Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics, where we discuss the top political headlines with some of today's best minds. And Senate Democrats have called for Justice Clarence Thomas to recuse himself from the Trump immunity case. I don't think he will do that, but sure, why not. We have such a great show for you Today. Congresswoman Summerlee talks to us about how we achieve a more
democratic America. Then we'll talk to Democracy Dockets Mark Elias about the latest court cases he is battling to protect democracy. But first we have the host of Think Lake, an economist podcast, University of Michigan Professor Justin Wolfers. Welcome back to Fast Politics. Justin Wolfers, happy to talk. Oh my god, to be an economist trying to explain this anonymy.
It's fun and it's easy.
All right, let's go explain it to me like I don't understand what you're talking about, which full disclosure, I only mildly understand what you're talking about.
Okay, here's the simple truth. It's good, thank you for coming to my ted talk. Years of study went into that.
Oh nice, So tell me what's happening the landing has been soft.
Yes, Molly, we just met.
It's not even true we know each other.
Well, I know, I'm just blessing you. Look, here's another way of talking about the economy. We'll talk about a soft landing. But what I want you to do, Molly, is tell me what you care about, and I'll tell you how we're doing. And tell me, as a person, what you care about.
Well, I know what voters care about, because I've been told many, many times that all voters care about as inflations.
Okay, so that's not true. There's a long industry of people who analyze election results from the United States and around the world, and I'm in that industry, and they relate it to economic conditions. And this is where you get the old expression it's the economy stupid. That What we've learned is economic conditions, broadly defined, have a big impact on whether the incumbent party gets re elected. And when we say economic conditions, usually it means two things.
One means the real economy, by which I mean real things that happen. Do people really have jobs? Is unemployment really low? Are we producing lots of real thing? And the answer on that is unemployment's near a fifty year low. We have employment rates up near their post. They're twenty first century high and possibly not too far off an all time high, certainly above pre pandemic lows and above
pre pandemic trends. And I know it gets very exciting when I say gross domestic product, but that's another real indicator of what's really happening. How much we make, how much we earn, how much we're spending, also strong and growing. So that's one side of what's really happening. The other side is, yes, inflation also matters, but it's not the
only thing that matters. Inflation was a year and a half ago running at rates of nine percent, and there was a bunch of people who said, don't worry, it's transitory, including myself. People in Washington think transitory means it'll be done by the end of the week.
Yeah, it was a rough one.
Right, so it didn't happen. Now in economics we move a little slower, and so a year and a half later, inflation's down too, as of this morning, three point one percent. So it was transitory. Where by the word transitory we mean not quite as quick as your hope, but not quite as slow as you feared. So the two things we care about how much stuff's getting made, people getting jobs, stuff like that. All good inflation, what's the price tag on stuff? Not all good? But the bad stuff's behind us.
And we're on the way down to two points something percent inflation. Wow, and that's normal. That's the reason you and I never talked about inflation prior to the year twenty twenty. It's, first of all, we'd never met. And secondly, because the preceding thirty years it had been two points something percent and it was so boring, no one cared. Guess what real Soon now maybe even today, it's so boring, we're going to stop caring.
I was helping you could explain why you can't have radical deflation and why it needs to go back. Deflation has to happen slowly.
Right, we can have radical deflation. Here's how you do it. You stop the economy. Just hit the brakes as hard as you can. I've done that in the car before everyone jerks forward. Someone's head goes through the screen, the windscreen, and they're miserable. And that's how it works. In economics. We could have a recession in ducer recession. Maybe by the government cutting back on spending on the FED, raising rates to unbelievable levels, and they could induce a recession.
This is what Paul Volker did in the early nineteen eighties, and it caused inflation to fall from fifteen percent down to more normal rates of three four five. So that kind of feels like it would get the job done. But guess what we got inflation from nine down to three without a recession. Even better. So what people were talking about previously is let's have what they called a
soft landing. The hope a year ago was that we would be able to slow the economy just a little bit, just enough it wouldn't throw millions out of work, but still enough that it would cause inflation to go down. My friend Jason Furman ran a survey of economists back then a year ago, and they gave it a one and six chance that we would achieve a soft.
Landing, right one in sex. Wow.
Now, guess what. We didn't just get a soft landing, We got better. Inflation has basically come all the way down. It's over the last six months, core inflation's run at two point nine percent, so two point something. That's where we want to maybe wanted a little bit lower half a point, and the unemployment rate is still within a quarter point of it's fifty year low. So it's an extra soft landing. It's not even really a landing. It's some economists are calling it an immaculate disinflation.
So let's talk about an immaculate disinflation. I'm going to guess that some of what happened was that the American rescue plan helped this immaculate immaculism be immaculate, and that the ways in which like for example, the aid to Ukraine was funneled through building weapons in the United States, those kind of things actually pumped up the economy. Yes, no discuss.
