District Club: Congress Breaks, Trump Contemplates Iran and Kamala Hits the Trail

Okay, first, before we give you the facts of the day, Run, Hide, Fight! Infidels is streaming now only on Daily Wire. It's an ode to the great action movies of the 80s and 90s. There's even a love story which nobody expected. And you can support Daily Wire's mission to continue making movies that people actually want to watch. Go check it out. You know what's wild? Most people are still overpaying for car insurance just because it's a pain to switch. That's why there's Jerry. Jerry is the only app that compares rates for over 50 insurers in minutes, and it helps you switch fast with no spam calls or hidden fees. Drivers who save with Jerry could save over $1,300 a year. Before you renew your car insurance policy, do yourself a favor. Download the Jerry app or head to jerry.ai slash wire. This episode is brought to you by TXU Energy. For the first time ever, Texans have an energy plan that combines free nights all year with daytime summer savings. It's called Free Nights All Year. Free Nights and Cool Summer. You get free nights every night, all year long, plus a 25% bonus toward your daytime use all summer. It's a first-of-its-kind plan created for how Texans actually use energy. Discover how much more you could save with Free Nights and Cool Summer. TXU Energy. Energy for everything. Visit txu.com for more information. Rep number 1-0-0-0-4. Welcome back to another edition of The District Club. I'm Ben Domenech, opinion editor at The Daily Wire, joined by my colleague Tim Rice, who is the D.C. Bureau Chief, and we also have two guests today. We don't have Mary Margaret, a White House correspondent, but we do have a White House correspondent, Reagan Reese, from The Daily Caller, and we have Democratic strategist and former Obama advisor Amisha Cross with us as well. This was an interesting week in Washington for a number of reasons. There's certainly people who believe that the midterms do not start until the point when the members of the House of Representatives tuck tail and run back to their districts, afraid of what lies behind them there, especially considering the way that this Congress has behaved over the past couple of months. They seem to have no eagerness to stay here in the swamp, and they wanted to get back home because they are worried. They're worried for a number of different reasons, which we can get into, but Reagan, I'll start with you. When it came to the decision by Congress to head out of town this early before the November elections, isn't that really a sign of weakness and, frankly, an incapability of the Republican leadership to keep their conference under control? A thousand percent. It feels like they just, I can't even really comprehend them leaving because I feel like they just got back, and now they're out again, and they were barely here, and I barely even noticed they were here. I think that this is just, it just adds to the negative vibes going into the midterms from Congress, from the GOP. It doesn't seem like they're operating from a position of strength. They don't want to stay. They don't want to fight. They don't want to pass anything, and I think after just the whole situation with the Save America Act and how that was flubbed, the least you could do was maybe stay a little bit longer, try to get something passed, try to get some win on the board for your team going into the midterms, but they don't seem willing to do that at all. Amisha, you saw a couple things happen this week in terms of that dynamic that Reagan's talking about. You saw a vote on Iran war powers where you had seven Republicans break with the president, including some Midwesterners, which is a little bit of a surprise. You saw the remarks from Maria Salazar on the immigration issue. Clearly, there's. There's a lot of different frustrations coming, both the administration and the Republican leadership from a couple of different directions. At the same time, a lot of Republicans are excited about the fact that almost $100 million has been committed in the past couple of weeks from a major MAGA-adjacent PAC spending in critical races across the country, not just Senate races, but houses as well. Should Republicans be coming out of this week feeling like we should be worried about this infighting, or is it more like actually, now this is. The campaign is really starting. We're coming to it a little bit late, but post-Dallas, we can get our feet underneath this. I think the Republicans should be worried, and they should be worried because Americans are still fighting the affordability crisis. We see that changes the pump. Gas prices continue to go up. People's utility bills are rising like crazy. Congress letting out this week was a little bit wild, and I will say that to Reagan's point, because quite frankly, they kind of just came back. And for them to have some of the lowest approval ratings of any Congress, period, in American history, and to be at the face of the midterms just a few months away, I think that there's a lot of frustration around people trying to figure out how to manage crises back home, respond to their district, but also in some ways running away from the crises that Trump has created for the entire nation and some of the commentary he's had. I think one of the things that you didn't mention was also Thomas Massey making those calls to essentially have an investigation into Secretary Hicks. I think that that matters, and that that was one of the trigger points to them basically going, you know, I don't want this to happen to me. I don't want this to happen to me. This is a president who's under fire, and his stalwarts are having a hard time explaining it to their general population because they honestly, affordability