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Kamala Harris's Path to 270 · Pod Save America

• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: I'm Tommy Vitor.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Good to be back from Chicago, but I really miss
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: not sleeping and... eating like shit.
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: What about you? It's weird to not be doing this
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: in eyeshot of a Michael Jordan statue or 15,000 of
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: our closest friends.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that was a lot.
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: Super loud noise all the time behind us and no headphones.
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: Great week though.
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: Very fun.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: Also, fantastic city.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: Chicago, it was like what, 72, 75 every single day. Perfect.
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: I maybe want to move there again.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: And we barely got to enjoy it.
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: I walked by the lake one time for about an hour.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Did you get out? Smart.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: No, not at all. Sorry about that. I like two
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: blocks from the hotel, maybe. All right. On today's show,
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: the Trump campaign says Trump is serious about ramping up
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: his schedule and staying on message as we head into
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: the fall. And they really mean it this time. Kamala
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: Harris and Tim Walz get ready for a swing through
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: southern Georgia in their first big interview. Then you'll hear
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: Harris campaign's battleground state's director, our friend Dan Cannon, talk
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: to Pfeiffer and me about the campaign's path to 270.
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: and what they're doing on the ground to get there.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: But first, now that both conventions are over, one of
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: the last, and potentially the last, big event between now
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: and Election Day is the September 10th presidential debate on
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: ABC News. But even that might not be a sure thing.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: On Sunday night, Trump posted a rant about ABC News
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: on Truth Social, saying, quote, I ask, why would I
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: do the debate against Kamala Harris on that network? Ostensibly because...
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: Sunday's This Week roundtable triggered him in some way?
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: He also doesn't like George Slopidopoulos. Slopidopoulos. That could be
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: a thing.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: He had complaints about Slopidopoulos, John Carl, Donna Brazile. Huh.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: He was pretty angry.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: It's been the same cast of characters on ABC for
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: a while. You probably should have seen this one coming.
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: So Playbook had more reporting on Monday morning that there's
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: actually a substantive disagreement between the campaigns about whether the
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: rule should be the same as the Biden-Trump debate. The
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: Trump campaign wants the mics muted again when the other
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: candidate is speaking. But this time, the Harris campaign wants
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: the mics on the whole time.
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: Got it.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Here's Trump when he was asked about it in an
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: event on Monday.
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: Would you want the.
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: Microphones muted in the debate whenever you're not speaking?
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: We agreed to the same rules. I don't know. It
• 2:39
  Speaker 3: doesn't matter to me.
• 2:40
  Speaker 4: I'd rather have it probably on.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: But the agreement was that it would be the same
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: as it was last time. In that case, it was muted.
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: Didn't like it the last time, but it worked out fine.
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: Ask Biden how it worked out.
• 2:54
  Speaker 5: It was fine.
• 2:55
  Speaker 3: And I think it should be the same. We agreed
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: to the same rules. Same rules and same specifications. And
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: I think that's probably what it should be. But they're
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: trying to change it. The truth is they're trying to
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: get out of it because she doesn't want to debate.
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: She's not a good debater. She's not a smart person.
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: She doesn't want to debate.
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: On message.
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: I love there's like a takeout order coming in as
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: he's doing a press conference. So perfect.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: I also like that he had like campaigns, messages, same rules.
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: We agreed to the same rules, got to be the
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: same rules. And then he just can't help but just
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: do his own thing, which is, oh, I don't care
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: either way. Put them on. Maybe I think I'd rather
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: have them on, but they were off last time.
• 3:33
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: Also, we demand the Biden debate.
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: So after that, Brian Fallon from the Harris campaign tweeted basically, great,
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: we're agreed.
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: I like that.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: Why do you think the Harris folks want Trump's mic on?
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: While Kamala is speaking because of what we just heard,
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: he's an angry, undisciplined jerk and swing voters dislike that
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: about him. When the Trump, the Twitter feed shows up,
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: I think Kamala Harris does well. And also I think
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: they probably know that Donald Trump is going to get
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: very triggered by criticism from Kamala Harris. Historically speaking, he's
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: especially thin skinned when criticized by a woman or a
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: person of color. And they want everyone to experience that
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: reaction in real time.
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: You don't think a lot of voters will find a
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: crazy old man interrupting Kamala Harris every five seconds attractive?
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: No, I don't. I think it'll be incredibly off-putting and
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: people could hate him.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: It's interesting because I think you were one of the
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: first people... before the last debate, when they talked about
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: the mics muted, and I remember you saying like, you know,
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: I don't know if it's a great idea for Biden
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: to ask for the mics to be muted because Trump
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: will be interrupting him, but we won't get to hear
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: Trump saying all this crazy shit.
• 4:41
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: That was my concern. He started barking at him from
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: 12 feet away, but the mics don't pick it up. Yeah.
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: And I think like in one of his post-debate interviews,
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: Biden actually said that part of his problem was Trump
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: continuing to like yell at him and him not being
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: able to But yeah, no, I think it's a pretty...
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: I totally get why the Harris campaign wants the mics on.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: It feels like the Trump campaign seemingly doesn't want that
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: for the same reason.
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's right. I mean, we keep reading
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: these background quotes and stories from frustrated Trump aides who
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: want him to be... talk about policy, stay on the prompter,
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: just generally be disciplined and not be himself. And then
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: the best part is that Trump then complains about these
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: conversations with his aides at rallies. You and I were watching...
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: one of these in the bus the other day, right? Remember,
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: he did an audience poll about whether he should get
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: personal with his attacks. And then when they said yes,
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: he said he was going to fire whoever told him
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: not to do that. It was great.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: I mean, I thought it was smart of the Harris
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: campaign to basically, this debate had been happening behind the
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: scenes and they basically made it public. They told Playbook
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: on the record that they think that the Trump campaign
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: didn't believe they could keep their candidate under control for
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: 90 minutes, but they suspect that Trump believes otherwise. And
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: sure enough, they drove a wedge between Trump and his campaign.
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: That's right. I mean, they know that any kind of
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: story like this about Trump being handled by a staff
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: is going to make him mad. And it's going to
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: lead him to want to overrule them publicly, which gets
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: Kamala Harris what she wants. It's also, you know, there's
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: been a lot of reporting, I think, correct reporting about
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: how the Trump campaign until recently was a lot smarter
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: and more disciplined. And we're also seeing them slowly bring
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: back the old names like the Corey Lewandowski's of the
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: world who are not disciplined, who are disruptive and chaotic.
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: And so if Kamala's spokespeople can like roll a grenade
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: into Trump HQ with these background staffs, make him pick
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: a fight with his own aides, that is a huge bonus.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: And by the way, now he has, you know, they
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: can go back and do negotiations and being like, your
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: candidate just said publicly, he doesn't mind if the mics
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: are not muted. If for some reason, they can't agree
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: on this and they say same rules, let's just do that,
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: that's easier. I don't think it's like the worst thing
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: in the world for Kamala Harris, but I do think
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: it's much better if the mics are on.
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think the mics on would be better, but
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: also everyone's just kind of like feeding the daily press
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: cycle beast here. Yeah.
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: I mean, do you have any doubts that we'll still
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: have a debate?
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: I mean, tell me if you disagree because I feel
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: too confident in this, but I think this debate happens
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: because at the moment, I could make the case that
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: it's in the best interest of both sides. Trump is
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: seething at Kamala Harris's good press. He wants to destroy her.
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: He says publicly that he hates her. He says publicly
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: that he thinks she's dumb. That's going to lead to overconfidence.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: So he's going to want to debate. Kamala Harris and
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: her team, they know she's good at this, that she'll
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: put the time in, that she's disciplined. And also though
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: that most voters don't know her. So this is an
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: important opportunity. I also think The stakes, the downside risk
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: of being seen as ducking a debate when maybe it's
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: the only one is pretty high.
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I agree with all of that. I
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: think that it is in both of their best interest
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: to want the debate. The reason I'm not 100% certain
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: is because I don't think either of them absolutely needs
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: the debate at this point to win because the race
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: is basically tied. So you could see it falling apart
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: because like, you know, tied race, maybe Trump's up in
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: a couple battlegrounds. Maybe she's up in a couple battlegrounds.
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: If somehow this whole thing falls apart, you know, you
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: could see both of them thinking, all right, I'll just
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: grind it out, doing my rallies and interviews on my
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: own until November. But you're right for the reasons you said.
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: For both of them, I think they'd rather have the
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: debate each campaign.
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it'll be a lot of eyeballs. Yes. A huge opportunity.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: And he wants to, you know, he wants to use
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: the debate to just plant more doubts with voters about her.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: And she wants to reassure people who might not know
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: enough about her. So regardless of what happens with the debate,
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: the Trump campaign is telling reporters they're launching a new
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: strategy for the fall. More events and surprisingly smaller non-rally
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: events where Trump will allegedly drive a more focused message.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: He took this strategy for a spin on Monday when
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: he addressed a National Guard Association conference in Detroit where
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: he was officially endorsed by former Democratic presidential candidate turned
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: Trump debate coach Tulsi Gabbard. She's had a journey. Then
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: he kind of sort of stayed on message. Let's listen.
