Transcripts For CSPAN Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan Discusses Federalism The Coronavirus 20240712

Rigorous but also recognized the need to balance these important considerations that we have to go through as we try to deal with this pandemic. He is the author of a book called still standing. Welcome. Thank you, it is wonderful to be with you. Great to be with you. I want to start with your book. One of the things that struck me early on, you talk about your dads influence in your life. There are so many poignant vignettes in the book where your dad plays an influence in your life. You talk about the joy you shared. Your dad was a courageous figure in american history. He was the only republican to ofe for all of the articles impeachment against president nixon. He spoke up vocally about the misdeeds that were going on in that administration. About howlittle bit your dad influenced your thinking now is a governor. How did the things you do every day, how are they affected by him and the important figure in american politics . Thank you for the question. I am very proud of my dad. I talk a lot about him in the book because he had more influence on me than any other person and i learned so much about integrity and Public Service from my dad who served in congress act in the 70s. He served on the House Judiciary Committee during the impeachment of richard nixon. He was a republican who supported nixon and campaigned for nixon and thought he had done a good job as president. He was also a former fbi agent and georgetown lawyer. He fought to make sure that the impeachment proceedings were fair. He pushed back when he thought the democrats were being too partisan and he wanted to make sure they can provide for a defense and call witnesses. But after seeing all the evidence , he really made the very difficult decision to say that the president was guilty of impeachable offenses and he said no man was above the law, not even the president of the United States and ve became the first republican on the committee to come out for nixons impeachment and know at the time it was not a very popular position. He was at the white house and his colleagues in congress and many constituents were angry about it but its a moment in history that people have known for and the thing im most proud of him for and i think it just taught me about doing the right thing and putting aside his own personal career which he gave up by making that decision , whatever personal affection and Party Loyalty to do what is right for the country. And i have a great example of that in my dad. One of the things you talk about in the book as well is what it was like to win an election that nobody thought you can win. And not to get into the politics of it too much but im kind of curious , the themes that you emphasize in the campaign. The need to change the government to be more effective , to be smarter and better stewards of taxpayer money. The need to have a better education for every child in maryland. How much has those scenes during the campaign translated into what youve as governor. Its really what i focused on the past six years on accomplishing and weve made Real Progress in those regards but in 2014 , maryland at the highest democratic registration of any state in america and we had only elected one republican in 50 years. We really were given no chance whatsoever to win, nobody thought we had any chance. Our race didnt get much attention and shocked the world. It was the Biggest Surprise upset in america but we had to win by winning all of the republican and nearly all the independence and a big chunk of the democrats and we did that by putting together a Grassroots Organization that really focused on economic issues. Our state had raised taxes 43 times in a row and we lost businesses, jobs and taxpayers were fleeing our state. A gallup poll came out that said 47 percent of people in our state wanted to move out of the state and that broke my heart and made me frustrated as i tried to run for governor and do something about it and i promised to do something about it. Our Economic Performance was 49 out of 50 states. He had raised taxes eight years in a row and crushed our economy and i promise to turn that around. We cut back six years in a row and eliminated a 5. 1 billion deficit and turn our economy around where we added more businesses and more jobs than ever before. Moved on the end, the bottom of the pack to the top 10 as the biggest economic turnaround in america enable us enabling us to pay for more Services Like record investments in education, record investment in the environment, cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay which is the biggest Natural Resource and a natural treasure and a dramatic improvement in transportation and other things. By cutting back we actually increase revenues and we had a huge economic turnaround. Thats been impacted dramatically over the past few months with the economic fallout from covid but were in better shape than we would have been had we not taken those actions for the past 5 and a half years. I want to return to that covid conversation but i want to hear more about as a governor , one of the things that i think this pandemic and the crisis has shown us is this value and importance of strong leadership at the state level. So much of the Public Health response for example, the educational response is all driven by what happened in state capitals and happened in local counties and theres a lot of attention paid to washington, a lot of attention paid to whats happening there but talk a little bit about the role that you see for governors in times of crisis like the one that where in in particular and maybe talk about your work in maryland generally but also you have the opportunity until recently to share the National Governance governors association. And