Trump is winning the presidential race according to some polls. But others say Harris is ahead. What’s the point of following the polls if they contradict each other and, at times, seem outright broken? On this week’s “How We Got Here,” Max and Erin talk with Crooked’s Dan Pfeiffer to explain how Trump, the pandemic, iPhones and more messed with the reliability of presidential election polls.
Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris are preparing to make their closing pitches to voters ahead of Election Day. The Harris Campaign announced she’ll make her final arguments to the American people next week in a speech at the Ellipse in D.C., the exact same spot where nearly four years ago, then-President Donald Trump incited a mob of his supporters to march toward the Capitol. The Harris campaign said the decision to have the vice president speak at the Ellipse is me...
Last night, Vice President Kamala Harris was in the Philadelphia suburbs for a CNN Town Hall with Anderson Cooper and an audience of what the network called “undecided and persuadable voters.” Harris fielded questions about whether former President Donald Trump is a fascist, and was asked by audience members what she’d do about the price of groceries. There’s a reason the CNN town hall was in Pennsylvania. It’s the state both campaigns have visited the most – and where they’ve spent the most mon...
Roughly 20 million people have already voted in the upcoming election, either by mail or in person. And as the ballots keep pouring in, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are running around the country, trying to sway as many voters as they can ahead of what’s shaping up to be a historically close election. On Tuesday, Vice President Kamala Harris sat down for interviews with NBC and Telemundo, while former President Barack Obama and rapper Eminem rallied for her in M...
It's officially two weeks until Election Day, and SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk wants you to vote — for former President Donald Trump, obviously. In fact, Musk wants you to vote so badly that he says he’s giving out $1 million a day to people in swing states who sign his petition supporting the rights to free speech and to bear arms. It’s part of an effort to get more Republicans registered to vote. Except legal experts we spoke with — like Maryland Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin and UCLA electio...
In-person early voting kicked off this weekend in Nevada, one of the key swing states that will decide the upcoming election. Like all the other major battlegrounds, polling averages show the race there between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump is a statistical dead heat. Four years ago, President Joe Biden won Nevada’s six electoral votes by about 2.5 points. But Nevada is also a state where Republicans could chip away at the Democrat Party’s historical advantage wi...
Buying a home is already so expensive in America, but climate change is poised to make it much worse—even if you don’t live in the path of a hurricane. This week on How We Got Here, Max and Erin take a look at Florida to understand the thorny problem of insuring a home in a warming world. They break down how the insurance system is trying to account for ever-increasing risk, and explain why people keep moving to the places that are hardest hit by climate change.
In the aftermath of increasingly destructive natural disasters like Hurricanes Helene and Milton, politicians on both sides of the aisle have politicized the recovery effort. What fewer people are making political is the reason those storms were so destructive: warmer oceans caused by climate change. Bill Nye, the Science Guy, joins us to talk about why people should vote with the environment in mind this November. And in headlines: Former President Donald Trump blames Ukrainian President Volody...
Polls have shown that former President Donald Trump is increasingly weak when it comes to support from women. Recent Wall Street Journal polling found that Vice President Kamala Harris has a 13 point lead over Trump among women. In an attempt to reverse those trends, Trump went on Fox News to speak to a crowd of all women where he called himself the “father of IVF.” Erin Ryan, host of Crooked’s Hysteria and the weekend edition of What A Day, joins us to debrief. And in headlines: Democratic Repr...
In a Presidential race that will be decided on the margins – there’s evidence that Vice President Kamala Harris is losing support among Black Voters and Latino Voters. Both groups still overwhelmingly support Harris, just less overwhelmingly than Democrats in the past. Journalist Paola Ramos has spent the last few years trying to understand why a growing number of Latinos seem drawn to former President Donald Trump and his far-right, nativist message. She spoke with insurrectionists, border vigi...
