DAVE DAVIES, HOST:
This is FRESH AIR. I'm Dave Davies. Democrats gather in Chicago next week for their national convention in the middle of a presidential campaign that is, well, like no other in our lifetimes. It was already an odd race, pitting former President Donald Trump, trying to regain the office he claimed was stolen from him four years ago, against the man who beat him, President Joe Biden. Then came Biden's disastrous performance in a June debate, an attempted assassination that nearly took Trump's life just days before the Republican Convention, followed by Biden's withdrawal from the race and his endorsement of his vice president, Kamala Harris.
Harris and her new running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, have suddenly energized Democrats - drawing huge crowds, raising record sums of money, and erasing Trump's lead in opinion polls. Trump, who is also well-funded and determined, is now attacking Harris in countless ads and public comments, even as he laments Biden's exit from the campaign.
For some perspective on where we are now and what to expect, we turn to Evan Osnos, a staff writer for the New Yorker, who's covering the contest and recently followed the Democratic candidates in their rallies in key swing states. Osnos has reported extensively from China and the Middle East in the past, and shared a Pulitzer Prize in investigative reporting. He's also authored three books, including "Joe Biden: The Life, The Run And What Matters Now," published in 2020. You can hear him regularly, along with his New Yorker colleagues Susan Glasser and Jane Mayer, on the weekly podcast "The Political Scene."
Evan Osnos, welcome back to FRESH AIR.
EVAN OSNOS: Thanks, Dave - glad to join you.
DAVIES: So this is a very different race. Is it hard to recast the convention, or, you know, is it a matter of simply changing the speakers and their order?
OSNOS: No, it really does change things because a convention, historically - I mean, if you go back all the way to the beginning of the 19th century, these things have been around since the 1830s, and conventions were either designed to actually nominate the candidate or later, really since the 1970s, they've been mostly an image-building exercise, a unifying exercise, where you remind people out in the country of who it is that the candidates are and why you should be enthusiastic about it.
Remember; at this point, it really was just a complete transplant of who the center of this campaign was. Instead of it being a moment to look back and in a sense, try to encourage people to celebrate Joe Biden's first term, they are fundamentally shifting the language and the idea of this campaign to a concept that we are on the cusp of a different future, that Kamala Harris and Tim Walz represent, as they now so often say, an opportunity to turn the page, to say, we're not going back. That is a really different kind of message.
DAVIES: Right. You know, people talk about the convention bump that a candidate typically gets, you know, a little boost in the polls, a point or two, from a week of heavy coverage and positive coverage as they and their allies speak to the nation. You know, televised conventions used to be a common experience among all Americans. Networks would cover them every night, and it was a chance for the party to get its message to voters beyond their base. And I think nowadays, that's particularly rare. To what extent does this convention offer Democrats that chance to speak to a broader audience?
OSNOS: Well, I think it does in the sense that there are a lot of Americans, who - let's remember, Dave. Most people choose to go about their daily lives not thinking about politics. There is this very dedicated subset of people who are obsessed with it. But a lot of people really are only tuning into the presidential race now or even later. For them, this is a chance for them to say, well, OK, who is Kamala Harris? Who is Tim Walz? I mean, let's be honest. Most Americans had never heard of the Minnesota governor until a few weeks ago. Even a lot of political junkies didn't know anything about him.
In that sense, giving people a chance not only to hear their own - to hear the voices of those candidates and to hear them tell their story, but also there's going to be, as you often see these kind of videos, which are products. Let's be sure about that. But they're designed to give you a sense of what does this person care about? What shaped them? Was it military experience? Was it growing up in a certain kind of family or a certain part of the country?
And this question of a bump in the polls. It is a real thing. I mean, just if you look back over the course, since really, as long as Gallup's been measuring this, the largest bounce out of a convention that we've ever measured was in 1992. It was when Bill Clinton, in his Democratic convention, made this pretty convincing case that George H.W. Bush was responsible for people's economic troubles.
The result was a 16-point bounce, which really helped them ultimately win that election. In this case, one of the questions to look for is whether or not Kamala Harris and Tim Walz have already, in a sense, had their bounce because they had this very unusual transformation of the race when they both suddenly became the candidates. Maybe people have already tuned in, and they may not get that bump that comes out of it. But it is very likely that they will come out of the convention, assuming things proceed somewhat normally, and this is maybe not a year to assume anything normal, but they may come out of it with an advantage that will make the challenge for Donald Trump even greater as they approach the final 75, 80 days of this campaign.
