Latest / Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar / 10/20/26: Wild Potential Midterm Scenarios, GOP Abandons Trump, MAGA Implosion Weeks Before Midterms

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10/20/26: Wild Potential Midterm Scenarios, GOP Abandons Trump, MAGA Implosion Weeks Before Midterms · Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar

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  Speaker 1: So head over to BreakingPoints.com. You can sign up for
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  Speaker 1: the newsletter at the top for free today. Good morning, everybody.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Happy Tuesday. Have an amazing show for everybody today. What
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: do we have, Crystal?
• 0:22
  Speaker 3: Indeed, we do.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: Deep dive into the midterm elections from a variety of angles.
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: Logan Phillips is going to join us momentarily to take
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: a look at the numbers. And OK, let's say we
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: had a polling mess the size of 2016. What would
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: that look like? What about 2025, where actually Democrats were underestimated?
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: What would that look like? We will go through all
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: of that with him. Then we're also going to take
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: a look at the impact specifically of Trump in this
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: election cycle. Some new numbers are out that show Republicans
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: are not running ads with his name in it whatsoever.
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: He has virtually disappeared from the Republican side in terms
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: of their ad campaigns. Democrats on the other side are
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: talking about him nonstop, so it tells you quite a bit.
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  Speaker 2: At the same time, one of the major issues that
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  Speaker 2: has emerged in the midterm elections is concerns over Trump
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  Speaker 2: and Trump family corruption.
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  Speaker 4: J.D.
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  Speaker 2: Vance once again in the hot seat over this as
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: new revelations have come out alleging a major pay for
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: play scheme involving the Kennedy Center. We'll get into all
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: of that. We got a soccer special here taking a
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: look at the way that boomers are organizing nationwide against
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: paying property taxes. having a lot of success in a
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  Speaker 2: wide variety of states. We're also going to take a
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: look at Michigan specifically, where Abdul El-Sayed seems to have
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  Speaker 2: had the most viral clip of the entire campaign. Some
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: interesting media commentary around that as well. And then we're
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: going to be rejoined by Daniel Lidd. He's the mathematician
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  Speaker 2: that we had on before to talk about the AI
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: revolution in math and whether or not he is feeling
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: existential dread over the state of his profession in Actually,
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: he seems to have a more hopeful outlook. So excited
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: to dig into that with him.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: Yes, that's exactly right. Before we get to that, though,
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: we had some interesting exchanges. So we've received some interesting
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  Speaker 1: emails over the last couple of weeks. Let's put this
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  Speaker 1: up here on the screen. These are from our producer, Griffin.
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  Speaker 1: Both of these are from two separate firms who purport
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: to represent CalSheet. And they have emailed us. This is
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  Speaker 1: my personal favorite one. We hope you're doing well. We're
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  Speaker 1: reaching out to discuss a Q4 partnership between Breaking Points
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  Speaker 1: and CalSheet. a federally regulated U.S.
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  Speaker 1: They say breaking points is a strong fit for this
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  Speaker 1: campaign based on your content and audience. So it appears
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  Speaker 1: that these people think that they can just hire these
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  Speaker 1: firms and just blast creators, YouTubers, et cetera. First of all,
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: they're obviously wasting their money because they've never listened to
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: our show. But we just wanted to deliver our official
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  Speaker 1: response of not only no, but fuck no. We do
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: not want your blood money. And that is why we
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: have premium subscriptions. Not now, not ever. Yeah, not now,
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: not ever. The business will go under before we take
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: your money.
• 2:53
  Speaker 4: I'd rather go.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: Bankrupt before we take your disgusting money. And I hope
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: that you people get thrown. into prison. And if I
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: have anything to do with it, that's how we will
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: end up. So because of all of you, BreakingPoints.com, the
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  Speaker 1: premium subscribers, we are in a position where we can say, no,
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: fuck you. And so that is our official response to Kalshi.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: So yeah, there you go. And this isn't just a
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: Kalshi thing. This is for anybody who wants us to
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: do an ad read, be it Manscaped or any of
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: these people, but in particular, these literal scum of the
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: earth over at these gambling companies. And then, so with that,
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: we also have, we need your help. So I don't game,
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: I've never played GTA. I hear it's big. Let's put
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: this up here on the screen. So this advertisement was
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: placed in Miami. And apparently in this universe, there's something
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: called Weasel News.
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: And it like played. This is according to Griffin.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: This is according to Griffin.
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: It plays in the cars that you steal. Right.
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: It plays in the cars that you steal. Anyway, so
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: they have apparently for the first time these hosts of
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: Weasel News. Now, a lot of people, many friends, people
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: who don't watch the show like any of that, they're like, dude,
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: this is literally you. So what do you guys think?
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: I personally, I don't see it. I see it in
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: Crystal's case.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: You see it in my case? Oh, I see it
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: so much more in your case. I don't see it.
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: I just don't see it.
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: So a few things. First of all, they would have
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: been doing the graphics a number of years ago. There's
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: a point that Griffin made. And I used to have
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: that haircut.
• 4:23
  Speaker 4: You did have it.
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: And I used to wear the big earrings like that
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: as well.
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: And I know that you have that dress.
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: Now my earrings are a little more tame. I do
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: have a little bit of a bigger pair on today.
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: But my earrings are typically a little more restrained these days.
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: That's true.
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: The outfits are totally us. You literally have that tie.
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: I do own that exact tie.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: And you used to wear it.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: And I used to wear it all the time.
• 4:39
  Speaker 5: A lot.
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: Five years ago. That's true.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: Talk to me about the glasses.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: Okay, but everybody, a lot of people wear these. Well, obviously,
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: number one, I'm not black. That seems to be like
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: the biggest difference.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: It's not right. Like, obviously, they wouldn't do exactly us.
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: I'm also not, I don't know if that, if she's
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: like Asian or Latino, some sort of like racially ambiguous,
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: but they, you know, it's drawing inspiration. That like, it
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  Speaker 2: very much looks like.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: The pocket square and the tie and that shade of blue.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: I do actually own that exact outfit. So I, I
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: don't know.
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  Speaker 4: I don't know. All right.
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: So when the game comes out, we'll take a listen.
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  Speaker 4: We'll let us know.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: You let us know.
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: You guys let us know what you think.
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: Is it us or not? I truly, like I said,
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: I've never played this video game in my entire life.
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to play it. I guess I wish
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: you guys all the best. But yeah, let us know.
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: Let us know in the comments section. If it is,
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: I at least know enough to know that it's a
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: great honor. So thank you. And for increasing the profile.
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: Even if it's, yeah, like caricature-ish or mockery, whatever.
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  Speaker 6: Yeah, whatever.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: It's in the culture. Yeah, it's one of the biggest cultural,
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: you know, I know enough to know that every guy
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: who I know is going to take work off or whatever.
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: There's already an estimate that the U.S. is going to
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: lose like hundreds of billions of dollars in productivity on
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: the day or the week or whatever after COVID. the
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: game comes out. Okay. So with all that preamble, with
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  Speaker 1: our screw you to Kalshi, with our plea for whether
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  Speaker 1: that is us or not, according to you guys, let's
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  Speaker 1: get to our interview with the great Logan Phillips. We're
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  Speaker 1: very excited now to be joined by our great friend,
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  Speaker 1: Logan Phillips of race to the white house.com. It's good
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  Speaker 1: to see you, Logan. Thanks for joining us, man.
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  Speaker 4: Hey, great to be on as always.
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  Speaker 7: All right.
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  Speaker 1: So our weekly check-in, let's go ahead and put a
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  Speaker 1: three up here on the screen. Here's what we've got now.
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  Speaker 1: So far from Logan's website. Tell us a little bit
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  Speaker 1: about where things look in your current forecast, Senate, House
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  Speaker 1: and governor's races.
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  Speaker 4: Well, this is a really unique election in that it's
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  Speaker 4: kind of battlefield America. We're seeing places in play all
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  Speaker 4: across the map, ranging from Maine to Nebraska and Kansas.
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  Speaker 4: And so we have both a chance for historic election
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  Speaker 4: for Democrats where they can sweep the map. And there's
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  Speaker 4: also a chance here where they don't gain that much
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  Speaker 4: in the Senate and they only pick up a little
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  Speaker 4: bit in governor races. So that's what kind of makes
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  Speaker 4: this race interesting is because they're overperforming so much in
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  Speaker 4: red areas, boy, does that increase their maximum potential. But
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  Speaker 4: you could come up short. gaining a lot of ground
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  Speaker 4: as Hillary Clinton did in places like Arizona and Texas.
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  Speaker 4: If you don't win, it doesn't get you much.
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  Speaker 1: Right, makes sense.
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  Speaker 2: So we wanted to dig into this question of a
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  Speaker 2: potential polling miss at this point because we've touched on
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: this with you before, but we wanted to do it
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  Speaker 2: in a bit of a more systematic way and say, okay,
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  Speaker 2: if we had the polling miss of 2016, what would
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  Speaker 2: that look like? If we had one like 2022 or 2025,
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  Speaker 2: what would that look like? Let me go ahead and
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  Speaker 2: start with a New York Times analysis. This is from
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  Speaker 2: Nate Cohn. I can put this up on the screen
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  Speaker 2: and we can get your sort of overall view here.
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  Speaker 2: He says polls show Democrats ahead. Are they, quote, right
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  Speaker 2: this time? And, you know, he has proper level of skepticism,
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  Speaker 2: as we all should. The polls are not going to
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  Speaker 2: be exactly correct. They will likely be off in one
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  Speaker 2: direction or the other. He does, however, point out that
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  Speaker 2: the polls have been closer in midterm elections. And in fact,
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  Speaker 2: at times they have underestimated Democrats in midterm elections and
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  Speaker 2: they dramatically underestimated Democrats in the 2025 gubernatorial elections, both
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  Speaker 2: in Virginia and and New Jersey. So what is your
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: sort of overall view of your level of confidence in
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: the polls right now and some of the things that
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  Speaker 2: you're paying attention to before we get into the specific numbers?
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  Speaker 4: I would say that you can't just look at the
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  Speaker 4: polls here. All of the indicators to me look really
• 8:07
  Speaker 4: good for Democrats. First, they did an outstanding job in
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  Speaker 4: these special elections. And I think that's true also if
• 8:13
  Speaker 4: you combine that with what happened in California and Washington.
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  Speaker 4: They were outperforming expectations if it were like a neutral
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  Speaker 4: cycle by like eight points.
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  Speaker 3: Wow.
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  Speaker 4: And since then, the environment has moved in their direction
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  Speaker 4: by like a point or two. So you have that
• 8:26
  Speaker 4: and you also have the fundraising. Now, I know that's
• 8:28
  Speaker 4: not going to sound right at first because if you're
• 8:29
  Speaker 4: talking about the super PACs, then Republicans have a big advantage.
• 8:32
  Speaker 4: But the actual donations to candidates. from individuals, which is
• 8:36
  Speaker 4: a better indicator and more predictive of candidate success. Democrats
• 8:40
  Speaker 4: have been swamping Republicans in race after race.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: You mean like small dollar donations?
• 8:44
  Speaker 4: Just regular donations that exclude PAC money or self-funding.
