Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics, where we discussed the top political headlines with some of today's best minds, and Donald Trump is retruthing videos of George Soros being killed.
We have a great show for you today.
Democratic poster and Biden White House insider John Delavalpi. We'll talk to us about why gen z is more political than past generations, and then we'll talk to CNN's Joan Biskubic about her new book Nine Black Robes.
And her explosive reporting on the Supreme Court.
But first we have legendary democratic strategist James Carvel. Welcome back to Fast Politics. Fan favorite James Carvel.
No, thank you, it's good to be back.
Yeah.
And now we need to talk about the librides me and you texted me this and it's just such an incredible story, So talk to me about this.
What's happening in Texas' libraries.
Well warned books and they described in Loano, Texas. One wrote it would be better to close the library and put Pawn back in a kid section among the books her group deems pawn, Larry the farding reprecan is so noisy, and.
My favorite Gary the Goose and his gas on the loose.
When they came after gay people, I didn't say anything because, well, I'm not gay. And then he came after black people, and I didn't say anything because I'm not black. Not a covenant are people who fought Well, it's time for me to speak up.
You've lived through so many campaigns and you've worked on them. It seems like Republicans are heading into a ditch.
It kind of does, and I don't know how they pull out of it.
I mean, think of is Sir Tim Scott announces his exploratory committee. Of course he does what you're not supposed to do. He's running and he doesn't have my hands on the washing. Well that's the only question people going to ask you. Broan Desatus is rightful president? He didn't have an answer on Ukraine, of course, you got this insane book banning. I mean, we can't tell the children that they're gay people out there or black people.
What are they gonna do with it? Fire? You know, they can't find that out.
It's insane on a level that you can't believe. And then, of course is judge these pills. They don't seem to want to get better. They really don't. I don't understand politics. So you get a twenty seven percent issue and you ride it as hard as you can.
So here's so here's a question for you.
So we have book banning, we have all of these radical anti trends, anti gay, anti education bands going up in these red states. We're seeing just a ton of this real crazy kind of you know, trying to please the base. So is the game here just the electoral college is so crazy that you can win even if you don't win. I mean, is that what these Republicans are thinking or are they just out of control?
Well, first of all, I think they live at above all, right, So all they care about are the base in the base outlets. And you know, remember in twenty twenty, they came within I don't know what forty five thousand votes that have turned the vote around, and take the toll that we won Georgia, Arizona, Nevada, and Wisconsin by and it's not a lot of votes. And you know a lot of people saying we're gonna have a recession coming up, Well, the hell I might be a striking distance.
They might wonder damn thing.
Understand that we didn't have any turnout to speak of in twenty twenty. I mean, there's a lot to be worried about.
Here, right, it's just a fiasco. Talk to me about what you see Democrats doing that's during this period, which I think is kind of interesting.
One of the things they did is they want a big election in Wisconsin. You know, you got to haat the off to Ben Wickler and the job that they did there. And you know, they're outperforming in Virginia in every election. Hell since the twenty twenty two election, I think Deno crowds have outperformed substantially.
You know, we've got to build on that.
The biggest problem that we have, in my mind, is we're just having dismally low black turnout in twenty twenty two, and unless we figure out a way to address that, we're not going to be able to witney these kinds of races. I'm really have a pay attention tag on the Mississippi governor's race because that's a twenty twenty three election and if they so, let's talk about that.
Yes, all right, So.
If there's any spillover from this insanity in Tennessee, you might see it in black turnout Mississippi this fall.
So do you feel like this stuff that happens in Tennessee does it suppress black turnout? Is that what you're saying?
Well, no, I'm I'm hoping it's stimulated interesting people see that. And the guy from Tennessee to Justin Jones, Yeah, he and the god from Memphis, Justin Pearson are quite smart people. And that speaker looks like he's somebody got held back a year when he was in school.
And it's not the sharpest knife in the draw.
No, he's not.
You know, maybe Justin Jones is in divinity, in the master's program in divinity at Vanderbilt. I'm hoping maybe if he can do some kind of black churches in Mississippi. Delta think he's quite a hit, and you know he's kind of young. I mean that was pretty cool him and Joan Bias singing we Shall Overcome.
In the airport. Yeah.
Yeah, that doesn't make you feel good. I don't know what can.
But I mean the hopefully this will stimulate people to come out and vote. I mean, we certainly got to put the stimulant right then hopefully they take it.
But it's a race we can win Mississippi. Yes, Okay, you've just blown my mind, James Carvill.
The Democratic floor in Missit is like forty seven and a half.
Right in.
The black share is about thirty eight and a half, and we're lucky if we'll get above thirty if we got the black share up to five with Wen easy plus. They have an incumbent governor who is particularly corrupt and particularly stupid. He literally has the single most slappable face I've ever seen in life. And we have a great candidate, Brandon Presley. He's from Tupelo. Yes, he's part of that family distantly related.
You gotta be more specific here. He's related to the king, yes, okay, go on.
