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The Current Transcript for November 21, 2017

Host: Anna Maria Tremonti

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Listen to the full episode

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

Her name is Delores and you don't want to step on her heels because she will use those heels to make you sit down.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: You don't want to mess with Delores. She is the alter ego of Donna Brazile, Democratic Party operative of long standing. The woman who took over the DNC the Democratic National Committee just as 20000 e-mails were being dumped by WikiLeaks into a U.S. election fight that sideswipe the Hillary Clinton campaign. It was a campaign both arrogant and controlling. And Donna Brazile was caught in the middle, learning about Russian interference even as Clinton's own strategist tried to undermine her. What she learned and what the Democrats need to learn from it all in half an hour. And if you can't mess with Delores you confront Harry at your peril.

SOUNDCLIP

My name is Harry Leslie Smith and I am almost 100 years old. My memories and my voice are my last weapon against the political tide.

AMT: He is 94. He has survived extreme poverty, war, the death of loved ones. And as he watches the politics of Europe and the world he has no hesitation in chastising those he believes are taking us back to the future. Harry Leslie Smith, his podcast and his political passions, in an hour. But since we're talking politics and those ready to speak truth to power we'll start here.

SOUNDCLIP

I am an Inuit woman that lived off the land and continue to live off the land and my lifestyle that sustains me is now threatened.

AMT: The search for truth on the troubled project called Muskrat Falls. I'm Anna Maria Tremonti. This is The Current.

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Muskrat Falls inquiry 'very much about money' and 'not about people,' says Indigenous group advocate

Guests: Peter Cowan, Denise Cole, David Vardy

AMT: Well it was supposed to be something to power a province into the future. Instead it appears to be dragging everyone further into debt. Controversy has clouded the plans for the Muskrat Falls hydroelectric projects since it was first unveiled in 2010. Yesterday the Newfoundland and Labrador government spelled out just how it will proceed with an inquiry into the over budget behind schedule mega project. Opponents are angry; the cost has ballooned to twelve point seven billion dollars. That's more than 5 billion dollars above what Newfoundlanders thought they'd pay and they have many questions about what it will do to the environment. Here's a look at some of the trouble that has followed the Muskrat Falls project over the last seven years.

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FORMER PREMIER DANNY WILLIAMS: So Muskrat Falls over budget?

VOICE 1: Yes.

FORMER PREMIER DANNY WILLIAMS: Over schedule.

VOICE 1: Yes.

FORMER PREMIER DANNY WILLIAMS: Ideal?

VOICE 1: No, but that's the very nature of megaprojects.

[Outdoor chatter]

MUFFLED PROTESTER: Don’t arrest my sister she is only doing this because she …

PROTESTER BILLY GAUTHIER: And right now I'm on day five of my hunger strike. And I'm going to keep on going. And there's no stopping me. There's no stopping me whatsoever. Stop poisoning our waters. I don't care how much money it costs to you.

PREMIER DWIGHT BALL: I guess there are lots of things that I would consider right now. My job now is to manage a project that I really didn't support in 2012. And you know getting out of this we would still be left with the cost and still left with having to find reliable power in the future.

NALCOR CEO STAN MARSHALL: An additional $75 million a year is required to operate these assets once the assets come into operation. Nalcor must take all reasonable measures to minimize the impact on customers.

FORMER PREMIER DANNY WILLIAMS: One reporter by the way says that I am conspicuously absent in addressing my legacy. Well he need not worry anymore cause here I am. I know that history will prove the value of Muskrat Falls and its worth.

AMT: Well the voices of some of the key players in this story, including former Progressive Conservative premier Danny Williams, the current Liberal premier Dwight ball, protester Bill OK and now of course CEO Stan Marshall. In a moment we'll hear from two critics who are desperate for answers but aren't sure they're going to get them. But let's start with CBC reporter Peter Cowan. He is in St. John's. Hi Peter.

PETER COWAN: Good morning, Maria.

AMT: Well first of all what is Muskrat Falls going to look like can you describe this place?

PETER COWAN: Yes so this is a dam that's going in on the Churchill River which is one of the biggest rivers in Canada. It's going in in central Labrador which is a pretty remote location and the dam itself is fairly modest. It's going to be 32 meters high so about a 10 story tall building if you can picture that. And the area that's going to be flooded is about 41 square kilometers of land around the Churchill River Valley. So right now it's about 85 percent complete. And part of the project is going to be constructing a power line because the issue is you've got this power but it's in central Labrador where the power's needed is in Newfoundland. So there's an eleven hundred kilometer power line that they're just finishing up construction that will actually take this power especially to the St. Johns area where it's needed most.

AMT: And so once the power is up and running how important is that kind of power for the province?

PETER COWAN: Well it looked like it was more important back when the project was originally planned and sanctioned. And the latest projections show that the power isn't going to be as necessary four years into the future, but when it comes online in two years ratepayers in Newfoundland and Labrador are going to have to start paying and paying pretty dearly. Right now the estimates are that power prices are going to almost double to around 20 cents a kilowatt hour.

AMT: So this brings us to this inquiry why wasn't launched in the first place?

PETER COWAN: This is a project that everyone has questions about, and the issue is that it is such a huge and complicated and so expensive project that really what government has decided here is the only way to get some answers about what exactly happened, where things went so off the rails is to pass this all over to a judge to be able to spend the next two years trying to untangle this all. And there's a lot at stake here. You heard from former Premier Danny Williams. This is one of his big legacy pieces from the time he was in power trying to get this dam on the Churchill Rivers and something that pretty much every Premier since Confederation has dreamed about doing. He was the one who actually got into place and from the side of the current government - you know this is a project that they inherited when they took power two years ago. It's one that they've made it clear they're not very happy about, and they're certainly eager to try and be able to point the finger at you know when the anger comes with those power bills they want to be able to point the finger at somebody else.

AMT: So what will this inquiry look into? Will it get to the nitty gritty of all of these concerns?

