Two struggling out of work Democrat politicians. They're just looking for a job. That's all they want. They're just looking for something to do. This is the situation for Kamala Harris and Pete Bodhajid, as well as a little bit Alexandria Ocasio Cortez. So I'm going to talk about these three politicians today and they're sort of stuck political places where they seem to be. And I think I'm going to start with Kamala Harris.
So there are.
Several different stories coming out about Kamala Harrison.
What's she going to do?
Kamala Harris seems to be stuck with some indecision. She's not sure if she wants to run for governor of California in twenty twenty six or if she wants to run for president in twenty twenty eight.
She's unsure. I think you have to do either one or the other.
I don't think you can credibly run for governor and then immediately turn around and you know, you get sworn in and you know, I guess January of twenty twenty seven, and then you immediately say no, I'm trying to run for this office where I'll get sworn into something else in January twenty twenty nine. Doesn't seem credible. So she's she's got to kind of pick one or the other. So how would she do? Interesting little piece in National Review by Jim Garrity about this.
Now.
He also notes that there are similar sort of efforts and rumblings about Pete Bootajige that Pete Bootagige might run for governor of Michigan, at which I think is by the way, completely hilarious. So you know, I'll talk about Bootajidge and Kamala kind of to other here. I have a little bit more of a history with Pete Bodhagic because I used to be a resident of the city of South Bend, Indiana, where Pete was once the mayor.
He was seemingly an okay mayor. He was a huge abortion zelot, and he blocked efforts for zoning for sort of the useful zoning thing for a pro life pregnancy center in South Bend, which was ridiculous and obviously motivated motivated by his hyper abortion politics. But you know, it seemed like a whatever mayor of South Bend. For some reason, his job performance as mayor of South Bend vaulted him
to some kind of national prominence. I don't think he was a bad mayor of South Bend, but I just don't know that he was like the greatest mayor in the history of the United States of America. South Bend was growing and developing regardless of him. It was growing and developing because the University of Notre Dame was growing and developing, and more people and more investment were coming
around the university and more tax revenue. And you know, there's a gazillion new condos that have been built with a gazillion, you know, dollars worth of probably property tax revenue pouring in. That's all within the South Bend city limits. And I think the positive developments that have happened in South.
Bend would have happened with or without Pete bootajigch.
Nonetheless, boutajij was the mayor of South Bend, and everyone loved, oh, Mayor Pete. But the problem was he had no future. Indiana, while it did go for Obama in I believe at least in two thousand and eight, reverted back to its sort of more or less permanent Republican status. The local House of Representative seat where Boodhage was more or less situated,
became a fairly reliable Republican seat. Jackie Wiloorski, the late congresswoman, came to kind of dominate it, and Bootajig had no options for realistically winning the governor's seat in Indiana or a US Senate seat from Indiana. Indiana was just too Republican. It was electing guys like Mike Pence. So Bootajig very sneakily changed his place of residence from Indiana to Michigan. Now he was from South He was living in South Bend, which is, you know, like a ten minute drive away
from the Michigan border. But now Bootajig has positioned himself, Oh, okay, I could be a Michigan resident. And so he seems to be positioning himself to try to run for God of Michigan. But again, I think with Boodhajij he has to make this calculus. Do I want to run for president maybe in twenty twenty eight. Do I hold on to some sinecure between now and twenty twenty eight so that I can run for president against not Donald Trump, against jd Vance presumably. Now let's talk about Kamala if
Kamala decides to run for governor. There is reporting out there that some of the prominent people who are planning to run for governor might drop out. I don't think all of them will drop out, but some of them might. And I think it's a question of how much goodwill with the donor class Harris has been able to retain, because that's the fundamental truth about running for a statewide office in California. Do you have the goodwill of the
donor class. That's what determines who wins the Democrat nomination, the Democrat primary process in California, and that determines who will win. It's part and parcel of why I think Harris was not ready for primetime, why she was a bad presidential candidate both in twenty sixteen and in twenty twenty four. To win a statewide office in California, what you really need is the money to run television ads within the Los Angeles media market. That is kind of
the key thing. The LA media buys are crazy expensive, and so if you're well funded enough to do that, that helps you win a lot of the kinds of traditional things that you'd think of as like essential or a politician to win office, winning a debate, you know, having debate chops, interview chops, one on one chops. A lot of that stuff is not as important in California
for statewide office. I think people just kind of you know, a lot of California politicians tend not to get very many reps as a debater, and as a result, when they then get to primetime, like Kamala Harris, they don't look that great. They don't look that great in a lot of different kinds of situation, in interview situations and debates.
