The Great America Show - RCP’S BEVAN SAYS TRUMP REFASHIONED THE REPUBLICAN PARTY IN HIS IMAGE： THE GOP IS NOW AMERICA FIRST, NATIONALIST AND POPULIST

00:00:00.000 Hello, everybody. I'm Lou Dobbs. This is The Great America Show. Welcome, thrilled we could

00:00:05.520 get together, and thanks for joining us. Today, we, as usual, will be talking about our national

00:00:11.680 politics, the economy, the quality of our lives in America. I want to bring to your attention,

00:00:18.220 if I may, a poll in the Wall Street Journal this week that is more disturbing than any poll I've

00:00:24.620 seen in my career in radio, television, and podcasting. I tell you that only to say,

00:00:31.160 prepare yourself for bad news about our country. Our deal here is we talk straight, you and me,

00:00:38.560 about every subject, every question, and today is no exception. It's such a sad reflection of our

00:00:45.840 country, this poll. I feel like I should say I'm sorry at the outset. With that, here we go. This

00:00:54.000 poll was done by the Wall Street Journal and NORC at the University of Chicago. I don't normally give

00:01:02.260 too much weight to polls. I take them all with large amounts of salt, but this one seems entirely

00:01:08.860 different, and unfortunately, it seems reliable. If it's off, I doubt it's off by much. Its findings

00:01:16.740 are nothing short of dismaying to me, and I'm sure all who care deeply about this great country

00:01:22.600 are great people. The journal said this of its poll, quote,

00:01:28.140 Patriotism, religious faith, having children, and other priorities that help define the national

00:01:34.780 character for generations are receding in importance to Americans, end quote. That description is something

00:01:44.140 of an understatement, I'm afraid. Here are some of the numbers and a few of the categories

00:01:49.940 important to those surveyed. You decide. First, I'll give you the value or the priority. Then the

00:01:57.980 percent who felt the value was very important to Americans 25 years ago, and the percent who do so

00:02:05.520 now. Here we go. Patriotism. In 1998, 70 percent of those surveyed felt patriotism was very important.

00:02:17.560 Now, almost half that number, only 38 percent, still consider patriotism to be very important.

00:02:25.480 Religion. Back in 1998, 62 percent felt religion was very important to them. That number has now fallen

00:02:36.600 to 39 percent. Having children. Almost 60 percent felt having kids was very important in 1998.

00:02:46.520 That number is now only 30 percent. Only half as many think having children is very important.

00:02:54.020 And fourth, money. In 1998, 31 percent thought money was very important. Now, that percent has risen to

00:03:03.000 43 percent. More than a third more now saying money is very important to them. After living through the

00:03:09.680 pandemic, the Biden hyperinflation, volatile markets, it's understandable. As I said, those declines,

00:03:17.900 both dramatic and dismaying, the declines in patriotism, religion, and having children hit me

00:03:26.240 like a brick, frankly. I expect you as well. Half as many Americans putting a priority on having

00:03:33.060 children. That is a sure statement of a lack of faith in our country's future, our future. The decline in

00:03:41.720 the percent of Americans for whom religion is very important is troubling, but I can't say it was

00:03:47.380 unexpected. Religion is constantly under assault from the secular left, the anti-religion culture that

00:03:55.340 has grown up, and the national media that is aggressive. I don't like it, but can't say it's a surprise

00:04:02.940 given the country's lack of moral values. And the freefall in American patriotism is horrific

00:04:09.360 in what it both is and what it portends for the country. The Marxist left controls our government,

00:04:17.160 of course, our schools, colleges, universities, media of all kinds. That amounts to a brainwashing

00:04:24.560 on a national scale, an inescapable indoctrination of Marxist ideology that permeates now American

00:04:33.380 society. Which means there's no clear way to recover our arguably most critical value, which

00:04:41.020 preserves and protects all our founding values, our national values, or at least what once were our

00:04:48.540 national values. As I said, the journal poll isn't inspiring, to say the least. But it is, I think,

00:04:55.500 a credible snapshot of where we are as a people today. Not good. It should at the very least motivate

00:05:02.880 us all to work harder for the America we prize, for ourselves, and for future generations. And now,

00:05:11.140 new developments in the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's persecution of President Trump.

00:05:16.940 The jury went home again yesterday without hearing evidence, without voting on any charge against

00:05:24.020 President Trump. Barricades were also taken down. Uniformed police officers were pulled from the area

00:05:31.220 around the courthouse in downtown Manhattan. All that leading to some speculation that the district

00:05:38.160 attorney is about to drop his case against Donald Trump. Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C.,

00:05:45.740 the chief D.C. District Judge has ordered former Vice President Mike Pence to testify about his talks

00:05:53.200 with President Trump in the days leading up to January 6th. The Obama-appointed Judge James

00:06:00.320 Bozberg is hearing the special counsel's case against the president's handling of top-secret documents that

00:06:07.740 Mr. Trump had in his Mar-a-Lago office, and which he says he declassified, as well as allegations the president

