Time to get you home and watch the game. That do want you to know charlie cook made the ultimate sacrifice tonight. Game. Tickets to the he gave them to his son so he us. D join [applause] pay. Tall price to we thank you doubly for that. Lso wanted to mention i think john might have that we have a couple exciting programs two more exciting coming up. Enator Sherrod Brown joins us november 19. Susan rice, former national advisor, on january 14. Mentioned, there is no better place for political junkies to go to know whats american politics than the Cook Political Report. Editor, the the founder, the publisher, has and they have been very, very by the the hill center, way. Charlie is here was here a years ago Jennifer Duffy have been here with us. And coming into 2020, believe it or not, were already in the of it. We thought it was a good time to have charlie cook back, and he with usly agreed to come us, again. So, charlie, good to see you. Hank you so much for coming back. Charlie thank you. My pleasure, bill. I talked you and about this evening, it was some hree weeks ago, maybe, and Something Big has happened since then. Ooming over the american political landscape. So i just want to ask you and way. T out of the the impeachment inquiry, what impact do you think this will on the 2020 campaign . Primary and general . Sure. E first, let me say that john 1980 was an interesting experience for me. I learned, a, that actually i id know something about politics. B, i should never be a manager. O it was a real educational experience. So it steered me the right way. Here. Re to be you know, we talked earlier about lets not let this focus entirely on impeachment because there is this election out there, so im it from e approaching this way. Because everybodys got an opinion and nobodys going to mind. Anybodys i personally dont you know, f i were a democrat, i dont think i would do this because i lived here through two of them. I was in college during the nixon impeachment. Obviously doing minus letter and a doing a newsletter a column with the clinton impeachment. Or done hes said forget what hes said or done, forget whether he deserves it or just throw that all aside, to me it sucks all the oxygen out of the room. I am an were independent. I am a moderate. Would re a democrat, i want every bit of energy to be winning a november 3 election and not on not on the regardless of what merits the merits may be. Because i think having a focus election and impeachment are somewhat contradictory, and, sure how i am not great an idea if youre a for the president have a victory to be acquitted by the senate. By the senate and i was acquitted. I was found innocent. He charges were found to be false. Anybody doubt thats what hed say . And the fact is the chances of there being 20 republican joining the 47 democrats, theyre nonexistent. Whatever the evidence is, it doesnt, you know, thats just not going to happen because theres no tolerance in the dissentan party for any of the president. Mean, you can ask bob corker, ask john flake, ask sanford, anybody. Personally wouldnt do it. Thats me. Whatever. Of in this kind segways into, into, and this segues what ill what do you want to do first . First that have been here, charlie and i have about 30 minutes. E need more time than that but well hold it to 30 minutes and then open up to your questions. That. O jump in on so does that mean for democrats they ought to get this done fast, like maybe before the end of the year, and then leave time for other issues, shall we say . Charlie well, the thing is, i was correct aker the first time where she said, you know what, this is not what ought to be doing. Nd im not entirely convinced shes changed her mind, to be perfectly honest. Fter all this ukraine stuff started, you know, there was sort of no point digging in her heels. Another ing to go to level whether she was onboard or not. And but i do find it that somehow the Judiciary Committee has this them, which y from suggests to me maybe this is not necessarily really its more than impeachment and we already had that going on. Im not sure whether things have changed that much. Bill maybe theyre trusting dam schiff more than jerry nadler. Khary its charlie its got to go through the Judiciary Committee. Down that road, would you agree, as some people suggested, as soon as they get vote, without rushing it, get to a vote the better . Vote le with, the vote in the senate will be it Mitch Mcconnell decides is. Bill i am talking about in the house. Know well, i bill i know. Lets go to the primary. Does this help joe biden or him because of all this other these rumors or allegations . Its e i dont think helpful at all, but i dont know if we know whether its going to not. Him or i mean, we saw forget merits justification or anything. We saw Hillary Clinton turned hillary, and were now seeing an effort to turn biden into nt crooked joe, and the thing is, there are i know there are here that have known joe biden for, you know, a billion have. As i and you know, if somebody wanted biden ake a case of joe being the democratic nominee or joe biden being against a sident, i could throw out few reasons. I crooked joe isnt dont i dont think there is a crooked bone in the guys body. Thats not who he is. Ive never heard any suggestion that he did anything inappropriate. His son may have taken on a two that he or shouldnt have, but, anyway, i ont the thing is, i think the Biden Campaign made a mistake. I will keep this tight. Allowedistake when they all their eggs to be put in the basket because that are well as long as you perceived to be most electable, but if that basket develops a have a it, you dont whole lot left, and if i were saying, this is about experience. And i look around this field and some amazingly talented people and probably one or two that are going to be president United States someday, really amazing people, but right now with