This is the part of the book that my my hair almost stood up when you discovered that Bernie Sanders is really good friends with who?
0:09>> Chuck Schumer.
0:10>> Chuck Schumer and Bernie Sanders are buddy-buddy.
0:13>> Buddy-buddy.
0:16>> Hi everybody, welcome back. It's been quite a COVID day here at the Jimmy Dore Show as usual cuz all the all my friends in the space are too big of to cover this stuff, so I got to I got to cover it for them.
0:30I got to do the jobs that they won't do.
0:32And I'm glad to. I'm glad to do it.
0:38I'm glad to talk to people who are willing to risk personal and professional uh gain to tell the truth, to be a truth-teller. And speaking of that, we have another one of those uh right here. There's a lady who wrote this book, Evan Barker, wrote this book called Nothing Left, the Confessions of a Democratic Operative, which I just read this book. It's uh It's a fantastic read. Anyway, Evan is here with us. Let me just tell you who Evan is.
1:10Um she is a former Democratic campaign operative who has raised tens of millions of dollars for Democratic candidates and organizations. She left her party, however, over Democrats' embrace of elites and corporate interests while abandoning the working class.
1:27She's the author of this book. It's a New York Times best-seller. Can you believe that? There it is, Nothing Left.
1:33Um so here she is. Let's Welcome back to the show, Evan Barker. Hey Evan.
1:39>> Hey Jimmy, so good to be here. It's it's amazing to see you again.
1:43>> It's a it's great to see you, too. Um I just want to Let me just tell Let me just read the jacket, I think, of this book and it'll give people It says, "A rising star in the trenches of the Democratic politics, Evan Barker was a gifted fundraiser who scoured tens of millions of dollars, who secured tens of millions of dollars for progressive insurgents and major Democratic groups, but in August of '24, standing on the floor of the Democratic National Convention, she came to a stunning realization. The party she had devoted her life to had lost what it stood for and had no clear way to recover its soul. I was at
2:25that convention and I can't believe we didn't run into each other because I was disgusted.
2:31>> I would have loved it.
2:32>> I had the exact same one. I was It was depressing to me.
2:36I because the last Democratic National Convention I was at was in 2016, where if you walked in, it was in Philadelphia, you walked in there and half the convention was filled with people who supported Bernie Sanders and it looked like we were about to take over the party. Like that this can't this couldn't go on much longer. And then you She shifted to 2020, the next convention, there isn't one cuz of COVID, and then you go to '24 and you walk into the convention hall in Chicago and it was like a Stepford Wives convention.
3:06>> [laughter] >> It was It was filled with billionaires and millionaires and nobody and everybody just clapping like seals and going along and it was the and I it made me disgusted. They didn't even And you know, they rigged the primary in 2016, they rigged the primary in 2020, and then in 2024, they didn't even bother to have a primary.
3:27>> Nope. They just rigged it for three cycle or yeah, three presidential elections in a row now, right?
3:32>> And the delegates didn't care. Nobody cared.
3:35Nobody cared. So, >> I cared. You cared.
3:38>> I cared. It was depressing to me.
3:41Um >> If I had met you there though, maybe I wouldn't have written the book. Maybe I would have never came out because I would have felt a little bit more sane.
3:49Um so maybe it it happened the way it did for a reason. That's the way I look at it.
3:54>> So, here it is in the introduction, you say, "I had come to the realization a week or so before the day I returned home from the 2024 Democratic National Convention. Everyone there had drunk the Kool-Aid upon entry, but no one handed me a glass. The entire time it felt like I was inside a small-c corporate infomercial. Every person I encountered was high out of their minds, spellbound by Kamala Harris's identity as a black woman. For 3 days, I couldn't stop thinking about my mom and grandma in Missouri who both lived on their social security checks. In their world, everything was unaffordable, grocery
4:34prices were through the roof, the rent was climbing every month, but I didn't hear this mentioned at the DNC. Instead, Democrats shouted out joy and sang about a brat summer."
4:46>> Yeah. And then >> So, >> what happened. Donald Trump won.
4:50>> And and Donald Trump won.
4:53And the the real tragedy there was Donald Trump ran on a populist message that you thought the Democrats what should be saying. That they were going to end the wars, invest that money back in America, they were going to restore free speech and the Constitution, and and my body, my choice, which Democrats don't say anymore. I don't know if you noticed that. They don't say that anymore ever since COVID. It's their pro-abortion, which to me is the grossest. And uh and Donald Trump won.
5:23>> a vasectomy van at the DNC.
5:26>> [laughter] >> And and so you there there's so many things that you talk about um the you know, you you your journey uh from out of college and you were so happy that Barack Obama passed the Affordable Care Act because you have a chronic condition and you couldn't get health insurance. And so you thought that was a great thing and they they were going to build on it. Um and so then you actually ended up working for Hillary Clinton.
5:55>> Yeah.
5:56>> Of all people who who said Medicare for all will never come to pass. She was very joyful about that. Um >> I needed a job.
6:04>> Yeah, I get it. Um So talk about you know you you became very disillusioned very quickly. You saw that the Democratic Party wasn't a party of the working people, that it was about these elites.
6:21>> Right.
6:21>> And that who could buy their way into office. And so just talk a little bit about that the beginning of your disillusion.
6:29>> Yeah, so yeah, I mean you kind of mapped out the beginning.
6:33And the whole book is a series of disillusionment actually. You know, I started out an Obama Democrat and then kind of you know the hop scotch over to Hillary Clinton and then ended up finding Bernie's movement and thought that that movement was the answer too. And I write in the end of the book, you know, first the Democratic Party screwed Bernie Sanders and then the progressive screwed Bernie Sanders over as well. And so you know, I thought I was kind of in the right movement for a while and I the second chapter of the book is all about working for Brent Welder who I I think you know him. I think
7:06>> Yes, I big fan of Brent Welder.
