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00:02:29.520He and I sat down and talked about, all right, let's kind of look back and see what is it that we didn't accomplish
00:02:36.960and what were the reasons why we were not as successful as we might have been.
00:02:41.080And we looked at a variety of things and, you know, we kind of tried to figure out, well, why, why, why?
00:02:45.140And we really came to the conclusion that gerrymandering was a problem that prevented him from getting in full his agenda, though he had significant accomplishments.
00:02:56.180And as we looked more, we said, you know, and a lot of the stuff that's coming out of the states is unpopular and nevertheless gets passed.
00:03:03.820And that was also as a result of gerrymandering in state legislatures.
00:03:07.980And so we said, all right, let's go after that problem.
00:03:10.480And so we formed up the National Democratic Redistricting Committee in January of 2017.
00:03:15.140to really promote fairness in the redistricting process.
00:03:19.560Republicans had put together, through a thing called Project Red Map in 2011,
00:03:26.200gerrymanders in a whole variety of states that have endured,
00:03:29.460endured through the course of that whole decade,
00:03:31.880and put in place measures at the state level that people didn't like.
00:03:36.880But nevertheless, Republicans did it and didn't suffer any political consequence because of the gerrymanders.
00:03:42.740And then we had a gerrymandered House of Representatives. And if you look, when we started out, Democrats had to overperform by about 22 percent in order to get to 50-50 in the House of Representatives as a result of what we've done.
00:03:56.120That number is now just about one and a half percent, something like that. We can actually, you know, actually handle that.
00:04:01.620And so we've promoted fairness. And that is fairness has almost been like a weapon for us. We use that word. People like the idea that citizens ought to choose who their representatives are as opposed to politicians picking their voters. And so that's why we have been engaged in this in this fight.
00:04:19.840Mr. Attorney General, so much of what you tried to achieve and pursue in 2017 had a little bit of its origin story and what happened with the Shelby County decision in the Supreme Court, a 5-4 decision in 2013. Remind everybody what happened at the Supreme Court in 2013.
00:04:38.960Okay. 2013, the Supreme Court, as you said, in a 5-4 decision, Chief Justice Roberts writing for the majority, and he stated very famously in his majority opinion that America has changed.
00:04:52.820And as a result, they used that as the basis to take from the Justice Department the ability that it had to pre-clear changes that states wanted to make when it came to all kinds of electoral things, whether it was how lines were drawn with regard to certain districts where polling places should be opened or closed, where voter purges should be allowed.
00:05:18.460took away from the Justice Department the ability to challenge states when they tried to do these
00:05:23.980things. And that has had a really negative impact. We have seen poll closures all around the country.
00:05:30.400It's one of the reasons why you see long lines in certain states. We've seen voter purges that
00:05:35.140disproportionately occur in communities of color, in places where Democrats are perceived to live.
00:05:42.560A whole range of things has happened since the Shelby County case. It's taken the Justice
00:05:47.080Department, not off the field, but certainly taking away from the Justice Department a lot
00:05:51.260of the tools that it once had. And so in an effort to sort of push back, you've been a big
00:05:58.000part of your organization, is also highlighting some of those purges as it relates to the voting
00:06:03.060rolls, highlighting some of what is just overt voter suppression activities as it relates to
00:06:09.480reducing the number of polling options in places. And it led to a lot of victories. And I think
00:06:15.920what I'd love to highlight is not just the problem, but some of your success in terms of
00:06:21.580what your organization has been able to achieve. And I want to get back to Prop 50. I want to get
00:06:25.640back to what's happening, not just in Texas, but across this country at this moment. But talk to
00:06:29.880me a little bit about what you were able to achieve with the organization in 2018, 19, 20,
00:06:36.020over the course of the last decade or so. Yeah. I mean, you know, if you look at the work that
00:06:40.960we have done since 2017 by, you know, focusing, using a state-based strategy, different strategy,
00:06:48.040you know, depending on the state, by supporting candidates who would stand for fairness,
00:06:52.920by challenging laws that were put in place or procedures that were being used in a variety
00:06:57.740of states, by raising the consciousness of people about the importance of fair redistricting,
00:07:03.580by standing for independent commissions and trying to get those in states wherever we could.
