FEBRUARY 28, 2019

NEWS AND VIEWS

CNN DID A BAD, BAD THING, AND WHY? BUT IS THIS TRUE, OR JUST ANOTHER FAUX NEWS FICTION? TYT BACKS IT UP, THOUGH, AND FOX GOT IT FROM PASTE MAGAZINE, KNOWN MORE FOR NEWS OF MUSIC AND THE ARTS. SOMEBODY WAS EITHER PRESENTED THAT STORY WHOLE OR TOOK HOURS TO DISSECT THE NAMES FROM A LIST OF ATTENDEES. THIS IS A DAMAGING WAY TO START A NEW MARRIAGE, DNC.

I FIRST SAW THIS STORY LAST NIGHT WHEN I WAS TRYING TO GET TO BED, SO I DIDN’T INVESTIGATE IT THEN. CNN WAS ALWAYS TRUSTWORTHY, I THOUGHT, BUT THEY APPARENTLY WILL TAKE AN EXTRA BUCK ALSO. THE HERO, FOX NEWS, A TRUE “GOOD SAMARITAN,” COUNTERS CNN IN ECHOING THE PASTE MAGAZINE STORY. SHOULD WE HAVE THE FBI LOOK DEEPLY THIS AND SEE WHAT THEY FIND? HOW DID PASTE GET THIS?

I THINK THIS HAS BEEN A TRUE EXERCISE OF WHAT THE TERM “FREE PRESS” MEANS. THANK YOU, FOX, TYT AND PASTE MAGAZINE! CENTER FOLD DEMS, YOU AREN’T WINNING FRIENDS THIS WAY, AND I THINK YOU WILL BE NEEDING FRIENDS LATER. THE AMERICAN PEOPLE JUST DON’T LIKE THIS KIND OF THING, AND I FOR ONE, AM TIRED OF BEING HERDED AROUND LIKE A SHEEP. YOUR LESSON FOR THE DAY IS TO LISTEN WITH CLOSE ATTENTION TO THE GREAT ARETHA FRANKLIN’S SONG “R E S P E C T!” SEE ALSO THE PASTE MAGAZINE STORY AFTER THIS.

https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/cnn-accused-of-failing-to-disclose-that-bernie-sanders-town-hall-was-loaded-with-democratic-operatives
CNN accused of stacking audience vs. Bernie Sanders in town hall event
Brian Flood By Brian Flood, Joseph A. Wulfsohn | Fox News
MEDIA
FEBRUARY 27, 2019 Published 21 hours ago Last Update 19 hours ago

CNN admitted fault on Wednesday after being accused of failing to disclose Democratic Party ties of several attendees who were able to ask 2020 presidential hopeful Sen. Bernie Sanders questions during the network’s town hall on Monday.

“Though we said at the beginning of the Town Hall that the audience was made up of Democrats and Independents, we should have more fully identified any political affiliations,” a CNN spokesperson told Fox News.

A Message from troy.edu

The CNN event followed other recent town halls featuring Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif; Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn; and potential independent candidate, former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz. But unlike those town halls, many participants who posed policy questions to Sanders appear to have political ties, which was first reported by Paste Magazine.* see below -- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paste_(magazine)

FOX NEWS DOMINATES MSNBC, CNN ACROSS THE BOARD DURING FEBRUARY

Paste writer Jacob Weindling questioned whether CNN stacked the audience against the Democratic Socialist by not disclosing the background of some of the participants.

Paste Magazine pointed out that at least four attendees have deep roots in the Democratic Party and the D.C. lobby, and alleged the way CNN described the participants either downplayed their background or did not disclose such ties at all.

Tara Ebersole, who asked about Sanders’ plan for universal health care, was introduced by CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer as a “former biology professor,” but her reported LinkedIn page claims her current job is chair of the Baltimore County Democratic Party.

LEFTIES TURN ON ANTI-TRUMP CNN AFTER NETWORK HIRES EX-JEFF SESSIONS SPOKESWOMAN SARAH ISGUR

Yunjung Seo, who was described by CNN as a “George Washington student,” is currently an intern for the Democratic fundraising organization, the Katz Watson Group, and was previously a campaign fellow for Hillary Clinton for America according to her reported LinkedIn page. Her question was about how Sanders plans on alleviating student debt.

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“It will not happen again.” Sen. Bernie Sanders addresses allegations of sexual harassment on his 2016 campaign and describes protocols he says his campaign has implemented. #SandersTownHall https://cnn.it/2ViRP2T

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However, the arguably toughest question of the night was asked by Shadi Nasab, who was referred to as an “American University student” but is also an intern for the left-wing group Public Policy, according to her reported LinkedIn page.

“As we saw in the 2018 midterms, the Democratic Party has become more female, more racially diverse, and younger in age. How can a voter like me feel confident in your ability to represent the party, especially given that your response to sexual harassment allegations during your campaign is that you were ‘a little bit busy running around the country trying to make the case to be elected as president,’" Nasab asked.

Abena McAllister, who was described by Blitzer as “active in Maryland Democrat Party,” was listed by CNN’s chyron as a “mother of two.” However, she is apparently the chair of the Charles County Democratic Central Committee.


Paste Magazine’s Weindling thought the questions were “completely normal” until he did a little digging.

"You cannot help but wonder about the intent behind this, as well as CNN’s role in selecting this questioner while not disclosing her workplace."

— Paste Magazine's Jacob Weindling

“Now that it has been revealed that the question was asked by an intern at a major lobbying firm, you cannot help but wonder about the intent behind this, as well as CNN’s role in selecting this questioner while not disclosing her workplace,” Weindling wrote. “If it was just this one questioner, we could chalk it up to a mistake, or an acknowledgement that CNN reasonably didn't believe that an intern needed to disclose her workplace. But this wasn't just one questioner. There were a bunch of audience members who are far more active in politics than CNN disclosed.”

Mediaite’s Caleb Ecarma pointed out why some prominent Democrats might not want Sanders to come off as favorable during the CNN event.

“Sanders has been harshly criticized by leading Democrats for supposedly trying to spoil the party’s primary election, given his label as an independent and perception as an outsider,” Ecarma wrote.

The Young Turks – a progressive digital news organization – spent significant time breaking down the situation. Host Ana Kasparian said “it appears that CNN did not disclose the true identities of the individuals asking the questions,” calling the network’s behavior “unethical.”

“Viewers should know who these individuals are,” Kasparian said.

Young Turks founder Cenk Uygur admitted he didn’t know if the participants did not fully disclose their identity to CNN or if CNN purposely withheld information from viewers. But Uygur said there is an “unfortunate history” of CNN being unfair to “one particular candidate,” which he said is Sanders.

