The Daily - 'The Interview': Gretchen Whitmer Wants a Gen X President — in 2028

Episode Date: June 22, 2024

The governor of Michigan isn’t saying it should be her, but she’s not saying it shouldn’t be, either.

From The New York Times, this is The Interview. I'm Lulu Garcia Navarro. There is one thing that's certain about this year's election. Whatever the result, it will be the end of an era, opening the door to a new generation of political leaders. And for Democrats, there are few politicians buzzier than Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. After serving in the Michigan state legislature, Whitmer was elected to the governorship in 2018.

And when COVID hit, she became a national lightning rod for some of the restrictions she put in place, taking hits from Trump, whose rhetoric she blames for inspiring an assassination attempt against her. Trump, whose rhetoric she blames for inspiring an assassination attempt against her. But it was what Whitmer achieved in 2022 that really cemented her as a political force. That year, she was reelected on the back of a reproductive rights ballot referendum. She also achieved something that hadn't happened in nearly 40 years in Michigan. With the help of redistricting, she gave Democrats a trifecta, with both the state House and the Senate flipping to blue. In the past few years, Whitmer has leveraged that majority to enact a progressive wish list of policies, including basic but meaningful gun control legislation, a new clean energy plan.

And she's also been pushing for educational reforms like universal pre-K and free community college. Whitmer is term limited, though. Her governorship will end in 2026. And there's a lot of speculation about what's next for her. Like many politicians with national ambitions, she's written a new book about her life and vision for the country. It's called True Grudge. She's also raising her profile as co-chair of President Biden's re-election campaign.

We talk about Biden's challenges in the second half of our conversation and about whether she can deliver the must-win state of Michigan. Here's my conversation with Governor Gretchen Whitmer. I want to get the elephant out of the room, which is you're releasing this memoir in the middle of the 2024 election cycle. So why now? So it's less of a memoir and more of like a handbook. The question I get whenever I'm traveling, even within Michigan, but certainly outside of Michigan as well, is how do I stay positive? And all the ugliness and craziness that I've had to lead the state of Michigan through, how do I stay positive? Why do I want to keep doing this work? And I thought, you know, this is going to be another heavy year, 2024. Sure is. It's going to feel very dark at times with the political rhetoric and this important election coming up. And I thought, if I can put some light out into the world right now, maybe you can laugh at my expense. Or maybe there's a little inspiration here that'll help you get through whatever you were navigating.

Were you worried about how it was going to be perceived, though, putting it there at this moment? Because you can put light into the dark at any time. But this is, as you mentioned, just a very important election, and you are a very prominent Democrat. You know what? I can't worry about how everything's going to be perceived. That's one lesson I certainly have learned in the last six years. No matter what I do or say, people are going to have their own take on it. So you got to do what you know the right thing to do is. This book did help me understand you as a person. It is a book that talks a lot about your own personal story, how you view the world. You write in the book about

how you partied in high school and college and that you didn't really become ambitious until you got into law school. You talk about how you actually threw up on your principal who found you passed out in the parking lot from drinking. And first of all, like mortifying. But you didn't include this in your book for no reason. So I'm curious, what were you hoping to show? Well, every one of us has our flaws, right? That was a period of time when, was not particularly disciplined and was focused more on having fun. And that's okay, too. I learned a lot during that period of time. But it was that real big screw-up that taught me each phase in life, you learn things, you've got opportunities.

And my mom and I, we had a very tough relationship during that period of time, as I would have had with my daughters if they'd been as wild as I was at that age. But I also was the moment where I really learned who I was. And when I went to law school is when it all started to click for me. So I was a little bit more of a late bloomer than my sister was. But by the same token, I think these are lessons that help keep me humble. And fortunately, when I was a teenager, we didn't all have phones where we could film one another making, you know, not the greatest judgments. Yeah, for sure. And in fact, you make a point that humor and being able to not take yourself so seriously is part of what you think makes you a powerful

politician in a way. You actually put a picture of yourself in the book, Missing a Front Tooth, because you had an accident growing up. So first of all, it's funny that you married a dentist, right? As a woman, though, we're always so attuned to the way we look, how we're perceived. I mean, women we know, and specifically in politics, get judged a lot more harshly. Do you worry about that? Women, of course, you know, we can't just switch out ties every day. We've got to be mindful of what we wear on top of how we look, etc. And so it can get expensive.

