[RADIOLAB INTRO]

BECCA BRESSLER: Lulu?

LULU MILLER: Yeah.

BECCA: Hello!

LULU: Hi, can you hear me, okay?

BECCA: I can hear you.

LULU: All right!

BECCA: Do you have your orange slices?

LULU: I've got them.

BECCA: I have a confession ...

LULU: Hello, this is Radiolab. I'm Lulu Miller. And recently, our producer Becca Bressler told me to call her up and somewhat mysteriously bring orange slices. She said it would help get me in the mood for the story she wanted to tell.

LULU: I guess where do we start?

BECCA: So months ago, we decided to have this meeting where everyone came to it with monoliths. Like, what are groups that we think of as being monolithic? Like, every video game player lives in his mom's basement and is a dude. And you know ...

LULU: Right.

BECCA: And at some point, the idea of soccer moms came up.

LULU: Okay.

BECCA: And, like, of course I've heard of the phrase—I played soccer, I have a mom—but I got sort of curious about where she came from. Like, how did she become a monolith?

LULU: Hmm.

BECCA: And so I started poking around, and what I learned is that ...

[NEWS CLIP: Campaign '96.]

BECCA: ... she was born in the run up to the 1996 presidential election.

[NEWS CLIP: Tonight in the land of Lincoln, the convention of Clinton. The Democrats ...]

BECCA: Bill Clinton is running for re-election. He's the incumbent against Bob Dole, the Republican candidate. And the soccer mom was this little slice of voters who helped hand him the election, and completely changed the way political campaigns did what they do from that point forward.

LULU: Okay.

[phone rings]

ANN LEWIS: Hello.

BECCA: Hi, Ann!

BECCA: And I should say, I learned this story from these two women who worked on Bill Clinton's campaign that year.

ANN LEWIS: I joined formally around Labor Day, 1995.

BECCA: Ann Lewis, communications director.

ANN LEWIS: And the deputy campaign manager.

BECCA: And ...

CELINDA LAKE: Hey.

BECCA: Can you hear me okay?

CELINDA LAKE: Yeah, I can hear you great.

BECCA: ... pollster Celinda Lake.

CELINDA LAKE: I was brought on to do some special projects, including looking at women voters.

BECCA: So Clinton had won his first term in large part thanks to women voters.

ANN LEWIS: That's '92.

BECCA: But then ...

ANN LEWIS: In '94, drop off. The women who had made a big difference in '92? Less likely to vote.

BECCA: So in 1996, the Clinton campaign needed to convince those women to come back to Clinton. And they started thinking, like, "Okay, we can't just say, 'Hey, women. Clinton is your guy.' We need a way to focus our message. We need to find a group of undecided women that was large enough to make a difference in the election, but cohesive enough that you could identify key issues they all cared about, and tailor your message to them."

LULU: Oh, interesting.

BECCA: And after doing a bunch of polling and research, they landed on ...

CELINDA LAKE: This cluster of women who were moms, who lived in suburbia, who tended to be college educated.

BECCA: Maybe in their 30s and 40s.

CELINDA LAKE: Tended to work outside the home.

BECCA: Predominantly white.

CELINDA LAKE: Were more secular. It was just a cluster of traits.

BECCA: But according to the polling, there were a lot—millions of them. And they seemed to be up for grabs.

ANN LEWIS: They were the most valuable swing voters.

BECCA: And just as they were zeroing in on this massive, swayable slice of America, this woman running for city council in Denver ...

CELINDA LAKE: Susan Casey.

BECCA: ... gave a speech.

CELINDA LAKE: And she said, "I am a soccer mom running for election."

ANN LEWIS: And I thought, "Ooh, yeah! That's it. That's who these women are."

CELINDA LAKE: The soccer moms.

ANN LEWIS: Soccer moms.

[NEWS CLIP: News In depth tonight, the political professionals this year have called them 'soccer moms.' They may be the most influential voters in the country right now.]

[NEWS CLIP: Kelly Anne, tell me what is a soccer mom?]

[NEWS CLIP: The so-called soccer moms are these predominantly white women who live in the suburbs.]

[NEWS CLIP: They are the most hotly pursued voters in this election.]

BECCA: And the soccer mom became this political force to be reckoned with.

[ARCHIVE CLIP, soccer mom: Get in there, Randy!]

[NEWS CLIP: They may sit on the sidelines at soccer games, but these women are front and center in this year's presidential campaign.]

BECCA: A force that Ann and Celinda started to harness.

CELINDA LAKE: Recruit them and talk to them. Get 10 soccer moms in a room.

BECCA: Finding out what they wanted and then promising to give it to them.

[NEWS CLIP: Television ads promote Clinton initiatives on family leave, parental control over television programming ...]

BECCA: The Clinton campaign started rolling out policies about tobacco advertising.

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Bill Clinton: We fought to protect our children from the harmful effects of tobacco advertising aimed at them.]

[NEWS CLIP: US President Bill Clinton has unveiled a program designed to keep guns out of the hands of young people.]

BECCA: Gun control.

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Bill Clinton: If it means that teenagers will stop killing each other over designer jackets, then our public schools should be able to require their students to wear school uniforms.]

BECCA: School uniforms. Sometimes just little things that these soccer moms cared about.

[NEWS CLIP: And it appears to be working.]

[NEWS CLIP: Polls show most of these women leaning towards Clinton.]

[NEWS CLIP: Among them, Bill Clinton has a stunning 28-point lead over Bob Dole.]

BECCA: And on November 5, 1996, Clinton won.

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Bill Clinton: Thank you for being here.]

BECCA: In part because he locked down the soccer mom vote.

CELINDA LAKE: He won that—yes, he won the soccer mom and it was key to his victory, actually.

BECCA: Men split their vote for Dole and Clinton. Women on the other hand, 55 percent of women voted for Clinton, and only 38 percent of women voted for Bob Dole. So women elected Bill Clinton, and what pollsters and strategists would realize over the years is that targeting their campaign messages to ever finer and more specific groups? It works. And over the years, who this target was has mutated. It became the security moms after 9/11. The NASCAR Dads, Joe Six Pack, The Walmart Moms. And these voting blocks just kept getting smaller and smaller.