• 8:57
  Speaker 6: Look at what's going on right now. with Ukraine disurging
• 9:02
  Speaker 6: into Russia, okay? You're going to end up in World
• 9:06
  Speaker 6: War III. Kamala Harris is letting terrorists come into our
• 9:12
  Speaker 6: country at record numbers and letting jihadists pour into our
• 9:17
  Speaker 6: homeland by the thousands and thousands and thousands. Can't do that.
• 9:22
  Speaker 6: Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are promising the exact opposite.
• 9:29
  Speaker 6: They want endless war, open borders, voting rights and free
• 9:32
  Speaker 6: health care for illegal aliens, Soviet-style price control, censorship, unlimited
• 9:39
  Speaker 6: migration from terrorist hotspots.
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: Does the new strategy involve horse tranquilizer?
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's weird. I mean, also, like, your boss likes
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: one thing, big rallies and crowd events. And you're going
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: to say, actually, we're taking your toy away. You're doing
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: small events now. That's not going to go well. This
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: reminds me a little bit of 2008. when McKinney, picked
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: Sarah Palin and Sarah Palin starts having these big rallies
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: and their message about Obama was he's the biggest celebrity
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: in the world and all he can do is do
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: these big rallies. And so then we decided as a
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: campaign to like have Obama do these smaller events. And
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: then I remember one day there was the split screen
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: where Barack Obama, who could command these like huge crowds,
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: was like in a library with kids and he was
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: like reading the kids like George W.
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: Bush, My Pet Goat style. And so there's Obama with
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: a small little crowd and he's sort of trying to
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: do like an early childhood education message. And then there's
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: Sarah Palin with this huge fucking crowd. It's like, no, no, no,
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: we can't do that.
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: Fix this right now.
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: That's the whole point.
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: No, no.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: The big rallies are the whole point for Donald Trump.
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know why you take that away from him,
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: but he's not going to be disciplined no matter where
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: he is. So give up.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: What did you think of the on-message Trump? I don't
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: know if it was much of a message.
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: So my favorite is when off-message or at least off-prompter
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: Trump disagrees with on-prompter Trump in the same event. So
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: this is my favorite example from the speech today. This
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: is verbatim, by the way. Trump says, quote, The National
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: Guard is America's first and last line of defense, and
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: you do not get the credit you deserve. But actually,
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: you do, because deep down, everybody knows it. You get
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: a lot of credit in your own way. It's so funny.
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: You can tell when he's reading the remarks for the
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: first time and then reacting to them like that.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: I just, like, whatever. That's his message, I guess. He wasn't,
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: you know, he wasn't doubting Kamala Harris's racial identity. He
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: wasn't calling Tim Walls tampon Tim as he did on
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: Twitter last night.
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: He did it at the event too. Oh, he did
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: it today too. Sorry, I missed that part.
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: Okay, so he wasn't really on message. But I think
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: even that message, like they haven't, it doesn't seem like
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: they've settled on a message about her that is, that
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: seems effective to me. Like why he's talking about Russia, Ukraine,
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: like what?
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: He was all over the place. So the prompter remarks
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: and then he did a rally speech on top of it.
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: I thought, I mean, yeah, there was a lot of
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: talk that he was low energy and One thing I
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: thought was interesting was he was joined by Tulsi Gabbard,
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: who was an Army Reserve officer and then served in
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: Congress as a Democrat. When you have Trump going from
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: the RFK, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. endorsement, and then you
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: have Tulsi Gabbard on stage, I think that's kind of
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: an interesting bipartisan narrative. Now, sickos like us know this
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: is a misleading narrative because Tulsi quit the Democratic Party
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: in 2022, and RFK Jr. is a dino. He's a
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: Democrat in name only, literally. He is just an anti-vaccine person.
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: The rest of the speech was the greatest hits. I
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: did think the emphasis in front of a military audience, basically, that,
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: you know, the Afghanistan withdrawal was a mess and Trump
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: is the one who will keep the U.S. out of
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: wars could be compelling, but it's just mixed up with
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: all this other junk.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: I mean, to your point about sickos like us, I
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: do think in these these bigger rallies or events or whatever,
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: like we're the only ones paying close attention to. And
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: watching this whole rally other than the people there.
• 12:48
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: And so all of this is about just like what
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: message headline do you want to generate every day? And
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: they're not coming anywhere close to doing that.
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: No. And they have no control over what the headline
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: of the day is because they can't control their boss.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: Do you think there's any value then to the Trump
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: campaign signaling a new strategy? that their candidate is surely
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: going to be unable to follow? Or are they just
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: looking for like a narrative reset or what?
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: I can never tell if this is because Trump's staff
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: just constantly talks to him in the press. If this
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: is undisciplined people just kind of like mouthing off. But
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: it does set up the easiest gotcha in the world.
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: If you're going to be like, we're going to do small,
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: tighter rallies. And then he goes off script for 45 minutes.
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I was trying to think about this. Like you
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: do have, you have a structurally close election between, and
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: a press corps that's just going to get bored of
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: the Kamala honeymoon narrative. And so if you still have
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: a tide race a few weeks from now, or even
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: if Trump, you know, gains a point or two, maybe
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: they then want the coverage to treat that momentum as
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: if it was like fueled by a new Trump or
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: at least a new Trump strategy. So it's like, let's
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: go where the, let's go where the puck is headed.
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: That makes sense.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess. I don't know. Cause I do think
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: we're already seeing it in some polling. Like this is,
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: It remains a close race. It was always going to
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: be a close race, except when a extenuating circumstance like
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden's debate performance happens. Donald Trump versus a generic
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: Democrat or most Democrats against a generic Republican. We're still
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: going to be like within five points. So everyone should just,
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: you know, buckle up. It's going to be a close race.
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: So a CNN story this morning said that the increased
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: pace of events is a, quote, direct response to the
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: enthusiasm spike. from Democrats since Harris replaced Biden atop their ticket,
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: sourcing that to people familiar with the plans. We love
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: a source familiar. I would also note Trump's truth post
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: the morning after the DNC that said, my administration will
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: be great for women and their reproductive rights.
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: That settles it.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: Just wild. Maybe the first time he's used that phrase,
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: followed by a campaign statement sprinting away from conservative positions
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: on IVF and contraception. Another data point here, J.D. Vance,
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: who will reportedly be camping out in the blue wall states,
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: especially Pennsylvania, as part of this new strategy, reiterated on
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: Meet the Press that Trump would veto a national abortion ban.
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: Do you think the Trump campaign is genuinely nervous or
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: just this is just what a campaign normally does to
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: try to win?
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: I mean, I think that they thought when it was
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden running and maybe even before the debate, they
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: thought that the campaign was over. And that they were
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: going to win 400 plus electoral votes. You saw that
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: Tim Alberta at the Atlantic did this long piece where
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: he spent all this time with Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita.
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: And they were so cocky. And they were talking about
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: this historic, you know, sweep of MAGA through the country.
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: Trump was barely doing events. He was just golfing every day.
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: And now they know it's a toss up. So I
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: think they're definitely trying to get him to refocus, be
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: more disciplined, mop up some problem positions. Unfortunately, you can't
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: mop up the choice of J.D. Vance, but maybe they're
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: just going to stick him in a state and never
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: see him again. But, you know, like those tweets you
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: just read aloud about, you know, protecting reproductive choice or
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: Trump vetoing a national abortion ban, don't believe that for
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: a second. It's bullshit, but it's a good strategy to
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: try to get ahead of those attacks before the debate
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: or just attacks generally about abortion.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: It makes me think they're seeing something in their polling
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: that abortion is really hurting them, which, you know, should
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: not be a surprise to any of us, but it's
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: good to know that they're seeing this too. And part
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: of it, I think, is you're also seeing this sort
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: of widening gender gap.
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: I bet that's a lot of it.
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: And, you know, if we get to the point where,
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: you know, Kamala Harris is winning women by more than
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump was winning men, then that's sort of ballgame.
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: And more women turn out, I think. Right.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: So that's kind of it. I also think that whether
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: the campaign's rattled or not, Trump is clearly rattled himself
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: by Because of anyone, he knows the value, the political
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: value of attention and celebrity. And he's looking over at
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris and he's thinking that like her popularity is
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: sort of like reaching into more celebrity status. And he
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: doesn't like that.
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: No, not at all. And, you know, he saw Obama's
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: celebrity translate into massive electoral victories.
• 17:10
  Speaker 6: Yes.
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: So we haven't really talked about RFK Jr. 's endorsement
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: of Trump since it actually happened on Friday. We were
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: flying home. Trump and Kennedy appear together at an event
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: in Arizona. where Kennedy said Trump will make America healthy again,
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: which he's now abbreviated as MAHA. Which I didn't realize
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: until I was sort of looking at Twitter this morning,
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: and I see all these, like, hashtag mahas everywhere. Maha memes.
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: It sounds like something you get deboned at the table
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: at an expensive restaurant. Really weird. Yeah. Good luck with that, buddy.
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: Rebranding MAGA. Okay, RFK Jr.
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and then he had this, like, long tweet, too,
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: where he was trying to redefine MAGA, and he's like,
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: I know some people don't like it, but it's actually,
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: it can be kind, and it can be, like, welcoming.
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: Yeah, there's an audience.
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: And Donald Trump goes on like a like a 10
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: tweet thread just out of his fucking mind. Yeah.
