Latest / DEEP INSIGHT / 'THAT'S where his thoughts are ' Nicolle reacts to Trump's BIZARRE catcall about senator's 'ASS'

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'THAT'S where his thoughts are ' Nicolle reacts to Trump's BIZARRE catcall about senator's 'ASS' · DEEP INSIGHT

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: In a moment of self-made political crisis for Donald Trump
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: and a breakdown among his supporters, both in office and out,
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: the most pressing consideration for the rest of us is
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: whether that was then and this is now. You go
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: back 10 years from today, the public had its hands
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: on the infamous Access Hollywood tape. Trump was slipping in
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: the polls and suddenly warning of a stolen election. We
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: all know how that story ended. His supporters, both in
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: office and out, came back to him. Again, that was then,
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: and hopefully this is something different now. Images of Trump's
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: event in Youngstown, Ohio yesterday, specifically what the Washington Post
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: describes as, quote, Entire sections of the arena and upper
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: levels mostly empty. Trump, who often brags about the size
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: of crowds at his events, made no mention of the
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: attendance on Monday night. More from the Post, quote, As
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: they pay more for groceries, struggle with high housing costs,
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: and wince at the price at the gas pump, some
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: former Trump voters said, say they feel a disconnect between
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: their priorities and his. For some, that gap has widened
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: as a new wave of proposed data centers in the
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: area raise questions about who stands to benefit from the
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: next chapter of American industrial growth. Now presented without further comment,
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: a closing message of Donald Trump on behalf of Senator
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: John Husted of Youngstown, Ohio.
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: But I'm standing over here and I don't do this
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: with men very often. I started examining his body because
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: I didn't know he was a great athlete. And I
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: looked and I watched up and down. I looked at
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: his ass and I looked at the whole. And then
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: I looked at his hands. Look at his hands. He's
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: got these like claws. And I got it. You are
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: a great athlete. I didn't know that because he doesn't
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: talk about that. Congratulations. Now they finally know. That was
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: very good. Look at that jawline. I'm telling you.
• 1:55
  Speaker 3: I never saw that.
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: I never studied him. Now I study him.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: I looked at his ass. Now I study him. That's
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: where his thoughts are. That's what gets his attention. Houston's
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: physique notwithstanding, he and other Republican candidates seeking re-election in
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: three weeks must reckon with Trump's historic unpopularity and political toxicity.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: Whereas 10 years ago today, the GOP was falling back
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: in line. We'll ask again, that was then, is this
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: now something different? That question is where we begin today
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: with the publisher of The Bulwark, host of the Focus
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: Group podcast, Sarah Longwell is here. She's the author. Sarah,
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: you know I love to ask you, where are we?
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: What are you hearing? What are voters telling you?
• 3:00
  Speaker 4: I mean, the more the closer we get to the
• 3:02
  Speaker 4: election and look, Democrats start to do the thing that
• 3:05
  Speaker 4: Democrats do where they kind of start to, you know,
• 3:07
  Speaker 4: bed wet and get nervous. And are the polls going
• 3:09
  Speaker 4: to revert to the mean? And are we going to
• 3:11
  Speaker 4: see people come home to Trump? And there's just no
• 3:15
  Speaker 4: evidence of that anywhere, not in any of the polls,
• 3:18
  Speaker 4: not in any of the qualitative work that I do
• 3:20
  Speaker 4: listening to voters. When I listen to voters, they say
• 3:24
  Speaker 4: the same thing over and over again. It doesn't matter
• 3:26
  Speaker 4: if it's Texas. It doesn't matter if it's Georgia. It
• 3:28
  Speaker 4: doesn't matter if it's Ohio. They are mad, not just disappointed.
• 3:32
  Speaker 4: They are mad about how much everything costs and about
• 3:36
  Speaker 4: the war. The war was a real turning point with
• 3:40
  Speaker 4: voters because it pushed them from a let's wait and see.