PETER COWAN: Yes and no. I guess it depends on who you talk to. Government insists that they've given up fairly broad mandate. So they've purposely said to Justice Richard Live Long who's going to be taking this on. You can look into any and all areas one of the key things that a lot of critics have been asking for is a forensic audit of the project to know just where the twelve point seven billion dollars has gone. How it got so expensive? That's something government isn't doing. But they've said it's up to Justice LeBlanc if he wants to hire those expertise and go over those books with a fine tooth comb he can. They're going to be able to hire outside expertise; things like engineers; business expert; finance experts to be able to sort of look into this. So the main principle is it's going to be looking at what the correct analysis done? Is this actually lead the best cost option for the province? Has it been well executed? And interestingly the one thing it doesn't specifically look at is the environmental concerns that have been raised by many of the Aboriginal groups in Labrador.

AMT: That's not in the terms of reference?

PETER COWAN: No it does not specifically say that the... It says that Indigenous people have to be involved in this inquiry but it doesn't say that the concerns that they've raised have to specifically be addressed although government said they've made it broad enough that that is something that justice LeBlanc look into.

AMT: Okay. So it really is going to depend on what justice LeBlanc feels should go forward then.

PETER COWAN: Absolutely and so far he hasn't been available to the media yet. But that will be one of the key questions for him is you know how important he thinks those issues will be when he sits down to look at this.

AMT: And the costs. I mean we are talking twelve point seven billion dollars in a province with a population of just over half a million. That's a lot of money.

PETER COWAN: Yes. And basically everyone in this province is going to have to pay for this for decades. I just want to give you a little bit of a comparison. On a per capita basis it would be like Ontario taking on a 330 billion dollar power project. So it's a lot of money for not a lot of people that are going to have to pay for it.

AMT: And Premier Danny Williams as you pointed out championed this project when it was first announced we requested an interview with him we didn't hear back. In a statement yesterday, he said he hopes the inquiry examines the project's positive aspects as well as its deficiencies. Will positive things come out of this do you think?

PETER COWAN: Certainly we expect that Danny Williams will be one of the people who will be represented at the inquiry. The current PC opposition which was in government at the time, they've certainly insisted that there are still positive aspects. It's certainly done some things like for example help the economy. There's been you know a lot of that money has gone into trades positions. There are people who've made good livings for the last few years working on this project. But you know the issue is that the situation has changed a lot since it was originally sanctioned. The costs have gone up. It's two years behind schedule and at the time the price of oil was high when they looked at alternatives. You know this was designed to get us off expensive oil. Well oil isn't as expensive as it was anymore. So you know these will be things that they have to look at as they do their analysis.

AMT: Well Peter thanks for bringing us up to speed. Oh you're welcome. Peter Cowan, reporter with CBC News in St. John's. Now the Muskrat Falls project has triggered strong opposition particularly from local indigenous people who are concerned that the project could damage land and water on which they depend. Denise Cole is with the Labrador land Protector's. It represents the concerns of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in that area. She is in Happy Valley Goose Bay Labrador about 30 kilometers downstream from the Muskrat Falls project. Hello, Denise Cole.

DENISE COLE: Good morning.

AMT: Will this inquiry confront your concerns?

DENISE COLE: No not really. We feel that this announcement is really a distraction. Just in time for a federal visit to apologize to Labrador. The regional by-election is happening in the Avalon. It certainly doesn't include our cultural or environmental or health impacts that we've identified that will be downstream like the methyl mercury poison in our food web, catastrophic dam break and drowning of over a thousand people within two communities that are closest to the dam site. And that sacred space where over you know 70000 artifacts have been found has been taken for profit. Now for us this inquiry is very much about money. It's not about people are culture or health. The forensic [unintelligible] is actually optional. There is no environmental mandates like Peter and spoken to. The broken methyl mercury agreement hasn't been mentioned and as so many said indigenous people, but it's not. It is indigenous leaders and groups are included in this inquiry not the actual people which shows a very lopsided approach to getting favor from the leaders by striking deals. You know, Dwight Ball have his cards a little bit in the announcement when he said ‘well you know we're working towards something with the [unintelligible]’. So it's you know are you trying you know, is this government actually going to try to leverage approval of a project or a favorable input into an inquiry by offering some of these deals to indigenous governments.

AMT: Okay let me ask you a few really specific questions because you mentioned so many things. You talk about a dam break. There's some issue about the structural stability of something called the North spur. What is that?

DENISE COLE: Well the North spur is a [unintelligible] of a natural dam on the river for generations but it's never had you know 39 meters of water pushing on it, which is what the reservoir height will come to. And it's made predominantly of quick clays and sand and if you were ever there you could literally in some spots throw a ball from one side to the other. This is how thin this strip of land is and it's always been an area of contention and a fear around stability. We've had landslides there many times over the years and so it is again like the fact that we've been asking for an independent review of the north spur to make us feel safe. This is still it's not included in this inquiry and this government's you know continues to not even answer to that. It seems like the downstream population is a you know like we're like a by-product. We're disposable when it comes to this project. Including now in this inquiry there isn't many consequences identified. You know if the inquiry comes out, the project is going to continue to go full steam ahead. So what's the point of this inquiry if it's going to actually mean something. They use the language of 85 percent complete. But if there's lives at risk, is money really still going to be the priority? We have two years left. It is a cultural genocide happening here.

AMT: Right. Okay. Let me get back to this, so if it bursts who's in danger?

DENISE COLE: There with the lower valley of Happy Valley Goose Bay and the entire community of Mud Lake. And Mud Lake, you can only travel in Mud Lake by water and air. So if the dam is the North Spurs were to let go you're talking literally 20 minutes. There's no evacuation plan. There's no warning system in place. That community and the 50 or so people that living there will be washed away. This is why we use the language of a cultural genocide that's happening here. The prime minister is coming here to apologize for what they've done to hurt children and culture while they've put 9.2 billion dollars in federal loan guarantees to continue hurting children and culture and it's a sick hypocrisy. There's no truth and reconciliation in this project.

AMT: Well let's move to the environment because I know you have concerns and we don't have a lot of time. Methyl mercury, what is the concern? That this is what this is what will happen when the land is flooded, methyl mercury will come to the surface or come into the water?

DENISE COLE: Yes. And then to put it like this the biggest issue is into our traditional food web. We very much depend on... If you look at the Harvard study that came out [unintelligible] Muskrat right. There were major concerns about what methyl mercury will do to our traditional foods. When you have communities like Rigolette, which is further downstream that has a huge dependency, all of us have a huge dependency on eating our traditional foods which are very nutrient rich. And so the mitigation they talk about the same address this independent expert advisory committee is well behind schedule and it seems to be they only can again make recommendations and this inquiry doesn't even speak to that at all.

