July 30th, 2019 – Second Reading Podcast

[0:00:00 Speaker 0] welcome to the second reading podcast from the University of Texas at Austin. The Republicans were in the Democratic Party because there was only one party chart. Tell people

[0:00:12 Speaker 1] on a regular basis there is still a land of opportunity in America. It’s called Texas.

[0:00:17 Speaker 0] The problem is these departures from the Constitution. They have become the norm.

[0:00:24 Speaker 1] At what point must a female senator raise her hand or her voice to be recognized over the male colleagues in the room?

[0:00:35 Speaker 0] And welcome back to the second reading podcast for the week of July 29th? This summer is just winding on. I’m Jim Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas, joined again by Josh Blank, research director at Said, Texas Politics Project. Keeping Kulish Josh

[0:00:55 Speaker 1] trying my best.

[0:00:57 Speaker 0] It’s very hot out there not to talk about the weather. Um, but you can’t really help it at this point. It’s just

[0:01:04 Speaker 1] it’s July and Austin,

[0:01:05 Speaker 0] right? So you know, the thing is, it’s not almost over. It’s great. Only 2 to 3 more months of this. Um, okay, we want to talk about a few things today. Besides the weather, um, Topic one is something I suspect many of you have not seen much about. If you’re in the course but is really, ah, getting people to prick up their ears and turn on their, you know, check into all their gossip channels in Austin this week And that is, Ah, something that happened. Would Speaker of the House Dennis Bonnin? Um, some of you remember Dennis Bonding is in his first term, just finished his first term as speaker of the House. He’s from Angleton, a longtime veteran in the Texas House of Representatives elected speaker in You know, what was a fairly shrewd political move and maneuver back in the fall of 2018. Had a fairly successful 2019 session, Um, elected very much on, ah, platform of serving all the members of the House and bringing some sense of normalcy back to the internal operations of the House into the party. And then some of that took a little bit of a hit last week. So last Thursday, it was reported in the Tribune after a release by one of the principals in this meeting that that Speaker Bond and had a meeting in his office with the director of one of what we would call a dissident conservative interest group that has been very active in promoting the most conservative candidates for the most part in the Republican Party in this state

[0:02:47 Speaker 1] and in Republican primary and

[0:02:49 Speaker 0] particularly have have been active in supporting conservative Republicans against concert against sometimes incumbents, but certainly other candidates that they think are not conservative enough but are still Republicans in the primary elections. And in this meeting, which was reported initially by Michael, the director of that organization, a guy named Michael Quinn Sullivan Ah who said that he had been invited to this meeting and that during this meeting ah, the speaker offered them a deal in which, if they would stand down in challenging Republican incumbents writ large but limit their challenges, toe only 10 members, which allegedly the speaker gate well gave to them through the ah, head of the House Republican Caucus that then they would allow them to have access to press credentials in the House of Representatives. And this gets into the weeds and we’ll go too far into it. But basically, empower Texans claims to be a journalistic organization that is separate from a connected interest group that that takes place that conducts all these efforts in campaigns. They’ve had a court challenge to not, you know, because they were prohibited from getting court credentials and they’re getting press credentials. And the reason they were prohibited from getting press credentials was basically because they were seen as a hostile force to the establishment forces in the house. So

[0:04:23 Speaker 1] why they’re clearly engaged in Election Arian attacks? I mean, they’re not, I mean, regardless of which part of the coalition they belong. Teoh They’re very actively involved

[0:04:31 Speaker 0] in active interest group and then their argument as well. We have two separate organizations. It’s legally not the same, etcetera. And this is our First Amendment rioting. You’re curtailing this. They have actually not been overly successful of that in the court. Pretty much unsuccessful. So but But this is what was on the table. Now, you know, this becomes a political problem for the speaker, and it’s really the first big political problem the speakers had. Right?