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: The audience of one for that RFK tweet, trying to
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: redefine and make America great again for Cheryl Hines, his wife,
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: who I believe is furious at him reportedly about this decision.
• 18:14
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: He said at one point he said she would divorce
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: him if he endorsed Trump. So. Oh, wow. Do with
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: that what you will.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: Kennedy said on Fox this weekend that Trump did not
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: offer him a cabinet position or anything else in exchange
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: for his government. Though he later said, he talked to
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: me about a unity government. So I don't know what
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: the fuck that means.
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: What? Yeah.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: Unity government with like someone who got no votes.
• 18:35
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: By far the biggest news about RFK right now involves
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: yet another dead animal, Tommy.
• 18:41
  Speaker 6: I just.
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: In a newly unearthed interview with Town and Country in 2012,
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: his daughter, Kick Kennedy, who has reportedly been spending time
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: with Dunkin' Donuts spokesperson Ben Affleck. It's just a whole
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: nother story we can get into.
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: Yep.
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: She said that when she was a kid, her dad
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: cut off the head of a dead whale with a
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: chainsaw and tied it to the top of their minivan
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: to bring it home. Key quote, as if you needed
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: a quote. Every time we accelerated on the highway, whale
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: juice would pour into the windows of the car and
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: it was the rankest thing on the planet. We all
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: had plastic bags over our heads with mouth holes cut
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: out and people on the highway were giving us the
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: finger to But that was just normal day-to-day stuff for us.
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: Why don't you close the windows?
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: That is incredible.
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: If you have a whale carcass on your roof, close
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: the windows. How many stories like this does this family have? Infinity.
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: First of all, I want to say, Kick Kennedy is
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: a cool name.
• 19:40
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: And when Hannah and I were figuring out what to
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: name Lizette and James, I did not know that random
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: verbs were available to me as options.
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah, her little brother, Punch Kennedy.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: Is that true? Shimmer Vitor. Also, did you know that
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: Connor Kennedy, the Taylor Swift ex, is also RFK Jr.
• 19:59
  Speaker 6: 's kid?
• 19:59
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: I did know that. These family gatherings must be wild.
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: You got Ben Affleck. You got Taylor Swift. Talk about
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: a black sheep, though.
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: Zero vaccines. Yeah, no vaccines anywhere. I would like you
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: to rank the whale head, the dead bear cub, and
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: the brain worm in order of which creeps you out
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: the most.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: Brain worms run away number one for me. Disgusting. Worms
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: are generally disgusting. And anything in your brain, I think,
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: is like actual nightmare fuel. To rank the other two,
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: I need some more information, which is what kind of whale.
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: Really?
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: Well, the blue whale is the largest thing ever known
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: to live on the earth.
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: Do you want to do Charlie's bedtime? Because he has
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: been obsessed with types of whales, types of sharks. He's
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: very into marine life right now. And he has lots
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: of questions. And you're a big marine life guy.
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: Call me anytime. But a blue whale weighs between 100
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: and 200 tons. So that's a lot of head for
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: your roof. Now, even like a beluga, a baby beluga,
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: if you will, That's still, I think, like 1,000, 2,000
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: pound whale. So what I'm getting at is you're talking
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: about like 100 pounds of head on the roof and
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: all the associated juices. So I'm guessing, so baby bear
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: is gross because it's sad that it's a baby, but
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: I think it's probably brain worms one, whale head two,
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: bear three. Your rank?
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: So it depends on which category, right? Like if you
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: rank them by stories, like insanity of the stories, it's
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: got to be bear cub first.
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: You think even chainsawing off the head of a.
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: I just think that in terms of how hard I've laughed,
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: watching the video of him tell the bear cub story
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: to Roseanne is maybe the hardest I've laughed all cycle.
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: I was literally crying.
• 21:42
  Speaker 5: Me too.
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: Crying laughing.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: And there's so many holes in the story. If you
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: talk about what I'd... Personally, I would not want the
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: brain worm.
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: Sure.
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: But of all the stories we've talked about on this podcast,
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: when I just said the words, whale juice would pour
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: into the windows of the car... I came closest to
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: actually gagging.
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: These poor kids.
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: Of all of the different stories. That is fucking gross.
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: Have you ever seen the video of the rotting whale
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: carcass on the beach that explodes?
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: Oh, yes.
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: Because they get all the juices and anyway. Google it.
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: YouTube it.
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: Now that we've had a few days of coverage and
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: we got the whale story in, what do you make
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: of how the Kennedy endorsement is playing for Trump so
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: far and how much it might matter?
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: Like, it's hard to tell. So I watched parts of
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: the Kennedy press conference and I watched parts of the
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: Trump event where he introduced him. And RFK got a
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: huge ovation at Trump's event. So that probably tells you
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: something about, as Kamala Harris would say, the Venn diagram
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: of overlap between their voters, like probably a little more MAGA.
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: Trump said that RFK, he wants RFK to investigate chronic
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: health problems and childhood diseases. And my favorite part of
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: the pitch was Trump praising Kennedy for his commitment to
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: providing safe and healthy foods to kids. Remember, this is
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: the guy who fed college athletes McDonald's every time they
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: came to the White House. Anyway, like Kennedy's message, it
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: was muddled. It was weird. He made it sound like
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: he cut some backroom deal. And then also he's going
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: to stay in on the ballot in some states. So
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: like none of it really makes sense. The polling on
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: this has shown that RFK pulled votes pretty evenly between
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: Trump and Harris. RFK was doing better with Latino and
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: Black voters. And so if he's able to peel off
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: some of them, that could be a problem. But that
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: might have been a legacy from the polling about RFK
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: from the Biden era. So my guess is it's a wash. Yeah.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: And it may be too early to tell still. I mean,
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: Nate Silver- like reran his model without RFK Jr. said
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: that basically nothing changed. We had a poll out today,
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: maybe the first big national poll since the debate and
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: from Echelon, by the way, it has Trump 49, Kamala 48,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: but they also, they ran it with Kennedy and then
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: without Kennedy, but still with the other third party candidates.
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: And it maybe helped Trump a smidge more without Kennedy
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: in the race. But when they did the four way
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: or five way now without RFK Jr., Kamala was up
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: like 48, 47. So it's hard to tell. It's all,
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: I think, around the margin of error. So it's sort
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: of tough to figure it out.
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: Right. Is Robert F. Kennedy, is he going to endorse
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: and then go do work in key battleground states? Or
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: is he going to endorse and then just like go
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: collect dead corpses of animals around his house?
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: And what audiences is he speaking to that aren't already
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: Trump people or, you know, so I don't think it
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: matters too much. Kamala Harris and Tim Walz have been
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: off the trail since the convention, meeting with advisors and
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: just letting the vibes permeate. We also know that she's
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: already started debate prep at Howard University with longtime Hillary
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: Clinton spokesman Philippe Reines playing Donald Trump.
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: Who went full method last time. Full method. He was
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: like in character for months. Yeah.
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: I wonder if Philippe has done that to himself again.
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: I wonder if he ever left.
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: We should reach out to Philippe and see what kind
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: of response we get back if he sounds like Trump
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: or not.
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: Okay, I'm on it.
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: On Wednesday, Harris and Walls are going to head out
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: on a bus tour through South Georgia together. And on Thursday,
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: Harris will hold a solo rally in Savannah. We're going
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: to hear from the Harris Campaign's Battleground States Director in
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: a minute. But what do you make of Harris and
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: Walls targeting Georgia for their first post-convention travel?
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: Okay, I'm going to do my best Dan impression here. So,
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: I mean... It suggests that they think there are multiple
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: paths to get her to 270, 270 electoral votes. I mean,
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: when Biden was a nominee, it really felt like the
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: only path to 270 was Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, and the
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: Nebraska 2nd District, right? The other paths would involve Sunbelt states, Georgia, Arizona, Nevada,
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: and maybe North Carolina. That just seemed off the table
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: because actually Trump's numbers had been improving in those states because, well,
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: we'll get to that in a second. Kamala going straight
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: to Georgia. suggests that her team really thinks that they
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: might win the state. I mean, it's not like a
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: quick trip. It's a two-day bus trip. So the reason
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: for the previous sort of calculus with Biden was he
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: was doing well with older, whiter voters, but struggling with
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: young voters, Black voters, Latino voters. Kamala Harris has improved
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: the party's standing among all of those groups, which opens
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: up these Sunbelt states. So basically, whereas before, losing Pennsylvania-
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: was basically game over for Democrats. This means there could
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: now be viable alternatives.
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: And Pennsylvania and Georgia both loom so large for each campaign,
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: because I think if Kamala Harris loses Pennsylvania, it becomes
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: really tough for her to find a path to 270,
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: even winning a lot of the other swing states. Conversely,
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: if Trump loses Georgia, he would need not just Pennsylvania,
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: but another Biden state and maybe two, depending on which
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: ones it is. So if Kamala Harris can win Georgia,
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: she goes a long way toward putting Trump away. I
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: also think that for all the reasons you just said,
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: they wanted to, the Harris campaign wants to send a
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: message at post-convention that they're not just camping out in
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: blue wall states, right? That if they do really see,
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: which they do see multiple paths to 270, as Dan
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: Cannon will tell us soon, then they want to tell
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: everyone like, we're going for it. And also if, you know,
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: Even if the easiest path to 270 remains Pennsylvania, Michigan,
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: and Wisconsin, and Nebraska too, while you still have time,
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: now is the time to go to Georgia and Arizona.
