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'COWARDS' Claire McCaskill BLASTS GOP lawmakers now trying to distance themselves from Trump · INSIGHT TODAY

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Columnist for the Washington Sun, Matt Lewis. His latest piece
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: is titled, I almost never vote for Democrats. I'm making
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: an exception this year. Matt, this reminds me when Christopher
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  Speaker 1: Buckley and I wrote a column in 2006, lamenting high deficits,
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  Speaker 1: high debt, big spending, just out of control spending in Washington, D.C.,
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  Speaker 1: a war in Iraq that had veered wildly out of control,
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  Speaker 1: terrible reactions, Hurricane Katrina, Harriet Meyers debacle. And we did
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: an article that said it's time for us to go.
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  Speaker 1: And Chris Buckley and myself wrote the article saying, you know,
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  Speaker 1: we vote for Republicans. We're not going to this year
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  Speaker 1: as a form of protest. It sounds like you're there
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  Speaker 1: in 2026.
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  Speaker 2: That's right, Joe.
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  Speaker 3: And look, I think it feels like 2006. I remember
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  Speaker 3: what it felt like in 2006. And that vibe, that zeitgeist,
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  Speaker 3: I think it's very similar. And look, yeah, you have
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  Speaker 3: a Republican president who has really just run this country
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  Speaker 3: into a ditch. I think there's an opportunity to send
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  Speaker 3: a message to him. It could be about gas prices.
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  Speaker 3: But As someone who cares about the Republican Party and
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  Speaker 3: I don't want to sound naive, but hopes to someday
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  Speaker 3: bring it start to at least bring it back to
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  Speaker 3: the kind of the Reagan conservatism. I also think there's
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  Speaker 3: an opportunity here because for the first time, Joe, I'm
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  Speaker 3: seeing elected Republicans scrubbing Donald Trump from their websites. I'm
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  Speaker 3: seeing elected Republicans criticizing him over, you know, murdering people
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  Speaker 3: with ice cubes. killing Americans in the streets and over
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  Speaker 3: the war in Iran, which he promised not to do.
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  Speaker 3: And so I do think that this is an opportunity
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  Speaker 3: to send a message. It is a midterm. It is
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  Speaker 3: a referendum, I think, on the policies of Donald Trump.
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  Speaker 3: And so that is what I have decided to do
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  Speaker 3: this time around.
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  Speaker 2: So, Matt, we've been talking this week about some of
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  Speaker 2: these numbers, unlike we've ever seen that 17% of Americans,
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  Speaker 2: one seven, support Donald Trump on how he's handled the
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  Speaker 2: cost of living. That's a crazy number when you consider
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  Speaker 2: Republicans and MAGA and everything else are now part of
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  Speaker 2: the group that thinks he's not doing a good job
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  Speaker 2: on the economy. We've heard Republicans try and flail to
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  Speaker 2: make a case. We heard Speaker Mike Johnson this week say,
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  Speaker 2: give us two more years and you're going to get
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  Speaker 2: more of the same or we're going to do a
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  Speaker 2: little better even. Well, America is saying we don't want
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  Speaker 2: any more of this. So the argument seems to be, well,
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  Speaker 2: the other side are socialists or their faith isn't real
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  Speaker 2: or some of these arguments we've been talking about this morning.
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  Speaker 2: If you're a Republican running in one of these swing
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  Speaker 2: districts or a state that's suddenly close that shouldn't be,
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  Speaker 2: what is your case right now?
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  Speaker 3: I don't know if my imagination's that good, but I
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  Speaker 3: think what you have to do, you can't I don't
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  Speaker 3: think you can plausibly make the case for Donald Trump
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  Speaker 3: actually as a conservative. If you care about things like
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  Speaker 3: the rule of law, character, free speech, you can't make it.
