Amanpour & Co. - August 26, 2024
From June 12, 2024, Journalist George Packer spent months reporting from Phoenix, where he investigated the quixotic growth fueling urban expansion — even as the water runs dry and the heat kills hundreds. Packer and climate expert Leah Stokes join the show. Co-directors Asif Kapadia and Joe Sabia on their film “Federer: Twelve Final Days.” Professor Leah Rigueur on the Black vote ahead of the 2024 election.
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00:00Hello, everyone, and welcome to Amanpour and Company.
00:07Here's what's coming up.
00:08We are playing Russian roulette with our planet.
00:13Hotter and hotter as climate records continue to shatter, I speak to Professor Leia Stokes
00:20and writer George Packer, who's just back from scorching Phoenix, Arizona.
00:25Finally, to the game of tennis, I love you and will never leave you.
00:32One of the greatest players in the history of the game, directors Asif Kapadia and Joe
00:37Sabia bring us never-before-seen footage of tennis icon Roger Federer's final days on
00:43court.
00:44Plus, African-Americans have been very vocal about how unhappy they are with the American
00:49two-party system.
00:50Professor Lea Rigger talks to Michelle Martin about the black voter dynamics that could
00:55swing the U.S. election.
01:15Amanpour and Company is made possible by the Anderson Family Endowment.
01:20Jim Atwood and Leslie Williams.
01:23Candace King Weir.
01:25The Family Foundation of Layla and Mickey Strauss.
01:29Mark J. Bleschner.
01:31The Philemon M. D'Agostino Foundation.
01:34Seton J. Melvin.
01:36Charles Rosenblum.
01:38Ku and Patricia Ewan, committed to bridging cultural differences in our communities.
01:44Barbara Hope Zuckerberg.
01:47Additional support provided by these funders and by contributions to your PBS station from
01:54viewers like you.
01:58Welcome to the program, everyone.
01:59I'm Christiane Amanpour in London.
02:02Today, Greece closed schools and even the Acropolis due to soaring temperatures as G7
02:08leaders traveled to Italy to discuss the planet's biggest threats, including the climate crisis.
02:13Last month was the hottest May ever, marking the 12th consecutive month that records were
02:19broken.
02:20In North America, a heat dome stretched across Mexico and the southwest United States in
02:26recent weeks, killing dozens of people.
02:28Listen to one woman describe the feeling in Arizona.
02:31So, to be honest, it feels like someone grabs a blow dryer and it's just blowing it straight
02:37in your face.
02:38That's exactly how it feels.
02:40It's really hot.
02:42Sometimes if you go outside, you feel like you can't breathe.
02:46Caught between increasing climate disaster and toxic partisan politics are people like
02:51that, many of whom who are living in the reality of climate change right now.
02:56In a major new cover story for The Atlantic, journalist George Packer spent months reporting
03:01from Phoenix, Arizona, exploring the quixotic growth fueling urban expansion, even as the
03:07water runs dry and the heat kills hundreds.
03:11But Packer found some glimmers of hope, writing, quote, partisanship mattered less than facts.
03:17Disinformation and conspiratorial thinking had no answer for a dry well.
03:22And George Packer joins me along with Professor Leah Stokes, an expert in climate and energy
03:27policy and co-host of the podcast, A Matter of Degrees.
03:32Welcome both of you to the program.
03:35George Packer, I just want to start because yours is entitled Phoenix is a Vision of America's
03:40Future.
03:41Describe how, what are all the intersecting issues that make it a vision of the future?
03:47Yeah, The Atlantic wanted me to go somewhere that would give us at least a laboratory where
03:54we could see how America is doing and where it's going.
03:58And Phoenix, I think, is about as good a lab as you can find because it really has all
04:03the major themes and conflicts and issues of our time.
04:09It has political extremism in a big way.
04:13Every election year is a tense year in Arizona, and this year is no exception.
04:19It has a climate crisis that you just described and that I reported on in my piece with unbearable
04:26heat, as well as disappearing water in some parts of the state.
04:30And it also has the border and immigration as a huge factor in the coming election.
04:35Abortion is another one.
04:37It's got this incredible nexus of issues, some of which divide people almost hopelessly
04:45and others have this odd effect of overcoming some of the divisions that seem so permanent
04:51and insuperable in our country.
04:54So before we get to some of the, you know, policies and things, I just want to read a
04:58little bit from your article because you experienced that extreme heat firsthand and you struggled
05:04to walk even a mile from your hotel to an interview without feeling unwell.
05:09Here's a quote.
05:10Last summer, heat officially helped kill 644 people in Maricopa County.
05:16They were the elderly, the sick, the mentally ill, the isolated, the homeless, the addicted.
05:22Methamphetamines causes dehydration and fentanyl impairs thought.
05:26And those too poor to own or fix or pay for air conditioning, without which a dwelling
05:30can become unlivable within an hour.
05:33Even touching the pavement is dangerous.
05:36You know, were you prepared for that kind of extreme?
05:40No, I don't like really hot weather.
05:45So I dreaded it.
05:47But when you're in it, you have this sense of real danger, imminent danger.
05:52If I lose my way on a walk, if I stay out too long, if I can't find water, you are risking
05:59your life.
06:00And people who are homeless, people who are vulnerable in the ways that I described are
06:06risking their lives every day and dying every day in the emergency rooms over the summer
06:10fill up with people coming in whose body temperatures are 106 or 7, which is heat stroke and can
06:16be fatal.
06:19People find ways of coping.
06:20The city of Phoenix has lots of innovative methods of allowing people to come inside
06:27and cool off in these cooling buses and cooling buildings.
06:32They're trying to plant more trees and build more shelters because it's a kind of naked
06:36exposed city in the summer.
06:39But it all feels unsustainable because driving, which is one way to cool off because you're
06:46in your car, which is air conditioned, is also burning you up because air conditioning
06:51causes 4 percent of global global emissions.
06:55So there and the temperature rises every year.
06:58There is no abating of it.
07:01And who knows where it will be in 25 years.
07:03So there is a sense of eight months of the year.
07:05It's paradise.
07:06And that's why people move there and four months of the year.
07:09It's deadly.
07:10Leah Stokes, let me ask you about, you know, you study this.
07:15You also study the, you know, the politics around it, environmental politics.
07:20So one of the things that George said, he quoted in his book in the article, whiskey
07:26is for drinking.
07:27Water is for fighting.
07:28You know, there's a lack of water, but apparently people didn't seem to think that that was
07:32something that, you know, should be an election issue or political issue.
07:39What are you seeing in terms of the politics around this now?
07:44Well, that's a great question.
07:47You know, the fact is, as we just heard, the climate crisis is happening now.
