Pod Save America - "The Tucker Carlson Caucus."

Episode Date: April 19, 2021

The Biden administration waffles on its pledge to take in more refugees, a few Republicans try to start a white nationalist caucus in the House of Representatives, and Crooked Media Political Director Shaniqua McClendon joins to talk about Vote Save America’s new filibuster whip count, where you can see where your Democratic Senator stands on eliminating the rule.For a closed-captioned version of this episode, please visit crooked.com/podsaveamerica. For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail] and include the name of the podcast.

Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Vitor. On today's show, the Biden administration waffles on its pledge to take in more refugees. Three Republicans try to start a white nationalist caucus in the House of Representatives. And Crooked Media political director Shaniqua McClendon joins us to talk about our brand new filibuster whip count, where you can see exactly where your Democratic senator stands on eliminating the rule that's standing in the way of just about everything good in the world. stands on eliminating the rule that's standing in the way of just about everything good in the world.

But first, in case you missed it, check out Pod Save the People, where co-host Kaya Henderson sat down with Oscar-nominated director Shaka King to talk about Judas and the Black Messiah. Fantastic interview, fantastic show, as always. Dre and the gang have been doing some great work lately covering a lot of really important news. Go check it out. All right, let's get to the news. One of the many awful legacies of Trump's presidency was his decision to turn away thousands of refugees trying to escape war and persecution in some of the most desperate places in the world. Up until 2016, the United States took in about 80,000 refugees each year. That

was true under both Democratic and Republican presidents. By Trump's last year in office, however, the cap was down to 15,000, one five, and he essentially banned refugees from majority Muslim and African countries. On Friday, Joe Biden signed an order that ended that ban, but left in place the historically low cap of 15,000 refugees, saying it, quote, remains justified by humanitarian concerns and is otherwise in the national interest. Dozens of Democratic members of Congress immediately criticized the decision, including leaders like Nancy Pelosi and Dick Durbin.

And just hours later, the White House said that they would increase the cap by May 15th, though they said it's unlikely that they'd hit the target of 62,500 refugees that they promised Congress back in February. Tommy, what do you think is going on here? they said it's unlikely that they'd hit the target of 62,500 refugees that they promised Congress back in February. Tommy, what do you think is going on here? And what are the consequences of the administration dragging its feet on this issue? So, I mean, for the issue itself, I think I would sort of divide it into human consequences for these individuals and then political consequences around the refugees debate. So a little more backstory, like back in February, President Biden delivered a speech at the State Department where he said that

the Biden administration would set the refugee cap for next fiscal year at 125,000. And then about a week later, the State Department sent a report to Congress saying it would admit 62,500 refugees by September 30th of this year, so the end of this fiscal year. So that would get him above the historical average. It's very good. But then the White House just sort of mysteriously didn't sign the presidential determination that actually formalizes the decision and makes it happen. I remember Ben and I talked about this on Pod Save the World last week because we were sort of confused by it. And we chalked it up to like the staffing not being in place. We just didn't really know. So the human consequence of that though, is you have tens of thousands of

refugees who have been fully vetted and they're just sitting in limbo. Many times they're in like very dangerous refugee camps, but you have flights getting canceled. You have like pregnant moms who can no longer travel because they missed their window where they could get on a plane. And then the consequence in general was the U.S. was on pace to let in fewer refugees than any president in history, less than Trump. So that's just devastating for the human beings here who are like trying to get out of someplace where they had to escape. The political consequences, I think, are that the decision felt pretty heartless to a lot of progressives and to activist groups. And then it kicked up

this conversation about refugee admissions that is probably unhelpful. Because you can remember when Trump would demagogue this, he made them all sound like terrorists were sneaking in through this program when really they're the most heavily vetted of anyone admitted into the US. And I just think the Biden folks could have avoided this whole dust up if they just signed this presidential determination back in February since they'd already owned the higher number. So it was a very confounding issue. I couldn't figure out what the hell happened on Friday. Lovett, could you figure it out?

