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Biden Passes the Torch to Kamala · Pod Save America

• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Jon Lovett.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: I'm Tommy Vitor. I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: Well, holy shit.
• 0:26
  Speaker 3: Uh.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: We have just lived through what I'm pretty sure were
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: the most shocking 52 days of any presidential campaign in
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: our lifetime.
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: Definitely.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: On May 30th, Donald Trump became the first presidential nominee
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: in history to be convicted of a felony. On June 27th,
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden had a debate performance so catastrophic that most
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: Democrats and Democratic voters eventually called on him to step down.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: On July 13th, Donald Trump survived an assassination attempt a
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: few days before picking J.D. Vance as his running mate
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: and accepting the Republican nomination for the third time in
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: a row. And at 1.46 p.m. Eastern on July 21st,
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden posted a letter on Twitter announcing that he'd
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: be withdrawing from the race. Shortly after that, he posted
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: a message fully endorsing his vice president, Kamala Harris, to
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: take his place. And since then, she's won endorsements from
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: dozens of Democratic officials. And most importantly, just about every
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: single potential challenger for the nomination. The vice president made
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: her first appearance this morning at the White House during
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: an NAACP sports event. Here's what she said about Biden's legacy.
• 1:27
  Speaker 4: Biden's legacy of accomplishment over the past three years.
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: Is unmatched in modern history. In one term, he has already.
• 1:37
  Speaker 4: Yes, you may clap. In one term, he has already
• 1:45
  Speaker 4: surpassed the legacy of most presidents who have served two
• 1:49
  Speaker 4: terms in office.
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: So we're going to discuss everything, but let's just start
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: with a quick sentence or two reaction from everyone. I'll
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: just start. Trump's party is a cult of personality, and
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: ours is not. And the Democratic Party rallied around Joe
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: Biden in 2020 when everyone believed that he was our
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: best chance to beat Donald Trump. He did. And then
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden held that coalition together by listening to the
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: people in the party with different views, in some cases
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: changing his own views. And in 2024... when the party
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: and the voters told Biden he wasn't our best chance
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: to beat Donald Trump anymore, he listened again and he
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: changed his mind. And that's not just the model of
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: what a strong leader should be. That is the model
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: of what a strong democracy should be.
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: The last few weeks have been contentious because we all
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: understand the stakes in defeating Trump. But the only reason
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: the debate was worth having, and this went unspoken, the
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: only reason it was plausible is because we also understood
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden's character, which meant We knew that he would
• 2:51
  Speaker 3: ultimately do what he felt was best for the country.
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: And yes, there's ego and there's pride. But the reason
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: people felt like this argument was worth making is because
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: if we could succeed in making the argument, he would
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: do what was best. And so I feel like there
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: was an incredible outpouring of enthusiasm and excitement. But my
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: first reaction was just this feeling of gratitude to Joe
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: Biden for being the best version of Joe Biden in
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: this moment where we needed him to be.
• 3:16
  Speaker 5: I decided to leave my phone inside and be present
• 3:19
  Speaker 5: with my daughter for 45 minutes yesterday.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: And that's when this broke. So jokes on me.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: How many texts did you come back to on your phone?
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: A trillion.
• 3:28
  Speaker 5: But no, but jokes aside, I am relieved but anxious
• 3:31
  Speaker 5: about how difficult the road ahead is going to be.
• 3:33
  Speaker 5: I think our odds of winning this election are a
• 3:35
  Speaker 5: lot better than they were a week ago, but still
• 3:37
  Speaker 5: at best 50-50, at best 50-50. I think Joe Biden deserves...
• 3:42
  Speaker 5: a lot of credit for stepping aside. There's a reason
• 3:44
  Speaker 5: people still celebrate George Washington. And it's because most people
• 3:48
  Speaker 5: don't voluntarily give up power. It's exceedingly rare. I'm sure
• 3:52
  Speaker 5: this was an agonizing decision for him.
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: Politics is not just his job. It is his calling.
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: It has been his life.
• 3:58
  Speaker 5: And I think he probably feels like a piece of
• 4:00
  Speaker 5: himself is dying by giving it up.
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: And that is brutally hard. That said, I am worried
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: about how.
• 4:05
  Speaker 5: Long it took to get from the debate to today
• 4:08
  Speaker 5: and Republicans are trying to try to turn this into
• 4:10
  Speaker 5: a conspiracy and they're going to try to lay it
• 4:12
  Speaker 5: at the feet of Kamala Harris. I worry about the
• 4:14
  Speaker 5: damage this process has done to trust in the Democratic
• 4:17
  Speaker 5: Party writ large. But today I am energized. The party
• 4:21
  Speaker 5: is too. You can see it online. You can see
• 4:23
  Speaker 5: it in the grassroots fundraising. You can see it from
• 4:25
  Speaker 5: the big donors. I got a text from a donor
• 4:27
  Speaker 5: yesterday who said he had gone from basically leaving the
• 4:30
  Speaker 5: Democratic Party to cutting a massive check. A massive check. So,
• 4:35
  Speaker 5: as Bama would say, fired up, ready to go. But
• 4:37
  Speaker 5: like a lot of work to do here, people.
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: Dan?
• 4:40
  Speaker 6: My immediate reaction was sadness. Like I was sad that
• 4:44
  Speaker 6: we were at this place and I felt, you know,
• 4:47
  Speaker 6: just empathy for Biden and all the people around him,
• 4:49
  Speaker 6: the people who work for him, all the people who
• 4:50
  Speaker 6: were on that campaign. But I think it really is
• 4:54
  Speaker 6: a hallmark of Joe Biden himself, right? Like this is
• 4:58
  Speaker 6: the embodiment of his message, right? In 2020- He came
• 5:01
  Speaker 6: out of retirement to run because he believed, and correctly so,
• 5:04
  Speaker 6: I imagine, that he was the only one who could
• 5:06
  Speaker 6: defeat Donald Trump at the time when his country needed
• 5:07
  Speaker 6: him the most. And then in 2024, he did the
• 5:11
  Speaker 6: thing that almost no politician would ever do. And certainly,
• 5:14
  Speaker 6: it's impossible to imagine Donald Trump doing, which is to
• 5:16
  Speaker 6: put his personal ambition aside and do what is right
• 5:20
  Speaker 6: for his country. And we should all be grateful to him.
• 5:24
  Speaker 6: We should celebrate him. And I think that it is
• 5:26
  Speaker 6: a testament to to the president he is and the
• 5:31
  Speaker 6: man he is that he did this at this moment,
• 5:33
  Speaker 6: because it is an incredibly difficult thing to do.
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: And he did it.
• 5:37
  Speaker 6: And it's just, thank you. It was, I think, what
• 5:38
  Speaker 6: we should say to him.
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. All right, let's start with what we
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: know about how Biden made the decision. According to NBC,
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: senior campaign aides weren't told of the decision until 1.45
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: Eastern time on Sunday. That is one minute before the
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: letter was posted on Twitter. As late as Saturday morning,
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: Biden was telling staff that the campaign was, quote, full
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: steam ahead. We haven't yet heard from Biden about why
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: he changed his mind. He said in the letter he
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: will address the nation this week. He's still recovering from COVID.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: But the reporting is that his two top aides, Mike
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: Donilon and Steve Reschetti, came to him with new internal
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: polling from the battleground states that showed almost no path
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: to victory. Politico reported that these were the first swing
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: state polls the campaign had conducted in two months, which
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: is shocking, if true, and that they showed Biden behind
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: everywhere and even sinking fast in Virginia and New Mexico.
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: They also reportedly knew that the pressure from Congress and
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: maybe Nancy Pelosi in particular was about to enter a
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: new and more public phase. So starting on Saturday afternoon,
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: Biden worked with Donilon and Reschetti at his beach house
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: to draft the letter. He apparently spoke with the vice
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: president and Jen O'Malley Dillon, his campaign chair, and a
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: few of the most senior West Wing staffers before the
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: letter went out. But that was about it. What do
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: you guys make of the reporting around how and when
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: Biden made the decision and how he made the announcement, Tommy?
• 7:04
  Speaker 5: So, I mean, I think that Joe Biden deserved to
• 7:06
  Speaker 5: break this news himself, which is why it was so
• 7:08
  Speaker 5: close hold among staffers and why I think the process
• 7:12
  Speaker 5: between Decision Saturday and Announcement Sunday feels very compressed after,
• 7:16
  Speaker 5: you know, a long.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: Period before that.
• 7:18
  Speaker 5: I've seen some reporters and others like dunking on Biden
• 7:20
  Speaker 5: staffers for saying last week that Joe Biden was still
• 7:24
  Speaker 5: in it. Frankly, I don't think that's at all fair.
• 7:26
  Speaker 5: Like he was running until he decided not to. There
• 7:28
  Speaker 5: was no dishonesty there. Like that's what happened.
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: And so it was all present tense. If you look back,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden is the candidate. Joe Biden is running. It was.
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: And that's not that's not new. I mean, right.