AMT: Okay. And also the company that's overseeing all this is Nalcor and we received a statement from them and they say “Nalcor will support and cooperate fully with the inquiry for the Muskrat Falls project and is committed to making information available to the inquiry remain focused on completing the Muskrat Falls project and bringing transmit the transmission project into service by mid-2018.” You have a meeting coming up with the Nalcor CEO. What are you going to say to him?

DENISE COLE: Well we're going to talk a lot about the fact that this project is not in line with United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous people. Due to the consult in free and prior informed consent to it life and the project has not been achieved in this project. The fact that no court talks about that this is and so does the Canadian government. This is about getting renewable energy for Atlantic Canada. When reality is that Nova Scotia will still depend predominantly on coal and oil because [unintelligible] wants to sell much of that power to the US…

AMT: Okay, Denise Cole, we have to leave it there. Thank you.

DENISE COLE: Thank you so much for this opportunity.

AMT: Denise Cole communications rep for the Labrador land Protector's she's in Happy Valley Goose Bay Labrador. David Vardy has his own concerns. He's an economist, former chair of the Newfoundland and Labrador Public Utilities Board. He's been following this project closely for years. He's been raising alarm bells along the way. He joins us from St. John's. Hello.

DAVID VARDY: Good morning, Anna Maria.

AMT: Why have you been raising alarm bells?

DAVID VARDY: Because there are a lot of problems with this project not only with the construction but also with the operations. The basic business plan is flawed. The number of respects, particularly in relationship to the demand - the projections for demand were totally exaggerated. And what's likely to happen though when rates increase by double is that the demand for power is going to collapse, which essentially means that there will be no power demand for Muskrat Falls power. And that's and that will lead this project, this twelve point seven billion dollar project, high and dry as a stranded asset which is going to have to be ultimately written off.

AMT: So you're saying that the numbers are wrong?

DAVID VARDY: I'm saying they did the numbers wrong big time. I was one of the people who called for the inquiry and I'm glad that the inquiry has been called but I had hoped there would be a consultation process on the terms of reference, because I think it's very important to get the terms of reference right. This is one of the most important inquiries that we've had in this province since Confederation and I think it's something that requires a lot of input from the public but that didn't happen. Clearly this was the terms of reference were written by the senior public service. The focus was on the costs of construction and the scheduling and those kinds of issues and on the behavior of Nalcor and how well Noel cork communicated with the government. But the thing that's really missing from these terms of reference is the operations mode; because the problem does not end with the when the construction is finished. In many respects the problem only begins when construction is finished because then we have to pay, then we have these massive obligations to repay the debt. And so that's the question how are we going to meet those obligations. So the focus of this inquiry I what I hope is that this inquiry would focus yes on the past but only in terms of informing the future. What we need to do is find solutions for the flawed business model with which we've been working. So this is not broad enough the terms of reference are not broad enough to actually focus the commissioner on the problems associated with Muskrat Falls. They can be fixed. The [unintelligible] get to spend a lot of money on this inquiry probably an 8 digit number. It's important that we get value for money from this inquiry. We're not going to get value for money if we focus only on the past.

AMT: But the terms of reference are very broad. Could not justice LeBlanc go to the very places you're talking about in terms of his inquiry? Could he not ask those things if he chooses?

DAVID VARDY: That's a very good point. That's a very good point because it leaves in the hands of the commission or the fate of this whole process. And so depending upon his initiatives this could cover many of the bases that I'm concerned about. But one of my concerns is that I had hoped that this would be not just a single commissioner. There would be a panel of commissioners including an engineer with experience in building mega-projects in various places throughout the world. And also a person who has got expertise in energy policy and energy economics and public utility regulation.

AMT: He can draw on those people.

DAVID VARDY: He certainly can draw on those people. And if he does that's wonderful. But certainly the fact that it's a lawyer, a judge gives a signal that there's going to be a focus here on the things that are written specifically in the terms of reference. And we have to depend on his ability to interpret the residual clauses because there are some general phrases and in the terms of reference.

AMT: Before I let you go, we're almost out of time. This won't stop the project. So what's the inquiry really for? What is it to learn about something for the next project?

DAVID VARDY: Well I would hope that was my preference that it would inform not the next project but this project because we have to remember that we're three years away from the completion of this project. While it may be 85 percent completed, there's still a lot of work that has to be done over the next few years. And for me the biggest priority is to get information on best practices and governance that can inform the final three years. That's why I think an interim report would have been extremely important.

AMT: David Vardy we have to leave it there. Thanks for your time.

DAVID VARDY: Thank you very much.

AMT: Sounds like we have more controversy as the controversy continues David Vardy an economist and former chair of the Newfoundland and Labrador public utilities board he joined us from St. John's. Stay with us. The news is next and when we return we're talking to Donna Brazile. She likes to swear she's not afraid of a fight and she's spilling lots of dirty details on the Democratic Party apparatus that lost to Donald Trump. I'm Anna Maria Tremonti. This is The Current.

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Why Hillary Clinton lost the U.S. election: former DNC chair's insider account

Guest: Donna Brazile

AMT: Hello. I'm Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current.

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Still to come: Harry Leslie Smith survived the Great Depression, World War 2, the loss of his own wife and son and now, 94 years of age, he has discovered podcasting and more than 100000 people online have found him. He'll explain why he's fighting for equality and will fight for equality until he drops dead. But first Donna Brazile on the break-ins and breakdowns that put Donald Trump in the White House.

SOUNDCLIP

Tonight a major snag on the road to party unity. [Cheers] WikiLeaks releasing nearly 20,000 internal DNC e-mails including some that appear to show efforts to undercut the rise of Bernie Sanders. In one a communications official considered pushing the narrative that Bernie never ever had his act together that his campaign was a mess. In another a top official wonders can we get someone to ask his belief does he believe in God, adding my Southern Baptist peeps will draw a big difference between a Jew and an atheist. The response: An amen.

AMT: Well that's a report from ABC News on July 23rd of 2016, the eve of the US Democratic National Convention. The release of those e-mails prompted an immediate resignation of the Democratic National Committee chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Donna Brazile, a longtime Democratic strategist and political pundit, was asked to step in to take over as interim DNC chair. And that put her in the middle of one of the dirtiest and most controversial elections in U.S. history. Now Donna Brazil has rocked the Democratic Party with her new book Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break Ins and Breakdowns That Put Donald Trump in the White House. Donna Brazile joins me from Washington D.C. Hello.