00:06:15.540 interfered in or obstructed the transfer of power. There are times it's hard to believe that the District of

00:06:23.200 Columbia federal judges and DOJ prosecutors do anything other than work on cases and in courtrooms

00:06:31.360 committed to nothing else but the deep state's persecution of President Donald Trump. And it's

00:06:37.660 been going on now seven years. Three of the cases outside of D.C. are in New York. Our guest today is the

00:06:46.080 founder and executive editor of the highly successful website dedicated to politics, national political

00:06:52.560 reporting, elections, campaigns, and polling, Real Clear Politics. Welcome, Tom Bevin. Great as always

00:07:00.560 to have you with us here on The Great America Show. President Trump under relentless lawfare by the left,

00:07:06.920 the Marxist-MDA, Bragg, having trouble bringing, apparently, though, a grand jury to indict the president.

00:07:13.360 A weak case, and it looks weaker by the day. Your thoughts, Tom?

00:07:18.600 Well, I mean, we'll see what happens with this as, you know, this string plays out. Clearly,

00:07:26.460 it seems, from everything that I've read and heard, and I'm not a legal expert, but I do, you know, I do read

00:07:33.880 a lot of legal experts, and everyone that I've read suggests that this, should he be indicted

00:07:41.660 for this crime, that it is, as Jonathan Turley put it, legally pathetic, that it's really

00:07:51.840 an abuse of prosecutorial discretion to make these charges and stretch it into a felony for an action

00:08:03.320 that was seven years ago, unrelated to, you know, campaign finance, et cetera, et cetera.

00:08:08.100 It's been fascinating the way this whole thing has played out with Trump, you know, announcing that

00:08:13.760 he was going to be arrested and sort of sent everybody into a tizzy, and now we're, everybody's

00:08:18.380 sort of hanging on the grand jury every single day, and it keeps getting canceled, and, you know,

00:08:25.100 so it's been a bizarre spectacle, unlike anything we have ever seen, and so we'll see whether we

00:08:32.440 we actually cross the Rubicon here in indicting a former, not just a former president, remember,

00:08:38.620 the potentially future president, and certainly he is the, one of the only announced candidates

00:08:44.020 on the Republican side running for the nomination in 2024.

00:08:47.480 Yeah, you're exactly right, and I do want to highlight the appearance of Robert Costello,

00:08:54.920 who at one time was a representative, legal representative for Michael Cohen, also a former

00:09:02.600 prosecutor himself, a terrific lawyer, puts himself before the grand jury and decimates

00:09:10.860 Michael Cohen's credibility, calling him without question a pathological liar, staying straightforwardly

00:09:19.560 that everything that he had said was a lie. It was powerful testimony, and then for Alvin

00:09:28.300 Bragg to have over 300 emails and only produce six of them for the grand jury. I mean, Alvin

00:09:38.860 Bragg, and as you said, I'm no attorney either, but that is, that sounds like a crime to me.

00:09:45.780 What do you think, Tom? Look, Alvin Bragg is someone who has, you know, he's been vocally

00:09:55.240 after anti-Trump and vocally after, not just vocally, but I mean, he's been after Donald Trump

00:10:02.100 as, as a lot of folks, Democrats in New York have been, Letitia James and others. I mean,

00:10:07.140 this has been, this is how, this is how they ran their campaigns, this is how they got elected,

00:10:10.620 this is how they're demonstrating to folks that they, you know, these are the promises that they're

00:10:17.460 trying to make good on. So, you know, Politico came out with a story the other day, which was

00:10:22.080 just farcical, this, you know, that he's, he's a real by the book guy and, and, you know, which

00:10:28.880 just the way the media has, has handled this as well, I think has been, well, unfortunate,

00:10:36.900 let's just put it that way. I think that's probably a kind description. There's been a lot

00:10:42.160 of talk about the process, but not a lot of talk about just how big of a stretch this would be and

00:10:48.060 how unprecedented something like this would be. And certainly I think even, even Democrats could

00:10:54.040 admit that this would set an awful precedent. I mean, this is the continued weaponization

00:10:59.220 of our politics and, and, you know, Democrats may be jumping up and down and cheering now because

00:11:05.780 they think, you know, the, the quote unquote walls are finally closing in on Trump. Um, but,

00:11:11.220 you know, next time around, it could be, it could be a Democrat who's, it could be Joe Biden. It could

00:11:16.240 be a future democratic president, uh, or office holder who is in the legal crosshairs. And it's just,

00:11:22.200 it's a bad development for our Republic that we find ourselves in this kind of situation.

00:11:25.880 Unquestionably. I was reading the other day of some comments and among them, uh, was why the,

00:11:33.860 the Marxist dims are behaving as they are. Uh, because as you say, there are cycles here,

00:11:41.260 but the commenter pointed out that the Marxists are now in it, uh, for the whole enchilada.