During the 2016 election, the network took a lot of heat after it was discovered that Donna Brazile, who was a commentator at the time, leaked questions from a town hall event with the Clinton campaign.

Brian Flood covers the media for Fox News. Follow him on Twitter at @briansflood.


THIS STORY IS SAD FOR ME, BECAUSE I HAVE ALWAYS LIKED THE CNN WAY OF FINDING A BALANCE BETWEEN LEFT AND RIGHT OPINIONS, AND IT IS USUALLY VERY INTERESTING TO ME. THIS ARTICLE AND THE ONE BELOW IT FROM PASTE AND GREAT, IN MY VIEW. CHECK THEM OUT.

https://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2019/02/did-cnn-stack-the-audience-for-bernies-town-hall-l.html
Did CNN Stack the Audience Against Bernie Sanders at His Town Hall?
By Jacob Weindling | February 26, 2019 | 1:32pm
Photo via screenshot

Editors note: we reached out to CNN for a statement on this before publication, and a CNN spokesperson provided us with the following statement the next day:

Though we said at the beginning of the Town Hall that the audience was made up of Democrats and Independents, we should have more fully identified any political affiliations.
Monday night, Bernie Sanders did a town hall on CNN, and for the most part, he was asked substantive questions and answered in kind. One minor exception came in a question about the sexual harassment that took place in his 2016 campaign. His response to the initial reports was too dismissive, and last night he wasn’t able to fully articulate how he would stop it from happening again, other than saying that his campaign is committing lots of resources and he will have the “strongest protocols” and utilize an “independent commission” that people can bring their complaints to, without really elaborating on who or what that commission would do.

The bigger problem here is that we find ourselves in a confusing situation thanks to cable news not adhering to basic standards of journalism. (Unfortunately, that’s an evergreen sentence.) When I watched the town hall live last night, this question seemed completely normal and well within the bounds of what Bernie was brought there to talk about, but now that it has been revealed that the question was asked by an intern at a major lobbying firm, you cannot help but wonder about the intent behind this, as well as CNN’s role in selecting this questioner while not disclosing her workplace.
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“It will not happen again.” Sen. Bernie Sanders addresses allegations of sexual harassment on his 2016 campaign and describes protocols he says his campaign has implemented. #SandersTownHall https://cnn.it/2ViRP2T

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This is a Public Policy Intern at one of the biggest lobbying firms in DC Cassidy and Associates. pic.twitter.com/qNszxq6Tne

— Mike Gapes Fan Account (@respecteconomy) February 26, 2019
Again, Bernie's campaign issues with sexual harassment are a major storyline going into 2020 and given that he still hasn't completely addressed it, he should be asked these questions. The problem is that when the question comes from an intern at a major DC lobbying shop—and that fact is not disclosed—you cannot help but wonder who really asked that question of Bernie. And a closer look at Cassidy & Associates' financial partners paints a picture of a group that really, really would not enjoy a Sanders presidency.

If it was just this one questioner, we could chalk it up to a mistake, or an acknowledgement that CNN reasonably didn't believe that an intern needed to disclose her workplace. But this wasn't just one questioner. There were a bunch of audience members who are far more active in politics than CNN disclosed. Watching the town hall live made it seem as if these were just folks from all walks of life, when in reality many of these supposedly innocuous questioners were political operatives in one way or another, as this thread revealed.

— CNN called Tara Ebersole a “former biology professor” when her LinkedIn page lists her current job description as “Chair, Baltimore County Democratic Party” since 2016. Further, her husband was part of Hillary Clinton's leadership council in Baltimore in 2016.

— Abena McAllister was labeled “an active Democrat,” which is far less descriptive than the Charles County Democratic Central Committee's description of her as their Chair.

— Yunjung Seo was simply called a “George Washington Student” by CNN, despite her LinkedIn page saying she also works for the Katz Watson Group, a fundraising and consulting outlet.

— Michelle Gregory was simply listed as a “Maryland voter” by CNN, but a cursory Google search reveals her to be much more active in politics than just voting.

Then there's this:
Similarly, The reparations question was offered by an Aspen Institue alum. She works for a non-profit who's board directors includes execs at Booz Allen Hamilton and the Carlyle Group https://t.co/phzN6uXnXr

— Mike Gapes Fan Account (@respecteconomy) February 26, 2019

I watched the entire town hall last night, and none of the questions asked by these people resonated as unfair to me. There were a couple asked by other people that were based on wrong assumptions (like the myth that Bernie’s only support comes from young white dudes), but it’s hard to blame individuals for coming to wrong conclusions like that when the Democratic Party’s infrastructure has invested so much time and energy gaslighting the public into thinking that way.
In fact, the worst question last night came from Wolf Blitzer, who went off of the New York Times’ initial reporting on Elizabeth Warren’s stance on reparations, when a clarification made by The Washington Post the next day walked back the far more certain NYT characterization of her position and certainly did not indicate that “she wants to support reparations” like Wolf asserted. One of Bernie’s better moments came when he challenged Wolf on the basis of his assumption while saying he agreed with Warren’s quote about reforming the system to distribute more funds to reach “distressed communities.” There’s a big difference between that and supporting a policy to financially compensate every living descendant of American slavery, and four days ago, WaPo reported that Warren, Julian Castro and Kamala Harris did not respond to questions about clarifying their stance around that reality of what the word “reparations” means.

But back to my main point: really the only problem in all this is that because CNN did not disclose many of these questioners’ ties to politics, one cannot help wonder why. The famed Bobby Knight quote of “stupid loses more games than smart wins” is Occam’s Razor here, as Wolf Blitzer isn’t exactly universally respected and we have documented CNN’s struggles with the truth before, but the nefarious angle is the elephant in that Washington D.C. room.

There is absolutely, positively no question that elite members of the Democratic and Republican Parties, as well as major media, despise Bernie Sanders because he openly advocates destroying the system they sit atop. When you bring a bunch of politically-involved people out and depict them as just regular “Maryland voters,” one cannot help but wonder about the motivations behind a decision to do less journalism than is required of the situation. CNN brought a de facto lobbyist on their air and didn’t disclose it. That’s bad.

