Conversation with Radio Host Bill press. They took part at an event at the hill center in washington, d. C. Looking at key house and senate races in the upcoming elections. Good evening, good evening. Thank you, john. It is great to see you all and it is great to welcome our friends from cspan around the world tonight to the hill center. We know we have some stiff competition tonight because it is a playoff game for the nats. Yes, go, nats. Not start me does until 8 00 p. M. So we promise, at least for the locals, to have you out in time to get home and watch the game. Andens isi want you to know that charlie cook made the ultimate sacrifice tonight. He has tickets to the game. He gave them to his son so he could join us. [applause] small price to pay. [laughter] we thank you doubly for that. Also wantsed to mention that we have a couple of exciting programs coming up. Two more exciting programs coming up. Senator Sherrod Brown joins us november 19 and susan rice, former National Security adviser on january 14. As john mentioned, there is no better place for political junkies to go to know whats going on in american politics than the Cook Political Report. Charlie cook, the editor, the founder, publisher, and theyve been very good to the hill center, by the way. Charlie was here a few years ago. Jennifer duffy and david wasserman, who cover the senate and the house for charlie have been here with us. And coming into 2020, we are already in the middle of it, we thought it was a good time to have charlie took back and he generously agreed to come back with us again. So charlie, good to see you and thank you for coming back. My pleasure, bill. And i talked about this evening, it was as if some weeks ago. Something big has happened since then. Looming over the Political Landscape so i just want to ask you and get it out of the way, the impeachment inquiry, what impact do you think this will have on the 2020 campaign . Primary and general . Sure, first let me say 1980 was an interesting experience for me. I learned actually i did know something about politics and i should never be a manager. It was a real educational experience. It steered me the right way. Its a pleasure to be here. We talked earlier about lets not let this thing focus entirely on impeachment because there is an election out there. Im glad we are approaching it this way. Everybody has an opinion. I personally dont if i were a democrat, i would not do this. Ive lived through two of them. I was in college during the nixon impeachment and the clinton impeachment. Impiece. And to me, forget what the president is alleged to have said or done. Forget what hes said or done. Forget whether he deserves it or not. Throw all that aside, to me it sucks all the oxygen out of the room. Im an independent, a moderate but if i were a democrat, i would want every bit of energy to be focused on winning a november 3rd election and not on this, regardless of what the merits may be. Because i think having a focus on the election and impeachment are somewhat contradictory. And im not sure how great an idea if youre a democrat, for the president to have a victory, to be acquittaled by the senate. I was tried by the senate and i was acquitted. I was found innocent. The charges were found to be false. Anybody doubt thats what hed say . And the fact is the chances of there being 20 republican senators joining the 47 democrats, theyre nonexistent and whatever the evidence is, thats just not going to happen because theres no tolerance in the Republican Party for any issent of the president. Jeff ask bob corker, flake, mark sanford, there isnt any of it. If i were them, i would not do it. Whatever. In terms of what impact would this have on the president himself . Lit me jump if, in i can. Or should i do biden first . First of all, those of you who have been here, charlie and i have 30 minutes. We need more time than that but we will hold to it 30 minutes. So does that mean for democrats they ought to get this done fast , before the end of the year and then leave time for other issues, sh we say . The thing is, the speaker was correct the first time where she said this is not what democrats ought to be doing. And im not entirely convinced she has changed her mind, to be perfectly honest. But after all this ukraine stuff started, there was no point in digging in her heels. It was going to go to another level whether she was on board or not, but i do find it interesting somehow the judiciary committee, this has moved away from them, which suggests maybe it is not, it is more of an inquiry than impeachment and we already had that going on so im not sure whether things have changed that much. Or maybe theyre trusting adam schiff more than but now that theyve started down that road, would you agree, that a lot of people have suggested, the sooner they get to a vote, not to rush it, but the sooner the vote, the better. Well, the vote will be when Mitch Mcconnell decides it is. Well, in the house. Well, i wouldnt do it. Lets go to joe biden because hes the focus of this. Do you believe in the primary this helps joe biden or hurts him because of all these rumors, allegations . I dont think its helpful at all but i dont think we know whether its going to hurt him or not. We saw forget merits or justification or anything. We saw Hillary Clinton turned into crooked hillary and were now seeing an effort to turnvice President Biden into crooked