And he's from the same town, that same county the king is from its headquarters in Tupelo. And he's elected to the Mississippi Public Service Commission from North Mississippi.
Citate.
It's that back to the highest ranking elected Democrat in Mississippi. And he's a quite good candidate. I'm supposed to spend a lot of time on this. They're so corrupt. Now if you people haven't caught owned, they think Louisiana is like more corrupting.
It's not.
In Louisiana it's not close to Mississippi when it comes to corruption, not nowhere near, and it's all the public dominated.
So can you say a little more about how you think that voters might elect a Democrat in Mississippi, I mean, just because of his message or.
The corruption story as people figured out there's a bucket road of corruption in Jackson.
Can you be a little more specific about what that looks like?
Diverting five million dollars and money's supposed to go to feed people, building a volleyball arena for All's daughter.
Right, Okay, I remember this story?
Yes, yes, yes, Mississippi has a seven and a half sales tax on food, okay, and they want to eliminate the state income tax to charge poor we of course high percentage of poor people in the country. Well, sales tax on food kills poor people, right, of course, kill them.
It's slaughtersome, right, And that money is going to Brett Farre's volleyball arena.
Right. It goes on and on.
The state auditor is elected, is it back toly a Republican?
He's a very credential guy.
So this guy's running against Tate Reeves.
Yeah, he's run against Tayter. He's about as smart as a tater. The polls of forty six forty six, Wow, I mean, you know, if we can put the thing in and we can get that black turnout, we can do a lot better.
And by the way, rural.
Hospitals are closing Mississippi just left and right. You can't imagine, of course, just out of cruelty, they only expand Medicaid. Well, Brandan will gets in there, he'll be almost force him to do.
It, right, I mean, because that does fall to governor's right.
Yeah, I mean the legislation, but the governor has all the power. You see that even the right way North Carolina legislature decide they we're going to expand medicaid.
You think about it.
Even if you live in a rural county, maybe you have health insurance, but if you don't have a hospital, it's not gonna do any good.
And that's getting worse and worse every day.
They're closing them left and right.
You do this one election, you would probably help more people, and you could imagine you'd probably be a half million people would get health care. You would stop a horrific increase of a semist sales tax food.
I think Brandon would like to get rid of it totally.
You know how much that would say, We didn't mean to say a family of making twenty two thousand dollars a year with their bucket load of a Mississippi Jesus has a.
Lot of money.
Yeah, that's so interesting. So that's a great example.
We've seen some real surprises for governors races, starting with Kansas, North Carolina, you know, states that we think of as very red states. But because you know, these governors have done such crazy stuff, they've ended up electing Democrats.
Yeah.
Yeah, I mean I think it's catching up with him. Nashally, I love Trump out and pot who are going to fold abortion were four pointed judges like real, But you know he didn't take possibility for anything.
Right, No, it's never his fault, right, Nope.
We could do well in twenty twenty four four.
You know, No, but you look you look at Striking, This is two thirds of a country doesn't want Biden to run for reelection. I mean, we're just doing things in this country. You know, two thirds of people in this country don't want about law abortion pills. I mean, at some level in politics, you've got to start giving the public what it wants basically what the public wants, so a lot of the same things that you and I would want.
So what do you think about that crazy polling number.
I think people feel like Biden is too old, right, It's an issue that's not going to go away. They're not going to like change. You know, you sometimes people think you too liberal. Where you can sort of tack a little bit to the Senate that too conservative. You can you can fiddle ideology, you know, you can make adjustice. He can't adjust your age, and so he does it. Obviously I'll beat my form. I think he's done a good job, but the question is not going to go away.
I do think that running against Trump, it's not as much of an issue. I mean, if he's running against someone like Ron DeSantis.
People have to choose, all right.
Don't even know if Clump's going to be Several people that have seen him said he just looks awful and he's really fat. You hope you don't phowto number here in the next.
Year and a half.
I think he's going to run.
People have said, with some long shit, the borrol Igo case isn't a non laughable defense for him in it. I think that's going to be his downfall of documents.
Obviously, the document's case, you know, And we're hearing more and more that Jack Smith has this plan and that plan, and he's you know, interviewing people. But ultimately it doesn't necessarily matter, right, I mean, I think the base doesn't care about Jack Smith.
The base is forty percent. You can't win with forty.
Percent, right, No, no, you can't win, but you can win a primary.
It could. That's that's their huge problem.
But it's not our problem.
No. You know, he's gotten now a new ad with food and fingers.
That's an amazing ad.
Oh.
I mean, they're just brutal and de Haanders don't know what he stepped into. You know, I've told you before this program that Susie Wiles is like she's vicious. Oh yeah, and they hate DeSantis and they hate the white and the Democrats. We said, we just well, we know we'll get Trump will probably beat him, you probably will, but you know, in a recession, are you sure?
Right?
The stakes are much higher if you're going to against Trump too.
Hi, it's not even the word for.
It, right.
I do think that DeSantis is actually much scarier than Trump because DeSantis is good at doing this.