I feel like I read every story about this. And, you know, I was trying to give the Biden administration the benefit of the doubt here. to give the Biden administration the benefit of the doubt here. You know, on one hand, they said, well, it's taken some extra time to figure this out and to bring these refugees in because the Trump administration decimated the program. So you can sort of see that. They said that the Office of Refugee Resettlement has been under particular strain because it's also the office that deals with the unaccompanied migrant children that are coming in, that are coming over the border to the south. Of course, people pointed out those are two separate, like funding buckets, two separate staffs that deal with that, even though they are all under the same office. So I couldn't really

figure out what the holdup was since they ultimately have said now, okay, we're going to try to hit that 125,000 number by next fiscal year. Yeah, it is strange. I was having the same challenge. I think there's like a political question, a communications question, and the policy question. What I didn't understand on the policy front is there really are practical challenges that were created by the Trump administration that seem to be a big part of this. So they lowered the cap to 15,000. According to the Times, citizenship and

immigration services had reduced funding for even fewer officers than the 350 that were there in 2017, but there were only 136 by the end of last year. 105 offices where refugees could settle were closed by April of 2019. The Trump administration closed field offices all over the world. A lot of private organizations, due to lack of funding, had to close their resettlement offices. So I do think part of this, and both Jen Psaki has said this, Jake Sullivan has said this, that they have to rebuild the resettlement program.

Now, is that an excuse? Is that real? I think it's probably both and probably leans more towards having a real logistical challenge of standing this thing back up quickly. 15,000 cap was the goal to kind of under promise and over deliver, which has kind of been a political philosophy of how they do things, where they caught off guard by the reaction to the delay. I'm really not sure. Yeah. And then also there are political considerations that I think, look, they're ultimately going to increase dramatically the number of refugees admitted. That doesn't remove the moral. That doesn't change how that doesn't change what Tommy points out is the real hardship this causes for people stuck waiting right now in desperate circumstance. Now, if the issue is the politics of it, if they are going to raise the cap, they're going to pay for that politics at some point. So it's the issue that, oh, this is just an acute moment.

We're having both of these stories at once, like makes it something that'll be more lasting. I really I don't totally know. I don't totally understand it. Yeah, I want to get into the politics of it because, you know, CNN and The Washington Post both have sources on background saying that the original order stemmed in part from fear that it would fuel the political attacks on Biden's border and immigration policies. And then fucking, you know, C plus Santa Monica fascist Stephen Miller popped up on Twitter and said that the announcement reflects team Biden's awareness that what's happening at the

border will cause, quote, record midterm losses. Tommy, how valid do you think the political concerns are here? Yeah, Stephen Miller. Stephen Miller would blame any problem on immigrants if he could. So I don't give a shit what he says. I mean, yeah, I don't want to come off as like the righteous, pure policy guy here who's saying do the right thing, because it is incumbent on every White House to make the best policy decision, but then also execute on those decisions with the best political strategy so that you can actually get them done. And administrations get themselves in trouble, I think, when they view things as purely policy decisions and they don't think through the political considerations or the hoops you

have to jump through to actually execute. A good example for us was Obama's attempt to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay. The prison became a recruiting tool for terrorists. It was immoral. It was expensive. Republicans wanted it closed. It felt like a no-brainer. But then you get to the how and the challenges of where you have to resettle people and where

you do the prosecutions and how you prosecute terrorists or suspected terrorists. And lo and behold, we fucked up the politics so badly that Congress swept in and made it impossible to close on a bipartisan basis. So all that's just to say, I think the Biden team is right to think about potential political attacks around immigration, around the border, around refugees. And they're absolutely right to predict that the Republican Party will continue to demagogue these issues. You know, like Trump, I think during the campaign said, Biden will turn Minnesota into a refugee camp, right? Like that was how racist and terrible he was on these issues. I'm sure he was directing that towards Ilhan Omar. But I think the back and forth last week was the worst of both worlds,

because now the left and the right are the mad and there's renewed focus on this problem that I don't think was really part of the conversation. So I think politically, if they had just signed this presidential determination in February, it would have been part of a flurry of news like Ted Cruz and the gang are going to keep visiting the border. Fox News will find a new caravan just in time for the midterms. You can't stop bad faith attacks. But I don't know that this would have been a part of it. I just I don't quite get how they're linked. I think the big question on immigration for the Biden administration that and it seems like they're wrestling with this, is how do you pursue policies that you believe are right but may not be as politically popular as some other policies?

