Episode 53: In Washington DC With Presidential Debate Coach Brett O'Donnell

He's so good at breaking out where we are with things and we're excited to talk to him .

Here sometime between September and November every time we come , one of the prettiest times to come , because we're not in that cold snap season yet , so there's still beautiful leaves that have changed . They're on the trees . Right now it's gorgeous . We are in Georgetown , which I've never been in Georgetown before .

Well , I shouldn't say that I guess we were here , yeah it was briefly .

But anyway , we were walking down Georgetown geeking out on all the cool architecture of these buildings and taking pictures and just like crazy old building . And now you look down and there's a Ralph Lauren in it , for example .

We're starving , so everything's kind of turning to the dinner hour and we're walking by this place and it's called Martin's Tavern and it looks cool , it's like historic , it's got a little bit of that ambiance to it that I love , but it's pretty crowded and there was a bit of a wait and we're kind of like I don't really know if this is you know what we

should do or not . So we press on . We end up at this like Italian grab yourself a slice kind of place . Nothing to write home about , Just a basic , basic pizza joint .

It's JFK proposed to Jackie O at this restaurant , and then every president since Harry Truman has been there to eat , so like it's just full of history , which of course I love . Instead , we go to a five and dime . You know , cut yourself a slice of Italian joint that you could get anywhere .

I don't do it as much in New Mexico , quite frankly , as I do when I go to , like a historic city , but I want to know , like what happened here . Like when we went to Boston , I do that too , like what's the oldest restaurant in town and you know that kind of stuff , and we tend to go to Old Abbot's Grill , which is the oldest restaurant in town .

But then we get home and get up the next morning , yesterday morning , and see that President Biden's granddaughter was right where we were , in the middle of Georgetown off Wisconsin , and she was there with Secret Service Protection and someone broke into the Secret Service car that she was in , broke the window and there was a shot fired by one of the Secret

Service agents and he just kind of realized that we are now , or we're still in , a time where crime is everywhere , it's exploding everywhere and it's a national epidemic . We know it's an issue in New Mexico , but it's a massive issue here in DC . It's a huge issue , obviously , as we talk about Chicago and San Francisco and all these big cities too .

But this just goes to show this approach of you know , not enforcing the law in service to some sort of ideology that is incredibly dangerous for the people of this country . It has to stop . And so you even go to these places like Georgetown , which I can't imagine . How expensive these places are .

So yeah , it just it was kind of one of those little wake up calls that hey , maybe you think you're safe walking around the streets at , you know 10 o'clock at night , but maybe it's not .

It's impressive in the day , don't get me wrong . I think it's really cool . You see the reflecting pool , all of that in the day . The famous forest scum scene is filmed right there , where he's like screaming Jenny and he runs into the reflecting pool . I know the bench there that they filmed the firm at .

I mean again me and my movie knowledge right or my own movie knowledge .

It's such cool that everybody out here and then look at this right here , oh yeah , who needs this when you've got this ? So there you go . Yeah , Honestly , you could have literally had George Washington himself Walking by saying can I answer any questions ? And these guys are like they've got their . They're very yeah .

Come on , kids . Yeah , it's like , yeah and like video , what you're seeing , the capitals behind there . I mean it's , it's all lit up like a . Christmas tree .

And the fact that when he took his family to see the Grand Canyon , yeah , you give good look at it and then you're good , you're gone . Yeah , You're like okay , this looks good . I'm going to get a little bit some of them . I stay it longer , but you know I want to see a lot and get a lot done in a montage .

So it's like let's get , let's go , let's go , Anyway .

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She's dismembering the Vec , yeah , and then you guys are just loving , just like yeah , yeah , let's do this .

But I just think you know she's a force on that stage . She has a lot of great ideas . She has to come off strong and you know , what we'll and what we'll hear from Brett here in a few minutes is just how women kind of have to present themselves in a different way sometimes than men do , not necessarily the old-fashioned , you know stereotypes .

That's not at all what he's addressing . But just on , where is a line for a woman on a debate stage versus a man and what can each one gender ? You know people have these ideologies of what men should talk about and what women should talk about . So anyway , I think she's impressive . I like what she had to say last night .

