There Are No Girls on the Internet - Will we ever see a woman president?

Episode Date: March 5, 2024

On this special International Women’s Day episode, Bridget reflects on what honoring women means and talks to NBC’s Ali Vitali about why we haven’t seen a woman in the White House...yet.  Check out Ali’s great book,  Electable: Why America Hasn't Put a Woman in the White House . . . YET: https://www.harpercollins.com/products/electable-ali-vitali?variant=40087982473250See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Another podcast from some SNL, late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter.

Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the IHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Run a business and not thinking about podcasting. Think again. More Americans listen to podcasts than ads supported streaming music from Spotify and Pandora. And as the number one podcaster, IHearts twice as large as the next two combined. Learn how podcasting can help your business.

Call 844-844 I-Hart. I'm Joey Dardano. And on my new podcast, hope from a hypocrite, I'll be changing lives, helping people in need with thoughtful solutions. Sike, I'm a comedian. I'm not qualified to give good advice. Join me and my comedian friends as we riff, rant, recommend some of the most legally dubious advice known to me. This is Help from a Hypocrite, the worst advice from the dumbest people you know.

Listen to Help from Hypocrite Wednesdays on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. There are No Girls on the Internet as a production of IHeart Radio and Unbossed Creative. I'm Bridget Todd, and this is There Are No Girl. on the internet. Friday, March 8th is International Women's Day. And here at there No Girls on the Internet, we're celebrating by taking part in IHeartRadios Women Take the Mic Initiative. International Women's Day has always kind of meant a lot to me. It is so important to me to be honoring and lifting up women all over the world. And I think this year I'm doing that

while also really wrestling with the fact that women, both here in the United States, but especially globally, are facing a lot right now. You know, in times of war, in conflict, we know that it is always women that really bear the brunt. And I guess that's just sort of weighing very heavy on my mind as I reflect on what International Women's Day means to me this year. I do also just want to take a moment to honor the women who have supported me and helped me to get where I am today. You know, I know that I would not be doing any of what I am doing, if not for the women that came before me. You'll hear a bit more about that later in this episode. but the woman that I kind of modeled my career after was the late, great Gwen Eiffel,

a journalist and correspondent on PBS. Gwen Eiffel was the first woman to host a nationally televised U.S. Public Affairs program with Washington Weekend Review. I actually have a picture of her hanging on my fridge right now. My parents always watched her on PBS, and when I was a kid, it was the first time that I saw a black woman had this big career on television. And I always wondered, wow, I wonder if I was a kid. I could do that too someday.

You know, she really had the quintessential big career that I always wanted for myself. Like, she did it all. She moderated presidential debates. In fact, in February of 2016, Gwen Eiffel, alongside Judy Woodruff, became the first team of women to moderate a Democratic presidential debate, moderating the debate between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. You know, some little girls dream of being president. Well, I did not dream of being president.

I dreamt of being the woman who asks the person who wants to be president, hard questions on television. And I might not ever have a big career like Gwen Eiffles, but she really inspired me to want to ask questions and challenge myself and others. As women, we should be seeing ourselves reflected in government, politics, media, journalism, culture, art, and every other place where decisions are being made, including the White House. NBC's Ali Vitale has been covering elections from the campaign trail for years. Her book, Electable, Why America Hasn't Put a Woman in the White House, dot, dot, yet, takes a sweeping look at one of the lingering questions of American elections, at a time when more women have run for president of the United States than ever before in our history. Will we ever see a woman president?

Ali and I have been friends for years, and I hope that you'll enjoy our conversation about women and our white, health ambitions throughout history as much as I did. So, Allie, you have been covering the campaign trail pretty much like since I've known you. So for years, what has that been like for you? It has been like, I don't know, six or seven years now straight of just traveling from Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, Florida, everywhere in between, constantly, just following candidates, Republicans, Democrats, midterms, presidentials, we do it all.

Yeah, I mean, one of the big questions I have for you is having done this for so long, what changes have you seen in the way that we talk about candidates, especially women, people from marginalized backgrounds? Like, have you seen a change since the beginning of your time doing this to now? Gosh, I hope it's changing for the better. I think it's changing for the better in large part because I think that media is more comfortable calling out sexism and racism. there's not necessarily anymore this knee-jerk reaction to both sides, things that just

shouldn't be both sides. So I look at it, especially through the lens of someone like Hillary Clinton, right? In 2008, the media ecosystem didn't necessarily know how to deal with a moment about, like, are you likable enough Hillary, right? Remember that moment on the debate stage with Barack Obama and her in New Hampshire? Everyone remembers the Obama piece of that moment, and he's got a little bit of criticism for that. But few people remember the fact that it was a media moderator who teed that moment up by asking Hillary Clinton, voters say that you are qualified, but they say that you're not likable.

