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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. As many Americans celebrate the return of Brittney Griner, but many Republicans not so much, have you wondered at all why Russia cared so much about getting that arm smuggler back? Viktor Bout had been imprisoned in the US for over a decade. Was he anything to Vladimir Putin that Brittney Griner is to so many Americans? Have you wondered about that? Well, it's starting to look like, yes, he really is.

It turns out Bout has immediately used his freedom to join a radical Russian political party that supports Putin's invasion of Ukraine and denounces the West in general, liberalism in particular, and, oh, LGBTQ human beings specifically. As The Guardian reports this morning, the so-called Liberal Democratic Party that Bout immediately joined despite its name, Liberal Democrat, has since its foundation in 1991, propagandized an ultra-nationalist and xenophobic ideology, urging Russia to invade countries of the former Soviet Union.

Bout, parroting much of Putin's recent statements that blasted liberalism, predicted the end of Western civilization. He is quoted by The Guardian saying, "What is happening in the West is simply the suicide of civilization, and it may be happening in all areas with drugs and LGBT+ among them," said Bout. How far is that from Donald Trump, Jr., writing that the US traded for Brittney Griner rather than US Marine Paul Whelan, also in captivity in Russia, to improve the Biden administration's diversity, equity, and inclusion score? He said that.

Many other Republicans echoed Trump's sentiments if a little less directly, but there were Bout and Trump, Jr., both somehow using this prisoner exchange in the last few days as an occasion for white heterosexual male grievance. That's where we begin on a Monday in the Christmas season with a traditionalist saying, "Goodwill toward all." Whatever happened to that?

With us now to talk about that and other Monday morning politics is Susan Glasser, Washington columnist for The New Yorker, co-anchor of their weekly podcast, The Political Scene, and co-author with Peter Baker of The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021, one of the best-selling political books of this year. Susan is also especially well-suited to the topic of Griner and Bout as she spent four years as The Washington Post's Moscow co-bureau chief. She's been editor of Foreign Policy magazine and her previous books include the one called Kremlin Rising. Susan, great of you to join us today. Welcome back to WNYC.

Susan Glasser: Thank you so much, Brian. Great to be with you.

Brian Lehrer: Let's start on the Russian side of this. I was wondering why they still cared about Viktor Bout. Now, what I'm reading makes it look like it might be for pro-Putin celebrity backup to the extent that Viktor Bout is a celebrity. How does it look to you?

Susan Glasser: Well, look, Putin will take all the support. This is essentially the official state ideology of Russia at this point is the kind of ultra-nationalist, absolutely exclusionary, anti-gay, and everything else rhetoric. This is what Putin has created in terms of an ideology for the modern Russian empire he aspires to create. Bout is obviously endorsing that. Remember, he essentially was one of the world's leading underground arms dealers when he was eventually arrested and prosecuted in the United States.

He may bring something more than rhetorical support to bear ultimately for Putin's war in Ukraine. I think that's the thing to look out for. I was thinking about all the examples during that long war of the United States in Afghanistan when there would be Taliban or Al-Qaeda prisoners ultimately released. They would soon enough turn up fighting again or in the fight again. I think Viktor Bout is going to be in a fight again.

Brian Lehrer: That's interesting. It suggests that he still has some kind of power to influence the outcome of wars or the outcome of where arms move from place to place. All Americans know about him, in general, is that he's called the Merchant of Death and he's called a notorious arms smuggler. After all these years in prison in the United States, what power over anything arms-related or military does he have?

Susan Glasser: Well, I guess we're about to see that in action, Brian. I think those relationships that he built up over decades, do they still exist? Obviously, Putin's military is stretched to the extreme. They are using not just the official Russian military but groups such as the Wagner Group, which is essentially Russian mercenaries who were fighting in Syria, in the Middle East, and in other conflicts around the world. In Libya, for example. What are Viktor Bout's potential ties outside of the boundaries of Russia and its official military complex? That's something that I'll be watching out for, for sure.

Brian Lehrer: The fact that he said specifically LGBT, as he put it, LGBT+, would contribute to being the end of Western civilization, that was coming out of Viktor Bout's mouth immediately upon return, was that, besides being hate speech, a very undignified swipe at the American he was traded for, Brittney Griner, being Black and gay and vocally proud of those things?