like trying to work with governors that have different political point of view . I think the role of governors as always been important. I think were closer to peoples problems and i think others across america have really been, weve been the laboratory for democracy and i think weve also been doing a more effective job. If you look at every poll or years, people, voters trust their governors more than any of their representatives in washington. Either in the executive branch or legislative branch because they feel that the governors are competently solving problems and getting things done maybe they didnt pay as much attention to those governors out in the states , they were getting as much of the media attention. But in this pandemic i think people really did see governors stepping up. And weeding on the lines of this crisis. And i happened to be in the position of leadership of the governors at the time. I was honored to have been elected by my colleagues to serve as chairman of the National Governors association. I just finished my term last wednesday. So im now relieved of my duty and i passed the torch to Governor Cuomo of new york but i spent the past year leading the nations governors and in the biggest crisis i think any of us have ever had to deal with. And ill tell you, im really proud of the great work by the governors across america on both sides of the eye. The way they come together. And work to try to tackle these regrettable problems and of course we havent always agreed on all the solutions but i think we really did step up at a time when america needed us to and i think unlike maybe some of our partners in washington that dont ever seem to find a way to get along or reach compromise, we seem to be a lot of dysfunction, the governors did Work Together in a bipartisan way throughout the crisis. And i think in a certain way we set an example for the rest of the nation about the way politics and work and it should work. So i think the governors have been leaving and i think people recognize that we have them. The conversation i had recently with another governor, he said we dont have a choice to make it work. Its not like we can pass the buck to someone else. Its not like we can pass, not my problem because are there problems you have to react to that are really your problems. Youve got to do with. Are you confident Going Forward. Given how dysfunctional our politics are in america that these working relationships between governors can continue , what allows that to happen. Is it a sense of where in the same boat here or is this something more than that . Im hopeful and i do think were in a better position as governors and ive been on the executive committee of the nga the whole time ive been governor and i was impressed even as a freshman after i was elected i went to this seminar for new governors and i met all these governors for the first time both democrat and republican and i noticed right away that there seems to be a pretty good bipartisan cooperation. There were ceos are our respective states. We dont really put on the red jerseys and blue jerseys suit up every day to go after one another and its more like sharing best practices. A lot of open discussion about how are you dealing with this situation in your state or how have you handled this problem or are you seeing these kinds of things. Different than if youre in a legislative body and youre up against the other team every day on a particular issue. We dont always agree on everything but we do share and cooperate quite a bit and i think we really came together at a need during this crisis. But im hopeful that the governors will continue to Work Together in the future and i think the role of the state may have changed. There are role for the federal government and a role for the state and i think the state have certainly up in their kinds of things that theyve taken on that i never had to do before and people have seen them as handling those responsibilities well and hopefully the governor will continue to Work Together in a more bipartisan way and hopefully maybe will even be able to convince some of our colleagues and partners in washington on both sides of the aisle to try to do a little bit more of that as well. With respect to covid19 and what youve done for response to the pandemic i want to go through a series of different issues that you had to deal with so the first one i think is a tremendous one which is balancing the needs of the economy in maryland against the needs to have a robust Public Health response to the pandemic. How much do you think your own background as a businessman, someone who is successful in building and growing businesses, how has that affected your you of what the right balance is in terms of getting the economy reopened and restarted west and. I think it definitely had an influence on me. I mentioned early on i Small Business owner who never Held Elected Office and i ran for governor because i was frustrated with the direction our state was heading economically. Thats massive tax hikes were crushing our Small Businesses and killing jobs and making people leave the faith. So that was my whole mission in life try to fix that. So the last thing i want to do was hurt Small Businesses and cost a job. But at the same time we were dealing with an unprecedented Global Pandemic where we knew that thousands of lives were at stake. So you have to balance those needs and what we did early on and all the governors were placed in a position where we had to make hundreds of decisions we never imagined having to face. We never thought we would have to deal with a situation like this. What i put together at the beginning of this crisis this smartest Business Leaders and smartest Public Health the doctors and epidemiologists from places like Johns Hopkins and we met on an ongoing basis with Business