Progressives and the Biden Appointments

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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. As Joe Biden rolls out his Cabinet picks the names Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren are not among them. Biden yesterday conspicuously name-dropped one of them as he nominated Wally Adeyemo to be his deputy treasury secretary.

Joe Biden: I tell you what, Senator Warren really likes you.

Brian: Adeyemo was Warren's chief of staff. How much progressive cred should Biden get for Adeyemo or that Senator Warren really likes him? That's just one example of the dance taking place right now, between Biden and the progressive wing, if you can call it that, if that's the right label. Everybody's got their own label of the Democratic party as Biden rolls out his nominees.

Progressive groups like Justice Democrats, which helped Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez get elected, the environment-oriented Sunrise Movement, Data for Progress, and others, want someone like Bernie Sanders for labor secretary, Bernie himself, preferably, a position not yet announced. They want the first Native American interior secretary, maybe Congresswoman Deb Haaland. Do not want Democratic regulars like Rahm Emanuel, who Biden is said to be considering for a big job. This current dance is only about the nominees. Then there will be the ones about actual policy.

Joining me now for a progressive journalism and advocacy perspective of how the transition is going in these early days are Katrina vanden Heuvel, publisher and editorial director of The Nation, she's also a Washington Post columnist, and Karthik Ganapathy, a communications consultant who has been a spokesperson for progressive politicians, including Bernie Sanders, Keith Ellison, and Charles Booker, as well as the ACLU and the climate change organization, 350.org. Karthik, welcome, and Katrina, welcome back to WNYC.

Katrina vanden Heuvel: Thank you, Brian.

Karthik Ganapathy: Thanks for having me.

Brian: Katrina, in general terms, to start out, how happy are you with the emerging Biden cabinet? Feel free to name names.

Katrina: First of all, good morning, Brian. I wanted to step back for a moment. We're coming out of a chaotic crisis-ridden four years. We're moving toward at least restoration, though I think in these times of multiple crises we need reconstruction. we need more than restoration. In terms of personnel's policy, I begin, as I think we must in these times begin with the more positive. I think Janet Yellen, who will be first woman treasury secretary, represents one of Biden's more encouraging appointments.

She appears to understand, we can't go back to the old ways of growth. She is someone who comes from the Academy, not Wall Street. Many had hoped for Elizabeth Warren, but it's important that she doesn't come from Wall Street and have those ties. I do think the Biden-- Then you have Jared Bernstein in the National Council of Economic Advisers. He's a longtime advocate for the middle class for growth, avoiding this fetish with deficit reduction, which has afflicted I think Democrats for decades. Heather Boushey has been at the forefront of understanding the need for paid leave and someone who's written for The Nation, as has Jared, and that's I find hopeful.

I move to the foreign policy team, and I think many of your listeners understand that Biden may well be constricted. We all hope the Georgia runoffs go well, but if they don't, he's going to have to govern by executive orders and will focus heavily on foreign policy where presidents often have more leeway. I think in the foreign policy arena-- I don't know if your listeners know what the blob means? It's an adherence to a Washington consensus and establishment consensus.

I think some of the names we've seen, appointments, and those being talked about have been implicated in the foreign policy calamities of the last decades. Iraq, one of the great debacle of our foreign policy, intervention in Libya, ongoing ties to Saudi Arabia trade, fomenting of a Russian cold war, possibly cold war with China. They will be returning to "normalcy", which has to be understood as something critical, which is, and I know your other guest will talk about this, but signing back onto the climate agreement is imperative.

Signing back onto the Iran nuclear deal, if what's happened in the Middle East and Iran hasn't made that much more difficult. Signing on the new START agreement, which is the last remaining pillar of arms control. Signing on February 5 is the deadline or else it crumbles. I think that's really important to understand, and the last thing about the foreign policy group is, as your listeners know, Michèle Flournoy was scheduled to be the first woman defense secretary, but the progressive community has really made a campaign, and I think a legitimate one, not just about her record supporting failed and tragic military search in Afghanistan, intervention in Syria, Libya, Iraq.

Also very important, Brian, the revolving door aspects of some of these foreign policy candidates. I mean, these are people who have-- Flournoy was on the board of weapons contractor, Booz Allen Hamilton. They transacted their public role for personal gain. I think that's hard set, but they come from Booz Allen, Westech advisers, Tony Blinken, some come from the Madeline Albright firm, which is called Strategic Advisory, so it's opaque. You don't know.