Most of the things that I wear and buy are actually secondhand. And I rented a dress from Rent the Runway to give my first State of the State speech in. And the predominantly Republican legislature to whom I was addressing at the time, I knew that there were a lot of things that they weren't going to share as terms of values and vision for the state when I laid out the vision. But I wanted to feel confident going in. I wore this, I thought, attractive blue dress. Oh my God, the fashion police showed up the next day. The critique was not about what I said or the important message that I shared. It was about what I was wearing. And they actually interviewed people about how they thought I looked in that dress. And as the mother of two

young women, it was just crushing, not because it hurt my feelings, but because here I am laying out a vision for a state after just getting elected the chief executive officer of a state of 10 million people where we have serious issues to tackle. And that's what I was talking about. And the focus was what I was on what I was wearing. And I think that we deal with a lot more of that than than men ever do. And I am mindful of it because I want people to focus on what I'm saying, not anything else. When you say you're mindful of it, do you forefront your gender or do you pretend that it's not there? I'm not going to talk about it. I'm a person in a suit and my gender doesn't matter. Or do you feel that there is a different thing that as a female politician you bring to the table?

I go back and forth, to be honest, Lulu. I think that there are moments where you might take a situation as a learning opportunity to educate someone. There are moments where when you're talking about something that is inherently gender-based, reproductive rights, for instance, talk about my experience as a woman, as a sexual assault survivor. There are moments where I ignore the noise and just muster through. It's, I think, a calculation. Calculation maybe sounds too, you know, planning. It's an assessment that women have to make at all times. A colleague when I was in the Senate came up to me and said something totally out of bounds and very over the line. And I remember sitting there thinking,

I've got to figure out how to respond to this. Can I educate him? Why what he just said is totally inappropriate? Do I ignore it? Do I laugh and brush it off and tell him that he's foolish? Do I take it on in a very serious way? And it's sometimes exhausting to figure out how do I have to respond to someone else's bad behavior? But I am mindful because I think about the women who come after me or my own daughters. And what did you decide?

Well, in that one, I responded with some very colorful language and put him in his place, and he never bothered me again. I want to talk a little bit about you as a political leader, because one of the reasons you are viewed as this rising star for Democrats is that you are a popular governor in a battleground state. In 2022, you got a trifecta for the Democrats. You won the House, you won the Senate, and you won the governorship. I guess my question is, there's two ways that you can move when something like that happens, especially in a state that is so closely divided. You can decide to do what some governors in red states and purple states have done, which is to say, I'm going to be a centrist. I'm going to move more incrementally. Or you can enact what is a very partisan agenda, right? You took that second route. What was the calculation there? Why did you decide, I'm going to really try and run with the ball? Well, we ran on an agenda and people elected us on that agenda. And so my philosophy is if people have elected you to do something, do it. Don't waste time. Don't make excuses.

Deliver. And I'm grateful that I've got this second term. A lot of folks are writing my political obituary going into the reelect in 2022. I ended up winning by almost 11 points. And that, for me, made me feel very confident that people expected me to lead on the issues on which I was running. I also, though, want to make sure to recognize, I think you can't win an election in Michigan by double digits if you're not also drawing over people who are not traditional Democrats. And I'm proud of that. One of the stories in the book I tell is about my friend Randy Richardville, the Republican leader. And we had a lot of knockdown drag outs when I was the Democratic leader in the Senate. He was the Republican leader. He was in the majority.

We did battle. We'd often, though, also end the day going and grabbing a beer together, because I think that it's important to not take things personally, but to stay focused on doing the job and also trying to continue to build relationships with diverse sets of interests and people. That's what our system is supposed to be about. It's supposed to be about that. But, you know, one of the things that I know other Democrats have pointed to is that the Republican Party under Donald Trump has gone in a particular direction that makes that they feel very, very difficult. So that sounds great to sit and have a beer with your political adversary. But at the same time, there are

huge ideological chasms at the moment. There's no question. I mean, it's challenging. I don't ever want to imply that it's easy. It takes work. It takes thick skin and a short memory. And that's a good thing in politics, that's for sure. During the pandemic, when things were really at their hottest, when the former president singled me out and called me that woman from Michigan, and I was getting a lot of threats at the time. My Republican-led legislature, who'd worked with me pretty well up until that moment, really turned on me. That was the moment when everything kind of changed.

