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“He’s Running (from the law)” · Pod Save America

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Thank you. Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: On today's show, Donald Trump makes it official, Republicans win
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: the House, Nancy Pelosi steps down as leader, Carrie Lake
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: loses her race for Arizona governor, and later, Dan talks
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: to the Nevada Independent's Jon Ralston about how he nailed
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: his midterm calls, and they talk about Nevada's political future.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: But first, the Crooked Store just launched brand new holiday
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: merch inspired by your favorite Crooked podcasts. New items include...
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: A bake appreciator apron.
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: Fucking brilliant. I'm so pleased. What a great idea. Just great.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: For all you take appreciating bakers out there, I can't
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: wait to see. I want to see a picture of
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: Elijah in his take appreciator apron. That's what I want
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: to see. A magnetic poetry kit that allows you to
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: make your own notes app apology. Okay. And more. This
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: holiday season, every order from the Cricut store will support
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: Vote Save America's Every Last Vote Fund to help the
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: Georgia runoffs. So, Go to crooked.com slash store to shop now.
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: And speaking of Georgia, early voting starts Monday, November 28th
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: for the December 6th runoff. There's not much time. If
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: you're a Georgia voter, head over to votesaveamerica.com to make
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: your plan. If you're not a Georgia voter, but you
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: still want to help, which you should, you can find
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: remote and in-person volunteering opportunities at VSA. You can also
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: donate to our Every Last Vote Fund. It's going to
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: go directly to grassroots mobilization. to turning out young people
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: and people of color. It's going to help people with
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: early vote and mail-in vote. It's a great fund. Please donate.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: Raphael Warnock needs all the help he can get. Republicans
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: are spending a lot of money on this race. So
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: please go to votesaveamerica.com now to help get involved.
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: Can I do two? I have two housekeeping notes.
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.
• 2:09
  Speaker 3: Great.
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: One, there's so much I enjoy about doing this podcast
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: with you, but there's nothing I enjoy more than watching
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: you learn about the merch your company makes in real time.
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: You're basically Donald Trump making a policy announcement. Like you
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: had no idea about the, the bake appreciator apron until now.
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: Like it just, it came out of your mouth and
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: you learned it.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: Look, after five years, the three of us have tried
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: to split things up with this company. And who do
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: you think oversees merch of the three of us?
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: I'm guessing it's definitely not you, based on our experience
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: every Thursday. And I'm guessing it's not Tommy.
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: That's right. That's right. This is a love it thing.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Second thing, and more important, is I just want to
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: take a brief moment and say happy birthday to Howley.
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: Today is her birthday.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: Oh, happy birthday, Howley.
• 2:55
  Speaker 4: Yes, yes.
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: We've been doing this podcast for a long time. The
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: podcast has never been recorded on our birthday before. And
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: so it's a very special day.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: Here's the thing. I think of all of our partners,
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: Holly is the biggest fan of PSA. She's the most
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: consistent PSA listener. And I know that because she will
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: text our text chain with me and you and Emily
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: and Holly on it. And she will mention something that
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: happened on the pod and Emily will not know what
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: she was talking about.
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: Well, you should know that while she is a consistent
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: PSA listener, we are not in her top five of
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: crooked media podcasts.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: Oh, that's tough.
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: Huge, huge world though.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: Huge world.
• 3:34
  Speaker 4: Oh yeah.
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: Never cared about sports once in her life in any way,
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: shape or form. Not one bit about it. Fucking binging
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: world corrupt. Like there was no tomorrow. Yeah.
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: There's a lot of world does out there. My buddy
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: from college visited me over the weekend and he was like,
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: I don't have time for a lot of pods. I
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: listen to Pod Save America. And of course, Pod Save
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: the World.
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, of course.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: Of course. Okay. Let's get to the news. After three losses,
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: two impeachments, and one attempted coup turned violent insurrection, Donald
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: Trump announced that he's officially running for president from the
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: scene of his crime at Mar-a-Lago. The hour-long address was
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: panned as, quote, one of the most low-energy, uninspiring speeches
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: ever delivered by Trump And that was from his former
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: White House spokesperson, Sarah Matthews. The most prominent politicians in
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: attendance were former Congressman Madison Cawthorn and Devin Nunes. Don Jr.
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: wasn't there. Ivanka wasn't there and released a statement during
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: the speech saying that she would not be part of
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: his campaign. Jared Kushner will also not be part of
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: his campaign, but was in attendance. None of the networks
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: carried the speech. CNN carried the first 25 minutes and
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: even Fox News cut away multiple times. At one point,
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: People in the crowd tried to leave, but were prevented
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: from doing so by security, red wedding style. As for
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: the speech itself, here are some highlights.
• 4:54
  Speaker 4: In order to make America great and glorious again, I
• 4:57
  Speaker 4: am tonight announcing my candidacy for president of the United States.
• 5:03
  Speaker 4: And we love both sides. We're going to bring people together.
• 5:06
  Speaker 4: We're going to unify people. Two years ago, when I
• 5:10
  Speaker 4: left office, the United States stood ready for its golden age.
• 5:15
  Speaker 4: Blood-soaked streets of our once great cities are cesspools of
• 5:18
  Speaker 4: violent crimes, which are being watched all over the world.
• 5:22
  Speaker 4: We're going to be asking everyone who sells drugs, gets
• 5:26
  Speaker 4: caught selling drugs, to receive the death penalty for their
• 5:30
  Speaker 4: heinous acts. China played a very active role in the
• 5:35
  Speaker 4: 2020 election. Just saying, just saying. President Xi, who's now
• 5:41
  Speaker 4: president for life. I call him king.
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: He said, no, no, I'm not the king.
• 5:45
  Speaker 4: I said, yes, you are the king. You're president for life.
• 5:47
  Speaker 4: It's the same thing. And I'm a victim, I will
• 5:50
  Speaker 4: tell you.
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: I'm a victim.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: Think of it.
• 5:54
  Speaker 4: I have no doubt that by 2024, it will sadly
• 5:58
  Speaker 4: be much worse, and they will see much more clearly
• 6:02
  Speaker 4: what happened and what is happening to our country. And
• 6:05
  Speaker 4: the voting will be much different. Wow.
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: Tour de force, Dan. What'd you think? Why did he
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: sound like they hit him with a few tranquilizer darts
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: before he walked out on stage?
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: I think drowsy walrus is a great way to describe it.
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: So I like your tranquilizer darts. You know, his heart...
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: I mean, that sounds ridiculous. He doesn't have a heart.
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: His black, corroded heart was not in it. He just.
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: It.
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: Really felt like he... announced he was going to make
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: this speech. Felt like he had to do the announcement
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: because he made the announcement before the election. All of
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: his candidates lost and he took all the blame for
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: this and people sort of turned on him. But he
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: knew– because Trump has a sense of these things that
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: if he were to delay his announcement, that would be
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: a sign of weakness. So he just plowed forward. He
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: didn't want to be there. The people in the room
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: didn't want to be there. Fox News didn't even want
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: to cover it. I don't even– like the fact that
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: Don Jr. didn't show up for it is notable.
• 7:02
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: The fact that all these people tried to leave a
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: Trump speech and could not leave is funny, but also
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: sort of a metaphor for the last seven years of
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: our life. You just cannot get out the doors of Mar-a-Lago.
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: We are stuck. We're stuck in Hotel Mar-a-Lago.
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: I guess that's what it is. Yeah, we're all at Mar-a-Lago.
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: I mean, it's just– it was just all lame. It
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: was just totally– surprisingly lame, I would say. Surprisingly lame.
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: It definitely felt like they had the speech written before
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: Tuesday's results, and then they had to go back in
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: there and try to make a few edits to make
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: it reflect the reality of what happened. You can always
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: tell with those speeches. Here's what I think happened. Every
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: once in a while, Trump's staff somehow convinces him to
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: read a speech off a prompter. And in this case,
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: I think they probably told him it would like, you know,
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: it would enrage the fake news media if he showed
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: some message discipline and stayed on script and didn't turn
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: the whole thing into another rant about 2020. The problem
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: is for Trump, this has always been his problem. He
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: hates reading speeches because Stephen Miller is a, again, number one,
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: a terrible human being. Right after that, a terrible, terrible speechwriter.
