free c-span radio app ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ >> our guest is michael bender h wall street reporting and the author of the brand-new book frankly we did when the selection in the inside story of how trump lost, welcome to the "washington journal", let's start with the title of the book i wanted to play the short segment the wee hours of november 4 early in the morning

the night of the election president is at the white house and many others to let's take a listen toco that moment. >> this is a fraud on the american public, this is an embarrassment to our country, we were getting ready to win this election, frankly we did win this election. [cheering] michael and iconic moment in the inspiration of your title why did you choose that. >> it shows and underscores how trump imposes reality on so many different moments in the night of november 3 we didn't know trump had lost and we didn't know biden had one and here's trump declaring off script living very clearly that he won the race in one of the things that struck people from doing reporting on 2020 was how often he did this weather was the

election, covid, the george floyd protest, his insistence in his messaging is trying to impose his own reality on the current situation no matter what the facts are on the ground. >> another thing about that moment i try to remember if i was up for that orsino first thing in the moment enter morning and on c-span it felt like to me the people in the room were encouraging and i had no idea what he would say next. >> it's about 230 in the morning, wednesday morning for good reason and i did tell this in the book it was a pretty chaotic scene of the white house that night trump did not want to, and address.m the nation thy had encouraged him to come out and give a speech, that line was on the speech there were folks including rudy giuliani who told

other aides to just say despite other people in the room knowing that was not the case and there no data to suggest that. >> before you dive deep into the conversation i want to point out how you set up the book in terms of the background and the interviews of people, many of my trump world sources should their first accounts in internal campaign documents, text messages and e-mails and calendars to reconstruct key moments during the campaign some spoke of an opportunity to share with awi witness from the front row seat to history obviously you been covering the campaign and the full extent of the term presidency from 2016 on, how were you able to gain sources and get people to help you out and comment for you even if off

the record on this book. guest: it's a question i've been a journalist for two dozen years, i bring experiences from newspapers in ohio, florida, before he came to washington and since 2016 i've covered for the wall street journal both campaigns all four years in the white house, wasn't just for this book it was over the course of five years and that people respected my process, my reporting and my writing and through that it's worried both the trust tocy re-create these r people to talk to me there was a fair amount of people that spoke to me in a therapeutic way, there is not a lot of room in the bubble around president trump to criticize him, not criticize him but tell me doing something wrong or tony need to do something different a lot of that spoke to me bluntly and

that they had had an opportunity to do that with their own colleagues. >> your conversations that mar-a-lago and donald trump in one incident he says you're in isolation at home and you get called in for an interview, you have no idea, was that a common occurrence. he called me in april to complain about a story inll the wall street journal that was three days old and it brought me in forat an interview and settig up with the press team and they said please don't call me and tell me i-5 minutes to do this is in the middle of the pandemic and were all over the house we closed off the portraiture now i get a call this is can you be here in five minutes this is before the juneteenth rally i

was surprised they showed up and there was no real message they wanted to know what i wanted to talk about and what was on my mind and the president was a few months away from the election it was stunning that there was no particular plan on trying to get the message or point across. >> was that before or after he had been demoted in the campaign. >> this is a few days before the juneteenth rally in tulsa that is his first and only rally that had an empty seat and it in the initial campaign manager was demoted a month later.s host: how big of an effect was a loss, he was demoted, how much did that hurt in the campaign. >> i think it hurt him at the end of the day, he had never

been a part of any political campaign for trump 2016, this is his first political campaign that he is running but in a weird way it was a perfect campaign manager for donald trump and whatever in the book brad and trump were aligned on how they viewed pr, promotion and branding and saw that to create its own energy in the political movement so effectively brad is an advertising executive and he built a 2 billion-dollar campaign and built an advertising agency, when trump demoted he puts another man who is an effective political strategist but a different kind, more of an accountant than a promotional type person so he built an advertising agency and put an account in charge of it and spent the last couple of months almost rebuilding the entire campaign from the inside out.

