Kamala Harris Crushed Donald Trump...And Voters Noticed | The Focus Group Podcast

people want to see how she handled Donald Trump because they see it as a standin for how she'll handle other autocrats uh across the world Sarah I was thinking about you telling me that the entire time I was watching that debate because I thought that was so wise and she did it she clearly did it hello everyone and welcome to the focus group podcast I'm Sarah Longwell publisher of the bull workk and this week we're ing the first and possibly only debate between Donald Trump and kamla Harris and boy what a difference two months has made since the June debate between Trump and Biden here's what you're going to hear today Harris eased the concerns of a lot of Voters who didn't like Trump but weren't sure what to make of her she reassured them that she's ready to be president and Donald Trump looked every day of his 78 years of age my guest this week oh and I'm very excited about it is Dana Bash host of CNN's inside politics at State of the Union and she was the co-moderator of one of the most consequential presidential debates in American history back on June 27 she's also the author of a new book America's deadliest election the cautionary tale of the most violent election in American history Dan thanks so much for being here hi Sarah I'm so excited you know what's amazing about this is I was on your show the day of the debate so you got to ask me about my predictions then or you know what I thought she should do and now I'm going to get to ask you a bunch of questions about how you thought she did and the moderators did uh but first I do want to talk about your book because uh you wrote about the Reconstruction Era Louisiana gubinatorial election of 1872 where there was so much voter suppression and skull duggery it's a great word from my producer skull duy uh that there wasn't a clear winner and it took almost two years and a lot of violence before the election was resolved so I'm interested in why you chose to write about this although uh as somebody uh I do a lot of work like in the Democracy space and political violence has just it's a it's a it's become such a major topic of concern not just since January 6th but even leading in I think there's I hear this in the groups a lot like they feel like we're on the precipice of a civil war they feel like we're so mad at each other uh and so yeah tell me why you decided to write this book yeah I mean listen I I think that the idea that political violence is kind of hovering over us feels um different for Our Generation but unfortunately it is the through line of America political violence and this particular era the Reconstruction Era and in in even more specifically in uh 1872 this election in Louisiana was after obviously the most violent time in American history which was the Civil War America was trying to heal and the South was having a little bit of trouble reconciling the notion of their former slaves now freed being able to go to the voting booth next to them and pick who was going to be their elected officials uh locally and nationally and so what happened was this was kind of one of those you know sliding doors where you could go a completely different direction depending on what happens in that moment this country could have been so different had this election in 1872 not been allowed to go the way it went and what I mean by that is the election beforehand in 1868 which was the first time in Louisiana in particular that uh fredman could vote black men could vote and they elected like other Southern States they elected black Representatives because they the new voters elected people who would represent them and their interests well by n by 1872 the southern Democrats because it was the solid south of course then the Democrats were the um majority in in the South and it was the Republicans who were the party of Lincoln they wanted to give uh for the most part give African-Americans rights and Democrats did not they realized the only way to stop that representation that equality was at The Ballot Box and so there was enormous corruption fraud intimidation disenfranchisement and violence and it was so messed up like not the accusation of Fraud and corruption like we saw in 2020 without evidence to to prove it but like actual corruption um that nobody would concede the election so two Governors were sworn in two legislator were sworn in and it was a mess for months and months and months and then the people who at the sort of top of the ticket were encouraging violence openly encouraging violence and their people listened in uh a um Parish called Grant Parish named for ulyses srant who was the president at the time there was a massacre called The cax Massacre and about 150 probably more black men were were murdered in Cold Blood it was horrible and in order to try to find Justice it was decided that they would be tried in federal courts to test the 13th 14th and 15th amendments that had just passed an attempt to give um rights to to black men went all the way up to the Supreme Court and what the Supreme Court decided was that it's not a federal decision it's not a federal um role to determine people's civil rights it's a state role and so Louisiana said and other Southern States said great we agree and they enacted Jim Crow laws that stayed in effect for a 100 years and so that's just one example of why this era was so incredibly important and then if you fast forward four years the corruption and fraud and violence that I described totally racial uh wasn't just in Louisiana it was in other states and it was such a mess that multiple slates of electors were sent to Congress in the uh presidential of 1876 so much that these electors were just thrown out why Sarah because it was decided that the role of the Vice President in counting the Electoral College votes um was ceremonial and they couldn't he couldn't decide and so the whole election was decided by a commission because that's what they do here in Washington even back then they come up with commissions and one man one single man ended in that commission ended up deciding being the deciding vote for the president of the United States but because nothing is for free there was a back room deal and it was the Republican then almost president was President Hayes and with a wink and a nod he said thank you for making me president uh in exchange I am going to pull all the federal troops from the south who are there protecting the Civil Rights and the and the safety of blacks so in these two elections you saw the Civil Rights get thrown out and then you saw the protections the physical protection for uh newly freed black Americans get withdrawn and that led to what we saw until the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s you know I can't say that I was like a big not a big history buff uh and I was that surprises me you know I'm I'm a big political science nerd and so to the extent that I like uh engage with history it was often through the prism of political science and so I read a lot of The Federalist Papers think a lot about the founding but I I I don't necessarily I I've never sort of read tons of books by historians but as a more as a grownup uh especially somebody now who is sort of riveted by the complexi of our moment and trying to understand them by listening to voters I become much more interested and it I think one of the things I'm constantly shocked by is both the contingencies of History like how certain small things just create trajectories that linger uh and affect us today um but also I think there's something about being maybe a kid in the 80s and '90s where we just felt like we got it all solved like things things feel pretty good and we don't see a lot I mean obviously we've lived through some crazy things you know the uh Rodney King and the