Ceos and leaders and with Health Experts and i tried to get the best advice from both of them about finding that balance and knock on wood i think weve done pretty well in that right now marilyns numbers are terrific. Declining positivity rates , consistently down and in much better shape than all the other states across america and economically were doing better than most of the rest of the country. Our unemployment is 30 percent better than the rest of the country, than 35 other states. Not to say we havent been impacted. Weve lost businesses and people are unemployed but weve managed to keep a huge portion of our economy open throughout this in a safe way and weve reopened most of our economy with some restrictions and masking and some capacity limitations and doing it in a safe manner to keep the virus under control but also not having any problems of spiking and opening and reshutting the economy which is the worst possible thing you can do. Are you thinking about the situation as we move toward the fall and potentially people going additionally back to work and potentially back to school. How are you thinking about how youre going to flex your strategy based on what might happen Going Forward . Is it the same approach youve taken all along and do you anticipate having to make significant changes, lets say you get into the heart of cold and flu season, what your approach to whats coming up. Based on all the expert advice from a team that we meet on an ongoing basis and our health team and every single day, we watched a whole series of metrics. We meet every morning , and we take action based on exactly whats happening but we remain very concerned. Whats happening in other states. We are trying to remain vigilant and we are able to move on a moments notice to either take action to be more aggressive or to open up more things as were able to. We want to get people safely back to work and we want to get our economy healthy again but we want to make sure we do it in a way that is a so its a delicate balance. We are concerned about the fall season on a potential site and we want to avoid the problems were seen in other states so were watching it very carefully but so far weve been able to get in all our numbers are hospitalizations are down deaths are down, icu beds are down. An hour in every single county in the state we have record lows in positivity. Those are all great pieces of news and certainly not the case in other states. We have a question from chantel about education and covid19 and wanted to know how your view of what has to happen in this fall with the Education System has informed you are thinking about this really critical question around slowly opening and in particular there was some backandforth with some action with that Montgomery County took in your state and maybe talk about how you are approaching the question of school reopening. I talked about those decisions we had to be involved in this has been the most difficult. So many parents would love to see their kids get back into schools. But we want to make sure that we do that in a safe way so weve been taking all the inputs from the cdc , from our state Health Department and in our state , our state board of education is on the body and the superintendent of state schools put together a very detailed plan almost 2 months ago. Which allowed to set some guidelines following tdc and our Health Department guidelines and the detailed plan to put forward for our coronavirus recovery. But they also gave the flexibility to the local newly elected School Boards to make independent decisions on their own counties on the reopening so were there now actually tomorrow where those final plans are due from the county. The state board of education will then review all of those and without a final report the following week. Of our larger schools to sims are going with almost complete Virtual Learning at the beginning of the semester. Some others are smaller ones in rural areas where they have low infection problems and dont have the same crowding issues. Are working towards more getting some kid back in the classroom with a little bit of a hybrid situation and theyre working towards getting more kids back in the classroom as they can in a matter of weeks down the road. But we gave the possibility to the local School Boards who had already read a situation in Montgomery County was the , the Montgomery County board of education which is elected by the voters made the decision to close their rules which they have the right to do , theyve not opened them yet but a bureaucrat that works for the county Health Department ordered all the archdiocese and all i want to be closed as well. So that person did not have the authority to do that. We thought that the private schools should have the same , estate plan gave them the same ability at the school board did to make they had plans that met all the state guidelines, the cdc and state Health Department guidelines this person was wrong in taking action, didnt have the authority to take action so that is what was different. We wanted all the schools to be treated the same way under the plan and the person realized they made a mistake and back down and rescinded the order was in error. Do you have a view on what should be happening with sports in the state of maryland in terms of whether its youth athletics, there are a couple of professional teams. Do you have a view on whats happening with sports, College Sports as well as we move towards the fall . Other people are trying to make these decisions and were, theyre all getting the best advice and input from the medical professionals as well , but its a difficult choice. I know that the professional Football Team in washington a report today that theyre going to try to open without fans. That was just, they Just Announced this afternoon. I think the Baltimore