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The Biden-Trump Rematch Begins · Pod Save America

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:21
  Speaker 3: I'm Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Vitor.
• 0:23
  Speaker 4: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: Gang's all here.
• 0:24
  Speaker 5: Here we are.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: Well, Dan's on Zoom. Sort of.
• 0:26
  Speaker 3: Tough.
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: On today's show, Nikki Haley concedes to Trump but doesn't endorse.
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: Dean Phillips concedes to Joe Biden and does endorse. Adam
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: Schiff is headed to the Senate. North Carolina Republicans nominate
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: a Holocaust denier for governor. And Joe Biden prepares for
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: his biggest speech of the year.
• 0:42
  Speaker 5: But first.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: Super Tuesday told us what's been obvious for a very
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: long time. President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: are headed for a November rematch that no one asked for.
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: It's happening, guys.
• 0:56
  Speaker 3: It's happening. It's happening.
• 0:57
  Speaker 4: It's at Gerger Loins.
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: We started a podcast eight years ago talking about Donald Trump.
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: Eight years later, here we are. Still running for president.
• 1:05
  Speaker 5: I think we've slowed him down. I think we've slowed
• 1:06
  Speaker 5: him down, though. I think there's not as much air
• 1:10
  Speaker 5: in those tires.
• 1:11
  Speaker 4: All right.
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: So on Super Tuesday, Biden won every contest but the
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: caucuses in American Samoa. Talk about that soon. And has
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: won every state and every delegate but 10. He's now
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: just a few hundred delegates away from officially clinching the nomination.
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: Trump won every Super Tuesday contest but Vermont and is
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: also just a few hundred delegates away from clinching, which
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: he will. because he's now the only Republican candidate left
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: in the race. Nikki Haley suspended her campaign this morning,
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: but declined to endorse Trump in her concession speech. Let's listen.
• 1:42
  Speaker 6: I am filled with the gratitude for the outpouring of
• 1:45
  Speaker 6: support we've received from all across our great country. But
• 1:49
  Speaker 6: the time has now come to suspend my campaign. I
• 1:54
  Speaker 6: said I wanted Americans to have their voices heard. I
• 1:57
  Speaker 6: have done that. I have no regrets. In all likelihood,
• 2:02
  Speaker 6: Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee when our party
• 2:05
  Speaker 6: convention meets in July. I congratulate him and wish him well.
• 2:11
  Speaker 6: I wish anyone well who would be America's president. I
• 2:15
  Speaker 6: have always been a conservative Republican and always supported the
• 2:19
  Speaker 6: Republican nominee. But on this question, as she did on
• 2:24
  Speaker 6: so many others, Margaret Thatcher provided some good advice when
• 2:28
  Speaker 6: she said, quote, Never just follow the crowd. Always make
• 2:34
  Speaker 6: up your own mind.
• 2:36
  Speaker 4: It is now up to.
• 2:37
  Speaker 6: Donald Trump to earn the votes of those in our
• 2:39
  Speaker 6: party and beyond it who did not support him. And
• 2:43
  Speaker 6: I hope he does that. This is now his time
• 2:47
  Speaker 6: for choosing.
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: So, do we consider the votes burned? Is that the
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: non-endorsement we were hoping for? What do we think?
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: Love it?
• 2:55
  Speaker 5: Here, if you say, uh, it is now up to
• 2:59
  Speaker 5: Donald Trump to earn the votes of those in our
• 3:01
  Speaker 5: party and beyond it who do not support him, and
• 3:03
  Speaker 5: I hope he does that. If you're saying, I hope
• 3:05
  Speaker 5: Donald Trump earns everyone's vote, what exactly is she hoping for?
• 3:11
  Speaker 5: Because it sounds like she's hoping that he wins the presidency.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: Hoping that I guess he has a personality transplant. Yeah,
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: he suddenly changes his ways.
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: He's going to build that big tent.
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he's finally going to change. Yeah, he's going to mature.
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: 77 years old.
• 3:25
  Speaker 5: She hopes, yeah, turns over a new leaf. The thing
• 3:27
  Speaker 5: that I feel like just, I've seen a bunch of
• 3:29
  Speaker 5: people talking about this speech and, you know, has she
• 3:31
  Speaker 5: burned the ships or not? Will she endorse or will
• 3:33
  Speaker 5: she won't? It is truly amazing that she has been
• 3:36
  Speaker 5: running against Donald Trump for a year, running hard for
• 3:40
  Speaker 5: three months. We have absolutely no idea what she thinks.
• 3:43
  Speaker 5: We don't know what she thinks. We don't know what
• 3:44
  Speaker 5: she actually thinks.
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: Sort of been the case for her entire political career.
• 3:47
  Speaker 4: Dan? I'm not going to make a prediction whether she's
• 3:50
  Speaker 4: going to endorse or not endorse. Coward. On the eight-year anniversary,
• 3:55
  Speaker 4: we're going to bring predictions back into the podcast.
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: Yes, exactly. Hillary's going to win.
• 4:00
  Speaker 4: She's leaving herself the option to do it, but he's
• 4:03
  Speaker 4: obviously not going to earn the votes of anyone. I
• 4:05
  Speaker 4: think in his statement, his truth about this, he called
• 4:07
  Speaker 4: her bird brain and said she did really poorly and
• 4:10
  Speaker 4: then asked her supporters to vote for him. So I'm
• 4:12
  Speaker 4: not sure. It's a low bar she's setting.
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: Like I thought it was better than an endorsement, but
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: not as good as a non-endorsement where she took a
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: few more shots at Trump. That's what I would say. Tommy,
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: what did you think?
• 4:24
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: Listen, first of all, Maggie Thatcher, shout out.
• 4:27
  Speaker 6: Right here.
• 4:28
  Speaker 4: Good for her.
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: You know, look to me.
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: She's a world through and through at her core.
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: She knows really how to appeal to the core.
• 4:34
  Speaker 4: She knows the Republican Party.
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: It sounded to me like she was setting up a
• 4:39
  Speaker 3: process for her to come back to the fold and endorse.
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: She wants to make it bigger and about her supporters
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: and not herself because she of course not about her.
• 4:48
  Speaker 3: It's about the country, John. So I think she'll probably
• 4:51
  Speaker 3: at some point pretend that Trump has changed or improved.
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden will do something that a bunch of establishment
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: Republicans will arbitrarily decide is unforgivable.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: Give more people health care or something.
• 5:03
  Speaker 4: Almost certainly be calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. The
• 5:07
  Speaker 4: thing that sends a run to Trump's camp.
• 5:09
  Speaker 5: It's also, I think, telling that, as she was saying, like,
• 5:13
  Speaker 5: I hope Donald Trump does whatever he can to earn
• 5:15
  Speaker 5: the votes of my supporters. He was putting out the
• 5:17
  Speaker 5: statement he wanted to put out, dinging her, that he
• 5:20
  Speaker 5: wrote before she spoke but didn't get it out in time.
• 5:22
  Speaker 5: so that he could get a statement out saying, I
• 5:24
  Speaker 5: hope she never fucking quits.
• 5:25
  Speaker 4: I hate this woman.
• 5:27
  Speaker 5: And then the campaign puts it out and just puts
• 5:29
  Speaker 5: a little note that says, just so you guys know,
• 5:30
  Speaker 5: it was from before she started speaking. That's when he
• 5:32
  Speaker 5: wrote it. But we didn't get it out in time,
• 5:34
  Speaker 5: but we wanted to put it out anyway.
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: I'm looking forward to the Unity event in Unity, New Hampshire. Yeah,
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: her convention speech. Or maybe she'll do the Ted Cruz,
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: vote your conscience at the convention and then go ahead
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: and vote for him.
• 5:46
  Speaker 4: Who knows?
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: Dan, can you talk about your message box takeaway from
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: last night that Haley's candidacy helps Biden in the general?
• 5:52
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think when you look back on this, Nikki
• 5:54
  Speaker 4: Haley never had a shot to beat Donald Trump. But
• 5:57
  Speaker 4: what happened is the Koch brothers spent almost $ 100 million
• 5:59
  Speaker 4: to fund a sophisticated, persuadable voter ID program for Joe Biden.
• 6:04
  Speaker 6: Right?
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: Thanks, Koch brothers.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: Exactly.
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: Like we always say here.
• 6:09
  Speaker 5: There's only one left. There's one, the Koch brother. Sorry,
• 6:13
  Speaker 5: the Koch organization.
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the Koch organization. Thanks, Kochs.
• 6:16
  Speaker 5: Well, no, I do think the dead one is happy.
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: I didn't know we're done. He was happy to be
• 6:18
  Speaker 3: part of it.
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, I can thank him. It's still his money.
• 6:21
  Speaker 3: Is that the one who bought all the fake wine?
• 6:23
  Speaker 3: It's a great documentary. Anyway, continue.
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: Sorry.
• 6:26
  Speaker 4: I mean, basically, when you look at this, there's been
• 6:28
  Speaker 4: this little pushback over the last few days or so
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: about this idea that Haley voters are a demonstration of
• 6:35
  Speaker 4: weakness for Trump Because in the New York Times-Siena poll,
• 6:39
  Speaker 4: a near majority of her supporters voted for Biden in 2020.
• 6:43
  Speaker 4: And so people are still like, so see, Trump is
• 6:45
  Speaker 4: never going to get those voters anyway if they're telling
• 6:47
  Speaker 4: exit pollsters they're not going to vote for Trump because
• 6:49
  Speaker 4: they never were. That's because a bunch of Democrats came
• 6:51
  Speaker 4: into the primary. I think that's idiocy for two reasons. One,
• 6:56
  Speaker 4: it's only half of her voters. But also, the people
• 6:59
  Speaker 4: that Biden needs are the people who voted for Trump
• 7:01
  Speaker 4: in 2016 and Biden in 2020 and now don't know
• 7:04
  Speaker 4: what they're going to do. These are the exact kind
• 7:05
  Speaker 4: of Republican-leading independents who vote in Republican primaries. It's just
• 7:09
  Speaker 4: a pure numbers game, right? Take Michigan, right? There were 300,000,
• 7:13
  Speaker 4: almost 300,000 people who voted for Nikki Haley in that primary.