Being politically-involved doesn’t disqualify these folks from asking questions, and it doesn’t automatically make their motivations disingenuous. These people are still people just like you and me. Had CNN been more accurate in describing the questioners, I wouldn’t be writing this column. The only reason we have to doubt their motivations is because CNN hid crucial context that is easily found in the public record, therefore we cannot help but wonder why CNN left out such vital information (I reached out to CNN and asked them to shed light on why they left out this vital info and will update the piece if I hear back).
Again, the questions themselves last night were almost entirely fine on the surface. Bernie should face tough questions like any other presidential candidate, but we should put all of our cards on the table when going through this stuff (which doubles as my central criticism of Bernie’s handling of the sexual harassment revelations). CNN bringing up these so-called “voters” to ask some of the most politically perilous questions for Bernie comes off as incredibly shady, and doubly so since they didn’t reveal their backgrounds. CNN was either pushing an agenda, or they failed at a very basic tenet of journalism. I don’t have enough information to come to a firm conclusion about CNN’s motivation, but if I assumed that these multiple oversights were intentional as part of a larger anti-Bernie agenda, there would be more journalistic rationale behind my assertion than CNN’s belief that they can get away with characterizing the current Chair of the Baltimore County Democratic Party as simply a “former biology professor.”

Jacob Weindling is a staff writer for Paste politics. Follow him on Twitter at @Jakeweindling.


“You can't fly under the radar and win, and if any of this secondary crew last as long as Iowa, it will be an act of stubbornness and/or delusion. They're not threats.”

THIS IS ONE OF THE BEST ANALYSES OF HOW THE VOTING IS LIKELY TO GO THAT I’VE SEEN, AT LEAST WITHIN THIS YEAR OR SO, AND IT IS ALSO THE BEST STATEMENT OF WHY, FOR ME, BERNIE IS THE ONLY WAY TO GO. NEARLY ALL OF THESE CANDIDATES ARE NOT ORIGINALS AT ALL, AND THEY DON’T HAVE COMMITMENT. A STORY IN THE LAST SEVERAL MONTHS BY A MAN WHO HAS BEEN INVOLVED WITH HIM FOR YEARS CHARACTERIZED HIM AS “AN AUTOMATON WINDUP.” HE GOES ON TO SAY THAT HE DOESN’T MEAN THAT BERNIE IS LIKE A CHILD’S TOY, “BECAUSE HE IS NOBODY’S TOY. HE’S A GROWLER. HE GOES FORWARD A LITTLE AND THEN GROWLS. HE GOES FORWARD AGAIN AND GROWLS.”

THIS IS WHAT I SEE IN BERNIE BESIDES THE GENUINELY KIND-HEARTED SOUL THAT INHABITS HIS BODY. DON’T LOOK AT HIM WHEN HE IS FROWNING AND THINK THAT’S ALL THERE IS. LOOK AT HIM IN THE VIDEO YOU’VE ALL SEEN WHEN THE LITTLE BROWN SPARROW LANDED ON HIS PODIUM AS HE WAS SPEAKING, AND EYED HIM CLOSELY FOR 30 TO 45 SECONDS, AND THEN FINALLY LIFTED OFF AND WENT BACK UP TO THE SKY. AS LONG AS THE BIRD WAS THERE, BERNIE WAS SILENT AND LOOKING AT IT AS IT TURNED ITS’ LITTLE HEAD AROUND CLOSELY EXAMINING HIM. WHEN THE BIRD HOPPED BACK UP INTO THE AIR, BERNIE CONTINUED SPEAKING. IF I WERE A RELIGIOUS PERSON, I COULD SEE THAT AS A CLEAR SIGN FROM GOD. AND AS FOR THE “GROWLING” PART OF HIS PERSONALITY, I SEE HIM AS A MAN ON THE LEFT WHO HAS THE PURE GUTS TO GO UP AGAINST DONALD TRUMP AND WIN. HE IS A MAN BORN IN NEW YORK CITY ON A LIMITED FAMILY INCOME, WHOSE MEMORIES WERE OF A FAMILY WHO WERE ALL OR NEARLY ALL KILLED IN EUROPE BY ADOLPH HITLER. MOST OF US WHO ARE OLD ENOUGH TO REMEMBER THAT PERIOD, ARE NOT “PASSIVE” ABOUT IT, AND I BELIEVE THAT BERNIE SEES A MAN IN OFFICE IN THIS COUNTRY WHO IS ALL TOO MUCH LIKE HITLER. HE HAS STATED SEVERAL TIMES RECENTLY THAT HIS GOAL IS TO GET DONALD TRUMP OUT OF THE PRESIDENCY. THAT’S THE KIND OF PERSON I WANT FOR PRESIDENT – ONE WHO HAS GENTLENESS IN HIM AND HOT PEPPER AS WELL.

THOSE ARE THE TWO REASONS THAT I WANT BERNIE AND NOBODY ELSE. NUMBER ONE, THOSE IDEAS OF HIS THAT THE CENTRISTS ARE TRYING SO HARD TO MASTER FOR THEMSELVES, THEY ARE NOT CENTRIST IDEAS, AND NONE OF THOSE PEOPLE EXCEPT OCASIO-CASTRO AND PERHAPS ELIZABETH WARREN VOICED THEM BEFORE 2018/19. SHE, UNFORTUNATELY, IS TOO YOUNG TO STAND FOR VICE PRESIDENT OR PRESIDENT. 2040 WILL BE HER YEAR, PERHAPS.

I ALSO BELIEVE IN THE PRINCIPLE OF GIVING CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE, AND I’M NOT THE ONLY ONE WHO IS STRONGLY SAYING THAT BERNIE IS THE MAN. IF I WANTED A WOMAN, I WOULD WANT A SPICY ONE LIKE AOC, NOT AN ARROGANT ONE LIKE HILLARY CLINTON WHO WAS BLIND TO HER OWN WEAKNESSES, AND TO THE LACK OF SOCIAL FAIRNESS THAT SHE EMBODIES. WHILE IT’S TRUE THAT BILL CLINTON DID COME FROM MODESTLY PROSPEROUS PEOPLE, CLINTON CAME FROM A DECIDEDLY WELL-TO-DO FAMILY AND SHE SHOWED HER CLAY FEET WHEN SHE SAID A FEW MONTHS BEFORE THE 2016 ELECTION THAT TRUMP’S FOLLOWERS WERE “A BASKET OF DEPLORABLES.” THAT’S A VERY PRIVILEGED THING TO SAY, AND A BASIC PSYCHOLOGICAL ERROR FOR SOMEONE WHO WANTED TO WIN THE ELECTION.

WHILE I, TOO, SAW THE “COMMONNESS” OF SO MANY OF TRUMP’S FOLLOWERS, AND I FEARED THEM, SHE MADE A TERRIBLE PSYCHOLOGICAL MISTAKE WHEN SHE SAID THAT. EVEN THE DEVIL FEELS HURT AND INSULTED BY THAT KIND OF PUT-DOWN. OF COURSE, I GET THAT OPINION FROM JOHN MILTON’S PARADISE LOST, NOT THE BIBLE. HILLARY CLINTON DOESN’T HAVE THE RIGHT SET OF IDEAS FOR ME, BECAUSE AT THIS POINT IN TIME ESPECIALLY, I DO NOT WANT “AN INCREMENTALIST” AND I DON’T EVER WANT SOMEONE WHO SCORNS SUCH PEOPLE. I DO FEAR THEM, SO I BELIEVE THEY WILL HAVE TO BE FOUGHT, BUT I DO SEE THEM AS BEING CHILDREN OF GOD JUST AS MUCH AS I AM.