Those things pumped up the economy, that's what we're calling the real stuff before. But they likely also had an effect on inflation, which would be to raise it. So, Molly, I'm going to ask your permission, can we do economic theory on this show?
Please? I know, okay, ys always.
But I want your listeners to really understand this. In economics, of course, we talk a lot about demand and supply, and so all those folks who were terribly worried about inflation a year ago were worried the problem was demand. Basically, their view a year ago was that we had unemployment too low, we had incomes too high, we had too much of a good thing, and so too many dollar bills in our wallets chasing too few goods, causing inflation.
And if you thought that it was too much demand and too much of a good thing causing inflation, what you would want is to crush the extra demand and bring us back to a normal amount of a good thing, and that would crush inflation, which we didn't do. The other story is it was supply. Supply is basically look, business went crazy. It was a weird time to do business. Global shipping routes were jammed. Energy prices went through the roof because Putin invaded Ukraine, so did some food prices.
We saw bird flu raise egg prices, but more importantly, we just saw the pandemic do what pandemics do, which is cause infinite disruption in all of our workplaces. And all of your listeners can recognize that whatever business you work in, it was turned utterly upside down. Now, the thing about a supply disruption is once that disruption passes, once global shipping routes are back to normal. Once factories can open without worrying about every sneeze, then business goes
back to normal. And I think that's basically what happened that we had this weird period. Let's call it the pandemic.
I had to put too fine a point on it, yes.
Which made it really hard to do business, and that led to all sorts of very unexpected price rises. And that pandemic passed. Business went back to normal, and with it so did inflation. So look, I know, Molly, you have a tendency to want to put things in partisan terms,
so mean by this story. It's not really that Joe Biden did one thing or another, although there is one thing that actually believe it or not, I think it's Donald Trump deserves a lot of credit for interesting He appointed Jay Powell to head the FARED and the FED has been very patient and very careful, and it resisted all of the calls from conservatives to engineer or recession to get rid of inflation. And that patience has paid off, as we've seen, you didn't need a recession to get
rid of inflation. Now, I'll bring it back to your partisan terms. Conservative economists with their hard money doctrines and their calls for the next recession were exactly wrong. And those of US counseling a little more patients because we really care about keeping people in work and we're a little more cautious and said, let's just wait and see, this might just be supply.
We were right, So ultimate Lea really was supply. I can't believe you just call me partisan, you monster.
I sorry, I'm.
Very mad at you, But let me ask you. When we look back on this is now we're going to get really boring. So everyone you can put us up at two point oh speed. Actually I think this is quite interesting.
But that's just me, Molly, I mean, thank you. There's no greater introduction I could have hoped forul than like I'm about to go to my guest. He's an economist. Tune out to exit to exit.
Baby.
Is that just because I called you patisan?
Yeah, pretty much.
We're I'm sorry you are in Manhattan, for Manhattan, you're a swing voter.
Right, yes, exactly. So I want to ask you, like what percentage of this inflation was caused by modern monetary theory? Which is I'm sorry to do this, but.
This is such like don't go too, ks through this is that way you learn your swear words listeners, Molly's had some nonsense whispered in her ear. My professional bullshit is.
Okay. Modern monetary theory quickly is that you can just print as much money as you want. It doesn't matter.
Go. Modern monetary theory is either original or it's right, but it's not both. Look, I don't know, Like it's a subtribe of economists who believe that they've understood the economy and the rest of us don't. Look, their criticism is none of us do. They're right, none of us do. But if their claim is they and they alone do. I'm generally against messianic figures who by themselves have discovered truth.
But I really have tried a good faith attempt to engage these folks, and either they're saying something totally absurd, and then I argue and I'm like, hey, that sounds crazy, and they're like, oh no, no, no, no, we're not saying that
at all. And then they say something totally obvious. So either they're saying something that mainstream I must have understood all along, which is the real constraints on being able to just keep spending more money is eventually that will cause inflation, or they're saying something really absurd, which is there's no constraint and the government should just keep buying stuff forever. I don't know which it is, my friends in modern monetary theory. I apologize for not understanding you.
There is a point in my career I figured I got old enough that if I don't understand what you're saying, it's your fault, not mine. When I was young, I used to think it was me.
This is realm. We've hit real niche humor. Here, niche niche humor.
It's just you and me, mate, just you.
And me finding this hilarious. So let's talk about what it looks like now. We still have a very tight labor market. Will you talk about that for a minute. I mean, it's good to know we'll never fix the citizenship problem. So these jobs will luckily, we'll find children who have come over the board to work in these jobs. Right. I mean, that's what the Republicans want, not to seem partisan writing.
