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[applause] announcer: today's veterans day ceremony replaying the --at the --b of the unknown shoulder soldier replaying on c-span. across the country members of congress participating in activities and tweeting about it as well. there is a competent jim mcgovern "proud to be in belchertown for veterans day as we honor all of our veterans

thanks to representative marie who joined." "it is wonderful to see so many people supporting our veterans with so many veterans and active duty in our midst." mademust uphold promises to veterans and support them after their service." congressman from ohio saying "thank you for your service and including this video." 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month -- each year we recognized the anniversary of the end of world war i by recognizing the men and women who served our great nation. we recognize the veterans day through ceremonies and speeches and speak of conflicts and the numbers involved. while they are all important, we also must remember individual service and sacrifice. our nation has promised not to forget, yet so many veterans

pass without speaking of their experiences. we should celebrate this day by telling their stories. i partnered with the library of congress veteran history project to in sure stories are not forgotten. as we promise not to forget we must ensure the individual veteran is not forgotten. ensure world war ii veterans are able to have their experience preserved in the library of congress. note different. -- was no different. he was a good guy and he knew what he was doing. supremeer was the commander and he never held a combat unit, but he was what they call a strategist. he was good. we lost a lot of people because the weather was bad. i will tell you about patent -- general patton. "i want youchaplain

to write me a prayer." hewas very religious and made it out that they and had it redone for all of the guys. the next day, here come the bombers knocking them out left and right. without the open air battle we would have taken a beating and that saved our next. we were surrounded, but general there,that planes over he had to go 100 miles in the guy was retired, but he did it. , he wasn'tglory scared of nothing. he wasn't scared of nothing. fromncer: video .ongressman renee c -- renacci

the new york daily news reporting that jeff miller is under consideration to be veteran secretary. congressman miller who endorsed donald trump did not say he would take the job if offered, but neither did he rule out the prospect of serving in a trump cabinet. read more at the new york daily news. next up, pollsters, reporters, and political scholars analyze voter turnout in a look at demographics and the ability of president-elect trump to -- work with congress. and the future of the democratic party. good evening, everyone. my name is bruce robbins and it is a pleasure to welcome you here. robbins ands ruth

it is a pleasure to welcome you here. introduce anyone come a couple of quick details. if you have a phone please turn it off or silence it. number two, everyone wants to sit up straight and put on nice smiles because c-span is taping us tonight. rut i have the pleasure of introducing theh: moderator -- introducing the moderator who is

kenneth. our panelists tonight are jeff hunt, and mr.asey morris. we also brought in sarah murray. please join me to welcome ken walsh and our death -- and our guests. [applause] ken: thank you all for coming. i want to thank the panelists for being here and the smithsonian for being here and ruth robbins for organizing it. i want to thank you for being here. it is a very emotional time, and ruth and i were talking about whether we should show a clip,

we were thinking about showing a saturday night live clip, but it felt like too much levity and we decided not to do it. i sure you are all aware of the portrayals of trump and clinton by alec baldwin and kate mckinnon, that we decided to did not feel appropriate. instead, i am going to give you some clips of abraham lincoln. as i say, it is a very emotional time for a lot of people. hillary clinton supporters are really sort of reeling and they expected to have a big win today. most of the pollsters felt that hillary clinton would win, maybe not so big, but that she would win. and now we have donald trump who is now president-elect. he met with president obama today at the white house, they were supposed to be for 15 or 20 minutes and it ended up being 90 minutes in a very familiar setting in the oval office with the two chairs in front of the

fire ice. he -- fireplace. for trump supporters this is a time of jubilation and not a small degree of gloating because they said this would happen and it has happened. in my due diligence, i checked the numbers and at this point there is a little bit of fluctuation but clinton has 290 coral votes -- i mean donald trump has 290 electoral votes 232, but theas popular vote is going clinton's way. she has about a 300,000 vote lead out of about 220 million votes cast. so what happened is we had almost a split, and even split in the country in the popular vote and that reflects this amazing divide we are in right doesnd so the question is donald trump have a mandate?

he did not win the popular vote, but a lot of of the -- a lot of people who got elected win is aose act as if they had mandate. in 2000 we had a long supreme court fight and george w. bush won in the supreme court and lost the popular vote by half a million votes, but he claimed the mandate as every president does when they take office. so we have protesters in the streets now saying that donald trump is not their president. i just saw some emails of organizations saying we are going to fight him every step of the way. it is not a pretty picture and i know when i have given talks like this before a lot of people from the audience have said that we would need some clarity in the election, we need a clarifying election and it does not appear that is what we got. ourre interested if panelists agree with this.

in some ways the presidential campaigns have become like pendulums and we go from one party to the other from the democrats to the republicans in my lifetime covering politics we've gone from jimmy carter to ronald reagan to staying with george herbert walker bush, bill clinton, george w. bush, barack obama, back in or is an back-and-forth. very difficult for any party to win two consecutive terms. a couple of others points i want to quickly make. we read some of lincoln's writings today to get into the more inspirational quality of our politics. we would be wise to familiarize ourselves. in his second inaugural address, the most appropriate for this moment, he calls for the famous lines "malice toward none, charity for all." and talked about the nation

winding -- binding of wounds. we have to see if that happens. this moment will be difficult. i want to wind up with a little analysis i wanted to read briefly and have our panel respond. this comes from a democratic pollster associated with jeff guerin and worked with bill mcintyre who did it and -- an analysis with his associates. he said "3 forces collided to elect donald trump president. first, truly clinton was a deeply flawed candidate, second mr. trump a brilliant manipulator of broadcast media outlets who benefited from copious amounts of free airtime and third of the element of the 2016 elections pundits consistently underestimating a large segment of our society is deeply, miserably miserly -- miserly angry. they are angry at the arrogance

of the rich and well educated, who don't seem to care that the working class standard of living, a third of being marked as racist and deplorables, afraid that their children do not have reasonable prospects for advancement. that is one explanation of what happened on the trump side and to some extent the by datuk in the electorate because remember bernie sanders, who challenged hillary clinton and lust, appealed to that same sentiment from the left that donald trump did from the right. with that i would like to ask our panelists starting with jeff who is working for one of the super pac's that supported hillary clinton. if you agree with that analysis and how you see what happened here. what did happen? >> if peter hart said it, i agree with it. [laughter] jeff: i think they're obviously is a lot to what peter had to say. your lincoln quote really isn't

comforting because that that was after a great civil war where one achieved a military victory over the other, so i hope that beforewhat we go through we have charity to all in the country. divided in a lot of ways and this election reflected those divisions. the divisions are not only about economics, although there are definitely those at work. in a larger way, it is about what is happening to america that we are at a fork in the road in some ways in terms of what we make of our diversity as a country and we are changing a lot of ways and people have very competent feelings about that. the work we were doing in the lead up to the election on election night we asked people

whether they saw the growing diverse city in the country as a change for the better war worse and there is nothing that sort of a drew a brighter redline between clinton voters and trump voters than that question. that the more you tended to see increasing diversity of the country as a change for the better, something exciting, the more likely you were to be for clinton, but if you didn't feel that way about what is happening in the country in that respect you were very likely to be for donald trump. that was being litigated. the other big question that i was paying attention to thinking about election night was in some ways the defining question for election night was how much risk were americans willing to take when they cast their ballot? it turns out a lot of them were willing to take a fair amount of