CELINDA LAKE: Campaigns now have access to so much more information. People are more interested in sort of slicing and dicing and making distinctions.

BECCA: Like, for example, as I was doing this soccer mom reporting, I came across this map in Politico. In 2016, they went looking for the new iteration of the soccer mom, and you could move your cursor across different swing states, and it would highlight these very specific, cutesy-named groups of voters.

LULU: Hmm.

BECCA: So, like, in Colorado, you had the 'newly mortgages,' who were people who just bought a house, there were 'white women of Vegas,' 'lunch pail Catholics,' skittish soldiers,' 'battleship makers,' 'Cuban millennials.' And I just really loved how incredibly specific this map was.

JAY LEVY: Jay Levy.

BECCA: Hi, Jay. This is Becca Bressler calling from Radiolab.

BECCA: And so I first just called up a bunch of political strategists and pollsters to get a sense of what would this map look like today? You know, what are the surprising hidden slices out there in today's election?

JAY LEVY: So the one that I've been using personally is 'Trader Joe Republicans.'

BECCA: I heard about 'sunset boomers' in Florida.

POLLSTER: I didn't even know in rural New Mexico there's a lot of Hispanic cowboys.

BECCA: 'Elderly unsure dairy farmers in Wisconsin.'

JAY LEVY: So I'm looking at three or four interesting groups of voters that I think are very nuanced, very targeted, but at the same time, very influential and very powerful. Let's start with what I call 'Island Reagans.'

LULU: Okay, Becks. I see the charm in these names, and how the more particular and specific you get with these slices, the more seductive it becomes. But at the same time, are these just strategists throwing names on the chaos to give themselves an illusion of control?

BECCA: So yeah, I wonder that, too. And at the same time I thought we're constantly being told the country is solidly divided into two camps, but we also know this place is increasingly diverse. And there's just gotta be so much more complexity out there. So I just grabbed a few other producers to go peek into some of these slices to see, you know, are these groups real? And are there people in them who could swing this election one way or another? First up is producer Tobin Low.

LULU: Tobin, what is the name of your slice?

TOBIN LOW: I got 'Trader Joe's Republicans.'

BECCA: Trader Joe's Republicans. Okay. Okay, so what are they?

TOBIN: They are Republicans that are sold in the snack aisle of Trader Joe's. I'm just kidding.

LULU: [laughs]

TOBIN: No, these are Republican voters—specifically in Texas. And according to the political strategist who told us about them, they have some preferences that at least I might stereotype as qualities of liberals. So, like, they shop at Trader Joe's, they listen to NPR, they may have things in their home that they 'Live, Laugh, Love,' which is so oddly specific.

LULU: It is.

TOBIN: And a thing that's tripping them up this year is that they are very conflicted about Donald Trump. It was described that they generally don't like him, and they're very unsure of how to vote when it comes to the presidency, but they do plan on voting for other down ballot Republican issues and to make sure Republicans don't lose Senate seats.

LULU: Is this like a big group? Could they actually sway the vote away from Trump?

TOBIN: Nobody is quite sure, but I will say ...

TORI MORELAND: I know I'm not the only one that holds—I'm certainly not the only one that holds these sort of unique set of views.

TOBIN: ... it was not hard to find one.

TORI MORELAND: My name Is Tori Moreland. I'm actually a political consultant here in Austin, Texas.

TOBIN: She calls herself a small-l libertarian.

TORI MORELAND: But I certainly have a Republican voting record.

LULU: Does she actually shop at Trader Joe's?

TORI MORELAND: I do.

TOBIN: She loves the xiaolongbao.

LULU: What is the xiaolongbao?

TORI MORELAND: Soup dumplings that they keep frozen. That's one of my favorite snacks.

TOBIN: Do you listen to NPR?

TORI MORELAND: I do. Yes.

TOBIN: Do you have anything in your house that says 'Live, Laugh, Love?'

TORI MORELAND: Oh my God, no. [laughs]

LULU: That's good.

TOBIN: She loves—or loved—the Colbert Report.

LULU: Huh!

TORI MORELAND: You have to be able to laugh at yourself, I find. I think as somebody who works in politics and kind of sees how the sausage is made, you've got to laugh at some of it sometimes.

TOBIN: And the thing that really stood out to me is that her progressive trappings, they don't really stop at the surface level.

TOBIN: Climate change. Do you believe in climate change?

TORI MORELAND: Yes, very much so.

TOBIN: Do you find yourself in the pro-choice, pro-life ...?

TORI MORELAND: I am pro-choice, but I will admit that's probably not as common.

TOBIN: It's interesting for me to hear you talk about these progressive ideas, just because there are things that I'm used to associating more with the Democratic Party. What is it for you that keeps you from being a Democrat?

TORI MORELAND: I mean, if I had to put it into a single item, I would say it's this idea of who is the better provider of solutions and outcomes. I think the left tends to take this view that government is ultimately the best and most effective way of creating large-scale solutions. And I feel that's not the case, that actually, whether it's the free market or just folks coming together can voluntarily create solutions that are superior.

TOBIN: You know, she talks about this sort of conflicted mix of experiences. You know, on the one hand, liberal values of Austin are seeping in.

TORI MORELAND: Austin is such a unique place in the sense that progressive ideas, truly like Democrat socialist ideas are the mainstream.

TOBIN: But on the other hand, she feels her childhood guiding her. She was raised in a very conservative community in Texas.

TORI MORELAND: The buckle of the Bible Belt.

TOBIN: And speaking of buckles and conservatism, she remembers growing up that her dad had this passionate resistance to seatbelt laws.

TORI MORELAND: That isn't the role of government. And he really hearkened on this idea of what the role of government is and its limits and why those limits exist and why they're important.

TOBIN: How do you feel about Donald Trump?

TORI MORELAND: I mean, I think we'll look back on this moment in history and be saddened by what took place. I think though, there's a real danger to the opposite side as well, that wants to take us down a path that I don't think reach the ends that I have in mind that are about maximizing choice.

