CHICAGO — You’ve likely heard this before, or felt it in your bones, but it’s horrifying, debilitating and worth repeating, especially right now, as we head into a political season: At least half of this country hates the other half. According to the Pew Research Center, 75% of Democrats think of Republicans as close-minded. And 64% of Republicans feel the same way about Democrats. Nearly 50% of Republicans think Democrats are lazy. And nearly 40% of Democrats think Republicans are idiots. Majorities in both parties believe the other does not share its goals. Worse, a study by the advocacy group More in Common found one’s education did not hugely affect those assumptions.
Is this any way to run a democracy?
The good news — according to another Pew study released last month — is nearly 60% of all Americans agree ... our democracy is not working as it was supposed to.
Nobody is reaching across the aisle, as they say.
But for nine years, from his office on the second floor of a house overlooking South Woodlawn Avenue, David Axelrod has tried. First, as the founder and director of the Institute of Politics (IOP) at University of Chicago, which promotes public service and an engaged democracy; then, beginning seven years ago, as host of “The Axe Files,” his popular, intimate and wide-ranging podcast created with CNN. That partnership, of course, would be a non-starter for many Americans. Then again, as yet another survey reported in May (conducted by bipartisan pollsters for IOP), a quarter of Americans are so angry at government they fear it will “soon be necessary to take up arms” against it.
A podcast won’t change that.
Still, in a small, thoughtful way, “The Axe Files,” which airs its 500th episode this month, has been building a sometimes nuanced, occasionally touching ongoing oral history of these political times, as viewed from both right and left — including politicians, activists, campaign strategists, White House cabinet, press secretaries, disgraced press secretaries, governors, disgraced governors, congressmen and congresswomen (sitting and disgraced), journalists, historians, theologians, prime ministers, presidents, soldiers, entrepreneurs and Tom Hanks. Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy on what it means to not to have an emotional connection with the legislation before you. Karl Rove on the suicide of a parent. Activist Heather McTeer Toney on connecting climate change with social justice. Gov. J.B. Pritzker on campaign spending. Kellyanne Conway on competitive blueberry packing. But also, Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr, Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wy., Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Judd Apatow, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot.
The tone is patient, and unusually persistent, allowing room for ideas, personal histories but also real answers, showing us politics as it exists out in the world, not how it should.
Which was an annoyance of Axelrod’s as a student at University of Chicago in the 1970s: He had worked in politics at 10, campaigning for New York City mayor John Lindsay, but while attending the famously cerebral school, politics became theoretical, abstract. Since then, Axelrod’s trajectory has been hands on, as a City Hall reporter for the Tribune, political strategist, architect of Barack Obama’s presidential runs then White House adviser. After a decade at IOP, he will leave in January, but “Axe Files” (and “Hacks on Tap,” his other podcast, with Republican consultant Mike Murphy and former White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, nearing 200 episodes) will continue.
On the occasion of the “Axe File’s” milestone episode, he sat to talk about himself. The following was edited and condensed for length and clarity from a longer conversation.
Q: We’re talking just before you’re leaving the Institute, and just before your 500th episode of “The Axe Files” arrives, so considering the state of political discourse in this country, do you ever wonder if you’ve had an impact? Can anyone have any impact anymore?
A: It is a really good question. The podcast flowed out of my work at the Institute, and in our first years we would have people like Newt Gingrich and I would have dialogues on stage with them, and the goal then was always not to get into a cable TV rumble but find out who these people were, how they thought the way they thought. Obviously there would be disagreements but it’s harder to hate people when you know them, by and large. Steve Edwards, who was at WBEZ for years then program director (at IOP), said this would make a good podcast. I didn’t know what a podcast was. Anyway, to answer: Within the confines of the podcast, discourse has been healthy. My fifth (episode) was with Mitt Romney. I ran the campaign that defeated him in 2012. But the conversation was good. I was interested in things others were not. I remembered his dad, who was a renegade in the Republican Party (and governor of Michigan), and really one of my political heroes because he stood up for civil rights and things hard to stand up for in the Republican Party. The lesson that Mitt got from his dad was caution. Because his dad was incautious in his advocacy, and that cost him his political career. Which is interesting because Romney is channeling his dad now. He is the figure in the Republican Party his dad was in the 1960s. Karl Rove — in many ways my opposite — some of our conversation was about how we both had parents who took their own lives. It’s important to understand people’s stories. That flows out of working at the Tribune. Stories are everything. Not just what people think, but who they are. That’s the podcast.
Q: But do you ever fear it contributes to the idea of politics as entertainment?
A: Even to understand someone’s politics you need to understand how they came to believe what they believe and the forces that shape their thinking. So no, I don’t have a concern about that. But it was easier seven years ago to have these conversations.
Q: It’s harder to get guests these days? Particularly those on the right?
A: It’s harder now. I have been relatively successful. Still, in this environment, everyone has gone to their corners. I would love to sit down with Tim Scott, the senator from South Carolina, who is a really interesting person. There is a good chance he will be on the Republican ticket in one way or another in 2024. I would love to sit down with him. We haven’t been successful yet. There is pressure on people to stay in their lanes and never drift out of media channels that appeal to their bases. It is much more pronounced now. I had a wonderful conversation with Trump’s pollster Tony Fabrizio, who has an amazing political story but also a personal story as a guy who came out as gay late in life, at the apex of the Republican Party. But I would be lying to you that the receptivity is the same. It’s easier to get Republicans who are considered apostates within their party.