07:51For decades, it was sort of viewed as a problem for the future, something that would affect
07:56our grandchildren or maybe poorer people in developing countries, you know, maybe something
08:02for somebody else.
08:03And what we are seeing is that this is the climate crisis.
08:06It is on our doorsteps.
08:08This is what we are seeing in the United States at just one and a quarter degrees centigrade
08:12of warming.
08:13What happens when we blow past that 1.5 degrees target that, you know, governments around
08:18the world are trying to hold us to?
08:19What if we go to two degrees or two and a half degrees?
08:22What does life look like for everyday people?
08:26And so this is becoming a really important political issue.
08:29And in the United States, for example, with the upcoming election this fall, there's going
08:33to be a very clear choice between somebody who says he, quote, wants to be a dictator
08:38on day one to drill, drill, drill.
08:41That's, of course, Donald Trump and somebody who really is the best climate president this
08:45country has ever seen and has really focused on this issue.
08:48So will that play out in the election?
08:51Will people show up to vote for President Biden because of his climate record?
08:54I think it's too early to tell.
08:55But we're certainly seeing the impacts are hitting everyday Americans every day.
09:00Leah, I want to ask you a little bit more about the politics, because George says, you
09:04know, solving the problem of water depends on solving the problem of democracy.
09:08Here's another quote.
09:09The Republican Party there is more radical than any other state.
09:13But the chief qualification for viability is an embarrassingly discredited belief in
09:18rigged elections.
09:19So you've got that.
09:21How does that affect what people think about climate policy, Leah?
09:26Because there are conservative Republicans who do believe, I mean, they may be a small
09:31group, but they do believe that climate should be a unifier.
09:35And way back when, Republicans were, you know, it wasn't a partisan issue.
09:40You are absolutely right.
09:42This is something that I've written about in my book and many other political scientists
09:45have studied.
09:46In the past, right wing parties around the world were more supportive of climate action.
09:51For example, George H.W. Bush and even George W. Bush were supportive of doing things on
09:56climate change.
09:57Unfortunately, the fossil fuel industry has really taken hold of right wing parties like
10:03the Republican Party in the United States, but many right wing parties around the world.
10:07They have become really a chief constituency in the Republican Party.
10:11And you'll hear, for example, Senator Whitehouse from Rhode Island talk about this a lot.
10:16The unlimited campaign contributions that we're seeing in the post Citizens United world
10:21means that fossil fuel companies can pour so much money into our elections.
10:26And they really have, for example, primaried the few Republicans, people like Representative
10:31Bob Inglis, who cared about climate change.
10:34And even people like, for example, Senator McCain from Arizona, who cared about climate
10:39change.
10:40These people were challenged in part with fossil fuel money by having these primary
10:45challenges.
10:46And that is part of why the Republican Party has moved so far away from climate action.
10:52And George, when you were getting testimonials from all these people, you know, whiskey is
10:56for drinking, water is for fighting.
10:59But on the other hand, you know, there's no conspiracy theory, I'm paraphrasing now, that
11:03can account for a dry well.
11:05What feeling did you get from ordinary people in Phoenix about whether this was an issue
11:10that should be legislated, that climate should be something that governments, not just individuals,
11:18take care of?
11:20I think when you put it in the biggest terms possible, which is climate change, it immediately
11:27gets pulled into the vortex of the culture wars and the partisan wars, and the sides
11:33line up and nothing gets done legislatively.
11:36But if you look at it locally, and in terms of a community's water supply, or even the
11:42well in somebody's backyard in a rural county, a conservative rural county in southern Arizona,
11:50once people find that they're losing their water, and it's in Arizona, it's partly because
11:56in rural areas, there is no regulation.
11:59Phoenix is highly regulated, and Phoenix has a lot of water.
12:03It's not about to run out.
12:04But ex-urban communities around Phoenix, and even more rural areas around the state, are
12:10risking their groundwater.
12:13And it's because it's unregulated, and big agribusinesses are coming in from out of state,
12:19and even from other countries, and pumping relentlessly.
12:23Local people, including MAGA Republicans, are upset about that, and are now starting
12:29to demand that their state representatives allow legislation to pass that would regulate
12:35groundwater.
12:36It's still stuck in the partisan gears of the Arizona state legislature, but what's
12:40interesting to me is to watch actual personal experience of that incontrovertible fact,
12:46that my well is dry, change the mind of a voter.
12:51And that seems to me like the beginning of a sane politics around climate.
12:56In other words, when it happens to me, no matter what side of the political aisle I
12:59am on, I can see the devastating effects of it.
13:03And in your piece, basically you say Joe Biden's infrastructure, microchip, climate bills,
13:09are sending billions of dollars to the valley where you were, but I hardly ever heard them
13:14mentioned.
13:15So I want to ask both of you, basically we're not hearing much about climate in any of the
13:21political manifestos and talking points that both parties are using right now on the campaign
13:28trail.
13:29Leah, let me ask you about that.
13:30Do you think people will vote on climate?
13:36Young people?
13:37Well, I certainly hope so.
13:39The fact is the Republicans have put out a plan.
13:42It's called Project 2025.
13:44And people like Bill McKibben have written about this in The Nation.
13:47And it is a very detailed plan for how to dismantle our federal infrastructure.
13:52Things like getting rid of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which literally
13:56just keeps track of data around what is happening to our earth.
14:01They want to dismantle the Environmental Protection Agency.
14:04We saw what a first Trump administration would do, rolling back almost 100 environmental
14:09rules, pulling us out of the Paris Climate Agreement.
14:12And what does a well-organized second Trump administration look like?
14:17If you want to know what it looks like, look at that Project 2025 document.
14:21It's very scary.
14:22By contrast, what the Biden folks want to do is they want to keep delivering.
14:26And as you're saying, why don't people know about it more?
14:28Well, this law is just beginning to roll out.
14:31And we really need those four more years for all of those jobs to start rolling into these
14:36communities, for people to get electric vehicles, for them to put in a heat pump, to start seeing
14:41those benefits.
14:42You know, laws take time to really take hold.
14:44And with those crucial years before 2030, whoever wins this fall election will really
14:50be rewriting world history when it comes to the climate crisis.
14:54So I certainly hope people understand the climate stakes of this election, because they're
14:57monumental.
14:58Well, interestingly, one of his previous transition people did say that they would reverse everything
15:06that Biden has done.
15:08Do either of you know whether any of Biden's climate initiatives have a sort of baked in
15:14or all or many of them reversible?
15:17George?
15:18Well, what I would add to what Professor Stokes said is I'm not sure that policy and voting
15:26are as connected as we think they are or as they used to be.