Ravens maybe try to put together a plan sometime this week. I know theyre all working in conjunction with the nfl and the players union. Many of the colleges were working towards in the university of maryland and some of our other university were working on getting games played but the big ten made a decision to cancel all fall sports just a few days ago we want the having or any other sports at the state and with this opening, not some of the schools not opening, also impacting nearly all of High School Athletics because even the schools that are opening are able to play the ones that are. Its kind of a mess. Again, some of the youth athletics programs are opening in a safeway and taking all kinds of precautions, but its really individuals trying to make those decisions in a way that keeps all of the students and athletes and all staff and everybody is safe as possible. But id love to see some sports. If we can do it in a safe way. One of the things i think helped enable safe reopening is access to adequate testing. Testing for covid19, this is something you made a lot of news on earlier in the pandemic and you write about in your book. Your decision to go out there and be proactive and procure testing from korea. Maybe talk a little bit about what influenced your decision to do that and how was it trying to explain to other governors and folks in washington what youve done . First of all, just this last week we had another major announcement on testing and together with the Rockefeller Foundation i put together 10 other governors and states to put together a deal with a couple of Different Companies in the United States to do 5 million rapid tests, the newest latest version of antigen rapid testing, which is the 15 minute to 20 minute test that are going to make a huge difference as we try to get things reopened so thats the latest iteration of states taking action, us taking the lead on testing and getting some of our colleagues, half of them are democratic and half of them republican governors so it goes back to our discussion about working together in a bipartisan way. But early in the pandemic, you go back to the early part of this. In march, when the president said states were on their own for testing, and we had only done in march about 2000 tests in the entire country. There werent any real tests available in the United States. We were getting desperate so we knew this was a need so we were searching everywhere and my wife is from south korea. We have a Good Relationship with president moon and the ambassador from south korea, so we started a negotiation with a company in south korea, and it and ended up acquiring half a million test kits from south korea and a company that we flew in at the time that was more than four out of the top five dates in america combine and it was quite an accomplishment. It became the key to our longterm testing strategy, about 1. 5 onene million tests in our state, and its really helped us to get this virus under control. Those tests are kind of the workforce that weve built a lab at the university of maryland ourselves. We brought in eight of the art robotics machine tests that we imported from korea. We are running them at two separate labs. Get incame everything we Nursing Homes and all about outbreak clusters, so its part of our testing strategy but we also have 220 other Testing Facilities around the state using multiple labs across the country. It is the key to getting open again and this is a situation where, while weve gotten some assistance from the federal government, it was mostly the states stepping up on their own to try to tackle this problem. It at the beginning of this, was 50 states competing with one another and the federal government and other countries in a very constrained market with desperately needed supplies there was very little of. So it was difficult, so we were happy we were able to get that accomplished. Interstateioned this compact that you lead to bring on line access to antigen testing. Its always struck me that this is an important part of the response to covid19, which is states giving neighboring states working together to try to manage common concerns. Are there other areas where you see this approach potentially being effective in the context of the pandemic . Are there other ways you think that governors can or should Work Together to help manage this crisis . I think we can, and obviously testing was the most important issue, and i argued while im basics right guy and were talking about federalism today, i argued early on i thought there should have been, this is one thing that the federal government with all of its power could have really done a better job early on about putting together a National Testing strategy. Out of necessity, we had put on our own. Having 50 state competing with one another and not make a lot of sense, so in this most recent iteration, we after our experience of doing the half one million tests from korea, this time we talked with a couple of american companies. One of which developed these tests in maryland. And we worked with the Rockefeller Foundation helping to organize distant planet opportunities for the state. There was competitive pricing by doing a larger order. Not out competing with everybody and i was able to convince colleagues to go in together on this 5 million tests. Its a pretty big deal because the federal government had done it. Im not sure its the best way to do it but it was a lot better than each person going out there scrounging around trying to find their own supplies and its probably other things that we could do with respect to ppe, protective equipment and other types of things. Out of necessity, we kind of had to form these coalitions, and maybe is a framework and a future about how states can form either regional and or just partnerships with a larger group of