risk in our survey that we did on election eve. the people who voted for donald trump, 21% said he was a risky choice as a voted for him anyway . they voted for him anyway in part because they did not have any confidence in the alternative that hillary clinton representative, but also because in the ways peter describes they said -- they had so little sense of steak in the status quote that it felt like a risk worth taking even though many of them thought that donald trump -- thought and think that donald trump does not have the experience and knowledge of president should have or the temperament that a president should have. at that moment people were take ato -- willing to risk and we will see how they feel about that risk a few months down the road. the last thing i will say that important -- was important to this election is that the river

the republican party and right-wing spent a lot of time demonizing hillary clinton. that happened on steroids throughout the election. the challenging thing for the media to know how to do with that. donald trump repeatedly referred to her as a criminal in a cynical and dangerous and demagogic way. and it was at various points in the campaign. she did things either by commission or omission that may have exacerbated the concerns people had. it was very hard with that, given how much of the bandwidth donald trump had been taking up, for her to break through and provide the kind of confidence peter was talking about in his comments. not impossible, but very challenging given the unprecedented nature of donald

trump costs attacks -- donald trump's attacks on her. at least since the start of the 20th century in light of the media environment in which he was operating. >> let me take up your point about risk. i grew up in southwestern virginia in a county that went trump.18% for cole county was economically devastated certainly. nowhere near among the people in the high school now as grew up with me. i was talking to my wife. she said, you know, those people are buying a lottery ticket and i think to some extent that is right. if your expectation is some sort of incremental change, the situation is sufficiently

devastating and that is just not good enough and you are willing to risk quite a bit for the hope of dramatic change. >> can we turn the lights up? >> i will try and speak up. the last time a democrat followed got elected after a two-term democrat had served was martin van buren, i believe after andrew jackson -- it did not happen in the 20th century. a long time ago, ironically martin van buren was considered the first professional politician. side, for other political scientists to study

what they might call fundamentals, the movement of the economy and how long it party has been in power, the average predictions for people who have worked these out several months ago was that the democrat would win a little less than 51% of the popular vote. if you look at the last nine elections that were open seat elections where there is not an incumbent running, the ranges from 54 points to 45 and the median is about 49. from a historical perspective, it actually outperformed. perspectivetorical it is not a surprise, it is a surprise in who the candidates were and what we thought the race was going to be about in advance of the race. this is more or less what you get. this should have been a republican year. >> i think one of the things that has sort of been not

focused on as heavily -- we know about the immigration argument, we know about the economic angst underestimated by both parties that it is worth remembering that donald trump is not a republican from an ideological standpoint in many ways. i also think we underestimated that unexpectedly brutal and deeply personal election with two flawed candidates was going to have on the size and shape of the electorate. there were millions of people that were modeled to show up on election day who stayed home and may be were republicans who could not wrap their arms around trump, we know there were millions of republicans who voted for mitt romney that did not show up for donald trump and there were even more millions of democrats who voted for barack obama who did not show up for may be clinton and crooked hillary argument and the amount of time donald trump

spent hammering home the notion that she was a criminal even though that is not with the fbi decided, that stuck with people and it wasn't that they could not bring themselves to cast their ballot for one candidate, they just couldn't bring themselves to show up and cast a ballot and i think we made a lot of assumptions the direction the turnout moved and that it was going to go up again and it was not true. this is proof that negative campaigning so tone negative and so divisive had an impact than it did the press the vote. -- depress the boat. >> i would echo jeff on the change. i get to work on nbc wall street journal. one of the questions we wrote this year, how do you want to vote? do you vote for a candidate that supports major change, and here is the kicker, even if you do not know what the change is going to be? or do you want to vote for a

ofdidate that is kind steady, predictable, and who will keep going in the same direction we have been headed? we wrote it a little better than that, but that was the choice. in the last track out of the field sunday 54% of americans say i want change even if i don't know what the changes going to be. 41% say i want steady progress. that is a powerful, underlying thing in this election. the other thing is quite unusual is i said by the way we have one in five voters who have an unfavorable opinion of both candidates and people presume that is normal. it is not. in the life ofr -- poll since the 1992 was 1992 there was a time when bill clinton and george bush who had 12% who didn't like either of them.

in 2012 we talk about close and divided, only 6% of the population were unfavorable to both obama and romney. when you are at 18%, three times or four times that the normal. you are a voter and you just said you have an in -- unfavorable view of both candidates come what you do? what they did was they voted for donald trump over hillary clinton because that underlying change means she is the default status quo, it is a third-party term. if i do not like either of them my instinct is to vote for again,y new and i think, we should come as we always do respect to the american electorate and if you respect the electorate we had people that went to vote for the candidate that they thought best represented their economic interest. in parts of the country that feel very disengaged from this -- in front of this country's success the doctor was kind enough to talk about his own county.

81 to 19 is a huge number. even obama was probably 72 to 28. so when you go from pennsylvania, ohio, michigan, wisconsin, and you are taking these kinds of margins to that level, you start tipping. the last thing will say is people will say how did he get so close and what happened? kerrytt romney-john nonwhite graduates -- it turned out to be 37 points. if you are a white, noncollege graduate you voted for trump by 37 points. it is bigger than ronald reagan against mondale in 1984 and if you are looking at benchmarks that is a wow. if romney carries them by 25 and you carry them by 20 -- 37, that

is a net 12 points and 34% of the electorate and the obama margin disappears in one subgroup because you have a net 3.7 point score and it is a dead even race. those were the states that make a difference, those voters matter even more that they represent a larger share of the electorate. >> the idea is that donald trump was dangerous even though he was a change, he was dangerous and that did not seem to register. that is what everybody was thinking, that people thought he was dangerous. the word people used, but risky. people knew they were taking a risk, that he is lacking in the knowledge of experience that a present -- president ought to have when he takes office.

