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Good morning, everybody, Happy Monday. Have an amazing show for everybody today.
What do we have, Crystal.
Indeed, we do coming down to the wire here of course in terms of the election, So we have a lot of news for you there. Trump has this big Madison Square Garden rally yesterday and it was really something, even the Trump campaign distancing themselves from some of the remarks that were made at that rallies. That will bring you all of that. We've, of course, also got all of the latest polls to try to figure out where this race is. Spoiler alert, it's still fifty to fifty
and very close. We've got some comments from Michelle Obama directed towards men in particular, and also a little hot mic moment from commal hair where she seems to indicate that they have ground to make up there among men in the country.
So we'll bring you that as well.
Trump winning some Muslim American endorsements in the state of Michigan. Absolutely wild scene there given past history. Jeff Bezos deciding seemingly to curry favor with Trump by withholding an endorsement by his paper, The Washington Post, dooking a lot of controversy there. The La Times also deciding not to endorse in this race. They're giving a different reason though for their rationales. We'll break all of that down for you. We have doctor Treza Parsi on to talk about the
very latest with regard to Iran and Israel. Israel finally launching that, you know, what they describe as a retaliatory attack towards Iran. There's a lot that's interesting there, so we'll get into that as well.
Absolutely can't wait for that before we do. Thank you twelve our premium subscribers. We're coming down to the wire eight days until election day. Right now, we are filming content today with Logan Phillips, our election partner. He'll be here on election night as well. Go ahead and sign up Breakingpoints dot Com, so you get exclusive access both
to some of that premium election and content. Our predictions will drop there first on who's gonna win, what are electoral maps, and all that will be in addition to some great subscriber benefits on election night. So Breakingpoints dot Com you can become a subscriber. But as Crystal mentioned, Trump was at Madison Square Garden.
Let's get to it.
I don't know if you guys know this, but there's literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. Yeah, I think it's called Puerto Rico. All right, heck, yeah, that's cool. Black guy with a thing on his head. What the hell is that a lampshade? Look at this guy? Oh my goodness. Wow, I'm just kidding. That's one of my buddies. He had a Halloween party last night. We had fun. We carved watermelons together. It was awesome.
In fact, she is the devil. Whoever screamed that out? She is the Antichrist.
And there's not one moment I've ever been with him off camera he's spending his time grousing about people he hates. Ever, he's talking about the people and the country he loves in his private time. Trust me, you.
Know something, Trump maniacs. I don't see no stinking Nazison here. I don't see no stinking domestic terrorists in here. The only thing I see in here are a bunch of hard working men and women that are real Americans.
Brother.
So that was before Donald Trump even took the stage. It was as I described, full maga. I would put it as a mini RNC effectively. Lots of controversy this morning over Tony Hinchcliffe's joke there about Puerto Rico. In fact, the Trump campaign themselves have come out and they've distanced them from it. Let me go ahead and read you what they said in a statement this morning quote the joke does not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign. So I'm sure there will be a lot
of bedwetting over this on both sides. What I mean by that, Crystal is not the liberal freak out over it, But on the Republican side there's a big debate over like, why should you even apologize over a joke. I like Tony and think he did a great job specifically at the Tom Brady Roast and previously. The thing is and
this is what I've been thinking about. The reason why is that you shouldn't necessarily just have an edgy campaign guy or sorry, edgie comedian at a campaign event, because it appears as if that is a reflection of the campaign as opposed to at a roast or elsewhere. Now, look, in general, if making a joke about Puerto Rico is literally enough to push you over the edge, I don't know.
I think it's frankly kind of.
Ridiculous, but maybe people vote that way. The point remains that there are five hundred thousand people of Puerto Rican descent, apparently in the state of Pennsylvania.
I saw it's one of the largest.
Old friend Chuck roacha who runs that Latino focused Nystra pack or whatever, and he's already raising money.
He's like, give me money so I can text this to everybody.
Bad Bunny came out and endorsed Kamala Harris immediately after this came out. So look, will it make a big difference. I don't know, but I think that the point stands that in general, like nine days out for this, the Puerto Rico joke, it just doesn't appear to be helpful. I guess the countercase to what I would say is everyone said that about Springfield, everyone said it about God. I covered twenty sixteen Judge Curiel Casier Khan and all this.
Stuff didn't matter.
If anything, the controversy he's so racist this time, look at this, all of that.
It didn't work right.
So I'm not so sure it's going to be like totally determinative. The way I saw MSG and the rally yesterday I tweeted this was this was basically a mini RNC, the most storied of venue in the country.
There. If their goal was to dominate the conversation, to.
Have a gigantic media spectacle, I think they succeeded.
That conversation now centers around them.
And the only question is is it twenty sixteen when that dynamic is to his benefit or is it twenty twenty two when this being on full display is going to repel voters.
I genuinely have no answer to that question.
Yeah, I mean it was like dark RNC. This was like.
You flag fly, I mean, you got not just to fixate on Tony is honestly to miss.
The overall I agree, but even the rest.
Of you know, even if you're just letting me in Tony.
Not only do we you know, called Puerto Rico a pile of trash in the ocean. There were insults at Jews, at black people. He said they were, you know, carving watermelons instead of pumpkins. There were insults at Latino's, you know, sexual disgusting, sexual joke, even just with Tony. But even if you put that aside, you got this other dude
calling Kamala literally the devil and the anti Christ. The whole thing, the whole positioning of it is this sort of like worshipful uh situating as Trump is like gonna save us like the Jesus Christ figure against Kamala the anti Christ. You had another speaker who referred to her effectively as a sex worker, saying she had her you know, pimplant handler her. You had Hulk Hogan at another point we played part of his comments.
Another point he.
Seemed to make a hawk tua joke about Kamala. You had Byron Donalds, who is a black congressman, introduced literally with Dixie, the facto anthem of the Confederacy. And then of course you have Trump doing his normal thing talking about that enemy within, talking about using the anli and Enemies Act, which was last use for Japanese internment. So, you know, the overall question of the rally or why it even existed.
To me, it's less about an electoral.
Consideration and it's more about creating a sense of inevitability and sort of like domination. You know, and we already seen and we're going to talk about the Washington Post, like Jeff Bezos pulling his endorsement.
You see some.
