The Daily Beast Podcast - Stefanik’s Replacement Theory Talk Led to a Day of Infamy

Episode Date: May 17, 2022

Congresswoman Elise Stefanik has the “worst luck in American retail politics ever,” declares host Molly Jong-Fast on this episode of The New Abnormal. Stefanik’s past “replacement theory” rhetoric has resurfaced after the “screed” of the Topps shooter Payton Gendron had been reported to contain the same kind of views. Somehow she thinks she’s the victim—and Molly and Andy Levy dive into that on this episode. Plus! Democratic strategist Adrienne Elrod gives Molly the low-down on the Pennsylvania candidates running in Tuesday’s election, including Dr. Oz and Kathy Barnette, who is “even too Trumpy for Trump.” And Shannon Watts, founder of anti-gun violence group Mom’s Demand Action, explains the loophole that allowed the Topps shooter to get his gun, and how the NRA is linked to what drove him to kill. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi, I'm Molly Zhang Fast, no relationship to Kim Jong-un. I'm a left-wing pundant and a writer at the Atlantic Info. And I'm Andy Levy, former Fox News and CNN HLN guy and current cable news conscientious objective. And I'm producer Jesse Cannon, and I'm here to make sure things don't go too far off the rails. We're here to have fun, smart conversations with the wisest and funniest and funniest people in science and media and politics that help make what's happening today clearer. Our world has been turned upside down, and on the new abnormal, we'll talk about the people who got us into this mess and how we'll hopefully get ourselves out of it. What a great show we have today. Democratic strategist Adrian Elrod is going to come by to talk to us about the midterms with Democrats and messaging. Then we're going to talk to Shannon Watts, who's, of course, the founder of Mom's Demand Action and a board member of every town for gun safety.

And she's going to talk to us about the gun violence in Buffalo this weekend, as well as a host of other issues. But first, let's have some fun. Andy Levy. Molly Jongfest. We're coming off a weekend of five mass shootings. One that captured the headlines, though just one of five, was this incredibly tragic. I want to say it was racially motivated. A shooter, an 18-year-old shooter drove from somewhere between two and five hours away

and shot up a grocery store in Buffalo. shooting 13 people, 11 of whom were black, in a largely black neighborhood, he has a screed of white replacement theory, a manifesto that looks like something you might read in conservative media. I mean, obviously, just absolutely horrific. And we're at the point where there's just no words to describe it. The fact that it was, as you said, only it was one of five mass shootings this past weekend is just, unreal, but that's where we are as a country these days. He left 188 page manifesto filled with

white nationalism. Yeah, you know, we're a political podcast, so let's get into the, the icky politics of this, which is that, as you said, this guy was a, you know, full on racist, full on anti-Semite, full-full-on believer in this absolutely, you know, ridiculous and obscene great replacement theory that has become a huge deal on the right. It's really become one of the GOP talking points. Yeah, no, it really has. And it's, and I mean, they're all scrambling now to try to say that it's, that that's not true, but it's true.

A fascinating thing, we have Stefanik, who was at a time thought of as sort of a more normal member of the GOP that's out the window. And instead of apologizing or saying, you know, there's no place. for racism in this party, she attacked the media and said that they were twisting her words, which we all know is not true. So I think that we're not seeing there are fewer and fewer Mitt Romney's in this party. No, that's absolutely true. A mere couple of years ago, she was not like this. She was just more of her run-of-the-mill GOP politician. And now she, you know, she jumped on the Magatrain, but she doesn't even have the courage of her lack of convictions.

And now that people have died because an 18-year-old asshole used those theories as the basis of his worldview, now they want to run away from the theories. Which, look, if someone went out and killed a bunch of people because of stuff I'd been saying, I'd want to run away from the stuff I said too. But that doesn't change the fact that you said it. And doesn't change the fact that Tucker Carlson has been promoting this on his very widely, wide. watched show, you know, for the past six months or a year or however, however long, or ever long he's been harping on this replacement theory. And, you know, of course, you had some of the, some of the very fine people down in Charlottesville were saying Jews will not replace us. And it's important to know that they weren't, they didn't mean they were going to be

replaced by Jews. The ultimate great replacement theory is that it's, you know, it's that you're trying to change the demographic of a country to make it more favorable to your part. And that's the claim is that the Democrats want all these, and let's just be honest, whether they say it or not, they want that the Democratic Party wants brown people to come in and assuming that they will vote Democrat and they will change the demographic makeup of this country. But behind that theory is, as it always is, the notion that this is a Jewish plot. So when the people in Charlottesville were chanting, Jews will not replace us. That's what they meant. They didn't mean, you know, we're not going to be replaced by Jewish people. we're not going to let the Jews get this evil work their evil magic and get this plan through.

So what you've got now is you've got people out there like Ben Shapiro and stuff like that saying, you know, you can't say it's replacement theory that the Republican Party is talking about because the replacement theory is that it's all the Jews fault and none of them are saying that. That's like, yeah, shut up. Like Ben Shapiro is the last year. He's just trying to make Jewish Republican work and he'll do anything he can. I know. And it's just, it's pathetic and it's awful. And let's be perfectly clear. Whether Tucker Carlson, whether Stefanik, whether Matt Gates, whether any of the other, you know, scores of Republicans who talk about great replacement theory and talk about replacing people, whether they actually say the Jews are behind it or not, it doesn't matter. It's the same theory. And it all boils down to the same thing. And also eventually those people are going to come for the Jews.