• 3:43
  Speaker 4: And maybe Trump will figure out how to be his
• 3:46
  Speaker 4: businessman self and bring things back. The war was something
• 3:50
  Speaker 4: it was a choice he made. They know that about
• 3:52
  Speaker 4: the tariffs, too. These were choices made. that Trump made
• 3:56
  Speaker 4: that are costing them more money and that he's done
• 3:58
  Speaker 4: nothing to make their lives better, which is why in
• 4:01
  Speaker 4: a world where he used to be Teflon on things
• 4:04
  Speaker 4: like the corruption, things like building, you know, whether it's
• 4:07
  Speaker 4: the reflecting pool or building the ballroom, all stuff that
• 4:11
  Speaker 4: used to kind of just be noise, that stuff hits
• 4:13
  Speaker 4: right now. And it hits because people feel like there's
• 4:17
  Speaker 4: pain in their own lives that the president is not addressing.
• 4:20
  Speaker 4: And that's why everything feels different.
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: Sarah, you know, there's some things that we've covered here
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: for a decade. And I think to your point about Democrats,
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: I think the reason this season is sort of a
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: cycle of PTSD for them is because things that would
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: have destroyed any normal politician, things like the release of
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: the Access Hollywood tape where Trump said, you know, I
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: can grab them between the legs when you're famous, they
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: let you do it. He would prevail even though his
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: own campaign thought that was a bottom falling out moment.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: What you describe about the war seems like a shaking
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: of a kaleidoscope where it made everything look different. So
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: the weird comments, the flagrant misogyny, the brazen corruption, the
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: political prosecutions, each of those things, if people felt good
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: about their lives and felt like he'd kept the core
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: promises of no forever wars and making their personal economies
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: better might not have bothered them? Or are you able
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: to disaggregate those two things?
• 5:24
  Speaker 4: No, and I think I think it's a tough lesson
• 5:26
  Speaker 4: to have to learn. I think it's not doesn't make
• 5:28
  Speaker 4: us feel great about voters to believe this. But I
• 5:32
  Speaker 4: do think that it's true that people have to experience
• 5:37
  Speaker 4: negative personal consequences for them to turn on Trump, at
• 5:41
  Speaker 4: least Trump fans.
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 5:43
  Speaker 4: People who who were his base, people who have been
• 5:47
  Speaker 4: three time Trump voters at this point for them to
• 5:51
  Speaker 4: abandon him. or turn on him or get angry at
• 5:54
  Speaker 4: him because there's different permutations for different types of voters.
• 5:58
  Speaker 4: But for that to happen, it required their lives getting worse.
• 6:02
  Speaker 4: I mean, I could have I can't tell you how
• 6:03
  Speaker 4: many times I heard this going into the 2024 election
• 6:06
  Speaker 4: where voters said, I want Trump's pre-COVID first term economy back.
• 6:11
  Speaker 4: That's what they wanted. They wanted that economy back. And
• 6:14
  Speaker 4: Trump promised it to them. And it is the fact
• 6:17
  Speaker 4: that their lives have gotten materially worse over over the
• 6:20
  Speaker 4: course of the Trump administration that they're now turning on him.
• 6:22
  Speaker 4: But I think if their lives were better, if the
• 6:25
  Speaker 4: economy was on fire, if we were truly in a
• 6:28
  Speaker 4: golden age, even if Trump was doing all of these
• 6:30
  Speaker 4: other horrible things, his people would still be with him
• 6:33
  Speaker 4: and a lot of independents would stick with him. And
• 6:36
  Speaker 4: that's just something we have to understand to understand politics.
• 6:39
  Speaker 4: That's why in the book I talk so much about
• 6:42
  Speaker 4: You've got to focus on people's material well-being and people's
• 6:46
  Speaker 4: personal safety, because that is the thing that motivates voters
• 6:49
  Speaker 4: more than anything else.
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: I want to turn to some of the voters, because
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: I think this is where I think you derived you know,
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: so much of your understanding of this moment and the country.
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: And Chris, you've always sort of, I think, brought their
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: voices out on the show as well. So I want
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: to read some of the voters in their own words.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: This is from the Washington Post as well. In Ohio,
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: some Trump voters question whether Trump is still fighting for them.