I share a picture in the book from the window that I took on my phone when they had a demonstration. People showed up in their cars and shut down the capital city. And they were holding up signs calling me, you know, a Nazi. We saw Confederate flags, saw a Barbie that was dressed like me and hanging from a noose. And it was shocking. I also had a Republican leader who took to calling me names and shared a stage with a lot of the, some of the folks that ultimately were tried for the plot to kidnap and kill me. And yet, I had to keep negotiating with that guy because I had to get a budget done. And so, I think that that short memory and thick skin is really important if we're going

to try to bridge these gaps, because I got a job to do at the end of the day. Let's talk about that era, because it was the period when you became a national figure. Very early on, you and then President Trump were at odds, to put it mildly. And you became a symbol of what Republicans saw as draconian pandemic restrictions. You faced protests, death threats. You write that you were shocked at how virulent the reaction was. Looking back, why do you think people reacted the way they did so quickly? One of the things that I did during the pandemic was talk to my colleagues a lot, especially my Midwestern group of governors, bipartisan group, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,

Wisconsin, Minnesota, and even Kentucky. And it was really helpful for perspective. and even Kentucky. And it was really helpful for perspective. Every one of us was dealing with some level of that animosity. In swing states, it was even more heightened because of the political dynamic and I think some intentional efforts to really gin it up. But every one of us was dealing with it. When I chatted with Mike DeWine, who is in a Republican-controlled state of Ohio, and he's dealing with threats or dealing with anger from his legislature trying to scale back his executive powers, that was really good for perspective for me. I will say, though, that it was uniquely worse in Michigan. One of my colleagues on our group call said, you know, Gretchen, you're doing a lot of the same things the rest of us are, but why do you take so much more crap for it?

And he said, as soon as that last word landed, he said, wait, don't answer that question. I know you're the one woman that's doing it of this group of governors. You think it was sexism? Well, that was his theory, and I'm not going to combat that. I do think that that was maybe what made our situation in Michigan stand out. Things went off the rails in Michigan. In October 2020, 14 men ended up being arrested for plotting to kidnap you and overthrow the Michigan government. You write in the book that this was referred to in the press as a kidnapping plot,

but you say that's not accurate. Can you tell me why not? What do you see it as? I'll tell you in context of another situation that was covered as a assassination attempt. Not long ago, there was a single person that showed up on Justice Kavanaugh's lawn, and it's been covered as an assassination attempt. It was one person who was apprehended well before any threat really became real to Justice Kavanaugh, and I'm grateful for that. I recognize a threat against anyone, no matter who they are, what their political views is, undermines our system of democracy, and I think it's really important that we all call it out when it happens. The way that was covered versus how 12 to 14 people who were plotting

over the series of months, who were doing exercises, they had what they called a kill house, running through scenarios about how to kidnap me and kill me. And let's be clear, they weren't going to keep me for ransom. Their intention was to, like a terrorist organization, have a sham trial and then execute me. It was very clear in a lot of their communications that was the plan. And it was over the series of months, they staked out a vacation property that my husband and I have on more than one occasion. They had plots to blow up bridges and kill police officers as well, to even burn down the Capitol, locking the legislature inside. All of that has been labeled a kidnapping plot.

And it does feel like it is to discount the seriousness. It was over such a longer period of time, so many more people involved, so many weapons involved. And yet the discrepancy of how that was covered versus how this one person on Justice Kavanaugh's lawn was covered, it was really shocking when you think about it. You write in the book that you want to meet with one of the plotters who pleaded guilty who is in prison now. What do you want to meet with one of the plotters who pleaded guilty, who is in prison now, what do you want to know? I'd like to understand what drove this group of people to take this extreme position and to try to undergo this exercise to try to kidnap me and kill me. I want to understand it.