MORE IMPORTANTLY, I’M A STRONG BELIEVER IN MENTAL HEALTH CARE, AND WHEN I SEE BRUTAL HATRED LIKE THAT, I SEE IT AS BEING THE HURT AND INJURY THAT THEY BEAR, TURNED OUTWARD AS A WEAPON AGAINST THE WHOLE WORLD. I THINK THAT MOST CATHOLICS WOULD SEE IT IN THAT WAY, BUT I’M NOT SO SURE ABOUT PROTESTANTS. SCORN IS SIMPLY NOT HELPFUL IN ANY WAY. SOME SORT OF MANDATED MENTAL HEALTH TREATMENT WOULD BE USEFUL, I THINK, AND DEFINITELY FAIR. WHEN I SEE FOUR LINES OF YOUNG ANGRY-LOOKING YOUNG MEN, ALL CARRYING THE TORCHES OF THE WORLD WAR II SYMBOLIZING HATRED INTO A PUBLIC PARK AREA WHERE A CONFEDERATE STATUE STANDS, CHANTING “BLOOD AND SOIL,” I FEEL THAT SOMETHING NEEDS TO BE DONE. THIS IS NOT A TIME FOR SOCIAL SNOBBERY. IT IS WITH PAIN THAT I SAY THAT IT SEEMS TO ME, NOW, THAT THE FREEDOM TO JOIN AN ACTIVE AND AGGRESSIVE HATE GROUP SHOULD NOT BE ONE OF OUR GUARANTEED RIGHTS. THAT ISN’T FREEDOM OF SPEECH, BUT VICIOUS HATRED AND ABUSIVENESS. VERY FEW OTHER COUNTRIES ALLOW THAT, AND THE HONEST PEOPLE HERE DON’T BELIEVE THAT WAY, EITHER.

THE PROBLEM THAT WE ON THE LIBERAL SIDE OF THINGS – THE DEMOCRATS OF ALL STAMPS -- HAVE IS THAT THERE IS A SIMPLE NEED I’M AFRAID, TO DIVIDE THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY ON A PERMANENT BASIS, SO WE CAN MOVE ALONG INTO SOME SORT OF PROGRESS TOWARD JUSTICE AND DECENCY; BUT PERHAPS INTO THREE PARTS OF VARYING OPINION RANGES, AND REGULARLY GET TOGETHER TO MAKE GROUP DECISIONS AS NEW EVENTS OCCUR THAT CREATE A NEED TO RE-THINK AND MODIFY OUR GOALS AND METHODS; AND THOSE DECISIONS SHOULD NOT BE DONE IN SECRET. NO MORE OF THOSE “SMOKE-FILLED ROOMS” OF THE 1950S AND LATER. IF ANY OF YOU REMEMBER THE DEMOCRATIC CONVENTION OF 1968, YOU WILL SEE MY POINT. THAT’S THE ONE THAT TURNED INTO A “POLICE RIOT,” AS COPS ON THE OUTSIDE OF THE BUILDING TRIED TO CONTAIN ANGRY STUDENTS WITHOUT PLAN OR SENSITIVITY. IT WAS A MINI-BLOOD BATH. I SAW IT ALL ON THE NEWS ON TV, AND IT WAS GENUINELY FRIGHTENING. I THINK THAT HAD TO DO WITH EUGENE MCCARTHY, THE INTELLIGENT AND BENIGN, BUT “RADICAL,” PEACE CANDIDATE. THAT HAD TO DO WITH THE VIETNAMESE WAR. LIKE BERNIE SANDERS, HE HAD A LARGE AND PASSIONATE STUDENT FOLLOWING.

WE NEED TO WORK ON OUR PARTY STRUCTURE AND BELIEFS ON A FREQUENT BASIS, NOT ONCE EVERY 50 YEARS. I BELIEVE THE REASON WE DEMOCRATS ARE AT ODDS RIGHT NOW TO THE DEGREE THAT WE ARE IS BECAUSE WE HAVEN’T DONE THAT. JESUS’ METAPHOR OF THE NEW WINE BEING PLACED IN OLD WINESKINS IS VERY, VERY IMPORTANT. BEING PASSIVE IS NOT THE ANSWER, BUT BEING REGULARLY AND FREQUENTLY IN DISCUSSIONS ABOUT GROUP ISSUES IS. ANY OF YOU WHO HAVE EVER SEEN “A QUAKER MEETING” IN OPERATION WILL KNOW WHAT I MEAN. IT’S MORE THAN A RELIGION. IT’S A DECISION AND GROUP-CONSCIENCE MEETING.

SOME PEOPLE HAVE JOKINGLY SAID OF UNITARIANS THAT EVERY TIME THEY HAVE A DISCUSSION, IT BECOMES A FIGHT, OR THAT LEADING UNITARIANS IS LIKE “HERDING CATS.” UNITARIANS ARE A GOOD DEAL LIKE QUAKERS – CARING, BUT INDEPENDENT. SOMEWHERE IN MY PHOTOS ON THE INTERNET IS A CHARMING AND HUMOROUS CARTOON OF SOME GOOFY-LOOKING MEN ON GANGLY AND WILD-LOOKING HORSES TRYING TO “HERD CATS.” SOME DOZEN OR MORE CATS ARE RUNNING IN EVERY IMAGINABLE DIRECTION WITH THEIR TAILS ALL PUFFED UP AND A PANICKED LOOK ON THEIR POOR FACES. I HAD HEARD THAT PHRASE BEFORE, BUT NEVER SEEN A PICTURE OF IT.

TO TRY TO PULL THIS TOGETHER INTO SOMETHING THAT WILL BE MORE UNDERSTANDABLE, I’M ENVISIONING SOMETHING MORE LIKE A PARTY-LEVEL CONGRESS OR SENATE, OR BETTER STILL, REGULARLY HELD TOWN MEETINGS SO THAT WE WON’T BE ONE CITIZEN FIGHTING AGAINST ANOTHER AT PARTY VOTING TIMES, OR A POWER GROUP AT THE TOP WRITING THE RULES AND THEN TRYING TO FORCE THEM DOWN EVERYBODY’S THROATS RATHER THAN ALLOWING IT TO PERCOLATE ITS’ WAY UP FROM THE BOTTOM. AND OUR ISSUES WILL BE UP TO DATE WITH THE WORLD, TOO, IF WE DO THAT. THEN, BEFORE VOTING EVEN STARTS, THE PARTY SHOULD HOLD A PLANNING SESSION WHOSE TASK WOULD BE TO STUDY, THINK, TALK, AND THEN VOTE AMONG THEMSELVES ON THE PROBLEMS TO BE DISCUSSED.