[0:04:57 Speaker 1] Right, I think I think that’s right, mean, one of the things that you know you were mentioning here is the fact that you know Bonnin, we say, is a creature of the house. He was elected at a very young age. He served for a very long time in the house. And part of, you know, the the argument, you know, for his election was the fact that he was there is he said, to serve the body, and he really would, you know, stand up for the body, you know, especially when attacked by outside forces, whether that be the Senate, on the one hand. But also groups like Michael Quinn, Sullivan’s and Power Texans on the other. And so the notion that he had had a closed door meeting with the head of the group that he has been, you know, at odds with, and also to work out a deal in which you know they would train their fire on a select list of incumbent Republicans was, you know, pretty scandalous. And I mean further context for this. Is that the end of the session bond and made clear to all of the incumbent House members, Democrats and Republicans that if they campaigned in ah, in the elections of other incumbents, or whether that’s a Democrat supporting a Democratic challenger to a Republican incumbent or a Republican incumbent supporting a Republican challenger to a Democratic coming, they would be punished. So the idea that the speaker had then gone behind members backs to enlist 1/3 party to actually do this attacking was, you know, I mean, it’s fodder for it. Certainly. Look, it’s hot and awesome. This is fun, right? Nestle Fund Summer Surprise If you’re interested in politics, it was fodder for a lot of chatter and excitement on people who follow these things and saying, You know, how true is this is this right is really what happens,

[0:06:34 Speaker 0] right? So and so we should mention that Michael Quinn Sullivan’s group published the A long piece by Michael Quinn Sullivan claiming that this had happened that this meeting that happened and the, you know, the Post was a very kind of blow by blow. You know, I walked in and this is who was there and we talked about this for a while, and then this came up and then the speaker left the room and the list was giving, you know was named to me on. He named all the names on the list, and, you know, we were talking about this before It’s a list that, by and large, can be made to make sense. If you’re looking at this story, there were people on that list who had also been candidates for speaker and not really gone along with Bond and right away. People that have been you have seen is either contenders or to some degree, you know, not not is down with the bond speakership as everyone else seemed to be. For the most part,

[0:07:30 Speaker 1] yeah, it’s difficult. I mean, looking at that list to try to figure out the plausibility of this account. You could look at that list and think, you know, both. That is a plausible list. If this is true that this is what happened in the, you know, the speaker conveyed through Intermediary that this was the list of people at the same time, you could look at that list and say, Well, you know, and this is sort of the question. We haven’t gone to the competing narrative here, which is to say, you know, just to be cleared of murder mystery here bonding is categorically denied this version of that that first

[0:08:00 Speaker 0] the way that this you know, that this plays out over the weekend is Ah, the speaker sends a letter to Michael Quinn Sullivan that reads in a lot of way, almost like a letter that you’d send to.

[0:08:14 Speaker 1] Why did he send it? Thought he sent it to the house

[0:08:16 Speaker 0] to a little well that I think that came later, wrote Michael Quinn Sullivan back and said, You know, enjoyed visiting with you and you know, thank you for your service to conservative causes the paraphrase. But I want to correct your impression that I asked you to intervene in any way in any House races against any candidates, including especially Republicans, and so implicitly contest the account of the meeting right, but confirms that the meeting did did take place right and that this was a meeting that seems to be and also points the endpoints. Quinn Sullivan, to the proper procedure for credentials, says that I don’t have any. The speaker’s office doesn’t have anything to do with this. There are two other bodies elements, you know, entities you need to talk to, you know, So I wouldn’t be talking to you about that, and you should talk to them.

[0:09:09 Speaker 1] One of what you’re currently suing,

[0:09:10 Speaker 0] right So you know. So he basically confirms the fact that there was a meeting, which is which is eyebrow raising and of itself for the reasons you’re talked about, Which is Michael Quince alone is often seen as a hostile outside forces by many members. Um, but denies the account. Um, you know Michael Quinn Sullivan is sticking with his story, and there are a lot of people have some of the people, at least one of the people on that list, you know, wants more information about this. The speaker later wrote the members of the house also denying it. So the speaker is saying that the meeting is confirmed that the meeting happened, but is contesting Michael Quinn Sullivan’s account of the meeting. So, you know, before we get too too much further in the weeds. So what do we What do you want to take out of this? Implicate as implications in terms of, you know, the political system more large in Texas first and because, you know well, we talk a lot in the class about how the house operates and the nature of the speakership. This is the first big challenge for a speaker who just finished his first term with largely positive reviews, notably some of the people that were not giving him largely positive reviews were the outside Mawr far right? Conservative groups like or even especially, empower Texans. So in terms of the position of the speaker, you know, up to this point, Monitored looked very secure. All of a sudden, he’s got This is kind of the first big problem to solve second and kind of along these lines that it underlines two degree to which the speaker is elected by the body to represent them. He is not elected statewide. His position in the house is driven by his election in a district. In this case is we’ve said of Angleton area for Dennis Bonnin, but it becomes speaker by being elected by the 149 other members of the House of Representatives. And at this moment, you know, as you were saying, Ah, big part of his argument was, I’m here to represent the body, which is what they say when they’re trying to be all of chummy and inside a um and and right now there are some that are not feeling represented, and it undermined and it undermines his trustworthiness. To have spoken loudly and often about not challenging it about not supporting challenges to incumbents is, as you were saying, but then being accused of trying to get someone else to do it on the down low and via somebody that is widely disliked in the body. You know, people have worked with Michael Quinn Sullivan and empower Texans,