Democrats want robots to do them right. And look, Molly, go back. You spoke economics. I want you to speak like a person. You said, we have a very tight labor market. Yes, but don't you mean good?
I mean good, except that you need people to work these jobs.
Oh so you're saying poor employers are sometimes finding it hard to find workers when they're offering measly wages. So workers who are looking for work and find it. I don't know about you, Molly. It makes me really happy. And then I know in New York you've got like lots of fancy people you hang with and they're like, it must be hard to find people these days. And the answer is when you pay very little, it is. And the thing is, those of who are truly liberal, Molly,
think that's wonderful. And I know it's harder to get your house clean for not much money. But here's the thing. If you want it cleans, just pay a little more.
Oh my god, it's Wolfer's out of control. He's out of control. No, But I mean, ultimately, you need people to pay into Social Security for the economy to keep going, you need to add workers, right or Am I confused here?
Look? Am I pro immigration? Yes? I believe it's wonderful for the United States, and I believe it's wonderful for the immigrant which is an important fact that shouldn't be lost.
Where is that accent from just Carriot?
Sorry, go on, Yes, this is Michigan. I know you people call me fly over country, but this is how we speak out here.
I feel like that is not how you speak in Michigan.
But some people say, actually, the United States get some of the best and the brightest as a result of its immigration policies. But I still just want to go back. What do you care about in the labor market. Look, here's the other thing. One of the big talking points out there is real wages aren't growing, prices were growing, wages weren't keeping up. Not true. What's actually happening is wages are out growing prices. I want to go a step further. Wages are growing the fastest for those who
need it most. Those are the to end of the instruction really important. There's this sort of vibe session debate, which is interminable discussion, which is the economic statistics say that things are going well, and infinite column inches have been devoted to the fact that public opinion polls suggest
people aren't so happy about it. Now, it turns out all of those column inches are being written by people in the upper middle class the upper middle class are not getting pay rises right now, the working class are, and the middle class are, and so the reality is life is getting quite a lot better for the folks that those of us a somewhat liberal persuasion actually care about. But the whining is coming from folks who are profoundly out of touch with reality. And the reality is that
working class jobs wages are rising a lot. So, yes, it's hard to get someone to clean your house cheaply, but some of us think that's fabulous.
I personally have had very good success in my life with the people that I have work in relationship with. But I'm more just talking about this sort of larger sense in which you know, how we keep it moving.
Yeah. No, so you're like, how do we maintain an economy with really low unemployment? Right, bloody great question, I reckon it's worth finding out. But it's happened before. It's happened before in the United States fifty years ago, and it's happened in a handful of other countries. Japan for many years had two percent unemployment. New Zealand, which is a small, uninteresting country near a large and vibrant, terrific country.
I feel like you have some bias here.
No, I'm an economist. New Zealand its official unemployment count at one point was like two hundred and seventeen people. Wow. The labor ad minister at the time joked that he knew all the unemployed people. Look, maybe it's impossible to run a labor market that tide, but maybe it's possible. We haven't run that experiment in the United States in several generations. So yes, immigration may well help if low unemployment causes higher inflation, but right now it's not right.
It's a good point, And I think it's interesting as we're talking about this because you really do see how and this is so counterintuitive. But ultimately what you're saying is that the president doesn't have that much control over the economy.
It's an interminable debate. You and I can go back and forward. The general view when you ask Washington pundits is the president can do whatever he wants to win the economic indicator with the click of a finger, click of his fingers. And the general view when you ask economists is how and there's a great suspicion that presidents have a great effect on things. Probably a truth somewhere
between those two views. I do think it worth that it's interesting that one of the most unremarked but remarkable thing that's happened is inequality has declined through the Biden presidency, and it just so happens to be a Democrat in the White House, and one wonders whether somehow the emphasis of the president on lifting up working class Americans is actually finding its way through to the lives of working in middle class Americans.
That's a little bit of partisanship. I'll take it. Thank you so much, justin I hope you'll come back.
Oh, it's a great joy, Molly.
Congresswoman Summerly represents Pennsylvania's twelfth district. Welcome back to Fast Politics. Congresswoman Summerly, thanks so much for having me.
I'm always excited to be here.
Well, it's very mutual. So let us talk about the Freedom to Vote Act and what is happening in Congress. It's weird to talk about something in Congress that is like an actual normal congressional thing after the last couple of weeks before we talk about what you're doing, which is so important and so crucial. Is it weird to be in Congress right now?
Goodness.
Yes, actually, let's just start there. Yeah, it's a strange place. It's probably one of the least productive congressional sessions ever. And you know, I think the weirdest part about it is that Republicans are saying this, like hardcore right winging Republicans are the leading voice is saying that everything that's happening right now is ridiculous. So you know, if they're saying it, then it's absolutely true. It's absolutely that absurd.