.host: that tulsa rally was a bs wasn't it. guest: definitely i write in the book no one wanted to tell trump, usually on his way to rallies it's a race to the president to tell him how many people inside, how many people are waiting outside and that grows by a fewew thousand, 5000 every side but in tulsa instance no one would o tell him that it was a bust in far shorter projections until he was inside the arena in the green room in the holding room and turns on fox news and see some talking about the numbers on television. host: michael bender is the guest frankly we did win the election the inside story of how trump lost, we welcome your calls and comments 2,027,784,000, 202,784,000 for republicans in 202,748,002 for independence and all others, we

had a couple of weeks ago michael wolf on the end of the term presidency, one of the things that i noticed that differs you spend a lot of time talking about the front row shows the folks that will loyal at the trump rallies, who were the front rows. guest: i appreciate you bringing that up there is a vertical library going back to the 80s it be more this year what makes this unique not only among books that if, out already but what's coming forth its come out of three ways inside the room moments to the oval office under the $2 billion campaign and also i think exclusively some of trump's most loyal supporters the folks ago to 30, 40, 50 trump rallies and i do that in

order to understand what about them as people bringing them over and over and over again and what it is about trump that attracted them in the first place in order to understand the movement which is important not just in the context of 2020 but moving forward, even after january 6 trump is drawing thousands of people to the rally in ohio last month, thousands more to a rally in florida this month and is still important to understand why people keep coming back after what happened on january 6. host: your room white house reporter from washington you're the president's nemesis and you're in the cage and the rallies, how did they the front row come to trust you? >> i showed up i would've done mostly in reporting on trump's loyalist you walked to the front

of the line and you do a quick interview and wait for the most while this quote you can get in you rundown walk away, we talked a lot about topics but i wanted to know who they were, where they came from and what their families thought about some of these folks came out for days at a time i was out with them ten, 11, 12:00 o'clock at night or early in the morning and i effectively became a member of the front row joe's and they were calling me wondering if i wanted to split with them at the next rally. . . . point, they effectively

became a member -- they effectively, i became a member of the front row joe's. some of these folks were warmhearted kind people at their core. i was honored to be able to tell their stories. host: tell us briefly about one of the front row joe's. >> basically what i found is a lot of the folks who go to these rallies are attracted to trump, but they have tanning on their hands. they are -- but they have time on their hands. they are retired and they form a community. the election. randall gets so sick in the summer of 2020. >> i don't want to give away the punchline he is in the 60s, he's a smoker he knows the risks of covid.

he is convinced he has covid. he can barely get out of bed he had his neighbors bring out the groceries. but he refuses to go to the hospital, he refuses to get tested because he does not want to add to trumps numbers positive or negative. >> he told you that? >> per x probably. he did recover from that sickness. it was one of the stories you hear of how loyal somebody's fields of donald trump. >> michael our guest he's the author of a brand-new book frankly we did win this election for the inside story of how trump lost. we welcome your comments. this code at leesburg, virginia dear from karen. karen go ahead. >> hello good morning. i am a democrat, african-american but i knew quite a few people whether

they're going to vote in the election but i will tell you one thing that resonates with them as most of the hate a cheater and a liar. i don't care where you are from. whether you are in ruralth nebraska and in a bingo hall or you are on the job and you know who was a habitual liar. i think the dechert with trump is the service. the following the rhetoric, following the mad man when he leverage the postal office and we saw pictures of post office boxes at the people said that's it. we knew he was doing everything he could. you could not hide behind the election, it was a direct tangible physical thing and

said i'm going to make it very difficult for you to vote and people were like i am done. a few to change his position on the coronavirus once he started post office boxes he cut that budget it was done. and so many people said i am headed to the polls to matter what. i'm going to stand in line because they took the po box off the corner. you could not be an integrity person do something like that. it is so bold and so brazen and thinking now you've got my attention. and that is what did it. with that is what brought out a lot of people who had never voted. they did not like biden but they did not like the way trump handled it. to me that was the icing on the cake. >> i think karen raises some good points here. one is on the post office trump was very open about what he was doing here. he did now and to encourage