• 7:17
  Speaker 4: And so let's just pretend that half of them were
• 7:20
  Speaker 4: always going to vote for Biden. They just wanted to
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: play in an open primary because they wanted to just
• 7:26
  Speaker 4: pull one over on Trump. But then you still have 150,000 voters,
• 7:30
  Speaker 4: some portion of whom are open to Biden. And in
• 7:33
  Speaker 4: the exit polling, we've seen upwards of 60% to three
• 7:37
  Speaker 4: quarters of Nikki Haley voters who say they will not
• 7:39
  Speaker 4: commit to voting for the nominee. So that is 150,000
• 7:42
  Speaker 4: voters in Michigan that Joe Biden can target. And you
• 7:46
  Speaker 4: know what Joe Biden won Michigan by in 2020? 150,000 votes.
• 7:49
  Speaker 4: So it's just, these are voters that the Biden folks
• 7:51
  Speaker 4: can go get in his camp. They can track them
• 7:54
  Speaker 4: down and they now have eight months to persuade them.
• 7:56
  Speaker 4: And Donald Trump is helping them by saying things like
• 7:59
  Speaker 4: non-MAGA people are not welcome in this party. So I
• 8:01
  Speaker 4: just think, this is, she has given a little bit
• 8:03
  Speaker 4: of a roadmap and ID'd a whole bunch of voters
• 8:05
  Speaker 4: that the Biden votes can go get. And I think
• 8:06
  Speaker 4: that's been very helpful to him, even though I'm sure
• 8:08
  Speaker 4: that was not her intent.
• 8:09
  Speaker 5: Dan, can I do a question about this? Because I
• 8:10
  Speaker 5: was thinking about this when I was reading your message box,
• 8:12
  Speaker 5: as I do every morning, as like almost like a
• 8:14
  Speaker 5: prayer ritual. So you see, like in the exit polls,
• 8:19
  Speaker 5: you see this sort of weakness that there are a
• 8:21
  Speaker 5: ton of Haley voters, including Republican Haley voters, that just
• 8:24
  Speaker 5: say they won't vote for Trump or they're open to Biden,
• 8:26
  Speaker 5: just shows like a real weakness that Donald Trump has.
• 8:28
  Speaker 5: And then you look at like the polls that just
• 8:30
  Speaker 5: came in and if you were wondering who has done
• 8:33
  Speaker 5: a better job of consolidating their own party, it's actually Trump, right?
• 8:36
  Speaker 5: Like Biden's in the 80s and Trump has in the
• 8:39
  Speaker 5: 90s among Republicans. Is that just the difference between these
• 8:45
  Speaker 5: two electorates? Is that the difference between people that, like,
• 8:49
  Speaker 5: how do you explain that difference?
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah, how do you square in the New York Times poll,
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: like 48% of Haley voters saying they were Biden 2020
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: voters but then Trump winning 96% of his 2020 voters.
• 9:03
  Speaker 5: Which is the high one, right? It's like 94 or 96, right?
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: I'm talking New York Times.
• 9:09
  Speaker 4: So it's 48% of Haley supporters who say they voted
• 9:11
  Speaker 4: for Biden, 31% who say they voted for Trump. And
• 9:13
  Speaker 4: the rest are people who either declined to answer or
• 9:15
  Speaker 4: most likely did not vote in 2020. So when you're
• 9:18
  Speaker 4: dealing with a margin of error, that math actually works
• 9:21
  Speaker 4: out okay, that you have a couple percent of Trump's
• 9:23
  Speaker 4: voters who have voted for Haley in the primary, who
• 9:26
  Speaker 4: may be unwilling to vote for him in the general.
• 9:29
  Speaker 4: And so those are the people you'll get. We're talking,
• 9:31
  Speaker 4: everything's happening on the margins here, right? Trump has obviously
• 9:33
  Speaker 4: done a better job of consolidating his overall base. Biden
• 9:39
  Speaker 4: has done a better job of consolidating primary voters than
• 9:42
  Speaker 4: Trump has. And you see that in the poll where
• 9:44
  Speaker 4: they ask people if you voted in a primary, in
• 9:46
  Speaker 4: the New York Times poll, if you voted in a
• 9:46
  Speaker 4: primary and a midterm, then Biden actually was up by
• 9:50
  Speaker 4: one point among that group of people. It's when you,
• 9:53
  Speaker 4: the further you get out among Trump voters, the better
• 9:55
  Speaker 4: he does. But the hardest core people, are some, or most,
• 9:58
  Speaker 4: the most regular Republicans are ones he's struggling with, and
• 10:00
  Speaker 4: those people that Joe Biden can go get. Look, in
• 10:03
  Speaker 4: an election like this, you're trying to go get, if
• 10:05
  Speaker 4: you could find 15,000 votes in Michigan of people who
• 10:10
  Speaker 4: voted for Haley, who either didn't vote in 2020 or
• 10:12
  Speaker 4: voted for Trump in 2020, that could be enough to
• 10:15
  Speaker 4: win this race, right? Like, so that's why I think
• 10:17
  Speaker 4: it helps.
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think- We don't know how many Haley voters
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: supported Biden in 2020. We just know polling. But one
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: thing that keeps coming up and that has for like
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: a year, a couple of years now, is there is
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: about 30 percent of Republicans who say they don't like
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump, believe that Joe Biden won the 2020 election,
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: tell pollsters that he shouldn't be president if he's convicted.
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: So there's like there's like 30 percent of Republicans out
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: there who are at least potentially persuadable.
• 10:46
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: I think that's what we've learned from both Haley's candidacy.
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: and everything that people have told pollsters for the last
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: several years now.
• 10:53
  Speaker 5: Right, and right now, if you look at the other
• 10:54
  Speaker 5: polls about the general, two-thirds of those voters are saying
• 10:58
  Speaker 5: they're coming home, but a big chunk of those people
• 11:00
  Speaker 5: are gettable.
• 11:01
  Speaker 3: One thing before we move on from Haley, I have
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: to point out that in that fun little period between
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: results coming in and her dropping out where there was
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: a bunch of reporting, her spokeswoman sent a statement to
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: Politico saying that Haley was watching the results with staff and, quote,
• 11:16
  Speaker 3: the mood is jubilant. And I just love that because
• 11:20
  Speaker 3: rarely do you see bullshit printed quite that directly because,
• 11:23
  Speaker 3: you know, clearly it was not jubilant when you're only
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: winning Vermont.
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: Tommy, I don't know what the fuck you're talking about.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: They could have been jubilant that the campaign's over and
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: they don't.
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: Have to work hard anymore. That's a very good point.
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: I take it back.
• 11:33
  Speaker 4: They were expecting to win zero contests and they won one.
• 11:36
  Speaker 4: So I'm sure they're incredibly excited.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: We gave a little short shrift to Vermont here.
• 11:40
  Speaker 5: Vermont, yeah.
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: The big Vermont victory.
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: Shout out, Vermont.
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: All right, so the overwhelming majority of Republican voters got
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: their preferred candidate for president, a criminal defendant facing 91
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: felony charges that include trying to overturn an election. He lost.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: In last night's victory speech, Trump dispensed his... Trademark optimism
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: from the scene of one of his crimes at Mar-a-Lago.
• 11:58
  Speaker 4: We're going to stop him.
• 11:59
  Speaker 7: We're going to close our borders. We're going to have
• 12:01
  Speaker 7: to deport a lot of people, a lot of bad people,
• 12:04
  Speaker 7: because our countries can't live like this. Our cities are
• 12:08
  Speaker 7: choking to death. Our states are dying. And frankly, our
• 12:12
  Speaker 7: country is dying. And we're going to make America great again,
• 12:16
  Speaker 7: greater than ever before.
• 12:19
  Speaker 5: Thank you very much.
• 12:20
  Speaker 4: It's been a big night.
• 12:21
  Speaker 5: Thank you very much. Thank you.
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: How's that for a general election message? Our country is dying.
• 12:26
  Speaker 5: Low energy. And I'd say I just found it so
• 12:28
  Speaker 5: distasteful that CNN took the whole speech.
• 12:30
  Speaker 4: Just kidding.
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah, he's back to like the American carnage message. It's
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: very dark.
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: Very dark. Very dark. And the low energy plus the dark.
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: The darkness of the message was interesting to me.
• 12:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's fitting, really.
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: Because at his rallies, he's like having a good time.
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: He's a comedian. He's saying crazy shit. He was very
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: subdued last night.
• 12:50
  Speaker 5: Yeah, not the Iowa guy.
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm sure it was like, hey, Iowa, you were gracious.
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: New Hampshire, you were an asshole. Just try to be
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: on message here. So he tried to be on message,
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: which he's always looking bored when he's on message.
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's true.
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: Did the primary results and exit polls from last night
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: tell you guys anything else about Trump's strengths or weaknesses
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: heading into the general? Dan, you had anything?
• 13:11
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think there's been a consistent story from Iowa,
• 13:15
  Speaker 4: New Hampshire, South Carolina, Michigan, which is, There's a group
• 13:18
  Speaker 4: of voters. Most of the men have voted for Haley
• 13:20
  Speaker 4: that he struggles with. It's college-educated Republicans. It's people in
• 13:23
  Speaker 4: the suburbs. It's people who don't believe in the big lie,
• 13:26
  Speaker 4: which is a problem for Trump nationally because the majority
• 13:28
  Speaker 4: of voters don't believe the big lie. He's losing those
• 13:30
  Speaker 4: voters by 60 points in some cases. And so there
• 13:32
  Speaker 4: is this group of people. It's the 30% you identified.