Those are two areas where I think the economics are hopeful, I think obviously climate coming out of this climate denialist administration, [unintelligible 00:06:21] party will speak to that. I just worry that on the foreign policy, when we need such a fundamental debate, at this time of fundamental debate about security strategy for the 21st century. We're living through this pandemic and if not now, when, when will we understand that we need a redefinition of what security means that focuses on the existential threats, climate change, global pandemics, nuclear cyber arms race. I think that will be something very important to look at.

Brian: Listeners, you get the phones this segment, if you consider yourself a progressive, how happy or not with the Biden transition and Cabinet picks so far (646)-435-7280, (646)-435-7280. Karthik, I'll bring you in on roughly the same question, but let me play a clip of Biden, another clip. If he earnestly name-checked Elizabeth Warren in announcing Wally Adeyemo for deputy treasury secretary, he named checked with a little more humor, someone else in nominating his actual treasury secretary.

Joe Biden: We might have to ask Lin-Manuel Miranda, who wrote the musical about the first Secretary of Treasury Hamilton, to write another musical about the first woman Secretary of the Treasury Yellen.

Brian: Karthik, how are you with Janet Yellen for treasury? Are you as supportive as Katrina is, and do you happen to know Wally Adeyemo, Elizabeth Warren's chief of staff, now nominated as deputy treasury secretary, or have a comment on the way Biden used Senator Warren's name to get cred for not nominating her?

Karthik: To the broad question, I think in general people like Janet Yellen, people like Ron Klain, who's going to be President-elect Biden's chief of staff, that's a lot better than Tim Geithner and Rahm Emanuel. That's one of the things that gives me hope. This is from my perspective better in some ways than the Cabinet and the senior staff that President Obama initially put together after being elected in 2008. That's one of the things that personally gives me hope.

I do think, as Katrina points out, there's huge areas of concern on the foreign policy side. That's not to say that these are all the people that I would have chosen. I wouldn't. I mean the truth is Bernie Sanders lost the primary and so there's obviously a consequence to that. I think a lot of progressive's do understand that Biden gets to appoint the Cabinet that he wants. I think our role as progressives now is to say our piece about people that we find over the line. There's reports that the incoming Biden administration is considering Rahm Emanuel for some top post. That should be a clear cut open-and-shut case-

Brian: Because?

Karthik: -even if you set aside all of his neglect of the federal judiciary, his repeated advocacy for a smaller stimulus bill in 2009, even if you set that aside, this is a guy who covered up the murder of a child in Chicago, and every Democrat should be able to agree that that's wrong.

Brian: You're talking about as mayor of Chicago with respect to a particular police shooting.

Karthik: Right. That should be a clear cut open-and-shut case. In general, Brian, I guess I would say I'm cautiously optimistic, and Katrina actually wrote a great piece about this. The fact that Biden feels the need to name-check Elizabeth Warren, as you point out, that to me is a signal that he understands the power of the progressive wing of the party and he values the progressive perspective.

The fact that he feels compelled to say that this is someone Elizabeth Warren likes, to me is a continuation of themes that he emphasized during his campaign when he ran on Scranton versus Park Avenue. He wants to be seen as a fighter for working people. He ran as a fighter for working people, and so I think he wants the people he chooses to feel as administration to be seen that way as well.

Brian: I see you keep a tweet of yours from last year pinned at the top of your Twitter feed, which refers to when you were campaigning against the Keystone XL Pipeline in South Dakota for the environmental group 350.org. You were furious that a "Democratic consulting firm was doing media for your opposition, the company TransCanada." Why do you keep that tweet at the top of your feed a year and a half later and is it relevant to the dance taking place in the party during the transition right now?

Karthik: Yes, I probably should change that, but in general, I think, the reason I started my firm is because I really do believe there's a toxic overlap between Democrats and corporate interests. I tend to think that Democrats are at our best when we're fighting for working people instead of oil companies. I don't think that's a particularly controversial take, but I do think if you're a consultant that that's giving advice to congressional campaigns on how to win, that it's a conflict of interest and morally dubious thing to also be advising TransCanada on how to shut down the pesky activists who want you to pay attention to things like climate science.

Brian: Let me follow up, Katrina, with you. Let me ask you just to follow up on what Karthik was just saying about corporate Democrats, on another name from the nominees' list yesterday and get your take, and then you can go wherever else you want. Controversial on both the left and the right apparently is Neera Tanden to run the Office of Management and Budget. Neera, who's been among other things, CEO of the think tank Center for American Progress and a Hillary Clinton campaign policy advisor.