LULU: Do you know how she voted in the last election?

TOBIN: She didn't vote for president. She did show up to vote for other Republicans and to vote on certain issues she cared about, but she abstained from voting for president.

LULU: Does she have thoughts—does she know what she's gonna do in this one?

TORI MORELAND: Yeah. So I've seen a ton of buzz online, this idea of who could possibly be an undecided voter in mid-October of a presidential election, considering who's at the top of the ticket. And on the one hand, I say, "Yeah, who would be undecided?" But then I really—when I think about myself going to the ballot box and making that decision, I'm very much conflicted. And so I find myself truly in mid-October in 2020 an undecided voter in terms of the top ticket item for president. I'm not sure if I want to go third-party or sit it out entirely as I did in 2016.

LULU: Producer Tobin Low. Next up Sarah Qari. Hi!

SARAH QARI: Hi Lulu.

LULU: So what slice did you pick? What is the name of your slice?

SARAH: Okay, so the slice that I dove into is the Patel Motel Cartel.

LULU: Patel Motel Cartel.

SARAH: Yes, exactly.

SARAH: Have you heard that term before?

MOTEL OWNER: [laughs] Yes I have.

MOTEL OWNER: Mm-hmm.

MOTEL OWNER: Yes.

MOTEL OWNER: I've read the whole article on that Patel Motel Cartel before.

SARAH: The name comes from this New York Times article about Indian-American hotel owners.

TWINKLE PATEL: My name is Twinkle Patel, and I own hotels.

SARAH: Is that, like, offensive?

TWINKLE PATEL: I don't really find that offensive personally.

MOTEL OWNER: I don't find it offensive.

SARAH: Do you feel you're like a member of the Patel Motel Cartel?

MOTEL OWNER: Yeah, absolutely. Why not?

MOTEL OWNER: Yep. I am. [laughs]

LULU: Wait, so what exactly is the Patel Motel Cartel?

SARAH: Okay, so it turns out something like half of all motels in the United States are owned by Indian Americans.

LULU: Whoa. Half of what? Like, tens of thousands of motels.

SARAH: Yeah! And then, like, 70 percent of those people all have the last name Patel.

LULU: Huh!

SARAH: Which is a common surname in the Indian state of Gujarat, which is where a lot of these people's families happen to originate from.

LULU: Oh, okay.

MOTEL OWNER: It was a very viable business to go into.

MOTEL OWNER: They can live on-site, you know, they can run the property, they can minimize expenses. They don't have to pay rent.

MOTEL OWNER: Hotels require a lot of labor. [laughs] And often with our Indian, South Asian families, we kind of have our built-in labor force, which is our families. [laughs]

SARAH: And also, the people who run these hotels and motels, they kind of stand out from the larger Indian-American voting block. Recent polling has shown that almost three-quarters of Indian Americans are voting Democratic in this election.

LULU: Wow, I didn't realize it was that high.

SARAH: Yeah. But a lot of these hotel owners that I talked to ...

MOTEL OWNER: I'm in Minneapolis.

MOTEL OWNER: Tuscon, Arizona.

SARAH: ... many of them ...

MOTEL OWNER: Lima, Ohio.

SARAH: ... in swing states ...

MOTEL OWNER: Orlando, Florida.

MOTEL OWNER: Maggie Valley, North Carolina.

SARAH: ... well ...

MOTEL OWNER: I already put my vote in, and I went all red.

SARAH: They're swinging hard for Trump.

MOTEL OWNER: I voted for Trump.

MOTEL OWNER: Definitely the Republican side.

MOTEL OWNER: We've seen a huge savings when we did our taxes after Trump got elected.

MOTEL OWNER: The center of my universe is my hotels, my livelihood, and my work.

MOTEL OWNER: This is the only president who came up from the hotel industry, so he knows.

MOTEL OWNER: The fact that he's signed the front of a paycheck and not just the back of a paycheck.

MOTEL OWNER: Not only signed the back of a check, he's also signed the front of a check.

SARAH: So there's this big group of Indian-American hotel owners peppered all over swing states, lots of whom appear to be supporting Trump. But the reason I found this slice so interesting, the reason it feels like a slice that could really swing an election is because it also contains guys like Mehul.

MEHUL PATEL: Mehul Patel.

SARAH: Mehul lives in Minnesota.

MEHUL PATEL: I've lived in Minneapolis for the last six years.

SARAH: And he owns a bunch of hotels with his family in Minnesota and Wisconsin.

MEHUL PATEL: Minneapolis, Rochester and throughout Wisconsin.

SARAH: His parents bought their first motel when he was 11 years old.

MEHUL PATEL: It was a small motel. It was off of the interstate that went between Milwaukee and Green Bay, it was called Parkway Motel.

SARAH: That's where he grew up.

MEHUL PATEL: When I was just going into high school, I remember most people were like, "Oh, what are you doing this weekend?" And it was like, "Oh. Well, I'm helping clean rooms."

SARAH: He'd be helping fold towels, repainting the beige walls.

MEHUL PATEL: You know, in the summers, I remember having an outdoor pool that I would help my dad maintain vacuuming the pool.

SARAH: Eventually, as he got older ...

MEHUL PATEL: As we saved money.

SARAH: ... his family buys more motels.

MEHUL PATEL: A little bit bigger properties.

SARAH: And then once he finishes college ...

MEHUL PATEL: I kind of took over the business and grew it.

SARAH: Today it's this huge business. They own, like, 12 hotels. So when we started talking about the election ...

MEHUL PATEL: You know, a lot of us small business owners are only looking at how it affects their business. This is our bread and butter. And, you know, these businesses is my parents' 401(k).

SARAH: I was sort of expecting him to echo some of the things I'd heard earlier about liking Trump's tax cuts or opposing Biden's proposal for a federal $15 minimum wage.

MEHUL PATEL: Historically usually we've leaned Republican.

SARAH: You mean you and your family?

MEHUL PATEL: Correct. But this year is a little different with everything going on.

SARAH: The pandemic has just crushed his business.

