Funding for “To the Contrary,” provided by: This week, on “To the Contrary,” First, Kamala Harris' media blitz targets women who are not engaged in politics and revelations from Melania Trump's new memoir.

Hello, I'm Bonnie Erbé.

Welcome to “To the Contrary,” a discussion of news and social trends from diverse perspectives.

Up first, the Harris campaign's media push.

Vice President Kamala Harris is engaging in a comprehensive media blitz aimed at reaching a diverse range of voters ahead of the upcoming election.

Her appearances span both traditional media like 60 Minutes and newer platforms, such as the popular podcast “Call Her Daddy,” which caters to Millennial and Gen Z listeners, mainly women.

The Harris campaign hopes to reach key demographics who may be less tuned in to politics.

This strategy mirrors efforts by Donald Trump, who has also turned to social media influencers and nontraditional outlets to engage younger audiences, particularly men.

Joining us today are Erin Matson, feminist activist, podcast host Amala Ekpunobi, Jessica Washington, politics reporter from The Intercept, and Carrie Sheffield from the Independent Women's Forum.

So let's get started.

The first question to Erin is how effective do you think Vice President Harris strategy is of appearing on both traditional news outlets and nonpolitical platforms like podcasts will be in reaching younger voters?

Yes.

Thank you for the question, Bonnie.

You know, every single vote is going to count for both sides in this election, right?

It's going to be very, very tight race.

And so I think it's smart to to be in all forms of media.

I do want to push back against this idea of traditional media versus other media.

I think at this point, podcasts, online, social media, that is the media, that is how people are accessing information.

I think we've seen both from Hannah and I.

And I also want to say in the intro, I should have added that this is not exactly a new phenomenon.

I mean, it's been going on now for at least close to a decade.

I would wager.

Yeah.

I mean, I think you're seeing both campaigns are heavily investing in social media and also going on podcasts.

You know, “Call Her Daddy” is the second most popular podcast out there.

So that was a huge get for Kamala Harris.

I will say I really appreciated her comments there where she pushed back on this thing about women without biological children.

That has just been such a damaging and hurtful attack to so many families.

And so I was very proud to see her use that forum to address that.

It's quite often that politicians go on these podcasts, so that's nothing new in that respect.

I will note that if you look at today where things are today, within the Real Clear Politics Electoral College average, again, it doesn't matter about the national polling.

And I think a lot of the shows that she's going on are basically echo chambers.

A lot of them are based in New York or LA.

Well, those electoral delegates aren't going to be helping her any because they're already in the bag.

You know, why didn't she go on podcasts that are, you know, more in the Midwest or or geared toward people who are more middle of the road.

She's going for people who are already, like, converted, as far as I'm concerned.

And that's why she's losing, according to Real Clear Politics, that has Trump at 281 and Vance at 257, and so.

The New York Times had her, just this week, had her, you know, at above 270, actually.

So there are different takes on that.

Sure.

Well, the New York Times also had Hillary Clinton 96% chance of victory over Trump in 2016.

So yeah, I actually am leaning on Carries opinion there.

I would love to see her go on more a dissident podcast to really have more of a, I don't want to say combative, but a more constructive back and forth about her policies, about her record.

And I'll go ahead and say the same for Trump.

Recently, we've seen him appear on Logan Paul's podcast.

He appeared on the podcast of Andrew Shows flagrant.

These are very right-leaning, male-oriented audiences, so we'd love to see them maybe flip the script on each other and switch over and go to these different podcasts to each other.

I want let me.

Let me ask you about that because, you know, they're going to get an unfriendly reception if they do that, which they're trying to avoid.

And a lot of these podcasters just jump on their guests and don't even let them talk very much.

So what's the point of that?

I think this is trying to this is a GOtv, get out to vote, effort to get the people you know who already support you to to get off their duffs and do their citizen duty and vote.

Yeah, I guess I would disagree in that you can find podcasts that are willing to have a perfectly respectful conversation, I host a podcast myself.

I would have a perfectly respectable conversation with Kamala Harris in places where I disagree with her.

