theintercept--2020-02-20--How Bloomberg Blew It in Las Vegas

How Bloomberg Blew It in Las Vegas

six of the remaining Democratic candidates faced off in Las Vegas ahead of the Nevada caucuses .
All eyes were on former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg , who , despite sitting out the early contests and appearing in none of the previous debates , has surged in many polls thanks to a relentless , self-funded ad campaign .
Would he live up to his own hype ?
In a word , no .
Bloomberg was unprepared for the barrage of attacks he faced from all sides and suffered especially from a set of withering takedowns at the hands of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s DC Bureau Chief Ryan Grim joins Mehdi Hasan to discuss Bloomberg ’ s debut performance and how the debate might affect the race going forward .
Elizabeth Warren : We are not going to beat Donald Trump with a man who has who knows how many non-disclosure agreements and the drip , drip , drip of stories of women saying they have been harassed and discriminated against .
Mehdi Hasan : Welcome to Deconstructed .
I ’ m Mehdi Hasan .
And that was Senator Elizabeth Warren , at the ninth democratic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the other eight was actually a debate .
Pete Buttigieg : You ’ re on the committee that oversees border security .
And we ’ re not able to speak to literally the first thing about the politics of the country to our south .
Amy Klobuchar : Are you trying to say that I ’ m dumb ?
Are you mocking me here , Pete ?
MH : So who won the debate ?
Was it just Warren ?
Warren and Sanders ?
And what happened to the man from the ads @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Republican mayor of New York Michael Bloomberg ?
Bernie Sanders : Mr. Bloomberg had policies in New York City of stop and frisk , which went after African American and Latino people in an outrageous way .
AK : I think we need something different than Donald Trump .
I don ’ t think you look at Donald Trump and say , “ We need someone richer in the White House.
” EW : I ’ d like to talk about who we ’ re running against : a billionaire who calls women @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lesbians ” .
And no , I ’ m not talking about Donald Trump .
I ’ m talking about Mayor Bloomberg .
MH : That ’ s how last night ’ s debate kicked off .
Literally the first thing that Bernie Sanders and Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren did was to go after their newest on stage rival .
So question , why did Michael Bloomberg the eighth richest man in America , the former mayor of the country ’ s biggest city , who successfully and astonishing zoomed into third @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and a handful of other Super Tuesday states thanks to hundreds of millions of dollars in endless ad buys on TV and online , why did he turn up for this ninth Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas last night ?
What did he think was gon na happen ?
Why didn ’ t he just stay home at the mansion and watch it on TV with the rest of us while planning his next advertising blitz ?
Because that debate was kind of a disaster for the billionaire from New York .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ s been pretending to have Barack Obama ’ s endorsement on TV , who ’ s been pretending to be a Democrat since 2018 , who ’ s been pretending that he ’ s a Trump hater , when in fact , he ’ s on record saying : Michael Bloomberg : I know Donald Trump .
He ’ s a great guy .
He doesn ’ t do everything he says , but he sure tries and I ’ m a big fan of Donald Trump .
MH : Last year , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to run for president because of all the apologizing he might have to do .
MB : It ’ s just not going to happen on a national level for somebody like me starting where I am , unless I was willing to change all my views and go on what CNN called “ an apology tour ” .
MH : Last night , though , he had to offer a pretty half-hearted apology for his terrorizing of black and brown people in New York via stop and frisk .
MB : If @ @ @ @ @ @ @ time in office , the one thing that I ’ m really worried about , embarrassed about was how it turned out with stop and frisk .
We adopted a policy which had been in place , the policy that all big police departments use of stop and frisk .
What happened , however , was it got out of control .
MH : He didn ’ t , however , have to apologize for his spying on Muslims because nobody gives a damn about Muslims .
Still , it turns out when @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his rivals to take shots at him , and when you see how unprepared he is for those attacks , how robotic and charisma-free he is , well , he doesn ’ t look all that inevitable , despite the billions at his disposal .
I mean , you think he ’ d have come prepared to deal with all the expected and very legitimate attacks on his wealth , on his billionaire status from the likes of Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders and even , even from NBC ’ s Chuck Todd @ @ @ @ @ @ @ earned that much money ?
MB : Yes , I worked very hard for it .
And I ’ m giving it away .
MH : Sorry , if someone asks you why you ’ re so filthy rich and you ’ re running for office , you don ’ t say it ’ s because you worked hard , implying therefore the poor people are poor because they don ’ t work hard or don ’ t work as hard as you .
Yeah , tell that to a single mother working @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has to stay at home to care for an elderly or sick parent .
Tell them that , Mike .
Thankfully , though , Senator Elizabeth Warren was on fire last night , mainly again , at Bloomberg ’ s expense .
EW : When the mayor says that he apologized , listen closely to the apology .
The language he used is about stop and frisk .
It ’ s about how it turned out .
Now this isn ’ t about how it turned out .
This is about what it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
It targeted communities of color .
It targeted black and brown men from the beginning .
You need a different apology .
MH : Those people who are quick to write Warren off in recent weeks might want to think twice this morning .
She ’ s very good at debates .
She just hasn ’ t been very good at winning primaries , so far .
So will this debate lead to a shift in the polls ?
The polls remember that are currently showing Bernie Sanders , the clear leader @ @ @ @ @ @ @ weekend and nationally where Sanders is 16 points ahead of Joe Biden in second place in the latest Washington Post/ABC opinion poll .
By the way , and this is kind of important when all of the candidates were asked towards the end whether they thought the candidate who arrives at the Democratic Convention in Milwaukee in July with the most pledged delegates should win the nomination , all of Bernie ’ s rivals said no and only Bernie said yes .
BS : Well , the process includes 500 super delegates on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that the will of the people should prevail , yes .
The person with the most votes should become the nominee .
MH : They ’ re scared of Bernie , scared of him winning , no doubt about it .
And they ’ re scared of Bloomberg too .
Understandably , he has unlimited resources .
So last night was supposed to be the night where the other candidates tried to take both Bernie and Bloomberg down .
But did they ?
MH : I ’ m joined now to discuss the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s D.C. bureau chief , my good friend and a regular guest on the show , Ryan Grim .
Ryan , thanks for joining me on Deconstructed .
Ryan Grim : Thanks for having me here .
MH : Ryan , let ’ s get straight to it .
Who was the winner of the debate , in your view ?
Was there a winner ?
RG : Well , there ’ s kind of two winners like , history I think will mark this as one of the greatest presidential debate performances @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and that ’ s Elizabeth Warren .
But you know , paradoxically kind of the winner was Bernie Sanders because what he needs is for Bloomberg to have his momentum blunted and for the trajectory of the race to continue as it has been the last few weeks .
And so he got that which you know , if your eye ’ s on the prize of the nomination , then he is the winner .
If your question is about who won this discrete debate , then no question , Elizabeth Warren @ @ @ @ @ @ @ good point because if anyone you know the proverbial Martian landing from outer space last night and watching the debate might assume that Michael Bloomberg was the front runner , in fact , he ’ s third nationally , hasn ’ t taken part in any of the primaries so far .
And yet the most of the fire that was rained down was on him , not on the guy in first place .
And Pete Buttigieg tried a couple of times he had his kind of pre-prep lines , where he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Bloomberg on the other saying they ’ re not Democrat , saying one ’ s an extreme socialist , the other ’ s extreme capitalist , but the rest of them didn ’ t really go after Bernie at all .
RG : No , they didn ’ t and Bloomberg is sort of a potential front runner , you know , because he has this reserve of billions of dollars that he has promised to spend it on his own behalf .
MH : He ’ s only spent a few @ @ @ @ @ @ @ few hundred million .
RG : More than anybody has ever spent on a primary and he spent it in just a couple of weeks .
MH : So Michael Bloomberg turns up for this debate .
He only qualified for it very late in the day .
If I was Bloomberg , I wouldn ’ t have turned up .
Why do you think he turned up ?
RG : I think he turned up because he absolutely had to .
You know , he ’ s going to take on the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
And so if he looks like a guy who ’ s going to be hiding behind his money and can ’ t show up , you know , at a Democratic debate , then how are people going to envision him showing up at a Republican debate ?
So he wasn ’ t left with much choice , but I think , you know , he ’ s a smart guy .
And I think in the back of his mind , he probably knew that he was better off , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ debates .
And I think that ’ s one reason that he actually refused contributions from the very beginning because the DNC had rules that said , in order to be in the debate , you have to meet a certain polling threshold and a certain number of donors threshold .
So he figured , okay , well , as long as I take zero dollars from all people , then the DNC can ’ t force me onto the stage .
Interestingly , it was Warren ’ s people , you know @ @ @ @ @ @ @ kind of publicly and then privately pushed the DNC to change the rules , so that Bloomberg could get on the stage .
And precisely for this reason because they know that this is the kind of villain that Warren is most effective at slaying .
MH : Oh , yeah .
I saw someone tweet that , I think was Eric Levitz of New York Magazine that Elizabeth Warren was put on this earth to own Michael Bloomberg which I thought was appropriate .
I mean , the thing about Bloomberg — @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a moment .
The thing about Bloomberg which amazed me as you say , he ’ s a smart guy .
Clearly , he ’ s a smart guy , wouldn ’ t have gotten to where he is in life if he wasn ’ t a smart guy .
And he ’ s surrounded himself with some smart people .
Tim O ’ Brien , former colleague of yours and mine , Howard Wilson , other people who have kind of worked in campaigns or worked in the media .
And he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ quickly , you know , third nationally , first in Florida , almost come out of nowhere .
That ’ s impressive .
And then you see him turn up for this debate , where as you say he knew , you know , he had to turn up , he knew he was going to get attacked by the likes of Elizabeth Warren .