IF WE WOULD DO IT THAT WAY, THERE WOULD ALSO BE LESS MONEY-RELATED PUSHING AND SHOVING UNDER THE GUISE OF “INFORMING” OUR DECISIONS. I WOULD HAVE US DISALLOW THE PARTICIPATION OF THE FINANCIAL AND POWER CENTERS – THE BANKING OR OIL INDUSTRIES, FOR INSTANCE. IN A TIME LIKE THESE WHEN WE, THE LIBERAL-LEANING CITIZENS OR DEMOCRATS, SEE AND FEEL A STRONG NEED TO PUT UP A VIGOROUS OPPOSITION TO TRUMPIST OLIGARCHY OR SOME OTHER DISORDERLY OR UNFAIR ACTION; WE COULD CALL THOSE TALKING SESSIONS AN OPINION TAKING SESSION. WHEN THE IDEAS ARE FULLY FLESHED OUT AS I HAVE DONE WITH THIS SET OF IDEAS, SO THAT THE WHOLE PROPOSAL WILL BE CLEAR AND UNDERSTANDABLE, THEN WRITE UP A FORMAL LOCAL PROPOSAL OF THE NEW RULE, ACTION, OR LAW.

WE SHOULD NOT EVEN ALLOW TERMS LIKE RADICAL TO ENTER THE DISCUSSION UNTIL THE PROPOSAL IS DEVELOPED. ALL DISCUSSIONS SHOULD BE OPEN TO FRESH AIR AND LIGHT RATHER THAN BEING A FORCED DECISION. IN THAT GROUP, THE “LOCAL CITIZEN’S ASSEMBLY” PERHAPS, WE COULD RESEARCH AND DISCUSS, THEN CHOOSE CANDIDATES FOR THE 2020 ELECTION AFTER WORKING TOGETHER FOR THE CANDIDATES WITH THE LARGEST NUMBER OF POPULAR VOTES. I AM THINKING HERE OF MAKING BASIC CONCEPTS INTO A WRITTEN AND DEFENDABLE FORM FOR A MONTHLY MEETING. THIS WOULD THEN BE PLACED BEFORE A CITY COUNCIL FOR LEGALLY CORRECT LANGUAGE AND IDEA ORGANIZATION. A GOOD WAY TO DO THAT MIGHT BE BY HOLDING REGULAR POLLS ON SPECIFIC SUBJECTS. IN THE MODERN ERA OF COMPUTERS THAT COULD BE DONE EITHER ON PAPER THROUGH THE MAIL, ON THE INTERNET, OR OVER THE TELEPHONE AS LONG AS IT IS DONE BY AN ACCREDITED POLLING AGENCY SUCH AS QUINNIPIAC. THAT WOULD CREATE A GOOD DEAL OF LOCAL PARTICIPATION IN DECISION-MAKING AND AN AWARENESS OF WHAT THE LOCAL ISSUES AND OPINIONS ARE.

https://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2019/02/what-are-bernies-2020-chances-a-paste-politics-dis.html
Can Bernie Really Win Easily? A Paste Politics Discussion
By Jake Weindling & Shane Ryan | February 28, 2019 | 9:26am
Photo by Sean Rayford/Getty

Because we live in hell and in a country with a major media constantly looking to the next election, the 2020 election has officially begun in 2019’s nascent stages—which also means that it’s officially hot take season. Given that Paste politics is a leftist outlet and Bernie Sanders announced his presidential candidacy (while citing one of our Paste politics pieces in his announcement video — we see you Bernie), and Elizabeth Warren also jumped in recently, we feel something of an obligation to hash this topic out in public. Below you will read an e-mail exchange between me and my hot take compatriot, Paste politics editor Shane Ryan, who fired the first salvo in this war by writing on the day Bernie declared that “Bernie Sanders is going to win, and it’s going to be easy.” But is he right?

I’ll now change my pronouns from pointing towards you, dear reader, to Shane as we officially kick off the 2019 2020 Hot Take Wars.

Jacob Weindling: For me, the most convincing argument you made in your piece was about name recognition. We live in a country where congress has about a 20% approval rating and about a 95% reelection rate. The prevailing thought is “everyone sucks but my guy,” and that mindset is directly informed by having very little information about anyone other than who is currently in power. I place the vast majority of the blame for this depressing fact that we don’t teach civics in this country, as well as on major media misinforming the populace—as you can turn on any Sunday show or cable news panel and watch the same Very Serious “both-sides” deficit-scold arguments from the same set of elite media folks. Bernie had very little name recognition in 2016, and now only Joe Biden bests him. That’s a major, major asset.

For any readers still not convinced about the utmost importance of name recognition, I have two more pieces of evidence to submit to the court. One, Bernie is very popular on the left and his support has basically remained the same since people learned who he was.

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And two, if you ask most people who their top two candidates are right now, they're overwhelmingly Bernie and Biden—which makes absolutely no ideological sense given that they are basically the left and right endpoints of the current ideological spectrum in the Democratic Party. As much as us policy-centric folks wish that we ran the world, we don't. Folks less plugged-in than those of us who spend our days wading through the political muck decide presidential elections, and name recognition is one of the biggest deciding factors in whether a candidate will win.

But that doesn't mean us policy-centric folks don't have some power over this election. The 2018 election and the elevation of Medicare for All and the Green New Deal to the center of the 2020 Democratic platform is proof that policy is ascendant on the left, and that most people generally want to do big things to fix our very big problems. The question is how should we go about doing it, and this is where capitalism comes in to the discussion.

I semi-critiqued Elizabeth Warren's generally awesome access to universal child care plan because “access” is code for “market-based solution.” To me, that's the central fault line on the left. If you want to work within the framework of the current capitalist and constitutional structure of the United States, you are a liberal, whereas if you want to generally destroy and then replace/amend the capitalist status quo with something tilted towards social democracy, you are a progressive (I prefer the term leftist, personally). I've publicly documented my move away from capitalism here at Paste, and I think that this Bernie-Warren dynamic is another litmus test for what constitutes leftist politics, because the central narrative out there so far does not do a good enough job explaining the irreconcilable fundamental ideological fault lines between pro-capitalism liberalism, social democracy and socialism—distinctions which will be a major factor in who wins in 2020 whether they are properly covered or not.

What do you think?