Elites basically hedging their bets, trying to not get on Trump's bad side because they're afraid of that quote unquote retribution that could come. So having this very you know, ominous spectacle in the center of a very diverse, deep blue city, Yeah, I think that's more what it's about.
And it ties into.
There could be a vibe with it because it seems it's like a lot of bravado. It's basically projecting like we are already so confident that we've won this thing that we can send Tony Hinchcliff out there to insult a major critical demographic group in a swing state. Like it almost has the vibes of like Hillary Clinton popping the champagne on the plane on election Day, which also by the way happened on the way to New York. But for them it's sort of true because even if
they lose, they're going to claim that they won. And that's the other goal of this rally and the one they're doing New Mexico, the one they're doing Virginia, whatever.
Trump constantly talking about how you know, they've got him with ninety three percent odds that he's gonna win, et cetera, et cetera, bolstering polymarket and all of these odds makers that show a you know, wildly improbable probabilities in favor of Trump is to create the sense of inevitability so that if they lose, their supporters will all be primed to think this could not have been fair, it must have been rigged. And so you know that's part of the goal of this rally as well. And yeah, I
mean it was like, I found it very disturbing. I found it really ugly. And to your question of like, you know, the electoral implications and the calculus that went into this, et cetera. We were talking after the Rogan interview about how the goal for Commlin these final days is like I can be commander in chief the golf for Trump is like, I'm not a fascist, I'm a bro right hanging out with Joe Rogan. Don't think that this rally really served his interests in making him seem
less scary, less dark it. You know, if anything feeds into the closing message of the Harris people of like, listen, you should take seriously what John Kelly, Mark Milly, Jim Mattis, Mike Pence have to say about who this guy actually is. So, you know, I don't buy that it's them electorally. And they also have a different coalition than they did in twenty sixteen. You know, in twenty sixteen, it was all about juicing the white working class vote, worked for him
obviously enough to win an electoral college. This time, they are really reliant on eating into Democratic margins with black and Latino men.
So that I think is part of why.
Whereas in the past in twenty sixteen, you know, if there was some racist joke made or whatever, Trump would never have apologize for it. I think the fact that they're trying to court that different coalition, or really electorally dependent on that different coalition, is what leads even the Trump campaign to be like that was too far.
See I don't know.
I have a totally different read. I didn't see that. I mean, I think you're prime to see darkness or you're seeing darkness. I'm trying to look at it as like basically an entertainment event. When you literally have hul Cogan like ripping his shirt off and coming out and like we're not nutsies here, and then you had what Tony Inchcliff and the comedian. The aspect of it to me was just pure camp and entertainment. You could see darkness if you want to, and you're taking it seriously.
But the whole point of Trump is that most people don't take him seriously, specifically the people who vote for him or are inclined to do that. So for them, like they see, if anything, the media bed wedding, they love it.
There's nothing they love more.
Than to see people call him a fascist or a racist or compare it to Nazi msg. That's the best thing that could happen for them, because they wear it on their sleeves. Then why are they well, okay, they're does isself the one comment. But this antichrist stuff, that's like, first of all, that's like any Republican evangelical man not endorsing it. I've always found it creepy and weird, but that's what they do. Well, let's continue with the Hull Cogan,
Tucker Carlson's speech. Almost all of it is basically a round a vibe of our opponent as a joke. There is a sense of an ability, there is domination. But also what we're missing is there was a lot of like laughter and frankly, like exuberance in the room for what they're projecting. I saw another electoral thesis, which is swing state voter time is over at this point, like they've either made their decision or not. This is just
purely about driving out the base. And with that regard, I mean, look, I've spent too.
Much time now in Republican areas.
I've talked about this previously, and some GOP people will hate this. There is a deep element of Trump's support which is on the nose and for lack of a better word, crass. Like in twenty twenty, I remember I told the story a lot. I was driving through you know, rural Nevada, and I just saw this gigantic sign this farmer had and it just said Trump, fuck your feelings. And I've thought about that sign a lot, because I
think that is everything. I was recently in Pennsylvania at like one of those pumpkin patches or whatever, and there's literally like grown men walking around with like f your Feelings t shirts and I'm voting for the convicted felon bumper stickers with truck nuts. As we'll get to, there is a deep element of that, and those people love this and you can hate it if you want, but.
They like it, you know, just it's the whole Maga mema. There's a are you offended yet? You know I'm a white.
Christian male, Like does that piss you off? That is a deep part of Trump culturalism, which is aimed directly at the beating heart of institution and of Washington. So I see this as the apotheosis of maga. The question in my mind is it twenty twenty two or is it twenty sixteen? In general, for Trump, this stuff doesn't stick. It usually doesn't hurt. This whole fantasy about Latino and
black man. I mean, we've talked about this before. It's nice to win a couple more percent, but the vast majority of the electric's some seventy four to seventy five percent is white. Fifty five percent of those people no college degree, median voter in this country, fifty five year old white dude. Yeah, but yeah, I mean I know they're you know, their culturally will be signs most with them.
Offended by this whole situation is a lot of those white college educated okay, vote.
That's already right.
I mean, they're they're not.
I mean that's where listen, I think you're right that this is the kind of beating heart apotheosis of Maga. And that's what I find so disturbing. I think the deal, the implicit deal that Trump has with his support is basically, you give me unending loyalty, and listen, if you watch this and you didn't think that this was like, you know, worship of a cult hero. I don't know what you
were looking at. You give me unending loyalty, and I will give you permission to indulge the ugliest parts of yourself. That's what was on display here. I mean, Tucker came close to saying it. He said something to the effect of, you know what we love about Trump is he's given us permission to tell the truth, which is of course preposterous when you look at a guy and Donald Trump who probably lies more than like literally any other political
figure we've ever seen. But what he means by that is now, like we can tell the racist joke about black people and watermelons, or you know, call Puerto Rico a pile of garbage.
We can label our political.
Opponents as the enemy within and threatened to turn the military on them, or label them literally the anti Christ or the devil, or as one MAGA supporting evangelic pastor has been calling her, like the Jezebel spirit.
We can do all of those things.
We don't have to pretend that we have this like you know, veneer of polite society, and it's not about it's really not about policy, because we've seen him be all over the map. We've seen this policy platform this time around totally different than what it was in twenty sixteen.