Like the fact that Ben Shapiro somehow thinks that they're just going to kill the people who aren't Jewish but who are minorities is like completely crazy. The thing that I want to focus on here is that like immigration is down, right? There's no, you know, how are they get, you know, this fear of immigrants is not based in any kind of real, you know, there are certainly people at the border, but not, you know, not in the quantity in which. the anxiety is set up. You know, this is really just one of these anxieties that has almost no real bearing in the real world. Yeah, I think you could make an argument that Joe Biden's immigration policies

are at least functionally to the right of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush and George Bush. I mean... Yeah, I think a lot of people are not happy with his immigration policies because they're nothing. Yeah, he has not changed much from Donald Trump. I mean, and as you said, you know, people on the left are not overjoyed with Joe Biden's immigration policy. So it's the caravans writ a little larger.

Every time there's an election coming up, so every even year, basically, whether it's midterms or presidential, we get everyone, you know, the right starts harping on these migrant caravans and our open borders, our borders are like could not be less open, it seems to me. but they harp on that because, look, they know fear is a powerful motivator for voting. And particularly on the Republican side, that's really all they have. You've got an entire party based around fear. So that's what we get. But then, of course, when you have a guy out there, and look, I don't know that this guy

watched Tucker Carlson, he may not have. I don't believe he mentioned Tucker Carlson in his, I don't even want to dignify it by calling it a manifesto. In his screed, I think is what you called it earlier. Yeah, that's a good word. You know, I don't think he mentioned Tucker Carlson. But the fact of the matter is, he is exhibiting the, it's the same ideology. Well, and it's the result of a culture of where white nationalism is the mainstream, yeah.

Yeah, in the Republican Party, white nationalism is pretty well mainstreamed at this point. And sure. So, yeah, you're going to get a guy driving, you know, hours from where he lives because he wants to find a neighborhood that has, you know, a high concentration. of black people because that's who we want to kill. And the idea that we're going to now pretend that that shit is divorced from the stuff that the Republican Party has been peddling for, I mean, I'll be, you know, I'll be polite and say since 2016, although you could go back much earlier than that. But it's been.

Yeah. Luke Gingrich. Ronald Reagan. Spiro, Agnes. No, absolutely. You know, I guess what you could say is. maybe it's been more overt since 2016. It's a lot more of the, I'm sick of this expression, but I'm going to use it anyway. It's a lot more of the quiet part out loud.

Like there are fewer quiet parts now. You know, there's a lot more stuff at full volume. And no, I'm sorry, you're not getting away with pretending you're. What's amazing is like Stefanik and people like that. Oh, they're the victims now. She's the victim. Like people are lying. They're dead because of an ideology she's been pushing and somehow she's the victim.

Fuck off. Well, that's the sort of brilliance of these conservative victimese, is that no matter what happens, somehow you're able to be the victim, you know, no matter what really happens, it's all you're the victim. I mean, it's completely strange. I think there are two issues here, right? There's one is the white nationalism mainstreaming and radicalized people taking. this ideology and using it to her people. The other is the proliferation of AR-15s, which is the gun for these kind of crimes. I think that that is, we have had times in American life where there have been bans on

these type of assault weapons. And again, I mean, obviously, we're not in a place where Democrats have had a great deal luck legislating on guns, but clearly we have a real problem in this country. Yeah, I mean, I will say I don't think that's a problem that's going to go away. I think this country has made that perfectly clear that regardless of anything, the guns are safe. People may not be safe, but the guns will always be safe. And I'm going to say this as a former gun owner and as someone who, maybe no one will listen to this, used to be an NRA member. They suck. I mean, the NRA absolutely sucks. And they've done great damage to this country. And again, I'm saying this as a former member and someone who bought into some of their stuff for a while. I will say, I guess in my defense, I will say that I quit the NRA when Obama was president because it was just like I would get their magazine and it would just be all this anti-Obama stuff. And I was like, you clearly, this is about a lot more than guns for you.

isn't it? It's something about, there's something about Barack Obama that really bothers you. Never could quite put my finger on it, but there was something. I don't know. Yeah. The NRA may go away, and we really don't hear much from them anymore, I guess, since all the lawsuits and everything, they've kind of been neutered. This country is, it's gun culture and it's car culture, and it's really hard to change that. And I don't want to just throw my hands up and say, like, I don't even like talking about the guns part of it because I just feel like it's nothing's going to happen with the guns part of it. Like maybe we have a chance at changing the, you know, at calling out the white nationalism bullshit and doing something about it. I just, we are never going to have enough

politicians in this country who want to actually do something about the guns or even if they want to, who will actually do it. 200 years from now, you know, when we're all wearing scuba gear to record our podcasts, maybe I'll be proven wrong. But, I don't think in the near future that you're, you know, I think the Democrats could have a 65, 35, 35 majority in the Senate, but, you know, you'd have enough people like, you'd have enough mansionite type people that you would still not be able to pass meaningful gun legislation. I really believe that. Yes, I agree.