Shane Ryan: Jake, I agree with you, and would cite this piece by Zaid Jilani at Jacobin which outlines that very dichotomy, and is a good read if people want to go more in-depth:

The two senators also have distinct theories of change. Sanders has long believed in bottom-up, movement-based politics. Since his days as mayor of Burlington, Vermont, he has tried to energize citizens to take part in government. He generally distrusts elites and decision-making that does not include the public. Warren, on the other hand, generally accepts political reality and works to push elite decision-makers towards her point of view.

As Jilani points out, this is not an across-the-board truth: Warren has endorsed Medicare-for-all (despite being opposed to it five years ago and rarely bringing it up even today), and Bernie has worked within the system for goals like pressuring Amazon to raise its minimum wage to $15. Those aren't the only two examples, but by and large the pattern of political thinking is pretty constant, and pretty different, between the two candidates.

Which brings us to what I think is the most important point: Bernie Sanders' paradigm requires a popular movement, and he has a popular movement. I don't mean to be reductive, but speaking from a realpolitik standpoint, that really might be all we need to know. He stepped up when nobody else had the gumption after the field cleared for Hillary Clinton in 2016, and it turned out that a lot of people were ready to hear a democratic-socialist, “taxes-are-actually-good” approach to governance. He didn't win, but the reward for his courage was becoming one of the most popular politicians in America and wielding an unbelievable amount of influence over the party.

Elizabeth Warren's approach requires popular support, but not a movement. It only requires winning elections and then commencing the work of reforming the system. Her problem—and to me, it's an insurmountable one—is that she's going against Bernie Sanders, and against him, you need a movement to win. But there's just no oxygen on that terrain, is there? Sanders raised more money in about three hours than anyone else raised in a full day after announcing their candidacies, and Warren's problem is that she's trying to occupy a similar leftist space. If the votes exist, for her, they exist among Sanders supporters, and the bleak reality is that as of last Tuesday morning, Sanders is already standing in her spot.

Here's where we get to the superficial part of politics, and talk about instincts and charisma and etc. Because look, if Warren was some kind of transformational political personality, I'd still give her a shot. She isn't—policy aside, I'm very bearish on her as a candidate. I thought her response to the Native American heritage was an unbelievable blunder, and her weird “I'm gonna get me a beer” video with her stiff husband was about as cringe-worthy as it gets, particularly in its obvious thirst to co-opt AOC's social media savvy. Like it or not, that kind of stuff informs perceptions of authenticity, and when you combine it with the fact that she's going to be preaching a less sweeping vision of progressivism than Sanders, I really do not see how she drums up the kind of critical support she needs. To be perfectly frank, it wouldn't shock me to see her drop out before Iowa.

In short, I'm with Amber A'Lee Frost, who wrote:

She's not charismatic and appears to have absolutely zero understanding of what voters want in a candidate, as indicated by her pre-campaign soft launch on a bit of specious family lore about Native American heritage. Literally, no one cares, and yet she keeps doubling down on it. She chokes, she flinches, she reacts every time Trump insults her, and thus the public is far more familiar with her defensive “Orange Man is Mean to Me” ethnic delusion than they are her “Accountable Capitalism Act”...

So, here's my perspective: I agree fully with your breakdown of what it means to be a progressive/leftist versus what it means to be a framework liberal. I identify with Sanders on that front, and I think it's a more exciting and appealing proposition for most voters. And while I like Warren's policies, and she's certainly my second choice, and she distinguishes herself from the rest of the pack, from a practical standpoint I don't think she has a prayer. And I have to say, based on her “work from within the system” mentality, it's not a shock to me to learn that she was a Republican as recently as 1996, supported charter schools, and etc. I trust her now, and I'm not snarking on her the way I will hopefully get to snark on Kamala “Seriously Progresssive Since 2017!” Harris, but I think it's a sign of the times that our second-most progressive candidate for president probably voted for Ronald Reagan.

Now, should we move to the other candidates who might have a shot at dethroning Bernie, or is there more to say about Warren?

Jake: I largely agree with your assessment of Warren, so I won't turn this into a game of “yes and,” but I do want to expand a little on my point about the vital importance of her platform to the debate of capitalism versus Democratic Socialism. As much as folks want to conflate hers and Bernie's platforms, they're not the same. They only feel the same because that's how far right the Democratic status quo has shifted since 1980. Bernie wants to blow up the system and enact an FDR New Deal-type market infrastructure while Warren simply wants to lay waste to the monopolies dominating the markets.

I was a capitalist and now I'm not, but that doesn't mean I don't believe in markets. Capitalism has brainwashed us into thinking that capitalism = markets, but markets have existed as long as humans have. They're a natural consequence of our respective talents, and they are extremely effective at producing a lot of money and resources. Capitalism says that markets should be dictated from the top-down in a private profit-based model, while Democratic Socialism wants the government to heavily regulate markets so the focus is on providing maximum value to the consumers of the market. Capitalism claims to achieve that end through profit-based competition, but, well…look around. Does it look like we have highly competitive industries dedicated to serving the interests of their consumers?

Warren is not trying to change that fundamental top-down capitalist paradigm—she's just trying to aggressively intervene in markets to free them up to work the way capitalists say they're supposed to work, as demonstrated by her fantastic idea to make workers represent 40% of boards—but 40% still means that workers have less power than capitalists who definitely haven't demonstrated any desire to repeal harmful regulations. Bernie is a New Deal Democrat who wants to fundamentally change major parts of the economy in the same style as America's longest serving congressman, the late great John Dingell — while Warren, like you said, probably voted for Reagan.

Who you support between the two says a lot about what you think about economics.

I became a Democratic Socialist because I realized that there were far too many markets I believed should not be driven by a profit motive to justifiably call myself anything but a Democratic Socialist. I still believe in market competition (but not in the existence of a “free” market), I just don't think that a lot of major industries like health care or energy should be private and profit-based, and this is going to be the crux of the 2020 debates: what markets should and should not be controlled by the government? Democratic voters are functionally unanimous on the topic of enacting socialized health care, even though many (definitely-not-insurance-company-backed) politicians like Amy Klobuchar are not. I don't think Bernie should have to worry about anyone who comes out against his Medicare for All plan because 85% of Democrats want it and health care was by far the number one issue in the 2018 midterms.

If I were sitting in the Bernie camp, I would consider Warren to be my most immediate threat, given that she's the only one who could plausibly steal votes from his ideological base (*raises hand*). But given her political missteps and her lukewarm MA numbers, her ceiling does seem very low. I think Warren's likeliest path to the nomination is co-opting Biden's supporters. Bernie's biggest threat, as always, is the Democratic establishment. They've created a rabid hurricane of disinformation around him, and many less plugged-in folks have internalized the incorrect assertion that he's too divisive to win. Given that you've planted the flag in the ground on Bernie's impending victory, which establishment-backed candidate(s) do you fear most?

