On today’s episode of the 5 Things podcast: Israel hit two refugee camps Sunday in the Israel-Hamas War. Former President Donald Trump leads President Joe Biden in key battleground states, according to new polling. USA TODAY National Political Correspondent Phillip M. Bailey looks at how Tuesday’s Kentucky gubernatorial election could give a blueprint for 2024. A nurse who died by suicide penned a letter to her abuser – the U.S. health care system. USA TODAY Breaking News Reporter Claire Thornton looks at the impact of removing homeless migrants from shelters in New York City.
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Hit play on the player above to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript below. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.
Taylor Wilson:
Good morning. I’m Taylor Wilson. Before we get started, I want to let you know that, beginning tomorrow, our show becomes The Excerpt. It’s the same podcast you know and love, and I’ll continue to be your morning host, just a new name and, well, some new theme music. Tune in tomorrow to hear the changes. For today this is 5 Things You Need To Know, Monday, November 6th, 2023.
Today, Israeli airstrikes hit refugee camps in Gaza. Plus new polling brings worries for Biden ahead of 2024. And we look at the role Kentucky could play in giving us a blueprint for next year’s election.
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Israeli airstrikes slammed two refugee camps in Gaza yesterday, killing at least 53 people, according to the Hamas-run health ministry and an Associated Press report citing hospital workers. Israel killed dozens last week when it twice bombed the Jabalia refugee camp, calling it a Hamas stronghold. Israel says it is targeting Hamas fighters, and has accused the group of using civilians as human shields. Critics say the strikes are leaving innocent people dead, and fueling a dire humanitarian crisis across Gaza. Some 1.5 million Palestinians, around 70% of Gaza’s population, have fled their homes since the latest war began with the Hamas attack in Israel that killed more than 1,400 people, while Hamas fighters also took some 242 people hostage. More than 9,700 Palestinians have been killed according to Gaza’s health ministry. Israeli ground troops have entered Gaza, and are expected to enter Gaza City today or tomorrow, according to Israeli media reports.
Meanwhile, Qatar, the tiny Persian Gulf nation, has become a pivotal player as an intermediary in negotiations aimed at securing the release of the hostages captured by Hamas. Four have already been freed, and the Israeli military rescued another in recent days. The country also helped broker a deal that allowed for limited evacuations of foreign passport holders, and some critically injured people from Gaza. According to Jonathan Panikoff, an expert on Middle East affairs with the Atlantic Council, a nonpartisan think tank, Qatar “is the only government that has sufficient capability, and is looked upon favorably enough by both Hamas and Israel, to be willing to engage with them on things like humanitarian issues.”
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Former President Donald Trump leads President Joe Biden in five battleground states for a hypothetical matchup ahead of the 2024 election. New polling from the New York Times and Siena College published yesterday found that Trump led Biden by ten points in Nevada, six points in Georgia, five points in Arizona and Michigan, and four points in Pennsylvania. Biden only defeated Trump in one of the swing states in the poll, Wisconsin, despite winning all six battleground states listed in the poll in the 2020 election. The survey showed that Biden’s popularity among groups of voters who supported his victory, like those under the age of 30, appear to be declining. Trump and Biden both grabbed 37% of the vote in a USA Today/Suffolk University poll released last month.
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Kentuckians will head to the polls tomorrow to decide the state’s next governor, with incumbent Democratic governor Andy Beshear battling it out against Republican challenger, Kentucky attorney general Daniel Cameron. I spoke with USA Today national political correspondent, Phillip M. Bailey, about the race and how it might map out a blueprint for 2024. Phillip, good to have you on.
Phillip Bailey:
What’s going on, man?
Taylor Wilson:
As you write in this piece, Kentucky might give us some clues about what voters want nationally, and the political strategies that succeed electorally. Phillip, let’s start with Governor Beshear, you just talked about him. Could he be a blueprint for Democrats in 2024?