states. To sinkingu be open up reopening processes with lets say with virginia and other states in your region, is that something you contemplated doing . With all the governors, i think i lead the some calls on videoconferences like the one were doing today with all of the nations governors. Thirtysomething with the president or Vice President , the other with governors, so there was a lot of talk and cooperation with among the governors, but also we did regional meetings. So i talked on a regular basis in our area with the governor of virginia and washington dc and i talked with our other neighbors in delaware and pennsylvania and so there certainly are, the virus does not recognize borders or political parties. So working in a particular area, i know in the new england area, in new york, some of those governors band together and there was western states. They kind of got together. It certainly makes sense. Each state is different and the decisionmaking in those states varies, but for example in the washington region, were very connected by the metro system. Our transit system, people are going to work from maryland into d. C. , from virginia, there is a lot of transportation back and forth, working in one place and living in the other. For us to not be talking about shared issues of hospitals and transportation and whats going on with the virus and be taking completely independent action did not make a lot of sense. So while we are not 100 in sync, we have certainly cooperated and coordinated and communicated on a regular basis about actions we were taking and we tried to stay at least somewhat in step with what our neighbors were doing. One of the things ive observed with other states, and this is maybe just a challenge that we have because of the politicized environment where in environment we are in, but you oftentimes see representatives of the Business Community longer heads with Public Health professionals. It seems like their arguing different things, when in fact maybe they are not. Maybe theyre staying a lot more in common that we think so george has got a question about the process in maryland and how you is how most interactions between the Business Community you mentioned community you put together area you got public professionals, how they Work Together, do you feel that they tried to accommodate the interests of the other side and what role have you played in trying to broker these conversations . George has an excellent question. So you would be surprised how much agreement that there was between these two groups. Certainly sometimes the Public Health officials were not so much concerned about the economy. So they might take a more aggressive stance and say, we should vote for all these things or take aggressive action because it will stop the virus. And the business folks might say yes, but youre going to kill off the businesses and jobs. And they might be a little more aggressively to say dont go for these restrictions. But amazingly, there was an awful lot of agreement where we put together i think 13 different Industry Sectors who met on an ongoing basis. Plan forosed a effective reopening and came up with their own ideas that we could do this more safely. And our overall business came to me and said we want our economy open, so if you could place capacity with sections on restaurants, the Restaurant Industry could stay open. If you would put a masking directive on, we wouldnt have to close all our businesses so businesses because we would stamp out the virus. So we had a unanimous agreement on the panel. They wanted that to actually take steps that the doctors were even recommending because it would help them keep their businesses open. You would think they would say, we dont want all these restrictions, but in fact they saw what was happening in other states where things were shutting. 21 states were closing things down. And they said we do not want that to happen to us. There was a lot of, we see the other side and talk to each other and there was a lot of really good collaboration and discussion back and forth and sometimes it was surprising that the business folks gave the doctors good ideas about how to stop the virus. You mention a lot of the economic decisions fall to the governors. But there are certain areas where the federal government and state governments have to Work Together. So one of those areas for example now is the debate over how we can get Economic Relief to people who need it been affected by coronavirus by the shutdown for directly because they cant work because of coronavirus and we had a series of packages already. One of the proposals that has been raised potentially is to put more onus on the states to cover unemployment insurance. Insurance for people who may need it Going Forward. And its very fluid, and obviously theres no particular solution, but what are your guiding principles. What do you think about what the proper role is for washington versus what the proper role is for states in providing this kind of Economic Relief as we move forward in this crisis . Is one of the tougher questions, but obviously there are a lot of things the state can do better than the federal government. And we are closer to peoples problems. Weve been able to get these benefits out to people and administer all the programs. We are able to help Small Businesses, get this money out to people who desperately need the help. But the stimulus money from the is the oneernment thing the federal government really should be doing and states are really impacted. So we had a commitment from the Administration Early on back in april for a 5 billion stimulus package to state and local governments, which was not in this latest proposal, so the state are taking quite already. Now the most recent iteration is they also have to pick up the tab for a orson of the unemployment benefit. Were taking a close look at but our early estimations are this will cost our small state somewhere between 120 million and 180 million a month. And were already in a situation where we are having a multibillion dollar shortfall. State and local governments across the country have already people. 