At this same event.
You had people who were, you know, spouting policy positions that were totally at odds.
With each other.
Rudy Giuliani calling all Palestinians terrorists and you know, cheering for war hawkishness. And then Tulsi Gabber goes up there and is like, oh, Trump is the anti war candidate. It doesn't have to be coherent because it's not about that policy.
So I don't know what.
The electoral impact will be, you know, I genuinely I don't think that this served the end that you and I both were saying that Trump had. His goal in the final days was humanized himself and to make it feel preposterous that he was, you know, the sort of like dictatorial, authoritarian, fascist figure. I don't think that this helps him in that regard. You know, is it a game change with thought?
I don't know.
But to me, it's just more it's less about the electoral impact and more just about what this movement actually promises to deliver, you know. I mean a core promise that he's making that he talked a lot about here, and actually we can play a little bit of the
Trump mashup. I don't know if it includes this part or not, but something he's repeatedly promised is to use the Alien Enemies Act of what is it, like seventeen ninety eight or whatever, which was last used to justify internment of Japanese Americans during World War Two.
Like, that's a promise that he makes.
He talks about the enemy within he you know, this is like a core part of what's being cheered here.
I think it's ugly.
I think it's disturbing, And as I said before, I think the core promise is like you can where your fuck you're feeling sure, you can say, like you know, all of the ugliest things that you would normally say in private, it can now be out in the open.
And that's what this is.
A solibrations Again, Tho, where you're seeing it is disturbing, and I'm like, I'm just looking at at analytically. What it comes from is people feel truly like the Washington establishment media institutions, et cetera, not only have left them behind, and I'm not even talking about economically, it's almost almost purely culturally. And their rage has now been bubbling for almost twenty five years. So this is a logical and frankly like very predictable and political expression.
I think there's a lot to that.
I also think that that rage can be directed towards, you know, the corporate CEOs and billionaires and elite class that have created vast inequalities in this country, or it can be directed at, you know, a group of vulnerable migrants to be scapegoated, which yes, I think is.
Really this is a very common talking point. Again, the fact is it's that reality. Yeah, but Democrats have tried it, and the truth is that people don't like when millions of illegal immigrants come to their country. That's not scapegoating, it's a pure fact. It's no country on earth would accept the level of illegal migration that we've had, and they rightfully blame a lot of elites for washing that away and just saying, oh, it's actually not a problem.
It doesn't matter if your community gets totally flooded or whatever.
We've had this debate a million times is.
To pretend like the whole problem in this country is immigrants.
Is proposable, a big thing and it's ugly, is illegal immigration, and now most people believe that. In fact, if you look at you know, you're talking about alieness edition. If there was an Axios poll or whatever and it was like, how many Americans support putting illegal immigrants in camps and deporting them, it was forty seven.
Percent of the vast majority of independence.
So I don't think it is our electoral point. I'm really not just getting your electoral point. Although I do think that the pulling on immigration is a lot more complex than you say, because if you ask them also, should there be a pathway to citizenship for people who are here who are undocumented, they also say yes, and they definitely don't support like let's totally close our borders
and have net zero migration. So putting the electoral point aside, though it's a moral point, I think it's wrong.
I think it's wrong. I think it's ugly.
I think it's an inaccurate picture of where the problems in this country actually stem from. I think it's cheap to take shots at people who are, you know, largely powerless, who are oftentimes escaping, you know, systems of persecution that our country basically, you know, set up. Many of the migrants who are coming here are fleeing from countries that
we have incredibly onerous sanctions on. So yeah, I think it's it's cheap, it's ugly, and it's wrong, you know, the electoral point, like, we'll see how it works out next week. We'll have an answer to that very quickly. But you know, my fear is that it actually is too effective, that it does work, that there is a large appetite for it.
But I'm also not convinced of that yet.
I mean fair enough, I guess I would just say you can, you're what free to morally object, But it's a democracy. People get to vote how they want, and I don't generally believe in like tisting it people and saying oh, it's actually not a problem, like we should hear what it is. Like, Look, do I live my life with your feelings T shirt and trucknuts?
Now?
I don't, And honestly I don't have a lot of like I don't really get it period, but I can anthropologically look at them and be like, Okay, well there's something going on here, and for me, like full maga.
Basically of what that rally was is that is a political and cultural expression of, frankly, a very ignored force and of one which people feel is not accurately reflected in their higher institutions of culture media, and at a certain point, like you do have to if it wins, people should ask a lot of questions about how did that happen?
What exactly led to this?
If you want to make that corporate argument, you know, I mean, frankly, look I don't even.
Disagree, but the truth is is that people don't care.
I hate to say it, but every time that they've tried the so called deliverism and this argument in the especially in the face of mass illegal migration, it's rejected almost entirely.
To the extent that Democrats have won any ground.
It's with rich, college educated whites who are culturally look at the truck nuts and the fuck your Feelings t shirt and are repulsed by their fellows the elder people.
While thing to say, though, when Republicans, when was the last time they even won the popular vote?
Uh, well, two thousand and four.
So I mean, you act like this is the vast majority of the country.
Number one, I mean Democratic Democrats, even in the electoral Number one.
I mean, but that's pretending like the only thing anyone cares about is immigration. Number one, Democrats have embraced a very hawkas, but to pretend like, you know, the anti immigrant positions one that isn't held by elite politicians is at this point preposters. It's my view that doesn't exist among elite politicians. You don't hear it from Democrats at
this point whatsoever. But number two, like there's this posturing, like this is this overwhelming majority that's being ignored, and it's like, no, actually, it's it is a minority, as evidence by you know, every election since Donald Trump has been on the scene, where he has never won the popular vote, and where Republicans lost in twenty eighteen, loss in twenty twenty two, et cetera.
And you know, so it.
It also overstates how popular this mode of politics has been proven to be. So, Like I said, listen, I'm really not making an electoral point because I'm humble of I don't know what's going to happen next week. You know, maybe people love calling Puerto Rico an island of trash and love calling for immigrants to be rounded up and put in camps, and love you know, saying Kamala Harris is the Antichrist, or at least just you know, are happy to ignore it for whatever reason that could certainly
be the case. I'm making the point that, you know, I immigrants are not the problem in this country. They are not the reason why buying large housing prices are high.
