The Daily Signal - #409: The Fight That Broke the Democratic Party

Episode Date: March 3, 2019

On today’s podcast we feature an interview with Jon Ward, a political reporter in Washington who wrote the new book, “Camelot’s End: Kennedy vs. Carter and the Fight that Broke the Democratic Party.” Ward chronicles the fight between President Jimmy Carter and Sen. Ted Kennedy in 1980, recalling how the Kennedy’s primary campaign against Carter paved the way for Ronald Reagan’s election as president.Also on today’s show:• Mykala Steadman shares a heartwarming story about the difference one neighborhood made in the life of a young child.• Your letters to the editor. Next week your letter could be featured on our show; write us at [e-mail] or call 202-608-6205.The Daily Signal podcast is available on the Ricochet Audio Network. You also can listen on iTunes, SoundCloud, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app. All of our podcasts can be found at DailySignal.com/podcasts.If you like what you hear, please leave a review or give us feedback. Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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This is the Daily Signal podcast for Monday, March 4th. I'm Rob Blewey, editor-in-chief. And I'm Rachel Dahl-Judis. We're back on our studio today after three busy days at the conservative political action conference, better known as CPAC. We hope you'll check out all of our stories at DailySignal.com. On today's show, we're airing Rob's interview with John Ward. He's a political reporter in Washington who wrote a new book about the fight between

Jimmy Carter and Teddy Kennedy that broke the Democratic Party. We also have your letters to the editor and our colleague, Michaela Stedman, shares a heartwarming story about the difference one neighborhood made in the life of a young child. Before we get to our interview, we'd like you to help us spread the word about the Daily Signal podcast. That's right, Rachel. Please subscribe, rate us, and give us a five-star review on iTunes that will help us make sure that we're continuing to grow and reach more listeners. Stay tuned for today's show coming up next. We're joined on the Daily Signal podcast today.

by John Ward. He's a senior political correspondent for Yahoo News, host of the Long Game podcast, and author of the new book, Camelot's End, Kennedy v. Carter, and the fight that broke the Democratic Party. Rob, thanks for having me. Well, you and I have known each other for, I think, at least a decade, dating back to your reporting days at the Washington Times and the Daily Caller. You've traveled around the world as a reporter. You've covered presidential campaigns, and now you've written this new book. So I want you to take us back to that period in the 1970s leading up to the 1980 election when you say it was really a fascinating time in American politics. Yeah, and I think it was a very dark time.

I started this book six years ago. And at that point, the economy was kind of humming along. We had kind of come out of the recession of 2008 and 2009. and things were just sort of, you know, the election had just happened. Actually, when I started this, Obama had just been reelected. And so things were kind of steady as she goes. And when I started speaking to people who were active in politics during this time, who were intimately familiar with the mood of the country at that time,

it seemed foreign to me, just this idea that there would be such a level of, anxiety and worry and kind of a national, I guess to use a word that is often used in reference to Jimmy Carter, a malaise. It's been interesting. I'll kind of skip back to why it was that way in a second, but it's been interesting over the years that I've worked on this. And just to specify, I wasn't working on it all the time. I had a full-time job and was raising a family.

So I probably could have gotten it done a little quicker if I had just done only this. But, yeah, it was interesting to see the country kind of slip into a much darker period of time from when I started it to when I finished it. The reason why it was so bad for those who are, you know, under 40 who weren't really alive then is there are a couple reasons. One was you had an economic picture that was incredibly dark and getting darker. You had energy crises in the early 70s, which then popped up again in 1979. You had inflation and interest rates that make today's look like they're from fairyland. Inflation was double digits for 79 and 80 for most of those two years. And what that means is that people, especially in the middle class and those who are working poor,

those who are in the lower rungs of society, especially those folks have a really hard time making any kind of big purchases. There was a lot of anxiety about our role on the world stage. And I think to kind of sum it all up, it was the real first puncturing of the post-war prosperity boom that we had had going for decades in terms of economics and world stage. But there had been a lot of social upheaval for going back to the 60s with the assassinations. nations of JFK and RFK and MLK, the Vietnam War Watergate. So there was a lot of upheaval that way as well. And I should also add, there was a lot of industrialization going away because of globalization even then.

So the Rust Belt was getting hit then as well. It was kind of a perfect storm. So you have these two men, President Carter, who's elected in 76, and Senator Kennedy, who's been serving in office representing the state of Massachusetts. They come from vastly different backgrounds, though. one from New England, one from Georgia, and then they find themselves in this position as rivals. How did that happen? It happened over time.