joe. I know there are people here who have known joe biden for a billion years, as i have. If somebody wanted me to make a case against joe biden being the nominee or joe biden being president president , i could throw out a few reasons. But crooked joe i dont think theres a crooked bone in the guys body. Thats not who he is. And ive never heard any suggestion he did anything inappropriate. His son may have taken on a business deal or two that he shouldnt have. But the thing is, i think the Biden Campaign made a mistake when they allowed all of their ggs to be put in the electability basket. Because that works well as long as you are perceived to be the most electable. But if that basket develops a whole, you dont have left. Whole lot and if i were them, i would say this is about experience. I look around this field and i see some amazingly talented people and probably one or two that are going to be president of the United States some day. Really amazing people but right now with where the country is, you need experience to undo x, y, and z and ive got more than the rest of the field combined. And by the way, i am the most electable. With electable and electability being the cherry on top. The thing is electability is gets stripped t away. And if theres not a lot there in terms of your case, anything that makes you look like youre less equitable because its not just ideology. There are many aspects of it. So one of the many advantages to being a subscriber to be Cook Political Report, you get things like this that i got 10 minutes ago. Things we trust. Tuesday treats. I want to ask about some of the things you trust, right . Uhoh. And these are based, by the way, on polls for the most part. Why should we trust my poll today . Do you trust any poll today . First of all, i think theres an urban legend theres out there. Well, polls were all wrong in 2016 and the first question i ask first of all, which polls are you talking about . The National Polls that khalilly showed the rear politics average had Hillary Clinton ahead by three points . What do National Polls measure . The National Popular vote. What did she win that by . 2. 1 percentage points. Most polls were between two and four and this was two. The fact is, this is about as close as this gets. It is closer than it had been in 2012 when the National Polls were suggesting a closer race between obama and romney. Basically 40 states went the way we thought. And there were six or seven states we knew were going to be close and guess what, they were close. And there were three where everything was wrong. Michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania and we could spend a whole three hours talking about those three. Thats where, and it was statelevel polling. Unfortunately polls are commodities. That people think one poll is as good as another. Well, shoot. Thats like one car is as good as another and thats absolutely not true. You look at the network polls, you know the the you know, the telephone ones. I think online is a little more problematic. They could be done well or badly and most are done badly. Ut the tell polls that washington post, cnn. Fox news, nbc wall street journal. Is one of my favorites. These polls are very highquality. They are very expensive. I think they are trustworthy. Some of the universities do a nice job. Some dont. The thing is, there are some lousy polls out there that, you will never see me quote certain polls because i think they are flawed and i wont do it and sometimes i give a hard time to journalist friends of mine who cite polls they know good and well theyre lousy polls. Systems so the first thing you trust, is trumps Approval Rating, 44 disapprove. 53 . You trust it . What do you tell us . The 44 was approved. The thing about President Trumps Approval Rating, i hear people say either this time is different, theyre really going to drop now and this is the straw that broke the camels camels back. We have a whole barn full of straw of things that were supposed to be, you know, this time is different. Im from missouri, show me on that one. But the other thing people say is well, why dont the president s numbers fall. And the thing is, for something to fall, they have to rise figures. Youre looking at a president thats had the narrowest trading range of any president. We are at 354 major National Polls have tested his job approval eight and in all but one, his numbers have been upside down with higher disapproval numbers than approval. Thats never happened. The first fox news in february 2017, the president had 48 approve. 47 disapprove and every other one of foxes and every other one has been upside down but normally in the first three years, a president has a there may be a 20 to 25point gap between the peak, which is usually they honeymoon and their trough, where they have some bad stuff happened. There is variation that is there. For President Trump, that has not been the case in gallup, best job Approval Rating was 46 . The worst was 35 . Fox news is a 10point range. So when good things happen, his numbers hardly go up and bad things appen, they dont tend to go down. I think its a product of the hyperpartisanship and the tribalism we have now. Theres one group of people, there is nothing he could do that is wrong. And another group, there is nothing he could do that is right. That is three quarters of the electorate. Ull text show less text the so is a