Right. So the White House wants to focus its attention almost exclusively on the pandemic and the economy, but they're clearly doing a lot of things on immigration. They're dealing with the situation at the border. They're dealing with increasing the cap on refugees. And like we said, just so people know the polling on this, like Morning Consult did a poll in January about all of 28 of Biden's executive actions that he had announced then that he was going to do. The only executive action that was underwater was the action to allow 125,000 refugees, and only 39% of voters supported that. 48% of voters opposed it. Five of the seven lowest polling executive actions were all around immigration. Now, to the Biden administration's credit, they are moving forward on all those

immigration actions anyway. But it does seem like what they believe is, OK, we're going to talk most about the stuff that's popular, like the American Rescue Plan, like what they're doing on the pandemic. And we'll do the other stuff and not talk about it as much like what's going on on the border. think, though, is like in a vacuum, that might be fine. But Republicans love it are clearly going to make immigration an issue nonstop between now and the midterms and beyond. So it seems like you have to be proactive about this kind of stuff and tell a story that's going to, you know, sort of win people to your side on this. Yeah, it's I will say, like, I think that's, of course, right. But at the same time, like the Biden administration, like even on their immigration policy, like they haven't been skittish, like they've been willing to kind of embrace the the kind of progressive proposals without worrying so much about bad faith attacks from the right. Yeah, no, they they are.

They get an A on on embracing the proposals and the policy. And look, it could be a couple of different things. They are dealing with a pandemic right now. We're still dealing with an economy that's hurting. President wants to go out every single day and talk about the top issues on people immigration, on all of their xenophobic bullshit to try to force that into the national spotlight and make the next election about that more than anything. And I wonder, Tommy, at some point, the Biden administration has to hit back on that and make the case that there is nothing for us to be afraid of in taking refugees. There's nothing for us to be afraid of in, you know, taking care of unaccompanied migrant children who come to our country. What do you think? Yeah, I mean, look, I justaccompanied migrant children who come to our country?

What do you think? Yeah, I mean, look, I just don't get it. Like he did the public messaging part in February where he said the next year's fiscal cap would be $125,000. And then they walked it back for some reason. So on the refugee piece of this, it was confused. And I think the rapid change sort of reflects the fact that internally they realized they'd screwed this up and they wanted just to get it right. Yeah. And hopefully now that they've clarified it, that we're on the path to fixing this issue. But everyone should keep an eye out.

Everyone should keep holding them accountable, making sure they actually do this, make sure the refugee program starts up again. And they hit those numbers that they promised. One thing we know for sure is that regardless of whether Biden and the Democrats focus on immigration, One thing we know for sure is that regardless of whether Biden and the Democrats focus on immigration, Republicans certainly will. On Friday, Punchbowl News published a seven page proposal for something called an America First Caucus, which states that, quote, America is a nation with a border and a culture strengthened by common respect for uniquely Anglo-Saxon political tradition. Anglo-Saxon political tradition. It goes on to say that immigration is putting the, quote, unique identity of America at risk and calls for limiting legal immigration, quote, to those who have demonstrated respect for this nation's culture and rule of law. This Anglo-Saxon caucus was reportedly the brainchild of Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene. And both Representatives Matt Gaetz and Louie Gohmert tweeted that they were proud to

join Greene in the caucus. But after immediate blowback from both Democrats and even Republicans like Liz Cheney and even Kevin McCarthy, Green's office tried to distance the congresswoman from the document and finally told reporters she is, quote, not launching anything. Love it. How big of a deal is it that a few of the craziest right wing nutjobs in Congress tried to launch an Anglo-Saxon caucus in the House. Should we feel better that it failed after criticism from senior Republicans or what? No, no, I don't feel better. I have never felt better. I wonder what it's like to feel better. But the so what happened? What happened was they launched something that they thought would be non-controversial in their own party. They thought this was just going to be like embracing Trump, which has become non-controversial inside of the party. And this document, even if you remove the words Anglo-Saxon, is in the spirit of what

Trump has said and done. And it is, you know, fascism with American characteristics. And I think the reason you saw Marjorie Taylor Greene, but also Gates, Gohmert, people like Paul Gosar, act like this was something great that they were just going to do and not worry about is they would have been fine in the way in which our politics currently works if they were D'Anglo-Saxon hadn't been in there. If they had just made a few more pieces of the racism subtext as a rather than text, it would have become kind of acceptable. And Kevin McCarthy would not have felt the need to

do something that obviously take a great deal of courage, which is issue a powerful subtweet. So like my lesson from this is the only mistake they made politically in this climate is they included the words Anglo-Saxon and were a little too explicit about the fact that they just don't want brown and black people to be Americans. I will say that there was there has been a big change. And in fairness, right, it was it started with the Trump administration. But there has been a change in how certain Republicans talk about immigration since Trump became president, whereas they've all felt comfortable being against illegal immigration and railing against illegal immigration. But during the Trump administration, partly because of Stephen Miller, partly because Trump himself, you started seeing Republicans

talk about curbing legal immigration. And in this document, aside from the Anglo-Saxon thing, they want to limit legal immigration to those who have demonstrated respect for this nation's culture and rule of law. That is an entirely different level of xenophobia than we have heard from mainstream Republicans in the past. Certainly, at least most of the party before Trump. And I think that is a change. Well, I don't know. Look, I think the Republican Party is like constantly ebbing and flowing in terms of how openly nativist and racist and anti-Semitic it wants to be. Not nationally necessarily, but David Duke got 38% of the vote in a 1991 Louisiana governor's race. That's horrifying, right? Pat