They are not the.
Reason why it's so hard to afford healthcare. They are not the reason why education costs have skyroad rocketed so dramatically. They are you know, yes, there is an issue with we need to get the border and control. I personally think we actually be better off as a country if we let in far more legal immigrants than we have. But you know, I just think that this direction for the country is ugly bad and wrong.
Okay, my byeline.
Again, I think that's fair. I've made various counter arguments as to why. But in general, again, you want to listen to people and you don't want to try and override their concerns.
And if that I fundamentally.
Believe, and I actually tweeted the other day, I don't think it's the economy stupid.
I think it's immigration stupid.
I think that if Trump wins this election, specifically if he also wins a popular vote, which I think there's a twenty seven percent chance according to Nate Silver, it will be the clearest mandate and or electoral signal in modern history, especially because a lot of the retconning of twenty sixteen.
If we go back and look if there was.
A study done by the CSPI, I want to say we talked about it in twenty twenty, where the vast majority of people who voted for Trump did so because of immigration. And I've just come around to the fact that immigration is the singular defining issue of the Republican Party.
I think abortion is now the defining issue. Either of those two reconcilable questions will be determined on election day as to what it is, and democratically it does need to be solved or at least found like some sort of status quo like we did previously in eras, because otherwise, you know, if you care about taxes or whatever, the vast majority of people these days are not voting on that, they can claim what they want. I've seen too much
swing state data on immigration for Republicans. It is literally the number one thing that they're running at Reublicans.
No, it's not.
No, the Republicans have reduced their ads spending on immigration, but they're they're predominantly spending money on trans panic and yeah, but they are like taxes economic space.
I disagree with that because the trans ad is all about illegal immigration. It's specifically when you watch it, they're like talking about transgender surgeries for illegal migrants from the clip of twenty and nineteen. I mean, look, you've said it before too. A lot of that is just coding Comma as too liberal. Is that immigration trans whatever. I mean,
at the end of the day, it's not economic. I know that one on Democrats they're trying with taxes, which talked about with Logan last week, but a huge part of it is just abortion too. So you know, what does the mandate say if Kamala wins. I would say, if Kamala wins, that the mandate is actually that this maga you know, fear feeling stuff does not land in the way that I think it does, and people should
be very humble about that too, which they won't. I think You're right, they'll say that the election was stolen, but vice versa. You know, if that if that wins, people should really take a step and be like, Okay, what's going on here?
You know, why did this happen?
Yeah?
Maybe, although it's also like, you know, the election is probably going to be decided by like a tines se liver of votes.
Maybe yeah, So you.
Know there will be many things last to everything.
Should I say that ninety percent of people agree with me or with you?
Of course not.
Yeah, I'm just saying, like I think there's a tendency sometimes in an election that's very narrow to read into that like, oh, the public overwhelmingly thinks this. So the public overwhelmingly thinks that when it's really like, you know, twenty thousand people in Wisconsin whatever, you know. So I
don't think that our deep divide in the country. I don't think we'll learn anything that more, much more profoundly different about the deep divides that exist in the country, depending on whether this is a narrow win by Trump or a narrow win by Kamla.
All right, should we hear let's.
Talk about plate Trump. I was just gonna skip it right.
So to me, it's the same shit. There's that.
Here's the thing.
To me, Trump is a secondary character almost for this because Trump himself and what he says does not matter.
As we see at the rally.
You can be anti war, and you can say the Palasais, what did he say? Are raised at age two years old to slaughter people. The contradiction is the point. The contradiction is the fact that the cultural saying fuck you to the elites.
That's it.
That's basically to the elite, okay, fine deliverable immigrants.
To elite tastemakers who think that it's okay to have twelve million people illegally let in your country, or who don't think it's that big of a deal or whatever it's about, you know, even culturally to the extent I mean, I've talked about this before. You can't turn a TV on without seeing like some transgender couple or whatever in a TV show shoehorned and got for no reason.
I mean, it's annoying. It is annoying.
I mean, right, because it's obviously a social agenda, of which is held by a small.
Social agenda trying to be imposed as theory of people.
Well, no, you don't hate transparent you think that they do, so I don't.
Think that people hate trans people. I don't hate trans people. I think people should be able to do what they want. I don't like gender ideology and specifically the way that it's message towards children or I mean, we haven't covered this yet, but there was a landmark study about puberty blockers that somehow got held up at the NIH because it happened to prove that it didn't work so well for the people.
Who do that.
Those are legitimate issues. And that's my point is that, but you.
Didn't start with that.
You started with seeing a transgender couple in a commercial.
Which is what, which is a signal of what, which is what.
Signal of Hey, it's cool to be who you are, no big deal, which is something that most Americans agree with. Which is why the like, you know, transgender panic in twenty twenty two didn't pan out because people like, all right, whatever, does they care more about other stuff? Because you know, it's the only Kelly out there being like, oh, high school athletes, transgender high school athletes is my number one issue.
Like that's an insane fringe view, but it actually is. Hell, I don't think I don't think you do hold that view, but that is like a kind of a core bul Like she gets a lot of praise for that in the Republican Party, and you know, so that's become a center of energy among this group as well.
But the trans thing was just a metaphor for the idea that social liberalism dominates at the very high commanding heights of the American culture, from Disney to Wicked or whatever, and that people are annoyed by it to the point where, yeah, they like the maga apotheosis because they want those people to cry tears and to feel bad.
I sympathize. I understand that feeling. Do I think it's all that productive. No, not necessarily, but I mean it's politics, right.
We have to learn a little bit from what Vox Popular, you know, is kind of trying to send a signal on and that's what I would hope that people take away if Trump does win the election. Unfortunately, I don't think that that's necessarily the case. But that's kind of why I say Trump is not what he says doesn't matter. He's a figure. Is is like a like a lightning rod or whatever for whatever cause that you know, pisses
people off in the way that you want to. I think immigration is the bigger part of that, but there's it's a big tent, you know, for grievance. That that explains why Rudy and Tulsey and RFK and all these people can be pro Trump all at the same time, and the internal contradictions are the point. You know, I
increasingly believe that about MAGA. Let's move on to the next part here as skipping Donald Trump and talking here about the popular vote and also about some Trump efforts to run up the score and possibly set the stage for a stop to steal two point zero. Let's start with Harry Enton about that possibility of Donald Trump winning the popular vote.