• 13:35
  Speaker 4: And that has persisted through this. And even there are
• 13:37
  Speaker 4: some who are voting from the primary who are indicating
• 13:39
  Speaker 4: some reservations about it, particularly who's convicted for a crime.
• 13:43
  Speaker 4: So it is a story of a dominant performance among
• 13:46
  Speaker 4: the MAGA base. And some real weakness against non-MAGA voters.
• 13:50
  Speaker 4: And we're not a MAGA majority country, so that's not
• 13:53
  Speaker 4: great for him.
• 13:54
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: We also just saw that there's a super PAC that
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: was a pro-Haley super PAC that has rebranded as Haley
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: voters for Biden. So hopefully they spend some money.
• 14:02
  Speaker 5: Sort of seems like Also making Trump's point. Give him
• 14:08
  Speaker 5: one point there.
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: I do think one, a couple of strengths that Donald
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: Trump has going into the general, the entire Republican establishment
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: is behind him, including we just found out this morning
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: that Mitch McConnell has just decided to back him. Donald
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: Trump is a challenger in an environment where last time
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: an incumbent president won reelection was 12 years ago. because
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: the country has been, you know, voters have been pretty upset.
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: And so that's what Joe Biden's dealing with. But again, weaknesses, suburbs, moderates,
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: Haley voters. And I think it's good to, you know,
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump starts 40,000 voters in the hole. That's what
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: he lost by in 2020. So he can't afford to
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: lose a bunch of voters, even a couple Republican voters
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: here and there.
• 14:50
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: I mean, but to your point about the sort of
• 14:52
  Speaker 3: anti-incumbent sentiment, I did notice that 55% of California primary
• 14:57
  Speaker 3: voters rated the economy negatively, including 66% of independents. So
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: that's a big headwind for Joe Biden. There are, you know,
• 15:05
  Speaker 3: 66% of California independents disapprove of Biden's handling of the job.
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: Trump is beating Biden by eight points when it comes
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: to job approval with California independents. So again, that's just
• 15:14
  Speaker 3: like one snapshot based on the California exit polls, but
• 15:17
  Speaker 3: it shows the challenges of being an incumbent right now.
• 15:20
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: And other weaknesses for Trump. I think all the felony
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: charges should be weaknesses. He is unpopular still. He's a
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: little more popular than he has been, but he's still
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: a pretty unpopular guy. And of course, his lack of
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: discipline and penchant for saying crazy shit. I think that's
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: a weakness as well. So before we get to Biden
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: and the general election strategy, let's run through some of
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: the other notable results from Tuesday night. Adam Schiff is
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: most likely headed to the U.S. Senate. He finished first
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: in California's top two primary and will face Republican Steve
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: Garvey in November, though it shouldn't be much of a
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: race because of California's voter registration. Katie Porter and Barbara
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: Lee came in third and fourth with much less of
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: the vote than the polls had suggested. Any thoughts on
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: how Schiff was able to dominate this primary?
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: Money. He had like $ 40 million in a state that's
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: just absurdly expensive to run in to begin with. And
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: they had so much money, the Schiff team, that they
• 16:32
  Speaker 3: could spend like between $ 11 and $ 15 million boosting Steve Garvey,
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: the Republican, who he will now run against, including running
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: ads on Fox News. But then he also could run
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: pro-Schiff ads. He could run anti-Katie Porter ads. And Schiff
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: ended up doing more campaigning for Garvey than Garvey did
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: for himself. I think he spent like $ 1. 5 million. He
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: barely did events. Schiff also had a bunch of institutional support,
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: like Pelosi loves Adam Schiff. She helped him raise money.
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: She elevated his profile in the House. Republicans gave Schiff
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: an in-kind contribution when they censured him, which made him
• 17:04
  Speaker 3: a star on MSNBC. And I think Porter and Barbara
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: Lee split the progressive vote. But as you said, even
• 17:12
  Speaker 3: combining their vote totals would not have gotten them where
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: they needed to be to make the runoff.
• 17:17
  Speaker 5: So yeah, I do think also like Being a chief
• 17:20
  Speaker 5: Trump antagonist in a state as big as California, where
• 17:22
  Speaker 5: it takes millions and millions and millions of dollars just
• 17:24
  Speaker 5: to get people to know who you are, was a
• 17:27
  Speaker 5: pretty tough uphill climb for anyone who wasn't Schiff.
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: And a chief Trump antagonist in a time where the
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: most powerful motivating force for Democrats has been Donald Trump.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: That is what has gotten Democrats to the polls from
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: 18 on every single election. And when you are the
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: guy that just takes it to Trump all the time
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: and is seen as taking it to Trump, then that's
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: going to benefit you. In other down-ballot news, the Senate
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: map is just about set. Colin Allred will face Ted
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: Cruz in Texas, and it'll be Ruben Gallego versus Carrie
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: Lake in Arizona because Kyrsten Sinema has announced her retirement.
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: We'll get there. We'll get there. In the North Carolina
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: governor's race, Democrat Josh Stein will face Republican Mark Robinson.
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: If you haven't heard of him before, He's the lieutenant
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: governor right now. He's a Hitler-quoting Holocaust denier who has
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: called being gay a filthy abomination that marks the end
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: of civilization and said that school shootings are karma for abortion.
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: Trump has called Robinson Martin Luther King Jr. on steroids.
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: Sounds like a nice guy.
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: Should we do a little greatest hits of Mark Robinson oppo?
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: You got some others? Yeah, let's keep going.
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: So I want to flag that first one, the Martin
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: Luther King comparison, because Robinson likes to attack Martin Luther
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: King Jr. and the civil rights movement. So he's actually
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: criticizing him there, Trump. Robinson voiced support for passing, quote,
• 18:47
  Speaker 3: a bill saying you can't have an abortion in North
• 18:49
  Speaker 3: Carolina for any reason. He called abortion murder and genocide.
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: He refused to commit to protecting IVF. He called public
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: school teachers, quote, wicked people. You mentioned the Holocaust, calling
• 18:59
  Speaker 3: it hogwash. You got really mad on Facebook about the
• 19:02
  Speaker 3: movie Black Panther.
• 19:03
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I was very upset about Black Panther.
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: And said the character was, quote, created by an agnostic
• 19:07
  Speaker 3: Jew and put to film by satanic Marxists and only
• 19:11
  Speaker 3: created to pull the shekels out of your Schwartz pockets.
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: Did I do that right?
• 19:15
  Speaker 5: Yeah, that's a, well, it's an epithet for black people. So, yeah, it's,
• 19:20
  Speaker 5: you know, Black Panther was a conspiracy by Jews to
• 19:23
  Speaker 5: trick black people into, I guess, having a good time.
• 19:25
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: The hogwash quote, the first part of that, because I
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: saw the whole Facebook post, it's from March of 2018.
• 19:32
  Speaker 3: It's been a lot of time on Facebook in 2018.
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: A lot of time.
• 19:36
  Speaker 5: Wow.
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: It's, quote, this foolishness about Hitler disarming millions of Jews
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: and then marching them off to concentration camps is a
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: bunch of hogwash. That's the post.
• 19:47
  Speaker 5: That is the post.
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: Just in case you think libs are just exaggerating.
• 19:52
  Speaker 3: Yeah, no. In context, these are all worse.
• 19:53
  Speaker 5: He also referred to the students at Marjory Stone Douglas
• 19:57
  Speaker 5: as spoiled, angry, know-it-all children, silly, little, immature media prostitutes.
• 20:02
  Speaker 5: That's a child prostitute. And this one, listen, it's been
• 20:07
  Speaker 5: a very serious and terrible situation. But after the Boko
• 20:12
  Speaker 5: Haram kidnappings in 2014, he posted on Facebook.
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: It's not funny.
• 20:17
  Speaker 4: George Soros stole them girls.
• 20:19
  Speaker 3: I can't.
• 20:19
  Speaker 5: I'm sorry.
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: Jesus Christ. The folks at the DGA wanted us to
• 20:25
  Speaker 3: remind you to text NC to 30201 to help Democratic
• 20:29
  Speaker 3: governors win North Carolina.
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's important. That's important because here's where we stop laughing.
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: Race is tied.
• 20:35
  Speaker 4: It's tied bad.
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: It's real bad. Josh Stein is the Democratic Attorney General
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: in North Carolina. Dan, what do you think about this race?
• 20:40
  Speaker 4: I fucking hope Josh Stein can win because if not,
• 20:43
  Speaker 4: we're in real trouble.
• 20:45
  Speaker 3: Quite a setup for that.
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: So get him those shekels. Oh my God.
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: It's a situation in North Carolina where Mark Robinson does have,
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: even though he's a fucking loony kook, he has a
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: lot of name ID because he is the lieutenant governor.
• 21:02
  Speaker 5: Yeah, this guy's already the lieutenant governor of North Carolina.
• 21:05
  Speaker 5: He's not just walking in off of Facebook.
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: Now, Josh Stein has run statewide also, so he's a
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: statewide figure as well as attorney general.
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: Isn't it cool to be a kook in North Carolina?
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: Wasn't that Outer Banks? The kooks in the.
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: Who are you thinking of?
• 21:17
  Speaker 4: The TV show, The Outer Banks?
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: The Pogues were cool, my bad.
• 21:20
  Speaker 5: Sorry, yeah.
• 21:21
  Speaker 3: Oh, my God.
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: I watched TV during the pandemic. Someone get a compilation
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: of Tommy's dad jokes for New Year's. It's a reference.
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: It's topical.
• 21:28
  Speaker 4: It's timely.
