The Daily Beast Podcast - Youngkin’s White House Dream May Push Virginia Further Right

Episode Date: October 1, 2023

Aaron Kleinman, Director of Research for The States Project, tells The New Abnormal that if Republicans are able to win both houses in November’s state election, prepare to see a radical raft of policies by Gov. Glenn Youngkin as he sets his sights on the White House. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi, I'm Andy Levy, former Fox News and CNN-HLN guy and current cable news conscientious objector. I'm a former libertarian who now sits comfortably on the left. Hi, I'm Danielle Moody, former educator and recovering lobbyist. But today, I'm an unapologetic, woke commentator on America's threats to democracy. And I'm producer Jesse Kedin, 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 some of the most knowledgeable and entertaining people in politics, media, and beyond. Our goal is to try and make sense of our current crazy world, our new abnormal, and hopefully even make you laugh through the tears.

Hello and welcome to another bonus episode of the New Abnormal. And we thank you so much for being here. Today we have an extra special guest with Director of Research for the States Project, Aaron Kleinman, who will tell us all about his organization and their current efforts in Virginia's General Assembly election, which holds the key to whether or not Glenn Yonkin will be able to oppose his radical agenda or not, but for our own. First, let's have some fun. Ready to do some clips?

Clips! Yeah. Okay. As we know, the stupidest people in Punditri can only talk about Biden's age because it's a thing that any idiot could discuss and many of them are idiots. But truly the conversation that really needs to be around if we're going to talk about Biden or McConnell's senior moments, I need to know what the fuck this is from former President Trump.

What happens if the boat has an accent starts sinking, do you get electrocuted if the boat's Like, the guy said, you know, I've never thought of that, actually. But I think I gave him an idea, actually. Now, can you imagine the boat goes down and you're sitting on top of a battery? I don't feel good about that, right? In other words, you have... The man knows how electricity works, just like a fifth grader. What is he talking about there?

What is he talking about? As someone who part of their degree was in electricity, he seems to be confused that DC versus AC power, that you're going to get electrocuted by the battery if it's in water. The battery of what? That's what I don't understand. A electric boat. Oh, electric boats. That's what we're talking about here. He's dumb. That's not how it works. That's not how it works. Someone should tell him that's not how it works. You know, so this is hot off of him saying that windmills are killing whales in South Carolina. Because they fly? Yeah, well, you know.

Okay. I think there's some seriously weird things happening that man's brain more than usual. And I think we need to get to the bottom of it. I really wish, you know, the way we used to flock to diners, to interview Trump voters, we could just start maybe sending some people to be like, where do you get this from, sir? And what fantasies are you having at night? I mean, his brain is a special fucking place. It is. Like, it is so dark.

and yet filled with mirrors. Like, it is just weird. It's so weird. And the fact that what gets me is the laughter from people in the audience. Like, because if you were to pull them aside and say, what did he just say? I don't know.

I just think it's funny. Like, that's their reaction. This is maybe, I think, starting to change. But my God, the double standard that is given, or that is held between him and Joe Biden for gaffes and miss speaking, is unbelievable. And I mean, we've seen a bunch of examples in the past couple weeks. Danielle, you've brought him up on this show when he talks about getting us into World War II and when he

confuses Jeb Bush and George W. Bush. And he does things like this constantly. And you're just looking at this like, I don't love what aboutism. But when it's literally happening in front of your eyes, like you know that if Joe Biden had said something like that, like the World War II thing instead of World War III. Everyone would have been all over him and we would have had 30 think pieces from David Brooks, et cetera, about, you know, why Joe Biden is too old to be in office. But we get nothing with Trump. It's like with him, all the stuff is baked in. And we've talked about this on the show before. We can't let that happen. We can't let this shit be normalized. And this guy in one speech makes more mistakes than Joe Biden does in like a month of speeches. And I'm not saying to not

