Latest / Pod Save America / Always Test Your Hopium

Transcript

Always Test Your Hopium · Pod Save America

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• 1:32
  Speaker 2: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: All right, Dan, on today's show, we're going to talk.
• 1:36
  Speaker 4: About the brand new Time Sienna polls that the polling
• 1:39
  Speaker 4: gods have blessed and cursed us with. Whether we think
• 1:43
  Speaker 4: the overall political environment for Dems is too good to
• 1:46
  Speaker 4: be true, Republican candidates finally running away from Trump, and
• 1:50
  Speaker 4: the latest development in one of the many wars Trump
• 1:52
  Speaker 4: is losing, this one against the media. Then you'll all
• 1:57
  Speaker 4: hear Tommy's conversation with activist and former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: It was in the studio yesterday.
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: Very cool.
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: I know. And you're in the studio today, which is great.
• 2:07
  Speaker 3: Also cool. Not as cool, but cool.
• 2:08
  Speaker 4: Because right after this, we're getting on a plane and
• 2:10
  Speaker 4: we're going to Austin for the Texas Tribune Festival.
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: Very cool, too.
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: There'll be a live show there Friday night. It's Friday night? Yeah,
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: today's Thursday.
• 2:18
  Speaker 3: It'll be in your feeds on Sunday, will it not?
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: It will. It will. It will. Thank you, Dan. All right.
• 2:23
  Speaker 4: Let's start with Donald Trump's plan to make his Chinese
• 2:26
  Speaker 4: communist pal Xi Jinping feel right at home during his
• 2:30
  Speaker 4: visit to America. Crackdown on journalists who report news that
• 2:34
  Speaker 4: Trump doesn't like. On Thursday morning, Trump appointed Judge Timothy
• 2:37
  Speaker 4: Kelly ordered the White House to restore the press access
• 2:40
  Speaker 4: Trump tried to revoke for CNN, MSNOW, and Politico, at
• 2:43
  Speaker 4: least while the lawsuit plays out.
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: Judge Kelly said the outlets would probably.
• 2:48
  Speaker 4: Succeed with their claims and was not swayed by the
• 2:51
  Speaker 4: administration's argument that the ban was really about protecting national security.
• 2:55
  Speaker 4: Probably didn't help that the White House made their case
• 2:57
  Speaker 4: by citing a Politico story. the source for which turned
• 3:00
  Speaker 4: out to be, according to Oliver Darcy at Status, J.D.
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: Vance. J.D.
• 3:06
  Speaker 4: Vance risking national security by leaking to Politico with an
• 3:10
  Speaker 4: administration-approved background briefing.
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: That's how you get away with it.
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: That's how you get away with it.
• 3:15
  Speaker 4: By late Thursday morning, after initially getting turned away again,
• 3:19
  Speaker 4: even after the judge's ruling, reporters from the offending outlets
• 3:23
  Speaker 4: were finally back in the briefing room. Still some confusion
• 3:26
  Speaker 4: about when and whether network pool coverage will resume. That's
• 3:30
  Speaker 4: contingent on the White House allowing CNN to participate. First
• 3:34
  Speaker 4: Amendment principles aside, since the White House is putting them aside,
• 3:38
  Speaker 4: why not us? As a former White House communications director,
• 3:41
  Speaker 4: how much do you think access to the building matters
• 3:43
  Speaker 4: these days?
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: I don't want to put them totally aside because it
• 3:46
  Speaker 3: is just worth, we just should say that it is
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: absolutely essential that the federal government cannot bar members of
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: the media from accessing government property based on what they report.
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: Like that is.
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: That it's a cut and dry case.
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: The State Department, if that was happening in any other country,
• 4:04
  Speaker 3: the State Department would send out a warning about how
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: democracy was falling in that country. Like it is a
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: it is a blaring red light.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 4:11
  Speaker 4: Now, to be sure, according to previous court rulings, the
• 4:16
  Speaker 4: White House could decide we're not having any press at
• 4:18
  Speaker 4: all in the White House. Like we're just not granting
• 4:21
  Speaker 4: access to anyone. Once you open it up to some press,
• 4:25
  Speaker 4: you got to open it up to everyone fairly.
• 4:27
  Speaker 3: Now, in terms of how much it matters in the
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: day-to-day capacity of the press to scrutinize Trump, it matters.
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: Having the right people in the room who can ask
• 4:38
  Speaker 3: questions of the White House press if we ever have
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: press briefings again matters. I think the decision to kick
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: the wire reporters out of the pool is much more
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: consequential in terms of actual scrutiny of the president and
• 4:51
  Speaker 3: the capacity to hold them accountable than barring individual reporters,
• 4:55
  Speaker 3: as wrong as that is. Because It's those pool reporters
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: who are in the room in intimate settings with the
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: president who are able to ask him questions directly, even
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: when he doesn't want to take those questions. But it's
• 5:06
  Speaker 3: also they kicked the reporters out of the Pentagon. There's
• 5:10
  Speaker 3: still been a ton of great reporting about the war
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: in Iran, about a bunch of corruption and problems in
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: the DOD. The reporters that we know who do the
• 5:18
  Speaker 3: hardest reporting on Trump, like Maggie Haberman, Jonathan Swamp, New
• 5:21
  Speaker 3: York Times, they're not hanging out in the white house, right?
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: They're not, they're doing that. I'll think he's not even
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: from Washington, DC. Sometimes they're in New York or wherever
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: they are using the phone. So you can still hold
• 5:30
  Speaker 3: them accountable. He's not going to escape it, but it
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: is quite bad.
• 5:34
  Speaker 4: What do you think the political effect has been? Like,
• 5:38
  Speaker 4: it doesn't seem like this was a, a plus for Trump.
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah. I think to the, this is not a thing
• 5:45
  Speaker 3: that gets voters worked up about Trump has benefited from
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: that for many, many years. And the press, I think,
• 5:51
  Speaker 3: is fair to say, is paying a price for not
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: having stood up in a collective way to Trump during
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: his first term when they had more leverage and Trump
• 5:59
  Speaker 3: had fewer ways to get his message out on his own.
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: But it's just one more thing. Like in all the polls,
• 6:05
  Speaker 3: we're talking about these New York Times, Santa polls, they
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: ask voters whether Trump is focused on the right things
• 6:08
  Speaker 3: or the wrong things.
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: And it's like two-thirds of voters or six in ten
• 6:11
  Speaker 3: voters say he's focused on the wrong things. There's one
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: more wrong thing, right? It's the ballroom. It's the helipad. It's,
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: you know, kicking, you know, caring about your press and
• 6:18
  Speaker 3: kicking them out. That's all the wrong stuff. It's one
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: more example of a thing he's doing other than lowering
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: people's costs.
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: So before we move on, you know what outlet never
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: gets banned from the White House? Crooked media.
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: I was going to say Fox News.
• 6:29
  Speaker 4: No, we haven't gotten banned yet. That's because we haven't
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: been given access yet. But you know the best way
• 6:36
  Speaker 4: to support us so we can become a growing, an
• 6:39
  Speaker 4: even bigger independent pro-democracy media company that may someday Get
• 6:43
  Speaker 4: access to the White House. You can subscribe today at crooked.com
• 6:46
  Speaker 4: slash friends and become a Friend of the Pod subscriber.
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: How do you do that?
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: You go to crooked.com slash friends.
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: Okay, time out. That pitch sucked.
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: What?
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: Let me tell you how to do this, all right?
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 6:55
  Speaker 3: Do you, if this is not, give us money so
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: we can be closer to Donald Trump. That's a terrible
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: fucking pitch for this company. I said someday.
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: I meant like in a future administration.
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: Here's the thing. Do you want to see Crooked Media
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: on that list of the banned media companies, yes or no?
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: If the answer is yes, subscribe today.
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: How's that going to help us be on the bandwagon?
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: Because they're going to help us build up the resources
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: to do the things it requires to cover Trump in
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: the way that will piss him off to the point
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: that Natalie Harp will be showing newsletters from the Crooked
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: Media Substack or clips from this podcast to him, which
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: gets us banned.
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: Because, you know, it was Natalie showing him an MS
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: Now segment.
• 7:37
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 7:38
  Speaker 4: That got them banned. And like, we don't know who
• 7:41
  Speaker 4: the segment was, but it could have been us. It
• 7:44
  Speaker 4: could have been a late Saturday night MS Now segment
• 7:49
  Speaker 4: from Cricket Media.
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  Speaker 3: Our goal is to get our content on Natalie Harp's iPad.
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  Speaker 3: And the way you help us do that is by
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: subscribing right now, becoming a friend.
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: Of the podcast.
• 7:57
  Speaker 4: And if neither of these pitches were persuasive enough to you,
• 8:01
  Speaker 4: you also get ad-free episodes of all your favorite Crooked pods,
• 8:04
  Speaker 4: subscriber-only podcasts, and you get all our Substack newsletters too.
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So there's a lot of reasons.
• 8:11
  Speaker 4: It's a menu of plugs. Crooked.com slash friends. All right,
• 8:14
  Speaker 4: let's get to the politics. For the first time in
• 8:16
  Speaker 4: any election during the Trump era, we are witnessing a
• 8:19
  Speaker 4: veritable stampede of Republican candidates running away from their wildly
• 8:24
  Speaker 4: unpopular leader. In the last few days... Florida gubernatorial candidate
• 8:28
  Speaker 4: Byron Donalds, hardcore Trump acolyte, basically removed any mention of
• 8:32
  Speaker 4: Trump's endorsement from his campaign website. Newly vulnerable Kansas Senator
• 8:37
  Speaker 4: Roger Marshall distanced himself from ICE deportations happening in his state.
• 8:41
  Speaker 4: We got a Republican senator from Kansas just distancing himself
• 8:46
  Speaker 4: from Trump on ICE in Kansas. Texas Governor Greg Abbott
• 8:51
  Speaker 4: imposed a data center ban. And Utah Senator John Curtis
• 8:56
  Speaker 4: called for an investigation into a Russian oligarch paying for
• 9:00
  Speaker 4: Don Jr.
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: 's wedding.
• 9:03
  Speaker 4: But the area where you're seeing the most flip-flopping, unsurprisingly,
• 9:06
  Speaker 4: is the Iran war. Here's Michigan's Mike Rogers, who's been
• 9:10
  Speaker 4: an Iran war hawk for decades, basically any kind of
• 9:14
  Speaker 4: war hawk for decades, in a video released on social
• 9:17
  Speaker 4: media this week.
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: Michigan families are struggling with the price of everyday life.
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: Groceries cost too much. We have to bring prices down.
• 9:25
  Speaker 4: The war with Iran needs to end, and end quickly.
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: I think Mike Rogers is doing a lot of grocery shopping.
• 9:32
  Speaker 3: That is the first time he's been in a grocery store.
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: Now, was that a... Do you think maybe that was
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: a Publix in Florida? Maybe.
• 9:39
  Speaker 5: Maybe.
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: Good use of Publix.
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: Or when he's in Florida, maybe he gets someone else
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: to do a shopping for him.
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it seems like the... Why wear the vest?
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a... That's really... That's giving some Dr. Oz vibes. Yeah,
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: it's very crazy.
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: He's going to buy some.
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: Some crudite.
• 9:55
  Speaker 3: Some crudite.
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: Some crudite. What do you think? You think these distancing
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: maneuvers will work?
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: I do not.
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: A little too late.
• 10:02
  Speaker 3: I do not, John. Just, they look craven, cynical, desperate.
• 10:08
  Speaker 3: It's so obvious to us what they're doing. The defining
• 10:10
  Speaker 3: characteristic of Republican politicians in this era is complete and
• 10:13
  Speaker 3: total fealty to Trump. So all of a sudden, 40
• 10:16
  Speaker 3: days before an election to decide that you're against the
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: things you've been saying. You're for that you're against the
• 10:21
  Speaker 3: person you were saying you were for. Voters are not
• 10:23
  Speaker 3: going to believe it. We know that they prize authenticity
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: over everything else, and this looks quite inauthentic. But even
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: more so, we know that the swing voters who decide
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: this election are the ones who are most cynical about politicians.
• 10:40
  Speaker 3: Do we really think those voters who distrust everything that
• 10:45
  Speaker 3: any politician says is going to believe that all of
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: a sudden these Trump alkalites have come to some sort
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: of deathbed political conversion? I do not.
• 10:53
  Speaker 4: I guess the other side of it would be if
• 10:56
  Speaker 4: you are the type of voter who's going to go
• 11:00
  Speaker 4: to the polls in November, doesn't pay much attention to
• 11:02
  Speaker 4: the news, doesn't like Trump, isn't happy with the war,
• 11:07
  Speaker 4: but is the kind of person who's like, well, I
• 11:10
  Speaker 4: want to check on Trump, but even though I don't
• 11:12
  Speaker 4: like him, maybe this Republican candidate... It seems like they're
• 11:16
  Speaker 4: not on the same page as Donald Trump.
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: And so maybe I'll give them a try.
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: That is possible. And I'm sure there is a person
• 11:24
  Speaker 3: or two like that somewhere in America. But it's just
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: where are these people going to see this stuff? Like
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: they're not even like leaning into it. At least Congresswoman Salazar,
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: whose ad we looked at last week, she at least
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: did it in an advertisement. This is not an ad
• 11:37
  Speaker 3: from Mike Rogers.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: It's a video.
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: Who's going to see the video?
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: That is weird. Who's the video for? Us. Yeah.
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: And so they can write a bunch of stories. People
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: write a bunch of stories that they'll see saying he
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: breaks with Trump. You know, like who was going to read,
• 11:51
  Speaker 3: in Kansas, going to read Roger Marshall's tweet? You know,
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: so like this is too little too late. It's weak.
• 11:58
  Speaker 4: Are you surprised they just held another vote on an
• 12:00
  Speaker 4: Iran war powers resolution? And, you know, it passed the
• 12:06
  Speaker 4: House over to the Senate and Collins, Susan Collins voted
• 12:10
  Speaker 4: for it. But on the no side, Dan Sullivan in Alaska,
• 12:16
  Speaker 4: Roger Marshall, the Kansas Senator we were talking about, and
• 12:19
  Speaker 4: John Husted in Ohio, all in tough races, competitive races,
• 12:25
  Speaker 4: all voted no.
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: Are you surprised?
• 12:27
  Speaker 3: I think they're still afraid of angering Trump. This was
• 12:31
  Speaker 3: a very close vote. They basically had to hold Cassidy.
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: and convince him to vote to keep it from passing.
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: Cassidy, who fucking voted no.
• 12:39
  Speaker 3: Yes, exactly.
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: Like, has nothing to lose, just doesn't care.
• 12:42
  Speaker 3: It's just like, you mentioned, like, there is a potential
• 12:45
  Speaker 3: price to pay on a micro level for angering Trump. Like,
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: you mentioned Byron Donalds took all the Trump references off
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: of his website.
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: He put them back on when someone told Trump. So,
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: you know, and these candidates are becoming more and more
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: dependent on MAGA Inc. super PAC money. So, you know,
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: you can see that they are betwixt in between here.
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: And in the end, they're going to stick with the
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: person who has the millions of dollars in super PAC
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: money to spend.
• 13:10
  Speaker 4: Conservative radio host Steve Deese, who's from Iowa, wrote a
• 13:15
  Speaker 4: long thing on Twitter about how the war is unpopular
• 13:17
  Speaker 4: with conservatives right now in the state of Iowa as
• 13:21
  Speaker 4: COVID lockdowns and the TARP bailout. Deep cut, TARP bailout.
• 13:26
  Speaker 4: He also said, quote, we need the president out on
• 13:28
  Speaker 4: the stump ASAP. and that Republicans need to, quote, stop
• 13:32
  Speaker 4: running fake and gay ads about how often so-and-so shows
• 13:35
  Speaker 4: up for votes. Agree or disagree with his prescription? Are
• 13:39
  Speaker 4: the ads fake and gay?