We've done very little this Congress except for cinsure the leading progressive black and brown voices. We found time for that, but we hadn't seemingly found time to pass any bills or to pass a budget, which is obviously our basic responsibility.
You know, I don't bound time for anything else.
But we are silencing and punishing black and brown members.
Let's talk about They kicked out Kevin McCarthy. Now he's leaving for good. They got had three weeks no speaker, panicked and picked a speaker that nobody knew. That's what it looks like from the outside you are inside Congress. Is that what it looks like from the inside.
I hate to say it, but that's what it looks like to me, I did not know that man. Sorry to that man, but I had never heard him either. So it was as much as a shock to me, but it was also very telling that you know, when we talk about it, you know, you say, we didn't have a speaker for three weeks. Essentially, it took the Republican Party one year to pick a speaker because the election was in last November, so they had his last November to decide who they wanted to lead our Congress.
We knew on January third that Kevin McCarthy was a placeholder.
That was very clear.
By the end of the twelve line right, we then go, he fills his placewoader seat. They start over again in the end of the you know, in the fall, and then it takes more weeks after that, so it took a year for them to pick even a speaker. So yeah, it looks as observed from the inset as I imagine it looks from the outset.
One of the things that Republicans have done is they've been sort of putting these bills up in order to try to get liberals to have to vote against them, to try to prove that liberals are anti Semitic. So you voted yes on reaffirming Israel the States right to exist. You voted yes on calling on Hamas to immediately release hostages taken during October twenty twenty three. So these are
like the two larger bills. Now they have more bills that say all sorts of vague stuff, explain to us what's happening here.
I don't know that I can explain necessarily what's happening aside from what it feels like to me. I imagine what it feels like to many Americans is that the Republican Party is distracting from their inability to advance an agenda, from their inability to pass a budget, and they are using the very real pain, the very raal fears of our Jewish communities as a wedge as a weapon. And I think it is every bit as racist as they always are.
Is every bit as racist as they always are.
Here we're talking about the a party that contains people who unapologetically have said Jews will not replace us, with unapologetically pushed you know theories such as the Great Replacement theory, who unapologetically marginalized and oppressed black and brown people who are horrible to immigrants of all, well, I won't say all, but unapologically horrible to immigrants who don't look like them,
who don't share their religion. They have not stopped or seed any of this in the midst of these bills. They still continue on their path. They still continue on their crusade to harm all Americans who aren't them, don't look like them, who are not wealthy, white man of a certain age range of demographic The fact that they're leaning so hard into this is for me, the saying that the activation is a confession here.
That's right, it feels to me anyway. We're in the cusp of a multi racial democracy for the first time ever, and that is what's making Republicans so scared slash angry.
Let me just say that, I mean, yeah, I mean I think we are at a crossroads.
I think we're at a critical crossroads in our democracy. We can see it as we are at the cusp of this multi racial democracy, this wild car a reflective representative democracy, or or we are at the cusp of an eroding democracy, one that doesn't survive into the future and two decades into the future because we've not.
Papped the holes that are becoming more and more uncontainable.
If you can see the holes and the cracks and democracy, we're already in a world of trouble. So that brings us to you know, this piece of legislation, which is a direct response to further attacks on Section two of the Voting Rights Act.
Tell us about Section two for those who are playing along at home.
Yeah, it's the last bit of reports that voters, private voters have against discriminatory attacks on their access to voting right whether or not, you know, particularly black and brown voters can bring suit when they're being or when there are laws that have a disproportionate burden on their access
to voting. So what we saw and what we have seen, right, for instance, we've seen you know, states, and we know that voting looks different from not just state the state, but it looks different from municipality the municipality, county to councy. But where we saw we see some states, right, they'll have some counties that will have expanded access to voting
to poles and others that have more limited access. That was the situation that we've seen in one case where all of the voters that had a higher burden to figure out how to vote, to have access to early voting or you know, drop boxes or things of that nature, whereas their white chunter parts and counties next to them didn't share those same impediments. Right, and Section two has for decades protected these voters to be able to not just bring suit, but proof that there was a disproportion
in a disperate impact on them. The courts are now attempting and have said that that burden has to be substantially higher, which essentially makes us so that black and brown voters who are being discriminated against, they don't have any your ecourse to fairness or to corrective measures when they're discriminated against at the polls.
Right, that sounds very much like the Supreme Court.
We know, the Supreme Court that has been intentioned built, And as we talk about the erosion of voting rights, you know, we can go back to the Supreme Court seat that they stole.
Everything that we've been seeing has been an escalation.