00:11:48.780 There's not going to be a next time in their, in their worldview right now, their at least U S view,

00:11:54.540 uh, and they are going to be the dominant, uh, party emerging victorious, uh, from what has been,

00:12:01.180 uh, outright, uh, vicious, uh, assault on the constitution, on the American way, fundamental

00:12:10.180 principles, ethics, heritage, you name it, they've gone after it. Uh, what do you, what's your reaction

00:12:16.780 to that? You know, I, I'm not, uh, I, you know, if you, if you study politics and you study history,

00:12:26.040 uh, that seems unlikely. I mean, there, there are ebbs and flows. There are, um, you know, rhythms to,

00:12:35.920 to our, our political life. I mean, and, and there are also, you know, uh, constant proclamations

00:12:43.580 that, that, you know, it's, it's end times for, for one side or the other. I mean, I can remember,

00:12:49.640 you know, we started real clear politics in 2000. I remember in 2008 after Barack Obama was elected,

00:12:55.100 that that was the end of the Republican party. I mean, that, that this was going to be a,

00:12:58.520 a rump party. It was going to go the way, the wigs, et cetera, et cetera. And lo and behold,

00:13:03.700 two years later, Republicans absolutely demolished the Democrats in that midterm election.

00:13:09.560 Uh, they ended up winning, you know, the gubernatorial elections less than a year later

00:13:14.720 in New Jersey and, um, Virginia. So I, I think some of those pronouncements are, are, uh, you know,

00:13:21.700 a little bit, I mean, I do think we have gotten more, there's no question loom. And the data supports

00:13:27.060 this. When you look at polls that we, we become more tribal and more partisan as a country. Um,

00:13:33.560 and that's something that's been happening for some time, but it, it certainly has accelerated

00:13:36.980 under Obama accelerated even more under Trump and has continued under Joe Biden. Um, and that people

00:13:44.280 now look at each other. It used to be that we would just disagree about things, uh, about policies,

00:13:50.800 but, um, now each side views the other side as an existential, literally an existential threat

00:13:57.540 to their, uh, way of life. And so it has taken on, um, I think the, the, the tone of arguments,

00:14:04.940 um, has taken on a more dire, um, more dire tone. And, um, but I, you know, I'm not,

00:14:15.180 I'm not convinced that, that that's the case that we're headed towards civil war or that, uh,

00:14:20.880 this is going to be, you know, the, the, the progressives, liberals, Marxists, whatever you

00:14:26.320 want to call them are, are, are, you know, they're Marxists are going to be winning and, and, and have

00:14:31.620 like some final victory from which, uh, the other side is never going to recover or reemerge. I just,

00:14:37.880 I, I just don't buy that as a fundamental premise.

00:14:40.820 Well, obviously I would hope that you're right. And my fears are misplaced. I, I have to wonder

00:14:49.820 though, when I watch a man like the former president Trump, four years, uh, as president,

00:14:57.840 he is under assault, uh, the FBI, the department of justice, the democratic party all aligned, uh,

00:15:06.320 in an effort to, to frame him. Uh, they successfully framed general Michael, uh, Flynn,

00:15:12.840 his national security advisor, uh, no, no accounting at all for what were obviously criminal, uh, acts

00:15:21.040 by the, by the deep state and various, uh, members of the department of justice, the FBI for directors

00:15:28.420 of the FBI successively lying to the American people about the Russian hoax, about the, uh, the

00:15:35.420 investigations into it. Uh, and then here we are seven years later and on it goes only the,

00:15:41.860 most of the energy is that, uh, now with the ebb of the January 6th committee, it's in the state

00:15:47.820 prosecutors and Manhattan DA's offices that gives great teeth, at least to me, uh, to those concerns

00:15:57.100 about, uh, uh, the intent, uh, and the, and the manifest anger of the, the Marxist Dems who are

00:16:05.780 attacking, it seems every institution of every element of American life. Well, I will certainly

00:16:11.640 agree with you that, you know, Donald Trump is, is, uh, in many ways, a unique historical political

00:16:19.300 figure, obviously elected without any prior political, you know, holding, holding office

00:16:24.680 or being in the military and the reaction to him, as you mentioned, you know, the, not just the

00:16:31.020 Democrats, um, and the media, but also, you know, aspects of the, of the government itself turned on

00:16:37.320 him, including his own party. I mean, don't forget how, you know, members of, of the Republican

00:16:42.580 party sought to try and first deny him the nomination and then worked in opposition to him

00:16:46.780 once he was inside, uh, once he was in, in, um, in the white house. So he, he definitely elicited,

00:16:54.420 um, the kind of reaction that we have never seen by these different institutions. Um, and they did,

00:17:04.480 I think the historical record is pretty clear that, that, um, these institutions acted in ways that

00:17:11.520 they have never acted before. You had the media literally standing up and declaring themselves as

00:17:16.080 part of the resistance. I mean, this was CNN, MSNBC, obviously, um, and others, but the media acting

00:17:22.900 in a, in a, in a way, um, openly declaring that they were against him. Um, and as you mentioned

00:17:32.220 across the board, you saw norms that were being broken because there was this end justifies the