• 7:38
  Speaker 5: Like this happens every time someone announces for president. You're
• 7:41
  Speaker 5: not running until you are. So I, too, was shocked
• 7:43
  Speaker 5: to read that they hadn't polled in swing states or
• 7:45
  Speaker 5: at least some swing states for a while. That suggests
• 7:48
  Speaker 5: some willful ignorance, maybe by some of Biden's top aides.
• 7:52
  Speaker 5: And that some of the pushback about Biden's numbers not
• 7:55
  Speaker 5: moving in swing states was not honest or at least
• 7:58
  Speaker 5: not fully honest. But, you know, I think big picture,
• 8:02
  Speaker 5: Biden's got a great campaign team. I'm really glad Kamala
• 8:04
  Speaker 5: Harris is going up there today to meet with them.
• 8:07
  Speaker 5: Some of the smartest people in politics are sitting in Delaware,
• 8:09
  Speaker 5: like waiting for marching orders. They had a candidate challenge
• 8:14
  Speaker 5: and a decision making challenge at the very top. But
• 8:16
  Speaker 5: there's a super effective organization sitting there for Kamala Harris
• 8:19
  Speaker 5: to take over.
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: And that's a good thing.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: I will also say on the polling, from that reporting,
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: just about everyone in the Biden campaign did not have
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: access to the polling. And so it was very closed off.
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: So that's why he's polling.
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: Just a few top advisors. So part of why I
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: think a lot of the rest of the team was saying, well,
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: the numbers haven't moved just because they just hadn't seen it.
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: As for what changed, Dan, what's your take on the
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: polling element of these reports? Why do you think they
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: didn't poll swing states for so long? What was going
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: on there?
• 8:47
  Speaker 6: I'm very skeptical that that report is true. It just
• 8:51
  Speaker 6: seems impossible for me to imagine that a well-funded, incredibly
• 8:55
  Speaker 6: sophisticated campaign would not do a series of polls during
• 8:59
  Speaker 6: the 21 most tumultuous days of the campaign. Even put aside,
• 9:06
  Speaker 6: I understand the hesitancy given how committed Biden was to
• 9:10
  Speaker 6: continue the race to do a poll that determined whether
• 9:12
  Speaker 6: he should get in or out, but you want to
• 9:14
  Speaker 6: be tracking it to know what's happening, to know how
• 9:16
  Speaker 6: to adjust your ad traffic. to just understand what the
• 9:19
  Speaker 6: dynamics are, allocate resources among states. And so we know
• 9:23
  Speaker 6: they did some polling because they put that polling out
• 9:25
  Speaker 6: in the, I think, 96 hours or so after the debate.
• 9:28
  Speaker 6: It was a Jeff Guerin poll. It was a poll
• 9:31
  Speaker 6: of seven battleground states, right? Not seven individual polls of
• 9:34
  Speaker 6: the battleground states, but a combined universe taken only from
• 9:36
  Speaker 6: the battleground states that showed movement kind of akin to
• 9:40
  Speaker 6: what we were seeing at the time of a few
• 9:41
  Speaker 6: points against Biden. And we were seeing mostly in that poll,
• 9:44
  Speaker 6: people moving to undecided, not to Trump. So I just
• 9:47
  Speaker 6: don't know whether that's the first poll that made it
• 9:51
  Speaker 6: to Biden or something. It doesn't make a ton of sense.
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: I don't know. I kind of think that that is
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: what they were doing because I think some campaigns just
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: do the– like they did the the Garen polls that
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: were the universe of swing states. But they had some
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: other reporting said that they just hadn't gone in. to
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: the actual state-by-state swing states in a long time.
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: That is possible.
• 10:10
  Speaker 6: That is possible, right? It's just we have this one
• 10:12
  Speaker 6: report that says that, and I'd like to see more
• 10:14
  Speaker 6: before concluding that they didn't do real polling in that period.
• 10:17
  Speaker 6: You sort of understand not polling, not investing. It's a
• 10:19
  Speaker 6: tremendously expensive endeavor to poll, to do seven large sample
• 10:23
  Speaker 6: size polls in the battleground states. They did more because
• 10:25
  Speaker 6: this report suggests that they also went into states that
• 10:28
  Speaker 6: have now become purple, like Virginia and New Mexico and Minnesota,
• 10:32
  Speaker 6: to not do that for the July week and letting
• 10:35
  Speaker 6: things settle out from the debate.
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: So who knows?
• 10:38
  Speaker 6: But maybe it was willful ignorance. Maybe this was the
• 10:41
  Speaker 6: moment when it came time to share that polling with
• 10:44
  Speaker 6: the president to make the case. They seem to be
• 10:46
  Speaker 6: basing a lot of their public arguments, at least, on
• 10:51
  Speaker 6: a very selective cherry picking of public polls. When we
• 10:54
  Speaker 6: were all seeing private surveys that were circulating around from
• 10:58
  Speaker 6: high quality Democratic pollsters showing something that I think was
• 11:00
  Speaker 6: very similar to what was in this Biden poll that
• 11:03
  Speaker 6: he was reported to have seen on Saturday. I guess
• 11:05
  Speaker 6: it's maybe speaks to just the maybe lack of a
• 11:09
  Speaker 6: process to get to this point until the very.
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: Very end.
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: There was a political story that had more details about
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: Chuck Schumer's meeting with Joe Biden last week that I
• 11:20
  Speaker 3: just found interesting. But this is what the story says.
• 11:23
  Speaker 3: It says, Schumer said to Joe Biden, I do not
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: expect you to walk out of this room making a decision,
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: but I hope that you will think about what I said.
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: The president tells Schumer, I need a week. And then
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: the two of them hugged. And I just found that
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: to be like a moving story. I just, it's hard
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: for me to imagine that moment between these two men
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: that have known each other for a long time.
• 11:43
  Speaker 5: Do you think it was a grip and squeeze or
• 11:45
  Speaker 5: was it like a tap on the back? I bet
• 11:46
  Speaker 5: there was like three to five taps.
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: But it just, that whatever the, like the mounting pressure
• 11:51
  Speaker 3: he was feeling, whatever new information he was feeling, whatever
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: kind of, easy way or the hard way we were
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: hearing from Nancy Pelosi. It was just, just in seeing this,
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: it was a reminder that a lot of this, yes,
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: we care about the political stakes, but this was human.
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: And this was people trying to persuade someone in a
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: very difficult moment.
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: Um, long time friend too.
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 12:08
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: That's all.
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: But I do think, I think it's important to realize
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: before we move on that, you know, it's Joe Biden,
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: which pushed out, it was elected officials. It was donors.
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: It was this, it was that the end of the day,
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: it sounds like there were from all the reporting, there
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: were two factors in the decision, what voters were thinking.
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: and his ability to change their minds. And, you know,
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: for all allegations of polling denialism and all this kind
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: of stuff, at the end of the day, Joe Biden
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: saw the numbers and the number behind the numbers are
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: voters and what the American people are thinking and said,
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: you know what, there's not a path here. And I'm
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: going to accept that. And I'm going to listen to
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: the voters in my own party and in the broader electorate.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: And I'm going to do the unbelievably hard thing that
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: is the right thing.
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I do think you have to, I think that's
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: all true.
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: And then on top of that, the fact that it
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: did seem as though as much as we had seen
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: politicians coming out publicly against him, that the week starting
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: right now was going to be even worse.
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: But even that they were, they didn't want to come
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: out against him until they saw that. No, of course,
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: of course, it was all the internal polling. All right,
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: let's talk about what's next. The DNC immediately announced that
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: the party would quote, undertake a transparent and orderly process
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: to come up with a new candidate. But as of
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: this recording, pretty much the entire Democratic Party establishment has
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: endorsed Kamala Harris, including around 150 House Democrats, 35 Democratic senators,
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: 17 governors, including everyone who was thought to be a
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: potential challenger to Harris in a possible mini primary. So
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: Gretchen Whitmer, Andy Beshear, Josh Shapiro, Gavin Newsom, Mark Kelly,
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: Raphael Warnock, Wes Moore, J.B. Pritzker all endorsed Harris. Joe
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: Manchin also said he's not running. There was a moment
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: there where there's sources close to Manchin saying he was
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: thinking about it, but he said this morning he's not running.
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: And it seems like the... He just couldn't resist.
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: One last news cycle. He couldn't resist.
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: Like, maybe I'll re-register as a Democrat and run. Probably
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: wouldn't go well.
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: Houseboat tour.
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: And it also seems like the entire Biden campaign operation
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: can and will now get to work for her, which
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: is excellent that, you know, and General Malley Dillon on
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: a call yesterday told them they all still have jobs
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: and they should. They've been working their asses off for
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: under the most trying circumstances imaginable. Tommy, what do you
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: make of the quick support behind Harris and... Why don't
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: you think any other Democrat took up the DNC on
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: their offer to run in an open process?
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: I think there's a few reasons.
• 14:27
  Speaker 5: I mean, I think the first is they all probably
• 14:29
  Speaker 5: know that Kamala Harris is the immediate frontrunner and anticipated
• 14:33
  Speaker 5: that Joe Biden would endorse her the way he did
• 14:35
  Speaker 5: and then saw this flood of endorsements right out of
• 14:37
  Speaker 5: the gate. The second is I think everyone is aware
• 14:40
  Speaker 5: in Democratic politics of how little time we have between
• 14:43
  Speaker 5: now and Election Day and now and the formal nomination process.