MEHUL PATEL: We were down 90 percent in the month of April and May compared to previous April and May.

SARAH: Oof!

SARAH: And now ...

MEHUL PATEL: The more that I read how COVID-19 was dealt with, I mean, did our administration know months in advance that this was coming?

SARAH: ... he's filled with all of these questions.

MEHUL PATEL: Why wasn't there a travel ban? Why weren't we taking the proper measurements to try to deescalate it?

SARAH: And so as a result ...

MEHUL PATEL: I think a year ago, I would say Trump would be my choice, but just what's happened.

SARAH: Now he's not so sure. And it's not just the pandemic.

MEHUL PATEL: A lot of it is immigration. Trump's immigration policies are tougher than what Biden will have.

SARAH: The Trump administration has tightened restrictions on H-1B visas, which historically, have been really important for Indian-American immigrants.

MEHUL PATEL: Joe Biden goes with that immigration policy a little bit better.

SARAH: But ...

MEHUL PATEL: But Biden also hasn't said much about how he's gonna help small businesses.

SARAH: ... as our conversation went on, he kept swinging back and forth.

MEHUL PATEL: Does Biden have some good things for the future as far as healthcare and climate change and education? Yes. But if we don't get out of this, and I have to start over with our businesses, that's a big blow to us.

SARAH: But then again ...

MEHUL PATEL: Again, Trump has a little bit more of that business mind.

LULU: Wow! So you kind of witnessed the sloshing back and forth in real-time.

SARAH: Totally! And from what he says, he's not alone.

MEHUL PATEL: The other part, it sounds silly, but I'm part of these WhatsApp groups.

SARAH: With, like, other hotel owners.

MEHUL PATEL: Every day reading other people's views on it, it's kind of like, "Oh, wow, I didn't look at it like that. Oh, wow, I didn't read it like that."

SARAH: Are you gonna hold your nose and vote for one or the other?

MEHUL PATEL: I have not made the decision. I'm kind of still trying to see how things turn out. I mean, I know we're getting down to the wire, but every day is huge with what comes up and how they're speaking. I think it's gonna be a game-time decision.

SARAH: I would love to find out what you decide in the end. I'm on the edge of my seat.

MEHUL PATEL: Yeah, it's not fun but it's unpredictable. We don't know.

LULU: Producer Sarah Qari. Next up, Tracie Hunte. All right. So Tracie, which slice did you pick?

TRACIE HUNTE: Well, I guess I picked an absence.

LULU: Hmm.

TRACIE: You know, you looked at that list that Becca put together, and you notice that they're not really talking about Black people. And that's because when it comes to the Black vote, pollsters don't really give us cute nicknames. They just sort of lump us all together. And I mean, I get it.

CHRISTINA GREER: Every four years, we see roughly 90 percent of Black Americans voting for the Democratic candidate.

TRACIE: This is Christina Greer.

CHRISTINA GREER: I'm an associate professor of political science at Fordham University.

TRACIE: And while the history of the Black vote in this country is super complicated, she says the main reason for this is pretty simple.

CHRISTINA GREER: If you look at the policies of the Republican Party, they have been in the more recent history, a more white nationalistic ideology, which a lot of Black people reject, obviously, because it's anti-Black.

TRACIE: But the problem with treating the Black vote as a bloc, she says is it's just not.

CHRISTINA GREER: There are hardcore leftist progressives, there are folks in the middle, and then there's serious conservatives. Black folks, they're just sort of seen as this lump, but there's a lot of action going on there.

TRACIE: And she told me about one politician who ran a campaign that in a way ...

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Chris Christie: Good morning everybody. Thank you for being here.]

TRACIE: ... proved that point.

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Chris Christie: I am proud to be here to endorse Donald Trump for President of the United States.]

TRACIE: Chris Christie. So before he joined team Trump, Christie was Governor of New Jersey. And in his second race for that job in 2013, something kind of crazy happened: he got nearly a quarter of the Black vote—21 percent.

LULU: Wow!

TRACIE: Were you surprised by the 21 percent?

MIKE DUHAIME: Yes, we felt quite good about it. I think we more than doubled our percentage among African Americans.

TRACIE: Why don't you go ahead and just introduce yourself?

MIKE DUHAIME: Sure. I'm Mike DuHaime. I've worked for campaigns big and small. Worked for President George W. Bush, I've worked for Senator John McCain, Rudy Giuliani and Governor Christie's races.

LULU: So what happened? I mean, how did the Christie campaign do it?

TRACIE: Well, he did a ton of events in majority Black towns and cities.

MIKE DUHAIME: I remember him doing a town hall meeting in Irvington, New Jersey, which is right outside of the—it borders on Newark. And he did that all over the place.

TRACIE: He got endorsements from Black politicians.

MIKE DUHAIME: There's one short visual of him hugging an African-American Democratic mayor.

TRACIE: Also got an endorsement from a prominent Black Democratic minister.

REGINALD JACKSON: Bishop Reginald Jackson.

TRACIE: So why did you—why did you support Chris Christie?

REGINALD JACKSON: I was very strong on the education issue, and he was very supportive of giving parents a choice in making sure that their children got a good education.

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Shaquille O'Neal: I don't endorse many politicians, but Chris Christie is different.]

MIKE DUHAIME: We also did a commercial with Shaquille O'Neal.

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Shaquille O'Neal: He's a good man. Excuse me, he's a great man. Please join me in supporting Chris Christie.]

TRACIE: And, you know, there was this one other thing too, which meant a lot to me personally as a Black woman. When Whitney Houston died the year before, Chris Christie ordered all the flags in the state lowered to half mast. And even when there was a backlash, he didn't back down.

LULU: Huh!

TRACIE: So you add that all up, and twice as many Black people as usual came out to vote for the Republican. So you might be wondering: who were they? Well, we can't really know for sure who they all were, obviously. But for the sake of doing the thing that none of these political consultants ever seem to do for Black people, let's try to visualize the Black voters Christie was trying to win over.

LULU: All right.

TRACIE: So of course, you've got your Black Republicans. And according to sociologist Corey Fields ...