• 21:29
  Speaker 5: I didn't think it was bad.
• 21:30
  Speaker 4: It was topical.
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: It's on my team.
• 21:32
  Speaker 3: It's timely.
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: It's very timely.
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: How dare you?
• 21:34
  Speaker 5: I always love Go For It.
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: Anyway, anyway, got to help Josh Stein, everyone.
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: Yes, please. Come on.
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: This is bad, bad, bad, bad. Everyone, thoughts on Allred
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: versus Cruz? I think it's tough for Allred in a
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: presidential electorate environment. But, you know, polls so far, limited polling,
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: but polls so far show him somewhat close to Cruz.
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: Yeah, look, Ted Cruz absolutely sucks. People hate his guts.
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: He motivates Democrats in a way that very few other
• 21:59
  Speaker 3: down ballot races will. Colin Allred is a really good guy.
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: He's a super interesting bio. Played in the NFL. He's
• 22:06
  Speaker 3: from Texas. Played college football there, too. Um, he's really
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: smart and thoughtful and a compelling speaker and was great
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: on this show in particular. So I don't know. He's
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: someone we'd love to have in the Senate. Excited about it.
• 22:16
  Speaker 5: At some point.
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: And if you're great on this show, that's all it takes.
• 22:19
  Speaker 4: Sky's the limit for you.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: Rocket ship.
• 22:20
  Speaker 5: Yeah. You can't get to the Senate or the White House,
• 22:21
  Speaker 5: but there's a lot of other cool places you can
• 22:24
  Speaker 5: get to.
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: Like the show.
• 22:27
  Speaker 5: Like the show.
• 22:27
  Speaker 4: Yeah. I don't know.
• 22:28
  Speaker 5: You know, look, Texas, Texas has been like Lucy with
• 22:31
  Speaker 5: the football. I know. But you know what? Uh, So it's,
• 22:34
  Speaker 5: this is America.
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: This is, this is America. And it's a new day.
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: It's a new, and I look at Beto.
• 22:40
  Speaker 4: Couldn't do it where, where Beto walk.
• 22:42
  Speaker 5: Colin can run.
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: Then do you have some insight?
• 22:44
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 22:45
  Speaker 4: I don't know if it's insight. I think Colin Allred
• 22:48
  Speaker 4: is a, basically a perfect candidate for Texas is a
• 22:52
  Speaker 4: black moderate football player. Um, He has a great demeanor.
• 22:57
  Speaker 4: He is someone who reaches out to people across the
• 23:00
  Speaker 4: ideological spectrum. He can sort of elide some of the
• 23:04
  Speaker 4: typical caricatures of Democrats. Is it a very hard race
• 23:07
  Speaker 4: in Texas generally? Yes. Is it even harder in a
• 23:09
  Speaker 4: presidential year with Donald Trump on the ballot? Absolutely. Does
• 23:12
  Speaker 4: he have a shot? Sure. It's a long shot, but
• 23:14
  Speaker 4: he has a shot. But there's also real value in
• 23:17
  Speaker 4: supporting and funding his candidacy because the map is shifting
• 23:21
  Speaker 4: in ways that are not great for Democrats. Texas is
• 23:23
  Speaker 4: something we need to get into our column before long.
• 23:25
  Speaker 4: And every time we run a competitive, well-funded, well-organized race,
• 23:29
  Speaker 4: we get ourselves a little bit closer to Charlie actually
• 23:31
  Speaker 4: kicking that football. And so I think if people have
• 23:36
  Speaker 4: money and they're looking for Senate candidate support, it is
• 23:38
  Speaker 4: not the race that will likely deliver us the Senate.
• 23:40
  Speaker 4: But building long-term, sustainable, progressive power, investing in Colin Albright
• 23:44
  Speaker 4: is probably a good idea.
• 23:46
  Speaker 3: Hey, who better to kick that football than a 6'1,
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: 237-pound outside linebacker who ran a 4'7, 5'40. Wow.
• 23:54
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: And played at Baylor.
• 23:55
  Speaker 4: Do you have his combine stats in front of you?
• 23:57
  Speaker 3: I googled it. I did.
• 24:00
  Speaker 5: He has it saved on his desk.
• 24:02
  Speaker 3: I haven't tattooed him.
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: All right. Another state that's been shifting to Democrats, Arizona.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: Kyrsten Sinema is out.
• 24:10
  Speaker 5: Don't let the door hit you where the good Lord
• 24:11
  Speaker 5: split you.
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: I make dad jokes?
• 24:16
  Speaker 5: That's not a dad joke. That's just a great old saying.
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: That is a dad joke. That is a dad joke.
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: So she's out. She hadn't been raising a lot of money,
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: so people kind of suspected she was out. Seems like
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: she's retiring for good. Doesn't quite seem like she's ready
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: to jump on the no labels ticket. I haven't heard that.
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: She wants to spend more time with her hedge fund,
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: I think. Yeah, I think she's going to go do
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: her marathons. She likes her marathons.
• 24:37
  Speaker 3: Learn more about wine.
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: Learn more about wine. So last two head-to-head polls in Arizona.
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: have Gallego up 7 and 10 on Cary Lake. Only
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: two polls, you know, not super high quality polls, but
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: not bad. Not bad. What do you guys think?
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: He's another really good candidate, I think. I mean, he's
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: a former Marine. He talks like a normal human being.
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: He's super thoughtful. He can connect with like your average voter.
• 24:59
  Speaker 3: He's a combat veteran. I mean, I think the fact
• 25:02
  Speaker 3: this is now a one-on-one race is really important. I
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: think what he needs is money because Kyrsten Sinema has
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: been kind of like parked in this will-she-won't-she region, the
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: DSCC and all the other party organizations haven't been able
• 25:15
  Speaker 3: to go all in on Arizona. So they've been having
• 25:17
  Speaker 3: to cobble together their own grassroots donor base. So they're
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: a little behind just on raising, but at least they
• 25:23
  Speaker 3: have this fundraising base of their own, and now they
• 25:25
  Speaker 3: need the DSCC to come in and help them out.
• 25:27
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, look, Arizona has, you know, this is
• 25:31
  Speaker 5: a closely divided state, but it's also a state that
• 25:34
  Speaker 5: has rejected these fucking kooks. And... Carrie Lake, if they
• 25:37
  Speaker 5: ran a, she's the queen of the cooks, she's the
• 25:38
  Speaker 5: queen of the cooks. And if they had run a
• 25:40
  Speaker 5: more normal old school type of Republican who didn't believe
• 25:43
  Speaker 5: in the election lie and wasn't just, you know, harassing
• 25:47
  Speaker 5: Ruben Gallego at the airport, uh, maybe they'd have, maybe
• 25:50
  Speaker 5: this would be, uh, maybe they'd have a better shot.
• 25:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: And much like Trump, she was telling McCain voters to, uh,
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: fuck off. Um, so I bet, I suspect you'll see
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: Gallego try to, um, reach out to a lot of
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: those moderate and independent voters who make up a big
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: portion of the electorate in Arizona. I noticed that you
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: could sort of tell that he's been moderating a little
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: bit over in the last several months. But look, replacing
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: Sinema with Gallego and keeping the Senate means that we
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: would have the votes to get rid of the filibuster
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: at least for reinstating Roe v. Wade and passing the
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: Voting Rights Act. It is huge if we hold the
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: House and the presidency, too. But like we've we talk
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: a lot about all the bad things that we can
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: prevent from happening if if Joe Biden wins again and
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump doesn't. But this is a good thing, a
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: really good thing. Voting Rights Act and abortion rights nationwide.
• 26:46
  Speaker 5: Yeah, these are like taking just a second on just
• 26:49
  Speaker 5: the kind of like cynical, you know, no labels-esque bipartisanship
• 26:55
  Speaker 5: of Kyrsten Sinema and the things she decided she was
• 26:58
  Speaker 5: going to draw a line on. Because, you know, in
• 27:01
  Speaker 5: her announcement video, she talks about bipartisan legislation that would
• 27:05
  Speaker 5: have passed if she didn't exist. But then you look
• 27:07
  Speaker 5: at like the places where she said, I'm going to
• 27:09
  Speaker 5: use my power to kind of demonstrate what it means
• 27:13
  Speaker 5: to me to be bipartisan. That was where she decided
• 27:15
  Speaker 5: to save the filibuster. That is where she decided to
• 27:18
  Speaker 5: stop the Biden administration from negotiating for prescription drugs. That
• 27:20
  Speaker 5: is where she decided to protect things like the carried
• 27:22
  Speaker 5: interest loophole. And I think it is a very good
• 27:24
  Speaker 5: thing that she discovered that there was no constituency for
• 27:27
  Speaker 5: defining bipartisan as just stopping a few progressive but also
• 27:32
  Speaker 5: extremely popular bipartisan policies.
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: One quick thing on Carrie Lake is she's been trying
• 27:37
  Speaker 3: to smooth over her her MAGA craziness. And, you know,
• 27:40
  Speaker 3: she was like all in with Trump on attacking the rhinos,
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: attacking the McCain family. Right. Like it's MAGA only for her.
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: She's been trying to walk that back. Meghan McCain tweeted
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: the other day about Carrie Lake trying to walk back
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: these attacks on her dad. And her tweet ended, no peace, bitch.
• 27:57
  Speaker 3: We see you for who you are and are repulsed
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: by it. And Carrie Lake wrote back this novel in response.
• 28:02
  Speaker 3: It was like, I'd love nothing more than to buy
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: you a beer, a coffee or a lunch and pick
• 28:05
  Speaker 3: your brain about how we can work together. So she
• 28:07
  Speaker 3: is full on groveling and trying to, you know, clean
• 28:10
  Speaker 3: up her past. We'll see if it works, but I
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: hope not.