is at the top of the ballot. And it seems like everything else is at the top line of concern for the president. I wonder, I think I agree that it's absolutely ridiculous that Congress would skip town, come back, one vote, skip town. But genuinely, do we, I really want, I don't know, do we think that it matters that much to the American people? That I think the Republican infighting absolutely is something that they should be worried about. And of course, it matters to the American people insofar as they think of it, right? If you think about my congressman or, you know, it's the classic, they're more concerned with going home to their district and fundraising and running. Everyone's always running for reelection. But at this point, A, does anyone expect Congress to do anything? And B, how aware is the average? voter of when Congress is in and out of session, right? I mean, I almost wonder if it's more when I'm thinking of what is my congressman doing for me? It's more congressional and action writ large, maybe not necessarily the voting schedules, but I don't know. I just, it seems to me that like, I'm just going to say no, maybe not, but I don't think it helps. I will tell you exactly how Congress skipping town impacts me directly. I am preparing to play in the congressional softball game. It's the female members of Congress versus female members of the press. We've been practicing every Monday, every Monday morning for the last several months, getting ready for this game, batting practice on the weekend, scrimmage this weekend. And now, because Congress is out, there's been kind of some talk about whether this game is going to go on. Are we going to have players who are going to be able to play in this game? I love softball, so I want to play. And so it's kind of been like, we're all on the edge of our seat. Do you think they're running away because they thought they were going to lose to you? I don't know. I'm not sure. They should be afraid. They definitely should be afraid, but that's how it's impacting me. So I'm particular. I mean, I'm going to just be honest about my bias. I'm particularly upset that Congress has gone because I need them to play this game. I want to play softball. I think I'm particularly surprised that the Democrats have not analyzed this more in terms. And to your point, I do think that the American public probably isn't paying attention to congressional schedules in general, but considering all of the on the table and the things that the American public want to see changed, and these are the people who hold that strength of power. And yes, elections are coming up. Obviously, people have to fundraise. We know that they're stomping the ground in their home districts. All of those things matter. However, the business of the American people still needs to be done. Amisha, do you think that part of it could be that Democrats want to run on the concept that this is an out-of-control administration fueled by the Congress versus a do-nothing Congress, which has been the way that they've kind of framed it in the past? Yes, I think that is 100 percent. To a certain extent, Republicans are giving them a win in that. But I do not have it. I think that sometimes the Democratic Party gives the American public in their consciousness around these issues way too much credit. There's a lot that has to be explained in real time. And you have to keep hammering at home the expectation that come November, they're going to say, OK, well, two and a half months ago, these people left and just abdicated their duties, I think is going to be a problem. You have to in real time showcase what this actually means for people, because the average American family is fighting to make sure they can put food on the table back to school for many people was this month for some states last month. There's a lot that they're trying to figure out. A lot of people can't afford to pay their rent come the first of the next month. So there's a they have to set that table. And I'm frustrated because they don't think they're doing it. And I think that's that's the key point, because, again, when I when I say, you know, I don't think the average American is thinking of this. I don't think that I don't think they should have to. Right. I mean, that's but you're right. And maybe not strange. I think Ben's probably right of the reason why Democrats aren't hammering that message. But this is the sort of thing I think we often those of us in Washington take for granted, like we're here. Right. We see, oh, they're in, they're out. Will there be a recess? This is like obviously it does matter. But telling the story. Yes, exactly right. And how it relates, how it's directly tied to the things that are making Americans lives harder that prevent them from caring about things like when Congress. So we have this two prong thing happened this week, and I want to get all of your takes on it, because I think you could analyze them in different ways. One is the the Massey thing related to Peacock Seth that you made mention of. He's he's a weird duck. He's headed out the door to say the least. I have respect for him. Any man who can build a Bluetooth powered chicken coop is a. someone who I understand could be a good guy to know when the apocalypse happens. But I do think that, you know, other than that, you know, he doesn't really represent the party or the main stream of the party. And Pete Hague said this also, even on the Democrats list, I know that they like to complain about him. I actually think he's not even on the top rung of ones that they're going to go after when it comes to potentially impeaching cabinet secretaries. That's just me personally. Maybe you have a difference of opinion. But that to me was kind of a significant moment in the