people to vote by mail he was very concerned about that. i think to karen's point here, and get into this a little bit in the book here, thehe boomerang effect this has. there's a lot of people in the middle of 2020 with some these rules started changing in the shifted towards a mail in or absentee voting people will worried about errors in the process. like basic marketing.ch you're always someone who buys her shirts and pants in a store you do not want to try to get that person to start buying online. there's a chance their patterns break here. there is fear people are not going to follow the rules, get the directions wrong there talked up. what trump effectively does sears put so much attention on

mail in ballots it has the opposite effect. numbers on the book first time mail in voters the error rate was way down from a normal is in other states when the start to implement the electioneering. >> visit the post campaign that they could have emphasized mailwh in ballots and deadweight better? >> one 100%. the trump campaign, the trump white house, the committee there's one person who is worried about fraud, widespreadad fraud and that's donald trump great senior people around trump had asked time and again to hit the brakes on this kind of rhetoric. it was going to hurt the people, republicans. in the proof of that is places like florida or republicans have been competitive and successful for long time.

republicans were responsible for putting in absentee voting and vote by mail per this does not inherently hurt republicans. >> went to ask about charlottesville, particularly will shorten that phrase. youho write about the business of fallout, the departure from the president's strategic policy form. nomos chief economic advisor, you write in the book later in a private meeting inside the oval office : unloaded on the present told him his lack of clear tape and harmful to the country put an incredible amount of people working in the white house. he told trump he might have to quit. no one backed him up. others in the room including the vice president mike pence or been quiet. but you're right he did return to his office after the meeting broke up following a few minutes behind, pence climb the flight of stairs

appeared at the threshold of cohen's door, i am proud of you pence told him safely out of earshot of the president. with that atypical sort of behavior of the vice president? >> it was. the vice president is very loyal to president trump. in my reporting find one instance where he really pushed back on donald trump read thousand when the president accused him of trying to hire one of his own aides when it turned out they had discussed that and the president's son-in-law had asked mike pence to make thathe hire. it's important to forget to january 6 when trump repeatedly asked pence to overturn the election, the fair and free election. pence and his team that they had been very clear with trump he did not have that report authority. my reporting maybe it wasn't

so clear. when he told him no that was nested in a bunch of maybes. one line i have in the bookk aside don't think i have the authority to do this. but whatever your legal team comes up with i will take a look at. the president hears that second part. when interviewed dropped a couple of times out of mar-a-lago after the presidency told me pence had never told him no. that may or may not be rights but that isnt certainly what trump came away with. >> is going to ask you this earlier. you interviewed the president. he calmly assume he is okay with people talking to reporters since he talks to reporters. >> he's not okay with people talking to reporters. he wants to be a cheap that's sure. hesu had me down because he wants to he wants his message and part of this book wants to be able to sway some of these

scenes and shape them but i found into interviews over several hours as almost every question i asked him, was brought back to election fraud in 2020. conspiracies in arizona, that sort of thing. >> you may not want to answer this. over the course of your reporting on the president during his presidency, was he the source of some leaks either to your organization or other news, organizations? >> there were a lot of leaks coming out of that white house at all levels i think. >> let's hear from nancy in stratford, connecticut independent line go-ahead. >> caller: good morning. this is a very serious statement and question. we all know and heard then president of the united states trump asking the georgia secretary of state find me 11000 votes.ea

now the gop successfully passed state laws to be able to do this in the future, change votes. be very upfront, mr. bender, how close is america close to being a banana republic? >> you are right to be concerned about that phone call with the georgia secretary of state. there are measures underway, discussions underway for election protections in washington. those are going to be difficult to approve. not just that congress is divided. urthere's a very large segment of the republican base that believe trump actually did win the election 2020 but even republican leaders know that is not correct. they think trump is onto something by using election

security as a motivator. it says this is deafly something to watch in the next couple of years heading into the midterms. >> will go to the republican line, this is a plymouth, north carolina go-ahead. >> good morning how are you? >> host: find things you are on the air. >> caller: how are you today? >> guest: fine thank you. >> caller: it's been a long morning i have watched several segments. my comment, i'm going to try to keep it short, i think you're getting too wrapped around in america today inng american politics but always from bipartisanship up to the conversation about who won the election. and at this point i won't even argue that point because i think it is a dead horse. and i think that's exactly part of the issue. my issue is democrat, republican, libertarian, it