about how we will act and behave as commander in chief, they worry about his temperament and whether he will have a divisive impact, but for the reasons that we discussed, there were a group of -- can i fact check you on one thing? 120 million people voted for either clinton or romney, but a little over 5 million voted for third-party. it is possible, not likely, that this will be the first election since 1948 where fewer people voted than in the last eight years previous and think about the amount of population growth in eight years. it really goes to sarah's point about the question that people

voted with their feet. >> i think washington -- and by that i mean the ecosystem on it -- many of us spend our professional time living in is an echo chamber. tooink everybody was way slow to start figure -- paying attention to what was going on outside the echo chamber. i think that goes for a lot of reporters and pundits and campaign professionals who were frankly all looking at the same sets of numbers. going into election nights you talk to republicans and democrats and do this for a living and i said the same thing which was democrats were going to win the senate and hillary clinton is going to be the next president. i think there were there were lessons that we learned through the course of this election that the hillary clinton campaign in particular completely missed. when we started out, it was going to the jeb bush versus hillary clinton. two giant professional campaigns with $100 million or more, $100

million for the superpac. everybody feared they knew how , democratic to run to this group and that group and put together a victory and jeb bush failed so quickly as i dynastic candidate. he struggled on the stump, even though he did everything in theory that you could ever want in terms of name recognition. mixed bag in his case, but still, people knew his name. clinton team for some reason didn't seem to process that that might matter to them later on and they were surprised that bernie sanders was so strong and they wrote him off as somebody who was on the fringe. when you're dealing with capitol hill or the white house there is a sense that you have people on the edges that do not matter. sometimes they throw bombs or hold stuff up, but never the people actually running the country and i think the clinton

campaign treated bernie sanders a lot like that. i covered him for four months. i remember feeling like i was marooned on an island. nobody paid attention and nobody was covering him and i kept saying to my boss, waking up the day after the michigan primary which bernie sanders one and getting on a conference calls with people at the office and everyone saying we were so surprised and i said, if you listen to what i was saying yesterday maybe you wouldn't have been so surprised and we were not surprised it happened. i think the clinton campaign missed the passion and the disconnection going on. clearly there is an ideological difference for people who voted for bernie sanders and donald trump. they pick a social issue and they are less likely to tell you they are on opposite sides. like the system in washington was ignoring them

and there was no way people would even listen and the only way they would be able to say anything to change it was to do something like support bernie sanders. i think donald trump voters felt the same way. the clinton campaign missed it entirely. they continue to -- you see it in john podesta's hacked emails. they were trying to figure out, how is she going to stand on tpp? there was a 12 e-mail chain figuring out where they would put her on this issue. people really were rejecting that kind of politics this time and i remember every time driving to a hillary clinton event, we drive through the airport, usually in the us of -- outside of the city or if you happen to be driving through favorable city and all you see is trump signs. every clinton event was very small. it was like covering mitt romney in the final days. the excitement -- people really cared and were really invested ini was not true on the hillary

clinton side. >> it is reeling a mate -- really amazing with the benefit of hindsight and not having worked in the campaign, but it is a lazy -- amazing at how you -- look back at how inton ran her campaign between the end of the primary election day how much the notion of the system being broken and a message of economic populism that cad --ders totally evacuated evaporated from her message. it was nowhere in the general election. >> it showed back up in michigan two days before the election. she started saying hey, working people, i feel your pain, i promise i do. you are very right about that. >> i was out on the road to some extent. not as much as my colleagues. but there was a tremendous amount of excitement for trump. i was brought up in the school of political analysis that you have to be careful about

intensity in rallies because it is a big country and just because people show up at rallies doesn't mean a person will win. >> a good political campaign knows how to build a crowd. kenneth: right. this was a much different intensity from what hillary clinton was dealing with. i was in north carolina a few days before the election and they were all over the place. michelle obama was there and even then -- trump did one rally -- i don't know if you were there. a giant rally. he announced his new deal for african-americans. even if that intensih different than the hillary rally so maybe we have to reevaluate and i want to come back this later -- come back to this later the type of analysis we do as political reporters and political strategists. maybe the conventional types do not apply as much as we thought they did. >> and things are okay for the most part.

people who are working and living in washington for the most part, the economy has been insulated here for a wide variety of reasons. there are not this many people feeling this kind of pain. and i met so many people at bernie sanders rallies. you look around and you say wow, i should start thinking about how hard it is for people. talk to people who are working three jobs, making less money, and paying more for their health care. it is millions of people. >> i want to ask our pollsters the gender question. what were numbers on the gender gap? >> the exit polls have the gender gap slightly larger than 2012. clinton won women by 12 points, which is two points larger thing -- than obama did. the exit polls are not perfect.

for the moment they are what we have got. for clinton among women, 12 points for trump among men. -- that nets out at a difference of 24 points. it was 17 points. a large piece of that is more men voting for trump than women voting for clinton. there was some of both. to ask youout exactly that. what was the turnout for when -- men and women? only tool we have to know that is the exit poll. the exit poll was 52-48, but is such an imperfect -- what will happen in a couple months from now is we will have voter files that tell you exactly who voted. that will provide a much better analysis of at least the composition of the electorate.

the exit polls in 2012 we know overstated to some extent the share of the electorate under the age of 35 years old. overplayed it -- overstated the chair -- the share of the state that was african-american. this voter final analysis that will happen later on will be much more reliable and meaningful than exit polls. >> i want to share one of my the yversial science that chromosome makes people lazy. it is one more thing where men and -- where women -- they vote, -- it is one more thing where women vote and they fill their ballot and do their stuff and differencecially the

between men and women with business -- ethnicity and age. --y are just a little drafty drifty compared to women in that same age group. says 521148, but i think normal we are going to see the women number go up. >> i think we have polled that before, right? just stepping back again and looking at this amazing year and a half. where there are one or two turning point we could look at as really making a difference? at the end you had the fbi on off-again investigation and you had donald trump's tape on the bus where he talked about groping women. were they turning points or is that over simple find things? kasie: putting me on the spot. this may not be your question,

but i think one of the things that set this whole thing in motion was what happened at the white house correspondents dinner with donald trump and barack obama. a lot of this, especially in the beginning, was a drive-by donald trump to prove that he could do something that a lot of people thought he could not do and would ridicule him for. he seems to be someone very driven by making sure that people take him seriously and i think voters identify with that. a lot of people that voted for him were motivated to vote for him and feel the same way. they feel like people discount them, dismiss them as deplorables, or pick your word. i think there was a kind of anti-elitism or whatever it was driving at. i think that is how this got set in motion.

>> i think it would be helpful in terms of balance how much of this was built in by those strong structural factors, versus how much is campaign events. i think the comey thing helped in one regard. covers aas a group narrative in a storyline and switching to the comey thing snapped the entire line about donald trump's the hitter to women and the allegations just stop and it gave him 10 or 11 days to run a coherent campaign where he spoke from a teleprompter and stayed out of the news and ran a competent campaign for the last two weeks. i think that switch made a

difference in terms of how he got in the campaign compared to what the dialogue would have been. sunlen: i would argue that started sooner. i think the access hollywood tape donald trump talking about , the fact that he was asked if he ever actually did that to women and a dozen women came out and said he made unwanted sexual advances to them, that made a difference. internal polling and public polling showed donald trump dead in the water, down 10 points or 12 points and dragging down the senate and there was no recovering from that moment and things are looking like not that far from election day. before the comey thing happened, the obamacare premium announcement came out and that fed so perfectly into the notion that washington was building these systems not designed to make your life better.

