Politics
Podcasts, ‘The View’ and Howard Stern: How Harris and Trump are 'microtargeting' voters
The viewers of “The View” talk show and the listeners of Howard Stern’s satellite radio program couldn’t be more different: older women who watch daytime television for the former versus young and middle-aged white men who have long constituted the fervent followers of the once-raunchy stylings of the latter.
Yet within the span of a couple of hours Tuesday, Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris traveled between their studios in Manhattan to sit down for lengthy interviews, an odd juxtaposition of a television show initially viewed as a ladies-who-lunch klatch and a radio host who became famous because of pornographic, misogynistic and at times racist diatribes that led to millions of dollars in indecency fines from the federal government.
Historically, serious political candidates would never have appeared on either; President Obama was mocked by fellow Democrats for being the first sitting president to sit for an interview on “The View.”
But both programs, which have millions of followers, have evolved: “The View” is one of the most popular stops for presidential candidates of both parties, and Stern has transformed into a therapy-touting, inquisitive interviewer. And both represent a bipartisan strategy as candidates of both parties including former President Trump court voters through the exponentially growing network of broadcast, radio, podcast and social media venues where voters who aren’t MSNBC or Fox News junkies get their news.
Bill Burton, a national spokesperson for Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign who worked on his communications team during his first term in the White House, said “the landscape has completely changed” since he started working in politics a quarter-century ago.
“Once the most obvious ways to communicate with voters was through political reporters,” he said. “That has shifted to getting a better understanding of who voters are, where they’re getting their information and communicating with them where they’re getting their information.”
The heightened focus on nontraditional media is the latest iteration of microtargeting, efforts by campaigns to reach specific blocs of voters. One of the most effective efforts occurred during President George W. Bush’s 2004 reelection campaign when strategists used consumer data, such as which magazines voters received or the cars they bought, to surgically target Republican voters in Democratic precincts in states such as Ohio.
“Campaigns are no longer a top-down approach to messaging. Oftentimes, it’s a very customized bottom-up approach,” said Kevin Madden, a GOP strategist who worked on Bush’s 2004 reelection bid as well as Mitt Romney’s 2008 and 2012 campaigns. “Before 2004, campaigns had 30-second ads targeted at the general population of people watching the news at 6:30 and across cable news. Now … you have this almost omnipresent approach communicating through all these channels based on what you know about their issues and what you know about peer sets.”
Recalling those efforts two decades ago, Madden said: “If you drive a truck and drink Budweiser, you’re one of our voters. If you drive a Grand Cherokee and drink Heineken, you may be a swing voters. Based on consumer habits, we know where to target you with some of our messaging, whether it’s peer-to-peer communication or through Field & Stream magazine.”
“Now, it’s morphed into a more comprehensive understanding of electorate,” said Madden, now a senior partner at a Washington-based global strategic communications group. “A couple cycles ago, it was sort of like painting by numbers. Now, it’s like pixilated digital images, and we just get more and more understanding of the electorate and mood shifts and what motivates them.”
Trump has also appeared on nontraditional forums, such as the podcasts of the Nelk Boys and professional wrestler Logan Paul, both popular with young men. On Tuesday, the former president said on Ben Shapiro’s controversial podcast that President Biden and Harris ought to be removed from office through the 25th Amendment, which addresses the transfer of presidential power in cases of disability, resignation or removal from office or death.
Harris has also spoken to eyebrow-raising hosts, such as Alex Cooper of “Call Her Daddy,” an explicit podcast that boasts millions of listeners and is reminiscent of the early days of Stern’s radio show because of its frank sexual banter.
On Tuesday, Harris’ questioners on “The View” were friendly. The two Republicans sitting around the coffee table on set were notable Trump critics: Florida strategist Ana Navarro and former Trump White House aide Alyssa Farah Griffin. Harris used the appearance to roll out a proposal to offer long-term-care assistance for seniors through Medicare as she addressed the needs of the “sandwich” generation, people who are taking care of aging parents and children.
