by Brian Abrams
ADAM HITCHCOCK
People on the campaign were cautiously optimistic going into the end. We felt like everything had come together, and that was a testament to all the things we’d been doing since early 2007 and that we believed in this strategy. All that work and preparation we had put in place on the ground, at that point it was just executing on what we knew would work.
JOSH LIPSKY
It was just a feeling of As soon as the end of this debate happens at ten thirty, it is go time. It is an all-out sprint. That night we all got on planes all over the country. I remember people saying to each other, “I’ll see you in Chicago.” And it was just that moment: Whatever happens tonight happens, and we’ll see you when we see you, and it’ll be election night and don’t plan on sleeping till then.
BRANDON HURLBUT
We felt we built the greatest grassroots operation ever. We felt that people were inspired by this guy in a way they’d never been inspired since maybe Jack Kennedy—but there was the uncertainty of Are people really going to make this leap?
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2 Clinton technically won the Nevada caucuses, beating Senator Obama in the popular vote 51 percent to 45 percent. However, Obama picked up more delegates—thirteen to Clinton’s twelve.
3 February 5, 2008.
4 Arguably the most notorious excerpt was during the forty-minute sermon “Confusing God and Government,” recorded on April 13, 2003. Delivered inside Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ, Wright admonished the United States for its systemic oppression of the African American community. “The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law, and then wants us to sing ‘God Bless America.’ No, no, no—not ‘God Bless America.’ God damn America! That’s in the Bible—for killing innocent people! God damn America for treating her citizens as less than human! God damn America as long as she tries to act like she is God and she is supreme!”
5 “I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can disown my white grandmother—a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed her by on the street, and who, on more than one occasion, has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe. These people are part of me. And they are part of America, this country that I love.”
6 The Democratic US senator served Montana from 1978 to 2014 and chaired the Senate Finance Committee from 2007 to 2014.
7 The Troubled Asset Relief Program was part of the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act, signed into law by President George W. Bush on October 3, 2008, in response to the subprime-mortgage crisis. It authorized the Treasury to spend up to $700 billion to rescue the financial system from collapse; expenditures ranged from purchasing equity shares in the nation’s eight largest banks to extending loans to the auto industry.
8 Hank Paulson, former chair and CEO of Goldman Sachs, who served as President Bush’s Secretary of the Treasury from 2006 to 2009.
9 University of Mississippi, September 26, 2008.
10 Hofstra University, October 15, 2008.
2008–2009
It was ten p.m. Chicago time when the network feeds cut to Grant Park. The Chicago Transit Authority had upped the usual number of trains and buses to usher some 240,000 people eager to witness the acceptance speech of the first African American elected president of the United States. Jesse Jackson Sr., among several others, had broken into tears. At campaign headquarters, staffer Brandon Hurlbut “collapsed on the ground” in relief. Even McCain surrogate Joe Lieberman, who was in Arizona with the Republican nominee, admitted to “a kind of excitement in me that this had happened.”
November 4 was a night the world had long awaited, to witness the US break a racial barrier and rid itself of the stench from the Bush era. New Delhi’s TV channels broadcast wall-to-wall coverage of American news. Citizens in a war-torn eastern Congo cheered in the streets. In Berlin, a twenty-nine-year-old architect had rushed to her radio in anticipation that the election would “give America a new face.” The president-elect’s victory speech echoed the sentiments that democracy had demonstrated that evening, with returns putting him at 365 electoral-college votes over McCain’s 173. Approximately 130 million Americans showed up to the polls—more than in any other presidential election in the nation’s history.
If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer. It’s the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen; by people who waited three hours and four hours—many for the first time in their lives—because they believed that this time must be different. That their voices could be that difference. It’s the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled. Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been just a collection of individuals or a collection of red states and blue states; we are, and always will be, the United States of America.
President-Elect Obama’s remarks continued with several shout-outs, among them to his wife, Michelle (“the love of my life, the nation’s next First Lady”); daughters Sasha, age seven, and Malia, age ten (“you have earned the new puppy that’s coming with us to the White House”); his sisters, Maya and Auma; and his eighty-six-year-old grandmother, who, in a cruel twist of fate, had died twenty-four hours prior (“I know my grandmother’s watching, along with the family that made me who I am”). He also acknowledged campaign brain trusts Davids Plouffe and Axelrod, once colleagues at a Chicago political-media firm who would, for a while at least, go separate ways. “Right after the election,” Plouffe said, “my arrangement with the president . . . was I would take two years out and then come back in. That was always the plan.” As for Axelrod, he would accompany his star client to the west end of Pennsylvania Avenue. According to campaign staffer Eric Lesser, Axelrod, in his capacity as senior advisor to the president, said he needed “a grunt”; Lesser said he would “be honored” to assume the role.