call out the Joe Biden stuff and it's unfair to bring up his age. It's not unfair. And yes, shit like that can be pointed out. But you got to do it for Trump too. And I just feel like in this, like in so many other ways, the media is just failing us. Strong agree. Check in the box on the right. Well, speaking of failure, we're going to now talk about two people whose brains are failing. Representative Warren Bober would not acting like an unruly teenager at performances of Beetlejuice The Musical has decided that she cannot be won up by the most unhinged member of Congress, Marjorie Taylor, Gangrene of the Brain, who put in an amendment to lower Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin's pay to $1. Well, while Lauren Bober decides since Marjorie is attacking a black man,

she needs to go after another minority. So let's listen to her. Since the beginning and was appointed to the transition team. Some irony there in November of 2020. As the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Readiness, Mr. Skelly played an instrumental role in the disastrous and shameful withdrawal from Afghanistan that killed 13 of America's finest. 13 American heroes, this embarrassing surrender to the Taliban. As DOD's highest ranking trans official, this delusional man thinking he is a woman embodies and espouses the wokeism that's causing significant harm to our military readiness and troop morale. Let me tell you something about Lauren Bobert.

And I'm going to say this and I honestly don't give a fuck. Her ass should have been pulled off the fucking floor for that transphobic, bigoted fucking statement. She should have never been allowed to make that statement on the floor. And there should be a campaign by Democrats to whomever runs the rules up in that place to make it plain. Because again, I will say, take out trans and put in Jewish. take out trans and put in Muslim, take out trans and put in black. Any other group that would never have been allowed. So why is it okay for her to get on the house fucking floor and spread her transphobic bigotry and disrespect in the way that she fucking did?

She is disgusting and she's a fucking disgrace. Honestly, I cannot, Jesse, that clip, my blood pressure. Yeah, she needs to fuck off forever. And you handled the bigotry stuff. I don't think I can add anything to that. I just want to point out that one of the things she's mad about is the military fighting climate change. She, I am sure, does not know this.

But oddly, the Pentagon has been, out of all government agencies, even under Republicans or whatever, the Pentagon has been sort of at the forefront of talking about the issue of climate change because they have multiple reports that correctly point out that climate change is what is called in the military a force multiplier. In other words, it leads to conditions that can make conflicts worse. And when you're talking about famines and you're talking about mass migrations because of climate change. So if she were simply a bigot, that would be enough for her to fuck off forever. But she's also just unbelievably stupid. And so she needs to really fuck, like, really fuck off forever, not just fuck off forever, but really fuck off forever.

My favorite thing about refuting this this week, too, is that on the news, there's a whole lot of generals going on talking about the idea of that the military being woke and the woke generals sitting around reading CRT is one of the stupidest thing. It's so dumb. Every one of these people is a conservative. Of course. could never give a fuck about wokeism. Like, that's the thing they want to think about. These are people who think about dropping bombs on people for Christ's sake. It's unreal.

Well, okay, I'm going to turn this ship around a little and bring us to a happier place after that. So as we tape this, the Republicans started their impeachment hearing for President Biden. And Rep. Connolly, a Democrat, in case you don't know, did a great job with a question at this hearing. Distract. deflect, the symbol. Hold on to those two words, distract and deflect,

because I think this hearing is all about look over here, not over there. So Professor Gerhardt I've heard concern about branding. So shouldn't we be concerned about all those Biden towers all over the world where foreign partnerships

were formed and influence was used here in the United States. I've seen these towers in Indonesia, in the Philippines, in Turkey. I even saw one in Chicago. Shouldn't that be a source of concern of this committee in terms of influence both foreign and domestic when President Biden became present? If there were such things as Biden buildings.

Well, was there anyone who did have them? I think we all know who had... Well, could you tell us? Because, you know... Well, just give us. me the name, Professor Gerhard. I think if we're talking about Mr. Trump. Ah, thank you.