He seemed unprepared , to me .
Or maybe it wasn ’ t lack of preparation .
Maybe it ’ s just in his constitution that he ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with criticism .
I guess if you ’ re a billionaire , who ’ s run your own company and then run a major city you surround yourself with yes men , you ’ ve never really had to put up with criticism .
RG : I think that ’ s a big part of it .
And when we say he ’ s a smart guy , you know , there are 10s of millions of smart guys and smart women in this country .
He ’ s not a uniquely talented @ @ @ @ @ @ @ created a box that sits on the desks of financial titans that he charges them , you know , extraordinary annual fees for and he benefits from these network effects .
The reason that you use a Bloomberg terminal is not because it ’ s the best device that anybody could create .
It ’ s because everybody else uses a Bloomberg terminal .
You ’ re not on Facebook because you absolutely love Facebook , people are on Facebook because other people are on Facebook .
RG : Right , so he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ boxes .
That doesn ’ t make him some unique figure .
And so I think that the gap between the quality of his ads that Democratic primary voters have been watching and his — RG : Excellent ads , the best ads that money can buy , quite literally .
The gap between those ads and his performance is going to be jarring to a lot of people .
MH : Although how many people would have seen it , I guess , this classic question we ask after every debate is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Deconstructed , we , Intercept a part of that , how much of our coverage will drive what Democratic voters then do in terms of you know , we ’ ve looked for bumps in the polling after debates .
Will Elizabeth Warren get a big bump because she clearly had a good night ?
Will we see Bloomberg a little bit even fade ?
Because a lot of Democratic voters , as you say , have seen these ads .
I know people , elderly voters who have said to me @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , their kids who are friends of mine , saying , you know , I like Bloomberg because he ’ s friends with Obama because they ’ ve seen all these ads where he makes it look — MH : Yeah , as if he ’ s endorsed by Obama .
And if they ’ ve actually watched the debate , they ’ ll have seen Obama ’ s vice president go after him .
They ’ ll have seen Sanders and Warren go after him .
Pretty much everyone on the stage @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his popularity do you think ?
RG : I think it will now because the question that every Democratic primary voter has who is open to supporting Mike Bloomberg is can they beat Donald Trump ?
And so a lot of those people are either watching pieces of that debate , or they ’ re going to see the viral clips that that come out of the debate of Warren kind of eviscerating him .
And then they ’ re going to picture Michael Bloomberg on the stage with Donald Trump and say @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Maybe I was wrong .
Like , I hoped that Mike Bloomberg was going to be the easy answer to this quandary that we ’ ve been facing for years .
But you know , clearly , you know , he ’ s not the guy .
MH : He ’ s not the guy .
He ’ s the guy who ’ s rolling his eyes when he ’ s put under pressure by his fellow Democrats .
I mean , I personally , a discussion for another time — I wonder @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for a debate with whoever the Democrat — RG : He ’ ll certainly tease it because he loves the drama .
MH : But he ’ s a coward fundamentally , and he ’ s already laying the groundwork to avoid the debates by claiming the commission is biased against him .
But just , you mentioned Warren a few times .
Let ’ s talk Elizabeth Warren .
Ryan , I think it ’ s fair to say you and I are among the tiny handful of journalists in this town @ @ @ @ @ @ @ write off Elizabeth Warren .
She was very , very strong last night .
This is what she was kind of born to do .
She ’ s very good at debating .
We ’ ve seen her in the Senate cross examining a range of kind of billionaire baddies from the banks .
So , it wasn ’ t surprising that she came out strongest of all the candidates , including Bernie , against Michael Bloomberg .
RG : Right , the calendar is tough for her .
You know , there @ @ @ @ @ @ @ cast in Nevada .
You know , this was the debate for the Nevada caucuses .
In 2016 , there were 86,000 votes cast total .
And so , you know , those 70,000 people , a significant chunk of them presumably voted for Bernie Sanders , given what people were reporting from the — RG : Right , exactly before last night ’ s debate .
MH : And she wasn ’ t doing well before last night , let ’ s be very clear about that .
She didn ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hoped she would in those first two states especially in New Hampshire , which is neighboring her own state .
A lot of her supporters have claimed erasure by the media .
Do you buy that , that she ’ s been kind of ignored by the media ?
RG : Certainly , compared to I think Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg .
They have a very good case to make because I think you could argue that neither of them should be taken seriously at all as candidates given that they have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and brown voters .
This is Klobuchar and Buttigieg and so you ’ re heading into Nevada and South Carolina , and then Super Tuesday .
So where on earth is their path to victory where at least Elizabeth Warren , you know , had a plausible path and , you know , so to spend the scarce media resources that you have on Klobuchar and Buttigieg rather than Warren .
It , I think is unfair .
But yeah , she got killed in New Hampshire and I think Warren supporters need @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And although you ’ re right to say that the media exposure for Buttigieg and Klobuchar has been too high relative to their chances , and it ’ s almost certainly driven by the fact that they ’ re “ moderate centrist ” who a lot of mainstream media pundits love .
I was just on CNN a couple days ago Bill Kristol , who was singing Amy Klobuchar ’ s praises .
Having said that , after tonight ’ s debate , it ’ s fair to say that Klobuchar and Buttigieg @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , couldn ’ t they ?
There were some great moments where they just savaged each other .
They ’ ve clearly proven in previous debates that they don ’ t like each other .
I think she had the upper hand in most of the debates leading up to last night where she really kind of got in good digs against Mayor Pete and his inexperience in previous debates .
Although I think last night he really , really got under her skin .
RG : Yeah , oh , he ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ know , she looks at him like he ’ s a member of her staff .
MH : Hasn ’ t thrown anything at him yet , but she looked like she wanted to last night .
RG : Oh , she very desperately wanted to throw something at him .
She just straight up told him , all you ’ ve done is memorize a bunch of talking points .
RG : And she went back to a line that she had used a devastating effect on him earlier .
But like @ @ @ @ @ @ @ kind of Trump language problem where she ’ ll deliver like a piece of the sentence and not the entire sentence .
And so , in the earlier debate , she had hinted at how , look , yes , it ’ s fair to say that you ’ re a tough politician , if you ’ ve won as a gay Democrat statewide in Indiana , but you haven ’ t , you know , you lost badly .
So , but she kind of butchered it a little bit the first @ @ @ @ @ @ @ went back to it this time , and reminded people that he had run statewide in Indiana and lost by 20 points .
And then she added the point that he lost to the guy who then himself later lost to a Democrat in a Senate race , so it was not in an unwinnable race .
MH : But it was really , it was Buttigieg who really got some blows in on her I thought last night when he pointed out the fact that she didn ’ t know the Mexican @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that painful exchange on Telemundo last week where she couldn ’ t name the president of Mexico .
She dug herself deeper and deeper into a hole .
Last night , she claimed it was you know , oh , I just forgot it .
It was a momentary lapse which it clearly wasn ’ t .
He managed to lay a blow on her there about that .
He then went off to her record on voting for Trump judges .
She has one of the worst , if not the worst @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , when it comes to voting for Trump judges .
And at the end of the debate , I ’ m not sure how many people notice this .
She seemed to rush off the stage .
She didn ’ t stay to talk to any of the other candidates .
She dodged shaking Buttigieg ’ s hand .
I don ’ t know if she went off stage to break some things .
But she left in a hurry .
It seems like he really , really got under her skin .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ , did she look down at her notes when she said Lopez Obrador ?
MH : I need to go back and check the tape .
It ’ s a good question .
I saw people tweeting suggesting that even last night , she wasn ’ t quite sure about the president ’ s name .
RG : Yeah , it very much like , to me , she said , I remember and I would like to apologize to and then she glanced down at her notes and then said , Lopez @ @ @ @ @ @ @ notes , she probably had Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador .
And then she looked at her notes and said , let ’ s just do Lopez Obrador .
I don ’ t know why her staff didn ’ t just tell her to do AMLO .
But actually , when it comes to her staff , the answer is because her staff is afraid of her .
MH : And I think we ’ re going to hear less and less about the Klobuchar surge .
From kind of today onwards , I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ ve had kind of “ moderate pundits ” trying to kind of make her surge happen .
She did do better than expected in the Iowa , New Hampshire caucus and the primaries , no doubt about that .
But nationally , she ’ s still weak , and I don ’ t see where she goes from here .
Obviously , Buttigieg thought he could take some of her votes .
But you know , she got very annoyed , Amy Klobuchar , about Bloomberg and his campaign suggesting that her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the way , but a lot of Democrats up until last night were probably thinking that because the three of them haven ’ t been able to take out Bernie on their own so far .
RG : Right , Democrats , you know , who want a kind of moderate nominee or who want a nominee who they believe can beat Donald Trump , they definitely want everyone to get out .
Except nobody agrees on who is going to get out .
You know , he ’ s trying to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in front of like the entire country .
And that ’ s just not how this works .
MH : It ’ s funny you mention the smoke filled room because of course , towards the end , there was this crucial moment where all of them were asked .
And it reminded me of that moment in 2016 , kind of when similar things happened in the Republican party where kind of 16 republicans couldn ’ t defeat Trump together , none of them would get out of the way so that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ unite around one person to defeat him .
He benefited from that division hugely , in a way and I hate to make this analogy because Bernie ’ s not Trump , but in a similar way , Bernie is been fitting .
But when they were asked last night about , you know what happens at the convention if none of them turn up with a majority of pledged delegates , should the person with a plurality with the most delegates , even if it ’ s not a majority , should @ @ @ @ @ @ @ surprise , only Bernie said yes , every single other candidate on stage said no .
Maybe the person who doesn ’ t show up with the most delegates becomes the nominee , that would be chaos , would it not ?