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: who has never learned to write in Trump's voice ever.
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: And it shows. So with Trump, you either get low
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: energy and somewhat on message or high energy and deranged.
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: And like, sure enough, the New York Times reported in
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: one of the stories about the speech that like AIDS
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: have been wrestling with Mr. Trump's impulse for airing grievances,
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: particular over 2020 in hopes of keeping him focused on
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: the future. They were determined to recapture the feel of
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: his 2016 campaign when he ran as an insurgent against
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: the political establishment. So you could tell that was the
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: intended message, but to get him to do that, you
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: have to script him, and he's never good scripted.
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: I mean, that may have been the intended strategic imperative,
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: but there was nothing in the speech that led to that,
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: because you can't run as the insurgent political establishment while
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: you spend six of the 12 hours of your speech
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: talking about your accomplishments as president like two years ago, right?
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: It was just a mess. And what I think it
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: really goes to show is that Trump has nothing to say.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: Well, I was going to say, do you think there
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: was a message in there? What would you take out
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: as a message in that rambling?
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: I mean, that... Like, it feels fake to even answer
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: that question, but I will try.
• 9:38
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: Right. I think this is a joke we used a long,
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: long time ago in the beginning of this podcast and
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: Trump was that it was sort of like trying to
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: divine strategy from a monkey throwing feces like it just happens.
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: But it is what I think Trump's advisors think the
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: message is, is to use the. fond memories that some
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: small portion of people have of Trump's accomplishments against the
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: sour sentiments of the American people during the Biden presidency.
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: Looking at wrong track, right track numbers, inflation, et cetera,
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: that things– You know, sort of you stop the calendar
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: the day before the pandemic started. This is what life
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: was like then. This is what life is like now.
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: And I'm going to lay all of your dissatisfaction, all
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: the dissatisfaction you have with the direction of the country
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: at the feet of the president. There's one small problem
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: with that strategy is they just tried it eight days
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: ago and it didn't work.
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: Which that sort of cast a pall over the entire speech.
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: And you can tell. I mean, the line, and we
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: played it in the clip, the citizens of our country
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: have not yet realized the full extent and gravity of
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: the pain our nation is going through, but they will.
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: Maybe the lamest line of the entire speech, but I
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: guarantee you that line was not there before the midterm results.
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: I mean, this speech looks different. I'm not sure Trump
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: ever was going to, he was never going to deliver
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: this well. It was never going to be a coherent
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: message or part of a strategy, but the environment at
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: which it would take place would be very different if
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: 13 of 16 Trump-endorsed candidates had won, not lost. If
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden had suffered a rebuke, not a victory. The
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: environment was no one wanted Trump to be doing this.
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: Trump didn't want to be doing it. People in the
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: room didn't seem to want to be there. It's like
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: they didn't realize they had to go there to get
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: the Tuesday surf and turf at Mar-a-Lago. And it was
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: just the whole thing. It was really interesting leading up
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: to it. You kind of hit this in the intro,
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: but Donald Trump is a former president of the United States.
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: He is someone who led a violent insurrection to try
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: to overthrow election results. He is one of the most
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: famous people on the planet. He is under like nine
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: criminal investigations in every imaginable jurisdiction. And his announcement for
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: president felt like a non-event. There wasn't chatter of it.
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: There was no countdown clock. No one seemed excited about it.
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: The MAGA media wasn't excited. Fox sort of seemed like
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: they had to go to a wedding. It's a couple
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: they didn't think made sense. It was just all– it
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: was just really interesting. I don't know if that tells
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: us anything what's going to happen over the next two years.
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: But in the moment, it was a dud.
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: There was also, by the way, a Herschel Walker endorsement
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: in that speech. that Raphael Warnock immediately turned into an ad,
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: which I thought was great. That's the only thing that
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: really came from that speech. Also, no hint of a
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: policy agenda or what he would do as president, except
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: for the only new policy item he has that he's
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: been talking about in rallies for the last couple months
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: is this executing drug dealers thing. He's going full Duterte
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: in the Philippines. It's just very... It's there's nothing new
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: to say. I mean, there's this whole debate about, you know,
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: should networks cover Trump? You know, we've had for seven
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: years now. But I think that the lack of coverage
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: this time around was not necessarily like, oh, because we
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: don't want to broadcast his lies. But if you're just
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: just being a news organization, you cover what's new. Or
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: even if someone isn't new, but what they're saying is new.
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: And there was nothing new here.
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: He has thought about nothing other than Election Day 2020
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: for two years. And it's just, it's boring. This is
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: the worst thing that can happen to Trump is to
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: become boring.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: Boring and a loser. Those are the two worst things. Well, so,
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: you know, as we mentioned, even Fox News broke away
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: from Trump multiple times through the speech. Here's the moment
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: that happened.
• 13:42
  Speaker 4: You know, Germany tried it. They were up for about
• 13:45
  Speaker 4: a year. Remember I sent to Angela? Remember Angela? Do
• 13:51
  Speaker 4: you remember Angela? Nobody's remembering her now. Just joining us,
• 13:55
  Speaker 4: President Trump in Mar-a-Lago announcing his 2024 presidential run.
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: Angela Merkel, no one's remembering her anymore. Tough, real tough
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: from Sean Hannity there. Why do you think Fox of
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: all places did that? What do you think was going
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: on there?
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: I mean, they care about ratings too, I guess.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: I think they thought that they were helping Trump more
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: by cutting to two sycophants, Pete Hegseth and Mike Huckabee,
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: to praise the speech as opposed to actually playing people
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: the speech, which sucked. Yeah.
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: I mean, it's just there's someone sitting in a control
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: room at Fox who- while Sean Hannity shows off, right?
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: The most pro-Trump personality on primetime is up there. And
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: that person looked at what Trump was saying, thought about
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: what the audience wants to hear and should hear, and
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: decided that instead of hearing the former MAGA king drone
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: on about Angela Merkel, they would rather talk to a
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: guy who hosts Fox & Friends weekends. Like that was
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: the choice they made. And I don't even think it's–
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: I think it like maybe if like Lachlan Murdoch or
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: the woman whose name escapes me who runs Fox now
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: were like making– like were in the room pulling the levers.
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: But this is the– it's 10 o'clock at night. on Fox.
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: It's just some random person who's making a judgment on
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: quality of television, and they think Trump is bad television.
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: And they just think that's notable. I don't really believe
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: it says anything about, are the Murdochs walking away from Trump?
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: Because it was very praiseworthy from all the commentary on
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: it and the guests they booked on that show were
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: booked to say nice things about Trump. There wasn't like
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: they were getting one of the MAGA types like Candace
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: Owens or someone else who has expressed reticence about Trump 24.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: It was just sycophants. But it says just a lot
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: about the quality of the speech and the entertainment value
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: and the news value of him.
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: What do you think about the reaction from Republican politicians,
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: Republican pundits, and Trump's potential rivals?
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: Silence?
• 16:10
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: It's a lot of, not a lot of conversation. Not
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: a lot of takes from the Republican side.
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, not people saying positive things, not people saying negative things.
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: There's been a little strain of of the pro-Trump world,
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: like the Lindsey Graham's are like, if he can just
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: stick to the script like that, then he can do well.
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: And it's like, no, I'm not sure what that means.
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: My favorite reaction was from the Conservative National Review, which
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: just had a big picture of Trump on the cover
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: and said, no. And the opening line of their editorial
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: about the speech was, and Trump's 24 candidacy, quote, to
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: paraphrase Voltaire after he attended an orgy, once was an
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: experiment Twice would be perverse. First of all, so national review.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: How long do you think they've been sitting? The Voltaire
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: orgy thing has been in their draft folders. They've been
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: looking for that for a decade.
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: I think the dynamic here is most Republican politicians and
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: rivals don't want him in charge of the party, but
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: they're afraid of him. in the base of voters. And
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: so they're not sure what to say yet. So they're
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: all just going to be weak cowards like they usually are.
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: And we're running into one of the exact same dynamics
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: that actually led to January 6th, which is this pending
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: Republican runoff is forcing a lot of people to keep
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: their powder dry because they're afraid that if they attack Trump,
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: they will diminish turnout among his voters and therefore lose
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: a Senate seat. That is the root of the quote,
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: from a Republican leadership person about what's the harm in
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: humoring Trump when he was spreading lies about the election
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: around this time in 2020, and they're doing a similar thing.