they sell them to you and say they are doing them for you to improve your life and you find out it is not really work that way and your income is going up and your -- your income is in going up but your obamacare premium is going up. donald trump looked at those numbers and he went to a teleprompter. he said, let me tell you how much obama care premiums are going up in north carolina or ohio or florida or wherever he was and comey came right on the heels of that and completely changed the narrative of the campaign. to questions about hillary clinton and the legacy she would carry on as president rather than the question about donald trump. >> and the clinton response was to turn their fire onto comey rather than explain why she was potentially innocent. she never got to the point where she was answering questions about her email use in a way she isde people feel ok,

right and didn't do anything wrong or that they could forgive her for what she did because she was always so defensive about all of that and that i think that is true up to the end. >> the access hollywood tape turned out to be a turning ayotteut more for kelly more than donald trump. it is inexplicable and shocking to me that if donald trump behaved himself for five days everything that happened before those five days was forgiven and forgotten regardless of how anrible the thing was starting with the primary we said this would be the strong -- straw that breaks the camel's back. this camel had the strongest back in history. [laughter] and hillary was the opposite of that. as short as people's memories were about donald trump, they

were just as long for hillary clinton. >> i know there is an argument that the media jumped from things too quickly and did not focus on these donald trump issues which was like drinking from a fire hydrant, just one every hour it seemed, but you were on the air putting being -- these things out constantly in the battleground states. you are advertising about trump's remarks on women and one group after another. it wasn't that a vanished from the radar screen, it is just that people were paying attention to other things. >> we spent a lot of money reminding people in different things, the priority being the super pac for hillary clinton reminding people about the various things he said about women and did about women in his life and really the other kind of point of focus for us had to do with his temperament as

commander intrigue which was truly worrisome -- commander in chief which was truly worrisome to people. came up organically in focus groups. just his general divisiveness and trump tenor. >> what was amazing in talking and traveling with donald trump voters, it serves your point how quickly they forget him for things. he became a vessel for whatever voter issues were. if you used to vote as democrat but you don't feel like you are getting ahead, then donald trump became your economic vessel. you found a way to say i do not agree with the things he says about latinos are muslims are screwed up and apologized and he has the right message on this and we heard people say that time and time again about whatever their core issue was. >> there is a phenomenon in

social psychology called cognitive dissonance. when people want to do something and they really wanted to do something in this case, they find a way to do it and explain it to themselves and it is a powerful force. >> all eyes point to you now. >> trump's candidacy completely changes the race. what i wonder about is given the nature of the historical dynamics, it seems certainly plausible that another republican could have one might reasonably have one, but it would not have been the same constituency. is this a situation where you continue to double down with the constituencies that are becoming increasingly smaller, but you get more and more of them? or are you moving to another

orientation toward the party where you do not get white, working-class without a college education as much as donald trump does, but you do better with latinos and women overall. in essence, you win, but you win with a different constituency. i think some people would say that was never going to be possible. it was only going to be this way. i do not know about that. >> that would be your nightmare. [laughter] >> for a democrat that is really troubling. >> i know i have talked too much but it relieves my anxiety about donald trump. [laughter] the states that made the difference difference in breaking what people thought of the big blue wall, pennsylvania, michigan, and wisconsin.

donald trump is a much better candidate for those states than mitt romney. what connection to some of these -- mitt romney is culturally alien, more culturally alien than clinton or barack obama. kasie: he kept saying things that reinforced that. >> but donald trump was their guy. for the change in complexion of the vote in those three states in particular, donald trump was probably a really good candidate for them. other republicans would've been much more vulnerable to the big blue wall aspect of the electorate. >> what does it say about hillary clinton or the electorate that donald trump, who lives in a penthouse in manhattan who grew up with a , cushy life, whose father gave him a multimillion dollar loan to build a business was able to essence of the

working-class american better than hillary clinton who had an upbringing that looks more similar to some of those people? issues matteris and i agree with jeff that the republican party that existed before tuesday has been changed. every party that comes its president and donald trump in substantial ways has shifted the orthodox of the republican party both on immigration come on the border wall in terms of priorities come on trade, on saying we will be less involved around the world and reforming medicare. those are five incredibly powerful differences from the previous republican parties. thoseality is they have five policy positions when bonded together uniquely fit the noncollege white voters across the state in a way that as he -- we are going to

do this because no other republican has ever said this. and he's going to try and get those things done. the donald trump republican party is going to be a very different looking vehicle than it has been for the post ronald reagan and bush era. these will be unbelievable changes in what it means to be a republican. he won the election because of it and the thing about this a twoy is it will have year an a for your decision about the direction for the future. >> in the immediate issues where trump is redefining the orthodoxy of the republican party, does that mean the freedom caucus in the house and the members of congress will rollover? they have been on the other side of these issues. i think they genuinely felt this for a long time.

do they say, never mind, we have a new president to redefine the party or are we in for the same kind of stalemate? >> when everybody is feeling their worst, we had that shift in 2009. republicans woke up and said wow, democrats run everything. there is a reason the u.s. senate because the constitution is the genius of people. take 60 votes. of course obama was operating temporarily with 60 votes, republican 62. things are not going to happen as radically or quickly as we think because every vote will become a 60 vote. to answer your question, the republican party historically has been pretty responsive to and so i think --

here is the other thing that happened which jeff mentioned two candidates and just to fill in the blanks those are two candidates who through their endorsement after the access hollywood story. point he is making, those are the two republicans who lost. my candidate john mccain went -- withdrew his endorsement. kelly ayotte was a senator and john mccain was a personal brand. >> in a red state running against a candidate that was not terribly strong. those two were in races. -- those two were neck and neck races. >> the point being that in the republican party -- hierarchicalhow the republican party is. >> where does this leave the democrats?

>> great question. >> do you want me to speak? [laughter] >> i think there is a short-term answer to that and a long-term answer to that. the short-term answer is that needs --he party that donald trump is going to do a lot of things that are harmful to the people democrats an harmful to the values democrats hold dear. it's a part of it is in the near-term, how being a minority can democrats most effectively stand up to that and rally the country against that. i think there will be opportunities for democrats to do that. people did not sign up -- including the people who voted for him, did not sign up for all the things donald trump is going to do as president. people in our election polls said hillary clinton gave them an -- a clear idea of what

her priority -- priorities are than donald trump did. so he is going to do things that will really contest -- test of the country and the depth of his support. the longer-term -- i spoke at the center for american progress the week before the election and said i was haunted by the brexit election. in some ways, this was our national identity election in a same way that brexit was. the remain campaign was a campaign entirely based on fear. so the people that felt that things were working for them, there was nothing about the campaign that was giving people hope and what i said at this meeting was that i am haunted

that we are in the same position . we are not giving people hope who are really looking to us for that. and for the longer term that is what the democratic party needs to figure out. the things that are happening to the country are real. the things that make people anxious are not fantasies, they are realities. and so really the emergence of new voices and new thinking about how we address of those. >> remember the polling of the institutions which in the media was at the bottom. >> we were right about putin. [laughter] >> to what extent was this notion that donald trump embodied -- as you are saying he was a vessel for anger and

resentment. to what extent was this was a repudiation of relief in general wall street business, , washington, congress? kasie: it was entirely that. 100% that. if you look at -- i forget who was making this point. i should be giving them credit. there was someone who pointed out during election coverage on tuesday night that both bernie sanders' campaign and donald trump's campaign had enemies. there was an enemy -- topple the thing that is making your life harder. for bernie sanders, it was wall street. big banks in the case of donald trump, it was immigrants. you name it. those things were absent from hillary clinton's campaign, and for most of the primary challengers.