Let's take a listen.
Trump may finally get his great white whale. Harris versus Trump national margin. You mentioned that New York Times poll a tie that's actually right in the middle of the spectrum. When we're talking about recent polling data, you don't have to look very far to find Donald Trump ahead nationally. He was up by two points in the CNBC poll, up by three in the Wall Street Journal poll. Very close races within the margin of error. But then the same thing on the other side, right, you have Harris
up by three points according to IPSOS. The say twenty four you gov poll it's a bunch of academics also has Harris up by three. But the bottom line is with the popular vote, which we really haven't focused upon, a very very tight race, John. Fact is, Donald Trump is very much in a position he could win the popular vote, which of course is something he would.
Absolutely love to do and would be something very different than we have seen compared to last time in the polling, compared to last time.
Exactly right. So I went back through the time machine, all right, I went back through the time machine to see where were the past two races. At this point in the campaign, Look, Harrison, the average poll right now is up by one, well within the margin. Ever, you go back four years ago, Joe Biden was well ahead of Donald Trump in the national popular vote polls. He was up by nine even Hillary Clinton was up by
six points. So now Donald Trump is in a position he really hasn't been before at this point in the campaign where he could truly compete. And we can truly say that the popular vote at this point is way too close to.
Cole okay, so very clearly it's possibility.
I guess.
My one quibble though, is that he was using polls and not the actual results from twenty sixteen to twenty twenty. And did you notice that right right? Because the actual twenty sixteen popular vote was two point one for Hillary.
Let's see what it was for I think it was four and a half. I was, yeah, it was quite high.
Yeah, it's in fifty one point three to forty six point eight. And I guess the reason there was a massive historical turnout in all states, so we actually won more of the popular vote because it had a lot more Blue voters in places like New York, California and elsewhere that came out.
But that, yeah, in addition, so it is an interesting point.
Yeah, I mean, one of the things that's fascinating here is that between twenty sixteen and twenty twenty, Republicans actually opened up more of an electoral college advantage. And now, based on the twenty twenty two results and based on the polling you know, as it exists currently going into twenty twenty four, it looks like they may actually have less of an electoral college edge than they did even in twenty sixteen, which shows you these coalitions aren't exactly
static that they move around. I mean, do I think Trump's going to win the popular vote?
Probably not.
In both twenty sixteen and twenty twenty he got around like forty seven percent of the vote. I think it would be a stretch to see him getting an actual over majority.
But you can't rule anything out.
And I will say, if Trump wins the popular vote and loses the electoral.
College, there's a three percent chance that will be that will.
Be the end of the electoral college. It will be over for the electoral college. And I just want to say, like back when Hillary lost because she won the popular vote, and lost the electoral College. I wasn't one of those people around there bitching. Yes, I went the electoral College to go away, But those were the rules of the game,
and she understood them that she played. And so even if you know Trump wins the bopular and loses the electoral College, you don't get to cry about the rules of the game as they are set up and established today. But you know, he's clearly trying to project a lot of confidence. Like I said, I think the New York City rally was an attempt to create the sense of inevitability. He also we can put this up on the screen A five. They announced they're going to do a campaign
in Salem, Virginia. Now, Pole just came out a high quality poll from Washington Post showing you know, Virginia looks like it's not a swing state. It looks the same as it did last time. I think it was six okay was the margin.
So you know Virginia better than I do. What is what's the vibe in Salem? Is it like southern VIRGINI I.
Think Salem is southwestern Virginia. I'm pretty sure so this is I can look it up, but I'm pretty sure. This is like in the mountains in southwestern Virginia.
I thought about it going and then I saw it was a three hour drive time. I'm like, that's not gonna happen.
Yeah, yeah, let me see. Yeah, yeah, yeah it is.
It's almost like to the Virginia line over close to ROANOK. So yeah, this is like this is rural Appalachian Virginia. I'm sure he has a lot of supporters there. They'll be very excited to see him. Is he going to win the state of Virginia this I would be willing to say absolutely not. He's also doing a rally in New Mexico. Is he gonna win New Mexico? Also, there is zero indication he's going to win the state of New Mexico. You even have a fake Ramaswami in the.
New York Yeah. New York is a swing state.
It's said the rally like do people just like being lied to?
I don't know, because that is also preposterous and there is no no data to back it up whatsoever. But the plan here is to create the sense of like, oh, we're going on the offense, even in places like New Mexico and Virginia and New York. Can you imagine we're going on. I saw people tweeting like, Oh, We're gonna win New.
Jersey, Like, no, you are not.
But the idea is to create the sense that it's a done deal, the election's over. Trump's gonna win, even though every you know analysis out there says it's a coin flip. And then if he does lose, you created the sense that it was over and there was no
way Democrats could win. And so then your your fans are going to be primed and ready to believe that if you don't win, this was stolen, and they'll be ready for whatever, you know, conspiracy theory you want to put out there as to why this was unfair, unjust and you were robbed, et cetera, et cetera. And so I genuinely think that is part of the strategy of going to places like Virginia, New Mexico, New.
York, et cetera.
I think that's definitely part of it. I was wondering too with Salem. I was like, Okay, well, what's the big brain case for it? Is like, like you said, Appalachia trying to get some North Carolina folks maybe to drive over.
Could be you know. I was like, OK, I could see that, but you could just go to Yeah, you could.
Just go to not that to North Carolina.
Actually, I mean I don't know.
You know, I read stories about people at these Trump rallies. You drive for fifteen hours or whatever, so you never know. In terms of New Mexico, it's funny. Last time around, I remember tracking this Trump was they were like, we're gonna win New Mexico.
New Mexico's in play.
Jason Miller, who currently works with the campaign, he kept saying that over and over again. And the action result is he lost it by I think a bigger margin in twenty twenty than he did in six years. So yeah, I don't think that New Mexico is gonna happen. I mean, I guess the case is maybe some people drive over from Arizona from to New Mexico, but in general, right.
The domination is the point.
Now the risk is that, hey, man, you probably should go to Wisconsin. Because I may have incorrectly been decided, but I saw someone say he hadn't been to Wisconsin or in that area in like three weeks, which is a long time. I mean, that was a huge talking point after twenty sixteen. So there could be a lot of overconfidence in the Trump campaign right now.