and 91 and like you know it's not like we were there was nothing but I think we generally felt safe and the Spectre of political violence I know this happened for me that going into 2020 I was surrounded by people who were like nope they could there could really be political violence and I was like nah I don't think so it's not really what we do here anymore mhm and then uh and then we did uh but but but when I listen to you and when I when I read books like yours I am reminded that we do have a brutal violent history uh that is a through line and and it's not it's both an attempt to keep people out of sort of the promise of the American experiment right it's about excluding people and also about people fighting to be included uh right fighting for the right to vote uh I think a lot now about the right to vote and where it came from and how many people I mean it's a it's a cliche right people bled and died for it but of course they did I knew nothing about this era and I feel really bad about it and I was embarrassed about it but it says a lot about our education system as I'm older than you you know going to elementary school in the late 70s early 80s um High School in the late 80s we I went to a great Public School in New Jersey but like we didn't learn this stuff yeah hey is there something comforting about first of all let me just say that I appreciate that you were like I don't know anything about this so I'm going to write a book about that that's a very specific kind of thing it's very well I want to I want to be totally transparent in that David Fischer who's my co-author um he came to me with this idea okay and and he was like this is an incredible moment in time it wasn't um it's not welln and should write about it and because I obviously cover politics for a living and elections and covered 2020 um you should do it with me and I said okay it's great uh does it make you does it give you comfort because I'll say there is something comforting is it I don't know if comforting is the right word because it's kind of a nice word but I guess the fact that this is not a unique like it's Unique to us but it's not um like we've survived it before we've survived it that's right come back from this is there something about giving it a longer lens that makes you feel better a whole lot worse than it is it could be worse and it was worse yes I definitely feel that way but I also feel like we have to keep these these moments in time alive because yes we survived but at what cost um we survived barely um you know the leaders back then engaged in these compromises in order to just um not have another civil war and to unite the the country but the um Unity on top was like literally a Band-Aid and underneath it the wound was still very much festering and so I think that's another really important lesson and uh and you know never mind just the lesson like you were saying of making sure people vote making sure that their votes are properly counted and I mean another sort of deeper part of this book is who is in control of the voting booths of the of the certification of votes in Louisiana it was called The Returning board in other states it's called the canvasing board they're different names for them in different states but at the end it is about who who is in charge of deciding who wins the state and whether or not the people in that state accept it whether that decision is legit and then in the on the presidential level whether it can be approved um that is all very real and sort of scary stuff that we need to be thinking about now looking at these states Georgia Pennsylvania Arizona Michigan I mean this stuff matters so much well and it reminds you that like this stuff isn't all worked out right like when you get a system that is not built for a character like Donald Trump uh and a movement that is willing to blow through the Constitution and a lot of the the constraints that have been put in you know I I I'll tell you this was this was a real shock to me sort of as I went through 2017 and 2018 is how much of what uh you know how many things were just Norms right they weren't laws it was like we noten supposed to do this but there's not really a rule saying you can't like okay if you want your you know son-in-law to be the you know whatever you want to install your whole family in the white house there's no rule saying you can't so this is the next book that I want to write and I need maybe you can write it with me because I'm trying to figure out the best way to um to to I'm still noodling it in my head which is the end of shame that the Norms were in place without actual laws and and rules because people didn't do it because they didn't want to feel ashamed a lot of people don't care anymore shame is normalized this is one of the things that Donald Trump taught a lot of people um which is that and it was it's sort of how he handled the um uh what's it called the bus uh the grab them by the whatever moment Access Hollywood Access Hollywood thank you mhm uh is he understood something about Domin uh sort of like domination politics that I think a lot of us didn't right like I did expect because I grew up as a as a conservative where people talked about character counting as a central thesis for what it meant to be a conservative uh that that the American people wouldn't tolerate things like this but Donald Trump understood in that like lizard brain of his that if he just plowed through gave them Applause I reason locker room talk that people would like get over it and when we I remember when he said you know we're going to shut down Muslims coming into the country we're like we can't do that you can't say that turn his poll numbers went up um and so even now watching uh and this is going to turn us actually to the debate uh watching them the Trump folks Hugh huitt comes to mind as a as an actor on this coming out and saying no he won he won uh you know refs have looked and actually in retrospect Trump totally won this uh and Donald Trump's claiming that he won there's this way in which and it's a line from 1984 right like they demanded that you ignore uh your eyes and your ears and and that is it there's a lot going on there it's some of it's shame some of it's propaganda some of it's the way tribalism is working on us but there's a lot to mind there and it is why I do the focus groups because I'm trying to understand what it is about people and I'll say I I I do not compare this time to 1932 I don't think that's like exactly I don't think that's what we should be doing but I will say I remember being as a young person always wondering when I learned about the Holocaust I thought I don't understand how that could happen I don't understand it just seemed to me it boggled my mind I much more now see how it can happen I can see how these things work on people and how people get into mindsets of enmity hating one another dehumanizing one another how leaders uh who put forward propaganda who dehumanize other people how that works like I'm just watching right now we've decided Haitians are stealing and eating pets you know it's like this is uh this is like long-standing human stuff that humans can go for yeah no it it it's very true all right let's talk about the debate because I want to get to it um because I know that our listeners are like Longwell give us the focus groups we got to know how do the people how do they feel about that debate uh and uh you know it generally it tracked with what we're hearing sort of broadly from the public um which is that Harris won the debate and Donald Trump definitely lost so let's start by listening to how a group of trump to Biden so our flippers that we talk about on the show a lot these are kind of your swing voters how they talked about the debate the morning after it felt like a lot of the things that Trump was you know