podcast
The Assignment with Audie Cornish
Every Thursday on The Assignment, host Audie Cornish explores the animating forces of this extraordinary American political moment. It’s not about the horse race, it’s about the larger cultural ideas driving the conversation: the role of online influencers on the electorate, the intersection of pop culture and politics, and discussions with primary voices and thinkers who are shaping the political conversation.
The Pennsylvania Voters Who May Decide the Race
The Assignment with Audie Cornish
Nov 4, 2024
With just hours before election day, we’re returning to a handful of people who represent a crucial voter segment: unhappy Pennsylvania Republicans. John King interviews three people who voted for Nikki Haley in the state’s primary back in the spring — long after she’d dropped out. How they and others like them fill out their ballots this week may decide the next president of the United States.
Episode Transcript
John King
00:00:00
This is it. We're releasing this the day before Election Day. My team and I are out on the road in this homestretch, hitting five swing states in five days.
Allie Malloy
00:00:09
You want to. Put your laptop like there. And then we can —
John King
00:00:13
I'm recording this from a hotel room in Tucson.
Allie Malloy
00:00:18
Here. Take one of my $10 waters.
John King
00:00:19
'But with this episode, we're bringing you back full circle. We started this podcast series in Pennsylvania back in the early summer. It was, of course, a very different race back then, but the election could still come down to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and its 19 electoral votes. The biggest prize of the seven swing states. We're going to hear from three voters here, and they have a lot in common. They're white. They're all older, Gen-X or boomers. They all live in the suburban or ex-urban counties right around Philadelphia, the all important counties that will decide who wins Pennsylvania and perhaps decide who wins the White House. And they're all Republicans. All of them voted for Nikki Haley in the Pennsylvania primary long after she was gone from the race. And that makes them the voters that both candidates would love to win over.
Michael Pesce
00:01:14
The scary part is, you know, I'm not voting for a candidate. I'm voting against a candidate.
Joan London
00:01:21
Sometimes you have to say American first, conservative second, Republican third.
Cynthia Sabatini
00:01:26
It won't be until Election Day that I bring my mail in ballot to the courthouse.
John King
00:01:35
Where these three have come down and how they're feeling about the outcome of the race offers us a remarkable 11th hour window on what is going down as the strangest, most complicated, hard to call presidential race of the ten I have covered. I'm John King, and this is All Over the Map.
John King
00:01:56
Where are we? Tell me about this place.
Michael Pesce
00:01:58
So we are on Pennsylvania State game land.
John King
00:02:01
We're starting with Michael Pesce. He works in a meat processing plant in Bucks County.
Michael Pesce
00:02:05
As you can probably hear, there's a rifle range in that gun range down below us.
John King
00:02:09
If you've been with us since the beginning of this series, you'll remember Michael. He's the first voter you heard from. And his mind was made up a long time ago. He knew from the beginning, even though he's a Republican, not only would he never cast a ballot for Donald Trump, he planned to vote Democratic this time around. And that didn't change when the Democratic ticket did.
John King
00:02:30
We're at the end. What's your sense of what's happening here? The vice president trying to reach out to more people like you who are Republican by day but don't like Trump? Do you think she's having any luck?
Michael Pesce
00:02:43
I don't. I think that the people that are going to see her and the people are going to see Trump are the people who are already voting for those two. I don't think it's swinging things one way or the other. I think it's going to be really close. I just don't understand how anyone can still be considering Trump after everything he said in the last couple of weeks. Yet it doesn't move the needle one way or the other. If you're voting for Trump, you're voting for Trump.
John King
00:03:07
In terms of your feelings, having been here through the 2016 experience where, you know, Trump didn't win the suburbs, but he did better than he did against Biden. Does this feel more like 2016 or more like 2020 or just completely different?
Michael Pesce
00:03:20
I feel that it's more like 2020 where people have like, we know what we're going to get with him. And most people say we know what we're getting with her, but we really don't. She's clearly a different person. But I think the people who are saying, you know, this is what Trump is, this is what we're going to get. You know, they've already made the decision. They're like, I am. You're just there's no way we're going to vote for him.