I think it'll be interesting to see you know is she , does she have ? One of the questions that were asked of her was where do you see a pathway to beat Trump , like , do you think there's a path forward to get ahead of Trump ? And she gave a really good answer .

If you're Nikki Haley versus Donald Trump or you're Ron DeSantis versus Donald Trump , you got a shot . I mean because people don't realize . If you look at the Iowa poll right now , take a look at this Iowa poll right here you can see it's not some 50-point gap , so it's tighter in the states that actually have gotten to see these candidates a bit more .

So we'll see what happens without it . That's interesting In her rationales , basically , yeah , watching that thing whittle its way down . But she's also somebody who I think I found to be . First of all , it just reminded me that the energy it takes to crank it up and she gave us 40 minutes probably of just in then taking questions .

She made a very strong case for obviously continuing to help Israel and continuing to make sure our national defense is exactly what it needs to be and , given her experience at the UN , that makes some sense . She has some real good background to that .

And just how you really do have to knock on doors , meet the people , be in front of folks I mean , even you know . That's something that we were pretty adamant about , even though the expectation is oh yeah , you may have seen Mark on the weather , but that doesn't mean that you know exactly who he is or who he stands for .

So it is , she drilled home how important it is to get out there and meet with people one on one or in small groups , or to just take a few minutes with her . So I thought it was , I appreciated the invitation , I thought it was great to see her one on one .

I did give , I did tell her how much our daughters went out and bought her buttons after the first debate , because she is strong and it's nice to see a strong woman up there fighting for the people .

And here is Brett O'Donnell . Well , it is our pleasure to be here in a secret location in Washington . DC with famed political consultant Brett O'Donnell , to talk about all things politics . Brett , thanks for coming up to the lair , as we call it here .

But what we do want to talk to you about is kind of where the state of the race is and where the state , I think , of Republican Party is after the last elections here a week ago . So , let's talk a little

bit . I know you did one of the races in Virginia and taught to us for a lot of conservatives and I think this was really I think , especially coming from the left was , oh my gosh , what a devastating night for Glenn Yonkin . And if you looked at the number , I mean this was by no means a devastating night .

But tell me what you saw from the inside and where are we right now ?

Republicans won almost every district that Joe Biden won by nine or fewer points . And then on top of that we did win a couple of races in places where Joe Biden had won by over 20 points . So I had a candidate in the District 27 Senate race . She won her race in a Joe Biden district . So Republicans did outperform .

The problem is Virginia has become a blue state and really the person who way outperformed was Glenn Yonkin when he won .

And so using Glenn Yonkin's win as a measuring stick against the House and Senate races is a little unfair , because , first of all , in a governor's race you're going to have bigger turnout and second of all , you've got all of these little districts now where there's different issues that come up . But I think that was a big problem .

I do think one problem that Republicans had was , again , we didn't handle the abortion issue properly . I thought going out and really giving the Democrats a 15-week ban as an issue was a bad thing . Let's not make that the reason . Look , the majority of people in Virginia are really concerned about three big things the economy , crime and education .

Those were the things , by the way , on which Glenn Yonkin won . He didn't win offering a 15-week abortion ban . Can I ask you ?

So you get , I think , enticed into that , thinking OK , but you're playing a fool's game , because then you still open yourself up to the governor , whoever that is , or an opponent wants to ban abortion .

That's all , if you . Obviously I live in the state and pretty much every single candidate ran on that ad , and what they do is they say , well , it won't really be 15 weeks , they'll ban all abortions .

But I do think that the way we talk about this issue doesn't come across with compassion , doesn't seem like we want to work from consensus and we throw out common sense . And those three C's , I think , are the principles on which Republicans can use to approach this issue .

When we start talking about ban , that's a negative word , so people take that wrongly , and then when we start putting weeks on it or things , we start to sound unreasonable . So this is a sticky issue . As a man , I don't completely claim to understand all of the things that go into this , and so we have to be compassionate with this .

