Transcript of BONUS: "We, The Voters," an NPR Live Elections Event

Morning Edition is in Pennsylvania, where polls show Trump and Harris nearly dead even.

This is about character. This is about integrity.

Who did it better? On immigration, on the economy.

We heard from these campaign surrogates at a live event in Philadelphia. I'm E. Martinez with Laila Fadel, and this is a special election episode of Up First from NPR News.

Hey there. It's Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I know this is hard to believe, but one day the election will be over. Then the winner gets a lot more powerful. It's my job to report on what they do with that power. That's public accountability, but it's not possible without public support. So please support our work. Sign up for NPR Plus. Go to plus. Npr. Org. Hey, it's Susan Davis. Yes, there is more than one election happening this year. There are 34 Senate seats up for grabs, and in the House, Republicans are clinging to a single-digit majority. Those races will determine what the next President can do with his or her power. We're covering it all this year, but we can't do it without your support. So help us out and sign up for NPR Plus. Go to plus. Npr. Org. Wait, wait, don't tell me.

Fresh air up first. Npr News Now, Planet Money, Ted Radio Hour, Thru-Line, The NPR Politics Podcast, Code Switch, Embedded Books We Love, Wild Card, are just some of the podcasts you can enjoy sponsor-free with NPR Plus. Get all sorts of perks across more than 20 podcasts with the bundle option. Learn more at plus. Npr. Org. We are less than two weeks away from Election Day, and our co-host, Michelle Martin, and Steve Inskeep, have been in Pennsylvania to get a sense of how voters are deciding. This week at Member Station WHII in Philadelphia, they hosted a live event where congressional representatives from both parties made their case to voters. We also heard from experts on immigration and the economy and reporters such as NPR's political correspondence, Susan Davis.

I feel like the polls are really accurate right now. Close race within the margin of error. It does feel like this is a race and this is a state that at this point in the campaign, it is just nuts and bolts, turnout, operation, motivation.

Economist, Kent Smetters, and WHyY reporter, Carmen Russell-Sluchansky discussed the national debt. It's like our fiscal house is burning down, and these two are are getting over the furniture.

Both of them are going to increase the debt while actually contracting the economy.

Carmen, has any one person you've interviewed over the course of this election, you mentioned the debt to you as an issue? Has anybody?

Actually, that has not come up a lot.

An immigration expert, Mzafer Chishti, said the country is coming to terms with profound changes.

And the facts we can all bandy about.

It's not about facts. It is about identity and culture.

Also in the hot seat, two surrogates for the campaigns, Pennsylvania Democrat, Madalene Dean and Florida Republican, Byron Donald. The two house members offered closing arguments for their candidates, and we're going to play portions of those interviews now. With less than two weeks to go, Dean thinks late deciders will break for Vice President Kamala Harris.

I don't like hearing the polls when I wake up, but what I can tell you is what I'm seeing on the ground that I have never seen in the three or four presidential campaigns that I've been a part of, and that is energy on the ground.

She insisted that in a brief campaign, Harris has laid out some idea of what she stands for.

I think she has detailed policies that she wants to work on. For example, homeownership, affordable housing, building more housing stock, in talking about the economy, making sure small businesses have a shot, people have a shot at a house, an opportunity economy, as she calls it.

Let me talk about one aspect of that economy. We've been talking with voters across the state and heard a lot of things, a lot of positive things about Vice President Harris and negative things about vice President Harris. Some of the more negative things that you will hear from swing voters or undecided voters are words like fake or insincere. And there was a voter, he's a Trump supporter for sure, in Western Pennsylvania who's involved in the fracking industry. I said, Well, Vice President Harris said she also supports fracking. She's not opposed to fracking. And he simply did not believe that in the details that was going to prove to be true. Ultimately, he believed Democrats were going to put more regulatory hurdles in the way of his business. Would Would you agree with him?

No, I wouldn't. I don't think there's anything wrong with her opinion around fracking and how she has spoken about it, changing over the course of her experience. Those who worry about, Is she being genuine? I can tell you up close and personally, she's quite genuine. In terms of the facts and the truth, we know that the candidate on the other side is incapable of telling the truth over and over and over again.

What about people who say, and this is actually a bumper sticker I saw on the way up here, that said, I liked three dollar a gallon gas and mean tweets better. What do you say to people who say that?

I'm not good at bumper stickers. I like this economy better. I like people speaking to one another with dignity. Don't we want to bring decency back into our public discourse?

But can you say more about why that matters? I can imagine there are some people who will say decency and civility isn't making the cost of eggs any cheaper for me.

What do you say to them? I'd say take a look at what we were able to accomplish last Congress, because this Congress, as you well know, Democrats are in the minority. But the Congress before, we passed the Infrastructure Bill, the Pact Act for our Veterans, the IRA dealing with prescription drugs and climate change. All of these things have been engines for this economy. The economy is growing, wages are growing, inflation is down, so this economy is getting better. But we do have to recognize the pain of picking up eggs or bacon. Those prices still have to come down.

Let me ask about another topic. Why do you think it is that when asked, so many voters raise immigration as a concern, including, I think, some voters you'd really like to get and maybe you would have on other issues?

Because it is a concern. We need a civilized humane immigration system. This country was built on migrants, but immigration, our system is broken. And that was true not just for this current administration. It was true under Mr. Trump. I visited the border, and what I have is a system and border patrol agents that are heroic. They're doing amazing work, but they are understaffed. They don't have enough money or resources. You saw that we had a bipartisan bill that was going to be quite conservative to deal with immigration. And Mr. Trump scuttled it.