John King
00:03:43
You're going to vote for her. But do you know what you're getting?
Michael Pesce
00:03:46
No I don't. And that's the scary part, is, you know, I'm not voting for a candidate. I'm not voting for policy. I'm voting against a candidate and policies and not even all the policies, just, you know, the unstableness some of the things he says are truly scary.
John King
00:04:04
You want your party back. What do you see as the likelihood of getting it back?
Michael Pesce
00:04:08
So if Trump loses, then I think that the Republicans will start coming back to what they were because they don't have that radical right side. They don't have the the craziness and the instability. I think you have people at the top of the Republican Party who are going to come back and say, okay, we saw what, we saw this populist kind of government. It didn't work for us. We lost in 2022. Now we lost in 2024. We need to go back to what we were doing because we were at least winning then.
John King
00:04:40
But if he loses, do you expect him to concede that he lost?
Michael Pesce
00:04:46
No, I that's just not going to happen. He's never going to concede that he loses anything. You know, the last election, he lost by 7 million votes and he's like, no, I didn't. So this one, I think, is going to be a lot closer than that. And if he loses, I don't see how he says, yeah, I lost this one.
John King
00:05:06
So and then what happens if she wins and you voted for her? Is it okay? I'm going to give her a chance and I'm a Harris supporter? Or is it, I did something that was very important to me on principle, and now I'm going to get about the business of trying to convince the Republican Party to get its act together?
Michael Pesce
00:05:19
See, I'm not so much us versus them. I look at it, we need to do what's best for America and what's best for us worldwide. So if she's going to support Ukraine, I'm all in. If she's not going to support Israel, I'm not all in. You know what I mean? It's, for me, it's what's best for the country. I really don't care who's in charge. It's whatever is going to move the country forward and keep us as the number one country in the world. That's what I support.
John King
00:05:49
What do you think happens to you, if anything, if he wins?
Michael Pesce
00:05:54
So it's funny, someone asked me that last week, you know, because of being on here and how I feel about things. And, you know, people are like, why aren't you worried? And I'm like, well, you know, in the back of your mind, you worry about those things. I think the biggest thing will, you know, people will be like, I told you so, I told you so. And I can live with that. My hope is, is that, you know, he loses and he just fades into the annals of history and we move on and we get back to doing what Americans are supposed to be doing.
John King
00:06:27
But you don't feel threatened in any way?
Michael Pesce
00:06:29
No, not now. That could change. You know, come see me at the end of January if he wins and we'll see how things are are looking then.
John King
00:06:42
Well, it's nice to see you again.
Joan London
00:06:43
Good to see you, John.
Joan London
00:06:44
All right, everybody good?
John King
00:06:45
Joan London is a lawyer from the Philly suburbs. She lives in Berks County now. She's a proud Reagan Republican, fiscally conservative, believes in protecting American interests overseas like Michael. She knew from the beginning she could not vote for Trump. But until a few weeks ago, she wasn't planning to vote for Harris.
John King
00:07:05
After the debate, you made a pretty big decision. Tell me why.
Joan London
00:07:10
What happened was this. I was at the point where I had even decided for whom I was going to protest vote. It was going to be a fellow Pennsylvanian Senator Toomey. I figured that would be a perfect protest vote. But then I was watching the debate and there was the usual Trump hyperbole and millions and millions and billions and billions, short on specifics. And then, of course, there was him again spreading the rumor about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio. But that wasn't the last straw. It was close. But the last straw was where he said that we have to have a negotiated settlement in the Ukraine because President Putin has nuclear weapons and we could have World War III if we don't. And for someone who claims to be a conservative, to say that was, in my opinion, outrageous. It's appeasement. It's dangerous. If we're not required to put up with individuals walking into our country illegally, and I don't believe that we are required to tolerate people walking into our country illegally, and he was the first to say that, he wanted to build a wall and he wants to deport everybody who here illegally. Then why is it that the Ukraine should have to tolerate an invasion of its sovereignty? Because it's the same premise, and you shouldn't have to negotiate the end to that. Certainly the Republican Party that I that I grew up with believed that you don't tolerate communist dictators and in this case, the former head of the KGB, walking into a sovereign country. You you do what you have to do to fight that. So that that was really the moment. And I remember the next morning realizing that I had absolutely changed my mind. And even though I have serious policy differences with Vice President Harris, I decided that this time it wasn't so much about policy in this. In this instance, it was about policy, but also about about character in general.