15:29I think people vote more and more along what I would call tribal lines.
15:35This is my identity.
15:36This is who I vote for.
15:38And if they discover that Biden's three big legislative achievements have brought a battery
15:46plant to their town, they may not think, therefore, I will vote for Biden.
15:51It may just kind of go in one ear and out the other.
15:54I saw a lot of that, just national politics and the ins and outs of Washington legislation
16:00having very little effect on people's thinking about the election.
16:05And it's also, I think, the failure of the Biden administration itself to defend its
16:12achievements and to speak for them.
16:14And that goes to the president himself, who is not a master of rhetoric and rhetoric is
16:18important in politics.
16:19So that doesn't quite answer your question.
16:21But I do think we shouldn't expect there to be a logical cause and effect if a bill gets
16:27passed by a president that leads to certain electoral results.
16:31And Professor Stokes, you know, overseas, we've just seen the European elections and
16:36the Greens didn't do very well, which is very different to what happened the last time there
16:40were these parliamentary elections.
16:45All this emotion and enthusiasm around Greta Thunberg, which really powered a Green sort
16:51of momentum in Europe a few years ago, seems to have not materialized this time.
16:59What are you seeing overseas as well?
17:01Because even the Europeans have tried to have a, you know, a Green recovery, so to
17:06speak.
17:07Yeah.
17:08I mean, look, the polling going into those elections in the last few days was worse than
17:13what the actual outcome was.
17:14It's true that the Green parties did not do very well and there were some surging in the
17:18far right.
17:19But it was not as bad as people were predicting in the polls.
17:22And the coalition that will continue to govern does want climate action.
17:27And of course, as you know, what really matters is who is controlling the countries in the
17:31European Union.
17:32So, for example, the election coming up in the UK within a month, which looks like the
17:37Labour government, the Labour Party may regain government.
17:41It's going to be crucial that they actually govern on climate change, that they use these
17:46years up till 2030 to make a difference.
17:48Because as you were saying, we could be seeing rollbacks in the United States.
17:52In fact, we would be if Donald Trump becomes president.
17:54And so countries around the world really need to be electing climate leaders and having
18:00them deliver.
18:01Because 2030 is just really one election cycle away.
18:04The elections this year will determine the fate of our climate goals.
18:09Because that is one of those benchmark years for achieving all the dates and the limits
18:15that we've been told by the UN.
18:17You know, we have been reporting on young people, for instance, in Montana, in the United
18:22States and elsewhere, elderly people in the U.S. and in places like, I think it was Switzerland,
18:28who took, you know, the authorities, government, whoever it was, to court for their own human
18:34rights in terms of the right to be, you know, healthy and to have their wildlife, etc.
18:39Do you think, Lea and even George, that they have weight in the political universe right
18:49now?
18:50First to you, Professor Stokes.
18:52Yeah, I really think that George's reporting is showing what the front lines of climate
18:56change look like, as are these court cases.
18:59You know, people are connecting the dots.
19:01They're starting to understand that climate change is happening now.
19:04And that's even starting to break some of the partisan division, as George was talking
19:07about.
19:08And so these court cases are really starting to change the dialogue.
19:12There's also laws beginning to be passed, like in Vermont, really just in the last couple
19:16weeks that say that the fossil fuel companies who lied about climate change, they will be
19:22responsible for paying for some of the damages that they caused.
19:25So we're really moving into the climate change era where damages are happening now.
19:29And I think that is going to start to shift the politics.
19:32And last final quick word to you, George, did you come away with any optimism from all
19:37of that very intense reporting?
19:40Again, when I was very close to people's lives as they lived them and as they experienced
19:47them, yes, people were sane.
19:48They were rational.
19:49They made rational choices about what they needed in order to make sure they would have
19:52water or even they would not die of heat.
19:56But I think the bigger this issue gets, the more abstract, the more global, the harder
20:01it is to move people on it.
20:03Climate is a very low priority in most polls before elections.
20:08It matters hugely who gets elected, as Professor Stokes was saying.
20:13But it doesn't necessarily get people elected.
20:16And that's the worry I have year after year and why we keep kicking the can down the road.
20:21George Packer, Professor Leah Stokes, thank you both very much indeed for joining us.
20:26Next, we turn to a true legend.
20:29When tennis great Roger Federer retired two years ago, it was the end of an extraordinary
20:34career.
20:35In Grand Slam after Grand Slam, he racked up the titles while appearing eerily calm
20:40and grounded.
20:42But for him, the tantrums of other greats like McEnroe or even Djokovic.
20:46Now a new documentary takes a look at the enigmatic Swiss giant following him behind
20:51the scenes in the last 12 days of his career.
20:54Here's a clip from the trailer.
20:56I thought until this morning I had emotions in check, but I can feel it coming up.
21:03He will play the Labour Cup.
21:06That'll be his last match of his career.
21:08Djokovic, Nadal, Murray, they're all going to be there.
21:11No, I will not have this feeling again.
21:14It's painful.
21:15A mountain of memories are flooding back to him right now.
21:20These are the nerves I'm going to miss once I'm officially retired.
21:27Finally, to the game of tennis, I love you and will never leave you.
21:35The film is called Federer 12 Final Days and it is co-directed by Asif Kapadia, known for
21:41highly acclaimed documentaries like Amy and Senna, and Joe Sabia, best known as the creator
21:46of Vogue's 73 Questions, and both join me here on set.
21:51Let me ask you first, how did you come up with this?
21:58How did it come about?
21:59Well, I was saying I didn't search for this.
22:01This kind of searched for me because in 2019, I interviewed Roger for 73 Questions and it
22:06was the best interview that we've done.
22:07He had a good experience.
22:08I had a good experience.
22:10And I kept in touch with his team.
22:11So in 2022 comes around, I get invited into his office where his agent, Tony, says, top
22:17secret, don't tell anyone, but Roger's going to retire from the sport of tennis next week
22:20and he's going to do it via his Instagram page in an audio message.
22:24And then 12 days after that, he's going to play his last match.
22:27Should we film something?
22:28I'm like, of course you should film something.
22:30So film something as a home video, a personal memento, or as a documentary?
22:34He's a private guy, so I think there were reservations, especially from Roger, like,
22:39I don't want to put this out to the world.
22:41I'm so private.
22:42So the opportunity arose to say, okay, well, we can go in his home for the first time.
22:46We're going to capture his children for the first time.
22:48His wife, Mirka, may give an interview for the first time in 20 years.
22:51So I definitely agreed that this should be something that's private.
22:54It should probably never see the light of day.
22:56And that gave Roger the comfort to allow me, another cameraman, and a sound guy to capture it all.