So you know, way back in twenty thirteen when they eroded Section five, and in twenty twenty one when they are starting to erode Section two, when we saw them still a Supreme Court case that helped them build one of the most conservative and reactionary courts that we are dealing with right now. Then we can directly tie those actions to our loss of abortion care, we can tie
those actions to our loss of affirmative action. We can tie that to so much more, and then we can tie directly to the insurrection, right, because that's the next frontier is making sure that certain people never get to vote again.
Yeah, that's sort of the goal there. I mean, it's not even sort of, it is the goal.
It is absolutely goal.
They were able to somehow get the cr passed. I mean, is there a way to get these people to get at all interested.
In this seeing anything in this commers pass. I think that the last twelve months have shown us to maybe not hold our breath right, but it's also reminded us that we have to fight that much harder to reclaim the gabbles, to alert the American population to the threats that it's facing from a radicalized, extremist right wing Republican Party.
It was not a one off thing. Donald Chalk was not a one off.
That man said he wants to be a dictator on day one so that he can get through everything that he would have to otherwise go through the democratic processes if he was a dictator for one day, he just do all these terrible things. Right that a presidential candidate and former president could even joke about being a dictator in our society, well.
Especially one who really does want to be a dictator.
That man is telling you precisely what he is in the Democratic Party. If we are the Party of democracy, of democratic values, then we have a responsibility of not equivocating with Republicans who are fascists, not pretending that there are another side of the coin, and not pretending that our democracy isn't under attack. We're not going to fortify our democracy by pretending that the threats and the risks to it are understated somehow. So that's what we need
to do. When we still present legislation. We have a responsibility to still present the solutions to legislative policy issues that our constituents and our country have. And we have a responsibility to still protect democracy whether or not we have the gabble. So we like to hope that and we would wish that democracy and protecting democracy is a
bipartisan issue. If it's not, then we need to take this to the polls, and we need to remind Americans that one party doesn't just want democracy to end, they're actively working towards it.
No agreed, And I think that's right. You're being targeted right now by apec Ape Well. I was going to say, a nefarious billionaire who also funds the right wing attack on the Supreme Court. They're putting pictures of you next to Trump and MTG explain this to.
Us, So yeah, they you know what they did that to me in my first election. I think that's really important, right because even as people are talking about whether or not, you know, corporate packs such as the ones that an organization like a PAC ones, whether or not they are or should be allowed to operate in our political system like this because they're a single issue organization and a
single issue that is important to many American voters. But the reality is is that a one hundred million dollars to spend against five people is objectively absurd. That is objectively an existential threat to our democracy. And particularly when we look at where they spend the money and how they spend the money, we can really kind of hone in on the ways in which not only is it
a threat to democracy. But the people who are going to be harmed those strets with democracies are black and brown communities like the ones that I represent, the ones that Jamal Bowman represents, or Chlory Bush, which is where they are exclusively focusing. These are communities that aren't rich, right, These are working class communities that don't have one hundred million dollars to counter at that. But if you don't have one hundred million dollars, does that mean that you
don't get to have a representative of democracy. Doesn't mean that you don't get to pick your own politicians. When they ran against me last year, they never mentioned Israel once, not one time, not one time in any race across the country.
They called me a trunk supporter. They imply that I was a Republican.
I also think that it's important you actually were the co sponsor of this bill condemning Hamas.
Yeah, because actually, what we're trying to do is we're trying to kill any distinct So even when we not just co sponsor, but we champion, we advocate vocally against the wars of Hamas and war when we say on equivocally that we believe that Israelis and Palestinians deserve and that it is worth fighting for their right to live peacefully and safely. We are labeled enemies, we are labeled
terrorist sympathizers, and it brings harm to us. They know that when they tweet at me, they know that they are unleashing upon me, people who are going to be racist against me, people who are going to threaten our lives. They know that we get death threats and so much hate from their targeting, and their targeting is never in
good faith. They are attempting to blatantly squash conversation. But right now, desperately, we need to actually be embracing a nuanced conversation around what is happening in Israel and Palace that not run away from it. But we can't do that, and anyone who thinks about doing it or threatened with
millions and millions of dollars against them. They said that they will spend one hundred million dollars this cycle just to silence and ensure that progressive black and brown voters in this country do not have the representation that they called for, that they fought for. But it also means that I have to raise money. It means now that
we have to find a way to fight back. Because my constituents, all of mike is are Jewish constituents, and our black constituents, they voted for representation that focuses not just on our differences, but on our similarities. On climate justice, on healthcare for everyone, on infrastructure, on equitable schools, and making sure that all of our workers have a living wage in the union. Those were concepts and ideas and values that unified all of my districts and so many
other districts. And when this type of money comes in to osi scate, to distract and to expread this information, it keeps us from having those unifying conversations. It keeps us from having conversations about the representation that people in PA twelve one to have, that the people in other districts like Minnesota or Saint Louis or New York one to have. And that's why we are fighting back. I'm not a famous representatives. I'm not you know, God blessed
the members of this blog, okay before me right. They have access to a lot of money because of their notoriety. I don't have it, and that's why I'm APEX number one target because they think I'm the most vulnerable. So we need folks who believe in this type of courageous representation and advocacy.