00:17:38.760 means mentality that, um, when it, when it came to Donald Trump, is that something that will, um,

00:17:46.800 cause Donald Trump is, I mean, look, we're going to go through this again in 2024. Um, but at some

00:17:52.600 point we're going to be on, we will be beyond Donald Trump. And the question is, are all of these

00:17:57.820 institutions, have we sort of crossed a Rubicon there where these institutions are going to forever

00:18:03.940 function that way toward, uh, whoever the Republican nominee is and, or, you know, president? Um, I

00:18:13.620 don't know the answer to that. Uh, I hope the answer is no, but you might be right that, that we

00:18:18.500 have, this is, this will become the new normal, uh, not just for Donald Trump, but for, for, for any

00:18:24.460 Republican, any Republican that's in office, but that's a, that's a frightening proposition.

00:18:29.120 It is a frightening proposition. And, and, and, and before we sort of turn to a world without

00:18:34.860 Trump, let's look at the one that we've got. And that is, I, for the longest time, Tom, thought

00:18:39.340 Trump derangement syndrome was just a silly nonsensical rationalization by the left, uh, to, 0.62

00:18:45.580 uh, cover, uh, the venality of, uh, of their actions against it. Uh, but it turns out it's widespread 0.52

00:18:52.760 and there is some considerable, uh, I think evidence that it's a real thing for many left

00:18:58.920 wing, uh, Marxists, you name them what you will, uh, in this country, but it's still no

00:19:05.800 excuse. It's no rationalization. And this president is the only certifiable president

00:19:11.000 over the course of seven years who committed no wrongdoing. I mean, he went through, think

00:19:15.880 of this. I mean, it's as if the American people are not keeping score here, two impeachments,

00:19:22.160 two special counsels, almost four years of FBI investigation of one kind or the other.

00:19:28.300 And that doesn't include their efforts, uh, to frame him, uh, and to create the, the great

00:19:34.880 Russian hoax. It is, it seems to me, uh, a very serious and lasting situation that is going to 0.92

00:19:43.080 have to be resolved. One hopes at the, at the ballot box, but one way or another, because this,

00:19:49.320 this state of, uh, of conflict, uh, can't just smolder endlessly.

00:19:57.120 Well, yeah, I think you're right about that. I mean, we're going to have a reckoning here with

00:20:02.500 Donald Trump. The Republican party is going to have a reckoning with him. Um, and we'll see how

00:20:06.860 that plays out. Um, but if he is the nominee, if he does end up winning in 2024, I mean, he's sort of

00:20:13.840 telegraphed that in no uncertain terms that, that, uh, he will, is going to try and fundamentally

00:20:21.780 reshape government and, and root out a lot of the, the, uh, you know, actors that, that worked

00:20:28.680 against him the first time around. So there will be a reckoning, uh, with regard to, to Donald Trump

00:20:35.260 here in the next year and a half. Um, and it may last longer than that if he wins, if he wins

00:20:41.260 election. Um, but you're right. I mean, look, I think there are going to be textbooks written

00:20:48.440 about Donald Trump's presidency, um, because of how unique it was, even in this kind of tribal

00:20:56.440 environment. As I said, the, the reaction, you mentioned Trump derangement syndrome. I mean,

00:21:01.820 it is, um, obviously with the media, obviously with the left, but I'll go back to the, you know,

00:21:08.780 parts of the Republican party. I mean, that just absolutely, um, you think of like the Lincoln

00:21:14.340 project folks, you think of all of the folks that worked, uh, against him because they had that exact

00:21:21.960 same mentality, um, and could not stand. I mean, this is part of, I think this is part of, this was

00:21:28.180 obviously part of Trump's appeal, being an outsider coming into Washington and having all of those,

00:21:33.760 uh, forces sort of arrayed against him from the outset, uh, was something that we've never seen

00:21:39.480 before. And obviously, you know, he, he managed to get some things done even while battling those

00:21:46.060 forces on a, on an absolute daily basis. The fact that he was for the first time in 20 years,

00:21:53.560 able to raise real wages for the middle-class working men and women and their families in this

00:21:59.660 country, that alone speaks to significant historical achievement, particularly with those

00:22:06.840 forces, as you say, uh, arrayed against him. Paul Ryan, uh, and Mitch McConnell were on a seven year,

00:22:13.160 have been on a seven year jihad against Donald Trump. Uh, it's the most peculiar thing. Uh, Romney,

00:22:19.620 the same. We, this class of, uh, rhinos, uh, within the Republican party is, have been every bit the

00:22:26.460 obstructionists of not some cases, uh, uh, even more, uh, than the, the left of the democratic party.