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: I feel like this question's a trap in so much
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: of a form. I think Steve Deese is a very
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: smart person.
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: So I don't want to jump ahead.
• 13:49
  Speaker 3: And everyone should follow, and the White House should listen
• 13:52
  Speaker 3: to him, and Trump should campaign. He should campaign everywhere,
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: all the time. There was a report I saw that
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: Trump was planning to campaign in 35 districts.
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he's got to get on that.
• 14:01
  Speaker 3: I saw that in National Journal, and I haven't seen
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: it anywhere else.
• 14:04
  Speaker 4: He's very busy with rolling out the red carpet, literally,
• 14:08
  Speaker 4: for Xi Jinping right now and bragging about how much
• 14:11
  Speaker 4: he loves granite and his new helipad.
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: That was what was going on today with Trump. Not
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: a lot of campaigning.
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: Message of the day.
• 14:18
  Speaker 4: Message of the day. He likes granite just like me.
• 14:23
  Speaker 4: Trump's response to the rest of his party pulling the
• 14:25
  Speaker 4: fire alarm has not been to campaign so far or
• 14:29
  Speaker 4: to end the war. In his UN speech on Tuesday,
• 14:32
  Speaker 4: he again threatened to annihilate the Islamic Republic. Don't know
• 14:36
  Speaker 4: if that helped him with farmers in Iowa. Instead, he
• 14:39
  Speaker 4: says he's considering a ban on diesel exports.
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: There you go.
• 14:42
  Speaker 4: As a way to bring down prices for truckers, a
• 14:45
  Speaker 4: move that a lot of business groups think would backfire.
• 14:49
  Speaker 4: Certainly wouldn't bring down the price of diesel globally. And
• 14:52
  Speaker 4: we are, of course, in a global market as much
• 14:54
  Speaker 4: as Trump and MAGA folks wish we weren't. And Trump
• 14:58
  Speaker 4: is also maybe using taxpayer money to run this ad,
• 15:02
  Speaker 4: which has been seen on Newsmax and at least here
• 15:06
  Speaker 4: in the L.A.
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: Market on Fox.
• 15:07
  Speaker 5: Together, we will defeat communism, socialism and Marxism in America.
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: America will never be a communist country.
• 15:37
  Speaker 4: Okay, so there's a little tagline there at the bottom
• 15:41
  Speaker 4: that just said, paid for by the U.S.
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: Government.
• 15:46
  Speaker 4: In case you couldn't hear what they were singing, it
• 15:48
  Speaker 4: was just love me over and over again with images
• 15:51
  Speaker 4: of Trump.
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: A little on the nose, if you will.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: I thought this was fake.
• 15:55
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: At first, because I feel like this has to be illegal.
• 15:58
  Speaker 3: It seems to be illegal.
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 16:01
  Speaker 4: I think more than— No, it didn't say, like, vote Republican,
• 16:03
  Speaker 4: so I guess there's that. But it did just sort of, like,
• 16:07
  Speaker 4: glaze Trump for 30 seconds while being like, we're going
• 16:10
  Speaker 4: to fight the commies.
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: Definite violation of the anti-glazing provision of the Hatch Act.
• 16:15
  Speaker 3: But the other thing is this ad looks almost exactly
• 16:19
  Speaker 3: like those MAGA Inc. Super PAC ads that we watched
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: on this podcast, including the use of Dana White. That's
• 16:26
  Speaker 3: Dana White's voice doing it. So it's almost exactly like,
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: here's the thing.
• 16:29
  Speaker 6: Is it illegal?
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: Probably. Are all the laws around this largely unenforceable in
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: the president? You mean from those laws?
• 16:34
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: But you know what that ad really is?
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: I was going to say.
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: Fucking embarrassing.
• 16:38
  Speaker 4: Oh, I was going to say, yeah, maybe it's illegal
• 16:40
  Speaker 4: because it's an in-kind contribution to the Democratic Party. Well,
• 16:42
  Speaker 4: because I would like, I would like that ad saturating
• 16:45
  Speaker 4: every single market.
• 16:46
  Speaker 3: Well, here's the thing. It's not on every market. It's the,
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: according to ad impact data, they spent $ 14, 000 on it
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: to air it only on Fox and Newsmax. I either
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: programs that Donald Trump is watching. So this is obviously
• 16:59
  Speaker 3: about making this sad man feel better about himself.
• 17:02
  Speaker 4: Do you see that Washington post story from last weekend?
• 17:04
  Speaker 4: We talked about it on Tuesday's pod about like Trump
• 17:07
  Speaker 4: getting the sads and, and, and being upset that like
• 17:10
  Speaker 4: no one's thanking him for anything and he's losing.
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: And this is a wall street journal story too about it.
• 17:14
  Speaker 4: But in, in one of the stories, uh, it had
• 17:17
  Speaker 4: him around that, uh, his wildly successful convention in Dallas. Um,
• 17:22
  Speaker 4: looking himself at each ad and each video and trying
• 17:27
  Speaker 4: to say, making edits to the video and saying this
• 17:29
  Speaker 4: is good because they were all about him and how
• 17:31
  Speaker 4: great he was. So that does fit with that sort
• 17:33
  Speaker 4: of larger scheme to make him feel good about himself.
• 17:37
  Speaker 3: This is the digital equivalent of what has happened in
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: campaigns for years, which is you put yard signs on
• 17:45
  Speaker 3: every block between the office and the candidate's house so
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: that they believe that the campaign is going great. And
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: this is that.
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: It's a great idea. All right, Dan, let's talk about
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: the polling.
• 17:56
  Speaker 4: It is, of course, that time of year when the
• 17:59
  Speaker 4: mornings get darker and the air gets crisper. And we
• 18:04
  Speaker 4: warn people about paying too much attention to the avalanche
• 18:07
  Speaker 4: of polling, despite talking about nothing else in our group chats,
• 18:12
  Speaker 4: with the exception, of course, of the viral Globe story
• 18:15
  Speaker 4: about the lesbian bar in Western Massachusetts that just dropped
• 18:18
  Speaker 4: its mask mandate.
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: And if you don't know what I'm talking about.
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: I still haven't read it. I can't believe it. I'm
• 18:24
  Speaker 3: saving it for the plane time.
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: I want, yes. John, I cannot get.
• 18:28
  Speaker 4: I want, while you're reading it on the plane, I
• 18:30
  Speaker 4: want to know your reaction.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: I'm going to watch your reaction wherever we're sitting. Each line. Okay.
• 18:37
  Speaker 4: In fact, maybe you should read it out loud to
• 18:38
  Speaker 4: the plane.
• 18:39
  Speaker 3: Oh, that's a great idea.
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: It's amazing.
• 18:43
  Speaker 4: Anyway, the dominant story over the last week or so
• 18:46
  Speaker 4: has been how the bottom seems to be falling out
• 18:48
  Speaker 4: for Trump and Republicans after a ton of polls that
• 18:52
  Speaker 4: seem too good to be true for Democrats, especially in
• 18:55
  Speaker 4: red states, have been released. Nate Silver's flipper model, Nate Silver,
• 19:00
  Speaker 4: still counting, New Crooked Media Podcast with Claire Malone.
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: And Galen Druk. Check it out.
• 19:05
  Speaker 4: It's, you know, it's going like gangbusters right now. Only
• 19:08
  Speaker 4: a couple episodes in.
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: It's excellent.
• 19:10
  Speaker 4: Anyway, Nate's flipper model now puts Democrats' chances of winning
• 19:13
  Speaker 4: the Senate at 69%.
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: Nice.
• 19:17
  Speaker 4: And about 91% chance of winning the House. His likely
• 19:22
  Speaker 4: voter generic ballot has Democrats up nine points and Democrats
• 19:28
  Speaker 4: leading in all of the competitive Senate races. But then,
• 19:34
  Speaker 4: just as I predicted slash feared, In our, I think
• 19:38
  Speaker 4: our Wednesday meeting, I said, imagine if we wake up
• 19:40
  Speaker 4: Thursday and we're trying to figure out what to talk
• 19:41
  Speaker 4: about on the pod and we get a New York
• 19:43
  Speaker 4: Times poll.
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: Sure enough, we did.
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: So I think I told you that the rumors were
• 19:48
  Speaker 3: swirling that the New York Times was in Michigan. conducting
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: a poll as we speak.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: That was just a tweet that both of us saw
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: because our algorithms.
• 19:53
  Speaker 3: Are set up completely. Yes, yes, yes.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: That is true.
• 19:56
  Speaker 3: But I'd also heard that from several people.
• 19:57
  Speaker 5: Oh, you did?
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: Well, you got real reporting there.
• 20:00
  Speaker 4: Anyway, other Nate and his New York Times Sienna polls
• 20:04
  Speaker 4: dropped of Michigan, New Hampshire, and Maine.
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: And they brought us back to Earth.
• 20:09
  Speaker 4: Good news is Abdul is up 49-44 over Mike Rogers
• 20:15
  Speaker 4: in Michigan, although this was probably taken before that social
• 20:19
  Speaker 4: media video of Rogers in the grocery store came out.
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: Yes, that's true.
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: Who knows? He could be taking the lead now.
• 20:24
  Speaker 4: Chris Pappas in New Hampshire is up 50-45 over John Sununu.
• 20:29
  Speaker 4: But in Maine, Troy Jackson is behind Susan Collins by
• 20:34
  Speaker 4: three points, 46-49. Now, just as we sat down over
• 20:41
  Speaker 4: the last couple hours, there have been two additional main polls.
• 20:45
  Speaker 4: There's a UNH poll, where I think it was 51-47.
• 20:51
  Speaker 4: And then there's a UMass Lowell poll, which is 49-43.
• 20:56
  Speaker 4: And they're both Jackson leads in both of those. Now,
• 21:00
  Speaker 4: they are not as high quality as the New York
• 21:02
  Speaker 4: Times poll, which is the best, but there you go.
• 21:06
  Speaker 4: What the hell do you think is going on in Maine?
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: Well, let's stipulate a couple of things. One, as you said,
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: the New York Times is the best of the public pollsters.
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: Does not mean they're infallible, but they are the best.
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: I think Nate Cohn does the best.
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: We once thought that J. Ann Seltzer at the Des
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: Moines Register was infallible. She was.
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: Everyone's infallible until they aren't, John. That's the thing. So
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: that's one. Two, the average, at least before these two
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: polls that you mentioned came out, according to Nate Silvers, is...
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: Jackson plus 2.8. And so it's worth just remembering that
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: in polls like this, Jackson winning by 2.8 and Collins
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: winning by three points are both within the range of outcomes.
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 21:52
  Speaker 3: What the poll, what all the polls are telling us
• 21:55
  Speaker 3: is that this is a very, very close race. It
• 21:58
  Speaker 3: is a toss up race. If I had to pick Like,
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: which side I would rather be at this point? I
• 22:04
  Speaker 3: would rather be Troy Jackson and Susan Collins, as hard
• 22:06
  Speaker 3: as she is to beat, just because the political wins
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: are so much at Jackson's back. I can go through
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: here and, you know, it's interesting to look at this,
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: that Nate Cohn's poll and the other polls and see, like,
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: why is this one different? Because it's the only one
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: that has shown Collins winning of all the polls we've
• 22:21
  Speaker 3: seen in, for weeks.
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 22:23
  Speaker 4: And I know you've been doing some unskewing of the
• 22:25
  Speaker 4: poll today because you're a big proponent of poll unskewing.
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: No, as I wrote in the message box today, poll
• 22:30
  Speaker 3: unskewing is loser shit. You shouldn't do it. But I
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: do think when you get two polls with different results,
• 22:37
  Speaker 3: it's worth trying to understand what that difference is. And notably,
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: this is not a more Republican sample than other polls.
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's not the problem.
• 22:44
  Speaker 3: Nacon looks through and it looks exactly like a CNN
• 22:47
  Speaker 3: poll that came out recently that has Jackson up three.
• 22:49
  Speaker 3: A couple of things that I would point out from
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: this poll that I think are noteworthy, which is Susan
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: Collins is a big Image advantage here, she has a
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: net positive rating of three points. Jackson is, I think,
• 23:00
  Speaker 3: about seven or eight points underwater.
• 23:01
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I would say on that one, before you go on,
• 23:04
  Speaker 4: I was not surprised that, I was maybe a little surprised,
• 23:08
  Speaker 4: but not really surprised that Susan Collins had a favorable
• 23:12
  Speaker 4: image in the poll, right?
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: I think she was like 51-48.
• 23:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, she was a little higher than I thought. She
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: was underwater last time. There have been a lot of ads.
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: She's had a big spending advantage. So it's not shocking
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: that she would get to that. That's all with it.
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: That's possible.
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: The more shocking result was Jackson's favorability, unfavorability, which is 41-49. Yep.
• 23:29
  Speaker 3: And what is most notable of that, like Jackson's much
• 23:32
  Speaker 3: less well-known. It took him a long time to get
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: up on air. People don't really know who he is.
• 23:37
  Speaker 3: He was just a legislative leader who had run for
• 23:38
  Speaker 3: governor in a relatively low-profile race. This poll has 18%
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: of 2024 Kamala Harris voters who have an unfavorable impression
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: of Jackson. That's kind of just you know, maybe people
• 23:51
  Speaker 3: in Maine can tell us otherwise, but that's hard to
• 23:53
  Speaker 3: see how that's possible. It just runs against the basic
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: trend of polarization where people support, you know, naturally have
• 23:59
  Speaker 3: a reflexive opinion of the people in their party. And
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: Jackson is not a controversial candidate. He's more a blank slate.
• 24:07
  Speaker 3: So it would be one thing if he had a
• 24:09
  Speaker 3: lower approval, but there was a large number of Democrats
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: who did not know who he was. That's not really
• 24:14
  Speaker 3: what's happening here. So that's where the other thing that
• 24:16
  Speaker 3: I think is just very interesting about this sample is,
• 24:20
  Speaker 3: and these are small subgroups that are going to have
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: large margins of errors, but this poll has Jackson only winning,
• 24:26
  Speaker 3: Jackson endorsed by Bernie Sanders, progressive, winning voters under 30
• 24:30
  Speaker 3: by two points.
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: That was great. It's like his worst demographic, age demographic.
• 24:36
  Speaker 3: In 2020, according to exit polls, when Susan Collins was
• 24:38
  Speaker 3: winning by almost nine points against Sarah Gideon, she lost
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: voters under 30 by 16 points.
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: So the.
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: Those things are sort of normalized. You get to what
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: I think this is, which is an incredibly close race
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: against a hard candidate. The pro-Collins side has a $ 25
• 24:56
  Speaker 3: million spending advantage going forward if you look at all
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: the money spent and money at the time reserved. That's
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: a huge advantage in a state the size of Maine.
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: That can have an impact here. But this is a
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: state that wants Democrats to be in charge of the
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: Senate by 11 points.
• 25:12
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: And those two things.
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: At some point.
• 25:14
  Speaker 4: 12% of Maine voters who want Democrats, who told the
• 25:18
  Speaker 4: New York Times they want Democrats to control the Senate,
• 25:20
  Speaker 4: said that they will vote for Susan Collins in this poll.
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: And again, like you said, it's not to say that
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: the poll is wrong.
• 25:25
  Speaker 3: No, no, no, I'm not saying that at all.
• 25:27
  Speaker 4: But if you're the Jackson campaign and you're reading this poll,
• 25:31
  Speaker 4: and maybe your private polling also has it, maybe not
• 25:34
  Speaker 4: a three-point deficit, but you're close, what do you do differently?
• 25:39
  Speaker 3: You have to go at the point you just made.