7:08>> Me too. Yeah, I I still like Brent a lot.
7:11And yeah, and so I was his fundraiser and helped put him on the map and I got really pissed off during his primary actually. Just the things that I started to see. There was a couple of bad signs from the progressive wing and then of course my vengeance was at that time was really at the establishment Democrats because I saw them come into his race with almost a million dollars to spend against him in in favor of Sharice Davids. Um and and it was it was really awful. I mean he he definitely like he should have won that race and there was a lot of big money outside spending.
7:46And then you know I write about AOC and you know as I was there with Bernie and AOC the first day that they ever met in Kansas with Brett Welder. He got them to come to his uh uh uh his his rally in Kansas to stump for him. And even before that you know I talk about in the book about how AOC got really nervous leading up to the rally.
8:09>> Because he was white.
8:10>> Because he was white. Exactly and that that was kind of an omen. That was a little foreshadowing event for me for what was to come. Luckily she still ended up coming although I bet today she I would be surprised. Yeah she wouldn't she wouldn't absolutely not. And so you know it was sort of a foreshadowing event and then I ended up working for Adam Green who I'm sure you know him as well.
8:33Well that >> I yeah I we kind of fell out over the 2020 election with Adam Green because he supported that Charlotte Allen.
8:41>> Elizabeth Warren.
8:42>> Elizabeth Warren and she did that attack on Bernie calling him a sexist and he tried to defend that and it just I just had rage for him at that moment and it still hasn't gone away. But you talk about that in the book about how when Elizabeth Warren conspired against Bernie Sanders on behalf of the establishment. That's that's the crazy part that people don't realize and Adam Green was then doing the bidding. Adam Green whose whole his whole life was spent trying to oppose the establishment he then got in bed with the establishment in the 2020 election to screw over the actual progressive candidate which was Bernie Sanders. Go
9:18ahead and talk about that if you want.
9:20>> I I like Adam Green personally just so we know every you know everybody. I I totally get how you why you feel why you feel but yeah and for a while actually Bernie and Warren consultants I write this in the book. We kind of iced each other. You know there was a the there was a period where you know he we didn't really talk that much um after that. And that was also a disillusioning thing, you know, the book actually exposes a lot of behind-the-scenes events um within the progressive movement of progressive politicians like Warren and even Bernie himself actually actively screwing over progressive candidates
9:57that could have won um for them. And so another example uh is Andrew Romanoff who ran uh in Colorado um in 2020 against John Hickenlooper. And in that race I watched Elizabeth Warren wade in and endorse against Andrew. She endorsed John Hickenlooper, this like total corporate uh you know, Democrat who would never go along with any of her breaking up monopoly policies, you know. And um and then >> But he made a he made a cardinal sin against the party. Remember, what was that?
10:29>> Yes.
10:29So the cardinal sin was that I think in 2012 when he was running against Michael Bennet um for US Senate, uh somebody from Obama's administration had called him and had basically asked him to get out of the race um and wanted him to take a job in the administration. And instead of doing that, he went to the press and told them what happened. And so yeah, I write about having a relationship actually with the head of the DSCC at the time that I was helping Romanoff and later talking to him. And you know, he was like, "I can't believe you worked for the devil." And you know, they really really hated Andrew. And I
11:03think it was uh you know, Bernie was really close I learned at that time cuz I didn't understand it.
11:09>> is this is the part of the book that my my hair almost stood up when you discovered that Bernie Sanders is really good friends with who?
11:19>> Chuck Schumer.
11:20>> Chuck Schumer and Bernie Sanders are buddy-buddy?
11:23>> Buddy-buddy, yeah. Good friends.
11:24>> which is why Bernie Sanders wouldn't endorse that uh that progressive candidate for Senate and instead went along with Chuck Schumer's choice, which was Hick- Go ahead.
11:34>> So, he didn't endorse Hickenlooper, to be fair. He just stayed out.
11:37>> Right.
11:37>> Which but wasn't helpful, you know? And to Adam's credit, actually, they did endorse Andrew Romanoff. And Cenk Uygur was helpful. And you know, there were people that were helpful. But But it wasn't the thing that would have really helped Andrew was a Warren and a Bernie endorsement. And I wa- I watched them both basically they turned their backs on him and walked away because they were trying to play ball with the establishment. And I think that that was sort of the beginning. That was the first time I saw progressives themselves turn their back on their own people. And I started to wonder, Jimmy, what is the
12:13point of an anti-establishment wing of the party if they're not willing to actually challenge the establishment.
12:19Andrew was the only person during that cycle that was running that was well-funded that actually had a chance at winning. Chuck Schumer blessed their involvement, Warren and and Bernie's involvement in a race that was not winnable. And that was Charles Booker who was running in Kentucky against a Republican in a deep red state. And so, he was okay and they both endorsed him at that time, but they completely stayed away from Andrew. And that was when I I really got mad. And I also saw, you know, with Kara Eastman's race, I saw the Nebraska And this was never public before until this book, but I saw the
12:56Nebraska Democratic Party actually cut her campaign off.
13:01This really made me mad. From the voter file, weeks before her election when she's running against a Republican.
13:10They cut her off.
13:12>> The dem- The Democrats sabotaged their own candidate in a general election against a Republican. So, that's the And the voter files is very, you know, it's the you can do email blasts. It's all kinds of stuff that you need. It's It's critical. And they cut that candidate off from it, and she ended up losing.