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  Speaker 3: Even as a MAGA person, like as a hardcore America
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  Speaker 3: first MAGA person, like how could you make it? He's
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  Speaker 3: he didn't bring prices down on day one. He didn't
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  Speaker 3: keep us out of foreign wars. I mean, you go
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  Speaker 3: down the list. He has really betrayed his promises. And
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  Speaker 3: I think that is a character issue. So I think
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  Speaker 3: what you have to do if you're a Republican running
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  Speaker 3: is you have to If you can, begin to distance
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  Speaker 3: from these policies. And we're seeing that happening. If you
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  Speaker 3: can get away with it, Trump makes that hard. But
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  Speaker 3: you also have to disqualify your opponents, right? You have
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  Speaker 3: to say, like... Actually, Sherrod Brown and Josh Turek and
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  Speaker 3: James Tallarico are woke. They're communists. They're woke leftists. And
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  Speaker 3: I'm just of the opinion that dog won't hunt. The
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  Speaker 3: candidate quality on the Democratic side right now is pretty solid.
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  Speaker 3: There may be a couple of exceptions where it will work.
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  Speaker 3: I do know there are obviously DSA people like running
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  Speaker 3: for Congress in places like New York and Illinois or Colorado.
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  Speaker 3: But for these prominent U.S. Senate races, a lot of
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  Speaker 3: these candidates are really good. So it's going to be
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  Speaker 3: difficult to demonize some of these people.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 4: And to Matt's point just now about Republicans not having
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  Speaker 4: anything to run on, a strategist told me for my
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  Speaker 4: new piece that there's this also frustration. Voters are angry, quote,
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  Speaker 4: because they are hurting. And through his actions, Trump is
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  Speaker 4: telling them that he doesn't give a damn. So there's
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  Speaker 4: that just utter disconnect, Claire, where there's no sense that
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  Speaker 4: he's even trying to make our lives better. So with
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  Speaker 4: this as the backdrop, my question to you is, we're
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  Speaker 4: seeing some Republicans, some saying, hey, I might cross party
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  Speaker 4: lines and vote for Democrat. More and more saying or
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  Speaker 4: not saying I'll probably just stay home because I'm just
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  Speaker 4: disgusted with the whole thing. How do Democrats take advantage?
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  Speaker 4: What would be your advice to candidates? Is this something
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  Speaker 4: you need to sort of shift messaging, tailor an appeal?
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  Speaker 1: What's the play?
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  Speaker 5: Well, I think it's important to point out that any
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  Speaker 5: of the Republicans that are trying to distance themselves from
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  Speaker 5: Donald Trump, they were in Congress. They had the power
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  Speaker 5: to stop Donald Trump and they didn't. Instead, they went
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  Speaker 5: along with what Donald Trump has done. They hid under
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  Speaker 5: their desks. They cowered. like the cowards they are. And
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  Speaker 5: so now for any of them trying to distance themselves,
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  Speaker 5: it rings very phony. But I think really more importantly,
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  Speaker 5: they ought to continue to focus on those independent voters. Yeah,
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  Speaker 5: they're going to have to get some Republicans in some
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  Speaker 5: of these states. I mean, Adam Hamilton won't win in
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  Speaker 5: Kansas unless some Republicans vote for him. Tallarico won't win
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  Speaker 5: in Texas unless some Republicans vote for him. But those
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  Speaker 5: independent voters, the margins with independent voters is really where
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  Speaker 5: they've got to focus. And that's where you just stick
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  Speaker 5: to your knitting on cost, cost, cost. This guy is
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  Speaker 5: building ballrooms and gilding his office with gold filigrees. And
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  Speaker 5: I'm worried about your grocery bill. And if they do that, it's.
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  Speaker 2: Going to work.
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  Speaker 5: And they won't have to get as many Republicans if
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  Speaker 5: they get their margins up with the independent voters that
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  Speaker 5: are willing to vote for either party.
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  Speaker 1: So, Claire, let me ask you this question. You represented
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  Speaker 1: Missouri in the Senate. How does Missouri go from having
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  Speaker 1: someone like you to having someone like Eric Schmidt as
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  Speaker 1: their representative? And I'm not saying that being funny. What
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  Speaker 1: has happened in the state of Missouri? What has happened
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  Speaker 1: in some of these other states where you have these
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  Speaker 1: people who just act? I don't know Eric Schmidt, but
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  Speaker 1: he acts like a clown on TV. He lies. He spread,
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  Speaker 1: you know, he's warned not to not to talk about
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  Speaker 1: an Atlanta Hawks game, not to show he he does
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  Speaker 1: it anyway. He actually he calls Jack Smith a, quote,
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  Speaker 1: dirtbag when he's the one who has been trying to
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  Speaker 1: scrub January 6th from America's memory. I'm pretty sure I
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  Speaker 1: know if dirtbag is applied to either Jack Smith or
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  Speaker 1: Eric Schmidt, what history will who history will judge the dirtbag.