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: Regardless of how you feel about Susan Collins, regardless of
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: how you have voted for Susan Collins in the past,
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: if you think that Donald Trump should no longer be
• 25:49
  Speaker 3: in charge of the Senate, if you think that there
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: should be some sort of check on Donald Trump, you
• 25:54
  Speaker 3: have to vote for Troy Jackson. That is exactly what
• 25:57
  Speaker 3: you're maybe a Democrat. You voted for Collins in 2020.
• 25:58
  Speaker 3: Maybe you voted for Collins before that. Maybe you think
• 26:01
  Speaker 3: Collins is different than these other Republicans. But if you
• 26:05
  Speaker 3: care about who controls the Senate, if you're angry about
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: what's happening in this country, the way to express that
• 26:10
  Speaker 3: anger is a vote for Troy Jackson.
• 26:12
  Speaker 4: I wonder, and now, again, I don't know what's going
• 26:15
  Speaker 4: on in the state of Maine because we're not on
• 26:17
  Speaker 4: the ground there. But from where we sit, I can
• 26:22
  Speaker 4: say that, like, that race has not been nationalized in
• 26:25
  Speaker 4: any way. We don't hear much about that race since
• 26:28
  Speaker 4: Plattner dropped out. And it's interesting to me to compare
• 26:33
  Speaker 4: it with Michigan, where obviously Abdul has gotten a ton
• 26:38
  Speaker 4: of attention. That race has gotten a ton of attention.
• 26:41
  Speaker 4: There's obviously like a very divisive primary there. And, um,
• 26:45
  Speaker 4: you know, if you asked a national audience, a national
• 26:49
  Speaker 4: audience of political junkies who talk about this all the time,
• 26:52
  Speaker 4: they might tell you, well, Abdul's pretty polarizing and maybe
• 26:55
  Speaker 4: it was tough after the primary to get Democrats on
• 26:58
  Speaker 4: board with him. And maybe he still needs more Democrats
• 27:00
  Speaker 4: and who knows. And Mike Rogers is kind of boring
• 27:04
  Speaker 4: and seems like an old school Republican and maybe he'll
• 27:06
  Speaker 4: do well. And like in that poll, and we can
• 27:09
  Speaker 4: talk more about it in a second, but like Abdul's
• 27:11
  Speaker 4: got 95% of Democrats. He's got a better favorability rating
• 27:15
  Speaker 4: than Jackson for sure, even after he's been beat up
• 27:17
  Speaker 4: on Fox News and elsewhere all the time. And it
• 27:20
  Speaker 4: does make you wonder, does someone who is more unknown
• 27:25
  Speaker 4: nationally or even in their state, and Abdul's somewhat known
• 27:29
  Speaker 4: in his state, but also Troy Jackson was Senate minority leader.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: There for a while.
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: I'm not sure that's worth it.
• 27:34
  Speaker 4: But do you need to be out there everywhere all
• 27:37
  Speaker 4: the time either doing events or doing press, that it's
• 27:40
  Speaker 4: going to reach a lot more voters who don't pay
• 27:42
  Speaker 4: close attention to politics to sort of get your name
• 27:44
  Speaker 4: ID up there.
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: You might. You absolutely might.
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 27:47
  Speaker 3: I think this race was about Graham Plattner, not about
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: Susan Collins for a long time, and then it sort
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: of became about neither.
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: And maybe a little bit more about Troy Jackson than
• 27:57
  Speaker 3: Susan Collins, or at least 50-50, and you've got to
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: make it more about Susan Collins. You know, you have
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: to be the kind of candidate that you can be,
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: and I don't know Troy Jackson. Abdul's obviously a very
• 28:07
  Speaker 3: specific type of candidate who can go on every, can
• 28:10
  Speaker 3: and will and wants to go on every single podcast
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: in the world and be everywhere. And, you know, and
• 28:14
  Speaker 3: Ossoff's a certain candidate who is on MSNBC every night.
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: That may not be Troy Jackson, but I think he
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: has to do, you know, it's actually interesting because it's
• 28:23
  Speaker 3: not even that this poll suggests that people don't know
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: who he is since we need to be out there more.
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: They don't like him.
• 28:28
  Speaker 3: It's that, I just don't buy that. I just do not, like,
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: I could be wrong, you know, and Nate Cohn wrote
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: in his, because I really, the thing I appreciate about
• 28:35
  Speaker 3: Nate Cohn is when his polls don't match what everyone
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: else thinks, He doesn't hurt his polls, right? He doesn't.
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: And then he will explore and take on the idea
• 28:42
  Speaker 3: that maybe it's an outlier. In fact, Nate Cohn, in
• 28:44
  Speaker 3: the column he wrote about the poll, raised the question,
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: is it an outlier or an omen? So he may
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: be telling us what's coming. But as we sit here today,
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: I am very skeptical of the idea that Democrats do
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: not like Troy Jackson.
• 28:57
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: Well, we'll see.
• 29:06
  Speaker 3: Thank you. Thank you.
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: Thank you.
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• 31:57
  Speaker 4: One caveat on that main poll, almost all of it
• 31:59
  Speaker 4: was conducted before a fairly explosive ProPublica story alleging that
• 32:04
  Speaker 4: the FBI was investigating whether a major Susan Collins donor,
• 32:09
  Speaker 4: former Navitek CEO Martin Kao, a defense contractor, had essentially
• 32:13
  Speaker 4: participated in a pay-to-play scheme. Campaign money in exchange for
• 32:18
  Speaker 4: Collins helping secure federal defense contracts. And that the investigation
• 32:23
  Speaker 4: was still active when Trump's purge of FBI and Justice
• 32:27
  Speaker 4: Department officials ended it in 2025. Particularly notable piece of
• 32:31
  Speaker 4: evidence in the piece, and they have these emails. In 2019,
• 32:36
  Speaker 4: Cao met with Scott Reed, who ran a Susan Collins
• 32:38
  Speaker 4: super PAC, then told him via email that he was
• 32:41
  Speaker 4: writing a $ 150, 000 donation through a shell company, put it
• 32:46
  Speaker 4: in writing, And then seven days after the money was deposited,
• 32:50
  Speaker 4: Collins asked for Kyle's number so she could thank him.
• 32:54
  Speaker 4: Here's Collins pretty angrily denying the whole thing.
• 32:58
  Speaker 5: It is so offensive. Legally false. And it is so offensive.
• 33:06
  Speaker 5: It really offends me. And I'm offended for my staff, too.
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: Code red. We have gone from concerned to offended.
• 33:16
  Speaker 3: Multiple times offended.
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: So offended.
• 33:18
  Speaker 4: That's like as exercised as Susan Collins gets. What's your
• 33:22
  Speaker 4: read on the story and its potential impact? We should
• 33:24
  Speaker 4: also say, by the way, that all the denials afterwards
• 33:27
  Speaker 4: from Susan Collins and her staff, ProPublica ran another story
• 33:31
  Speaker 4: the next night that some of those were just lies.
• 33:34
  Speaker 4: She was like, oh, well, the Biden administration investigated this.
• 33:37
  Speaker 4: They found no wrongdoing.
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: It was closed.
• 33:39
  Speaker 4: She was talking about like an earlier investigation into Cowell.
• 33:42
  Speaker 4: And then there was this later investigation and that's where
• 33:45
  Speaker 4: she and her super PAC and you know, her staff
• 33:47
  Speaker 4: and her office, whatever they were part of. So she wasn't, they're,
• 33:50
  Speaker 4: they're not telling the truth even in their denials already. Um,
• 33:54
  Speaker 4: which is easily proven, but so who knows? But anyway,
• 33:57
  Speaker 4: what do you think?
• 33:58
  Speaker 3: You generally do not want the, want your candidate's name.
• 34:02
  Speaker 3: Donor FBI investigation in the same sentence ever shell company donation.
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: Just a ton of words.
• 34:08
  Speaker 3: You don't want, yeah. How much is it going to matter?
• 34:11
  Speaker 3: I don't know the answer to that. There has been
• 34:14
  Speaker 3: a lot of advertising spent trying to tell Maine voters
• 34:18
  Speaker 3: that Susan Collins is corrupt. There's a Democratic Super PAC
• 34:22
  Speaker 3: ad that's up right now from the arm of the
• 34:25
  Speaker 3: Senate Majority PAC that is talking about donations from Epstein
• 34:30
  Speaker 3: donors and votes about the Epstein files and all of that. Obviously,
• 34:36
  Speaker 3: there are a lot of smart people working on this
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: race who are looking at a lot of data. I
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: just have remained skeptical that you're going to convince Maine voters,
• 34:44
  Speaker 3: after all these years and all these years of voting
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: for Susan Collins, that she is corrupt. I did a
• 34:53
  Speaker 3: lot of work my pre-podcasting days in very small states
• 34:56
  Speaker 3: like South Dakota, where everyone has a relationship with their politician.
• 35:02
  Speaker 3: This was Joe Biden in Delaware before he was vice president,
• 35:04
  Speaker 3: same thing. I think it's just very hard to convince
• 35:07
  Speaker 3: people that she's corrupt. And that's the reason.
• 35:09
  Speaker 4: Do you think it's easier to convince people that Susan
• 35:14
  Speaker 4: Collins is just MAGA and is going to mean, you know,
• 35:19
  Speaker 4: that she's just going to let Trump do what he wants?
• 35:22
  Speaker 3: I think you have a better chance of that considering
• 35:23
  Speaker 3: the track record. That's like, we're going to Finish this podcast.
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: It's going to come out tomorrow morning, and I'm going
• 35:29
  Speaker 3: to get probably a lot of texts from people working
• 35:32
  Speaker 3: on this effort who are going to show me data
• 35:33
  Speaker 3: that says otherwise.
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: No, I'm asking the question because I genuinely don't know.
• 35:37
  Speaker 3: Because the point is not she's MAGA. That's also not credible.
• 35:40
  Speaker 3: It has to be a real thing, which.
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: Is— This is a good exercise. You have to tell
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: a story.
• 35:45
  Speaker 4: What is the story of Susan Collins where she was
• 35:48
  Speaker 4: an independent— You're from Maine, and you maybe don't like
• 35:52
  Speaker 4: her— Or maybe you're a Democrat or you're maybe, you know,
• 35:55
  Speaker 4: but you have voted for Susan Collins in the past.
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: Maybe you didn't last time. Maybe you're undecided.
• 36:01
  Speaker 4: And you do think that she's someone, as you can
• 36:04
  Speaker 4: see in this poll, who has delivered for Maine and
• 36:08
  Speaker 4: she breaks with Donald Trump and other Republicans once in
• 36:10
  Speaker 4: a while.
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: What's the story you tell that voter? I think the.
• 36:13
  Speaker 3: Story is that she has voted with Donald Trump, whatever
• 36:16
  Speaker 3: it is, 92% of the time. She has supported him
• 36:19
  Speaker 3: when Trump has needed her. We have incredibly high stakes decisions,
• 36:22
  Speaker 3: including Supreme Court justices that are going to come up
• 36:24
  Speaker 3: over the next few years. And do you want someone
• 36:26
  Speaker 3: who agrees with the people of Maine or someone who's
• 36:28
  Speaker 3: going to vote for Donald Trump?
• 36:29
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: I might. I've been thinking about this. I might.
• 36:33
  Speaker 4: It's a little more subtle, but I think you can
• 36:36
  Speaker 4: run an ad campaign around this, which is like she's
• 36:38
  Speaker 4: been there forever. And she has been in Washington too long.
• 36:42
  Speaker 4: And the longer she's been in Washington, the more she's
• 36:44
  Speaker 4: gotten like Washington. And she went there. And at one point,
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: maybe she was an independent voice who delivered for Maine.
• 36:49
  Speaker 4: Look at the cost of living in Maine. Home heating
• 36:51
  Speaker 4: oil just hit its highest price ever in Maine. Like,
• 36:54
  Speaker 4: for all that she's delivered for Maine, has she done
• 36:56
  Speaker 4: that much for your life right now? And now she's
• 36:59
  Speaker 4: got this lobbyist issue, and she's now voting with Donald
• 37:03
  Speaker 4: Trump 95% of the time. Like, what happened to Susan Collins?
• 37:06
  Speaker 4: Don't we want to change right now? Which combines a
• 37:09
  Speaker 4: few of those things.
• 37:10
  Speaker 3: Oftentimes, and I've been on the losing end of this
• 37:13
  Speaker 3: when I work for Tom Daschle in South Dakota. Oftentimes,
• 37:15
  Speaker 3: the way you beat a well-liked politician with a long
• 37:18
  Speaker 3: history in a state is you tell a story about
• 37:20
  Speaker 3: how they've changed. It's usually how they've gone to Washington.
• 37:22
  Speaker 3: I think that what you're hitting on the right way.
• 37:24
  Speaker 3: I just am not. But I can be convinced. People
• 37:28
  Speaker 3: with internal polling data, I can be convinced you're going
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: to reach me. But as of yet, prior to that point,
• 37:34
  Speaker 3: I'm not convinced that the change is she's corrupt.
• 37:41
  Speaker 7: Right.
• 37:41
  Speaker 3: You can go Washington. The way they took Daschle down
• 37:44
  Speaker 3: a whole bunch of other ways was that he became
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: more liberal than the state.
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 37:48
  Speaker 3: And the proxy for that in this case, and he was,
• 37:51
  Speaker 3: is the voting with Trump 90% of the time. And
• 37:55
  Speaker 3: that he had gone Washington and he lived in Washington
• 37:58
  Speaker 3: and he had a Washington lifestyle. I think in this one,
• 38:00
  Speaker 3: I think it's more she goes along to get along
• 38:03
  Speaker 3: in the Republican Party. And that is the real consequences
• 38:04
  Speaker 3: for Maine. And she has done that throughout the Trump era.
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah. All right.
• 38:09
  Speaker 4: Let's talk about the two less psychologically– destabilizing times polls,
• 38:14
  Speaker 4: Michigan and New Hampshire. On one hand, we love a
• 38:17
  Speaker 4: five-point lead, especially where the Dem candidates are at 49%
• 38:21
  Speaker 4: in the case of Abdul and 50% in the case
• 38:24
  Speaker 4: of Pappas. On the other, both Abdul and Pappas are
• 38:28
  Speaker 4: underperforming the generic ballot in their respective states. What do
• 38:31
  Speaker 4: you make of these polls in these two states?
• 38:33
  Speaker 3: I think the explanation for the Michigan result is easier
• 38:38
  Speaker 3: than the New Hampshire result. When you look at the polls,
• 38:40
  Speaker 3: you can see it, which is As you point out,
• 38:42
  Speaker 3: to Abdul's credit, and frankly, to the credit of Haley
• 38:46
  Speaker 3: Stevens and Gretchen Whitmer and just almost everyone in Michigan.
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: Team players all around.
• 38:52
  Speaker 3: They got aboard and they have united the Democratic Party.
• 38:55
  Speaker 3: The damage to Abdul has lingered among independents. In a
• 38:59
  Speaker 3: world where Trump has absolutely putrid approver rating with independents,
• 39:03
  Speaker 3: it's essentially a tie among independents between Abdul and Mike Rogers,
• 39:08
  Speaker 3: which is why this race is five points, not 10 points.
• 39:10
  Speaker 4: Although- 8% of Trump voters back Abdul, which is more
• 39:14
  Speaker 4: than back Troy Jackson or Chris Pappas.
• 39:16
  Speaker 3: Yes, which we're going to have a– is there a
• 39:19
  Speaker 3: conversation about the horseshoe effect if that happens in the end?
• 39:22
  Speaker 3: The other reason why Abdul is winning by five, not
• 39:26
  Speaker 3: more– and this is hard because they did not include
• 39:29
  Speaker 3: the governance race.
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: In here. Yeah.
• 39:31
  Speaker 3: So there was not a, you don't have this other baseline.
