Populism & Swing Elections with Ron Brownstein & Rebecca Bennett

**Al Hunt** (0:11)
Hello, and welcome to Politics War Room with James Carville and Al Hunt. This week, our guests are the congressional candidate for the 7th District in New Jersey, Democrat Rebecca Bennett, and our favorite political journalist, Ron Brownstein, of CNN and Bloomberg Opinion. Now remember, we love taking your questions, so write to politicswarroom.gmail.com for next week's show. We'll get to as many as we can, but don't forget to tell us where you're from. You also can text updates about what's next for Politicon and Politics War Room by signing up at politicon.com. So tell your friends about us and remind them to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. And please check out the links to our sponsors, Trust and Will, and Miracle Made, Quince and Aqua Tru, and our episode, Show Notes. We thank you for supporting these sponsors. It helps make this podcast happen.
This is an explosive week in politics, and who better to shed some insight than Ron Brownstein, the political analyst for CNN and columnist for Bloomberg Opinion, and no one knows or writes better about American politics.
Ron, Graham Platner is going to have to drop out of this race. But there does not seem to be any natural replacement. Most of the major possibilities in Maine have lost the primary for governor or other things. There's no clear process as to what to be done. But just thinking with an eye to the Biden-Harris situation of several years ago, they have to have, don't they, an open process, if brief, it only can be two weeks, and then have some group, state committee, whatever have you, pick a nominee after maybe a debate. But you tell me, you know more about it than any of us do.

**Ron Brownstein** (2:05)
Well, you know, I guess I feel like there are, and wrote, as I wrote in June, I think there are reasonable alternatives for Maine Democrats. You know, it was sort of a concentration or a, you know, kind of a concentration of errors that produced this primary, because on the one hand, you know, this outcome, Platner did touch a chord early on, right? I mean, he did, I mean, there is a genuine response to him that goes beyond the extent to which I believe national progressive groups saw him as a way to make a point. Yes, but he ultimately did touch a chord among Maine voters. But part of what happened was that no organic alternative really emerged because the national Democratic leadership was so invested in the Governor Janet Mills as, you know, their choice that prevented anybody else, I think, preempted anybody else from getting in the race. And one of the results of that, Al, was that they ended up having five serious candidates in the gubernatorial race. I mean, you know, the Maine gubernatorial, Democratic gubernatorial primary was where all of the talent flowed. And, you know, they had a number of candidates who did really well and showed statewide appeal. Hannah Pingree was the eventual nominee. Former Speaker of the House probably would have been the strongest alternative to Platner in the Senate race. But she's now otherwise engaged in the governor's race. But I think the other, you know, three of the other four, I don't think Angus King's son is, you know, necessarily a reasonable choice for the other Senate seat. But Troy Jackson, former state Senate President, rural district, genuinely working class in a way that, you know, Platner really was not in his personal background. He endorsed Platner, Platner endorsed him, Bernie endorsed both of them. He is a plausible candidate. Shana Bellows, the Secretary of State who ran against Collins in 2014 when she was much younger, and her only background was that she was out of the state ACLU. She did well in this, and she certainly scratches the itch of voters who want a party that is more committed to resisting Trump. And then Neeraj Shah, the former state public health official, who is more moderate, also a reasonable choice. So I think out of those three to begin with, I don't think Jerry Golden in all likelihood will reconsider the outcome, and he was probably too much of a poke in the eye to the forces that advanced Platner. But I think between, honestly between Bellows and Jackson, I think that they have a kind of a candidate who would be acceptable to the broad range of the party and would not seem like a repudiation to the most ardent Platner folks. And, you know, they don't have a process to get there. It seems like they are in good faith trying to figure out what will get them there, you know, whether it's some kind of state-wide convention or caucuses again. I mean, obviously, they can't do a primary again after some kind of debate.