where the country is, to undo, yourience know, x, y, and z. More than the rest of the field combined. Most the way, i am the electable. Electability will be the cherry top. The thing is, electability, its ike very nears and veneers and it gets stripped away. If theres not a lot there in this your case, then anything that makes you look like youre less electable, is not justtability ideology. I mean, there are many electability is in the eye of beholder and there are many aspects of it. Ill one of the great advantages of being a subcriber to the Cook Political Report, something, maybe 10 minutes before i sat down. We trust. Charlie yeah. What i call tuesday treats. To ask you about some of the things you trust. Uhoh. E bill these are based, by the way, on polls. Should we trust any poll today . Charlie well, i any poll ou trust today . Charlie well, first of all, there is an urban legend out well, the polls were all wrong in 2016. First question is, what polls are you talking about . Talking about the National Polls that basically real, clear politics average of all major National Polls, had Hillary Clinton ahead points . E well, what do National Polls measure . The National Popular vote. Win the National Percentage by, 1. 2 points. Some were two. This is about as close as this stuff gets. Than it hady closer been in 2012 when the National Polls were suggesting a closer and romney obama that went, yeah, but what you 40 you know, basically states went exactly the way we thought. There were six, seven states were going to be close. Guess what, they were close. Three where e were everything was wrong. Michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania. A whole two spend hours talking about those three, and it was e statelevel polling. Things one of the good thats unfortunately happened is polls are commodities. People think one poll is as good another. Well, shoot, thats like one car is good as another. Know, ats you absolutely not true. There are polls you know, you network polls, you know, the telephone ones. Is a little more problematic and they could have done well and done badly and done badly. Ut of the telephone polls that post, fox ison a good poll, wall street journal is a good one. These polls are highquality polls. Polls. E very expensive i think theyre trustworthy. Universities. There are some lousy polls out there that i would i dont quote l never see me certain polls. Just because i think there are methodlogically and i wouldnt do it. Ometimes i give a hard time to journalist friends of mine that know good and damn well are polls. N. P. R. He first thing is, and pbs news hour poll, trump rating, 44 disapprove, 3 you trust it, what does it tell us . Charlie the 44 was approved. Thing aboutk the President Trumps Approval Rating is i mean, i keep say, either, a, this times different. Theyre really going to drop now. This is the straw that broke the camels back. Whole barn we have a full of straw. You know, of things that were know, this be, you times different. Well, im from missouri. One. Me on that the other thing people say is, president s nt the numbers fall . And the thing is, for something rise first. Y got to and youre looking at a resident thats had the narrowest trading range of any president in the history of polling. Were at 354 major National Polls, credible tested his ls have job Approval Rating. 353354 all but one his numbers have been upside down ith higher disapprovals than approval. Now, the thing about it is, nope, thats never happened. Y the way, the one the one was the first fox news back in february of 2017, the president 48 approved, 47 disapproved. And every other fox and every other one of those have been upside down. In the first three ears, a president has there may be a 20 to 25point gap between their peak which is honeymoon, right, if theyre elected, and their trough where they have some really bad stuff happen. Variation. A wide oscillation thats there. But for President Trump, that been the case. In gal lineup gallup, best rating. 35. E was fox news, 10point range. 4838. Things happen, his numbers, if they go up at all, hardly go up. Bad things happen, they dont to go down. And i think its a product of he hyperpartisanship and the tribalism that we have now is that theres one group of people that there is absolutely nothing could possibly do thats wrong. And another group that theres nothing he could possibly do right. And so you thats 3 4 of the is right there. Bill a president that cant get 50 , whos never been above 50 in trouble for reelection . Charlie hell yes, yeah. If this is an up or down of President Trump, thats it, hard hat, its very, very to see extremely how he wins vote. Pular charlie it would be hard for him to win the Electoral College as well. About ke the old story the woman whos asked by a friend, hows your husband, and compared to what . And thats why if youre a if you you want it to be a referendum. You know . Choice, ut if its a well, a choice between president or who . D what is it democratic socialism . Is it the squad . No, a. O. C. Isnt 35 years old so she cant run. A choice between . Thats where it gets a little more complicated. If i were a democrat i wouldnt want it to be a choice. I would want it to be a referendum. Bill second thing you can trust you go to the democratic the quint pack poll, latest one, looking at the standing. Elizabeth warren, 27 . Joe biden, 25 . 