there was no acknowledgment where people could say, that guy is scaring me over and i want -- is screwing me over and i want to fix it. >> do we all agree it was a repudiation? >> i would like to be a little different spokesperson. our job is to listen to people. we wrote a question in 2014 and said hey, we just survived a great recession. how much impact did that have on your family? 64% said so -- we asked, when you say that, what do you mean? we got, i lost my job, i lost my pension, or i have my job but in -- i am making have of when i -- half of what used to make. page after page in which the lives have been interrupted after that horrible economic episode.

we asked in august 2016, two years later, how much impact did it have on your family? it dropped from 64% to 61%. we read the same stories. when you read 80 pages about how the great recession affected your life and what it meant, these are profoundly personal difficult stories. that 60% of the country is years after we think the recovery has taken place. that kind of economic dislocation, and what that has unleashed i think is something we need to speak to. i hope i am not being difficult with my panelists.

i don't want to look at it as being anti-elitist. people are expressing this profound dislocation economically on how they felt and how they want that addressed in their lives. sara: for me anti-elitism is not quite right. people who seem to be using the system to enrich themselves. obviously 40% must have told you, i wasn't affected. those are pretty stark lines. >> stand your ground, you were right the first time. [laughter] i would not suggest that i predicted donald trump. in 2014 we did a lot of research about trust in government. there were two things we were learning. one thing is that he will really believed, all of america believed that washington was for interestsor special that can afford to pay for lobbyists. and is working for them at the

expense of other, regular americans. the other thing is that there were a lot of americans who felt the economy was not working for them. there is a group of people who expected that after eight years, they would have been made whole by now. and the fact that they hadn't been made whole. it is not just about their incomes, it is about their assets. their homes and retirement accounts are not worth as much. the fact that they have not been made whole when other people are making off like bandits. that is what makes wall street the center of the eye of hurricane. the combination of those two things, the economy not working for people, and the government not working for people -- is toxic.

it was the backdrop. >> for democrats, barack obama was on the campaign trail saying hey, i saved us from the great recession. some said clearly he made things to make it better, but a lot of people were not feeling that. certainly that is the argument hillary clinton tried to make. she did not say any negative things about the president for fear of alienating her coalition. but on the other hand, her other voters needed her to say something that the president did not fix it entirely. >> years of talking to consultants and strategists, americans want to be rich themselves, so they don't mind people getting rich, as long as it doesn't pull them down. when they felt like someone is getting rich at my expense -- is that what happened?

>> i worked for some very wealthy candidates across my career. they follow two camps, people who give the money, and people who made the money. when i work for candidates that are very wealthy -- i worked for a mayor of houston that started working when he was eight years old. he never finished college, straight out of high school made it into the oil industry, and was conspicuously wealthy. people said that is ok, he worked for it, i don't find that. that is the wealthy candidates where they are given money, where there is resentment. i don't think americans mind that you worked hard and found a way to make a lot of money, that is ok. when you have been given the

money, or if you believe that our entire system is so twisted , that people who have the money are the ones getting massive money, that breeds in anger and resentment. it is palpable. >> part of it is what you have, and where you think you are going. the polling i have seen suggests differentas have a idea of what is ahead than white americans if they had the same amount of money. you have to ask yourself, you have certain groups they can feel like there is promise in the future, where other groups don't.

i see from campaigning standpoint how important it is to identify particular individuals to blame for what seems to be a fairly complex problem. that becomes particularly dangerous if you actually get elected. there is some expectation about addressing that particular individual or group of people to solve a problem. if the problem does not get solved, where does that leave us? >> a couple of other quick things. the idea of race. for many years from the senses we get the idea that -- from the census that we are becoming a majority minority country. by 2040, white people will no longer become a majority in the united states, roughly around that time. the feeling that the republicans are on the wrong side of the demographics, latinos in particular were going for the democrats, trump was stirring up latinos against the republican party itself.

and african-americans were solid for the democrats for a long time. how did this election strike you as far as race goes? is there a cause a permanent divide -- quasi-permanent divide with minorities? >> it is developing. -- it's not just now that it is developing. i think it is a central feature of the election. we talked before we started about how people felt about this exact change, whether it is change for the better. white people are very divided about this. it determined people's votes, or at least predicted people's votes. there is another side of this from the democrats.

we were going into this election, oh, we've got this big blue wall, plus demographics. and with combination, we cannot lose. the world is changing in our willtion, the electorate get younger and more people of color. over the long haul, that is definitely true. in any giventrue election and was certainly not true for this election. >> more than half the kids being born in the country today -- younger kids are nonwhite, they will be aging into the electorate. this country will be going through an incredibly sure -- sharp change. we have according to the u.s. census the highest amount of people born outside the country since 1880, and the highest number of people speaking other than english in the last 80 years. i believe in the american ideal. i believe america is founded on the principle. we are infinitely stronger

because of this incredible influx of new people. august what has happened in every way above immigration? every wave has led to social tension, dislocation, a battle as we assimilate people. we actually the irish with of immigration. guess what has been a happy outcome over a generation? our country capacity's to function as a nation. i think that will happen over time. we're watching the same dislocation that took place with each part of these immigration waves. i think there is a right side to history. the right side is no party is going to survive as the right party. if you do not find a way to have some inclusive message, and some capacity to motivate people around these divisions, you are not going to survive as a party.

>> can i add one thing quickly? you asked about turning points. i think the emergence of the black lives matter movement was a turning point. especially when black people were being killed by police, and when police were being killed by assassins. it came front and center for people and their way of thinking about the world. to me, donald trump did a lot of unforgivable things in this category. a a lot of them. but the most unforgivable thing he did in the campaign was to rub these racial divisions raw. and to run a campaign that was designed to exploit them for his political advantage. that happened, and it made a difference. he won votes on that basis. but it does an unforgivable thing. i don't think he can make up for

it. if he's got a job to do as president, making up for it is a good one. >> that is a good question for president-elect donald trump. i would love to know what is going through his head as he watched people spilling into the streets and protesting. we've heard from african-americans, muslims, latinos, young women, who woke up the next morning and cried and were afraid. that is something we have not seen in this country for a long time. we saw a plot of strong feelings when president obama was elected, but this is a different story of sentiment. -- sort of sentiment. republicans will say it was because democrats spent a lot of time casting donald trump as an unacceptable person to president. the reality is that donald trump supported stop and frisk, called

for a muslim ban, said horrible things about women, and he did a lot of things that gave all of these groups of people real reason for fear. but now he is a president-elect. when you see these people having these reactions, how do you handle that? if you want to be president for all people, does he understand the amount of work that is going to take? >> feel free to ask about this in the questions, but the final point i want to make is about governing. what is possible? are we headed for more deadlock? is anger going to paralyze everything? is there any insight into what can be done? >> i think it is smart to focus on infrastructure. there is consensus around that-- there is a start at least. but once you get past that, the list gets long.