I mean, the thing that I found interesting, really fascinating about doing this project, was discovering the ways in which they were radically different and from basically alien planets and the ways in which their lives and careers moved in parallel until. they kind of collided in 1980. Carter was thinking of Kennedy as a rival much longer before Kennedy was thinking of Carter. Kennedy couldn't have cared less about Jimmy Carter until Jimmy Carter became president. Carter, however, started thinking about running for president in 1972, four years before he actually got elected. And so there's this really interesting chapter where Hunter S. Thompson, the gonzo journalist, who wrote Fear and Loathing, in Las Vegas, he is kind of present with Kennedy when Kennedy goes to Atlanta and meets Carter for the first time.

And Thompson writes this incredible account of watching Carter kind of circling Kennedy like this shark, which is, there's so much in this story, I think, that upends our ideas of who both of these guys are and adds layers of complexity to it, to our understanding. And so Carter kind of circles Kennedy like a shark and ultimately in Thompson's estimation embarrasses Kennedy at this Law Day event in Athens at the University of Georgia. So that was because Carter was thinking that he was going to have to run against Kennedy in 76. He saw two guys in his way to the nomination, Kennedy and George Wallace, the governor of Alabama. And so Kennedy was not thinking about Carter. Carter was thinking of Kennedy.

When Carter gets elected in 76, then obviously, you know, there's much more of a sense on Kennedy's part that as he thinks about running, that that makes Carter an obvious rival. But it took some time for him to get there. Well, I want to come back to Kennedy in just a moment. But first I want to ask you about that famous Malays speech. You referenced Malays earlier. You know, conservatives often look back at Jimmy Carter. presidency as a failure. And one of the moments, not just conservatives. That's true. One of the moments that certainly comes to mind is that speech on July 15th of 1979. By the way, I'll note that that was

about a month before I was born. So I'm one of those people under 40 who, you know, obviously came of age at a time without really recognizing a lot of those things that took place in the 70s. And you say something interesting about the speech that I really hadn't considered before. The speech itself wasn't necessarily the problem. It was what followed the speech. So what exactly happened? Yeah. And there's a lot of, there's a number of things in this story that are remembered a certain way, but happened a different way. And the Roger Mudd interview is another good example of that, where things are kind of pulled out and become symbolic of those events, but aren't necessarily exactly how it happened. And so not only is it the fact that the speech,

went well and was well received, he actually never used the word malaise. And that was a word that as far as I could tell, and I don't think anybody else has researched or reported out, there have been other people who claimed the person that they knew who was the first to utter the word malaise. I don't think anybody has actually tracked it down to the extent I did, which was to track it back to a guy named Clifford Clark, who was a counselor like multiple presidents. Anyway, Carter doesn't use the term. It's used in the press after this guy, Clifford Clark, uses it.

But what leads up to the speech is the energy crisis. There are gas lines developing around the country at gas stations where people are waiting in line for gas for multiple hours, four or five, six hours, sometimes leaving their car at the gas station overnight, waiting for a shipment of gasoline to arrive at the gas station the next day. There's violence breaking out at gas stations. There's a person stabbed and killed in Brooklyn. There's a person shot and killed in Brooklyn. There's a person shot and killed in Texas. There's a trucker strike which exacerbates that and puts a strain on the delivery services of goods around the country.

So Carter's abroad. His staff tells him, you've got to get back to Washington right now because things are actually falling apart and you could lose the presidency right now. And so he rushes back, cancels a vacation, a badly needed one in Hawaii on a stop over there, was going to give a regular sort of energy speech, but his pollster, who's kind of this, you know, once in a lifetime character, I'm trying to think of the, he's like a shaman. You're talking about Pat Cadell, who recently died. Yeah, Pat is part like, part polster, part medicine man, right?

And he's like this, you know, mad max of polling. He is telling Carter, you know, you've lost the country, you've got to do something different. A regular speech won't cut it. And, you know, Vice President Mondale, Ham Jordan, chief of staff think this is nuts. But Carter goes with Cadell. Cadell actually co-ops Rosalun Carter to get on his side to convince Carter about this. Carter goes to Camp David. Nobody really knows what's going on for the first day or two, not even his top staff. But he ends up holding a summit with people from all walks of life, leaders from religious, political, economic, cultural realms, and comes back down from the mountain.