Trick question, and Trump did call for that bill to be killed. You're correct. Is the purpose of the immigration system to let people in or keep people out?

It should be actually a give and take. This notion of just shut it down, just shut it down. If you're at Any border crossing, what you actually know is it is a huge part of our economy that people are coming in and out every day to go to school, to go to work. Mr. Trump promises mass deportation and high tariffs. Do you know what that will result in? Top economists have told us, inflationary, recessionary cycles.

It's closing argument time. We're two weeks out. Do you want to make a closing argument?

I have three sons, three daughters-in-law, four grandchildren, another one on the way maybe this week. I see this election entirely through their eyes, their futures, and their children's futures. This is about character. This is about integrity. This is about people willing to tell you the truth even when it is uncomfortable. The answer is so obvious. It's Kamala Harris. Congresswoman Madalene Dean, Pennsylvania fourth.

Thank you so much for joining us today.

Thank you for having me.Thank you, to you.Thank you. What a pleasure.Thank you.

For Dean, the decision between Harris and former President Donald Trump comes down to character. Our co-host Steve Inskeep and Michelle Martin then turn to Florida congressman Byron Donalds, who is campaigning for Trump in Pennsylvania with a different message to voters.

The number one is the economy and frankly, inflation, which has really crippled families. The second one is immigration that under Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, illegal immigrants have come into the United States, and they've been spread in every town, county, city across the United States.

In Pennsylvania, the former President talked about Charleroi, which is a small city, and we've done some reporting there. It appears that there was a food packing plant that needed extra workers, couldn't find them locally, and the people who ultimately took the job were Haitians who have temporary protected status, as I understand it in the United States. Yes. Senator Vance, he says, I will call them illegal regardless of their status. Are they illegal to you?

Well, how they actually came to be in the United States is because the country of Haiti has been devastated, frankly, by the fact that rival gangs now run that country. And so the United States did give temporary protected status. I think the thing that needs to be understood is the fact that they're the straw that is breaking the camel's back with the 10 million plus illegal immigrants from countries around the globe that are in the United States.

How mass is the mass deportation supposed to be?

First, you have to start with criminal aliens, convicted murderers in the United States. You start with them and you start working your down. To the point of the border bill. The fact is, the border bill that was negotiated in a bipartisan fashion, some of your very conservative members helped to negotiate this bill, brought it before the body, and the former President said to kill it because he was pretty clear about this because he wanted to run on immigration as an issue.

Why would you agree to that?

Well, I'm glad you brought this up because there's been a lot of, I would say, misreporting about this particular border bill. The bill was dropped on a Sunday night. I read the bill the second the bill dropped. My first call was to Speaker Johnson, and I said, Speaker, there's no way this bill should get a vote in the House. I did not talk to Donald Trump. House leadership, Mike Johnson, Steve Scalese, both put out statements the next day saying that bill was dead on arrival in the House and it would not get a vote. So the media talking point that Donald Trump killed this bill is not accurate. That bill was killed because House leadership said very clearly it would not get a vote in the House of Representatives, and it died.

Okay, let's just move on to another topic here if we can. One of the very few Two truly undecided voters that I've encountered when talking with people here in Pennsylvania is a man named William Timbers. He's a steel worker in Western Pennsylvania. He's African-American. He's been working for 26 years, put his kids through school. He is with you on abortion rights. He is with you on social issues. His problem with your candidate has to do with his talk about being a dictator on the first day. His talk about an hour of rough treatment and crime would go away, which he saw as a call for of violence. How would you answer that voter who sees example after example after example in which he hears former President Trump saying he will go outside the rule of law and outside the democratic process?

A couple of things. First of all, one thing that's been debunked about this dictator on day one, he was actually being sarcastic. What he was referring to... Oh, come on now, everybody. Come on now, everybody. We have a studio audience. It's okay.

I understand what you're saying.

But let me be clear about what he was talking about was actually putting back into place executive orders that Joe Biden undid when Joe Biden became President of the United States.

One other question about the former President's statements. Our correspondent Tom Driesback went through a number of the President's speeches, this is his own words, in recent months, and found roughly 100 threats to investigate, prosecute, jail, or otherwise punish his perceived enemies. In your view, is that all sarcasm, or is that something that is meant?

I look at reality. Back in the 2016 campaign, obviously, Lock Her Up was all the rage at the Rallies. Did Donald Trump turn the Department of Justice on Hillary Clinton? No, he did not.

He actually did not do that. Well, he did call for investigations of people.

Did he instruct Bill Barr to go after Hillary Clinton? No, he did not. We have seen the Department of Justice go after Donald Trump on multiple times. You could agree or disagree on the charges, but the reality is that we have seen a weaponization of the Department of Justice under Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

I'm going to give you a closing word as we did to Representative Dean. Sure. If you're looking at a voter who's never voted for Trump before, is deeply skeptical, what's your 30 Second pitch to this man.

This is the greatest Pepsi taste challenge in American politics. You've had two administrations. Who did it better? On immigration, on the economy, on foreign policy, you named the issue, Donald Trump was a significantly better President than Joe Biden/Kamala Harris.

Representative Donald, thanks for taking the questions. I really appreciate it. Thank you.

It's Thursday, October 24th. This has been a bonus episode of Upfirst from NPR News, Ami Martinez. For more election coverage, tune in to our morning edition or subscribe to our newsletter. This bonus episode of Upfirst was edited by Taylor Haynie, Alice Wolfley, Mohamed Elbardici. It was produced by Kelly Dickens, Barry Gordimer, Iman Mahani, and Adam Bierne. We get engineering support from Stacey Abbott. Don't forget to listen to Up First Daily for all the election news you need through November fourth and beyond.

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