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: All right, let's talk about Joe Biden, who won every
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: Super Tuesday primary but American Samoa, which he lost to
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: 52-year-old Jason Palmer by 51 to 40. Not percentages, votes.
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: All right, raise your hand here. Who knew the name
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: Jason Palmer? Who had heard the name Jason Palmer before
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: last night?
• 28:42
  Speaker 3: Any of you guys? Not even.
• 28:44
  Speaker 5: I think he texted me for donations, but I can't
• 28:46
  Speaker 5: tell because everybody's texting me.
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: Dan, what about you? Did you ever hear of Jason Palmer?
• 28:50
  Speaker 4: He learns something new every day.
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: Can I tell you my funny Jason Palmer thing from
• 28:54
  Speaker 3: this morning? So I, like you, I Googled him. I
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: was like, who is this dude? Politico had done sort
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: of a profile video of him about a month ago.
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: His entire case is like, I'm 52, I'm young, Joe
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: Biden is old. The Politico video included a counterpoint from
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: a spokesperson to say it's okay to be old from
• 29:11
  Speaker 3: Dianne Feinstein's former press guy, who's like, actually, no, age
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: doesn't matter.
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: Hey, I get some backup here.
• 29:17
  Speaker 3: Which I just thought was pretty amazing. Continue though.
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: You mentioned that his whole thing was just campaigning as
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: a younger Joe Biden, but the same thing. Also, Dean
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: Phillips's whole thing. And Jason Palmer will end up with
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: more delegates than Dean Phillips, who did suspend his campaign today,
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: though Phillips did it in a pretty classy way, He
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: endorsed Joe Biden, said he's going to campaign for him,
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: said he's a good and decent man. Dean Phillips also
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: had quite a funny tweet last night. He said, And
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: then after Jason Palmer won, he replied to that tweet
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: and said, Oh, and Jason Palmer.
• 29:58
  Speaker 3: That's good.
• 29:58
  Speaker 5: Good for Dean Phillips.
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: Good for Dean Phillips. All's well that ends well there. Okay.
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: The only nominal opposition to Biden materialized last night in
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: the uncommitted vote, again, which received 19% in Minnesota, 13%
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: in North Carolina, and 8% in Colorado. Biden campaign is
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: not concerned. They released a memo this morning saying they
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: are well-prepared and well-positioned to beat Trump, who they called, quote,
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: cash-strapped and beleaguered by an extreme agenda that makes him
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: unpopular with the voters he needs to win. The pro-Biden
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: groups and super PACs alone have promised to spend $ 700
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: million to defeat Trump with an ad campaign that will
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: start immediately just as President Biden prepares to deliver the
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: State of the Union address tomorrow night. What do you
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: guys make of the uncommitted vote?
• 30:41
  Speaker 3: I mean, look, I'm biased here because I care a
• 30:43
  Speaker 3: lot about Gaza, but I'm concerned. I don't think Biden
• 30:45
  Speaker 3: is going to lose Minnesota. That's not my fear. But
• 30:48
  Speaker 3: I think there's a warning sign here. I think we
• 30:49
  Speaker 3: saw it in Michigan. We saw it in Minnesota. Those
• 30:51
  Speaker 3: states have large Arab-American, Muslim-American populations, but I think it's
• 30:54
  Speaker 3: wrong to think that this is just an issue with
• 30:56
  Speaker 3: that cohort of voters. I think young voters are extremely
• 30:59
  Speaker 3: frustrated about the administration's Gaza policies. The uncommitted vote was
• 31:03
  Speaker 3: highest in areas with the most young voters. You're seeing
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: protesters at like every single Biden campaign event. You're seeing
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: Wall Street Journal polls that shows concern about Gaza policy
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: is growing. And so I just think like the death
• 31:17
  Speaker 3: toll is already staggering, but listeners should know that this
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: will be nothing If there is a Gaza-wide famine, if
• 31:23
  Speaker 3: there's a massive cholera outbreak or some other disease, if
• 31:26
  Speaker 3: there's a major ground invasion into Rafah where 1.4 million
• 31:29
  Speaker 3: people are now living mostly in tents and shelters. So
• 31:33
  Speaker 3: I know the Biden team is pushing hard for a
• 31:35
  Speaker 3: six-week ceasefire, but they need to dial up the public pressure,
• 31:39
  Speaker 3: I think, state more clearly where they stand. Because you
• 31:41
  Speaker 3: saw Kamala Harris talk about the administration's policy that they've
• 31:44
  Speaker 3: been talking about in other places and get cheered. Because
• 31:47
  Speaker 3: she forcefully called for a ceasefire, whereas other Biden officials
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: have been booed for kind of talking about the same thing,
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: but in a less, you know, declaratory way and sounding
• 31:58
  Speaker 3: like they're observing the events versus trying to shape them.
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: I will say, too, that if you read some of
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: the interviews with people who voted uncommitted, it's not just
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: that they're Arab-American or Muslim or young progressives. One person
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: was quoted saying, like, I'm really upset about Gaza. I'm
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: also mad about inflation and the border being out of
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: control and too many migrants coming in. So it's, it's
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: like a, it's just, it's become a vehicle for a
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: protest about Gaza, but also a host of other issues
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: that people are upset with.
• 32:27
  Speaker 3: They got 11 delegates.
• 32:28
  Speaker 5: And I look, I, and I agree with everything that
• 32:30
  Speaker 5: Tommy is saying, but I do think it's even, it
• 32:32
  Speaker 5: is deeper than that, which is if you ask people
• 32:35
  Speaker 5: how they feel about a Biden Trump rematch, 48% say
• 32:38
  Speaker 5: they're negative about it. 42 are depressed about it. And
• 32:41
  Speaker 5: that is more true of Democrats than it is Republicans.
• 32:44
  Speaker 5: And like, You can like slice the numbers any way
• 32:46
  Speaker 5: you want. You can point to the ways in which
• 32:47
  Speaker 5: you have strength. That is a huge problem. It is
• 32:49
  Speaker 5: a huge problem that Democrats on the whole find that
• 32:53
  Speaker 5: find the prospect of this rematch depressing.
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I will. I will say like on the whole,
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: when you look at the uncommitted vote and you compare
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: it to the uncommitted vote against Barack Obama in 2012
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: through a host of states, it is not. it looks
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: favorable compared to that. They're similar, the margins and that.
• 33:12
  Speaker 3: Gaza's not going away.
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: But also we're rerunning an election where last time Joe
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: Biden only won by 40,000 votes. Dan, what did you think?
• 33:18
  Speaker 4: Look, I agree with what you said. You got to
• 33:19
  Speaker 4: put these things in context and historically it may not
• 33:23
  Speaker 4: look as bad, but the primary results to date, I think,
• 33:25
  Speaker 4: have told an overly optimistic story about Joe Biden's coalition, right?
• 33:31
  Speaker 4: We see this in the polls. He is struggling much
• 33:33
  Speaker 4: more than Donald Trump to to rebuild his 2020 coalition.
• 33:37
  Speaker 4: And the way the Michigan results were spun because expectations
• 33:41
  Speaker 4: were so high, where I think you and Mehdi talked
• 33:43
  Speaker 4: about it last week, but 100,000 votes, maybe it's not
• 33:47
  Speaker 4: the percent number that people thought, but 100,000 votes is
• 33:50
  Speaker 4: a lot of votes in Michigan. I really hope we're
• 33:51
  Speaker 4: not talking about Minnesota as the battleground state in a
• 33:54
  Speaker 4: few months, because if we are, we got problems- If
• 33:57
  Speaker 4: Minnesota is in trouble, we are in real trouble in Wisconsin.
• 33:59
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 33:59
  Speaker 4: But it's just, I think it, I think it's, I
• 34:02
  Speaker 4: think a lot of people who have taken solace in
• 34:04
  Speaker 4: some of the primary results in giving them a permission
• 34:07
  Speaker 4: to dismiss the polls. And I think what I think
• 34:09
  Speaker 4: is the political reality of the work Joe Biden has
• 34:11
  Speaker 4: to do and can do that. Hopefully this is a
• 34:14
  Speaker 4: reminder that that work exists. It has to be done.
• 34:16
  Speaker 4: It's not just Gaza. It's over a whole bunch of things,
• 34:18
  Speaker 4: but Gaza is a very particular specific challenge that has.
• 34:22
  Speaker 3: To be addressed.
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I, I heard on MSNBC last night, someone say
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: the polls are all wrong. And the proof of that
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: is these exit polls saying that people, people saying, telling
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: the exit pollsters that they wouldn't vote for Donald Trump
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: in the general. And I was like, that is not,
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: that is actually not proof that the polls are wrong
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: because also exit polls are also polls. And we just
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: went through exactly what's going on with the Haley voters.
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: We don't know. There's some portion of them that are
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: gettable for Biden, but we don't know beyond that. Dan,
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: what's your take on the, um, on the memo that
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: the Biden campaign put out this morning and sort of
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: the ad campaign starting now?
• 34:55
  Speaker 4: I think the memo is the best, most realistic case
• 34:59
  Speaker 4: they have put out for why they have optimism for
• 35:03
  Speaker 4: this election that does not show up in the polls, right?
• 35:06
  Speaker 4: That Biden has some structural advantages. Donald Trump has some weaknesses.
• 35:09
  Speaker 4: We talked about them here. And I think it's the
• 35:13
  Speaker 4: case that I think that has to be made to
• 35:15
  Speaker 4: activists and donors about why Biden can win. There's a
• 35:19
  Speaker 4: lot of like, Trump can't win. People care about democracy.
• 35:22
  Speaker 4: They'd never elect this guy that's all just like voodoo,
• 35:25
  Speaker 4: wishful thinking. And this is like the real, this is,
• 35:28
  Speaker 4: I mean, this is how a campaign who is serious
• 35:31
  Speaker 4: and has a plan to go win. This is how
• 35:32
  Speaker 4: they lay out that plan. And it's a very credible case, right?