criticizing and exploiting Joe Biden for now he's the old man that can't keep up you know and that was kind of a fun Dynamic I had not heard a single thing about people eating pets people eating cats and dogs but that kind of leasts to the fact that what I liked most about the debate was the fact that they did fact check yes finally for once somebody went no you're wrong they don't kill babies after they're born that never happened I like the fact that they they were even about it they fact checked both her and him so it wasn't like they were all ganging up on him but that was something I didn't see coming I literally did a spit take Joe Biden was kind of moving at half speed and uh it was just easy to hit him below the belt easier whereas KLA is sharper more intelligent articulate you know she was pretty much built for this I feel like to put him in his place but in a way that's you know informative and comforting almost whereas Joe Biden left a lot of people feeling unconfident and it was it makes sense it's like someone bullying someone in a memory care unit that's just not nice Harris being more presidential that's obvious we know Donald Trump is just gonna run people through the mud and I was actually pleasantly surprised at Harris because like many of us we haven't heard much from her you know she addressed most of the issues pretty well and she gave Donald Trump like what maybe other candidates couldn't you know she was a little bit sarcastic or talking back with him which I appreciated but as much as it is entertaining I don't know that that's what we need in a presidential debate for 2020 for but it's just where we're at right now I I don't think that we can group her with with Biden I mean that's just so typical of trump he's just bullying it is that like Trump wants to do the same old things where KLA wants to kind of try something new I think in Harris's remarks last night about her not being Joe Biden she said clearly I'm not Joe Biden I'm not Donald Trump she was channeling her Obama there and I think it came across really well she also spoke about the future many many times whereas Trump has the concepts of a plan and I got so tired of hearing Trump raal on how many millions of criminals are being led into the country and people's crime rates are dropping but ours are going up but I'd like to know where he got those stats after the second or third time hearing it every time they started talking about immigration had kind of just tuned out for a little bit well I think that uh Kamala handled that very well actually and pointed out that Trump influenced uh a lot of people to shoot down that multi-billion dollar border Bill and kamala's words really resonated with me she goes he's campaigning on a problem he stalled a solution so that he could use this against me he was picking a cameela like well you didn't do anything the last three and a half years but the same can be said about him because he's been a president for four years and like we were talking about the Obamacare you know he wants that change but he did nothing so you know he's picking at her for something and I kind of feel like you know he had his chance and he was he was the man and he I felt like he didn't do anything Trump was so negative and divisive and there's no hope but he's going to fix it now at least there was optimism coming from the Harris side of the thing and it it was the breath of fresh air which is what we need in this country I really did want to see how Harris could hold her own on a stage like that with such a daunting uh established opponent and I felt like she gave more specifics I felt like in the end the factchecking favored her over him and I was very impressed she did seem very presidential and I participated in this same group after the first debate and I said there needs to be realtime factchecking that would be a great Improvement so uh I was really happy to see that okay so as that guy said we had a bunch of people in this group that we had uh in our groups immediately after the June debate uh which you Moder ated uh when they panned this group uh you know panned Biden's performance and uh so we talked a bit about how they viewed this debate relative uh to the Biden Trump debate which is why you're hearing uh some of that I want to talk about your own debate experience and so back when you were moderating the June debate what went through your head as you were watching sort of this performance uh unfold and I guess I'm interested I mean I I will take anything you want to tell me about like what the pressure's like because I as somebody who does have to perform in public sometimes I just so acutely aware of both for everybody who's there Trump kamla the moderators it is a like lot it's a big pressure moment uh and then I I'm dying to hear your thoughts on the fact checking yeah okay well first of all on the on the uh the pressure yeah so much so much pressure um what I I had done uh many primary debates but this was to say this is next level is an understatement I'd never done a general election debate uh nor had Jake and so we were extremely aware of the stakes but for me just in my own head and emotionally and mentally what I tried to do was as much as I could just put blinders on and just be in the moment be in the room it's just me it's just Jake it's just Trump it's just Biden and we're just doing this and try not I mean when you're performing when you're performing on TV especially you obviously have to think about that aspect of it but in this case I I just tried to stay in the zone as much as I could because if I started to think about 1550 million people then I would have probably crumbled and fallen on the floor so I just as a human being I just I just uh I couldn't do that um and it did help to have to have Jake there and it mostly helped to I mean I think he would say the same about me but what really helped was our prep yeah and the team that we have Sarah I and you you know some of our team members here because you you've done a lot of CNN and we're grateful for that but there is this this remarkable group of people and I kind of joke that it's like Avengers Assemble that when we have this big event we have all of these superheroes who have different superpowers and they all come together in one room and we figure out how to rule the universe and fix the universe and that is what happens in these um in these big moments and this is what we did I me we spent hours and hours and hours with questions with topics um with trying to figure out the order we of course do mock debates where somebody plays Trump somebody plays Biden and we go through and once we do that you get a feel for what works what doesn't work what lands what doesn't land um and we did it over and over until the morning of the debate because it's that but it's also like you know things happen in the world and in the news and so um the Press is key yeah is absolutely key and knowing that we have a net like we have these tremendous people that I told you about uh not only prepping us beforehand but in the in the um control room then um your oh fact check okay so okay so let's talk about this so we approached the debate in a traditional way which is since 1960 since Kennedy Nixon the debate moderator have been facilitators and not participants in the um well that's not true we're obviously participants but we have been facilitators when it comes to the content of of what they're saying except for when they don't answer your question um I have in primary debates and in the general election debate followed up my question was President Trump will you accept the results of 2024 second time third thir time okay um and the feeling was that once you participate with more than that you're putting your thumb on the scale [Music] and why is it when we're doing when i'm doing an interview