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: And why is that? Just like that it's voter enthusiasm,
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: it's grassroots?
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  Speaker 4: I think it's a combination of two things. One, frankly,
• 8:54
  Speaker 4: I think Democrats, that is their bread and butter these days,
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  Speaker 4: and Republicans have gotten a little less active on fundraising
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  Speaker 4: because they know they're going to get it from the PACs.
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  Speaker 4: But it's also separate from that. I think it's a
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  Speaker 4: sign of enthusiasm. And this does make my personal forecast
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  Speaker 4: a lot more accurate when you take this into account.
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  Speaker 4: So maybe that's not true anymore with the area of
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  Speaker 4: PAC money, but I still think it says something about
• 9:17
  Speaker 4: the quality of the candidates and the quality of their
• 9:19
  Speaker 4: operation and the base enthusiasm that Democrats have, which I
• 9:23
  Speaker 4: think is still important.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, we were talking before we turned the cameras
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: on about Kansas and Roger Marshall. And, you know, this
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: is a race that going into the cycle, no one,
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: including Roger Marshall, would have thought that this seat would
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: have been in play. He's barely raising any money at
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: all to his Senate campaign at this late date after
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: you very much know that he has a real race
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: on his hands.
• 9:45
  Speaker 4: Yeah, this isn't even like Nebraska last year where people
• 9:47
  Speaker 4: weren't taking it seriously to the end. And maybe you
• 9:50
  Speaker 4: guys were on it. Most people weren't. Everyone's been talking
• 9:54
  Speaker 4: about Kansas for months, except it seems Roger Marshall, because
• 9:57
  Speaker 4: I don't know what he's doing. I don't know how
• 9:58
  Speaker 4: he's raised that little. It's baffling to me. Like you'd
• 10:01
  Speaker 4: think someone would come in and just rescue him and
• 10:04
  Speaker 4: bring him along to fundraisers and raise more than the
• 10:06
  Speaker 4: pitiful amount he's gotten. So yeah, he's relying on outside money.
• 10:10
  Speaker 4: And to some degree, like we see this every cycle
• 10:13
  Speaker 4: that when there's a huge wave, the people that loses
• 10:16
  Speaker 4: the most on the very far fringes are candidates that
• 10:19
  Speaker 4: have been safe their whole career that have never tried
• 10:21
  Speaker 4: to have to actually win swing voters. Maybe they did
• 10:24
  Speaker 4: their first.
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: Time 10 years ago. That's why when you're like, oh,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: how does he not raise any money? He's never had to.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: You win the primary and that's it.
• 10:31
  Speaker 4: It's over.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: You need a few token million dollars and you get
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: the R next to your name. Everybody checks the box
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: and you get to move on. You buy your house
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: in Washington. You don't think about it. You put your
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: kids in a Washington high school because you're never going
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: to leave. That's literally the mindset of these people. One
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: important part of the Nate Cohn thing before we move on,
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: is the big question to me is these red states.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: Like it's the Kansas, it's the South Carolinas, and it's
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: the others where you had the similar kind of enthusiasm
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: going into 2018. But at the end of the day,
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: the Republicans come home. What meaningfully makes today's race different
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: than that race at the time?
• 11:06
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it's definitely different. I just don't know
• 11:08
  Speaker 4: if it's different enough for Democrats to win. I think
• 11:10
  Speaker 4: they're going to win Texas. And I think Kansas is
• 11:12
  Speaker 4: a toss up. But voters are really frustrated with the
• 11:17
  Speaker 4: Republican Party. And this includes some genuine Republicans and a
• 11:21
  Speaker 4: lot of our leaning independents. This does not mean that
• 11:24
  Speaker 4: everyone's turn would often be framed as such. That's not true.
• 11:27
  Speaker 4: But a sizable portion in a coalition in elections that
• 11:31
  Speaker 4: are as competitive as America, which might be the most
• 11:33
  Speaker 4: competitive in the world, that's massive. And so it's, you know,
• 11:39
  Speaker 4: this is the problem for Republicans that they're rallying call
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: for Donald Trump that everyone and most voters in the
• 11:45
  Speaker 4: party buy into is that The system is not working
• 11:47
  Speaker 4: for them. They already felt that in their lives, but
• 11:49
  Speaker 4: it's been doubled down on messaging time and time again,
• 11:51
  Speaker 4: that politicians are corrupt, that people are not putting them first.
• 11:55
  Speaker 4: And then now they're seeing those same things being done
• 11:59
  Speaker 4: by a president that they thought was going to change things.
• 12:02
  Speaker 4: I think that has gotten more people to start to
• 12:04
  Speaker 4: question things. And the thing about Trump is once you
• 12:07
  Speaker 4: start to question him, a lot of the things that
• 12:09
  Speaker 4: you just dismiss because they're Trump being Trump start to
• 12:11
  Speaker 4: really get on your nerves. Yeah, that's true.
• 12:13
  Speaker 6: Fair.
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: All right, let's dig now into the numbers. Let's put
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: this first graphic up on the screen. Okay, so what
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: we asked you to do here is to take the
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: current polling average in all of the Senate races, that's
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: the column that you see here on the left for Alaska, Florida, Georgia,
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: et cetera, on down the line. And these are all
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: of the races that were even colorably interesting in the Senate.
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: And then to apply to it, what if the pollsters
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: are off by the average amount they were off in 2016? Now,
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: 2016 and 2020, There was a very similar polling miss.
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: They underestimated Republicans by what was it? It was about what,
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: three points? Yeah, roughly right about three points. So what
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: do we see if we have a similar polling miss
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: as what we saw in 2016 and in 2020?
• 12:58
  Speaker 4: Yeah, what would happen is the Senate would become a
• 13:02
  Speaker 4: battleground of a different nature, kind of flips. Democrats would
• 13:06
  Speaker 4: have about a 30% chance instead of about a 70%
• 13:09
  Speaker 4: chance in the Senate. because Republicans would be on track
• 13:12
  Speaker 4: for basically keeping everything the same. They would lose North
• 13:15
  Speaker 4: Carolina still reasonably cleanly, but they would pick up Michigan, Ohio.
• 13:19
  Speaker 4: And when I say pick up, I want to be clear.
• 13:21
  Speaker 4: This would be so close that it basically isn't really
• 13:23
  Speaker 4: even picking up. It just means it's a straight down
• 13:25
  Speaker 4: the middle race. Michigan would be separated by 0.01%. Wow.
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: Oh, my God. God forbid.
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: Sounds like a horrible situation. And Ohio, you have by 0.1%.
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: So if the 0.01 and the 0.1 holds, you end
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: up with Republicans holding onto the Senate, narrowly holding onto
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: the Senate, even in the realm where you have that
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: level of miss, where Republicans are underestimated.
• 13:51
  Speaker 4: Yeah, and that's on paper, right? So you have those
• 13:53
  Speaker 4: two races, which I think are basically tied, right? So
• 13:55
  Speaker 4: they could go either way. And then you have Alaska
• 13:57
  Speaker 4: and Texas, which would be around a percent difference or less.
• 14:01
  Speaker 4: So the thing is, this miss never happens across the same,
• 14:04
  Speaker 4: almost every one of these years. Even when there's a
• 14:06
  Speaker 4: huge polling miss, there's going to be a race where
• 14:08
  Speaker 4: there's an exception that goes the other way and someone's underrated.
• 14:11
  Speaker 4: So Republicans would be clearly favored to win the Senate
• 14:14
  Speaker 4: in this scenario, but Democrats would still have a fighting chance.
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 14:17
  Speaker 4: Interesting.
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: Okay. So let's steel man this too. So 2016, why
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: were the polls wrong? you know, a lot of our
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: audience is young. They may not even know they were
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: in high school or something like that. Why were they wrong?
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: Give us the spiel.
• 14:28
  Speaker 4: You're making me reach into my 2016 brain here.
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: I know. Especially for those of us who had to
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: sit through those long New York Times profiles about white
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: people in Ohio or whatever at a diner. But yeah,
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: go ahead.
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 14:39
  Speaker 4: Well, the reason they won is that people under, people
• 14:43
  Speaker 4: miss what was happening in 2016 going into the election,
• 14:46
  Speaker 4: which is that Trump brought a ton of new voters
• 14:48
  Speaker 4: that were disproportionately white, didn't vote too often, didn't have
• 14:54
  Speaker 4: college degrees, who felt they were left behind. And Trump's
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: whole campaign was, you're getting screwed and I'm going to
• 15:00
  Speaker 4: change things. And it motivated a lot of new people.
• 15:03
  Speaker 4: You know, they figured that out in 2008 because maybe
• 15:05
  Speaker 4: the first black president made it a little more obvious
• 15:07
  Speaker 4: that black voters were going to turn out at high levels,
• 15:09
  Speaker 4: but they completely missed the ball in 16. And then
• 15:12
  Speaker 4: in 2020, which was also a big miss, you had,
• 15:15
  Speaker 4: I think a lot of this came down to COVID.
• 15:18
  Speaker 4: Some of the same problems repeated themselves, but also Democrats
• 15:21
  Speaker 4: were home way more than Republicans in a way that
• 15:24
  Speaker 4: might not ever repeat itself in that type of dynamic.
• 15:27
  Speaker 4: What do you mean by that?
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: Like how?
• 15:29
  Speaker 4: Who was more likely to answer the phone? The person
• 15:30
  Speaker 4: that was worried about the pandemic.
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: Right, right.
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: Right. The white collar worker at home. Right. Democrats core
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: base excited to tell pollsters how much they hate Donald Trump.
• 15:39
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: And so even though Biden ends up winning, when we
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: were covering that together, I mean, it was looking like, oh,
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: it's going to be a bloodbath.
• 15:46
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: And it's not going to be anywhere close. And then
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: it was very close. OK, so let's bring our minds
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: forward a little bit in time now to 2022. Economic numbers,
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: Biden's in the presidency. Economic numbers are not looking great.
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: People are dissatisfied. Everyone's thinking, oh, it's going to be
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: a red wave. Now, the polls never showed a blowout
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: for Republicans, but we were all kind of applying our
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: 2016-2020 mind, saying, oh, well, if the polls show Republicans leading,
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: it's going to be Republicans by even more than that.
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: So the general consensus was a red wave is coming,
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: and then It did not arrive. And in fact, the
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: polls underestimated Democrats by a bit in that particular cycle,
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: by about three and a half points in that cycle.
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: So here we have the numbers for 2022. What you
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: see here is that if you have that level of
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: a polling miss underestimating Democrats, it becomes quite a blowout
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: on the Democratic side. You have states that are flipping
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: that you never would have imagined before. Obviously, you've got
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: you've got Iowa flipping. You've got Kansas going and not
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: by really that narrow of a margin. You have the
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: Democrat winning by four points in Kansas. You have South
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: Carolina going blue by two and a half points. And
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: of course, Texas. James Tallarico would prevail by almost six points.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: So that is another possibility that is on the table here.