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: Like in previous polls, we've talked about this race. We've
• 39:35
  Speaker 3: showed the delta between what Jocelyn Benson was getting of
• 39:39
  Speaker 3: the gubernatorial ballot and what Abdul is getting in the
• 39:42
  Speaker 3: Senate race. And that gives you a sense of whether
• 39:44
  Speaker 3: he's underperforming the state. Is on the question of who's more,
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: who's more extreme, Uh, there's by 14 points voters see
• 39:53
  Speaker 3: Abdul's more extreme than Mike Rogers. And that is what
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: that is bleeding into the independent numbers. I think, which
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: is why it's five points, not seven points, eight points,
• 40:00
  Speaker 3: nine points, or 10 points. Now I'll take a one
• 40:02
  Speaker 3: point win. I don't give a shit.
• 40:04
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 40:04
  Speaker 3: Same where we will have this discussion afterwards about how
• 40:07
  Speaker 3: he does. Cause this is going to matter so much
• 40:09
  Speaker 3: to this battle of narratives heading into 2028 about the
• 40:13
  Speaker 3: currency of a candidate with Abdul's progressive values and positions.
• 40:18
  Speaker 3: and not just a battleground state like Michigan, but also a, uh,
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: top tier primary state now.
• 40:23
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 40:23
  Speaker 4: And, and the other thing is of all these three states,
• 40:26
  Speaker 4: Michigan is the swingiest state, the more, the more conservative state.
• 40:30
  Speaker 4: So he is doing the best of the, of the
• 40:33
  Speaker 4: three polls. That is the best poll, um, which you
• 40:37
  Speaker 4: might not have guessed heading into it. Um, he also
• 40:39
  Speaker 4: is the only Democrat of the three who beats, uh,
• 40:42
  Speaker 4: his Republican candidate on cost of living.
• 40:45
  Speaker 3: That is also deeply concerning.
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: Uh, Plus nine, well, for the other two. Yeah, exactly.
• 40:50
  Speaker 4: But yeah, Abdul's plus nine on who do you trust
• 40:52
  Speaker 4: more on cost of living, plus 24 on health care,
• 40:55
  Speaker 4: which again, I think speaks, I think all three of
• 40:57
  Speaker 4: these polls like scramble a lot of narratives on all
• 41:00
  Speaker 4: sides of the democratic discourse. But the idea that, you know,
• 41:03
  Speaker 4: Abdul's cost of living economic populist message is earning him
• 41:10
  Speaker 4: more trust among voters on the most important issues for
• 41:14
  Speaker 4: voters than the other two candidates is notable.
• 41:17
  Speaker 3: And that he has not paid a price for Medicare
• 41:18
  Speaker 3: for All.
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: Now, the Republicans have not litigated Medicare for All because
• 41:21
  Speaker 3: they're afraid to do so.
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: Right, right.
• 41:24
  Speaker 4: So what's going on in New Hampshire? I will say,
• 41:26
  Speaker 4: you know, Kamala did win by six, right? It was 48-42,
• 41:29
  Speaker 4: I think.
• 41:30
  Speaker 3: In New Hampshire?
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 41:32
  Speaker 3: She won by 2.8 points.
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: Oh, it was less?
• 41:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 41:35
  Speaker 3: Someone should correct me, but I'm pretty.
• 41:36
  Speaker 4: Sure that's right. Okay, so it's better than she did
• 41:39
  Speaker 4: in New Hampshire, but what's going on?
• 41:41
  Speaker 3: It's once again below the generic ballot, which is like
• 41:43
  Speaker 3: 11 in New Hampshire.
• 41:44
  Speaker 2: The.
• 41:47
  Speaker 3: I think this is really about the two candidates. When
• 41:49
  Speaker 3: you dig in the polling, it doesn't make a ton
• 41:51
  Speaker 3: of sense. Pappas is doing better with independents than Sununu.
• 41:55
  Speaker 3: There is less enthusiasm among Democrats for Pappas, although he's
• 41:57
  Speaker 3: mostly consolidated the party. The thing really is that John
• 42:02
  Speaker 3: Sununu is part of a, and you and I talked
• 42:04
  Speaker 3: about this with Alex last week, is part of a well-known,
• 42:08
  Speaker 3: well-liked political dynasty in New Hampshire that is associated with
• 42:13
  Speaker 3: being anti-Trump. You remember his governor brother.
• 42:16
  Speaker 2: And moderate politics.
• 42:17
  Speaker 3: And moderate politics, and always has been, right? His father
• 42:19
  Speaker 3: was chief of staff in the White House for Reagan,
• 42:23
  Speaker 3: but Chris Sununu, who was the governor for many terms, very,
• 42:26
  Speaker 3: very popular, and was the Republican's top choice to run
• 42:30
  Speaker 3: for the seat, was a very, very outspoken, aggressive Trump critic. Remember,
• 42:36
  Speaker 3: he went to the mattresses for Nikki Haley until Trump
• 42:40
  Speaker 3: became the nominee, and then he just backed Trump. But
• 42:42
  Speaker 3: he has that credibility. So it This is a case
• 42:45
  Speaker 3: where Pappas is not a bad candidate in any way, shape,
• 42:47
  Speaker 3: or form. We think he's sort of a generic Democrat
• 42:48
  Speaker 3: in this case. And Sununu is a Republican plus candidate.
• 42:55
  Speaker 4: That is one where I can see, because it was
• 42:58
  Speaker 4: a very late primary, the closer we get, like if
• 43:01
  Speaker 4: the Times polls this again, or there's a bunch of
• 43:03
  Speaker 4: other polls in New Hampshire, I could see him doing better,
• 43:06
  Speaker 4: like actually improving.
• 43:06
  Speaker 3: I think that's true. He's also at 50.
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 43:10
  Speaker 3: So it's like, there's not that much room.
• 43:12
  Speaker 2: You were right on the money.
• 43:13
  Speaker 4: It was 2.8 by 2.8. Um, and, and comma one in, in, uh, 2024, um,
• 43:19
  Speaker 4: zooming out from all these polls, um, what's your overall
• 43:21
  Speaker 4: take on the political environment right now?
• 43:25
  Speaker 2: Too good to be true for Democrats too early to tell.
• 43:28
  Speaker 4: Or, you know, throw the time Sienna polls in the
• 43:31
  Speaker 4: average and keep on huffing the hopium.
• 43:33
  Speaker 3: Well, I think you throw them all on the average always.
• 43:35
  Speaker 3: And that's, that's the, that's honestly the real answer about Maine.
• 43:38
  Speaker 3: If you throw in the average, the average still shows
• 43:40
  Speaker 3: a slight advantage for Jackson, which, as I said, is
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: basically a toss-up race. I think when you look at that.
• 43:48
  Speaker 3: Do we all sit here and worry about a systemic
• 43:50
  Speaker 3: polling error like 2016, 2020? Yes.
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: Of course.
• 43:53
  Speaker 3: We absolutely do.
• 43:55
  Speaker 4: Can I give you what Nate Silver's doom scenario is
• 43:58
  Speaker 4: on that? It's going to happen.
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: I know what it is. Well, I feel like we
• 44:01
  Speaker 2: should tell everyone. Yeah.
• 44:04
  Speaker 4: One of the things that Nate describes, both Nates describe this,
• 44:06
  Speaker 4: is a possibility, is in a lot of these polls,
• 44:10
  Speaker 4: it's the red states where Democrats are doing best in
• 44:15
  Speaker 4: these polls. And specifically among demographic groups like younger voters,
• 44:21
  Speaker 4: Latino voters, and now working class voters, right? Who obviously
• 44:25
  Speaker 4: were more Trump in 2024. And so the swing is
• 44:28
  Speaker 4: biggest among those groups. And so when you get to states,
• 44:31
  Speaker 4: with older populations, with whiter populations like Maine, then you
• 44:37
  Speaker 4: don't see as much of a swing, right? And maybe
• 44:40
  Speaker 4: that explains, there was a New York poll out this
• 44:43
  Speaker 4: week that showed Kathy.
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: Hochul only up nine in New York.
• 44:46
  Speaker 4: There was a couple of Minnesota polls we talked about
• 44:48
  Speaker 4: a while back that has Peggy Flanagan shows her in
• 44:52
  Speaker 4: a tighter race. So it's like, what's with these sort
• 44:54
  Speaker 4: of Northern bluish states that are not as good for
• 44:58
  Speaker 4: Democrats as like, Kansas may be in play and some
• 45:01
  Speaker 4: other red states.
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: So that's one. So maybe there's like a geographic thing
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: going on.
• 45:05
  Speaker 4: And then Nate Silver said, now those same voters, working
• 45:09
  Speaker 4: class voters, Latinos, voters in red states are also some
• 45:12
  Speaker 4: of the groups where polls have tended to overestimate Democrats
• 45:15
  Speaker 4: in recent election. Um, so are we looking at like
• 45:20
  Speaker 4: maybe all those good polls in the red states that
• 45:22
  Speaker 4: are showing those swings are a mirage and it's a
• 45:25
  Speaker 4: polling error. And that these blues, these bluer states that
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: are showing it tighter are are the real polls.
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: Now that's the scary, that's the scary.
• 45:31
  Speaker 3: So I think let's take that, let's take that apart
• 45:33
  Speaker 3: in a couple different ways. One, like it is possible
• 45:36
  Speaker 3: there's a systemic polling error, right? And as you say,
• 45:38
  Speaker 3: that polling error would be disproportionately taking place in the
• 45:41
  Speaker 3: states you mentioned, the ones that we are most excited
• 45:43
  Speaker 3: about right now. There are the reasons why that may
• 45:47
  Speaker 3: not be happening.
• 45:48
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 45:48
  Speaker 3: And look, if the polls are off by two points
• 45:50
  Speaker 3: or two, three points, that's not a polling error. That
• 45:52
  Speaker 3: is a historically normal poll. One, the polls have been accurate.
• 45:56
  Speaker 3: In the midterms, no one ever believes the polls are
• 45:58
  Speaker 3: accurate in 2022, but they quite very much were. It's
• 46:00
  Speaker 3: just the vibes were wrong. At least in the Trump era,
• 46:04
  Speaker 3: at least. Also, this time, we have other data points
• 46:08
  Speaker 3: that point towards a blue wave. You have special election performance,
• 46:13
  Speaker 3: which in and of itself is not super predictive, but
• 46:16
  Speaker 3: it's much more, and this is some research Amy Walter
• 46:18
  Speaker 3: has done at the Kirk Political Report, excuse me, the
• 46:21
  Speaker 3: special election results are much more predictive in midterms than
• 46:25
  Speaker 3: presidential years for all the obvious reasons. They let us
• 46:27
  Speaker 3: down in 24, but well, it's just because the, the,
• 46:29
  Speaker 3: the larger, the, the greater the proportion of electorate that
• 46:32
  Speaker 3: is first time or less engaged, less frequent voters, the,
• 46:36
  Speaker 3: the greater the distance between the special election electorate and
• 46:40
  Speaker 3: the actual electorate. That's that gap is less in midterms.
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 46:43
  Speaker 3: And we also have primary voting data where Democrats have
• 46:47
  Speaker 3: been outvoting Republicans, even in red states. So just the
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: total number of Democrats participating in primaries is way up.
• 46:51
  Speaker 3: It's down for Republicans. And so those all contribute here.
• 46:55
  Speaker 3: And you can see that in what we were with
• 46:57
  Speaker 3: the Latino numbers, but in actual precinct results, both in
• 47:02
  Speaker 3: New Jersey and Virginia in 2025, and then in the
• 47:05
  Speaker 3: special election we've seen particularly in Texas in that special
• 47:08
  Speaker 3: Senate election that we saw many months ago, you're seeing
• 47:10
  Speaker 3: dramatic more than 20-point shifts among Latinos in Latino-heavy precincts.
• 47:16
  Speaker 3: So all of that indicates that I don't think this
• 47:19
  Speaker 3: is– like 2020 was a systemic era where everything– The
• 47:23
  Speaker 3: polls painted a picture of the world that did not exist. Now,
• 47:27
  Speaker 3: maybe these polls are not painting. Maybe the blue wave
• 47:30
  Speaker 3: is not as big as the polls suggest for all
• 47:32
  Speaker 3: the reasons you mentioned, but there are all these other
• 47:35
  Speaker 3: data points that would support the idea that this is
• 47:38
  Speaker 3: very good. And then say, you don't want to believe
• 47:39
  Speaker 3: any of the polls, the price of gas, the price
• 47:42
  Speaker 3: of groceries, the fact that mortgages hit seven mortgage rates
• 47:44
  Speaker 3: at 7% today, all of that are things that historically
• 47:47
  Speaker 3: are very, very bad for the company. Now I got
• 47:49
  Speaker 3: a lot of theories. about, you know, I've, I got,
• 47:52
  Speaker 3: I got bull cases. I got bear cases. I got
• 47:54
  Speaker 3: things in the middle. And there are a couple, I
• 47:56
  Speaker 3: think the red state thing is really interesting. Like, why
• 47:59
  Speaker 3: are we doing better in red states than blue states?
• 48:01
  Speaker 3: I think there are a couple of, there's the poll
• 48:04
  Speaker 3: potential polling error. So that that's obviously very real. Another
• 48:07
  Speaker 3: one is, is in the Senate races, we have better
• 48:09
  Speaker 3: candidates in the red states. Like, like I, like I'm
• 48:12
  Speaker 3: just Tallarico, Sherrod, Poltova, Turek. These are all truly excellent candidates.
• 48:18
  Speaker 2: Cooper.
• 48:19
  Speaker 3: Cooper, John Ossoff. For example, Abdul is a very talented candidate,
• 48:23
  Speaker 3: but there's real reasons to believe he could underperform the
• 48:26
  Speaker 3: environment there. Troy Jackson is untested. Chris Pappas, sort of
• 48:32
  Speaker 3: a not particularly well-known candidate. The other one, which is
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: the flip side of the polling error, is we have
• 48:38
  Speaker 3: squeezed every bit of blood from the stone of college-educated states.
• 48:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 48:46
  Speaker 3: And where there just aren't that many people, you know,
• 48:48
  Speaker 3: there's that much more, there's not that much swing left
• 48:51
  Speaker 3: or swings remaining in like a New Hampshire. And, you know,
• 48:55
  Speaker 3: if you look at Trump's approval rating with, so Trump
• 48:58
  Speaker 3: won white non-college educated voters, which are disproportionate in these
• 49:02
  Speaker 3: red states we're talking about by 34 points, current exit polls.
• 49:05
  Speaker 3: In the New York times poll, he's only plus eight
• 49:08
  Speaker 3: with them nationally. And then now the one from September.
• 49:10
  Speaker 3: So if those, you know, non-college voters, non-college, particularly non-college
• 49:14
  Speaker 3: white women are moving towards Democrats, that's going to have
• 49:17
  Speaker 3: a much bigger effect. It's the inverse. of what happened
• 49:20
  Speaker 3: in 2016. Right. And like, that's the question. That's what
• 49:22
  Speaker 3: we're really going to have to see.
• 49:24
  Speaker 2: The only other, uh, doomer scenario is.
• 49:27
  Speaker 3: I got another one too. Yeah.
• 49:28
  Speaker 4: Well, this is, and this is what the main result
• 49:32
  Speaker 4: would show, which is, um, Trump ends up being quite unpopular.
• 49:37
  Speaker 2: And, you know, we see an exit poll on, on,
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: on the night of the election.
• 49:41
  Speaker 4: It's like Trump's approval was 38%, 40%, right. It would
• 49:46
  Speaker 4: still be, that would be very low comparison. Um, but
• 49:49
  Speaker 4: all these Republican candidates were just able to convince people
• 49:54
  Speaker 4: that they're different than Trump and that in your Republican
• 49:57
  Speaker 4: and you don't like Trump or you're an independent, you
• 49:59
  Speaker 4: don't like Trump, but you can still vote for Republican Congress.