If you do, we need the support.
If we lose these seats, it will send a message that you can't be pro our Jewish siblings and pro Palestinians, pro life, pro peace. You can't be pro peace in this Congress if they defeat me, and if they defeat all of the black members of the squad, just the black members of the squad.
So please give what you can.
Go Yeah, more about me, learn more about our movement at SUMMERFPA dot com. But we want to expand, not shrink our movement summerly.
Thank you, Thank you. Mark Elias is the founder of Democracy Doted. Welcome Mark to Fast Politics.
Thanks for having me.
I am really delighted to have you. You're one of the people that makes me feel better knowing that you're out there. That's so terrible. I'm sorry, but it's true.
If I'm your source of optimism, you need a source of optimism.
Let's be honest, I do need a source. Look, all I have is me and my giant mug. But so let's talk about what the election landscape looks like, I mean, Republicans just want to make it harder to vote because they know they are losing, right, I mean, that's the net net of this whole fiasco, right.
Yeah, So, look, the Republican plan is pretty out there, like they're not hiding it, right. They want to make it harder to vote and easier to cheat. So the harder to vote part is the voter suppression. The easier to cheat is all of the things that they want to do to make it easier to overturn free and fair elections the next time and have a more successful you know, January sixth, Right.
So let's talk about harder to vote, because that's sort of where you come in. I mean, you probably also come in in the latter. But the former has been telling the Republicans have been working for a long time, Right, It's just that as they continually lose the demographic battle, it takes on more urgency.
Yeah. So I think that to understand where the Republican psychology is, you have to actually go back in time to the election of Barack Obama in two thousand and eight. At that time, you know, it was not clear where the demographics of America would shake out electorally. As you may remember, George Bush made a real push, for example, for Hispanic voters to join the Republican Party. But after Obama put together what became known as the Obama Coalition,
Republicans realized they had a problem. After the twenty twelve election, you'll remember, they did this very very famous autopsy report, and what came out of that autopsy report were a series of recommendations from the Republican Party, from the RNC that said, we need to moderate on immigration, we need to moderate on abortion, we need to find other ways to reach out to young voters and minority voters. And that was, in a nutshell molly supposed to be the
candidacy of Jeb Bush. People don't remember Jeb Bush was supposed to be the front runner in the twenty sixteen campaign, but he got steamrolled by the opposite of that, which was Donald Trump. And so since the Donald Trump era, Republicans no longer aspire to having a majority of the vote. They don't try to win majorities. They try to rig the rules to be able to effectuate the ruling of
the public without a majority coalition. So that's why in two thousand when George Bush loses the popular vote but wins the electoral college. It was such a traumatic event even for him and Republicans, Whereas by the time you get to twenty twenty, Republicans are trying to scheme to figure out how to lose the popular vote and still win the presidency. And in twenty twenty for it'll be even more.
I think that's a really salient point. The thing that makes me sleep at night, and I don't sleep that well. So it sometimes works, sometimes doesn't.
But maybe you need to move out of New York City and into the suburbs. It could be like street.
Noise, you know, that'll do it. But is the idea that there's a certain amount of voter protection that comes from the governors right in states like Wisconmsin and Michigan. And Wisconsin lasts probably because the governor has much less power, but Michigan, Pennsylvania where governors have made it a little bit easier to vote, or have they been able to protect voting as it is? Is that true? Am I wrong? And talk me through that?
Look, it's largely true. But we have two phenomena that we have to account for. The First is that most of our elections in this country are administered at the local level, at the county and subcounty life. So as much as governors can do and secretaries of state can do on a statewide level, we still see these bad actors at the local level, these election deniers taking over
local election offices, and that's really hard. That's really hard for our system, which counts on those election officials to be doing the honest thing. The second thing is, of course, that you have the increase in Republican election vigilanteism. So we used to think about the threat of to our elections coming mostly from state actors, legislatures passing bad laws, governor Republican governors implementing bad laws, Republican secretary of states
or ags. What we have seen in the last couple of years, though, is the growth of a vigilante culture among Republicans and Conservatives, where small groups of non state actors these sort of think about Molly the imageges of Conservatives in Maricopa Counties staking out dropboxes in body armor, right, And that is very hard even for governors to do much about at a systemic level, And that's part of the reason why my team and I remain so busy in court because when you deal at the local level
with election deniers, you deal with these election vigilantes, oftentimes the courts are your best options.
