Brooks and Capehart on the final days of the midterm campaign

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• Judy Woodruff:

  The finish line is just a week-and-a-half away for thousands of candidates vying for seats in Congress and at the state and local level.

  Let's turn now to the analysis of Brooks and Capehart. That is New York Times columnist David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart, associate editor for The Washington Post.

  Hello to both of you on this Friday night.

• Jonathan Capehart:

  Judy.

• Judy Woodruff:

  And, Jonathan, I want to bring up something at the beginning of our conversation that's kind of hard to think about. And that is the husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was attacked in their home in San Francisco overnight.

  He's had surgery. They say he's going to recover. But what does this say?

• Jonathan Capehart:

  It's shocking to — it was shocking to wake up to that news this morning.

  We have gotten to a point, I think, in our political discourse where things like this are bound to happen. And it is imperative upon our elected officials, the elected leaders, political leaders, to tamp down the rhetoric, to call it out, and to say, I don't know how to say it, but stop it.

  I think folks need to look at, what would have happened if Speaker Pelosi had actually been home? It's bad enough that Mr. Pelosi was attacked. He's 82 years old. But if we don't get to a situation where Republican leaders step forward and say to the country that the conspiracy theories and the violent rhetoric is not — it's not appropriate, it's un-American, it is dangerous, then we're going to see more of these attacks, I think.

  I mean, that's — I don't know what you think, David, but I just — we're in a very scary moment in this country if something like this can happen.

• David Brooks:

  Yes, I mean, when I talk to politicians, they say their death threats have gone up.

  For those of us in the media, death threats have certainly gone up. I have a friend out in San Diego, the chairman of the county council there, a guy named Nathan Fletcher, who was the face of the county on COVID over the last couple of years. His home was firebombed in the middle of night.

  He wakes up, his kid is screaming, and they have to get everybody out. And I have lunch with them. He's chairman of the county council. He's not, like, governor.

• Jonathan Capehart:

  Right.

• David Brooks:

  And he's got security detail. And that's just the way it is.

  There was the guy who wanted to kill Brett Kavanaugh. And so these are isolated — these are incidents. The question is how isolated. The climate is certainly inflaming them. Are we going to see much more widespread voter intimidation, much more violence in the streets?

  You would think the risks have gone up. I hope we're not at the spot where we're really entering into an era of violence. But it does seem — and I have thought this for last year or two, just talking to people — that something bad is going to happen. And something bad has just happened.

• Judy Woodruff:

  Yes. It's just — it's hard to comprehend. But it does seem to be the kind of thing that we're seeing more of right now.

  And it's in this atmosphere, Jonathan, that we are just a couple of days, what, 10, 11 days away from the midterm elections. Temperatures are running high. What are you seeing? You talk to a lot of people.

• Jonathan Capehart:

  Well, the number one thing that comes through is that nobody knows really what's going to happen.

  You can look at the polls. Folks are looking at polls. But, in the end, we're not going to know what's happening in the country, how the country really feels until the folks go to vote, and those votes are counted, and we start seeing the results.

  In some parts of the country, it could be the economy that's driving people to the polls. In other parts of the country, threats to democracy, threats to freedom, abortion rights could be a part of — could be a part of the conversation.

  I was in Pittsburgh yesterday interviewing the Pennsylvania — current Pennsylvania state attorney general, Josh Shapiro, Democratic candidate for governor. And in talking to him, his message is threats to democracy woven into the economic message, the freedom message, because it works against the candidate he's running against, Doug Mastriano, who was here in Washington on January 6, a dabbler in conspiracy theories.

  That will work in Pennsylvania. But does the threat to democracy argument work in other parts of the country? We will find out on election night.

• Judy Woodruff:

  You talk to a lot of people too. What do you…

  (CROSSTALK)

• David Brooks:

  Well, I know. I know what's going to happen.

  (LAUGHTER)

• Judy Woodruff:

  Tell us.

• David Brooks:

  It's my job to have false confidence in my knowledge.