I'm definitely responsible for factchecking real time factchecking which is not easy I am absolutely responsible cuz it's just me and person I'm interviewing same goes for a town hall CNN often does these Town Halls where it's me or one of my colleagues and the elected official presidential wannabe and a room full of people asking questions um back check is is key but when it's one candidate and another candidate and they're going back and forth our approach to it again just going back to how I started this was more traditional it's up to Joe Biden to fact check and a BC took a different approach and that's just again like a different philosophy I think things have have changed now because there's lots of debate about this approach I will say one of the voters said um he was happy about the factchecking which is interesting also said that it was balanced um it wasn't and and I'm not saying anything negative about my friends at ABC I think they did a terrific job but there were I believe four times where they fact checked Trump and look there's not necessarily an equal playing field here like you don't always have to be if you if you make a decision to fact check and one person is lying up the Wazoo and the other person is shading the truth or being a more of a typical politician rather than flatly lying um there's I don't think you have to be Equitable however there were times when kamla Harris again in a typical politician way I'm not saying she did anything different than anybody else when you ask a question who's running for office didn't answer the question there wasn't followup like well my question was or um so so I guess my point is is that to me it looked like there was a very deliberate plan to fact check Donald Trump because of the fact that he lies more than and just lie it's not even shading the truth he lies more than any politician In Our Lifetime that we have seen in the public sphere and they were prepared for it and that was their approach and there's a big debate about that and uh and there are people who say our approach was right there are people who say their approach was right and the way that media organizations approach debates I think from now on is going to be a more of a more of a jump ball I mean what do you think I'm curious about your your perspective yeah so uh you know the night of as I was watching it um I was like when they did the first fact check I was like oh my gosh do my ears deceive me are we going to get a fact check of Donald Trump and I think there's a little bit of having listened to this guy lie in many ways because does so much friendly media he goes so unchecked so often cuz he's so much of what it is is people playing things at rallies that just letting these lies persist something about like me cries out for could somebody just tell them in front of people that they're not murdering babies after they're born like this is let me ask you a question why why isn't that Comm in a debate why isn't that kamla Harris's Ro so I will say so this is uh so I was saying in the moment I really was like thank God you know somebody saying and the reason I'll tell you that the difference between the moderators doing it and KLA Harris doing it is it is KLA Harris's job but she's also not a neutral Arbiter of the facts right she's an adversary in that space they're the ones who were supposed to be neutral and so and and as so create so them it seems like a natural role for them to be in some ways Arbiters of like major truths uh that being said subsequently first of all I think that the rightwing where you guys are getting major Kudos so you guys are uh you and and um Jake are being very celebrated for your performance among folks on the right because they did feel like it was evenhanded uh and you guys yeah nobody was putting their thumb on the scale I would say in retrospect having thought about it a little bit more I don't think it was terrible for them to do it once or twice I think going doing it four times and I think if they were going to do it they needed to find a way to do it to her too right that was you're saying it in a much more articulate way because I'm being um cautious about it because I don't want to yeah this is your piss everybody off yeah you know everybody can be everybody can be mad at me all the time uh but I I I just I I am because it really did give the right uh now I think that they're they're playing the refs because they're guy got smoked but also definitely and and let's be clear yeah they played the refs with us beforehand I mean the way that the way that they and I again I tried to tune it all out I took Twitter off my phone and everything before the debate but um playing the refs is like that's what they do on both sides so I I do think there is Peril like there is a lot of peril in in getting involved and I think Candy Crowley this is like the one big the part of the reason that I think people are like let's not do this is cuz um that happened one time uh and it was a big disaster right and so you do want to be very careful uh it's a tough call I think I think the the media trying to figure out how to handle Donald Trump uh I just I get frustrated myself sometimes but I also just think it's a really hard thing to do it is hard it is hard and and again the ABC made the decision that Donald Trump is a unique character who should have a unique set of rules applied to him um and just on the other thing on the candy thing who I will say that I love and has been a mentor and a wonderful person um you know part of the of the sort of lore about the danger of factchecking is that if you're going to fact check you real time you better be right yeah and there was just there was one moment when it was about crime stats and I can't remember which of the moderators said but crime been if you look at the FBI stats crime has been going down FBI stats do say that but Trump was also right that the FBI did not have the crime stats in major cities because the major cities have not reported those stats to the FBI so this is like you're going to go down a rabbit hole of nuance where everybody has a point yeah and um I don't like that last part Trump said but I don't know if people believe him and I don't know that he's behaved in such a way that he deserves the the benefit of the the benefit of the doubt yeah um yeah I look I think there's a lot of fairness in this um I I think I think that the first thing that they they checked on I I can't remember if it was the murdering babies but they I thought that the fact check on Springfield and that they're eating dogs and cats I thought that was super Fair because it's a new story and it's one that like there's a lot of like wait is this happening what is going on here and as news people they had the to like call them and say okay this isn't happening I felt like that one was really fair but I agree with you that on the crime stats and then even like there's not really Donald Trump is lying that you can just like murder babies uh after they're born but he is there there are states that have laws that are extraordinarily liberal around the ways in which you can have an abortion even of a healthy baby up until 9 months without uh a penalty now typically that is not what happens it is usually a devastating case so rare it's so you know uh but yeah it is it is a complicated thing to fact check absolutes uh in that space now let me just tell you one I'll give you one little piece of um in Intel which is had Donald Trump in our debate said the election was stolen he would have heard from us okay so unlike a fundamental of democracy that is so dangerous and we saw what it did in 2020 he he didn't he didn't say it he didn't say that which was noteworthy uh that is true although you know I will say that did you guys you did ask about January 6th you did at right I'm pretty