Buchanan ran for president on a hardline anti-immigrant platform. I think he called for a full pause in immigration for five years or something that outrageous and out there, right? So yes, these are three particularly enormous dum-dums, right? Like Matt Gates, whatever the fuck you say his name, jumped on this because I'm sure he was excited to talk about literally anything else but his like potential DOJ investigations, right? But I do think we got to keep an eye on this stuff. And I'm glad that McCarthy and Cheney and some others came out against it. But I think we should view this Anglo-Saxon caucus, even if it's dead on arrival,

as a data point about the broader trajectory of the Republican Party and how, you know, emboldened these forces feel. And I think the answer is in the post-Trump era is getting worse, not better. Much worse. No, much worse. I mean, Tommy, a few episodes ago, your under the radar story was about Tucker Carlson promoting the great replacement theory, which suggests that Democrats are trying to take power by replacing white voters with non-white immigrants. A few days after Carlson did that, the Republican National Committee sent out a fundraising email with the subject line, quote, Do you watch Tucker Carlson? He's absolutely right. So there's this debate about, you know, whether it's better to ignore crazies like Greene and Tucker or whether we should draw attention to the fact that elected Republicans and conservative media figures

are using language that's no different than white nationalist groups. Lovett, what do you think? I think it's really hard. I think it's a really hard challenge. It is noticeable when there is this kind of news cycle around Tucker Carlson. You know, he embraces white nationalism on his show. It then becomes a firestorm on Twitter and in the mainstream press. He then enjoys it and responds to it and it builds and he gains more attention and sucks more and more of the political oxygen out of the room. That said, we have to talk about it. We have to

talk about the fact that, you know, unalloyed white nationalism has a very big foothold in the Republican Party. It is the mainstream now of the Republican Party. You know, I know this is something Tommy's been struggling with, too. Like, how do you how do you address the threat that these kinds of figures pose without elevating them, not just in the consciousness of people who want to stop them, but in the consciousness of people who love it? I don't know. It's a really big problem. This is how we ended up with Trump. This is how we could end up with Tucker Carlson on a debate stage with a bunch of Republicans. You can't figure out how to stop him in a couple of years. Like, I think social media is what makes this complicated, right?

Because if this was the 1930s and you caught some American politician reading aloud from Mein Kampf, right, you wouldn't go photocopy those pages and then hand them out without context, right? That's insane. But that's what happens on Twitter and Facebook every day. Lots of well-meaning people clip and share long clips from Tucker Carlson about the great replacement theory because they're outraged. And they assume everyone else is outraged too. But you inadvertently end up spreading his message, juicing the Twitter algorithm in a way that his views get seen or he gets more followers.

And then Tucker doubles down and he says to his listeners, talking about this is how we own the libs, right? And it becomes folded into that part of the message. And so what happens is over time, once fringe political speech becomes normalized and racist, anti-Semitic fringe ideas become more commonplace and they get more traction. So that's the ebb and flow. And the alt-right people, the far-right, they know this, right? Like a lot of them, again, were just toiling away on fringe websites that no one ever saw until they figured out that if you said something offensive on Twitter, tons of well-meaning liberals would share what you did because they were mad about it. And it's a very deliberate strategy and we need to be smarter about it and counter that by calling them out for what they're saying and why they're saying it. We have to talk about their motives, all the

things they want to distract us from and not talk about, and not just assume that when you share Tucker talking about the great replacement theory, that everyone is going to find that morally repugnant because nationalism and nativism are a part of the fabric of America, unfortunately. And we have to tell a better story, not just share his story, because that can lure people in. It's very enticing to a lot of like angry people. I think that's a very good rule and way to handle it is just don't share without context and explanation.

And like, it just, you cannot assume that everyone thinks like you do. And someone is automatically going to find what tucker says repulsive and horrible like you have to teach people how it's being heard by especially white nationalist groups right nick nick fuentes who is a white nationalist holocaust denier um he responded to carlson's segment that monday night about the replacement theory by tweeting this week tucker red pilled four million people and there is nothing liberals can do about it. So I do think that, like, you can't ignore it.