does not matter bipartisanship it does not matter. we in america that too wrapped up van jones interview people during the presidential did not particularly like trump racial things and a big farmer about too go under. but the policy is generally a conservative thinker

especially people of color do not trust their local people. they looked towards the federal government to make states do what they should own to a discussion, especially in congress, the house, the senate about what is right or wrong for the national welfare. and earlier, a veteran ofss world war ii, it is interesting bipartisanship issued and the trump issue has gone so far right or left that it is hard to know what is right or wrong. >> are right we will let you go there, michael bender. >> i think his point there is a personality versus policy question. there were a lot of policies

of president trump that had wide support across the country. it overshadowed a lot of concerns about his personality. it ends up hurting him in the end was there was less focus on the policy. president trump came into an office as a change agent not like president obama. a lot of the front wrote josiah spoke to and got to know were obama supporters caught up in the celebrities and ending the endless wars and there was some overlap on the last two presidency previous two presidents. in the end it becomes personality for president trump. says write this book how many people around the president and the white house and campaign had thought he'd become dangerous in those last six months at the white house

in his own desperation to hold on to office. he was willing tos go to most any measure necessary in order to keep his own -- to stay in the west wing. he wanted to shoot americanry spread even military officials and defense officials people protesting the george floyd civil rights abuses should be shot in the leg, shot in the foot have their skulls cracked. >> you write about watch the video and air force one with the president his reaction after that. on his expressions on condolences to the family that's quite a change toth what happened a couple of weeks later in front of lafayette square. >> it's a very good example of a personality versus policy does take him if you days

before he watches the floyd video he never watches the whole thing but is deeply affected by the video as all of us where we watch that in real time when it happened. president trump is a very visceral person. he learns and absorbs things by watching them more than reading. when we attacked sierra in his first year in office was after he had seen a video of children affected by chemical weapons. but it quickly turns. this is that never report seen in the book. he views the protest in a personal apron people are protesting a murder. with civil rights abuses and internalize it as personal. it is seen his push through some criminal justice reforms.

head push the permanent funding for historically black colleges and universities. in the way he vocalizes this to his staff as i did all of these things and black people still hate me. they are never going to vote for me. he merely turns on a dime here and doubles down on the law and order image and wants to disperse the crowd, once used uniformed active-duty military to healthy protest protest. >> who are the aides encouraging that change? >> guest: there are a few of heard one of my scenes in book these are big meetings in the oval office, ten, 12, 15 people in these meetings. and into the summer steven miller is describing the cities burning. american cities and burning. market-leading joint chief of staff determine the top general in the u.s. military has the data here.

he sees this percentage of cities have protest. find in those cities a tiny fraction of people are protesting. these are not cities down. these are images on television that the president aides are reacting too. he swivels in his seat and swivels a back to steven miller and tells them to shut up, in the oval office. another is a portrait of abraham lincoln over the president's shoulder he said that man, mr. president is an insurrection. we have the protest. >> host: colleen independently go-ahead. t >> caller: real quick, will first this is coming from a person who voted for ross perot. that is where my stances i still revert back to my vote for ross perot.

everything he said has come true. the two-part question for michael bender, who gave the order? i want to know who the person is who gave the order to the entire media complex to ignore the will of the people by completely halting and stopping the election results of our president by refusing to report who won the election. it did not come down to one state mica did with bush and gore with florida. because fox news reported arizona way ahead of biden winning arizona. they obviously knew he won arizona when it was showing trump was way ahead at the time. it cannot be about the ballots because of fox arizona head. so, who gave that order? that is what i would like to know. >> there was no order for the media to report this one way or the other.

news organizations, fox news to the associated press had put two project winners get it right. the entire reputation on these decisions. how many ballots are left, a lot has been written on this. in the news organizations brought a way to explain their methods and procedures for these calls with. >> call for youal on twitter with the description of being called into the white house with an interview with the president. they say you are a journalist for that cannot think a bigger complement to give a living in today's political scene.

