Did Democrats Learn Their Lesson Or Will They Keep Losing? + The Electoral Landscape After Six Months Of Trump

There's a state picnic of some sort in Kentucky, they'll call it Fancy Farm, and you know it's the Iowa State Fair in Iowa where political candidates get together. There's all these different things. Someday I'll give you a whole tour. I actually would love to sell a podcast series where I just go from a political event to political event where they you know, sometimes you've got to go eat bad fried fish with the local political leaders to showcase your wares and this or that.

The question is can they put the Senate in play? Here we are six months in. I still think the Democrats are favored to win the House, but I don't have the same kind of certainty about it as I felt six months ago. Part of that is to do with redistricting and what may happen, the fact that we are going to redo all these maps, and I think it does sort of put a bit of paralysis over the House map, especially when you look at four states that may all try to remap their congressional districts before

the November elections. Texas, Ohio, California, New York. All of four of those states have talked about a Missouri might, Florida might as well. So the fact that you may just take those first four states I mentioned, Texas, California, New York, Ohio. Boy, there's approximately over a dozen swing districts just there. So those four states alone could decide

this majority. Because you know, one of the ironies about this reapportionment map, the one that we did right after the census in twenty twenty, the map that was put into place in twenty twenty two, is I would argue it's the most competitive map, ie map that we've had. I can go in individual states and say this is an unfair map in favor of the Republicans, this is

an unfair map in favor of the Democrats. But when you actually look at it from a wider lens through all fifty states, you're like, oh, it's basically two and ten.

You know, two hundred and five sure bets for the Republicans, two hundred and five sure bets for the Democrats, and oh another twenty eight that are going to be the actual battleground, right we what both parties have successfully done is shrunk the battleground. Now, what could happen with all of this attempt at redistricting in this mid decade attempt here, as particularly as Republicans try to try to safeguard their very narrow house majority, is it might actually expand the

number of swing districts they could actually open up. And this is what I think could be the unintended consequence of all this. If California Democrats are looking to find more create more opportunities for Democratic seats, what it's going to take for them to do it might weaken some

Democratic seats and put them more in play. Ditto for what could happen in Texas as they try to strengthen some Democratic seats to make them more Republican leaning. The Republicans they put in those districts are going to come from say, solid red districts that suddenly become lean Republican and potentially competitive if Democrats find a compelling candidate. So but at this you know, this is why you know

the fact that they're going through this process. You know, someone like me looks like it's like, well, you know, I hate jerrymandering. I hate how each state does it, you know, but the results seem to be uneasy equilibrium, which is probably better long term for the country.

but there are certain things that still favor the Democrats in the mid terms. One is their their voting coalition. They've become the coalition. They've they've acquired suburban voters as part of their coalition, and suburban voters of the reliable voters they vote in every election. Twenty and thirty years ago, suburban voters leaned Republican, which is why Republicans used to overperform in special elections. Republicans used to overperform in the midterms.

It was Democrats that needed the presidential turnout years to improve their standing, you know, as recently as two thousand. You know, Republicans over indexed in the midterms in ninety eight, and Democrats over index in the presidential vote, which allowed them to pick up four Senate seats in a presidential year. It really wasn't until the advent of Trump when he sort of shifted the party away from its Chamber of

Commerce routes to these more populous routes. They basically traded a bigger pool of potential voters in presidential years, which has helped Trump, but they've traded it for less reliable voters in midterm years, where the Democrats have the more reliable voters. Now that's why you see them over performing in in special elections and why so many Why for instance, I believe, and you'll learn this in the day, Wigle, that there's probably going to be a special election in

December and Tennessee. That is close enough that I'll start talking about it on this podcast. You can hold me to it if it happened. If it doesn't happen, I will happily admit I'm wrong on that one. But this is that special election Mark Green who just resigned his seat in Congress, and it's got a bit of the suburbs of Nashville. It's got the makings of a potential, you know, low turnout election. The people paying attention lean left,

the people paying less attention. There may and then that's another aspect of the midterms of why the Democrats might be favored is that the out party is already showing signs of being more motivated to vote in the mid terms than the end party. You know, it could very well be that MAGA is tired of winning and doesn't see a need to get out there and vote. This

is obviously a mindset that's Trump. White House is trying to figure out how to change because it has been a hallmark of the Trump era that in the midterms, Republicans underperform.

unified than it's been in any midterm yet in the Trump era. You know, in both twenty eighteen and twenty twenty two, the two midterms were Republicans lost the eighteen midterms and essentially underperformed in their narrow House victory in twenty two, Mitch McConnell run in the Senate campaign army, and even on the House Republican side, they were constantly looking for candidates in these swind districts that had some distance from Trump.

Republican party more unified, you could say more. You know, it's Trump's party now, right. McConnell was still fighting, was still swimming against that current. And even at times Kevin McCarthy went hot and cold at swimming against that current.

You know, he kind of would be with Trump, then he'd be against him and on camp you know, so, but either way, there's none of that now, right, Mike Johnson always swims with Trump, and John Thune has made the decision, even though he's not always seeing eye to eye with him, he is not he is not going to operate that way as far as running the Senate Republican campaign arms. So this is a more are in

sync Republican party and that should in theory put them in better positions in some of these primaries. And then there's one other aspect that unity on the Republican side has also improved their financial aspect. For the first time, frankly, in about a decade, the House Republicans collectively in the swing in the in the in the most vulnerable districts, seem to outraise the House Democratic incumbents in their most vulnerable districts. This had not been the case for multiple cycles.

Democrats had been really good about raising early money fortifying their more vulnerable members. It seemed as if this time the Republicans finally got their act together.

not the Republicans, right, and that unity gave them the opportunity to win forty seats in twenty eighteen.

you happy about this tax cut? Come out and vote, aren't you happy about these deportations? Come out and vote versus So they got to create fear. I know that they're talking about trying to use the threat of impeachment if Democrats win the House, they'll impeach. I would be surprised if voters buy into that. You know, maybe someone there in the base will, but you know, you know, outside of al Green, you don't hear a lot of Democrats talking impeachment right now in the.

of the midterms. It's interesting, since nineteen ninety, every time

the Democrats have won the midterms, so that would be nineteen ninety, that would be arguably two thousand and six, twenty eighteen. Those three times the win in the midterms led to winning the presidential Two years later nineteen ninety, they gained seats in both the House and the Senate. They already have the majorities, but the gain seats in both the House and the Senate. They won the presidency in ninety two. In two thousand and six, they won both the House and the Senate, and at the time

the Senate was a bit of an upset. In what happened in eight they win the presidency and won even more House and Senate s. It's added to both majorities on that front. Eighteen they win the House. While they didn't get weren't able to pick up the Senate, it did foreshadow the ability to win the presidency. The last time Democrats won the midterms but lost the presidency the following two years was actually eighty six.

what are they as a party. They're having a generational fight, they're having an ideological fights. Sometimes those two things aligned, sometimes they don't. You know, has the part already lost enough in order to do the soul searching that needs to be done? You know? How much should the party be focused on policy and democracy versus culture?