For 10 days. Which is an extraordinary long time, at least in today's world. No, it is. There's a lot that's different about that time. But yeah, he comes back after 10 days and gives the speech, which is now known as the Malay speech. I think the key term that I think of that Carter actually used is the crisis of confidence speech. And it's a remarkable speech. I think it's in many ways a very admirable speech.

I think he really talks about things that presidents before. before and after really haven't risked or dared to talk about things like the spiritual and psychological condition of the American public. These are things that are hard to kind of put your finger on and it's politically risky. I think it's a gutsy speech in many ways. And it is well received at first. But a couple days later, Carter ends up on the advice of Ham Jordan, which also was reported for the first time in the book that Jordan was the main advisor of this.

Jordan advises him to show strength by firing the majority of his students. cabinet, Carter takes the advice, and it's interpreted as basically a sign of panic and the fact that it makes people think that Carter's in over his head. And that is really what then taints the speech in the eyes of history. How did you find that memo, by the way? I mean, here we are decades later, and you're the first to report this. I was at the Carter Center doing document research there, and, you know, it's not, I would like to say that I went through every single document at the Carter Center that's relevant to this story. I did not. But I managed to find that one.

And, you know, I actually don't know how much is there that I didn't get through just because you'd need to spend a couple weeks there to really nail that down. That's a great scoop. Okay. So back to the situation. How does Teddy Kennedy, the senator from Massachusetts, react in 1979 to what Jimmy Carter has just done? Well, according to Kennedy, he watches that speech and basically says, Carter's blaming the American people. for our problems instead of leading. And so, you know, I need to run against him.

I think to back up, though, it's important to understand the context. And that is that ever since Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed by Sirhan Serhan in 1968 in Los Angeles, when Bobby was running for president, Democrats had wanted Teddy Kennedy to run for president. They actually tried to get him to run in 68. Mayor Daly in Chicago at the convention tries to get Kennedy to run. run, Kennedy says no, wisely, I think, and says I'm not ready. 72 and 76, Kennedy is a considered potential candidate for president. The problem is the thing that happened in 1969, the year after Bobby was shot, which is the incident at Chappaquittic, where Mary Joaquipekne leaves a party on Martha's Vineyard in Teddy

Kennedy's car and ends up dead the next morning. Ted's rendition of that is that he drove off a bridge, panicked, got out, caught out, couldn't get her out and didn't tell police about it until the next morning because he lost touch with his wits. So he probably should have gone to jail for that. He definitely should have lost his seat for that. But it was a different time. And the Kennedy's had a formidable operation, you know, legal and political. And that's still lingering over him in 1970.

So that is still lingering in 1972. And that's why he doesn't run at 72. In 76, his son had just had cancer and had his leg amputated. I think that was part of what was weighing on him. But again, Chappaquiddick's in the background then. What happens in 79 is that Kennedy is upset. Carter is a president who is in the Democratic Party, but not of the Democratic Party. He is more conservative than the base of the party, which a lot of people don't really realize, I think.

They think of Carter as more left wing. But he was fiscally conservative. He increased defense spending. He was culturally conservative. And so he's out of touch with the party in those ways. He's also just not, he came from outside Washington without a lot of Washington contacts, and he never really sought to ingratiate himself in the Washington political establishment. And so all of that makes him vulnerable off the bat.

And then start of 79, his poll numbers are good. He's at about 50%. But then you have the energy crisis. You have inflation. And those things drive his poll numbers. way, way, way, way down by the summer of 79, which is a helpful reminder to people who think Trump is impregnable right now. His poll numbers are okay right now, but he's at the same spot that Carter was at when he was

at 50%. We don't know what's in the future. We don't know what happens to impact President's poll numbers. And so as Carter's poll numbers go down and down and down and down, by the fall of 79, polls show that Democrats want Kennedy as their nominee versus Carter by about two to one, like 50 to 25% roughly speaking, which is a pretty dramatic set of numbers. And so it's basically thought of that Kennedy is the de facto nominee almost. It's going to be a cakewalk for him.

So I think all of the extraneous reasons that Kennedy gives for why he ran against Carter are relevant, but not determinative. I think what's determinative is the fact that it was considered to be Kennedy's for the taking because of Carter's. terrible poll numbers. Again, for our listeners, we're talking to John Ward. He's the author of Camelot's End, Kennedy v. Carter, and the fight that broke the Democratic Party. So given the state of Carter's presidency and the situation at hand, why couldn't Teddy Kennedy capitalize? Another funny thing about history is that the way we remember them, right? We think of the hostage crisis as hurting Jamie Carter politically. And it did, ultimately. But when the hostages are first taken in November of 1979, it's three days before Ted Kennedy is set to announce his candidacy.