• 50:02
  Speaker 4: And And then you can just, you know, just be
• 50:04
  Speaker 4: mad at Trump and he's not going to be president
• 50:06
  Speaker 4: anymore in a couple years anyway. And so somehow we've
• 50:10
  Speaker 4: started to depolarize the electorate.
• 50:11
  Speaker 3: Well, I think that there's– I know that it's depolarizing.
• 50:14
  Speaker 3: The way to think about it is– and this is
• 50:15
  Speaker 3: the difference between 2018– well, 2018 was great for Democrats
• 50:18
  Speaker 3: and 2022 was not great for Republicans.
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, right, right.
• 50:21
  Speaker 3: And this is Ron Brownstein's thing that he talks about
• 50:23
  Speaker 3: all the time, which is our success will be dictated
• 50:26
  Speaker 3: by the percent of people who disapprove of Trump who
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: vote for a Democrat. We got– you know, high eighties,
• 50:33
  Speaker 3: in some cases, 90% of those people in 2020 is
• 50:37
  Speaker 3: 2018 in 2022 Republicans got much fewer. And so that's
• 50:41
  Speaker 3: why we were able to win in Pennsylvania, uh, Georgia
• 50:45
  Speaker 3: places like now, you know, it's obviously these are small
• 50:48
  Speaker 3: sample sizes, but we're the, we also had bad Republicans
• 50:50
  Speaker 3: had bad candidates in 2022, which may be why that is.
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 50:53
  Speaker 3: And then the other thing to think about here is,
• 50:56
  Speaker 3: cause I was struck by this cook political battleground report
• 50:58
  Speaker 3: where they, I think we talked about it last week
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: where they did 37 districts that are the– all the
• 51:03
  Speaker 3: toss-up lean Democrat, lean Republican districts in their ratings that
• 51:08
  Speaker 3: has– those districts altogether have a Trump plus five– Trump
• 51:13
  Speaker 3: won them by five points. The generic ballot has– in
• 51:16
  Speaker 3: that poll has Democrats winning by two, which is seven points.
• 51:19
  Speaker 3: Seven points, but it's the bottom half. It's the floor
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: of the range we're seeing in the polls. You see
• 51:23
  Speaker 3: a seven-point generic poll today, you're kind of like, eh,
• 51:25
  Speaker 3: not that great. We're used to these 11s and 12s.
• 51:28
  Speaker 3: And one possibility there... But in battlegrounds.
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: Well, right.
• 51:32
  Speaker 3: But the reason why the battlegrounds would be more at
• 51:36
  Speaker 3: the floor than the ceiling is... Or under the national
• 51:41
  Speaker 3: average is because the campaign is being waged there. So
• 51:45
  Speaker 3: if you are just in a non-competitive state, non-competitive district,
• 51:50
  Speaker 3: all you're getting is Trump bad news.
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 51:52
  Speaker 3: And so you look at then 2024... The swing in
• 51:55
  Speaker 3: the battleground states.
• 51:56
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, this is like the Kamala.
• 51:57
  Speaker 3: The Kamala argument is, I think it was like two
• 51:59
  Speaker 3: point something, and the national swing was 4.8. So where there's,
• 52:03
  Speaker 3: you're actually, voters are.
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: She did surprisingly worse in blue states.
• 52:08
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 52:08
  Speaker 2: In 24.
• 52:09
  Speaker 4: And the campaign made the argument afterwards that no one
• 52:12
  Speaker 4: cared about because she lost. That like actually where they
• 52:15
  Speaker 4: waged the campaign and spent a whole bunch of money,
• 52:17
  Speaker 4: she did better than she did nationally.
• 52:19
  Speaker 3: And so like that does, in a national that does
• 52:22
  Speaker 3: you no good. in a, like losing by less in
• 52:26
  Speaker 3: a battleground state gets you no extra electoral points, but
• 52:30
  Speaker 3: narrowing the margins there is going to take some of
• 52:32
  Speaker 3: these districts, you know, that could be like plus 12,
• 52:36
  Speaker 3: plus 10, get a lot harder if it is actually
• 52:38
  Speaker 3: the case, if we actually see that Republicans spending money
• 52:41
  Speaker 3: where politics is a focus, you know, can narrow that,
• 52:46
  Speaker 3: what the generic ballot is nationally.
• 52:48
  Speaker 4: Anyway, the upshot of this is Democratic candidates need money
• 52:52
  Speaker 4: because we're being outspent.
• 52:54
  Speaker 2: And they need help.
• 52:55
  Speaker 3: And how can they get help, John?
• 52:56
  Speaker 4: They can go to votesaveamerica.com, and we'll send you out
• 53:00
  Speaker 4: to a state. We'll give volunteering shifts, and you can
• 53:03
  Speaker 4: donate to the Senate Fund or the House Fund, and
• 53:06
  Speaker 4: we'll split it up between the most competitive races.
• 53:08
  Speaker 3: I do feel like, before we move on here to
• 53:10
  Speaker 3: our very important last topic, that I just want to
• 53:15
  Speaker 3: say this, because I know I have this brand as
• 53:18
  Speaker 3: a doomer, as someone who wades through silver fencing for
• 53:20
  Speaker 3: dark findings, but Even my worst case scenario here that
• 53:24
  Speaker 3: I'm laying out, other than the systemic polling error where
• 53:27
  Speaker 3: everything is fucked, is consistent with Democrats winning the House
• 53:31
  Speaker 3: and potentially winning the Senate too. These are questions of margins.
• 53:37
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 53:38
  Speaker 3: But the worst case scenario, the worst real realistic bear
• 53:44
  Speaker 3: scenario is so optimistic compared to what we thought it
• 53:47
  Speaker 3: would possibly be.
• 53:47
  Speaker 2: That's true. That is true. We do have one more
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: Senate race to talk about before we get to our
• 53:51
  Speaker 2: final topic.
• 53:51
  Speaker 3: That's right. Well, I think this is an important topic, too.
• 53:53
  Speaker 4: Which is the New York Times report on Mary Paltola's
• 53:56
  Speaker 4: campaign in Alaska. For those who didn't read it, the
• 53:58
  Speaker 4: Times described Paltola's political operation during the campaign and in
• 54:01
  Speaker 4: Congress as being chaotic and not a great place to
• 54:04
  Speaker 4: work and gave a few examples, including, quote, angry and
• 54:08
  Speaker 4: profane outbursts from the candidate who allegedly at one time
• 54:12
  Speaker 4: shoved an aid in frustration, which Paltola's campaign said was
• 54:15
  Speaker 4: being mischaracterized. Times also wrote that one of Peltola's demands was, quote,
• 54:19
  Speaker 4: requiring aides to feed live crickets to her family's pet chameleon, Meatball.
• 54:25
  Speaker 4: The campaign pushed back on the story and cited Peltola's
• 54:28
  Speaker 4: grief over her mother and husband's deaths over a few
• 54:31
  Speaker 4: months in 2023 as being partially responsible for any outbursts.
• 54:35
  Speaker 4: What did you make of the story?
• 54:40
  Speaker 3: It gave me no political concern for Mary Peltola. Like,
• 54:43
  Speaker 3: this is clearly an attempt to sort of do to
• 54:45
  Speaker 3: her what happened to Katie Porter.
• 54:46
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 54:47
  Speaker 3: And sort of have this, or that was done to
• 54:49
  Speaker 3: Amy Klobuchar in the 2020 Democratic primary. I look at
• 54:54
  Speaker 3: this and I cannot see a world in which this
• 54:55
  Speaker 3: story makes it less likely that she wins the Senate
• 54:58
  Speaker 3: race in Alaska.
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't either. I mean, I will say this.
• 55:02
  Speaker 4: I feel like I have been spoiled in my life
• 55:06
  Speaker 4: in politics because we worked for a boss who was
• 55:10
  Speaker 4: unbelievably nice to us.
• 55:11
  Speaker 3: Did not yell at us.
• 55:12
  Speaker 2: And always patient.
• 55:13
  Speaker 4: And I do not have a lot of patience for
• 55:16
  Speaker 4: bosses in politics or elsewhere who are mean. And if
• 55:20
  Speaker 4: one of them was mean to me or bullying, I
• 55:22
  Speaker 4: would fucking get out of there. Like I just, I
• 55:24
  Speaker 4: just can't, but I don't have an experience with that.
• 55:26
  Speaker 4: And I have no idea what it's like to work
• 55:28
  Speaker 4: for Mary Peltola or Carrie Katie Porter or any of
• 55:30
  Speaker 4: these people that there's been stories about. I will say, um,
• 55:34
  Speaker 4: it is hard to imagine that even if I have
• 55:37
  Speaker 4: had a horrible experience with a boss in politics or
• 55:42
  Speaker 4: especially in politics or on a campaign, um, that I
• 55:46
  Speaker 4: would and then a month before an election for a
• 55:51
  Speaker 4: seat that could determine control of the United States Senate
• 55:55
  Speaker 4: would ring up the New York Times and complain about it.
• 55:59
  Speaker 4: I just can't get there. And I'm like, who knows?
• 56:01
  Speaker 4: I could not put myself in the shoes of someone
• 56:03
  Speaker 4: who would do that.
• 56:04
  Speaker 3: Not at least.
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: I mean, I can put myself in the shoes and
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't do it. I think it's fucking nuts.
• 56:08
  Speaker 3: I have, I've worked for great bosses. Absolutely great bosses.
• 56:10
  Speaker 3: Barack Obama was one of them. I've also been very
• 56:12
  Speaker 3: much on that. I also worked for Senate leadership. So
• 56:14
  Speaker 3: I've been yelled at by lots of senators that I
• 56:17
  Speaker 3: didn't even work for all the time. It's not pleasant.
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: You still get yelled at by senators.
• 56:22
  Speaker 3: I still, every once in a while, that still happens. And,
• 56:25
  Speaker 3: you know, that is, it is terrible. And there are
• 56:28
  Speaker 3: some really shitty bosses on Capitol Hill and in life. Like,
• 56:31
  Speaker 3: that is absolutely true. There are some, there's some context
• 56:36
  Speaker 3: to some of this, which was right after Mary Paltova
• 56:39
  Speaker 3: had lost her mother and her husband and was dealing
• 56:42
  Speaker 3: with grief. There are definitely cases where bosses do ask
• 56:48
  Speaker 3: things of their employees, and this is true of members
• 56:51
  Speaker 3: of Congress, that are not appropriate. They go beyond just
• 56:56
  Speaker 3: duties like picking up the dry cleaning, babysitting our kids.
• 57:00
  Speaker 3: You hear those stories, and that is bad. I don't
• 57:03
  Speaker 3: think feeding the pet while you're thousands of miles away
• 57:07
  Speaker 3: or running for re-election is appropriate. That's probably annoying and
• 57:10
  Speaker 3: I think kind of gross to a lot of people
• 57:12
  Speaker 3: to feed live crickets to an animal. Like my wife
• 57:15
  Speaker 3: would not like that at all.
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 57:18
  Speaker 3: Which is why I will never fulfill my son Jack's
• 57:20
  Speaker 3: dream of having a pet tarantula.
• 57:22
  Speaker 2: Oh, boy.
• 57:22
  Speaker 3: That's what he really wants.
• 57:24
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 57:27
  Speaker 3: But it's also not something you think like, you know what?
• 57:31
  Speaker 3: That is so bad.
• 57:33
  Speaker 4: And it's got, like, some text from her, too, where she, like,
• 57:36
  Speaker 4: you know, has a few, you know, the R word,
• 57:39
  Speaker 4: the F word, right? But it's, like, also the idea that, again,
• 57:44
  Speaker 4: that a former staff member would be like, hey, New
• 57:46
  Speaker 4: York Times, here are the texts from my boss when
• 57:48
  Speaker 4: she was really angry and said something awful.
• 57:52
  Speaker 3: I think if you, like, that stuff was quite inappropriate,
• 57:56
  Speaker 3: but you sort of have to, and, like, we shouldn't,
• 57:59
  Speaker 3: that stuff should not be tolerated, but you have to
• 58:01
  Speaker 3: weigh that against the consequences of Republican Senate that confirms
• 58:05
  Speaker 3: a Supreme Court justice in 2027.
• 58:08
  Speaker 4: Or like the rest of her career and personality. Like
• 58:11
  Speaker 4: people have bad fucking moments.
• 58:13
  Speaker 2: That's the other thing.
• 58:14
  Speaker 4: It's like, I just can't, I can't deal with the like,
• 58:17
  Speaker 4: the one thing that comes out about you, we're going
• 58:18
  Speaker 4: to use it to like, and you know.
• 58:20
  Speaker 2: Fuck off.
• 58:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah, like I don't know her, so I have no context.
• 58:22
  Speaker 3: Some of these other politicians you hear this about, we
• 58:24
  Speaker 3: have met before. Right, right, right.
• 58:26
  Speaker 2: I have no idea. Yeah, never met her.
• 58:28
  Speaker 4: Anyway, yeah, but I think from a political perspective, I
• 58:32
  Speaker 4: don't see this as hurting her at all. She's very,
• 58:35
  Speaker 4: very well-liked in Alaska. Okay, one last thing before Tommy's
• 58:38
  Speaker 4: interview with Colin Kaepernick. According to Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville,
• 58:43
  Speaker 4: I have a new reason to be worried when I
• 58:45
  Speaker 4: get on the plane this afternoon.
• 58:47
  Speaker 2: Let's watch. We're excited.
• 58:52
  Speaker 7: Many airline pilots, flight attendants, and air traffic controllers are
• 58:59
  Speaker 7: parked of the furry community. When you walk onto a
• 59:02
  Speaker 7: commercial flight, it's possible that the pilot flying your plane
• 59:07
  Speaker 7: could have a deranged fetish of dressing up like an animal.
• 59:12
  Speaker 4: Also, transgenderism is a mental disease, a blown up emoji
• 59:18
  Speaker 4: next to him on an easel. So like, I don't
• 59:21
  Speaker 4: even want to know what the rest of the speech
• 59:22
  Speaker 4: was about.
• 59:23
  Speaker 3: I think it's best we don't.
• 59:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 59:24
  Speaker 4: So a bit of context there, because clearly that needs context.
• 59:28
  Speaker 4: That came from Tuberville's, it's a 20-minute floor speech on
• 59:31
  Speaker 4: Tuesday where he warned about the dangers of gender confusion.
• 59:34
  Speaker 2: There you go.
• 59:36
  Speaker 4: He did gender confusion. That was probably the first section
• 59:38
  Speaker 4: of the speech. Then he moved into the furry section.
• 59:40
  Speaker 3: As one does, yes.
• 59:42
  Speaker 4: Tuberville's currently squaring off against Doug Jones in the race
• 59:45
  Speaker 4: for governor of Alabama. On Thursday, Tuberville tweeted a link
• 59:48
  Speaker 4: to a recent furry migration convention, which he said featured
• 59:52
  Speaker 4: an aviation furs meetup. Before posing the question, would you
• 59:56
  Speaker 4: be comfortable with a mentally ill furry being your pilot?
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 4: I mean, well, now you're saying mentally ill furry.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 4: Like, I don't want a person who's mentally ill as
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 4: a pilot.
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 5: No.
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 2: But I don't know.
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 4: Whatever they do when they're not safely flying me to
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 4: my destination, I'm fine with.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 3: I know you are. And look. You and I have
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 3: gone on many flights together over the years. And I've honestly,
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 3: ever since we watched this clip this morning in our
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 3: editorial meeting, never seen you more excited to get on
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 3: a plane. Like, we're doing this podcast early so you
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 3: can get to the airport early.
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 4: And I'm like, can I get, look, I'm not, I'm not,
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 4: I'm getting off this plane unless I am assured that
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 4: our pilots, at least one of them, could be the co-pilot.