DAVIES: It's interesting that this time they're returning to Chicago, where in 1968, they probably had their most disastrous convention, where Hubert Humphrey, who had been Vice President under Johnson, was the nominee, essentially because of his relationships with party leaders, and thousands of protesters got into brawls and battles with police. In fact, it was described in a later report as a police riot.
It was an ugly thing to watch, and it harmed the party, and eventually they lost narrowly to Nixon that year. That's obviously not going to happen this time. But, you know, convictions are often an opportunity for people who differ from the party's leadership in some respects to have their voice. You know, there's an old saying that Republicans work things out - Democrats fight things out.
OSNOS: Well, one point of real division within the party is this question of how the Biden administration has handled the war in the Middle East. And, you know, there was earlier in the campaign, when Biden was the nominee - there was real concern that that could become the defining divisive issue, that it was generating particularly in states like Michigan a source of permanent vulnerability for him. That has diminished somewhat, partly because Kamala Harris is perceived to be perhaps less associated with the policy, even though on paper, in fact, there's not that much difference from how she's talked about U.S. policy towards Israel and the war in Gaza.
I think we should be reasonably expecting that there will be protests. This is part of the process. And in Chicago, already, there are groups that have applied to protest have been approved to do so. Some of their attorneys have described it as probably 25,000 people. Chicago is the home to the largest Palestinian community in the country. So you can expect to see things in the streets.
You know, I used to work at the Chicago Tribune, Dave, and the memory of 1968 is really strong in the city, in the minds of the political class and then also even in the police department. So in a way, they are conscious that the world is watching, as it was said in 1968. So I think there is going to be this thing to watch about how the police manages what will be a tense - perhaps tense encounter.
And then there's the question of what goes on inside the convention. There are about 30 delegates who are uncommitted, meaning that they have signaled that they are withholding their full-throated endorsement of the nominees because of their concerns about Gaza policy. There's been some reporting that, in fact, they are perhaps going to make their presence known by candlelight vigil or some other kind of activity, but it may not be a floor fight in the conventional sense. There is not a policy platform to be decided that is likely going to be ventilated and resolved out in public view.
DAVIES: You know, since that is a point of contention between Kamala Harris and some section of the Democratic Party. I thought we'd listen to a clip of her dealing with protesters. There was one that got a lot of coverage where some people were chanting and she essentially said, if you want to see Donald Trump get elected keep saying that, otherwise, I'm speaking. The one we're going to hear here is a subsequent speech in Arizona where she kind of addressed them in a little more complete way. Let's listen.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: You know what? Hold on a second. Hold on, hold on. Hold on, everybody, hold on. Hold on. Let me just say this on topic of what I think I'm hearing over there. Let me just speak to that for a moment and then I'm going to get back to the business at hand.
(APPLAUSE)
HARRIS: So let me say, I have been clear. Now is the time to get a cease-fire deal and get the hostage deal done.
(APPLAUSE)
HARRIS: Now is the time. And the president and I are working around the clock every day to get that cease-fire deal done and bring the hostages home.
(APPLAUSE)
HARRIS: So I respect your voices, but we are here to now talk about this race in 2024.
(APPLAUSE)
DAVIES: That was Kamala Harris in Arizona I think pretty effectively addressing some demonstrators. But that doesn't mean that, you know, they agree with her. I mean, they appreciate her compassion but want things like an arms embargo until there is a cease-fire in Gaza. How much can this hurt the ticket, do you think?
OSNOS: Well, as you say, Dave, look. What you heard her doing was something very important, which is that she was trying to find a solution. She can't try to ignore or stiff-arm what were going to be ongoing interruptions in her speeches. You know, that was a real change from how she responded in Detroit, which I was - a rally I attended, where she said, in effect, If you want Donald Trump to win, then continue talking like that. And that rubbed people the wrong way on the left. You heard about it over the days that followed. And so you see this different way of her talking about it.