Vice President Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump are working hard to earn the support of a key voting bloc this election: union voters. While most major unions have kept up the tradition of backing Democrats by endorsing Harris, two of the country’s biggest unions — the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the International Association of Fire Fighters — opted not to endorse either candidate, citing internal divisions among their ranks. April Verrett, president of the Service...
Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate Tim Walz will spend this week barnstorming through the so-called “Blue Wall” states: Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Between now and Saturday, the two have more than a dozen campaign events planned in the three states. While the ‘Blue Wall’ offers Democrats the best shot at winning the White House, the Harris campaign’s slate of stops there this week also reflects the party’s growing unease as the presidential race tightens. All three stat...
Jill Stein may not be polling high, but in several states she’s poised to bring in more votes than the margin of error between Harris and Trump. Her campaign events tout that they could cost Harris key states like Michigan, and thus the election. Is this what she wants? A closer look at Stein’s 20 years in politics reveals the Green Party candidate has had little success in elevating left-wing positions, and many of her stances—including a ceasefire in Gaza—aren’t nearly as clear cut as they see...
People in Florida are assessing the damage caused by Hurricane Milton. The storm made landfall late Wednesday as a Category 3 storm just south of Tampa, dropping up to 18 inches of rain overnight. As of late Thursday, around 3 million people in the state were still without power. At least 12 people died, though that number is expected to increase as rescue efforts continue. Hurricane recovery — both from Milton and Helene — is happening right alongside the 2024 election, conspiracy theories and ...
Hurricane Milton made landfall Wednesday night along Florida’s Gulf Coast as a Category 3 storm. It’s expected to be one of the most powerful hurricanes to hit the U.S. in more than 100 years, with sustained winds of over 120 miles an hour. As Milton moved closer to shore Wednesday, strong inland winds triggered tornado warnings across parts of Florida, and at least one tornado was reported near Fort Myers. WAD’s own Josie Duffy Rice got in contact with two friends who evacuated from western Flo...
In Texas, Democratic Congressman Colin Allred is making Republican Ted Cruz work hard to keep his Senate seat, with polls showing the race within three percentage points. Cruz’s campaign seems to think the best strategy for winning re-election is to lean into anti-trans messaging. Semafor politics reporter Dave Weigel joins us from the campaign trail in Texas to talk about how Cruz and other Republicans are leaning into anti-trans fearmongering this election cycle. Later, Grace Panetta, politica...
The Supreme Court kicked off its new term Monday by opting not take up two cases that could have major implications for reproductive rights. In one decision, the court rejected an appeal from an Alabama fertility clinic seeking to avoid a wrongful death lawsuit over the destruction of a couple’s embryos. The other case it rejected was an appeal from the Biden administration over emergency abortions in Texas. With issues like trans rights, ghost guns and the potential for more election cases on t...
Donald Trump rallied with Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk Saturday in Butler, Pennsylvania, at the same site where a lone gunman attempted to assassinate the former president earlier this year. Meanwhile, Vice President Kamala Harris was in North Carolina over the weekend helping with the ongoing recovery efforts from Hurricane Helene. She’s scheduled to do a series of sit-down interviews this week with a slew of different outlets, from ’60 Minutes’ to ‘Howard Stern.’ Today also marks one year si...
Iran launched ballistic missiles at Israel this week, in the latest escalation between the two Middle Eastern powers. But would you believe that 40 years ago the two nations enjoyed a quiet diplomacy? What happened here? And why is the rest of the Middle East once more getting sucked into the rivalry? This week on How We Got Here, Max and Erin explain why “ancient hatred” isn’t to blame, what role Lebanon and Hezbollah play, and how Donald Trump has made—and could still make—all of this much, mu...
While Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are vying for the White House, neither will be able to make good on their campaign promises if they don’t also get some help from their respective parties in Congress. Control of both the Senate and the House are up for grabs this election cycle. And right now, Democrats’ quickest path to victory in the House runs through two unlikely states: California and New York. California Democratic Rep. Mike Levin talks about his experie...