COREY FIELDS: There's a fair amount of variation among Black Republicans.

TRACIE: Some of them don't think about race when it comes to politics, but some do.

COREY FIELDS: Race-conscious Black Republicans, for them, you know, race is central to how they understand their lives. So something like school vouchers.

TRACIE: Right.

COREY FIELDS: Right? So a race-conscious Black Republican would say, "I support school vouchers because they empower Black parents to make decisions about their child's education. And who knows what's best for Black children—their parents, or some white administrator on the school board?"

TRACIE: Some Black Republicans support Trump.

WOMAN: I'm glad that President Trump is more reserved as far as trying to do interventionism, and I also appreciate his push to make us energy-independent.

TRACIE: And some ...

MAN: While I'm a Republican ...

TRACIE: ... do not.

MAN: ... I'm basically an independent until Trump leaves office.

TRACIE: So that's the Black Republicans.

LULU: Okay.

TRACIE: But there are also some more swingable slices.

REGINALD JACKSON: When I was in New Jersey, I would tell everybody that I was a Democrat with an open mind.

TRACIE: This, of course, is Bishop Reginald Jackson. And Christie wasn't the first Republican he endorsed. He even voted for Nixon.

REGINALD JACKSON: I think Blacks need to vote in their best interests.

TRACIE: But when Christie ran for President ...

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Chris Christie: They've been chanting in the streets for the murder of police officers.]

[ARCHIVE CLIP, interviewer: Well, individuals have, but the Black Lives Matter is about ...]

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Chris Christie: Listen, that's what the movement is creating.]

REGINALD JACKSON: I thought it was absolutely untrue and irresponsible.

TRACIE: ... he didn't support him.

LULU: Okay, so we've got a couple kinds of Black Republicans, we've got the Democrat with an open mind.

TRACIE: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

LULU: Any others?

TRACIE: Yes.

CHRISTINA GREER: I think the inconsistent voters or maybe like, 'that cousin'. [laughs]

TRACIE: [laughs]

CHRISTINA GREER: It's like, "I'm abstaining because it's the lesser of two evils." and it's like, I would call him 'that cousin.'

TRACIE: That cousin.

MAN: I actually don't vote at all.

TRACIE: And why is that?

MAN: I don't feel as if politics is for us as far as, like, Republican and Democrat. I always feel like that neither party is for us.

TRACIE: Who else? Who else?

CHRISTINA GREER: Like, the Southern grannies.

TRACIE: Older Black women?

CHRISTINA GREER: Yeah.

TRACIE: Very involved in their communities. Church-going. Staunch Democrats.

MINNIE SMITH: I've always voted Democrat.

CHRISTINA GREER: You know, and vote consistently. They've never missed an election.

MINNIE SMITH: My name is Minnie Smith. I'm 90 years old, and I'm in Houston, Texas. I vote every time it's time to vote.

CHRISTINA GREER: You know, those elections where people win with, like, 2,000 votes? Like, those are the Southern grannies.

LULU: Producer Tracie Hunte. Radiolab will be back in a moment.

[LISTENER: Hi, this is Emily and I'm calling from Toronto, Canada. Radiolab is supported in part by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, enhancing public understanding of science and technology in the modern world. More information about Sloan at www.sloan.org. Thanks!]

[JAD ABUMRAD: Science reporting on Radiolab is supported in part by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.]

LULU: Radiolab. Talking about voting blocs. Aka. voting slices.

BECCA: Slices. Yes, they're now slices.

LULU: Becca, you took a couple of your own to chase down, right?

BECCA: Yes, I did.

LULU: Okay, so who did you look into?

BECCA: Wait, hold on one second. There's some—is that a fire alarm?

LULU: I know. I heard it. I did. It sounded very ...

BECCA: I've never heard that noise before.

LULU: Oh. Yeah, you should go find that. It sounds like a smoke detector.

BECCA: Yeah, hold on. Goddamn it! Okay, one second. It's so high!

LULU: Would a broom be able to ...?

BECCA: Yeah. [laughs] [screams] Oh, [bleep] yes. Oh [bleep], I literally broke it! Oh my God! Lulu?

LULU: Yes.

BECCA: Well, this is actually a perfect little segue into our next one, where I guess you could say things don't go as you planned.

LULU: All right. So where are we going for this one?

BECCA: Okay. So we are going to what I think we think of as the heartland of America, the heartland of manufacturing. And specifically to ...

[ARCHIVE CLIP, advertisement: [singing] Goodyear take me home.]

BECCA: ... the headquarters of Goodyear Tires.

LULU: Okay. And why exactly are we here?

BECCA: Well, so I had reached out to a political consultant in Ohio who said that I should go look at Republicans up and around the Akron area who work for Goodyear Tires. And so I went looking for what we're calling a Don't Tread On Me Republican.

LULU: The pun there is on tread, like tire treads?

BECCA: Yes, tire tread. Don't tread on me. Tread tire.

LULU: Got it.

[phone ringing]

BECCA: Who are potentially up for grabs, and might swing against Trump because of a tweet.

BOB SHROFF: Hello?

BECCA: Hi, Bob.

BOB SHROFF: Yes.

BECCA: Hi, how are you?

BOB SHROFF: Good, how are you?

BECCA: So I first called up this guy, Bob Shroff.

BOB SHROFF: I work for Goodyear, I'm 48 years old, married with two kids.

BECCA: So Goodyear has about 64,000 employees, and Bob started out ...

BOB SHROFF: Working on these massive machines.

BECCA: ... making rubber for all these different car parts: tires, suspensions.

BECCA: And how long have you worked at Goodyear for?

BOB SHROFF: So I've been at Goodyear for 27 years. I got hired in July of 1993.

BECCA: And are you the first in your family to be a Goodyear employee, or does it stretch back?

BOB SHROFF: No, ma'am. So my grandfather worked there, my dad worked there. They're both retired. I work there now along with my brother. My grandmother actually worked there, as well as my great grandmother.

BECCA: Oh my God!

BOB SHROFF: So it's a long history. It's treated my family very well.