>> what will be interesting is how the republican party on capitol hill responsd -- responds to how donald trump changes the traditional orthodox pillars on which the republican party is built. mitch mcconnell embodies what the republican party has been. now he is going to have to figure out -- they were on capitol hill today. i encourage you to look at the photo. [laughter] it is quite illuminating in showing what the republican party in washington has been, and what it is becoming. you talk to republicans, and they have no idea. [laughter] >> we have seen gridlock before and we were probably see more gridlock going forward, but it

is important president obama into the white house a man who is questioned his birthright to be president. hillary clinton told people you need to give donald trump a chance to govern. we were on top of the chamber with the white house in the background. the white house is still standing. the peaceful transition of power still happening. america is still america. >> we will see if he gets his twitter account back. who knows what will happen? you had your hand up earlier. >> what was the relationship between the -- questions like legalization of marijuana and assisted suicide with the people coming to the polls, even if they did not like either of the candidates. >> did you hear that ok? >> the question was, we had a

lot of initiatives on the ballot, marijuana and assisted suicide. i do a lot of those initiatives, i did the work in arizona, the only state where we defeated marijuana. it does change the composition of the electorate. for example, an arizona and looks like you had a higher turnout with 18 and 29-year-olds. and so -- [laughter] but what happens is a lot of times in a presidential election, the impact of the deferential turnout that an initiative is muted because we have such a high level of turnout. you see it much more dramatically in the off years. jeff does a lot of work, i'm comparing nose of people who run campaigns. i don't know of a state where i think the initiative change the composition so much that it is a

different person running for president because of something on the ballot. i do not know a state, i do not think of a state where the elect or results is different for president because of something on the ballot. >> are any of you troubled by the fact -- any of you troubled over the last 16 years there have been two candidates who have won the popular vote but not the electoral college vote? >> i'm sorry. let me answer that. when i talk about the founding genius of the constitution, it was a document that was meant to create legitimacy and a mandate for the president. so, they deliberately -- let me defend the electoral college. i think it is a piece of genius in this regard. they did it so that california and, california and new york and some states, could not elect a president because of votes. they wanted to create a president who would govern with some kind of majority. they made up the electoral college for that purpose. there were 15 minutes where that was possible.

they put in the house of representatives where we go one vote per state. maine and california get the same vote because they want the president to serve with some majority creating that presidency. so, i believe that has worked to create the capacity for every president to have a majority that elected me. i do not think the popular vote would do that. in new hampshire, god knows, there must be 300 or 500 counties. nobody would ever go to some of these states. i will see if other people are troubled. i believe powerfully we should not change it. the electoral college serves the purpose of allowing every president to say that he or she starts with a majority that provides the power to govern in the country. >> i wonder what you think of

that notion of the electoral -- >> i tend to be on your side. but i'm also a pragmatist. so, i think it will get changed when both political parties see it in their interests to change it. >> which will probably never be at the same time. >> there are a lot, the problems associated with it, can you imagine this year if you actually had to deal with recount issues? the actual popular vote, half a percentage point. you have got to recount everything, literally? i mean -- >> real quickly, it is never going to happen because the constitution requires a constitutional amendment that requires 3/4 vote. do you think south dakota, north dakota, any small state would vote for it? it is never going to be changed because of the process you have to go through to amend it.

>> i think the biggest divide, you guys correct me if you think i am wrong, it seems to me the biggest divide in this election was between rural america and the rest of america. one thing, i think, for democrats it is very clear, a lot, especially in these blue states, it was people who used to be part unions or white blue-collar workers went for donald trump because the democratic party got completely disconnected with those people and their priorities. and instead, they fell to demographic destiny in cities. you can see it when you look at the map. it is very dangerous for any political party in america to get to the point where they are ignoring the wide swatch of land in between. >> let's give someone else a chance. yeah, go ahead.

>> so, we know that trump won a lot of blue states like wisconsin and michigan. why did hillary perform really well in nevada? >> it is a great question. you know, part of the theory of building a new hillary coalition that would be slightly different from the obama coalition was to do really well with hispanic voters. and those voters really matter in nevada. and they turned out at a very high level and at a very high level for her. some organically, some organized through their labor unions they belong to. but in the states you mentioned, michigan and wisconsin, hispanics represented a much smaller part of the vote.

bill put some information together the other day about the lower turnout in some key democratic counties and states like that. so, the composition of the -- nevada electorate worked very much in her advantage in a way that was not true and those other states. >> i think one thing to remember, blue states are only blue states until they are not anymore. and red states -- and voila, what we saw was the beginning of a change in the map of a lot of folks who work a lot of data and new polling, what was going to happen. it just happened faster than we expected this election. they expected democrats like hillary clinton to do better with latino voters, making inroads in places like nevada. be able to make places like

arizona competitive or maybe republicans appealing more to white voters and begin to make more inroads in places like wisconsin and michigan. i don't think anyone expected it to happen this quickly. and with such a break from the data we were seeing publicly. >> go ahead. >> so, several members of congress, including republicans, have expressed doubts that trump will [indiscernible] what is the feeling on how his base will respond to some of those goals not being achieved. the ability to forgive him quickly will extend into his administration? >> yes. i do think that. i do think that ability will extend, because when you talk to people, specifically about a lot of these goals, they will say, people have told me,we know he is not going to deport everyone here illegally.

we know he is not really going to ban muslims from coming to the u.s. we're angry and he is filtering that anger. and this is of the people have said over and over again. he is a negotiator in your new -- and you need a starting point. and he is going to make it feel like this is his starting point in that negotiation. i think one of the things that will be interesting looking on capitol hill is who he works with to get these things done, like some of the things that donald trump is talking about are not pillars of republican ideology. so, it's possible we see, you know, if he wants to be an effective president, will we see him siding with democrats on some issues, siding republicans on other issues? >> that is something republicans on capitol hill are already raising with me today. we're really interested to know actually whether donald trump is willing to have a conversation with elizabeth warren. you read what bernie sanders said in his words, he is going to use racist, misogynist policies.

i have no interest in that, but if you want to do something that is going to help working and middle america, then ok. i will work with the guy. >> let's go somebody in the back. let's go to the gentleman in the middle. >> can you repeat the questions because we are not hearing them? to what extent do voter i.d. laws reduce voting times, have any impact on the results of this election? has any research been done into that yet? >> how much do voter i.d. laws and other voter suppression efforts have an impact on the election? anybody? >> we think they have a substantial impact in north carolina in reducing the african-american vote. you have seen the pictures of

the long lines at polling places. when you set out in a deliberate way to make it harder for people to vote, it is not shocking that fewer people end up voting. and the courts mitigated some parts of the most blatantly racial parts of the north carolina voting law, but not all of them. not things related to voting hours and access to polling places. those things matter. they were done with the intent and the intent was accomplished. >> did it determine what happened in the state? >> that you have a governor's election in north carolina where the democrat is ahead by 4000 votes. it was 4000. if it ends up going the other way, it clearly would have mattered. >> the gentleman in centerfield back there. >> you talked a lot about --

trump voter and who he is. who is the clinton voter? they are slightly more. who are they? >> the question is who is the clinton voter? who turned out for her? >> as you heard, she did better with women. there tended to be more female, better educated. >> a lot better. if you pull the numbers from postgraduates, it is stunning. >> did anyone in this room vote for donald trump? one. two. anyone else? >> that is the shy trump effect. >> you all are hillary clinton voters. [inaudible] >> i don't vote in elections that i cover. that i think you just answered your own question, because the country is so divided and so -- that question was pew who did the work on whether you had a

