Nicole Wallace (3:52)

We are back on this election day with Michelle Basil and Tim Miller. Tim Miller, I didn't mean to leave you out of the first conversation. California was a place you called home for a long time. What are you hearing and what are you thinking about Prop 50?

Tim Miller (4:08)

It's all good, Nicole. The music gives me clammy after the last couple election nights, so I needed a little bit to get ready to be on. Look, I'm hearing of what Jacob was reporting and seeing. I'm like you. I love hearing from the voters, my friends out there in California. I think it looks quite good for Proposition 50. I think that, you know, what you led with the beginning of the show is super important that Donald Trump is. We still have to go through this now. I think it's, it's important that we're clear eyed just about how shaky our situation is that the pro democracy movement, the Democratic Party, have to win by big numbers in order to avoid having elections be challenged right now in this country. Right. Like, I think that if Prop 50 wins are very narrow margins, you can already see the playbook that Donald Trump is going through. It's the same playbook after he lost the 2020 election, probably, if they, if it wins by a big margin, you know, those kind of pretend like it didn't happen, and he'll just complain about it from time to time. That's not really a good place to be when, when you feel like elections are only going to count for sure if they're blowouts because the President of the United States wants to undermine them. So I think California is super important. And I guess the other thing, I'd say the one. Well, I guess there have been two. Two big races, but one of the two big states we haven't got to yet is in Virginia. Yeah, I just wanted to tie those elections. What's happening in California as well, because if Abigail Spamberger wins the governor's race there, which, which it looks like she's likely to the Democrat, and if the Democrats hold on to the House of Delegates there, then Virginia will potentially have an opportunity. And they've signaled that they will follow California's lead when it comes to the redistricting fight. And that's a state where Democrats could pick up another three seats, maybe. So conceivably, the result of Today, if Prop 50 gets through and if those results happen in Virginia is, you know, somewhere in the neighborhood of eight seats in the House of Representatives that the Democrats could pick up to offset the gerrymandering that Republicans are doing in Texas, Missouri, Indiana and elsewhere.

Nicole Wallace (6:03)

Yeah, it's super important. And thank you for one for bringing Virginia back into the conversation and tying all those together. I mean, the other sort of net that catches all these stories is the location of where Donald Trump, who's made no secret, I mean, all the reporting on Trump's relationship with DOJ suggests that in instances where Trump decides Blanche and Bondi aren't part of the chain of command. I mean, Halligan seems to be reporting directly to Donald Trump on some of the grand jury presentations she's made in Tish James and Jim Comey. So this is what doj, which Trump has made no secret in describing as an organization that he leads when he chooses to. So this is where DOJ has sent election monitors. Passaic County, New Jersey, where Alicia just was, Kern County, California, Riverside County, California, Fresno County, California, Orange County, California and Los Angeles County, California. Does that sound like a strategic list to you or just big vote buckets?

Tim Miller (7:09)

It seems like a big vote buckets with Hispanic voters to me. And look, I think that intimidation is certainly something that is on their mind. I think a lot of times their efforts at voter suppression end up backfiring because it draws attention and people don't want to be bullied by the government and people want to kind of speak out for their side and have their voice be heard. But yeah, look, if you're going to send election monitors, you're going to send federal officials to voting locations in places that have big Hispanic populations, or maybe they're mixed families where, you know, somebody in the family is a legal resident and someone is undocumented, that might deter them from going to vote. And I certainly think that is one of the things at least that's on their mind.

Nicole Wallace (7:55)

Well, my first question went to what will they be wearing? Because the folks that are walking the streets don't look like ICE agents used to look. And one of the reasons is we learned that they're mostly CBP agents or largely CBP agents now, but they're also dressed like, like they could be in Fallujah. I mean, they're dressed in fatigues in many instances and they're wearing things strapped to their bodies that in past days they could, I mean, the look is meant to do what you just said, intimidate.