sense of it was giving voice to the same type of people that J.D. Vance was talking about in Dallas, as we saw, who are frustrated with his administration because they feel like Donald Trump ran on no more wars, or even if he's not calling them wars, tiny little military actions that are over, you know, yeah, kinetic actions, drop a bomb, leave, you know, etc. And there are a lot of people who are upset about that. Tim, do you, how significant, do you think that is? I mean, I think it's a great question. I think it's a great question. Do you think this break actually is, is this kind of a point we're going to look back to and say, this was a moment in which Republicans made known to the administration for the first time that they really are frustrated? Yeah, I think absolutely. And I think we're also going to look back at it in retroactively in terms of the beginnings of the Vance campaign, because I think that's the other thing that's going on here, right? And as you just mentioned, this was the vice president addressed this in Dallas. The president didn't really talk about this at all. And I, Thomas, he is an odd duck. I don't think that I support what is probably a kind of punitive YOLO senioritis investigation. Well, one of his, one of his things was for instance, a kidnapping Duro was like one of the reasons to impeach Pete. I'm sorry. I don't think, I don't think that there's anybody in the Republican coalition he would be on board with. But that said, I have for months been, it's been driving me crazy and I understand why and it's Donald Trump, but it's been driving me crazy that we've just been really insisting on this. Everything is great. Don't look at Iran. Everything is great. Your gas actually, isn't that expensive when it's so not easy, but obvious in my view for the messaging to be, we're asking you to make a sacrifice. Like we need, we needed to do this. We can't have a, and that, I mean, it's a big play, but it's high risk, high reward, right? Say my fellow Americans, we had to take out this evil empire. We're asking you to, you know, shoulder the burden a little bit now, but it's going to be better in the longterm instead of just everything's amazing. So I, even though I don't necessarily agree with the position, I'm at least happy the Republicans are acknowledging that things aren't that great. Like at least finally someone woke up and was like, okay, let's have a message. Reagan. Do you think that, do you think that Republicans should follow Tim's guidance or should they instead lie and say, we're all about having our cake and eating it too? I will say that. I think one of the great strengths that JD Vance does is he plays this empathy card and he says, I understand you're struggling. And we've seen this on the campaign trail when he's talked about the midterms, he's talked about the state of the economy. He's been the best spokesperson, I think, for the administration when it's come to the midterms and he's played up this angle. And I thought what he did at the RNC convention, where he said he kind of extended that olive branch, that arm out to young men, to young people who are upset with the administration. I thought that was really powerful. And I think that could be effective. I'm a young person. I'm Gen Z. I'm around a lot of other young people who are frustrated and angry with the administration, that exact coalition that he's talking to. And I think that was a great step in the right direction for that group. And I think that's one of the things that JD Vance does well. And so, you know, I think it would be helpful. I don't think you're ever going to see President Trump say like, I understand you're struggling. That's just kind of not in his nature. I think he likes to list his, his accomplishments. And I think pairing them together can be an effective team. Listen, I know that it's, I know the gas is expensive, but the roof is caving in at the Kennedy Center. I don't know if I, I don't know if that translation works. I get that JD Vance has his, the young people coalition of which he had when he ran, when he was in, when he ran for vice president, when he was chosen as vice president as well. He is somebody who can speak to, you know, college students. He's somebody who can speak to recent grads. However, telling people to take more pain when they're telling you that they are at the brink is not a winning message, especially when that pain is. Uh, it comes from a place where many Americans on the left, the right up the middle, even non-voters don't really know why we're there to begin with. And I think that because the administration went back and forth on that, because he gained a lot of voters who normally wouldn't have even given a second look black men specifically when you say no more wars, because a lot of them have fought in multiple American wars. Um, seeing that happen when, you know, the nation is already still trying to reel from what we saw with the pandemic, people's personal economies have not bounced back, unfortunately. And when we're spending multi billions of dollars a day somewhere where you cannot tell people when we're going to get out, why we initially went and the frustration that many people have is that we have been, there have been nations trying to pull America into war with Iran for the past 45 years, one in particular, and every single president on the left and the right has staunchly said no. So why is it that this one believes that he was smarter than all of the rest of them combined and walked us into something that was a red flag for multiple years? Well, let me, let me suggest that there's kind of an alt history of this that I think the administration could have done that would have been both better in terms of their foreign policy, but also would have