Latest / Pod Save America / Trump Sabotages Trump Agenda

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Trump Sabotages Trump Agenda · Pod Save America

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  Speaker 2: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 1:20
  Speaker 3: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: On today's show, Donald Trump touts a major accomplishment on
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: affordability as only he knows how, by canceling it. We'll
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: talk about why and why the president is fighting again
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: with Republicans in Congress. We'll also talk about Zoran Mamdani's
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: House candidates going three for three in New York's primaries
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: on Tuesday and why that's causing some Democrats to panic
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: and Republicans to smile. We'll do a quick check in
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: on J.D. Vance's charm offensive and whether it's winning over
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: his wife. And then Gina Hinojosa, the Democrat running to
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: be governor of Texas, stops by to talk about her
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  Speaker 2: race against Greg Abbott and why she might become Texas's
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: first Democratic governor. in nearly 40 years. Before we start,
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  Speaker 2: all your favorite Crooked Pods, plus you get subscriber-only shows
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  Speaker 2: like Polar Coaster with the one and only Dan Pfeiffer.
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  Speaker 2: And I hear you guys are back at it. You
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: did another Polar Coaster this week, right?
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: We did.
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  Speaker 3: It came out this week. We talked a little bit
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: about the New York races that you and I are
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  Speaker 3: also going to talk about. We also talked about the
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  Speaker 3: politics of abortion. four years after Dobbs.
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  Speaker 2: Excellent. Everyone check that out. You can get it if
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  Speaker 2: So check it out, crooked.com slash friends. All right, let's
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: get to the news. Donald Trump made some real progress
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: this week trying to sabotage his Republican majority in Congress.
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: Minutes before he was scheduled to appear at a signing
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: ceremony for a landmark housing affordability bill that passed with
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: huge bipartisan majorities, the president announced that it was canceled
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: and that he won't be signing the housing legislation until
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: Congress passes the SAVE Act, which is the bill that
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: would require all Americans to show passports or birth certificates
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: in order to register to vote, and has failed to
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: pass in the Senate five times now. The housing bill
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: would reduce barriers to building new homes and limit the
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: ability of big investors to buy up single-family homes, ideally
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: lowering the price of housing down the road. But alas,
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: Trump doesn't want to give anyone the impression that he
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: and his party are focused for even a second on affordability.
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: So no housing bill this week. Trump elaborated on his
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: thinking in an Oval Office appearance a little later in
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: the day. Let's listen.
• 3:46
  Speaker 4: Basically, it's the Save America Act. Everybody wants it. Everybody
• 3:52
  Speaker 4: is it, including Democrats. I said I'm not signing the
• 3:55
  Speaker 4: housing bill. I want to see what happens. We said, look,
• 3:57
  Speaker 4: the housing bill is housing. I made billions of dollars
• 4:02
  Speaker 4: with housing. I know housing better than anybody, maybe anywhere.
• 4:06
  Speaker 4: It's all about the interest rate. Lower the interest rates,
• 4:09
  Speaker 4: you can have all the housing you want. But you
• 4:12
  Speaker 4: have to understand, I don't wanna hurt people that own
• 4:14
  Speaker 4: houses too. Affordability, we're doing great. The Democrats gave us
• 4:20
  Speaker 4: a tremendous affordability problem and we're reducing prices a lot.
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  Speaker 2: I'm a billionaire, I made a fortune on housing and
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: we gotta help other people who already own homes.
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: Take it from me, successful slumlord on how to deal
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: with housing prices.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: So considering that the housing bill will become law in
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: 10 days, even without Trump's signature, and that if he
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: does decide to veto it, Congress has the numbers to
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: override a veto. What was Trump thinking when he decided
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: to do this? What's going on here, Dan?
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: You know, there's been this debate over the years, whether
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: Trump is crazy or crazy like a fox. This is
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: just crazy. Just put yourself in the position of Republicans, right?
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: You're a vulnerable Republican. You're like a Susan Collins or
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: a Dan Sullivan or you're one of these Republicans like
• 5:10
  Speaker 3: Mike Lawler in a purple district. You wake up on
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: Wednesday morning. Here's what your day looks like. Democrats are
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: in the middle of a giant fight because we've elected
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: some socialists in New York City. You're about to have
• 5:20
  Speaker 3: a signing ceremony for a massive bipartisan bill that would
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: be signed by Donald Trump. But written in part by
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: Elizabeth Warren that will address housing prices. It'd be a real, actual,
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: tangible accomplishment. You could take the voters to say, like,
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: I'm trying to do something to deal with your cost
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: of living crisis. And instead of that, Donald Trump just
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: minutes beforehand sends out an insane truth, canceling the signing ceremony,
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: stomping on both the Democrats' bad message, the Republicans' good message.
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: Because he has a near fatal attraction to a bill
• 5:54
  Speaker 3: that no one likes. And if it were to pass,
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: would make it harder for Republicans to win elections.
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: It is wild. And that he just keeps– first of all,
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: let's just talk about the Save America Act, which he
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: has called it. It was the Save Act. Then he
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: changed it to the Save America Act. It's also supposed
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: to like ban mail-in voting nationwide. I think that's part
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: of it too. Or that's like one of the add-ons
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: that he included himself. Um, so I don't know why
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: he's so, I mean, I know why, cause he thinks
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: that like, it's going to help them rig the elections and,
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: and win, but it is, it is wild to me
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: that no one has told him, none of his political
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: advisors have told him that actually, um, this bill would
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: probably hurt Republicans, um, because it would make it harder
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: for the, um, lower income Americans, uh, much of whom,
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: many of whom vote for Donald Trump and wrote for
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: Republicans now, um, to register to vote because not everyone
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: has their passport lying around. Not everyone has their birth
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: certificate lying around. Republicans run around saying that this is
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: only about like showing your license and showing some form
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: of ID and isn't that easy to do. And that's
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: not actually what the bill does. The bill is much
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: more comp, makes, the bill makes voting and registering to
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: vote much more complicated than that.
• 7:12
  Speaker 3: I mean, it would end under current form, basically end
• 7:15
  Speaker 3: online voter registration and automatic voter registration. We've talked about
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: this before. Not that many Americans have– a majority of
• 7:22
  Speaker 3: Americans do not have passports. The ones who don't have
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: passports are just unfortunately working class and didn't go to college,
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: which has been the core of the Trump base. But
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: it– like I just– so there's a bunch of different
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: things going on here. It can't pass.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: Right.
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  Speaker 3: They tried several times. It cannot pass. It doesn't have
• 7:38
  Speaker 3: the– there aren't 60 votes, obviously, and there aren't 50
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: votes to eliminate the filibuster. And then even if it
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: were to pass, it would be bad for Republicans. And
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: at no point in these various– junctures, does Trump seem
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: to understand? It's true. It's delusional. The whole thing is delusional.
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: His obsession with this seems genuine. Maybe it's because it's
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: something he wants that he can't get. That's what bothers him.
• 8:07
  Speaker 3: Because up until this point with this Republican caucus, he's been,
• 8:11
  Speaker 3: with the exception of the Epstein files, what he has wanted,
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: he has got. You want to confirm a bunch of
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: fucking dunderheads to be in charge of the military and
• 8:18
  Speaker 3: health and human services. We'll do that. You want us
• 8:21
  Speaker 3: to stand idly by while we prosecute people? We'll do that.
• 8:24
  Speaker 3: But here's the thing he wants and he cannot have,
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: and it seems to be driving him even more bananas
• 8:29
  Speaker 3: than usual.
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: I also think that all these things he wants to
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: do with voting and the election... he is being told
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: or has been also told by the courts that he
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: can't do via executive order. But you can tell that
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: if he doesn't get the SAVE Act passed, he's still
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: going to try to do a lot of this shit
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: around the election, which should alarm everyone, of course. On
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: the housing bill, though, the thing is going to become law.
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: In fact, right before we started recording, Mike Johnson said
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: that he talked to Trump and that they will be
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: transmitting the legislation to Trump. So I assume, although I
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: shouldn't assume, but Seems like he might just sign it
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: after all. But even if he doesn't, it becomes law. Like, great.
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: It's good legislation. His opportunity to take credit for it
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: is sort of gone now. And it's not like people
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: are going to feel the effects of this housing bill,
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: certainly not by the midterms, maybe not for a couple
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: of years, because really it's just sort of reducing barriers
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: to building more affordable housing and sort of changing some
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: of the formulas for how the federal government gives money
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: to states and Now it's going to be based on
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: whether they've actually produced more housing and built more housing.
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: So they can still take credit for it, but I
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: don't think Trump's going to be taking credit for it.
• 9:44
  Speaker 3: But even then– so when you– like we should– we'll
• 9:48
  Speaker 3: get into this, but as we know, a bill that
• 9:50
  Speaker 3: does not actually impact people's lives has limited political impact.
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: But the moment when people pay attention is the signing ceremony.
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: 10 days from today, Thursday, is the 4th of July weekend,
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: which seems like a bad time to get attention for
• 10:06
  Speaker 3: your bill.
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: Well, also, apparently, the Wall Street Journal has him saying,
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: Trump saying to someone, one of his advisors, at my rallies,
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: no one cares about the housing bill. at my rallies,
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: but when I say save America, then every, they can't
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: sit down. Um, and then apparently punch bowl has four sources, um,
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: saying that the Trump said to Mike Johnson directly, no
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: one gives a shit about housing.
• 10:31
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: I remember he said that, uh, he said that a
• 10:33
  Speaker 3: few months.
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: Ago, like literally like affordability is the top issue. And
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: then when you dive into affordability, like sometimes it's groceries
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: and gas, sometimes it's housing, but housing is I think
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: it's like one of the, maybe the top two or
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: three concerns of most American voters.
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: And particularly younger voters, like this shows up in focus groups.
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: It shows that it's like, yes, is it true that
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: people are not cheering for the 21st Century Road to
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: Housing Act? Of course. Would it be helpful for Republicans
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: and Democratic incumbents to go to voters and say, here
• 11:04
  Speaker 3: is a thing, a bipartisan accomplishment I had that is
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: addressing your concern, even if you're not feeling it? Absolutely.
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: And Trump is just making that messier. for Republicans because
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: he's having some sort of insane temper tantrum over a
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: bill that can't pass.
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: After canceling the bill signing, Trump did attend his previously
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: scheduled lunch with Senate Republicans, which went about as well
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: as you can imagine, given the circumstances. According to Senator
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: John Kennedy, Trump was, quote, mad as a murder hornet
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: and berated Republicans for not supporting him on an Iran vote.
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: which then led to a shouting match with Bill Cassidy,
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: who Trump recently drove from office. CNN reports that Trump
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: told Cassidy to sit down. Cassidy refused and raised his voice.
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: Trump called him a lunatic. Cassidy then referred to Trump
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: as brother and Trump told him he wasn't his brother.
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: And then Cassidy eventually sat down. Um, John Kennedy later
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: said that the meeting was a success because quote, no
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: one got stabbed, which is an excellent bar to set. Um,
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: Trump also apparently isn't done trying to force Republicans to
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: eat shit on Iran. Uh, the administration just asked Congress
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: for $ 88 billion in funding, uh, which would mostly help
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: pay for the war. How do you think that's going
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: to go over Dan?
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: Well, before we get to the war funding, um, In
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: this meeting, in the Punchbowl reporting on it, and Punchbowl
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: generally gets like a full live texting of these sorts
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: of things. It seems like no one pushed back on
• 12:42
  Speaker 3: Trump on the SAVE Act, even though every Republican senator
• 12:45
  Speaker 3: with the possible exception of Mike Lee and maybe Rick
• 12:47
  Speaker 3: Scott know it can't pass. None of them would say
• 12:50
  Speaker 3: it to Trump's face, which is why they're in this
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: mess to begin with, which is a pure sign of
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: weakness and failure from John Thune.