[0:11:47 Speaker 1] and nothing today are

[0:11:48 Speaker 0] they have Ally there, some people, their allies. But it’s been, frankly, a shrinking group of allies and their Sina’s people that participate in Democratic primaries. Republican primaries. Yeah, I’m sorry. In Republican primaries, Um, and then, you know, I think I think the kind of highest level it really underlines how political parties in the American system, including with state level, are always coalitions of interests, of ideological commitments and priorities. And even as we’re seeing in this case at this level within the chambers, personal factions, I mean, if you were to take, you know, all 10 of those guys and Bonnin and really the people in the Republican coalition with just a few outliers, there’s not a lot of difference between what they’re after. By and large, they have different priorities, you know, But they have different priorities, and they line up differently in terms of personal factions and cliques, you know, and you know that it was a big factor. I think in looking and parsing that list of 10 people that helps you make sense or not make sense of it. So, you know, many of those targeted worry their competitors for the speaker seat or not enthusiastic supporters, Um, with a dollop of the left right piece of that.

[0:13:03 Speaker 1] Yeah. I mean, two things I’ll add to that. I mean, I think in the way of your saving another piece to this is that you know, you’re right. I mean, I don’t think that many of the 10 Republicans that were named there or the speaker or even if you were then pick out some random set of other Republican of the house are gonna look that different. You highlight some of the reasons that they’re the same. And I mean, I think one of the major difference us too often comes down to not necessarily their policy preferences, but their calculations about the feasibility of enacting that policy and the likely, you know, reaction once policies enacted. And this comes down to some of them. Or this is really, I think, where you get to have some of the issue in the Republican coalition between sort of far right groups and farther right members or members to the further to the right of the ideological spectrum versus more center right or establishment Republicans or what you might call them is this notion of, you know, like, for example, what would happen if we outlawed abortion entirely in the state. I mean, it might be a goal overall for the group as a whole, but how you do it and then the consequences, or where you start to get to see a lot of a lot of differences there and the other thing. You know, I think that sort of important as you mentioned this with coalitional politics here, you know, right now I mean one of the sort. I think the parlor game question is, you know, OK, So who’s account do we believe? Or is it somewhere in the middle and again Bonds account is that this basically didn’t happen? Is he can is Michael Quinn Sullivan conveyed it, and obviously I wouldn’t say we should target these people. That doesn’t make sense. But there were. You know, there are some ways about which that account has been released that makes people a little bit suspicious and particular the fact that you know Chairman Burrows, who is the other? Ah, you know, Republican member of the meeting basically has not made any comment about what happens. Ah, and to some degree at Bonhams request through bond. That’s what he said. And that sort of seems on, I think, for a lot of Republicans would say, Well, wait, why can’t the other person of the meeting like, confirm or verify one account of the other that creates ah problem And the problem just becomes, You know, at this point it gets the coalitional politics. We’re talking about this this morning before here. You know what makes coalitions workers often, you know, temporary, transactional and can change depending on the nature of a changing situation. The reality is that whether this is true or not, for members who maybe aren’t as supportive of Bonnin but decided that they should get on board at the outset for members who are outright, not supportive of his of his speakership. Now you’ve got some ammunition, something to question.

[0:15:26 Speaker 0] And there is a Yeah, and, you know, I probably overdid it a little bit insane that they’re not that far apart. But there are. You know, there are differences in any. I guess the question in the sense of this is that the question becomes priorities. If you think about looking at the last session as we’ve talked about this, what’s really become kind of the distinguishing point between the far right and the centre right kind of governing coalition in the Republican Party in Texas of which and Bonnet is now part of that governing coalition is less. You know what we all think about all these issues is what issues should we emphasize?