president whos never been above 50 from trouble for reelection . Yes, yes. If this election is just a referendum up or down on President Trump, thats it. Just. That its extremely hard to see how he wins the popular vote and frankly i think it would be hard for him to win the elek Troll College as well. Elect roll college as well. Its like the story about the woman who was asked, how is your husband and she says compared to what . [laughter] if you are a democrat, you want it to be a referendum. Choice s a choice, a between trump and white, or who. Is a democratic kict the social snitch sit the squad . What is it a choice between . The second thing, you go to the democratic primary quoting the latest poll, looking at standing, Elizabeth Warren, 27 . Oe biden 25 . Bernie sanders 6 , kamela harris, 3 and pete buttigieg, the momentum with Elizabeth Warren . Thats the figures poll thats number one. Its the only Major National poll thats shown warren in first place nationally. Almost all the others have it closing up a lot and it is closing and the thing is, she has momentum. I watched her several times in owa and once in new hampshire. And without saying anything about like, dislike, anything like that, i saw two of the best president ial stump speeches ive seen in my they were good. Whether nominating her is a good idea or bad idea for democrats is another question. It was like, as if somebody had had the best speaking coach on the planet working with her for years. It was smooth as silk. Shes operating as a candidate on a level higher than any other candidate. And her campaign is on a plane higher than any other democrat. Is she going to win the nomination . We dont know. Lots of polls show it closing. That is the only one that has it ahead. Bill were you equally blown away by joe bidens Campaign Speeches . Charlie i was talking to one of the networks, these young reporters that are following fulltime. Its funny, by the time these campaigns get going good, they know word for word the candidates stump speech. And if one word is different, one sentence is different, their ears perk up. There are two joe bidens. There is teleprompter joe and there is nonteleprompter joe. Teleprompter joe does fine. No problem. Nonteleprompter joe, you never know where that is going. [laughter] ive always thought it was like bird hunting. Theyve got the dogs and the collar and where the guide or hunter can give an electric jolt to the dog to get their attention. Bidens staff should put one around his ankle. [laughter] youre from california. Reagan, i was driving the Pacific Coast highway one time, you nudge him back over. A jolt. [laughter] no, but, the thing is, everybody has assets and liabilities. For biden, hes got more experience than the entire rest of the field put together. Is age a liability . Heck yeah. But all of these candidates have assets and liabilities. You just total them up at the end. Bill do you see the end game here . Has it boiled down to joe biden and Elizabeth Warren with bernie fading . Charlie i think bernie is fading. After a good fundraising quarter. I think so. You see Bernie Sanders now, and it is almost word for word for word the same speech as four years ago. This is version 1. 1. You take out the Hillary Clinton references, you throw in some trump references, but it is basically the same speech. But with both sanders and warren, what you have is, this is not Michael Dukakis liberalism. It is more he we long populism. Populism and liberalism and there are two different versions of populism but this is about the whole system is totally screwed up and weve got to blow the whole thing up. Its about big change. And to me the choice the democrats have is to go big or go home. Where big is big, bold, exciting, risky, like Elizabeth Warren. Or go home, go home to something that is familiar, something that is comfortable. Something that is fairly safe. That is joe biden. But for anybody else, they will have to elbow their way in. And im not seeing anybody who is able to do that. But just one other thing on biden, to me, there have been three trajectories for biden. Possible trajectory. Biden holds on and goes on to win the nomination. The second one, biden fades. The third one, biden collapses. ,e says, does something something happens, and he goes down. For numbers two and three, it matters when does that happen . Because if it happens early on while there are centerleft establishmentfiendly alternatives, or late in the process where it is just biden and warren, or biden, warren, sanders . If that does happen, when does it happen . But the centerleft establishment friendly alternatives, they are borderline life support right now. Watch this why carefully. Right now, technically it is a threeway race. We kind of know which direction bernie is going. It is a twoway unless kamala, or amy klobuchar, or buttigieg. Or something. But right now, there is no momentum for any of the other candidates. Bill when you look overall at the Political Landscape, has it changed since 2016 . Particularly in the heartland. You mentioned the key states. Michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania. Do you detect any change their . Ct any do you dete change there . Can we read a change . Charlie we have seen some change. We have to think about, what did happen in 2016 . Why did it happen . What were the proportions . How much of this was about donald trump . How much of