DONNA BRAZILE: Hello. Thanks for having me on.

AMT: Well before we get to those e-mails let's give it a few things about Donna Brazile on the table. You're a long time Democrat. How many campaigns have you run?

DONNA BRAZILE: I have been actively involved in the Democratic Party since the age of nine. I have been active in non-presidential campaigns, as a staff member, starting in 1976 as a youth coordinator with Jimmy Carter to retire at age 40 as Al Gore's campaign manager. I've been involved in 11 presidential cycles. And the cycles include campaigns where I was not on staff but serve as either strategists or adviser, 21 mid-term cycles, 21 cycles in which your nonpresidential light states like Virginia, my home state of Louisiana and whenever we have House and Senate races. I've been involved in 56 congressional House and Senate campaigns. I've managed several of those I've worked on many others. and 19 state and local campaigns. I have worked in 49 states and one more state I would become Miss USA without the bikini.

AMT: [Laughing] And you're still standing.

DONNA BRAZILE: I am still standing. In two years I celebrate my 50th anniversary in American politics. I feel no ways tired.

AMT: Just a few more things you're no shrinking violet. You like to cuss.

DONNA BRAZILE: [Laughing] Well I tell people I have a little Tabasco on my tongue from time to time. I'm a Louisiana girl. I don't believe that you can see everything with some of the noun verbs adjectives and adverbs and try to put in some profanity and then some good stuff. Not bad.

AMT: And when you're angry what’s the name of your alter ego?

DONNA BRAZILE: Her name is Dolores and you don't want to step on her on her heels because she will use those heels to make you sit down.

AMT: Okay so now that we know all these things what went through your mind when those 20,000 stolen DNC e-mails were dumped onto the Internet by WikiLeaks?

DONNA BRAZILE: I panicked. I left home in Washington D.C. and I immediately got up to Philadelphia and began to look for the Sanders people. I mean what I know today I would have looked for both the Sanders and the Clinton people. But given what WikiLeaks did at that moment, which was to pour out all of the relevant e-mails involved in Bernie Sanders, I went up to them apologized profusely and told them that I will get to the bottom of it. I will learn more about what was going on at the DNC. I knew just a little bit about the hacking but not enough to give them any assurances and I promised him I would get to the bottom of it.

AMT: What did you inherit when you took over as chair of the DNC?

DONNA BRAZILE: Well I was shocked. I walked into a building. I'm very familiar with the DNC. I've been chair twice. I was chair previously in 2011. I walked in a building that was riddled in debt. Staff morale was very very low. And get this there was an active campaign by the Russians to discredit us, discredit the nominee, destroy the Democratic Party, to alter and to destroy our data and to harass our staff. So I walked into a huge mess. So one that and just go home and get back in bed and say next. But I love my party. I love my country. I wanted to Hillary Clinton to win. I supported President Obama. And so when the call was made of course I would step up quit all my other occupations and take on the role as a volunteer to serve as the chair of the Democratic Party for the second time in my life.

AMT: The DNC was heavily in debt. And what did you discover about who was controlling the money?

DONNA BRAZILE: Well the DNC had over $20 million in debt in large part because we took out loans in 2014 to help the House and Senate candidates, plus there were leftover. There was leftover debt from 2012 when President Obama won re-election. When I found out of the debt and the fact that there was a joint fundraising agreement signed by both candidates, but a memorandum of understanding between the Clinton campaign staff and the DNC staff that gave them control over the technology research and communications departments. I was very dismayed by that fact. I was also dismayed that there were literally no bid contracts where the DNC was paying consultants upwards of 25000 a month, when the party was broke. The party was broken. In exchange for helping us reduce the debt. Hillary Clinton campaign put us on a starvation died. That diet kept me from doing my job because I started raising money and I wanted to ensure that the DNC was not only helping her win which is very very important. I wanted to win the presidency but I was also concerned about races from the school board all the way up to Capitol Hill.

AMT: And because of what you saw with that agreement with the Clinton campaign and the DNC, you actually told Bernie Sanders you'd found the cancer.

DONNA BRAZILE: That was a very difficult thing to do because I promised Bernie's campaign in July that I would go over to the DNC and that I would conduct a very forensic examination, and while I found no evidence of rigging – and I've said that over and over repeatedly – what I did find was something that really disappointed me. When I was Al Gore's campaign manager I stepped aside as co-chair of the Rules and Bylaws Committee. We try you know on the DNC - I'm a member of the Democratic National Committee - we try to maintain our autonomy, our independence and what I found was that the Clinton campaign in exchange again for helping us reduce our deficit, had begun to utilize those resources to pay vendors, to set up operations that had no impact whatsoever on the primary. I found no evidence of that. She won fair and square. She won more than four million votes. She won more states, more pledged delegates as well as unpledged delegates but it's still broke my heart to see that they were utilizing the DNC in such a way before the primary ended to run the general election campaign.

AMT: And it wasn't the only run in you had with him at one point you have it out over that kind of control with the man running the Clinton campaign. What do you tell them to put on the table?

DONNA BRAZILE: I told them to put their dicks on the table. I said “why don't we all put our dicks on the table?” Well look I use that as a metaphor. If I offend anybody well I'm sorry. I'm a big girl. I've been involved in politics for a long time. Often the only woman or the only African-American in the room and I find it sometime insulting that women have to take a back seat to people with less experience simply because they are male and they have a “penis”. And so I would often tell you just put it on the table because I have the biggest one which means I have nothing to show for it. But I wanted them to understand that my voice matters. My experiences matter. My ideas matter. I don't have to wait for you guys to take a poll or to come back with some computer model when I have already visited the state three or four times. And so I push. In politics, you're fighting not just for your candidate to succeed but you're also fertilizing the country. You want to put resources so that people who are running for local races can also have their ideas out there. And this campaign was really focused on 270 electoral votes, again, which I firmly supported. But I also want to support things that were happening where people live, where they work, where they play and where they pray. I want to touch voters at the local level.

AMT: And of course as you try to do all that in the midst of that there is this email hack. How did you learn that Russia was behind the hacking of the DNC?