“There are so many people in our country who are right in the middle, taking care of their kids, and they’re taking care of their aging parents. And it’s just, almost, impossible to do it all, especially if they work,” Harris said, recalling her experience caring for her mother after she was diagnosed with cancer. “We’re finding that so many are then having to leave their job, which means losing a source of income, not to mention the emotional stress. And so what I am proposing is that basically what we will do is allow Medicare to cover in-home healthcare.”
But Republicans quickly focused on an answer about what she would have done differently than Biden during their time leading the nation — a tricky line Harris had to walk as she is loyal to the current president while also arguing she is a change candidate.
“There is not a thing that comes to mind … and I’ve been part of most of the decisions that have had impact,” Harris said, later adding that she would include a Republican in her Cabinet.
Trump; his running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance; and other Republicans seized upon the remark.
“President Trump breaks the internet on X Spaces with Elon Musk, attends UFC fights and football games to roaring crowds, and opens up on personal topics like his family’s struggle with addiction on podcasts like Theo Von,” Anna Kelly, a spokesperson for the Republican National Committee, said in a statement. “In contrast, Kamala Harris doubles down on the past four years of failure, from the disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal to crushing inflation and record high prices for rent, groceries, and gas.
“The contrast is clear: while President Trump continues to build the largest, most diverse coalition in history, Kamala Harris wants four more years of the same weak, failed Biden-Harris agenda — and Americans will reject the tired politics of the past when they vote for President Trump in November,” Kelly said.
Shortly after her appearance on “The View,” Harris did an interview that lasted more than an hour with Stern, who initially was famous for having lascivious discussions on the airwaves, releasing “Butt Bongo Fiesta,” a $10-million-grossing home video featuring him spanking young women’s bare bottoms in time with music, and many other instances of offensive content, including using the N-word.
He dabbled in politics, flirting with running for governor of New York before being required to release his income. He had a New Jersey highway rest stop named after him after endorsing successful GOP gubernatorial candidate Christine Todd Whitman.
As Stern has aged, he has evolved. Although he had a long-term relationship with Trump — they attended each other’s weddings — Stern said it disintegrated after he refused to introduce Trump at the 2016 Republican National Convention because he was backing Hillary Clinton.
His interview of Harris was fawning. Stern urged his supporters to vote for her or, if they supported Trump, to not vote all together. They both repeated familiar talking points about the perils they believe the former president poses to democracy and the world.
Although Harris hit many of the same notes as prior interviews, such as speaking about eating an entire bag of nacho cheese Doritos — “family size” — the night Trump won the 2016 presidential election, she also spoke about her love of Formula One racing and surprising her husband with tickets to see U2 at the Sphere in Las Vegas.
“Oh my God, have you been to the Sphere?” she asked Stern. “Everyone should go in with a clear head.”
Stern responded, “Basically, don’t be high?”
“Correct,” the vice president said. “It’s a lot. There’s a lot of visual stimulation.”
Politics
In Congress, a Push for Proxy Voting for New Parents Draws Bipartisan Support
Representative Brittany Pettersen, a second-term Colorado Democrat, was not planning to have a second child at the age of 43.
“As if our life wasn’t complicated enough!” she said with a laugh as she arranged herself on a couch in her office on Capitol Hill earlier this week, staring down at her pregnant belly just weeks from her due date. She blamed the “mistake” on the confusion of working in two time zones. “It can make things hard with consistent birth control,” she said. “It was not part of the plan.”
Congress has existed for 236 years, but somehow Ms. Pettersen is about to become only the 13th voting member to give birth while in office, and the first from her home state. As Ms. Pettersen tries to plan the next phase of her life, the reality is setting in that this job was not created with someone like her in mind.
There is no maternity leave for members of Congress. While they can take time away from the office without sacrificing their pay, they cannot vote if they are not present at the Capitol. So Ms. Pettersen has taken a lead role in a new push by a bipartisan group of younger lawmakers and new parents in Congress to change the rules to allow them to vote remotely while they take up to 12 weeks of parental leave.
