brexit has been the great unmentionable so far in the selection. but tonight keir starmer called for closer ties with the eu. louisville just that and what can the party s social media campaigns tell us about the state of the race. good evening. welcome to newsnight, home to analysis and interviews. who would have imagined at the last election that the towering presence of brexit would hardly register as an issue half way through the next election campaign? it has not gone away as an issue, itjust seems to have been parked by all the main parties. ..for now. but tonight the labour leader, sir keir starmer, whose ming vase strategy started by saying as little as possible about britain s exit from the european union, has under the bbc s questioning given the fullest account of how a possible labour government would approach this thorny issue. we will be exploring that with the head of labour s pro european bloc, and the conservatives new approach to the election leaning in to d
white campaign video before. almost white rishi campaign video before. almost while rishi sunak was still speaking in the while rishi sunak was still speaking in the rain while rishi sunak was still speaking in the rain on the steps of number ten. in the rain on the steps of number teh~ they in the rain on the steps of number ten. they were clearly ready for this ten. they were clearly ready for this that ten. they were clearly ready for this. that means that they have an advantage this. that means that they have an advantage when it comes to recognition. i was speaking to a labour recognition. i was speaking to a labour candidate earlier this week who said labour candidate earlier this week who said in labour candidate earlier this week who said in the constituency that she is who said in the constituency that she is canvassing, local people know her. she is canvassing, local people know her~ people she is canvassing, local people know her. people say
have no members which he said have hdreds of thousands of veterans. they ve lost their non-profit status. you were saying before we got so rudely cut off by gremlins that you ve never heard of this group. nobody s heard of these guys. they don t work in washington they don t have any programs that we can speak of. i ve never met any of their members. i ve never even seen a t-shirt. i mean, these folks don t seem to be legitimate. they re definitely not a member of the veterans coalition. those are the top 50 groups in d.c. that drive policy. most of them don t do endorsements and the ones that do it s a very hard earned endorsements and they take it very seriously don t just frivolously throw it out in the middle of the day on a uss iowa charade. it s a real insult to veterans. i hope there s accountability in the media but there hasn t been much. the debate the other night we had three hours and i like jake. jake knows our issues. but he blew it. and he said he blew it. but that d
$170 billion at the v.a. and you re a conservative. well, talk about how you re going to fix it. are you going to they do mention complaints about the v.a. they just don t what they do now is say i m going fix the v.a. which is like saying i m going to fix washington. it s the new throwaway line in politics. we need people to hold them accountable the media to hold them accountable. the candidates are responsible too. they blew an opportunity in two debates to talk about these issues which are populist issues. we re not talking about a small group of people. 22 million veterans in america and our members vote about 93%, 94%. they vote. they re involved. you go to iowa, new hampshire you re going through veterans halls, you re talking to veterans. you really need to bring some serious policies. also remember we ve got folks in iraq and afghanistan right now. they couldn t even talk about that. they want to be commander in chief. this is both parties. both parties are not addres
ticked off after not being mention mentioned. we ve got to zpip make our politicians and media address the urgent issues of our day. it s like the early days of the aids crisis when their friends were dying all around them and nobody seemed to care. that s where we are as veterans and we need our presidential candidates to respond we need the media to respond if they don t people watching take it to them in the town halls, take it thome in social media stand with us in the other groups and hold them accountable. thing about you guys which is unique is the perceived political capital around veterans issues and around military issues. so you get all the lip service in the world and that not only gives people a chance to say they re with you when they re not, try to get credit for things they don t deserve but it also does open opens the door basically for fraud, for people to come in and say oh, yeah, i ll give you a veterans endorsement, i ll give you a seal of approval on this is