RG : It would be you know , and a politician ’ s view on process is completely determined by what outcome that process could lead to .
I mean , even toward the end of the 2016 campaign , Bernie Sanders started arguing that super delegates ought to support him @ @ @ @ @ @ @ head even though he was behind in pledged delegates .
You know , there is no sanctity around process around any politicians .
MH : They are politicians for a reason .
RG : Right and Chuck Todd was right to say , Bernie , I ’ ll take you last on this one because I know where you are , which shows that Chuck Todd who just a few days ago was laughing at the idea that Bernie Sanders is the front runner is now basically conceding that he ’ s the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ come into the convention with the most delegates with the only question being does he have 50 % plus one that locks it up ?
Or is it a plurality ?
MH : Do you believe , sorry , to put the prediction gun to your head , but do you believe that anyone can turn up to this convention in Milwaukee , in the summer with a majority of pledged delegates ?
RG : The irony is that the only person who can at this point is Bernie Sanders .
Like there @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that if he wins Nevada , then pulls off an upset in South Carolina which is looking increasingly possible for him and then , you know , it locks in half the delegates on Super Tuesday .
That you know , that pushes a lot of people out of the race , makes him the presumptive front runner .
And he is then within striking distance of getting an actual majority of pledged delegates .
There ’ s nobody else that you can kind of craft a scenario that doesn ’ t involve @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the rest of the candidates .
MH : You ’ re telling me that you don ’ t think Klobuchar can turn up with 50 % plus one ?
RG : No , I think the Klobu-mentum is finally going to meet non-white voters .
And a strong fifth isn ’ t going to get you there .
MH : It ’ s gon na be fascinating to see people who kind of first , you remember , the Democrats went on and on about popular vote and Trump and then Iowa happened @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lead wasn ’ t that important , or now it ’ s going to be or the person with the most delegates or most votes in the primaries doesn ’ t have to be the nominee .
Let ’ s see what super delegates do in the second round when they ’ re free to vote as Bernie pointed out tonight .
What ’ s interesting , I think , Ryan , is that you have a lot of people in the media , a lot of people in the “ Democratic party @ @ @ @ @ @ @ chaotic it ’ s going to be , how many people want to stop Bernie , and you look at the polls , average Democratic party voters don ’ t necessarily want to stop Bernie .
He ’ s actually hugely popular with Democrats across the board .
He has the highest approval rating amongst Democrats .
And the most recent polls show that he ’ s increased his support amongst African Americans , among voters under 50 , among conservative Democrats , too .
People quite like Bernie as a second choice @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the biggest analytical errors that pundits make is when they refer to people as moderate voters .
Say , well , there ’ s , you know , 75 % of moderate voters here .
And then you have 25 % of Bernie voters or sometimes they ’ ll add together Bernie voters and Warren voters .
But there aren ’ t moderate voters .
They are voters who have decided at that moment that they are supporting a candidate that the media is considering to be moderate .
But that doesn ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
They may have a lot of different reasons for supporting that particular candidate .
And the most likely reason is they believe that that candidate is the one most likely to beat Donald Trump .
And that might mean that they actually agree with Bernie Sanders on his policy message , but they just think that he can ’ t win .
So if Bernie Sanders continues to win then they move to him .
MH : Agree , but I would go even further .
I would say it ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ It ’ s about the fact that they quite like Bernie Sanders .
They don ’ t hate him , or despise him or see him as you know , an Armageddon candidate in the way that some in the media or Pete Buttigieg last night are trying to suggest that he is and there was a great exchange where one of the moderators said , oh , Bernie , people don ’ t like socialism in a recent poll , and Bernie ’ s great comeback was , but who was winning @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Which I think is a very important point that ’ s overlooked and therefore you get all these artificial debates about how do you stop Bernie , socialism .
Bernie bros were a big chunk of last night ’ s debate , dedicated to kind of his horrible supporters online .
And yet , not a single minute of last night ’ s debate was devoted to foreign policy .
The president of the United States has massive control over the world ’ s strongest military .
And yet again , we had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Israel Palestine , no mention of the nearly million people displaced and Syria since Christmas , many of them starving to death as we speak .
No mention of what ’ s going on with Iran .
Yeah , it was a real , real letdown .
It was otherwise actually a quite strong and entertaining and important debate .
But again , no foreign policy .
RG : Yeah , that was interesting that they didn ’ t touch on anything .
And I think it comes back to how linked to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ debate moderators are .
They will not bring up foreign policy in a debate if foreign policy has not been front and center in the news in the recent week .
You know , I think that basically explains 100 % of the reason why it didn ’ t come up .
MH : And I think it ’ s sadly , journalistic malpractice , not to bring it up .
But anyways , we ’ ve run out of time .
Ryan , thanks so much for joining me to give us @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s debate .
I ’ m sure there will be many more such discussions .
RG : Well , thank you for having me .
MH : That was The Intercept ’ s DC bureau chief Ryan Grim discussing last night ’ s debate in Las Vegas .
And that ’ s our show .
Deconstructed is a production of First Look Media and The Intercept .
Our producer is Zach Young .
Our theme music was composed by Bart Warshaw .
Betsy Reed is The Intercept ’ s editor in chief .
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On Wednesday night, six of the remaining Democratic candidates faced off in Las Vegas ahead of the Nevada caucuses. All eyes were on former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who, despite sitting out the early contests and appearing in none of the previous debates, has surged in many polls thanks to a relentless, self-funded ad campaign. Would he live up to his own hype?
In a word, no. Bloomberg was unprepared for the barrage of attacks he faced from all sides and suffered especially from a set of withering takedowns at the hands of Sen. Elizabeth Warren. The Intercept’s D.C. Bureau Chief Ryan Grim joins Mehdi Hasan to discuss Bloomberg’s debut performance and how the debate might affect the race going forward.
Elizabeth Warren: We are not going to beat Donald Trump with a man who has who knows how many non-disclosure agreements and the drip, drip, drip of stories of women saying they have been harassed and discriminated against.
Mehdi Hasan: Welcome to Deconstructed. I’m Mehdi Hasan. And that was Senator Elizabeth Warren, at the ninth democratic debate in Las Vegas, which unlike the other eight was actually a debate.
Pete Buttigieg: You’re on the committee that oversees border security. And we’re not able to speak to literally the first thing about the politics of the country to our south.
Amy Klobuchar: Are you trying to say that I’m dumb? Are you mocking me here, Pete?
MH: So who won the debate? Was it just Warren? Warren and Sanders? And what happened to the man from the ads, the man with the billions former Republican mayor of New York Michael Bloomberg?
Bernie Sanders: Mr. Bloomberg had policies in New York City of stop and frisk, which went after African American and Latino people in an outrageous way.
AK: I think we need something different than Donald Trump. I don’t think you look at Donald Trump and say, “We need someone richer in the White House.”
EW: I’d like to talk about who we’re running against: a billionaire who calls women “fat broads” and “horse-faced lesbians”. And no, I’m not talking about Donald Trump. I’m talking about Mayor Bloomberg.
MH: That’s how last night’s debate kicked off. Literally the first thing that Bernie Sanders and Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren did was to go after their newest on stage rival. So question, why did Michael Bloomberg the eighth richest man in America, the former mayor of the country’s biggest city, who successfully and astonishing zoomed into third place nationally, is leading in Florida and a handful of other Super Tuesday states thanks to hundreds of millions of dollars in endless ad buys on TV and online, why did he turn up for this ninth Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas last night? What did he think was gonna happen? Why didn’t he just stay home at the mansion and watch it on TV with the rest of us while planning his next advertising blitz?
Because that debate was kind of a disaster for the billionaire from New York. Here’s a man who’s been pretending to have Barack Obama’s endorsement on TV, who’s been pretending to be a Democrat since 2018, who’s been pretending that he’s a Trump hater, when in fact, he’s on record saying:
Michael Bloomberg: I know Donald Trump. He’s a great guy. He doesn’t do everything he says, but he sure tries and I’m a big fan of Donald Trump.
MH: Last year, Bloomberg said he didn’t want to run for president because of all the apologizing he might have to do.
MB: It’s just not going to happen on a national level for somebody like me starting where I am, unless I was willing to change all my views and go on what CNN called “an apology tour”.
MH: Last night, though, he had to offer a pretty half-hearted apology for his terrorizing of black and brown people in New York via stop and frisk.
MB: If I go back and look at my time in office, the one thing that I’m really worried about, embarrassed about was how it turned out with stop and frisk. We adopted a policy which had been in place, the policy that all big police departments use of stop and frisk. What happened, however, was it got out of control.
MH: He didn’t, however, have to apologize for his spying on Muslims because nobody gives a damn about Muslims. Still, it turns out when you put him on stage and allow his rivals to take shots at him, and when you see how unprepared he is for those attacks, how robotic and charisma-free he is, well, he doesn’t look all that inevitable, despite the billions at his disposal. I mean, you think he’d have come prepared to deal with all the expected and very legitimate attacks on his wealth, on his billionaire status from the likes of Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders and even, even from NBC’s Chuck Todd.
Chuck Todd: Should you have earned that much money?
MB: Yes, I worked very hard for it. And I’m giving it away.
MH: Sorry, if someone asks you why you’re so filthy rich and you’re running for office, you don’t say it’s because you worked hard, implying therefore the poor people are poor because they don’t work hard or don’t work as hard as you. Yeah, tell that to a single mother working two minimum wage jobs or someone who has to stay at home to care for an elderly or sick parent. Tell them that, Mike. Thankfully, though, Senator Elizabeth Warren was on fire last night, mainly again, at Bloomberg’s expense.