• 14:48
  Speaker 5: You know, we were arguing a couple of weeks ago
• 14:50
  Speaker 5: that a mini process could be great because it creates
• 14:53
  Speaker 5: press attention and it showcases all our great candidates. And
• 14:56
  Speaker 5: it's a conversation about ideas and that if Kamala Harris won,
• 14:59
  Speaker 5: it makes her even stronger. But at some point, like,
• 15:02
  Speaker 5: you know, it could be divisive. The time is just
• 15:05
  Speaker 5: wasn't there. And so they decided, let's unify. And then
• 15:08
  Speaker 5: third is just let's be honest, like politicians are risk averse.
• 15:11
  Speaker 5: And a lot of them know Kamala Harris is the
• 15:13
  Speaker 5: front runner and they know that Trump is currently winning. Uh,
• 15:17
  Speaker 5: and many are probably thinking, all right, let's let the
• 15:19
  Speaker 5: vice president run this cycle and maybe I'll run in 2028,
• 15:22
  Speaker 5: you know, I'll keep my powder dry. So I don't
• 15:24
  Speaker 5: know if it was a mistake or not. I just
• 15:26
  Speaker 5: think it's, um, it's just a function of like how
• 15:28
  Speaker 5: constrained this timeframe is.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: We have a strong bench, but they, they are not,
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: none of, none was bold enough to challenge Biden two
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: years ago. It doesn't seem like they would be bold
• 15:40
  Speaker 3: enough to try to mount a three week campaign against
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: a front runner endorsed by the president when there's So, so,
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: so little time. I do think like if there were
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: something that was going to do it, like we are
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: in the middle of an open and orderly process, right?
• 15:54
  Speaker 3: Kamala Harris working the phones all weekend to get people
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: to endorse her is politics. And if any of these
• 15:59
  Speaker 3: candidates had been thinking about maybe mounting a challenge this weekend,
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: the last week before, they'd have been working the phones
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: saying to elected Democrats in important positions, hey, just keep
• 16:09
  Speaker 3: your powder dry. I'm thinking about jumping in. If I do,
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: let's see what the polls say, whatever. They would have
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: done politics. So just because a bunch of people come
• 16:16
  Speaker 3: out and say they are behind Kamala Harris doesn't mean
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: we are not in the middle of that open process.
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: It's just someone would have to challenge her.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Dan, I was a fan of the idea of
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: an open process, like in the days after the debate,
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: both because I think it would help rebut the argument
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: that the DC insiders were installing a new nominee. And
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: because I thought it would like, I think, Kamala Harris
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: was the overwhelming favorite. And if she emerged from that
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: process as the candidate, it would make her even stronger.
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: As the days ticked down, I was like less and
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: less enamored of the idea because I just didn't know
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: if we had enough time. And then by the fact
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: that it happened on Sunday and we only have three,
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: four weeks to the convention, I was like, I don't
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: know how you would do a process in a couple
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: of weeks. And I imagine even though one of these
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: candidates could have challenged her, That's what they were all
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: thinking too. Like she's getting all these endorsements. What am
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: I going to do? I'm going to jump in now.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's right.
• 17:10
  Speaker 6: There's the, with every passing day, the stakes get higher
• 17:14
  Speaker 6: and the pressure mounts. And yes, like in an ideal,
• 17:17
  Speaker 6: I hate to say this Sorkin-esque fashion of the, you know,
• 17:21
  Speaker 6: like they're this roadshow where they're doing debates everywhere and
• 17:24
  Speaker 6: meeting with labor unions and meeting with seniors and speaking
• 17:26
  Speaker 6: at the NAACP and all of that seems great. And
• 17:28
  Speaker 6: that would be this great media play. We just don't
• 17:30
  Speaker 6: have time to do that. If someone had wanted to
• 17:32
  Speaker 6: do it, that would have been the right process, but
• 17:34
  Speaker 6: no one does. I think that was, yes, this is
• 17:36
  Speaker 6: maybe a risk averse group where they thought they couldn't win,
• 17:38
  Speaker 6: but also Biden's decision is so historic because it therefore
• 17:44
  Speaker 6: speaks to the stakes. And so let's just get to
• 17:46
  Speaker 6: work because there's not a great argument against Kamala Harris.
• 17:48
  Speaker 6: And there are a a million great arguments for her
• 17:51
  Speaker 6: to be our best standard bearer in this moment.
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: And by the way, like one of the reasons was
• 17:56
  Speaker 3: to make sure that it didn't seem as though some
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: smoke-filled room was making the decision. Based on the collective
• 18:02
  Speaker 3: energy and response, I think the fear of that was overblown.
• 18:06
  Speaker 3: I think everyone was like excited to get behind her.
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: And if anything, a challenge that seems to suggest some
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: group of party insiders was suggesting we should skip over
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: Kamala Harris and go to somebody else, I think could
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: have even been more damaging.
• 18:20
  Speaker 5: The Sorkin version was apparently Mitt Romney wins after a
• 18:24
  Speaker 5: series of town halls hosted by Emma Chamberlain and Millie
• 18:27
  Speaker 5: Bobby Brown.
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: Zendaya, I think, was on that list as well.
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: I missed that part.
• 18:31
  Speaker 5: There was some crazy thing in Semaphore that someone had
• 18:34
  Speaker 5: pitched a series of town halls that was as silly
• 18:36
  Speaker 5: as you could possibly imagine.
• 18:38
  Speaker 6: It was Ted Dindersmith, who's a venture capitalist, and Rosa Brooks,
• 18:41
  Speaker 6: who's a long-term Democratic policy advisor, who had a A very,
• 18:43
  Speaker 6: very good process for this, with the exception of making
• 18:46
  Speaker 6: the mistake that everyone makes in a memo, which is
• 18:48
  Speaker 6: suggesting Taylor Swift be involved with something.
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: Too much detail.
• 18:52
  Speaker 6: There was a forum on the humanities with Lin-Manuel Miranda
• 18:58
  Speaker 6: and Taylor Swift. But point being, we're not going to
• 19:00
  Speaker 6: have to cross any of those bridges. And so no
• 19:02
  Speaker 6: one has to send a calendar invite to Taylor Swift
• 19:04
  Speaker 6: to get her ready for this.
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: Good.
• 19:05
  Speaker 3: And Sorgan withdrew his Mitt Romney pitch with a few hours.
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: It was tough timing for his pitch since it happened
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: just hours before Joe Biden withdrew from the race. There
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: have been some questions about like why Pelosi, Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries,
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: and Barack Obama have not endorsed Harris yet. It's only
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: because per the DNC's statement about wanting to have an
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: open process, they as party leaders did not want to
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: thumb the scale for anyone and they want to have
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: like it's a contest let's see who's in I would
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: imagine now that just about all the contenders have decided
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: to bow out and there probably was not going to
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: be a challenge to Kamala Harris I would imagine the
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: four of them will probably endorse soon but just for
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: people wondering that's why Yeah, it was the right thing
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: to do.
• 19:51
  Speaker 3: They were stepping back and saying, even in President Obama's statement, Immediately,
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: it was that he hopes that she.
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: Earns it, right?
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: That was the whole idea. And Kamala Harris, in her statement, said,
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: I want to win and earn this nomination, right? And
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: that was a very specific signal to the open process.
• 20:09
  Speaker 5: There was no secret plan by moderates in the party
• 20:11
  Speaker 5: to install Joe Manchin or some other boring person. The
• 20:15
  Speaker 5: people tweeting about that are losing it. Everyone just focus.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: It's wild. We're good.
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: And we're back. And now we're going to talk about
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris's candidacy. And we have some refreshments here because
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: we are now.
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: We're coconut pilled.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: We're coconut pilled.
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: Thank you.
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: We're all coconut pilled just like everyone else.
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: Not Dan, though. Oh, that is so thick.
• 20:46
  Speaker 8: Oh, my God.
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: Is this just a mix? Jesus Christ, people. It is
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: just the mix. I didn't want to.
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: Just the mix?
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: It's morning. I didn't think anyone wanted booze.
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: Hey, come on.
• 20:54
  Speaker 8: I mean.
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: It's been a long couple years, right?
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: Why are you so burdened by what has been? Look,
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: we were half drunk on almost all of the pods
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: we recorded last week. What do you mean half? The
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: five in a row, yeah.
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: I was on the plane when we were just about
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: to take off from Chicago when the note came through,
• 21:13
  Speaker 3: and I was just like, screw it. I'm going to
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: be drunk on a plane talking about Kamala Harris.
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: Let's go. I really did.
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: I really was just two sheets to the wind. All
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: the best tweets happen when you're drunk.
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: Absolutely.
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris candidacy completely upends the dynamics of the race.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: That is an understatement. People are clearly very psyched and energized,
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: especially Democrats. ActBlue, which is the platform, the fundraising platform
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: for Democrats, had its largest fundraising day ever yesterday. Harris
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: has already taken in more than $ 86 million as of
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: this recording.
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: That's crazy.
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: Probably more by now. That's crazy. Then there's the polling.