So when President Biden appointed his son to manage U.S. foreign policy, both in the Persian Gulf and the Middle East peace, by the way, a son who couldn't qualify for getting a security clearance, but President Biden apparently granted it to Hunter anyhow. And then after leaving the White House getting a $2 billion deal, because we're told by Mr. Zabinsky follow the money, especially foreign money. Shouldn't that be of concern to us that maybe a sweetheart deal occurred with the blessing of the president, with foreign money, and should we look in a hundred Biden for that, given the fact that he handled Middle East peace in the White House? It should have been a concern with President Trump and his son-in-law.

Oh, Trump, I got that wrong again. God. I was just going to say it sucks that he had to pull teeth to get the professor to say what he should have just said from the start. Did he say Biden buildings or Biden towers? He said towers. He said towers. Yeah. Jesus Christ. No, he teed it up perfectly. I do think he got one thing wrong when he said they were discussing branding. They were actually discussing Brandon. Oh, right. Yeah. Oh, God. All right. I got one more for you. Former governor. Nikki Haley, the person I despise with pretty much every fiber of my being in the absence, I knew of her, I have to say, the wrong clock occasionally gets it right. And what she did on the debate stage to Vivek the fake Ramoswamy, Chef's Kiss.

There's one person on this. This is infuriating because TikTok is one of the most dangerous social media apps that we could have. And what you've got, honestly, every time I hear you, I feel a little bit dumber for what you say. Because I can't believe. They hear you've got a TikTok situation. What they're doing is...

I mean, I can say that for every single Republican debate. Every single Republican that opens up their mouth. I feel stupider for having listened. Bravo, Nikki Haley. Yeah, I mean, good for her for saying that. And she has clearly her role at the debate, or part of her role anyway, she has decided is to just pounce on that clown. And I would like, in a third debate, the only way to really escalate this is for her to deck him.

I'm trying to get a hashtag going. It's hashtag deck Vivek. Ooh, better than Donald Duck. That's really good. Yes, I know it relies on mispronouncing Vivek, but that's okay. I think in this case, that's okay. I agree. I would be curious to see how much she would jump in the polls if she just decked him. It's very clear she wants to. So Nikki Haley, take the deck the Vec challenge. Take the deck the Vec challenge. Yes.

He loves misgendering people. We can pronounce his name a little wrong. Exactly. Oh, yes, we can. Yes. Because in this instance, two wrongs do make it right. While we're all focused on the 2024 election, the Commonwealth of Virginia has just started early voting for its very important, 2023 elections.

Every seat in the General Assembly is up, and Virginia, Virginia currently has a split legislature with Republicans narrowly controlling the House of Delegates and Democrats with a slight edge in the state Senate. Here to give us more details is Director of Research for an organization called the States Project, Aaron Kleinman. Aaron, thanks so much for being here. Thank you for having me on, Andy. So before we get to Virginia, tell us more about the States Project. The States Project is a group that thinks state lawmakers are the most powerful policymakers that nobody really pays attention to. So as part of our work, especially on the electoral

side, we really try to support lawmakers who will try to improve the lives of their constituents by supporting things like better labor laws, clean air, clean water, equal rights, equal representation, access to reproductive health, all the things that, you know, we think that the country benefit from. We also have a policy arm that kind of works with lawmakers to help equip them with the tools they need to really implement the changes in laws that they want to see once they're elected. So the New York Times did a big piece on TSP, as I'm told it's called, on Monday, which is great. I do just want to point out that you and I talked last week before the Times piece about you coming on. Just make it clear that we were here first.

Yes. No, the new abnormal was in on the state's project story on the ground. Okay. All right. So let's talk about Virginia. As I said, literally every seat in the General Assembly is up in both houses. Can you ballpark how many of those are competitive? There are probably about maybe a quarter of the seats in each chamber will see kind of a significant push by both sides to win them.