this was about Hillary Clinton . And what was that about . And i think secretary clinton, she and her husband have always been polarizing. She had 25 years of accumulated baggage. Whether it was justified or not is for somebody else to decide. But it was interesting watching secretary clinton. Until the me too movement arrived, it was like he had a teflon coating. This stuff did not seem to stick to him that much. But if president clinton had teflon, secretary clinton had velcro. Stuff just stuck to her, whether it should have or not. It did. My theory, and i go with a lot of data, but this is my own instinct, i think there were a lot of voters that were never going to vote for donald trump. It just flat wasnt going to happen. But they were not terribly excited about voting for Hillary Clinton. But they were going to do it. Maybe they would hold their nose. Then one month out, the billy bush access Hollywood Tape comes out. And suddenly, the election is over. Theres no way trump can win. Theres no way clinton could lose. The republican speaker of the house comes out and suggests maybe the republican nominee should step aside. This thing is over. Suddenly there was intensity among the trump people where a lot of them did not think he was going to win. But they were going to vote for him no matter what. But there was so much ambivalence on this other side, that suddenly anybody that was not excited about voting for Hillary Clinton got a pass. They did not have to. They did not have to do anything they did not want to. She was going to win anyway. So i dont have to vote. In 2016, to remember the old gomer pyle show, surprise, surprise, surprise. We were all kind of surprised. I dont think it was about lying to pollsters that much. It was more there was so much ambivalence on one side and they did not think they needed to vote. And they flat didnt vote. Bill it particularly happened in michigan and wisconsin and pennsylvania. By not that many votes. Charlie we are talking about three states that are in the northeastern quadrant of the aretry, and they states that have had manufacturing. That has been a tough sector. There are lots of things going on. For example, if you are going to put together a list of all the states in the country let me put it differently. These are three of the states with the most restrictive early voting in the entire country, where virtually all the votes in those states were cast on election day. You look at these other states, most of these other states where people had been voting for weeks. Does that change . I dont know. But it suggests it is more than coincidental. I think there was a whole lot going there. In two of the three, the Clinton Campaign did not target them. They thought they were fine. The first democratic nominee since 1972 no, the first democratic or republican nominee since 1972 to not set foot in the state of wisconsin after labor day. I had two friends who are members of congress from michigan who warned me about michigan. Watch out. She may not have this in the bag. Debbie dingell and fred upton. Did charlie listen . No. [laughter] but the thing is, there were always warning signals. You dont know which ones to Pay Attention to and which ones you dont. Bill more and more people are also looking, is it realistic, at texas . Six republican members of haveess from texas announced their retirement. Which some people read that they know texas could be moving purple or maybe even light blue. Charlie it is no secret that texas is getting less republican than it used to. Texas is in the process of becoming a purple state. Now, several of these people, there is not a chance they could lose. They were safe. I think part of it was a reflection of an expectation that republicans are not going to get a majority back in the house anytime soon. Its like, being a minority in the house of representatives, that kind of sucks. Particularly, if you have been term limited out of being a committee or subcommittee chair or ranking member. But the thing is, it is changing and a lot of people, they recognize the growing minority population. But the big thing is the suburbs. You have lots and lots of people from other parts of the country moving into texas and they are not voting like texans. It is becoming a purple state. I think it is going to be 2024 before it gets, like, legitimately purple, purple. That is where the math changes for republicans. Its going to be close right now, this time. I dont think it switches. But back to your michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania, going into the 2018 election, republicans had governorship in two out of the three. And coming out of those three, zero out of three, where scott walker loses reelection in wisconsin. Republicans lost the open seat governorship race in their where they lost. Democrats go 30 in u. S. Senate races. You total up the votes for the u. S. Senate in those three states, and what was a grand total of 78,000 votes in those three states combined, it was like 1. 3 million in the governors races. 1. 