sure you did yes I did feel like it played a slightly bigger role in this debate than it did no no it did it did our Focus was more looking ahead yeah like my question was about 2024 and the election results uh and is that because like when you go into it is it that you're thinking okay I have things I want to learn about this or I believe that this is what voters want to learn about this no both I mean honestly I I this sounds so uh self-serving but truly the way that we go into it is what matters most to the voters particularly the voters who matter the most yeah um the people who haven't yet made up their minds yeah who the people you talk to who are real by the way yeah I mean people who are like and look there is an element of and we're going to get into this but like there's an element of people wanting to be courted or wanting to you know they're holding out there's a certain type of voter that's just like I don't know I'm still still thinking about it uh and but it's also a real thing that people want especially with kamla right now they know why they don't like Trump but they're like I don't know I'd like to affirmatively like her um and you know I have concerns about the economy which they do can I can I also ask you this about this I'm sorry to turn the tables on you can't stop being the interviewer yeah no no no because I want to because I think about this a lot and I'm curious because you have an informed opinion on this since you talk to people who are undecided all the time so in 2016 Brad parscale who was the digital director for Trump who did all the ads and then of course he became briefly the campaign director in 2020 he told me he'd never done politics before and he told me that his sort of North Star the way that he framed all of the ads all of the messaging for Donald Trump was that iPod commercial with the guy in like in Shadow dancing around with the earbuds and because it was how he how it it wasn't about like here's how an iPod works and let me tell you the the mechanics of it and the technology it was like this is how it makes you feel mhm and nobody wanted to know the backstory of the iPod they just wanted to know how it made you feel and that's how he focused on on Donald Trump meanwhile you had Hillary Clinton with like 17-point plans of her 17-point plans and like nobody cared so that's how I've been thinking about politics with Donald Trump on the ticket but now Sarah when you hear I'm not sure yet so many people want to know well I want to know more about what she's going to do on the economy not to say that's not a completely legitimate question but why don't you want to to know what he's more of what he's going to do yeah uh and why why is she being held to that standard um in a way that I don't think he is what does that mean what is that about so I'm going to take a shot at answering this because it's um I think a lot in the groups about what they're saying uh their preferences are and what their revealed preferences are as they talk um and so I listen to a lot of Voters right now being like well I want to know more about policy now I think that there are a lot of Voters who feel like that's the thing that they should say that's sort of the smart um way to express why they haven't arrived on a uh at a firm conclusion um but I would say the revealed preference tends to be much more like does she clear some internal bar I have over what it means to be presidential and I think there's a lot of funny things in the mix there that are like some of them I'm going to use the word like preder natural when people are talking and they talk a lot in frames of strength and weakness um a lot of times what they mean is like Trump's a big guy who like I wouldn't want to punch me or insult me or he scares me a little bit and so maybe he'll scare world leaders or he'll stand up to people um or he'll make the side that I don't like uh feel afraid because the most annoying person in my office is the person who is demanding that I use pronouns in my email you know it's just there's so much going on in what a voter and so I think there there's a lot of his like uh and also uh for for Comm in particular she is she is contending with a few different things some of it's racial some of it's gender but mostly it is San Francisco prosecutor I'm sorry uh but like well not not so much the prosecutor part but like San Francisco Progressive was what I mean it's San Francisco Progressive because for these swing voters and this is where as I try to remind people all the time the the swing voters are center right they are right-leaning independent soft GOP voters they are not like committed Democrats most of the time um and unless they've moved hard since 2016 and that happens to people but for a lot of them they're like I really hate Donald Trump but I also hate like a San Francisco aggressive that is not my jam I do not like it and I know what that means and I don't I'm not into it and so what they're mean is like has she has she sufficiently disabused me of the notion that she is going to behave like a San Francisco Progressive when she gets into office and I think that's a lot of it yeah so and that and that comes out of their mouth is I want more policy yeah and also like I want to see more of her I want to know more about her I want to feel comfortable with her which is why look the debate uh and I've got to play more sound from these guys actually literally it's my next it's my next setup you you've like led into it okay so because uh so while they were sure that that she won the debate uh there's the the thing that the guy said in the in the last clip was about this it was about specifics right so the biggest complaints that we hear about Harris is that voters don't see her enough they don't know what she wants for the country this is what they want so here's how these Trump to Biden voters felt about the specifics that they got from Harris during the debate I was hoping for some answers that I didn't get I think the biggest thing that we need to deal with now is because it is a dead heat they both have so much baggage that I was hoping to get some of that addressed last night that just wasn't addressed some of the things that Harris did in California that were never touched on um they did touch on part of trump so I thought that was good I think that Harris was the clear winner Trump would start out great and then just literally Drive himself into a wall after about 30 seconds she gave specifics he gave generalities on every single topic what are you going to do well she said I'm GNA do this I'm gonna do this I'm gonna talk to this guy I think they need to do this I'm just gonna fix it how I'm gonna be so awesome you just can't believe it well how and he never did to the how other than by the sheer force of his personality and will he's going to make it better I feel like a lot of the rhetoric in the um debate space in general is really emotionally geared and like lacking a lot of information so I mean I went into it kind of expecting that taking it with a grain of salt and trying to be entertained by it more than I'm trying to like base my opinions around whether I'm voting for each candidate I think it's just more important to take the time to look at the Hard facts on your own not just base it on a debate because they're just insulting each other saying ridiculous things and you know a lot of that information that you're hoping for is just lost and Ethos I wanted some some answers which in the beginning Tom didn't seem like she was going to give but she got there she was definitely very presidential I live in Georgia we just had a school shooting here as I'm sure most of you guys know I am a gun owner I own plenty of guns so I wanted answers on guns abortion Gaza Israel stuff like that I feel like I got all the answers from comma but Trump