23:02And then Asif, how did you come into this?
23:04I mean, obviously you have a record as the preeminent sports and other documentarians,
23:09but how did you get into this?
23:11I knew nothing.
23:12I didn't know any of it.
23:13You didn't even know Roger Federer was going to resign?
23:15No, I didn't know anything about that.
23:17I didn't know Joe.
23:18I just was sent, like, some material.
23:20I was sent a link saying, have a look at this.
23:22Would you be interested in kind of turning it into a feature film?
23:25Because this has been created.
23:27It's a home movie.
23:28No one's meant to see it.
23:29And I had a look at it.
23:30I have to be honest.
23:31At the beginning, I was like, I'm not sure.
23:32Not sure this is for me.
23:33But I watched it, and I found it really emotional.
23:35And I thought, this is interesting because it's basically, it's not a life story.
23:38It's about getting old.
23:39Exactly, exactly.
23:41It's not the whole arc of a fantastic career.
23:44It's those 12 final days.
23:46So, emotional.
23:47I'm going to play a clip.
23:48You've given us a few clips.
23:49And this is, I mean, I think it's quite funny because Federer is known for being quite emotional.
23:55Let's play this clip.
24:03Do I have to move to the side like that?
24:05Yeah, no problem.
24:08I feel like I'm ready to start and get it behind me.
24:12That's how I feel, my God.
24:14Hopefully, I will not be using those tissues today.
24:17But I'm an emotional guy, so we'll never know.
24:20I mean, were you having to sort of navigate his, you know, the tap works throughout?
24:25I just arrived from a flight from Switzerland that morning.
24:29And I'm in that room.
24:30I lost my luggage.
24:31It didn't arrive for days.
24:32And we're just figuring it out.
24:34How are we going to do this with just two cameras and a sound guy?
24:37So, everything you see is just so there's no time to prep.
24:40There's no time to plan.
24:41Just shoot and see what happens.
24:43So, he's in that moment.
24:45You're watching the feels.
24:46You're watching the nerves.
24:47You're watching him go through something like looking off of an edge of a cliff and feeling like you're about to jump.
24:53And that was that moment.
24:54That was the tension in the room.
24:55It was so special.
24:56And then you, who knew nothing about it, what was, how did you then shape the story?
25:03What was it about this actually really interesting end of a person's career?
25:08Yeah.
25:09So, for me, it's always interesting to kind of say, well, what is this film going to be?
25:13What is it about?
25:14I'm of a certain age now.
25:16And I'm looking at it going, well, you know, I'm a director.
25:19I hope I can carry on directing in my 60s, 70s, 80s if I want.
25:22A lot of my heroes carried on until really late in life.
25:24If you're an athlete, there's a point when your body just can't do it anymore.
25:27So, I thought that was interesting.
25:29And also, the way I read this, like my other films, I was given this archive.
25:34There's all this material of a particular period of time.
25:36I didn't know Joe at the time.
25:38I didn't know anything.
25:39I hadn't met Roger.
25:40And I just started looking at the material with my editor, Avi.
25:43And then the idea was, well, let's keep it for what it is.
25:46Let's just protect that form for a period of time.
25:49But through it, we go off to tangents.
25:51We go to the past.
25:52There's, like, the history of great tennis players that all appear at different points.
25:56McEnroe, Lever, Borg.
25:58And we say a little bit about each of them.
26:00There is archive, but it's not.
26:01And Nadal, of course.
26:02And his friends and his rivals.
26:04We're in the locker room.
26:05We're in the car.
26:06We're in the elevator.
26:07You know, we meet the family.
26:08And it was just this idea of telling a character's story,
26:12but through a very small framing device.
26:14And I thought that was interesting.
26:16I hadn't really seen that before.
26:17No, I hadn't either.
26:18And I will say that for the first 27 minutes, I was, you know, it's an hour and 27 minutes.
26:23And I was trying to figure out where are you going, what are you doing,
26:25because that was the first bit of him announcing and all the rest of it.
26:29But then it suddenly got into this chapter.
26:33People don't like to talk about aging.
26:35They don't want to talk about retiring.
26:37They don't want to be, you know, knocked off their pedestal.
26:40Do you think that was it just the knee?
26:44What was it that caused him to retire then?
26:47Was it the injuries?
26:49I think the knee surgeries had a large part to do with it, for sure.
26:52I think the knees made him a different player.
26:55But more significantly, I think it forced him to be just a normal human
27:00to realize that age catches up with everyone at a certain point.
27:04This is something that Asif latched on to when Rodgers coach Severin says that epic line,
27:10athletes die twice.
27:12And I think what you're noticing is a real-time,
27:14moment-by-moment observation and realization of this fact.
27:17And that's what makes it so compelling is that this is so raw.
27:21There's a subtlety to this.
27:24But even more importantly, the fact that no one's giving their say
27:27about how it all needs to unfold.
27:29There's no development executives telling Rodgers how to do this.
27:32Rodgers is not telling us how to capture this.
27:34So you're capturing something that feels unique in a time where everyone expects
27:37for docs to be so big and so loud and trying to do everything.
27:40Exactly, and the fact that he was just going to retire,
27:43I mean, he was one of the greatest ever.
27:46I mean, and he was just going to put something on social media,
27:49you know, goes to what you've just said.
27:51There was no big, you know, direction about how to step off the stage.
27:57And I want to play this clip because we see him himself comparing his own temperament
28:04to, let's say, Djokovic's.
28:08The Federer fans in the beginning didn't really like him
28:11because they just thought, well, Rodgers is, like, a bit more easy.
28:14You know, he does it with ease.
28:16Then Nova came in with his strong personality
28:18and that unbelievable grit of wanting to win at all costs.
28:24I know that this was something I was criticized a lot heavily.
28:27Why wouldn't I fight more when losing?
28:29I didn't quite understand what that meant.
28:31Do I have to grunt? Do I have to sweat more?
28:33Do I have to shout more?
28:34Do I have to be more aggressive towards my opponents?
28:36What is it?
28:38I tried, but it was all an act.
28:41I'm not like that. It's not my personality.
28:44I just think that's such a fascinating insight, Joe.
28:47Really tricky to make that balance.
28:50Yeah, I credit Asif for figuring out how to make the archive go deeper
28:55than the surface that I scratched.
28:57And that was Asif's job in pulling that out.
28:59Yeah, no, but I just mean the fact that he had to deal with his public persona.
29:04Was he going to, you know, scream and shout and do a tantrum?
29:08But he didn't.
29:09I don't know whether you ever discussed anything like that with him
29:12in the 73 questions.
29:14Oh, no, no, no, definitely not that.