We see it's not there.
You go, it's only been a month. You know, it's been a month since you're in Wisconsin. Now, maybe it's just a sign of hey, we're gonna win Wisconsin.
We're not worried about it. There's some signs in that direction.
I mean, you know, we were just talking with Logan and he thinks was and is like the smallest or the best state now before him in terms of but he.
Still has them losing in the average.
So it's I mean, no one could think like, even if you feel like Wisconsin is moving towards Trump, you certainly can't think like all.
This is done and you know it's a wrap now.
I do see he's going to hold a rally in Milwaukee a couple days before the election.
Okay, so that's on their radar. I listen.
I mean a lot of these campaign decisions on the Trump side too, are just about like his ego, Yes, right, like he wants to pretend like New Mexico's in play.
He probably maybe even believes it.
Right at the rally last night, he said he thinks they're going to win Colorado. You are not gonna win Colorado. But you know, he may have convinced himself of that, and so part of it is just like playing to his ego as well. And then I also think there's a sense that since politics are so national, does it really matter if you do the rally in Sale in Virginia versus in North Carolina.
That was my other case was that it's just like it's all a show, and.
It's a national show, and the particular location, like whether it's in ped Slovania or in Virginia or whatever, it doesn't ultimately matter all that.
U That's what I was thinking, because I was, you know again the Madison Square Garden thing. At first thought it was dumb. I'm like, why are you doing it? And then I was like, oh, well, even if you live in like bumfuck wherever, like you know what Madison
Square Garden is. So you see a picture of Madison Square Garden and Trump in a packed arena where they literally had to turn people away, and you know what, it is same in terms of I mean, actually I remember in Iowa and in New Hampshire last time around, Trump did not spend that much time or on the ground in twenty sixteen, Ted Cruz and the Marco made a lot of talking points about that, but what ended
up being correct. The correct strategy was just going Fox News or go wherever, hold a rally, say whatever you want, people into it it, watch it, vote for you. I mean, obviously was he got second I think in Iowa. But that was a big media strategy where the ground game was shook up entirely by the nationalization my politics. And if you look at this time around, I mean Ron DeSantis and Nicki Haley and these people, they spend a ton of time on the ground. Vivek didn't go to
all ninety nine counties in ilank. Yeah, it didn't matter, right, how much you get five percent of the vote something like that.
Yeah, And Chick was really the first person kind of understand that back in twenty six it was, you know, because he didn't run like a traditional campaign.
Really it was very like more like Rocky too.
You think it's ramshackle now.
Back then it was a wild It was the Trump helicopter and like five guys, one of them we used to work for the UFC.
That was it.
Yeah, and you know, it was enough to win the popular road to get the job done and you know the rules of the game as they existed, so so that that may be part of it too.
Is like the.
More traditional campaign heads on his team are like, Hey, he wants to do this thing for his ego and it doesn't really hurt, so.
Why not go to Virginia.
I don't know, I think I am yeah, I think that that's the correct strategy. Probably the nationalization matters most. And yeah, like you said, for stop the steal two point zero, if that's what you want to set up, you're like, well, you know, the inevitive ability. I mean, I just feel like at the point this cake is baked, like they're going to say it no matter what, like whether they're going to Salem or whether they're going away,
it doesn't matter. I mean, the level of like delusion up here, specifically for a lot of these boomers like you, there's not a word you could say to these folks about why the election was not stolen. So he's got it in the bag.
And I was.
You know, if you go on Twitter, the amount of election just straight up bullshit that you will consume on a daily basis is unbelievable to me. I think Trump is doing quite well on the race. I think he's got a more better than not shot of winning. Do I think he's a ninety three percent chance of winning? No, who even comes up with this stuff? Yeah, that's where I'm like, okay, I'm I was thinking about this. Republicans seem booied psychologically, are buoyed by this sense of inevitability.
Democrats are neurotic, and they're convinced that they're going to lose. Now, every big thing I've ever accomplished in my life, even if I ever had a good chance of doing it, I always acted like I was gonna lose, just to make sure you do everything to make sure that it doesn't happen. So there are just screens of overconfidence to me right now and bravado and ego.
It's just I don't know, karma is real, all right, Like it'll check you very quickly.
It's a coin flip election.
Yeah, that's what it is, a coin flip election, and you know, no one can say which direction the polls might be wrong, Like we don't know. Maybe they are underestimating trial. That's that's very possible, but you don't know that. So yeah, I mean part of it is just they like to pretend. I mean, it's part of like the ethos of like owning the Libs. Part of owning the
Libs is like we're destroying you and we're dominating. You're gonna we're going to New Mexico, We're going to we're going to New York where you know, we're eating your lunch.
You're going to be destroyed.
You're gonna be as one speaker at MSG said, you're going to be slaughtered on election day. It's part you know, that's part of what like fuels this movement is the sense of like, you know, we're destroying you and owning the Libs, et cetera. And then from the Trump perspective, this and the you know, Trump influencers. I do think it's more concerted strategy to lay the groundwork for. But if we do lose, we're going to claim we want it anyway, and you are all going to believe it,
and they are all going to believe it. And I think there will be much that we're going to talk more tomorrow about some of the specific, like organized efforts that they put in place to lay the groundwork for that challenge.
If they were you know, to narrowly lose or to lose at all the election. Next week. We're going to get more into the specifics of that.
But you know, when you see like Elon talking about potential voter fraud and Marjorie Taylor Green claiming that they're switching votes, and then this organized effort of all these lawsuits across a bunch of different states that they've already put into place, you had some dude in North Carolina suggesting they should just preemptively hand the Electoral College votes over to Trump.
Makes you see that, Yeah, I did, and he's actually a member of Congress.
That's just incredible, unbelievable. So I mean there, Yeah, they are laying the groundwork and it will not be hard. It will be much easier this time around to convince all of their people that the election was stolen than it was last time around.
And that's part of what's going on here.
There you go.
All right, So, speaking of that coin flip election, we have Logan Phillips from Race to the White House joining us to talk about exactly where things stand. The latest polls break all of that down for us, and also to answer this question of whether or not pollsters are hurting because you see hurting like with the d I feel like I always it sounds like hurting, I.