If you kind of drill down a little deeper, the tipping points see, you know, right now I think there's around like seven of them that are probably at the tipping points for control in both chambers that are really focusing a lot of our energy on right now. But we're keeping tabs on everything and there's still more than a month between now and election day. So as, you know, things progress on the ground as we see, you know, the macro, environment is like and have the Virginia specific and district-specific environments are like, we might shift around and see which racism would really benefit most from interventions. As you said, there are several seats, I think you said seven, that could sort of put us at a tipping point. And obviously the perfect outcome for either party would be to end up with control of both houses. And there's definitely a chance that could happen, right? Yes, either party could win a

majority in both house. If you look at 2021 in Virginia, they elected a public and governor. If you look at the state legislative maps, he carried a majority of seats in both chambers. So that's kind of their path. But also, if you look at 2020, Joe Biden won significant majorities of seats in both chambers. On the other side, Democrats could afford to lose a few of those Biden seats and still have majorities. In fact, I think someone crunched the numbers here and is as a whole, they run eight points behind Biden, then they would still win majorities. But one other kind of historic thing in Virginia that's worth noting is in the 21st century, Democrats have never gotten a higher percentage of the state legislative vote than the previous gubernatorial vote. Historically,

how they do in the governor's race is kind of like sealing on their support. So basically, they're trying to defy history here by doing better than they did in 2021. And so, yeah, even though the seats kind of lean, they were going to presidential year in an odd year election, you may not have the presidential electorate. And so it really is a toss-up. let's talk about what we're looking at if the Republicans end up with control of both houses. Let's talk about why this is so important because, as you pointed out, they would also have the governorship with Glenn Yonkin. So let's start with reproductive rights. Yeah, Virginia is the only state that has not enacted a post-Dob's abortion ban in the South. The ramifications that are

regional eight masses, not just for the people in the Commonwealth, Virginia. If you need access to reproductive care in the South, Virginia is the easiest place you. you get to you, especially if you don't have the money to fly. And if you have to drive to get that health care, and then all of a sudden, Virginia isn't offering it anymore. That adds basically 12 hours to your round trip for it. And that kind of puts it out for reach for a lot of people, especially if you can't afford to fly. It seems that there's a decent likelihood that you can't afford to take that much time off work. And so for working class women across the South, Republicans winning and enacting abortion bans would be a disaster. And young kid has come out and said, oh, we just want to do a 15-week

ban. But we've seen across the country, right-wing legislators, like in Florida, they're like, oh, we're going to do a 15-week ban. And then later they passed a six-week ban. There's even a candidate in one of these swing seats. So, you know, like, you know, one of the people who's like a majority maker, not like, you know, the far-right people who you know are always going to this work. But again, you know, people who are presenting themselves as moderate. He told people was like, yeah, you know, we'll campaign on a 15-week ban, but I really want a total big. And so they might say that, but, you know, we don't know what they're going to do when they actually govern it. So If they win majorities, there's a really significant risk that, you know, not whether there be a 15-week

but probably something more stringent too. And so that's really the reproductive states here, which are mass. Yeah, definitely. People love to talk about Yonkin being this sort of purple state Republican, but I seem to recall he ran hard on what the right loves to call empowering parents, which is, at best, a barely concealed anti-gay, anti-trans agenda. I'm assuming that agenda would be high a list of a fully GOP controlled legislature? They would love to support book bans. In fact, there was a story in today as Washington Post about how there's one woman in Virginia has banned something like, you know, she spends all day just reading books for things that

she tries to ban and that her local school bans that. And right-wing legislature would really help lean into that. And, you know, I think more broadly, you would see attacks on LGBT rights as well, because that's where a lot of this comes from. You're not just at a risk for, you know, kind of public schools will obviously get, would get worse under a right-wing legislature and also gay rights would take a step back as well. And so again, if they can flip just, you know, a few seats in the state Senate and hold on the state house, that's on the agenda.