achieved a lot of their national security aims. And that's essentially to keep this to what the president promised from the beginning. What, what secretary Rubio was saying from the beginning, we need to destroy their ballistic missile program because we don't do it now. We are going to face a situation where they have such heavy armament that we don't have any capability to go and hit their nuclear program. But he said that it was gone, but that's the point. And then it wasn't in part because I think, you know, we had bad military intelligence that suggested to us that they were weaker than they actually were. That's setting that aside though. I think that a major part of this, Reagan, you talked about the younger sort of male set. I think so much of the driver of this is just the cost that families are bearing. It's not actually a foreign policy decision. It's less, I mean, people aren't having a situation where you've got hundreds of people coming home in, you know, in flag covered coffins. Right. Which is what turns people against war. I mean, I think that the truth is the denigration of the idea that American working and middle-class families that voted for Donald Trump are pissed off about having to pay for expensive gas over the entirety of a summer that they did not expect to have to make those choices. I feel like that's what the big thing is. And they have messaged that terribly. Yeah. Well, Ben, I wonder, do you, going back to the JD Vance of it all and the sort of the political, uh, angle, uh, where do you think this puts JD going into 2028? Does he pull an Al Gore? Does he try to run? I don't know. I mean, I get. My God. Oh, no. Well, hey, hey, hey, there were a few hanging chads away. Does he say, you know, hey, you know, Mr. President, please don't come out and campaign for me. Does he start running more and more away? Does he put distance between himself and the white, the rest of the White House, the West Wing, or? I don't think. Or should he? I don't know. That would just be political. That would be political suicide. But it was one of the arguments that people wanted for Kamala Harris when she was. It was. They wanted to definitely distance herself from Biden, which would have been extremely difficult. You're right. You're totally right. I didn't think about it. Megan, what do you think? Well, that's exactly what I was going to say. I said, I think she might, I think JD Vance could have a little bit of a, a Joe Biden problem where Joe Biden was in Kamala Harris's ear kind of saying, Hey, don't put too much distance. Like, don't forget about me. And I think that, uh, it's going to be a hard position for JD Vance to create distance from president Trump and things that weren't popular while also trying to hang on to him in a way simply because I don't think president Trump would take it. Well, if JD Vance started to break with him and I think that's fair at the end of the day, Marco Rubio has better numbers. Um, he's somebody who I don't know any secretary of state in the history of secretary. Exactly. He is trying to stay away from some of this and stay above the fray. And I think that the fact that president Trump even put his VP as essentially everything Iran, um, instead of maybe making the frontal face, his secretary of state is a very interesting move and it has implications for 2028. Not only, not only, not only keeping him or letting him say out of Iran, but then also allowing him to do this sort of like Cuba, South America thing, which is like, obviously nothing's really happened there yet, but it's good. It's just like good, positive Republican secretary of state messaging. Like Cuba will be free in this century. Like, okay, mr. President, I, you know, like that's, that's, that's a good campaign line. So a basic thesis here that I've had for a while about 28 and feel free to call me crazy for thinking this. I actually don't think that president Trump cares about JD Vance one way or the other. I just don't think he cares about him. I don't think he cares about his political future. I don't think he cares about where he is. I don't think he cares about, you know, the distancing or anything like that, that is going on on some level. I just think he doesn't care about him in the same way. He really didn't care about Mike Pence, you know, at all really until he didn't have the courage or whatever, but, but, uh, how inconvenient, but the thing that I do think that he cares about is I think he cares a lot about a Republican winning in 28. I reject this idea. Some of the consultants advance that like Trump doesn't care about the Republican future at all. It's all, you know, it's all dead after he leaves, he spends his money on his library, et cetera. I actually think he really wants a Republican to win because it gives him vindication that his policies were right. So from that perspective, if there comes a where jd for whatever reason is dropping below a potential other candidate you know tv tvd is there a point where the president's like hey this is wide open you know let's uh let's come let's pull the boardroom set out we'll do this we'll do this every night prime time on fox you know i'll i'll you know i mean a trump moderated debate can you imagine people told you this is crazy i don't this is the least crazy thing i've heard that's exactly what's gonna happen all the time about this that is literally they're like it's gonna be jd it's over it's not and i'm like why would it be over that is the least crazy i have ever heard in fact i think that is prescient like that's what's gonna happen what was it a couple months ago when they were talking about the you know the the excess of gold that is all across the white house at this point and trump said well you know cubans really like gold you might