In strict policy terms, what she's describing is, in fact, what the Biden administration has been pursuing, which is a cease-fire, getting hostages home. But it is also trying to create essentially a way for people to find their way to giving her the benefit of the doubt. What she's saying is, I don't have a solution for you right now. She is not, by any means, adopting the policy of an immediate arms embargo, which is exactly what many pro-Palestinian protesters are seeking. But she's trying to thread this needle. And I think that so far, the indicators are that in Michigan, for instance, which is a state where there was a lot of vulnerability for Democrats around this issue...
DAVIES: Because there's large Arab population there, right?
OSNOS: Exactly. It has a large Arab and Muslim population. and recently, we've seen indications that the Harris campaign has pulled ahead of Donald Trump in some of the polls. It's still small differences, but it is a sign of a shift in tone.
DAVIES: We are speaking with Evan Osnos. He's a staff writer at The New Yorker. We'll continue our conversation in just a moment. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF SLOWBERN'S "WHEN WAR WAS KING")
DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR. And as we anticipate the Democratic National Convention next week in Chicago, we're speaking with New Yorker staff writer Evan Osnos about the state of the race.
I'm interested in Joe Biden's role here. You know, I think it was your colleague, Susan Glasser, who mentioned that at the rally in Philadelphia, when Kamala Harris introduced Tim Walz, that Joe Biden's name was not mentioned at all. It has to be hard for him to watch all of this euphoria for his replacement. I'm wondering - you know, you've reported a lot on the Biden world - what do you hear about what he's thinking or saying?
OSNOS: Yeah, I was talking to somebody yesterday who's very close to him who said to me, look. He is disappointed but not depressed. I think there is a very complicated thing going on right now. He on some level came to terms with the reality that his political moment had closed. His political opportunity had closed. And internally, there was essentially an accumulation of data, of polling evidence, that they had realized that in places that he would absolutely need to win in order to have a second term that they just weren't going to win those.
And then in some ways, it was easier for him to reach that decision as a political judgment than as a referendum on his worthiness of a second term, on whether he was up to the task. Because the reality is, physically, personally, psychologically, Dave, I don't think that he has come to the same view that lot of members of the public have, which is that it would be difficult or impossible for him to have done a second term. That's just not how he sees himself. He has often told people, I don't feel my age. And that's not just a line. I think it really is rooted in his self-perception.
But I think it's important that you're going to see him at the convention on Monday. This is a big moment. He's going to give a speech. And that is a chance, in effect, to make vivid this sense that Kamala Harris' candidacy does, on some level, rest on the foundation of what came before. It is a movement towards the future and a break with the past, but it would not be possible were it not for some of the policy gains that were made under the Biden administration. I heard her, interestingly, in Michigan, after not mentioning his name in Philadelphia, it was notable to me that she made a point to talk about him at this big rally. And you heard the crowd then start this chant saying, thank you, Joe. So it's a balancing act, but I think it's not one they're going to overlook.
DAVIES: You know, it's truly remarkable to see how Kamala Harris and her buoyant running mate Minnesota Governor Tim Walz have inspired and energized Democrats since this change occurred. I thought we would listen to a bit of Tim Walz's speech in Nevada. Here he's talking about his background.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
TIM WALZ: My dad was a teacher. My older brother was a teacher. My sister was a teacher. My younger brother was a teacher.
(APPLAUSE)
WALZ: And we married teachers. So...
(APPLAUSE)
WALZ: The privilege of my lifetime was spending two decades teaching in public schools...
(APPLAUSE)
WALZ: ...And, you might have heard, coaching football to a state championship. So...
(APPLAUSE)
WALZ: Here's...
UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: (Chanting) Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach. Coach.
WALZ: Don't ever close that yearbook. That's my pro tip. Look. My students and my players are the ones who encouraged me to run for office. They saw in me what I hope to instill in them, a commitment to a common good and something so important - the belief as each and every one of you came here as a single person. A single person can make a difference.
DAVIES: Tim Walz speaking in Nevada. Boy, they love him. Republicans are already punching holes in his record, and there's going to be plenty more of that. You've covered politics a long time. Is what we are seeing now something distinctly different to you?
OSNOS: It's really kind of fascinating. I have to say we haven't heard a Democratic candidate or, really, any Republican candidate who has the credibility to make the kind of self-description that you just heard a second ago - teachers marrying teachers. You know, we saw his financial disclosures recently, in which Tim Walz, frankly, is in a similar position to where a lot of Americans are. He doesn't have a huge amount of savings. He lives in a house, at this point, that is the governor's mansion.