What is happening? You think there's something to understand? Maybe. Maybe there's not. But I'd like to see. I'd like to know, is it because there wasn't, for that person, economic opportunity? Was it because they got laid off during the pandemic and they were really worried about how they were going to make their house payment? What was it that set them off? It can't just be the fact that we wanted people to wear a mask because they showed up in masks to be not identified. So it wasn't the act of wearing a mask, but what was it?

What was happening that, is there a lesson to learn from this? That's what I always want to know. Do you forgive the plotters? I do. And eight of them are doing hard time now. So I think that's important to point out. Some were acquitted. And you write in the book that you think that that was unfair. I do think that it was, you know, very sad to see such a disparate treatment of people that were a part of the same undertaking. And I think it does us all a disfavor if there's not accountability. But for the ones who took accountability and who

shared their remorse and participated with the prosecution, I did ask the judge to take that into account and to recognize that that is a positive outcome and hopefully that that was reflected in the sentencing. Separate from what happened to you during this period of the pandemic, I do want to ask you about some of the lessons that you may have learned. Michigan's stay-at-home order did last longer than other states. You closed all the schools in March 2020, and you didn't urge them to be reopened until a year later. Do you think now that we sort of have the fullness of hindsight, schools should have reopened earlier because we know now how profoundly it impacted kids

to be out of the classroom? I have said many times that if I could go back in time with the knowledge we've accumulated now, there certainly are things that I would have done differently. I also want to remind everyone that during that period of time, Michigan was so hot compared to the rest of the country. It was New York, Detroit, it was Chicago, and it was New Orleans that were having massive impact from COVID. Our hospitals were at real brink. Of course, you were dealing with the situation, and no one really knew how to deal with this. It's less about what you were facing, but more specifically about the impacts of schools. You're seeing it in Michigan, chronic absenteeism, students performing below pre-pandemic levels in reading and math.

So just applying that as the current governor, what do you see maybe the lessons are of that period, particularly when it comes to kids in schools? I think we have to remember that we were looking at lessons from the Spanish flu and recognizing that we hadn't dealt with a global pandemic in 100 years, that that particular virus absolutely was devastating to younger people. epidemiologists and our public health experts, the thought that we might have a lot of school-age kids that were going to die from this virus, I think, was really what motivated our actions and the actions of lots of governors when we stopped kids going to school. It has carried a long, hard price tag with it. We've made massive investments in early childhood and in free breakfast and lunch for all 1.4 million Michigan kids and literacy coaches. And so we're working to help get our kids back on track. But absolutely, if I could go back in time with the knowledge we have now

and knowing this virus didn't disproportionately kill children, would I have done some things differently? Yes. Staying in Michigan, one of the more recent issues, it's fair to say, that you struggled with is the conflict in Gaza. Michigan has the second largest population of Arab Americans in the country. There was a huge movement to vote uncommitted to protest the Biden administration's handling of the conflict. And in some Arab American communities, up to three quarters of Democrats cast their votes as uncommitted. Do you worry that the protest vote will translate into meaningful erosion of Biden's support? I think one of the really important lessons right now is everyone's hurting. The only universal truth here in the States is that everyone's hurting. We're watching what's happening, the loss of life. It's profound.

The hostages that are still in captivity, the remains of hostages who've not survived. the remains of hostages who've not survived. So I do think that it was important for people who disagree with the policy to be able to make an outward statement of that through that vote. I also think it's important to recognize we've got a high-stakes election coming up. We know that this is a very stark choice in front of us, and there are going to be generational impacts from the outcome of this election. And so I'm doing everything I can to make sure that Michiganders in all of these communities feel seen, heard, respected, and reflected in the policies of President Biden. of President Biden. I mean, what does that look like? Because recent polling has shown that among Muslim and Arab American voters,