13:30>> She lost by 1.9 points.
13:32>> And And so, they So, that's the you know, that's the old thing. They'd rather They'd rather lose to a Republican than win with a progressive.
13:41>> Yeah, and that's what I started to see.
13:43Um and then on top of that, there's all this identity politics, but you know, we can get into that later.
13:48Um but but but you know, I started to see this, and then you know, I went to to DC in 2019 in the summer of 2019. I was kind of in between jobs at that point, and I met up with this guy named Corbin Trent, who I was friends with, um who was working for uh AOC as her communications director in Washington DC. And I remember he was telling me that he was kind of nervous because Nancy Pelosi had just demanded a meeting with AOC that week um because Shoaykat, her uh chief of staff at that time, had been in some very big public feuding uh with the Democratic Party online, because I think Shoaykat and Corbin went to DC to do
14:30what they thought they were elected to do, which is to be a true anti-establishment force in the Democratic Party. Um but AOC wasn't game for that. And uh 5 days after that meeting, both Corbin and Shoaykat were ejected uh from her office in DC.
14:46>> So, AOC has a meeting. So, they go to to DC. She has her staff, her communications director, her chief of staff, which are there to really challenge the establishment.
14:56>> Right.
14:58>> Nancy Pelosi calls a meet personal meeting with AOC, and immediately after that meeting, she gets rid of those guys who are actual progressives wanting to challenge the establishment, and she turns She rolls over and turns into an establishment toady.
15:14>> Right. And And I think at the lot of At that time, a lot of progressives saw it as AOC was being co-opted, and she definitely was. But I think the point that I make in the book is that it wasn't just AOC being co-opted, it was the Democratic Party also being co-opted, but in this really perverse way because it wasn't like they were co-opting each other and Nancy Pelosi would suddenly start championing all of the economic populism stuff that Bernie Sanders had ran on and had inspired AOC allegedly and others to run on as well and the reason that they, you know, came into power and got into office. But, it
15:51was that they would kind of take the the more social justice-y type stances. So, like, you know, abolishing ICE and I a race politics and gender politics, and they would put that at the forefront of their menu, defunding the police, abolishing prisons, all of that stuff without doing any of the economic populist stuff, too.
16:12And so, that's kind of what I That was the co-opting that I saw in in the exchange, I think, for for what happened in this situation.
16:23>> And so, >> disillusioned me.
16:26>> And so, you write on page on page 51, you say you talk about you say it was becoming clear that the most of the people that I met in politics who had coveted jobs working for the prestigious DC-based organizations came from similar backgrounds. They were usually from upper-middle class or wealthy families, typically coastal, and lived in cities like DC or New York. Most of them had gone to private schools. Many of them went on to Ivy League. Sometimes their parents led NGOs and other political adjacent projects. Often their parents were donors themselves. If they weren't involved in politics through work or
17:07donating, then their parents were usually professors or lawyers.
17:11I was the rare bird. You were the regular blue-collar person coming from the Midwest, and that's when you realized you weren't really like them. In fact, uh, you thought >> [laughter] >> you you you So, that was a big open eye-opener for you.
17:29Uh, here I just want to read this one part, too. You say uh, you had worked on this one woman's campaign, Karen, which you never mention who the her last name is, but uh, you say, "I was becoming frustrated with candidates like Karen and Hillary Clinton. It seemed to me that they were more interested in acquiring power than enacting policies that transform people's lives. Karen seemed too out of touch to represent regular people in D.C."
17:56>> Yeah.
17:56>> So, that's basically what the Democratic Party had has become. It's become >> and the progressives, both.
18:03>> And the And the progressives, both.
18:05>> to lump them in together because the progressives like to act like they're that they didn't participate in the stuff and they absolutely did. And, um, and I saw like extremely Yeah, everybody that I worked with was just completely out of touch. And, you know, I was working in these I was working in these rooms, Jimmy, and I was raising money from these really powerful people. My mom and grandma were living in a mobile home in Missouri, you know, while I was doing this. Like, I would go back home and, uh, and just and just talk to them and I thought at that time that AOC was the answer and I thought that she was
18:34going to be able to be the one that transform their lives for them. And I soon found out that it was all just a mirage. It wasn't It wasn't what it seemed to be at all. And that really, you know, the the pol like what they what they cared about was identity politics.
18:49>> I That's >> Identity that that Yes, the poison. Not only for the Democratic Party, not only for the progressive movement, but for the country.
18:59>> Yeah.
18:59>> Identity politics because it was it's identity over substance. And in fact, you talk about how this wokeness inside the Democrats and the progressive movement became all about skin color and and gender and nothing about substance or competence.
19:19In fact, they kind of resented that you were white and competent. And [snorts] you write on page 53, you say the white campaign workers typically felt a lot of guilt for growing up privileged. They often liked to demonstrate to others an awareness of their privilege. [laughter] It was obnoxious, even comical. To me, I genuinely have any such guilt. I felt bad when any fellow human was suffering or had an injustice done to them, but I didn't view life through a lens of race.
19:49Instead, I viewed things as simple as right or wrong.
19:53>> Yeah.
19:53>> And but that's not how the progressives see it and that's not how the Democrats saw it. And then you say on page 93, you go, "I was beginning to learn that the bowels of the Democratic Party often function the same way as a prison with people aligning tribally with their respective identity-based clicks and then doing favors for their friends.
20:16That's how consultants seem to get contracts. It was word of mouth and whoever got in the candidate." So So that's That was kind of a stunning thing when you said that the bowels of the Democratic Party function the same way as a prison and they were all about white guilt and and identity politics.
20:34Just talk about the worst parts of that.