How would you reassure them? And this likeability is something that you need to be president. It's nice to have. But like, I don't think you need to be president if you're only if you're a likable person. So people forget that. I think that we have come further, thankfully, in the decades since that moment or less than a decade since that moment, at least not asking those questions anymore. But the thing about sexism, and you know this, is it's persistent. If it's not likeability, it becomes something else. And I would argue that in 2020, likeability became electability. And that's sort of the whole premise of my book. And that's really where I start out. The whole thesis is that it's fair to want a candidate who's electable, who can win, because everyone wants to pick a winner,

certainly in 2020, every single Democratic voter that I talked to just so badly wanted to pick the person who could beat Trump. But the thing about electability is no one knows who can actually win until voters vote. And so it's really where are you assigning your benefit of the doubt. And I think the upshot of the book is in a whole bunch of different ways, we give male candidates much more benefit of the doubt than we do female candidates. It's fascinating. The book is fascinating. Can you talk us through some of the ways that you see this playing out for women, that women are not given the benefit of a doubt the way that men are? Because, yeah, I can think of some recent male presidents who I might say were not the most likable. And yet, that didn't stop them from getting to the White House.

I mean, the first person that I thought of was Donald Trump, because I would go out on the campaign trail. I covered him in the 2016 election and his first year and a half in the White House. And what voters would say to me all the time was, I don't like him. I don't like the way he talks. I don't like the way he acts towards people. But I also like that he says what is on his mind. And I also like that he tells it how it is. But I like the policies.

I like the judges. They found ways to rationalize the fact that they didn't like him, but he was strong. And they wanted him to be president. And with women, what a study that I point to in my book has found is that it's not just, oh, nice to be liked, everyone wants to be liked. it impacts the way that people won't vote for female candidates because in the case of someone like Trump, voters will vote for a man that they don't like, but they are less likely to vote for a woman who they don't like. And so it's not just nice to have. You have to have it. You have to be

likable, but then you also have to be strong. And the moment that I come back to a lot from 2020 was this seminal moment on the debate stage in January of 2020 in Iowa, we're like two weeks from caucus. All of us are exhausted. Heavily cast. room of reporters. Everyone on stage is very on edge, all of the candidates, because there's just been this leaked meeting that happened between Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. I'm sure you remember this, where Bernie allegedly said to Elizabeth Warren, I don't think a woman can win the presidency or I don't think a woman can win the presidency against Trump. And Elizabeth Warren, surprise, surprise, disagreed with that premise as a woman who was going to try to be a woman who took

on Trump. And they get on this debate stage and I'm covering the Warren campaign. And they feel like, Like she's on the record telling her side of the story and no one is believing her. And so she goes forward and tries to take this moment and make it into one that's like a big electability argument. Here's why Elizabeth Borg can win. And she says, of all the people that are on this stage right now, and she's next to Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar is the only other woman up there. She says, of all the people on this stage right now, only two of us have won all of our elections.

Me and Amy Klobuchar. Yes. And that's the reaction that Klobuchar had. She's, like, laughing, chuckling at her podium because she knows it's right. And everyone else is just up there stoically nodding. And it's a proof point. That's a way that you can prove the unprovable, which is like, I know you don't know who's going to win come Iowa caucus day in 2020,

but I can tell you that every other time I've been on a ballot, everyone's voted for me enough to the point that I've won. Same with Amy Klobuchar, the men? They don't get to say that. Joe Biden, he ran for president twice before he ran in 20. He didn't win any states outright then. They were failed presidential campaigns. And yet, he was the guy who had the air of electability around him in 2020, in large part,

because he was a moderately positioned white male of a certain age. And so that's a moment that I look at it. And I'm like, this is the seminal moment where you look at electability as both an important metric and also a very heavily gendered one. And part of the reason I wanted to tackle it in this book is because in the the media environment, especially in cable, we are moving forward so quickly doing live shots every hour and the hour. And you don't always get the chance to unpack things through a gender lens, a race lens. You are solely looking at it sometimes through a horse race lens.