00:22:33.900 Uh, but we have a new formulation of power. It seems to me too, in the nation's capital, we have the FBI,

00:22:41.400 uh, who's given up a portal to, uh, the Democrat law firm, the DNC law firm, the, uh, the Clinton,

00:22:48.700 uh, uh, uh, law firm Perkins Coy, uh, how many law firms in the country have a portal right into the

00:22:55.980 FBI? I would hesitate to say the more than I would say probably there's one for sure, but I think

00:23:05.100 probably no more than three. And I bet you, none of them would go to a Republican so-called Republican

00:23:10.100 firm. Uh, we're looking at a weaponization of government against the citizens, whether it's,

00:23:15.500 uh, the, the, the collusion of the education department, the department of justice FBI with

00:23:21.800 the white house to go after parents, uh, and the school board association. Uh, it's one thing after

00:23:28.920 another, uh, in which they are attacking. And that doesn't even include 87,000 IRS agents, obviously that

00:23:36.340 this president wanted, uh, and looks like he will get most of, uh, this is just a realignment of power

00:23:42.760 in DC and across, uh, all of the nodes of the federal government, isn't it?

00:23:50.660 Well, I mean, look, I think there certainly have been disturbing episodes where you have seen the

00:23:55.380 federal government, um, act as I said, in ways, whether it's against Trump or, or even against,

00:24:01.740 as you mentioned, the case of, of the FBI, like in these parent school board meetings, um,

00:24:07.960 and the IRS. I mean, there are certain episodes that I think, um, yes, give people pause. I will

00:24:16.380 say also though, um, when you talk about Trump and we talk about how he, you know, you mentioned Paul

00:24:22.380 Ryan and Mitt Romney. I mean, Donald Trump has fundamentally changed the Republican party. I mean,

00:24:27.140 he did it and he did it in, in a matter of less than a year. He absolutely reoriented 40 or 50 years

00:24:36.640 of Republican orthodoxy on trade, on foreign policy, um, on immigration, um, just across the board,

00:24:45.700 massive, massive shifts. And he, for whatever reason, um, unlike all the 15 other people who ran

00:24:54.480 from, you know, all of these, uh, qualified governors, Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, you know,

00:24:59.840 senators, you name it. Um, none of them were able to tap into that, uh, which was clearly there in

00:25:07.420 the rank and file of the Republican party. I mean, those, those sentiments were, were clearly there,

00:25:12.940 but had been unaddressed for, you know, as I said, decades. And Donald Trump came in and was able to

00:25:20.940 absolutely refashion the Republican party in his image and it will continue to be in his image

00:25:25.320 beyond, uh, long after he's gone. I mean, we can see that very clearly now. I don't think there's

00:25:32.520 going to be any going back to the, you know, John McCain, Mitt Romney, uh, Republican party. I mean,

00:25:40.720 there, there is a pre Donald Trump phase of the Republican party and there is a post Donald Trump

00:25:45.340 phase, which we are now in, and that's going to continue for a long, long time.

00:25:49.320 You really think this is the post Donald Trump phase?

00:25:52.960 Well, I'm, it could still be the actual Donald Trump phase. I'm not saying, I'm not making any

00:25:59.340 predictions about what's going to happen with him in the Republican primary, but I'm, I'm just saying,

00:26:03.760 you know, that policy wise, uh, moving, you know, from when Trump ran for office, uh, from that point

00:26:13.100 on policy wise, everything has changed and will continue to be in, in the sort of America first,

00:26:19.180 nationalist, populist, um, you know, wing of the party that that's the party or that's the,

00:26:25.540 that's where all the energy and enthusiasm and ideas are coming from. It is not the,

00:26:31.060 you know, there's not a huge contingent out there that is, is yearning to go back to,

00:26:36.700 you know, Paul Ryan's, uh, and, and Mitt Romney's sort of free trade, um, you know, open border or

00:26:45.560 whatever, whatever the policy was on immigration, um, prior to Donald Trump. I mean, there's just not

00:26:50.920 a lot of people in the Republican party that, that want to see the party go back that direction.

00:26:55.580 Yeah. And there are so many people in the party who are MAGA, who are, as you say, America first.

00:27:02.960 And that is one of the brilliant strokes, I believe of this, uh, of president Trump is that he brought

00:27:10.520 a populism that is rooted, uh, in the, his interest in the wellbeing of the middle-class, uh, working men

00:27:18.420 and women, this forgotten American as, uh, as he put it in his campaign and, and the democratic party 0.98

00:27:26.480 has just given all of that up for gender identity battles, uh, issues over, uh, uh, well, I guess it 0.90

00:27:36.080 all goes to the same thing, drag shows in public libraries, uh, adventurous, uh, wars. Uh, it looks

00:27:44.840 like this administration wants a war, uh, that it can join, uh, in Ukraine. Uh, it is impossible

00:27:52.400 to see what the constituency of the Democrat party under Joe Biden is because he is offering, uh,

00:28:01.600 nothing, uh, to most of the broadest demographic groups. Uh, he is focusing on the, uh, I guess a

00:28:11.100 series of, uh, minorities, uh, across society, but his policies are, are to me, it's just

00:28:20.540 balkanization rather than a, a constituency that's been brought together. Your thoughts.