He's good at stunts, right, all right. His whole answer on Ukraine is really amateur stuff. And Trump has just pummeled him and he doesn't know how to fight back. I'm in too, bringing Jeff row in. You know, they're trying to figure it out. But he's good at bathrooms, right. You know, he talks about his record yet crime breaking. Vought is high a crime wake in California, New York. And you know he's had a you know, he because he did sot of well against Trump at the beginning,
and everybody enamored with him. I don't see any evidence that he can hit big league pitch in it, that he can play in this field.
I just don't.
What about that twenty twenty four Senate map.
To keep the Senate wouldn't need fifty three plus percent of the popular vote, which is exceedingly difficult to do it had been done.
But also, I mean, like Joe Manchin, I mean, do you think he even runs as a Democrat.
I mean, honestly, when I look at the poet in West Virginia, he might not even be able to win if he runs a Democrat.
I mean, the thing about West Virginia is their governor used to be a Democrat. I mean he could just run as an independent.
I think he and Mansion a friendly to the too well people in the state. Yeah, I mean Mansion. In twenty eighteen, they said didn't do anything to get him to switch. He told me he didn't switch any wore switch because it may be if he wants to stay in the Senate, the only way he can do it is he switches.
Or he runs as an independent.
Yeah, maybe he could is run into as an independent.
But speaking of running as an independent, and it's being horrible, here's in cinema.
She's done. You can stick a walk in her. She's done.
You don't think no labels can get the money for her and runners at third party?
Well there are about no labels is I don't know how much money is left after everybody gets that cut. Third Way is fine organization.
I like to any of that.
This is just sheer evil. This is what is this get The only thing that they can do is throw the election to Trump.
That's it.
Yeah, somebody's got to make money to help get Trump elected. I am so not a fan of no abels. You can't believe it.
Well, they're basically just a Republican SuperMac, right.
They get some dollars that I know, and I like. It's one of these things that it sounds attractive and it's not. There's nothing good that can come out of it. I'm sure that the Russians and the Koch brothers and the whole thing is figguring out of way that they can be part of this giant effort to ruin the country. It sounds good.
Yeah, that's right, right, But but Shared Brown, John Tester, are you're not so worried about that, Angus.
King, I'm worried sick about testing Shared Brown?
Really yeah.
I mean, we had to have a wrong from soft him general election in them, and you know we have.
We worried a little bit about Bobby Kasey in Pennsylvania. You know, we got to keep that Nevada seat, which we won about seven thousand votes last time. We got to keep the oars on a seat. The place we might have a chance, honestly is Texas.
Who is going to run for that seat?
If Colin Albred runs.
I like him, He's a close friend, great guy, got a great life story, and you know Ted Kruz he's not that popular, and he's trying to be out a way around this, and Texas is changing, and I think it would be wrong to give up on Texas.
By way.
It's the best chance we have for a pickup in the country in Mississippi. If we had somebody running in Cyndy I Smith, what is she do? One ox rock to a second?
Okay, yeah, you know, three of a square yard of concrete. I don't know.
Take you pick, James Carville. I hope you'll come.
Back always, Molly, love you so much.
John Delivopi is a Democratic poster and the author of Fight How gen Z is channeling their fear and passion to save America.
Welcome to you Fast Politics, John.
I love it. Thanks so much for having me.
Thanks for coming on.
So you are a famous celebrity, largely famous for your incredible polling, which has gotten you to the White House. But let's first start you sort of become an expert on this generation that is coming up and what do we call them?
Well, we were calling the courge generation gen Z. You know.
Ma, I've been at this with students of data to a politics now for a couple of decades.
So I've been.
Fortunate enough to measure the entire generation of millennials their political activity.
And now we're halfway into gen Z.
Okay, so let's talk about gen Z a little bit and then we can talk about the current news. So I'm gen X, but I want to ask you my generation, just give us the landscape.
My generation sucks, right.
Our generation sucks, yea, our generation sucks. We just don't have like a central identity. You know, it's smaller. We don't have a central identity. And the reason I say it sucks today, Molly, is because when I ask gen xers what they think of essentially their kids, you know, gen Z would sentially be the kids of Gen X.
They've got like terrible views of them.
I've asked this question a bunch of times and number purchase and raised, whether it's a feeling thermometer or a basic fave on fath in, a strong majority of gen X has negative views towards gen Z.
That's why I say they suck.
Yeah, that's why we suck. Let's talk about what you're seeing.
I think what we're seeing is a political enlightenment of a new generation. Would I argue in my book, would I argue after looking at forty five youth surveys over the last couple decades.
Is that two things.
One is no generation I think since the greatest generation has dealt with more trauma, more chaos, more quickly before neuroscience tells us that the human brain is mature around the age of twenty five, then that's just this generation Gen Z. They don't have a living memory of nine to eleven, which also means they don't remember September twelfth or September thirteenth, arguably the last time our country was truly united in a common cost right.
And even then it wasn't that united. But yes, continue right.