Susan Glasser: Well, it certainly could have been. Remember, again, this has been a pillar of Vladimir Putin's ideological, rhetorical assault on the West, is to imply that Russia under his leadership has become the bastion and guardian of traditional "values." That is one of the many ways in which Putin has sought to make common ground, common cause with extremists in the West, in fact, by saying that their culture has become decadent and that he is the guardian of a much "pure culture." I think it's very consistent. Viktor Bout wanted to please the man who just sprung him from US prison. Using that kind of hate speech, as you termed it, is exactly the way to please his master.

Brian Lehrer: Donald Trump, Jr., writing that Biden traded for Griner rather than US Marine Paul Whelan to improve Biden's DEI score, as Trump put it, diversity, equity, and inclusion score and other comments like that, one could think some American Republicans are on the same side of the culture wars with the Russian arms dealer they denounced the release of more than the American whose freedom was achieved. Do you think we're seeing anything like that nexus?

Susan Glasser: Yes. Again, this is something that Putin has sought to make, a common cause with far-right groups in Europe and the United States for a long time, predating this war, in fact. Obviously, Donald Trump, Jr., is something akin to a professional troll constantly seeking the most inflammatory, divisive thing he could say. One thing I want to point out is that-- and it's so disturbing. What you see in his comments about Brittney Griner, what you see in his father's reaction to this, I think, is so consistent with how Trump governed, especially toward the end of his presidency.

Remember, even during the COVID pandemic, Donald Trump, the president, did not see himself as the president of the whole country, but just those he defined as Americans, his Americans, red America. It was a very exclusionary definition of what constituted an American, just as Putin has very exclusionary definitions. I think that's foundational to who the Trumps are in public life.

Brian Lehrer: I wonder if you think Brittney Griner's identity was part of the reason Putin detained her of all people in the first place and then held her for 10 months while it made headlines in the United States to make a show of being anti-Black, anti-gay, anti-woman, all of which he has this history of being as you've been describing, because it somehow helps him politically at home, not just with the Steve Bannon, Donald Trump portion of the American right. You think?

Susan Glasser: Well, look, she was detained about a week before Putin's latest invasion of Ukraine. Russia has a long history. Essentially, this was a hostage-taking, a very useful thing to have a prominent celebrity American in your jails at a time when you know you might need leverage and a negotiating thing. Who knows how purposeful that was versus an accident that proved to be useful for them?

I just don't know that we have seen a full account yet to really understand. It's an opaque system, Putin's Russia. Things are not always as purposeful as they seem in Russia, but she, from the very beginning, was this incredibly strategic and useful bargaining chip for the Russians. Her ordeal unfortunately was akin to being taken hostage by the Russian state.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, we can take your Monday morning politics calls for Susan Glasser from The New Yorker on Brittney Griner's freedom and the reactions to it, or Kyrsten Sinema leaving the Democratic Party to become an independent, which we'll get to in a few minutes, or other Monday morning national politics. 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, or tweet @BrianLehrer. Let me play a clip of US Special Envoy Roger Carstens, who was the person deployed to meet Griner at the point of exchange and accompany her home on the plane. Carstens was on CNN's State of the Union yesterday. Listen.

Roger Carstens: When she finally got onto the US plane, I said, "Brittany, you must have been through a lot over the last 10 months. Here's your seat. Please feel free to decompress. We'll give you your space." She said, "Oh no, I've been in prison for 10 months now listening to Russian. I want to talk, but first of all, who are these guys?"

She moved right past me and went to every member on that crew, looked them in the eyes, shook their hands, and asked about them, got their names, making a personal connection with them. It was really amazing. Then later on, on an 18-hour flight, she probably spent 12 hours just talking. We talked about everything under the sun. I was left with the impression that this is an intelligent, passionate, compassionate, humble, interesting person, a patriotic person, but above all, authentic.

Brian Lehrer: Imagine being that person. Of course, imagine being Brittney Griner and everything she's gone through, but imagine being the American who greets her and rides home on a plane with her and listens to her talk, and is in conversation with her for 12 hours. Susan, as a foreign policy journalist as part of your background, do you know Roger Carstens or that intense job he's apparently had a number of times of greeting US hostages upon release?

Susan Glasser: Well, it is a very intense job. That's actually gotten more intense in recent years. Unfortunately, it's not just the Russians who figured out that holding prominent Americans is a way to gain leverage and bargaining power with the United States. North Korea is another example. Iran is another example. Increasingly, the world's rogue regimes have turned to this kind of weaponized arrests of Americans. It's become an evermore important job. Remember that the fourth and final national security advisor in the Trump administration was Robert O'Brien, who had that job as the hostage envoy.