just sat there taking her bait and not answering questions I feel I don't really expect to get answers in a debate I would like that but past experience I think has shown me that like it's rare that that those lingering questions that I have get addressed last night stayed with that I thought Trump started off decently like I I remember like being like just sort of surprised at him at the beginning of the debate and then I felt like about halfway through maybe a little less than halfway through that he just shot himself in the foot I think I think she was the the clear winner she was more presidential and he did a poor job of taking her bait and allowing himself to get upset and caught up in different issues that we didn't need to spend a lot of time on in my opinion through some of those discussions like with Russia and Ukraine and the Middle East I was just coming back to the fact that like the two of them standing on the world stage her just having just the a better ability to present presidentially to present like she's a leader and I I have conflict with that because that's not totally what it's about like the substance is really important but but I did find myself just keep coming back to that it would just be nice to go back to a place where we have a president that can just stand on their own on the world stage and not be a joke yeah so like I shouldn't even have answered your question I should have just let them answer because I think I think they do it right I think um and and look my big takeaway from the groups that we did right after was the fact that people were organically saying she seemed presidential and to me that was which is not a small thing for a woman no that's the big hurdle the hurdle is like can you be seen as somebody that they're like no I think she can stand up to world leaders I think she can uh you know be the one who pushes back against big bullies in the world uh and Donald Trump was I said this on your show and I I and I stole it from a guy who said it in the focus groups that people want to see how she handled Donald Trump because they see it as a standin for how she'll handle other autocrats uh across the world Sarah I was thinking about you telling me that the entire time I was watching that debate because I thought that was so wise and she did it she clearly did it yeah she clearly did it credit to the Great American voter who who said that uh and I stole it from um okay and it's actually I'll actually just note there was one guy uh who felt like he didn't get enough answers he was like the most down on her in the whole group but even he said Harris gave them more specifics uh and Trump's ramblings about immigrants and eating cats and saying that he had the concepts of a plan really turned him off um and ultimately it was a queen Clean Sweep uh with these voters for K which actually I'll just throw out is um was very notable because these were a lot we had a lot of repeats in this group like I said a lot of people who'd been there from uh the debate in June and so we wanted to compare them three of them had really been leaning RFK over kamla uh in this group and we knew that from the screens and from the conversations we were having with them so it's interesting to hear that one of the things she did was move them from yeah I think I'm going to ditch out to third party now RFK is gone uh but she Ed Trump but he's endorsed Trump and so she brought them back um okay uh I want to we're like you and I are just we're talking so much that now we're I can't keep you here forever so I've got to keep keep rolling the sound keep rolling the sound okay so uh this guy who was the biggest uh skeptic in the Trump to Biden group was a former California resident and he said one of the things that was really holding him back was her uh her record as attorney general there in California uh so I want to listen to what he said about that and then what the reservations the rest of the group sort of still voiced about KLA Harris so when she was attorney general her Department her rest the back page until he committed suicide her Department argued against letting people out because otherwise they couldn't find cheap labor she put people in jail for drug offenses and then admitted that she did it herself she withheld evidence until she was forced by a court to do it to get a guy off death row she's a bully in a completely different way than Trump but yes it may have been her department but she still was over it so she's done a lot of really horrible things that nobody's asked her about yet and I was in California I lived there when she was the Attorney General it's not like this is secondhand this is in the papers that's the kind of thing that I need answered it's like how do you really feel now why did you mess up you know do you feel bad that you know this guy committed suicide and nobody's asked her about that in the way that Trump has been asked about his stuff that's like the one thing that I need answered is explain yourself on this pretty much after the debate last night kind of decided that it was going to be a Harris vote and um just brought me back a little bit I'm have to do some research now I feel like you should be hesitant toward any politician they're all doing something I mean I would argue that Joe Biden was not always great in the past too and I'm not even that educated on it but yeah they're all kind of bad so when it was announced that she was going to be assuming this Ro I was disappointed again and wasn't sure which is why it was very important to learn more about her and what she was going to stand for and hearing some of the things said about her I'd heard some things but there's a lot that every politician has in their closet that we're not always familiar with so um knowing I do not want Trump back in office and I have two choices right now that are really in the Forefront I have to at least be educated enough and I do have to fact check some stuff but I still leaning towards Harris I never really kind of heard what she was really doing so I have to admit I never thought about her being president if you would have asked me a couple months ago that well Biden drops out and they do Harris how would you feel I would have said negative cuz that was my viewpoint of her the whole time if someone else was in the picture against her I might feel differently but um I can't see myself ever voting for Trump so I guess I'm trying to push myself to her is she perfect I would have to say probably not I didn't know a lot of these things like was saying I'm not educated on that really to be honest with you so I have to say my view has been a little more positive than it was a couple months ago but probably not you know not 100 per. uh so interesting it is interesting and it's interesting how and this is where new information can matter to voters right this this one guy uh he was he was pretty D like he was not happy she was the the candidate but even he like I said when we did vote Choice he was going to vote for her and so was everybody else in the group and I think that this is where I guess I want to make observation um about these undecideds and kind of how it works uh which is I feel like an election is often decided by which way kind of the late Independence and undecideds break at the end uh and I think that there is a it is interesting to me to hear from people because I remember in 2020 one of the people are always like how do you know cuz I obviously I do the Republican voters against Trump stuff and they're like well how do you know that Republicans were moved on this and I was like well because down ballot in these swing States Republicans overperformed Donald Trump and so at the top of the ticket those republ people who voted Republican down ballot either voted for Joe Biden or they left it blank and so there's