2 million in the senate. I forget how many hundreds of thousands of votes in the congressional races. Where whatever was going on in those three states in 2016 did not appear to be happening in 2018. So, yeah. And the president s job Approval Rating in those three states, not good. Not good. Bill i think you already answered the question, but i dont want to just talk about the president ial. I do want to talk about every seat in the house is up and the senate leadership. Is there any chance Kevin Mccarthy is going to be the next speaker of the house . Charlie any chance. You know. Bill all right. Charlie i think the odds are it would take something cataclysmic for democrats to lose their majority in the house. It is not a huge majority, but right now we are looking at yeah. But the senate is bill lets talk about the senate. What are the chances and what are the key states that could swing it . Democrats need to pick up, what, four . Charlie technically speaking, it is three if they win the white house. Four if they dont. That it does is not seem that many to pick up, and yet, what are the options . Lets do chances first. If i had to make up a number right now, i would say 30 to 35 of the democrats get a majority in the senate. But the thing is these elections, if you told me, if god told me today President Trump is going to get reelected. Thats the only piece of information i know. At that point, democratic chances of winning the senate back would be somewhere between 0 and 5 . But if god told me he was going to absolutely lose reelection, i would say it is 5050. The reason is we are seeing these races nationalized. 2016, the first election since we began electing u. S. Senators that every single u. S. Senate race in 2016 went exactly the same way the state was going in the president ial. 100 . Never happened before. 2018, 79 of the u. S. Senate races went the same direction, as same party won the senate two years earlier in the president ial. Right now, 88 out of 100 senators are representing states that voted for their party in the 2016 election. So, these cases where the state tends to go this way but the senator goes that is not happening anymore. So, what happens . I think democrats could win, there are three seats that i think are republican well, let me back up. I think democrats need to knock off four republican seats. Because doug jones in alabama, awfully,wfully, awfully hard. In a president ial year, president ial turnout, im not sure he could beat roy moore. But i think democrats are going to have to gross four to net three. You can look at arizona with Martha Mcsally facing a very tough race. Colorado, cory gardner. Very, very, very tough race. The third one i would put Susan Collins in maine. I think shes going to have a race just about as tough as those two. And then the fourth would be north carolina. It is to list it is tillis or one of the two georgia seats. Democrats dont need a way to pick up two or three. But to get to four or five, they need a pretty goodsized wave. But what they need is a wave comparable to 2018. The thing is, what happened in 2018 is the suburbs were on fire. Collegeeducated suburban voters , collegeeducated suburban women, they were on fire in 2018. And if they are on fire next november like they were last november, then suddenly the suburbs around charlotte, the research triangle, around atlanta, suddenly those become very winnable races. They need a wave to get a majority, but they dont need a wave to pick up a couple of seats. Bill to the chagrin of a lot of people in this room, you did not mention kentucky. [laughter] charlie you know. Watching amy mcgraths race was a lot of fun. What was so fascinating about last year was it wasnt so much people that had worked their way up the political ladder that were doing well. It was people that were interesting, that had compelling personal narratives. It was oftentimes not career politicians. So, she beat the point spread. But the thing is, the state of kentucky is harder than the district that she lost, number one. And number two, the kinds of places where democrats are doing better are places with big suburban populations. And the places not so much are states where lower urban suburban populations like kentucky. Anything is possible. But i dont expect to see mcconnell lose. But it is important to realize what happened in that election, where democrats got their majority in the house was in the suburbs of atlanta, dallas, houston, kansas city, oklahoma city, richmond, winning 11 out of the 12 districts in new jersey, which is like one big suburb. [laughter] picking up four in orange county, california, where it was not the squad districts. It was suburban districts that went from red to blue. And to be honest, if there is a republican if there is a democrat majority in the senate, it will be because of what happened in the suburbs more than anything else. But also, does the africanamerican vote get more engaged than it was in 2016 . Because we knew that you know, it was obvious that Hillary Clinton was not going to get the same africanamerican vote the first africanamerican president got. Everybody knew that. But there was an assumption that with latinos and women, the first woman nominee, given some of the things donald trump had said, that would make it up. Offset it. Didnt happen. Bill i know we have exceeded our limit, but one more question and then we will open it up to you. Charlie, when did you start the Cook Political Report . Charlie 1984. Bill all right, 1984. A lot of people feel today that they are disgusted with politics. Politics is broken. It is too divisive. There is too much hate. There is too much ugliness. Are you still a believer . Have you given up on politics . And is it broken . And can we fix it . What is your