Trump elevated him with very little other experience to be the national security advisor. I should point out, by the way, we were talking about the Trumps and Brittney Griner earlier. Trump has publicly criticized the Biden administration for not being able to secure the release at this time of Paul Whelan as well. You see this on the right. It's important to point out that Whelan, in fact, was in Russian custody for two years of Trump's presidency. Trump obviously did not get him out and was not able to arrange a trade with the Russians.

Brian Lehrer: Listener tweets, "Not sure how this Bout news is surprising. Maybe he does believe in the things he says. Of course, he will kiss the ring of the leader that freed him." Let's go to a phone call. Kylie in Northern Virginia, you're on WNYC. Hi, Kylie.

Kylie: Hi, good morning, so two things. Let me just say as a disclaimer. Number one, I'm just elated that Brittney Griner's been released. I am. Number two, I canceled cable, so I don't always watch cable news. Maybe people have been saying this and I just don't know it, but I feel like we could have guessed that the conservative right would have something to say about the trades that the Biden administration made for Brittney Griner.

I guess I'm just wondering. It feels very naive. I wonder if the Biden administration could have taken the air out of some of these anti-Black, anti-gay, anti-DEI attacks from the right and meet them where they are to give a really "American message" just to deflate this because we knew it was coming and it just feels like we handed-- "We" being, I don't know, empathetic people. It just feels like we handed them a chip almost. I just wondered about your guest's reaction to that thought that I'm having.

Brian Lehrer: Great question, Kylie. Thank you. I did notice in that clip that we played that Carstens threw in the word "patriotic" in his description of Brittney Griner. What do you think about Kylie's question?

Susan Glasser: I think trolls are going to troll, unfortunately. Donald Trump, Jr., is almost the personification of that and his father. There's a reason we titled our book about Trump The Divider. When there's an opportunity to separate Americans out and against each other and use them against each other, he has, generally speaking, chosen to take it. I think the Biden administration had a very difficult choice when Russia refused to entertain the swap for Paul Whelan. In fact, as reported in The Times the other day, they actually proposed wanting to swap Paul Whelan for, essentially, a stone-cold killer, an assassin who had killed someone in cold blood in Germany.

That was just too far. The Germans wouldn't think of it for understandable reasons. That left the president of the United States with a very painful choice, which is to bring one but not both of these hostages. That's why they are home. We'll see what happens to Whalen going forward. Putin, I did notice, very explicitly said the other day that he did not rule out future negotiations and future such trades. It's not entirely impossible to imagine that Whalen can get out at some point too. I think it was a very painful and difficult choice.

Brian Lehrer: Kylie, thanks for your call. On Biden not ruling out future trades, here's one more clip of his envoy, Roger Carstens, on CNN yesterday. This one, he responds to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Bob Menendez of New Jersey, who's a Democrat, who seems to also have been critical of the prisoner swap, not on any identity grounds, but Bob Menendez saying, "We must stop inviting dictatorial and rogue regimes to use Americans overseas as bargaining chips." Here's Biden's envoy, Roger Carstens, on CNN with Dana Bash responding to that.

Roger Carstens: Well, I'd say that it's important to note that people that are held overseas are important to us. That's where I'd say I start when I look at the question morally. Was it bad to trade someone like Viktor Bout? I think the question is, it's horrific to leave an American wrongfully detained in a foreign jail cell.

Dana Bash: Is it going to incentivize other bad actors?

Roger Carstens: Let me say this. There are bad actors. We used to say the other side gets a vote. In this case, it's hard to keep these dictators and these dictatorial governments as Chairman Menendez said from taking Americans and trying to use them as bargaining chips.

Brian Lehrer: Susan, how tough a call is that, the tension between winning freedom for Americans and not incentivizing more hostage-taking? This is hardly the first time this question has come up.

Susan Glasser: Well, that's right. It does seem to be a tactic that is preferred by nations like North Korea and Iran to a certain extent that want to be in a position to have something to negotiate with the United States over. It is a very difficult problem, maybe the most difficult problem. The thing that keeps striking me is how uneven this trade was, right?