Trump is leading Biden by 32 points. That's a huge defection from 2020. So how are you addressing that? What we have seen, at least in so many of the conversations that I've had on the ground in Michigan, is this is a community that takes umbrage with the, to put it lightly, with the president's policies. That being said, I hear routinely that they also

recognize that a vote for Donald Trump is a vote for someone who pushed a Muslim ban, who talks about countries with people of color in incredibly harsh and cruel terms. I think that making sure that people come out and vote is going to be the important focus of our work going into the fall election. And I don't take any vote for granted, and I don't think that the Biden administration does either. Last question about Gaza, which is a bit of a personal one. We've seen a lot of college activism. You have two college-age daughters. One just graduated from Michigan, and one is still a student there. What have they been telling you about what's going on

in campus? Well, I'm glad that I've got a 22-year-old and a 20-year-old who are very confident and invested and vocal. And I learn as much from my kids as I do anybody. And I'm grateful. You know, my daughter, my oldest, called me early on, probably late last fall. And she was really upset about the deaths in Gaza and the escalating loss of innocent lives, jarred by what happened October 7th without question and then the ongoing loss. I've asked her questions. She's got a wonderful, diverse group of friends. This generation sees, I think, the humanitarian need and is very motivated to call on our leaders to address the crisis that is playing out every single day.

And so I am very appreciative of their advocacy and activity, and I think it's emblematic of what we're seeing across our younger generation. So you think the protests on campuses were a legitimate expression of that? Some of them were. Some of them crossed the line. You know, it's funny, as we've been talking, it strikes me that we've been talking about issues in Michigan, but they're all so resonant to the national stage, right? Your state is such a microcosm of what is happening in different parts of this country. And, you know, you are one of the co-chairs of the Biden re-election campaign.

As we're speaking today, you just came from the White House. And obviously the president's age has been an issue for voters. And there's been a lot of questions about his mental fitness. He's 81 years old. Pretending that this isn't an issue hasn't really been working for Democrats. I mean, it is an issue for voters. Do you see it as a legitimate concern? And how should Democrats be talking about it? Well, one of the things I know is you can't tell people how to feel, and you can't tell people to ignore something they are questioning or they're interested in. I think it's important to recognize, yes, the two leading standard bearers for the two big political parties in this country are both, you know, 80-ish, right?

It's an inescapable fact. One has got a record of delivering incredibly for the people of our country. The CHIPS Act, the IRA, the investment that's happening on shoring supply chains and the investment on bridges and roads all across this country. President Biden has a record of delivering, and that's the kind of leadership I, that we will see for the next four years if he's reelected. On the contrary, the other 80-ish year old is someone who has not articulated any sort of vision for our country, someone who has been more about dividing us, someone who, when they don't like someone, will attack them and mobilize their supporters to threaten them. Someone who has only talked about grievance and vengeance. And I think people want a leader who is going to make their lives better, who is going to work at it every single day. President Biden has shown that he is that person, and he's the only person that falls into that category in this race for president.

So I'm hearing the message there. It does make me think, though, something you do write a lot about in the book is the power of messaging, the power of how you articulate a vision. It's something that you were very proud of in 2017 and 2018. Your slogan was fix the damn roads. I learned a lot about Michigan roads reading your book. I want to say that I didn't know, you know, but my editor had to Google to find out what Biden's slogan this year was. And it is finish the job, which I have to say is not much of a humdinger. Democrats nationally are really struggling with messaging about where the party stands. When I talk to voters, they really have trouble articulating what Democrats are going to do for them. I think that I talked to a lot of my colleagues. Governors, I think, know what's going on in their states better than anybody. And we all get asked, what about the national messaging? And I think a national message is always a challenge. Washington, D.C. is so far away from the average person's life

that to conceptualize what a $3 trillion investment in onshore and supply chains means to your everyday life is darn near impossible to discern. And that's why I've always learned, when you show up and ask people, they're going to tell you what they want. They're going to tell you what they need. And they're going to use the language that they use. Fix the damn roads was not something that we poll tested or focus grouped. It was just conversation after conversation. What do you need me to do if I'm elected? Fix the damn roads. But Governor Whitmer, it's ironic because President Biden passed an infrastructure bill. He is fixing the damn roads. That's right. And bridges and Internet. Right. But he's not getting credit for it. I mean, why do you think that is? For that same reason, right? I think the pandemic's taken a toll. People are stressed out. They're just trying to pay the grocery bill, get the kids off to school, show up at their job and maybe get a little bit of sleep at night. They're not consuming everything. They can't discern what the CHIPS Act has meant. get the kids off to school, show up at their job, and maybe get a little bit of sleep at night. They're not consuming everything. They can't discern what the CHIPS Act has meant. And so we got to tell that story better. There's no question that that's maybe one of the most