overall feeling . Charlie oh geez, i wish we did not do this one. As someone who my entire adult i mean, ever since i was a freshman in college, ive worked on campaigns, on capitol hill when i was in college. Worked as a pollster. Did other things, then started the newsletter in 1984. My entire adult life has been watching and loving capitol hill and politics. But, wow, this thing really is broken. It is really, really broken. It is pretty disheartening to see what is happening in the process. And the toughest thing is when i go on college campuses, and tomorrow, im spending the day at the Naval Academy talking to classes, and one of the Cardinal Rules when talking to students is dont bum them out about politics. [laughter] well, i tell you what, it is kind of hard to put a happy face on what is happening in american politics. You think about during president clintons administration, we thought things were acrimonious, bitterly partisan then. Those are the good old days. You know . Things have just progressively gotten more acrimonious. And whether you are looking you can blame it on redistricting, and part of it is that. You can blame it on the different media structure. You can blame it on the sorting out, where suddenly you used to have conservative moderate democrats that were the ballast. The balance that kept them from going off to the ditch. You had liberal moderate republicans that kept Republican Party from going there was an overlapping. There is no overlapping now. None, zero. And so, the parties are more cohesive, what a political scientist would say. As a result, they are becoming more ideological and primaries are getting further out there. And the kinds of people that build consensus, that compromise, that the system is based on it working out, those kinds of people are generally not winning primaries. If they do win general elections, once their party has a bad year, they are the first people over the side. For the life of me, i dont know why members of the house lose why they ever want their party to win the presidency because the thing is when most members of the house lose reelection, it is when their party has the presidency. And its usually a Midterm Election, and they get blown away. Thats when the wave comes in and they are the washed out to ones sea. If the other side has the white house, some lose, but not that many. I am troubled by it. You say, what could fix this . And, you know, my optimistic side hopes at some point that we have the right kind of leader, of either party, comes up and unifies the country and leads us as weve had at other points in american history. That is my optimistic side. My pessimistic side thinks, for this system, for us to get better, we may have to have some truly horrific event occur that would be an electroshock therapy on the body politic. And to me, 9 11 may have been the event that could have brought the country together and could have healed some of these wounds. And i dont blame either side exclusively. But what happened . Well, the controversy. Should we invade iraq . Yes or no . Wider it all right apart, than it was before. So, i hope we get a really great leader that leads us out of this at some point. Whether they are republican or democrat, i dont care. But i fear that it may be some horrible event that jolts us into behaving the way we are supposed to behave. Bill well, we prefer the hopeful outcome. Charlie you and me both. Bill right. That is why i say nobody knows politics better than charlie cook. [applause] we have two microphones. It is very important tonight since cspan is here that you wait until you have the microphone in your hand and speak close to the mic so we can hear you, and please stand, if you well. Given there are doubts about joe biden, is Terry Mcauliffe on the radar as a good replacement . Bill Terry Mcauliffe, a previous guest of the town hall. Charlie Terry Mcauliffe, ive known terry since 1982. I have been wrong about Terry Mcauliffe a lot. I was skeptical he could win a governors race. He did. I was curious about whether he would turn out to be a good governor. He did. He took a look at this i dont think anybody new is getting in this thing. We will see people leaving, not people coming in. Youve got to really capable youve got two really capable people, Michael Bennet and steve bullock, and they both got in the race late. They had good reasons. Senator bennett had some Health Issues he had to get past. Bullock had a legislative session in montana he needed to get past. To be honest, you know what, i think the window closed before they ever got in. I think it is way too late for anybody. People think michelle obama. Its too late for anybody. It is. First of all, you wouldnt get into the debates. Certainly not until november. What we have is what we it is going to be one of these. I think you will see a halfdozen people drop out the next three weeks, four weeks. After maybe the next debate, october 15. The threshhold goes up. It gets harder. Once you are not in the debates, you are off the screen. Bill might as well drop out. Question over here. Yes, sir. Hi. Thank you so much for your cogent discussion. Ive learned a lot. You have answered my questions except this one. I want to take us away from president ial politics. Will you please tell us how you first learned of amy walter . [laughter] tracked her, and how she came to your organization and where she is going . Charlie