  (LAUGHTER)

• David Brooks:

  I mean, all we can do is look at the polls over the last month or two. And there's been a significant swing to the Republican Party.

  And if you want to know how the polls have done this week, there's more swing to the Republican Party. You see shifts in the generic ballot, which is, which party do you want to control of Congress? You see shifts in places like Georgia, where Herschel Walker in a series of polls has been leading.

  And I think, if this trend is real, you can expect this trend to continue. In the last several midterm elections, in the last 10 days, there was an additional 1.5-point swing toward the president — against the president's party. And so once these things get rolling, they tend to continue.

  So it's possible, of course, the Democrats will keep the House, but FiveThirtyEight, the polling — the organization, says it's down to about a 20 percent chance. And so the odds are just hurling against the Democrats.

  And you could say, hey, we have sunk back to normal. This is a president whose approval is in the low 40s. It's just normal for his party to lose a lot of votes. And I think that's somewhat true, just a normal midterm election.

  I do think a few weaknesses in the Democratic approach have been revealed. One, they just haven't been able to get over — be the party trusted on the economy. And Biden had these big economic packages, but, somehow, they have not said, that Democratic economic approach, we want that. Of the voters voting on the economy, 70 percent favor the Republicans.

  Crime, they have sort of missed that. The Gallup Organization found that the number of people who say crime is increasing in their neighborhood is increasing at the fastest point since 1972. And they haven't been able to growth that issue. And then Hispanics. Trump, as we know, did much better with Hispanics the second time.

  And while the Republicans haven't continued to gain among Hispanics, that Hispanic gain the Republicans saw in 2020, that seems to be about where it is right now.

• Judy Woodruff:

  So, do you see that it is moving inexorably in the Republican direction, and for the reasons that David laid out?

• Jonathan Capehart:

  Well, inexorably is the word that I will take issue with.

  Yes, if you're looking at the polls, it is looking like the momentum is shifting or has shifted back to the Republicans. But in this hyper-news cycle that we're in now, 11 days is a very long time. Each day is an eternity.

  So I think we're going to see swings back and forth over time. There are two variables here that make me hedge in terms of my false confidence here.

  (LAUGHTER)

• Jonathan Capehart:

  One is the surge in early voting that we have seen in places where there's early voting.

  When Democrats hear that there's a surge, there's this confidence that, oh, that's — those are our voters that are going out. But we don't know that for sure. And, also, I'm wondering, the other variable is abortion, the Dobbs decision. When it hit, it was an earthquake. That earthquake has subsided.

  But will we see it show up 11 days from now and the impact that will have? And so, I mean, sure, right now, David, there's a shift. But whether it's inexorable, I'm not that confident to say it's an inexorable shift.

• David Brooks:

  I admire your reserve.

  (LAUGHTER)

• Judy Woodruff:

  I mean, the poll — I mean, David, we know the polls have not always been accurate in the past. I mean, we're looking at trends. You're looking at trends.

• David Brooks:

  Right.

• Judy Woodruff:

  So do we need to be humble at this point?

• David Brooks:

  No, absolutely not.

  (LAUGHTER)

• David Brooks:

  No, there's just a lot of polls.

  I mean, they could be wrong, of course.

• Judy Woodruff:

  Huge.

• David Brooks:

  And we would say they were a bit wrong about 2016. But there have just been so many. It's not — I mean, there are now hundreds of polls, not only the national polls, but in race after race after race.

  It's very hard to see a place where the polls are now trending in the Democratic direction, including weird things like — won't happen, like the governorship of New York state, where the Republicans are picking up a little steam, where Democrats are pulling their ad spending out of marginal districts or out of districts that should be safe for them.

  And the interesting thing on the abortion issue, it really was a real issue. It still is a real issue. But over the last couple of weeks, if you ask people, what do you care about, among highly educated voters, Dobbs is still a huge issue. But among less educated, less affluent voters, it's become less of an issue, and the economy has become a greater issue.