But despite that, and despite the impact they've seen from the financial crisis, from obviously school shootings, school shooting drills, opioids, climate change, systemic racism, COVID, et cetera. Despite all of that, rather than fleeing, rather than running away losing complete trust and institutions which they have, they've also decided to stand
up and to fight. And the way in which I measure that is it just from social media and organizers and protesters, but it's basically looking at the elected results the last three three and a half electracycles ty eighteen, twenty twenty, twenty twenty two. This generation has voted at numbers we have not seen in at least fifty years.
When we were their age, Molly, real quick. When we were their age, we voted at.
Half the level as our children in the midterm election, at half the level.
Very interesting.
Tell me why they see an urgency.
It's related, frankly to this whiplash that they came of age under between no Drama Obama and President Trump. When immediately they saw the ramifications, the tangible differences that politics and political engagement can make. They saw that and they began to kind of pay closer attention. And of course they were I think empowered by like minded individuals that they could connect with the students of Parkland who did
an incredible job not just protesting but registering voters. It's spreading that message from coast to coast and every community where they touched, and that really kind of started and I think kind of lit a flame from twenty eighteen on that voting.
Is just part of who they are, it's part of what they do.
Unlike other generations, voting is an important part of that what we might call their civic toolbox. They're going to use every single tool that they can to create the America that they know we can be.
This younger generation has the Republicans pretty worried.
Is that right?
They should be worried.
Whether or not they're worried enough to actually stick a step back into listening and to internalize what they're hearing, that's another conversation, because I'm not sure they're wired enough to change course.
Explain to me what they don't like about this administration and Republican politics in general.
Especially over the last couple of weeks between Wisconsin and Tennessee.
It seems to me, from.
Kelly and Conway to Scott Walker, right, they're talking about we have a messaging problem with gen Z. We need to stop in doctor nat and then we need to turn them around. These are all quotes of My response is and I've briefed, I briefed the Trump Whitehouse, and we've briefed several tendants. Repote kids run for president for years and years, and what this version of the Republican Party doesn't understand is that it's not a messaging problem
they have. It's a values problem. And unless they listen to those shaned experiences of gen Z if they look at our pulling or any other public polling available and they see the deep concern they have about losing their basic rights and freedoms as Americans. Whether that's the woman's right to her reproductive choice, whether that's the right to breathe clean air in a drink clean water, or right to be free of gun violence when you're into her
classroom or other public space. These are basic fundamental rights there at the highest level of concern for gen Z, regardless if you're a male, female, white, black, Aspanic, Asian American Democrat or even Republican.
So what percentage of gen Z is pro choice?
It's a difficult number sometimes to kind a pinpoint bally based upon all the different topics under debate today, But I'd say a solid two thirds, too close to you know, eighty percent. When you're talking about, for example, access to medical abortion pills, that's a that's you know, that's a more nuanced view of that, but solid two thirds.
It seems like medical abortion pills are a loser for Republicans.
There is a one state in America where there's net support for banning. There not one state in the Union where there's net support are betting that.
So remember, so we have two cases right now. This could possibly go up to the Supreme Court. I mean, they still might decide not to if they're smart, they'll decide not to hear it. But if they do decide to hear it, you could see a world where they decide to ban medical abortion pills.
Is there anything not on the table with this court?
I mean at this point, yeah, that would be my thinking.
So if that happened, what would that look like in this you know, this would then be the second Row election.
Yes, and there are two places I think where President Biden has several October is always places to grow, Okay, right, but I think there's a lot of opportunity from to grow among the suburbs. I think there's a lot of opportunities to grow among women, specifically white women. I believe he lost the white female vote in twenty twenty. So there were just a couple of examples I think of significant change that we could see in the elect if
the Republicans continue to be on this path. Another little footnote to that is when we talk about the youthho and the the gen z in the millennial vote, there are only two states with more than three electoral votes where the Democrat where Biden did not.
Win the youtha only two states, one of which was Tennessee. Right, Oh, let's keep an eye on that.
Let's talk about Tennessee for a minute, because this is kind of an incredible situation. In Tennessee.
You had a sort of groundswell.
Of young voters, right, some of whom were already in the legislature, including the two Justins. What do you think you'll see out of Tennessee? Now?
The biggest barrier Molly to young people participting in politics is can they see the difference that engagement makes more people generally volunteer in service than vote.
And is there a better example?
Wait, explain that more people volunteer than vote.
That's crazy off your election when less than half, less than half of young people vote, you'll have more young people volunteer in a significant way through some form of community service, whether they high school, college, or working within their religious community or helping neighbors.
Yeah.
So that's why I never bought the idea of like apathy. It was not a connection or seeing the tangible difference that politics can make. So if you take that framework and you apply that to Tennessee. You can see the difference that those two incredible young leaders have shown all of us.
Right.
They have really kind of put the issue, the continued issue of gun violence, of school shootings, and the lack of empathy perhaps right of the opposition party into full force, into show that the power of organizing and community can change outcomes. As they were both reappointed the last week.
So I mean, do you think there'll be a groundswell of voting in Tennessee.