• 17:12
  Speaker 4: Yeah, and that's why this is honestly, when you guys
• 17:14
  Speaker 4: messaged me about this last night, it was a brilliant
• 17:16
  Speaker 4: idea because it shows exactly what we're dealing with. The
• 17:19
  Speaker 4: map is so broad. We haven't experienced this before. At
• 17:22
  Speaker 4: least I haven't because I wasn't paying that much attention
• 17:24
  Speaker 4: in 2006 when I was 13. So this is definitely
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: an election where these races could be in play because
• 17:31
  Speaker 4: they're overperforming so much in these red areas. And if
• 17:33
  Speaker 4: they just do a little better than with the poll,
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: so just a little better, they can cash in on
• 17:38
  Speaker 4: a historic level. that would change the next six years
• 17:41
  Speaker 4: of our politics.
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so let's talk through the structural things again. What
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: happened with that miss? So with that miss, I mean, generally,
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: I remember I used to say, like, you know, the
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: breaking points rule is you take a Republican number and
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: you add five to it or something like that. You know,
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: I was like, you just, you know, you've seen too
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: much at this point. Yeah, it's like, oh, well, and then,
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: of course, that was the one year the rule completely
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: falls apart. Structurally, what happened? Because I've actually seen some
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: people say, hey, if you paid attention to the special elections,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: the ingredients were all there. You should have just, if
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: you just looked at that, you could have predicted democratic overperformance.
• 18:15
  Speaker 4: That's kind of what I did.
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Okay.
• 18:17
  Speaker 4: So, all right.
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: So, but then what did everybody else miss? What were
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: the structural ingredients for what went wrong in that race?
• 18:22
  Speaker 4: I think they missed that the change had happened. And look,
• 18:25
  Speaker 4: this is just part of the human condition. We always
• 18:28
  Speaker 4: overlearn the lessons from the last big thing that happened.
• 18:32
  Speaker 4: I mean, you know, I'm bringing a little broad here,
• 18:33
  Speaker 4: but And mistakes followed from World War I caused World
• 18:37
  Speaker 4: War II.
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: Sure, sure.
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: Right?
• 18:38
  Speaker 4: America always goes from excessively interventionalist to completely losing sight
• 18:42
  Speaker 4: of the world to getting too confident. And then now
• 18:44
  Speaker 4: we're in Iraq. Now we're in Iran, et cetera.
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: Right?
• 18:46
  Speaker 4: So this is the same thing that happens with people
• 18:48
  Speaker 4: talking about politics. And if you want to be better
• 18:50
  Speaker 4: than the conventional wisdom, that's literally all you need to do. Well,
• 18:53
  Speaker 4: it's not all you need to do, but it will help.
• 18:55
  Speaker 4: is just recognize that everyone else is over-indexing for what
• 18:59
  Speaker 4: they literally just saw yesterday. And that's what happened in
• 19:02
  Speaker 4: 22 because there were really big signs in that Republicans
• 19:05
  Speaker 4: are doing quite well in special elections and they were
• 19:07
  Speaker 4: doing a lot better in the polling. And then the
• 19:09
  Speaker 4: bottom started to fall out after Roe and they started
• 19:12
  Speaker 4: nominating candidates like Doug Mastriano in Pennsylvania that were talking
• 19:16
  Speaker 4: about kicking voters off the rolls as a central campaign
• 19:18
  Speaker 4: message and banning abortion in places where voters disagreed with that.
• 19:22
  Speaker 4: And so that conjecture, that wasn't every candidate, but we
• 19:24
  Speaker 4: had a lot of those candidates disproportionately in swing races,
• 19:27
  Speaker 4: I feel like even more than in just red races.
• 19:29
  Speaker 4: And so Republicans weren't able to take advantage. I also think,
• 19:32
  Speaker 4: and this is a huge contrast with this year, Joe
• 19:36
  Speaker 4: Biden did not force Democrats to stick with him all
• 19:38
  Speaker 4: the time. A lot of them separated themselves.
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: He would only complain to them on the phone in
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: leaked audio. Yeah, but he didn't say it in a
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: normal way.
• 19:48
  Speaker 4: Which is the president grumbles in his... take it. He's
• 19:50
  Speaker 4: not happy that all these people, especially if this is
• 19:52
  Speaker 4: their second term, that they personally recruited to run and
• 19:55
  Speaker 4: were in theory inspired by him or her. And then
• 19:58
  Speaker 4: now they're like running for the hills trying to avoid
• 20:01
  Speaker 4: them like crazy. Yeah, that probably drives all presidents crazy
• 20:03
  Speaker 4: because they all have egos. But they're at the end
• 20:05
  Speaker 4: of the day. They want to win the Senate. They
• 20:06
  Speaker 4: put it aside. Trump's made it way harder. And you
• 20:09
  Speaker 4: see Ashley Hinson in Iowa, for example, toss a brace,
• 20:12
  Speaker 4: but she was losing earlier. And now it's basically tied.
• 20:16
  Speaker 4: And that's because I think in part, she's done a
• 20:18
  Speaker 4: really good job of saying she wants to be bipartisan,
• 20:22
  Speaker 4: creating her own brand that's separate from the party. Michelle
• 20:24
  Speaker 4: Tafoya is doing the same thing in Minnesota. It's a
• 20:26
  Speaker 4: very tough year to run, but she's way overperforming the
• 20:29
  Speaker 4: rest of her party. Susan Collins does that. That's not
• 20:32
  Speaker 4: what most Republicans are doing. And so that could be
• 20:35
  Speaker 4: the thing that sinks a lot of these people.
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: Interesting.
• 20:37
  Speaker 5: All right.
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: So now let's talk 2025. Now, this may surprise people because, well,
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: first of all, there were just fewer elections. It's just
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: basically Virginia and New Jersey have their gubernatorial elections. And
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: because the polls were directionally correct, they showed a victory
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: for the Democrats in both cases. I don't think people
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: really processed how much of a miss it was. But
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: let's put this up on the screen. This of the
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: years we're focused on here was actually the largest polling miss.
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: It was about 8.1 percent of a miss, underestimating Democrats. Okay,
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: so now we're getting really wild. Okay, if we had
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: a polling miss in 2026 that was the same as
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: the polling miss in 2025, so just last year with
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: Virginia and New Jersey, you would end up with Democrats
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: having a super majority in the Senate, something that seems impossible,
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: I think is probably very unlikely. But if you did
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: apply that same polling miss from just last year, that
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: is what you would.
• 21:33
  Speaker 4: End up with. Yeah, now this type of miss is
• 21:35
  Speaker 4: more likely to happen when it's a special, it's an
• 21:38
  Speaker 4: off-year election. It's sort of like halfway to a special
• 21:40
  Speaker 4: election because the turnout gap can be bigger.
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: And so that's harder to estimate. Is that what's going
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: on there?
• 21:45
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it's harder to estimate and you're more likely just
• 21:47
  Speaker 4: to have a big miss with two races than you
• 21:49
  Speaker 4: are with like 35, right? That being said, I mean, look,
• 21:53
  Speaker 4: this is like the best case scenario for Democrats. It's
• 21:55
  Speaker 4: unlikely this would be a historic miss, but there's like
• 21:58
  Speaker 4: a five to, you know, somewhere between a five to 10%
• 22:01
  Speaker 4: chance of this type of thing happening. And in this scenario, look,
• 22:04
  Speaker 4: we've incredibly limited polling in this, admittedly, but based off
• 22:07
  Speaker 4: the small polling we have, Mrs. Hippie in Louisiana would,
• 22:09
  Speaker 4: I believe, flip in this map. That's crazy.
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: That's totally nuts. Really wild. Yeah, I'm not there yet.
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: It's like you said. But like, again, structural ingredients. I
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: think that's what we got to try to look at.
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: Like when I look at your map, for example, and
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: you have Tossup in Kansas and toss up in Iowa
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: and toss up in Alaska. Already, these are such dramatic
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: problems and a lot of things have to go right.
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: So I think the bigger question is how much of
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: this is local or national? Like you've talked previously here,
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: candidate quality, how it really matters in particular for Texas,
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: like Tallarico, right? Like I feel, I personally think if
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: Cornyn was the nominee, he would probably win. And I
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: don't think he would win by a lot, to be clear.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: It would be maybe even less than Ted Cruz and Beto.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: It might be one or 0.5. I'm just like, yeah,
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: I feel like enough of the traditional people are just
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: going to come home. But I opened the paper this morning,
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: and I'm looking at the Dallas Morning News, who my
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: whole life endorses John Cornyn, is like, we're with James Taylor. Now,
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: is that going to swing a ton of people?
• 23:14
  Speaker 3: No.
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: But it's indicative of, I know these are upper crust,
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: rich people who send their kids to SMU, they're holding
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: their nose and they're like, I'm going to Tallarico. That
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: doesn't happen with John Cornyn, in my opinion. So that's
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: my question, is how much of this is local candidate
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: quality and then how much of it is national? Because
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: for a lot of years, it didn't really matter who
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: the candidates were by plus or minus two, something like that.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: Because at the end of the day, whoever's in the Senate,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: you're voting for Trump or you're not. And that really matters, right?
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: In terms of who that person is. What have you
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: seen in your analysis?
• 23:44
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it's both. I mean, you're not talking
• 23:46
  Speaker 4: about Alaska being in play if- even with Paltola running,
• 23:50
  Speaker 4: if this environment was like tepidly bad for Republicans, but
• 23:54
  Speaker 4: not terrible. Interesting. That being said, look, this is my
• 23:57
  Speaker 4: hot take, and maybe I'm going to look dumb for this,
• 23:59
  Speaker 4: but I genuinely believe that we're getting a little less
• 24:03
  Speaker 4: polarized after a sprinting in the other direction. What I
• 24:06
  Speaker 4: mean by that, to put it in English, is voters
• 24:08
  Speaker 4: have been less willing to break with their party. And
• 24:11
  Speaker 4: so red states vote redder, blue states vote bluer, and
• 24:14
  Speaker 4: we feel like we're long past the era where you
• 24:17
  Speaker 4: saw Democrats representing places like Missouri and South Dakota and
• 24:21
  Speaker 4: Republicans winning a lot of blue places as well. And
• 24:25
  Speaker 4: so maybe that's going to change a little bit.
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 24:29
  Speaker 4: Because people don't like either party. They think the whole
• 24:32
  Speaker 4: system is wrong. That is like the consensus across America.
• 24:36
  Speaker 4: And Canada equality might mean a little bit more.
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I could see it. Look, the one
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: thing that you have to accept in politics is whenever
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: you get sort of like a mental frame of what's
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: going on, things shift. So I could definitely see that.
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: You know, I want to talk a little bit more
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: about all of the polling misses and try if we
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: can to put some theories together. So it certainly seems
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: like there is something about when Trump is on the ballot.
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: pollsters underestimate his support, his support specifically. Whereas the midterm elections,
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: it's been more of a mixed bag. And in fact,
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: I mean, these two midterm elections, the most recent, the
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: 2022 midterm and the 2025 off-year election, they underestimated Democrats.
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: And look, pollsters are human beings. They want to try
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: to adjust things. They have gotten a lot more shit
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: for underestimating Republicans than they have for underestimating Democrats, ultimately.