I don't know. Maybe. I hope they do pass something. So as we are taping this, Elon Musk is tweeting little poop emojis to the CEO. of Twitter. No one knows what it means, but I'm going to go out of a limb here and say that Elon Musk's Twitter acquisition has gone the way many Elon Musk things go off the rails. I'm starting to get the sense that Elon is going to put some people on Mars before he

owns Twitter. That's my hot take. Yeah. I just, I mean, I got to say, I saw the proof. emoji thing. And I think the Twitter guy was talking about how tough it is to quantify spam and stuff like that. I wasn't exactly sure because, to be quite honest with you, I just kind of rolled my eyes and kept scrolling. Right. Because I'm just, I'm, I am so over Elon Musk. And, and again, look, I just, part of me, like, I love, I love space. I love the idea of going to space. I love

watching the SpaceX launches. I love when they land, you know, the, the fuel tanks or the engines, whatever it is, that they're, that they land on the barges. I just think that's, for me, that's a real sort of look what we can do type situation. Like, it's just amazing to me. But he's such a shitbird. And I'm done with him. I don't know how else to say it, but he's just, honestly, he's not that smart, I think. And I think, I think he's good at some things. Like he's good at buying companies, like Tesla and whatever. But I don't think on like a, day-to-day basis. He's just not that smart a guy. And I think you're right,

Molly, I think, and I've been more hesitant about this than you have. I will, you know, you've been strong about the idea that he was never going to buy Tesla. I mean, Twitter. Yeah. But I've come around to your way of thinking on this. I just, I think he's looking for ways out now.

I mean, honestly, I just never thought he had the money. And also, by the way, taking a company private because you like the tweets. I mean, there are really much better things to do with your money. You would think, yeah. I'm just saying, like, especially right now, you know, and you could do a lot of stuff with your money that would be a better use of it.

And you'd mention this earlier before we were taping when many of the best conversations happen, that the lesson Elon Musk has taken from Trump and Trumpism, which I think is really your right on here, is that attention is good and he needs to get it. There are a lot of people who are, like, worried he's going to run for president. I don't think he's going to run for president because he's South Africa. But I do think that this attention economy is going to be a situation that we're going to see more and more of. And you even see this with these congresspeople, right? They are like, Stefanik got this job in leadership and then doubled down on these white replacement theories and this sort of crazy stuff because it got her attention and fundraising.

I mean, she saw MTG do it, right? I mean, this is one of the results of this attention economy. No, absolutely. And I just, I wish, like, if you're that much of a narcissist and you need attention, at least can't you just do what the normal narcissist do and host a podcast? Like, it's just, it's so much better. You know, I. Elon Musk, get a podcast.

Adrian Elrod is a Democratic strategist who's worked on campaigns for Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton. Welcome to the new abnormal, Adrian Elrod. Thank you, Molly. I am so honored to be on your podcast. I'm a huge fan. I've been listening for a long time. And obviously a big fan of yours. So thank you. Well, the feeling is mutual. Brands. Yes. So, but I want to talk to you about the destruction of the Republican Party. I feel like this was, this weekend was, at least Defonik has the worst luck in American retail politics ever. I mean, remember when she was actually kind of where she was like when she was a never-Trumper and she was like a moderate Republican from New York and was sort of like embraced by some of the former or like the never-Trump former Republican women.

And now she's not only like MAGA, but she is ultra MAGA all the way and apologetically. She's really leaned into this MAGA thing. And it's quite remarkable because I haven't looked at the latest numbers on her district, but I worked at the D-Truple C during the 2006 cycle. And upstate New York is a weird place. I mean, it can it can flip pretty quickly. I mean, look at Kirsten Gillibrand's race. When she ran for the House, of course, she's now in the Senate. Those races can flip pretty fast.

I don't think that she's necessarily in jeopardy, but she certainly is putting herself in a situation where Democrats are going to really want to target her down the road. It's interesting because it's like, so on Friday, she did this tweet that was like Democrats are pedophiles. It wasn't quite that, but it was, it embraced QAnon language in a way that we have not seen a more mainstream Republican do. and she is in leadership. And then came a mass shooting with a shooter who had a manifesto that read like something out of white replacement theory.

So in normal world, like pre-Trump, this would end a politician's career. Oh, God, yes. I mean, without a doubt, you know, you look back at the things that used to end politicians' careers, you know, a domestic violence charge. just one domestic violence charge would force a politician to step down. You know, one erratic comment and a scrum with reporters might cost a member of Congress

to resign, a politician to resign. Trump changed all of that. He upended all of that. And now you've got people who are going to the extreme and not only going to the extreme and documenting their extreme comments on a way that you can never take it away. I mean, that tweet will live with her for the rest of her life.

It will live with her. It will live with the Republican Party and going into infamy. But yet there are no repercussions. I mean, the only repercussion is for us to vote these people out and to run strong candidates who fit the district, fit the profile of their district who can beat some of these folks. But it is quite remarkable how dramatically things have changed

just over the course of the last few years under Trump. It's interesting because you've seen sort of the party change. I mean, I think a lot of people thought in January that when Trump was gone, Trumpism wouldn't get war. in his absence? Well, yeah, I think we all kind of wondered what that was going to be. I mean, and I think it's still sort of left, you know, I think the jury is still out to see what kind of form Trump is and takes.