I don't think there's any sort of question that you know. This is like a law fit. I think was it the third law of physics? I think I'm not a physicistem really thinking that good is science, but I think it's.
Like a third law.
Right, every action as a reaction, and in this case, the reaction is going to be stronger than the initial reaction, and it's going to be more powerful. And I think it just gives young people across that state much more reason to turn out. And I'm sure it's captured the attention of funders and other folks who support younger people.
And I looked at the college, I looked at the results from Knoxville, you know, the college down where Republicans went quite handily twenty twenty, I'm not sure that's going to be the case in twenty twenty four.
So again it doesn't necessarily I mean these the electoral votes will probably still go to a Republican.
Yeah, Tennessee most likely the cycle.
Yeah, but a things will change and also maybe they'll pick up a congressional seat.
And right, I mean that state legislature, state legislature.
Yeah, So I wanted to ask thank you, speaking of it's never too soon to start panicking about this coming election. I wanted to ask you, Republicans have the House by five seats.
How many seats in New York?
Did did Congress talk to me about that Republican New York delegation, many of whom won in Biden districts.
I think that that you have volt now that they've turned out in three elections in a row, Like I said, at record studying levels. This is changing the way which the national parties think about strategy. And the thing about young voters is that they there's always more of them. Despite the fact that they've had these record turnouts. You know, we're still on average fifty percent among college students at
sixty percent. So what I'm saying is that now that Democrats understand this, I think that and now that there's a play book from Wisconsin from the Wisconsin Supreme Court election just a few weeks ago, I believe that the Democratic Party will be investing on the ground to move young voters in these very close contests like in New York, like in Colorado, on some of these other places, and potentially going to flip them by maximizing that Cohort, I can't talk to you about every single race, but I
think that's going to be a new tool in the Democrat toolbox.
So I want you to say more about the playbook from Wisconsin because that's explained to us what Democrats did in Wisconsin. Because remember it's a split state and Judge Janet won by eleven points. So if that isn't something to learn from, I don't know what is.
So two other sets of numbers right that capture my attention, one of which is the turnout on college campuses. Turnout at the University Wisconsin system was between eighty and ninety nine percent of the turnout. And the last mid term election, okay, when you had the governor in the center races and this is an.
Off year, like off year, off year election.
One hundred percent. Yes, that's part one and part two. The folks who turned out. The worst precinct was seventy eight percent for the progressive candidate. The worst precinct in some cases there were eighty eighty five ninety percent so fore of the Democratic back candidate.
So those are the results.
How they got there is they did it with a relatively small team of twelve or thirteen staff.
I am so proud that.
One of my former students, Teddy Landis, was one of the key organizers of this movement. And what he did was he had twelve or thirteen staff. He had one hundred paid fellows essentially interns tends on students on campuses. They paid him, I don't know, a couple hundred dollars a week. They had the right vibe on campus in terms of how important this election was. But before they turned out people, they actually began to educate them first. So the three key components to moving young people to
turn out one, educate them. They had non parsan voter guides available in every college campu hard copies as well as through internet QR codes want. Second, the second thing is they talk to them about the importance of this election and the difference that their participation can make.
Second, and then the.
Third thing is they able to tear down some of those logistical barriers around registration and turning on election day that digital ads.
But that was a relatively small component I think too.
Just the real organizing and the joy that these young young people had in organizing their peers. They knocked on every college dormitory minimum of two times.
Wow. So I mean, is that a playbook that Democrats could use in twenty four without question?
I think so.
There's two parts of that playbook, right, One is the framework I talked about, right, education, empowering, and then lowering the barriers to participation. Those three components are going to be critical. But just the idea of empowering other students to take this into their own hands. Right, provide a framework, but give them the flexibility right to On this case, students wore running around and judges costumes.
Right.
They had hundreds of gabbles on the hill at one of the universities there. Whatever they could do to create a spectacle, right that would pierce through the traditional bubbles of people who care about politics to make it kind of you know, a part of kind of who they are. And of course, you know it wasn't just young people might take the former chair of the Wisconsin Party helped oversee and helped collaborate, you know, with the young people who are still so new with the process that they
obviously could use some hands of more experienced folks. That's a certainly kind of a playbook. Because listen, it's almost like in politics, Molly, we talked about a blind pole, right, you know, because of the way the Republicans are treating this generation. You know, seven out of ten young people, if you just pull them out of a door or pull them out have a high school class or community college class, are going to be with a Democrat.
Yeah, because their choice is nothing or I mean, if the Republicans offer voters nothing, I mean, and Donald Trump's gotten a raw deal is not something people vote on, especially if they're young.
Right.
So I wanted to ask you not that I think Donald Trump has gotten a raw deal, because I do not. So I just wanted to ask you. Now you are like into this twenty twenty four cycle. You are involved in the Biden White House. So you see a lot of stuff and you have Biden's ear. What do you think Biden needs to do? I mean his numbers again, I don't believe any of these numbers, so whatever, but
what can he do? I mean my sense is that really the issue is just to get his people out there, right, like you're not going to change the Newsmax.