[0:16:02 Speaker 1] Right. And this is what

[0:16:02 Speaker 0] you mentioned abortion, and that’s what maniac of that. So the far right has been, for the most part, wanting to emphasize more social issues to some degree, and on some of the and some of the issues that then the other people the other faction wants to emphasize, like taxes. They have somewhat more extreme positions, though not fundamentally Deborah. And so there is this tension between those two factions.

[0:16:28 Speaker 1] Yeah, and this is not like a little issue. It is. You guys have all learned, you know, in 140 day legislative session that takes place every two years. There’s only so much room in so much time to address issues. And even an issue that, you know, maybe it’s not a huge policy debate but could create a lot of friction in the body because of its ideological components can actually derail a significant number of days of the legislative session of which there are only so many. And that’s why this agenda control thing actually becomes important. It’s not like the U. S. Congress, which is meeting more or less perpetually besides their recesses, or in other states where the Legislature is basically again, more or less meeting, you know, at least every year. If not, you know, really, almost continuously in Texas. Because of this limited amount of time on Lee, so much can get address in each legislative session. So this agenda control issue among the majority party becomes, you know, I mean, it’s extremely important if you’re looking to achieve certain

[0:17:19 Speaker 0] goals and can is, we’re seeing can become a source of division right and and factions sort of distinguishing themselves. OK, so moving on, just what very briefly we want to touch. Speaking of Coalitional politics, the two Texans in the Democratic presidential nomination contest who the on Castro and bid or work? Ah, we’ll have to perform well in the Democratic debates that are being held this week in Detroit. Probably by the time you hear this, the debate will happen have happened. So we’re not gonna the labor that’s too much. But the debates also underline how the nature of the to catch all political parties in the US shape politics and some of the same dynamics actually are at work in the in the contest for the Democratic presidential nomination. You know, there is some left right spread here in terms of from center left in the Democratic Party to the further left. But even how you look at that and how you define yourself is in some ways shaped by what issue you’re pushing toe to the front of the agenda in this race.

[0:18:24 Speaker 1] Yeah, I think that’s right. I mean, if you’ve been following any of the coverage leading up to these debates or you know, even if you just follow some of the coverage after after to speak this sort of coalitional who fits where people talk about lanes alive, right? I mean, this is the way that, at the very least, the political press chooses to understand. It is not clear that the candidates aren’t looking at it this way to me in the first night debate. Ah, in one of the questions, one of the big questions was, you know, so okay, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are gonna be on the same stage. They boasted they basically been in that second and third place position in most national polling and the ideas, their tomb or they’re too canny to represent the progressive wing of the party. More so, yeah, the left end more So then, let’s say the left of center and which Joe Biden is representing on looking Teoh capitalized on, Occupy. Right. And so the idea is that people watching the debate tonight have sort of asked, you know, are these two candidates going to go after each other a little bit to try to, you know, separate themselves, make one look better than the other, and the serve again speaks to coalition at this point, the process with 20 candidates. You know, it’s not necessarily the case that every candidate is trying to sweep up all of the voters. Yet some degree, they’re trying to appeal two slices of the electorate, and that’s conditioned by the electoral map. It’s the fact that, you know, is going to Iowa and New Hampshire than South Carolina. So it’s the sequencing of those races, plus the nature. And the composition of the Democratic primary electorate means that, you know, it’s not necessarily the case that better. A Rourke is looking to get all the Democratic voters right now. He’s looking to get a foothold in with some subset

[0:19:55 Speaker 0] and expand out if you can just get some leverage.