But getting security badges was more than two months away. The priority was setting up transition headquarters—one inside a nondescript office building in DC, another in Chicago’s Kluczynski Federal Building—to build a new government and deal with the multiple financial crises. And, despite the ocean of revelers chanting “Yes we can!” past one a.m. at Grant Park, those issues were still on people’s minds. “This is just the beginning,” one onlooker told a reporter. “Now comes the hard part.”
JOE LIEBERMAN
The day after the election, one of the first calls I got was from [Senate Minority Leader] Mitch McConnell. “I know the Democrats are angry at you, and I just want you to know that we’d love to have you in our caucus. We’ll arrange a package for you.” I thought it was great. So by the end of the morning, [Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid called. “Joe, I’m gonna be in my office Thursday. Please come in as early as you can.” So I did, and basically Harry told me that people were really upset that I had supported McCain, and that there would be a move in a closed caucus to deny me seniority, which meant that I would lose my chairmanship on the Homeland Security Committee.
BILL DAUSTER
Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel, US Senate Finance Committee (2003–2011)
Deputy Chief of Staff, US Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid (2011–2017)
We were working hard to try and keep all of our Democrats together, and Senator Lieberman was one of the more difficult ones.
JOE LIEBERMAN
So he said, “I wanted to ask you to avoid that and step down as chairman of Homeland Security. I think I can make you chairman of the Small Business Committee,” which was a nothing
committee. So I said, “Harry, I’ve been a good member of the caucus. You’ve been able to count on me.” “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” “And McConnell’s talked to me.” “Well what is he going to offer you?” “I don’t know, but maybe I’ll see.” “So you won’t step down as chair of Homeland Security?” I said, “I can’t.” So Harry, as was his wont, lowered his head. He looked down probably for what was ten seconds, but to me seemed like three minutes. Then he raised his head and said, “All right, let’s figure out how we’re going to get you the votes to keep your seniority.”
HERBIE ZISKEND
The Democrats ensured that Lieberman stayed enough in their camp that he kept his committee assignment in the Senate. That didn’t happen accidentally. He’s from the critical state of Connecticut, which has Hartford, the insurance capital of the country. People understood how the system worked.
BRIAN DEESE
Special Assistant to the President, National Economic Council, White House (2009–2011)
Deputy Director, National Economic Council, White House (2011–2013)
Deputy Director, Office of Management and Budget, White House (2013–2015)
Senior Advisor to the President, White House (2015–2017)
The morning after the election, both Jason [Furman] and I returned to the office after having been in Grant Park the previous night and thought that we would have a kind of leisurely day.
JASON FURMAN
Deputy Director, National Economic Council, White House (2009–2013)
Chair, Council of Economic Advisers, White House (2013–2017)
We got in late [on Wednesday], and I think there was one other person in the entire headquarters. Up until then, [we] never had fewer than several hundred people there at a time.
BRIAN DEESE
David Axelrod came by our little area. “President-elect’s gonna have a press conference on Friday.” I remember this was right around ten o’clock. “We need to announce the president-elect’s economic recovery council, and we need to have our first meeting with those people.” And we said, “We don’t have an economic recovery council.” And he said, “Exactly, so we need to create one and we need to get them here.”
JASON FURMAN
We started working on the president-elect’s first meeting with his transition economic team, which happened on the Friday after the election. That was also his first press conference.
BRIAN DEESE
That kicked off a flurry of activity in the subsequent forty-eight hours. Before the press conference at a hotel down the road in Chicago, [we held] a meeting with a group [that] included Governor Granholm and a long list of eminent economic thinkers. That was largely a kind of broad-strokes Where are we and what are we going to need to get done? conversation.
JIM MESSINA
You’ve heard this famous thing where Obama heard the news about how bad the economy was, and looked at Axelrod and me and asked, “Is it too late to ask for a recount?”
JAMES KVAAL
Special Assistant to the President for Economic Policy, White House (2009–2010)
Policy Director, Obama for America (2011–2012)
Deputy Director of Domestic Policy, Domestic Policy Council, White House (2013–2016)
People joked among themselves about the bad timing for this administration. It was true that the president ran for office with a long list of things that he wanted to do, [but] was handed a to-do list which included this great economic crisis, restarting the financial markets, digging out the housing markets, creating jobs—plus ending two wars overseas—and that all needed to happen before he could get to the things he always wanted to do. On the other hand, I think folks go into public service because they’re eager to make a difference, they’re eager for a challenge, and a situation like that, where it really felt like every hour of every day was critical in terms of the impact you were having, could be rewarding.
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN
D-Maryland, Eighth District, US House of Representatives (2003–2017)
D-Maryland, US Senate (2017– )
I had worked with Rahm at the [Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee]. When he was chair, I was the candidate-recruitment chair. I don’t have any stories beyond what you already know—every other word is a four-letter word, and he’s an intense, hard-driving guy. And when he took the job as chief of staff, they were determined to get as much stuff done as possible. You remember his quote, “A crisis is a terrible thing to waste.”