BECCA: So the tweet. So August 19, 2020, so just a couple of months ago, Trump tweets, "Don't buy—" I mean, like, should I pretend to be Trump? Like, I don't know. His emphasis is important, so maybe. So let me try again. "Don't buy ..."

LULU: Please try to be Trump. Yeah.

BECCA: [laughs] No, I—how would I even do this? "Don't—" I'm not gonna do it. Okay, "Don't buy Goodyear Tires. They announced a ban on MAGA hats. Get better tires for far less. This is what the radical left Democrats do. Two can play the same game, and we have to start playing it now."

LULU: Wow!

BOB SHROFF: I saw it, and was furious, just furious over it.

BECCA: Because for Bob, he's like, "First of all, look, Goodyear has a policy and they've always had a policy."

BOB SHROFF: That political clothing, headwear ...

BECCA: Gear.

BOB SHROFF: You know, buttons, anything of the like has always been, you know, not appropriate at Goodyear.

BECCA: The idea that Goodyear was just, like, singling out MAGA hats ...

BOB SHROFF: Was just simply not true.

BECCA: But Bob said to really understand why someone like him was so furious about this tweet, you have to understand Akron, Ohio.

BOB SHROFF: Yeah, so back in those days ...

BECCA: So back around the turn of the century, Akron got the nickname "the rubber capital of the world."

BOB SHROFF: All of the big rubber manufacturers were headquartered here.

BECCA: So not only did you have Goodyear.

BOB SHROFF: But Firestone.

BECCA: BFGoodrich.

BOB SHROFF: General Tire, Mohawk Rubber.

BECCA: And in Akron, you have these neighborhoods like ...

BOB SHROFF: Goodyear Heights. Firestone had Firestone Park.

BECCA: Schools.

BOB SHROFF: You know, we have Firestone High School, we have Seiberling Grade School, which is—you know, those are all rubber names.

BECCA: If you went downtown, there was a factory or a shop.

BOB SHROFF: From one of those rubber companies just about on every corner.

BECCA: This area just sort of has the tire industry in its DNA.

LULU: Hmm.

BECCA: But then jump ahead to the mid '90s.

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Bill Clinton: There was no turning back from the world of today and tomorrow.]

BECCA: President Clinton signs NAFTA.

BOB SHROFF: The North American Free Trade Agreement.

BECCA: Which as we know now sent a lot of manufacturing jobs to Mexico and out of the country.

BOB SHROFF: And over time ...

BECCA: Bob said in Akron ...

BOB SHROFF: You know, the shops close up.

BECCA: ... thousands of people lost their jobs.

BOB SHROFF: It's nothing like it used to be.

BECCA: Though then ...

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Donald Trump: Thank you, everybody.]

BECCA: ... 2016. Donald Trump ...

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Donald Trump: It's great to be in Ohio. I love this state.]

BECCA: ... who campaigned in Akron, campaigned to make America great again.

BOB SHROFF: And ...

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Donald Trump: Bring back your jobs ...]

BOB SHROFF: ... bring back all these American jobs.

[ARCHIVE CLIP, Donald Trump: ... that have been taken from your state and every other state in the union.]

BECCA: Jump ahead.

[NEWS CLIP: We have a major projection.]

BECCA: Trump takes Ohio.

[NEWS CLIP: Donald Trump will take Ohio.]

BECCA: In large part, because he picked up these Republican votes because he said he was gonna get out of NAFTA, he was gonna protect American jobs. And then four years later he writes this tweet.

BOB SHROFF: And for a sitting President—a sitting President of the United States to call for a boycott of one of the oldest tire manufacturers in America, it's shameful. It's just shameful.

LULU: Huh! So is the idea here that Bob is Republican, but now he just can't with Trump because of the tweet, or ...?

BECCA: [laughs] Well, so I mean, I guess I should just come out and say it: like, Bob is actually not a Don't Tread On Me Republican. Bob is a Don't Tread On Me Democrat.

BOB SHROFF: I won't predict a win for Joe Biden in Ohio, but I hope he wins Ohio, because if he wins Ohio it's over for Trump.

LULU: Oh, okay.

BECCA: So Bob explained to me he's kind of been a lifelong Democrat.

BOB SHROFF: It's generally Democrats that are more worker friendly.

BECCA: And Bob is like a union guy.

BOB SHROFF: My grandfather was in the union. My dad was in the union.

BECCA: Bob is in the union, and therefore, typically votes Democrat.

LULU: Huh. And is Bob like an outlier?

BECCA: No.

BOB SHROFF: I would say that there's more Biden supporters in the shop than there are Trump supporters.

BECCA: Because Bob said a lot of his co-workers are pro union.

BOB SHROFF: If you're a strong union supporter, I don't understand how you could support Donald Trump.

LULU: So is this just a case of, like, your political strategists made a misassumption?

BECCA: Yeah. I mean, sort of. Like, there definitely are white blue-collar workers in Ohio who voted for Trump, who might turn against him because they don't think he delivered on his promises. Like, that's definitely a thing.

LULU: Okay.

BECCA: But I do think the assumption here was just that these Goodyear employees that are also predominantly white, they work in manufacturing, that they all would have been Trump supporters. And that just doesn't entirely hold.

LULU: Hmm.

BECCA: Well Bob, I'm wondering, do you know anyone who was pro Trump and is now going Biden because of this tweet?

BOB SHROFF: Well, I do know that a friend of mine who I believe is kind of a Trump-leaning type person, I do believe it did change at least his mind.

BECCA: Hello, Scotty.

SCOTTY OSWALD: Hello.

BECCA: Hi. How are you?

SCOTTY OSWALD: Not too bad. How about yourself?

BECCA: So the friend is Scott Oswald, also known as Scotty.

BECCA: Can you tell me a bit about how you and Bob know each other? How'd you guys strike up a friendship?

SCOTTY OSWALD: Well, I tattooed one of his sons probably about six years ago.

BECCA: Oh, really?

SCOTTY OSWALD: Yeah.

BECCA: So Scotty doesn't work at Goodyear. He is a tattoo artist.

