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connected. we are doing our part switzerland easier to do yours. sparklight supports c-span is a public service along with his other television providers give you aow seat to democracy. >> we are joined by salena zito, national political reporter for the "washington examiner" also a columnist with the near post here to talk about aspects of the campaign 20.4. thanks for your time this morning that youd thanks for me. >> host: you can ask when this but in 2016 you traveled across the country because you wanted to get a sense on politically before the election. i want to ask you about that but factor into how things have changed since you made this initial travels. >> guest: well, traveling across the country is sort of always been away that i approached howick of american politics, whether it's presidential election or you know a midterm election. that's also significant in a lot

of ways in a lot of people's lives. in 2016 i decided the best way to sort of capture the most important states in this election meaning pennsylvania, ohio at the time if you remember in 2008, in 2012 ohio had given their votes to barack obama. so very much a battleground state. it also wisconsin,]thi that was also a state that had at one time given barack obama their votes. i wanted to see, i went across the lincoln highway which is u.s. 30, and only take the back roads because of the it's more significant to understand not just visually what you see, how places are coming back or how places were detained, but also capture the sentiment of people. i came back and i wrote

basically this election is over and we just don't, , people just don't know whatpl yet. i understood that donald trump was appealing to voters, in particular in counties where he shouldn't have been doing well. counties that were traditional counties. it doesn't mean he was forming a coalition just with democrats, but he was,emocrats were joining republicans, including reluctant republicans who didn't really care for his style but were not happy with the status quo. there were not happy with hillary clinton. they hadn't felt as though joining barack obama they had been prosperous or that their needs were being heard. so that's how i understood it back then. fast-forward to 2020 i think it's important to add 2020s in this. i did but always do, i can back

roads talky people in the places where they are, in the neighborhoods, bowling alleys, coffee shops, wherever people in a community congregate. and what i learned then was is that voters were, remember, 2020 was in the middle of right? that was a very difficult time for people and while they had felt as though they had done better under trump, very unhappy in a lot of ways about hiswa comportment. and so 2222 gone either way, and that was my conclusion. i could see that it going in either direction and was pretty clear that in particular older americans were unhappy, meaning senior citizens were unhappy with trump's comportment because if you think about it, a lot of older americans dumb senior citizens have lost friends, lost family members, and they thoughh

the dignity andt the seriousnese dignity that those losses the surge. if you look at the in 2020 and the senior citizense narrowly lost to joe biden. fast-forward to today, still doing the same thing, still on the road. i don't live in washington, d.c. or new york. i live in western pennsylvania, as i like to call it the paris of appalachia. a lot of these voters are the types, are the kinds of voters that will decide the election. that's what i try to focus on. people who live in pennsylvania not ohio anymore, ohio has gone solidly red. i can imagine biden making compelling enough argument to them to go back to being

democrat. but also spending a lot of time in michigan and wisconsin. north carolina. these are the states that it going to decide the election. >> host: what's working if you focus on those things in the voters of 20.4, what's working in the former president favor and what's working against him? >> guest: him. so i wrote a piece recently, you know, a year ago everyone was talking up what's happening in east palestine, the ohio town t. and sort of a lack of response by, or perceived lack of response, or at least perceived lack of empathy from the biden administration. i will say that east palestinian is not even an hour away from her and live. it's where my great grandparents are from. it was, the federal response

wasn't there. however, the visual of president biden showing up was not present, or even the visual transportation secretary pete buttigieg. but donald trump who was down in the polls in that time, this is about february 22 of 2023, he was down in the polls. a lot of republican voters were very unhappy and/or skeptical of him because of what happened in the midterms in the past november. a felt as though he it had supported candidates that were not unable to win in a general election. so he was probably at his lowest point. he showed up to that east palestinian, and use walking around and just watching the people responded to him being there, to him showing up and he

helped to i forgive him of bottled water he brought with him. i wrote down at the time, well, if this has able to redeem himself and he's able to eat off some like a ron desantis who ha a remarkable win in november of 2022, it happen here. it's because he out of anyone who was in the running are considering running for it was president, he showed up toho defend. and that projection is important because when voters seers visuas such as that, they see themselves in the moment. there was this great song back in the '80s that billy joel called, saying called allentown, right? and it wasn't just not our intent. i canou remember people where i lived and where i grew up feeling that moment of watching

their town decay. and trump understood intuitively that that was an important place to show up, and so i think that was h turning point. >> host: our guests with us until 8:45 if you would ask you questions about aspects of 202-748-8000 for democrats. 202-748-8001 for republicans and 202-748-8002 for independents. you can text us at 202-748-8003. ms. zito what is your assessment we passed i will enhance your looking had t to south carolina? what asia-pacific and the former president becoming the presumptive nominee? haleyactoring how nikki factors in. >> guest: so i was not in new hampshire. i was in iowa ahead of the caucus there. i think that nikki haley had in

her final days leading up to new hampshire had run a very, very good campaign. she was making aw good, compelling argument, but it certainly wasn't enough to get her even narrowly close to president trump. we have seen tht before and i know it seems like a one million years ago, but john kasich did this in 2016. ted cruz did this in 2016, they played the long delegates and ni haley has an argument to stay in their until super tuesday. however, i understand why she is doing it. is 2024, we know there is some kind of crazy disaster that happens.