People are not going to be voting for him. I mean, but first of all, let's take one swall step back, and I would challenge anyone to name a more consequential president and delivering for young people in several decades, right in terms of following up on what he promised during the campaign, that's part one. From fighting for student loan relief to climate to guns, et cetera, et cetera.
He has done what he said he do want.
That doesn't mean that every young person is following the news as closely as you and I are, and I appreciate that, right. So, one thing I think that he and the administration could not do enough of is continue to talk about all the wins from having our first African American female in the Supreme Court, through all the other accomplishments, and say this is because of you. This is because of the participation in those swing states and in every other state across the country. He's not president
of the United States without young people. They were a core part of that coalition. So he can never do enough of that and to celebrate those victories and let them know that they were an important part about I think they have done a pretty incredible job of that during the campaign season of during the last midterm cycle. But I think that you can never do enough of that, especially during this time, because it's all about building trust and building kind of a relationship with this generation.
So what about stuff like a lot of younger people feel that really, you know, they've been sort of dragged into debt that they cannot repay and that is following them everywhere. I mean, what else can Biden do for these young people to know that he's looking.
At for them.
Obviously continuing to fight on this on the student depth that's obviously not in his hands at the moment, but it's about understanding the fact that half of them, half of eighteen to twenty nine year olds. Molly tell us Untel medical researchers that several days the last couple of weeks they've felt hopelessness, depression, boneliness, twenty five percent say it's so bad that they have thought about self harm
five percent every single day. So it starts with a recognition from President Biden all the way down that this generation has incredible kind of anxiety about their future. Yeah, we can't solve everything, but here are some things that government could do to lessen the burden just a little bit. Help them feel safer in school, right, help them access if not college, community college with a chance to learn
your practice, and to buy a home. So there are a variety of ways, I think, but in that context, I understand the real pain that so many members of this generation have, being empathetic to that and using that to find big things that government can do to again, just take a little bit of that load off their backs every day.
Thank you so much, John, you are the best.
Love it. Thanks so much, Molly.
Joan Biskubik is a CNN Senior Supreme Court Analyst and author of Nine Black Robes Inside the Supreme Courts, Drive to the Right. Welcome to Fast Politics Town.
Thank you. I am so happy to be here, Molly.
We're delighted to have you. So I want to talk to you.
You're Supreme Court analyst. The book is called Nine Black Robes. I first want to ask you, how different is this Supreme Court right now than any Supreme Court in history?
Or is it not.
That's a great question, and it is very different. I started covering the Supreme Court late eighties early nineties, first full time when I was at the Washington Post and then moving on, and I always would write about the conservative majority. But when I look back and consider who I was labeling the conservatives for that majority, they would definitely be liberals. Today we're talking about Sandra Day O'Connor, Anthony Kennedy, people who then evolved into centrist justices and
now whose legacy are essentially being erased. The Court is so different because the appointees since two thousand and five, essentially with Chief Justice John Roberts and then into two thousand and six with Samuel Alito, moved the court further to the right. And then, of course the three appointees of President Donald Trump really propelled the bench into a whole another territory, which is how I think we got the Dobs ruling in Jewe, rolling back nearly fifty years of precedent.
Yeah, so let's talk about I sort of want to start with Dobbs, even though you have some really interesting stuff from your book, but I want to first talk about Dobbs because it's such a seismic shift. I mean, I want our listeners to sort of get like, how you think this Dobbs decision came about a little bit, if that makes sense, Like, obviously there were conservatives in the court who had always wanted this, but how they were able to sort of get it through.
Sure, the Dobs decision is so intertwined with the death of Jessice s Ginsberg. That was the culminating moment that got us to this point, when Justice Skinsberg died and Donald Trump was able to speed through the nomination of Amy Cony Barrett. But things had been building before then.
I do want to remind our audience that there have been plenty of justices through the years, Republican appointees and Democratic appointees too, who might not have ever voted for Roe, might have thought that Roe was wrongly decided, but who left it in place because they believed in precedent. So, year after year, decade after decade, despite lots of misgivings about Roe on the part of for example, Sandrady O'Connor
and Anthony Kennedy, they still voted to uphold it. So you basically had a nineteen seventy three decision that justice is adhered to, even though they had misgivings. Starting then, when you take the two thousands, the early two thousands and the appointment of Chief Justice John Roberts and Samuel Alito, you saw much more scrutiny of reproductive rights. And then
what happened when Justice Ginsberg died. It was right in the same month that Mississippi had come up to the Supreme Court appealing earlier rejection of its fifteen week ban on abortion. And never before had the Court in this modern era decided to take up an appeal of an abortion ban. But that timing was so perfect for Mississippi because it suddenly gave a new audience for Mississippi. So when the Justices decided to take that case once Amy Coni Barrett was on the court, they did so with
some reluctance. At first, they had waited to consider the petition from Mississippi for its fifteen week ban, But then when they even agreed to take it, Molly they said that they were only going to consider one question, and the question was whether the fifteen week limit on abortions would conflict with Roe and the whole idea that government could not interfere with the abortion choice before the moment of viability, which now put it roughly twenty three weeks.