EW: When the mayor says that he apologized, listen closely to the apology. The language he used is about stop and frisk. It’s about how it turned out. Now this isn’t about how it turned out. This is about what it was designed to do to begin with. It targeted communities of color. It targeted black and brown men from the beginning. You need a different apology.
Lester Holt: Senator, thank you.
MH: Those people who are quick to write Warren off in recent weeks might want to think twice this morning. She’s very good at debates. She just hasn’t been very good at winning primaries, so far. So will this debate lead to a shift in the polls? The polls remember that are currently showing Bernie Sanders, the clear leader in both, Nevada which votes this weekend and nationally where Sanders is 16 points ahead of Joe Biden in second place in the latest Washington Post/ABC opinion poll. By the way, and this is kind of important when all of the candidates were asked towards the end whether they thought the candidate who arrives at the Democratic Convention in Milwaukee in July with the most pledged delegates should win the nomination, all of Bernie’s rivals said no and only Bernie said yes.
BS: Well, the process includes 500 super delegates on the second ballot. So I think that the will of the people should prevail, yes. The person with the most votes should become the nominee.
MH: They’re scared of Bernie, scared of him winning, no doubt about it. And they’re scared of Bloomberg too. Understandably, he has unlimited resources. So last night was supposed to be the night where the other candidates tried to take both Bernie and Bloomberg down. But did they?
[Music interlude.]
MH: I’m joined now to discuss the Last Vegas debate with The Intercept’s D.C. bureau chief, my good friend and a regular guest on the show, Ryan Grim. Ryan, thanks for joining me on Deconstructed.
Ryan Grim: Thanks for having me here.
MH: Ryan, let’s get straight to it. Who was the winner of the debate, in your view? Was there a winner?
RG: Well, there’s kind of two winners like, history I think will mark this as one of the greatest presidential debate performances ever turned in by any presidential candidate and that’s Elizabeth Warren. But you know, paradoxically kind of the winner was Bernie Sanders because what he needs is for Bloomberg to have his momentum blunted and for the trajectory of the race to continue as it has been the last few weeks. And so he got that which you know, if your eye’s on the prize of the nomination, then he is the winner. If your question is about who won this discrete debate, then no question, Elizabeth Warren.
MH: It’s a good point because if anyone you know the proverbial Martian landing from outer space last night and watching the debate might assume that Michael Bloomberg was the front runner, in fact, he’s third nationally, hasn’t taken part in any of the primaries so far. And yet the most of the fire that was rained down was on him, not on the guy in first place. And Pete Buttigieg tried a couple of times he had his kind of pre-prep lines, where he went after Bernie on the one hand and Bloomberg on the other saying they’re not Democrat, saying one’s an extreme socialist, the other’s extreme capitalist, but the rest of them didn’t really go after Bernie at all.
RG: No, they didn’t and Bloomberg is sort of a potential front runner, you know, because he has this reserve of billions of dollars that he has promised to spend it on his own behalf.
MH: He’s only spent a few hundred million so far, only a few hundred million.
RG: Just a few hundred million.
MH: Pocket change for him.
RG: More than anybody has ever spent on a primary and he spent it in just a couple of weeks.
MH: So Michael Bloomberg turns up for this debate. He only qualified for it very late in the day. If I was Bloomberg, I wouldn’t have turned up. Why do you think he turned up?
RG: I think he turned up because he absolutely had to. You know, he’s going to take on the biggest bully on the block Donald Trump. And so if he looks like a guy who’s going to be hiding behind his money and can’t show up, you know, at a Democratic debate, then how are people going to envision him showing up at a Republican debate? So he wasn’t left with much choice, but I think, you know, he’s a smart guy. And I think in the back of his mind, he probably knew that he was better off, the longer he could stay away from these debates.
And I think that’s one reason that he actually refused contributions from the very beginning because the DNC had rules that said, in order to be in the debate, you have to meet a certain polling threshold and a certain number of donors threshold. So he figured, okay, well, as long as I take zero dollars from all people, then the DNC can’t force me onto the stage. Interestingly, it was Warren’s people, you know, Adam Green of the PCCC that kind of publicly and then privately pushed the DNC to change the rules, so that Bloomberg could get on the stage. And precisely for this reason because they know that this is the kind of villain that Warren is most effective at slaying.
MH: Oh, yeah. I saw someone tweet that, I think was Eric Levitz of New York Magazine that Elizabeth Warren was put on this earth to own Michael Bloomberg which I thought was appropriate. I mean, the thing about Bloomberg — we’ll talk about Warren in a moment. The thing about Bloomberg which amazed me as you say, he’s a smart guy. Clearly, he’s a smart guy, wouldn’t have gotten to where he is in life if he wasn’t a smart guy. And he’s surrounded himself with some smart people. Tim O’Brien, former colleague of yours and mine, Howard Wilson, other people who have kind of worked in campaigns or worked in the media. And he’s got this far, quite quickly, you know, third nationally, first in Florida, almost come out of nowhere. That’s impressive. And then you see him turn up for this debate, where as you say he knew, you know, he had to turn up, he knew he was going to get attacked by the likes of Elizabeth Warren. He seemed unprepared, to me. Or maybe it wasn’t lack of preparation. Maybe it’s just in his constitution that he’s unable to take criticism or deal with criticism. I guess if you’re a billionaire, who’s run your own company and then run a major city you surround yourself with yes men, you’ve never really had to put up with criticism.
RG: I think that’s a big part of it. And when we say he’s a smart guy, you know, there are 10s of millions of smart guys and smart women in this country. He’s not a uniquely talented person. What he did is he created a box that sits on the desks of financial titans that he charges them, you know, extraordinary annual fees for and he benefits from these network effects. The reason that you use a Bloomberg terminal is not because it’s the best device that anybody could create. It’s because everybody else uses a Bloomberg terminal. You’re not on Facebook because you absolutely love Facebook, people are on Facebook because other people are on Facebook.
MH: First mover advantage —
RG: Right, so he’s the guy that made those boxes. That doesn’t make him some unique figure. And so I think that the gap between the quality of his ads that Democratic primary voters have been watching and his —
MH: Very good ads.
RG: Excellent ads, the best ads that money can buy, quite literally. The gap between those ads and his performance is going to be jarring to a lot of people.
MH: Although how many people would have seen it, I guess, this classic question we ask after every debate is, how will the “media” and Deconstructed, we, Intercept a part of that, how much of our coverage will drive what Democratic voters then do in terms of you know, we’ve looked for bumps in the polling after debates. Will Elizabeth Warren get a big bump because she clearly had a good night? Will we see Bloomberg a little bit even fade? Because a lot of Democratic voters, as you say, have seen these ads. I know people, elderly voters who have said to me, who have said to you know, their kids who are friends of mine, saying, you know, I like Bloomberg because he’s friends with Obama because they’ve seen all these ads where he makes it look —
RG: He’s endorsed by Obama.
MH: Yeah, as if he’s endorsed by Obama. And if they’ve actually watched the debate, they’ll have seen Obama’s vice president go after him. They’ll have seen Sanders and Warren go after him. Pretty much everyone on the stage went after him. Will that dent his popularity do you think?
RG: I think it will now because the question that every Democratic primary voter has who is open to supporting Mike Bloomberg is can they beat Donald Trump? And so a lot of those people are either watching pieces of that debate, or they’re going to see the viral clips that that come out of the debate of Warren kind of eviscerating him. And then they’re going to picture Michael Bloomberg on the stage with Donald Trump and say to themselves, you know what? Maybe I was wrong. Like, I hoped that Mike Bloomberg was going to be the easy answer to this quandary that we’ve been facing for years. But you know, clearly, you know, he’s not the guy.
MH: He’s not the guy. He’s the guy who’s rolling his eyes when he’s put under pressure by his fellow Democrats. I mean, I personally, a discussion for another time — I wonder whether Donald Trump will even turn up for a debate with whoever the Democrat —
RG: He’ll certainly tease it because he loves the drama.
MH: But he’s a coward fundamentally, and he’s already laying the groundwork to avoid the debates by claiming the commission is biased against him. But just, you mentioned Warren a few times. Let’s talk Elizabeth Warren. Ryan, I think it’s fair to say you and I are among the tiny handful of journalists in this town who have constantly said don’t write off Elizabeth Warren. She was very, very strong last night. This is what she was kind of born to do. She’s very good at debating. We’ve seen her in the Senate cross examining a range of kind of billionaire baddies from the banks. So, it wasn’t surprising that she came out strongest of all the candidates, including Bernie, against Michael Bloomberg.
RG: Right, the calendar is tough for her. You know, there have already been about 70,000 early votes cast in Nevada. You know, this was the debate for the Nevada caucuses. In 2016, there were 86,000 votes cast total. And so, you know, those 70,000 people, a significant chunk of them presumably voted for Bernie Sanders, given what people were reporting from the —
MH: Before last night’s debate.
RG: Right, exactly before last night’s debate.
MH: And she wasn’t doing well before last night, let’s be very clear about that. She didn’t perform as well as the campaign had hoped she would in those first two states especially in New Hampshire, which is neighboring her own state. A lot of her supporters have claimed erasure by the media. Do you buy that, that she’s been kind of ignored by the media?
RG: Certainly, compared to I think Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg. They have a very good case to make because I think you could argue that neither of them should be taken seriously at all as candidates given that they have less than 5% support among black and brown voters. This is Klobuchar and Buttigieg and so you’re heading into Nevada and South Carolina, and then Super Tuesday. So where on earth is their path to victory where at least Elizabeth Warren, you know, had a plausible path and, you know, so to spend the scarce media resources that you have on Klobuchar and Buttigieg rather than Warren. It, I think is unfair. But yeah, she got killed in New Hampshire and I think Warren supporters need to grapple with that.