  And I think Democrats are somewhat in — well, one of the things they did, they said, here's what you should care about, democracy and Dobbs. These are the major issues. And a lot of people said, no, actually, we care about crime, inflation, and homelessness.

  And a lot of Democrats, I think, for too long said, no, you shouldn't care about those things. You should care about these things.

  And if you're going to run a campaign, don't tell people what they should care about. Just focus on what they actually care about. And I think that would have been a better strategy.

• Judy Woodruff:

  Do you want to respond?

• Jonathan Capehart:

  I mean, there's so — there's so much there.

  Look, I think Democrats are running — national Democrats, sure, will say, run on this, run on that, and this is their message, what your message should be. But, in individual races, there are plenty of Democrats who are saying, don't tell me what to do. I'm out there campaigning. I'm listening to my constituents. And they care about the economy. They care about gas. They care about — they care about jobs.

  And they are — and they are running in that way, and also to the point where a big story has been made about how much President Biden has been out on the campaign trail, and the fact that nobody wants — wants to campaign with him. But the president is comfortable enough in his own skin where, subliminally, his message is, do what you need to do. Do what you need to do to win.

• Judy Woodruff:

  And you were saying that's one of the things he — you talked to him about in your interview with him last week.

  I do want to say, we got a glimpse of what's going on in Democratic thinking when the hot mic between the president and Chuck Schumer a couple of days ago. We're not going to play sound up, but, essentially, what they said was that the debate in Pennsylvania wasn't hurting as much as it — as might have been anticipated, Schumer said. He thought things might be looking better in Nevada, but worse in Georgia.

  So we did get a little bit of a glimpse. But, on Pennsylvania, David, you had John Fetterman, the lieutenant governor, up against Mehmet Oz, the celebrity TV doctor. A lot of comment afterwards about how the stroke that Fetterman had in May has had lingering effects. What did you take away from that?

• David Brooks:

  Yes.

  Well, I saw the debate the next day, because I couldn't watch it live. And I'd read the articles which said that he was struggling. I was unprepared for how much he was struggling. And so I found it sad.

  And so the question is, should it be a live political issue? If I were a Democrat in Pennsylvania and I supported the Democratic agenda, I would vote for John Fetterman. I mean, it would not change my vote, because the important thing is, if you're a Democrat, who's in control of the Senate.

  I do not — I think communicating is part of the job of being a senator. And maybe he will recover. And we — the piece had — there was a — and maybe he will be fine. We pray so.

  But I do think, if you can't communicate as well, then you're just going to be less effective at the job. And there was a guy in Illinois, Mark — Senator Mark Kirk, who had a stroke several years ago.

• Judy Woodruff:

  Right.

• David Brooks:

  And it wasn't — and he tried to run for reelection. It wasn't a big issue, but it was an issue, because people thought he might be impaired in different ways than Fetterman.

• Jonathan Capehart:

  I think that watching John Fetterman was halting. We're so used to seeing politicians on the debates — on the debate stage polished or not polished, answering questions or not answering questions.

  But watching John Fetterman was a halting experience. But I do think, for a lot of voters, sure, it is legitimate to have questions about whether the person can do the job. But you mentioned Senator Kirk. We also had Senator Van Hollen who had a stroke. Senator Ben Ray Lujan had a stroke.

  Having a stroke does not prevent you from having the competency to do the job. And I think that, if anything, it, in an odd way, humanized him, because he's not the only person who has ever had a stroke, who has had to recover from a stroke. And I think it made him even more relatable than he already was, which was his big calling card in his campaign.

  So, yes, I think, as halting as it was, I don't think it's disqualifying.

• Judy Woodruff:

  Sensitive, sensitive subject. And we will see how voters — how voters react in Pennsylvania.

• Jonathan Capehart:

  Yes.

• Judy Woodruff:

  David Brooks, Jonathan Capehart, thank you.

• Jonathan Capehart:

  Thanks.

• Judy Woodruff:

  Thank you.

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