You're listening to the Buck Sexton Show podcast, make sure you subscribe to the podcast on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hey, everybody, welcome to the Buck Brief. Ryan Gradusky with us to talk about Iowa elections, politics, all those good things. And also, for those of you who are on YouTuber rumble, you can see Ryan's dog is making a guest appearance this episode. Ryan, what is Is it a she? And what is he? Or she? It's a he is?
He is a five year old multi poo that I rescued, and he's a giant pain ninety percent of the time, but he's pretty lovable and he is Yeah, he's a five year old multi pooh rescue all right.
He's very cute. He's currently giving giving some smooches to mister Ryan Gerdusky. All right, let's talk about saving America, Ryan, and to start with that, where things are for the Republicans going into Iowa? I was what ten days away as I talk to you, What are there? What are the numbers telling us right now? What are the chances of there being any real surprise break it down?
I mean, Iowa is a caucus, right, so it's all about organization. It's not typically you don't just show up to vote. You're staying in a school or a facility for hours at a time to argue and yell with people about trying to get your candidate over the line. They change the rules all the time. The rules used to be that the bottom candidates had to bottom voters had to then reassemble to go to the top voters, and that's how you picked one. The Democrats still did
that as of twenty twenty. I don't know if Republicans do it anymore. I don't think they do. But it is a it's a slog and it's an organization. Trump's pole members are the strongest by far, but by like twenty five points in Iowa and some of the polls. But the thing about organization is that all people who organize for winning candidates in Iowa are all behind the Santas. That's the thing that he's got the Senator, he's got Bob van Platt, he's got the real organization behind him.
He's got a lot of evangelicals as well behind him. I don't know if that will be enough to sit there and swing the entire thing. Iowa elections sometimes because they are you know, their caucuses have swung as much as fifteen points. When Rick Santorum won in twenty twelve, he was way behind the polls the day before election day. Yet and still that though his numbers were much smaller than than Disanna's is right now, the margins rather much much smaller. So I you know, it could always be
a surprise. You never know, the only the only poll that matters is the election day poll and who shows up. And you know, some Trump supporters get complacent and think that he's got this in the bag. There's no point of sitting inside of a school for seven hours and yelling and screaming. Then you know, then Disantas might surprise it. It's not completely uncommon. People have surprised the Iowa caucuses before,
which is why they're not super indictive. Who's going to win the presidence or the presidential nomination.
So I need you to move to the center of the frame so people can see you more easily. And also there you go, scooch over and they can't even really see the doll. There we go, and now we can see the adorable, adorable dog. My brother. My brother has a multi Pooh, and my older brother has a Pomeranians. We only have the most masculine attack dogs imaginable in his family. I have an Australian Labradoodle puppy. So people better watch out the burglars better stay out of our places.
So anyway, back to back to where we are on this I you know, if I mean realistically, if Trump wins Iowa, do you do you feel like it's over and everything else is pretty much a formality.
If he wins Iowa, definitely Desanders's campaigns over. If he goes to New Hampshire because the because independence can vote, he could still lose New Hampshire technically because I like thirty eight percent of all register are independents and they can vote in both the Democrat and Republican primary. There is no Democratic primary that day, so they can all go in the Republican primary. And Trump does not do very well with independence, and that's a chance for Nicki
Haley to win the day. Also, New Hampshire is another state where people way behind the polls have huge comebacks. John McCain two thousand and eight. That is where mid Romney came back in twenty twelve. That is where Donald Trump came back in twenty sixteen. That's where Pappy Kennon won nineteen ninety six. These are states that John McCain when they're in two thousand, despite being against George W. Bush and him being the presumptive nominee. These are states
that do throw curves, that do make politics interesting. So it certainly would be over for de Santas's campaign if he cannot win in Iowa. I don't know if it would be over for Nicky Haley. She's still fundraising well past South Carolina. She has fundraising dates already lined up past South Carolina. There is something to say about a candidate who stays in for the long haul despite you know,
only garnering thirty percent or whatever. That's what Jesse Jackson in nineteen eighty eight, and although his candidacy did not win, his ideas certainly did.
So you never know. If I want, I want to jump in here for because you mentioned Nicky Haley, and that's gonna be my next question. Explain Nicky Haley to me right now. She just raised like forty five million ride or something like that. I have yet to meet a person in real life. Now, maybe this just is telling people who my friends are. I've yet I have. I have obviously a lot of Trump and DeSantis supporters that I know in my life. I come across, you know,
go to events, see people. I even have. I have friends who are VIVAC voters. They'll vote for Verveke over anybody else. I don't have a lot of them, but I have like a couple. I don't know anybody who is all in on Nicky Haley, and yet she's surging, She's raising millions, the donor class likes her. What's what's going on? Like, explain the Haley phenomenon.
Uh, Nikki Haley is one. There's a lot of people in politics period who want a girl president, so that's part of it. Secondly, she's extreme. I mean, Nikki Helly is now a joke Neily. He's been around for in politics for over twenty years, going back to when she
was in the state House. She's extremely well polished, and she offers a lot of Republicans the alternative that they want to hear, which is somebody who is more hawkish on foreign policy, less culture war, less less about the culture wars, a throwback to an older time in Republicans and somebody with who seems respectable, and she a lot of a lot of people vote for their candidate on vibes, and she gives the vibe of a woman who's very strong. She's a boss, and she is not going to disrespect
the office of the presidency. I have actually my very very very very close friend from college. His mom is a Nicki Haley supporter, and she absolutely hates Donald Trump because Donald Trump she thought disrespect of the office of the president and that is a big deal to her and that's why she thinks that Nikki Hilly wouldn't do that. So that's partially the group. And also she's not going to make waves. Nikkiy Hilly is not going to like,
you know, change her immigration system immensely. She's not going to change our trade policy imensely. She's going to be you know, she'll probably appoint decent judges. And that's probably all we're going to get out of her. That it's going to be important other than try to declare war with a round or anybody else.
All right. I mean, the good news is, you know, if Nikki Haley gets elected, load up on that defense contractor stock. I want to ask you about the Democrat side of this equation. Here a second, but first up from our sponsor, and you can tend to your cute little fluffy flu multi pooh over there. She's very he he sorry, very masculine, very cute. He's a rescue, so he's tough. He's seen some stuff, man.
A lot of other talks.
You know. He's a he's a rescue. He'll he'll, he'll cut a pooch, you know what I mean, he'll.
Anybody.
Yeah, that's true. All right, Look, this could not come at a better time in our society. I'm speaking of a new company with a new membership offer. It's from a company called Patriot Defender. Legal defense for you and me, the commedy need most these days, no cost legal defense to protect your rights, freedom's reputation, and your way of life. Speak up at a school board meeting about vaccine mandates, suffer the consequences. Your legal defense is covered. Right to
free speech is denied, suffer consequences. Legal defense is covered. Use your Second Amendment rights to defend yourself covered. I r s audit for political targeting covered. I'm a big believer in this kind of defense. It's something you want to have just in case that day arrives where your rights are being violated, you will have legal backup. My friends,
go to patriot Defender dot com. Patriotdefender dot com the only membership organization of its kind that goes beyond just concealed cary weapons defense, a whole bunch of constitutionally protected rights where you're getting back up, legal backup from Patriot Defense. Go to Patriot defender dot com. All right, on the Democrat side of things. So, now Ryan, we have passed you and I have been talking to this for many months, and I appreciate you've been a voice of standing. Well,
everyone's like, you don't understand. They're gonna RFK Junior and Newsome are gonna run a two day primary, and it is all this crazy stuff. I've just it makes no sense, right right, That's not happening now right, So now it's all, Oh, they're gonna they're gonna change things out at the convention.
Yeah.
To me, abandoning a president and a vice president in office for a convention floor fight is electoral suicide. Am I missing something? Uh?
No, you're not. It's not going to happen. And for some reason they believe they also this weird belief that Republicans have because they're only listening to a lot of Republican media, which is only talking about Gavin Newsom as
if Democrat. There's not a single other Democrat in the country who wants to probably be president, and there's just just Gavin Newsom as if he's ordained to be such no a floor or fight would be a disaster, and you would have literally half a dozen Democrats from very big states that control most of the delegates all running up against each other and fighting. And I mean, it's this is so insane. It's not going to happen, Like it's literally not going to happen. It hasn't ever happened.
It's not going to happen this time. Besides death or a severe injury that is crippling. Joe Biden will be the presidential nominee in twenty twenty four?
Is is he so that the people that I that I talk to who think that it's not just going to be like a walk in the park for Trump. The primary thing that there's the there's the legal stuff that they're doing, obviously, the prosecutions and the taking him off the ballot, the taking him off the state ballot thing. No, I don't think any serious person believes that that's actually going to work in the end, but it's it's they like the optics of it, even if it loses the
legal stuff. You know, who knows that's a little bit of a more of a coin cost depending on what the Supreme Court does in a few places, you know, the prosecutions. But what I hear from people is, yeah, the Democrats haven't opened up their campaign on Trump yet and that's what will change the numbers. How much of that do you buy versus how much of what we're seeing right now is Joe Biden is bad at his job and a lot of people are recognizing that maybe who didn't before.
Well, Joe Biden is also has there's not a lot of competency brings to it because he is he is a man of a particular age who seems older than he is, and that that gives a lot of people pause in a lot of different demographics that he means. What Joe Biden has going for him is the most critical swing states in this country are still for as divers donation as we've become, still about ninety percent black white states, so Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Misty, Gain Wisconsin.
With the exception of Texas, Nevada, Arizona, and Florida, these are ninety percent black white states. Even New Hampshire, if you want to throw it in there. Things got really
wild where trumps surge or is all coming from. Even if you include the polling that has them strong with black voters, which I don't know if I believe or not, But if you include that polling, the numbers that he has had in New York Times numbers, I think he was down twenty one points with college educated whites, which we put him on path for the worst performance with college educated whites since Verry Goldwater in nineteen sixty four.
Is there a path if you lose that by that much to make it up for it with non college educated whites and minorities. Yes, there is technically, but I don't have a ton of confidence in that. It's never been done before. He's trying to have to build a new coalition. You're building a new coalition with one hundred percent name ideal already going in. No one's going to learn anything on Donald Trump. I like they're learning on
Joe Biden. At this point, it's gonna be based on who shows up, which is gonna be a high turnout election because college is k Whites always turn out, and the question of do young people turn out to black people turn out. If black vote to Clea fines by one percent from what it was in twenty twenty four, donald Trump will probably be president. Just like if the black vote mimics what it happens. Black vote declined by one percent in twenty sixteen, which put Donald mac donald
Trump president. That one person declined would make him president. But I don't know if it's overall going to happen. You could. That's like the big, big question. What's also happening, which is a mix I put this on my subset, which is very very important. A lot of older Black vote,
which are the most loyal Democratic voting bloc. You know, time has gone on, a lot of them have started dying out, a lot of the new Silent generation group within that demographic, and they're being replaced by younger Gen Z black voters who are less ideologically aligned with the Democratic Party and less partisan of the Democratic Party. So the idea of Republicans getting twelve percent of the Black vote elevens in the black vote are more likely now
than ever. But it's not because of any real partisan change. It's mostly because of a demographic change of one generation dying while though I'm being born.
So I promise, if you get this right, we will revisit this in eleven months. But if you get it wrong, we're going to pretend like it never happened. And you're going to tell me after this sponsor read, You're going to tell me right now, going with your gut, what who's in the presidential election? What happens in the presidential election? And why? So I'm you're calling a shot here in
the upper deck, way up there. And the good news is people could listen to this and they'll say, you'll think one thing or the other, but you can't be wrong because it hasn't happened yet. And if you're right, Ryan, I'm gonna mark this down. We're gonna blast us everywhere after election day. And if you're wrong, no one's even at our mother so sold wait, so so you think about it while I while I speak to our sponsor here for a second. The tunnel. The Towers Foundation does
amazing work. They made a promise after the tragedy of nine to eleven. To make sure we never forget, Tunnel to Towers is committed to supporting America's heroes and their families. Heroes like US Army specialist Michael Hook. Specialist Hook lost his life in a rock when his helicopter was shot down. He enlisted in the military after graduating high school. He left behind a pregnant fiancee who gave birth to a
son he would never meet. Thanks to the generosity of friends like you, Tunnel to Towers paid off the mortgage on his family's home, relieving a financial burden and bringing stability. The foundation helps gold star and fallen firstusponder families, as well as our nation's most severely injured heroes and homeless veterans. Joined Tunnel the Towers on its mission to do good because heroes are counting on you. Ninety five cents if every dollar goes directly to its programs I donate every
month comes out automatically eleven dollars. So easy. It's not a lot of money, but if everyone listening to this donated, it would make a huge difference. Tunnel to Towers T two t dot org. That's the website to go to to donate t the number two T dot org. All right, Ryan, I asked you to call your shot. I mean, this is like hitting a home run that goes out of the stadium and into the parking lots. It's eleven months out. Who is in the general election? Who wins the general election?
And why do you think when all said and done, they will have won the general election?
I think it's gonna be Joe Biden Kamala Harris versus Donald Trump. And I mean I'm not picking his VP, but it will probably be I think the top like three contenders for VP would be like, I don't know, JD Van's, Tim Scott and Christy Nome and then the nominee will I probably would bet on Joe Biden winning re election. By he'll probably win. He'll probably lose Arizona, which he won the last time, and he'll lose Wisconsin,
which he won the last time. But the demographics of Georgia are moving too progressively and there's not enough college educata whites that would flip back to maybe win Georgia, and the black vote is only increased Pennsylvania. The college educata white vote is just gigantic, and it's getting bigger while the rurals are emptying out and Michigan, I just I think that the Michigan vote will be strong enough
for Biden to keep that state blue. Because the College of Ka whites on the west coast don't hate Joe Biden like the like the on the western side of the state don't hate Joe Biden like they hate Hillary. It will be very very very very tight. I think Trump could probably flip Arizona and flip Wisconsin, but I don't know if he can flip Michigan, pennsylvani you know, or Georgia or Nevada. But as a right I mean literally, it's gonna be a right now. I hate making predictions.
I don't know even just agree to this, but that's what I would say as of right now.
Well, the good news, like I said, if you nail any of this, by the way, you can just cut it too. So we just get you all the parts that you're right, so you're we can be shameless here. Editorial freedom literally editorial free.
Anything could happen. But like this is what I'm looking at right now is do the college educated white boats and now the non college to show up and and do minorities not show up. Those are the big three questions. And because I think that most people's minds are set and that's, uh, that's kind of where.
People are, right. Do Republicans take the Senate?
Yeah, I think they went on Tanna back. I think they went West Virginia. I don't know about Ohio. Shared Brown's a tough soob Michigan who knows. And I don't think they're going at Arizona.
Do you think, uh, billionaire guy in Pennsylvan and you know I'm talking about David mccorm you think he can win? No chance? Wow, not a chance. Ryan swinging the bat not fearless, fearless swinging at these pitches. Jesus. All right man, I mean, look, you everyone got to hear it. I know our pro Trump audience right over there, they've already to They've already like clicked off this. It's okay.
I hope I mean listen, Royce, is Biden or Trump? I would hope for Trump, But like at the same time time, I'm looking at the numbers. I don't know. I don't know if the growth with hispans nations. And the question is can Trump close the gap? And you know, can he win you know, can he close an Orange County Florida? Yeah? Can he get ten points higher in California? Maybe,
like he can do all those things. But if you look at where the states are that matter, you know, the RUSS the white white non college educator vote is smaller.
And do you think do you do you think the the idea that Demo crats are panicked about Joe Biden is overstated? You think you think they actually.
I know quite a few have said we're going to give up, like nothing, they're going to give up, but they have come they've already rested on the idea that Democrats they believe. A few people that I know who are really smart, said, you know, we're going to win the House. The Democrats will win the House back, they'll lose the Senate, and they'll lose the presidency. And they're just going to come to the conclusion that they're going
to lose the presidency now to deal with it. So if they do win it, it's a big win and they're very very happy about it, but they do believe that they're going to lose as it right now because Joe Biden. But I don't know any other Democratic that put together the coalition needed for the Democratic Party. Remember one in for sorry go ahead.
No you go, you go ahead because I have a common question for you. But one in.
Four Biden voters are voter are white people without a college degree. They should be Republicans by this point, but they are still not because of a certain a few issues that keep them within the Democratic line. Sixty one percent of all Democrats are white voters. The number of noncollecated whites is going to go down. But all Biden has done, all the Democratic Party has done is sit there and tell white voters, we don't want to hear from you. Is why we're not doing Iowa caucus, we're
not doing the New Hampshire primary. We don't want to hear from white voters. Biden try to give my black minority minority farmers bailout. He wouldn't do the same thing for white farmers. There when when the fifth when thirteen Republican attorney generals said to corporations, you can't hire based on race anymore. You have to hire based on their twenty one Democratic attorneys also know it's great if you if you try to have a diverse feel by by
not hiring white people, all of these things. This is going to come to a head. And at the same exact time, you have the inflation issue, and you have the job issue, and you have the border issue. Joe Biden for everything that people feel like, Joe Biden is not a hateful person the way that people hate AOC or they fear Hillary Clinton presidency or whatever. I don't know anyone who could build this coalition together because most of the upcoming Democrats are going to be full blown
Jesse Jackson, It's our time Rainbow coalition, NonStop. Just they will be like Harry Lake, like, do you not vote for me? If you're a McCain supporter, do not vote for me, if you're a white person at a college degree, and they are going to excise millions of people the Democrats need. I don't know if anyone else on the scene right now will be able to put that together.
If Kamala had to actually be at the top of the ticket against Trump, does she lose straight up? I mean you think it just doesn't happen.
Yeah, yeah, no one. I mean, listen, I'm gonna it's very unpopular. Most people don't want a woman president.
They just don't.
They don't want a woman president. They don't want they don't when female politicians have to walk a very tight high wire because they come they try to constantly come off stronger than they are, so they come off extremely unappealing. And this is a problem with female politicians almost always across the board. And Kamala is extraordinarily unlikable. She's just extraordinarily unlikable. And I don't know if she has a
natural constituency anywhere. Yeah, so I don't think she can I don't think I don't think most Democrats can win if they run.
So we have Ryan making huge predictions for the election that is eleven months away. And I will mark this, Dad, I will remember this. I like that we got you to swing the bat. You know you didn't You didn't say, oh, I can't. You know. I appreciate you swung the bat.
And I mean, if I'm wrong, I'm wrong, it doesn't really matter, like whatever.
I don't care Bryan or Dusky. Everybody subscribe to the National Populace newsletter on substack and he will be bringing you all these insights and you can also probably email him and yell at him there for not being sufficiently supportive of Donald Trump as the nomad. Anyway, Brian, thank you very much. Thanks for having out. I appreciate it.