RAHM EMANUEL
Senior Advisor to the President, White House (1993–1998)
D-Illinois, Fifth District, US House of Representatives (2003–2009)
White House Chief of Staff (2009–2010)
Mayor of Chicago (2011– )
How I was approached? I didn’t really have much of a choice.
JIM MESSINA
After Rahm had been selected, I remember being sent to the Senate, where I had worked for thirteen years for the most powerful Democrat, to talk about the stimulus bill. And the stimulus bill was supported by the Bush administration. They helped draft it . . . and I was having a discussion with one of the key Republican staffers who I had dated from time to time. I remember her saying, “Jim, we’re not going to compromise with you on anything. We’re going to fight Obama on everything.” And I said to her, “That’s not what we did for Bush.” And she said, “We don’t care. We’re just going to fight.”
BARNEY FRANK
D-Massachusetts, Fourth District, US House of Representatives (1981–2013)
Chair, House Financial Services Committee (2007–2011)
Obama was unprepared for it. It took him a while to realize the nature of his enemy. He did have that comment which made me crazy, that he was going to be “postpartisan.” At the time when he said that he gave me postpartisan depression.
RAHM EMANUEL
The president asked me to be the chief of staff based on three, I suppose, core qualities that he wanted. One, he said, was our personal relationship that went beyond professional. Second, my entire White House experience at a senior level, so I knew the way the building operated. Then third, my legislative background from the Hill. I would say, on the latter part, I brought, obviously, not just [having been] a member of Congress, but [also] a member of leadership who had something to do with both taking back the House [in ’06] and building on that majority [in ’08]. But I purposefully went out to build a White House team that had a deep legislative bench.
JIM MESSINA
I was very worried about the relationship at the very beginning, because Obama hired me to be the deputy chief of staff before Rahm had agreed to be the chief of staff. And I remember Rahm had said to him, “I’ll take it, but I want to appoint my deputies.” And Obama said, “Well, that’s fine, but I already picked one of them.” I’d met Rahm, but I had no relationship with him. It was fair to say he was not happy to be handed a deputy.
JENNIFER GRANHOLM
The president [-elect]’s meeting in Chicago was the first meeting of economic advisors. There were all these notable individuals around the table, and obviously some of this was staged for the media to show he was on it, but you know, Larry Summers and Paul Volcker—all of these economists—were present, and I was the only governor. He asked me to say a few words about what was happening in Michigan to set the stage, and the quarterly earnings of the automakers had come out that very day. They were through the floor.
AUSTAN GOOLSBEE
Both Chrysler and GM were in big trouble. Ford had gotten some cash right before the financial crisis and decided they were not going to ask for rescue money. And presumably, by showing they were stronger, I think they were thinking they would get more demand. So you had GM and Chrysler, and the real question, from the beginning, was twofold: One, could the economy handle a shutdown of these massive manufacturing enterprises, and the second part was, If you wanted to save them, was it feasible?
BRIAN DEESE
There was a meeting about two weeks
later in Chicago, and this was before any of the president’s economic team members had been named. It was a meeting of advisors, including folks who had been working on transition economic policies, a sort of initial Where are we? with respect to the handful of core challenges we faced.
JASON FURMAN
We went over a provisional stimulus plan with the president-elect that was about $300 billion. As soon as Larry [Summers] and Christy [Romer] came on the team in late November, they both started pushing for a much larger number than that.
BRIAN DEESE
That meeting was not decisional in any way. It was more just an update for him. Jack Lew was there. Jason and I were there. Austan Goolsbee. It was a combination of the campaign economic team—Jason, Austan, and me—and then some advisors. That meeting was sort of like, Here’re where things stand. Here’re the big challenges we’re sorting through, and we’ll come back to you in roughly a month, once you have your economic team in place, and give you a serious rundown with recommendations. Between then and Thanksgiving the president [-elect] would nominate the four members of the economic team.11
TED KAUFMAN
D-Delaware, US Senate (2009–2010)
They had charts up on the wall. I went with the vice president [-elect to the Chicago meeting]. I was the cochair of his transition, and it was a small group. Valerie Jarrett and Mark Gitenstein, and I think Rahm was there and Axe, and some really top-flight economists. We sat and went through the charts, and it was like, Ohhhhh my God.
DAVID AXELROD
There were overlapping economic crises. One was a slow-rolling crisis that had been unfurling for decades, and these were the changes in our economy that marginalized a lot of middle-class jobs that didn’t require high levels of education. There had been a flattening of wages for some time, and you had a lot of people who were working but working for far less. And so there had been this restiveness. It obviously crested in 2016, but there had been this restiveness for decades that was exacerbated by the crisis.