sort of three ways these voters can go they can leave it Blake blank or ditch out to third party they can as a center voter vote for the Democrat or they can like and this is one of the things I always say about undecided voters is sometimes it's also like the decision to get out and vote like it is undecided between the couch staying home and voting and so people say it's all that turnout but to me that's part of an IND those are that's an affirmative decision you have to make and so what she's doing is she's chipping away with these voters they know that you hear them say they know they don't like Trump they already voted for Joe Biden despite not being Democrats in 2020 because they hated him so much but there's been a lot of backsliding in these groups I've watched it you know for a long time where people are mad about the economy they're frustrated about just a whole bunch of things with Joe Biden thought he was too old and so she is trying to chip away at these people to get them to believe they can affirmatively vote for her and I do think that what you're hearing from them is when push comes to shove and they've got a vote they'll break her way and affirmatively so not just leave it blank which to me is is her doing the job with these voters so interesting so fascinating can I ask you though so uh you know I'm always interested in then the post debate narrative and everything what how do you think what what is journalist's role now in kind of the post after a debate and how they think about shaping The Narrative such a good question because it matters yeah it matters because people have just had like 90 minutes of stuff um thrown at them and to distill it you you know it helps to hear from people who who cover this like like me and my colleagues it's something I think about I take it really seriously I approach it as a reporter and not a um you know an analyst but also I I I don't go she won she crushed him none of that that's not in my lexicon I it's not my job it's fine I say that I say those yeah they're partisans they're people who are who are have a have a point of view um and that is their job and that is your your job on a panel or in your podcast so um I try to do it like just an informed observation uh for example the I think the thing that I said right out of the gate was that the statement that she made I am not Donald Trump and I am not Joe Biden to me was just kind of summed up her whole approach I called it kind of modern triangulation but it's also her trying to really differentiate herself from everybody and and then I kind of took it from there so I think it matters a lot I really do yeah I mean look I I gotta I got to say I've gone like the debate it does come at you so fast like that 90 minutes and Donald Trump uh is also like indecipherable sometimes so I was like what did like going back and listening to the answers I'll be like oh he did say that or uh I didn't catch that the first time and I think that for journalists what they choose to highlight from those things because it it gets reduced to sound bites and and I actually the one versus loss like I was in the moment being like she is dominating him but I will say I also view my job as to be honest with people as somebody who is doing analysis and so after the Joe Biden debate I told everybody I you know I watched your debate at the Aspen ideas Festival in front of a live audience and so uh Jonathan capart was moderating the panel and I had to so we did 30 minutes up front of like what does Joe Biden need to do in this debate then we watch the debate and then we had to go back get back up on stage and I and there was I was on with some damn kind of operative types who were like debates don't matter this is this is fine and I was like I was like guys this is a nightmare like this is what are you talking about this is that's campaign ending and then I did spend the next much to many people's annoyance being like Joe Biden cannot continue this campaign and part of it was because I was listening to voters incessantly say I don't think he'll live through his next term and I don't feel like it's responsible to vote for these were like soft Dems saying I don't think I can vote for him and then he listen to like hard Dems be like well I'd vote for his brain in a jar and you're like all right well it'd be better if you didn't have to do that I think we could all just admit that up front uh and so I think just from listening to voters so often I can see them warming up to her uh with this and I think that the I want to hear more about the policies is like just part of the warming process uh and one thing I also know is that the more voters see of Donald Trump the less they like him that has always been true the more he's in their faces and the Amnesia that Democrats have been beating their heads against the wall about uh with him um about what it was really like when he was president yeah and and just kind of the yes I mean is their argument yes maybe you had more money in your pocket because the economy is cyclical which nobody will say and there were reasons for that but um pre pandemic obviously but what about all the rest I feel like that fog is is lifting a little bit Yeah I think that's right um all right uh I want to turn to how a group of 2020 Trump voters who are down on Trump so we screen for this type of group a lot people who voted for Trump but they're like uh I really don't want to vote for this guy again partly because we view them as in our persuadable universe uh of people we're trying to Target um now this group isn't going to be uh as much fun a for for for people who are uh hopeful of of persuading these people uh to vote for KLA Harris as the swing voters were um but it is clear that they this debate did nothing to make them less down on Trump uh from their assessment of his performance let's listen I voted for him in the last election and the junk that happened at the Insurrection and you know him trying to get through to Mike Pence I just sat there and I was like just accept it with Grace they were asking him direct questions and I'm just sitting there and I'm just saying just answer the damn question the debate last night was like a tough watch you know he kind of bered coma for like well you only have four sentences in your plan it's like okay what's yours do you have a single sentence he said he has a concept of a plan that's just like not good enough for me it said with the abortion laws are you gonna veto that because I went out and voted so that my state would have that because that directly affects my young adult woman life like that's terrifying to know that you could just come in and say nope actually I know you voted on that but we're going to change it where Harris was like these are my plans and this is what I want to do it felt like all he did during closing remarks was like name call and be need to her I was like is this really like how you think you're going to like sway yes I was on board with Trump 2016 and 2020 I really like the slogan make America great again and especially like the stimulus checks that came about because during Co part of the time I was unemployed so that helped out quite a bit but now really worried about the comments last night about food goods and services you know the prices going Skyhigh through the roof and about the tariffs being impos the price hike occurring as a result of that and also I was thrown because he never did answer the damn question on uh if he would support Ukraine to win the war against Russia basically I'm appalled by both candidates and I'm very disappointed Trump because I thought initially that he was going to bring a breath of fresh air to Washington he was going to be able to come up with a better program than the nonprogram that his predecessor had and what's tragic actually is that he's not