20:37>> Yeah, the worst parts of that. So yeah, I started noticing you know, obviously with everyone else. There were signs of it before 2020, but especially in 2020, things got really out of control. You know, I was fired by a client, a Justice Democrats candidate for just giving her advice on donors to call that I thought she should be calling a different list than she was calling on the day of the Kyle Rittenhouse verdict. And because I did that on that day and I wasn't thinking about about skin color and I wasn't thinking about her skin color, cuz that's not really how I like thought about the world, to
21:09be honest with you. And I was working really hard to get progressives elected.
21:13Uh you know, I was fired and and and kicked off the team. I was expected to be silent. I was expected to just act as an ally, to infantilize non-white people. And it just got really really gross. And I think the thing that really the book really blows the whistle on is, you know, not only I think a lot of people like to blame activists, right?
21:34They're just like, is just activists.
21:35They're being crazy. It's not really a reflection of, you know, anything real or But reality is that there were a lot of donors pushing this. There was a ton of donors.
21:45>> Yes.
21:46>> Like very progressive donors that were funding >> Like rich rich white progressive donors.
21:51>> Yeah.
21:52>> And who who would who were pushing this whiteness is bad, you're intrinsically racist, and you should apologize for being white.
21:59>> Right. And they were they were they were pressing it on the candidates and the organizations. So, one of the things that I talk about in the book that's never been made public before is that in 2020, George Soros's organization announced that they were only going going to fund groups led by non-white leaders for a period of 5 years. And I saw people passed over for jobs because of this, because they were afraid that, you know, they wouldn't get funding if they didn't have a non-white person leading their movement. And I thought it was really really wrong. And I also saw donors demand that intersectionality
22:32ring through all of the messaging. So, for example, if I were working with a veterans group, they were suddenly expected to start talking about racial justice and policing and all of these other issues that weren't really related relatable to ending foreign wars or supporting veterans after they come home from foreign wars. And so, it just kind of turned into this like insane monster that the Democrats and the progressives have never really reconciled with.
22:58>> Well, you say in the book, you say I noticed an ambient tension in many of my interactions with big donors and organizations. There was beginning to be a lot of talk about the concept of whiteness and what it means to have privilege. I knew people expected me to be aware of my privilege, but I not I did not speak like other white women who worked in the space. I I wasn't very deferential and I was incredibly direct in my interactions with others regardless of whom I was talking to.
23:28This was my professional style. But here's the irony. In progressive politics, non-white staffers often come from privileged backgrounds, too.
23:37>> Yes, that's true.
23:39>> the general narrative. An inconvenient inconvenient thing to talk about or even notice."
23:46And you talk about this uh black woman you met uh and she you said I learned that she grew up and she and she worked for uh uh Chesa Boudin, George Gascón, and Karen Bass Karen Bass here in Los Angeles and was part of the criminal justice reform orbit. I learned that she grew up near Atherton, California, the single wealthiest zip code in the United States, where Sheryl Sandberg, Marc Andreessen, and Charles Schwab have owned homes. On Zoom calls, I could see she lived in a penthouse in New York that overlooked a Manhattan skyline. She had another home in Los Angeles where she split her time. My mom
24:25back in Missouri had a much more marginalized existence than she ever had. I suppose these are the reasons I didn't feel the same guilt as those around me.
24:35And so, that that's I mean, I think that it it it you can't like overstate how gross this identity politics was and still is, I think, inside the Democratic Party.
24:48>> still is. Actually, Jimmy, since I've written this book, it came out about 2 weeks ago, I've had numerous, I'm telling you, like every single day, almost, I have had a message or two messages or three messages from people that are still working either in establishment politics or progressive politics that are telling me their stories and are telling me that it's still happening and are telling me that they want to get out and they don't know how.
25:13And that and one person wrote to me and they wrote to me from a burner account.
25:18This is how paranoid they are of of being exposed or you know, getting in trouble inside these spaces and he said or she said, I don't know what their gender is, you know, said to me, um, I never like I I I sighed the biggest sigh of relief I think I've ever sighed in my entire life after finishing your book because I know now that I'm not batshit insane. I know that this is actually happening and it's still happening and and somebody else is willing to call it out and you you you can't talk about it.
25:51Even if there's been a supposed vibe shift since Donald Trump has been elected, I like people in these spaces, they're they're still afraid. They're still terrified. Like this is still happening inside of the party. It's just it's quieted down a little bit externally, I think, but it's right there and it's bubbling up beneath the surface. And so when I hear people like AOC yesterday wave her hand away about Woke 1, I'm like, well, what are you talking about? Like wait till you see Woke 2. I don't even know I mean I don't even know if there's really a difference.
26:24>> So AOC was on uh this week on Sunday and uh let's just listen to what she had to say.
26:31>> That's possible to to win the Senate. So I've been focused on on those legislative races.
26:36>> What do you make of those controversial statements I'm sure you've seen? I mean she's uh you know, the the Thanksgiving dust-up. She says she doesn't, you know, still believe that but uh you know, uh the abolished prisons, abolished police, which is also positions that have been taken by a lot of the progressive candidates who have won.
26:53>> Mhm.
26:54>> How do you How do you get around that?
26:56These are not positions that are supported by >> Right. I I mean, I think that a lot of these races, even right now, they'll have a tendency to be nationalized, but these races ultimately are local, and all politics are local. My understanding is that um is is that Francesca Hong has made clear her present stances to her voters.
27:20>> moved away from a lot of that stuff.
27:21>> moved away from it, and I have a local city councilman that has this uh saying, "Woke one was crazy."
27:30>> [laughter] >> "Woke one was crazy." Okay, that's interesting.