MH: And although you’re right to say that the media exposure for Buttigieg and Klobuchar has been too high relative to their chances, and it’s almost certainly driven by the fact that they’re “moderate centrist” who a lot of mainstream media pundits love. I was just on CNN a couple days ago Bill Kristol, who was singing Amy Klobuchar’s praises. Having said that, after tonight’s debate, it’s fair to say that Klobuchar and Buttigieg could have their own spin off series, couldn’t they? There were some great moments where they just savaged each other. They’ve clearly proven in previous debates that they don’t like each other. I think she had the upper hand in most of the debates leading up to last night where she really kind of got in good digs against Mayor Pete and his inexperience in previous debates. Although I think last night he really, really got under her skin.
RG: Yeah, oh, he’s always under her skin. You know, she looks at him like he’s a member of her staff.
MH: Hasn’t thrown anything at him yet, but she looked like she wanted to last night.
RG: Oh, she very desperately wanted to throw something at him. She just straight up told him, all you’ve done is memorize a bunch of talking points.
MH: Kind of true.
RG: And she went back to a line that she had used a devastating effect on him earlier. But like Klobuchar has a little bit of the kind of Trump language problem where she’ll deliver like a piece of the sentence and not the entire sentence. And so, in the earlier debate, she had hinted at how, look, yes, it’s fair to say that you’re a tough politician, if you’ve won as a gay Democrat statewide in Indiana, but you haven’t, you know, you lost badly. So, but she kind of butchered it a little bit the first time she tried it. So she went back to it this time, and reminded people that he had run statewide in Indiana and lost by 20 points. And then she added the point that he lost to the guy who then himself later lost to a Democrat in a Senate race, so it was not in an unwinnable race.
MH: But it was really, it was Buttigieg who really got some blows in on her I thought last night when he pointed out the fact that she didn’t know the Mexican president’s name. There was that painful exchange on Telemundo last week where she couldn’t name the president of Mexico. She dug herself deeper and deeper into a hole. Last night, she claimed it was you know, oh, I just forgot it. It was a momentary lapse which it clearly wasn’t. He managed to lay a blow on her there about that. He then went off to her record on voting for Trump judges. She has one of the worst, if not the worst records, I think in the Senate, when it comes to voting for Trump judges. And at the end of the debate, I’m not sure how many people notice this. She seemed to rush off the stage. She didn’t stay to talk to any of the other candidates. She dodged shaking Buttigieg’s hand. I don’t know if she went off stage to break some things. But she left in a hurry. It seems like he really, really got under her skin.
RG: Although, did you notice, did she look down at her notes when she said Lopez Obrador?
MH: I need to go back and check the tape. It’s a good question. I saw people tweeting suggesting that even last night, she wasn’t quite sure about the president’s name.
RG: Yeah, it very much like, to me, she said, I remember and I would like to apologize to and then she glanced down at her notes and then said, Lopez Obrador. I think she on her notes, she probably had Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. And then she looked at her notes and said, let’s just do Lopez Obrador. I don’t know why her staff didn’t just tell her to do AMLO. But actually, when it comes to her staff, the answer is because her staff is afraid of her.
MH: And I think we’re going to hear less and less about the Klobuchar surge. From kind of today onwards, I suspect, after every debate, you’ve had kind of “moderate pundits” trying to kind of make her surge happen. She did do better than expected in the Iowa, New Hampshire caucus and the primaries, no doubt about that. But nationally, she’s still weak, and I don’t see where she goes from here. Obviously, Buttigieg thought he could take some of her votes. But you know, she got very annoyed, Amy Klobuchar, about Bloomberg and his campaign suggesting that her, Biden and Buttigieg should get out of the way, but a lot of Democrats up until last night were probably thinking that because the three of them haven’t been able to take out Bernie on their own so far.
RG: Right, Democrats, you know, who want a kind of moderate nominee or who want a nominee who they believe can beat Donald Trump, they definitely want everyone to get out. Except nobody agrees on who is going to get out. You know, he’s trying to pull off some smoke filled room thing in front of like the entire country. And that’s just not how this works.
MH: It’s funny you mention the smoke filled room because of course, towards the end, there was this crucial moment where all of them were asked. And it reminded me of that moment in 2016, kind of when similar things happened in the Republican party where kind of 16 republicans couldn’t defeat Trump together, none of them would get out of the way so that, you know, the party could unite around one person to defeat him. He benefited from that division hugely, in a way and I hate to make this analogy because Bernie’s not Trump, but in a similar way, Bernie is been fitting. But when they were asked last night about, you know what happens at the convention if none of them turn up with a majority of pledged delegates, should the person with a plurality with the most delegates, even if it’s not a majority, should they win the nomination? Surprise, surprise, only Bernie said yes, every single other candidate on stage said no. Maybe the person who doesn’t show up with the most delegates becomes the nominee, that would be chaos, would it not?
RG: It would be you know, and a politician’s view on process is completely determined by what outcome that process could lead to. I mean, even toward the end of the 2016 campaign, Bernie Sanders started arguing that super delegates ought to support him because he was polling better head to head even though he was behind in pledged delegates. You know, there is no sanctity around process around any politicians.
MH: They are politicians for a reason.
RG: Right and Chuck Todd was right to say, Bernie, I’ll take you last on this one because I know where you are, which shows that Chuck Todd who just a few days ago was laughing at the idea that Bernie Sanders is the front runner is now basically conceding that he’s the one who’s most likely to come into the convention with the most delegates with the only question being does he have 50% plus one that locks it up? Or is it a plurality?
MH: Do you believe, sorry, to put the prediction gun to your head, but do you believe that anyone can turn up to this convention in Milwaukee, in the summer with a majority of pledged delegates?
RG: The irony is that the only person who can at this point is Bernie Sanders. Like there is a path that he has to that if he wins Nevada, then pulls off an upset in South Carolina which is looking increasingly possible for him and then, you know, it locks in half the delegates on Super Tuesday. That you know, that pushes a lot of people out of the race, makes him the presumptive front runner. And he is then within striking distance of getting an actual majority of pledged delegates. There’s nobody else that you can kind of craft a scenario that doesn’t involve, you know, lightning striking dead the rest of the candidates.
MH: You’re telling me that you don’t think Klobuchar can turn up with 50% plus one?
RG: No, I think the Klobu-mentum is finally going to meet non-white voters. And a strong fifth isn’t going to get you there.
MH: It’s gonna be fascinating to see people who kind of first, you remember, the Democrats went on and on about popular vote and Trump and then Iowa happened and suddenly Bernie’s popular vote lead wasn’t that important, or now it’s going to be or the person with the most delegates or most votes in the primaries doesn’t have to be the nominee. Let’s see what super delegates do in the second round when they’re free to vote as Bernie pointed out tonight. What’s interesting, I think, Ryan, is that you have a lot of people in the media, a lot of people in the “Democratic party establishment” talking about how divisive and chaotic it’s going to be, how many people want to stop Bernie, and you look at the polls, average Democratic party voters don’t necessarily want to stop Bernie. He’s actually hugely popular with Democrats across the board. He has the highest approval rating amongst Democrats. And the most recent polls show that he’s increased his support amongst African Americans, among voters under 50, among conservative Democrats, too. People quite like Bernie as a second choice.
RG: Yeah, one of the biggest analytical errors that pundits make is when they refer to people as moderate voters. Say, well, there’s, you know, 75% of moderate voters here. And then you have 25% of Bernie voters or sometimes they’ll add together Bernie voters and Warren voters. But there aren’t moderate voters. They are voters who have decided at that moment that they are supporting a candidate that the media is considering to be moderate. But that doesn’t mean that they themselves are moderate. They may have a lot of different reasons for supporting that particular candidate. And the most likely reason is they believe that that candidate is the one most likely to beat Donald Trump. And that might mean that they actually agree with Bernie Sanders on his policy message, but they just think that he can’t win. So if Bernie Sanders continues to win then they move to him.
MH: Agree, but I would go even further. I would say it’s not just about his policy message. It’s about the fact that they quite like Bernie Sanders. They don’t hate him, or despise him or see him as you know, an Armageddon candidate in the way that some in the media or Pete Buttigieg last night are trying to suggest that he is and there was a great exchange where one of the moderators said, oh, Bernie, people don’t like socialism in a recent poll, and Bernie’s great comeback was, but who was winning in that poll? He was. Which I think is a very important point that’s overlooked and therefore you get all these artificial debates about how do you stop Bernie, socialism. Bernie bros were a big chunk of last night’s debate, dedicated to kind of his horrible supporters online. And yet, not a single minute of last night’s debate was devoted to foreign policy. The president of the United States has massive control over the world’s strongest military. And yet again, we had another Democratic debate, no mention of Israel Palestine, no mention of the nearly million people displaced and Syria since Christmas, many of them starving to death as we speak. No mention of what’s going on with Iran. Yeah, it was a real, real letdown. It was otherwise actually a quite strong and entertaining and important debate. But again, no foreign policy.
RG: Yeah, that was interesting that they didn’t touch on anything. And I think it comes back to how linked to the news cycle, a lot of debate moderators are. They will not bring up foreign policy in a debate if foreign policy has not been front and center in the news in the recent week. You know, I think that basically explains 100% of the reason why it didn’t come up.
MH: And I think it’s sadly, journalistic malpractice, not to bring it up. But anyways, we’ve run out of time. Ryan, thanks so much for joining me to give us all your insights on last night’s debate. I’m sure there will be many more such discussions.
RG: Well, thank you for having me.
[Music interlude.]
MH: That was The Intercept’s DC bureau chief Ryan Grim discussing last night’s debate in Las Vegas. And that’s our show. Deconstructed is a production of First Look Media and The Intercept. Our producer is Zach Young. Our theme music was composed by Bart Warshaw. Betsy Reed is The Intercept’s editor in chief.