29:17I think the thing that was interesting about 73 questions
29:20is that you see him engaging with the ball kids
29:22and spending time to talk to them.
29:24You see him answering questions like,
29:25what rival do you dread playing the most and enjoy playing the most?
29:28And his answer is Rafael Nadal.
29:30A little bit of a precursor to what you see.
29:32What I think is really more interesting is what you don't see in 73 questions,
29:35is specifically him about to play his last slam where he made it to the finals.
29:41He ended up losing to Djokovic.
29:43But this is a guy who has his knee injuries on his mind.
29:45This is a guy who's so concerned that his wife and his family
29:48are going to witness something catastrophic,
29:50given this knee situation, the anxiety in that.
29:52So I think the relief and the release that everyone feels when watching this,
29:56knowing that he finally got through this retirement okay,
29:58he did it safely, he did it with class, he did it with elegance,
30:01is something that's very palpable.
30:04I actually got to interview him in 2015 at Wimbledon
30:07and I sort of delicately broached the issue of,
30:10because I'd been told by people who knew him that as a kid,
30:13he had been quite emotional.
30:15He wasn't above throwing a racket round and his parents had to get him in hand
30:19and tell him how to behave.
30:21So this is our clip.
30:23You seem to have this equanimity about you.
30:25Losing doesn't put you into some kind of vortex of despair.
30:29Andy Murray's mother has been quoted as saying
30:31when he lost to you in 2012 here,
30:33he was desperate and sad and weeping for days.
30:37It affects some people, but it doesn't seem to affect you.
30:41Not so much, you know. I agree.
30:43I think I used to be so emotional when I was younger
30:46that I learned from that.
30:48I cried too often when I was younger,
30:50all the way from, I'd say, eight to about 20.
30:53It was unbelievable emotional years for me.
30:55Every time I lost, I would basically cry.
30:57Even as a pro, sometimes on court,
30:59sometimes I could manage to get off the court and then break down,
31:02which was better.
31:04But eventually I got my act together
31:06and now I take it like a man and five minutes later I'm fine again.
31:11Of course I'm also disappointed that I have to either wait a year
31:14until Wimbledon rolls around
31:16or until the next Olympic comes around.
31:18It takes four years, but it just goes with the territory.
31:21You can't win them all, but what you can do is give it all you have.
31:24And once you have no regrets,
31:26I think you can accept losses also a little bit easier.
31:28I think it's amazing. I think it's really amazing.
31:30First of all, that he's a grown man
31:32who is not afraid to show his emotions,
31:34therefore gives a lot of boys and men permission to show their emotions.
31:38But I wonder...
31:39It's a film with lots of grown men crying.
31:41Yes, it really is!
31:43It really is. What happens is he sets everyone else off
31:46because he's coming to the end of his career
31:49and all of his rivals are there in the room
31:51and they can see it's going to be me soon.
31:53What am I going to do?
31:54And all of them are thinking, what next?
31:56What do we do now?
31:57I didn't think that. You're right, of course,
31:59because now Nadal is in question.
32:01Djokovic had to pull out of Roland Garros
32:03and had surgery for his meniscus.
32:05You can't fight time.
32:06So that's what's really interesting.
32:08It's about him, but it's really about them.
32:10And I think the audience, all of us go through this moment
32:12saying we've come to the end of a certain part of our life.
32:14What are we going to do next?
32:16So that's what I find kind of powerful.
32:18It's quite subtle compared to so many other films I've done,
32:20but it's also quite Roger.
32:22That's him. He's quite contained, very Swiss,
32:25turns up on time, really, really polite and a gentleman,
32:28but he's got all this emotion underneath it.
32:30I think seeing these athletes be so open with their emotions,
32:34I've not seen anything like that.
32:36I was going to ask you how it compared to, for instance,
32:40I know Senna was not alive when you did it,
32:42but Diego Maradona, Senna, their personas,
32:46how did they compare in this kind of regard?
32:48I think for me, the challenge is to look at the material,
32:51study the archive, try to understand their psyche.
32:55And then the film has to be true to the character.
32:57So Amy is about Amy and she's very different to Roger.
33:00I don't know if Roger's ever been to Camden.
33:02They're very different where they're from.
33:04And so the film has got to be true to the person you're making it about.
33:07And so that's the thing.
33:09Rather than imposing a style on each one,
33:11it's really about the film is kind of a reference
33:14or a vision, visually, of the person.
33:17And Roger's very different.
33:19Tennis is very different to Formula One.
33:21Tennis is very different to football if you're from a favela,
33:24you know, in South America and live in Naples.
33:27That's not the same as Wimbledon.
33:28So the films are not going to be the same.
33:30So this, I believe, the next clip we have,
33:34I think it's about the Lever Cup,
33:36the final meeting of them all and his final game.
33:39Let's just play this little clip.
33:42CHEERING
34:04Just, I guess, seeing all the other players, that was hard.
34:09They were so emotional.
34:15Their whole career, I've been there.
34:18It is. I mean, the audience was crying.
34:21Everybody was crying.
34:23When you see that, what do you think...
34:26Obviously, they had such a bond.
34:28They all respected Roger. They all respected each other.
34:31They were just so top of the game.
34:33Do you think that we will see another rival?
34:36I mean, when you see people like Carlos and Yannick Sinner,
34:40do you think that we're going to see another great rivalry
34:43that Roger has inspired, you know,
34:45a whole new and younger generation of male players?
34:49I mean, if you asked me this question years ago,
34:51I wouldn't know how to answer because I wasn't a tennis fan.
34:54But after this experience, I watched tennis enough
34:57to be able to have an opinion to say that, yes,
34:59the new generation is playing at a level, I think,
35:02a lot of people have never witnessed before.
35:04And I think people like Roger, Rafa, of course Djokovic,
35:07have inspired a whole generation to kind of break through
35:11to a level unseen before.
35:13But the question, I think, on a lot of people's minds,
35:16and I was really captivated by the unanimity
35:19of how everyone agrees that Roger did it most beautifully.
35:22I think, yes, because I think everybody struggles
35:25with how to do it, and that's why this film
35:27is so interesting in that regard.
35:29I want to play my final clip.
35:31It's about Mirka, his wife, and as you said,
35:33she's basically never given an interview.
35:35This isn't her, actually.
35:36This is Roger talking about her, but it's very interesting.
35:40It's only afterwards where I started to realise
35:43how much Mirka's been suffering.
35:45I don't remember her begging me to stop,
35:48but of course she was asking the question,
35:51why are we still doing this?
35:54I know that for her sitting there,
35:56she really didn't like that anymore because she could feel
35:59I was not going to be the best anymore.
36:01We've got 30 seconds.
36:03Her value.