Et cetera.
Let's not forget how Kamala Harris got absolutely skewered in the twenty sixteen Democrat debate when she went up against Tulci Gabbard. So what you need to win is the goodwill of the donors, and Harris has always had that. Harris has always had the good will of the donors more so than anybody. She has been a creature of
the California donor class. She got introduced to that class by Willie Brown, who took her from the obscurity of being just another attorney in the Alameda County Prosecutor's office to all of a sudden, you know, big fancy job within the San Francisco DA's office and then running for DA of San Francisco and then Attorney General of California, and then Governor Willie Brown introduced her to that magic circle of San Francisco area donors as it's sometimes referred to,
and they were the ones who propelled her advance. I think people saw her after she won attorney general and people were already starting to think, is this the next Barack Obama? They thought, Okay, she's Attorney General of California.
Now could she become you.
Know, senator, you know, a US senator represent in California, you know, if Barbara Boxer steps down, and she was the anointed pick when that happened. The donor class liked her, knew her. I think she has the ability to be charming,
particularly in social situations. There's a lot of sort of reporting in history about her, the way that she was able to effectively work the social circles within the San Francisco glitterati class, and she rode those connections to getting nominated senator and getting the backing of those donors to win her attorney general, her state wide attorney general's race, and then to win her statewide US Senate race. I think this has always been my theory. I've never really
read much reporting on it. I to this to my dying day. I will believe that Joe Biden only picked her to be vice president because the donors forced her on him. The donors wanted her. Biden sort of painted himself into a corner by saying, our learned her practice the first black woman, so he was restricted to black women. And so what does he do well? He picks this person with whom he had never worked. He never worked with Kamala Harris. They didn't overlap at any point in
the Senate. She started in the Senate after he left as Vice president. She didn't work for the Obama administration. He had no track record of working for her, and in fact, he had ample reason to dislike her. And there's you know, been reporting, you know, whispers and rumors and stuff.
Nothing substantiated, no one on the.
Record that Joe Biden hated her guts because during one of the twenty sixteen debates, Harris basically tried to suggest that Biden was a racist because of his position on bussing policies, like suggested right to his face that he was a racist, so Jill never liked her. Biden has no reason to like her, no track record of working
for her, he says, a black woman. But there were other black females he could have picked, people like Susan Rice, who went on to play a very prominent role in the next Biden administration, sort of the quiet but extremely influential role. There were other black women he obviously could
have picked. And it was also a thing of like usually you figure, okay, you pick a vice president either because they can help deliver you a critically important swing state or because you think, you seriously think they would be very good at governance. And Harris was neither. She wasn't delivering an important swing state. Biden was never going to lose California, And clearly she wasn't very good at governance because Biden was clearly undermining her her entire time
as vice president. You know, as much as during the campaign we wanted to criticize Kamala Harris for her performance on the border, a really close examination would show how Biden, I think, in just my opinion, Biden really set her up such that there was no way she could have succeeded the ambit of what he gave her responsibility for. It sounded like she was totally in charge of the border, but actually the things she was even able to affect any change to were pretty darn limited and there was
no way she was going to fix anything. Now you can look, she was a member of his administration, supported his policies. I think she has to take the blame for the failures of the Biden administration on the border. But clearly Biden was not helped. He was not doing anything to cover her with glory. So I'll always put so, why did he pick her if he hated her before, hated her during, hated her after. I think it was because the donor class really wanted her and made him
take her. They probably said, hey, you're old. We want this person that we like and trust just in case anything happens, and he said, all right, that's the condition of you guys giving me a bunch of campaign money and then I'll do it. So does she still have that donor support? I mean, I gotta think that these not every single one of these donors from California is jumping at the opportunity. I mean, she lost an election where she outspent Donald Trump significantly. She ended her campaign
with twenty million dollars in debt. Her campaign probably had to hit up some of these California donors to pay off her campaign debt. You know, she was still sending campaign donation emails after the election was over. How bad do they want? So? Do they want to help her out now that she's sort of looking for this consolation prize of being governor of California. I also wonder, frankly, does she actually want to be governor?
