Carville: Dems ‘Shouldn’t Go out and Tell People How Great the Economy Is’

COOPER: “You know, I guess — I mean, some would look at it and say, well, why are Republicans thinking that killing a border deal would be beneficial to the Trump campaign? I mean, there’s the obvious reason that not giving any kind of victory to Biden would help Trump, but if voters are aware that the former president is the one saying, ‘Don’t do this,’ I assume there would be a certain amount of outrage over that. Although I guess, among his core supporters, that doesn’t really matter.”
CARVILLE: “Well, he can’t just run among his core supporters. And you have to be constant. You have to talk all the time about a do-nothing Congress. So every time that the Democrats are asked about this, to say, ‘Look, we negotiated in good faith. It was a do-nothing Congress.’ And the public understands that Trump doesn’t have a vote. There’s 49, I think it is, Republican senators, there’s 220 or 221 Republican House members. The onus should be on them. And if they want to say, well, Donald Trump controls the duly elected representatives, then say that. But I don’t think that’s a very satisfactory answer to 55 percent of the American people. I really don’t.”
COOPER: “You know, you famously have the line, ‘It’s the economy, stupid.’ You talked about running against a do-nothing Congress, and obviously, President Biden is focusing a lot on the former president. Is the economic message not — I mean, shouldn’t that be front and center? I mean, there’s certainly some good economic news, I believe.”
CARVILLE: “Right, but people live in an economy and they feel it. And we know from the Clinton years and we know from the Obama years that it takes a lot — you have to go pretty deep into a recovery where people are feeling it. And I think he should talk about things they’ve done to help families cope with cost-of-living increases, like the prescription drugs or releasing the Strategic Petroleum Reserve or other things that they’ve done to clear up the supply chain. But it’s hard — if you tell people they live in a good economy, and they don’t think they do, they think that you don’t understand their lives. And I think he can talk about things that he’s done, he can certainly talk about his infrastructure bill, which is a real magnificent achievement, but I don’t agree that they should go out and tell people how great this economy is. You’ve got to let people feel the economy and they can talk about measures that they’re taken to help people deal, which obviously has been a cost of living increase for families across this country.”
COOPER: “Yeah. James Carville, thank you so much. Good to talk to you.”
CARVILLE: “Thank you, Anderson. Happy Mardi Gras to you, man.”