• 12:57
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: Like, you have him in the room. This is the
• 12:59
  Speaker 3: big problem. You can't pass anything. The House, it's why
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: we should mention, Trump's got everyone so ginned up on
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: this that Annapolina Luna has stopped, will not allow anything
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: to pass on the House floor until the Senate passes
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: the SAVE Act, which is something that doesn't make a
• 13:12
  Speaker 3: lot of constitutional sense.
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: It's like they're talking about a bank shot.
• 13:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah. So it's like they can't pass the rule. They
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: can't pass anything. They're trying to pass the appropriation bills.
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: They have to go home on Friday because they can't
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: do anything. And- And she's demanding that they attach the
• 13:26
  Speaker 3: SAVE Act to either the FISA bill or the defense
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: authorization bill, which the Senate will then take out in
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: both those cases. But so the whole thing is you
• 13:35
  Speaker 3: have– Trump has got everyone chinned up about this. But
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: no one will say to his face why this can't work.
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: It is one thing for his like terrible, slavish, obsequious
• 13:45
  Speaker 3: advisors to not say it. But here are members of Congress, senators,
• 13:49
  Speaker 3: who are not up for reelection this year. Maybe some
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: of them are not up for reelection ever again. Who
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: are incapable of mustering the courage to say to one
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: man a simple math fact.
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: And it's like they could have even talked beforehand and said,
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: all right, I'm going to bring it up, but back
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: me up if I do.
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: Strength in numbers. Still nothing. Still like Bill Cassidy, I guess,
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: got up and yelled at him about the Iran war
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: powers vote.
• 14:16
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: And then change his vote.
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: And then change his vote. Because the White House afterwards
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: gave him a briefing that he wanted. And then he
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: felt sad that he raised his voice. I'm like, the
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: guy cost you your job. You're not going to be
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: a senator anymore because of this man. Sorry. For, I guess,
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: voting for impeachment the second time. Apparently Trump in the meeting, too,
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: was like, all the people that voted for my impeachment,
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: voted to convict me, are gone now. And then he
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: looked over at Lisa Murkowski, who was just sitting there
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: in the corner. He's like, accept her. Unbelievable.
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: Did Susan Collins not vote for that?
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: Oh, interesting. Did she vote for the second impeachment? She
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: had to have voted for the second impeachment.
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: I mean, look, in fairness, we have barely covered the
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: main Senate race this year.
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: Maybe Susan Collins got smart and just didn't go to
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: the lunch.
• 15:10
  Speaker 3: She probably didn't go to lunch.
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: If I were Susan Collins, I would stay clear of
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: anywhere where Donald Trump was. That's got to be a base,
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: like a campaign 101 kind of thing. So here's the
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: thing now with this Trump and the GOP Congress. I'm
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: wondering how much all this matters because not many actual
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: work days left between now and the midterms. They're going
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: to go home for the 4th of July break. They're
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: going to come back. There's going to be August recess.
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: Then they come back, then everyone's campaigning, and then it's
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: November before you know it. Trump seems intent on sabotaging
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: any chance of anything passing before Election Day. I see it.
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: It seems hard to believe that this $ 88 billion war
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: funding supplemental is going to pass, even though. They thought
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: they were really clever and included some Ebola funding in
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: it to try to get Democrats to vote for it.
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: It doesn't seem like anything else. It doesn't seem like
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: the Save America Act is going to pass. But then
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: the question is, does any of that matter in terms
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: of the politics of the midterms?
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: That's an interesting question because I don't think there's any
• 16:17
  Speaker 3: sort of bill, even this housing bill, Republicans could pass
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: that would dramatically change the political dynamics here. Look, I
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: think if you're an incumbent member of Congress and you
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: can pass something that addresses people's number one concern and
• 16:31
  Speaker 3: you can talk about that on the trail or in
• 16:32
  Speaker 3: a debate or in an ad, that's better than nothing.
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: And so this is an opportunity cost for the way
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: Trump stepped on the housing bill. What I think probably
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: matters here is they're going to need to pass this supplemental,
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: which is politically toxic. In that CVS poll, 69% of
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: people think the war hasn't been worth the cost. We
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: haven't even paid the $ 88 billion yet. So when you
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: start paying the $ 88 billion, numbers are going to get worse.
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: And so they need– and it will be on reconciliation.
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: So they need 50 votes. And in our old world,
• 17:02
  Speaker 3: we used to be like, well, Susan Collins doesn't have
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: to vote for it and she'll be fine. But now
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: you've got a bunch of other Republican senators. You have
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: Dan Sullivan. You have John Husted. You've got a bunch
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: of people who are going to have to probably cast
• 17:13
  Speaker 3: a vote here and that's going to be an unpopular vote.
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: You're going to need everyone to do it because you're
• 17:16
  Speaker 3: going to– you'll probably get Fetterman I guess. So maybe
• 17:18
  Speaker 3: you can lose three Republicans.
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: But that will be it.
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: It's good. Also– There's also a government funding deadline, by
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: the way.
• 17:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I was going to bring that up, too, is
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: that that's the real, that's looming here right before the election.
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: It's looming. We got a loomer.
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: We're already looming. It's only June.
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's September 30th. There's a government funding deadline. So
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: you got that. You got this war funding supplemental. Nothing
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: that anyone wants to pass, that's for sure.
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: If I was Donald Trump and I cared passionately about
• 17:44
  Speaker 3: election integrity, one thing I would do is demand that
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: I would suggest that I wouldn't sign a government funding
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: bill unless they included, unless they passed the SAVE Act.
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: It's just an idea. I hope it doesn't make it
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: to his ears.
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: I'm sure that's already on a notepad somewhere, Dan, or
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: a whiteboard in the White House, for sure. No, I think,
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: and the other challenge here is, I think they thought
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: that this $ 88 billion war funding supplemental would, like they
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: waited until after they thought the war was over, and
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: then so they could sell it as like, oh, this
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: is just backfilling, you know, like now we just, it's
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: for future conflicts and now our military is depleted and
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: we need it. And what are you going to do now?
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: You know, except the war doesn't seem to be over.
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: There was another tanker that was attacked by an Iranian
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: drone today. Um, it does not seem like the traffic,
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: the traffic has increased through the straight, but it is
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: not anywhere near back to normal levels. I believe like
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: the Chevron is saying the gas prices will be elevated
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: for a while. Trump's flipping out about that. Now he's
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: promising to go after price gouging Gas companies are open
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: like a DOJ investigation, which, as we know from the
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: Biden administration, works so well.
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: We tried that in the Obama years.
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: Us too. Yeah, it never works. But you say it anyway.
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: And so he's going to have to deal with that.
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: Gas prices are going to be still high. And so
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: that's going to make the $ 88 billion look even worse
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: to voters, I think. Yeah.
• 19:10
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's, it's terrible. Honestly, it's probably would have
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: been better to do it when the war was going on.
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: So you could make it be about protecting the troops.
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: And instead it's just, it's like, here's the bill has
• 19:19
  Speaker 3: come due for this unfun thing that no one wanted
• 19:21
  Speaker 3: and everyone hated.
• 19:22
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: And, uh, and by the way, we're, we've cut all
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: your Medicaid too, and, uh, everything else in the government.
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: So good luck with that.
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: But we do, we do have money for ballrooms and, uh, algae,
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: the war on algae. We have to, we're so better
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: for the world on algae.
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: It really does make you think like when these Republicans
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: hit the trail in the fall, Like, they don't have
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: much to say except that Democrats are, as our next topic,
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: Democrats are all crazy socialists. I don't know what else
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: they can say about themselves and what they've done in Congress.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: I don't really imagine anyone talking about this housing bill because,
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: like you said, if the housing bill hasn't really had
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: any effect on housing prices- I don't think that's going
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: to land very well with people.
• 20:01
  Speaker 3: They will do, and it's not going to work, and
• 20:03
  Speaker 3: it's going to be pretty pitiful, and it is like
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: leading with your chin, but they will talk about the
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: tax provisions in the big, beautiful bill. No tax on tips,
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: the Social Security stuff, tax cuts for middle class, which
• 20:14
  Speaker 3: will then allow every Democrat to point out that most
• 20:17
  Speaker 3: of the tax cuts went to billionaires and corporations, and
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: that we are paying for those tax cuts for billionaires
• 20:23
  Speaker 3: and corporations by cutting health care, food assistance, closing rural hospitals,
• 20:28
  Speaker 3: et cetera.
• 20:37
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• 23:15
  Speaker 2: Well, before we get too excited about what that midterm
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: might look like, let's talk about what's going on on
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: the Democratic side. Speaking of inter-party turmoil, we got some
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: fresh drama brewing thanks to the good people of New
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: York City who had quite a primary on Tuesday. A
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: slate of three candidates endorsed by Zoran Mamdani won their
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: Democratic primaries in deep blue House districts. In the 7th district,
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: Democratic Socialist Claire Valdez won the open seat over a
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: pretty progressive opponent endorsed by the retiring Democratic member of Congress.
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: In the 10th district, Progressive City Comptroller Brad Lander defeated
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: incumbent Dan Goldman in a race that was largely about Israel.
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: Both men are Jewish. Lander ran as a self-proclaimed liberal Zionist.
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: but hit Goldman on voting against legislation to block military
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: aid to Israel and taking money from pro-Israel lobbying groups.
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: And then the biggest upset of the night in another
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: race that was largely about Israel, four-term representative Adriano Espaillat,
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: head of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, and the first undocumented
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: immigrant to serve in Congress, lost his Harlem Bronx district
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: in an upset to a leftist community organizer named Darieliza
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: Avila Chevalier, a democratic socialist who also believes in abolishing prisons, police,
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: and all deportations. Now, there were plenty of other primaries
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: in New York and elsewhere on Tuesday where mainstream and
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: moderate Democrats not only won, but in some cases fended
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: off more progressive challengers. But to give everyone a flavor
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: of how the DSA victories are landing in the world
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: of politics, Here are reactions from James Carville, Zoran Mamdani,
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: and Hakeem Jeffries.
• 24:59
  Speaker 5: Everybody's always said, no, no, we're a coalition, we're a
• 25:03
  Speaker 5: big tent. And there's just some shit that I can't
• 25:06
  Speaker 5: be in the same tent with. Let's negotiate the terms
• 25:09
  Speaker 5: of a schism here. Maybe we can We can part
• 25:12
  Speaker 5: under some kind of advantageous terms for both of us.
• 25:15
  Speaker 3: But I'm done.
• 25:16
  Speaker 5: I'm not in that fucking political party.
• 25:18
  Speaker 7: What is the Democratic Party if not its voters?
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: And what we saw yesterday evening were Democrats across the
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: city turning out and voting for a new kind of politics.
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: You can't.
• 25:29
  Speaker 3: You can't think this is a positive development in New
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: York politics, can you?
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: And all they'll just, you know, Dems will be Dems
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: or something like that.
• 25:39
  Speaker 8: I don't see how you can say that.
• 25:43
  Speaker 3: You need to reject those things, I think.
• 25:46
  Speaker 9: First of all, I've clearly rejected those things.
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: That's number one.
• 25:49
  Speaker 9: Number two, and my record speaks for itself, this is
• 25:52
  Speaker 9: not a Dems will be Dems thing. Donald Trump is
• 25:55
  Speaker 9: the president of the United States of America right now.
• 25:58
  Speaker 9: Are you kidding me? I'm happy to talk about primary
• 26:01
  Speaker 9: elections in one of the bluest cities in the country.
• 26:05
  Speaker 9: At the end of the day, listen, our focus is
• 26:08
  Speaker 9: going to be on ending this national nightmare in this
• 26:11
  Speaker 9: country that America is suffering.
