amy: from the republican national convention in milwaukee this is democracy now! >> so tonight i stand here humbled and i am overwhelmed with gratitude to say i officially accept your nomination to be vice president of the united states of america. amy: "is there something more

radical than maga? j.d. vance is dreaming it." we will look at how j.d. vance has gone from a to a leading fierce critic of donald trump to a leading in the maga movement. and now trumps running mate. >> we need a leader who answers to the working man, union and nonunion alike. a leader who will not sell out to multinational corporations but will stand up to american companies and american industries. amy: we will speak to politico reporter ian ward and historian nancy isenberg, author of "white trash: the 400-year untold history of class in america." all that and more coming up.

welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, this is war, peace, and the presidency. breaking with convention. i'm amy goodman. president biden has tested positive for covid, and canceled a campaign speech wednesday evening as he headed back to delaware to self-isolate. the white house said biden has mild symptoms and is being treated with the anti-viral drug paxlovid. biden was set to address the unidos u.s. conference in las vegas to appeal to latinx voters. earlier in the day, an unmasked biden was seen greeting supporters. just hours before news of the president's covid diagnosis went public, biden made headlines over comments during an interview with bet journalist ed gordon. >> is there anything you would look to, you personally, not other pungent's, not family members, that you would look to to say if you see that i will reevaluate.

>> some medical condition that emerges. doctors say you have this problem or that problem. amy: later in the same interview, biden appeared to forget the name of his secretary of defense lloyd austin, referring to him as "the black man". separately on wednesday, california congressmember and u.s. senate candidate adam schiff publicly called on biden to "pass the torch", after reports he told donors privately biden could cost democrats the presidency and the senate if he stays in the race. this comes amid reports that top democrats nancy pelosi, and party leaders chuck schumer and hakeem jeffries, have directly expressed concerns to president biden over his ability to beat trump. meanwhile, biden has been the subject of backlash this week over comments he made in an interview with journalist speedy morman on complex, where biden claimed he was "very supportive" of palestinians. >> are you a zionist?

>> yes. you know what a zionist is? >> i just ask the questions, i do not answer. >> i am the guy that did more for the palestinian community than anybody. i am the guy that opened up the assets. i'm the guy that made sure the egyptians open the border to get goods through. amy: president biden's comments come as israel's us-backed war on gaza has now killed nearly 39,000 palestinians, according -- though the true death toll is certainly much higher. among those killed was muhammed bhar, a 24-year-old man from gaza city. bhar's mother says her son, who had down syndrome, was separated from his family and mauled by a combat dog that israeli soldiers unleased on bahr as he cried out "khalas ya habibi", meaning "enough, my dear".

muhammed bhar's mother says he was non-verbal and these were the only words his family had ever heard him speak. the red cross warns hospitals in southern gaza are at "breaking point" due to the spike in patients as israel intensifies its attacks across the territory. only 10 of 26 un healthcare facilities in gaza remain operational. on wednesday, the top u.n. aid coordinator for palestine, muhannad hadi, said women and girls in gaza are facing harrowing conditions and everything is a priority and everything is a challenge. >> the discussion i had with a woman group was what i have never had in my entire career in the united nations. women expressed to me how they go through difficulties living there stop the number one thing

women complain about was privacy. the lack of privacy and dignity. amy: here in milwaukee, senator j.d. vance of ohio formally accepted the republican vice presidential nomination as he took the stage on day three of the republican national convention wednesday night. vance appealed to the working-class and voters in the rust belt swing states. vance touted to his appalachian roots and lashed out at president biden over his foreign foreign policy record, including his support of nafta, which vance blamed for exporting thousands of u.s. manufacturing jobs to mexico, and biden's role in the iraq war in the senate, supporting president bush's invasion of iraq. vance is a u.s. marine veteran who served in iraq. vance also promoted tougher policies on china, which he's described as the "biggest threat" facing the u.s., and blamed biden for skyrocketing inflation. vance was introduced by his wife usha vance, a lawyer and the daughter of indian immigrants. much of the rnc has centered