But it certainly has gotten worse. And, you know, look, I believe that Democrats are going to do well. I think we're going to not do as bad as some people think of the midterms in 2022. And I think certainly at this point, if Joe Biden runs for reelection, and it's Trump is on the other end of the ticket, that he's got a pretty decent shot of, winning. But, you know, what does happen, Molly, if a Ron DeSantis, somebody who certainly espouses some of the crazy and, you know, frankly, scary viewpoints of Donald Trump, what if he ascends to the White House? He's somebody who is, I think, in many ways, worse than Trump in terms of

his viewpoints, but has a more moderate way of sort of, you know, discussing those viewpoints. How does that change the equation? How does that change Trumpism? You know, I think those are things that we don't necessarily believe will happen in terms of him as the name to the White House, but we have to account for the possibility that it could happen. And how does that change? Yeah, I think of like the worst thing is a dissantis playing by Trump rules. Yeah. Yeah. I couldn't agree more. I mean, you know, you look what he's done with Disney. You look at some of the, you know, insane laws, of course, in Florida, the 15-week abortion ban, which would be a trigger law that would go into a place.

if Roe is overturned. I mean, he's a very, and of course the way he gets COVID, he's an extreme version of, I think, some of these ultra-maga Republicans, but he comes across as sort of like the guy next door that maybe some folks want to have beer with. And those are the ones who are really scary, the ones who are sort of hiding behind their ultra-maga viewpoints,

but coming across is maybe at least in some respects a little bit more of a normal person. Like Youngkin. Like Youngkin. is a great example. A great example. Patagonia wearing, you know, that is the logo on what go on is red Patagonia fleece, which, you know,

Patagonia is not too happy about that. They're a pretty progressive company that is very pro environment. So, yeah, those are the folks that scare me in, and the Republicans, I mean, Molly, they are, we can say a lot of things about the Republican Party, but they are somewhat smart in terms of how they recruit candidates and how they run certain candidates and races that, you know,

sort of fit, at least from a personality standpoint, the politics of that region. In Glenn Yankan was somebody who came in there. He looks like a normal guy. You know, it looks like kind of your rich dad next door, rich middle-aged dad next door, but he is somebody who espouses extreme views. And those are the types of Republicans that I think we're going to see more of in some of these districts that, you know, they're trying to flip. Some of these states and these districts are trying to flip. One of the complaints I get from a lot of Democrats, we have a lot of Democratic Congress people on this podcast. And one of the complaints I get a lot.

Great. One of the complaints we get is that they feel that Biden is not doing enough sort of orating. What do you think about that? I mean, is that just normal midterm complaining? Is that true? Would you like to see him out there more? I mean, what's your hot take? First of all, that this White House,

Molly, as you'll certainly recall, has done such a great job of handling the COVID pandemic and most importantly, protecting him and protecting some of the other senior level are obviously protecting him and the vice president. So they have not been traveling, at least the first year they weren't traveling as much, right? And certainly on the campaign that I worked on,

and we were not, we were, you know, everybody was pretty much quarantined to their homes because that was pre-vaccination. But I think you will see him out there more. I mean, the White House has made it. very clear that he is going to start, you know, contrasting his message more with Republicans. They're using the term ultra-maga, which I think is extremely smart. And you will seem out there more. I mean, look, summertime is a great time to hit the campaign trail, you know, go out there

or sell, President Biden will be out there selling his agenda, you know, selling the infrastructure bill. I just saw, I think, something in my inbox this morning that he's going to be traveling more over the next few weeks, selling infrastructure. That's something that I think you're going to be seeing a lot of, not just from President Biden, but from the cabinet members as well, and of course, from the Vice President. And look, you know, memories are fleeting. People may be complaining, members of Congress may be complaining now, but I think in a few months when you really see President Biden out there on the campaign trail more, not just selling his agenda, but also appearing with some of these candidates, some of these members who are running for re-election congressional

members, up and down the ticket, then you'll hear less of those complaints. And, you know, you'll hear more about the great accomplishments of this administration. it still drives me crazy, Molly. And I think this is something that is, you know, not just the administration's not necessarily fault, but something I know that they're working on rectifying, but it's the fault of me. It's the fault of anybody who has a platform who's going out on television, talking to the media, doing your podcast. I mean, the president has a great story to tell. This economy is recovered from a once-in-a-generation pandemic far better than we ever expected. I mean, there's been significant job growth and not just jobs that, you know, are giving.

the unemployment numbers under 4%. These are jobs that people actually want. These are good paying jobs. There's a story to tell here about how the economy recovered and recovered better. And I think it takes the administration and candidates who are running for re-election. And then people like us, it takes all of us to go out there and tell that story and talk about it because the American people should hear directly from the people who are part of making that story happen.

They should be hearing from those folks more often on this. What races do you feel like you're a little bit excited about? Well, I got to tell you, this Pennsylvania race is, I realize it's timely because the primary is tomorrow. Tomorrow? Very exciting. I do love the Democrats. Let's first, we need to talk about the Republicans. I know.