breathe left on in the office waiting for the president oray be in the middle of a rally? >> when this movement was fresh and brand-new for all of us were i made sure when i got into rallies to note the exits and the way out in case something happened. it's not the first time i felt like that covering a political event. >> is you ever see a reporter, collie get roughed up or have their equipment damaged or anything? >> no. i definitely saw shouting matches, finger pointing that sort of stafford friends who did get roughed out but never that eyewitness of my own two eyes or was there in the moment. in chicago, 2016 by. >> how many rallies you think you covered over the course of 2016? have you ever run a tally on that? >> i haven't.

this is where i attained an honorary joe's status. estimate to some of our rallies and ask what the favorite moments were. quickly realized i'd been toro 50 or 60 per. >> i heard the trump supporters paid to attend those rallies and trump pays them to attend. do you see any evidence of that? >> i will say the very first rally so to speak when he announced in york the famous golden escalator moments, we had a reporter on the scene who said tourists have been brought in from outside to help fill up the atrium there on that date. to this and have yet to meet anyone out in the rallies, out in the country these arenas, never been to the new york event. these are real things these are real events, these are

real people showing up for to support donald trump. >> donald trump was a tugboat's new book, let's hear from thomas and strongsville, ohio republican line. >> good morning. i was just wondering if you could enlighten us how much the media played in this election? because obviously they were very biased. a lot of unknown authors coming forward in leaks. i just wondered what your thoughts were on that. >> thomas hello to everyone and strongsville that is where i'm from, my hometown. the media always has a role one way or the other in these elections.

we are hearing the stories and we hear these races, it's more of a mere with people getting information from so many different sources these days. when people asked me about the people kind of things and how much it played a role in defeating trump, president trump went out of his way to speak to the media at the white house at events. i brought multiple authors down to mar-a-lago.t he sees a very important role for the media whether it is fox news, the wall street journal, the washington post or c-span. he has acknowledged as much publicly as well. >> let's go to richmond, virginia on the democrats line.

>> good morning. i voted absentee and is kind of tricky because it was a post office and covid. what i did as i requested in absentee ballots and then hand delivered it to a drop box which was on the other side of town. things are rather complicated. i did want to comment thank goodness we don't have another four years of 45. and thank goodness for the free press and journalism. thank you. >> want to ask you your writing but the role of melania and trump in the final weeks. this is about election night just before the election night rally. the few write the constant use of the white house for political purposes also made her uncomfortable. to try to stop the campaign from using it, or office slow walk several requests from the campaign ahead of the rnc. the convention, she delivered

her speech from the rose garden. the present would not accept his parties nomination on the south lawn. did it said surprise you the first lady took such a contrary view to at the president wanted to do in that case? >> yes and no. monia trump is very much a germ phobic it did not surprise me. she is almost homeopathic and how she approaches health and medicine. it did not surprise me she was very concerned about covid and taking precautions. it didn't surprise me how much back-and-forth there had been ahead of that election night party. she'd made repeated requests for the chief of staff to use the white house. the first lady's office traditionally is in charge of events in the white house. that approval he succumbed to her offices why she was involved. it takes president trump a few days before election night to

phone his wife frome air force one and plead with her to use the white house. they cannot go anywherech else. >> because of d.c. law they cannot use the hotel right? >> everywhere across the country that point. she effectively throws her hands appearances do whatus you want. you are going to anyway. think this is important in the sense of how many people around trump tried to act as guardrails for him. tried to dissuade his decisions one way or the other. it and up being more speed bumps and guard rail. >> is that also true. >> i think so. unsaved you want about them orr their policies, they are pretty effective relatively.