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: So do you think that part of the reason why
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: the midterm polls have been wrong in the opposite direction
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: is because of pollster overcorrection trying to make sure this
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: time we don't underestimate Republicans?
• 25:42
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think that could be part of it. And also, like,
• 25:45
  Speaker 4: I just want to say on the 2022 map, I
• 25:46
  Speaker 4: forgot to say this before. Part of this is because
• 25:48
  Speaker 4: we're using real clear politics, which does tend to have
• 25:50
  Speaker 4: a Republican bias. I don't know if that's because they
• 25:53
  Speaker 4: were embarrassed about 2020 and trying to overcorrect, because they
• 25:57
  Speaker 4: didn't include some very good polling in New Hampshire. The
• 26:00
  Speaker 4: pollster they called the best that released a poll two
• 26:02
  Speaker 4: days before the election because it would have moved their
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: average to showing Maggie Hassan winning the race. So their
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: miss was a lot bigger than other people that year,
• 26:10
  Speaker 4: to be fair.
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: That makes sense.
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: Isn't that the year all these random Republican pollsters came
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: out of the woodwork? Yeah.
• 26:15
  Speaker 4: You can make adjustments for that and start instituting bias checks.
• 26:18
  Speaker 4: Like that's the downside of RCP versus, you know, myself
• 26:21
  Speaker 4: and Nate Silver is that they don't correct for partisan
• 26:24
  Speaker 4: pollsters and they do like three or four and it's
• 26:26
  Speaker 4: kind of open for interpretation of the most recent polls.
• 26:29
  Speaker 4: And so like if you're just including all of them
• 26:31
  Speaker 4: and two of them are Republican pollsters, you're more at
• 26:33
  Speaker 4: risk of making this type of mess.
• 26:34
  Speaker 7: Got it.
• 26:35
  Speaker 4: That being said, like I think part of this is
• 26:38
  Speaker 4: that pollsters job has gotten way harder because I think
• 26:41
  Speaker 4: the answer rate for polls by phone is like less
• 26:43
  Speaker 4: than 10% of what it was in 2016. And it was,
• 26:46
  Speaker 4: it was surging down at that point too. Cause people
• 26:49
  Speaker 4: wouldn't get a random call. Like we remember when we
• 26:51
  Speaker 4: were younger, you usually answered it. Now it's well, five
• 26:54
  Speaker 4: years ago, it used to be a scammer. Now it's
• 26:56
  Speaker 4: AI pretending to be your grandma.
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: I've gotten six layers before I answer a phone call.
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: Like I went to the carrier to block unknown numbers.
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: I have a screener. I have like, if I'm answering
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: your phone call, You're a real person. I can't be
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: the only person. I've paid money for apps that will
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: block robocalls.
• 27:16
  Speaker 4: I answer the random numbers because I need someone to
• 27:18
  Speaker 4: so that these polls are better.
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: Oh, fair. You're part of the polling bias.
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: Let me ask you this, Logan.
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: If we understand the limitations of the polls, we understand
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: that we've had a variety of misses in a variety
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: of directions. What other things are you looking at? What are,
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: when you say the fundamentals, what do we mean here?
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: And is there anything you're looking at? People are starting
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: to parse through the early vote data, which I always
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: think is a little bit of a dicey proposition, especially
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: if you don't know what.
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'm looking at it too. Let's be real.
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: I'm an early vote crack addict. I just, I can't
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: get enough.
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: And we are going to try to do a segment
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: on it. Anyway, putting that aside, what are you seeing
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: right now that you think people should be paying attention to?
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: I'll tell you. I'll put my cards on the table.
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: I was saying yesterday in our planning call that we
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: need to get a graphic that's just like the gas prices.
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: The average today, what it was a week ago, what
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: it was a year ago, what it is for diesel,
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: because I don't know that there's any better indicator of
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: the mood of the country and where we're likely to
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: end up on election day. So that's my simple heuristic.
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: What are the sorts of things that you're specifically looking at?
• 28:23
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I actually haven't looked at the early vote this year.
• 28:26
  Speaker 4: And I'll be honest, I'm a little scarred for life
• 28:27
  Speaker 4: from it because in 2016, my friend that worked at
• 28:30
  Speaker 4: the DNC was giving me all this information. He was
• 28:33
  Speaker 4: so confident about how amazing Clinton was going to do
• 28:35
  Speaker 4: after the strong numbers in Miami, which actually went amazing
• 28:39
  Speaker 4: for Democrats. They just did everywhere. They did horrible literally
• 28:41
  Speaker 4: everywhere else in the state. Right. Or at least in
• 28:43
  Speaker 4: the northern parts of the state, I should say. But like,
• 28:47
  Speaker 4: I think it's so easy to see what you want
• 28:49
  Speaker 4: to see. Voting patterns change. Democrats might even be scared
• 28:52
  Speaker 4: about the mail-in ballots after Trump was up to some
• 28:55
  Speaker 4: stuff trying to change the rules and there wasn't Successful
• 28:57
  Speaker 4: like this could all change the way people vote cycle
• 29:00
  Speaker 4: to cycle and so drawing these big conclusions from it
• 29:04
  Speaker 4: It literally might be a signal that Democrats have decided
• 29:07
  Speaker 4: How much they're gonna spend in early geo TV? right
• 29:11
  Speaker 4: and trying to bank in some votes in mail or
• 29:13
  Speaker 4: how much Donald Trump is has a decided to encourage
• 29:16
  Speaker 4: or discourage people from using mail-in ballots.
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: Well, I remember for Democrats, 2024, the lines were out
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: the door in Northern Virginia. People were like, oh my God,
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: look at all these Democrats. Trump wins all seven swing states. Including,
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: by the way, his margin in Virginia is higher than
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: it is.
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: Oh, well, even worse than looking at the early vote
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: data is looking at like, oh, there's a long line
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: in Fairfax County at this point. You know, I mean,
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: that's really... not that i won't do that i was
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: gonna say i'm still that but because we're just so
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: desperate for any sense okay so early vote you're like
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: just don't even look at it yeah but i will.
• 29:48
  Speaker 4: So i can answer your question better next time but i.
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: Will say i anecdotally looking on twitter you see people
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: cherry picking oh you know, I'll see the same state
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: analyzed in totally polar opposite directions. So putting aside early vote,
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: what else are you looking at?
• 30:04
  Speaker 4: Yeah, honestly, I like doing a combination of quantitative and qualitative.
• 30:09
  Speaker 4: And they're just between personal conversations, focus groups I've listened to.
• 30:14
  Speaker 4: There is so much frustration with a lot of Trump voters.
• 30:19
  Speaker 4: And I don't necessarily Like some of this has actually
• 30:22
  Speaker 4: died in the wool Republicans, but especially soft Trump voters.
• 30:25
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 30:26
  Speaker 4: They just are not happy with what's being delivered. It's
• 30:29
  Speaker 4: sort of a crisis for them about who they're going
• 30:30
  Speaker 4: to vote for. And so these conversations are very much
• 30:34
  Speaker 4: reflecting what I'm seeing in all these other indicators. And
• 30:38
  Speaker 4: I genuinely think that means something. I think you got
• 30:41
  Speaker 4: to combine that with the data because you're not going
• 30:43
  Speaker 4: to talk to everyone. You're just not. So you're no
• 30:45
  Speaker 4: person in America unless they're traveling all over. is going
• 30:49
  Speaker 4: to have a proper read of the whole country. Yeah.
• 30:51
  Speaker 4: But I'm also really hearing this from folks that both
• 30:55
  Speaker 4: first and second hand, they're in places like southern Texas
• 30:59
  Speaker 4: in the Rio Grande Valley, whose family always votes for Republicans.
• 31:03
  Speaker 4: But this year, like they are just so frustrated with
• 31:06
  Speaker 4: what they've seen from ICE, what they've dealt with with
• 31:08
  Speaker 4: prices that they're going to flip for Tallarico. And so
• 31:12
  Speaker 4: like and some for Hinojosa, like this is definitely happening again.
• 31:15
  Speaker 4: It's a question of how much. and how much decides
• 31:18
  Speaker 4: who actually is going to win these races. But I
• 31:20
  Speaker 4: think it's really clear that the movement is real.
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: Interesting. Well, if you want another data point, off our
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: YouTube analytics alone, I thought Trump was going to win.
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: And now off of our YouTube analytics, I'm like, it's
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: going to be 60 seats for the for the Democrats.
• 31:33
  Speaker 4: What do you mean when you say that?
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: Well, you can just tell, like, general, like, what people
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: are looking at, like, oh, what's getting the click rate,
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: what generally, you know, people.
• 31:40
  Speaker 4: Are into, what the commenters, you.
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: Know, things like that. Don't read them. We don't read them.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: But it's, in general, you know, in terms of the
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: reports that we get back, and then also the shareable,
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: the like ratio, all that other stuff. I'm like, yeah,
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: I mean, look, people call it the podcast election, so
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: it's like, take it for something, right?
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: In terms of how that looks. So anyway, yeah, a
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: little peek behind the curtain. for everybody.
• 32:01
  Speaker 5: Okay.
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: Uh, let's get to the next part with the GOP.
• 32:06
  Speaker 4: All right.
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: Turning now to the GOP, Logan, you were just talking
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: about how Republican voters are sounding off organically behind the
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: scenes about how they're pretty much done. Here is BA
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: is a farmer in Georgia, basically saying I'm done with
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: the Republicans. I'm going to go ahead and vote for
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: John Ossoff. Let's take a listen.
• 32:21
  Speaker 8: On his vineyard in Southern Georgia, Gary Polk feels the
• 32:24
  Speaker 8: impacts of many of president Trump's policies firsthand.
• 32:28
  Speaker 7: The fuel today is twice as high as it would
• 32:30
  Speaker 7: have been this time last year.
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: The president says all the time that he is doing
• 32:35
  Speaker 3: these mass deportations because non-citizens, people who are here illegally
• 32:41
  Speaker 3: in some cases, are taking jobs from Americans.
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: Is that the case?
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: That's just, that's not true.
• 32:47
  Speaker 7: They're not taking jobs from Americans. And actually, a lot
• 32:52
  Speaker 7: of times they are filling jobs that Americans don't want.
• 32:58
  Speaker 7: more ag jobs and more labor-intensive jobs, construction jobs.
• 33:04
  Speaker 8: Polk also worries about access to health care in rural
• 33:07
  Speaker 8: areas after his 36-year-old daughter Amy suffered serious strokes that
• 33:11
  Speaker 8: nearly took her life.
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: Amy has come a long way.
• 33:14
  Speaker 7: She still can't speak very well. She's just now started
• 33:17
  Speaker 7: to eat some soft foods, but she's a fighter.
• 33:20
  Speaker 8: After weighing all these factors, Polk has decided for the
• 33:23
  Speaker 8: first time in his life to cast a ballot for
• 33:25
  Speaker 8: a Democrat. incumbent Senator John Ossoff. He doesn't agree with
• 33:30
  Speaker 8: the Democrat on all issues, notably abortion, but it is
• 33:34
  Speaker 8: Ossoff's help in getting federal aid after Hurricane Helene wreaked
• 33:37
  Speaker 8: havoc on Polk's grape crop that won his vote.