The right doesn't like her, according to what I've read, because she's insulted a lot of Republicans on Twitter and she's furiously deleting hundreds of tweets, so those aren't front and center. The left doesn't like her partly because the Center for American Progress takes corporate donations. What do you think of Neera Tanden herself and is she emblematic of this broader tension between corporate and non-corporate Democrats as Karthik kind of framed it?

Katrina: I knew you'd asked me about this, Brian. I think there's a fight for the soul at the Democratic Party. It's been going on for decades. I think that the insurgency inside the Democratic Party is stronger than it's ever been, stronger than certainly 2008 when so many demobilized after Obama won. There is a new ecosystem of progressive groups that in some states, in Pennsylvania, for example, played a role in Biden's victory. I think that's why progressives feel they should be more at the table.

I'm thinking of Working Families Party, People's Action, Justice Democrats, Black Lives Matter electoral. There was exciting fact that movement people now want to run for office, AOC just being the tip of the iceberg. There are many more. I do think Bernie Sanders campaign in 2016 into 2020 played a fundamental role in rethinking the corporate piece of the Democratic Party, which has been to ascendant. If you can untether from big money, which is very tough for most candidates, it's a different kind of politics.

I think Trump won in 2016 lost in 2020, but there's racism, there are grievances, but there's also a sense that the Democrats haven't had a clear and compelling message for working people. I've stepped back at Neera Tanden. CAP is viewed probably by the Biden team as part of the left. I think it's different. I think it was a shadow Cabinet for the Clinton administration. Neera Tanden has been very close to Hillary Clinton. I think one of the reasons people feel negative about her, yes, the corporate funding of CAP, her Twitter feed is pretty aggressive. I hate to see Twitter politics dominate, but I think that's a big part of it, why she's deleted tweets.

There's no question that there was some Middle East money, Saudi money. There's a story of deleting a report that CAP had done on spying on Muslims in New York. Bloomberg gave CAP money. They took down the report. But let me step back and just say, I don't think anyone, and I looked it up last night on this call, maybe they could name the current OMB head. It's an important position. It's going to demand confirmation and it's true that the Republicans may well be the ones who deny her confirmation, not the left.

She is emblematic, as is Rahm, the two of them. On the other hand, you step back and Representative Pramila Jayapal is putting forth legislation I think in the next week's rethinking the OMB as this neutral arbiter of grading legislation and adopting new metrics. I think that's very creative and reduces OMB power. Neera Tanden is a controversial figure. I don't know about the right, I assume in that community, but on the left she's controversial.

I think with Rahm Emanuel, Karthik said it well, but I think it hurts the Democrats. It's not just Rahm's-- His policies are out of sync with the Democratic Party trying to win younger generation, more diverse generation, people of color. What he did in Chicago, both in terms of police brutality, but also on education, very committed to charterizing, privatizing education. He's had his run. He had his run in the House. He had his run in the Obama administration.

I'm not sure why there's-- I suspect this is where progressives may "win" and Rahm won't get a post, because a lot of political capital will go into that fight. The last thing I'd say is, there were commissions, Sanders and Biden commissions. You haven't really seen enough of the Sanders people inside. If there is a sense of team of rivals, I wish there were more, we may see more at the lower levels.

Brian: With us for a progressive journalism and advocacy perspective on how the transition is going and the nominees in these early days are Katrina vanden Heuvel publisher and editorial director of The Nation, she's also a Washington Post columnist, and Karthik Ganapathy, a communications consultant who has been a spokesman for progressive politicians, including Bernie Sanders and others, as well as the ACLU and the climate change organization, 350.org. Let's take a phone call. Craig in Westchester, you're on WNYC. Hi, Craig.

Craig: Hi, Brian. Thank you so much for covering this topic today and having this wonderful guest. My comment is Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders shouldn't feel overlooked by not being appointed to the president's new Cabinet because Biden, I think, needs them in the Senate where the Democratic Party will have a difficult time obtaining control. I was wondering if you guys have any opinions on that?

Brian: Karthik, as a former Bernie spokesman, do you have an opinion on that? I'll say that several people have also tweeted that Vermont and Massachusetts have Republican governors, so the Democrats would lose that seat and the potential to control the Senate, depending on how the Georgia special elections turn out, if they take either one out of the Senate, leaving the appointment of the replacement to the governor. Karthik, you want to react to any of that?

Karthik: Yes, sure. The first thing I'd say is I'd obviously love to see Bernie Sanders as the labor secretary. I think that would be a huge step forward for working people.