John King
00:09:26
So help me. What was your decision that I, I can't risk a protest vote that might help Trump, I need to actually vote against him? I can't just be on the sideline? What was the math calculation?
Joan London
00:09:38
The math calculation was exactly that. I, I needed to vote against allowing him to become president again. That way, if it does happen, and it could, because it's a dead heat in almost all of the swing states. But I don't want it on on my conscience that, that I contributed in some way to that. I would rather argue against bad policies and temper those for four years. Let the Republican Party lose. Let them rebuild. They will rebuild as a as a traditional conservative party as opposed to a populist party of tariffs. Sometimes you have to say American first, conservative, second, Republican third.
John King
00:10:26
What is your personal math? You were here in 2016, obviously, and in 2020, Trump narrowly wins in 2016. Biden wins narrowly a little bit more narrowly in 2020. Just what is your gut tell you about this, about how close it is and if you had to pick, you know, as we head into the final stretch, do you see someone with an advantage or do you just see a photo finish and who knows?
Joan London
00:10:48
I see the photo finish and I don't see the finish on election night or even in the week of Election Day. I see the finish probably in court at some point in December, like in 2000. I think the country is that polarized, that it is that close and maybe it's just the lawyer and me, but I have the feeling that that it in that it ends in court. And I don't know which way that that it ends. I just hope that whichever judges hear it are fair minded. But but credibility is everything with the courts. And I hope that judges will handle this in a fair minded way.
John King
00:11:26
Let me close by asking you about your own plans in the final stretch here. You're going to vote for a candidate with whom you have pretty significant differences because of a question of principle. Does that mean you try to convince any friends to do that, too? Or is it just I made my decision, I'm at peace with it and that's it.
Joan London
00:11:45
I, I have made my decision and I'm at peace with it. This is not an election where I'm judging anyone else. I have friends who are voting for Trump. I have friends who are voting for Harris. I have friends who are leaving the top of the ticket blank, voting third party, protest voting. These are very difficult choices. I don't judge anybody. I just tell people what what I'm going to do and why. Because we have someone who is running, who is policy wise on most things. I agree. I agree with more. But in terms of character and in terms of that one foreign policy stance in particular on the Ukraine and also on the issue of tariffs and generally on pitting people against each other, having incited a riot once and maybe would do it again, that's a that's a huge concern. So that's not a person for whom I would vote, but I'm not going to overly try to influence others. Just lead by example.
John King
00:12:58
We're getting to the end here. Have you made up your mind?
Cynthia Sabatini
00:13:01
No.
John King
00:13:02
Cynthia Sabatini lives in Media, Pennsylvania. That's Delaware County. She does consulting work in the pharmaceutical industry.
John King
00:13:09
Are you leaning one way or the other?
Cynthia Sabatini
00:13:11
Well, let me put it to you this way, that I am disenchanted with the Democratic Party. And it's causing me to view Harris in a slightly different light. And the reason I'm disenchanted with the Democratic Party has to do with the local Democratic Party that runs the township, runs the school board and runs the county. They have no sense of fiscal responsibility to the taxpayers. They're just about instituting new taxes to provide more and more services, not all of which are necessary.
John King
00:14:00
And so you're mad about a local issue. And is she going to pay the price for that?
Cynthia Sabatini
00:14:06
She may. She may, because the way I view the Democratic Party is they are the party of big government that likes to spend money. And as the Democratic Party has become more of the party of the college educated and affluent, they take full advantage of that because that group has the greater financial bandwidth. That's why they've lost the working class party, because they're struggling under the economic reign of terror of the Democrats.