[0:19:58 Speaker 1] Yeah, I mean what they all say. I mean, the interesting thing is, you know, it’s widely sort of assumed that better work has have a really good debate performance, and it’s true for both Castro, an American true for a lot of cancer. In one of the things gonna change between this debate, going to the next one is so far. To get into the Democratic debates, you’ve had to either be polling above a certain threshold or have enough donors spread across a certain number of states. When we move to the next debate, you’re actually be able to do both of those things to qualify. And right now I think only seven of the 20 candidates debating tonight would qualify for the next debate. And that’s why everybody’s. That’s why if you’re read seven, it feels a little bit breath, as I mean. To some degree, I feel like it’s a little ridiculous. I mean, it’s a debate going on at the beginning of August or you know or left relates in late July. How serious can be. But the reality is, you know, for some of these candidates like this is going to be their last, best chance to have a big moment before they’re going to get winnowed out of the next ah, prime base of the next primary debate, which is going to take place in August, actually in Texas. And he’s

[0:20:56 Speaker 0] so it’ll be interesting to watch, you know how they approach. I mean, there are different ways you can try to stand out. One is by, you know, trying to appeal to the people in your lane or you know that corresponds to the messaging or the brand, you know? So for better or work, it would be, you know, we need a new, you know, new brand of a new kind of politics that transcends all the nastiness and ugliness. And, you know, I mean, in a primary, it’s kind of tough because he still wants. It has to be partisan and appeal the partisans, but he’s trying to appeal to the new, you know, kind of breath of fresh air. I think Castro and one could disagree about this has been angling somewhat more from the left but also trying to occupy the field on the immigration issue, which also helps underline, you know, his presence or his origins in Texas and and his ethnicity.

[0:21:49 Speaker 1] Yeah. I mean, Castro definitely feels like I mean part of this. This is the problem with this whole lane dynamic. I mean, I really start things like, Well, where does Castro fit in this? In this, you know, in this constant, this construction of the case and certainly

[0:22:01 Speaker 0] like an aggressive highway driver. You can change lanes.

[0:22:04 Speaker 1] Yeah, multiple times. But I mean, this case, I mean It’s a little too simple. I mean, I think you’re right. I would say, You know, Castro’s probably, you know, somewhere between let’s say, you know, the moderate Democrat Centre left Democratic candidates and the more progressive, more left leaning candidates on most of the policy issues. I think he’s kind of set himself as you know, he’s had experiences. Ah, Mayor. And also he’s worked and he’s worked at the housing or a Nermin diplomatic, progressive, pragmatic, progressive. But then I think. But then you’re right. Then

[0:22:34 Speaker 0] use that. If they want,

[0:22:35 Speaker 1] they could. And then But then you hit the immigration issue and he’s using his own personal history. You know, his own demographics, and he’s pushing pry further to the left on that issue, which doesn’t speak so, like so is he. A really progressive candidate is a moderate. Is he someone? Well, that’s where you get the limitations of these kinds of definitions. I mean,

[0:22:52 Speaker 0] well, yeah, I mean, they in a primary, they come and go because the candidates are doing trial and error. I mean, they’re trying, you know, they’re trying out lines and they try to define themselves a certain way. And if it doesn’t work, you know they’ll adjust as much as they can and especially right now, I think you know you’re you’re going to see that. So

[0:23:10 Speaker 1] I didn’t talk about this before. I wanted one point I’ve been thinking about, which is you may hear a lot of talk about, you know how Oh, you know, long drawn out primaries. A lot of candidates. They hurt the eventual nominee. And, you know, in some cases that’s true. In some cases, it’s not, I think here in the Democrat primary, you’re seeing, you know, potentially how I’m not sure that’s true. I mean, if anybody besides Joe Biden who came in as a front runner or Bernie Sanders also came in with a wellspring of support, ends up winning the nomination, it’s gonna likely be because this process has forced them to refine and improve their message and improve their connection with Democratic voters in a way that they’re going to be seen. Is there going to require doing better and growing their support? And I don’t think that hurts any of these candidates, and longer that probably makes a better candidates ultimately, So anyway, just just an asylum. Another pet peeve. Their topic three.

[0:23:57 Speaker 0] Although at some point you got it, you got a thin it out a little.

[0:23:59 Speaker 1] Oh, yeah? Well, hope we’ll Hopefully about the next

[0:24:01 Speaker 0] one. Yeah, well, I think almost certainly. And I get it is to come the one more. You know, I think one thing, it’s interesting. It’s gonna be interesting to watch, and this could be proven wrong by the time you will hear this, but, um, from wrong all the time. Ah, you know, it’s gonna be interesting to see what the unintended consequences of ah, higher level of desperation on the unknown candidates is, you know, And this is where I feel like an old guy. I mean, you know, without going hey, back in 1984. Although that’s what I’m thinking. You know, sometimes the melee of people trying to make their case inadvertently helps another candidate on the stage that that’s one of the things I’m really kind of watching.