Phillip Bailey:
Kentucky is not often thought of as a bellwether, but Taylor, this is important for listeners to remember. Maybe they don’t know this. Kentucky actually has been a consistent bellwether for the presidential election going all the way back to 2003. Every off-year election, the Kentucky gubernatorial outcome, the presidential outcome mirrors it, meaning that whatever party won the governor’s race here in Kentucky, that same party has won the presidency the very next year. And that’s been like that for the past 20 years. So, Kentucky is a bellwether.
Beshear is running heavily on abortion rights, jobs, infrastructure. He often talks about high-speed internet. He’s a kitchen table guy. I talked to New Jersey governor Phil Murphy, the chairman of the Democratic Governors Association, who’s very close to Governor Beshear of Kentucky. He says we have a deep bench when it comes to our governors. Gavin Newsom in California, Whitmer in Michigan, Moore in Maryland, but he looks at Andy Beshear and says, this is a guy who has all the skills.
So, the way Andy Beshear is running this race, I do think you’re going to see Democrats talk about jobs and infrastructure and the accomplishments under President Biden, but I do think one of the most interesting things, and probably the ad of the cycle, was the ad that the Beshear campaign came out with, featured a young woman here in Kentucky, who talks about a very serious assault that she suffered [inaudible 00:05:33] how she was raped at 12 years old by her stepfather, and under the law here, she would be forced to carry that pregnancy to term. That ad has caught national attention. It certainly shows that, post-Dobbs in the Supreme Court, that Democrats feel the wind is at their back when it comes to abortion rights and access. It’s definitely put Attorney General Daniel Cameron, the Republican nominee, on his heels. He sort of changed his position a little bit here, after saying he was firmly pro-life in April, saying, “I would sign legislation that had those exemptions in it.”
Taylor Wilson:
And when it comes to Daniel Cameron, what lessons can national Republicans take from him and this election?
Phillip Bailey:
Daniel Cameron is running on a lot of cultural issues. He’s running heavily on the debate surrounding transgender rights. I mean, that’s something he consistently brings up. And the way the attorney general talks about it, Taylor, is he talks about it in terms of crazy versus normal, that look at this outside world, look at Washington, look at all these things that they’re saying about pronouns, et cetera. Doesn’t that make you feel nervous? Isn’t that just not the normal way of life, the way you’re used to things going in rural Kentucky? He also talks a lot about Joe Biden. President Biden has seen his numbers nationally take a nosedive, but in Kentucky it’s even worse. In a state like ours, where he already lost to President Trump in 2020 by about 26 points or so, he sees his numbers dipping even further down.
So, I think you’re going to see Daniel Cameron talk about three things, and the Republicans will mimic him, I think, in 2024. Obviously culture war issues, I think abortion is going to be supplanted or replaced by transgender issues on the right. I think you’re certainly going to see them talk consistently about Joe Biden and his lack of popularity. And I think you’re going to see the strain on the average American’s wallet. While there might be these job reports and these overall economic reports that the president points out too, have all the good indicators and positive indicators on it, average Americans, when they go to the grocery store, when they go to the pump, et cetera, they’re feeling that strain. Daniel Cameron, I think, is a clear sign that Republicans want to talk about that, how it’s much harder, how your dollar doesn’t go as far as it used to under Joe Biden.
Taylor Wilson:
And race has also played a role in this Kentucky election and the buildup to it. How has that nationalized this for voters around the country?
Phillip Bailey:
Daniel Cameron, who is African American, is Kentucky’s first Black attorney general. He’s already shattered and made history there. If he were to win, he would become Kentucky’s first African American governor, and I believe maybe the first African American Republican governor since the Civil War era, since the Reconstruction era. That history-making campaign, that historic bid, however, is being met with a heavy amount of resistance from Black voters in Kentucky and African American PACs, activists, and social justice groups around the country, because of Daniel Cameron’s role in the Breonna Taylor case, Breonna Taylor being the young African American woman who was shot and killed by Louisville Metro Police after serving a no-knock warrant at her apartment in 2020, that along with George Floyd sparked these massive protests about police accountability across the country.