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: So polls taken before Biden announced he would withdraw have
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: generally been slightly more favorable to a Harris candidacy than Biden.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: CNN had the vice president polling four points ahead of
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: the president nationally. And the Time-Siena poll that we talked
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: about last week has her outperforming Biden in Pennsylvania and Virginia.
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: But it's not like she's outright winning the state she'll
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: need yet. Nate Cohn had a piece out this morning
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: setting out the challenges for her. Her approval rating isn't
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: much better than Biden's, and she's never been broadly popular.
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: But obviously, circumstances are completely different now. She has a
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: huge chance right now to reintroduce herself to the country,
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: and she's going to do so with a ton of
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: attention on her. And it's always a challenge for any
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: candidate in this media environment to get attention. She'll have
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: a ton. And she'll also now have a ton of
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: money behind her. A lot of people have already been
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: circulating this ad from Harris's 2020 primary campaign just as
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: a preview of what her campaign against Trump might look
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: and sound like.
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: Let's listen.
• 22:48
  Speaker 8: Sick of this? Well, think about this. He's a world
• 22:52
  Speaker 8: leader in temper tantrums. She never loses her cool. She
• 22:58
  Speaker 8: prosecuted sex predators. He is one. She shut down for-profit
• 23:03
  Speaker 8: colleges that swindled Americans. He was a for-profit college.
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: At Trump University, we teach success. Literally.
• 23:12
  Speaker 8: He's owned by the big banks. She's the attorney general
• 23:16
  Speaker 8: who beat the biggest banks in America and forced them
• 23:18
  Speaker 8: to pay homeowners $ 18 billion. He's tearing us apart. She'll
• 23:25
  Speaker 8: bring us together. This is Trump. And in every possible way,
• 23:30
  Speaker 8: this is the anti-Trump. So if that's what you're looking
• 23:34
  Speaker 8: for in your next president, there's really only one. Kamala.
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: Just put it in my veins.
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: Love it.
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: What do you think about Kamala's upside? What advantages does
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: she have against Trump?
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: So that ad, I think, captures it.
• 23:53
  Speaker 3: The contrast that we've all felt like was missing, that
• 23:56
  Speaker 3: we've been really wanting this campaign to make, they now
• 23:58
  Speaker 3: have the perfect candidate to make it. First woman to
• 24:00
  Speaker 3: be vice president campaigning for reproductive freedom. against a man
• 24:03
  Speaker 3: found liable for sex abuse who overturned Roe and wants
• 24:06
  Speaker 3: to control your body and ban abortion. The chief law
• 24:09
  Speaker 3: enforcement officer of the nation's most populous state against a
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: convicted felon who incited an insurrection. And someone new and
• 24:18
  Speaker 3: someone exciting versus someone who most Americans are fucking sick
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: of and have been telling pollsters for years they would
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: rather have an alternative to. And so you just see
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: the contrast so clearly. It's freedom versus control, like safety
• 24:31
  Speaker 3: and calm versus... chaos and corruption and the future versus
• 24:36
  Speaker 3: the past.
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: Pelosi just endorsed breaking news on the pod.
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: There we go.
• 24:39
  Speaker 8: Okay.
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: Harris, not Trump.
• 24:42
  Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah.
• 24:44
  Speaker 6: Good flag, Tommy.
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: Good flag. Thank you.
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: One other advantage that was in that ad that, you know,
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: media pundit types might not grab onto, but I think
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: voters are going to really care about, the housing point.
• 24:56
  Speaker 7: Yes.
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: That when she was attorney general, she sued the banks
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: on behalf of homeowners and returned $ 18 billion to homeowners.
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: Housing is the number one affordability concern among every demographic group,
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: every voter you talk to. Donald Trump is a slumlord.
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: That's his background. And Kamala Harris has already fought the
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: banks on behalf of homeowners, making it more affordable. I
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: think that's just a great contrast, and I hope we
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: hear more about it.
• 25:23
  Speaker 3: And I think slumlord is part of it, but I
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: also just He is in the pocket of his wealthy
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: donors and billionaires, right? He has already promised them a
• 25:29
  Speaker 3: corporate tax cut. He is on the trail talking about
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: how he wants to reward these people. It's one of
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: his biggest proposals. So I think that is important.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: Dan, where in the electorate are we seeing enthusiasm among
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: certain groups of voters that might not have been there
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: in the polls for Biden?
• 25:45
  Speaker 6: Well, you know, as we know, Because of his age,
• 25:48
  Speaker 6: because just of being ground down as an incumbent during
• 25:51
  Speaker 6: really tough times, President Biden has suffered with three key
• 25:54
  Speaker 6: groups from his 2020 coalition. Young voters, Black voters, and
• 26:00
  Speaker 6: Latino voters. And Kamala Harris offers upside with all of those.
• 26:04
  Speaker 6: We already know that she does better with Black voters
• 26:07
  Speaker 6: than Biden does. There's a split ticket data for progress
• 26:10
  Speaker 6: poll of Black voters where her overall favorability rating was
• 26:14
  Speaker 6: five points higher than Biden's. And most importantly, that five
• 26:17
  Speaker 6: points came entirely in the strongly favorable category, so there's
• 26:20
  Speaker 6: more enthusiasm for her. She has more room for definition
• 26:23
  Speaker 6: because fewer people know enough about her to draw an opinion.
• 26:27
  Speaker 6: We know broadly in all of the polling that the
• 26:29
  Speaker 6: groups least likely to have an opinion yet on Kamala
• 26:32
  Speaker 6: Harris are the exact voter groups that Biden has been
• 26:35
  Speaker 6: suffering with, so there is upside there. Our friend Carlos
• 26:38
  Speaker 6: Odio tweeted out today some polling from a recent poll
• 26:42
  Speaker 6: in Nevada of Latino voters that showed that she showed
• 26:45
  Speaker 6: real potential to both win back some voters, Latino voters,
• 26:49
  Speaker 6: particularly Latinas, who were open to supporting RFK Jr., and
• 26:52
  Speaker 6: others who had sort of dropped out of the electorate
• 26:55
  Speaker 6: altogether because they didn't like the choice of Biden or Trump.
• 26:58
  Speaker 6: And just broadly here, people have, and you see this
• 27:01
  Speaker 6: in the enthusiasm, in the ActBlue numbers you mentioned, just
• 27:04
  Speaker 6: the flood of pro-Kamala Harris content on TikTok and other
• 27:09
  Speaker 6: social media sites just something you never saw for Biden,
• 27:12
  Speaker 6: just never, ever, ever, and it is everywhere for Kamala
• 27:14
  Speaker 6: Harris today, is that people have been screaming for a
• 27:18
  Speaker 6: different choice, and now they have one. And so there
• 27:21
  Speaker 6: was an opportunity there to build back the coalition that
• 27:26
  Speaker 6: beat Donald Trump in every election since 2016, right? And
• 27:30
  Speaker 6: so she has the ability to do that in a
• 27:31
  Speaker 6: way that Biden wouldn't.
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Carlos's poll, and Carlos is like one of the
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: best pollsters of Latino voters in the country, that Nevada poll,
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: the groups that she was winning back, voters who said
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: they were going to sit out a Biden-Trump rematch, so-called
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: double haters, and those who somewhat disapprove of Biden, and
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: Biden was losing those voters, and now she's winning the
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: somewhat disapprove voters. So that is early signs, one state,
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: but encouraging for sure. Tommy, what are some of the challenges?
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: What are the biggest challenges that Kamala Harris is facing? Sure.
• 28:04
  Speaker 5: So here are some of the ways I think Republicans
• 28:06
  Speaker 5: are going to go after her based on a scan
• 28:08
  Speaker 5: of conservative media over the last couple of days. I
• 28:11
  Speaker 5: do think the biggest message, the public messaging will be
• 28:15
  Speaker 5: attacking her on immigration because she had this central job
• 28:18
  Speaker 5: to dealing with migration and Republicans are going to argue
• 28:20
  Speaker 5: that she was the immigration czar and she is responsible
• 28:23
  Speaker 5: for the situation at the border. I think the more
• 28:26
  Speaker 5: subterranean whisper message will be about race and gender. The
• 28:30
  Speaker 5: worst people on the internet are calling her a DEI
• 28:33
  Speaker 5: vice president, which is racist and sexist and stupid and wrong.
• 28:39
  Speaker 5: And it kind of gets worse than there. Like you're
• 28:40
  Speaker 5: already seeing some birther stuff again, people suggesting she's not
• 28:44
  Speaker 5: eligible to run. That is, again.
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: A lie.
• 28:47
  Speaker 5: But that stuff travels fast on the Internet. You're going
• 28:49
  Speaker 5: to see Republicans say she was complicit in a cover
• 28:52
  Speaker 5: up of Biden's age and fitness for office. They're going
• 28:55
  Speaker 5: to go after her on crime, especially helping raise money
• 28:58
  Speaker 5: for a bail fund in 2020. They're going to try
• 29:01
  Speaker 5: to tie her to every liberal thing that has ever
• 29:03
  Speaker 5: happened in California for time eternal. They're going to go
• 29:07
  Speaker 5: after her for not having children. So like, again, obviously
• 29:10
  Speaker 5: a lot of these attacks are disgusting, racist, sexist, dishonest,
• 29:14
  Speaker 5: but I think that's what we all need to be
• 29:17
  Speaker 5: ready for. Like, this is not likely to be a
• 29:20
  Speaker 5: high-minded debate about the issues, you know, in healthcare. It's
• 29:23
  Speaker 5: going to be some nasty stuff.