But in essence, the larger momentum of the atmospherics may favor them, and they may do well in the midterms, but it may be meaning, you know, it may it may not foreshadow success in twenty eight, because twenty eight may truly be the actual fight for the soul of the party. Which direction should it go? Right, That's what happened. That's what happened after ninety.

position before midterm. Yet doesn't mean they'll have success. It just simply means Democrats aren't going to get handed easy opportun tunities thanks to own goals by the Republicans right that benefited them quite a bit in eighteen, twenty and twenty two. In these down ballot races, I do think you will see fewer own goals on the R side than we've seen, and the question is are there going to be own goals?

the first quarter. There's plenty of examples where one thing looks like it's going one way after one quarter and then literally, you know, you know the expression a week is a lifetime in politics, Well, imagine what three more six.

anything yet, but it was starting to look I don't think we had had the Connor Lamb special just yet, but it was the Mike Pompeo Special. There was a couple of others, and hey, is there something happening out here. You also had a divided Republican Party and a unified Democratic Party. Eight years later, some of this looks similar. We've had some special elections, there's been some over performance

by Democrats. But you have a unified Republican party for the most part, arguably, and it's a divided Democratic party. What are you taking away so far in twenty twenty five and how would you compare it to twenty seventeen.

ton of money that really not performed by much. The

parties are very different than they were eight years ago. I was just talking to colleagues about Eric Schmidt, and I was saying, well, he's won. In the many lists at Missouri Center of Republicans who hold seats that sometimes Trump critics used to hold, there are very few left. We were down to the point where Tom Massey is the most visible Trump critic and that is a huge shift of the window of what's acceptable in the Republican Party.

We all in the media the universe changes, but we use the same terms like centrist and moderate and pragmat et cetera to define the party. And a modern rep look in at this point is somebody who doesn't really criticize Trump, but maybia votes against some of his nominees sometimes, and eight years ago it was somebody like Bob Corker who is trying to slow the agenda down or voting

against it. So they're there, and they also have a vision of governments, which there are still lots of liberals I think who criticize it and say it's all based on Trump's adjuta and what his biases were from twenty years ago. He's obsessed with Japan and the trade deficit. They're all in on it, and they also have a vision of the country that is understandable. I could sum up, Okay, if Republicans get everything they want, total stopped, integration, prices

go down for zero some reasons. I'm not saying that's right. I'm saying that's what the vision is. A smaller welfare state. You have to work harder to be part of a foreign policy. We're paying more attention to the Western hemisphere than the rest of the world, except when you want to know about these prize and you need to bomb Ran. But the Democratic vision, and for all the burbiage they

spent about this, their problem is for the first time since nineteen eighty, they had a failed presidency and they had a chance to try out their version of how the world should work, their vision of what America is. People didn't like it. I don't think they've made peace with that, and I don't think they have a coherent vision that makes sense to people because it's not credible. They just had Joe Biden. Theyve American people, They had a president try kinesy and stimulus in the economy. It

led to some inflation. They don't like it, you know, need to overcomplicate. I think just that this is the least credible Democrats have been on a number of areas. And it's not even like whack the mall. They have a whackable board. They're like hitting even the mallet to

hit the headboard instead of the moles. They're really not attacking any of the problems they had because it would start with saying, like Trump said in twenty fifteen, Hey, the Republican Party is terrible and it's screwed up, and I'm not gonna apologize. I'm just going to make fun of them, say here's a different vision. They don't add that. They don't have anyone doing that. No.

that mean for the midterms? Well, I go back and I'm going to go in the way back machine, and my apologies for that, but I'm gonna go back to the eighty six midterms.

them in twenty eight. So that's a model that I've been you know, is it You could picture the Democrats learning the wrong lessons that their success When when you look at that Wall Street Journal poll, you had a huge majority saying that they don't think Congress is pushing back hard enough on the president. You have unpopularity there, So you see how you can run an anti campaign and win in the midterms, but it doesn't do anything to improve the Democratic brand going into twenty eight.

they they Italy holler bien. Yeah, but that's I start with the Democrats problems because yeah, I've done my way back machine visit was I read Outcrum's memoir of creating the Democratic Leadership Council, which when I started out reporting, which really was writing my own stories two thousand and four ars or dous and five.

some reason. That's what happened with the DLCs. A lot of Democrats came into the process at the end of the Bush years and said this, this is a disaster. There's all these wimpy moderate Democrats or conservative Democrats who voted for the disaster, voting for George W. Bush's war. Why do we do that in the first place, we

can build a new majority. Then Brock Obama did it, and it's ten years of let's repeat the Obama experiment, the experiment, let's repeat the Obama map. We can, we can do it, we can. We can lose by attrition working class voters because they're being replaced over time. That doesn't end not to get into the entirest to last a couple of years. That's what happened to the DLC. That book's useful because they were doing things that wouldn't work anymore. They It was a very media focused narrative.

Focus the narrative, and by narrative, I mean it was built for a time when Americans read basically, if they didn't read or watch the same news outlets, it was understood those new dead let's had the power to shape the storylines.

got shared a lot of times. So the DLC would have these meetings around the country and say, Okay, we've got Bill Clinton, We've got Bruce Babbott, we've got Mike Dukakkas Speed part of some of these meet these young future Democrats who have new ideas and reporters would come to them and they meet the Democrats. Donors would come. There was just you could build a momentum through this discourse. And that discourse has shattered. We're on a podcast. That's

another example of how all you could do. Actually going to go back, if you really wanted to do this, go to your go research every David brodercolumn and then from nineteen eighty five to nineteen ninety and it would be a parade of new kind of Democrat, new kind of democrat, new kind of democrat.

entire delegate selection process, the creation of super delegates, right, the Stop Jesse Jackson movement. It was all designed to help the southern governors. And at the time it was lbj son in law Chuck Rob governor of Virginia, that everybody assumed would be the great beneficiary.

the DLC was also tactical. They knew that if they created Southern Super Tuesday, it was a way to insulate them from a super lefty becoming the nominee.

It's isolate. One thing Democrats are trying to do. There is a very stop start conversation they're having about, let's just call it the Biden administration's position on gender and transgender rights and the sword version, which i nick The New York Times had had a very very long piece based on scrimmitting decisions outcome that gets into this history.