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: Your reaction to the results, and then we can do
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: the reaction to the freakout. And I know you wrote
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: a wonderful message box about this today. So thank you.
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: Tell us about it.
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: Sure.
• 26:28
  Speaker 3: So let's just start with the elections themselves. No one
• 26:30
  Speaker 3: should dismiss this. Like two incumbents losing election on the
• 26:35
  Speaker 3: same night is a big deal. Since 1946, so from
• 26:37
  Speaker 3: 1946 to 2024, more than 98% of incumbents have won renomination.
• 26:38
  Speaker 5: Wow.
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: In the House? So it is in the House. So
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: it is very rare for members of Congress to lose
• 26:51
  Speaker 3: their primaries, two losing on one night, one of them
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: being the chair of the CHC, and then specifically losing
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: to a political novice with a, I would say, a
• 27:01
  Speaker 3: colorful history of online posts. That does seem to be
• 27:04
  Speaker 3: in vogue this cycle for Democrats. That's a big deal.
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: We shouldn't dismiss it. I would say the Lander-Goldman race
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: is a little– different in the sense that Lander is
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: a citywide elected official who ran for mayor, has high
• 27:21
  Speaker 3: name ID, and the endorsement and full support of the
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: very popular mayor, Democratic Socialist mayor of the city. And
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: each of these races are a little different in what
• 27:30
  Speaker 3: drove it. But I think the thing we should take
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: away is, like so much else that's happening in this country,
• 27:35
  Speaker 3: like is happening when progressive speed establishment candidates in the
• 27:40
  Speaker 3: 2nd District of Maine in the California race where Randy
• 27:43
  Speaker 3: Villegas won, Graham Platner forcing Janet Mills out of the race.
• 27:51
  Speaker 3: There's a giant warning sign for the Democratic establishment here,
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: where the support of people like Schumer or even Akeem
• 27:57
  Speaker 3: Jeffries is certainly not an asset in your campaign. It
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: may be a detriment. It is very clear that the
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: groups on the left, Justice Democrats, Democratic Socialists of America,
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: Our Revolution, are out-organizing, out-fundraising, out-working, out-maneuvering the traditional party institutions.
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: That is happening. They have captured the energy. They are
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: being more creative. They're being more strategic. They're being more aggressive.
• 28:23
  Speaker 3: And if you are someone in the democratic establishment, you
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: should be deeply concerned about what this says about where
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: the party is, what the standing of the party is,
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: what the ability of the party infrastructure is to actually
• 28:36
  Speaker 3: win elections. So this is a big deal. Now, To
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: Akeem Jeffries' point, this is taking place in a city
• 28:43
  Speaker 3: that Kamala Harris won by 38 points in what was
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: a bad year for Democrats, particularly in a city like
• 28:50
  Speaker 3: New York. And so this is a very, very, very
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: Democratic city. And all across the country, you're seeing– yes,
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: you're seeing progressive candidates win and you're seeing progressive candidates
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: lead like Abdullah Saeed in Michigan according to the most
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: recent polls. But you're also seeing moderate candidates in Alaska,
• 29:06
  Speaker 3: North Carolina– I don't know if it's fair to call
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: Sherrod Brown a moderate, but he's certainly not a democratic socialist.
• 29:11
  Speaker 3: He's an economic populist. And you saw in New York,
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: just on that very same day, in New York 17,
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: one of the most important districts in the country for
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: Democrats to take the House, you have a more moderate
• 29:24
  Speaker 3: veteran candidate win.
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: That's the Mike Lawler district.
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: That's the Mike Lawler. That's Kate Connolly who won that primary.
• 29:31
  Speaker 3: And so you're seeing– it's like there is a mixed picture,
• 29:33
  Speaker 3: but there is– in all the races, but there is true.
• 29:36
  Speaker 3: It is very true that there is an antipathy toward
• 29:38
  Speaker 3: the establishment. We can talk about why that is. There
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: is more energy on the left and there is sort
• 29:44
  Speaker 3: of greater tactical, strategic, and organizational energy and success among
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: the groups on the left.
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: I think that's all right. I also think it's useful
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: to sort of define what the freakout is about because-
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: it's even more, it's even narrower, I think, than just like,
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: you know, there's some progressives winning in places and DSA
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: places and moderate. Even just the three races we're talking
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: about here from Tuesday night, we're talking about three races
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: and three house races. And in one of those races,
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: Clair Valdez seems like a normal DSA candidate in the
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: vein of an AOC or a member of the squad, right?
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: We talked about Brad Landor, Lander is basically like a
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: standard progressive Democrat.
• 30:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah, standard New York City progressive Democrat.
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but it also has said like, you know, after
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: he won was like, I want to go help frontline
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: members who are out there and I hope some of
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: the moderates come help me and I've helped moderates before.
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: And so like, that's Brad Lander. Really here, the panic
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: is over. Daryl Iza Avila Chevalier. And I will just say,
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: she might be the most left-wing candidate to ever win
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: a Democratic primary in our lifetime. There's been a lot
• 31:02
  Speaker 2: of focus on her old tweets, which she has deleted
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: and mostly apologized for. I'm fine with that. My general
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: position is to give people a chance who want to
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: take back something they said or posted. Certainly would love
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: to take back things that I've posted. And I also
• 31:19
  Speaker 2: think that some of her tweets have been taken out
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: of context and exaggerated. Here's where I have a problem.
• 31:25
  Speaker 2: She has not apologized for attending an anti-Israel rally on
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: October 8th, October 8th, 2023, a rally that was condemned
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: by Zoran Mamdani, AOC, and Brad Lander, who we were
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: just talking about, who actually left the DSA because it
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: promoted that rally, where attendees chanted that Hamas's resistance was
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: justified the day after October 7th, the day after they
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: slaughtered a thousand Israelis. And to this day, She still
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: defends attending that rally. The other problem I have, she
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: sat for an interview with the New York editorial board
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: last week, last week, where she said she's against all deportations.
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: She's for open borders because, quote, bordering is a very
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: modern construct, actually. The borders are in our hearts and
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: our minds. She wants to abolish prisons. and refused to
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: say when asked, she got four different chances on this,
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: refused to say that a convicted murderer should be sentenced
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: to any jail time at all. And they kept giving
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: her another chance, like, are you sure? But what happens
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: to the murderer that just convicted? Nothing. Now, maybe she
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: turns over a new leaf in Congress and like her
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: voting record doesn't match some of these more extreme positions.
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: I hope so. But I think the reason I bring
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: this up is because when Democrats get questions about this,
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: I think the answer is easy and important to give,
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: which is that she currently holds a range of views
• 32:59
  Speaker 2: that go from moronic to abhorrent. And not only those
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: views not align with most Democrats in the country, nearly
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: all Democrats in the country. all elected Democrats, actually most
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: elected democratic socialists. But like, I don't even think they
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: align with like a lot of the people who probably
• 33:22
  Speaker 2: voted for her. And so like, I think people should just,
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: you just got to say that. And I don't think
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: you lump her. I think it, I think it does
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: a disservice to the other progressives and the other even
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: DSA members to pretend that she is part of this,
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: like there's new energy and it's great and whatever. And
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: it's like, no, no, no, no, no. It's one thing
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: to have these views in the past and be like,
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: you know what, I've learned, I've grown, which she said
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: about some of her tweets. But to sit there a
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: week ago and be like, yeah, no prisons, no borders,
• 33:51
  Speaker 2: no police.
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: Here's the thing. Also, who cares?
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: Well, but I already see people doing the like, you know, like, well,
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: we got to understand the energy. No, no, we got
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: to understand the energy with a lot of these candidates.
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: She is, that was a mistake. And like Mamdani endorsing her,
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: also probably a mistake.
• 34:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, you'll notice that when Bernie Sanders did
• 34:10
  Speaker 3: his congratulatory tweet afterwards, he congratulated Brad Lander and Clara Valdez.
• 34:16
  Speaker 4: Oh, he did?
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: Because Bernie's fucking smart. That's why.
• 34:18
  Speaker 3: I mean, those are the two he specifically endorsed, but
• 34:22
  Speaker 3: he did two, not three. But also, she's one member
• 34:26
  Speaker 3: of Congress.
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: Right, right.
• 34:28
  Speaker 3: This is who the voters picked. So in two years,
• 34:29
  Speaker 3: someone's got the opportunity to challenge her. Maybe she comes
• 34:32
  Speaker 3: to Congress and she's a productive member. Maybe she's not.
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: It doesn't, but it's, it's just like, I think.
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: I'm not, I'm not saying it's, I'm not saying it's
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: the end of the world. I'm saying that, um, I
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: actually think it's very easy here.
• 34:44
  Speaker 9: Oh yeah.
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: What I'm saying, what don't do is like, she is a,
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: she is about to be the biggest celebrity on the
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: right of all time. She's going to, she's already like
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: starring on Fox and every fucking segment. And it's going
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: to be like that forever. And you know what? Most people,
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: when they hear her, there's tape of her saying all
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: these things last week. When they hear that, they're going
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: to be like, this is fucking nuts. And then if
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: they go to Democrats and be like, what do you think?
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: And Democrats are like, ah, it's not a big deal.
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: Everyone's freaking out over nothing. Then you would not blame
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: the voter for being like, well, that's weird. Why wouldn't
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: you just say it's crazy?
• 35:16
  Speaker 3: The Republicans will try to make her a celebrity, a
• 35:18
  Speaker 3: face of the party. I think they're going to really
• 35:19
  Speaker 3: struggle to pick an unelected member of Congress as the
• 35:22
  Speaker 3: face of the party when they have struggled to make
• 35:23
  Speaker 3: AOC or Nancy Pelosi or someone else the face.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: Of the party.
• 35:26
  Speaker 3: But let's say it comes up. It could come up
• 35:29
  Speaker 3: in a debate, come interview. If you're a member of
• 35:31
  Speaker 3: running in any district, frankly, but it's strictly a front-line
• 35:34
  Speaker 3: member in a purple district or a red district, there's
• 35:36
  Speaker 3: no greater gift than the opportunity to distance yourself from somebody.
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: In a party.
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: That's why I said that.
• 35:43
  Speaker 3: It's a gift. Yes, for sure. I think that the
• 35:48
  Speaker 3: freakout– let's try to break– the freakout is not just
• 35:55
  Speaker 3: about her. The freakout is about a few things that
• 35:56
  Speaker 3: are sort of political and institutional. One of them is
• 36:00
  Speaker 3: there's always this fear that Democrats are going to nominate
• 36:03
  Speaker 3: candidates too liberal to win the general election. That is
• 36:06
  Speaker 3: not a fear here.
• 36:07
  Speaker 4: No. Right?
• 36:08
  Speaker 3: These are some of the most Democratic districts in the country.
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: These people are all going to Congress.
• 36:11
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 36:11
  Speaker 3: They're all going to Congress. So that's– and that– we
• 36:13
  Speaker 3: are not seeing a situation where currently– we'll see what–
• 36:18
  Speaker 3: people are going to have an argument about Maine, about
• 36:21
  Speaker 3: Maine Senate. But we have not– As of yet, for
• 36:24
  Speaker 3: the most part, we have not been– the Democratic voters,
• 36:26
  Speaker 3: not the institutions, not the groups, anyone, not the party apparatus.
• 36:30
  Speaker 3: The voters are not picking candidates who may be too
• 36:33
  Speaker 3: liberal to win. The two possible exceptions there are Randy Villegas,
• 36:37
  Speaker 3: which is the DCCC picked a different candidate in that race,
• 36:40
  Speaker 3: and then Matt Dunlop instead of Baldacci, the son of
• 36:43
  Speaker 3: the former governor in the main second district. We probably
• 36:46
  Speaker 3: weren't running the main second district under any scenario. You
• 36:48
  Speaker 3: need a very, very good year for that. That's really
• 36:50
  Speaker 3: like only.