27:33>> And uh and I think that what's important is that we have to assess what >> I mean, did did the movement go too far with some of those positions? I mean, you >> So, what what How do you respond you see her do Hi, it's woke one. And she just tries to wave away the destruction that she did, the personal destruction to people. And what what what do you what do you This That made me incensed when I saw that. What what what How do you react to it?
28:02>> I mean, she's just trying to pretend like this is some kind of mass hysteria that we all went through. It's like you were the architects. You were part of this. You were like one of the most potent voices behind all of this that we all just had to live through. It makes me extremely angry, Jimmy. It makes me so mad. I mean, people's lives were ruined over this Like, I literally don't work for the Democratic Party anymore because of this And for her to just say that it's crazy, it makes me angry. It pisses me off to no end. It makes me want every single person to read this story and to understand what happened,
28:37and to understand that it's still happening. Like, my friend Lee Fang, I don't know if you know him, he works at The Intercept.
28:42>> His His His career was destroyed. All of his colleagues turned their back on him.
28:47Like this is up. Like he did more as a journalist to help her than like anybody else. I mean, he like profiled her, he wrote about her, and for her to just laugh this off like it didn't happen. Like it doesn't matter that it happened. Like it's just some big joke.
29:03It's disgusting. And like this is why the Democratic Party cannot move forward. They don't understand. They pushed an entire cohort of people out of their movement. They made people vote for Donald Trump because of this And for her to hand wave it away, like it's not going to work that way. I want a reckoning. I want people to admit they were wrong. I want people to completely disavow this Until then, I cannot move forward. They're like there's no way. I'm not going to.
29:32I'm going to keep talking about it cuz I'm so freaking mad.
29:36>> Uh that's how I felt.
29:37>> I I I felt the same way. Uh you know, you said you actually say earlier on in the book, let me get to page well, 127.
29:47Uh And this is why work working so so So she's talking about there's AOC's talking about DSA candidates >> Mhm.
30:00>> having saying these extreme things like defund the police and abolish the Senate and things like that.
30:06And um and also the whole woke movement, right?
30:10And she's trying to wave it away. And And Lee Fang, if people don't know the story, I'm pretty sure what he his his cardinal sin was during the BLM riots, he went and talked to black business owners, and they were upset that the writers were wrecking their town. And he was said is is Am I wrong about that? Is And then they came down on him for just reporting what other black people were saying in cities where they were destroying their neighborhoods.
30:37>> He didn't even give commentary. He didn't even give his own thoughts. He just posted a video of a black man saying that he didn't understand how, you know, whenever it's like a police officer killing a black person, everybody gets, you know, up in arms and there's like, you know, and of course he was sad. He didn't like what happened to George Floyd, but when it comes to like day-to-day crime in their neighborhoods, nobody gives a That's all this man's opinion was and Lee just posted it and because of that, he was eviscerated.
31:02He was destroyed.
31:04>> And and he's just one he's just one example of that.
31:07>> Yeah. I I go into more details in my book.
31:10>> Oh, yeah, there's there's plenty more details. I mean, the story about you being on a Zoom call and you you were with this black woman and she when you were there was other people and you were just there doing your job taking notes and she said, "Well, I'll talk about this later more later in a in a in a black space where I feel more safe." And what she was actually saying was that your presence, a white woman, made her feel unsafe on a Zoom call? And just could you just talk about that experience?
31:38>> It was it was it was I I it was just so strange. Like I was sitting in this call and it was during the summer of Floyd. It was during that time and I was trying to help her. She was running to be a progressive district attorney, you know, and I'm helping raise her money. I raised her a lot of money, actually. And she's talking to an another black woman, a donor, on a call and I'm just sitting there taking notes like I always did, you know, just doing call time. And yeah, she said that my essentially, without directly talking to me, but knowing that I'm sitting there listening, you know, we're
32:09on a it's a call just like this, says that I made her unsafe. My face went bright red. I was like, "What are you talking about? I'm trying to help you.
32:18I'm trying to help everybody right now, you know, I'm I'm like a fundraiser that is like teaching an insurgent how to fundraise so that they can go on and enact these policies that they say will help black and brown people. And and and this is what I'm trying to do and you're saying that I'm unsafe just because of my skin color? Like it was it was it was racist. That's what it was. It was it was racist, but you're not allowed to say that, you know.
32:46>> that's the kind of environment that people are reaching out to you now since this book has been published to to lament that that they're they're stuck in this system where they have to apologize for being white and they're considered to be a racist until they you have to prove otherwise, and just just being born white makes them uh guilty of something.
33:08>> And it was particularly bad for men. I talk about that, too, in the book. I mean, it was really, really bad for men.
33:14Um they didn't like white women, but they hated men. And um it was it was um looking back on it, it's kind of comical. It's sad, too. It My book is like a dark comedy.
33:25Um but, you know, there would be uh times where I'd be like talking to white guys that I worked with or that I knew on campaigns, and you know, they would kind of like be like, "Oh, Evan, this is kind of like I don't know if I like know, and I would be saying the same back, you know, back to them, checking in on them, actually. Like, "Are you okay? That was kind of brutal what we just went through." And then we'd hop on a Zoom call, and I would just have to watch them self-flagellate uh in order to survive in this environment. There was all this pressure from like other politicians, organizations, progressive
33:53organizations, you know, that like if you didn't have enough uh diversity on your website or something, you could lose clients. You know, it got to the point where I myself I'm I you know, it's My book is called Confessions of a Democratic Operative. I have to confess my own sins. Um I I would look at resumes that I got. I was in a position of hiring, and the first thing that I would do is I would um try to see what their skin color was and what their gender was. And if they were a white man, I did not set up interviews with them.