But basically Trump Biden says trans right to be a civil rights station of our time. He reverses a lot of the Obama Sorry, Obama starts to be more accepting of trans people. Gender is a septacritical working sex. Trump undoes it. Biden puts it back into effect. Trump unwinds it all, and there's this very stop start conversation about did Democrats was that a mistake? Did Democrats need to

rethink this? The way it's being done is that occasionally a Democrat will get asked a question about some aspect of this issue, not the every Biden executive order, but the sports aspect of the issue, and a Senator or a Congressman We'll get asked and they'll say what they think. They'll get piled on by tre be majority, but just every every group in this space, human rights campaign. I'm glad the new groups like Christopher Street Project will come

in and say this person is betraying our movement. No one can lead our party. And also what fort lab They'll say, and they're weak. This is weakness. This is the Democrat who is responding to defeat by abandoning a section of party. Won't they abandon? What is next? And they're they I've not seen people respond to that by saying I was I was wrong. We're giving a new interview and saying I was completely right. They just don't come at again. Ruby Guyego went through this, the Santra Arizona,

Seth Molton went through this. Massachusetts, there's the there's a very good reporter, Oreana Gonzalez that notice, who's been doing iterative stories about House Democrats trying to come up with some position, but they're not having the conversation in public. And the DLC had a lot of conversations in public. And this is the hardest one because they are just

parents every day affected by this issue. I'd bring up the hardest one because it's the one that I've seen Democrats touch the stove and pull it away from the vassist. But you could say the same for immigration. Immigration is even stranger because now today Nearri Canna has an article in the Wall Street Journal about how they're going forward.

But there's no Democrat who's come out and said very clearly, here's I'm giving a speech and a place where reporters will be. Biden was a disaster. He let our party down, and he was wrong on immigration, and instead here is an immigration position that is going to piss off people who thought that who believed in one thing, and to in twenty twenty, who believed that, for example, that asylum is the human rights which is a sign that a

lot of Democrats campaign behind. Literally, they're not doing that. I'm going to float something in Interview'm going to float into the pod. They would notice, Well, hopefully some people notice. It is very hesitant and odd, and you can trust that with Republicans and Trump, Trump can say something and then there is a discourse around when Trump is saying, do you Republicans agree with Trump? And they not agree

with him. He just put out our new position on trade or on whatever it is, or whatever it is, and it's not like I didn't go off in question gets asked, oh, well, who's the leader of the party. That's the same of the DLC. You know, need a leader, You needed just some sort of coherent network that was having a conversation that people understood was a conversation about

the party. You also had the progressive of the Jesse Jackson. I'm saying, here's our conversation, here's our populism. It's just this very anomized selection of groups. And I say this in the reporters. I've just had to build charts of which group says which. Because news stories still exists and TV's story still exists, you can only quote so many people.

But it's this total post Tower of Babel cacophony of who stands for what in the party and very unclear what their position is on anything, because they're not starting with, hey, Biden was wrong, here's why he was wrong. I'm willing to have Mike Donaldan tell me, I'm i stink. I'm willing to have hundred to buy meal. Let me who cares. They're not doing that, They're not confronting that they had a failed presidency.

because he had both right. He was seen as the guy who ran McGovern's campaign in seventy two, who was an interventionist and who was like, you know, he was not easily and he was this sort of Bill Clinton like figure.

showed that there was a way to do this. I want to pick up on something on immigration because the Wall Street Journal poll and I think this is the you why is Trump's numbers starting to go upside down on immigration?

His numbers were worse when it was just immigration. It turns out what the country wanted was they didn't like the chaos at the border. Yeah, they didn't mean they wanted to get rid of every migrant in the country. And I think that that's the opening here. And ironically, that was the Democratic position under Obama. Tough on the ball, order, lenient on my and fought pathway to citizenship for people already here. And it turned out that's a fifty five

to sixty percent agreement message. And for some reason, I go back, it's a debate I moderated. I go back to that first debate where they decriminalize, where everybody on stage but Joe Biden and one other wanted to decriminalize the border, and You're like, oh my god.

and it backfires and you're just credit. No one does it again. This is Sam brown Back in Kansas. A Reblicans still can't win a governor Grace in Kansas because it is tax plant sage disaster. Trump has done some things that I think it's the third pause. Nobody's going to like Obamacare. It can be hacked away at, but

nobody's running out your failing anymore. But he's also done some things where he his response is so angering to progressive, attacked so many of their political no just I would say what they think is American period, that they will overreact and with immigration, that's what happened is there's a lot of Democrats and the thing you said about two thousand and eight, the Democrats in this space the sort of way to share a Metagalasius types. They often will say,

just go back to two as an eight twenty twelve Obama he said things that Democrats don't say anymore, and they were popular and Democrats voted for offense. Right, you could call it a wall. It is a defense. Is

a wall? Yo, Read the language and the platform, because I've talked to some people are in the democratic polling and data space who've just gone back and looked a platforn You can look at a platform language with somebody with a time to just do regression and say what words drop out out, what words come in the party just gets much more optimistic about its future and cannot imagine a backsliding which has already happened to something that is,

let's say, backsliding to a right wing country. I'm trying not to try to overegg what I'm saying now. The Trump thing on immigration is he's president. He starting to tries to build a wall. There's a Republican division on that, and Tom Tillis, who's retiring when the Republicans wh complains about a moving military money to fund the wall. He

has very visible deportation facilities. Those are unpopular. There's actually the whole remain in Mexico policy in part comes from not wanting that imagery of camps because American sea camps and they have associations. They don't like to thank that the deeps in other countries there's less cameras exactly, and then that keeps going. I'm covering the twenty nineteen Democratic primary at this point, and that poll will Braves hand Its.

It is such a great question for Democrats comes from this discourse saying how do we prevent this from ever happening again? Well, instead of deportation being a criminal, it's already a civil ALTI what if it's something even less. What if you're just you're allowed to show up and say I'm I'm demanding asylum because look at how terrible Trump is. This is not America, m E. Lazarus, Poem, etcetera, etc. That we need to make sure that no Trump can ever happen again. And that's a lot of the Biden

premise in twenty twenty. I'm going to run Trump will be an aberration, This will never happen again. Part of that never happened again agenda. Everyone deserves asylum. And so they got themselves into a very humanitarian, emotional immigration position

that they cannot defend. And the result. I mentioned those camps because one thing that Trump is doing in this term unthinkable last term, going to them, just going to the sending Christine home to Salvador, personally, going to Aliger Ralpatraz in Florida with this confidence that the country has moved so far towards him on immigration and deportation that they're going to buy and I have some people merchandise

