it might take a week a month a year but for the sake of a more perfect version of ourselves and our country and our future still very much present in the hearts and minds of tens of millions of Americans we have to do this thing the introspection the self-reflection the internal audit of what exactly went wrong and it has to start right now however painful that process might be for many of us there is an urgent need as we speak to trans form to be relentlessly curious about our country our friends and neighbors who voted
for Donald Trump to get closer to that reality not farther away from it and to view right now apathy and disengagement as completely counterproductive to be unwavering in our commitment to better understand why exactly bipartisan urgent messages about preserving democracy demanding decency and protecting women didn't prove persuasive to enough people Tuesday this morning in front of his assembled cabinet and others in the Rose Garden on the grounds of a White House still occupied by President Joe Biden he shared this message with the American people listen setbacks are unavoidable but giving up is unforgivable setbacks are
unavoidable but giving up is unforgivable we all get knocked down but the measure of our character as my dad would say how quickly we get back up remember a defeat does not mean we are defeated we lost this battle the America of your dreams is calling for you to get back up that's the story of America for over 240 years and counting it's a story for all of us not just some of us the American experiment endures we're going to be okay but we need to stay engaged we need to keep going and above all
we need to keep the faith setbacks are unavoidable this was the important part giving up is unforgivable so it is with that mandate from President Joe Biden in mind that pro-democracy forces must today begin a vital longer term project that is not to change any of the values so dear by so many but to find a better way to communicate them and to persuade more Americans justifiably feeling like they have to choose between the two people justifiably more concerned with the cost of everything like their next car payment or their rent payment or groceries or
daycare or whether or not they can really swing that trip to Disneyland that they promise the kids or hope to perhaps it does start an end with just this how we talk about and communicate and feel people's deep anxiety about our economy according to the Washington Post quote two-thirds of Voters rated the economy as not so good or poor compared to just onethird who rated it as excellent or good according to network exit polls of the voters who rated the economy negatively 69% of them voted for Donald Trump a significant margin make no mistake vice
president kamla Harris was running on a strong economy she had a plan to make it better for everyone and she talked about those plans in every one of her public appearances but there was a breakdown the American people preferred said they preferred someone with no such plan vague promises about usings of someday having a plan promises about changing things or making things better um someone whose own running mate had once called called him quote America's Hitler that's who they chose so the Urgent work today and tomorrow and forever long it takes for Democrats and anyone
who was welcomed inside the pro democracy tent to do this work however painful it may be however uh much we'd rather binge our favorite network shows this is what has to start today for the sake of our kids for the sake of their kids it's time to get to work no one better to start this conversation with than some of our most favorite experts and Friends political strategist MSNBC senior analyst Matt Dow is here with me at the table anchor of msnbc's 11th Hour NBC News senior business analyst de Rule and David Jolly a former
Republican congressman from Florida now an MSNBC political analyst so Matt dad I'm going to tell a story because I feel like our conversation last night bookended our conversation around I don't know 10 or 11 p.m. on Election 04 when you like kind of two parts Carrie ma one part mad scientist cracked the code on the exit polls figured out what was going on and were're able to accurately predict how for would end I feel like last night you cracked the code on Tuesday night explain to our viewers sure well thank you Nicole um I mean
this is a process that I think for everybody is going through and I think the way we have to look at this is we have to understand what happened before we can actually really talk about it clearly and what went on in the course of this I'd like to say first democracy worked Tuesday it may have not got the result but 50 states had 50 elections it all functioned probably in the end 160 million people will have voted it's getting counted it's uh it's going well so democracy Works um even though the end result right
now is dissatisfactory for a lot of people I think that what happened and it caught I think a lot of us because we assumed because of the Donald Trump was disliked by a majority of people and distrusted by a majority people and was seen as extreme by majority people that that would rule the day and on on Election Day that same thing happened a majority of the people that came to the polls on Election Day disliked Donald Trump a majority of the people on Election Day distrusted joh Donald Trump and a majority of the people
on Election Day thought he was too extreme but the problem fundamentally which often happens in politics in a presidential election is your fate is determined by the Viewpoint of the incumbent president and so on Election Day according to the latest NBC exit polls Joe Biden's approval rating was 40% a net minus 18 approval rating every other president who's run for reelection in modern times ends up on Election Day with the same number they have in approval so Barack Obama in 2012 had a 51% approval got 51% of the vote in 2004 George W bush had
a 51% approval got 51% of the vote when Jimmy you know Carter lost he had a 41 42% approval he got 41 42% of the vote in 1980 every single time and even a vice president think of 1988 when Herbert Walker Bush ran against Mike duus George I mean Ronald Reagan's approval rating was 55% George Herbert Walker Bush got 53% so the expectation with those fundamentals ignoring all the other data and that approval was driven by perceptions of the economy as you said to start the show the expectation would be that a candidate for president
by the Democrats or vice president would get around 40 or 41% of the vote the vice president vice president Harris is going to end up with 48% of the vote which means for the first time in modern history she's going to outrun the incumbent president's approval by eight points that's never happened before never happened at all and one of the things I think that we that we have to understand is that in case you look at every geography you look at all the demography and you say what happened the most predictive result most predictive factor
of how people voted no matter who they were was their approval of the president of President Biden and so for me when you look at this and the interesting thing is in the seven swing States U the vice president ran four points better than she did in all the other states when you look at where Donald Trump gained which means he gained seven points Donald Trump gained seven points in all the other 43 States and only gained three points in the swing states which means her campaign worked it just couldn't overcome the weight and anchor
of Joe Biden's approval number and that's fun we we might argue with whether voters should or should not but when you're a voter who's out there trying to make a decision and he they they can't pay the rent as you say they can't the groceries are too expensive they don't know what they're going to do about health care or daycare they have all those things and they're being told oh forget about all that vote quote unquote on behalf of democracy well we might think as individuals who are blessed in our lives that we're over overcome
that and we can we be able to do that but most people in their lives have to focus on just what's right in front of them and their feeding of their children and the care of their parents and all of that and so that's fundamentals the perception of the economy which then moves into the perception of the incumbent C president means that that vice president Harris actually way overperformed what you would expect