John King
00:14:50
If you can't vote for her, does that mean you vote for Trump?
Cynthia Sabatini
00:14:55
No. Trump is a nonstarter for me. So he's not a consideration, because I don't view the tax plan that he put into effect when he was president to be sound either.
John King
00:15:13
Is that it about him? Is it because you didn't like his economic plan? Or do you have other reservations that you think. I don't I don't want a return of the Trump presidency, because.
Cynthia Sabatini
00:15:24
What I don't think Trump is necessarily dignified to be president. He says outrageous things and on a world stage, do we want this individual representing us? And also January 6th to me was the breaking point, quite honestly. Now, I didn't vote for him in 2016. I didn't vote for him in 2020. So I was never predisposed to vote for him. Even though I am a registered Republican and feel a kinship with the Republican Party and their traditional economic stances on January 6th, 2021, that just put the nail in his coffin for me. If I had, if I would ever entertain voting for.
John King
00:16:22
So if Nikki Haley were the Republican nominee, this would be a no brainer for you.
Cynthia Sabatini
00:16:26
I would likely vote for her. Absolutely. In fact, she's an individual under consideration for me to write in.
John King
00:16:35
To write in.
Cynthia Sabatini
00:16:35
To write in. But I haven't made up my mind.
John King
00:16:38
So let's let's walk through that. What could the vice president do to convince you she's not the local Democrats are mad at? Is there anything she could do?
Cynthia Sabatini
00:16:49
Oh sure. Sure. She never answered, has never answered directly, how she's going to pay for the $25,000 subsidy for first time home owners, the $50,000 deduction for small business owners, the $6,000 expansion of the child tax credit. Please tell us. All she says is I'm not going to tax those who are making $400,000 per year. Are you talking about couples or you talking about individuals at that level? Are you talking about earned income? I'm a numbers person and I want to know the specifics. We have a looming federal deficit. At some point, the piper will have to be paid. So tell me. Show me the calculations. Everything I've read is that she's poised under her plans to increase the deficit by $3.2 trillion.
John King
00:18:01
Those those studies also say that Trump's plan would increase it even.
Cynthia Sabatini
00:18:05
Even more, so. But Trump's not a consideration for me.
John King
00:18:10
So she needs to connect some dots that in your view, she has just not connected.
Cynthia Sabatini
00:18:13
Yeah.
John King
00:18:13
SHe hasn't done the math right for you.
Cynthia Sabatini
00:18:15
I think to me, this is a very sensitive issue. It's sensitive at the local level. It's sensitive at the national level. And I now am highly more sensitized about this because what's going on in my local township where I just attended a meeting two nights ago about the imposition of a new tax, which will cost me dearly.
John King
00:18:44
How do you run the math in your head in the sense that you didn't vote for him in 2016 or 2020? He won here in 2016 and he went on to be president. He lost her in 2020 and Joe Biden became president. It's closer this time. If you believe the data.
Cynthia Sabatini
00:18:59
I know it is.
John King
00:19:00
And so who do you not want more, in the sense that if you write in somebody, you could be helping Trump?
Cynthia Sabatini
00:19:09
Well, you know, John, I have Democratic friends who've posed that question to me. And they also felt that I helped Trump win here in 2016 by writing in Senator Susan Collins. I really don't care what they personally think about that. To me, I don't want to be forced into making a decision between one of the two. And I think it speaks to the fact that I don't like the two party system in the country of 340 million people. We're reduced to this. I would much prefer a parliamentary system.
John King
00:19:52
You can make that case, that or other political reforms. But there's an election days away from now. That's not going to happen.
Cynthia Sabatini
00:19:57
I know. I know. And I have to deal with the reality. I know that. And that's why I'm still on the fence.
John King
00:20:05
Right. So what do you do? What do you do in the in the few days you have left? Is it just waiting to see if she answers? Your question? So it's really on her, because you're not going to vote for him?