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: Unless Jared Golden had not retired.
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 36:54
  Speaker 3: Jared Golden is like Joe Manchin, right? The only person
• 36:56
  Speaker 3: who could win that was probably Jared Golden. The other
• 36:59
  Speaker 3: fear is that this is evidence of like a Tea
• 37:04
  Speaker 3: Party-like moment for the party. And there are– I think
• 37:09
  Speaker 3: it's a bad comparison because the Tea Party was a
• 37:11
  Speaker 3: very specific thing in time. It was about a very
• 37:13
  Speaker 3: specific thing in time. It was largely– it was a
• 37:16
  Speaker 3: sort of astroturfed, corporate-funded– reaction to the election of a
• 37:21
  Speaker 3: black president. But what you are seeing is the party
• 37:26
  Speaker 3: base saying they are done with the establishment. They are
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: done with the leadership. They have great skepticism. That leader,
• 37:32
  Speaker 3: I think there's three reasons why that skepticism exists. One
• 37:36
  Speaker 3: of it is, and it's different in every race, and
• 37:38
  Speaker 3: it's even different in some of those races in New York.
• 37:42
  Speaker 3: One is anger that the party has failed to stand
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: up to Trump. The second is That the party is
• 37:51
  Speaker 3: too captured by corporate interests, too unable, unwilling, too cowardly
• 37:59
  Speaker 3: to take on the interests and to advocate for working people, right?
• 38:02
  Speaker 3: That they're not addressing people's economic pain. And then the
• 38:06
  Speaker 3: third reason is Israel and Gaza. And that was obviously
• 38:09
  Speaker 3: particularly prominent in the Landor-Goldman race, where that was a
• 38:12
  Speaker 3: primary point of distinction between the two of them.
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: In the Chevalier race.
• 38:18
  Speaker 3: In the Chevalier race, yes. And you see that in
• 38:22
  Speaker 3: each of the– like the knob, the dial turns to
• 38:24
  Speaker 3: different levels in each different race around the country around
• 38:27
  Speaker 3: those three things. The other question is, is the party
• 38:32
  Speaker 3: becoming– moving dramatically to the left, right? And I think
• 38:36
  Speaker 3: that one is interesting because it is an incontrovertible fact
• 38:40
  Speaker 3: that the party is more liberal than it was 10
• 38:44
  Speaker 3: years ago. Like when Obama ran for reelection in the
• 38:48
  Speaker 3: Gallup polling, 42% of Democrats considered themselves liberal or very
• 38:52
  Speaker 3: liberal and 36% considered themselves moderate. Today, north of 54%
• 38:58
  Speaker 3: consider themselves liberal or very liberal and 34% consider themselves moderate. Now,
• 39:03
  Speaker 3: I could do a full podcast on how that number
• 39:06
  Speaker 3: happens because the moderate number stays the same and the
• 39:09
  Speaker 3: liberal number goes up.
• 39:11
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 39:11
  Speaker 3: And it's certainly not from conservatives becoming liberals. It's because
• 39:13
  Speaker 3: the conservatives left the party and they're replaced by White
• 39:16
  Speaker 3: college-educated liberals who were former Republican voters. But that is true.
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: And white college-educated voters and just highly educated voters in
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: general have just become more– specifically become more liberal in
• 39:29
  Speaker 2: their own views. Yes.
• 39:31
  Speaker 3: And it has led to– as the party has become
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: less working class in its identity and frankly its orientation,
• 39:38
  Speaker 3: cultural issues, social issues, climate change, democracy, immigration, crime. LGBTQ
• 39:46
  Speaker 3: rights have risen in priority for the party, and that
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: has made people identify as more liberal. But it is
• 39:53
  Speaker 3: worth just remembering that the core part of any successful
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: Democratic coalition is Black voters, and Black voters remain more
• 40:02
  Speaker 3: moderate than the party. You see this in this really
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: fascinating Pew political typology study that came out last month.
• 40:08
  Speaker 3: It was very clear that Black and Latina voters and
• 40:10
  Speaker 3: Asian voters are much more moderate, or more moderate, sort
• 40:16
  Speaker 3: of this activist, more liberal Democratic base on crime and immigration.
• 40:22
  Speaker 3: Crime and immigration are the two. And then the other
• 40:24
  Speaker 3: question is, are Democrats becoming socialists? And this is also
• 40:27
  Speaker 3: really interesting because there is this Gallup poll that everyone
• 40:30
  Speaker 3: fixates on which showed that 66% of registered Democrats have
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: a positive view of socialism. And then in the New
• 40:37
  Speaker 3: York Times poll that we've talked ad nauseum about, 49%
• 40:40
  Speaker 3: of Democrats and Democrats leaning independents, it's one sample, have
• 40:47
  Speaker 3: a favorable view of socialism. And interestingly enough, a plurality
• 40:51
  Speaker 3: of every old age cohort, including Democrats over 65, have
• 40:56
  Speaker 3: a favorable view of socialism. Now, here's a pop quiz
• 40:59
  Speaker 3: for you. I asked Caroline this on Polar Coaster, but
• 41:01
  Speaker 3: can you guess which group has the highest favorability of socialism?
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: Let's see. Young men.
• 41:09
  Speaker 3: Well, which age cohort? It is actually men 30 to 44.
• 41:13
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: But 30 to 44 are... That's us, right? No, that's me.
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: That's you.
• 41:17
  Speaker 3: That's not me anymore. Thank you for pointing that out.
• 41:20
  Speaker 3: Thank you for pointing that out.
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: No, it's not me anymore. Fuck, I'm 44.
• 41:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's true. It was you. You just moved in.
• 41:24
  Speaker 3: But it's actually... It's millennials more than younger. It's by
• 41:28
  Speaker 3: about nine points, actually. It's interesting, which I think is
• 41:31
  Speaker 3: coming of age in the Great Recession.
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, and it speaks to... sort of the question
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: that you're raising by these maybe surprising results to some people,
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: which is I do think it is more of a
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: commentary on capitalism and the failures of capitalism, at least
• 41:48
  Speaker 2: how people have felt that in their own lives, than
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: a love of socialism. Or I think if you asked then,
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: and I haven't seen a poll that's done this, like
• 41:56
  Speaker 2: what do you think of when you think of socialism?
• 41:58
  Speaker 2: They think of like Bernie Sanders and universal healthcare, not
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: abolishing prisons.
• 42:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah, which is not necessarily a– a lot of socialist
• 42:10
  Speaker 3: countries had a lot of prisons actually.
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: Famously so. Famously so.
• 42:16
  Speaker 3: Someone had gulags, you would say.
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: And you know what? Every country has borders.
• 42:21
  Speaker 3: That's true.
• 42:22
  Speaker 2: Every single one.
• 42:23
  Speaker 3: Both in their mind and in reality. So I was
• 42:26
  Speaker 3: going to say, the socialism, you hit on the key
• 42:28
  Speaker 3: point here, which is I think it's more of an
• 42:30
  Speaker 3: indictment of capitalism than socialism.
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 42:32
  Speaker 3: And so I guess the question is, if you're a Democrat,
• 42:35
  Speaker 3: how do you react to all of this? And the
• 42:38
  Speaker 3: advice that I've been giving candidates and other people is, one,
• 42:45
  Speaker 3: you have to find a way to separate yourselves from
• 42:50
  Speaker 3: the establishment that everyone hates. You can't be a typical Democrat,
• 42:53
  Speaker 3: and you have to understand what makes people so mad
• 42:56
  Speaker 3: about it and show that you have a solution to
• 42:58
  Speaker 3: it or are different from it. The second thing is
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: you don't have to embrace socialism, but you sure as
• 43:02
  Speaker 3: hell better understand what is causing people to embrace socialism
• 43:07
  Speaker 3: and speak to that economic pain. And you got to
• 43:10
  Speaker 3: find a way to, to have some sort of, um,
• 43:16
  Speaker 3: energy and excitement and authenticity in your, in your life.
• 43:20
  Speaker 3: Like what is like, I think what is, I think
• 43:23
  Speaker 3: powering some of these, these that social necessarily, but some socialists,
• 43:28
  Speaker 3: some DSA, some, more progressive candidates is they are speaking
• 43:31
  Speaker 3: with authenticity and conviction about issues, whether it's Abdul talking
• 43:35
  Speaker 3: about Medicare for all in Michigan, whether it's Platner talking
• 43:38
  Speaker 3: about how the system, the system, the elite system has
• 43:41
  Speaker 3: failed him and failed so many manners. It's how Zoran
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: has talked about cost of living. It's like, there's this
• 43:46
  Speaker 3: authenticity and conviction to it that most of the people
• 43:50
  Speaker 3: that you don't get from a lot of moderate, it's
• 43:52
  Speaker 3: not all moderates or somebody certainly do it, but it
• 43:54
  Speaker 3: doesn't show up in the same way.
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: There's another, there's two more, um, reasons that i think
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: there's so much anger at the democratic establishment right now
• 44:04
  Speaker 2: um one is we have said for a long time
• 44:09
  Speaker 2: now since iraq that um people they don't want to
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: spend money on endless foreign wars they don't want to
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: lose american lives and forever wars they also don't want
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: to spend a lot of money because they feel like
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: we spent and they're right like billions and billions and
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: trillions of dollars on iraq and other foreign adventures that
• 44:26
  Speaker 2: have not worked out um I think that is how
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: most people who are upset with how Biden handled Gaza feel, right?
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: It is not Israel has no right to exist. It
• 44:40
  Speaker 2: is why is our money being spent or being sent
• 44:46
  Speaker 2: to Bibi Netanyahu and the Israeli government who have just
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: slaughtered thousands and thousands and thousands of people in Gaza
• 44:56
  Speaker 2: and are now doing the same in Lebanon. And that
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: feeling cuts across party, ideology. It is not fucking horseshoe.
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: It is not like the far left and the far right.
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: Go sit in a focus group. Go talk to most voters.
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: It's a very common feeling. And the fact that people
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: look at the Democratic establishment and don't feel like that
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: they are on or they feel the same way or
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: they're acting the same way is a huge fucking problem.
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: You also said people are mad that the Democratic establishment
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: hasn't stood up to Trump enough. I also think Dave
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: Weigel made this point today, a reporter at Semaphore, that
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: they're still mad that the Democratic establishment fucking lost to
• 45:34
  Speaker 2: Trump again. Like that is, I know we're all like,
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: we don't want to go back and look back at
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: 24 and all that kind of stuff. Like we lost
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: to Donald Trump for the second time after the guy
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: was convicted of crimes and sent an insurrectionist mob to
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: the Capitol.
• 45:49
  Speaker 3: That's the original sentence.
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah. The people who were in charge there, people aren't
• 45:53
  Speaker 2: going to feel too warm and fuzzy towards them. Like
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: that is just, that is, that to me is looming
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: over everything. Like, yes, there's the corporate stuff and economic,
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: like all that is real money in politics, establishment, two codes,
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: all of it's real for sure. But like, if we
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: had just beaten Donald Trump, then a lot of voters
• 46:11
  Speaker 2: would not think that. Yeah. And so, uh, that's, that's
• 46:15
  Speaker 2: going to be a big one too.