• 35:35
  Speaker 4: It is why this election is, will undoubtedly be closer
• 35:38
  Speaker 4: than what the margins we see like in this New
• 35:40
  Speaker 4: York Times poll, right? Is that Biden has these financial advantages,
• 35:43
  Speaker 4: structural advantages. Donald Trump has weaknesses that can be exploited
• 35:46
  Speaker 4: that just haven't been exploited yet.
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: What do you guys think?
• 35:50
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I agree with that. What I thought when reading
• 35:52
  Speaker 5: it is like, you know, we are, that theory totally
• 35:57
  Speaker 5: makes sense to me. I hope and believe it will
• 36:01
  Speaker 5: be true. The polls do not reflect it yet. And
• 36:05
  Speaker 5: what I think when I see this is just, OK,
• 36:07
  Speaker 5: you have this huge financial advantage. The Republican Party is
• 36:10
  Speaker 5: just not as well organized. OK, when do we start
• 36:12
  Speaker 5: seeing the results of an ad campaign like in the polls?
• 36:16
  Speaker 5: When can we start to say, OK, the Biden campaign's
• 36:18
  Speaker 5: theory and their confidence or their performance of confidence, which
• 36:22
  Speaker 5: is what they should be doing, is now bearing out
• 36:24
  Speaker 5: and showing that their theory of the case now towards
• 36:27
  Speaker 5: naysayers who, by the way, were wrong about Biden a
• 36:30
  Speaker 5: bunch of times in the past are wrong about Biden again.
• 36:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, they said They pointed out that 10%
• 36:35
  Speaker 3: of the electorate is undecided, that those supporters like Biden's
• 36:39
  Speaker 3: policies and accomplishments. They just don't necessarily know about them.
• 36:42
  Speaker 3: Going to Super Tuesday, 31% of the electorate wasn't sure
• 36:45
  Speaker 3: if Trump would be the nominee. So people are probably
• 36:46
  Speaker 3: thinking about the race differently now, or at least they
• 36:49
  Speaker 3: will be soon. So yeah, look, there's time here. I
• 36:52
  Speaker 3: do think the State of the Union will be a
• 36:54
  Speaker 3: big moment.
• 36:54
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: To your point, Leavitt, about the ad campaign, I think
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: it is really good that they are starting early. There
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: were some comparisons made to Obama in 2012, starting in
• 37:05
  Speaker 2: May of 2012, I believe, unleashing like an ad campaign
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: to define Mitt Romney, which was quite successful. And so
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: that's great that it's even earlier than that. I think
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: the only difference that's a challenge for the Biden folks is,
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: you know, our goal was to define Romney for people
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: who either didn't know him or remembered him as a
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: moderate governor of Massachusetts. Their goal is going to be
• 37:25
  Speaker 2: much tougher because Donald Trump is well-defined in the minds
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: of voters. And so I think that It's not just
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: negative ads that I bet they'll run, but contrast ads, right?
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: And so it's what Trump means for you, what Biden
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: means for you, what the difference is. I think that's
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: going to be more important than just remember this crazy
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: thing that Donald Trump said.
• 37:43
  Speaker 5: I do think that's like, yes, I think it's voters
• 37:46
  Speaker 5: have a, obviously know who Donald Trump is. But if
• 37:48
  Speaker 5: you look at these polls, their memories are fuzzy. And
• 37:52
  Speaker 5: it is about what parts of Donald Trump are salient
• 37:53
  Speaker 5: to people. And as they point out in the memo,
• 37:56
  Speaker 5: a third of people going into Super Tuesday still didn't
• 37:58
  Speaker 5: believe that Donald Trump was going to be the nominee.
• 38:00
  Speaker 5: And what is not perspective, imaginary, past, gauzy Trump going
• 38:05
  Speaker 5: to be like in people's minds, but the real actual
• 38:07
  Speaker 5: menace and threat of Trump as they define him?
• 38:09
  Speaker 4: It's not just that we had it much easier in
• 38:11
  Speaker 4: 2012 because Romney was largely undefined. Also, people watched TV
• 38:14
  Speaker 4: in 2012, right? It's just like a lot of that
• 38:18
  Speaker 4: ad campaign that started in May of 2012 was a
• 38:21
  Speaker 4: very specific cable television buy on programming, targeting women, informing
• 38:27
  Speaker 4: them that Mitt Romney, who many of them thought was moderate,
• 38:29
  Speaker 4: if they knew anything at all, wanted to defund Planned Parenthood, right?
• 38:32
  Speaker 4: So you could reach a shitload of people in a
• 38:34
  Speaker 4: very targeted way in 2012. That is much, much more
• 38:37
  Speaker 4: challenging now. And it's virtually impossible, other than it's during
• 38:41
  Speaker 4: sporting events, to reach people under the age of 45
• 38:46
  Speaker 4: on linear television, right? Which is where a lot of
• 38:48
  Speaker 4: that money will be spent. So there is a big
• 38:50
  Speaker 4: challenge there, but that's the advantage of having all of
• 38:52
  Speaker 4: this money. And while there's a lot of stuff that's
• 38:54
  Speaker 4: happening for political advertising on connected TV's, a lot of
• 38:59
  Speaker 4: places you can't buy ads. You cannot buy political ads
• 39:01
  Speaker 4: on Netflix for people who have the ad tier on Netflix.
• 39:04
  Speaker 4: And so it won't just be ads, but ads will
• 39:06
  Speaker 4: at least provide some background noise for this.
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: And coincidentally, the Biden campaign is struggling with voters under 45.
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 39:14
  Speaker 3: Well, also interestingly, they're probably gonna have to run ads
• 39:16
  Speaker 3: with the same exact message because a lot of voters,
• 39:19
  Speaker 3: I know this will be shocking to listeners of the show,
• 39:21
  Speaker 3: don't understand the depth of Trump's opposition to abortion access.
• 39:25
  Speaker 3: And what he did to lead to Dobbs being overturned.
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that'll be a huge challenge.
• 39:30
  Speaker 3: Dobbs ruling.
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: That is Axios reports that the campaign's new strategy is to, quote,
• 39:34
  Speaker 2: go for Trump's jugular. They said, quote, Biden has told
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: friends he thinks Trump is wobbly, both intellectually and emotionally,
• 39:40
  Speaker 2: and will go haywire in public if Biden keeps hitting him.
• 39:43
  Speaker 2: What do you guys think of that strategy?
• 39:45
  Speaker 3: I like it.
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: I like triggering him on issues and contrasts. But I
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: hope you pick issues and contrasts that work to Biden's benefit.
• 39:52
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 39:53
  Speaker 5: Look, I think it's already working. It's already happening. The
• 39:55
  Speaker 5: fact that Trump is going on and being like, actually,
• 39:57
  Speaker 5: I confused Nikki Haley and Nancy Pelosi on purpose. I
• 40:01
  Speaker 5: was doing it on purpose. It is already getting to him.
• 40:04
  Speaker 5: So I like that.
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: There's value in it. It is basically like the Lincoln
• 40:08
  Speaker 3: Project theory of the case from the last cycle, right? Remember,
• 40:10
  Speaker 3: they would run ads like, just in the Palm Beach area,
• 40:13
  Speaker 3: I'd be like, Donald, they're talking about you. And it's
• 40:15
  Speaker 3: like him tweeting on the toilet as the image. You know, right?
• 40:18
  Speaker 3: So this is a strategy that I support and I'd
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: like to see implemented, but is not novel per se.
• 40:24
  Speaker 4: Dan? Yeah, I think if there's opportunities to do that,
• 40:28
  Speaker 4: they should do it. Biden and his team like to
• 40:30
  Speaker 4: call Trump a loser. They've been doing that. Biden did
• 40:32
  Speaker 4: it in his democracy speech on multiple occasions. He did
• 40:35
  Speaker 4: it in that South Carolina political speech he did right
• 40:37
  Speaker 4: before the primaries. So we should do that. But I
• 40:39
  Speaker 4: actually think that's not what their strategy is going to be.
• 40:42
  Speaker 4: I think that's something you tell Axios. In the statement,
• 40:45
  Speaker 4: we did that. We did it on time because people
• 40:47
  Speaker 4: are like, Biden's got to fight back. He's got to
• 40:48
  Speaker 4: be punished.
• 40:50
  Speaker 5: If you give a leak.
• 40:51
  Speaker 4: To Axios about your political strategy, you are saying, I
• 40:53
  Speaker 4: really want to tell my donors what I'm going to
• 40:56
  Speaker 4: do so they'll write me checks. And I think they
• 40:57
  Speaker 4: will do some of that. I think there's that New
• 40:59
  Speaker 4: York Times story where it talks about Biden really wants
• 41:02
  Speaker 4: to do those TikTok videos where he is– He is
• 41:04
  Speaker 4: holding an iPad and responding to crazy things Trump says.
• 41:07
  Speaker 3: The dances?
• 41:07
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 41:08
  Speaker 3: Yes, he wants to do the dances.
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: Biden's out there being like, bring me my TikTok. Bring
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: me the TikTok.
• 41:12
  Speaker 4: Get ready with me.
• 41:14
  Speaker 5: Get ready with me while I go to Ukraine again.
• 41:16
  Speaker 4: Yeah. But in the statement they put out last night,
• 41:19
  Speaker 4: which I think is the, in my opinion, at least
• 41:21
  Speaker 4: the best distillation of a message for this race, here's
• 41:25
  Speaker 4: what Biden said. Tonight's results leave the American people with
• 41:28
  Speaker 4: a clear choice. Are we going to keep moving forward?