on anti-immigrant hate speech and policies. among the speakers yesterday were donald trump, jr., texas governor greg abbott, and former trump adviser peter navarro, who was released from a miami federal prison earlier in the day before flying to milwaukee to address the rnc. navarro served four months in prison for contempt of congress, after he defied a subpoena from the house select committee investigating the january 6 insurrection. in more news from the rnc, the peace group codepink is facing death threats after a republican cogressmember accused one of its of political violence branded the group pro-hamas. codepink says rep. derrick van orden of wisconsin falsely accused nour jaghama, the group's palestine campaign coordinator, of assault after he shoved past her outside the rnc

as people waited in line to be let into the security zone. jaghama was detained for 15 hours and charged with battery. van orden, who is a former navy seal, has a history of aggressive behavior, including against fellow members of congress. elon musk has announced plans to move the headquarters of x and spacex out of california and relocate to texas over a new california state law that protects the rights of transgender students. the law, signed by gavin newsom this week, bands schools -- bans schools from forcing educators to notify parents when their child changes their gender identity without their parents consent. this includes asking to use a different name or pronouns. elon musk, who has an estranged

trans daughter, said on x, "this is the final straw." at least eight states have passed legislation to roll back child labor protections, including iowa and west virginia. the department of labor has reported an increase in 88% in child labor violations between 2019 to 2023, many cases involving migrant children. puerto rico has filed of -- has filed a lawsuit against fossil fuel giants bp, chevron, exxonmobil, and others, seeking at least $1 billion in compensation for their role in fueling the climate crisis. the corporations are charged with hiding for decades evidence that greenhouse gas pollution from fossil fuels would have catastrophic impacts on the climate. puerto rico's secretary of justice domingo emanuelli hernandez said in a statement,

"they did not truthfully warn puerto rican consumers about the consequences of using and burning fossil fuels on the island, as well as their impact on the environment. it is time for them to mitigate the damage they have caused to puerto rico and not let puerto ricans foot the bill," he said. and dr. bernice johnson reagon, civil rights activist, scholar and musician who started the vocal ensemble sweet honey in the rock, and co-founded the freedom singers and the harambee singers, died tuesday at the age of 81. in the early 1960's bernice johnson reagon performed with the student nonviolent coordinating committee's musical group freedom singers, bringing liberation songs to marches, jails, and organizing meetings. she joined democracy now! in 2008 to celebrate the life and work of another civil rights musical icon, odetta, and recalled her own musical trajectory. >> sweet honey in the rock, which came out of a theater workshop was going to be a cappella, was going to do songs that came out of these struggles

in the stages of life, people on a community-based level, calling on people to pay attention to issues we need to be addressing as responsible citizens and the singer, the artist really had a big role to play in challenging our society and culture to transform itself and to do better. absolutely the freedom singers and the freedom song in the civil rights movements is formative for me as a singer, as a composer, and as a scholar. amy: bernice johnson reagon's daughter, toshi reagon, also an acclaimed musician, shared the news on social media wednesday, and included a quote from her mother: "i was here before i came and when i die, i am not leaving." and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now, democracynow.org. war, peace and the presidency:

breaking with convention. coming up, ohio senator j.d. vance formerly accepts the republican vice presidential nomination to run with donald trump and takes the rnc stage. stay with us. ♪ [music break]

amy: "joanne little" performed by sweet honey in the rock, with bernice johnson, one of the group's founders. she has passed away at the age of 81. this is democracy now! democracynow.org. war, peace and the presidency: breaking with convention. i am amy goodman.