This is the reality.
Being governor is a much more difficult job than being senator. You can tell Gavin Newsom is totally over it. He doesn't want to be working right now. Being governor requires, you know, traveling all up and down the state, overseeing emergency efforts when bad things happen, making decisions about stuff. I'm guessing Newsome, after you know, the two plus years of COVID, is probably so exhausted.
From being governor.
He's just completely checked out to his two years of managing COVID terribly. And I don't think Harris has given much evidence. You know, a lot of reporting kind of indicates that she doesn't. Really She was not always willing to actually do the reading and do the briefing and really study the issues, and not always seemed like she was really willing to work hard and go the extra mile does which he actually want to be governor. I think being a senator is a much more natural fit.
It's a much easier task being a senator. You go to committee hearings, you get your information fed to you by your staff, you vote on stuff.
You know. It's not that hard.
Relatively speaking. But the Senate seats are unavailable. Adam Shift just got elected to the Senate and Alex Paedia got elected in twenty twenty two to the Senate, so his his Senate seats not open until twenty twenty eight. If Harris is going to wait until twenty twenty eight, she's not gonna wait until twenty twenty eight to run for Senate.
She's running for president.
If she waits that long. So and I would say this if I were another enterprising, smart Democrat, I feel like I could really make a name for myself in a Democrat gubernatorial fight with Kamala Harris, make a pretty compelling case and say hey, why would we vote for this person? She wasn't that effective a vice president she lost to Donald Trump.
Our party.
Lost all this ground in California under you know, with her as the presidential candidate in twenty twenty four, why should I bowance scrape to Kamala Harris?
Who the hell is she?
I think someone could make a pretty compelling case for themselves as a Democrat to run against Kamala. Maybe the donor class goes to all these people and says, get out of the way, clear the field for her, or else you'll never get a job in California politics.
Again. That's this is the thing with California Democrats.
They have the kind of money muscle to threaten people to get out of the way like that. You know, That's why Gavin Newsom didn't face any challenges when he was recalled from the Democrats side. So it will be interesting to see when we return. Whom might Kamala Harris face in California if she runs for governor, and who might she face if she decides instead to wait and run for president in twenty twenty eight.
That's next on the John Girardi Show.
So if Kamala Harris pour out of where Kamala Harris needs a job. If she runs for governor, who might she face if she runs again for president in twenty twenty eight.
Whom might she face?
So she might run for governor in twenty twenty six, she might run for president in twenty twenty eight. She's got to do one or the other. In all likelihood, she can't do both. It would be insane to run for governor, serve for like, you know, do a two year two years in office, you know, with much of the second year just being completely consumed with campaigning. Who might she face in California, Well, there had been a lot of rumblings that Javier Bessera might jump into the
governor's race. The Secretary of Health and Human Services, Javier Bsera kind of depends on a lot of the same donors that Kamala Harris gets. Rob Bonta, the current attorney general. I don't know that there's a single attorney general for any state in the country who doesn't think that he or she shouldn't become the governor of that state. Rob Bonta seems to be intimating he wants to be governor.
I don't know that's a smart thing for Bonta. He's been involved in a couple of different alleged corruption scandals for different things.
I think maybe if I was him, i'd sit this out.
