Today, Explained - Biden his time

Episode Date: June 8, 2020

Pandemic, protests, and the best poll numbers yet for Joe Biden. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. Must be 19 years of age or older to wager. Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have any questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Two weeks ago to the day, George Floyd died after Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for almost nine minutes.

And ever since, people have been out in the streets demanding action. Black Lives Matter isn't just something that happened several years ago anymore. It's not just something that, you know, your woke cousin says at Thanksgiving dinner. Now, Ben and Jerry's wants to dismantle white supremacy. Sesame Street held a town hall on racism. Racism? What's that? Oh, racism is when people treat other people unfairly because of the way they look or the color of their skin. And this weekend, the movement got bigger. Peaceful protesters demonstrated in cities big and small throughout the United States, the protests continued to spread worldwide. Australia, Poland, Italy. A statue of a slave trader got toppled and thrown in a harbor in England.

Mitt Romney was out marching in D.C. A way to end violence and brutality and to make sure that people understand that Black Lives Matter. And the president of the United States, he spent the last few days mocking Mitt, dog whistling law and order, and rallying against sleepy Joe Biden. Unfortunately for President Trump, Joe isn't looking all that sleepy anymore. Over the weekend, Joe Biden officially clinched the delegates needed to win the Democratic nomination. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell

came out and said he'd be voting for Joe. And today, a CNN poll put Biden at 55% over Trump's 41. It would appear that Sleepy Joe is Biden-ist time all the way to the White House. It's been a long time since we've talked about Biden's candidacy on the show. So I asked Matthew Iglesias if all the tumult of the past few months has been good for Joe 2020. Well, I think the idea of sane, decent government, right, which has always been what Biden has been promising, that that has a lot of appeal and resonance now. I mean, it's been striking looking at the pandemic that, you know, basically every governor in America, every head of state in Europe has gotten a bounce in the polls. and resonance now. I mean, it's been striking looking at the pandemic that, you know, basically every governor in America, every head of state in Europe has gotten a bounce in the polls,

and Donald Trump has not. And some of that is because of specific policy decisions Trump has made wrong. But I think a lot of it is because Trump has not performed the role of head of state. He has not led national mourning. He has not conveyed factual information to the public in a calm and credible way, right? And Biden is out there reminding us of what it is like to operate as a normal politician and of how valuable it is, right? Not to say everything in America was perfect in December 2016, but that we had certain things that we could count on then that we can't count on now. And similarly, I think with the policing issue, you know, of course, one message of the protests is that we can't just go

back to normal, that we can't just accept business as usual. But something that we're seeing in President Trump's response to the protests is a total lack of empathy, a total lack of calm, a total lack of reasonableness, an inability to say, ah, I see a lot of people are out in the streets. I hear what you are saying. I am going to do something that will help address your concerns. Instead, he's responding in a very abnormal way, tear gassing demonstrators, lashing out on Twitter in weird ways, doing nothing to try to promote reconciliation, to acknowledge the depth of feeling that people have, delivering no concern on both of these fronts, no ability to even perform any kind of genuine concern for the well-being of other people. And it is making some of the banal aspects of Biden's campaign, like what if we just had a decent man who says reasonable things in response to crisis, seem really meaningful to a lot of people.

Well, I think we've talked about how Trump's dropped the ball time and again since the beginning of the pandemic, but we haven't actually spoken about Biden much at all since this all started. So why don't you just catch us up? What exactly has Joe Biden been doing since he went into quarantine? We had this kind of eerie final debate between Biden and Bernie Sanders. We come together tonight at an extraordinary time in our country when people are worried about far more than just presidential politics. We're in a national emergency because of the devastating global pandemic of coronavirus.

Which it was just the two of them, and it was in a sort of socially distant manner. It was a little awkward, as I guess it would be. It was strange. Then Biden, we have seen him since then, primarily from the basement of his house in Delaware, where he has been recording occasional videos, dropping in on some media appearances, some of which have gone well,

some of which have not gone so well. We're going to take a question now from Maureen Jenkins. Maureen, you are unmuted. Maureen? Maureen, are you there? He also launched a podcast, Matthew, just like you and me. He's got a podcast. We don't like you and me. He's got a podcast. We don't like to talk about the podcast because that's the competition.

You know, and he has struggled to gain attention because there's an asymmetry between the president of the United States and a challenger in a moment of national crisis. Right. Trump used to do these daily COVID press conferences that would be carried on television. Biden is trying to get attention. He's making videos. I want to welcome all of you to a family town hall on COVID-19 with Vice President Biden, Dr. Joe Biden, and former Surgeon General Dr. Murth.

He's making statements. He's doing media appearances. Vice President Joe Biden, thank you so much for being a guest on our show at At Home Edition. I can see you're at home or somewhere. Where are you right now? I'm in Wilmington, Delaware in my recreation room at home. They set up a makeshift studio here. I'm just getting used to what you're very used to. Not a ton of people are seeing them, but, you know, Trump's numbers start going down,

Biden's numbers start going up, and he is putting out plans for how to deal with the pandemic. First, we're going to make sure that testing is widely available and free, because we learned early on there was a fear of people that if I go get a test, is it going to cost me all this money? How can I pay for it? What will I do? And free, but available. And that everyone who needs a test could get it. He's also fortunate in that Ron Klain, who was his chief of staff when he was vice president, who was a very high-ranking member of Biden's inner circle, he also happened to have served as a bolizar late in the Obama administration.

So he's got a key staffer, a trusted advisor, who's one of the most knowledgeable people in America about pandemic response type issues. So, you know, Biden is there. He's able to put out calls. He wants to use the Defense Production Act to mobilize to create more personal protective equipment. He is supportive of delivering more aid to state and local government budgets. And he's also just, he's standing with science. He is wearing masks. He is talking about things in a serious way, staying on point, staying focused. And he looks a little invisible to some people who are critical of him. But to those who are paying attention, he's starting to give us a taste of what normal presidenting,

you know, would look like and how reassuring that might be. How does this translate after the death of George Floyd? I know Joe is supposed to travel to Houston today to meet with George Floyd's family. How has he addressed the protests and demands and the Black Lives Matter movement? So, you know, African-Americans are Biden's political base. That's who carried him to victory in the Democratic Party primary. And his ties to the sort of African-American political establishment on a personal level have been very important to sort of his success and to his sort of life and career. You know, a nuance is that the protest movement, Black Lives Matter, is very much a movement of a younger cohort of African American activists who are not necessarily share their elders' view of

Biden personally or of politics. But the fact that Biden is a white politician who has such close ties to the Black community and such a close political relationship with the Black community lets him do the sort of symbolic healing stuff that people like to see from leaders in times like this, like what Trump can't do. The best way to bear loss and pain is to turn it into that anger and anguish into purpose. And Americans know what our purpose is as a nation. It has to be guided. It has to be guided. He has been catching some criticism about how he's approached race and especially policing in the past in his political career.

Will any of that stick to him next to Donald Trump? I mean, I think it's a tough one. You know, Trump had a strategy going for sort of a one-two punch of a message to Black America. One was to brag about how African-American unemployment was at an all-time low, which was true. We've created 1.3 million new jobs for African-Americans. Black American unemployment has reached an all-time low in the history of our country.

It's the best, best we've ever done. The other was to hit Biden for some of his tough on crime stuff from the 1990s. And then the third was to note that he signed the Bipartisan First Step Act. And so, you know, Trump was going to be the pro-cop candidate because he has that constituency locked down, while also suggesting to younger African Americans in particular, that maybe the Democrats are all talk on some of these racial justice issues. The killing of George Floyd, the subsequent protests, the brutality of the police in addressing some of the protesters has all made it more difficult for Trump to run a campaign that's

based on pure trolling. You know, you kind of have to pick a side here. And the fact is that while Biden's record is not free of anything that a criminal justice reformer could complain about, it's pretty clear what side Trump is on and what side Biden is on. So it's created a more simplified situation politically. More with Matthew in a minute. I'm Sean Ramos for him. It's Today Explained. Support for Today Explained comes from Ramp. Ramp is the corporate card and spend management software