In African American politics. I think this is a national race. I mean, you’re seeing a level of involvement here, not just from African American activists, people who are born and bred in Kentucky, but outside groups, not just running ads, but they are here with buses, they are mobilizing and organizing African American voters, specifically against this potentially history-making African American candidate.
Taylor Wilson:
Phillip M. Bailey is a national political correspondent for USA Today. Amazing insight for us, as always, Phillip. Thanks so much.
Phillip Bailey:
No problem, Taylor. Thank you.
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Taylor Wilson:
Two months after his daughter died by suicide, Ron Smith found a note titled, “Letter to my abuser.” His 28-year-old daughter, Tristin Kate Smith, wasn’t writing about a person. The nurse was addressing the American healthcare system. Smith, who had worked at several healthcare facilities wrote, “I gave my heart, my body, and my mind to you, dedicated long hours and days, and gave you my all.” After finding her letter, her dad decided it was worth sharing to raise awareness on the toll the healthcare system had on her and other nurses. Her letter addressed issues of staffing shortages, assaults on healthcare workers, unfair compensation, and the overall stress and burden that is placed on nurses. Experts stress that it’s difficult to pinpoint one reason why someone would take their own life. If you or someone you know may be struggling with suicidal thoughts, dial 988 to reach someone with the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, they’re available 24 hours a day, and provide services in multiple languages.
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New tent cities could soon pop up in New York City, as Mayor Eric Adams begins removing homeless migrants from shelters. Meanwhile, as winter approaches and temperatures drop, many of the migrants have nowhere else to go. I spoke with USA Today breaking news reporter Claire Thornton to learn more. Claire, good to have you back on.
Claire:
Thanks, Taylor.
Taylor Wilson:
So, New York City mayor Eric Adams has been really banging the drum about his city getting too many migrants to accommodate for months now. How many migrants have been sent to New York recently, and what’s he saying will happen to them?
Claire:
Since April of 2022, so about a year and a half now, 130,000 migrants from around the world have arrived in New York City, and about half of them are in shelters. Migrants are from Central and South America, African countries, really around the world, and many of them came up through Mexico and were bussed from the southern US border by Republican governors. These tens of thousands of people in New York City, many of them might not have any connections in the city, any family, and so some of them are going elsewhere, but many of them are in shelters. They have a unique right to shelter in New York City. It’s the only place in the country that guarantees shelter for anyone who needs it. But the mayor says that New York is so full after all this time, that he’s going to start to kick migrants out of the shelters.
Taylor Wilson:
Have notices started going out to migrants, and how many migrants are out of time on this?
Claire:
Yeah. So, the first notices to leave the shelters started being handed out in July. Since then, the mayor’s office told me this week that over 21,000 vacate notices have been handed to migrants. If you are alone, if you’re just an individual person, you’re getting a 30-day notice, and if you are a family, families are getting 60-day notices. They can leave and start the intake process again and try to get readmitted to the shelter, but it’s not guaranteed.
Taylor Wilson:
Claire Thornton with some great insight for us on a difficult but important story as always. Thank you so much, Claire.
Claire:
Thanks, Taylor.
Taylor Wilson:
The mayors of five cities, including New York, pressed President Joe Biden last week about getting more federal help to try and manage recent surges of migrants in their cities. And the White House said it has entered into a partnership with New York City on a work authorization clinic, where hundreds of migrants a day can submit work permit applications. Biden has also requested $1.4 billion from Congress to help state and local governments provide shelter and services for migrants, after earlier pleas from democratic mayors and governors.
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Thanks for listening to 5 Things. A reminder, if you have any comments, you can always find us at podcasts@usatoday.com. And I’ll be back tomorrow with The Excerpt from USA Today.