want the guy who's gonna keep it you know as opposed to read to it in ohio style or or you know make it look like his his chicken coop that costs more than a g wagon what do you think um i would i just want to say on the gold part uh i think it would be a shame if the gold got ripped down from the oval office because i have to say it really looks great when you're standing in there it feels like someone kind of breathed life into the oval office and it's decorative so um maybe for that piece alone i think that maybe uh that's an it's an interesting theory then and i i i like that because i think uh there's so much of the narrative right now that trump doesn't care about 2028 that he doesn't like jd vance uh and i like that take because i'm not quite sold on that yet i'm not totally sure what's going on right now which direction the president's gonna go but i'm not also bought in on the fact that he just wants to throw jd vance the wolves and doesn't care what happens yeah i think this this cycle especially i mean there you can critique and i mean also i do want to note right that everyone was freaking out that the president's not going to spend any of his money on the midterms maga inc isn't going to spend any money oh look lo and behold what happened this week they spent the money of course they're going to spend the money i don't think that we can see you know the president hasn't gone full like presidential i don't think he's in the same mindset as you know bill clinton or barack obama and like i am now a steward of this party but i think people really underestimate that he did make a lot he moved on that front this term and this cycle he definitely cares that's why he was getting involved in primary you know not in a in a way where it was like this guy's maga this guy's not he was trying to pick winners yeah i think even the way that he needled he keeps needling ken paxton on the stage it's partially just because everyone loves that line but it's also like it's not like it's not uh it's not little morco it's not it's not lion ted it's hey man maybe put a tie on hey man maybe get some energy or you're gonna lose the talent i don't think he sees himself as a steward of the party i do think that he he sees himself as a steward of his legacy yes and that these people after him are going to have to carry that on so the electoral politics is a means exactly in the middle it's still kind of the same thing right like it's yeah i also need well i also need the presidential wall of fame to stay for whoever because i played a role in helping with the presidential wall of fame when i interviewed the president um he asked for my opinion uh about whether he should hang the auto pen portrait in joe biden's spot and that's your fault this is the breaking news and he like you know he had natalie hart bring out these frames to show me these photos and he was like and what do you think do you think i should unveil the auto pen in joe biden's place and i was like i think it's very trump and a couple weeks later it was up there so that's like my stamp on the white house so i have to say that is that is a proud accomplishment i the only thing i got out of my interview was i helped convince him to give the the stadium land back to dc so anyway amicia i want to ask you about the 2028 democrats side of this because we did see this past week this weird fly fishing based conversation between jake tapper and gavin newsom definitely looking like people who are not never fly fished in their lives what was the idea behind why fly fish appeal to men which that's it's you know the fly fishing males are their own demographic that is a specific demo some of them are my friends but i'm right what was your take on the idea that the thing that would prevent gavin newsom from running in 2028 is that he has like shared consultants with kamala so you know not not breaking news necessarily but he doesn't want to run the demo that they both have fundraised from the same base they both have you know to a certain extent so i think that's a really good point and i think it's a really good point i think it's a good point i think it's a good point i think it's a really good point i think it's a really good point laughingstock and i wish she i wish her well and whatever she decides to do but 2028 people want to turn to pay the energy is behind the aoc movement writ large it's obvious i mean it's just they not just in terms of engagement but in terms of their ability to move the narrative i mean when you see hakeem jeffries move the narrative right now in a way that the media doesn't already want him to go i i feel like i feel like aoc is just going to be a much bigger challenge and i think that the only way that you can beat her is if you are someone who is as ruthless as i think gavin newsom has the capability of being when it comes to everything he's had to navigate in that blue dominated state aoc by the way sorry just quickly reagan before you go who is spending the weekend i believe in and around buffalo yes which is uh of course just a little bit outside queens uh i wonder why she would be interested in going that far upstate new york well best of luck to her upstate new york i'm an upstate new yorker myself um i'm from a pretty red area and i don't know it's interesting the state of new york is so interesting i think aoc probably won't play very well with upstate new yorkers but it really doesn't matter because you have the city um aoc is so kind of like spunky and cool and i think she is what kamala harris wishes she was because some of those moments where kamala harris tries to be funny or she tries to be kind of hip uh it doesn't land well uh one of the things that i think is really a nail in the coffin for kamala harris in her book is she literally