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: There will be some people who may think they're going
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: to come out in early December after that election's decided
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: and say they're for DeSantis or something else, but you
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: can't give Trump space. He gathers strength in these periods.
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: You can't humor him. You have to come out and
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: say it, and they are going to make all the
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: same mistakes all over again, and he will end up
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: likely leading the party again, or at least for the
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: foreseeable future for that reason.
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: I do think it's like the, you mentioned Candace Owens,
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: people like her, Laura Ingram, there's more MAGA pundits that
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: have a lot of influence that are starting to break
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: away from him than there have been before.
• 18:38
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: And I also think it's notable that there's a place
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: for these people to land and it's with Ron DeSantis.
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: And you're seeing, you know, like I don't know what
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: the primary will look like. You know, you've got like
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: Mike Pence out there, by the way, that Mike Pence
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: town hall last night, it was very funny from beginning
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: to end, which may seem, uh, may seem counterintuitive, but
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: here's one really, really funny clip of him trying to
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: answer a question from one of the audience members.
• 19:09
  Speaker 3: And this freedom based on Roe also continue.
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: Barbara, thank you.
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: I'm, I represented Madison County in Congress for many years.
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: Andrea.
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: It's nice to see you.
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: But yeah, you get like Mike Pompeo, Mike Pence, Kristi Noem.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: But like, I think if the field is split, then
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: Trump gets the nomination because he only has to hit,
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: you know, 30, 40% in some of these states and
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: it's winner take all in the Republican primary. But if
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: for some reason they all decide not to run or
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: everyone consolidates quickly around just DeSantis and Trump, I think
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: that is a different situation.
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, we talked about this for a long
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: time last week. We don't really know how it'll play out,
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: but Trump is definitely weaker than he has ever been.
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: The question is whether Republicans will have the courage and
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: the strategic sense to exploit that weakness, or they will
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: do what they did in 16. They did multiple times
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: during the presidency and certainly after January 6th, which is
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: just stay silent, hope Trump falls under his own weight,
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: and that is not going to happen.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: Not going to happen.
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: If you want to be the man, you've got to
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: beat the man, and none of them are trying to
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: do it. DeSantis is– it's still early, so we don't know.
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: We don't even know if he's running. We don't even
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: know if he has the capacity to relate to human beings.
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: We do not– no one really seems to know that.
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: But it's notable that he has stayed silent this whole time,
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: that Trump has attacked him. He has stayed silent. And
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: if folks who dare to remember that long ago, the
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: strategy of all of those candidates, Christie, Rubio, Jeb Bush,
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: was to attack each other, not Trump, to try to
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: be the Trump alternative. And by the time, there never
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: got to be a Trump alternative. The Trump alternative ended
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: up being Ted Cruz, which is just amusing in so
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: many ways. Because if you don't attack him, he's going
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: to gain strength. And so what happens in the next
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: several months here, I think, will determine how he's going
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: to look if a primary takes place. And we don't
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: really know that it will. When we had Maggie Haberman on,
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: she raised real questions about whether, based on her reporting,
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: whether DeSantis would actually run against Trump. Now, Trump is
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: a much weaker figure now than when we spoke to
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: Maggie a month ago, but we'll have to see.
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: So I agree with all that. And I've been saying
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: that if Trump goes after DeSantis and DeSantis doesn't hit back,
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: he's screwed. just to play devil's advocate, I was trying
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: to think of like from DeSantis' point of view, why
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: he might be operating like he's operating. Like, are there
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: any sort of smart reasons? I think he probably looks
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: at the Republican electorate and thinks, okay, most of these
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: people still have very warm feelings towards Donald Trump. Obviously,
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: there's some like MAGA fanatics, but even the people in
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: the party who might be open to a DeSantis candidacy
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: over Trump, still probably like Donald Trump. So if you
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: start getting into pissing match with Donald Trump right now, then,
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: and people still don't know Ron DeSantis or enough people
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: all over the country don't know Ron DeSantis, you know,
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: then maybe his approval goes down and he, you know,
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: his candidacy is over before it begins. Since Democrats are
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: much better at beating Donald Trump than Republicans, what advice
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: would you give Ron DeSantis right now?
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: So I.
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: tend to agree that getting into a truth-off on Truth
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: Social with Donald Trump seems like a bad idea. That's
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: not how to engage with him. Don't come down to
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: his level.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: Don't do the Marco Rubio dick joke thing.
• 22:40
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: Basically, take Rubio's strategy, Jeb Bush's strategy, do the opposite
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: of those things. Do not be those people. You're all
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: Florida politicians. Meet with them, talk to them, take notes
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: on their plans, and then do the exact opposite. If
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: he wants to be the alternative, he has to take it.
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: He has momentum right now. Don't forget about getting into
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: a fight with Trump. What could he be doing right
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: now to raise his profile, to become a vessel for
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: the anti-Trump sentiment in the grassroots of the party? Put
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: aside the establishment. The mistake to make is to be like,
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: all the hedge fund guys are coming out for you.
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: Ken Griffin, Steve Schwarzman, that will help fund your campaign,
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: but it's going to be to Trump's advantage. Just like
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: all of the establishment going to Jeb Bush helped Trump
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: in 2016. But be out there. He's been incredibly quiet.
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: He got his good run of press and it's just
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: sort of like doing Florida things. Find a way to
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: Is there a big speech to give to lay out
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: the future of the Republican party that makes the case
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: that it's forward looking? It can be an implicit criticism
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: of Trump, but don't just hold yourself up in a
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: room with like your four advisors and try to have
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: a bunch of meetings. You, if you want to give yourself,
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: even if you have not yet decided to run, and
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: I imagine he probably hasn't decided to run yet and
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: he has some process to go through you. If you
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: want to make sure you have that opportunity at the
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: end of your process, you have to be very visible now.
• 24:09
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: I imagine that, uh, He would take a look at
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: sort of the primary that we ran against Hillary Clinton
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: back in 07. Because, look, and there's a couple of
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: big differences. I think Ron DeSantis has a lot more
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: material to work with Trump than we do.
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: That's one difference, yes.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: But he's also running against someone who's like even more
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: beloved by the base, I think, than Hillary Clinton was, right?
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: Because there's, like I said, Trump fanatics. Look, I think
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: he's now got these... you know, incredible majorities in the
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: Florida legislature. And I think that, you know, session doesn't
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: end till the spring. So he'll try to probably pass
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: a bunch of shit between now and the spring. I
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: imagine he will try to pick a lot of fights
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: with the Biden administration because he is a governor of
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: a big state and he'll try to do more stunts
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: like the migrant stunt, right? He's going to try to
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: get more. I think if you're him, you want to
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: get more attention being like, I'm the one who can
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: take the fight to the Democrats and to Joe Biden,
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: not this other guy who's yesterday and I'm the future.
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: And by the way, he's a loser and I'm a winner.
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: And he might not say that explicitly, but those are
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: sort of the larger themes that you want to get across,
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: even if it's implicitly probably over the next several months.
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: And I would imagine in this context that electability is
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: going to be a huge point of conversation in And
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: that has been Trump's superpower among Republicans is that he
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: beat Hillary Clinton. And then he could make a kind
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: of fake argument about keeping the Senate in 2018 and
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: then almost winning in 2020. That has been punctured. And
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: if you were a citizen, you would position yourself as
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: the MAGA guy who can win, the conservative who can win,
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: not an establishment conservative, a grassroots conservative who can win.
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: But you have to make that case for yourself. We
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: gave Joe Biden, and a lot of pundits did, some
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: crap for being so explicit in his electability messaging in
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: the 2020 Democratic primary, but he was right to do so.
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: That's what people cared about. There was obviously a lot
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: of evidence to suggest that he was quite electable all
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: the head-to-head polls with Trump, but he also made the
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: case for himself, and that's what people wanted, and DeSantis
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: would have to do the same thing.
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah. So speaking of Biden, the Biden political team released
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: two videos in response to Trump's announcement. Let's take a
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: listen to a clip from one.
• 26:32
  Speaker 4: Nobody has ever done what we've done in the last
• 26:35
  Speaker 4: four years.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: Their entire economic plan, tax cuts for the rich and corporations.