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: I'll save my comments for why Americans are taking that job.
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: But nonetheless, Mr. Polk voted for Republicans. Now he's voting
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: for John Ossoff. I also thought one was interesting as
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: the first farmer I've listened to who is not voting
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: Democrat solely because of diesel prices and or tariffs. And
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: so that is an example. Another thing, Logan, which I
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: often find in these things is people are actually very
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: bad at being like, this is why I'm no longer
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: done with Trump. They'll like make something up.
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: But a lot of the times it's they come back
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: to it's a feeling it's like multifactorial. But Nonetheless, it fits,
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: as you were saying, with a lot of the focus
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: group data that you've listened to. Like, where does that
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: fit in?
• 34:18
  Speaker 4: Well, most people aren't like us three.
• 34:20
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: They're ready to exactly.
• 34:21
  Speaker 4: Give their reasons because they just are analyzing it over time.
• 34:24
  Speaker 4: And you can see Biden's numbers dropped after Afghanistan. No
• 34:27
  Speaker 4: one was talking about that in the next election, but
• 34:29
  Speaker 4: it changed the way people saw him. True. Great point.
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: That's a great point.
• 34:32
  Speaker 4: So what was the question you were saying?
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: Just how does it fit with the focus group and
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: other stuff that you've seen? Yeah, yeah.
• 34:37
  Speaker 4: I think that is really representative. There's all sorts of
• 34:40
  Speaker 4: different reasons, but above all else, people think they're not delivering.
• 34:43
  Speaker 4: And the difference here is what you said about John Ossoff,
• 34:46
  Speaker 4: which is what he is exceptional and every person in
• 34:48
  Speaker 4: the Senate and House should learn from. You need staff
• 34:51
  Speaker 4: members that are obsessed with making people's lives better in
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: the state or district because that is what everyone says
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: about Ossoff is they call his office and they are
• 34:58
  Speaker 4: the problem-solving center, both in getting individual help and also
• 35:03
  Speaker 4: making changes to bills. And that's what you're supposed to
• 35:05
  Speaker 4: be doing when you're in office.
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: Interesting. All right, let's put B1 up on the screen.
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: So this shows Trump's midterm rally schedule. He's headed to Kansas.
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: Never would have thought that one would be on the map.
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: North Carolina, South Carolina, Iowa, Florida, Georgia, and Michigan. So
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: some of those are places we would have expected to
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: be battlegrounds, some of them decidedly not, South Carolina, looking
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: at you. However, how excited, Logan, first of all, what
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: can we glean from the schedule reading the tea leaves
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: about how they're feeling about how things are going? Second
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: of all, how excited is, let's say, Mike Rogers going
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: to be to have Trump show up in the state
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: of Michigan?
• 35:47
  Speaker 4: He's probably not going to be excited, but there's actually
• 35:49
  Speaker 4: an argument for him doing this, okay? So, Donald Trump
• 35:52
  Speaker 4: is clearly hurting Republicans, but... To some degree, that's priced in.
• 35:57
  Speaker 4: All right. The stronger the linkage, the better for Dems.
• 35:59
  Speaker 4: That's the downside of him coming. The upside is Republicans
• 36:03
  Speaker 4: are a lot less motivated and he is better able
• 36:07
  Speaker 4: than anyone else in their party to stir some excitement
• 36:11
  Speaker 4: and energy. So if they don't have as bad of
• 36:14
  Speaker 4: a turnout gap, they might be able to be safe
• 36:17
  Speaker 4: in places like South Carolina, for example, which I think
• 36:20
  Speaker 4: they're going to win, but is in play.
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 36:23
  Speaker 7: And.
• 36:25
  Speaker 4: then it's the persuasion gap which will be real. And
• 36:27
  Speaker 4: this certainly doesn't help. That being said, I did see
• 36:32
  Speaker 4: Ashley Hinson when she was in the White House with Trump.
• 36:35
  Speaker 4: Every quote she said was intended to not be able
• 36:38
  Speaker 4: to be clipped about how great Trump is. It was
• 36:40
  Speaker 4: meant to be specifically about a mill or fat.
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: I noticed that. She's like, thank you, Mr. President, for
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: bringing steel to our state.
• 36:48
  Speaker 4: Second, if you look at the look in her eyes
• 36:50
  Speaker 4: when he says, and Ashley, we're going to be in Iowa.
• 36:53
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 36:54
  Speaker 4: She has a pretty good poker face, so you really
• 36:56
  Speaker 4: got to look at the eyes. It's the same look
• 36:58
  Speaker 4: I have if I'm nervous at a bar and not
• 37:00
  Speaker 4: feeling like fully myself and talking to a cute girl.
• 37:03
  Speaker 4: It's like he looks like she looked a little like
• 37:07
  Speaker 4: dead in the eyes and scared.
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: Good analogy. I can't relate.
• 37:12
  Speaker 4: I can't relate.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: Let's put B2 up here on the screen. Here's what
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: Trump said. is currently focused on, meanwhile. He says, New
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: Mexico should immediately change its name to New America. We
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: are not Mexico. We are the United States. The name
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: should add great value and prestige to the home state.
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: Home values and incomes would rise, and you would even
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: be prouder while saluting our American flag. Maybe even the
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: crooked elections that New Mexico is known for would become
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: honest again. So, meanwhile, that's what he is focused on. And,
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: you know, this fits very much with B3. We'll put
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: that one on the screen. This is very interesting from
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: the New York Times, where they talk specifically about how
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: there's something missing from Republican ads as the midterms near.
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: If you go down and you look, Trump has effectively
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: disappeared from Republican campaign ads. And so they show how
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: Democrats have dramatically spent an inordinate amounts of money, like
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: tens of millions of dollars, with Donald Trump's name in
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: the ads as the closer we get to Election Day.
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: Then they show comparatively that Republican mentions of Trump after
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: September have effectively been nuked, and especially from the time
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: period of before the Iran war. It's basically after the
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: Iran war, his name drops off a cliff with a
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: lot of these Republicans in their ads whenever they're talking
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: about why somebody should elect them.
• 38:35
  Speaker 4: Yeah, that's because he's so unpopular right now. And it's
• 38:38
  Speaker 4: also like a strength of support thing. We've talked about
• 38:40
  Speaker 4: this before. People that don't like Trump can't stand him,
• 38:43
  Speaker 4: and people that like Trump are split evenly between liking
• 38:46
  Speaker 4: and loving him. So part of this is the reaction
• 38:48
  Speaker 4: that it's gonna cause. I think his approval rating is
• 38:51
  Speaker 4: a little weaker than the top line number would say
• 38:53
  Speaker 4: for that reason. And I think separate from that, the
• 38:57
  Speaker 4: big message you're seeing, if there's any overall national message,
• 39:00
  Speaker 4: something you're hearing from Abdul El-Saeed and candidates all across
• 39:04
  Speaker 4: the country is twofold. One, Donald Trump has the wrong priorities. Two,
• 39:09
  Speaker 4: they're campaigning on Donald Trump's priorities. But with a different
• 39:12
  Speaker 4: set of policies to get there. And it's sort of
• 39:16
  Speaker 4: like a message saying to some people that are Republican,
• 39:19
  Speaker 4: I'm actually going to deliver on the change that you wanted.
• 39:22
  Speaker 4: And we need to refocus on what our priorities are.
• 39:25
  Speaker 4: So I think there's some Trump voters that are willing
• 39:28
  Speaker 4: to vote for the Democrat. or the independent in like
• 39:31
  Speaker 4: a Dan Osborne situation in Nebraska because they want the
• 39:35
  Speaker 4: priorities back to what the types of things Trump ran on,
• 39:38
  Speaker 4: but is mostly ignored since he got into office this term.
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: Let's put before up on the screen. This is a
• 39:43
  Speaker 2: new Reuters poll that finds Trump falling to his lowest
• 39:46
  Speaker 2: approval rating for their polling at 31 percent, which is
• 39:51
  Speaker 2: really scraping the bottom of the barrel here. And the midterms, obviously,
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: just around the corner. If you'd asked me a few
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: weeks ago, Logan, I was very much remembering 2018, which
• 40:00
  Speaker 2: was a good year for Democrats. But there were originally
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: some states like this and some districts like red districts
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: that were on the table. And there was a coming
• 40:09
  Speaker 2: home for Republicans where the losses were stemmed. And ultimately, yes,
• 40:14
  Speaker 2: Democrats had a good year, but it wasn't like a catastrophic,
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: error-defining bloodbath of the sort that could potentially be on
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: the table this time around. However, as we become very
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: close to the day and Trump's approval rating continues to fall,
• 40:27
  Speaker 2: And I'm looking, gas prices still very high, a lot
• 40:30
  Speaker 2: going on in the Middle East with the Houthis and
• 40:32
  Speaker 2: the Red Sea and the Strait of Hormuz and all
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: of this. It doesn't seem like you're having quite that
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: same effect as you did in 2018. In 2018, the
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: Kavanaugh hearings really did a lot. And I was working
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: on some campaigns at that time. The polling could see
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: it shift in red districts. Thus far, you haven't seen
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: that same coalescing. There hasn't been a turnaround in the polls,
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: even in these red districts. Is it getting to be
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: too late in the game at this point?
• 40:59
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think so. I mean, it's not like it
• 41:01
  Speaker 4: is too late in the game for a state like
• 41:02
  Speaker 4: Iowa or ones that are really close to shift, but
• 41:04
  Speaker 4: for the whole thing, yeah. I mean, this is such
• 41:07
  Speaker 4: a different race. Let's go back to 2017 for a sec.
• 41:09
  Speaker 4: What happens? I think it's literally the day after, if
• 41:11
  Speaker 4: not a few days after. You have the biggest protest,
• 41:14
  Speaker 4: arguably in American history, for the Women's March, where, like,
• 41:19
  Speaker 4: I think more people came for that in D.C. than
• 41:21
  Speaker 4: the inauguration. At least it felt like it, right? So
• 41:24
  Speaker 4: people who did not like Trump were outraged and outraged
• 41:27
  Speaker 4: and scared and mad from day one. And that wave
• 41:30
  Speaker 4: built so that by the start of 2018, it was
• 41:33
  Speaker 4: like a D plus eight year. And then the car
• 41:35
  Speaker 4: was parked and it was there nationally and Republican individual
• 41:39
  Speaker 4: Senate races and governor races and house races. The Democrats
• 41:42
  Speaker 4: were all ready to vote and saying they were decided.
• 41:45
  Speaker 4: And then the Republicans didn't know much about the candidates.
• 41:47
  Speaker 4: And so that gap narrowed and it was a pretty
• 41:49
  Speaker 4: good year polling wise. But if you look at the
• 41:50
  Speaker 4: polling a few months earlier before the election, it wouldn't
• 41:53
  Speaker 4: have been right here. Look, I don't know which direction
• 41:56
  Speaker 4: the polls are going to miss. So maybe it's not
• 41:58
  Speaker 4: going to be as extreme as it looks right now.