So we have a candidate that is so Trumpy, she's like almost too Trumpy. She's too Trumpy for Trump, right? Who won't answer? He hasn't even endorsed her. And she's, yeah. Yeah. And she won't answer questions about her military service or about where she grew up or where she lived or who she is or what her phone number is. Okay.

She got a mean piece written about her by Selena Zito, which I think should speak all the volumes in the world. Then we have TV doctor. Mm-hmm. Yep. Dr. Oz, who, you know, despite his Trump endorsement and despite, you know, having extremely high name ID, and, you know, I think pretty much every household in America knows who Dr. Oz is. If they haven't, then they probably haven't been watching network television or didn't watch network television. But yet, he is still not breaking away from the pack. In fact, you know,

the race is at a dead heat between three candidates at this point. And it's very telling. I'm looking to see, does the Trump endorsed candidate who has extremely high name ID actually break through and win tomorrow night? And that's going to be fascinating to me. And look, I, you know, I think we can't necessarily dictate Trump's influence in every single race because there are some candidates in past primaries that he's endorsed that who won. Of course, J.D. Vance in Ohio being, you know, a prime example of one. But Charles Groper in Oklahoma. Charles Grover in Oklahoma.

And then there are people that he's endorsed who have not won. So I think it's really hard to like sort of tell his influence. But yeah, he didn't win. Charles Groper didn't win either. And he didn't win exactly, exactly. But I'm looking forward to seeing what happens with Dr. Oz. And look, I will tell you this, if Dr. Oz does win or if this other crazy woman wins tomorrow night, I think Democrats have an extremely good chance of flipping that seat, especially when you've got really great candidates like John Federman, Malcolm Kenyatta, and Connor Lamb running.

Those three are, you know, it's a shame that they're all running against each other because they are all such great candidates in their own right. But, of course, whoever wins that race, the other two will campaign very heavily for them. And I'm excited about this race because that could be one that we flip. And we could certainly use some races that we flip going into the 2020 midterms. So let's talk about what's happening in New Hampshire. That seems like a really important seat for Democrats not to lose. I'm a little more, I think, optimistic than a lot of people because I have these cousins who live up there. And they said they don't know who the Republican is who's running.

Oh, that seems like great news. That's really good news. I feel like that's good news. Well, yeah, it's really good. And look, Mala, you and I both, we've, you know, you covered these races. I've worked on a number of races where something like that happens and the Republicans still wins because they just have an R by their name. Yeah.

But I think Maggie Hassan has done a good job of sort of moderating her positions. I was pretty disappointed, frankly, to see that she took such a strong, strong stance on the border issue. she went really hard against rescinding Title 42. And that was a bummer to me because I think if you're a Democrat, especially if you're running statewide, you have to give those progressives like the most active part, the most active wing of the Democratic Party.

You have to give them something to get excited about and you have to give them something to sort of knows to give them some hope. And that did frustrate a lot of progressives in New Hampshire when she took a pretty aggressive stance regarding Title 42. but for the most part, I think she's running a pretty good campaign. New Hampshire is just one of those weird states, you know? I mean, people think it's, you know, it's New England, so therefore it's like, you know,

solidly blue. But there are times where it is not solidly blue, and a lot of those times are the midterms. So that's going to be one to watch. You know, I feel like, especially with Roe being in jeopardy, I think that that helps Maggie. And I hope that she will take sort of take the ball with Roe and run with it, because I think that's something can get her over the finish line. and make sure that we hold that seat in Democratic hands. You're a Democratic strategist.

What do you think about this strategy where you have these Democratic senators who sort of don't do media? I mean, Maggie's a good example, also Cortez. I mean, where they don't do national media, maybe they do some local media, but they're pretty scarce. I mean, do you think that works?

I am always a little bit on these Democrats because it's like one of the things that people liked about Trump and I'm not in any way saying that I liked anything about that. lunatic. But one of the things that people liked was that he was accessible. Yeah. He would do his own tweets and you would feel like you could interact with him, even if it was negative. Yeah. And I wonder if like these old school politicians who just don't engage are are sort of leaving votes on the table. Yeah. I mean, I think it really depends. I mean, first of all, I'm a big believer, Molly, that if you're good with reporters and you're good on message and you can

defend your policy positions and you can draw a contrast with reporters, then, I mean, with your opponent, I'm sorry, then yes, you should be talking to reporters. You should be doing a lot of media. I do understand, I guess, kind of the decision to do less national press and more, you know, focus your press more on local, you know, speaking to local reporters, doing, you know, local broadcast, local radio, local, you know, conversations with local reporters. But I think it's smart when, especially if you're running for the United States Senate and you're running for re-election, by the way. I mean, my God, go on MSNBC. It's the friendliest network.