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: And record-breaking unemployment. The worst jobs report on record. Do
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: you believe in punishment for abortion, yes or no?
• 26:45
  Speaker 4: There has to be some form of punishment.
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: For the woman?
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: Yeah, there has to be some form.
• 26:50
  Speaker 4: And if I win, we will treat those people from
• 26:53
  Speaker 4: January 6th fairly. And if it requires pardons, we will
• 26:58
  Speaker 4: give them pardons.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: And then the other one, not as good for audio,
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: but it's just Trump talking about infrastructure a million different times.
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: And then it's a split screen. And the other side
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: of the screen is Biden just quietly signing the infrastructure law.
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: What do you think about the Biden folks doing the
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: smart move?
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't think this says a lot about what
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: strategy they would employ in the 2024 campaign. The Biden
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: folks are in a bit of a challenging purgatory because
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: their most likely opponent, one who at least up until
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: last week had a very large megaphone and ability to
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: attract attention for himself, is out there campaigning against them.
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: Biden has not made a decision about running. He has
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: a process that's going to take himself into next year
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: talking to his family. And so you're in this place
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: where someone's running a campaign against you, but you have
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: not stood up a campaign on your own to fight back.
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: And so this is, I think, as much signaling that
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: they are going to push back. It's both messages, right?
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: It's I'm a success. He was a failure. I'm better
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: at infrastructure than him, which obviously sends people to the
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: ramparts are so excited about that. And just reminding people
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: that he's just like all the candidates they just voted
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: against on Tuesday with the big lie and the January
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: 6th stuff and the abortion stuff. But it's just sort
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: of telling the world, not really the larger electorate, but
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: just pundits and political activists that we're going to punch back.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: in the interim before a decision is made on a reelect.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I thought the issues they chose in that first
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: video that we heard is smart and telling for everything
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: we've just been talking about with the midterms. It's like
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: he's extreme on economic policy, extreme on abortion, extreme on democracy.
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: They hit it all. So our old boss, David Plouffe,
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: reacted to the speech by tweeting, assume he could win
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: again despite it all and act accordingly. Do you agree?
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: And what does act accordingly look like?
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: I absolutely agree. Every election, barring some dramatic change in
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: the political coalitions within this country, every presidential election in
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: the years to come, every midterm election in the years
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: to come, is going to be incredibly closely divided in
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: the small handful of states that decide the Senate, the House,
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: and the White House. And in the middle of a
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: pandemic in which Donald Trump's absolute, obvious, well-broadcasting competence killed
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: hundreds of thousands of Americans, he only lost by 40,000 votes.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: If he is the Republican nominee, we are right around
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: a coin flip away from him being president again. You
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: had this conversation offline that I recommend everyone with Lynn Vavreck,
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: the political science professor who has done a lot of
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: studies of presidential elections and makes the point that we
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: live on the knife's edge all the time because we're
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: so closely divided. And so whoever is on that ticket
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: in those two seats, one of them could be president
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: and and it could absolutely be Trump. And we can
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: laugh at him. We can make fun of him. We
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: deserve that, frankly, as a country and as a party.
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: But be aware, do not take him for seriously. Do
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: not take a single thing for granted, whether it's Donald
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: Trump or Ron DeSantis or any other Republican. They can
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: absolutely be president, whether Joe Biden is a nominee or
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: someone else. That is the world in which we live.
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And especially if it's a rematch, if it's Joe
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: Biden and Donald Trump, then Joe Biden won by like 40,000
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: votes across three states. And that is tiny. Anything could
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: happen with those 40,000 voters.
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: I mean, that is a weather system in the Midwest
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: from losing. Like that is just how close it is.
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: That is exactly right. All right, let's talk about the midterms,
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: which more than a week later are almost done. The
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: Republicans are officially projected to win the House with the majority.
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: You'll probably be able to count on one hand. I
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: think it's going to be somewhere between 220 and 222 seats.
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: If it's 222, that would actually be the mirror image
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: of what the Democrats have now as a majority. This
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: means that Kevin McCarthy will need almost every Republican to
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: be speaker. The current speaker, Nancy Pelosi, announced today, right
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: before we were recording this, that she will be stepping
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: down from leadership. She will remain in Congress, at least
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: for the next two years, but she's ready to pass
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: the torch to the next generation of leaders in the Congress.
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: Over in the Senate, Mitch McConnell was reelected as minority
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: leader after challenger Rick Scott only won 10 votes yesterday.
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: Only 10 votes for Rick Scott. And the last big
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: governor's race was called in Arizona, where Katie Hobbs beat
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: well-filtered election denier Carrie Lake by less than a point,
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: about 34,000 votes. Hobbs' victory means that just about every
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: Trump-endorsed election denier who ran for governor, secretary of state,
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: or attorney general lost. Let's start there. Carrie Lake was
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: heralded as the future of the Republican Party. What happened?
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: How did Katie Hobbs win?
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: It is a.
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: Yet another piece of evidence that this election was a
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: rejection of Republican extremism. Even charismatic, well-media-trained extremists still lose.
• 32:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah. She did get closer, right? It's interesting. I was
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: looking at the numbers on the governor's race and the
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: Senate race, and Mark Kelly got the most votes of
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: any of the four candidates, 1.3 million. Then Katie Hobbs,
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: she was at 1.28 million. Then Lake at 1.264. And
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: then Masters at 1.19. Blake Masters, just shitty candidate.
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: It's weird that the guy giving off serial killer vibes
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: was a drag on the ticket that year.
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: So Hobbs got a lot of criticism, including from us,
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: for not debating Carrie Lake.
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: Not me. I wasn't on that episode.
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: You're a dick. Why do you think that worked, or
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: at least didn't hurt enough to cost her the election?
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: It is funny that the two prevailing bits of political
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: conventional wisdom was that Katie Hobbs should have debated and
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: John Fetterman should not have debated, and they both weren't.
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: I know. I think that while there is some evidence
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: in one particular poll that John Fetterman's decision to debate
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: may actually have helped him, or at least that his
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: numbers went up In the wake of that debate, in
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: part because I think maybe some sympathy for his performance, Dr.
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: Oz's statement about wanting local political officials involved in abortion
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: decisions probably wasn't great for him. But what it probably
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: says is that for the people who pay attention to debates,
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: whether someone debates or doesn't debate, how they do in
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: that debate is a conversation that happens among people who've
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: already decided to vote and decided who they're going to
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: vote for. And so it probably had zero impact either way.
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: And this is a thing we should probably– presidential debates
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: I think are different. They have a much larger audience.
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: The conversation is bigger. They're broadcast on national television, on
• 33:51
  Speaker 2: the networks. But in these state races, they are fun
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: to talk about. They may be fun to watch for
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: some people. But it's just worth reminding ourselves that it
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: is a small– the vast majority of the electorate, particularly
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: the ones who are going to decide the election through
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: their decision to vote or not vote or for whom
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: to vote, it's a conversation they're not engaged in. It
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: does not matter. So we should just remind ourselves that
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: the small tactical things don't matter as much as the
• 34:12
  Speaker 2: big stuff.
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: That's my takeaway, too, is, look, I'm a big persuasion
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: guy and I want to live in a world where
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: two candidates, two candidates debate and then they and then
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: there's undecided voters watching and they change their minds. And
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: I just we're not in that world where I think
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: about the calcified politics that that's the world we're in.
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: And and also that the people who are undecided don't
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: consume that much news. And not only are they not
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: watching debates, but they're probably not consuming that much coverage
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: of the debates. So I think it's very possible that
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: if John Fetterman had never debated and decided not to
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: debate and Katie Hobbs did choose to debate Carrie Lake,
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: we could have ended up with the same exact results.
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: I can't tell you what I'm so excited for.
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: What?
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: Some point, like four to six months from now, we're
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: going to be sitting down to do the Thursday podcast
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: and you are going to learn in that moment that
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: Crooked is now selling big Persuasion Guy t-shirts.
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: And no one will buy that. It will be our
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: worst selling item. All right. So almost every election denier
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: running for statewide office lost. And with the very notable
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: exception of Carrie Lake, who just this morning refused to
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: concede and made up some nonsense about voting irregularities, which
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: is not true. Almost every other election denier has also conceded.