important, biggest challenges for us going into this election. But in many ways, this is a kind of vibes election. I mean, when you poll people and you ask them, what is the economy doing? They think it's in recession. How is the stock market doing? They think it's down. There isn't a real understanding of even where the country is at. So then how do you reach those people? Well, and an interesting thing, too, is in some of the most recent research, individuals feel like their situation is pretty good, but the rest of the economy is not good. And that's the absolute inverse of what generally you see. People feel like, okay, I'm not doing good, but everyone else seems to be getting ahead. It's the inverse. It's a strange phenomenon. I don't know how to explain it, but I do know we've got to make sure that

people appreciate all the different things that are happening in their communities because of the work that President Biden has done. So last question. Biden is behind in many polls, and certainly it is close in swing states like yours. He is losing ground to young people, Black and Brown voters. As we record this, the polls are pretty tight in Michigan. It's a must-win state. Do you feel pressure to deliver the state? Can you? Well, in 2022, we absolutely ran up our numbers and won by 11 points and flipped the legislature in the process. We showed up everywhere.

That is going to be even more important now than ever. I do always know that there's a path to victory through Michigan. It's going to be a little more challenging this cycle, but we've rolled up our sleeves. We're not going to get distracted. We don't celebrate small leads in polls. We don't fall apart when there's a small lead on the other side in a poll. It's Michigan. It's going to be tight all the way through the election. We're going to do the work, and I feel confident we're going to be able to win this race.

Gretchen Whitmer, thank you so much. I look forward to our next conversation. Me too. Thank you. Thank you so much. I look forward to our next conversation. Me too. Thank you. After the break, I call the governor back to get her take on a few specific issues, including reproductive rights. Every American woman and her family and health care providers deserve to know that this fundamental question around health care is vested solely in the individual, and that's going to have to happen at the federal level. So I do believe we've got to continue,

and I do believe that's why this upcoming election has such high stakes. Hi, Governor Whitmer. It's Lulu. Hi. Where are you right now? Where am I catching you? Right now, I am in Detroit. The great city of Detroit. Governor, we only have a little bit of time, so I want to jump right in. Great. So I'm guessing that you're not going to tell me if you're running for president in 2028, right? I don't know what the heck I'm going to do in 2028. So you can ask, but that's the honest answer.

That's fair. But you're clearly preparing for a bigger role on the national stage. You are term limited. Your term ends in 2026. So I do want to sort of understand how you think about some key issues. And after our last conversation, I was thinking about how we really didn't get to dig into reproductive rights. And I wanted to ask you on a national level, Roe isn't coming back. You know, Congress has been unable to pass legislation protecting contraception, much less abortion. Do you see any way to protect abortion at the national level? Well, I do. And I think ultimately that's got to be the goal right now. We've seen it all across the country. When people get an opportunity to weigh in, they overwhelmingly vote to enshrine abortion rights. We saw it in Ohio. We saw it in Wisconsin with their Supreme Court election. We saw it in Michigan, a 10-year quest to undo legislation that made it more difficult for women to access abortion and health care. I got to sign the repeal of that

into law in the wake of us amending our Constitution to protect abortion rights. And talk about that in the book, how personally gutted I was when I shared my story of being a sexual assault survivor. Didn't make a damn difference on the debate. But 10 years later as governor, we flipped the legislature, we stayed at it, and ultimately I got to sign the repeal. Now, these are overarching issues. We don't solve them overnight, but the fight is worth having. What I'm hearing you say is that the only way to really resolve this now is going state by state. And as you know, that's going to lead to basically a patchwork situation where some women will be able to have the right to reproductive freedom and some women won't because of where they live. Which is why, Lulu, at this point,

this is where we can make progress in this moment by enshrining it where we have those tools. But at the end of the day, every American woman and her family and healthcare providers deserve to know that this fundamental question around healthcare is vested solely in the individual. And that's going to have to happen at the federal level. So I do believe that's why

this upcoming election has such high stakes, not just for abortion rights, but certainly abortion rights are at the heart of a lot of what we're talking about, individual freedoms. Speaking of that, the Supreme Court has been mired in controversy, especially around Justices Alito and Thomas. Do you think they need to recuse themselves from rulings on anything to do with the 2020 election and President Trump? Well, you know, as a lawyer, my understanding is that, you know, that would be appropriate. The Supreme Court operates under their own rules.