36:04I think she's the person who moves me the most in the film.
36:07Whenever she turns up on the screen and speaks
36:10and is also emotional, she's the one who makes me cry personally.
36:14Tennis is so unusual.
36:15No other sport has the wife or the girlfriend or the family
36:18constantly there to cut away to.
36:20You don't have that in football, you don't have that in rugby.
36:22Tennis, it's all a part of the story, isn't it?
36:24It's the family and the coach and the wife or girlfriend.
36:27And that was a great story. Or husband.
36:29They met at the Australia Olympics.
36:32She was a tennis player.
36:33Injury forced her to retire early and she supported him forever.
36:37Incredible woman.
36:38Yeah, and it's a really, really good film.
36:40And it comes out on the 20th, correct?
36:42Next week. Wonderful.
36:43Josebia Asif Kapadia, thank you so much indeed.
36:47Now, as the US November election draws closer,
36:50Republicans and Democrats are treading a fine line
36:54between appealing to their loyal base and undecided voters.
36:57For Democrats, Black voters have historically been
37:00a bastion of support, but recent data warns
37:03against taking them for granted.
37:05In fact, a Pew research poll showed about half
37:08would replace both presidential candidates,
37:10hinting at their growing disaffection
37:12with the Democratic Party.
37:14And to understand why, Michelle Martin speaks with
37:17Leah Rigueur, Associate Professor of History
37:20at Johns Hopkins University.
37:22Thanks, Christiane.
37:23Professor Leah Rigueur, thank you so much for joining us.
37:26Thanks for having me.
37:27As we are speaking now, there have been a slew
37:30of headlines about African-American voters,
37:33Black voters, and their sort of ambivalent feelings
37:37about the candidates.
37:38So why don't we just, before we kind of dig into the data,
37:41why don't we just kind of just drill down
37:44and say what are the most important themes
37:47to be looking at right now and what's just noise?
37:50So I think some of the things that we should be looking at
37:53are the levels of dissatisfaction
37:55with the American political process.
37:57African-Americans have been very vocal about how unhappy
38:00they are with the American two-party system.
38:03And a lot of it, I think, has to do with, you know,
38:06overall trends in the larger country.
38:10And in that respect, African-Americans are just like
38:12their white counterparts or their Asian counterparts
38:15or their Latino counterparts.
38:17They deeply care about the economy.
38:19They care about social mobility.
38:21They care about their communities.
38:22And for many of these people, they have seen that, you know,
38:25the policies that either the Biden administration
38:28has touted or, in some cases,
38:29that the Trump administration has touted,
38:31that none of those have actually affected
38:33their lived experience.
38:34So when you see African-Americans,
38:36and when we interview African-Americans
38:38or poll them across a wide field of data,
38:42we tend to see overwhelmingly that they are deeply unhappy
38:46with their position and their lived experience
38:48within the United States.
38:50Is this more of an issue for Democrats writ large
38:54than it is for Republicans?
38:55Because we keep seeing how there are Republicans
38:58who, you know, aren't in love with their choice either.
39:00I guess what I'm asking you is,
39:02are African-American voters dissatisfied
39:05because of their lived experience as Black people,
39:08or are they dissatisfied because Democrats overall
39:11are satisfied and because they tend to be Democrats?
39:14So it's all of the above.
39:16And I will tell you that this is a larger problem
39:18for the Democratic Party
39:19than it is for the Republican Party.
39:21One of the things that we've seen
39:23over the last several presidential cycles
39:25is that Republican candidates can win
39:28without a majority or even a large percentage
39:32of the Black vote.
39:33But we also know that Democrats can win
39:37with the help of this very large
39:39and loyal Black base of voters.
39:41And so the real problem is the enthusiasm problem.
39:45Democrats need Black voters
39:47in order to win presidential elections.
39:50Republicans only need a small sliver of Black voters
39:54in order to win elections.
39:55And this is why I say that in many ways
39:58it's an uphill battle for Democrats in this respect.
40:01Republicans only need a low turnout from Black voters
40:05in order to win elections
40:07as of the last really 50-some-odd years.
40:10And so part of what the Democrats are facing
40:13is we have this incredibly loyal base,
40:15a block of voters for whom no other demographic
40:19within the United States functions this way.
40:22And yet because they have been so loyal
40:24and because they vote as a block
40:26in overwhelming numbers for the Democratic Party
40:29and have done so since really 1964,
40:32we begin to see that Democrats
40:34are taking Black voters for granted
40:36or treat it in very superficial ways.
40:39Black voters have expressed over the years
40:43both anger, disenchantment, disillusionment
40:46with the feeling that they aren't being appreciated
40:49in the way that the Republican Party
40:51appreciates its white base.
40:53So it is a question of loyalty,
40:54but it's also a question of what have you done for us lately?
40:57According to a survey from GenForward
41:00at the University of Chicago,
41:02this survey found that 17% of Black voters
41:05would vote for Donald Trump
41:07if the elections were held today,
41:09today being when the poll was taken.
41:11First of all, do you think that's a valid number?
41:13And secondly, what do you make of it?
41:15I think the number, there's probably a little bit,
41:17it's probably off a little bit.
41:19One of the things that we see
41:21is the number that people give
41:22in these kind of polling data
41:25tends to be offset by at the end of the day
41:27when people go into the ballot box,
41:29they either vote for the Democratic candidate
41:31or they don't vote at all, right?
41:33So it manifests itself as a non-vote
41:35at the top of the ticket.
41:37But I also want to remind people
41:39that anything within the range of 18,
41:41roughly 18%,
41:43is actually within the norm
41:45of the last 50 some odd years.
41:48We tend not to see it as the norm
41:50because of the Obama era.
41:52If the Obama era, those numbers are just astronomical
41:56because of the overwhelming level of Black support
41:59for the first Black president.
42:01But what we see starting in 2016 really
42:03is a return to the average.
42:05So I like to say that when we see these Trump numbers,
42:08whether they were in 2016, 2020, or 2024,
42:12we are seeing a return to home,
42:15that essentially Black people who vote
42:17for the Republican Party are coming home.
42:20The other thing that I think is important to keep in mind
42:23is that when Black people perceive
42:25very little difference
42:27between the two major political parties,
42:29really one of three things happens.
42:32Either they vote for a third party candidate,
42:35they don't vote altogether,
42:37or in very small numbers,
42:39within the mean of what we're seeing with the Gen Forward,
42:42I think, polling data,
42:43they will vote for and support Republicans.
42:46So I think that tells us something
42:48about how Black voters perceive the Democratic Party,
42:52or at least 17% to 20%.
42:55We also know that younger Black voters
42:57are increasingly expressing dissatisfaction
43:00with the Democratic Party.