• 42:00
  Speaker 4: But this is clearly, I believe in the momentum of
• 42:02
  Speaker 4: polls very strongly. If you're seeing a shift across the board,
• 42:05
  Speaker 4: the direction of the campaign is definitely shifting. And here
• 42:08
  Speaker 4: things went from, okay, Republicans are going to have a
• 42:11
  Speaker 4: slightly worse than average year to this could be absolutely
• 42:14
  Speaker 4: terrible for them. And that has happened since like March
• 42:17
  Speaker 4: where Democrats were a little behind the curve. Hell, they
• 42:21
  Speaker 4: were losing in the national polling at a certain point.
• 42:24
  Speaker 4: Last year, like up until like halfway through the year,
• 42:26
  Speaker 4: it has been a slow shift away from the Republican Party.
• 42:29
  Speaker 4: So the momentum is not going back to them. I
• 42:31
  Speaker 4: think it's kind of plateaued. But for month after month,
• 42:34
  Speaker 4: Democrats were gaining. And I don't think you're going to
• 42:36
  Speaker 4: have a massive shift back across the country in Republicans
• 42:39
  Speaker 4: direction in the next few weeks.
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, what's fascinating. I mean, Crystal's point was talking about
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: gas earlier. I'm looking right now. Gas is $ 4. 27 a
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: gallon nationally. I mean, what are we doing here? $ 4. 27
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: a gallon nationally. It's been over $ 4 a gallon for
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: six months. The price of Brent crude oil, not that
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: anybody should care because what you care about ultimately is
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: refined products. The price of Brent crude oil is $ 111
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: a barrel. I mean, it's the highest it's been in months.
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: So you put those two things together and that means
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: that 427 is only going one direction in the next
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: couple of weeks. When people go to vote, gas will
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: be over $ 4 a gallon. I can say that pretty confidently.
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: And diesel will be well over six bucks if you're
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: in California or in a lot of these other battleground states,
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: like for example, in Michigan, Michigan has some of the
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: higher gas prices around four 50, their national or their
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: statewide diesel prices around, you know, is $ 6 and 42 cents,
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: which is higher than the national average. I mean, at
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: a certain point, like these things, plus the approval rating
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: and all that, they're just, it's going to sink you.
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: Like it will sink the type of momentum that you're getting.
• 43:40
  Speaker 4: And I think Trump is literally like his biggest weakness
• 43:44
  Speaker 4: comes so into play during an economic challenge that people
• 43:46
  Speaker 4: blame him for. because he is not doing what every
• 43:49
  Speaker 4: other candidate would do.
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: I feel your pain.
• 43:51
  Speaker 4: I feel your pain. He's not saying I hear you.
• 43:53
  Speaker 4: He's saying you're wrong. I think just yesterday he said
• 43:56
  Speaker 4: the prices are going down, down, down. And people don't
• 43:58
  Speaker 4: want to hear that. They want to hear I'm working
• 44:00
  Speaker 4: on this and I'm going to do my best to
• 44:01
  Speaker 4: make it better instead of saying you're dreaming. It's just
• 44:05
  Speaker 4: insulting for people, and that's part of the reason why
• 44:08
  Speaker 4: some folks are willing to say, trying to grab his
• 44:10
  Speaker 4: attention and say, listen, this is real. That's a way
• 44:13
  Speaker 4: to tell the president that it's real if you're a
• 44:15
  Speaker 4: Republican and you start voting the other way in a
• 44:16
  Speaker 4: red state.
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I get it.
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: Last one I have for you. Let's put B5 up
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: on the screen here. So we've been talking all about
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: the Senate, right? And that's where the most exciting action
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: is because that's the House that's most in play, the
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: chamber that's most in play. However, if we look at
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: the House, I think most people think, OK, Democrats are
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: going to win the House. But there is a question
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: of how far the wave goes. And so The Washington
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: Post did this breakdown of now you've got some deep
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: red districts that have become house battlegrounds, and they lay
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: out some races to watch here. And we've had a
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: few candidates on who would be in some of these districts.
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: We talked to Nicole Laughlin last week in Florida 26.
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: It's the R plus 18 district in Florida, however heavily Latino.
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: It seems to be shifting very dramatically. What are you
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: what sort of outcomes do you think are on the
• 45:07
  Speaker 2: table in the House? Because I ran in 2010 as
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: a Democrat disastrous year for Democrats. And it was a
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: sort of year where you were looking at like, oh,
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: my God, this person lost. That person won. 2008 was
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: the opposite on the Democratic side. There were races that
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: suddenly were in play that nobody was paying attention to
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: that had very little money spent and raised. They were
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: completely under the radar. So what is the sort of
• 45:28
  Speaker 2: what are the sort of outcomes that you think could
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: be on the table here in the House?
• 45:31
  Speaker 4: All right. I didn't know that, Crystal. That kind of
• 45:33
  Speaker 4: breaks my heart. You'd be so good at it. Although
• 45:34
  Speaker 4: you're going to do shows. I guess it worked out.
• 45:36
  Speaker 2: Things worked out just fine, Logan. Don't worry about me.
• 45:40
  Speaker 4: My cousin ran in 2015 in Loudoun County. And as
• 45:45
  Speaker 4: a Democrat, he lost by like 1%. He was outspent
• 45:49
  Speaker 4: 10 to 1. And that was like the last time
• 45:51
  Speaker 4: Loudoun County was competitive. And it was an amazing year
• 45:53
  Speaker 4: for Republicans. Like he would have won easily. He's now
• 45:56
  Speaker 4: moved to Ohio. So unfortunate for him. But it is
• 45:59
  Speaker 4: all about the years.
• 46:00
  Speaker 5: Anyway.
• 46:01
  Speaker 4: I think the thing that's unique about this cycle is
• 46:05
  Speaker 4: you have a lot of really great candidates. There's a
• 46:08
  Speaker 4: lot we can say about Democratic leadership and failures last year.
• 46:12
  Speaker 4: But one thing they didn't fail at, and maybe this
• 46:14
  Speaker 4: isn't Democratic leaders, maybe this is the infrastructure of grassroots.
• 46:17
  Speaker 4: So many good candidates ran in states, in races across
• 46:20
  Speaker 4: the country, because what happens in waves that is in
• 46:24
  Speaker 4: your tough places, people will run because they've had enough
• 46:28
  Speaker 4: and they want to make change happen.
• 46:29
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 46:30
  Speaker 4: And on the other side, people won't even, we can't
• 46:32
  Speaker 4: even get a candidate sometimes, right? And so, like, that
• 46:36
  Speaker 4: is what certainly happened to Democrats in spades this cycle.
• 46:39
  Speaker 4: So if it becomes a mega wave, they have a
• 46:42
  Speaker 4: real chance in lots of competitive districts. Like, Elise Stefanik's district,
• 46:48
  Speaker 4: to me, looks competitive. And Blake, his first name starts
• 46:53
  Speaker 4: with G, but like, he has raised so much money
• 46:56
  Speaker 4: from actual donors. He's running against Anthony Constantino, who's been
• 47:00
  Speaker 4: self-funding and When you have these candidates raising these enormous
• 47:05
  Speaker 4: amount of money in places that are supposed to be
• 47:07
  Speaker 4: over r-plus-10 But people are really dissatisfied and it hits,
• 47:11
  Speaker 4: you know that district extra hard now You have a
• 47:13
  Speaker 4: chance to build a win, right? So there is like
• 47:16
  Speaker 4: to me the median scenario is like Democrats 233 in
• 47:19
  Speaker 4: the house and part of.
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: It could be how much gain is that explain.
• 47:22
  Speaker 4: It's not that much because Democrats barely lost the house
• 47:25
  Speaker 4: last two cycles and So it'd be like a gain
• 47:27
  Speaker 4: of like 20 seats. But if it gets bad enough
• 47:32
  Speaker 4: for them, you're going to see some breakthroughs even in
• 47:34
  Speaker 4: a very gerrymandered era, which makes big gains harder. You know,
• 47:38
  Speaker 4: it's really a question of how many of these hard
• 47:39
  Speaker 4: to reach places that have Republicans that have never had
• 47:42
  Speaker 4: to run a competitive race before in their lives that
• 47:45
  Speaker 4: are just not ready for it.
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, just to put a finer point on it,
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: you mentioned Elise Stefanik's district. This is the district Donald
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: Trump won by 21 points.
• 47:53
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: That's insane.
• 47:55
  Speaker 4: It is insane.
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: For that to be even talked about as competitive.
• 47:59
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I can't wait to see. Because, yeah, if you move,
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: let's say you win that by five. I mean, that's
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: still humiliating because now you've got to contest it in
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: the future. You can't gerrymander your way out of this.
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: There's only a certain amount that you can do.
• 48:13
  Speaker 4: It's true.
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: At a statewide. My biggest questions, we haven't spent any
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: time on this, but state legislators do, for the next
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: upcoming map cycle and for what all that, will look like,
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: and especially after what we saw in Virginia and a
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: lot of the crazy stuff the Republicans pulled. If you
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: get legislator sweeps, which I've heard is on the table
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: in some very swing states as well, I'm like, a
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: lot of these maps are going to be gerrymandered right
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: in the other direction.
• 48:40
  Speaker 4: Well, for next year, yeah, you're probably going to see
• 48:42
  Speaker 4: mid-district gerrymandering become more common.
• 48:45
  Speaker 2: It's going to be the norm now. Why wouldn't it be?
• 48:47
  Speaker 7: No, you know what?
• 48:48
  Speaker 4: You're making a really good point. And actually, this is
• 48:49
  Speaker 4: where Republicans, I never thought about this before. This might
• 48:52
  Speaker 4: be the biggest mistake Republicans have made.
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: Oh, the mid-district thing? I totally agree with you.
• 48:56
  Speaker 4: Because now, like 2030, this is me getting ahead of
• 48:59
  Speaker 4: my skis, but whatever, right?
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: This is what I do.
• 49:02
  Speaker 4: I think in 2028, Democrats will more likely than not
• 49:04
  Speaker 4: win the White House. Obviously, it's competitive, but I think
• 49:06
  Speaker 4: they're going to win, which means in 2030, they're probably
• 49:08
  Speaker 4: going to have a terrible year because it's a midterm.
• 49:11
  Speaker 4: And normally, that means the GOP would be able to like,
• 49:15
  Speaker 4: gerrymandered the heck out of the map again, like they
• 49:17
  Speaker 4: did in the 2010s. But if we're doing, like... mid districting,
• 49:22
  Speaker 4: Democrats can lock in a lot of advantages in places
• 49:24
  Speaker 4: to be able to staunch how much of a wave
• 49:27
  Speaker 4: 2030 would be, which means the Republicans don't get 10 years.
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, that's what I'm that's what I'm thinking. Like
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: my immediate reaction, because that's exactly what happened. People were
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: saying about Obama, remember Obama, like what was it? I
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: forget how many state legislatures.
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: A thousand state legislative seats that were lost by Democrats
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: under Obama.
• 49:45
  Speaker 6: Yeah, exactly.
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: It was a disaster. And the way that structurally screwed
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: them going into.
• 49:50
  Speaker 4: Like if you had 08 and 10 instead of 06
• 49:52
  Speaker 4: and 08. Exactly. Completely different.
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: We live in a different world if that happens.