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: If it's October, you know, maybe... and we see the
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: polling change or whatever, maybe you're back in those three
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: blue wall states all the time, but at least now
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: you should go to Georgia. And by the way, this
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: is how you win Georgia if you're Kamala Harris and
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: Tim Walz. And honestly, this is sort of how Joe
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: Biden won it as well. Like you go to, obviously
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: you win it in Atlanta and the suburbs, right? Like
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: you try to get a huge vote share, huge margin
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: out of there. But a lot of these like rural
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: Southern areas that are like heavily black population in Georgia are,
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: and probably haven't been visited by either campaign in a
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: while ever, ever. Like you want to cut those margins.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: You want to increase black turnout. And it's great that
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: she can do that, you know, and she can have
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: a message in, in, in Southern Georgia. That's, you know,
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: economically populist and, uh, I don't know. And Georgia's and
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: Georgia has a weird relationship with Trump for a, for, uh,
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: you know, a purple, sometimes Republican leaning state.
• 28:21
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: I mean, back to the sort of discipline of the
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: Trump campaign and whether they've changed their tune on some things.
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: I mean, Trump, just seemingly, like a week ago, put
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: to bed this little online feud he's been having with
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: Brian Kemp, the very popular Republican governor of Georgia. So
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: they're clearly trying to get him to take the state
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: more seriously. Yeah, if nothing else, you want to run
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: down Trump's margin in these rural counties in every state, basically,
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: including Georgia. I mean, at the end of the day,
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: campaign strategists will both talk a big game and try
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: to suggest that they have an opportunity to win as
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: many states as possible. But what you should look at
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: is their money and their candidates' time. And the fact
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: that Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are spending two days
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: in Georgia suggests to me that they think it's a
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: very real target. Yeah.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: And, you know, Plouffe told me on that last episode
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: of The Wilderness, he's like, head fakes don't make any sense.
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: He's like, it's too expensive. He's like, if you're going to,
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: you don't say like, oh, you know, head fake meaning
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: We're going to seem like we play in one state
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: only to like lure the other campaign in and whatever else.
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: He's like, if we're going to a state, we're going
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: to play in the state. We're going to spend the money.
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: Especially at Georgia where, you know, you've got the Atlanta
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: media market. Yeah, North Carolina is shockingly expensive to play
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: in on TV.
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: So word has leaked that Harris and Walz are going
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: to sit for an interview together during the Georgia swing.
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: We don't know yet with whom. As you all know,
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: the political press has been really into Harris doing an interview.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: They've been a little annoyed that she hasn't done one yet.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: Any chance that first interview was with us?
• 29:49
  Speaker 6: I think.
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: Surprise, maybe?
• 29:51
  Speaker 6: Much like.
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: Maybe you guys didn't tell me? Yeah.
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: Lovett just did it on Fiji or something.
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: That's where he is right now. Yeah.
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: I think several months ago, John, there was no chance
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: of us getting that interview. Now maybe there's a slim
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: to no chance.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: There's more paths for us.
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: More paths for us. We know more people. Fewer people
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: in the organization want to kill us currently than a
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: month ago. Let's want to take some bets on what outlet. Yeah.
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: Oh, that's fun.
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: My money's still on 60 Minutes. 60 Minutes.
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: That's the one to do.
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: It's the obvious easy one. But if we put odds
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: on it, we could go down the way.
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: I wonder... I could see Lester Holt. Lester Holt, I
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: like Lester Holt. Lester Holt or Norah O'Donnell are both like,
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: you know, they're good, solid interviewers who are respected because
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: they don't lean one way or the other. But they're
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: also not like, they're not just like looking to get you.
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: Now, the question is.
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: And she had tough, she's had notoriously tough interviews with
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: both of them.
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: With Lester, yeah. The question is, will the press count
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: an interview if it's with a progressive host? Like if
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: you did a Rachel Maddow sit down, would anyone know?
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: They will not count it. Even though Trump never leaves
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: his Fox News space. Exactly.
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: Complete double standard. And she will just not get credit
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: for it, which is absurd. But I'm betting they know that.
• 31:07
  Speaker 2: NPR.
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: NPR.
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: I don't know.
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: A local Georgia?
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: I would do a lot of local interviews. I mean,
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: I think what they probably should do after this big
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: interview going into the event is just do a ton
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: of local press, a lot of local TV. They should.
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: What do you think are the toughest questions she'll get
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: and how should she answer them? Should we just, let's
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: do some interview prep.
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: Should we bucket them?
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, let's bucket them.
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: So there's one bucket that's probably like, uh, what did
• 31:32
  Speaker 2: you know and when did you know it about Joe
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: Biden's health?
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: I hadn't even thought about that one.
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: Probably get a lot of those. Um, Do you think
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: that's that hard? I think obviously the guys can do
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: the job through the first term. I mean, we now
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: know that as obnoxious podcasters and others were trying to
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: push Joe Biden out of the race, he was negotiating
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: a massive hostage deal with Russia to get a bunch
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: of Americans home. So clearly the guy can do the job.
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: And I think she'll probably say something like that. She'll
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: use that as an example. She'll use all the legislation
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: they passed together as an example. She'll talk about, you know,
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: we saw him. We saw him at the DNC on
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: Monday night give a speech that was like a rousing
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: speech for the crowd. Yeah, there's plenty of answers.
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: To that, I think. Yeah, that's pretty easy. Okay, second
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: bucket may be positions you took in 2020 that you
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: walked away from now.
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: I think that's like the first one they ask her.
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So, John, aren't you going to ban fracking?
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: Look, on all these issues, my values haven't changed, but
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: I've always been realistic and pragmatic. I said that during
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: my DNC speech. And also, that's how Joe Biden and
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: I governed over the last four years. We worked with
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: Republicans to rebuild America with an infrastructure bill. We made
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: private health insurance more affordable for people and brought down
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: the cost of prescription drugs. And we worked with one
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: of the most conservative Republican senators in Congress to put
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: together a really tough border bill that Donald Trump killed.
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: So we know what it's like to be pragmatic and
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: work with the other side.
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: What I'm hearing from you is you value winning.
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: My values are- In it to win it. She should
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: just say that.
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: I'd be fine with that.
• 33:04
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: We worked with, what's his name? The super white looking guy,
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: the vampire one, Lankford. Lankford. He did the immigration. Well,
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: that's the third bucket in my little notes here. Immigration,
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: the border, what is your role in the sort of
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: policy generally been over the years? Now, there is some
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: helpful data for them where apparently, I can't remember if
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: it was crossings or like contacts at the border are
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: down something like 50%. after the executive order. So they'll
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: probably point to some successes, but people are still pretty
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: concerned about the border generally. Yeah.
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: And I do think that's the best. I think the
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: border is actually the easier one there because she can say, yeah,
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: you know what? People are concerned about the border and
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: that's why we want to pass. That's why I've said
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: that if I become president, we'll pass this border bill,
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: this bipartisan deal that was written by a conservative senator.
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: And Joe Biden had to take action on, we had
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: to take action on our own When Donald Trump killed
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: that deal, and guess what? Crossings are down, but we
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: got to do more, right? Like, I think that's an
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: easy one. I think on inflation, she could probably say,
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: you know, the steps that Joe Biden and I took
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: brought inflation down faster than almost any other country. But
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: we have a lot more to do to bring down costs.
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: And I'd love a Congress that would be willing to
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: do more. Like, Republicans... just blocked a bipartisan bill to
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: extend the child tax credit. That would lower costs for people.
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: Why aren't they passing that bill? Because it would hurt
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: my campaign because it wouldn't help Donald Trump. That's crazy.
• 34:28
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: I think what has been so great about her campaign
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: and message so far is that Kamala Harris seems far
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: more unburdened by what has been and doesn't feel as
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: obligated to defend the Biden record as much as paint
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: a picture of what she's going to do going forward.
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: And I think that's a lot better in this context.
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: She will not probably be starting the answer with I'm
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: the guy who passed the Inflation Reduction Act. The balance
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: of what we've done and what we need to do
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: will be much more weighted towards what we need to do.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, for a variety of reasons, we'll probably get zero
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: I'm the guy responses. And then if it was me,
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: I would love to know how she differs from Biden
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: on Gaza policy, whether she's willing to increase pressure on
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: Netanyahu to end the war, if there's anything we can
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: do in the next few months. I mean, I'm of
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: the personal opinion that Joe Biden might not be running again,
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: but that he is going to be very personally engaged
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: on all things through the remainder of his presidency, especially
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: foreign policy, especially the Bibi Netanyahu account. So I just
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: don't think she's going to have a lot of space
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: to change things. But I think she should signal that
• 35:33
  Speaker 2: she will do things differently going forward. I think the
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: progressives want to hear that, but also the war's been
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: going for 10 months. Like whatever we've been doing has
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: not affected change in the way that we, the United
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: States wants. We want a ceasefire. We want the hostages back.
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: We want to end the war. And showing some sort
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: of space between her and Biden and the willingness to
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: do something different, I think would be meaningful.
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: What could she say that is like meaningfully different in
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: terms of like, where do you differ with him?