from the detention camps. So how did Democrats get in that position? They did overreact to Trump and they didn't come up with their own coherent immigration policy. That was what they were skipping. There was a coherent you're affording to it. There was a coherent Obama policy to on order, security, lenient,

on pathway to citizenship. A question I like to ask the Democrats I talked to, like the ones who are running for Andy Basher I talked to last week, and I'm editing something is I'll ask who deserves to be here? Like beyond if you're born in America, you're on the process right now getting naturalized. Who else deserves to be an American? And the answers have been not. Bascher's answer was involving well, you know, it's about the workforce. Well

even that, that's how they're saying. In twenty nineteen there were Democrats and I was saying, we need immigrants here for the workforce, and that's it. They were saying, Hey, if there are people seeking asylum somewhere. I remember Democrats having Trudeau envy because they were watching Justin Trudeau in Canada personally welcome Syrian refugees and saying, what if this country was like that? What if this country was taking

in more refugees. We used to be like that. We used to be like that during the gerald Ford operation that brought people from Vietnam. The country's moved so far right because of the backlash to Biden, and the backlash was engendered by Fox News et cetera coverage of the border, what other areas, So the Democrats not realize that the country has moved away from them, because I do think both parties storytelling of a lot of politics. But I

wrote a callum out this Kawisco. In Democrats' minds, the way history moves is that something outrageous happens and people get up in the streets and protests, and then the people who were defending outrageous thing crack down the protesters, and the whole country looks at that and says that can't happen, and they move on. It never happens again.

And I'm not trying to impugne Democrats or say that just in covering them, listening to the rhetoric a lot of their rhetoric assumes that there's going to be a selma for the outrage. There's going to this is what happened immigration hundred from what happened under this policy, and this refugee policy, this is what's going to happen under for gender based rights, trans rights, LGBTQ rights. And when it doesn't, they seem to be They seem not to know what to do with a Republican party that's very

comfortable saying things that make fun of human suffering. I mentioned the detention camps, but there there is a level of mockery for the Trump administration that I think borders or maybe has gotten on the border of eu bris. They definitely look like a Republican party that can't imagine

losing ever again, which is how you get into trouble. They might go back and regret some of the gladness with which they talk about these issues. But Democrats, I think we're just not ready for a cultural shift away from them, and they're looking at these polls and saying this poll says that Trump's some unpopular immigration, But what does that mean when you come back, it's who deserves to be in the country. Correct? When it comes to who does what does ender mean in the law, There

are these tough questions. They just punted because they said, well, from it's unpopular, we're going to go I'm not trying to ramb I'm just trying to bring things together. Same thing with gender happened. A lot of the movement on people's acceptance of trans rights was not a lot some of it was driven by Trump, by people saying, why is he being so cruel to people who are trans and just want to live their lives? Sert of a military the.

of the country? You know, Reagan was tough, all those all that, all that mindset.

twenty two, and it's funny life to merge. The Democrat majority comes out before Democrats are able to win something. Their second what comes outhen Democrats have a pretty good min term, so they keep the people get missing missing what they're saying.

my students said, oh my god, I wish i'd read this before the twenty four election.

the country mean, what do borders mean? And there are Democrats now saying you can't have a country without borders. Just he has shifted the conversation his direction on what that means.

of led with his chin on this. And as I'm a son of Columbia immigrants, I voted for the Lake and Riley Act. I don't regret voting for it. Some people who are in the country don't deserve to be here. Come at me, But what does that mean as a full policy? Still bring that out on the gender stuff that that has become, that has been more complicated because

the way that they look into this. If I can just quickly, I always I'm sorry I summarize it without being blase about what happened. But gay marriage, which was the fight for gay marriage, which we were both covering for years, was very incremental inch by inch. A lot of Democrats not even in committing to endorseing gay marriage, like Barack Obama until twenty twelve.

be good with that. Like, there was a real and it was a fifty one proposition about how much to go into the no fight for same sex marriage now versus fight for same sex marriage later, right, And that was a divide, by the way, similar divide on trans issues inside HRC, though I see that they've they've moved past that debate a little bit.

to put on the ballot in some states? Hey, this state now defines genders as two sexiest man in female. Well that's a great question. Why has it that happened? Well, the one thing is that they they think just even some of them are too younger. Remember two thousand and four when it wouldn't be a perish a referenda. But they they assumed they'd be they'd be outspent on these. They assumed they would not win as many as they did. They also had trouble convincing the party that it mattered.

And the story of the right on this up to twenty twenty was that their donors didn't understand why this was such a big deal. The Caitlyn Jenner coming out in twenty fifteen in the context of a twenty sixteen Republican race. You can find Republican at the time like Rick Santorum saying, well, Kaitlyn Jenner says, she's a woman, She's a woman. Sure they didn't understand. They end their family was also Republican. There was a weird part of that. You wonder if she had been a high profile Democrat.

If the conversation would have been the same, just maybe maybe, but just the way it was seen as a libertarian issue, It's like, why do you want the republic the Republican party that just got killed on gay marriage after and you can't even talk anymore, why do he wants to get involved in this? Regrets had the same set of facts, Well, we may gain marriage, move so slowly that now we're

kind of embarrassed that we moved so slowly. There was a very brief news cycle in twenty fifteen because Hillary Clinton had been Secretary of State and wasn't taking political positions. How come she had endoorse gay marriage yet and the

Trump campaign had some fun with Donald Trump endorse gay marriage before Ellary Clinton did so. The trans issues, the history quite complicated. I recommend reading Susan Striker's book on transgender history to catch up on this stuff. They are different movements that are interlocking. They're there and they fight, they they've boon different things. But the way that this has gotten the bomb Minstration of biderministration said well, no,

these are these are human rights. Weren't forcing them, and we're changing the way that the code the government's code talks about gender. We are changing the way that healthcare plans cover gender medicine. We're doing that. There's not going to be a debate, there's not going to be referendums in the States, it's not going to all to take forever. We're just doing it because this is right. And then

the backlash later. I mean, so it's imagine if because what happened with game marriage is sometimes a court would legalize it and there'd be a voter backlash. But imagine if instead Bill Clinton in nineteen ninety nine says change the legal code. Marriage now means whatever, No, he didn't,

he did, Delma. And so the way the trans rights have played out politically, I think has been again traumatized to people who are who are progressive, who believe in this, to trans people, because the recent experience is that human rights moves in one direction, and that actually was the trench forefare of gay marriage was not repeated for trans rights, it was handled differently. Your party really fully understood the implications.

Now they've got a good understanding implications. There are people trying to find a way through. But instand what you're seeing is because it wasn't just America, UK, European countries still have the same thing. All right. We have a new understanding of what gender is. It's enforced in the code. And the backlash came after that, This progressive dealing with a with a right wing backlash for a lot because people are cycling through the political process just because of

mortality who don't remember things. I find this in the report. People who do not remember Barack Obama being elected. Certainly

they don't remember purely when gay marriage was unpopular. There are a lot of people in political activism, in democratic powery politics, and their story is, look, the country is becoming more progressive. Why would you ever question rights for all people, something that's good for all people. Why would you ever do that? How could the Democrats sell people

out by saying maybe it's going too fast? Republicans say, I think they're snake bit by gay marriage, and now the degree they moved from we're not sure if we should run on this issue too. We're going to attack every Democrat over it. Again. I think seems eu briistic because in those spaces I'm talking about, the democratic donor space was one thing they're saying is courts might take care of this, and that's like a very if you know what you mean by that, your life, right, another

thing of your life. That's a little hard to hear, the saying, look, scremedi happened, there's going to be another. There are there any more cases before a six to three Supreme Court. The next time the Democrats is going to run for office, a Republicans say this is hey, they're going to do this, They'll say no, it's all illegal. That's terrible to hear. If you're progressive, that's like saying, well the ports and handle every wade. Stop running on

abortion in Texas. It's over you. Just what's your what's your frame of ressent reference as a progressive or if looks that one, we're never going to get it back.

under people's skirts. If that is your only quote unquote violation to the cultural center right, I don't think you could be tough on trans folks and soft on immigration and think that's going to solve your problems. If you're going to pick one of these cultural hot button issues to run against the party on. It feels like immigration is the probably the smarter play if you're just playing.

mean basher, Andy basher. Another thing I asked him was about the Trump's orders on gender medicine for miners, and he said, well, I'm against surgeries on minors, and I always had it been, and I guess that didn't get reaction anymore. But it's the what also affects more people's lives. I think this is this is this is going. That's exactly right. It's a part of it, yeah, versus you know, thirty percent of the country. But I I I I vote. Sorry,

you're the host, and I keep, I keep, I keep. No, no, no no, I think this is a no no no. We spent a good chuck here. That was the big picture.

You know, Democrats like need to figure out what they believe and talk about it, as opposed to say, and where we believe is moving this way and I'll get right with history. They just need to say, why do I believe this?

the mayor of Burlington, the mayor of Milwaukee. We may have a mayor of Minneapolis, and you know, the mayor of New York City. So I am skeptical that's this transferable into the rest of the party. And I expect

most of the party to feel comfortable distancing themselves from mom Donnie, you know, in some sort of Oh, I like him, he's a good campaigner, but that's not what I'm for or hostile, but it will be some form of that. You concur with that, or do you think they could it could have more legs.

it straight. And if everyone agrees that Democrats need to run for something, not against something, I'm not convinced that a midterm message for the incumbent party that runs everything will be Hey, look at that guy in New York. Now I talked to I've known mam Day for a while. I talked to him in the race for mayor, but I met him when he was running for State Senate in New York. The rise of DSA New York, the story of socialists until Mamdani over the last couple of

years that they were losing brown. They were losing ground votes for the reasons that a lot of left wing or groups lose round infighting and people quit and people lob accusations at each other. But also they were getting

blamed for a lot of policies that they advanced, like bail reform, more of the criminal policies, socialist criminal justice. Yes, but socials were not getting dinged for their economic ideas. They were getting hurt for the other ideas about remaking remaking society. Prison abolition, police abolition, defunding police is downstream from that. And Mam Donnie didn't run on that. Remind

ran on affordability. So I feel the one way I view what he did is more he's like the Howard Jarvis of of a browsing a portability Howard Jarvis, you know, passes this doll initiative in California in the seventies on tax limitation that free defines the state, but Democrats don't see Prop thirteen. But Democrats don't see it coming because they they thought they were being responsible stewards of this exparis money and saving up for a big surplus and

not refunding people's money with taxes. And in New York there was a lot of denial like, well, I mean, yeah, the housing thing is slow, but we need to work through these groups and we're going to build this housing. But this donor's opposed to it, and Mam Donnie. There's been this fight for who owns this agenda between more moderate Democrats and Progresses because they do want to be the party of affordability. It just needs different stuff in

different places. I mean, you mentioned Minneapolis and housing affordability is less of an issue in Minneapolis because it's not as expensive. It's society spent to lived there. New York has been New York Los Angeles. I mean you can really start that there. DC area are just if you're in when you're done with this podcast, go look up Zillo and look up what it costs to have a big family home in those places, You're not going to

have the same issues outside of urban areas. So he is he is for urban democrats, like a Howard Jermans figures saying, look, if you don't deal with this, voters are going to react and make you deal with it. And I look more housing etctera, go ahead. My test on Mom Donnie is Mikey Cheryl. If somehow she loses, I think there will be this idea that there's a Mom Donnie effect and that hurt her in the Northern

Jersey suburbs, right, Like, that's the scenario. I had an interview with Rama Manuel a couple of weeks ago, and that was his paranoia that does Mom Donnie become a problem? You know?

they can complain all they want around the lieutenant governor's campaign. Please, it's Donald Trump and the land Doge that is the that is going to put Abigail Spamberger in Richmond.

a I'm going to answer it first. And I'm curious if there's any other state that you I think the most interesting state to understand where the country is headed, where the Democratic Party is headed, is the state of Michigan. You have a Democratic primary and Senate that is going to pit sort of establishment DC versus sort of younger outsider state senator right and Molly McMorrow versus Haley Stevens.

And then you have the three way race for governor, which is going to test sort of where is the middle?

unless something changes, I'm going to Michigan on Saturday. So I'm glad it's important, But I mean it's got era.

who's interesting. He's also kind of as a storytelling figure, sort of interesting because he was the first black Democrats speaker of the State House in Michigan, and Michigan Democrats finally won this trifecta in twenty a twenty two, and then they didn't do as much as other Democrats did with their trifecta. And there's not real metrics, not much

excitement around Joe Tate because where was the agenda. Where was the great Whitmer agenda that she could compare to what Tim Walls did in Minnesota or what Kathie Hochel did in New York, et cetera. Uh. And so Tate has not gotten much much momentum. Abdul has gotten some of that progressive in christ And yes more is running more as an anti I agree with you because the

stories they're all telling are very interesting. The reason that the more of people's theory of the case is he is at the leading edge of the suburban state Michigan revival from the suburbs of Detroit. The subject froid big place. Uh. And she's been doing this work in Michigan, not in d C. Their theory is just being connected to DC and Democrats flopping around failing. Uh is not going to be a winner for Haley Stevens the Stephens. The Stephens theory is more that she gets things done, she can

work with both parties. Is that still the wait get ahead? Yeah, that she's Ferry Peters or she's a lista slock into an extent and I'll do the saed l sa Ed theory is Democrats were not inspiring enough. They're not straightforward enough of what they believe, say what they think, call out for I mean day waned how I interviewed him and he calls what happening, what's happening Israel and Gaza genocide? Do that his theory, and that's that's a very powerful

strain of progressive thinking. The note for true progressives have not been tried. They the democratic establishment never let Bernie get the nominations, so we've never got to see out put him progressive in there, and you're gonna wake up correct Bernie's was Bernie won Michigan primaries twice, right, No, he won the first one and he got he got smoked in pointy twenty uh.

never will, But in Michigan is one of those places. New Hampshire primary was the first place where this started to pop up. Because Bernie kills Hillary in the New Hampshire biggest landslide and they through the primary. He runs four years later, he's better known. He does much worse. He wins the primary, but barely because it turns out a lot of his voters just like, no, I'm an independent and I hate Hillary. Same thing happened to Michigan. He Biden wins every county in the state because a

lot of the Bernie voters just they hated Hillary. How many of them would have come out for Bernie had he been the nominee. How many of the voted for Trump? We don't know. And I think it's very fair to progressives to say that's right, you never have to test that particular campaign. And the abdulah l said theory is, I'll do it. I'm going to test this campaign. I'm

going to run as a Bernie populist in Michigan. And the mcmorro theory is more I'm going to run as the Buddha Judge generational change outsider candidate, and the Stevens Camp theory is look, Gary Peters won, I can win and so yeah, very different theories of how how the party, how the party works. And I needed to spend time out with them because the thing in common is they're really not attracting new people. They're not finding those voters who got disaffected by Democrats in the in the last

few years and now have found somebody inspiring. And I think that does come down to policy. And I think it was a non more immigration than anything else, because that's one thing you hear a lot talking to the non white voters who were Democrats and voted for Obama and then voted for Trump. A thing that comes up very frequently is I work for what I have. And then the Democrats gave free hotels to all the elie

immigrants boom once. How much did it hurt the party that they were seeing as the party not just of not giving things, not giving things away to people, Because this was the we're trying to the eighties, this is the crisis the eighties. The Democrats of the party of handing out welfare and taking the economy. How much of this and it's over?

comes Mike Duggan, sort of rumpily rumpty, old white guy mayor of Detroit, right and sort of I'm going to turn your street lights on and fill your potholes kind of guy, sort of technocraty, right, sort of Bloomberg without the nice suits. And that's I don't know if that's going to work outside of the Detroit metro area, which is my curiosity. He does really well in in his media market. He's much less known obviously in the rest

of the state. But that's my curiosity is if he wins, what does it mean and what does it mean for Democrats more so than it is for Republicans, because to me, this would be more of a of a statement against the against the Democrats than it would be because one would assume by the general Whitmer's out there trying to help Jocelyn Benson be the heir apparent.

without doing anything, maybe just being in that position. He ran for senidate twice and lost. With that theory, as soon as we going state a black elected Republican, he's he's going to be. He's going to be in the mets with later in Black Bowl.

been winning. James is not a runaway favorite. He's never he's he's done, he's done, he's out performed when I think he ran it behind Trump and twenty twenty yes, hand Trump joined my eighteen, but the stated not on fire for John James and being a Republican House member is the least effective part of it. If I'm wrong, Republicans haven't been able to win statewide in Michigan fourteen I mean, right, Rick Schnyder, that's the last one. Yeah, yeah,

I mean Democrats. The Democrats have swept everything except the presidential in twenty twenty sixteen, twenty sixteen, and twenty two.

Those are big ifs, and those are big butt forst But really it's yeah, Democrats what they can't win any of the state wide races republicly in twenty twenty two, and Democrats win every state supreme court race every time. It's not Trump on the ballot Democrats. Sweet, you're right, Well, what's interesting about what's going on?

team was interested in for Senate races. This time, John Thune and the Trump team are working in tandem and they're really The only disagreement going right now, arguably is Georgia. And we can have a conversation about Louisiana, but that's a separate issue in Texas.

Look howt quickly a primary was shut down in North Carolina, Look out quickly, But like this is a quickly a primary was shut down in Florida for that Senate seat. It does you know, I see a Republican Party for the first time in the Trump era rowing in the same direction as far as tactic tactics are concerned.

convert who's with him on everything. So is it worth? I mean Jim de Mint had this quote especially. I think this quote got blown up because this was the at the height of the Mitch McConnell Senate warriers where he wanted to discredit Jim Dimitt and the Conservatives. But the men said, I'd rather have you know, uh, He'd rather have a thirty yeah like man and senators than sixty WinPY Republicans. And they said that's a loser mentality.

We don't want thirty. But it turns out, what's uh fifty three Republicans of whom two of them want want to break with Trump on some things, turns out to get you everything you want. You have, you can still get your Mitch McConnell gets to vote against nominees and give a statement about it. And Tom Tillis gets to do his interviews where he says he has a problem with Trump, but you mostly get what you want. It

turns out, and this is the experience Democrats had. It turns out, I mean had had really had like Al Cunningham, she just kept in his pants in twenty twenty and they had one more Senate seat in twenty twenty one. Trillions more dollars could have passed, and not because it didn't require building party just May didn't need Roy. How bad it would do you need Joe Mansion's vote? Right?

get the candidates he wants. And it's really those kind of rogers, guys who genuflect to Trump and are willing to support whatever he does, even if they but they have some other appeal beyond Trump. That's the sweet spot.

They're going to find some of those. They have not found one in North Carolina. They have not found one in Georgia. I don't know who they could and I'm not just going down the entire list of people in George. But they did get very fixated on Brian camp and once he decided not to do it. Can they find somebody whose brand is independent of independent of Trump, but also endorse by Trump. They don't have somebody, obviously, And I.

those people throughout these states. It's just who of them? Who of them can? Cause you know, podcasts actually good training for some of the guys who can go on and kind of riff for an hour. In terms of you knows, all right, those guys I think always need to be in the mix. Hey, you're the NBC all the time. He might run for sent Yes, I'm.

a yellow flag for the midterm. What say you am I overranke rating it?

I don't expect Democrats to win it. I'm talking about that.

they got to do something. Second thing is other than Ran Paul and Glenn Youngkin. Have you seen anybody else on the.

getting into that that mix. Even the Trump kids, they'll get pulled. Not really. I feel that it's not because they're afraid of Trump stepping in and defending Dadie Vance and attacking them. I just haven't seen it yet. No, you're not missing anything. I've not seen a Republican that we've not heard of get in and put himself out as a as somebody that donors might want to be

interested in. They might be underplaying it because it's it's I think Vance is a strong vice president in that position, but not invincible and does not have the independent appeal of Trump so young can. I mean not surprising that the former Carlisle is being entrepreneurial, but nobody else yet.

the past. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm not. I'm not as sold into Paul. I never underestimate I never underestimate the Paul family. They have a following that's durable.

for the next two years. I mean, go back to George Bush and eighty eight, who really had trumple luck in that nomination down when he was there to a very popular president, right, but.

out of here on this because I think it has to do potentially, why do you think there's so many interested Democrats in running for Iowa Senate, Like of all places where we're seeing and they're all what's interesting about the four candidates three are already in one is pondering.

who got those short straw. On the Republican remander, I think it's it's one of a faction, a factor of the party at the party decline and there's no one in the party who can say run for this, not that too the man that's the Sands factor, because the sand Reublicans really said, I mean, if if he does

run and when it will be. Remind me a bit when Republicans jerrymandered out Joe Connolly and forced to run for Senate, which he with Donnelly, would you, which he won Indiana because Republicans went on to terrors taking away rob Sand's powers and he said, it's nothing for me to run for his auto anymore. It's a run for governor.

Emmanuel would have been with Champion back in oh six. Run on corruption, run on you know, saving people money, you know, sort of run on sort of bread and butter issues to get you know, that's what's available to them. And then you throw in the fact that you know Kim Reynolds. You know, it's funny she's so I assume she's not running because she made Maga so mad by endorsing Desanta's And that is still a hangover inside the Republican Party in Iowa a little bit. But it is

fascinating to me. You're just like, Wow, Democrats are struggling as a party, but somehow they have four reasonably decent Senate candidates showing up in Iowa. All of them are interesting on paper candidates. The guy and Council bluffs, the Chamber of Commerce guy, the baseball player, right, like they all have interesting one I think a Republican seat and a special so they all have their story. They're like

four Molly mcmorrows, if you will out of there. So it's just a it's it is an other one where it makes me want to go to the state fair this year, and you know state fairs in about a week.

he didn't in twenty twenty two, but the Santus brought this up. But Iowa and Florida were this archipelago of states where there was a red wave and that was in part because Democrats just gave up on Iowa and they.

basically got there because he went to places that Democrats had stopped going to.

I will always get some cheese curds because I try to avoid fried stuff, but that that hot cheese curd in fresh brine oil unbeatable. But that's boring and there's usually more more exciting one once you get there. That competition that they had every year for the for the best new experimental food, just Minnesota is in. It is a thousand years ahead of everybody.

on any campaigns that you want to go.

it Brian f from track It, Massachusetts. Maybe it's track It.

Monday's class to discuss in the topics. Always appreciated your insider analysis and love to have the chance to listen to you without the restrictions of the sixty minute show, actually forty four minutes. I just read a book called Lucky Loser, in which the author's journalists for The York Times exposed Trump's solution of success. I was floored by how much of his life has been built on live scams, and wonder how so many people have been duped by him.

Will there ever be a Toto who will pull away the curtain?

of his businesses were failures. And there was certainly plenty of stories done about how not had they simply let his inheritance just accumulate interest and dividends in the stock market, that he'd have more money today than he did when he used his inheritance to try to try his hand at real estate development.

and it's been sold out every day. And I said, props for the show, and he goes, yeah, And I said, and I remember asking him, you've been compared to P. T. Barnum, Do you take that as a compliment, he said, I do, and I thought that was the as revealing of a moment as you could have had with them, right, Speaking of revealing moments, I do, I do believe that. You know, there's always the pictures worth a thousand words and sometimes

videos worth a million. If you just needed one video to explain Donald Trump's presidency, what it likely was like, what was it like to work for Donald Trump? And what kind of person is Donald Trump? The video of the staffer dropping the golf ball and supposedly searching for the golf ball and then dropping in to make it easy for the president to find. I don't think you need anything else. I think it is one of those need you say more? What else do you need to

know about him? And I remember, actually, of all people, it was Rush Limbaugh who once said, by the way, that golf golf will tell you more about a person's character than anything, right, because you score yourself. It's all the honor system. Did you find your ball?

somebody that has a foot wedge? I always say ironically it was Russe Limbaugh, because look, I mean there's stories of Bill Clinton was a cheater at golf supposedly, right, you'd hear these stories, So it's a I think it's an incredibly revealing moment. But to go back to the basis of your question, when I think about all these I don't think you know think I don't think we realized that the country needed more of an education his

business background. I think there was this weird assumption first when he first got in, there wasn't the typical coverage you get of who is Donald Trump? Do you really know Donald Trump? Because nobody took the candidacy seriously. It felt like a publicity stunt. Because most of what Donald Trump's done his whole life is aublicity stunt. And in fact, to those of us that have had to cover Donald Trump off and on, he was viewed as kind of

he was viewed as that person. Oh god, I mean in twenty eleven, when he was floating the idea of running for president, it felt like we were all being used for just a publicity stunt for.

the appeal of Donald Trump, right. That was that That's been you know to me, that's the that's disconnect number one. But disconnect number two is we did not we made too many assumptions that the what we we kind of knew Trump was was sort.

don't need to pray for Toto to come in. But there's also a part of me that thinks that that this is something that maybe not that it will be like the Wizard of Oz. It'll be the end of the story when people finally all figure it out. But I often wonder if we collectively had sort of treated him as a candidate, that we didn't assume everybody knew, that we had dug into his background, as if we

assumed the voters didn't know him. Maybe some of these stories hit differently, hit sooner, but you know, hindsight, right, what do they say? Twenty twenty next question comes from Jim parts unknown perhaps, and he asked us, why does the USA give such unconditional support to israel? I perceive nat Yah who's having more sway over Trump than vice versa.

Why does the tail wag the dog here? People are suffering, starving, and no matter what Israel does, it seems they have our unconditional support. Why aren't we the one dictating the terms? You're asking a question that Jim Baker once asked of George H. W.

George W. Bush, Wata is welcome with Barack Obama. Warld is welcome with with with Donald Trump, what is welcome with Joe Biden, and yes, even Donald Trump, right like, you know, because of the posture he takes.

Hillary and he didn't like Hillary. And there's there's a part of Trump that's just very binary in his thinking that way. So, but I think he now realizes because I do think you know, Trump seemed Trump. Trump is moved by pictures, right, we know this, right, He believes

in the visual. He understands visual. I think I've shared with you that he one time wanted to rewatch an interview I conducted with him without sound before, you know, just wanted to see what the lighting look like, see what he looked like.

with this at all. Now, I have to tell you there's a there's another part of me that thinks, I where the United States of freaking America. Why can't we go in there and say, God, damn it, Hamas, We're coming in and we're feeding everybody, every fucking person. We're feeding everybody in Gaza, and what are you going to do about it? And we come in there like the mighty United States government and we're there to make sure everybody eats and everybody's got access to food. Who's going

to stop us? So there's there's a part of me that thinks that if we want, you know, if we wanted to, we.

political mistake. That the reason there's a rising anti Israel sentiment in the Democratic Party is directly because of how Biebe drove a wedge and sort of became a partisan, got involved against Obama and against Democrats in our country, right, got involved in politics, in partisan politics on the side during during the Romney campaign, and that was that did some real damage. In fact, I get into this with

Richie torresm my Newsphere episode this week. If you go check out my interview with Richie where we talk about that and the damage, the long term damage politically BB did to Israel's standing.

for Israel. Now it is interesting to see that that that that faction exists, and there's sort of the roots of MAGA I think are very Israel skeptic a little bit due to sort of more in the isolation is upfront, but you know, so this is and then the Republican Party became, thanks to the evangelicals, more pro Israel than the Democratic Party. It's possible we're starting to see this

coalition sort of reshape itself yet again. But look, you know, the future of Israel's standing with the United States, I think depends largely on how long beating that now, who stays in power?

politicians having powerful national presence with presidential potential. As a lifelong Virginia made me realize we haven't had a politician with such a profile in my lifetime. I know in Virginia used to be the home of presidents. Right, It's still I think second to Ohio in elected presidents, but hasn't had a president since Wilson anyway. Do you think that is a product of governors having a single four

year term referring to Virginia. Is it because the Commonwealth's politics have been dominated by birds and warners, with the occasional rob Kine thrown in since the post war air thus making it hard for newcomers to break through, or given the relatively stable state wide economy, Jinay, governors not make lasting national impressions provided they stay out of legal trouble.

eighty four election, which ended up benefiting Walter. It ended up becoming sort of it did eventually benefit of Bill Clinton right come ninety two, but it was actually designed to help one of these Southern governors and the southern governor that the party, the people in the party that pushed for this primary calendar change and was orchestrating this sort of one of the first sort of races to early up primaries and create is the Southern Democratic governors.

They wanted to create a primary day Super Tuesday. This is the original Super Tuesday was just Southern states, and it was the goal was to elect one of these Southern Democratic governors, whether it was Rubin Ascue a you know, you had Jimmy Carter before them, but you had a Rubin Ascue in Florida or Bob Graham later, you had a Zel Miller, you had Chuck Rob, you had Bill Clinton, you had Dick Riley in South Carolina.

to know Mike Allen. Mike Allen of Axio's Fame, Playbook Fame. He was a young cub reporter for the Richmond Times Dispatch and man, this was his beat. He had the feud the Warner they excuse me, the the Rob Wilder feud. One of the great inter party fights ever.

thirty for thirty for politics. You know, this is one of those What if I told you that two Democratic governors, one who was the lieutenant governor at one point to the Democratic governor got into the type of fight that started secret tape recordings, secret you know, nude massages and how it, you know, upended the future of Virginia's democratic

politics and presidential politics. So look, and Mark Warner was going to run for president, and then a guy named Barack Obama started to He was going to be the new media guy. He was the tech guy that was going to be able to talk to this new Internet community in six seven. Look, if Obama doesn't run, Mark Warner may have been that and had been a Virginian. So I do think some of it recently has been timing. Glenn Youngkin, I think is going to run in twenty eight,

so there's another opportunity. But you know, I've never met a Virginia governor who liked the one term lament. They all think it should be, you know, and you don't. Obviously, you can serve non consecutively. Terry mcculloff wanted to do it. He just lost to Youngkin and couldn't pull it off. Terry mcaloff was going to run for president. He wanted to run for president in twenty twenty had Joe Biden not run, and I think had Biden not run, TERR mccallff would have jumped in to try to be the

centrist candidate in that lane. So I look at and and Tim Kaine was Hillary. Let's not forget Tim Kane was Hillary Clinton's running mate, right, So I think there was certainly opportunities that just sort of you know, for a variety of reasons, specific specific folks. Look George Allen, you know, I profiled him early on in a Washingtonian piece. I remember I went to a NASCAR track with George Allen as he was starting to prepare for a presidential

candidate in two thousand and eight. This was in two thousand and five. But he had to get through a reelection that most people thought was going.

to have a governing majority, or at least a non hostile legislature. So I think there's plenty that want to add their name to the list. But you know, there was a time, you know, I think I think, especially now with Jade Vance being in in the in the catbird seat to be the next nominee the Republican Party, Ohio's, Ohio's got a better chance of electing a new president than Virginia does.

whim or did they set new precedence?

what a legislature was intending. They wanted to force a court order so that they could open up the map. But I think that's the issue. There's nothing in the constitution. The constitution simply leaves it to state legislatures to decide the lines. They don't say how this state legislatures should decide the lines. Which is why if you want to use an outside commission to draw the lines, and then the legislature approves, you want to have the legislature draw it,

so be it. But it's however the legislature deems the way to do it in state in said state acts. But look, this is the hallmark of the Trump bears. There was a whole bunch of things that we thought were there's a whole bunch of norms that we all treated as law, and it turns out nope, they were just they were just traditions we all agreed to abide to abide by until apparently we didn't. And I kind

of think that's where we are in redistricting. And it's certainly a fear that I have, which is this tip for tat. I understand it strategically right.

then you don't have trustworthy elections. Right if you get to decide who your voters are, is it a democracy anymore?

can have an equation. You know, no district should be more than more than ten points ten percentage points more Republican or Democrat than the average percentage of what a Democrat has gotten over a decade in the last two governors races and presidential races. You sort of average those numbers. I know I'm sitting here describing some easy math to go by, but I would take sort of give me the average democratic statewide vote among governor's races and presidential races.

convention would be the death of the most important part of the Constitution, the First Amendment. How can we protect the freedoms of speech, assembly, press, and most importantly, the separation of church and state in a constitutional convention. I do not trust my fellow citizens to keep that and certainly not to strength it back to the founder's intent.

I think you might get a campaign finance law in there. I think you would get term limits or age Actually, I think what's more likely is age limits. Right, since age minimums are already in the constitution, I think it makes it easier to sell age limits in the constitution. So maybe we would have it for the judiciary, for the Senate, for the House, et cetera.

think you can't. I guess I'm going to put my faith. Let me put it in another way. I trust the voters. There's always something to learn from the voters, even if I disagree with their decision, and I think our I think ultimately voters eventually get it right. We have two hundred and forty eight years with this republic. So far because when we've gotten it wrong, we've eventually gotten it right. Do we elect the McCarthy, We do, and then we eventually move on from McCarthy.