And I’m Mehdi Hasan. You can follow me on Twitter @mehdirhasan. If you haven’t already, please do subscribe to the show so you can hear it every week. Go to theintercept.com/deconstructed to subscribe from your podcast platform of choice, iPhone, Android, whatever. If you’re subscribed already, please do leave us a rating or review – Do it. Go do it now. It helps people find the show. And if you want to give us feedback, email us at Podcasts@theintercept.com. Thanks so much! See you next week.


theintercept--2020-02-21--Intercepted Bonus: Inside the Secretive Court at Guantanamo Bay as CIA Torture Architect Testifies

The Intercept ’ s research editor Margot Williams reported from Camp Justice at Guantanamo Bay during an extraordinary moment in the 40th pre-trial hearing for the five men accused of plotting 9/11 .
The men are being charged with crimes that can result in the death penalty and pre-trial hearings have been continuing in this case since 2012 .
During this hearing , the architect of the CIA ’ s torture program , Dr. James Mitchell , was brought to the war court as a witness .
This was the first time that Mitchell appeared in open court .
Williams @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s testimony , and how the legacy of CIA torture has impacted the 9/11 case for nearly eight years .
Jeremy Scahill : I ’ m Jeremy Scahill coming to you from the offices of The Intercept in New York City and this is a special bonus episode of Intercepted .
Buried deep under headlines about Donald Trump ’ s impeachment “ acquittal , ” the Democratic primaries , Pete , Bernie , Bloomberg , was news out of Camp Justice in Guantanamo Bay , Cuba .
Last month , the two masterminds @ @ @ @ @ @ @ were called as witnesses in a pre-trial hearing for the men accused of plotting the 9/11 attacks .
Amy Goodman : Dr. James Mitchell was in the courtroom for a pre-trial hearing for five 9/11 suspects she had been subject to torture euphemistically called “ enhanced interrogation techniques.
” JS : When the capital trial at Guantanamo ’ s war court finally happens next year , in 2021 , it will have been two decades since the crime took place .
Here are some of the truths that have long been forgotten .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The people who engineered torture were never held accountable and the men who may have been involved with the September 11 attacks have not yet been convicted .
The problem of Guantanamo Bay has only been mentioned in one Democratic debate .
Yamiche Alcindor : Why couldn ’ t you close Guantanamo Bay ?
Why couldn ’ t the Obama administration close Guantanamo Bay ?
Joe Biden : We attempted to close Guantanamo Bay but you have to have Congressional authority to do it .
They ’ ve kept it open .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ fact , think it ’ s the greatest , it is an advertisement for creating terror — JS : When Trump took office , he cancelled transfers for men who were cleared to leave the Guantanamo prison .
He also campaigned to fill that prison back up .
Donald J. Trump : This morning , I watched President Obama talking about GTMO , right , Guantanamo Bay , which by the way , which by the way , we are keeping open , which we are keeping open and we ’ re going @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dudes , believe me , we ’ re gon na load it up .
JS : Of those 40 men who remain today at the Guantanamo Bay prison , five of them are now involved in what ’ s known as the 9/11 trial .
For almost eight years , this infuriating and Kafka-esque case has dragged on .
There have been at least 40 pre-trial hearings .
The case is completely marred by CIA torture at black sites .
Now , new questions about the FBI ’ s involvement have made a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The government ’ s obsession with keeping every detail classified continues to add fuel to an already out of control fire .
Arguments abound over what can even be said in court .
Most of what happened to these men where they were how they were treated , it ’ s classified .
We ’ ve reported on Intercepted in the past that some of these men like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed , known as KSM , the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks , first went through secret CIA operated outposts known as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Rosenberg talk about how the current CIA director , Gina Haspel , may have run a black site at Guantanamo Bay itself .
Carol Rosenberg : And I look at the words on the page , and I ’ m like Gina Haspel , ran a black site at Guantanamo ?
It ’ s been widely reported that she certainly ran a black site in Thailand .
And the Guantanamo episode continues to be , you know , really mysterious .
And then I begin , I go on a mission to try @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
And as you would know , Jeremy , those who know for sure can ’ t say , but those who know the program have a context where they can talk about it .
I ’ m not saying it ’ s a fact .
I ’ m saying this piece of information was declassified .
The CIA won ’ t confirm it , they won ’ t deny it .
One of the reasons it makes perfect sense is that what they have acknowledged is that she had a number of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ not describe throughout her career , and that would fit perfectly with it .
JS : Defense lawyers are over these years of pre-trial hearings have argued that because of CIA torture , and even Haspel ’ s past involvement , a fair trial for these men is impossible .
Here are defense attorneys Alka Pradhan and James Connell , in a recent documentary called “ The Trial ” describing issues that they ’ ve faced as part of the legal team for Ammar al-Baluchi .
Alka Pradhan : This is a death @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to be entitled to every scrap of evidence that could be material to the case .
Everywhere we go , we ’ re looking for information that we have not gotten from the U.S. government , like where they may have been held , which the government has said absolutely flat out they consider to be classified and will never tell us .
That ’ s sort of crucial to the case .
James Connell : For years , everything that Ammar said was classified .
You know , if he said , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the restroom ?
” That was classified .
That was exceptionally complicated .
One of the few things that we ’ ve sort of won the case is having that system rolled back .
And so now his ordinary day-to-day communications are not classified .
But even now , anything that he wants to say about his time in black sites , we have to have reviewed for classification .
That ’ s just one example of self-inflicted wounds that the United States government imposes on itself and the people who work @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
JS : We ’ re going to hear more from Alka Pradhan in a moment .
But first in January , The Intercept ’ s Margot Williams went down to Camp Justice at Guantanamo to cover an extraordinary moment at the war court where Dr. James Mitchell was brought in for questioning .
Mitchell , of course , is the CIA contractor , who with no previous experience in interrogations , designed the so-called “ Enhanced Interrogation Techniques ” program , which amounted to nothing but torture and produced zero results .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ quiet .
He ’ s written a book called “ Enhanced Interrogation.
” He ’ s been the subject of a Vice documentary .
James Mitchell : You know , one of the rumors that I don ’ t remember which journalist it was started about me was that I somehow walked into the front gate of the Agency , banging on the door , said , you know , there ’ s torture to be done , let me in .
JS : And he ’ s given many interviews over the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the core problem lies at the way that the current versions of the Quran and the Hadiths and the violence that are in that are accepted as being the true word of Allah passed down unerringly — and our PC culture prevents us from challenging that .
JS : In a civil case in 2017 , Mitchell and his partner in torture , Bruce Jessen , were questioned in a videotaped deposition .
Bruce Jessen : We were soldiers doing what we were instructed to do .
Sheri Fink ( NYT ) : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ military psychologist who became a CIA contractor and his colleague , James Mitchell .
JM : Any expertise in the art of interview ?
My god , I ’ m a clinical psychologist .
Interviews are what we do .
SF : They ’ re now defendants in a case brought by some of the men tortured in those prisons : Suleiman Salim , Mohamed Ben Soud , and Obaidullah , the nephew of Gul Rahman , who died in custody .
JS : But that case against the two psychologists was settled @ @ @ @ @ @ @ criminal prosecution .
Mitchell appeared for the first time in open court last month .
He ’ s previously admitted to personally waterboarding Khalid Sheikh Mohammed .
In the Guantanamo court , he sat just yards away from that very prisoner .
Margot Williams was there for all of it and while there , she brought her audio recorder and attended some press briefings from defense lawyers .
Alka Pradhan : Dr. Mitchell in particular , his book talks about how he knows some of the requirements came from the 9/11 commission , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ requirements that came directly from the FBI , you know , our guess would be that he had some knowledge , both of them had some knowledge that these were coming from the FBI and that there were FBI agents involved in Washington and the Pentagon who are coming up with these questions for the purposes of the 9/11 investigation .
And that ’ s what we want to find out is : How much did they know while they were torturing these men .
JS : That was attorney Alka Pradhan , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the only audio Margot was allowed to record to explain more about this hearing and what she saw at Camp justice .
Here is Margot Williams .
Margot Williams : I was at Guantanamo in January of this year to watch the 40th pre-trial hearing session in the trial against the 9/11 defendants who are detainees in Guantanamo .
MW : When the media and the non-governmental observers and the family members of victims of the 9/11 attacks come down to Guantanamo to watch these hearings in person , we sit behind a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ there ’ s four rows of chairs .
We can see what ’ s going on in the courtroom .
But what we hear is on a 40 second delay , and we see that 40 second delay video on screens above us .
So , we can at the same time see what ’ s going on live and watch it , and hear it on a 40 second delay .
The reason for the 40 second delay is that if any classified information gets mentioned , and we don ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , they turn off the sound , they put white noise on and the screen goes to white .
Alka Pradhan : This is probably one of the most consequential hearings we have had yet , rounding on the eighth year of pretrial hearings for the 9/11 case .
And of course , during these two weeks , we will be taking the testimony of doctors Mitchell and Jessen who were involved in the inception of the CIA torture program .
MW : This is the second time these five defendants in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ military court .
It ’ s a military court .
It ’ s not like a regular court and it was originally the Bush administration [ that ] brought them before the court .
And then when President Obama became president , and if you remember the first day of his administration , he said he was going to close Guantanamo .
Barack Obama : I ’ ve said repeatedly that I intend to close Guantanamo , and I will follow through on that .
I ’ ve said repeatedly that America doesn @ @ @ @ @ @ @ m going to make sure that we don ’ t torture .
Those are , those are part and parcel of an effort to regain America ’ s moral stature in the world .