Tony Atkins, the state Senate leader, the former state Senate leader from San Diego area, former abortion clinic executive, huge lefty. She is sort of intimated she might want to run. Antonio Viiregosa, the former mayor of Los Angeles. There's some rumblings that he might want to run again. Viaregosa has been in the past kind of a little bit within the Democrat Party, the sort of non establishment character for statewide races. He ran against Gavin Newsom back in twenty eighteen,
didn't get it. Does he want to try again. I think Harris would likely just beat out all of those people just based on nothing more than name recognition. Okay, I'm betting I'm rattling off these this list of names. I don't think I'm guessing a lot of you listening didn't necessarily know right off the bat who several of those people were. So I think she's got a good
shot against any of those people. And there are also these news reports that there are some people who might just decide not to run for governor in twenty twenty six if she runs, So there's a possibility that her very presence could clear out the field that maybe she's still got enough donor support and strength that they could threaten people to get out of them. Not physically threatened, but like, you know, the way that Democrats are able
to do. The California Republican Party doesn't have enough money to threaten people to get them not to run for things like hey, if you run for this, you're going to screw this up. So if you run, we're never going to fund you again for any other race. The Democrats can do that, right, They've got the money, they've got the muscle, they've got the means to actually make credible threats like that. Now what if she runs for president? Who are the likely Democrats? Well, there's Pete Boodhagg. He's
definitely gonna be chomping at the bit. I think some of the other twenty twenty twenty has beens might think about, hey, maybe now it's my shot. Kirsten Gilibrands, the Elizabeth Warrens, the you know several others might think, h you know, what if it's my time. And of course Gavin Newsom, Gavin Newsom's gonna run in twenty twenty eight, and I think Harris needs to do the calculus here, of because Harris and Newsom are I've always argued, basically the same person.
They're the same person, They came from the exact same political universe, they have the same exact donor class, the same kinds of people support them, same kinds of people have funded their life. They both are Willy Brown proteges. Their relationships with Willy Brown were only slightly different. So I think that might weigh into her decision. You know, is the donor class willing to roll the dice again on another Kamala Harris presidential run.
I don't know.
Maybe those donors tell her, look, we'll fund you for governor, but we want to give Gavin a shot. You had your shot twice, you didn't win. We're going to fund Gavin.
And maybe that's the thing.
I don't know how much agency, necessarily Kamala Harris has in all of this, or how much of her decision making is going to be made for her by the donors. Now, when we return, I want to talk about the the political ambitions and future of a Democrat who I think will people thought was going to play a major role in the Democratic Party going forward, and maybe will she run for president in twenty twenty eight. Alexandria Ocasio Cortes
next on The John Girardi Show. It's not a quinkie dink that the most extreme and crazy partisans for either party are in the safest seats. Bernie Sanders is a senator representing Vermont. No Republicans going to win Vermont, So Bernie Sanders is safe in Vermont. No. Marjorie Taylor Green is, you know, one of the more one of the harder right people within the House of Representatives. A lot of people on the left of side. How comes she's not?
How does she stay in office? Well, because she represents a hugely right leaning district. It's not rocket science.
You know.
How does Maxine Waters continue to exist as a politician. Well, she's in a huge, you know, massive Democrat majority district. And AOC is one of these people. I'm sure AOC has driven Pelosi crazy over over the years, in part because AOC has the luxury of being able to say the most unhinged, crazed, insane liberal crap possible with no threat of repercussions to her political future. She lives in a district that's like a plus twenty eight Democrat registration district.
I mean, she could murder someone in broad daylight and she'd still win that House district. So and I'm sure Pelosi, who for her years as Speaker had her eye towards the broader picture of the party. Ironic because Pelosi is
in a super hard left district herself. But Pelosi, from her leadership position, has to think about look out for the interests of Democrat members of the House who live in, you know, districts that voted for Donald Trump, or districts that voted for George W. Bush or whatever, or John McCain, whatever. And so AOC's bomb throwing from the far left I'm sure has driven Pelosi insane over the years. Now, AOC is finally going to be old enough to run for
president in twenty twenty eight. You have to be thirty five years old, and I think she's turning thirty five sometime between now and the twenty twenty eight election. So in twenty twenty eight, she'll be old enough to run for president, and I think she's gonna run. Now, some stuff has happened recently with AOC that sort of might indicate where she sort of stands within the Democrat Party,
and it's not super high. So right now, a lot of sort of mini elections are happening within the House of Representatives for basically they're sort of horse racing going on for committee assignments and who's going to be on the Republican side, who is going to be the chair of all the different committees in the House in the Senate, And on the Democrat side, who is going to be the ranking member on all the different committees on the
House and Senate. So each committee has a chairperson who's from the majority party and a ranking member who's the lead person from the minority party. In every committee, the majority party has more members than the minority party. So there was this mini election just recently on Tuesday, just yesterday that AOC just lost. Democrats were deciding who should be the ranking member of the Oversight and Accountability Committee, and AOC just lost to Representative Jerry Connelly, who's from
Northern Virginia. Now, AOC has been heralded as the voice of a generation, literally called that by like GQ magazine, all these magazines that do these glossy spreads about how wonderful.
AOC is the.
Darling of all kinds of New York media, and she's in New York City. She's got this media advantage that you know, she's bopping around between Washington and New York City. She can be in the spotlight as much as she wants all the time. She's young, she's exciting, she's got this huge social media following. Everyone likes her, blah blah, she's pretty, Like like, oh, sorry, am I not allowed
to note that? But oh, that has zero percent of anything to do with her appeal outraged feminists listening to this.
I don't know how many outraged feminists are actually listening to this.
Uh yeah, is that why she goes all dulled up on the cover of GQ magazine and you know, uh with with perfect makeup and big old you know, pretty earrings and lipstick.
And blah blah. Yeah.
The fact that she's pretty has nothing to do with anything with her success. Okay, sounds good.
Now.
I think AOC still wants to run, But I think she's going to be the Bernie Sanders of this next generation. As much as she's been hyped by the media as the voice of a generation, you know, this generational political talent. She's so great, she's so amazing. She's mended fences with Nancy Pelosi clearly not mended fences that much. Basically, she's still not even able to win a ranking membership for
a committee she wants. She gets beat out by some seventy four year old so Hakeem Jeffries, who's the minority leader for the Democrats now in name, I guess unlessen until Nancy Pelosi goes away. Hakim Jeffries has boasted about that House Democrats have clearly been in the midst of a generational transition. But then, in contrast to this, and Jim Garrett has been writing about this at National Review. He cites this piece from Mike Lillis, who writes for
The Hill. On Wednesday, the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee confirmed the ranking member positions for the senior lawmakers of four top committees, Ways and Means, Energy and Commerce, Financial Services, and Appropriations. Here are the ranking Democrat members for those committees. Richard Neil, Democrat from Massachusetts going to Ways and Means.
He's seventy five Energy and Commerce. Frank Palone, a Democrat from New Jersey, who's seventy three the ranking member for the House Financial Services Committee is going to be that spry young thing, Maxine Waters, who is eighty six years old, and the ranking Democrat on the Appropriations Committee is Rosa Delaro, who is eighty one years old Democrat from Connecticut. None of them faced competition from younger members, and again the Oversight Committee, AOC third age thirty five, got beat out
by a seventy four year old. The trend will continue on Monday, when the Steering and Policy Panel is scheduled to fill out its committee roster, which will keep a number of veteran lawmakers in the ranking member spots they
currently hold. That includes Representative Benny Thompson, Democrat from Mississippi, who seventy six at Homeland Security, Nidia of Velasquez, a Democrat from New York who's seventy one, ranking member of the Small Business Committee, Zoey Lofgren, Democrat from California who's seventy six on the Science, Space and Technology Committee, and Gregory Meeks, a seventy one year old Democrat from New
York on the Foreign Affairs Committee. Jim Garretty notes all of those members of Congress are close to a decade older than the actresses that starred in The Golden Girls when they started filming that program back in nineteen eighty five. Good thing, the Democrats are putting the Joe Biden era and his style of jeriatrics sclerotic leadership behind them. Huh So what does this tell us? What does this tell
us about AOC's presidential futures? First, the old folks are still running the Democratic Party, and I think the Democrat establishment has always been better able to keep its hand on the scales of things than the Republican established establishment has been able to do for the Republican Party. Exhibit A of that reality is Donald Trump became the Republican nominee and Bernie Sanders never did. Okay, the Democrat establishment
never wanted Bernie Sanders. They did whatever necessary steps were needed to, you know, put their hands on the scales to tip things away from Bernie Sanders, change the whole system, their whole super delegacs, all these different things to ensure that Bernie Sanders would never ever, ever ever become the Democrat nominee. They do a Hail Mary intervention in twenty twenty to get Joe Biden to win the Democratic nomination.
They go through you know, they do everything possible to ensure there's no competitive primary in twenty time twenty four, the Democrat machine gets what it wants, that they're able to push Joe Biden out of the presidential election even when they want. Republicans ain't got that kind of muscle. So if AOC runs, who's going to fund her, Well, she's not getting any of that Gavin Newso money. She's not getting any of those California big time donors. They're
giving to their boy. Gavin Newsom's their boy, he's always been their boy, and he's gonna stay their boy. And those rich donors from California, they're not crazy about Bernie Sanders style socialism, and that's what AOC is probably. Also, just to note, some of these donors are probably not crazy about how anti Israel AOC has been, so that she might also weigh against her when we're talking about
who's going to give money to whom. Now, in politics, the surprising becomes reality much more quickly than people expect. That's why they're surprises. Could AOC overcome whatever these handicaps are. Clearly she doesn't have a lot of support from Clearly she's not very well supported by the establishment of her party. Clearly, the establishment of her party likes the baby boomer generation more so than they like her. They're clearly not quite
ready for a millennial like her. But is she able maybe as to position herself as sort of an anti establishment character enough will the country be tired of Donald Trump by the time we get to twenty twenty eight such that she becomes a more attractive, interesting, singular figure than Jadie Vance, than Gavin Newsom. That's the real question is will she be able to sort of shove out the rest of her Democrat competition in order to get to Jade Vance. I think it's possible, but I don't know.
There's one old broad standing in her way.
Nancy Pelosi. Nancy Pelosi's still going. Nancy Pelosi is.
Going to be a power figure in the Democratic Party until she literally dies. Pelosi actually broke her hip recently, just like a week ago, during a trip to Europe.
So you know, hope you feel better.
Nancy Pelosi was the key link between the Democratic Party and the donors. That's why she's always That's why they made her speaker. She was always the key link between the Democratic Party and the donors. She was clearly far more influential than anybody in decision to get Biden to drop out than any other elected Democrat, and she played a much bigger role in all of that than any
other elected Democrat did. She was the link between the donors and the rest of the party, and she was the voice of the donor saying the donors are not going to give any money if Biden doesn't drop out, and far more so than Chuck Schumer, far more so than Hakim Jeffries. For the love of God, you can still feel her presence her sway.
Over the Democratic Party.
And I don't think Pelosi's forgotten or one hundred percent forgiven AOC for their various clashes. When we returned some big developments from RFK Junior on abortion issues next on the John Gerardy Show Quick Thought Here there were some great encouraging tweets from Senator Josh Holly from Missouri about
his meeting with RFK Junior. Various Trump cabinet appointees are making the rounds on Capitol Hill and meeting with different Senators who will be voting on their confirmation, and Holly reported a lot of things that I've been really worried about with RFK Junior. I guess one of the main things I've been worried about is RFK Junior has been an abortion advocate for pretty much his entire adult life. And RFK made some commitments to Senator Holly that I
thought were really encouraging. He noted that he's going to support all of the first Trump administration policies on the Mexico City policy, defunding abortion abroad, defunding abortion domestically, reinstating restrictions on Title ten money, that Title ten money won't be able to go to abortion providers, That he's going to appoint all pro life deputies within the Department Health and Human Services, on and on and on. This is
all really really good stuff. Now, the one thing I didn't hear anything about was how are we regulating the abortion pill. That's the bit the biggest driver of the increase in the number of abortions that we've seen over the course of twenty twenty to twenty twenty four. President buying loosen restrictions on the abortion pill. The number of abortions has jumped by one hundred thousand per year in the last four years. Will he restrict that I really.
Hope so that'll do it. John Rolady shows see next time on Power Talk