00:28:27.660 No, I, I agree with that. And it's not just Joe Biden. I mean, this is something that's been

00:28:31.400 happening with the democratic party for some time. It's, it's, you know, identity politics and Barack

00:28:38.860 Obama was actually very good at this. I mean, he would, they would segment their messages and he

00:28:43.440 would go out and, and address, you know, all of the various constituencies, um, and provide them

00:28:50.160 with, you know, their, whatever policy tailored to, to make those folks feel, uh, like they were,

00:28:59.480 uh, included. But, but again, um, as you mentioned, I think that this is not FDR's party. This is not the

00:29:07.760 party of sort of the blue, blue collar working class. Um, and in many ways it's, it's anathema to

00:29:14.900 that in the sense that, um, it is, it is targeting these tiny little slices of the demographic of, of,

00:29:23.140 of, you know, the, the, the population, um, with this sort of, uh, hierarchy of, of victimhood and

00:29:33.400 this idea that it's, it's all about equity and it's all about, um, you know, not equal opportunity,

00:29:39.060 but equal outcomes. And the, the government's going to help engineer that. Um, and, you know,

00:29:44.000 for the 2% of you that are LGBTQ or whatever, you know, the government's going to step in and make 0.69

00:29:49.600 sure that, uh, you know, have all of these, um, protections and policies. Uh, and so I think that

00:29:57.700 that is, um, that's tough to be a national party when you do that, because if you're not speaking

00:30:04.400 to the broadest possible constituency, and that's, you know, if you look at what Donald Trump has done

00:30:08.760 and the Republicans have done, uh, when they talk about wages and, and things of that nature, um,

00:30:16.200 they're reaching across class lines. They're reaching across ethnic lines. Um, it is, it is, uh,

00:30:21.980 I shouldn't say, I meant, I didn't mean to say class lines. They're reaching across sort of racial

00:30:27.160 lines. Um, it is more class-based than, than race-based, um, because a lot of folks, regardless

00:30:33.700 of whether you're black or brown or, you know, purple or blue share the same economic, economic

00:30:40.760 interest. They want higher wages. They want lower inflation. They want, you know, reasonable gas

00:30:46.280 prices and energy prices so that they can, you know, increase their standard of living.

00:30:50.900 Um, and so I do think it's, it's, but look, the Democrats, um, you know, Joe Biden did get an awful

00:30:58.760 lot of votes. Um, and I think Republicans have to make sure that they're speaking in ways that don't

00:31:05.120 alienate pieces of the, of, of the population. Um, because there, there's a fight over the, you know,

00:31:10.880 10 or 15% in the middle. The fact that independents didn't go with Republicans in 2022, despite all of

00:31:18.080 the sort of horrendous numbers from the Biden administration, whether it was this job approval

00:31:22.240 rating, inflation, gas prices, you name it, the fact independents didn't vote overwhelmingly for

00:31:28.440 Republicans, um, I think is a cautionary tale. They have to be careful and they have to make sure

00:31:32.420 that they're, they're speaking to independents in particular. Oh, without question. They represent

00:31:37.180 such a sizable block of, uh, of votes, uh, arguably much larger than the, than the, uh, sympathetic

00:31:46.100 margins for the Democrats with Republicans and Republicans with Democrats. Uh, I, I do, I do want

00:31:53.940 to kind of explore this idea of, of president Biden with all of this now being at 38% in the most recent

00:32:01.700 polling, uh, coming very close to, uh, to the low point of his, uh, of his presidency. I'm one of those

00:32:08.980 people, of course, who thinks how in the world can anyone given this, this man's impairments, uh, his,

00:32:15.780 uh, his policies and his, uh, awful judgment, uh, and agenda, could he have even 38% of the American

00:32:24.420 people approve of the job he's doing? Uh, what do you make of it? Well, listen, part of this is,

00:32:35.400 you know, you have to look at, we're a country now that's watching two movies. I mean, when Donald

00:32:40.860 Trump was in office, Republicans gave him 90, 93, 95%, uh, uh, job approval rating. Democrats never gave

00:32:49.020 him more than five, six, seven, 8% approval rating. Um, and independence sort of bounced around in the

00:32:54.960 middle. It's the exact opposite with Biden, right? Democrats give him, you know, high marks for his

00:33:00.240 job. They think he's doing a bang up job and Republicans, you know, give him a terrible marks

00:33:05.940 and independence are somewhere in between. So he's got a little bit of a higher, uh, floor than

00:33:11.460 Donald Trump did, but not much. And, and you mentioned this, this poll that came out showing nationally

00:33:17.440 there, the Des Moines register poll came out last week. Biden's approval rating in Iowa

00:33:22.140 is 30%. And just to, just to sort of hammer home the point I just made, um, he has a 75% approval

00:33:30.760 rating among Democrats. He has a 3% approval rating among Republicans and among independents,

00:33:35.780 it's 29%. It's still that high. It's among independents. Yes. 29%. So, you know, that's

00:33:44.940 basically three out of four saying they disapprove of the job that he's doing. Um, so by the way,

00:33:52.440 that's not so different from where he was heading into the 2022 election. I mean, independents

00:33:58.200 overwhelmingly were against him, uh, didn't think he was doing a very good job, particularly on the

00:34:04.980 issue of the economy, which everyone rated as the number one issue in that election. Um, but yet if you

00:34:11.460 look at the exit polls from that election, they didn't hold it against him, uh, in the same way

00:34:16.400 that, uh, that presidents in the past had been, had been penalized for having, you know, 8% on, uh,

00:34:23.620 inflation or, or, you know, $4 a gallon gas. And so how big, how big a role do you think, uh, J6 and

00:34:32.340 Mar-a-Lago, the J6 committee and Mar-a-Lago, the raid played in diminishing, uh, mitigating, uh, that,

00:34:43.340 uh, earlier enthusiasm on the part of independents going into the election?