MW : The idea was they were going to bring those charged to the U.S. and charge them with crimes under the federal judiciary , Southern District of New York .
And then how Congress voted to not allow the Guantanamo detainees to come to the United States .
They could not come to trial in the United States @ @ @ @ @ @ @ over again under the military commissions in Guantanamo .
Since 2012 , this case , which is the case against the 9/11 defendants , it ’ s a capital case .
They are being charged with crimes that can result in the death penalty .
And pre-trial hearings have been continuing in this case since 2012 .
This hearing was the 40th pretrial hearing .
AP : We ’ re going to hear about a lot of different things from doctors Mitchell and Jessen .
And during these couple of weeks , we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ FBI ’ s deep involvement in what has been called up till now the CIA torture program , but in fact , is shaping up to have been a full government program of torture for these detainees that turned into a full government cover up for the purpose of the current prosecution and eventual execution of Mr. al-Baluchi .
MW : Over the past couple of years , what the defense attorneys have been able to discover and put forward is that the FBI was also involved all along in the providing questions @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the black sites .
So the FBI did not have clean hands .
They were not at arm ’ s length from the whole process while the defendants are being tortured .
That ’ s kind of what the issue is right now .
Should those interviews that the FBI did after 2006 , should those be thrown out as well ?
And then what do they have to pursue for the case ?
Dr. James Mitchell and Dr. Bruce Jessen , they are psychologists and they were asked by the CIA to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which they could interrogate these top prisoners that were in CIA custody after their captures .
JM ( in 2017 ) : I disagree with the suggestion that we were architects because we weren ’ t breaking new ground , you know , in the sense that architects do .
MW : This is the first time they ’ ve appeared in open court and more significantly , I believe one of the reasons that a lot of press went down to Guantanamo to watch this was it was of course , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ men that they knew from having interrogated them in the past .
So , the defendants were for the first time facing the men who had interrogated them in CIA black sites .
Carol Rosenberg : Are you able to say how your client reacted to watching him today ?
MW : Mr. Ruiz told us that when he asked Mr. al-Hawsawi about what he thought of Mitchell , he kind of shrugged and said arrogant .
Walter Ruiz : The one word he used was he ’ s arrogant .
So he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as angry when he had the run-in with him in 2003 , the one episode .
But his main reaction really was not so much to Mitchell but was he was actually very appreciative .
CR : What do you mean by that ?
Appreciative that somebody , that he had seen when he was first brought here has actually been brought in to explain what he was doing ?
WR : No , he was appreciative of our efforts on his behalf in a way that was moving .
MW : Ruiz @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Dr. Mitchell .
He confronted Dr. Mitchell repeatedly with incidents that he characterized as torture .
At the end of the day , he played a clip in which Dr. Mitchell himself kind of made a joke about the use of the word torture .
JM : We never used the word “ torture ” — cause torture ’ s a crime .
[ Laughter . ]
Well , it gets used colloquially .
And he used the word torture although he didn ’ t say torture .
He said torches .
Mike @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it ’ s fucking semantics .
But at any rate — MW : Attorney Ruiz said after objections to the word torture by the prosecution , “ I know torture is a dirty word .
I ’ ll tell you what , Judge I ’ m not going to sanitize this for their concerns.
” MW : In this hearing a lot of psychological terminology was used to make it sound like there ’ s an academic and scientific logic and method to the kind of techniques — I ’ m saying techniques @ @ @ @ @ @ @ used on these prisoners .
Some of the phrases used were “ intelligence requirements , ” “ abusive drift , ” “ countermeasures to resistance , ” “ Pavlovian response , ” “ learned helplessness , ” “ negative reinforcement , ” “ a conditioning strategy.
” They showed a chart of “ moral disengagement.
” One of the techniques is something called “ walling ” in which the guy is thrown against the wall , and the wall is safe because it ’ s made of plywood and it ’ s constructed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s not solid .
When walling is used the term walling , they use a beach towel to wrap around the prisoners neck so he won ’ t be harmed .
And then later , even when they ’ re in a non-coercive situation , they take the towel , these doctors , took the towel and put it just so that the prisoner could see them .
So they would know that if they did not behave , or answer the questions , that they might have to have that towel around @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wall again .
They called it a “ Pavlovian tool.
” And so these same guys were in the room , being reminded of what they had endured as prisoners in the black sites by the sight of the people who had used these methods on them .
It ’ s not as if I ’ m overwhelmed by it because I ’ ve spent 18 years reading testimony and reports about torture .
It was striking in this proceeding at these hearings with Dr. Mitchell who actually conducted these interrogations and debriefings @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
And I ’ m using that word too but the preponderance of euphemism in these proceedings did kind of overwhelm me .
JS : Margot Williams is the research editor for investigations at The Intercept .
Years before names were publicly released , Margot compiled the first list of the Guantanamo detainees and assembled a comprehensive GTMO database for the New York Times .
Her latest article for The Intercept is titled “ At Guantanamo Bay , torture apologists take refuge in empty codewords and euphemisms.
” More of Margot ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Mitchell can be found at theintercept.com .
Margot Williams spoke with Intercepted associate producer Elise Swain .
And that does it for this special bonus episode of Intercepted .
Until next week , I ’ m Jeremy Scahill .

Subscribe to the Intercepted podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, Radio Public, and other platforms. New to podcasting? Click here.
Last month,
The Intercept’s research editor Margot Williams reported from Camp Justice at Guantanamo Bay during an extraordinary moment in the 40th pre-trial hearing for the five men accused of plotting 9/11. The men are being charged with crimes that can result in the death penalty and pre-trial hearings have been continuing in this case since 2012. During this hearing, the architect of the CIA’s torture program, Dr. James Mitchell, was brought to the war court as a witness. This was the first time that Mitchell appeared in open court. Williams describes her reporting trip, Mitchell’s testimony, and how the legacy of CIA torture has impacted the 9/11 case for nearly eight years.
Jeremy Scahill: I’m Jeremy Scahill coming to you from the offices of The Intercept in New York City and this is a special bonus episode of Intercepted. Buried deep under headlines about Donald Trump’s impeachment “acquittal,” the Democratic primaries, Pete, Bernie, Bloomberg, was news out of Camp Justice in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Last month, the two masterminds of the CIA’s torture program were called as witnesses in a pre-trial hearing for the men accused of plotting the 9/11 attacks.
Amy Goodman: Dr. James Mitchell was in the courtroom for a pre-trial hearing for five 9/11 suspects she had been subject to torture euphemistically called “enhanced interrogation techniques.”
JS: When the capital trial at Guantanamo’s war court finally happens next year, in 2021, it will have been two decades since the crime took place. Here are some of the truths that have long been forgotten. The prison at Guantanamo is still open. The people who engineered torture were never held accountable and the men who may have been involved with the September 11 attacks have not yet been convicted. The problem of Guantanamo Bay has only been mentioned in one Democratic debate.
Yamiche Alcindor: Why couldn’t you close Guantanamo Bay? Why couldn’t the Obama administration close Guantanamo Bay?
Joe Biden: We attempted to close Guantanamo Bay but you have to have Congressional authority to do it. They’ve kept it open. And the fact is that we in fact, think it’s the greatest, it is an advertisement for creating terror —
JS: When Trump took office, he cancelled transfers for men who were cleared to leave the Guantanamo prison. He also campaigned to fill that prison back up.
Donald J. Trump: This morning, I watched President Obama talking about GTMO, right, Guantanamo Bay, which by the way, which by the way, we are keeping open, which we are keeping open and we’re going to load it up with some bad dudes, believe me, we’re gonna load it up.
JS: Of those 40 men who remain today at the Guantanamo Bay prison, five of them are now involved in what’s known as the 9/11 trial. For almost eight years, this infuriating and Kafka-esque case has dragged on. There have been at least 40 pre-trial hearings. The case is completely marred by CIA torture at black sites. Now, new questions about the FBI’s involvement have made a path to conviction even more clouded. The government’s obsession with keeping every detail classified continues to add fuel to an already out of control fire. Arguments abound over what can even be said in court. Most of what happened to these men where they were how they were treated, it’s classified. We’ve reported on Intercepted in the past that some of these men like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, known as KSM, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, first went through secret CIA operated outposts known as black sites. We heard reporter Carol Rosenberg talk about how the current CIA director, Gina Haspel, may have run a black site at Guantanamo Bay itself.
Carol Rosenberg: And I look at the words on the page, and I’m like Gina Haspel, ran a black site at Guantanamo? It’s been widely reported that she certainly ran a black site in Thailand. And the Guantanamo episode continues to be, you know, really mysterious. And then I begin, I go on a mission to try and figure out the truthfulness of this. And as you would know, Jeremy, those who know for sure can’t say, but those who know the program have a context where they can talk about it. I’m not saying it’s a fact. I’m saying this piece of information was declassified. The CIA won’t confirm it, they won’t deny it. One of the reasons it makes perfect sense is that what they have acknowledged is that she had a number of covert short term assignments that they will not describe throughout her career, and that would fit perfectly with it.
JS: Defense lawyers are over these years of pre-trial hearings have argued that because of CIA torture, and even Haspel’s past involvement, a fair trial for these men is impossible. Here are defense attorneys Alka Pradhan and James Connell, in a recent documentary called “The Trial” describing issues that they’ve faced as part of the legal team for Ammar al-Baluchi.
Alka Pradhan: This is a death penalty trial and we’re supposed to be entitled to every scrap of evidence that could be material to the case. Everywhere we go, we’re looking for information that we have not gotten from the U.S. government, like where they may have been held, which the government has said absolutely flat out they consider to be classified and will never tell us. That’s sort of crucial to the case.
James Connell: For years, everything that Ammar said was classified. You know, if he said, “Excuse me, can I go to the restroom?” That was classified. That was exceptionally complicated. One of the few things that we’ve sort of won the case is having that system rolled back. And so now his ordinary day-to-day communications are not classified. But even now, anything that he wants to say about his time in black sites, we have to have reviewed for classification. That’s just one example of self-inflicted wounds that the United States government imposes on itself and the people who work for it that make things super complicated.
JS: We’re going to hear more from Alka Pradhan in a moment. But first in January, The Intercept’s Margot Williams went down to Camp Justice at Guantanamo to cover an extraordinary moment at the war court where Dr. James Mitchell was brought in for questioning. Mitchell, of course, is the CIA contractor, who with no previous experience in interrogations, designed the so-called “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques” program, which amounted to nothing but torture and produced zero results. Mitchell over the decades has not been quiet. He’s written a book called “Enhanced Interrogation.” He’s been the subject of a Vice documentary.
James Mitchell: You know, one of the rumors that I don’t remember which journalist it was started about me was that I somehow walked into the front gate of the Agency, banging on the door, said, you know, there’s torture to be done, let me in.
JS: And he’s given many interviews over the years.
JM: You know, the core problem lies at the way that the current versions of the Quran and the Hadiths and the violence that are in that are accepted as being the true word of Allah passed down unerringly — and our PC culture prevents us from challenging that.
JS: In a civil case in 2017, Mitchell and his partner in torture, Bruce Jessen, were questioned in a videotaped deposition.
Bruce Jessen: We were soldiers doing what we were instructed to do.
Sheri Fink (NYT): This is Bruce Jessen, a former military psychologist who became a CIA contractor and his colleague, James Mitchell.
JM: Any expertise in the art of interview? My god, I’m a clinical psychologist. Interviews are what we do.
SF: They’re now defendants in a case brought by some of the men tortured in those prisons: Suleiman Salim, Mohamed Ben Soud, and Obaidullah, the nephew of Gul Rahman, who died in custody.
JS: But that case against the two psychologists was settled. Mitchell and Jessen have never faced criminal prosecution. Mitchell appeared for the first time in open court last month. He’s previously admitted to personally waterboarding Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. In the Guantanamo court, he sat just yards away from that very prisoner. Margot Williams was there for all of it and while there, she brought her audio recorder and attended some press briefings from defense lawyers.
Alka Pradhan: Dr. Mitchell in particular, his book talks about how he knows some of the requirements came from the 9/11 commission, right? And given the volume of requirements that came directly from the FBI, you know, our guess would be that he had some knowledge, both of them had some knowledge that these were coming from the FBI and that there were FBI agents involved in Washington and the Pentagon who are coming up with these questions for the purposes of the 9/11 investigation. And that’s what we want to find out is: How much did they know while they were torturing these men.
JS: That was attorney Alka Pradhan, these briefings from the defense teams were the only audio Margot was allowed to record to explain more about this hearing and what she saw at Camp justice. Here is Margot Williams.
Margot Williams: I was at Guantanamo in January of this year to watch the 40th pre-trial hearing session in the trial against the 9/11 defendants who are detainees in Guantanamo.
I’m Margot from The Intercept, Margot Williams.
[Chatter.]
MW: When the media and the non-governmental observers and the family members of victims of the 9/11 attacks come down to Guantanamo to watch these hearings in person, we sit behind a glass in a kind of gallery and there’s four rows of chairs. We can see what’s going on in the courtroom. But what we hear is on a 40 second delay, and we see that 40 second delay video on screens above us. So, we can at the same time see what’s going on live and watch it, and hear it on a 40 second delay. The reason for the 40 second delay is that if any classified information gets mentioned, and we don’t have clearances to hear this classified information, they turn off the sound, they put white noise on and the screen goes to white.
[White noise.]
Alka Pradhan: This is probably one of the most consequential hearings we have had yet, rounding on the eighth year of pretrial hearings for the 9/11 case. And of course, during these two weeks, we will be taking the testimony of doctors Mitchell and Jessen who were involved in the inception of the CIA torture program.
[Music interlude.]
MW: This is the second time these five defendants in the 9/11 attacks have been brought before the military court. It’s a military court. It’s not like a regular court and it was originally the Bush administration [that] brought them before the court. And then when President Obama became president, and if you remember the first day of his administration, he said he was going to close Guantanamo.
Barack Obama: I’ve said repeatedly that I intend to close Guantanamo, and I will follow through on that. I’ve said repeatedly that America doesn’t torture. And I’m going to make sure that we don’t torture. Those are, those are part and parcel of an effort to regain America’s moral stature in the world.
MW: The idea was they were going to bring those charged to the U.S. and charge them with crimes under the federal judiciary, Southern District of New York. And then how Congress voted to not allow the Guantanamo detainees to come to the United States. They could not come to trial in the United States. So the trial had to start over again under the military commissions in Guantanamo. Since 2012, this case, which is the case against the 9/11 defendants, it’s a capital case. They are being charged with crimes that can result in the death penalty. And pre-trial hearings have been continuing in this case since 2012. This hearing was the 40th pretrial hearing.
AP: We’re going to hear about a lot of different things from doctors Mitchell and Jessen. And during these couple of weeks, we’re going to talk about the FBI’s deep involvement in what has been called up till now the CIA torture program, but in fact, is shaping up to have been a full government program of torture for these detainees that turned into a full government cover up for the purpose of the current prosecution and eventual execution of Mr. al-Baluchi.
[Music interlude.]
MW: Over the past couple of years, what the defense attorneys have been able to discover and put forward is that the FBI was also involved all along in the providing questions to the detainees while they were in the black sites. So the FBI did not have clean hands. They were not at arm’s length from the whole process while the defendants are being tortured. That’s kind of what the issue is right now. Should those interviews that the FBI did after 2006, should those be thrown out as well? And then what do they have to pursue for the case?
Dr. James Mitchell and Dr. Bruce Jessen, they are psychologists and they were asked by the CIA to help come up with some techniques with which they could interrogate these top prisoners that were in CIA custody after their captures.
JM (in 2017): I disagree with the suggestion that we were architects because we weren’t breaking new ground, you know, in the sense that architects do.
MW: This is the first time they’ve appeared in open court and more significantly, I believe one of the reasons that a lot of press went down to Guantanamo to watch this was it was of course, the first time they had seen these five men that they knew from having interrogated them in the past. So, the defendants were for the first time facing the men who had interrogated them in CIA black sites.
Rosiland Jordan: Are you able to say how your client reacted to watching him today?
MW: Mr. Ruiz told us that when he asked Mr. al-Hawsawi about what he thought of Mitchell, he kind of shrugged and said arrogant.
Walter Ruiz: The one word he used was he’s arrogant. So he said arrogant. He also described him as angry when he had the run-in with him in 2003, the one episode. But his main reaction really was not so much to Mitchell but was he was actually very appreciative.
RJ: What do you mean by that? Appreciative that somebody, that he had seen when he was first brought here has actually been brought in to explain what he was doing?
WR: No, he was appreciative of our efforts on his behalf in a way that was moving.
MW: Ruiz was quite outspoken in his questioning of Dr. Mitchell. He confronted Dr. Mitchell repeatedly with incidents that he characterized as torture. At the end of the day, he played a clip in which Dr. Mitchell himself kind of made a joke about the use of the word torture.
JM: We never used the word “torture” — cause torture’s a crime. [Laughter.] Well, it gets used colloquially. And he used the word torture although he didn’t say torture. He said torches.
Mike Ritland: I mean, to me it’s fucking semantics. But at any rate —
MW: Attorney Ruiz said after objections to the word torture by the prosecution, “I know torture is a dirty word. I’ll tell you what, Judge I’m not going to sanitize this for their concerns.”
[Music interlude.]
MW: In this hearing a lot of psychological terminology was used to make it sound like there’s an academic and scientific logic and method to the kind of techniques — I’m saying techniques — the kind of torture that was used on these prisoners. Some of the phrases used were “intelligence requirements,” “abusive drift,” “countermeasures to resistance,” “Pavlovian response,” “learned helplessness,” “negative reinforcement,” “a conditioning strategy.” They showed a chart of “moral disengagement.”
One of the techniques is something called “walling” in which the guy is thrown against the wall, and the wall is safe because it’s made of plywood and it’s constructed so that it bounces. It’s not solid. When walling is used the term walling, they use a beach towel to wrap around the prisoners neck so he won’t be harmed. And then later, even when they’re in a non-coercive situation, they take the towel, these doctors, took the towel and put it just so that the prisoner could see them. So they would know that if they did not behave, or answer the questions, that they might have to have that towel around their neck and be thrown against the wall again.
They called it a “Pavlovian tool.” And so these same guys were in the room, being reminded of what they had endured as prisoners in the black sites by the sight of the people who had used these methods on them.
[Music interlude.]
It’s not as if I’m overwhelmed by it because I’ve spent 18 years reading testimony and reports about torture. It was striking in this proceeding at these hearings with Dr. Mitchell who actually conducted these interrogations and debriefings and used these what he calls techniques. And I’m using that word too but the preponderance of euphemism in these proceedings did kind of overwhelm me.
JS: Margot Williams is the research editor for investigations at The Intercept. Years before names were publicly released, Margot compiled the first list of the Guantanamo detainees and assembled a comprehensive GTMO database for the New York Times. Her latest article for The Intercept is titled “At Guantanamo Bay, torture apologists take refuge in empty codewords and euphemisms.” More of Margot’s reporting on the pre-trial hearing of James Mitchell can be found at theintercept.com. Margot Williams spoke with Intercepted associate producer Elise Swain. And that does it for this special bonus episode of Intercepted. Until next week, I’m Jeremy Scahill.