And I really wanted to be able to go back over this campaign, especially because all of us were stopped in 2020, right after Warren dropped out because of the pandemic, I wanted to be able to go back over it with a heavy gender lens and try to explain. in what's unquantifiable, which is that gender really plays a role here. You can't put a percentage on it, but that doesn't mean that it's not there. Yeah, I, so first of all, I just, you probably get this a lot. Or maybe you don't, I don't know. I get so set up with the kind of reporting that only frames things as a horse race,

like who's going to come out ahead. Because I do think that can be important, but it doesn't really tell us a lot about where we are as a people, what we care about, what we're thinking about, when we're just thinking about it as like, who's going to win? I think so much of the nuance about things like identity, gender, race gets lost, but we know these things are so salient in our world and in our society. So thank you, like, from the bottom of my heart for, from, for like, actually doing the work of trying to shade in some of that nuance. It is so easily lost when we talk about politics. But I also think that that's what people are hungry for, right? Like, people are very tuned

in right now. That is one of the biggest outbrooks, I think, of the Trump era is the fact that a lot of people who might have been casual or non-political people have started to tune in in a little bit more of a consistent way. And I recognize that there's a ton of fatigue out there right now. But I think that's also why it's important to put things in context for people. And to explain like, okay, this one thing happened over here, but it's connected to these 10 things that happened over here. And oh, by the way, the thing that runs under the lens of all of is gender or is race or is something else. And I think that that's really important, right?

If you're going to get to be an expert in something, you should be able to talk about all the different prongs of it. And so I think it's a real privilege to be able to explain politics through all of those lenses, not just who's going to win, even though you and I both know elections have consequences, sure. But like, I do think one of the positive things about 2020 was you had candidates who were running who were putting policies at the forefront. the fact that Elizabeth Warren's tagline was, I have a plan for that,

wasn't necessarily just about policy, though she loves policy. Like these people love policy. Let me tell you, they love the policy. And also, like, as someone who's read many of those policy memos, they know their stuff. I mean, many of the policy priorities that she put forward ended up being the nuts and bolts of, like, the larger Democratic platform once the primary was over. But it was also a way for her to, like, show expertise. and that's really important for women when they are running as well.

So, like, you had candidates who were trying to lean in, not just to the horse race, but who were trying to steer the conversation to a policy place as well. And that helps, too. Yeah, I want to talk a bit about that because you talked about the amazing moment of Warren being like, oh, well, we've won all of our races, the women on the stage. Do you think, like, when I think about all the different stereotypes and negative misconceptions about women as leaders, I think that's, and you and I could both probably rattle off a bunch of them, but I think that one that we used to see a lot of is like, oh, women are not competent.

And part of me feels like it has probably gotten to a place where it's like women are competent, but like she has to be competent, but also nice about it. Like I almost wonder if like the, it's like the stereotype has kind of evolved to continue to oppress women and not allow us to be the lead, the effective leaders that you and I that we can be. But also it's like, oh, yeah, you can't just be a woman who has a plan for everything. You also have to be, like, demure about it. It's to be nice about it.

It's like, I have a plan for everything, but no worries if not, you know? But I do think, so first of all, the good news is that any, like, polling or bias research that's out there shows that, thankfully, public opinions has shifted on this idea of female competency. Like, there is now, and I point to this in my book, like, people think that men and women are as competent as each other. So yay, for very obvious progress that should have never had to be progressed to.

But I also talk in the book about this idea, and I'm actually sure that you feel this too. Like, the idea of being called a smart girl is something that I dig into in my book because it's something that I've been called, but it's an example of, like, words that are coded, that, like, if you are female, you know what it's like to have something said to you

that kind of sounds like a compliment, but like isn't actually a compliment. And it's one of the things that I dive into in the book in relation to how we talk about female candidates, because you're right, there's almost an apology that has to come after you assert yourself or after you show how smart you are or after you actively pursue the goal that you're trying to go towards. And there's a great op-ed that came up during the 2020 race that said something to the effect of, you know, she's the most beautiful woman in the world, but also she's very ugly. She's, you know, she holds the, she knows how to shoot a gun, but also she's never held a gun. Like all of these random examples that the author gave. And the final one I thought really was a gut punch because it was she wants to be

president, but she'd never run for it. And that's almost what we demand in women is like, we want you to assert yourself. We want you to try. We want you to be the best. You should strive to be the best. but also don't make anyone feel uncomfortable that you're in your pursuit of doing those things. And that's, you know, I think that's something that women who are listening to this and who have been in these spaces that are still so male dominated, I think that's something that a lot of people resonate with. And it's part of why I think that the more diverse your newsroom gets, the better you'll be at calling out the narratives when they start against female candidates. and also you won't fall into those traps in the first place. At least I hope not. Yeah, that is a gut punch.