• 46:24
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  Speaker 2: Terms and conditions apply. So here's something fun. The primary
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  Speaker 2: season isn't over yet. and the left is targeting a
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: few other big races in places that aren't as blue
• 49:24
  Speaker 2: as New York City. We talked about some of these,
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: but in Colorado, Democratic Socialist Milat Kiros is running against
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: Congressman Diana DeGette, though that's also a safe seat, even
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: DSA state rep Francesca Hong is running for governor in
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: a crowded field that includes Lieutenant Governor Sarah Rodriguez and
• 49:43
  Speaker 2: Mandela Barnes. And in Michigan, our pal Abdul El-Sayed is
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: in a tight Senate primary with Mallory McMorrow and Representative
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: Haley Stevens. So it does feel like there's a little
• 49:53
  Speaker 2: more at stake in the Wisconsin and Michigan primaries. What
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: is your read on those?
• 49:58
  Speaker 3: You know, it's very hard to play the prospective electability game.
• 50:05
  Speaker 4: Right?
• 50:05
  Speaker 3: The argument here is among some, and I'm not making
• 50:08
  Speaker 3: this argument that Hong and Abdul are less electable than
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: other candidates on the ballot. And in Wisconsin, there's already
• 50:17
  Speaker 3: a movement. One of the center left candidates has dropped
• 50:20
  Speaker 3: out and endorsed Rodriguez. And as there's a movement to
• 50:23
  Speaker 3: try to consolidate the field around Rodriguez, I honestly don't
• 50:27
  Speaker 3: know enough about that race to know for sure that
• 50:32
  Speaker 3: one candidate is more electable than the other. Um, I
• 50:35
  Speaker 3: know that's a very hard race, right? It's a very
• 50:38
  Speaker 3: tough state. Winning a third term in a row is
• 50:42
  Speaker 3: always challenging for governors. So, you know, that's going to
• 50:45
  Speaker 3: be a tough race. Michigan, the polling is, you know,
• 50:49
  Speaker 3: Abdul is leading in the polls. Haley Stevens is in second.
• 50:53
  Speaker 3: The candidate that I have supported, Marilyn Monroe, is in third.
• 50:57
  Speaker 3: There have been hypothetical tests against Mike Rogers, who's a very,
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: very good candidate. He lost by just, I think, about 24,000
• 51:02
  Speaker 3: votes to Alyssa Slotkin in 24. You know, the polling
• 51:07
  Speaker 3: shows that we've seen shows maybe McMorrow and Stevens, a
• 51:10
  Speaker 3: couple points more, you know, doing better against Rogers than Abdul.
• 51:15
  Speaker 3: I don't know what to make of that, whether that
• 51:17
  Speaker 3: is real or not. It's not significant. It's not a
• 51:18
  Speaker 3: dramatic difference in that. So it's, it's hard to say.
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: Abdul is obviously a very, very talented candidate is very
• 51:24
  Speaker 3: talented communicator. Would he be able to navigate the tax
• 51:27
  Speaker 3: that will certainly come to him as a, as a
• 51:31
  Speaker 3: Bernie endorsed candidate? candidate, a Muslim candidate who will be
• 51:35
  Speaker 3: attacked for his views on everything in his background. He
• 51:39
  Speaker 3: certainly is talented enough to be able to navigate that,
• 51:41
  Speaker 3: but I am not, I can't look at those races
• 51:43
  Speaker 3: and say, if we nominate the, you know, Hong or Abdul,
• 51:47
  Speaker 3: we're certainly going to lose. Like it's, it's not that
• 51:51
  Speaker 3: it's not that clear to me. And it's certainly no
• 51:53
  Speaker 3: one has presented evidence to that fact.
• 51:55
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 51:56
  Speaker 2: It's tough. I mean, look, I I'm, and I'm supporting Abdul, um,
• 52:00
  Speaker 2: his friend had a pot on crooked, um, But I'll
• 52:03
  Speaker 2: be honest, that is the race where, and again, because
• 52:07
  Speaker 2: it's less about, I mean, it is about who these
• 52:10
  Speaker 2: candidates are, but it's also very much about the environment
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: in the state. And even like Plattner is running in
• 52:17
  Speaker 2: a state that is much, much more democratic than Michigan.
• 52:21
  Speaker 2: And I do think that if a Bernie endorsed sort
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: of more lefty candidate can pull it off in Michigan,
• 52:29
  Speaker 2: I do think Abdul can do it. But I think
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: it's gonna be tough. Um, and like, he's going to
• 52:34
  Speaker 2: face all kinds of attacks, um, not just for his
• 52:37
  Speaker 2: ideological position, but many unfair attacks, like you said, because he's,
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: he's Muslim. Um, so I think that's going to be,
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: that's going to be challenged, I think. And then I
• 52:44
  Speaker 2: think with Francesco, same thing, and I don't, I don't
• 52:47
  Speaker 2: know her as well, but I saw it like she'd had,
• 52:51
  Speaker 2: you know, she'd had some past support for, or advocated
• 52:54
  Speaker 2: at one point, like defund the police. And then last week,
• 52:57
  Speaker 2: you know, she had a video that said, there's no
• 52:59
  Speaker 2: way I'm going to cut public safety. And that to
• 53:01
  Speaker 2: me is like, okay. this is the kind, like, yes,
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: this is what you need to do to win these states.
• 53:07
  Speaker 2: And like, if you are a further left candidate in
• 53:10
  Speaker 2: a state like Wisconsin, in a state like Michigan, I'm
• 53:13
  Speaker 2: not saying like, just, you know, change all of your
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: fucking positions. You shouldn't do that. But you do have
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: to run, like you're running a general election in a
• 53:22
  Speaker 2: purple state, which you are, and know where the voters
• 53:26
  Speaker 2: are and know the most important issues, Medicare for all, healthcare,
• 53:30
  Speaker 2: sort of economic populism, And I would imagine that they're
• 53:34
  Speaker 2: going to emphasize those above all else and then have
• 53:37
  Speaker 2: something to say on some of the attacks that are
• 53:40
  Speaker 2: going to come their way on crime and immigration and
• 53:42
  Speaker 2: cultural issues. But I don't think that's going to be easy.
• 53:45
  Speaker 2: Mamdani campaigned, has all kinds of past positions, and he
• 53:48
  Speaker 2: has increased the police budget since he's been mayor. And
• 53:52
  Speaker 2: guess what? And he's done all of his other stuff
• 53:53
  Speaker 2: that he talked about, right? The rent freeze, I believe,
• 53:55
  Speaker 2: is going into effect today. He's trying to do all
• 53:57
  Speaker 2: the other stuff. And he's wildly popular.
• 53:59
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 54:00
  Speaker 9: It is.
• 54:00
  Speaker 3: When we talked about some– the Tea Party comparison here
• 54:05
  Speaker 3: is that in both the 2010 and 2012 Senate races,
• 54:10
  Speaker 3: the Republicans nominated a bunch of candidates in states they
• 54:12
  Speaker 3: should have won, like Indiana, Missouri, Delaware in 2010, where
• 54:17
  Speaker 3: Mike Castle would have walked into the Senate. And instead,
• 54:21
  Speaker 3: they nominated Christine O'Donnell, who did not walk into the Senate.
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: Nor did she fly in on her broomstick.
• 54:27
  Speaker 3: Nor did she fly in on her broomstick. Deep cut,
• 54:31
  Speaker 3: deep cut. This is a 15-year-old reference to a Senate race.
• 54:35
  Speaker 2: 15, yeah, okay, 15.
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: 16, 16 years. But one of the mistakes those candidates
• 54:43
  Speaker 3: made is they also ran terrible races because they refused
• 54:45
  Speaker 3: to acknowledge the reality of the states in which they
• 54:48
  Speaker 3: were running. And you can be a liberal candidate, you
• 54:53
  Speaker 3: can be more liberal than the electorate and still win
• 54:56
  Speaker 3: if you are running a smart strategic race that does
• 55:00
  Speaker 3: acknowledge the realities of what it takes to win in
• 55:03
  Speaker 3: a state like Wisconsin or Michigan.
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: And it depends on which issues you're more liberal than
• 55:08
  Speaker 2: the electorate on.
• 55:10
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 55:10
  Speaker 2: That's a big one. We use like liberal, conservative, left,
• 55:13
  Speaker 2: right as just like these catch-all terms, but it really
• 55:15
  Speaker 2: depends on what you're talking about.
• 55:17
  Speaker 3: That's right. That's right. And it's not just issues. It's
• 55:20
  Speaker 3: obviously things you've said, things you've done, who you are,
• 55:23
  Speaker 3: your cultural connection to people. But yes, you can– like
• 55:26
  Speaker 3: if you were a serious candidate, can win in the
• 55:29
  Speaker 3: right environment, running the right campaign.
• 55:31
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 55:32
  Speaker 2: All right. So Tommy talked to Maggie Haberman and Jonathan
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: Swan this week about their new Trump book, Regime Change.
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: Go listen to that interview if you haven't already. It's great.
• 55:40
  Speaker 2: But one of the more incredible anecdotes in the book
• 55:44
  Speaker 2: is a dinner at the White House in October of
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: last year– where Trump asks Rupert Murdoch, in front of
• 55:51
  Speaker 2: Marco Rubio and J.D. Vance, who are sitting at the table,
• 55:55
  Speaker 2: which one he liked best, and to rate both of them.
• 55:59
  Speaker 2: And Murdoch reportedly said of Rubio, Marco is brilliant, and
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: said of Vance, I think J.D. has the potential to
• 56:07
  Speaker 2: be great. Vance apparently tried to laugh it off with
• 56:12
  Speaker 2: a sarcastic line.
• 56:14
  Speaker 4: Oh, thanks.
• 56:14
  Speaker 2: Thanks, Rupert. Thanks a lot. Of course, We here at
• 56:18
  Speaker 2: Pod Save America think Murdoch and Trump and others are
• 56:21
  Speaker 2: just being grossly unfair to our boy, J.D., who has
• 56:25
  Speaker 2: continued to just ooze charisma during the press tour for
• 56:29
  Speaker 2: his new book. Just as one example, check out this
• 56:33
  Speaker 2: exchange with conservative columnist Ross Douthat at The New York Times.
• 56:38
  Speaker 2: Let's be honest.
• 56:39
  Speaker 7: The tone of the administration is not consistently a Christian tone.
• 56:45
  Speaker 7: There is a tone of aggressive uncharity to people who
• 56:50
  Speaker 7: aren't on board with the administration's policies.
• 56:52
  Speaker 10: The tone argument is in some ways, I think, people
• 56:56
  Speaker 10: see what they want to see. And I also think
• 56:59
  Speaker 10: that tonal arguments are ways of frankly policing working class
• 57:04
  Speaker 10: ways of communication and covering them in elite preferences.
• 57:09
  Speaker 2: Okay. I think the tonal arguments are ways of policing
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: working-class ways of communication and covering them in elite preferences.
• 57:23
  Speaker 2: Few things. First of all, you sound like the right-wing
• 57:27
  Speaker 2: version of a woke scold from academia who can't get
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: off blue sky. That's what that sounded like. Two, I'm
• 57:34
  Speaker 2: not sure how the... Manhattan billionaire president calling Americans he
• 57:40
  Speaker 2: doesn't like human scum is a working class way of communication.
• 57:44
  Speaker 2: And I do think it's a bit insulting to working
• 57:46
  Speaker 2: class Americans that J.D. Vance assumes that they all speak
• 57:50
  Speaker 2: about their fellow Americans that way. I'm also not sure
• 57:53
  Speaker 2: when loving thy neighbor and Christian charity became an elite preference.
• 57:59
  Speaker 2: That is an elite preference now.
• 58:01
  Speaker 3: Wild.
• 58:02
  Speaker 2: Just from top to bottom, wild. Is that just me?
• 58:07
  Speaker 2: I don't know. I couldn't believe that when I saw that.
• 58:10
  Speaker 3: I would say you did say to us in our
• 58:12
  Speaker 3: production meeting today that you could do a whole podcast
• 58:14
  Speaker 3: on this topic.
• 58:17
  Speaker 2: I think it was like the last time I tweeted, actually.