they're keeping the president focused and drifters away for lack of a better term. an trump surrounded by experts and when it matters here he was on his own policy initiative with the peace plan but he sees the direction this is going paid the people in georgia they are pleading with jared. he's shown his effectiveness at directing the president, pleading with him for help. he tells them no i can't. through the giuliani is involved at this point and there's nothing i can do. some of the georgia republicans were stunned they'd never do anything like

that from jared before. >> let's hear from tony in tampa. on the independent line. >> how are you doing? >> i just want to say that media attacked his character. but especially as theef conservative leader they never had a reporter hold him accountable. 25billion in the first buzzer to build a wall which he passed on. it took 15 miles and rebuilt he had put up originally. instead of getting taken out we work later on to get it replaced will go back to the old system, that they want. he takes the tax off of it it becomes three times as many people signed up than what obama had. as far is jared and melania,

they brought the crime bill, this empowerment zone, all of these other policies he did not came a campaign on at all. the hedge fund guy when he he promised four and five gdp every month. we've got 3% gdp one month since the tax cuts. nothing was maced based on the stock market and corporate bonds. he traded 6 million bucks. for some went with the best economy had $680 billion in welfare programs. >> couple of issues there, michael bender. >> guest: i think he raises some interesting pointsuc here. to tony's point is how

ill-serveder the president was by all of the in fighting underneath him. the president's top priority from day one of inauguration's reelection. they filed paperwork that day in order to start the wheels on the reelection campaign. i could not sit here and tell you one other person around him for four years who shared their top priority. >> and other an ongoing campaign. >> tony raises some points have you start out a little differently with someop different policies there are some decisions -- the wall. no one took that campaign promises. no one owned that around him to get that done and make sure is done in the way he wanted.

we see that all the way through until the final race when the top aides have a come to jesus moment meeting ande make sure they're all in the room for some of these decisions for their all invited to the same meetings, these are the things that arep happening. i am convinced he's not well served and ultimately his staff around him.he but he is the president and the buck stops with him. the responsibility lays with him. it's contentious they get they describe the chairs in front of the president's desk, quite a scene there. >> in one of my interviews with the wall street journal to the course of the for your site asked about some of the infighting of what he was doing about it. he kind of threw up his hands

and they're all fighting over who loves me the most. former president terms future texas sent trump suggested declaring himself president for life. do you think he is testing the waters to see if he could get enough support to do that? >> he's definitely thinking about running for president again. 2022 is going to be informative on that decision. he has made two dozen endorsements so far put everything from the u.s. senate some he has endorsed a nfrepublican primaries. he is endorsing challengers instead of sitting members of congress with the senate easy nathing to pull off even for aen former president as popular as he is within the country. there is also to help determine which way he goes in 2024. i think this shows, outlines

in some new ways this president as a candidate heading into 2022 republicans have a choice whether or not, or how to redefine their party post trump. and whatever decision that is, this book says they cannot go into that decision. there's no excuse whether to go into that decision with other than eyes wide open. >> republican line. >> caller: yes, goodev morning. i like to ask just a couple of questions. to bunch of trump rallies andpu trump supporters. i mean from the wall street journal part. >> yes sir. all events where i was working

always identified myself as a wall street journal reporter and talk to people specificallyir for the book after the election. >> they do you were in a conservative reporter. you say you were never attacked but yet in this book you consider trump supporters i'm really tired of being demonized for exercising my right. >> you should be assigned in this book i don't call anyone not caesar brownshirts. he had long been given a wink and a nod of some of those elements in america and in the party. all the way from charlottesville and the joint chief of staff chairman is

questioning whether some of the hires that the presence ofbr bringing into the administration may have ties. but certainly i don't identify any of these book number of rallies she comes to the capitol, washington for january 6. she says in this that if mike pence would have come out of that building i guarantee he would have died, saunders said. if it was not my gun fire he would've been pummeled. they were going to kill him in the street. does that surprise you? >> that shocked me. saunders out the rally inld january 6. as in the march up to the capitol that afternoon. >> that she get inside the capitol? >> she did not. she was with several people, friends. it was so crowded she only got

to the west front of the capitol. and they did not want to lose each other so they just sort of stopped and took in the scene, and took in the moment. but what she was describing to me was the march from the mall to the capitol pence put out a statement in settings not going to overturn the results. this was news to sondra and the trump supporters because trump had been telling everybody had been telling them for weeks that pence might do this. >> touches on it at the speech before the rally. >> the reporting and the journal that pence was not going to do it. pence office did not go they