The nature of the "offense" of Brittney Griner was so vastly different from that of Viktor Bout, a global bad actor, arms dealer. Again, you have this asymmetry. It gives Russia a leverage and a power completely disproportionate, which is why it's a favorite tactic of outlaw regimes. Frankly, that's what Vladimir Putin's government of Russia has become, an outlaw regime.

Brian Lehrer: Teresa in the Bronx, you're on WNYC. Hi, Teresa.

Teresa: Hello, Brian, and to your guest. I just wanted to say that I don't know about all the political aspects of it, but I was thinking that maybe Brittney could be a catalyst for change for these women basketball players to have to go outside of the US to supplement their incomes because I think that really needs to stop.

Brian Lehrer: Teresa, thank you. That's why Brittney Griner was in Russia in the first place, right? She's actually a big star in Russia as a basketball player who tours over there sometimes, which of course, the male players in the NBA as opposed to the female players in the WNBA financially don't have to do.

Susan Glasser: Yes, that's an important point. Look, I want to make another point that we haven't really made today, which is that Putin's government is an outlaw government. It's terrible what Brittney Griner suffered. Believe me. The conditions in Russian prisons, in a Russian penal colony like the one that she was in, absolutely horrific. It's in the context, at the same time, of mass-scale attacks on Ukrainian civilians. I do think it's important to remember that in any conversation about this horrible war. Brittney Griner was a casualty of that war.

She happened to be picked up at the airport a week before the invasion, was clearly held as a result of the conflict. Millions of Ukrainians are literally hostages as well and victims of massive attacks on the civilian population of Ukraine. It's not just a war between soldiers on the front line. Vladimir Putin has chosen to wage war on the people of Ukraine as well every day, taking out the electricity in major cities in the middle of winter, bombing indiscriminately. I think it's important. There are different kinds of hostage-takings that happen in a war and all of them are horrific.

Brian Lehrer: Mark in Harlem, you're on WNYC. Thanks for calling in, Mark.

Mark: Hi, Brian. Perhaps you and your guest can get something straight for me. I've changed in terms of my opinion about all this. I was critical of Brittney before and brought into this whole thing of bringing Whelan back, but I did a little bit of research on the Russian penal codes. Apparently, up to 2 grams of hemp or cannabis is considered to be an administrative violation, 15 days detention, a 5,000-ruble fine, and she had 0.7 amount of residue. I said to myself, "Well, they weren't even following their own laws." Then I'm looking at this lionization of Paul Whelan.

What I saw is that he was dishonorably discharged from the Marines for attempting to steal $10,000 from the Marines when he was in Iraq. I also read that he has four passports of four nationalities: UK, Irish, Canadian, and American. I'm saying to myself, "Well, if Whelan is not this hero left behind on the battlefield, this honorable Marine, and if he has four nationalities, why is the United States the only one tasked with bringing him back?" I'd like to find out if that's true. If it is, I wish we would stop this whole lionization of him. He's not entirely a clean character and it's turning out that Brittney is a victim to me anyway.

Brian Lehrer: Mark, thank you. Very interesting. Always interesting to hear anybody who changes their mind on anything as dug in as people tend to be these days on so many things. I don't know Paul Whelan's background, so I don't know if what Mark said is true, Susan. I do have another tweet here from another listener who says that-- Sorry, I have to pull this back up. It says, "Whelan, discharged from the Marines, was one step above a dishonorable discharge." I don't know if any of that is true. Do you?

Susan Glasser: I haven't weighed into the details. I believe it has been reported about the discharge pretty extensively. It has been notable to me that Republicans in their effort to weaponize almost anything, you've seen some of them making this claim and building up Whelan. Again, I would point out, though, that both of them are victims in the sense that the Russian legal system is not on the level here.

It's not about following their own rules. It is about leverage. It is not a rule of law society at this point. It is completely controlled and overseen by the Kremlin. There is no sense of independent justice being done. That can be misleading to folks when they're reading well that there was a court proceeding, there was a conviction, that this is not akin to a trial on a court proceeding in a rule-of-law country. That is very important.

Brian Lehrer: Well, do you have any theory as a Russia watcher, why you think it was Brittney Griner and not Paul Whelan who was traded for from Russia's standpoint? Carstens in the clip that we played, Biden's envoy, Roger Carstens, makes it sound like it was the only swap that Putin was interested in.