And that's what Trump wants, right, I mean, that's when Trump says, you've got to watch them vote every vote, right, That's what Trump wants.
Yeah, And it's a really important point, Molly that you just made. When he says we've got to guard the vote or watch them vote. He's not talking about getting you know, uniformed police or election officials to watch. He is encouraging the same kind of activity that we saw on January sixth. He's trying to get his supporters to engage in vigilante and that is what is so dangerous and I've been sounding the alarm about for twenty twenty four.
Is that that is the dog whistle or maybe not even dog whistle, maybe it's a bullhorn that he is saying, is for groups of his supporters.
To do this.
Yeah, that's going to be bad. I mean that seems pretty fucking bad. Excuse my friend. So let's talk about where you're seeing this sort of most egregious voter defranchising.
Yeah, So I think it comes in a couple of varieties and a lot of different geographies. So we know that Kleta Mitchell, who is a well known conservative lawyer, she was on the tape that Brad Rosenberger made with Donald Trump. She was one of the people on the Trump side of that conversation, and she was not that long ago caught on a released tape encouraging Republicans to target young voters, particularly college voters, in trying to disenfranchise them.
So I think one stream of this will be wherever there are college campuses and you have concentration of young voters, we should expect to see targeted voter suppression, election visulanteism.
So what does that look like.
It is a few things. One of the big tactics that they are touting is voter challenges. Now, you know, again you and I have talked about voter challenges in past opportunities. But just to put a little perspective in the runoff in twenty twenty one in Georgia, when there were the two Senate seats in January of twenty twenty one that led to the Democrats taking control of the Senate. The Republican Party and their allies challenged the eligibility of
three hundred and sixty four thousand Georgians. They tried to disenfranchise that many Georgians. Now my team went to court, we prevented it, and then Republicans changed the law in Georgia to make it harder to block challenges and easier to make mass challenges. So we so on another one hundred thousand challenges. When Rafael Warnock had his election in twenty twenty two, CBS News just did a profile of these voter challenge efforts that are moving from state to state.
I think they identified eleven states now where conserners have plans to challenge the voting rights or the ability to vote on a mass basis. They're building AI tools to do this, and so those tools will be targeted at young voters, they'll be targeted at more transient voters, they'll be targeted, I believe, at minority voters. And so we need to wake up and realize this is going on, and we need to tackle this as a political matter, an organizing matter, and a legal matter.
That is really fucking scary. But I also want to ask you about this sort of jerrymanderd voting. You know the congressional this the congressional seat voting. There have been efforts on the part of even this incredible conservative Supreme Court to sort of throw out some of the jerrymandering I'm thinking about Alabama. Can you talk to me about where that is and what you see and what is making you hopeful or worried or whatever it looks like there?
Yeah, Molly again, I think you go back to our basic frame here, which is that Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier to cheat because they don't command majorities. So one of the ways they make it easier to cheat is by rigging the districts. Right, Rigging districts is just another way of saying you're rigging the rules of voting. And so in Alabama, and in Georgia and in Louisiana, my law firm is suing the Republican states because they failed to abide by the Voting
Rights Act. The Voting Rights Act has a very very specific requirement that says that under some circlement that you cannot dilute minority voting strengths. So we suit Alabama, and Alabama lost. They went to the US Court, and as you point out, to many people surprise, including Alabamas, the Supreme Court rejected their challenge.
Were you shocked by that, by the way, you know, I was not.
We had two cases in twenty twenty three that went to the US Supreme Court that were voting cases, the Alabama case and then the so called independent state Legislature theory case.
Both of which the Supreme Court took your side on.
Yeah, we won both of them. And that's not to say the Supreme Court is not trouble. It is in a lot of respects. But I do think that the Supreme Court when it comes to these existential democracy questions, not the incremental democracy questions, but the existential democracy.
Incremental they love, but existential they don't like so much.
Yeah, which is the reason why Molly, I'll say here, I think Jack Smith is going to win the immunity case against Donald Trump because that falls in the existential Now, will the court down the road, you know, narrowly construe the statutes that he's charged under and you know, maybe give a wink and now there maybe, But on these big democracy questions, they're not ready to take that lead. And so in Alabama we won. Alabama refused to then draw awful map, so we had the court do it.
Now black voters will have two rather than one black opportunity district. We have won a case in Louisiana, we have one a case in Georgia, same theory, same results. Both of those states are traveling the road that Alabama did, which is they're refusing to comply with the law. And in both of those cases, we are going to be pushing the courts to draw new maps in time for
twenty twenty four. So you know, again, the courts continue to be imperfect in many respects, but they are still among the strongest bulwarks to protect democracy.