And what happens is that the hostage crisis turns the Iowa caucuses, which are in January, away from a contest between Jimmy Carter and Ted Kennedy for the sole of the Democratic Party and turns it into a referendum on whether or not Iowa caucus goers support the president or not, versus at the time when he is basically in a showdown with the Ayatollah of Iran. And so what that does is it really pushes Kennedy off stage. He can't get into the news cycle. He can't really talk about the hostage crisis in an effective political way because to praise the president just helps Carter. And to criticize the president just goes against this idea that everybody is rallying around the president at that time.

So the hostage crisis kind of saves Jimmy Carter's bacon in the primary, in the early primary, at least, especially in Iowa. The other factor to consider is the Roger Mudd interview where I don't think that impacted voters as much, but it definitely told elites, oh, he's not as formidable a candidate as we might have thought. And everybody remembers from the Mudd interview the question of why do you want to be president, which he answered halfway effectively. I don't think it's as bad as people remember it. I went to Nashville to their archive of network television footage, watched the full hour of that mud special. The first 30, 40 minutes are all about Chappaquitic. And so there's a lot of detail in the book in a chapter about that mud interview

is really a blow-by-blow of the mud interview. And I think readers will find that part really fascinating because the only way to find out what's in that mud interview is to either go to Nashville. and watch the footage at that place, or you can read the chapter. And it's just pretty appalling how badly Kennedy handles that interview. Yeah. Yeah, certainly great detail. John, thank you for doing that.

You tell a remarkable story about the scene then at the 1980 Democratic Convention at Madison Square Garden in New York City. Share with our listeners what happened and how Kennedy came to steal the show. There was a lot of concern leading up to the convention that Carter might actually lose the nomination to Kennedy. And another piece of reporting I did to really determine whether that was a real concern was talk to Tom Donnellan, who was Carter's delegate hunter, who became Obama's national security advisor during his administration. And Tom told me that even up until the week before the convention, they were gravely concerned that they were going to lose the nomination at the convention. And so there's a showdown on the first night. Carter does ultimately prevail on that. The next night, Kennedy gives his speech that is really kind of one of the more famous political speeches of the last 50 or 60 years where he talks about how the dream will never die.

For all those who cares have been our concern, the fight goes on, the cause and durers and the dream will never die. For me, a few hours ago, this campaign came to an end. for all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die. Two nights later, Carter gives his speech, which is kind of a dud. And Carter is hoping that Kennedy will join him on the stage

after the speech and help the party unify and heal its wounds after this bitter, exhausting fight. by joining hands and raising them together in a symbolic pose of unity. So what happens, though, is that Kennedy is at the Waldorf Astoria, and it takes him 20 minutes to get to the stage, and the applause dies down, which after about 5, 10 minutes, which is already sort of deflating, and it's on national television. They're not really cutting to commercials.

They're showing all of this. When Kennedy gets there, he shakes hands with Carter, but won't do the hands raised pose at first. So Carter sort of lets him walk around the stage and shake hands with other people and then tries to do it again. Carter goes for the handshake and tries to raise the hands three or four times. Each time Kennedy will shake his hand but won't raise his hands. And so what a lot of people remember this is that Jimmy Carter on national television basically chases Ted Kennedy around the stage. And Kennedy, according to a lot of people, including Carter, is drunk as he's doing this.

And so Carter should have left that convention having been hailed as the victor. Instead, he was embarrassed and humiliated. It's probably the most politically humiliating moment of his life. And as we know from history, I mean, anytime an incumbent president faces a challenge from his own party, obviously they start out in a week in position, this left him in an even weaker position heading into the general election against president, soon to be president, Ronald Reagan. That's right. And I just want to insert here, there are three times in history that a president, a sitting president, has failed, has tried to be re-nominated and failed to do so.

All three of those were right before and right after the Civil War. There's a fourth in 1885 with Chester Arthur, but he kind of retired. He didn't really seek the renomination. But it's really interesting to me. It's worth further study on what about the environment led to that. But it's interesting that all three of those incidents, a president seeking re-election and failing to be renominated in his own primary. It's interesting that it all happened around the Civil War. It is.