• 49:55
  Speaker 4: Democrats control the House in 2012. He comes into his
• 49:59
  Speaker 4: second term with another trifecta.
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: Right, exactly. Who even knows?
• 50:03
  Speaker 4: Whatever.
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: There's so many different things. that we could be living in. Anyway, yeah,
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: nerdy segment, but I hope you guys enjoyed it. Thanks, Logan.
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: Thanks for stopping by, man. Appreciate you.
• 50:11
  Speaker 4: No problem, guys.
• 50:14
  Speaker 3: J.D.
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: Vance sat down with Mark Halperin for an interview on
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: a variety of topics, but Halperin pushed him in particular
• 50:21
  Speaker 2: on Trump family corruption. Let's take a listen to how
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: he handled that.
• 50:25
  Speaker 5: One thing we hear from the two-way community all the time,
• 50:27
  Speaker 5: and I bet you hear it too, is disappointment and
• 50:30
  Speaker 5: concern that the president's family has gotten much wealthier while
• 50:34
  Speaker 5: you've been in office. How do you feel about the
• 50:36
  Speaker 5: fact that they've gotten wealthier while you've been in office?
• 50:38
  Speaker 6: Well, I think they were already a very, very wealthy family.
• 50:40
  Speaker 6: And I think it's a family that suffered extraordinary financial
• 50:45
  Speaker 6: consequences for him being president the first time. And I
• 50:48
  Speaker 6: think if you look at the long sweep of the
• 50:50
  Speaker 6: first Trump administration, obviously that four-year period in between, and
• 50:54
  Speaker 6: the second Trump administration, I just don't understand the argument
• 50:59
  Speaker 6: that somehow... politics has made Donald Trump or his family
• 51:02
  Speaker 6: much better off.
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: I mean, their lives were nearly destroyed. Their business was
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: nearly destroyed.
• 51:07
  Speaker 6: They tried to throw the president in jail for something
• 51:09
  Speaker 6: like 900 years. So I don't see the benefit there. Now,
• 51:13
  Speaker 6: I do think there's a separate concern that I sometimes
• 51:15
  Speaker 6: think gets muddled with the first concern, which is that
• 51:18
  Speaker 6: is D.C. just too corrupt of a town? Do people
• 51:20
  Speaker 6: get too rich for knowing the right people? Do they
• 51:23
  Speaker 6: sell access to the president? Now, I've never seen any
• 51:26
  Speaker 6: evidence that anybody selling access to the president or certainly
• 51:28
  Speaker 6: selling access to me But like if there's a credible
• 51:32
  Speaker 6: accusation there, I guarantee you the president of the United
• 51:34
  Speaker 6: States is going to be the first person in line
• 51:35
  Speaker 6: to say that's ridiculous and despicable. And I am, too.
• 51:39
  Speaker 2: No one is selling access to the president. He's never
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: seen any evidence of that. I mean, I think that
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: is pretty preposterous. Just to give one example. And Pedro Gonzalez,
• 51:49
  Speaker 2: shout out to him, tweeted about this. He says last year,
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: Vance's inner circle opened a private club in D.C. with
• 51:54
  Speaker 2: a five hundred thousand dollar membership fee. Virtually everyone involved
• 51:57
  Speaker 2: is a close fans ally from David Sachs. to Donald
• 51:59
  Speaker 2: Trump Jr. The whole idea is to have an exclusive
• 52:01
  Speaker 2: place for Trump-aligned elites to hang out close to the
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: halls of power. It really is remarkable what a hypocrite
• 52:07
  Speaker 2: Vance is. I mean, we could go through, we could
• 52:10
  Speaker 2: spend the entire day going through the Trump era scandals,
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: some involving directly him, a lot of which has to
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: do with his crypto wealth, newly found crypto wealth. Even
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: if you think, Sagar, about all of the schlocky merchandise
• 52:22
  Speaker 2: that he's constantly, the sneakers and the watches and the
• 52:25
  Speaker 2: God knows what else, that they're constantly hawking. And you
• 52:28
  Speaker 2: sit there with a straight face, oh, I don't think
• 52:30
  Speaker 2: they profited off of the presidency. Literally no one buys it.
• 52:34
  Speaker 2: Even Republicans don't buy this at this point.
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: You actually made a fantastic point yesterday where you should
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: say we find that disgusting and that's why we told
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: Kimberly Guilfoyle to go and we've opened a DOJ investigation.
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: But Trump's not going to have that. He needs you
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: to defend him. I was reading a little bit behind
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: the scenes about that ridiculous woman who became the press secretary,
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: Katie Zachariah. I don't even know if that's her name.
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: I didn't have enough time to learn it. Now you
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: don't need to. Now I don't need to. I can
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: forget that she exists completely. Apparently, the reason that she
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: was picked is that she would strategically book herself on
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: television at the moments when she knew Trump was going
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: to be watching TV, like, oh, I don't know, 10 a.m.
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: Eastern Standard Time. And she would put herself in a
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: position where she was vehemently defending Trump. Trump went over
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: the chief of staff's head and specifically booked her because
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: he needs people to defend him specifically on television. So
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: when Trump sees a clip and you don't adequately kind
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: of suck up to him enough, you can't have that.
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: Like the Kimberly Guilfoyle example we gave is exactly what
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: you would do rationally if you were running, but you're
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: not dealing with a rational actor. It's just funny too
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: because you can see how J.D. will break whenever he
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: wants to. Like for example, in that same interview, Mark
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: Halperin goes, OK, are you going to endorse Netanyahu? And
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: he was like, no, I don't endorse foreign leaders.
• 53:52
  Speaker 2: Not true. Other foreign leaders.
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: We play a clip on our show of him and
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: Viktor Orban doing a rally in Hungary while he's the
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: vice president, which, you know, you probably should be doing
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: that period because Orban lost, which is pretty humiliating. But
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: beyond that, and Trump is indoors, all kinds of Bolsonaro
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: and all these other people across the world. But it's
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: like he's not going to get in trouble with Trump
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: for not endorsing Bibi. But the one thing is, if
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: you don't say that he hasn't enriched himself It's over, right?
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: Side note, but did you see that Bolsonaro is using
• 54:20
  Speaker 2: AI to like change his sort of like schlubby white
• 54:24
  Speaker 2: guy supporters into like hot Latina chicks to make it
• 54:28
  Speaker 2: look like that's who's supporting him?
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: Props to him, you know?
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: Anyway, new world.
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: There's always a humiliation in terms of our actual supporters.
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: Our friend Juan was sending me, he was down in
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: Brazil yesterday. So he's sending me images.
• 54:41
  Speaker 2: We should have him on actually.
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. Juan, now you're in. He literally sent me
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: this picture of Flavio Bolsonaro 2026 and a Trump was
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: right about everything hat in English together being sold at
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: Brazilian rallies, just so people know. He said it's very
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: 2024 down in Brazil.
• 54:57
  Speaker 4: Interesting.
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: Side note.
• 54:58
  Speaker 2: Anyway, it is a day that ends in Y, which
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: means we have a number of new potential corruption scandals
• 55:03
  Speaker 2: circling the Trump administration, which is also circling the drain.
• 55:07
  Speaker 2: And this one really sort of fits into the lane
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: of It's a pit of vipers and they're all coming
• 55:13
  Speaker 2: after each other now as the wheels come off and
• 55:17
  Speaker 2: everyone is starting to hate one another and the glow
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: of victory and sense of ascendance is gone. The bloom
• 55:23
  Speaker 2: is off the rose, so to speak. Now you have
• 55:26
  Speaker 2: these fights starting to break out. Kimberly Guilfoyle was one
• 55:30
  Speaker 2: of them. And now we have this one. Let's put
• 55:31
  Speaker 2: this up on the screen. This is reporting from Axios.
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: They say secret pay for play text rocks the Trump
• 55:38
  Speaker 2: White House.
• 55:39
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 55:40
  Speaker 2: So we've got a number of characters involved here. We've
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: got Alina Haba. We've got Rick Grenell, who previously was
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: very involved in particular in some of the Venezuela machinations.
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: And we have this Turkish businessman, Turhan Mildon, who Alina
• 55:55
  Speaker 2: Haba just married. So Alina is alleging that Rick Grinnell
• 56:02
  Speaker 2: sort of put the screws to her now husband, Mildon,
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: to donate millions of dollars, some of which was supposed
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: to go to this sketchy African enterprise and no one's
• 56:13
  Speaker 2: really nailed down what that piece of this was supposed
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: to be. And the other half, which was supposed to
• 56:18
  Speaker 2: go to the Kennedy Center donation, which along with the
• 56:22
  Speaker 2: ballroom is something Trump is very fixated on. He wants
• 56:24
  Speaker 2: it named after him and they're closing and they want
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: to renovate, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So this money
• 56:29
  Speaker 2: was supposed to go to the Kennedy Center as a
• 56:31
  Speaker 2: way to curry favor with Trump and gain this Turkish
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: businessman access to Trump and the administration and get the
• 56:41
  Speaker 2: insider VIP treatment, which, by the way, apparently he did get.
• 56:45
  Speaker 2: He was spotted at the Kennedy Center next to J.D. Vance, etc. However,
• 56:50
  Speaker 2: now Alina is claiming that Rick Grinnell stole this money
• 56:55
  Speaker 2: and never gave it to the Kennedy Center fund. She
• 56:58
  Speaker 2: brought this to the White House, and now it's a
• 57:00
  Speaker 2: whole thing. He denies it completely. I genuinely, actually looking
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: at this, not that I find any of it preposterous
• 57:05
  Speaker 2: to believe that this sort of favor trade is going on,
• 57:08
  Speaker 2: but he does make some good points about the story
• 57:10
  Speaker 2: not totally adding up. And her numbers have shifted over time,
• 57:14
  Speaker 2: and they use like a British spelling of the word,
• 57:16
  Speaker 2: I think center, which he wouldn't have used because he's
• 57:18
  Speaker 2: not British. So anyway, there are some holes in the story.
• 57:21
  Speaker 2: But Sagar, first of all, no one would be shocked
• 57:23
  Speaker 2: if this sort of pay-to-play thing was going on. Very
• 57:25
  Speaker 2: similar to what was going on with Kimberly Guilfoyle, where
• 57:27
  Speaker 2: she's promising, hey, you give me this and I'll be
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: able to help you out in this variety of ways.
• 57:32
  Speaker 2: But also, now we have a lot of drama and messiness,
• 57:36
  Speaker 2: which is truly breaking out.
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: I believe Rick's side of the story, but what I
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: definitely believe is Alina Haba is using this to... Look,
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: this is what people don't get. None of these people
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: have any principles. And at the end of the day,
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: she wants power and she's power hungry and a media
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: like literally like all she wants to do is be
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: linked to Trump. She was his lawyer, personal lawyer, nominated, humiliated, obviously,
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: whenever that didn't work out for her. Now she's married
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: some billionaire who people didn't even know anything about trying
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: to use the money and proximity to Trump. Apparently, you know,
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: there's some allegations around business dealings and things like that.