• 29:25
  Speaker 6: Can I just make one point here? Like, this is
• 29:27
  Speaker 6: not a, this is a hard conversation to have, like
• 29:29
  Speaker 6: in the back and forth of a campaign. If you're
• 29:30
  Speaker 6: having it, you're probably losing, but it is just as
• 29:32
  Speaker 6: a factual note that Kamala Harris was not in charge
• 29:34
  Speaker 6: of the border. She was not in charge of border management.
• 29:37
  Speaker 6: She was not in charge of DHS or.
• 29:40
  Speaker 5: What she would ask to do was to go to
• 29:43
  Speaker 5: some of the Northern Triangle countries and try to work
• 29:46
  Speaker 5: on the issues that are underpinning migration, leading people to
• 29:49
  Speaker 5: want to leave those countries. She was very specifically not
• 29:52
  Speaker 5: in charge of the border, but they will try to
• 29:54
  Speaker 5: tie that to her.
• 29:54
  Speaker 6: Which is the exact job that Obama gave Biden when
• 29:57
  Speaker 6: Biden was vice president. Yeah, I like sort of the
• 30:02
  Speaker 6: country is clamoring for new and normal. And so they're
• 30:04
  Speaker 6: going to be desperately trying to say she's not new
• 30:06
  Speaker 6: and she's not normal. And I think the goal and
• 30:09
  Speaker 6: the opportunity is for Kamala Harris to be able to
• 30:12
  Speaker 6: go out there and rightfully take credit for being part
• 30:15
  Speaker 6: of the incredible successes of this administration while talking about
• 30:18
  Speaker 6: the future and all the things that she can do
• 30:19
  Speaker 6: in the future. And just by her being out there,
• 30:23
  Speaker 6: and I think having this groundswell of support and unity
• 30:25
  Speaker 6: behind her will help in tamping down the ways in
• 30:28
  Speaker 6: which they try to paint her as other whether because
• 30:30
  Speaker 6: of race or gender or trying to paint her as
• 30:34
  Speaker 6: a lefty. And by the way, I think one of
• 30:36
  Speaker 6: the reasons some people sort of were at least a
• 30:38
  Speaker 6: little bit skeptical of Kamala Harris, and that skepticism I
• 30:41
  Speaker 6: think grew over the past couple of years, is because
• 30:43
  Speaker 6: when she ran for president, I think she struggled to
• 30:47
  Speaker 6: talk about being a prosecutor at a time when there
• 30:50
  Speaker 6: was a lot of progressive angst around police and a
• 30:53
  Speaker 6: lot of energy around reform. And I think That being
• 30:57
  Speaker 6: an asset, a pure asset in the run up to
• 30:59
  Speaker 6: November is really important. And I think she's going to
• 31:02
  Speaker 6: embrace her role as the chief law enforcement of a
• 31:05
  Speaker 6: state running as a criminal.
• 31:06
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 31:07
  Speaker 8: Yeah.
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: I mean, look, I've seen the polling. I've sat in
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: focus groups since the 2020 election in the primary. And
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: voters do tend to have an unfavorable, not Democratic based voters,
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: but swing voters, voters who are who we want to
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: get people who don't know if they're going to vote yet.
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: they tend to have an unfavorable impression of her. But
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: the upside is that impression is not hardened. It's not
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: like they have strong feelings. They have like a vaguely
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: unfavorable impression of her. And so now that she has
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: all this attention and this opportunity to sort of reintroduce herself,
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: I think that she can change those impressions, certainly more
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: so than Donald Trump can change impressions about him or
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden could change impressions about him, right? And, you know,
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: I think that she's an underdog in this race. I
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: think she should embrace... the role of underdog here and
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: and like you know when you're a black woman whose
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: name is kamala harris like you're always an underdog and
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: you know she can say that i didn't she didn't
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: get where she is by you know complaining or waiting
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: her turn or asking for favors she fought she fought
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: hard for it and she worked hard and she was
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: elected attorney general of the largest state in the country
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: then she was elected senator from the largest state in
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: the country and then she served three or four years
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: as vice president united states and like every national security
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: meeting so like She gets to have the sort of
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: the experience that comes with being vice president, but she
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: doesn't have to be tied to all of the unpopular stuff.
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: And in some ways she is unburdened by what has been. Yeah.
• 32:33
  Speaker 3: And yet she exists in the context.
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: And that's the.
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: Beauty of it. Gotta get that in as many times
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: as we can.
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah. No, it's not stale yet. Is it?
• 32:42
  Speaker 2: No. I don't think so.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: No, we're still there. VP speculation is already heating up.
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: We got one more veepstakes.
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: I can't believe it. I can't believe it.
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: We thought they were all over.
• 32:50
  Speaker 3: And they say God doesn't give with both hands.
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: Apparent frontrunners include Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear,
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly, Secretary
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: of Transportation Pete Buttigieg. We should say that Governor Gretchen
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: Whitmer took herself out of contention this morning right before
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: we were recording. She said she's going to be co-chair
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: of the campaign. She has no interest in being vice president.
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: She said she's staying in Michigan. Thoughts on the pack, Dan?
• 33:17
  Speaker 6: I mean, they would all be great. They all offer
• 33:21
  Speaker 6: different things. Like Josh Shapiro is incredibly popular in Pennsylvania.
• 33:23
  Speaker 6: There is no path to 270 without Pennsylvania. Andy Beshear
• 33:27
  Speaker 6: offers ideological balance. Mark Kelly could help put Arizona back
• 33:31
  Speaker 6: in play. And also he is also offer some ideological
• 33:34
  Speaker 6: balance and was also an astronaut, which is very cool.
• 33:37
  Speaker 6: And so the question is, what is the process going
• 33:40
  Speaker 6: to be to vet these people on a incredibly short
• 33:43
  Speaker 6: period of time? Even if she waited until the absolute
• 33:46
  Speaker 6: last minute of the convention, there are three and a
• 33:48
  Speaker 6: half weeks to do this. This is normally a months-long process.
• 33:52
  Speaker 6: None of these people have ever been vetted for vice
• 33:55
  Speaker 6: president before, so there's not some long dossier sitting on
• 33:58
  Speaker 6: a shelf somewhere in the DNC. It's going to be
• 34:00
  Speaker 6: incredibly interesting and challenging to get that process done quickly.
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: What do you guys think?
• 34:06
  Speaker 3: My one thought in all this has been, how can
• 34:09
  Speaker 3: the Kamala campaign use this selection process as a way
• 34:15
  Speaker 3: to get attention and put her in a position to
• 34:17
  Speaker 3: be making the decision in a way that redounds to
• 34:20
  Speaker 3: their benefit? I don't have an answer, but I've just
• 34:21
  Speaker 3: been thinking about that. Do you do big meetings?
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: Are you an apprentice kind of thing?
• 34:27
  Speaker 3: No bad ideas in a brainstorm.
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: Let's talk to our special reality TV correspondent here.
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: By the way, the only reason we have a literal
• 34:35
  Speaker 3: palm tree on ready is because it was here from
• 34:38
  Speaker 3: when I got back from my little trip. But no,
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: but I do think that like a moment, like showing
• 34:42
  Speaker 3: her make, like this is the first and the first
• 34:45
  Speaker 3: and biggest decision she's going to make as the presumptive
• 34:48
  Speaker 3: nominee of the party. And I would like to see like,
• 34:51
  Speaker 3: you know, they're all coming to the observatory, whatever.
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: So I was excited about that.
• 34:56
  Speaker 5: I mean, look, I'm basing this entirely off of like
• 34:58
  Speaker 5: a very cursory understanding of the resumes of all these people.
• 35:01
  Speaker 5: So take it with a grain of salt. But it's
• 35:03
  Speaker 5: hard not to like the idea, like living in a
• 35:05
  Speaker 5: world where people know like one thing about the vice president.
• 35:08
  Speaker 5: It's hard not to like the idea of that person
• 35:10
  Speaker 5: being an astronaut from a swing state, you know, like.
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: You'd do worse than that, Mark Kelly.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: Similarly good.
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: I know.
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: And you know I love Governor.
• 35:17
  Speaker 3: Josh Shapiro because he fixed the highway in a matter
• 35:20
  Speaker 3: of days.
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: And I'll never forget it. Exciting young governor from Pennsylvania.
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: That's interesting.
• 35:24
  Speaker 5: I mean, there's a lot of videos, I don't think coincidentally,
• 35:27
  Speaker 5: circulating of Mayor Pete Buttigieg or Secretary Pete Buttigieg eviscerating
• 35:32
  Speaker 5: Republicans in arguments. Pete could be a strong choice. At
• 35:35
  Speaker 5: a minimum, someone should talk to Pete and say, hey, man,
• 35:38
  Speaker 5: resign from DOT and hit the campaign trail full time
• 35:41
  Speaker 5: from now until November. We'll make you a secretary of
• 35:43
  Speaker 5: defense or something next time. Get that guy out there.