wow. Bill she is so great. Charlie i am proud of our whole team. We have some enormously talented people. Amy was actually the political director of the womens campaign fund. And jennifer duffy, who is still with us, and Elizabeth Wilner was our house editor at the time. We went over to meet. We would meet with people and go through from alabama, wyoming, going through race by race and what we are seeing, that kind of thing. I had not met her before. But she was this incredibly impressive young woman. I just made a mental note, and once we had an opening, she was the only one we interviewed. And she was with us for six, eight years, and then left us for a little while. And then came back to us and has been with us since 2013. But she is just amazingly talented. Really bright. Really fair. Wonderful person. Jennifer duffy does senate governors. Shes been doing you know, first got into senate races in 1986. And she has forgotten more than anybody else knows about u. S. Senate races. And then david wasserman, who is 30 years younger than i am, he wasnt born when i started the newsletter. [laughter] bill wow. Charlie he is so damn smart. He is our house editor. Ive got five incredibly talented people working for me. Im very lucky. Ah, it was my idea and i built it, but you know what . Im basking in the glory of people that are smarter than i am that are doing a great job. Bill and the website is . Charlie cookpolitical. Com. Bill cookpolitical. Com. And dont forget the bill press podcast, my new podcast. If you have an iphone or smart phone. Search the bill press pod and you are in. Be sure to subscribe. If you like what you hear, you can give us a five star review. That always helps. [laughter] charlie give the review and then listen to it afterward. [laughter] bill that is even better. Yes . There are so many ways we communicate with each other now. We have social media and so many different factors of our media. My question is, how do you see us in five years in terms of, just using the media we have . Charlie you are asking somebody that is 65 years old to speculate about technology. [laughter] you know, im trailing. Im the wrong person to ask. I think social media has been very, very good, and it has been very, very bad. We learn a lot. But its been incredibly destructive. As has the internet overall. A lot of people news is not curated anymore. If somebody wants to believe that there is a pizza parlor on connecticut avenue that is a child sex ring, they can read it and they can believe it. Its like, wow. It is good and it is bad. But im the wrong person. Ask somebody on the other side of 40 that question. Bill but it certainly is true that more and more people get their political news today online rather than the morning paper or the evening news. Charlie first of all, like nutrition, eat a balanced diet. [laughter] dont go to one place or one direction or one food group. Try to stay with things that are more likely to be right. If you read the wall street journal, read the new york times, the washington post, watch newshour. The three network broadcasting, you know what, in a Perfect World everybody would be watching the pbs newshour every night. That is not the world we live in. It is a little highbrow for a lot of folks. But i would settle for just watching one of the three broadcast networks for 30 minutes each night. That would be better than going in and getting into these ideological silos where we are building up this ideological intensity, and people are getting just one side. It does not matter which side. That is not healthy. Diversify your media diet. Bill just a little footnote, in this weeks new yorker, toward the back in the book reviews, theres an excellent article about social media and making the point that initially people thought the printing press, it was so great. It printed nothing but really good, uplifting stuff. That is not true. And they thought social media will be like that. You will be able to put it out there and there will be nothing but good stuff on there. There is a lot of good stuff, a lot of bad stuff. Now they are realizing, uh oh, what are we going to do about this . Charlie the troubling thing is, there are some really bright people that are in congress, in politics today, some really, really good people. But we are not getting the caliber of people running for Elective Office we got when i started the newsletter in 1984. Theres some good people. But we are not getting the thing is bill do you want to name names . [laughter] charlie if some young person came to me and said im thinking about running for office someday. I hope you do, but before you do that, ask yourself, go into a room by yourself with a legal pad and a pen, and write down year by year every year you have been alive and everything you did that year you would not want on the front page of a newspaper or in a tv ad said about you. Then take a really good look at it before you burn it or shred it. Because it is going to come what we are getting, people have either this is an exaggeration, have either lived their lives or had no shame. Thats an exaggeration, but we are missing out on a lot of really, really talented people. And that troubles me a lot. Even when really good people do get elected, sometimes the system doesnt let them do what they know is the right thing. I mean, this is breaking the Cardinal Rule of bumming people out about politics. But there