DONNA BRAZILE: Well on the day I took control of the party I had her Robby Mook on an earlier a TV show describe that it was Russians and I kept saying “Huh. That's the second time I've heard that. Let me investigate it.” I talked to Mark Elize one of the lawyers for the Clinton campaign and he gave me a little bit more background of what the DNC had found when the remediation started on April 29th. And by the 1st of May we had hired a company that had an expertise in this area and it told us about APT 28, APT 29, these active persistent mergers and threats Cozi bear and fancy bear. But still I had no idea because I personally don't ever want to encounter a bear in or out of a zoo or cage or in the wilderness. And so when they gave me the full background I was told by a friend of mine, who was the National Security Advisor at the time, to go and get a brief. She encouraged me, she pushed me, she persuaded me. When I went over and had my briefing at the FBI what I learned shocked me, scared me, frightened me. In fact when it was over with, I didn't want to go back to the DNC. I wanted to go to the Pentagon and say “What the hell am I doing going back to the DNC. I should be going to the Pentagon. We're under attack. We're at war. We can't fight the Russians. We are the Democratic National Committee. We barely can pay our bills.”

AMT: John Podesta the then chair of the Hillary Clinton campaign had his e-mail stolen again, and supposedly by Russia, leaked. How did the party deal with that constant drip of those e-mail leaks by WikiLeaks.

DONNA BRAZILE: I can tell you that it was problematic. You know the media fed on those e-mails as if it was bread from heaven. They stood up, they wrote about it. They tweeted it out. It became the driving narrative. On October 7, 2016 I thought Donald Trump would lose the election. And then the bots and trolls took over on that day. We had an assessment from the DNI the director of national intelligence and others DHS Department of Homeland Security, that indeed it was the Russians that were interfering in meddling election. And they also confirmed that the Russians had hacked the Democratic National Committee. Soon afterwards there was an Access Hollywood tape that came out where Donald Trump allegedly made - let's just say - offensive remarks regarding women. Then by late afternoon evening John Podesta's e-mails were leaked. John Podesta’s E-mails and they numbered into the tens of thousands. They were not just dumped out one day. They were leaked every day to amplify and to be used in such a way by social media platforms to illustrate and highlight what Donald Trump was saying every day on the campaign trail. So this hurt us. This was devastating because it was hard to get our message out a message where Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine. They were talking about jobs. They were talking about economic development but all the media wanted to talk about was whatever was leaked in that day's dump. So it was very very difficult and of course the other purpose in this propaganda information disinformation campaign was to sow discord and create chaos and to keep Americans fighting each other, as opposed to fighting what we all attempt to fight it when we're in elections. It's for our values to be heard.

AMT: You seem to be saying that you can really connect the dots between those leaks the Russians and the Trump campaign.

DONNA BRAZILE: You know before I left the DNC I was anxious to file a lawsuit. I thought no one would care and I believed that the party was greatly harmed by the hack in and the attempts to destroy our databases and to harass our staff. I saw a connection. I could not prove the collusion because of course I wasn't party to the Trump campaign. But there was there was almost a rhythm that I saw each day as a hack and occurred and the volatility of the race. And I wanted to connect all those dots. I hope the DNC will pursue this lawsuit before I left as chair at the end of February. We were ready to go but I thought it was on. It was the responsibility of the next chair not the interim chair to take that bowl of a move.

AMT: You became the subject of intense controversy when WikiLeaks included an e-mail that purported to show you giving a question from a town hall debate to Hillary Clinton at the expense of Bernie Sanders. What happened there?

DONNA BRAZILE: Well two days after I criticized email dumping and said Don't read anything postmarked from Russia, WikiLeaks sought to divide and promote more disinformation. There were active measures to split up the party and you may remember when Debbie Wasserman Schultz was the party chair. She decided that the DNC would only sponsor six debates. And there was a giant fight about that. There was enormous pressure to expand the debates in town hall meetings and I made a conscious effort to get diverse communities involved and get questions that had not been previously addressed into the debate; like the death penalty, like criminal justice reform, like what happened with the flint water crisis. I gave both campaigns a heads up about the questions about the topics. But WikiLeaks only addressed the e-mails to the Clinton campaign. And because my e-mails were corrupted I couldn't find the Bernie Sanders e-mails. That's what happened. And long before I wrote my book, I apologized because I lost- I could not find those e-mails. Of course I resign at CNN and I do believe that we have bigger fish to fry than Donna Brazile trying to dig dig dig dig dig define. I also write in a book that I shared stuff with Sean Spicer that's before he morphed into Melissa McCarthy. I shared stuff all the time with candidates. And look it wasn't because I was receiving information from CNN. CNN never shared anything with me other than the topics it was because I wanted to see these issues addressed and if I had to talk about Republicans which I often did on TV my transcripts are somewhere, I want to know what was going on. I mean part of being in in the field of punditry, a pundit is a partisan with a point of view, is to get that view across to the voter.

AMT: That's why you're there.

DONNA BRAZILE: Can you underline that?

AMT: Well you had a very long connection with CNN as a commentator and a political pundit. I have a clip of CNN's Anderson Cooper talking about you in the leaked e-mail and about your book. Listen to this.

SOUNDCLIP

So is this just about Donna Brazile trying to peddle a book. I mean because as Brianna mentioned, you know, somebody who didn't work at CNN she gained access to one town hall question and she gave that, or at least attempted to, or in an e-mail gave it to somebody in the Clinton campaign which is completely unethical. She lost her job. You know she I mean I frankly view it as a huge betrayal of everybody who worked at CNN and the fact that she did that.

AMT: Donna Brazile what do you think of the way CNN characterizes this?

DONNA BRAZILE: CNN never gave any of us access to anyone. We didn't have it. They had a vault. I never saw Anderson before a debate. I never saw the questions. And for them to even say that I thought it was just a bridge too far. But nevertheless I love CNN. I miss CNN in terms of you know being there with my friends. I stepped down the night that came out because I warned on CNN and said “Give me time to get home I'm in I'm in Atlanta. If you give me time I might be able to find it.” I wasn't afraid of what I found. I knew what I had done. I knew I gave people head up whatever. But when they didn't give me that and they wanted to put out a statement and I said to them and hear the exact words: “You're going to put my life in danger.” And by the time I got home and I saw that suspicious package on my steps, I sent an e-mail that evening and I said “I resign.” It is not worth it. My life is so much more important than the disinformation, propaganda, warfare, the WikiLeaks and the Russia.