And I feel like I really saw it with Vice President Harris. I remember reading someone saying like, oh, she's, like, the insult that they gave. I mean, they didn't come out and say that it was an insult, but we can read between the lines. It's like, oh, she's ambitious. She really wants to be president. And it's like, do you think that the men on stage, like, accidentally filled out their paperwork to run for president? and they don't actually want it. It was just some big mistake, and now they're on stage.

You just showed up here one day. Yes. Of course she wants to be president. That's the point. Everybody on that stage wants to be president. That's the point. The fact that it is lobbed at women coded as an insult, or coded as like, this is why you shouldn't trust them,

because they have high ambitions for themselves, and they want power and they want visibility, and they're making themselves big. And that's something that is to be distrustful of. if you are a woman or a person or like a woman or a woman of color in particular. Like I don't see that same thing lobbed at men, even though of course they want to be president. Of course they're ambitious. Yep.

Exactly. And that was the word of the vice presidential deep stakes, if you remember, right? Biden says he's going to pick a woman. A bunch of really amazingly qualified women get put on both the public list that the media like to make, but also the campaigns list. And it's everyone from Stacey Abrams to Kamala Harris to Elizabeth Warren to Amy Klobuchar to Val Deming, Tammy Duckworth, Gretchen Whitmer, all of these really amazing women that showcase just how much work Democrats have put in to filling the pipeline with really good talent and diverse talent. And all of them going forward and voicing the fact that they want to be vice president, raising their hand and saying, yeah, I would do that job and I would be good at it. and here's why, that got turned into, oh, well, they're ambitious.

And now we're back to those words that found like they should be compliments, but really they're not. And that was, I think, one of the things that felt particularly gendered about a process that shouldn't have had gender percolating behind it at all, was the vice presidential V6. And that word ambition just reared its head in such a negative way. But I think the silver lining to it was that what we saw, happened was Democratic groups formed this whole group of, you know, strategists and operatives and

Emily's lists and other groups that have been working to elevate women across politics. They formed, We Have Her Back, and you watched it happen. When they would do live shots, they would be asked, okay, you know, who's better suited to be vice president? Karen Bass or Kamala Harris? And instead of comparing, contrasting, one down to elevate the other, I watched Valerie Jarrett do this time and again on MSNBC. She would say, well, Karen Bass would be a great choice for XYZ reason. Kamala Harris would be a great choice for ABC reason, and they would both be amazing vice president, period. They did not say anything negative and they did not pit these women against each other.

That's not to say that it didn't happen because politics is still politics. But when it came down to it, you watched Democratic women especially, try not to make this seem like a cat fight. And I think that was a really big silver lining that makes it better going forward. But yeah, Kamala Harris has been a really fascinating person rising to the role of vice president because her ambition and having run for president beforehand, which by the way, Joe Biden did right before he got to be vice president. That's somehow being held against him. Let's take a quick break. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guide, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel

and friends. hilarious guests from Jim Gaffigan to Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and headwriter, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. The worst singer in the group? The worst? Yeah. Me.

Is there anything to the idea that because you're from Harvard, you only got in because your parents made a huge donation. The group. The yard birds, right? That's the name. The Harvard Yardt Yard, but they're open. Do you have a name suggestion? We're open.

Since you guys are middle-aged, one erection. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Humor me. I need some jokes to make me seem funny. Run a business and not thinking about podcasting, think again. More Americans listen to podcasts than ad-supported streaming music from Spotify. Fian Pandora. And as the number one podcaster, IHeart's twice as large as the next two combined. So whatever your customers listen to, they'll hear your message. Plus, only IHeart can extend

your message to audiences across broadcast radio. Think podcasting can help your business. Think IHeart. Streaming, radio, and podcasting. Let us show you at IHeartadvertising.com. That's IHeartadvertising. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athletes themselves, their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From

viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports Slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to Sports Slice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slicelife-Life 12 and the TikTok podcast network on TikTok.