[0:24:42 Speaker 1] You know what I agree. I thought that there were a lot more of that in the last debate, and there wasn’t

[0:24:46 Speaker 0] not enough desperation

[0:24:47 Speaker 1] out of desperation yet, but I think that is something that really benefited Kamala Harris in the last debate, right to some degree, just just her being able to say, Hey, guys, stop it. You look ridiculous. Makes her look like the adult in the room. And she definitely benefited last

[0:25:02 Speaker 0] and and I think would also you know, what can also happened even without the direct intervention of a candidate. And I think it’s very I just feel like it’s likely to happen in this field Is that somebody that nobody knows stands up and says, Hey, we really need a fresh voice and I’m that voice and their persuasive But then somebody who’s Yeah, you’re you know, you’re right, whoever you are and Kamala Harris or somebody in the medium tier that’s come up benefits from that. Yeah, Um, yeah, it’s good argument, but sorry. Sorry about you.

[0:25:38 Speaker 1] So I don’t know who you are

[0:25:39 Speaker 0] or say, um okay, you know, Topic three that we were just gonna flag because it’s just so you know there. But we don’t have much time. Is racing the headlines again? Israel is a result of yet more signaling via Twitter from the president. We can’t cover the Sol, but it’s out there over the weekend, Donald Trump attacked Maryland Congressman Elijah Cummings, referring to his district in terms you know, as, ah, infested by rodents and crime and but in a way that couldn’t help but ah come across as racial signaling, particularly in the way that in the language that he used and in context of things that the president has tweeted before and been arguing for years during his career, it it it further inflame the conversation about the president’s willingness to use racially loaded or, you know, racist language. Um, in his tweets and in his comments as a way of trying to appeal to some faction of the base. We were talking before this about, you know, the degree to which this was strategy in the degree that was just the president being the president and having this angry in ingrained way of communicating. You know, I was thinking after we’re about this after we had a conversation about this briefly before the podcast, you know? I mean, I think with the president they merge in a way that, you know, this is his instinctive strategy. When these things float in front of his radar and he doesn’t ask anybody about it, and he does it. It’s comfortable to him and he thinks it’s effective.

[0:27:20 Speaker 1] Yeah, I mean, if the impulse ah, you know, generates the type of feedback that the president likes must put it that way, then it becomes a strategy.

[0:27:31 Speaker 0] Those neural pathways have got a lot of reinforcement over the course of his 70 plus years on the planet.

[0:27:36 Speaker 1] And so I mean, that’s the thing. There’s this whole impulse strategy, you know. But obviously I’m outside this look. It’s kind of irrelevant. It may have been an impulse when it started, but, you know, it would have been very easy for the president to pick another divisive topic or to, you know, do something else because he does it all the time and change the news cycle. And it changed the discussion to whatever. You know, the next thing that he’s focused on is, but I think the fact is he chose not to do that.

[0:28:03 Speaker 0] Yeah, I mean, you know, just to make that explicit. I mean, I think if you’re much of the sort of unattributed reporting has been well, this makes his staff really tense. They wish you wouldn’t do it. they think it’s a bad strategy. And this was really, I mean, in terms of you saying while there’s a 1,000,000 things he could have done if you wanted to be, you know, divisive and appeal to his base. And he chose the thing that seemed, you know, as inflammatory as he could get at this point. And if you go back to something we talked about in the last week of the week before in the podcast. I mean, this follows on the president making the comments about the four members of Congress that they should go back to their where they came from. Other from three of the four from America, all four American citizens, all four, have been elected to Congress. Julia Member, duly elected members.

[0:28:48 Speaker 1] All four of them are non white,

[0:28:50 Speaker 0] but all four of them are non white. But it left this like it’s almost like it left this little space for and you work. You are articulating the serial earlier today, four people to say, Well, you know, America, love it or leave it, you know, whether they’re from here or not. From here, I don’t think it’s because they’re people of color I think it’s because they’re not from here. And I think that’s you know I can if you if you’re already holding some of those attitudes, you’re able to resist that being called racist. Well, then he went and then attacked an African American member of Congress

[0:29:23 Speaker 1] long long serving and

[0:29:24 Speaker 0] wrong, long serving African American member of Congress and criticized, You know, the district in the city, that he represents Baltimore. And so it’s almost a Ziff. He closed any space for doubt.