00:07:08.380It's interesting. Wherever we tried to get an independent commission, whether it was a red state or a blue state, people overwhelmingly supported them. We got them in Missouri. We got them in Utah. And then Republican legislatures did things to the efforts that we had. But the people always supported them.
00:07:25.120And so that's what we have done, use those different tools. And as a result, we ended up with maps in 2024 that a lot of analysts, as well as the New York Times, produced the fairest maps in generations.
00:07:39.540Now, fairest, but not totally fair. There are still states that are still gerrymandered. If you look at Texas, if you look at Wisconsin, Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, there are still places that are still gerrymandered and are still a focus of our work.
00:07:56.160And a big part of just the gerrymandering, and just to sort of unpack this a little bit more, the racial dimensions cannot be understated, or at least even overstated.
00:08:06.480I mean, so the impacts, the Black community, Hispanic community, talk a little bit more about how that manifests in many of these different states.
00:08:17.540This gerrymandering is done on the backs of people of color.
00:08:22.280And one only has to look at what's going on in Texas now.0.97
00:08:26.160They get there. They think five seats. I think they're being a little optimistic, but they get whatever it is they get out of this this gerrymandering that they're doing at the expense of people of color in largely urban areas, largely Hispanic, but African-Americans, you know, as well.
00:08:45.740We see them, you know, breaking up districts in Austin, Texas and San Antonio and drawing these really weird lines so that you really decrease, dilute the power, the electoral power that communities of color have in Texas.0.52
00:09:01.220Now, they'll try to say this is only partisan. These are only partisan things that we have done as if that somehow makes it better.0.86
00:09:08.200You know, we're not we're not racist. We're just doing things, you know, that are inconsistent with our sense of who we are and consistent with our Constitution.
00:09:16.100But it's only on a partisan basis. But if you look, it always almost always comes down to making it more difficult for people of color to vote and then taking away from people of color, communities of color, the political power that they've long sought and have tried to hold on to.0.73
00:09:36.240So California is one of those states with an independent redistricting commission. It was a commission that when I was mayor, there was an effort to repeal it that I publicly opposed because Blanc supported the idea of independent redistricting.
00:09:49.620And it's a point of pride that this state has been one of the leaders. What happened, however, in Texas changed the equation. And I'm curious just from your prism and your perspective as a champion of independent redistricting as well.
00:10:04.680What does Texas represent to you? And first, if I could just unpack a deeper question. Why do you think President Trump made the phone call to Greg Abbott? Why do you think he even pursued this mid-decade redistricting strategy in the first place?
00:10:23.300Well, before he picked up the phone, he looked at his desk, picked up some papers that said, these are your polling numbers, Mr. President. And he made the determination that unless we cheat, unless we come up with more safe Republican seats, we're in real danger of losing our majority in the House of Representatives.
00:10:42.200And that would really establish a really huge obstacle to doing the kinds of radical things that they have done in the first eight months and want to continue to do over the course of the next three years or so.
00:10:55.660And I think that's the thing that generated the call from the president to the governor in Texas.
00:11:03.080It's an interesting thing. You know, when he called, when the president called those folks in Georgia and said, I need 11,780 votes when it came to the 2020 election, Republicans in Georgia, you know, Secretary of State Raffensperger, a person who I don't agree with on a whole bunch of stuff, you know, they at least had the guts to say, no, we're not going to do that.
00:11:21.680Called Greg Abbott and he expressed some, you know, little concern about it at the beginning, but at the end of the day, did exactly what it is that, you know, the president asked him to do.
00:11:31.880You know, we've always thought of the California Independent Commission as the gold standard.
00:11:36.360It's something that as I've campaigned around the country for fairness, I've always pointed to California.
00:11:41.680And I think the system in California is a great one.
00:11:44.660But I think the determination that you made and other Democrats in California was exactly the right one, given what they did in Texas and what they're doing in other states as well.