34:24And I'm ashamed to say that I did that.
34:26I was pressured to do that. There was a ton of social pressure. It was like an impossible environment to exist in. It it's still is. It's still happening to men in these spaces. I've had men that have written to me that have told me that about their experiences of applying for progressive jobs and how they now understand why they were never able to make it in progressive politics.
34:49>> And >> Um Yeah.
34:50>> Yeah, you you talk about speak you speak directly to this issue.
34:54You say, "Healthcare went from the primary issue to a secondary one. Now, every issue had to justify its relevance by appealing to identity. If someone wanted to talk about housing costs or veterans issues, they had to talk about them in racial terms. I began to wonder whether donors were excited about race politics because it allowed them to avoid the harsh economic realities facing American workers. The average American worker had only a thousand dollars saved for retirement. Identity politics and social justice issues were a good distraction for us all." And you talk about this thing called RCN, race
35:33class uh narrative.
35:36Uh you say >> Yeah, race class narrative. But I like race clash narrative better. I think that's That's way more fitting.
35:43>> [laughter] >> Uh r- RCN, race class narrative, was a way to pivot every issue to identity. It trained politicians to think of every issue as an identity issue first and foremost. Race class narrative was an entire intellectual framework that reduced every agenda item on the progressive wish list to racial politics. And here's here's I'll give one example. Uh when Bernie Sanders wrote on Twitter, "Raising the minimum wage is not a just about economic justice, it's about racial justice.
36:17Nearly half of black and Latino workers in America make under $15 an hour. We must end starvation wages and give 32 million Americans a raise by increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour. That is racial class narrative.
36:33>> Right.
36:33>> When Kamala Harris gave her speech and said, "Because of systemic inequalities, workers of color were more likely to be on the front lines, but when working people are left unprotected, everyone paid." This is So, you give example after example that everything is seen through the eyes of race.
36:51>> Mhm.
36:52>> And that is a poison. And so, now we're So, when we that video I talked about I showed of AOC talking about the these DSA people who just won in New York, right? Because Mondaire Jones endorsed them and um But the the >> Mondaire still does it, by the way. The the the whole like rich and whiter neighborhoods thing that he wrote that was on his website. That's RCN, baby.
37:20That's it.
37:21>> So, >> [laughter] >> So, What what So, here's the problem with that. So, they've just completely alienated the white working class.
37:32>> Yeah, and not just white people, too.
37:33It's like I think a lot of Latinos and black men don't like it, either, to be honest with you.
37:37>> Well, Donald Trump got some like 40-some 47% of the Latino vote, for F's sake. I mean, it was crazy. I mean, if of course it was all on a con. He didn't mean anything he was saying.
37:48>> Yeah.
37:48>> Um so, that's what's I'm going to I'm going to look for one more thing.
37:54Uh So, I Uh oh, here it is. Um Uh Oh, here it Oh, here it Here that is. On a Zoom call with a black woman candidate and a donor, the candidate said, "We can talk later in a black space, a safe space."
38:13My face turned bright red. My presence made the Zoom call unsafe. I was just there taking notes, doing my job. These words made me feel weird. But I pushed the thoughts deep down inside telling myself, "Don't be a fragile white woman."
38:26Eventually, I figured out I was playing a game I couldn't possibly win. My skin color would always mean I was guilty, implicitly racist, unable to ever fully trust, be trusted, and permanently the problem.
38:40>> Permanently.
38:41>> A culture of fear and paranoia permanent permeated the progressive movement. The pressure to tattle, correct, and confess was immense. Everyone was horrified by the racism that surrounded us, but at the same time the same people who were outraged were terrified of getting canceled or saying something perceived as racist.
39:04That's a That's got to be an unbelievably suffocating environment to try to to try to work in, let alone live in.
39:11>> It was impossible. It was literally impossible, Jimmy. Like, that's I mean, that's I made me go crazy. Like, I literally went crazy. I think I might be the only person that's written like honestly, like from an honest place about what actually went on inside the Democratic Party during these years.
39:31>> You I think you are. I >> think anybody else has.
39:34>> Nobody else is telling the story. I think that's why it's a bestseller.
39:37>> I think it's also why most like you're the the first like person from the left that's actually interviewed me about this, by the way.
39:45>> Oh, really?
39:46>> Yeah. I don't think any Anybody on the left has interviewed me about uh this at all. Like, they're like they're just kind of ignoring it even though it's on the New York Times bestseller list. I It's like they don't want to engage.
39:59>> Uh Soon it finally hit me. Progressives were not interested in building a movement to fight for economic populism.
40:07They were just as out of touch as normal Democrats. They were champions of identity politics and racialism. They were not the same progressives I found when I worked with Brent Welder and fell in love with the Bernie movement. It wasn't even close. There was nothing left of who they once were.
40:27And that's exactly how I I felt the same way. I mean, I I knew this, but then when I walked into that convention hall in Chicago in '24, it was right in my face.
40:40>> That's how I felt.
40:41>> And I just couldn't and you know, you talk about And I saw Jake Yuger there and other people who I thought would be just as disgusted as me and they were not.
40:53>> Yeah, I I wrote about that in the book.
40:55>> Yeah, you talk about how Jake was excited that Kamala Harris was some progressive.
40:59>> Yeah, he did. He said he was excited and I I mean, I did give him the you know, maybe he felt like me and he felt like he couldn't say anything. I don't know, but um but yeah, he he also said he was excited and that it that the convention was just so progressive and I I felt really really lost. I just felt very lost at that.
41:21>> Okay. Well, anyway, >> Wait, what?
41:24>> No, she >> I want to make sure.
