About a week after a Columbia commencement address where she warned journalism graduates not to equate objectivity with neutrality, but with facts and truth, PBS Amanpour and Company host Christiane Amanpour aired a previously recorded interview with election denier Stacey Abrams on Tuesday how she is able to put so much energy saving “the democratic process.”
Abrams’s alleged fight to save democracy from voter-suppressing Republicans was not the only thing Amanpour was deeply fascinated with. The reason Abrams was on Tuesday was to promote her new novel, which led a star-struck Amanpour to wonder, “You know and I'm sure many people have asked you, but you are one busy woman as a public servant for so, so long. How do you get time to write novels?”
For Abrams, book writing allows her to “try to balance my life so that I’m tackling the issues I care about from multiple perspectives.”
Clearly not caring about the actual facts and effects of various voting laws, Amanpour would later ask, “What should young people, the younger generation learn from what you did? First of all, having lost those two major, you know, gubernatorial races, and yet putting your energy into the same passion, and the process at a time when even in the United States the democratic process is being incredibly infringed?”
Since Amanpour was not there to insist on compliance with facts, Abrams replied, “Voter suppression is not new and it is not done. and so part of my responsibility is to articulate what the problem is, but demonstrate the solutions.”
After waxing poetic about the need to protect democracy both at home and abroad, Abrams added, “When I didn’t win in 2018, I did not imagine the full consequences, but I knew I had the responsibility to keep acting, to keep pushing and so I was able to scaffold organizations that defend democracy and build our senses and do good work to secure public policy.”
Those organizations have been plagued with legal and ethical questions, but Amanpour naturally ignored that, instead wondering “And for you, what were the full consequences?”
Despite Georgia voter participation breaking all sorts of records, Abrams continued to spread fake news, “Not winning means a lot. It meant that my-- the governor was able to pass even more voter suppression legislation; he was able to ignore the needs of our citizens.”
Abrams then went on to tout the state electing two Democrats to the Senate, but as for Amanpour, her commitment to factual journalism clearly has its limitations.
This segment was sponsored by viewers like you.
Here is a transcript for the May 30 show:
PBS Amanpour and Company
5/30/2023
11:17 PM ET
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: You know and I'm sure many people have asked you, but you are one busy woman as a public servant for so, so long. How do you get time to write novels?
STACEY ABRAMS: Writing, for me, is just as important as anything I do. I try to balance my life so that I’m tackling the issues I care about from multiple perspectives, and writing is one of those ways I get to think about issues, investigate them, kill off people I don't like. Lots of fun.…
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: What should young people, the younger generation learn from what you did? First of all, having lost those two major, you know, gubernatorial races, and yet putting your energy into the same passion, and the process at a time when even in the United States the democratic process is being incredibly infringed?
STACEY ABRAMS: Voter suppression is not new and it is not done. and so part of my responsibility is to articulate what the problem is, but demonstrate the solutions. I did stand for office twice, and it is important to secure the jobs that have the greatest impact, but not getting the job does not exempt you from doing the work and the work of protecting democracy, the work of expanding democracy, belongs to all of us.
As a young student at Spelman College years ago I signed up people to vote. Now I’m trying to protect that very right and for me, these are of a piece, I can be a candidate for office, but I am always a citizen of, not only, the United States, but a citizen of a global democracy that requires protection.
And when I think about the young people I’m going to get to work with, my job is to show them that yes, you may lose something, you may not get the thing you seek but that is not exempt you from doing the work that needs to be done and even more, it creates opportunities that you didn't see.
When I didn’t win in 2018, I did not imagine the full consequences, but I knew I had the responsibility to keep acting, to keep pushing and so I was able to scaffold organizations that defend democracy and build our senses and do good work to secure public policy.
AMANPOUR: And for you, what were the full consequences?
ABRAMS: Not winning—
AMANPOUR: Yeah.
ABRAMS: -- means a lot. It meant that my-- the governor was able to pass even more voter suppression legislation; he was able to ignore the needs of our citizens, but the larger construct was that we were also able to elect two U.S. senators who have the ability to help secure judgeships and secure leadership that guided us through what could have been tumultuous consequence to our previous president.
We were able to secure electoral college votes, that changed the leadership of this country and that, I would say, has had international impact as we address what’s happening in Ukraine. I shudder to think what would have been had we not had President Joe Biden in office and so there've been both domestic and global consequences to being able to stand up and defend the right to vote and more importantly turn out voters.