Mean her ding. They probably are hurting.
They're probably also hurting emotionally. But anyway, because they're all getting like the exact same results, So is that likely or are they kind of trying to fudge the numbers a little bit so that they're not too much out over their skis in the event of either a Trump or a Kamla victory.
Let's get right to it all right, guys.
Election Day, as you probably know, is literally a week from tomorrow, which I'm having trouble rapping my head around. But joining us sound to breakdown where the polls stand as of today is our friend Logan Phillips of Race to the White House and offering exclusive content here at Bring Points.
Great to see Logan, Yeah, of course.
So we've got a little clip here from Steve Kernaki over at MSNBC talking about how the poles have trended somewhat towards Trump.
Let's take a listen to that.
One thing we have noticed in the last couple of days. This is not all of the polls that are out there now, but we have seen a number four in the last four days that have shown very small but in the context of this close race, potentially meaningful movement in Trump's direction. I don't want to overstate it, but at the same time, it's hard to ignore these four. The CNBC poll came out the other day as Trump ahead by two, the Wall Street Journal poll trump ahead
by three. These are national numbers Sienna and the New York Times A tide race, CNN a tide race. The significance here is broader movement again we're seeing in Trump's direction. To put this in some context, here is our current national polling average. Let me call that up on the screen for you. Right here, Harris continues to lead nationally. I want to stretch that, but we've been tracking this
every week on the air. Here a couple of weeks ago, this number was at three for Kamala Harris, her leading the poll average now down to one point because of some of the numbers that I just showed you. Of course, the swing states, the battleground states, are going to be what decide this election. And look how close those are.
We see one point two nationally.
Just about all these swing states are even tighter than that one of.
Those poles that Karnaki references, there is the New York Times, Theano Pole, which of course people pay a lot of attention to.
You can put this up on the screen.
This is I believe, their final final national poll before election day, and it does show the two of these candidates tied for eight percent. So what are you seeing in terms of the trends as we head in here to the final stretch.
Yeah, the trends are that the race went from Razor tight with Harris having a slight edge to Razor tight with basically being even maybe the slightest vetch of Harris in the key swing states. So the movement is real, fortunately for Harris, and it's unusual'll say this for a
Democrats perspective. The election is decided by the Electoral College versus the national vote, and while Trump is gaining in swing states, the gain is a little more subtle, except maybe in Wisconsin where it seems to be getting a little faster.
Got it right, So if we stick with them and we continue down some of the data points that we have, can we put the next one up on the screen. We saw here, you know, multiple show things showing tied. Now as you just mentioned, Can you lay out why maybe the popular vote will not be as a deciding
factor this time around? So what I mean by that is usually the rule of thumb with Republicans is that if the Democrats are losing the popular vote or even polling in the popular vote within one or even two points, and that usually means that there's an electoral college bias to the Republicans. Something we've been trying to prime the audience for is this may be changing because of Republican shifts in deep blue states places like California and in
New York. Should we read into it that way and contextualize it in the swing states?
Like you said, yeah, I do think that Harris probably needs to win the popular vote to win, and on average she's leading the polls by like one and a half to two points. Okay, nationally speaking, but the change and how much of an edge you need can change dramatically, And honestly, there have been cycles even in this millennium twenty four twenty twelve where Democrats lost the popular vote they easily could have won the election, especially two thousand
and four, So we actually see cycle to cycle. This changes all the time because individual states change all the time. If Texas becomes a proper straight down the middle state, Democrats could easily lose the popular vote and run the electoral college, for example, which is not where we're now we.
Are yet, right, So this could be more of a precursor, possibly of things to come, This trend very possibly.
Yeah, what are some of the demographic realignments that have led to that shift in terms of the popular vote electoral college vote dynamic.
I think that Democrats are doing a bit better in the suburbs now they c hereinly did in twenty twenty two, and that is making helping them a little bit in states like Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin. Honestly, every single one of the swing states, right is also kind of what's putting
Texas in play too. Plus, Democrats appear to be doing a little better at the white vote relative to how they were doing in sixteen and perhaps twenty at least relative to where the popular vote is, so that means that they're, you know, the alignment of voters might be a little closer to just where the swing states happen to be. It doesn't mean that that inherently would give
you an edge. It is just the absolute ran and which states happened to be the most competitive American politics at this point in time.
Is this a continuation of some of the trends that we saw in the mid terms because Republicans, you know, that red wave didn't materialize, but there were a few states where they were kind of did right, Florida and New York in particular, California somewhat to a lesser extent. What are some of the peculiar dynamics in those states which are not swing states that have led Republicans to either you know, gain ground in New York, gain even more ground in the state of Florida.
Yeah, I think some of it has to do with focal politics. Kathy Hocals in particularly popular in New York. Cromo had was popular until we had all his ethical issues that force you out of office. And it's you know, when you have a stay of one party rule for long enough time, it can lead to some inefficiencies in government and people can over time turn against that. So that might be a problem there as well. You know,
crime has been a problem in New York. It's gone down, but you know, still important to people and New York probably due to federal reasons hasn't always had the resources and needs. As you have a lot of immigrants and asylum sequens've come to the state who don't yet have this status that they may or may not get depending on the individual. It's able to get a job, they
have to wait like a year for it. So now the state has to provide for them because of the slow federal policy, and so that's making people more That's.
Been a big long island staten island thing. Let's put the next one up here from CBS. So this was one of the few that had it just fifty forty nine, not just tied. But if you take a look at
that battleground figure, we have it fifty fifty. I mean, so when we're talking here, logan like even also in your own models, and you're looking at those battlegrounds says, how do you suss out like the reality of a point three advantage or a point four or something like that, because it just seems so within the margin of error that it's difficult to you determine even with an average when we're talking about edges that are that small.
Yeah, you're sure to have the edge, you know. We can look at hundreds to pass a long absolutely, yeah, yeah, yeah, there's a correlation. Even THO doesn't feel like there's anything. But the fundamental nature of this stuff is the assumptions that we make about the electorate. They're always going to be wrong in some way. We just don't know what parts if they're going to be wrong, right, So it's just like you a little more room to be wrong
in one direction. If you have a point four lead, then you're down point four.