SCOTTY OSWALD: I met pretty much his entire family that night.

BECCA: He has tattooed Bob sons and Bob and his wife, too.

SCOTTY OSWALD: We just kind of all struck up a friendship.

BECCA: Do you feel like you became a part of their family? Would you go have dinner with them or hang out at their house or anything?

SCOTTY OSWALD: Oh, yeah. Absolutely, for sure.

BECCA: And so Scotty told me when he heard about Trump's tweet ...

SCOTTY OSWALD: I just don't—I don't know. I didn't really get it. And to me, I just took it personally because it affected so many people that I knew, you know?

BECCA: So soon after, he texted Bob.

SCOTTY OSWALD: I kind of hit him up. You know, I was like, "Hey, what are your thoughts on this?"

BOB SHROFF: I said, "I felt like he acted like a 14-year-old child. In my eyes he looks like a bully.

SCOTTY OSWALD: And then I finally was just kind of like, "Well ..."

BECCA: "You know, I actually could use some new tires."

BOB SHROFF: And he wanted to know if I could get him a discount on Goodyear tires because he wanted to run right out and support Goodyear.

SCOTTY OSWALD: I just want to support a local company, and I want to support my friend's business.

BECCA: And he did. He took his car to the shop. Bob, using his company discount, got Scotty four new tires. And that was that.

LULU: That's a really sweet gesture.

SCOTTY OSWALD: Yeah, but I mean ...

BECCA: And then we got into it, and we started talking politics. And I said, "You know, Scotty, Bob says you're Trump leaning."

SCOTTY OSWALD: Mm-hmm.

BECCA: That's how he described you. Is that how you would characterize yourself, or at least, like, in 2016, is that how you would have characterized yourself?

BECCA: And he says ...

SCOTTY OSWALD: No.

BECCA: Oh.

LULU: Huh! [laughs]

BECCA: Do you have any idea why Bob might have suspected you were Trump leaning?

SCOTTY OSWALD: I do not know. I mean, he might have just taken a guess.

BECCA: And he guessed wrong. But Scotty actually isn't a voter. He's never voted before in an election. And he's never been ...

LULU: Really? Ever?

BECCA: Yeah.

SCOTTY OSWALD: I kept thinking, like, "It's not important. It doesn't matter. Like, my vote doesn't really count."

BECCA: But he says since 2016 ...

SCOTTY OSWALD: I sort of feel like that we've sort of taken a giant step backwards as far as community, and just being civil, you know?

BECCA: And he feels like Trump is dividing our country.

SCOTTY OSWALD: I believe so, yeah. And I'm definitely hitting up the polls because I feel like that it's more important this time than it's been in quite some time.

BECCA: And so I asked him who are you gonna vote for?

SCOTTY OSWALD: I'd rather not say but I think you know who I'm not gonna vote for.

BECCA: He was a little hesitant and cagey, which is weird. It's just like process of elimination here.

LULU: Right.

BECCA: Like, obviously, he's gonna vote for Biden.

SCOTTY OSWALD: Yeah, but I mean ...

BECCA: But we kept talking, and eventually Scotty was like ...

SCOTTY OSWALD: I was really into Andrew Yang.

LULU: Huh!

BECCA: Yeah.

SCOTTY OSWALD: And I was kind of disappointed that they didn't really give him a good platform to, like, express what he wanted to do.

BECCA: And for Scotty, what he's gonna do is when he votes for the first time in this election, he's going to write in probably Andrew Yang.

LULU: All right. Didn't see that one coming.

BECCA: Yeah. Neither did I. And, you know, reporting on this, like, I've come to really appreciate just how hard it is to put people in some group, because you make all these assumptions that can just get upended.

LULU: Yeah. Right.

BECCA: And this next story is actually a pretty extreme version of that.

[phone ringing]

BECCA: Okay, so ...

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: Hi!

BECCA: ... the slice is the Chaldean-American community in Michigan.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: Metro Detroit is home to the largest concentration of Chaldeans outside of the Middle East, which is about 160,000.

BECCA: This is Crystal Kassab Jabiro, she's a middle school teacher.

BECCA: What grade do you teach?

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: Eighth.

BECCA: Oh my God, teenagers are not fun.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: Well, I beg to differ. I do love them. [laughs]

BECCA: Crystal told me the Chaldeans are indigenous to Iraq, started immigrating to the US in the early 20th century to work the Ford plants, which is why so many of them live in Michigan. And the community is overwhelmingly Catholic.

FRANCIS: We are heavily invested in the Roman Catholic Church.

BECCA: This is Francis, which is a pseudonym. I'll explain why later.

BECCA: And how old are you?

FRANCIS: 52.

BECCA: Like Crystal, he's lived in the Detroit area for most of his life.

FRANCIS: I own a body shop that works on commercial vehicles like semi-trucks and trailers.

BECCA: And he says the Catholic religion is a major part of the Chaldean identity. For one thing, it's a huge part of why so many of them live in the US in the first place.

FRANCIS: In Iraq, 99 percent of the population is Muslim. So at one time there were 2.5 million Chaldeans in Iraq, but ever since ISIS did a lot of damage to Chaldean villages, there's only like a couple hundred thousand left.

BECCA: So being Catholic, when it comes to politics, he says abortion is a big issue.

FRANCIS: To us, you respect life and then you honor it. You know, and you honor that person. But life always comes first.

BECCA: And because of that, most of the Chaldeans typically vote Republican. When the 2016 election came around ...

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: I just kept going ...

BECCA: Crystal says ...

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: ... back and forth in my head. And I said, "Well ..."

BECCA: ... she didn't love Trump, but ...

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: I said, "You know, I'm just gonna do the Catholic vote and I voted for Trump."

BECCA: And so did most of the rest of the Chaldean community. And it's worth noting actually, that Trump only won Michigan by 10,000 votes. And especially because of this one area, Macomb County, where there is a large Chaldean-American population.

LULU: And how many again are there did you say, Chaldeans in Michigan?

BECCA: There are about 160,000 Chaldeans.

LULU: Oh, wow!