Susan Glasser: Yes, I think the record suggests that's the case at this point. Again, the Russians proposed a swap that would involve Whelan that was unacceptable to the United States and its ally, Germany, because the only swap that Russia proposed according to the reporting that's come out in recent days, in The Times, and elsewhere was a swap for an assassin who murdered a Chechnyan fighter in Germany a few years ago and was then captured. That was not a trade that Germany was willing to entertain.

That was the only deal that was on the table that Russia would entertain for Paul Whelan. I also think you asked why they're handling it differently. The Russians claim that Paul Whelan is a spy. They claim that that is a different category of a prisoner than Viktor Bout and Brittney Griner. That is why they refuse to have him as part of the deal that the Americans entertained. At the moment, the United States does not have a Russian spy in its system that they could have offered up. The Americans say that Whelan is not an American spy, but that is the allegation that the Russians have been saying.

Brian Lehrer: Interesting that for as bad as everybody is saying Viktor Bout is, there was somebody even worse who Russia wanted in exchange for Paul Whelan, what you're saying was a trade the United States would make. All right, we're going to continue with Susan Glasser from The New Yorker on other things right after this. Stay with us.

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. More Monday morning politics now with Susan Glasser, who writes the weekly letter from Biden's Washington column for The New Yorker, co-hosts their weekly podcast, The Political Scene, and is co-author of the recently released The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021. Here's Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat no more, explaining why to CNN's Jake Tapper. Tapper had just cited to her many Democratic Party priorities that Sinema supports, including expanding healthcare access, abortion rights, LGBTQ rights, a path for Dreamers, and green energy, and Sinema said--

Kyrsten Sinema: I know this is really hard for lots of folks, especially in DC. What's important to me is to not be tethered by the partisanship that dominates politics today. I think Americans are tired of it. I think Arizonans are tired of it. What I'm interested in is working on all those issues that you just mentioned that I care deeply about and that I believe my constituents care deeply about, but I want to work on them in a way that is productive, that is free from the trappings of the pole of the political system. The national political parties have pulled our politics farther to the edges than I've ever seen. I want to remove some of that poison from our politics. I want to get back to actually just working on the issues, working together to try and solve these challenges.

Brian Lehrer: Kyrsten Sinema on CNN last week. Listeners, I know there's reason not to take that statement purely at face value, which we'll talk about with Susan Glasser, but anybody listening right now sympathetic to this idea? Anybody out there listening want there to be more people leaving the Democratic and the Republican Party and setting up some kind of independent shop, be it a centrist third party or something else?

212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, or tweet @BrianLehrer. Susan Glasser, how much do you take Sinema at her word there about fleeing the polarization, looking for a better way, and how much is this about the fact that she stood a good chance of losing a Democratic primary in 2024 in Arizona because of how she has blocked some of Biden's agenda even as a Democrat?

Susan Glasser: Well, there's no question, Brian, as you pointed out that she was looking at a very tough road to renomination as a Democrat. Ruben Gallego, a popular congressman from Arizona, actively contemplating a primary. Now, she won't have a primary. Of course, there's the possibility that if Democrats nominate Gallego or someone else and she runs as well that you could have a situation where you could tip the seat to the Republicans. That might even be a likely scenario at this point.

The fantasy of a viable, successful independent party movement has been around ever since really. Teddy Roosevelt gave it a shot more than 100 years ago and no one has really successfully been able to break the chokehold of the two-party system. The structural incentives are just too strong there. In the end, ultimately, Donald Trump, who flirted as well with an independent who runs for office, that's why he chose what his son-in-law at one point called the hostile takeover of the Republican Party because it proves to be in our system-- The way to real power is to weaponize one of the two parties, not to abandon them.

We'll see what happens to Sinema. In the short term, I think it's important to note that there's not going to be all that much change in the Senate as a result of this. She is not going to caucus with Republicans. She's still effectively going to get her committee assignments from Democrats. She's still very likely to continue voting with them on most of the major issues. People are not anticipating a radical shift in her as a result of this announcement, which does seem driven by the politics back in Arizona as much as by anything else.

Brian Lehrer: Right, so caucus with the Democrats like the two other independent senators. Sometimes people forget that Bernie Sanders of Vermont is an independent. Of course, he is. He's not a Democrat. Also, Angus King of Maine, who's not as well-known as Bernie Sanders, but he's also an independent. It doesn't seem to most commentators, including you, I hear you, to change very much of what Democrats can get done in the Senate.