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: Do you think that's a sign that the conspiracy is
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: losing its power? And what do you think happens with
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: Kerry Lake?
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: It means that democracy is completely safe. We can disengage.
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: Everything is fine.
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: That's all the time we have for today. We will
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: see you in a couple months.
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: This is now a reality TV podcast. I don't know
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: what happens with Kerry Lake. I don't think it really matters.
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: There are legal processes with which people can contest election results.
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: I don't know what she is going to do.
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: She will follow those.
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 36:06
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: But I think it says two things. One is the
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: best way to avoid election deniers, potential insurrection, all the
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: things is to just win by a lot, right? Like
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: Doug Mastroano is an actual insurrectionist. He was unable to
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: challenge elections because he got his ass kicked. So if
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: you want to avoid it, kick people's asses. In some states,
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: that's going to be impossible because the margins are so narrow,
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: but when you do, that solves that problem. And it,
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: And if all of these Trump big lie candidates conceded
• 36:32
  Speaker 2: like normal Republicans, it probably speaks very directly to the
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: specific sociopathic danger that Donald Trump is. Only he can
• 36:40
  Speaker 2: take this all the way to the end in a
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: way that ends so dangerous. To believe it so much
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: or trick yourself into believing it so much that you
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: send an armed, violent crowd to the Capitol to murder
• 36:54
  Speaker 2: your vice president in an attempt to keep power, that
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: is something very specific to him. Yeah. And I think
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: that is like when you ask, you know, the question
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: about David Plouffe's tweet, like act accordingly because that threat
• 37:05
  Speaker 2: still exists even if these, as long as Donald Trump's
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: in politics, that threat exists.
• 37:10
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: I think the results of this election also made them
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: realize that it's not very popular to be an election
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: denying extremist.
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: It's also in like what, you know, this is impossible
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: to sort of sort through and pull apart. But like
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: most of these election deniers were extremists, not just because
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: they were believed in the big lie, not just because
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: they wanted to criminalize all abortions with no exceptions, most
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: of them, but there are plenty of other crazy things
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: they said too. Like, it's just hard to, you know,
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: Doug Mastriano is like posing in a Confederate uniform picture.
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: Like there's the, you know, Blake Masters is saying that
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: the Unabomber had some, was an underappreciated thinker. Like these
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: people had plenty of crazy shit to pick from here.
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: And it's pretty clear that even folks who were very,
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: very upset with the direction of the country were not
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: ready to take a chance on people like that.
• 38:03
  Speaker 2: You know, I have seen some evidence, and even in
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: some of your wilderness focus groups too, that the big,
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: sometimes there are issues that become identifiers of something that,
• 38:13
  Speaker 2: you know, we've seen this in immigration debates before where
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: the Republican position on immigration for some portion of Latino
• 38:19
  Speaker 2: voters was a sign that these, that this is not
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: my party, even if I agree with them on this
• 38:23
  Speaker 2: handful of other issues. And for, For some set of voters,
• 38:28
  Speaker 2: the big lie mattered. It was a sign that you
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: were not tethered to reality or to seriousness or you
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: were too Trumpy in a way that I think mattered. Abortion,
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: same way, right? These extremist positions on abortions, those things
• 38:41
  Speaker 2: may matter than all of the other sort of ancillary
• 38:43
  Speaker 2: crazy stuff. And Democrats are going to have to get
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: ready to run against a Republican Party that either at
• 38:50
  Speaker 2: the top of the ticket or in some of these
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: Senate candidates who avoid those obviously losing positions. They may
• 38:58
  Speaker 2: believe them, but they won't talk about them. And we're
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: going to have to figure out how to... We always
• 39:04
  Speaker 2: talk about how you create the issue environment you need.
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: Republicans helped create it for us because Donald Trump and
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: his candidates couldn't shut up about the things voters hated
• 39:10
  Speaker 2: about them. That will be different next time, unless Donald
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: Trump's at the top of the ticket.
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: And by the way, they will be aided by a
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: media that will love a storyline that Republicans have decided
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: to quote unquote moderate themselves.
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: I am already throwing up in my mouth thinking about
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: the Ron DeSantis coverage as the both sides press you. Well,
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: he yearns for a normal Republican who bullies gay and
• 39:35
  Speaker 2: trans kids from the podium.
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: You know it's coming. You know it's coming.
• 39:40
  Speaker 2: It's just like being two degrees less clumsy or less
• 39:46
  Speaker 2: obvious an asshole than Donald Trump does not make you
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: George H.W. Bush people.
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: We talked a lot about the House and Senate dynamics
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: on Tuesday's pod. But now that we know who the
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: leaders are and what the margins will be, what do
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: you think we can expect from Congress over the next
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: few years?
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: Well, I guess we don't know yet that McCarthy will
• 40:05
  Speaker 2: be the speaker. He still has to go get those
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: 218 votes. He fell 31 votes short in the nomination process,
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: which is large. I would expect he ends up the speaker.
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: There is no obvious other person out there. And that
• 40:22
  Speaker 2: 31 votes is leverage for whatever insanity Republicans want. And
• 40:25
  Speaker 2: we've already seen it. It was mentioned, buried in the
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: New York Times, that one of the things that McCarthy
• 40:32
  Speaker 2: has agreed would be on the Republican agenda is investigating
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: the treatment of the quote-unquote political prisoners from January 6th.
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: And then, just this morning, the House GOP Twitter account
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: tweeted out, Hunter's laptop is real, all capital letters. So
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: like they're just, they're lessons not learned.
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: Yes. Just as a point, they are, one of their
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: priorities is not to lower inflation or that it's to
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: advocate on behalf of the people who tried to murder
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: Mike Pence, which is funny because you know, who's a
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: member of the Republican caucus, Greg Pence, his brother.
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah. I forget that. I'm glad.
• 41:13
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: They, I mean, the New York Times put it well,
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: and they said just in one of the stories that
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: their agenda is investigative, not legislative, which is exactly right.
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: All they want to do is investigations. And that's how
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: Kevin McCarthy is going to keep his caucus together, by
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: promising those things. So it's going to be an interesting
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: two years. What do you think about this? Did you
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: see that we might not get the debt ceiling down
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: in the lame duck? Because fucking Joe Manchin again is like, oh,
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: we need a bipartisan.
• 41:43
  Speaker 4: Ugh.
• 41:44
  Speaker 2: The election was nine days ago and we're right back
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: into the Manchin cul-de-sac. I mean, it's insane. It is insane.
• 41:54
  Speaker 2: This is Joe Manchin's fault, I believe, if this ends
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: up to be the case. But the reporting suggests that
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: this is not just posturing, that people are very concerned
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: that this will not happen. And we are handing a
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: detonator to a group of dangerous yahoos. Yeah.
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah. A caucus that's basically now run by not really
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: Kevin McCarthy, but Marjorie Taylor Greene. And she gets to
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: decide what happens. She gets to decide whether the global
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: economy blows up or not.
• 42:24
  Speaker 2: Kevin McCarthy is someone who voted to overturn the election
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: hours after a mob of Trump supporters tried to kill him.
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: This is not– John Boehner was a miserable speaker. He
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: was just a weak individual. But he did not– he
• 42:41
  Speaker 2: thought his members were crazy and tried to– and failed
• 42:44
  Speaker 2: to moderate their craziness. That is not Kevin McCarthy. No.
• 42:48
  Speaker 2: He makes John Boehner look like Nancy Pelosi. He's so
• 42:51
  Speaker 2: weak and dumb. And so this is very, very dangerous.
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: And there were forces– Mitch McConnell, for instance, was a
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: stronger– forced within the party and able to help work
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: with Senator Reid and others to eventually bring these debt
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: ceiling fights to a close without crashing the global economy.
• 43:12
  Speaker 2: Mitch McConnell has a fraction of the legitimacy within the
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: party he had before. So it's very dangerous. And with
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: Trump running for president on top of this and pushing pressure,
• 43:22
  Speaker 2: I mean, it is insane to not fix it. And
• 43:25
  Speaker 2: Republicans should want to fix it, frankly.
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: Yes. I don't get it. Whatever.