43:02Many of them have indicated
43:03that they view President Biden and his administration,
43:06whether rightly or wrongly,
43:07they view that administration
43:09as either indifferent or outwardly hostile
43:11to issues of civil rights.
43:13Say more about that.
43:14Why?
43:15Behind closed doors,
43:16or even really not behind closed doors,
43:17a lot of the Democratic strategists
43:19will express surprise and dismay.
43:20They're like, well, what about Kamala Harris,
43:22the first African-American slash South Asian person
43:25to hold that seat?
43:27What about all the efforts
43:28that the president has made on college loans
43:31to cancel that debt?
43:32Or, you know, they look at things like that
43:34and they go, what's the story?
43:36So what is that?
43:38You know, one of the pushbacks I always get,
43:40including from Democratic strategists
43:42or even just the general public,
43:43is, well, why are we so concerned?
43:45It's still, you know, the number is still like 80%
43:47of African-Americans or Black voters
43:49support the Democratic candidates.
43:51And yes, that may be true,
43:52but it's also true that there is a slow trickle
43:55of Black voters who are expressing dissatisfaction
43:58and also articulating a kind of argument
44:01about the failures of the Democratic Party.
44:04And so part of what I would put forward
44:06is that we're not necessarily seeing
44:08a robust effort on the part of Republicans.
44:12They're not winning Black voters over
44:13because of their policies or procedures or programs,
44:16but instead because of the failures
44:18of the Democratic Party
44:20to connect organically and authentically
44:22to a very, I think, tense section,
44:27cross section of Black voters.
44:29And in that case, one of the things that we know
44:32is that there is a way in which the Democratic Party
44:36has completely missed an opportunity
44:38to really get down organically
44:40and understand the needs, the desires,
44:43and the frustrations of Black voters in many ways.
44:47What does that look like?
44:49The Obama approach, I would maybe,
44:51you could argue the Obama-Biden approach
44:53has been to act on policy
44:57without labeling it as being for the benefit
45:00of these groups, right?
45:02Their approach has been,
45:03we're going to work on policy
45:05and we're going to present this policy
45:07as beneficial to the country at large
45:10and read between the lines.
45:12If you cancel student debt,
45:13who has the most student debt?
45:15It's certain groups.
45:16If you make health care more widely available
45:18through the Affordable Care Act,
45:20read between the lines.
45:21Who does it benefit?
45:22Is it really that the messaging needs to be
45:25this is for you?
45:26Or are there other policies
45:28that the Democrats aren't pursuing
45:30that African-Americans identify
45:32and say you're failing us?
45:34All of the above.
45:35And I would think back to the 2020 Democratic primaries
45:39where there was a real conversation,
45:41an actual real conversation between the candidates,
45:44the front-runner candidates,
45:45both in the 2020 and 2016 presidential primaries
45:50about what would it look like to have policies
45:52that are aimed specifically
45:54at African-American communities.
45:56And in 2020, President Biden said,
46:00I will appoint a black woman to the Supreme Court
46:03and he did it.
46:04And it was one of the most powerful things
46:06that he could do,
46:07even though the naming of a black woman
46:09and saying I want to put a black woman
46:11on the Supreme Court
46:12is something that may have alienated
46:14ostensibly racist people
46:15that maybe the Democrats needed to win.
46:18And yet it paid off political dividends.
46:20It paid off heavily
46:21and it was rewarding, essentially,
46:23the most loyal constituency of his base.
46:26What else should the administration be doing
46:28that they're not?
46:29Voting rights, criminal justice reform,
46:31and some kind of large economic incentive.
46:34And I don't want to take away
46:36from the ways in which the Biden administration
46:38has actually done those things
46:40through colorblind policy.
46:42They have done that.
46:43The messaging around it, though, is deeply important,
46:46particularly in the way that you are conveying
46:48to audiences who feel left behind.
46:50One of the things that the Trump administration
46:53did very well
46:54is that they spoke explicitly to their core base,
46:57the people that they needed to win.
46:59And a lot of people, I think,
47:00were taken aback by that.
47:02But actually, if you look at it
47:03on the grand scheme of things,
47:04it was an incredibly important strategy.
47:06You need people enthusiastic around these things.
47:08But you also need policy wins,
47:11very big policy wins.
47:13And so I think for many audiences,
47:15you can point and say,
47:16well, I'm being gridlocked,
47:17and all those things are true.
47:18I'm being blocked out of Congress.
47:20It's not possible to do these things.
47:22But that's not what audiences see.
47:24They see themselves being left behind.
47:26You know, we've talked about, you know, policy.
47:28We've talked about sort of messaging.
47:30But do you think that there are
47:31some other factors as well,
47:32like behind the disaffection of Black voters?
47:36The number one problem is disaffection
47:39with policy and lived experience.
47:41But something else that we've seen
47:43really just explode over the last eight years
47:45is that there is a concerted cyber effort,
47:47international cyber effort,
47:49that is explicitly aimed at Black voters
47:52and Black people more generally.
47:54It pops up across these various
47:56kind of technological platforms,
47:58including Instagram, Facebook,
48:01Twitter, now known as X, TikTok.
48:04One of the things that's remarkable
48:05about these, I think, concerted efforts
48:08is that they are built on kernels of truth
48:10and frustration that African Americans
48:12and Black voters have with the Democratic Party.
48:15And then, of course, what happens
48:16is that these things are blown up
48:18into misinformation,
48:20into people in digital Blackface, right?
48:22These kinds of conversations
48:24that take on a life of their own.
48:26And then the other thing that we know
48:28is that it is very hard, if not impossible,
48:31to track how these things are showing up.
48:33I know during the last election,
48:34there were a couple of accounts
48:35that were very much a product
48:37of Russian troll farms
48:38who were basically studying
48:39sort of points of division
48:41in the American society
48:43and actively kind of poking at them.
48:45Exactly.
48:46And so I think the best kind of
48:50misinformation or disinformation
48:53is the kind that starts
48:55from a kernel of truth
48:57because it makes it far more believable
48:59or a kernel of frustration.
49:01So if you know that, for example,
49:03Black men feel very strongly
49:05about the criminal justice system
49:07and about the disproportionate way
49:08in which the American criminal justice system
49:11has treated Black people,
49:13and you know that there's some way
49:16in which Joe Biden, President Joe Biden,
49:18was involved in the passage of, say,
49:20the crime bill in the 1990s
49:22or things of that nature,
49:24it is very easy to take that
49:26and to blow it up
49:27into something entirely different
49:30and to keep hitting people
49:31and hammering people on this issue.
49:33You mentioned Black men.