But he's not somebody who spent years on Wall Street. He was not an Ivy League graduate. He's not the thing that has been for - as much as you hear presidential candidates try to present themselves as the voice of the common man, in a lot of cases, it is a performance that runs pretty thin. It's just not the case with him. This - it really is his background.
You know, Dave, I've spent a lot of the last decade or so kind of talking to people around this country, trying to make sense of what we're all going through in the years since Donald Trump came on the scene in 2015. And the thing that comes to the surface over and over again no matter where you are and no matter whether you're talking to a conservative or a progressive is this sense that people in Washington just really don't have any connection to the lives of people around the country. They just live differently. They have different kinds of jobs. They have different kinds of education. They just don't know what it feels like.
And I think Republicans are going to try everything they can to poke holes in Tim Walz. But it is very hard to present him as something other than a person who knows what it feels like to be out in the country, living a normal life. That's who he is. And I think for that reason, he does represent something quite different than we've had in presidential politics in a while.
DAVIES: The Republican candidate for Vice President is JD Vance, and he's made news of his own with past and present statements. I'm wondering. How do you see the interplay between Walz and Vance? Is that going to be a dynamic of its own that affects the race?
OSNOS: It has been interesting so far that in some ways, Tim Walz is actually filling the role that JD Vance wants to play, meaning that Tim Walz is positioning himself - is kind of presenting himself as the everyman, somebody from the Midwest who just has had a regular life. And JD Vance's self-presentation, of course, was, you know, largely formed out of writing a book about growing up in Appalachia, "Hillbilly Elegy," and coming from humble circumstances and making his way to the top. But it hasn't really played out for Vance, of course, in the election in the way that he or Trump would want. The polling data so far showed that it has not really delivered many benefits.
You know, I think that Vance has been a pugnacious figure since joining this ticket. And the question is a little bit, well, if Vance is the pugnacious figure and Trump is the pugnacious figure, then who is it ultimately who is reaching out to those on-the-fence voters and saying, I see you; you know, I'm an approachable, appealing, personable figure? That hasn't really communicated.
So look. Vice presidents - often, the most important role that they play in a race is not delivering a specific state or anything like that. It's in filling out this feeling, this portrait of what the ticket represents. And in that sense, Walz has been a counterbalance to Harris because they're from very different parts of the country. They have very different family backgrounds and ethnic backgrounds. It's not clear what Vance has delivered for Trump, and it's hard to see how - short of some really big shift in his language or the way he talks about policy, how he would suddenly become a great asset for Trump.
DAVIES: Let me reintroduce you. We're going to take another break here. We are speaking with New Yorker staff writer Evan Osnos. He'll be back to talk more after this short break. I'm Dave Davies, and this is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF TONY WILLIAMS' "CITY OF LIGHTS")
DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR. I'm Dave Davies. As the Democratic National Convention approaches next week, we're speaking with New Yorker staff writer Evan Osnos about the 2024 presidential race. We're discussing the new Democratic ticket, Vice President Kamala Harris and her vice presidential running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, just weeks after President Biden dropped out of the race, and we're talking about what to expect as the race unfolds. Evan Osnos appears regularly with his New Yorker colleagues, Jane Mayer and Susan Glasser, on the podcast "The Political Scene."
You know, before we continue the conversation, I just want to give a plug for that podcast. I consume a lot of political information. And I've picked up on this podcast a few months ago. And I will say these are three people who have a lot of experience and insight, and I always learn something I didn't know what I listen to it.
OSNOS: Oh, wow, thanks. Dave, coming from you - means a lot. I'll tell Jane and Susan. I appreciate it.
DAVIES: Do that. It's called "The Political Scene". I know that you recently traveled to several of these speeches in swing states with Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. You know, you could see these speeches from anywhere on television. I'm wondering what you get by actually being there.
OSNOS: I mean, honestly, when I go, I'm not even really there to listen to the candidate that much. It's really about the crowd, and it's about trying to understand why they're there and to pick up on the body language of how they're feeling about it. That is the closest proxy that we can ever get as reporters to the voter and the mood in the country. I mean, just the simplest stuff, Dave, like, how much are people willing to schlep to get to an event.