And we're back. For women, both in politics or government or just professional women in general, I'm sure that you get this as a journalist. I think that we have this cultural attitude that effort is bad. Like, if people can see the effort, that's no good. It's supposed to look effort.

You're supposed to look like you don't really want it. And that, you know, if you're good at something, it's just happenstance. It's just natural. Like, I've never shot a gun before, but I'm great at shooting a gun. Like, I think that we're told as women that you have to hide all of the inner machinations that make you ambitious, that make you show up as a professional person who wants to achieve things and, you know, have a big, flashy career. or a big flashy life or something,

I think it goes back to this like cultural attitude that we are not supposed to see that from women and when we do, we don't like it. And we have to like ding it down. Yeah. And so you know what? Like to the extent that we can as individuals, like we have to lift up the work, right?

Like I do feel like we're in a period where I think it's like all of us. Like I look at my girlfriends who are hard workers. They strive for their goals. reach for them. Like, I am definitely someone who tries hard. I will say that openly. I do my research when a story is breaking. For example, when I knew that Speaker Pelosi was going to be making an announcement about her future plans, the first thing I did was pick up a book that I had read about Pelosi six months ago that I didn't remember every detail of, but I was like, okay, how can I scan for the fine points that I had marked off the pages on? Like, it's okay to do your research.

to anyone who's listening, like, I would never be able to show up on television every day and know random facts about the legislative push that Nancy Pelosi made in 2008, just off the top of my head, you have to work at it. And I actually think the more that we normalize that for other women, the harder it becomes to ding people for working hard and for showing up and being smart. And, you know, we can kind of take that back. Like, I do want to believe that that power is within us. So I'm not willing to cede the space to the patriarchy on that one for me or for anyone else, like, who's running for president or who's just like, you know, going about their day, trying to be the best version of themselves.

Yeah. And it goes back to what you were saying about the we have her back coalition. You know, I do think that, I mean, on the one hand, I hate that it's kind of on us as individuals to combat this stigma that I think is like highly institutional and like systemic. But I do think like modeling how you can. can talk about other women who are ambitious and like not, not give, not give people fodder to be like, ooh, cat fight or like, ooh, like, you know, I work for a gender justice organization ultraviolet and we have a norm where even if we're talking about a woman that we don't like or that we don't agree with her, like, our values don't align. We think she's like not good for the country or whatever as a lawmaker. We don't call her unqualified. We don't call. There are certain things that we don't call her or that we will never like even imply because it adds to this it adds to this stigma that I think holds us all down as women and so even even if we're saying like oh this woman

we don't like her if we say that she's unqualified or this or that or this that can come back to get us because we're all women and all of our all of our oppression is really linked in that way we're just we're just adding fuel to that fire to have somebody be able to lob that at another woman and keep her down Yeah, look, so much of this is systemic, too. Like, I always think about the idea of a lot of my friends, I feel this way a lot, the idea of imposter syndrome. And really, that almost puts the onus on us.

Like, it's our fault that we don't feel like we are qualified enough or that we are taking up space in the right way. And really, like, the onus should be on the system in which we are operating, because I can guarantee that every single one of my friends who has the feeling of being an imposter in the spaces that they're in, that's not the case. They are more than qualified to be there. Their voice should be valued there. It's the systems that we need to push back on and the systems that need to stop making us feel like we are outsiders to them. So I think that that's really important. It's not fair that we have to reshape these structures, but that's sort of

the onus that we have right now, whether it's fair or not. Yeah, I mean, it's like that's the trip of living in a patriarchal society, I guess. It's like, Like it shouldn't be on us, but it is. And like, it's like part of the work, part of, part of, part of showing up. And what a trip it is. And what a trip it is. But you know what? You bring up something that's so interesting too because there is, in the book,

I do explore a lot about Democrats in large part because six of them ran for president in 2020. But I also talk about republicanism and gender and identity. And there's a really fascinating thing happening on the Republican side, right? now where they are electing more women. But the groups that exist on the Republican side to try to get more women in their pipeline, thankfully now there's a recognition among Republicans that women can run in really tight races. They're a large part of the reasons they flipped so many seats in 2020. A lot of the competitive seats this cycle had women running in them on the Republican side, especially. So all of those things are true. But they're having a kind of debate.

about can we call other women unqualified or unviable? And they're having it because of people like Marjorie Taylor Green and Lauren Bobert who have embraced non-reality and who have embraced conspiracy theories and election denialism. And it's a thing that the whole Republican Party is dealing with right now, like the role of Trump, the role of election denialism, the role of the fringe of the party, they're all figuring it out right now. But when it comes to women, I've watched these women's groups try to draw the line by using words like, we only endorse viable female candidates or we only endorse qualified female candidates. They're trying to make that delineation because they think that some of the women who have risen to popularism in recent years and months are not qualified and should not be indicative of the kind of Republican women serving.