49:34Is there a way in which the disaffection
49:38or let's just say attitudes writ large
49:41about the Democratic Party,
49:43the Biden administration,
49:44among Black voters,
49:46does it cut differently
49:48depending on who you are?
49:50I guess what I'm wondering,
49:51does this cut differently based on gender?
49:53There's absolutely a gender component.
49:56And I want to clarify this first
49:59by suggesting the overwhelming majority
50:02of Black voters, male or female,
50:05support the Democratic Party
50:07and support Democratic candidates.
50:09With that being said,
50:11Black people that vote Republican
50:14in presidential elections,
50:15they tend to be overwhelmingly Black men.
50:18And there are a couple of reasons for this.
50:20I think one of them is this idea
50:22of an individual and kind of frustration,
50:26right, the sense of an individualism
50:28and frustration
50:29with these larger political institutions.
50:31So there is, you know,
50:33take the George Floyd moment.
50:34Many Black men looked at that
50:36and said this is a failure
50:38of American political institutions.
50:40But it's not just a failure
50:42of the Republican Party.
50:44That's not how Black men viewed that.
50:46They viewed it as overall
50:48an overarching frustration
50:49and failure with the American system,
50:51right, policing and things of that nature.
50:53And they see it as a bipartisan failure.
50:56But what that allows them to do,
50:57particularly given that their sense
50:59of individualism is much higher
51:01than Black women,
51:02is to think how can I then vote
51:05in a way that best benefits myself?
51:08Black women have a much,
51:09much more difficult time divorcing themselves
51:12from this idea of the collective
51:14best interests of the race.
51:16And that's where we really begin
51:18to see these differences.
51:19It's also true that there is
51:21a certain cross-section
51:22within the Black male population
51:23that is attracted, I think,
51:25to Donald Trump's sense
51:26of essentially machismo
51:28and authoritarianism.
51:29They like that he is essentially
51:31a strong man.
51:32He is seen as strong.
51:34They don't see him as weak.
51:35So I think that there are
51:36significant gender differences
51:39that actually end up playing out
51:41in really important political ways.
51:43Former President Trump,
51:44candidate Trump,
51:45has said that he's not going
51:46to announce his vice presidential
51:47nominee until the convention.
51:49There seem to be two
51:50African-American men
51:51who seem to be in the running
51:53for that slot.
51:54South Carolina Senator Tim Scott
51:56and the Florida Congresswoman
51:57Byron Donaldson.
51:58I was just wondering,
51:59does that matter?
52:00Do you think that that matters?
52:02It matters, but not
52:03for Black audiences.
52:04It matters for white audiences.
52:06Interesting.
52:07And let me explain a little bit.
52:08One of the things that we see
52:10over and over with Black audiences
52:12is that there is a particular kind
52:14of candidate, Black candidate,
52:16that has enormous amount of appeal.
52:19Think Barack Obama, right?
52:21They have to be authentically
52:22and organically connected
52:24to Black communities.
52:25They have to seem invested
52:27in essentially the uplift
52:29or the betterment
52:30of Black communities.
52:32Neither one,
52:33and I would particularly point to
52:35the Congressman's remarks
52:36the other day
52:37where he romanticized Jim Crow.
52:39I would point to the fact
52:41that both of them have white spouses.
52:43That matters to Black voters.
52:45And one of the things
52:46that we know from studies
52:47about Black Republicans
52:49and Black audiences
52:50is that Black audiences
52:52actually treat Black Republicans
52:54more harshly than they do
52:56white Republicans
52:58that hold the exact same views.
53:00Why?
53:01Because they view
53:02those Black Republicans
53:03as traitors,
53:04as betraying the best interests
53:06of the Black communities.
53:08Now, where it matters, though,
53:10is for white audiences,
53:11particularly white audiences
53:13that are deeply uncomfortable
53:14with Donald Trump's brand
53:16of bigotry, xenophobia, and racism.
53:19Tim Scott is a reassurance.
53:21He says, well,
53:22if Tim Scott supports Donald Trump,
53:24then he can't be that bad, correct?
53:26It provides a kind of shield
53:28for accusations of racism,
53:30of bigotry, and xenophobia.
53:32And I do actually think politically,
53:34from a political calculation
53:35point of view,
53:36that's very important.
53:37Before we let you go,
53:38the Biden administration
53:39or the Biden campaign
53:42has seemed to have really
53:44stepped up its outreach.
53:46I mean, there are a lot of events.
53:48As we are speaking now,
53:49there's a Juneteenth celebration.
53:51I just wondered,
53:52do things like that matter?
53:54They do matter.
53:56But I want to remind people
53:57that the Democratic Party
53:58actually has a much harder battle
54:01right now than the Republican Party
54:03in terms of its relationship
54:05to Black voters.
54:06So one of the things
54:07that they really need
54:08to pay attention to
54:09and really invest money into
54:11are these organic,
54:13listening conversations.
54:15Sit down with Black voters
54:17and say, tell us what you want,
54:19and then listen,
54:20rather than lecture.
54:21It's the same advice
54:22that I gave in my book
54:23to Republicans.
54:24If you're actually serious
54:25about winning over Black voters,
54:27sit down and listen.
54:28Don't start six months
54:29before an election.
54:31And I think it's a tall charge,
54:34but it's not too late.
54:35And certainly,
54:36if the Democratic Party
54:38is willing to invest money
54:40and time and effort,
54:42they can win back those voters
54:45who seem disaffected
54:46and disenchanted
54:47with their relationship
54:49with the Democratic Party.
54:50It is absolutely not too late.
54:52Professor Leigh Rigger,
54:53thank you so much
54:54for joining us
54:55and sharing these insights with us.
54:56Thanks for having me.
54:58And fascinating analysis there.
55:00Finally tonight,
55:01toothbrushes,
55:02bottle caps,
55:03and beach toys,
55:04trash that has sunk
55:05to the bottom of our oceans
55:06and polluted our beaches
55:08has resurfaced as art
55:09in this New York Aquarium exhibit
55:11called Washed Ashore.
55:1335 larger-than-life sculptures
55:15try to provoke viewers
55:17into thinking about
55:18how plastic is threatening
55:19the health of our planet
55:21as rising sea levels
55:22continue to jeopardize
55:23coastal cities
55:24and temperatures
55:25breaking alarming records.
55:27Protecting our oceans
55:28and marine wildlife
55:29has become ever more crucial.
55:32And that's it
55:33for our program tonight.
55:34If you want to find out
55:35what's coming up every night,
55:36sign up for our newsletter
55:37at pbs.org slash amanpour.
55:40Thanks for watching
55:41and join us again tomorrow night.
55:43♪♪