It is shaping up to be a busy week in politics as midterm races intensify
and President Biden travels to serve a hurricane damage. Laura Baron
Lopez has more
After visiting Puerto Rico today, President Biden plans to travel
to more hurricane damaged communities in Florida later this week.
Meanwhile, lawmakers have left the capital and are launching their
final midterm messages and you campaign ads to talk about the political
implications of all of this. I'm joined by our politics Monday duo
Amy Walter of the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter and Tamara
Keith. NPR. Thank you ladies for joining us, Amy, I wanted to start
with you. President Biden was in Puerto Rico today is going to Florida
later this week.
Week and Florida's poised to receive billions of dollars of disaster
relief. That's led to some accusations against Florida Governor Ron
DeSantis, as well as Senator Marco Rubio, both Republicans of hypocrisy
because they voted against the same type of disaster relief for New
Jersey when hurricane sandy hit is this impacting voters at all in
terms of their perceptions of the Republicans in Florida? That's
right. I think at this moment in time, especially in the immediate
aftermath of this hurricane and the cleanup that is going to be needed
after work
Where voters in the state are looking to
Governor DeSantis and their senators is the amount of help that they
can give them and the and they want to see their elected officials
focused really almost exclusively on what they can do to help not
getting in political fights, or, you know, losing their focus on
what is immediately in front of them. I think on the question of
whether these sorts of issues this hypocrisy did you vote for against
giving money to one part of the country while asking taxpayers to
give money to
You what you hear Republicans saying, like Marco Rubio is
Listen, I will vote. I voted plenty of times to give money to other
communities hit by natural disasters. But these bills have to be
clean. They can't have add ons into them. But one person's add on,
of course, right. It doesn't look like a clean bill. Maybe somebody
else's lifeline in another district or part of the country. This
is the dance that always becomes challenging when trying to pass
these sorts of bills in Washington because what is a disaster?
May look obvious in some places, and it's a little bit more challenging
in others, and we don't know yet if Governor DeSantis and President
Biden are going to appear together when the president goes to Florida,
But looking at the broader midterm math, Tamara Democrats are hammering
the abortion rights issue across the country and incumbent House
Democrat Abig able. Abigail Spanberger just launched an ad featuring
a rape victim in her race.
At the age of 17. I was raped.
It was devastating.
Yes, leave, Vega said. Women can't get pregnant from rape because
it's not happening organically that made me sick tomorrow. As you
know, this is about defying the odds of history for Democrats because
typically the party in charge of the White House loses the midterms.
Is this abortion rights issue giving them a chance? Well, it is certainly
something that they are putting their money behind. Um you know,
a way to know whether whether a politician or party thinks that a
message is working is to look where the money
He is flowing and in the last
A couple of months, basically since the Dobbs decision, But it's
grown as time has gone on. Democrats are putting more and more money
into ads with this abortion messaging many of their negative campaign
ads about their Republican opponents in particular focus on abortion
rights, and they've also tried to expand it to say that this is about
freedom and about you know, democratic ideals and and and broaden
it out beyond the abortion issue. The reason they're doing this is
Because young voters female voters, there are a lot of voters who
are deeply concerned by the Dobbs decision by what they've seen following
it, and and so democratic campaigns are investing in this. They also
saw a couple of special elections that led them to believe that this
is an issue that will work for them.
Is it enough? Um I don't know that it's enough to overcome all of
the other fundamental challenges that Democrats face in this cycle,
including economic concerns, and just the fundamentals of the midterm
when the president is in power and is not super popular, But an analysis
of data from ad impact says that about 20% of all spending right
now is on these abortion related ads from Democrats, Speaking of
the economy that was initially the issue that it seemed like Republicans
were going to be run.
Any enforce steam ahead on and that's not to say that they aren't
but they are now focusing in states like Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.
A lot on crime and a lot on immigration in Pennsylvania. Mehmet odds
this Republican Senate candidate there has a new ad out on drugs
and on crime.
John Fetterman supports decriminalizing dangerous drugs like fentanyl
and heroin. Betterment supports creating heroin injection sites,
and our neighborhoods means ideas are radical, deadly and wrong.
Giving addicts easy access to drugs is not the answer. Stoking fear
among their base was a big thing that Republicans have done in the
past. They did it in 2018, and it didn't quite work that election
cycle. But do you think that this time around
It will. So the challenge in a place like Pennsylvania for both of
the candidates, because this is an open seat. They were having to
define themselves right that these are two people who aren't sitting
incumbent for Dr Oz who just saw there. His challenge. A lot of it
was in the primary. A lot of conservative voters didn't know anything
about Dr Oz. They didn't really trust him. He was not
Originally from Pennsylvania, just recently moved from New Jersey.
And he seemed like somebody because of what his past profession was,
which was being on TV.
Hanging out with people like Oprah, being part of sort of the Hollywood
said that maybe he wasn't there kind of conservative, so he had to
bring those voters back in. But
What he needs to do right now is pivot more toward the general election
and bring in those swing voters. John Fetterman has done a great
job up until this point of defining himself as not your sort of typical
Democrat, not your typical politician you could see in that photo.
He's got the sweatshirt and the cargo pants and the tattoos
that is his uniform. But his record
While he's been in office has been much more liberal than the state
itself, and it gives Republicans the opportunity to cast him as out
of step on this issue. Look, just throwing out the term abortion
or throwing out the term crime isn't going to work in every race.
Not every candidate is going to be able to be easily labeled as out
of step work to the extreme out of the out of the mainstream on those
issues, But some candidates like we saw in the abortion ad.
Have said things that put them outside of the mainstream. Some candidates
and Federman is one of those have called in the past.
For the decriminalization of some smaller, small amounts of drugs.
Or he is on the pardon board as lieutenant governor, so he has a
record on those issues that may play better in a place like Pennsylvania.
Then it would just bringing this issue up against another candidate
who may not have a track record or have any relationship with these
issues. And the note on that. Yes, Fetterman supports decriminalizing
drugs, which is very different than legalization.
And he cast it more as a public health versus prosecution.
Issue, But I want to also get to former President Donald Trump and
something he did on Friday, which was news hour. We've covered a
lot about the growing violent rhetoric among the Republican Party.
And on Friday, former President Trump attacked Senate Minority Leader
Mitch McConnell and in his post on truth, Social, Trump said McConnell
quote has a death wish and must immediately seek help and advice
from his China loving wife.
Oh Oh Chow today, Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney said that rhetoric
like that could cause cause violence. She also called it racist.
But the vast majority of Republicans have not condemned this. So,
Tamara, What does this silence among the GOP say about the party
today? Well, this is pretty classic silence. When Trump has tweeted
things in the past. Now he puts it out on truth social. He goes up
to the line. He crosses the line. He does things and says things
That put Republicans in a terrible position, and then they say, Oh,
gosh, I haven't seen the tweet, Um and and it's a It's a pretty standard
pattern of trying to wish it away where the Republican Party knows
that he has this powerful figure. I mean, he is the Republican frontrunner
until something changes for 2024. He has endorsements are needed,
and he's out doing rallies and
And yet he is a very difficult problem for Republicans in terms of
wanting to lead or being able to just say, Oh, we've moved on. They
can't say they've moved on. The final thoughts totally agree with
this, and I think what we're going to find is the more that Donald
Trump is in the news, the better Democrats feel
Amy Walter. Tamara. Keith. Thank you so much for your time. You're