So it's fascinating that those are one of the words that you guys think about actively. because in watching it on the Republican side, that's one of the words that they use as sort of like a line of demarcation. Like we only support serious candidates, which is to say they don't support the conspiracy theorists. And like, that's a line that needs to be drawn in Republican politics right now,

but it's fascinating the way that they're drawing it. That's so interesting. And it's like, I mean, especially coming out of midterms where people were like, oh, there's going to be a red wave. And I would say that like people kind of rejected that, like,

like election denialism vibe. I think people, the voters kind of were like, no, thank you. And I do think like figuring, like it's interesting how they're using these, I don't know if euphemisms is the right word, but using these ways to draw a line in the sand and to sort of like explain,

like, oh, these are the kind of candidates that we're looking to support and uplift, not these other ones. They're not going to come out and say, oh, we don't want to, you know, get in bed with an election denial, a denial candidate or a conspiracy theory candidate, but like the way that they're using language to sort of like, but you know what we're trying to say, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Well, and some of them

will say that. I mean, some of the women that I talk to and quote in the book will say that is not the kind of female candidate that we want to put our money behind, to put our resources behind, to help out of primaries. And I specifically say to help out of primaries because a large part of reason that groups are so important in elevating female candidates and people of color. Basically, anyone who's non-white and non-male, the reason that's important is because they're operating in structures that are just tilted against them. Like, this is a system at the end of the day that was built by men, built by white men, for white men to keep power for white men. So anyone who's not that is already kind of going against the system as it was built. But in primaries,

is really where we see gender and race play a role that can be counterproductive to the candidate. And that's why it's so important to focus on primaries. Because when people get to general elections, they're tribal. If you're a Democrat, you're probably vote in Democrat. If you're a Republican, you're probably vote in Republican. I love independent voters, but increasingly it's a smaller and smaller slice of the pie. And so that's why the focus is so important on primaries, just generally, because that's really where the dynamics are. It's not as tribal there because you're picking. among multiple people in your own party. Yeah, this is going to be, I'm not even really sure how to ask this, but it fits so nicely

in the intersection of your work. There are so many women candidates who do embrace things like election denialism and conspiracy theory. There are a lot of men who do it too, but plenty of women become like rising stars and have big platforms and big profiles on the basis of their embracing conspiracy theory and election denialism. Do you think there's something about women where, when they have embraced this, this ideology, it like helps them more? Like, what do you think is going on? Well, on the Republican side,

definitely. I mean, but again, it's not just women on the Republican side who are being forced to grapple with what I would call like republicanism in the age of Trump, because the more I'm out, the more I hear voters who say that like the word Republican doesn't mean conservative anymore than the word Republican means Trump. So the party itself is going to, through a reckoning. The fact that there are women at the forefront of that movement, but there are also men at the forefront of that movement, you know? Like, I don't know if that's necessarily a gender question, but I do think that it speaks to something that Secretary Hillary Clinton said to me when I was talking with her for this project, which is the entire idea of

electability has changed, right? Like the idea, and she brought up an example, not using a specific candidate, but she pointed to the Republican side where she thought at one point that a woman holding a gun prominently in a campaign ad might not have been viewed as electable several years ago, but certainly helps a woman's electability now in the Republican Party. So look, the upside of that is that we are starting to see more kinds of women as electable. The downside is that right now in Republican politics, it is also popular. to deny results of legitimate elections, proffer lies to an electorate about those elections. That's problematic from a small D democracy standpoint. And that's just like a Republican thing

that they're dealing with right now, gender aside. Yeah, that is so, so interesting. And it's like, even though that's not necessarily, you know, particular to gender, I do see it as just like another way that it can become a trap for women, right? Like another way that like it can be this tightrope that women are expected to walk that men just are not. Yes. Yeah. Well, there's also something interesting on the Republican side of this too where I found a study in my book where if you are female or a person of color and I think the study was was around demographic biases that may exist within conservative voters. One of the ways that candidates of color and female candidates can overcome any demographic biases that exist is by being more hyper-conservative. So if you're

Carly Theorina or if you're Ben Carson, and those were some of the names that were tested by in this one study, their hyper-conservatism showing that ideologically they ascribe to all aspects of republicanism, that can overcome any bias that might exist because they are black or because they are female. And I thought that was a really interesting study that sort of explains why you have the rise of certain very hyper-conservative women on the right. It kind of explains Sarah Palin and Marcia Blackburn and Marjorie Taylor Green and Lauren Bobert. Like there at least is some explanation for it because on the Republican side, otherwise, they do. do not want to talk about gender and identity politics. That is like a bad word. Don't get into it.