Tim Miller (8:32)

Of course. And this is a, you know, kind of tale as old as time, you know, going back to kind of police strategies and inner city neighborhoods and things of that nature. So this is not a first for that, but the, the, for it to be a federal government directed operation, for Donald Trump to care about it personally, for him to be directing, as you mentioned, what's happening at doj, for him to be posting, you know, about how he's hearing about, you know, election theft or whatever, trying to raise the, raise suspicions about the election. And then like you mentioned, I, you know, we'll have to kind of see exactly what things look like at these various voting locations. But the CBP and the ICE agents, you know, they don't look like people that are there just to do their job and keep the peace and go after violent criminals. They look like they're there to intimidate and this is part of their plan. And like, they also will tell you that this isn't even us, you know, guessing that. I mean, the administration just posted, I think it was the New York magazine story. It was a magazine story, you know, about all of the kind of notch with pictures of some of the extreme activities that ICE and CBB have been undertaking. They blew up the pictures of the magazine and posted it outside the detention center in New York City. Today where they're also going to be elections. So they're not subtle about what they're trying to do.

Nicole Wallace (9:48)

Let me ask you, Tim, about Gavin Newsom. His public life has been, I just described it as sort of, you know, a lot of big swings. And I think a lot of people in the Democratic coalition haven't loved every move he's made. But he has been out there perhaps most aggressively trying to find his place in this post 2024electoral defeat, this new time of Trump. He's found his voice maybe on the streets of LA when not just ICE and cbp, but also military and some active duty military showed up in Los Angeles. And between the time that he announced and I was on the air when he went to the Prop 50 announcement and there were federal agents outside of his event, I mean, he's living the story that we're all trying to cover and tell. What are your thoughts about him right now?

Tim Miller (10:41)

Yeah, yeah. Look, I haven't enjoyed, I haven't agreed with every move that he's made either when it comes to the governing of California. But I think that where he's been strong throughout his whole career is as a fighter. Right. I go back to, you know, I've always had a little bit of a soft spot for him to go back to the gay marriage fight. Back when he was mayor of San Francisco, he was one of the first people at the tip of the spear fighting for gay marriage. Back when it wasn't quite popular, it wasn't nearly as popular. It is now nationally, of course. And then you think about the fight against Ron DeSantis kind of making the case for Democratic governance over Republican governance. And then in that clip you played at the beginning of the hour, him talking here about how in this moment, I think the Republicans in Texas and nationally made the bet that Democrats would do what Democrats do and. Right. Like gather a commission together and think about what they do and you know, we'll revisit in 2028 and instead just kind of grabbing the mantle of this fight and saying, no, we're going to take you on head on right now. We're going to play hardball. I think in those moments of the big fights has been where he's been strongest, you know, as opposed to maybe some of the governing coalition management elements of the job.

Nicole Wallace (11:49)

Like Tim, I get a little clammy when I hear that music, but we will be hearing that music all night long. Welcome back to our election night coverage with Tim, Michelle and Basil. Tim, let me give you one more and then I'm going to open it back up to the panel. What questions do you have tonight that you'll have some answers to in the morning?

Tim Miller (12:12)

I'm interested in where Alicia is right now. I was really interested to hear more for her tonight. I think the Hispanic vote question will tell us a little bit about. I think that will be a group that will be able to actually see whether there's been a change in the first 10 months and in how people vote. Donald Trump's over performance with Hispanics was a big reason why he succeeded. We don't talk about that as much as we do some of the other demographic groups that he overperformed with in 2024. And so I think that will be interesting to see for sure. And you know, like I said the first one, I'm a political dork. So I'm going to be looking at those. Virginia and New Jersey for that matter. State legislative races. Let's see what's happening in the Virginia House of Delegates. Are they going to get a big enough lead to do a redistricting next year? Are Democrats going to do better in places that they haven't done as well, exurban parts of the state? I think Democrats will obviously do well in Northern Virginia, where government workers are rightfully enraged about Doge and what's happened in this administration. But how do they do in the rest of the state, I think will be interesting as well.

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