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: He kicked some ass on Bill Maher.
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: He shut up Bill Maher.
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: Do you know how hard that is? We got to
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: get Pete on the show because last time he was on,
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: he did it from the Department of Transportation and he
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: had to be all serious and non-political.
• 35:58
  Speaker 6: I mean, you were badgering him on Boeing. Can you
• 36:02
  Speaker 6: guarantee my personal flights are.
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: Hey, Dan. Don't you think that was warranted? The doors
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: are flying off the fucking planes, Dan. Oh, I'm sorry.
• 36:10
  Speaker 7: I'm sorry.
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: Over at the Department of Justice, they launched an investigation
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: after that.
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: Just saying.
• 36:15
  Speaker 6: You seem very interested. You were this close to giving
• 36:17
  Speaker 6: him your personal flight numbers on your next six trips.
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: So here's the deal. I think that you just, they're
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: going to throw poles in the field here, right? If
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: you find that Josh Shapiro, adding him to the ticket,
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: really like helps you in Pennsylvania significantly, which I think
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: it may. He's wildly popular in Pennsylvania, even among Republicans.
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: When we were at the RNC, we were talking to
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: some Republicans there pretending for a while that we were
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: not who we are and asking who they're most afraid of.
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: And they're from Pennsylvania. And they were like, yeah, we'd
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: be very afraid of Josh Shapiro. So, but, you know,
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: test it out, see what happens. I think you probably
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: do the same for Mark Kelly in Arizona, because I
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: do think that if Kamala's advantages are that she could
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: potentially do better with younger voters, black voters, brown voters,
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: it may start putting some of those Sunbelt states back
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: in play that were sort of out of play with Biden.
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: And so, you know, you could see the Mark Kelly thing,
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: and for all the reasons Tommy mentioned, working well. If
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: you're looking for, like, a really effective communicator who can
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: be on the trail and be on television and everywhere
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: else all the time making the case, then you got
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: your Pete Buttigieg, you know? Those are sort of my
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: thoughts on that.
• 37:21
  Speaker 6: I mean, can you just imagine... the amount of anticipation
• 37:24
  Speaker 6: in the audience for a Pete Buttigieg's JD Vance debate.
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, it'd be good.
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: Awesome.
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: I also do think that like, they are all good choices.
• 37:33
  Speaker 3: There are good arguments for all of them. Also any,
• 37:35
  Speaker 3: any one set of polls in this environment, like who
• 37:37
  Speaker 3: knows if you should really trust it in terms of
• 37:39
  Speaker 3: what will matter for the end. So it isn't really
• 37:41
  Speaker 3: about who she feels most comfortable with in terms of
• 37:43
  Speaker 3: someone who's going to be there in that big role.
• 37:46
  Speaker 3: I also do like the idea though, of, you know,
• 37:48
  Speaker 3: if you have, we have Doug, we have Josh Shapiro,
• 37:51
  Speaker 3: we're on our way to a minion. All right, and
• 37:53
  Speaker 3: that's something to think about as well.
• 37:55
  Speaker 5: I'm going to float Mike Pence again. He's got experience.
• 37:58
  Speaker 5: You know, he sticks by his values.
• 38:00
  Speaker 7: Yeah, sure.
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: She wouldn't be able to meet with him one-on-one.
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: That is a huge plus.
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: That's so funny. Three feet on the floor.
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: That's a huge plus.
• 38:08
  Speaker 2: That's the rule.
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump. Let's talk about Donald Trump, the changed man
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: who's been touched by the hand of God. He seems
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: to be taking all of this in stride. He went
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: on Truth Social this morning and wrote lots of things
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: saying that Biden wouldn't remember his decision to step down.
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: And also, quote, the Democrats pick a candidate, Crooked Joe Biden.
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: He loses the debate badly, then panics and makes mistake
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: after mistake, is told he can't win. and decide they
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: will pick another candidate, probably Harris. They stole the race
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: from Biden after he won it in the primaries. These
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: people are the real, all caps, threat to democracy.
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: He's really upset. He's on one.
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: Here is a clip of Trump talking about his new
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: likely opponent, Kamala Harris, the day before Biden dropped out.
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: And then you'll hear reactions to Biden's endorsement of Harris
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: from Trump aides Stephen Miller and Kellyanne Conway.
• 39:10
  Speaker 6: From the moment we take back the White House from
• 39:13
  Speaker 6: crooked Joe Biden and Kamala, I call her laughing Kamala.
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: You ever watch her laugh? She's crazy.
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: You know, you can tell a lot by a laugh.
• 39:22
  Speaker 8: No, she's crazy.
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: She's nuts.
• 39:24
  Speaker 4: They held a primary. People, they had ballots. They filled
• 39:28
  Speaker 4: out circles. They went to the voting booth. They spent
• 39:31
  Speaker 4: money on advertisements. And as President Trump said. The Republican
• 39:36
  Speaker 4: Party spent tens of millions of dollars running against Joe Biden.
• 39:40
  Speaker 4: Now they just woke up one morning and said, never mind.
• 39:42
  Speaker 4: We're canceling the entire primary. We're getting rid of our candidate.
• 39:47
  Speaker 4: And we're pretending the election has never even happened. And
• 39:49
  Speaker 4: we're going to let donors handpick a new nominee.
• 39:52
  Speaker 7: She had disastrous staff turnover as vice president. I check
• 39:55
  Speaker 7: it on the daily. Her public schedule, gentlemen, rarely has
• 39:59
  Speaker 7: anything on it or one or two things on it.
• 40:02
  Speaker 7: She does not speak well. She does not work hard.
• 40:04
  Speaker 7: All right.
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: So let me ask you.
• 40:06
  Speaker 7: And she should not be the standard bearer for the party.
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: She does not work hard. It's really trying to get
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: that in there.
• 40:12
  Speaker 5: I would love to see an ad of all these
• 40:14
  Speaker 5: guys getting her name wrong on purpose. It's such a
• 40:17
  Speaker 5: purposeful disrespect.
• 40:18
  Speaker 8: Yeah.
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: It's also just fucking child.
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: They're children.
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: There's childish. Tommy, why do you think Trump's been attacking
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: someone he's no longer running against for the past 24 hours?
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: You heard him at the rally talking about Harris, but
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: he really hasn't been truthing much about Harris yet.
• 40:32
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, it's not an exaggeration to say that
• 40:34
  Speaker 5: their entire campaign is built around running against Joe Biden.
• 40:38
  Speaker 5: Tim Alberta tweeted a photo from the Trump campaign office
• 40:41
  Speaker 5: where on the wall it says, Joe Biden is weak, failed,
• 40:45
  Speaker 5: and dishonest. It's written on the wall. I guess they're
• 40:47
  Speaker 5: going to have to paint over that. So, you know,
• 40:49
  Speaker 5: Democrats have wanted this campaign to be a referendum on Trump.
• 40:52
  Speaker 5: but Republicans have managed to make it a referendum on
• 40:55
  Speaker 5: Biden and his age and his fitness for office. That
• 40:57
  Speaker 5: line of attack is now gone. And so I'm sure
• 41:00
  Speaker 5: these guys did some oppo on Kamala. They were probably
• 41:03
  Speaker 5: preparing a messaging push around the VP debate, but now
• 41:06
  Speaker 5: they have to just change everything. So the campaign is flailing.
• 41:09
  Speaker 5: Trump is flailing. They went from confident, convinced they were
• 41:13
  Speaker 5: going to win to this new dynamic. And also like
• 41:15
  Speaker 5: I watched Fox News for a couple hours yesterday. You
• 41:17
  Speaker 5: see it there too. They have not figured out their
• 41:20
  Speaker 5: marching orders and how to refocus on kamala harris and
• 41:24
  Speaker 5: look that's going to change but it was really interesting
• 41:27
  Speaker 5: again tim alberta who wrote that long piece for the
• 41:29
  Speaker 5: atlantic on the senior leadership of the trump campaign he
• 41:33
  Speaker 5: said you're already starting to hear some regret about the
• 41:35
  Speaker 5: selection of jd vance as vice president because it was
• 41:39
  Speaker 5: cocky and he doesn't give you anything so like these
• 41:43
  Speaker 5: guys they're gonna figure it out but they're discombobulated just.
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: What we were all saying is that that's the pick
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: you make when you think you're gonna win not when
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: you're trying to in that piece too um He also
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: has a quote from Susie Wiles, who helped run Trump's
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: campaign on Super Tuesday. And she said, I don't think
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden has a ton of advantages, but I do
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: think Democrats do. So they are clearly, they think that
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: they're worried more about Democrats than they were about Joe Biden. Dan,
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: how do you think the campaign's message changes with the
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: Harris candidacy, the Trump campaign?