“This job is not made for young women, for working families, and it’s definitely not made for regular people,” said Ms. Pettersen. “It’s historically been wealthy individuals who are not of childbearing age who do this work.”
Before boarding her plane on Thursday to return to Lakewood, Colo., where she planned to remain until after she gives birth, Ms. Pettersen introduced the “Proxy Voting for New Parents Resolution.” It would change House rules to allow new mothers and fathers in Congress to stay away from Washington immediately after the birth of a child and designate a colleague to cast votes on their behalf.
“I feel really torn,” Ms. Pettersen said, “because I’m going to choose to be home to make sure that my newborn is taken care of, but I feel that it’s unfair that I’m unable to have my constituents represented at that time.”
The resolution, she said, “is common sense. It’s about modernizing Congress.”
The idea has been percolating on Capitol Hill for some time, but has become all the more pressing for the new Congress, its proponents argue, because the House is now so closely divided, with Republicans holding the majority by just one vote.
Republicans savaged former Speaker Nancy Pelosi for breaking with centuries of history and House rules by instituting proxy voting during the coronavirus pandemic. Former Representative Kevin McCarthy, as the minority leader, filed a lawsuit arguing that allowing a member of Congress to deputize a colleague to cast a vote on their behalf when they were not present was unconstitutional.
House Republicans also argued that allowing proxy voting would have a negative effect on member “collegiality.” Ms. Luna’s resolution never came to the floor for a vote.
Now, the bipartisan group is trying again. Ms. Pettersen’s resolution was one of the first introduced in the opening days of the 119th Congress. It is slightly broader than Ms. Luna’s original proposal, written to include proxy voting for new fathers.
“I’m not in favor of proxy voting; I think it should be very rare,” said Representative Mike Lawler, a New York Republican who welcomed his second child eight days before the election. “But I don’t think any member should be precluded from doing the job they were elected to do simply because they become a parent.”
Mr. Lawler, a leader of the new effort whose baby is 2 months old, cannot afford to be away from the Capitol while his party holds a one-seat majority.
“I understand the impact when you are given a choice between being home or coming and doing your job,” he said. “It’s not a great choice.”
Mr. Lawler dismissed concerns from House leaders about creating a bad precedent, saying the existing protocols no longer fit the Congress of the modern era.
“You have younger people getting elected to public office at a much higher rate than when these rules were established,” he said. “If we talk about being pro-family, you have to at least recognize that giving birth to a child or becoming a parent should not be an impediment to doing your job.”
Ms. Pettersen said she had considered having her baby in Washington so she could continue voting, but ultimately decided against it.
“It’s unfair to my family and unfair to my newborn if we’re not at home where all of our support and my doctor and support system is,” she said.
Ms. Pettersen is still relatively new to Washington and to motherhood — her son is still in prekindergarten — but the disconnect between her situation and the job of an elected official has been painfully obvious to her ever since she was pregnant with her first child and serving in the Colorado legislature.
Back then, she was the first member of that body ever to go on maternity leave. The only way to get paid while on leave was to categorize her situation as a “chronic illness.”
When she returned, Ms. Petterson successfully pressed to change the law to ensure that future state lawmakers would be given up to 12 weeks of paid parental leave.
Even before she walked the halls of Congress as the rare pregnant member, Ms. Pettersen said she felt like an odd fit for the Capitol.
When she was 6 years old, her mother was prescribed opioids after hurting her back and became addicted to heroine and then fentanyl. She overdosed more than 20 times. Growing up, Ms. Pettersen said, nobody even kept track of whether or not she came home at night.
“I saw Phish shows when I was 12 years old in Kansas and other places,” she said. “Still got straight A’s, though.”
(Her mother recently celebrated her 70th birthday and seven years in recovery.)
Because her parents were behind on taxes, she didn’t qualify for student loans, so Ms. Pettersen paid her way through school in cash, waiting tables, cleaning houses and working various odd jobs. She was the first person in her family to graduate from high school or college.
Beating the odds has made Ms. Pettersen even more determined to try to change her current workplace to make it feasible for more people like her.