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  Speaker 1: And it will probably be the one not standing up
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  Speaker 1: for cops. They get the hell beaten out of them
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  Speaker 1: on January 6th. So how is it that that guy
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  Speaker 1: represents a state you represented not so long ago?
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  Speaker 5: Well, what Donald Trump did brilliantly is he tapped into grievance.
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  Speaker 5: He tapped into people, particularly in rural areas of my state,
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  Speaker 5: that felt like they'd been left behind, that everybody was
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  Speaker 5: getting the help but them. They were living by the rules.
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  Speaker 5: They couldn't afford to retire. They couldn't afford to take
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  Speaker 5: a vacation. They couldn't afford to send their kids to college.
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  Speaker 5: And meanwhile, they thought everybody else was getting something and
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  Speaker 5: they weren't. Donald Trump figured that out. So he blamed
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  Speaker 5: it on the Mexicans, not microchips. He spent a lot
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  Speaker 5: of time convincing folks that were upset that they'd been
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  Speaker 5: left behind that he was their savior. And it worked.
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  Speaker 5: He got a lot of people in rural Missouri that
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  Speaker 5: had voted for Democrats to switch. And the cultural issues helped.
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  Speaker 5: The way he spoke helped because he said things out
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  Speaker 5: loud that they were thinking, but nobody had ever said
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  Speaker 5: out loud before. Now, here's what's happened, Joe. Those margins
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  Speaker 5: went crazy in rural areas of Missouri and allowed Eric
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  Speaker 5: Schmidt to be a clown and still get elected. But
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  Speaker 5: what's happening now in rural areas, health care hospitals are closing.
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  Speaker 5: The tariffs are killing the farmers. Input costs on diesel
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  Speaker 5: are through the roof. And you're seeing those margins, at
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  Speaker 5: least in the polling I'm looking at, beginning to swing
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  Speaker 5: back to a more reasonable level that would allow Democrats
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  Speaker 5: to win in states like Missouri again. And you're seeing
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  Speaker 5: it in places like Iowa and Kansas.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, you know, Willie, the crisis in rural health care,
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  Speaker 1: we've been actually talking about it long before the so-called
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  Speaker 1: Big Beautiful Bill passed. That savaged rural health care even more.
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  Speaker 1: There's such a rural health care crisis. There's a farming crisis.
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  Speaker 1: You have people losing their farms. There's a trucking crisis.
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  Speaker 1: Truck truck companies going bankrupt right now. Diesel well over
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  Speaker 1: six a gallon. You look at the damage that tariffs
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  Speaker 1: have done. You look at the damage that so much
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  Speaker 1: of the Republican policy is done. Trump's policy is done
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  Speaker 1: to rural areas today. you know, you can understand why
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  Speaker 1: Democrats are making gains in the rural part of America.
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  Speaker 1: In fact, what's hard to understand is why anybody in
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  Speaker 1: rural America would vote for Republicans right now under this administration.
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  Speaker 2: And what's so remarkable, Joe, about everything you just laid
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  Speaker 2: out there is each of those was a choice. The big, beautiful,
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  Speaker 2: bill was a choice to strip funding away from rural
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  Speaker 2: hospitals and red districts and hospitals all over the country.
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  Speaker 2: The war in Iran was a choice. The trade war
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  Speaker 2: moves was closed. Gas and diesel, the prices go up.
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  Speaker 2: That was a choice. Tariffs were a choice. That's driving
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  Speaker 2: prices up across the country. And Donald Trump, Republicans were
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  Speaker 2: warned about all this. Many Republicans knew about all this.
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  Speaker 2: They wouldn't stand up to him because they fear him.
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  Speaker 2: And now they're left to deal with the consequences. Less
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  Speaker 2: than five weeks from now, we'll see what they are.
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  Speaker 3: Or just click below.
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  Speaker 1: Thanks.