Fighting in the Middle East between Israel, the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, and Iran dramatically ramped up this week. On Tuesday, Iran launched around 200 missiles at Israel in response to the assassination of longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah last week. With the help of the U.S., Israel was able to defend against most of the Iranian airstrikes and prevent significant damage. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to retaliate, while Iranian officials have warned of more ai...
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance met Tuesday for the first and only vice presidential debate ahead of the November election. It’s also likely to be the final debate for both campaigns, making it one of the last big moments before voters decide who will take over the White House. The two men kept things pretty civil over their 90 minutes on stage, and neither committed the kind of egregious error that could hurt their respective tickets. WAD host Jane Coaston recaps the highlights...
The death toll from Hurricane Helene topped more than 120 people on Monday across six states in the southeast. Hundreds are still unaccounted for, and the number of casualties is going up. Juliette Kayyem, faculty chair of the homeland security program at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and the author of ‘The Devil Never Sleeps: Learning to Live in an Age of Disasters,’ explains what the next steps in recovery will look like. And in headlines: Israel launched a ground invasion in southern...
Huge swaths of the Southeast are still digging out from Hurricane Helene after the storm made landfall Thursday night along Florida’s gulf coast. As of late Sunday, more than 90 people were reported dead across six states. Tampa and western North Carolina saw some of the worst damage from the storm. Blue Ridge Public Radio reporter Gerard Albert III joins us to talk about rescue and recovery efforts around Asheville, N.C. Later in the show, Michigan Democratic Sen. Gary Peters talks about the st...
The California Attorney General sued Exxon Mobil this week for misleading the public on the sustainability of single use plastics. How did plastics recycling go from an exciting promise to a scam perpetuated by Big Oil? Max and Erin tear into Exxon’s decades-long campaign to unwrap the truth—with help from journalist Oliver Franklin-Wallis and the AG himself, Rob Bonta. Why is it so hard to recycle plastic? Who actually processes our waste? Will the lawsuit work? Listen to this week’s How We Got...
Federal officials on Thursday unsealed an inducement charging New York City Mayor Eric Adams with a litany of corruption and illegal campaign finance crimes, making him the city's first sitting mayor to charged with a crime. But in good news, New York's WNBA team has made it to the league’s semifinals! While 2024 has been a banner year for the WNBA, players have also had to deal with a torrent of racist invective and general culture war nonsense all season long. Crooked’s own Erin Ryan, host of ...
Vice President Kamala Harris laid out what she called her “pragmatic” approach to growing the economy during a speech in Pittsburgh Wednesday. While Harris has been closing the gap with former President Donald Trump, when it comes to which candidate voters trust more to handle the economy, most polls show he still has the edge on one of the top issues in the race. But it’s not like Trump has particularly good ideas for voters who want the economy to work better for them. Among his more hare-brai...
In his final address to the U.N. General Assembly Tuesday, President Joe Biden reflected on his foreign policy legacy and called on world leaders to “end this war” in Gaza. But privately, senior administration officials have reportedly acknowledged that Biden's time is running out to reach a deal for a ceasefire and the return of the remaining hostages to Israel before he leaves office. The prospect of a deal looks more distant than ever right now because of the rapidly escalating conflict betwe...
Let’s talk about polling! A bunch of new polls have us feeling a whole lot of feelings right now. 'Pod Save America' co-host Jon Lovett joins us for a vibe check on the state of the presidential race, and shares what he thinks we should all take away from the latest polls. Later in the show, New York magazine reporter Kevin Dugan explains former President Donald Trump's latest foray into the world of cryptocurrency. And in headlines: Israeli airstrikes hit 1,300 targets in Lebanon, Nebraska Repu...
A slew of new polls shows Vice President Kamala Harris with a slim lead over former President Trump in the must-win swing state of Pennsylvania. With just about a month until Election Day, both presidential running mates spent the weekend campaigning in the state to shore up support for their respective tickets. One person who definitely knows how to connect with voters in Pennsylvania, though, is Democratic Rep. Summer Lee, whose district includes parts of Pittsburgh and its surrounding area. S...