• 58:19
  Speaker 2: I mean, I've been retweeting things here and there, but
• 58:23
  Speaker 2: the last time I really tweeted was a week ago
• 58:25
  Speaker 2: because I've been trying not to tweet that much. But
• 58:27
  Speaker 2: I saw that and I just, first of all, I
• 58:28
  Speaker 2: couldn't stop laughing. And then I listened to the whole
• 58:31
  Speaker 2: interview with Ross, which was fun, which was a real journey.
• 58:36
  Speaker 3: I think people should know that you had a day
• 58:39
  Speaker 3: to yourself in Chicago.
• 58:41
  Speaker 2: I did.
• 58:41
  Speaker 3: A beautiful summer day in Chicago, but you were by yourself.
• 58:44
  Speaker 3: You could have done anything in the world.
• 58:46
  Speaker 2: And what did you do?
• 58:47
  Speaker 4: And I did.
• 58:47
  Speaker 2: And it was a beautiful day. And I walked down
• 58:49
  Speaker 2: by the lake and I walked all the way to
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: Lincoln Park where we used to live. And I had
• 58:53
  Speaker 2: a great day. But while I was walking, I was listening.
• 58:57
  Speaker 3: You thought to myself. I was listening to Interesting.
• 58:59
  Speaker 2: Times with Ross Douthat and J.D.
• 59:01
  Speaker 11: Vance.
• 59:02
  Speaker 2: And J.D. Vance.
• 59:03
  Speaker 3: Good for you.
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: Look.
• 59:04
  Speaker 3: I very much agree with you here. It is like
• 59:08
  Speaker 3: using the term tone policing is just perfect. But like
• 59:13
  Speaker 3: the bigger point with this is and it says something
• 59:17
  Speaker 3: about J.D. Vance, which is J.D. Vance came from a
• 59:19
  Speaker 3: working class background. Like his story is very famous. but
• 59:23
  Speaker 3: what he, and it is a, you know, as told
• 59:26
  Speaker 3: in his book and the Netflix movie of which he
• 59:29
  Speaker 3: was a producer made of his life story, um, tells
• 59:33
  Speaker 3: you is that he picked himself up by his bootstraps,
• 59:36
  Speaker 3: went to an Ivy league college, went to the military,
• 59:39
  Speaker 3: became quite successful. We came a venture capitalist, CNN commentator,
• 59:43
  Speaker 3: all the things that all the, all, all the checklists
• 59:46
  Speaker 3: on the MAGA resume that you need, Hollywood producer, venture capitalist, and, uh,
• 59:52
  Speaker 3: and Hollywood producer, or CNN commentator, all of the above,
• 59:56
  Speaker 3: and became an elite. Like, that's his story. The story
• 59:58
  Speaker 3: is someone who was raised in this incredible, difficult scenario
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 3: involving drug addiction and poverty and rises to the most
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 3: elite pinnacles of American society, becomes the vice president of
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 3: the United States. But what he has taken from that
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 3: is that, is he's become elite. And he looks down
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 3: his nose at everyone else. Because this is the, he
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 3: tries to, in the Trump era, not the pre-Trump era,
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 3: but in his post, Trump's no longer Hitler, I shall
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 3: work for him and serve him era, he tries to
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 3: put on the clothes of an anti-elitist. But he is
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 3: a pure elitist. And there is nothing more elitist than
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 3: saying that basically telling someone not to be a dick
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 3: to their fellow citizens is anti-working class.
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 2: Look, when Trump goes out there and And Rob Reiner
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 2: dies and he celebrates with the Truth Social Post or
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 2: celebrates that Bob Mueller dies with the Truth Social Post.
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 2: That's just what working class people do.
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 3: That's what they're doing at the diner, at the bar.
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 2: That's just how they talk. And the reason he knows
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 2: that is because he serves a working class president, Donald Trump.
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 2: Donald J. Trump cares about the working people, is of
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: the working people. And that's just, that's how he talks.
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 2: That's how working class people talk.
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 3: When the working class president fires off an offensive truth
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 3: from the gold toilet upon which he's sitting, that is
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 3: working class talk.
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah, when he says, look, we just can't afford childcare.
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 2: We can't afford to give people childcare, but also check
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 2: out my ballroom and look at the gold. Look at
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 2: the gold everywhere. That's, again, if I had a nickel
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 2: for every time a working class person said that, I
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 2: wouldn't be working class. I'd be as....
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 5: Oh, J.D.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 4: Vance.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: Amazing. Ross Douthat, he looked like he wanted to laugh, too.
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 3: Which is the first time that's ever happened in Ross
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 3: Douthat's life. A truly humorless man.
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: I felt bad for Ross because the problem with that
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 2: interview was he had to cram too many topics in
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 2: because J.D. Vance only gave him a certain amount of time.
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 2: And so there were so many crazy things that J.D.
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 2: Vance said that you could tell that Douthat wanted to
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 2: follow up on, and he moved on to the next thing.
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 2: And I was like, you should have. I would have
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 2: asked him about that sentence, maybe.
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 3: You would have done a whole podcast.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: J.D.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 3: Vance, come on offline, do a whole podcast about this.
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 2: Iran, religion, all the other stuff, I would have just
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 2: given up, and I would have been like, let's talk
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 2: about the tonal arguments and the tone policing. We don't
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 2: want to be tone policing. Anyway, one more of these
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 2: from J.D.
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 9: Vance.
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 2: There was another very human, very authentic Vance moment this
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 2: week that also got a lot of attention. Apparently, Usha
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 2: Vance hosts a YouTube series called Storytime with the Second Lady,
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 2: where she and a guest read to kids. Very nice.
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 2: And this week's special guest... was J.D., who is allegedly
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 2: her husband. Let's see how it went.
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 11: Today's special reader is my husband, Vice President of the
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 11: United States, J.D.
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 4: Vance.
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 8: Thanks for joining us today, honey.
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: Of course.
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 2: Good to see you. Now, if you're just listening to this,
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: pause it. Go to the YouTube app on your phone.
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 2: Go to Pods of America YouTube or your laptop. Get
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 2: to the nearest YouTube app you can get to. And
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 2: watch this, because what he does there is he says,
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 2: good to see you, and then reaches awkwardly across and
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: gives her two fatherly pats on the knee, very light
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 2: pats on the knee, just light pats, pulls the hand back,
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 2: and then they just sit and stare at each other.
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 2: Is that how you and Holly greet each other after
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 2: a long day apart, Dan?
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 3: I will say that if you can't, look, it's hard
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 3: to be a public figure, right? The glare of the
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 3: spotlight- is intense. But if there's one moment where you
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 3: could possibly be yourself, it would be sitting with your wife.
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 3: And he is incapable of doing that. It honestly seems
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 3: like they have never met each other.
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: It's not like he had to give her a big kiss.
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 2: He could have just done nothing. He didn't have to
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 2: tap her knee like that.
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 3: You can see it going through his head.
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 2: He looked like he was about to be like, looks
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: like you got a bun in the oven there.
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 3: Honestly, it's just.
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: I mean, I just.
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 3: It's like the first meeting between a man who's never
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 3: had a date before and a mail-order bride. It's just so...
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 3: I just don't.
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 2: Also, like, I hope everyone realizes that they could have
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 2: edited that, right? They could have done another take. They
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 2: could have cut that part out. It wasn't a live performance.
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 2: It was a White House thing.
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it does make you wonder, are there, somewhere on
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 3: the cutting room floor of the White House, are there
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 3: nine knee pads that were less affectionate than that one?
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Did he perhaps like high five her for the
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 2: first time?
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 3: Is there a fist bump?
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 2: Did he shake her hand? Nice to see you. I'm JD.
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 2: Wow. Anyway, watch out Marco Rubio.
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 3: As Rupert Murdoch would say, he's got the potential to
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 3: be great.
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 2: He certainly does. He certainly does. That potential, it's there somewhere.
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 2: We have not seen it yet. Neither has Rupert, but
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 2: it's there. Okay. When we come back, I'll talk to
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 2: the Democratic candidate for governor of Texas, Gina Hinojosa. Pots
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• 1:06:38
  Speaker 2: food and dog food because he really likes the real
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 2: food and is always trying to get it off the table.
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 2: But now that he has Sundays, he is very excited
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 2: every time he eats. We pour it into the bowl,
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 2: he runs to the bowl, and it's easy to store.
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 2: It doesn't smell bad like some of the other dog food,
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 2: and we love it. Make the switch to Sundays. Go
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 2: right now to sundaysfordogs.com slash crooked50. Gina Hinojosa, welcome to
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 2: Pod Save America. It's great to be with you. So
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 2: there's been plenty of national focus on the Texas Senate
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 2: race between James Tallarico and Ken Paxton. There's been less
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 2: attention paid to the gubernatorial race that you're running against
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 2: three-term incumbent Greg Abbott, who's running for a record fourth
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 2: term as governor. We'll get to him in a minute.
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 2: But for all the people listening who are meeting you
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 2: for the first time, who are you and what made
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 2: you get into the race?
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 11: So I am running for governor of Texas because what
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 11: I see in 2026 is that everything is on the
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 11: line and this is perhaps our last best chance to
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 11: save what we hold dear in Texas and in this country.
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 11: And to explain, I grew up on the border with Mexico.
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 11: I grew up in the Rio Grande Valley in Brownsville, Texas.
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 11: And I was raised on the promise of the American
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 11: dream there. We used to cross back and forth between
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 11: Texas and Mexico all the time back then. And I
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 11: remember as a little girl being struck by extreme poverty
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 11: I witnessed in Mexico. And I remember asking my dad, why? Why,
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 11: when we cross into Mexico, are there beggars? I said, beggars,
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 11: we didn't have homelessness then. We didn't have a word
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 11: for it.
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 8: I said, beggars. And then when we cross back into Texas,
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 8: there are none.
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 11: And I'll never forget, my dad said, because in Mexico,
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 11: they have the rich and then they have the poor
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 11: and they don't have.
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 8: Much in between.
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 11: And in America, we have a strong middle class. And
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 11: he was talking about the American dream and working Texans.
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 11: right now are struggling to achieve the American dream in
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 11: a big way. It is why I'm running for office.
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 11: It happened to me. I never meant to run for anything.
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 11: I made my husband promise to never run for office
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 11: before we got married. But they tried to shut down
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 11: my son's school. So I ran for the school board. One,
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 11: that fight for schools took me to the Texas House.
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 11: And what I see in the Texas House is the
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 11: reason our schools are shutting down. The reason we are
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 11: struggling so much is because we are paying into a
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 11: system that is working against us. It is one big grift.
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 11: It is policy that is driven by moneyed special interests.
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 11: And I refer to it as the Greg Abbott corruption tax.
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 11: We pay more, we get less because we are all
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 11: paying the Greg Abbott corruption tax. And now we have
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 11: over a hundred schools shutting down in Texas. We have
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 11: over 150 school districts operating at four days a week,
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 11: whole school districts, because they can't afford to operate at
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 11: five days a week. Um, We have the most people
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 11: being disconnected from their electricity of any other state. We
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 11: have the most uninsured of any other state. We have
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 11: the most uninsured children of any state. We have the
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 11: most bankruptcies. We have the first major American city in
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 11: Corpus Christi to potentially run out of water, despite the
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 11: fact we are paying about 75% more in property taxes
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 11: under Greg Abbott.
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 8: That is Greg Abbott's record. And he owns it. And
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 8: that's where I'm running.
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 11: I have a plan to save Texas schools and to
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 11: put money in your pocket. And I think it's important
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 11: that people understand, yes, we fight for our public schools
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 11: because of our kids and our community. But we fight
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 11: for public schools because there can be no American dream
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 11: without strong public schools.
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 8: Because public schools.
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 11: Provide the opportunity, the gateway for the American dream. And
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 11: of course, if we can't afford to live and thrive
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 11: in Texas where we live, then there can be no
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 11: American dream. When I was a little girl, Texas was
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 11: the American dream manifest, right? But that is why I'm running.
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 11: We have to fight to win back the American dream.
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 2: So you're no stranger to politics, even though you didn't
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 2: think you would run. You've served in the Texas House
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 2: and I believe your father, who you mentioned, was chair
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 2: of the Democratic Party in Texas for about a decade.
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 2: What did you learn from him about politics and the
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 2: state of the Democratic Party in Texas? Yeah.
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 11: Well, to be clear, the number one lesson I learned
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 11: was that I did not want that life for myself.
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 2: Interesting. How come?
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 11: Because my dad belonged to the world and not to me.
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 11: And I wanted a quieter, simpler life.
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 8: I'm a lawyer.
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 11: I had a small practice. I thought that's what I
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 11: would do. I would be the best at my small practice.
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 11: And that is why I made my husband promise to
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 11: never run for office. But life had other plans. So
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 11: that's what I mostly learned. But I will tell you
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 11: that it is in the Texas house where I have
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 11: learned that really there's so much noise, but there is
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 11: one fight.
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 11: And that fight is the fight of 2026 in this country,
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 11: in this state. And it is, are we going to
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 11: be a state that is by and for the people
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 11: or are we living in the billionaire's world and we're
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 11: just here?
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 8: That is the fight.
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 11: That is the fight that is behind why schools are closing.
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 11: That is the fight behind why we can't afford to
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 11: pay things. That's the fight behind why Corpus Christi is
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 11: running out of water.
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 8: That is the fight.
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 2: Speaking of billionaires and money in politics, the man you're
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 2: running against is sitting on more than $ 100 million. Recent
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 2: poll had about a third of Texas voters saying they
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 2: don't know enough about you to have an opinion. How
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 2: do you introduce yourself to a state as big as Texas,
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 2: especially when the current governor has so much money to
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 2: run his own ads and campaign?
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 8: Yeah, you're right.
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 11: Texas is giant. Running for governor of Texas is like
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 11: running for president.
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 4: Yeah. Right.
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 8: We're doing things differently.
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 11: We've divided the state up into seven regions, running like
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 11: full congressional campaigns in each of those regions because we
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 11: are such a big and diverse state. What the polling
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 11: shows is that since the end of last year, my
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 11: name ID has gone up 20 points. We went from
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 11: nine points down to five points down as that's happened.
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 11: And so as people get to know who I am,
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 11: they're with me. And people want change. What I am
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 11: seeing across the state, what elections are showing in Texas,
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 11: what polling is showing is that there is this anti-incumbency
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 11: energy in Texas right now. And Greg Abbott offers more
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 11: of the same. And his problem, even though he has
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 11: all that money in his campaign account, is that you
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 11: use money to tell people who you are and what
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 11: you're about.
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 8: And that's his problem.
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 11: People know who he is and what he is about,
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 11: and they don't want it anymore.
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 8: They want change.
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 11: The number one response I get from people when I
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 11: say I'm running for governor against Greg Abbott, he can
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 11: run again. Like, really?
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 8: Don't we have term limits?
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 2: Well, and I'm sure there's plenty to say about him
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 2: and his record. What is the one specific thing he's
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 2: done that you would point to if a voter– because
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 2: you'll probably need some of these voters, right? People who
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 2: voted for Greg Abbott three times now. You have a
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 2: three-time Abbott voter who's at least open to a different
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 2: choice this time, but isn't sure. What's the one thing
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 2: you'd say about what Greg Abbott has done to persuade
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 2: that person?
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 11: He's given a billion dollars in no-bid contracts to his donors.
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 11: He's the most corrupt governor in Texas history. I'm not
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 11: saying something. We've never had this level of corruption. But
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 11: every major challenge in Texas... is about follow the money
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 11: right back to Greg Abbott's donors.
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 2: So it's common for challengers to say the incumbent is corrupt,
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 2: worked for billionaires. Beto said a version of this about
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 2: Abbott in 2022. Lupe Valdez said it in 2018, both
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 2: still lost by single to double digits. Why do you
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 2: think this will land in 2026 where it hasn't worked
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 2: as well before?
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 11: Well, what we are seeing is that it is already
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 11: landing in Texas. And 2018, you referenced, that was the
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 11: closest we've come in a long time to potentially flipping
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 11: a seat statewide in Texas. That's when Beto ran against
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 11: Ted Cruz, right?
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 8: That's the last time.
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 2: We had- 25 points, right?
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 8: That's right.
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 2: Remember it.
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 11: That's the last time we had a midterm election with
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 11: Trump in the White House.
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 11: And Democrats swept. We picked up 12 seats in the
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 11: Texas House. We flipped all of Harris County, Houston. So
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 11: Democrats swept in a big way. We were not ready, right?
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 11: Maybe we could have flipped the whole Texas House had.
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 8: We been ready.
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 11: We are ready in 2026. And so for the first time,
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 11: we have Democrats running in every congressional seat, every state house,
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 11: state senate seat, and already we have seen dramatic improvement
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 11: in our performance. So Democrats overperformed Republicans in the primary.
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 11: That rarely happens in Texas. I had eight opponents in
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 11: my primary, and still I got twice as many votes
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 11: as Beto got in 2018 because people are doing the
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 11: work for change. And 2018 is different because we have
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 11: two strong candidates at the top of the ticket. Beto
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 11: was pretty much the only one who could raise real
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 11: money in 2018 and took on all the arrows, took
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 11: on the entire campaign. It's different this time around. What
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 11: we've yet to see, though, the thing that is to
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 11: be determined is are people going to believe what they
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 11: see with their own eyes in Texas where we're winning
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 11: Tarrant County? Tarrant County, for instance, that was the most
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 11: Republican county in the whole United States of America. We
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 11: flipped a state Senate seat swung it 31 points to
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 11: elect Taylor Romet. Steve Bannon embedded himself in Tarrant County
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 11: the month before that happened and said right off the bat,
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 11: I'm here because as goes Tarrant County, so goes Texas,
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 11: so goes the nation.
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 8: Well, we won it.
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 11: And it's not just Tarrant County. It happened in Cyphere.
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 11: It happened in Arlington. It happened in Leander. It happened
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 11: in Denton, Pearland. It is happening all over Texas. And
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 11: what we are seeing in 2026 is people just want change.
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 2: Education is a signature issue for you. You mentioned 100
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 2: plus schools are closing, 150 plus districts have gone to
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 2: four-day weeks. For someone outside Texas, what is actually happening
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 2: to the public schools right now? And what did Abbott
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 2: do to cause it?
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 11: So What I see in the Texas House, I sit
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 11: on the Public Education Committee with James Tarrico. We co-chaired
• 1:18:36
  Speaker 11: the effort to fight vouchers in 2023, and we beat
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 11: Greg Abbott then. We had rural Republicans join with us
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 11: to defend public schools and vote against vouchers. Greg Abbott
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 11: took out those Republicans who voted. with us in their
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 11: primaries by putting a million dollars in against each of
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 11: them in their primaries.
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 8: And so then he.
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 11: Got the votes and we passed it, vouchers, last year.
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 11: Vouchers is an example of what has happened to our
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 11: public schools in Texas. It is just vendor contract after
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 11: vendor contract to somebody who is connected to Greg Abbott.
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 8: And that is where our money for our public schools
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 8: is going.
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 11: So Greg Abbott received $ 12 million, the largest campaign contribution
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 11: in all of Texas history from an out-of-state billionaire, Jeff Yaz,
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 11: who has a financial interest in vouchers, right? That is
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 11: the kind of grift and corruption that people are feeling
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 11: in a real way. And so Those alliances I made
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 11: across the aisle with MAGA moms, with football coaches in
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 11: rural communities, with superintendents, principals, people who love their public
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 11: schools are angry in a big way at Greg Abbott
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 11: for what he's done to our public schools. And I
• 1:19:50
  Speaker 11: believe that that will be the difference in this election.
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 11: People see this as our last best chance to save
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 11: public schools in Texas.
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 2: Education used to be an issue that Democrats talked about.
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 2: Every campaign cycle all the time. I feel like in general,
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 2: the party has been fairly quiet about it recently. I've
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 2: heard you talk about it now. Rahm Emanuel has been
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 2: talking about it recently. But in general, why do you
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 2: think the Democratic Party has sort of shied away from
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 2: focusing on education? And what do you see as a
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 2: positive vision in public education and education in general for
• 1:20:27
  Speaker 2: both Texas and the country to take?
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 11: We've just gotten lost in all of really a lot
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 11: of high-tech solutions to education that have not worked. In Texas,
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 11: it's happened in a big way. Now they're trying to
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 11: push in Houston, Texas. Greg Abbott took over Houston ISD
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 11: and trying to put in 100 AI schools in Houston
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 11: with this idea that we don't need teachers, we need
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 11: education guides. And so it's Just a way for them
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 11: to make money off of our public school dollars. So
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 11: I'm proposing a back-to-basics approach where we pay teachers their worth.
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 11: And it doesn't feel sexy.
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 8: Back-to-basics. Pay teachers their worth.
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 11: Novel concept. It doesn't happen because nobody makes money off
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 11: of it but teachers. Billionaires don't make money off of it.
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 11: And I think in lots of ways– Democrats have moved
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 11: away from just the basics. Again, it's the American dream.
• 1:21:31
  Speaker 11: How can you have the American dream without strong public schools?
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 8: Public schools tell.
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 11: Every child you can be anything you want to be
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 11: if you put in the work. How are we letting
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 11: it happen that our public schools, and it's not just Texas,
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 11: but it's in Texas in a big, big way, are dying.
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 8: On the vine?
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 11: In Texas, there is a unique kind of pride. Texas
• 1:21:51
  Speaker 11: public schools are Friday night lights. They are enshrined in
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 11: our Texas pride. Constitution. They made us who we are.
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 11: People have big pride in public schools in Texas. And
• 1:22:01
  Speaker 11: I think that is why it is resonating in a
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 11: way that there is a possessiveness and an understanding that
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 11: this is a part of who we are.
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 8: And people are ready to fight for their public schools.
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 2: What do you do about low-performing public schools and low-performing teachers?
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 8: It's never the right answer to take.
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 11: Power away from parents and community when our public schools
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 11: are struggling. I do think we need a back-to-basics approach,
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 11: money in the classroom. We have had a teacher exodus
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 11: in Texas. We have, for the first time, Texas is
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 11: hiring more uncertified teachers than certified teachers by a lot.
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 11: We now have teachers who have no college degree being
• 1:22:47
  Speaker 11: hired in Texas. I have a neighboring school district. Their
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 11: number one source of new hires is out of the
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 11: country because they can't find people to work for what
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 11: we pay who have the experience.
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 8: We all know it's, again, not rocket science.
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 11: The best thing we can do for a child's education
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 11: is put a great teacher in the classroom. And we
• 1:23:09
  Speaker 11: have steered so far away from what we know works.
• 1:23:14
  Speaker 11: So again, it's a back to basics approach, making sure
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 11: we have great educators.
• 1:23:18
  Speaker 8: In the classroom.
• 1:23:19
  Speaker 2: Looking at the polls, some of your strongest numbers are
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 2: with Latino voters. Some polls have you up nearly 20 points. Trump,
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 2: of course, carried Latinos in Texas in 2024. You've said
• 1:23:30
  Speaker 2: the Latino vote can be the difference if we choose
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 2: to be. What does choose to be mean? And what
• 1:23:36
  Speaker 2: has the party gotten wrong over the last several years, decade,
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 2: at seeing sort of Latino voters either drift away from
• 1:23:45
  Speaker 2: the Democratic Party or, you know, in the case of 2024,
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 2: toward the Republican Party?
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 11: I think we have taken our eye off the prize
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 11: of what are we fighting for. Again, I think there
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 11: is one fight. It is the fight about whether it
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 11: is a country, a state that is by and for
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 11: the people. That is the fight for the American dream.
• 1:24:01
  Speaker 11: They are one in the same. And I think we
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 11: get distracted by culture wars and social issues.
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 8: We take the bait all the time. And I get it.
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 4: I mean, it.
• 1:24:13
  Speaker 8: Is infuriating things that Republicans do. do and say to
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 8: different groups that consist of our coalition.
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 11: But when we're fighting about those things, we are not
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 11: talking about the thing that impacts all of us. And
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 11: that is, can you afford to live and thrive in Texas?
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 11: And that has to be the fight. So the Latino
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 11: vote is hugely important to your point.
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 8: You're right. Absolutely.
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 11: In 2018, Beto got 64% of the Latino vote. Again,
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 11: the closest we've come in a long, long time to
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 11: winning as Democrats. When I get 64% of the Latino vote,
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 11: I win because there are more of us in the
• 1:24:55
  Speaker 11: voting population than there were then. To give you a
• 1:24:59
  Speaker 11: sense of where Latinos are in Texas in 2026, Taylor Romet,
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 11: who flipped that state Senate seat, got 79% of the
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 11: Latino vote in his election.
• 1:25:11
  Speaker 8: All right.
• 1:25:12
  Speaker 11: That is the potential. Of course, we're taking nothing for granted.
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 11: I am heavily focused on engaging the Latino vote in
• 1:25:20
  Speaker 11: this election. And if we choose to be as if
• 1:25:22
  Speaker 11: Latinos will show up, we have seen this year that
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 11: Latinos are showing up and we need Latinos to show
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 11: up in a big way in November.
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 2: I think one challenge Democrats have had over the last
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 2: decade is sort of assuming that for Latino voters, immigration
• 1:25:38
  Speaker 2: is the top issue. When, as you said, the economy
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 2: affordability is still number one, just as it is with
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 2: non-Latino voters. That said, Trump has decided to make immigration
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 2: central to his second administration even more than it was
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 2: in the first. I think that personally, what I've seen
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 2: from Democrats over the last decade is fear around the
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 2: issue of immigration. And so when you ask Democrats about immigration,
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 2: people either say, okay, we need a strong border for sure.
• 1:26:08
  Speaker 2: But what Trump's doing with ICE is horrific and wrong.
• 1:26:13
  Speaker 2: And That's about as far as it goes.
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 2: At some point, we'll be in power again, hopefully. So hopefully,
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 2: you'll be governor. What is a positive vision for immigration
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 2: that you think can rally the country behind the Democratic
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 2: Party that recognizes, as my old boss Barack Obama would
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 2: always say, that we're a nation of laws and a
• 1:26:37
  Speaker 2: nation of immigrants?
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 8: I think we have to stress that we're for border security.
• 1:26:41
  Speaker 8: We all want that.
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 11: I grew up on the border, of course. I want
• 1:26:44
  Speaker 11: border security. And what is happening right now is not that.
• 1:26:48
  Speaker 11: And the district attorney in Harris County will say he
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 11: has child sex abuse cases that he cannot prosecute because
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 11: the witnesses have been detained or deported or too afraid
• 1:26:59
  Speaker 11: to come forward. That makes us less safe, not more safe.
• 1:27:03
  Speaker 11: And here's the other thing. The other thing is that
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 11: it's hard to be generous to immigrants when Americans are
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 11: struggling themselves so much.
• 1:27:13
  Speaker 4: Hmm.
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 8: It is hard to be generous.
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 11: With the American dream when people feel like it's out
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 11: of reach for themselves, right?
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 8: I think it's a classic example.
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 11: Of the, you know, put your oxygen mask on first
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 11: and then help others in need. We have to recognize
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 11: that Americans working, Americans working Texans are not making it.
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 11: We need to make sure they get the oxygen mask
• 1:27:39
  Speaker 11: first and that we message and we work to deliver
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 11: for Americans first, really, for Texans first, that we're doing
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 11: everything we can to address, again, the one fight. The
• 1:27:53
  Speaker 11: one fight. Is this going to be a country and
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 11: a state for us or for moneyed interests?
• 1:27:59
  Speaker 2: Do you think we need to revamp our asylum laws?
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 8: Sounds like it, yes.
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:28:06
  Speaker 11: Yeah. And can I give you an example? So Biden's Last,
• 1:28:13
  Speaker 11: the December before his last year in office, remember we
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 11: had the caravans at the border. It was chaotic. People
• 1:28:21
  Speaker 11: in Texas were angry. And I got a call. I
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 11: was chair of the campaign committee for the Texas House
• 1:28:27
  Speaker 11: at the time. I got a call from my member
• 1:28:30
  Speaker 11: at Eagle Pass, who is a frontline member.
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 8: And he said, Gina, they.
• 1:28:33
  Speaker 11: Have shut down the border to Eagle Pass in Mexico.
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 8: This was the week before Christmas.
• 1:28:40
  Speaker 11: To all commerce, it is killing our local businesses. We
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 11: are going to lose. And I said, okay, let me
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 11: see what I can do. So I called the Biden
• 1:28:50
  Speaker 11: administration and I said, we need an emergency meeting. Within
• 1:28:54
  Speaker 11: 48 hours, we had their top border officials on the phone.
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 11: I had my border members on the phone. And the
• 1:29:02
  Speaker 11: Biden officials heard an earful about how this is not working.
• 1:29:06
  Speaker 8: Something needs to change.
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 11: That next week, the Biden administration sent delegates over to
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 11: negotiate enforcement on the Mexican side. And what you will
• 1:29:19
  Speaker 11: see in the numbers is that crossings plummeted when that happened.
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 11: We need, when it comes to immigration, like common sense solutions.
• 1:29:30
  Speaker 11: I think that there is no question that Biden avoided
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 11: the issue and did not deal with it until it
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 11: was out of control.
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 8: And we need to make sure that we.
• 1:29:40
  Speaker 11: Have people in office who stop playing politics with immigration
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 11: and just work on real solutions.
• 1:29:47
  Speaker 2: I unfortunately have to ask you about the screwworm, which
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 2: I had never heard of until a week or so ago.
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 2: For listeners, the New World screwworm is a flesh-eating parasite
• 1:29:55
  Speaker 2: that infests livestock. It was eradicated from the U.S. 60
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 2: years ago, but now it's back in Texas cattle for
• 1:30:00
  Speaker 2: the first time. Two things. How bad is this for Texas?
• 1:30:05
  Speaker 2: And also, the reporting is that all the cuts from
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 2: Trump and Doge slowed the federal response. Has Abbott said
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 2: one word criticizing the administration that hamstrung him and Texas?
• 1:30:17
  Speaker 2: And if not, what does that tell you?
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 8: Yeah, that Abbott is a weak governor.
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 11: We have a governor who understood years ago that the
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 11: screwworm was coming. It is in Texas now. It is
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 11: going to be very hard to eradicate. It is spreading
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 11: in Texas. Now that it is here, we're looking at
• 1:30:36
  Speaker 11: disastrous consequences. And I don't think it's just for Texans,
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 11: but yes, for Texas ranchers, for the price of beef.
• 1:30:43
  Speaker 11: That we have a governor who either didn't care enough
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 11: or didn't have the sway, the juice with the administration
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 11: and a secretary of agriculture from Texas under the administration
• 1:30:55
  Speaker 11: to say, hey, I understand you're dozing all this other stuff,
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 11: save this. This is important and we need to make
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 11: sure we're doing what we need to do is a
• 1:31:05
  Speaker 11: failure on Abbott's part. I lay this on the lap
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 11: of Abbott that he could not communicate with the Trump
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 11: administration the urgency of making sure we had a solution
• 1:31:16
  Speaker 11: before it was too late. And here we are now
• 1:31:19
  Speaker 11: with screwworm in Texas and spreading.
• 1:31:21
  Speaker 2: So there are, last question, there are just so many
• 1:31:25
  Speaker 2: very important, very competitive House and Senate races this year
• 1:31:28
  Speaker 2: that could decide control of Congress. There are other gubernatorial
• 1:31:31
  Speaker 2: races that, at least on paper, seem closer, more competitive
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 2: even than yours. For people who are looking to donate
• 1:31:38
  Speaker 2: their time and their money to midterm races this year,
• 1:31:41
  Speaker 2: why should they choose yours?
• 1:31:42
  Speaker 11: Because the fate of the union depends on Texas in 2026.
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 8: After the U.S.
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 11: Supreme Court decision on redistricting that gutted the Voting Rights Act,
• 1:31:53
  Speaker 11: there are now no rules. And what will happen in
• 1:31:56
  Speaker 11: Texas because Republican leaders have already said they're going to
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 11: draw new lines next year, we lose five Democrats in
• 1:32:03
  Speaker 11: Congress under a new map with no rules. That's on
• 1:32:08
  Speaker 11: top of what the Brennan Center predicts will happen at
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 11: the end of the decade through census, which is four
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 11: years away, that Texas will gain four to five more
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 11: congressional seats because we're growing faster than all the other states.
• 1:32:23
  Speaker 11: We take from blue states those congressional seats. If Republicans
• 1:32:28
  Speaker 11: control that, that's another four to five seats that Democrats
• 1:32:32
  Speaker 11: lose in Congress.
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 8: That's 10 seats in.
• 1:32:36
  Speaker 11: Congress that Democrats, that are off the table for Democrats
• 1:32:40
  Speaker 11: to The governor of Texas controls 10% of Congress.
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 2: We need a.
• 1:32:49
  Speaker 11: Governor in Texas who will veto their rigged maps. This
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 11: is the most important governor's race in the whole country
• 1:32:57
  Speaker 11: for that reason.
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 2: Gina Inarrosa, thank you so much for joining Pod Save America.
• 1:33:01
  Speaker 2: Good luck out there. Everyone always says, Democrats are dreaming
• 1:33:05
  Speaker 2: of Texas again. Same thing as you said. At some point,
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 2: we have to win Texas. Because Congress, the maps, but
• 1:33:14
  Speaker 2: also Electoral College. That's right, also. As the Midwestern states
• 1:33:19
  Speaker 2: start getting a little redder, we've got to make up
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 2: for it somewhere. Texas is just too big to ignore
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 2: at some point.
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 11: Congressional seats equate to electoral votes. So, right, if there's
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 11: no way to win Congress, then there's no way to
• 1:33:30
  Speaker 11: win the White House.
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 2: Well, thanks for what you're doing. Good luck out there.
• 1:33:34
  Speaker 4: Thank you.
• 1:33:34
  Speaker 2: And talk to you soon.
• 1:33:35
  Speaker 3: Thanks.
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 2: That's our show for today. Thanks to Gina Hinojosa for
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 2: coming on. Dan will be back in the feed on
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 2: Sunday with a conversation with Strict Scrutiny's Leah Littman. Have
• 1:33:44
  Speaker 2: a good weekend.
• 1:33:44
  Speaker 1: Bye, everyone.
• 1:33:45
  Speaker 2: Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. Our show
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 2: is produced by Austin Fisher, Saul Rubin, McKenna Roberts, and
• 1:33:50
  Speaker 2: Farrah Safari with Ree Cherlin, Elijah Cohn, and Adrian Hill.
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 2: Our team includes Matt DeGroat, Ben Hethcote, Jordan Cantor, Charlotte Landis,
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 2: Kirill Pelleviv, David Tolles, Mia Kelman, Ryan Young, and Naomi Single.
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 2: Our staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of
• 1:34:01
  Speaker 2: America East.