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: In Liberty, Ohio, Brian, a 54-year-old who voted for Trump
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: in all three of his elections, voiced discontent, quote, I'm
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: extremely disappointed in him, he said, speaking on the condition
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: that only his first name be used because of concerns
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: about his privacy during a politically contentious season. I fell
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: for it. Sitting at the counter of the Yankee Kitchen
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: restaurant in Vienna, Ohio, he described losing his job of
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: roughly 25 years as a welder and confronting a job
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: market he calls a, quote, ghost town. He watched steel
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: plants and then auto plants shutter across the region, leaving
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: some former factory workers stocking shelves at Wal-Mart. Now he
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: plans to vote only in local races in the upcoming election,
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: saying he cannot stand either party's candidates for Senate or governor. Chris,
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: two things. One, the tribalism, to me, rings out as
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: the thing that Brian won't talk about, right? Not wanting
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: to use his last name, quote, because of concerns about
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: his privacy during a politically contentious season. This is this
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: permission structure that Sarah has been tracking and talking about
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: for as long as I've known her. But suddenly there
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: is a permission structure growing that hasn't existed in 10
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: years to not be for Donald Trump. And it doesn't
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: necessarily mean in Brian's case that he's enthusiastic about the
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: Democratic Party. But staying home is something that is just
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: as dangerous to Donald Trump this year.
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: Well, I agree. I think there's something going on in
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: Ohio that goes beyond Trump. Yes, the people in Ohio
• 8:45
  Speaker 3: have all the same anger. We just talked about the war,
• 8:48
  Speaker 3: the inflation. They're really upset about the desecration of symbols
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: like the Kennedy Center and the White House. But we
• 8:56
  Speaker 3: have special conditions in Ohio that have people angrier than
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: I've seen in the 30 years I've been in Cleveland.
• 9:03
  Speaker 3: It has to do with data centers, property taxes, and
• 9:06
  Speaker 3: private school vouchers. The fury of is huge because it's
• 9:10
  Speaker 3: basically been a shift of Ohio tax wealth to the wealthy.
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: And the problem for John Husted, who you just talked
• 9:19
  Speaker 3: about with Donald Trump, he is the face of data
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: centers in Ohio. We ran a headline in the summer
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: two years ago saying, will voters hold John Husted accountable
• 9:29
  Speaker 3: for their huge electricity bill spikes because he caused them
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: with the data centers. He brought as many of them
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: here as he could without once thinking about the demand,
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: the need for infrastructure. It's also a very cozy relationship
• 9:44
  Speaker 3: he always had with the utilities and these are big
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: customers for them. So every time somebody opens an electric
• 9:50
  Speaker 3: bill in Ohio, they get angry and they curse their government.
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: Every time they fill up their gas, It's a joke.
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: People get in their car and they say bad things
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: about Donald Trump. I think after 20 years of kind
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: of abusive Republican rule in Ohio, people are fed up.
• 10:08
  Speaker 3: I think Houston is going to lose substantially. I think
• 10:11
  Speaker 3: you'll have a Democratic governor in Ohio. Nobody would have
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: said that two years ago. If I'm wrong, I'll be
• 10:16
  Speaker 3: happy to come back and eat my words. But the
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: anger is palpable. I'm going to get more than 50,000
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: text messages from readers to me this year. I feel
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: like I really do understand what they're saying. They are furious.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: Say more about the data centers, because what's interesting to
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: me is that Republicans are are doing neither nor, right?
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: They are neither advocating for the benefits of data centers
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: nor listening to the discontent, anger, and fear about their existence.
• 10:46
  Speaker 3: Well, we have more than 200 in Ohio, partly because
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: of the work of John Husted. There was a secret
• 10:53
  Speaker 3: deal before John Husted was the kind of governor that
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: gave billions of tax breaks to the developers of those
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: that will last for 40 years. But it was really
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: the electric bills spiking. The demand for power by these
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: centers has created a huge upcharge. And now, Anna Staver,
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: one of our reporters, did a great story a couple
• 11:13
  Speaker 3: of weeks ago. Because all these new transmission lines are needed,
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: it turns out there's no oversight when those are built
• 11:20
  Speaker 3: and the utilities get a huge percentage of the cost
• 11:23
  Speaker 3: of them as part of their fee. So the utilities
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: just keep profiting from the data centers and people are
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: just angry about it. It was interesting when they were coming.
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: There was never a thought about what this does to
• 11:37
  Speaker 3: the needs of power. The Republicans have been very down
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: on green energy in Ohio, always pushing for fossil fuels.
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: We're the one state, I think, that declared by law
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: natural gas is green energy.
• 11:50
  Speaker 5: Hey, it's Rachel. I am so glad to see you
• 11:53
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• 11:54
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• 11:56
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• 11:59
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• 12:03
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• 12:06
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• 12:08
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• 12:12
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• 12:17
  Speaker 1: Thanks.