Don't talk as a woman. Don't talk. They don't want to hear that. It's just are you, you know, their metrics for assessing candidate viability are just different. That is so fascinating. So I have to ask, though, the book is called Electable by America hasn't put a woman in the White House dot, dot, dot, that yet. And that title makes me that you are, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, what are you, what are your thoughts? Do you think we're going to see a woman president in your lifetime, our lifetime? Like, are you hopeful? What do you think? I need to see it. We have to see it. We're going to see it. I mean, I was so, like, I thought, I thought we had our time and then, then, you know. I mean, look, I, I, I've said yet, because.

because A, I need to be optimistic about this. I do think that you have people, even Liz Cheney right now, who have made the point in recent months that men have been running things for a while and it hasn't always gone so great. I do think that it's time to maybe try something else. At the same time, though, too, there have been just systemic issues

with why a woman has not been able to ascend to the White House. And in large part, it's because we haven't seen a ton of women serving an elected office until like the last 40 or 50 years. And I know that sounds like a long time, but it's actually not that long. And women are filling the ranks of both parties so much right now that finally there are long lists of women who we can say, okay, they can run for president on the Republican side, they can run for president on the Democratic side to the point where I think in 2024 and 2024 is tough because two men still still. govern this process. And so at a certain point, it becomes a numbers game. And I think that gone are

the days where you're just going to have only fields of dudes running for president. There are going to be women who are running. I also think that what Biden did by electing, by choosing Kamala Harris and then Kamala Harris and Joe Biden being elected in 2020, the fact that we have our first female vice president is huge women of both parties that I talk to for this book agree that she makes it easier for those who come after her simply because she goes to work being who she is every single day, and it allows the American mindset to see female leadership at its highest rungs, quite frankly. That's also something that Speaker Pelosi has done for this country because she was elevated first. But I also think that especially if it's Biden and Harris again in 2024,

it's going to be really hard for Republicans to just nominate another ticket that looks like Trump and Pence that just looks like two older white men again. I do think that we're now in a place where gender and diversity is an asset. And I look at it in 2020 when Biden chose Harris. I mean, the fact that he had just consolidated his power, he had just won the primary, and he comes out and he says, I'm going to choose a woman. To me, it was a sign that times had changed because if you look at, look at the last few times that men had selected women as their running mates,

we're talking about Walter Mondale in 1984 when he chose Geraldine Carraro, and his campaign was in the tank. He was not doing well. He needed something that could excite his days. They thought, hey, we'll do a woman. And it was sort of a throw spaghetti at the wall kind of moment, see if it sticks. It didn't. But it was also the mindset the next time we saw that happen, which was on the Republican side, 2008, John McCain picking Sarah Palin, shocking everybody. But the mindset was the same. He was falling behind Obama in the polls. He needed something to excite the base. He chose someone who was female, who used phrases like she wanted to finish the work that Hillary Clinton had started because Clinton ran in 08

and fell short to Obama. I mean, it was very throw spaghetti at the wall, see what sticks. Now in 2020, you have Biden purposefully choosing a woman saying that her gender, her lived experience the different things that she brings the table are assets. It's not just, we'll see what happens. We'll pick a woman. It's, no, we want to pick a woman. We want to pick a woman of color. She provides us drinks that we would not otherwise have. That is a really big moment of progress and one that it's hard for me to see not sticking. And so I do think we're going to have a female president. And I do think we're going to see more female vice presidents. I would love to see both happen at once. That would be really cool.