nermeen: and i'm nermeen shaikh. welcome to our listeners and viewers across the country and around the world. the republican national convention is entering its final day. donald trump will accept the parties nomination tonight. on wednesday night ohio senator j.d. vance accepted the republican vice presidential nomination and gave his first speech since becoming trump's running mate. j.d. vance gained fame as the first author of the best-selling memoir hillbilly elegy: a memoir of a family and culture in crisis about growing up in appalachia. vance is a graduate of yale law school who served in the marines and became a venture capitalist. it was elected to the senate in 2022 -- keep was elected to the senate in 2022 and parts -- in part thanks to billionaire tech investor peter thiel, who spent a record-breaking $10 million to support j.d. vance's campaign.

for years vance was a vocal critic of donald trump. in 2016 he wrote in the atlantic, quote, "trump is cultural heroin. he makes some feel better for a bit. but he cannot fix what ails them, and one day they will realize it." on wednesday night vance called from "america's last best hope." >> things to work out well with a lot of kids i grew up with. every now and then i will get a call, did you know so-and-so, and then i woke here they died of an overdose. as always america's ruling class wrote the checks. communities like mine paid the price. for decades that divide between the view with their power in washington and the rest of us only widened. from iraq to afghanistan, from the financial crisis to great recession, from open borders to stagnating wages, the people who govern this country have failed and failed again.

[applause] that is, of course, until a guy named donald j. trump came along. president trump represents america's last best hope to restore what, if lost, may never be found again. a country where working-class boy born far from the halls of power can stand on the stage as the next vice president of the united states of america. amy: that was j.d. vance speaking at the republican national convention last night in milwaukee for the first time as republican vice presidential nominee. we are joined by ian ward, politico reporter who interviewed j.d. vance at length over the course of a few months earlier this year for a profile headlined, "is there something more radical than maga? j.d. vance is dreaming it."

his new piece out this week is "are republican voters ready for the nerdy radicalness of j.d. vance? donald trump puts the new right on the ballot." it is great to have you with us. you spent a number of weeks with j.d. vance for this profile. few journalists know him like you do at the national level. if you can respond to what he said last night on the stage of the republican national convention and then talk about exactly who j.d. vance is, his profile, his history. >> i think we have seen that j.d. vance can wear many hats as a politician. he can be the attack dog, he can be the intellectual articulate

or of the populist right, key can be the memoirist he was when he rose to national prominence with hillbilly elegy. there was a question which version of him what we see and i think we saw the memoirist come to the floor. he dove deep into his personal background and rehashed the material in hillbilly elegy about his childhood in ohio and he struck a more restrained tone then you have seen him strike in the past. it was may an indication that trump can be his own attack dog during the campaign and they might deploy vance as a more restrained voice. lyrically we expect to see vance parked in the rust belt states. -- politically we expect to see vans parked in the rust belt states. his background in ohio gives him

a connection to those voters. it is unsurprising we see him lead into that element of his biography. it is something to keep an eye on going forward. it is political trajectory you are seeing his biography take center stage. that was not a given. there is a world in which you wants to turn the page -- in which he wants to turn the page and strike a new note, but we are not seeing that, we are seeing him return to his hillbilly elegy roots at the basis of his political identity. nermeen: you said you were impressed after having spent all of this time with him -- that you were impressed by the breadth of his knowledge and interests. he could say a little about what he spoke of in the interview with you and what that might indicate about how he will be as a vice president and what his

interests and priorities will be. >> i think there are a lot of republican politicians, especially in congress and on the hill who've taken up the trumpian talking points without trying to dig deeper into a philosophy or theory that pulls them altogether. vance is a smart guy despite what you think of his politics. he is a memoirist. he is adept at spinning personal tales into political lessons. he is educated at yale law school. it has a writers mentality and brings a writers approach to politics regardless of what you make of his political ideas. in our interviews we talked about a shockingly broad array of things. he brought up that he had been thinking about the french president charles de gaulle and

his legacy in postwar france. we talked about rail safety reform which was one of the legislative battles he took up in his first year in the senate. we talked about his intellectual influences, which include a range of writers and thinkers within the conservative movement. we talked about his family life in washington. regardless of what you think of his politics he is an interesting, smart guy. he has far ranging interests and he is willing to talk about those things with reporters and constituents, which makes him a little bit different than the average politician who pretends to be -- who tends to be one-dimensional. amy: if you could tell us more about his background. not everyone has read hillbilly elegy, and how important it is and how the republican convention is using his mother's addiction, for example, mainly