I mean, this rally in Detroit that I attended the other day - it was hot. And interestingly, people started to faint. I mean, it was just that kind of big, crowded space, and every half an hour, somebody would say, we need a medic and somebody would come over and they'd get them water, give them some air and that person would get back up on their feet. But what was noticeable about it was people weren't leaving. I mean, there is a level of intensity of commitment, of passion that is - you can't see that from TV, and you can't see it from reading a short squib about it in the newspaper. You have to go and really feel it.
And honestly, the last time we saw that in politics was in 2016 when Donald Trump came on the scene, because if you've been watching If you've been watching his speeches on TV as a regular political analyst, you would have said, well, this guy doesn't talk like much of a president, he doesn't have a firm grip on the facts. This clearly isn't going to go anywhere. Remember; people treated it like a joke at the time.
And, of course, it wasn't because if you'd gone to those rallies, I remember going to the first one in Iowa that I ever went to. And people were lined up as far as possible, and that was a sign of something profoundly different. And I see that on the ground at these Harris-Walz rallies. It is a level of thirst, really, to be witness to it. And I think that is the hardest, most powerful ingredient in politics, and you can't fake it, you can't engineer it, and when it happens, it really has the ability to shape the course of a race.
DAVIES: You know, there's a lot of talk among media critics and certainly Republicans that Kamala Harris, you know, hasn't yet kind of run the crucible. She hasn't engaged with reporters and taken tough questions. I assume - she says she's going to do this. I assume she will. Based on her record, how do you think that'll go?
OSNOS: Yeah, I think there's no question she will do it. She said she'll have an interview by the end of the month. Some people said, well, maybe it should be sooner than that. I think that the fact is that her early tenure in the vice presidency was largely defined by an unhappy experience in an interview. There was this now-famous interview she gave with Lester Holt and, which she talked about her involvement in border policy. She tried to differentiate what was the perception that she was in charge of the border, when, in fact, she said, no, I'm looking at root causes.
In any event, it didn't work. And it cast this really long shadow. When you talk to people who worked with her in that period, they say that she essentially kind of receded into self-doubt. You know, she was afraid of coming out and hurting the administration by doing more interviews. So that contributed to this feeling that she was gradually drifting into the background, and that had a long-term effect. It's part of the reason why today, some people say, I don't know exactly who she is.
But you also see some very different indicators, Dave, particularly on the night of the debate when Joe Biden had so much trouble on that stage, Kamala Harris came on to CNN shortly afterwards and gave an interview to Anderson Cooper that was pugnacious. She was - at that case, she was still defending Joe Biden and making the case that he had done as well as he could. But more to the point, you just saw her more comfortable in the role. In some ways, that was a soft start of what eventually became this decisive turn in the feeling among Democrats that she should be the nominee.
DAVIES: So let's talk about Donald Trump a little. He loves to mock his opponents. You know, we heard him questioning Harris' racial identity in that interview with the National Association of Black journalists. And he's kept it up in other ways, you know, talking about nicknames for her. Here's a short clip of a recent speech in which he talks about Kamala Harris' name.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
DONALD TRUMP: Kamala Harris - you know, it's interesting. Nobody really knows her last name. If you ask people, do you know what her last name is? Nobody has any idea what it is. Harris. It's like Harris. I don't know. How the hell did this happen?
DAVIES: Now, Donald Trump riffing. You know, there's a narrative among a lot of analysts, and including a lot of Republicans, that he is harming his own cause by indulging his instincts to engage in this kind of stuff. Do you agree?
OSNOS: Yeah, it's amazing how undone he's been by her entry into the race. I think it's because he's tried a lot of his techniques. You know, he's tried half a dozen different nicknames for her, like Laughing Kamala, which just ends up blowing back on him because it turns out that a lot of people out there are actually really thrilled by the sight of a presidential candidate laughing and having some fun in the process. Then of course, he tried this race-baiting when he said that she had, as he said, chosen to be Black. It didn't work. As a result, you've seen him recede a bit. I mean, he was - to borrow a phrase that Tim Walz has used about Trump, in some ways, he's frozen in the face of this very different ticket. He doesn't know what to do.
And last week was the time when he should have been out there doing everything he can to try to shape or define, to use an overused word, what the Harris-Walz ticket was about. Instead, he was at Mar-a-Lago, and he gave this one press conference that was completely bizarre, full of really strange claims, and it did not, by any means, shift the focus back to his potential, if anything. It just seemed to remind a lot of these voters out there that what they are seeking above all is not a specific candidate. They are seeking to turn the page from this very difficult last period in politics. And he is - every time he appears is a reminder that this would, in fact, be a return to the Trump era.