[0:29:37 Speaker 1] Yeah. I mean, the thing is that you know not, you know I mean, I don’t see now that the fax matter, but just to throw this out there, I mean, so this is not the first time that I think he’s attacked. No slash incomings district specifically who is the member?

[0:29:51 Speaker 0] And he did the same thing with John Lewis,

[0:29:53 Speaker 1] right, with John Lewis,

[0:29:54 Speaker 0] another long term African. Oh, you know, Elijah Cummings is probably like the second most distinguished African American member of Congress behind John Lewis, a civil rights

[0:30:04 Speaker 1] And just to be fair for just a moment, I mean, he’s attacking him because Elijah Cummings shares a couple of committees that are undergoing investigation, the various investigations into the president. And so that is, I mean, if you want to say, what is the impetus for attacking this member in particular, other than race, that is the reason. But in doing so, he described, the district basically is as a hell hole where no one would want to live. Well, look, it’s a majority African American district. It actually has higher rates of college completion than the country as a whole. It actually has a pretty high average income relative. That is because

[0:30:35 Speaker 0] I think, you know, they’ve been saying there’s like the second highest African American median income

[0:30:41 Speaker 1] in the country National District. It doesn’t mean that doesn’t have crime and issues. But, you know, you can see how you know someone might say, Boy, the way he’s the language she’s using. I mean, you know, to describe this district the fact that he’s choosing to attack him on the heels of attacking again four minority representives of Congress, time to go back to their own country. You could see how people might read that is racist, right? And you know it again. And I wasn’t saying that he could have chosen any other thing. I’m just saying it wasn’t even in the case that he could have chosen something else divisive to talk about. But the president is very good at changing the media narrative if he wants to. He is very much capable of going out and with a tweet with an executive order with some kind of, you know, new rule making decision, you know, changing the news cycle from focusing on whether or not his rhetoric is racist to something else that he’s doing. And it seemed like he chose to stick on this path, and, I mean, almost should add. He also, you know, basically got into a spat with the Reverend Al Sharpton, also black from New York. You know, get well, the same as they went on and on. But anyway,

[0:31:53 Speaker 0] you know what? I think two things are not coincidental in terms of this, what is he going to choose to talk about? You know, even though it wasn’t very successful, Robert Mueller testified before Congress, and that was the media spectacle now that broke his way in terms of the coverage and pull of their topic. But, um, and there was more farming, you know, and Elijah Cummings was following up on some of that when the oversight committee. That’s not That’s not what the impetus of this force will release. The hook that Trump used the hook that Trump used was Elijah Cummings grilling, you know, a Trump administration official on policy at the border, which then he then tried to turn in this way in the way that you’re saying so. I think, you know, just to close this out and, you know, try desperately to have one theme here, although it’s it’s not bad

[0:32:42 Speaker 1] thing. This is

[0:32:44 Speaker 0] the most in this, um, you know, the background of this is the Coalitional politics and in the Democratic and the Republican Party among racial lines in terms of support and opposition to Donald Trump’s. If you look at Texas numbers, um, you know Trump’s job approval overall in our last poll was 52 44 52 approved, 44 disapproved higher than his national numbers, which I would expect in Texas Republican state. These are registered voters, but you know his job approval among Anglos whites in Texas, 61 positive, 35 negative among African Americans, 27 positive. 66 negative

[0:33:25 Speaker 1] with 66 or with 60% of that disapproving strongly,

[0:33:28 Speaker 0] right? So there is a strong racial component. I mean, the you know there are there are strong there. There stark differences in the racial perceptions of Donald Trump and these were not going to go away would be my guess. And the point here is the president seems to not want them to go away based on his actions. And I think whatever ambiguities one wants to sort out about what the right label is or whether this is, you know, strategy or impulse. Whatever. The president is comfortable with these numbers yet, so with that will call it a wrap, and we’ll see you next week. Second Reading Podcast is a production of the Texas Politics Project and Liberal Arts Instructional Technology Services at the University of Texas at Austin.