yes blames everyone she even blames her husband doug there's like a section of the book where she has her knives out for her husband for forgetting their anniversary on the campaign trail and it's like this whole crazy thing and i was like god what i would have made to watch amisha read this book it's terrible political instincts it's terrible but it's the best book of all the books that have come out from 2024 i've read them all green john pierre's book was one of the worst books i've ever read jill biden's book was what i i wish she did the kamala harris playbook and i wish she kind of brought out the knives and told us all about what nancy plosy did to joe biden instead it was kind of like this delicate uh defense uh anyways all that to say i think that the this kind of coalition this joe biden kamala harris going into 2028 is going to have a an uphill battle and i you can't play back the greatest hits again and one of the issues that kamala has is not only messaging it's actually not and to a certain extent every elected and people seeking office has to shapeshift for different audiences but for her it becomes so inauthentic because i don't think that she spends enough time with the people and there's a level of frustration folks have with that because whether she's you know diving into detroit whether she is going to georgia anywhere outside of atlanta atlanta is its own anomaly um there are questions as to who she is what she stands for and what she's going to do and what she's going to do and it's not that the american public didn't know her she was in the senate for a minute then she was vp it is who are you beyond that veil and i think that that's part of her issue the other thing is um she she she has a challenge not only from the left but younger voters but also among male voters and there is an argument that it could be sexist but then again in places where women have done well even where there are female governors she was running in a different race from them and fell way behind so it's not just that i feel like she's gotten worse i feel like she's gotten like So let me give you an example of that. Let's work our thoughts back to the before time, okay, the long, long ago. Kamala Harris had one of the greatest campaign launches I've ever seen. Yes. A massive crowd. That's what I was just going to say. A great speech, like a personal story. It was like, oh, you know, this is something. I don't know if she's going to be able to get through this field with all these other people, but this is something. Yeah. And then everything went down and down and down and down, and then she ended up getting out before people even were voting. Absolutely. So she got the VP job, and then it got worse and worse and worse, and maybe it wasn't entirely her fault, but no, that's exactly what I was going to say. I remember that little girl was me. It was T-shirts. It was on everything. And then she got to South Carolina, the most African-American primary, and came in like four feet. When she put out the Kamala Harris for the people signs and that branding, I mean, you know, I'm sure people criticized, but it was cool. And it felt like, yeah, that felt completely apace with everything else about her campaign. If she launches 2020, which she won't, but if she launched 2028 with that same branding, everybody would be like, that's the phoniest thing. Well, you may mention something that I think is really interesting, and that is her lack of retail capability, her lack of ability to talk to people normally, which was something that really came through a lot in the social media. Yeah. And one of the yellow school buses. Anyway, but the thing that I find so interesting is we've had this run now with the inspirational support. Approach from Barack Obama and then the heavy retail approach of Donald Trump, who is the best retail politician I've seen since Bill Clinton in terms of the presidency. Just the capability to walk into any McDonald's and take it over and have everybody like him, even if they didn't vote for him, the kind of thing. Who do you think is the best retail politician on the Democratic side? Because from my perspective, that is also one of J.D. Vance's weaknesses, is that he is not, he doesn't have that same capability. Interesting. It's not as bad as someone like Obama was, but when he goes into places, he often seems awkward. Yeah. Because he's, he has an extremely high IQ. He's very smart. He's very nerdy. He's got the Jeb Bush problem. Yeah, exactly. And he hasn't been a politician for that long. Yeah. Also true. Also true. So what do you think? John Ossoff. Okay. I would say Ossoff and then. So you think that's not just an act? No. You think that he has that capability? Absolutely. And, you know, whether it is a deep red state, a blue state, a purple state. He has been able to draw people in, in a way that is harder for some Democrats. It is interesting. When we were talking earlier about that, the PAC spending. I don't know if you've seen the states ranked. They're spending a lot in, in Ohio. They're spending a ton in Michigan. Everybody's going to be in Michigan. Spending in North Carolina. Spending in New Hampshire. Georgia is actually either fifth or sixth on the list in terms of the current spending nationally. That is a shocker for a state that Donald Trump won. Yeah. I don't. Well, part of that. It's because of the Republican that Ossoff is running against. If the governor of Georgia, Brian Kemp, had to run against him, that would be a much different place. He's running against a much weaker candidate. And, you know, yeah, the wind is behind his sails. I don't know. I kind of feel like you would know better than me, genuinely. But I do. I still I can't shake the fact that I feel like it's a little bit of an