Another relevant question when we look at the balance of power in the Senate for 2024. I don't know if you watch Arizona politics, which are so central to national politics these days as a swing state. If you watch them enough to have a sense of what would happen in a hypothetical three-way Senate race, a Democrat, a Republican, and independent incumbent, Kyrsten Sinema, could she win or which party would she wind up as a spoiler for?

Susan Glasser: Well, I think that's the big question going forward. In effect, she's daring Democrats to run somebody against her on the theory that they would back down rather than lose the seat altogether. I think that is the risk factor that she has opened up for Democrats. Are they willing as much as they dislike Sinema? They already did. Now, they do a lot more as a result of this. Do they dislike her so much that they're going to proceed with nominating a candidate and risk handing the seat over to not only a Republican but, potentially, a very extreme Republican?

That's the other factor here. You saw, of course, in 2022 in the midterm elections that Republicans in Arizona nominated both for governor and for Senate two very extreme candidates. Blake Masters was the Senate candidate who lost against Mark Kelly, the Democratic incumbent. Kari Lake, of course, perhaps the Trumpiest of 2022's crop of very Trumpy candidates, lost in the governor's race. One question is, what kind of Republican are the Republicans going to put up against Sinema and a possible theoretical Democratic opponent as well?

Brian Lehrer: You said there's no third-party moderate or centrist movement possible in this country. That may be true. His history certainly suggests that it's true, but maybe we're at this polarized point where some people say it's the really engaged Democrats and really engaged Republicans who are the most polarized and as polarized as they become. The media reflects that because we cover the two parties. There's a whole lot of Americans out there who are sick of the whole thing and willing to make more compromises in general on their pure positions even if they're motivated in real self-interest or real values.

New Jersey Democrat Tom Malinowski, who just lost a seat in Congress to a Republican, says he's starting a moderate party. Also, Andrew Yang. Was it Andrew Yang and Christie Whitman? Andrew Yang and somebody. I think it was Christie Whitman, former Republican governor of New Jersey, have talked about forming a centrist party. You don't think there's an appetite out there that matters to anything?

Susan Glasser: You know, Brian, I do think there is an enormous appetite. That clip that you played of Kyrsten Sinema is extremely appealing in terms of its rhetoric to a pretty broad swath of Americans, who would define themselves as much more centrist than what they perceive to be the extreme polarized nature of our politics right now. In politics, right in the end, elections come down to a choice, this or that candidate as opposed to a universe of possibilities.

Even many Republicans who have become soured on their party because of Donald Trump, they see the present crisis in American politics is such that they're not able to go in that direction because, in the end, there's usually the higher principle of actually defeating those who would take down the democracy. That's the direction that you've seen the Never Trumpers take in recent years.

I never thought I would see someone like Liz Cheney endorsing multiple Democratic candidates for Congress, but that's exactly what she did this year even though she doesn't agree with them ideologically on almost any of the core substantive policy arguments of our time, except for that key principle of defending the democracy and the threat posed by Trump and his followers. Is the present crisis so grieve essentially that it's required to keep that coalition together? There's a lot of people who are very angry about the prospect of that party. I think it's called the Forward Party because they're worried that it could become a spoiler and enable Republicans who follow Trump to win key offices or even the presidency again.

Brian Lehrer: Bob in Brick, you're on WNYC. Hi, Bob.

Bob: Hello. I just wanted to make a comment about Kyrsten Sinema. This big move to be an independent, I see it more as attention-getting. I think if she really wanted to stop the tribalism and extremism, she would be pushing for ranked-choice voting for everybody because it helps take out that extremism. More moderates get elected through ranked-choice voting than extremists. Extremists do not have enough support to get over 50%.

Brian Lehrer: Bob, thank you very much. That's another show really. Of course, we've covered ranked-choice voting here a lot because New York City instituted it last year. It had all kinds of effects on the mayoral and other New York City elections. It's true, Susan. I don't know if you've looked at this very closely yourself.

In theory, when you have a ranked-choice voting system where people choose a second choice and a third choice, if your first candidate doesn't get in, then it does have an effect of breaking the binary bonds of this one versus that one and a lot of people endorse-- In fact, don't they have that in Maine where Angus King, the independent senator, was elected? I think they do. I don't know if that's a path forward for something in the United States on a more widespread basis.