And in this next election, you really should be worrying about politically apathetic people, people who are sort of sitting on the fence when it comes to these two candidates.

People who are underwhelmed by both options and are thinking, I'm not even going to show up to the ballot box to even put in a vote, because they don't want to be a part of the system.

So those are the people that I think they should really be focusing on talking to.

Instead of preaching to the choir and standing in their echo chambers, as Carrie said.

I find it really kind of an interesting conversation specifically about “Call Her Daddy.” I mean, one thing that we saw, and I don't know how much people have been following kind of the aftermath of that interview, there were in particularly in Alex's comment section, a lot of comments from fans who were really critical of the podcast of having Kamala Harris on.

I do think she's seen as very apolitical.

She comes from Barstool, which is kind of I think a lot of people would consider slightly right-leaning.

So I think her audience is kind of a very diverse mix of people, because throughout the country who are interested in things that generally are not political.

So I actually do think “Call Her Daddy” was somewhat of a smart move because you have this group of women who some of them maybe are undecided, some of them who just decided to sit out the election, who aren't tuning in for politics, but who do know, and trust Alex Cooper's voice.

So I thought the kind of conversations afterwards and seeing that a lot of the audience really did not like having Kamala Harris on that podcast at all.

But even more so that there was disagreement within that audience.

I actually do think shows like that that are very apolitical, are kind of a smart move from a get out the vote effort, as you mentioned.

And obviously doing an interview with Howard Stern is obviously different than doing an interview with, Alice Cooper of “Call Her Daddy.” So I do think there's a mixed media strategy that we'll have to see how it shakes out.

What do you all think of her performance on that podcast?

I was personally not a fan of her performance on the show.

I felt as though Alex Cooper didn't really push her on any of her stances, on any of her record.

She handled her a lot of softball interview questions, and I would expect that Alex Cooper would do the same if given the opportunity to interview Donald Trump.

I know she also invited him on the podcast, but he decided to interview elsewhere.

So I was looking for some more hard hitting questions.

It felt as though Alex was really setting her up to tell her own personal story and lay out a vision for female voters, as Alex Cooper generally agrees with her on a lot of her political stances.

I don't mean that Alex Cooper is right-leaning, but I think that some of the audience that transferred with her from Barstool may have more conservative opinions.

Got to say, Alice Cooper is someone who has made her stances on.

And Bonnie, to answer your earli question about, why go on a show with a combative host?

I would say part of why I was invited to go on the Bill Maher show back.

This was actually before Trump, when he was, it was under the Obama days, and he was much more left.

I didn't want to go on, but his executive producer said to me, at any given moment, we have 3 million people watching, and we have about a million people who are persuadable.

And so it's just think of you're talking to those people in the audience.

You're not there to talk to Bill Maher, you're there to get your ideas out there.

Does everybody agree or disagree that this will have an impact on women voters and get more of them to the polls for Kamala Harris?

I mean, Bonnie literally every single vote is going to count in this election, no matter what candidate you are in, no matter what side you want to win.

The margins are so tight and so, you know, does it matter?

Yes.

The answer is it does matter to the extent that it can cause either candidate to cross the finish line.

That remains to be seen.

All right.

Let us know what you think.

Please follow me on Twitter @BonnieErbe From the vice president to the former first lady, Melania Trump's new memoir is making headlines with revelations about her life and views.

In the upcoming book, the former first lady breaks with her husband on the issue of abortion.

She also gives her views on other topics and defends herself against critics, including on issues as diverse as her husband's border policy and her own nude modeling career.

Pundits have speculated whether her new memoir will help or harm Donald Trump's campaign to be president again.

What do you think Carrie Sheffield?

I think Melania is the definition of an independent woman, and I think this memoir illustrates that and this trope within some media on the left, that Republican women are all muzzled by their husbands.

I mean, this is just a case in point that that's absolutely not true.

And I'm not married.

I'm a single woman, and I plan to vote for Trump.

So it's just, I think it will help.

I think, in the end, she's a strong, beautiful woman, and she's been treated very badly by the mainstream feminist press.

Let me just ask you this, though.