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 3: Is a furry.
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 2: Is a furry.
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 3: Do you think there's some sort of.
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 2: Flying the furry skies? Is that what.
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 3: We're... Do we have a, do we have a pod title?
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 3: Is that what that is?
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 4: That guy has to be the dumbest motherfucker in the
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 4: Senate for sure.
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 2: Right?
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 3: I mean, that, yeah.
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 2: I would not say Congress.
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you just don't know.
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 2: Check out the House.
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah, Senate, I can buy that.
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 2: I think Senate. He's it. He's the dumbest one.
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 4: Anyway, but God, it would be nice if Alabama was
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 4: a different state and Doug Jones could win that one.
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 3: Maybe he will.
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 2: Maybe he will. Maybe this is it.
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 3: Maybe there's a giant pro-furry vote that we don't know about.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 4: Mary Paltola, that story does not matter. The furry story
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 4: takes down Tuberville.
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: That's what I'm going with. When we come back, Tommy's
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: interview with Colin Kaepernick.
• 1:01:31
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  Speaker 1: of premium wild-caught seafood. That's wildalaskan.com slash crooked for $ 35
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  Speaker 1: off your first order. Thanks to Wild Alaskan Company for
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: sponsoring this episode. My guest today played six seasons for
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: the San Francisco 49ers. He's the co-founder of the Know
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: Your Rights campaign and the author of the new book,
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: The Perilous Fight.
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 2: Colin Kaepernick, great to meet you. Great to meet you, too.
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 2: Excited for the conversation. Thank you for coming in.
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: It's amazing to have watched you played and to have
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: read about you for so long. But then to read
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: the book and to get to hear you tell these
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: stories in your own voice and correct the record in
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: a lot of places, I think is really important.
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 2: So it's a great book. Congratulations on getting it done. Oh,
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 2: thank you.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 6: It was a lot of correcting the record, a lot
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 6: of process in there. But I'm excited it's out in
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 6: the world, and hopefully people are able to take that,
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 6: run with it, and hopefully it gives them some new insight,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 6: some new perspective, and gives us a pathway to be
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 6: able to discuss how we move forward.
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: So I bet a lot of listeners, look, my shows,
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: my audience is like, they're obsessed about politics, probably not
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: so much sports.
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: They probably heard your name around 2016 and are aware
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 1: of kind of the quote-unquote controversy, but they don't, know
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: how much success you had on the football field before that. Like,
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: can you just tell folks about the 2012 season? Because
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: that story alone could be a book. It was just
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 1: like this incredible right moment.
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 6: So the, the 2012 season, this is my, my second
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 6: year in the NFL. Um, at that point in time,
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 6: I'm a backup quarterback behind Alex Smith. Um, Alex gets hurt.
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 6: I've been training, preparing, waiting for this moment to step
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 6: on the field, take over for him. Um, my first
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 6: start was a Monday night football game against the Chicago
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 6: bears went out, played really well. And during that time period, uh,
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 6: Jim Harbaugh, who was our head coach made the decision.
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 6: We're going to stick with you. And Alex was playing
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 6: incredibly well. So the change wasn't, Hey, he's playing bad
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 6: or anything. Um, But on the back of that then
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 6: became we're going to the playoffs, my first playoff game
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 6: against the Green Bay Packers.
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 2: We go up, we go out, we put up, I
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 2: think it was 45 points. It's crazy.
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 6: Set an NFL record, 181 yards rushing, my first playoff game,
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 6: and then ultimately went to the Super Bowl that year.
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 2: And 263 passing, right? Yes. You were a busy man
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: in that game. We were busy. It was a good
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 2: one for us. Yeah. It's crazy.
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you made it all the way to the Super
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 1: Bowl the first season you started. For folks listening, that
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: doesn't happen very often. It's like you and Tom Brady
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 1: and a couple of other folks. And it was, the
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 1: Super Bowl was my 10th NFL start.
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 2: It's crazy.
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 6: So it wasn't even a full season, jumped in in
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 6: the Super Bowl, and then the following year went back
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 6: to the NFC Championship.
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: So it's not only that you were one of 32
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 1: starting NFL quarterbacks, you were playing at the highest possible level,
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: which I think It's just relevant when we get into
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: the conversation about the NFL blackballing you later.
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 1: So let's fast forward to 2016. There's this like series
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: of very high profile, horrific cases of black men being
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: essentially executed by police.
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: Freddie Gray in Baltimore, Alton Sterling in Louisiana, Philando Castile,
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: just name a few. Can you describe how those stories
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: impacted you and kind of like built on what you've
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: been reading and studying throughout your life?
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 6: Yeah, so those killings directly impacted me and directly impacted
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 6: the protest. But prior to that, I had been reading,
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 6: I had been researching a lot of the material and
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 6: insights and history that I wasn't given growing up in school.
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 6: And what kicked that off was the autobiography of Malcolm
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 6: X that my wife Nessa gave me. And that then
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 6: took me down a path of reading Fanon, reading, uh,
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 6: Huey Newton and Angela Davis and Steve Biko and Garvey
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 6: and all of these, uh, black revolutionary leaders that have
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 6: looked at systems and why are these systems producing these
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 6: outcomes and how do we actually work to be able
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 6: to address the systems? So had been doing that also
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 6: in advance of this, we've seen, we've seen Mike Brown
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 6: be killed, um, and the, the Ferguson uprising, um, We've
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 6: seen Tamir Rice.
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 2: We've seen Eric Garner.
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 6: So this has been going on for years, and there's
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 6: a whole history behind it. And a lot of the
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 6: conversation that was happening in 2016 in the groups that
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 6: I was talking with are, well, we have to do something.
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 6: And we have to do something significant to address this.
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 6: And that ultimately led to the protests at the beginning
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 6: of the NFL season. And it's also important content This
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 6: is a little bit of a new era for us
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 6: where social media is much more prominent.
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 2: Right. As we have these police killings happening, they're traveling.
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 6: And they're traveling across the country. We're all watching it.
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 6: I think the The direct comparison here is, I mean,
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 6: when we look at Rodney King being beaten by the police,
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 6: there were riots. We're at a place now where we
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 6: see black people being killed with such consistency that we're
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 6: being desensitized to it. It's being so normalized that it
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 6: becomes like, oh man, another one. And then people go
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 6: about their day. As opposed to, we have to take
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 6: action to stop this. And we need to do it
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 6: urgently and we need to do it definitively.
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 1: And so you you decide to protest. You you sit
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 1: during the anthem for a couple of games. Finally, a
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: reporter notices. I think Steve Weiss, you tell him, quote,
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to stand up to show pride in
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: a flag for a country that oppresses black people and
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: people of color. To me, this is bigger than football.
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: And it would be selfish on my part to look
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: the other way. There are bodies in the street and
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: people getting paid to leave and getting away with murder.
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: I think you mentioned this conversation to your partner, Nessa.
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: She says, how hard do you go? You said four
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: out of 10. Turns out a Colin four is like
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: a massive global story. Breaks containment from sports media. Everyone's
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: got an opinion on it. I'm like Fox news and shit.
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: Did it surprise you how, how much the story sort
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: of blew up right away?
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 5: It, it did.
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 6: Now I, I had an expectation of, I thought there
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 6: would be a certain response in particular from white people. Now,
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 6: that statement I thought was just pretty straightforward and factual.
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 6: So I didn't think it was something that would blow
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 6: up into the story that it was. That's why in
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 6: my mind, I was like, that was a four. There's
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 6: a whole lot of other things that I could have
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 6: said that go a lot further than that. But, I
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 6: think what it got to the crux of is how
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 6: fragile this persona or facade of justice and liberty and freedom.
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 6: And when you actually poke at that and is this
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 6: actually being applied to everyone? Is everyone actually in a
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 6: space where they're able to have safety? They're able to
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 6: walk the streets and not be targeted. And the response
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 6: on the other side of that was so aggressive and
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 6: so loud. To me, it was, in many ways, it
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 6: was curious as to why it was so controversial to
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 6: say police shouldn't kill black people. And I think that
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 6: was very, very revealing. And I'll also say in response
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 6: to it, there was also overwhelming support as well So
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 6: I want to make sure that both of those are
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 6: covered because what we really saw was two sides of
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 6: America in.
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 2: That response.
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 6: And some of that being significant pushback and some of
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 6: that being, no, we're seeing this every day in our communities.
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 2: We have to address this now. Yeah. So there's this
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 2: massive debate. I mean, you're right.
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 1: There definitely were supporters and then people loudly criticizing you.
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 1: It was hard to read that your family wasn't initially
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 1: very supportive of you. They were like, we know cops,
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: you're kind of embarrassing us. I mean, that must have
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 1: sucked and tough.
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 6: Yeah, not the response you want or I expected. And it's, again,
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 6: I've gotten to a place that whatever people's responses are,
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 6: that's what it's going to be. But to me, I
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 6: want to stay focused on the issue. And I have to,
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 6: I have to keep moving towards addressing that. Um, and
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 6: in that moment, as much as that was like shocking
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 6: to me, it also, uh, in many ways, it validated
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 6: a lot of the experiences that I'd had prior. Um,
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 6: and also was very similar to the responses that we're
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 6: seeing across the country. So I think the parallels there, um,
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 6: not that it made it better, but it, it made
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 6: it less shocking, um, in that regard, but obviously not
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 6: the response that you want to get.
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 1: Um, debates about free speech in America always seem to
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: get hung up on how someone is protesting and not
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: what they are protesting. Um, that is very stupid, but
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: just to like, kind of let's entertain that debate for
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: a minute. Like when you look back at, I was
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: just trying to think about it. When I look back
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: at your protests, you're not trying to distract from the anthem.
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 1: You're not trying to call attention to yourself. You're like a, Big,
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: you're 6'4. You're physically making yourself smaller in the moment, right?
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: By like sitting or kneeling. In every other context, kneeling
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: is respectful, right? If a guy gets hurt on the
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: football field, everyone takes a knee. When you go to church,
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 1: you pray, you get on your knees, right? Like, so,
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: but the debate becomes, this is disrespectful to our troops
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: or some shit, or like, no.
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 2: One's talking about police brutality.
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 3: And it's just like, it.
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: Feels like that was I don't know. What was that
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: incredibly frustrating? Did you expect that?
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 6: Oh, it was, it was very frustrating, but it, there
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 6: was a realization that all of the, all of the
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 6: conversation was used as a distraction or deterrent to actually
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 6: addressing the issue. It was the, the form of protest.
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 6: It was, uh, the flag. It was the military. Um,
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 6: Then it became, you know, the conversation with the NFL.
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 6: All of the conversation and where a lot of the
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 6: media ran with it was to spaces other than the
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 6: actual issue of police killing black folks. And for us,
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 6: we tried to approach it from a space of, well,
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 6: anytime we're asked, we're just going to bring it back
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 6: to this, this issue. But you, you can't control the
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 6: whole media landscape. And it's also interesting. We're also in
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 6: a new media landscape where views and clicks in the
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 6: business models are changing during this time period. So it becomes, well,
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 6: we need eyeballs. And what's the thing that's going to
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 6: give us more eyeballs becomes part of that conversation as well.
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 6: In addition to some of the I would say some
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 6: of the reporters or outlets that may be taking a
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 6: little more nefarious approach to try to redirect the conversation
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 6: to gain political points or try to rally people around
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 6: political parties.
• 1:16:13
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: And so, you know, the NFL, again, to fast forward
• 1:16:16
  Speaker 1: a little bit, they collude to blackball you and prevent
• 1:16:19
  Speaker 1: you from playing again. You file a legal action against
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 1: the league for collusion. You eventually settle with them. I
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 1: hadn't realized until I read the book. how much politics
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 1: influenced the outcome of the legal process and frankly, like
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: the options available to you. Can you explain that to
• 1:16:35
  Speaker 1: listeners and how the Supreme Court in particular factored into
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: your thinking?
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 6: Well, first within the grievance process with the NFL, we
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 6: tried to avoid going down that process. We reached out
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 6: to the NFL in advance, tried to ask to have
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 6: a conversation and they were like, No, file it.
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 2: Good luck. Really? It was a surprising response to me.
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 2: That's crazy.
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 6: And this is on the back of NFL coaches saying, oh,
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 6: he's a starter in this league. So it was very
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 6: obvious what was happening. We're like, look, let's just cut
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 6: this out and get back to what we should be doing.
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 6: But that ultimately led to the grievance process. Now, the jurisdiction...
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 6: that we have to operate within is the arbitration process
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 6: that's in the collective bargaining agreement.
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 2: So that's laid out.
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 6: Now, as part of that, we did look at options
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 6: of can we get outside of that jurisdiction? And if so,
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 6: how do we go about that? And as we did
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 6: that analysis, part of it became if we go to
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 6: a federal judge and try to go to federal court,
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 6: they're going to kick it back to the jurisdiction of
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 6: the CBA. The other part that became a factor is
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 6: because Donald Trump had aligned himself and the NFL owners
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 6: had aligned themselves with each other and had shared interests here,
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 6: we see as Donald Trump is nominating Supreme Court justices,
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 6: Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, we also see NFL owners and organizations...
• 1:18:22
  Speaker 6: backing these candidates. So Michael Bidwell from the Arizona Cardinals,
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 6: John Elway of the Denver Broncos, backing these candidates in
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 6: the process. The Supreme Court flips. It's now 6-3 Republican.
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 6: And we're in a space where at this point in time,
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 6: it's very, very much a loyalty to Donald Trump. And
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 6: the analysis is even if we get to the Supreme
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 6: court and we have the best case and it is,
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 6: it is obvious and they explicitly stated, right. It didn't
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 6: seem like there was a scenario where they would ever
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 6: rule in our favor.
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 6: Um, the business interests just weren't there. And I think
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 6: at that point in time, the conversation was also, is
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 6: the Supreme Court actually going to operate in the way
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 6: that was intended to? And we see some of that
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 6: playing out.
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Your hesitation was well-founded, it turns out. Yeah.
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 6: And that was early stages of this, but we have
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 6: since seen that play out. So that led us into
• 1:19:32
  Speaker 6: the traditional grievance process. We had to go through a
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 6: special arbitrator. um on the back end of that if
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 6: you win there then you can go to an appeal
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 6: which is a three-person arbitration board but the the structure
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 6: is if any one of those arbitrators makes a decision
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 6: the nfl doesn't like they can fire them and replace
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 6: them this process is.
• 1:19:55
  Speaker 2: So rigged so they mean they've been lying.
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 6: Their incentives to be like well you're going to rule
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 6: in our favor yeah um And we see this play out.
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 6: And it's very rare that the NFL even gets to
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 6: a place of settling a case. So the evidence there
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 6: was overwhelming.
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 2: But it.
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 6: Is a process that you have to navigate, to your point.
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 6: It is very much rigged. It's set up in the
• 1:20:25
  Speaker 6: NFL's favor. And the NFLPA, the Players Union, isn't strong.
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 5: So.
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 2: they haven't put the.
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 6: Right safeguards in place for players and protections in place
• 1:20:36
  Speaker 6: for players. And that's a whole other conversation.
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And also, like, the politics of this. I mean,
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 2: the issue got picked up by Trump so quickly.
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 1: I mean, he called protesting players sons of bitches in
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 1: a speech in September of 2017 in Alabama. Very subtle
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 1: venue for that. I mean, how did his involvement in
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: the conversation kind of change your experience of it?
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 2: Well, his involvement.
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 6: Put much more of a political spotlight on it, more
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 6: than it already was. And then we see the NFL
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 6: owners align to that as well. When we see him say,
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 6: get the sons of bitches off the field, we see the.
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 2: NFL owners follow suit.
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 6: We see Bob Kraft, who's the owner of the New
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 6: England Patriots, On Air Force One with him, we see
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 6: Donald Trump calling Jerry Jones, saying, this is a winning
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 6: issue for me.