So that was the one question they were going to take it on, and we all sort of understood that to still be a momentous case, an important case, because viability had been the firewall for nearly five decades. But then given the new justices we had, this court was ready to go further and decided to not just address the question presented, which was focused on this Mississippi law, but to go further and say for the first time
that Roe cannot stand. Roe is gone. So it was in some ways very well timed on the part of Mississippi and also these other states. There was a prelude to the Mississippi case in Texas's SB eight case, which had essentially banned abortion at roughly six weeks. So these things all intertwined right at this crucial moment that was just in the aftermath of Ruth Bader Ginsburg's debt.
Yeah, so I want to talk to you about this quite interesting story that comes from your book about a secret deal between Justice John Roberts and Anthony Kennedy on gay rights. Roberts and Kennedy were these sort of old school conservative justices, ones who went to the court not with the goal of reshaping it, but really, I think largely, and again I'm no expert, you are with the goal of kind of finding consensus building. I mean, do you
think that's true? And talk to me a little bit about what happened with this deal.
Sure, And I think you rightly are characterizing how people have thought of Justice Kennedy mainly and the Chief to an extent, in terms of their institutional interests and moving incrementally right. You know, Ronald Reagan put Anthony Kennedy on the bench when you couldn't get Robert Burke through. And Kennedy was quite conservative consistently in the beginning, but obviously
changed through the years. And he was the one who gave us the twenty fifteen landmark ruling in Ogerbergerfell versus Hodges, which declared same sex marriage a fundamental right. So that's kind of where you start with its chronology. I lay out for this deal on gay rights. And the chief is he obviously is to the right of Anthony Kennedy, but he also is a bit of an incrementalist who didn't want things to be pushed too far. So this tale that I spin in my new book begins with
Chief Justice Roberts dissenting so angrily to a Bergafell. He takes the unprecedented for him step of reading his descent from the bench. He has never done it in any other case for his eighteen years on the court, and he says, just who do we think we are saying that it should be up to the legislatures across the country on whether same sex marriage should be allowed. So he's very angry in twenty fifteen, but he still has
to think about this institution that he is overseeing. And there are these two gay rights cases that come up in twenty seventeen. They're the first major battles since a Bergafell, and he works with Kennedy to sort of move more incremental, get a little bit more of what he wants because one of them involves religious interests, but he also offers
a concession to Kennedy. One involved a case of two lesbian women who had wanted to have both names on a birth certificate for their baby, but Arkansas had prevented that. And that was a case that just as Kennedy and the liberal members of the bench had wanted to just handle in summary fashion because they thought that law is wrong and it conflicts with Obergefell, and they needed a
sixth vote. There's a private rule at the court that normally you need five votes mally as I'm sure you know, but you need a six if you're going to do a summary reversal. So the Chief was willing to offer his sixth vote to summarily reverse this ruling to women who wanted both names on the baby's birth certificate, and to cast that vote without any record of it, because when you do a summary reversally, they don't have to say the votes. But at the same time, he wanted
something from Kennedy. He wanted Kennedy to agree and to be inclined toward a Colorado baker whose case now you're very familiar with, but back in late twenty sixteen early twenty seventeen had just arrived at the Court, and just as Kennedy really did not want to take up a case that involved a baker who had refused to make a cake for a marriage celebration for two men who had married wanted him to bake a cake and he had refused, and the Colorado Civil Rights Commission had sanctioned
this baker, Jack Phillips is his name. But the Chief really felt like they should start looking at those kinds of cases because he was concerned, as he even wrote in his dissent in Albergafel, about religious interests, people who are religious who do not want to acknowledge same sex marriages and somehow could be punished for their resistance. And so, as you noted in the book, there's this tale of how Roberts feels like it's in his interest to work
with Kennedy for a compromise in these two cases. And I use it as an example of how this is the Chief using his soft power of persuasion to get something he wants in the wake of old Bergefel, And I think it also shows how the justices' positions on
gay rights evolve and are always fraught. These cases are always fraught, and right now we have one pending that essentially picks up the chapter from The Masterpiece cake Shop, and it now involves, as you probably have been following, a woman who designs websites who doesn't want to have to design a wedding website for a same sex couple. Yeah.
Do you feel like a lot of these conservatives and tanks and liberal think tanks do this, But I feel like conservatives do it more. Have really been so focused on bringing up these cases in front of the Supreme Court that it's kind of perverted the way that the Supreme Court functions.