raised by his grandmother. they are very much talking about fentanyl, they are liking it -- they are liking it to what he referred to as illegal aliens talking about drugs being brought over the border when the facts about who brings drugs over the border, 90% are brought by u.s. citizens at u.s. ports of entry. tell us his personal story about how he was raised and how that shaped him as he made his way to the ohio state and yale law school when he met his wife, who would go on to clerk for two supreme court justice is. one was brett kavanaugh and one was justice roberts. >> vance grew up in middletown, ohio, a small to medium-sized town about an hour north of

cincinnati in western ohio. he claims to be descended from hillbilly royalty, that is his term. a distant relative was involved in the hatfield mccoy feud, the famous appellation feud. -- the famous appellation feud -- he grew up in a troubled and broken family. his parents got divorced when he was very young. his mother struggled with drug addiction. he was raised primarily by his grandparents. he spent his summers growing up returning to kentucky, to coal country where meemaw's family roots were. he said he felt like kentucky was his spiritual home even though middletown, ohio was his actual home. his mother struggle with drug

addiction has become essential part of his political story. the way republicans have been using the opioid epidemic and tying it to immigration is a good symbol for the various assaults on national sovereignty -- this is how they would put it. the united states has surrendered control of its border and its people to outside influences, to foreign invasion, to use a popular conservative term. we have abandoned protecting our borders and that means immigrants, drug dealers are assaulting our american citizens. obviously it is a political risk that resonates with the republican base and an interesting symbol for the way republicans think about the abdication of american sovereignty and the turning over of the governing of america to elites whose allegiance ease are primarily to a cosmopolitan

world untethered from american soil and american citizens and who have abandoned the american people to these nefarious forces that exist outside of us. nermeen: you talk about the term you have written about, the new right, which j.d. vance is supposed to be the intellectual light. you explain the new right, one of the central tenants is that " the development liberals point to as signs of progress are in fact engines of civilization collapse." if you could explain how vance views this and how this might shape the way he influences or determines trump's policy if he is elected president. >> vance is often described as illiberal or anti-liberal. he has used the term post-liberal. what he means, just using that

as a neutral description of beliefs, he does not believe in the prominence of small l liberal democracy. liberalism as a political theory. it is belief that economic liberalizations, the expansion of personal rights and the leveling of unjust social hierarchies leads to a better world for everyone. he does not think that is true. he thinks small l liberalism is a superstructure to protect the economic interests of a certain type of person, a cosmopolitan person, the professional class, on the left what they call the professional managerial class. he does not buy into the prominence of small -- he does not buy into the promise of small l liberalism. he thinks it has led to economic discretion of communities and the discussion -- and the

destruction of social hierarchies has led to cultural degradation and chaos. this is a belief shaped by his relationship with peter thiel. he thinks technological innovation has been perverted by feckless elites who cannot get their act together and use technology to control their economic interests. thiel as a line that we wanted flying cars and we got 140 characters. technology had the potential to revolutionize our lives but instead it gave us twitter and thiel blames that on the perversity and fecklessness of political and cultural elites. when vance describes himself as a postliberal or a liberal, that is what he is getting at. amy: as we talk about billionaires, what about elon

musk saying he will be giving $45 billion to the republican efforts to elect president trump every month leading up to november, which would be nearly $200 million? and j.d. vance's relationship with these tech millionaire and billionaires. >> vance, after he went to yale and briefly practiced law he went into silicon valley and work for peter thiel's venture capital firm and spun off his own firm that did not last long. he lived in silicon valley and was tied into this world of right-wing silicon valley money and political influence. they have consolidated behind him. thiel funded his 2022 senate campaign. this is a serious tension in the republican campaign.