It is. Well, again, great detail in the book about the situation there at the 1980 Democratic Convention and how it all went down. So you have then Carter going into the general. losing, of course, to Ronald Reagan, Senator Kennedy going on to serve for a number of years, representing Massachusetts until he suffered his death due to cancer. Did Carter and Kennedy make amends for what happened during this period? Or how did their lives, how did they live out the rest of their lives? And did they interact at all during those decades to come?

Those are two separate questions and really both good and interesting questions. As far as whether they reconciled, there's a really funny scene from the 1988, I believe, a convention where their aides tried to bring them together to show, again, show unity. And Kennedy makes some nice comments about Jimmy Carter in this moment. Carter, however, is incredibly stingy with his comments and just comes off as kind of a stick in the mud. So they didn't really do much in terms of repairing old battle wounds there. I think those who read the book will find that Carter's comment at the end of the book demonstrates that I think he, in his later years, has mellowed on this somewhat. But he definitely still blames Kennedy for costing him the election in part.

As far as how they lived out their lives, I think to me that this story is really an interesting window into what both of these men became. And I want to read a quote, actually. It's from Carl Barth, and it's in the introduction to my book. It says, history is made up of living men whose work is handed over defenseless to our understanding and appreciation upon their death. Precisely because of this, they have a claim on our courtesy, a claim that their own concerns should be heard and that they should not be used simply as a means to our ends. I think both these guys, Carter and Kennedy, are often sort of caricatured. Carter is sort of like a weak, a weakling. And Kennedy, depending, you know, sometimes by Democrats, he'll be caricatured as the line of the Senate, and that's all he is.

And by conservatives, he'll be caricatured as the guy who got drunk and slept around a lot, which he did do. I think what this story, though, shows us about Jimmy Carter is that he was an incredibly strong-willed politician, very complicated. And incredibly, I think his post-presidency is incredibly admirable. He's done an amazing amount of good work, humanitarian and political, around the world. Folks, I think, especially on the right, will have a lot of problems with his views on the Middle East. Setting that aside, I think he's been an exemplary ex-president. I think Ted Kennedy, for him, this story, this chapter of his life was key for him to exercise the demons that were haunting him. I think much of his misbehavior grew out of the incredible amount of stress and grief that he was dealing with as a younger man.

The grief everybody knows about. The stress, I think, because of the incredible amount of tragedy that's befallen the Kennedy family, the stress, I think, comes from this burden of being expected to run for president and being expected to live up to the legacies of his older brothers. that is not to excuse anything that he did, but it is, I think, explanatory of some of it. He continues to live a debauched lifestyle throughout the 80s and into the early 90s. There's a famous GQ piece by Michael Kelly about this, but he meets his second wife in 91 or 92. And by the mid-90s, he has, I think, reached the final 15 years of his life where he stabilizes his personal life and puts some final work in the Senate as a capstone on his Senate career. I think he is an example of what an effective lawmaker is, which is somebody who works

across the aisle, builds relationships, builds expertise, is patient, and works in increments. That's basically how a legislature is supposed to work, especially in our system. And so I think he's a model of an effective lawmaker, ideology aside, I think, as a tactician. And so, you know, I think his legacy is one of overcoming and persevering, a flawed legacy. I think, you know, we cannot forget Chappaquitic and some of the other things in his past. But I think, you know, to sort of condemn him by only his misdeeds is to oversimplify it. John, what's one of the biggest surprises that you discovered in researching and writing this book? There were many things about it that I thought, really, that happened?

I can't believe that happened. I do think the way that the hostage crisis helped Carter was shocking to me. But in broader strokes, the fact that Carter grew up with, you know, no running water, no electricity, and that Kennedy grew up with such a privileged lifestyle, I think was shocking to me. I think just if I had to pick one thing, it would be the idea that Carter is such a strong-willed, at times even ruthless politician, was. totally upended my understanding of who he is. And I also came to a much greater appreciation for the depth of his religious faith, which I think is widely understood, but maybe not always. Final question for you. Why should conservatives buy it? What lessons can they take away? Our audience, of course, is mostly conservative. So what would you tell them?

Well, I think I would, first of all, go back to that Carl Barth quote. I think that history is always instructive, regardless of the ideology that we're examining. I think it gives us wisdom. I think it gives us a better perspective on our current moment. If you want to apply it to our current political moment in any way, I do think there's some things that you can pull out and examine as far as what happens when a president, a sitting president, is primaried. And if people are considering, is Donald Trump going to receive a primary challenge, which sounds like there will be some form of it. The question is how serious it will be.