AMT: You just mentioned a package. You were very concerned about your own safety during the election. What steps did you take to protect yourself in the end?

DONNA BRAZILE: I took extremely extremely cautious steps personally but also professionally to protect the entire headquarters of the DNC. We added additional security. We had our bill men swept and for any devices. We also made sure that everyone entering the building had the proper identification that no one from the outside could come in. I also took those additional steps at my home and other places. Because the threats that came in I was told by officials “don't brush them off take it seriously,” because of what was going on.

AMT: We don't have a lot of time left but I want to get into the actual run up when you were you were traveling around to various areas. And you saw a lot of problems with the way the Clinton campaign was moving forward. You said at one point that you were getting a whiff of defeat. What did you see on the ground that the Clinton campaign missed?

DONNA BRAZILE: I went from Florida to Colorado to Nevada and not once, multiple times, to Pennsylvania. I went to Northern Virginia. I went everywhere and I kept hearing is “Madam Chair We need more this we need more of this.” Madam Chair “When are you going to start doing the ads. Madam Chair. We need more surrogates. Madam Chair” and I keep hearing from people who should have had those resources already and it was September October, early, late October.

AMT: I really get the impression after reading your book that the Clinton campaign just didn't get it, that they almost handed it to Trump because of the way they chose to campaign. They were so caught up in their sterile rooms as you call them with their computers and their algorithms that they never thought to go out and meet the people.

DONNA BRAZILE: You know I describe it as being just they were arrogant. They were dismissive if they dislike my book write their own book, but don't throw shade on my book when all I'm trying to do is to open up this wound, to clean it all to dress it so that we can move forward in 2018 and beyond.

AMT: And so the scandal around the Russian interference in the 2006 election has only intensified in the years since Donald Trump has won. Special counsel Robert Mueller is digging into any collusion that might have taken place between the Trump campaign and Russia. Knowing what we know now do you think the Trump campaign worked with people associated with Russian intelligence?

DONNA BRAZILE: Here's what I know. The Russians tried to destroy our country and they took active measures to destabilize our democracy and to make Hillary lose. We need to figure out who help them. What role that they play. And the WikiLeaks dump. Who knew about the rubles and the advertisement on Twitter and face Facebook and who gave them the data and the information? How many state elections systems did they try to hack? How many voter registrations did they actually penetrate any of these systems? There are so many questions that have been answered. I am hopeful that these congressional investigators will finish their job and director Mueller will come to his conclusion and that we will all as a country of the United States of America agree that the hack in 2016 should never occur again and we need to prepare for 2018-2020 and beyond.

AMT: So what can Democrats learn from that 2016 presidential campaign?

DONNA BRAZILE: I would hope that this goes beyond the Democratic Party because while the Democratic Party was hacked in 2016 we know from previous attempts the Chinese tried to have both campaigns in 2008. The Democratic Party at least from this from my vantage point is already learning the lessons. We our cyber security has been strengthened. We have a new team of people protecting our digital apparatuses. And I do believe that our staff and our coworkers will have better cyber literacy so they understand how to keep our data safe. But as a country we need a president who will acknowledge that this happened and we need Congress to take active measures to prevent it from happening again in every state in the United States must also train its staff with cyber illiteracy in cyber hygiene as well.

AMT: And as Democrats, you need a candidate got one in mind?

DONNA BRAZILE: No I don't have a candidate but you know what I have. I have hope. I choose hope. I choose hope because I do believe that there is an awakening taking place all over this country. Young people are getting more engaged. They're getting involved. They're running for office. I saw evidence of it in Virginia in 2017. And I am sure that 2018 is going to be a great year for Democrats fall. We will have some little tailwind behind us and not the here that we face in 2016.

AMT: Or they'll have to face Delores.

[Laughter]

DONNA BRAZILE: Delores isn’t going nowhere. She's been with me. She's been a part of who I am because I am passionate about democracy I'm passionate about the Democratic Party. More importantly I am passionate in my call to serve.

AMT: Thank you. Thank you from Canada.

DONNA BRAZILE: Well I love Canada. And look from every now and then we need that cold front to push down that low pressure system that keeps the hurricanes away from New Orleans. Thank you. Bye bye.

AMT: Thank you. Bye bye. Donna Brazile former interim chair of the Democratic National Committee. Her new book is called Hacks: The Inside story of the Break Ins And Breakdowns that Put Donald Trump in the White House. She joined us from Washington D.C. Let us know what you think. Tweet us at the current CBC find us on Facebook. Go to the website cbc.ca/thecurrent and stay with us in our next half hour Harry Leslie Smith says he's seen humanity at its best and worst. He's 94. He's got a podcast. He's next. This is The Current.

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THE CURRENT | 94-year-old podcaster Harry Leslie Smith says he'll 'drop dead' before he stops fighting for equality

Guest: Harry Leslie Smith

AMT: Hello I'm Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

My name is Harry Leslie Smith and I am almost 100 years old. My memories and my voice are my last weapon against the political tide. I want to return to Britain and the world to the darkness of my youth when the ordinary worker grubbed for existence, while the one percent of that day lived off the fat of our labor like princes during the days of slavery. So welcome to my last act of defiance.

AMT: With those words 94 year old Harry Leslie Smith launched his first podcast. It is called Harry's Last Stand. It has attracted tens of thousands of listeners eager to hear the political views and personal insights of a man with his life story. And what a story it is. Harry Leslie Smith has survived a lot; extreme poverty in childhood in Britain, the Great Depression, the Second World War and later, living in Canada, the loss of his wife and one of his three sons. As he puts it, he's seen humanity at its best and at its worst. Now he fears the world risks repeating past mistakes. So he's warning a younger generation to protect the values and gains for which he helped fight. And he's using their tools to convey his message through his podcast and his 144,000 followers on Twitter. He is also the author of several books. His latest is called Don't Let My Past be Your Future. Harry Leslie Smith is with me from London, England. Hello.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Hello. My name is Harry Leslie Smith.

AMT: And you are defiant [laughs].

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: And I will be to the end.