When you talk about a strong, independent woman, what about the fact that he's, at least it's been alleged widely in the media, He's having an affair with Laura Loomer, and she sits there and they're all over each other on, you know, video and she sits there and takes that.

Well, I'm not privy to their marriage.

I'm not privy.

I haven't seen any videos of Laura Loomer.

I, for me personally, I mean, that's their marriage.

And I think if progressives say they want to keep people out of the bedroom, that would be an example here.

You know, again, this is I. I'm sorry.

I'm sorry.

I'm confused.

Keep people out of the out of their bedroom.

Yeah.

Like, like to let people have a private life.

And when it comes to abortion, that's different because you're talking about, again, I'm speaking for myself personally, because IWF doesn't take a position on abortion.

To be pro-abortion, as far as I'm concerned, there is an additional life at stake.

And what you're describing is different.

You're describing sex between or potential sex between consenting adults versus taking the life of an unborn child.

Very different things.

Let's talk about abortion.

Let's talk about what Melania said on abortion.

Here's something that I think is really important.

We now have a majority.

It's a slim majority, but it's actually a majority.

A majority of Republican women of reproductive age.

So I'm talking, you know, up to age 45, do actually want a national law guaranteeing abortion access.

And Melania Trump just echoed a view that seems to comport with that.

And so, you know, we are continuously seeing in when abortion goes directly on the ballot that Republican voters are going and supporting those ballot initiatives, in fact, in the upcoming, and upcoming questions, it's anticipated that some states may actually see a majority of Republican voters voting for reproductive freedom on the ballot.

So I think that's really interesting.

I think there's more going on here than just, you know, some have suggested that isn't this convenient for Trump when he's trying to turn down the dial on his anti-abortion views?

That his wife comes out with this.

You know, their their marriage is inscrutable to me.

I think it's inscrutable to everyone.

But, so we can't comment on that.

We just simply can't know what's going on between the two of them.

But I will say that, you know, regardless of the fact that this view is convenient to be brought up at the time she's actually tracking with where Republican women seem to be going.

Jessica, do you think that her saying she's pro-choice in this book will bring back anybody who may have decided not to vote for Donald Trump this time to into his fold?

I certainly think it's possible.

And as Erin mentioned earlier, every vote counts right now.

And so every little thing that shifts the needle could be the big thing.

I mean, elections are this election is going to be incredibly, incredibly tight.

So it's impossible for me to say whether or not they're going to be some Republican women in particular who read this and say, okay, maybe Trump is softer on this issue.

He married someone with these viewpoints than I previously thought.

I think that's certainly plausible.

I also think Melania Trump has a very different connection to politics than maybe other first ladies that we've seen, particularly thinking about Dr. Jill Biden thinking about, Michelle Obama, thinking about Hillary Clinton, whove been very involved in their husbands political careers.

And whove had kind of, I would argue, political careers of their own, as well, even if they weren't directly in elected office.

So I think Melania Trump's viewpoints aren't as directly arent understood as directly correlated to Trumps as perhaps other first ladies.

So I think it's going to be a little bit different than you would see again, if we saw Dr. Jill Biden come out with an opposing viewpoint in previous lectures, an opposing viewpoint, or if we've seen Michelle Obama come out in an opposing viewpoint on an issue as, you know, heated as abortion.

You know, I think it brings us back to an America that once was I often see a lot of people talking about how politics is ruining their marriages.

It's ruining their families.

They can't be friends with certain people who have differing political opinions than theirs.

And to hear Melania Trump sort of step out and say, “I wholly disagree with Donald Trump on his stance here” is a very enlightening thing.

And I think it really points to what America could be.

And it's people in marriages who have very differing political opinions.

And Donald Trump is often accused of being in his own Make America Great Again echo chamber.

And that seems to not be the case.

Even in his own marriage, he's willing to be married to somebody who vehemently disagrees with him on political stances that he's held in the past.

And it does seem as though it's softening his view on abortion.

We watch JD Vance in his vice presidential debate, saying, “I want American women to trust me again, and I'm listening to my constituents.