We have to approach this with some common sense and we need to try to seek some consensus . The one thing that I think national Republicans should do is do what the Dobs decision said . Let's let the states make up their minds what New York decides isn't going to be what Florida decides .

What Virginia decides is going to be different from California , but let's let the states handle this . Now , look , I'm pro-life , I make no bones about it that I think we should try to go out there and convince the public that our way is the better way . But we haven't done that .

We have sort of lost this war where you need to go make the case to the American people about the issue before you make the case about the policy , and so we need to go out and convince people look , this is a life , all life is precious . We need to value life , both unborn and born life .

Let's have compassion toward our fellow man , and so when Republicans don't approach it from that perspective , they look like they're strident and just stuck in their ways . And it's a bad thing .

Whether we determine late term abortion being the eighth and ninth month or something to that degree , do you think that is still , you know , the thing that our candidates should be talking about ? Or is that even dangerous because it's talking about some limitations ? But I feel like the majority have to agree on that part .

But we need to first of all educate the public that that's where Democrats are , that they're the ones who are extreme on this issue . And then I do think we need to do a better job of of going out and convincing folks that life is precious , we believe in the sanctity of life , not just for the unborn but for the born and that we value life .

And as a society , you know , things can unravel pretty quickly .

So we'll wrap on abortion here in just a second . But how do we bridge that gap then ? Does it take multiple messaging points to be able to do that ?

And I agree with your point , you got to change hearts and minds and there has to be some compassion on our part that I do think we have parts of our party that just we were at events where people would stand up and call me a baby killer because they're like wait a minute , you know you're not strong enough on abortion and then all of a sudden you go oh

my goodness , no , but that , that , that is some of what you're talking about . So how do you overcome how long it takes us to make our point ?

I mean , christy , we we watch the debates and one of the things we we kind of go back and forth on the Nikki Haley answer on abortion , but my argument to Christy likes the answer , but my argument is that's a long answer .

They took it out of the hands of unelected justices and they put it in the hands of the people , and now we're seeing states vote . And what I'll tell you is , as much as I'm pro life , I don't judge anyone for being pro-choice and I don't want them to judge me for being pro-life .

So when we're looking at this , there are some states that are going more on the pro-life side . I welcome that . There are some states that are going more on the pro-choice side . I wish that wasn't the case , but the people decided .

But when it comes to the federal law , which is what's being debated here , be honest , it's going to take 60 Senate votes , a majority of the House and a president to sign it . So no , we haven't had 60 Senate votes in over 100 years . We might have 45 pro-life senators .

So no Republican president can ban abortions , any more than a Democrat president can ban these state laws . So let's find consensus .

And until we have folks who are willing to go out and make the case on this issue and change arts and minds it's really hard to have a 15 second debate about this issue because both sides are very polarized and until we can sit down and have a reasonable discussion , I think this is going to be a very tough issue .

Dobbs , you know , in many ways the pro-life movement celebrated Dobbs , but it is . It's caused kind of great chaos and and it's and it's misunderstandings on both sides . And until we can go out and sort of make that case to say you know , here's why this is a life should be valued .

Here are the ramifications of this and really that comes upstream from politics . You know it's a cultural argument and so we have to have that argument before we get to politics , because politics is at the end of the stream .

Where do you think the race is right now on the Republican side ? Do you think , in a broad sense , that that we were looking at potentially a three person race here ? And how do you , how are you able to handicap ?

In a presidential race , the debates are everything in in Senate races and gubernatorial races and down there are a part of it . They're a part of the narrative , but in at the presidential level , debates really matter .

For example , if you read the New York Times piece that's out this morning on Tim Scott and the failure of his campaign , it draws the conclusion that , in large part , his campaign floundered because of his debate performance .

And so and you've seen the candidates that have risen to the top Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis have done so in the backs of pretty good debate performance . So I think the field is starting to winnow down . But the problem with not having Trump participate in the debates is that they are .

You know , folks are living off of the kind of two 2016 Donald Trump , and we haven't seen what 2020 for Donald Trump really looks like in the crucible of debates . You know , admittedly , in those 2016 debates he did pretty well for himself . Nobody thought he would . He was .