Q: So is all engagement good engagement?
A: Depends on the quality of the conversation. I had a conversation with (House Minority Leader) Kevin McCarthy years back that started off in a very convivial way but as soon as we got to Trump, he went to battle stations, it became more vituperative than I like these conversations to be. You can have challenging conversations where it doesn’t feel that way. I just had a conversation with Pete Ricketts (Republican governor of Nebraska). He’s part of the Ricketts family that owns the Cubs. It wasn’t heated, but it became revealing. If you start with their lives, it sets a tone for productive conversations.
Q: Would you have a Marjorie Taylor Greene on? Considering the show is sometimes about reaching beyond familiar caricature, she would seem perfect.
A: I don’t know how productive that conversation would be. The challenge is to get people willing to go beyond caricature. I thought you were going to ask about Trump.
Q: I was.
A: I think about it often. I am fascinated with how Trump became Trump. His father told him the world divides into killers and losers. Be one or be the other. Which seems like the formative lesson of his life. I would love to talk to him about his dad and how he came to believe what he believes about the world, that whatever you do in service of winning is justified and whatever you don’t do is stupid. A fascinating discussion if you could have it. Marjorie Taylor Greene is a reflection of a period. But Trump is central.
Q: One thing that’s notable about the podcast is how — most of the time — you are able to get people to provide real answers, as opposed to the typical vagaries.
A: Well, I had a very challenging conversation with Kellyanne Conway recently, and in front of an audience. It became hard because she has talking points and she doesn’t want to depart from them, and she will get contentious when you try to.
Q: But when do you back off then? Because, if this is a conversation, as much as you want to a real answer, a lot of push back can also grind an interview to a halt.
A: That’s right. There comes a point where I know they’re not going to answer.
Q: Which in a way is an answer.
A: Yes, and people can draw their own conclusions when someone is clearly trying not to answer. The other handicap is I tend not to ask questions I know the answers to. I don’t want to go through that exercise and not get a real answer — through sometimes I err too much on that one. I have a wonderful researcher named Miriam Annenberg who gives me a 20-page memo before the podcasts, so I have a sense of the tender areas and where the armor is you will not penetrate. So sometimes I don’t want to waste time.
Q: Tell me about working for Harold Washington.
A: One of the top two or three candidates in my life — in terms of the quality of the experience with them. He was extraordinarily theatrical, super smart, tough as nails. If you were a novelist, you would have a hard time creating a character this vivid. He grew up a rebel within the machine that he toppled. I covered him at the Tribune, then left in 1984 and later worked for him. First, I had made the (career) transition to work for (Illinois Congressman) Paul Simon. When I left the Tribune, on the first day, I was at a speech (Simon) made and halfway through his speech I thought, “Oh, I can applaud now.” As a journalist I was trained to be as objective as I could. You usually get a deeper perspective when you work with a politician. But the Harold I knew was not all that different from the man I covered as a reporter. He could be as brutal a politician as you met, and as charming a person. I remember going to city hall. He asked me to come in and talk about working for him. He’s at his desk and asks, “Do you want half my sandwich?” I said, “Mayor, I am not eating your sandwich.” He said, “Look at me. Do I need both halves?” The Tribune once assigned me to do a curtain raiser on the 1983 mayoral race. I went to see Harold and he was half an hour late and still wearing shades and he goes, “Can we talk off the record?” He said, “You know what it’s like to be a congressman? They treat you like a king. You come and go as you please. You disappear for a day and nobody cares because there are 435 of them. It’s a damn good life. Now why would I ruin that life by running for mayor?” He said if there were like 80,000 registered (to put him on the ballot) by whatever date, if they raised half a million dollars to run — “Then I will run. But they will never do it.” The next time he saw me was at his mayoral announcement and he said, “Remember that conversation we had? Well, they did it. I have to run now.” He loved running, and being the mayor. It also killed him.
Q: Was the podcast meant to be like those off-the-record conversations?
A: Yes. Which is why I never call them interviews. They are conversations. It doesn’t always work out. Occasionally listeners complain I talk about myself too much. But I do that in the service of trying to relate. I know what it is like to be in the middle of battle, in a White House at a difficult time. I try to bring my experience so they are conversations. You want to forget the microphone is in front of you. One of my earliest podcasts was with Alastair Campbell, communications director for Tony Blair when he was prime minster of Great Britain. He’d had a nervous breakdown in his early stages with Blair. He talked about what it felt like to go mad. Sometimes you have to shut up and listen.
Q: I’m sure you’re being asked, so: What’s going to happen in November?
A: Every index you look at as a practitioner — history, attitudes on the economy, a president’s approval rating — suggests Republicans should have a big year. But the only thing that may spare Democrats some pain is Republicans. There’s a marked change since the Dobbs ruling (that removed the national right to an abortion), and that condemnation crystallized Republicans as extreme — as a party that talks a lot of about freedom and is now threatening freedom for many. That’s amplified by (Republican) candidates endorsed by Trump. I think Republicans will take the House. The Senate is an open question. It may not be the big year for Republicans all the signs suggest. The most ardent voices are defining their party in ways that are unhelpful. Because of the Supreme Court, the stakes feel much higher. And this time, I do expect people to vote.
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