But progress is slow, but it's coming. I have to believe it. I'm happy that you're doing this work of like modeling the progress that we have made and signaling to the progress that is yet to be made in the future. You know, I do think this book came about at a dark time for everybody because the pandemic happened. I was asked to do this book in March of 2020. And a week later, I flew home from being on the road with Biden in Ohio and Elizabeth Warren

had just dropped out. and all of us never left our houses again for the next few months. So it was a dark time. And I remember the only thing that I said to my editor was, I don't want to do this book if I can't come out in a place where I feel optimistic. I can't not find the silver lining. So I remember some of the early calls that I made to some of the smartest sources that I have where I just said, make me feel good about this.

Like, it's going to happen, right? Like, I feel like it's going to happen. Point me to some examples that make you feel like it's going to happen. And I came out with a lot of things. examples. And yes, it's important to show why it hasn't happened yet and to shine a spotlight on moments where, unfortunately, the isms, sexism, racism, all of the others, won out. But I think once you show people that those moments have happened, once you see it, you can't stop seeing it. And that's part of helping this road to progress, too. That's so powerful. And, Ellie, I have to say,

and not to get too, like, fappy or whatever, but, you know, you and I, like, we kind of came up in the, in the sort of political media space together. And I remember when we were working together at MSNBC, I could just tell that, like, you were going to be a real mover and shaker in the space. And so watching you, like, you were on the campaign trail, you were like, I follow you on Instagram and I see these images of you, like, you know, setting up. producing like shots and setting up shots like talking like you are in it and watching this trajectory has been really incredible and powerful and I can't help but wonder how many little girls like when I was a kid I used to watch Gwen Eiffel on TV and be like I could be her someday and I wonder like are you the Gwen Eiffel for a new generation of women who are finding their voice in political media I say yes first of all you just gave me chill. Second of all, my God, immeasurable, immeasurable goal for me to put up. I mean, my God. But I think

about it too as like, there's just more of us now, right? Like, there are just more women who are out there who are empowered to be experts, who are empowered to ask good, tough questions. I think that's good for everybody. I mean, I love looking around and seeing in a scrum or in a gaggle when I I'm with a candidate, like a bunch of other women around me. I think that that is just such an amazing thing. And I love it even more when it's a female candidate. It's the center of it. But I mean, yeah, you and I both, I think, have really climbed through our industries.

And I think about the way that we first met, too. I mean, right? We were doing a shoot for Liz Plank, right? Liz Plank brought us all together. the queen to talk about hate online and like the nasty things that people said to us. And it sort of brings us full circle a little bit too, right? Because we were there trying to reclaim some of the nasty words that people were throwing at us just simply for being smart and female and online, right?

Thankfully there are girls on the internet now, right? Who can have each other's backs and like, you know, not. not let that stuff just go unchecked. But, like, that's how we met. We met by calling out sexism online. And now you get to be a proof point that, like, it's not just dudes in a toxic environment. Like, it's women are here and making it better,

which I would argue is happening all over. I mentioned it at the start of the show, but the team here at There Are No Girls on the Internet is celebrating International Women's Day this week. For more programming honoring the incredible, incredible women of the network and worldwide, head to IHeart Podcasts International Women's Day Feed by searching Women Take the Mic wherever you look for your podcasts. We're featured along shows that I love, like therapy for black girls and others.

That's Women Take the Mic on the IHeart Radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Got a story about an interesting thing in tech or just want to say hi? You can reach us at hello at tangoati.com. You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tangoody.com. There are no girls on the internet was created by me, Bridget Todd. It's a production of IHeart Radio and unbossed creative. Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer. Tari Harrison is our producer and sound engineer.

Michael Amato is our contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Dodd. If you want to help us grow, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. For more podcasts from IHeartRadio, check out the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Another podcast from some SNL, late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David. David Letterman help make you funnier.

This week, my guest, S&L's Mikey Day and headwriter, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Joey Dardano, and on my new podcast, hope from a hypocrite,

I'll be changing lives, helping people in need with thoughtful solutions. Sike, I'm a comedian. I'm not qualified to give good advice. Join me and my comedian friends as we riff, rant, recommend some of the most legally dubious advice known to me. This is Help from a Hypocrite,

the worst advice from the dumbest people you know. Listen to Help from Hypocrite Wednesdays on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, it's Edwin Castro, also known as Castro 1021. And I'm Conkey, his best friend and businessman.

And we've got a new show called The 1021 Podcast. I'm taking you behind the scenes on how I became one of Twitch's most popular streamers. We also love sports. And with the World Cup right around the corner, we'll be breaking down the biggest storylines ahead of the big tournament here in the USA. Listen to the 1021 podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human. Thank you.