Cynthia Sabatini
00:20:15
No, I'm not voting for Trump. I am praying for divine intervention. I may go back to church. No. Okay. Let me not be flip.
John King
00:20:27
No, no, no. It's okay. Everyone makes their decisions their own way. But is it a, for you, it's, it's math. You want to see her spreadsheet. You know, some people say I want to know who she is, I don't know, You know, I want to be able to close my eyes and say she's a president.
Cynthia Sabatini
00:20:39
I don't know who she is. I don't know who she is, really. I really don't, because she had different positions than she does now. But she continues to say there's still within your value system. So connect the dots for me, Vice President Harris, how does your value system affect your change in policies. I believe she's a person of character. I have no qualms about that. I really do. I think she's an upstanding individual. It's just that I really don't know what to expect from her if she is indeed elected. I don't. I don't know what her positions will be. Is she merely running towards the middle because she wants to win the swing states? I really don't know who she is. I certainly didn't get an idea of who she was as vice president. Now, that may be unfair because vice presidents are second bananas to the president. But in this three month period of time. I just don't have assurances of who she is and whether she'll revert to earlier beliefs. Will she be tough on the border? And she never answers anything directly.
John King
00:22:12
In the end, I just make sure I have this right. And in the end, she can win your vote. But if she doesn't, you won't give it to her just because you don't want Trump?
Cynthia Sabatini
00:22:23
I don't know. Because there could be something else that bubbles to the surface, something that is egregious, something that is world shaking that makes me think, you know, I better rethink this. I better vote for her. I will tell you now, I have decided. It won't be until Election Day that I bring my mail in ballot to the courthouse and drop it in the drop off box at the courthouse in media.
John King
00:22:59
So you're going to sit here on the morning of Election Day and fill that out?
Cynthia Sabatini
00:23:04
Yep.
John King
00:23:04
Or maybe the night before. But you think it'll be —
Cynthia Sabatini
00:23:06
Maybe the night before.
John King
00:23:08
You think it'll go right to the end?
Cynthia Sabatini
00:23:09
I do. I do. That's how I'm inclined.
John King
00:23:12
So then help me with this one. Finish the sentence. Madam Vice President, if you want my vote here in the very important Philadelphia suburbs, you need to do —
Cynthia Sabatini
00:23:22
You need to answer questions on point. You need to provide more details about your economic plan. You need to provide more details about your vision also for this country. Now, she's addressed that somewhat. But I'm you know, I'm a bottom line person, I want details. I think Trump's going to win. The lion's share of my friends and family are Democrats. They think at the 11th hour people will have such reservations about Trump. That it will cause them to vote for Harris. I don't see it that way.
Allie Malloy
00:24:18
We're on tour this week. That's what I've been calling it.
John King
00:24:21
Yeah. Taylor's opening for us.
Allie Malloy
00:24:24
And we've lost the plot.
John King
00:24:26
That's what happens when you're on the road for 15 months. Allie from Allentown, that's Allie Malloy, currently Allie in Tucson, with me in this temporary studio, courtesy of Marriott. And Allie's been my sidekick for months now through the jet lag, through state after state after state. All the rest of it. So what do you think when you listen to these three?
Allie Malloy
00:24:47
You know, obviously, a lot about what we do is anecdotal. And these voters, they don't represent Pennsylvania as a whole, obviously, but they do represent these unsatisfied voters who whether or not they are for Trump or for Harris or for neither. It, it speaks to the frustration and just the lack of choices and people making their choices based on being against something.
John King
00:25:13
They are interesting and they're critical in the short term. And they're also part of a fascinating question that's going to live with us beyond this election, which is what happens to the Republican Party? If Trump loses, that debate starts right away. If Trump wins, that debate, you know, it's more of a mumble among those who don't like Trump, but he'll be dominant for a while. So we'll be talking to these voters for years to see what happens. But right now, they matter because 155,000 people voted for Nikki Haley long after she was out of the race. That tells you something. They do not want to vote for Donald Trump. In fact, they want to vote against him. Joe Biden won Pennsylvania by 80,000 votes. The math is pretty simple. You have 155,000 people in a state that was last decided by 80,000 votes and decided by half that when Trump won it in 2016. For Harris, the challengers win them over.