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 2: Fall in line. We see Jerry fall in line. Woody
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 2: Johnson became his ambassador to the UK. Exactly.
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 6: And this is in addition to NFL owners donating millions
• 1:21:53
  Speaker 6: of dollars to him, his inauguration.
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 2: We see Stephen Ross.
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 6: The owner of the Miami Dolphins, hosting a fundraiser, raising
• 1:22:01
  Speaker 6: millions of dollars for him. So the alignment of their
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 6: interests we see become so closely connected that essentially they're
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 6: operating as one in the same.
• 1:22:12
  Speaker 1: Speaking of NFL collusion, um, Macklemore was just pulled off
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 1: of Ed Sheeran's tour.
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: Uh, it happened because of Bob Kraft's throw to the Patriots.
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 1: You just mentioned, by the way, I'm a Patriots fan.
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 1: I don't feel great about it in this conversation, but
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 1: I should just be honest. Um, Bob Kraft calls Ed
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 1: Sheeran and he says he's going to cancel your concert
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 1: at Gillette Stadium in New England if Macklemore isn't dropped.
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 1: According to the Wall Street Journal, Kraft was in touch
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: with other team and stadium owners who were also going
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 1: to cancel concerts if Macklemore wasn't dropped. Kraft was offended
• 1:22:42
  Speaker 1: by comments Macklemore made in support of the Palestinian people
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 1: and about Gaza.
• 1:22:47
  Speaker 2: The collusion there sounds.
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: Very similar to your case, but I wondered what your
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: reaction to reading about all this was.
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 5: The collusion.
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 6: They're just openly colluding now. To me, we have gotten
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 6: to a place where in 2017 when we filed the
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 6: collusion case, it was, no, we're not doing this. That's
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 6: not what's happening. They're trying to deny it. All the
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 6: facts and evidence says otherwise. But as we sit here
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 6: today and we're talking about Macklemore, we're seeing them do
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 6: it openly. We're seeing them do it publicly.
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 2: And brag about it to the Wall Street Journal.
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 6: They're bragging about it. And they also know or have
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 6: a high degree of confidence. There's no repercussions. There's no
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 6: accountability to them or for them. So I think for me,
• 1:23:45
  Speaker 6: it gets me to a space of we collectively have
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 6: to decide, are we okay with this type of collusion?
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 6: Are we okay with with this oligarchy operating in this
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 6: way where they're able to attack and target individual citizens.
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 6: And also what does that mean for everyone else that follows?
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 6: So I think there should be very definitive action that
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 6: people are taking to make sure that this doesn't happen again. Yeah.
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 1: I mean, look, I, Bob Kraft, he's got free speech too.
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 1: He can be offended by whatever offends him. He's entitled
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 1: to his opinion. I guess he's entitled to, I guess,
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 1: who gets to play at his venue. I watched the
• 1:24:25
  Speaker 1: Macklemore speech. I thought it was entirely inoffensive. I know
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 1: that Macklemore did wear a costume in 2014 that was
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 1: really bad and he apologized for that.
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 2: It was sort of like this anti-Semitic kind of like mask.
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 1: But I also, I went back and I looked at
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 1: some acts that recently played at Gillette Stadium. And I
• 1:24:43
  Speaker 1: think it's interesting to Think about which artists get canceled
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 1: or dropped and which don't. So Morgan Wallen did a
• 1:24:51
  Speaker 1: show at Gillette in 2025. In 2020, he was arrested
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 1: for smashing a bunch of stuff in a bar when
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 1: he was asked to leave. In 2024, he was arrested
• 1:24:59
  Speaker 1: for throwing a chair off the roof of a bar
• 1:25:02
  Speaker 1: in Nashville, which landed right next to a bunch of cops.
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 1: And then in 2021, he was filmed screaming racial slurs.
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 1: And then last month, Chris Brown played at Gillette. In 2009,
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 1: he pleaded guilty to felony assault charges for beating up Rihanna. 2013,
• 1:25:18
  Speaker 1: he punched Frank Ocean over a parking spot.
• 1:25:20
  Speaker 2: I didn't even know about that. It's crazy, right?
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 1: Later that year, he was involved in Hit and Run,
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 1: another assault, another assault in 2016. He was arrested in 2018, 2025.
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 1: I'll stop belaboring this, but I'm not calling on Bob
• 1:25:35
  Speaker 1: Kraft to cancel their shows or cancel them big picture,
• 1:25:40
  Speaker 1: but Again, it's like in your case, physical violence, including
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 1: assaulting women, was not a deal breaker for Bob Kraft,
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: but speech was. I just think that's interesting and worth noting.
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 6: Well, we see that across the NFL as well. We
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 6: see players that have legal issues, and they are welcomed
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 6: back in. And I think in part, I look at
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 6: those as... it gives them leverage in many ways, the
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 6: NFL owners and organizations. Because then in helping navigate a
• 1:26:15
  Speaker 6: legal situation, it's almost a sense of you are now
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 6: indebted to us and you're going to take the actions
• 1:26:23
  Speaker 6: that we want you to take. And we'll have requests
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 6: that come along with that. Now, I think the threat
• 1:26:32
  Speaker 6: to the NFL owners are the people who are willing
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 6: to to use their voice and also are not bought
• 1:26:41
  Speaker 6: and paid. If they can't control you, that becomes a
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 6: threat to them. If you're advocating for people that they
• 1:26:52
  Speaker 6: view as counter to their interests, then it becomes a
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 6: threat to them and they will do everything they can
• 1:26:58
  Speaker 6: to try to squash that and tamp that out.
• 1:27:01
  Speaker 2: So I think there's a major issue there in the
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 2: power that is wielded.
• 1:27:10
  Speaker 6: I think, again, collectively as people, we have to look
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 6: at this and say, well, are we okay with this
• 1:27:16
  Speaker 6: or are we going to take action to try to
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 6: make sure that this doesn't happen?
• 1:27:27
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• 1:28:36
  Speaker 1: Greater than 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy.
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 1: Includes up to 20 gigabytes I think interestingly, too, Macklemore,
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 1: my understanding is I think he owns all his own
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 1: music and is independent from any label.
• 1:28:34
  Speaker 2: So he's not facing the kind of control that you
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 2: were just mentioning that players deal with. Yeah.
• 1:29:01
  Speaker 1: Um, so fast forward to 2020, uh, George Floyd is
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 1: murdered in front of our eyes. Um, it explodes the
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 1: conversation that you've been having for years now. Uh, this
• 1:29:10
  Speaker 1: time the NFL is forced to respond. Roger Goodell posts
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 1: a video where he says, quote, we, the national football
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 1: league condemn racism and the systematic oppression of black people. We,
• 1:29:19
  Speaker 1: the national football league admit we were wrong for not
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 1: listening to NFL players earlier and encourage all to speak
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 1: out and peacefully protest.
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 2: He doesn't mention your name. which is pathetic.
• 1:29:29
  Speaker 1: But did that feel like vindication? Because it sure sounds
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 1: like vindication.
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 2: No.
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 6: Because the only reason he did that video was because
• 1:29:40
  Speaker 6: there was a video put out by some of the
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 6: star players in the NFL calling him out and calling
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 6: the NFL out for not doing anything over the last
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 6: four years, but then also specifically in this moment in
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 6: the wake of George Floyd being killed by police. And
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 6: If you go back and look at the video from
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 6: the players and you look at the video from Roger Goodell,
• 1:30:06
  Speaker 6: he says everything verbatim in that video with the exception
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 6: of he changes. I think the players video said we
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 6: apologize to the protesting players for not supporting them or
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 6: something of that nature. And he says, well, we should
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 6: have listened earlier. Even in this moment of national protests,
• 1:30:34
  Speaker 6: international protests, the position is always to protect their own interests.
• 1:30:41
  Speaker 6: And there's legal ramifications for them if he's saying we apologize,
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 6: admitting wrongdoing, which is why there's the kind of sleight
• 1:30:51
  Speaker 6: of hand there.
• 1:30:52
  Speaker 2: Got it. But it.
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 5: Again.
• 1:30:57
  Speaker 6: they are always going to look out for their interests
• 1:31:00
  Speaker 6: and they will only take actions if it is in
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 6: a space that they are forced to. They're never going
• 1:31:07
  Speaker 6: to be proactive and say, oh, you know what? We
• 1:31:09
  Speaker 6: know this is an issue. We're going to go out
• 1:31:10
  Speaker 6: and address it. They will always be looking at, well,
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 6: what's most profitable for us and how can we keep
• 1:31:17
  Speaker 6: control and keep things out of the way?
• 1:31:19
  Speaker 1: And I bet our listeners don't know how much money
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 1: Roger Goodell makes. I think it's like 64 million 65
• 1:31:28
  Speaker 1: million at the kind of tail end of his contract.
• 1:31:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah he's making an insane amount of money to.
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 1: Do what to fly in a private jet to games
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 1: like a lot of people would love that job roger
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 1: i mean to protect the owners and make them as
• 1:31:39
  Speaker 1: much money as humanly possible.
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 6: Well that that's thing protecting the owners and being the
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 6: shield for the owners is the number one responsibility there
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 6: right and not the players no it has nothing to
• 1:31:50
  Speaker 6: do with the players like That's not where his allegiance is.
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 6: That's not where his responsibility is. And again, when we
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 6: look at contracts and agreements with executives like this, typically
• 1:32:05
  Speaker 6: it is in the framework of you have a fiduciary responsibility.
• 1:32:10
  Speaker 6: So they're always going to be looking out for their
• 1:32:12
  Speaker 6: own financial interests. Now, to me, the part that becomes
• 1:32:17
  Speaker 6: interesting in my case is the financial interests actually say
• 1:32:21
  Speaker 6: otherwise because my jersey went to number one. We have
• 1:32:27
  Speaker 6: the campaign that we did with Nike in 2018. We
• 1:32:30
  Speaker 6: see a jump of $ 6 billion in their valuation during
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 6: that time period. So this also becomes one of the
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 6: moments that we see them working counter to the business
• 1:32:40
  Speaker 6: interests of the NFL and more so are focused on
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 6: power and control than just the financials.
• 1:32:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, they wanted to show that they could silence you
• 1:32:50
  Speaker 1: to silence future critics of the league or about whatever,
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 1: I guess.
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 6: And all of the ripple effects that come with that.
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 6: Power of players, stronger union, if players organized, guaranteed contracts.
• 1:33:05
  Speaker 6: So on the tail end of that, that could have
• 1:33:08
  Speaker 6: financial implications for them. And a lot of those actions are,
• 1:33:12
  Speaker 6: we're going to try to protect this now and protect
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 6: the power and control that we have to make sure
• 1:33:17
  Speaker 6: this doesn't ever happen.
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 1: It's crazy that the NFL of all leagues, the most
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 1: violent sport on the planet, does not have guaranteed money
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 1: or guaranteed contracts for players. People always read the headline
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 1: number that some agent leaks, but it's all bullshit. The
• 1:33:30
  Speaker 1: guaranteed money is so low, and if you blow out
• 1:33:32
  Speaker 1: your knee, you're done, right? They cut you and you
• 1:33:34
  Speaker 1: don't get paid.
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 2: Yep.
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 6: We've seen one, I think two instances of fully guaranteed contracts.
• 1:33:43
  Speaker 2: Extremely rare.
• 1:33:44
  Speaker 6: And we've seen the NFL owners... also be very critical
• 1:33:50
  Speaker 6: and try to push on each other to make sure
• 1:33:52
  Speaker 6: that doesn't happen. Um, but NFL, NFL contracts, um, or
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 6: NFL lifespan is typically three and a half years, um,
• 1:34:03
  Speaker 6: on average. So you have a very short window to
• 1:34:06
  Speaker 6: try to earn as much as you can, the NFL
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 6: before you're going to be out.
• 1:34:10
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 1:34:10
  Speaker 6: Um, that also, and this is where, uh, the union
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 6: has to be stronger because Most of your long-term benefits
• 1:34:19
  Speaker 6: as a player don't kick in until after year four.
• 1:34:23
  Speaker 6: Or at least that was the case while I was playing.
• 1:34:26
  Speaker 6: So you see the interest of the NFL show up
• 1:34:31
  Speaker 6: in ways of that nature where they will try to
• 1:34:36
  Speaker 6: maximize the profitability and their retention of dollars to the
• 1:34:41
  Speaker 6: expense of the players.
• 1:34:42
  Speaker 2: College sports have changed. It's entirely new.
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: I mean, they changed it completely since you were at
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 1: the University of Nevada. Back then, a college player could
• 1:34:53
  Speaker 1: get tuition, room, board, books. Now athletes can get paid
• 1:34:58
  Speaker 1: for their name, image, and likeness. It's easier to transfer.
• 1:35:02
  Speaker 1: Some schools are paying athletes directly. What do you think
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 1: of the evolution that we've seen?
• 1:35:08
  Speaker 2: I think the evolution is needed.
• 1:35:11
  Speaker 6: We've seen college sports for generations now. exploiting athletes and
• 1:35:17
  Speaker 6: exploiting their talents and not paying them for the labor, um,
• 1:35:22
  Speaker 6: and positioning it as student athletes. So they aren't employees.
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 6: So they don't have to go down this path of
• 1:35:28
  Speaker 6: paying players. I think NIL helped open that door for
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 6: players to get paid. I also think there should be
• 1:35:36
  Speaker 6: more work done to be able to get them directly
• 1:35:38
  Speaker 6: paid from the universities, um, across the board for the players.
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 2: Um, Now, some of the new legislation that is coming out.
• 1:35:47
  Speaker 2: Ted Cruz's bill.
• 1:35:49
  Speaker 6: That is essentially trying to recreate structures that professional organizations have,
• 1:35:57
  Speaker 6: limiting players' ability to earn, creating non-competitive environments for teams,
• 1:36:05
  Speaker 6: where it's fascinating to me in a capitalist society where
• 1:36:11
  Speaker 6: the position is, well, it should be meritocracy and the
• 1:36:15
  Speaker 6: best person wins. And hey, if you have the best
• 1:36:18
  Speaker 6: product and the best thing and you can pay for it,
• 1:36:22
  Speaker 6: everybody else just has to compete with that. And what
• 1:36:25
  Speaker 6: we see in these organizations, professional organizations and at the
• 1:36:29
  Speaker 6: college level is more so a collective that is built
• 1:36:34
  Speaker 6: around socialism. We want to share our resources and we
• 1:36:38
  Speaker 6: want to make sure we're doing revenue sharing and we
• 1:36:40
  Speaker 6: all get an equal portion that hey, if we're the
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 6: Cleveland Browns, we're not making as much as the New
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 6: York teams or LA. So we need to balance this
• 1:36:51
  Speaker 6: out to make sure there's some equity within this. Then
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 6: when you get to the player side, it's like, well, no, no, no.
• 1:36:59
  Speaker 6: This just has to be pure competition. We're also going
• 1:37:02
  Speaker 6: to cap. We're going to cap how much you can
• 1:37:05
  Speaker 6: make because we need to protect our interests to make
• 1:37:08
  Speaker 6: sure that we're making as much as we can. And
• 1:37:12
  Speaker 6: To me, it just becomes insidious in the sense of
• 1:37:19
  Speaker 6: why not just be open with what you're trying to
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 6: accomplish and say it and let people address, hey, we
• 1:37:25
  Speaker 6: agree with this or we don't. And the reality is
• 1:37:28
  Speaker 6: the overwhelming majority of people don't agree with the approaches
• 1:37:32
  Speaker 6: that they're taking and want people to be able to
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 6: go out and earn as much as they can.
• 1:37:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it's a cartel, right? Like you and
• 1:37:39
  Speaker 1: I couldn't go start We can start a business. We
• 1:37:41
  Speaker 1: can start a juice stand. We couldn't start a new
• 1:37:43
  Speaker 1: NFL team.