Shane: My fears:

1. Joe Biden
2. Kamala Harris
3. Nobody else

There's a rabid base of Bernie-haters online who still carry the secret flag for Hillary Clinton and believe with all their hearts that Sanders cost her the election (despite mountains of evidence showing that Sanders loyalists voted for Clinton in the general at a far greater rates than her own supporters backed Obama in 2008), and that all his supporters are racist, sexist white men (despite mountains of evidence that he polls way better with women and minorities than he does with white men). To them, these are almost religious truths, and they spend their days alternating between delusional victimhood and outright attack. They really, really don't want Bernie to be president, and you hit on a good point—if they were smart, maybe they'd back Elizabeth Warren and try to usurp Bernie's support from the left.

Maybe they sense the same weakness in Warren that I do, though, or maybe they just hate even the hint of progressivism, because at the moment it appears that they've coalesced behind Kamala Harris. The fact that Warren can't even land this demographic only solidifies my belief that she's a dead candidate walking.
So, first, I fear Kamala. Unlike Warren, Kamala Harris projects strength, and she's charismatic, and I think she's going to do well in the spotlight and will hold her own in debates, where she'll probably be more nimble than Bernie, who basically sticks to his stump speech. She has a chance to score a big early primary victory in her home state of California and forge a lead early if she can survive the first four (the nullification of the early southern primaries that buried Sanders is a good thing for him, but also her). She's just progressive enough to pass muster on big issues like universal healthcare and free public education, and who knows, maybe she'll capture the black or female demographic in the way her supporters hope. I'm not exactly sure how, but she's already boxed out everyone else in her lane, especially Booker and Gillibrand, so she's certainly not a political incompetent. I don't think endorsements really matter that much (unless Obama picks a side), but the fact that she got Barbara Lee, who everyone had pegged as a Bernie surrogate, is at the very least a surprise.

I think her shady past as a prosecutor and AG is really going to hurt her with progressives, though (read here and here for the best background), and when you couple that with the fact that her leftist transformation is very recent, I don't think she's going to have much trust with the Bernie wing. Whether she can catch on with everyone else and present herself as the moderate choice who can beat Trump pretty much depends on Joe Biden. If he runs, she's toast.

In terms of the other candidates, nothing scares me. Along with suffering on the name recognition front, Gillibrand spent her formative days defending big tobacco executives, Booker is a known Big Pharma flack, Klobuchar is a psychopath who abuses her staff, Sherrod Brown doesn't even have the courage to endorse Medicare for All, and nobody else has the profile to even matter. The collective strategy here seems to be “play very safe,” except that only works when you have a lead. Playing safe from behind is a great way to remain anonymous. You can't fly under the radar and win, and if any of this secondary crew last as long as Iowa, it will be an act of stubbornness and/or delusion. They're not threats.

But Biden is my number one fear. He's popular, he's got name recognition, he might get Obama to endorse him, and even if he doesn't, he'll be seen as Obama's guy. He's the nostalgia candidate, and right now he's even polling better than Bernie. We've talked about why we think he's at his peak popularity right now, and I'll let you delve more into that.

Jake: Yeah I have a rule I'm calling the President Giuliani Rule for all early 2020 coverage, and that's to take all early polling as far more indicative of “I know this name” than “I want this person,” and I'm of the opinion that most of Biden's support right now is “oh yeah, the Obama guy!” As Senator Biden—who echoed proud segregationist Strom Thurmond's racist “forced busing” phrase in the 1970s to stymie the effort to integrate our schools (despite saying he was for it in theory)—becomes a more significant figure in the 2020 primary, Biden's popularity will wane as everyone runs to his left and he'll either have to defend his unpopular Senate record or repudiate it (although Amy Klobuchar's “you can't have anything” CNN town hall is making me rethink the “everyone” part of that conviction). I wrote up a piece about polling from New Hampshire revealing that of people who have currently declared a preference for a 2020 primary candidate, 82% are willing to change their minds by the time the primary rolls around in less than a year. If I'm Joe Biden, that's the kind of figure that keeps me up at night.

It's probably just because I've planted my flag on the “Biden won't win” hot take, but I see Harris as Bernie's biggest overall threat because I think she is the likeliest to receive the biggest chunk of people who agree with that 82% for all the reasons you laid out above. One of the biggest things people seem to want is something new, and Bernie doesn't have that advantage over most of the field now that he's a known commodity. That said, I think that's an advantage that almost goes away in the debates.

The new stuff that really matters are all the new policies on the Dem platform this time around, and once the debates start, people are going to start stumping for their big ideas. Here's my prediction for how they will go, given that per the candidates' declared positions to this point, everyone is basically just hacking off popular parts of Bernie's 2016 platform to center theirs around:

Gillibrand: “I have major policy A and it's great!”
Harris: “I have major policy B and it's also great!”
Booker: “Major policy C is super coolio yo!”
Bernie: “I agree, policies A, B and C are all great and that's why they're all on my platform.”

Policy wonkery won't be the main reason someone wins, but it's going to become harder and harder to paint Bernie as divisive and anathema to the Democratic Party when every Democratic candidate spends their time stumping for different parts of his platform, and he then spends his time pointing out how right they are to push for big ideas like Medicare for All and the Green New Deal.

I hate that my brain goes to this, but Mark Cuban likes to harp on Shark Tank about how dominating a small market can be a massive money-maker, and I think that can be said of gaining votes too. Bernie's central appeal is leftist policy, and of the people who prioritize very liberal policy above all else (as to how big this portion of the electorate is, hard to tell, but we can start at the 43% of Dems who voted for Bernie in 2016), he gets most of those votes. Biden and Harris are running on personality as much as they are policies (Harris still doesn't have a policy section up on her website as of this writing), and there are far more ways to split the votes of the kind of Democratic voter who prioritizes personality than to split the votes of those who prioritize policy. That built-in lead among a significant part of the Democratic electorate, plus the name recognition factor and the astounding amount of money he raised in the first 24 hours prove to me that on paper, Bernie Sanders is a major presidential contender and only Joe Biden can objectively be put above him as of right now. I mean, these fundraising figures for a Democratic Socialist in the United States of America are mind-blowing.