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: I'm trying to remember who floated this idea. I think
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: it might've been Peter Beinart in the New York Times
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: was like, what she should say is I will enforce
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: current law Specifically, the Leahy Law, which says you cannot
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: give military or material support to military units that have
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: been accused of gross human rights violations and use that
• 36:21
  Speaker 2: kind of blanket statement as a signal that we would
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: condition aid to some of these units in Gaza that
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: have been accused of human rights violations. You know, you
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: can go deeper than that. But I think that's, you know,
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: that would be signaling a pretty large change because the
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: Leahy Law has never been applied to Israel before. but
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: you could also, there's other ways to do it. I mean,
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: I think you could have an advisor go out there,
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: someone like Phil Gordon, who's our top foreign policy guy
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: and give an interview and do some of this work
• 36:49
  Speaker 2: for you, you know? So I'd like to see something.
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: One question I have is how forward leaning should she
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: be on saying that she has changed those past positions
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: that she's taken during the 2020 primary? Do you, I mean,
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: because I'm sure if you're an advisor and you're writing
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: out the talking points, you do something like I just did,
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: but She'll get pressed by some interviewers and she'll certainly
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: get pressed in the debate. I wonder if at some
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: point you have to say, you know, I learned over
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: the last four years governing an entire country with Joe
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: Biden that you've got to be more pragmatic. And, you know,
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: like I wonder if she sort of signals a cleaner
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: break with her past positions than just trying to skirt
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: around it. Yeah.
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: I think I would advise her not to be cute
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: with it and be like, look, I spent four years
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: as vice president. I learned a lot of new information
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: and I changed my mind. Yeah. But if you do
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: that four or five different times on a bunch of issues,
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: I think you can, you could string it together in
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: a way for the Trump campaign that makes her look bad.
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah. You need to do fracking. You need to do
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: Medicare for all. And you need to do border policy.
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: And then some of the ones like, sure, I'd blame
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: plastic straws and that kind of stuff.
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: Were we for banning plastic straws? Was she?
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: Unfortunately, too many people are. Sorry, that's just my unpopular position.
• 38:04
  Speaker 2: Go ahead. Come at me, straw people. I love straw.
• 38:07
  Speaker 2: I'm different to straws.
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: I'm learning to go without straws. I'm trying to be
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: a good liberal in California.
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: Is it a tooth thing? Some people have sensitive teeth. Yeah,
• 38:15
  Speaker 2: it is. Okay.
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: Fair.
• 38:17
  Speaker 2: I'm just trying to unpack this. Thank you.
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: I appreciate that. What's the biggest pitfall with the debate
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: coming up? What are you most worried about?
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: With the debate itself?
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah, like for her and the debate.
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: I think it's just the stakes. That's such a funny,
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: obvious thing to say. No, I mean, like the last
• 38:32
  Speaker 2: debate ended a candidate's career. So I think there's going
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: to be some.
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a big deal.
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: It's going to be some eyeballs. We also, listen, we
• 38:41
  Speaker 2: also went from a race where I think, I remember
• 38:43
  Speaker 2: this number from a poll. I don't remember which poll
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: it was. 73% of voters said they had all the
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: information they needed about both candidates to make up their mind.
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: They all felt like they couldn't learn another thing about
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: these guys and they didn't want to. And that changed
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: the day Kamala Harris got into this race. So she
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: knows that if she's got a great debate, it will
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: benefit her enormously. Even if she has a good debate,
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: people just want basic information about like who she is,
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: who she'll fight for, what she'll do.
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: I'm sure there will be this debate as we head
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: into the debate about how much she should focus on
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump and talk about Donald Trump because most voters
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: have made up their mind about Donald Trump. And I
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: do think that her primary goal should be giving voters
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: information about her, voters who don't know enough about her
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: and want to know more, who are open to her candidacy.
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: Like that's number one, but he is going to try
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: to put her on defense the whole time. And so
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: are the moderators are going to probably ask her some
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: pointed questions. So you do want to have some offense
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: on Trump just to eat up the time so that
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: you're not spending 90 minutes just taking hits from Trump
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: and trying to defend yourself. Because even if you do
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: that well, it will still be judged as you were
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: on defense the whole time.
• 39:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good question. I think she's got to
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: be on offense a lot. Yeah. You know, I mean,
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: you can do a lot of framing your positions through
• 39:58
  Speaker 2: as an attack on your opponent.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and do a lot of comparison stuff.
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I mean, I hope.
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: I'm going to do this, he's going to do that
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: kind of thing.
• 40:05
  Speaker 2: Honestly, it's a good thing that they've been off the
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: trail for a while because I hope they're doing a
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: ton of debate prep.
• 40:09
  Speaker 6: Me too.
• 40:09
  Speaker 2: Because it helps. It does.
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: And he's not, he's doing... Policy discussions.
• 40:14
  Speaker 2: Do you believe that? I think he's a liar. I
• 40:16
  Speaker 2: bet they do real debate preps and he just is
• 40:18
  Speaker 2: too arrogant to say it.
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: Well, also, if Tulsi Gabbard is involved in debate prep,
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: which the reporting says that she is, and the reason
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: she is, I don't know if anyone remembers, but in
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: 2020 when she was running for president in the Democratic primary,
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: during a couple of debates with Kamala Harris, she picked
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris to go after more than any other candidate.
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: And she claims to... I think with some good reason,
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: know a lot of Kamala Harris's positions and how to
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: get her and stuff like that. So I could imagine
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: Tulsi Gabbard just playing Kamala Harris in debate prep. I
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: don't know why you wouldn't do that unless you're just
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: an undisciplined, lazy fuck, which he is. Yeah, or the
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: only reason not to, I guess, is you probably want
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: that person to memorize verbatim some of the Harris lines
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: and maybe Tulsi won't do that work. I think the
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: same article that talked about Tulsi being at prep said
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: that Matt Gaetz was one of their best debate prep
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: secret weapons.
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: He's good at zingers.
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: I can see that just because he seems like a
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: terminally online individual who would know exactly what Kamala Harris
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: and Democrats have been saying because he just consumes that
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: much information.
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: That sucks. I hate to have to compliment him.
• 41:26
  Speaker 6: I know.
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: Well, I don't think it's a compliment. It's one of
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: the worst qualities about us.
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: That's true.
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: Being terminally online.
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's fair. Come on our subscription show. And then
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: we'll always have that photo of him from Narency with
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: just the Putin-like Botox.
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's tough. Okay, when we get back from the break,
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: Dan and I sat down with the Harris Campaign's Battleground
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: States Director, Dan Cannon, on the sidelines of the convention.
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: We decided to save it for today because it's about
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: exactly what we're talking about in this show, how the
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: Harris team is approaching the fall campaign and where they're
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: putting their resources. Before we get to that conversation, two announcements.
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: Speaking of Battlegrounds, Pod Save America is headed back to
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: Phoenix this on September 7th at the Celebrity Theater. Oh,
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: on the road again.
• 42:07
  Speaker 2: We just got home. Two weeks from now?
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: Two weeks from now, yeah.
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: You should tell Hannah. Yeah, same.
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: Same with Emily. Join me, Dan, Lovett, Tommy, and guest
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: host Jane Koston as we welcome Senate candidate Ruben Gallego
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: to ask him hard-hitting questions like, why is Carrie Lake
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: like that?
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: Do you think if we invited Carrie Lake, she'd show up? Probably.
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: She would. It's worth thinking about. Should we host a debate?
• 42:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, why not?
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: An impromptu debate for Gallego. I'm sure he'd appreciate that.
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: We'll also be in Philly at the Met Philadelphia on Sunday,
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: October 6th. For a limited time, we're offering our listeners
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: 10% off select tickets. Use the code WEIRD10 to unlock
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: the tickets labeled DNC offer. Very specific. Get your tickets
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: at cricket.com slash events today. We would love to see
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: you in Philly. We are also very excited to share
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: that the trailer for Cricket's newest limited series, Empire City,
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: is here. In Empire City, the untold origin story of
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: the NYPD, Peabody award-winning host Chenjerai Kumanika takes you deep
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: into the hidden history of one of the largest police
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: forces in the world, from its origins rooted in slavery
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: to rival police gangs battling across the city to the
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: everyday people who resisted every step of the way. It's
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: a captivating and immersive look into New York City's past
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: and a must-listen primer for understanding today's debates around policing.
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: especially in this moment as we gear up for another election.
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: This is an excellent show. We've been working on it
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: for years. Chandra is an incredible host. Literally years now. Yeah.
• 43:33
  Speaker 2: He did a series in 2018 called Uncivil that folks
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: might have listened to that was unbelievable. So when we
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: had the chance to work with him, we jumped at it.
• 43:40
  Speaker 2: So check it out. Amazing show.
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: So you can listen to the trailer out now wherever
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: you get your podcasts and follow Empire City on your
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: favorite podcast platform to hear the first two episodes when
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: they premiere on September 9th. When we come back, Dan Cannon.
• 44:06
  Speaker 5: Joining us now is the Battleground States Director for the
• 44:09
  Speaker 5: Harris-Walls campaign, Dan Cannon. Dan, it's great to see you, buddy. Hey, Dan.
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: Hey, John.