I'm listening to the American people.

And this is what the majority of them are asking me for.” So maybe we need to have a conversation about that and start moving in their direction.

But is there any doubt that if he were appointed president, I mean, if he were elected president again, that he would do anything but continue to stack the court with, ultra conservative justices?

What's important is that when we look at Roe v. Wade and the overturning of Roe v. Wade, it has been handed back to the states.

That's what's important here.

The states are now going to decide, which means you now have a voice and, you know, if your state has a majority of people who are looking for a pro-choice legislation, that's exactly what you're going to get.

And even looking at the Supreme Court, this is something that Ruth Bader Ginsburg, even agreed with and said, “You know what?

Roe v. Wade is not the direction we need to move in here.

We need to allow states to make this decision.” I think the federal government should do a few things and do a few things well, and making these decisions, about a national abortion ban or things like that is not their job, in my opinion.

Really?

I recall RBG saying that she agreed with critics of the Roe opinion who said that it was based on shaky grounds, penumbra, shadows, blah, blah, blah, that kind of language.

But I don't recall her saying that it should go back to the states and people should be able to vote on it in their states.

She said that it was poorly decided.

And but when you're looking at the Constitution, if the rights are not explicitly enumerated to Congress, then those rights are retained by the states.

And so because there was no explicit right to an abortion in the Constitution, that is the enumeration clause.

That is why it goes back to the states.

And that's what Trump has said over and over that well, first of all, he's very pragmatic.

He said it won't even reach my desk because you're not going to get two-thirds of people to sign in support of a nationwide abortion ban.

So he's right about that.

But even if it was, he said, “I've already done, you know, put the justices on who decided this correctly, which is that it should go back to the states.” I want to switch topics a little bit here since we're on the topic of the Trump marriage, the former president, what do you think people are thinking about his mental capacity eroding?

He's gone on more and more digressions as he gets older.

He's hammering away at the same points over again.

He's not really talking much in terms of, you know, tangible policy that he may try to get enacted while he's in the White House.

What are everyone's thoughts about that?

Bonnie, it's a fair question.

I mean, it's definitely a fair question that people are asking.

He does say things that appear to make no sense.

And he is now an extremely old presidential candidate.

The moment that Biden dropped out, it really created space for people to look at Trump and say, “Wait a minute, this guy's really old, too.” I will say, as someone who dementia sadly runs in my family, this is something I'm sensitive, keenly sensitive to.

And yes, I mean, I have seen things on television before, video footage of him that that does raise my concerns if he's fully there and equipped mentally to lead.

But I think regardless of those questions, what he has actually demonstrated in policy and his words and actions and Project 2025 and the supports that are around him and, you know, the plans that are supposed to go into motion if he becomes president.

I think that alone is what demonstrates his unfitness to become president.

But, yes, these are legitimate questions, and I can understand why people are concerned.

I am.

I have family members in my family with dementia as well.

And I think the just the most robust, resounding rejection of this is compare and contrast Trump to Joe Biden.

And to see that split screen of how just Biden had to resign because it was so clear that he was senile, he couldn't even finish a complete sentence.

He said something like.

But wait, let me.

The New York Times did an exhaustive review of nine rallies where he gave speeches and they found, you know, huge amounts of digressions that made no sense to anybody.

A lot of people didn't know what he was talking about.

Well, as to whether the New York Times journalist understood what Trump was talking about, I'm not surprised at all, because the New York Times is so unplugged from middle- American culture, from middle Americans understanding of memes and just how Trump approaches things.

Okay.

But tell me a little bit about it.

Like, for example, tariffs.

He says he's going to put tariffs that, you know, countries levy on us back on them.

And especially China which we are huge importer of Chinese goods, which is seen as by some as a very inflationary move.

But if that's how he's going to raise revenue, I don't I really don't see that as a full policy.

It's not using the government to, to enact fiscal policy.

I don't like tariffs either.

But he uses them as negotiating tools because he says, for decades we've been asleep at the wheel.

Our politicians, American politicians, have been asleep at the wheel such that we've created trade deals that very disfavor our own people.