• 41:30
  Speaker 4: Or will we allow Donald Trump to drag us backwards
• 41:32
  Speaker 4: into the chaos, division, and darkness that defined his time
• 41:34
  Speaker 4: in office?
• 41:35
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 41:36
  Speaker 4: Like that is ultimately, and I think you get to
• 41:38
  Speaker 4: that message by, without having to make Donald Trump glitch
• 41:42
  Speaker 4: on television every other day.
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: But he'll probably do that on his own.
• 41:46
  Speaker 7: Yeah, that's right.
• 41:46
  Speaker 4: The glitching is the chaos.
• 41:47
  Speaker 5: The glitching is good.
• 41:48
  Speaker 4: The glitching.
• 41:48
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 41:48
  Speaker 2: The glitching is the chaos.
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: Like a glitch, yeah.
• 41:51
  Speaker 2: I just want them to, and I think Loser does this.
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: But if you're going to trigger him, you've got to
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: trigger him on issues that work for you. Because if
• 41:58
  Speaker 2: we have like a news cycle of fights about some
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: crazy thing Donald Trump said that we know doesn't matter
• 42:03
  Speaker 2: to voters as much, we're just sort of wasting time.
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: So I think like on election denialism, on abortion, like
• 42:09
  Speaker 2: there are these issues that we know are weaknesses for
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump that I imagine that if they're going to
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: trigger him, they would.
• 42:14
  Speaker 3: Do it on that.
• 42:15
  Speaker 5: I agree with that too. But if you look at
• 42:16
  Speaker 5: the polls, the polls show that like You ask people, like,
• 42:19
  Speaker 5: do you think Joe Biden is mentally fit or Trump
• 42:22
  Speaker 5: is mentally fit, physically fit, physically fit? There is a
• 42:25
  Speaker 5: group that says Biden's fit.
• 42:26
  Speaker 3: There's a group that say Trump is fit. There's a
• 42:28
  Speaker 3: group that says neither is fit.
• 42:29
  Speaker 5: We may struggle to get the Biden number up, but
• 42:31
  Speaker 5: we can get that both are unfit number up, too.
• 42:33
  Speaker 5: You know, I don't hate that.
• 42:34
  Speaker 4: I think the poll. I think the pollster should ask
• 42:36
  Speaker 4: the question, is Trump morally fit?
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.
• 42:40
  Speaker 2: Well, Biden was doing better in the New York Times
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: poll on who has the temperament and character to be president.
• 42:45
  Speaker 2: He was winning on that one. And that's been the
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: case in a couple polls now. What do you guys
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: want to hear from Biden in the big State of
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: the Union tomorrow night?
• 42:54
  Speaker 3: I got one for you. Okay. From Kentucky to Kiev,
• 42:57
  Speaker 3: we're rebuilding bridges and our alliances. Well, you don't need
• 43:02
  Speaker 3: to rebuild alliances in Kentucky.
• 43:03
  Speaker 2: To Kiev, motherfucker. What about his friend Mitch McConnell?
• 43:07
  Speaker 5: Well, maybe they'll go do another bridge event together.
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: Oh God, he's going to say something nice about Mitch
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: McConnell and the State of the Union.
• 43:13
  Speaker 5: Yeah, people aren't going to like it. So, you know, John,
• 43:17
  Speaker 5: you made the point about what's motivating Democrats. And there
• 43:20
  Speaker 5: were two numbers. We talked about the polling last week,
• 43:22
  Speaker 5: but there was two that jumped out at me about
• 43:23
  Speaker 5: the State of the Union. You know, you had mentioned
• 43:26
  Speaker 5: that like, that more people think Trump has a vision
• 43:28
  Speaker 5: for the country, but actually 50% of voters think Joe
• 43:31
  Speaker 5: Biden has a vision for the country. But if you
• 43:33
  Speaker 5: ask people who's fighting for people like you, Trump is
• 43:37
  Speaker 5: beating Biden. Trump's, it's 48 to 52. For Biden, it's
• 43:40
  Speaker 5: 42 to 58. And then if you ask people, what
• 43:44
  Speaker 5: is the 2024 election about? Is it about hope for
• 43:46
  Speaker 5: what might happen? Or is it about fear of what
• 43:48
  Speaker 5: might happen? For Biden voters, it's 65, 35% fear, right?
• 43:52
  Speaker 5: And I think that that is a legitimate place for
• 43:55
  Speaker 5: Democrats to be. We are talking about the end of democracy.
• 43:58
  Speaker 5: We're talking about the end of basic human rights. But
• 44:00
  Speaker 5: I do think this is a speech to say, hey,
• 44:02
  Speaker 5: we are going to do everything we can to protect
• 44:04
  Speaker 5: basic rights. We're going to do everything we can to
• 44:05
  Speaker 5: protect democracy. But here's what we can do with this democracy.
• 44:08
  Speaker 5: Here are the things that we can achieve if we
• 44:10
  Speaker 5: are able to protect this democracy. Because I do think
• 44:12
  Speaker 5: that's the third piece. You know, he's done this big
• 44:14
  Speaker 5: abortion speech. He did that great January 6th speech. And
• 44:17
  Speaker 5: now it's okay. If we're protecting basic rights, that's stopping
• 44:20
  Speaker 5: something bad. We're defending democracy, that's stopping something bad. What
• 44:23
  Speaker 5: are we going to do?
• 44:25
  Speaker 3: Dan?
• 44:26
  Speaker 4: First, I have a question for you guys. Do you
• 44:27
  Speaker 4: think he should make an age joke?
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: Look, I've said this quite a few times now. I
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: think from the scene from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: where Gene Wilder.
• 44:38
  Speaker 3: That's a big ass, John.
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: He trips. It looks like he's going to trip and
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: then does a somersault and he's up on his feet.
• 44:43
  Speaker 3: You didn't see the other takes. You didn't see the
• 44:45
  Speaker 3: other takes.
• 44:47
  Speaker 4: He didn't do that live.
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: He's got one shot. Let's just do it. Do you
• 44:50
  Speaker 2: want to be president or no?
• 44:51
  Speaker 3: I'd vote yes, Dan.
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: Okay. Yeah, I think so too.
• 44:53
  Speaker 3: That's a good one.
• 44:56
  Speaker 4: Other than that question, I have, I think, a different
• 44:58
  Speaker 4: take than Lovett on this. What I kind of hope
• 45:03
  Speaker 4: for Biden... on Thursday night is that he talks to
• 45:10
  Speaker 4: the American people sort of where they are. I think
• 45:13
  Speaker 4: one of the problems that we... This is less things
• 45:14
  Speaker 4: that come out of Joe Biden's mouth, so maybe I
• 45:16
  Speaker 4: shouldn't worry about it, but you heard a lot from
• 45:17
  Speaker 4: other Democrats, members of Congress. It's like, Joe Biden has
• 45:20
  Speaker 4: passed more legislation in three years than any president's passed
• 45:24
  Speaker 4: in 16 years. Greatest president since FDR. This is the
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: greatest economy since the post-World War II boom. And those
• 45:30
  Speaker 4: things may all be technically true in many ways, and
• 45:33
  Speaker 4: Joe Biden has been a great president, but This is
• 45:35
  Speaker 4: not something you can sell to voters in this political environment, right?
• 45:38
  Speaker 4: They don't know any of the things you did. They
• 45:41
  Speaker 4: don't know– they're not happy with the way things are.
• 45:44
  Speaker 4: They don't feel good about the economy. And so we
• 45:47
  Speaker 4: think there is just a lowering of the rhetoric. And
• 45:50
  Speaker 4: I took this from the statement they put out last night,
• 45:52
  Speaker 4: which is Joe Biden inherited an absolute shitshow that Donald
• 45:55
  Speaker 4: Trump helped create. You can't– people will not believe that
• 45:58
  Speaker 4: Donald Trump is fully responsible for COVID, but he did
• 46:01
  Speaker 4: put us in a worse position than we should be in.
• 46:03
  Speaker 4: Worked hard, worked in a bipartisan way to make real progress.
• 46:08
  Speaker 4: Here's where we are today. Here is what I want
• 46:11
  Speaker 4: to do. But more importantly, here's what the Republicans will,
• 46:13
  Speaker 4: and Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans will take away
• 46:15
  Speaker 4: from you. Because I think if people are so cynical
• 46:17
  Speaker 4: right now, it's very hard to convince them that we're
• 46:20
  Speaker 4: going to pass a bunch of really big things. Those
• 46:22
  Speaker 4: things will be in the speech, of course. But I
• 46:24
  Speaker 4: think more emphasis on the things Republicans will take away,
• 46:27
  Speaker 4: your rights, your freedoms, birth control, IVF, your health care.
• 46:32
  Speaker 4: And just like loss aversion, I think, is going to
• 46:34
  Speaker 4: be a very powerful message here. And I think there's
• 46:37
  Speaker 4: just a lowering of the rhetoric to sort of be
• 46:40
  Speaker 4: right where people are. And the democracy stuff is very true.
• 46:43
  Speaker 4: It's very important. But our friend David Axelrod said something
• 46:47
  Speaker 4: on CNN last night that I thought was very, very
• 46:50
  Speaker 4: apt for Biden's speech, which is, if there's a family
• 46:53
  Speaker 4: sitting on the dinner table talking about the future of democracy,
• 46:56
  Speaker 4: They probably weren't worried about how much their dinner cost.
• 46:59
  Speaker 4: And so if you want to get to the market stuff,
• 47:01
  Speaker 4: you have to get to the economic stuff first. And
• 47:04
  Speaker 4: so I hope we sort of see that tomorrow night.