they have been campaigning on what they call economic populism and promising to protect the workingman, at the same time they've been accepting enormous checks from silicon valley billion errors and billionaires and plumbing them for donations and hosting fundraisers. i am not entirely sure what musk sees in vance and trump. i think they think he would be friendly to their economic interests and technology interests. he will do traditional deregulation and do tax cuts for billionaires. that is entirely possible based on trump's first term but i am not entirely sure how they plan to navigate this tension. they might just ignore it. on the one hand they are doing economic populism, on the other hand they are cozying up to billionaires. it strikes most people as a start contradiction. amy: can you talk about j.d.

vance saying trump makes racial resentment worse by talking about rapist immigrants and banning all muslims. he wrote in 2016 "trump makes people i care about afraid. immigrants, muslims, etc. because of this i find him reprehensible. god wants better of us," he wrote in october 2016 about president trump. ian? >> the big question is to what degree j.d. vance has undergone a genuine ideological transformation and to what degree he has molded himself into the trumpian model for reasons of self-advancement. his own explanation for his transformation is twofold. one is that he lived through the first trump administration and saw they were right on the policy issues he cared about.

the second is he was radicalized by the liberal response to trump's presidency. he was at that point ensconced in rarefied liberal circles due to hillbilly elegy and as he watched liberals respond to trump and in his terms lose their mind over what trump was doing he realized he was not one of these people and he took active measures to distance himself from that. he gave an interview at the new york times recently where he said i self-consciously burned bridges with the liberal world i had become so close with. part of how he did that was posting inflammatory things to twitter and on his various social media accounts and saying nasty stuff on the campaign trail. it seems to have been a calculated strategy. he has embraced the gop's divisive rhetoric on immigration.

i think there is a political calculation. the more inflammatory he can be online and the more he can distance himself from the never trump last -- the never trump past he had embraced the more he can ingratiate himself with the maga base. i think that has paid off. he is the vice president now. nermeen: if you can say -- in your piece, there is something more radical than maga and j.d. vance embodies that. how does he embody that, starting with his position on abortion? >> he told me he supports a 15 week federal ban. he has since waffled on his abortion position and come around to trump's talking point that abortion should be left to the states.

his abortion stance is somewhat unclear at this point but he in the past has expressed support for federal bands and very restrictive federal bans. but i mean when i say something more radical than maga, what distinguishes him from the trump faithful is he -- even before he was considering being on the ticket was thinking about the trumpian movement in terms that transcended trump. he never solves trump as the end-all, be-all of the movement. he sees trump as a vehicle for a transnational revolution that could extend 10, 15, 20, 100 years in the future. he said to me the country was not screwed up in 10 years and it will not be unscrewed in 10 years. he is thinking of the populist nationalist project and a timeline of decades, not in a timeline of election cycles.

we have some indication that trump has embraced that vision. he did not have to pick an heir apparent to the mega movement. -- to the maga movement. he picked j.d. vance. people like steve bannon have all told me they see vance very clearly as the future of the nationalist right and not an extension of trump. amy: last night j.d. vance was introduced by his wife. extremely accomplished lawyer, clerked for what ended up being two supreme court justices, brett kavanaugh and roberts. she met him at yale law school. she probably talked about her hindu heritage, that she is a

vegetarian and he learned to cook as a vegetarian. also his own conversion just a few years ago to catholicism. can you talk about his religious trajectory? >> he has written about his own religious trajectory and it tends to date back to his introduction to peter thiel, a well vance was a student at yale in 2013. he attended a talk by peter t hiel at yale. they became friends. thiel has undergone his own spiritual transformation. vance was introduced to the writings of a french literary critic and philosopher and christian apologist and catholic. over the course of 2013 to 2019 when he was accepted into the catholic faith he said they