You can't just let Tucker be saying all this stuff. But you have to tell people why it's so dangerous. But look, there's, I mean, we can ignore it all we want. Like, in the Republican primary in 2024 and in Republican primaries in 2022, like, whatever Kevin McCarthy wants to do, whatever Liz Cheney wants to do, whatever well-meaning Republican wants to do, there are going to be lanes for pure white nationalist garbage talking points from candidates. And those candidates could do very well in the 2022 primaries. They could do very well in the 2024 presidential primary.

Like this is here to stay in the Republican Party. This is the same Republican Party that was, you know, the establishment was confidently telling people that Donald Trump could never win the nomination. Right. Well, then he did. And then he won the presidency. So from now on, when people say shit like this, like we got to stay on top of it. Yeah. The other the other thing I would just add is you. Yeah, the other the other thing I would just add is you it's when Tucker says Democrats don't care about you. They don't want to help you. They've given up on policies that are popular or that make life better. So they're trying to import noncitizens to make your vote count for less. Obviously, there's a big component of that, that we have to draw attention to the parts that are purely racist. But there is another piece of this, which is we have to prove him wrong on the merits of what Democrats do. We have to pass legislation that people see in their lives. And we have to demonstrate that, like, this is false across the board, not just in terms of the racist element, but in terms of politics not working for people. We have to prove that our democracy can work. We have to prove that

we can, in the next 500 and some odd days, show demonstrable change that kind of can attack at the margins. I think there's a lot of people who are unreachable, but at the margins that they can see that democratic policymaking has been affected. All right, Congress is in session this week, and the gap between the productivity in the House and the Senate is becoming even wider. On Thursday, the House is set to vote on making Washington, D.C. the 51st state, which will be one of over 40 bills passed by House Democrats in just this session of Congress. 40 bills passed by House Democrats in just this session of Congress. Others include the Equality Act, which would prohibit discrimination based on sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity. The American Dream and Promise Act, which would protect up to 4.4 million dreamers. The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which would increase accountability for police officers. Legislation to strengthen background checks for purchasing firearms. And of course,

police officers, legislation to strengthen background checks for purchasing firearms, and of course, the For the People Act, which would save democracy as we know it. But over in the Senate, none of this legislation will pass so long as the filibuster remains in place. Joining us today to talk about our plan to fix all of this, Crooked Media's political director, Shaniqua McClendon. Hey, Shaniqua, welcome. Hi, this is my first time here. I'm like really excited. We're excited to have you. Would you tell us all about Vote Save America's call tool and our brand new whip count? Yeah, yeah. So if you head over to votesaveamerica.com slash for the people, all one word, we have a list of all 50 Senate Democrats. And right next to that, we have whatever the latest thing they've said about whether or not they support eliminating

the filibuster to pass HR1. And as you scroll down, you'll see some people have gold stars next to their names, because they've been very clear about where they stand. But most of them have a phone next to their name, because most of them have been what I think is intentionally vague about where they stand. So if there's a phone next to their name, we would love for you to call them and figure out, you know, where they stand on eliminating the filibuster to pass HR1. And, you know, these calls are really important, because they'll put pressure on Democratic senators to hopefully do the right thing and eliminate the filibuster to pass H.R.1. But at least it will push them to get clear on where they stand. So if they actually don't

support it, say that and stop just kind of running around and leaving people confused, especially since this is something that has been discussed since the Democratic primary started in 2019. So it's not like they didn't know the question was coming or they've been confused about it. Shaniqua, do you ever feel bad about spreading misinformation about the fact that you've been on Posse of America before? I was really trying to remember when I saw Jordan's note. And now... Huge impression it left on you. I remember I was on a live stream. Wait, what? Does that count as the same? Okayhuh okay wait well then what are we talking about look i don't know jordan jordan waller put it in the hard fact she was the one

who corrected love it didn't even love it didn't even really have the correction handy it was all jordan oh now she said she'll find it after she just uh after she just dropped rolled that grenade right into the uh into the zoom interview i feel like you should know it off the top of your head without looking if if you're just gonna throw that out there well you know what you're here now which is the most important thing that's true that was me saying a nice thing i wasn't trying to be mean about it i'm happy to be here i won't give you i won't i won't pin you down the exact number but it does feel like there's not enough gold stars right now um next to all these senate democrats i counted them there's 16 of course i should have known you counted them like there's not enough gold stars right now next to all these Senate Democrats. I counted them.