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Inflation is down, but the effects of inflation and
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: the lingering memories of inflation and the high prices are
• 47:15
  Speaker 2: still around, and you've got to acknowledge that. And like
• 47:18
  Speaker 2: you said, I think Biden has been better at that
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: than some of the broader democratic universe of surrogates. But Dan,
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: you sent me this blueprint polling memo, which is great
• 47:31
  Speaker 2: because they asked people's top concerns about a Trump second
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: term and then top concerns about a Biden second term.
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: Top Trump concerns, abuses of power. Trump would abuse the
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: presidency to take revenge on his political rivals, breaking the law,
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: ignoring military leaders and acting in dangerous ways that threaten
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: national security. And then abortion. What do we do to abortion?
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: And then policies that favor tax cheats and rich people.
• 47:55
  Speaker 2: So you do get a little bit of, you get
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: the economy stuff, but you, and we talk about democracy
• 48:00
  Speaker 2: as if it's like all or nothing. I think it's
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: the way it's framed. When you talk about democracy, just
• 48:05
  Speaker 2: as like, we must save democracy. It might sound a
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: little hyperbolic to people who don't necessarily think that democracy
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: is under attack. I know that's a lot of people
• 48:12
  Speaker 2: believe us when you, when you drill down on exactly
• 48:15
  Speaker 2: what he's going to do, extremely unpopular for people. Now,
• 48:17
  Speaker 2: you can't do that in the State of the Union
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: because he's not going to talk about Trump abusing his power.
• 48:22
  Speaker 2: But as the campaign goes forward, it's a good thing
• 48:24
  Speaker 2: to keep in mind.
• 48:25
  Speaker 4: Just to the point about how a lot of Americans
• 48:28
  Speaker 4: consume this, in this blueprint poll, which is, I think, very,
• 48:33
  Speaker 4: very useful, working class voters, people who make under $ 60, 000,
• 48:35
  Speaker 4: here are the top three concerns about Trump. This is
• 48:38
  Speaker 4: a group that Trump is winning by 3% in this poll.
• 48:41
  Speaker 4: Number one, Trump will let rich tax cheats off the hook. Two,
• 48:44
  Speaker 4: Trump will cut Social Security and Medicare. Three, Trump would
• 48:47
  Speaker 4: cut taxes for the rich, but not working in middle-class families.
• 48:51
  Speaker 4: Those are the top three concerns for people whose economic
• 48:53
  Speaker 4: and financial security is at the forefront of their life.
• 48:56
  Speaker 4: And those are the people in that New York Times
• 48:58
  Speaker 4: Santa poll that Biden is struggling with the most, people
• 49:01
  Speaker 4: who make less money.
• 49:03
  Speaker 5: I have a feeling we will hear that contrast in full.
• 49:05
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 49:06
  Speaker 5: I will also say, last year's State of the Union,
• 49:08
  Speaker 5: I thought was like a really great moment for Joe Biden.
• 49:11
  Speaker 5: And I think it was a great moment because I
• 49:12
  Speaker 5: think he had an economic message. It was a great
• 49:15
  Speaker 5: moment because he was energetic, he was feisty, and he
• 49:17
  Speaker 5: mixed it up.
• 49:17
  Speaker 3: A repartee.
• 49:18
  Speaker 5: He mixed it up with the Republicans in the room.
• 49:21
  Speaker 5: And look, there's never been a moment in Joe Biden's
• 49:25
  Speaker 5: life in which it was more important that he seemed
• 49:29
  Speaker 5: vigorous and energetic and honest fucking shit. Maybe more important
• 49:33
  Speaker 5: than- You think so? Don't you agree with that?
• 49:36
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 49:37
  Speaker 4: I also, by the way, here's the joke.
• 49:39
  Speaker 5: No, no, I do think this, oh, come on. But the,
• 49:42
  Speaker 5: I will say, I think the age joke is going
• 49:43
  Speaker 5: to be about, it'll be about Mitch McConnell. We've known
• 49:46
  Speaker 5: each other for, I've been working with, I've been working
• 49:48
  Speaker 5: with Mitch McConnell for 200 years.
• 49:49
  Speaker 3: My intern.
• 49:50
  Speaker 5: That's my prediction. That's a prediction.
• 49:52
  Speaker 4: Can you send that in? There's still time. We got
• 49:54
  Speaker 4: a day.
• 49:55
  Speaker 5: I'm going to be like, yeah, I'll be like, uh,
• 49:56
  Speaker 5: The movie Tomorrow Never Dies. I'm going to make the news.
• 49:58
  Speaker 3: From Scranton, Sister wrote, we're rebuilding the steel industry. Oh
• 50:01
  Speaker 3: my gosh, still going on that.
• 50:03
  Speaker 5: Oh my God, Iron Dome.
• 50:05
  Speaker 2: Iron Dome.
• 50:06
  Speaker 3: We love the Iron Dome system.
• 50:08
  Speaker 2: Speaking of the State of the Union, we'll be streaming
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: the speech and doing a group thread in two places
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: on our Friends of the Pod Discord and on our
• 50:14
  Speaker 2: YouTube page. The difference is that on the Discord, you'll
• 50:16
  Speaker 2: be able to submit questions for us in the main chat.
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: So if you haven't already, head to crooked.com slash friends
• 50:21
  Speaker 2: to learn more and sign up before tomorrow. Also, It's
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: the general election. We got to do a Vote Save
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: America plug. Go to Vote Save America.
• 50:27
  Speaker 3: It's time to sign up.
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: Go to votesaveamerica.com. And here's our promise. We're not going
• 50:32
  Speaker 2: to have you waste your money or waste your time.
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: We're going to tell you like where you can get
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: the most bang for your buck and where your volunteering
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: is going to have the most effect. And, you know,
• 50:40
  Speaker 2: to Dan's earlier point about how the media environment's broken
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: and it's really, really hard to reach people these days
• 50:45
  Speaker 2: and the Biden campaign is going to be doing all
• 50:47
  Speaker 2: it can. There's only so much that we can control
• 50:49
  Speaker 2: about what the Biden campaign does or what Joe Biden does.
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: But guess what? We all have agency here. We're all messengers.
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: We all know people. And, you know, part of our
• 50:57
  Speaker 2: job in the next eight months is to help turn
• 51:00
  Speaker 2: those poll numbers around. And every time we ask, like, oh,
• 51:03
  Speaker 2: what's the Biden campaign going to do to turn the
• 51:05
  Speaker 2: poll numbers around? Well, that question should be directed at
• 51:08
  Speaker 2: all of us, too, because this is all of our democracy.
• 51:11
  Speaker 5: And if you're not enthusiastic about these two options in 2024,
• 51:15
  Speaker 5: wait till 2028 where there's one option and a guy
• 51:17
  Speaker 5: outside the voting booth with a rubber truncheon.
• 51:19
  Speaker 2: What does he have, a rubber what?
• 51:21
  Speaker 4: Truncheon.
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: Truncheon. Hitting you. Also, we promise not to text you
• 51:25
  Speaker 3: photos of ourselves with alarmist copy at the end of
• 51:28
  Speaker 3: every quarter.
• 51:29
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not going to send those to you.
• 51:30
  Speaker 3: No promises to you. Friend.
• 51:33
  Speaker 2: All right, everyone. Our fundraising is underwhelming. So tomorrow night,
• 51:37
  Speaker 2: State of the Union, Dan and I, we're staying up late.
• 51:39
  Speaker 2: We're going to do a post-so-to record.
• 51:41
  Speaker 3: So, yeah. I'm jumping on with the WOD squad. Please do.
• 51:44
  Speaker 3: Subscribe to WODaday.
• 51:45
  Speaker 5: Okay.
• 51:47
  Speaker 2: And Lovett's going to be doing a show.
• 51:48
  Speaker 3: I'll be doing my show.
• 51:49
  Speaker 2: He's got his variety hour.
• 51:50
  Speaker 5: And I hope they give Biden and me the same
• 51:52
  Speaker 5: fucking drug right before we go out there.
• 51:54
  Speaker 6: You know?
• 51:55
  Speaker 3: Something to get us up.
• 51:56
  Speaker 4: Got to get up.
• 51:56
  Speaker 3: Who's they here? Got to get up.
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 51:57
  Speaker 3: They.
• 51:58
  Speaker 2: The same people Mark Robertson's talking about.
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 52:00
  Speaker 4: Same people Mark Robertson.
• 52:01
  Speaker 3: Same people that made Black Panther.
• 52:02
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 52:02
  Speaker 4: We're going to cut it here.
• 52:03
  Speaker 2: We're going to cut it here.
• 52:04
  Speaker 4: Goodbye, everyone.
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: Goodbye.
• 52:05
  Speaker 6: Bye.
• 52:07
  Speaker 2: If you want to get ad-free episodes, exclusive content, and more,
• 52:10
  Speaker 2: consider joining our Friends of the Pod subscription community at crooked.com
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: slash friends. And if you're already doom-scrolling, don't forget to
• 52:16
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• 52:19
  Speaker 2: YouTube for access to full episodes, bonus content, and more. Plus,
• 52:23
  Speaker 2: if you're as opinionated as we are, consider dropping us
• 52:26
  Speaker 2: a review. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production.
• 52:29
  Speaker 2: Our show is produced by Olivia Martinez and David Toledo.
• 52:33
  Speaker 2: Our associate producers are Saul Rubin and Farrah Safari. Kira
• 52:36
  Speaker 2: Wakim is our senior producer. Reid Cherlin is our executive producer.
• 52:40
  Speaker 2: The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: Cantor is our sound engineer with audio support from Kyle
• 52:46
  Speaker 2: Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Writing support by Hallie Kiefer. Madeline
• 52:50
  Speaker 2: Herringer is our head of news and programming. Matt DeGroat
• 52:52
  Speaker 2: is our head of production. Andy Taft is our executive assistant.
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Haley Jones, Mia Kelman,
• 52:59
  Speaker 2: David Tolles, Kiril Pellaviv, and Molly Lobel.