underwent a spiritual transformation. in the book hillbilly elegy you can sense this search for a deeper spiritual foundation for him. he grew up in middletown, descendants of the scots irish folk who were generally protestant in a protestant-lite way and he was always disaffected at that. he talks about his teenage and college years embracing atheism as a reaction to what he saw as the weak religious foundations of his childhood and it led him to catholicism. it tracks with a broader evolution on the right towards a more muscular conservative catholic faith. he is close with a handful of conservative intellectuals who are very outspoken catholics and juxtapose their own catholic worldview to the liberal one he rejects. catholic social teaching, which

tries to infuse political and social life with catholic theology is right there. that is an intellectual influence for him as well. i think catholicism is a political story and a personal story. amy: we want to thank you so much for joining us. ian ward, politico reporter who has interviewed j.d. vance extensively over the course of a few months. earlier this year for a profile he did for politico magazine headlined is there something more radical than maga, eddie vance is dreaming it. his new p -- j.d. vance is dreaming it." his new piece out this week is "are republican voters ready for the nerdy radicalness of j.d. vance? donald trump puts the new right on the ballot." next up, historian nancy isenberg, author of the award-winning book, "white

trash: the 400-year untold history of class in america." ♪ [music break] amy: "aint gonna let nobody turn

me around" by the freedom singers. bernice johnson reagon, a founder of the freedom singers and sweet honey in the rock, has passed away at the age of 81. this is democracynow! democracynow.org. war, peace, and the presidency. i am amy goodman with nermeen chic. -- with nermeen shaik. nermeen: we are joined by nancy isenberg, she is an american historian and the author of the award-winning book, "white trash: the 400-year untold history of class in america." amy: she wrote a widely cited review of jd vance's "hillbilly elegy" for the new york review of books in 2018 headlined "left behind." she is emeritus professor of history at louisiana state university. welcome to democracy now!.

it is great to have you with us. when president trump named j.d. vance as the vice presidential nominee, as his pick to be vice president if he wins, can you talk about your response informed by your response to hillbilly elegy? >> yeah, hi. i was not completely surprised because i did write a review that did not go along with the general chatting class consensus that hillbilly elegy was somehow a revelation or told us the truth about the people who were supporting trump. i am more skeptical. i was skeptical from the beginning because memoirs are about self fashioning. the strongest message in hillbilly elegy is the one that was echoed last night at the republican convention is the self-made man myth.

this is the myth that somehow america creates opportunities and just like benjamin franklin, you can fashion yourself and rise up the ladder to success. this is very much something j.d. vance believes in. it is a part of his memoir. much of what his memoir says tells us nothing about real class conditions. the person you just had on from politico who talked about the scotch irish tradition, that is a myth. that is a myth that was reinvented in the 1980's by people who were trying to shift the debate to an ethnic identity instead of talking about class. that is something that americans have trouble addressing is class divisions and the republicans do not talk about them and the democrats do not talk about them. this is the undercurrent of j.d.

vance. the reason he was chosen and what was not mentioned is because of his youth. this has been in the news, the media, everyone has been attacking biden for being too old and now trump is too old and how they pick a 39-year-old young man who projects youthfulness because it appeals to the media. that is why he is on the ticket. his rise was created by the mainstream media. it was the liberals who embraced him, the liberals who were reading hillbilly elegy, not trumpsters. nermeen: so if you could explain the argument in your book "white trash: the 400 year untold history of class in america." explain the origin of this historic phrase white trash and what the myths are about class

and poverty that pervade american political and social life and why you think that is the case. >> my book is challenging the big myth about america which is the american dream which is connected to the self-made man, that somehow at the time of the revolution we broke from great britain and we eliminated aristocracy, we eliminated class divisions and somehow we were a unique, free, liberated people. none of that is true. we have relied heavily on english traditions. where you think we got our law? the common law. not only that, the ideology of class have been pervasive in america. the sad thing that we forget and the reason that white trash still exists today is because it goes all the way back to the colonial period. it goes back to the elizabethan.