There's 16. Of course, I should have known. You counted them. So there's only 16 gold stars. It's time for people to get off the fence. It's time for people to get off the fence at this point. I mean, you can understand people being intentionally vague for a while because there hasn't been a bill to actually take the stand on. for a while because there hasn't been a bill to actually take the stand on. But now that we have 40 bills, over 40 bills piled up that have passed the House, it's getting time. You spent some time

working on the Hill, Shaniqua. What was your experience with constituent calls? How effective are they in persuading members of Congress? They're really effective. I will say constituent calls, that's normally the first thing you do on the Hill in an entry-level job. And it's, like, terrifying. People are not always nice. But the way it works in most offices is staff assistants and interns, they answer the phones. And you literally tally up, I mean, on computer software, but you tally up how constituents are feeling about different pieces of legislation or just issues. And this includes voicemails, too.

different pieces of legislation or just issues. And this includes voicemails too. So if you, you know, don't get through to a person and you leave a voicemail, just be sure to leave your zip code so that they know that you're from their state or district, because we did not, you know, we didn't log in anything that didn't have identification for where you lived. But if an issue is not already in this software that we use to log all of those issues, initially, we'll just say, enter it in kind of generically and say, we'll pass that along to the senator. Once you get a certain number of calls, if it's not already kind of a big issue in the news, we'll add it into the system. And so then it's, you know, kind of a bigger deal if it's in the system, but continuing to say, we'll get this to the senator, we'll let them know how you feel.

And that really happens. You know, every day we sent a report to senior staff and a senator that had all the issues people called in about listed out and how many people called in favor of it, and how many people called in opposition to it. But then when you get more calls, you know, you stop saying, okay, we'll just let the senator know how you feel. And senior staff decides, okay, we need to actually come up with talking points for this. So we're going to have to actually figure out how we feel about it. And one thing I think is worth pointing out is that if we felt strongly about something, there was never any ambiguity, we had talking points ready. If two people called in, they got them if, you know, 500 people called in, they got them, it was on the issues that we were a little

squishy on that it was, we would just say, we're going to pass this back to the senator. So it's important to call because you keep, as you keep increasing the pressure, the senator's office and the senator want to give you a response because some of them want to do the right thing. I'd like to say most of them, but most of all, everyone is focused on getting reelected. And if they feel like their constituents are really riled up about something, they want to figure out where to be and to be on the right sideelected. And if they feel like their constituents are really riled up about something, they want to figure out where to be and to be on the right side of it. And just adding on to that, oftentimes, when I was there, people who sat at home watching Fox News all day is who called into our office. And so they were overrepresented in the responses we were

getting from constituents. So it's important that we make sure that we're heard so that those folks don't get overrepresented and then sway elected officials towards something that just a loud, vocal minority of people want. That's a really good point. Tommy, it's only been a few months since Biden took office. Why do you think it's so important to really ramp up the pressure on the Senate and launch this whip count right now? Obviously, there's a lot of bills that came over from the House, but what's the urgency right now? Yeah, I mean, look, these things build over time, right? I mean, to add to what Shanika was just saying, Barack Obama's chief of staff, Pete Rouse, who was later his White House chief of staff for a time, who was called the 101st senator, used to personally edit every piece of mail that went to constituents. So like senior people really

hear about these tallies that are coming in, They pay attention. But, you know, like legislative sessions, they're slow. They're cluttered. The midterm elections come fast. Senators and members of Congress are the only adults who inexplicably have recess frequently. Right. So you don't have a lot of calendar to work with. You're fighting for time. You're fighting for mindshare. And then like the reforms we're looking for when it comes to the filibuster, that's the first step to unlocking all the other stuff we want to then do. So like this is very urgent. Yeah. And we have had some experience with this kind of thing before, for those of you who've been listening to Pod Save America for a long time now, back in what, For a long time now, back in what, 2017, I believe it was maybe 2018. We did a we did a whip count. Love it. Called called Waffle House. Remember when we were there was a there was a budget there going through Congress and basically Democrats said we're not going to fully fund the government until we get a vote on protecting the dreamers. the government until we get a vote on protecting the dreamers. And we started drumming up a little bit of a whip count. And a lot of Senate Democrats sort of they jumped off the fence there. Yeah, it worked. It was an acute success. It may have played some small role in shutting