Susan Glasser: Yes, I think it's an excellent conversation to be having. Where I would look is Alaska, where we had a very dramatic demonstration of exactly this effect just this year because of the ranked-choice voting. Sarah Palin tried to make a big national political comeback bid and run for an open House seat. She lost not once but twice both for the special election and then in the general election.

It was exactly because of ranked-choice voting that Sarah Palin was denied another run at a national political career. I think that's very interesting. Lisa Murkowski, the Never Trump, more or less, Republican senator from Alaska, she won her re-election in part because of the ranked-choice voting. I think it's not even theoretical. It potentially could be a solution to some of the polarization that we've talked about.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, I just looked it up and I remembered right Maine, which has an independent senator, does have ranked-choice voting. One more call. John on Staten Island, you're on WNYC with The New Yorker's Susan Glasser. Hi, John.

John: Hello. I have a thought occurred to me a while back and I want to run it past this morning's guest. If Trump had won the 2020 election and were still president of the United States, does she think that Putin would've invaded Ukraine because he already would've had a puppet in Washington?

Brian Lehrer: Well, I'm not sure I see the connection. I imagine my guest would be. Susan, this is really in your expertise, but I would imagine that Trump would've looked the other way much more than Joe Biden has.

Susan Glasser: Well, look, it's a very interesting hypothetical. We'll never know the answer to it, but it is very true that Trump had a well-documented skepticism about Ukraine and pro-Russia tilt. In fact, one of the most extraordinary moments, this was recounted actually by the former US Ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, in her memoir. In a meeting in 2017 in the Oval Office, Donald Trump literally told the then-president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, that he did not consider Crimea to be a part of Ukraine, that he didn't think it was really a big deal because Russia should have it anyways.

Imagine telling that to the president of a country whose territory has been taken in force by the neighbors. It's not theoretical. Donald Trump was a skeptic of Ukraine, not really interested in defending its territorial integrity. Look at how he sought to undermine NATO throughout his tenure as US president. Imagine if he had succeeded in withdrawing from NATO as he became very, very closer to doing than most people realize during his tenure. I think that the caller's onto something there. Obviously, what might have been, we won't ever definitively know the answer.

Brian Lehrer: Let me ask you one closing question on your reporting as that caller brings up Trump versus Biden. We may be seeing Trump versus Biden again in 2024. We certainly may not, but we may. You wrote an article just recently about the aging leadership of both parties and whether they're equipped to take the country into the future.

I wonder if you could just state your basic takeaway as we run out of time because one could argue that young Democrats and young Republicans are quite similar on the issues to older Democrats and older Republicans. Just depends which one like Joe Biden or Bernie Sanders within your party. How much do you think age is really determining people's views as opposed to the ongoing partisan polarization?

Susan Glasser: Well, I think it is not so much an ideological question as it is a question of what's required to lead the country through grueling, demanding times. It is remarkable that we have such advanced-age leadership in both the Republican and the Democratic parties. Joe Biden, of course, is the oldest United States president ever. Before him, Donald Trump was. We're dealing with a situation where they'd be both parties' nominees.

You would have, again, the prospect of four more years of people presidents in their 80s. If Biden was re-elected and serves all the way till the end of his next term, he would be 86 years old. I think that there's a legitimate issue that's going to be a big issue for him if he runs for re-election, whether it's against Donald Trump or not. Obviously, Trump is not very much younger than Biden. In that sense, we're talking just about a gerontocracy that extends to both parties.

Brian Lehrer: Although with the series of wins that Biden has had recently, both on policy and the lack of a red wave in the midterms, do you think as the letter from Biden's Washington columnist for The New Yorker that any Democrat would primary him in 2024 if he does choose to run?

Susan Glasser: He doesn't look that way to me now. Certainly, there are many Democrats who are eager to get in an open race. I do think that if Biden does not run, Kamala Harris does not have a free path to the nomination she would face. I think a lot of contenders are getting into the field against her. As far as I can see right now if Biden chooses to run for re-election as a Democratic nominee, he's very likely to get that Democratic nomination without a big fight.

Brian Lehrer: Susan Glasser, Washington columnist for The New Yorker, co-anchor of their weekly podcast, The Political Scene, and co-author with Peter Baker of The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021, one of the notable political books of this year. Susan, we always appreciate it. Thank you so much.

Susan Glasser: Thank you, Brian.

 

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