• 42:11
  Speaker 6: It means we have a lightning quick pivot from ageism
• 42:13
  Speaker 6: to racism and sexism. It's like, I mean, Tom is
• 42:17
  Speaker 6: exactly right that their entire strategy was based on weaponizing
• 42:21
  Speaker 6: the three quarters of Americans who thought Joe Biden was
• 42:23
  Speaker 6: too old to do the job and frame it as
• 42:25
  Speaker 6: strong versus weak. That does not work anymore because now
• 42:27
  Speaker 6: Trump is the really old candidate. Trump is the one
• 42:29
  Speaker 6: who misremembers things and misstates things. Trump's the one who
• 42:33
  Speaker 6: doesn't have the stamina to keep up a normal campaign
• 42:37
  Speaker 6: schedule where he does a couple events a week and
• 42:39
  Speaker 6: spends the rest of time sort of hanging.
• 42:41
  Speaker 2: Out at Mar-a-Lago.
• 42:42
  Speaker 6: And that flips everything they had planned to do on
• 42:45
  Speaker 6: its head. It's very clear that I think there's going
• 42:48
  Speaker 6: to be a two-part strategy. One is to continue to
• 42:52
  Speaker 6: sort of take advantage of the broader anti-incumbent environment that
• 42:55
  Speaker 6: is happening across the globe and paint her as the
• 42:58
  Speaker 6: incumbent and tie her to all of the least popular
• 43:01
  Speaker 6: policies of the Biden administration. And then to do what
• 43:04
  Speaker 6: they always do with a female candidate or a candidate
• 43:08
  Speaker 6: of color, which is to try to define them out
• 43:10
  Speaker 6: of the American mainstream in terms of values. You could
• 43:13
  Speaker 6: hear Kellyanne Conway in the least subtle way possible doing
• 43:15
  Speaker 6: that right there. They're going to talk about being from
• 43:18
  Speaker 6: San Francisco. They're going to take some of the policy
• 43:20
  Speaker 6: positions that she had maybe earlier in her life or
• 43:22
  Speaker 6: maybe took in the 2020 Democratic primary and try to
• 43:25
  Speaker 6: say that she is too radical, too far left for
• 43:28
  Speaker 6: the country. Because the one place in all the polling
• 43:30
  Speaker 6: where Harris generally does better than Biden by a point
• 43:33
  Speaker 6: or two with almost all groups except Biden. Republican-leaning independents,
• 43:37
  Speaker 6: where Biden had a little bit of advantage. And so
• 43:39
  Speaker 6: that's the place where they're going to try to stop
• 43:40
  Speaker 6: the bleeding here if she starts making gains. And that's
• 43:42
  Speaker 6: usually the way in which Republicans have had success, at
• 43:45
  Speaker 6: least on a state level, with candidates like Kamala Harris.
• 43:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: It does feel like in right-wing media in like the
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: first 24 to 48 hours after a big news development
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: like when none of them have figured out what the
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: message is and so they're all just sort of flailing
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: it's a fun thing you can watch it happen they'll
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: all like by next week they'll have all landed on
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: on something probably along the lines of what dan was
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: saying but right now it is uh you can enjoy
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: it for now.
• 44:07
  Speaker 5: David just sent along a Trump truth, which is, he says,
• 44:11
  Speaker 5: Joe Biden will go down as the worst president in
• 44:12
  Speaker 5: the history of the United States.
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: Kamala are horrible and incompetent. Borders are, will be worse.
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: So immigration first attack.
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: Taking that out first.
• 44:18
  Speaker 6: Which does speak to the upside of Kamala Harris too, right?
• 44:20
  Speaker 6: Is that she has the capacity to, and I think
• 44:24
  Speaker 6: it's even more important for her than it was for Biden,
• 44:26
  Speaker 6: to lay out a second term agenda that has some
• 44:28
  Speaker 6: differences with what Biden has done or proposed, right? And
• 44:31
  Speaker 6: so she can, you can't run away from the administration
• 44:34
  Speaker 6: that you were on, but you can talk about what
• 44:36
  Speaker 6: you would do going forward that may be different than
• 44:38
  Speaker 6: what he'd done. You can do that on the border
• 44:39
  Speaker 6: and that might be a huge priority for her.
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: Also on the border, she has a pretty easy answer
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: right now. Um, you know, Joe Biden and I took
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: an executive action and border crossings have plummeted over the
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: last month since he took the executive action, but you
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: know what? It's not enough. And if you want to
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: do more, you can pass the, uh, the bipartisan legislation
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: that was written by one of the most conservative senators.
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: If Donald Trump lets you, I mean, it's like Donald
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: Trump block. Yeah.
• 45:01
  Speaker 5: It's just an easy, um, She could humiliate Bibi Netanyahu
• 45:05
  Speaker 5: on Wednesday when he visits, slap him around a little
• 45:08
  Speaker 5: bit publicly.
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't hate it.
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: That's your kink.
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: Cancel the meeting? That is my kink. It's the only
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: thing I can think about.
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: So, Lovett, there was a second presidential debate slated for Tuesday,
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: September 10th. But following Biden's June debate performance, we all
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: kind of assumed the second debate wasn't going to happen,
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: partly because Trump didn't seem like he was going to
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: go for it. Do you think Trump will ultimately agree
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: to debate Harris?
• 45:29
  Speaker 3: So, first of all, It was Trump that introduced the
• 45:33
  Speaker 3: idea already of not debating Harris under the terms they
• 45:36
  Speaker 3: already agreed to. And it does speak to the lack
• 45:37
  Speaker 3: of discipline of Trump.
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: And he did that by saying, well, it's supposed to
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: be on ABC, but George Stephanopoulos is, you know, bad
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: for some reason. So now we got to do it
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: on Fox.
• 45:48
  Speaker 3: He's opening the negotiation again. But just, you know, what
• 45:53
  Speaker 3: we've been talking about for a long time is a
• 45:55
  Speaker 3: hyper-disciplined on-message Trump campaign and an undisciplined Trump where they
• 45:58
  Speaker 3: let him truth like crazy and then try to kind
• 46:00
  Speaker 3: of cattle prod him into submission when he's in front
• 46:04
  Speaker 3: of cameras. But this was a 24-hour period where they
• 46:06
  Speaker 3: really had no message and no way to control him.
• 46:08
  Speaker 3: So he's really introducing the idea that he is worried
• 46:11
  Speaker 3: about debating Kamala Harris. And I'm glad that he's introducing
• 46:14
  Speaker 3: that idea. I think with Trump, it's all transactional. I
• 46:19
  Speaker 3: believe he'll want to debate, but I also think it'll
• 46:21
  Speaker 3: be a question of whether or not he feels like
• 46:23
  Speaker 3: he needs to debate.
• 46:25
  Speaker 2: And I think that'll be based on polling.
• 46:27
  Speaker 3: But I find it I find it hard to imagine
• 46:29
  Speaker 3: him not wanting to be out there saying he wants
• 46:32
  Speaker 3: to debate Kamala Harris and that it won't ultimately happen
• 46:34
  Speaker 3: and that he's just using this to reopen the negotiations
• 46:37
  Speaker 3: on more favorable terms, which is what he does on everything.
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: Anyone have a different view?
• 46:41
  Speaker 6: I think she should do the Fox News debate.
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 46:46
  Speaker 6: I mean, just the way to, I mean, yes, I mean,
• 46:48
  Speaker 6: it would obviously have to be Brett Barrett, Martha McCallum,
• 46:51
  Speaker 6: who I'm no fan of in any stretch of the imagination,
• 46:53
  Speaker 6: but Just imagine going into the lion's den and taking
• 46:57
  Speaker 6: down Trump on Fox News. I think you should demand both, right?
• 46:59
  Speaker 6: You do the ABC debate. I'll do a Fox One
• 47:01
  Speaker 6: in September. She is an underdog. You got to be
• 47:06
  Speaker 6: aggressive about it. And I think she could beat him
• 47:08
  Speaker 6: in a Fox debate. And it would be a huge moment.
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: It would. It really would.
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: No, I think, I mean, you're right about the polling.
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: Like if she doesn't make up this gap and it's like,
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: you know, he's five points ahead, four or five points
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: ahead by September, he might feel fine being called a coward.
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: which is what he'll be called if he declines to
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: debate her. But if it's, you know, if it's close,
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: I think it's going to be hard for him to
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: just seem like he's afraid of debating her.
• 47:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's what it comes down. And by
• 47:35
  Speaker 3: the way, I just think it's, yeah, I just think
• 47:36
  Speaker 3: we're heading towards at least one other debate. I wouldn't
• 47:38
  Speaker 3: be surprised if Stan said that there wouldn't be two.
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: Almost immediately following Biden's announcement that he would not seek
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: the Democratic nomination, congressional Republicans began calling on Biden to
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: resign the presidency, with Speaker Mike Johnson tweeting, if Joe
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: Biden is not fit to run for president, He's not
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: fit to serve as president. You guys think this matters
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: at all?
• 47:56
  Speaker 5: I think anything can matter if congressional Republicans and their
• 48:01
  Speaker 5: conservative media mouthpieces decide to make it matter. You also
• 48:04
  Speaker 5: have a White House press corps that was described to
• 48:07
  Speaker 5: me by some Biden aides as the most angry version
• 48:10
  Speaker 5: of a press corps they have ever seen because they
• 48:13
  Speaker 5: feel misled about Biden's age and because the attacks on
• 48:16
  Speaker 5: stories about his age were admittedly so far over the top.
