Politics

Take a breath and keep these 10 things in mind if you’re nervous about next week

Published

2 years ago

November 11, 2024

Take a breath and keep these 10 things in mind if you’re nervous about next week

This is an adapted essay from “BLN Live Democracy 2024: The Insiders,” a virtual event featuring Jen Psaki, Steve Kornacki, Michael Steele and Claire McCaskill.

The days before an election are always a time of high anxiety. But as we approach this critical moment for our democracy, it’s important to take a step back, take a deep breath and relax.

So, here are 10 reasons why supporters of Vice President Kamala Harris shouldn’t freak out in these final days:

Number 1: We are more motivated.

Democrats’ enthusiasm has been a continuing trend across the polling. This isn’t always the case, it certainly wasn’t the case in 2016. But ever since President Joe Biden stepped aside and Harris stepped in, we have had more enthusiasm on our side of the aisle.

Number 2: Harris has closed the gap on economic issues.

The vice president started out way behind Donald Trump on key economic questions, like who voters believe is better for the economy and who they believe will look out for them. Those are the kinds of things that drive “feel” voters — people who make up their minds in the last two weeks of the election. That’s a good sign for Harris.

Number 3: We know what we’re doing in the field.

Just think about Trump’s buddy Elon Musk — he’s offering people $100 to sign a petition that says they support the First Amendment. Do you think Democrats signed that petition? I think some did. I think there’s probably a boatload of $100 bills going out to folks who are voting or already voted for Harris.

Musk’s approach isn’t an accurate way to get data to find low-propensity voters. It’s just another example of the billionaire thinking he’s the smartest guy in the world. With no political campaign experience, he thinks he can handle getting people to the polls in a crucial battleground state like Pennsylvania.

But our team actually knows what they’re doing. We’re more experienced. We’ve been building our ground game for over a year. That ground organization is one thing the Biden campaign did well, and Harris inherited it.

Number 4: It’s Trump’s bros and billionaires versus you and your family.

The former president’s campaign is geared toward people who think Hulk Hogan pulling off his shirt is important. It’s geared toward white men, bros who listen to Joe Rogan and billionaires like Musk. That’s not very appealing to people like you and me. I believe that will cost them at the ballot box.

Numbers 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10: Dobbs and its impact on women.

We’ve already seen the data. Women are showing up. The polls were off in 2022 because nobody expected the Democrats to do as well as they did. Reproductive rights was and still is a driving force for women voters.

And anybody who thinks that emotion has gone away when we’re watching women die and when we’re watching women who have troubled pregnancies lose the ability to have children — it’s not going away.

It’s more acute, more emotional and more passionately felt by women of America now than ever before. That includes Republican women and women who are married to Trump supporters. And I don’t care if they tell them they’re doing it or not, I guarantee a whole bunch of them are casting their ballots for Harris this election.

Claire McCaskill

Claire McCaskill, a Democrat, was the first woman elected to the U.S. Senate from Missouri. She is currently an BLN and NBC News political analyst.

Allison Detzel

contributed

Politics

World Cup fuels ticketing reform demands

Published

9 hours ago

June 21, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Demands are growing for a political reckoning over ticket scams at the World Cup — and beyond.

The National Independent Venue Association and Fan Alliance, organizations representing and advocating for entertainment venues and artists respectively, sent a joint letter to Congress on Thursday, calling on lawmakers to ban speculative and ghost tickets, cases where resellers flog tickets they don’t actually have.

The letter — addressed to Speaker Mike Johnson, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer — includes nearly two dozen accounts of fans who say they were scammed out of thousands of dollars trying to get tickets to the World Cup, which began last week. The groups are also asking fans to share their own stories with elected officials via the Fix the Tix Fan Action Center that launched last week.

“Every one of these stories erodes the public’s faith that consumers should and will be protected from fraud,” NIVA Executive Director Stephen Parker and Fan Alliance founder Donald Cohen wrote. “We urge Congress to work with us to prevent fraud like this in the future and finally enact ticket resale consumer protections that will protect Americans and ensure affordability.”

The letter flagged fans like Dacy Gillespie, who bought World Cup tickets for her sons on Christmas, only to learn on match day — months later — that the seller couldn’t deliver them. And Skylie Shore, who Parker and Cohen said spent well over $6,000 on tickets to the Scotland-Haiti match on June 13, but was forced to wait outside the stadium because she couldn’t access them as fans marched in on gameday.

“These examples reveal a consistent pattern: consumer deception, speculative ticket sales, and broken-hearted American families at the hands of resale ticketing companies like StubHub,” Parker and Cohen wrote.

In a statement, StubHub spokesperson Jack Sterne said that the platform does not allow speculative ticket sales, and blamed FIFA for users’ difficulty in accessing their tickets.

“We understand that attending the World Cup represents a significant investment in time and money, and we take our responsibility to every fan who books through our platform seriously,” Sterne said in a statement. “Many of the issues fans are facing trace back to the event organizer’s technology infrastructure, newly announced transfer restrictions, and a new app that was launched just a month ago.”

In response, FIFA said in a statement that the organization “can guarantee the validity and delivery of tickets purchased through its official platforms” and that FIFA.com/tickets “is the official ticket sales channel” for the tournament.

NIVA and Fan Alliance are urging congressional leadership to place universal price-gouging limits on ticket resale, enact stringent fines on perpetrators and a violation-reporting mechanism for ticket scams, and require secondary ticketing platforms to produce data on ticket fulfillment and consumer complaints.

The groups are not the only ones monitoring for evidence of shady ticket practices. Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway issued a consumer guidance in advance of the tournament, urging match-goers to beware of fraud and promising to hold offenders accountable. And the FBI in May put out a public service announcement, warning fans against purchasing tickets on copycat websites modeled on FIFA’s.

“With the World Cup coming to Kansas City, excitement is high and, unfortunately, so is the potential for fraud,” Hanaway said in her statement. “Missourians should be able to enjoy this once-in-a-generation event without fear of being deceived. My office will hold accountable anyone who seeks to exploit our families, and we stand ready to assist anyone who encounters suspicious activity.”