He got the field down , he by all accounts out , debated the competition , but you know what ? That's eight years ago . And so he needs to stand up for his policies , defend his actions , because he's really kind of a semi incumbent right .

While he's not the current president , he has a record now and he should have to defend that record in the crucible of debate . So I think that's hurt the race some , but even that , being all things being considered , I still believe that it's not in the bag for Donald Trump .

I think that as the field winnows down and as people really start paying attention so you know , the three of us were politicos , right , we love this stuff , we pay attention to it every single day , 24 , seven . But folks out in the heartland , they're just starting to really pay attention .

You know , there's a , there's the saying in Iowa , two guys walking down the street what did you think of that presidential candidate ? And the other guy says I don't know , I've only met him six times and so , and so folks , folks are just beginning to really settle in to to pay attention .

I think that if a Rhonda Santas could knock off Donald Trump in Iowa , then I think the race is wide open and the Iowa numbers too , by the way , for people who are paying attention .

And so if Trump goes down in Iowa , then I think it's a wide open race because people will you know it's , it may be even a hi ho , the witch is dead moment where people say , oh , wait a second , this guy isn't inevitable , and so we'll see what happens .

But but you know still all things , if you were handicapping , you'd say Trump has a tremendous advantage . But I still think that that if somebody were to take him down in Iowa , new Hampshire , then that blunts the momentum and it could be a new race .

Where are you on the narrative now starting to develop , which is really starting to point out that we are not dealing with the same Trump that we were dealing with in 2016 . You can feel that narrative starting to emerge here . It's got a threat of the Biden narrative in it , sure .

And so I think you know that's , a candidate like that could have a pretty good shot . And I think there's a lot of people out there who just you know they they're nervous about beating Joe Biden .

And while the polls seem to say right now Donald Trump might defeat Joe Biden , they're still nervous about defeating him because the guy campaign from his basement last time and they're worried that he's going to do the same thing and Donald Trump won't be able to defeat him . And they remember , oddly enough , a debate mattered . They remember that first debate .

You go talk to a lot of folks , even in Iowa , new Hampshire , and they'll say , man , I remember that first debate of Donald Trump would have just been better . In that first debate he probably would have won . And now I'm worried about whether or not he'll be able to do that now , four years later .

And I'm saying right here , and I think in this next debate , especially now that the field has winnowed down , so there's really kind of two primaries that have been going on . You know , with Trump , not in the debates it's been who's the ? You know who's going to be the person to take him on .

Now that the field has winnowed down , it is it's less advantageous for you to just debate the other people in the room .

You have to , you have to take him on , yeah , even if he's not on the stage , and you have to show hey , look , I know some of you like this guy , you like his policies , but let me tell you you can have the good from Donald Trump , but not the bad with me , you know .

And so I think if you can make that argument and take him on in that way , you know , to 2016 , donald Trump great , but 2024 Donald Trump isn't showing up for you , and if you can make that argument , I think you can be effective in starting to make this a race .

Multiple polls yeah yeah , in a couple of polls that meet certain standards by the RNC , but um .

So the RNC in times past has only looked at numbers from the last debate to the next debate , but apparently they've been looking at numbers all the way back , which seems to me to be a bit unfair , because the races has changed a lot .

If you're in a three or four-person race and you're not hitting the numbers now , even though you hit them in the past , you should be done Right . I mean , look , the truth of the matter is it is an alternative to Donald Trump , not multiple , and so you have to figure out who that alternative is .

And we got to get there before Iowa , because I believe that , if you know , if Donald Trump has a convincing win in Iowa , it's going to be hard to knock him off in New Hampshire or South Carolina , because then people will say , well , you know , the guy must be the nominee .

So you know , if I mean , I think if he wins by less than 10 , the media is going to write hey , wait a second . You know the maybe he's not the command . You know the commanding lead , that , the leader that we thought he was .

So we'll see what that number looks like , but I do think that if that happens , then that that's a problem for the Trump campaign .

Do you think that that was the case or do you think that they were trying to stand out and point each other's flaws out ?