• 1:37:44
  Speaker 2: It's scarcity.
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 1: The values go up, but yeah. And the, and the
• 1:37:47
  Speaker 1: owners make out like bandits, but the players aren't getting paid.
• 1:37:50
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 1:37:51
  Speaker 6: And they also have to become an NFL owner. The,
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 6: the structures around that are to be able to make
• 1:37:59
  Speaker 6: sure that that stays the good old boys club.
• 1:38:03
  Speaker 2: Um, I believe a.
• 1:38:05
  Speaker 6: Significant portion of the purchase of an NFL team has
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 6: to be in cash. Um, believe it's a 75% majority
• 1:38:13
  Speaker 6: vote that you have to have to get approval. So
• 1:38:18
  Speaker 6: they have created structures to be able to insulate themselves
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 6: to make sure, are you actually politically aligned with all
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 6: of us? And there aren't going to be any mavericks
• 1:38:29
  Speaker 6: out here. There aren't going to be any people that
• 1:38:31
  Speaker 6: go rogue on us because we're going to make sure
• 1:38:34
  Speaker 6: that we ensure that every person that walks through this
• 1:38:37
  Speaker 6: door to become an owner of an NFL team actually
• 1:38:40
  Speaker 6: is aligned with our interests and is going to take
• 1:38:42
  Speaker 6: similar actions.
• 1:38:43
  Speaker 2: That's crazy.
• 1:38:45
  Speaker 1: In the book, you write about your approach to politics
• 1:38:49
  Speaker 1: and voting and how it evolved over time. Can you
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 1: just talk about how your thinking changed and what changed it?
• 1:38:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:38:55
  Speaker 6: So going back to 2016, a lot of what I
• 1:39:01
  Speaker 6: had seen in politics and also looking at some of
• 1:39:04
  Speaker 6: the historical perspectives around politics was politics hadn't changed a
• 1:39:10
  Speaker 6: lot for the black community. They're, There are pockets where
• 1:39:15
  Speaker 6: you see this show up, but largely see people's needs
• 1:39:18
  Speaker 6: being unmet. And also getting into a space of constantly
• 1:39:25
  Speaker 6: talking about like, what are the lesser of two evils?
• 1:39:27
  Speaker 6: And that's a very typical conversation. And in 2016, I
• 1:39:31
  Speaker 6: was like, well, I don't want to throw my support
• 1:39:33
  Speaker 6: behind people that I don't believe in fully. And so 2016,
• 1:39:39
  Speaker 6: I didn't vote. I've since changed that perspective. and look
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 6: at voting as a tool for us to be able
• 1:39:47
  Speaker 6: to use, but that shouldn't be the only lever that
• 1:39:50
  Speaker 6: we're utilizing. And part of this understanding was also the
• 1:39:55
  Speaker 6: work that we were doing directly in communities, understanding the
• 1:39:58
  Speaker 6: policy impact and how that affected that work, but also
• 1:40:02
  Speaker 6: looking at the long-term impact and implications of this. We
• 1:40:09
  Speaker 6: had not, or at least in my lifetime or in
• 1:40:12
  Speaker 6: my memory, seen a president like Donald come in who
• 1:40:17
  Speaker 6: is willing to just throw rule of law out the window,
• 1:40:20
  Speaker 6: any practices, processes, decency out the window and just try
• 1:40:28
  Speaker 6: to do whatever he wants. So I think the extreme
• 1:40:31
  Speaker 6: came out of 2016. The other part is being able
• 1:40:37
  Speaker 6: to see and understand the generational impact that has been had.
• 1:40:41
  Speaker 6: So just looking at the judge's side as we were
• 1:40:44
  Speaker 6: looking at the Supreme Court, also getting more insight on
• 1:40:48
  Speaker 6: all of the federal judge appointments that were happening. I
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 6: believe at that point in time when I was looking
• 1:40:54
  Speaker 6: at the numbers, it was like 46 out of the
• 1:40:57
  Speaker 6: 54 federal judges that were appointed had come out of
• 1:41:00
  Speaker 6: the Federalist Society, which just to be able to have
• 1:41:06
  Speaker 6: an organization essentially train and breed judges to their politics
• 1:41:14
  Speaker 6: and have all of those appointments become lifetime appointments, it
• 1:41:19
  Speaker 6: then becomes a space of, oh, the impact and significance
• 1:41:24
  Speaker 6: here is well beyond just who is on the ticket,
• 1:41:27
  Speaker 6: but all of the areas of influence underneath that. And
• 1:41:30
  Speaker 6: that was the area that I had to grow in politically.
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 6: I didn't have that understanding in 2016. Again, post-voting, I
• 1:41:38
  Speaker 6: think there's still a ton of work that we have
• 1:41:40
  Speaker 6: to be doing and we have to be leaning on
• 1:41:41
  Speaker 6: politicians aggressively to actually pass policies that, that support communities. Um,
• 1:41:48
  Speaker 6: but that's, that's been some of the evolution, um, of
• 1:41:51
  Speaker 6: understanding and has now led me to take a different approach.
• 1:41:54
  Speaker 2: Are there any candidates out there running now, maybe just
• 1:41:57
  Speaker 2: in office that you're excited about? Yeah.
• 1:42:00
  Speaker 6: The ones that, that have been interesting to me, um,
• 1:42:03
  Speaker 6: I mean, obviously Mamdani in New York, um, He is
• 1:42:07
  Speaker 6: one that has been very interesting to me.
• 1:42:09
  Speaker 2: Abdul El-Saeed. Oh, yeah. In Michigan. He's a buddy of ours.
• 1:42:14
  Speaker 2: We used to do a show with him here. Oh, really?
• 1:42:15
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 1:42:16
  Speaker 2: I didn't realize that.
• 1:42:17
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 1:42:17
  Speaker 2: I'll give you his number. He's great.
• 1:42:18
  Speaker 6: I really like the approaches that they're taking because they're
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 6: staying very focused on the needs of the people. At
• 1:42:28
  Speaker 6: least thus far, it doesn't seem like they are able
• 1:42:33
  Speaker 6: to be bought or swayed within those conversations. I think
• 1:42:37
  Speaker 6: that's incredibly important. I also think how they have been
• 1:42:42
  Speaker 6: able to navigate the attacks that have come their way
• 1:42:45
  Speaker 6: and be able to redirect that and stay the course,
• 1:42:49
  Speaker 6: that has been impressive to me. So I'm excited about
• 1:42:54
  Speaker 6: where we're headed with some of the candidates that are
• 1:42:57
  Speaker 6: out there. I also think this is representative of what
• 1:43:01
  Speaker 6: we've seen over the last 10 years and people being
• 1:43:04
  Speaker 6: fed up just with the establishment. We need something different.
• 1:43:09
  Speaker 6: We need people that are actually going to come in
• 1:43:11
  Speaker 6: and serve our needs and get things done. And I
• 1:43:15
  Speaker 6: think this new wave of candidates is exciting. We'll see
• 1:43:19
  Speaker 6: how this plays out over time. But I think this is,
• 1:43:22
  Speaker 6: I think it's refreshing to be able to see candidates
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 6: take the positions that they've taken and move the way
• 1:43:29
  Speaker 6: they have.
• 1:43:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:43:30
  Speaker 1: I mean, look, Zoran's campaign was like your 2012 season.
• 1:43:32
  Speaker 1: You know, he just blew up, you know, took it
• 1:43:35
  Speaker 1: all the way. Abdul is amazing because he's a brilliant guy,
• 1:43:40
  Speaker 1: like Rhodes Scholar, public health expert, but also is just
• 1:43:43
  Speaker 1: a great communicator. I was out in Detroit two weeks ago.
• 1:43:47
  Speaker 1: I went to a town hall and I watched him
• 1:43:48
  Speaker 1: just like interacting with people. And it's like he's giving
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 1: people some hope and inspiration at a time when not
• 1:43:54
  Speaker 1: a lot of that running around.
• 1:43:55
  Speaker 2: So it's been great to watch. Last question for you.
• 1:43:58
  Speaker 1: So you write in the book that you no longer
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 1: watch the NFL and that quote, whether to watch the
• 1:44:02
  Speaker 1: NFL or not is a personal decision for each football fan.
• 1:44:05
  Speaker 1: I understand that, but it also immediately tells me a
• 1:44:07
  Speaker 1: good amount about the character of the person I'm engaging with.
• 1:44:10
  Speaker 1: I winced when I read that because I love the NFL.
• 1:44:12
  Speaker 1: I watch football. My team's the fucking Patriots. Bob Kraft
• 1:44:15
  Speaker 1: is the owner. I felt like the interpretation is maybe
• 1:44:19
  Speaker 1: you think I'm a shitty person, but I don't want
• 1:44:21
  Speaker 1: to speak for you.
• 1:44:23
  Speaker 6: No, I think if we are going down the path
• 1:44:28
  Speaker 6: of we want to live our principles, we want to
• 1:44:30
  Speaker 6: live our practices, we have to take the the best
• 1:44:35
  Speaker 6: practices and the best approaches possible to support the things
• 1:44:39
  Speaker 6: that actually support us. And the things that don't align
• 1:44:42
  Speaker 6: with our values, I don't think we should be supporting those. Now,
• 1:44:49
  Speaker 6: there's always nuance within that because, I mean, if you
• 1:44:53
  Speaker 6: go across corporations, there's always going to be something in
• 1:44:55
  Speaker 6: there and people aren't perfect people. So like there is
• 1:45:00
  Speaker 6: nuance within that. But overall, I think the position that
• 1:45:04
  Speaker 6: I've seen is, hey, I'm supporting and I want to
• 1:45:10
  Speaker 6: do the things I can. And at the same time,
• 1:45:12
  Speaker 6: we'll take actions that may be counter to that. And
• 1:45:16
  Speaker 6: my hope is that people will take more consistent actions
• 1:45:19
  Speaker 6: because on the other side of that is actually accountability
• 1:45:23
  Speaker 6: to those organizations. In the collusion, whether it is me,
• 1:45:28
  Speaker 6: whether it is McLemore, whether it is Donald targeting private citizens,
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 6: All of these are spaces that we have the opportunity
• 1:45:37
  Speaker 6: to be able to show up and say, no, we
• 1:45:40
  Speaker 6: don't believe in what you're doing. And we're going to
• 1:45:42
  Speaker 6: take actions to show you as such to make sure
• 1:45:45
  Speaker 6: on the other side of that we can create change,
• 1:45:47
  Speaker 6: whether that's policy, whether that's processes. But those become opportunities
• 1:45:52
  Speaker 6: for us collectively to have influence on those institutions.
• 1:45:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, look, I struggle with this, like the
• 1:46:00
  Speaker 1: concussions and stuff you read about CTE, like it makes
• 1:46:03
  Speaker 1: it hard to watch the game. Bob Kraft, as we discussed,
• 1:46:06
  Speaker 1: is a big Trump fan. Like, that makes it suck
• 1:46:08
  Speaker 1: on a bunch of levels. But I also have these
• 1:46:10
  Speaker 1: issues with, like, a lot of things I do in life. Like,
• 1:46:13
  Speaker 1: I don't love Amazon's labor practices. Do I use Prime
• 1:46:17
  Speaker 1: every day?
• 1:46:17
  Speaker 2: You know what I mean? And so, I don't know.
• 1:46:19
  Speaker 1: I think it's a challenge to wrestle with, like, our
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 1: own hypocrisies and where we're falling short on this stuff
• 1:46:24
  Speaker 1: and to.
• 1:46:25
  Speaker 2: Know actually what's effective. Like, you know, people who really
• 1:46:28
  Speaker 2: believe in.
• 1:46:29
  Speaker 1: Climate change and want to take steps to combat it
• 1:46:31
  Speaker 1: always have shit thrown back in their face.
• 1:46:32
  Speaker 2: Being like, well, you flew on an airplane. It's like,
• 1:46:35
  Speaker 2: you know what?
• 1:46:36
  Speaker 1: Me not flying on airplanes is not going to do shit.
• 1:46:38
  Speaker 1: And it's like, I do wonder if I don't watch
• 1:46:40
  Speaker 1: the NFL, does that hurt the owners? Does that hurt
• 1:46:41
  Speaker 1: the players? Does it just not matter?
• 1:46:43
  Speaker 3: I don't know.
• 1:46:44
  Speaker 6: Well, I think these have to become targeted. And we
• 1:46:50
  Speaker 6: have to be intentional when those show up. We know
• 1:46:52
  Speaker 6: boycotts are extremely effective. We're seeing this with Target right now.
• 1:46:59
  Speaker 6: They've rolled back their DEI practices to be in alignment
• 1:47:03
  Speaker 6: with Trump and capitulate. We've seen the black community collectively
• 1:47:07
  Speaker 6: boycott them. Their bottom line has been hit. And now
• 1:47:11
  Speaker 6: they're having to rethink their approach around this. So I
• 1:47:15
  Speaker 6: think it is hard to say, hey, we're going to
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 6: do everything all at once. And that's not an effective approach.
• 1:47:21
  Speaker 6: But in the moments that we have the opportunity to say, no,
• 1:47:25
  Speaker 6: here's a clear example. We're going to rally around this
• 1:47:27
  Speaker 6: and behind this. Those targeted actions become extremely valuable. Because
• 1:47:33
  Speaker 6: it also sends a message to every other corporation, in
• 1:47:36
  Speaker 6: the NFL's case, every other owner. That becomes an effective
• 1:47:42
  Speaker 6: way for us to be able to put pressure and
• 1:47:44
  Speaker 6: apply pressure and have influence on their practices and ultimately
• 1:47:48
  Speaker 6: making them change where you might not be another executive
• 1:47:52
  Speaker 6: sitting at the same table with them, but that collective
• 1:47:55
  Speaker 6: power of our dollars, that is very valuable.
• 1:47:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, money talks. I mean, I think you pulled your
• 1:48:00
  Speaker 2: book from Target, right?
• 1:48:01
  Speaker 7: Yes.
• 1:48:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:48:03
  Speaker 6: Book is not in Target. Children's books aren't in Target.
• 1:48:07
  Speaker 6: We have pulled everything out.
• 1:48:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:48:08
  Speaker 1: Well, look, everyone should buy The Perilous Fight. It's a
• 1:48:11
  Speaker 1: great read. It's super interesting. There's a million stories in
• 1:48:14
  Speaker 1: there that we did not touch on today. So I'm
• 1:48:16
  Speaker 1: really grateful for your time. Thanks for coming in. It
• 1:48:18
  Speaker 1: was great to meet you.
• 1:48:19
  Speaker 2: Oh, thank you. It's been a pleasure and big fan
• 1:48:22
  Speaker 2: of your work. And please continue. We will try until
• 1:48:25
  Speaker 2: we're all arrested by Trump. See how that goes.
• 1:48:30
  Speaker 4: That's our show for today. Thanks to Colin Kaepernick for
• 1:48:32
  Speaker 4: coming on. We'll be back in the feed on Sunday
• 1:48:34
  Speaker 4: with a special episode of Pod Save America live from
• 1:48:38
  Speaker 4: the Texas Tribune Festival.
• 1:48:40
  Speaker 3: Bye, everyone.
• 1:48:41
  Speaker 2: Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production.
• 1:48:43
  Speaker 4: Our show is produced by Austin Fisher, Saul Rubin, McKenna Roberts,
• 1:48:45
  Speaker 4: and Faris Safari with Reed Cherlin, Elijah Cohn, and Adrian Hill.
• 1:48:48
  Speaker 4: Our team includes Matt DeGroat, Ben Hethcote, Jordan Cantor, Charlotte Landis,
• 1:48:51
  Speaker 4: David Tolles, Mia Kelman, Ryan Young, and Naomi Single. Our
• 1:48:53
  Speaker 4: staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.