did not push back. it was the trump media where they are getting their information from him. they felt subscribed pence would do this. sondra described a moment of -- surge of energy that went for my walk into a run. needs get pence chance starts on the way to the capitol per. >> what is the relationship between the former president mike pence? >> i do not even know if there are words to describe that relationship. they are speaking to each other their multiple phone calls. it's phone calls back and forth. i've not spoken to mike pence i spoke to president trump about it.he if you are donald trump and you believe pence has effectively committed treason

and was so disloyal to turn an election against you before you start these conversations again? he told me was a just don't talk about it. >> list get a couple more calls will go to joe in somerset, new jersey. joe republican line hi there. >> caller: good morning gentlemen how are you? i have a few questions for you. first of all i'm not a trump fan. i know him personally there is a relationship to my grandmother and him what he did to my family and people in atlantic city. he is a liar and a cheat i have no liking for trump. in the election itself there are questions that have to be answered. it is not a big lie. there are questions that have

a never been answered that we also their own two eyes. let's go to philadelphia right off the bat. number one my mother in the 70s was a republican inspector she went to neighborhoods that were worse than vietnam. she had to inspect the election counting. in philadelphia there's an incident for publican with an orange sign guy candidate african-american guy and pushed him away and said you're not getting in here. then a woman comes out and push them away said you're not getting out of here i will call the police. they went in and locked the door he could not go into the building for a. >> go there, joe any response on these claims? >> anecdotes are not data have looked at trump'se own justice department has

looked at these instances. all of them have concluded there's no widespread fraud. election security can alwaysth be improved. i vote by mail processes are legitimate debates but there is no election fraud on to claim that trump won the election 2020 is a big lie. >> the president continues to talk about though pretty back on the many rallies speaking in phoenix. trump returns to and predicts it will vindicate him. did you ask about these continued rallies? >> my interviews for him or couple must refer the rally started up again. is more in the transition moment between post- presidency and not quite ready to get back on the campaign trail yet. i was in cleveland for his

first rally in june the first one since january 6. half ofte that rally was points of election fraud. trump talked for four years about election night when in 2016 and lawton 2020. it's an interesting strategy fees going to try to talk about his loss the next four years and then try to win. >> here is john and liverpool, new york democrat line. >> yes guys, let's remember that although trump lost republicans did well. trump is an abrasive guy and that hurt him. now i work with a bunch of people who think trump won the election. i talked to them what makes you think. a lot of times it gets back to computer issues. i am near 70 years old. computers kind of scarere me.

they talk about how easily it would be for a computer to steal 20000 votes or one guy and get them to a another guy or wipeout this and that. how can you make a person like me confident these computer atrocities don't exist? >> host: i guess that's a question for 2022 the president backing so many republican nominees. yet still talking about malfunctions in the election system, fraud and the election system. does that serve him well to continue talking about that? >> or some republicans who think that whateverne they can use at this point to motivate the base as a positive. including things like security or trump won a. >> yours is one of several books coming out about the election. michael wolf with his book did

you expect so much competition your writing this? >> after the election after the books were announced it was a little harrowing. this is my first book. >> replanning to write on the election before the results? x yes they went into 20 knowing to write a election book. i knew i had the reporting to work for me too do not have a tv show or huge social media presence. i've other things that sell books for first-time authors. i do let the reporting to the work to compete with these other journalists and authors have with well-earned reputation spread quickly back on the biden feed yet? >> probably keep worrying about trump. >> michael bender the brand-new book frankly we did

win the elect this election the inside story of how trump lost. thanks for being with us. >> thanks for having me. ♪ ♪ >> c-span's washington journal every day take your calls live on the air and we discussed policy issues that impact you. coming up tuesday morning, arkansas republican congressman french hill discusses white covered 18 cases due to the delta variance. and the divided administration economic agenda. than afl-cio president now current congressional legislation could affect union. also, "washington post" reporter on their new book i alone can fix it. donald j trump catastrophic final year. watch c spans "washington journal" seven eastern be sure to join the discussion for facebook comment.