This is a window into what happens when a president receives a serious primary challenge. But I really approached this book and this work as a student, from a position of curiosity, rather than to try to teach any kind of lesson. I don't like books, especially history books, or I don't like any kind of art that I feel like is didactic, that is trying to teach me a lesson. I would prefer that somebody tells me a really interesting story, does a good job, and lets me come to my own conclusions about what the lessons are. Well, you certainly have done that.

Again, John Ward is the author, and the book is called Camelot's End, Kennedy versus Carter, and the fight that broke the Democratic Party. John, thank you. Rob, that was fun. Thank you. Do you have an opinion that you'd like to share? I'm Rob Blewey, editor-in-chief of The Daily Signal, and I'm inviting you to share your thoughts with us. Leave us a voicemail at 202-608-6205 or email us at letters at daily signal.com.

Yours could be featured on the Daily Signal podcast. Thanks for sending us your letters to the editor. Each Monday, we feature our favorites on this show and on our morning bell email newsletter. Rachel, who's up first? Tara Saunders from Blaine Washington writes, Dear Daily Signal, I read your article about teens wearing Make America Great Again hats

and how they are being targeted by the left. I was discussing very recently with a few friends how we are afraid to let our teen sons, who happen to be Caucasian, were anything remotely patriotic, especially anything about Trump or Maga for real fear for their safety. These are smart, kind-hearted,

nice boys with big futures ahead of them from highly educated homes who, like many in this country, have the audacity to believe in conservatism. We are moms who are afraid for our kids' safety, their physical as well as mental safety. Because we believe in small government and personal responsibility, we are labeled fascists. And any amount of bullying, intimidation, and even violence is not only allowed by the left, but cheered. And Mike Cave of Silver Creek, Nebraska, writes, I enjoyed Rachel Del Judas's report on the March for Life. I am 63 years old and have been married to my lovely wife, Lori, for 31 years. We have three grown children and our family has always been pro-life. I support the Heritage Foundation, Life Issues Institute and other conservative groups. I am greatly relieved to see that we have a great group of young people in America that gets it. Life, all life is special. That's all that needs to. to be understood. And Don Fiegel adds, quote,

I love you, Rachel Del Judas. Keep up the good work. Your reward in heaven is awaiting your arrival, but please stay here to report on this evil culture. Wish I had the funds to give millions, but unfortunately my wife and I are struggling to live on Social Security. We will, however, continue to pray for Rachel and her work. Well, that's awfully nice, Rachel.

Thank you, John. That was very kind. Your letter could be featured on next week's show. send an email to letters at daily signal.com or leave a voicemail message at 202-608-6205. Do conversations about the Supreme Court leave you scratching your head? Then subscribe to SCOTUS 101, a podcast breaking down the cases, personalities, and gossip at the Supreme Court. We're joined in our studio today by Michaela Stedman, who has a heartwarming story to share with us. Yes, I do. Thank you, Rob.

Raphael and Glenda Savitz moved to Newton, Massachusetts two years ago. Soon after, they introduced their baby girl Sam to their neighborhood. Sam was born deaf, but that did not stop her from trying to communicate with others. It also did not stop her neighbors from trying to communicate back. We'd start taking her on walks, and we'd be signing, and people would be curious. How do I sign this? How do I sign that? Finally, the neighborhood decided to hire an American Sign Language teacher named Reese McGovern, But first they spoke to Sam's mother Glenda.

And they came to me and they said, would you mind if we love the course, we love the teacher, would you mind if we hired the teacher and brought him back to our neighbor? We have your permission. Are you kidding me? Yeah, you can have my permission.

Now every week on Islington Road, you will find Sam's neighbors learning to sign language together. What was expected to only be a small group has grown into a gathering of 20 plus people, all coming together with the sole purpose of learning to speak Sam's language. Sam's parents feel truly grateful for the difference their community has made in

their family's life. It's, yeah, it's really shocking and beautiful. We are so fortunate. Such a great story, Michaela. Thanks for finding that one. You're welcome. We're going to leave it there for today. The Daily Signal podcast comes to you from the Robert H. Bruce Radio Studio at the Heritage Foundation. You can find it on the Rikishay Audio Network along with our other podcasts, and all of our shows can be found at daily signal.com slash podcasts. You can also subscribe on iTunes, Google Play, or your favorite podcast app. And be sure to listen every weekday by adding the Daily Signal podcast as part of your Alexa Flash briefing.

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