Allie Malloy
00:26:01
John, a lot of people ask us how we find these voters. We have a great team who spend hours trying to find them. And in recent weeks, it's gotten a little bit harder. A lot of people, particularly moderates, don't see the upside in it. What do you think that's about?
John King
00:26:19
It's about polarization. It's about safety. I mean that in a life or death way. I mean, the idea that grief during your life way. We have had some people who have said that being part of the series has caused them grief. Have had friends get in their face. Have had friends say, how can you possibly think that way. If they own a business, there's been online postings saying boycott them. And you have a lot of these people who say, You know what? You're at the point now where you're going to ask me you're going to vote for. And if I tell you, I'm going to take grief for it. No, thank you. And I respect it. I respect it. But it makes me all the more grateful for those who have continued to stay in this conversation.
Allie Malloy
00:27:02
So we've been to most of the battlegrounds in the last few weeks, but in the last two weeks or so, and our visit to Pennsylvania exemplified this, there does kind of seem to be this pessimism on both sides of the aisle about the election. And even if you think that your candidate is going to win or you're not sure. It just there's a darkness almost around the country on both sides. Or an unsuredness.
John King
00:27:29
Yeah, you're right. I would call it a sense of apprehension, a lot of anxiety. This is supposed to be a celebration, even if your candidate loses. This is what makes America unique. We have a presidential election every four years. We have a peaceful transfer of power. The winner gets a parade down Pennsylvania Avenue and you give that person a brief honeymoon. And then, yeah, if you if your guy or gal didn't win, then you start organizing for the next one. That's the way it's supposed to work. But everybody is scarred in different ways by what happened four years ago. Everybody is scarred by what they saw January 6th, by the fact that the campaign really never ended. It's a whole new world and it leaves people a mix of anxious and apprehensive and doubtful and pessimistic and cynical about something that is supposed to be our most glorious celebration, win, lose or draw. And that's sad. That's sad, but it is very real.
Allie Malloy
00:28:23
So, John, what do you think's going to happen this week?
John King
00:28:25
Well, you know, I don't know the answer to that question. The most fascinating thing to me is that that now is part of our job to. It's part of our job, too. I mean, I used to, you know, even back in my AP days before I came to CNN and television, election night was the big night. You wrote the analysis about how and why it happened. The whole time you're thinking next week, I'm on vacation, right? And now, you know, you have people asking, Is there going to be a civil war? And they're not joking. That to me, I was going to say, it's a parallel universe, but it's not. It's our universe. I mean, people are having these questions and conversations about what should we be thinking about? It's on voters minds all across the country, Democrats, Republicans, independents. And guess what? It has to be part of our planning and what we do for a living, which is a, a whole new world.
Allie Malloy
00:29:16
I can't let myself think about it if I'm talking about what Allie, the non journalist, is thinking. Allie, the journalist is just preparing and ready for whatever comes and also has her vacation plans on hold. I'm, I'm worried. But I do think hearing from our voters does give me some hope because we hear from a lot of people and no one wants the unrest. I believe in the best of America still. And that might be, maybe even naive. But I've seen it this past year on the road, so I still hold out hope. But am I preparing for the other options? Yes.
John King
00:30:05
This podcast version of All Over the Map is a CNN audio production. Our show producers are Grace Walker, Jesse Remedios and Allie Malloy. Our editor is Graelyn Brashear and our senior producers are Dan Bloom and Haley Thomas. Dan Dzula is our technical director, and Steve Lickteig is executive producer of CNN Audio. Support from Nicky Robertson, Jacqueline Kalil, Alex Manasari, Robert Mathers, John Dianora, Leni Steinhardt, Jamus Andrest, Nicole Pesaru and Lisa Namarow. Special thanks to Wendi Brundage and Katie Hinman. I'm John King. Thanks for listening.