BECCA: Yeah. So the Chaldeans definitely helped get Donald Trump elected in 2016, but then something happened that complicated things.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: So it was June—June 11, 2017.

BECCA: It was a Sunday.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: It was a very busy day for my family. We went ...

BECCA: Crystal spent the morning running from thing to thing—church, a soccer game.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: Then my daughter had a piano recital.

BECCA: A communion party.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: Then we went to the soccer banquet. It was boom, boom, boom, one thing after another from eight o'clock in the morning.

BECCA: She gets home at around 7:45 pm.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: I said, "Let me put some pictures up from the communion party."

BECCA: And she goes to Facebook to upload some pictures.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: Once I got on Facebook, I saw all these videos of people down at the federal building downtown.

BECCA: Screaming and crying.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: Saying, "Let him go, let him go!"

BECCA: She sees a video of a man ...

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: Being detained with an IV on him.

BECCA: ICE officers had fanned out across the area detaining Chaldeans.

FRANCIS: Oh, my heart fell. This is it. This is what we've been worried about.

LULU: Whoa! So what—what happened?

BECCA: Well, it's kind of complicated, but ICE picked up a whole bunch of Chaldeans because of a change the Trump administration made to their arrangement with Iraq when it comes to certain non-citizen Chaldeans in the United States.

LULU: And how many people got detained?

BECCA: About 200.

LULU: Wow!

BECCA: So the question is is that could these detentions of Chaldeans, could this have soured enough people in this community to vote against him, and maybe Michigan could swing back to Biden? Because remember, there were only 10,000 votes that made the difference in 2016.

LULU: Okay. Wow!

BECCA: So Crystal, for her part, she kind of sprung right into action. She went down to the local high school, started connecting people with legal aid.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: I remember seeing a girl, and I looked and I said, "What are you doing here?" She said, "My mom. My mom was detained." I said, "What?" And this is a girl I had went to high school with. You know, she was just shaking and she was nervous. You know, she just didn't know what to do. You know, I guess you see these things and, like, they happen to other people.

BECCA: Mm-hmm.

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: They happen to other people. We hear the deportations that happen all the time of course to our Mexican brothers and sisters, and we never seem to think it's gonna touch us.

BECCA: Did you feel responsible in any sort of way?

CRYSTAL KASSAB JABIRO: I did. I know—and I beat myself up for it for a long time. And that's why I worked so hard since then to vote him the hell out, to elect a real leader, a man like Joe Biden.

BECCA: Now Francis, he didn't so much spring into action.

FRANCIS: I just took off.

BECCA: He fled.

FRANCIS: Because they had—they knew where I lived.

BECCA: Because Francis actually ...

FRANCIS: I am not a citizen.

BECCA: ... is more or less hiding from ICE right now.

FRANCIS: Oh I am. Yes, I am. Like any car that pulls up, I'm watching my cameras more than my TV. I get paranoid if a car pulls up, I don't know if it's them, I don't know if they found out. I don't know. I just don't take any chance. I don't leave home for two or three days.

BECCA: Does the fear impact you in other ways? I mean, do you have trouble sleeping?

FRANCIS: Oh my gosh! I was so bad that I had nightmares every night that people were grabbing me, agents. I was up but I couldn't stop them. Like, I felt like I was up but I was paralyzed. And that was every single night. And the worst part is like, I'll hear them breaking down the door, they're coming. Like, I can feel hands grabbing my arm, trying to get me, and I can't move, and it's all just a nightmare.

BECCA: If Biden were to get elected, do you think that you would stop hiding?

FRANCIS: I think that there wouldn't be this initiative to try to remove us, so I would not be in fear. No, I don't think I would be.

BECCA: And who do you support for President?

FRANCIS: Trump.

BECCA: Can you help me understand that?

FRANCIS: I will. I will help you. This is the humility. I don't care about myself. I care more about conservative values and for this country more than myself. So if I have to suffer because of my beliefs, I will. I will

BECCA: Is the idea then that you believe in prioritizing unborn life over living Chaldean Americans in your community?

FRANCIS: Yes. Yes, I do. What can happen to our lives? Like, we're not being killed. We may be being moved around or having to go suffer a little bit until we find a country that will accept us and live, but that's doable. That's not death. That's not the same as abortion, that's not the same thing. I mean, it could be possible death. You know, in Iraq it could be, but I'm just not willing to do that. Like, I'm not willing to sacrifice my beliefs.

LULU: Producer Becca Bressler. This episode was produced by Becca Bressler, Tracie Hunte, Matt Kielty, Tobin Low, Sarah Qari, Pat Walters, with help from Johnny Moens. Also, if you feel like you belong to a special voting bloc that has not been mentioned here or in the media anywhere, think about it, come up with a name and send us the name of that bloc on Twitter, on Facebook. And maybe take this episode as a reminder that whatever happens in the next few days and weeks, beneath the political parties are people.

LULU: Special thanks to Darren Samuelsohn who's now at Business Insider and the team at Politico, illustrator Josh Cochran whose 2016 map inspired this episode. Ferdinand Omondi, Tex Dozier, Susan Carol, Lana Atkinson, Jay Levi, Geraldo Cadava, Matt Catts, Verlaine Williams, Miss Pamela, Nadaj Green, Dale Peron, Vin Arceneaux, and Aaron "Wiki Wiki Wiki" Wickenton. Thanks for listening.

[LISTENER: Hi, this is Jake Allen calling from Winona, Minnesota. Radiolab was created by Jad Abumrad and is edited by Soren Wheeler. Lulu Miller and Latif Nasser are our co-hosts. Dylan Keefe is our director of sound design. Suzie Lechtenberg is our executive producer. Our staff includes Simon Adler, Jeremy Bloom, Becca Bressler, Rachael Cusick, David Gebel, Tracie Hunte, Matt Kielty, Tobin Low, Annie McEwen, Sarah Qari, Arianne Wack, Pat Walters, and Molly Webster. With help from Shima Oliaee, Sarah Sandbach, and Johnny Means. Our fact-checker is Michelle Harris. Thank you.]

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