6. 1 million and states are in the same situation many businesses are. Revenues are down 20 to 30 revenues are down somewhere in the 20 to 30 range depending on the state because of tax revenue decreases. So were all making very difficult choices. Less assistance wont help us grow out of the economic recovery. People we are trying to provide benefits to, the people providing the benefits are not dont have the money to pay them. So were going to try to figure it out. We appreciate some of the assistance and help from the cares act in washington, but there was a lot of discussion. No discussion about this before it was announced and so far i havent talked to many of my colleagues have it figured out, i dont know if one governor has said that they were able to implement this program and the other ones are kind of scratching their heads at this point. One of the areas that the pandemic has certainly affected is the Healthcare System. Maryland is obviously blessed to have a number of really highend, highperforming health care institutions, academic and otherwise. Has this affected or changed the way you think about the Health Care System in maryland but also the u. S. . Do you have thoughts on what may be some changes are that need to happen in the Healthcare System to address not just things like the pandemic, but also some of the underlying issues in the Healthcare System the pandemic exposed . We are very proud to be home to the fea and nih and some of the institutions that i mentioned earlier like Johns Hopkins university of maryland. Medstar health. We have some great hospitals and great academic institutions with lots of helprelated industries, it is a big part of our economy. But theres no question that the Healthcare Industry has been impacted, just like so many other businesses, in a couple of different ways. Those hospitals were doing less of the kind of profitable things that they normally do. Their revenues are down, they were providing much more, many of these other services on covid19, their expenses were way up. They had difficult problems with their Frontline Health care workers becoming sick. Theyre in the most dangerous profession. I have been on the front lines. They are the heroes of this thing. We had to build 6000 additional hospital beds, we worked with our Hospital System for surge capacity. They are looking at how they continue to provide services, how they continue to be profitable. Theres not a huge margin in these hospitals and some of them are hurting, just like the state governments and other businesses. But i have to take a look at how do we become more prepared for the next pandemic. At the federal, state, and local level, and in the Hospital Systems and the hospitals themselves, how do we not get caught flatfooted without ventilators and swabs and all of these ppe that nobody has. Masks and all those kinds of things. We couldnt find anywhere in the world. Everybody is scratching their head trying to figure out how we prepare for this. Weve got five minutes left in our conversation and i want to ask you a couple more questions. Looking ahead with this pandemic, and i know theres a lot of things that one could be worried about or one could be anxious about, but what keeps you up at night as you think this in the course will run. What are some issues that you are already thinking ahead on when it comes to reacting to what happens as we go forward . A lot can from the beginning of this thing for months and its still the same two things. I guess on the health side, while im very happy with where we are, i still remain concerned about the potential spike again in the confluence with the flu season and as were getting more people into the workforce and trying to get people back to school that we dont have a resurgence of the virus. Keeping people safe and not having another spike. Thats the one, and the other one is just how do we get our economy back on track. Can we get people back to work, help those struggling businesses and those companies that are in trouble . Had we get our economy back to where it was, because we had a booming economy we spent 5 and a half years turning around and almost all those gains disappeared in five months and i want to make sure that we can get things back on track and thats going to continue to keep me awake. I want to close with a question that reflects on your time as governor. You mentioned that states are laboratories of innovation and laboratories of democracy. Can you tell us about one really innovative change in what you that you as governor are proud of, and maybe one thing that got away. Doug was curious, one thing that youre really, happy about one thing you think back you say i wish we gotten it done but didnt. Im really happy that even though im a republican and in an overwhelmingly Democratic State in and the legislature thats democrat we found Bipartisan Solutions to a bunch of problems. It is hard to pick one that we had success on, but i would say the justice reinvestment we passed was one of the most innovative in america, where we lowered our prison population more than 49 other states. We saved a heck of a lot of money that we reinvested in things like addiction programs, drug treatment, mental health, diversion programs. We made a real difference on that issue. And as far as the one that got away, i think we havent been able to get everything done, the big frustration for me, im a big believer in nonpartisan redistricting, because i think gerrymandering is one of the biggest problems we have facing the country, and its one of the reasons