• 43:29
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: Anyway, to end on a high note, we should say
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: that with Pelosi stepping down, I think she will go
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: down in history as maybe the best, most productive, shrewdest
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: speaker of the House that the country has ever seen.
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: Hands down. I don't even think it's a close call.
• 43:46
  Speaker 2: She has been a tremendous speaker, a tremendous minority leader
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: in the opposition. She has stood up against– she has
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: worked with presidents, stood up against presidents. I don't even
• 43:57
  Speaker 2: think it's a close call.
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: It's the sheer amount of legislation she's gotten through. She's
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: been able to keep her caucus together. It's incredibly impressive.
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: And the thing that– everyone is like this Republican caucus
• 44:09
  Speaker 2: is going to be a disaster when it's this close.
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: And Nancy Pelosi passed huge pieces of legislation. With this
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: exact margin. And no one thinks Kevin McCarthy could do it.
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: They're going to be shocked if he can get these
• 44:20
  Speaker 2: fucking Yahoo's degree on a lunch menu. And she's passing
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: climate change legislation and major stimulus bills and all of that.
• 44:27
  Speaker 2: I mean, she's amazing. She will go down in history.
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: President Obama would always say he couldn't have done any
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: of that stuff without her and Senator Reid.
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: And he really believes that. He really believes that. Okay.
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: When we come back, Dan talks to John Ralston of
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: the Nevada Independent about what happened in that state in
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: the midterms.
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: Joining us now is the person who reminds us every
• 44:56
  Speaker 2: two years that the Silver State matters, John Ralston, Nevada Independent. John,
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: welcome back to Pod Save America.
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: Hi, Dan.
• 45:03
  Speaker 2: Right around the time early votes start coming in in
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: your state, I set up Twitter alerts for you so
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: I can track what's happening. So I know that you
• 45:11
  Speaker 2: are relatively sleep deprived these days and been pretty busy.
• 45:14
  Speaker 2: So we're grateful that you would take the time here
• 45:16
  Speaker 2: when you should be heading towards your vacation, I would hope,
• 45:19
  Speaker 2: to talk to us about this.
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: Actually, you know, it's funny how many Twitter friends I
• 45:23
  Speaker 3: make every other year, and suddenly they disappear. It's like
• 45:27
  Speaker 3: a one-election stand, Dan. It's so hard.
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: Well, I stick with you. I turn off the alerts
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: after the votes are counted, but I still read your tweets,
• 45:36
  Speaker 2: to be very clear.
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: I want to start with a prediction that you made
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: before the election. I think if you had polled Democratic
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: operatives around the country, the sentiment was, is that Catherine
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: Cortez Masto was by far the most vulnerable of the
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: Democratic incumbents. If you'd asked us to pick one race
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: that we were likely to lose, it would probably be
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: this one, given some of the recent strength that Republicans
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: have shown in the state, the demographics, et cetera. I
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: think you shocked a lot of people and frankly gave
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: a lot of Democrats hope when before the election, you
• 46:09
  Speaker 2: predicted that Masto would actually win and that the Republican
• 46:13
  Speaker 2: Joe Lombardo would win the governor's race. What led you
• 46:16
  Speaker 2: to make that prediction? And did your reasoning bear out
• 46:20
  Speaker 2: when those results came to fruition?
• 46:23
  Speaker 3: Well, and now I have to prove that there was
• 46:25
  Speaker 3: reasoning behind this.
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: The thing is, even a broken clock can explain why
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: it's right.
• 46:31
  Speaker 3: It was not a magic eight ball, I promise. So listen,
• 46:37
  Speaker 3: I've been doing these predictions for a long time, as
• 46:39
  Speaker 3: you know, before the election. And this was the hardest thing.
• 46:42
  Speaker 3: year that I've had to do it. And I took
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: a lot of heat, by the way, as you probably
• 46:47
  Speaker 3: saw if you were on Twitter, especially Republicans who were
• 46:50
  Speaker 3: not just confident, but almost cocky that they were going
• 46:53
  Speaker 3: to win that race. So how did I come to
• 46:55
  Speaker 3: the conclusion to make the kind of split verdict? Lombardo
• 46:59
  Speaker 3: had been running ahead of Adam Laxalt, Catherine Cortez Masto's opponent,
• 47:04
  Speaker 3: by one or two points in every poll that I
• 47:06
  Speaker 3: that I had seen. But as you know, Dan, I
• 47:08
  Speaker 3: kind of ignore polls once I start looking at the
• 47:11
  Speaker 3: early voting data, which is somewhat predictive in Nevada because
• 47:16
  Speaker 3: so many people vote early, even after the change in
• 47:19
  Speaker 3: the way we do elections with all the mail ballots.
• 47:22
  Speaker 3: And it looked like the Republicans were doing pretty well.
• 47:25
  Speaker 3: But there were several things that went into the calculation.
• 47:28
  Speaker 3: First of all, there was no question in my mind
• 47:32
  Speaker 3: that people really, really hated Steve Sisolak for what he
• 47:37
  Speaker 3: had done during COVID and the COVID hangover, as I
• 47:42
  Speaker 3: call it. And so I thought he was in big trouble,
• 47:44
  Speaker 3: whether that's fair or not, that I'm just talking about
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: how I made the decision. And so I thought there
• 47:49
  Speaker 3: were people who were just going to never vote for
• 47:52
  Speaker 3: Steve Sisolak, including some Democrats and independents, a big cohort
• 47:56
  Speaker 3: in this state. And so I came to the conclusion
• 48:00
  Speaker 3: that Joe Lombardo's team had run a good enough campaign
• 48:02
  Speaker 3: that they were going to squeak it out. So Catherine
• 48:05
  Speaker 3: Cortez Masto was running against someone who I think the
• 48:09
  Speaker 3: national media really missed something in focusing so much on
• 48:13
  Speaker 3: Blake Masters and Herschel Walker and Dr. Oz as being
• 48:16
  Speaker 3: these terrible Trump endorsed candidates that made what should have
• 48:21
  Speaker 3: been wins very, very iffy. Adam Laxalt's a terrible candidate.
• 48:26
  Speaker 3: The only difference is that his campaign was able to
• 48:30
  Speaker 3: cocoon him enough so he didn't say as many dumb
• 48:33
  Speaker 3: things as some of these others. And he had worn
• 48:36
  Speaker 3: out his welcome here, Dan. He had upset a lot
• 48:39
  Speaker 3: of Republicans by blowing what they thought was an almost
• 48:42
  Speaker 3: sure thing governor's race, therefore giving, in 2018, giving Democrats
• 48:47
  Speaker 3: complete control of Carson City and the ability to redistrict
• 48:51
  Speaker 3: and reapportion however they wanted. And so there were some
• 48:55
  Speaker 3: buyer's remorse going on in the Republican Party that a
• 48:58
  Speaker 3: lot of people did not pick up on. And especially
• 49:01
  Speaker 3: in Washoe County, which is where Reno is, by the way,
• 49:05
  Speaker 3: he ended up losing by five or six points. And
• 49:09
  Speaker 3: so Catherine Cortez Masto had run almost a flawless campaign,
• 49:14
  Speaker 3: very disciplined. She worked really hard the last month and
• 49:19
  Speaker 3: her media in defining Laxalt as this kind of child
• 49:23
  Speaker 3: of privilege, carpetbagger who moved here to run for office
• 49:27
  Speaker 3: and who was caught on tape saying Roe versus Wade
• 49:31
  Speaker 3: was always a joke. And they played that over and
• 49:34
  Speaker 3: over again. I thought combine all those factors with the
• 49:38
  Speaker 3: fact that despite the premature burial of the so-called Reed
• 49:43
  Speaker 3: machine here that was still alive and well and would
• 49:46
  Speaker 3: just barely push her over the top. So that's how
• 49:49
  Speaker 3: I came to that conclusion.
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: There's been a lot of conversation over the years, but
• 49:52
  Speaker 2: even in the wake of the election about the quote
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: unquote Harry Reed machine, could you sort of explain what
• 49:56
  Speaker 2: that is, how it works and how it has persisted
• 50:00
  Speaker 2: both long after Senator Reed's passing, but also with some
• 50:05
  Speaker 2: changes in the leadership of the Democratic Party within the state?