act with him. I feel like he thinks he's he's white Obama. I think he just thinks that everything he does is a stepping stone to the white. Or maybe maybe an act is even the wrong. Maybe there's a genuine. But he's been so convinced that he sold himself on this narrative of I am going to be the next inspirational Democratic presidential candidate. I mean, for so long that I feel like, yeah, they call Shapiro white Obama. I mean, he developed the cadence. It was a lot going on. It was kind of a better retail politician than John Ossoff. I think that he's in a in an era where it would be extremely difficult. I love Josh Shapiro. However, I think that there are. Is that more the Israel issue or more the just the nature of him being viewed as representative? Of a portion of the party that that people have the DSA hates Sanders hates, et cetera. And he digs his heels in every time. And I stand true on what you know, 10 toes down. However, it does have electability issues. Does Josh Shapiro run in 2028? I'm wondering, like, because he seems like a good. Candidate. I don't know. I guess I don't know. The only good presidential candidate in Pennsylvania is a man named John Fetterman. And I would support that. Honestly, that is a great idea. That man would win a landslide victory. Yeah, I don't. I that's interesting. I kind of forgot about Shapiro until we started talking about this. But when we're talking about inspirational candidates, someone who I thought was going to be more inspirational, who I think is running into way more roadblocks as weirder and weirder things come out is Tallarico. I had to, like, pause for a second because I only hear Tallarico in my head. They're getting to me. They're getting to me because he's I think he's good and he seems authentic and he seems rather nice. They're normal. But then there's all these weird clips that keep coming out about him. And you're like, OK, now he seems a little creepy, has these weird slip ups. Do you think that this is and I imagine it's probably a combination of both. But do you think that this is that he really does have just such a huge backlog of weird stuff that's being exposed? Or do you think Republicans just so effectively backed him into a corner from the beginning of this campaign that now he's just playing defense, fighting the I'm not a freak narrative? Yeah. You know, I think there's there is a lot of stuff on him. I had a scoop a couple. Months ago from a pack that ran a AI generated video of Tallarico singing a rendition of favorite things about transgender children and how he loved transgender children. And I was happy to run it because I was like, this is weird that you're using AI to create an ad about a guy who has so much about him and that you can. Now there's all these clips. Oh, you mean that it was a mistake for this group? Yeah. It got a lot of attention because it was bizarre. I thought. And I'm sure. I'm sure you have thoughts on this, too. Part of this team to me seems to be the unique, weird dynamics of the politics of Texas. There are a ton of Democrats who are Republicans in Texas because of the dominance of Republicans. So basically, you're actually a Democrat, but you're a pro business chamber of commerce person. So you go into the Republican lane and that's the way to get up. That means that the Democratic Party in Texas tends to be freakier like the state led. OK, OK. And, you know, full disclosure, I hated that job. But I worked in Texas for a bit across for four of their major cities. And Texas is a very different place for Democrats to play one even. Democrats trend a lot more, you know, red. I wouldn't even say purple. They turn a lot more red than they do in other states. In addition to that, it is so pro-business. It is so private sector friendly. It is so strong in that sense that if you want to get ahead in Texas, there are certain types of campaigns you have to run. And it has pushed certain Democrats who are just like, I'm not going to do it to other states. The former president of the Black Caucus in Texas moved to California because there's no shifting certain people to the caucus. And those are Black people in Texas. I think that Texas plays weird politics in general in terms of the framework for national parties. But it is a place where it's going to be extreme. It would have been extremely difficult no matter who came out as the Democratic nominee, to be fair. But I do think that there's so much false information about Tallarico that people are making for no reason. He's a little weird, but then there are a lot of weird people in Texas that get to stop somebody. He's also running against a guy. I would say that clip of him saying his favorite drag queen, like with no hesitation. I did. I thought. I thought that was a little. That was a little freaky. No, but to Ben's point, that to me was, yes, and bad if you're trying to run for Senate in Texas and have a national political career. But the first thing I thought when I saw that was keep Austin weird. Yes. That makes sense for James Tallarico as a state official. Of course he does. Of course he does. It'd be like asking me who my favorite Broadway singer is. And a highly rated one there. It's a very artistic place. Yeah, as opposed to a guy like Beto, who actually, when he was in Congress, had a relatively centrist voting record, was not known as being a far left guy and then kind of had to go further left when he was running statewide in ways that ultimately probably helped, you know, do his candidacy. Well, that plus that, you know, the photo with the truck and the dog and all. Oh. He did his own. Never, never come out and say that you're born to run. Born to run. Born to do it. No, no, no. With the time that we have left, I'm curious, Amisha, and I'd like to get all