period when the original purpose on the part of the english for colonization was to dump the "waste people." that is where white trash comes from. referring to the expendables, people who were hurting the economy in great britain, dump them into the colonies and get rid of the rubbish. that is the term thomas jefferson used. trash literally means trash. if you can think of any negative connotation associated with waste, that was part of the rhetoric as well. in our class system, what we also do not understand, this is very much a rural notion. waste not only means rubbish, it means wasteland. this is a part of the common law. the idea of unplowed, unproductive land. these are the terminologies that

provide the foundation for talking about white trash. our class system and this term has evolved over time. they referred to scrappers, squatters. people who are trespassers, criminals. crackers attacks there intellectual abilities. any negative association you can attach to a group has been applied to people who fall under this rubric. we also have to distinguish -- white trash does not include all people who are poor or struggling. there are more refined distinctions. to this day there is a distinction among americans in more rural areas and particularly in the south, a distinction between white trash and rednecks. rednecks are hard-working, their next are red because they are burned from the sun, they were associated with living in the swamps in the south. hillbilly is a distinctive term, people from the hills.

in a sense it is all linking people to specific regions, specific kinds of land. this is important. we erase all of this because we think americans are detached from the land. property is still the most important source of wealth and i think we need to remember that white trash is still with us. we have modern trailer trash, we have these terms that are still thrown around. just changing the language will not get rid of the class divisions and that is where i think ripples -- that is where i think liberals are really at fault. historians have done. they refer to people moving west as squatters -- as settlers instead of squatters. we have to face the fact that class divisions are real. there are distinctions. we cannot -- the urban poor is

exactly the same as the rural poor. nermeen: if you could speak, there is the question of white trash, that is to say not only in economic terms poor white people, but also black and latinx people in terms of percentages of population by race and ethnicity in 2022, 17% of black people in the u.s. were living below the poverty line compared to 8.6% of white people. there is a massive intersection of race and poverty. if you could talk about that and how this figures in the conversation about class in the u.s.. >> that statistic distorts things because the population

size of people who are classified as white are much larger. there is widespread white poverty and poverty shifts depending on what region or what area of the country you are in. there is black rural poverty as there is white rural poverty, but one of the problems we have with this discussion, and other scholars have noted this. often educated liberal elites have seen poverty as a black i ssue. it is not. this comes from the 1960's, the idea of reducing everything to the urban context that we have to recognize if we go back in time, one of the things that is quite striking is the relationship between poor whites and poor blacks was much closer than between poor whites and the

aristocratic white elite who looked down on poor whites. poor whites and poor blacks often live next to each other, they engaged in trade relations with each other. we have to recognize that poverty can have similar consequences for these groups and the whole term "poor white trash" was something blacks used to describe poor whites, and went on my book tour, many black americans understood the story quite well, where i think for liberal elites it is much more incomprehensible or surprising to them. i think we cannot reduce or return to the political strategies of the south where it leads would try to increase the tensions between black and white

and create a sense of competition, and this goes back to the confederacy, when they had to appeal to poor whites to make sure they would join the confederacy and be cannon fodder. they had to make the argument that if they do not support the confederacy that free blacks will somehow be elevated above then. this is something today. the idea of inciting competition between two groups. this is what trump does when he incites competition between immigrants and supposedly poor whites who are middle-class americans. amy: nancy isenberg, we will leave it there but this is a discussion we will continue to have. professor eisenberg -- professor nancy isenberg is the award-winning book, "white trash: the 400-year untold history of class in america." this is democracy now!,

democracynow.org, war, peace, and the presidency. nermeen: lance to virtually nominate biden despite calls for him to step aside. a poll shows nearly two thirds of democrats want biden to withdraw from the race following the disastrous debate with donald trump. on wednesday adam schiff publicly called on biden to "pass the torch." senate majority leader chuck schumer and house minority leader hakeem jeffries have both met with biden to discuss concerns about him staying in the office. in another major development biden tested positive for covid, forcing him to pause campaigning. earlier in interview was released where biden said he would consider dropping out of a medical condition emerged. amy: we are doing two hours of