AMT: And you have said that you want your grandchildren and their generation to think about the fact that they must fight against the dying of the light. What do you mean by that?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: I mean I can see already that retreating back to my past. Life is not good anymore for ordinary people. We realize that when we see the abundance of food banks, people try to survive in a country which has become more selfish. All I see here is rows and rows of people lying the on the sidewalk with a blanket over them or a sleeping bag. And I think what a shame that this is happening to a country which one time it's the greatest country on earth.

AMT: You know you make the point in your first podcast. You know you're almost 100. Why would a man in his 90s marching toward a century be so worried about the future?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: I worry because I like people. I love people. I know what it's like when people suffer and suffer I mean real suffering. When you go to bed at night with an empty stomach and you get up in the morning with an empty stomach. And all you can feel as a kid it's real and it isn't the center of your stomach where you're charging to school and you don't know what to do to fill that void.

AMT: That's how you grow up isn't?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Oh it is.

AMT: You were in Barnsley, Yorkshire am I right?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: That's right.

AMT: You were very poor. You had a sister named Marion what happened to your sister?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Marion was my parents’ first child, actually. She was born in 1915. And my father was a miner. And the people who owned the mines worth the upper crust and they didn't believe in paying good wages so they could barely survive on his income. And the only place where you get to live when Marion was born was rather fetid structure of a house. And we always had a feeling that that was the house where Marion contracted chest problems.

AMT: She got tuberculosis didn't she?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Yes.

AMT: And how old was she when she died?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: About five or six.

AMT: So your family was living in real poverty and you had to go out and find food at times with another sister, Berta.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: We had no choice. We had to have food. You did everything possible where you thought there might be some [unintelligible] that you could push into your stomach. We used to go behind restaurants and go through the garbage bins in the mornings on our way to school, and hope that maybe some guest had too much on his plate and had been scraped into the bin. Sometimes we were lucky but most times we were not.

AMT: How old were you when you were first sent out to work?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: I was five, actually.

AMT: What did you do?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: I was what you call a beer barrow boy. And I pushed a cart with bottles of beer around the neighborhood to give a little Clubfoot to the poor people they could never afford more than one bottle at a time. But they had to have something to raise their spirits and hope I guess.

AMT: But you were just a little kid that must have been hard to push that around.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: It was. And that cart had big [unintelligible] wheels and if I went down the curb I had to let it down gently then push it across the street and then turn around and pull it up on the next pavement. It was a test of strength.

AMT: I can't imagine. Harry Leslie Smith you also tell a story about a new pair of winter boots.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Ye. That was when I was about 13. I was going to a school in Halifax, England. We again were pretty pretty down poor. And we never had new shoes. Everything was old. And when the holes began to appear in the bottom of the shoes, then you would push cardboard into the soles so your foot wouldn't be on the ground. But this particular day I just couldn't find anything to stick into the shoe. So I did not go to school and went I went next day Mr. Doss said “where were you yesterday?” And I lifted up my shoe to show him and they said “see me tomorrow after school.” So the next day I came to school. He pulled out from his desk a new pair of shoes. [Sobbing] I was really really shaken.

AMT: What a lovely story and you still remember it all these years, later.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Oh yes.

AMT: You make the point that your dad worked in a coal mine and he lost his job. At one point, he took you and your sister to the gates of Weetabix factory. What was he doing?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: He was looking for work. Yes. But of course there was nothing for healthy men. And my father, injured in the mine, he had a truss around his stomach to hold his belly button in place and he couldn't have got a job but they had offered it to him you know. So anyway when they said “no I'm sorry,” he would say “you've got any Weetabix that you can let me have for the children?” and said “Sorry mate.”

AMT: So he brought you because he thought they would they would sympathize with him a little bit.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Yes. That is right.

AMT: And they didn't.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: No. No.

AMT: It must have been hard.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Oh it's unbelievable. And you know my feeling is it's happening all over again. Today in this time of plenty, our richest people are not paying their share of taxes in order to keep the government's providing for the lower classes who are struggling.

AMT: Well you know in line with your concerns, I'm going to play you a report back from 1945. This is when Clement Attlee became Britain's first Labor prime minister.

SOUNDCLIP

[Music]

The sweeping of victories throughout the country mark an epoch in the political life of this country. I am certain that this election has been one in which the electors have thought deeply on the fundamental questions of the future and they realize that Labor is the party of the future and that Labor's policy is the only policy that can lead us to peace abroad and social justice at home.

AMT: Harry Leslie Smith, what goes through your mind when you hear that and you reflect on those times?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: I remember the fact that all army groups came together as one and bluntly told the election committee, before the election, that they would only elect a Labor Party that would place in our country a national health service that was free for every man woman and child. It was something which we knew had to be given to people. We had gone forty years right up to the war, without medical attention. Can you imagine? I am sad to say I feel that the government is chipping away at it and hoping that bit by bit they will take that away from today's people.

AMT: Do you think people of this generation understand the struggle of your generation to get those things?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: They do. You can't understand the deprivation, the sacredness, the hunger was so rife. It's just impossible to describe. Well it wasn't just for a week. It just went on month after month and it became so bad that eventually my mother said to my father “I love you but I can't live with you anymore. I've got to seek a man who has a job and can provide for the children.” And before we knew it my sister Alberta and I found that we had a pig farmer. His job was a pig farmer. Apparently he'd known my mother years ago. He moved in instead of my father.

AMT: So you watched the toll of poverty on your parents, on their relationship, on everything you understood.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Yes. I think the only thing that saved me was I discovered the public life libraries [chuckles]. And I spent –with my sister – will be rooting through books in the early days when we were too young. It was mostly fairy stories. But as time went on we started digging deeper and deeper into serious literature.

AMT: There's still a lot of poverty across Britain today. How do you think that is affecting the social fabric?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: I think you know what it's causing partly is not just there, but in other countries too, is beginning to cause people who feel that they have to do something drastic to show their disapproval of the world as it is. That is the worst possible thing because only ends up with the death of innocent bystanders or friends.

AMT: Along with all of this and your views there, you actually campaigned against Brexit. I'm interested to know how you felt when you learned a majority of Britons had voted to leave the European Union?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: I think it was such a foolish move. For one thing, who is going to provide the food for Britain? I think we would find that there would be less work than there is now. They've forever pointed out the fact that the immigrants moving into Britain, which is a lie. They never ask how many Brits have gone to live in the EU. They are just not thinking straight. And I think it's not going to end good for them.