00:34:48.240 You know, it had some effect. Um, it's really, really hard to quantify, uh, you know, abortions.

00:34:56.280 The other issue is like, well, how much did that, did, did the Dobbs decision have on,

00:35:01.380 on, uh, impact, you know, the election? It had some, it had more, I think in certain states where

00:35:07.980 it was on the ballot, like in Michigan and other places. Um, but I mean, I went back and looked at

00:35:13.300 all the pre-election polling to find out, okay, well, you know, what exactly happened here? Um,

00:35:18.360 and it, it wasn't really there in the data. I mean, there was not really an indication. Every

00:35:22.980 single poll, pre-election poll, you know, showed the economy was number one and that, you know,

00:35:28.340 abortion was basically down the list for independents and certainly Republicans. It was,

00:35:34.080 it was up on the list of Democrats. Um, but at the end of the day, it ended up mattering. I think,

00:35:39.520 I think those two things probably, and then you look at candidate quality and some of the

00:35:42.840 candidates, uh, Democrats did a very good job, I think of, of, uh, you know, demonizing Republicans

00:35:50.020 in big races and also, you know, really pouring their resources into those four or five Senate

00:35:54.720 races that mattered the most where Republicans, I think, didn't do as good of a job strategically in,

00:36:00.440 in buttressing those candidates and also getting out of the vote in those states.

00:36:03.640 Yeah. And we have to give Mitch McConnell some credit for that or blame if, uh, you prefer,

00:36:08.140 uh, because he actually lined up money against candidates that were, uh, Trumpian are Trumpian

00:36:15.220 like and, uh, and did them dirty. Uh, that had an influence as well. And, you know, the, there is

00:36:22.420 one area in this that we, when I, we talk about mitigating forces, countervailing influences within

00:36:28.360 the, the body politic, we haven't even mentioned the media. Uh, the national media is aligned with

00:36:36.140 the democratic party, uh, almost absolutely. Uh, there is very little margin between their,

00:36:43.680 uh, their interest in that of the, of the, of the Marxist Dems. Uh, the coverage has been so

00:36:51.500 one-sided and overwhelming, at least in my judgment, uh, that the American people have been censored

00:36:58.620 by their FBI, their department of justice, uh, by, uh, by social media, by, uh, legacy media,

00:37:08.420 corporate media. And it's very difficult to break through. And if I'm running the Republican

00:37:14.940 party, uh, which would not be my favorite job, I can tell you, uh, I just can't even imagine where

00:37:21.540 you begin to break down that resistance to the ideas of Republicans and moderates and independents,

00:37:28.440 uh, and bring forth a real public discussion, debate, and dialogue about important issues.

00:37:35.780 We haven't had hearings in this country on, uh, transgender issues. We haven't had

00:37:41.660 debate about a wide open border. We haven't had discussions, hearings in Congress, and it goes on

00:37:48.920 major issues that are just simply leaving the American people out of the conversation. Uh, your

00:37:56.820 reaction to the, what has been a suppressive role, uh, rather than, uh, an enlightening and

00:38:02.360 illuminating role for the, for the fourth estate. Well, I, I will certainly agree. And having,

00:38:08.120 you know, not been involved in politics or journalism professionally before starting real clear politics,

00:38:13.740 I really didn't fundamentally understand, um, just how, um, influence the media was and,

00:38:24.820 and continues to be, um, by sort of, you know, democratic values and ideals. But you learn that

00:38:34.020 pretty quickly when you follow the news professionally, it doesn't take long before you're

00:38:38.160 seeing, you know, the way headlines are written, the pictures that are used, the language that's

00:38:42.660 used, the way, the way these stories are structured, um, just over and over and over again,

00:38:48.980 you see, uh, the major media in this company sort of in this country, um, really sort of putting their

00:38:55.980 thumb on the scales for, for Democrats and, and in many ways, giving Republicans, uh, the, the opposite

00:39:03.640 treatment. You know, I look immigration, for example, I mean, it was a big issue in a lot of

00:39:10.000 these races. I mean, it was, it was discussed. You had Mark Kelly running away from the Biden

00:39:13.420 administration on it in, in the Arizona Senate race. Um, I, so it's not that Republicans can't,

00:39:20.880 it's not that they can't, uh, emphasize their issues that they can't get those issues, um,

00:39:28.400 amplify them for the public. And they're certainly the way that the media has fractured. There are

00:39:32.980 opportunities and outlets for, for Republicans, uh, to, to drive those sorts of narrative, but they

00:39:39.440 have to do it in the face of knowing that at the, at the sort of national level, when you look at

00:39:45.380 most of the media outlets, most of the television outlets, and certainly most of the print publications

00:39:50.340 from the Washington post, the wall, wall street journal, even, uh, New York times, et cetera,

00:39:54.740 that, um, that they're going to be, they're not going to be given, uh, uh, um, a fair shake when it

00:40:01.980 comes to coverage of, of their campaigns and the issues that the American people are caring about.