Now, Oh, they are definitely being delivered cases. I mean, just think of what we have percolating in Texas right now on a medication abortion. There are activists who are bound and determined to get to this court, and right now there are no liberals who want to get to this court. So let's just say they are doing everything to make cases stay away from this court. So they've got their own agenda of saying, do not go to the Supreme Court. Let's go to state court for things
as much as we can. They don't want to do that. Meanwhile, folks on the writers saying we want to get to this court, this court has a big welcome Matt sign out for us. In fact, that's how I gave kind of a long tail about Mississippi's great timing. But when Mississippi first came up to the Court with its ban on abortions at fifteen weeks, it was not asking for a reversal of Row, because Ruth Bader Ginsburg was alive
and Amy Cony Barrett was not yet on. But once there was that switch the ones, just as Barrett had succeeded Justice Ginsburg, they changed their legal arguments and they said we want everything now, and they got it. And that's why you see these other like minded advocates coming to the Supreme Court with things that they had never had an audience for before.
I keep going with this for a minute. Does it feel like they've slowed down at all? Like after overturning Row, taking it right away from women that they had had for fifty years? Do you think that they've slowed down and been like, oh too much? Or do you think they're going to keep going remaking the country.
No, I don't think they've slowed down. I'll give one small caveat to that, having to do with some external factors. But I will just read you what you probably saw at the beginning of the book, which is a line from the dissent and Dubbs that I think does capture the attitude of the court. No one should be confident that this majority has done with its work. Just think what they've taken since then. We have the Harvard and
University of North Carolina firm inve action cases. We have the North Carolina independent State Legislature theory.
Okay, that wasn't going to come up.
Let me just tell you it's up there. It was actually put to oral arguments. But there's a way that it might get derailed because a new North Carolina Supreme Court is reconsidering that issue, So there might be an off ramp for the justices on that. But they haven't obviously shied from racial affirmative action, and I would think that this court would want to go further on that. And then just what I mentioned about the website designer case, where we have this new one that's kind of picked
up from the Masterpiece cake Shop dispute. I think this is a court that would like to see the wall of separation between church and state dissolve more that they feel like religious conservatives have been facing more and more discrimination, just as Alito talks about that all the time.
On the court and off Alito has some real brain worms. Tell me what you're watching this session in the Supreme Court.
I really need more information about Justice Barrett. She doesn't write on a lot of cases. She hasn't been writing concurrences that would give us more of an insight into where she's at. I'm just interested in if maybe she'll break off more on death penalty cases, as she has done a little bit. I just want to see how strongly she's going to be with her fellow Trump appointees. So far she has been, but she's still relatively new.
So I'm paying attention to her as a justice, trying to see where she might be independent from the others.
Ellie Mistyle came on this podcast and he said that during oral arguments, she seems very smart, even though she votes with the conservative block one hundred percent of the time, that he wonders if perhaps she is a person who may ultimately be changed by the court.
That's interesting that he would say that. I mean, I do feel that she's someone who will bear watching and that she might be different. Now. When brit Kavanaugh came on, there was some idea that maybe he would join forces with the Chief a little bit more than he has, and he's just moved further to the right. I think the other thing I'm watching is what happens among those three liberals. They have such a weak hand right now.
The most they can hope for is the Chief to move over a little bit and to work along the margins of cases with one or two other justices. But they're very interesting in that Justice Sodomywa is now the senior among them. I'll be watching for how she assigns dissents, what she keeps for herself, what she passes on, because that's some decent power there. And Elena Kagan, who had worked very closely with Steven Bryer, and she had worked
with the Chief a little bit. She doesn't quite have an ally right now, and I have a feeling that she will be a little bit louder on the left. She had worked to broke her compromises, but she doesn't have the people to compromise with anymore with the way it's changed. So I'll be watching her too. And of course, our newest Justice, Katanji Brown Jackson, has been very active at oral arguments, but I'm eager to see more of her writing and to see how she will distinguish herself.
Yeah, it's such a tough and strange Supreme Court, and you don't see anything on the horizon that makes you think there's any way in which the Court gets expanded or anything like that happens.
I just don't, Milly. I'll tell you why. I think that people have legitimate concerns about this court. It's not going to change for a very long time. Given the ages of the conservative justices. We're looking at a court that will be with us for like fifty more years.
But when you think of even President Biden has said he doesn't want term limits or court expansion, and I think so many Democrats and liberals who would criticize the court nonetheless have a real institutionalistvent and would resist that. And also there's a very strong argument that to have any kind of term limits you would have to amend the Constitution.
Thank you so much. I hope you will come back.
Thank you, Molly.
It was fun being here, and please invite me back. I would have fun.
So far.
And it's historic consequences. Who is Jesse.
Cannon BII, John fast So, Texas Republican Representative Brian Slatton, who is our age are really my age, since you're a denial that we're the same age. Who's married and a former youth minister. Well turns out he was sleeping with a twenty one year old and turn up budgetly and he's one of those guys who was always talking about Krumers.
I'm telling you, every accusation is a confession. Every accusation is a confession.
The projection that's happening these days of this grubir thing is really really something, and one would hope that this would maybe be what silences them, but no, we have no hope of.
That, right, no hope, not even a little. That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to hear the best minds in politics makes sense of all this chaos. If you enjoyed what you've heard, please send it to a friend and keep the conversation going. And again, thanks for listening.