AMT: I want to ask you about your own life. After the war, you fell in love with Frieda but she was from the wrong place wasn't she?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Yes. She was a German girl.

AMT: As a British member of the Air Force you weren't supposed to be dating someone from the so-called enemy side.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Oh God. No. You could be hauled in by military police and put on charges and they will [unintelligible] you.

AMT: And the war was over.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Yes. Oh yes.

AMT: So you end up making a life in Canada. You have three boys and then Frieda and your son Peter become ill at around the same time. What happened?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Frieda of course contracted rheumatoid arthritis. That was a terrible, painful thing. Peter we knew was schizophrenic and we brought him home to live with us, outside Kohlberg actually. It was really a very difficult period.

AMT: And you became a caregiver to both her and Peter then.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Yes that's right. I tried to get Peter, to keep interested, take him out to have a beer, occasionally at the village pub. And also got him interested in woodcarving. I wanted to get him doing something so he felt he wasn't just sleeping and looking at the wall you know. And he became a very good woodcarver. In fact I still have a couple of pieces hanging in my apartment. He became, in later life, a great man who was called by large organizations in Canada to speak out about mental problems and was really well known for his discourse on how to survive you know.

AMT: And the experience of caring for him and your wife and having them both die. What did that do to you?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: I was just devastated. In fact within a year I'd already decided that I would go back to Germany. I already knew that the apartment block in the country, where my wife lived and where I used to pick her up to go for trips, was still standing. I went back and I would stand across the road looking at the door of her apartment thinking that she was going to walk out of it.

AMT: How did you go from the despair over losing her and your son to the defiance we hear now in your podcast?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: My son John and I celebrate my wife’s birthdays and my son’s birthday every year.

AMT: It's an important time, huh?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: It was a [unintelligible] great life, actually.

AMT: And you still travel. You want to visit a refugee camp, refugee hotspots, as well. Like you still want to go and see these things, why?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Oh yes. I want to see how they're reacting to what is happening to their world. I want to be able to - from what I read in their faces and in the whatever they say - that by writing a book about their lifestyles, and about the way we treat refugees that hopefully I can change the world’s thinking about refugees, that I can get the world to realize that we are all human beings. Whatever color under the skin, we are the same.

AMT: You know the message you give in your podcasts about treating people equally, about your concerns, about inequality have really struck a nerve with a lot of people especially young people. Are you surprised how many young people are interested in what you have to say?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: No I'm not. I'm surprised somehow because it became more towards the last three or four years, young people are beginning to take more cogent interest in what is happening around them and they're beginning to realize that they are going nowhere. They don't have permanent jobs. They don't have enough to buy a home. They're in limbo. They have no hope about marrying and having children and a house where they can after work go back and say thank goodness and close the door.

AMT: I was going to ask you if that scares you but I think it makes you angry doesn't it?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: It does because it's only, it is greed that has driven all these rich 1 percent and 10 percent people. I think it's time that we started becoming, as a nation, more angry.

AMT: Did you think when you were a young man that and things had appeared to change that you would be fighting this again, at this point in your life?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: I did not actually. I must say this all happened after my wife died. I went to Portugal for the winters. I was there during the banking crash of 09 whether I realized what those bankers did. I felt that it was time that I became interested in governments and banks and what have you. Because not what of those banks that caused mayhem across the world and were the direct result of austerity, they didn't get the punishment they should have got.

AMT: You know I was going to ask you when you're 94 and a lot of people would either want to relax, or frankly couldn't even be able to do what you do because they don't survive as long as you do. But I realize you don't think there's time to relax at 94, that you think that this is important and you need to talk about it as much as you can. Am I right?

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: Oh absolutely, absolutely. I will be doing this until I drop dead. Because I don't think there's any greater challenges than to get people to wake up to a society which is taking advantage of their good nature because ordinary people seem to just sit back and say nothing and do nothing. It's time that they – and it will happen. I don't know where - that there will be a revolution or something.

AMT: Harry Leslie Smith thank you for speaking with me.

HARRY LESLIE SMITH: It's been my pleasure. Thank you.

AMT: 94 year old Harry Leslie Smith author of Don't Let my Past be Your Future. His podcast is called Harry's Last Stand. Visit our website cbc.ca/thecurrent and we will post photos of him and a link to his podcast.

SOUNDCLIP

[Song: When I am gone by Phil Ochs]

There's no place in this world where I'll belong when I'm gone

And I won't know the right from the wrong when I'm gone

And you won't find me singin' on this song when I'm gone

So I guess I'll have to do it while I'm here

And I won't feel the flowing of the time when I'm gone

All the pleasures of love will not be mine when I'm gone

My pen won't pour out a lyric line when I'm gone

So I guess I'll have to do it while I'm here

And I won't breathe the bracing air when I'm gone

And I can't even worry 'bout my cares when I'm gone

AMT: Phil Ochs with When I'm Gone. That's our program for today stay with Radio 1 for Q. The Giller Prize is one of the most prestigious literary awards in Canada and Tom power talks to the winner of this year's Giller Prize, Michael Redhill. Now earlier I spoke with Donna Brazile the former chair of the Democratic National Committee about her turbulent time leading up to last year's U.S. presidential election. If you missed it you'll be able to catch it today on the CBC Radio app or on our website. There's someone I didn't ask her about after we ended our conversation she told me why she was really glad I didn't go there. Then she did. We'll leave you with that. I'm Anna Maria Tremonti. Thanks for listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

DONNA BRAZILE: I'm so glad you did not mention my dog Chip, because the other day somebody mentioned Chip and I was off guard and I started crying. I miss my doggy.

AMT: I was going to get there. I was going to get there, but…

DONNA BRAZILE: I miss my Poody wipes he was such a great dog.

AMT: Beautiful picture at the back of the book of you with the dog.

DONNA BRAZILE: You notice I only want one picture. I said forget these candidates. I only want one picture in my book of my dog. I mean I miss my dog.

AMT: It's interesting because I looked for other pictures and I realized nope.

DONNA BRAZILE: No. I said no this is not about, you know, people know me. I don't need to put a picture of Obama, Clinton and Bob and all these. I want my dog.

[Music: Theme]

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Tuesday 21 November, 2017 Full Episode Transcript

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