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 50:08
  Speaker 3: So the Reed machine developed, was developed by Harry Reed
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: after some, it actually goes way back to 1998 when
• 50:17
  Speaker 3: he almost lost his seat to John Ensign by 428 votes.
• 50:21
  Speaker 3: I remember all these numbers because I have a crazy
• 50:23
  Speaker 3: memory and I happen to be writing a book about
• 50:25
  Speaker 3: Harry Reed.
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's cool.
• 50:27
  Speaker 3: And I used to, yeah. So, and he knew he
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: had to make some changes and they didn't all come
• 50:31
  Speaker 3: to fruition until 2004 when he brought in an operative
• 50:35
  Speaker 3: from Missouri by the name of Rebecca Lamb, who he
• 50:38
  Speaker 3: essentially became tasked with overseeing the read machine. And what
• 50:42
  Speaker 3: she did was bring in all these very talented, hardworking,
• 50:45
  Speaker 3: both data-driven young operatives and just hard workers who knew
• 50:50
  Speaker 3: that there was a formula. And the formula isn't that complex.
• 50:54
  Speaker 3: Executing it is to some extent. And that is register
• 50:57
  Speaker 3: as many voters as you can and then turn them out.
• 51:01
  Speaker 3: Bank votes during early voting. Early voting lasts for two
• 51:05
  Speaker 3: weeks here. But Harry Reid wasn't the guy who was
• 51:08
  Speaker 3: going door to door. He wasn't the guy crunching the numbers, right?
• 51:11
  Speaker 3: He was making sure the thing got funded and no
• 51:13
  Speaker 3: one could raise money like Harry Reid. So after he
• 51:16
  Speaker 3: left office in 2016, the machine was still there. It
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: had a harder time raising money. And then after the
• 51:25
  Speaker 3: last cycle, it had even a more difficult time because,
• 51:28
  Speaker 3: as you alluded to, these Democratic socialists took over the
• 51:32
  Speaker 3: Democratic Party, which I had often referred to, and I
• 51:35
  Speaker 3: think Rebecca Lamb cringed at this description, a legalized money
• 51:39
  Speaker 3: laundering operation, where they would raise all this money, you know,
• 51:43
  Speaker 3: and then use it to register and turn out voters.
• 51:45
  Speaker 3: But they got around that. They set up a parallel organization,
• 51:48
  Speaker 3: and they still got the funding for this machine, and
• 51:52
  Speaker 3: they were able to change some election laws that they
• 51:56
  Speaker 3: thought would benefit them, because they have an organization and
• 51:59
  Speaker 3: infrastructure that The Republicans have tried some copycat stuff, Dan,
• 52:02
  Speaker 3: but they have never been as effective or hired as
• 52:05
  Speaker 3: good people as Rebecca Lamb and her team. And it
• 52:09
  Speaker 3: is remarkable, by the way. People think that Catherine Cortez
• 52:12
  Speaker 3: Masto's victory is remarkable, and it is in many ways.
• 52:16
  Speaker 3: But the fact that Steve Sisolak, after everything he had
• 52:19
  Speaker 3: endured and all of his negatives, is going to end
• 52:22
  Speaker 3: up losing by about 12,000, 14,000 votes out of more
• 52:24
  Speaker 3: than a million castes. That's solely due to that machine, Dan,
• 52:30
  Speaker 3: and what they were able to do. It's why they
• 52:31
  Speaker 3: won three House seats that the Republicans thought they were
• 52:34
  Speaker 3: going to take. It's why in a midterm with Joe
• 52:37
  Speaker 3: Biden's numbers here under 40 percent in some Democratic polls,
• 52:41
  Speaker 3: they picked up seats in the legislature. You know, so
• 52:45
  Speaker 3: it really is a remarkable operation. And Rebecca Lamb, who
• 52:50
  Speaker 3: I thought was going to do a mic drop several
• 52:52
  Speaker 3: cycles ago, she won't do that until she finishes some stuff.
• 52:57
  Speaker 3: She wants Nevada to be first in the nation in
• 52:59
  Speaker 3: the primaries and wants to win for president in 2024.
• 53:03
  Speaker 3: But she deserves a lot of credit. She likes to
• 53:07
  Speaker 3: operate in the background. She'll probably hate that I'm even
• 53:09
  Speaker 3: saying her name on this podcast. But she is responsible
• 53:12
  Speaker 3: for these victories.
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: Nevada is a state that I think a lot– you
• 53:17
  Speaker 2: probably know this too well to agree with it, but
• 53:19
  Speaker 2: a lot of Democrats thought was trending pretty strongly blue
• 53:22
  Speaker 2: after 2012. Obama won it easily in 08, I think
• 53:25
  Speaker 2: over six points in 2012. snapped back in 2016 and
• 53:30
  Speaker 2: then has been incredibly close since then, incredibly close in 20.
• 53:33
  Speaker 2: And it has been sort of on the forefront of
• 53:34
  Speaker 2: some of the demographic shifts that have happened within the
• 53:37
  Speaker 2: party coalitions since Trump. Is there anything you saw on
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: Tuesday or in the election month that is what you
• 53:46
  Speaker 2: guys do there that gives you some indication of where
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: your state is going in 2024 and beyond?
• 53:54
  Speaker 3: It's hard, you know, it's hard to, I mean, you
• 53:56
  Speaker 3: talk about the eternity in politics, 24 hours is an
• 53:59
  Speaker 3: eternity in politics. Now the way it works, right, as
• 54:02
  Speaker 3: opposed to two years. But listen, there is no question
• 54:07
  Speaker 3: that if you just look at the numbers, Nevada has
• 54:11
  Speaker 3: turned slightly rightward since the time that Obama did so
• 54:15
  Speaker 3: well in the state. He won by double digits the
• 54:17
  Speaker 3: first time, and then, as you say, won by six
• 54:20
  Speaker 3: or seven points the second. But I'm not sure that
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: that is something the Republicans can bank on. And Washoe County,
• 54:29
  Speaker 3: which is really the deciding county and really the bellwether
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: county in Nevada, the way it works real quickly is
• 54:35
  Speaker 3: that Clark County, where Las Vegas is, has 70 percent
• 54:37
  Speaker 3: of the votes, very heavily Democratic, although less so than
• 54:41
  Speaker 3: it used to be. The 15 rural counties are deep
• 54:44
  Speaker 3: red counties. And then they try to offset whatever the
• 54:48
  Speaker 3: margin is in Clark. And then Washoe decides things. I
• 54:52
  Speaker 3: think that people in Washoe County after 2020 thought that
• 54:56
  Speaker 3: Washoe and after what happened with COVID and people being
• 55:00
  Speaker 3: really mad at the Democrats, both Biden and Sisolak, it
• 55:04
  Speaker 3: was trending red. I had someone on election day when
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: the initial results came out, someone very smart Republican operative
• 55:10
  Speaker 3: in Washoe text me and say, I guess Washoe is
• 55:12
  Speaker 3: going red again. And then everything changed as all the
• 55:15
  Speaker 3: votes came in. And so Washoe County is a purple county.
• 55:21
  Speaker 3: And you could even say that it's trending slightly blue
• 55:25
  Speaker 3: in some ways. And so, listen, as you know better
• 55:28
  Speaker 3: than anybody, Dan, candidates matter, campaigns matter. And who the
• 55:32
  Speaker 3: Democrats nominate, if Biden doesn't run, who eventually is the
• 55:36
  Speaker 3: Republican nominee is going to determine a lot that happens
• 55:40
  Speaker 3: in Nevada. But I think you still have to say
• 55:42
  Speaker 3: that Nevada leans slightly blue in the presidential race based
• 55:46
  Speaker 3: on what's happened since Obama won in 2008.
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: Joe Lombardo was one of the small handful of candidates
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: endorsed by former President Trump that won. He certainly got
• 55:59
  Speaker 2: less attention than Kerry Lake or Doug Mastriano. Tell us
• 56:03
  Speaker 2: a little bit about Joe Lombardo. Should Democrats who were
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: very worried about these MAGA candidates who have at some
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: point in time expressed some support for the big lie
• 56:12
  Speaker 2: or question about Biden's legitimacy, what should we think about
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: Joe Lombardo and what a potential threat he poses to
• 56:19
  Speaker 2: election integrity and democracy in your state?
