Former Obama Pollster Weighs in on the Trump Presidency

Steve Adubato sits down with former Obama Pollster, Cornell Belcher, about his book "A Black Man in the White House" and his outlook for the Trump Presidency.

6/28/17 #2053

Excerpt:

"Hi, I'm Steve Adubato. Welcome to the Tisch WNET Studio, here in the heart of Lincoln Center. It is my honor and pleasure to welcome my friend Cornell Belcher. He is former Obama pollster, you're so much more than that. Thank you. [laughter] Also the author of A Black Man in the White House. How you doing? I'm doing well. I'm honored to be on your show. I really am. I appreciate it. It is great to have you. We got to see each other a few weeks back? Yes we did. We were paired together on another network. [laughter] And Joy Reid? By the way, Joy's been here with us many times from MSNBC. She's good people. She does a great show. She does. And by the way, we did a selfie. Can I do this? [laughter] This is the worst selfie of all time. I just... our producers don't know. This is... guys? The worst selfie of all time. Can we take a look at this? I think it's pretty good. Two good looking grey haired guys there. Can you see this? [laughter] The worst... [laughter] Why is your head bigger than mine? Why is more your face...? You got more face time than me. [laughter] I have more hair. Yeah. It was interesting to get to see you, and hear you, cause I've always watched you on the air before. I'm curious, you got into the business of politics and commentary when? And why? I... you know, I got in the business of politics a lot longer before I got into commentary. I grew up in the South, and fascinated with political behavior. Right? Where I'd play base... back then, when kids would play baseball. You remember that? Yeah before... [laughter] Now it's... videobaseball. Yeah. Videobaseball, or you know, or soccer. Yes. But I won't get all started on that. And you know, and we played baseball together. It was a really integrated, mixed neighborhood. And we'd all get along together. But you back to their... your friend's house, and there'd be a Confederate flag. Right? And I was like, "Okay, I don't understand what's going on." So I've always been fascinated by political behavior. So how people behave politically. And reading Du Bois' works early on. I wanted... W. E....? W. E. B. Du Bois' work early on. I always wanted to sort of get involved in the social sciences as a vehicle to bring about change and to help uplift people. The commentary stuff came later, with some success. I was actually Howard Dean's pollster at the DNC before I was part of the Obama team. And there was a need for a voice, really sort of hard defending President Obama. Right? And there were a lot..."