matured or changed at all as a result of having been president for four years he's not more flexible or open-minded or courteous or in any way uh a better human being and again I'm a I'm a Paul by the lack of quality of both major party candidates but Trump is is a tragic figure because he's incapable of coming up with any kind of meaningful program a big issue about healthc care which is so horribly expensive in this country you know he has no plan he says well I'll have a great plan and come up with it what's your great plan at least give us some idea of what the great plan is and another disturbing remark and regards to Trump is that immigrants are now eating your pets okay even if that's true I don't want to know about it thank you you know that was the weirdest remark of the whole debate I wanted to hear about this project 2025 thing that I kept on hearing about that's scary to me um I support Christians my son is in a Christian private school but um I don't like this radical Outlook of what they got going on in that plan so I want to hear more about Trump thankfully he did mention that you know he's not going to look at it but that's right now I I do have some concerns with that because I feel like with the right money because money talks and you know maybe a middleman for that establishment coming to him will he look at it eventually during his presen term so now let's listen to what the disaffected Trump voters had to say though about Harris I was hoping for some clarification on what their plans are and Trump was like oh we've got you know really great people we got a really great team we got really great people but didn't voice what those plans are and that was the most frustrating thing of the whole thing you know and Harris just wants to throw money at anybody I know that you know talking about the $50,000 for small business owners is that only for citizens is it for anybody who immigrated illegally or is it for people who are in a certain demographic as far as their income where's that money coming from We're GNA get further and further in depth did Harris win last night um no and the reason why is because she needed to show that she had U some programs or what Define herself and she didn't do that because she didn't answer any of the questions and I was uh disappointed about that honestly I'm I'm not voting for Harris I'm not voting for Trump but she did not do her job last night and Define her positions all I heard was I'm gonna give these people money I'm gonna give these people money I'm gonna give these people money hey don't give small businesses $50,000 or whatever you're going to give them go back and collect the billions from Co that nobody administered properly I don't want to rant and Ray but I am very disturbed with Trump but boy if you think Harris is the savior we are in some deep trouble here I just wanted to see now that Harris is part of the campaign and she's has the Democratic nomination that what will happen now with the new debate and my my key thing was that I was looking more so about how you going to help better this economy instead of insults and and dodging questions and the whole night I saw that certain questions that were asked by the the moderators they were more so on herris side than Trump's side anyway so Trump was getting the the fair end anyway and I think the best point for Trump was at the very end when he got to do his closing statement and he spoke more about the three and a half years that Harris been vice president what has she done for immigration what has done to help with the economy he said you haven't done nothing I was really hoping to have like like a clear winner of like wow that was amazing like you're really touching on all things I'm worried about oh I feel so much better like here's my plan and here's how I'm GNA make it happen not well here's my plan and you know well where does that money come from am I gonna be paying for your $50,000 small business startup money like I can't have my taxes right any higher and it's also really scary to hear that people who are going to move their Airbnb houses into you know residential homes is just going to jack up the price because they know hey you're going to get that six grand Harris uh she sidestep totally the question about immigration and you know she just really didn't say anything about that and and everything else and of course Trump when they asked him about the the January 6th Insurrection he said well what about all the prosecuting of all the people that burned down Minnesota you know he sidestepped that too so these are former Trump voters but they are now the double haters uh and in a way that I think the swing voters uh sort of the Trump to Biden voters that Coalition that that KLA Harris needs to keep together feels like she's moving them back to a place where they're getting comfortable with her but these Trump voters who are like sick of trump they're still kind of a pox on both their houses and uh ultimately there was one person in the group group who was going to vote for Harris there was one who was going to go uh back to Trump but the rest were going to sit it out or go third party a lot of them had actually been kind of interested in in RFK um but as I always say the most important thing is to build the biggest broadest anti-trump Coalition so I'm not going to be complaining that hard about Trump voters moving off of trump uh so Dan I'm going to close with this there's like a little bit of conventional wisdom here in a lot of this actually back in Aspen when uh you know when after Biden kind of cratered uh and we just watched you guys uh you know like I said that the Democrats on the panel were like debates don't matter and now I'm watching today Republicans and people like uh you know Ben Shapiro and others be like debates don't matter what do you think do you think debates matter of course I definitely think debates I mean well aside from the um the one that was uh outsized in its importance the one that Jake and I moderated because it ended the candidacy of Joe Biden yeah absolutely they matter because especially in today's day and age when people are just getting the bits and and bites on their phones and that's how they consume information to have a more fullsome live event where they can see them um in real life it almost matters even more in some ways uh because they're not just memes and Tik Tok um videos they're like actual people don't you think I totally agree I I think that and and look I think that saying right now that debates don't matter after one of the debates just literally took out the both the sitting president and nominee for the Democratic party like that's a nuclear hot take because I mean clearly they matter and they they make a big difference but your point about this is it's one of the only times you get to see them face off against each other they have to answer questions uh from I think moderators are working to be standin for the voters uh and they're deeply important and um uh yeah and I I I want to congratulate you uh and everybody else who does the moderation because I think it's a really hard thing to do um and I think it offers a lot to the voters uh who who do want they they want to see whether or not they want every specific on policy like they say they do they they certainly want to see how these guys comport themselves and drawing that out is a is an extremely important job so danab bash thank you so much for joining us thank you for having me oh my gosh this is like just my happy place talking about politics with s long well same this is the best and thanks to all of you for listening to another episode of the focus group podcast remember to rate and review us on Apple podcast subscribe to the bull workk on YouTube and become a bull workk plus member at thework.com we will see you next week