Brian: He is, despite who the governor of Vermont might be, he is campaigning for that job. I've seen him in an interview say, yes, he would like to be the labor secretary, basically, right?

Karthik: Yes. He stated his interest out in public and I think Bernie's moral compass has always been oriented towards helping working people. If he thinks that this is the way he can do it, I think that makes a ton of sense. To your other point, I think there's some debate about the Republican Governor of Vermont. Phil Scott has promised to appoint an independent who would caucus with the Democrats, so someone in Bernie's mold, if Bernie was appointed to a cabinet position. Which you can have a conversation about how much faith you can put in that. In general, the risk, I think, is fairly low.

I do think that Biden administration should seriously consider that. I obviously would have loved to see Elizabeth Warren either be the treasury secretary nominee, but this is one of those things where I think we have to make our case and I think the call is ultimately up to Joe Biden.

Brian: Half our listeners right now are going, "Wait, what? Vermont has a Republican governor. I didn't know that," but that's another show.

Katrina: He said he would appoint an independent or he'd appointed an independent or a Democrat, but though Bernie is an independent, he caucuses with the Democrats and you can't be assured of that. Though he has said very firmly, he'd like to be secretary of labor. He could do phenomenal things I think with the hearings, bringing attention to labor rights and abuses.

Brian: Let's take another call. Oh, screeners can I go to line two? There we go. Antonio in Bayside, you're on WNYC. Hello, Antonio.

Antonio: Hi, Brian. I'd like to say it's an honor to be on with your guests. Essentially, I'll get right to the point, the Democrats need to embrace more of the sensibility that kept the House seats for the ones that ran on, in other words, the ones that ran on more of an AOC Green New Deal, et cetera, they kept their seats. It's a canard that's going around that the Defund the Police and everything hurt the seats that they lost. Max Rose basically was running as a Republican light and that's why he lost. He really didn't differentiate himself from Malliotakis. We all need that.

Another point is that the Democrats need to double down on sensibility and not labels. Raising the social security cap that's been at 115,000 for years, like that would make it solve it, things that are common sense. Green New Deal is common sense. Stop articulating it or trying to fight back when people say, "Oh, it's left or it's progressive." No, it's just common sense.

There's a myriad of things that are just-- like Medicare for All is common sense. It's taking away from making it a profit motivation to more of a public good, like a police department or fire department. I think it's just better messaging. We can't have these hacks like Rahm Emanuel or anyone associated with the Hillary Clinton campaign. It has to be new, fresh ideas and sensibility. I'd be interested.

Brian: Antonio, thank you so much. Karthik, can you address the first thing that he brought up? Because this has been a going analysis and a going probably debate within the party. Biden won for president, but Democrats lost 11 seats in the house and the Senate did not turn as well as expected, like with Susan Collins and some other races. We apparently saw a meaningful amount of ticket-splitting with Americans voting for Biden, but their Republican congressional candidates.

There is a lot of analysis. Like the caller Antonio says that it was a problem of leaning too far left with things like Defund the Police and power players like Bernie Sanders, who openly call themselves socialists, making that sweeping policy agreement that Bernie made with Biden during the campaign, and that turned off voters in some of these more swingy districts. That that's why moderates like Max Rose lost. The caller says it was because they weren't progressive enough. The other analysis says it's because the National Democratic Party looked too progressive and so in these moderate districts, they paid the price. What do you think?

Karthik: Yes, I'll say two things here. The first is that, the thing I've never understood about this argument is that Republicans will run ads, calling you a socialist, saying you want to defund the police. They will say they will claim all kinds of things regardless of whether they have any basis in truth or not. That's what they did against President Obama. It's what they do to Democrats around the country. What they did obviously against Hillary Clinton.

The notion that if we shy away from the word socialism, if we shy away from the Green New Deal, if we shy away from a Medicare for All, ideas that I would add are enormously popular with the Democratic base of the party, but even more popular than most politicians, the notion that if we pretend, or if we say we're not socialists then they won't call you a socialist, I just don't think that has any basis in fact, or recorded history.

I think it serves Democrats well to go to where the energy of their party is, where the energy of their base is, which is in these new progressive ideas that are starting to take hold and reshape people's understanding of what's possible and have energized millions of new young people to get involved in the process.

Brian: Go ahead you can make a second point. Go ahead.