And so he's saying, we're not doing that anymore.

We're not on autopilot anymore.

We're going to wake up.

We're going to look at each deal and if it's unfavorable to us, we're going to respond accordingly.

Amala, your thoughts on that.

And also let me just add that he's also increased, so that I think use of four letter words in all his speeches at his rallies and to the point where I think the f word is the f- bomb, as they say, is the only one he hasn't used.

Is that a sign of senility?

Yeah.

I don't think Trump is senile in any way, shape or form.

I did think we got a good look at that, with the Joe Biden's presidency, and he still happens to be the sitting president somehow with his state of mental decline.

And that's very shocking to me.

I also want to say, for the record, that Trump is in no way, shape or form a supporter of Project 2025 and has done no work on Project 2025.

We're seeing a president who, yes, is old in age, and I think that's concerning.

We should all be having conversations about gerontocracy, because that seems to be the general state of American politics as it is.

And I would love to see some fresh new faces.

Let me get back to Project 2025 before you get too far away from it.

It was staffed all by his former employees and close political contacts.

So to say that he's not, he doesn't support it.

It belies the fact.

It does not.

So Project 2025 has been something that the Heritage Foundation has been working on for decades.

This is something that they put out every election cycle to sort of give their ideas of how to make the government work in a more Republican manner, and they've been doing this for quite some time without Donald Trump even being in politics.

You even have the director of Project 2025 saying, “Yes, we've all, you know, in some capacity, not all of them, but some of us have worked for Donald Trump and have been aides to his campaign.

But he is in no way, shape or form involved with Project 2025, nor has he endorsed Project 2025.

He's actually come out and denounced Project 2025,” and you actually have that from the director of Project 2025 itself.

Whether or not we need to or want to tie Trump directly Project 2025, I would say there are as you Bonnie as you mentioned, there are ties that I think we can see.

And whether or not Trump has distanced himself from that.

I think we don't even need, though, to analyze Project 2025 in order to analyze some of Trump's other policies.

I think if you are concerned about, immigration rights, I think than Trump's own policies, you can look into some of that particularly obviously, not just mass deportation, but what he's threatened to do to Haitians currently residing in the United States.

I think we can also look at his tent cities policy for unhoused people, detaining them in these kind of outdoor tents.

You can look at also kind of similar policies around immigration for undocumented folks of the United States.

I think it's.

Important, which, by the way, he recently Kamala Harris put out a housing plan that increases the production of housing units by millions.

And he said that his response to the same question or his point at one of his rallies, was to say that he would deport millions of illegal immigrants and that they would, that that would open up housing for other people who need it, although there's really no indication that that would happen.

Most of the housing that immigrants, generally speaking, early immigrants, before they get a foothold in the economy here, would not be wanted by anyone else.

Well, and another important point about and to that point, I mean, bleeding undocumented immigrants for the housing crisis, when we know a large part of the housing crisis is has it, you know, it has to do with supply chain issues.

There are a ton of different issues going on with the housing crisis.

But, I mean, as to your point, undocumented immigrants often times live with family members.

It's not research.

And I've talked to folks at the Urban Institute, I've done some reporting that I'm proud of on this subject.

But I would say there's not a lot of evidence that undocumented immigrants are making housing go up.

And in fact, a lot of undocumented immigrants who work in construction, if we were to actually deport and Mother Jones did a fantastic investigation in this, that if we were actually to deport everyone who is undocumented, undocumented in the United State it would ground construction to a halt.

I mean, there's just no evidence that we would actually be able to deport everyone.

And then suddenly housing prices would go down.

Undocumented immigrants were also banned from federal mortgage programs.

They're not able to access a lot of the programs that people who are living in United States with documentation are.

So, again, there's just no evidence that mass deportation is a successful housing strategy.

And in fact, it would probably cause the opposite issues.

All right.

Thank you all.

Very enlightening show.

That's it for this edition.

Please follow me on Twitter and visit our website PBS.org/tothecontrary.

And whether you agree or think to the contrary, see you next week.

Funding for “To the Contrary,” provided by: