This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Donald Trump has lost his grip, and it’s making him prone to a variety of political errors, some of which we enjoy with pure schadenfreude, others of which could cause tremendous collateral damage. In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * What if anything makes Marjorie Taylor Greene’s early exit from the House of Representatives different from past Trump purges? * Why did he blow up his party’s big plan to make Zohra...
Nov 26, 2025•32 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Donald Trump’s Epstein coverup has faltered. Jeffrey Epstein’s estate has produced tens of thousands of emails implicating scads of U.S. elites, Trump foremost among them, but including famed economist Larry Summers and other prominent Democrats. Meanwhile, Congress has now voted overwhelmingly to compel the Justice Department to release its Epstein case files. In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * What do the rece...
Nov 19, 2025•34 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm After notching huge victories in last week’s off-year elections, Senate Democrats were overcome by a failure of nerve, and agreed to reopen the government without restoring anyone’s health insurance or securing any legal mechanism to rein in Donald Trump’s lawlessness In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * What the fuck? * Why did the standoff end the way it did? * How could the eight capitulators plus Chuck Schumer...
Nov 12, 2025•36 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm It was a night of blowout victories in elections for Democrats and Democratic causes across the country, significantly surpassing the party’s most optimistic expectations. In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * What, if anything, do the margins, and the nature of the sweep, tell us about the politics today; * How compatible are these results with a Democratic Senate victory in 2026? * Why “Democrats should moderate”...
Nov 05, 2025•28 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Even some of Donald Trump’s own voters were shocked to see he summarily demolished part of the White House, surprising many Democrats who had convinced themselves Trump is teflon and people don’t care about his corruption or vulgarity. In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * The long history of politicians not doing stuff like this, fearing political backlash; * Whether this episode suggests swing voters can be moved...
Oct 29, 2025•40 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm More than seven million Americans marched peacefully in the streets. Republicans are palpably spooked about it. And courage is proving contagious: In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * How Trump’s king-like abuses are, for the first time in a decade, becoming hard to distinguish from kitchen-table issues; * Whether, given the galvanizing power of No Kings, Democrats should pivot to the theme (away from health care)...
Oct 22, 2025•27 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm The government shutdown just crossed the two-week mark. If you take Donald Trump and his people at their word, it doesn’t seem like it’s about to reopen. But they are also huge bluffers. In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * Has Trump hit upon a (legally dubious) way to keep the government “shut down” indefinitely? * Which signs suggest he’s digging in and which suggest he’s bluffing? * Are we about to test, once a...
Oct 15, 2025•37 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm As anticipated in last week’s episode, the government did indeed shut down, and as of this recording Congress remains at an impasse. At the same time Donald Trump and Stephen Miller are trying harder than ever to foment street violence in blue cities and maybe even martial law. In this episode, Brian and Matt discuss: * How the GOP’s ongoing Epstein coverup is prolonging the shutdown and making it likelier that they “lo...
Oct 08, 2025•37 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Donald Trump has crossed an important redline: He ordered his administration to prosecute former FBI Director James Comey, fired the prosecutor who told him he had no case, and installed a lackey who did as ordered. In this episode: * What distinguishes the (weak, losing) Comey indictment from past abuses of prosecutorial power? * Why Comey shouldn’t try to get the charges dismissed on selective prosecution grounds, and...
Oct 01, 2025•42 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm With the firing (and then unfiring) of Jimmy Kimmel, the right-wing crackdown in the name of Charlie Kirk seems to have bumped up against real limits. In light of the week’s developments, we discuss: * The schisms within MAGA that were on display at the Kirk memorial; * How those schisms fused with resistance backlash, forcing ABC and Disney to rethink their decision to take Kimmel off the air; * Whether this is a sign ...
Sep 24, 2025•35 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Donald Trump and several of his top officials have promised to unleash a partisan crackdown in Charlie Kirk’s honor, even as the notion that Kirk’s assassin was in league with the institutional left becomes more far fetched. In light of the week’s developments, we discuss: * Our personal reactions to the Kirk murder, and the contours of the overall public response; * What we know about the GOP plan to use it as a pretex...
Sep 17, 2025•39 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Another government shutdown looms, and, thus, so do more angsty struggle sessions over what Democrats should do, and what effective opposition looks like. In this episode, we discuss: * How does mounting bad news for Donald Trump—bad jobs numbers, defeats in court, and revelations about his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein—affect the politics of a shutdown? * Who’s got the better bead on how Democrats should proceed, M...
Sep 10, 2025•41 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm This week, we indulge all the speculation and look ahead to politics if and after Donald Trump dies in office. For instance: * Is a movement that claims the mantle of making America “healthy” sustainable in a world where the obese 79 year old president croaks after his health secretary takes vaccines off the shelf? * Does JD Vance have the juice required to consolidate all the pro-Trump factions (many of which hate each...
Sep 03, 2025•49 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm This week, a close look at two troubling authoritarian provocations from the Trump administration: Friday’s dawn FBI raid of John Bolton’s house in Maryland, and Monday’s purported firing of Lisa Cook, a member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. We discuss: * How Matt managed to leave his microphone in Maine. * What Trump seemingly hopes to accomplish by making an example out of Bolton. * Whether opposing the re...
Aug 27, 2025•31 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Donald Trump’s federal occupation of the capital continues, but the context has worsened. It now unfolds alongside Trump’s seemingly related efforts to: 1) gerrymander as many red states as possible; 2) unconstitutionally void and rerun the Census in a manner that would benefit Republicans; and 3) assert unconstitutional control over the time, place, and manner of elections. In this episode we’ll discuss: * To what exte...
Aug 20, 2025•39 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Donald Trump has commandeered Washington DC’s police force and deployed federal agents and national guardsmen to patrol DC streets, on plainly pretextual grounds. In this episode we’ll discuss: * What makes this affront to DC sovereignty unusually offensive; * Trump’s stated reasons for seizing power, and how to see through them; * What, if anything, elected Democrats should say and do to defend district residents Then,...
Aug 13, 2025•39 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm This week, we’re reassessing both the resiliency of the economy, and the health of U.S. democracy. Why? Because recent data suggests Donald Trump’s reactionary policy blitz (global tariffs, mass deportation) has caused the economy to seize up; and Trump has responded by trying to kill the messengers. In this episode you’ll hear all about: * What the recent jobs numbers actually say, and how do they gel with other recent...
Aug 06, 2025•20 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Donald Trump is trying desperately to bury the Jeffrey Epstein scandal. In this episode, Matt and Brian explore all the distractions Trump has attempted—implicitly and explicitly—to knock the Epstein files out of the news, why Trump is so desperate and why are his usual tactics failing. * Should we at this point suspect this is a coverup of damning evidence of Trump’s conduct specifically? * If the story is just that Ep...
Jul 30, 2025•36 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm The new Superman is a critical hit and box-office smash—despite conspicuous Republican efforts to discourage people from seeing it. It’s the GOP vs. truth, justice, and the American way! In this episode, Matt and Brian explore all the reasons the modern right might have been put off by this movie, and Superman’s longer-running themes: * To what extent are right-wing critics really just evincing old, philosophical conser...
Jul 23, 2025•39 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm The race is on between Donald Trump, who’s desperately trying to put down the raging scandal surrounding his Jeffrey Epstein lies (whatever they happen to be) and Democrats who are finally engaged, and trying to pry the truth loose. Who’s gonna win? In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * How has the Epstein scandal developed over the past week? * Why have Democrats been uninterested in all matters Epstein, both rece...
Jul 16, 2025•38 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm The Trump administration suddenly wants you to stop asking questions about Jeffrey Epstein. Case closed. Nothing to see here. That client list we promised to release? It doesn’t exist. In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * What is the Jeffrey Epstein conspiracy theory, and why has it persisted so long? * Why are Epstein’s old, wide-ranging associations distinct from all the other rich guys who hobnob with politicia...
Jul 09, 2025•44 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Minutes after recording this episode, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) provided the decisive vote for GOP legislation to kick 15-20 million people off their health insurance and give rich people a trillion dollar tax cut, along with many other horrors. Now it’s back to the House, where hope, which springs eternal, goes to die! In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * What more could have been done to stop this? * By whom? *...
Jul 02, 2025•42 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Welcome to hell, because we’ve reached the hot war phase of the second Trump presidency. Or have we? In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * What has actually happened, both since 2018, and just in the past couple weeks, and why it’s so unlikely to have left the U.S. and the world better off. * Is there any upside to Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu using and playing each other in a way that undermines both of the...
Jun 25, 2025•27 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Donald Trump may not always chicken out, but his on again/off again, advance-retreat dance does seem to insulate him from lasting blowback. It seems the only way to drag Trump’s popularity down low enough to really hem him in is for his supporters to find out the hard way. In this episode, Matt and Brian tackle the questions: * Does the hyperbolic claim that “Trump Always Chickens Out” serve to insulate him from public ...
Jun 18, 2025•35 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Since last week’s episode, Donald Trump and Elon Musk had a bitter falling out, Republicans encountered new obstacles to enacting their top priorities (cutting rich people’s taxes and poor people’s Medicaid) and Trump ordered a federal siege of Los Angeles. Also, Brian got his first taste of sweet, sweet European health care. What do these things have to do with one another? Arguably not much, arguably quite a lot. If s...
Jun 11, 2025•51 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Brian’s European Vacation continues as Matt is joined by special guest Jane Flegal of the Blue Horizon Foundation to break down the energy provisions of Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill. The energy cuts have attracted less attention than the health care provisions in part because they were made much more severe at the last minute. Jane breaks down how the Inflation Reduction Act changed America’s approach to clean energy subs...
Jun 04, 2025•37 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Brian is on vacation, so special guest McKenzie Wilson joins Matt to talk about Blue Rose Research’s retrospective on the 2024 election and their work on message-testing. McKenzie came to Blue Rose after working in the private sector, working for Jamal Bowman, and working in the Biden administration’s Department of Health and Human Services — she believes in progressive values and she wants to win elections. In this epi...
May 28, 2025•37 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm By the time you listen to this episode, the Republican bill to give rich people trillions in tax cuts, and throw millions of people off of Medicaid will be…somewhere. It could be on the glide path to passage in the House, or on life support, or somewhere in between. But the basic shape of what Republicans want to do, and what Donald Trump wants them to do, is clear. In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * How this te...
May 21, 2025•41 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm Donald Trump blinked, as many people suspected he would. This week, he reduced the embargo-level tariffs he imposed on China a month ago, and did so unilaterally. So in exchange for a month-long crisis, a still-looming supply shortage, lost jobs, and lost wealth, we got nothing! But Trump’s supporters are all too ready to cover for him. In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * What does Trump’s reversal mean for the e...
May 14, 2025•47 min
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.politix.fm They won’t come right out and say it this time, the way they did in 2017. But Republicans are still hellbent on repealing the Affordable Care Act—or at least the half of the ACA that expanded Medicaid coverage to millions more poor and disabled Americans. In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss: * What do Republican pronouncements about their aspirational health care cuts actually mean? * Will cuts to a program that ben...
May 07, 2025•45 min