• 44:12
  Speaker 4: Good to see you guys.
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: Thanks for coming on.
• 44:14
  Speaker 4: Happy to be here.
• 44:15
  Speaker 5: Let's start with the map, okay? Talk to me about
• 44:19
  Speaker 5: how you guys see your best path to 270.
• 44:22
  Speaker 7: The thing I'd say about the race today that's actually
• 44:24
  Speaker 7: pretty similar from the last, really the whole year, is
• 44:27
  Speaker 7: that there are seven or so states, and we talk
• 44:29
  Speaker 7: about them all the time. You guys talk about them
• 44:31
  Speaker 7: all the time, but you've got the Blue Wall states
• 44:32
  Speaker 7: in Michigan and Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and obviously the Sunbelt states.
• 44:36
  Speaker 7: in North Carolina, Georgia, and then the Western states in
• 44:39
  Speaker 7: Nevada and Arizona. And they've been close this entire time.
• 44:42
  Speaker 7: I know that some people obsess about the polls.
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: Not us.
• 44:45
  Speaker 4: Not you guys.
• 44:46
  Speaker 5: Other people, not us.
• 44:46
  Speaker 4: No polar coaster.
• 44:47
  Speaker 5: Yes, exactly right.
• 44:48
  Speaker 4: But people look at that and obsess a bit.
• 44:50
  Speaker 7: But in truth, all of those seven places share the
• 44:52
  Speaker 7: characteristic of having really close races for Senate, for governor,
• 44:56
  Speaker 7: for president in multiple cycles in a row. And we
• 44:59
  Speaker 7: all know that those election results are way more predictive
• 45:02
  Speaker 7: than We believe there's political gravity.
• 45:04
  Speaker 4: In this country.
• 45:04
  Speaker 7: Stuff's going to snap into a close race kind of regardless.
• 45:07
  Speaker 7: And we never really felt that they were out of
• 45:08
  Speaker 7: reach before. I think we're strengthened in the Sun Belt,
• 45:11
  Speaker 7: certainly over the last month or so. But I still
• 45:13
  Speaker 7: believe all seven of those places are destined to be
• 45:15
  Speaker 7: very close. I don't think about it. Jen does not
• 45:18
  Speaker 7: think about this like a blue wall path or a
• 45:20
  Speaker 7: southern path. There's seven places, any one of which could
• 45:23
  Speaker 7: be the tipping point state. And so we have operations
• 45:25
  Speaker 7: built to scale significantly. in all of them to win
• 45:27
  Speaker 7: a close election.
• 45:27
  Speaker 5: Are you thinking of North Carolina? Like, the way this
• 45:30
  Speaker 5: has been commonly thought of, not by you guys necessarily,
• 45:32
  Speaker 5: but by yahoos like us, is there are the six,
• 45:34
  Speaker 5: the six that put Biden over the top in 2020,
• 45:36
  Speaker 5: the six that Democrats did very well in 2022, and
• 45:39
  Speaker 5: then there's North Carolina, which is sort of the one
• 45:41
  Speaker 5: potential expansion state. Do you, are you treat them all,
• 45:44
  Speaker 5: is North Carolina in the same category as the other
• 45:46
  Speaker 5: six for you guys?
• 45:47
  Speaker 7: Sure, it was 1.3 points separating Biden and Trump.
• 45:50
  Speaker 5: 73,000 votes, right?
• 45:51
  Speaker 7: It's not that much, right. And the demographic changes have
• 45:53
  Speaker 7: been good for us in that state over the years. Also,
• 45:56
  Speaker 7: you've got a characteristic there, much like in Arizona with
• 45:58
  Speaker 7: Mark Robinson. I mean, what his rhetoric and what he
• 46:01
  Speaker 7: stands for, he's a living embodiment of Donald Trump and
• 46:04
  Speaker 7: mega extremism in that state. Josh Stein is going to
• 46:06
  Speaker 7: win that race for governor. We're going to link those
• 46:08
  Speaker 7: two guys. I think those politics are just toxic for
• 46:11
  Speaker 7: suburban voters and some of the new residents of that state.
• 46:14
  Speaker 7: So it's a tough place to win, Dan, no question
• 46:17
  Speaker 7: about it. But we think about that as one of
• 46:19
  Speaker 7: the core Seven battlegrounds.
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: Can you talk about why the demographic changes there? What
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: are the demographic changes that have made it seem more favorable?
• 46:27
  Speaker 7: Yeah, you've got more educated voters coming into the states.
• 46:29
  Speaker 7: You've got folks that are moving in from from northern
• 46:32
  Speaker 7: states as well. And you've got you've got obviously a
• 46:34
  Speaker 7: population center in the triangle with, you know, expansion in
• 46:37
  Speaker 7: the economy, you know, new housing, you know, a really
• 46:40
  Speaker 7: booming place to be.
• 46:41
  Speaker 4: The kind of voters that maybe are not very into politics.
• 46:44
  Speaker 7: They're not necessarily dyed-in-the-wool Democrats, right? But they are not
• 46:47
  Speaker 7: the kind of folks that are attracted to Donald Trump's
• 46:49
  Speaker 7: brand of politics. They just don't want that level of extremism.
• 46:52
  Speaker 7: And we did see some of that in 2016. I mean,
• 46:54
  Speaker 7: Hillary Clinton did well in the suburbs, you know, in
• 46:57
  Speaker 7: North Carolina and nationally. And we lost in some of
• 47:00
  Speaker 7: the rural parts of the state, and we didn't quite
• 47:01
  Speaker 7: turn out the cities like we had to. And so
• 47:03
  Speaker 7: I think what we've learned since then is it's not
• 47:05
  Speaker 7: enough to have the demographic shifts increase. work in your
• 47:07
  Speaker 7: favor if you just kind of cleave off a whole
• 47:09
  Speaker 7: section of the state. Which is why having an organizing
• 47:12
  Speaker 7: approach with 173 staff, 25 offices, people have been on
• 47:16
  Speaker 7: the ground since January, where in 2016 we had a
• 47:19
  Speaker 7: team built in July and August. We're just starting, really,
• 47:22
  Speaker 7: at this point in time in 2016. That gives you
• 47:25
  Speaker 7: a runway to really engage people and cut those margins
• 47:27
  Speaker 7: in rural North Carolina.
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: Can you talk a little bit about that organizing program
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: in all the states and sort of your strategy for
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: when you have your staff on the ground, your volunteers
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: on the ground, like how they're going about trying to
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: get voters?
• 47:39
  Speaker 6: Yep.
• 47:39
  Speaker 7: So one big advantage we think we have against Trump
• 47:41
  Speaker 7: campaign is they've not done any of this.
• 47:43
  Speaker 4: They've got no infrastructure.
• 47:44
  Speaker 7: In North Carolina, we've got 24 offices, 25 actually, to
• 47:48
  Speaker 7: their one they opened up last month.
• 47:50
  Speaker 4: Pennsylvania, 36 offices to three. Nevada, 12 to one.
• 47:53
  Speaker 7: You can rinse and repeat that story across all the
• 47:55
  Speaker 7: battleground states. I don't think Trump cares about having a
• 47:59
  Speaker 7: relationship with any person, but certainly not voters, right? He's
• 48:02
  Speaker 7: transactional and thinks his cult personality is good enough. But
• 48:06
  Speaker 7: we built 1,600 staff and growing, 300 offices and growing.
• 48:10
  Speaker 7: They're engaging tens of thousands of volunteers who are doing
• 48:13
  Speaker 7: hundreds of thousands and now millions of voter contact attempts nationwide.
• 48:17
  Speaker 7: in a week, and that's important on the mechanics of
• 48:19
  Speaker 7: an election. You can register people, you can turn people out,
• 48:22
  Speaker 7: you can cure ballots. There's lots of things you do
• 48:25
  Speaker 7: to win a tight race with that organization. But the
• 48:27
  Speaker 7: other thing it does that I think is really underrated
• 48:29
  Speaker 7: in politics is there's a presence and an engagement level.
• 48:32
  Speaker 4: People are bought in the election.
• 48:33
  Speaker 7: All this enthusiasm, the 400,000 people that came to this
• 48:36
  Speaker 7: campaign organically when Kamala Harris became the nominee, there was
• 48:40
  Speaker 7: a place for them to go, right? So this last weekend, 2,800
• 48:44
  Speaker 7: events in Battleground States just that weekend leading into the convention.
• 48:48
  Speaker 7: The Battleground States then shifted 24,000 people in action on Monday.
• 48:52
  Speaker 7: We had 400 phone banks on Tuesday night. We had
• 48:56
  Speaker 7: 500 watch parties coming tonight. Every day there's this new
• 48:58
  Speaker 7: momentum and a place for it to be channeled. And
• 49:01
  Speaker 7: what I think that does is it makes the conversation,
• 49:03
  Speaker 7: whether it's over paid media or earned media or just
• 49:06
  Speaker 7: in the discourse, it makes it more real to people
• 49:08
  Speaker 7: when they know someone who's been a part of the campaign,
• 49:10
  Speaker 7: they've seen an event in their community, people that look
• 49:12
  Speaker 7: like them and think like them and are part of
• 49:14
  Speaker 7: their area are connected to this. I think that's how
• 49:16
  Speaker 7: you cut through and actually connect with people in a
• 49:19
  Speaker 7: way that's more real and lasting.