Do you find it? I mean, I know that we shouldn't think, you know, when we think about this country, we shouldn't be so surprised. But are you surprised that you have these state legislatures saying no to the Supreme Court?
No?
I mean, the same impulse that led the governor of Alabama to stand at the schoolhouse doors is what's leading this here. And I want to make clear what that is because it's a bit of a twist on the Oh, they're racist. This is not to say they're not racist, but I think it's actually in some ways more pernicious than that, Molly, which is that they would rather not they would rather be seen defying a court order than complying with You know that image of George Wallace at
the schoolhouse doors. He knew, he knew that those black students were going to get registered, he knew it, but he wanted the political theater of it being done over his objection. And so one of the things that has returned in the era of Trump is the Republican need for the political theater of being oppositional to the rule of law, oppositional to voting rights, oppositional to democracy, and that's really really dangerous. But not on resident I'm.
Glad you talked about that, because it's so important to remember where we came from as a country, and that Trump is not I mean, yes, he's an outliar for now, and yes he's an enormous step backwards, but he's not such a huge deviation from some of the many sort of sinister figures we've had in early American days. And I think that's a really a good point.
He also, by the way, Molly could not be accomplishing what he is accomplishing in the Republican Party without a party of collaborators. Oh yes, I mean Mike Johnson is a collaborator for January six Will you talk.
About Mike Johnson because he was He's sort of got on Trump's radar by trying overturn the election, right, Yeah, So I wrote.
A piece on Democracy Docket that said that Mike Johnson, other than Donald Trump, is the most culpable federal elected official in the events of January sixth. Say more right, So if you take Donald Trump out of the equation and you just say who was elected, who was in federal office that was most culpable for January sixth, I think there's no question it's the now speaker, Mike Johnson.
And that's because when he was just Congressman Johnson, he organized the Amicus brief whereby one hundred and twenty six House Republicans supported a frivolous lawsuit that Texas filed in December to throw out the election results in four states. You may remember that in December of twenty twenty, when it was clear that all of their litigation options were collapsing.
They were losing cases around the country on a state by state basis, Texas went to the US Supreme Court and asked the Supreme Court to throw out the results in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan.
Crazy even for these Republicans, I have to say, right.
And Mike Johnson, his job was to get Republicans in the House to sign onto that brief. And so why do I say he was the most culpable because that
was the organizing tool. If you look at who signed onto that brief, that became the organizing effort of what eventually turned into the protests, that their effort to not certify the electors on the night of January six, and we know now there were communications between him and Donald Trump in which he is conveying to the Republican members that Donald Trump has a list of which members are
on and which members are not on that brief. That is, as far as we know, the first and most significant effort to organize Republicans in Congress to try to overturn the free and fair election on January six.
Do you think that Johnson really thought he had a shot with us or do you think he just thought that he would help him with Trump and the Republican Party.
I think we underestimate Republicans when we think that they are in on it. It's one of the things I worry about. Sometimes I'll hear, you know, democratic elected officials or pundits say, oh, you know, Republicans, they understand what they're doing and they're just humoring Trump, or you know, Mitt Romney will say, oh, he's just saying those things like this is deadly serious. You know, Mike Johnson was a backbench member of the House. He is a true believer.
I believe he believed that Donald Trump should stay in office. I believe that he was not concerned about the voters in four states. I think he was not concerned about democracy. And I think that we make a real mistake on our side if we think that Stephen Miller is just doing shtick, that Steve Bannon is just doing theater.
No, they want a result, Yeah, they want a result, but just sort of more specifically, do you think they thought there was a legal mechanism for this or you thought that You think they thought we'll just try anyway and maybe it works.
I think that he organized them in that instance, not because they thought they were going to win in the Supreme Court, but because Donald Trump needed a way to solidify all of the House Republican and so Molly, here is here is the thing. Mike Johnson gets one hundred and twenty six of them in December. By the time you get to January sixth, the number of Republicans in the House who opposed certification jumps one hundred and thirty nine. That brief was the thing that started to create the
blacklist or the white list for Republicans. He makes clear to his colleagues, if you're not on this brief, Donald Trump will know he's looking at the names. And so that's why I say he was so culpable.
Mark Haunting as always, thank you for joining us, Thank you.
For having me no moment, Oh fuck only Jesse Cannon, Molly john Fast the vibes impeachment hearing.
It's got bad vibes.
If you're asking me.
It's got bad vibes for Republicans. Dozens and dozens of Republicans, even Fox News hosts let that sink in have bluntly admitted there's no evidence to support impeaching President Biden. This is a waste of time. Congressman McGovern he said it not me, poor, poor, poor, never mind, fuck them, they are our moment of fuckery. 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
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