And , and it's interesting , desantis won that debate handily by that poll , by two to one margin . But it's funny if you ask women who won the debate predominantly , they will say Nikki Haley won the debate .

There are gender norms in communications and men can get away with things that women can't get away with , and so when Nikki Haley calls Vivek scum , there's a lot of women who are like darn right , he's scum because he's going after your daughter .

But then there's a lot of men who like that's very inappropriate , she shouldn't have done that , you know , and so and that's you know , that is just , it's inescapable . But I think those two have developed a pretty strong dislike for each other and I think it's bad ?

That's kind of a , that's a Brett O'Donnell move for people who know it , and and . But at the same time , where do you come down on when you do start to see that real kind of visceral reaction to another candidate on the stage and how do you protect against that becoming an issue ?

I've worked with female candidates , I coach Michelle Bachman in the primary , and that line is different for women than it is for men . Yeah , so you have to know , you know where that is , make sure you don't cross it .

But but you , you have to be that , look , we're looking for our champion right in primary , so , so you have to be able to go out and sort of be the aggressor , be the most aggressive in the debate , so the people know , hey , that person can go take on the Democrat right and defeat the Democrat , and it's really all about that .

I mean , if you look at classic debates in political history , you know , you think of Mitt Romney . Even though he didn't win , he won his first debate because he was aggressive , but then he lost the next two because he went into a shell . Yeah , so it's about , you know , that controlled aggression that determines whether or not you're going to be the winner .

When he's running against Jimmy Carter , he's got this great name the lion of the Senate , you know and he gets asked by Roger Mudd in a 60 minutes interview why do you want to be president ? Yeah , and he can't answer the question , and that killed his candidacy because he didn't know why he was running , who he was , you know .

And that's the , that's the stuff you know , but but they want the flash and the pain and to make you think that you know , like it's like mad men and you know , I mean it's just crazy .

And what struck me about that is that Axelrod you can say it or not , but he's very still tight with Obama . You still wonder if some of that came from Obama .

Casey , this isn't Mitt Romney or John McCain or anybody else on the other side , but this Donald Trump . It's a fundamental question as to what American democracy is going to look like the day after the next election . So the stakes are very high . He knows that , but I think he needs to take a sober look at the whole landscape .

And , yes , he's committed to moving forward . I get that but he ought to then look at what his campaign is doing and what they need to do and get out of this sort of referendum frame and go after it .

Then he should step aside , because Biden was able to campaign from his basement because of COVID . You could say , covid , hey , I can't campaign . It's not going to be that way this time . And so I think a lot of Democrats have seen the spate of polls that are out there that show Biden losing in some of these swing states . That would cost him the election .

A Politico's analysis yesterday that shows Joe Biden losing the electoral college massively to Donald Trump in a basically landslide victory for Trump . Really , I think all of those things combined have Democrats a little nervous about where he is . And then there's just the continual mounting evidence that the guys not all there .

If you saw the Reeth Laying episode this past weekend at our 17th cemetery where he's walking in circles , doesn't know where to go . I mean all of those things , that sort of disorientation , and you've got an 80-year-old guy . It looks like he's not up to the task of doing the job , and the world's a dangerous place .

We have two wars that are going on right now and hot spots all around . Folks are really very nervous about their security , and rightly so , and so I think that they've seen this and they're worried about it . And there's others waiting in the wings .

I mean , the Democrat Party has some younger folk , I think , that would like to try to step up and take a shot .

I don't think they'd be a great candidate to effective , but they have younger people in their party , like Gavin Newsom , governor Whitmer , governor Bushier , so they have folks around the country who could potentially run their race and at least pass the hey , I'm mentally competent test . And I think that's a big problem for Democrats .

And couple that with the fact that there's not a single policy thing that Joe Biden can point to and say hey , look at this , I got this right . Whether it's foreign policy , the world's a mess . The economy Democrats are telling him stop using Biden . They're telling him put it in the trashy .

I mean Republicans have said that , but Democrats are saying that the border is a disaster . Even Democrats like Adams in New York and Chicago other places are like hey , we got the border policy wrong . So I just think that it's going to be awfully hard Now . Look , we're past the deadline in some of the early states for the primaries .