of your thoughts on this. We had a lot of different issues percolate up. In the past six months that last year were not really on the mindset of the people. You know, if you go back to pre January, obviously, you know, Iran wasn't happening. Obviously, the price of gas, while not low, was much lower. The you know, so those things were significant issues. Affordability was still an issue, but it was not the top. But then we've also had all these weird issues come up that are now animating a lot of the conversation, including conversations about AI, conversations about data centers, people fighting over things that they weren't necessarily fighting about six months ago. Sometimes in weird midterm elections, there's an issue that sneaks up on you that comes out like kind of late in the game. You know, sometimes it's like a member of Congress getting a scandal that comes in late and that dominates something. Sometimes it's somebody saying something really stupid in a debate. But it's it's also this wasn't midterms. But in 2016, EpiPens, EpiPen, EpiPen came out of nowhere. Like, yes, that was wild. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But like, yeah. I totally that's a perfect example, though, with the time that we have left and I want I don't want to hear all your all your votes, but with the time that we have left, do you think that there's going to be some issue that percolates up right at the end of the game? And if so, what do you think it is? Oh, absolutely. I mean, the the October surprise is typically talked about in in terms of presidentials. But I think that for this one, it's it's likely going to be something health care related. I think that we're going to see a big health care twist that is going to throw off both parties to to have to address because Democrats don't necessarily have the strongest wins there either. And then Republicans are currently in office. So you're going to have to figure it out and at least have a response. But I definitely think it's going to be health care. What do you think? I love the health care idea. I think that we also have I think there's another issue that drops. Oh, yeah. And I don't know what it is, but I think the fact that we're going to take over our banking system, something. Yeah, like something or maybe like a hack. I don't know. We had something that I think there will be a lot of the A.I. is going to continue to be an issue, but I think there'll be another if that makes sense. There will be a lot of pressure from this administration, I think, to hold off for any companies announcing A.I. layoffs right after the ad will until after the election. And that is something that I just think is the biggest percolate because it's just the thing that comes first. It's like we can easily get rid of a third of our workforce and replace it with A.I. That's something that hits every congressional. Yeah, I think those are both great answers because the only thing that comes to mind is one thing that's already bubbling. Bubbling up right now is the data center issue. And I'm working on a piece about the state of the midterms in Ohio and everything I've heard from people on the ground is, yeah, we really don't know what to do with this data center issue. And we're kind of passing around messaging on the GOP side of what are we how are we going to handle this? And it's making, I think, people less optimistic than they should be in Ohio with the state of both the governor and the Senate race because they don't know how to handle it. So I think it's been a crazy week with A.I. I get crazy past few weeks with A.I. and just all the fears around it. I refuse to believe that the Claude that is planning my wedding right now is going to kill me one day. I refuse to believe it. It's not going to keep up with another A.I. It's going to be someone else. It's going to be Grock because you used Claude. Yes. Is your answer the layoff? So the thing that I actually think that could happen that could throw a wrench in the works here is that we've been a little slow on lawfare lately, and it's been to my belief that we're going to see some advanced return of Democrat lawfare post-election one way or the other, and that a lot of that could come in the form of looking at, you know, the president's family, particularly. You know, we saw this latest report from ProPublica about Don Jr. and that weird sort of wedding party kind of stuff. I think that there could be a push on. Sort of the financial fraud kind of front that Democrats seize on to as basically saying, you know, when Donald Trump ran for president the first time, his answer to all these questions was, I'm rich. I can't be bought. That's how you know I'm incorruptible. I can't you know, I am the one who's going to come in here and fix this and drain the swamp and all this other stuff. And then Boosie was on 60 Minutes talking about trying to buy a part. Yes, exactly. And so I think that there could that could be something that is seized. And I yeah, I think also to. I think that's right. And the confluence of the ProPublica story dropping and the 60 Minutes part and story dropping within each other is, if not intentional, then there's momentum building. And if you're not going to have I mean, you know, in the in the 2006 midterm, it was sex scandals related to members of Congress. You're not going to have it's if it's not to be sex, it's going to be crime. That's going to be the. Oh, but we're never going to. I mean, come on, we're never going to. I mean, that's some of the ones that we've had in the last couple of years. We used to be a country. So you've been watching another edition of the District Club brought to you by The Daily Wire for Tim, for Reagan, for Amisha. Thank you for tuning in. We'll be back with more next week.