You might have one or two challenging positions, but, I mean, challenging questions, but if you can't defend your position on some of the policy positions that you've taken because you're running in a swing district or you're running in a tight reelection, then maybe you should rethink everything. So, and plus you can raise a lot of money. I mean, Rachel Maddow is known for being a. giant fundraising machine for candidates, not because she's trying to, but you go on there, you get exposure to all these really hardcore national Democrats. And you have money. And these are like people who are going to give you $5 donations, which is exactly the kind

of donation that you want, grassroots donations. So I think candidates should be doing a lot more press. I realize time is limited. But I would be, you know, trying to do, trying to talk to as many reporters and trying to reach as many people as possible if I was a candidate. where you see our listeners happen to be extremely engaged, tend to be Democrats. Tell us where they should be focused. If there's a candidate, they should be supporting.

Oh, yes, of course. Well, look, I'm very excited about Stacey Abrams and Raphael Warnock in Georgia. I think that's, Georgia is just such an interesting state because it's, of course, trended more democratic in recent years. But, you know, I was a little nervous about those two races just because Georgia is so marginal, but I think with Roe being in jeopardy, that has changed the equation on everything. And, you know, Stacey is a hero in Georgia. Right.

And has registered a lot of voters. Has registered a lot of voters and has put a lot of voter protections in place to the extent that she can for someone who's not currently holding elected office. She's really a big energizer, not just for voters in Georgia, but for somebody across the country or candidates across the country. So my eyes are on that. You know, I'm also, again, going back to Pennsylvania. I just think Pennsylvania is such an interesting state.

You know, Biden narrowly won that state. I think by 1.2 percentage points in 2020. Of course, Hillary Clinton lost that state by less than a percentage in 2016. It truly is the ultimate example of a swing state. And I, again, I was kind of worried about Pennsylvania until I thought Memit Oz might be the nominee or this other crazy woman. Kathy Barnett. And it doesn't, I don't know. I mean, I don't want to, you know, jump, put the car before the horse.

But it doesn't feel like Dave and McCormick has the wind in his sales like those other T-Dos. So. Yeah, it doesn't seem like it. Even though he hired many members of Trump World. I mean, just crazy. I know. What does that tell you? What does that tell you?

So I would say that those two states, you know, Florida, I'd love to see Val Demings beat Marker Ruby. Oh, my God. That would be a dream. But she's raised a ton of money. She's raised a ton of money. And it's, I think her campaign is being extremely well-referming. and this is not a criticism of her. It's more of just Florida becoming a more and more red state.

I mean, I'm interested, Molly, to see what happens in 2024 because, as you know, running a presidential campaign in Florida is so insanely expensive. You've got basically five states under one state, under one umbrella. You know, the northern part of the state is so different from the southern part of the state. The middle part of the state is more like a Midwestern state. The northern part of the state might as well be Alabama. And then, of course, you've got the Cuban and Hispanic community in the southern part of the state. So it's really expensive.

It's really hard to run a campaign there. And, you know, if Florida looks more and more out of reach, you know, at the presidential level for Democrats, I could see Democrats putting more money in the states like Georgia and North Carolina try to solidify some wins there. So I'm looking forward to just seeing what the margins are in that race in Florida. But I love Val Demings. My God, she's incredible. And I would love to see her upset, Margo Rubio. Yeah.

Oh, so interesting. Thank you for joining us. I hope you'll come back. Thanks, Molly. I would love to. Thanks for having me. Shannon Watts is the founder of Mom's Demand Action and a board member of Every Town for Gun Safety. Welcome to the new abnormal Shannon Watts.

Hey, how are you? I'm thrilled to have you here, and I'm so thrilled that you could come on. First of all, you've been working on this for a long time, but are you sort of shocked at the proliferation of shootings? It feels insane, and I don't know if that's... because I follow it so closely, and this is the work I do every day. I think we expected that after the pandemic, given the millions of guns sold, given the laws that were loosened, given the Trump administration, I mean, he had the ATF selling, allowing curbside gun sales. I think we expected that when things got back to so-called normal, we would be in for a crisis of epic proportions.

but then you have to marry in the conspiracy theorists and the hate speech that we're seeing become normalized as part of the right-wing platform. And that is clearly a recipe for tragedy and disaster. So a good example is that in Buffalo during these church services, there were people who were heckling Tish James because they're so furious that there aren't gun laws. in place. I mean, what could theoretically be done? Well, you know, there's only so much control to James has, right? Yeah. This is a huge problem with many tentacles, right? And it's really the culmination of extremism and easy access to guns. So it isn't as simple as one law fixes everything.

Now, that said, there are certainly so many things that research and data shows, us that we can do to address this issue. So first of all, let's look at the federal level, right? We haven't even been able to pass something as simple as a background check on every gun sale because Republicans stood in the way of that back in 2013. Lots of gun legislation that has been shown by data to save lives has passed the House. It has not passed the Senate. And these are things like closing the Charleston loophole, right? The gunman in Charleston was able to get a gun, even though he had a criminal history and was a prohibited purchaser because of the loophole that allows a gun dealer to sell a gun if a background check hasn't cleared in three days. That seems

like a pretty simple loophole that we can all agree needs to be closed and yet Republicans have stood in the way. We also want to have a director of the ATF. Right. We haven't had one for nearly a decade. So President Biden has recently nominated Steve Dettlebach. We are all in on working to make that confirmation happen. And then certainly there are state and local laws. You know, we don't have all the data yet, but it sounds like New York's strong gun law worked. This teen who lived 10 minutes from Pennsylvania may have gotten his magazine there, the high capacity magazine he used. The state has a red flag law. However, it doesn't sound like it was utilized because this kid was a minor when he made the school shooting threat, right? So red flag laws work, but only when they're used. So,