Shane Goldmacher
✔
@ShaneGoldmacher
· Feb 25, 2019
NEWS: Bernie Sanders has raised $10 million from his presidential campaign in less than a week

Two big stats:

— 359,914 total donors
— 38.76% of donations came from NEW email addresses that hadn't previously given to Sanders https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/25/us/politics/bernie-sanders-10-million.html …

Senator Bernie Sanders has raised $10 million in the first week of his presidential campaign.
Bernie Sanders Raises $10 Million in Less Than a Week
Mr. Sanders started the race with the largest donor network in the 2020 field. That list has grown substantially since then, as more than a third of his donations came from new email addresses.

nytimes.com

Shane Goldmacher
✔
@ShaneGoldmacher
Of the 359,914 Bernie Sanders 2020 donors so far, only *20* have given him the legal maximum of $2,800. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/25/us/politics/bernie-sanders-10-million.html …

841
6:50 PM - Feb 25, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
Senator Bernie Sanders has raised $10 million in the first week of his presidential campaign.
Bernie Sanders Raises $10 Million in Less Than a Week
Mr. Sanders started the race with the largest donor network in the 2020 field. That list has grown substantially since then, as more than a third of his donations came from new email addresses.

nytimes.com
318 people are talking about this

Shane Goldmacher
✔
@ShaneGoldmacher
· Feb 25, 2019
Replying to @ShaneGoldmacher
The Bernie Sanders campaign has already signed up more than 48,000 donors on a recurring giving plan — worth a combined more than $1 million per month. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/25/us/politics/bernie-sanders-10-million.html …

Senator Bernie Sanders has raised $10 million in the first week of his presidential campaign.
Bernie Sanders Raises $10 Million in Less Than a Week

Mr. Sanders started the race with the largest donor network in the 2020 field. That list has grown substantially since then, as more than a third of his donations came from new email addresses.

nytimes.com

Shane Goldmacher
✔
@ShaneGoldmacher
One cautionary note on all the new email addresses: Bernie's donors skew young, so plenty may have changed jobs, graduated from a .edu email etc.

Still: Nearly 39 percent of Sanders's week one donors came from emails that had never donated before. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/25/us/politics/bernie-sanders-10-million.html …

302
7:03 PM - Feb 25, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
Senator Bernie Sanders has raised $10 million in the first week of his presidential campaign.
Bernie Sanders Raises $10 Million in Less Than a Week

Mr. Sanders started the race with the largest donor network in the 2020 field. That list has grown substantially since then, as more than a third of his donations came from new email addresses.

nytimes.com
96 people are talking about this

Because I’m convinced that Biden is going to fall victim to father time and have his support scattered across the political chessboard, I can’t see anyone else other than Bernie as the Democratic frontrunner at this point. Given that Trump is the weakest incumbent in our lifetimes, it’s pretty likely that a Democratic Socialist is the current favorite to be our next president, and that’s pretty remarkable given where this country was just four years ago.

Shane: Jake, to close us out, I’ll just point out that since we started emailing back and forth, Bernie has registered one million volunteers and passed the $10 million mark in fundraising, and a new Morning Consult poll already has Sanders within two points of Biden. It’s worth remembering that in 2016, Sanders’ upward trajectory never stopped—he got closer and closer to Clinton, but he just started from too far behind to make up the gap. If you believe that some politicians just know what they’re doing, and if you believe he can withstand a year of establishment propaganda aimed at him, it’s hard not to see the early indicators as more evidence that he’s going to cruise to victory. In the meantime, all eyes are on Biden. Stay tuned!


https://www.usnews.com/news/us/articles/2019-02-26/former-us-ag-whitaker-to-clarify-house-testimony-nadler
Former U.S. AG Whitaker to Clarify House Testimony: Nadler
Feb. 26, 2019, at 9:04 p.m.
BY DAVID MORGAN

PHOTOGRAPH -- FILE PHOTO: Acting U.S. Attorney General Matthew Whitaker testifies before a House Judiciary Committee hearing on oversight of the Justice Department on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., February 8, 2019. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/File PhotoREUTERS

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former acting U.S. Attorney General Matthew Whitaker agreed to meet with lawmakers to clarify his testimony, a congressional leader said on Tuesday, referring to an appearance where Whitaker was quizzed about whether President Donald Trump had sought to influence investigations.

"I want to thank Mr. Whitaker for volunteering to meet with us to clarify his @HouseJudiciary testimony," Representative Jerrold Nadler, chairman of the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee, tweeted, saying he hoped to schedule Whitaker in the "coming days."

Lawmakers have not said what Whitaker will address from his Feb. 8 testimony, which Nadler previously said was "unsatisfactory, incomplete, or contradicted by other evidence."

But the most persistent questions then focused on whether Whitaker had contact with Trump about an investigation into hush-money payments to women during Trump's 2016 presidential campaign and Michael Cohen, Trump's former personal attorney.

The Justice Department, which has already said Whitaker stands by his testimony, had no immediate comment.

The brief tenure of Whitaker as head of the Justice Department ended on Feb. 14 when the Senate confirmed Trump's choice of permanent Attorney General William Barr.

The Judiciary Committee has obtained possible evidence suggesting that Trump asked Whitaker about possibly changing the prosecutor in charge of the hush-money probe, said a person familiar with the matter.

A House Judiciary Committee spokesman and a spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office declined to comment.

If true, such a request by Trump could bolster Democratic efforts to show that the president has sought to influence law enforcement investigations against him and his associates.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller is said to be close to ending a 21-month investigation into whether Russia meddled in the 2016 election to help Trump; whether Trump's campaign colluded with Moscow; and whether Trump has since obstructed justice.

Nadler's panel has information suggesting that Trump asked Whitaker if U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman could take control of an investigation of Cohen by prosecutors in the Southern District of New York, said the source who asked not to be identified.

Berman is a former law partner of another Trump attorney, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. Trump dismissed as false a report in the New York Times last week about a similar request to Whitaker.

Congressional investigators now have information that such a request was made and that Whitaker provided misleading testimony to the panel while under oath during his contentious Feb. 8 hearing, the source said.

In that session, Whitaker testified he had not talked to Trump about the probe and had not interfered with it in any way.

He also denied media reports that claimed that Trump had lashed out at Whitaker after he learned Cohen was pleading guilty to lying to Congress about a proposed Trump Tower in Moscow.

Nadler said then that media reports contradicted Whitaker's testimony and that "several individuals" had direct knowledge of phone calls Whitaker denied receiving from the White House.

Cohen was sentenced in December to three years in prison after pleading guilty to campaign finance violations, including making payments to adult film actress Stephanie Clifford, known as Stormy Daniels, and former Playboy model Karen McDougal. Cohen said he made those payments at the direction of Trump.

Both women have claimed they had affairs with Trump. He has denied having sex with Daniels and denied McDougal's claim.

Cohen testified behind closed doors to the Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday. He is expected to testify publicly on Wednesday before the House Oversight Committee.

(Additional reporting by Nathan Layne and Karen Freifeld; Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh and Cynthia Osterman)

Copyright 2019 Thomson Reuters.