• 49:21
  Speaker 5: Rumors are, reports are that on Friday, RFK Jr. is
• 49:24
  Speaker 5: going to drop out. Maybe he endorses Trump, maybe he doesn't.
• 49:27
  Speaker 5: We'll put that aside for now. But have you guys
• 49:29
  Speaker 5: thought a little bit about how that might impact the race?
• 49:33
  Speaker 7: I mean, I think his stock overall has tumbled pretty far,
• 49:37
  Speaker 7: sincerely part of the race. He's You know, he's obviously
• 49:39
  Speaker 7: toxic and has some pretty kooky ideas and is tumbled.
• 49:42
  Speaker 7: So I think less about him at this point, obviously,
• 49:45
  Speaker 7: especially if he decides to exit the race. There are
• 49:47
  Speaker 7: some voters that have been kind of parking themselves with
• 49:50
  Speaker 7: him or ain't really any third party candidate. And for
• 49:52
  Speaker 7: his voters in particular, I think those are people that
• 49:55
  Speaker 7: do not want to be with Donald Trump and MAGA
• 49:57
  Speaker 7: for one reason or another. And so they're kind of
• 49:59
  Speaker 7: sitting over there. So I think our approach has to
• 50:02
  Speaker 7: be to be inclusive, to be welcoming, to say, look,
• 50:04
  Speaker 7: there's a home here. There's a sane place for politics here.
• 50:07
  Speaker 7: that can responsibly govern this country, and you don't want
• 50:10
  Speaker 7: to be with that lunatic. And it may be a
• 50:11
  Speaker 7: hard sell for some of those voters, but I think
• 50:13
  Speaker 7: that we can make a good case. And so I
• 50:14
  Speaker 7: think less about him, but more the ability to welcome
• 50:16
  Speaker 7: those folks into this campaign.
• 50:18
  Speaker 5: And obviously, over the last month, a lot of the
• 50:23
  Speaker 5: Democratic coalition, the anti-MACA coalition has come home. We've seen
• 50:26
  Speaker 5: numbers go up with young voters, black voters, Latino voters
• 50:29
  Speaker 5: all across the board. Who are the folks that you're
• 50:31
  Speaker 5: still trying to get across the board? Give me an
• 50:34
  Speaker 5: example of some of your targets.
• 50:35
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 50:36
  Speaker 7: I mean, I think there's a bit of an all-of-the-above
• 50:38
  Speaker 7: strategy here because every state's going to be so close
• 50:40
  Speaker 7: that we can't have just one pathway.
• 50:42
  Speaker 4: So you named a few, Dan.
• 50:43
  Speaker 7: Those are definitely places that we've done well, I think,
• 50:46
  Speaker 7: in the last month. We still have to push on
• 50:48
  Speaker 7: expansion into the suburbs and do better, even better, with
• 50:52
  Speaker 7: Republican women and independent men, especially on reproductive rights, or
• 50:57
  Speaker 7: perhaps on January 6th, people that just cannot be with
• 51:00
  Speaker 7: Donald Trump. We want to keep bringing those folks into
• 51:02
  Speaker 7: the tent. I think we have to do really well
• 51:04
  Speaker 7: with union and labor households in places like Michigan and
• 51:07
  Speaker 7: Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. And the fact that the vice president's
• 51:10
  Speaker 7: been endorsed by 12 unions, Sean Fain, enthusiastic again on
• 51:14
  Speaker 7: both the convention and in Detroit with UAW, those are
• 51:18
  Speaker 7: huge targets for us as well. And then across rural America,
• 51:22
  Speaker 7: whether it's in Wisconsin or Eastern North Carolina, having a
• 51:25
  Speaker 7: presence so that we don't get killed.
• 51:27
  Speaker 4: It's not 80-20, it's 60-40 or even 70-30 in some places.
• 51:32
  Speaker 7: In Wisconsin, we've got 44 offices, which means a presence
• 51:34
  Speaker 7: there in community, in a state with 72 counties, right?
• 51:37
  Speaker 7: So we're kind of everywhere with the intent of cutting
• 51:39
  Speaker 7: those margins.
• 51:40
  Speaker 5: Do you think you guys will use walls in some
• 51:43
  Speaker 5: of those rural areas to try to drive those numbers down?
• 51:45
  Speaker 7: Yeah, I think so. I mean, and the vice president
• 51:46
  Speaker 7: as well. I think the two of them together actually
• 51:48
  Speaker 7: complement in their values. But certainly Tim Walls, you know,
• 51:52
  Speaker 7: the camo hat is pretty great.
• 51:54
  Speaker 4: You've seen us rock that out all week.
• 51:56
  Speaker 5: I have like a list of 12 people who want
• 51:58
  Speaker 5: me to bring home a camo hat. They can't be
• 52:00
  Speaker 5: found anywhere in America.
• 52:01
  Speaker 4: I have not been able to find the camo hat yet.
• 52:02
  Speaker 4: I've been looking for one all week.
• 52:03
  Speaker 2: I know. Same here.
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: One of the biggest challenges this cycle, and it's sort
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: of been a growing challenge over the last several cycles,
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: is reaching voters who just don't pay a lot of
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: attention to politics and sort of don't get their news
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: and information from the places that we all do. How
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: are you guys thinking about that challenge now? Are more people...
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: I'm guessing many more people are tuned in than they
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: were just a couple months ago. But how do you
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: see that universal voters right now?
• 52:32
  Speaker 7: So I think that's a great way of thinking about
• 52:33
  Speaker 7: what this moment does for us.
• 52:35
  Speaker 4: The race has not fundamentally changed.
• 52:37
  Speaker 7: It is still a very close race, as I said,
• 52:39
  Speaker 7: with states that are going to be tight and razor
• 52:43
  Speaker 7: close at the end.
• 52:44
  Speaker 4: But we have enthusiasm and people that can now carry
• 52:46
  Speaker 4: on that message to cut through. John, so... I mean,
• 52:49
  Speaker 4: you know this. It's a fractured media environment. People are siloed.
• 52:52
  Speaker 4: They can curate their own content.
• 52:53
  Speaker 7: They can go down a rabbit hole of their own
• 52:54
  Speaker 7: making and not really be part of a discourse on
• 52:57
  Speaker 7: a broadcast basis.
• 52:58
  Speaker 4: And if you don't have people that can.
• 52:59
  Speaker 7: Cut through at the doors or on phones, but also
• 53:02
  Speaker 7: in online spaces, our program is a blended organizing program.
• 53:06
  Speaker 7: If you're a volunteer, just like in real life, we
• 53:09
  Speaker 7: ask you to volunteer in WhatsApp groups, on Facebook chats.
• 53:12
  Speaker 7: A shift these days can mean spending some time on
• 53:15
  Speaker 7: a message board, having a conversation, the same way you
• 53:17
  Speaker 7: would do a phone bank, right? So we cut through
• 53:19
  Speaker 7: in all the places people have real conversations with real people,
• 53:23
  Speaker 7: and to do that at scale. So what this enthusiasm
• 53:25
  Speaker 7: does is take the infrastructure we've built, that intention, and
• 53:29
  Speaker 7: have enough people to carry forward into those places that
• 53:31
  Speaker 7: can cut through an otherwise.
• 53:32
  Speaker 4: Pretty fractured media environment.
• 53:34
  Speaker 5: How are you feeling about the 2nd District of Nebraska?
• 53:36
  Speaker 4: I'm feeling great about the 2nd District of Nebraska. We
• 53:38
  Speaker 4: had a great rally there.
• 53:39
  Speaker 7: We had 7,000 RCPs within a span of six hours
• 53:42
  Speaker 7: for Tim Walls. He sold the building out, of course.
• 53:46
  Speaker 7: Good team on the ground, and I think that we'll
• 53:47
  Speaker 7: have a great chance to win the 2nd District.
• 53:49
  Speaker 5: I mean, I hope so. I ask that only because
• 53:52
  Speaker 5: I know you guys don't think about paths, but the
• 53:56
  Speaker 5: one path depends on the 2nd District of Nebraska. Have
• 53:59
  Speaker 5: you heard anything about Republicans making another run and trying
• 54:02
  Speaker 5: to turn the state into a winner-take-all situation?
• 54:04
  Speaker 4: You know, it's not something we track too closely.
• 54:06
  Speaker 7: I think that our message here is to build something
• 54:08
  Speaker 7: on the ground that can be lasting and large. The
• 54:10
  Speaker 7: fact that Governor Walz came there and you saw such
• 54:13
  Speaker 7: tremendous enthusiasm for his candidacy I think helps on all
• 54:15
  Speaker 7: those measures, but we feel good about it.
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: There's obviously been a lot of focus on, you know,
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: the anti-MAGA coalition coming together over the last month since
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: the vice president's become the nominee and sort of the
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: polls have tightened. Is there anything with Kamala Harris as
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: the nominee that now opened up sort of new challenges
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: for you guys that you hadn't had before when Biden
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: was the nominee?