down the government for about 48 hours, which was over a weekend. It was over a weekend. So, you know, the hours were less significant. But nonetheless, it was effective because politicians are skittish and you've got to make sure they're afraid of the right things. And they can be afraid of being called partisan scorched earth warriors who don't care about bringing people together, or they can be afraid of the base for not delivering on their promises. And we don't just want to do this because it's not just because we believe it's the right thing to do for the country to pass some of these bills. There's 500 and some odd days to not just pass progressive legislation that shows people that we've earned their vote, but also to pass H.R. 1 to make sure we protect those votes if we do earn them. So

time is ticking on that. And there's one other just look, I'm in charge of corrections today. Shame on you, Tommy, for calling it a recess. It's a homework period. It's a homework period. Homework period? No way. We call it recess, congressional recess. Yeah, I know. But they don't like that anymore because it sounds like recess. And so they refer to it as district. So they went with homework? That's better? Okay. It's a district working period. They go home, they do work at home. District working period, yeah. District working period. Homework. It's not called homework. Oh, right.

Sorry, portrait mode. You flubbed your homework. Bunch of pedants. Can't even hear me. My Zoom's breaking up. I don't even know what's getting through. Yeah, are you here with us? I'm breaking in, but leave this in. Hey, get some fucking internet.

How long have you been doing this? Can we get some rural broadband for Lovett wherever he is in Biden's Build Back Better plan? He's either in super HD portrait mode or you can't see him. Don't cut this we're leaving this is our lives am i back we've you're back you're back now for now we'll see maybe these democrats could pass a broadband bill we already made i already made that joke while you were cut

out uh all right we we've talked we've talked a lot about joe mansion and kirsten cinema's support of the filibuster shaniqua what what other Senate Democrats are you keeping an eye on here that have been particularly waffly on their support of the filibuster? So three states that really stood out to me because they are all three represented by two Democrats, but the other Democrat in the state has come out in support of eliminating the filibuster for H.R.1. has come out in support of eliminating the filibuster for HR1. And so Patrick Leahy in Vermont, Bernie Sanders is his counterpart, he has been really vocal about this, but has said, you know, the Senate is where legislation comes to cool off. It's the saucer or something like that. I know. And, you know, I just think it's interesting, because he has, you know, Bernie Sanders there, who has been, who who's vocal about everything and really pushing a progressive agenda. And this is part of it and has just kind of landed on that.

I think out of the three, I'm going to mention he's the one that really needs to be pushed so people can understand where he stands, because the Senate is where things come to cool off. Doesn't answer the question, like, do you want to pass HR1 or not? And then was really interested, and I wouldn't call him, you know, John Ossoff from Georgia, Senator Warnock has said, you know, he does not think the filibuster is worth saving if we can't pass HR1. Ossoff has said he's open to eliminating the filibuster. But I just think that is a pretty lukewarm stance for someone who is the 50th senator, as far as I'm concerned, like he was the last person to be elected. They got elected together, Warnock and Ossoff, but looking at the vote count and vote share. You're tough, open to eliminating feels pretty good to me.

He should just say it. He should just say it. No, but he should, sorry, he should just say it. He should just say it. No, but he should. Sorry. He should just say it because it's like, you know, this isn't just about getting people to be for this. It's like the difference between people who are for this because they have to be and people who are for this because they recognize that it's like the right thing to do and something to fight for. Yeah. And will Senator Warnock be back in 2023 if he doesn't do this? Would Ossoff have been elected in 2020 if Georgia had the bills that they're working on in place now? So if they keep going and these are on the books, you know, he wouldn't have been elected. So I think he kind of owes it to the folks of

Georgia and everyone who has helped out to get him elected to do the right thing. And then finally, our senator, Senator Feinstein, she, I'd say in between Leahy and Ossoff, and said that she doesn't want to end tradition, but the opposition party shouldn't be able to prevent votes on important bills. I just don't get the obsession with tradition. You know, that goes back to Joe Manchin for me. I just don't know what he's holding on to. goes back to joe manchin for me and i just don't know what he's holding on to but especially for feinstein who represents california um i just that just feels like a not good excuse to me

um so yeah those are the three that i'm really going to be watching to see what they do because um i mean i would put cinema there but she's you know yeah doing her thing to annoy people um but yeah i think it's really interesting that you have three Democrats who their counterparts in the state are other Democrats who have been pretty upfront about how they feel about this. And then you have these three who are who are not. And if you live in their states, you should call them and get them to be more clear on good advice. The two dudes that I'm watching are the senators from Delaware. You got Chris Coons and Tom Carper. They've both been very lukewarm on this. And they are from a blue state, Joe Biden's home state.