• 48:21
  Speaker 5: harsh that I think kind of radicalized them against it.
• 48:24
  Speaker 5: My guess is that most voters think that the question
• 48:27
  Speaker 5: of whether Joe Biden deserves four more years is very
• 48:30
  Speaker 5: different than six more months.
• 48:32
  Speaker 2: You know what I mean?
• 48:33
  Speaker 5: Like, I think the idea of like calling on him
• 48:34
  Speaker 5: to resign now is ludicrous. There's also not a lot
• 48:37
  Speaker 5: of time for congressional investigators to like rev up, you know,
• 48:41
  Speaker 5: hearings or subpoena documents.
• 48:43
  Speaker 2: But it could happen. And like, I'm anxious.
• 48:46
  Speaker 5: It's not the highest you know, on my anxiety list,
• 48:48
  Speaker 5: but it's there.
• 48:48
  Speaker 3: Any moment Republicans are spending trying to attack Joe Biden
• 48:52
  Speaker 3: is a moment Kamala Harris is out there able to
• 48:54
  Speaker 3: define herself. If they want to make the next few
• 48:56
  Speaker 3: months covering up, if they do that, that will be
• 48:58
  Speaker 3: the bank shot.
• 48:58
  Speaker 2: Sure.
• 48:59
  Speaker 3: But like, you know, I, I think the Democrats are
• 49:02
  Speaker 3: going to be so lined up behind Joe Biden as
• 49:06
  Speaker 3: the hero who served out his term and then did
• 49:08
  Speaker 3: what was best for the country. And, and so I just,
• 49:11
  Speaker 3: I don't, I think it can matter if people think, oh,
• 49:13
  Speaker 3: it was Do people know about this? They're going to
• 49:14
  Speaker 3: try to do it as a conspiracy and to cover up.
• 49:16
  Speaker 3: I'm a little worried about that, but I'm not worried
• 49:18
  Speaker 3: about this specific argument.
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: I had been more worried about it until it started
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: happening and I saw how it was like playing.
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: Because I think it's just in a, it's an attention thing, right?
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: Like so much attention now is on the race between
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: Trump and Kamala Harris and what they're doing that even
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: the bank shot feels like it's, Like, if I was them,
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: there's more direct arguments against Kamala Harris that would probably
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: resonate with voters than to do this. Because this whole
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: fucking thing about a cover-up, too, it's like, what are
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: we talking about, right? Like, these Republicans in Congress have
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: met with Biden, and they've said stories like, oh, he
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: seems like he's lost a step and stuff like that.
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: But none of them walked out of meetings for the
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: last couple of years and being like, Oh, he must
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: step aside. He must resign. This is so bad. And
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: so like, that's the same kind of relationship Kamala Harris had.
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: So like, what are you talking about?
• 50:03
  Speaker 3: It's on the floor of the house saying that Kevin
• 50:05
  Speaker 3: McCarthy was out negotiated by Joe Biden.
• 50:07
  Speaker 2: Like we, right.
• 50:08
  Speaker 3: Joe Biden has been the president. He has been being
• 50:10
  Speaker 3: the president.
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: It's just, it's them. It's, it's something that they were
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: going to, it's their old campaign argument that they're still doing.
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: And you're right. They might send investigators there.
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: They like to move the goalposts. We'll see if they
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: even bother. Yeah.
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: Republicans are also continuing to threaten legal action. Speaker Johnson
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: is saying that Republicans are likely to file challenges alleging
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: a violation of state rules on withdrawing or substituting candidates
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: on the ballot ahead of the election. Dan, should we
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: be concerned about this?
• 50:35
  Speaker 6: I would never say in a world where there are
• 50:37
  Speaker 6: a bunch of like Judge Eileen Cannon clones running around
• 50:40
  Speaker 6: the judiciary or with the Supreme Court, we shouldn't be
• 50:43
  Speaker 6: concerned at all. But there's pretty clear body of law here,
• 50:47
  Speaker 6: which is the Democratic Party is the one with the
• 50:50
  Speaker 6: ballot line. And it's up to the Democratic Party, as
• 50:53
  Speaker 6: it sees fit, to pick their nominee. The way that
• 50:57
  Speaker 6: Kamala Harris is going to become our nominee is through
• 50:59
  Speaker 6: a totally normal, well within the rules process where a
• 51:03
  Speaker 6: majority of the delegates ratify her as the nominee. I'm
• 51:06
  Speaker 6: sure there will be legal challenges, but a bunch of lawyers,
• 51:08
  Speaker 6: including Mark Elias, have said they are not going to
• 51:10
  Speaker 6: succeed in doing it. So this is not high on
• 51:13
  Speaker 6: my worry list right now.
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: I mean, if, God forbid, Joe Biden had had a
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: health incident- prevented him from being the nominee, there would
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: be zero question whether the Democratic Party would have ballot
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: access for a new candidate. He has decided to step down,
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: withdraw from the race on his own volition. So it's like, well,
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: it's the same. I don't understand. Like, it's not.
• 51:39
  Speaker 3: And by the way, like, we're also it's absurd. And
• 51:41
  Speaker 3: by the way, also, it looks like we're heading towards
• 51:43
  Speaker 3: doing a kind of early nomination process, assuming there's no
• 51:46
  Speaker 3: real challenge anyway. And so even those those questions about
• 51:49
  Speaker 3: ballot access will hopefully be mitigated as well.
• 51:54
  Speaker 6: We have dealt with this many times before because candidates
• 51:56
  Speaker 6: have died after the nomination has gone through. And the
• 52:00
  Speaker 6: courts have allowed the party through a previously existing process
• 52:03
  Speaker 6: to pick another candidate to be on the ballot. And
• 52:06
  Speaker 6: so it's just, they're throwing shit at the wall right now.
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: Well, it's very funny that for the longest time, Republicans
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: are like, Joe Biden must step down. He's too old.
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: The Democratic Party must replace him. He's too old. So
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: then he steps down and comments, no, wait a minute,
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: you can't do that. Joe Biden has to be the one.
• 52:24
  Speaker 6: Most of what we say is bullshit.
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: Why did you do that? Doesn't make a lot of sense.
• 52:29
  Speaker 3: Also, just like these tribunes for the 14 million votes,
• 52:33
  Speaker 3: Stephen Miller is beside himself on behalf of the base
• 52:36
  Speaker 3: of the Democratic Party, a group of people whose votes
• 52:38
  Speaker 3: he wanted to be thrown out in the name of
• 52:40
  Speaker 3: an insurrection.
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: Such bullshit. All right, before we go, just wanted to
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: share some incredible Vote Save America numbers from Shaniqua, who
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: runs VSA. Roughly 6,000 people signed up for Organize or
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: Else over the weekend. And people donated $ 225, 000 across all
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: of Vote Save America's funds. 1,500 were new donors, many
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: of which were recurring. So far, in total, over 24,000
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: people have signed up. And those folks have already reached
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: out to over 1 million voters. Don't be left out.
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: We need everyone's help right now. All hands on deck
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: for the next four months. Again, Kamala Harris is going
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: to be an underdog in this race. Joe Biden has
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: given us the chance. Kamala Harris is giving us the chance,
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: like a fighting chance to win. Doesn't mean it's in
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: the bag by any means. We are still underdogs here.
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: This is going to be a really, really tough race.
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: But if everyone works really hard over the next four months...
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: we can pull this out. So go to votesaveamerica.com slash
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: 2024 and click sign up to get started. This message
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: has been paid for by Votes Save America. This ad
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: has not been authorized by any candidate or candidates committee. Blah, blah, blah. Also....
• 53:53
  Speaker 3: I think the blah, blah, blah makes it legally invalid.
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: It's also going to be on all of us to
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: arm people with the best arguments and information we need
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: to win this election. So please consider sharing Pod Save
• 54:02
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• 54:04
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• 54:07
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• 54:10
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• 54:12
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• 54:14
  Speaker 1: Crooked.com slash newsletters. You can sign up and be a
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: message box subscriber. All right. Are we going to have
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: a day off before you hear us again or what?
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: I don't know. I don't know. Every day.
• 54:24
  Speaker 6: She can announce her VP tomorrow.
• 54:26
  Speaker 2: I record tomorrow.
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: Oh, my gosh.
• 54:28
  Speaker 2: I love her. Leave it tomorrow.
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: Okay. Well, we'll probably talk to you on Wednesday. Well,
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: we'll talk to you on Wednesday. Tommy will talk to
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: you on Wednesday.
• 54:34
  Speaker 5: If you're sick of hearing us talk, you don't know
• 54:36
  Speaker 5: how sick we are of hearing us talk.
• 54:38
  Speaker 2: That's true. We're with you.
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: That's true.
• 54:39
  Speaker 3: And we know you're not sick of hearing us talk.
• 54:40
  Speaker 3: You're going to listen to every goddamn episode.
• 54:42
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: Thanks, everyone. We'll talk to you on Wednesday. Bye, everyone.
• 54:47
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• 55:09
  Speaker 1: Our show is produced by Olivia Martinez and David Toledo.
• 55:12
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• 55:16
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• 55:19
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• 55:22
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• 55:25
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• 55:32
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