• 54:36
  Speaker 7: I mean, the challenge that we really have right now,
• 54:39
  Speaker 7: less so about her as a candidate, more so about
• 54:41
  Speaker 7: the fact that it's a different race from a structural standpoint,
• 54:44
  Speaker 7: not with the voters, not with the polls. but structurally
• 54:46
  Speaker 7: with the people coming in. We have to run a
• 54:49
  Speaker 7: different kind of campaign now in some respects. Yes, we
• 54:52
  Speaker 7: have the infrastructure built, yes, you have the offices, you
• 54:54
  Speaker 7: have the staff, you have an approach to people in
• 54:56
  Speaker 7: these battleground states, but now we have to meet the
• 54:58
  Speaker 7: demand of literally hundreds of thousands of people coming in
• 55:01
  Speaker 7: and wanting somewhere to go. One, they gotta know more
• 55:04
  Speaker 7: about Kamala Harris. They like her, the first impression's been phenomenal,
• 55:07
  Speaker 7: but we gotta fill that with a real story of
• 55:09
  Speaker 7: her bio before the other side does that against us, right?
• 55:13
  Speaker 7: And then arm them with the ability to go carry
• 55:14
  Speaker 7: that forward to other voters. So I think every day,
• 55:17
  Speaker 7: and this is what keeps me up at night to
• 55:18
  Speaker 7: the extent anything does, is racing to meet that demand.
• 55:22
  Speaker 4: You know, we caught the car in some respects.
• 55:23
  Speaker 7: And so the team has to be built fast enough
• 55:25
  Speaker 7: and stay up, keep up with that so that we
• 55:27
  Speaker 7: can service that.
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: Is there anything that you think the Trump campaign is
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: doing well that worries you?
• 55:34
  Speaker 7: Well, I'm not sure if something they're doing well that
• 55:36
  Speaker 7: worries me. I just know that they have the ability
• 55:38
  Speaker 7: and he has the ability to completely operate independently from.
• 55:42
  Speaker 4: Any ethics or morals.
• 55:45
  Speaker 7: And so whether it's election interference or denialism or whatever else,
• 55:49
  Speaker 7: you just can't trust that they'll play straight and fair.
• 55:50
  Speaker 4: They won't, right?
• 55:52
  Speaker 7: And so I think we're prepared for that. And on
• 55:54
  Speaker 7: that point, nothing like experience. We saw this in 2020.
• 55:57
  Speaker 7: We've had a really good voter protection team, of course.
• 56:01
  Speaker 7: but also a legal operation built way earlier than ever before,
• 56:05
  Speaker 7: taking on challenges even months or years ahead of, more
• 56:09
  Speaker 7: than a year ahead of the actual election, to help
• 56:11
  Speaker 7: set the stage for a strong legal defense in the fall,
• 56:14
  Speaker 7: because we know they'll bring stuff that's off the wall,
• 56:16
  Speaker 7: but you have to knock it all down, of course.
• 56:19
  Speaker 7: And so that's a place that's unknown for us, how
• 56:22
  Speaker 7: they'll do that, but we know that they'll try, and
• 56:25
  Speaker 7: the team is prepared.
• 56:26
  Speaker 5: Prior to Kamala Harris becoming the nominee, the Republicans were
• 56:30
  Speaker 5: making bones about competing in Virginia, New Mexico, New Hampshire.
• 56:37
  Speaker 5: Public polling I've seen shows that those are sort of
• 56:38
  Speaker 5: reverted back to where they are. Do you guys have
• 56:39
  Speaker 5: to play any defense there in terms of, do you
• 56:41
  Speaker 5: have operations built there at all?
• 56:43
  Speaker 2: We do.
• 56:43
  Speaker 7: We don't take any votes for granted. You know, we've
• 56:45
  Speaker 7: got a team in Virginia and in Minnesota, right, in
• 56:47
  Speaker 7: Maine and New Hampshire. And we don't expect that we
• 56:50
  Speaker 7: can just not talk to voters and have it work
• 56:52
  Speaker 7: out for us, right?
• 56:53
  Speaker 4: So, yeah, we'll treat voters with respect and have a
• 56:55
  Speaker 4: good operation there. It doesn't change for us that the
• 56:58
  Speaker 4: theory that those four.
• 56:59
  Speaker 7: Or seven yeah really the seven and you know we
• 57:01
  Speaker 7: have folks in florida too florida's not gonna be 2020
• 57:04
  Speaker 7: florida it's not you know the center of the battleground
• 57:06
  Speaker 7: map that's that's pretty clear but there's an interest there
• 57:09
  Speaker 7: because there's a ballot measure there's a really bad abandoned
• 57:12
  Speaker 7: abortion um the politics there have been untested in some
• 57:15
  Speaker 7: respects and i'll just point out that what ron desantis
• 57:17
  Speaker 7: has done which people think works because he's won and
• 57:20
  Speaker 7: now he keeps doing this stuff but his most extreme
• 57:23
  Speaker 7: politics have not been on the ballot it's all happened
• 57:25
  Speaker 7: since his election And when it has been on the ballot,
• 57:27
  Speaker 7: Daniel Cameron tried that playbook and lost in Kentucky, right?
• 57:31
  Speaker 4: So I think Florida's interesting. We'll test that out a
• 57:34
  Speaker 4: little bit.
• 57:34
  Speaker 6: Okay.
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: That's news.
• 57:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: Interesting.
• 57:39
  Speaker 2: It's interesting.
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: It is an interesting state.
• 57:42
  Speaker 5: Maybe news was a little bit of an exaggeration there,
• 57:44
  Speaker 5: but it was interesting to me. You know, one thing
• 57:47
  Speaker 5: that keeps us all up at night is whether the
• 57:50
  Speaker 5: data is correct, right? In 2020... The polls were off by,
• 57:55
  Speaker 5: you know, eight points in some cases. I think the
• 57:58
  Speaker 5: Biden campaign had better day than anyone else, but even still,
• 58:00
  Speaker 5: you know, that campaign was in Iowa and Ohio at
• 58:04
  Speaker 5: the end, right? Can you talk a little bit about
• 58:08
  Speaker 5: anything you guys have done or that may give you
• 58:11
  Speaker 5: more confidence that you're accurately assessing what the electorate will
• 58:15
  Speaker 5: look like in November?
• 58:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 58:18
  Speaker 7: I mean, I think over every single cycle, and you
• 58:20
  Speaker 7: know this, the Democratic data operation iterates.
• 58:22
  Speaker 4: It does not We iterated backwards for a little bit,
• 58:24
  Speaker 4: but we're iterating forward again. We're iterating in the correct direction, yes.
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: We're not going back.
• 58:28
  Speaker 4: We're iterating forward, yes.
• 58:31
  Speaker 7: But I have a great deal of confidence that we
• 58:33
  Speaker 7: have a robust operation there that's got a lot of data,
• 58:36
  Speaker 7: a ton of it, a very good approach to how
• 58:38
  Speaker 7: we think about it, a conservative approach to how we
• 58:41
  Speaker 7: evaluate what's real and.
• 58:42
  Speaker 4: What's not real.
• 58:43
  Speaker 7: I think people watching this, back to the polar coaster,
• 58:46
  Speaker 7: just shouldn't worry about the head-to-head stuff too much. The
• 58:49
  Speaker 7: data that's the best data, of course, is the actual
• 58:51
  Speaker 7: data election results. And we kind of know where that's been.
• 58:54
  Speaker 7: But in terms of our operations and what voters we
• 58:56
  Speaker 7: talk to, how we think about registration, how we think
• 58:58
  Speaker 7: about expanding the electorate, where we have to go, I
• 59:01
  Speaker 7: think we have a really sophisticated operation. Democrats have put
• 59:03
  Speaker 7: a lot of resources in the last several cycles into
• 59:05
  Speaker 7: making sure it's strong, it's robust, and we have access
• 59:07
  Speaker 7: to it.
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: Dan Kananen.
• 59:13
  Speaker 5: For our listeners who are fired up about Kamala Harris
• 59:15
  Speaker 5: and Tim Walz, where can they go to help you
• 59:18
  Speaker 5: elect them president?
• 59:18
  Speaker 2: Thank you, Dan.
• 59:19
  Speaker 4: I was going to get there.
• 59:20
  Speaker 2: They can go to go.kamalaharris.com I'll say it again, go.kamalaharris.com.
• 59:30
  Speaker 7: Phone bank canvas shift just get involved in any way
• 59:33
  Speaker 7: you can and we'll sign you up.
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: They'll put you to work guys they will sign up
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: Dan Cannon thank you so much for joining us and
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: good luck out there.
• 59:41
  Speaker 4: Thanks Sean thanks Dan.
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: That's our show for today we'll be back on Wednesday
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: with Lovett and guest host Simone Sanders Townsend friend of
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: the pod MSNBC host and of course former Kamala Harris
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: advisor jealous haven't seen Simone in a while talk to
• 1:00:00
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• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: on this conversation pod save america is a cricket media
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: production Our producer is David Toledo. Our associate producers are
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: Saul Rubin and Farah Safari. Reid Cherlin is our executive
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: editor and Adrian Hill is our executive producer. The show
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan Cantor is
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: our sound engineer with audio support from Kyle Seglin and
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: Charlotte Landis. Writing support by Hallie Kiefer. Madeline Herringer is
• 1:00:48
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• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: head of production. Andy Taft is our executive assistant. Thanks
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Haley Jones, Phoebe Bradford,
• 1:00:57
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• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: and David Toles.