for all the divisiveness and dysfunction, and i put a nonpartisan redistricting bill in the past five years. It doesnt get past are 75 percent legislator and i dont have the ability to put that on the ballot but i think its a critically important thing going to keep fighting for because i think its important to our democracy. Governor hogan, this has been a great conversation, thank you for your time. I encourage all of you who want to read more about governor hogans accomplishments in life, pick up his book, still standing, its a great read. A great opportunity for you to learn about all the things youve done in maryland. I appreciate your time and sh on capitol hill where House Speaker nancy pelosi will hold a Weekly Briefing with reporters. She is likely to talk about negotiations for a second coronavirus aid package as well as the 2020 election and joe biden selecting sender Kamala Harris as his pick. We will show you some of todays washington journal while we wait. [no audio] [no audio] a senior Political Columnist at the National Journal where he writes his again to the grain column. What did you think of the pick of Kamala Harris . Was a very conventional pit and a very conventional one. Senator harris is someone who has appealed to both centerleft democrats and progressive democrats. One of the more notable things is if you have any criticism from progressive groups that was a concern for democrats. In her speech yesterday she put out a prosecutorial record against president trump. While she certainly stumbled during her own president ial campaign, her biggest asset is her record and skills as a prosecutor and she showed that in her speech yesterday where she laid out a case and arguments she will be making against the trump administration. Host we were talking about whether vp picks matter. Do we tend to overstate the importance of vp picks . Guest usually we do. This pic is more significant than most because joe biden is 77 years old and is unlikely if he wins to run for a second term. Senator harris interestingly alluded to that point. She called abide in something of a bridge between herself and former president obama which i thought was an interesting turn of raising her remarks yesterday. She is the future of the party and by picking someone who has a bright political future, joe biden is anointing Kamala Harris as a star and someone to watch Going Forward. This pick is more significant than most previous Vice President ial running mate picks because she could be a future president , she could be someone that biden is passing the baton to to another future political leader in the Democratic Party. Host if this was the obvious or conventional pick what did you make of the trump team response, was it wellprepared . Over the map. Ll the Trump Campaign cant seem to get its message against senator harris and the biden ticket straight. There are a lot of vulnerabilities senator harris has. She is one of the more liberal members of the senate and has a more liberal voting record. Some folks in the Trump Campaign seem to want to criticize her for being too tough on crime or so divisions within the ranks because of her prosecutorial record. Ultimately in the general election, if the Trump Campaign wants to score points against has famouslys, she hemmed and hawed on medicare for all during the president ial campaign. There is a lot the Trump Campaign can use against senator harris. They did not seem to use any of it. They seem to be clear on what their message was and is going to be against the running mate. Junkieou are a political and enjoy taking a deep dive into campaign 2020 now would be a good time to call in. Journal, the National Senior Political Columnist there. Epublicans, 202 7488000 democrats, republicans, 202 7488001. Democrats, 202 7488000. Independents 202 7488002. Harris have impacts on house or senate races . Are there obvious places where democrats want her to come to their district and republicans will use her in their races . Senate and House Democratic Campaign Committees very much are supportive of the ticket. They believe senator harris is at best an asset and that is even for more some of the red state democrats running for office. Harris is someone that will play well in the suburbs. She will play well in the areas democrats need to make gains in. Its an open question of whether she will play well in the red states that make up a lot of the battlegrounds like iowa and thatna, some of the races are very close that lean towards the republican party. Harris is going to do well what democrats have done well for the last few years. I am not sure she has a broad enough appeal among slightly more conservative voters, certainly soft Republican Voters. There could be a limitation because of her voting record and the positions she has taken during the president ial primary. Against fracking, supported the Green New Deal deal, health care, immigration, she is liberal in her voting record. Toimately that is not going matter as much as how the Biden Campaign utilizes her and she certainly provides a good partner for the former Vice President in a lot of these traditional battleground states. Column, against the grain at the National Journal. A recent piece why iowa is the most important state on the political map. Why . Josh its important because of the senate and house races. If trump does not win iowa he is in big trouble, he needs to win iowa. There is a senate race that could end up determining which party holds the majority, joni ernst is running for reelection. Theresa greenfield, her democratic opponent has put on an extremely close race. Three of the four house seats held by democrats are very competitive across the state of iowa. This will be a big bellwether and i think there is a real sense about whether democrats can make inroads beyond the bluest parts of the country