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: But what the Pit of Vipers story kind of shows
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: you is this is what it's all gonna look like
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: come a year from now. A year from now, we
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: will be sitting here and covering some of the most shocking,
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: you know, revelations in terms and sometimes they may not
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: live up to the hype or not, but like every
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: other day there will be congressional investigation subpoenas. These people
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: will be before Congress. There will be an, if you
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: thought the Supreme court stuff precedent that was set previously
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: was crazy, it's about to get crazier. We're going to
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: be at executive privilege and total immunity for official acts.
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: All of that will be re-challenged in court as they
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: take them for not fulfilling their obligation to come before Congress,
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: of stonewalling special counsel. I could go on forever.
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: You're also going to have more people who, Kimberly Guilfoyle
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: may take this path, who see that the Trump ship
• 59:04
  Speaker 2: is sinking and want to get off.
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 59:07
  Speaker 2: And so they offer up what they have and they
• 59:10
  Speaker 2: offer to testify. And so you'll have all of these
• 59:12
  Speaker 2: grudge matches of people who probably secretly hated each other
• 59:15
  Speaker 2: for a long time. playing out in public as well.
• 59:19
  Speaker 2: So we're just beginning to enter that potential era. We
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: also have more reporting from The Washington Post here about
• 59:26
  Speaker 2: Trump's ballroom fund. Let's put this up on the screen.
• 59:29
  Speaker 2: From The Washington Post, they dug in here to the
• 59:32
  Speaker 2: full list of major donors, something that has not been
• 59:35
  Speaker 2: previously reported. And keep this up on the screen. Let's
• 59:39
  Speaker 2: tick through some of these names. We'll be familiar to you. Oh, look,
• 59:42
  Speaker 2: who's number one on the list there, Sagar? The Adelson
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: Family Foundation. Surprise, surprise. Coming in number one on the list,
• 59:50
  Speaker 2: $ 25 million donated so that Trump can have his ballroom. Next,
• 59:54
  Speaker 2: we've got Apple sucking up to him with the big
• 59:57
  Speaker 2: $ 25 million. Then we have the co-founder of the Dish
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 2: Network and Echo Star. Then we've got NVIDIA, Jensen Huang,
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 2: and all of these people slash entities coming in at
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 2: $ 25 million donated. Then we drop down to Google. We've
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 2: got $ 22 million. We've got the Laura and Isaac Perlmutter Foundation.
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: Isaac is the former CEO of Marvel Entertainment. $ 20 million.
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: Lockheed Martin, those defense contractors can always be counted on
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 2: for some millions flowing into your coffers. And next we
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 2: have Microsoft at $ 10 million. So a list of players
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 2: that you would probably expect. Let's go ahead and put
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 2: the next piece up on the screen here because this
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 2: is where the corruption angle comes in. So this is
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 2: a chart from this same article that shows not only
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: who is paying, but also indicates that about half of
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 2: the entities or individuals who have donated to this ballroom
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 2: fund have also received federal contracts during his second term.
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 2: So everyone knows this is a big priority for Trump.
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 2: He talks literally obsessively obsessively about it far more than
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: he talks about your condition, your standard of living, the
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: cost of living, any of that. He is obsessed with
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 2: this freaking ballroom. And so you've got people who know
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 2: this is the way to get in his good graces
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 2: and ultimately to potentially be able to get federal contracts. Now,
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 2: what the White House responds is that the people who
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 2: complain about this would also complain if it was taxpayers
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 2: funding it.
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: True. True.
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 2: I complain about both of these things.
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: Guess what?
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 2: We have a process in place. If you have a
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 2: priority in something you want funded, You are supposed to
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 2: go through Congress and get it approved. And then, you know,
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 2: there is some sort of democratic check on this. And yes,
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: I would oppose that because I think there are far
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 2: greater priorities than you having this gilded ballroom that you're
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 2: obsessed with that you want to put your name on. So, yes,
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 2: you're right. I do oppose either funding mechanisms through the
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 2: corrupt donor process or through the now taxpayers dollars are
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 2: not only going to, you know, your various wars. illegal
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: and horrific wars overseas, but are also going to your
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 2: gilded ballroom.
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: See, but the real question is whether you support unlimited
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: funds to destroy the ballroom, because that's where I'm at.
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: So no matter what it costs, it has to be
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: razed to the ground and the original East Wing must
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: be built brick. You know when billionaires are like, I
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: shipped a mansion over and- We deconstructed the marble. That's
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: what I want. I want people crawling through the landfills
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: and re-getting the East Wing supplies wherever it is, no
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: matter the cost. That would be a jobs program. Yeah,
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: it would make a WPA program.
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 2: I think we can all tear it down as like
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 2: a community effort. I'm sure. Like as a come a
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 2: great coming together.
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 4: I'll be there.
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 2: And then, you know, the restoration can be done as
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 2: a sort of jobs program for the next administration.
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: Anyway, actually, returning to the graphic, can we put it
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 1: back up on the screen, the original C3, just so
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: I can show people, it's very important to actually go
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: down this list so you guys can see. Adelson goes
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: without saying, that's just the Israel pay-for-play screen. But take
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: a look at the other people who are three out
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: of the top five, Apple, NVIDIA, and Google. Well, what
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: do you think all these people have in common? Shall we?
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: So for example, NVIDIA needs Trump on export controls. $ 25
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: million is nothing. They print that in a single second
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: over at that company, which has a large... NVIDIA's market
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: cap is larger than the entire European stock market, all right?
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: And then same whenever it comes to Apple.
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 4: Why?
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: Tariffs, because their tariff exemption on China is the only
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 1: thing keeping that company together and all of its profits.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: And yet, even with that, remember, if you guys, like me,
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: I was day one iPhone Duo customer. I mean, these
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: things are going for 2,500 bucks now, right? So 3,000
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: if you want a terabyte. I mean, obviously, I get it.
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: It's always been more expensive, but that's still pretty shocking.
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: And a lot of that is because of global trade.
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: Tim Cook and now the new CEO have played Trump
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: like a fiddle for years whenever it comes to tariff exemption.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: And then finally, Google. So obviously, they say it as
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: settlement funds from Trump's lawsuit against YouTube, but you and
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: I both know what this is. This is about antitrust
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: exemption and specifically, with Google what they really need. I
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: was just reading about this. Sergey Brin basically went 20
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: years without ever being involved in politics. Just didn't give
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: a shit, right? Well, all of a sudden, the California
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: wealth tax comes on, and Sergey, who has some maha
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: girlfriend or something like that now, and is super pro-Trump,
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: he's never spent more money in politics in his entire
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: life than against the billionaire tax in California. That's what
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: this is all about. It's purely, it's not even ideological.
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: It's greed, like straight up greed. And continuing down, Perlmutter
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: from Marvel, Hollywood. I mean, people have no idea because
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: they probably have never looked. The Paramount merger and everything
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: that's gone on also with Disney, they need significant regulatory
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: approval and everything behind the scenes on Hollywood. I don't
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: doubt that some of this is ideological, but it's not
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: a coincidence that the vast majority have immense business interests
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: before the government. And that's the issue.
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 4: Of course.
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 3: Of course.
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Very obvious what's going on here. And it's utterly disgusting. Sagar,
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 2: you flagged this this morning. Let's put this up on
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 2: the screen from ProPublica. New revelations about how not only
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: is Trump engaged in all sorts of corrupt schemes, but
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 2: he's also using his FBI to erase a bunch of
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 2: investigations that were previously ongoing. You know, there was some
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 2: reporting about Susan Collins in particular. Now we've got some
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 2: new information here from ProPublica about a South Carolina alleged
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 2: bribery investigation. Well, the investigation part is real. The bribery
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 2: allegations obviously are alleged that may have saved both Lindsey
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 2: Graham and Jim Clyburn. So a little bit of bipartisanship here.
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 2: Not surprising when you're talking about corruption. from this investigation. Sagar,
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 2: what do we know about what was going on here
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 2: or what's alleged to have been going on here?
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: It's kind of complicated. I'll explain it. So Martin Kao,
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: former CEO of the Hawaii Naval Contractor, told the FBI
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: his business model was trading campaign donations for federal contracts.
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: And in South Carolina, he made cash for contracts arrangements, allegedly,
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 1: with Lindsey Graham, James Clyburn, and Joe Wilson. So this
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: is a bipartisan scheme. each of whom said he asked
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: them for $ 100, 000. Graham met with Cow and one of
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 1: their lobbyists at a steakhouse here in Washington. Graham's campaign
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: required a $ 40, 000 contribution just for a 45-minute meeting. Cow
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: says Graham agreed to support $ 10 million a year in
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 1: funding in exchange for a $ 100, 000 pledge. That same week,
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: his office confirmed to the Office of Naval Research $ 10
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: million should go to the Natick University South Carolina partnership,
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 1: and the contract was awarded in July of 2020. So
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: the contract timeline and all that stuff basically lines up.
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: Similar thing happened with James Clyburn. LD, specific to this company,
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: had language that appeared in the House Appropriations Bill. Clyburn, remember,
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: is one of the most powerful members of the United
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 1: States Congress. So these two people basically come together, or
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 1: these people come out, and in late 2024, they go
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: after them, Basically, they're saying, hey, you guys are subjects.
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: After Trump returns to office, the DOJ public integrity section
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: loses its authority to bring new cases. The assigned prosecutor leaves.
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: Kash Patel purges the corruption unit. The person who was
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: in charge of the unit then fired in October of 2025.
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: And the agent who originally was looking into this. is
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: pushed out in early of 2026. They now say that
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: the case is dead. So basically, the guy pled guilty
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: in 2022 to illegal campaign donation and loan fraud. He's
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: actually serving prison sentence for 87 months. But they shut
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 1: the investigation down into Lindsey Graham and Jim Clyburn charges. basically,
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: Clyburn and Graham's office and all these other people are like, oh,
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: he's a convicted felon, he's telling lies, and all that, which,
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: you know, might be true. But also, you know, if
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: you take a look here, at the end of the day,
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: you know, and to be fair, they're like, he's seeking
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: a sentence reduction and all that. ProPublica has him pretty
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: dead to rights in the fact that regardless of whether
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: it was true or not, it was not properly investigated.
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: And that's what Kash Patel and the FBI, obviously, they
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: say we looked into it, nothing came out of it.
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: But You know, I mean the story, here's the thing.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: The details do line up. Like he had the dinner,
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 1: they gave the cash, the contract flowed. I mean, I
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: wouldn't say it's enough for me, but smoke and all
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: of that, that's around here. So FBI shut it down.
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: Just wanted to give a shout out to ProPublica These
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: types of stories are so difficult to do, and they
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: actually did all the legwork. We'll have a link in
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: the description if you want to.
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 2: Go read it. Yeah, they do fantastic work on this. And,
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 2: you know, I think some of the most shameful stuff
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 2: that Trump has done, too, is these, like, pay for
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 2: pardon things.
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 2: All of these criminal fraudsters who have done horrific things and,
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 2: you know, are let off the hook because they hire
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 2: the right person and funnel money to the right person
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 2: and suck up to Trump in the right ways. And
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 2: it's utterly disgraceful and disgusting abuse of power.
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 4: Exactly.
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: All right, let's get to property tax.