i understand why she is staying in. she will get delegates that she is there in case something happens. if things continue into trajectory that they're going, it is very difficult to imagine her path forward. host: one of the cases she has made his age, competency, do you think thaen we look at who may e presumptive candidate for each party? guest: i think that is a very effective argument if you are a republican running against joe biden. there moments where he struggles with names, where he is. in terms of being at an event

and talking about another place. he is 81 and she has an effective argument. in terms of competencies she has an effective argument. at the end of 2020 one was when afghanistan happened and people believed that while america should leave afghanistan but they believe how we left was incompetent. he has never regained traction in the polling. not going to east was perceived as incompetent. ignoring hawaii while it was burning, people view that as a

coveted. she has a compelling argument. with donald trump, there are hundreds of different ways to say he is vulnerable but i don't thinkcompetency is the best argt to go against him. he has plenty of other problems. host: our guest is with us until 8:45. you are on with our guest salena zito from the washington examiner. caller: i am a true independent. i left party over its obsession with daca. but i believe republicans are socially acceptable fashions. no candidate is talking about the rise of corporate landlords responsible for 50% of home puhases which is causing the

housing crisis in first-time homeowners to be wiped out. i would like to add that donald trump is not an intelligent individual. he has a lot of grievance and supported january 6 people who in my opinion, committed treason. the whole world saw him direct people to attacked the capital. i find your guest rather partisan when she tas about dohio and hawaii in these other places where donald trump never went to jackson, mississippi and she doesn't seem like someone cloaked in reality if she thinks donald trump is a candidate. guest: the famous quote i don't

know anyone who voted for nixon. you talked about land ownership. local issues, candidate should do a better job running on those issues. because those are the that affect people's daily lives and they feel those are that are ignored. ohio has changed. it was once a measurable battle republicans have run thece democrats out of the state. however now, i am working on a y

about the race between sharad brown, who has held that seat since 2006. it is really having a struggle running against a republican even though they don't know who the candidate is going to be at. in terms of donald trump, pele like you they like. no matter what stars you throw at them, when you throw those darts they tend to like that person more. the same with joe biden, i can't believe anybody would vote for joe bidethere were plenty of peo voted for joe biden and they will come out and vote for him again. host: in florida, phil is on the

line for republicans. caller: i did vote for trump in 2016. i did not vote for him in 2020 and i probably will not vote in 2024. when we had the pandemic, i thought he was in way over his head. he didn't know what he was doing. i know a lot of people were scared if we have another crisis you have a president who was very ineffective. he got the vaccine going but governors were bidding on ventilators, confined gloves, i will probably not vote for him. guest: i have written about this

a lot in the past couple of years. partisan vulnerabilities into the point i made in the beginning, these are the type of voters that trump lost in 2020. to her point, he did not handle covid correctly and that was his challenge that year and he did not rise to the occasion as needed. i did a series earlier this year for the pittsburgh gazette with a look at three groups of voters. voters who were ride or die died biden, and rider died trump voters. there is a striking amount of voters who just don't want to relive 2020 again not just with

politics but it is a reminder of the year of covid in the year that changed everybody's life. you lost your job, a friend, a family member. in putting that match up again is another reminder of how much 2020 impacted your life. host: manny from florida on the independent line. caller: i am from pennsylvania and anyone who knew donald trump in the 70's and 80's. i remember going down to atlantic city, donald trump has always destroyed unions and small businesses. for anyone to think he is the workinclass, a hundred thousand dollars a year you should not be voting

for donald trump. if you go into the tax laws that were passed with donald trump of the republic kids you are screwing yourself. people that vote for trump and think that he is for the working class. the republican party has given themselves to china. donald trump is not an exception , he is made a career stealing from working-class people. guest: theueclass, union, laboru want to pull them together. these are the voters that are in

the crosshairs of american politics. to his point, his perception of trump is that he is for the management and not the working class and the perception of biden, is that is working towards eliminating their jobs. what do i mean by that? jobs in the energy industry or automobile industry in which a green workforce and climate out, a lot of these fighters say, i don't like trump but i don't like what biden is doing because he is eliminating my job.

i think voters are caught in the crosshairs are the union, working class voter. host: what about the recent -- from unions? endorsement from the unions? guest: since bill clinton, union workers, laborers have moved away from the democrats and moved towards republicans and working class voters have shifted towards republicans. they know when the majority, republicans don't. look very different today. there are social justice unions but they are all lumped together when you look at exit polls.

union leadership is at odds with the rank and file and even the uaw president admitted that his rank and file vote for biden despite the endorsement. host: the voting population, women in light of the recent verdicts with the e. jean women voters in swing states. if there were to be a close election his comments could sway what is its appeal to women especially t >> gue complicated. so let's think back. let's walk back a couple years

to 2016. september 2016. 16. it comes.. down to, the c he say their something. and pretty much everyone wrote his obituary at the moment. it was six ahead of, seven weeks ahead of election day and people didn't think that female voters were going to vote for that didn't happen. they did fall for it. 2020 did not vote for him. i don't know what happened in 2024. is it bacon that donald trump is just going to be this crass person towards these voters and their so upset because a b and c in the life? may be. i think it's too early to determine that i don't care what the it's too early to determine what that the impact is going to be, like come back to me in the third week of october and i will let you know what i think is going to happen with women voters.

because they are single issue voters. they are voters that have a multitude of concerns that range from caring for an elderly parent to having young children, to all sorts of other things. so i think that we need to watch election evolves come see what the most important issue is going to be. right now it's immigration and inflation. but maybe, you know, war is also on the table and then that changes the voters minds again. so i just think it's too early to figure that out yet. >> host: how does abortion policy factor in to that? >> guest: it depends on how th .. and an incredibly personal issue.

it is and a lot of people's mind, you have a percentage of people in one direction and a squishy middle. by the individual candidates. host: this is salena zito she serves a national political reporter publication in the new york post. even pennsylvania democrat line. >> you mentioned allentown in your segment. >> will need this program here you can finish watching on c-span.org. now coverage here on c-span.