Rightly, right, let's put a five up on the screen. This was a poll that I'm sure the Harris people were very happy to see. This was ABC IPSOS poll of likely voters. It has Harris up at fifty one, Trump at forty seven. Greg Sargent opines here that it's better for her than other national polls finding a tie because she runs better among Latinos and blacks including men, then those other poles, while holding on to the same percentage of the white vote as Joe Biden.
Per Ron Brownstein, This is the key. What do you make of this pole? And how real do you think that these shifts.
That we've seen in other poles among black men, among Hispanic men in particular, Given that you do have some poles like this that really don't find any movement at all.
Yeah, I mean, if SOS has generally been more favorable for Harris this Cyclewar Times has generally been more conservative favorable for Trump, so that might be what's that play here. I think, ultimately the odds are that Trump has gained in these polls. But in twenty twenty two, the polls were off by like a point and a half. Maybe the movement at the end was real. It just might have been Democrats outright leading and then it went to
the slight Republican lead at the end. But there's no way to know this for sure because you only have one election. So maybe the polls two weeks ago and the movement was completely made up, which is hard to tell.
Yeah, I know, I mean, I know this can be frustrating, and let's continue to the next one. Nate Silver, he had a very good breakdown of actually each of the individual swing states. I wonder if we could put it, We'll put that tear sheet please up on the screen. But I was looking at his Wisconsin model, and if we check Wisconsin, what he has in front of there is basically like a fifty three percent chance that Kamala would win THEO would win Wisconsin. But you were just
saying that there has been some overall movement. You actually see there exactly what you said, our one point sixth advantage and a change from the last month. Is there anything from you can look at from his overall analysis and also maybe pair it with the early vote of some signs where things can differently go.
Yeah, there's been consistent Poule movement in Wisconsin. We thought it might be true for Michigan, but we got a bunch of high quality polls showing Hair still ahead by it modestly in Michigan. So I think Wisconsin's is one of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin that I'm most worried about for Harris, that it's most likely to flip.
Interesting, So, for if you're the Harris campaign, what looks like your best path to two seventy And conversely, if you're the Trump campaign, what is your most likely path to two seventy?
Yeah, I still think for Harris it's the conventional Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania.
All plus Omaha.
Yes, but North Carolina is so close right now that it easily could be the one that saves Harris, Like.
If she loses Wisconsin but wins North she could win North Carolina and that would be enough for.
And if she wins North Carolina and Nevada, which you know, I still think she's modestly favorite Nevado.
So you're still very bullish on Nevada. So let's talk about that, much less so than my most last Okay, much last.
Let's talk so because for everything I've seen right now, I guess the bowl case for Trump is you've got this like major Republican turnout. According to Joel Ralston, a huge percentage of the votes have actually already been cast to.
The overall electorate.
The bear case for Trump is that there's a big what is it other of people who are unidentified in party, and that that other demographic is disproportionately younger people who are most likely to vote Democrats. So the other category being so large could be skewing it. But you're still less bullish, So tell us why.
Yeah, because the early vote has not been good for them. Now, yeah, some of that's not counting a lot of the mail in ballot that's going to be coming in, So maybe it's not as bad for them as we think Okay, the polling has been sort of good for Harris generally underrate STEM so that doesn't assily Kerry cycles in cycle in Nevada. In Nevada specifically it has up to this point anyway. Yeah, Yeah, I mean I think it's I
think the case for Trump stuff again and stronger. That being said, I mean, if you look at Maryland, for example, I saw this great graphic from split Ticket this morning the twenty twenty two election. You know, the breakout of like how Republicans did an early voting relative to twenty twenty suggested all sorts of good signs for them. No one really thought that Dan Cox was going to be Wes Moore in that.
Race, but that's the governor's race.
Governor. Yeah, thanks for saying that, So I and he ended up winning by like the same margin. I think that Joe Biden won Maryland and most exactly right, because it's just the makeup of election day was also really different. So this stuff is clused. But the makeup of the electric can change. How independent and swing voters vote can change as well.
Okay, we were reading a little bit yesterday, Crystal and I at different states and how they vote, so I had no idea. For example, like ninety percent of Arizona votes or votes early. So maybe if you could just tell the audience like which states were the early vote, maybe matters more. And then where also, like which states on the same day could be determinative, Like with the Maryland.
Like you were saying, yeah, in Maryland, I mean saying that Maryland, I would say Nevada and Arizona, those are states you're going to see a lot more early voting. It's more important, you know, especially because Nevada has a lot of clonary workers who are show to get election day off so they try to get in early, right yeah. And Georgia has a strong early vote. But even there, right, like this is what it was the last few cycles, you might change. Democrats got the big bank of votes
early on. Republicans came in droves at the end. So I think for all of these states it's still going to be a factor, but it's more that you know each state by state.
It's just hard to say.
Right now because we don't have a voting pattern long enough post twenty twenty, when more people got ento early voting, right yeah, yeah.
And the other thing is difficult is every state has different sequencing in terms of like is it just mail in, is it just early in person, which tends to be more Republican, And so I think that's part of what's accounting for. Like, if you look at those Blue Wall states, you go, oh, that looks pretty good for Democrats. Then you look at Novoda and you're like, oh, now it's
terrible for Democrats. Part of it seems to be that different states have different sequencing, different percentages of the vote that are expected to come in early, et cetera.
So can be very difficult.
Like you said, especially post twenty twenty, we really don't have a model for this election, which is post COVID but not during COVID, and what the makeup.
Is likely to look like.
Yeah, and I would say the general thing is right. Over the last two weeks served in positive signs for Republicans an incredibly competitive phrase, but much like perhaps a lot of pundents were overreading the good signs for Kamala, the same thing is happening now. And I think it's in part due to past experience of headaches twenty twenty and twenty sixteen. If you don't love to be wrong, but I don't like to be wrong in the same way twice or three times in a row.
Well, that's a perfect segue and to the next conversation we want to have about what has been kind of like an online debate among nerds and data geeks, et cetera.
Over whether or not the pollsters are quote unquote hurting.
This is going to be posted later in the week for everybody to take a look at as we head into election day.
It's going to be posted today for premium subscribers.
If you want to become a premium subscriber and here logan answer this incredibly important and interesting question, go.
To Breakingpoints dot com. So get that right away. All right, let's pug back up this graphic.