Does Corruption Matter?
What Next | Daily News and Analysis
Slate Podcasts
4.3 • 2.4K Ratings
🗓️ 25 October 2018
⏱️ 13 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
When it comes to the people we vote for, how corrupt is too corrupt? With Herb Jackson, Washington correspondent for USA Today and The Record. We take a whirlwind tour of the U.S. politicians hitting the campaign trail with a dark cloud hanging over their heads. We land in New Jersey, where Senate Democrats suddenly have to worry about a tighter race. The reason? Their incumbent, Bob Menendez, narrowly escaped corruption charges last year.
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Podcast production by Mary Wilson and Jayson De Leon. Engineering by Terence Bernardo.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This week, as we inch closer to another election, I've been trying to answer this question. |
| 0:06.8 | When it comes to the people we vote for, how corrupt is too corrupt? |
| 0:12.2 | Like last night, I'm watching the candidates for governor in Florida, get ready to debate. |
| 0:16.4 | Because tonight we're going to seek answers to the issues that matter most to you. |
| 0:21.6 | It's clear the mood in the room is tense. |
| 0:24.6 | Democrat Andrew Gillum is black. |
| 0:26.6 | By the end of the night, he'd come this close to calling his Republican opponent Rick DeSantis a racist. |
| 0:32.6 | Now, I'm not calling Mr. DeSantis a racist. |
| 0:34.6 | I'm simply saying the racist believe he's a racist. |
| 0:44.7 | But meanwhile, DeSantis is trying to focus everyone's attention somewhere else, to a vacation Gillum took, to New York a couple years back. It turns out the FBI is investigating some |
| 0:49.5 | free Broadway tickets Gillum got while he was there. Well, when I work with the FBI, I was doing it as a prosecutor to bring people to justice. |
| 0:56.9 | When Andrew is dealing with the FBI, he's dealing with an undercover agent as a person |
| 1:00.8 | of interest and investigation. |
| 1:02.3 | Why would an undercover FBI agent posing as a contractor give him a $1,000 ticket to Hamilton? |
| 1:08.9 | It's hard to figure out what's true here. |
| 1:11.5 | There's no indictment, no criminal complaint. |
| 1:14.7 | But DeSantis has seized on this moment. |
| 1:17.5 | He said, this is what local corruption looks like. |
| 1:21.7 | But is it? |
| 1:23.4 | Is this about the ticket to Hamilton? |
| 1:25.4 | Exactly. |
| 1:26.2 | See, you do now. |
... |
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