So there has to be education and implementation that helps police utilize these laws. And then, you know, very simple. If you have to be 21 to buy cigarettes, you should be 21 to buy an assault rifle, right? Again, this teen white supremacist was able to get his hands on three long guns because even though you have to be 21 in the state of New York to buy a handgun, you only have to be 18 to buy a long gun. And sadly, Trump appointed judges are striking those. laws down. They just did here in California. And so those are, those are just scratching the surface of what we could be doing. But we have a narrow majority in the Senate. And we have, you know, we have a lot of states where there are Republicans in charge of state houses or there are preemption laws that

prevent mayors and cities from making policies that will save lives where they live. No, that's a good point. The Supreme Court has a concealed carry law that they're about to rule on just for people who are keeping track at home. Can you explain what this law is and what and what the status is? This is an NRA lawsuit. The plaintiffs want the Supreme Court to essentially rob the American people of their right to pass laws and protect themselves from gun violence. They want to impose a Guns Everywhere agenda.

That's the NRA's agenda to allow more guns in public spaces. Look, this is a conservative court more than in my lifetime, right? Yeah. If they want to take a historical approach, which several of the justices have said they subscribe to, then the New York's statute around permitting should be upheld. But if extremism wins out, then we will have to, and by we, I mean the gun violence prevention movement, we will have to go state by state and mitigate all of the fallout. And, you know, there are real consequences if the Supreme Court rules in favor of gun manufacturers. They really want this lawless gun free-for-all in our community.

In New York, it will mean that you will have permitless concealed carry, right? It will impact how permits are given, and it will make it easier to get a permit. One of the things that struck me as, like, a possible way to keep, you know, again, the idea here is in American life, people don't stop doing things until they get in trouble. With the Sandy Hook case, the families were able to hold the gun manufacturers libel, right? Right. So, you know, that is an interesting case because there's this law passed by Congress called Placa, which basically means that unlike any other industry in this country, it is very difficult to sue gun manufacturers for their products, the misuse of their products or the malfunction of their products. And what the Sandy Hook Court case was able to do was bypass that law and sue them around the way guns are marketed, specifically to children, to dangerous people like white supremacists. And as a result, the really interesting insights we're getting into how gun manufacturers and lobbyists have operated to try to ensure that there are more guns in more places, regardless of the dangers that. it poses, really the reckless and lawless approach that they have taken to sell guns is finally

being revealed. And it is a way in to holding manufacturers accountable. And we've also been able to go into states like New York and actually reverse that federal law at a state level so that gun manufacturers can be held accountable. And I'll tell you, that is their worst nightmare. Right. So it's hard for me to imagine the Supreme Court, not doing the most reactionary, conservative thing. I mean, have, do you have any indication from the oral arguments, how it's been going or anything like that? We really don't know. I mean, there's been concerns about Alito saying things around guns in the subway and whether that would be problematic, which we, we believe, would be. Yeah, I really don't say. As someone, Jesse and I can both attest,

I think that, yes, making the subway more dangerous would not solve any problems. But I don't know how as a justice you don't see what's happening in this country every single day and think that making it easier to access guns would be better for America. I mean, you know, if more guns and fewer gun laws made us safer, we would be the safest nation in the entire world. And instead, we have a 26 times higher gun homicide rate than any pure nation. The NRA's agenda, you know, the lie that it's sold, us that more guns make us more safe is is false. It's been proven to be false. Why do you think,

like the NRA is out of business, right? Like they are in terrible, terrible trouble. And yet we somehow, we're still held hostage by them. Why is that? I would argue that it's not really them anymore. Oh, interesting. The rhetoric that they have really embedded in our culture. culture that the they really started. I mean, if you go back to Waco, right, that is when the NRA realized that they could fundraise off of these radical messages. And that's when George Bush Sr., the former president, resigned from the NRA, when they started to refer to government officials as Jack Booted Thugs. And really, it was originally supposed to help them raise money. And what it became was part of their policy platform. And, you know, it's like an overlapping

circle now, right? The NRA's agenda, the Republican agenda, the Christian nationalist agenda. And that is that gun extremism is a recruiting tool. It's really an organizing principle for all the right-wing extremists and related groups, which has increased something like 30 percent in the last few years, these groups, so-called, you know, militias. And it gets these young white men through the door, or more likely an online meeting site to radicalize them, not dissimilar to what we saw in Buffalo this weekend. And then they use conspiracy theories like the Great Replacement Theory. Again, these theories were originated and propagated by NRA leaders to stoke fear and then ultimately recruit new members. Right. What could people listening to this podcast do? Well, I wrote a whole thread this

weekend because, you know, I was getting so many texts from friends who are not activists, who are not involved in this, who said, like, don't you feel hopeless? How do you keep doing this work? And what I said back is like, what is the other option? We sit on the sidelines and allow our brothers and sisters, particularly those in black and brown communities to be slaughtered? Is that the option? Yeah. It isn't. We have to all do this work. And I tell the story of someone I read about before I became an activist. And she made sandwiches for people who were unhoused. And she said in this newspaper article that so many people reached out and said, how can I help you? Can I give you a donation to make more sandwiches? And what she said was,

it would be really helpful if you made your own damn sandwiches. The point being that you can't count on other people to do this work. You have to get off the sidelines and you have to find a piece of this that you're passionate about and you have to do it. And we are now the largest grassroots movement in gun violence prevention. We aren't just moms anymore. We're mothers and others. We're students and survivors. We're men and non-moms. And we are doing this work every single day at all levels. So if you're interested in working with city councils or school boards or in state houses or in Congress or in corporate boardrooms or to educate people about secure gun storage, there is a piece of this work for you. And it is so simple. You just have to text the word ready to 64433. And a volunteer

will immediately reach out and get you involved. But we have to use our voices and our votes on this issue. You know, I'm thinking of the well-intentioned white women who voted for Governor Yonkin in Virginia to show Democrats or to maybe punish them, to teach them a lesson about closing schools too long. But these are the same people who are forcing guns into schools. Where again, black and brown students are most at risk. So I would just encourage everyone to get involved in this issue and to vote only for guns and champions. Interesting. Thank you so much for joining us. This was super interesting and also so upsetting. Yeah. Andy. Molly. Who has gotten your ire today? My ire today. is aimed at a guy who's been a long time rock and roller.

You know, I remember as a teenager listening to some of his songs, Wango Tango comes to mind. Oh, Jesus Christ. So here he is. He's at a Trump rally, and he's telling people to bash the skulls of Democrats and Marxists and Communists. Force, if I do say so myself, everybody in your life,

to think of what the enemies of America have done in the last 14 months and that they didn't sneak into the White House, they lied, they cheated, they scammed, and every day the Democrats violate their

sacred oath to the Constitution. And if you can't impress your friends on that, they shouldn't be your friends. So, thank you for inviting my beautiful wife, Chamein, and I, my friend, in my guitar this is a 1966 gift of birdland from caldusuf. Wow!

Does it sound as good out there as it does up here? By the way, you don't need enough medicine that you're not cleaning us over, you can't play licks like that. So I love you people madly, but I'd love you more if you went forward and just went berserk on the skulls of the Democrats and the Marxism and the Communist. It's a lot of strong talk for a guy who somehow managed to get a whole bunch of deferments from the draft when his country called him. Which, by the way, I'm not opposed to. I'm opposed to the draft. And, you know, I don't have a problem with people who don't want to serve. But I have a problem with chicken hawks.

And Ted Nugent is a chicken hawk. and he's a guy who gets up there and talks a good game. But when it comes down to putting himself on the line, he's one of the first people to run away, much like Molly's favorite former president, Donald Trump. So he gets my fuck that guy for, first of all, saying shit like that, like right after a mass murder from someone who was espousing, as we said, you know, what have become mainstream Republican values.

So he managed to say that right after, that. And a guy who also, again, he's big on encouraging other people to bash skulls, but not so big on putting his own, you know, fists where his mouth is. So fuck that guy. I don't even know who Ted New Jersey. I mean, I sort of know who he is, but I'm happy to know as little as possible. My fuck that guy, his name is Pete Ricketts. He's very rich and fancy. He is the governor of Nebraska. he has no hair, and nothing wrong with not having hair, and he thinks that if you're raped or incest, you should definitely be forced to carry your baby. Again, I just want to say this, 93% of all abortions happen in the first trimester. Okay, so we are not talking about babies here.

We are talking about a blastocyst that is the size of a fingernail clipping gets to be about the size of a lime. You know, we are not your quote-unquote baby has a tail. These are not babies. And also, I would like to point out, we had Governor Tate Reeves of Mississippi. You'll remember Mississippi as being 50th in the country in most metrics of child. Like education. And safety. Education, infant mortality.

I mean, Mississippi is, it's a state that does not do for its people. And so Tate Reeves says in a tweet that he is going to become a sanction of life because he's going, you know, he's mad at California for trying to become a place where you can go to get abortion. So Tate wants to know that he's going to become an oasis for life. Again, you're an oasis for life. like stop having, you know, improve your maternal fetal, you know, have less women die in child birth or pregnancy, protect the children you have. You know, they are, Mississippi has just, uh, has really been just an absolute embarrassment and all of those metrics. And so, again, they both get a hearty, fuck you for me. Yeah, I'm with you on that.

I think he's, is he, is he, is he, is he Tate Reeves' communications person? Yes. Yeah. He tweeted, life begins at conception. Every heart that beats inside the womb deserves a chance to beat outside. So he apparently, and I guess this is where being 50th in states in education comes into play, he thinks there's a heartbeat at conception. I think that's right.

But it's good. It's good that the people who are making laws determining, you know, how women are not allowed to have control of their own bodies. It's good that they have no understanding of science. They're absolute monons. Yeah, I think it's really good for the country and for the world. On that note, we'll wrap this episode of the new abnormal from The Daily Beast. In future episodes, we'll be talking to smart folks from the Daily Beast and beyond from media, culture, politics and science.

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