DAVIES: There was a story I saw recently where the reporter asked one of Trump's aides, you know, what about this stuff about the nicknames he's trying out on her? Do you know what they mean? And he said, no, I don't, and he should be just talking about the price of groceries. I mean, there are issues that could work for him, right?
OSNOS: Yeah, it's true. And that's the thing that's kind of baffling is in the past, he did show this ability to figure out - he had this kind of uncanny, almost innate capacity to figure out what a room wanted, what an audience needed. And even if it was a dark thing, he would meet it there. And in this case, he just seems trapped in a version of himself that is, at this point, 8 years old. I mean, he's using a lot of the same lines that he used in 2016.
And Americans are - we're not the same country that we were. In some ways, I think we've been hardened a bit by the last eight years. People know what it means when a candidate starts to raise crazy claims about the use of artificial intelligence as Trump has done to try to undermine the possibility that she's getting huge crowds. I mean, it just almost in an epidemiological sense, Dave, we're no longer naive as a voter population. People are they've seen his techniques, and they don't have quite the same effect the second time that they did the first.
DAVIES: We're speaking with Evan Osnos. He is a staff writer at the New Yorker. We will continue our conversation in just a moment. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF KYLE EASTWOOD'S "SAMBA DE PARIS")
DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR. And as the Democratic National Convention approaches, we're speaking with New Yorker staff writer Evan Osnos about the 2024 presidential race.
You know, there's a weird stasis to this race in some ways, in that, so many Americans have hard, fixed opinions about Donald Trump. And yet, from some of the reporting, there's this volatility to what's happened. For example, Tammy Kim, who's one of the contributing writers to the New Yorker, wrote a recent article about the youth vote. And she noted that a Pew research report in July found that registered voters under 30 leaned towards the Republican Party by sometimes a double-digit margin. Now, there - young people are choosing Harris over Trump by as many as 20 points. That's pretty wild, isn't it?
OSNOS: Yeah, that's profound. I was working on a story for a long time before this switch between Biden and Harris about this sense of real malaise, particularly among young people. It came from this feeling that they lacked agency, that it was almost like politics was this hermetic world that no matter what you said, no matter how much violence was unfolding, gun violence in people's schools, that nothing seemed to matter. And the fact of this switch at the top of the party and this idea that you have somebody coming in who is - let's call it what it is. Kamala Harris listens to music that is of much greater interest to young people. She's got Beyonce playing whenever she steps out on stage. There's a way in which she just feels so much more connected to people's lives, if you're under 30, that it had this immediate electrifying effect.
I mean, just as an example, there's an uncommitted delegate in Minnesota, for instance, somebody who has said that they're not willing necessarily to endorse - they weren't necessarily willing to endorse Joe Biden because of concerns about his Israel policy. And actually, that person has now, according to something I just read this morning, has said, they're more open to endorsing Harris precisely because his granddaughters came to him and said, look, we're really excited about her and what she represents, and we want you to take a second look. I think you're seeing versions of that play out in families all over the place.
And look. I need to be clear here. This is by no means done. If we've learned anything in this race, It is that 80-some days is a tremendously long and turbulent time in this politics, and things could take more somersaults between now and the election. But that change from having young people being fundamentally disengaged to having them be engaged is perhaps the single biggest change that's happened over the course of the last few months.
DAVIES: Yeah, and its suddenness makes you wonder if it could reverse just as quickly.
OSNOS: Yeah. I think that's true. And I think what we've seen is that people are open to persuasion, and that is a source of great volatility, and it will stay that way right up until Election Day.
DAVIES: And what do the opinion polls tell us about Black support for this ticket as opposed to Joe Biden?
OSNOS: Well, it had been a source of concern for Democrats because Black support traditionally has been essential to Democratic victories, and it was weakening for Biden. We're seeing so far actually a big change. There has been a surge of Black voting support for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. I've seen it just on the ground in rallies in - I was in Atlanta. I was in Detroit recently. Both have large, very active Black voting populations, and the level of enthusiasm was not something we've seen really since Barack Obama ran for president in 2008.