in the suburbs. Iowa voted for trump by nine points, a pretty republican state. Democrats if they can continue to hold their gains or make inroads in a state like iowa its not a good sign for republicans across the board. Iowa or to talk about any other state on the map. The topic is campaign 2020. Our first caller from lancaster, South Carolina, independent. Good morning. Caller emotions, emotions, emotions. The only reason joe biden picked Kamala Harris is because she is a person of color. I knew he wasnt going to pick a 100 black woman the daughter of immigrants and she is married to a white man. They just use the black people year after year for votes and nothing ever changes. Host who would you have liked to see him pick . I would love him to pick a qualified person and not be bullied into picking a black woman or a woman of color. She did identify herself as a black woman. She identified herself as an Asian American a few years ago. An Indian American a few years ago. To galvanize the black people to vote for somebody . I used to be a democrat, they have gone to the left. Its all about the new immigrant. They are not going to do anything about illegal immigration. Is theamala harris daughter of jamaican and indian immigrants, 55 years old. Your thoughts on the call . Josh biden in his speech yesterday certainly framed the selection of senator harris as a historic pick, one that black and brown girls will look up to for years to come. They are hoping to get a benefit not just because she has the requisite experience that can energize africanamerican and asianamerican voters as well. I think there is an interesting point that harris did not get a whole lot of traction with africanamerican voters in the democratic i marry. In South Carolina she was pulling well behind joe biden when she dropped out of the race. I think there is an open question of the degree of which she will energize the democratic base. Did not havee who a record of doing so this reaction among organizations going to benefit from the historic nature of host you mentioned how joe biden framed that. Here is that moment. Her story is americas story, different from mine in many particulars, but also not so different in the essentials. She hasworked hard, never backed down from a challenge, and she has earned each and every of the accolades and achievements that she has gained, many of them in the face of obstacles that others put in her way. Nationrning across the little girls woke up, especially little black and brown girls, who so often feel overlooked and undervalued in their communities, but today just maybe they are seeing themselves for the first time in a new way as the stuff of president s and Vice President s. Host joe biden in wilmington, delaware. What is the state of the race as we head into the convention weeks for the two parties . Josh joe biden holds a comfortable lead, but the campaign, what exists of the campaign in this election season , is only beginning. Andou look at the National Battleground state polls there are some signs that the race is tightening a little bit. There was a democratic poll that showed trumps job approval going up from 38 in july to 43 in august. 43 is not good but there is a bit of an uptick. There are a lot of softer Republican Voters disillusioned with how the president was handling the pandemic and there is some sign that they may be coming home to the republican ticket. As we getys tighten closer to the election, but trump is down by a fairly significant margin and he is struggling in a lot of the big important battleground states from florida, north carolina, even arizona. There are signs she is getting the base back. Host line for democrats. Caller good morning to both of you. I want to say that Kamala Harris was not my first choice and vp pick. However, this woman is very bright. She is articulate, she is well educated, and i happen to like her. I happen to like her. She was in first choice from what i happen to like her. I would never, ever choose a man whocalled women ditzy, called women all kinds of names, and im talking about trump. I enjoy the fact that biden said i am going to listen to this moment, im going to have her be the last person in the room that gets me an opinion. His Vice President , who is a yes person, who sits gives the table and accolades of he is the Supreme Leader kind of thing. I dont like this kind of person. I know in my own experience that people who give me their own opinion, and then i think about things and maybe i change my mind based on that opinion. Had histhing, trump plane over wilkesbarre, pennsylvania and the saying vote for me. I will never ever vote for trump. Roachcouldve picked a and i wouldve voted for biden. Host crystal and pennsylvania. Judah in kentucky with his thoughts, independent. Caller thanks, john, and mr. Kraushaar. Im still kind of the setting for this november, and i like Kamala Harris, but im still learning a lot. Im wondering what these claims about what she did as a prosecutor in california, keeping people in jail, death row, things about marijuana. Is just the much other Party Planning up on these things to tear her down. Can you comment on that any . Guest sure. There is a lot of substance evend her tough on crime, small crimes like marijuana da ofsion, when she was San Francisco and her time as attorney general of california. About a decade ago the mood with the Democratic Party was for lawenforcement. Prolaw enforcement. If you wanted to succeed international politics, you cannot be seen as soft on crime, especially from california, the bay area. For someone with broad political ambitions, she was kind of of that and that was the record. She was someone who did prosecute aggressively, including crimes like marijuana possession, and detractors, progressives mostly, find it as aggressive. Live to nancy pelosi for her we