They don't have to run in a primary , they don't have to slide farther left and everybody raises their hands and agrees to free health care for people coming over illegally , and now we see what the result of that is . You don't have those kind of moments that are wrapped around your neck , yeah .

And then couple that with the fact that you've got all of the scandal stuff going on with Biden , where you have Politico last week running an article about all the lies Joe Biden has told about Biden incorporated . So I think there's a lot of X factors which are fighting against him being the eventual nominee .

And you've got Gavin Newsom out there running a shadow campaign . He's going to take on Ron DeSantis in a debate here in a few days . I mean , I think that there are a lot of folks with the knives out .

And I think Newsom sees this as an opportunity . It's his chance to go into the so-called lion's den of Fox News and say , hey look , I can convince moderates to come my way .

And it's a chance for Ron DeSantis to go and say I'm fighting the other side and I'd be the most effective person to take on the other side and the person who might be their nominee .

But yeah , whatever , it's going to be a very interesting debate we're excited about that .

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Where do you go with this , and are you terrified with what you see ? I am .

But I actually think it's worse than 1939 . It feels like that masses of people have come out of the woodwork with anti-Semitic hate spewing across the globe .

Jews make up roughly 3% of the population in the world , and yet they are in the United States , and yet they're on the receiving end of 60% of all religious hate crimes , and that is terrifying , and it should terrify us all , because this is how genocide gets started .

And so we should never forget that Hamas attacked innocent women , children and men and did horrific things to them unprovoked , and they've taken the moustache , they've taken Americans hostage .

To this day , there are Americans being held hostage , and so we never , ever , ever , would have called for a ceasefire in the world with Japan , and and I remind folks that we dropped two atomic weapons on Japan In order to save hundreds of thousands of American lives and and so why in the world would we ask Israel to Cease fire , or a pause that they don't

want , that would allow Hamas to regain advantage , is beyond me it is terrifying and we were talking about the fact that when you look back to the hostage situation with Carter and you know how much coverage that got and how it was a really like that countdown .

It's not indiscriminate , it's aimed at taking out a Terrorist threat that they face every day . Israel is a small country . It is surrounded on all sides by enemies Hezbollah , the West Bank , palestinians and Hamas to the south . They face these challenges every single day , and and we here in America , you know , take for granted our wide open space .

But in Israel , with a small country and a national security challenge like they have , they have every right to go in and eliminate Hamas . And , by the way , the people of Palestine or the people of Gaza elected Hamas , is their government right , and so they . It is .

They are , they are complicit with this terrorist act , and so Israel should be given a leeway to eliminate Hamas , conduct this policy , and we should support them . They are a closest ally in the Middle East . They are a democracy , the only democracy in the Middle East .

And what other people don't know is Israel has an Arab population that lives right Israel million they they have representatives in the Knesset right , and so they live peaceably there . But Hamas , hezbollah , they are dedicated to one thing the elimination of Israel . Israel is literally Fighting for its existence right .

I just think the the narrative that's being discussed here , you know , you know , I even talked about with professional people that I respect greatly they're saying , christie of these protests are not only pro-Hamas , they're just , you know , they're against the occupation , which also drives me crazy because I'm like , what occupation ?

Give people maybe a couple things to look for to be able to say , okay , it's important that this happens first , so that we get into a race , that's that that really does look different than 2016 , and that the field is already much , much smaller than it was . So that part is is good for for being able to have a robust one-on-one fight . But what ?

What are you hoping to see in the next month or so as we head toward Christmas ? That would lead you to say , okay , we're getting to where things could get really interesting .

That could make the field Very interesting for us . I also think that Donald Trump , if he shows up to a debate , that is a sign that they're nervous about the race and I think that there's a great possibility there's . There'll be one more debate after this one in December in Iowa , before the Iowa caucuses . I think Donald Trump might show up for that debate .

If he shows up for that debate , that could make the race very , very , very interesting , because candidates will actually have a chance to prove their medal against Against the frontrunner . So , and I think if he gives them that , that's a benefit for democracy yeah , it's great , it is good , it is good .