-de-sacs and we talked. And you know what? I invite everybody to come. The 14th District of Illinois is a beautiful place. It's half suburban. It's half rural. We have these wonderful women.

I call them Pat and Barb and Sue and Marge because they are the real ladies of the 14. And they will sit. I'm telling you, they will sit and have a wonderful conversation with you. They will tell you all about their families and their concerns and what we need to do about climate change and how we can lower drug prices. And then they will offer you some cookies and some tea and then they will ask you all about your life. And you'll be like, but I have these talking points. They'll be's be like no tell me about your life in california what are you doing how's your family and uh you won't want to leave and she uses coasters whenever she's using the coffee table absolutely and you need to take your shoes off and coming into her living room okay

okay congressman lauren underwood thank you so much for being here. Oh, well, thank you. This is so fun. This is fun. And you know what? I hope that everybody takes some pride in the work that we're doing in the Congress. We work for you, the American people. And so be in touch with us, right? I love seeing the comments online on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram. I love people stopping at the airport or on the train or whatever. And that kind of dialogue is important. For so long, we millennials have not

had elected representatives in the Congress. And for the first time in the Democratic side, we have a whole little caucus. And, you know, let's make sure that we are doing the work that, you know, will improve all of our lives. Do you think that titling this episode, Congressman Underwood slams roommate Katie Hill, will get people to hear it? You know what? Let's talk about that clickbait culture. And let's talk about these reporters that are so pressed to sow division between me and my other congressional colleagues. I'm sick of it.

Particularly the women of color in the caucus, that they will slap my picture on an article that I am not quoted in, I'm sick of it. I feel as though maybe I played into this in some way by trying to divide you and Katie. I would just encourage everyone to reflect on the importance of having a big tent party and the opportunity for voices to speak authentically. And perhaps if folks are, you know, a little bit uncomfortable with, you know, the thoughts being expressed. Maybe let's just focus on those sentiments and not who is speaking, right? Because for the first time, the superstars coming out of the Democratic Party are young women of color. Isn't that incredible?

It's exciting. It's exciting. And, you know, that's disruptive in and of its own and people get, you know, they start to feel some kind of way, but we're here and we're leading and we're making change and we're serving the people. And I'm really excited. Let's just leave it there. Okay. What are we supposed to do? I can't say anything after that. Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

That's our show for today. Thanks for joining us and we will see you next week bye everyone so I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm