Full Episode - Both Parties Point Fingers… And Fix Nothing + What Does A Winning Democratic Coalition Look Like In ‘28?

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free quote at ethos dot com slash chuck. That is e Thos dot com slash chuck. Application times may vary and rates may vary. Hello Aaron, Welcome to another episode of the Chuck Podcast. Let me give you a quick rundown of what we have for today's episode. Look, I've got a little more fallout from the events on Saturday and frankly a laments, I'm not gonna lie to Yeah, this is you know, I know we're all shocked that our leaders aren't meeting the moment, but our leaders aren't

meeting the moment. Let's not take our eye off the ball of Iran. We have just hit essentially a new high and gas prices since the start of this war. We're now at a high on gas prices that we had to deal with at the start of the Ukraine Russian War. The problem here is that there doesn't seem to be a near term solution on the horizon. Then we have a bunch of political updates. We have a new house map in Florida. It's a fascinating new map. My quick headline is this is a great map for

Republicans in a presidential year. This is a shaky map for Republicans in a midterm year, particularly a midterm year where they could where they're the party in power. I

will dig into that a few Senate race developments, and then my conversation today is with Atima Omara. She's the author of a new book called The Instigators. It's basically about the role black women in particular have played as sort of the leading voices inside the Democratic Party at least in the twenty first century. But there's also more historical elements here. A Teama is not necessarily a full

time historian. She's a political strategist. She has been in the trenches on democratic politics and on the politics of

particularly in the African American community, and she's got some interesting insights. We talk a lot about sort of twenty twenty four, the future, what the future of the party is, the very splits and divides. Plus her book. Just trust me, if you're a political junkie're trying to understand where it's the Democratic Party headed, you know what could work, what might not work. This good conversation for you. I think

you're going to enjoy it. Obviously, it's Wednesday, so it's Top five day, and I've got a fun little take on a top five list today. The top five races that are that are the most dangerous for Donald Trump to cement lame duck status. Right, The test of his political strength inside the Republican Party is these are five Republican primaries that will tell us how lame the duck in the Oval office is these days. Right, So I think you're going to enjoy that. And Plus I'm gonna

take some questions. But let me begin with a lament. And I know this isn't a shock or a surprise, but it is still striking to me over the last couple of days that you know, to see what didn't happen.

After last Saturday night's events, we had a man show up at the White House Correspondent Center armed had written a manifesto anti Trump's screed. He was stopped at a security checkpoint, and the response from the White House has essentially been, well, we should tighten security and build my ballroom. And it's the Democrats and the left's fall. And that tells you something because there was a time in this country not that long ago, when something like this would happen.

A president in particular would treat it very differently. There would have been an attempt, at least in an attempt to study the country to lower the temperature, like what George W. Bush did after nine to eleven, making it crystal clear that the United States was not at war with Islam. Right, there was an important he had to say it, and it took an American president to say it. There isn't there was nobody else that could say it that would have any sort of meaning beyond the President

of the United States in that moment. Presidents are in charge of the thermostat of the political temperature of the country period, and he chose to turn down the thermostat, saw what was building, feared what was building, and he turned down that thermostat. But we haven't really had that moment, right, they even had the moment where this president said this isn't who we are, this is not acceptableybe, it's time

to take a breath here. I know we've all allowed political rhetoric to get out of hand, right, And yet that's not the instinct right now, is it? And that's the problem. So instead of reltigating how we got here, and I think that's part of the problem, right, that everybody feels pretty confident that they're right and the other

side is wrong. I have felt it. I wrote sort of a similar thing on in my column this week for Newsphere and substat that essentially argued that, look, we're here, and you know, yes, there's no doubt that Donald Trump's arrival in twenty fifteen accelerated this moment, but that doesn't excuse the behavior now on the laugh to just say, well, donald Trump started eight, you'r reporce you. So that's not good either. So that's why you know, we can re litigate.

I mean, there's definitely nobody can deny how this began, but everybody's in charge of their own behavior here. And I still believe ultimately it takes a president, and we may have a president who is not interested in turning the temperature down. But here's the simplest way I can explain it, because we've produced a new kind of political environment that's quite scary. For years, we treated certain rhetoric

as performance. And I know we're going to go through this again, and some of you may roll your eyes, Oh, we've been through here before. Yeah, we have, and apparently we haven't learned the lesson, so we've got to keep going here, right, But we treated the rhetoric that's campaign stuff, and there was you know, you know, I think, frankly, I have a higher tolerance than most right because I'm

used to heated campaign rhetoric. It's crowd stuff. It's right out of the WWE and that's what Trump thinks, that

he's doing it for entertainment purposes and things like that. He doesn't really mean it, and I believe that. I don't think he really meant it. But that's me. That doesn't mean what other people and then there are people that act in his name that did mean it right.

But when this has started to when this is when this starts happening at scale over time, it stops being performance and it gets turned into a permission slop and then after a while becomes something bigger, becomes the environment itself. We can trace that shift pretty quickly. Right. We know Donald Trump didn't invent anger in politics, but he absolutely changed what was acceptable to say out loud, punching protesters,

carrying them out on stretchers, personalizing everything, turning all personal opponents into enemies. Many of us felt it personally. And you know, with fellow Republicans who are not MAGA members, many of them don't speak out for fear. Out of fear. Trust me, I've had every single mainstream reporter has had this conversation with an elected Republican, every single one in Washington.

We all all have an off the record, and I have multiple off the record conversations with elected Republicans essentially saying I don't call it out because you have no idea what his people do to me or due to my family, or the threats that are made. Right it is, there is a coercion that has taken place here, and

that's why it's sometimes frustrating to watch this. Right, some people only want to look back the last four years and say, boy, look what the Democrats have done. And there's some truth to that, right, the democratic cretoric has gotten harshir the violence that being prone to violence, it does seem in the last couple of years coming more

from the left than the right. But you're sticking your head in the sand if you don't realize we're living, if you don't pull back the camera more and realize, oh, how did we get here? This is how we got here, right, And the fact is, anybody that's been doing this for a decade knows this is how we got here. Now you can choose to put your partisan blinders on and say it's their faults. Look at how nasty and awful the left is. Look at how nasty and awful Donald

Trump is. The fact is both things can be true at the same time, you know, and that's something. And this isn't both siding everything. This is you know, two wrongs don't make right. Our politics is fucked up because of too many people believing that two wrongs make a right, and this sort of idea that you fight fire with fire, and whether it's on things as sort of arcane as

drawing congressional district lines to the rhetoric that is used to describe a political opponent that you don't agree with. But the bottom line is the line has been moved and we have created the conditions for more of this, not less. Now, we spent years talking about January sixth in that matters, But here's the thing I think we've missed. That wasn't the end of something. That was actually the beginning of something, especially after he pardoned everybody in January sixth.

So the real question now is what happens after that kind of permission has been established and what is it going to take to create a safer sense of normal in our political discourse. Because here's what we've learned right now,

the permission slip of January sixth has has not stayed contained. It has spread, and it didn't spread ideologically. It's not on one side of the aisle. It has spread culturally, and you can see it big and small. You see it in moments that would have been unthinkable before. A sitting president reacting to the death of a former FBI director Robert Muller by saying, good, I'm glad he's dead. You know that moment, the fact that he couldn't even

fake it until the man was buried. In that moment, he couldn't think about people that loved that man, who were children and grandchildren and nieces and nephews and spouses. That was the President of the United States's reaction. And then we're surprised when people who don't like this president decide, you know, they're going to fight fire with fire. It should be an earthquake in American politics, and it's barely a tremor. So why does that moment matter? Not because

it's shocking, but because it's not shocking. Nobody's batted an eye at it. It just simply got absorbed, filed away, added to the pile of incendiary rhetoric that we've now decided is normal. And that was the tell. That was the normalization. And once you get there, this is how it works. It doesn't take a movement and it doesn't

take coordination. It just takes one broken person who may have their own problems and who may decide maybe their own sociopathic tendencies and their own narcissism they think somehow they can solve a problem, or they can be a hero. One unstable, angry person who looks around, seize the tone, seize the language, thinks that this is now more acceptable than ever, or that it's the only thing left in the arsenal to do, and then they decide to act

within it, within that environment. That's it, that's the mechanism. Now let's layer something else on the top of all this. The last decade has made a lot of people feel like they've lost control. These technological changes are fast. Our cultural changes are super fast. Right, Economically, culturally, socially, it feels we've all we feel less stable in all parts of our lives today. And then we have an information ecosystem that is exploitive, reinforces one idea over and over.

Someone else is responsible for the situation. Point the finger, don't look in the mirror. There's no such thing his personal responsibility anymore, no self reflection, right, you see it. Politicians refuse to take to take stock in their own behavior. They just point a finger. Political parties won't take stock in their own behavior. They point fingers or exploit for

political gain. Quote the system, right, and this is what the system looks like. And once you've believed that, the distance between blame and justification gets a lot smaller. And here's the part. A lot of people are going to miss or ignore the guy on Saturday Night right, and the left has to deal with this. And this wasn't caught, This wasn't somebody acting on Trump's behalf. His grievances ran in the other direction. But he chose to believe this

was the way out. He'd lost faith in the political system. It's not a contradiction, it's a confirmation that we have The environment has changed. American politics is now brutal, it's now violent, and this cold civil war is warming up. We should not want this environment to set in. It takes and there's only one president at a time. And now we've learned this doesn't stay directional. It gets adapted,

it gets mirrored, and it gets thrown back. And you know, I've been disappointed in watching the reactions from the left, which has been frankly similar to the reactions on the right. Just coming up with the evidence of why it is all Donald Trump's fault. And there's a strong case that he created the conditions for this moment. But it doesn't justify the behavior, and it doesn't justify amping up your rhetoric, and it doesn't justify any of the behavior with fighting. No,

all you're doing is accelerated your tape. It's a race to the bottom, and you're trying to win. Nobody wins a race to the bottom. Yeah, you can comfort yourself by saying Trump's reaping what he sewed, but it doesn't solve the problem. You and I aren't any safer with that attitude. The question is what are you doing to change this. I'm sorry that most people don't think Michelle Obama was right. I don't even know if Michelle Obama believes she was right that when a political opponent goes low,

you go high. Because the minute you start rationalizing your violence,

well they started it even rhetorically, you've crossed the same line. You're no longer arguing about politics. You're justifying outcomes, different side, same logic. And that's what this environment is produced. That's why, unfortunately, we don't have a president that can deal with this moment and take it head on, because it would take self reflection. He doesn't have it. It would take an admission that he was a big contributor to what's to

this broken environment that we're living in. But I don't like. But at the same time, those on the left should take no comfort that he started. It doesn't justify the actions or the behavior. So what would leadership Would a good leadership moment look like right now? Well, it certainly would sound different. You'd hear a president acknowledging the moment, not spin it, not assign blame, just simply acknowledging it.

You'd hear something like, we've all contributed to this own here, we need to say it back, we need to lower it, and I need to do a better job myself. How do you know some of you are probably laughing if Trump would ever admit anything. I'm just telling you what it would look like if we were modeling this moment correctly, you'd at least see an effort, a small one, to create space to try to interrupt this cycle. That's what leadership in this moment would look like. That's not what

we have. And now we have leadership on the Democratic side who's like, screw them, let's go. We don't have the president we need right now to get through this moment, and we're not going to get what we need from this White House. So instead, what we're going to get as finger pointing, one sided explanations and political framing of this moment. There'll be no acknowledgment of how we got here, and without that, there's no way to actually deal with

this moment. So we're going to end up moving on, not because we should, but because we can't get out of it. Right we don't have the people at the table. The voters are going to have to give us new leaders to see if they can get the country unstuck here.

And look, we might hear a lot about security, more barriers, more distance. Boy, is that that's not the issue. And if anything, ratcheting up security only makes this worse. You want to create more barriers between the elected officials, the powerful, and the actual rank and file people. That's not a free society anymore. Security is not the problem. Fact, security worked here can't secure your way out of a culture.

This is not about just going into a bunker or finding a ballroom on grounds that are impossible to get on unless you've given biometric issues. So right now we

don't have the leadership that's interested in reversing this. We are escalating. We believe that you can't show weakness, and because there's this fear of ever showing weakness politically, we now default to confrontation. And the problem is that confrontation is only going to make us less safe. We're less stable. So it's a lament. I'm not going to be labor this anymore. I am going to do my best to canntinue to highlight why we have You know, we've this

is a This is a collective failure of American leadership. Donald Trump's on top, but he's not alone. Get to the ballot box and realize that character matters, that morality matters, that temperament matters. Policy goals matter too, But how do you want to achieve those goals? How do you plan to achieve those goals? Persuasion or coercion. It's a big difference. One is something you do in a democracy, the other

is something you do in an authoritarian regime. It's the decision we have to be and we have to make. Speaking of pouring fuel on this fire. As I was putting this monologue together, we got news that at federal grand jury North Carolina, somebody went shopping for a grand jury and dieted former FBI director Jim Comey the Justice Departments to attempt to criminally charge the former FBI director

that President Trump fired. The charges are not immediately clear, but apparently the case stems from a photograph that James Comy posted online last year showing seashells on a beach

that were arranged to write out the numbers eighty six and forty seven, with forty seven supposedly being representative of the president in eighty six meaning banning or removing someone, or slang for killing someone. So you can see exactly what the Trump administration is up to. They are taking they are trying to weaponize this moment to prove that all of this is on the backs of Trump critics and that somehow they have clean hands and they have

nothing to do with amping up this rhetoric. The amount of exploitive ways the president has ordered his government to harass the Komi family, including his daughter, who had a job in the federal government, and she's now in the middle of a lawsuit about her firing. Look, I'm not going to sit here and justify Komy doing what he did. It was stupid, and I think a lot of Komy's actions while he was FBI director, were just horrendous. He had the disease of eye alone can fix it disease, right,

But the First Amendments, the first Amendment, and unless this government can prove that this is connected to anything, was an instigated Actually somehow somebody took it as an order. I don't know where this case is going, if this has anything remotely to do with that, with that social media post, but that is pouring fuel on this fire. That is not an administration interesting in turning down the temperature.

And this is my fear of Democrats get into office and win a majority in the House and the Senate and immediately go for impeachment. We are just going to be in a cycle and a race to the body. I know the elected officials I'm looking for. I'm looking for people that are going to turn the page, that want to restore honesty and credibility and trust into government and they show a little bit of humility and character

and morality while in office. That might be too much to ask for in our politicians, huh, But if this is what we ask for in our friends, this is

what we ask for and how we raise our kids, and you know what it should be what we ask for and what kind of representatives that we have in this country. Character is destiny. It's a cliche for a reason because it's amazing how often it turns out to be true. By the way, one final point, I'm the Jimmy Kimmel's stuff. Jimmy Kimmel should apologize. Do I think the government should be going after him like this? Of course not. He's got First Amendment rights. But the joke

in hindsight after the events on Saturday, looks terrible. So say it, Admit it. It's okay. You can say I was not intended for what it got interpreted as, which means you've got to write a better punchline or you got to write a better joke. I'm not sitting here defending the behavior of this government or the president in targeting Kimmel. But see, this is sort of the problem, right, Everything is about you got to pick a side, or you're on Jimmy Kimmel's side or you're not on his side.

I'm on Jimmy Kimmel's side. I'm on the side of free speech. But if I said that and then that

event happened and somebody got mad, I'd have apologized because I'd have felt like shit because it wasn't what he I do believe it was not what he intended, but I'm not here to explain him. I just think that again, it goes back to are you going to be a de escalator or do you want to be an accelerant in this moment. It's pretty simple decision people have to make.

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wildgrain dot com slash podcast to start your subscription today. That's thirty dollars off your first box and free croissants for life when you visit wildgrain dot com slash podcast, or simply use the promo code podcast at checkout. This is a sponsor I absolutely embrace, so use that code. A few other things. I really want to highlight an interview I did for Newsphere with a long time intelligence

analyst from in US government, Beth Saner. She's now out of government, but one of her last jobs was being basically the only effective daily briefer to the president in the first term. To President Trump, she built a rapport with him where he at least started to accept some intelligence. I urge you to watch the interview in WHULL. I hope some of you have subscribed a newsphere. I'm just

telling you it's really it's a high end news product and if you really really want not just reporting, but really smart analysis, looking around the corner type of stuff, newsphere is the place for you. But I want to share a little bit because look, we're in the middle around. We just hit a new high end gas price. This is not getting resolved tomorrow. And the impact on our economy,

I mean it is. You know, there's been this sort of like stick the markets have been sticking their head in the sand, very hopeful, almost like on some sort of AI high if you will, right. But I can tell you the way consumers are going to feel. Consumers are going to hate this economy, and they already hate this economy. But I just want to sum up a

few things. My conversation with best Sayer, I would call was very sobering, and she kept returning to one basic point in our thirty minute sit down that the US may be measuring this war one way, bomb damage, destroyed ships,

degraded assets, but Iran is measuring it another way. Entirely, as Sanner put it, Iran's measuring stick is regime survival. Something I've been emphasizing here that the problem we have is what does our victory look like and what does their victory look like? Right now? Their victory simply surviving gives them leverage, and that means we may be winning tactically while still moving farther away from what was supposed

to be a strategic solution. So her argument is that we've fallen into a very familiar American pattern assuming military superiority can solve a political problem. She compared it to Vietnam to Iraq to Afghanistan, moments when we misunderstood the culture,

the leadership, the decision making, and the resilience of the adversary. I mean, how many times do we have to wash rents and repeat? Apparently we had to do it again. And one of her sharpest lines in this interview was we're fighting the Iranians in time, right, that's the warning. We're focused on what we can destroy and they're focused on what they can survive. And that brings us to

the Strait of hormones. Sander said, the strait is now the immediate crisis, not because the nuclear she has gone away, but because this is the thing that can blow up the global economy right now. I love this line she gave me. She said, the strait is an emergency, which is the alligator closest to the boat. Yes, and our

nuclear armed iron is bad. You know what's the worst thing right now? And a rhine in control of the Strait of hormones. It's the alligator closest to the boat. You can't get to the other one until you deal with this one. That's the frame. The nuclear program is still the long term strategic threat, but the strait is the crisis sitting in front of us. Shipping, insurance, energy prices, allies, China, Russia, all of it, all of it choked off at this

choke point. And Sander's broader critique is that we are not sequencing our power very well. We actually sequenced our power really well in Venezuela. She used Venezuela as a net positive comparison. Right, we had diplomacy, we had information, military, force, economics. These are all the tools that she outlined that are supposed to work together, but you need to do them in a certain order. And instead she's arguing we're relying too heavily on the military hammer and then wondering why

the diplomatic door is hard to to reopen. And she made this chilling observation, the Iranians understand us better than we understand them. That does seem like a scary proposition. They see the threats, they see the pauses right, they're paying attention, they see the extensions of the ceasefire, and every time we threaten something and don't do it, they read that as proof that they're winning. The bottom line from Santa is this, you can have overwhelming military success

and still not have an endgame, or she put it, you can have overwhelming conventional military success and still be no closer to a solution. Welcome to the Iran that we have in front of us right now. That's the warning. This doesn't end with a bomb damage assessment. It's going to end with diplomacy and right now. The question is not just whether Iran comes back to the table. It's whether we know who exactly we're supposed to be negotiating with and whether we know how to get to an endgame.

All right, let me get through a few political questions that I know you guys are interested in. Let's start with the Florida remap here, and it is, like I said at the top, this is a map that if you're Republicans, you would have loved to run on in twenty four, and you may like to run on it in twenty eight, especially if Marco Rubio's on the ticket. It basically dilutes some Republican some big Republican congressional districts in central Florida, both near Tampa Bay and near Orlando,

and makes them a little bit more competitive. Ditto in South Florida. And that all makes sense in a presidential year. The problem with this map for Republicans is it's made. It has now put more seats in play for Republicans. It now means they have to spend more money than ever. Yes, they can claim Democrats have to spend a bunch of money because the Democratic seats they have to fight for and then they have to see if they can win a couple of others. So let me give you a

few little highlights for those of you that are familiar. Basically, it didn't make any changes in the northern part of the state. It really is sort of Tampa Bay, Orlando, and the Miami mostly the Miami for Lauderdale market, a little bit of Palm Beach. So let's start with Jared Moscowitz W Washerman Sultz. This is Districts twenty three and twenty five. This is parts of so Moscow. It's basically used.

It's been the congressman for Parkland, right, and so it's both I think, a little bit of Palm Beach and a little bit of Broward County and W. Washerman Soults, who used to be almost all exclusively browd County. It's gotten more Miami, so there's less now a Broward County base in District twenty three, which was Moscowitz, and that puts them in danger. Meanwhile, you've got W. Washerman Soultz's twenty fifth district now essentially is a coastal seat and

now is Delray Beach to Miami Beach. So it's both heavily Latino and really wealthy. You know, she's if she were not pro Israel, I'd say she'd have a hard time holding that seat. But she can hold the seat. It may be a swing district now, and she's not running swing districts very often, and that's something that might be different, you know, to me. You know, there's certain members of Congress. When you're always in a swing district, you're sort of you have muscle memory for it, you develop.

It's like anything when you have one workout routine. If you do the same thing over and over again, that's what I do. Unfortunately, I don't diversify my workouts. I'm you know, I sort of I'm really I'm really good at handling treadmill running. I'm really bad at handling anything else. So, you know, I think what's new for w Wasserman Chols is going to be being in a swing district mindset.

But she's kind of I've noticed she has lowered her national profile a bit and gone more I think frankly in response to I mean, her district has been getting a little bit more competitive over time. Meanwhile, the twenty second district, this is lowis Francle, this was mostly Palm Beach. Well,

it now is shifting parlis and balances across both Palm Beach and Broward in central Florida. The ninth district, this is Darren Soto. This one gets dramatically. This one essentially gets erased. It's moved from a majority Latino seat to a plurality white one. And if you just look at the data, goes from a plus three point five Harris

district to a plus eighteen Trump district. Meanwhile, Kathy Casters seat in Tampa Bay fourteenth district, it's been we've drawn to be much more competitive, and it shifts to a narrow plus three Republican edge. The point is that Castor has been targeted, but this is not an automatic loss here. Meanwhile, there's been some huge fallout, right. So Daniel Webster, longtime member of Congress in Florida, he'd been one of the louder voices saying don't do this. He walked. He's like,

I'm not defending this new seat. Here's what happened to his seat. The seat is no. He had a R plus twenty fortress. The new lines moved parts. He had the villages in his district, so it took the deep red villages and put them into some adjacent districts, and it's just turned what was a very Republican district into

essentially a lean R And I think they just assumed Daniel Webster, who's been everybody, Yes, he could hold it, but he doesn't want to hold it. And as an open seat midterm year, this is the first district created that could start to get us into dummy mandar territory. And then to make Castor work, they had to pull

Republican voters from neighboring thirteen and fifteen districts. Well, the thirteenth is represented by Anna Paulina Luna, who was already in a fairly competitive district as it is, and she is somebody who's always been seen as a little bit too conservative for the district she's represented. Well, now what is it Now? She's even more you know, so she might not be the right person to hold that for the Republicans. So that seat arguably now has become more vulnerable.

And then in South Florida, in order to do this this sort of cracking and packing of they did that they to spread out the Broward County voters a little bit so that they didn't all get consolidated. They had to move some reliably Republican voters into these more competitive districts. What it is left is, it's left both Mario Diaz Billard and Carlos Sementez with more diverse and less predictable

red electorates in Dade County. And it wasn't that long ago that both of those districts had plenty of Democratic

voteds Miami. Dade County is a swing county. It's still a swing county. Yes, a lot of Republican money has moved to Miami, a lot of major private equity firms have moved to my All of that is true. But all the people they bring are they're bringing, They're not necessarily bringing Republican voters. And it is not clear that the Latino vote is going to be as Republican in twenty six as it was in twenty four. And if it is not, then suddenly these two districts are in play.

And Maria Salazar was already in play, although that got configured a bit too so bottom line, I know I went through it individually. Bottom Line, this will be a

good map for Republicans in twenty eight, but they may this basically may not pick up four, probably is maybe it picks up one or two, could be break even. But it has done this. It's made Florida. It's actually this is what it did is that Florida was not going to be home to many swing districts, and now it is. Now there's going to be more money spent. Right Virginia created a situation where there's much fewer swing districts, much less money will be pouring in from either party.

This new Florida map actually increases the need for campaign spending. You'll see there's a bit more competition. And then we've already seen that both the governor's race and the Senate race aren't cakewalks for the Republicans. So it's Florida battle around state again. I'm not quite ready to go that far, but it is more competitive and might have as many house seats in play, certainly more house seats in play, or maybe as many a house season play as a

state larger than it than Texas. A few other nuggets just to share with you. One interesting new Democratic poll out of Texas that shows tall Rico within a high single digit lead over Paxton and a low single digit lead over Cornyn. That's not surprising. I think what's surprising that there is still a lead over Cornan. I think the real question is if Cornyn wins this runoff, is this still a competitive race? Now? The problem that Tallarrica's going to have is that I think if Cornan wins

a runoff, they'll be less national. There'll be less money coming from the Senate packs because there'll be a belief that it and we know John Thune's going to be more willing to spend more money than ever. Now, Look, do I think no matter who the Republican nominee, there's going to be a ton of money poured into Texas. I do, But there'll be more if it's Corny than

if it's Paxton. So that's a note there. And I still you know, you still see all the and I'm going to get to this in my top five list, but you're still going to see You're still going to see Paxton still seems to have the advantage of the runoff. Susan Collins deciding to go negative on Graham platter before the primary. If you're Jana Mills, this is exactly what

you were hoping for. But it might but there's another way to look at this, The fact that the Colins superPAC has decided to engage Platiner now rather than after the primary sort of gets there was this growing conventional wisdom that if Collins could choose, she'd rather face Platiner than Mills. Well, guess what the super pac has decided. No, no, no, no, no. They want to kill Platiner. Now they want to face Mills. And you know what, I think the Collins people are right,

and I think we've been watching this race together. You've probably seen me evolve on this a little bit myself. I was a little skeptical, and now I see the strength of Platiner, don't get me wrong. And so it's interesting now you see the Colins super pack essentially deciding, oh no, we much rather face Janet Mills. Look, she's just not a good candidate. Doesn't mean she might now make a great senator. She's just not a good candidate,

whether a primary candidate or general electric candidate. It's been exposed in the primary by Platner, who's a very good political athlete, and now the Collins people see it in their numbers. Right, This just reinforces what we've all been seeing in these public polls. Platner's a strong is in a strong position at the moment to win this senencee. Collins would much prefer to face an opponent who also

is an incumbent politician. Pretty logical to me. All right, let's sneak at a break when we come back my conversation with a Tim O'Mara. Like I said, she's a Democratic strategist, but also look, she's written this great book called The Instigators about the history of sort of and power of black women in politics. So you know, whether she wants to be known as an historian or not, she now is as well when you go down this road.

So I think you'll enjoy the conversation, especially if you're truly trying to understand what the future of the Democratic Party and the Democratic Coalition is going to look like. All right, let's take a break. This episode of the Check podcast is brought to you by Soul. So if you love that end of the day unwined but hate

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and use the word podcast. That's getsol dot com promo code podcast for thirty percent off. And yes, I too,

am a customer. So joining me now is a first time author. The book is called The Instigators, And as you can see the author here Atima O'Mara, she's even she's got merch. I love it like you know, you got a shirt with it there. I mean, you are extraordinarily well prepared. What this book is about. It's essentially about the role that black women in particular have played and are playing right now in American politics, and the influential role that younger Black women are playing these days

in American politics. So this book is part analysis because she's in the advocacy space, political strategy space, but also historical because this is not a new thing. Black women in many ways have carried the banner for civil rights and for voting rights and for just rights in general. Teama joins me now, team, Welcome to the podcast.

swing between two sides. Actually, most swing voters swing between voting and not voting as much as they swing actually between the two parties. Not saying that there aren't some voters that do this and they become incredibly decisive when the margins are super thin. But is that a fair is that? Is that a fair marker here? That it was one of the big MythBusters you wanted to do, was that?

of his as well as advocates who were like, all right, if you want to stay in political power, we are going to make you put in the work for it. So you had organizers like Chelsea Higgs Wise who had started ah, you know, marijuana advocacy organization that was grassroots to push for the legalization, Like, forget the criminalization, We're just going to go the full legalization and organizing people around that young you know, black single mother.

then and unable to be seen as the as the alternative. Uh, if there was a if, if Northam decided to resign in the in this case, was it easier to get leverage on him or was it actually harder when it when he felt quote politically safer because his LG had separate political issues that made him a fraud potential replacement governor, It.

if you won't stay, we're gonna make it work for it, and how a lot of those policies, and you know, he made himself very amenable to that because I think he realized, certainly.

And there's so much pressure these days, frankly not to be seen as working with somebody who maybe was against your interests six months ago, six years ago, you know the you know what always invited, what always made to me what the most inviting thing of our democracy in general is that even at its founding, it was intended to be a negotiation, right that it was always a negotiation.

So if we if you think of politics as a negotiation, it means you're going to actually make some common cause with people you don't normally agree with, because it's a quote negotiation. And yet I feel like that art has been lost in modern politics, more so in the democratic side of the eye. I am I being a little overly critical here, not.

in being buddies with these folks.

that this made the most sense. So I'm one of those people where it's like I understand the point of coalitions, where it's like, all right, let's just be in the room on this one point and win, so that we can at least have a conversation.

from the twenty twenty four Action Report point.

Lots of stories from black staffers who were trying to renegade, just figure out how to do operational work on the ground in communities that we needed to vote, as well as you know, black consultants who weren't sort of getting the resources they needed and black led, brown led organizations to turn out their communities that they got in twenty twenty by comparison.

New Jersey to me or the probably the best examples, but this was across the board, right, It just felt like that there was somewhere, you know, I do think I go back to what I believe more so today than I even believed a decade ago, which is that swing voters are those that swing between voting and not voting, which means it is a mobilization tool, But it doesn't mean you don't have persuasion. Right, Yeah, And this is why I hate saying, you know, and I did it

to you, right, I said Pick one was a mobilization persuasion. Well, the fact of the matter is you couldn't persuade those who normally are with you to go vote. So guess what, you had a mobilization problem that was also a persuasion problem.

Gore didn't win, Kamala Harris didn't win. It's hard to succeed a president who is unpopular for one reason or the other, either personally or professionally, and my goodness, look how close she came, and yet and yet he was holding it right. So I still at the end of the day put this on Biden that we could sit here and nitpick all we want. If Biden had been a more popular president, Kamala Harris would be president.

between his popularity and then the operation that was handed to her that set her up for.

Is it Michigan? Yeah, it's Michigan. Right, four Senate seats Joe Biden would have lost. Joe Biden been the nominee, he'd lost all four of those Senate seats go down. I'm pretty convinced to that because he probably has something. He's probably performs two or three points lower than she does.

and that's not the same. I think that that's always the biggest mistake most amateur analysts make with black voters, but walk me through sort of the ideological spectrum of black women and what works and what ideological arguments don't.

Like why do some progressives have such a hard time convincing black voters to support them?

not talking about the environment. What's happening right now in this country around you know, data center organizing, like anti data center organizing, and not really realizing it's very much of an environmental justice issue. And you know that we

have a great opportunity because it's like a multi racial now sort of organizing. It's happening in some of the redist areas to some of the more blue areas against this this sort of pushing of corporate stuff, but not really kind of capturing a lot of that energy or understanding or proposing policies that really take into account the experiences of what it means to be black or brown in the US.

lot of that. We don't even see you trying to put together piecemeal reform in the direction of.

if we don't, we're seeing a whole slew of voter suppression bill is going to come, which they did. And so I think it's that that's like, Okay, you're asking us to trust where there isn't something, and officials are like, I need you to trust that we're going to do the right thing. And it's like got to be a little goob and take in that relationship.

governor becoming president. It is probably that level of patience. Right, Obama had more patience for the process then maybe I remember a lot of people thought that he should. Biden had a lot more patients for the process, because you know, they've been on the other side. You know, even if briefly they you know, they're too personally friendly with those But what would that have looked like? And what if the whole thing had blown up and you wouldn't have

gotten anything? And perhaps you just think, you know what, No, they would have you know, a little hardball wouldn't have hurt them.

that he was the father of one of our evangelical leaders, Pat Robertson. I believe I think it was his father, right, yes, yes, yeah, And so he was like, absolutely, I am not meeting with her. I am not voting for this thing. The Jenet was like, Okay, that's how you want to play ball. Found a primary opponent, groomed him and did an operation to essentially take.

there's some things to learn from him. You know, he's won twice. Don't don't think he doesn't know what he's doing here. That doesn't mean you have to emulate him, but there is tactics you can learn from him, just like you would learn from your enemy in a war. Oh wow, that was pretty smart. Well you got to try that, you know, when it comes to drones or whatever.

was through very much not on the dogged persistence of activists. But then you know, when it came leg slatively, these folks were like, all right, I'm going to make this happen.

being a tad cynical, but you know, how would you advise today's activist groups to get more leverage in the non campaign seasons.

politically engaged like you and I, you know, there is just more challenging.

pac this year future forward? Okay, we'll try that. Like it's just like redoing whatever they thought worked in twenty twelve, right the last time it all kind of came together, and it's just a consistent attempt to replicate twelve. And they're almost thinking that these you know, and there's been something missing here right in the off year. What did what did the right do? Well? They used crypto organize

young men and that had a bigger impact, and I think I expected it also wasn't just young white men, it was young men of color. Right. I think crypto has been you know, I think I've got a lot of skepticism about it. I got a lot of concerns about it. But politically it has been very effective for the right to woo young men under forty, regardless of race. Am I not wrong about that? No?

given a political argument. You realize it.

they'll they'll hint at something political, going well, we're not touching that because of this, And then I'm like, wait, where are they coming down? Like I don't maybe I don't want to know. I enjoy this too.

the last two sizes that sell. Well, that's essentially what we've done with our politics. We have two choices. You know, good luck if you want a different you know, the spybe got a different size. Good luck that. And I know, are we have a structural you know, there's no doubt the people have spoken about their dissatisfaction with the two parties. How do we know they're not registering in either one of them? It's a rejection, collective rejection. But we don't

have a way. This group of voters is begging for something different, but we don't know how to offer it. And I say we, meaning the collective, we left and right.

you know, all the way from local to national party politics and Democratic Party is that you know, in the entire time even that I've been involved in, Democratic Party has evolved in change. You couldn't talk about abortion at all, and people were like third rail.

it is now. For me, I found, you know, common cause of people who felt similar to me in what we were advocating for. You know, Working Families Party has become a good holding space for a lot of those

folks who are pretty frustrated you can vote a certain line and not have to run a Democratic party in New York. They're building power in other places. But I you know, say, hey, Working Families Party exists primarily to organize people who agree on some of these issues around a multiracial democracy, as you know, a stronger social safety and all of that.

you know. And if we had been a four party European sort of like the French, we would have had four finalists, you know, Bernie with the Greens, yeah, and Hillary Clinton with the you know labor, let's center labor, you know, and maybe Marco Rubio with the sort of center right party, and then the nationalists being Donald Trump right like, that would have been your European breakdown. And

who knows what that coalition would have looked like. It's possible Sanders and Trump would have bound together in a run off situation, you know, or Rubio or Clinton or maybe not right, it could have been based on the

cultural lines that are drawn. So it is. I do think Americans want that kind of flexibility in their politics. We just don't know how to deliver that system.

with the electoral.

electoral college issue goes away. And it doesn't mean it doesn't exist, It just goes away if you raise the numerator, right, like that's been And oh, by the way, if we have more members of Congress than you actually have more people with access to power, and you've opened the door, you've lowered the barrier to entry, and you may diversify in all sorts of ways what Congress looks like. You know that for some reason, that's an easy reform to

do without a constitutional amendment. And it's really hard to get people engaged in.

lot of a lot more folks as as they are realizing now you know everyday folks that it's not working well.

a winning Democratic coalition looks like in twenty twenty one.

came from somewhere else in the world. You know, you are likely to have okay, counter economic strubles. You're likely to have been in debt. You know these are people, you know, Ayana Presley says, the people who are closest to the pain should be closest to the power. And those are the definitely the folks who should be at the table. I mean one thing, even just to go back to sort of the David pluffs and Carvill's Carvil who's long since been eating out on his time.

in Miami. I believe if I had started kindergarten eight years sooner, I'd have been in a segregated system, right, And you know that when that generation, as I like to say, ages out of voting, that's like a big structural like I don't I sometimes think we don't fully appreciate, you know, how young are. Multi ethnic and multi racial

democracy really is, right. It has only been around since nineteen sixty five, and there's you know, a third of American of the American electorate lived a in a free,

multi racial society. It didn't mean it didn't exist, but one that we actually recognized.

democratic side. I mean, I've got my skepticism about Ram, whether Ram can shed the establishment baggage of his previous eras and all that stuff, but he's right about this topic. And I think the shattering of the public education system actually brings us apart as a society as well, Like I think this is a polarization issue. It's not just bad for education outcomes, it's actually bad for the culture. If we don't have a shared public education.

I always say, we're you know, Miami had this reputation of being where the city of the future, meaning you know, tomorrow's problems are happening right now in Miami, and then we solved. We went through all this in the eighties, right then. And yet now it's you know, you don't have socioeconomically wealthy people and socioeconomically poor people in the same schools, and you don't it's not even a close call. That actually was a reality in the eighties.

but it's very much affected by the seg The.

around it, which most black people have. And there's a chunk of white strategists to have, but they're not the one sort of of of leading that work, and then you're going to have some tone deaf responses like I remember as reclined at some point after you know, Kirk was murdered, where he said, you know, what is it like, what would it be if we like went into a church and argued about abortion rights and folks from like in the South and the Midwest are like, we'd be dead, Like,

we don't, that's not how we organize here around that. So, yeah, that lack of understanding when we have people who are polsters and strategists, and.

you can find Confederate flags and other parts of the world.

on that. You know, though, it's interesting you say that. I always thought that Barack Obama's superpower as a political victor was being from Illinois. You know, when you looked at the just the simple power of the states you know that were that touched Illinois were all important moments for him in the primary. First of all, there was Iowa Indiana late in the process, a statey loss, but almost one Missouri on Super Tuesday, one that he eked out.

It was important to eke one out against her and the power in general, and he did really well and basically anything that was touched in Illinois. But you know, because there's this assumption to does the swing vote is the swing area of America still the Midwest? Or you know, is that the last time the Midwest sort of was the swing area and just everything is down south? Now?

that Mason Dixon line keeps moving, you know, right, Yeah.

bad poll number on a Wednesday night. You know, just special eating, you know, because there's just all sorts of noise because and it's like, just because people go to their church on Wednesday nights doesn't mean they're religious fervor it might just simply be that's what the community does to get together on a Wednesday.

up living around the world, had lived in a multiracial place like Hawaii. He kind of really early on understood how to talk to everyone. That was his talent.

Unlike a lot of other folks he was you know, I think, yeah, other folks he was in the primary with at that time.

giant field of about forty mentionables these days. Who give me a quartet where you think, yeah, the VP or P is going to come out of this?

I know they hate when people like me put them on the couch. I will go to my grave believing that she's yet to run a campaign that was her campaign, yet that she's always been running somebody else's race or somebody else's, you know, suggestion. I found her primary campaign to be this attempt to be all things to all people. She was trying to straddle write the Medicare for All mindset sort of told you everything you needed to know. She was trying to be all things. To all parts

of the party. It felt very consultant driven her twenty sixteen race per Senate with Holp, consultant driven her twenty ten campaign. You know, so she's always had I think, and so my guess is you're right, we will see a different version of her. And I'm very curious what it is. Yeah, Sam, very curious what it is. So that's three Pritzker awesof and common don't think I didn't keep count.

the instigator. Do you when do you think this translates to more black women getting elected on their own right statewide?

Although I think we're finally starting to see that breakthrough.

that clever. This is why I'm like, they're terrible at this, Like they could be much smarter about their policy. Like you want to drive a wedge. Yeah, offer offer to give Arlington back in exchange for statehood? You want state? Hup, you got to take Arlington?

it's definitely I think a book a book worth getting to understand just how big the importance is in a primary particularly. But I found what I found really fascinating when Atimo was making the case is sort of, do Democratic strategists who aren't from the South just not get it right? Let's just say there might be something to that, right too many I could tell you this, if I were running for national politics, I wouldn't hire anybody that lived in New York or DC. Right, you want people

that are grounded somewhere else. I think you know it just is, you know, certainly at least as one foot outside the coast. I certainly would be as far away from New York as I possibly could culturally in California, because I think right now for the Democratic Party, the coasts coastal connections are sort of radioactive. All right, let's go with the top five list.

We just haven't fully realized it yet. Sometimes you have to go back, you have to go forwards, and then you'll go, oh, it turns out that he was a lame duck starting, you know, with the with the you know, it could could have begun all the way on tariff day, right. It was like with Joe Biden. You know, in the moment of the Afghanistan withdrawal, it you didn't realize, oh,

that's the beginning of the end of his presidency. Then the farther away we got from it, and the less unless he recovered from that moment, the more you're like, oh, hey, that turned out to be the beginning of the end of his presidency. Right. In some ways, that's when it began, right, And it is one of those things you sometimes it

takes takes a beat to look back. But I definitely think in this midterm cycle, especially with the way that Donald Trump has tried to exert a grip on the Republican Party, right is he took over he you know, at first it was hijacking, and now he's done a purge and this is his party. His endorsements usually lead

to victories. And that's what I'm framing my top five list around, which is the top five primaries where Trump is most vulnerable to seeing his choice lose and essentially which would then trigger the narrative that perhaps his grip on the party itself is loosening. And we know that that has all sorts of contagion effects, right, And there's no doubt you can probably guess what the number one race is going to be. But all of this begins

in the next couple of weeks. Okay, four of my five primary races are all in the month of May,

So we're going to find out in the month of May whether Trump's grip on the party is as strong as it has been over the last few cycles. So my top five races that will be to me are a measurement of his strength in the party and will be a essentially success. Right, Well, then the critics quiet down and his grip on the party. Titans failure and the grip starts to loosen. How many multiple failures and the whole thing could collapse. So number five on my

list is actually not a primary. It's the only non primary I've put on the list in his North Carolina Senate because Michael Wattley essentially got handed the nomination right

he was the de facto candidate after Laura Trump decided she didn't want to be a senator. But this was essentially Trump blessed. This was Trump's rn Sea chair, so you know, he walked. So this is somebody that Trump has groomed to be a party leader, essentially shifting him to the top spot at the RNC and now shifting him into the nomination slot for the open US sendency to replace Tom Tillis. And oh, by the way, he essentially chased Tom Tillis out of the party. Don't believe me.

Just look at Tom Tillis's behavior right now in the Senate. He ain't doing Trump's bidding. Look, losing to Roy Cooper is not a sign that Donald Trump has lost his fastball. Okay that I'm not going to sit there. But if Michael Wattley loses by double digits. Then this is proof that Trump really just absolutely made a gigantic mistake. Right, probably should have let if he didn't really have confidence in Watleys as a statewide candidate, well, let a primary happen.

In some ways, a competitive primary might have given new name id to somebody that's a rising up, might have been a member of Congress. But that is not how they wanted to handle things. So I do this race, and for me, the marker is double digits versus single digits. A double digit Roy Cooper victory really is an indictment on Trump's political acumen, right, and will be will cause all sort because this is a former R and C chair.

We'll cause all sorts of handwringing and blind quotes and all of this stuff saying, you know, this was crazy, what was even made the nominee? This is all Trump? Right, So he is just large ownership of the North Carolina center race, more so than Maine, more so than really any other competitive center race. Right, this is his creation. Right, He bullied the till Us out of the party, he put his person in there, He cleared the primary field, right, so there is no Senate race. He in some ways

owns more than this one. So that's number five of them, list number four. It's another center race Louisiana Senate. Now we've got the primary on the sixteenth of May, and then there's likely to be a run off because we've got a three way competitive race, and with of course

Bill Cassidy the incumbent, Julia Letlowe congresswoman, and then John Fleming, who's been in this race before. So it's a three way race. They've all got reasonable money and there's going to be two that make it through. If Cassidy's one of the two, you know, Cassidy is a puncher's chance in this thing. Now, look, they've rigged the rules in Louisiana to try to punish Cassidy. Right, this is the

first time they're ever doing a cartisan primary. That Louisiana used to be an all party primary, one ballot and then there was sort of a runoff situation. Frankly, it's actually a model that I wish more states would have adopted. And so it's a shame to see this go the other way. But we know why it went the other way. Cassidy voted to convict Donald Trump after the second impeachment and this was they knew that in the old system

Cassidy would survive. How do we know this, Well, there's still two impeachers in the House, Dan Newhouse in Washington State and David Valade. And what do they both have in common? They are in all party primaries. They did not have a partisan primary that they had to get through. Anybody that had to get through a partisan primary lost. So look, I am I certainly think Cassidy's the underdog here. I think he'll get into the runoff. I assume he loses,

But what a repudiation to Trump. If he doesn't. It's a big win for Trump. If Cassidy doesn't even make the runoff, it's a small win for Trump. If he knocks him off in the runoff, it's a humiliation. If Cassidy wins renomination Texas Senate. This is number three on the list. Look, even though Trump is supposedly not endorsed,

it's pretty clear Paxton's Maga Cornin is not right. So Trump is. You know. My guess is if he the fact that he hasn't endorsed now means he's probably not going to because he's afraid. I think of this one because it's not clear. I don't know, you know, I don't think he has the standing with the party anymore that endorsing Cornan would put automatically put him over the top. Put it this way, he's afraid to find out, and the lack of him not wanting to get involved in

this race says more about his own fear of exposing himself. Right, does the Emperor have clothes on or not moment than anything else. So you know, he'll take credit for a corn and win if Cornin somehow gets out of this runoff. By the way, this runoffs May twenty six, end of the month, right after Memorial Day, so likely to be low turnout, usually not a good sign for the for the for the more center right candidate or center left candidate,

you know, always usually an advantage for the base. But this is one that I think, you know, Cornyn surviving this is a repudiation Omega, and that in it indirectly is a repudiation a Trump or a loosening of the grip. Next time, this is Georgia governor, and this is going to be an interesting test. So Trump's already endorsed in Georgia Governor. He endorsed the Lieutenant Governor Burt Jones, and

he's endorsed him from the beginning. And Burt Jones has been somebody that has flirted with some of these conspiracies.

He's been on the MAGA train from the beginning, very much like Paxton in Texas well. A new candidate jump in this race, sort of a former healthcare executive named Rick Jackson. Got a terrific personal story that really I think resonates with people. He's essentially a foster kid that built his own life after that and he's been incredibly charitable with Foster organization. So he's just he's got a he doesn't have the usual political narrative for a biography.

I think it's quite syllable, and I think him is you know, you know, if you're gonna ask me, I think Brick Jackson's the favorite to be the next governor,

let alone the primary winner. Now. Rick Jackson, in some ways he's been He jumped in this race, and he proclaimed himself, you know, very much a Trumper, basically trying to trying to trying to triangulate a little bit and sort of either forced Trump to duel endorse like he's done in the past when he sees somebody playing up to him or in some ways dare Trump to back

up his endorsement. And I think that's you know, if Trump doesn't come to Bert Jones's aid here because Rick Jackson is self funding, well, what's Trump raised all this money for? Right? Is he going to use his money to show to defend those that stood with him and

that you know, got in early or not. And if he doesn't come in and help Jones here, if this Maga super pac, I really think it does send this broader message and it's a bad look for the Trump movement that hey, it's a one way loyalty street and he's going to he will run away from you if you look like you're weak or losing, even if it's not on you. And you know, the idea that he is not a reliable ally, I know is going to

shock people. But you know, if Burt Jones wants to know what this feels like, he can go ask the Lensky what it feels like. Right. And the number one on the list that to me probably matters more than any of the other races on this list is the May nineteenth primary in Kentucky's fourth congressional district and Thomas Massey. A Thomas Massey victory, I think cements the narrative that Trump's Elaine Duck, his his his control of the party

is loosening and there's no going back from it, like it becomes just it is. It is probably the single most powerful narrative reaction of anything on this top five list. That's why it's number one for me on this list. I think this has the you know, he has repeatedly gone after Massey. This is one of the few races he's put his money where his mouth is. Massey has done his thing, and he's gone back, and he's certainly not been shy about trying to fight fire with fire

back on him. You know, past is if past is any guide here, Massy's gonna lose. But there is risk if Massy wins this, and he's pretty connected to this district and Kentucky Republicans tell you talk about a group of Republicans that just aren't cookie cutter, right, and there's none of them you can point to and say, well, they're you know, look at the Senate race, right, There's it's easier to make the case that they're non Maga than Maga there is this own sort of independent streak

that they have. McConnell is no Maga Republican for different reasons than Ran Paul is no Maga Republican for different reasons, and Tom is Massey, And then you could keep you got the Secretary of State, Michael Adams is a different type of Republican, but so is Daniel Cameron, and so is Andy Barr. I mean, it's just been you know, in some ways, I'm going to be culturally surprised if Massey loses, because it's not in the culture of Kentucky politics.

And at the same time, right history shows that when Trump really wants to weigh in on something and throws actual money behind that way, he can have some success. But if you're trying to keep track, when does lame duck status officially begin for Donald Trump? Thomas Massey victory on May nineteenth would cement the narrative that is that

he's fully in lame duck status. Ask Chuck, all right, let's do a little last chuck here. First question comes

from Doug and Shaker Heights, a wonderful community in Cleveland, and he goes new listener here, really appreciate the measured analysis on the show. I'm wondering if Ohio Democrats made it a strategic mistake by backing shared Brown again, given concerns about his age, branding and his association with the national party leadership. With nominating younger, newer candidates be a better way for Democrats to rebuild their image and compete more effectively in states like Ohio. Curious to hear you

take thank you, Doug and chicker Wright. So I think big picture your instinct. I could see where you're thinking, and I kind of tend to agree with it. And I'll be honest, I was surprised that Brown got into this race because do you realize and I bet I don't know if you do, And I don't know if

many Ohioans realize this. This is technically not the time for this seat to come up, but this is a special election to fill out the JD Vance's term that began in the twenty twenty two cycle, right, and John Houstad was the appointed successor. He was the lieutenant governor before that, the Secretary of State sort of really sort of a more of an Ohio Republican and anything on

the megaside of things. But this was DeWine's appointment and it's only for two years, and you're reward for winning this massive, expensive Senate race in twenty twenty six, is you got to run again in twenty twenty eight? And I just couldn't believe that Shared Brown was going to sign up after running in twenty twenty four. We know he already did this running in twenty twenty six and then running in twenty twenty eight. Is he really going to have run three straight Senate races? If he wins,

does he not run for reelection? And then if he doesn't run for reelection, who the hell are Democrat's going to find that can somehow hold a seat when it apparently is going to be proof that only only a Shared Brown can hold the seat. So yeah, it was a head scratcher to me on a number of levels. And I expect that Shared Brown I knew he wasn't done running like he just certain people his motor was still going right. The one office he never ran for

was governor. He's run for a lot of state wide offices. I think he was Secretary State at one time. I think he ran for another state white office. I mean, he and Mike de Wine have you know, and the one you know, he could have and there would have been some sort of poetic irony, you know, following Mike de Wine, because the one office Mike the Wine always that he had eluded him before finally winning in uh

back in twenty eighteen was governor. So I figured Shared Brown would run for governor because it's a four year term. Number one, I think it was an open seat, it was winnable. I think Ramaswami has proven to be two week a very weak Republican nominee, and maybe Amy Acton, who's going to be the likely Democratic nominee for governor, switches over to the center race. Now I don't you know. And and my concern about Shared Brown as the nominee

is that Houston. You know, normally what makes a midterm year advantageous for the out party is you get to run against incumbents, and I guess Shared Brown could run against Trump, and he's going to run against Republicans. But it's it's hard not for voters to see him as any anything but part of the establishment, just the Democratic establishment. So all your choices, do you want the Republican establishment

or do you want the democratic establishment? That's it. I don't know if there's a stronger Democrat that anybody that you could have found other than Chuck Schumer for the center race. I think governor's races are still winnable in Ohio. I don't know if center races are, but maybe Shared Brown's the one Democrat that can win. Maybe Tim Ryan could have you know, maybe there's somebody new or younger. Maybe there's a taller Rico out there. I've always sad,

you know, you know it is. I do believe Ohio is a light red state, not a dark red state. So the right type of Democrat can still win out there. You know, maybe maybe Greg Landsman from the Cincinnati area. Right. So let's just say I've I've gone at this one hundred ways from Sunday, I think from sixty thousand feet. I agree with your take on this that this is, but there's also an argument to be made who else could have done it in this environment for the cost

of this race. And when you look at the larger map that the Democrats were facing, this was you know, a tried and trude and proven voke get her in Ohio. Right, But there's a lot of and I've given you all the reasons why I'm surprised he said yes, and that to me is, to me still the biggest surprise because by saying yes, I think you've inadvertently signed that if you win, you've signed up for one more ride on twenty eight And my god, I know he used to

be a House member and you're used. But senators usually don't like to have to run every two years, and if he wins, his reward is to run again, literally in two years. Dean from Long Island rights with Donald Trump paying off wind companies to abandon offshore Win project, I we thank you for writing this in I have a piece of my monel that I put together that

was going to be on this, and then I just there's so many other things that piled on top of it. So I'm so glad this is a question. So thank you, Dean. But let me bears repeating with Donald Trump paying off win companies to abandon offshore win products, so you know, if that would be considered interference with contracts, could be allowing the States to sue the administration and keep the companies involved. Thanks Deem from Long Island. Look, I think

it's an interesting way to go. I think there could be lots of lawsuits on this, but I just this whole thing, you know. Again, it goes back to sort of what's wrong with our politics in general. Not everything is either or. Some things are ants, okay, and we need energy badly. Why are we ruling out parts of energy? Right? I think you know, weaning yourself off of any energy

is a bad idea at the moment. All of the above, but it's really foolish not to be thinking about alternative energy sources at a time when literally wars get started over access to energy. So this is just stupidity. This is bad policy, This is bad for the country long term, all because of a fetish about climate change. I mean this is literally like, well, I don't want to I don't want to do these wind farms because somehow it'll make us think we believe in climate change and we

will need to prove that renewables don't work. Why don't we want to prove that renewables don't work. All we're doing is handing more more power to China. Right. The war of choice against Iran has absolutely scared a whole bunch of smaller and middle sized countries who don't have their own energy access who rely on buying oil from the Strait from the Gulf, and it comes to the Strait of hormones, it go man. We got to find alternative sources. And it isn't all just finding alternative sources

for oil and gas. There's going to be a surge in interest in renewables. And guess what country they're going to go to for the supplies to tap into solar and to tap into wind. It ain't going to be the United States because this administration is gutting the entire industry. It's again, this is self inflicted. There's no part of this that makes any sense. And the amount of people that don't say this is nonsense. This is not about

climate change. This is about preparation by the freaking insurance policy. Sorry. I find the war against climate change to be just so asinine because at this point, who cares whether it's man made or not. The climate's changing. We have more wildfires happening, we have stronger hurricanes, we have coastal erosion. Why does it matter how it started? We should all be trying to mitigate it, and all be trying to

and there's no interest. Literally, this ideology on the right is to pretend it doesn't exist, that it's made up up. You want to disagree in the origin story, fine, but the results not made up. This is the world we're dealing with. The climate has changed. Do you want to fight over whether it was a hidden hand above or an actual person or an industry or entity? Sorry, I know I get a little rant about this. I just find this one of the dumber things. Where did we do?

I just you know, why wouldn't we want the insurance policy? Next question comes from Pete. What do you make of the what if scenario where Trump bought the Buffalo Bills in twenty fourteen? Could owning an NFL team have kept him from unning for president of twenty sixteen? And if so, how differently do you think that election in the broader political landscape since might have played out? Pete, that's a

good one. It is a what if. You know, when I did my original what if on twenty sixteen, I think I was riffing with Jonathan Martin. I worry this is on the old NBC feed. The their own They didn't get to own the name, but they owned my intellectual property there. But we went through all these various scenarios on that. Do I think if he were the owner of the Buffalo Bills he wouldn't have run president? Yes, I do, And I think the NFL would be something.

Put it that way, and you'd have, you know, the war between Jerry Jones, Bob Craft and Donald Trump, those three egos fighting each other for supremacy among owners, right, like, man, let's let's let's get that. Forget the TV series running point about you know, loosely about the Genie bus Lakers. Let's do that, right, Craft, Jones and Trump NFL owners, right, you know, the New Housewives of the NFL, but starring Jerry Jones, Donald Trump and there. So what would happen

in twenty sixteen? I will tell you so if Trump never runs, there's sort of two what ifs that I've entertained on this and they and I have to talk about them sequentially because this if there's no Bridge Gate, Chris Christie's the nominee in sixteen. Chris Christie's personality fit the moment, right, because Donald Trump proved that this is what kind of the country was looking for. It fit

the moment. But he'd have been a lot He's he probably wins big, not small, Christy versus Clinton, Christy probably gets fifty one to fifty two, fifty three percent of the vote, and Christy would have been challenged from the right by you know, by the Ted cruises of the world, would have been hit hard on judges, on abortion and some of these cultural issues that I think wouldn't have mattered because Christy was just a better debater and he

would have been, you know, without Donald Trump involved, Christy would have been the star of that show. All right, that that's one scenario. But bridge Gate did happen, and it was a different It was a you know, it's funny. It was sort of like a wounded version of Chris Christy in that primary, and we didn't get the best version of him it would have been, because I do think if Christy's in that race, Trump's just an endorser of Christy. He never jumps in because he doesn't think

he can be Christie. So that's sort of where one of my head. That's one of my what if scenarios. The second one if on this is so let's say bridge Gate happened, and so what you essentially have is is I think Rand Paul would have been a much bigger factor because Paul had the non traditional Republicans that were interested in something new. Now, the minute Trump got in,

it was like a vacuum cleaner on Paul's support. Right the first chunk that he took, first, lunch money he took was not Jeb Bush's lunch money, it was actually Ran Paul's lunch money. And so I think without Trump, Paul's a much bigger player Rand Paul. You know, there's a scenario where Ran Paul's nominee and Paul versus Clinton is very similar to Trump versus Clinton, except probably a

little less personal. And I think given what we saw with the with the vote and the desperation that there was among you know, there's sort of the obstinates that there was and the electing Hillary Clinton right, there definitely was a strong anti Clinton chunk of voters that just were put a low ceiling on her ability to gain votes. So I think Paul, so Christy, Paul, and then probably Ted Cruz. That's probably the order of likely nominee with

no Donald Trump and no Bridgegate. I think Christy with Bridgegate, I probably think the nominee is still Paul or Cruise. I don't think Rubio. I think we found out that Rubio was trying to straddle too much there. Now, maybe Rubio looks like a better candidate, but you know it's pot You know you could, you could if you want to argue with me, that maybe Rubio gets in there. Now, Rubio and no nominee probably wins by a bigger margin over Clinton too than Trump. I do think both Rubio

and Christy would have been stronger candidates than Trump. I think both Crews and Paul would have been kind of the exacts, very similar races where we're some sort of split decision. That was fun. Pete, all right, Next question comes from Ben s from Tona, Wanda, New York. One of my favorite undergrad courses I took at the University

of Rochester was titled the Mythology of the Founders. I remember writing my final paper on Congressman Raoul Labrador on behalf of the Tea Party advocating for the repeal of the seventeenth Amendment because it deviated too far from the Founding Father's intentions, for better or worse, Many Americans mythologize our founding documents and their authors, and I wanted to know how you might navigate that with some of the proposed constitutional members you have to discussed on the podcast

Go sabers ps. Did you have a favorite course from your college days? I did. I had all. I would say, you're gonna you know, it's gonna be a bit dorking out. I loved all my history classes. It didn't matter which is, you know, I had a general one. I had an

at least history that I took. Two different mid least history courses I took, but I always say this the two courses that I used the most in life, in my professional life, after I took an elective on the federal budget, which is the type of the type of

course that only at GW is going to offer. Right you're in DC, and it was taught by somebody that worked at OMB, and I just it was you know, it is certainly benefited me in my ability just simply learning how to read a federal budget right when you see how you look at it and things like that, and how it's done and how the math works. Right, the math isn't the rules of math for federal budgets

don't necessarily follow the general rules of bath. That was that was a big one for me as well, but as for your So, I I believe in founders intent, right, but that doesn't mean you don't modernize with founders intent. The seventeenth Amendment is an interesting debate. You know, in my class how Washington works that I briefly talked about here that I teach part time at USC for for the visiting students that have internships in DC. We just

did our final They just did their final prison. They just did their oral presentations on what their final paper is going to be on, and one of them is for And the whole is what's what's a you know, how would you try to make Washington work better? What's run reform you would do to make Washington work better?

And there's one gentleman who picked repealing the seventeenth Amendment and about how you know it would and one of the best of fits that he believed brought to it was that it would actually make state legislative elections more important, more people would look into that, more senators would be

more representative of their states, rather than an ideology. So it's an interesting argument on the seventeenth On the seventeenth Amendment, we know what the intent, but the intent of the Electoral College was to actually be a bit of a vetting mechanism in case the public went too far off out of the mainstream. And we've let the states essentially create what are likely unconstitutional faithless elector laws on that. But we've never tested the faithless elector issue in court

per se. But right now states just bound electors, and so they've kind of made the electoral college no longer a vetting issue. So I think I am a believer in Founder's intent, which means to me, if my amendment couldn't easily be defended by something already written in the federalist papers, then I might I might be willing no longer to defend that addition to the Constitution. And in staid,

just why don't you just codify this? Look, there's certain ideas that should just simply be codified into law by Congress. Like I don't think there should be a constitutional amendment for reproductive rights. I think that's something that should just simply be codified into law, why you know, And it's sort of a fear of doing it that now makes you think, well, I guess you got to do it

as a constitutional amendment. And it's perhaps if you make a better argument about equal protection that the equal protection argument on reproductive rights Trump's the original back and forth on Row and Dobbs anyway, but set that aside. But I'm sort of it. I take your point here. Like so, for instance, I think the nullification of a presidential pardon, the way it is framed, this constitutional amendment actually fits

the vision of the Founders, right. It uses the same logic of a supermajority that a that overwriting a veto would use it, doesn't you know. It's still it respects the idea that a president does have this power. It just offers a nullification by Congress if it's if Congress

deems it so. So I could argue that that, you know, But I think that I I where I generally agree with you is that proposed constitutional amendments that there should already be federalist papers written that already would defend the concept even if the amendment hadn't been proposed back then. And I could argue in some of these proposed amendments, whether it's on whether it's on money campaign money, I

think they're you know, whether it's on the election of judges. Right, there's there's certainly the Founders have made their made their They've told us what they meant based on the Federalist papers, so I'd sort of think that should be the guidepost, all right. Last question it comes from fred a. Hey.

I've been thinking about Thomas Jefferson's quote that the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants, and now it's often used to justify a more extreme interpretation of the Second Amendment parts of the country. That idea still resonates deeply, but I wonder if it's something we should be moving beyond as a modern democracy. How do you interpret that quote today's political context? Best regards freda A. Look, I

think that that you know, we didn't there wasn't many democracies and free societies that even existed when Jefferson said that quote, and there were a lot more authoritarian regimes we called the monarchies, but they were just that you know, you know my attitude on this. I think the monarchies are just a just a way to beautify the term dictator. And I do think that we you know, one of the things and the sort of fits hand in glove

with the last question. Actually, one of the things that we failed to do is understand, you know, what moment were they living in at the time. And that's why I would emphasize this, what moment was he living in at the time, Right, he was living in a moment where there was some where you had revolution brewing in France, and he certainly had been an ambassador there. He knew that there was right we had it brewing, and and

it already happened in the United States. So there was definitely we definitely had you know, you could you could feel it. I find it hard to believe that he thinks this would apply to our democracy that instead it applies if democracy you know that, you know, every once in a while, you got to fight for democracy. I think that's what it is. But there's no doubt that quote gets gets weaponized by those who rationalize or justify behavior that is that a mature democracy shouldn't be dealing

with right that with a steadier instead of leaders. But we're not in a stable place right now, and so what I think that quote really means is that you got to fight for democracy and freedom every once in a while, because notice it says the blood of patriots and tyrants. Right So, now where what may be subjective is one person's patriot is another person's tyrant. It just like I've always said, one person's patriot is another person's terrorist.

Right the British monarchy thought the American those that were revolting were terrorists. We call them patriots. So yeah, I sort of think that Jefferson is responding to the moment he was living in, and then it didn't apply to a mature, modern, two hundred and fifty year old democracy that we're supposedly celebrating this year. All Right, love the Q and A. You guys got made to pop off on the environment. I've been waiting to find a way to pop off on that, and I think even my

producer might split that out. You might see that part of the Q and A separated out. We rarely rarely do that with the ass Chuck segment, but to say you touched a nerve as an understating on that way. So with that, I'll see you twenty four hours