A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
The Alt Universe Of The Right-Wing Media Ecosystem
You go where the votes are. Period.
It’s not validating Fox News to agree to an interview in hopes of reaching voters, particularly in this case disaffected Republican women.
The idea that Kamala Harris’ interview with Bret Baier was some kind of Daniel in the lion’s den moment conflates the relatively straightforward task of dealing with a hostile interviewer with the exceedingly difficult task of penetrating a closed-off, self-reinforcing news bubble based on endlessly repeated falsehoods, relentless appeals to tribal identity, and the grinding delegitimization of people of color and political foes.
When it came to confronting a hostile interviewer, Harris more than held her own against Baier. Here she is rejecting the misleading clip Baer showed her of Trump speaking earlier on Fox News, which was not one of the many recent examples of him warning of an “enemy within” but was instead a tepid defense of his own rhetoric:
WOW — Kamala Harris forcefully calls out Bret Baier for playing a deceptive clip whitewashing Trump’s comments about “the enemy within” pic.twitter.com/JmIwSQXVjv
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 16, 2024
As for puncturing the Fox News bubble, Harris’ presence essentially did that, albeit for less than 30 minutes on a Wednesday evening in October. There’s only so much you can do. I’m reminded of this smart thread on debunking v. pre-bunking from two years ago by Jennifer Mercieca, a historian of American political rhetoric at Texas A&M: “Every day our political discourse is dominated by an agenda-setting war (what issues we should talk about) and a frame war (how we should frame/understand those issues). Again, so much of our political discourse is about controlling our political discourse.”
Harris didn’t have much control over the Fox News agenda-setting: “immigration” – by which we really mean the vilification of people of color as “other” – dominated the first 10 mins of a 26-minute interview, and abortion never came up. But she was relentless in maintaining her own framing of the issues that did come up. The tradeoff – losing an agenda-setting battle in order to fight and try to win a framing battle – is the calculation the Harris campaign made in deciding it was worth it to reach some subset of voters.
And it never hurts to force a little bit of reality into the faces of Fox News viewers.
Watch The Full Interview
Quote Of The Day
Kamala Harris, defending the Constitution at a campaign appearance in Pennsylvania:
Kamala Harris: “We know the Constitution is not a relic from our past, but determines whether we are a country where the people can speak freely and even criticize POTUS without fear of being thrown in jail or targeted by the military.”
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.bsky.social) October 16, 2024 at 4:36 PM
Georgia State Election Board Slapped Down Again
For the second day in a row, a state judge has rejected last-minute rules changes by the MAGA-dominated Georgia State Elections Board.
‘Unconstitutional Government Interference’
An advocacy group filed a federal lawsuit to stop the pressure campaign by the administration of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) against TV stations to prevent them from running ads in favor of the passage of Amendment 4, which would protect abortion rights.
2024 Ephemera
- Fox News poll: Trump leads Harris 50%-48% among likely voters nationwide, a flip from last month when Harris lead Trump 50%-48%.
- WaPo: Inside Elon Musk’s plan to trigger a ‘red wave’ for Trump
- WSJ: Republicans Rush to Bolster Trump’s Ground Game
Tough Day For Project 2025
Two related developments:
- In an internal tiff, the former director of Project 2025 condemned the “violent rhetoric” of Kevin Roberts, the president of the Heritage Foundation, which served as the incubator for the blueprint for a Trump II presidency. In an interview with the WaPo, Paul Dans also called on JD Vance to retract the foreword he wrote for Roberts’ book. Dans blames Roberts’ inflammatory public comments for the negative publicity Project 2025 has received
- Donald Trump Jr. is leading an effort by Trump’s transition operation to compile a list of people banned from working in a Trump II administration that includes … wait for it … people linked to Project 2025. “Clearly people working on Project 2025 are blacklisted,” a former Trump official told Politico. Stay skeptical though. The ban on Project 2025 may be a pre-election tactic easily reversed after a victory in November.
Loud And Proud
After fielding the question dozens of times since July and mostly bobbing and weaving around it, JD Vance was pushed by a reporter Wednesday into saying that he didn’t think Donald Trump lost the 2020 election.
UPDATE: Donald Trump Prosecutions
- Mar-a-Lago case: With a trial in the currently-dismissed classified documents case months or years off at best, two prosecutors on Special Counsel Jack Smith’s team have returned to their regular jobs in the Justice Department.
- Jan. 6 case: U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan rejected the vast majority of Donald Trump’s claims that he is due more discovery in the case, but tossed him a bone on a few of his discovery requests.
- Jan. 6 case: Trump is asking Chutkan to push a deadline related to the arguments over presidential immunity until after the election.
- Jan. 6 case: Special Counsel Jack Smith argues in a new filing that Trump bears responsibility in law and in fact for Jan. 6:
Contrary to the defendant’s claim … that he bears no factual or legal responsibility for the ‘events on January 6,’ the superseding indictment plainly alleges that the defendant willfully caused his supporters to obstruct and attempt to obstruct the proceeding by summoning them to Washington, D.C., and then directing them to march to the Capitol to pressure the Vice President and legislators to reject the legitimate certificates and instead rely on the fraudulent electoral certificates.”
Donald Trump Is Still Trying To Silence Stormy Daniels!
As recently as this summer, while settling his judgment against Stormy Daniels, Donald Trump’s attorneys pitched a new hush money agreement to the porn actress, Rachel Maddow reports:
Sigh …
The armed North Carolina man arrested Saturday for allegedly threatening FEMA workers says he was motivated to intervene in person by that blitz of bogus social media posts about Hurricane Helene aid being withheld – and semi-admits to being bamboozled: “I went up and saw that there was absolutely nothing there, so I stayed, and I volunteered all day.”
The full report, including a phone interview with the man, from WGHP in Greensboro:
$50B Double Whammy
Hurricanes Helene and Milton are each projected to exceed $50 billion in damages. Only eight prior hurricanes have produced that much damage, but five of those have been in the past seven years.
Jimmy Carter Lives Long Enough To Vote For Kamala Harris
Former President Jimmy Carter, who just turned 100 years old and has been in hospice since February 2023, when he was a mere 98 years old, fulfilled his wish of living long enough to cast his vote for Kamala Harris.
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