friend, you knew somebody who voted for donald trump or you knew somebody who voted for hillary clinton. hillary clinton won people who live in cities, won people of color, won people who are well educated, she won the kind of people you come across every day. and this is a particular kind, and you walk into hispanic community, it is little bit different. potentially, this is -- so there's a difference there. i just cannot overstate the degree to which people who voted for hillary clinton and who assumed and thought there was no way she could never end up president of the united states different in their outlook and -- differed in their outlook and the people they were talking to and surrounding themselves with than the people who voted for donald trump. >> it does make me wonder of those democrats that did not stay home, how many stayed home because it was unfathomable that

donald trump would win. >> you think it's unfathomable to the clinton campaign. flying on the plane for three days having a party. >> there was a couple of weeks, a couple months before the election, the late-night shows -- you cannot imagine a donald trump presidency? did you ask everyone in your yoga class? you know. [laughter] we live in our own bubbles. our bubbles do not look like the american electorate writ large. >> that is the danger that this divisiveness and lack of understanding between those two groups. >> [inaudible] >> i was wondering why hillary clinton didn't run a more positive campaign. she ran on the children's health care plan. law enforcement and many think she did, and yet you barely heard them on her advertising or

in her speeches. unemployment, went from 10% down to 4.8%. while most people i think in the rust belt think it is 40% and worse. she, if she highlighted that, i thought she might have done better. >> a lot of people in the rust belt feel it in their lives in this negative way, independent of the numbers. there is always controversy about that on employment rate. underemployment, people do not look for jobs anymore. a lot of people you are describing, yeah, they pay attention to the positive numbers but the trump people, that did not reflect them. they must've felt the elite world does not understand them because it does not reflect their lives. i come from a working-class background myself.

it's very rare in the editorial meetings in washington, these days, i must say. that is part of the diversity we need in the media. right. but the, i think a lot of people have not been living those unemployment numbers below 5%. and i think that is a problem that the hillary campaign did not address properly. >> income has trended down since the end of the recession. there's good numbers and not so good numbers. it's not like income has been up by five point. >> she did run a number. her advertising was a pretty good mix of positive and negative ads. she had some very good positive ads. the difference between her two minute closing ads and donald trump's closing two minute ad was night and day. literally, hers was quite hopeful and positive.

his was really quite dark in terms of its view of the world. in terms of her, i'm interested in what sarah has to say. in terms of her speeches, it is very hard to communicate a positive message in this environment and this media environment, in particular. -- in this this media environment, in particular. do you think that is true? >> i think it is true that it's hard to convey, but i don't think hillary clinton was running a positive campaign. i do not think donald trump was running a positive campaign. it's hard. it was difficult for her to run on the legacy of barack obama. and to be out there, the positive things you want to say is the economy is getting better. people are not feeling that.

>> we have some people in the balcony. the lights are in my eyes. i can't point to you. you will have to sort it out yourselves. let's go to the balcony. >> my question is this, first of all, let's face it, two identical products, one costs $12, one cost $24. i think we would all buy the $12 one if it comes from china or somewhere else. we will always buy the lower-priced products if all other things are equal. my questions are this. how do you -- what do you account for the fact that polls were so wrong, number one? and number two, do you think it was a good idea for hillary to

switch towards the end of the campaign to advertise more the senate races instead of spending more and her campaign as president? >> i think we all heard that question. why do you think the polls were? >> the last two days have been very bad. >> i have a not popular point of view on this. which is that jeff and i will keep our clients because our private polling was correct. and helped direct the campaign. and i think what people understand, and let me speak up for nate silver. when nate silver, his final prediction, he says there is a 30% donald trump can win. she's three points ahead. in these three of the last four elections, the last result has been three points different than the last track.

three points is a blink. what he said is it was this guy because either it was tied, three points better or the person or one to three points better and no one noticed. the reason there was this meltdown is because people said, my gosh, everyone said clinton is going to win. how could trump win? let me give you -- i will give you my small example. she is three points ahead. you carry white, noncollege voters by 10 more points and win by more than ronald reagan and that is 3%, 10% more, 3.4%. it's tied. and polls, by the way, i'm sorry, polls are not great at saying i know for sure that there will be higher turnout in these areas. and even by the way, all these analytics. i have made 100,000 phone calls. they are not that great down to one or two point, couple points level.

so, what i am suggesting is there is, i understand, i also understand, believe me i'm getting it, i understand all across america people are saying the polls were all wrong. i just think if you do this for a living, the internal clients in each campaign were not shocked. i do not have jeff's poll. but i had a poll in michigan four days out that had trump ahead. my client said, that cannot be right. i said, guess what? you paid for one poll. she's in detroit on friday. if my poll is wrong, what is she doing in detroit on friday? i said the reason you should believe -- there is something big going on in michigan. and this poll picked it up, because the people that run the race with more money than god are putting her in michigan on friday, and detroit. that is telling me this poll is correct.

>> their numbers are usually not necessarily better than public polling, but the polling you guys see every day in newspapers and on tv, there tends to be a lag because news organizations are not doing a day-to-day, they're not spending the kind of money that the campaign are doing, minute by minute. but they do different kinds, tracking phones. a lot of times, that is why often will just survey people like jeff and people that work around him to say, what you guys seen? because i think your point is very much taken. in the last couple days, it can actually move. if you're not paying attention at that moment, you are not going to see it. >> the other part about the public polling and the network polls, the networks are paying for them. they are going to give them a

tremendous ride. and it is going to look like the most fabulous moment in the campaign history because they are paying for them. these two guys. >> bill has done great work for nbc news. >> that poll is hillary clinton by three or four points. i can say lots of good things, how that poll's constructed and i can also say here that, hey, guess what? it did not lead to the expectations people want. for people were getting our briefing. we were doing a pretty good job saying yes, here is what could happen. >> but i think, i mean, yes, there were misses on state-level polling. >> wisconsin. >> north carolina? some of these polls should have shown donald trump ahead. if you assume -- >> north carolina was -4 for clinton. >> ok, but here, we took, our firm did something different. the real clear politics averages all the polls within two or three weeks. we said, we will take the last week of polls.

we compared the margins from the last weeks of polls in these states compared to what really happened. every state was margin of error except for wisconsin and north carolina. and so, again, what i am saying is if you actually take a moment, let me drop the ones that are two or three weeks old. look at the last week, that even at the state level from all of the public polling, but here is what happens. the margin of error is, wow, she's been ahead for weeks in florida. at the last public poll she is plus one? and then it becomes, she lost by three. you can't melt down -- >> let me -- let jeff have the last word. i think we are out of time. >> well, the second part of the question was campaigning for senate candidates. i, working for a lot of senate candidates, i have appreciated the effort, but in campaigns you can't look like you are taking a

victory lap. you have to run through the tape, the voters have to see you run to the tape, especially in this kind of election. run to the tape, especially in and -- you know, it sent the wrong vibe for a lot of voters. and the truth is, after the comey letter, they had to change that anyway. >> let's do two more. the fellow over there in the blue? >> local 942. i do know a lot of people who voted for trump. and a lot of people who said i was going to vote for bernie sanders but since he is not in the race i'm voting for trump. why doesn't the democratic establishment get it? president obama is up there earlier this year saying we have got -- this country is not in decline. he said, it is a wonderful time to be young. there is all of this opportunity.

and i am looking at massive segments in a country that are working at or near minimum wage. they've been in constant decline since the 1970's. these chickens are coming home to roost since the 1970's. at mininmal age, to buy a car, compared to the 1970's, it is three times more expensive. these people in upstate new york had a 60% wage cut. they're running like mice on wheels, going faster and faster. they're getting further and further behind. it just can't go on like this. i don't understand why the democratic establishing couldn't get this. i'm a lifelong democrat. >> anybody want to address that? >> well, i -- i totally agree. it was what it was trying to say in a less articulate way about what our challenge is as a party going forward is giving hope to

people who are experiencing not just feeling those things but experiencing those things -- we need to not just have a message but a set of policies for people who are struggling to stay in the middle class, who don't, who think it is impossible for their kids to be in the middle class. who find it, who think their aspiration to rise into the middle class is at a dead end. um, the one thing is that when you have the office for 8 years, you can't just say, you can't -- you know, act as if the 8 years didn't exist. you have to be able to say something about your record, and if you are the person who held that office, you want desperately to do that. so, that, you know, i think president obama was always careful to say we have much further to go. when you save the economy from a

real disaster, that is what we were facing in 2008, you would like a little credit for that. and so, it is not shocking that president obama took some. and he deserves some. but that led to a very kind of confused, schizophrenic message. >> we have time for one more. yeah, go ahead. >> if this election is about anything -- it's -- broken government. in that regard, perhaps gerrymandering covers some of that ground. what would it take to connect the dots of this pernicious, they did to us, we're going to do it to them. in fact, most people think it started with governor gary in massachusetts. it was first done by patrick henry in the fifth district of virginia. anyway, i worked that campaign. [laughter]

north carolina, ohio, pennsylvania and how -- in the statehouses. and what would it take, many experienced people say this is the secret sauce of modern politics. >> you mean the safe districts that never change? >> packing district and what it is doing to statehouses. >> has to be our last round of answers. >> this is another topic in which i have a lot of information and a strong opinion, which is that if what's happened in congress is most members of congress can only lose in a primary. what happens is you wake up as an elected official and you say, oops, i have to stay close to my party's base. i believe if we had state supreme court round the country for each state drawn maps, instead of having 90

competitive districts, we would have 240. these men and women wake up and say, yikes, i could lose my district. i have worked with a lot of different members of congress. the members of congress and one of those swing states have a political antenna where every day they're going like this. the men and women i work with in safe seats are -- they've never had to do that. so, it is an unfair system that produces what this polarization, and we have very unfair seats. and we have very unfair seats. 20, four years ago they were tipped democrats. you can look at the two-party votes cast, and republicans are getting a list of about three to five points more seats than we are votes. ago, democrats had

seven points. system, fore the the one thing that both members of congress feel, every party agrees on is i will take the current system, because i have a better shot at a safe seat. then you try to do initiatives, is the ultimate process fight and process fights are very hard to mobilize. california initiatives change the california primary systems because i believe that our country with state supreme court drawn districts with fair and more competitive seats, would instantly and fundamentally change the political rewards culture in a way that would produce a radically different outcome, legislative leave. -- legislatively. have roughly only 90 competitive seats out of 435, maybe 90 unless you have massive scandal.

it would half the seats. african-american areas, rural areas, half the seats being competitive would radically change american government in terms of how much got done and what the cooperation would you like a cross party. whatever party your income you have to produce a result of allow you to be reelected in a competitive seats. ison that point, arizona that, have an independent counsel to does it and there's more seats competitive than you might think. actually to answer your question about the democratic establishment. i think my answer to that would be the clintons themselves. it's probably because she lost in 2008 and when she ran in 2008, there was an ascension that she was going to be anointed. she lost to barack obama and then in the ensuing eight years, it had built up to this point where no democrat could really cross her, and a younger member

of the party, you'll notice that bernie sanders was the only one who really stepped up to run against hillary clinton. there was a reason for that. the clintons made sure that was the case. >> you are breaking martin o'malley's heart. >> i know. he tried. is theond part of that clintons are products of their own environments and what they learned when they were in politics. the democratic party have become too liberal, and their answer to that was to run as centrists. previously, he only got elected president as a democrat if you were from the south where you had to be more moderate. they ran on globalization and the lessons and things the clintons have internalized for decades is that this is how you win as a democrat, and anyone who tries to do it another way doesn't understand that. they, in becoming a

political institution, failed to learn that sometimes anger people are quick up to -- quicker to pick up on what's going on around them. the challenge for the democratic party, we been talking so much about the republican civil war, but the civil war within the democratic party, cut is clinton effect that such a hold on the party, their bench is not they are -- is not there. who's going to run in 2020? it's possible sen. sanders: take another run at a, that's four years down the line. >> concluding thoughts? we are at that point. crucial, itt's occurred to me that the last time you had a president as a moderate who faces a congress that is united but is more extreme, was jimmy carter.

to he comes from nowhere win, completely unexpected, two years out. carter, and his experience with the democratic withess is what we may see trump and the republican congress. i don't know. that's the case, then 2020 is when the democrats need to find ronald reagan. [laughter] >> anybody else? well thank you so much for coming. [applause] thank you. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

>> views coming up from this morning from several of the war memorials on the national mall in the nation's capital, as the nation observes veterans day with november 11 marking the end of world war i, european countries observe remembrance day, and armistice day as well. the holiday became veterans day in the united states in 1954, and now honors all american men and women who served in the armed forces. ♪

>> members of congress active on twitter with veterans day activities. ohio democrats tweeting a photo of a flag raising at a local school. and from ohio republican, joined marcy kaptur at a gold medal ceremony. justenator from georgia one reelection, joining home depot today to honor all the veterans who bravely served our country during their celebration of service event. senator warren hatch of utah remembering his brother, jesse, a world war ii veteran. here is his video. hatch: my brother was a young graduate of high school who went into the military, he wanted to be a pilot. ony pushed him into a gunner

a be 24. -- b-24. down. shot he was listed as missing in action, it was a really hard time for my parents, and for me. i remember with the military came to our front porch and i was down in the woods and i heard my mother start to cry, and iran back up out of the woods and they didn't know what to do. rosesd received 12 yellow just a short while after that, apparently, my brother had bought those before that faded trip over germany. in austria. and sent them. she thought he was alive until they finally found his remains and we went through it all again. it was a very difficult thing. loved paying tribute

to our veterans and supporting them in every way we possibly can. >> at 11:00 a.m. this morning, or his last time as commander-in-chief, president obama later brief -- laid a wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier. the president spoke to the audience in the nearby have a theater as part of their veterans day ceremony. >> present.

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