Karthik: Yes, I'll just make one other point here, which is that the thing I haven't been able to stop thinking about is that in the aftermath of the election, Marco Rubio did an interview where he said that the future of the Republican Party is as a multiracial working-class party. It's interesting to me, because it to me says we're in a moment when we are shifting from a left right understanding of politics, and as your caller just suggested, what we're moving towards is essentially a bottom-up politics.

I think the point that Marco's making is that the Republican Party needs to be a party that advocates for things that benefits most people, which they haven't done. They've been the party of corporate tax cuts and tax cuts for the rich, policies that benefit only a very small number of people and hurt the rest of us. For me the question is, can Democrats embrace this shift that's happening in our politics? Can we become the party of the working class? Can we become the party of the every man, and start advocating in truly policies that will transform and improve people's lives without equivocation and without feeling this need to run to the center. If we do, I think that spells enormous electoral success.

Brian: Katrina, to the point Karthik was just making, if you watch Fox, if you watch Tucker Carlson, for example, whatever else you may think of him, a lot of his populism rests in this argument that the wealthy elites from the coasts don't have your interests in heart. It's a class-based argument that the Democrats need to fight I think.

Katrina: Listen, I think the reason the election was not a blowout as it should have been for President-elect Biden was that the campaign didn't focus enough on the economy. I do think there is a multi-racial, inclusive, class-based populism that again, this insurgency I talked about understands you can't do identity without class. You don't pit them against each other.

By the way, many of the workers in this country are brown and Black. I think the growing progressive wing of the Democratic Party is a great asset. To treat it as a liability,as Karthik was saying, is a huge mistake. First of all, because many of the issues, progressive wing's big ideas enjoy greater support than most Democratic candidates. Look at the initiatives like the minimum wage in Florida, which passed. I think those need-- and there were other tax initiatives.

I think we need also to look at, as I said, the movement people who are now running for office. The progressive caucus in the House is the largest caucus. It's going to be more effective as a kind of block. It's a turning point moment and one, I think, that will be accelerated by the crisis. We've lived through the intersecting crises of health, racial justice, economic justice.

I think it's a mistake on the Democratic Party establishment side to dismiss the energy, as Karthik said. There's enormous energy and there's enormous support for some of these strong ideas like Green New Deal, Medicare for All. I do think, and AOC said, "Not a single member of Congress, that she's aware of, campaigned on socialism, or defunding the police"

I always felt Bernie Sanders was a New Dealer. If he'd run in that way-- He said to us in an interview once, "Well, I wanted to educate people about socialism." I don't think campaigns are about education often. You don't have the time, but I think we're at a turning point in this country and it's a moment of peril and possibility, but these issues are becoming more and more popular and a younger base is picking them up.

I think the Democratic Party risks obsolescence, and I do think what progressives are looking at is taking over the party. I think that is a very interesting strategy.

Brian: The last question. We just have 30 seconds. Just to follow up on that. What about the map of where the Democrats lost their congressional seats? They seem to be in these more, "moderate districts." AOC can say that nobody ran on socialism from her safe seat, but that doesn't register in Staten Island where Max Rose lost his seat because it looks like too many voters there, the Democrats were being soft on the looting that was taking place in some of the racial justice protests, and wanting too much overhaul of the economy along Democratic-Socialist lines. 30 seconds. Katrina, you'll get the last word. Were you able to hear?

Katrina: Yes. I could hear. I don't know if Karthik is there. Listen, I think politics-- Sorry.

Brian: All right. Karthik 30 seconds. You will get the last word.

Karthik: Sure. Yes, I think it's become a canard. I actually just don't think that this is the issue at the end of the day. I really think campaigns are about making voters feel something and making them feel like you're on their side. The notion that it's about this specific phrase about Defund the Police or about socialism, I just I also ultimately don't think that's the calculus for voters at the end of the day. What it is, is, "Is this person on my side? Can I trust them to go to Congress and fight for me?" The way to do that is by advocating a bold progressive agenda that makes people feel like we're actually attuned to the challenges they are facing, low minimum wage, rising health care costs. That's the stuff we should be talking to.

Katrina: Six and a half words, Brian. Politics is about improving the condition of people's lives, so they feel that it matters to vote. It matters. It changes lives in positive, important directions and we need to focus on that.

Brian: Katrina vanden Heuvel, publisher and editorial director of The Nation, also a Washington Post columnist, and Karthik Ganapathy, communications consultant, who has been a spokesman for Bernie Sanders, Keith Ellison, Charles Booker, the ACLU, and the climate change organization 350.org. Thank you both so much. The conversation continues.

Katrina: Thank you.

Karthik: Thanks, Brian.

 

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