I mean, I talked to a woman at the rally in Atlanta who was in her 70s, and she was there with a walking boot because she had a broken foot, and she said to me, I'm a Black woman who has waited my whole life for this, and I wasn't going to miss the chance to see Kamala Harris in person. And she had lined up since 9 o' clock in the morning on this broken foot in order to get in that room and see her for herself.
DAVIES: Wow. You know what I wanted to ask a question about - how do you cover a modern campaign? I'm just - how do you figure out what to focus on?
OSNOS: (Laughter) I think the thing that I'm always trying to look for, and this is particularly true about how the New Yorker tries to write about politics is we're trying to figure out what is the larger meaning of this race, of this moment. It's not just about a candidate. It's about what is this country facing as a period in time. I mean, are we facing a threshold in terms of racial politics, gender politics, class politics? Is it actually about geography? Is it about people moving into separate parts of the country and living almost non-intersecting lives? Is it actually about generations?
And I think that's the thing that is kind of thrilling at a moment when so much of politics can feel kind of trapped in this spin cycle of repetitive language and rhetoric - that you do see somebody come into the scene. We thought we understood who Kamala Harris was. But actually, we didn't. And this is a moment of humility for the political writers out in the world. A lot of the stuff that people said about Kamala Harris two years ago doesn't really hold true anymore and how the public looks at her. And that's partly a measure of her. It's partly a measure of the moment. But it sort of reminds you that you have absolutely no choice but to go out there, stand in line, talk to people and hear about what it is that they're feeling and doing and sacrificing and seeking if you're going to try to understand what politics is really about.
DAVIES: You know, when you laid out that question a moment ago about - what is this moment in America? Is it a racial reckoning? Is it a class battle? Is it a set of geographic shifts? It's too much to ask this, but do you have an answer for us?
OSNOS: Well, I guess the thing that really rises to the surface for me now is the feeling of how much generational change is this central nerve running through so much of our lives. I mean, it was at the core of why Joe Biden ultimately had to step out of this race - this extraordinary seismic event in politics. I think it is a moment where we have more Americans who are millennial and Gen Z than we have boomers and above. And it is a shift. We're standing at a moment of change. And this doesn't come around all that often - every 30 years or every 60 years. And we're just beginning to come to terms with what that means about the things that get attention.
And I do find that no matter where you are in this country, that is something that comes up over and over - this feeling that there are a lot of young people who have started to turn away from the political class, the political establishment, even the notion that the popular will is going to be expressed in policies and government. You know, they heard over and over again - there'd be a terrible school shooting. And what they would hear from the people they had put into office, the elected officials in this country, was, we send our thoughts and prayers. And what they didn't get was any meaningful change.
And I think that issue - the reason why I return to that issue is that, you know, gun violence, school shootings is the most acute, brutal demonstration of the failure of policy to address an absolute issue of life and death. And to see the possibility that it might actually become unfrozen as an issue - that is then a way that it can begin to restore people's confidence in the reasons to participate in joining the civic infrastructure of this country, of joining in efforts larger than ourselves and believing that it's worth doing and possible to make a change.
DAVIES: And you think Kamala Harris is tapping into that issue on gun...
OSNOS: I don't want to overstate it, but I do believe that she is, at this point, riding an untapped reservoir of energy of people out there who do want to be a part of something bigger than themselves and their daily lives. You hear it from people out there. They're looking for a sense of belonging. But the idea of being part of something bigger and inspiring has been pretty absent from politics.
Curiously enough, one of the few places that we've seen it - and a lot of people don't like what form it takes, but it was the Trump phenomenon. That did give people in those early years a feeling who - that they'd been left behind by politics. But here was this person who was speaking for them. That is an incredibly powerful force. And you're now seeing, actually, that people on the Democratic side are feeling inspired and swept up in something for the first time in a long time.
DAVIES: Well, Evan Osnos, thanks so much for speaking with us again.
OSNOS: You're welcome, Dave. Thanks for having me.
DAVIES: Evan Osnos is the staff writer at The New Yorker. He appears regularly with New Yorker colleagues Jane Mayer and Susan Glasser on the podcast "The Political Scene." Coming up, TV critic David Bianculli reviews "Bad Monkey," the new mystery series starring Vince Vaughn. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF MICHAEL BISIO QUARTET AND RON SODERSTROM'S "A.M.") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