Yeah. I'm assuming also a bunch of environmental protections that wouldn't survive a fully GOP-controlled state government. Oh, absolutely. You know, clean water and clean air. Those are two things that we really want to support lawmakers and try to protect. And a young kid who's really tied very closely with kind of the far right money networks that are very tied into rolling back environmental protections. That is a real worry there, especially, you know, Virginia, you have Chesapeake Bay.

That is important to the entire eastern seaboard because that's a lot where a lot of, for example, for aquaculture, a lot of fish, you know, have their spawn in Chesapeake Bay. It's really, really important for the entire East Coast. protecting clean water in Virginia is very important. And if you kind of are letting polluters run rampant there, it affects everything. What about voting rights? Day one for that is probably going to be rolling back voting rights. They have campaigned very explicitly on making it part of people to vote in Virginia. In fact, there's even a risk that there are very few lawmakers in the Republican Party in Virginia. There are a couple who are willing to say that Joe Biden won in 2020. Looking at the 2024 election, which again, you advise people at the start of this not to do,

focus on 2023. But if you want to look at 2024, Biden probably needs to win Virginia to win the electoral college. If you have a governor who won't say that Biden won, you have a majority of the state legislation that won't say that Biden won. You have, you know, the potential for some post-election shenanigans that we avoided in 2020, but certainly might be back on the table in 2024, especially because it's looking like a rematch of the 2020 election. So the democracy stakes here are huge as well. It's just amazing because everyone talks about Virginia as this purple state that sort of straddles the South and the North. But in the stark terms that you're portraying it, if we get a full GOP-controlled legislature along with the governorship, it will be, it sounds to me

functionally no different from a deep south red state like Mississippi or Alabama. You really need to look at kind of what far-right legislators have done across the country and they really haven't pulled any punches. I mean, you look at a state like Florida, for example. Florida, obviously in 2022, which is not a very good year for their party, but 2020. it was still a purple state. I mean, it was still very close. But you've seen Rod the same basically build a national profile off of a really kind of hard right policy agenda that he worked with a blind state legislature to get. And then if you look at, you know, Virginia has another governor with national ambitions. And Yonkin is the biggest funder by far of the rights legislative

efforts. He's, again, really tapping into that far right money tree to help them be elected. So he is going to try to press an agenda that can get him elected. nationally, and we've seen what the right wings, primary electorate looks like. So nothing's off the table here. He can't run for re-election. He's not thinking about reelection. He's not thinking about what's best for the car. He's not thinking about what you make him president. And enacting a lot of far-right wish lists, you know, that's kind of how it's a lot of go. So it's really kind of an alarming thing that could happen here is if he gets a client legislature. So which races in Virginia is the state's project focused on? We are constantly evaluating shifts with

the electorate and the districts to make sure that we're focusing on the races that are the most important. Right now, there are a couple of state Senate seats, one that's in kind of the Newport News, Williams-Williamsburg area, and another that's kind of Loudoun County, the western part of Loudoun County, which is kind of the D.C. suburbs. Those are the state senate seats really focused on. And then in the state house, we have, you know, there's another in the D.C. suburbs, but also the Richmond area and Virginia Beach area are really kind of, or the state house districts that we're focusing on right now are. But again, we're pretty plugged in. You know, we're trying to work with campaigns to make sure that they're using the most effective tactics and are spending on really kind of evidence-based ways to increase their vote share.

And again, these are the districts that are going to make there's a few majority and a minority. In 2021, when we were tried to reelect the state house, we were really kind of working hard, especially toward the end at, you know, what ended up being the, tipping point seat. And if only a few hundred votes had changed, the right wing would not have a majority in the state house. So again, just like these really small interventions can have such a huge difference for the direction of the state. Yeah, I said at the top of the interview that both houses are narrowly controlled by one party. And to be clear, when I said that, that could sound like, oh, well, it's seven or eight seats. But it's not. It's fewer than that, right? Republicans would need to flip two seats to one control of the state Senate. And Democrats need to

flip three seats to get control of the state house. The margins couldn't be any narrower. They're very narrow. And again, like, if you look at 2022 and we won historic majorities in Minnesota and Michigan and Pennsylvania, a lot of those were just one-seat majorities and really a few hundred votes changing or made the difference between, you know, I think people have kind of seen the huge strides that those states have made. It's now that we've elected those state legislatures that have majorities that are working court that caught good. The difference are getting that and, you know, no progress at all is a few hundred votes in one.

seat, really critical to just make sure that we do everything we can in these tipping point races to get these candidates cross-finished one. What does the polling look like right now? I don't want to put you on the spot and I'm not looking for an exact answer, but what are the chances that Virginia ends up fully Republican controlled? What are the chances it ends up fully Democratic controlled? Or is it just at this point, it is truly up in the air and we don't know? It really is up in the air and we don't know. I could see any of the above happening. And then if you are contrast to 2021, I think even at this point in 2021, we still thought that Democrats were favored this far out, but then McCalloff campaign kind of imploded in October. Right. Right. Right. Drag. Everyone

down with them. So, you know, there's plenty of ballgame left. Similarly, you know, there are a lot of kind of kind of macro events that could affect the election, you know, like the government shutdown. Virginia is one of the most federal government dependent states in terms of, you know, employment. That could be a real wildcard into how this election plays out. You know, similarly, you know, if there are other kind of conditions nationally that benefit the far right, then that would be bad news. Right now, it's just kind of, we're taking, you know, in terms of what we're doing right now, we're looking at kind of, if the macro environment doesn't change, these are the candidates that will probably make the difference. But we're flexible enough that, you know, if things kind of, if things

shift around and that maybe some districts become better than others, then we have the flexibility to really help focus on campaigns elsewhere. For now, and again, you know, even though we're really focusing heavily on these seven districts, we're trying to help candidates really across state just maybe not to the degree that we're really focusing on these south. Gotcha. Tell me a little more about the state's project. How long have you all been around? We were founded in 2017 and I joined in 2018.

The long as I've had a single job, this is the only place that will have me, I guess. We've really grown since then and I think we can say that we're the biggest group on our side focusing on state legislatures. You know, in 2022, we invested 60 million in states like Michigan and Pennsylvania and Arizona. We, again, we got these historic, which we helped get these historic majorities in Michigan and Minnesota that year. And in Pennsylvania, we actually put the state house too. So that was kind of the culmination of a lot of hard work on our end. And so, you know, but you also have to keep in mind that the far right has had groups like Alec and AMP and this state policy network. They had those were decades. So, you know, we're still playing catch up to the far right when it comes to the

state. So yeah, if you want to see what you can do to help us out, one of the best things you can do is donate to through our Gives Park program to those seven candidates in the districts that will make the difference, that looks like don't like the difference right now. Check that out at statesproject.org. Yeah, that's really the best way. And then, you know, check out the whole site. And we have many other ways to get involved. That's kind of what I would ask you to do right now with just a month left before the election in Virginia. Well, all of this sounds unbelievably important, especially since, as you pointed out, the right, they've been doing this for a really long time and unfortunately they've been successful in a bunch of states and you know we've really seen

over the past i don't know six seven years in particular how important it is to hold on to state or to gain state legislatures so Aaron thank you so much and check out the states project at statesproject.org as Aaron said and we'll keep an eye on Virginia maybe we'll be able to talk to you after election day and see how it went I'd love to do that between that and having a newborn I'm not how much I'm going to sleep over the next month. You're going to have to let me sleep a little bit and I'll be back. All right. Well, Mazel Tov on the newborn and thanks so much for being here, Aaron.

Thanks for having me, Andy. Take care. Hope you enjoy checking out this episode of the new abnormal. We're back every Tuesday, Friday, and Sunday. If you enjoyed it, please share it with a friend and keep the conversation going. This podcast is a Daily Beast production with production by Jesse Cannon and Shamis Calder. Want more great listens? Check out our comedy podcast, The Last Laugh, and our star started the

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