coverage every day from the republican convention in milwaukee, wisconsin. we are again joined by chris lehmann, d.c. bureau chief for the nation. so much has changed in the last 24 hours. just as j.d. vance is about to give a speech at the republican convention, president trump is there every night at the convention, his right ear has a white bandage on it because of the attempted assassination. we learned that president biden has come down with covid. he left las vegas and returned home just before that, in this bet interview he said if a medical condition emerges, so much is happening. nancy pelosi has apparently spoken to him as have other democratic leaders, pushing him to step aside. the significance of this moment. >> it is unprecedented, to put

things mildly. it is striking -- i have been here in milwaukee covering the convention. most of the other journalists and political operatives i am talking with were all talking about the democrats yesterday. this is a potentially huge development and it is still not clear how it will all shake out. the reason i think nancy pelosi in particular is playing a leading role in all of this is during her long tenure as speaker and minority leader for the democrats in the house, she was laser focused on the fortunes of vulnerable incumbent democrats in purple and red districts, historically red districts. she is looking at pulling numbers that suggest with biden

on the top of the ticket democrats have a vanishingly thin chance of recapturing the house and to put things in bald power politics terms, if trump is reelected, the house has to be the power base for the democrats. the house is the most popular branch of government. it is the most responsive to the people because of the electoral cycle and the number of representatives. amy: because members are elected every two years. >> that is a flashing red warning lights for democrats if the house is in jeopardy. amy: we are hearing all sorts of names bandied about. the idea that if president biden will step aside that he is even possibly talking about with democratic leaders. polls note, let harris could win -- polls show kamala harris

could win, who would be the vice president? we have heard about gretchen whitmer, wes moore, now a new name is servicing, mark kelly, arizona swing state senator, the husband of the shooting victim and former congress member gabby giffords who is an astronaut. amazing what is happening in these moments and the possibility of the virtual rollcall, whether this will be put off. already it has been put off until later so it does not happen during the convention. >> like i said, unprecedented. this is all crack the political reporters and political junkies that you get to speculate about all of these alternate scenarios. i think it more realistic terms,

kamala harris would be at the top of the ticket. who knows, you have this vacancy at the vp slot. it is interesting to see all of these machinations go forward. i have peace earlier this week or last week -- the time is blurring for me -- about the democrats addiction to resume candidates and that is how they wound up with someone biden's age. they have this institutional deference to longevity and people holding power and it is a dramatic contrast to what has been happening on the republican side. you had trump, but even before trump, paul ryan. at one point with kevin mccarthy he was one of the young lions in the party.

they get shunted aside without remorse. there is a real sense. amy: and then you have this fascinating alignment, of the progressives, who have been very critical of president biden. everyone from bernie sanders to aoc, when it comes to him stepping aside they have firmly backed him and it is the corporate centrist democrats that have said step aside. in the last weeks bernie sanders meeting with him, president biden putting forth all of these suggestions, everything from supreme court reforms to term limits to ending medical debt. >> again, centrist versus progressive weighing is a fascinating -- versus progressive wing and it goes back to what i was saying earlier about nancy pelosi and the house. if biden were to stay at the top of the ticket and a republican landslide in sued, the first

people to go down are these centrists. they are in districts that otherwise lien rights. the -- that otherwise lean right. progressives are in safe districts. they're making their own separate leadership calculations that have biden hangs on these are chips that can be redeemed for things we want on our agenda. they also have a media image of being firebreathing and incendiary figures. if they can come off as cautious and sensible and horse trading figures, that redemption to their broader image in political discourse. a lot is going on. amy: we will continue to cover it. president trump takes the stage tonight at the republican national convention. we will be back tomorrow with two hours of war, peace, and the presidency: breaking with

convention. chris lehmann, thank you for being with us. democracy now! is currently accepting applications for a director of development to lead our fundraising team. learn more and apply at democracynow.org." i am amy goodman for