Michael Hastings - Panic 2012: The Sublime and Terrifying Inside Story of Obamas Final Campaign

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Panic 2012

The Sublime and Terrifying Inside Story of Obamas Final Campaign

Michael Hastings

A BuzzFeed Top Secret Election Project

BLUE RIDER PRESS

A member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

New York

Published by the Penguin Group

Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street,

New York, New York 10014, USA

USA / Canada / UK / Ireland / Australia / New Zealand / India / South Africa / China

Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

Copyright 2013 by Michael Hastings

All rights reserved. No part of this product may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the authors rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

Published simultaneously in Canada

While the author has made every effort to provide accurate telephone numbers and Internet addresses at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors, or for changes that occur after publication. Further, the publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

C ONTENTS

N OTE

The majority of this book is based on original reporting, including approximately 45 post-election interviews with Obama officials and others associated with the campaign, more than 81 hours of audio recordings from the trail, and the 87 or so articles I wrote for BuzzFeed from April 2012 to November 2012. That being said: the book owes a huge debt to contemporary news accounts as well as the often colorful White House pool reports. A comprehensive list of sources is available online.

T HE P RINCIPALS

President Barack ObamaHero

Mitt RomneyVillain

Michelle ObamaFirst Lady, or FLOTUS

Joe BidenVice President

Jim MessinaCampaign Manager, Obama for America

Stephanie CutterDeputy Campaign Manager, Obama for America

Valerie JarrettSenior White House Advisor

David Axe AxelrodChief Campaign Strategist

David PlouffeSenior White House Advisor

Ben RhodesDeputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications

Bill BurtonHead of Priorities USA Action Super PAC

Jon Favs FavreauSpeechwriter

Rahm EmanuelMayor of Chicago, Former White House Chief of Staff

Jen PsakiObama Campaign Spokesperson

Jay CarneyWhite House Press Secretary

Robert GibbsFormer White House Press Secretary

Bill ClintonFormer President

Hillary ClintonSecretary of State

David PetraeusCIA Director, September 6, 2011November 9, 2012

Chris StevensU.S. Ambassador to Libya

Sean SmithU.S. Foreign Service Information Management Officer

Heather, Nathan, and Samantha SmithSean Smiths Wife and Their Two Kids

Chris ChristieThe Guv

Bruce SpringsteenRocker

Paul RyanBowhunter

Secret ServiceEverywhere

Ed HenryHead of White House Correspondents Association, Fox News Correspondent

Ben SmithEditor in Chief, BuzzFeed

Michael HastingsNarrator

Part I

Crisis

Chapter 1

What Happens in Vegas Does Not Stay in Vegas

Nevada

September 30October 1

At 12:46 p.m. Pacific Standard Time, Air Force One landed on the runway at McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas, the temperature 92 degrees.

AF1 is the ballingest of ballin private jets. It is a souped-up Boeing 747, official designation VC-25A; it has unlimited range, ready to fly for days on end, refueling in midair; its electronics block electromagnetic pulse attacks; it has 4,000 square feet on three floors, complete with a conference room and an onboard medical suite; it is a $179,750-an-hour expression of American power, and it carries the president of the United States through the skies.

It lands weird, too, as it did that Sunday afternoon. Owing to its unique engineering qualities and the intense desert heat the plane seemed to float in a pixelated haze, hovering, pausing, then softly hitting the tarmac.

President Barack Obama emerged from the shimmer in a navy blue suit, headed down the steps and shook hands with the seven greeters there to meet him. He took off his suit coat, rolled up his sleeves, and posed for a photo in front of the rope line.

There were 37 days left until the election.

Vegas was contested turfthe best views in the city of that Sundays arrival belonged to Obamas sworn enemies, billionaire casino magnates Sheldon Adelson and Steve Wynn. From the private casino on the 37th floor of Adelsons Venetian, or the 63rd-floor penthouse of Wynns Encore, the two self-made entrepreneurs had the perfect line of sight on the man theyd gamble over $100 million in campaign contributions to beat.

That the cash happened to be filling up the bank accounts of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryana Mormon-Catholic duo who allegedly frowned upon Nevadas brand of sinmissed the point entirely. In the game of billion-dollar national politics, hypocrisy was a hang-up for suckers and losers, two categories of human beings Vegas casino owners knew well.

Just a month earlier, Wynns five-star pleasure palace hosted an epic summer blowout, with Prince Harry of Wales getting naked and wasted and paparazzid at the 21-and-older pool at the Encoreeight balls for all, most likely, at a poolside spot where models, high rollers, celebrities, and bodybuilders eased off hangovers and built new ones. The pool bar included a sign calling it the European, or topless, section of the resort, meaning a good time was guaranteed. Adelson had his own international network of vice, too, stretching from Dean Martin Drive to Macau, an island off the coast of China where reports of yellow slave trade activity at his four casinos persistedreports, of course, that were strenuously denied, litigiously pursued, and eventually retracted.

It wasnt about the GOP family values for themthe daily lessons of cooperation, patience, mutual respect, and responsibility that the Republican Party platform calls the first level of self-government. No, it was about the cold, hard cash. A second Obama term would close a few corporate tax loopholes, creating a negative effect on tax rates that would cost them hundreds of millions of dollars in profits from their foreign businesses.

For that, they really did not appreciate our Barack.

Obama carefully avoided their powerful little corner of the city on this trip, the Encore and the Venetian kitty-corner off Sands Avenue and Flamingo Road. Although in the past the president had stayed on the Vegas Strip, right downtown in Caesars at the heart of the American Dream, those kinds of distractions wouldnt do for what he was supposed to be in town forto prepare for the first presidential debate of 2012.

The 51-year-old president had to be ready to take on Mitt Romney, face-to-face, for the first time.

The plan: a campaign stop at a high school on Sunday evening, then three days of training for the showdown in Denver. His senior staff was with him or would soon arriveJon Favs Favreau, Anita Dunn, Ben Rhodes, Lute, Jen Psaki, Jay Carney, David Axe Axelrod, Jim Messina, and David Plouffe, with Senator John Kerry flying in on Southwest over the weekend. Fixer Ron Klain would be there, and, of course, a lawyer, Bob Bauer.