00:11:58.860And what I've said, you know, I thought about this long and hard before I said, you know, this is something I think we ought to do because I've been fighting.
00:12:06.060I've been fighting against gerrymandering, either by Democrats or Republicans.
00:12:10.720But I think that what's happening in California makes a great deal of sense.
00:12:17.280It is something that kind of meets this three part test of mine.
00:12:20.640It's got to be responsive. And so it's certainly responsive to that which happened in Texas.
00:12:24.300It's got to be responsible. Didn't go crazy. Just came up with a way in which you try to come up with additional seats.
00:12:30.940And it's got to be temporary. You know, I want to get back to this whole fight for fairness and the way in which it's crafted in California.
00:12:38.500In addition to having the people ultimately vote on it, which is not what happened in Texas, it only will exist until after the next census.
00:12:46.780No, and I appreciate this. And so your evolution was mine as well, as someone that believes in the principle of independent redistricting as well.
00:12:54.300So it wasn't I was an immediate response, frankly, was in response to outreach by legislative leaders in Texas that said, well, hey, California, you know, have our back.
00:13:06.000And we thought it may be a rhetorical play just to support them and say, we're watching, we're paying attention.
00:13:11.580But realizing the consequences of these five seats and how that can tip the balance and rig the next election in the 2026, we were able to fashion a process that, as you say, is temporary, transparent and democratic.
00:13:26.020It's the only maps that are now being presented to the voters themselves.
00:13:30.800They will decide for themselves in the most transparent way and in a temporary way that ends, as you suggest, after the 28, 8 and 30 and into the 32 census will revert back to its original form again, only in response to Texas.
00:13:47.400But I want to ask you to respond. It's not just Texas, is it, Mr.
00:13:51.340attorney general. We're seeing this in Missouri just this week. You're seeing activity in Indiana,
00:13:57.920conversations that are happening in Florida. There's different conditions and criteria in
00:14:03.100Ohio and Utah. Maybe you can give us a lay of the land more broadly. Yeah, I mean, you hit just about
00:14:08.880all the states where this is still being considered. Texas has already done it. Missouri has already
00:14:13.580done it. But those other states are certainly considering it. And Ohio has got to redraw their
00:14:19.560maps because of a constitutional provision there. But the question is, what are Ohio Republicans
00:14:23.940going to do? There is, within the Ohio Constitution, a prohibition against partisan
00:14:29.740gerrymandering. So we'll see what they do in Ohio. What are they going to do in Kansas? What
00:14:34.320are they going to do in Florida? There's a whole range of other states where they've made the
00:14:38.020determination that they're going to really kind of cheat. And that's what it is. You can talk
00:14:42.060about a whole bunch of different things. It's cheating. They're going to cheat to try to hold
00:14:45.660on to the majority that they have in the House of Representatives. And it really comes on the
00:14:50.840basis of fear. They're afraid of the people who they say they want to represent. They're afraid
00:14:56.360of the legislative agenda that they have tried to put in place. They're afraid of the administrative
00:15:02.080things that they have done. They're afraid to be held accountable for, you know, taking a whole
00:15:07.040bunch of good people and a whole variety of government agencies around the country and
00:15:11.300simply told them, you know, get out of here. You're fired. They're afraid of trying to defend
00:15:16.760that which Elon Musk and his doge bros did. It's all a political fear that is driving what it is
00:15:25.600that they're doing. And it's fundamentally un-American and it's unpatriotic. You know,
00:15:31.140it's cheating, but it also goes against that which we do and which makes, I think, this nation
00:15:37.580exceptional. We trust the people to make determinations about policy and the direction
00:15:42.440of the nation. And they want to cut the people out of the process.0.95
00:16:07.580signals to the world that you're not to be played with. And just because you have the capability,
00:16:12.040that does not mean that you need to. Listen and learn the hard way on the iHeartRadio app,
00:16:17.500Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In 2023, Bachelor star Clayton Eckerd was accused
00:16:24.360of fathering twins, but the pregnancy appeared to be a hoax. You doctored this particular test
00:16:30.060twice, Ms. Ellis, correct? I doctored the test once. It took an army of internet detectives