41:26>> Uh Steph just wants to make sure you have time. You don't have to run.
41:30>> Uh I have I have an another interview in 10 minutes, but I can talk for a little bit longer. Yeah, for sure. Uh I like talking to you. It's fun talking to you.
41:38>> Uh So, uh >> We're kindred spirits.
41:42>> And you you talked about you were at the convention.
41:45>> Yeah.
41:46>> And and I couldn't get over how all they talked about was abortion. They they didn't talk about anything except hating Donald Trump and abortion. It was It was And by the way, >> identity.
41:57>> Identity and they don't ever By the way, I remember grew up my body, my choice.
42:02That all went out the window during COVID.
42:04>> Sure did. With the mask.
42:06>> Not only the mask, but you had to take a experimental medical treatment. And if you didn't take experiment, you couldn't get it you couldn't work. You got >> You can go to Yeah.
42:14>> And in fact, there was there was a poll that said 47% of Democrats wanted you to take that your kids be taken away from you if you wouldn't give them this experimental medicine. I mean, that's a real thing. And so they don't say my body, my choice anymore because if they did, you would have the choice to not take that experimental medical treatment, but they wanted that forced on you. So they don't say that anymore.
42:35They went from my body, my choice to I'm pro-abortion, which is like being pro-amputation. It's the weirdest thing.
42:41>> [laughter] >> It's the weirdest It's like, yeah, well, you have to do it, but nobody's excited about it. But no, they they are. And so when Oprah got it introduced, uh that's when you left. So talk about that.
42:52>> Yeah, so she came on. I watched her for a few minutes, actually. Um, you know, I was at that point I was pretty jaded. I think it was day three of the convention, and I was I was pretty over it all of it, you know, at that point.
43:05Um, but I I sat there and I was just like, I don't want to listen to this billionaire lecture me and lecture my mother back home about how we just need to have joy, and we need to be so excited about abortion and about Kamala Harris's identity. It was just such and I realized it was like it hit me all at once. I was like, I now understand why so many people in my family left and have gone to the right. Cuz that's what happened. I read about that in the book. A lot of my family members used to be like union Democrats, construction workers, uh bricklayers, you know, and I watched them over time just leave and go to the right. And I
43:48was like, of course they went to the right. I mean, this this party is so disconnected. I went up to the donor suites. I saw all the donors like literally looking down and all of the little minions in the convention, you know, and I was just It was just It just hit me, and I ended up leaving. I just walked out of the convention. I remember there was this guy uh standing by the door. I don't know who he was, and he was like, "Leaving so soon? You're leaving?" You know, like, you know, "You you had a prime seat to see Oprah Winfrey. Why wouldn't you want to stick around? It's really hard to see her, you
44:20know?"
44:20>> Yeah.
44:20>> And uh I I texted my husband, and I was like, "I'm coming home tomorrow. Like, I'm I'm going back to the hotel, and I'm booking a flight home." And then when I got home, I went to this uh dinner party in >> Oh.
44:33>> San Francisco.
44:34>> Moms for >> For Kamala.
44:35>> Moms for Kamala, you mean?
44:38>> [laughter] >> And I went >> Oh.
44:41>> The Moms for Kamala. And I >> Oh.
44:44>> I went, and and this is the other part of my You know, this book, it's about politics, but it's also about social class. I think every page, really, I am I touch on class, right?
44:54>> Yes.
44:54>> And I ended up moving to the Bay Area in 2019. I met my husband, and I kind of joined a new social class through marrying him. And that was another part of my story. And just like living here and interacting And by the way, I have no friends here. I have I have like no friends. And >> [clears throat] >> I'm okay with that. It's fine. I got I got people back home I talk to, and my husband's a good friend. So, but I have no friends. And And I And I And I just uh I went to a dinner with these like upper class San Francisco moms that, you know, one of the one the one that asked me how the convention was,
45:30uh thinking I would tell her, "It was just fantastic. It was so Brad."
45:34>> [laughter] >> She uh she didn't she didn't wasn't working. She hadn't worked in like a year. They lived in a condo uh in San Francisco. Um they would they would spend like most of their time in Europe, just vacationing. Her husband didn't work, either. And then when I told her I didn't like it, and that I didn't think I was going to vote for Kamala, she looks at me, and she goes, "Oh, well, you're just saying that from a place of privilege."
45:57>> Ha.
45:59>> Yeah.
46:00>> The exact opposite.
46:01>> That was the moment. That was the moment where I was like I looked at her and I was like, "Oh, yeah? You think my family back in Missouri, do you think they have privilege right now? Do you think that that that they're just reeking with privilege and that's why they're so upset at the Democratic Party?" And I noticed my mother, who was also a lifelong Democrat, who voted, you know, she was a Joe Biden supporter in 2020, hated Donald Trump. By 2024, she was ready to jump ship. She was so fed up and disgusted with them, okay? And uh but then I I all of these women that I was surrounded by, all these other moms,
46:37okay, comparing them to my own mother, they were just more in love with the party than ever. And I was like, "There has been a total realignment here and the Democrats don't even give a shit."
46:46You know, but this is not a way for them to win. Like besides the fact that it's all just really stupid, like they cannot win Jimmy national elections if they cannot figure out how to appeal to people like my mom again.
47:00>> So, just like so I just wanted to make this point quickly that the the the the DSA Mom Donny DSA and those people uh the DSA is mostly uh like 70% >> rich kids >> rich kids, college-educated people.
47:16And the last thing they would ever do is go to Staten Island to a Amazon fulfillment center and try to recruit white working-class people to join their DSA.
47:27>> even want them. They don't think they need them. Yeah.
47:31They don't want us. They don't They >> [laughter] >> They don't care. Like they really really don't. Um it before And that was that was the also another breaking point was I was on the lawn of Tom Steyer's house in San Francisco at a party and I saw my friend get up and give a speech. Uh she had just been tapped to lead his organization to a group of extremely rich people that were just clinging on to her every word, you know, clapping like drunk and sealed, so happy, just so happy to be there, so drunk, so drunk on their own stupidity. And uh she gets up there and she goes, "The The working class, the the white working class that
48:09voted for Donald Trump, they're not coming back. We don't need them anymore.
48:13The future is young people, people of color."
48:17And I was like, "Fuck you." Like this is not Like Donald Trump is going to win again. And this was in 2022.
48:25You know, I looked at my husband, I was like, "Well, that's a great way to get Trump reelected." Like what are they doing? Do they not understand that white working class people, this is what like blows my mind, white working class people and Latino and black working class people, they have the same cultural values. They have the same values. Black working class people have way more in common with my relatives in Missouri who love Donald Trump than they do with Zohran Mamdani or any of his followers in Bushwick.
48:53>> 100% And that's the thing people don't get.
48:58And so I've get I've kind of I I'm turned into a bit of a pessimist because I see, you know, uh Donald Trump ran as a populist. He He sounded like So a lot of Bernie Sanders voters actually voted for Donald Trump in 2016.
49:15>> Yeah.
49:16>> And so that's the thing that Democrats could not wrap their brains around. And so a lot of a lot of black and like 20% of black men or people voted for Donald Trump, 40-some percent of Latino. And they could But of course Donald Trump was lying. And but he his message, his campaign message >> His campaign message was great.
49:35>> It was like It was like I I remember I played >> I always wanted.
49:39>> It was like, "Well, this is what Why aren't Democrats saying this? Why aren't Democrats talking like this? This is the way Democrats should be uh campaigning."
49:47And Kamala Harris wouldn't say any of it.
49:50>> Mhm.
49:50>> And And I'm like campaigning with Liz Cheney.
49:52>> She yes, she started touring with Liz Cheney and there was Trump campaigning with RFK talking about fighting big agriculture and beating and beating back big farmer and and that I'm like this is what the Democrats should be saying. Why aren't they saying this?
50:09>> Yeah.
50:10>> And of course you made the ultimate sin you voted for him.
50:13>> I did.
50:15>> And of course now everybody who did that knows that he was lying.
50:20>> Yeah.
50:20>> And he's he's there's there's been a cut >> He's done he's done a few things I like.
50:26Like I'll say that. There's been a lot a lot I don't like but there's been a few things. He got rid of paper straws.
50:32>> [laughter] >> Big deal, okay. Um >> No tax on tips. He did that.
50:36>> on tips. Yeah, exactly. No tax on overtime. He did do those things. He did close the border and he ended DEI. Um and I do think the biggest >> But he instituted a new DEI. You know that for Jewish people on campus. You know that.
50:49>> Oh with like all of the deportations and everything.
50:52>> actually implemented DEI for Jewish students on college campuses. But go ahead I I interrupted you. Finish.
50:58>> Well, so so so what I was saying is that he did do some of those things, right? I think the biggest thing that his presidency, and this is why when people ask me, people will ask me if I regret voting for Donald Trump. I will tell them no. I would not vote for him today.
51:18Like if the election were held today I would have but I don't regret voting for him because he at least provided some there like I don't know if I would have gotten to be able to tell my story, you know, if Kamala Harris had won. You know, that I think there was some there was a counter balance that needed to occur for the culture. And of course there's like things that he's done that have been absolutely horrible like the Iran war.
51:41I'm completely against that.
51:44But There needed to be some sort of check on the Democrats for those years, you know, and now the Republicans are kind of running up against the same thing where they're headed into this election, Jimmy, and and I have to go in like 30 seconds, by the way.
51:59>> Okay.
51:59>> Um but but they're you know, in this election and they're not talking about the economy.
52:05>> No, I know.
52:06>> They're like they are not They're doing They're kind of falling trapped to the same issues that the Republicans had or that the Democrats had in 2024 where they're like just telling everyone that everything's okay.
52:17And uh and it's it's >> the problem is, Evan, is that they all work for the same donor class.
52:23>> Right.
52:23>> That's the and that's the problem. And there's no changing that.
52:26>> Yeah.
52:27>> So, anyway, uh and that's the real problem. And that's you outlined that in the book that the donor class is actually runs the parties and especially the you know, your your view of the Democratic Party. And that's why I don't think there's any way to vote our way out of this.
52:40Uh but anyway, everybody check out Nothing Left. It's a New York Times bestseller, Evan Barker. It's great to talk to you. I appreciate your courage to tell the truth and to pay the consequences for it because you certainly have paid the consequences for it. You are now persona non grata in the Democratic Party and progressive circles. You live in the Bay Area in San Francisco. You have no friends.
53:02>> [laughter] >> And >> I I made more money, people. People are like, "She's just doing this for the money." I made more money working in Democratic politics than I have from writing this book. Okay? Just so everybody freaking knows. Um >> [laughter] >> it's like you don't actually make that much money writing a book.
53:18>> Yeah, I know. I wrote a book. There's not much not much money in it. But anyway, Evan, go to your next interview.
53:23Thanks for good great to talk to you.
53:24Hope to see you soon.
53:25>> Thank you so much. Bye-bye.
53:27>> Hey, come see me do a live celebrity panel August 30th in Burbank, California. Then stand up in New York City in Village Underground September 13th. And then in Chicago September 18th, 19th, and 20th in Rosemont and Chicago. Go to jimmydore.com for a link for tickets.
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