And I think you should call them and tell them if they don't get off the fence, Dan Pfeiffer is going to primary one of them. He should. He needs to put together the exploratory committee. He needs to put together the committee just to show that it's there's some, you know, there's some bite behind the bark. You know, we got to get Dan in this contest. The other thing is he just rattled off a list of senators. And it's even when you, you know, obviously Ossoff is an exception.

But one other reason we have to move fast is not to put too fine a point on it. Like we're one hardened artery away from losing the Senate at any time. That's not wrong. Just something gonna keep in mind yeah well and also yeah you talk about lahey and feinstein too those there's like opposition that is due to sort of um political concern like how's this going to play in my next race i know like maggie hasson in new hampshire has a tough race coming up she's been sort of on the fence but then there's just I've been in the Senate for a thousand years and this is all I know. And that's like Feinstein and Leahy. Also, if I hear that one, no one uses a saucer anymore.

We're all using those stupid fucking paper things around our Starbucks to like if legislation does any more cooling in the Senate, it will just be ice. They don't do anything. They don't pass anything. There's not some issue of like overheated House bills coming over to the floor in the Senate and rapidly getting passed. The Senate doesn't do anything. They raise money and then they leave. Yeah, it's like it's like too much legislating these days. We got to slow this slow this bad boy down to reconciliation bills every four years. Great. So just in case you are not sure what to do when you call, what to say, what argument to make. Last week, we asked you all to send us voice notes explaining what you would say, the argument you would make to Joe Manchin, Kyrsten Sinema or any other Senate Democrat who's still on the fence about abolishing the filibuster.

You really delivered. Here are a couple of our favorites. Let's play the clips. That is what I'd truly like you to be A filibuster buster could save democracy And everyone would be in love with thee Hi, Joe. I'm one of your constituents. I appreciate the critical votes you've cast to do things like protect the Affordable Care Act, but there is a version of U.S. history in which you could cast many more critical votes. Reform the filibuster, Joe.

And if you do, I will personally organize a group of West Virginian progressives to carry you and Susan Collins to the top of Cooper's Rock so that you can shout both sides until it rings off the Appalachian Hills. I like the appeal to ego at the end there. That was good. I really liked that one. The song. I don't know.

That is quite a song. We have one more that came in through email and not through voice note that John Lovett's going to read for us. All right, here it is. From a listener named Alec to Mr. Manchin. Oh, God. Come on, Alec. That's sort of there's a space between, you know, inside of his name to

make a little pun. There's no argument that hasn't been made to you yet. Ultimately, you just mistake Republicans for people acting in good faith. And that's very silly of you. But anyway, below is something you probably haven't considered about the filibuster. Did you know Philly comes from a Greek word philia meaning love? Did you know bust means to bankrupt? The filibuster is literally bankrupting love, loving policy and loving progress.

I feel like we're all Sam going throw the filibuster in the fucking volcano already and you're like, nah bro, you'll have to bite my finger off. That was so much cringe in so few words. Alec, thank you. Thank you for sending that deeply uncomfortable missive. Who's Sam? It's Samwise Gamgee, I believe. Gamgee's from Lord of the Rings. That's a Lord of the Rings

reference. Okay. I think we should take two lessons away from these. One, don't be mean. It's probably better not to be mean to them.

Two, keep it simple and make sort of basic direct arguments. That would be my advice based off our experience just now. And I'm also just like,

I'm very interested in Greece by way of Wisconsin. I'm also just like, I'm very interested in Greece by way of Wisconsin. I'm also interested in that path. Yeah, yeah. No, don't be mean, but dripping condescension and sarcasm, like screaming both sides

from the top of a mountain. I laughed. That works. That works. That's better than just straight mean. All right. Do not forget to call your senators so we can keep updating our whip count. Go to VoteSaveAmerica.com slash for the people. You can find our call tool there. We'll have scripts for you and you can check out the latest count. Shaniqua, thanks for joining us. Thank you for having me for what I still stand behind is my first time.

I like that. I like the confidence. Jordan went silent on this. And just one other quick note. The best way to reach Dianne Feinstein is by telegram. Okay. All right, everyone. We'll talk to you Thursday. Take care. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive producer is Michael Martinez.

Our senior producer is Flavia Casas. Our associate producers are Jordan Waller, Jazzy Marine, and Olivia Martinez. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin is our sound engineer. Thanks to Tanya Somenator, Katie Long, Roman Papadimitriou, Caroline Rustin, and Justine Howe for production support. And to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Narmal Konian, Yale Freed, and Milo Kim, who film and upload these episodes as videos every week.