I think it's really something that gives me great anxiety is this distrust in institutions that have sustained this democracy for so long. And we sadly have seen so many Americans get persuaded by, I think, false information and undermine our institutions. And then when you see justices that appear to have real conflict not recuse themselves, it further erodes our confidence in these institutions that sustain this democracy. And it's very concerning. Yes. Do you think the court needs to be expanded then? I mean, because it's a 6-3 majority and if things like abortion rights, for example, are ever going to be reconsidered, the current makeup of the court isn't one that

is favorable to Democrats. You know, Lilo, I get we're stepping way outside of, you know, my expertise as a legal mind. But I would just say this, whether or not the court gets expanded or whether or not, you know, we just ensure that President Biden is the one in that office who makes the next handful of appointments. All of these things work toward the same end of restoring some integrity into our government, which is desperately needed. Moving to another subject, it does seem that 2028 is going to necessarily see a changing of the guard. What do you hope your generation of politicians can do for the country? So I'm 52, almost 53. And, you know, as I talked to my fellow Gen Xers- Best generation.

Yeah. We recognize that our parents' generation has had a lot of excess. And certainly, I worry about so many of the decisions that were made prior to my kids' generation and what they are worried about. And so I'm hopeful that we can really move the needle, whether it's around bringing down our nation's debt or ensuring that we are active when it comes to climate and solidifying and protecting individual rights. These are really the existential issues that my kids' generation is worried about, gun violence, etc. And so I'm hopeful that in 2028, we see Gen Xers running for the White House and that someone from my generation is ready to take the mantle. My last question is about Trump. You know, he is a convicted felon now.

And even if he doesn't win the election, Trumpism as a political movement seems like it's here to stay. Do you agree with that? Do you think his ideas and his vision will outlast him? There are still a lot of Republicans out there who would not identify as Trump supporters, but are not willing to relinquish their party. They're fighting to bring back some common sense and more traditional viewpoints and values to the party. And I'm hopeful that they're successful because I do think it's important for our system of governance to have robust debates with people with different perspectives. I miss having pro-choice Republicans in Michigan in government. I miss being able to have thoughtful debates and then ultimately find common ground. I'm always striving for it, but

it's a lot more challenging. And I think the average person in this country expects that of us. And so I'm hopeful that this is a chapter, but not a trajectory. Governor Whitmer, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it. Thanks, Lulu. That's Governor Gretchen Whitmer. True Gretch, what I've learned about life, leadership, and everything in between will be out on July 9th. This conversation was produced by Seth Kelly. It was edited by Annabelle Bacon.

Mixing by Afim Shapiro. Original music by Dan Powell and Marion Lozano. Photography by Philip Montgomery. Our senior booker is Priya Matthew, and our producer is Wyatt Orme. Our executive producer is Alison Benedict. Special thanks to John Lindstrom, Rory Walsh, Renan Borelli, Jeffrey Miranda, Maddy Maciello, Jake Silverstein, Paula Schumann, and Sam Dolnik. If you like what you're hearing, follow or subscribe to the interview wherever you get your podcasts.

And to read or listen to any of our conversations, you can always go to nytimes.com slash the interview. And you can email us anytime at theinterview at nytimes.com. Next week, David Marchese speaks to the one and only Eddie Murphy. I remember I was 19. I went to the blues bar. It was me, Belushi, and Robin Williams to coke out, start doing coke. And I was like, oh no, I'm cool. And every now and then, over the years, I'd trip about that moment because I was really young and it would have been so easy to try some coke. I wasn't taking some moral stance, but I just wasn't interested in it and to not have the desire or the curiosity of it that I'd say that's providence. I'm Lulu Garcia Navarro, and this is The Interview from The New York Times. Thank you.