“Being pregnant and being a member of Congress, people ask, ‘How are you doing this with your family?’ — all these questions I know my male colleagues don’t get,” she said. “It’s such a double standard.”
Politics
'Space coast' congressman sets bold goal for American moon missions
The Space Coast’s new congressman wants the U.S. to set bold goals for exploration beyond our Earth, believing the country’s potential will take Americans sky-high – literally.
“We need to do everything we can to make sure it’s safe, but it’s done in a way that removes some of the superfluous red tape so that we can get out there, compete and beat China and beat any other nation,” Rep. Mike Haridopolos, R-Fla., told Fox News Digital in an interview.
“Because the moon and beyond is not a cliché from a Disney movie. It is the future.”
Haridopolos said he would “love” to see the U.S. return to the moon in the next four years of the Trump administration. The Florida Republican was careful not to speak in absolutes, noting, “We can’t guarantee anything,” but credited billionaires like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos with revitalizing the science and space sector to make such conversations possible.
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“It’s a stepping stone,” he said. “For example, as we’re starting to move towards [nuclear power], with the need for more and more energy here in the United States…There’s particles that are on the moon that they would bring back because they’re very scarce here in America [and] around the world.”
Helium-3 is a highly coveted resource found on the moon known to be key in nuclear fusion processes.
“From that point, you settle the moon, and then you go on to Mars, which has been, of course, Elon Musk’s vision,” Haridopolos said. “When he thought of things like SpaceX, it was, how do I get to Mars? And then how do you pay to get to Mars? That was the inspiration behind a lot of the new technologies he helped create. And now he’s got a fellow zillionaire in Jeff Bezos dreaming of the same type of things. It’s really exciting”
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In Congress, the first-term lawmaker represents part of the country that’s famous for being home to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
The Space Coast broke its all-time annual record with 93 orbital launches last year, according to Florida Today.
Just this week it’s scheduled to host launches by both Musk’s SpaceX Falcon 9 and Bezos’ Blue Origin rocket.
He lauded both President-elect Trump’s vision for space as well as new House Space Science and Technology Chairman Brian Babin, R-Texas.
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“Donald Trump has proven day-one and officially in 2019 that he loves space,” he said, referring to Trump’s creation of the Space Force.
He suggested that the U.S. approach to the final frontier may not be dissimilar to the optimism and pride seen in 1969, when Americans landed a team of astronauts on the moon.
“It was an inspiration for my parents’ generation,” Haridopolos said. “Now, of course, Elon Musk gave us this whole new vision of landing potentially, in our lifetime, on Mars. It’s remarkable. And so the president said this is the future.”
Politics
Newsom invites Trump to California to see L.A. fire damage
Gov. Gavin Newsom sent a letter to President-elect Donald Trump on Friday inviting the incoming leader to California to meet with fire victims, survey the devastation in Los Angeles County and join him in thanking first responders.
The invitation, which the governor’s office said was emailed to Trump’s team, marks a change in tone in the political battle between Newsom and Trump.
“In the spirit of this great country, we must not politicize human tragedy or spread disinformation from the sidelines,” Newsom said. “Hundreds of thousands of Americans — displaced from their homes and fearful for the future — deserve to see all of us working in their best interests to ensure a fast recovery and rebuild.”
Trump has been a vocal critic of Newsom since the fires began and blamed the governor and “his Los Angeles crew” for the disaster, though the Republican’s claim that a lack of water in Southern California led to a shortage for firefighters have been widely debunked.
In a briefing earlier in the day with President Biden, Newsom spoke out against the misinformation and lies.
“It breaks my heart, as people are suffering and struggling, that we’re up against those hurricane forces as well,” Newsom said. “It affects real people.”
Trump previously traveled to California as president to survey fire damage after the Paradise fire in 2018 and a spate of wildfires in 2020.
The governor on Friday also called for an investigation into the water supply problems that left fire hydrants dry and hampered firefighting efforts in Pacific Palisades.
Staff writer Faith Pinho contributed to this report.
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