00:40:09.440 They're in some cases, in most cases being absolutely censured though, Tom, uh, we're,

00:40:15.180 we're looking at the example of the 51 intelligence, former intelligence, uh, officials who put together

00:40:22.020 that, uh, infamous letter, uh, consigning the Hunter Biden laptop to Russian disinformation when every

00:40:31.140 single one of those people knew it was a lie, including five former CIA directors. Yet they were the tool

00:40:38.840 of the Democrat candidate for president. And obviously so. And the Republican attorney general,

00:40:46.440 Bill Barr, uh, sent out FBI agents to, to absolutely censure conservative and Republican

00:40:54.940 voices and the president of the United States in a critical election. And then didn't intercede when

00:41:01.480 he knew personally that the Russian disinformation letter was a lie. He didn't remark on it to the,

00:41:09.360 the, the, the intelligence community or to, uh, the American public who were trying to make a decision

00:41:14.780 between two men running for president. Uh, these are outrageous when we know in subsequent, uh,

00:41:20.320 polling that the New York post article that was censured, uh, would have made all of the difference

00:41:26.840 in the margin of victory, uh, and that Trump in point of fact would have been, uh, statistically,

00:41:32.920 at least we can say, uh, president of the United States. They all in combination leave aside all of

00:41:39.520 the issues about rigged electronic voting, rigged, uh, ballot harvesting, rigged, uh, election, uh, timing.

00:41:47.940 Uh, we are talking about changing history and we have a, a body, body politic. Yes. The body politic

00:41:56.860 was certainly influenced, but the elites of both parties, uh, stayed mum, ununderstandably in the

00:42:03.660 case of the Democrats on the issue and felt like it was better to protect the idea that we had a free

00:42:10.680 and fair election rather than one that was absolutely rigged, uh, by, by one party.

00:42:17.660 Well, you're not going to get any argument from me about the New York post, uh, story,

00:42:22.640 Hunter Biden laptop and the way that that, you know, the, uh, the letter from the 51, uh, security

00:42:30.400 officials or the way that Twitter and Facebook and social media colluded to, to suppress that story.

00:42:37.220 I mean, that's well documented. And I think it was just an outrageous example, uh, and a, and a true

00:42:42.800 low point in this country's history in terms of, uh, you know, free speech and journalism. I mean, this

00:42:48.060 is 20 years ago, 30 years ago. Um, that kind of story you'd have every, you would have every news

00:42:57.960 outlet in America taking and trying to figure that out, getting a copy of that and, and trying to,

00:43:05.480 you know, validate those emails and, and instead everybody just put up a, you know, said, no,

00:43:11.600 we, we're not dealing with that. It's just disinformation. And it was disgraceful. And so

00:43:15.700 you're not going to get any argument from me on that. Um, now whether it would change the outcome

00:43:19.740 of the election, you know, that's, that's debatable. Um, but it's certainly whether it would have or not,

00:43:27.380 uh, the fact that that went down the way it did was an absolute disgrace.

00:43:31.540 Yeah, it was a disgrace. And, uh, and I say it straight out, it changed history in, in my view,

00:43:39.400 uh, Tom, we always give our guests the very last word. And if, uh, you will, sir, uh, it's been a

00:43:45.400 pleasure talking with you. And if you will, you're concluding thoughts today.

00:43:49.700 Well, I just, I want to thank you for having me on. It's always great to be with you, Lou,

00:43:54.540 and I, I enjoy, uh, chatting with you. Well, those are concluding thoughts and they're

00:44:00.020 positive and I, and I hereby, uh, align myself with those remarks entirely. Tom Bevin,

00:44:06.000 real clear politics. Thanks so much, my friend. Thank you. American. Thank you. Thanks everybody

00:44:10.760 for being with us here tomorrow. We'll be Congressman Matt Gates champion for president Trump sponsoring

00:44:18.040 legislation to get our troops out of Somalia. That's right. President Biden put our troops

00:44:25.000 into Somalia among his very first orders as president. Please join us here tomorrow till

00:44:31.640 then. God bless you. God bless America.

The Great America Show - March 29, 2023

RCP’S BEVAN SAYS TRUMP REFASHIONED THE REPUBLICAN PARTY IN HIS IMAGE： THE GOP IS NOW AMERICA FIRST, NATIONALIST AND POPULIST

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript