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Michael Cohen Incriminates Trump · Pod Save America

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: Tommy is out today because last Tuesday, he and Hannah
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: welcomed a baby boy into their family. James Vitor is
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: now home from the hospital. He's healthy. Hannah's doing great.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: Lizzie's excited to be a big sister. And Tommy's going
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: to be back hosting Wednesday's pod with special guest Jen
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: Psaki because we got lots of shows to do and
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: we're still down a host since Jon's on his eat, pray,
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  Speaker 1: love it journey this month.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: Well, congratulations to Tommy and Hannah. It's a beautiful baby.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: I'm so excited for them.
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  Speaker 1: So excited. All right. On today's show, Democratic Senate candidate
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: Colin Allred stops by the studio to talk to me
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: about beating Ted Cruz and his thoughts on everything from
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: immigration to Gaza. It's a really great conversation. So tune
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: in for that later. But first, the New York Times.
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: Just came out with a poll.
• 2:32
  Speaker 3: That shows us leading everywhere by a lot.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: This is the cover story.
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  Speaker 4: And I think you'll find it very interesting, but I'm
• 2:40
  Speaker 4: sure you've all read it.
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  Speaker 3: Leading in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan, Georgia, and Nevada.
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  Speaker 1: I think we're probably leading in New Jersey.
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  Speaker 3: We have the rally. Greg cannot prove his case.
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  Speaker 4: Got no evidence.
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  Speaker 2: And I'm innocent.
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  Speaker 1: Trump just summed up the show there. Another awesome, totally
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  Speaker 1: normal day in American politics. So we're going to cover
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: all that. Let's start with the trial where the prosecution's
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: star witness has taken the stand. For those of you
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: who don't remember, here's a refresher. Michael Cohen was Donald
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: Trump's personal lawyer and fixer for many years. In 2018,
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  Speaker 1: he was sentenced to three years in prison after pleading
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: guilty to some of the same crimes that he's now
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  Speaker 1: testifying Trump helped commit, namely disguising hush money payments as
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: legal expenses to evade campaign finance laws and hide the
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: Stormy Daniels story from voters. Cohen testified that Trump explicitly
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: directed him to make the hush money payment because after
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: the Access Hollywood tape came out, he thought the Stormy
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: Daniels story might cost him the election, saying, quote, this
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: is a disaster, a total disaster. Women will hate me.
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: Guys will think it's cool. But this is going to
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: be a disaster for the campaign. When Cohen asked Trump
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: how Melania would take it, Trump said, how long do
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: you think I'll be on the market for? Not long.
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: Great stuff. Great stuff, Dan. Husband of the year. That guy.
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  Speaker 1: So the concern for the prosecution heading into this testimony
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: was that Michael Cohen, not exactly an honest broker, had
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: some credibility issues, has perjured himself a few different times.
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: As of this recording, he still hasn't been cross-examined yet.
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  Speaker 1: But how do you think his testimony landed?
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: Well, I want to stipulate that the analysis I'm about
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: to give is based on tweets.
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  Speaker 1: That's the best kind of analysis.
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  Speaker 2: The reason why it's relevant here is based on all
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: the courtroom dramas I've seen, how a witness presents himself
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: to the jury is almost as important as what they say.
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: And I would say based on Michael Cohen's appearances, both
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: when he was shilling for Trump on cable and when
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: he was a Trump on cable, the guy does not
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: exude credibility, right?
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  Speaker 1: He's kind of a bit of a goofball.
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: Goofball. Sleazy goofball.
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: Slimy, slimy goofball is his general demeanor. And I think
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: it's something that the prosecutors are clearly aware of because
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: for much of his testimony, they seem to mostly be
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: using him to corroborate, testimony and evidence already introduced in
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: the record with yes or no questions, limiting his exposure
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: to the jury. But when he did testify to first-person accounts,
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: he did two things I think were very important legally,
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: but also politically in terms of making this case matter.
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  Speaker 2: One is he testified that Trump was actually involved, intimately
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  Speaker 2: involved in the scheme itself, and that's very important. And second,
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  Speaker 2: and this goes to the point you just made in
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  Speaker 2: the intro here, is he testified that Trump's motivation was
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: not necessarily about keeping this from his wife, it was
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: about the election. And that's so important, I think, in
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  Speaker 2: terms of making this case matter to voters, is that
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  Speaker 2: he was trying to hide a key piece of information
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  Speaker 2: from the voters before the election. And Cohen was crystal
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  Speaker 2: clear on that point.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, Cohen also testified that, quote, everything required Mr.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: Trump's sign-off. He also testified that he went to Trump's
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: office during the transition to discuss the reimbursement plan with
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: Trump and the Trump organization's CFO, Allen Weisselberg, who also
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  Speaker 1: went to jail, testified that Weisselberg showed the document calculating
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: Cohen's reimbursement to Trump and that Trump signed off. And
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: there's actually, to your point, there's a document with Weisselberg's
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  Speaker 1: handwriting on it saying that the reimbursement to Michael Cohen
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  Speaker 1: was grossed up so that Michael Cohen could pay the
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  Speaker 1: extra in taxes. Again, this is not what you do
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  Speaker 1: with legal expenses. So, yeah, it seems like there's a
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  Speaker 1: document for everything that Michael Cohen testified or at least
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  Speaker 1: some corroborating evidence in some way. And I don't know.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, like, I'm sure the defense has been preparing
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  Speaker 1: for this cross-examination for quite some time. But all the
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  Speaker 1: reporters in the courtroom on Monday have said that Cohen
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  Speaker 1: came off just like very matter-of-factly, didn't come off too crazy,
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  Speaker 1: didn't come off like a liar, just was like sort
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  Speaker 1: of just went through everything. And a lot of it
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  Speaker 1: was going through things where he was looking at a
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  Speaker 1: text or a document. And so it wasn't like Michael
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  Speaker 1: Cohen was freelancing a lot. Yeah, I'd just be interested.
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  Speaker 2: We will have multiple pods this week. So we'll also
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  Speaker 2: get to talk about the cross-examination. So I'll be interested
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  Speaker 2: to see how he withstands that.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. But again, like you said, it's really important that
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  Speaker 1: Trump thought he was doing this to help the campaign
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: because that would be the campaign finance violation. And it's
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: also important for the prosecution to prove that the business
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  Speaker 1: records were falsified, not just by Michael Cohen acting on
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  Speaker 1: his own, but that Trump knew that their business records
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  Speaker 1: were falsified, caused them to be falsified, directed them to
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  Speaker 1: be falsified, and did so with the intent to cover
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  Speaker 1: up this larger crime, which in this case was a
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: campaign finance violation. So do you see apparently Trump brought
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: a cheering section on Monday? He had Senators J.D. Vance
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: and Tommy Tuberville were there to provide, I guess, emotional
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  Speaker 1: support and also attack the witnesses and the jurors as
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: a way to get around Trump's gag order. Tommy Tuberville
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  Speaker 1: was like calling them, like suggesting that the jurors might
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  Speaker 1: not be Americans.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, what embarrassing shit for everyone involved. Right? Just
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: what a sad little baby Trump.
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  Speaker 4: Is, right?
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: He pretends to be this strongman dictator and he needs
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: an emotional support center to make it through the day. Like,
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: I mean, that's what the point he says is that
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  Speaker 2: Trump's team was very worried about how this was impacting
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  Speaker 2: his mental health. They want him to have people in
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  Speaker 2: the audience who he knows loves him so that he
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: can look at, which is obviously not his family. It
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: is like thirsty wannabe MAGA senators like J.D. Vance and
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  Speaker 2: Tom Thurber. And for those two men, what an embarrassment.
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  Speaker 2: Have some pride. You're United States senators. If you want
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: to shill for Trump, and especially in J.D. Vance's case,
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  Speaker 2: sacrifice everything you claim to have believed in before, that's fine.
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: But do it from a respectable distance. You have to
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  Speaker 2: have something better to do than to sit in that
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  Speaker 2: courtroom for an entire day It's just, it is, it's pitiful.
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  Speaker 2: They're all pitiful. It's all embarrassing. It's a sad statement
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  Speaker 2: on Trump. It's a sad statement on these people. It's
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: a sad statement on the Republican Party because I'm sure
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: there is a waiting list of yahoos to come fill
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: these roles for the next couple of weeks. And somewhere
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: Ted Cruz is begging to be invited and is not
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  Speaker 2: getting invited to this.
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  Speaker 1: Also, Marco Rubio not getting a look and he's on
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: that short list. He's about to move out of the
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: state of Florida, you know, so he can be on the,
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: so he might be able to be a VP. Maybe
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: he'll move to, maybe he'll move to Manhattan. And then
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: he can just camp out outside the trial and be
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump's hype man for a couple more weeks. So
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: we're going to dig into the entire New York Times
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: poll in a second. But they asked a few questions
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: about Trump's legal issues. Here's what we learned. 64% of voters,
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: and these are, by the way, voters in the swing
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: states that they polled. So 64% of swing state voters
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: say that they're paying a lot or some attention to
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: the news about Trump's legal issues. By 49 to 45 percent,
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  Speaker 1: a plurality of voters don't think Trump will be able
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  Speaker 1: to get a fair and impartial trial in Manhattan. And
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: only 35 percent of voters think it's likely he'll be
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  Speaker 1: convicted in this Manhattan trial. 53 percent say it's somewhat
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: or very unlikely. What do you think of those numbers?
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: They tell you anything new or surprising?
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: My general rule with the question of, are you paying
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: attention to X story, is the people who say a lot,
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: the people who say none are telling the truth, and
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: everyone else is lying. It's just like, yeah, you're vaguely
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: aware that a trial is happening, and so you're going
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: to say you're paying some. And I think what that
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: shows is what we see just in general political engagement,
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: what we see in some of the other polls, is
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: that there are some people paying a ton of attention.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: I think it's 29% in this poll who are paying
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: a lot of attention. And everyone else is paying either
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: no attention or just like they're vaguely aware it's happening
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: and not dialed in the details. They couldn't explain the crime.
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: They couldn't tell you that Michael Komen has testified. They
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: might not tell you who Michael Komen is. And I
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: do think that that is somewhat positive for the argument
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: against Trump, right? Where it's just, it means that there's all,
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: the fewer people who know about the bad things he's done,
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: at least gives you the opportunity to believe that there's
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: upside and as more people learn about it, opinions can shift.
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: And the other thing I think is just interesting is
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: the fact that people do not expect to be convicted,
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: which shows they're not paying attention. Because if you're reading,
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: if you're on Twitter, you're listening to podcasts, you follow
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: Norm Eisen and Andrew Weissman on Twitter, you would believe
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: with almost a certainty he's getting convicted because that is
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: the general tenor of all the coverage. And you ask
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: any of these people who've been following the case, these attorneys,
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: former prosecutors, et cetera, and the only reason they tell
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: you that Trump may not be convicted is because of
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: juror nullification, like one juror hangs the jury or two jurors.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: It's not because of the strength.
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: Of the case.
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: And I think if Trump's conviction comes as a surprise
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: to people, it will have a bigger political impact than
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: if they've already priced it into the baseline.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I thought the same exact thing. I think it's
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: like you want to beat expectations on the conviction front.
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: And if no one's really, if very few people, I
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: guess only a third in this case, are expecting a
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: conviction and one comes, then maybe you'll start to see
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: some numbers move. Or maybe not. Who knows? We're living
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: in the most fucked up political universe you could imagine.
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: But actually, my take is going to be we're not.
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: So stay tuned for that.
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  Speaker 1: Okay. Well, which brings us to the fun stuff, Dan. Yesterday,
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: I woke up to a New York Times story that
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: Dan Pfeiffer texted us At 4.53 a.m., that was the
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: timestamp on the text. I was up. I had just
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: gotten up. It was the first thing I did was
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: grabbed my phone off the nightstand, turned it on, looked,
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: see a text from Dan, see it was a New
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: York Times story. I had like an intuitive sense. Because
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: the text was that early that it was going to
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: be New York Times Sienna polls.
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: Wow, that's impressive because I'm often texting around that five
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: o'clock time.
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: Here's the headline of the piece. Trump leads in five
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: key states as young and non-white voters express discontent with Biden.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: Just like other polls, Biden does slightly worse with registered
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: voters than he does with likely voters, which are just
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: people who say they're very likely to vote. I tell
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: the pollster that. I'll give you those slightly rosier numbers.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: which are still not so rosy. Trump with likely voters
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: is up 13 points in Nevada, 13, nine in Georgia,
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: six in Arizona, three in Pennsylvania, one in Wisconsin, and
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: Biden is actually up one in Michigan. The good news
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: is that Biden's doing a few points better in the
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: 538 polling averages of these states. The bad news is
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: Trump is still leading in every state by similar margins
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: in the 538 polling average from seven points in Nevada
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: to half a point in Michigan. And really, you know,
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: it's easy to understand why. Just listen to some highlights
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: we put together of his rally in New Jersey over
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: the weekend, the latest state he announced he'll be competing in.
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: The late, great Hannibal Lecter is a wonderful man. He
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: oftentimes would have a friend for dinner.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: Remember the last scene? Excuse me, I'm.
• 13:40
  Speaker 3: About to have a friend for dinner as this poor
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: doctor walked by. But Hannibal Lecter, congratulations. The late, great
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: Hannibal Lecter. And we're also thinking about Melania's incredible mother
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: who just passed away, Amalia. We want to say hello.
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: She's up there looking down right now.
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: She's saying, that's a large crowd of people.
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: Carried out by.
• 14:01
  Speaker 3: That's right, all being done by him. Carried out by
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: radical Democrat district attorney... You know who he is? Fat Alvin.
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: When I'm president, we will not allow our colleges to
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: be taken over.
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: By violent radicals.
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: And if you come here from another country and try
• 14:19
  Speaker 3: to bring jihadism or anti-Americanism or anti-Semitism to our campuses,
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: we will immediately deport you.
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: You'll be out of that school.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: That's it, Dan. That's the guy that right now, More
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: voters want four more years of that. They want four
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: more years of Donald Trump, the guy who is talking
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: about Fat Alvin and threatening to deport pro-Palestinian protesters and
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: going on a weird tangent about Hannibal Lecter that, look,
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: if you listen to the whole speech, you're not missing
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: any context there. There's nothing that's. There's nothing that's going
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: to say, oh, that's why he was randomly talking about
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: and congratulating a fictional movie character who was a cannibal.
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: Also not dead Hannibal Lecter. I mean, just as a
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: point of fact, he escaped at the end of the movie. Like,
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: that's the point. He calls Clarice from Brazil or something
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: in that Panama hat.
• 15:18
  Speaker 4: Remember?
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, yeah, if you want to get picky
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: about it.
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: I just, look, look, we care about facts on this podcast,
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: and I think that's just yet another one of his lies.
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: Someone should hand out some Pinocchios somewhere.
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: Look, this is why he's leading in the polls. This
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: is why people want Donald Trump for four more years
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: in this country, United States of America. Before we get
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: into the poll, actually, why do you think Trump held
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: a rally in New Jersey? It was in a very
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: red part of New Jersey, in the southern end of
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: the Jersey Shore. I believe the crowd estimates were I
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: had to look three times. It was like 100,000 people?
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: 80 to 100,000 was the estimate I saw.
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: What?
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: It's a big rally.
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: That's a big crowd. That's a big crowd. That's a
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: big crowd. Even if it was exaggerated by 30, 40, 50%,
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: it's still a big rally.
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: So Donald Trump's not competing in New Jersey. Let's just
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: stipulate that. There's a really funny.
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: Are you saying he was lying? Are you saying he
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: didn't- I mean, much.
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: Like the Hannibal Lecter thing, he was incorrect. There is
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: a funny line in the New York Times story about
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: it where he says, Donald Trump has often said he's
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: going to– something like– I'm paraphrasing here. Donald Trump often
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: says he's going to compete in New Jersey, something that
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: even his aides are skeptical of. No, they're not just skeptical.
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: They're not competing in New Jersey. So why New Jersey?
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: And there is– like with Trump, there's always just like–
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: you can kind of boil it down to like his
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: Homer Simpson brain, which is like, me love big crowd,
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: and so let's go to New Jersey. And it kind
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: of makes sense. Like you can– strategically, you can understand
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: the desire to have a very large rally in the
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: middle of this trial when he can't campaign just as
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: a show of strength.
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: If he did.
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: 18,000 people in Sarasota, Florida, we wouldn't talk about it.
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: But 80,000 people in New Jersey, that'll get your attention.
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: And I grew up on the East Coast. I've been
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: to Iowa and New Jersey a lot. And it makes sense.
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: Because for a rally, a big, big rally, you need
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: two things. You need to be able to do it outdoors.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: And you need to be able to do it in
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: a place you don't go to very often or ever.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: Like if Trump just went to Florida or Ohio or
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: any of these places he's been 50 times in the
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: last five years, you wouldn't get a big crowd. He
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: doesn't do rallies in New Jersey. Wildwood is in a
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: very red part of New Jersey, but it's also a
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: beach town where the population swells in the summer. And
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: it brings a lot of people out of, including sort
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: of Republican, MAGA people from New York and Pennsylvania there.
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: And so it's kind of pitch perfect for where Trump
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: could have a huge rally and sort of just send
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: this signal of strength. It doesn't say anything about where
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: he's going to compete. It's just a chance to show strength.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: And it probably succeeded in having a crowd of that size.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: All right, let's dig into the poll. If some of
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: you are still breathing into a paper bag, fear not.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: We got the Polar Coaster host, Dan Pfeiffer, here to
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: tell you all why you should take this poll seriously,
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: but not literally. This poll and all polls. Which you
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: wrote today in your fantastic message box.
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: Well, thank you, John.
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: It's been a busy morning, I'll tell you that. Which
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: everyone should subscribe to. Dan, what's going on in this poll?
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: Just as always, the important reminders that polls are not predictive.
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: They're just a snapshot in time. We should not- Pretty
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: shitty snapshot. Well, I mean, I'm not saying it's a
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: great moment in time. What a terrible moment in time.
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: And maybe in- mid-November, we're all excited. We'll look back
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: and just think about what a depressing time mid-May was, right?
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: So it's just important to remember that and that you
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: just can't obsess about the head-to-head in these, right? There's
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: a lot of fluctuation. You look at the larger trends
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: and you try to mine these polls for actual information
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: that can get you the outcome you want. But why
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: is this snapshot in time so shitty? I think it's
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: actually pretty simple. And This poll just makes me think
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: that we have probably overcomplicated politics a lot over the
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: last several years because there's like this larger metaphysical question
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: about how in the world can a plurality of this
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: country want Donald Trump back in the White House after
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: everything he did? And someone else can answer that. But
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: in terms of the electoral coalitions, it's pretty clear. One,
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: Trump is getting 95% of his voters from 2020. Biden
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: is getting 87% of his voters. 7% of Biden's voters
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: are planning on voting for Trump. That's kind of everything
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: right there. Biden is doing less well with younger voters,
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: Hispanic voters, and Black voters than he did in 2020
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: by pretty large margins. Second, this is largely about the economy.
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: You have three quarters of voters in this poll say
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: the economy is fair or poor. Those numbers are worse
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: among the parts of Biden's coalition that he's struggling with.
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: 90% of voters 18 to 29 say the economy is
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: doing fair or poor. 81% of Hispanic voters. It's very clear.
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: And then you have 30% of voters, about 30% of
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: voters in this poll say that either the economy writ
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: large or inflation cost of living are the single most
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: important issue that are going to drive their decision. That
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: is more than double any other issue, including abortion or immigration.
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: And then you have Trump leading on the economy by
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: 20 points, right? It's just not like it's that, that
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: that's what's happening here. It's not, it's simply, it's just
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: not that complicated as to what we are, what we
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: are dealing with. That's, that's where we are right now.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, they actually broke down. Uh, so the,
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: the 14% of voters who said that they supported Biden
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: in 2020 and are now not supporting him. And as
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: you said, 7% said Trump and the rest said some
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: other candidate or they don't know yet. But the 14%
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: who said they're not supporting Biden, they broke them down
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: into which issue is the reason they're not supporting Biden.
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: About 30% cite the economy, inflation, cost of living, some
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: combination there. 11% cite immigration. 9% said foreign policy. 7%
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: said abortion. I guess these are like anti-choice voters who
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: voted differently. for Biden in 20, or maybe they're just
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: confused about who caused Roe v. Wade from being overturned.
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: There's some numbers there that suggest not everyone's clear on that.
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: And then 4% said Gaza. So you can imagine that
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: the 9% that said foreign policy, probably a bunch of
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: that is Gaza as well, though there could be also
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: voters who are in the camp of like, we don't
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: like sending money overseas to foreign wars. The world is
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: a mess. That could be mixed in as well. But anyway,
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: that's sort of the breakdown of the universe of voters
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: who are not supporting Biden who did in 2020. I
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: do think the weird thing here is like in this poll,
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: Biden wins almost exactly the same share of white voters
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: as he did in 2020 in these States, college educated
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: white voters and non-college educated white voters who are usually,
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: who are as a, as an entire group are much,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: much more Trumpy Trump's best group, but Biden's keeping his,
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: his share of those, those voters as well. And I'm
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: wondering if like the larger story is about the economy
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: and Why is it breaking down on racial lines and
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: generational lines? When if you just look at the economic statistics,
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: there is not a ton of economic evidence that says
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: that in this economy over the last several years, young
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: people and voters of color are faring particularly worse than
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: white voters. Obviously, over the last several decades, centuries in
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: this country, they have been. But just in the last
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: several years, since we've come back from COVID, there's not
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: a ton of evidence of that. So I'm just, and
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: it's not just the New York Times, by the way,
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: like all the polling keeps showing this, you get on
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: one hand, this weakness with young voters and voters of color.
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: And there is an assumption that these are like progressive
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: voters abandoning Biden, either over Gaza or over not canceling
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: student debt or whatever. 11% of registered voters think Biden
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: was not progressive or liberal enough, this poll. And relatively
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: few of those voters are actually defecting from Biden. So
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: they don't think he's progressive enough, but they're not defecting.
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: And Biden's losses are concentrated among moderate and conservative Democratic-leaning voters.
• 23:06
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: I mean, well, I think there's a couple of things there. One, yes,
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: it is all the points you make about how economic
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: impacts have felt across these various cohorts. But there is
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: just like some common sense here, which is inflation in
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: particular hammers people lower down the income scale. than anyone else, right?
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: Especially young voters, right? You generally make less money than
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: older voters, right? You've built up less savings. You have
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: less wealth. You probably haven't a chance to buy a
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: house yet. So you're one of the people being specifically
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: hammered by spikes in rent or spikes in interest rates
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: for making it impossible to buy a house, right? You
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: don't own your car outright, right? You're trying to make
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: car payments. And so I think that helps explain a
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: little bit of why these specific groups are being targeted.
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: It's also kind of where Biden has maybe hit his
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: floor with non-college white voters and hit his ceiling with
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: college white voters. And the difference is with everyone else.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: And he's not going to lose many more. He doesn't
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: have many more non-college white voters to lose.
• 24:05
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: And there aren't that many. And it just based since
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: most voters in this country are non-college voters, there aren't
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: that many more college voters to go get.
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I will say the only, the reason I bring
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: this up to you is the only, I don't know
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: if you want to call it a hopeful sign or
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: the more confusing sign here is that those also happen
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: to be the groups that, young voters and especially young
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: voters of color who are most difficult to poll. And
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: they tend to be least trusting of institutions and potentially
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: and the media and potentially like taking a pollster's call.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: And so, like, again, I wouldn't take that to the bank.
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: I wouldn't get too excited about it. But if we
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: learn by the end of the election that this was
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: all this was a lot of this was polling noise,
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: that would be one reason why I think.
• 24:48
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: I mean, you can– like there were two very large polls,
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: both done by John Della Volpe, one for Harvard, one
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: for Snapchat, that were huge sample polls of voters under 30,
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: which showed Biden doing a little bit better with young
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: voters than these polls did, but still pretty seriously underperforming
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: his 2020 margin of 24 points that he beat Trump by.
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: So it's like– this is sort of my take on
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: all of this. Like is– And they make this point
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: in the– and Nate Cohn makes a point in the write-up,
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: which is if the numbers hold with black voters and
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: Hispanic voters, it would be the greatest racial realignment, electoral
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: racial realignment since the Civil Rights Act. Is that going
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: to happen?
• 25:31
  Speaker 5: Maybe not.
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: Maybe it will. Maybe not.
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: We don't know. But it ultimately doesn't change anything. The
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: polls all show something similar, which is Biden is underperforming
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: among these groups. How much– There's a lot of noise
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: in there, like a ton of noise. But the trend
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: is very clear that there's work to do there. So
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: it's like the debate over response rates and sample size
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: and crosstabs kind of missed the point is we know
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: we have work to do. And are we going to
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: work less hard because Trump's getting 12% of black voters
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: instead of 18% of black voters? Are we going to
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: work less hard to try to turn out youth voters
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: because Biden is really up 18 instead of 8?
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: No, it's the same thing.
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: It's like there's a very specific, clear roadmap here of
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: the voters we need to go get to win this election.
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: And all the rest of it's kind of just like
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: a parlor conversation that is really irrelevant to the people
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: actually doing the work of winning the election. It doesn't
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: really matter what the margin is at this point. You're
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: going to invest the same amount of money, invest the
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: same amount of time to do it. And the way
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: the Biden campaign is spending their money and building their
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: organization suggests that whether their margins are like the Times
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: poll or some other poll, that they see a huge
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: priority to go get Black voters, Hispanic voters, and young
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: voters and bring them back into the anti-MAGA coalition.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: One other reason why it's probably not useful to unskew
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: this one or polls like this is in this poll,
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: for the first time, they asked about the Senate candidates
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: in each of these states where there's a competitive Senate election.
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: And the poll showed that every Democratic Senate candidate in
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: these states is either winning or tied. So Nevada, Jackie
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: Rosen is tied at 41. Arizona, Gallego is up three.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: Casey is up two in Pennsylvania. Tammy Baldwin's up seven
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: in Wisconsin. More importantly, those Democrats are winning their Senate
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: races or at least leading, sorry, in their Senate races.
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: with very normal, ordinary support from young and non-white voters,
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: which really does speak, like if you're, and they did interviews,
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: the New York times did interviews with some of these voters,
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: these split ticket voters and you know, 60 year old
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: Hispanic truck driver in Milwaukee. I like what Tammy Baldwin
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: is doing. I do not like what Biden's doing. He's
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: failing the U S that's going to be a split
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: ticket voter, uh, like 22 year old Hispanic voter in Nevada, uh,
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: favors Jackie Rosen right now, but is voting for Trump
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: saying the border crisis has a lot to do with it.
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: Migrants crossing the border are lazy, just looking for free things.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: And then it goes on and on like that. You
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: can read these interviews and just absolutely pull your hair out.
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: There's like a construction worker in Wisconsin who's literally, he
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: said he's never seen more construction in the state ever.
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: He's working on the AI plant that Biden just went
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: to Wisconsin to tout. And he said that he's not
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: voting for Biden because there's been so much traffic because
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: of the construction.
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: Fuck. Well, politics is not transactional, my friend. That's the thing.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: But what do you make of these like this? Because again,
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: just much like the biggest racial realignment since the civil
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: rights movement, it would probably be the most split ticket
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: voting that we've seen in a long, long time if
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: all these Democratic Senate candidates win and Joe Biden does not.
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: I'm going to be very curious to see how much
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: split ticket voting there actually is, right? It's just when
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: people go in there in this day and age- Do
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: you really pull the lever for Donald Trump and Ruben Gallego?
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: Or that's just– it has not happened very often recently.
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: It did happen in Maine to a great deal in 2020.
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: Mr.
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: Wilderness, I think what we need here is focus groups
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: of Trump Baldwin voters, Trump Gallego voters in Pennsylvania– Trump-Federman
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: voters or Trump-Casey voters, or probably aren't a ton of
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: those yet since those races are close. But I'm glad
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: that you're trying to interview those people. That's interesting. But
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: I would like to hear a real conversation on what's
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: driving that.
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: Because it's coming right here on this feed, end of May.
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: Get ready.
• 29:46
  Speaker 3: Boom.
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: We are excited for this. I guess we're going to
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: put it on a trailer. I don't know if I
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: was supposed to do the announcement. Anyway, it's happening.
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: So there's a couple of things here, right? Because these
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: Democratic Senate candidates are performing just like a typical Democrat,
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: including the Democrats who won in these exact states in 2022,
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: Is it a particular Biden weakness with these types of voters?
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: Is it a particular Trump strength?
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: Or is it a.
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: Potentially more likely that this really is about the economy?
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: And voters really don't tend to hold senators accountable for
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: the economy in the way they hold presidents accountable for
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: the economy. So you can be really mad about the
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: economy and still vote for Tammy Baldwin, but feel, I think,
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: incorrectly and unfairly penalize Joe Biden for the cost of
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: eggs by voting against him. Because we saw that in 2022.
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: One of the explanations why Democrats did so well and
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: the quote unquote red wave didn't happen was Democrats won
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: a shockingly large number of voters who said inflation was
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: the number one issue. It just didn't apply to their
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: Senate or congressional vote. And that may be what's happening here.
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: But that's why we need these wilderness focus groups. So
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: stay tuned.
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: You find any good news in this shit sandwich? Any
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: other interesting points that give you a little hope? Yeah.
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: I mean, I just don't panic about this poll. Don't
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: panic about any poll, frankly. Don't panic about anything. Panic
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: is a very counterproductive response. But the takeaway from this
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: poll for me is there's a pretty large persuadable universe here.
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: And Donald Trump's lead here is pretty fragile, I think.
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: He is being propped up by voters who disapprove of him,
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: don't like him, disagree with him on a whole bunch
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: of issues, and have a long history of voting for Democrats.
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: And so it's not easy. It's going to take a
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: lot of work. It's going to take a lot of organizing.
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: It's going to take everyone listening to this doing their part.
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: But those are voters we can go get back. We
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: are not in a position where we have to go
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: get a bunch of typical Republican voters or a bunch
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: of people who voted for Trump in 2020 to win.
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: We have to go get people who have long been
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: a part of our coalition, who agree with us on
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: issues like the economic policy, abortion, immigration, a whole bunch
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: of them, and just go persuade them. And what this
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: shows is the more, and this is reflected in the
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: split between registered voters and likely voters, it's reflected in
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: the split between highly engaged voters and less engaged voters,
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: is the more people know about Joe Biden and Donald Trump,
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: the better Joe Biden does. And that's a roadmap for
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: winning the election, right? And there's less than six months
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: to go. We've got a lot of work to do
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: and time is ticking away pretty fast here, but This
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: is winnable. Like Donald Trump has winded us back. There's
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: no question about that. But the path to victory is
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: is very clear.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah. The flip side of that split ticket voting point
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: is that if you're voting for a Senate Democrat, like
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: you're you're gettable for for president or you should be.
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: And the other thing I notice is that 74 percent
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: of likely voters said that they're either very or somewhat
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: satisfied with the way things are going in their own lives. Now,
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: you can still construct a person. You can imagine a
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: person still who is like, I'm pretty happy with the
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: way things are going in my life. I'm still pretty
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: pissed about inflation and I'm annoyed with Joe Biden. Right.
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: So like it's not a perfect. But, you know, if
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: it is not like the electorate is out there thinking
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: my life is terrible and gloom and doom kind of thing.
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: So like that that suggests some persuasion is possible as well.
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: I also think to your point about the likely and
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: registered voter split, John De La Vope, who we've talked to,
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: you've talked to on all of our pods, noted that
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: especially among young people, the registered, you know, Biden is
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: basically down three with young people among registered voters. And
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: he's up seven with likely voters. That's a 10 point
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: swing as you get to likely voters. Now, again, he
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: won them by 20 something points in 2020. So that's
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: still a ways to go. But it's, you know, the
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: likely voter model does change things. Also, I noticed this.
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: They asked this question, if Trump wins, how much would change?
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: And the groups that are most likely in the poll
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: to think that he changed little to nothing are 18
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: to 29 year olds and Hispanic voters, two of the
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: groups that Biden's doing not great with. And the groups
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: that are least likely to think that Trump's changes would
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: be very bad for the country are 18 to 29
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: year olds and Hispanic voters. So you've basically got a
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: cohort of young voters and Hispanic voters who think like,
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: maybe Donald, who either think maybe Donald Trump won't actually
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: change that much about what's going on. And if he does,
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: maybe it won't be so bad. And that will be,
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: and obviously that's an alarming thing to think, but like
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: that is the work of a campaign. And that'd be
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: the work of the Biden campaign to go out there
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: and not only make the case for Joe Biden, but
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: also make the case that a second Trump term would
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: be extremely damaging to the country and would actually change
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: quite a bit from where we are right now. So
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: there's obviously like some things that are beyond Biden's control.
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: He can't do much to make inflation come down faster
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: at this point, I suppose. He could do like Trump
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: would probably do and start yelling at Jerome Powell to
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: cut interest rates. But I don't see him doing that.
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: Nor do I know if that's a wise.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: He should do it. He should absolutely do it.
• 35:00
  Speaker 3: Oh, no.
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: One last unwritten norm collapses. What are we going to do? Yeah.
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: So there's that. But there's a lot of things he
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: can control. So let's focus on like what he and
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: his White House and his campaign can control. If you're
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: running the campaign and looking at numbers like these, how
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: might they impact your strategy?
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: I always find it best to try to set up
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: your campaign strategy and then analyze the efficacy of it
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: by picking some numbers you want to move. And there
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: are two numbers in here that I think are really important.
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: One is Biden has only a 10-point advantage on abortion.
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: And abortion is essentially tied for second as the issue
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: that voters say is most decisive in their vote. And
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: so I think you want to build on what Biden
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: has been doing, right? They've run 90% of their ads
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: have been about abortion. They've been hammering it. is you
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: want to increase the number of people who say abortion
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: is going to help decide their vote, and you want
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: to expand your lead in trusting Trump over abortion. And
• 35:55
  Speaker 2: we've seen in Navigator polling, the listen I talked about
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: on Friday, I guess, that over time, more and more
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: people are beginning to see Trump as anti-abortion. A majority
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: now think he would sign a federal abortion ban. And
• 36:07
  Speaker 2: so the work is being done there, and you want
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: to see that expand. But I think most importantly, we
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: are now six months from the election. You have... Three-quarters
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: of the country say the economy is fair or poor.
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: This is, as I mentioned earlier, particularly true among the
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: voters you need most. Your most important persuasion targets are
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: the ones most sour on the economy. I don't think
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: you're going to make people be able to feel better
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: about the economy. I hope we have this sudden drop
• 36:38
  Speaker 2: in inflation. Jerome Powell cuts interest rates. We have this
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: virtuous cycle. Everyone starts feeling better right as people vote.
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: If that happens, great. But we clearly can't plan for it.
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: And I think there was probably some more optimism three
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: or four months ago that we were going to be
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: sort of leaning into a better economic environment.
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: As the election happened.
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: How people feel about the economy lags behind actual economic progress.
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: Even if things get better, it's not clear that people
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: will really be feeling it measurably by the time they vote.
• 37:05
  Speaker 2: So instead of trying to make people feel better about
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: the economy, we have to make people feel worse about
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: how Trump would manage the economy. And I think a huge,
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: just you have to, You don't have to beat him
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: on the economy, but you can't lose by 20 points.
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: And the polling we've seen shows that Trump is very
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: vulnerable if you make the case. And it's a pretty
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: simple message about Donald Trump wanting to cut taxes for
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: his rich friends, for wealthy corporations, repeal the Affordable Care Act,
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: and try to pay for all of this by cutting
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: Social Security and Medicare. We've seen this in polling. That's
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: one of the things that working class voters in particular
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: are most afraid Trump will do, which is to give
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: tax breaks to the rich and It's just a New
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: York Times story over the weekend, which didn't even make
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: our podcast today, that he may owe the IRS $ 100
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: million for double counting tax credits on Trump Tower Chicago.
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: You want to tell him Trump's first priorities would be,
• 37:55
  Speaker 2: if he gets elected, to stop the IRS from enforcing
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: tax laws on rich people like Donald Trump. And so
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: making this populist argument, the Scranton Joe versus Park Avenue
• 38:08
  Speaker 2: Donald or Mar-a-Lago, Donald, pick your rich place of choice.
• 38:11
  Speaker 2: But we have to hammer him on the economy. I
• 38:14
  Speaker 2: think that's the only way in which we will actually
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: win this election. You're seeing that in some of the
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: stuff Biden has been doing. You saw that in his
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: Pennsylvania tour. But that's my takeaway from this poll and
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: how you go about changing the numbers.
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: I think you have to hammer Trump on the economy.
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: I totally agree. I also think you have to lay
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: out specific policies, what you're going to do, what Biden's
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: going to do if he gets another term and he
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: gets Democratic majorities to further bring down costs for people.
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: Like you have to be offering something as well. And then,
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: but overall you're right. Like the economic message has to
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: be a choice, not a referendum. Like right now Biden
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: has turned it into a referendum because like, I think
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: the balance between here's what we accomplished, listen to all
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: these good economic statistics and here's what I do to
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: bring costs down. And here's what Trump would do is
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: just way off. It's way off. And I get that
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: you do have to do both, but like just the, the,
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: And look, I think it's Joe Biden is on all issues,
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: like of all issues, right? Joe Biden is especially empathetic
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: to working people who are struggling. It's the Scranton Joe, right?
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: He like he gets this viscerally. He's got it when
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: we were in the White House with them. He's got
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: it before. And like, so I know that he like
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: has that in him, but I also think that is
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: at war with like him being so annoyed that he's
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: not getting more credit for bringing the economy out of
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: recession and getting inflation down as fast as it's come down.
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: And honestly, it's come down faster and better than in
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: most other developed wealthy countries. And I think he's, you know,
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: I would be pissed too if I was him, right?
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: But like, In every interview and in every speech that
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: comes out, well, the first thing you hear is, well,
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: people have more money and they're this and they're that.
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: And New York Times interviewed a Biden 2020 voter in
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: Nevada who is not voting for him this time, who said,
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: concerning to me when I keep seeing press come out
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: of the White House where they keep saying the economy
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: is good. That's really weird because I'm paying more on
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: taxes and more on groceries and more on housing and
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: more on fuel. So that doesn't feel good. It's like, yeah,
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: we can argue back and forth about like, whether people
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: should feel this way about the economy or not, which
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: is like what everyone on Twitter does all day long.
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: But like, if people are actually feeling this way, you
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: can't argue people out of your, their feelings. You just
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: can't do it. You've got to just like say, here's
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: what I'm going to do. I know things are tough
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: and we've come a long way, but we have so
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: much more to do and we have to bring costs down.
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: And it's ridiculous. These corporations are making so much money
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: and Donald Trump gets to, uh, get $ 100 million off
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: his tax bill because he cheated and he's going to
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: help his rich friends. Well, I'm going to go out
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: there and I'm going to fight for you. And here's
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: what I'm going to do in a second term if
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: you send me a bigger Congress, Democratic Congress. Like I just,
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: he's just going to do that every day.
• 40:54
  Speaker 2: I think it to be fair to the Biden campaign
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: and to Biden is that there is a difference between
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: what is in the ads, what was in the State
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: of the Union, what's in most of the speeches post
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: State of the Union, and what the president says at
• 41:08
  Speaker 2: fundraisers and in interviews.
• 41:10
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: Like what we're largely reacting to here is the one
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: line in the, or the one answer in the Aaron
• 41:16
  Speaker 2: Burnett CNN interview last week, where he sort of responded
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: to the, her asking him the question that triggers every politician.
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: Let me ask you about a poll that tells about
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: the economy, right? Which is why do you think this
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: poll says this? And he, I thought his answer for
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: that was not awesome.
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: But then I, you know what, this was also though,
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: this was Ron Klain's point in that like, That event
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: that they've had a whole couple, I think it was
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: like a couple hour press cycle about it, where Ron
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: said he's like doing too many bridge, ribbon cuttings at
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: bridges and stuff like that. There is just, there's this
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: like feeling that they need to give him credit. And
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: I get it. You've said this before that like he
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: does need a baseline that he, to like make people
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: believe that he has accomplished something on the economy because
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: that gives him the credibility to say, I'll be able
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: to do more. But the ability to do more thing
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: is just not as– it just hasn't been out there
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: as much.
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I think that people like us– what most voters
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: are getting– like the ads last year were I think
• 42:20
  Speaker 2: overly triumphant on the economy and then they came too early, right?
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: I think people thought that things were turning. It didn't turn.
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: The ads now are– they're either about abortion or or
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: they are going after Donald Trump for being a populist, right?
• 42:33
  Speaker 2: There's like, it's all contrast, right? It's Biden did this
• 42:36
  Speaker 2: and Donald Trump would do this bad thing, right? He
• 42:37
  Speaker 2: cut social security.
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: He would.
• 42:39
  Speaker 2: And so Biden has to, like, there's no margin for
• 42:41
  Speaker 2: error here. You can't even, you do an interview, you
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: got to answer it right, right? You do a speech,
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: any single off, you know, you go off the prompter
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: for a minute, you delve into the dark, the parts
• 42:51
  Speaker 2: of your psyche that are annoyed. Obama would do this
• 42:53
  Speaker 2: a lot too. Every politician does it. There's not really
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: room for that now six months out. But since the
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: State of the Union, I think the economic messaging has
• 43:01
  Speaker 2: been pretty damn good. That I really do think, right?
• 43:03
  Speaker 2: There have been some moments here with Biden where I
• 43:05
  Speaker 2: think they've been less good. But in general, I think
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: they're doing the right things. Yeah.
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: It also requires more effort because identity inflected issues just
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: get more coverage from reporters and conflict gets more coverage.
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: And so when you're trying to pick a fight about
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: the economy, you know, it's not fucking 2012 anymore. Like
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: that's just not how our politics operates where people are,
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: reporters are going to cover big fights about the size
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: and role of government and your economic policy. Like that
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: just doesn't happen anymore. And so it just takes that
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: much more effort and that much more repetition and that
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: much more discipline to get the message out, which is
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: just tough, you know? All right. When we come back,
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: I will talk to Congressman Colin Allred about his Senate
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: race in Texas to hopefully defeat Ted Cruz. Joining us today,
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: he's a former NFL linebacker and voting rights attorney who
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: currently represents Texas's 32nd District and is running to unseat
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: America's sweetheart, Ted Cruz. Welcome back to Pod Save America,
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: Representative Colin Allred. Yeah, thanks for having me. Thanks for
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: being here. It's your second time on this podcast. You were,
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: of course, running for Senate against a professional podcaster, Ted Cruz,
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: amateur senator, professional podcaster. So there's a New York Times
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: story today about Cruz trying to rebrand himself as someone
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: who is at least capable of bipartisanship, which I found amusing,
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: mostly because the piece quotes three of his Republican colleagues
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: in the Senate, actually laughing at the idea of Ted
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: Cruz becoming some kind of a constructive force in the Senate.
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: What do you make of the rebrand? And do you
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: take it as a sign that he might be worried
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: about losing to you?
• 44:51
  Speaker 5: Well, you know, actually, yeah, I think I take it
• 44:53
  Speaker 5: as kind of a compliment.
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 44:54
  Speaker 5: You know, this guy who's been a hyper-partisan, you know,
• 44:59
  Speaker 5: who's been one of the most divisive senators in the
• 45:01
  Speaker 5: country for 12 years, is all of a sudden trying
• 45:03
  Speaker 5: to convince folks, no, actually, none of that is true.
• 45:06
  Speaker 5: I'm a deal-maker. You know, I've got a post office named,
• 45:09
  Speaker 5: you know, at some point. I mean, it's, you know,
• 45:12
  Speaker 5: it is laughable. And as you mentioned, I come from
• 45:15
  Speaker 5: a football background. And the funny thing about the NFL
• 45:18
  Speaker 5: is everything's on tape, you know, and we always say
• 45:21
  Speaker 5: you are what you put on tape. But so is
• 45:23
  Speaker 5: a lot of this, you know what I mean? Like,
• 45:25
  Speaker 5: we've seen you on the Senate floor trying to repeal
• 45:29
  Speaker 5: the Affordable Care Act, you know, reading Green Eggs and Ham.
• 45:31
  Speaker 5: You know, we've heard, you know, folks like John Boehner
• 45:34
  Speaker 5: call you Lucifer, you know, and Lindsey Graham joking about
• 45:38
  Speaker 5: you were murdered on the Senate floor. I mean, like we,
• 45:39
  Speaker 5: you know, I mean, like we, we've been there for this.
• 45:43
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 45:43
  Speaker 5: And so it's, it's, it's funny, but I think, you know,
• 45:45
  Speaker 5: maybe it is a badge of honor.
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And those are all stories that like, you know,
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: a national audience knows about Ted Cruz and we all
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: know what we feel about him. Where do you think
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: he's most vulnerable from a Texan's point of view?
• 45:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 45:57
  Speaker 5: Well, I think fundamentally he's not done the job and
• 46:00
  Speaker 5: you and I both know this, uh, you know, there's
• 46:03
  Speaker 5: a lot to do as an elected official, but the
• 46:05
  Speaker 5: way that you can go on vacation and when 30
• 46:08
  Speaker 5: million Texans are freezing in the dark. I think that's
• 46:10
  Speaker 5: a good time to go to Cancun. Is if, number one,
• 46:13
  Speaker 5: it doesn't really matter to you that much. But number two,
• 46:15
  Speaker 5: there's also not anything that you would be doing otherwise.
• 46:19
  Speaker 5: Which is what I was doing, because I was in
• 46:21
  Speaker 5: office at the time, was on the phone with FEMA,
• 46:23
  Speaker 5: working with our county, trying to find buildings that had
• 46:25
  Speaker 5: power on that we'd call warming centers. At a food bank,
• 46:29
  Speaker 5: trying to hand out food, because when the power goes out,
• 46:32
  Speaker 5: working families lose all the food that's in the fridge.
• 46:34
  Speaker 5: There was a lot to do. In fact, it was
• 46:36
  Speaker 5: one of the busiest times I've had. But for Cruz,
• 46:38
  Speaker 5: he was able to go on vacation. He's like, well,
• 46:41
  Speaker 5: what am I going to do? There's nothing to do, right?
• 46:42
  Speaker 5: I can't podcast, you know, I might as well get
• 46:44
  Speaker 5: out of here. And so I think that's the biggest
• 46:47
  Speaker 5: thing is that number one, how extreme he's been, but
• 46:51
  Speaker 5: also he's not been doing the job. And so we
• 46:53
  Speaker 5: joke about him podcasting three to five times a week.
• 46:56
  Speaker 5: That's time he could be representing 30 million Texans who
• 46:59
  Speaker 5: need him. His vision for us is an extremely dark one,
• 47:02
  Speaker 5: you know, nationwide ban on abortion. I tell folks all
• 47:04
  Speaker 5: the time, Ted Cruz is our problem in Texas. But
• 47:07
  Speaker 5: he's also your problem, you know, because he tried to
• 47:10
  Speaker 5: overturn the election in 2020. He wants to ban abortion nationwide.
• 47:14
  Speaker 5: And he's somebody who we're looking around for who's responsible
• 47:17
  Speaker 5: for how we ended up in this place in our politics.
• 47:19
  Speaker 5: You know, he's like exhibit 1B.
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I don't know how he podcasts that many times
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: a week. I podcast that many times a week and
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: I have two young children. I have no time to
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: do anything else. Right. Right. So clearly he's not doing that. Also,
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: I'm not also a senator. Yeah. So Cruz did do
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: a Fox News interview this week that sounded much more
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: like the guy we've all come to know and loathe.
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: He tried to blame you and Joe Biden and other
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: Democrats for getting some donations from groups that he says
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: indirectly funded some of these campus protests. I don't really
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: understand why students would need funding to leave their dorms
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: and go protest on their own campus. But he clearly
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: sees this attack as a political winner. What's your response
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: to that? And how do you feel about the protests
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: in general? Yeah.
• 48:02
  Speaker 5: Well, I mean, that's not even a bank shot. I'm
• 48:05
  Speaker 5: just trying to make stuff up, right? And as you know,
• 48:10
  Speaker 5: we've gotten to this point where they're just throwing whatever
• 48:12
  Speaker 5: they can and seeing what sticks. But what I have
• 48:16
  Speaker 5: found interesting is that these folks who talked so much
• 48:19
  Speaker 5: a year ago about the First Amendment and how We
• 48:22
  Speaker 5: have to have the First Amendment enforced on college campuses.
• 48:25
  Speaker 5: Our governor, for example, in Texas, saying the First Amendment
• 48:28
  Speaker 5: will be enforced in Texas. Then when you have somebody
• 48:32
  Speaker 5: saying something that you disagree with, that's when they, now
• 48:36
  Speaker 5: they want to come in and crack down. And I
• 48:39
  Speaker 5: find that to be instructive, of course, because the First
• 48:45
  Speaker 5: Amendment is a stubborn thing. It applies to speech that
• 48:48
  Speaker 5: you agree with and speech that you disagree with. And
• 48:50
  Speaker 5: obviously there's limits to it. You know, I'm a lawyer,
• 48:53
  Speaker 5: I'm a voting rights lawyer by training. You know, you
• 48:56
  Speaker 5: can't run into a crowded room and say fire and
• 48:59
  Speaker 5: all kinds of things, right? And your First Amendment rights
• 49:03
  Speaker 5: can be limited in terms of how they impact someone else.
• 49:05
  Speaker 5: So hate speech, for example. And, you know, I think
• 49:08
  Speaker 5: sometimes that line has been crossed. But, you know, I
• 49:12
  Speaker 5: think it's an American value to understand that we have
• 49:15
  Speaker 5: the right to protest. There are limits to it. I
• 49:18
  Speaker 5: don't think you should take it too far. But that
• 49:20
  Speaker 5: certainly this is something that has been going on in
• 49:23
  Speaker 5: our college campuses, but also just in our country since
• 49:26
  Speaker 5: the very beginning. And, you know, I'm a civil rights lawyer.
• 49:28
  Speaker 5: I'm an African-American serving in Congress. I'm here because of protest,
• 49:32
  Speaker 5: because of the civil rights movement, because of some folks
• 49:35
  Speaker 5: making some folks feel a little bit uncomfortable at times
• 49:37
  Speaker 5: and talking about, hey, listen, we want voting rights. We
• 49:39
  Speaker 5: want to be able to be a part of this democracy.
• 49:42
  Speaker 5: And it can be uncomfortable. It could also make real change.
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah. 26 of your Democratic colleagues in the House just
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: sent a letter to President Biden criticizing his decision to
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: pause the transfer of certain weapons to Israel. A lot
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: of your other Democratic colleagues in the House and Senate
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: have praised that decision. Where do you stand on Biden's announcement?
• 50:01
  Speaker 5: Well, you know, I'm on the Foreign Affairs Committee. And,
• 50:03
  Speaker 5: you know, this is something I've worked on quite a bit. And,
• 50:06
  Speaker 5: you know, listen, I think that October 7th was a
• 50:10
  Speaker 5: horrific tragedy. And also, we know who's behind it, the perpetrators.
• 50:14
  Speaker 5: And I certainly think that any country is not only
• 50:17
  Speaker 5: within their rights, but has to do what they can
• 50:20
  Speaker 5: to protect their people. And when we're talking about Hamas,
• 50:23
  Speaker 5: that's where the focus always should be. Obviously, what we've
• 50:27
  Speaker 5: seen is that this has also impacted so many innocent civilians.
• 50:31
  Speaker 5: And when I was last in Israel, I visited a
• 50:34
  Speaker 5: kibbutz called Kefar Asa. And in this kibbutz, these are
• 50:37
  Speaker 5: the most peace-loving people that you'll ever come across. I mean,
• 50:41
  Speaker 5: our progressives wouldn't even touch these folks.
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean?
• 50:43
  Speaker 5: Like they share everything.
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: These are the people marching in the streets, protesting Bibi Netanyahu. Right.
• 50:49
  Speaker 5: And we were doing a Zoom with this father of
• 50:53
  Speaker 5: four in Gaza City named Mohammed, who was actually supposed
• 50:55
  Speaker 5: to come meet with us in person, but couldn't get
• 50:57
  Speaker 5: out that day. And I think about that meeting a
• 51:00
  Speaker 5: lot because Mohammed was not a supporter of Hamas. And
• 51:04
  Speaker 5: he was worried about his children and And that kibbutz
• 51:07
  Speaker 5: was the site of the attack on October 7th. That
• 51:10
  Speaker 5: was one of the places where they broke through. And
• 51:12
  Speaker 5: an Israeli general called it the site of a massacre.
• 51:15
  Speaker 5: And I think about both of those things and think
• 51:17
  Speaker 5: that there has to be another way for us here.
• 51:21
  Speaker 5: We need to obviously find a way forward on creating
• 51:24
  Speaker 5: two states, one in which we have a peaceful and
• 51:27
  Speaker 5: independent Palestinian state next to an independent Jewish democratic state
• 51:31
  Speaker 5: in Israel. And we all know that. But in some ways,
• 51:34
  Speaker 5: I think this conflict has reignited that discussion. And anything
• 51:37
  Speaker 5: that takes us further away from that, I think we
• 51:40
  Speaker 5: have to question. And so some of the conduct that
• 51:43
  Speaker 5: we've seen, particularly this potential invasion of Rafah, I think
• 51:47
  Speaker 5: calls that into question. Are we moving towards that or
• 51:49
  Speaker 5: away from it? And as the United States, I think
• 51:51
  Speaker 5: our role has to be to try and encourage that
• 51:53
  Speaker 5: and try and create the conditions for what we know
• 51:55
  Speaker 5: will be hard to do, but that we have to
• 51:57
  Speaker 5: use this tragedy in some ways as an opportunity to
• 52:01
  Speaker 5: try and revitalize this discussion around two states.
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it certainly seemed to me like, you know, deciding
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: not to send 2,000 pound bombs for an invasion of
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: Rafah while still providing the Israeli government with defensive weapons
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: that they need. I don't know what's so objectionable about that.
• 52:21
  Speaker 5: Well, it's been done before, you know, American presidents have
• 52:23
  Speaker 5: done it before.
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 52:24
  Speaker 5: But also, I mean, this is, you know, we're having
• 52:26
  Speaker 5: an ongoing discussion, I think, with our allies in Israel
• 52:30
  Speaker 5: about the conduct of the war and also what we
• 52:33
  Speaker 5: want to see and what we don't want to see.
• 52:35
  Speaker 5: And so, you know, I think that's what we're seeing,
• 52:37
  Speaker 5: you know, now spilling out into public, what I think
• 52:39
  Speaker 5: has been a lot of the conversations that I know
• 52:41
  Speaker 5: have been held behind closed doors, right? To try and
• 52:45
  Speaker 5: encourage what we want to see, which is to keep
• 52:47
  Speaker 5: the focus, of course, on Hamas. But let's also, let's
• 52:51
  Speaker 5: be cognizant of how we do that. And, you know, we,
• 52:56
  Speaker 5: after 9-11, we made a lot of mistakes in Iraq
• 52:59
  Speaker 5: and Afghanistan and And I think, you know, obviously there
• 53:03
  Speaker 5: are lessons that have to be learned from that, that
• 53:05
  Speaker 5: as you are prosecuting a conflict, that the way you
• 53:08
  Speaker 5: do it is as important as why you're doing it.
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 53:11
  Speaker 5: And that moral high ground, especially for democracies, is incredibly important.
• 53:15
  Speaker 5: And Israel is a democracy and we share values with Israel.
• 53:19
  Speaker 5: And I think we're encouraging them to follow the same
• 53:21
  Speaker 5: values that we share.
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: Separately, some of your Democratic colleagues sent another letter to
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: President Biden. How's Dems? Busy writing lots of letters this week.
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: This one urged Biden to take action on his own
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: to make the southern border more secure. I know you
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: supported the bipartisan border deal that Donald Trump and the
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: Republicans killed for what they admitted were political reasons. Do
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: you want to see President Biden act without Congress to
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: make the border more secure?
• 53:44
  Speaker 5: Yeah, so here's the thing. My family's from Brownsville, which
• 53:49
  Speaker 5: is the tip of Texas. I was raised by a
• 53:51
  Speaker 5: single mom, was a public school teacher in Dallas. But
• 53:53
  Speaker 5: my grandfather was a customs officer in Brownsville after fighting
• 53:57
  Speaker 5: in the Pacific in the Navy in World War II.
• 53:59
  Speaker 5: And so I spent a lot of my childhood in
• 54:01
  Speaker 5: the Valley, in South Texas. And I know that our
• 54:05
  Speaker 5: border communities are not just these places where you go
• 54:08
  Speaker 5: to point out problems. They also bear the brunt when
• 54:12
  Speaker 5: we see these migrant surges. I think folks around the
• 54:15
  Speaker 5: country have started to see it in other cities, but
• 54:17
  Speaker 5: that's what the border experience has been for some time.
• 54:20
  Speaker 5: And so I've been critical of multiple administrations for not
• 54:22
  Speaker 5: helping the communities themselves, and also of this administration, of
• 54:26
  Speaker 5: not getting caught trying trying to help alleviate some of
• 54:31
  Speaker 5: that burden. And so I do think that it's important
• 54:34
  Speaker 5: that the president acts. I think that obviously Congress needs
• 54:38
  Speaker 5: to act as well. We've not passed a comprehensive reform
• 54:41
  Speaker 5: to our immigration system since the Reagan era. And the
• 54:44
  Speaker 5: deal that you were talking about, I was talking to
• 54:46
  Speaker 5: some folks earlier. I'm not sure everyone understands exactly. This
• 54:50
  Speaker 5: was really, I think, targeted at what we're seeing at
• 54:53
  Speaker 5: the southern border, which is largely an asylum crisis. We're
• 54:57
  Speaker 5: having Folks come and declare, ask for asylum. About 90%
• 55:02
  Speaker 5: of them are going to be rejected, but it's going
• 55:04
  Speaker 5: to take five, six, seven years for that rejection to come.
• 55:08
  Speaker 5: And so what we were trying to address there was
• 55:10
  Speaker 5: trying to speed that process up, raise that threshold a
• 55:13
  Speaker 5: bit so that, because most of these folks are coming
• 55:15
  Speaker 5: because of economic inconvenience, economic disaster where they're from, right?
• 55:20
  Speaker 5: And that's not going to fall into one of the
• 55:22
  Speaker 5: asylum factors. And so what we're trying to do there
• 55:24
  Speaker 5: is say, listen, let's make this more orderly. Let's make
• 55:27
  Speaker 5: this happen much faster. Let's surge resources. There was CBP personnel,
• 55:30
  Speaker 5: immigration judges, administrative personnel that all would have been hired
• 55:33
  Speaker 5: from this. And folks like Ted Cruz, who have been
• 55:36
  Speaker 5: talking about this being the biggest crisis facing the country,
• 55:39
  Speaker 5: as you said, agreed with the policy, but wanted to
• 55:42
  Speaker 5: take it down because they want to have this issue
• 55:43
  Speaker 5: to run on in November. And so I do think
• 55:46
  Speaker 5: it's important that the president acts, but certainly let's call
• 55:49
  Speaker 5: out the folks who are responsible for for putting in
• 55:52
  Speaker 5: this position. I say all the time, I don't know
• 55:54
  Speaker 5: why Ted Cruz won't help us secure the border, but
• 55:56
  Speaker 5: I know that when I'm in the Senate, I will.
• 55:58
  Speaker 5: And we can do it consistent with our values, right?
• 56:00
  Speaker 5: We don't have to demagogue about it. We're the United
• 56:02
  Speaker 5: States of America. We're Texans. We can do this in
• 56:05
  Speaker 5: a way that's consistent with who we are.
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: One thing I've been wondering, as I know the Biden
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: administration is weighing this decision, is obviously legislation would be
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: more effective than executive action from the president. But I'm
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: wondering if what's holding it up is them trying to
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: figure out with the council's office, which you worked in,
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: whether this can pass legal muster. Do you think that
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: there are executive actions that can sort of pass legal
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: muster on the border that the president hasn't taken yet?
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: I think it's.
• 56:33
  Speaker 5: Likely that whatever they do will get hung up in
• 56:35
  Speaker 5: the courts. And that's likely. We've seen that across multiple administrations.
• 56:40
  Speaker 5: DACA was in the same position. And so I think
• 56:43
  Speaker 5: that's likely. But I do think there's an element of,
• 56:47
  Speaker 5: let's recognize that the facts on the ground have changed,
• 56:51
  Speaker 5: and let's try and address what the specific issue is now, which,
• 56:54
  Speaker 5: as I said, is largely around the asylum process and
• 56:58
  Speaker 5: how long it's taking for that to end, the backlog
• 56:59
  Speaker 5: that we have there, and the fact that that's also
• 57:02
  Speaker 5: acting in some ways as a draw for folks who
• 57:04
  Speaker 5: are saying, listen, if I can get there and claim asylum,
• 57:07
  Speaker 5: then who knows, five, six, seven years, I might be
• 57:09
  Speaker 5: able to stay. And that, I think, is also a
• 57:11
  Speaker 5: contributing factor. And certainly the coyotes, the human traffickers, they're
• 57:15
  Speaker 5: taking advantage of that as well. And they're spreading that message.
• 57:18
  Speaker 5: So the word is out on that. And so we
• 57:20
  Speaker 5: need to counter that. Exactly what they can do that
• 57:24
  Speaker 5: will pass judicial muster, I don't know. But I do
• 57:28
  Speaker 5: think it's important to show how much we care about this,
• 57:31
  Speaker 5: that Democrats are serious about this, and also to present
• 57:34
  Speaker 5: an alternative view of what a secure border looks like.
• 57:37
  Speaker 5: Because to me, it's not barbed wire. To me, it
• 57:40
  Speaker 5: has to be that folks are treated humanely, They're processed
• 57:43
  Speaker 5: in a timely manner. Not everyone's going to be able
• 57:45
  Speaker 5: to stay. But let's do this consistent with our best
• 57:48
  Speaker 5: traditions instead of losing some of ourselves in how we
• 57:52
  Speaker 5: treat others, right?
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: This debate has been so politicized nationally. What do most
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: people not understand about the border and immigration that people
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: like your family who've lived near border communities understand really well?
• 58:06
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, I think it's a couple of things.
• 58:10
  Speaker 5: Number one, I think there's some frustrations. That, you know,
• 58:13
  Speaker 5: when migrants come, that, you know, people may have a
• 58:17
  Speaker 5: feeling that they're getting some kind of benefits that folks
• 58:19
  Speaker 5: who are living there already and who need help are
• 58:22
  Speaker 5: not getting. Some of our border communities are really struggling
• 58:24
  Speaker 5: and need investment, need help. But I think there's also,
• 58:29
  Speaker 5: on the flip side, a feeling that this is seen
• 58:31
  Speaker 5: as a place to just point out problems and talk about,
• 58:34
  Speaker 5: you know, use words like invasion and talk about rampant
• 58:37
  Speaker 5: crime when that's not the lived experience of folks on
• 58:40
  Speaker 5: the border. who in many ways are having, you know,
• 58:43
  Speaker 5: kind of a living, you know, a mixed cultural, you know,
• 58:47
  Speaker 5: just kind of beautiful experience where, you know, my mom
• 58:50
  Speaker 5: growing up, you know, she would be in Brownsville, she'd
• 58:53
  Speaker 5: cross over to Mexico, she'd have dinner, come back, you know,
• 58:55
  Speaker 5: and having, you know, this kind of, you know, back
• 58:57
  Speaker 5: and forth that enriches both cultures. And that's really, I think,
• 59:01
  Speaker 5: you know, can be a beautiful thing. And this idea that,
• 59:04
  Speaker 5: you know, that it's just, rampant with crime, it's so
• 59:08
  Speaker 5: dangerous and all these things. I mean, that's just not realistic,
• 59:11
  Speaker 5: you know, and it's not true. But when I see
• 59:13
  Speaker 5: folks like Ted Cruz put on their kind of outdoor clothing,
• 59:16
  Speaker 5: you know, like he's, you know, and he goes down
• 59:19
  Speaker 5: and he like get like in the weeds, you know,
• 59:21
  Speaker 5: and he's like pointing out migrants, you know, I'm like, listen. Like,
• 59:24
  Speaker 5: we have folks to do that, right? You know, like,
• 59:26
  Speaker 5: get your tail in D.C. and help us pass some
• 59:29
  Speaker 5: legislation to address what they need us to do, you know,
• 59:32
  Speaker 5: which is to have the resources to handle it.
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: Speaking of demagoguing immigrants, your fellow colleague from Texas, Chip Roy,
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: went viral this week in all the wrong ways for
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: a speech he gave on the House floor. I just
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: want to play a quick clip and get your reaction.
• 59:45
  Speaker 4: We have 51.5 million people who are foreign-born in the
• 59:48
  Speaker 4: United States.
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: They have about 20 to 25 million kids.
• 59:52
  Speaker 4: That puts that well over 20-something percent of our population.
• 59:54
  Speaker 4: It's the highest such number in the history of our country.
• 59:58
  Speaker 4: People say, well, isn't that great?
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: Is it? What do you think of that?
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 5: You know, they're saying the quiet part out loud now,
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 5: you know.
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 5: The whole great replacement theory is now almost, you know, mainstream. And,
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 5: you know, we're a nation of immigrants. And John Lewis,
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 5: who was a mentor of mine and a hero of mine,
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 5: It used to say that we might have come here
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 5: on different ships, but we're in the same boat now.
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 5: We're all Americans. And that's our strength, right? I mean,
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 5: folks are not flooding into China, right? They're coming here.
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 5: And we are attracting the best and brightest from around
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 5: the world. And it's enriched our society. It's enriched our economy.
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 5: And it's something that has been a strength for us,
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 5: an ongoing strength, one that Russia can't equal, that China
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 5: can't equal, that sets us apart. and that even some
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 5: of our allies, you know, like Japan and others, I mean,
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 5: look at what they're facing in terms of, you know,
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 5: their future unless they address, you know, their population. And
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 5: so for us, I mean, this is a strength. Immigration
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 5: is a strength. Having, you know, new voices come in
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 5: is a strength. We're a beautiful tapestry, you know, of
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 5: so many folks coming here. Texas isn't a perfect example
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 5: of this, right? Texas is not, you know, it is
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 5: in every way as diverse as any place that you
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 5: can ever go. And that's in terms of Yes, white folks,
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 5: black folks, Latinos, yes, of course, but also huge East
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 5: Asian and South Asian populations rapidly growing. Folks wanting to
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 5: come there. Folks wanting to start a business. And in
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 5: order for that to continue, it has to be a
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 5: place where folks will feel welcome. And that's what I
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 5: think folks like Chip Roy and Ted Cruz put at risk.
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 5: And this near total ban on abortion puts at risk.
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 5: It's this story that this is a place where you
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 5: will be welcome and that you can raise your family
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 5: and grow your business here. and be allowed to chase
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 5: your version of the American dream without somebody imposing something
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 5: on you. And that's all being put at risk by
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 5: these folks, and I think they don't even understand what
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 5: our strengths are.
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: So I'm sure you saw the news that Texas Congressman
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: Henry Cuellar was indicted for allegedly accepting bribes, money laundering,
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: and attempting to violate foreign influence laws. You joined Democrats
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: and Republicans, rightly, I think, in voting to expel George
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: Santos after his indictments. Many Democrats have called for Bob
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: Menendez to resign after his indictments. Do you think Cuellar
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: should resign? Yeah.
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 5: So the distinction there I had was that when the
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 5: first vote was brought up for Santos in terms of
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 5: him being expelled, we didn't have an ethics report and
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 5: we didn't have anything. The case obviously hadn't gone to trial.
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 5: And so I felt that due process had not been served.
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 5: And so Jamie Raskin and I and some others, we
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 5: voted against expelling him at that point. When I did
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 5: vote to expel, I based it on the ethics report
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 5: that then had come out. And I based it on
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 5: what was in that report, that that was enough, that
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 5: he brought the House into disrepute, basically, and that that
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 5: process had some element of due process to it. And so,
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 5: you know, Henry's gonna have his day in court, and
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 5: I've said this, and I believe this, you know, I
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 5: worked in the U.S. Attorney's Office, and these folks take
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 5: their jobs very seriously, but I think it's a sign
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 5: of a functioning democracy when people in power are held
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 5: to account. And whether it's Henry or anyone else, they'll
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 5: have their day in court in front of a jury
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 5: of their peers, and they'll get a chance to make
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 5: their arguments. And if it's not proven beyond a reasonable doubt,
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 5: then they'll obviously get off. But here, the point is,
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 5: I think, that that's our tradition, is that we have
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 5: to have some element of due process. And I don't
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 5: think that's been reached yet.
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: Got it. Let's talk about the eternal dream of a
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: blue Texas. In 2018, Beto comes within three points of
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: beating Cruz. Closest to Democrat, came to winning statewide in
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: Texas since, I think, 1994. 2020, Joe Biden loses the
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: state by six points. 2022, Beto loses the governor's race
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: to Greg Abbott by 11 points. What's your take on
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: what's happened to the politics of the state since 2018?
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: And how do you think we start moving it back
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: in the other direction? Yeah.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 5: Well, first of all, I think 2018 showed how many
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 5: Texans are ready to move on from Ted Cruz.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 5: And I tell folks all the time, you know, I'm
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 5: running against Ted Cruz. I'm not running about our past
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 5: or other races that have happened. This is about Our
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 5: future and who's going to represent us for the next
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 5: six years, who's not been doing the job in him
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 5: in the Senate, and who I think would do a
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 5: very different job in the way I would approach it.
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 5: But we're also, you know, we're living in the post-Dobbs world,
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 5: and we're experiencing what a near total ban on abortion
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 5: looks like. And so this is a completely different era
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 5: for us. And I think it's only now becoming clearer
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 5: to Texans, and I guess probably to Americans more broadly,
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 5: just how horrific this law is. And, you know, it's almost,
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 5: you know, my wife and I have had two baby
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 5: boys in Dallas in the last five years. You know,
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 5: that process, as you know, is frightening no matter what.
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 5: You hold your breath at every single ultrasound, at every single,
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 5: you know, genetic test. Those rooms are too small to
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 5: have Ted Cruz in there too, right? Peering over the
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 5: doctor's shoulders. And when we hear these stories, you know,
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 5: and Dr. Austin Denard is a friend of mine. She
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 5: was my guest at the State of the Union. She's
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 5: an OBGYN in Dallas. Her husband is also an OB-GYN.
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 5: They had two kids, had a much-wanted third pregnancy, and
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 5: she notices on a routine ultrasound that the baby's skull
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 5: is not forming. She's a sixth-generation Texan. She grew up
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 5: 10 minutes from where I grew up.
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: Went to high school.
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 5: I know her entire life story pretty much. And she
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 5: had to flee our state to get the care she needs,
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 5: an OB-GYN. And we were only beginning to experience, I think,
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 5: the downstream impacts of of what this law has done
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 5: to our medical schools, to our universities, to our business economy,
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 5: where now if you want to recruit or retain top talent,
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 5: you've got to talk about this. And so it's going
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 5: to have a huge political impact. And so we have
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 5: to make sure Texans know that. But also this is
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 5: a different race, and I'm a different cat. I'm a
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 5: different opponent for Ted Cruz. I've been the most bipartisan
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 5: member of the entire Texas delegation. I'm proud of that.
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 5: I've worked across the aisle to get things done. I've
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 5: shown that you can bring people together around our shared
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 5: values instead of pitting folks against each other. And I'm
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 5: confident that when we can tell my story about being
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 5: raised by a single mom in Dallas, having a big
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 5: deal to get a scholarship to play football at Baylor,
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 5: making it to the NFL, becoming a civil rights lawyer,
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 5: and serving in a way that has brought folks together,
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 5: that we're going to reject Ted Cruz. What surprised you
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 5: the most about running statewide in Texas? I mean, you know,
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 5: I'm a fourth-generation Texan. My family, as I said, is
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 5: from Brownsville. I went to school in Waco. So I
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 5: was aware of the scale of our state. You know,
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 5: I mean, I think.
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 5: It is just incredibly massive. I think what surprised me
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 5: the most, I don't know. I mean, I think I
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 5: am constantly impressed by the pockets of resistance, if you
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 5: want to use that term, that you'll see like in
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 5: the panhandle where they're trying to pass at the local
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 5: level laws saying you can't drive through the county if
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 5: you're going to use the county roads to access an abortion.
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 5: And there'll be a few brave women up there who
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 5: have organized themselves, who are pushing back against literally billionaires,
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 5: who are behind some of this radical social policy stuff.
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 5: They're standing up to them. They've got their Facebook groups going.
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: They're active.
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 5: And they're in what we would all call a deeply
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 5: red county.
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 1: And they're winning.
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 5: And they're winning because they care. It's their community. They
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 5: think this isn't right. And I think that that's something
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 5: that I think folks... often underestimate. And I say this
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 5: all the time, and I really mean it. I think
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 5: our people are so much better than our politics, right?
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 5: Our people, you know, recognize extremism. I think our people generally,
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 5: what they want is fairly modest. You know, they want
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 5: to have a chance, you know, to chase their version
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 5: of the American dream. They want to have, you know,
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 5: some slight shifts in priorities to give them a shot,
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 5: and they know that it's up to them from there.
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 5: And I think so many of those folks have stood
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 5: up in recent years and been counted And they inspire me.
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 5: I'm serious. When I meet them, I thank them because
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 5: I think it's so inspiring what they're doing against incredibly
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 5: tall odds and in places where they're not coming on
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 5: Plots of America to talk about it. Nobody's putting their
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 5: name in the paper, but they're heroes.
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah. It's funny. Our old boss, Barack Obama, used to
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: say that about our people are better than our politics.
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: And I have wondered in recent years if it's still true.
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: I was hoping it's still true, and it's good to
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: hear from someone on the campaign trail. Even in the
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: reddest places, you're seeing people who are just trying their
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: best to make it. Last question. I saw you post
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: when Cowboy Carter was released. In 2018, Beyoncé made a
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: last-minute endorsement of Beto. Any plans to reach out to
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: her before Ted Cruz pretends to be a fan? That's right, right, yeah. Oh, man. Listen.
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 5: Beyonce, if you're listening, there's an open invitation.
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: She is a big fan of this podcast. Yeah, she's
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: always listening.
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 5: We'll get you in touch.
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 1: Listen, she is a Texan.
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 5: And it's time for Texans to stand up. We've had
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 5: kind of a gang of extremists take over parts of
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 5: our state. It's not who we are.
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: It isn't.
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 5: I know folks out there maybe think it is, and
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 5: I understand that because that's what you're seeing. But trust me,
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 5: I spent my whole life in Texas, right? You don't
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 5: get any more Texan than me. I was captain of
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 5: the football team at Baylor. I grew up in Dallas,
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 5: and my family's from all over the state. I've had
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 5: a relative who was the governor of Texas back in
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 5: the Depression era. I think I know who we are,
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 5: and we're not who these people say we are. And
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 5: so we need every Texan and everyone who's interested in
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 5: helping out in Texas. To get involved, go to ColinAllred.com.
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 5: This is not a long shot race, John.
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 2: No.
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 5: This is a tough but winnable one. I got into
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 5: Congress by beating a 22-year incumbent who nobody thought I
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 5: could beat. And I'm going to beat Ted Cruz, too.
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 1: I believe. That's good. Colin Allred, thank you so much
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 1: for coming back to Pod Save America. And good luck
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: out there in the campaign trail.
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 5: Yeah, thanks for having me.
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: Thanks to Colin Allred for joining today. If you want
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: to help that campaign, go to his website, like he said.
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: And also, in Vote Save America, we have a bunch
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: of down-ballot candidates in Texas. Avery Bishop in Dallas County,
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: Laurel Swift in the San Antonio suburbs, and Christian Carranza
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: in the San Antonio suburbs. These are candidates who could
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: flip seats. You can go help them. Go to votesaveamerica.com.
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: Just go to votesaveamerica.com slash 2024 to sign up for
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 1: Organize or Else. Because we talked a lot about polls.
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: And we talked a lot about what we can do.
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 1: And the one thing that we can actually do to
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: make an impact is go out and talk to voters.
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 1: And we will give you all kinds of things to do.
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: We will give you volunteer shifts. We'll tell you where
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 1: to donate. Votesave America has a fantastic website. Organize or
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 1: Else is really exciting. You can sign up to join
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: a team. You can gamify it. It's great. I think
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: we already got like a couple thousand after the first week,
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: but we need more people. If you're listening to this
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 1: pod and you're worried about the polls, this is the
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 1: best thing you can do. So everyone have a great day,
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: and we will be back with a new episode on Wednesday. Bye, everyone.
• 1:11:13
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• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: consider joining our Friends of the Pod subscription community at crooked.com
• 1:11:19
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• 1:11:22
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• 1:11:25
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• 1:11:29
  Speaker 1: if you're as opinionated as we are, consider dropping us
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: a review. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production.
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: Our show is produced by Olivia Martinez and David Toledo.
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: Our associate producers are Saul Rubin and Farrah Safari. Kira
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 1: Wakim is our senior producer. Reid Cherlin is our executive producer.
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 1: The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: Cantor is our sound engineer with audio support from Kyle
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Writing support by Hallie Kiefer. Madeline
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: Herringer is our head of news and programming. Matt DeGroat
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: is our head of production. Andy Taft is our executive assistant.
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 1: Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Haley Jones, Mia Kelman,
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 1: David Tolles, Kiril Pallaviv, and Molly Lobel.