are some unfortunate trends in american politics. And i do hope that somebody does something, something happens that can jolt us out of this. But this is its a really dangerous spiral american politics is in. And all of the fault is not just on one side. There is plenty of blame to go around. Bill yes, maam . For the 2020 election, could you comment on aspects of Voter Suppression and gerrymandering . Charlie well, let me do the second one first. If i could wave a magic wand and do one thing for our political process, it would be redistricting reform. I think it is actually even more corrosive than what is happening in campaign finance. And both sides are guilty. One decade, one side does it more than the other. It depends on who had the opportunity to do that. But the joke is, we have gone from voters picking their elected officials to elected officials picking their voters. And it is creating these districts that are not going to produce anybody that would be open to consensus or compromise, that sort of thing, so that is the one thing that if i could do one thing, that would be it. But, you know, the Supreme Court seems to have other views. And so, i dont think that i guess some states are doing it that have valid initiatives, but legislatures do not voluntarily give up power. That is just sort of a general rule. Iowa did once in redistricting. But a long story. So, that is the one thing i would do. What was the other thing, the first part you said . Voter suppression. To me, you get a drivers license if you were born here, you turn 18, you should be a voter, period. Ok . All right, if you commit a horrible felony and you are out probation until you are out and off probation, ok. But we are seeing fights to keep people off the voter rolls who there is no reason why they shouldnt be on them. I think it is very, very unfortunate. And it is just again, we have both do the ends justify the means . If you are a College Student and you live in a state eight or nine months of the year, you ought to be able to vote there,. But, you know, it is all kinds of things. For a long time, i poopooed Voter Suppression. It is not the only problem in this country, but it is a bigger problem than i thought it was. And you do wonder how some people sleep at night. Bill we have time for one final question before the nats take over. Yes, maam . Could you comment on whether you think that young people in this country appreciate how dangerous our political dysfunction is at this point . They clearly understand Climate Change, but do they understand change like we have been discussing . Well, you know, the Voter Participation rate for young people ok, yes, did more young people vote in the 2018 Midterm Election than in any Midterm Election in history . Yes, but that was a really low bar. [laughter] i used to joke that if we are going to see the highs turn up for young people in the Midterm Election, and if 10 of them vote, it would be the highest i am being facetious. But the thing is, we are not blaming that generation. 1972, guys are getting shipped off to vietnam, drafted and sent off, and young people didnt vote then. That was the first year that 18yearolds had the right to vote, and the Participation Rate for people 18, 19, 20 was low. It has always been, and sadly, i think it is until people until maybe you buy a home, have kids and a stake in the community, worried about property values. You know where you would likely be living for the next few years. It is when people have a stake in the community, that is when they start voting in bigger numbers. And so, it is not blaming this generation. They are behaving just the same way their parents and their grandparents did when they were 18, 19, 20, and it is unfortunate. Now, could Something Like Climate Change galvanize them and get them back out and get them to vote in big numbers . You know, i hope so, i hope so, but the same thing is you could say that at some latinos will point start voting in big numbers. Hasnt happened yet, you know . And gosh, we are discouraging people. [laughter] this is horrible. Bill but charlie, it is going to get better. First of all, thank you all for charlie coming out charlie first of all, thank you for coming out and having me here. What an amazing place this is, and cspan is awesome. Bill it has opened up a window for everyone else to see, for good and for bad what is going on out there. We thank you all for coming to the hill center. Charlie, thank you so much. [applause] and to all of our friends at cspan, thank you for joining us, and now, go nats [applause] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2019] [indistinct chatter] [indistinct chatter] announcer the white house did not release a weekly address from the president. U. S. Representative lisa blunt rochester from delaware gave the democratic address, highlighting House Democrats new legislation, the lower drug costs now act. The bill was introduced in response to the rising cost of prescription drugs. Rep. Blunt rochester hello, im congresswoman lisa blunt rochester from delaware. When i ran to represent the first state in congress, my constituents and people across the nation demanded action to Lower Health Care cost and improve access to Quality Health care. And congress promised to follow through. Since january, members of the house have worked to deliver on that problem
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