• 56:21
  Speaker 3: It's a great question. And I think it's unfair to
• 56:24
  Speaker 3: Joe Lombardo to compare him to Kerry Lake or Mastriano.
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: I only put him in that basket as someone Trump endorsed.
• 56:31
  Speaker 2: But yes, he is different. And also in the sense
• 56:34
  Speaker 2: that he won. So they probably said something.
• 56:36
  Speaker 3: And he is not an election denier in that sense.
• 56:39
  Speaker 3: And the story of Trump endorsing him is kind of
• 56:42
  Speaker 3: interesting in the sense it's a different kind of story
• 56:44
  Speaker 3: than almost any other one. Joe Lombardo was in a
• 56:47
  Speaker 3: multi-way primary for governor. against the likes of a former senator,
• 56:51
  Speaker 3: Dean Heller, the mayor of North Las Vegas, John Lee,
• 56:55
  Speaker 3: who switched parties to run, and a guy named Joey Gilbert,
• 56:57
  Speaker 3: who is a mega maniac, hydroxychloroquine believer, conspiracy theory believer.
• 57:05
  Speaker 3: But he started to do well and started to get
• 57:07
  Speaker 3: kind of a cult following. And a cult following sometimes,
• 57:10
  Speaker 3: as you know, Dan, is enough to win in a
• 57:12
  Speaker 3: multi-way primary. And so that's when they reached out and
• 57:15
  Speaker 3: got the Trump endorsement just to kind of seal the
• 57:18
  Speaker 3: deal in the primary. But Lombardo, I won't say he
• 57:21
  Speaker 3: kept him at arm's length, but he came right after
• 57:23
  Speaker 3: the primary, Trump did, to do an event for Lombardo
• 57:28
  Speaker 3: and Adam Laxall. And it was actually almost comical, and
• 57:30
  Speaker 3: you'll appreciate this. There's the sheriff of Clark County running
• 57:34
  Speaker 3: for governor and Trump standing next to him. And the
• 57:36
  Speaker 3: first thing he says, and what got the headlines is,
• 57:38
  Speaker 3: Nevada is a cesspool of crime. Thanks, Mr.
• 57:43
  Speaker 2: President.
• 57:43
  Speaker 3: So- He tried to not emphasize at all the Trump endorsement.
• 57:51
  Speaker 3: But one, this is my opinion, strategic error that Sisolak
• 57:55
  Speaker 3: and his team made, Dan, is that during a debate,
• 57:58
  Speaker 3: and I moderated the debate, I asked Lombardo if he
• 58:01
  Speaker 3: thought Trump was a great president. He said, I wouldn't
• 58:04
  Speaker 3: use that adjective. I'd say he was a sound president.
• 58:08
  Speaker 3: By that afternoon, they put out a press release correcting that,
• 58:12
  Speaker 3: saying he was a great president. And then Trump came
• 58:15
  Speaker 3: a couple of days later. And when Lombardo was up
• 58:17
  Speaker 3: on stage, he was calling him the greatest president of
• 58:20
  Speaker 3: all time. So it was a kind of pathetic bending
• 58:23
  Speaker 3: of the knee. But like almost all Republican candidates think
• 58:26
  Speaker 3: they have to do this. And the New York Times
• 58:28
  Speaker 3: reported that. Last week or this week, I'm sorry, Dan,
• 58:31
  Speaker 3: all the time is running together.
• 58:32
  Speaker 2: I understand it.
• 58:35
  Speaker 3: Exactly what I thought had happened is Trump heard about
• 58:37
  Speaker 3: what he said in the debate, went crazy, was going
• 58:39
  Speaker 3: to withdraw the endorsement until they put out the corrective
• 58:43
  Speaker 3: statements on that. But, you know, he's not an election denier.
• 58:48
  Speaker 3: He did the nod to election integrity, which are the
• 58:50
  Speaker 3: code words that the base needs to hear. But he
• 58:54
  Speaker 3: has not talked about overhauling election laws. Sure, he's for
• 58:58
  Speaker 3: voter ID, like every Republican is for, but that's going
• 59:00
  Speaker 3: nowhere in a democratically controlled legislature. A real election denier
• 59:05
  Speaker 3: secretary of state who could have done some damage lost.
• 59:09
  Speaker 3: And so I don't think that Lombardo's agenda at all
• 59:12
  Speaker 3: is to change the election laws to make them a
• 59:17
  Speaker 3: threat for integrity. They're going to try to ratchet back
• 59:20
  Speaker 3: certain things. But here's the thing, Dan, is that what
• 59:23
  Speaker 3: the Reed machine has proven is that, I sound like
• 59:26
  Speaker 3: their agent here, but it's the truth, is that it
• 59:29
  Speaker 3: doesn't matter what the system is. They're going to out-organize,
• 59:32
  Speaker 3: they're going to outwork and out-fund whatever the system is.
• 59:35
  Speaker 3: And so I do not consider Joe Lombardo a threat.
• 59:39
  Speaker 3: The thing about Joe Lombardo, sheriff of Clark County, he's
• 59:42
  Speaker 3: a cop his entire career. He doesn't know anything about
• 59:44
  Speaker 3: state government or these state issues. He was able to
• 59:48
  Speaker 3: fake it through superficial answers during the campaign. He's got
• 59:51
  Speaker 3: a lot to learn. And who he puts around them,
• 59:54
  Speaker 3: I think, are going to be the signal on that
• 59:56
  Speaker 3: issue you asked about and other issues in state government.
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 2: Last question for you. You mentioned Rebecca Lamb's desire to
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 2: make Nevada the first in the nation in the primary process.
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 2: We don't know whether we're going to have a Democratic
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 2: primary this upcoming election cycle. There may not be. But
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: the DNC is looking at how to rearrange the calendar.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 2: There have been a lot of concerns since 2020 about
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: the sort of accessibility of caucuses as a method. Is
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 2: Nevada considering switching to a primary in order to be
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 2: in the front of the calendar? Is there anything you
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 2: can tell me about how the party there is thinking
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 2: about it?
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah, they changed it. They changed the law. And so
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 3: it's going to be a primary because just for this reason, Dan,
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 3: because they knew that the Iowa caucus was a nightmare.
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 3: Caucuses are undemocratic. Even Harry Reid may rest in peace
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 3: before he came out and said, all right, I've decided
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 3: caucuses are anti-democratic. We should change it. But they were
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 3: doing this all because they wanted to show the DNC, look,
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 3: we're up to doing this the right way. Please make
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 3: us first. And by the way, I think if Harry
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 3: Reid were still alive, that we would have a much
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 3: better chance of being first in the nation because he
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 3: could whisper in the presidency or do this for me, Joe,
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 3: because the president will have some say in this. I
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 3: don't think first in the nation is going to be Delaware,
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 3: but I do think that he is going to have
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 3: some say if there is a primary system and who
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 3: goes first. And I think Nevada has a great case
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 3: to make. By the way, I'm obviously a partisan on Nevada.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 3: You know, I think we matter and we should matter more. But,
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 3: you know, we're much more of a demographically diverse state.
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 3: And we are what the Democratic Party wants to show
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 3: to the nation, despite the kind of quirkiness of Nevada
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 3: and the caricaturing of Nevada that is done. Not that
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 3: you would ever do that, Dan, but that some people
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 3: nationally have done.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: John Ralston, thank you so much. I hope these final
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 2: votes get counted and you get to take a long vacation.
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 2: And thanks for all your hard work in keeping us
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 2: updated on what was happening this election.
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 3: Thanks for having me.
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: Thanks to John Ralston for joining us today. Everyone have
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: a good weekend. Dan and I have a Thanksgiving mailbag
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: for you that's going to run next Tuesday. Other than that,
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 1: everyone have a great Thanksgiving break and we'll see you
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: after the holidays.
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 3: Bye, everyone.
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: producer is Michael Martinez. Our senior producer is Andy Gardner Bernstein.
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: Our producers are Haley Muse and Olivia Martinez. It's mixed
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: sound engineered the show. Thanks to Hallie Kiefer, Ari Schwartz,
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: Sandy Gerard, Andy Taft, and Justine Howe for production support.
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: And to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Phoebe Bradford, Milo Kim,
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: and Amelia Montu. Our episodes are uploaded as videos at youtube.com
• 1:02:51
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