16 . E sanders, pete. Harris, Elizabeth Warren, the momentum with Elizabeth Warren . Charlie well, only Major National poll thats shown place. In first almost all of them have it closing up a lot. And it is closing. Thing is, she she is come shes got an enormous amount of momentum. I watched her several times out in iowa and once in new in the last 60 days. And without saying anything like, dislike, anything ike, i saw two of the best president ial stump speeches i have ever seen in my entire career. They were good. Whether she nominating her is a good idea or bad idea for democrats is another question. Thing is, it was like t was it was as if somebody had had the best political speaking coach on the planet years. With her for it was smooth as silk. Edges. So shes operating as a candidate on a level higher than thisany other candidate in this race, and her campaign is on a plain higher than any other democrat. Is she going to win the nomination . We dont know. Lots of polls show it closing. That is the only one that has it ahead. I do not know if she has closed the gap fully or not. Equally blown away by joe bidens Campaign Speeches . Charlie i was talking to one of the networks, these young reporters that are following fulltime. Its funny, by the time these campaigns get going, they know word for word the candidates the candidates stump speech. If one word is different, one sentence is different, their ears perk up. There are two joe bidens. Teleprompter joe and nonteleprompter joe. Teleprompter joe does fine. Nonteleprompter joe, you never know where that is going. I thought it was like bird hunting. Theyve got the caller and where the guide can give an electric or hunter can give an electric jolt to the dog to get their attention. Bidens staff should put one around his ankle. [laughter] when he starts going, i was driving the Pacific Coast highway one time, you nudge him back over. A jolt. [laughter] no, but, the thing is, everybody has assets and liabilities. For biden, hes got more experience than the entire rest of the field put together. Is age a liability . Heck yeah. But all of these candidates have assets and liabilities. Bill has it boiled down to joe biden and Elizabeth Warren . With bernie fading . Charlie i think bernie is fading. After a good fundraising quarter. I think so. You see Bernie Sanders now and it is almost word for word for word the same speech as four years ago. This is version 1. 1. You take out Hillary Clinton and you throw in trump. It is basically the same speech. With sanders and warren, what you have is, this is not Michael Dukakis liberalism. It is more huey long populism. Populism this is about the whole system is totally screwed up and weve got to blow it up. Thing up. Le its about big change. And to me the choice the democrats have is to go big or go home. Where big is big, bold, exciting, risky, like Elizabeth Warren. Or, go home to something that is familiar, something that is comfortable. Something that is safe, joe biden. For anybody else, they will have to elbow their way in. I have not seen anybody able to do that. One other thing on biden, there have been three trajectories for biden. Biden holds on and goes on to win the nomination. The second one, he fades. The third one, biden collapses. He does something, something happens, and he goes down. For numbers two and three, it matters, when does that happen . If it happens early on, while there are centerleft establishmentfiendly alternatives, or late in the process, where it is just biden and warren . If that does happen, when does it happen . The centerleft establishment friendly alternatives, they are on borderline life support right now. That is why, watch this carefully. Right now, technically it is a threeway race. We kind of know which direction bernie is going. It is a twoway unless kamala, klobuchar, or buttigieg. Right now, there is no momentum for any of the other candidates. Bill when you look overall at the political landscape, has it changed since 2016 . Particularly in the heartland. You mentioned the key states. Michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania. Do you detect a change . Can we read a change . Charlie we have seen some change. We have to think about, what did happen in 2016 . Why did it happen . What were the proportions . How much was about donald trump . How much was about Hillary Clinton . What was that about . I think secretary clinton, she and her husband have always been polarizing. She had 25 years of accumulated baggage. Whether justified or not, is for somebody else to decide. It was interesting watching them. Until the me too movement arrived, it was like he had a teflon coating. Stuff did not seem to stick to him that much. If clinton had teflon, secretary clinton had velcro. Whether it should or not, it did. My theory, and i go with a lot of data, but this is my own instinct, i think there were a lot of voters that were never going to vote for donald trump. It wasnt going to happen. They were not excited about Hillary Clinton. They were going to do it. Maybe they would hold their nose. One month out, the billy bush tape comes out. Hollywood tape comes out. Suddenly, the election is over. Theres no way trump can win. Theres no way clinton could lose. The republican speaker of the house suggests may be the suggests maybe the nominee should step aside. This is over. Suddenly there was intensity among the trump people where a lot of them did not think he was going to win. There was so much ambivalence on this other side, anybody that was not excited about Hillary Clinton got a pass. They did not have to. They did not have to do anything they did not want to. She was going to win anyway. So i dont have to vote. In 2016, to remember the old gomer pyle show, surprise, surprise, surprise. I dont think it was about lying to pollsters. It was more there was so much ambivalence on one side and they did not think they needed to vote. They didnt. Bill particularly, in michigan and wisconsin and pennsylvania. Votes. That many charlie three states in the northeast and states that have had manufacturing. That has been a tough sector. There are lots of things going on. For example, if you are going to put together a list of all the states in the country, these are three of the states with the most restrictive early voting in the country. Where virtually, all the votes in those states were cast on election day. You l