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Matthew, we know Biden's doing well in the polls, but with so much going on in the country, how does he get people to care about his platform? What even is his platform? Yeah, the Biden platform is one of the weirdest things because the policy conversation around Biden in the primary consisted exclusively of people talking about what he doesn't favor. Senator Biden, your plan will keep and allow insurance companies to remain with status quo, doing business as usual. And that's going to be about jacking up copays, jacking up deductibles. It will still be the situation. Biden wants to double the federal minimum wage. He wants to essentially quadruple the amount of federal housing assistance to low income families. He wants to triple federal spending on poor schools. He wants to spend a trillion dollars on climate solutions. He wants to set new higher standards for emissions, things like that. He has, you know, a suite of agenda items going back to before the protests to address

criminal justice reform, ranging from descheduling marijuana at the federal level to bringing back Obama-era oversight of departments that there were complaints about, to creating grant programs, to sort of create financial incentives for cities to adopt reform agendas, things like that. Then on healthcare, he wants to create a public option that should lower costs for people. He wants to change how the ACA subsidies are benchmarked, which, like, I can see people falling asleep when you talk about that. But what it means is lower premiums and deductibles. So, you know, it's out there, right? The hallmark of the Biden policy agenda is that he has tried to avoid stuff that is unpopular. That sometimes means avoiding things that capture the imagination

in a big way. But it is a lot of things that would deliver a lot of concrete help, particularly to lower income people. Yeah. I mean, does he have a plan for how to turn this economy around? I guess the stock market's doing well, but people are going to be hurting worse and worse, no? Yes. I mean, the economic recovery bit, I don't want to say that he doesn't have a plan, but he is trying to not get in the way of congressional Democrats. House Democrats have passed their $3 trillion Heroes Act, which would give more money directly into the pockets of almost everybody, would extend bonus unemployment

insurance benefits, would give a lot of money to state and local governments. Those are the three main pillars. Then there's like a million small things. You know, Biden is supportive of that law. If he was president today, he would be trying to get that enacted and signed. I think Biden has wisely tried to avoid saying exactly what he thinks the situation will be in January. But he was kind of the point

person on stimulus implementation in the early Obama administration years. And, you know, he's very proud of that work. Nancy Pelosi was the Speaker of the House back then. So I think there's not a ton of daylight between them or, you know, a radical rechange in thinking that we should expect. Basically, if he was president, you would put a radical rechange in thinking that we should expect. Basically, if he was president, you would put a lot more federal money into existing programs and into people's pockets. How does he draw attention and excitement to his campaign when we're like in a crisis on top of a crisis? It feels like in these moments, so much attention is afforded the president. And of course, the president isn't really doing much with that attention constructively. One obvious thing seems

like he could announce a VP candidate and then make some news. Yeah, a VP candidate would make some news. But I think that they are not going to try anything too drastic as long as they are up in the polls. I mean, campaigns who are winning don't change directions radically. And I think he clearly feels he is getting enough attention to have a nice lead. He is trying to raise money. Right now, you know, Trump has a huge war chest. I think one thing he is worried about is getting buried in dollars and, you know, doesn't want to let that happen. But I think to some level, one of the implicit promises of Bidenism is that you can have a president who is not in your face on the news all day, every day, making trouble, making waves, and he is content to sort of

live that ethos. And so for all the people who are like, oh man, that presidential race, no one's even talking about it, it's irrelevant, you would say, actually, it's going fine because that one guy who's not a total nightmare is actually winning? It's traditionally been the case that people don't focus in on elections

in a super duper way until they are much closer than they are now. Trump kind of upset the apple cart and turned electoral politics into an all day, everyday story for people. Then the pandemic, the protests have sort of focused us on Trump even more, but also on the election a little bit less. So, you know, I don't know exactly how that all kind of nets out. But I mean, I do think that, you know, what Biden is trying to tell you is normalcy, not in the sense that there will be no policy change, but in the sense that most days, most people maybe won't need to think about national politics that much. Sounds dreamy. Thanks, Matthew. Thank you.